My interest in technology stemmed from video games, so when surrounded by so many emerging electronics, its natural to seek out those that cater to the gamer within. The Consumer Electronic Show has plenty of technologies to whet appetites from countless industries, but the gaming audience has drawn a significant amount of attention. From the hardware you may be packing to LAN parties in the upcoming year to peripherals that will help you reach a new competitive level, I've scoured the show floor with the intent of bringing you a preview of what you may be gaming with, on, or as in 2013.
Project Shield was an announcement from Nvidia that gained a lot of attention. Marketed as a ‘portable handheld PC’, the Shield is proposed to have the capability to play Android games as well as stream PC games wirelessly through methods such as connecting to your desktop from your couch. Equipped with the new Tegra 4 GPU and a 720p 5” retinal touch display mirrored with a full sized controller, the Shield definitely has power but will it suffer in the same way as the current handhelds on the market? Either way we’ll be keeping an eye on it throughout 2013.
In the same spirit, Razer was showing the Edge Pro Gaming System, a concept they announced at CES last year. The Edge will be available in 2013, $1,299 scoring you a high-end gaming tablet equipped with an i7 dual core, 8GB memory, Nvidia GT 640M LE, 10.”1 HD touch screen display, and an up to 256GB SSD. The Edge is typically marketed with the Gamepad Controller accessory, which is a frame that equips it with Hydra-like wand controllers on both sides of the tablet, but is sold separately. Also available is a docking station and keyboard dock, transforming the Edge into a laptop-like state if desired. Time will tell if the market exists for such a product, but any gamer can appreciate the technology and potential behind this one.
The night of the Pepcom Digital Experience, we received a press release from Xi3 Computers, a company that specializes in modular computers, about an involvement with Steam and a supposed ‘Steam box’. We would find out later from Gaben himself that the box wasn’t going to be provided from just one company, but many as long as they meet certain specifications that rank the system depending on what games it was capable to run. Still, it was exciting to see a prototype, known as the Piston box, in person.
Kingston was constantly great during every meeting we had, especially from the eyes of a gamer. A big fan of competitive gaming, Kingston scores early points with me by holding the HyperX Anniversary Tournament, and the fact that they played the final matches live at CES set it over the edge. It was such a great experience to watch top StarCraft II players like MC, PuMa, YongHwa, and Jaedong compete live.
With minimal time and equipment to game on during CES, any opportunity to get my fix is much appreciated, and there was plenty available. Video games are a great way to demonstrate products, and was especially true considering the presence of mobile/cloud gaming this year.
South Hall is home to the Gaming Showcase, which honestly sounds much more interesting than it actually is. Unfortunately a lot of booth space is occupied by vendors trying to sell novelty accessories and such, but there are a few gems to find, and plenty of demo’s to waste time on. We did see a few gaming related vendors that we work with like Lian Li, but there wasn’t any actual gaming going on really.
Aside from a booth or two we actually saw more actual gaming at other booth’s like Razer’s as well as a few random companies that seemed to of setup gaming stations to keep themselves busy in any offtime.
Wes did have a chance to play a short (very short) demo of Batman at the Super Micro booth where they were showing off their new gaming line of PC’s. Our friend Justin, who some of you know from our LAN’s, works with them now. I’m sure we can expect to see his gaming interests in their product line in the future.
Of course, we saw plenty of hardware were looking forward to in 2013:
