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'Rain' announced for PSN from SCE Japan Studio
Rain, an atmospheric looking PSN game from Sony Computer Entertainment's Japan Studio, was just announced during Sony's Gamescom presser. The story centers on a little boy who has become invisible, and the player's only distinct impression of the boy's position is through interacting with the world's ever-pouring rain.It's like that scene from Hollow Man, but way more endearing and way less super freaky. No information was given regarding a release date, and it's worth noting that Rain is the game's working title.
Sony trademarks 'Rain,' 'Until Dawn' in EU and US before Gamescom
Sony is either preparing a few unannounced IPs for the public eye, or it's really concerned about the weather at Gamescom next week. Sony has trademarked "Rain" and "Until Dawn" in the US and Europe, both as "computer game software." The above image was included with the Rain filing via OHIM, the European trademark system.Until Dawn was registered on OHIM in May and on USPTO in August; Rain hit both OHIM and USPTO on July 30. No additional information is provided in the filings, but OnlySP links the Rain trademark with a gif depicting an unknown PlayStation quick-time-event (mostly because it happens to be raining in the scene). The image in Rain's filing takes a more Limbo approach than the gif suggests, but for now any speculation is just that.Sony's Gamescom press conference is on Tuesday, August 14, and the trademark timing seems right for a reveal.
Mortal Kombat Komplete Edition trailer looks back on Rain
Fans really wanted Rain to return in Mortal Kombat, designer Brian Lebaron says, and it was a task more difficult than developer Netherrealm Studios expected.
AirGo Outdoor Speaker adopts AirPort Express, shrugs off rain
Sure, you could buy an outdoor speaker with native AirPlay support, or you could stuff that spare AirPort Express you have laying around into the AirGo Outdoor Sound Station. This weather resistant speaker forgoes the usual baked in BridgeCo silicone for an integrated AirPort Express dock. Of course, this kind of ad hoc integration isn't cheap -- the AirGo will set you back almost $400, and that's without an Apple AirPort Express. The AirGo's AC cord (that's right, no batteries) ensures that you won't get too far into the great outdoors with this rig, but Russound's CEO is confident that weather won't be a problem. Rain? "Break out the Slip 'N Slide," he says "and continue to rock on." Sounds good to us. Slide on past the break for the official press release.
Scientist creating rain-making lasers, Weezy and Fat Joe await royalty checks
We've heard of "making it rain," but actually making it rain -- with lasers, no less -- now, that's something to write home about. A team of researchers at the University of Geneva is coming ever closer to creating real-deal downpours by shooting beams from their Teramobile mobile femtosecond-Terawatt laser system into the sky above the Rhone River. While logging nearly 133 hours between the fall of 2009 and spring of 2010, the team observed that the beams actually triggered the creation of nitric acid particles, which bound water molecules together creating water droplets. Those droplets proved too small and light to actually be categorized as rain, but the discovery has apparently spurred the scientists on. Previous efforts to make it rain, known as seeding, have used rockets and jets to shoot silver iodide and dry ice into the sky. No word yet on when the scientists expect to successfully "wash the spider out."
100 percent chance of Rain with new Mortal Kombat DLC on July 19
Rain, former denizen of Edenia and walking Prince reference, will be joining the twenty-first century on July 19 as Mortal Kombat's third DLC character. Half god, half severe weather alert, Rain originally debuted in Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. It looks like he's retained all of his old tricks, including his lightning bolt, water levitate, and magical-compulsory-teleportation feet. Rain will be available for 400 MS Points ($5), or as part of the Season Pass.
Skarlet enters the Mortal Kombat arena today, Kombat Pass also at GameStop
Skarlet, Mortal Kombat's bloody female ninja, is available as paid DLC today. You can get her either as a standalone download for 400 MS Points ($5), or as part of the 1200 MS Point ($15) Mortal Kombat Season Pass on Xbox 360, where you pay a large sum up front and then gain access to all of the DLC cheaper than buying it piecemeal. We've tucked a gameplay trailer for Skarlet just past the break. She's the first of four new characters promised throughout the rest of the summer. Warner Bros. also informs us that you can go into your local GameStop and pick up a Kombat Pass there, if you're one of those oddballs who needs a physical object when handing cash over for goods and/or services. Oh, and if you're skipping the DLC altogether, don't forget to download the compatibility pack. It'll net you some retro costumes for Cyrax and Sektor!
Skarlet enters Mortal Kombat on June 21; Kenshi, Rain, one other coming later
Today, IGN revealed that we'll be able to add Skarlet to our roster of Mortal Kombat fighters next Tuesday, June 21. Following the bloody female assassin will be Kenshi, Rain and a mysterious fighter to be named at a later date. The new DLC (DLK?) characters will be sold individually throughout this summer, and a downloadable compatibility pack will ensure that everyone can see them, even if they don't purchase them. Hit the jump for the announcement trailer.
Minecraft beta update 1.5 to include weather effects
Since everyone knows that Minecraft's raked in a cool $33 million to date, Notch has taken it upon himself to, in true rock star fashion, make it rain. In a series of Tweets this morning, Notch revealed that Minecraft beta update 1.5 will add precipitation to the game, which could possibly have gameplay implications like watering crops, putting out fires, filling small holes and moistening wolves. By the way, "Moistening Wolves" is totally the name of our new, indie noise-rock band. Notch included an image of the weather effects at the border of two in-game biomes, showing off some sort of fantasy world where distinct rain and snow systems are allowed to hang out and be buddies. We called up our local meteorologist to see if this was a phenomenon that could occur in real life, and he literally exploded.
Heavy Rain film adaptation helmed by Deadwood creator
Heavy Rain is getting the Hollywood treatment and, hopefully, some American accents to go along with it. David Milch, executive producer of "NYPD Blue" and "Deadwood," is working on an adaptation that will simply be called "Rain." According to Variety, Milch will begin writing the script after finishing work on his current project, a new HBO series called "Luck." "David Milch's incredible ability to transform intense and complex storylines into gripping, popular drama makes him the perfect partner for us to have on Heavy Rain," producer Bob Shaye told the outlet. We then fictionally added, "Milch's penchant for adding male nudity into NYPD Blue makes him the ideal candidate for this project."
Google brings current weather conditions to Google Earth, confirms it is, indeed, still raining in Pittsburgh
Google's busted out Google Earth 5.2, and all you meteorology nuts are going to want to hear about this. The update includes current weather condition imaging such as rain and snow cover in the radar layar with the cloud cover view on. Now, we love seeing weather maps as much as the next guy, but we're also pretty bad at predicting what's going to happen next based on those images, so we'll just leave that to the pros for now. Either way, if you're lucky enough to live in the U.S. and some parts of Europe, that feature is currently available.
Swiss scientists create dark clouds with a laser lining (video)
Lasers can tell time, shoot down missiles and power one heck of a TV. Now, scientists claim they can create rain clouds, too. Turning a 5-terawatt infrared laser on the sky in short, 100-femtosecond bursts, researchers at the University of Geneva managed to strip electrons from the surrounding air, causing the formation of "hydroxlyl radicals" and growing water droplets in their wake. Though some scientific peers believe the idea could never be used to generate real, useful rain compared to existing cloud seeding techniques, Geneva scholars have now duplicated the effect in both the lab and in the skies over Berlin, and we're sure it's only a matter of time before some nefarious villain figures the frickin' weather control technology into a suitably evil plot. Video after the break.
The Queue: Tenacious Queue
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW Insider's daily Q&A column where the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Adam Holisky will be your host today. Howdy folks. Alex and I had to take a little time away from our daily column to focus on other things. While I can't say just yet what we've been working on, I can say that you'll enjoy it when you see it.It's a surprise! You'll be surprised. Tomorrow. Hopefully. But now I've probably jinxed it.Oh gawd, what have I done?SpearXXI asked..."Is there a way to get the White Hippogryph that is at the flight point of the Argent Tournament?"
Shigeru Miyamoto back for round two -- nominated for 2008 Time 100
We imagine that Shigeru Miyamoto, creator of some of the most recognizable intellectual properties on the planet, doesn't like coming in second place -- let alone ninety-second place. Unfortunately for the banjo-plucking game designer, that was the case in last year's Time 100 list, when Shiggy, sandwiched between the world's fifth richest man and the author of "The Secret", nearly didn't make the cut. Though his pride was surely bruised, Miyamoto wasn't discouraged by the low ranking -- he merely stepped up his game, providing oversight for some of last year's best-selling Wii titles. Perhaps that's why he's been nominated for the 2008 Time 100 list, where dedicated Nintendo fanboys have pushed the eccentric designer to number 27 -- somewhere between Michael Cera and Oprah. Your votes can help propel the father of modern video gaming to the top of the list, a position currently held by a certain precipitationally-named Korean pop star. Unless, of course, you're anti-Shiggy -- but who could you say "no" to that adorable face?
Wishing for weather in Outland
Prancing around Quel'Danas for my daily quests day in and day out has reminded me of something I've very dearly missed. Weather! It rains very frequently in Quel'Danas, and combined with all of the action going on around the island, it has a very strong feel of being alive.Zangarmarsh has rain as well, but I can't think of any other zone in Outland that has weather effects that come and go. Sure, some zones have Infernal rains and such inside and outside of them, but that isn't really the same. It's a constant, it's static. When you go to that zone, it will be there 100% of the time. Azeroth's weather wasn't like that. After it was added, of course. It might be raining in Stranglethorn, it might be sunshine from horizon to horizon. When it was raining, the zone had an entirely different feel. You were doing the same things, but it just felt different.I brought this up with some friends of mine a few times before, and we tried to think it through with logic at first. You know, the atmosphere is different, so maybe other zones in Outland can't rain. It's an alien world, so who knows? Even if you play the 'alien world = no rain' card, I think there are some awesome weather-related things you can do. Read on for my thoughts on the matter!
One Shots: A rainy day on the Go'Shek farm
We can't speak for you, but for many of our U.S. writers, the weather has been strange and "bleh" at best. That's why when we saw this one come in, we had to smile -- someone in the game world is sharing our stormy weather. This screen comes to us today from Diminuendo, who plays a Blood Elf Rogue on Quel'Dorei. Diminuendo says: I was running through Go'Shek Farm in Arathi Highlands and I noticed an orc standing on the roof. I think he's always up there, but I found it interesting that he was up there in the rain. I figured he was fixing a leaky roof. It sounds plausible to us, except that he seems to be holding an axe. Maybe he's messing up his annoying neighbor's roof instead? Whatever his reason for being up there (and his friend for being in the foreground) neither one of them looks to be too happy about being out in the rain. With that murky gray sky above, can you really blame them?If you have a funny, interesting, strange, or off-the-wall screenshot to send us, then take a moment, dig through that screenshot folder and send 'em in to us at oneshots@massively.com! Be sure to include your name (character or personal, your call) and whatever else you'd like to note about yourself (class/guild/server/etc.) along with a short blurb about the image. It could be one of the next ones featured here on One Shots! %Gallery-9798%
Researchers dream up rain-powered devices
There have certainly been gizmos to surface throughout the years that react in some form or fashion to rain, but Jean-Jacques Chaillout and colleagues at the Atomic Energy Commission in France are fantasizing about using those diminutive droplets of water to actually power useful creations. After using computer models to find out just how much energy could be created by rainfall landing on piezoelectric materials, they determined that between 1 nanojoule and 25 microjoules of energy could be generated per drop. Granted, that won't keep a WoW gamer crankin' through the eve, but it could be used in everyday sensors that just need a smidgen of power in order to beam back results or data to ground control (or Major Tom). So yeah, these may not work so well in Death Valley, but we hear Amazonia could really benefit.[Via NewScientist, image courtesy of ABC]
Inis makes potential worst game ever
You may know Inis as the developer of fantastic games, such as Gitaroo-Man Lives! (PSP) and Elite Beat Agents (DS). However, Siliconera has unearthed one of the most shameful projects in videogaming history: Rain: Wonder Trip, exclusively for PSP. The "game" has you interacting in all sorts of ways with the notoriously popular Korean pop star, Rain. According to Spencer, Wonder Trip is "an interactive PSP title where you interact with him in his limousine. You can check Rain's schedule, answer questions in QuizBillionaire mode and buy him presents. If you pick the right gift or order his favorite food you can make him happy." Don't you want to make him happy?!The game was unleashed upon the Korean public a few months ago. While we thought nothing of it, we're shocked, horrified to see Inis' name tarnished by such a desperate project. Please, never do that ever again. Thanks. For the curious, check out the game's official website.
Extending the weather and seasons of Azeroth
We had two similiar comments drop in on the tipline in the past few days that both are pretty interesting ideas that WoW does all right with, but could probably do a lot better. Foxtir dropped us a note the other day voicing an opinion about the night and day cycle of World of Warcraft. As you may have noticed, WoW does have a night/day cycle already-- when it's midday, the light looks very different from the middle of the night (and my favorite zone in the whole world is Hinterlands in the evening). But Foxtir wants an even more obvious cycle-- during the day, Stormwind should be bustling, while at night, the weirdos could come out, and maybe even some Defias could be found in the city. It would be cool to see the day and night cycles have a gameplay effect as well-- in Warcraft III, they definitely did, but in WoW, I don't know that the day/night timing has any effect but the lighting.And Jasperwind sent another note saying basically the same thing about the weather-- we've got the occasional rain and snow, but what if weather affected gameplay somehow? Or even more extreme forms of weather, he suggests-- what if earthquakes scared mobs away for a matter of time?Let's give Blizzard credit where credit is due-- most games don't have a night/day cycle (much less a realtime cycle), and many games have no weather at all, or implement it badly (and anyone who's ever experienced a freak storm in Tirisfal will agree that Blizzard didn't do that). So WoW is already ahead of the curve in both cases. But in an MMORPG where we pay monthly, we can always expect more. And it would definitely be cool (and add a little more strategy to the game) to have these cosmetic changes affect the lives and actions of the characters we play.
Reader WoWspace of the Week: 2.3 WoWspaces!
No, this week I'm not featuring WoWspaces that have lots of good information or reaction on the upcoming patch. Considering we're featuring oodles of 2.3 news lately, I thought it would be fun to show off 2.3 WoWspaces. (I'll let you figure out which one is the .3 of a WoWspace) These are some of the generally off-the-beaten-desk variety pictures that we get. That said, on with the show!The first WoWspace this week (pictured above) features one thing we haven't seen featured in a WoWspace until this week -- feet! This WoWspace belongs to Bork. He writes:While playing WoW on a TV is not a new idea, It did take me quite a while to get it to the point where I wasn't leaning over my coffee table the whole time -- at least, not without a big ugly book for a mouse pad. I had to scale up the interface in the config so I could actually read the tiny text in the interface. (the GUI stops you at one) Bartender 3 also helped since scaling up the interface made the bars render off the side of the screen.I have my keyboard all taped up to a product from laptopdesk.net. I tried many things but this was the lightest and easiest. I also couldn't stand gaming with the wireless products out there so I have a standard wired keyboard and mouse (lots more blue tape holding it down to the carpet).Anyway, just wanted to share in case someone else is trying to get this to work in their living room. I actually gave up and moved everything into my bedroom twice because of a sore back, but now it works well.For those who are interested in the other non-traditional WoWspaces for this week, click on the link below and let's continue on!
