There are some Western creations—take Total War, for example—which do an amazing job of recreating Japan. Then there are other Western creations—say, Kill Bill—which do a wonderful job of riffing on Japanese pop culture. Then there’s stuff like SimCity Social. SimCity Social is an online social game for Facebook. Brad, our SimCity Social firefighter, just…
There have been reports of Chinese developers ripping off browser games or smartphone games. Nothing new! This, however, is slightly different. Developer Dominic Szablewski says the game engine he developed (and sells) is being copied and sold in China. The engine Szablewski created is Impact—it’s a JavaScript Game Engine designed to create HTML games. The…
This last week I took my annual trip to the US to visit family. Like always, while I was there, I made sure to hit up the used game stores and buy games that have never come out in Japan—i.e. Dead Space, Command & Conquer Red Alert 3, etc. Despite having lived in Japan for…
The years have flown right by. Think about your first time to play a Zelda or a Mario title. You’ve changed. But so have Link and Mario. Next January, Japan’s Medicom is releasing a trio of Mario and Link “Ultra Detail” figurines. They measure about 2.3 inches tall and are priced at ¥730 (US$9). For…
Cute? These Pocket Monsters aren’t cute. They’re creepy. But that’s the point: artist Vaughn Pinpin redesigned the first generation of Pokémon starters if they were characters in a Tim Burton movie. The result is brilliant—creepy, but brilliant. Pinpin is planning to re-do the first 151 Pocket Monsters in the Pokédex all dark and quirky like.…
Starting a bit over two years ago, Bandai Namco began an experiment of releasing small original PS3 games along with their most popular anime titles in “hybrid packs.” The latest of these is Macross: My Boy Friend is a Pilot 2012 which shares a Blu-ray with the classic anime remaster of Macross: Do You Remember…
Earlier this year, AKB48—Japan’s biggest girl group—released a candy commercial that grossed out pretty much the entire country. This year, AKB48 is back with a new ad that won’t gross everyone out. It’ll freak them out instead. Progress! In the commercial, the members’ heads were superimposed on the bodies of six-year-old children. The concept behind…
Kids? They don’t have money. So thirteen bucks might not be much to working adults, but it is when you are a child—a MMORPG playing child, that is. Dragon Quest X is, for the first time in the DQ series, a subscription-based MMORPG. To enable kids the ability to play for two hours at set…
That’s according to the Xbox 360 Japan Twitter feed—which explicitly makes it seem as though the Xbox 360 will get RE6 DLC before the PS3 does. So, what, launch day then? Kidding! (Not really.) 『バイオハザード6』Xbox 360版ではダウンロード コンテンツの先行配信も予定しているとのこと。 [Twitter] Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan,…
Numerous Japanese sites are speculating that The World Ends with You is iOS bound. Earlier today, Square Enix revealed that the game was an iOS title on its online store page for the game’s new soundtrack . The iOS notice has since been removed from the soundtrack page, while the countdown site soldiers on. Thrilling.…
According to reports out of China, a man in Guangzhou phoned the police because he thought the Spicy McChicken he ordered was too darn spicy. After getting his food, the man sat down and took a bite. Website The Nanfang reports that the man seemed surprised by his sandwich, so he called over a McDonald’s…
Next spring, arcade shooter DoDonPachi SaiDaiOuJou is headed to the Xbox 360, with a new character and new mode.
Okay, let’s be fair. The PS3 is not silly looking. Nor is Batman or an elephant. But buildings that resemble them? Or saltshakers? And sperm? Silly. Japanese website Heaven has a round up of buildings from across the globe that either accidentally resemble things—or totally resemble them by design. Some of the buildings Kotaku has…
When compared to a $6000, life-sized statue of the man, a $375 statue of Old Republic’s Darth Malgus suddenly doesn’t seem as expensive, does it? The Sith Lord “Premium Format Figure” (but actually a statue) by Sideshow goes on sale in March 2013. At 20″ tall and with a real fabric cape, you can pre-order…
Adding to the ranks of people who worked on the Mass Effect series that we’ve featured here on Fine Art, tonight we turn the spotlight on Finnish artist Mikko Kinnunen. Though focusing solely on his Mass Effect work, amazing as it is, would be selling him short. Having also worked for companies like Paramount Pictures…
Army of Two: The Devil’s Cartel might be the most unnecessary sequel of this console generation. Who asked for this? Did you? You? What about you? It sure as hell wasn’t me. As snooze-inducing as the game may end up being, though, at least this clip associated with it is worth a watch. It was…
Not that this is a new idea – it’s where a lot of the appeal of AAA devs going indie lies – but it’s nice to remember that as annoying as the endless stream of Kickstarter projects are, and as big as the risks are for both developers and consumers, there’s an upshoot to the…
Let’s recap. In November 2011, Ubisoft creative director Stanislas Mettra said the following about I Am Alive, a game for the Xbox 360 and PS3: We’ve heard loud and clear that PC gamers are bitching about there being no version for them. But are these people just making noise just because there’s no version or…
I’m not normally one to indulge in “TOP TEN THINGS OF THIS THING” lists, but when they involve badass box art from 1980s and 90s PC games, I can’t help it. Topless Robot put together their list of “10 Insanely Badass DOS Game Boxes”, and it’s good reading, mostly because they know the worth of…
If you’ve got the capability right now, whether on GameCube, Wii or even PC, go put Wind Waker on. And just look at it. Soak up how a video game released almost a decade ago still looks like it could have come out yesterday. Once you’re done, ask yourself “how did Nintendo do that?”. Then…
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