Rube Goldberg:Burn the Wind

Spotted on splodetv is this most excellent rube goldberg device that utilizes flame, explosives and combustion to continue the chain reaction. Science Patrol is not responsible for the actions contained in this video. We would have burned down the lab for sure.

Happy Thanksgiving!

From Master Blaster and your friends at Science Patrol.

We Have Arrived

Mr. T's NE Mowhawk Haxxor

I used to play World of Warcraft. I don't anymore, but I did.
I probably wouldnt have stopped had i known Mr. T had hacked the game so he could play a Night Elf Mohawk. While WoW is one of the most expansive, immersive, and engrossing games you can play; if there is one thing it lacks it is Night Elf Mohawks as a playable class.
Epic.

Me and My Squad of Ultimate Badasses Will Protect You

"I'm ready, man, check it out. I am the ultimate badass! State-of-the-badass-art! You do not want to FUCK with me. Check it out. Hey, Ripley, don't worry. Me and my squad of ultimate bad-asses will protect you. Check it out. Independently targeting particle-beam phalanx. Whap! Fry half a city with this puppy! We got tactical smart missiles, phase plasma pulse rifles, RPG's... we got Sonic Electronic Ball-Breakers! We got nukes. We got knives, sharp sticks, bolos, nunchucks...we be doin' Indian burns...."
-Private William Hudson, Aliens

Meat.

Although im told its a classic, i recently discovered This hilarious short story by Terry Bisson. Coincedentally not 24 hours later was i made aware of this meaty stuff. Apearantly if you are made out of meat, you need a meat chair, a meat toilet, a meat bike, a meat iron, and a meat blowdryer so you can rep your meaty pride.

from OhGizmo!
Paolo Maria Deanesi(artist page)

I speak Basic.....only Basic.

I dont speak Russian. In fact im not even sure what language it is that i dont speak, but that's o.k. because This entire page is full of breathtaking CG images; and a picture paints a thousand words. Go there, check them out-there are dozens.

Victorion, Defender of the Mission

Every neighborhood should have a benevolent mecha watching over it.

We <3 Rube Goldberg

Virtual Worlds within Virtual Worlds

This is an old article, but it represents the forefront of artificial life research in the Offworld Colonies.

The continent of Svarga is an artificial environment in Second Life that is growing and evolving on its own. James Wagner Au reports.

Truck the Future

Otaku-like truck drivers in Japan drive these pimped-out monstrosities that look like Optimus Prime crashed into a pachinko parlor.

Steampunk Mission to Venus

No man-made probe has ever survived for more than 2 hours on the surface of the planet Venus. Things there melt, as its surface tempature is a sweltering inferno teeming with corosive atmospheric gases and cosmic radiation. That is why nasa wants to go there. Because you kind of cant. New research on old science from two scientists at the Glenn Research Center in Ohio is out to change all that and send a robot to the Venusian surface that can survive there for at least several weeks.
By utilizing a device invented in 1816 called a Stirling Cooler, the scientist are working on a rover that uses the expansion and compression of gas in a piston to keep the electronic circuits cool. The Stirling Cooler was invented in 1816 by a Scottish clergyman named Robert Stirling, who had no intention of going to Venus at the time.
While NASA currently has not approved a mission to Venus, Im betting a rover that can survive its harsh surface can probably convince them to give him a ride.

link

What You are Now Watching is Only the Beginning

On Friday night I was witness to a wonderful nocturnal display that I would compare to the Northern Lights: only through being in the right place at the right time would one be able to seee something totally incredible.

Leaving all hyperbole aside, what did happen? New York Public Access did play, at 1:30 AM, a program that I have described in my logs as "the channel-surfing of the Gods." The specific Gods would in any paper of record be nameless, but were definitely chthonic, eldritch, lustful and bloodthirsty, and some were quite depraved. It was a bad-ass display, and despite my best efforts, the VCR recorded only static and some harrowing moans that weren't part of the original broadcast. This Youtube clip is low quality, but more is available here.



It's called Concrete TV, and the God in question is Concrete Ron, the latest recipient of a Science Patrol Medal of Infinite Density. We ran out of Scanning Tunneling Electron Microscopes, so our new gift to honorees is a pair of welding goggles that allow the wearer to stick their face inside any substance to see what's inside. I tried my pair on everything from an iron foundry to Aria Giovanni, and I know you're gonna get a kick out out of these.

Book Autopsies

By Brian Dettmer. There's more here, and here.

Plumbing the Depths of Space

Picked up Super Mario Galaxy yesterday. A lot of blogs have already commented on the tight controls and varied gameplay, so I would like to focus on the evolution of Mario's gameworld.

As you know, Galaxy centers on Mario's travels in space. I did not appreciate the nuances of this until I started playing. Then I suddenly remembered--There is no Up or Down in space.

Mario's original abilities, after all, were to run left and right, jump up, and fall down landing on opponents' backs. When Mario 64 was released, Mario could suddenly run in all directions, so players had to learn to think of "Left" and "Right" as relative, changing factors. Of course, this maps realistically to our own worldview. If I'm giving directions in real life, the expression "Run right" is meaningless. We use a frame of reference: "Facing the castle, cross the the lava pit to your right." Mario's world evolved to become more like our own.

Galaxy is a challenge precisely because most of us have never navigated open space. When Mario stands on an asteroid, the game doesn't allow us the luxury of thinking of this as a planar surface. The camera doesn't swoop behind his head, it remains dangling in space. We can clearly see the insubstantial nature of the surface, while empty space yawns all around us. Mario cannot "jump up"--he jumps away from the surface. Each jump increases the feeling that he could jump away and not be pulled back. To navigate this sphere, Mario will spend a lot of time "upside down" to our eyes. You'll constantly find your senses confounded by what your eyes are seeing.

I'm going to make a prediction now: when orbital vacations are commonplace and tourists spend their time exploring the low-grav regions of asteroids and artificial satellites, they will explain their comfort level by saying "I played a lot of Mario Galaxy as a kid."

NASA talks Sci-Fi

NASA has an excellent page displaying the tenets of Science Patrol.

Clive Barker's Jericho

I like Clive Barker's books but this sounds like excrement. This is not the future of games, people. Right? Right?

Dead Island

One thing that we like to see more of at Science Patrol is more realistic physical modeling of humans in videogames. This video displays just such a technology, to gruesome effect. (ZOMBIES ZOMG)

New Ghostbusters Game

Money Quote: All four members of the movie team -- Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Bill Murray and Harold Ramis -- will be giving voice and likeness rights for the game. Some supporting castmembers have signed up as well, including William Atherton, Brian Doyle Murray and Annie Potts.

Tomorrow is the Future, Today...on Weed

This is my essential point: whatever is imagined in sci-fi (or "skiffy" as we refer to it in the lab) will eventually, probably, come to pass. This is a thing. Now, in Achewood, I read this panel some months ago, and was struck by the power of his idea. What I did not know, is that the Japanese have done exactly that. Did Ray know this, as his stoned self stood at home plate? I don't know. But science has made dunderheads of us again. What was once stoned fiction is now science fact. BLAMMM.

Writebot Uprising Iminent

From robotlab comes a kuka robotic arm programmed to scribe the entire Martin Luther version of The Holy Bible in calligraphy. These kuka arms have been programmed to do some pretty amazing things, like this higly inspired kuka arm that was hacked to be controlled via Wiimote. And use a sword.

Link.

Happy Birthday, Mario

Mario has appeared in over 200 video games to date. Super Mario Galaxies was released yesterday but I will be getting my copy tomorrow. Then none of you will hear from me for some time. Portrait by Rob Sheridan.

Mother 3 Eats your Face

Mother is the Japanese name for the series known as Earthbound in the U.S. The third entry in the series was made for Game Boy Advance several years ago, but Nintendo has thus far not approved the game for an American localization even though Mother 2 (heroes shown above) is one of the most beloved of SNES games. (Reggie Fils-Aime and George Harrision have repeatedly made rumblings about Virtual Console versions of Earthbound, Mother 3, and other classic Japanese titles, but these have thus far failed to come to fruition.)

Anyway, in the absence of real progress from Nintendo, fans are busily translating the ROM of Mother 3 into English. They've been at it for one year and this video just whets my appetite. Thanks, Nintendo, now only "pirates" will have access to this masterpiece. Arrrr!