Recently I had a chance to try Kinect at a friend's house, and as a technology it worked pretty well in my opinion. Of course it could be better regarding accuracy, lag and depth perception, but still, a fun piece of tech all-in-all. And since I'm a puck head through and through, the first thing that came to my mind was playing as a goalie in EA's NHL series while using Kinect. It could be fun, right?

Just like the Wii and NHL Slapshot, playing goalie using Kinect could be a fun addition to the virtual hockey legacy if you don't get too stuck thinking about realism. And come on, if you have tried Slapshot you know what I'm talking about. Realism, as much as most of us like it, does not always mean fun.

Now, I would imagine going all Kinect would be impossible for a number of reasons. Obviously, not many living rooms have a surface as slippery as skates on ice for lateral movement, and not many gamers could handle playing as a butterfly goalie for a whole game. (I'm ashamed to say that sometimes just the controller feels heavy in my hands after a long night of virtual hockey.)

And having a Kinect goalie would mean that most clubs would need multiple goalies because most of us gamers would not be up for more than a game or two per night. But if you manage to recruit the Ryan Miller of virtual hockey, who can play 10 games a night while playing solid throughout, you are a lucky GM indeed.

There's also the issue of scaling the goalie. If you dress like the Michelin Man, the game would have to cut you off at some point so you don't just fill out the whole goal and turn goal-line camping into an even more effective strategy than it already is in the game.

Either way, could Kinect be used in addition to the normal controller to lower the athletic requirements? For a goalie, Kinect could be the positional controller, and you could still use the normal wireless pad for saves and other animations.

Or would Kinect goalies (Kinolies or Gonects?) have the chance to buy additional wireless controllers? Like a light harness with big buttons that you would press to make a save? One button for each limb maybe? Press both leg buttons and you will go down to butterfly, press all four buttons quickly enough and you will do a crazy Hasek-style flip or spin.

There are loads of options for controls, and I'm sure EA is testing the technology as we speak to find a plausible set of controls that would work well enough to be implemented into the game. I just hope that we can try playing Kinolie sooner rather than later, even if it is just via an arcade title similar to 3 on 3 NHL Arcade or a limited game mode in NHL 12.

Just imagine the raised heartbeat, the amount of adrenaline in your veins and the laughter of a spouse/roommate/parent/sibling in your ears as you get ready for a match. It would be awesome