Guitar Hero Strikes Back

Activision on Tuesday took the wraps off Guitar Hero Live, setting the video gaming stage for a battle of the bands.

Though Guitar Hero's original developer left the group years ago to work on Rock Band, the series is in capable hands. DJ Hero developer FreeStyle Games has been prepping Guitar Hero Live for its fall release, which may be right around the time Rock Band 4 appears.
The philosophies of the two music games always have been different, and these latest versions are no exception. Rock Band 4 is focusing on backward-compatibility and building on its current community, while Guitar Hero appears to be taking a slightly more forward-facing approach.

New Smart Drone Breaks $1K Barrier

A new aerial drone from 3D Robotics packs two computers and an array of powerful features for US$999.

Solo's two computers -- one on the craft and one in the controller -- have enabled it to make some radical breakthroughs in autonomous flight and camera control, according to 3DR.
Built on 1-GHz Cortex A9 ARM chips running Linux, the computers allow operators to preprogram the drone's flight path so they can concentrate on shooting video or stills from the unmanned aircraft system and not be distracted by piloting tasks.

Apple Devs Play WWDC Lottery

Apple on Tuesday announced that its 26th annual Worldwide Developers Conference will take place in San Francisco June 8-12.

The event will include more than 100 technical sessions on developing, deploying and integrating the latest iOS and OS X technologies.
Attendees will get access to the latest innovations, features and capabilities of the OSes, as well as best practices for enhancing an app's functionality, performance, quality and design.
In hands-on labs with more than 1,000 Apple engineers, devs can learn how to integrate new technologies and fine-tune their apps.