Belkin PureAV HDMI Interface 3 to 1 Video Switch

RRP $249.95

Luckily, TV manufacturers are beginning to compensate for the growing number of High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) appliances, by including 2, 3 or more HDMI ports on their product. I have a fairly recent TV (about a year old) which only has 1 HDMI port, but my PS3, Xbox 360 and laptop all use HDMI. Sure, I don’t use them all at once, but having to swap the cords over all the time proved a real pain in the proverbial.

The answer? An HDMI switching unit with 3 inputs and 1 output. Forget those cheap HDMI splitter adaptors that degrade quality and defeat the purpose, Belkin have provided the perfect answer with their HDMI Interface 3 to 1 Video Switch.

This small (19cm x 8cm x 3cm) but surprisingly solid and heavy unit slots anywhere in your entertainment setup and comes complete with a high quality PureAV HDMI cable, which weighs quite a bit by itself. You can switch between inputs using the solitary button on the front of the unit or using the accompanying remote control (yes, yet another remote control for the collection!) But for some bizarre reason, the unit doesn’t have a power on/off switch – meaning it’s always on, unless you physically pull the power cord out. In these times of hardship and power saving, this feature (or lack of) left me scratching my head.

Although there are only HDMI connections on this device, you can use an HDMI Interface-to DVI cable to connect and switch between DVI components if need be. The unit also supports 480i, 480p, 720i, 720p, 1080i, and 1080p resolutions.

The PureAV HDMI Interface 3 to 1 Switch has been a Godsend for me, eliminating the need for stretching my arms behind the TV and in small gaps between shelves and also reducing the chanced of scratching my entertainment unit with flailing cords.

Belkin Micro USB Auto Charger

RRP $24.95

If you’re on the road a lot, either with work, commuting or to and from the skifields, the last thing you need is for your phone or MP3 player to die on you. If you have a model which can be charged via USB then Belkin’s Micro USB Auto Charger is the perfect device to have handy in your glovebox. Whip it into your car’s cigarette lighter socket and charge up your iPhone, iPod, MP3 player, mobile phone or, if Xzibit has pimped your ride recently, even charge up your PS3 controllers.

• Low profile design
• Quick-charge USB port for fastest possible charge
• Input voltage 12V DC
• Output voltage 5V DC, 1Amp.
• 1Amp QuickCharge USB port is compatible the iPhone and will charge other USB devices twice as fast
• Compatible with most USB devices, including iPhone, iPod (all models) and mobile phones including BlackBerry
• Micro size leaves the adapter almost flush with the dash of your car
• 1 Year Warranty

I recently purchased some USB rechargeable AA batteries, which are great for keeping in the car when you need them for anything, and you always need AA batteries just when you think you’d never need them. Even these can be charged quickly using the USB charger. Honestly, when I received this product I thought I would never use it, but it’s come in very handy on more than one occasion – and at only $24.95 it’s cheap enough to warrant a purchase purely for the convenience of having it when you need it.

When it comes to mobile games, I firmly believe that the mark of a successful title is whether it can be played in short bursts or at least be able to save anywhere for continuation at a later date. It’s got to be addictive, with simple controls and you must be able to follow what’s happening on screen, even with the sound turned off.

Each month I’ll are take a look at 4 of the latest downloadable mobile games from Telecom’s TNZ Games service. Most are priced at $6.90 and are around 300-500kb in size.

Hasbro Battleship/Connect 4

With the recent release of Hasbro Family Game Night on larger consoles, Electronic Arts have released two of the individual games from this series that are ideal for the mobile platform. Connect 4 has you playing against the ‘computer’ AI, or against a friend by passing the phone back and forth. There are two modes of play: Classic – I’m pretty sure I don’t need to describe how to play Connect 4 to anyone, do I? And Power Chips, a score-based game in which you have a time limit and several types of chips to drop that will change rows to your colour, explode lines or block your opponent for example. I find myself coming back to this mode quite often due to the added excitement of the time factor.

Battleship plays out exactly like the board game. Place your ships on your board, or use the auto placement feature (which does use some conservative placements), then take turns with the AI or a friend to take shots at coordinates chosen by moving the cursor around. Hits and misses are marked by a small animation and then a red or white peg respectively. If playing against another human, then a screen comes up telling you to pass it to the other player, so that neither player can see each others’ ship placement. Play modes are: Classic, Fire & Reload (in which you get to fire off a small salvo) and Fire Again on Hit (score a hit and fire again until you miss). This is a great little time waster as the games are short, but still long enough to keep it interesting.

Score 80%

The Sims 3

While I’m admittedly not a huge Sims fan myself, mainly due to the fact I don’t have the spare time to invest in the game to do it any real justice. So I was curious as to how the Sims format would fit into my ideal definition of a mobile game. The answer is – not that well. Obviously the range of options are cut down dramatically to incorporate the format, which is perfectly understandable. But I found being unable to flick between menus to keep up to play with all the important issues going on behind the scenes (which are what Sims games are all about) a nightmare. Several times my Sim died of starvation when I had eaten fairly recently and also lost her job due to it being hard to keep track of time. All things that are easier to track on a bigger screen and with a mouse/cursor. Asking whether I wanted to Save the game upon entry to any buildings soon became annoying too.

Dedicated fans might enjoy it, if purely to get a “fix” when away from their PC, but this mobile version of the highly successful series just didn’t win me over.

Score 50%

The Price is Right

I know a couple of people who are absolutely hooked on The Price is Right game show, but even they would struggle to find any value whatsoever in this silly and pointless mobile version of the famous TV show.

You are presented with several rounds of gameplay, which vary as you progress. It can all be over in the first round if you don’t guess the closest price to match the item presented – and straight away we hit the first fatal hurdle. The item might be a 50” LCD Television – no brand – it could be a Transonic worth $1800 or the latest Sony Bravia worth $5000. How are we to guess with any accuracy? Not only that, but are we guessing in Australian dollars or NZ? This is an underlying fatal flaw throughout the game.

Even if you do manage to fluke it through to the end, the feeling of success is a hollow one due to the fact that you’ve not won anything, but instead blown $6.90 on a load of rubbish.

Score 20%

Bejewelled Twist

Bejewelled is exactly the genre of game that suits the mobile platform. Addictive, challenging, time-dependant and void of any need for complicated controls or graphics. In Bejewelled you are given a screen full of coloured gems, by moving the cursor and pressing the action button you can rotate any square of four gems in a clockwise direction with the aim of lining three or more up – at which point they disappear and more drop down. The more points you score, the faster your meter rises and you can move onto the next level.

There are several types of special gems, usually helpful but also deadly like the bomb gem which you need to dispatch quickly before it counts down to zero.

Aside from the highly addictive Classic mode above, you can play Zen mode – which just goes on forever with no stress whatsoever, Challenge mode – basically a puzzle mode which assigns various goals, and Blitz mode – in which you aim for the highest score possible in a time limit.

All in all, Bejewelled Twist epitomises everything that you’d want in a mobile game and is $6.90 well spent.

Score 90%

Dell Studio XPS 16 Laptop

$2599 from dell.co.nz

Dell have combined the power and versatility of their XPS series with the modern stylings of their Studio range and produced an absolute beast of a machine that will also turn heads. But the Studio XPS 16 isn’t made to plant on the table of your local WiFi Hotspot café, there’d be no room for your cappa and carrot cake. With its 16” screen and weight of just under 3kg, the XPS 16 is meant to be a fully features desktop replacement with the added bonus of portability.

The moment you take the XPS 16 out of the box, you know that you’re holding something with excellent build quality. The second you see your reflection in the glossy exterior, you feel an instant connection with the unit and the good impressions continue as you further explore the design characteristics. From the wedge-shaped profile, drop hinge, slot loading DVD-RW drive to the touch sensitive multimedia buttons, leather grip and brushed aluminium accents, it’s easy to see that the XPS 16 is meant to take pride of place on any desktop or entertainment setup.

A couple of small insignificant features which I like are the ringed lights on the outer hinges which glow white under normal usage but turn orange then red before flashing as your battery power gets lower. There is also a blue light on the power plug that connects to the laptop, which stays glowing for about 30 seconds even after disconnection from the mains. Silly I know – but sometimes it’s the little touches that mean a lot.

It’s when you start playing with the multimedia features of the XPS 16 when you discover the most redeeming feature of all – the stunning 16” 1080p full HD RGBLED screen is a joy to behold and even moreso when combined with the optional Blu-ray optical drive. Viewing angles are excellent and the only colour inversion noticed was when the screen was tilted back and you looked from a low angle – which you wouldn’t anyway. Reflections are a problem too if you are in brightly lit environments or outdoors. Bright sunlight makes it virtually impossible to see anything on screen – but this is a problem with many laptops, and if you’re in this situation then you’ve taken the XPS 16 away from its intended areas of use anyway.

With its high-performance ATI^TM graphics card, the Studio XPS 16 delivers true-to-life entertainment. And your graphics-intensive applications run like a charm. So you can easily create digital content – or just sit back to enjoy it with unbelievable realism. For extraordinary sound quality, the XPS 16 has premium speakers with an integrated subwoofer and 5.1 Dolby^® Digital outputs.

There is an integrated webcam and dual-array microphones, so you can easily stay in touch with friends and interact with the online community. Why worry about forgetting your password? Facial recognition security software lets you log onto your laptop with a simple scan of your face. It automatically locks your laptop when you step away, and unlocks it upon your return.

Ok, it’s specs time – and what an impressive list of specs it is:

Processors

Up to Intel^® Core^TM 2 Duo Processor T9800 (2.93GHz, 6MB L2 Cache, 1066MHz FSB)

Operating System

Genuine Windows Vista^® Ultimate

Genuine Windows Vista^® Home Premium

Genuine Windows Vista^® Home Basic

Memory

Up to 4GB 1067MHz DDR3 SDRAM

Up to 8GB 1067MHz DDR3 SDRAM for 64-bit Operating Systems

Chipset

Intel^® PM45 with Centrino^® 2

Graphics

512MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3670

LCD Display

Edge-to-edge Glossy 15.6 inch Full HD WLED LCD display (1080p)

Edge-to-edge Glossy 16 inch Full HD RGB-LED LCD display (1080p)

Audio and Speakers

7 Watt Integrated Stereo Speakers with Subwoofer

Hard Drives

Up to 500GB 5400RPM Hard Drive

Up to 320GB 7200RPM Hard Drive

Up to 128GB Solid State Hard Drive

Optical Drives

8X DVD+/-RW Slot-load Drive

4X Blu-ray Disc Slot-load Combo Drive (DVD/CD+/-RW + BD Read)

Power

6 cell 56 WHr Li-Ion Battery

9 cell 85 WHr Li-Ion Battery

Camera, Microphones

2.0MP Integrated Webcam

Dual Digital Array Microphones

Wi-Fi Options:

Intel^® 5100 Wireless N Half Mini-Card

Intel^® 5300 Wireless N Half Mini-Card

Bluetooth Options:

Bluetooth^® Internal (2.0) mini-card- Standard

Ports, Slots, Chassis

Externally Accessible

(2) USB 2.0 compliant ports

(1) USB 2.0 compliant / e-SATA port with PowerShare

15-pin VGA video connector

IEEE compliant 1394a port

Integrated network connector 10/100/1000 LAN (RJ45)

54mm Express Card slot

Display Port

HDMI Port

AC adapter connector

Audio jacks (2 line-out, 1 Mic-in)

8-in-1 Media Card Reader

Dimensions & Weight

Width: 15.15″ (384.9mm)

Height: 0.95″ (24.1mm) front / 1.34″ (33.95mm) back

Depth: 10.02″ (254.6mm)

Weight: Starting weight of 6.4 lbs. (2.91 kg)(16″ WLED display, 6 cell battery). Weights will vary depending on configurations and manufacturing variability.

With hardware like that, especially the graphics card, the Studio XPS 16 does get quite hot, in fact it’s probably the worst I’ve encountered for self cooling. You need plenty of ventilation around the machine, and having it on a bed or the like is a definite no-no. Also, unless you’re like myself and have well and truly finished procreation, then you wouldn’t want to sit this portable sperm-boiler on your lap for too long either. Also, due to the nature of its workings, the battery life on the review unit I experienced was decidedly average – with a maximum of around 2 hours untethered. But if you’re replacing your old desktop computer anyway, then leaving the XPS 16 plugged in isn’t going to be an issue.

So whether it’s online communication, web surfing and word processing or graphic design, multimedia entertainment or graphics laden intensive gaming, then Dell’s Studio XPS 16 will rise up to meet your needs and then some. It’s a stunning machine and a processing powerhouse.

Title: Wii Sports Resort

From: Nintendo

For: Wii

If you own a Wii console and bought it new, then chances are you have already played the original Wii Sports. Its sequel, Wii Sports Resort must be played utilising the new Wii MotionPlus remote attachment which, thankfully, comes packaged with the game along with an extended remote sleeve.

There are 12 games available to play, including the return of 10 Pin Bowling and Golf, which have been beefed up a little. Also available are Archery, Swordplay, Wakeboarding, Frisbee, Basketball, Table Tennis, Power Cruising (Jetski), Canoeing, Cycling and Air Sports.

With the exception of Swordplay (where you can get by with minimalist movement), Cycling (where you make peddling motions with your hands) and Air Sports (flying a plane), all of the sports absolutely nail the technique and timing needed to perform the sport in real life thanks to the added feedback from the MotionPlus.

There’s so much to do in Sports Resort for the whole family. My personal favourites are the 3 Point Shooting Contest in Basketball, Table Tennis and dogfighting against friends in Air Sports. This is what Wii gaming is all about, Wii Sports Resort is a must-own.

Score 95%

Title: Sacred 2: Fallen Angel

From: Ascaron Entertainment

For: Xbox 360

Sacred 2 is an RPG in its most classic form. If you’re a veteran of the genre then think about the likes of Diablo for a comparison. But if you’re a veteran of the RPG genre then Sacred 2 on the Xbox 360 is a game you should probably steer well clear of. Unless, that is, you want to be buried neck-deep in clunky menus to perform simple and frequent tasks, sloppy graphics, collision problems and an uninspiring story.

But it’s not all bad news for Sacred 2. Ascaron Entertainment have presented us with an enormous world to explore, multitudes of side-quests and fun combat based gameplay where killing things and stealing their stuff is pretty much the bottom line of the game. Killing more things gets you more stuff, getting more stuff helps you kill more things – simple as that.

If you own a capable PC, then I’d recommend playing Sacred 2 on there. But if you’re tied to playing RPG’s on consoles then give this one a hire first. I should add however that the game contains one of the best looking opening actions sequences I’ve seen this year.

Score 60%

Sony Ericsson W705

(Telecom XT Network)

RRP $599

In all my years of reviewing mobile phones, surprisingly enough I had never reviewed or even used a Sony Ericsson handset until the W705 arrived on my desk. I have friends who have a love/hate relationship with the brand. One friend has had nothing but hardware problems with them and has had numerous replacement phones over the years – yet he still updates to the latest Sony Ericsson model when it’s released. So I figured they must have something going for them – and after a couple of weeks using the W705 I experienced both frustration and joy.

Frustrations were associated with texting and mainly the fact that ‘space’ has been mapped to the ‘hash’ key instead of the ‘0’ key like every other mobile phone I’ve used. Why? Just to be different? Well unless you’re used to Sony Ericssons then this one small difference proves to be one huge pain in the arse.

After over 10 years of texting using the ‘0’ key for spaces, retraining my brain and the muscle memory of my thumb was impossible in the 3 weeks I had the W705. The sheer amount of text messages I sent with ‘+’ between words was embarrassing.

My other issue was that it seemed just too long-winded to send a new text message to a recipient in your contacts. Perhaps one click too many for what should be a very streamlined and convenient feature – considering it would easily be the most utilised feature on any mobile handset.

The sliding action of the W705 felt a little too fragile for my liking as it doesn’t have the clicky nature of the comparable Nokia models. There was also nothing substantial for the thumb to get a purchase on to slide the top up. I either ended up inadvertently pressing a button or plastering thumbprints all over the screen.

That aside, the W705 is jam-packed with great little applications, features and utilities. First and foremost is the fact that it’s a fully featured Sony Walkman with Clear Stereo, Clear Bass and premium headphones to deliver sound in its purest form. The clever, although somewhat gimmicky inclusion of Shake Control means that with a flick of the wrist, the phone will select the next or previous song or playlist. While quite clever, it’s a feature that I can’t see being used all that often. SensMe is a feature that might get more use. By labelling your music appropriately, you can quickly choose a “mood” of music to listen to. Feeling a little melancholy? Then your W705 will filter through your collection and play all your Alanis Morrisette, Creed and Enya tracks - just in case you were thinking about backing away from that cliff.

All the features you would expect from a modern phone are here, but a few of the more notable/interesting ones are:

Camera

3.2MP

3x Digital Zoom

Geo Tagging

Video & Picture blogging

Video light & Flash

Photo Fix

Entertainment

Radio

Walk Mate (built in pedometer)

YouTube viewing and upload

Motion gaming

3D gaming

Connectivity

WiFi

PictBridge

USB

PC Sync

Bluetooth

Google Maps

Access NetFront Web Browser

Music

Music tones (MP3’s as ringtones)

TrackID

Shake Control

SensMe

Bluetooth stereo

Album Art

Screen

2.4” 262.114 colour TFT

320×240 pixels

Memory

Memory Stick Micro up to 8GB (4GB included)

Phone Memory 120MB (approx)

Size/Weight

95×48x14.3 mm

98g

Ultimately, the Sony Ericsson W705 is a fun phone to play with and well worth a look if you don’t want to carry around a Walkman and a phone separately. Some of the inclusions seem a bit of a gimmick, but then there are others that make you want to show it off to anyone who will listen. Sony Ericsson fans will love it to bits, and given enough time I probably would have grown to love it too – but the fact that it was inconvenient to open properly and having the space button mapped somewhere else just left me scratching my head. For the reasonable price of $599 (cheaper if you commit to certain plans) you do get a lot of phone for your money.

Ultimate Ears 700 noise-isolating earphones

RRP $499

Logitech have released a new model in their highly popular Ultimate Ears range of professional noise-isolating earphones. They claim that the UE 700’s are used by 75% of professional musicians and sound professionals which I thought was a bold claim until a quick perusal of the product website provided a who’s who of celebrities, bands and solo musicians using Ultimate Ears. Whether Logitech bung a set in every celebrity goodie bag at Hollywood functions is something most of us will never know, but they have some high profile endorsements nonetheless.

To give you a cleaner, more precise audio experience, the Ultimate Ears 700 earphones use a custom-tuned dual-armature layout that separates the broad frequency response – 10 Hz to 16.5 kHz – into two high-fidelity channels per ear.

As small as a peanut, the micro-design provides a comfortably secure fit that allows you to wear it a long time without discomfort. Wear them with the cord hanging down for casual listening or over the ear while exercising or when more active.

Three different-sized silicone ear-cushions and two sets of Comply™ foam ear cushions are included to find a “magic seal” against outside noise in your ears. Tapered silicone ear-cushions are designed to naturally fit into your ear-canal for a better seal. Also included is a pocket-ready hard case for storing your earphones and spare ear-cushions and a Sound Level Attenuator for lowering the overall volume levels of noisy sound sources. The UE 700’s are compatible with any hardware that has a 3.5mm headphone jack

The true test of an earphone that fits properly is from the amount of collateral noise, or how much others can hear what you’re listening to. There’s nothing worse than hearing every guitar riff coming from the earphones of the kid sitting down the other end of the bus. I put the UE 700’s though some vigorous testing in perhaps the most sensitive of situations – sitting in bed next to my wife who was trying to get to sleep. Firing up the laptop I plugged the UE 700’s and equipped the Comply™ foam ear-cushions. Tests were preformed at levels that my ears could handle without bleeding and the results* were as follows:

1. Public Enemy………….Pass
2. Slipknot…………………Pass
3. Mario Lanza……………Stirred slightly, but Pass
4. Cyndi Lauper…………..Pass
5. Quake III………………..Pass
6. Action movie…………..Pass

*It should be noted that the measure of success in these tests was NOT waking my lovely wife up.

In fact the only time I got told to shut up was from excessive keyboard tapping.

So the UE 700’s not only look and sound amazing, but they sound pretty good to everyone else around you too. After all, 75% of music industry professionals can’t be wrong.

Specs:

• Type: in-ear

• Frequency response: 10 Hz-16.5 kHz

• Impedance: 40 Ohms, 1 kHz

• Sensitivity: 113 dB SPL/mW at 1kHz

• Weight: 0.41 ounces (11.6 grams)

• Noise isolation: 26 dB

Connection

• Cable length: 46 inches (116.8 cm)

• Input connector: 1/8 inch (3.5 mm), gold plated

Title: The Conduit

From: High Voltage Software

For: Wii

If you happen to be a Wii owner who has a separate shelf for your Wii-exclusive first-person shooters then I would imagine it’s been looking pretty bare in the last couple of years. Well, it might just be time to dust off that shelf, vacuum the dead moths from the corners and place High Voltage Software’s The Conduit in pride of place.

The Conduit has attracted a lot of attention due to its marketing drive and due to the fact that many gamers are heralding it as the game that proved the FPS genre isn’t a lost cause on the Wii. Well this may be true, the game is a success from a technical perspective and will hopefully encourage other developers to take a serious look at what the Wii can achieve with its 1600cc motor in comparison to the grunty V8 powerhouses of its current generation counterparts. So yes, the genre isn’t a lost cause, but as a game, The Conduit is a missed opportunity.

At face value, The Conduit’s storyline is shallow and generic. If it were a recipe then it would be an Edmonds Cookbook staple.

1. Take one alien invasion
2. Add one Secret Service agent
3. Season with assorted weapons
4. Simmer for a couple of hours, stirring occasionally.

Sure, there are twists and conspiracies thrown in and your role changes in conjunction to these twists as you work out who you can and can’t trust. But due to the cast of characters who have absolutely no character and the vanilla plot and setting, you just don’t get drawn in or emotionally attached to the game whatsoever. Halfway through the game I find myself thinking: “Yeah, I’m enjoying the innovative controls, and it’s nice to see my Wii tested graphically – but I’m not sure I can be bothered playing any further”. There’s just nothing compelling enough to make you want to finish the game when you know it’s going to be a case of wash, rinse and repeat. The plot is stitched together by dialogue boxes between levels which doesn’t help bring any sense of atmosphere to the game. There are radios scattered throughout which supply much needed backstory which gives some kind of context to your cause.

Let’s cut to the chase and talk about the controls. It is after all, what will shift units off the shelves – and so it should as the remote and nunchuk work very well indeed. Not mouse and keyboard well, but once you have them fine-tuned and are used to them, you’ll wonder if you could ever go back to double thumbsticks. Everything about the controls can be calibrated and tweaked, and it’s well worth taking the time to get things just the way you want them. As a default, the Wii remote is used to aim up, down, left and right along with firing, weapon changes and melee. The nunchuk thumbstick moves forward and back plus strafes and you use it to throw grenades by mimicking a throwing action. The melee, using the remote, is achieved by a short stabbing/prodding motion and feels a little silly to begin with. Many times I found myself moving both controllers which initiated both a melee and a grenade throw until I co-ordinated myself to move one without the other. But as mentioned, everything can be customized – so if the melee action doesn’t agree with your playing style then you can easily map it to the D-Pad for example. There are about 10 separate actions to perform in the game, so taking some time to set up the controls to your liking is imperative, especially with movement and aiming sensitivity. The default was a bit twitchy for my preference, so with a little tweaking the accuracy I obtained was spectacular.

I must admit to being a tad cynical about how well the control method was going to work, but walked away with a feeling that I’d actually physically contributed to the fight and a warm glow that the future bodes well for the genre on the Wii. Roll on the next Metroid release!

Sadly, the game itself doesn’t live up to the lofty heights of the excellent controls. Poorly designed levels present a mixture of sewers, streets and government bases, yet all play identically with narrow corridors funneling you from one alien-filled area to the next. Your mecha-insect-like enemies spawn from egg-sacs which must be found and destroyed if you want the steady flow of attackers to stop. Locations range from obvious to devilishly hard to find and you’ll die many, many times from enemies sneaking up from behind and above as you search every nook and cranny. There are several frustrations like this, another being forced to find and disarm virtually invisible bombs while snipers are taking pot-shots at you and on-foot enemies are swarming around. Usually the controls are quick and accurate enough to deal with any situation thrown at you, but then there are isolated instances when myriads of enemies (they’re called The Drudge by the way) are already alerted to your presence and are waiting behind a door for you to enter. You’ll be killed several times over until you can memorise their scripted locations by trial and error. It just illustrates the thoughtless design on display throughout the game.

Up to 12 players can compete on 7 multiplayer maps based on the single player levels. But because these are centered around corridors and rooms, most deathmatch battles come down to who can aim and shotgun the fastest or throw lucky grenades. Capture the Flag matches also prove lacklustre as the levels don’t really allow for any creative team tactics. You can rank up, which is great, but unfortunately the multiplayer leaves you with the same hollow feeling that the single player campaign does.

Graphically, The Conduit is one of the better looking games on the Wii – but don’t go comparing it to FPS graphics on other consoles – the Wii will never, ever compete. But there are impressive textures and lighting plus great detail on the enemies and explosion effects. There was literally no drop in framerate, even with a screen full of enemies, but I did experience some sporadic lag playing online. The art direction is generic, with unimaginative enemy and environment design that goes hand-in-hand with the aforementioned generic storyline.

At the end of the day, The Conduit is a triumph in technical achievement in terms of nailing down a brilliant interactive FPS control system – and is well worth playing to experience that alone – but without any substance to back it up, the whole experience is a bit, for want of a better term…”meh”. However, mark this game down as the title that proved FPS games on the Wii are no longer something to be sneered at.

Ups: The fantastic control method is a feat of technical excellence. Fully customisable to suit your own style of play.

Downs: The game is bland with no substance in story or level design. Difficulty drifts from very easy to frustratingly hard.

Score 68%

Watch the trailer

Title: Ghostbusters: The Video Game

From: Atari

For: PS3

There was no happier gamer than myself when I found out a Ghostbusters game that remained faithful to the movies and their hilarious cast of characters was being made. What made it even better is that the game boasts a new storyline written by Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis and includes all the original voice talent.

The game is a 3^rd Person adventure in which you play a nameless and voiceless rookie who has been drafted into the Ghostbusters team two years after the second movie ends. In a nutshell, you move from situation to situation hunting down various types of ghosts and capturing them with your proton packs and traps. While on the surface this does get somewhat monotonous, the action and character interaction is usually entertaining enough to keep it interesting.

In terms of difficulty, the game is all too easy, especially the boss battles. Graphically the special effects and character likenesses are impressive and worthy of the films.

Ultimately, Ghostbusters: The Video Game does nothing wrong, but doesn’t break any ground either. Still, it’s a must have for true fans of 80’s memorabilia.

Score 70%