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Japanese bankers get exosuits to help move stacks of cash
Japan's Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation announced Friday that it will provide Hybrid Assistive Limb (HAL) exosuits to select senior employees as part of a pilot program aimed at reducing the strain of moving currency. "There have been many cases when a physical burden was placed on senior employees carrying heavy parcels of banknotes and coins. By adopting Cyberdyne's robotic suits, we can help reduce that burden," Tomoyuki Narita, a spokesman at SMBC, told the Wall Street Journal. About 16 percent of Sumitomo's employees (and 25 percent of the nation) are over the age of 65. The HAL is designed to augment its user's strength, reducing the perceived weight of an item by 40 percent so that a 10-pound weight only "feels" like it weighs 6 pounds. Should the pilot program prove effective, Sumitomo could expand it to more branches throughout Japan. [Image credit: Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corp]
The purest form of the MMO and the destruction of society
There is the design for a game out there that would truly be the end of all other games. It would be perfectly balanced, with content enough for lovers of PvP and PvE to enjoy the game equally. There would be no questions of developer ploys to trick us out of more money, of unequal loot distribution, or of whether it rewarded time or skill more evenly. There would be no option but to play it... which is why we should be happy that it currently only exists as the centerpiece of an SMBC Theater short. Whether you're a veteran since Ultima Online or still new to MMOs as a whole, you're likely to recognize the behavior on display in this short -- and even if you can guess the joke, the execution is still spot-on. So if you could use a chuckle or two (possibly at your own expense), take a gander past the cut. After all, we can take heart that such an insidious game doesn't actually exist... or does it? (Editor's Note: I'm level 250. Someone send help. ~Sera)
Sunday Morning Funnies: Failed analogies
Can you believe it's almost April? I'm afraid of the impending warm weather. This week, we have two absentee comic authors, not counting those that do not update regularly. Fortunately, both left us filler content, so it's almost as if we're not missing anything. We also have a new, one-time comic this week. Awkward Zombie: Bully Mammoth. Check out the latest from Cru the Dwarf. I like this one, or "heart" it as it were. Dark Legacy Comics points to Death Knights as our latest common enemy, but did anyone pause for the butterfly? Blizzard has a fifth game in development, you know. Experience Points. Flintlocke vs. the Horde shows that while Trolls might be questionably gruesome, they're also pretty forgiving. Giant Sewer Rat. GU Comics. Check out the latest from LFG. Man, I love that bunny. New Venture, from Monkey Punchers. NoObz filler. NPC: Toxic Guilt. Teh Gladiators: All he wanted was to play. More filler! Due to the flu, Disgraph is filler this week. I wouldn't recommend reading it though if you're eating or have sympathetic reflexes. World of Warcraft, eh?: The Horse Men Cometh. SMBC has posted a WoW-relevant comic. Thanks to everyone who sent this in!
