World’s First Super-Sized Manned Robot Takes Its First Steps

Towering robots walking the Earth was once something you could only witness in sci-fi movies, but not anymore.

With the help of conceptual designer Vitaly Bulgarov, Hankook Mirae Technology, a Korean technologies company, has just released video of the world’s first manned robot or “mech” taking its first steps. Unlike most robots in the movies, the mech (also known as METHOD-2) is not able to think or act for itself and requires human control to spring into action.

The human-controlled mech is able to walk forward and backwards, however, the robot is limited in its movements since it must remain plugged into a power source. The METHOD-2 isn’t exactly free-standing either, as it requires a chain hoist it up.

While the released videos appear to be nothing short of a technological miracle, Bulgarov’s ties to the visual effects world have many questioning the validity of the videos.

Bulgarov has past experience as an industrial designer for Pansonic, Intel, and Google. He’s also contributed to such blockbuster films as “RoboCop,” “Ghost in the Shell,” and the “Transformers” series.

In an investigation into the facts surrounding the METHOD-2 mech, the team at Live Science were unable to find information regarding the engineers working on the project. They also discovered that Hankook Mirae Technology has only been associated with Bulgarov and has no other significant influencers.

Read More: Self-Driving Car Somehow Reacts To A Crash Before It Even Happens — This Is Amazing

Responding the the skepticism regarding his work with the company, Bulgarov notes that the cloud of mystery is nothing more than a cultural difference between Korean culture and the western world.