Friday 16 October 2015

Logitech G633 and G933 headphones

Logitech G633 and G933 headphones

In development for 18 months at its expansive US audio facility which I recently visited, Logitech’s new gaming headphones aim high, and hit most marks. These are gaming cans we can recommend highly; although they certainly aren’t the cheapest you can buy. Ostensibly the two models are identical, with the cheaper 633’s eschewing wireless, though in testing the wireless G933’s gain a smidge of amplifi cation from the wireless circuitry and as a result have a slightly fuller tone.

Don't underestimate the Force

Star Wars: Battlefront

Imagine the pressure involved in making a Star Wars game that is releasing a month ahead of an all-new Star Wars movie. Now double it, because that game is a Battlefront title, and then double it again because it’s being made by DICE. Subtract the number you first thought of and then multiply it by Episode VII. Yeah. That kind of pressure.

Mighty No. 9

Mighty No. 9

Should you be worried about the delay?

Where is Mighty No. 9? You should be banging your head against its brick wall of difficulty spikes and moaning on Reddit about how it is or isn’t better than how you remember Mega Man by now. But you aren’t, and we weren’t really sure why. So we went straight to the source, to producer Keiji Inafune himself to get a little more info on the delayed platformer.

Telltale: behind the scenes

Inside Telltale Games

For 11 years, the Walking Dead developer has been chasing down the future of interactive entertainment. As it turns out, though, the future is now

In 2004, following the high-profile cancellation of the adventure game Sam & Max: Freelance Police, a trio of former LucasArts employees founded California-based Telltale Games with a vision for “television-style gaming”: sitcom-sized episodes based on popular licences to be delivered digitally on a set schedule. At the time, cofounder Kevin Bruner expressed that Telltale’s plans were “bigger than videogames” – the studio wanted to class up interactive entertainment the same way HBO was doing for TV with high-quality scripted shows like The Sopranos.

Minecraft Story Mode

Minecraft Story Mode

The hasty cash-in train? Nah, you missed that one

In the grand pantheon of things that annoy us about games, the hasty cash-in has to be the worst. It’s cynical, preying on the devout fandom of those who love something more than life itself. It’s bad, giving us a game that’s been in development for about three weeks (slight exaggeration), released as a buggy, broken mess. It’s frustrating, because it sells really well despite being awful.

Using professional printing services

Using professional printing services

Whether it’s for newsletters, stationery or Christmas cards, a professional printing bureau is often your best option. Ben Pitt explains what’s involved

Home printers are great when you want to make a few quick copies of something, but when print runs involve hundreds of copies it all becomes much more laborious. The paper input and output trays need constant monitoring. The printer randomly reports that an ink cartridge is empty, even though you know there’s still enough for dozens more pages, so you stand over the printer watching for streaky colours. When it’s time to replace a cartridge, you discover the colour you need is the only one that’s not there. Then there’s the rigmarole of collating and folding multiple-page documents without getting the pages mixed up.

Desktop publishing with Quark DesignPad

Desktop publishing with Quark DesignPad

Is an iPad really up to the demands of desktop publishing? Ben Pitt takes Quark’s design app for a test drive to find out

Incredibly, Microsoft Windows has been around for 30 years, and some of the stalwarts of media-production software – Photoshop, Cubase, QuarkXPress – aren’t much younger. Some people would argue this maturity makes them refined and packed with useful features, but to others they’re bloated, overly complex and set in their ways. There’s some truth to both viewpoints.

Where’s my smart home anyway?

Where’s my smart home anyway

Is the Internet of Things all hype? Nicole Kobie explains why smart homes and other connected gizmos are struggling to capture the imagination – and purchasing pounds – of consumers

The promise of the Internet of Things (IoT) and smart homes is glorious: a life of leisure enabled by the tech equivalent of a house staff straight out of Downton Abbey. A revolution in home convenience unmatched since the heyday of consumer home appliances in the 1950s.

Moore's Law at 50

Gordon Moore

Back in 1965, the country was gripped by Beatlemania, as the Fab Four released Help!, Yesterday and Nowhere Man. Across the pond in San Francisco, the nascent flower power movement was about to usher in the hippy era. NASA’s second-generation manned spacecraft, Gemini, flew for the first time, although it would be another four years before Apollo 11 landed man on the Moon. Harold Wilson was in Number 10, average UK annual income was £751, and you could buy a house for £3,660, a Mini for around £500, and a pint of bitter for 9p. Computing was dominated by million-pound mainframes and ten thousand-pound minicomputers; the microprocessor, and its promise of desktop computing, was still six years away.