Anyone remember The Jetsons? Remember the robot they had that automatically vacuumed the floors for them? Well, it's reality now. A Japanese company (whose name I think was Metshusko) has created an automatic home cleaner that weighs 40lbs, is battery operated, and after you push it around the house once it memorizes the path and vacuums the floor for you from there on out and put itself away when done. They're saying they should be available in two to three more years... Gee, next thing you know we'll all be making cogs and sprockets. We're sure enough pushing buttons.
So... onto other odds and ends, last month was the thirtieth anniversary of the launching of the Telstar satellite. This was the first satellite to make possible the transmission of TV images from one place on Earth to another. It's thanks to this technology that we can now watch The Simpson's anywhere in the world.
Ok, enough standard rambling and onto reminiscent ramblings...
Remember when video games weren't capable of voice? Heck, who would of thought of a voice in a game? Well for your information Williams did. Yes, one of the all time most innovative video game companies introduced voice first in their game Sinistron.
This game definitely kicked butt! You played a small ship in overhead view. Your goal was to mine oar from asteroids by butting you ship into them and grabbing the nuggets as the floated away from the rock. Each nugget you grabbed could be used as "seeking" bomb. Also on the screen were other ships, some were also mining the rocks and grabbing ore to use in building the Sinistron. Others were hunting you down and shooting at you. Once the Sinistron was constructed he yelled and laughed at you and chased you down to destroy you. Your only defense against him is your "seeking" bombs which you must use on him once he is constructed and destroy him to complete the level.
Not only do you have all of this going on, but this game is as fast if not faster than Defender Stargate. Unfortunately, I can't really recommend a place to find this machine now to play. I myself ended up buying one in an auction, and even now it sits in a friend's basement till I have the room to put it up. Sigh...
On another subject... Last issue I made reference to old games coming out on new machines. Well, if you haven't noticed, it looks like Nintendo is following a trend by releasing boat-loads of old Atari stand-bys on the GameBoy. So far I've seen Missle Command, Centipede, Asteroids, and a couple others that elude me. Now, of course they're only Black & White. But what the heck? It's still nice to have them, and even in Black & White they're comparable if not better than their Atari 2600 counterparts.
Hmmmm... Maybe I could spoof Ferrari Man with a "Head-to-Head" on every version of Ms. Pac-Man! Maybe not.
Till next...
Originally appeared Vol 1, Iss 3 (08-09/92)