Usually, our Kickstarter watch has a geeky slant to it. Comics, video games, table top games and even film projects around the geek lifestyle have made their way onto the Kickstarter Watch. But this one is just plain awesomeness.

I am throwing it on the table that if this Kickstarter succeeds, it will make its way right onto the Dude, I Want That website. Everyone travels with their pets in the car with them but there has never been a safe way to have your Doberman sit on your lap while cruising down the highway on your Harley Davidson. That of course is being changed by Greg Hudome at Dog Saucer.

As you see in the cover image and video below, Dog Saucer provides a way for motorcycle owners to transport their dog around in style hooking to the back of their hog. From the looks of it, this is only going to be an option for dogs of a certain size as smaller Chihuahua sized pups can pop right out the back with the way it is currently designed.

There is enough room for a larger dog to turn around and have its head come out of the front or rear of the pod. How safe this is at high speeds is probably debatable but it can’t be much more dangerous than the people who have their little dogs running across their lap, on the wheel or under their feet on the high way.

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For things like movies, TV shows and games, it’s pretty easy to get excited about a certain product when you see a trailer or other prmo-type material. Movies, TV programs and games are tangible things we have a lot of experience with so we pretty much know what we’re getting into. Then there’s something like Google Glass.

This is a product so different and, at the moment, so scarce, it’s difficult to really know what to think about it. Is it the “next big thing” or is it jus another fad that will disappear as fast as it appeared? Time will tell.

What does help answer this question, at least a bit, is all the videos and more Google are putting out about Glass. In this latest one, a pretty comprehensive ‘How To”, Glass’ features and use are explained in detail.

The video shows you how to navigate the UI with the side touchpad, adjust the display for optimal viewing, and put the device to sleep to help conserve battery. It also gives a better look at the whole experience than what we’ve seen so far.

We’re still not convinced that Google Glass is the “next big thing” and/or a “must have.” However, it is nice to see more of what Google has in mind for the product. Who knows, if they keep this up, they might just convince us after all.

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In somewhat of an ominous email I, and probably nearly every Xbox Live member, received today from Microsoft, a date has been announced for the folks at Redmond to reveal their next generation gaming console. A day past 3 months after Sony held their presentation for the Playstation 4, M$ will lay it out for everyone on May 21st at 1pm EDT/10am PDT.

Rumors have flowed a plenty about what the next Xbox (720? Durango? Fandango?) will feature, from features like an updated or even built in Kinect sensor, HDMI passthrough letting it act like a cable box, whether or not it will support Blu-Ray media, to screams that it won’t be able to play used games.

Hopefully most, if not all, the rumors out there will be answered during the presentation, and maybe we’ll even see what the damn system will look like (unlike the Playstation 4, which we’re still waiting on…).

Watch the announcement live May 21, 1pm EDT/10am PDT on Xbox Live, Xbox.com or Spike TV.

If you’re a geek or gamer (or both), chances are you’ve played Dungeons & Dragons, or know someone who has. First introduced in 1974, D&D went on to become an international phenomenon selling over $1 Billion worth of books, 20-sided dice and related materials in over 30 countries.

To this day, many leaders in entertainment, and other industries, hail D&D as a major inspirations for their creativity and imagination. In short, it was quite a game. And to many, it still is. But where did it come from?

The common wisdom is D&D was invented by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, two friends who’s love of gaming led them to create the first rule books, and more, for what would become modern D&D and later, Advanced D&D. But is that the whole story?

Over at Geek Dad they’ve wondered the same thing and a statement about the discovery of a rare manuscript may just hold the key to unlocking the mystery of who really created the game. According to the statement by the Strong National Museum of Play, “A rare manuscript believed by some experts to be the earliest existing version of Dungeons & Dragons” is now on display at their Rochester, NY, museum.

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What would it be like to be a real life superhero? While we don’t have people sticking to walls, flying across the planet or shooting lasers from their eyes, there are groups of men and women who work together in an effort with local law enforcement to help protect their communities. One such self-made super hero is Phoenix Jones.

Jones and the rest of the Rain City Superhero Movement help protect the streets of Seattle, WA. Unlike Stan Lee’s So You Want To Be a Superhero which created fictional personas, Phoenix and the rest of the Rain City Superhero Movement are the real deal.

Phoenix Jones, a former MMA fighter, recently took world renowned pickup artist and dating coach Adam London on one of their nightly patrols. London, who talks about trying to experience everything in an effort to make his life more interesting and build attraction, takes to the streets with Jones on a night of patrolling. As you will see below, even though London, Jones and the rest of their group don’t engage in an actual altercation, there is some real danger to what they do.

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Last year on April Fool’s Day, Mimobot jokingly announced a Jar Jar Binks styled thumb drive in their line of Star Wars related storage accessories. Luckily, this was only a joke as it was revealed that they would not be taking it to the manufacturer. Everyone had a good laugh with sighs of relief.

But apparently there was some negative backlash over Jar Jar’s false Mimobot. And it wasn’t PTSD for those who contemplated bombing the Mimobot factory. It was from people who were actually disappointed that it wasn’t really happening.

It seems 500 people (which is our best guess since the Jar Jar Mimobot will only have 500 produced) made enough of a fuss to get Mimobot to create a thumb drive of the Gungan nightmare. After all, why would they risk making more Jar Jar Binks Mimobots than they believed they could realistically sell?

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Hey all! As I am sure some of the regular readers of The Flickcast have noticed, my favorite part of the Con season is taking pics at them. Unfortunately, due to some professional responsibilities, I was only able to get down to one day of WonderCon this year.

But because my time was limited, I didn’t waste it on panels and the like. Instead I hit the floor with camera in hand and got as many pics of the Wondercon sights as I could.

While WonderCon doesn’t have the size of San Diego or New York Comic Con, the fans there weren’t any less fervent with their cosplay love. This year I saw a lot of new and original costumes I had not seen before. While a pimped out Boba Fett was present, I also saw for the first time Paper Mario as well as a group of female X-Man villains. Alongside the working R2 units, there was a life sized Wall-E that sadly the picture doesn’t do justice as it captured all of the personality of the movie and brought it to life in front of us all.

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Like all good things done by Nintendo, it’s time for special edition hardware. With the Pokemon franchise being possibly the most recognizable mobile game in the world with its original GameBoy roots, Nintendo is bringing the pocket monster flair to their behemoth (only in terms of importance, not size) pocket based console.

Retailing for a cool $199.99, the Pikachu themed 3DS XL will come with a 4 GB SD memory card and be available in limited qualities. From the look of the above image though, it may only be the top of the 3DS XL that features the Pikachu treatment as the hinge appears white, meaning the actual body of the system may be white as well.

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Now, I’m not going to come on here and pretend I know what every geek in your life is going to want. But if they are anything like me, there is at least something on here that they do want.

The nice thing is that even if they already have it (or you picked the one thing on this list they actually hate), every item is coming from a store they will be able to return it to and buy something they do want.

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While we didn’t get a chance to make it to Dragon Con this year, we did hear the stories. We heard about some pretty epic cosplay and even saw tons of pics, but nothing would have prepared us for this. Shot by the team of Micah Moore, Black Faucette, Justin Reich and edited together by Micah, this is the definitive Dragon Con video.

For those who have never been to Dragon Con, it is a multigenre meeting of the geeks that draws over 50,000 in attendance to Atlanta, GA each year. Every year, Dragon Con earns a reputation for some of the top cosplay in the nation, even sometimes surpassing that of San Diego Comic Con in high quality costumes. In its 26th year, Dragon Con keeps getting bigger and bigger.

In the video after the jump, Micah and the rest of his team from BeatDownBoogie.com use a remix of “Real Hero” from the film Drive to show off the unparalleled level of dedication and fandom of the attendees for this year’s Dragon Con. It’s videos like this that make us proud to be geeks.

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You know, it’s surprising. With all the “negative” connotation that comes from the mainstream media about living the geek life, their mass marketing machines sure cater to us. Think about it. Movies. Games. New high end tech. It isn’t the average Joe Sixpack who is the first to consume these. It’s us. The first iPhone users. The first HD TVs. The latest gaming rigs. All geeks. But because we are usually the first to adopt these new products on top of keeping up with our current regular purchases, we need to budget correctly or you won’t even be able to afford a place to live in to store all this cool new stuff.

The first and most important thing is to always prioritize. And no, that doesn’t mean deciding if it is a bigger priority to get the PlayStation 4 or XBox 720 when they come out next year. This comes to setting aside your basic necessities for living. Whatever amount of money you are making, set aside your money for housing, food, clothing, transportation and medical care. Once you have that safely set aside, the rest is your disposable income and that’s what you get to have fun with. Never sacrifice the necessities just so you can play.

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When we first got games on our cell phones, it was something to do to fill the time waiting in line at the bank or kill a few minutes when someone was late to meet you at the movies. There were only so many minutes you could stomach the slow moving and poorly animated versions of Snake or Tetris.

But as with all things tech, mobile phone games gave way to smart phone games which have the abilities to rival those of big screen content. While not everyone wants to keep a Nintendo 3DS or PlayStation Vita in their pocket, most people do have an iPhone or Android and they will play games on them. But the biggest weakness that some smart phone games still deal with are the controls.

While some games are perfect for touch or tilt controls like Angry Birds or Super Monkey Ball respectively, some genres don’t lend themselves to these mobile control schemes. Shooters and platformers require both twitch precision and a full view of the gaming environment but these are both lost when gaming comes to the mobile touch screen device.

Virtual D-Pads are constantly inaccurate and sometimes a game requires so many buttons that the player has to cover a quarter of the screen to access them all. The answer on how to remedy this is Bladepad.

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It’s impossible to look at the game software and development world and not notice what’s going on with Kickstarter.com. Projects that previously never could have seen the light of day because big time publishers wouldn’t have even placed them on their radar now are empowered by this new system of funding, preordering and further endorsing these in-development properties. Periodically, The Flickcast team will check in on Kickstarter to give you the heads up of some projects we feel deserve your attention that even some of The Flickcast may be helping Kickstart as well.

The first item on our Kickstart watch isn’t a piece of software but a new console in development. Ouya comes with some big promises behind it that look to change the face of home console gaming. It isn’t claiming to be a graphical powerhouse that is going to compete in the same market as the XBox 360 or the PlayStation 3, nor does it claim to have some new gimmicky control like the Wii or Wii U. It promises something that console owners aren’t used to at all.

” It’s time we brought back innovation, experimentation, and creativity to the big screen.” Ouya recognizes that a large chunk of gaming has changed from being a home console experience to the tablet or mobile market and that is where some developers are stuck because of the huge cost of developing for any of the big 3 consoles or the PC. The team behind Ouya refuse to settle for these restrictions and have created an open source engine running on Android technology. This means developers with any kind of budget can create games for the system.

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PAX East rapidly approaches, which means you’re probably starting your packing list right about now. And whether you’re a PAX East veteran or attending for the first time, it may be tricky, downright overwhelming even, figuring out exactly what to bring with you.

Well, allow me to pack for you. Here are some things you must absolutely bring with you this weekend. This stuff, and underwear. You may need underwear.

Portable gaming device

Believe me, whether you’re waiting in line to play a game on the floor, sitting and waiting for a panel to start, or killing time in the bathroom line, you’re going to want a portable gaming system with you.

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If you feel your current XBox console is starting to get a bit long in the tooth and are anxiously waiting for Microsoft to drop some new, shiny hardware goodness, you are going to have to wait a bit longer. Until next year, in fact.

That’s right, Microsoft has confirmed that the next next-gen console, rumored to be called the Xbox 720, will not even be announced or talked about at the 2012 Electronic Entertainment Expo, or “E3″ as we like to call it.

“While we appreciate all the interest in our long-range plans for the future, we can confirm that there will be no talk of new Xbox hardware at E3 or anytime soon,” the company said in a statement. “For us, 2012 is all about Xbox 360-and it’s the best year ever for Xbox 360. The console is coming off its biggest year ever-a year in which Xbox outsold all other consoles worldwide.”

Well, that’s nice for Microsoft. We’re glad they feel the XBox 360 is still a great gaming platform. In fact, it really is. It still manages to offer a lot to gaming developers and the games still look pretty darn good when played on it.

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Even though we love Apple’s iPhone here at The Flickcast, that doesn’t mean we don’t occasionally look at offerings from the Windows and Android world. In fact, if there was a phone other than the iPhone we would use, it would probably be the Galaxy S from Samsung.

Mostly due to the tight integration with Google and the Android OS, the Galaxy S is a smartphone we can see taking the place of, or being side by side with, our beloved iPhones. But up until now, we’ve resisted the temptation.

However, thanks to the diligent folks at BGR, we now know that the Galaxy S III is coming soon and we also know that the specs on this new device are going to be even harder to resist. Here’s the specs:

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