Medi-Bot

From The Guardian:

"The days of a guaranteed pain-free visit to the dentist may not be far off thanks to a petite Japanese woman in a pink sweater who goes by the name of Simroid. She has a limited vocabulary and a strange complexion, but the 160cm-tall humanoid robot is happy to feel your pain.

Simroid, who will be used at medical colleges, releases a clearly audible "ouch!" whenever a trainee dentist touches a nerve and a reassuring "that's better" when the drill hits the right spot.

"We want to use the robots to train students in medical techniques that don't cause unnecessary pain," said Naotake Shubui, a professor at Nippon Dental University who helped develop Simroid.

The robot is one of hundreds of cutting-edge devices and contraptions on display this week at the world's biggest robot exhibition. The Big Sight complex in Tokyo has been turned into a shrine to Japan's fascination with machines, shaping their purpose in an age of falling birthrates and shrinking workforces."

Read More Here.

Check out this Medi-Bot video courtesy of "Look Around You" here.

Total Recall

Nasa has just outlined plans for a manned landing on Mars. They plan for it to be a 30 month trip, 16 of those being actual time on Mars. The astronauts would have to be very self sufficient for the trip to work. Their air and water will be recycled and they will grow plants on board to feed them as well as contribute to they're "psychological health".



















read here for more info.
see what the Mars Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, are up to here.

Hack The Planet

nervous

very nice Black Flag cover by Whiskytown (featuring Ryan Adams) from the Drunken Confession sessions. Download here!

Orange ryhming dictonary

November is a big month for video games. All the blockbusters hit stores to amp everyone up for the holiday season. This year there's quite a few superstars in the line up, Call of Duty 4, Assassins Creed, Mass Effect, Kane and Lynch, Uncharted, Super Mario Galaxy, Rock Band and this list goes on. The one buy that no gamer should miss out on is the Orange Box from Valve. 5 games for the price of one. Included in this wonderful package is the outstanding Half-Life 2 as well as Half-Life episode 1 and 2. Also included are Portal and Team Fortress 2.

Portal may well be one of my top 10 favorite games. And i recommend playing through that before going into episode 2 as there are some tie-ins. It starts as more of a straight puzzle game. the objective being get from point A to point B using your portal gun. The game takes some seriously interesting turns as you go through the levels constantly guided and/or tormented by GlaDOS who's in charge or your "testing" in the Aperture Science Labs. one of the most gratifying experiences i've had playing a video game in awhile and i've kept going back to replay levels.

The Half-Life series is an under rated one. Not getting as much talk as the likes of Halo or most military FPS's. But the story, design, and gameplay of Half-Life are all so well done. The Characters you meet and play along side are unique and interesting and it's a pleasure more than a burden to encounter them. The level design is always interesting and fun and the enemy encounters never grow old. The story is that of Gordan Freeman a scientist from "Black Mesa" who accidently opened up a portal to an alien world. Half-Life 2 picks up some time after that incident and Gordan has been placed sometime in the future by a mysterious benefactor. The world is quite different than Gordan left it. It is controlled and policed by an alien empire known as the Combine. Gordan fights to help a group of human rebels in hopes to win back the earth and stop the Combine.

Team Fortess is a very stylized online multiplayer. I haven't dove that deep into it yet. The graphics and set up are really fun. You can choose a different class during each respawn, from heavy artillary, spy, medic, engineer or another each has there set of special abilities and weapons that will help you win the battle. As i said this is a very stylized game and it's worth playing just to check the visuals.
















Learn more Here!

Squad based combat

I previously made a post about The Monster Squad. At the time it had not been available on DVD. I was only able to get it by downloading the torrent. But since then truly beautiful things have happened. The Monster Squad has been re-released on DVD for it's 20th anniversary. For the first time presented in it's original wide-screen format. It has also been remastered and looks incredible. Do not be a fool, purchase this and live the glory.

RQR Studio

I recently made a quick webpage for a good friend's studio, which is of the utmost quality (the studio, not the page). It's pretty basic but it looks pretty. check it out here.