Mike Fahey

Only One RPG Has Music From The Rocky IV And Transformers: The Movie Guy

Welcome to Morning Music, Kotaku’s daily hangout for folks who love video games and the cool-ass sounds they make. Today we’re listening to music from an indie RPG composed by Vince DiCola and Kenny Meriedeth. DiCola of course, is best known for the synth-driven soundtracks to Staying Alive, Rocky IV, and (lest we forget) 1986’s…

The Playable Pac-Man Is A Great Touch In Dontnod’s Latest Mystery, Twin Mirror

Twin Mirror, the latest game from Life is Strange developer Dontnod, is a dark psychological thriller set in a podunk mining town. Like many a small town, the best thing about the fictional Basswood, West Virginia is the grungy old Pac-Man machine in the back of the local dive bar. I wasn’t expecting the Pac-Man…

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

The weekend is for figuring out what my children want for Christmas aside from “a toy” and “get the fick out of my bedroom.” It’s also for playing video games, and it turns out there are quite a few to play. I find myself with a glut of games I want to play as we…

Persona 5 Strikers Comes West On February 23, With A Surprise PC Port

According to an unlisted video on Atlus’ YouTube channel, since pulled, the Dynasty Warriors-style sequel to Persona 5 is finally coming to North America and Europe on February 23, including a release on Steam for PC, along with PS4 and Switch. That’ll wake you up, get you up, and get you out there. Released in…

World Of Warcraft Shadowlands’ Alt-Leveling System Is A Refreshing Change

Unlike World of Warcraft’s Legion and Battle For Azeroth expansions, which gave players a choice on which zones to level up their characters, Shadowlands’ story campaign is very linear. Fortunately you only have to play through it once. With the new Threads of Fate mode, players who’ve reached max level can skip the story with…

Immortal‘s Version Of Assassin’s Creed‘s Leap Of Faith Is More Of A Panicked Plummet

There’s a moment at the beginning of Immortals Fenyx Rising, the new open-world adventure from the developers of Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, where it feels like newly-forged hero Fenyx is going to go full-on assassin. She climbs a massive stature, surveys the land, and then prepares to leap gracefully to the ground. She would have done…

This year The Lego Group is celebrating a quarter-century of Lego video games, beginning with a historical podcast series starring documentarian Ethan Vincent and former Kotaku boss and hair model Brian Crecente. It’s called Bits ‘N Bricks, and you can listen to its intro episode right now.

Genshin Impact Wins Apple And Google Play’s Best Game Of 2020

Huh, people seem to like massive free-to-play action role-playing games with serious The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild vibes. miHoYo’s Genshin Impact came out on top of both Google and Apple’s official game of the year lists, beating out whatever the Candy Crush people are doing and all of those games advertised in…

The Massive Radio Telescope From GoldenEye Just Collapsed

The massive Arecibo Observatory radio telescope, made famous in the James Bond movie GoldenEye and paid homage to in the classic Nintendo 64 game, completely collapsed early Tuesday morning. This breaking news comes just a few weeks after the announcement that the invaluable astronomy tool would be demolished due to fears that it would completely…

The Switch Version Of Immortals: Fenyx Rising Tries Real Hard

Assassin’s Creed Valhalla is not on the Switch. Neither is Watch Dogs Legion. The only one of this fall’s three vast, open-world Ubisoft games to grace the Switch is Immortals: Fenyx Rising. It doesn’t look as good or run as well as it does on Xboxes and PlayStations, of course, but for a Switch game…

Official Die-Cast Poké Ball Replicas Run $100 Apiece, Should Not Be Thrown

Launching just in time for Pokémon Day, February 27, The Wand Company has turned everybody’s favorite pocket monster prison into a $100 metal replica, complete with proximity-sensing lights, a numbered collector’s case, and a warning for it to never, ever be thrown. Obviously, someone is going to spend $100 on this metal beauty and chuck…

Final Fantasy XIV’s final update of 2020, Futures Rewritten patch 5.4, launches on December 8. Along with new dungeons, main story quests, and trials, the patch adds Explorer Mode, which lets players explore dungeons and take screenshots without worrying about getting murdered by enemies. I’m down for some of that. 

Bakugan For Switch Has The Most Boring Battles

Remember back in July when Nintendo teased a new third-party game for the Switch and it turned out to be Wayforward’s Bakugan: Champions of Vestroia? The actual game is nearly as disappointing as the announcement turned out to be. Not only does it have the most tedious Bakugan battles ever, we don’t even get to…

Grab My Head And Fly, World Of Warcraft Angel

World of Warcraft’s newly-launched Shadowlands expansion takes players to Bastion, a world populated by angels who fly majestically through the sky, gripping our faces tight. Bastion, the first major questing area of the expansion, is basically where the white Magic: The Gathering cards live. It’s got rolling alabaster plains, gorgeous mythical creatures, and a race…

All The Big Games Coming Out In Fall 2020

It’s fall and not just any fall. It’s election year fall. It’s two brand-new video game consoles fall. It’s tentatively stepping outside to see if everything is okay fall. We’d probably be better off staying inside baking pies and playing video games. Fortunately, there are plenty of games on the way. As of this writing,…

Capcom’s Latest Retro Console Is So Adorable

Recently listed on Amazon Japan (via Siliconera) with a release date of December 1, Capcom’s Retro Station is a cute-as-a-button machine with five Street Fighter and five Mega Man games built-in. According to the Amazon Japan listing, the Retro Station is a showcase for two of Capcom’s more venerable series. There’s Street Fighter II, Street…

Chadwick Boseman Has A Street Named After Him In Spider-Man: Miles Morales

Along with a touching tribute in the end credits of Spider-Man: Miles Morales, late Black Panther actor Chadwick Boseman also gets a street named after him in the game’s version of New York City. Originally discovered by Reddit user RollieDell, Boseman Way is located on a stretch of the game’s 42nd Street, between 3rd Avenue…

Sorry, Animal Crossing Time Travelers, You Can’t Skip Ahead To The Holidays

Animal Crossing: New Horizons players who use their Switch system clock to jump forward in time won’t be able to get a sneak peek at what’s in store for Turkey Day (11/26) or Toy Day (12/24) this year. Unlike the game’s summer fireworks and Halloween celebrations, Thanksgiving and Christmas are date locked. Instead of being…

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

Weekends are for realizing you were so caught up in the next-gen hype you didn’t do “What Are You Playing This Weekend?” for a couple of weeks. Also, it’s about using a video game to learn about rice. If it weren’t obvious from the screenshot, I’ll be spending this weekend trying to get further in…

Avengers Gets Its First New Hero, Kate Bishop, On December 8

Not that we’ll ever truly get tired of Captain America, Ms. Marvel, Black Widow, Thor, Iron Man, and The Hulk, but it’s nice to see some new blood on the way. Kate “Hawkeye” Bishop joins the roster of Marvel’s Avengers on December 8, bringing with her a whole new story arc and a quiver full…