An exciting project of ours went live this Monday in France, where the French are able to get their hands on the extremely limited Golden-themed SteelSeries Xai Laser Mouse.

Surprisingly simple, a gift voucher for a Golden Xai is hidden within two different, randomly selected SteelSeries Siberia v2 headset retailboxes on the shelves of French retailers/webshops Virgin, Surcouf, Materiel.net, Pixmania, Rue De Commerce, LDLC, Grossbill and Darty, until April 2nd.

Final note: Only 100 of these babies were produced. Worldwide. :)

/Casper

We’re continuing our partnership with Burton for their 28th Annual U.S. Burton Open Snowboarding Championships at the Stratton Mountain in Vermont on March 16th-21st.

However, this year we kicked up our activities a notch, and got together with Volvo to offer you guys a chance at winning a trip to the event to check out the competition, the pro riders and even the SteelSeries booth. :-)

Basically we’re putting in the whole lot - VIP treatment, hotel accommodation, roundtrip airfare, all-access VIP tickets, cash to spend and finally ground transportation in a selection of brand new Volvo cars throughout the event.

To enter the win-a-trip contest, simply fill in your details on the SteelSeries Burton 2010 event page. See you on the slopes?

/Casper

To celebrate the availability of the most-definitely-awesome StarCraft II beta, Fnatic, SK Gaming and ClanBase are now giving away a bunch of the StarCraft II themed SteelSeries QcK mouse pads on each of their community sites.

In both cases we are talking easy-to-enter drop-a-comment-give-aways, which should leave you no other option than to join in. ;)

Check below for competition links:

StarCraft II competition at SK Gaming
StarCraft II competition at Fnatic
StarCraft II competition at ClanBase

- both are running throughout this week.

/Casper

We’re running an awesome giveaway these days for all SteelSeries fans on Facebook in cooperation with NCSoft, which basically revolves around us giving away a massive amount of Aion Basic Potion Packs to all our Facebook fans - while supply lasts. :-)

To get your Basic Potion Pack, simply follow these steps:

1) Become a fan of SteelSeries at Facebook
2) Check your updates after 15:00 CST the day you become a fan
3) Follow the link and enter the appropriate information
4) Check your email to receive your unique in game potion pack code

Make sure to all info in the tournament note HERE.

/Casper

We got together with Denmarks #1 Nintendo community, N-club, to give away a SteelSeries Xai for the duration of February and March.

All the retro lovers out there should take notice on this one, seeing as entrants are required to take a picture with themselves and their absolute best high score of all time - be it on the Wii, DS or event the Gameboy or NES platforms. :)

Head on over to the N-club competition page to enter the contest.

/Casper

Feeling sort of an awesome feeling of rendezvous creeping in, I’m happy to let you guys know that PC Gamer has awarded the SteelSeries Xai Laser Mouse with an Editor’s Choice award and a 95% score - as it happened with the SteelSeries Ikari Laser back in 2008 (97%, though).

PC Gamer wrote:

“The Xai is in every way equal to the SteelSeries Ikari - the hands-down best gaming mouse of all time that received a whooping 97% in October 2008 - except for one thing: It’s ambidextrous, with two thumb buttons on each side.

Oh, and there’s the extra-fancy 32×128 display tucked underneath the mouse, which allows you to swap profiles and save settings without ever having to use the included software (which is exceptionally well-designed - simple, minimal, effective). So take notice, right-handers: the lefties just leveled the playing field.”

VERDICT: 95% - Editor’s Choice Award.

US residents, make sure to pick up this months issue as it, besides the SteelSeries Xai review, also has a SteelSeries Kinzu feature.

Have a great weekend. :-)

/Casper

A rather small, but very significant software update has been released for the World of Warcraft MMO Gaming Mouse.

Updates:

- Fixed WoW Armory link for character info on the profile screen

Download the new software via our SteelSeries downloads page.

/Casper

HardwareHeaven took on Kim Rom, for a chat on everything SteelSeries. Touching on both Kim’s personal experiences and preferences as Chief Marketing Officer here in the company, the interview also revolves heavily around product development and SteelSeres in 2010.

This question especially should spark some excitement:

HH:
What do you see as being your most important product of 2010?

Kim Rom:
Okay, so… This is going to sound lame: We are announcing a new product within a few months that I believe will set a new benchmark for that type of product. We have been working on it for so long, we have put so much time into it, and we have come up with some ideas that I seriously think will wow just about everyone. My CEO would strangle me (very slowly, and very painfully) if I revealed what it was, and I realize that all this sounds like a lame marketing spiel, but this product is really just awesome in many ways. I see that baby as our most important product for the core competitive scene in 2010. When we release I suggest we give some to your readers and get their opinion on it… I am confident they will be wowed.

Check out the full interview on HardwareHeaven. :)

/Casper

Zath is hosting quite the epic World of Warcraft competition, running through to 7th of February.

Up for grabs you got basically the complete line of World of Warcraft peripherals from ourselves, as well as prizes from BradyGames, StarBucks and more official World of Warcraft products.

Head on over to the Monster World of Warcraft competition to enter!

/Casper

Big things were revealed this weekend when the SteelSeries Xai Laser Mouse was announced as a contender in the Peripheral of the Year category at the 2009 Engadget Awards.

If you dig the mouse, make sure to drop your vote - as always, we appreciate your support!

VOTE HERE!

*Update*: While on the subject, CravingTech just published their Xai review with certainty that some of the Xai features “will make lots of vendors jealous.” ;-)
*/Update*

/Casper