Cool Stuffs

If you have anAndroid phone outfitted with the version 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system (like the Samsung Galaxy Nexus, for instance), you can impress your geeky friends and impressionable schoolchildren everywhere with this neat, simple trick.

Step 1: Open the Settings menu and choose "About phone" from the list of options.

Step 2: Repeatedly press the version number (Android 4.0.x), about five times, until suddenly an image of an Android wearing an ice cream sandwich novelty treat pops up out of nowhere. Surprise!

Step 3: You're not done yet; do not let those sneaky-fabulous Android coders fool you! Press and hold the image until the little green, purposely pixelated dude expands in size four times, the phone vibrating slightly each time he enlarges. You may remove your finger from the screen when and only when you see scads of similarly bedecked androids flying across a blue screen, white stars exploding like popcorn.

Step 4: Bask in the superiority of your advanced operating system, while forcibly pushing aside the cold knowledge that precious few will congratulate you the way you deserve.

The 3DS certainly seems to be on a bit of a hot streak lately with Super Mario 3D Land and now Mario Kart 7. While the franchise has been a Nintendo staple for almost two decades, we were curious to see if MK7 had enough fuel in the tank to impress us all over again.

We've taken our laps with the game and rounded up our final thoughts:

Jeff:
Other than the brilliant use of 3D in Super Mario 3D Land, I'm not sure there's a better genre to show off the illusion than racing games. In Mario Kart 7 the effect is fantastic, but perhaps not as vital to the experience like it is in other games. Regardless, MK7 is the next game to buy behind 3D Land, successfully delivering the one-two combo punch the Nintendo 3DS has been so desperately seeking.

Sixteen new and 16 vintage tracks make up the game's playable areas, which comprise all the familiar settings in the Nintendo universe, though now the Mario Kart clan can race underwater and hang-glide.

Also new to gameplay seems to be more of a focus on driving skill than necessarily grabbing the right power-up in a key moment. Don't get me wrong, you will be blue-shelled to death on occasion, but MK7 definitely feels like it rewards the skilled driver as much as possible.

There a few new weapons in the game as well, like the tanooki tail and flower fire-shooter. Players can also make some tweaks to their kart by customizing a few areas of their vehicle's performance.

Taking the game online is mostly a positive experience, but quite frankly I'm just glad it works. Nintendo has had such a dicey reputation when it comes to online play that even getting into a race felt like a grand achievement. That said, there are a few issues with matchmaking and limitations with how much you can customize a race. But overall, online play will give players the most replay value of all the game's features.

Sure, there's enough tweaking here for die-hard fans of the series to fall in love with the franchise all over again, but casual players may be a bit more critical. In no way is MK7 a bad game, but I do wonder how much more room the series has to evolve.

Scott:
You could count the number of good online-playable Nintendo games on one hand, and still have a finger or two to spare. Mario Kart is one of the top, and my memories of Mario Kart DS still are warm and fuzzy. The only problem is, Mario Kart DS came out in 2005.

The Nintendo 3DS needs good games to justify its existence. Mario Kart 7 is, without a doubt, one of them, and alongside Super Mario 3D Land it's an excellent game with tight controls. Mario Kart 7 feels like a direct sequel to Mario Kart DS, and adds 32 tracks with surprisingly good online play and a variety of modest new additions, such as hang-gliding and underwater racing. I'd have given up those perks in exchange for, say, 10 more tracks (Mario Kart DS also had 32 tracks); despite how many tracks 32 sounds like, the game gets repetitive fast once you've raced through them all.

The 3D effect applied to racing is so seamless, so smooth, I'm shocked more racing games and flight games haven't been released on the 3DS. It's also somewhat unnecessary; unlike Super Mario 3D Land, I can't remember Mario Kart 7 being in 3D after I've played. Mario Kart 7 is an excellent demo of the potential of the 3DS; it feels like a GameCube game. Kids will go nuts for years playing local wireless racing oncar trips, provided they own a 3DS. Of course, you could also go out and buy a used copy of Mario Kart DS and dust off your old DS and get an experience that's less pretty, but not all that much different.

As for the future of Mario Kart games, I'd really love to see downloadable track packs. Nintendo only releases one Mario Kart per hardware platform, and I'd rather play this game a lot more. I don't have a friend in the family who will play with me, and online racing has its limits without a deep set of play modes and leaderboard challenges (Coin Battle and Balloon Battle are the two extra modes besides straight-up racing, but those have been in Mario Kart games for years). I wish this Kart had invented some new modes of play, additional wrinkles to extend the life of the title. After my handful of fun hours, I feel like I'm already starting to tap out.

Thecar pictured above does 0-60 mph in a scant 2.3 seconds, goes on to hit 100 mph in just under five ticks, and only costs $1,100.

No, that last bit is not a typo, because the Traxxas XO-1 only measures 27 inches from nose to tail. This is not a passenger car, but it's also not a toy. It's a remote-controlled scale race car and Traxxas says that it's the fastest in the world.

The Traxxas XO-1 may be small, but the speeds quoted above are full-scale. The R/C car achieves such speed thanks in part to its sleek body, which hides an aluminum chassis frame, a new high-output version of the Traxxas/Castle Mamba Monster Extreme brushless motor powered by a pair of Power Cell 3S 5000mAh lithium-polymer batteries, and a heavy-duty all-wheel drive-power train with an extruded aluminum center driveshaft. Beneath the car is a computer-designed undertray that integrates a front splitter and canards, a smooth undertray, and a rear diffuser, all of which work together to minimize drag and generate downforce as the XO-1 approaches (and possibly exceeds) 100 mph.

Even the new wireless controller is pretty high-tech hardware. The TQi 2.4GHz Intelligent Radio System features an internal antenna, a five-channel receiver, and an accessory docking base where you can connect an AppleiPhone oriPod Touch. When running the Traxxas Link App, the connected iPhone enables users to monitor the TQi's three telemetry ports and store drive profiles and preferences for up to 30 Traxxas vehicles.

Traxxas states that "the XO-1 is not a toy and is intended for use by experts only" and requires the use of high-speed gearing and high downforce splitter hardware (included) and the Traxxas Link Application running on an iPhone or iPod Touch (not included) to unlock the XO-1's 100+ mph top speed. This leaves Android, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry users in the dust, but I think that if you've got $1,099.99 to drop on a "not a toy," then you can probably spend an extra $199 on an 8GB iPod Touch.

Check out the video below to see the Traxxas XO-1 in action.