Tunneling
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Prototype NASA robot will burrow through sheets of alien ice
When it came to life on Mars, NASA might have struck out, but it's got a good feeling about Europa. The agency is working on a probe designed to scan its vast oceans for signs of alien life, but there's a problem, namely the thick layer of ice that covers the moon's surface. That's where VALKYRIE comes in, a torpedo-shaped robot that'll suck up water, warm it and fire it back into the ice to quickly and easily drill through the layer. Once the hardware reaches its destination, it'll release a swarm of smaller 'bots that'll map the geography and hunt for alien microbes. There's still a few issues to work out with the gear, like the fact that it can't properly change course while tunneling, which would be pretty essential if it were to come across a rock or other blockage. Then again, given that we won't be ready to launch a mission to Jupiter's moon until the early 2020's, NASA's got some time to fix the problems.
DARPA-backed Power Pwn is power strip by day, superhero hack machine by night
Call the Power Pwn the champion of white hat hacking. Underneath that Clark Kent power strip exterior, there's a Superman of full-scale breach testing that can push the limits of just about any company network, whether it takes 3G, Ethernet or WiFi to get there. Pwnie Express' stealthy sequel to the Pwn Plug ships with a Debian 6 instance of Linux whose handy hacking tools are as easy to launch as they are tough to detect. There's just one step needed to create a snoop-friendly Evil AP WiFi hotspot, and the box dodges around low-level NAC/802.1x/RADIUS network authentication without any help; in the same breath, it can easily leap into stealth mode and keeps an ongoing encrypted link to give do-gooders a real challenge. The hacker doesn't even need to be in the same ZIP code to crack a firewall or VPN -- the 3G link lets the Power Pwn take bash command-line instructions through SMS messages and doles out some of its feedback the same way. While the $1,295 device can theoretically be used for nefarious purposes, DARPA's blessing (and funding) should help keep the Power Pwn safely in the hands of security pros and thwart more than a few dastardly villains looking for weak networks.
Create my Champion: BGBB
The final Create my Champion is in, and I think you'll all enjoy this one. BGBB -- or Bunny-go-BoomBoom -- turned out much better than I had hoped. Although, while there are many animal heads and ears to choose from in the character creator, bunny ears is strangely not one of them.Munitions wasn't a power set that I'd been incredibly interested until I played this character. Cryptic has done a really amazing job creating a variety of guns and weaponry with which to obliterate your enemies. There's a power representing pretty much every firearm variant you'd expect: handgun, submachine gun, shotgun and assault rifle. I think there's even an uzi in there, although don't quote me on that one.%Gallery-69977%
Tunneling travel video appears for Champions Online
We told you about it in our expansive hands-on previews of the game, but now you can see it for yourself. The latest travel power video for Champions Online is here, and it's Tunneling! Now you can pop up behind your enemies Tremors-style, the maul them with whatever powers you've happened to choose.Just don't do it to us, because that's totally not cool.Burrowing, or Tunneling if you like, can be a lot of fun and is surprisingly faster than you'd think for a movement power that involves digging through the ground. Between this and swinging, we get the feeling that players are going to be dropping in and popping up all over the place come launch day in July. Check out the full video after the break.
