Like any community in the world, people who play video games have collaboratively created their own language and slang. Many of these words are international, but different languages have different ways of talking about play. This piece originally appeared 3/29/18. I’m totally fascinated by the way language influences culture and the way we think. It’s…
For a lot of gamers with demanding jobs, marriages and/or families, the excitement of reading good reviews for games like Red Dead Redemption 2 and Assassin’s Creed Odyssey is tempered by the sinking realization that they’ll never have time to play them. How do you make time for a 60+ hour game when you have…
For a beautiful few years, you have near-complete control over what your child plays. You decide what’s allowed and when, what to play together, which gems from the past to share with an excited five-year-old. Then a little more time passes, and suddenly the situation is completely different. There comes a point where kids are…
There are plenty of fun things you can’t really do when pregnant: waterslides, alcohol, trampolines, staying up past 10pm. You’d think that video games would be a totally unaffected pursuit, but as I’ve discovered, even cherished sofa-time is not safe. The first time I found out I was expecting a baby, for instance, I was…
After talking my way past the receptionist at a grotty hotel in Katana Zero, I stand in the elevator at the entrance to a heavily guarded floor, watching goons patrol back and forth. One’s got a shotgun, another a knife, another a pistol. I formulate a plan, then burst through the doors, slicing through all…
I think I fell in love with Yoshi’s Crafted World when I discovered the costumes. You don’t know cute until you’ve seen Yoshi running around the place in a little shonky cardboard cow outfit. My heart melted. This piece was first published on March 27, 2019. We’re bumping it today for the game’s release. Sweet…
Given that it is a FromSoftware game, I expected a lot of people would struggle with Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. I didn’t expect that I, a disciple of these games since Demon’s Souls, would struggle with it quite so much. Despite the superficial similarities—the graphics, the bonfire/altar save system, the rhythm of exploration and boss-fighting—Sekiro…
As a gamer parent, I long for the day when I can play side-by-side with my beloved progeny. Overtly or not, I think most of us hope that our kids will turn out to be mini Pokémon trainers or enthusiastic Destiny squadmates. But what’s the best way to introduce children to games? Sometimes, forcing something…
I look at my watch. It’s 9:48pm. I’ll do one more Trials Rising track, I think. After that, since I’m only two levels away from the next stadium challenge, I do a few more. The stadium challenge turns out to be a tough bastard that makes me want to bite my controller in half, but…
It’s been a while since I’ve played something as refreshingly uncomplicated as Crackdown 3. You’re a big dude (or lady) with genetically-engineered superpowers and a whole lot of guns. Out there is a futuristic city stuffed with militia and hostile robots. And after the briefest preamble, you’re free to absolutely go to town on it.…
Wargroove has everything: a charming 2D look, imaginative characters and toylike units placed on gorgeous little battlefields, and accessible turn-based strategy inspired and informed by Intelligent Systems’ classics of the genre, Fire Emblem and Advance Wars. So why am I not enjoying myself as much as I should be? This question occurred to me a…
Do you want to feel like you’ve taken something mildly hallucinogenic and you’re watching foreign-language kids’ TV? I’ve got the game for you. The new PC and Switch game Pikuniku has been one of the few bright spots for me in what has felt like an overly long January. It’s an imaginative and cheerfully dystopian…
In real life, I turn a bit green at the sight of a butcher shop. In video games, I am a merciless killer of monsters and, in Red Dead Redemption 2, deer. If you want to get into the game’s hunting, allow me to be your guide. Video games are all about escapism, right? This…
The video games media reports on leaked information all the time. So why, when British website Trusted Reviews published details from a leaked document about Red Dead Redemption 2 in February of this year, did it end up paying out over a million dollars to charities as part of a settlement with publisher Take-Two Interactive?…
For a couple of months I’ve been dipping in and out of #SelfCare, a game about deciding to not get out of bed. It’s nominally designed for people who don’t really like video games, but as someone who has played them all my life, I’ve found it a fascinating experiment in game design. #SelfCare is…
All gamer parents want video games to be a positive part of family life, and parental controls can help achieve that with minimal arguments. Parental controls on consoles are something that you never think about until you need them. When you have a video-game-obsessed eight-year-old on your hands who sulks every time you tell them…
This year I bought Shenmue for the third time. I bought it despite knowing, having played it and its sequel three times, that in many ways it is a trial to play. But it’s special to me anyway, as it is to probably millions of others. It’s a relatively new phenomenon, games following you through…
For a couple of years, I ran multiplayer Kotaku Game Nights in bars and pubs around London and Brighton, UK. We’d play good music with actual DJs, set up a bunch of consoles, get the beers in, and welcome anywhere from 50-200 people, depending on the night. It was the ultimate testing ground for competitive…
Welcome, new hunters. Let me guide you through your first few hours with Monster Hunter: World. Whether you’re a veteran wanting to know what’s changed or entirely new to the series, you’ll find these tips useful. This post originally appeared on 1/26/2018. We updated it in February with some new and advanced tips, and are bumping…
Video games often deal in illusions, proffering the fantasy of control and power even when your meaningful influence is minimal. Monster Hunter: World, the new third-person action game from Capcom, absolutely deals in fantasy. It plucks you from reality and sets you in the domains of exotically imposing monsters that you must hunt. In this…
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