Heather Alexandra

What Wolfenstein 2′s Bloody Twist Has To Say About Its Protagonist’s Body

Wolfenstein’s BJ Blazkowicz is one of the original first person shooter protagonists. He is a muscle bound action hero, the all-American army man. Through examining BJ’s body, Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus paints a thin line between power fantasy and Aryan ideals. SPOILERS AHEAD After his injury at the start of The New Order, BJ…

EA released a blog post today outlining changes to Star Wars Battlefront II’s controversial loot crate system. Among the changes are the removal of epic loot from crates and a minimum level requirement for upgrading star cards. We’ll see if it helps when the game launches next month.

Players Are Taking Amazing Super Mario Odyssey Photos

Super Mario Odyssey has tons of worlds and memorable sights. Thankfully, the game’s snapshot mode allows players to take pictures of their favorite memories or create bizarre pieces of modern art. This post will contain light location, enemy, and costume spoilers. A simple press down on the D-pad brings up Super Mario Odyssey’s snapshot mode,…

The Easiest Way To Earn Coins In Super Mario Odyssey

Super Mario Odyssey has tons of coins to collect and items to purchase. One special area with dozens of gold coins makes it easy to max out your wallet and transform Mario into Uncle Pennybags. The most effective location to gather coins in Super Mario Odyssey is in Bowser’s Kingdom. When arriving at the Beneath…

Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus: The Kotaku Review

The warm sun beats down on a main street in Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus, just in time for the Victory Day parade. Uniformed SS march down swastika-filled streets to thunderous applause. By the old diner, two members of the Ku Klux Klan practice their German. Everyone is white and happy. And it is so…

The People Behind Infamous Are Making A Samurai Game

Sucker Punch, the studio behind Infamous and Sly Cooper, has announced a new game. Ghost Of Tsushima, coming to the Playstation 4 focuses on feudal samurai. It has been three years since Sucker Punch’s previous game, the Playstation 4 title Infamous Second Son. A self dubbed “action, stealth adventure game,” Ghost Of Tsushima will feature…

Guacamelee 2 will be coming to the Playstation 4, exciting lucha libre fans and chicken enthusiasts around the world. Not now though. “Soon-ish.”

There’s More To Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus‘ Opening Than Sheer Brutality

Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus opens with a nightmare. This deep descent into BJ Blazkowicz’ personal hell highlights the personal costs of violence in the home and shows how oppression and hate repeat themselves. This post discusses topics of domestic abuse, animal abuse, and racism At the end of Wolfenstein: The New Order, protagonist BJ…

Binary Domain Treats NPCs Like Humans

Last night, I finished a playthrough of Binary Domain on Kotaku’s Twitch channel. The 2012 sci-fi shooter is rough around the edges but creates meaningful, intelligent interactions between players and their AI companions. SPOILERS AHEAD Binary Domain is a 2012 action shooter by Sega. A special forces team is sent into Japan to investigate a…

Bungie Says Destiny 2 PC Players Won’t Get Banned Unfairly, But Some Dispute That [Updated]

Destiny 2’s PC launch hit a rough spot Tuesday when numerous players took to the web to declare that they had been banned from the game unjustly. Many of those players speculated that the bans were due to third party programs such as Discord and Open Broadcaster Software. In a blog post today, developer Bungie…

We’re finishing our playthrough of Binary Domain right now on Twitch. It turns out that Heather was a robot the whole time!

Twitch Adds Loot Boxes With Temporary Emotes

Twitch has introduced loot crates for Halloween which offer temporary emotes. The crates offer random rewards, as well as a permanent reward for collecting the whole set. It’s weird. A Twitch blog post outlines a Halloween promotion in which players can spent “bits” to receive special loot crates. Bits are a digital currency bought with…

Nine Speedruns That Make Horror Games Way Less Terrifying

Horror games strike a balance between player control and dread. Getting chased by a murderer with giant scissors or dealing with legions of zombies is pretty scary. Thankfully, brave speedrunners are here to tackle them for us. Resident Evil Remake, Knife Only Resident Evil knife only runs are a good way of ruining your childhood.…

Fire Emblem Warriors: The Kotaku Review

Playing Fire Emblem Warriors feels a bit like herding a pack of ravenous lions. Countless enemies clash against heroes in glorious combat that mixes strategy and absurdity. It’s occasionally overwhelming but if you can tame the mayhem, the result is beautiful. The new game, which is out on the Switch and New 3DS, is part…

We’re charging into battle and beating up thousands of dudes in Fire Emblem Warriors right now on Twitch

What Destiny 2 and Overwatch Animations Tell Us About Their Characters

Even if we can’t see out character’s face and body, animation tells us a lot about characters in first person games. Heather takes a look in this critical video. Transcript: I was playing Destiny 2 and running public events for my weekly. After a while, I decided to punch every enemy I came across and…

Bungie Cancels Destiny 2‘s Trials For Two Weeks Because Of Glitches

Destiny 2’s competitive Trials of the Nine multiplayer mode will be delayed for two weeks after a glitch involving emotes allowed players to hide out of bounds. Earlier this week, Bungie removed players’ ability to purchase the ‘bureaucratic walk’ emote after discovering they could could use it to clip out of bounds. Players who previously…

A Game Where You Play As An AI With Amnesia

Transfer is a short narrative game by Abyssal Uncreations focusing on artificial intelligence and discovery. Taking the role of an AI after the end of the world, you need to find out what happened and what comes next. It’s moody and intriguing. It’s this week’s indie pick. At the start of Transfer, you are assigned…

‘Cupsonas’ Are A Thing Now

Cuphead’s difficult but cute. The game’s cartoony art-style brings everything to life with bouncy charm. Some fans have embraced the game’s visuals and created their own cupheaded characters. Riffing on the term “fursona,” referring to a personalized animal avatar, fans are calling their creations “cupsonas.” Some characters are teacups, others are frothing cappuccinos, and more…

Due to (ironically) technical difficulties, we’re switching our livestream over to Binary Domain right now on Twitch.