Apologies for the lack of articles lately. Trips to the States aside, I've just been busy as hell wading through the wealth of new games that've come out lately. That said, there's been tons of ace news and announcements from the Tokyo Games Show and Microsoft's X06 event to keep you guys busy, which you can find screenshots and blurb on over at the boards.
Expect more articles up on the site soon, but in the meantime here's a look at some of the new hardware that's just seen release for the Xbox 360. Both of these bad boys are currently only available via American import, but fear not as they'll be reaching European stores soon too.
Xbox Live Vision Camera
The Live Vision is Microsoft's attempt to breathe even more multimedia functionality into their ever impressive Live service. Forget text messaging and voicemails, video is the future...and now thanks to the Vision, the future is err, the now.
 | | The Live Vision is an entry level webcam with some great additional features, fetching for about $40 on import right now |
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Well kinda. The Vision is a nice bit of kit, don't get me wrong, and the additional wealth of features it adds to Live are indeed most welcome, but sadly it needs a good kick up the arse on the software side of things before I'd consider it a must-have. We'll come back to that in a second, but first things first, let's hear the good.
The camera itself is very sleek. Covered in that hand-shredding inch-thick plastic packaging from hell that's become a hallmark of all Microsoft products lately, the first thing that strikes you when you eventually break through its impenetrable armour is how bloody tiny the sucker is. In a good way. We're talking a mere 2 inches tall, give or take.
It's square in shape, has an adjustable base and connects via a USB lead which simply runs directly into your Xbox 360. As long as you've autoupdated to the most recent Live dashboard version, it'll be ready to go the second you plug it in.
But what does it do exactly? Video chat headlines the list of features. The quality of the conferencing is reasonable, with the Vision supporting resolutions of 640x480, which is more than adequate for the job at hand. Video chat proves un-laggy, clear and really kinda fun I must say.
Despite nabbing an early unit before its UK release later this month, I'm also rather pleased to see you can still do one-way video chat with recipients who don't even have a camera. Nice touch, that.
In terms of tweaks and options, the focus can be manually adjusted by rotating the ring of light on the front of the unit. You can also use real-time special effects in your video feeds if wanted, such as craaaaazy colours and pixellated mosaics. Fun stuff I guess - and one or two look surprisingly cool - but they ultimately prove useless and a little gimmicky.
All in all I dig the video chat, but support for more than two people would have made it far more useful (not to mention flat-out entertaining). Then again, we're still waiting for this kind of functionality to find its way into basic audio chat too, so I wouldn't hold your breath on that front.
Moving on from conferencing, the camera also lets you send still snaps in your texts and voicemails. This is a great little feature by itself, but the quality isn't mindblowing (1.3 megapixel) and it would have been nice if recipients could actually use these pictures in some way (perhaps as gamertags or dashboard wallpaper). Right now, they can simply view 'em and delete 'em...and not much else.
Speaking of gamertags, the Vision also lets you take snaps to use as your own custom gamerpics now, which in turn show up on your profile. These are only viewable to those on your buddy list, as to avoid strangers flashing their greasy cocks to infants, but it's a great way to rid Live of that anonymity and see just who those ugly bastards on your friends list are at last. Of course, for those who
do insist on whacking up a pic of a big floppy dick, parental control options allow the censoring of this stuff right across the board. Custom gamerpics are ace though, and this I wholeheartedly approve of.
 | | The Live Vision will hit Europe a little later this month, but those tight on cash might do well to opt out 'til software support improves |
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Another sweet little gimmicky trait is the way the webcam alters your dashboard background. In addition to your static wallpaper, you'll now see a "watery" video feed of whatever it's filming superimposed on top. It's very pretty, subtle, and I personally dig the heck out of it. From what I saw there's no way to turn it off though if you ain't quite the fan I am.
There are a few other settings you can mess around with though. Colour and Brightness help fine-tune your image for pixel perfect quality, and you can also zoom in at 200% if your camera is situated a little too far from your sofa, which proves particularly useful for those blessed with large living rooms.
Finally, it's worth noting the Vision also works perfectly as a PC webcam too, a sweet added bonus for Skype junkies like myself.
All this stuff's great, but the problem with the Vision is that there just ain't a whole lot else to do with it right now. Especially - as mentioned - on the software front.
Video chat is a laugh, but can I see myself using it
that much in the long run? Probably not. I much prefer the freedom of voicechat, where I'm able to simultaneously play games in the background, wonder downstairs for a beer, or pop to the bog for a dump (deaf Live fools, forever oblivious to the plops of my poop transmitting down the mic mid-conversation). When in the video chat screen though, that's your 360 locked in place 'til one of you ends it. A picture in picture display would have been a great way to solve this prob, allowing you to play some Geometry Wars or what have you in the background, but as of right now, no such feature exists. A shame.
As far as games go, the camera comes free with Uno. It's fun, simple, social, and fully supports the camera, but I personally find it pails in comparison next to the all-too-brilliant Texas Hold 'em, which conversely
doesn't support the camera I'm sad to say. Some of the older card games on Arcade have been patched with camera support though - such as Hearts and Backgammon - not to mention the work of awesomeness known as Bankshot Billiards. That's cool I guess, but beyond that...there really ain't much else.
The next big bit of use for the Vision will be Ubisoft's Rainbow Six: Vegas due out next month. This'll let you scan your face into the game and have your in-game avatar actually look like a photorealistic rendition of yourself in multiplayer games. The Dig is totally down with that, but I'd like to see it featured across more titles, namely GRAW.
As it stands, the Vision is an ace bit of hardware that pleasingly extends the multimedia capabilities of the 360, but it needs more, well, use right now. The Eye-toy "inspired" title TotemBall - which was touted as a freebie with the camera many months back - is nowhere to be seen. Will it show up as a free download on Arcade further down the line? No one knows. But such a title is exactly what the Vision needs as of right now.
A nice luxury item then, the Vision, but hardly essential buying material for the time being.
Plantronics Gamecom X30 Headset
As good as Live is, the voice comms never felt quite perfect to me. The bundled 360 headset isn't loud enough for my liking, and although perfectly functional, after sampling the delights of Skype and Ventrilo on the PC, the quality could be better to my ears too (although, admittedly, it towers over the likes of *gag* Roger Wilco).
So when my 360 headset went tits up last month, I saw it as an opportunity to try out a third-party option instead, and thus compare it with Microsoft's effort. Plantronics have been making gaming and non-gaming headsets for years now - including numerous models for the original Xbox - so they seemed like just the chaps to check out for such experimentation. With a history like theirs, surely these cats know what they're doing?
Wrong. The X30 makes me realise just how bloody good the original headset is in fact, 'cos believe me when I tell you...this thing is gash.
Once again, the X30 clicks into the base of your 360 pad as you'd expect. It includes a volume and a mic remote, but not in the convenient location of the original headset; this one's situated halfway up the cable, and is incredibly fiddly to find in the heat of the moment. As a result, it seldom gets used. Strike one.
 | | Also at $40, the Plantronics X30 is a wasted opportunity, simultaneously failing to fix some of Live's minor shortcomings, and ultimately ending up worse off then the cheapo official headset you got with your machine. Avoid |
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Strike two would be the mere fact that sound quality takes a noticeable turn for the shit with the X30 on. I'm constantly asking people to repeat themselves more slowly as I try to figure out just what the crap those waves of noise blurting into my eardrums speak of. Never had that on the old set I'm afraid. It works both ways too; people tell me I sound more distant and "crackly" than with the regular 360 headset. Previewing myself on the voicemail system backs up such claims. Tut tut.
On the plus side? The X30 is most definitely louder than the old headset. Too loud in fact - and that's strike 3 - I have to turn the sucker down to avoid distortion that renders me deaf. And what use is loudness when the quality's so effin' bad anyway?
I guess that if nothing else, ergonomically it defies such anger. The X30 is incredibly small and sleek you see, hanging from your ear in an inconspicuous manner where you can almost forget it's there at times. It's clipped quite securely in place though, so that even tugging on the sucker won't jar it loose. It looks nice too - grey and green to fit in with your 360 and its controllers - and that's a definite plus.
Sadly its small, compact size results in a mouthpiece just way too short and far from your mouth. Bending and repositioning it to a more useable position reveals worrying looseness to the build quality too, where you feel like the damn thing might snap off at a moment's notice. We'll call that strike 3 and a half.
Nope, this is a bunch of rubbish all in all, and I would recommend it to no one I'm afraid. Microsoft have their official new 100% wireless headset due out next month - one modelled on all those Bluetooth earpieces you see smug rich basts wearing on the train home - and it apparently features improved audio quality to boot. Trust me, wait for that...and resist the urge to waste your money on this hunk o' junk in the meantime.
Christmas Comes Early
Incidentally, joining the wireless headset in November will also be the Microsoft force feedback steering wheel, one peripheral I can't wait to fire up and let breath some life back into the likes of PGR3 and Ridge Racer 6.
And I ain't even mentioned the sounding-better-by-the-day HD-DVD add-on too...which'll fetch for a measly ?130 if you can believe that.
How these add-ons ultimately stack up remains to be seen, but for now I'll leave you with a Diggler promise that I'll be there, verdict in hand, as soon as humanly possible.
