Objects of Gaming Desire
Video and computer game players are a notoriously persnickety bunch. No matter which game you buy for them--even if it’s one they wanted--it’ll be old hat in a week or two. So forget trying to find eternal happiness in a single title. It won’t happen. But the gadgets we’ve found this year promise days, if not weeks, of digital bliss.
Sidewinder Dual Strike
Playing first-person action games can be frustrating as players rely heavily on both the keyboard and the mouse to see and kill everything around them. Watching an expert at the controls is a thing of beauty. Watching almost everyone else is a thing of comedy.
Microsoft’s Sidewinder Dual Strike game pad attempts to bridge the gap by giving ordinary players more intuitive control over most first-person games. In effect, the controller marries a traditional game pad with a mouse.
It provides seamless control for games such as “Sin,” “Half-Life” and “Unreal.” As players move with the thumbstick on the left side of the controller, they can look around by manipulating the right side, which is connected via a rotating ball-and-socket joint.
It’s effortless.
Price: $49.95
Availability: Most specialty software stores, such as Babbages and Software Etc.
System requirements: Pentium 166 running Windows 98 with 16mb of RAM and a Universal Serial Bus port.
Information: https://www.microsoft.com
Glasstron PLM-A35 Video Headset
If you or the ones you love don’t mind looking stupid--and we’re being charitable here--the Sony Glasstron PLM-A35 video headset offers the ability to watch television or play video games at eardrum-shattering levels without bothering anyone else.
Video headsets are nothing new, but most did little more than induce throbbing headaches after a few minutes of use. At just 3.5 ounces, this headset is sleeker than the monsters of the past. The headset fits even those with glasses.
Two half-inch, high-resolution liquid crystal displays sit inside the headset, giving wearers the illusion that they are watching a 52-inch screen from about six feet away. Sure the $600 price tag is steep, but have you priced big-screens lately? Stereo audio is supplied by headphones built into the headset stems.
Price: $599
Availability: Tough to find at retail, but available online at https://www.amazon.com.
System requirements: Any NTSC video source such as a television with audio and video outputs, DVD players or VCRs, camcorders or video game consoles.
Information: https://www.sel.sony.co
3dfx Voodoo 3 3500TV Card
True computer vegetables position their television sets next to the monitor so they can multitask, taking in the news of the day as they free the world from the tyranny of lizard people. The 3dfx Voodoo 3 3500 TV card can’t replace that experience--yet--but it beefs up most computers to handle better graphics, receive television signals and edit video.
Many of the hottest games show their true glory--or gore--only when optimized on an accelerator card. The Voodoo 3 3500TV marries that technology with the ability to receive and capture video from a tuner or VCR.
As a 3-D card, the Voodoo 3 3500 TV pumps out 8 million triangles per second and can create realistic textures and movements. The card carries 16mb of video memory, more than enough for most operations.
As a video capture and editing card, the Voodoo 3 3500TV allows wannabe Spielbergs to edit home movies and add special effects. Or, on a more mundane note, computer users can watch CNN in the corner of the screen as they cruise the Internet.
Price: $249.95
Availability: Most retail computer stores, such as Best Buy and CompUSA.
System requirements: Pentium 266 with 16mb of RAM and an advanced graphics port.
Information: https://www.3dfx.com
Sega Dreamcast
Simply put, Dreamcast rocks. That means it’s good, very good, at what it does--which is deliver high-intensity arcade-style games.
Dreamcast features 128-bit processing--twice the juice of Nintendo 64 and four times as much as Sony PlayStation--that delivers 3 million graphic polygons per second. That allows for more realistic movement and shading. Next year, online game arenas will host Dreamcast players, who can connect to the Internet through the machine’s standard 56K modem. Although only a little more than 3 months old, Dreamcast already boasts an impressive library of games. Fans of role-playing adventures and strategy games won’t find much just yet to interest them. But for folks who like their games fast, loud and beautiful, Dreamcast offers a range of titles unprecedented in video game history.
The console comes packed with a single controller and no games. An extra controller--at $30--is a must for multiplayer games. A visual memory unit--at $25--allows players to save games in progress. And then there are the games themselves, which start at about $40.
Price: $199
Availability: Most retail electronic and toy stores, such as Best Buy, Comp USA and Toys R Us.
System requirements: A television with audio and video inputs.
Information: https://www.sega.com
