Old and busted: Chess pieces that don't come together to form an ultimate fighting robot. New hotness: Chess pieces that do exactly that.
Joseph Larson's 3D-printable Action #Chess set doubles as a mecha construction kit, with knights that flip over to form feet, and bishops that serve as arms and hands.
King: "And I'll form ... the head!"
[make]
The amazing Shaun of the Dead Lego scenes created by Lego builder Yatkuu could be adapted into official sets, and Shaun himself, Simon Pegg, is a big fan of the idea.
The Lego version of a scene from the zombie comedy is now up for voting on Cuusoo, Lego's crowdsourced idea platform, and the company will consider producing it if it racks up over 10,000 votes.
Pegg gave the project a push by mentioning it during a recent appearance on Conan, and it's already up to nearly 8,000 supporters.
Lego has already proven it takes popular Cuusoo ideas seriously by producing fan-favorite Minecraft sets, so it's possible we could one day have our own Lego version of the Winchester Pub.
Lego builder Garry King, whose particular obsession is constructing Lego models of spacecraft from Battlestar Galactica, recently finished a truly massive model of the Battlestar Valkyrie, the ship commanded by William Adama prior to the Second Cylon War.
The model's size alone is complete mindblowing: it weighs in at over 110 lbs, measures just over 10 feet long, and contains 42,341 individual pieces. To get the ship into his garage for photos, King had construct a special rolling platform.
And what about the Battlestar Galactica? King's built that, too, in its 1978 series form.
He hasn't yet added the Galactica to his amazing collection of Battlestars from the modern series, but when he does, it's certain to be awesome.
So say we all!
NECA Toys shows off the light and sound capabilities of the official replica Aperture Science Handheld Portal Device in a new video that shows off the gun's very accurate details. They left out the "actually making portals" part, but it's spot-on otherwise.
Preorders for the portal gun have sold out, but the company plans to make more of the $139.99 toys available to eager Test Subjects soon.
[joystiq]
The Star Wars Collectors' Archive has posted a visual guide to the rare line of bootleg Turkish Star Wars action figures released in the '80s under the name "Uzay."
Uzay figures feature haphazardly-translated names ("Imperial Stormtoper" and "See-Threep") and low-budget package art -- a control panel that is quite obviously a calculator, for example -- but that only adds to their charm.
Collecting a full set of Uzay figures is nearly impossible, because their packaging is brittle and fragile, and some of the figures -- including the cryptically-named "Head Man" -- are believed to be one of a kind.
Check out a nearly complete set -- courtesy of collector Joseph Yglesias -- at the SWCA.
ThinkGeek's latest Portal 2 offering is a nearly life-size inflatable sentry turret.
The 40" blow-up turret doesn't speak or have working weapons, but given Chell's experience with the little guys, that might be a selling point.
You can use it to guard your evil lair or your fridge full of cake, and you don't even have to feel guilty if it pops. If the turret could talk, it would say, "I don't blame you."
The sentry turret is available now for $25 at ThinkGeek.
[escapist]
Previously: A ThinkGeek designer built his own amazing turret model that is unfortunately not for sale.
A Lego ninja duels a small army of other minifigs in the stop-motion music video for Camo & Krooked's "Afterlife (Remix)," animated by Namchild.
You'll want to keep watching until the reveal of the big bad at the end. Nobody could have seen that coming.
