Onslaught (comics)

Onslaught is a fictional character that appears in comic books published by Marvel Comics. The character first appeared in cameo X-Man #15 (May 1996), his first full appearance in X-Men vol. 2, #53 (June 1996). Onslaught was co-created by writers Scott Lobdell, Mark Waid, and artist Andy Kubert. He was written and introduced as a villain that was part of the effect of events in the 1993 Fatal Attraction storyline. Onslaught's introduction into X-men storylines caused its own cross over event across multiple Marvel comic book titles (several Fantastic Four issues, X-men and Uncanny X-men issues, and the Cable issues).

Onslaught was written as a sentient psionic entity created from the consciousness of two mutants: Professor Charles Xavier and Magneto. During a battle between the X-Men and Magneto's Acolytes, Professor Xavier used his telepathic powers to shut down Magneto's mind, rendering him catatonic. It was explained through the Onslaught crossover series that the darkest aspect of Magneto's mind escaped into Xavier's subconscious, where it 'merged' with Xavier's own darker nature to eventually grow into a separate persona of its own.

Onslaught (video game)

Onslaught is a video game that was released by Hewson in 1989 for the Amiga and subsequently ported to the Atari ST, PC and Sega Mega Drive.

The game is a fantasy platform beat'em up featuring an eerie soundtrack and graphic violence, with strong imagery of blood, gore and warfare.

Onslaught was re-released for the iPhone OS in December 2008 and for the Xbox 360 in January 2009 as part of the Xbox Live Community Games service.

Premise

Gameplay

Gameplay takes place in three sections. First, a territory to attack is selected from the campaign screen; next the player is taken to the territory, where he battles through hordes of themed aggressors on a side-scrolling landscape to reach a castle, which he must also conquer; finally the player faces the master of the castle – a wizard with four spell-casting tentacle arms – whom he must defeat by firing magic at him whilst avoiding the spells that the wizard fires back. On defeating the master of the castle the player wins the territory and returns to the campaign screen to select the next territory to attack.

Onslaught (2009 video game)

Onslaught (known in Japan as マッドセクタ　MadSecta) is a first-person shooter for WiiWare by Hudson Soft. It was released in Europe on February 13, 2009, in North America on February 23, 2009, and in Japan on March 3, 2009.

Gameplay

Onslaught sees the player as a member of a military team sent to a research colony on a distant planet after contact is lost. Upon arrival the team is attacked by swarms of cyborg insects, which the player must destroy and ultimately uncover what happened to the colony. The game features 13 levels grouped into tiers, with the player needing to pass all stages in a tier and defeat a boss in order to progress to the next one.

Like other Wii games in the genre, Onslaught uses the pointer function of the Wii Remote to aim and the Nunchuk to move. Motion controls are also utilized with a throwing motion of the Nunchuk used to toss grenades and waggling of the Remote to reload. Motion controls are also used to wield a laser whip, and to wipe off insect blood which can blind and damage the player. Players can also issue simple orders to two squad mates who provide additional support, while some levels give the player the chance to pilot a heavily armed vehicle.

Operation Sigma Sigma

The Sigma is an experimental glider developed in Britain from 1966 by a team led by Nicholas Goodhart. After disappointing performance during flight testing the Sigma was passed on to a Canadian group which carried out modifications, making the Sigma more competitive.

Design and development

Designed to compete in the 1970 World Championships, the team aimed to develop a wing that would climb well through a high lift coefficient and a large wing area, but equally had the "maximum possible reduction of area for cruise at low lift coefficients". At the same time for the minimum possible drag they aimed for "extensive" laminar flow. To achieve this they employed flaps that would alter both wing area and wing camber. Based on analysis of the nature of thermals encountered in cross-country flying, they reasoned that by having a slow turning circle, their sailplane could stay close to the central (and strongest) part of the thermal and gain maximum benefit.

Its unusual feature is its ability to vary its wing area using Fowler flaps. It had been tried before by the Hannover Akaflieg in 1938 with their AFH-4, the South African Beatty-Johl BJ-2 Assegai and the SZD Zefir gliders.

Sigma (cosmology)

Sigma in cosmology was a property of galaxies used when trying to work out the mystery of galaxies and their supermassive black holes.

History

In the late 1990s the NUKER experts had made observations with a spectroscope of two galaxies, one of an active galaxy with an active galactic nucleus called NGC10-68 and a dormant galaxy next door to us named Andromeda.

The observations are shown. The light from the centre in Andromeda galaxy was distorted proving the existence of super-massive black holes.

Other observations proved most galaxies had a similar centre whether it be active or dormant.

They then realised that the black holes must have something to do with a galaxy's formation, so they turned to something they thought was useless: the speed of the stars around the edge of the galaxy. This was Sigma, the speed of the stars at the edge of the galaxy supposedly unaffected by the mass of the black hole at the centre.

Usage In Cosmology

The NUKER team calculated the sigma of several stars in different galaxies and the mass of the black hole at the (nucleus) centre. They expected no correlation what so ever. But when plotting their results on a Scatter diagram and drawing a line of best fit they ended up with a positive correlation. It appeared that the heavier the black hole at the centre was the faster the stars within the galaxy travelled.

Sigma (duo)

Sigma is an English drum and bass duo consisting of Cameron Edwards and Joe Lenzie. They met at Leeds University at drum and bass nights. Their 2010 collaboration with DJ Fresh, "Lassitude", peaked at number 98 on the UK Singles Chart. Their single "Nobody to Love" topped the UK Singles Chart, becoming their first UK number one. Follow-up single "Changing", featuring Paloma Faith, also got to number one.

Career

Formation

Lenzie and Edwards met in 2006 at Leeds University; Cameron was working in local record store Tribe Records and with Echo Location's Obi running local night Event Horizon, while Lenzie was DJing hip-hop and warming up Event Horizon for such acts as Rahzel and Grandmaster Flash. Once they had finished in Leeds, they relocated to London and became a three-piece with Edwards' school friend Ben Mauerhoff, being signed under DJ Fresh's Breakbeat Kaos. After a while, long distances took their toll – Edwards and Mauerhoff were based in Surrey, whereas Lenzie was based in Harpenden, Hertfordshire and they couldn't get three people into the Harpenden studio – and Mauerhoff left. In December 2008 they formed their own record label, Life Recordings (so called because, according to Lenzie, the industry demanded that it be their life). Its inaugural release was a VIP mix of their early Bingo Beats single "El Presidente".