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What Caffeine Actually Does to Your Brain [Explainer]

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For all of its wild popularity, caffeine is one seriously misunderstood substance. It's not a simple upper, and it works differently on different people with different tolerances—even in different menstrual cycles. But you can make it work better for you. More »

How a DSLR, Protractor and Tape Measure Filmed One Man Walking America [Photography]

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Have you seen this incredible Levi's viral ad? A person walks coast-to-coast across America in stop motion. It's basically a commercial, but the effect is genuine. A group of guys traveled across the US, grabbing one shot at a time: More »

How To Make Your Own Glowsticks [Science]

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Were I a talented chemist, the first thing I'd make would probably be LSD. But the second? Definitely glowsticks. I know what you're thinking, "But I can buy LSD and glowsticks pretty cheap." Hence, I'm no chemist. [WonderHowTo via MAKE] More »

Incredible Physics Engine Yields Some Seriously Jaw-Dropping Dirt [Whoa]

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A column of dirt slamming down onto some steps. A sheet of fabric slipping off a sphere. Some water sloshing against a wall. In the real world: pretty unremarkable physics. When produced with the Lagoa Multiphysics engine: jaw-droppingly amazing physics. More »

Alien Swarm gets Source upgrade, free re-release

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Alien Swarm started life as an Unreal Tournament modification. Later, the team was hired at Valve to work on the Left 4 Dead series before moving onto Portal 2. Both Valve and the original team have put together a very nice present for fans: the game has been updated to take advantage of the Source engine, and will be made available today free of charge, including the SDK.

Alien Swarm is a top-down tactical shooter with up to four-player co-op, over 40 weapons, eight characters across four classes, and persistent items to unlock. This release also features full Steam Cloud support, 64 achievements, and a match-making system. In other words, this is an incredibly full-featured release for a very fun, if challenging, game. It's also hard to argue with the price.

Alien Swarm.

"In addition to the game, Valve will also release the complete code base for Alien Swarm. This includes updates to the Source engine SDK and full Steamworks integration," Valve states. "If you've ever thought about developing a mod on the Source engine with Steamworks, this release provides more insight and examples for using Steamworks in game production." This free release comes with the complete code base of the game, so you can really dig deep to see what makes everything tick.

This is a great bonus for fans as well as a good excuse to get some friends together for a quick session tonight. See you online!

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Elite Skills

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Zelda On Paper. It’s Like South Park For Nintendo Fans

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A guy calling himself Eric PowerUp has released a new Zelda animated series called Zelda On Paper. As the name would suggested the series, which covers Zelda 1 through 5 is made of simple characters in the spirit of South Park.

The movies were all created using stop-motion animation and they’re pretty awesome.

The first movie (shown below) features the first five shorts and is titled Zelda on Paper. So why the name? Each character was created out of construction paper!

When you watch the video, notice the dark nature of the videos humor, Link is portrayed as a little bit of a jerk.

So what do you think? Will you be keeping an eye on Eric PowerUp and his future videos? I’m a sucker for Nintendo game spoofs so i’m in!

Megaman Vs. His Worse Enemy

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Recorded by David and Chase and eventually brought to life by Alex Sedge, this Megaman spoof shows off the little blue guy versus his worse enemy.

Apparently Megaman doesn’t find his biggest enemy to be Sigma, Chill pPenguin, Flame Mammoth or any of the other various bosses he’s faced over the years. Instead Megaman in this video is afraid of some simple spikes that sit between him and the next platform.

I personally love the voice over for the video, it’s definitely now what I heard Megaman sounding like. It’s also funny to listen to his inner dialoguing about how he’ll clear the pit of spikes. I also have to give props to the team for matching the characters mouth with his voice so well and for applying well thought out sound effects.

Enough of my babbling, here’s the video:

What do you think about the video? As a huge fan of this video game series I couldn’t be any happier to see people still giving props to one of the most played games from my childhood.  Leave us your thoughts.

15 Things You Should Know About Caffeine

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When I think caffeine I always think coffee, I barely stand still to the fact that cola and tea amongst others also contain it. I never drank coffee, did not like it at all. It was thanks to having dinner at an Italian bistro which served good cappuccino’s that I started liking coffee. And when Starbucks opened at the train station that I frequent I really got into coffee.

Not that I am a coffee expert, but I guess having never drank coffee before it’s nice to have a new drink and new taste. A warm drink to relax at times. I now understand the appeal of hanging out in a coffeehouse everyday drinking coffee.

I never knew that caffeine works in the same parts of the brain as cocaine and heroine. So I guess it’s no wonder that caffeine is banned at the Olympics due that it increases endurance amongst other effects.

In November last year I quit caffeine cold turkey. No more iced tea, I drink decaf coffee and I drink decaf cola. And the few times I drink tea I drink tea without caffeine. And now thanks to this infographic I find out to my amazement that decaf is not really 100% decaf…..great.

Coffee lovers tell me that decaf coffee does not taste as good as regular coffee but to be honest I don’t see how the lack or not of caffeine affects the taste.

And finally that piece over Hitler getting caffeine and glucose injections sounds really far fetched, although considering all the craziness of that man, maybe not.

Gary Numan Plays "Cars" On Two Dozen Cars [Cars]

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Who? "Here in my car, I feel safest of all..." Ah, yes! Here is Numan, the electronic music pioneer, performing his 1979 hit "Cars"...on a bunch of cars. Oh, and the whole rig's powered by a single car battery. More »