Lava lamp? Pfff. YouTuber bfayer made a life-a-lamp. His calls his invention the Liquid Lifebar. It reflects to the amount of health or mana of his character in Terraria in real time. If he has a lot of health, the lamp’s water level is high and it glows a healthy green. But if he gets hit, the water level drops and the color gets warmer. When it turns red, he’s dead.
Bfayer made a time-lapse video of his build process. You can see the Liquid Lifebar spring to life at about 3:50 in:
Check the video’s description on YouTube to see the complete parts list. It would be awesome if bfayer could make it work in reverse as well, i.e. the Liquid Lifebar dictates the amount of his character’s health or mana.
Instructables member cunning_fellow made brass belt buckle with a crude handheld gaming device built-in. He calls it the Asteroid Belt, probably because the first game he’s making for it is an Asteroids ripoff.
I really like the brass case that cunning_fellow made for the device. It seems to be upside down in the pictures though. Or did cunning_fellow make it that way so it would be right side up from his point of view when he’s wearing the belt? Cunning fellow.
Head to Instructables to see more of the Asteroid Belt. Cunning_fellow clearly didn’t bother explaining his process in layman’s terms because the project requires advanced tinkering and programming skills. He did say, “If 1000 people all moan at me at once I could be persuaded” to make and sell more of the belt. He clearly underestimated the average Internet user’s moaning capability.
deviantART contributor/artist/bakologist Nicole William not only has two first names for a name, she’s also great at baking. Here’s a fondant cake she made for one of her biology classes three years ago. It’s a cross-section of an animal cell, complete with labels of its parts.
Mmmm… Giant edible animal cell.
I’m guessing whoever matched the label correctly got to eat the corresponding part.
Back in 2010, Ed Fries – former Vice-President of Game Publishing in Microsoft and one of the co-creators of the Xbox – created a “demake” of Halo for the Atari 2600 called Halo 2600 (Fries also talked about how the project came about on the linked page). Previously Halo 2600 was playable on PCs using an emulator or via its Flash port, but now the game is out as a legit Atari 2600 cartridge.
Here’s some gameplay footage of Halo 2600 courtesy of YouTuber dsdude1107:
Atari Age worked with Fries to release a cartridge version of the game. The first batch of cartridges were sold in a limited run in 2010, but they seem to be back in stock. You can order them from Atari Age for $50 (USD) each.
That’s pretty expensive, but at least each cartridge comes with a glossy label, a box and even a full color 8-page manual, all of which feature art that are waaaay better than how the game itself looks. Seriously kids, if you think the videogame trailers are misleading, imagine the crushing disappointment some of us suffered back in the day.
The Oculus Rift isn’t even out yet, but there’s already an emulator made for it. Or perhaps it’s precisely because the virtual reality headset isn’t out yet that this emulator came about. The program’s name is vbjin-ovr, an offshoot of a Nintendo Virtual Boy emulator for Windows called vbjin. Nope, I didn’t know that existed either. But I’m sure some 90s kid out there is beside himself with joy.
Here’s a screencast of YouTuber Cymatic Bruce playing a Japanese horror game called Innsmouth Mansion.
I doubt that I’ll ever get past the Virtual Boy’s horrible red on black graphics, but overall the emulator’s existence alone merits documentation. Plus Cymatic seemed really into it. Are you among the lucky few who already own an Oculus Rift dev kit? Get the Virtual Boy emulator here.
Red Dead Revolver‘s dueling mode was one of the game’s unique features. It attempted to emulate the feeling of tension by making the player go through a timing-based mini game. But what if you could actually go through the motions of a duel itself? Wouldn’t that be more exciting and fun to play? That’s the idea behind Quick Draw, a multiplayer game that uses the much maligned PlayStation Move controller.
Quick Draw is currently being developed by Greenfly Studios. Greenfly’s Stephen Morris described the mechanics and history of Quick Draw at The Penny-Arcade Report. Unlike most videogames, Quick Draw doesn’t have you look at a monitor and control an avatar. Instead, you just use your body and the Move controller to target other players, which ideally makes it a fun party game. Quick Draw has three modes, but the goal in all of them is simple: be the one with the fastest trigger finger. As you’ll see in the video below, the winner is the one whose PS Move doesn’t glow red after the shootout.
Gotta love the sound effects! Greenfly Studios is working on releasing Quick Draw not just for the PlayStation but for PC and Mac as well. I wonder if Quick Draw can also include a two-player game mode where you gather a bunch of PS Move controllers in the middle of the floor, then at the count of three both opponents scramble to get a controller and shoot at each other. But the catch is that only one of the controllers has a “bullet” in it, so the players have to keep scrambling for the loaded controller, like a scene from a comedy action movie.
Artist TJ Wilferd aka Unicron9 loves making custom action figures. Last year he boldly went and took Star Trek where the franchise hasn’t gone before – to the world of Transformers. He made an action figure that he calls Autobot E, a robot whose vehicle mode is the Starship Enterprise.
*cue transforming sound effect*
To take his creation to the next level, Wilferd even wrote a brief origin story for Autobot E. Capt. Picard and his crew were taking out the remnants of the Borg when they pick up a strange metal relic from one of the Borg’s ships. The relic then proceeds to take over the Enterprise and upgrades the ship. Eventually it directs the crew to Cybertron, which was being attacked by the Borg. A beatdown ensues and the adult Power Rangers win the day. I would love to see an animated short of that.
Warp to Wilfer’s deviantART page for more images (and the full story) of Autobot E.
We’ve seen the father of this LEGO mech hybrid; now it’s time to meet its mother. It’s a scale model of Evangelion Unit-01 from the Neon Genesis Evangelion franchise. Eva Launch!
Japanese LEGO enthusiast Moko says it took him three years to complete this masterpiece. The figure stands nearly 4′ tall and weighs almost 21lbs. Its torso is just a tad too bulky, but honestly I didn’t think you could make something this slim and articulated using LEGO pieces. It even has proper joints! Plus the colors are spot on.
Disengage your primary lock bolts and head to Moko’s Flickr page or his blog for more images of this sweet LEGO mech.
You’ve been dutifully leveling up at school. You’ve lost count how many times you’ve run the Part-time Job and Household Chore side quests. You deserve a reward. But rewards are a bit more special if they’re unidentified items right? That’s the concept behind LootCrate. For about $20 per month, you’ll get a goodie box containing 6 to 8 geeky items, from t-shirts to gadgets.
Aside from the overall geeky theme, the LootCrate elves also pick a theme every month. For instance, the April LootCrate box is called “Token” and contains merchandise of arcade classics like Street Fighter and Space Invaders. Each month, the company also randomly awards one subscriber with a Mega Crate, a rare drop that contains goodies worth $250 (USD).
Sign up for LootCrate on its website. Subscriptions start at about $20 (USD) per month and can be canceled anytime.
Some Iron Man fans are not too keen on his gold-heavy Mark XLII armor, but if you’re absolutely enamored with it Sideshow Collectibles has the ultimate item for you – a life-size replica of the suit.
The armor stands 85″ tall (about 7′) and weighs 105 lbs. It’s finished with automotive paint to give it a glossy look and it has LEDs on its eyes, arc reactor, palms and on the display base.
You’ll need Tony Stark’s wallet to get it, but I think we all expected that. You can pre-order it from Sideshow Collectibles for $8,500 (USD). I wonder if it could be modded into a wearable suit.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
