Culture

They Should Really Have More Conventions On The Beach

Oni-Con was held last week in Texas, a smaller convention that’s notable for one very cool thing: the con is held right opposite a beach, so cosplayers can cross the street and get some shots on the sand. Mineralblu headed down there for some shoots, and was cool enough to share some of those images…

Tracer cosplay by Rose. Photo by Martin Wong

C’mere Roach

Anna Podedworna is a concept artist at CD Projekt Red, where she’s worked on projects like the new spin-off release of Gwent, the card game from The Witcher 3 Below are some of the cards Anna illustrated for the game. You can see more of Anna’s work at her DAand ArtStation pages To see the…

Titanfall 2’s Gauntlet Demolished In Record Time

Today on Highlight Reel we have blistering Titanfall 2 gauntlet runs, self-nukes, Battlefield 1 moments, Dark Souls 3 meta, and much more! Watch the video then talk about your favorite highlight in the comments below. Be sure to check out, like, and share the original videos via the links below. Subscribe to Kotaku on YouTube…

Podcast: Skyrim Is Still Great

This week on Kotaku Splitscreen, we’ve got more games than we can even handle. Titanfall 2! Skyrim Special Edition! Final Fantasy XV! House of the Dying Sun! Mafia 3! And on, and on. Jason and I cover all those games and also answer some reader mail about Final Fantasy XIV and Destiny You can listen to…

After Nine Years In Development, Owlboy Is Worth The Wait

When Owlboy first started making waves nine years ago, indie games were barely A Thing. Minecraft and League of Legends hadn’t even begun to take over the world. Netflix was still a DVD-by-mail service. There were, like, two memes, both spread via telegraph and the US postal service. Now, finally, Owlboy is here. I find…

World Record For Beating Ocarina of Time Keeps Getting Broken Thanks To One Glitch

A while back, speedrunners believed that they had achieved a near-perfect completion time for Ocarina of Time, that nobody could beat the game much faster than 18 minutes and 10 seconds. Two years later, the time has been shaved down to an incredible 17 minutes and 24 seconds, and it’s all because of a trick…

Skeleton Armies, Still Metal

Alexandr Malex is a concept artist and illustrator from Belarus. You can see more of Malex’s work at his ArtStation page To see the images in their native resolution, click on the “expand” button in the top-left corner. Fine Art is a celebration of the work of video game artists, showcasing the best of both…

Bleach Creator Is Good At Bleach Cosplay 

Now that the Bleach manga is finished, creator Tite Kubo has more time to focus on things besides drawing and writing. Things like Bleach cosplay, for example. Kubo recently began uploading sketches to his Twitter account, as well as a series of photos. First this. Then this. The text reads, “Long time, no see.” He…

What It’s Like To Live With Two Cosplayers

In episode two of our new webseries all about cosplay and cosplayers, housemates Ashley and Alex share their experiences about living together and making outfits together. Or…trying to. You can catch the first episode, about a couple who cosplay so much they’re too busy to get married, here Behind The Mask is presented by Bandai…

Some Very Good Dragon Ball Cosplay

On the left, cosplayer and make-up artist Sosenka. On the right, cosplayer and make-up artist Sosenka. Her Majin Buu cosplay looks good in stills, almost photoshopped in parts (like around the nose and mouth), so it pays to see the whole thing in motion so we can get an appreciation for how legit the whole…

Skyrim Player Claims World Record For Fastest Marriage

They say you shouldn’t rush into a new marriage, but screw it. This is the funniest use of speedrunning I’ve seen lately. While many of us are familiar with traditional speedruns that require completion of a game, sometimes, titles develop other categories with more esoteric guidelines. In this case, there’s a whole division of Skyrim…

People Are Competing To Be The Fastest At Google’s Halloween Doodle

Is it any surprise that people are speedrunning the Halloween Google Doodle? Of course not—if a game exists, people will try to play it as fast as possible. The Doodle, which is still playable, is a simple game where you play as a cat witch who fights ghosts by drawing patterns on the screen. The…

Oh Hey, Cool Robots

Will Jinho Bik is a concept artist based in Los Angeles. You can see more of Will’s mechs, armour and weapons at his ArtStation page To see the images in their native resolution, click on the “expand” button in the top-left corner. Fine Art is a celebration of the work of video game artists, showcasing…

Cosplay Goes Wild In The Great White North

In most instances, yeah, you can get some impressive cosplay photos from a con floor or a studio. If you’re Canadian, though, you can head into that country’s vast wilderness, and get some pics that are truly special. Similar to an Iceland trip made last year by some of cosplay’s biggest stars, a band of…

Soldier 76 Makes It A Very Dad Halloween

Halloween isn’t about getting hold of candy. It’s about who is in control of the supply. And when it comes to Overwatch, only one character is in charge: the dad. Cajun Captain Cosplay dressed as Dad 76 for Halloween, and went all out, with t-shirt, dad shoes, dad pants and rocking chair (to match Soldier…

Steam Bans Misleading Store Page Screenshots

We’ve heard rumblings of a big Steam update on the horizon, and details are beginning to trickle in. Apparently it’s “a couple weeks away” and will, among other things, require developers to advertise their games with real screenshots, rather than art, CGI, or pictures of their spring break vacation to Cancun. A member of the…

Players Have Spent Years Trying To Get Peach To Save Herself In Paper Mario

In 2001’s Paper Mario, our favorite hero in blue overalls saves the day, just like he always does. Peach helps, but in the end, it’s Mario who defeats Bowser. For years, however, speedrunners and glitch hunters have attempted to rewrite that sequence of events. Many of us have played through Paper Mario sequentially, chapter after…

The Art Of Titanfall 2

Titanfall 2 isn’t just a very good video game, it’s also a very pretty one, with some of the best character, mech and environment design around. So let’s take a look at where all that stuff came from. Below you’ll find a collection of concept and promo work done by Respawn’s team of artists during…

That’s One Way To Handle Rising Sea Levels

Julien Gauthier is an artist who has worked on stuff like the PS4’s “This is for the players” commercial, and on movies like Guardians of the Galaxy and Batman vs Superman You can see more of Julien’s work at his ArtStation page To see the images in their native resolution, click on the “expand” button…