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We love, love , LOVE video games; the kids and I love them (my husband’s not as big into them). My four-year old and I jumped at the chance when we were invited to X’11 Canada to try out the new games due out this fall for the XBox.

With a family of five, we love multi-player, co-operative games, with some of our favourites being the Lego series (like LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean) and Little Big Planet. Disney Universe, from Disney Interactive Studios, promises a similar game play experience. I’ve seen the pictures on their Facebook page but playing the game just confirmed my excitement. I love that Disney Universe still gives you the ‘get the bad guy’ game play without the violence of other games, making it a great family game. Even the hexes are fun, like being turned into a bomb or a big shoe. The game incorporates some of your family’s favourite movies and characters (we played the Alice in Wonderland characters within the Lion King and Monster’s Inc. level). My four-year old loved seeing familiar scenes, like the door factory in Monster’s Inc. I can’t wait until the game is released this fall on the Xbox 360 (as well as the PS3 and Wii); just in time for holiday shopping.

Another great Disney-esque game due out this fall is Disneyland Adventures. In Disneyland Adventure, players explore the actual Disneyland park but more then that, they can interact with some of their favourite caharcters. On the demo version we visited Mickey Mouse and played a dancing game with the characters from Alice in Wonderland. The great thing about Disneyland Adventures is that it uses the Kinect technology from XBox, giving kids the controller-free play of interacting and playing, such as having a sword fright as Peter Pan with Captain Hook. What a great way to bring the Disneyland experience home. Disneyland Adventures will probably be something else on our holiday shopping list.

I was excited to see a lot of the family games using the Kinect technology on the XBox. If you’ve ever watched kids playing video games with controllers, they’re always trying to move characters by moving their body. Kinect for XB0x harnesses a child’s energy and movement into the game play.

Parents of preschoolers will love Once Upon a Monster, from Warner Brothers Interactive Entertainment. Kids interact with some of their favourite Sesame Street characters, like Elmo, Cookie Monster and Oscar, exploring the imaginary world of Sesame Street and helping solve problems. My four-year old loved helping to clean-up the garden by tossing colour-coded trash into the appropriate garbage cans. Using the Kinect game play, kids just move their bodies naturally and don’t need to worry about remotes. Once Upon a Monster is a great demonstration of an interactive, educational game that immerses kids into game play. I had heard about this game and I was interested in seeing how it would be executed and I must admit I was pleasantly surprised at the graphic quality at the demo we played with. We’re looking forward to its release in October.

My nine-year old loved Dance Central and now Dance Central 2 promises to extended the dance party experience with new characters, locations and popular songs. In a similar vein as Dance Central 2, you can move from dancing into cheering in the new Kinect game Let’s Cheer. Instead of just dancing, players can get into the fun rhthym of being a competitive cheerleader. Like Dance Central 2, player learn new cheers, which are broken down with body movement. But in addition to the cheerleader moves, voice recognition technology encourages players to learn and shout-out the chants too. My daughter is a wanna-be cheerleader, big on hand-clap rhymes; she would love this new game due out in November. Also being released from 2K is Nickelodeon Dance. Now younger kids can enjoy fun dancing games, like Dance Central 2, in a younger version. Nickelodeon Dance incorporates popular theme songs from Nickelodeon shows as well as family-friendly songs sung by some of your kid’s favourite Nickelodeon characters. My four-year old loved dancing with Dora and the Backyardigans in this game. Plus there is a fitness option where kids can do more exercise-oriented moves with the Nickelodeon characters.

For the older kids, I was excited to see Star Wars on the Kinect. We love Star Wars. We actually bought lightsaber attachments for our Wii remotes to try an emulate the Jedi experience. Well on the Kinect, you are the lightsaber. You use your hands to will the force and wield your lightsaber. As you can imagine, this was a popular game so we didn’t get a chance to try it (though we did see some stormtroopers playing). I love being able to experience the game of Star Wars more than just playing it. Star Wars for the Kinect is expected to be released just in time for the holiday season. Can’t wait.

Another anticipated game for our family is the Lego Harry Potter, Years 5 to 7 game. Though not a Kinect game, we are big fans of all the Lego games and the original Harry Potter game is great. We’re looking forward to continuing the saga in Harry Potter, Years 5 to 7.

Some other games I wasn’t expecting but I am interested in playing after seeing the demo: Rayman: Origins and RavingRabbids: Alive and Kicking. I love the graphics in Rayman: Origins; very whimsical and cartoon-like, and the co-operative play reminds me a lot of Little Big Planet, which is a big game in our family. I also like how in Rayman: Origins players can join-in or drop-out at any time during the game without interrupting the game (a must when you have multi-aged kids who have varying attention spans). We have Raving Rabbids on the DS and the kids love it; a favourite for road trips. The new game, Raving Rabbids: Alive and Kicking uses Kinect to put you in the game. The example we saw had the Raving Rabbids popping up all around your living room (you and your room are projected on the TV and the Rabbids pop-out everywhere). Like Wack-o-Mole, you have to stomp on them. That’s just one game. You know playing this you’ll end up absorbing the Raving Rabbids hyper behaviour. This looks like a great game with kids have friends over or a fun family night game. (below is a screen shot to give you a better idea)

Wow, not that I’m trying to rush through my summer vacation but I can’t wait for the holiday shopping season to begin. All these family oriented game releases just made my shopping so much easier.