Granted, blaues01′s hack is quite complicated and only works with Rhythm Tengoku, but the important thing is that his set up works – when he swings his sword, the A button is pressed almost instantly. That and he makes sheating and unsheathing a sword look bad ass:

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No sir, thank you.

[via Kontraband]

As much as I love Shogun Vader, I’d have to say that Japanese Obi Wan Kenobi aka Obi Wankabe looks so much more bad ass. I don’t like Japanese Han Solo though; his hair and his posture make him look like a moron. The villains are included in the gallery below. I think it’s amazing to see how little it takes to re-make these characters to give them a Samurai vibe. The Steampunk Star Wars though takes more imagination:

Again, I think Steampunk Obi Wan is the best, followed by Vader. But really, these pictures don’t do Sillof’s work justice. If you liked these you should definitely check out his website, where he’s provided ample explanation for each custom action figure he’s made. Don’t forget to check out his other work as well.

[via Oddity Central]

At first glance, Lam’s costume looks like it’s made from plastic, or maybe even metal. But the version in these pictures is actually made of several kinds of cardboard. For the plates of armor, Lam used dyed black cardboard topped with shiny black posterboard. The gold trim is mirror reflective posterboard, and the cloth that juts out of the plates are simply large shoelaces. Lam uses double-sided tape to hold the armor together. He wears a diving suit underneath the costume.

In real life though, Lam is more Cecil than Anakin – he’s a member of L.A. Jedi, a non-profit organization that “teaches people how to properly engage in lightsaber tricks and makes appearances at various children’s hospitals.” As for Shogun Vader, Lam says he’ll probably make plastic or even metal versions in the future.

[via L.A. Weekly via Boing Boing]

These types of eateries are very common in Asia. You get a bunch of meat and veg, and you cook it up in your own little hot pot. The Hajime restaurant is operated by Lapassarad Thanaphant in Thailand. She spent over 30 million baht ($930,000 USD) on these automatons that were created in Japan, of course.

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Customers get their orders in via a touchscreen, and the robots deliver food and clear it away. The robots can also do a little dance and are dressed up as samurai. Why? Why not?

[DJMICK via DVice]

The controller is modeled after the traditional garb of a Samurai warrior, but underneath this fighter’s mask is a scary Skeletor head, complete with glowing green LED eyeballs. Now I didn’t have the patience to read the entire Wikipedia entry on Samurai warriors, but I don’t remember the part about glowing green LED eyes. Leave us a comment if you happen to find that part.

The warrior controller does all of the usual stuff – it’s got dual digital/analog sticks, a D-Pad, shoulder buttons, has vibration feedback and works with the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, or any PC using a USB connection. Of course there’s that little part about how you’ll be left with painful red indentations of snake-dragons on your palms and creepy little faces on your thumbs after 60 minutes with Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, but that’s the price you pay for having a cool looking controller with glowing green LED eyes, right?

You can grab a Samurai warrior joypad over at USB Geek for $25 (USD). Personally, I prefer this guy with the mask on. He’s not so scary anymore.

From what I can tell, Bandai’s YUU HO KEI pedometer game involves ordering your foot soldiers out to battle with you – by making them walk – and then walk some more. The more distance you cover, the closer your army gets to the battlefield, and the closer you get to becoming a Samurai master.

But this pocket-sized gadget isn’t just for fun. It actually seems like a pretty nice pedometer, capturing data from your activity, and letting you upload it to Bandai’s website so you can keep track of your progress – a la Apple’s Nike + iPod kit. And it doesn’t just use a cheap motion sensor to figure out your footsteps – there’s a true 3-D accelerometer under the hood. Those Samurai warriors were sure crafty buggers.

No word on if or when you’ll be able to find this thing outside of Japan, but if you happen to live there, you’ll be able to grab one from the Bandai online shop for ¥4725 (appx. $49 USD) when it’s released later this month.

[via CoolThings via TOKYOMANGO]

The video game uses a cross hatching system for the graphics, giving it a hand-drawn look. Another feature to watch out for is the way enemies are hacked to pieces. Gamespot’s preview of the game said that instead of preset animations, the gore is more WYSIWYG. So you’ll have customized corpses, depending on where Afro’s sword meets the enemies’ flesh as well as the angle of the cut.

Gamespot also says that Afro’s combat moves have three main components: ground moves, aerial moves, and terrain, which is basically a way of saying that Afro can use his surroundings to turn enemies into Royale with Cheese.

In keeping with the stylized cartoon look, the game has no heads-up display; as Afro gets damaged, the screen becomes blurry and colors will fade. And if Afro is dishing damage, the visuals will become more focused. Ironically, the only way for Afro to regain health is by becoming more focused, which means that he has to fight to be healed.

You can get both PS3 and Xbox 360 versions of Afro Samurai at Amazon for $57 (USD). Who would win: Samuel Jackson with the powers of Mace Windu and the skills of Afro Samurai, or Hugo Weaving with the crisp suit of Agent Smith and the pointy ears of Elrond?

[via Kotaku]