L.A. Noire Incoming

Haven't spent much time with any one game lately, but I have a feeling that this might change that...

iPad Vs. Android tablet

I've been keeping an eye on tablets ever since my wife got an iPad last December. Sure, there's the venerable iPad; it's selling like crazy and legitimized a whole new product category. But I've really been rooting for an Android tablet to compete with it. The Galaxy Tab was an interesting size, but sort of a joke since it's just a slightly larger screen version of the phone I already have.

The Xoom and G-Slate sound great on paper since they equal or beat iPad on most all the specs. But I went and tried them, and came away unimpressed. While Honeycomb (the tablet-optimized version of Android) looks promising, there's almost no (non-Google) apps optimized for it yet. It feels very much like when Android 1.5 was only available on a G1 and trying to compete with the iPhone. But Android's main selling point has historically been that it was available on carriers other than AT&T. With most tablets sold being WiFi only, the carrier is largely irrelevant. I know there's no way I'm going to pay for a second data subscription when my phone (MyTouch 4G on T-Mobile) works really well as a wireless hotspot for free.

Another trend I've seen is that apps and games tend to hit iOS first, then Android later if there's enough demand. This is even more prevalent in the tablet space since iPad has such a head start. I think it has more than 70% of the market share at last count. I've played and enjoyed several great iPad apps while I've been waiting for anything compelling to come to Honeycomb.

A weird side effect of Apple's head start in market share is what it does for component prices. Since most tablets sold are iPads, they get better deals from component manufacturers, and can sell the device for a lower price. The Xoom was famously lampooned for being more expensive than a comparable iPad. While upcoming tablets from Samsung and others will soon fix this, as I write this, the iPad is sort of the "bargain tablet." If you can say that about a $500 toy that you probably don't need.

Finally, I've been able to compare Apple and Android WiFi implementations in a lot of different devices. In short, iOS devices do a much better job of finding and connecting to networks quickly and reliably. I'm actually surprised you don't hear more about this in the media. I doubt I'm the only one seeing this.

So you can probably tell where all of this is leading, but in the next day or two a new iPad arrives at my door. Actually, I'm taking over my wife's old one and she'll take the new one because I'm cheap and don't care about cameras. I may write another post about why I decided to get a tablet instead of a laptop, but it mainly comes down to portability, battery life, and instant-on. Also, I realized the only thing I need out of my laptop is to be an internet machine in my living room, not to run any specific software or games.

Image really has nothing to do with post

Since I'm sure you're wondering, "huh, what's that Dave guy been playing?"

I'm playing through Dead Space 2 again on a New Game+ so I can keep on using my powered up weapons and stuff. I started off strong but have been sort of losing interest in that one. Probably has something to do with playing the iPad version. Not nearly as good, mind you, but excellent for a tablet.

On the DS I've been playing Plants Vs. Zombies and Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes. Which is quite a mouthful, but really a lot like Puzzle Quest set in a bad Lord of the Rings knockoff story. It's fun and challenging. I actually found myself having to grind a bit to make it past some demon dude when I was only a few hours in. Most games these days do a lot more hand holding than that, so I was sort of surprised. And not necessarily in a bad way.

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit is nice. I can see Criterion's fingerprints on it. They made Burnout Paradise, which I absolutely loved. I don't love this one quite as much, but it's growing on me. I really miss the open world and the absence of loading times from Paradise. I'm starting to like it more since I'm slowly getting to the point where I'm unlocking the good cars which are a lot more responsive and fun to drive. In general, musclecars suck and Lamborghinis rule. But everybody already knew that, right?

For some reason, I decided to get a PS3 copy of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed and play through it again even though I played the Xbox 360 version when it first came out. What can I say, I'm a sucker for SW even if the game itself gets ridiculously difficult and frustrating towards the end. That I found a copy for $5 didn't hurt, either.

So I'm splitting my time between whatever game grabs me at the moment. Oh wow, I almost forgot to mention that I also grabbed Portal 2 and played through the single player stuff while PSN was down. That game is fantastic and really deserves its own post. I played splitscreen co-op with my wife after she got tired of me asking her to play. Her arguments against it were that she "gets confused just watching me play, how is she supposed to figure it out actually playing it?" and that that she's really bad at using dual joysticks to move around in a 3D space (even without portals). She did fine, and the pointer system that Valve put in place for the multiplayer works really well. I don't know that I'd want to try it without at least voice chat though. I'm looking to finish out the co-op but I don't know if she'll be willing to play much more, so let me know if you want to play on Steam or PS3 now that it's finally back online.