J's Cache - Tech News

Dragon Age live-action show announced

2011-02-15T15:53:00.000-05:00

Bioware and Electronic Arts have announced a new live-action online show called Dragon Age: Redemption to celebrate the launch of Dragon Age 2.

The six-episode series will be released exclusively online and will star Dr Horrible's Sing-a-Long Blog as both lead actress and scriptwriter.

Day, who has already written and starred in game-based series such as The Guild, will play an Elven assassin called Tallis who goes on a quest to capture a renegade wizard.

'Tallis is headstrong, she fights dirty, and she has a really sarcastic sense of humor,' Day told USA Today. 'I wanted to bring a modern sensibility to a fantasy character in a fantasy world.'

Filmed last month in LA, Dragon Age: Redemption saw Day collaborating with Independance Day associate producer Peter Winther and Lost cinematographer John Bartley.

You can check out Bit-Gamer's Dragon Age 2 preview for more information on the game, which launches March 8th.

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IRL Hacks: Invisible Tanks on the Battlefield.

2011-01-10T14:55:00.001-05:00

Armoured vehicles will use a new technology known as "e-camouflage" which deploys a form "electronic ink" to render a vehicle "invisible".

Highly sophisticated electronic sensors attached to the tank's hull will project images of the surrounding environment back onto the outside of the vehicle enabling it to merge into the landscape and evade attack.

The electronic camouflage will enable the vehicle to blend into the surrounding countryside in much the same way that a squid uses ink to help as a disguise.

Unlike conventional forms of camouflage, the images on the hull would change in concert with the changing environment always insuring that the vehicle remains disguised.

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2010-12-25T20:26:00.000-05:00

Activision Blizzard Inc has raked in more than $1 billion in worldwide sales of Call of Duty: Black Ops, the latest installment of the U.S. game publisher's most successful franchise.

That performance built on the previous benchmark of $650 million of sales in the game's first five days, which set a five-day global record for a movie, book or videogame, the company said.

"In all of entertainment, only 'Call of Duty' and 'Avatar' have ever achieved the billion dollar revenue milestone this quickly," Activision Chief Executive Officer Bobby Kotick said in a statement, referring to the blockbuster alien epic helmed by James Cameron.

Wall Street's expectations run high for Activision's holiday quarter, based also on the company's latest World of Warcraft installment.

But sales in the $50 billion U.S. video game industry -- which has been slow to bounce back from the recession -- are down 5 percent for the year to November 30.

Despite a strong November, research group NPD estimates that overall sales of gaming hardware and software for 2010 are likely to range from $18.8 billion to $19.6 billion, the top of which would be roughly flat with last year.

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Can't believe it broke the 1B mark, amazing.

Minecraft Beta Rare Secret

2010-12-24T13:59:00.000-05:00

"When indie smash hit Minecraft finally hit beta a few days ago, the game’s developer, Notch, said there was a super secret rare item added to the update. The update’s patch notes stated that the secret rare item was more rare than wearable cloaks that only Mojang employees could obtain, which, considering said cloaks are unobtainable by regular players, made the secret rare item pretty darn rare indeed. This, of course, sent Minecraft players into an exploration frenzy, causing them to meticulously explore the game world, as well as search through the game’s texture files.

Well, it turns out the secret rare item is a player skin that only one person, musician Deadmau5, is able to obtain and is only viewable on said player’s server. Notch confirmed this on Twitter, by answering this question with this response. This was confirmed again by another Mojang employee, Jens Bergensten."

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Haha, thought this was pretty awesome, gotta love Notch.

2010-12-24T13:50:00.000-05:00

A simple reactor that mimics plants by turning sunlight into fuel has been demonstrated in the laboratory, boosting hopes for a large-scale renewable source of liquid fuel.

"We have a big energy problem and we have to think big," said Prof Sossina Haile, at the California Institute of Technology, who led the research.

Haile estimates that a rooftop reactor could produce about three gallons of fuel a day. She thinks transport fuels would be the first application of the reactor, if it goes on to commercial use. But she said an equally important use for the renewable fuels would be to store solar energy so it is available at times of peak demand, and overnight. She says the first improvements that will be made to the existing reactor will be to improve the insulation to help stop heat loss, a simple move that she expects to treble the current efficiency.

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I wonder if any of these alternative means of energy production will ever see the light of day?