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Hardware Entertainment Games

LCD TopGun Hands On Review 98

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the shot-in-the-dark dept.
Xbox Evolution writes "Lik Sang has done a hands on review of a lightgun that is compatible with Plasma, LCD, TFT & DLP. The review of the LCD TopGun which works with the PS2, Xbox and PC gives a good overview of the features and functionality."
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LCD TopGun Hands On Review More

LCD TopGun Hands On Review

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  • Now bring back Duck Hunt! (Score:5, Funny)

    by BigZaphod ( 12942 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2006 @07:49PM (#14720627) Homepage
    Yes! Those old shooting games were the *best*! We need some new modern ones spiffed up with high-rez 3D laughing dogs and surround-sound quacks! I can't wait...

  • CRT (Score:5, Funny)

    by Hogwash McFly ( 678207 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2006 @07:52PM (#14720647)
    Still no support for CRT. Less space than a Nomad. Lame.
  • This operates by the same idea that the Power Glove does, remember the big T you had to set up? You've got to calibrate it, and it was never accurate. Old light guns made the targets white and the gun would sense that reflectivity, you'd hold the gun right next to the screen and never miss.
  • Jack Thompson is going to have a field day with this one. I'm very much against what he's doing but that doesn't stop the guy from spinning this out of control.
  • Don't light guns use intensity and not position to determine if you've hit the target or not? Why would they need to be "compatible" with a display device if all they depend on is intensity? Please someone educate me!

    • Re:Correct me if I'm wrong but... (Score:3, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      They detected the bright pulse of light caused by the electron beam hitting a parituclar phosphor. This swept across a CRT pixel by pixel, line by line. This only works with a CRT and needs specific support from the graphics hardware (to find out the X/Y position of the electron beam at the time of the light pulse)

      This doesn't work with LCDs, Plasma TVs, DLP/LCD projectors / OLED displays etc. as all pixels are illuminated simultaneously, not sequentially.

    • See [[Light gun]] (Score:4, Informative)

      by tepples ( 727027 ) <tepplesNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Tuesday February 14, 2006 @08:23PM (#14720896) Homepage Journal

      Don't light guns use intensity and not position to determine if you've hit the target or not? Why would they need to be "compatible" with a display device if all they depend on is intensity?

      Traditional light guns for CRTs since the Super Scope use submicrosecond timing of blue and green phosphor flicker, which when correlated with the timing of the horizontal and vertical blanking of the composite or luminance video signal gives position. Even older light guns that rely on intensity, such as the Zapper, might get confused by LCD's slower response and lack of flicker. This Wikipedia article [wikipedia.org] should help you understand.

  • A Little Too Real (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Smarty2120 ( 776415 ) *
    Getting a light gun to finally work with all the different screen types is great. Unfortunately, the gun looks very close to a real Glock. There is a very good reason to make toy guns a bright obnoxous color, even if it kills the "I'm holding a real gun" buzz a bit. How long until some some little kid gets killed in a rough neighborhood by a cop who thought this thing was real?

    • Re:A Little Too Real (Score:3, Informative)

      by jon.wolf ( 938920 )
      Actually, it looks nothing at all like a Glock. It seems to me to be modeled after the Beretta 92F/FS.
    • That's obviously not a Glock, it's a Beretta, but what about the orange cap I thought all toy guns were supposed to have?
      • My guess is that the gun pictured is not being sold in the US market. Some other countries are not as paranoid as the US is when it comes to toy guns (probably due to the fact that they have much lower gun-crime rates...or less lawyers).
    • Depends on how long before a negligent parents gives one to the kid and ignores him/her for the next 15 years of his/her life.
    • None if the parents teach the kid not to be a dumbass.
      • Clearly you have no parenting experience what so ever.

        Kids are excitable, everything is new, and they live very much 'in the moment'.

        This includes early teens. I think of all the stupid stuff I did, scares the hell out of me thinking what my kids will try.

        Ever have a for year old stick a bead up their nose just to see what would happen? I have. They new better when they thought about it, and we certianly never taught them to put things in their nose, yet it happened.

        I know you may have been joking, but rai
        • Certainly telling your 4 year old not to stick a bead up their nose is not necessarily something you would tell your kid, but one would think that a lesson you always teach your kid (and more often than once) is never to point a toy gun at anyone, and especialy never at a cop. Sure raising a kid is complex as hell. Teaching them basics like not pointing guns at people should be common place though.
          • > ... one would think that a lesson you always teach your kid (and more often than once) is never to point a toy gun at anyone,

            That's the whole point of a "toy gun", to pretend you're shooting at each other while making "bang" sounds. That's one of the main points, and that's why toy guns are painted with those horrid colors, to prevent any confusion.
            • Indeed, which is why I said teach the lesson more than once. Because kids don't really pay all that much attention. But you grind it through their skulls that they never ever point it at a cop and they'll at least get one part of it down. I know I did.
            • About banning toy guns altogether? In my home, they are banned. In the case some uninformed relative gives Lucas (going 7yo) a toy gun for his birthday, he plays with it inside the house for a couple of days with it and then it magically vanishes. That simple. Not that _I_ should be highly concerned -- his real interest is dinosaurs. :-)
    • How long until some some kid gets killed...by a cop who thought this thing was real?

      It's a question worth asking.

      My father, still a hunter, didn't own or play with replica guns or gun toys at any age. That was the one line between reality and fantasy his father would never cross.

      • My father, still a hunter, didn't own or play with replica guns or gun toys at any age. That was the one line between reality and fantasy his father would never cross.

        That explains the dresses then.

    • Simply changing the color of the gun would not help because it can be painted over in black. The best way would be to alter the shape AND add color to make the gun unrecognizable as a real gun.
      • Sure, and he can also carve a block of soap into the shape of a gun.


        Sorry, there is only so much you can do to stop people from being dumb-asses. If somebody goes out of their way to paint the gun black, then it really isn't your fault.

    • You sir are an idiot if you think the color of a gun makes the slightest bit of difference.

      Officers are trained in threat assessment and common sense tells you to take no chances. i.e. a six year old in the playground with what looks like an uzi is going to get treated very differently than a masked man leaving the bank in a hurry with what looks like a pink polka dot shotgun.

      Ask any officer if the color of the weapon makes the slightest difference? Now ask them just how far they would let the kid go befo
    • isn't that a beretta and not a glock?
      i don't know for sure but i do think it is
    • Any child that would consider that a good idea is clearly not old enough to be using something like this '(Mental years) .
      Why on earth should we all suffer because of some peoples poor parenting / stupid children .
    • How long until some some little kid gets killed in a rough neighborhood by a cop who thought this thing was real?
      I don't live in the USA, you insensitive clod!
  • Monitor to the danger zone!!!!
  • Thanks to the guys at Lik Sang for taking the time to do this review. It was very thorough and well written, with nice screenshots and good information about the gun. So much for the review.

    Having said that, I think it's a waste to use a gun-type pointing device with any kind of display screen, unless the game is about shooting through a window from the middle of a room. To physically get into the spirit of a gunfight takes more than a pistol grip and a trigger. You really have to be in a larger play enviro
    • Good point. Ya know what I wanna know, where can I buy a display built into a pair of sunglasses? The technology exists. There's a market for it. Why has no-one taken a punt and mass produced em yet? You have to make technology acceptable to the masses to reduce the costs and get it into the market. But everyone who makes wearable computers appears to think having equipment attached to your head in new and uncomfortable ways is a sane way to introduce people to them. Consider, for example, the EyeTap [eyetap.org]
      • There are two major problems with current VR technology. The first is head-tracking latency, and the second is focus. Even the best head-tracking systems take an unacceptable amount of time to relay the motion to the computer, render the scene from the new position, and display the resulting images on the LCDs in the glasses. Most people have difficulty adjusting to this, and many experience very unpleasant side effects. Furthermore, even with a full VR setup, you still have the problem that what you're se
        • When it comes to VR games I have to agree with you. There is certainly some issues there. But when it comes to augmented reality the kind of things researchers have acheived with custom built equipment is truely useful. It's so useful that commercial head mounted display systems are available for engineers and military specialists. These systems are of the "unfashionable" variety. So yeah, when it comes to consumer augmented reality the problem is not technology, it's a willingness to gamble on the cre
    • Yeah, what he said. And while we are at it, I don't want to play flight simulators unless I can actually be in a cockpit at 15000 feet. And no driving simulators till my seat jumps every time I hit a bump. And no more AI opponents; every character in every game should be played by another player or paid actor.

      We should just ignote the fact that there are technical and monitary limitations to everything. Sure, I could sit down and, with off the shelf technology, design an arcade shooter with 360-degree v

  • Sad experience (Score:3, Interesting)

    by LordMyren ( 15499 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2006 @08:55PM (#14721082) Homepage
    I'd just built a projector out of a LCD monitor. It was rigged up out of lego's, cardboard boxes, duct tape and hot glue, in the nice dark basement. We had a seven foot tall screen of playstation 2 going and had been playing GTA3, GT3 and Armored Core all week.

    My friend went out and bought a light gun thinking how awsome it would be. "Does not work with monitors, lcd's or projectors."

    Of course, it was actually all three.

  • Augmented gaming is better (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ben_1432 ( 871549 ) on Tuesday February 14, 2006 @09:34PM (#14721284)
    I'm not sure if anyone else is doing it, but an Australian uni group is working on an augmented gaming [a-rage.com] thing that looks significantly cooler.

    Why settle for a gun in your lounge when you can have a game incorporated into your surroundings?

  • Shame under UK law to be introduced soon .... (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Those under 18 will not be allowed to purchase this as it comes under the definition of "imitation firearm".

    In fact it looks fairly realistic, if you removed the fake laser unit under the main "pistol" it could even be classified as a "realistic imitation firearm" and thus banned from sale in the UK.

  • Molded from a real Beretta (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Note the gun is molded from a real Beretta. Even has the model and "PATENDED" on the side. Cut the cord and from a few feet away you can't tell if it is real or not. Definitely not good for kids...
  • http://www.erealgames.com/ [erealgames.com] I find this gun heaps more promising although there isn't any PC support yet. Works with PS2 and X-Box's though.
  • Lik Sang has done a hands on review of a lightgun that is compatible with Plasma, LCD, TFT & DLP to meet the massive demand for lightguns.

    ("but shoots very real holes in conventional CRTs" would also be an acceptable answer.)
  • Well folks, I don't know about you but I think that VP Dick Chaney should practice with this instead of a real gun. A lot less "Accidents" would happpen.
  • I used to love playing the rail games. Maddog etc. When I got my flat screens the fun went away :-( I took a look at the various tech involved and asked /. for comments, silly editors :-(

    I took a look at the tech involved in this and by far and the best tech is the laser dot on the screen which is captured by a seperate camera. In the military the small arms trainers work this way.

    I started off with a laser pointer and used a usb webcam. It worked well on anything other than CRT, crt can on occasion re
  • Every time i go to Lik-Sang, i wish that they had a redistributor located in the US. Soo much cool stuff, very reasonable prices, restrictively high shipping costs. I am not saying Lik is padding their shipping (as it does have to ship from Hong Kong) but when the shipping is 50 percent of the cost, it really becomes hard to justify.

    At 35 dollars each, these guns will sell like crazy. At 45 each they would sell well too.
    Unfortunately, being in the US means that shipping from Lik is always what turns me o
  • 3d Sound, Laughing Dogs and Dick Cheney hunting quail, but needs to avoid shooting friends while hunting.
  • When I first built my mame cabinet I opted for a thin-footprint design using a 17" LCD monitor. http://www20.brinkster.com/mymame [brinkster.com]

    I didn't know at the time that light guns didn't work with LCDs, I'd just honestly never thought of it. Now a few years later, I saw the Topgun guns designed to work with any screen and immediately ordered two. They arrived last friday.

    Given the two hours I've been able to play with them, here's what I can tell you so far:

    * For use with a PC, the install cd will install th

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