Review: The Rio Forge 256MB Sport

Quick Introduction

The Rio Forge 256MB Sport (FORGE256) is one of the best Flash players in the market having most if not all the features I've been looking for in a flash based player. Given the price the CircuitCity.com is offering combined with the mail-in rebate, it's probably one of the best values for an MP3 Player period. If you want to compare prices, try one of my favorite comparison sites:

www.pricegrabber.com

Price at time of purchase (04/2005) from www.circuitcity.com:

Price was: $159.99
You save: -$38.00
You pay: $121.99
Mail-in rebate(s): -$50.00
Shipping: (Free shipping on orders $25 & up + Free in-store pickup on all orders)
Price after rebate(s): $71.99


Positives

1) Quite a bit of music can be crammed into the player with it's decent 256MB on board memory. If you are using windows media player you can rip your CDs into WMA format. I suggest a bit rate of 96 KBPS for this player so you get a good balance of quality vs. file size. They say a bit rate of 128 KBPS is close to CD quality, but I personally prefer the smaller file size since the sound difference is almost negligible. You could get about 70-80 songs on the player by ripping songs to the 96 KBPS bit rate in WMA format.

2) The upgradeable memory is a definite plus considering the majority of the flash players out there have fixed internal memory with a maximum of 1GB. An upgrade is easily done with the SD/MMC Flash Expansion slot, just insert an SD or MMC flash card up to 1GB (1.256 GB total including the internal flash memory). This is also a boon for people who have digital cameras that use SD or MMC cards and have spare cards that they can use with the player.

I'm hoping a future firmware update will allow larger capacity cards like the 2GB SD cards to be playable. Who knows? There may even be larger capacity (3 GB or more) SD Card in the future. Hopefully the price for 2GB SD cards will go down as well. I guess we'll just have to wait see...

3) FM Tuner and FM Record - Play music from FM radio stations with 8 radio station preset slots. There is also a function to record FM broadcasts onto the memory. I live in a big city so I have a strong signal to my fave radio stations. Not sure how well the signal pick up is from more remote locations however. There is also a built-in stopwatch but unfortunately you can't change the music while the timer is running.

4) Downloading and transfer music files of internal and SD/MMC Flash memory via mini USB slot and supplied USB cable. Just plug it into your PC and it will act like a Removable drive. If you have an SD or MMC card in the player, it will load as a separate removable drive under Windows Explorer. You can also put other files in there like a USB flash/pen drive if you have the space.

The data transfer rate is not too bad under USB 2.0, and if you have an SD/MMC card reader and respective card you can also transfer music that way. I haven't really tried the supplied software and I guess you really don't need it if you download and transfer files straight through explorer. And of course, since the memory is solid-state, it is not as susceptible to skips, shocks and failures like hard drive based players can experience.

5) The player itself has an intuitive navigation system. There is a round navigation thumb pad with raised points for Play/Pause [up], Stop [down], Back [left] and Forward [right]. There is also a "Select" button in the center of the navigation pad, a menu button, a +\- volume control lever at the top and on/off switch that has a delayed "off" function so the player won't turn off by an accidental button tap. There is also a slider "lock" switch, which disables all of the controls and helps prevent accidental changes with the controls. Overall, the controls are simple and easy to use with one hand. It also has a decent LCD display for the size of the player and the backlighting works well in the dark.

6) The color of the Rio Forge Sport 256 (silver/gray) in my humble opinion is the coolest of the bunch, easily edging out the 128 (red) and the 512 (metallic-blue). The 512 MB player is arguably better because of the capacity, but you will pay for it in the price, which last time I checked was around $30-50 more depending on where you buy it. If they had a silver 512 I probably would have forked out the extra cash. Oh well...

7) Takes standard AAA batteries. Rechargeable batteries are probably the most cost effective, but you can put in the high quality batteries for endurance. There is no fixed internal rechargeable battery to worry about replacing when the battery eventually wears down and cannot hold a charge anymore like the iPod or similar players.


Negatives

1) Supplied earphones have awkward fit. It's supposed to be an "over the ear" design, but the vinyl ear-hooks are pretty flimsy and the fasteners that keep the ear-hooks in place feel jagged and tend to irritate the back of my ears slightly. The earbuds are huge too and never fit into my ears quite right. The sound is OK, not very crisp and not too much base response though. If you have a better pair of earphones, I suggest using them or buying a nice new pair. I wound up buying the Sony Fontopia MDR-EX71, which is an "inside the ear" type model and has significantly better sound output than the stock earphones.

2) I haven't actually gone jogging with the player. The Supplied armband and clip looks sturdy but I wouldn't try using the supplied clip to hang the player on your belt. With that said a belt clip would have been handy. It looks a little cheap, but since there isn't really any specific aftermarket accessories for this player like the mighty iPod line has. I suppose this will just have to do.

3) Although it is touted as a "sport" player, the rubberized grips and the metal faceplate tend to scuff easily. Since it is a solid-state flash player you can shake it around, but I wouldn't recommend dropping it because it is still largely made of plastic. The plastic cover that protects the mini-USB port is not attached giving it a good chance to fall off and be lost.

4) The panel to access the battery and flash card is made of plastic and it is a little tough to open and close so so take care when removing and replacing it.

5) The volume level, even at its highest setting is not that loud. To get the best quality sound out of this player you need to spring for some quality earbuds like Shure or Etymotic. If you don't quite have the cash for that, the Sony Fontopia MDR-EX71 earphones works quite well for me.


Bottom Line

If you are looking for an upgradeable flash-based player with good quality, Look no further than the Rio Forge Sport 256. Although the earphones and arm band could be better, the quality of the player itself makes up for the iffy giveaways it comes with and with the price Circuit City is offering, combined with the mail-in rebate, it is almost a steal.

Link Exchange: directsource-games.com

Until I have a reciprocal link page in place, I'll be placing links to other cool gaming and entertainment sites right here in my articles section. Here a site that offered a link exchange:

Direct
Source Games
Offering direct sources to high quality games and
gaming consoles that promote learning, fun, and family
togetherness.!

I'm not sure how accessible my own link in on that site, so I'll include a shortcut to that page for the indexing spiders to do their crawl:

http://www.directsource-games.com/greatlinksbackgammon.html

Actually, I'm much more of a chess player than I am a player of backgammon, but I guess the whole link exchange thing couldn't hurt... =p

Oh if you are a webmaster and are interested in doing a similar link exchange with my site feel free to drop me an e-mail at: admin@beyondzine.com

Review: Grand Theft Auto - San Andreas

Introduction

I thought I'd kick off beyondZINE's very first article with a review of one of my favorite games Grand Theft Auto - San Andreas by Rockstar Games. The official website can be found here: http://www.rockstargames.com/sanandreas/. The game was released on October 26, 2004 for the Playstation 2 console. Rockstar has not officially announced when GTA:SA will be released for the XBox or PC platforms, but like the predecessor GTA Vice City, ports to other platforms can be expected down the road.

I know the game has been out for a few months and the hardcore players have already purchased their copy, but there is always the discriminating buyer who have a limited budget, do their research and buy only the best games off the shelf to get the most bang for their buck. I happen to be one of those players who falls into that category. I had a copy of GTA3 but I never really got into it at first, I was much more into Gran Turismo 3 - A Spec and Metal Gear Solid 2. MGS2 just seemed to have crisper graphics than GTA3 so and more refined gameplay at the time, so I just set GTA3 aside. I managed to pick it up again but I got stuck on the second island during a tough mission where you have to beat the clock to several waypoints. I may actually go back to it someday.

It was not until I started reading the rave reviews for Grand Theft Auto Vice City that I finally got around to buying that game. I was actually looking into purchasing Midnight Club 2 because I'm into racing games and I read in a particular review that GTA-VC had one of the best motorcycle simulation systems, even better than MC2 so it put my decision to buy GTA-VC over the top. I may still buy MC2 just to compare, but I may wait until it becomes a "Greatest Hits" game and drops in price.

But I digress, from the moment I started playing GTA-VC I was hooked, it was easily one of the best games I ever played on the PS2 platform. In my mind it even surpassed MGS2 because of the open gameplay style, which totally enhanced the replay value of the game, unlike MGS2 where once you finished the game and go back for some of the "secrets" you may have missed and maybe go back another time to get a better "score" it's all pretty much over. Buying the next installment of the GTA series San Andreas was pretty much a no-brainer after that. But still, to those discriminating gamers, this review is for you.

General Gameplay

If you are a fan of the predecessors Grand Theft Auto III and Grand Theft Auto Vice City and have not purchased this game yet, there is probably no need to read any further. GTA-SA not only continues the style of open game play that GTA3 pioneered, but improves on it in so many ways, like being able to swim and dive in water. There are also certain role-playing elements that weren't in previous installments that add to the realism of the game like in the beginning of the game, your character starts out with skinny body and where you go from there is really up to you. For instance, you are able to have your character get buff by lifting weights at the gym. Your character can easily regain energy by eating food, but if your character chows down on too much fast food his body will fatten up like the old Jared from those Subway commercials. If your character's ass gets too large for your liking, don't worry, you can lose weight by dieting or exercising. Speaking of exercising, running, cycling and swimming will help increase your character's stamina allowing you move at faster speeds for longer times, which can come in handy throughout the game like when you have to chase down a "mark" or make a hasty getaway from the law.

Vehicles

GTA San Andreas also ups the ante on vehicle gameplay adding more cars and motorcycles to the mix. Throughout the game you can customize certain cars with spoilers, side skirts, bumpers, hood vents and nitrous boosters. Flying vehicles take on a greater importance in the game and your character eventually gains access to various helicopters planes and even jets. There's even a part of the game where you simply cannot progress in the story until you successfully pass pilot school and complete a few really cool flying missions. Once I got the hang of flying in the game, it became my preferred method of travel, simply because the game is so huge that flying around in planes and helicopters can save you so much travel time.

Watch out for the Hitman...

For those who played the previous installments of GTA you may notice an upgrade of the weapon aiming system. The new targeting system is similar to one of Rockstar's other games called Manhunt. You can still auto-aim like previous installments, but you also have the ability to manually aim, strafe, move while targeting, move while shooting, crouch for better cover and aim and roll while crouching to dodge enemy fire. The gory cinematic executions of manhunt have been omitted, but you can't have everything I guess.

GTA-SA also adds a "weapon skill" element for certain weapons. The more times you hit certain targets the better your weapon skill becomes with that weapon. The highest skill level for weapons that have them is the "hitman" skill level which allows you to shoot faster, auto-aim farther and even dual-wield certain weapons effectively doubling the rate of fire for those weapons.

A Tale of Three Cities

The game takes place in a semi-fictional state called San Andreas, which is modeled after the state of California and the plot takes your in-game character through 3 different cities and many different towns in rural and desert areas. The three cities are Los Santos, San Fierro and Las Venturas, which are modeled after the cities of Los Angles, San Francisco and Las Vegas respectively. According to the story, your character will be limited to the city of Los Santos in the beginning due to a recent earthquake that made the bridges and tunnels unsafe to travel across.

As the character progresses through the game and other areas on the map open up one can begin to sense the vastness of the game. You really start to get the feeling that you are traveling significant distances between areas. It's not just three different areas slapped on some map though, because of the way things are laid out you really get the feel that you are in different cities as you travel between them, much like how Liberty City of GTA3 is way different than Vice City of GTA-VC even though the gameplay is very similar, you get that same feeling when you move on to a different city within San Andreas.

Los Santos itself is almost a microcosm of Los Angeles the city it is patterned after. You have the ghettos and gang violence, the smog, the traffic jams, the Hollywood-like Vinewood area complete with the sign and the houses on the hills for all the rich movie stars and gangsta rappers. The rural and desert areas are filled with tractor driving farmer types, cowboys and rednecks.

As you move onto San Fierro the in-game twin of San Francisco you get to see a replica of the Golden Gate Bridge, Trolleys, hilly streets, a bay area, a Silicon Valley type area, a "boys town" area and a Financial district complete with that tall pyramid-like tower and even a few rainstorms. You just really get the feel like you are really there.

Las Venturas, the third city in the game has the look and feel of its real-world counterpart Las Vegas especially when the sun goes down and the neon lights start flashing. You have all these different casinos that are very similar to actual casinos that were around during the 90's and are still in operation to this day. You see all different types of NPCs here from the different areas in the game like hoodrats, yuppies and especially the Elvis impersonators. It's so visually impressive that you may find yourself just cruising down the strip in the game one night in your stolen car and taking in the sights.

Of course none of the cities would be complete without their own airports, which allow you to either purchase a passenger ticket to fly between cities or if you have a pilot's license, you can even grab a plane or helicopter and fly yourself to wherever you want in the game. With that said, San Andreas is easily one of the largest in-game areas I've ever seen and since it's a relatively open gameplay style of game you can pretty much go wherever you want.

The Player

I don't want to give up too much of the storyline away so I'll just start off with the synopsis as presented in the Rockstar Games San Andreas website and throw in a few of my notes thereafter:

Five years ago Carl Johnson escaped from the pressures of life in Los Santos, San Andreas... a city tearing itself apart with gang trouble, drugs and corruption. Where filmstars and millionaires do their best to avoid the dealers and gangbangers.

Now, it's the early 90s. Carl's got to go home. His mother has been murdered, his family has fallen apart and his childhood friends are all heading towards disaster.

On his return to the neighborhood, a couple of corrupt cops frame him for homicide. CJ is forced on a journey that takes him across the entire state of San Andreas, to save his family and to take control of the streets.

Liberty City. Vice City. Now San Andreas, a new chapter in the legendary series.
Grand Theft Auto returns to the PlayStation®2 computer entertainment system this October.

Although you start out with a specific character for the game much like the "silent guy" in GTA3 and Tommy Vercetti in Vice City, the character you play in San Andreas, Carl Johnson can be customized in appearance. Unlike the different "outfits" that Tommy had available in GTA-VC, Carl can wear different things for his torso, legs and shoes. He can also wear accessories such as watches, chains, hats and sunglasses. Carl can also get a variety of different hairstyles, get inked up with tattoos and as mentioned earlier can develop different body types based on exercise, diet or the lack thereof.

Early in the game you start off with very little "respect" with your fellow gang members. Respect will eventually be earned throughout the game, but you can get small boosts in respect by wearing certain clothing especially your gang's colors, developing a "gangster physique" and having the right hairstyle. With enough respect you can recruit gang members to do some drive by shooting against rival gangs or just have a crew of homies to back you up as you travel the mean streets of Los Santos.

The Sounds of San Andreas

GTA3 started out with it's own made for the game soundtrack, whose songs were arranged into their own radio stations complete with their own DJs and commercial breaks. Although most if not all of the songs were never played on the actual real world radio except maybe for some of the classical songs, the fact that you were able to switch to different and convincing radio stations in you car just added a degree of realism to the game.

Vice City completely raised the bar by including real world music in its soundtrack, from the 80's no less. In my opinion the entire soundtrack just completely added to the atmosphere of the game giving a player the feel that one was actually in a Miami Vice-like city back in the 80's. The blending of the music and gaming elevated the game to a work of art.

San Andreas took the formula of great music and great gaming and just ran with it with its own 90's based soundtrack. If you jack a car from a rival gang member in Los Santos you are likely to hear Radio Los Santos or Play Back thumping on the radio. The former is a gangster rap station and the latter is an old school hip-hop station. I found myself listening to Radio Los Santos through most of the Los Santos part of the game. Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg are f*cking awesome.

If you find yourself stuck in the countryside you might hear a lot of country music with the radio station K-Rose tuned to most of the dials. Even if you were never quite a fan of country, just driving around in a car or truck you just jacked from some NPC hillbilly hick with country music blaring on the car speakers just helps add to the atmosphere of the game.

There are actually a bunch of songs that I wound up liking that I never really got into until I started playing the game regularly. I'll eventually put up a list of songs available both in-game and on the CD soundtrack sets that are available for sale and maybe put in a future review. The bottom line is that the soundtrack and its various radio stations totally contributed to the feel of the game. About the only thing missing was a radio station featuring Sinatra and the Rat-Pack and perhaps some Vegas-Era Elvis. I know it's not exactly 90's but it would have made Venturas much more Vegas-like.

Aside from the music, the NPCs (non-player characters) or the average Joe and Jane citizens that walk San Andreas seem to have had a slight upgrade. They still interject their silly pre-scripted comments and react with various comments when you bump into them, but what do differently in San Andreas is actually have short conversations and saying goodbye to each other, with some of the conversation combos turning out to be rather funny. :)

The Storyline

Again, I don't want to give up too much of the story because it's almost like talking about a movie to someone who hasn't seen the movie yet. It's much better to just go out and see for yourself and like I recommended earlier if you enjoyed GTA3 and GTA-VC then go ahead and buy GTA-SA. If you are unfamiliar with the series you might want to start from GTA3 and work your way up. They are all great games in their own right and knowing what happens in the previous games just adds to and builds upon the overall appeal of San Andreas.

I do have to say one thing, the stories and the missions throughout the game were top-notch, but the ending itself could have been a little better. I loved how in GTA-VC you, or Tommy rather, received various forms of congratulations over the cell phone, lending to the sense that yeah, I really finished this game. We really didn't get that in San Andreas. While GTA VC simply had a better ending, I do have to reiterate that GTA-SA is overall a larger, more technically advanced and superior game compared to its predecessors.

I would say about the only way to advance the gameplay in a future installment now is to include some sort of online element to it. There are some rudimentary 2-player elements included in the game, but to really make the multiplayer action shine is to be able to put players on separate screens and go head to head in a race or death match or whatever. Imagine an massively multiplayer online version of Grand Theft Auto, oh the chaos! Maybe a limited multiplayer version would be more feasible.

Still that's the future. For now go ahead and buy Grand Theft Auto San Andreas. In my humble opinion it's one of the best games out there and it is well worth the price of admission.

beyondZINE articles is now online...

I figured out how to get blogger to publish directly to the beyondZINE host, so now I have a way to easily publish articles. Much thanks to blogger.com for providing this service.