A look at gadget, game and geek happenings in the week ahead.
Following a week of nostalgic geekery over the 30th birthday of one of the enduring arcade greats Pac-Man, plus the news that a new games console combining the NES, SNES and SEGA Genesis is on the way, we can wallow a little more because a bunch of Genesis classics including Golden Axe, Ecco the Dolphin, Comix Zone and Vectorman are headed to Steam.
On 1 June, these Genesis games will be playable on the PC via download from online game delivery platform Steam, which also made it possible for LucasArts classic Monkey Island to make its way onto our computer screens again.
More classic game goodness: the Super Mario Brothers are back again with Super Mario Galaxy 2, coming 11 June, in which the super siblings return to space for more exciting adventures.
Incoming Wave
Bada bing, Bada boom: Samsung’s next-gen smartphone, the Wave, which runs on its brand new advanced Bada software platform, will go on sale in the UK through Vodafone and arrives in shops on 1 June.
Of course the biggest news of the week was Google’s entry into the TV market. Unlike the Apple TV product, which was essentially a streaming media hub with access to iTunes, Google TV (built on Android and Chrome technology) integrates with the user’s HDTV and cable/satellite service making it a web/TV hybrid with Google search and access to the entire web.
No release date has been set for Google TV but it will be coming on stream through set-top boxes from partners including Logitech, as well as being directly built into new HDTVs.
A first look at the shiny new N8 smartphone from Nokia shows it far outshines its predecessor, the N97. Finest Fones has been playing with the device and reports that the CPU is “at least comparable to the ones found in the Omnia HD, N900 and Vivaz” plus the first ever Symbian 3 device has HDMI out with Dolby Digital Plus sound and Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n and an AMOLED touch screen.
By Marie Boran
Photo: Early reviews of the Nokia N8 are positive
