Now that the 2012 CES has officially opened, the appointments fly fast and furious.  We had a pretty full day yesterday, with appointments with companies across the board.  We visited with LG, Mitsubishi, Sony, Able Planet and Polk Audio from the Audio/Video side, so expect some great things over the next few days.  We also visited with Monster, Cables to Go, Razer, NZXT, Gunnar Optics, Fructel, Steelseries and IBuyPower.

Las Vegas is very much thought of by most visitors as a city of lights; the neon of the strip, the soft yellow light of the casino floors that leave you feeling you’re living in perpetual dusk, the brightness of the desert sun.
 
To me, Vegas is a city of music with a soundtrack not unlike that of New York City, or even Los Angeles. In fact, from the minute you get off the plane the “ding ding ding” of the airport slots hit your ears like the opening stanza of a well known tune. While the song isn’t always classic Rat Pack swing or even the sweeping thematic scores of the Bellagio fountain shows, it’s usually a song that is as enticing as it is continual.
 
Sadly for me, the music of my first day was very much a “Bittersweet Symphony”, even before I started my trip. A power outage on Sunday night left me with very little sleep and less than ready for the day to come. A 5 am cab ride ending in a 5 hour flight was not the highpoint of the day to be certain, but things didn’t stop there. On the way to my first meeting of the day, I was knocked down on a stairway by teens being chased by security. The fall wasn’t so bad other than it caused me to rip my pants from stem to stern, if you catch my drift. Amazingly, it wasn’t the kind of rip anyone could see, so I literally sat in my first meeting of CES with the lovely rep from Gameloft in a rather drafty pair of jeans.
 
Thankfully, the mall was very close by, and after some quick shopping I was back ready to take on the day. It’s a good thing, because I still had the walk back to the Excalibur to check in and take advantage of some down time to gamble a bit and relax before heading to Digital Experience.
 
Digital Experience is a smaller event that piggybacks on the draw of CES to get companies in front of press at a much less expense pricepoint. This show is usually a mix of big names that everyone knows, and smaller companies no one has ever heard of. The 2012 edition was no different, with some great discussion about tablet gaming at a budget price point with the Pandigital folks, and a look at the next Star Wars and DC Universe branded flash memory products from MIMOBOT, plus a few more things I’ll be writing about in further detail later in the week. Plus, I got to meet reigning Ironman World Champion Craig "Crowie" Alexander who was representing a new sports earphone product. With the way the day started it certainly ended better than expected.
 

Beware, PC accessory developers:  Zee Germans are coming!

Roccat Gaming (pronounced like "rocket"), the new kids on the block in North America dealing with PC peripherals, has announced their presence at CES 2012 with their line of products that will complete any gaming rig.  We had the opportunity to sit down with the crew from the Hamburg, Germany-based company to go over their first line or products that will be available in early 2012.  Our focus was on the trifecta of peripherals that completes any gamer's necessary collection:  the Kone Plus gaming mouse, Isku Keyboard, and Kave 5.1 headset.

Starting with the Kone Plus mouse, it first needs to be noted that this mouse boasts a 6000 DPI laser sensor, more than enough to satisfy your needs, whether you are an FPS junkie or hitting the MMO games.  The mouse comes with customizable profiles that can be identified by changeable LED lights on the system itself.  A key component for Roccat was that they believed most mice should be customizable in their look and not just set in one color.  Linking it up with varying gaming profiles makes a huge difference, so you can have a particular setting for an FPS, another for an RTS, and so on.  On top of this, if you aren't happy with a setting, such as the DPI, you can change it on the fly.  By pressing the adjusting button on the side of the mouse, the system will actually speak to you what your current DPI setting is and allow you to change it to a more sensitive or less sensitive setting, a truly innovative addition to a mouse.

After spending some time with the Kone Plus, we moved onto the meat of the peripherals, the Isku keyboard.  This keyboard is not for the faint of heart as it is quite larger than some gaming keyboards already out on the market.  While its size can be a bit overwhelming, what isn't is the customization that is available.  While having over 30 available macro keys to use is fantastic, you have to appreciate the little things that this product has, such as the three small macros that are built into the wrist rest at the bottom that are in perfect placement to be used by your left thumb.  Building on the little things, the backlight is fixed to a blue backlight to make it easy to read the keys.

The final product that we covered was the Kave 5.1 True Surround Headset.  We have to put the emphasis on the word "true" as most 5.1 headsets utilize SRS and not a system that fully immerses you in surround sound.  With three drivers in each earpiece, this headset makes sure there is nothing fake about the sound you are hearing.  While having a bit of size to it may deter some gamers away from the headset, rest assured that its comfort is top notch to go along with the solid noise canceling that is in the earpieces themselves.  The microphone itself has a blue LED light that comes to life when you have muted your microphone, making sure you are well aware that no one can hear you if you have activated it.

All in all, Roccat Gaming is making sure that their first jump into North America is bringing some firepower, and other companies had better take notice.

 

 

 

 

*An error was made in the original publication of this article regarding the backlight on the Isku Keyboard.  We apologize for any misunderstanding with the information that was originally posted

We stopped by the Hulu booth at last night’s Digital Experience and picked up a bit of gaming related news.  They were unable to provide us with a date other than “soon”, but the Hulu folks did confirm that Hulu+ is inbound for the Nintendo Wii in addition to the Nintendo 3DS (previously announced) later this year.  It appears that the Nintendo WiiU is also destined to get Hulu+, but they were also unable to confirm because it has not been announced yet.  Once it arrives on the Nintendo devices that leaves only the PlayStation Vita as the last major gaming hardware that Hulu plus has not been announced for yet. 

Sony always puts on a show for the press at their annual CES Press Event, and this year was no exception.  In addition to announcing their new products and covering previous years stats and sales figures, they always incorporate some Sony Entertainment into their press event.  This year, they brought out Will Smith and Director Barry Sonnenfeld to show off Men In Black III in 3D to the crowd.  It was the same trailer we have seen on TV recently, but with 3D incorporated in.  They also had Kelly Clarkson come out and perform  PlayMemories Online was new service introduced, which included PlayMemories Home, Mobile and Studio.  PlayMemories Studio was interesting, as it was touted as using the PS3 to View, Share and Edit the images, claiming it was “almost like a game.” To lead off the talking about phones, it was announced that Sony Ericsson is no longer, as the new name will be Sony Mobile Communications.  The new Xperia line of phones (Ion and S)  look pretty slick, as all will be in HD.

The 2012 CES has finally arrived and Sean, Ben and I have a pretty busy Press Day today.  We are scheduled to attend press events with Panasonic, Samsung and Sony as well as several others, do expect write ups over the next few days. So come back tomorrow morning and we should have some recaps posted for you.