Nothing but shooters
This week brings us a pirate-based shooter and two Japanese imports for the Virtual Console.
Virtual Console
- Super Fantasy Zone (1992, Sega Genesis, 900 Wii points): Super Fantasy Zone puts you in the role of Opa-Opa as you try and avenge the recent death of your father. In this shooter, you'll rack up points to upgrade your weapons and equipment.
- Gley Lancer (1992, Sega Genesis, 900 Wii points): It's the year 2025 and you must help stop an alien uprising. In Gley Lancer you'll board a starfighter of the same name to help end the battle.
WiiWare
- Pirates: The Key of Dreams (Oxygen Games, 1,000 Wii points): Pirates: The Key of Dreams is a nautical-themed shooter that has you searching for booty all while using the weapons of your ship to blast through your enemies and inevitably Blackbeard himself.
What games do you think are missing from the Wii Virtual Console? Sound off here!
(Credit:
O2 Planet)
(Credit:
DEG)
After having witnessed their rise in the bacchanalian heydey of the dot-com boom, we've always had an odd fascination with oxygen bars. And yes, we admit that it probably has something to do with Dennis Hopper's character in Blue Velvet too.
That aside, the "Entertainment Oxygen Lounge" may prove too difficult to resist even for skeptics like us. Not only does it have the requisite stress-reducing and mood-enhancing equipment, according to BornRich, but it combines that system with a massage chair. And we all know how we feel about those.
It gets even better: Add a DVD player, stereo, and high-end earphones for "audio/video therapy" to an "Aroma O2 Headset," and it's Bliss City. Come to think of it, we'll skip the oxygen and have a beer instead. Pabst Blue Ribbon, of course.
(Credit:
O2 Innovations)
Allergy season has already arrived in many places, as you might have sensed from the preponderance of red-eyed colleagues even before St. Patrick's Day arrived. And the onslaught of killer pollen might leave many wishing that they had their own oxygen supply.
O2 Innovations, however, is making this purported state of bliss a bit more accessible with the "O2B," which Chip Chick describes as a portable oxygen bar. The device still isn't cheap at $659 on Amazon, but that's still nearly half the cost of the "O2hi Personal Oxygen Machine" we saw last year.
The O2B, which bears the oh-so-California tagline of "Oxygen Is Beautiful," comes with its own headset, 12 mouthpiece filters, and 5 nose hoses, which we hope aren't as uncomfortable as they sound. But if they really want to distance their product from the pack, we'd recommend a mask so customers can do their best Dennis Hopper impersonations from Blue Velvet.
(Credit:
Yamagiwa)
Just like in the movies, they attack when you least expect it. It had been months since we'd encountered any spherical alien vehicles, but they're back--disguised a harmless air filter.
The "Antibac2K" claims to be a lightweight air-cleaning device that eliminates 99.99 percent of bacteria and other contaminants. That's a whole 0.02 percentage points more than other air filters, and we germaphobes all know how important that difference is.
But benefits aside, this circular menace is betrayed by its LEDs, which we all know the classic alien calling cards. We hope only that it doesn't joins forces with the evil Sanrio empire.
(Credit:
Bliss)
While on a recent stay at a swank SOMA hotel, Crave was graciously given the option of purchasing a "personal oxygen supply" in a sealed bottle perched on a sparingly appointed postmodern shelf. We declined. But we remained curious because we hadn't heard much about the old O2 ever since the whole oxygen bar thing of the late 1990s. Because the height of its popularity coincided with the dot-com bubble, we just assumed it was just another one of the countless bacchanalian excesses that defined the era.
Today, however, we learned that the phenom is alive and kicking in the form of such products as the "O2hi Personal Oxygen Machine," a little dynamo that Popgadget says "emits negative ions which purify the air to the point of being 50 percent more oxygen-rich than clean mountain air." For $1,295, we'll take their word for it.
Which just goes to show that, when a bubble bursts, the oxygen will just pump up another one. Or is it the other way around?
(Credit:
Plastic Bamboo)
We surrender. Hello Kitty has now invaded every aspect of life, including the very air we breathe.
The evil feline's latest incarnation is an air purifier being marketed first, of course, at Sanrio stores in Japan. Not only does it promise to reverse the negative ions at home, but Plastic Bamboo says it will also cleanse the oxygen in our cars if we use its cigarette lighter adapter.
If a pink bow begins to grow out of our expanding heads, you'll know we've been already been exposed.
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