Ethan Gach

Spider-Man: The Kotaku Review

Insomniac Games’ new Spider-Man adventure on the PS4 is a fun comic book brawler with some good story beats elevated by a system of acrobatics that features some of the most intuitive and exhilarating movement I’ve ever experienced in a game. It’s extremely fun, if you’re okay with a version of New York City that…

Today Nightdive Studios released the source port update for System Shock: Enhanced Edition on PC. Not to be confused with the full remake the studio is working on, the update does things like add higher resolution options and mod support for the existing version, while also fixing many of its bugs. 

Microsoft is rolling out Alexa support for Xbox One starting with the Insider program. This new set of features, called Xbox Skill, works with the Echo and other Alexa and Cortana-enabled devices, and includes being able to power the system on. It doesn’t yet include a voice command for getting more exclusives.

Far Cry 5 Players Hoped The Game Was Changing Seasons, But The Truth Is Different 

Far Cry 5 finally got a new game plus mode last week along with its third and final DLC, a set of brief new zombie missions. The new additions have inspired players, always looking for mysteries in the game’s fictional open world of Hope County, Montana, to desperately search for signs the game may be…

THQ Nordic announced today it’s acquired the rights to the 2012 fantasy RPG, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning It was created by the now defunct 38 Studios, a game company founded by Curt Schilling and which the former Red Sox pitcher eventually ran into the ground. The game was good though.

Game Developer Brianna Wu Loses Bid For Congress, Says She Didn’t Fundraise Hard Enough

Game developer Brianna Wu lost her bid for Congress yesterday and in a series of tweets acknowledged shortcomings of her campaign that she said she’d fix for a new bid for office in 2020. “Our campaign raised almost $200,000,” she noted in Twitter shortly after polls closed. “And truth be told, I did not put…

Call of Duty: Black Ops 4‘s new battle royale mode, Blackout, will feature 80 players per match during the beta, Treyarch told Game Informer after months of refusing to say. That’s 20 people less than PUBG and Fortnite, though the studio says the number could go higher for the full game later on.

Game Developer Brianna Wu’s Very Long Shot For Congress

When I arrive at the headquarters of Brianna Wu For Congress, a modest house near the bottom of a quiet street in Dedham, Massachusetts, the candidate is just back from her morning run. She’s practically electric while telling me and her husband about a group of construction workers she’d run past. She had thought they…

Tournament Underdogs Won This Year’s Dota 2 International

Tournament underdogs OG won this year’s Dota 2 International after a tense five game series against higher ranked rivals LGD. Victory must have felt especially sweet for the team’s skipper, Johan “N0tail” Sundstein, the only player who has been on the team since its original formation three years ago. OG has had diehard fans ever…

New Xbox All Access Program Lets You Pay Monthly For An Xbox, Game Pass, And Xbox Live

Microsoft has a new monthly financing program for the Xbox One called Xbox All Access, according to a blog post over at the Xbox website. The program allows users to commit to a two-year plan where they pay monthly for either an Xbox One S or an Xbox One X and subscriptions to both Xbox…

Almost Nobody Predicted This Weekend’s Wild Dota 2 Tournament

The International 2018 ends tomorrow. By day’s end, over $25 million will be divided up among 18 teams from around the world with the lion’s share, $11.1 million, going to first place. Whoever that turns out to be at this point, though, will be a team almost nobody saw coming. The tournament for Valve’s action…

It’s Been A Groundbreaking Month For Ocarina Of Time Speedrunning

The last month has seen some dramatic changes to The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time speedrunning, especially in the completionist category. A handful of newly-discovered glitches and shortcuts have blown open the doors on what was previously thought possible. One of the scene’s most accomplished players has managed to combine them to achieve some…

Fortnite’s Latest Update Brings An Actual Movie To Its Drive-In Theater

I have yet to make it through the entire three minute fan movie currently playing on loop in the northeastern part of Fortnite’s map without getting shot in the back, but that’s part of the fun. The game’s V5.30 patch hit earlier today, bringing new items and modes, as well as a working projector to…

Twitch Will Stream Months-Long Pokemon Marathon Starting Next Week

Over the next several months Twitch will stream the first 932 episodes of the Pokemon anime series, as well as every movie. The livestream will begin August 27 and last into 2019, the company announced today, making it not only the longest TV-like marathon Twitch done to date but also a perfect test of the…

Reigns: Game of Thrones, a mashup of the fantasy TV show and the Tinder-like card game, is coming to mobile and PC sometime in October. While it’ll include all the big characters from the show, the game explores possible futures for them, meaning it won’t be bound by existing canon.

There Are Never Enough AA Batteries Around To Power My Xbox One Controller

Two AA batteries. That’s all I recently needed to turn my Xbox One controller on and get back to steaming dumplings in Overcooked 2. It was around 1:00 a.m. on a Saturday, though, and I didn’t have any left. I found an Energizer box crammed upside down in a coffee table drawer. It was empty.…

Warhammer Card Game Feels Like A Heavy Metal Hearthstone

Not too long ago I heard about a Warhammer 40k card game on smartphones. I decided, as part of my fool’s errand to try to wrap my head around the new explosion in Warhammer video games, to check it out. What I found was a competent game made irresistible by how unflinchingly metal it is.…

Guacamelee 2: The Kotaku Review

Guacamelee 2 feels great to play. It’s a demanding platformer with elements drawn from the beat ‘em ups of old but executed with such precision they feel modern. The way throwing a punch can be intertwined with hoping over a pit of lava transforms every obstacle into a puzzle. Despite surface similarities and homages to…

Twitch Cuts Ad-Free Viewing Benefit From Prime Membership

New Twitch Prime members will no longer have access to ad-free viewing after September 14, the streaming platform Twitch announced today. Existing subscribers will still be able to watch streams uninterrupted until their next renewal date, at which point the ads will be inescapable for anyone who doesn’t sign back up for the site’s old…

HD remasters of both Grandia I and II will be coming to Switch this winter publisher GungHo Online announced on Facebook Both are JRPGs from Sega Saturn and Dreamcast eras respectfully defined by a unique turn-based battle system that incorporates active movement around the battlefield. Grandia II is currently already available on Steam