Star Wars

Science Is Teaching Kinect To Use a Lightsaber

A team of researchers at Stanford University are living the dream: they’ve used Kinect and a robot arm not to cure disease or solve the energy crisis, but to build something for lightsaber practice. The Kinect camera is able to track the movement and placement of a human opponent, with the arm programmed to respond…

Free-to-Play? Star Wars: Galaxies Cannot Make “a Change of this Magnitude”

When Sony Online Entertainment said it would shut down Star Wars: Galaxies by the end of the year, many teeth were gnashed and many garments were rent. A lot of people, thinking SOE failed to consider this, postulated about taking the game to a free-to-play model, and voila, the orphanage is saved! If only they…

There’s More than One Sexy Cosplay Costume, Ladies

Following Nathan Fillion’s important PSA last week, The Big Bang Theory‘s Kaley Cuoco addresses an important problem facing the ladies of cosplay—the impulse to dress like Slave Leia without thinking. Just in time for you to reconsider before packing for San Diego Comic-Con.

This is the Best Star Wars Game We’ve Seen In a Long Time

Forget everything you know about Star Wars games. The ones that used control pads, mice or keyboards. Because Fleet Commander, a student project, might just blow them all out the airlock. It’s been developed by Arthur Nishimoto, a student at the Electronic Visualization Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Initially designed in 2009…

30 Comic-Con exclusive toys you’ll sell your organs for

The cruel economics of Comic-Con dictate that gee-whiz collectibles (produced in ludicrously small quantities) will be rewarded to those who make the pilgrimage to San Diego. Here are the 2011 exclusives destined to whip convention-goers into a rampage.… [io9]

Turn Call of Duty into a New Star Wars: Battlefront Game

Hey, remember that mod that was going to turn Modern Warfare into a Star Wars game? It’s finally out. In development since 2009, it’s called Star Wars Mod: Galactic Warfare, and is the product of a team of German coders called BlackMonkeys. You can grab it at the link below. Since it’s a mod for…

Who Would Win: Darth Vader or Ryu?

With top-shelf cameras and editing software now in the hands of the masses, all it takes is a little vision to make it big on the internet. That said, it’s sometimes refreshing to see people dial it back on the special effects, and do things the old-fashioned way. If this battle between Ryu and Darth…

There Will Be a LEGO Star Wars “TV Special”

Which sounds a lot like a “movie”. Just that it’s headed straight to TV. Just in case you’re not instantly grasping the absurdity of this, we’re (probably) talking about a movie based on a video game that was based on a toy line that was based on a cartoon series that was based on a…

Star Wars Galaxies Is Dead, Long Live The Old Republic

Star Wars Galaxies, the original massively-multiplayer online role-playing game based on George Lucas’ universe, will go offline later this year after more than eight years of service, Sony Online Entertainment and LucasArts announced today. In a letter to Star Wars Galaxies players, the game’s developers call the closure of the MMO and its trading card…

The Secret of Star Wars

There are plenty of theories as to why the original Star Wars trilogy has been so successful. Analysis of its “hero’s journey”, its appeal to young and old alike, its timeless tale of good vs evil. I subscribe to a lesser-known theory. That it’s been such a big hit because the original three films were…

Take Assassin’s Creed, Mass Effect and Other Gaming Greats, add Jedi

Everyone loves Star Wars. If you don’t love Star Wars, you’re wrong. Some people love Star Wars so much, they want more things to be Star Wars. Forevergeek.com has taken 50 Star Wars Mashups from all over the internet and thoughtfully put them all in one place. Here are the video game tie-ins from their…

These Postcards Are Lousy With Midichlorians

I found these eight postcards at Lucas Arts’s E3 backstage meeting room, a place that was also home to a tiny museum and playable copy of Kinect Star Wars. Enjoy.

The Force Post Cards

Barely Feeling the Force in Kinect Star Wars

For as long as brothers have swatted one another with wrapping-paper tubes, Star Wars fans have wanted something, anything, to give them the sensation of wielding a lightsaber, repelling blaster fire and cutting down Stormtroopers in a streak of blue. That, too, is the goal of Kinect Star Wars and all who are making it…

The More They Keep Telling Me Star Wars: The Old Republic Isn’t Like World of Warcraft, the Less I Want to Play

I just had a hands-on demo with the hugely anticipated massively multiplayer role-playing game Star Wars: The Old Republic, but after an hour of watching self-described sizzle reels of prerendered and in-game footage, showing casually pirouetting Jedi and environments full of foxfire and crepitating tails of energy, I couldn’t actually make myself actually play the…

Kinect Star Wars Will Make You Say ‘Lightsaber ON!’

We showed you Kinect Star Wars last night. And today we’ve seen it played on stage. A lengthy play-through showed scenes pulled from several eras of Star Wars fiction, predominantly from the Clone Wars and prequel era. A live on-stage demo involved a player swinging their arms to swing a lightsaber, holding their hand out…

You May Not Want to Watch This Footage of Kinect Star Wars

Not if you care about video games. Or Star Wars Don’t just take note of the lag present when Kinect evangelist Kudo Tsunoda swings his lightsaber. Take a look at when he “jumps”, and his on-screen jedi doesn’t begin to somersault until Kudo has already landed. Oh dear. You can check out a slicker, less…

I Can Abide This Jawa Sandcrawler

Marshal Banana is just the right name for the person responsible for this enormous custom LEGO Sandcrawler, because this shit is b-a-n-a-n-a-s. It’s made of over 10,000 LEGO bricks, weighs 10kg, rolls, lowers its door and even sucks up droids. All that for “only” nine months design and building time. [thanks everyone!]

George Lucas Strikes Back: The REAL story behind the prequels

Check out this pretty hilarious fake trailer for George Lucas Strikes Back, a story about the original George, not the evil doppelganger Hollywood created to ruin the Star Wars legacy. It’s full of insane Star Wars references and weird nods to other series — and you’ll never suspect who’s really behind the plot to replace…

Jedis Are Such Assholes

Some Jedi are unnervingly good. Others are evil to their very core. And others, well, they’re just bros, hangin’ out, bein’ assholes. If the humour and special effects seem a little better than your standard YouTube fare, this is another Facerocker joint. In this case, a sequel to last year’s just as awesome Jedi A-Holes