Discussing Logitech's New Gaming Mice 242
Paul writes "Logitech had a busy day announcing three new products designed for gamers. The company introduced the Logitech G15 keyboard, G5 and G7 G-Series gaming mice. TechSpot had a brief talk with Erik Charlton, senior product-marketing manager at Logitech, who shared a few ideas and details on Logitech's newly announced products."
Re:Optimus (Score:3, Insightful)
I REALLY hope this isn't vaporware.
Re:Display? (Score:3, Insightful)
The press release said that several games will release support for it yet this year. And even if they don't, given the abilities of the community I expect third parties will write mods for the biggies, such as WoW and UT 2K4. Even if Blizzard provides native WoW support for it, I suspect other WoW plugin authors will rush to add even more functionality.
Regarding your other question: who looks at their keyboard? I don't know, I painted mine black a couple years ago :-)
Re:Images here (Score:3, Insightful)
However, I do think it will provide a reasonable place for auxillary information for games, too. Not everything is an FPS - think RTS or turn-based strategy. Getting instant information on how much range, firepower, armor, etc. your selected units have (averaged?) could be stunningly useful, yet be a little too much for the main game screen. A keyboard LCD fills this void in an efficient way.
-Erwos
Same as new golf clubs? (Score:3, Insightful)
Except for perimiter weighted irons, metal woods and graphite shafts, golf technology hasn't really progressed very much since Arnold Palmer first began playing professionally. New balls and club technology will maybe gain you a few yards off the tee.
With computer mice, scroll wheels and optical sensors were the huge breakthroughs. Laser is nice, but is not nearly as much better than optical as optical is better than a ball mouse. More buttons are ok, but often hard to reach at critical times. Tilt wheels are more gimmick than anything except for people with very wide documents. Wireless is not usually particularly useful, but some people like it.
So what is it that these new Logitech mice bring to the table that will revolutionize gaming? Would you gladly trade your scroll wheel for any one of these features? Probably not. Will you get more kills in FPS games? More items in MMOGs? More 'coffee' in GTA:SA? No, no and no.
The next revolution in pointer control may be when you don't need to use an imprecise limb for movement. Maybe contact lenses that point the cursor to where you focus your eyes. For mice, once you get it tracking well (optical/laser) and you cramp all the useful buttons where they are easily reachable (LMB, wheel, RMB), you have pretty much hit the limit.
Re:keyboard (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, I would cheer at the public execution of the f-lock inventor. Or the guy who made the f-lock disabled on boot with no way of changing it.
I have been hitting F5 to refresh the screen for as long as I have worked with Windows machines. Now someone has decided that F5 without the f-lock would be a great shortcut to close the window. What was wrong with Alt-F4? The function keys already served a function (hence their name). They did not need to be remapped.
Its also a little annoying when booting a PC and missing the Bios setup screens or Windows boot options because the keyboard boots up with the F-keys disabled.
Until the F-lock goes, I will not buy another Logitech or MS keyboard.
Re:Optimus (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Optimus (Score:2, Insightful)
The first rule of gaming: Look at the screen not the keyboard.
However with logitechs new brilliant design you would be able to see your health decresing while you'r looking the the key you program to run your move forward macro.