R2-D2 seems capable of so much with his rockets and all that stuff. Well what if someone configured him to be used as a home theatre system? Just your luck! The fine people at Nikko Home Electornics have done just that.

The R2-D2 Communication System, a 1/5 scale version of the droid, is a complex audio communication device equiped with radio, sounds effects, phone, webcam and is controled by a Light Saber remote! All this for a somewhat affordable $350.

The larger 1/2 scale R2-D2 Mobile Entertainment System is quite a bit more elaborate. He is equiped with a 2D projector (no crappy hologram?!), can play DVDs, CDs and many file types, has a dock for an iPod, has USB slots, memory card inputs for viewing photos, a number of audio/video inputs, radio and sound effects. And this is controled by a Millenium Falcon remote. This one will cost you quite a bit more at $2500.

Check out this clip of the larger MES model in action at CES courtesy of Shiny Media:

Spider-Man 3 may be months away, but Sideshow Collectibles already has three 12-inch action figures from Medicon available on their site. You can find each of the toys here: Spider-Man, “Black Suited” Spider-Man, and the spooky villain of the show. (Hint: It’s not Old Man Withers in a mask.)

Or, just click through to see the images mirrored here.
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News from CES 2007 is showing that many major porn studios are now leaning towards HD-DVD over Blu-Ray for a variety of reasons. A trend I’ve noticed while browsing in stores is that a lot more family oriented films seem to be going Blu-Ray with studios like Sony, Fox and Disney having a lot to offer that demographic, while HD-DVD has a larger selection of adult oriented titles, which is a phenomenon which will only be encouraged by this trend in the industry.

The high cost of Blu-Ray seems to be a major deterent of the format. A representative for the studio Bangbros mentions that the HD-DVD player is felt to have had better market penetration when compared to Blu-Ray largely due to the HD-DVD add on available for the XBox 360.

The number of XBox 360 consoles on the market surpasses PS3s by a considerable factor but PS3 has the advantage of it’s Blu-Ray technology being built in, while the HD-DVD add on for the XBox 360 is a seperate upgrade, which has on it’s own sold less units than the PS3. It goes without saying that anyone who buys an HD-DVD drive is actively interested in playing high definition movies with it though the same can’t be said about everyone who buys a PS3 or rather for those people who bought a system with the intention of ebaying it only to learn the market had been saturated.

Thanks to Matt of BoNR fame for the heads up.

2006-01-13 – Update!

According to this article it’s not only the industry that chose to go HD-DVD. Sony also doesn’t want porn on Blu-Ray and doesn’t allow distributors to make porn discs. I guess they’re trying pretty hard to maintain a certain family friendly image.

ActionFigureeXpress comes through with yet another hot exclusive. This time in the form of a King Randor staction. Masters of the Universe officianados may remember that King Randor was an SDCC exclusive for 2005 from the Four Horsemen. You can see a review of this convention exclusive Randor here. This time around Randor is sporting a new head sculpt, cape and shield. The shield replaces the staff accessory that came with the convention exclusive and if you look closely sports some memorable acid burns. His color scheme also matches that of the original Randor figure from the 80’s line.

(Classic Randor picture from He-man.org)

   

There are 2 major motion pictures in production both by giant directors and both are called Avatar.

James Cameron (Titanic, Terminator 2) finally ends month of silences on the secret filming he’s been doing on sound stages as he announces his “Avatar.” Its set for a 2009 release, and will feature humans at war with aliens in robot bodies. I think its human robots, but there might be alien robots too. And its the future. I can’t make sense of this, except it has nothing to do with that damn boat so I’ll take it. Harry Knowles spoke with Jim, but that interview was cut short when Malibu caught fire.

M. Night Shyamalan is decreasing in popularity the last few years, but I’m still a fan. Night’s “Avatar?”

I am not kidding. He’s adapting the faux-anime Nickelodeon series into a live action movie. I’m barely familiar with this series, so I took a look at Wikipedia and it doesn’t look like his usual fare. Well its got some supernatural elements, but its pretty far removed from “I see dead people” or “those we don’t speak of.”

Night’s not betraying his roots because he actually wrote the adapted screenplay for “Stuart Little” which is a movie I shamelessly admit to liking and have seen several times.

Now, the battle royale: Who gets to keep the title? Cameron’s management and Nickelodeon both claim to have had their names registered with the MPAA. Nick’s cartoon has been on the air for about 2 years, Cameron has had a script for 12 years, but has only been filming for 4 months. I predict Cameron will have to bend, since he’s not working with an established franchise.

Hasbro.com has posted images of what appears will be the next wave (third wave for those counting) of Titanium ships. The wave includes the Battlestar Pegasus, Classic Cylon Raider, and a repainted Cylon Raider from the episode ‘Scar’.

  

Also of note was the appearance of a Cylon Centurion. I had not heard anything about Titanium figures for BSG outside of the ships.

Thunderbolts #110
written by Warren Ellis, art by Mike Deodato

As Civil War trudges along, it’s finally time for the much-hyped new Thunderbolts lineup launch! While I’m a longtime fan of the group under Fabian Nicieza’s excellent pen (and I question the decision of taking the book out from under him – again), I won’t deny that the different approach Warren Ellis is bringing to the table has caught my interest.

In the new lineup we have cold-blooded killers mixed in with former, more heroic Thunderbolts. With the psychotics being controlled by nanites, and unwilling holdovers being forced on the team for yet unexplained reasons, things are no doubt going to be tense and violent, and with the ever-brilliant Mike Deodato (ever-famous for his work on the Hulk – where he even drew the Thunderbolts’ first appearance, in Incredible Hulk #449) on pencils, they should also look fantastic. Keep on reading after the jump for 5 preview pages – you really don’t want to miss it; Bullseye show off the different facets of his crazy while never lifting a finger – and also for our quick ‘n dirty rundown on the characters involved.

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The #1 reason people were still buying Playstation 2 this fall is coming to Xbox 360. Guitar Hero II will sport a classy white guitar based on the Gibson Explorer and will likely feature online functionality like song downloads (starting with the entire original Guitar Hero song list). Theres a press photo on the left of the box and guitar as well as the sticker sheet.

This much we know. But at CES yesterday, Kotaku’s Micheal McWhertor not only played it, but found out some of the new songs. Team Xbox also dig up some info. from those 2 links I’ve culled 8 of the 10 new songs:

“Surrender” – Cheap Trick {Correction: Reader Matthew points out that this track is already in the PS2 version of the game.}
“Billion Dollar Babies” -Alice Cooper
“Dead!”- My Chemical Romance
“Hush” – Deep Purple
“Life Wasted” – Pearl Jam
“Rock N Roll Hoochie Koo” – Rick Derringer
“Possum Kingdom” – Toadies
“Salvation” – Rancid

Those worried that GHII had a little too much metal can rest easy and this is a generous helping of classic and modern rock.
While I understand that online co-op is impossible, online leaderboards is going to inspire some really dedicated players in ways YouTube can’t provide. And I’ll happily shell out for some, if not all of the original Guitar Hero tracks, especially if they’re enhanced for GHII’s co-op multiplayer.

Guitar Hero II for Xbox 360 is slated for a March release in North America and Europe.