Logitech LX5 Cordless Optical Mouse review ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

Logitech LX5 Cordless Optical Mouse

★★★★★ ★★☆☆☆

A comfortable ambidextrous wireless mouse with at least one significant flaw in a harder-to-use-than-it-should-be middle mouse button.

Things I Learned From Dropping My Mouse Onto a Hard Surface

Never drop your mouse onto a hard surface. You can quote me.

I had been the satisfied owner of the Logitech Cordless Desktop for Notebooks but I recently dropped the mouse onto a hard surface from desk height. Mouse still seemed to work but then I noticed that I was having a hard time selecting things and that I was double-clicking items instead of single-clicking them. So, a new mouse was needed.

The LX5

I didn't really want to go to the expense of replacing my whole keyboard and mouse wireless setup. What I wanted was a mouse that would use the same, very handy, receiver as the Cordless Desktop for Notebooks.

Brilliantly, Argos sell the LX5 mouse for £19.95 and I just happened to have £20-worth of Argos vouchers. That feels free. I even got my five pence change!

I worked on the presumption that since this wasn't a Logitech Bluetooth product that it should work with the same receiver as my previous setup. And, after being a bit thick, it did! I didn't even need the supplied setup disc as Logitech have long since made their software support all their keyboard and mouse products. I simply pressed the Connect button on the wireless receiver and the SetPoint software now listed my mouse as the LX5.

Design

The LX5 is a medium-sized mouse with a design that features sides that are more sculptured than they appear in the Logitech promotional photos. It is also symmetrical. This means that the mouse is comfortable for use by left-handed and right-handed people.

Because it is a wireless mouse it is battery powered (2AA Duracell's are supplied, most impressive) and this makes the mouse much heavier than a wired equivalent. However, it is lighter than Logitech's rechargeable mice.

SetPoint Usability

The LX5 works directly in Windows XP without requiring any additional drivers or software installed. SetPoint is the software that controls customisation of Logitech keyboard and mouse products and is a highly recommended install. It is a vast improvement on Logitech's previous software and does everything you want it to.

It keeps itself up-to-date by checking Logitech every so often (I think it is every month or so). It tells you if the batteries in your cordless devices are getting low on juice. Most importantly, it allows you to customise what happens when you use your device. With the LX5 this means that the five functions can be mapped to do just about anything on your computer and that you can set acceleration and pointer speed values. You can also set up a game mode that automatically disables a couple of bits of business when you play games, presumably for greater accuracy or something. The game mode is a feature I've never had cause to use.

attractive, clear and easy-to-use

The SetPoint software is attractive, clear and easy-to-use. You select your category of device along the top (for example, My Keyboard or My Mouse) and then a page of setup or information down the left. Any attached devices appear in a drop-down list allowing you to independently configure multiple mice on the same PC. There are relevant and accurate graphics depicting which mouse and keyboard you have attached and everything is clearly labeled. It's a nice piece of software.

Mouse Usability

The mouse glides well and feels comfortable. The two main mouse buttons are in just the right place as is the mouse wheel. The mouse wheel has a nice feel to it with just the right weight. I haven't yet accidentally flicked the mouse wheel left and right but have used these (largely useless) functions deliberately and found them agreeably weighted also.

The main fault with the LX5 now comes to bear. The middle mouse button (ie, clicking the mouse wheel in) is oddly awkward.

middle mouse button is oddly awkward

You need much more pressure to activate the middle mouse button than either the left or right mouse buttons. The feel of the button is entirely different and it almost feels like you have to push it in a different direction to the left and right mouse buttons. Those two buttons have a nice clean click to them. The middle mouse button has a loud cler-unk. In fact, when I first tried to use the middle mouse button I thought that it wasn't there. I needed to push the wheel in much harder; harder than is intuitive.

I wanted my middle mouse button to behave like, well, a middle mouse button

The LX5 feature five customisable functions: left mouse button, middle mouse button, right mouse button, left mouse wheel and right mouse wheel. Of these, the middle mouse button is, by default, bizarrely mapped to a 'zoom' function. This zoom function didn't seem to do anything other than change my mouse pointer to a little magnifying glass. I didn't investigate further as I wanted my middle mouse button to behave like, well, a middle mouse button.

The SetPoint software comes into play here but the middle mouse button setting is tucked away under a drop-down under Other. Never mind, a job you only have to do once. I don't mind that but it is a bit weird.

pinging off into the sunset

Another complaint is the battery cover which requires a leap-of-faith as you push the compartment lock with all your might and hope it doesn't just go pinging off into the sunset. Still, Logitech claim an eight month battery life so you won't be needing access to it all that often. The batteries in the Cordless Desktop for Notebooks mouse lasted a couple of months or so; that was even though I consistently remembered to turn the mouse off whenever I wasn't using it for a period of time.

Conclusion

A comfortable ambidextrous wireless mouse with at least one significant flaw in a harder-to-use-than-it-should-be middle mouse button.

Stuntman PlayStation 2 video game review ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

★★★★★ ★★☆☆☆
Reflections take a genius game design (a mission-based driving action game which is NOT violent) and wraps it up in a cruel package which delivers exhilarating rewards but is more likely to make you want to cry and stab your PlayStation 2 to death. With two stunt sequences left in the game and an urge to throw the PS2 controller only just resisted, I had to retire.

CONTENT
Classified OK 11+ by ELSPA. Content OK 11+.




Indicative of the meanness of this game is the fact that the director has the same voice clip for a successful scene and an unsuccessful scene. He simply says "Cut" in a rather unimpressed voice. Surely, for a successful scene it would have been nicer for him to say "That's a wrap. Great work." or something.

Here's another one. The director calls out instructions. However, he doesn't call them all out. For example, in the Bond-alike movie "Live Twice For Tomorrow" you are tasked with "Get close and overtake on the right". You do that and he promptly fails the take for not staying ahead of the helicopter. This is needlessly, sadistically cruel.

Another item on "Live Twice for Tomorrow" tells you to overtake on the right but there's always been a car in the way every time I've attempted it. He then tells you to overtake on the left but the icon turns red (indicating stunt failure) before you even get there.

How about invisible scenery? In the Indiana Jones-alike movie, you bash two trucks out of the way in order to tackle a jump. But there is a piece of invisible scenery on the right of the road so if you head down there your car will crumple up as if you'd just driven into a concrete block. On that movie's Temple Trap level there is a rock which is much wider than it's graphic. Not quite as bad as invisible scenery is scenery which you can get caught on way too easily. The worst culprit here is roadside kerbs. Sometimes you can ride them. Sometimes it will throw your car up in the air removing your control and destroying the take. This isn't different kerbs on different kerbs, this is the same kerb on the same level. A kerb you ride a few times may end the take the next time. Also this is a game where you have to snick through tight spaces, yet the game designers thought it would be fun to put tiny little jutty-out bits of scenery, added detail and flavour presumably. These simply shouldn't exist.

The other vehicles in the game are also unfair. They speed up into you and never avoid an accident with you. Aren't they supposed to be highly trained stunt drivers aswell? It is anachronistic for them to keep causing accidents.

The handling of the car is a sore point. You can never quite get used to it because Reflections have kept a little invention from the "Driver 2" PlayStation game: the automatic handbrake. This means that sometimes when you turn strongly left or right, the handbrake is automatically applied making for a more spectacular cornering style. Unfortunately, it is not consistent and you never know when the auto-handbrake is going to be applied. Because it is always a surprise, your car always ends up facing in completely the wrong direction whenever it is applied. Take the same corner twice and once you'll understeer, once your car will spin around. In "Driver 2" this 'feature' could be disabled, making the game playable (in fact, most negative reviews of that game were clearly conducted by people who left the auto-handbrake enabled). Here there is no choice. You have random cornering ability whether you want it or not.

In fact, this is largely a game where none of the sharp bits were sanded down and, as such, reflect a game that is not finished and where such important gameplay details were simply not considered as important as Atari and Reflections bank balance.

The game also suffers from technical issues with the occasional ugly popping of textures (textures that are blurry and become clearer when you get closer but you shouldn't be able to spot when the game does this) and, much more critically, frame rate fluctuations. These fluctuations normally occur at the absolute worst time. For example, one occurs as you attempt to land a motorbike and sidecar on a very small temple rooftop making an already tricky stunt significantly harder.

Outside of the entirely brilliant premise there are some other things that the game does well. Probably the most notable of these is the trailers for the movies you film the stunt sequences for. Brilliantly, these trailers feature your actual stuntwork, not a pre-rendered or pre-driven sequence. For example, of the "Dukes of Hazzard"-style movie, I missed a chimney during a jump and that miss was in the trailer. Likewise on the Bangkok thriller Blood Oath, a bizarre but successful landing of mine was in the trailer. This is an exceptional detail, great appreciated.

Largely speaking, the replays are good and generally make your driving and stuntwork look better than it felt or did while performing the stunt.

This is such a missed opportunity, it is so close to greatness that it is upsetting. The Stuntman franchise is getting a belated sequel in 2007 but Reflections are not involved at all and, sadly, that may be a good thing.

Tadople mini movie review ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

★★★★★ ★★☆☆☆
Tackles the teen crush on an older woman, specifically a stepmother, with enough honesty, normalcy and insight to make this an interesting movie and doesn't forget to be entertaining and well-paced. It never becomes pretentious (despite quoting from Voltaire throughout) and doesn't outstay its welcome. Newcomer Aaron Stanford does well in the lead role. Poor picture quality (the movie was shot on video in a couple of weeks) doesn't negatively affect the movie, especially now that it will only be shown on television.

DESCRIPTION
15-year-old Oscar Grubman has found his perfect woman but the intelligent, attractive, mature woman with great hands he has fallen for is his stepmother Eve. Still, true love cannot be ignored and he prepares to reveal his true feelings on a trip home from college.

PEOPLE CREDITS
• Director: Gary Winick
◦ Sigourney Weaver: Eve Grubman
◦ John Ritter: Stanley Grubman
◦ Bebe Neuwirth: Diane
◦ Robert Iler: Charlie
◦ Aaron Stanford: Oscar Grubman
• Writer: Heather McGowan
• Writer: Niels Mueller
• Writer (Story): Heather McGowan
• Writer (Story): Niels Mueller
• Writer (Story): Gary Winick
• Producer: Gary Winick

CONTENT
Sexual swear words, adult dialogue. Subject - under-age sex, paedophilia. Mild sexuality
Classified 15 by BBFC. Suitable only for persons of 15 years and over.

Bad Boys II mini movie review ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

Bad Boys II DVD captures

★★★★★ ★★☆☆☆
Buddy-buddy action comedy that has lots of ideas and certainly tries harder to be good than you may expect. Overall, the film feels like it takes too long to do anything and seems a bit of a mess. The action is good but the comedy is better. Second time around it is a lot of fun.
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PEOPLE CREDITS
◦ Martin Lawrence: Detective Marcus Burnett
◦ Will Smith: Detective Mike Lowrey
◦ Jordi Mollá: Hector Juan Carlos "Johnny" Tapia
◦ Gabrielle Union: Syd
◦ Peter Stormare: Alexei
◦ Theresa Randle: Theresa
◦ Joe Pantoliano: Captain Howard
• Producer: Jerry Bruckheimer
• Writer (Story): Marianne Wibberley
• Writer (Story): Cormac Wibberley
• Writer (Story): Ron Shelton
• Writer (Screenplay): Ron Shelton
• Writer (Screenplay): Jerry Stahl
• Director: Michael Bay

CONTENT
Frequent sexual swear words. Substance abuse. Extreme violence, graphic violence. Sensuality, sexual references, nudity (Jessica Karr's breasts)
Classified 15 by BBFC. Suitable only for persons of 15 years and over.
Classified R by MPAA. Restricted: Under 17 requires accompanying parent or adult guardian.


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The car transporter chase sequence was also used in Clint Eastwood's action thriller "The Rookie".

Mission: Impossible III movie review ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

★★★★★ ★★☆☆☆
Twenty years after break-out blockbuster "Top Gun" Tom Cruise remains top of the pile of Hollywood A-listers and this good summer action movie demonstrates why. It's disappointing to see the rogue agent thing again for the third time in three films, none of the action scenes hit the same heights as the previous two movies but J.J. Abrams successfully brings one of cinema's very-bestest-ever bad guys to the screen with the help of a revelatory Philip Seymour Hoffman, delivers quality team-based action and gives his star something interesting to do in-between the running bits.
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PEOPLE CREDITS
◦ Tom Cruise: Ethan Hunt
◦ Philip Seymour Hoffman: Owen Davian
◦ Ving Rhames: Luther
◦ Billy Crudup: Musgrave
◦ Michelle Monaghan: Julia
◦ Jonathan Rhys Myers: Declan
◦ Keri Russell: Lindsey Farris
◦ Maggie Q: Zhen
◦ Laurence Fishburne: Theodore Brassel
• Writer (original Television Series): Bruce Geller
• Writer: Alex Kurtzman
• Writer: Roberto Orci
• Writer: J.J. Abrams
• Producer: Tom Cruise
• Producer: Paula Wagner
• Director: J.J. Abrams

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"Paramount Pictures Presents" Owen Davian counting to ten before shooting Ethan Hunt's wife in the head while the desperate, disbelieving IMF agent looks on. "9!" Hunt realises Davian is going to shoot her. Hunt knows he is helpless. Hunt knows there will be no rescue, that there is nothing he can say. "10!" The gun fires. The match strikes. Schifrin's theme kicks in. It is a perfect opening. The audience stops holding their breath. The movie is never as good again. It's also probably the best single scene / opening in the 2006 blockbuster season.

It is a credit to Tom Cruise as producer / star that he has made good on his intentions for this series, that is, to bring in a new director to make a new movie in their own style each time. When J.J. Abrams was finally brought in to direct this third in the blockbuster series, he was allowed to retool the enterprise to his own tastes and the final movie feels just like his famed television productions "Lost" and, particularly, "Alias". This is both good and bad. More good, though.

Abrams brings in Hunt's home life, camaraderie, a Greg Grunberg cameo, and plenty of terrific throwaway ideas. He also manages to successfully suspend disbelief at the world of Mission: Impossible (something John Woo notably failed to do with his endless face masks that change your entire body weight and shape) and makes the gadgets and technology fun, not stupid.

He also delivers one of the most attention-grabbing pre-credits sequences in history (detailed above) which is done without special effects, explosions, or even music (if memory serves). He just takes two great actors (Philip Seymour Hoffman as Owen Davian and Tom Cruise as Ethan Hunt) and puts them head-to-head in a situation our hero IMF agent Ethan Hunt cannot understand or win. The tension Abrams generates in this sequence is sensational and both his stars provide the goods drama-wise.

Paramount Pictures dropped Cruise at the end of the summer season despite him delivering this as the latest in a line of highly profitable movies that will continue to make money for many years to come. They cited Cruise's personal behaviour especially in relation to his then girlfriend / now wife Katie Holmes.


>> MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE
+ Pre-credits sequence. Wow!
+ Philip Seymour Hoffman.
+ Keri Russell (yummy) who also gets the coolest action moment in the whole movie when she catches a gun and, with one super slo-mo, super-smooth, impossibly brilliant movement, catches the gun, turns and takes down bad guys. Yay!
+ Baddie death. A great baddie deserves a great death and Hoffman gets one. Simple but great and the perfect end to a great bad guy.


>> MISSION: COULD DO BETTER
- Rogue-agent storyline. Again. For the third time in three films. Groan.
- Jackie Chan's staggering closing stunt from "Who Am I?" (the one where he literally runs down the sloping roof of a skyscraper) is revisited by Hollywood here but, if you've see Chan do the real thing, this verison underwhelmes. It has no build-up and not much believability. The first "Mission: Impossible" also borrowed from Chan ("Police Story III: Supercop") with the closing helicopter / train sequence but that managed to successfully throw money at the idea and came up with a great sequence.
- The action sequences are pretty forgettable.
- Doesn't really feel like a big-budget big-screen movie. I'd just been watching "The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King" prior to this and that feels like a big-screen production from frame one, reel one. This feels like a beautifully produced TV show and doesn't even feel like principal production travelled to Berlin, Vatican City or Shanghai.

Batman Begins PS2 video-game review ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

★★★★★ ★★☆☆☆
Atmospheric and fun movie tie-in video game. While the extreme linearity tends to be criticised by contemporary critics, it ensures that you always know what you are doing and you will not be getting stuck in this game. This gives Batman Begins a fluid, consistently enjoyable and atmospheric gaming experience. When the bad guys ask "Who are you?" you'll be saying back to the screen: "I'm Batman."
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PEOPLE CREDITS
◦ Christian Bale: Batman / Bruce Wayne
◦ Michael Caine: Alfred Pennyworth
◦ Morgan Freeman: Lucius Fox
• Writer: J.T. Petty
• Consultant: Denny O'Neil

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Impressively, almost the entire cast is present in the game in voice and likeness. Most of the likenesses are good with Christian Bale and Cillian Murphy really well done. Only Gary Oldman is missing even though his character is used. Additionally, the music and environmental sound effects are highly useful.

The graphics are very nice. Batman himself looks brilliant and the immediate environments are convincing and atmospheric. The lighting effects are frequently eye-catching. The fire and smoke effects are superb. The background environments are superb with animation even occuring in the background with car lights and monorails and more. The driving sections are also nicely done. The second one took me over eight minutes to drive through first time around and you go through Gotham, some tunnels, the dock area and finally some countryside and convincingly delivers a feeling of travelling somewhere at high speed. The graphics help the game feel very much part of the same Gotham City as the movie. On the minus side, I was playing the PS2 version which had some slowdown when the picture-in-picture technique was being used.

The big gameplay element trumpeted by the developers is that of fear: terrorising your opponents before you even arrive. The game uses it to disarm stronger opponents before you tackle them as Batman almost certainly gets killed if he takes on one or more baddies with guns. The only minor drawback is that the designers do not give you any choice in the matter. Nearly every battle takes place in a pre-determined trigger-the-fear-event then bash-the-baddies cycle. However, as I said before with regard to the game's extreme linearity, this does educate you so that if you see a baddie with a gun, you look for the fear-event or stealth-takedown. And these fear-events are pretty cool anyway. This is more a mechanic I would like to see be taken further in another game.

Generally, the gameplay falls into two areas: travelling and fighting. The travelling mechanics are largely brilliant. Batman is fast, nimble and able to use certain parts of the environment smoothly and to great effect. For instance, you can jump, double-jump and do this proper-cool glide with your Batsuit. You can also grapple to various areas, traverse narrow ledges and sneak through small areas. The control for this is simple and becomes second nature almost instantly. You also travel twice in your Batmobile and these are very very easy and break up the game nicely. You just blast through the streets for about six or seven minutes turbo boosting around and driving through any opposing vehicles. Oddly, no matter how many vehicles you trash the game takes significant pains to tell you that there were no casualties.

The other main gameplay element is fighting and in this the control makes Batman sort-of stick to his opponents so that you rarely end up hitting the air. You can move freely around the environment but it is always in relation to the nearest opponent. It sounds awkward but it's not. You then have five buttons you can use during fighting. Square is punch, Triangle kick, R2 defend, L1 is a context-sensitive and inventory-dependent gadget attack (like a smoke grenade or bat-attracting HT transponder) and Circle is a context-sensitive special attack which allows you to finish off opponents or attack them when have been knocked to the ground and other things. This is a simple (even though I've made it sound like you need three hands to control it) but generally fun fighting system and they are fast and furious. If you are low on health you will get frustrated with some of the fights against three manic inmates of Arkham Asylum but, largely, the pros outweight the cons.

Naturally, there are some little things that could be improved. Mostly little things, and none of them add up to a major gameplay problem. This is a game that plays smoothly from beginning to end.

Batman walks funny, it's a power walk (you know, like President Bush with his arms squared out and legs bowed) but, nonetheless, a funny I've-wet-myself walk. However, that's nothing compared to how he climbs ladders. Bizarrely, he climbs ladders like Spider-Man. Hmm. It's a bit of a shame as the game features largely terrific animation and the Bat himself looks fab. Until he climbs a ladder.

Another little gameplay tweak I would have prefered is the stealth mechanic. By pressing the left thumbstick in (L3) Batman enters a stealth mode where he moves quietly. It would have been more intuitive and more tense to make Batman make less noise the slower he walks. The speed Batman walks is controlled by the analogue thumbstick already and so integrating the stealth mechanic into the standard movement control would not have been difficult. The other use of the stealth mode (L3) is to crouch to go under certain objects. Batman crouches automatically when going through pipes and air-conditioning ducts, etc., and goes into a ledge mode to squeeze through narrow spaces or along narrow ledges so it could have been implemented that he automatically crouches for the one or two other objects he needs to sneak under.

Another gameplay irrittant comes during the fight sequences which are largely straightforward and cool but on some of the Batman vs. three opponents battles that occur during the Arkham Asylum stages. Sometimes it is impossible to extricate yourself from the fight and the three just pummel, kick and stab you to death without you being able to press a key to successfully block, jump out, run away or hit back. While this is annoying it forces you to be rather more careful than in most of the other fights. However, the real annoyance comes when you have to sit through the level reload screen and then run through all the unskippable dialogue before you can attempt the battle again.

Back to the good.

Gameplay rewards come in the form of unlockable bonuses and are entirely agreeable. The short interviews are as they should be: short. Though they are 4:3 they also play in the correct aspect ratio even if you are on a widescreen setup (providing you told the game you want it running in widescreen). This is a nice, often overlooked, detail.

You can unlock vintage batsuits, alternative Batmobiles and bonus Batmobile levels.

There is a Gallery of Fear containing characters you've intimidated and their back-story.

The game supports 16:9 and surround sound. The game has all dialogue subtitled and everything you need to know is presented on-screen via a context-sensitive radar and large crosses on anything you can interact with, along with full vibration support, so this is fine for deaf people also.

Miami Vice (2006) mini movie review ★★★★★★★☆☆☆

★★★★★ ★★☆☆☆
Quality crime thriller that lost me a bit on the actual story (why does the mid-level bad guy sabotage his own shipment?) but is a serious, cool, great-looking movie. Everytime I watch a movie about 'organised' crime, and drug-smuggling in particular, I always wonder how on earth these people ever get any business done and their product to the consumer. Special mention for the teeth-rattling sound effect for the big sniper rifles.
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PEOPLE CREDITS
• Writer: Michael Mann
• Director: Michael Mann
• Producer: Michael Mann
• Producer: Pieter Jan Brugge
• Executive Producer: Anthony Yerkovich
• Writer (original Television Series): Anthony Yerkovich
◦ Colin Farrell: Sonny Crockett
◦ Jamie Foxx: Ricardo Tubbs
◦ Gong Li: Isabella
◦ Naomie Harris: Trudy Joplin
◦ Ciarán Hinds: FBI Agent Fujima
◦ Justin Theroux: Zito
◦ Barry Shabaka Henley: Castillo
◦ Luis Tosar: Montoya
◦ John Ortiz: Jose Vero

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DVD
Picture quality on the DVD is superb with the odd exception of the final credits which are small and blurry. The remainder of the show displays remarkable accuracy and detail at all times. Audio is generally good but the subwoofer whumps that come with the big sniper rifles are a bit special.

WALLPAPER