Everyone is pretty much off work today, right? I know we are. Our staff works so very hard to make sure they have fantastic and interesting car things to show and tell you about, so they get the day off. We’re all taking it off! But, we will have a bunch of classic Autopian stories from our not-exactly-plural year-ish of existence being pushed on social media, so if you need something car-related to devour, we still got you covered. Oh, and that’s an AMC Mighty Mite up there, which I’m showing you because of Memorial Day, and it may be my favorite of the American not-jeeps.
The Mighty Mite was designed to be a smaller sort of Jeep that could be easily dropped by parachute from airplanes, and was very small and light. It used one of the vanishingly few American-designed-and-produced automotive air-cooled V4 engines, even! Eventually, though, better helicopters made it unnecessary since they could just drop regular, heavier Jeeps.
Once, back at the old site, I even speculated that all of the engineering developed for the Mighty Mite could have been used to make an AMC competitor to the Volkswagen:
I liked that story.
I also decided to showcase the Mighty Mite because it was primarily intended for the Marines, and my dad was a Marine. He was a little guy, like I am, and taught Judo in the 1950s to Marines. He used to say they picked him because he was small and the guys could throw him easier and build confidence, but I think there was probably more to it than that.
Anyway, have a great and meaningful Memorial Day! We’ll see you tomorrow! Have fun!
You do realize that actually designed the Nissan Pao from that Mighty Mite? ????
I managed to get a bunch of coding done on my meta-analysis yesterday! It probably wouldn’t be fondly received around many car nuts (it’s about green driving and commuting habits) but I’m counting any headway against the tide of my weapons-grade ADHD as a win.
Something I learned early in life: Short guys are as strong as tall guys and generally quicker.
The worst thing about military combatives / wrestling training is getting paired up against someone who (probably) looks like Torch’s dad. The short barrel chested guys will turn you into origami faster than you can say “chow hall bubbleguts.”
Being short in Judo is also a strength as your center of gravity is lower, making you more stable.
Good on your dad!
“I’m the classic Agency Type. Muscular..low to the ground.” …Vince Ricardo
I’d completely forgotten about that movie, great flick… I miss Peter Falk.
Serpentine! Serpentine!
Enjoy the day off! We’ve got lots of auto news to cover this week like the VW ID Buzz US/Canada unveiling. Right now go partake in whatever floats your amphicar.
“Little” Marines also make great machine gunners and mortarmen. Something about the small guy mentality made them the gutsiest, toughest of them all. Don’t ever cross one!
We used a lot of these in Viet Nam in 66-67. Relatively fast compared to everything else on the road there and had a cool exhaust note as well. They did burn very brightly if torched off completely due to the high light metal content. Rugged little fuc**rs too.
Enjoy a day off, just like a freshly serviced Alfa Romeo. The ‘check engine’ light needs a break too!
Gotta love air cooled engines!
Funny thing about the name Mighty Mite.
I’ve been making my own horror/sci-fi RPG and “Mighty Mite” is the name of one of the monster types. It’s a humanoid scabies mite, with a mite’s exoskeleton and a human face and proportions. They are also human-like in intelligence, but primitive and haven’t yet developed the use of tools. The juveniles are the size of a half dollar, but the adults grow to the size of a small dog breed.
Your first encounter with them is seeing the decomposing corpse of a small human boy. As you approach, you hear a sawing noise. The boy’s head splits open horizontally and the top pops off, out skittering a Mighty Mite adolescent.
You also encounter them in a boss fight with Vermin Supreme, a rat the size of a bus. The rat is covered in open sores and is thoroughly infested by juveniles. When you kill it, they all drop out of their host and attack you. You then have the fight extended. You can also lure Vermin Supreme into an engine oil room and then use a fire-based attack to set him on fire, and when you do so, the juveniles all drop off and skitter around on fire, before dying.
“Vermin Supreme, a rat the size of a bus.”
Even if it is, overall, decaying and disease-ridden, I bet it still has amazing pearly white teeth.
You know it! I intended the name to be a reference to the satirist and former presidential candidate. Here’s an AI-generated concept image of this creature:
https://i.imgur.com/QkWoFoK.jpg
Also, there’s the Mightiest Mite, another boss:
https://i.imgur.com/NVOip0D.jpg
I’m in the process of finalizing the sprite drawings for both of these. The AI generated images were used to make quick concepts with which I could reference while creating my own art. Everything in this project is meant to be some degree of disgusting, unsettling, and/or disturbing. Most of your main playable characters are small children.
Great nightmare fodder there, Toecutter. “Everything…is meant to be…disgusting, unsettling, and/or disturbing.” Welp, you’re off to a great start!
>>saw Damnation Alley with its armored flesh-eating cockroachs at a way too young & impressionable age
I like to refer to those as Roger Zelazny’s Giant Mormon Cockroaches. The movie had precious little in common with the book though…
Actually the correct term is RUS (Rodents of Unusual Size)…
“As you approach, you hear a sawing noise”
Preceded by
“haven’t yet developed the use of tools”
What is causing the sawing noise then?
(Sounds nitpicky I know. Just trying to help, small details like that can lead to suspensions of beliefs and can detract from the story, one idea or the other has to go).
Sounds positively horrifying though.
The mites have cutting edges on their 8 legs.
As a player, the knowledge that something can make a sawing noise without having developed tools? Makes hearing that sawing noise much, much worse.
Okay, I am here for more RPG / TTRPG content.
Given that you’re designing it, will we know who the Evil Empire is by their decadent, lavish vehicles that weigh more than 1000lb and have a sub-500-mile range on 10kWh?
(I say this with love, as a fellow DM)
There is no “Evil Empire” per se. The game is set in a giant domed city on another planet, Kepler 186F. The dome has a land area roughly the size of New York City, but there are 500 million people crammed inside. The surface of the planet outside of the dome is completely uninhabitable. Temperatures are too high for life to exist, and radioactive dust storms brew about coupled with an unbreathable atmosphere mostly composed of CO2.
What happens when you cut the power, life support systems, food production, ect.? Fast forward one month, where most of the dome’s remaining inhabitants are feeding on each other. Imagine what that would look like. Here’s a teaser sprite showing what goes down in this city, and as far as disgusting horror in this project goes, I’d give this a 2 out of 10(NSFW warning):
https://i.imgur.com/kiqJrmn.png
There’s one last shuttle back to Earth.
I suppose now you can see where I’m going with this? Most of your characters are small children, and the only adult willing to help them survive and make it to the shuttle is this creepy serial-killer/pedophile clown.
There are cars in the game. One of the villains is a Nazi cyborg who drives an electric musclecar with an onboard nuclear reactor modeled after a cross between a Hellcat and the Mad Max Interceptor. Another is a white Corvette C3 converted to electric driven by a cannibalistic adolescent feral child who wears a plague doctor mask, has glowing orange eyes, and carries a katana(this is a blatant reference to/ripoff of Carpenter Brut’s “Turbo Killer” music video).
I don’t describe these characters in detail with reason. This project is extremely politically incorrect and is meant to be disgustingly offensive. Which I think will accentuate the sense of horror greatly, which is what I’m really after. It’s also meant to be very Satanic and black-metal influenced.
As a little guy who used to play rugby, I think I can confidently say that your Dad probably got a little ego kick every time he threw a guy twice his size.
Hearty thanks to your Pa and everyone else, for their service and sacrifice.
Enjoy the respite folks, we’ll be here when you return.
Seconded. As hungry as I am for content, everyone deserves a day off sometimes. Enjoy.
Agreed! A day off is necessary now and again, even for a bunch of high-achievers like TheAutopian staff. 🙂
I got so much gardening done today.
Thank you for giving me a day off from reading this somewhat addictive content.