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Oh, and did I mention that the game hasn’t even been released yet?
Developers of the upcoming game Age of Wulan thought that auctioning off exclusive items for their new MMORPG would be a good way to help promote it. Something tells me they weren’t expecting someone to throw down an amazing $16,000 on a virtual sword.
Link Via Geekologie
Bob Anderson of West Sussex, UK, died on Sunday at the age of 89. He was a master fencer who taught lessons while serving in the Royal Marines, then represented his country at the 1952 Olympics. Anderson went on to develop a reputation as champion, both as a fencer and as a choreographer of on-screen sword fights. Most famously, he donned the mask of Darth Vader and wielded a lightsaber in all three original Star Wars movies:
Vader, “Star Wars’” intergalactic arch-villain, was voiced by James Earl Jones and played by six foot six (1.98 meter) former weightlifter David Prowse, but Anderson stepped in during the key fight scenes.
“David Prowse wasn’t very good with a sword and Bob couldn’t get him to do the moves,” said Anderson’s former assistant, Leon Hill. “Fortunately Bob could just don the costume and do it himself.”
Anderson later added to his vast body of work by directing fencing scenes in The Princess Bride and The Fellowship of the Ring.
Link -via The Mary Sue | Photo: Johnathan Player
Ericka Dufour and her friend Kyle dance with a sword and knife. It’s a pity that the audio doesn’t pick up him saying, “Here, Grandma, hold my beer and watch this.”
Link -via Super Punch
Swords are some of the most interesting and continually chivalrous weapons ever made. That’s why even today in movies the bad guy will often wield a sword rather than a gun to make the action that more intimate and “sexy.” But how were ancient swords originally created?
The sword is the perennial symbol of empires, knighthood, chivalry and fantasy. But it’s also one of the world’s most ancient technologies, connected with breakthroughs in metallurgy that would change the world. There are even some types of ancient swords so strong that modern science still can’t determine how they were made.
What is this thing? I’m having trouble tracking down an authoritative source (or even the origin of this photograph), but here’s what’s written on the sign:
This unusual item was captured by US forces during the Pacific Campaigns of World War II. It consists of a pistol known as the 7mm “Baby Nambu” and a samurai sword blade. This item was not a standard Japanese Army item and it is believed that the owner had it fabricated on his own initiative. It is further believed that it was intended to be used in frontal-type assaults.
Well, it’s not a bad idea. But it has one obvious flaw: no place to mount a scope. I mean, really, who wants to go into battle with a sword pistol with only iron sights?
via MArooned
The Buster Sword is a special weapon that appears in Final Fantasy VII. Flickr user Michaelcthulhu either made or commissioned a realistic version of one. In the linked video, he does his best to swing it like a functional weapon. The sword is for sale, so you’d better grab it before someone else does.
Video via Geekosystem
Discworld author Terry Pratchett was knighted by Queen Elizabeth two years ago. At the time, he lamented that the title didn’t come with a sword. So he decided to make his own, mining and smelting the ore himself, adding to it iron from meteorites. With professional guidance, Pratchett personally forged the sword:
With help from his friend Jake Keen — an expert on ancient metal-making techniques — the author dug up 81kg of ore and smelted it in the grounds of his house, using a makeshift kiln built from clay and hay and fuelled with damp sheep manure.
Pratchett, who has Alzheimer’s disease, also said he had thrown in “several pieces of meteorites — thunderbolt iron, you see — highly magical, you’ve got to chuck that stuff in whether you believe in it or not”.
After days of hammering the metal into bars, he took it to a blacksmith, whom he helped to shape it into a blade, which was finished with silverwork.
Link via Geekosystem | Photo by Flickr user David Jackmanson used under Creative Commons license
Nerdcore has a roundup of three signs of changing times in East Asia: an interview with the last traditional swordmaker in Taiwan, the decline of the geisha tradition, and the diminished demand in Japan for actors skilled in the martial arts of the samurai.
The last swordsmith in Taiwan is 65 years old and makes his blades using human bones with the permission of the deceased’s relatives. He says that according to tradition, the bones infuse a spirit into the completed sword.
Umbrellas for the Civil but Discontent Man (2008), by Bruce and Stephanie Tharp,
manufactured by Kikkerland
Just because it’s rainy season it doesn’t mean that you have to go without your swords. Here are three such combination of weapon and umbrellas by Bruce and Stephanie Tharp of Materious:
"Sigmund Freud contends that aggressiveness is a fundamental human instinct whose inhibition is a necessary obligation of social life. These umbrellas combine a symbol of gentlemanly refinement–the full-sized, black umbrella–with an element from more manly sword-bearing times. The umbrellas offer brief psychological respite from the dictates of social amiability.
Core 77 has the write up of the couple’s art display in Milan Design Week 09: Link – via oobject
