Month: October 2020

What could make you walk miles across a landscape full of Ice Age predators, all alone except for the toddler you’re carrying? Archaeologists recently discovered a long trail of footprints left behind by someone brave enough—or desperate enough—to undertake the journey.

Sometime between 10,000 and 15,000 years ago, a rather small person, probably a young teen or a short adult woman, walked quickly across the Pleistocene landscape. Mammoths and a giant ground sloth crossed the tracks in the travelers’ wake, trampling some of the footprints. People at ancient White Sands usually moved in groups, which often included a mix of ages and genders, based on the other trackways at the site. But for some reason, this person set out alone—almost.

The person’s gait is uneven, as if they were carrying a load on their left hip. And three spots along the northbound trail reveal what that load must have been: a toddler, probably around three years old. The child’s small feet left their own tracks when their guardian set them down just long enough to rest or switch arms.

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  The box is cool, sure... [credit: Sam Machkovech ]

This morning, the PlayStation 5 arrived at the Ars Orbital HQ, which means we're allowed to say a few things—emphasis on "few"—as the new console's November 12 launch date draws nearer.

First off, take a look... at the box! You can look as long and hard at the console's box as you wish. As part of our console review agreement with Sony, we're not allowed to share photos of anything inside the box yet, but we are allowed to confirm that there is indeed a working PlayStation 5 console in there. (Not cake.)

But we really can't say anything else about its contents. Anything that resembles an "impression" is off limits at this point, so if your many questions haven't already been answered by a Sony promotional video or social media post, we can neither confirm nor deny. (Our box absolutely pales compared to one of Sony's lead hardware engineers tearing an entire PlayStation 5 apart.) At the very least, we can zoom in on the box's fine text, which you'll find in the above gallery.