‘Shop Contest: Celebrating Our Favorite Witcher

This week contained the 10th Anniversary of The Witcher series of video games, and I think it’s appropriate that we celebrate Geralt, the lovable protagonist of those games. Personally, I think that Geralt might be one of the best characters in contemporary games. He’s often conflicted about his choices, has a sense of humor about…

Tekken Player Jumps For Joy After Closing Out The Upset

Tekken 7 pro Choi “Saint” Jin Woo is one of the top players in the game. He took second at both Evo 2017 and last year’s Tekken World Tour finals. So when fellow pro Tanukana eliminated him from Beast Arena in Hong Kong this morning, you can imagine how exciting that must have felt. In…

Does Spending More Money On A Game Make You Feel Obligated To Play It?

Do you feel more obligated to play the games you buy for $60 than the ones you snag during Steam sales? On this week’s Kotaku Splitscreen, let’s discuss. First, Kirk and I talk about the news of the week on Lindsay Lohan, Shadow of War, and Todd Howard. Then we talk about Far Cry 5‘s…

Sunday Comics: Stolen Nerd Badge

Hello! It’s time for Kotaku’s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best webcomics. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon. Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published April 2 Read more of Awkward Zombie Corpse Run by Alex Di Stasi. Published April 4. Read more of Corpse Run Double XP by…

Richard Lewis Leaves Full-Time Hosting Job At Eleague

Esports journalist and commentator Richard Lewis announced today that he would no longer be the full-time host for Turner and IMG’s esports tournament series Eleague. His statement, via TwitLonger, says he hopes he can come back in the future but “for now though, it’s time for a change.” Well, here it is. After more than…

One Overwatch Fan Is Tracking The Best Widowmaker Duelists In The League

Widowmaker is Overwatch’s femme fatale sniper, and many pros in the Overwatch League wield her rifle with deft precision. With her prevalence in the league on both offense and defense, one Reddit user is working to find out which Widowmaker trumps them all. User /u/zeftorias has created graphics tracking the stages so far, 1 and…

Mineski Becomes First Southeast Asian Dota Team To Win A Major

In a 3-2 victory over LGD Gaming, Mineski won the 2018 Dota 2 Asia Championships. It marks the first major win for a Southeast Asian team, a hard-won title for a few veterans, and a sign that the Dota landscape is not as set in stone as some might think. The story of this Mineski…

Seek The Golden Hot Dog In This Dreamlike Game

We all have weird dreams, but have you ever had a dream about a naked fella who’s looking for a golden hot dog in a dreamlike world? Well then you might enjoy Hot Dog Dreamer Hot Dog Dreamer is a short exploration and platforming game made in 72 hours for the Hot Dog Jam back…

I Love How Mimics Work In The Dark Souls Series

The mimic is a unique video game monster in the Dark Souls universe. These games reward players who pay attention and punish players who cavalierly make their way through the world. The mimic is the ultimate encapsulation of that design ideal. Mimics, well, mimic chests in the game, and when you go to open the…

Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: Give Me All The Dogs, Winners!

I asked for dogs, and you gave me dogs. Lots and lots of dogs, some of them excelling at their craft, and others just hanging out. It’s the perfect storm of dogs and video games, so let me show you the submitted images that I enjoyed the most. Last week I politely requested dog mashups,…

Dota Team Ambushes Opponent With Sneaky Teleport Play

In last night’s Dota Asia Championships, the home-crowd team LGD Gaming was in a bit of a bind against Virtus.Pro. The high ground of their base was broken and VP was knocking on the door, but LGD did have one thing left: the element of surprise. Hiding in Roshan’s pit was a single Dire siege…

The Weekend In Esports: Welcome To Miami

The League of Legends spring split playoffs are this weekend, and North America is headed to sunny Miami for the big dance. Normally the spring split playoffs are just a nice test of the waters between teams. The winner gets some good points towards worlds qualification, but the summer split has always felt like the…

This Week in the Business: Loot boxes, clones, and the industry’s problem with women

QUOTE | “Simply being aware that they are available for purchase reduces the immersion in the world and takes away from the challenge of building your personal army and your fortresses.” – Monolith Productions acknowledges that the impact loot boxes had on Shadow of War in a blog post announcing their removal from the game…

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

The weekend is for finally doing your taxes, partially because you’re running out of time and partially for the smug satisfaction of saying you did them “early” because you didn’t wait until the absolute last minute. It’s also for video games. I finally cleared out an area of Far Cry 5 and am determined to…

Tips For Playing Pharah From An Overwatch Pro

In Overwatch, I’m a Pharah main, but I have a problem: I’ve ridden her signature jetpack boosts all the way to my personal ceiling. So naturally, when confined in a small room with a person who, at times, has been called one of the best Pharahs out there, I had to ask: what should I…

Little Dragons Cafe is the latest game from Harvest Moon creator Yasuhiro Wada. It’s about running a cafe and raising a dragon—you know, normal small-town life stuff. Wada’s recent track record hasn’t been super hot, but this one at least looks nice. It’ll be out on PS4 and Switch this summer.

GTA Online Has A New Mode That’s Fun Even If You Play With Strangers

GTA Online received an update this week that added a brand new co-op racing mode, Target Assault. Usually I’m not a big fan of co-op modes in GTA Online—my friends aren’t always playing, and teaming up with randos can be frustrating. Target Assault, however, is perfect for lone wolves. Target Assault is an entirely new…

The Story Of Two Games That Took Forever To Make

Earlier this week, Chasm, the years-in-development action-adventure platformer inspired by games like Super Castlevania IV, finally got a release window of summer 2018. Below got similar news last month when its developers announced that the long-awaited roguelike would be out before the end of the year. It’s been a long road for both games, but…