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Hitting the Books: How America's Space Race sought to renew our 'New South'
This week in Engadget's Hitting the Books series: How America's Space Race sought to renew our 'New South.'
Eight top-secret aircraft that definitely aren't UFOs
Since its establishment in 1955, the Groom Lake airfield at Edwards Air Force Base—better known as Area 51—has hosted the development of some of the most exotic and advanced aircraft the world has ever seen. These so-called black projects, named for their ultra-classified nature, have produced planes like the SR-71 Blackbird, which is still the fastest and highest-operating aircraft ever built (that we know about); the F-117 Nighthawk, the world's first stealth attack aircraft; and the RQ-170, a mysterious and seldom-seen aerial reconnaissance UAV.
'Asteroids' travels to the Cold War and beyond in 'VEC9'
Asteroids is the quintessential vector arcade game, featuring a stark black background and simple, geometric images representing spaceships, bullets and floating bits of space rock. Now, that visual genre gets a modern upgrade in VEC9, a 3D vector arcade game about a cryogenically frozen USSR pilot who awakens 30 years after the fall of the Soviet Union and assumes the American military violently overthrew his country's reign. The pilot's mission is to attack major American cities in a spaceship outfitted with a giant laser and a chain gun, as Motherboard describes. VEC9 creators and tech tinkerers Andrew Reitano, Michael Dooley and Todd Bailey created a big, blinking cabinet for VEC9, complete with a massive controller that Motherboard says was originally designed for an M1 Abrams tank. The whole VEC9 shebang -- including retro-styled full-motion video cutscenes -- will be on display at Chicago's Logan Arcade starting November 7th.
Russians and Neo-Stalinists chew apart The Sun at Night's Soviet past
On November 3, 1957, under leader Nikita Khrushchev, the USSR launched Sputnik 2 into Earth's orbit with Laika the dog on board. Laika was not expected to survive the mission and she died of overheating hours after takeoff. This is where Minicore Studios begins The Sun at Night – by imagining a scenario where Laika doesn't die. Instead, she returns to Earth with robotic enhancements – including speech – and joins the fight against Soviet forces, which have conquered the world using a mysterious energy source. Some people don't like this premise. They're not upset about seeing an animal harmed in a digital world, they don't mind that the true story behind the game is kind of upsetting, and they're fine with the suspension of disbelief required to play as a talking robotic animal who crash-lands on Earth. They don't like how Soviets are portrayed in The Sun at Night – and they want Minicore to know. Of all the comments that Minicore receives on The Sun at Night's websites and email, 5 - 8 percent are from upset Russian nationals, non-Russian Communists or Neo-Stalinists who believe the game paints Soviets in an unjust light, studio founder John Warren tells me. "[They've] decided, after being given very little information about the game's premise, that it's a very pro-USA, anti-communism kind of narrative – which it really isn't," Warren says. "I mean, the Western countries like Britain and the US don't even really factor into the narrative at all. The game itself isn't really an indictment of any one political ideology or anything like that. At the end of the day, it's still a sci-fi platformer about a robot space dog."
Injustice: Gods Among Us 'Red Son' pre-order bonus also coming to NA
Originally revealed for UK retailers last month, the Superman: Red Son pre-order bonus DLC for Injustice: Gods Among Us will be available exclusively at GameStop in North America. As shown in the trailer above, the DLC pack includes Red Son-inspired alternate costumes for Superman, Wonder Woman and Solomon Grundy (who wasn't in the Red Son comic storyline).The pack also includes 20 extra missions set within the alternate Red Son universe, which is not to be confused with Injustice's also-alternate universe. It'll be interesting to see if Injustice's Red Son missions are actually set in an alternate version of Injustice's universe, making it an alternate, alternate universe. Alternate. Alternate. Now it just looks weird.
Intel brings Medfield to Russia with the MegaFon Mint
The Intel-powered mobile machine has been slowly picking up pace this year. Now, the chip-maker has signed up a new partner in the form of Russian operator MegaFon. So, it looks like we might see another (and we must say familiar looking) network-branded Android Medfield phone in the form of the MegaFon Mint. The spec-sheet, again, poses no surprises, with the same 1.6GHz Z2460 chip 1GB of RAM, 4-inch screen and 8-megapixel camera only further enhancing the sense of deja vu. What will be unique, however, is the price, which looks set at 17,990 Rubles (about $565), available from today.
iPhone 4S supports GLONASS satellite system, much to the delight of Russia
What does a Russian satellite system have to do with the iPhone 4S' GPS capabilities? Allow us to explain. Russian site iPhones.ru recently noticed that the 4S' spec page lists support for both assisted GPS and GLONASS -- the Kremlin's global navigation satellite system and acronym for GLObalnaya NAvigatsionnaya Sputnikovaya Sistema. The country launched GLONASS 35 years ago in the hopes that it would eventually provide an alternative to GPS and the EU's forthcoming Galileo, thereby reducing Russia's dependence upon US- or Europe-operated systems. The global system has since been beset by delays and budgetary setbacks, but last week, a Russian rocket successfully launched the 24th and final GLONASS satellite, completing the constellation and inching the infrastructure closer to full activation. News of the iPhone 4S' support has already elicited a delightfully surprised response from the Russian media, with daily Vedomosti writing: "If the iPhone 4S really does have Glonass navigation, this would be the first time the Russian system reached the world market." (Nokia, it's worth noting, announced in August that it would manufacture GLONASS-compliant handsets, while Samsung's High Fidelity Position app offers similar compatibility.) In light of Russia's economic and regulatory climate, however, the move may not seem so shocking. The Kremlin already imposes import taxes on handsets that don't support GLONASS and, as Russia's iGuides.ru points out, has even threatened non-compliant devices with an outright ban. Apple, meanwhile, has made no secret of its interest in expanding its influence within the country, with CEO Tim Cook recently referring to the Russian market as "more promising." It remains to be seen whether this added support results in sharper navigation capabilities, or if it enhances Apple's presence within Russia, but it's certainly a compelling development, nonetheless. [Thanks, AXR]
Bonhams' Space History Sale includes spacesuits, memorabilia, and a Game Boy flown in space
Bonhams' upcoming Space History Sale -- happening May 5th in New York -- is filled with items that will make any space geek reconsider their current spending priorities, but we couldn't help but notice one particular item that hits a little closer to home. Mixed in with spacesuits expected to fetch upwards of $100,000 and other various memorabilia from both the US and Soviet space programs in this, a wholly ordinary Nintendo Game Boy (complete with Tetris, of course) that accompanied cosmonaut Aleksandr A. Serebrov on Soyuz mission TM-17 in 1993. Interested? The estimate is pegged at a somewhat reasonable $1,500 to $2,000, but we have a sneaking suspicion Bonhams might be underestimating the will of a considerable number of folks who are both space and video game nerds (we're speaking as one ourselves, of course). Hit up the source link below to check out everything up for auction.
First Orbit offers a glimpse at Yuri Gagarin's spaceflight 50 years later (video)
It's been exactly 50 years to the day -- in some places, anyway -- that cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin's maiden voyage set off an international space race that defined an era, and while only Gagarin knew exactly what it was like to be the first man in space, documentarian Christopher Riley is giving us a glimpse of what the world might have looked like from the porthole of Vostok 1. As we reported before, First Orbit is a mashup of sorts that features original audio recordings from Gagarin's flight, coupled with footage taken by Italian astronaut Paolo Nespoli from aboard the International Space Station. The result is nothing short of stunning, but you don't have to take our word for it -- in fact, go ahead and grab yourself some popcorn, hit the play button, and prepare to be amazed.
Film recreation of Soviet cosmonaut Gagarin's historic spaceflight to be shown off next month
If you know anything about the history of spaceflight, you're probably already familiar with the historic journey of USSR cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, who flew around the Earth in 1961, making him the first person to ever travel beyond our planet's atmosphere. While audio recordings of Gagarin's observations exist, there are no video recordings except for those recently shot at the ISS following a similar plot of his trip, directed by Italian astronaut Paolo Nespoli, who currently lives on the space station. This video has now been matched up with Gagarin's audio, and made into a film to commemorate the 50th anniversary of his flight, which is on April 12th. The movie will be made available on that date for free download on YouTube.
Visualized: the fate of the most ambitious Soviet-era space exploration project
Project Buran was the USSR's answer to NASA's Space Shuttle Columbia. Unlike its highly decorated American counterpart, however, this child of the 1970s produced only one unmanned space flight during its operation and was ignominiously shut down by Russian authorities in 1993. The remains of this most ambitious (and expensive) effort are still around, however, and have now taken on a layer of rust, weeds and general decay that would make any post-apocalyptic set designer swoon with admiration. It's as beautiful as it is sad, this gallery of failed human endeavor, and you can see it in full at the link below.
Secret Soviet-era laser tank pops up in the Ivanovo Oblast
If we've learned anything from the former Soviet Union, it's that collapsed empires have lots of awesome tech just layin' around. We've recently heard tale of someone who found the remnants of the USSR's lunar program under a tarp somewhere, and now a Russian website has uncovered some pretty bad-ass pics of the 1K17 Self-Propelled Laser Complex. First deployed in 1992, the vehicle features a laser system that could be used, as the machine translated document says, to "provide anti-opto-electronic surveillance systems" in even "the harshest climatic and operating conditions imposed on the armor." (In other words, the lasers would disrupt the enemy's electronics and optics, even in the bleak Russian winter.) It seems that the program was discontinued pretty quickly due to expense, with the hardware eventually being consigned to the Military Technical Museum in the Ivanovo Oblast.
Visualized: the hardware of the Soviet lunar program
The Russian space program's emphasis on orbital space stations can be traced back to July 1969, when America put the first man on the moon and the Soviet Union scuttled its own lunar ambitions, either destroying or dispersing the hardware in the process. Despite the fact that much of it is still classified, a Russian blogger was recently able to snap a bunch of pics of the gear currently at home in the Moscow Aviation Institute. It's a shame we can't see some of this stuff where it would do the world some good, such as in the foyer of Engadget HQ. Hit up the source link for the rest of the story.
A look at leveling in World of Tanks
World of Tanks is in a class by itself -- if you want to play a vehicle-based MMO focused around motorized armor units, there simply isn't another option available. And while there were more than a few jokes at the time of its announcement, successful games with a strong vehicle focus exist already. But the core of a game like this is going to be the vehicles themselves, both their diversity and their interesting traits to set each one apart from its peers. The developers have released the access trees for all three main nations in the game -- Germany, the USA, and the USSR -- giving hopeful players an idea of what they can use to thunder about the countryside. Spanning the period between World War II and the Korean War, the list is fairly exhaustive, showcasing the diversity of tanks on the battlefield. The German progression path even includes the Maus, an experimental tank of absurd size that should please fans of bizarre WWII machinery. And if rolling around in a two-story tank doesn't get you excited, well, you're probably not the target audience. All three progress charts can be found on the official site for World of Tanks.
Soviet-era computer mice were plain, functional
You know, there was a time when the Soviet Union produced some of the greatest technology on Earth. Only problem was that was around 1957 -- and the USSR took another 30+ years to die a slow, painful death. Sometime during the Gorbachev era, scientists discovered "personal computers," and thus began a long tradition of making high-quality computer mice. In fact, the Russians were so good at making mice that they decided to write the word "mouse" on them in Cyrillic and include a little picture so that people wouldn't forget what it was. Perhaps there's a market for this type of antique obsolete computer hardware? Or maybe Logitech's next mouse will be inspired by this classic showing of Russian functionality -- surely that would be better than its sleek designs of today.[Via digg]
Legendary computer scientist Alan Kotok has died
Alan Kotok, a pioneer that helped create the first video game, SpaceWar! on the PDP-1, and helped the joystick, this site's namesake, become an icon of video gaming passed away peacefully in his sleep over the U.S. Memorial Day weekend. His help in creating Spacewar! was invaluable, although not necessarily conventional. In one memorable incident, Alan forced Steve Russel (the main author of Spacewar!) to get his act together by calling up the maker of the PDP-1 to get some math routines required to write movement code for the game. Once he'd received the code he slammed down the tape on Steve's desk (who was widely known by the nickname "slug") and said "Here you are Russel. Now what's your excuse?" Steve got the point and went on to finish Spacewar!Had Alan not taken the initiative like he did, the entire history of video games could have turned out differently. A man called Nolan Bushnell was later inspired by Spacewar! to try and make video games accessible to everyone: he eventually went on to found a little company called Atari. There's nothing to say that games wouldn't be as popular as they are today had Alan not given Steve Russel the kick up the arse he needed, but it certainly makes you think.Another of Kotok's achievements was working with John McCarthy of Stanford to create the first computer program that could credibly play chess. The program, which could look at 1100 positions per second, took part in an international competition with a USSR chess program in 1966. The match took nine months to complete! Alan is survived by his three children and one grandchild. His wife, Judie, passed away last year. Rest in peace, Alan.Update: see comments.
