Fun to play, easy to set up, great potential

Author's Rating:

Pros: Easy to set up, kids and adults have fun.

Cons: Camera can be confused by room decorations and inadequate lighting.

The Bottom Line: 
I recommend this product. An excellent, novel, entertaining alternative to traditional video games.

Author's Review
It's about time that someone has come up with a new way to play video games on a console. Sony's EyeToy for PlayStation 2 consoles places you in the game, literally.

The premise of EyeToy is to place your moving image (and, possibly, sound) on the screen to interact with a game. You control the EyeToy exclusively by moving your hands over the "controls" on the screen to choose options. Playing a game is just as straightfoward--move to interact with the game's characters and objects.

The EyeToy package comes with a small video camera and a disc. Set up couldn't be easier. Place the camera on your TV or just below it, plug it into either of the console's USB ports, load the disc into the console, and off you go.

The camera is small, not much bigger than deck of playing cards. It has a movable ring to focus the lens, two LEDs, and a posable base to adjust the camera's position. A blue LED lets you know that the camera is properly plugged in and working. A red LED flashes if the room is too dark.

The camera works well, although it can require some awkwardly placed lighting when playing after the sun sets. Also, a large painting in the room where I placed the EyeToy seems to confuse the camera. Moving the camera so the painting is no longer in its view corrects the problem.

The disc includes some setup options, a video messaging feature, some very simple interactive scenarios, and a dozen simple games.

Among other things, the setup options lets you adjust the camera to the lighting in the room that the EyeToy is in and how sensitive the camera is to your movement.

The video messaging feature lets you record a video and audio message and save it to a memory card. The audio comes from the camera's built-in microphone.

The interactive scenarios show cute animations or cool special effects. A favorite is Materialize, which renders moving things invisible. Stand still for a moment, step quickly to one side, then stand still again. The resulting screen movement shows you standing on one side of the screen, disappear, then reappear magically on the other side. Young kids who tried these scenarios had a great time jumping, running, and generally enjoying themselves in front of the TV, something you don't normally see kids doing while playing Tetris.

The games, while simple, are a lot of fun, especially with groups of people. You have the option of creating a profile, which keeps track of a 3-letter name and 3 poses (happy, sad, and funny). Any high scores you achieve will be recorded with your profile. After a few vigorous games, your arms can actually get tired.

I can't wait to see what other games Sony and other games publishers will come up with for this interesting new video game hardware.