Breaking in the Lenovo X220 tablet with Starcraft 2 ...

My latest tablet folly the Lenovo X220T has just arrived , an i7 version that took over a month to reach me , could it be the ultimate combination of tablet and laptop? that will have to wait as  Starcraft 2 needs to be tested with pen and touch control... 

The pen as others have noted before me does not need to touch the screen to scroll it , or icons and objects , and if you are wondering about the lack of gaming skills  I am right handed  which is why you see me fumbling with the pen in my left hand and the game itself as I attempt to film with my right.

All in all this is the tablet I would play Starcraft 2 on , at speed , as you can see ,even though I have also run the demo and website together on the dual screen Iconia , and Libretto , as well as playing on the atom ion powered joojoo. If you are noticing a theme here ... it is that if you want to seriously game you need Windows 7 on your tablet ... and they are getting faster every month ... sooner or later someone will wake up and add discrete graphics (up to date discrete graphics )

And  by the way the screen and keyboard on the Lenovo X220T are the finest yet seen... the touch as you can see from the video is also present and fully functional ... hmm serious games ... I think I shall try Angry Birds next .... more to follow ..

PS did I mention the build quality is awesome , there are no dead pixels , the machine feels like the most solid brick of Lego you broke your front teeth on ..in your infant years (hopefully) .. and it is whisper quiet even when uploading youtube video whilst downloading Crysis 2 on Steam whilst encoding another video and typing this blog entry ...

hmmh  1 month of waiting ... I guess patience is it`s own virtue...

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

CRYSIS 2 running on the Lenovo X220 Tablet

Ok Angry Birds time ... no ...  Crysis 2 first , this is the game running with vsync on , and no external optimizations, not bad ,not bad at all as you can see from the video

 

 

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220 T i7 tablet test no 3: Angry Birds on Windows 7 :It`s an App Jim but not as we know it...

Rovio`s old skool game designer green pig demolishing, perennial  chat show host filler material ,  phenomenon Angry Birds ,  is no longer confined to you vanity phone or tablet .. nay ..verily it can be played on Windows from here  and it was one of the first games thegameveda used to stretch the limits of Windows 7 Multi touch features on the Lenovo X220 T tablet .... One day soon EVERY app will be not just iOS and Android bound .. but available on your full OS machine .. or console ... if someone could come up with selling a cross platform licence for a game that would be very nice ... 

Last year Angry Birds started flocking to other platforms like Android , initially totally free , and of course to the Sony PSP .  That it hits Windows without any phone OS in the way is a happy surprise to Rovio`s fans ...


The key point here is although Apple rules the tablet waves , it does not own or look to control the developers that make iTunes the success it is .This has created a unique "freedom" to develop across platforms , that comes with : new IPs that jaded games journalists fed on a heavy Pizza and sushi diet by traditional game developer monopolies never saw coming  . So when your often labelled dead platform the PC is being rejuvenated before your very eyes..with Free 2 Play MMOS , Steam sales ,Facebook  gaming,  and increasing mobile games being ported over .. remember you have our hero Steve Jobs to thank ...  in a very strange Kevin Bacon six degrees of separation way has managed to resurrect the PC and Windows as a gaming platform ..every bit as much as the maestro  Gabe Newell over at Valve has! Eat your heart out Steve Ballmer ! and all whilst Bill is off teaching Bono how you really can save the world ... 


just goes to show what goes around comes around ... oh and the point of this test : Multi touch works most excellently on the Lenovo X220 T tablet as you can see in the video above ... 

of course you can still check out Angry Birds on iOS if you are old skool .... get it now @

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Portal 2 played on 3 Windows 7 tablets the dual screen Toshiba Libretto W100 and Acer Iconia and i7 powered Lenovo X220t

Portal 2 is the game of the year ..so far.. so today recovering from Steam`s summer camp thegameveda decided to devote half an hour or so playing the proverbial mouse in the maze.. not on my gaming rig but across 3 different Windows 7 tablets . You can see how the Source engine scales down and up from an i3 to i5 and i7 cpu and their accompanying Intel gpus .. you can also see my decaying grey matter spark into action as I learn how to solve the puzzles which your average lab rat probably does in its drug induced sleep , plus they get more cheese ...

oh and Portal 2 is pretty sharp on the Ion powered joojoo too.. more on that later 4 tablets in one gaming session is more than my prescription allows.......









this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220 T Tablet test no.6 : Star Trek Online MMO gameplay using Pen Touch and Nubbin!

Star Trek Online runs well on every tablet I have tested from the Atom and Ion powered Joojoo , the  dual screen Toshiba Libretto and Acer Iconia ( spread across 2 screens no less...)  . It also runs mighty fine on my multiscreen desktop at 5120 by 1600 , but only on the i7 powered Lenovo X220 T , do  I get  : Pen and touch control  , together with trackpad , nubbin AND full keyboard ... it is a new way of playing ... but first you will need to learn  how to play  as you can see in the following vids :

 go make it so .......

for collectors check out all the rare Star Trek games with thegameveda

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220 T Tablet test no. 5 Sid Meier`s Civilization V and Alpha Centauri played with pen and touch

And so you bought Civ V last weekend ... you are having big fun being a virtual megalomaniac .. but all that mouse clicking is a drag and so mid 80s in an Apple Lisa kind of way ...  well ok thegameveda finds all that mouse clicking or trackpad sliding totally square ... and I don`t care if it is made out of shiny new glass and you can do three finger swipes ... no.... no way does thegameveda put any faith in that hokey cokey mouse or track pad clicking ... give me a good pen and multitouch every time .. 


So here are two Sid Meier classics one old and one new , with tests of how you could control them using multitouch and pen input .  The pen input on the Lenovo X220T really adds finesse to touch control , even when Apple eventually move to a full OSX Lion touch Mac Air a pen may prove mightier than a 3 fingered swipe ( I can dream... you should see me in Apple Temples touching the screens of all the Macbook Pros and Airs ... not so subtly suggesting wouldn't it be cool if we had the touch control of an iPad on the screen or dual screen of a Mac Air.....who knows maybe Steve is watching from his dormant volcano secret base)

 First up Civilization V : 

and then we have a little Alpha Centauri gameplay which I still think is better than Civ V !

   




























this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220 T tablet test no.7 : GAIKAI used to play Dragon Age 2 with pen and touch

Dave Perry`s Gaikai is a work of genius , but then so was Three Weeks In Paradise  .. Dave has always been ahead of the curve , while other would be game designer maestros , like our beloved Mr Molyneux promise many things , Mr Perry just goes about delivering very cool games that actually do live up to the hype even the tessellation and infinitely improving graphics engine of Messiah ( the graphics get better with better hardware ... yeah  remember falling for that one?) ...Anhyoo Gaikai as you know lets you demo full PC games streamed in browser windows  .. as well as advertise them as an affiliate or publisher ...  Similar to Onlive but in need of more work , none the less it is on it`s way to change the way we game  , here I am using it to test the Lenovo X220T , mostly the Internet connection stability as Gaikai and Onlive require a steady constant Internet stream . This is played over wireless N , 50 Meg Broadband . This test also shows how you can play Dragon Age 2 with Pen , Touch , keyboard and track pad

GAIKAI PRIVACY POLICY

Data Collection

Gaikai may collect, store and use the following types of information and related data:

• information of or concerning your visits to web sites and web pages that are owned or controlled by Gaikai or its licensors or licensees (as applicable), and


• information that you provide to us for the purpose of becoming a registered user and/or otherwise using any of the products or services of Gaikai and its licensors and/or licensees (as applicable).

Use of Information and Related Data

Information and data provided by our customers, visitors and users is used to communicate with such individuals about the subjects of their requests or, to the extent applicable, to provide information about the products and services of Gaikai and its licensors and/or licensees (as applicable), and for the other purposes specified in this Privacy Policy or in relevant portions of the web sites that are covered by this Privacy Policy. In addition to the uses identified herein and/or elsewhere in this Privacy Policy, we may use your personal information to:

• contact you in connection with, and to deliver products and/or services (or related information or data) that you have requested,


• verify your authorization to access and use the web sites and/or web pages that are covered by this Privacy Policy,


• improve your browsing experience by personalizing portions of the web sites and/or web pages that are covered by this Privacy Policy, and


• provide you via email or other communication technology with information relating to the products and services of Gaikai and its licensors and/or licensees (as applicable) that we think may be of interest to you.


• THE FULL GAKAI PRIVACY POLICY CAN BE READ HERE

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220T tablet test no.8 : Dead Space 2 played on Gaikai over wifi with the Pen WITHOUT touching the screen!

So how then to  stress test the Wifi N modem in mine Lenovo X220T ? But of course Herr Professor I hear you say  ....by using an IE9 browser window to play Dead Space 2 instantly using Herr Perry`s shiny new Gaikai ... 


Dead Space 2 as you can see is quite the impressive demo for Gaikai , it is the most stable , and the most graphically intact and impressive of the Gaikai demos . .you can easily play this in full screen ... you can also play with Pen on the Lenovo X220T , you know with us lot playing through games in shorter spaces of time than youtubed episodes of reality tv ...we need challenges ... so playing through Dead Space 2 with Pen is going to be one of mine... heck I may even use it to make Modern Warfare last longer than it`s commercial this time.... 


Look at the video and you will see the Pen is never touching the screen ! wait till I splice one of these with one of my fingers! Cyberpunk yay...  This discovery calls for testing some classic Jedi Knight games ... 


On another note  this being a weekend of free Brink play , I was shocked to realise that the game cannot run on integrated gpu laptops ... or if it can I cannot be bothered to work around ... but using streaming and cloud based services it could run on any device instantly... so why bother getting the Steam version ....and publishers why bother limiting yourself to Steam and the minority core gamer market when using streaming you can play the most high spec game on the lowliest of netbooks or tablets  ( even iOS and Android!) ? Gaikai and onlive are the only true evolution in gaming in a decade ..changing where how and when you play ... ..let freedom reign! .... all the rest ... all the rest is just hardware.....

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220T Tablet Test No.10 : Darkspore played with Pen and with and without touching the screen!

Darkspore was one of the first games I tried out on a tablet , way back when it was in Beta , it had excellent mouse based controls that translated very well to my then newly Windows 7 installed   multi touch Joojoo [ 1 , 2 ]and multiscreen Iconia tablets  so it was always going to be a game I needed to test out the Lenovo X220 T . Maxis made a lot of friends during that Beta , if you were a part of it you felt you were part of the development team on a very cool game . 


Right now whilst you are still aching for Diablo III to arrive , the incredibly fun and under rated Darkspore is cheaper than most iPhone AAA apps ... and it serves as a very good testing medium for how sharp the Pen on the Lenovo X220T  is , and continues to reveal the absolutely Potteresque abilities of this battery less  game controller ( ok in thegameveda`s hand the totally serious Lenovo Pen is considered first a gaming device , second  a Deathly Hallow , third a potential Light Sabre ... and lastly a text input device) . The fascinating thing about the Pen is that you can hold it almost 1 cm from the screen and still interact with the screen , in Darkspore .... and eventually Diablo 3 this means an end to all that incessant mouse clicking ...that drives me mad when playing lootemups  , you can also use finger touch if you prefer , but the pen really adds finesse to messing with the creature designer , menus and combat I can hover the pen over a bad guy and attack far quicker than scrolling a  mouse or swiping a trackpad , just watch the video , and the first time you manipulate ( and every time thegameveda manipulates ) an object using the pen WITHOUT touching the screen you feel strong with the Force ...  Plus that pen is never running out of batteries or charge like your mouse! 

In the USof A get Darkspore  And in the UK you would be silly to miss out on Darkspore for £7.85



   

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220T Tablet Test No.9 : Crysis 2 played and or conducted with Pen

So I had to try this playing Crysis 2 with pen , and as you can see any kind of attempt at playing games with a pen that does not touch a touch screen , takes a bit of practice .. but perservere and you will get there in the end ... plus the best thing of all ....is the PEN NEVER RUNS OUT OF JUICE .. there are no batteries ...it will keep going as long as your Lenovo X220T ...



 

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220 T Tablet test No. 11 : Big screen 50 inch Plasma gaming Crysis 2 , Diablo 2 . Team Fortress 2 and Onlive and more errh tests ...

Test 1 : Crysis 2 on Steam running on an LG 50 inch Plasma and the Lenovo X220T !


What we see here is mine Lenovo X220T linked with a VGA lead ( Industrial !) to one of the few Plasma screens still  attached to a wall after last weeks UK Riots .... any way this will serve as thegamevedas next great test paradigm for the 12.5 inch screened Intel HD 3000 powered Lenovo X220T that you see in the bottom right corner of the picture .. this is an old Plasma ( 13 if I am correct)  but a bold Plasma ... and the res is 1366 by 768 , the screen refresh is 60 hz so you will see flickering my ageing vga camera ( circa 1999) , but rest assured when you actually play there is no ghosting or flickering the game play is as razor sharp as the picture above .. and I was certainly surprised how fast the game moves  


I am playing  Cryisis 2 from Steam  with a wireless Xbox 360 pad ( well it never gets any console use ) and just think the X220T is actually running 2 screens at 1366 by 768 as you can see 


The reason I test Crysis 2 so much is because it is really a Sandbox game hidden in an FPS , there are so many ways to take down the bad guys it deserves to be played again and again and again.... hhhmmh OK back to the serious work of testing the X220 T : 

Test 2 : Diablo 2  demo played with Pen and touch and mirrored on a 50 inch Plasma ... you know ...for budding Blizzcon demonstrators ..... 


In this test for those trying to impress Blizzard at one of their cons ... we use pen and touch to control Diablo 2  which is being mirrored onto the big 50 inch Plasma ...  and as the pen only needs to hover over the screen and never touch it no more mouse clicking .... although there is a lot of pen clicking .....

Test 3 : Team Fortress 2 : because someone requested it and we need to challenge the Lenovo X220Ts wifi , Intel HD3000 , and have some fun whilst where at it ... 

Test 4 : Onlive gaming on a 50 inch Plasma screen using the Lenovo X220 T 


Onlive is  a very good test of the broadband stability of the X220T and during the almost 20 minute test the machine NEVER drops a connection once , even though it is powering 2 screens ! including a 50 inch Plasma ....   I am playing with my trusty 360 pad ...  may be I will try using Kinect next time around ... And so you do not even need the onlive console if you have a nifty tablet PC like the Lenovo X220T as you can see from the video....

NB there is no actual flickering or ghosting on the plasma , this is due to the feeble vga camera I have at my disposal ....






   

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Lenovo X220T Tablet Test No. 12 : Playing 2 games simultaneously : Mass Effect 2 +The Witcher 2 and Mass Effect 2 vs Spore

Time to stress Gaikai , why not use it to play two games at once , yes you can , Gaikai requires no login unlike Onlive and Steam , without the shackles of an account system you can have more than one window open each playing a different game near instantly . As you can see in the video below  Gaikai is coming along in leaps and bounds , and remember you can just as easily do this on a $199 netbook , for me this is a groovy way of testing the wifi on the  Lenovo X220T . Now if Dave Perry could do something about the queues.....

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached 

Deus Ex Human Revolution for £15.15

in the UK Deus Ex Human Revolution is just £15.15! bet you are glad you waited!

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

this content is © and originated from thegameveda http://the-games-veda.blogspot.com/  if you are reading it from any other site that has not provided a link back it has been leached