Body and Brain Connection
Score: 65% ESRB: Everyone Publisher: BANDAI NAMCO Games America, Inc. Developer: BANDAI NAMCO Games America, Inc. Media: DVD/1 Players: 1 - 4 Genre: Health and Exercise
Graphics & Sound: Body and Brain Connection is a fantastic example of a great idea crippled by faulty technology and confusing design decisions. For all intents and purposes, Body and Brain Connection is a Kinect-enabled version of Nintendo's Brain Age franchise. Though the two games aren't directly connected, they share enough DNA you could consider them distant cousins. The two share a number of exercises (or, at least the concepts behind them) and are hosted by a now Avatar-ised Dr. Kawashima. Most, if not all, of the exercises require clear visuals, so while presentation is a core driving force with Body and Brain Connection, it's still important. So important, in fact, the multiplayer tacks on a few filters and other visual hijinks just to make questions harder to read or otherwise distract you. Body and Brain Connection is Avatar-enabled, so expect to see a lot of yourself during play. All of your movements are matched to your Avatar, which can lead to some incredibly awkward, or just plain odd, situations. Legs and arms bending in unnatural ways, tiny movement ticks looking bigger than they are... for as good as the motion-tracking seems in some areas, it's a wonder they cause so many problems during exercises.
Gameplay: After a roughly two weeks, my average "brain age" is sitting somewhere in the 40s. The daily grading has hit as high as 56 and as low as 36, which I don't think is a bad thing considering the number of problems I had with Brain and Body Connection. The core idea is neat: play a few brain-testing puzzles while squeezing in some light cardio. According to Dr. Kawashima, doing both at the same time is supposed to be incredibly beneficial. I won't argue whether or not the game will actually make you smarter (that's best left for people with "brain ages" in the 20s), but I can say Brain and Body Connection does a terrible job of motivating players to keep playing long enough to see if it actually works. Games are split into different categories testing memory, math and logic, for a grand total of twenty games in all. As I said earlier, most of the games are Kinect-eneabled variations of exercises from Brain Age or other brain-testing software. In one, you'll fill in the missing number in a match equation by kicking the right ball. Some are more unique, like one where you need to guide Pac-Man with one hand and follow a piece of fruit with the other. The always-present timer trips up even the "fun" exercises. Unlike Brain Age, where the point is to see how long it take to finish a specific set of exercises, Brain and Body Connection drops a short timer on each problem. I'm slow and terrible at math, so it takes me a while to figure things out. All the timer did was stress me out to the point I was blowing simple math problems like "1 - __ = 4." That shouldn't happen. To make matters worse, and getting back to the lack of motivation, Brain and Body Connection kicks players while they're down. Exercises are graded and anything less than a "B" is met with harsher insults the lower you go down the scale. Insults are even worse when you jump into multiplayer. On top of the game taking jabs, your friends are there to watch you crash and burn.
Difficulty: Exercises come in two types; those you play in "exercise" mode and those you play as part of your daily brain test. All games run on the same idea, but when it is featured in a test, it is usually a little harder than what you'd normally see. In one exercise, you need to convert digital time to analog by holding your arms in the correct positions on a clock. Normally, time is shown in regular time, but during a test, it is shown in military time. I don't have a problem with the differences between tests. I actually expect it. I do have an issue with the lack of "ramp up" in the differences. Three difficulty settings are available outside testing. Every game begins in "Beginner" and higher difficulties unlock once you've earned a specific grade. The problem is, there's no such separation during tests. It's the equivalent of teaching someone to drive a car then dropping them into the Indy 500. Okay, that's a bit of hyperbole, but you get my point. Normally, the motivation to keep improving your score would pick up the slack, but as we've already established, that probably won't happen.
Game Mechanics: Every exercise finds a different way to use the Kinect. A majority of activities involve punching items, like rats and balloons, though others ask you to kick soccer balls or mimic positions on the screen with your arms. Unless you're able to play for more than a hour, you probably won't notice any soreness like you will with other Kinect games, though your shoulders/ arms will get a bit of a workout. The Kinect's sensitivity is a big problem. Sometimes it isn't sensitive enough, other times it is too sensitive. It will usually misread your movements, so dropping your arms will sometimes cause your Avatar to accidently hit items. During a pizza sorting game, the Kinect misread my hand position and activated the Kinect menu. There's no telling which way the sensitivity will sway, so even if you play for a long time, its hard to come up with workarounds. I'm sure some of the problems are hardware-related, but given the number of better-performing Kinect games in my library, I'm inclined to say most problems are software issues. I'm no expert on the Kinect technology, but it seems like the game is measuring unnecessary parameters, such as depth. Sometimes my hand would go behind whatever I was trying to hit. I even tried to solve the issue by moving around the room to no avail. Brain Age is really good at positive reinforcement to the point you keep playing well beyond the point where it isn't fun. Brain and Body Connection doesn't and instead chooses to take a "tough love" approach. This accomplishes nothing and magnifies the game's other issues. I can handle a few issues with new tech, but when it affects my performance and I'm insulted by a light bulb, it's personal. At a lower price, or even as an XBLA download, Brain and Body Connection would be a more enticing offering. As it stands, it's more of a novelty. As brain workouts go, you're better off sticking to crossword puzzles, Sudoku or Brain Age.
-Starscream, GameVortex Communications AKA Ricky Tucker
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