The Download Munkey : Tracking the Treasure Down …

While Spiderman and Batman are unlikely to show up in the Simpsons’ neighbourhood of Springfield anytime soon, I’m sure that fans of these superheroes and other famous figures from popular culture will be delighted with this growing collection of Simpsonized characters over at Springfield Punx. Featured at Deadlicious not too long back, Springfield Punx is the brainchild of artist Dean Fraser who has been posting his fan art creations of Simpsonized characters online since June 2008.

Some of my favourites below. Artworks are copyright Dean Fraser, character and their likenesses copyright of their respective owners.

Spiderman

The Joker as seen in The Dark Knight.

Bond. James Bond

Skeletor from He-Man : Masters of the Universe.

Mr Spock – the only character I recognize from Star Trek

Rorschach from The Watchmen – Haven’t read Alan Moore’s The Watchmen yet but Rorschach is one cool character. First heard of The Watchmen after finding a papercraft Rorschach at Cubee Craft.

This October also happens to be month of Marvel at Springfield Punx and fans get to see some of the most-recognized names in the Marvel meta-universe like Captain America, Iron Man, The Hulk, and Dr Doom Simpsonized. How cool is that?

Captain America

The Punisher

View more of Dean Fraser’s creations at Springfield Punx.

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Marvel Official Wallpapers
Dan LuVisi’s Portraits of Movie Characters & More!
Cubee Craft – Marshmallow Man, Master Chief, Imperial Stormtrooper Paper Toys
Blue Sky Studios Challenge

A puzzle/platformer made by four students (Josh May, Anthony Serra, Josh Rutz, Michael Mackend) at the famous DigiPen Institute of Technology, Mystick puts you in the shoes of a stickman warrior who can alternate from light to dark modes in a world realized through equally abstract vector graphics.

In the light stance, our stickman hero aka Dr Noisewater glows with a bluish aura, triple jumps with ease and throws hadokens. Switching to the dark stance turns him into a feral hellhound-like creature bounding on all fours and allows him to unleash devastating melee attacks. The light mode attack can be charged up to produce a larger and more damaging fireball.

The light and dark modes aren’t only used for combat only, they’re essential for you to get to different areas of a level since red and blue-coloured platforms are activated depending on your current mode.

As for influences, I like to think of Dr Noisewater as a combination of four fighting series characters – Ryu and Akuma from the Street Fighter for the fireballs and teleportation/dodging abilities and Kyo Kusanagi and Iori Yagami from King of Fighters for the reddish and bluish flames (and feral stance in his “Riot of the Blood” state) respectively.

Dr Noisewater can be controlled via a Xbox 360 controller (no idea how) or via the keyboard.

The keyboard controls are as follows
Movement: W A S D
Primary Attack: J
Transform: I
Jump: Space
Dodge: O (Right), U (Left)
Explosion: L
Charge (Light Only): J (Hold and release)
Pause: ESC
Confirm selection: Space

You’ll definitely want to play through the tutorial (under Single Player) to understand the game mechanics before proceeding to the other 3 singleplayer levels or the Vs mode against other hotseat human players.

Download Mystick from the official Digipen page.

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Toblo – Awardwinning Digipen Game
The Perils of Wikipedia & More @ xkcd.com
The King of Fighters ‘98 Ultimate Match Wallpapers
UFS Wallpapers – Darkstalkers, Soul Calibur III, Samurai Shodown V, Street Fighter & King of Fighters 2006

Promotional wallpapers for Native Instruments, makers of the Traktor mixing software among others like the digital vinyl simulator Traktor Scratch. Been playing around with the LE (which unfortunately means Light Edition and not Limited Edition ) version of Traktor 3 that came with my recently purchased toy – a Numark Total Control MIDI controller.

© Native Instruments, Inc

Hopefully I can post some mixes up here to terrorize the eardrums in the near future

Download these wallpapers at Native Instruments.

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Android Jones – Musical Art & Much More
Why I Love Techno – Takuya Kashiwada @ Under Water Bar Praha
Links to Direct Downloads for Selected Annie Mac 5 Minutes Mixes
Produce Your Own Tracks with Orange Mixer

No prizes for guessing the target demographics for Inokatsu‘s promotional pictures for their range of AEGs (electrically-powered Airsoft firearms). Two of the SFW pictures below.

© Inokatsu International

Pointless promotional pictures aside, Inokatsu does manufacture a number of authentic Airsoft replicas of modern firearms like the AK series and a range of LMGs in current service with the US armed forces – M60s, M240B, etc. Some of the more “product-oriented” promotional pictures below.

© Inokatsu International

The AKs.

© Inokatsu International

The complete series of product photos and pictures can be found at Inokatsu’s official site.

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Tokyo Marui AirSoft Wallpapers
AKs, Screensavers & Image Rippers
David Andro – Military/Police Illustrator (GIGN, GIPN, RAID, etc)
Oleg Volk’s High Resolution Firearms Photos
Assault Rifle Basics Vidcasts

Been doing some research on Mesoamerican Indian history and culture after reading Chronofus.net’s enlightening guide on Aztec warrior suits and re-reading some the Central American adventures of Herge’s famous fictional reporter Tintin, especially The Seven Crystal Balls and Prisoners of the Sun.

I was orginally trying to find an PDF of the Codex Mendoza online (definitely not a Warhammer 40,000 Army Codex for sure ). I still haven’t found it yet but I discovered FAMSI instead – the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, Inc.

Of special interest at Famsi.org is the Codices section where 4 facismilies (copies) of Maya codices are up for download. I especially recommend the Grolier Codex, a comparatively short yet rather extensively commented series of photos of a Maya book. If you’re interested in trying to interpret the photos in the codices yourself, you might find the Inga Calvin’s 61 pages Maya Hieroglyphics Study Guide very useful.

© Justin Kerr / Famsi.org

Page 6 of The Grolier Codex

© Justin Kerr / Famsi.org

Page 34 of The Dresden Codex (Lord Kingsborough Edition)

The Madrid and Dresden Codices (Lord Kingsborough Edition) are also interesting stuff to look at too. No comments accompany these two PDFs although the Maya Hieroglyphics Study Guide mentioned above might be of help.

Read more and download these fascinating Maya codices and Inga Calvin’s Maya Hieroglyphics Study Guide at Famsi.org.

MORE @ THE DOWNLOAD MUNKEY:
Chronofus.net’s Guide to Aztec Warrior Suits
War and Game – Military History Blog