Microsoft Surface Hands On

Since I was out in Las Vegas last week, I decided to stop by the Rio iBar to give the Microsoft Surface a spin.  I don’t know of any place else in the US that has these installed right now, so it was nice to actually get to use one of these in person.

The first thing you notice is how beautiful the interface is.  Microsoft has put a lot of effort into giving the interface a polished look with smooth transitions & animations, gradients, and lush colors.  Overall, everything was intuitive and easy to use as you grabbed, pinched, and slid objects across the screen.

Most of the applications are easy to learn mini-games, and social/party games, which makes sense given that they are meant for a bar setting.  Each table has network connectivity so apps can talk to each other and access the internet.

One of the more interesting apps I used was one called Flirt.  There are cameras pointed at each of the Surface tables around the bar, and you can send messages to the other tables.  I guess the idea is if you see someone you are interested in, you can send them a pickup line through the table.  My lines never worked in person so I don’t think a creepy text message saying I’m watching them on a camera would help.

Here is another game called Last Call.

They also have a bowling game called High Roller which is obviously not meant to be a simulation.

This is definitely a first generation attempt and will require quite a bit more tweaking before it is perfected.  Several of the apps would not load and I encountered some issues with the touch interface (mostly while using the maps).  At one point I was able to hold my hands an inch away from the table and was still able to move the maps around.

Hopefully Microsoft can work out the initial kinks, I think the Surface has a lot of potential for building interactive applications.