Cecilia D'Anastasio

Illness Cost This Woman A Job. Now She Streams Diablo II From A Farm

“My mom always likes to say that I was hatched,” Diablo 2 streamerAlara Shadelaughed. We were sitting in her streaming headquarters, a totem-filled temple to the 2001 dark fantasy role-playing game. The walls were decked with flaming skulls, glistening black swords and figurines of sub-human beasts. Outside her window, a dozen horses milled about, alongside…

Five Things That Are Still Broken In Battlegrounds Even After ‘Launch’

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds is finally, officially released. After such a rich life in early access—a life haunted by glitches and server outages—I bet you’re wondering how Battlegrounds is holding up after its 1.0 debut. Well, Battlegrounds in 1.0 is still the glitchy, adrenaline-filled, totally random game that has seduced millions. I love this game as much…

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds Finally Comes Out For Real

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, the glitchy but charismatic survival shooter that has averaged over one million players in early access, is finally seeing a full release. It’s been a long, wild ride for the genre-defining hit, and with Battlegrounds updating to 1.0 at 2 am ET tomorrow, that ride’s not even close to over. The last-man-standing game…

The Switch Just Got Its First Smash-Style Fighter

A little platform fighter beat its gamedaddy Super Smash Bros. to the Nintendo Switch. A fun, easy-to-pick-up party game that simplifies aspects of Smash, Brawlout also misses out on a lot of what gave Smash character. Brawlout is a Smash-like, or a game that takes its mechanics from the genre-defining Nintendo fighting game. Eight months…

Crawl, a party game where your friends are dungeon monsters who want you to die, is now on the Switch. It’s a righteously good and dark as hell local multiplayer with some innovative mechanics that keep the game fresh every time.

Ubisoft Changes For Honor‘s Boob-Groping Emote [UPDATE]

Medieval fighting game For Honor is no-holds-barred gore and grime. So yesterday when the game replaced one of its racier emotes with a more tempered one, fans were a little peeved. For Honor’s Valkyrie hero is a beefy lady who fights with a spear and shield. Last month, she received a new execution, an emote…

The Dungeons & Dragons movie that’s been in pre-productionbasically foreverjust got a release date on July 23rd, 2021, io9 reports. Paramount Studios also set dates for the new G.I. Joe movie (March 27th, 2020) and Micronauts (October 16th, 2020).

Overwatch Players Are Actually Embracing Moira

It takes Overwatch fans mere minutes to churn out fanart for each newly-released character, but a few long weeks or months to welcome them into their competitive mode teams. But for maybe the first time ever, Overwatch’s newest hero, the mad scientist Moira, has been immediately accepted into the game’s competitive community with wide open…

Eight Anime Films Worth Watching That Aren’t By Studio Ghibli

What are your favorite anime movies? Spirited Away? Princess Mononoke? My Neighbor Totoro? Eh, I could see that coming. These Studio Ghibli movies are masterpieces. They’re also not the only anime films out there. Crazy, right? It’s safe to say that Ghibli corners the market for 90-minute escapist anime that makes you feel very nice…

The State Of Anime In 2017

In 2017, anime is being stretched in all directions. With a glut of new live-action anime adaptations, it’s being stretched into reality. With the airing of Naruto’s 720th (and final) episode, it’s stretching into the future. With behemoth streaming channels nabbing up licensing deals, it’s stretching into the mainstream. And by moving into the mainstream…

Track: Telecaster Stripes | Artist: Polkadot Stingray | Album: Honenuki E.P. Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

FCC Votes To Overturn Net Neutrality Rules, Brings Us One Step Closer To A Destroyed Internet

Today, the Federal Communications Commission voted to repeal net neutrality protections in a totally unsurprising move that will, in all likelihood, royally screw the internet as we know it. With net neutrality gutted, browsing the internet could resemble the token ‘90s experience of waiting for a porn image to load pixel by pixel—unless you pay…

Top Symmetra Player’s Overwatch Bans Won’t Stop Him From Picking His Favorite Hero

“Report him,” an Overwatch playersaid over team chat last week, referencing a Twitch streamer who goes by Stevooo. It was right after Stevooo hastily locked down the hero Symmetra. In text, the player then politely asked all 12 of the match’s players to report Stevooo “for poor teamwork.” Another player responded: “I did 5 times…

Battlegrounds Developers Accidentally Add Cameltoes, Remove Them

On Saturday, players noticed that survival shooter PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds featured cameltoe, or clothed labia, on its test servers’ female models. The game’s developers say that wasn’t intentional, however, and as of a patch last night, Battlegrounds’ female characters are exposed no more. Players first noticed last weekend that Battlegrounds’ test server had made a slight…

On Xbox, Battlegrounds Is More Of The Janky, Troubled Game I Love

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds’ is on Xbox today. The console’s more casual feel benefits players who prefer a more strategic, slow-moving pace, but that’s in part because the game’s signature jankiness is significantly jankier here—it’s hard to play ambitiously when everything from switching weapons to jumping off the airplane is just a little more finicky. If you…

Horror Game Hello Neighbor Is No Fun

Hello Neighbor is a stealth horror game with a winning premise and perhaps the worst execution of any game I’ve played this year. In the game, released last week for PC, Mac and Xbox One, the player sneaks into his insidious neighbor’s house. Developer Dynamic Pixels allegedly designed that neighbor as an advanced AI who…

Smash 4‘s Top Bayonetta Player Shortcircuited The Weekend’s Tournament

Saleem “Salem” Young, who plays the controversial Smash 4 fighter Bayonetta, clinically tore through the game’s top brawn at this weekend’s Boot Camp tournament like, as one commentator put it, a “a shark in the water.” Young rocketed into Smash 4’s top 10 rankings over the last year after achieving mastery of Bayonetta, a characterwidely…

Hawaii State Rep Is Drafting Bill Barring Minors From Buying Games With Loot Boxes

Imagine a 17-year-old gamer tossing a copy of the Teen-rated Star Wars Battlefront 2 onto his local GameStop’s checkout counter, only to be asked: “Sir, may I see your ID?” A Hawaii in which games with microtransactions are illegal for minors to purchase is one that state legislator Chris Lee is now hoping to realize.…

The Live-Action Alita: Battle Angel Trailer Exists And It’s Uncomfortable

The guy who produced Avatar is adapting the classic manga Battle Angel Alita to the big screen, because that’s certainly what we needed, and there’s a new trailer for it. Although Avatar writer James Cameron wrote the screenplay (argh), Robert Rodriguez, who directed Sin City, will be directing Alita: Battle Angel. Cameron has saidthat the…

Fortnite Battle Royale’s New 50 vs 50 Mode Is Awesome

Fortnite Battle Royale just got a 50 vs. 50 mode that’s everything I ever wanted a neighborhood game of Cops and Robbers to be. It encourages a hive-mind approach to a battle royale game that works surprisingly well. Fortnite is a game about building forts, shooting zombies and battling the apocalypse. In September, developer Epic…