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BioShock Immortalized In This Catchy, Darned Funny Song
Oh, man. There’s tribute songs, and then there’s tribute songs. This one, by New York singer/comedian Brent Black, who performs as Brentalfloss, falls into the italicized camp—not only did it make me laugh, I can’t get it out of my head. There are some lyrical turns in here that I can’t believe no one’s come…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 20, 2012 -
The Best Of Kotaku, This Week
Welcome to the Best of Kotaku, where Tina I round up all of this week’s best content. Tina’s off this week, so I’m going to make fun of/pay tribute to her by running this image of her amazing parking job in Sleeping Dogs. Parked vertical on the wall, like a boss. And before anyone else…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 18, 2012 -
And Now, Annie From Community Will Gasp Over And Over And Over
It’s been a banner week for TV supercuts, so let’s close it out with this montage of Annie from Community doing her “oh!” gasp over and over and over again. The clip, first seen at The A.V. Club, does a great job of showing how this show both gives its characters signature moves and then…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 17, 2012 -
Darksiders II And Sleeping Dogs: A Tale Of Two Very Different PC Ports
I played two PC ports of two big, exciting new games this week. One of them worked. One of them didn’t. The two big games in question were Square Enix and United Front’s Hong Kong crime game Sleeping Dogs and THQ and Vigil’s comic-booky fantasy game Darksiders II. Both games came out on Tuesday, both…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 17, 2012 -
Blonde Twins Playing The Elder Scrolls Theme On Harps While Standing In A Forest
From the people who brought you Blonde Twins Playing A Metallica Cover On Harps While Standing In The Desert comes this brave new experience in weird nature-set harp covers. As with the first time around, sometimes a headline is what it is. Sometimes you get exactly what you clicked on.
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 17, 2012 -
Man, Everybody’s Leaving Saturday Night Live
So many people are leaving SNL this year that people like Abby Elliott, who I feel like I’ve barely seen on the show, are also announcing their departures. Elliott will join two heavy hitters, Kristin Wiig and Andy Samberg, in leaving the show before its next season, and there are reports that “Weekend Update” anchor…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 16, 2012 -
One Day Soon, We’ll Have A Real Video Game Musical
Sure, we’ve got musical video games. But we’ve yet to have a real video game musical, a game that brings the goofy, earnest energy of musical theater onto a console or PC and lets us play our part. For a long time, it’s felt like an inevitability—people love musicals! They love video games! Who wouldn’t…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 16, 2012 -
This Whacked-Out, Wicked Cool Music Game Does Everything Backwards
Back in music school, I had the same thought that many a (possibly stoned) music student has had—what if we played famous music, but we played it… backwards? How would harmony work if chord progressions ran backwards? What insight could we gain into melody, into harmony? I ran this idea past some of my professors…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 16, 2012 -
How Skyrim‘s Difficulty Works, And Why That First Giant Killed You Outside Whiterun
All games are difficult. (Well, almost all games.) One of the most important aspects of difficulty is punishment—if a player fails in a game, the game must let them know it somehow. Bad player! No bonus XP for you! Do it five more times! In Mario, if you die, you restart a level. In Dark…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 16, 2012 -
Select Gamers Can Try Out Steam’s New Community Features Right Now
A few thousand (well, more like 100,000) lucky gamers can now use the new Steam community features announced this week by Valve. The new features, which include organized hubs for each game, new group organization, updates about your uploaded content, and a new friend interface, are now operating in a beta, according to an update…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 16, 2012 -
It’s The Middle Of Shark Week And There’s A Megalodon Roaming Liberty City
Holy crap look out! There’s a huge freaking shark roaming the Liberty City Bay. It hasn’t attacked anyone yet, but it seems like it’s only a matter of time, right? In light of our recent list of the best sharks in video games (and also the one from Banjo Kazooie) comes this mod from JMoorfoot4…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 15, 2012 -
Watch A Cutscene From The Last Of Us Come To Motion-Captured Life
“Is that a banana-gun in your hand, or are you just happy to see me?” I like these motion-capture process videos that Sony keeps putting out—they let us see the increasingly involved process of bringing these characters to life, and they we get to check out some of the cutscenes early, too. This one shows…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 15, 2012 -
Holy Crap It’s A Far Cry 3 Leopard Attack
Man, I’m starting to think that Far Cry 3 is more of a “Big Cat Hunter” game than the action game that Ubisoft is describing it as. How else to describe the fact that the best screenshots from the game all feature giant jungle cats doing rad stuff? Ubi dropped a passel of their trademark…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 15, 2012 -
Dressing Up Like A Slave (Or A Posh Lady) And Whipping Your Enemies In Assassin’s Creed III: Liberation
Last week at Ubisoft, in addition to playing through a big honking naval battle in the full console version of Assassin’s Creed III, I also had a chance to get my hands on its portable Vita counterpart, Assassin’s Creed III: Liberation In the portable game, players take on the role of Aveline de Grandpré, a…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 15, 2012 -
With Its Sweeping Nautical Battles, Assassin’s Creed III Finally Goes Full Pirate
I’ve been waiting for the Assassin’s Creed series to go full-pirate for a little while now. Earlier games in the series have allowed the player to climb about the riggings of ships, swash their buckles across the decks of schooners, and generally freely engage in all the kinds of things that pirates do. But the…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 15, 2012 -
Snakes. Why Did It Have To Be Snakes?
Raders of the Lost Ark is coming to IMAX. You know what? I’ll take it. For starters, at least it’s not a South Park doomsday scenario where Lucas has decided to add a bunch of CGI bullcrap to the film. It’ll just be higher-res, and I bet that boulder will look great on a huge…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 14, 2012 -
The Pint-Sized Wizards Of Final Fantasy III Bring The Thunder To PSP
This new Japanese trailer for the PSP version of Final Fantasy III shows the team getting their magic on against a variety of foes. It also demonstrates a smart way of showing PSP footage without spreading it out and making it look janky – super-impose smaller footage over bigger, out-of-focus footage! Crafty. Curious about what…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 14, 2012 -
Hotline Miami: A Neon-Drenched, Hyper-Violent Crime Game You Should Have Your Eye On
One of the games I’m most looking forward to this fall involves wearing disguises, infiltrating strongholds and taking out assassination targets in as smooth a way as possible. No, I’m not talking about Dishonored (though that game looks perfectly fine), I’m talking about Devolver Digital’s Hotline Miami, a new top-down killfest from artist Dennis Wedin…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 14, 2012 -
See The LittleBigPlanet Team’s Delightful-Looking New Game Tearaway In Action
Shortly after announcing their new paper-centric game Tearaway, Media Molecule’s Alex Evans and Rex Crowle demonstrated the game onstage at Gamescom. This game looks awfully cool, though I’ll admit I’m a sucker for everything Media Molecule has done up to this point. I’ve also been hoping for more good Vita games, and Iota’s adventure certainly…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 14, 2012 -
WTF? Namco Bandai Announces “World Tekken Federation” Online Service
Namco Bandai has unveiled a new online service that they’ll launch alongside Tekken Tag Tournament 2, and it’s called the “World Tekken Federation.” Slow down. Look at that name. Yup. The WTF. It’s okay to chuckle a bit. From the press release: The World Tekken Federation service will provide TEKKEN® players with a social community…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 14, 2012
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