Pitch (Not So) Perfect

I love Pitch Perfect. It's an excellent film, and although I have yet to see the sequel I am looking forward to watching it. However there is one scene in particular which really irks me. This particular moment is only visible for a few seconds but there are so many things wrong in these few seconds. Most of them are visible in this screenshot:


"Ain't wrong with that, mate," I can hear you say. However it's pretty evident that they are all looking at the same thing. And that same thing is a TV screen that moments before was displaying Kinect Sports.

Kinect Sports is a game developed by Rare, and release for the Xbox 360. In order to play it, you require Kinect, which is a camera that you plug in to the console and leave by your TV.

"Still not quite seeing the issue here, Dan."

OK. First, Kinect Sports (and Kinect games in general) requires that the players be stood up. They are all sat down. Secondably, Kinect for Xbox 360 only supports 2 player simultaneously. There are four of them.

Next, I'm fairly confident (although may be wrong) that Kinect Sports does not output in stereoscopic 3D. And yet they are all wearing 3D glasses. Even if the game was able to output images in 3D, I'd be willing to bet that the TV they are playing on doesn't support 3D either.

And that other thing about Kinect games? They don't need controllers because *you* become the controller. Yet three of them can be seen holding devices in their hands. One of them is holding an Xbox 360 controller. The other two are holding mobile phones. You can not play Kinect Sports with either of these devices; and you can only connect mobiles to the Xbox 360 using the Smartglass app, which I'd hazard a guess that they aren't even using (let alone heard of).

This moment almost ruined the film for me. And so I ask that when people decide to make movies, if they are going to include video games (or even just computer applications in general), they actually do some research to make sure they are being used correctly. Opening DOS and hitting random keys is not hacking somebody. Don't have the characters play games if it is quite obvious that the controller isn't even turned on. It makes you look stupid. And then it makes people like me, who point this stuff out, look even stupider for calling you out on it. So please double check these things, or at least hire someone (such as myself) to consult with to make sure you are doing it properly to begin with.

But other than this, as I said, Pitch Perfect is a great film. Worth a watch.

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