Today on Highlight Reel we have bad swings, dolphin smiles, clustered NPCs, and much more!

I never really thought much about the Dreamcast until it had all but vanished. By then, it had become a minor obsession of mine: a major console with weird games I’d heard and read so much about, but never gotten to play. The Dreamcast had a short life span in stores and friend’s houses, getting reduced to an exotic…

The Missing begins with two messages: “This game was made with the belief that nobody is wrong for being what they are” and “This game contains explicit content, including extreme violence, sexual topics, and depictions of suicide.” The messages cut straight to the chase: The Missing is both a sweet love story and one…

Over the last few months, Overwatch has looked less like a team shooter and more like the inside of a microwave bag of popcorn. A popular and beloved crowd control mechanic called the “boop” has become so prevalent that it’s causing anguish from players who would rather compete at a first-person shooter than pop idly…

If you’re looking for a lengthy, complicated, nuanced conversation about microtransactions in video games—and why they trigger so much rage—then you sure have come to the right place. That’s what this week’s Kotaku Splitscreen is all about.

We sometimes hear the tales behind the making of Nintendo’s greatest games: the Zeldas, the Marios and the Metroids. Let us bend our ears for another tale, this time of the making of Gold Digger, a game about a finger interacting with a nose.

Call of Duty is one of the biggest gaming franchises in the world, and Activision licenses the brand out to other companies to make merchandise. A lot of the stuff you’ll see the Call of Duty name plastered across seems to be designed for children, which is raising some questions: Why is Activision selling stuff based…

Mario Party is a cruel game that intentionally stokes chaos between friends. Last night I agreed to play the latest game, Super Mario Party, and discovered that this new entry in the franchise has tried to add a form of sportsmanship by making your characters high five each other. It does not have the intended result.

It’s obvious that parking your butt on the couch for several hours straight playing a game isn’t good for you, but sometimes it’s hard to resist. Here’s how to do it without messing up your body.