The Story: Alabama-based start-up, Envisions, announced today that they’ll be shipping initial units of their new game console/media center in October, answering the question asked by tens of consumers world-wide: “When will this magic device ever ship?”
The Envizions device – called Evo – is capable of playing PC games, downloading video on demand and much, much more. The company has been accepting preorders for the device, and has responsibly decided to send out the first production units (which company CEO, Derrick Samuels, claims will be rolling off the line by late August) to their “loyal” pre-order customers.
The company had originally been less than up-front about a possible ship date, prompting many comparisons to the infamous Phantom console. This, from gamesindustry.biz:
The company estimated that the EVO : Phase One will ship on time once an official date has been finalized.
Meaning, they’re confident that the device will not miss the deadline which has yet to be determined. Which is a clever way of saying that they have no idea when it will ship, but will get back to you. Well now they’re getting back to us. The word is: October 20th.
We’re hoping that Samuels is not actually THIS MAN, who is wanted for attempted murder in Virginia. Because if he isn’t, then there’s absolutely nothing we can find wrong with this deal. And despite the fact that we’re pretty sure the device will crash like a lead zeppelin, bringing some legitimacy back to the world of independent media devices would be a very good thing.
I’d wait for units to actually hit store shelves before shelling out the cash, but if you’ve got $679 burning a hole in your pocket, and have yet to invest in a media center PC, this may be just the thing. Plus, it’s got Kid Destiny!
For managing to generate positive buzz by carefully-deploying press releases, and then keeping their damn mouths shut and staying out of trouble, I’m awarding Envizions a BlogJam score of : 86.
