I have had a 360 since 2007. I was not going to get a current gent console till about a year after release but when this bundle deal went up on Amazon I could not hold off any more. Let's get into the pros and cons.
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Kinect:
Kinect is vastly better. I mean VASTLY better. Voice commands are heard/correct 95% of the time. Most times when the voice command was misheard it was cause I had said the command wrong. How is that you ask? Here is an example. Say "Xbox Go Home" and the xbox goes to the home screen. However I said "Xbox Home" and the xbox picked up on the "H" sound and thought I wanted the command "Xbox Help". Once you learn some of the commands the Kinect functions nearly flawlessly. I have my cable box passing through my Xbox One also. Saying "Xbox watch Comedy Central" and a second or two later my box is switching was a nice perk. You can use Kinect for game chat as well, but depending on your room the sound bouncing off the walls when you speak can make your game chat sound distorted like you have a slight voice modulator. I highly recommend calibrating the Kinect as well. It will function without calibration but I found it worked better after I calibrated it.
The hand gestures are improved as well. I had the original kinect and I can not tell you how many times I would try to close my hand to scroll or select things and nothing happened. The new kinect can see fingers so palm around your screen smoothly close your hand and pan/scroll on the screen. You no longer need to page through menus by holding your hand at the edge of the screen and waiting for kinect to pick up on it and turn the next page. Just grab and scroll. You can even scroll if you on screen hand reaches the edge of the screen. Want to go home without talking or using controller? Spread your arms, close your hands, pull your hands together. That simple. Reverse that to go back into the main app running. The Kinect is faster at recognizing hands and faces and responds quicker now. I will say though my couch is about 16-18 feet from my Kinect and if I lean back I can not get Kinect to see my hand gestures. If I lean forward it will see them. I would guess that any further then 15 feet away and Kinect filters out movements to avoid incorrect gestures. Voice controls were not affected by distance to Kinect.
For all the gestures and voice commands here is a cheat sheet.
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Controller:
The new controller feels like a cross between a PlayStation controller and a 360 controller. The shape feels nice in the hands. The battery compartment is flush with the back of the controller and the controller is much lighter then the 360 controller. The thumb sticks have knurling on the outer edge which adds a nice level of grip. The triggers are bigger and nicer. The D-Pad is nothing like the D-Pad on the 360. The D-Pad buttons look like that on the PlayStation controller and the D-Pad buttons click when depressed. I do not like the letter buttons being all black with a colored letter inside. I liked the colored buttons on the 360 controller but that is just me. Button layout is nearly identical to 360 but the lettered buttons are slightly larger. The Home button responds quicker but feels almost "cheaper" if that makes sense. The 360 button just felt more robust. The controller also seems to support game sound over a stereo headset if you have an adapter. My headset from the 360 was designed for a 360 controller and will not fit on the adapter so I have not tried this yet. Also as it turns out to get stereo sound through the controller you will need to do a controller software update. I have not done this either but will likely have to try it in the future. The headset provided with the console is better build construction then the 360, but still has room for improvement. It has a mute button that glows when on mute, with volume up and down for game chat volume. It does not play game sound only chat. The headset also connects to the controller even more securely then on the 360. There is no Sync button on the Xbox One. The Kinect has an inferred receiver in it and the Xbox One controller has an inferred blaster along the top. To sync a controller press the sync button on the controller and point it at the Kinect. I have gotten about 5-6 hours out of the provided Duracell batteries (yeah I know I was shocked too that the provided batteries were not some cheap off brand name) and the console is saying the batteries are more then half full.
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Console:
The console is big. Lets get that out of the way first. It is bigger then the 360 slim. It is bigger then the original 360. It is however quiet. I find that is a plus. Since this bundle DOES NOT come with a DISC, I dont know how loud it can be if a disc was spinning. Personally I am going to try to buy digital only copies of my Xbox One games purely because hot swapping between games on the HDD is easy, fast, and convenient.
The OS is flatter and simpler then the 360, very similar to Windows 8, and there are no third party ads, yet. The only ads seen are for games or apps to use on the Xbox One. To navigate I found telling the Kinect where you want to go easier then trying to find where the app is located. Example: I wanted to open my settings but could not find it quickly and did not know what buttons to push to find the menu that would lead me to the settings app. So I got frustrated and just took a stab at it saying "Xbox Go To Settings" Then screen went blank and the setting app opened up. Use Pins to set up shortcuts to apps and games you use often. I expect more apps to become available in the future as MS wants to use this console as a HTPC/gaming device. I have used the Snap feature to set up party/game chat quick and easy. The Xbox also will keep a game running while you do other things. The other day while waiting in a Titanfall menu, not the lobby queue, I snapped to TV while I waited for a friend to log-on. After about a minute an icon popped up and said that Xbox had found a Titanfall lobby ready to play and to hold the home button. So I did and it took me to a notification that said a lobby was found and was ready to go, and asked if I wanted to join. Meaning while I was doing something else, Xbox was queuing up lobbies in case I wanted to play. No waiting in lobbies for other players to join. I would like to try this feature with two games running at once when I get a second full game for Xbox One.
All in all I have enjoyed my purchase and will likely enjoy it for years to come. If I missed anything or you have questions feel free to comment/ask.
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Five Stars
Great product, my husband loves playing Titanfall.Update: After 1 year 6 months of purchasing our console, we are still very happy with the purchase. This bundle is worth every penny. We use it all the time, for playing games, not only Titanfall, we also play Diablo ROS among others. We never had any issues with the system or the hardware. My favorite feature is the kinect, that makes everthing so simple with the voice commands, being able to record a portion of your game, make screenshots, turn on or off your console. Opening apps like Hulu and Netflix with voice commands as well, it is all just great. We highly recommend this bundle for people that are willing to invest in a high quality product with the best technology and highest versatility between being not only a console but also an entertainment center.
