I'm trying something a little different here.

You see, I get lots of products to review. And I'm loath to turn anything down, and that's for two reasons:

1. I actually rather like writing reviews. It keeps me from living under a bridge, and it keeps my writing skills sharp.

2. I like stuff.

Problem is, I really only have one outlet for reviews, and that is gamedev.net. And once in a while I get stuff that's not really all that related to game development but is still review-worthy. Also, Drew and I have recently made an effort to purge the gamedev article database of obsolete articles and dead links and stuff that probably shouldn't have been included in the first place. And that means that old reviews are good purge candidates, especially if they're of products that no longer exist or are way out of date or are only tangentially related to game development in the first place.

So I decided to put reviews in the Bargain Basement Blog once in a while. That way I can still talk about the product in my official capacity as gamedev reviewer, and also I don't have to worry about reviews from happy sponsors being purged from gamedev sometime in the future. As long as gamedev and blogspot (which I must add is owned by Google) stay around, the reviews will live. Which means that the reviews will live forever.

That being said, here's the first in what will be an occasional series of gadget reviews.

The Razer Piranha Gaming Communicator and the Razer Destructor Professional Gaming Mat

Quite some time ago, I (along with Terri Carey) reviewed pro|tone m100 and m250 Earphones and the Pro|Solutions pro|pad. I actually quite liked the products. In fact, I grabbed another set of m250's when woot.com put 'em on sale. And I still use the pro|pad. I liked the product quite a lot back when I reviewed it, and I recommended it to anyone who could live with the thought of owning a mousepad that costs more than an average mouse.

So I was enthused when a new box arrived from Razer, presumably packed with pretentiously named and packaged products. And I wasn't disappointed. Any company that has the hubris to call a mouse pad a "Razer Destructor Professional Gaming Mat" deserves at least a little attention.

For the record, the official page for the Destructor is here. And it's worth a look just for the adjectives they like to heap on their gamer products. It actually rather reminds me of an introduction to an old Monty Python record I had as a kid, which described the fine quality of the plastic and how the hole in the center of the record had been drilled to fit my personal record player with all the precision of finest Swiss craftsmanship.

But, in Razer's defense, they don't take themselves and their image completely seriously. Along with the Destructor pad and the headphones were some cards welcoming me to the "Cult of Razer". And it is actually a very nice mouse pad. In fact, it's the nicest I've used. The surface, like with the pro|pad, is slightly abrasive and works perfectly with my optical mouse. The surface is also, despite being plastic, very hard and seems pretty scratch resistant. This, IMHO, puts it ahead of stuff like those 3M precision mousing surfaces which also work well but seem to scratch rather easily. I've had the Destructor on my desk for a couple of months and it looks as good as the day it arrived.

Unlike the pro|pad, though, it doesn't have the nice metal backing and the double-sided surface. It's a plastic surface backed by a neoprene rubber table-gripper.

The size and shape is very nice. It's only very slightly larger than the pro|pad, but the actual mousing surface is quite a bit larger because the surface covers the entire pad and doesn't stop shy of the edge like the pro|pad. So this does turn out to be a really large mousepad. It requires more desk real-estate than the aforementioned 3M pads, but unlike the 3M pads, you'll never find yourself driving the mouse off the edge.

Oh, and it includes a case. Yes, a case. For a mousepad. I suppose this is handy if you're using it for a laptop or you're taking your machine to a gaming LAN-party, but I really haven't put the case to much use. In the case's defense, it's quite nice. It's thick and padded and has a Razer logo on the front. My only worry is that if it got mushed or folded, the pad might get creased even in the case.

And the price is pretty high. The Amazon price is $37, which is almost ten bucks more than the pro|pad. While I do like the surface and size a bit better than the pro|pad, the pro|pad does have the advantage of being double-sided (in case you accidentally mess up one side) and is practically indestructible.

Honestly, if I had a lot of money to spend on a mouse pad, I'd stick with the pro|pad. Even though the website proclaims that the Destructor is superior for gaming, I think the pro|pad's lower price and other advantages make it a better choice unless you absolutely have to follow an all-black color scheme.

Next we have the Razer Piranha gaming Communicator, which was immediately co-opted by my wife upon opening the box. Despite appearing to be something that must be married to a particular game console, the Piranha has standard microphone and headphone jacks and hooked up to the PC just fine. It also has a USB connection that I don't quite understand. Best I can tell, the USB is used to power the blue LED lights on the side of the headphones as well as on the little volume dongle. The actual cable is very nicely coated in braided nylon and looks very tough. In fact, if Lassie ever barks at me because Timmy fell down a well, I'm gonna grab these headphone cables to pull him out.

Actually, I probably wouldn't. While the nylon covers the cable itself, it stops about two inches from the jacks at the end. I'm not quite sure if this is a good idea or a bad one. If your headphone cable is gonna fail, it's likely going to happen at the plugs, so having nylon webbing stop before the plugs doesn't help as much as it should. On the other hand, if somebody manages to pull on my headphone cable hard enough to break something, I'd rather break off the headphone plug than the headphone socket that's attached to the motherboard.

In the couple-months use of the Piranha, Shelly's had a couple of complaints. One is with the obligatory volume dongle in the middle of the headphone cable. The little volume wheel is pretty loose and changes with the lightest touch. I don't know if it's intended to be this loose for fleet-fingered gamers who need the most precise and quick control of gaming volume during crucial moments of the story (hey look, I'm a Razer marketer), but she does occasionally find the headphones adjusting the volume on their own just by rubbing against her pants while she sits at her desk. And it's a problem that's going to likely solve itself soon with a piece of scotch tape.

The other complaint is with the shape of the headphones themselves. Here's the publicity photo of the headphones.

As you can see, they're not very round. They're a bit angular. And if you push the earphones apart so they fit your head, the shape is a bit squarish. So rather than cradling your head or not contacting your head at all, the top of the Piranha touches the top of your head. And it's not noticeable at first, but it's a mite annoying after prolonged wearing.

So my conclusions for these two products:

Destructor Professional Gaming Mat - Very nice and big and tough, but expensive. The Razer pro|pad is probably a better choice.

Piranha Gaming Communicator - Very nice cables, but easily maladjusted volume dongle and a mite uncomfortable to wear for a long time.