You’ve Got Will Smith’s Back In The After Earth Mobile Game

Or maybe that’s Jaden Smith. It’s hard to tell. Either way, this is the official endless runner of this summer’s Smith-Pinkett-Shyamalan blockbuster, After Earth. For once a movie-based endless-runner makes sense. Father and son crash land on a planet hostile to humans and must struggle to survive while being chased by monkeys and the hostile…

Six Reviewers Say Soul Sacrifice Is a Tense but Rewarding Experience

Megaman creator Keiji Inafune’s Soul Sacrifice is hardly a cheerful game, but it is certainly a joy to look at, if what these people are saying is anything to go by. The story, the world, the choices—all interesting setpieces of a grotesque, tragic world, held together by combat that, at times, can get repetitive, but…

Microsoft Customer Service Is Not Spilling Any Durango Secrets

You may be tempted, now that Durango rumors are flying hot and heavy, to ask Microsoft’s customer support representatives about the next Xbox. One Kotaku reader tried that approach today. He even brought up the memo that was reportedly sent to Xbox employees earlier this week It didn’t work. Microsoft customer support ain’t spilling. They…

World of Warcraft Loses 1.3 Million Subscribers, Down To 8 Mil

Blizzard’s massively multiplayer online game is no longer quite so massive. World of Warcraft is down to eight million subscribers, publisher Activision-Blizzard said in a press release today. That’s a 1.3 million loss from February to May—mostly in the East, Blizzard says, but in the West as well. The popular game is still the world’s…

As part of its push to accommodate indie and smaller developers, Sony today made the software development kit for the Vita completely free. The SDK supports a bunch of other Sony mobile devices as well. The games will be made available through the PlayStation Mobile Store.

CounterSpy, an upcoming indie game for PS3, Vita, and mobile, looks pretty neat, like a stealthy Metroidvania stuck inside a Pixar world. More on the PS Blog

World of Warcraft…as a fighting game? Hey, it could work judging by this mock-up by Redditor GuardianReflex.

Star Trek‘s Commander Riker Was Amazing At Sitting Down

You walk into a room. You’re standing up, feeling pretty good. You’re master of all you survey. But now it’s time to sit down. How to sit while maintaining ownership of the room? Try Commander Riker’s tried-and-true technique. It’s amazing. We all know I prefer to stand up, all things considered. But now that I’ve…

The Moneysaver: Mass Effect Trilogy, Blu-ray Steelbooks, Double Fine

It’s the end of the world as Shepard knows it, but you’ll feel fine with these deals. Today we bring you Mass Effect Trilogy on the consoles for $40, along with a new Humble Bundle, and some sweet Blu-ray Steelbooks from Amazon. We’ve also got four previous deals of the day still going directly below.…

This Isn’t the Box Art of the Next Game from the Creator of Braid

That’s because The Witness probably won’t have a box. Jonathan Blow’s next game will probably be a digital download, just like Braid, the acclaimed indie title that made him a super-successful developer. But the upcoming PS4 title is still going to need some sort of eye-catching visual promotion. Blow shared these runner-up poster designs in…

Our Gears of War: Judgment review has been updated with a multiplayer segment as well as an overall verdict on the game (finally). To sum: you might have a better time picking up Gears of War 3 instead.

Whistleblower on MLB 2K Cheating Scandal at Last Finds Perfect Justice

Yesterday I mentioned that some familiar faces cashed $25,000 checks in MLB 2K13‘s Million Dollar Challenge, including a guy accused of cheating in last year’s contest. But I missed another important name: The man who blew the whistle on the scandal. Scott Young, edged out of a shot at a million-dollar prize last year by…

Show Us Your Best Wallpaper

I’m rocking the Portal wallpaper you see here on my home computer. On the work desktop I’ve got some Calvin and Hobbes, which has remained one of my favorite pieces for some time now. And here’s a full version of the fancy Portal wallpaper. The artist’s name escapes me, unfortunately. If you know who it…

Now Hiring for Kotaku: A Video-Minded Video Game Expert

Do you love video games? More importantly, are you able to communicate your love of video games through the 21st-century medium of online video? Then we should talk. Kotaku is looking for more New York City-based video editors—people who can capture, edit and narrate interesting video-game-related clips. It’d be like being a popular video game…

A Zombie Game Where You’re The Zombie

Lots of games feature zombies. Not many games let you play as them. Maybe that’s why I’ve taken an interest in Ray’s The Dead, a new Kickstarter project that promises to be a zombie game unlike any others, mostly because the zombies are the stars. This is an “action-stealth-puzzler” where you play as a zombie…

This Amazing GIF Will Show You Why Ray Harryhausen Was So Awesome

Ray Harryhausen passed away yesterday and, with him gone, we lost somebody would could bring fantastical creatures to life with his fingertips. Spotted on Twitter, this amazing GIF—pulled from British documentary Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects Titan—shows the master making a skeleton move. It’s freakin’ magic. Magic, I tell you.

Wolfenstein: The New Order, unveiled yesterday, will not feature any multiplayer mode, publisher Bethesda tells GameSpot

Some of the Best & Worst One-Liners in Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon

Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, came out last week. If you played it, you may notice that its main character, Rex “Power” Colt, is an unstoppable, one-liner army. In the supercut above, I assembled some of Rex’s funniest, stupidest and most groan-worthy zingers. See how long you can go without cringing, giggling or saying “I…

Here’s what’s going on Talk Among Yourselves, our reader-written blog: A pair of reader reviews covers recent downloadable titles. Contributor Viexi talks about budgeting your time when you’ve got to juggle video games and everyday life. And E1Salvador confesses to a secret shame related to Nintendo’s Mario games. And you can always go join the…

Remember, We’ve Got a Lot More than Los Santos to Discover in GTA V

At first I thought we were getting a subtle glimpse of San Fierro in Grand Theft Auto V, but now I’m not so sure. The bridge in this shot, one of a dozen screens Rockstar released yesterday, doesn’t bear enough of a resemblance and the location is out of whack. Hell, I was hoping that…