Amusingly Shuttle announced a new barebones PC kit meeting the requirements I requested in my last post about a day or two after I wrote it. Obviously they must think there is demand for such a machine too. I’m not planning to upgrade my current Shuttle gaming only box right now, I have better uses to put my money to although I admit I was tempted. When I do though, it will definitely be this new box or it’s sucessor. That said, I might have to re-evaluate if I actually even need a Windows gaming box. I’ve been playing the Mac pretty much exclusively over the last few weeks.

I wasn’t really watching the rumors but Apple just revamped the iPod line again. At first I thought nothing much was new until I noticed the 60GB model was about NZ$340 cheaper. I had originally been very tempted to get the original 60GB model when it came out but just found it too hard to justify the NZ$1100 it cost. I wouldn’t claim the new price is cheap by any means, but since I’ve got about that much in a medical insurance claim due to be paid any day and I’m not exactly short right now anyway (even though I don’t want to touch most of that money), I figured I’d splash out. I really don’t think many people use their portable players that much but mine is with me for most of the 7.5 hours a day at work and a significant amount of other time too. Also with my penchant for quality, a 10GB iPod like I currently have just doesn’t cut it any more (and hasn’t for a long time really). It might sound like I’m trying to justify it, but what I’m really getting at is that with reasons like that, I didn’t really feel it needed much justification, it was more a case of how long I could make do and how many $ I’d save by waiting. Now I’ve just got to pass the 3-4 weeks it seems it will take to arrive…*starts twiddling thumbs*

Still playing quite a bit of World of Warcraft but I’m going to keep off it Sunday to Thursday. Partly I think I’d just get bored of it quicker and partly it wouldn’t be right to leave a group in the middle of a quest because I have work the next day. I could never be one of those gamers that gets so caught up in the game that they play it to the exclusion of other aspects of life but I can see how others might with a game like this. Besides, the whole rest state system in the game will give me a nice XP bonus for spending time away so it’s win-win for me. Not doing too bad, almost level 28.

My X800 arrived at home this morning, I can’t wait to get home and try it out. Also a friend of mine picked up World of Warcraft so the plan tonight is to install the card into my Mac and join up with him in the game for some questing, etc. Should be a lot of fun. Had a busy day so far so it should be a good way to unwind.

Been playing quite a bit of Morrowind again recently. I now have my own stronghold and have progressed quite far into the game. I really like it a lot. Needless to say, I will be buying the sequel, Oblivion when it comes out. Might be worth taking some time of work for that if it’s half as good as Morrowind. No idea when it’s due out though.

Played with the Nintendo DS for the first time today and thought I’d post some impressions. I have made my general thoughts on the DS clear in previous posts, but taking it purely on it’s own merit it is undeniably a nice little machine. I do feel Nintendo didn’t come up with as good a design as they could have but it is appealing. The first thing I noticed when I held the unit in my hand (in the position used to play games) was that the plastic casing was not joined smoothly and the silver plastic (the piece with the d-pad and lower screen) sticks out quite a bit and digs into your hand. By moving my hand I found a more comfortable position but it didn’t feel natural to me. To me it does feel rather big and it doesn’t really seem to make good use of all the space, especially around the speakers. I’d rather had had a bigger screen personally. Both the screens are very crisp and clear. Much better than the various Gameboy Advance screens. I played Super Mario 64 and the graphics were rather nice. Definitely better than Playstation 1 graphics but still with many of the same artifacts. Blocky textures and little texture smoothing. No antialiasing either which bothered me far more than I expected. Thinking about it, antialiasing is just more noticable on 3D games and since I’ve been playing so many games with it in recent years, it bothers me far more than it used to. These aren’t big complaints though, the graphics are definitely a big step up from earlier handhelds. People describe the graphics as N64 level and I would have to agree, this is what it felt like to me. Sound quality was also very nice with clear and clean sounds coming out of the stereo speakers. The controls were very nice, a big step up from both the GBA and GBA SP. The travel on the buttons is great, they are much more accurate, and finally having four action buttons will make a world of difference. The L and R buttons are also much improved from the two GBA handhelds being less easy to bump and quicker to use with the shorter travel. The touch screen, messaging and voice recognition all seem like gimmicks to me but perhaps some games will make better use of them. The touch screen was usable in Mario 64 but it added nothing to the gameplay. The messaging does seem a bit pointless too since if you are within 802.11b range, you are obviously pretty close to the person and could most likely just talk to them.

Overall, it is an impressive handheld but it seems to me Nintendo has lost focus. One of the things they always said when referring to the Gamecube lacking DVD playback, etc was that it was a pure games machine. They didn’t want to try anything else, they just wanted to make the best games machine. To me the DS is the antithesis of these ideals with it’s wireless messaging, touch screen and voice recognition. A bit deal is being made of the touch screen especially. Owning a PocketPC where many games make use of the touch screen, I have to give this a big “Meh”. This adds nothing to the games.

Do I think it is a good handheld? Yes. Do I think it is a great games platform? Yes. Would I have bought one without the spectre of the Sony PSP on the horizon? Most certainly. Would I buy one in favour of the Sony PSP? Not a chance. I can’t say for sure, maybe I will pick up a Nintendo DS one of these days but I really can’t help but think this is what Nintendo should have released six months to a year ago. It would have been revolutionary back then. Now it just feels like a unfocused product designed to delay the upcoming Sony onslaught.