Call of Duty World At War’s Secret Ray Gun Was Annoying For QA Testers

Today we find out what the most popular indie games are on the Switch, learn how to use a calculator to beat a game, finally figure out what plans Google has for gaming, discover Belgium loves a gameshow featuring Tetris and hear a fun story from a QA tester. It’s another installment of Morning Checkpoint!…

Dancers are coming to Final Fantasy XIV The new class will release with the Shadowbringers expansion, and is a ranged DPS class that can also buff allies. I… was really expecting it to be a healer, honestly.

Blizzard Says Overwatch Toxicity Is Down 40 Percent

Not so long ago, Overwatch was a poster child for toxicity run rampant in competitive multiplayer games. People regularly trolled and spewed vitriol while a barebones report system did little to stem the tide. Oh, what a difference a couple years (and a smartly implemented endorsement system) makes. Overwatch, like pretty much all competitive games,…

Crunchyroll Responds To Concerns About Rising Prices

Today, subscribers to the largest anime streaming service, Crunchyroll, were hit with a 15 percent price hike monthly—spurring complaints from longtime users. Paying Crunchyroll subscribers received an email midday alerting them to the price change, which will come into effect for new users May 1, 2019, and for existing users, Aug. 1, 2019. Prices will…

Valve’s Rocky Road To Better Communication About Steam

Credit to Valve: Over the past 15 years, it’s turned Steam into a megalith and kept it relevant with a steady, if slow, stream of new features. But in continually reacting to problems instead of anticipating them, and by keeping communication to a minimum, Valve has left a swath of damage in its wake, from…

My friend Frank Cifaldi, producer of many retro game collections like SNK 40th Anniversary, sums up his company’s philosophy in two sentences in a GDC session today.

Dota 2 Now Lets You Bet In-Game Currency On Pro Tournaments

This week Valve rolled out a new smartphone companion app for Dota 2 that makes it easier for fans to keep track of big tournaments, follow the progress of their favorite teams, and get access to in-game stats in real-time. But that’s not all: the app also lets players gamble. Not with real world money,…

Anthem, One Month Later

It’s been one month since Anthem released, though it feels like a lot longer. So much has happened: a lot of it bad, but also some of it good. Despite all of the game’s issues, it has a small but solid foundation for BioWare to build on. There are also a lot of frustrating things…

The Creators Of Into The Breach Came Very Close To Giving Up On It

The strategy game Into The Breach is elegant in its simplicity, but that’s because its designers had to scrap several huge sections of the game that just didn’t work. Matthew Davis and Justin Ma, the minds behind FTL and Into The Breach, came on Kotaku Splitscreen during GDC 2019 to tell Jason and me how…

No, Cuphead On Switch Won’t Be Any Easier

The retro-themed, hand-animated indie darling Cuphead is headed to Switch on April 18, and its developer is excited for a whole new group of players to try it, and maybe even play some impromptu two-player at a rooftop party with single Joy-Cons. But the studio isn’t about to make the notoriously difficult action game any…

Tips For Playing Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice is fun and also challenging. There’s a lot to take in, both in and out of combat, and several aspects of the game require real concentration and attention to detail. I’m here with some tips to help you learn better and faster. There are lots of boss-specific strategies in this game,…

Will Google’s Stadia Make Consoles Obsolete?

Google’s upcoming video game-streaming service Stadia aims to eliminate the middleman by letting you play games in 4K and 60 frames-per-second on almost any device as long as you have a decent internet connection. While this sounds pretty incredible on paper, it leaves us with a ton of questions. I sat down with Kotaku’s Ethan…

Fate/Extella Link Is Delicious Hack And Slash Popcorn For My Soul

I don’t know a lot about Fate/Stay Night, a 2004 adult visual novel about stylized historical figures battling over the Holy Grail that spawned an anime, manga and video game empire. But I like over-the-top anime nonsense, and Marvelous’ Fate/Extella Link has that in spades. In proper anime style, the story of Fate/Extella Link takes…

The Division 2’s Tree Crates Are A Good Idea

Your average video game puts loot in boxes that sit on the floor or on the bodies of enemies who drop it when you kill them. The Division 2 does all that, but they are raising the game, folks, by also putting loot in trees. I support this. I was maybe 20 hours into The…

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

The weekend is for saying this is the weekend I’m going to make bread, again, and then for getting too intimidated to do it. Again. It’s also for playing video games. I’m excited to play some Apex Legends this weekend and get a bit further in the battle pass. Even though I’m not really into…