The [H]ard Facts

The truth is out there, or at least according to [H]ard|OCP, different from the hype.

In their latest photo-essay, the [H] team literally undressed a generation 1 Phantom game console unit to discover, as they put it:

"Basically the entire back panel of the generation 1 Phantom is put together with lots of hot glue and a lot of plugs that connect to nothing besides the ones that I have mentioned above that obviously do connect to something.."

They have cautioned that this is a review of a first-gen model (and developers Infinium Labs are currently working on third-gen models, as evidenced by their preview at this year's E3) but still, the very fact that Infinium launched a lawsuit against [H], have proven to be secretive to say the least (as evidenced by the [H] team's expose last year) AND that the CEO Tim Roberts seems to have led several companies to bankruptcy previously does lead one to wonder if this thing is really coming to fruition or if it's just a modern day version of snake oil.

For readers unfamiliar with the Phantom, the console was announced very early last year as another contender in the game console wars. It would supposedly support the latest graphics/sound technologies and rely on downloading games via a broadband connection (read: no discs) allowing users to buy/rent games they want and have them downloaded directly to the console via a then-unknown business model.

I was one of the many initially excited over this new console since the Infinium website posted a very flashy CG trailer of the thing supposedly in action, but then like the others, I became frustrated by the lack of information released by the company other than that it's under development. Many of the more established gaming sites ran scathing editorials of the console that no one's seem to know anything about, only (like [H]) to be met with lawsuits or even more obfuscating responses.

For one thing, I'm just interested to see how this will pan out, because tempting as it may seem, something just doesn't feel right in these gamer bones. Two decades of controller-twiddling gives one a gut feeling about things...