Hasta La Gadget!

The Justice League might not normally show up to save the innocent in a crossover utility, but even Superman and Co. could be persuaded by a one-off Kia Sorento complete with custom Jim Lee artwork. The customized car is the eighth in a series of Justice League Super Heroes models Kia and DC Entertainment have produced. The first seven featured each of the seven heroes themselves – Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, The Flash, Aquaman, and Cyborg – while this final model brings all of them together.

While the Sorento might initially seem like an odd choice, it’s actually one of the few cars in Kia’s range that could accommodate the whole Justice League team; it, and the similarly 7-seat Sedona, in fact.

The custom artwork is the handiwork of famous comic book artist Jim Lee, and then hand-airbrushed by West Coast Customs. On the outside, the metallic blue CUV spreads its quote of superheroes on either side, with Justice League branding across the hood, and sits on some impressively oversized special black-finish alloy wheels.

Lee began the process by hand-drawing the design separately, coming up with eight different versions including the all-heroes car that will be auctioned off. West Coast Customs then powered up their airbrushes to splash that custom artwork across the Kia bodywork, a difficult process given there are 3D curves and cut-lines to take into account. Some of the earlier, individual hero cars have been even more outlandish, with Kia cutting Batman logos into the radiator grill, for instance, on the Caped Crusader’s car.

Inside, meanwhile, there’s comic book artwork across the transmission tunnel and door trim, and – our favorite feature – each of the leather seats gets a hero’s logo on the headrest, and matching piping. In case you’re wondering, Superman is driving and Batman called shotgun.

More normally, the Sorento starts off at just over $24k for the somewhat less ostentations LX 2.4L with a six-speed auto transmission. You still get the seven seats, though, as well as SiriusXM radio, Bluetooth streaming, power windows, air-con, and 17-inch alloy wheels. Both front-wheel drive and all-wheel drive versions are offered, with up to 26mpg possible depending on model and driving conditions.

“Kia and DC Entertainment are both global brands sharing a youthful and creative mindset” Michael Sprague, EVP of marketing & communications for Kia Motors America, said of the collaboration. “With Jim Lee’s vision combined with the efforts of some of the best customizing shops in the business, it’s going to be a lot of fun unveiling these cars around the country.”

The limited edition Sorento has been shown off as part of a Kia collaboration with DC Entertainment at Comic-Con 2013, in association with the “We Can Be Heroes” campaign, as well as at other events through the year. Best of all, Kia is selling off the Justice League Sorento in a charity auction. Running until July 27, with a starting bid of $35,000, proceeds will go to Mercy Corps. [Limited edition Sorento auction on ebay]

2014 Kia Sorento Justice League ebay auction exceeds $37,000 is written by Vincent Nguyen & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

San Diego Comic Con has wrapped up and E3 has been long over, which means two of the biggest "nerd" conventions are gone until next year. That’s okay! If you’ve ever been to a convention like that, no matter how much fun you have or think it will be you’d know that going too often will take years off your life. But still, you’ll miss the nerds dressed up, the celebrities you can’t help but love and the people who take this stuff so seriously.

Read more…

Comic-Con may not be a vital venue for launching new gadgets, but for many attendees later today, the intersection of tech and art will be just up the street at 6th and Island Ave. — the location of tonight’s Engadget + gdgt Live event. We’re on the ground in San Diego for this evening’s festivities, and we’ve already spent some time exploring the convention center, too, including a mandatory stop to check out Rovio’s hardware-equipped Angry Birds Star Wars 2. As for tonight, you can expect to see lots of hot products from companies like Microsoft, Nokia, iRobot and Western Digital at the Stingaree lounge in the Gaslamp Quarter. As always, we’ll have giveaway items up for grabs, so there’s always a chance that you’ll head home with some awesome gear. And best of all, the event is free! Everything kicks off at 7PM. We hope to see you there!

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Source: gdgt

Add this one to your ever-growing book of video game enthusiasts against downloadable additions (DLC) to video games connected to the internet: Trey Parker says no to the whole mess for The Stick of Truth. The South Park-themed game will be released by the end of this year – right in time for the holiday season – but it’ll be cut to a standard size where its creators originally slated it to have so much content it would have taken many, many years to complete.

Speaking up at a Comic Con panel was none other than one of the two originators of the South Park universe, Parker dropping the F-bomb on the idea that they’d take the “extra content” they’d created for the game and release it as DLC. The plan instead, it’s readily understood, is that the content will be filtered into the South Park television series. The television series meanwhile has no end in sight – even if it has to be a web-based series some time in the future.

NOTE: Just in case you’re not up-to-date on the THQ bankruptcy situation – The Stick of Truth was picked up by Ubisoft. For the save!

What you’ve got with The Stick of Truth is a game that Parker reminded the audience this week is heavily inspired by the likes of The Legend of Zelda and recent epic-scale releases like Skyrim. That’s not to say it’ll be released with next-level eye-searing graphics.

On the contrary.

South Park: The Stick of Truth will continue the construction paper cut-out legacy that is the origins of the series. You’ll see some fancy “3D” graphics as appear here and there throughout the television series, but for the most part you’ll be staying quite flat. Make it go!

VIA Polygon; Kotaku

South Park’s Trey Parker says nay to DLC for “Stick of Truth” is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.

In “Firefly Online”, those of you crossing your fingers and your toes hoping for Joss Whedon to reveal a Firefly TV show revival at this years’ SCDD get a half-treat this afternoon. Those in charge of holding the torch for the long-lost cult classic science fiction show have found the developers and backing they need to create none other than a high-flying mobile video game, appearing in 2014 for both Android and iOS devices.

This game will allow you to fly Serenity through space, creating your own adventures as you do so. It’ll be up to you to create the ship from the show – or whatever ship you do so desire to create, while you “explore the Verse”, as they say. This game will feature “cross platform, cross device” support, meaning we’ll be able to pick up where we left off from one device to the other, too.

It’s Fox Digital Entertainment that’s footing the bill on this one, working with mobile game developer QMX Interactive behind the scenes. Those aiming to roll with the game in either mobile or desktop web browser format are able to access updates from the development crew through their official “Keep Flying” website. Upon signing up, the following message is delivered:

“On behalf of QMx Interactive and Spark Plug Games, we want to say thank you.

Together with you, our fellow Browncoats from around the world, we’re about to do the impossible. And that makes us mighty.

FIREFLY ONLINE is going to be a game unlike any other and 99.9% of that will be due to fans like you who are already making it so incredibly special. As a registered FIREFLY ONLINE player, you will receive exciting news updates and be entitled to future discounts and exclusive offers. You’ll be the first to know when our new website features are unveiled, such as the blog, where you’ll be able to track live progress of the game and ask questions of the developers, and the FFO store, which will be absolutely chock-full of shiny virtual loot (and real loot, too).

It’s going to be one mighty fine shindig, if we do say so ourselves.

Again, we humbly thank you for your support. Keep flying!”

– Andy Gore (QMx) and John O’Neill (SPG)

Stick around as we follow the creation of this game and see how it fares in the ever-expanding world of MMORPGs and the like. Until then – Find a Crew. Find a Job. Keep Flying.

NOTE: This game will be out for smartphone and tables initially, but the crew has made it clear that “we’ll see how things go :)”. They followed up to an off-hand question on if the game will appear for Windows RT, Windows 8, and Windows Phone 8 with a “just ’cause you asked 🙂 We’ll make it so.”

The PR team behind this game is clearly underestimating the interest they’re about to have with half-announcements such as these, bless them. They’ll wise up quick!

Firefly returns as a cross-platform cross-device multiplayer game is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2013, SlashGear. All right reserved.