December 17 was a gray and gloomy day in Portland, Oregon, but that didn’t stop the hosts of Digital Trends Live from diving into the tech news of the day with smiles on their faces.
First up for hosts Greg Nibler and Adrien Warner was the curious case of the exploding robot. KiwiBots have been in Berkeley, California, since 2017, and have made more than 20,000 deliveries on the University of California, Berkeley, campus and the surrounding area, but on December 14, one of the bots caught fire due to a battery malfunction. A passerby quelled the blaze with a fire extinguisher. Kiwi reacted to the incident quickly, pulling the KiwiBots from operation and implementing new software to monitor batteries in the future. This is likely just a speed bump for the burgeoning robot-delivery service industry; Postmates has already revealed Serve, its own robot.
On the video game front. voice actor Charles Martinet has jumped into the Guinness Book of World Records. As the voice of iconic video game hero Mario, Martinet set the record for most recorded video game voice-overs for a single character with the release of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, his 100th appearance as Mario. Woo-hoo, indeed.
Retro game consoles are all the rage these days, with Nintendo and Sony releasing modernized versions of the NES, SNES, and PS1. And now, old-school Sega fans can indulge their nostalgia, provided they have a Fire TV device. The Sega Classics app on Fire TV allows users to play 25 Sega Genesis games including Gunstar Heroes, Altered Beast, and yes, Sonic the Hedgehog — given that there are a million platformers better than Sonic, however, why would you want to?
Finally, DT’s Riley Winn stopped by Portland’s Roseland Theater to meet up with rock musician Dweezil Zappa, who talked about touring, the new music he’s been working on, and more. Among Zappa’s most intriguing projects is a collaboration with the Netherlands Orchestra.
Digital Trends Live airs at 9 a.m. PT from Monday through Friday, with highlights available on demand after the stream ends. For more information, check out the DT Live homepage, and be sure to watch live for the chance to win occasional prizes.
