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John Carmack Explains How to Make Rage Look Terrible
This afternoon, in an empty conference room inside the Hilton Anatole—a bizarre amalgam of hotel, conference center, and shopping mall—John Carmack sat alone in an uncomfortable metal chair, staring straight ahead. The technical director and co-founder of id Software, the company that invented the first-person shooter genre that now dominates much of the hard core…
By Joel Johnson -
Choice Quotes from John Carmack’s 2011 QuakeCon Keynote
Rage has been in the pipe for six years. “We invented this genre and we followed it a long ways…Maybe we shouldn’t have been quite as ambitious.” On Rage: “It really is probably the most enjoyable id game, from my perspective, we’ve ever made.” “I’ve never been one who played deathmatch for 8 hours.” “Everything…
By Joel Johnson -
How to Customize This Site’s Navigation
We’ve made a few small adjustments to our site today, including a new way to interact with stories in our right sidebar: You can now set the sidebar to a one- or two-paned interface, as demonstrated in the video above, made by our friends at Lifehacker We also gently pushed the maroon slider up towards…
By Joel Johnson -
Get the Magic of Kotaku All Up In Your Social Media Magic Hole
Hey guys, we’re dating now. I think that’s what clicking a button on Facebook means, anyway. So why don’t we lock it down the way kids these days do and make it Facebook official by Liking Kotaku? Liking us will feed all our best stories, contests and discussions directly to your Facebook page. You can…
By Joel Johnson -
“I’m the Best Man. I Did It.” Viral Freestyler Eli Porter Gets His Own Documentary, “People’s Champion”
Remember Eli Porter? You probably wouldn’t by name. But he’s the kid who went viral in the “Iron Mic” freestyle competition with the famous “I’m the best man. I did it.” line. And for some reason filmmakers Trent Babbington and Walker Warren decided to make a documentary about that moment—and I’m glad they did. “People’s…
By Joel Johnson -
Why Sony and Microsoft Teaming Up on Their Next Console Makes a Lot of Sense
Microsoft has trouble making hardware. Sony has trouble running online services. What if the next Xbox and the next PlayStation are one and the same? A few months ago, while reporting about the then unannounced Wii U console for Nintendo, we stumbled on an interesting ancillary rumor: Microsoft and Sony were in active discussions regarding…
By Joel Johnson -
This Week in the Business
What’s happened in the business of video games this past week… QUOTE | “Playing a much bigger game.” – EA, fresh off its massive PopCap acquisition, is setting its sights higher than Zynga, noting that Facebook is “just one segment” to leverage. QUOTE | A new study commissioned by Doritos found that girls who enjoy…
By Joel Johnson -
Lana Del Rey Sings a Lonely Song Called “Video Games”
25-year-old Lana Del Rey certainly has a lot to be sad about: she’s gorgeous, talented, and has excellent taste in old Hollywood indulgence. But as a bald traffic cop once wandered by my car and told me, everybody hurts sometimes. And there’s something genuinely affecting in the picture she paints of a relationship that hits…
By Joel Johnson -
Making a Magazine in Two Days Is a Longshot, But We’re Gonna Try
Remember last year when those guys got together and made a magazine in 48 hours? They nearly got sued. But they also made a great magazine! Now they’re back as Longshot Magazine—and I’m one pleased peckerwood to announce that we’ll be hosting the creation of this issue right here at the Gawker offices in Manhattan.…
By Joel Johnson -
Take Pity on a Newbie Today
Last night on the way back to my apartment in New York’s Lower East Side, I saw a crowd of men standing around two motorcycles. I’m a fledgling rider myself, as well as newly returned to the city. I’d spoken to these guys a few times before and did what I typically do when I…
By Joel Johnson -
‘Portalmon’ Design Now a Catchable, Testable T-Shirt [Updated]
Remember Matt Parson’s ‘Portalmon’ mash-up design? For the next 48 hours, you can now buy it as a lovely t-shirt for €20 (plus modest shipping). Update: Qwertee has set up a special promotion for Kotaku readers. Simply add the code ILoveKotaku when checking out to get the Portalmon tee for €10—half off!—with €3 shipping anywhere…
By Joel Johnson -
Reviews
Two Weeks and One E3 in Betabrand Couch Commando Cargo Pants
I’ve never worn a pair of prototype pants before. But Betabrand, the San Francisco-based company who makes sweatshirts designed using DARPA technology or pants designed to let you eat a lot of food, decided to send me the very first pair of their new “Couch Commando” cargo pants. I wouldn’t go far as to say…
By Joel Johnson -
Roving Hackers “LulzSec” Take Down Minecraft, Escapist Magaine, and EVE Online
According to their Twitter updates, LulzSec has launched DDoS attacks—either on purpose or as a side effect of a mass hack attempt—that has taken down EVE Online, Escapist magazine, and Minecraft, proving conclusively that they hate everyone equally.
By Joel Johnson -
Leaving Los Angeles, and E3 2011
If you’ve never experienced E3 before, right as you feel like you’ve caught up with the breakneck pace of announcements, presentations and demonstrations, the show is over. It’s one of those weeks that seems to pass in the blink of an eye. Here then, are 3,444 such blinks, glimpses of E3 from start to finish,…
By Joel Johnson -
The More They Keep Telling Me Star Wars: The Old Republic Isn’t Like World of Warcraft, the Less I Want to Play
I just had a hands-on demo with the hugely anticipated massively multiplayer role-playing game Star Wars: The Old Republic, but after an hour of watching self-described sizzle reels of prerendered and in-game footage, showing casually pirouetting Jedi and environments full of foxfire and crepitating tails of energy, I couldn’t actually make myself actually play the…
By Joel Johnson -
Activision Boss Refused Sneak Peek of Competitor’s Battlefield 3
According to CVG, Activision CEO wandered by the E3 booth of Battlefield 3, the regicidal threat to his company’s own Call of Duty franchise, for a friendly look at the competition. He was denied. However, Activision says this didn’t happen.
By Joel Johnson -
The Sights and People of E3 2011’s South Hall
I’ll give E3 this: It’s colorful. We did a few laps to see the big dogs: Square Enix, Activision, Ubisoft, Konami, Sony Ericsson, Microsoft…Robot Entertainment. (I can’t help it. Orcs Must Die looks really fun!) Photos by our fearless photog, Isaac Viel
By Joel Johnson -
8 Minutes of Our Hands-On Video Shows What It’s Like to Play Wii U
Stephen Totilo takes you on a whirlwind tour of Nintendo’s latest play for the living room, the touchscreen-and-motion-control Wii U. (But you’d watch 8 minutes of Totilo just to take a swim in those dreamy blue eyes, wouldn’t you?)
By Joel Johnson -
If Grand Theft Auto were a Pornographic…Oh, It Is Now
There’s absolutely no way that the link that’s at the end of this post is safe for work unless you work at a pornography factory (or Gawker) but if you’d like to see what a XXX parody of Grand Theft Auto looks like, you’ll find it at our sister site [Fleshbot]
By Joel Johnson
Joel Johnson
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