Basketball Challenge Pack Reaction Rundown
A couple of weeks into the life of the Kinect Sports: Season Two Basketball Challenge Pack, here’s a bundle of encouraging comments and feedback that we’ve found strewn from one end of the internet (yes, it does have ends) to the other. Showering our Basketball mascot Dunky Dino with praise and constructive criticism is all that prevents him from going feral.
Kinect Sports: Season Two add-on satiates basketball jones (XboxKinectFans)
Dunk Some Baskets in Kinect Sports: Season 2 (TrueAchievements)
New Kinect Sports: Season 2 invents a new sport called ‘basketball’ (Joystiq)
Basketball DLC added to Kinect Sports Season 2 (Capsule Computers)
‘Kinect Sports: Season Two Basketball Challenge Pack’ Review (Game Rant)
Kinect Sports: Season Two Basketball Challenge Pack DLC Review (The Controller Online)
Apr 2012
Challenge Pack #2 Reaction Rundown
It came out in March and added six new activities to Kinect Sports: Season Two free of charge, we rounded up some coverage and social media/comments thread feedback, then definitely didn’t forget to compile and post it. It’s right here. Witness: things that people said about Challenge Pack #2!
Kinect Sports Season 2 Gets Second Challenge Pack DLC (Kinectronic)
Grab the Kinect Sports Season Two Challenge Pack #2 for free (123Kinect)
Kinect Sports: Season Two Challenge Pack 2 Arrives (TrueAchievements)
Kinect Sports Season Two Gets Some Free DLC (The Controller Online)
Free Kinect Sports: Season Two DLC Adds Darts Vs. Zombies, More (Game Informer)
Zombies invade Kinect Sports: Season 2 DLC (GameZone)
Apr 2012
Kinect Sports: Season Two Achievements List
No doubt quite a few of you have made serious headway into these already. But to keep you occupied for a while longer, here’s the complete at-a-glance list of Season Two achievements. Get an idea of the ones you’re missing, decide whether to play to your strengths or break new ground, then limber up and fuel-inject that gamerscore!
Update: Basketball Challenge Pack released, adding 10 new cheevos for 25G each!
BASKETBALL CHALLENGE PACK
Party Animal: Score 75 points when playing Shot Party (25G)
Disc-Throw Fever: Clear two sets of music discs in 25 seconds when playing Shot Party (25G)
Disco Diva: Get a score multiplier x10 when playing Shot Party (25G)
Double Nickel: Score over 55 points when playing 3-Point Hero (25G)
Super Streak: Score 15 consecutive baskets when playing 3-Point Hero (25G)
3-Point Perfection: Score with four bonus balls within one single game of 3-Point Hero (25G)
Funky Dunkin’: Score 50 points when playing Alley-Oop Dreams (25G)
Dunky King: Pass to the green Dino 5 times in one game of Alley-Oop Dreams (25G)
Pass Master: Complete 15 passes in a row when playing Alley-Oop Dreams (25G)
Super Hooper: Score 200 baskets when playing the new Basketball Challenge Pack (25G)
MIDNIGHT MOUNTAIN SKI PACK
Blast Course: Blast-off time – Beat 01:50:00 on Midnight Mountain’s Backwoods Blast course (Champion difficulty) (25G)
Midnight Express: Out of the darkness – Beat 01:55:00 on Midnight Mountain’s Pitch Black course (Champion difficulty) (25G)
Opened All Hours: Clock is ticking – Beat 02:15:00 on Midnight Mountain’s After Hours course (Champion difficulty) (25G)
Gate Expectations: This is a classic – Pass a total of 500 gates on Midnight Mountain (cumulative) (25G)
Mountain Pressure: Pressure is on – You need a perfect run on each course of Midnight Mountain (25G)
Apr 2012
Behind the BAFTA Scenes
We’ve had the official News story on this month’s Kinect Sports: Season Two BAFTA win, but we thought it was worth complementing with a report direct from the scene. So we pinned down Simon, one of Rare’s delegates for the evening, and persuaded him to hand over a folder full of pictures and a rundown of the event from the rough vicinity of the red carpet and champagne seats….
Simon: The night started with the ten of us meeting outside our hotel, donning pretty much the same black tie attire, ready to set off to the Hilton on Park Lane. We were handed our golden tickets for the event before jumping into black cabs for the short ride.
Once we arrived, we made our way into the front entrance and then found out there was a red carpet around the back! As we realised this may be a once in a lifetime chance, we walked back outside, around the hotel and down the red carpet. No-one asked for our autographs for some reason, but it was worth it all the same…
We made our way upstairs for the champagne reception. The room was packed with invitees all dressed to the max, and we enjoyed catching up with some ex-Rareites whilst sipping the enormous amounts of champagne on offer. The room was quite large but you could hardly move, and after a couple of glasses of champagne it really started to heat up.
Mar 2012
Kinect Sports: Season Two March Records
Right then! It’s about time we rifled through the Kinect Sports: Season Two server data, identified some hard-hitting scores and times, verified their achievability against some of our testers’ best efforts and threw the resulting numbers out there for potential challengers to… challenge.
We see people on social media all the time claiming to be BEASTING at Season Two. Are you one of them? Think you could topple these scores? Fire up the game and go for it.
Note that as a general rule these performances have been logged in online games, as most offline results can’t be tracked by the servers. In some cases, if they looked impossible or we were short of data, our testers’ finest moments were substituted instead. If you’ve got proof (photographic, uploaded to Facebook or otherwise) that you’ve trumped one of these scores or times, send it to us and we’ll see if it climbs to the top of the heap! Challenge Pack #2 activities to be roped into the fun next time.
Mar 2012
Braving the Birmingham Bolt
On February 22nd, Rare dispatched the athletic equivalent of a hardcore SWAT team to the Birmingham National Indoor Arena. The reason for this was the Birmingham Bolt, a charity sporting event for UK Midlands businesses to compete and raise money for charity. With us having a couple of Kinect Sports games under our belts, it seemed rude not to.
Ex-Olympic 400m and relay runner Daniel Caines was on hand to commentate: no pressure then. But one hotly contested afternoon later, as the event drew to a close and the smoke cleared in and around the charity Thunderdome, the Rare squad had left their mark by finishing third overall. Contributing to this result was the long jump gold claimed by our man Simon, along with Eoin’s second place in the 400 metres. Not half bad!
Congratulations and thanks to all who took part, both for the result and the money raised. The full entry fee went to The Birmingham Civic Society’s Next Generation Awards, which works with over 13,000 young people in Birmingham to help them make a positive contribution to the city. Meanwhile all sponsorship money raised by Rare (and boosted by Microsoft) goes to our nominated charity for this event, Cancer Research UK.
Enjoy the pics of our dashing team in action. Or loitering around, or posing… but mainly in action.
Feb 2012
Maple Lakes & Midnight Mountain Reaction Rundown
Feedback time again, this time on the Kinect Sports: Season Two Maple Lakes Golf Pack that we PUTT out there in December and the Midnight Mountain Ski Pack FLAGGED for launch earlier this month. Web coverage, comments, social media reactions and no further attempts at humour below!
Kinect Sports: Season Two Gets Nine Extra Holes of Golf (God is a Geek)
Kinect Sports Season 2: Golf Pack & title update this Tuesday (123Kinect)
Kinect Sports: Season Two DLC Released (TrueAchievements)
New Kinect Sports: Season Two DLC adds skiing game modes (Strategy Informer)
More Kinect Sports: Season Two DLC Out Now (Kinectaku)
DLC REVIEW – Kinect Sports: Season Two (Kinect Reviews and Interviews)
“@RareLtd we LOVE the new golf DLC. We have a weekly get together called ‘Kinect and cocktails’ and all we do is drink and golf:-)” (_AngryBuddha_, Twitter)
“Cheevos don’t look easy, hope they’re all doable though!” (Dynosaw, TrueAchievements)
“Got the new ones done in an hour today. Not too bad. 1250/1250!!!” (xDJNeLLieNeLL, TrueAchievements)
“i like the new holes, not that the front 9 are bad but i do like the back 9 better, the 18th hole is a par 6, lol” (juliasdad, TeamXbox)
“I feel guilty, not buying Kinect Sports 2 DLC, because some British guy is always yelling at me, suggesting I do so when in the menus.” (Delibird444, Twitter)
“The ski dlc is good, The 3rd track can be a ***** can its got a lot of jumps and tight turns.” (thebestbit, TeamXbox)
“Sensacional uff super top” (Job Zamora Montiel, Facebook)
“@RareLtd The Kinect Sports 2 Golf DLC made me ragequit last night. 3 under par, messed up and would’ve finished 2nd. I hope you’re happy.” (CurlyHooligan, Twitter)
Jan 2012
Happy Hols from Rare and Season Two
We’re pretty much done here for 2011. Hope you all enjoy your end-of-year break, set aside some time to thrash your friends/parents/siblings at Darts/Golf/Skiing if at all possible, and bounce back fresh as a daisy in January. Here’s the 2011 Rare Xmas card to see us out. Have a good one!
Dec 2011
