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'Rocket League' is mining the '80s for nostalgia-tinted DLC
Rocket League fans, it's time to slap on your aviators, grab a hoverboard and fire up your favorite '80s playlist for a Radical Summer. Psyonix is tapping into the decade's pop culture tentpoles for the game's biggest event to date, lasting all summer long.
What's coming to Netflix in December: 'Mowgli,' 'Roma' and Springsteen
You might already be preparing to spend the holidays watching Avengers: Infinity War on repeat after it arrives on Netflix on Christmas Day, but there will be plenty of other new shows and movies for you to check out on the streaming service over the last month of the year. Among the big original movies are a version of The Jungle Book called Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle (December 7th) and Gravity director Alfonso Cuarón's Oscar contender Roma (December 14th). Another awards hopeful, Susanne Bier's Bird Box, will be available December 21st, and a Jennifer Aniston vehicle, Dumplin', debuts December 7th.
There's a VR game to go with Netflix's new 'Voltron' series
If you thought Netflix's Voltron Legendary Defender was a great new take on the old series, there's more where it came from -- not in animation, but in VR. On September 26th, fans can play the virtual reality game DreamWorks Voltron VR Chronicles on PSVR, Oculus Rift and HTC Vive for $15.
What's on TV: 'Voltron,' 'Sharknado 5' and 'Wet Hot American Summer'
This week is a big one for Netflix, although bigger releases like The Defenders are still waiting for later in August. This week we'll see season three of Voltron: Legendary Defender, as well as season two of Wet Hot American Summer. Syfy is back with its fifth Sharknado movie and DirecTV has the series finale of Kingdom. For gamers, The Long Dark is officially launching while TBS airs Road to the International Dota 2 Championships, and tech paranoia flick The Circle is available on Blu-ray. Look after the break to check out each day's highlights, including trailers and let us know what you think (or what we missed).
Netflix's 'Voltron' assembles in its second trailer
Netflix's upcoming Voltron: Legendary Defender is looking a whole lot more palatable than previously imagined. DreamWorks Animation's upcoming Netflix reboot of the classic series is taking a lot of cues from familiar faces (and voices) as the first trailer makes its way to audiences today.
Here's your first look at Netflix's 'Voltron' series
As Netflix expands its suite of original programming it's going to the nostalgia well once again. The good news here is that instead of another sitcom spinoff like Fuller House, we're getting Voltron: Legendary Defender. Today at Wondercon 2016 its partner Dreamworks Animation showed off a teaser trailer and some artwork to confirm everything still looks familiar to children of the 80s.
ICYMI: Multi-headed 3D printer, robo plant grafting and more
#fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-815575{display:none;} .cke_show_borders #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-815575, #postcontentcontainer #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-815575{width:570px;display:block;} try{document.getElementById("fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-815575").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: Autodesk built a 3D printing assembly line that gives different jobs to several print heads, allowing them to work collaboratively and quickly spit out a finished project. Clemson University used a Korean robot to graft up to 3,000 plants an hour. And a Kickstarter project for an augmented reality shirt is designed to teach kids and interested adults all about the internal organs. The Milky Way is looking stunning in newly released photos from the APEX telescope. As always, please share any great tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd.
Netflix's next kids' shows include 'Voltron,' Guillermo del Toro
If it wasn't already clear that Netflix and DreamWorks are best buddies, it'll be patently obvious after today. The two have announced an expanded partnership that includes a handful of new shows for kids. The highlight by far is Trollhunters, an adaptation of Guillermo del Toro's young adult horror book by the same name -- the series will show the adventures of a pair of best friends who discover terrible things. There are also plans for a "reimagining" of Voltron and several more, unnamed shows.
Snakebot and quadcopter combo makes for a go-anywhere rescue drone
Everyone has different ideas on what the perfect search-and-rescue robot is, and for a University of Pennsylvania Mod Lab team, it comes in the form of a snake drone-quadcopter chimera. The Hybrid Exploration Robot for Air and Land Deployment or H.E.R.A.L.D. is composed of two snake-like machines that attach via magnets to a UAV. After being carried to the site by the quadcopter, the snake bots can detach themselves, slip through the holes and cracks of a collapsed building, for instance, and slither to their destination. The researchers have been working on H.E.R.A.L.D. since 2013, but now that all its components can properly merge and work together like the robots in Power Rangers, they presented it at the 2014 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems. You can watch the machine ace the tests its creators put it through in the vid after the break, including a part where a researcher used an Xbox controller to navigate a snakebot through a pipe.
Voltron: Defender of the Universe coming this October to XBLA and PSN
THQ has revealed some details about the upcoming Voltron video game, first hinted at in the listing for a Comic-Con panel later on this week. The title will be called Voltron: Defender of the Universe (yes). It will be available on XBLA and the PSN later on this October (yes!) and allow up to five players to team up together as the five lions of the Voltron Force, even combining at one point to wield the Voltron sword as a team (YES!). Unfortunately, before the 10-year-old in you gets too excited, know that the game is being developed by Behavior Interactive, makers of the less-than-impressive Ghostbusters: Sanctum of Slime. The first trailer for the title shows some interesting dual stick shooter gameplay, but nothing that really convinces us this is a great game just yet. Maybe lessons were learned, right? THQ is scheduling Voltron: Defender of the Universe for the week of October 25, and it will cost $10. We'll be at the Comic-Con panel later on this week and let you know what we see there.
Voltron Comic-Con panel includes THQ's video games
No matter how much our rational selves tell us that licensed games based on a rebooted Voltron won't be good -- can't be good -- there's a part of us that still holds out hope for a modern and awesome interactive Voltron. It's the "Voltron" part of our brains. We should get our first inkling about what THQ plans to do with the license on July 21, during the first-ever Voltron panel at Comic-Con. Among the robo-lion dignitaries scheduled to present at the panel is THQ producer Adam Affrunti. The panel is supposed to feature, among other things, a presentation of all the new Voltron content on the way -- including video games. We'll find out then just how dashed our tiny hopes are to be.
Report: THQ forming Voltron games
Variety reports that when the '80s hit Voltron relaunches on the airwaves later this year in the form of Voltron Force, there will be video games on shelves to herald its arrival. According to the article, the titles will be published by THQ, which has secured the exclusive ability to do so from rights holder World Events Productions. No further details were divulged, such as which developer (or developers) will be in charged of translating the cartoon -- which features a five-person team piloting robotic lions that combine to form the titular mega-robot -- into something we can actually play. We've contacted THQ for comment and will update when we hear back.
Chevy Volt gets its own song and dance, humanity weeps aloud
And you honestly thought you'd see a decent return-on-investment from bailing these guys out.
Voltron game forms the head on iPhone, mobiles
What a tease: First we read on IGN that one of the the great untapped licenses, Voltron, would finally be made into a video game. But then we learn that it's not only an iPhone game, but an iPhone game (iTunes link) that's being ported to other phones. That's fine, but befitting of Voltron? We say no. Seriously, Sony, has no one explained Voltron to you well enough to convince you that it needs to be a real game? OK, let us take a swing. It's a robot made of lions made of robot. When the aliens exterminate us for being a failed species and we ask them what proof they have, exhibit one's going to be the fact that Voltron isn't a game and Dante's Inferno is.
Get a free episode of Dexter and Voltron for one week
Make sure you jump on the PlayStation Store this week. You'll be able to score a free episode of Dexter, the hit Showtime drama about "America's favorite serial killer." You can also search and find a free episode of Voltron on the PlayStation Store as well. (We're pretty certain the two shows are unrelated.) This special promotion will only last until June 8th, so you don't want to forget!Check out the rest of today's surprise E3 PlayStation Store update after the break.
The Queue: I can't help it if it's true
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. Alex Ziebart will be your host today.Just gonna let this one speak for itself. Oh, and if you want to know what today's obligatory Reading-The-Queue-Music is, it's of Montreal.lgnorman420 asked... "So I've been wondering as my guild has been running through Ulduar about the various machine names one might encounter throughout the game. Mimiron's creation, the V0-L7R-0N combat system or the XT-002 Deconstructor are two examples. Also the mechanical chicken quests back from mid-40s to 50s leveling also come to mind. Do these number/letter codes have any significance or are they just random sequences to give them a machine sounding kind of name?" I don't think there's any naming scheme across the board for robotic things in WoW. How they got their names differs from one to the next. For example, V0-L7R-0N is just a Voltron joke. I don't think XT-002 has any significance except that maybe (maybe) the 2 signifies that he's the second creation of Mimiron that you fight in Ulduar. The second line of defense or what have you. Someone smarter than I am should figure out what XT stands for. The robochickens are named after the zone you find them in.
Breakfast Topic: Gonna check out Ulduar on the PTR?
It doesn't take Mind Vision to determine that I'm really, really excited for 3.1, and of all of its features, the Ulduar raid has me enthralled the most. I love new raids, and after all this time running Naxx, I'm ready to move on to a bigger and badder place. It doesn't hurt that everything I've heard about Ulduar sounds great! 14 bosses, hard modes, optional bosses, getting launched onto the back of a giant fire-breathing robot ... I honestly can't think of any negatives about the place. I guess it's just what I needed. Of course, I haven't played it yet. But soon, very soon, the PTR will go live and I'll be able to bask in all of its brass-and-marble glory. And you won't be able to shut me up about it if you try. If you can't beat me, though, you should consider joining me there.I'm aware, of course, that raiding's not for everyone, and that some people don't want encounters spoiled for them before they go live. So what about you guys? Are you looking forward to checking out Ulduar for yourself on the PTR? Gonna wait until it hits live WoW to try it out? Or do you just not care about Titantown too much?THESE QUESTIONS AND MORE ANSWERED (BY YOU) IN THIS, THE BREAKFAST TOPIC.
Grab a free episode of Voltron off the XBVM
Remember when you were a wee little guy, getting up early on Saturday morning and pouring a bowl a cereal all to catch the entire three hour block of Saturday morning cartoons? Those were good times. And if the childhood experience you just envisioned took place sometime during the mid 1980s, we bet your cartoon viewing habits probably included feline-tastic Voltron. The same cartoon that's now available on the U.S. Video Marketplace where, for a limited time, you can download the very first SD episode of Voltron for free! So, re-live your childhood, pour some Fruity Pebbles, plunk down on the couch and watch some Voltron.[Thanks, ccc]
Realm mergers are a last resort
Realm population problems don't affect me too much, thankfully -- my server has neither too many people nor too few, and the faction balance tilts in my favor. But some people complain that their servers are ghost worlds, with not much at the auction house and not many to group for quests and dungeons. The "Recommended" tag Blizzard is using to help out low-population realms sometimes just doesn't do the trick: people play there for a while, see that no one is home, then decide to go somewhere else.So, while some people say the only way is to combine two low-pop realms into one, Drysc says that such mergers can only be a last resort:There are a couple issues with merging realms though that we would need to take into heavy consideration if one were to be considered. As many of the lower population realms are PvP, faction balance has to be taken into careful consideration. Would a merge worsen, improve, or leave any faction balance unchanged? Would a merge move the population up too high, queuing or leading to queues for the realm after that point? Do we have realms of the same time zone and type that would merge well under these conditions? There also many logistical issues with merges which ultimately effect the end user, such as conflicting character and guild names. So, in the end, a merge would only be considered if all other possible options have been completely exhausted. We're not just throwing recommended tags up on realms, and calling it a day. The recommended tag has done a lot of good for a lot of realms, but if we're seeing that they're no longer helping reach the type of population numbers we would like to see, then we would investigate alternate means. That's sort of where we're at now.So, what is there to do besides merge realms? Drysc calls that the "million dollar question," which I figure means that Blizzard doesn't know for sure, though at least a couple ideas come to my mind: They could have some kind of incentive to players who join low-population realms (that's what the Army is doing, I hear), or perhaps all but force new players to start out there unless they have a referral from another player. Of course any solution to this problem is going to create still more problems of another sort. What do you think would work best?
Today's most Zordonic video: Sega CD Power Rangers
The Mighty Morphin Power Rangers had an illustrious career in the early '90s. Sure, on some level they were the poor man's Voltron, but those SoCal teenagers sure did have a lot more video games than the lions of planet Arus. The video we have tonight (found after the break) is the Sega CD Mighty Morphin game's first level. The Dragon's Lair gameplay had you pressing buttons of an abridged episode. According to the synopsis, at higher levels you had to memorize what buttons to press because the game wouldn't tell you. Go, go, Power Rangers! Now, if you don't know what Voltron or the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers are ... well, um, the shows were about taking something like your Pokémons and connecting them into a giant Pokémon -- a Pikachimsnorlaxabulbapsysaur, if you will.
