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The best Xbox One games
The Xbox One has come a long way since its 2013 debut. Microsoft has fixed the console's hardware flaws with the One S and the recently released One X, but now it has a different problem to address: a dearth of compelling games you can't play anywhere else. In recent years the company has relied on timed third-party exclusives that eventually make their way to other platforms or are also available on Windows and Steam. It happens on PS4 as well, but the difference there is that Sony has a wide assortment of games that you can only play on its console. That's not to say there aren't exclusive games worth playing on Xbox; it's just that they're buried among annual Forza racing games, middling modern Halo releases and the testosterone-fueled Gears of War franchise. Microsoft has promised to break out of that predictable release cadence, though, so the future could be brighter than you may have come to expect. As it stands, these are the best Xbox One games you can play right now.
Kinect's value to artists overshadowed its gaming roots
The Kinect is officially dead. But the reality is that Microsoft signed the do-all sensor's fate years ago. Faced with slumping hardware sales in 2014, then-new Xbox chief Phil Spencer had a decision to make. Microsoft could either drop the price of the Xbox One, or continue letting Sony and the $400 PlayStation 4 eat its lunch. So it stopped bundling the Kinect with the console and cut $100 off the asking price. It worked. Microsoft doubled sales the next month, and this move has set the tone for Spencer's tenure: reversing the string of bad decisions Microsoft made leading up to Xbox One's debut. To illustrate the sensor's waning importance to Microsoft, the Xbox One S didn't have a dedicated Kinect port on the back when it was released in 2016. It's the same with the upcoming Xbox One X, except Microsoft isn't offering a free USB adapter anymore. The writing has been on the wall for a while now. If this week's news was surprising, you probably haven't been paying attention. The truth is that Kinect's greatest successes had nothing to do with gaming. Hackers adopted the sensor with open arms, using it for everything from interactive art installations to motion capture and even trippy stage shows for massive bands like Nine Inch Nails. Why? Because for the tech that's on board, Kinect was relatively inexpensive and easy to use.
Don't bank on Kinect games in 2017
"The problem is not that nobody has Kinect, but it's that nobody is talking about it anymore." That's Mattia Traverso, the creator of Kinect-exclusive game Fru. Traverso has a unique perspective on the Kinect marketplace because he's one of the last video-game developers to build an experience specifically for Microsoft's motion-sensing peripheral. Not that the Kinect is officially dead. However, Kinect is clearly not a priority for Microsoft. In 2016, the Xbox One's Kinect 2 received just two notable games from third-party studios, Fru and Just Dance 2017. Microsoft hasn't released a motion-sensing game itself since 2014, the same year the company announced it would start selling the Xbox One without the Kinect bundled in the box. Support for the peripheral has disappeared over the past three years, and with it, so has public attention.
The game that makes Kinect worthwhile: 'Fru'
When Microsoft announced it would start selling the Xbox One without the motion-sensing Kinect peripheral in June 2014, Mattia Traverso and his team at Through Games were shocked. They were in the middle of developing a Kinect-exclusive title, Fru, a platformer that used players' silhouettes to uncover hidden ledges and outlets in a Mario-inspired world. The Kinect wasn't off to a roaring start to begin with, but Through Games was down to take a gamble on an innovative idea. Besides, during the first few months of Fru's development, the Kinect was guaranteed to be sold with every new Xbox One. And then, suddenly, that potential was slashed. "I'd be lying if I said the status of Kinect didn't affect us," Traverso tells me. "The surprise of the unbundling did hit our morale during production, and we had some doubts and worries about whether we would be financially viable at the end."
Your body is a wonderland in Kinect platformer 'Fru'
Fru is two platformers in one game, with one layer of the world shown clearly on the screen, and another layer uncovered within the silhouette of a player's body as it moves in front of the Kinect camera, in real-time. The silhouette world offers new platforms, enabling players to reach the exit door in each level (with a little hopping, ducking and contortion). Fru comes from a collection of indies during Global Game Jam 2014, which prompted developers to create games with the theme "We don't see things as they are, but as we are." The team had 48 hours to create the game, and Fru ended up winning the judge and audience awards in the NHTV Breda Global Game Jam competition. If you have a Kinect hooked up to your PC, you can download Fru right here. Game Designer Mattia Traverso – previously of indie documentary game Riot and IGF 2012 student finalist One and One Story – tells Joystiq that he hopes Microsoft notices Fru so the team can expand on the idea. "We definitely have plans to bring this to the next level," Traverso says. "We are starting to work on it to make it an actual, full game and I am contacting Microsoft right now to see what we can do .... Right now we are trying to give it some visibility, to show the big M that this project is actually something interesting that people like."
