I’m not sure what reason the ancient Chinese had for using animals and why they were assigned to their respective years, but Wright actually provides historical justification as to how the Geek Zodiac is arranged. For example, the Alien sign takes 1938 – and all years in its cycle – because that was the year when the infamous radio broadcast of H.G. Welles’ War of the Worlds occurred. You can browse the details of each sign on the gallery below, or you can head to the Geek Zodiac website for the original charts.

Wright and Eckert have since turned the concept into a comic, which you can also read on their website. You can also get Geek Zodiac merchandise at Zazzle, including a poster of the zodiac itself. So what’s your sign?

[via Walyou]

This 6-legged robot is remote controlled and the central area can be fitted with several different projectile-shooting modules. Now do I have your attention? Good. The two shown here can fire discs or ping pong balls at varying angles, achieving great distances. It looks like there is also a dart module that isn’t talked about.

That’s cool all by itself, but he has also designed two types of armor that can be clipped on to the robot. The first is to change the color scheme, the second is for battles with other robots, and when it gets hit, it flies off. This will make for some cool robot battles for sure.

You can give Jamie suggestions for a name on YouTube. You could win a free robot if he picks your name.

[via Geek]

The dragon costume is a one-piece suit, but the Dragonborn armor is made of several pieces, including a sword, a shield and of course the iconic horned helmet.

After listening to the Internet’s demands – and no doubt seeing dollar signs as well – Alicia is now planning on making more of the costumes to sell on eBay. Looks like she’s gonna need a few bottles of Blacksmith’s Elixir.

[via Buzzfeed via Geekologie]

WASD Keyboards uses Cherry MX mechanical switches, so after creating your design you’ll choose the color and type of switch you want. You can also order a dampener if you don’t want the trademark clicking sound that mechanical keyboards make. You can also choose the font of the text on each key and whether the text will be engraved or lasered in. If you really want to get creative you can upload your own design or even send custom art for each of the keys.

Above is my design for a Technabob-themed keyboard; you can see more at WASD Keyboard’s website or have a look at the gallery below for more user-created designs.

Head to WASD Keyboards to design and order your own V1 Custom Mechanical Keyboard. Prices start at $140 (USD). The company also sells a Semi-Custom version of the keyboard, which is still brimming with tweakable specs.

[via Gamerfront via The Red Ferret Journal]

I can not think of a more bad ass question. Forget “Notch” or “Creator of Minecraft“. From now on we should be calling this man Markus “How Many Millions Exactly” Persson, who by the way wasted no time and proceeded to go straight to Tim Schafer himself:

It’s no secret that How Many Millions Exactly’s game is doing extremely well and that his company Mojang has also began publishing third party games. Just to prove how serious he is, he also tweeted:

How Many Millions Exactly and Schafer are now exchanging emails – possibly regarding the exactitude of said millions – but Psychonauts fans shouldn’t get their hopes too high just yet. How Many Millions Exactly may have many millions, but that’s not the only thing you need to make a game. I wonder what need I can answer with that question. Probably a researcher looking for the effect of millions of hours of sleep to a person.

It should be noted that Schafer’s company, Double Fine has also recently launched a Kickstarter project to create a totally new point-and-click adventure game – and you can help fund that for as little as $15.

[via Metafilter]

The Skyrim Creation Kit will let users create new characters and locations as well as tweak and mess around with the existing game in many ways. The developer says that the kit is the same program that their team used to make the world of Skyrim. If that’s true, this is a very generous gesture from Bethesda. They’re giving the public a chance to see what the pros work with.

Modders will be able to upload their creation to Steam Workshop for the world to see, play, adore and berate. Console (and OS X) users, in case you still didn’t get it by now – the kit and the mods are for PC users only. Watch the video for more on the kit:

Bethesda also put up a wiki page for the Creation Kit as well as a series of online video tutorials for using the kit. The first episode is already up, and thanks to the magic of embeddage, is already here! There. Below.

Steam users, the Skyrim Creation Kit should be available under the ‘Tools’ drop-down menu in your Steam library. If you don’t know what a Steam library is, go here and sign up. But that’s not all! Bethesda has also released the High Resolution Texture Pack free DLC for the game. So many bits!

Before you download the DLC or the kit, make sure your hardware meets the Skyrim‘s recommended requirements: Windows Vista or 7, a quad-core CPU, at least 4GB RAM and a DirectX 9.0c compatible NVIDIA or AMD ATI video card with at least 1 GB of RAM and the latest drivers. We await your mods! And don’t even think about making a peen-dragon – Bethesda has explicitly stated that they will ban any “offensive, copyrighted or trademarked material.”

[via The Escapist]

The Zen Table has two sizes – a coffee table measuring 56″ x 39″ x 19.5″ and a smaller desktop version measuring 13″ x 9.5″ x 2 1/2″. Both are made of bamboo and equipped with an SD card slot and a USB cable. The SD card slot is for the bundled SD card which will have several programs that instruct the table’s electronics to create patterns, but you can also send commands from a computer to the table via USB.

In addition, the coffee table version can also be equipped with a 3G modem that will allow it to receive new designs, as well as allow the user to control the table from an Android or iOS app that Hallam is currently developing. That means you can have the Zen Table write messages to people at the table or have it draw naughty images when your parents have a visitor. The possibilities are frightening. Here’s a demo of the Zen Table in contemplative action:

Here it creates something more modern:

Fancy eh? Kickstarter supporters thought so as well. Hallam put up a fundraiser on the crowdfunding website and was able to exceed his original target. I’m not sure when and for how much the final products will be sold, but the people who pledged at least $499 (USD) on the project are eligible for a kit containing the parts for the desktop version of the Zen Table, while $749 got them the same model but fully assembled. Two people pledged at least $4,999 to get their own coffee table Zen Table and one rich and lucky person shelled out at least $7,499 to get the 3G version of the coffee table. Meanwhile I’m still waiting for the iZen Garden app to go on sale for less than $5.99.

Head to Hallam’s YouTube channel to check out more videos of the Zen Table in action.

[Kickstarter via The Awesomer]

Matsumura and company call their invention the Universal Earphones. Their secret is surprisingly simple and inexpensive – a proximity sensor piggybacked on one of the earbuds. As you can see in the picture above, the sensor faces towards the left ear and away from the right ear. If it detects that it’s about 30mm away from the ear, it means that it’s on the right ear. This input causes the earphones to switch the channels accordingly.

But that’s not all. By running a weak electrical current through the ear buds, the Universal Earphones can also detect if it’s being used by one person or shared by two people. If the current is interrupted it means that the earbuds are on separate heads. The earphones will then pump out a mono mix of the audio being played so the listeners can hear both channels at once. Genius! I suggest you put on your own earphones – correctly, of course – when you watch the video below.

That was awesome, save for the creepy synthesized narrator.

[via Engadget]

The Power Box measures 4.5″×4.5″×8.75″ and weighs less than 2lbs., so it’s a very portable charger. Generally speaking, our legs are more powerful than our arms, so it should be easier to produce power on the Power Box than on a hand-powered generator. Add that to the fact that it has two pedals while most hand-powered generators only have one crank and you have a more useful and practical gadget. Its only weak point is that it doesn’t have a USB port. Instead, it’s just got an (ungrounded) outlet on top. Also you can’t use it while you’re running away from zombies. Hand-powered generators win that one.

The Power Box isn’t available for order yet, but K-TOR did say on their Facebook page that they’ve already “ordered production parts and tooling” for the device. The company’s hand-powered generator sells for $50 (USD), so I’m guessing the Power Box will be significantly pricier than that.

[K-TOR via The Gadgeteer]

Mouserugs look a lot like the actual thing because they’re basically miniature scale models of fancy oriental rugs. FiberLok, the company who makes them, photographs and scans actual rugs as the basis for their product. If a scanned rug happens to have a defect or imperfection, the resulting Mouserug will have it as well. The designs are not printed on the rugs; each one of the millions of nylon microfibers that make up each Mouserug is dyed with the needed color for added authenticity.

I want that Tibetan Tiger Rug. I’m sure my mouse would love it. Mouserugs sell for about $19(USD); you can order at Firebox or directly from their official website. I’m not sure if they’re all the same size, but Firebox says that the three models that they’re selling (there are tons more at the official website) measure 9.8″ x 7.1″. I also suggest you get one of these.

You can choose from two variants – one that says “Biohazard – Stay Out” and another with the more specific message “Caution: Zombies Ahead.”

Pack some green herbs and head to ThinkGeek to order the tapes. They comes in 50ft rolls and sell for $3.99 (USD) each.

Aside from looking neat, the lights also serve another purpose. As you’ll see in the video below, the blinking animation gets slower as the battery of the device being charged nears its capacity, finally fading out when charging is complete.

The Dexim Visible USB cables are available on Amazon, but for some reason the USB-to-micro-USB models are being sold for $60 (USD) – way more expensive than the iOS-compatible variants, which are priced at $15-$20. So if you have an Android phone or any other device that has a micro-USB charging port, you should consider importing one from Sanwa Direct(JP) instead.

[via Digital Trends]

Appropriately named My Little Pony: Fighting is Magic, the game is being made by indie developer Mane6. Gameplay-wise, Fighting is Magic seems similar to the Marvel vs. Capcom series. The ponies have four basic attacks – Light, Medium, Hard and of course Magic. As you’ll see in the gameplay footage below, there are also launchers, aerial combos and high-powered special attacks.

The game is currently in pre-alpha, but have patience. The folks at Mane6 promise that a version of the game will be released soon, featuring lead characters Twilight Sparkle, Rarity, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Applejack and Pinkie Pie, with more characters coming. Fighting is Magic will also have online play, a “lengthy” story mode with boss fights and will be totally free. No “pre-order now to get the Nightmare Moon exclusive” gimmick.

[via Reddit]

I’m not a Pokémon addict but I think it’s fair to say that this is something that fans of the series will pay to play. The main Pokémon games mostly feature static battle animations, so to have the monsters’ moves fully animated is an enticing proposition. Type Wild has nine fighters with movesets similar to Street Fighter characters. Here’s a demo video uploaded by YouTuber BlameTruth:

I have no idea why an official version of this game doesn’t exist. Unfortunately it seems as if development on Type Wild has stopped; if I understood the developer’s FAQ correctly the last update came in 2009. Commenter pandafrag summoned another page of the Type Wild website and it’s super effective – it seems that the game is still being updated. This download link still leads to the latest version. Like most PC games, Type Wild only works with Windows. Maybe someone can come up with a Digimon brawler for OS X.

[via Pokésho via Game Informer]

Each precision flying ‘bot is capable of perfectly balancing itself, but their true power is in their ability to fly in formations, and even adjust to new 3-dimensional patterns on the fly and avoid obstacles autonomously. But enough talk – seeing 20 of these nano-quadrotors in action it is truly a sight to behold:

The way they all buzz around together, they’re reminiscent of an 1980s arcade shooter, aren’t they? I’m totally thinking Galaxian or Galaga. While each one is small enough to fit in the palm of your hand, I still wouldn’t want to run into this swarm in a dark alley. There is serious power in numbers. We can only hope they don’t start adding weapons to them any time soon – and they don’t connect to Skynet.

The figurine is about 1.5″ tall and is made of polyurethane resin, cast from a handmade mold. Isaac’s adorable black eyes and anguished mouth are hand-painted and the whole thing is sealed with a glossy finish.

Escape to Etsy and pre-order the Isaac figurine for $20 (USD). Each figurine comes with a sticker of pixelated Isaac. Who is also crying.

[via Edmund McMillen]

LEGO said that they’re “developing a concept that celebrates the best aspects of building with the LEGO system and in Minecraft” and have not yet mentioned a release date or media of the actual products.

The images above are not from any official LEGO sets though – they’re just mock-ups made for Minecraft‘s CUUSOO page. But they look pretty Minecraft-ish enough. What’s next? Indiana Jones in Uncharted 4? Space Ghost in Ace Attorney 6? Ash Williams in Dead Rising 3? Gobots in Transformers 4? I can do this all day.

[via LEGO CUUSOO Blog via Brothers Brick]

Made by artist and photographer Mishka Henner, the width of each page in Astronomical represents a distance of 1 million kilometers (about 621,000 miles). Naturally it begins with the sun in the first two pages of volume 1. The rest of the books are nothing but blackness, interspersed with the planets where appropriate. The picture above shows the Earth – we’re on page 155 of volume 1. Meanwhile Pluto is on the 6,000th page of the set. Perhaps there are aliens lurking in the other pages.

This read-through really drives the point of the collection home:

Believe it or not, you can actually buy your own copy of Astronomical for your own bookshelf. Contact Mishka and he’ll gladly make you a whole set for £100 (~$157 USD). Honestly I think we just need the one set and any more would be a waste of paper, but that’s just my two cents.

[via io9 & CultureLab via Laughing Squid]

The replica is made of lightweight plastic and coated with acrylic paint. Its face and eye lids are moveable and the batteries take care of Wheatley’s glowing eye. Hooton worked on the replica on and off for about a month without using any modeling software or rotary machine, which makes this piece even more impressive.

Open a portal to eBay and bid at least $150 (USD) for a chance of taking Wheatley home. And if you do, don’t take him to the Central AI Chamber, no matter how nicely he asks.

[Sabretooth's Workshop via Super Punch]

This bit of geeky awesomeness is the Starship Enterprise coffee table. It’s a one-of-a-kind handcrafted hardwood model of old NCC-1701-C, carefully placed under glass to protect it from phaser attacks (and spills.) It was made by wood artist Barry Shields, who couldn’t have a more appropriate name, unless it was Joe Nacelles, Steve Photon Torpedo, or Harry Warp Core.

Barry says it took him over a month to build it just the way he wanted, and it shows. I love how he even made the glass on top match the lines of the Enterprise. The base lifts the ship off the ground, making it look as if it’s hovering above the thick-pile planetary surface (rug) below.

It’s made from cherry, ash and poplar wood, along with steel supports and the aforementioned glass top. Barry doesn’t list the exact dimensions of the Enterprise itself, but the glass is 34″ x 54″, and the table is about 17″ tall, so it’d definitely a full-size coffee table. If you want it, beam yourself on over to Etsy, and get your credit card out – since it’s going to cost you a cool $3,100 (USD) if you want this in your home. Frankly, I think that’s a small price to pay to own the coolest coffee table in the neighborhood.

[via SUATMM]