Microsoft's effort to win over the more informal crowd from Nintendo's Wii console and onto their Kinect was met with the utmost cynicism from video gaming followers along with pundits. The quite uncomfortable and very artificial demo during this year's E3 did Kinect no favors, and questions the system suffered from intense lag only worsened the pessimism encircling it. It was fascinating, then, to determine precisely how feelings modified and shifted as the public began to discover Kinect for themselves. Less a softening as a complete about turn. Not simply did the console perform the job, it also performed splendidly and, above all, was terrific fun. It's simple and easy to credit the turn-around of perception to Microsoft's smooth promotional machine, and it is certainly a tremendous aspect of the delight that now crackles in and around Kinect - however the fact is the only thing that can prove Kinect to you is the device itself.
It's a big device, shaped in the glossy black of the new Xbox 360 S. Installation is effortless: Kinect executes standard calibration tests prior to asking you to move into specified areas of your lounge to analyze the space you have. We have witnessed a good deal of stress around the amount of space you'll need to work with Kinect - but in my personal experience those grumbles seem ridiculous. It is successful in a modestly-sized room.
Kinect's controls function extremely well - enough so that you will get exasperated whenever you're instructed to settle for the standard Xbox controller to be able to modify your setting. This situation raises a doubt of whether or not the Kinect is seriously "controller-free." It's absolutely not there as yet. But, when you're within the Kinect world, it certainly is so much preferable to Nintendo's Wii, which continually requires you to click various control keys.
You will find quite a few basic motions you make use of with Kinect. You'll wave your hand sideways to start the apparatus. To temporarily halt the particular game you push your left arm up a bit, just like you're aiming at something on the floor on your left. To push a button on the screen, you anchor your hand in a still position for a handful of seconds. To navigate around menus, just scroll by moving your hand laterally. To receive voice commands, call out "Xbox".
The basic calibration operation also affords you a peek at Kinect's body tracking - as you check out your on-screen persona perfectly copying your movements. It really is astonishing to witness, whilst you maneuver your limbs and spin your head and hips and recognize the avatar engaging the exact same task. However, there is perceptible lag time between your own motion and the avatar's, but because it's apparent, it allows you to to acknowledge the limits of the technology and compensate for it. Having a minute lag would likely be way more aggravating.
In regards to the games, right here is the place Kinect without a doubt does a great job. Each starts with a brief tutorial, and description of appropriateness and functionality it incorporates - and then you should be gaming. My personal favourite game with the system thus far is definitely "Kinect Sports" - incorporating sports such as football, volleyball, bowling, table tennis, boxing and athletics. It's pleasing to play sport-related video games without trying to remember advanced key sequences to generate assorted movements
Kinect isn't really cost-effective entertainment, especially if you don't as of yet have an Xbox 360. Kinect accompanied by a 360 will end up costing $300 - $400. Although for the 42 million people which currently have an Xbox
you'll find it a much more reasonable expenditure.
Kinect is most certainly not devoid of fans and the spin Microsoft have launched continues to snowball. The preliminary battle is won, though the war to maximize the potential inside this astonishing piece of technology has only just started.
Read our review of iRiver Story HD
or How to Get a Free MS Kinect
Monday, 8 August 2011
Tuesday, 2 August 2011
Nokia Smartphone Comparison - N8 and E7
Nokia have struggled in recent times, and it's easy to pinpoint the exact occasion things started going wrong. It was 9th of January, 2007. Steve Jobs, co-founder of Apple, stepped up to the dais at the Macworld Apple convention - and in his hand was a prototype of Apple's latest gadget. A phone without a keyboard; a phone that would instead depend entirely on touch screen technology and a 'virtual' keyboard. The Apple iPhone shook the phone industry to it's (Apple-)core, and nowhere was this quake felt more acutely than in Finland, at the HQ of the undoubted kings of hand-held phoning. Nokia would strive for 3 years to react to Apple's game-changing phone. Their attempted iPhone killer was code named the N8. Was it another bomb, or a worthy challenger?
Every year Nokia have a flagship mobile phone, designed to display their most up-to-date research and development. In 2011 that flagship is the N8. My first reaction to the N8 is that the handset's pretty slick - the rounded finish is appealing, and the alloy casing gives it a superior look and feel. What leaps out at you is how many external buttons and slots decorate it. The right-hand side features a screen-lock switch and camera key, the left comes with a micro-USB interface and SIM/microSD slots, while on top is an HDMI port.
An essential component of any smartphone is the touchscreen. The N8's touchscreen is 3.5-inches, with 640 x 360 resolution, and made from 'Gorilla Glass'. Gorilla Glass, according to Nokia, is entirely scratch resistant. And when Nokia say scratch resistant, they certainly mean it. I rubbed keys and even a fork against it, and I must admit it didn't leave so much as a hairline mark. You can put your N8 in a pocket or bag and it'll remains pristine.
The operating system used by the N8 is the Symbian 3 - and it's the Achilles Heel of the N8. Symbian's OS is lethargic, has remarkably few in-built applications and seems dated, archaic even, in comparison to the Android and iOS. It's a little foolish that after spending so much time crafting a phone that is good-looking and well constructed, Nokia then went with a sub-standard OS that leaves the user with a bad taste in his mouth.
Soon after bringing out the N8, Nokia released the E7. It was shocking just how different the E7 and N8 were. The E7 is a lot larger and more heavy than the N8 (135 grams to 176 grams). It has a bigger display screen that includes a 'ClearBlack Display' - what this means, in lay terms, is that the phone alters the brightness automatically depending on the level of direct sunlight. In contrast to the N8, the E7's camera doesn't extend from the rear. That allows the case a more smooth touch and allows it to be placed flat on a table with the slider open. Despite the fact that the camera is more elegantly added to the E7 than the N8, the image and video quality is flat, and not as impressive as the N8. The E7 also has a QWERTY keyboard that slides out from the base of the device - this explains the bulk of the added weight of the phone. Sadly a change Nokia have not made is the mediocre Symbian 3 OS, so you'll have to put up with lethargic navigation and a limited selection of applications.
However, which of these phones do I consider better? For me it's undoubtedly the N8. The E7 is way too large to hold comfortably in your hand - a flaw which is amplified by the sleek metallic cover, which caused me to drop the E7 several times while using it. The QWERTY keyboard is a nice add-on, but also means the weight of the E7 is excessive. Quite why Nokia decided to go with a lower standard camera for the E7 is puzzling, but it's not good enough for such a costly phone.
Both phones have failings - mostly as a result of the awful operating system, but while the N8 is fantastic aside from its OS, the E7 is cumbersome, bloated, weighs too much and - bizarrely for a mobile phone - too big to grip in your hand.
While the N8 is not as consistently superb as the iPhone 4 or the Samsung Galaxy S2, it is nonetheless a step in the right direction for Nokia. It's clear evidence that the Finnish phone giants are far from finished.
Get a Free Nokia N8
Every year Nokia have a flagship mobile phone, designed to display their most up-to-date research and development. In 2011 that flagship is the N8. My first reaction to the N8 is that the handset's pretty slick - the rounded finish is appealing, and the alloy casing gives it a superior look and feel. What leaps out at you is how many external buttons and slots decorate it. The right-hand side features a screen-lock switch and camera key, the left comes with a micro-USB interface and SIM/microSD slots, while on top is an HDMI port.
An essential component of any smartphone is the touchscreen. The N8's touchscreen is 3.5-inches, with 640 x 360 resolution, and made from 'Gorilla Glass'. Gorilla Glass, according to Nokia, is entirely scratch resistant. And when Nokia say scratch resistant, they certainly mean it. I rubbed keys and even a fork against it, and I must admit it didn't leave so much as a hairline mark. You can put your N8 in a pocket or bag and it'll remains pristine.
The operating system used by the N8 is the Symbian 3 - and it's the Achilles Heel of the N8. Symbian's OS is lethargic, has remarkably few in-built applications and seems dated, archaic even, in comparison to the Android and iOS. It's a little foolish that after spending so much time crafting a phone that is good-looking and well constructed, Nokia then went with a sub-standard OS that leaves the user with a bad taste in his mouth.
Soon after bringing out the N8, Nokia released the E7. It was shocking just how different the E7 and N8 were. The E7 is a lot larger and more heavy than the N8 (135 grams to 176 grams). It has a bigger display screen that includes a 'ClearBlack Display' - what this means, in lay terms, is that the phone alters the brightness automatically depending on the level of direct sunlight. In contrast to the N8, the E7's camera doesn't extend from the rear. That allows the case a more smooth touch and allows it to be placed flat on a table with the slider open. Despite the fact that the camera is more elegantly added to the E7 than the N8, the image and video quality is flat, and not as impressive as the N8. The E7 also has a QWERTY keyboard that slides out from the base of the device - this explains the bulk of the added weight of the phone. Sadly a change Nokia have not made is the mediocre Symbian 3 OS, so you'll have to put up with lethargic navigation and a limited selection of applications.
However, which of these phones do I consider better? For me it's undoubtedly the N8. The E7 is way too large to hold comfortably in your hand - a flaw which is amplified by the sleek metallic cover, which caused me to drop the E7 several times while using it. The QWERTY keyboard is a nice add-on, but also means the weight of the E7 is excessive. Quite why Nokia decided to go with a lower standard camera for the E7 is puzzling, but it's not good enough for such a costly phone.
Both phones have failings - mostly as a result of the awful operating system, but while the N8 is fantastic aside from its OS, the E7 is cumbersome, bloated, weighs too much and - bizarrely for a mobile phone - too big to grip in your hand.
While the N8 is not as consistently superb as the iPhone 4 or the Samsung Galaxy S2, it is nonetheless a step in the right direction for Nokia. It's clear evidence that the Finnish phone giants are far from finished.
Get a Free Nokia N8
Monday, 25 July 2011
To Toy Story... And Beyond! The Brilliance of Pixar
Pixar Animation Studios is a computer animation film company situated near Berkeley, California. They started life making short movies and adverts, before reinventing the wheel with the world's first feature-length computer animated film, Toy Story. They have gone on to rake in twenty-six Academy Awards, seven Golden Globes, and 3 Grammys - and have made over $6.3 billion worldwide. Ultimately, though, it's not the statues or the money it's made which finally distinguishes it from other movie studios: it's the superb and consistent quality of their movies.
It's worth emphasizing that their success hasn't led to safe, conservative choices - far from it, Pixar have instead enacted a policy of taking big chances, telling stories no one else would dare invest in - and then crafting them into cinematic gold. Take the brilliant 'Ratatouille', in which a rodent chef creates dishes in a Paris restaurant. The picture's theme was the virtue of great art – hardly box-office bait – while the title was imagined so odd that a phonetic spelling was added to the poster. Or take 'WALL-E', an attack on capitalism; not only was this stunning movie desperately poignant for its 1st, dialogue-free 40 minutes, but it had a metal box for a hero and a steering wheel for a baddie.
Their multitude of devotees - both young and old - have grown to adore and place total trust in Pixar - to a level that no other film studio can equal. You can't throw a stone without hitting a Pixar fan... but have you ever met a Univeral fan, or a Paramount fan? Pixar has built this fan base via the self-evident but surprisingly infrequent tactic of working on the movies until they're at the standard they expect. Pixar take months constructing its story structures before characterisation or dialogue are thought about. In pursuit for the highest quality it works with the most talented writers and directors. Joss Whedon, mastermind behind Buffy and Firefly, worked on the screenplay for the original Toy Story. Tom McCarthy, writer-director of The Station Agent, worked on the script of Up. Michael Arndt, Oscar-winning writer of Little Miss Sunshine, co-wrote Toy Story 3.
Pixar have also learned from Disney's model of getting A-list actors for its voice casts: through employing Hollywood stars like Tom Hanks, Holly Hunter and Willem Dafoe, it made voice-acting the profitable industry it is today. The secret of Pixar, if you can isolate one, appears to be that they aren't about creating great movies for kids – just great movies.
Strikingly, at Pixar there is no room for the excess of pop culture references that have overtaken its competitors' animations. The leading culprit in this respect has been DreamWorks, whose wacky output too often comes across like soulless fluff. While Pixar adds jokes as the icing on the cake, for DreamWorks it is the cake: take out the in-jokes that litter Shark Tale or Bee Movie and there's not much left. These contemporary references immediately carbon-date those movies, leaving them even more unfathomable to future viewers.
An additional critical component is the design of their movies. They look like no others, have a grace and artistry which the likes of DreamWorks appear unable to match. A cause of this is that, unlike DreamWorks, Pixar bring out a film every year or two. That’s it. If you study a Pixar film, you’ll discover scarcely a glitch. Of course, each film is not completely perfect, but generally, the animation, sound, script, characters, pacing, comedy, emotion – it’s all unimpeachable.
As well as those technical components, Pixar movies have that intangible yet vital element: soul. Everything - from the story, to the characters, and the voice cast oozes with a human touch. This, beyond any other single component, accounts for why Pixar films are beloved by viewers of all ages, why the next Pixar feature is always expectantly awaited, and why Pixar are currently the best film studio in the world.
This is the UK's only Pixar DVD Price Comparison Site.
It's worth emphasizing that their success hasn't led to safe, conservative choices - far from it, Pixar have instead enacted a policy of taking big chances, telling stories no one else would dare invest in - and then crafting them into cinematic gold. Take the brilliant 'Ratatouille', in which a rodent chef creates dishes in a Paris restaurant. The picture's theme was the virtue of great art – hardly box-office bait – while the title was imagined so odd that a phonetic spelling was added to the poster. Or take 'WALL-E', an attack on capitalism; not only was this stunning movie desperately poignant for its 1st, dialogue-free 40 minutes, but it had a metal box for a hero and a steering wheel for a baddie.
Their multitude of devotees - both young and old - have grown to adore and place total trust in Pixar - to a level that no other film studio can equal. You can't throw a stone without hitting a Pixar fan... but have you ever met a Univeral fan, or a Paramount fan? Pixar has built this fan base via the self-evident but surprisingly infrequent tactic of working on the movies until they're at the standard they expect. Pixar take months constructing its story structures before characterisation or dialogue are thought about. In pursuit for the highest quality it works with the most talented writers and directors. Joss Whedon, mastermind behind Buffy and Firefly, worked on the screenplay for the original Toy Story. Tom McCarthy, writer-director of The Station Agent, worked on the script of Up. Michael Arndt, Oscar-winning writer of Little Miss Sunshine, co-wrote Toy Story 3.
Pixar have also learned from Disney's model of getting A-list actors for its voice casts: through employing Hollywood stars like Tom Hanks, Holly Hunter and Willem Dafoe, it made voice-acting the profitable industry it is today. The secret of Pixar, if you can isolate one, appears to be that they aren't about creating great movies for kids – just great movies.
Strikingly, at Pixar there is no room for the excess of pop culture references that have overtaken its competitors' animations. The leading culprit in this respect has been DreamWorks, whose wacky output too often comes across like soulless fluff. While Pixar adds jokes as the icing on the cake, for DreamWorks it is the cake: take out the in-jokes that litter Shark Tale or Bee Movie and there's not much left. These contemporary references immediately carbon-date those movies, leaving them even more unfathomable to future viewers.
An additional critical component is the design of their movies. They look like no others, have a grace and artistry which the likes of DreamWorks appear unable to match. A cause of this is that, unlike DreamWorks, Pixar bring out a film every year or two. That’s it. If you study a Pixar film, you’ll discover scarcely a glitch. Of course, each film is not completely perfect, but generally, the animation, sound, script, characters, pacing, comedy, emotion – it’s all unimpeachable.
As well as those technical components, Pixar movies have that intangible yet vital element: soul. Everything - from the story, to the characters, and the voice cast oozes with a human touch. This, beyond any other single component, accounts for why Pixar films are beloved by viewers of all ages, why the next Pixar feature is always expectantly awaited, and why Pixar are currently the best film studio in the world.
This is the UK's only Pixar DVD Price Comparison Site.
Thursday, 21 July 2011
Playstation Vita: The Best Hand-Held Game Device in the World?
Take a look at our website Deal or Scam.net for reviews of the latest fads, apps, hardware & software.
It must have been perfect timing for Sony when, only a matter of days after the latest Playstation hacking shambles, they had an opportunity to unveil to the world their next hand-held console: The Playstation Vita.
Following a quick apology regarding the data hacking occurrence, Sony's Jack Tretton presented the Playstation Vita to an excited E3 Expo. The Vita, which was formerly known as the NGP, will be out by the end of the year, and there will be eighty games scheduled for release in time for Christmas.
So, what did we think? Could it succeed the PSP, and compete with Nintendo's 3DS?
The first issue to discuss: the name. Vita. I must admit to not being a fan. What does 'Vita' mean anyway? Playstation is a station that you play on. That I get. Vita I don't. Now, maybe my negative first reaction is just a consequence of unfortunate memories of Windows Vista - which it sounds ominously similar to. Still, factoring in their previous Playstation names such as the Playstation Portable - well with that name the customer knew what he was purchasing - he was getting a hand-held version of the Playstation. Vita? Hmm. Perhaps I'll get used to it.
Moving to the design... as you would expect with Sony the Vita design is slick. Very slick. It's surrounded by a black shell, which will look immediately recognizable to PSP gamers. It carries a five-inch OLED screen, twin analogue sticks, plus a pair of cameras, located on the front and back of the Vita, which could come in useful for augmented reality games. The Vita's most potentially interesting addition is a good-sized touch-pad on the back of the machine - something which could easily allow for some fascinating opportunities for more creative developers around the world. This was demonstrated during a quick test play of 'ModNation Racers', where it was established that, while you create your own levels, you could make mountains by pushing the pad.
Regarding the Vita's size, it must be the largest 'hand-held' yet released. You must start to wonder whether hand-held is even the correct label for the device. This monster measures 182 by 84 by 19mm. That makes it bigger than the PSP 3000, although it should be added that the Vita is fractionally thinner. To put it in context, you could practically fit a whole iPhone 4 into the space taken up by Vita's screen alone. The Vita is notably more wide than the Nintendo 3DS, so there's no way that this device will fit in your pocket. So, all things considered, as it's a hand-held it will prove a little awkward if you take it with you to play on the bus.
As everybody knows by now, the success or failure of any device is determined by the quality and number of games. As mentioned above, there will be eighty games ready for the release date - and a fair few of these advance titles were listed in the announcement trailer that arrived online in the wake of the Vita's unveiling at E3. The sheer number of games featured was impressive. Titles rank from the indescribably eye-popping (Uncharted: Golden Abyss, a new version of LittleBigPlanet), the potentially worthwhile (Wipeout 2048, Project Gravity) and a few that seemed more forgettable (a couple of snooker and golf games that looked nothing special, for example). Interestingly, many of these titles will be cross-compatible with the Playstation 3 - these include Wipeout, and an RPG going under the working title of Ruin. It's important to note that while games ought to be playable across both of Sony's machines, to make it work you'll need to buy both the PS3 version as well as a Vita version.
Onto the price of the Vito... during the presentation it was made clear that Vita's power is comparable to its console stable mate. Sony say the Vita will cost $249 for the Wi-Fi only version, and $299 for the 3G device. To be fair to Sony, this leaves the Vita only a fraction more expensive than the Nintendo 3DS. This is a forceful pricing strategy from Sony, especially for a hand-held that is so strong and packed with features. The Vita will offer social networking elements that appear to surpass the 3DS, such as Near, which appears to function a lot like Nintendo's Streetpass, but in fact allows players to communicate properly, as well as swap trophies and other statistics.
When you think that the market has become increasingly directed towards low budget, casual games, be in no doubt that Sony's decision to make a device that has been made exclusively for the core gamer is an audacious and risky one. The Vita is an a key release for Sony, and while the company may still be reeling after the hacking problems, their new hand-held might yet capture the imagination of the gaming crowd, and re-assert Sony's place at the top of the console pyramid.
It must have been perfect timing for Sony when, only a matter of days after the latest Playstation hacking shambles, they had an opportunity to unveil to the world their next hand-held console: The Playstation Vita.
Following a quick apology regarding the data hacking occurrence, Sony's Jack Tretton presented the Playstation Vita to an excited E3 Expo. The Vita, which was formerly known as the NGP, will be out by the end of the year, and there will be eighty games scheduled for release in time for Christmas.
So, what did we think? Could it succeed the PSP, and compete with Nintendo's 3DS?
The first issue to discuss: the name. Vita. I must admit to not being a fan. What does 'Vita' mean anyway? Playstation is a station that you play on. That I get. Vita I don't. Now, maybe my negative first reaction is just a consequence of unfortunate memories of Windows Vista - which it sounds ominously similar to. Still, factoring in their previous Playstation names such as the Playstation Portable - well with that name the customer knew what he was purchasing - he was getting a hand-held version of the Playstation. Vita? Hmm. Perhaps I'll get used to it.
Moving to the design... as you would expect with Sony the Vita design is slick. Very slick. It's surrounded by a black shell, which will look immediately recognizable to PSP gamers. It carries a five-inch OLED screen, twin analogue sticks, plus a pair of cameras, located on the front and back of the Vita, which could come in useful for augmented reality games. The Vita's most potentially interesting addition is a good-sized touch-pad on the back of the machine - something which could easily allow for some fascinating opportunities for more creative developers around the world. This was demonstrated during a quick test play of 'ModNation Racers', where it was established that, while you create your own levels, you could make mountains by pushing the pad.
Regarding the Vita's size, it must be the largest 'hand-held' yet released. You must start to wonder whether hand-held is even the correct label for the device. This monster measures 182 by 84 by 19mm. That makes it bigger than the PSP 3000, although it should be added that the Vita is fractionally thinner. To put it in context, you could practically fit a whole iPhone 4 into the space taken up by Vita's screen alone. The Vita is notably more wide than the Nintendo 3DS, so there's no way that this device will fit in your pocket. So, all things considered, as it's a hand-held it will prove a little awkward if you take it with you to play on the bus.
As everybody knows by now, the success or failure of any device is determined by the quality and number of games. As mentioned above, there will be eighty games ready for the release date - and a fair few of these advance titles were listed in the announcement trailer that arrived online in the wake of the Vita's unveiling at E3. The sheer number of games featured was impressive. Titles rank from the indescribably eye-popping (Uncharted: Golden Abyss, a new version of LittleBigPlanet), the potentially worthwhile (Wipeout 2048, Project Gravity) and a few that seemed more forgettable (a couple of snooker and golf games that looked nothing special, for example). Interestingly, many of these titles will be cross-compatible with the Playstation 3 - these include Wipeout, and an RPG going under the working title of Ruin. It's important to note that while games ought to be playable across both of Sony's machines, to make it work you'll need to buy both the PS3 version as well as a Vita version.
Onto the price of the Vito... during the presentation it was made clear that Vita's power is comparable to its console stable mate. Sony say the Vita will cost $249 for the Wi-Fi only version, and $299 for the 3G device. To be fair to Sony, this leaves the Vita only a fraction more expensive than the Nintendo 3DS. This is a forceful pricing strategy from Sony, especially for a hand-held that is so strong and packed with features. The Vita will offer social networking elements that appear to surpass the 3DS, such as Near, which appears to function a lot like Nintendo's Streetpass, but in fact allows players to communicate properly, as well as swap trophies and other statistics.
When you think that the market has become increasingly directed towards low budget, casual games, be in no doubt that Sony's decision to make a device that has been made exclusively for the core gamer is an audacious and risky one. The Vita is an a key release for Sony, and while the company may still be reeling after the hacking problems, their new hand-held might yet capture the imagination of the gaming crowd, and re-assert Sony's place at the top of the console pyramid.
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