In Game Voice Control and Voice Chat! (Microsoft Gamevoice)

Member Name: Meshek

Product:	Microsoft Gamevoice
Date:	12/01/02 (1928 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Good Price, Control Games, Game Chat

Disadvantages: Sometimes Slow in reacting to game commands., Bugs before you download the Patch

Microsoft's game voice is the first device of kind (there has been some software only soloutions arround however these tend not to work very well unless one buys a good pair of headphones and microphone). It allows one to control games with ones voice and allows one to talk to other people while playing a game.

It comes with a very good set of headphones with a built in microphone which are made by plantronics for microsoft. The Headphones are very adjustable, both the position of the microphone and the size of the headphone, and will fit almost any sized head. The package also comes with a control box which has many bottons which can switch between the headphones and speaker, mute the microphone, tell the computer to listen for voice commands, talk to team, talk to 4 different individuals, talk to all.

The voice control for games is a kind of voice recognition. It differs from most voice recognition devices in that you do not have to train your voice you simply type in, in phonetics the sound you want it to react to. What it can react to is either a key or combination of keys or a macro where it will hold down one key for a certain length of time then another and another etc. This works quite well although it does sometimes make mistakes(this can be sorted out be given shorter phrases for it to react to or getting the phonetics better) and there is a slight delay (about 1/10 sec) between hearing and reacting. (Although this can be improved by making its process a high priority.)

The in game talk feature in games is good and works well. The inbuilt buttons on the control box which allow between talking with all, team, player 1 (user defined), player 2 (user defined), player 3 (user defined), player 4 (user defined). This feature does exactly what it says on the tin.

This is a good product that is resonably price. The headphones are good quality and the system works well. And as long as you download the patch there are not any
bugs to speak of.

Summary: