Industrial Revolution
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Teaming humans with robotic AI will remake modern manufacturing
Your public school education exists, in large part, thanks to the Second Industrial Revolution. When the revolution took hold of America in the 1870s, 30 years after the end of the first, half of the US population still spent their days toiling in fields. Education was typically voluntary, assuming the family was wealthy enough to afford tutors or school fees, and usually reserved for boys. With the development of commercial fertilizer and the internal combustion engine, productivity exploded while the number of farmers dropped to less than two percent of the population. It lessened the demand for child labor which in turn led to increased support for compulsory education for both sexes.
BioShock Infinite pre-orders in EU, AU, NZ can get Steelbook case
GameStop, EB Games and Micromania locations in Europe, Australia, and New Zeland will have a special, exclusive preorder item for the upcoming Bioshock Infinite. Players who pre-order the game at the specified retail chains in those regions will be rewarded with a special "Fink Manufacturing SteelBook case," emblazoned with the Fink Manufacturing logo.In America, GameStop already offers the "Industrial Revolution" pack with a preorder, as well as a special in-game weapon. But it looks like the SteelBook case is just for GameStop International customers. Bioshock Infinite is due on March 26.
Lazy 8 on the Cogs behind BioShock Infinite: Industrial Revolution
Independent developer Lazy 8 launched steampunk puzzler Cogs on PC in 2009; that same year Cogs was an IndieCade finalist. In 2010, the game snagged an IGF nod and won $100,000 in the Indie Game Challenge, and in 2011, Cogs was released for Mac gamers. Three years later, Cogs is still picking up steam and its quality is the reason Irrational Games approached Lazy 8 to assemble BioShock Infinite: Industrial Revolution."The BioShock Infinite team at Irrational was already aware of Cogs, the award-winning puzzle game that we launched in 2009," Lazy 8 founder Rob Jagnow tells Joystiq. "They knew they wanted to create something similar – challenging puzzles in a steampunk style – so they approached Lazy 8 Studios in the hope that we could help design a puzzle game with the same level of polish."Turns out Lazy 8 could do just that. Industrial Revolution is available now, for free, with pre-orders of BioShock Infinite. It's a flash puzzle game that has players fight on the side of BioShock Infinite's warring factions Vox Populi or the Founders, and generates in-game goods for next year's full Infinite release. Industrial Revolution comes with its own innate depth, however: The choices players make on the first playthrough are permanent and the game can't be replayed with different allegiances."It's true that Industrial Revolution is designed to be played only once, and while you're playing, you'll be offered choices about which factions you want to support. Not every player may realize it, but the choices you make will impact how the story is told to you. And once those choices are made, you can't go back and make them again. They're permanent. While that may not make everyone happy, I think it makes for a really compelling player experience. It gives a lot more weight to your actions and their consequences."
The Game Boy of the Industrial Revolution
Many a history buff know full well the contributions the lowly steam engine has made to not only the development of our native country, the U.S.A., but also that of the world. And now, finally, one of the driving forces behind the Industrial Revolution is now being used for something far more important: powering Game Boys. Actually, we're not sure why someone would make a steam-powered Game Boy, but hey, our hat is off to them because we could never do such a thing ourselves. We have a hard enough time figuring out which way the AA batteries go in.[Via Go Nintendo]
