Navigate the XMB
When you first turn the Move controller on, boot up your PS3 and see that white orb spring into action glowing a multitude of different colours it feels a bit gimmicky. During our first few hours or so with Move, the glowing orb was a little distracting, especially when you're just navigating the XMB. It looks nice enough and gives off a pleasant, feint glow, but we’re yet to see it used to its full potential in any of the launch games we've played. However, as more games for Move arrive it's going to be interesting to see how developers incorporate the orb into their games.To navigate the XMB you hold down the trigger with your index finger and can then move the controller up, down, left and right to navigate through the menus, using the new Move button to select your actions. The accuracy of Move is immediately noticeable in comparison with the Wii Remote. It takes little effort to be able to move through the menu system as it follows your hand movements precisely, so it's easy to make it stop exactly where you want it to without any problem or frustration. It’s a little bit more tricky to use if you try to type in messages because the margin for error, having to stop exactly on the right key on screen, is very small, but it does feel, fluid, natural and intuitive to use and after more usage it soon becomes second nature.
The ball on the end of the controller acts as the pointer, so you need to point Move directly at the camera. Contrary to some rumours you don't have to stand up directly in front of the PS Eye. Instead, you can tilt your camera up and down so you can use it while sitting on a chair, or even on the floor. The room where we play our PS3 is poorly lit with no natural light, yet the camera picked up our movements with no problem at all and no signs of delay as we moved it swiftly from one side of the screen to the other. We could also sit fairly close to the screen, approximately 4ft (1.2 metres,) and navigate the XMB without a problem. Even from this short demonstration of the Move's accuracy it's clear to see that the technology is far more advanced than that of the Wii Remote and if developers take advantage of it properly it could become a fantastic peripheral.
And that's really where the problem lies at the moment. There just isn't any great games to support Move. We’ll have standalone reviews of Start The Party, Sports Champions and Kung Fu Rider shortly so won’t go into detail here, but they feel like a set of tech demos, with each showcasing just how accurate Move is without leaving any lasting impression, or providing an immersive and exciting gamepaly experience. It seems as though Sony chose to rush the product out for Christmas rather than wait until there was some half decent software to make it a worthwhile purchase.
Normally at the end of each review we award the product with a percentage score, but PlayStation Move is a difficult peripheral to judge at this particularly time. The tech is very impressive, doing exactly what it claims it can do by tracking the controller perfectly accurately on screen. It also looks and feels great to hold. However, it's the lack of quality games at the moment that prevent Move from being this years must-have peripheral. For now, unless you've got children at home that you want to keep quiet for a couple of hours with Sports Champions, you'd be wise to wait a while until more games become available before you purchase Move. Buy it now and within a few weeks it will probably end up gathering dust in the same spot where your PlayStation Eye has been for the past few years.
Check back for PlayStation Move game reviews.
