Connecting with Kinect via Kinect Fun Labs

-- Avatar Kinect: FREE --

The fourth add-on for Kinect Fun Labs, Avatar Kinect provides gamers with the opportunity to express themselves with their Xbox Avatar -- providing a forum in which they can watch as their Avatar mimics facial movements, gestures, and expressions. The app is set up like a virtual talk show, and in fact gamers can not only create their own virtual talk show complete with monologue and sit-down interview (those being the two phases that are supported), they can actually upload their newly created show to Kinect Share, and from there download it and post it to YouTube or another social networking site, making them the star -- in Avatar form of course.

The app includes a number of different stages to give the shows a custom feel, and has built-in special effects that can be triggered by the gamer, including responses from the virtual audience and the iconic red 'X' and green tickmark that one sees often on game shows that represent incorrect and correct answers.

Avatar Kinect was created by developer Good Science Studios and published by Xbox LIVE Productions, and supports up to two players locally in co-op mode, or two players online through both System Link and the Internet, as it is an online multi-player app. Full support is present for HDTV in 720p mode, and it has built-in Dolby digital audio.

Avatar Kinect has 8 Achievements worth 50 Gamerscore points, including:

-- Avatar Kinect Pro (10 G) Cult following.

-- Circle of Friends (5 G) Drum circle with four friends.

-- Hello World (5 G) You told 'em all about it.

-- I Want My Two Minutes (5 G) Late night with me.

-- Lights, Camera, Action! (5 G) Cue the emotes!

-- Rock the House (5 G) Get the band back together and rock the house.

-- To Be or Not to Be... (10 G) Post 10 soliloquies of great social importance.

-- Two's a Party (5 G) Chat it up with a buddy.

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-- Mutation Station: FREE --

The fifth add-on to Kinect Fun Labs, Mutation Station offers gamers the opportunity to transform themselves in hilarious ways via their Kinect, transforming their room into a funhouse complete with distortion mirror that offers plenty of laughs as you use the various filters built into the game to create odd and funny versions of yourself.

Created by developer Relentless Software and published by Microsoft Game Studios in September 2011, the single player app (there is no support for co-op play) supports HDTV in 720p and includes Dolby digital audio, and neatly highlights the capabilities of the Kinect to detect and to isolate the humans targets in its view, and then manipulate just their forms -- an effect that can be noticed by the fact that the application of the various filters by Mutation Station only alters the player and not the room behind them.

Mutation Station includes 8 achievements with a total of 50 points.

-- Back to Reality (5 G) Experience your first complete transformation (primary player rewarded)

-- Capture the Magic (5 G) Share a photo on KinectShare.com (primary player rewarded)

-- Cinematographer (5 G) Share a video on KinectShare.com (primary player rewarded)

-- Fire Both Barrels (5 G) Activate the second transformation beam (primary player rewarded)

-- Happy Bending (5 G) Bend your body as much as you can in two directions (primary player rewarded)

-- Little and Large (5 G) Fully inflate and fully deflate your head (primary player rewarded)

-- Perfect Professor (10 G) Discover each of the different transformation effects in one play session (primary player rewarded)

-- Serial Shapeshifter (10 G) Share content three times in one play session (primary player rewarded)