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Tips & GuidesHow To Choose The Right Faction In Biomutant’s First Major Choice
Within the first few hours of Biomutant, you have to make a choice. You’ll find yourself at the fulcrum of a war between two opposing factions. Whichever one you don’t choose will, by virtue of you being an unstoppable badass, eventually cease to exist. And the one you align with will dictate the rough roadmap…
By Ari Notis -
Tips & GuidesEverything You Need To Know About Creating A Biomutant Character
Following the long-standing convention of complicated role-playing games, Biomutant makes you customize your character—their stats, class, and so on—before you actually know how the game plays. You’re essentially funneled into a situation in which you make lasting decisions without fully understanding their context or long-term ramifications. The following advice should guide you. What breed should…
By Ari Notis -
CultureOdds and EndsSkyrim Is As Old As Morrowind Was When Skyrim Came Out
Wanna feel old? I sure don’t but I do now anyway, all thanks to one astute yet extremely mean tweet that popped into my timeline and instilled in me a sudden urge to burn my savings on a premium Botox job: As amateur video game historian Chris Chapman pointed out, Skyrim is officially as old…
By Ari Notis -
OpinionImpressionsKnockout City Is Actually Pretty Damn Fun
Dodgeball sucks. I recall, during some school recess years ago, getting beaned in the face with a dodgeball. Blood, everywhere. Across the pitch, some kid stood, sneering, as all the other kids laughed. I think he broke my glasses? The specifics are lost to the fog of memory, but the feeling—total, abject humiliation—remains tattooed on…
By Ari Notis -
CultureE3 Fan Registration Opens Up Next Week
Following a year off as a result of the covid-19 pandemic, E3 will return next month as an all-digital event. It’s free—despite what some earlier reports suggested—but you’ll still have to register if you want access to what passes as a show floor at an online event without an actual show floor. Registration will kick…
By Ari Notis -
CultureOdds and EndsWhat Gaming Was Like The Last Time Cicadas Emerged, 17 Years Ago
You may know them as Brood X, or Brood 10, or the Great Eastern Brood. To most people, they’re periodical cicadas—insatiable insects that emerge from subterranean slumber every 17 years for the sole purpose of fucking each other to smithereens. Over the past week or so, Brood X cicadas have started to crawl out of…
By Ari Notis -
CultureReport: Netflix Looking To Hire Video Game Executive
Netflix, the streaming service responsible for episodic masterworks like Selling Sunset and Too Hot To Handle, is looking to hire veteran gaming industry execs, according to a new report in The Information Citing “people familiar with the situation,” The Information’s report says that, over the past few weeks, Netflix approached various executives with industry experience.…
By Ari Notis -
CultureKotaku Game DiaryReturnal Converted Me To 3D Audio
Returnal, a PlayStation 5 action game about dancing with death at an inescapable time-loop space rave, is a visual delight. It’s also an aural one. And at no time is that more apparent than when you play with a pair of 3D audio headphones. Let me put it this way: Before I picked up Returnal,…
By Ari Notis -
CultureNi No Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom Is Coming To Switch
A version of Ni No Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom that includes both expansions is coming to Switch on September 17, Bandai Namco announced today. The role-playing game was previously only playable on PlayStation 4 and PC. First released in 2018, Ni No Kuni II is set centuries after the original, but wipes the slate clean…
By Ari Notis -
Tips & GuidesXbox’s Quick Resume Might Mess Up Your Games’ Playtime Count
Last fall, while playing through Mass Effect 2 for the first time ever, I noticed that my endgame hour count tallied more than 87 hours. Weird, but whatever. Moving on. Turns out, Xbox’s ballyhooed next-gen Quick Resume feature appears to keep running the clock on some games. Of all the features introduced with the Xbox…
By Ari Notis -
CultureHere’s Everything Coming To And Leaving Game Pass Soon
The back half of May will see a whole bunch of additions to the Game Pass library, anchored by Knockout City. I have lost many, many games of dodgeball IRL, so I’m looking forward to continuing that trend in an interesting-looking game that may or may not fizzle out immediately. Always impossible to predict how…
By Ari Notis -
CultureThat Time I Accidentally Started A Pandemic In Cities: Skylines
To all of the people who live in Ariberg, my Cities: Skylines metropolis, I am truly sorry. My intentions were pure, I swear. Like many other wide-eyed millennials, I set out to enact meaningful change, to prove that American cities needn’t rely so heavily on a car-centric framework. But in the process of trying to…
By Ari Notis -
CultureGhostrunner Is Getting A Sequel
Good news for fans of wall-running and paint-by-numbers cyberpunk themes (so, everyone). Ghostrunner, the first-person cyborg parkour game, is getting a sequel, publisher 505 Games announced today. It’ll be called [drum roll] Ghostrunner 2 Developed by One More Level, Ghostrunner launched last fall for PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Switch, with next-gen versions planned…
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CultureOdds and EndsWhy The Rain In Returnal Feels So Damn Good
Returnal, a PS5 game based entirely on Vaas’ iconic refrain from Far Cry 3, is an impressive game. But few things are more impressive than its rain, which feels unnervingly real in your hands, a result of the PS5 controller’s advanced haptic feedback. Today, in a post on the PlayStation Blog, Housemarque’s Gregory Louden and…
By Ari Notis -
OpinionImpressionsHood, A New Multiplayer Heist Game, Is Fine
What if Robin Hood but moodier than a mid-2000s Warped Tour ticket line? That’s the premise of Hood: Outlaws and Legends, a class-based multiplayer heist game based on a dark and stormy version of the Robin Hood folk tale, officially released yesterday for PC, Xbox, and PlayStation. (Over the weekend, those who pre-ordered were able…
By Ari Notis -
CultureXbox’s Quick Resume Will Finally Show You What Games Are Suspended
This month’s Xbox update will bring changes to Quick Resume, including, at long last, an ability to see what games you currently have suspended on your Xbox Series X or S. Last year, Microsoft’s next-gen Xboxes received attention for improved performance and graphical fidelity. But Quick Resume—a feature that allows you to juggle around half…
By Ari Notis -
CultureKotaku Game DiaryLet’s Discuss Returnal’s Bonkers Mid-Game Twist
Returnal, the PS5-exclusive action game about losing all of your hard-earned progress, features one of the most bonkers moments I’ve ever experienced in a video game. I don’t mean the ending (though, yes, that too is bonkers); it’s all to do with a series of events that go down at the midway point. For the…
By Ari Notis