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African mobile game rewarded its top players with a real cow
What did your favorite mobile game give you the last time you topped its leaderboard? In Tunisia, the developers of a game called Bagra, which translates to "cow," gave its top players a real, living bovine. To win, the couple had to be better than everyone else in a game of keeping a digital herd of cows safe while stealing from others.
Marvel Heroes hands out free cows and plans team-up revamp
The Cow King is on the move in Marvel Heroes, and a call is going out for all supers to join the most ridiculous battle in the universe. During the weekend Cowtastrophe event, players will get an 40% XP bonus and a portal to the game's bovine levels, where they can slaughter beef for better loot. Marvel Heroes is even giving out a free mini-cow pet for any players who log in on Saturday. In other Marvel Heroes news, one of the next big projects for Gazillion is a revamp of the team-up system. While all of the details of this revamp are not clear as of yet, we do know that the revamp will allow players to customize team-up's power pools much like main characters.
Guild Wars 2 players pledge oath to game in video
Stop pinching yourself in a futile effort to wake up from what you think is an absurd dream. The Guild Wars 2 marketing promotion to ask players to pledge their allegiance to the game actually happened. We know this because we now have video proof of the fact. ArenaNet released a complilation video of players filling in the blanks of their own oaths to play the game (in exchange for a shot at a free copy of it, it must be said). From the adorkable to the bizarre and the cows to the cheap flame effects, this video has it all. And best of all, you can watch it in the privacy of your home with no one to judge you after the break.
Three COWs descend on Lucas Oil Stadium, courtesy of Verizon Wireless (video)
When you think of Super Bowl Sunday, many images likely come to mind: malty beverages, nachos, high-budget commercials and -- oh, yeah -- football. Even amongst us mobile fanatics, however, cellular coverage rarely crosses the mind. Fortunately, that's not how Big Red rolls. The company has brought three of its LTE cell-on-wheels rigs to Indianapolis in anticipation of the Big Game, which is expected to draw 85,000 attendees. Amongst other things, Lucas Oil Stadium is now wired to the teeth with $69 million in Verizon gear to ensure that all subscribers will be able to tweet along with each touchdown, fumble and botched call -- like the Giants / Packers game, for instance. In addition to the COWs, the equipment includes 400 mobile antennas inside the stadium to carry voice and data, along with 600 WiFi stations to support a total of 28,000 simultaneous connections. The folks at GottaBeMobile have an excellent spread of how all this came together, but if you're more of the visual type, you'll find a quick video after the break.[Thanks, Josh]
Verizon Wireless gives birth to first LTE COW in Florida, we're still waiting for a celebratory cigar
They're not keen on providing milk, and we've never found evidence to suggest that Verizon's COWs are indeed happy COWs, but Big Red has welcomed a new arrival to its family: the company's first LTE-equipped cell-on-wheels. Measuring in at 1,080 inches tall and weighing a stunning 24,000 pounds, the self-powered transmitter will begin rolling across Florida to handle demand spikes during major events and to serve as a backup communications solution for emergency response scenarios. Although just an infant, it's capable of handling hundreds of simultaneous calls and data transmissions. Spoken like a thrilled papa, Verizon gushed, "We're very proud of this new baby, and glowing about our 4G LTE services around the state." You'll find all the carrier's cheers in the PR after the break.
City of Heroes invites you to invite a friend
It's a busy weekend over at City of Heroes, as not only is the Freedom program in full swing, but Paragon Studios is prepping a new replacement refer-a-friend program to rope in as many stray cattle players as possible. Current City of Heroes VIP players will soon once again be able to send out invites to friends, family members, and unusually intelligent heifers who have either never played the game before or who are former players whose accounts have been inactive for over 90 days. If the recipient decides to become a VIP player (i.e., subscriber), then both the inviter and invitee will find themselves the proud possessors of 500 additional Paragon Points to spend in the in-game store. Friends can either be invited through the NCsoft website or the Paragon Market. While the program is not yet operational, Paragon Studios promises to let us know the moment it goes live.
April Fools' Day roundup: Google overload edition
Ah, April 1st. It's that time of the year again when the internet is rife with odd news and pranks. As before, news sites like us end up with a healthy stream of tips throughout April Fools' Day (thanks, by the way), so let us round up some of the best findings for your comedic appetite. Contenders include the usual suspects like Google and ThinkGeek, the former of which dominating the gigglesphere this year with some new "features." We also have some interesting submissions from Hulu, a font company, and probably plenty more to come as the day progresses, so keep watching this space as we add new entries to this post. Right, let the fun commence after the break.
HP data center fueled by hopes, dreams and... cow dung
We've seen data centers use excess heat for greener purposes, but how's about injecting a little green into the other side of that equation? HP Labs is on that very wavelength, going so far as to publish details on how these centers could be partially powered by none other than cow manure. Yeah, cowpies. The essential thought process went a little something like this: "Data centers need a lot of energy. Dairy farms create a lot of methane. Let's make it happen." Purportedly, 10,000 dairy cows could "fulfill the power requirements of a 1-megawatt data center -- the equivalent of a medium-sized data center -- with power left over to support other needs on the farm," and heat generated by the data center could "be used to increase the efficiency of the anaerobic digestion of animal waste." The stomach-twisting details can be found beyond the break, but we can't be held responsible for any images you conjure up. Remember -- once your third eye sees it, you can't un-see it. [Thanks, Bob]
The Queue: There is a Cow Level
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW.com's daily Q&A column where the WoW.com team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Adam Holisky will be your host today.There is no cow level.Repeat that three times.But if I was designing WoW I'd make sure there'd be some kind of cow level. After all who doesn't want to slaughter some bovines from hell?Osul asked..."What's a good reputation to grind for a newly 80 Ret Paladin?"
Creative gives up, introduces the Zen Moo
We've seen plenty of cheap plastic MP3 land-fillers in our day. But those usually originate from deep-down within the fetid bowels of some no-name manufacturing house in southeast Asia, not the once illustrious Creative. The Zen Moo (yes, Moo) appears to be be a Zen Stone with extra bits of plastic and paint added to achieve Cow. Like the Stone, you get a small OLED, 2GB of memory, 20 hours of playback, and FM tuner to the delight of kids across China (where the Zen Moo was announced) -- hey, it's never too early to destroy a child's hearing. Gift-wrapped product waifs holding the accompanying speaker accessory after the break. Update: Seems the Zen Moo is a tribute to the 2009 Chinese New Year, year of the plastic cow.[Via EpiZENTer, thanks Oscar M.]
One Shots: Well-balanced beef
Sometimes you find something strange in your favorite online world that makes you stop and say "what?!" Today's One Shots balancing act shows just a such strange situation from Lord of the Rings Online. If you look very closely, you see Tzel standing on a fence - not too terribly strange, really. But then, what's that to the right? Apparently a nearby cow thought that being atop a fence was a lovely place to spend some time hanging out as well - and a wee calf joined in the fun! As Laira, Hunter, Protector of the Shire who sent this screenshot in notes: Passing through the ranger camp of Esteldin in the North Downs this evening with my friend Tzel when we were surprised to stumble upon these animals balancing on the fences of their enclosure. Do you think we should alert their owner?Have you found something strange in your favorite online world? Perhaps you're a Lord of the Rings Online player who would like to show us what you're doing just before Mines of Moria launches? We love to see adventurers in their daily lives just as much as we love to see the silly and strange. Just send those to us here at oneshots AT massively DOT com along with your name and a quick description. Your screenshots could be the next ones shown here!%Gallery-9798%
Ear-A-Round headsets keep tabs on cows, make farming easier
In no way are we insinuating that farming is ever "easy," but a new headset designed for cows could make cattle herding a much less stressful experience. The Ear-A-Round headsets are the product of a project involving the USDA and MIT, and essentially, the GPS-infused devices would transmit stereo sounds directly in a bovine's ears in order to guide and direct his / her movements. Strange though the head-worn gizmos may look, the built-in solar panel should keep it juiced up and ready to dictate on command, giving farmers the ability to track and herd from the comfort of their computer desks. The overriding goal here is to "improve animal distribution on the landscape," though we can think of quite a few other positives to having such a robust virtual fencing system.[Via Core77]
How tranquil is this Tree of Tranquility trailer?
Lack of press? Lack of press? Why, that's all wrong ... now. The latest trailer for Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility has surfaced, in English and everything. Well, there's only five spoken words from the cheerful announcers, but the gameplay content features some items the harvesting hero is working with, like "perfect turnip" and "used hoe." It looks like a lovely, peaceful game (aside from the vicious attacks). The mix of farming and socializing has always been a great feature of Harvest Moon, and the wait for a full-fledged title on the Wii has been agonizing. Not long now -- August 26th is the time to plant to evergreen seeds of fun. And tranquility. %Gallery-3745%
Why buy the Harvest Moon when you get the cow for free?
There's been a disturbing lack of press about Harvest Moon: Tree of Tranquility. In fact, we've probably seen and heard more about Rune Factory: Frontier than we have about Tree, which came out in Japan last year.What we do know is that preordering the title through Amazon will get you an adorable cow plushie. Of course, it's difficult to tell when you'll actually receive the game and plush doll; Natsume lists "Summer 2008," Gamestop lists late July, Gamefly lists early August, and Amazon lists late August, to name a few of the scattered release dates. Still, for Harvest Moon fans who were planning to buy the game anyway, a cute cow plush is a nice bonus that might make preordering through Amazon the best way to go. It's certainly not the greatest gift ever, but we think it will definitely appeal to the Harvest Moon crowd ... mostly because we're in that crowd, and we want one for ourselves. Gallery: Harvest Moon [Via CAG]
One Shots: Moooooo
Reader Eric writes in with this... interesting... shot from Elwynn forest in the World of Warcraft. Though Elwynn is farmland typically filled with animals, both wild and domestic, a cow climbing trees is an unusual sight. Says Eric, "I was starting to level my warrior toon and I knew it was getting late... started seeing things..."One Shots lives on a steady diet of your screenshots! Snapped a good screenshot lately? Tired of seeing the same old games featured? Send us shots from your favorite game! It's easy to participate -- just send your screenshots and stories to oneshots@massively.com. %Gallery-9798%
Poll: Banish Gateway's spotted cow branding?
This morning's announcement about Acer's acquisition of Gateway left us wondering about the fate of Gateway's Holstein branding in the hands of Taiwan's Acer. Those spots were once proudly synonymous with Gateway's unexpectedly low-tech, Iowa roots -- an idea worn thin after the dot com bust. So what's your take, bring out the sledgehammer or spare that heifer for another day?%Poll-2681%
Robotic cow tongues... for lonely heifers
Remember the good ol' days when artists mocked religious deities and the only uprising to fear was that of the apes? Now, thanks to Doo Sung Yoo's "Lie" exhibit, we can add disembodied, robotic cow tongues to the list of imminent revolts. "Mooo...bzzz...oooo" will be the battle cry of our future overlords. Read-on for the yukgastic video. Trust us, you'll want to turn the sound up to 11 when they zoom in.[Via BoingBoing]
Harvest Moon: Attack of the Cows
Tired of being explolited as mascots for Marvelous Interactive's always-adorable farming sim series, the Harvest Moon cows have revolted, surrounding their cruel master to put her out to pasture once and for all. They finally secured the goats' loyalty, the final component of their master plan.That's the only possible explanation for the events transpiring in the above screenshot. Anything else, like that maybe she's feeding them or just talking to the cows, is so farfetched as to be unbelievable. Harvest Moon may be cute, but it's totally edgy.
Weekly Webcomic Wrapup: beware the Easter Cow edition
After an insightful episode of South Park that explained the relationship between bunnies, eggs, and the resurrection of Jesus Christ, we decided to do some of our own research into the history of the seemingly bizarre Easter rituals. After becoming bored with that, we thought about easter eggs in the virtual sense -- i.e. those hidden treats found on CDs, DVDs and video games.Celebrate Easter by telling us your favorite virtual easter eggs; while you're thinking, check out our picks for the week's best game-related webcomics. Be sure to vote for your favorite! Where's the dice? Brunch-out! Illustrative diagram Popular trends The real winner It's a-fatal! Truth stretching We wouldn't be surprised Partied out
Lely's Voyager keeps cattle grazing in the right direction
We wouldn't normally think that cattle farming would be the easiest, cleanest profession out there, but considering the wireless tracking gizmos, robotic milkers, and RFID tattoos that are now available, we're startin' to think these guys / gals have it made. Aside from dodging cow pies, farmers can now look forward to one more robotic innovation making things better, as Lely's automated strip grazing system, dubbed Voyager, "utilizes two robots to move an electrified fence-line at a pace that ensures that the sward is completely grazed." The "frontal grazing" approach purportedly maximizes grass utilization and keeps ungrazed areas from being "contaminated by manure," and moreover, the machines are solar-powered, automatically keeps the wire taught at all times, and communicates with one another via Bluetooth. Don't think that installing robots to do your dirty work will run ya cheap, however, as the Voyager system will only be available in limited quantities for around £15,000 ($29,664).[Via TheRawFeed]
