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The Weekend In Esports: Hearthstone Summer Championship And Rocket League Regional Playoffs

Welcome back! While the Worlds 2017 Group Stage finishes up overnight, the top players in Hearthstone will be grinding their way through the HTC Summer Championship in California. Russian wunderkind Pavel Beltukov is already in the quarterfinals, and will be looking for revenge after a dismal showing in the Winter Championship. Also look out for…

By Ethan Gach Published October 14, 2017

Esports

Team SoloMid Comes Up Short At League Worlds 2017

Only one hope left for North American League of Legends fans. After being given the “group of life” for the League of Legends World Championships, Team SoloMid was knocked out of group D in a tiebreaker last night. To rub a little salt in the wound, it was European team Misfits that took the win…

By Eric Van Allen Published October 14, 2017

Esports

Valve Responds To Debate Over Third-Party Dota 2 Tournament Streams

As the 2018 Dota 2 season kicks off, controversy had already begun to swirl around streamers who broadcast or commentate matches from tournaments they aren’t running. While Valve has responded to the issue, the answers ended up being more vague than some had hoped. In a blog post last night titled “Broadcasting Dota 2,” Valve…

By Eric Van Allen Published October 14, 2017

Culture

This Week In The Business: Much Ado About Loot Boxes

STAT | 25% – Amount of PC game revenue in 2016 that was generated by the sale of additional content like DLC and loot boxes, according to Digital River. The monetization service company believes the games-as-a-service trend has tripled the overall gaming industry’s value. QUOTE | “We think of it as a similar principle to…

Brendan Sinclair Published October 14, 2017

Culture

Track: Ruin | Artist: Hide Your Fires | Album: Empty Vessel Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

By Nathan Grayson Published October 13, 2017

Uncategorized

A Game About Deciding What Is (And Is Not) Soup

What makes soup qualify as soup? Must it be liquid? What if it’s frozen? Need it be edible, or can it contain rocks or batteries? Those are the kinds of heady philosophical questions posed by Something Something Soup Something Something Something Soup Something is a free browser game made by Italian philosopher and game designer…

By Nathan Grayson Published October 13, 2017

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Friday The 13th‘s Big Update Makes The Game Feel New Again

For fans of all things Jason Voorhees, any Friday the 13th on the calendar is a time for celebration, and today is no exception. With a physical release on shelves today and free DLC for all players, the studio behind Friday the 13th: The Game is helping ensure that the campfires around Crystal Lake are…

By Stacie Ponder Published October 13, 2017

Culture

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

The weekend is for seriously not being sick anymore, seriously. Also, video games. As ever, I will attempt to play The Witcher 3 then get distracted doing something else. Will this be the Overwatch even where I win something other than junk? (No. No, it will not.) What about you? What are you playing?

By Riley MacLeod Published October 13, 2017

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Loot Boxes Are Designed To Exploit Us

The influx of randomized loot boxes into games like Shadow of War and Star Wars Battlefront II has kicked off a discussion about their inclusion in games. Discussions of multiplayer imbalance and blocked off game content ignore an important truth: loot boxes are an ethical problem. They exist largely to exploit players and create addicts.…

By Heather Alexandra Published October 13, 2017

Esports

Abandoned Television Earns Smash Competition A Bomb Squad Visit

It’s an unfortunate truth of our imperfect world that security concerns arise whenever a significant group of people gather in a centralized area. Competitive gaming tournaments are no different, but a uniquely Super Smash Bros. situation arose at a major event last weekend thanks to a piece of dated hardware that continues to be necessary…

By Ian Walker Published October 13, 2017

Culture

Popular Battlegrounds Streamer Apologizes After Falsely Accusing Player Of Hacking

Shroud, one of PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds’ most popular streamers, isn’t somebody who loses very often. A former Counter-Strike pro, he’s rarely outsmarted or outgunned. It’s not uncommon to see would-be rivals try to level the playing field with hacks. Every once in a while, he calls out cheaters on stream. Recently, however, he seems to have…

By Nathan Grayson Published October 13, 2017

Uncategorized

Age of Empires: Definitive Edition has been delayed from October 19 to “early 2018,” the developers announced today. They say that they “will instead be inviting thousands more players from the community into our closed beta” for more testing.

By Riley MacLeod Published October 13, 2017

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Road Redemption’s Motorcycle Violence Reminds Me Of A Kid From Middle School

Road Redemption is the Kickstarted love-labor of some guys who realized EA was never going to bring back Road Rash. It perfects Road Rash’s idea (“it’s hilarious to swing heavy objects at stuff while riding a motorcycle”) by adding modern hotness: random tracks, unlockables, splitscreen co-op, and all that stuff. It just so happens that…

By Tim Rogers Published October 13, 2017

Uncategorized

Destiny 2’s Revamped Iron Banner Is Missing Something

Destiny 2’s Iron Banner event made its debut this week, another carryover from the first game that’s been tweaked enough to require a reappraisal. Unfortunately, it’s lost something along the way. Iron Banner is a week-long event that comes around every six weeks or so. It centers on the competitive Crucible, and in the first…

By Kirk Hamilton Published October 13, 2017

Esports

Smash Bros. Tournament Organizer Partially Pins Unusually Broad Controller Ban On Nintendo

A venue-wide ban on a modernized Super Smash Bros. controller at a major tournament last weekend has re-heated the debate about what kind of controllers should be used in Super Smash Bros. Melee tournaments. At The Big House 7, which featured everything from Super Smash Bros. 64 to Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, controllers…

By Ian Walker Published October 13, 2017

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The Most Popular and Influential GTA Mods Over The Last 20 Years

Over the last 20 years, modding has been a huge part of Grand Theft Auto’s culture. Not only do mods keep older GTA games alive, they allow large communities with different interests to form around the series. Here are some of the most popular, influential, and weirdest mods in GTA history. Superheros The phenomenon of…

Zack Zwiezen Published October 13, 2017

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As reported by Gamasutra, IGN has acquired indie-game deal site Humble Bundle. The terms of the deal have not been disclosed but the site will continue operating independently, ensuring everyone has at least one cheap copy of RPG Maker that they never use.

By Heather Alexandra Published October 13, 2017

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The More We Learn About Mario As A Character, The More He Sucks

2017 has changed Mario for me, and not just because he might be mind-controlling poor Goombas. Nintendo has told me too much about Mario, and now I can’t look at him the same way again. In the latest episode of the Favecast, Gita Jackson and I discuss how factoids like ‘Mario is no longer a…

By Patricia Hernandez Published October 13, 2017

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Of Course There’s Battlegrounds ASMR

“Hopefully, I can actually win one,” YouTuber Whisper Plays breathed into his microphone before he parachuted off a plane in PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. His mechanical keyboard clacked loudly as he dropped down and collected his first few items: a few packs of 9 m.m. ammo and a P1911 pistol, which actually takes .45 ammo. “I’m not…

By Cecilia D'Anastasio Published October 13, 2017

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People Are So Obsessed With Switch Icons, Now Developers Are Polling Them

Nintendo Switch owners really care about the icons that show up on their home screens, making so much noise that many developers are swapping them out. But not German indie studio Bplus. It’s asking fans to choose Puzzle Box Maker’s icon ahead of the game’s November release. In a post on the studio’s blog, Bplus…

By Mike Fahey Published October 13, 2017