By Andrew Liszewski
Hasbro’s new Scrabble Flash was a popular gift over the holiday season, and if you had a chance to play the multi-interactive LCD cube game you already have a good idea of what the Sifteo gaming platform is all about. It’s Scrabble Flash taken to a whole new level. The most obvious improvement are the cubes themselves which each feature a full color and clickable LCD display, a gyro/motion sensor so they know how they’re oriented and the ability to store multiple games at one time. The cubes wirelessly interact with each other allowing gaming elements to be spread across all of the LCD displays which allows for more creative games than just spelling out words.
During our hands-on we got to play a sort of Bejewelled clone where matching pieces across multiple cubes would all disappear, and the individual colored elements could be sifted around by just picking up and rotating the cube. Another example had a character traversing a maze which extended in different directions depending on which side of the cube you decided to place the next one.
The Sifteo system is definitely pretty unique and original, and if they manage to inspire and excite game developers it has a lot of potential. Though they can only be used with a running computer nearby which facilitates their wireless communications and presumably some of inter-cube processing. And while the charger included with the base kit features 6 slots, when available later this year Sifteo will only come with 3 cubes for $149. With additional cubes running $45 each.
