Origami Project Kafuffle Continues News

Pssst. Yeah, you. Have you heard about this revolutionary new product from Microsoft called the Origami Project? No? According to so-called 'reliable sources', this handheld will be a multimedia device that - and here's the clever, unique selling point - that will play music, access the net, and view photos. What, there's already a host of other such devices on the market that will do such a thing? But with all the commotion across the web, I thought that the device would be a bit more...original.

Further to the news last week that Microsoft was preparing to unveil a handheld device called Origami Project, which would play PC games together with the sort of functionality that seems to be available in most portable multimedia devices, comes more speculation about it's compatibility with Xbox 360.

According to certain sites and their reliable sources, the device (which will also have touch screen functionality) will have the capability to act as a second screen when hooked up to the next-gen console, providing anything from a new viewpoint in battle through to a digital countdown in a basketball...exciting stuff then.

What's perhaps more interesting is that all of this excitement around the web has come about because of the few seconds of Halo shown in the teaser video for the device, which has led some reports to appear on the web that a port of Bungie's game will be one of the first game titles to be released for it.

The sad thing is that the device has been blown out of all proportion since a simple check of the source code on the Origami Project website reveals its true nature:

"Origami Project: the Mobile PC running Windows XP"

So there you have it folks, Origami Project is a small tablet PC that runs XP. Nothing more. Just goes to show that certain areas of the web have been getting excited about seeing a three year PC game (and five year old Xbox game) running on a small PC - probably using the original PC-DVD too. What a fuss.

And as if to rub salt into the wound, Microsoft has pushed back the unveiling date to March 9th, which will probably mean another week of hysterics across the web.