Ian Walker

I Adore Final Fantasy VII Remake‘s Dorky Eco-Terrorists

Final Fantasy VII Remake is my first time playing the game that made Final Fantasy a household name. Growing up, my house was a Nintendo house. I cut my teeth on Super Mario Bros. 3 and played through Kirby Super Star more times than I can remember. My only memory of Final Fantasy VII is…

Hunting Down Animal Crossing: New Horizons’ Cherry Blossom Recipes Turned Me Into A Monster

I know what I said about Animal Crossing: New Horizons. “Take things easy,” I said. “Don’t let FOMO ruin the game for you,” I said. But last night, I failed to follow my own advice. My mad dash to round up cherry blossom recipes turned me into a ravenous monster, unable to appreciate the virtual…

If You’re Scared Of Spiders, Obsidian’s Upcoming Game Will Have A Mode Just For You

Let’s face it: spiders are scary. Even more so if they get blown up to monstrous proportions. Grounded, the upcoming survival adventure from Obsidian Entertainment, will apparently feature a special “arachnophobia mode” to help players avoid coming face-to-face with the game’s giant eight-legged monstrosities. What exactly this mode will entail is still a mystery Grounded…

Cat Calmly Ruins Twitch Stream

Most cat content on Twitch runs the gamut between harmless use of the animals as cute props and outright abuse. Very rarely does the mischief that these creatures house within their small frames get put on display as it did during a recent broadcast by fighting game streamer David “UltraDavid” Graham. While playing some Killer…

Playing Borderlands 3 Can Help Scientists With Actual Research

Ever felt guilty about playing video games while the world crumbles around you? Well, you’re in luck, because Borderlands 3 now includes a special mini-game that lets you contribute to real-world scientific research while earning in-game rewards. Borderlands Science can be found in the infirmary of Sanctuary III, the spaceship that acts as the game’s…

Everything Shown During Today’s Inside Xbox

Here’s a roundup of everything Microsoft shared during today’s Inside Xbox stream. An early version of Grounded, the upcoming survival adventure game from Obsidian Entertainment, will arrive on Xbox Game Preview on July 28. We learned that while Xbox Series X games can be stored on any external hard drives, they’ll need to be moved to…

PlayStation 5 DualSense Controller Revealed

While we’ve yet to get a glimpse of the PlayStation 5 itself, Sony has seen fit to tease us today with a first look at its controller. In a new post on the PlayStation Blog, Sony Interactive Entertainment senior vice president Hideaki Nishino unveiled the DualSense wireless controller, the company’s follow-up to the DualShock 4.…

Disco Elysium is heading to Switch, developer Studio ZA/UM revealed during a recent BBC interview. This conversation-based RPG was a smash hit when it arrived on PC last October, earning praise for its gorgeous visuals and darkly comedic tone.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons‘ Hourly Themes, Ranked

My favorite part of Animal Crossing games is the unique music for every hour of the day. In New Horizons, the tracks appear after the island’s Resident Services building is upgraded, giving players 24 individual themes to enjoy. A little bit of Ian Walker lore: I used to freelance as a music critic. It never…

Playing Dark Souls 3 With A Ring Fit Adventure Controller Is Quite The Workout

What if Dark Souls 3 was as taxing physically as it is mentally? That’s the question YouTuber Super Louis 64 sought to answer with his latest project: modifying a Ring Fit Adventure controller to work with Dark Souls In his latest video, Super Louis 64 details his efforts to play Dark Souls 3 with a…

Animal Crossing: New Horizons Patch Fixes Missing Balloons Bug

The latest Animal Crossing: New Horizons patch addresses a bug that prevented balloons from spawning in the skies above players’ islands under “certain circumstances.” Over the last week, Animal Crossing: New Horizons players have noticed something funky going on with the balloons that occasionally drift over their islands. Once the Nook Miles achievement for popping 300…

Instead Of Closing, Video Game Retailer Provides Employees With Bullshit Coronavirus ‘Safety’ Tips

Instead of providing stores with adequate sanitation supplies (or simply closing them outright) in response to the covid-19 pandemic, Game X Change corporate felt it best to send employees what amounted to a chain email full of bogus prevention tactics. Their advice includes gargling vinegar, drinking lots of water (to “neutralize” the virus in the…

Animal Crossing‘s Bunny Day Mascot Is A Lot To Deal With Right Now

The passage of time is a big deal in the Animal Crossing series. New Horizons players were today treated to a ton of changes as their islands transition into spring, which brought with it new critters to catch and cherry blossom trees to diversify the landscape. But with the game’s first holiday right around the…

Game Bundle Helps Developers Recoup Losses From A GDC That Wasn’t

In an effort to provide relief to developers left in the lurch after the Game Developers Conference was postponed late last month, gamedev.world has partnered with several studios to release a massive video game bundle via itch.io, the proceeds of which will go towards a fund established to support affected developers. There’s a ton of…

Samurai Shodown protagonist Haohmaru is now playable in Soulcalibur VI This is the 3D fighting game’s latest crossover after launching with The Witcher’s Geralt of Rivia and introducing Nier: Automata’s 2B in late 2018. I, for one, am thrilled to see another samurai in Soulcalibur

K.K. Slider Sold Out

Yesterday, after a couple weeks playing Animal Crossing: New Horizons, K.K. Slider finally made an appearance on my island. But the traveling canine guitarist has apparently become hot shit over the last two decades, so much so that he wouldn’t deign to visit until I took painstaking steps to bring my island up to his…

Combo Breaker Cancels Fighting Game Tournament For 2020

This year’s highly anticipated Combo Breaker fighting game tournament, originally scheduled for May 22-24, has been canceled according to an announcement released this morning by organizers. The annual competition is the latest such event to skip 2020 due to the ongoing covid-19 pandemic caused by a novel strain of coronavirus. “Combo Breaker made its cancellation…

In Moons Of Madness, Outer Space Is Just As Scary As Alien Monsters

I’ve never had any grand aspirations of being an astronaut, even as a kid. But in playing Moons of Madness, the latest first-person adventure from Norwegian studio Rock Pocket Games, I was given definitive proof that I just couldn’t hack it in outer space, long before the eldritch abominations started showing up. Moons of Madness…

Don’t Let FOMO Ruin Animal Crossing: New Horizons For You

I had my first opportunity to try out some online play in Animal Crossing: New Horizons the weekend before last. My sister and my friend visited my island so I could give them some of the stuff I had accrued during my extra two weeks with the game. They grabbed new fits at the Able…

Borderlands 3’s Latest Expansion Gives The Series Its First Good Boss Fight

Guns, Love, and Tentacles, yesterday’s major update to Borderlands 3, revolves around a gay wedding on an alien planet. While that’s fantastic in its own right, the rest of the expansion is pretty great too, combining fresh aesthetics with a bevy of cool new guns and what is arguably the series’ only good boss fight…