GameSpy has a great article about Spore and the new way to think about games. Will Wright, creator of SimCity and The Sims talks about his latest game where you become a cosmic creator. Here’s a great quote…“At the same time, what he calls the “value to gamers” levels off after a while. A game with 22,000 animations isn’t twice as good as a game with 11,000 animations. But fortunately, Wright learned another lesson from The Sims: People love to make their own content. They love to customize their experience…Putting two and two together, Wright concluded that there had to be some way where users could create content, instead of armies of developers, and a way to make a game craft itself around the user’s contribution”. I need this game.
Here’s an article (in German) and pictures of the 4th German championship of “casemoding” (modification of PC cases). Here’s a translated page, some of the translations are kinda funny. Click on the three pictures in the middle of the article and you’ll see 16 entries to the championship. I think I like this one the best, it’s a cyborg looking PC with flip top head and bar code.
I played this on Saturday and guessed 2 of them correctly… Turing’s Original Imitation Game was played for the first time ever at Simon’s Rock College of Bard in Great Barrington, MA on Saturday, April 16, 2005. The experiment was organized by Cameo Wood, Melissa Leventhal and Allyson Sgro…The participants were asked to chat with two companions over AOL instant messenger for five minutes, and then to guess which was a man and which was a woman.Full story here.
SPOT community site SPOTStop points to the new “How Smart Watches Work” article on How Stuff Works. If you’re curious how SPOT watches work, the specs, service and some of the technical details this is a great article. Awhile back I modd’ed my Sunnto to look a little tougher, and solar charged it.
MrJerm says…“When I went to my local hardware store and showed them the list of materials, they already knew what it was for…the $14 steadicam must be catching on….I added a $10 “fitness set” from Sports Authority. The neoprene girdle is a good thing to wrap around the handle, providing grip and smoother (for me) pans. The jogging weights easily slip on the bottom, making it possible to gradually increase the weight as I become more comfortable with the setup. And when the steadicam is not in use, the jogging weights make good…jogging weights….”.
From Michael’s “Optical Illusions & Visual Phenomena…This is pretty freaky, you stare at the green dot in the middle, as the background grid turns the yellow dots will disappear. Steady fixation favours disappearance, blinks or gaze shifts induce reappearance. All in all reminiscent of the Troxler effect, but stronger and more resistant to residual eye movements. Might be cool to make a video game that has this effect.
If you’re working on, know of, or are interested in car & transportation hacking- submit the best car hacks, mods, personal stories, project ideas, DIY links, etc. Here or in the comments! We’ve just finished up our second issue for the year and we’re looking at our third issue (transportation will be included). Here’s a great one submitted by Maker reader John- Motorcycle and scooter modification tutorials.