For nearly a decade, there hasn’t been more than a vestige of a black society in the official world of Dungeons & Dragons. There have been black people, but no black civilizations except for a relatively small group of survivors of a catastrophe and locals living under colonists’ control. Back in 2008, D&D’s traditional African-analogue…
Brawlhalla is a rebellious platform fighter born of a genre dominated by exactly one game. Unlike that game, it didn’t have 15 years of lovable Nintendo characters to work with, or four iterations’ worth of fans. Instead, Brawlhalla is weird. It’s got a fighter made out of the stars and galaxies of space who battles…
There are songs about death. There are movies about death, books about death, games about death. And yet, the $20 billion industry surrounding how we handle our dead is often invisible. It’s an industry that exists deep in funeral home basements or cramped offices, one that people only talk about reluctantly and in the worst…
“Hopefully, I can actually win one,” YouTuber Whisper Plays breathed into his microphone before he parachuted off a plane in PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. His mechanical keyboard clacked loudly as he dropped down and collected his first few items: a few packs of 9 m.m. ammo and a P1911 pistol, which actually takes .45 ammo. “I’m not…
Decades of D&D fans repeating the old adage “Friends don’t let friends play half-orcs” may have had some tangible effects. Yesterday, FiveThirtyEight publisheddataon the most D&D popular classes and races and, well, half-orcs only make up about five percent of all D&D characters played between August 15 and September 15. For comparison, more than fifty…
On Tuesday, Fortnite publisher Epic Games filed civil complaints against two alleged associates of the website Addicted Cheats who apparently used the site’s aimbotting services to kill Twitch streamers live on camera. For $5 to $15 monthly subscriptions, Addicted Cheats’ botting services aid players in tracking, aiming at and killing enemies in PvP games. To…
Since Fortnite announced its battle royale mode, there’s been a little, uh, tension between its developer Epic Games and the developer of that other battle royale game, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds. What’s come next has felt a little like an arms race for accessibility, throughout which Fortnite’s free, console-supported battle royale mode is quickly gaining traction. Prior to…
I was trimming the weeds on my overgrown Stardew Valley farm when I heard a mumbled “Canal Street” over the subway intercom. Shit, I thought, looking up from my seat on the J train. I should have gotten off two stops ago I collected my belongings and dashed out of the closing doors and onto…
Boo! It’s another Overwatch Halloween event! What’s that? You weren’t surprised? You’ve been saving up your credits for months so you could nab a new Zenyatta skin? Well…. Overwatch just announced “Halloween Terror,” which is live now with a few new skins and two PvE brawls.
I have never beaten Dark Souls 3 and, also, I have never had a glorious father-son fishing moment. Part of why I love Twitch is because it lets me live those moments vicariously. ParoXitiCstreams himself fishing on Twitch, often with his son. He’ll take viewers to the tackle shop, on a kayak, at the pond, by…
Two unsigned, ambitious competitors shook up the competitive Super Smash Bros. 4 community last night after shutting down the game’s best player, Gonzalo “Zero” Barrios, in two fun-to-watch upsets. At the Big House 7, Smash 4’s biggest tournament in the midwest, Zero Suit Samus player Tyler “Marss” Martins and Corrin player Brian “Cosmos” Kalu each…
Last week, Wizards of the Coast reimagined their classic horror game Betrayal at House on the Hill in a Dungeons & Dragons high fantasy setting. Back in 2004, Betrayal captured the curiosity and fear that comes with crawling through a haunted mansion with mechanics that brilliantly mirrored its horror theme. Slowly and deliberately, players map…
In survival game Ark: Survival Evolved, Church of Satan member Citizen V (his “under the horns name”) ignores the naked and empty-handed low-level players who supplicate at his tribe’s floating base. It’s an opulent base where his tribe hatches pteranodons and cultivates their naval armada. “Anyone worth my time, who enriches my life and brings…
Blizzard’s Battle.net service is giving players what they want—access to their gaming friends on every device, whenever. It’s a push for hyper convenience, but will undoubtedly lead many players to wonder which chat service they should use. On Battle.net’s beta version of its desktop app, a “Social” tab is now visible. Players can voice or…
Goodbye, Miiverse, you beautiful, mutant thing. If you’re a Nintendo fan, it’s hard not to get a little emotional about it. The Miiverse was a great expanse for small, lonely shouts into the abyss that is Nintendo’s communication infrastructure. Sometimes, we saw great, well-rendered gestures of love for dear Nintendo characters like Splatoon’s Callie. Other…
A bloodied wolf man birthing an unspeakable thing. The top half of a schoolgirl clawing her way across a marble floor. A soldier licking his lover’s eyeball. Heads up: This article contains explicit pictures and descriptions of sexual violence and gore. (Originally published 6/30/2016) This is ero guro, a Japanese artistic movement dating back to…
Nintendo and comics publisher Dark Horse have partnered to make an official Arms graphic novel, slated for Fall, 2018.
Last night, while a meatloaf roasted in my oven and I moved some kale around a pan, it suddenly dawned on me that nothing in my life more resembles a video game than cooking. If somebody had cut out the time between 9 and 10 p.m. yesterday, when I shopped for, prepared and cooked dinner,…
In Battlegrounds, I always close the door behind me. It’s not a matter of strategy so much as it’s a psychological thing—it makes me feel safe. The house I’ve entered is a safe, isolated little haven full of goodies just for me, and nobody, ever, will come up behind me and shoot me in the…
Battlegrounds’ Steam reviews tanked over the weekend after over 20,000 negative reviews, many from China, flooded the blockbuster survival-shooter’s page. Chinese players appear to be suffering from the worst connectivity to Battlegrounds in the world and these players are furious that, now, Battlegrounds is advertising a paid, third-party “internet accelerator” right on its menu. After…
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