Author - Judgeman

SteelSeries Kinzu Optical Gaming Mouse – A Review

2009/12/18
Judgeman
Reviews

SteelSeries has just released two new gaming mice, aimed at the hardcore gamer. The Kinzu Optical Mouse and the Xai Laser Mouse have been designed by professional gamers to give you the most responsive mouse you can find. In this review, I look at the little brother of the two gaming mice, the Kinzu Optical Mouse.

Kinzu Technical Specifications
– Ambidextrous lightweight ergonomic finger-tip / palm design
– Slip-resistant coating for superior mouse grip and control
– Gaming Grade optimizations for pro gaming CPI values
– CPI toggle for on-the-fly high & low sensitivity adjustments
– Customizable report rate between 125hz-1000hz / 1 ms response time.
– 3200 Counts Per Inch
– 9375 Frames Per Second
– Acceleration on/off toggle via software
– 50 Inches Per Second and 20G of acceleration
– Low-friction high-performance polyethylene feet

Design and Quality
The Kinzu Optical Gaming Mouse is a very standard looking wired mouse. It has a three button design (left, middle wheel, and right) with the SteelSeries logo on the palm rest. The slip-resistant coating on the mouse feels comfortable while in your hand and will actually do its job of keeping the mouse from slipping out from under you. The Kinzu’s design is also ambidextrous for the lefties out there and is very light weight to keep fatigue down in those marathon gaming sessions. The Kinzu operates with 9375 Frames Per Second at a movement speed of 50 Inches Per Second. The Kinzu is very smooth and reduces all jitter that you would find in mice that are not so gamer-centric.

I did run into two negatives with respect to the actual design of the Kinzu mouse. The first being that it only has three buttons. For my first person shooter testing last week, that was no big deal, since I never used the extra buttons of my previouse mice to play those games. When playing an MMO like World of Warcraft, however, I usually assign various actions to my fourth and fifth mouse buttons. The second negative I found is that the Kinzu Optical Gaming Mouse is very small. I play using a ‘palm grip’ on my mouse, and found that the mouse felt a bit too small in my hands. For those of you that have big hands and use a ‘claw hold’ on your mouse, this should be no problem for you.

Installation
The Kinzu Optical Gaming Mouse is very simple to install and is designed this way so you can take it to LAN parties without having to worry about complex install processes. The Kinzu can be a plug and play mouse, ready within seconds after you plug it into an available USB port. The second option for the Kinzu is to download the available software from SteelSeries. This allows you to set up to three profiles for the mouse as well as set its configuration to fit your needs.

Usage
In my week of testing the Kinzu Optical Mouse, I ran it through my standard gaming tests and used it in two completely different style of games – World of Warcraft and Team Fortress 2. I created two profiles for myself using the very simple-to-use SteelSeries software, one for my MMO games and the other for my FPS games. I could turn up the acceleration of the mouse for my FPS profile to keep the enemy in my sites, then switch profiles with the acceleration turned down to play my MMOs.

As previously-mentioned, in regards to playing MMOs, I did miss the fourth and fifth buttons tremendously. For MMO playing, the more buttons you have means the more you can bind to them and the less you need to drag your mouse around to activate a spell or equip an item. Other than missing those buttons, the Kinzu performed wonderfully in terms of sensitivity and movement. There was no jitter in the Kinzu’s movement and it was very accurate during my gameplay. Now, we all know that MMOs are not the benchmark for the performance of these mice, so let’s take a look on how the Kinzu helped me in my Team Fortress 2 experience.

Ah, Team Fortress 2… Tell me, why can’t I quit you?!? This was the perfect week for me to test the Kinzu in Team Fortress 2, what with the war going on between the Demomen and the Soldiers of the world. I chose my side (Soldiers FTW) and logged in, armed with the new Kinzu mouse. This, for me, is where the Kinzu was right at hime. The extra buttons I have used on other mice were not missed here. The accuracy of the Kinzu was fantastic and it allowed for some very smooth gameplay. The lightweight design reduced any type of hand cramping or fatigue that I normally experience whenever I play for too long. The Kinzu also showed its durability by surviving my temper tantrums during the week…

Conclusion
Steelseries has developed a very solid entry-level gaming mouse for those of us who do not have truck loads of disposable income. The Kinzu Optical Gaming Mouse is a very lightweight and durable mouse with incredible accuracy and smoothness for a much smaller price tag then it’s bigger brother, the Xai. The Kinzu will feel good in your hands for those marathon gaming sessions – although for me it could have been a tad bigger. The Kinzu’s easy installation also makes it perfect to take with you to a LAN game with your buddies or a full-on gaming competition. The Kinzu Optical Gaming Mouse retails for $34.99 and is available now.

*SteelSeries sent GamingShogun.com one Kinzu to test over the course of several weeks.

Valve to Clean House in Team Fortress 2

2009/09/02
Judgeman
News


Valve announced today that they will purge any and all items that have been acquired in Team Fortress 2 through a third party idling applications. Valve usually has a no tolerance view on any type of cheating or abusing of the system, but they did not have a policy like this prior to making this announcement. This time, they are only removing the items that were gained by cheating, next time it will be all items in the individual’s inventory. Valve claims that this will only affect 4.5% of the Team Fortress 2 population.

The good news, however, is that if you are one of those people, like myself, that never used the idling applications, you will be given a new hat. Valve has also increased the chance on people earning hats in game overall.

Team Fortress 2 Gets the Full Classless Update

2009/08/14
Judgeman
News

As we mentioned 2 days ago, Team Fortress 2 announced the beginnings of their next update, The Classless Update. Well, the update is complete and ready for download, so what exactly did we get this time? Four new maps, a new play mode and eighteen new hats that I can never seem to get. It’s a solid update, however I can’t help but to be a little disappointed that we didn’t get a class update. Yeah, I know we got two last time, I’m greedy.

Here is a list of the new content:

* Added King Of The Hill game mode.
* Added custom animations played by the losing team during the post-win state. They are moved into third person camera to enjoy them.
* Added lots of new hats.
* Added koth_Viaduct.
* Added ctf_Sawmill
* Added community map Arena_Offblast
* Added community map Cp_Yukon

Spy Sappin’ My Unlockables!

2009/06/01
Judgeman
Articles

Valve has made some big news in the month of March. No, it was not any type of E3 announcements, but an update to their online first person shooter Team Fortress 2. The Sniper/Spy Update was the largest for Team Fortress 2 so far, containing new achievements and unlockable weapons for both the sniper and the spy and new community maps. There was one more item the update contained that literally blew away the Team Fortress 2 community, the new unlockable system… (cont.)
Prior to the sniper/spy update, players had to earn their new toys via the Steam Achievement System. A player had to successfully complete a number of achievements prior to reaching the class’s milestone reward. These unlockables occured once you reached 10 achievements completed, then at 16 achievements, and finally at 22 achievements. With the new system implemented on May 22nd, the unlockables were now rewarded randomly, regardless of what class you were playing. You could receive any of the available items whenever the system randomly decided to give them to you. This would also include duplicate items. Why duplicate items? Valve announced that they are planning to allow item trading later in a future patch.

My personal feelings on this news was mixed at best. I am a huge fan of Team Fortress 2 and love playing for the unlockables. My frustration is that the last few class updates center around classes that I don’t play. So, if I wanted to get the unlockables for that class, I either had to spend countless hours getting beaten and burned in game, or go to an achievement farming server. With the new system, I got to play my heavy and still have a chance to earn the items. Sure, I hated getting items that I already had and not getting the brand new toys for the sniper and spy, but I understood what Valve was trying to do. I also see how frustrated a player could get by not getting the items through the achievement system. I personally had enough achievements to have all 3 sniper items, but only had 1 due to the random drop system. I saw the benefit to both systems and also saw how each system was flawed. The reaction from the Team Fortress 2 community was a little more one sided then mine.

Valve stated that this update to the unlockable system was due to the demand from most of the Team Fortress 2 community wanting to have more access to the items. The reaction on Valve’s own Team Fortress 2 forums were telling a different story. The majority of the postings on the forums from community members were extremely critical of Valve’s new system, comparing it to the drop system from a very successful MMORPG. It seemed that Valve may have misread the desires of their Team Fortress 2 players in regards to item unlockables.

So, what do you do if you are Valve? Well, give the people both. As of May 29th, Team Fortress 2 players will now be granted the random unlockable items, that also include hats, but will also be able to obtain their items through the nerfed milestone achievement system. The milestones now require far less achievements to unlock. I logged in on Friday and received all of the items that I’ve been missing since the beginning of the update. I see this as the best of both worlds, you now have two paths to reach your unlockables, the achievement system or the random drop system.