Written by Joseph Albahari In 1987, an urban legend was born. It was reported that 14 trucks of Atari products were taken from a factory in El Paso, Texas to a landfill in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The legend revolved around the failure of one particular game: “ET: The Extraterrestrial.” Zak Penn, writer of “The Avengers,” was intrigued by this tale ...

Written by: Joseph Albahari Are your passwords safe? That depends on when you last changed them. On April 7, it was made public that the security of the Internet was compromised by the Heartbleed bug. Heartbleed, or CVE-2014-0160 as it is technically named, is an OpenSSL security bug that has affected about 17 percent of the internet’s websites. The bug ...

Written by: Joseph Albahari With the help of generous Kickstarter donations, tech company Oculus VR was set to revolutionize the world of gaming. But in March, much to the dismay of the Internet, Facebook decided to buy Oculus VR for $2 billion. Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook, commented on the deal after it was made public. “After games, we’re ...

Written by: Joseph Albahari The Infinite Monkey Theorem states, “With one thousand monkeys typing on a typewriter, eventually one will write Shakespeare.” That deduction was considered when an anonymous programmer decided to create a program that allowed multiple people to play the same game simultaneously.  The social experiment named “Twitch Plays Pokémon” began on Feb. 12 and was hosted by ...

Written by: Joseph Albahari Daft Punk is not the only musical robot group storming the media in 2014. Z-Machine, an all-robot band created by Yoichiro Kawaguchi, a professor at the University of Tokyo, and designed by Naofumi Yonetsuka, a fellow robotics engineer of the university, has come into the spotlight. Kawaguchi and the other creators worked with Squarepusher, a recording ...

Written by: Joseph Albahari Sometimes, what is created must also be destroyed. Flappy Bird, one of the most downloaded games of 2014 across IOS, Windows and Android marketplaces has been removed this week at the request of its creator. Created by Dong Nguyen and developed by DotGears Studios, Flappy Bird was first released in May of 2013, but the game ...

Written by: Steven Setser Hello, and welcome to the final issue of SpecTech for this semester. I would like to announce my retirement from the Spectator. I will no longer be writing SpecTech, and I would like to thank all of my readers for their support during the last few years. This week has been a busy one for Sony, ...

Written by: Steven Setser After 2006, many thought that Sonic was finished, but then the impossible happened: a Sonic boom. After hits like Sonic Unleashed, Sonic Colors and Sonic Generations, many wondered what Sonic would do on next generation systems. Sonic Lost World was announced exclusive to Nintendo and seems to have been heavily influenced by the company itself. Is ...

Written by: Steven Setser Yet again, this week proved to be a week filled with rumors and new gadgets. Microsoft released a Remote Desktop app for Android and iOS that allows you to use your PC from an Android or iOS phone or tablet. Microsoft is working on a version for Windows Phone 8. If you did not update your ...

Written by: Steven Setser It’s no surprise that I loved Rayman Origins when I bought it over the summer. I grew up playing Sonic the Hedgehog, so I’m naturally good at platformers. I never enjoyed the Rayman series until Origins though. When Rayman Legends announced that it would be multi-console instead of Wii U exclusive, I was excited. However, could ...