Kirk Hamilton

The Oxenfree studio’s next game is called Afterparty, and it sounds really cool. It’s the tale of two college friends who unexpectedly die and go to hell. To escape, they have to beat the Devil in a drinking contest. Because, sure. Sure they do. IGN’s got the details

The State Of The Nintendo Switch In 2017

For all the video game industry’s noisy hype about groundbreaking technology, it’s still rare that a device comes along and actually breaks new ground. In just nine months, the Nintendo Switch has done just that. The world of games feels different now than it did one year ago. In the summer of 2016, the Switch,…

Prometheus Lens Is Dead, Long Live Prometheus Lens

All good things must come to an end. Especially in Destiny Last Tuesday, Bungie accidentally put a hilariously powerful laser gun into Destiny 2. Called Prometheus Lens, it was capable of deleting other players in the competitive Crucible in around a second, comically faster than any other standard weapon in the game. Bungie quickly acknowledged…

‘We’ve Made Some Mistakes’: Bungie Backtracks On Locked Destiny 2 Content

Shortly after last week’s Destiny 2 expansion Curse of Osiris came out, it became evident that players who hadn’t bought the DLC were locked out of activities they’d previously been able to play. Today, Bungie acknowledged they’d made mistakes with the existing system and said they’re changing how it’ll work. “It’s clear that we’ve made…

LMFAO Xur Is Selling Prometheus Lens

Destiny 2’s Curse of Osiris expansion included a bugged laser weapon that’s so powerful it’s completely ruining the balance in the competitive Crucible. So of course, Xur is selling it today. The Prometheus Lens, as it’s called, is normally a random drop. That means some players have it, but others are doomed to be fried…

All The Big Games And Announcements At The 2017 Game Awards

Tonight in Los Angeles, a bunch of game developers won well-deserved honors for the games they released in 2017. A bunch of other people showed off games that won’t be out until 2018 or later. If you want to read who won what, go here. If you want to get super hyped for games that…

In the latest official Destiny blog post, Bungie says it intends to fix the hilariously overpowered Prometheus Lens in next week’s 1.1.1 update. “Damage output is higher than intended,” indeed. Trials of the Nine will still run this weekend, so that should be interesting.

Bungie says Destiny 2‘s new “Raid Lair” will launch this Friday, December 8, at 10AM Pacific. I’m pretty curious to see what this thing will actually be. We’ll find out soon enough.

Destiny 2 Gets Its First Major Balance Patch

And the people rejoiced, for grenades had become more powerful. Except pulse grenades. Because fuck pulse grenades. Along with the new Curse of Osiris expansion, Bungie has released the first major balance patch for Destiny 2. You can read the full 1.1.0 update notes at Bungie’s website. There’s a large collection of “sandbox” tweaks, which…

A List Of Old Games That I Would Definitely Buy Again On Switch

Here I am, thinking about buying Skyrim again on Switch. Yes, Skyrim. A game I’ve played for 197 hours on Steam in addition to God knows how many on console. I’ve already made the case for why the Switch is so good for playing old games. Look no further than the impressive number of hours I’ve…

In-Game Purchases Poison The Well

Video games will always manipulate us. Each challenge and scenario in a game has been carefully engineered to make us react a certain way. Most of the time, that’s what we sign up for. But the moment real money enters the equation, something changes. In-game purchases, also known as microtransactions, have been at the heart…

Resident Evil Revelations’ Switch Motion Controls Are Really Good

This week, 2012’s Resident Evil Revelations and its 2015 sequel come to the Nintendo Switch. Both remasters are largely similar their console counterparts, with one big difference: motion controls. If you’ve played a Resident Evil game, you know how important aiming is. Ammo is limited, and the monsters you’re fighting take a lot of hits…

Bungie Changes Destiny 2 XP System After Players Discover It Was Rigged

Bungie has announced that it’s changing how Destiny 2 handles experience points. The move comes in response to players who have been raising questions about it over recent days, with a growing consensus that the system was rigged. For a while after starting a new character in Destiny 2, experience points (XP) are what you…

Tips for Playing Skyrim

Today, Bethesda is releasing their excellent role-playing adventure Skyrim for Nintendo Switch and VR. It’s a massive game, with hundreds of hours of exploration, magic and mayhem. Editor’s note 11/17/2017: We’re bumping these tips again today because the game is out for Nintendo Switch, as well as a VR version. Editor’s note, 10/28/2016: This post…

The Unending Appeal of Minecraft

The first half of 2017 was crammed with exceptional games. That high tide ebbed in May, and I’ve spent the last couple of weeks going back and catching up on what I missed. I’ve also spent a lot of time playing Minecraft, a game that came out almost six years ago. This post originally appeared…

A Perfect Mario Odyssey Moment

One thing I love about Super Mario Odyssey is how often it anticipates me. Odyssey seeks to strike a balance between structured challenges and open-ended play. It achieves that balance with remarkable consistency. Each level is a toy-filled sandbox, loaded with springs, levers, and buttons for you to bounce, pull, and press. The game feels so…

L.A. Noire: It Was A Weird Game

When I heard that the 2011 detective game L.A. Noire was getting remastered for current consoles, my first thought was, “Oh, cool! That was an interesting game.” Then I remembered that L.A. Noire was a very weird game, and one I didn’t even like back when I first played it. A thousand years ago in…

The space fascists of New Monarchy have won Destiny 2‘s second faction rally. Wouldn’t have been my first choice, but hey, at least Dead Orbit didn’t win. Time to go buy the New Monarchy sword and then never really use it.

Destiny 2 Players: Maybe Don’t Pledge Dead Orbit Today

If you play Destiny 2, you have a choice in this week’s Faction Rally. You can pledge New Monarchy or Future War Cult. Or, if you really, really want to, you can pledge Dead Orbit. This week is Destiny 2‘s second Faction Rally, and the first one since the game came out on PC. That…

What Is The Plural Of Xbox One X? [Update]

Look, I’m not suggesting that many people are going to buy more than one Xbox One X console. But if you did… how would you say that? The question of how to pluralize “Xbox One X” came up today in Kotaku’s work Slack. I asked Microsoft PR for their official stance, though I haven’t yet…