Run, coward!
Most of today’s video games are pushovers lasting a few mere hours. The following top 25, however, are the most difficult games you’ll run into and not easily beaten. We dare you to play any of the following without cursing, throwing controllers or kicking chairs.
Ice Climber (Nintendo)
Ice Climber looks deceivingly simple, with its cute Eskimo characters and equally adorable enemies.
In many ways, the Nerf gun is the go-to toy shooter. While BB guns will shoot your eye out, and water guns require a warm day and open space, Nerf’s foam ammo is safe for limbs and fragile furnishings. Nerf has been around for 40 years (the first product was a small foam ball), and foam ballistics have come a long way in that time.
It’s one of Britain’s unsung marvels – an aqueduct held together by ox blood, wool and sugar. This week, the 200-year-old amazing feat of engineering was added to the World Heritage List. Just don’t look over the edge!
The surface is as calm as a cup of tea and and there is no danger of getting lost on a stretch of canal a little over 7ft wide.
Even so, you don’t want to rock the boat just here.
Because if you lose your balance, you are not going to fall into the water.
You are going to drop 127ft on to an unforgiving slab of Wales and a lifejacket will not help you one bit.
Even the most blase, seen-it-all-before 21st-century traveller could not fail to be impressed by a boat journey across the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, near Wrexham in North Wales.
High there: A narrow boat on the amazing Pontcysyllte Aqueduct in North Wales
And if it’s impressive today, think how astounding it must have seemed 200 years ago when Thomas Telford’s audacious piece of design genius opened to a dumbstruck public.
No wonder Sir Walter Scott described this ‘stream in the sky’ as ‘the most impressive work of art I have ever seen’.
Last week, a panel of the world’s most eminent experts agreed.
Gathering in Seville for their annual congress, the heritage committee of the United Nations’ Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) voted to add 13 new names to their World Heritage List — the index of the most precious places on the planet.
The new additions included Korea’s royal tombs, Belize’s Barrier Reef, the entire Dolomite mountain range in Italy — and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct, along with several miles of the Llangollen Canal either side of it.
The UNESCO boffins might have struggled to pronounce the names, but they were in no doubt that this Welsh waterway should rank alongside the Taj Mahal, the Great Wall of China, Versailles, Kew Gardens, the Statue of Liberty and the Acropolis on an 890-strong list of world sites of ‘outstanding universal value’.
Feat of engineering: Robert Hardman takes in the 1,700ft span of the aqueduct
Crawling across the skyline in the Silver Vale, a 65ft narrowboat, I could not agree more.
You might think your HMO plan is scary, but at least it doesn’t use these vintage surgical instruments…hopefully.
Amputation Knife (1700s)
Knives used for amputations during the 18th century were typically curved, because surgeons tended to make a circular cut through the skin and muscle before the bone was cut with a saw.
lesbocages.com
Officially: LesBocages.com, tree service in the Brittany region of France.
Unintentionally: LesboCages.com, your source for locking up your out-of-control local lesbian.
freebase.com
Officially: Freebase.com, a social database about things you know and love.
Unintentionally: Freebase.com, the online destination when you can’t find your crack pipe.
sydneytherapist.com
Officially: SydneyTherapist.com, the website of Tanya Koens, a sex therapist in Sydney, Australia.
Arctic weather on Red Planet leads to precipitation of ‘diamond dust’
Clouds scoot across the Martian sky in a movie clip consisting of 10 frames taken by the Surface Stereo Imager on NASA’s Phoenix Mars Lander. This clip accelerates the motion. The camera took these 10 frames over a 10-minute period.
EvoGrid’s simulated world will allow artificial nature to take its course
The power of computer processing could one day solve the riddle of life’s origin.
Scientists think life appeared about 4 billion years ago, and ancient rocks on Earth can give us some idea of what the environment was like.
Scientists in three studies have identified similar genetic causes behind both schizophrenia and manic depression in a discovery that could lead to new treatments for millions with the illnesses.
One in 50 Britons suffers from schizophrenia or bipolar disorder
The new research has uncovered a common genetic basis for the two mental illnesses, which doctors had previously considered separate.
One in 50 Britons suffers from either of the inherited conditions, which are hard to treat and cause years of misery for patients as well as costing the NHS £2bn a year.
The discovery was made by three separate international teams who investigated the genetic basis of schizophrenia by pooling information about 15,000 patients and nearly 50,000 healthy subjects to conclude that thousands of tiny genetic mutations – known as single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) – are responsible for about one third of the risk of developing the illness.
The studies, reported in the journal Nature, also found that the same genetic variations in SNPs were linked with manic depression, despite the two conditions being treated as if they were unrelated.
Although the breakthrough does not bring scientists closer to a cure for the illnesses, it does allow researchers to narrow the hunt for further information about why they develop and how they can be contained.
Michael O’Donovan, professor of psychiatric genetics at the Medical Research Council’s neurogenetics centre in Cardiff, said: “This is a pretty major breakthrough for us because before today you could count on the thumb of one hand the number of common [genetic] variants that have been reliably identified for schizophrenia.
“Some of us were surprised to find that not only did these genes contribute to schizophrenia but they also contribute to bipolar disorder.
A pioneering treatment for the UK’s most common male cancer is more successful than surgery or radiotherapy, according to a landmark study by British scientists.
Prostate cancer is the country’s most prevalent cancer among men, with 10,000 deaths among 35,000 cases each year, affecting a third of men over 50.
Traditional therapies are invasive and require overnight stays in hospital, with multiple visits for further treatment.
They also have significant and long-lasting side-affects that put many men off.
However, new research shows that intensive ultrasound therapy matches the 92 per cent cure rate of traditional treatments – but dramatically reduces side effects.
The technique is also much simpler, involving a one off visit, with sufferers walking out of the hospital hours later.
Furthermore, those who undergo ultrasound can return to normal life in just a week or two compared with up to six months for the other treatments.
The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence, the NHS rationing body, which has previously considered the results of similar tests “uncertain”, has pledged to consider the new evidence as it assesses the technique for use in the health service.
It currently remains in clinical trials, but the results were described as “excellent news” by cancer charities.
“This technique needs careful evaluation to make sure that it can produce the same results as the proven treatments for early prostate cancer,” said Professor Peter Johnson, chief clinician at Cancer Research UK.
“If the treatment can be shown to have less side effects then that will be excellent news, but more research is needed to show this.”
Ministers have been considering whether to introduce a nationwide screening programme for prostate cancer, after the largest study of its kind suggested that it could save lives.
However, experts have warned that the risks associated with traditional surgery to remove some slow growing tumours, which can include incontinence, outweigh the risks posed by the disease for many men.
If caught early enough then treatments such as radiotherapy and surgery can stop the spread of the cancer but the side-effects severely damage the quality of life of the patient.
Of men treated with surgery or radiotherapy, up to 20 per cent usually suffer incontinence and half have impotence.
Radiotherapy can also cause other side effects in up to one in five patients, including pain and bleeding.
The new technique, known as High Intensity Focused Ultrasound (Hifu), focuses powerful soundwaves on an area about a tenth of an inch across.
Ingenious engineering and the will of slightly crazy homeowners, brings architecture to new heights
The expression “living on the edge” is about to take on a whole new meaning. Homes dangling from trees, balancing on sticks, hanging upside down, rotating around a spit, are just some of the residential wonders in our roundup.
Gangster House (Archangelsk, Russia)
Though incomplete, the “Gangster House” is believed to be the world’s tallest wooden house, soaring thirteen floors to reach 144 feet (about half the size of London’s Big Ben).
