Gizmondo Updates

[Chip]

The amateur crash test dummies behind the Gizmondo have just revealed the Gizmondo 2 for the first time. Oddly, it looks exactly like the original Gizmondo. The internal upgrades apparently consist of an unspecified nVidia GPU and better battery.

The other announcement is that the device will be available with either Windows Mobile or Google's Android.

Android strikes me as an incredibly odd choice for a gaming system that is supposed to be homebrew-friendly. The Android SDK only allows programs written in Google's special flavor of JAVA, and does not allow any access to the hardware. It's only really good for very simple games.

WiMo isn't much better. Unless the Giz developers intend to supply special libraries that allow coders to actually use the new 3D hardware, it might as well not be there. Though that may be the point. Perhaps one of the promises that the Giz managers are giving to commercial software houses is that only they will be able to make high-quality 3D games on the platform.

 

[Mutilator]

well im sure someone will buy it, but cant see it being a success after the last giz failed.

 

[CronoTriggerfan]

If they offer it at the budget price of $99, they may pull away some Wiz users, but it doesn't look like they will. Call me crazy, but I think history's about to repeat itself, as it looks like these guys have brought a knife (Gizmondo) to a gunfight (Pandora, Wiz).

 

[Classic Team]

Yes, you've heard right. Those of you who owned or own a Gizmondo may/may not be pleased to hear that the Gizmondo 2 is planned for release before christmas:

QUOTE
There is absolutely no way this will not happen. Rich Jenkins of Media Power has let a Swedish journalist see the new Gizmondo and confirmed it will be on sale by the end of the year. This year, before you ask.

The first Gizmondo was.. not very successful, but the new device - with its NVIDIA graphics and the option of either Windows CE or Google's Android as an OS is sure to be a winner, right?

A games handheld running Android could be a goer - there should be plenty of decent Android ports of around soon, but when was the last time you went out of your way to play a game on Windows CE? Can you even name 3 games that run on that platform?


The original website I found this at:
http://kotaku.com/5048758/gizmondo-20-defi...stmas-this-year

And the original source:
Here



EDIT: Merged with existing topic - Chip

 

[sam fisher]

Only Java (And proprietary Java implementation at that) generally means slowness abound.

 

[Alt Scythe]

YAY

 

[cherrycyanide]

It would be cool to see it running Android.

They could have at least re designed it. If it looked nice people would buy it as a media player.

 

[elan]

I like GIZ idea.Well it is time to change mobile .

 

[icurafu]

Could be interesting. But people will come in soon and bash it because it is Gizmodo which is giant target for ridicule at the moment.

 

[Firefox]

The hardware specs still don't look half bad, provided they don't ask too much money for it.

Wouldn't be keen on programming it under WinCE, though. A nice lightweight Linux or even coding straight onto the metal would be much better.

 

[anexanhume]

Do we know anything about the new GPU in this?

 

[zxxgp]

The article said you can get it with windows CE like the old one or with Android (Linux) so would not that be a pain from a development point of view. They would have to make the games work the same in both versions of the OS. Am I missing something?

 

[waffles]

I really think their actually trying to fail.
It has a bad name behind it, old design, and a untested software solution and a low supply of content.
Maybe if its super cheap and undercuts everything else.

 

[Firefox]

The article said you can get it with windows CE like the old one or with Android (Linux) so would not that be a pain from a development point of view. They would have to make the games work the same in both versions of the OS. Am I missing something?

I'm pretty sure that under Android you can only write Java applications that sit on top of the Android platform, which are never going to be anywhere near as fast as C/C++ applications that sit straight on the metal (or at least on top of the kernel and graphics driver).

 

[TwoHeadedBoy]

I don't know why everyone hates the design so much, at least it's original in a time when everything else looks like a Game Boy Micro or an iPod. It's cute!

 

[zxxgp]

The article said you can get it with windows CE like the old one or with Android (Linux) so would not that be a pain from a development point of view. They would have to make the games work the same in both versions of the OS. Am I missing something?

I'm pretty sure that under Android you can only write Java applications that sit on top of the Android platform, which are never going to be anywhere near as fast as C/C++ applications that sit straight on the metal (or at least on top of the kernel and graphics driver).

If the games (or programs) are done in Java that would solve the problem of needing multiple versions. The Gizmondo2 would need some awesome hardware to keep up with other devices if they are going to write games in Java.

 

[Nova]

I don't know why everyone hates the design so much, at least it's original in a time when everything else looks like a Game Boy Micro or an iPod. It's cute!

Agreed. And it looks quite comfortable to hold, and that's what counts, right?

Mark me interested, especially if it has that catapult game