table top
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EXOdesk hands-on
You've seen it shown off in poorly lit YouTube clips, now see in a poorly lit hands-on video from our favorite tech blog. The fine folks at ExoPC invited us up to their suite at the Trump hotel (which, by the way, smells exactly like you'd imagine Donald Trump does) to spend some quality time with their desktop extension. The core of the system is a 37-inch 10-point multitouch screen connected to a reasonably powerful laptop. But it's the software that's the real star. The tabletop computer is running the company's custom UI which is built on HTML5. Unlike other table-top computers, you're expected to use it alongside a traditional mouse and keyboard -- not in place of it. There's a dedicated EXOstore that's home to apps, also encoded in HTML5 and designed to run on any machine with ExoUI -- be it the EXOdesk, a tablet or standard desktop PC. In our short time with the desk, we were actually pretty impressed with its responsiveness and intuitiveness. As to be expected there are still a few kinks to work and some tweaking to be done -- but nothing that's an absolute deal breaker. The company plans to release a development kit sometime in the first half of the year, accompanied by developer hardware courtesy of Viewsonic. For a few more impressions check out the video and gallery below.
iTableous is a white iPhone 4 fit for a giant (video)
If you like flying unicorns, you probably love giant flying unicorns, right? Well, the white iPhone 4 has officially gone from myth to reality, but it seems some folks are still chasing the dream in a BIG way. Case in point: iTableous, an outsized tabletop bearing a striking resemblance to the long-awaited iOS handset. Unlike previous iPhone tables we've seen, this one doesn't support multi-touch -- a wireless keyboard and mouse hold the keys to navigating this behemoth -- but it does offer 4GB of DDR2 RAM, 500GB of internal storage, a 5.7 megapixel camera, 720p video recording, as well USB, HDMI and a good old 30-pin connector for hooking up the real-deal. What's more, this iPhone's a dual-booter, capable of running Mac OSX 10.6.7 (via Hackintosh) and Windows 7 Professional. If you're living at the tip of a beanstalk and need to shake that tired old 3GS, check out the video of iTableous in action after the break.
LED coffee table busts a multicolored move (video)
It might look like something out of MJ's Billie Jean, but this colorful LED array won't be under moonwalking foot -- that is, unless the party gets crunk. This colorful grid is actually a table top, brought to you by way of TI's MSP430 microcontroller, and it knows how to get down. The table is made up of 128 frosted glass cubes, each apparently capable of emitting 16 million colors. Its creators also produced a special beat-detection software, that could very easily have your furniture outshining the bumpers and grinders at your next party. If you're looking for a little extra something from your coffee table, you can find full build instructions at the source link below.
Rise and Shiny recap: Dofus
Years ago I had to find a job in my new home state of Texas. Luckily for me, my wife hooked me up with a friend who helped me get hired at Starbucks. At first, I hung my head in shame. Later, though, I enjoyed dealing with customers and the free coffee. I had a co-worker, a real chin-scratching, coffee house wanna-be intellectual who would often spend more time dreaming about some game than about getting people on their breaks. He even brought his Macbook to work to sneak in time in the game. I glanced over his shoulder one day and was delighted to see an odd-looking, cartoony, turn-based game on his screen. It turned out that the game was Dofus. I tried it immediately and fell in love with it, but that was years ago. I still found time to revisit the game, but once I started working at Massively, most of my time became dedicated to every other game in the world. Well, it's time to visit it again. During the first part of this week, though, I thought this was going to be a disaster. I stayed strong and battled my way through bot after bot, spam message after spam message, and eventually found the great game I remember. Click past the cut to see exactly what I found!
Free for All: Does this qualify as "massive?"
I was interested in hearing some of the responses to my WURM Online column last week, so of course I went looking. It didn't take me long and I found mostly positive responses. Over the years I have noticed that some of my writings can be pretty misunderstood, and usually because the idea I am trying to explain is such a basic one that people just make too much out of it. In the column in question I was essentially trying to do one thing: to tell people that WURM Online is a lot of fun. Still, some people seemed to think that I was saying something else, and some people even questioned why I would talk about it. In the words of one comment: "Is it even massive?" The person that wrote that seemed to be questioning whether or not the size of the playerbase in WURM dictated a "massive" title, or coverage in Massively. I can see why some players have this numbers paranoia, being that many titles are currently blurring the lines between single player, instanced and persistent worlds. Many of these games are free-to-play.
The Daily Grind: What do you think of table-top games?
There exists a very close relationship between MMOs and table-top games.Yesterday saw the launch of Ethernauts, the fifth expansion to EverQuest-related collectible trading card game Legends of Norrath. LoN is digital, but gameplay-wise, it's totally a table-top game. World of Warcraft has an entirely material trading card game. Warhammer Online is of course based on the Warhammer miniatures game, and WoW is getting a miniatures game of its own. And of course, the RPG genre originated on the table-top with Dungeons & Dragons.We're wondering: how much crossover is there between digital and table-top games? How many of our readers play them? Tell us! What do you think of table-top games?
PAX 2008: Count all the pretty pieces in the tabletop gaming gallery
One of the best things about PAX is that it's not just all about video games. There are legions of people who still enjoy doing it old school, and that includes board games, tabletoppers, and RPGs. We witnessed people playing everything from the massive, sprawling, plastic-fest of Twilight Imperium to the simple wordplay of Apples to Apples. Heck, even the final elimination round of the Omegathon was a Jenga showdown.Check out the gallery below that's filled with people who still love how a pair of dice feels in their hands. To those about to roll, we salute you.%Gallery-30902%
DDO Module 6 includes raised level cap and more
Module 6 for Dungeons & Dragons Online is currently in testing, and the developers have posted a list of changes they're working on. The most notable of these is a raise of the level cap to 16, but there are many other interesting updates as well, such as whole slew of new spells. Want to charm whole masses of enemies, or trap their souls in a gem? Well, soon you'll be able to!Though it's not exactly Turbine's flagship product anymore, DDO provides a unique online gaming experience to a passionate niche that includes fans of the table-top RPG. If you're part of that niche, get ready to move on up to the next level and take on new quests sometime soon-ish.[Via Razorwire]
Breakfast Topic: Lore and fantasy comparisons
You've been reading Know Your Lore for a long time now, and since then, you've started checking out the WoWWiki's lore information. You've read the World of Warcraft encyclopedia and history. You've even gone out and bought all the Warcraft novels, comic books and table-top roleplaying games, and previous Warcraft games, just so that you could go through and feast your eyes on more WoW lore.Or... maybe you've just read some of the quest texts every now and then. Everyone's got at least some idea of Warcraft lore just from playing the game, with some sense of what the story is about. Chances are you've also encountered many other fantasy stories of one sort or another, and perhaps started thinking about how WoW is different, or how it is the same. What are some of the similarities and differences you see between the Warcraft lore and the lore of other great fantasy stories? Do you think it's just a cheap ripoff of Lord of the Rings? Or do you think it brings its own unique contribution to the genre of fantasy storytelling and cannot be fairly compared to any other story lore? Perhaps it even draws the most inspiration from a certain religion or philosophy! What do you think?
