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Playing Zelda in real life is a lot like doing grade-school homework
Anyone who grew up playing the Legend of Zelda series has found themselves daydreaming about adventures on the plains of Hyrule. What would it really be like to traverse the lands of Zelda's kingdom, travel through time to solve puzzles and defeat an evil overlord with nothing but your own wit and bravery? It's an exciting fantasy, but temper your expectations. If escape room designer SCRAP's Defenders of the Triforce experience is any indication, the reality of a real-life Zelda adventure involves a lot of paperwork.
A real-world 'Zelda' escape room game is coming next year
Have you ever found yourself humming the Zelda theme on your commute, longing to embark on a Hyrulian adventure? Well, next year Nintendo will make that dream a reality.
Rare lunar rover prototype accidentally sold for scrap (update)
A priceless lunar rover prototype, built by NASA in the mid '60s, has been broken up and sold for scrap. Motherboard has discovered that the vehicle was found rusting in an Alabama back yard at the start of 2014. The roving Air Force historian who spotted it instantly raised the alarm, but officials reportedly didn't rush to get contact the owner to arrange recovery. Unfortunately, by the time that they had, the person had died, and whoever was handling their estate sold the rover off to a local scrap merchant for a lot less than NASA probably would have paid. We won't spoil the rest of the story for you, but let's offer up a lesson: if you have a six-wheeled, 8,000 pound space vehicle in your back yard, maybe google it before calling the breakers. Update: In a beautiful twist to the story, the scrapyard dealer who bought the vehicle didn't dismantle the vehicle. In fact, he contacted Motherboard with pictures proving that it was in one piece and that he was planning on selling it on at some point soon.
Elderly Georgian lady disconnects Armenian internet for half a day... by accident
A 75-year old lady from Georgia (the country, not the state) has perpetrated an impressive feat of international sabotage in what seems to have been an accident of extremely bad luck. While foraging for copper wire near her home in the village of Ksani, the unnamed septuagenarian managed to come across a critical fiber optic cable, one responsible for serving internet connectivity to "90 percent of private and corporate internet users in Armenia" and some in her own country as well. Her swift strike at the heart of said bit-transferring pipeline resulted in all those folks being thrown offline for a solid 12 hours, while the Georgian Railway Telecom worked to find and correct the fault. In spite of her relatively benign motivations, the lady now faces three years in prison for the damage she caused. We'd say all's well that ends well, but this doesn't actually seem like a very happy ending at all.
Meet iRobo, the Bangladeshi scrapbot
An enterprising graduate student from Bangladesh could be possibly pulling the rug out from under the robotics community with a pet-project he's been working on. According to reports, Feroz Ahmed Siddique of the International Islamic University in Chittagong says he's created a bot that -- when complete -- will pick up objects, mop floors, and perform other simple tasks. The robot, un-creatively named "IRobo" supposedly responds to voice commands, has spatial intelligence, and was made from scrap parts found at electronic and auto shops. "On completion, this robot will comply with different verbal commands for tasks like shifting objects, cleaning floors and standing guard," Siddique says, adding, "I hope people will be able to buy it for less than $1,000." Apparently, the student of engineering has been working on the robot for two years, and is already in talks with an Australian software company about production. Sure, it seems to just be a giant RC car, but soon we may all be getting our floors mopped by the IRobo... hopefully they'll get him a new helmet first. Check the video after the break to see your new robotic friend in action.
