Olympics-themed alternate-reality game goes live

As I predicted Sunday night, the Web site for a new alternate-reality game that seems to be tied to the 2008 summer Olympics in Beijing went live Monday.

The game, known as Find the Lost Ring, is built around a story line in which a young woman named Ariadne says she woke up on February 12 in a South African corn maze with amnesia and knows nothing about who she is or where she comes from.

The game's conceit will be to have players help Ariadne find her identity through a complex series of online and, most likely, real-world clues and puzzles. Somehow, it will all be tied in to the Olympics. One clue on the game's site says she offers up the "fact" that, after waking up, she spent a week in the hospital being treated for her very rare form of amnesia and that doctors there "say I'm an Olympic-caliber athlete".

To me, it's all very Bourne Identity-ish, except probably without a lot of gun play and CIA involvement.

For the full list of clues that launched the game, see my blog entry from Sunday night, which includes photos and the text of the initial clues.

Via Crave CNET

Connect a second display to your PC

If you hate having to change the video card in your PC to support multiple displays, here's a product that can help save you all the hassle. The Logitec LDE-SX010U, which is expected to be released in Japan in mid-March, is a USB-to-DVI dongle that lets you connect additional monitors to your computer via the USB 2.0 port.

The Logitec dongle supports a maximum resolution of 1,400 x 1,050 pixels, which is the standard native resolution for most 19-inch panels. Up to six displays can be connected to one PC, although a higher-spec'd computer is recommended as more displays are added. Users can choose to activate the multi-display option for larger desktop real estate, or the mirroring mode which essentially duplicates the content on the different screens. A "90 degrees" option also enables the display to be rotated for portrait viewing. Unfortunately for Mac users, the Logitec dongle supports only Windows Vista, XP and 2000.

Via Akihabara News.

A feast of sight and sound

Unless you are an audiophile, speakers are one of the first components people skimp on when building a PC. After all, surfing is a "private" affair and God forbid your neighbors hear which site you've been "researching".

But for the occasional techie, PCs are more than just bits and bytes. No reason why function and beauty can't go hand-in-hand. Ugly speakers are a big no-no. For this group with exacting aesthetic standards, check out the winners of the recently concluded speaker design contest at c4dcafe.com.

A full body workout with this force feedback vest

Too bad this one's only for PC games. Being a Wii gamer, TN Games' all-body force feedback FPS Vest would be perfect for complete immersive gameplay, together with the Wii's full-body interactivity. Until that happens, this US$169 (bundled with a game) body suit ups the ante for PC-based first-person shooters who desire more out of their game than just simple force feedback from their controller.

Thanks to eight active zones with integrated pneumatic technology, this simulates the direction and force of the bullets and explosions, letting you get into the thick of the battle with actioners like Space Incursion and Call Of Duty 2. Though why anyone would want to feel what it's like to be kicked in the chest or punched in the guts is something only the male of our species can answer.

Thanks to Uncrate

Fujitsu's 2.5-inch drives hit 500GB

Fujitsu announced two new 2.5-inch hard drives Monday that push capacity up a big notch to 400GB and 500GB.

The models will begin shipping in May, and the company said it hopes to ship 20 million this fiscal year.

But the drives, part of the MHZ2 BT series, aren't the fastest models around, spinning at 4,200rpm. Many laptop drives spin at 5,400rpm, and some at 7,200rpm. But it does consume relatively little power--1.8 watts when reading or writing, according to the company.

Fujitsu also intends the drive for use in digital video recorders, set-top boxes, tape backup replacement systems, and external hard drives, the company said. Several of those devices aren't as demanding of fast response but do demand lower power consumption.

Via Crave CNET

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