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Curiosity lands at the App Store, in the massively multiplayer cube-chipping category
Peter Molyneux's first creation since Lionhead is now live on the App Store, presenting gamers with a humungous cube composed of billions of tiny cubelets. Curiosity's virtual block needs to be stripped down layer by layer through collective effort, to reach the center and reveal "something life-challengingly amazing". There's no sign of the expected tear-inducing paid DLC; instead, you pay for power-ups using coins earned by tapping away at the game. 100 of those coins will let you see the stats screen, while 3 billion will reward you with the Diamond Chisel -- the ultimate tool for block-whacking. Based on our brief time at the grindstone, it's safe to say the game's impact won't be as profound as that of the other Curiosity, but its social aspects have some interesting potential -- not least using Facebook to locate friends who are playing and compare each other's progress. The game is available free at the App Store if you'd like to leave your mark.
XBMC for Android available in nightly builds for that risky media fix
We only just learned in earnest that XBMC was coming to Android last month, and yet we're already looking at workable builds. Kermonine96 at the XDA-Developers forum has started offering his own, unofficial nightly versions of the media center front end, both for regularly supported devices with Neon processor code (most often HTC and Samsung devices) as well as Neon-free hardware, like phones and tablets carrying Tegra 2 chips. Needless to say, the alpha-grade code shouldn't be used as the heart of a mobile media center: hardware decoding isn't functional, battery life is low and even a stable picture isn't guaranteed. That said, anyone who's willing to risk a skip-heavy movie or miss out on plugins now doesn't have to receive the XBMC crew's blessing to get a preview of its Android efforts.
NASA's X-48C hybrid wing-body plane completes first test flight
After planting a rover firmly on Mars' surface and testing a new methane-fueled lander, NASA has squeezed in the first test flight of its X-48C hybrid wing-body aircraft. Thanks to its design, which combines those of flying-wing and conventional planes, the X-48 could offer 20 to 30 percent more fuel-efficiency, greater fuel capacity and a quieter ride in its final form than traditional craft. The finished model has a projected range of 11,000 nautical miles and a 240-foot wingspan. As an 8.5 percent scale of the full-sized airplane, the remotely piloted prototype weighs in at 500 pounds with a 20-foot wingspan. During the test, it successfully took to the skies for nine minutes and peaked at an altitude of 5,500 feet -- though it's capable of soaring for 35 minutes and climbing nearly twice as high. Another version of the craft (likely with a human behind the flight stick) is estimated to be at least four years down the road, and the final model isn't expected to arrive for another decade.
Uncharted 3's latest lab is 5-on-5 SMGs, riot shields, and grenades
Naughty Dog has issued an update to Uncharted 3 with a brand new experimental Lab playlist to play around in. The playlist is going back to a 5v5 format, this time giving players a combination of riot shields, uzis, and grenades to carry out to the battlefield. Kickback and boosters are disabled, too, so it sounds like your best strategy is to be vicious: Shoot everything until you get close enough to stab them in the back.With this update, Naughty Dog also fixed an issue with DLC maps not showing up properly in the rotation, and there's a full rundown of what you'll see when on the company blog. The developer also promises a full schedule for upcoming labs and events soon, as well as more news about a new character coming to the game (from a Sony contest) and other updates in the next patch, 1.13.
Peter Molyneux divulges DLC details for Curiosity, we apply for a loan
Peter Molyneux's first post-Lionhead game, Curiosity, holds a big mystery and now it promises DLC with a colossal price tag. The game -- the first of 22 experiments -- will reveal a secret to the gaming guinea pig who deals the final blow to a single black cube. Shortly after its release, chisels that pack a mightier punch to the monolith will arrive as DLC for those who long to crack the container open. Prices for the downloadable tools will start around $1 (59 pence) for an iron implement and reach up to roughly $78,000 (£50,000) for a one-of-a-kind diamond version that hits 100,000 times harder. Once the secret is revealed, 22 Cans will use social media to study how the winner proves the milestone and spreads the news. Curiosity is expected to drop in about six weeks for iOS and PC, but feel free to begin pondering the secret of life, the universe and everything that lies inside the digital fortune cookie.
Cornell students steer Pong using brain waves, can't quite play during naps (video)
We here at Engadget are always fans of brain wave experiments, and so we were delighted when two Cornell University electrical engineering students, Chuck Moyes and Mengxiang Jiang, wrapped up a final project using brain waves in the best way possible: playing Pong. Their experiment links a baseball cap full of EEG-scanning electrodes to a computer, letting the cap wearer control a paddle using Alpha or Mu waves. Depending on the waves you use, you can move the paddle either by changing your concentration level or by thinking about moving your feet. You won't rack up a high score while napping (or with a teammate narrating over your shoulder), but with a budget under $75, it's hard to find fault. You can grab the source code below, and check out a video of Jiang and Moyes' handiwork after the break. [Thanks, Chuck and Mengxiang]
Windows Phone OS mod speeds up app load times, knows you'll play Monopoly on your break (video)
Microsoft Research has revealed some of its latest work into mobile app optimization -- and it's called the contextual solution, Falcon. Fast App Launching with Context aims to improve "key OS services" including memory management, scheduling and security. It does this by using location and sci-fi-sounding "temporal access patterns" -- when you use the app -- to pre-load programs before you've even decided to use them, which dramatically reduces perceived loading delay. A learning algorithm baked into the Windows Phone OS mod also improves its behavior and predictive powers as you use it. In the project's own tests, users were apparently saving up to 35 seconds on a single app launch. There's no news on whether the developmental mod will find its way into future Windows Phone iterations, but if our phone just knew to pre-load Kinectimals each morning -- the only thing that gets us through those 7am commutes-- we'd be more than willing to give it a go.
Microsoft demos vocal translator at TechFest 2012, uses your own dulcet tones (video)
Microsoft has demonstrated new software that can pull together real-time multilingual vocal translations using your own voice. Monolingual TTS currently handles 26 different languages, although it's not instant just yet -- it takes about an hour of training to get the experimental software acquainted with your own utterances. Demonstrated at Microsoft's TechFest 2012 showcase, the software can even mix up foreign language pronunciation of place names with directions in your native tongue. It also complements those efforts with a 3D image of your head, animating your lips along to the foreign words you'd otherwise butcher. See how an algorithm-educated floating head handles Mandarin -- and how it's all done -- right after the break.
The Daily Grind: Were older MMOs better by virtue of experimentation?
If you haven't sensed it by now, the Massively staff is made up of a very wide range of preferences, experiences, and gaming types. Sometimes quite heated discussions -- OK, rabid rubber chicken-throwing screamfests -- erupt due to disagreements over what makes MMOs great, what the industry should be doing, and what it did right in the past. Recently we got into a two-fatality "discussion" over whether or not MMOs prior to World of Warcraft were better simply because they weren't trying to copy WoW and were more willing to experiment. It certainly seemed like there was more variety from each new title back then, although some of those experiments certainly did not prove to be palatable to the gaming masses. Then again, this might be a case of rose-colored glasses looking upon the past with faulty nostalgia instead of accurate realism, and it discredits the actual innovation and evolution of the industry since then. There certainly are more people playing today than back then, and MMOs have become more widespread and accepted by even mainstream media. So what do you think? Were older MMOs better because they experimented more than ones today or do titles today deserve more credit for what they have become than glasses-wearing old-timers give? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
NC State researchers team with IBM to keep cloud-stored data away from prying eyes
The man on your left is Dr. Peng Ning -- a computer science professor at NC State whose team, along with researchers from IBM, has developed an experimental new method for safely securing cloud-stored data. Their approach, known as a "Strongly Isolated Computing Environment" (SICE), would essentially allow engineers to isolate, store and process sensitive information away from a computing system's hypervisors -- programs that allow networked operating systems to operate independently of one another, but are also vulnerable to hackers. With the Trusted Computing Base (TCB) as its software foundation, Ping's technique also allows programmers to devote specific CPU cores to handling sensitive data, thereby freeing up the other cores to execute normal functions. And, because TCB consists of just 300 lines of code, it leaves a smaller "surface" for cybercriminals to attack. When put to the test, the SICE architecture used only three percent of overhead performance for workloads that didn't require direct network access -- an amount that Ping describes as a "fairly modest price to pay for the enhanced security." He acknowledges, however, that he and his team still need to find a way to speed up processes for workloads that do depend on network access, and it remains to be seen whether or not their technique will make it to the mainstream anytime soon. For now, though, you can float past the break for more details in the full PR.
Intel reveals 'Claremont' Near Threshold Voltage Processor, other conceptual awesomeness at IDF (video)
Thought Intel was done busting out new slabs of The Future at IDF? Wrong. Justin Rattner, the firm's chief technology officer, just took the stage here in San Francisco in order to showcase a trifecta of new concepts, all of which were borne out of research in Intel Labs. The first, and perhaps most notable, is the Near Threshold Voltage Processor (code-named "Claremont"), which relies on novel, ultra-low voltage circuits that dramatically reduce energy consumption -- like EnerJ, but not. How so? Well, by "operating close to threshold, or turn-on voltage, of the transistors," it's able to scream when needed or scale back dramatically (below ten milliwatts) when the workload is light. If you're curious as to just how low that is, we're told that it's low enough to keep running while powered only by a solar cell the size of a postage stamp. Sadly, the research chip isn't destined to become a product itself, but Intel's hoping that the knowledge gained could lead to "integration of scalable near-threshold voltage circuits across a wide range of future products, reducing power consumption by five-fold or more and extending always-on capability to a wider range of computing devices." As for demos? A smattering of multicore / multiprocessor sessions aided Intel in upping its bragging rights, and we were informed that coding for multicore setups is "easier than the press makes out to be." The outfit also took the opportunity to release a Parallel JS engine to the open source crowd, adding data-parallel capabilities to JavaScript to purportedly "speed up browser-based services such as computer vision, cryptography, and 3D games by up to eight-fold." Furthermore, a newly revealed Hybrid Memory Cube -- complete with seven times better energy efficiency than today's DDR3 memory -- was also unwrapped. More details can be found in the links below, and we've got your unveiling video embedded just beyond the break. %Gallery-133942%
Navy blends Jet A and algae-based biofuel, uses it to power Seahawk chopper (video)
Considering that helicopters are entirely dependent on a spinning rotor to remain in the air, an MH-60S Seahawk doesn't exactly seem the most likely candidate for experimental fuel. That didn't seem to stop the US Navy, however, which successfully completed a test flight with a 50 / 50 blend of algae-based biofuel and Jet A (traditionally the flavor of choice for turbine-based aircraft). The mixture used is known as Solajet HRJ-5 Jet fuel, which doesn't quite have the same ring to it as good ole Jet A -- but it does happen to be based on a renewable resource and managed to keep the rotor spinning. There's no word on how much the new fuel costs to produce or when it might be ready for commercial use, but if all goes to plan, we may soon be using the green stuff for more than just sushi rolls and miso soup.
'Invisible' touchscreen prototype tested with iPhone
The video on the next page features a prototype for an "invisible" iPhone created by researchers at the Hasso Plattner Institute in Germany. Basically, the idea is that with your iPhone in your pocket, you can hold your hand out and move your finger around on it as if you were holding your phone, and those movements will be picked up by a motion sensor elsewhere, and then sent back to your handset. In other words, just by moving a finger around on your empty hand, the plan is that you can answer and control your iPhone. Unfortunately, the current implementation requires a camera to be mounted above you, and sends the signals back via Wi-Fi through another device as well, so it's not exactly easily usable (or cheap, probably). But the eventual idea is that the depth camera observing your actions would be wearable, so whenever you're in a situation where it would be more work to actually get out your phone, the camera would allow you to control things with just a few motions. Seems interesting -- if the researchers working on the project can pull it off without you looking like a nut, poking at your hand.
Hasbro's experimental Nexus-powered robot toy hands-on at Google I/O (video)
Are you ready to welcome our experimental toy robot overlords? They're adorable, and they're taking no prisoners here at Google I/O. Hasbro and Google are collaborating to bring these little critters to life by docking a Nexus S brain to an exoskeleton-like body containing a battery, a Bluetooth radio and a bunch servomotors (the kind you find in RC models). The battery powers the dock and provides additional juice to the phone which in turn controls the servos via Bluetooth. Where things get interesting is that these toy robots don't just act based on a set of rules programmed into the Nexus S, but actually react to their environment (using the handset's sensors, front-facing camera, and touchscreen) and communicate with Google's cloud services over WiFi (for facial and object recognition) in order to enhance their behavior. Shake them and they get dizzy, rub their display and they get happy / angry, show them a Decepticon card and they cower away. They will also take a picture of you, decide if you are friend or foe, and respond accordingly. Predictably, Hasbro is sticking with gender stereotypes by providing basic male and female "personalities," complete with accessorized docks. Check out these experimental creatures in our gallery and hit the break for our hands-on video. Just don't go in expecting a price and release -- it's prototype cuteness only for now. %Gallery-123276%
Google rolls out Chrome Canary to Mac
Good news for Google Chrome enthusiasts: Chrome Canary is now available for Mac. Windows users have had the option to download the pre-developer, experimental builds of the Chrome browser, dubbed Canary, for some time now. But now Mac Chrome enthusiasts can also throw caution to the wind and grab a version of Chrome that almost keeps up with its open-source brother, Chromium. But why not just use Chromium I hear you say? Because Chrome comes packing a few extras built in, like the internal Flash plug-in and other bits and pieces. You also get a nice bright, beautiful yellow icon in your dock. Just be warned that features will come and go as they're tested, and being experimental, it may not be as secure as some of the more refined builds of Chrome. To get Chrome Canary for Mac, head to the download page or check out some of the other more stable releases on the Chromium Early Access Release Channels page. [via Browser Scene]
NCSU teases TISSA for Android, a security manager that keeps personal bits private
Witnessing Android's recent string of privacy vulnerabilities, it's certainly refreshing to report on creative efforts to keep your identity secure. Most recently, computer scientists at North Carolina State University announced a project called TISSA (Taming Information-Stealing Smartphone Applications), a privacy manager that controls access to your private data on a need-to-know basis. The idea proposed by NCSU researchers is to allow you to decide what information -- such as your location, phone identity, contacts, and call log -- you want to share. In addition, you can fine-tune how your data is reported, by providing apps unlimited (trusted), filtered (anonymized), false (bogus), or empty results. While this method can't control how your information is used once its leaves your phone, it aims to put you in charge of what you're sharing. Next up, the team will present their proposal on June 4th at the International Conference on Trust and Trustworthy Computing in Pittsburgh. Until then, they're wringing their hands over how to best distribute this jewel -- might we suggest the Android Market? Full PR after the break.
Nokia experiments with Drop, elegantly shuttles photos and web links to mobiles (video)
Proving not all clever projects need witty names, Nokia introduced an experimental project known as Drop -- and it's likely to make your web browser and Symbian phone the best of friends. Intrepid testers may now push links, pictures, and even apply wallpaper to linked mobile devices, all from the comfort of Firefox or Chrome. While Nokia intends to add more features as development matures, what we're previewing appears decidedly familiar. Symbian^3 and S60 5th Ed. users can get a taste of the clever trickery right now, though considering Nokia's excitement in heralding this innovation late in Symbian's life cycle, we wonder if our friends from Espoo are pondering Drop's future for Windows Phone handsets. Want to join us in the speculation? Take a gander at the video after the break to see what these wide-eyed developers have in store.
Quadrocopters juggle balls cooperatively, mesmerize with their lethal accuracy (video)
You've seen one quadrocopter juggle a ball autonomously while gliding through the air, but how's about a pair of them working cooperatively? Yeah, we've got your attention now. The Zurich-based lab that brought us the piano-playing and ball-bouncing quadrocopter is back with a simply breathtaking display of robotic dexterity and teamwork. Like all mad scientists, they call their Flying Machine Arena research "an experiment," though we see it a lot more as a Pong-inspired dance of our future overlords. We all know how far video games have come since two paddles batted a ball between one another, right?
Adobe outs experimental Flash-to-HTML5 conversion tool, calls it Wallaby
Ah, if only we could flip a big happy switch and convert all the web's Flash content into (functional) HTML5 code. It's a dream shared by many and, funnily enough, the company pushing to make it a reality is none other than Adobe itself, the owner and proprietor of Flash. Its Labs research team has just released an experimental new dev tool, dubbed Wallaby, that's targeted at taking Flash-encoded artwork and animations and turning them into a more compatible mix of HTML, CSS and JavaScript. Of course, the intent here is not some magnanimous move to free us from the shackles of Flash -- Adobe openly admits that the initial goal for the new tool will be to help convert animated banner ads so that they work on the iOS platform -- but hey, even bad tools can be used for good sometimes, right?
Kiss Controller lets you play a bowling game with your tongue... while it's in someone else's mouth (video)
Oh, this isn't weird at all! The Kissing Controller, an experimental project by one Hye Yeon Nam, is designed so that players of a bowling game can impart power and direction to their spherical projectile by performing the timeless act of smooching one another. A customized headset is required for one of the participants, acting as the input receiver, while the other straps a magnet to his or her tongue and goes to town with some literal full motion controls. Thrust is added to the on-screen ball in accordance with how vigorously you move your tongue around, something we're sure your partner will appreciate. Video after the break.
