Culture

It’s Damn Near The Apocalypse, But At Least My Blaseball Team Is Doing Well

Shit sucks. Our government continues to expand the boundaries of its fascist power. The ostensible opposition party lacks the strength or willingness to do anything. Society continues to buckle under the weight of a preventable pandemic. The only “hope” we have is a doddering politician who promises to change nothing if he becomes president. But…

Players Are Making Amazing Things In Overwatch‘s Workshop Mode

Overwatch turned four this past June, and despite attempts to keep the game fresh with new events, skins, and game modes, there’s only so many times one can tell a teammate to get on the damn payload. But one way players are keeping the game fresh and exciting is through experimenting in Overwatch’s Workshop, a…

Destiny 2’s Newest Subclass Will Work Very Differently

Bungie is radically reworking how build customization works for Destiny 2’s upcoming Stasis subclasses. We got our first look at these new Stasis subclasses in all of their crystalline glory during Gamescom Opening night. Now Bungie has put up a blog post that breaks down how they’ll work in more detail, and it’s a big…

Moon Designer Credits Toby Fox With Motivating Western Release

If you’re enjoying Moon: Remix RPG Adventure’s newly released Switch port, you probably have Undertale creator Toby Fox to thank. In a recent VICE Games interview, Moon scenario writer and designer Yoshiro Kimura credits Fox with providing the “emotional motivation” necessary for the developers to finally bring the game west. “We’re from different generations, but…

Vlambeer Is Closing Down

In 2010, two Dutch students—Rami Ismail and Jan Willem Nijman—founded an independent video game studio. It would start with some fishing, go on to release games like Nuclear Throne and Luftrausers, and now in 2020 is shutting down like a rock band deciding yeah, you know what, enough is enough. So broken is this industry…

Pokémon Masters EX Hashtag Looks Real Bad In Lowercase

Last month, the mobile game Pokémon Masters underwent some changes. In addition to new story events and trainer pairings, it also received a new name: Pokémon Masters EX. But we’re not here to talk about any of that. We’re here to talk about how the game is getting promoted on Twitter, chiefly through a hashtag…

Ubisoft’s next Forward event will be September 10 at 3pm EDT, the company revealed today. A pre-show starts at 2pm EDT.

Biden Campaign Brings Centrist Yard Signage To Animal Crossing

It’s September 1, the 2020 election is barely two months away, and the Biden campaign has hit the ground running with some very official Animal Crossing: New Horizons designs for players to show support for the Democratic ticket throughout their islands. As The Verge reports, there are four separate designs. The first features the official…

Fortnite’s Latest Marvel Map Change Adds A Black Panther Statue

Since Fortnite’s Season 4 started, the map has been getting new landmarks at a furious pace. The latest is a monument to the Marvel superhero Black Panther, a giant statue called Panther’s Prowl. The Panther’s Prowl monument is just west of Misty Meadows. Like many of the new Marvel POIs, it’s less of a landmark…

How’s It Going? Hooray September Edition

It’s still hot outside, the sun is still shining bright, but there is an end in sight. Welcome back to our daily open thread. It’s going to be another month before the leaves start changing in my area, and who knows when the temperatures will drop from “it burns” to “this is nice,” but it…

Say Goodbye To Summer In Animal Crossing: New Horizons

It’s September in Animal Crossing: New Horizons unless you’re a dirty time traveler, and the onset of Autumn brings new bugs, new sea critters, new crafting components and recipes, and no more Sundays wasted on August firework shows, thank goodness. Last month’s fireworks were nice, but giving up a rotating visitor every Sunday so Red…

8BitDo’s New Arcade Stick Is Quite Charming

The fine folks at 8BitDo sure know how to put together attractive controllers. This is their new arcade stick for the PC and Nintendo Switch. It’s super-moddable, supports wired and Bluetooth connections, has easy button mapping, and even has a turbo function. All that tech, yet it still looks like a time traveller from the…

Obscure Puzzler Detonator Has The Most Gorgeous, Melancholy Soundtrack

Welcome to Morning Music, Kotaku’s new, daily hangout for folks who love video games and the cool-ass sounds they make. Today’s pick comes out of left field: an obscure PlayStation 2 puzzler that randomly happens to have an achingly gorgeous soundtrack. At the dawn of this year I was hip-deep in obscure corners of the…

Track: The Big Ship | Artist: Brian Eno | Album: Another Green World 

Nintendo Allows Cancelations For Digital Game Pre-Orders (In Japan, For Now)

Previously, if you pre-ordered a digital Nintendo game and then changed your mind, tough! As soon as the order was placed, your credit card was charged. That’s now changed—in the Japanese eShop, at least. Starting today, customers can cancel their pre-order games up to seven days before release, free of charge. After that window has…

A Fresh Take On The Legend Of Zelda

Anu Chouhan is an illustrator and character artist from Canada working in the video game business. While I’ll be posting a whole range of her work below, it’s this Zelda stuff up top that’s got me particularly smitten: it’s a depiction of Nintendo’s series as an ancient Indian Epic, inspired by the Vedic and Mauryan…

Counter-Strike Coaches Banned For Up To Two Years For Abusing Spectator Bug

Players get banned for cheating every day, but you know who usually doesn’t get smited from the competitive heavens? Coaches. Three professional CS:GO coaches have been handed punishments overnight, following a competitive ruling from tournament organisers ESL. The coaches for teams MIBR, Heroic and Hard Legion have been banned for 6, 12 and 24 months…

Moon Taught Me To Appreciate Its Weird World The Hard Way

Moon: Remix RPG Adventure is a niche “anti-RPG” from 1997 that last week made its way westward, for the first time ever, via Switch. While the digital manual provides some much-appreciated assistance, I recently found myself stuck in a game-ending situation that would have been entirely avoidable had I respected the game’s world. The main…

Wasteland 3, From The Perspective Of A Wasteland Newcomer

Early on in Wasteland 3, you’re forced to make a choice. The family of one of your party members, a young woman named Lucia Wesson, was recently killed. An early quest has you stumble upon a camp of downtrodden apocalypse survivors, where you meet Lucia’s ex-boyfriend. Even if he didn’t technically pull the trigger, he’s…

Ridley Scott On Fortnite’s Apple Trailer: “The Idea Was Terrific, The Message Was ‘Ehh'”

Hollywood legend Ridley Scott might be better known for films like Alien and Gladiator, but he also found time in the mid-80s to make Apple’s famous 1984 commercial. With Epic Games very recently and publicly recreating the ad, only now with an anti-Apple stance, Scott has some thoughts. To recap! Here’s Scott’s original commercial, which…