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The device takes the form of a headband with three electrode plates pressed to your forehead. The quick calibration tool measures brain and facial muscle activity, with a certain amount of movement or calmness of thought required to move a box to the right degree.

With the three minute setup complete, we were unleashed on Unreal Tournament 2004, using a slight frown to move forwards, our eyes to control strafing left or right and a severe frown firing our gun.

While we died embarrassingly quickly in the first few rounds, after ten minutes we could walk in straight lines and fire only when we wanted, rather than all the time. Strafing proved harder, but we could still have a reasonable fight with the bots even if we were hardly going to challenge pro-gamer Fatal1ty.

When asked

We're unconvinced about the quick reaction claims but can see an interesting future for the device. Gaming seems the most obvious application, but perhaps as an auxiliary 'unintentional' control device - when you recoil because a zombie has jumped out at you your game character might react likewise, for example. Or perhaps when playing a football management game your anger at some shoddy defending could be translated into an in-game touchline rant in the style of Sam Allardyce.

We can also see medical benefits, especially with people suffering poor motor skills in their body. This could be the fledgling steps of a new era of interactivity with the PC, though don't expect to see anything in the shops this side of 2010.

For PC Pro's coverage of the latest news from Computex 2007 see: www.pcpro.co.uk/html/computex2007