If you're feeling too detached from the experience of headshotting anonymous competitor's via standard mouse, maybe Zalman's FPS Gun (FG-1000) is what you're looking for. On display at CES 2008, the FPS Gun by Zalman—winner of our Least Worst 3D Gaming Display Award—was impressive in its ability to not be as bad as expected. Perhaps it's that the wrist is positioned vertically, allowing for a wider range of motion that made playing Unreal Tournament 2004 that much more enjoyable.

On the downside, only two of the four buttons felt like they were naturally positioned, with the glowing mousewheel awkwardly out of reach. Perhaps smaller hands will have an easier time scrolling, but when you've got dainty digits like I do, it's hard to imagine the current form factor working for a wide range of players.

Verdict: A good gimmick that works for simple shooters, but not for those in need of a robust button set up.

I'm by no means an E3 or CES (Consumer Electronics Show) veteran, having attended both shows only twice (and the "classic" E3 only once). But compared to foreign events like Leipzig's Games Convention, Berlin's IFA (tech show that rivals CES) or Tokyo's TGS, the two American shows had/have a distinct identity from their overseas counterparts. Maybe it's the attendance of people with similar values to my own (aka sucking both gasoline and fast food with no abandon), but this similarity, however trivial it may be, has made me wonder why CES isn't filling in the gaps of E3. While I'd never expect developers to attend in mass (and frankly, there isn't room), why don't Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo use the CES stage as a launching ground for their next year of products?

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I have no idea how it feels, but Nyko's Perfect Shot for the Wii remote certainly looks kick ass. My only issue is that I tend to forget about controllers that I have tucked away in elaborate cases, like the one still sitting dormant in my Guitar Hero controller.

As someone who's been gaming constantly since the age of four, I don't really buy into this, but whatever. A panel held at CES, where specialists discussed the impact electronics are having on kids, has thrown up some interesting arguments about videogames. One, from educational psychologist Jane Healy, is that because games teach kids "fight or flight" skills rather than "considered reasoning", they adversely affect a child's learning development. So she argues they should be kept away from games until they're seven, which is old enough to have allowed their brains to have developed "normally".

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Congratulations to the team at Zalman for walking away with this year's coveted Least Worst 3D Gaming Display award, which I suppose will now have to be a yearly tradition when we cover CES. Of all the companies demonstrating custom 3D solutions for PC games, Zalman's caused the least eyestrain, generated the lightest amount of nausea and required players to suffer the least dorky eyewear. Playing Unreal Tournament 2004 was actually quite fun in simulated 3D. What made the experience even better wat that crowds had thinned on the fourth day of CES 2008 to the point where we don't think anyone but Zalman reps saw us wearing dainty polarized glasses. Kudos to them and the team at Nvidia for making a nearly interesting experience!

Apparently, many of you have been demanding a "full body experience" and want to beaten about the head and shoulders by bladders filled with compressed air. At least, that's what I've been led to believe by the folks at TN Games, who were showing off their 3rd Space HXT Gear, which consists of a force feedback vest and helmet. You can most likely gather that the helmet excels at developing perfect helmet hair, effectively blinding hippie/emo/dirtball types, but what's not apparent in photos is that the device simulates 360 degrees of harsh noogies more accurately than any other force feedback helmet I've ever worn.

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Importer Innex featured the Retro Duo, an NES, SNES and Super Famicom player, heavily in its CES booth this year, giving old school console fans a chance to bust out their old carts and save a bit of space. The Retro Duo, which was paired with the NES and Sega Genesis-playing Gen-X, features S-video out, for those looking for a bit more clarity out of their 8-bit and 16-bit collection. The Retro Duo's controller looks and feels like the stock Super Nintendo controller, with another controller, part SNES, part NES Max, that should appeal to fans of that form factor.

One advantage the Retro Duo has over some of the other NES/SNES clones is its ability to properly play the original Starfox, which looked and played just as we remembered it. The double duty console looks like a pretty nice product for anyone who still has plenty of retro titles on hand and isn't already in possession of similar products like the FC Twin. More pics of the consoles are in our gallery below.

We caught up with John Koller, senior product manager for the PSP at Sony's CES booth this week, to get a quick update on the company's portable plans. When asked about the success of the recently launched PC version of the PlayStation Store that allows those without a PlayStation 3 to download games, trailers and more to their PSPs, Koller told us that while it was a bit too early for accurate numbers, the company is expecting big things from the service. "We have an opportunity to bring bite-size experiences to the system, ten second, pick up and play content that can be downloaded from the store," Koller told us, part of an effort to expand the PSPs demographic.

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The South Hall of CES is loaded with traditionally non-gaming companies showcasing their wares with popular games. If you want to get in a few free sessions of Guitar Hero III, Halo 3 or Wii Sports, this is the place to be. If you're looking for a speaker that's shaped like a Wii nunchuk, it's also the place to be. Fenda Tech's home theater offering may have a very specific appeal with it's Wii inspired speakers and subwoofer, but it actually sounds pretty good for a novelty product. Fenda says the 2.1 system "intensifies your gaming with a soundfield that surrounds you," so if that's sounds like your bag, watch for the $US 50-ish system to launch later this year.

Gizmodo had a chance to go hands on with that sexy OLED keyboard that can change each key to whatever you want instantly. The good news is that the Optimus Maximus keyboard itself functions like it should, it's responsive, snappy, but not too noisy. The ability to customize your keys also seems pretty locked-down. The only downside I could see from the hands-on at CES was that the keyboard gets greasy "very greasy" when you use it. That sounds like a HUGE issue to me. As someone who uses his keyboard so much the letters actually wear away, I couldn't stand having a board that was tactilely disagreeable, which is a pretty big disappointment for me because I've been jonesing for this keyboard since it was first announced back in the 1500s.