As someone with a fondness for Rez (not a HUGE fondness, but it was cool), and a Kinect, I rented Child of Eden. I gotta say, the lighting requirement for the Kinect kind of takes away from the experience. With a controller, it's great, because I can sit in the dark and play, which honestly for me at least, the music and atmosphere of the game are by far best enjoyed in a dark room w/ a great sound system for full immersion.

Still a worthwhile game, if only as a rental. I can't say it's worth the $50 price tag for me personally, but I can see grabbing it when it's in the $25-$30 range. I'm also curious to see how it plays on the PS3 using the Move controller later this year, since Move isn't as dependent on lighting as the Kinect is.

Thank god they put regular controller support in there.

I can understand your complaint. Rez and Child of Eden kind of fit in the same category for me as games like Flow. They are very different games, but they are still very relaxing and kind of put you in a trance. I never played flow in the day time because it was so damn relaxing and calming in the dark.

Umm... I have a few Kinect games, not Child of Eden, but... Doesn't the Kinect see perfectly in absolute darkness? It doesn't require light whatsoever. Is this some special Child of Eden requirement?

I've played this using the Kinect in a fairly darkened room (not pitch black, but you wouldn't want to try reading a book), and it was totally fine. It uses the IR camera to track you, so my body profile glows just as bright as ever on the little monitoring window, regardless of the brightness of the room.

@umdesch4 said:

I've played this using the Kinect in a fairly darkened room (not pitch black, but you wouldn't want to try reading a book), and it was totally fine. It uses the IR camera to track you, so my body profile glows just as bright as ever on the little monitoring window, regardless of the brightness of the room.

Didn't work very well for me in the dark, I might be missing something, standing back too far maybe. I'll mess around with it some more tonight.

Kinect is supposed to work in the dark, in theory. I have had some frustrating experiences with it mixing up my hands, or sending the camera careening behind me as I'm hit by pink missiles. That's less than pleasant, and it's made me prioritize using the controller for actually achieving awards and 100% purification rates (though some things, like taking down oncoming missiles, are intrinsically harder with the controller than with the Kinect).

I played this in the dark last night. Like, pitch black. I switched off all the lights, then turned the xbox on. Kinect recognised me just as well as it would in the light (apart from auto-sign in!) and I played two stages of CoE without a hitch. It uses infrared, so light is not a problem. You must have something else going wrong?

I don't see why Kinect shouldn't work in the dark, it detects its own infrared light, should not have anything to do with the lighting in your room.

I'm finding the controller a better experience regardless of the lighting with Kinect. It's cool, but kind of a novelty really. I'm doing much better with a controller and don't tire out my arms after every level..

@mnzy said:

I don't see why Kinect shouldn't work in the dark, it detects its own infrared light, should not have anything to do with the lighting in your room.

This.