Infinity Blade looks great on a 50" HDTV via iPad 2

Since iPad release last year, I see no reason to have a large screen tv at 12 feet away which gives me the same screen as an iPad at arms length or an iPhone in my face at night with headphones to allow wifey to sleep while I watch MLB. TV is dead.

I think some people are too focused on the "now" with these capabilities rather than thinking of the future potential ... if the current chips are capable of handling more sophisticated gaming it holds a lot of promise for future integration between the Apple TV, iPad, and iPhone/iPod. Using the iPad or Apple TV as the base station and iPhones or iPods as controllers (like a magnified version of what was done with Scrabble) could make an interesting gaming platform ... especially if Apple decided to use more of an onDemand style of gaming where you download the game to the Apple TV when you want to play it. If Moore's Law stays in effect, who knows what cabilities we are going to see in iPad 4 and iPhone 6 in just a couple of years. With the right technology we could see a compelling gaming alternative.

"probably still beat the iPad 2 in raw graphics performance"

I really don't understand why "probably" is in there. Consoles completely crush the iPad 2 graphics wise and probably (almost certaindefinitely) will for a very, very long time. Not that I care. I'd still rather have an iPad 2 instead of an Xbox - not for how good the games work - for the entire experience.

While certain games that are very active may be difficult to control while watching the huge TV, it sounds perfect for flinging some Angry Birds!

I will need to order a 20 foot HDMI cable heh heh

I never expected to see this kind of article on TUAW, Gizmodo maybe but...wow....what a bunch of tripe.

For those wondering, Yes, Infinity Blade required me to focus on the iPad for the most part to play. So essentially this would be used more for people who want to watch you play a game on your iPad more easily. Real Racing, however, didn't require me to look at the iPad at all. Unfortunately, the video we took for that makes the TV look a bit too washed out for the majority of it, but it's worth a look. Playing Real Racing 2 connected to the TV was awesome, even if the long cord was a bit lame. ;)

Better to focus on iPad as controller, and let services like OnLive move us to cloud gaming

For gaming, the HDMI adapter is useful for demo purposes or "showing off" to your friends I suppoose. However, I did test it out using facetime and although it was a bit awkward to hold the iPad while looking at the HDTV, the results were quite astonishing. It reminded me of Kinect in a way except it was much easier to set up. I was able to adjust the settings on my Sony Bravia HDTV to maximize the screen area to full screen. Facetime on your HDTV is amazing. I don't think the quality of the front camera is a big issue cause really we don't need see each other in HD. I'm hoping we get to the point where we can utilize the Apple TV instead of cables and we will be able to use onscreen gestures for the controls for gaming so we wouldn't need to look at the iOS device while playing it on the big screen.

While I agree that in no way is an iPad (yet) competing with dedicated consoles, would it be possible for developers to create a video out mode in the game where buttons are placed in easy access locations on the screen so you didn't have to look at them and the main game video is only sent out via HDMI? I understand that's more difficult than simple video mirroring handled by the OS but I wonder if the hooks are there in iOS to do so or if Apple will add them soon...

Yeah, Infinity Blade has been optimized for iPad 2 in the latest update that it is almost unplayable on the original iPad. It is so frustrating. The controls only work half the time. Instead of Shielding, it Parries. The Dodge controls would stop working at crucial moments of the game that you get trashed by a lowly troll while wearing the Infinity Blade.

So, is this a ploy to update to the iPad 2 when it is not even a year old?