Ethan Gach

Mario Maker 2‘s New Speedrunning Mode Looks A Lot Like A Popular Fan-Made Hack

In addition to the ability to play as Link, Super Mario Maker 2’s latest update has added a new speedrunning mode that’s remarkably similar to one rom hacker’s mod of an SNES emulator called Quantum Mario. This has raised questions about Nintendo’s relationship with the Mario homebrew community and the designers that power its Mario…

Goodbye To Cecilia D’Anastasio, Planeswalking Cyber Sleuth And Aspiring Palutena Main

Cecilia D’Anastasio, Kotaku Senior Reporter and resident Overwatchologist, has completed her last sidequest around these parts today and is heading off to new adventures elsewhere. We’d like to wish Cecilia the best as she embarks on the newest chapter in her career and tries to sell a whole new group of strangers on the merits…

Bungie is raising Destiny 2‘s Power Cap to 960 and the Pinnacle Cap to 970 when Season of Dawn starts December 10, the studio announced in its weekly blog post today Artifact power bonuses will also reset, so anyone not already at the current cap with gear will find themselves behind again. 

Rocket League Replaces Loot Boxes With Pricey Item Shop [Update]

Rocket League players will no longer have to worry about grinding for new crates and the keys that unlock them in order to get the custom skins they want. But the new alternative will hurt their wallets. Yesterday, Rocket League’s Blueprint update went live, kicking off season 12 and adding a new item shop where…

Destiny 2‘s Next Update Finally Explores The Mystery Of Saint-14

He’s a robot, a titan, and he died a long time ago, but who was Saint-14 really? The character has been a part of Destiny lore going back to the launch of the first game in 2014, but players are now more curious about him than ever, because Bungie has revealed that he’ll be a…

Gwent Is Shutting Down On Consoles

It’s no surprise that Gwent, The Witcher card game, is most popular on PC and iOS: the game’s hardcore competetive scene is on PC, while mobile is a lot more convenient for everyone else. Today, CD Projekt Red announced it’s pulling the plug on Gwent for consoles. “[W]e have made a tough decision: to discontinue…

Bungie shared some more details about Destiny 2‘s upcoming Season of Dawn on a developer livestream today. While there was no mention of a new raid or the return of Trials of Osiris, they did show off some of the Sundial activity which looks like Prison of Elders meets the Infinite Forest

I’ve Had To Kick My Modern Habits To Stop Dying In Halo: Reach Multiplayer

A little figure wearing red space pads flickers onto my screen from behind a pillar and I immediately pull the left trigger on my Xbox One controller to zoom down my rifle’s sights. Except this is Halo: Reach, and there are none. My blue space dude lobs a grenade instead. The red man disappears again.…

Halo: Reach Launches On PC, Becomes Third Most Played Game On Steam

The remaster of Halo: Reach came out on PC today, marking the series’ return to the platform after 12 long years, and Steam users have given it a Spartan’s welcome, with over 100,000 people playing at the same time making it one of the top five games on Valve’s storefront The game’s only been out…

The State Of Xbox One In 2019

Nearing the end of its life, the Xbox One feels less like a box for spinning video game discs and more like a platform for selling digital subscriptions. The pitch of a mostly-digital future that blew up in Microsoft’s face the year the Xbox One launched is now mostly here in 2019 and it’s not…

Persona 5 Royal drops on Playstation 4 on March 31 so you can start and never finish the sprawling JRPG all over again. The special edition adds more characters, a new part of Tokyo to explore, and an additional semester of school because who doesn’t want that?

The console ports for CrossCode, one of last year’s excellent action RPGs, have been delayed until sometime next year. Deck13, the game’s publisher, says it’s currently working on the Xbox One version with PS4 and Switch to follow. The Post Game DLC is also still in the works.

Ghost Recon Breakpoint Players Really Want AI Teammates

Ghost Recon Breakpoint players want to see the game become more tactical, less grindy, and be less online, according to the results of a player survey Ubisoft shared on Friday. Thousands of players participated in the survey. The requested changes and additions, many of which are already in the works, aren’t that surprising to anyone…

Super Mario Maker 2 Update Adds Link

Super Mario Maker 2 is getting a free update this Thursday that adds a bunch of new enemies and blocks for players to build levels out of, including a Master Sword power-up that will transform Mario into Link. When Mario becomes Link he’s able to use the character’s abilities, ranging from smacking enemies with his…

Buyer Beware: Nintendo’s Black Friday Switch Bundle Is The Old, Low-Battery Model

Some Black Friday Switch Bundles Include Older Versions Of The Console With Worse Battery Life There’s a $300 Switch bundle that includes a digital version of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe on sale this Black Friday at a lot of stores. It would be a solid deal, but there’s a catch: The bundle includes the original…

Google Says It’ll Give Refunds To Anyone Who Bought Stadia’s Free December Games

The Stadia launch games Tomb Raider and Farming Simulator 19 will be free to Pro subscribers of Google’s streaming platform in December, the company said yesterday. This would have been a raw deal for anyone who has purchased either game since Stadia went live, on November 19, but Google added last night that it will…

Dota 2 Gets Total Overhaul

I’ve spent over 1,000 hours playing Dota 2 and reading through the game’s latest set of patch notes is breaking my brain. The game’s Outlander’s update went live today, adding not just two more heroes but upending massive aspects of the game, including item delivery, teleportation, late game advantages, and item progressions. The base game…

Some Call Of Duty Players Find Themselves Spawning In Mid-Air

Call of Duty matches can be fast-paced slaughterhouses, which is why the game usually respawns you away from other players and, uh, on the ground. Recently, players have been noticing that’s not always the case. “Incredible, just incredible,” Reddit user McNugg2710 said in a November 22 post of a video showing them respawning out in…

The Elder Scrolls: Blades, the series’ free-to-play mobile spin-off, won’t come to Switch until next year, Bethesda announced today. The port was originally supposed to launch this fall, but the company said that it needed to be delayed due to work on improving the game, including an overhaul of how loot works.

I Never Knew Dying In Borderlands 3 Could Feel So Brutal

Sometimes you really need to kill a dude, and you just can’t, and it sucks. Borderlands 3 is not a heavy game. It’s full of bright colors, fun sounds, and jokes (even if most of them aren’t very funny). I would no more liken it to a Dark Souls game as put orange juice in…