Posted by: Jane Douglas

In the months following the launch of Apple's smartphone (this thing called the iPhone 3G - you may have heard of it), making a comparably sized splash with your new mobile must be a daunting prospect for handset makers.

That might explain Nokia's slightly bizarre pre-launch activities for the N96, the impatiently awaited follow-up to the frankly awesome N95.

The Finnish phone makers have put 96 of the mobiles up for grabs in a competition at a thoroughly flashy (and Flashy) site called Face the Task, styled after Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon, with a lady martial artist skipping over rooftops armed with a handy N96.

Not only that, but they are offering eco-friendly gadget fans the chance to alternatively"purchase" one of these N96s ahead of release by donating 759 Euros to the World Wildlife Fund, with the money going to a project for saving red pandas in Nepal.

It almost goes without saying that 96 prize units are special limited editions: they come in uniquely numbered decorated ash tree boxes, packaged in raw silk bags.

The word on the street (and indeed on the Tech & Gadgets news pages) is that an October 1st UK release date has now been confirmed for the N96 - for all the major operators but O2, funnily enough.

Read the full article here: Nokia N96 release date confirmed
And try your luck here: Win a Nokia N96

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Posted by: Jane Douglas

Because I like to keep my finger on the pulse on all the top-flight gadgetry I won't be able to afford this side of an obscene pay rise, yesterday I headed along to a Sony showcase event.

If I were to build a fantasy home entertainment system, I'd definitely need one of Sony's mammoth 70-inch Bravia LCD TVs, which dwarfed all the puny 46-inchers on show. Either that or, at the other end of the scale, the world's first ever organic-light emitting diode (OLED) televisions, the ultra-thin 11-inch XEL-1.

I'm told Sony is looking to bring the XEL-1 (right) to the UK around the end of this year, with a modified inbuilt speaker system. So far they've only been available in the US and Japan, retailing for about $2,500 (£1,250).

It'll have been worth the wait for British early-adopters of OLED television. The XEL-1 has an eye-popping million-to-one contrast ratio, producing incredibly rich blacks. At the Sony event the XEL-1 was being used to screen standard definition footage - and somehow even that looked sharper than HD.

I could barely tear myself away from the Sountina (left), either, a cylindrical glass speaker topped and tailed with cool blue lights and mounted on a leather-clad subwoofer.

Putting out crystal clear sound in 360 degrees, the Sountina is a speaker to be reckoned with - and is priced to match. One of these will set you back about $10,000 (£5000).

The Sony rep told me that they sell these mostly to high-end hotels and luxury car dealerships...

At the more affordable end of Sony's sound systems was the Rolly (below). Frankly, I'm not sure how we lived this long without MP3 players that doubled as programmable dancing robots.

These gizmos roll, swivel, spin, glow and flap their tiny "wings" in time with the music. Purchase two or more and you can synch them up to line dance together.

They have, unsurprisingly, been a bit of a hit in Japan. No exact date on when they'll be hitting our shelves, but keep an eye out - perhaps closer to Christmas.

A little less flashy but no less impressive were the new Vaio laptops. Across the various ranges, all Sony's laptops now feature a neat little cylinder hinge (left).

The green light is there mostly for cosmetic reasons, unifying the look of Vaio-branded laptops. More significantly, though, this hinge lets the screen sit a little lower - starting closer to the keyboard and allowing for a smaller overall footprint.

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Posted by: Jane Douglas

For those with even a passing interest in gadgetry, it's been hard to get away from the Flip.

Being a low-cost, easy-to-use gadget available just about everywhere from Amazon to Toys R Us, this ultra-simple video recorder has been popping up all over the place, it seems.

Or maybe it's just confirmation bias because the Flip has been on my mind of late. I recently commandeered our review unit to capture some video at a wedding and have been filming anything that crosses my path ever since.

Initially, I was dubious. I was wary of a sub-par gadget being cynically marketed with possibly a borderline-technophobic attitude, assuming the average user couldn't want anything as bafflingly complex as, ooh, a zoom function.

It didn't seem like that much of a bargain, either, though it was promoted as a cheap digital camcorder.

The Flip retails at just under £100. With plenty of us already carrying mobile phones capable of capturing a few minutes of low-to-reasonable quality video, why would anyone shell out a hundred quid for a gadget that's bigger and just a bit better than a mobile?

Consider me a convert, though, because the robust, minimal Flip has opened my eyes. The quality of its video is actually pretty good. Used in daylight, it produces surprisingly crisp-looking video and impressively rich colours.

One of our interns, a video specialist, went as far to say that in bright light the Flip had a better (automatic)  white balance than some of the office's much pricier video kit.

And then, also to recommend the Flip over your cameraphone, there's the fact that recording an hour of video (the Flip's limit) will suck your mobile battery dry - if it's even got the capacity to store that much. The Flip, meanwhile, will still be going strong on two AA Duracells.

If I had my way, the Flip would come with rechargeable batteries, a charger and a basic zoom feature - though these would all push the price up past that £100 sweet spot.

But I've no complaints, really. There's something very satisfying about flipping out this gizmo's inbuilt USB dongle and slotting it straight into your laptop - with no annoying fumbling around for just the right connector cable.

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Posted by: Nik Taylor

I hope you enjoyed all our coverage from last week's E3 conference in LA. Because we like to be helpful, we've put it all in one handy place - Tech & Gadgets' E3 special.

I had a great time out at the event, spending my time getting far more excited than is healthy about upcoming titles like Gears 2, Fallout 3 and Resi 5.

It wasn't all about the games though - there was a bit of down-time too. I tended to spend this trying to finish the unfeasibly large meals served up in American restaurants. It's not easy. Check out the slice of carrot cake I was served from the sweet trolley...

The plate it's on is a standard dinner plate. Needless to say, I didn't quite get through it.

It's been a busy week as usual on Tech & Gadgets. Click on the pictures below to check out some of the highlights.

Elsewhere on the web...

Off to see The Dark Knight open tonight? You'll soon be able to play the game too.

'Crazy' copyright fight by Universal.

If fonts were people.

Want a Back to the Future hoverboard? Only $30,000.

iPhone 3G: will it blend?

Mojave. Is it the new Vista?

See you next week.

Posted by: Nik Taylor

I'm back from E3, swapping the glorious sunshine of LA for the murky grey skies of another British summer.

Although the conference lacked any announcements that could be justifiably be described as 'huge', I found it thoroughly enjoyable. And there was plenty to talk about. Nintendo's announcement of GTA's debut on the DS caught everyone by surprise, and the company's new peripherals - the Wii Speak and MotionPlus will be interesting additions. Sony showcased some dazzling games - including MAG - an incredible sounding shooter that will enable 256 players to battle it out at the same time. Meanwhile, Xbox announced its new dashboard for Live, an innovation that looks as though it will radically change the online gaming experience.

This was my first time at E3 and one thing I really wasn't prepared for was the scale of the thing.

The conference itself, in the Los Angeles Convention Center (LACC), is modest in size and - these days, at least - fairly low key. However, there are attached events going on all over the city, meaning the week is spent being constantly ferried through the intense LA traffic. It can easily take an hour to get from a game demo in Santa Monica to a press conference at the LACC.

Quite rightly, the games were the stars of the show. Big name titles such as Fallout 3, Resident Evil 5, the astoundingly gory MadWorld and Prince of Persia all caught the eye.

The conference was also notable for the increased focus on casual gaming. Xbox has made a clear decision to go after this sector of players, with sing-along game Lips and camera-based title You're in the Movies both aiming to sell to the pick-up-and-play crowd. Even the developers of more traditionally 'hardcore' games are keen to emphasise the simplicity of their control systems. It will be interesting to see how long this lasts. Is casual gaming just a fad, or does the future lie with this kind of middle-of-the-road easy-gaming?

Anyway, I'm off to clear my fuzzy head of jet-lag, but look out on the site next week for reflections on this year's conference. We'll have a piece on the top games that were shown, as well as a general look back on how the week went. We'll also have hands-on first looks at Gears of War 2 and Fable 2, accompanied by interviews with game creators Cliffy B and Peter Molyneux, respectively.

Posted by: Nik Taylor

I've spent this afternoon dashing around the Los Angeles Convention Center, trying to take in as much as possible from all the games being demoed here.

There are stacks of shooters here, and of course Resident Evil 5 is a show stopper. Alhough what's been shown so far is not exactly a seismic leap onwards from Resi 4, the new title clearly has more than enough to keep the familiar heart-pumping tension and quickfire action going.

But the title that's really caught my eye is Fallout 3. I got to have a quick blast around it earlier and wish I could have had longer. Its developers Bethesda were behind Oblivion, and the trademark qualities of that game are all over this new shooter.

Click here for new Fallout 3 screenshots released at E3.

It's set in a post-apocalyptic Washington DC which you can explore fully. Right at the start of the game, you wander out onto a cliff edge to be confronted by an astonishing vista of the shattered capital. But what really makes the game jump off the screen is its shooting system.

When an enemy appears, you can hit a shoulder button to freeze the action. You can then select the body part you want to shoot - with percentage points showing your chance of a successful hit. From here you can set up multiple shots - all on the same body part, or on different parts or even different enemies. It gives you a number of tactical decisions to make.

Do you gamble on the low chance of making a successful head shot, or will you go for the easier torso hit that leaves a greater chance of survival? Once you make your decision, you come out of the frozen mode and see your shots ping out in cinematic style (those head-shots are awesomely impressive). It all makes the combat modes in the game far more demanding far, beyond the usual random hammering of the shoot button.

There's plenty more of interest too, such as the use of skill points, like in Oblivion, which can open up perks once increased (like in Call of Duty 4).

I look forward to seeing more of this game soon. Keep an eye on the site over the next few days for more on the top games from E3.

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Posted by: Jane Douglas

At the E3 games expo, from which my co-editor Nik Taylor is currently reporting, Nintendo have just announced that Rockstar will be bringing out a Grand Theft Auto game for the DS. It will go by the name of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars.

When I texted a friend the news, his response was a three-word text:

"What?! You joking?!"

And this is a guy who usually knows gaming news almost preternaturally early, like some kind of mystical videogame prophet.

So yes, this has been a surprise out of Nintendo's corner. For the DS, a GTA title is a pretty significant departure from the more family-friendly games we've grown accustomed to.

There are no screenshots yet - in fact, nothing but a logo from Nintendo so far, and the fact that the game will be set in Liberty City once more. But with the game scheduled for a winter release, you'll most likely not have to wait long for more from Rockstar...

Click for more news and views from E3 2008.

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Posted by: Nik Taylor

Lost Planet is to be turned into a movie. The Capcom title will get the Hollywood treatment with screenwriter David Hayter penning the script. Hayter was behind X-Men, X2 and Watchmen.

Click for more news and views from E3 2008.

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Posted by: Nik Taylor

Sony's E3 briefing on Tuesday was all about how the machine is set to 'take over your living room', in the words of Sony Entertainment CEO Jack Tretton.

Gaming surprises were thin on the ground. We got to see glimpses of upcoming games such as LittleBigPlanet (which is out in October and is exciting everyone apart from me, I think), Resistance 2 and DC Universe Online. Resistance 2, in particular looked ace.

There was the expected announcement of God of War III, and a short, movie-style trailer of that. Right at the end, we heard about the genuinely exciting MAG - Massive Action Game. This Call of Duty IV style shooter will support an immense number of players. You can go through the game in eight-player co-op mode - or you can head to multiplayer. This can handle battles involving up to 256 human players - all in squads of eight. You'll have to work your way through the game in order to earn the right to command your own squad. This looked really cool, but there was no word on when we can expect it.

Beyond that, the focus was on all the other things the PS3 can do, as well as new titles for the PSP and the continuing commitment to the venerable PS2 platform.

As of Wednesday, the PS3 store will include a video button, from where you can rent or buy digital downloads of TV shows and movies. Loads of studios are on board, but there was no mention on how this sort of thing might impact on sales of Blu-ray discs for Sony's player...

The PSP will be getting its own version of Buzz and - in the States at least - a new bundle with Ratchet & Clank: Size Matters, a silver PSP, National Treasure 2 movie and a 1GB memory card.

There was still no date on the appearance (or otherwise) of Home, and no comment on what's holding things up.

Oh, and you'll soon be able to watch Top Gear through Gran Turismo TV in GTV Prologue, as well as loads of other newly licensed motorsport content such as 24 hour Nurburgring racing.

Click for more news and views from E3 2008.

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Posted by: Nik Taylor

A few more details to follow up Jane's earlier blog about the Nintendo press conference. There were plenty of mutterings among the journos present that there was nothing really big here - but I thought the announcements were pretty interesting;

We got to see the new Wii MotionPlus demoed. Now this is either a handy add-on to improve the responsiveness of the Wiimote, or a complete admission that the original simply wasn't up to scratch, depending on your point of view. The main point is that it makes your arm movements much more accurately represented on screen.

You'll get one bundled if you invest in the new Wii Sports game - Wii Sports Resort - which was also on show. This game is beach-based and out next spring. Among the sports on offer are jetskiing, Frisbee throwing and the distinctly un-beachy pastime of fencing.

The announcement that really got everyone's attention was that Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars out for DS before Christmas. The new game will be set in Liberty City.

The latest party game for the Wii will be Wii Music. This music party game enables you to play more than 50 instruments by simply moving around in the way you would if playing them. I'm not quite sure how the gameplay will work with this one - apparently you can't make mistakes. In drumming mode the balance board is used to create  a full drum simulator. This also has lessons which it's claimed will actually teach you to play drums.

The Wii Speak add-on looks good. This enables speech over Wii for the first time. It's a multi-way microphone, so you only need one for the whole room. The add-on will come bundled with the new Animal Crossing game.

Spore will come to DS (in a scaled down form), as well as a new Guitar Hero game.

We saw a demo of Shaun White Snowboarding being played on a Balance board. Anyone that liked the skiing games on Wii Fit will be all over this one.

There was also a bit of talk about how the DS will be used to become more of a smart-console - so features will be added to help you do smartphone type things such as checking sport scores, airline times, local listings and so on.

Click for more news and views from E3 2008.

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Posted by: Jane Douglas

Nik is in the Nintendo E3 press conference as I type, Twittering away. I'm bringing his little snippets of fresh gaming news over here too. Here we go:

New Wii Sports game, Wii Sports Resort, will come with the new MotionPlus Wii remote add-on. Features frisbee throwing and jet skis, among other things.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars will be set in Libery City and out on the Nintendo DS this winter. Who knew?

Animal Crossing: City Folk will be out on the Wii by the end of the year. Will come with a conference-call-style microphone called Wii Speak.

Sandbox games don't come much more contrasting than Animal Crossing and Grand Theft Auto (I don't fancy the Animal Crossing critters' chances on the mean streets of Liberty City). Maybe this is a promising sign that Nintendo, having more or less cornered the family-friendly market, are looking to widen their range with some harder grown-up titles too.

Click for more news and views from E3 2008.

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Posted by: Nik Taylor

I couldn't get to EA's press conference today as I was busy on the other side of town checking out a demo of Banjo Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts (more on that soon). But I've tracked down some of the key points from the briefing.

SimAnimals (The Sims with, um, animals) will come out on Wii and DS.

The Sims 3 will be out in 2009. Characters will be far more complex and will be going out and about - rather than just staying in their houses.

Dead Space will be out on 360, PC and PS3 on October 31. One of the big features will be zero-G gameplay.

Demo of Mirror's Edge (free-running game) and a trailer for Spore were shown.

EA Sports will start using 'Dynamic DNA' which updates the way a player acts depending on daily changes in his real life stats. All Play will be brought in, which will give sports games more 'Wii-style' pick-up-and-play.

Plenty of games such as Tiger Woods and Need for Speed coming out for iPhone.

Dragon Age Origins (Bioware) and Left 4 Dead (Valve) both get demoed.

Visit our E3 special for news and views from LA.

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Posted by: Nik Taylor

There was no motion-sensitive controller and no ground-breaking handheld device. Such rumours had spread rapidly ahead of Xbox's media briefing on Monday morning at E3 - but in the end it was the games that were the stars of the show.

In-game demos of Resident Evil 5, Gears of War 2, Fallout 3 and Fable 2 made everyone sit up and take notice. On top of those were teasers for Guitar Hero: World Tour, Rock Band 2, Viva Pinata 2, among others. Topping the lot was a stunning teaser trailer for Final Fantasy XIII - now licensed for Xbox.

The briefing also covered a brand new dashboard for Xbox Live which will be launched in the autumn. Gamecards will be augmented with the addition of avatars, which the truly committed can customise with new clothes, hairdos and so on.

Logging into Live will take you into a community section, where you see all your friends as avatars, and can interact with them. From here, you can round up as many as eight in a party. Your party can then watch movies together, play games together or just flick through a few photos from someone's hard drive. The avatars look likely to become central to Xbox's commitment to casual gaming - with lots of examples of them popping up in various Live Arcade games.

Below are highlights of the demoed games - we'll have lots more about everything that was announced appearing on the site over the next few days.

Fallout 3:
We saw a playable section of an early level, as the main character walks through a Washington DC shattered by nuclear war. An innovative targeting system, which enables you to quickly home in on a particular part of the enemy, was demoed, as well as an array of serious weaponry. My favourite was the Fatman - an evil-looking piece of kit that fires mini nuclear bombs.

Resident Evil 5:
The really big news was the confirmed release date - Friday March 13 2009. It's a long time to wait, but the game looks worth it. The demo focused on the online co-op mode, which looked fantastic. Where most co-op modes leave the two players to hammer through the game with the occasional bit of team-work, on Resi playing together will be essential. The demo showed Chris Redfield isolated from his partner, who he had to help by picking off zombies with a sniper rifle.

Fable 2:
Peter Molyneux opened his presentation with the words 'Fable 2 is finished'. You'll be able to get your hands on it in October - though we still don't have a definite date. The game will have online co-op, but the really impressive part was how this works. As you walk around the Fable world, you'll come across orbs, which are images of where your friends are in the game. Click on one and your mate pops straight into your unique version of the game. I'll get a hands-on demo of the game on Wednesday, so keep your eye out for more details.

Gears of War 2:
This looked awesome. During the played demo, we saw enemies being picked up and used as cover and heard about how the co-op mode will support up to five players. A stand-out scene showed an immense army of invading locust far beneath Marcus Fenix. It looked like a cut-scene, but was clearly playable once he started destroying them with a gun turret. I'll be getting my hands on this on Tuesday morning - more then. It goes on sale November 7.

Square Enix:
Yoichi Wada from Square Enix finished things off with announcements about upcoming titles from that publisher. Infinite Discovery will come out in Europe on September 5, Last Remnant will launch November 20, Star Ocean: Last Hope will come out in spring 2009. But the demo of Final Fantasy XIII was the real show-stopper - it looked incredible. The graphical style is like real-life manga - the characters in the game appear almost photo-realistic. The suits from Xbox were rightly bullish about enticing this premium title over from Playstation.

It was a fascinating briefing in terms of seeing the quality games that are heading Xbox's way in the coming months - although there were no real 'omigod' announcements. Keep your eye on the blog and the Twitter feed tomorrow for the latest from the Sony and Nintendo briefings.

Visit our E3 special for news and views from LA.

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Posted by: Nik Taylor

Before the main Xbox briefing, European journalists were treated to a special (very early) 'pre-briefing', where we saw a demo of new sing-along game Lips.

It's basically the 360's take on the PS3's phenomenally successful Singstar titles. The game will ship with two wireless, motion-sensitive controllers, which light up as you sing into them.

The main differentiation from Singstar is that you can plug in your MP3 player and sing along to anything from there. 

Xbox demoed the game by getting one of the developers to sing Young Folks along with a 'volunteer'. In fact, the co-singer was more press-ganged into action, since persuading any jetlagged, just-woken-up journos to join in with the singing action before they'd had breakfast was unsurprisingly impossible.

The game looks to be part of Xbox's aim to tap into the casual  gaming market. It comes with 40 songs, including one from Duffy who was on hand to describe how great she thought the whole thing was.

The motion sensitivity is used to tap along to percussion sections of the song - so the mic can effectively become a tambourine, a la Rock Band. It looks like it will also be used to encourage general lead singer-style leaping about - though the developers were coy about all the ways they'll use the feature.

In fact, they were coy about quite a lot of details - such as what other songs will be on there, which music labels have signed up, how much the game will cost and when it will come out. Looks like a winner for Xbox-owning karaoke kings and queens though.

Visit our E3 special for news and views from LA.

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Posted by: Jane Douglas

Thank the gaming gods*: a release date for the long-, long-, long-awaited Resident Evil 5 is finally with us!

Okay, so the game won't be with us anytime soon. Nik, texting me from LA, tells me that the launch date is set for 13 March 2009 (that's a Friday the Thirteenth, naturally). But at this point I'll take a solid release date over endless speculation and delays.

*Or Capcom, rather.

 In other E3 news, Harmonix et al have unveiled a full track listing for Rock Band 2 and Nintendo have announced the MotionPlus Wii remote add-on. Click on through for the full stories.

Visit our E3 special for news and views from LA.

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Posted by: Jane Douglas

Nik's just emerged from one press briefing and is about to head into another: the big Microsoft announcement. The suspense is just about killing me.

Our lips are, for the time being, officially sealed on the subject of the initial briefing. But rest assured that all the news will be with you as soon as the E3 gods permit it.

Visit our E3 special for news and views from LA.

Posted by: Jane Douglas

For any gamers out there who aren't hooked on Twitter just yet, I'll be passing along the highlights from my co-editor Nik's Twitter feed from Los Angeles - more specifically, from the gargantuan gaming event that is E3.

Nik has apparently touched down in LA, shrugged off the eight-hour jetlag, and is prepping for his first day on the expo floor.

Rumours are already flying ahead of a big Microsoft announcement (on Monday morning for Nik, Monday evening for us). We're not sure how much credibility to give the gossip about a handheld console from the makers of the Xbox...

Further whispers among the games press touch on a widescreen DS Lite and price cuts for Sony's PS3 and the 360.

Stay tuned, game fans, there'll be live blogging from Nik right here, or you can follow his Twitter feed for tiny, tasty morsels of gaming news.

On a personal note, I want BioWare to blow us away with something awesome (a Knights of the Old Republic MMO? Some words on Mass Effect 2?) and to see Joystiq's 'prediction' of a Firefly MMO announcement come to pass. As Joystiq indicate, the latter is not all too likely (Joystiq attaches a 5% probability to it) so I'll probably be disappointed on that one.

A Fable 2 release date would be most welcome. Oh, and someone, tell us: What is Halo Blue?

Visit our E3 special for news and views from LA.

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Posted by: Nik Taylor

Ah, another weekend beckons. I, for one, will be putting my feet up as next week promises to be a busy one on Tech & Gadgets.

On Sunday, I'm flying out to LA to take in first-hand the Aladdin's Cave of videogaming that is the E3 conference, and I'll be adding all the news from there, as it happens, to this blog.

Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo are all expected to make major announcements in their briefings - with Xbox VP David Gosen, for one, promising 'fantastic surprises'.

If you're so inclined, you can keep right up to the minute by following my tweets on Twitter - right here - http://twitter.com/msntechnik

And of course we'll have stacks of features, news reports and photo galleries going up on the main site throughout the conference. That's all at http://tech.uk.msn.com/features/e32008

But enough looking forward for now. Let's take a look back over the week that was on T&G.

Elsewhere on the web...

We showed you the smokeless cigarette last week - now meet the fog-free cigar.

The toaster that adds an image of a Battlestar Galactica Cylon to every hot, buttered slice.

Do you miss your mouse when you're away from the computer? Fret no more, now you can even take it in the shower.

Have a good weekend. :-)

Posted by: Jane Douglas

Video: Mobile knife arch

Spotted a number of London police officers deploying (or rather, demonstrating) a "mobile knife arch" - a portable metal detector archway that can be packed into a car and set up wherever.

Click here or on the image above for the video.

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  iPhone 3G queue

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