Gadgets, Gizmos, and Games for Geeks

Dungeons & Dragons is filled with all kinds of macabre and imaginative monsters. Among them is the Beholder, also known as the “Sphere of Many Eyes,” is a blobby creature with ten eyeballs on tentacles, a cyclops eyeball, and loads of gnarly teeth in what is described as its “massive, gaping maw.”

If you have a toaster sitting on your kitchen counter, there’s about a 99.999% chance that it toasts some kind of bread. But if you’re in the other 0.001%, your toaster prints recipes for other meals which may or may not include bread.

When it comes to scary monsters from science fiction, Doctor Who’s Daleks rank high on the list. These soulless robotic aliens go around the universe, exterminating all those who stand in their way. So what better way to get people to stay inside of their homes during the COVID-19 pandemic, then to bring a Dalek to their doorsteps?

The original Star Wars trilogy is packed with memorable moments. Among them was the scene in Return of the Jedi where Princess Leia, wearing not much more than a metal bikini, uses the very chains that bind her to strangle her captor, Jabba the Hutt.

Give a geek some LEGO and great things happen. Kevin J. Walter is one such geek who loves to build awesome things with the versatile building blocks. This awesome thing is a Klingon Bird of Prey and it took 25,000 blocks to build.

Every geeky room needs some pixel art on the wall. But rather than just have some static image, why not go with something a bit more interactive? The Pixel Art Shop has got you covered. This Super Mario Bros.

A 144-piece jigsaw puzzle doesn’t sound very difficult, does it? Now imagine that all of the pieces of the puzzle were transparent, then ask yourself the same question. Now that sounds like a challenge to me!

Razer is best known for its bold and highly stylized computers and computer accessories. The vast majority of them are done up in black, with accents of neon green, and maybe some color-changing LEDs. But Razer also makes one product that stands out from the rest, and they’re pink headphones that look like cat ears.

Since I’ve mostly been using a laptop, an iPad and an iMac, it’s been a while since I had a computer with an upgradeable graphics card. But back in the day, I was constantly gunning for the latest and greatest graphics processors to play games like Quake II and Duke Nukem 3D at the fastest frame rate possible.

From 1998 to 2008, the Las Vegas Hilton featured an attraction called Star Trek: The Experience. I remember going to it during a Vegas vacation, and it was quite cheesy- but in a good way. But if you have fond memories of it, or just want to bring a little bit of Trek into your home, check this out.

Of the many things I’ve enjoyed in my life, LEGO bricks and belgian waffles are pretty high on the list. So I was pretty stoked when I saw this waffle maker that lets you combine these two passions of mine into one.

A few years back, we came across a pasta strainer inspired by the famed Flying Spaghetti Monster. Now you can turn any bowl of noodles into a pasta monster with this pair of serving utensils that look like a couple of googly alien eyeballs.

Full disclosure: as much as people loved Tetris, I sucked at the game. Every time the blocks started falling from the sky, I’d survive for about two minutes before I got overwhelmed, and they hit the top and my game was over.

Toymaker Super7’s ReAction line of action figures is designed to capture the feel and style of 1970s and 1980s action figures from brands like Kenner and Mego. So in other words, don’t expect them to be screen-accurate or well-articulated.

Electronic musicians are always looking for new ways to expand their arsenal of sounds. There are lots of different off-the-shelf synthesizers out there, but some of the coolest instruments are the homebrew designs out there. I recently stumbled onto this cool little touch-based synth, and it offers up some really nifty analog sounds.

Despite some early worries, Japan has so far managed to keep the COVID-19 outbreak relatively well contained in their country. It certainly could spike, but I’m hopeful that their efforts to reduce social interaction, and to quarantine people with the virus have paid off.