Optoma GameTime GT-7000 review

Most really, really cheap – as in, under £700 – projectors are designed for a life of Powerpoint presentations or school classrooms, and are often terrible at playing films.

Inevitably, then, the home cinema buff in us wasn’t expecting much from Optoma’s £550 GameTime GT-7000 – especially as the GameTime bit of its name immediately suggests an exclusive console game focus.

But a few movies down the line, we’ve actually come away from the GT-7000 feeling quietly impressed.

Breaking the sound barrier
The GT-7000 is remarkably small for a fully functioning DLP projector; not quite pocket-sized, but certainly a doddle to stuff into the small rucksack Optoma provides in the box.

That’s just the start of its portability, too. Uniquely, it also ships with a separate set of 2.1 speakers, finished in the same colour as the projector and tiny enough to share the same rucksack.

The provision of these iPod-esque speakers is significant because it immediately solves the problem you usually get with portable projectors of how to conjure up audio to accompany the pictures you’re projecting onto a friend’s living room wall.

Some portable projectors have speakers built into their bodies, but this leaves the sound considerably dislocated from the pictures. So being able to put the GT-7000’s external speakers right under the picture, or at least somewhere near it, is an exceptionally elegant solution.

Spot-on spec
As well as offering an unusually thoughtful package, the GT-7000 has some surprisingly impressive specifications up its sleeve. It’s got an HD-Ready resolution of 1280x720, for starters – by no means a given at the GT-7000’s price level.

Plus it boasts a contrast ratio of 4000:1 that makes the contrast ratio figures of any similarly affordable rival look pathetic by comparison.

Its connections thankfully include an HDMI, alongside the anticipated component video and D-Sub PC inputs. And it’s pleasant to set up, too, thanks to such unexpected bonuses such as a fair amount of optical zoom, Texas Instruments’ BrilliantColour processor for boosting colour vibrancy, various Degamma settings, and even a degree of colour management.

Games are not the only fruit
Despite its apparent mere gaming ambitions, the GT-7000 is actually surprisingly effective with films too. The main reason for this is that it is far more capable of producing a believable black colour than any similarly cheap machine, so that dark movie scenes look credible and dynamic.

The GT-7000 also makes the most of its HD Ready resolution, reproducing Blu-ray films and HD console/PC games with terrific sharpness and detail. Its colours are vibrant yet mostly believable as well, and its high native resolution ensures that colour blends are likeably subtle.

While the GT-7000 definitely comes to life with HD, especially an HD game, it isn’t by any means the disaster with standard definition sources we’d anticipated.

We’ve seen sharper standard def pictures from costlier projectors, certainly, but for the money the GT-7000’s relative freedom from noise and colour tone glitches makes its standard def performance more than good enough.

Problems, problems
Inevitably, though, the GT-7000 isn’t perfect. Its pictures aren’t particularly bright, for starters. Also, we detected the ‘rainbow effect’: flashes of red, green and blue stripes over really bright image elements caused by the single-chip DLP technology’s colour wheel system.

If you’re forced to site the projector near your seating position, meanwhile, you might be distracted during quiet game or movie moments by the hefty amount of fan-cooling noise the GT-7000 churns out. We were a little disconcerted, too, by how hot the GT-7000 still gets despite the noisy fans.

Sound worth a pound
Our last moan about the GT-7000 is that its speaker system is really pretty feeble. There’s precious little bass, nowhere near enough volume to produce a sound comparable in size to the king-sized pictures on show, and finally lots of distortion tends to set in when the going gets tough.

Probably the best thing we can say about the GT-7000’s audio is that it’s better than nothing. Just.

Legit way to get a PlayStation 3 for $99 only

This isn’t really “news” since its more than a week old, 10 days to be exact. But this is actually a good way for those that pay their bills with credit cards. Based on cnet.com, you can sign up for a PlayStation Visa card with no-annual-fee (even I want one just for the sake of it being a PlayStation

Visa card). Then go into SonyStyle.com and grab yourself an 80GB PlayStation 3 for the original price of $399. In a few weeks, Sony will reimburse you with $100 credit which knocks your PS3 down to $299 instead. And for those who regularly pay their bills using credits, this will be perfect for you. Within a six month period, you can get another $100 reimbursement for every $1500 spent on the PlayStation Visa card, looks like you can only do it twice judging from the original source.

I think this is a pretty good and legit way to get a good deal for a new PlayStation 3, those that pay their mortgage, car lease/finance etc can take this opportunity and get themselves a PlayStation 3 for $99 (plus tax of course). I would but I don’t have a mortgage yet, I’ve paid off my car awhile ago unfortunately and most importantly I’ve already got my 40GB PS3.

Source: cnet.com

Microsoft exec raises handheld Xbox issue

t's long been a subject of debate among gamers as to whether or not Microsoft will ever produce a handheld console to challenge the incumbents from Sony and Nintendo, so let's add a little fuel to that with news about a possible mobile Xbox.

Speaking to the games website Kikizo, MS VP Shane Kim strongly suggested that a handheld version of the Xbox is not just possible but actually likely.

When, not if

He bluntly stated: "For us, it's a matter of focusing on 'when', because if we chased after a mobile or handheld opportunity, we would not have the resources and ability to do things like... Project Natal. [B]ut we're building a service in [Xbox] Live that... will extend to other platforms. No question about it."

As for why making the Xbox experience mobile is important, Kim made it clear that connectivity is the key. "We understand that customers don't want an island experience, they want to be connected to the rest of their lives."

In other words, he sees it as essential to keep players within the Xbox world on as many platforms as possible.

A phone too?

Kim also raised the subject of what kind of hardware might be needed: "So the question will be, how do we enter into that market - do we do our own device, do we create our own phone?"

With so many diverse threads at Microsoft leading to mobile devices as diverse as Zune, Windows Mobile and, possibly, Xbox mobile, it seems clear the company has some big decisions to make soon.

Sony details PSP app store plans

Al Warmington on Sony's latest move to beat Apple

Sony’s big E3 announcement was the new PSP Go, which comes without a UMD drive but backed up by promises of a major PSP Store revamp. There have been whispers of non-gaming software being welcomed into the PSP Store for the first time and now SCEE’s head of developer relations, Zeno Colaço, has confirmed a new development ‘pipeline’ which will see all kinds of new content making its way to the handheld PlayStation.

“We’re introducing new initiatives for the PSP which take it beyond traditional gaming, but still includes elements from gaming, and also includes new developers,” Colaço told Develop in a behind-closed-doors interview at E3.

These initiatives include the significant reduction of the price of the PSP Software Development Kit, which developers need to create games for the handheld. But it is also opening up a brand new area of the PlayStation Store, which will have a much more relaxed stance on what’s allowed in and how much it should cost, paving the way for non-gaming apps for the first time on a handheld console.

Sony has also been courting new developers, including some who have worked with the Apple iPhone and on casual games, to ensure that there’s plenty of content to get PSP Goers going.

However, it’s still a bit of a mystery as to what this new content will be like; it has been described as “instant gratification, snackable content” by one developer. It’s clearly open to non-gaming apps, if the devs so choose, so we may yet see Twitter and Facebooks clients on the PSP. We could certainly do with some better internet radio apps too.

We’ll have to wait for the launch of the PSP Go in October to find out what’s up the PSP Store’s sleeve, but if it’s a success, Sony may just be able to turn the tables back on Apple.

Link: PlayStation (via Develop)

Buy one here: Gamestation | Game | Play

The making of iconic videogames

It is a rare thing indeed for a modern-day videogame to be described as truly 'groundbreaking', despite the number of times that particular adjective is abused by games mags and websites the world over, yet TechRadar has just been treated to a talk by two designers of the British games industry's biggest and most groundbreaking games of all time.

David Jones and David Braben were giving a short presentation at this year's Develop conference, each playing the other's best-known game (Grand Theft Auto and Elite, respectively) and sharing some of their thoughts on what made both games into the legends that they have unquestioningly become.

Both games – despite being from different eras - featured huge open worlds that gave the player a sense of total freedom to do what they liked, to create their own stories and inhabit their own, fantastically escapist alternative worlds.

And both games inspire that look in the eye of gamers of a certain age...

"Elite was criticised back in 1984 for its 3D graphics," admitted Braben. Ironic really, when you consider, as David Jones does, that the original GTA also received flack from games publishers and hardware manufacturers in the late 1990s for being "a 2D [top-down] game in the 3D world of PlayStation."

Elite took Braben and his partner eighteen months to complete from start to finish, which he admits "felt like a very long time back then", but publishers were not initially overimpressed with the pair's immense space-trading 3D fantasy game.

"The initial response from publishers was very negative," he recalls. "At that time [1984] there were lots of Pac-Man, Galaxians and Space Invader clones on the market. There was a 'coin-op mentality' whereby if a game didn't have a playtime of ten minutes max, with three lives, then publishers weren't interested."

Not bad, really, for a game that went on to sell more copies than there were BBC Micros on the market at the time. "Kids were buying them and taking them to school to play at their computer clubs," Braben fondly recalls.

The joy of docking

As David Jones clumsily flies an Elite Ship near to the anarchist planet of Riedquant, there is laughter from the Develop audience at the fact that he is having trouble making the ship go left or right.

Which reminds us of one thing: games were loads harder back then!

"It takes quite some dedication to get into a game of Elite," admitted Braben. "But then again, after waiting twenty minutes for the cassette to load, gamers were perhaps a little more patient than they are now!" he jokes.

In addition to fighting enemy ships, all of which were named after various snakes ("they had the most types in the Thesaurus" says Braben) the other key mechanic of Elite was having the ability to scoop up your enemies cargo and also to trade in a number of both legal and slightly dodgy cargo.

"The fact that you could also choose to become a pirate and a smuggler quickly became a central mechanic," says Braben. "Controversially, particularly because this was the BBC Micro, we put in slaves, firearms and narcotics."

Courting controversy

Still, despite all that, and despite the fact that Elite went on to become one of the biggest selling games in history at that point, there was little controversy around the game. GTA however...

"Oh the controversy aspect [of GTA] was completely built-up," admits David Jones. "It was used as marketing for the game. We employed Max Clifford who, once he saw the game, was a little bit disappointed [with its cartoony style]. So he just never let us show the game."

"He told us that he would just tell the politicians all about it without showing it," Jones recalls. "And, to his exact word, we were on GMTV within one week. One hour of prime-time television talking about the game. Just as he had said!"

Games PR has become increasingly (and often rather annoyingly) savvy to the ways of controversy, so it is strange to recall that Jones' first GTA was the controversial sensation that it was, a mere twelve years ago.

David Braben is almost jealous-sounding when he recalls how little negative press response his game received. "There was not even a bleep," he says. "Maybe we should have employed Max Clifford!" (Though he does then tell us that Elite was the "first game to ever do a press launch" - at some frighteningly in-the-dark rollercoaster at Thorpe Park, apparently!).

Elite did get a slot on ITN back in the day, although that was only because the news editor at the time had realised that all his staff were obsessively playing Braben's game on ITN's BBC B's in their downtime.

Memory overload

Elite was made for the 32k BBC Micro. "Well, around 22k when you take off the screen," recalls Braben. "Most emails you send these days are in the 30k mark," he says – an amazing fact which really does show how far we have come in 25 years.

The whole, immense galaxy of Elite. Less than an email.

Explaining the clever math behind this, Braben adds that the first version of Elite that he showed to publishers had "two to the power of forty-eight" galaxies. In the end, they settled on eight.

They also had to be careful about the self-generated names of certain galaxies as they "were noticing planets in the game that had names like 'arse'!"

"In those days we were really writing games for ourselves," says Braben, which is quite possibly why his early games were hilariously difficult at times. "There is that danger of being too close to a project... when you test it and test it and it becomes too easy for you."

Initial seeds of inspiration

So what were the original inspirations and 'eureka moments' behind GTA and Elite? Were there any?

"Initially, it was the tech," says Jones. "Once we had that isometric top-down view of a city and we knew we could zoom in and out and so on... then it was a case of ;wouldn't it be great if we could do?... It was a very iterative design process."

Jones and his team also had "the initial idea to play the police [in GTA]... basically we just wanted huge maps and an open and freeform playing area.

More than anything, Jones recalls that GTA was inspired by pinball. "You just have to get 1000000 points... plus all the dot matrix stuff in the game was emulating pinball. And each time you completed a mission it was effectively the same as giving yourself a multiscore bonus."

Braben echoes this idea that it was the technology that drove his inspiration. He also remembers having a lot of pressure for his game to "have an ending" and freely admits that he never, ever imagined gamers would actually put the time in to achieve the legendary status of being Elite.

Sony PSP Go to have you all hot and bothered?

Sony clocks up the PSP Go processor

UMD-less and smaller screen aside, the worst kept secret at this year's E3 gaming convention the PSP Go, could become the hottest gaming device, literally.

After the iPhone 3GS similarly felt the heat over sporting a sunshine-unfriendly frame, the latest instalment of Sony’s handheld gaming range could potentially be facing similar heat-inducing issues.

With capabilities for the Go to reach a maximum clock frequency of 480Mhz, gaming should be the most seamless and smooth running ever seen on a PSP console. While the new processing power should also deliver similar Apple iPhone 3GS-like speed internet browsing, it could well come at an expense with the PSP Go likely to feel like a portable iron in your hands after a gaming session.

A considerable increase on the 333Mhz of the current PSP, the processor life of the original PSP began at 222MHz owing to concerns of overheating and saving battery life. This was eventually increased to 333MHz via a firmware update, and speculation is rife that there could be firmware updates for the PSP Go to up the 480 MHz ante.

With just months from its October 1st launch, those eager to get their hands on the PSP Go will be hoping that the only hole burning in their pocket will be from the hefty £229 price tag and not from a sweltering console.

Link: Sony (Via Playstation Lifestyle)
Buy one here: Gamestation Game Play

Nintendo Wii MotionPlus Roundup

Over a year after it was announced at E3, we've finally got our hands on the Wii MotionPlus add-on, and on the first batch of games that exploit it. Ever since the Wii launched in late 2006, there's been a feeling that the motion-sensitive technology that is its key selling point hasn't quite lived up to expectations. Sure, we've had fun with our virtual tennis rackets, golf clubs, snooker cues and light sabres, but where was the pinpoint accuracy and lifelike movement Nintendo led us to believe would be ours?

MotionPlus is an attempt to put his right; a compact, snap-on module that helps the technology built into the Wii remote and the console itself get a more accurate picture of where the remote is in the 3D space in front of the screen, and the exact angle and position it's being held in. The result should be, theoretically, a new generation of realistic Wii games, giving the player more scope for genuine skill and finesse, and simulation games a closer approximation of that real-world feel. Does it work? We're about to find out.

The module itself is surprisingly small and light, adding approximately 4cm to the end of the remote, and weighing a little less than 20g. It snaps easily onto the expansion port at the bottom of the remote, with the catches disengaged by two buttons on the side for quick release. To stop this happening in game, there's a sliding lock on the back of the unit. A pass-through is provided at the bottom to allow you to connect your nunchuk, while a new protective jacket is provided to cover the extra length and prevent careless players from smashing your new LCD or plasma screen. Physically, that's all there is to it.

Behind the scenes, it's known that MotionPlus adds a special dual-axis angular rate sensor to the remote's existing accelerometers and IR transceiver. Not only can this give a more accurate picture of the linear movement of the controller, it also provides more accurate data on the rotation of the device. This particular function is key to the new MotionPlus games, as we'll see in a minute. Currently, just three games support the accessory, but later on this month we'll see Wii Sports Resort, with fencing, jetski and frisbee-throwing activities, and a rnumber of other MotionPlus-compatible games are on their way.

Wii Sports Tennis is, for many people, the thing that first attracted them to the Wii, so it's no surprise that MotionPlus has been adopted by this year's two Wii tennis games. Grand Slam Tennis is EA's first attempt to take on Virtua Tennis, Smash Court Tennis and the Top Spin series, and it's no surprise to see EA competing using the means it knows best - smart licensing. Grand Slam features all five tournaments of the Grand Slam series in their real-life locations, meaning that, while Virtua Tennis 2009 has to settle for the ‘London Tennis Club', Grand Slam can give you Wimbledon. And while both games give you a choice of 23 real-life players, EA has signed up such all-time legends as McEnroe, Navratilova, Borg, Sampras and Becker, on top of modern greats like Federer, Serena Williams, Nadal and a certain, rather popular Scottish chap.



In fact, EA has been very clever in the way it pitches Grand Slam at the Wii's mainstream market. Not only can you play with such recognisable old-school heroes, all represented in their vintage prime, but the whole look and feel of the game is bright, colourful, cartoony and clearly aimed directly at a casual gaming audience. The courts and players are caricatures rather than realistic versions of what you might see on TV, and the game uses a dynamic camera system that zooms in and out on the action to give you a workable view to make your next shot. And, unlike Virtua Tennis 2009, we get action replays after shots and a reasonable commentary from Pat Cash.

What's more, the structure of the main career mode is particularly straightforward and accessible. First you create your player using a cut-down version of EA's established GameFace technology, then enter them into the Grand Slam. Each round kicks off with an exhibition match, then proceeds to a Legend Challenge where, by beating a famous player, you can win a skill (e.g. Roddick's power serve or Navratilova's netplay), which can then be used to boost your abilities using the three skill slots available to your player. After that comes a short Skill Challenge - a quick singles or doubles match played using an unusual set of rules - and, if you've performed well in the previous three events, a bonus Legend Challenge. Finally you get the tournament itself, with four rounds and a final. There's enough play in each individual tournament to keep you busy for half an hour or so, and enough variety to ensure you don't get bored. Of course, it's not the deepest or richest career mode around, but then EA knows that it's in the online and - above all else - the offline multiplayer action that the game's staying power resides.


So how does MotionPlus affect the game? Well, the game already tracks the general direction of each stroke - straight, high to low or low to high - but MotionPlus adds the chance to add spin to the ball (by twisting as you connect) and aim the ball more accurately with the follow through. It's hard to explain in words, but what comes across is that the ball does what you want it to more often than it does with the regular remote controls, and there's a greater sense that what happens on screen is directly related to what's happening in front of it. The result is a very accessible, intuitive and enjoyable game of tennis, though there are still some annoyances. Both computerised and human players will score cheap points against you by hitting shots from the net that your onscreen persona just can't run to in time, and if you play against a character skilled in net-play, this might get on your nerves quite a bit. There will also be times when the motion sensing seems to go horribly wrong, though this can usually be cured by standing still for a few seconds before your next serve to give the system time to recalibrate.



For casual players, there's no doubt in my mind that Grand Slam is the most enjoyable and entertaining tennis game on the Wii, and is the sort of game that most Wii owners will enjoy dragging out all summer long. It isn't, however, necessarily the best tennis game on the system. Confused? Don't be. All will become clear on the very next page.

Author
Stuart Andrews

Published
5th Jul 2009

Manufacturer
Electronic Arts

Supplier
Amazon.co.uk

Price
£25.52 (Exc VAT)

as reviewed
£29.99 (Inc VAT)

Ion 2 Said to Double Ion's Graphics Power

You may already have heard that nVidia will be supporting VIA Nano CPUs with Ion 2 but you may not have heard the latest rumour, originating from Fudzilla, that the updated platform will feature notably more graphics power than its predecessor.



According to Fudzilla Ion 2 will feature double the 16-shader's offered by the 9400M graphics chip in Ion, to 32 - or possibly more - giving it a decent graphics boost. CUDA applications will also see an improvement, although as there are relatively few that I'd expect anyone working from a netbook to use on such a machine so that's not much of a selling point. However, Windows 7 will be able to leverage GPU-acceleration so the added power Ion 2 is said to be brining may well be welcome come October.

Also notably, Ion 2 is, thanks to a die shrink, supposed to offer this increased performance without an increase in power draw. There's also the potential that in reducing the die size of Ion 2, nVidia will be able to bump the price down a little and, as such, make its platform that bit more tempting to manufacturers and consumers alike.

Ion2 is expected to launch before the year is out, so we should only be waiting a few months to see if this speculation carries any weight.

Link: Fudzilla.

LEGO Battles - Nintendo DS

The basic premise here is pretty close to Command and Conquer. You take control of your LEGO characters to command them in various tasks around the game map. The map is fogged, and a few clear aims are given so you know what you are doing: fairly typical RTS stuff.

So you start off in LEGO Castle, taking control of your king and a few basic troops (guardsmen, archers, knights) as well as builders who create your base. Like C&C, you collect resources to give you the money to put up more buildings, defences and as levels progress, give you more options to create troops and vehicles.

Alongside the actual aims of the level, there are also bricks you can pickup as you roam around, which will allow you to unlock extras in the game. Some of these bricks are hidden in woods (in the Castle levels), which would have to be chopped down to reach them. It takes a fair amount of roaming to collect all the hidden extras, and there's a fair chance you won't bother, choosing to skip on in levels, rather than free roam.

Control is based around stylus highlighting and directing your LEGO troops. You can move them around or send them off to attack an enemy and so on. There are more advanced options such as a force attack, to fell trees, which they would otherwise just stand and look at. You can also get them to patrol an area, or stand their ground in defence, rather than running off after any enemy that shows themselves.

AI is always an issue in this sort of game and unfortunately it is something of an irritation here. Select a collection of men and send them to a location and you might find that half of them don't arrive, especially if they have to walk around a particular impassable object. They’ll find they can't progress, so they'll stop.

The same problem can apply on bridges, when you want to send your troops over to set-up a defensive bridgehead and move more men in behind, you might find some of your cavalry stops on the bridge, and the army backs-up, unable to pass.

We are also not totally sold on the caps placed on available characters, although it does mean you have think a little harder. Usually victory can be yours through a simple formula or combining all your men and all your vehicles and roaming around destroying things, but you'll have to do that in stages because you can't highlight everyone and send them off all in one go.

This might be something to do with available processing power more than anything else, as in some epic moments we did see the odd stutter as a massive battle pulled itself through a sticky patch.

But the game moves along at a fair lick, with just about enough variety to keep things engaging. The format of levels is usually pretty similar: go here, find this, destroy these things. Each storyline has a good and bad side too, so you get a chance to play with all the different characters, once you complete the first Act of each story.

Gameplay is fun and with levels taking about 20 minutes or so each, this isn't something you pick-up and play for a few minutes here and there. Equally, it won't take you too long to get through the game, with the difficultly set pretty low, although we found a few levels where our poor strategy led to a last minute defeat.

There are also a Free Play option and Multiplayer options, allowing you to battle it out in a head-to-head with various different types of battle available. It extends the life of the game and gives a chance to get away from the story mode if you find it getting a little stale.

Sony claims it had UMD-less PSP planned all along

Al Warmington wonders why it already seems like digital downloads have been left too late?

Sliding screens and internal memory aside, the most fundamental change in the new PSP Go is the lack of UMD drive. Until recently, UMD has been the only medium available to full-sized new PSP games.

But what at first glance looks like an abrupt turnaround for the tech giant, is in fact something that Sony has been considering since the birth of the PlayStation Portable, according to Sony’s Naoya Matsui.

In a recent interview (Japanese), the head of SCE's product planning division explained that Sony has been considering a 'network centric' model all along. “We'd planned to release a PSP model without a UMD drive since the very beginning,” Matsui said. “But if we'd simply released the hardware, there wouldn't have been much for everyone to enjoy. We needed to prepare the right environment for it first - things like the transferral of content with the PS3 and PSN, and PC software to manage content like music and movies such as 'Media Go'.”

These comments stand at odds with Sony’s sometimes painful love affair with proprietary optical media formats. But putting that aside, the question now on the lips of many critics is why did Sony take so long? Right now, PSP faces some of its toughest challenges yet – it’s already a long way behind the Nintendo DS in the handheld market and the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch are steadily encroaching on handheld gaming turf. The iTunes App store already boasts hundreds of downloadable titles and more major games publishers are getting board every day.

In the harsh clarity of hindsight, it seems that Sony should have pushed for digital content years ago, rather than waiting until now to jump on the bandwagon. Furthermore, in what seems like an attempt to pacify games retailers, the digital versions of games aren’t even particularly advantageous to the average consumer – they are set to cost the same as the UMD versions, despite the lack of packaging, instruction manuals and shipping costs, and they can’t be bought or exchanged second hand.

But then again, when the PSP launched back in 2004 – and even by the time it reached these shores, almost a year later – it was a very different market out there, and the handheld console was a very different beast. Back then, even having a very rudimentary browser on board was a bit of novelty, not something you’d expect as standard.

This was also months before the Xbox 360 hit the gaming scene and made game downloads a permanent fixture in the console market. Yet at the same time it was pioneering in-game DLC in games like Wipeout Pure.

So perhaps Sony’s mistake was in spending too much time preparing “the right environment”. Sony puts a lot of focus on its PS3-PSP interconnectivity, yet the number of people who own both systems must be relatively low. Even so it took until October 2008 for the PSP’s dedicated PlayStation Store to come to light and that’s given Apple’s rival devices a chance to slip in and grab a sizeable portion of the growing download market.

Yet Sony is not out of the game either.PSP Go is not due out until October 2nd, so customers have yet to express their opinion of Sony’s enhanced download service with their wallets. In the long run too, the huge Sony corporation has an awful lot of content and services that could be put to use on using that ‘network-centric’ model. Here’s hoping this could be the start of a new era for the PSP system.

Link: Sony (via Develop)

Zotac Ion Mini-ITX with Atom N330 review

Nvidia's new Ion platform gives Intel's Atom processor some sizzle

Amidst the gloom of global economic meltdown and tumbling PC sales, Intel's plucky little Atom processor has provided a glimmer of hope.

For starters, Atom has been the driving force behind the explosively popular new netbook segment. And later this year, it will attempt also to assimilate the smartphone market with the arrival of Moorestown, a massively more power efficient revision of the Atom architecture.

So far, however, Atom has frankly flopped when tasked with more performance-critical workloads.

Whether it's HD video decoding, gaming or heavy duty web browsing, Atom simply hasn't had the necessary chops.

Partly that's a function of the modest processing power of the Atom chip itself. But it also reflects the absolutely feeble Intel integrated graphics with which it's been paired.

You could say, therefore, that what Atom really needs is a new chipset with decent graphics. That's exactly what graphics specialist NVIDIA is betting on with Ion, its new Atom-compatible motherboard chipset.

Geforce 9400M by another name

Actually, Ion is nothing new. It's little more than a repackaging of the firm's familiar GeForce 9400M integrated chipset. That's possible because the Atom CPU uses essentially the same bus interface as the Intel Core 2 processors for which the 9400M was originally conceived.

But that's no bad thing. To take one high profile example, Apple reckons the 9400M is good enough to power a whole range of systems including several MacBook and iMac models.

More to the point, Ion / 9400M is definitely a massive upgrade in terms of 3D horsepower and in particular hardware 2D video decode features compared to Intel's awful integrated graphics.

Anywho, our first taste of Ion comes in the form of this natty little mini-ITX board-and-chip combo from Zotac. On paper, it's a fantastic package and comes complete with the flagship Atom 330 processor. It's a dual-core 1.6GHz chip with 1MB of cache and support for two threads per core.

It also sports a healthy array of video output options including VGA, DVI and HDMI, plenty of USB ports, a trio of SATA ports and even wireless networking, all as standard. It's also a completely passively cooled board making it effectively silent in operation and comes with its own laptop-style external power brick.

In other words, all you need to do it drop in a stick or two of memory, connect a hard disk and optical drive and you have a full featured PC. Hence, for our money, there are two basic usage models for this little mobo.

Firstly, it could be the basis of an occasional or casual secondary PC, perhaps on a kitchen worktop, in family room, that sort of thing. A cheap system that wouldn't be expected to do heavy duty number crunching. The other option is a cut-price alternative for a home theatre PC.

Desktop duties

As a general desktop tool, sadly, even Ion's multimedia prowess can't make the difference. We did our testing with Windows 7 RC-1. When Windows 7 arrives later this year, we think will be the mainstream choice for this sort of chipset.

It's definitely a bit kinder on hardware than the bloat-tastic Windows Vista. But in terms of day to day desktop use, it's still a little too much for even the dual-core Atom 330 to cope with. Responses are sluggish and web pages fail to scroll smoothly, for instance.



Passive

There are no fans on the board, so it runs very quietly

As for outright processing power, well, our benchmarks suggest the Atom chip has about 1/10th the grunt of a high end quad-core chip. It's also worth noting that this board-and-chip combo is a very poor solution for gaming.

Even at a meagre resolution of 800 x 600, it only manages about 15 frames per second in a relatively undemanding game such as Call of Duty 4.

Cinema on a budget

If desktop duties get the better of the Atom-Ion combo, can it achieve redemption courtesy of its hardware video decode capabilities?

To a degree, yes. Generally, we're very impressed with Ion's PureVideo 2D video engine. In our Blu-ray disc test, it puts in a pretty much faultless performance.

Our test Blu-ray movie is Fanstastic Four coded in the demanding H.264 codec. Playback is completely smooth and CPU utilisation during decode is typically around 15 per cent. Incredible given the weakness of the Atom processor.

Activision threatens to stop making PS3 games

"They have to cut the price," says exasperated Activision CEO

The CEO of Activision - the largest third-party games software publisher in the world - has threatened that his company "might have to stop supporting Sony" unless the cost of the PlayStation 3 is soon reduced.

"I'm getting concerned about Sony; the PlayStation 3 is losing a bit of momentum and they don't make it easy for me to support the platform. It's expensive to develop for the console, and the Wii and the Xbox are just selling better. Games generate a better return on invested capital on the Xbox than on the PlayStation," Activision CEO Bobby Kotick told The Times.

"They have to cut the price, because if they don't, the attach rates are likely to slow," he added. "If we are being realistic, we might have to stop supporting Sony. When we look at 2010 and 2011, we might want to consider if we support the console — and the PSP too."

Dystopian future for PS3

So, in Kotick's currently rather dystopian view of PlayStation's future, unless Sony can reduce the cost of the hardware to the consumer and boost sales considerably over the next twelve months, there is a likelihood that PlayStation gamers will stop seeing annual refreshes of their favourite Activision gaming series such as Call of Duty, Guitar Hero, Tony Hawk and more in 2011 and beyond.

Activision currently has a market value of $16 billion (£10 billion). Guitar Hero alone grossed more than $1 billion last year.

"It was as big as Titanic [the film] with better margins," boasts Kotick.

Via The Times

Steve Ballmer confirms Natal Xbox 360 for 2010

Microsoft CEO spills the beans in the Executive Club

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has confirmed that a Natal equipped Xbox 360 console will be releasing in 2010, speaking at The Executive's Club of Chicago this week.

Ballmer said that the new Xbox 360 will feature tech "really close" to an actuality, with its built in motion sensing cam and "natural interface," reports TG Daily.

Xbox 360+

Kotaku notes that while Xbox 360 director of product management Aaron Greenberg toed the company-line, telling them, "we're not going to be launching a new console any time soon," he did also admit that MS was looking at a Natal equipped Xbox 360 console, telling them:

"Yes, we have looked at that, but we haven't announced any details for something like that."

1-Up confirms the reports noting that Ballmer's recent "allusions to the details that suggest this is the Xbox Natal that we reported on late last week."

You can see that earlier report over on 1-Up for all the details.

Virtua Tennis 2009 game review

Virtua Tennis 2009 is proof positive that the publisher is in rude health

SEGA delivers another winner

SEGA attracts the hardest of hardcore fan-boys, very much in the same way as its Japanese stable-mate Nintendo does. Many of these men (for they are 99 per cent male) are of a certain age and grew up through the 1980s and 1990s with the classic SEGA and Nintendo consoles and games at the centre of their worlds. And many of these so-called ‘hardcore’ gamers decry the recent output of the Japanese gaming giants as “mediocre, at best” and not a patch on their past glories.

And most of them are wrong.

SEGA’s latest outing in its long-running arcade series, Virtua Tennis 2009 is proof positive that the publisher is in rude health and as far as it can possibly be from simply churning out yet another cash-in update to a popular franchise. Whether you are new to the series (in which case, where the hell have you been for the last decade?) or whether you are a hardened VT –nut that heads out to obscure, sleazy West End arcades to check out the latest update from Japan each year (hands up, us!) you are going to love this year’s virtual bat and ball action.

T3 tested out the game on the Xbox 360, which features a new online ranking system on Xbox Live where you can earn prize money in online tournaments, to then spend on better racquets and kit to upgrade your character. SEGA assures us that the PS3 version is pretty much identical and also reminded us that there is a Wii version on the way next month that makes use of Nintendo’s new Wii MotionPlus extra-sensitive motion control.

Which is all well and good we suppose, but we are so taken with the 360 version that we cannot imagine going back to flailing our arms around the place with a Wii Remote, because the level of control you have over the characters in this game via your thumbs is nothing short of incredible.

You can choose to play as or against around 20 of the world’s top players, across a range of highly realistic real-world courts and in various tournaments, such as the officially licensed Davis Cup. As always, the real genius in the Virtua Tennis series is in the deceptive ease in which you learn to play the game, when before you know it you’ve been playing little else for a month and you find that you are desperately looking for all comers to take on via Xbox Live in order to keep crawling up those online leaderboards. This is the high-grade crack cocaine of tennis videogames, in that it’s very more-ish...

Virtua Tennis 2009 also serves up a bunch of new players this year including the likes of angry, air-puncher Andy Murray and the French chick with the coolest name in Tennis, Ana Ivanovic.

Alround gameplay is also noticeably improved with better volleying, much more intuitive serving and long, glorious rallies both at the net and at the back of the court making us actually whoop with joy. Actually whoop. Oh. And there are also the requisite daft mini-games that feature crocodiles, fruit and pirates. Which you will quickly tire of. But let's not dwell on those.

Overall, VT 2009 is pure gaming zen. Sheffield-based studio Sumo has served up another flowing, graceful ace of a sports game.

Links: Virtua Tennis 2009

Logitech G9 Laser Mouse

Mighty mouse for gamers?

Logitech has a bit of a track record for producing serious gaming hardware. Its keyboards, gameboards and mice haven't always been top of gamers' wishlists in the performance stakes but when it comes to features, there's not much competition.

The G9 Laser Mouse is no exception. Its biggest feature is the customisation possibilities. A selection of 4 and 7 gram weights are included, giving a total of 25 different combinations that you could load it with, from 0g to 28g.

Then there's adjustable sensitivity, which has four presets, from slower than treacle to ridiculously whizzy. Perfect for those sneaky headshots. That takes the different combinations up to 100.

Then there's two different covers that you can put on the thing - an XL grip and a precision grip. The precision grip is slightly bumpy and apparently moisture resistant (which Logitech calls "DryGrip"), meaning that it's very easily handleable with sweaty paws. It has some air vents along the side too, presumably for extra ventilation of your mitts.

The XL grip is much bigger and considerably more comfortable, though it adds quite a lot of extra bulk to the mouse. A smoother finish means that it feels nicer to us, though if you're the kind of gamer who gets a bit moist in tense situations, then you might find yourself slipping a bit.

Unfortunately we're not sweaty people here at Pocket-lint, so to test the moisture resistance, we licked the precision grip instead, then tried out a bit of Left 4 Dead. Zombies seemed to be dying at just as fast a pace as normal, and we didn't slip, but did feel a bit ill half an hour later. Recommendation: don't lick your mouse.

In the software, you can set up four game profiles, which will adjust your settings automatically whenever you load that game. For example, if you want high sensitivity while playing Counter-Strike, but find the mouse whizzing about everywhere annoying while playing World of Warcraft, you can set that up. You can even set-up different colours for the LEDs on the mouse itself.

The buttons feel solid, and nicely clicky, and the scrollwheel in particular justifies plenty of praise. Compared to its predecessor, the G5, the scroll wheel on the G9 is infinitely better, moving fast when you want it to, but retaining plenty of control when you don't.

So, let's total up: 25 weight combinations, 4 sensitivity settings, 2 grips, and 4 game profiles. Multiplying those all together gives 800 different ways you can set this mouse up. Add that to 16581375 options for the colour of the LEDs, and this mouse can be configured in more than 13.2 billion ways. Not bad!

X-Men Origins: Wolverine - Xbox 360

Want to play with Wolverine?

This years first major summer blockbuster may only just have made it onto the big screen, but it’s not taken too long for the gaming world to have its own representation of the genesis of Wolverine.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is a truly action-packed title. Enemies flood towards you at specified points at the kind of rapid rate you’d expect football fans to head out of boozers at ten to three. And Logan certainly isn’t too reluctant to slice off limbs, heads, and keep the blood flowing free.

With one button initiating heavy attacks, another for quicker lighter flails, and one to prompt throws, the fighting system shares a lot with the likes of the Ninja Gaiden series. What starts as seemingly a mere button masher eventually becomes a quite depth filled collection of complicated combinations and manners in which to slaughter your prey.

Logan is more than happy to utilise the environment around him too. Levels are strewn with areas where you can bash enemies onto huge spikes, into spinning industrial fans, and even plummeting to oblivion. And the more interesting way in which you kill, the higher your experience levels head, allowing you to unlock new combos and moves, as well as get your basic stats made even healthier.

This blend of simplicity keeps things fast and frantic, and a whole heap of fun with the bog standard enemies. Though you will start to lean a little too heavily on certain combos that guarantee a swift kill, there’s no denying that things are certainly towards the better end on the fun scale. Sadly, things drop a touch as the game progresses.

The first boss battle is easy enough. You’ll use your swift dash to avoid your hulking enemy's attacks, before jumping on their back and hacking away at their health bar. Do that five or six times and down they go. The only problem is, boss battles don’t truly vary from that initial bout. Not only is the way to win exactly the same, the boss skins are identical. And hence, each becomes a test of how easily you can perform the same few button presses all over again without nodding off. It takes a good 4 hours of game time before the game finally decides to spice things up by chucking multiple of these behemoths towards you at once.

Similarly, the few puzzles lean towards just one of two variants. You’ll either wind a crank and be forced to hide behind moving cover/make a few jumps before the opening closes. Or you’ll carry a huge object to its nearby destination in order to open up the next area. Not exactly the kind of depth that we’d hope for.

Then there’s the much talked about aesthetics. While the idea behind Wolverine’s constant healing and true to attack body marks is a fantastic one, the sad fact is that the action is so fast, and with the camera needing to be quite a way away from Logan's back, that you’ll only really notice things during the few seconds of quiet time. It’s a shame as this is one good looking - if not visually astounding - title.

What’s a little stranger is the weirdness of the frame rate. While the action can be incredibly brutal, and numerous enemies can appear on screen without even a flicker, all of the sudden the game can stutter to a crawl with just two of you. It’s incredibly odd, and smacks of a game that has been rushed to the production line to tie-in with the movie's release. It’s an odd situation, particularly as the development team have gone to great lengths to maintain that they’ve had ample time to craft this one up to perfection.

PS3 to get Wii-like motion sensor?

Sony rumoured to be preparing its own Wii-killing wand controller

There’s a lot of buzz surrounding what Sony might be unveiling at the upcoming E3 gaming extravaganza. We’ve already got an inkling of what’s coming on the handheld front, but along with the PSP Go!, the Japanese tech giant may also be lifting the veil on a whole new PS3 controller as well.

The idea behind it is simple: beat that poxy Nintendo Wii at its own game. The new peripheral is expected to be a wand-like motion sensor, much akin to the Wii Remote. The difference, sources claim, is that it will be far more precise at measuring movements than Nintendo’s current technology.

“Sony's controller apparently used LEDs (light emitting diodes, essentially little electric light sources) and a small webcam to track the device's movements,” says Variety’s Cut Scene blog. “Because the camera can read different color lights and the shape and angle of each light, it's much more accurate than the Wii-mote.”

According to Kombo.com, early prototypes are already believed to be in the hands of a select few developers, tasked with coming up with a range of new motion-sensing games to support the launch of the new controller. It’s still unclear what the final product will look like – the prototypes reportedly look “kinda funky” – but it’s safe to assume that it will be a significant divergence from the current SIXAXIS and Dual Shock 3 controllers. The device pictured on the right is actually a Gametrak Freedom, but we’re probably going to be looking at something along the same lines.

This is all still rumour and speculation right now, so you should season it with a usual amount of salt. There’s some good evidence to back it up though, in the form of a patent that Sony has already acquired for a motion sensing controller that closely resembles a Wii Remote.

Interestingly, Sony might not be alone in taking the Wii head on – Microsoft is also believed to be buying into motion sensing tech. So far, Sony has won the bulk of pre-E3 hype, but Microsoft may still have a few tricks up its sleeve to boost the Xbox 360 in what has been a quiet year so far. Meanwhile, Nintendo is gearing up to launching its own Wii remote upgrade, in the form of Wii Motion Plus.

Link: PlayStation

Creative Fatal1ty HS-1000 USB Gaming Headset

If there's one thing I've learned over the years, it's that as much as I may enjoy playing games and watching films well into the small hours of the morning it's that fellow residents, and sometimes nearby neighbours, aren't always so appreciative. As great, then, as having a decent surround sound speaker setup cranked up to the max is, it's a fact of every PC (or, indeed console) gamer's life that a decent headset is one of those must haves.

There are, as common sense might suggest, two options. The former, and most obvious, is a simple stereo headset, such as the SteelSeries Siberia which as our review testifies was pretty nifty. The second category comprises devices such as the Saitek Cyborg that offer a virtual 5.1 surround sound from the two available speakers. As the Cyborg headset proved though, this can have mixed results.

If there was a company positioned to make and pair of virtual surround sound headphones and get it right, Creative is probably it. Creative has some real badge cache in the audio arena, with excellent products like the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Pro sound card and Auvana X-Fi headphones backing up that reputation. To that end, the Fatal1ty HS-1000 gaming headset should be pretty good. Especially as Creative claims to reserve Jonathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel's branding for the crème de la crème of its products.

Superficially the Fatal1ty gaming headset sets off on the right foot. The Fatal1ty branding is kept pretty low key, and there's no Razer Piranha-esque glowing LEDs, for instance. One trait the Fatal1ty headset does share with the Piranha, though, is the overabundance of pressure. I wouldn't consider my head to be particularly large, but wearing the headset for too long caused enough discomfort that I simply had to remove it for 15 minutes or so before being able to use it again - and too long equated to about an hour of use. Some might argue that such enforced breaks are a good idea, but I'd rather not try playing Left4Dead with throbbing ears. It's an intense enough game as it is without adding pain to the mix!

On the plus side, design-wise, the removable microphone plugs in as securely as could be asked and is nicely flexible, without feeling flimsy. The USB cable for attaching the headset to a PC is of a decent length, too and sports an in-line remote offering volume buttons and a microphone mute switch. This also has a clip on the back, so it can be attached to, say, a belt ensuring it can be easily located while also reducing cable tug on the head.

One potential stumbling block for the Fatal1ty headset is its use of USB, as opposed to 3.5mm jack, for connectivity. For the majority of buyers, that's a good thing as the headset packs an in-line sound card which takes care of everything a dedicated card would otherwise be required for, such as virtual 5.1-channel and EAX effects. However, anyone already owning a dedicated sound card will doubtless be a bit miffed that it is bypassed when using the Fatal1ty headset.

Overall at the price point the Creative Fatal1ty headset is hitting, around £45 at time of publishing, it's hard to complain about the inclusion of what is, as we'll come to later, a pretty decent sound card. It's not like finding an alternative headset is difficult for those with dedicated sound cards.

On the subject of the non-requirement for a dedicated sound card, then, Creative deserves a great deal of credit for the driver and software package it provided with the Fatal1ty headset. Features such as the X-Fi Crystallizer, which adds (as best it can) detail into compressed audio, CMSS-3D, which offers virtual surround sound, and Creative ALchemy which enables reproduction of DirectSound effects (something that's no longer supported by DirectX 10). Not to mention supporting EAX effects in games which use them - many do.

Although not as good as a dedicated Creative sound card could produce, the Crystallizer still did a decent job of improving a selection of Napster tracks. Obviously as with all similar solutions there's a limit to how much better compressed music can be made to sound, but Creative's effort is among the best. Obviously the Fatal1ty headset isn't designed for listening to music, and I certainly wouldn't recommend it for that, but for occasional listening or background listening while playing a few rounds of Counter-Strike, its definitely good enough.

Gaming performance lives up to Creative's reputation. There's a decent amount of bass which is obviously great when a few grenades start flying around and helicopters are soaring overhead. The removable microphone lives up to its noise-cancelling pretensions too, with nary a complaint from several friends using both in-game chat in Left4Dead and firing up Windows Live Messenger voice chat, too.

CMSS-3D, too, is by far and away the best virtual surround system I've ever used. The result was far better than that achieved by the Saitek Cyborg. Creative's support for effects such as EAX and DirectSound allows its products to beat out the competition in this area. I had almost forgotten, having become used to stereo speakers, how tense Bioshock can be!

I still prefer using stereo headphones in stereo mode, and surround sound speakers for surround sound, but if you simply must have virtual surround effects from a headset then I can't think of a better alternative to the Fatal1ty. Without using a dedicated sound card of course, but that's beside the point.

Verdict

Creative has a long reputation for producing great audio equipment and the Fatal1ty Gaming Headset HS-1000 doesn't let down that legacy. Thanks to Creative's excellent back-end support the Fatal1ty is definitely the only virtual surround sound headset worth considering.

Sega woos Nintendo DS women players with Project Beauty

Beauty may be skin deep but vanity goes a step further at being a forte with women. Sega knows that women gamers are a segment strong enough to sustain a games especially catered to them. That's why it's outing Project Beauty on Nintendo DS, targeting the 20-to-30 age group. Partnering with Shiseido, this personal digital beauty consultant scans you're your image onto the consol via a scanner and gives you tips on make-up and what styles would suit you best using the digital image. This software plus scanner bundle will be available in Japan on November 27 for $55. Till then may I suggest a visit to the nearest mall where those wonderful cosmetic consultants give you beauty and make-up tips for free!

Sega woos Nintendo DS women players with Project Beauty

Beauty may be skin deep but vanity goes a step further at being a forte with women. Sega knows that women gamers are a segment strong enough to sustain a games especially catered to them. That's why it's outing Project Beauty on Nintendo DS, targeting the 20-to-30 age group. Partnering with Shiseido, this personal digital beauty consultant scans you're your image onto the consol via a scanner and gives you tips on make-up and what styles would suit you best using the digital image. This software plus scanner bundle will be available in Japan on November 27 for $55. Till then may I suggest a visit to the nearest mall where those wonderful cosmetic consultants give you beauty and make-up tips for free!