AER

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  • ICYMI: Family seamstresses will be replaced soon enough

    by 
    Kerry Davis
    Kerry Davis
    10.12.2016

    try{document.getElementById("aol-cms-player-1").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: Robots have finally gotten around the 'needing human assistance' thing when it comes to sewing clothing. The Sewbo is one such option, which can stitch together clothing as long as the garment is first dipped in a stiffening solution that makes it feel like cardboard.

  • Fly among beautiful floating islands hiding ancient secrets in 'Aer'

    by 
    Jessica Conditt
    Jessica Conditt
    08.05.2015

    Aer is more gorgeous every time I see it. I first ran across it by accident: While waiting in a line at Gamescom 2013, I noticed Robin Hjelte, the game's creator, showing off a video on his tablet to a small, excited crowd. I peeked over his shoulder to see a beautiful pastel landscape with rolling green grass, adorable animals, and, at the center of it all, a young woman -- who suddenly transformed into a bird and soared off the land's edge, aiming for another tranquil island floating high in the sky. I gave Hjelte my card and told him to hit me up if he wanted to talk about the game. The following year at Gamescom, we sat down for a lovely chat. This year at E3, I finally got to play Aer (now with support from renowned German publisher Daedalic Entertainment), and the game sang in my hands as I flawlessly swapped between land and sky, and I wandered through dark, mysterious passageways with even darker secrets. Today, Daedalic and Hjelte's studio, Forgotten Key, released a brand new, infintely more gorgeous trailer for Aer, alongside confirmation that the game is coming to Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PC, Mac and Linux in 2016.

  • Turn into a bird and save the world in PS4 game 'Aer'

    by 
    Jessica Conditt
    Jessica Conditt
    08.12.2014

    Aer stands out even though it is accidentally, obviously on-trend: It's a low-poly exploration game set on a series of floating islands, it features a giant owl and it's devoid of combat. Some of these aspects appear in recent notable games, including Secrets of Raetikon, BioShock Infinite, Monument Valley and Fez, but Aer remains intriguing. Even in its early stages, it's fascinating and mysterious – it feels fresh, even in a market saturated with its individual components. "It's kind of funny," Forgotten Key co-founder Robin Hjelte told me at GDC Europe. "It's like, when you have a new car, you always start to see all the new cars. It's been a bit of the same thing: First we started off with, 'Yeah, floating islands. That's a cool setting; we want to do something with this.' And then we were like, 'Oh, boy. Everyone is doing floating islands.'" The same thing happened with the low-poly art style, too, Hjelte said.