Blizzard Says Their ‘Cool Meter’ Was Off On Mei’s Holiday Overwatch Skin

Overwatch skins might appear to be simple cosmetic alterations, but for some, they’re a matter of life and death. Or at least life and death by embarrassment. Fashion faux pas simply will not stand in this endless war of waifus and husbandos. Overwatch’s Winter Wonderland event and brawl center around Mei, who received a new…

Podcast: What’d We Get Wrong About 2016?

In January, Kirk and I made a whole bunch of predictions for 2016. On today’s Kotaku Splitscreen, it’s time to see which ones were right. Way back on Episode 17 (whoa we’re old), your intrepid Splitscreen hosts made a bet. We each laid out 12 predictions for 2016—predictions like “The Last Guardian will be disappointing”…

YouTube Says They Can’t Find A Subscription Glitch, But Something Doesn’t Add Up

Yesterday, YouTube Help published a video countering widespread claims by YouTubers that the platform is screwing them over. In an explainer that can only be described as 3:27 minutes of “actually,” YouTube reps claim that the streaming platform is not unsubscribing people from channels, an accusation hundreds of YouTubers have full-throatedly complained about for weeks.…

Ex-Lionhead Employee Tells Wild Story About Threatening Teenage “Trolls”

Lionhead Studios, creators of the Fable series, are no more, meaning there’s nothing stopping crazy stories from their past getting out. Like this one, where an ex-employee claims the developers once had some stuff stolen by some teenagers, who Lionhead tracked down then threatened with…ratting them out to one of their mums. As first reported…

King Leoric Cosplay Is Metal AF

I love this Diablo King Leoric cosplay by Endryus Makdragon so much. Every time I cast my eyes over it half my brain says “yup, that’s Diablo”, while the other half goes “haha GWARcosplay”.

When Your Mech Goes Up In Smoke

Overwatch cosplay byAngelina Vo. Photos by Johnny Ngo

Steven Universe cosplay by Punky Bruiser. Photo by KG Photography

2016’s Most Searched Video Games, According To Google

Google has released its annual collection of top search results for the year, and as always there’s some good video game shit to dig through. Like the fact Pokemon Go was the #1 search topic in the world for the year. And that many of you like to follow up your Overwatch Googling with something…

League Of Legends Cosplay From All Corners Of The Globe

League of Legends’ Elementalist Lux has ten different forms. So of course there are now different cosplayers dressed as each one. The shots were put together by Riot, and feature cosplayers from all over the world, from China to Turkey to Australia to Costa Rica. You can see the full gallery of all ten forms…

Modder Gives Counter-Strike‘s Most Popular Maps A Holiday Makeover

Counter-Strike might have Christmas chickens, but it’s severely lacking in Christmas maps. Enter a selection of phenomenal modded maps by BadtRIP Thanks to their handiwork, you can now play festive versions of Train, Inferno, Mirage, Overpass, Cobblestone, and Dust2. Changes are wholly cosmetic and include snow, lights, sleighs, and even Christmas trees. The weather outside…

Ex-Crytek Artist Looks To Sue Over Unpaid Salary

A former Crytek artist wants to sue the company for not paying its staff—and he’s crowdfunding a lawyer to make it happen. Ludvig Lindqvist, an FX artist who worked at Crytek’s main studio in Frankfurt, Germany, launched a GoFundMe campaign today in hopes of paying his legal fees against the studio. Crytek, he says, has…

Twitch’s AutoMod Is Already A Game-Changer, Streamers Say

Twitch’s crusade against garbage live chats saw a victory on Monday. The streaming platform released an automated moderation feature called AutoMod that is already, some streamers say, a game-changer. AutoMod filters toxicity and slurs from Twitch chat for human moderators to sift through and judge. It automatically flags any messages that may be considered hate…

Pro Wrestler Tweet Gets People Talking About ‘Black Excellence’ 

Last night, the pro wrestler Big E tweeted a picture of himself, Xavier Woods, Kofi Kingston, Sasha Banks and Rich Swann holding their respective WWE championship belts with the caption, “#BlackExcellence.” While wrestling is staged, having this many black champions at once is still an accomplishment, and marking the occasion with a photo is appropriate.…

The State Of The PlayStation 4 In 2016

The PlayStation 4 evolved this year. Sony’s flagship console got a little bigger and a little more powerful, though its potential is as yet undertapped. It also got its very own VR headset, though that headset noticeably fails to match its PC counterparts. It’s not clear whether Sony has moved their gaming system in all…