Wei-Chieh Tseng's mood tail, a robotic automated artificial appendage, hangs off a belt from the waist and can easily be hidden under clothing. The user controls the robotic tail via a Wii-mote Nunchuck in 4 directions. From what we see in the video it looks very cool and quite usable although a little corded. Why not use a wireless nunchuck? The real icing on the cake bit of tech is the mood cards. Using RFID technology the cards let others know how you are feeling by the tail reacting Angrily, Happily, or Sadly. simply swipe a card by the tail and a preprogramed motion goes into action. It looks like we are one step closer to animatronic appendages.
I'm here to tell you of the most exciting video game I have seen in development this year. Unlike most traditional gamers I am a gamer that has a very unique pallet. I am a fan of classic side-scrolling adventure's like Sonic the Hedgehog, Castlevania and Cold Shadow; a lesser known classic featuring Donald Duck as a ninja. I loved the Super Nintendo and adored my Sega Genesis, this was the height of video games for me. But let's not forget about Spyro The Dragon. It makes me sigh, the memories of classics such as these. I've enjoyed many games since but none has satisfied my yearning for story, aesthetics, and game play as the classics; they seem to have had fallen out of production, until now! In early 2000 Dean Dodrill, aka Noogy, began working on a project with his wife. The Project, still in development, is an animated movie by the name of Elysian Tail. [see official website]
Dean was an Epic Games artist who left the company when the anticipated Jazz JackRabbit 3 was canceled in 2000. Noogy became popular within the Furry Fandom for characters like Bonnie an anthropomorphic mouse starring in the animated film. Dust: An Elysian Tail is a side-scrolling action/RPG adventure. the video game entered into Microsoft's Dream.Build.Play competition in 2009 and was quoted as "...not only the best looking video game we've seen from the contest, it might be the best looking downloadable Xbox 360 title ever." Dodrill wound up taking home the XNA $40,000 grand prize for Dust: An Elysian Tail.
The game follows Dust, the main character, on a journey through Falana a beautiful and mysterious world. His goal is to liberate an opressed village and uncover his lost past. The animation looks smooth and the visuals are stunning with hand painted detail. The game has a deep combat system, echoing Cold Shadow, that rewards skilled gamers.
Dean was quoted saying "I'm going to finish up this game, and then it's back to the real deal... the film. It's hard to think of it, but this game is really just a tiny slice of a bigger picture. Hopefully the game finds success."
Also read Dean's full interview here. [via Xbox indies]
An interesting short film by The People's Republic of Animation. Narrated by Nick Cave. Directed by Eddie White & Ari Gibson. Produced by Jessica Brentnall. This acclaimed short animation blends stylish animation with a 1950's mood and great animation. It's poetry a divine rhapsody in the works, but don't take it from me. Watch.
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