They do say size isn’t everything and in the case of the new Xbox Live Vision Camera from Microsoft it couldn’t be more true, it really is very small but at the same time quite good looking with it’s green ring of light when it turns on and it’s small but effective adjustable neck.
The camera comes with a one month free trial of Xbox Live, an official headset as well as Uno and Totemball and this is great value when you consider that the headset usually comes in at around £12.99 alone.
There are many features to be found with the camera, for starters you are able to take a photo of yourself and use this in your personal gamercard, this will enable people on your friends list to see your face, whether they want to or not, but it’s a good idea which helps make your gamercard more personal and funny if you are a bit of a comedian, alternatively you can take a photo and send it as a message to anyone as long as you know their name.
One of the main features of the camera is the ability to video chat with your friends, and I’m pleased to say that this is great, first of all you invite your friend to a video chat, once they accept you will see their face in full glory next to yours, the quality of the video is excellent although slightly delayed, quite spookily if you look away from the camera and quickly look back you will see your eyes moving (now that’s weird). To chat you just need to use the headset (you know, the call centre one) all of which makes me look forward to the forthcoming wireless headset (not that I’m vain or anything), during chat you can use your control to make things more interesting, for example, using the trigger button you can make your friends pad vibrate or you can always change the picture type, these range from black and white and a strange colour effect to a negative effect which quite simply makes you look like something our of a horror movie, strange indeed.
The camera’s other features are the one’s which may interest gamers as you will soon be able to use face mapping to have your face in a game and this could be very interesting indeed, it has already been confirmed by Ubisoft that Rainbow Six Vegas will use this feature and I am sure that other games will no doubt follow, imagine scoring a goal for your favourite football team in-game? now that would be good or maybe a bit of home karaoke ala Singstar on the Playstation?
Whilst you are waiting for the game publisher’s to take advantage of this technology you can pass the time with Totemball, where you use your hands to control the character on screen as you explore the land while collecting the different totem pieces, although be warned that your arms will start to ache after about five minutes. You can also play the excellent Uno, which is based on the card game and utilises the camera by allowing you to view the other three players on screen during a Xbox Live match, this can result in good fun and seeing who you are talking to definitely helps the conversation, but as in life there is occasionally someone who decides to do something stupid, however you can easily be avoid meeting these people again by using Microsoft’s rating system.
The Live vision camera really is one of the best accessories yet for the Xbox 360, in it’s style and versatility, being able to use the camera as a webcam for instance is a great idea and offers more value and of course the possibilities as far as games are concerned are very exciting, the camera looks great also and sits next to your HDTV and Xbox 360 without looking out of place, Microsoft really seem to have put a lot of thought into this and providing they get the support of the third party developers (which I’m sure they will) then the camera will help the Xbox 360 go from strength to strength.
