I Wanta, The F&M Evantra

Do you happen tohave a trip planned to Tuscany anytime soon? If so, go ahead and add another destination to your Navigation System.  Enter in the town of Pontedera to your listof stops and pay a visit to F&M Automotive. While you are there you may want to purchase a new ride, lose yourNavigation Unit and got lost on the Italian roads, because F&M has producedsomething to rival the other Italian greats.

Look out Ferrari,Lamborghini and Vespa, there is a new Italian indulgence entering the arena.Faralli & Mozzanti, better known as F&M, have unleashed theEvantra.  The Northern Italian Company hasoutdone themselves with this handmade creation. The car boasts a 3.5-litre flat-six engine that comes in either a 329hp naturallyaspirated version, or a high performance twin-turbocharged 587hp version.  The high performance version can go from zeroto 62mph in 3.7 seconds.  By the way, italso looks remarkable.

This project wasfirst known as “Mugello,” but later changed to Evantra.  Evatnra is the name of an Italian goddess ofimmortality. With the dangerous speeds that you can reach in the Evantra youbetter hope that you are indeed immortal.

F&M will onlymanufacture five of these bad boys a year and the first one will roll out inabout six months. They have not mentioned anything about pricing yet, althoughI’m sure that it won’t be cheap.  You mayjust have to hang on to that rental Fiat with the navigation system.

The Dodge Viper is Coming Back....Sorta

Since Viper production was halted approximately a year and ahalf ago, America has been without a standout muscle car. Stateside muscle carenthusiasts have been as lost as a senior citizen trying to operate anavigation system.   Well, there is now a light at the end of thetunnel.  Dodge just made an announcementthat will ease those motor enthusiast worries. No longer will they feel as directionless as a navigation system missingits SD card.

The Viper is indeed actually coming back, but it will not bea Dodge.  It will be an SRT Product.  This is the second brand since the Fiattakeover that has been splintered off from the Dodge name.  The first was Ram Trucks.  It is an interesting move to separate Dodge,Ram Trucks, and now SRT from each other. I’m not quite sure what they are trying to accomplish.  It could be a dumb and we could look back ina few years and ask ourselves, “what were they thinking?” or we could look backand think, “what a smart move?” Either way, I am just happy the car thatepitomized American muscle in the last decade will be back on the prowl, orshould I say, “slithering back on the streets.” Come on, you knew there was no way I would get through this whole thingwithout a bad snake joke.

Another great benefit of this announcement is that it willbe sending people back to work; 150 people to be exact.  The SRT Viper will be made in the ConnerPlant in Detroit, Michigan.  According toDodge’s press release, the jobs were first offered to current Chrysler hourlyemployees who previously worked at the plant. The first Viper is expected to roll out the doors  in late 2012 as 2013 models.

The Integration of the Video Game industry and the Auto Industry

A few years ago people who played video games and enjoyed computers were considered to be “nerdy” as the rest of the world stayed analog but nowadays it is very different. In the last few years the car CD changer units and center console screen have become so advanced that they designs are being created by the video game companies that make racing games.

The idea of a video game company programming for a car may seem a bit strange to some but there are not many people more qualified to do it. Most racing game programmers have done more research into the way a car handles than a race team and they are used to using that raw data in a understandable way. Games like Gran Turismo have been programmed for years to display every bit of into that the car would give top the gamer. Polyphony Digital who created Gran Turismo was hired by Nissan to create the interface on their GTR.

This may be a strange marriage but it seems to have worked because the GTR is one of the most track capable cars that has ever been created. Now other companies are getting on this with the interfaces for the Navigation and social media platforms in new models being created.  Mercedes, BMW and Ford have all wrangled themselves a video game company or two to create the new designs for in car entertainment set ups.

This new integration of electronics into cars will surely mean a shift in the dynamics of the industry that used to be mainly reserved for car companies alone. This also means that the gaming industry will have the backing of the auto industry which can prove to be great for the future of gaming.