Most of us should be familiar with powered exoskeletons, from the iconic exoskeleton that Ripley used to attack the Alien Queen in the movie Aliens, to powered armour from science fiction militaries like Starship Troopers, Warhammer 40000 or even Battletech.
Recent developments in powered exoskeletons have yielded results that seems to herald the coming of powered exoskeletons as a factual technology. With the company Sarcos apparently having developed a fully functional prototype here. Although rudimentary, it brings the dream of powered movement one step closer to reality.
Complimenting this development would be the discovery of an alternative to bulky servo motors to control such exoskeletons. Engineers from germany have created a sort of artificial muscle, sort of like the "myomer musculature system" in Battletech - for those who know. It is hoped that this technology would do away with the motorised joints that make powered exoskeletons so bulky and unwieldy.
Such technologies have implications for both the civilian and military worlds, such as advanced prosthetics that would be almost indistinguishable from the real thing, or soldiers that are able to carry insane loads while running at speeds previously unimaginable. Of course, it'll be quite a while before the technology reaches maturity.
Powered exoskeleton in the near future
Mass Effect
Mass Effect, a sci-fi RPG by Bioware Corp., is basically awesome incarnate.
It melds the graphics and control scheme of Gears of War with the squad mechanics of Republic Commando, and puts in a team selection option similar to Blue Dragon. Level designs are reminiscent of Half-Life 2 and Halo3, but thats just the basics.
You have totally free reign over which world or system you ship, the Normandy, will go to. It's basically Oblivion in sci-fi, and the amount of details, backstory and quality that went into fleshing out the entire universe is awesome. Every race has a backstory, even extinct ones. Wars are catalogued, attitudes of alien species' vary greatly according to their history with another race. Even your crew members have varying attitudes.
This game basically immerses you so deep into the universe that you'd feel for your crew and team, and it really hits you hard when you're forced to make hard decisions, like living one of your crew behind in order to save another, or deciding whether to condemn an entire species to extinction or continue with your mission.
Complimenting this is an excellent dialogue system that is fluid to an extent whereby IF the player wasn't concentrating on which dialogue options to shoose from, it'd fit right into the silver screen of a sci-fi blockbuster.
Gameplay mechanics aside, the graphics are awesome, and the music sets the mood perfectly. Expecially after a mission where you lose a crew to the main antagonist. Walking around you ship feels just like an episode of Battlestar Galactica (reimagined), which means its awesome for sci-fi fans.
Except for the slow texture loading speeds (which I believe can be attributed to frame rate needs) and disappearing bodies, this game is GoTY content. If you have an XBOX 360, get it immediately. If you haven't got an XBOX 360, get one, then get it. It's an experience you'll never forget soon enough.
I'd give it a 9.8/10 anytime.
Ultimate security suite
Ever since Windows Vista came out users of the new OS have been complaining about the complete lack of free security solutions for their computers, partly due to the incompatibility of the new OS with the security program's coding, and the lack of timely updates to these security programs.
However, after several months the security suites are starting to emerge from obscurity after the Vista offensive. Free security solutions like Avast Antivirus, which has been Vista compatible for several months now, has only just gotten better in the OS integration. Furthermore, firewall solutions provided Comodo has recently released Comodo Firewall v3.0 - an awesome firewall software melding industry strength firewall with easy to use GUI interfaces. Added to that, v3.0 has a "Defense+" security suite in-built, which basically provides file system security reaching down even into registry blocks to prevent malware modification of core system files.
Comodo Firewall v3.0 is compatible with Windows XP and Windows Vista, with versions for both 32 and 64bits available.
As for Windows 2000 users, Comodo has released v2.4 as an update from its previous version.
So if you're looking for a security suite that is free and powerful, look no further.
