News from Around the Galaxy for August 22 2011

LukeSkywalkerANHV2Wallpaper.jpg

Today's news features Star Wars: The Old Republic opening with a limited run of copies, an R2-D2 Planetarium, and Star Wars meets Mexico's Day of the Dead.

Fans who are eagerly awaiting Star Wars: The Old Republic may find themselves waiting a bit longer when the game does ship, which is expected to be around Christmas of this year. The reason is that Bioware is now saying that they will only be allowing so many copies to be sold at first to ease the servers into the traffic. This is actually not a bad idea. With the demand as high as it’s been, having millions of people suddenly flooding the system may not be the best idea in a live format. So instead, they want to make sure that the launch goes as smoothly as possible, learning their lesson from other MMO’s that have started out on very shaky ground. So far, no one has said how many that will be specifically, nor how much the MMO will be after you buy the initial copy, if anything.


Remember that R2-D2 Planetarium we talked about earlier? If not, let me refresh your memory real quick. It’s a projector on top of the droid’s head that displays over 10,000 stars in an area on the ceiling for you to marvel at as you go to sleep. The LCD is bright enough to handle around a range of 5-7 feet and the circumference of the viewing area is around 6 feet. So it’s not going to turn your entire room into something like the local science museum’s version, but it’s still a fun thing to check out. And if you look closely, you may even see a moon, er, a space station, er, the Death Star lingering on the horizon. The star field is said to be quite accurate, so it can be used as an educational tool as well. The batteries last around 3 hours on four AAA batteries. We suggest using rechargables or you’ll go broke quickly. And if you are worried about space, he’s really not that big, around 8 inches high and about 5 inches wide and 3 inches deep. But he has all the details of the droid he’s based on and is officially licensed. Now on pre-order for a September 16, 2011 launch date, you can get this little guy for $88, but the shipping cost from Japan is not cheap at $43 to the US, so you might want to wait until it’s more readily available in the US. But if you don’t mind the high shipping, you can pre-order at The Japan Trend Shop.


If you ever wanted to know what would happen if you mixed Mexico’s Dia de los Muertos (also known as The Day of the Dead) with Star Wars, here is your chance to find out. Artist John Karpinsky has created some wonderful works of art on what the various characters would look like if mixed in with the holiday that celebrates with skeletons. And if you like what you see, you can purchase prints of these pieces at Etsy for around $10-75 depending on the art and size. And you can see his other works at his flickr gallery.

And that’s about all the News from the Galaxy we have at the moment. Stay tuned…
 
Home Register
Top