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CultureWhen Nintendo Struggles To Manage Expectations
Earlier this evening, while promoting an upcoming gameplay session for the new Paper Mario on Treehouse Live, Nintendo dropped a teaser for “a first reveal and gameplay for a title in a franchise new to developer WayForward”. And people lost their God damn minds. WayForward have a loooong history of making platformers across all kinds…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 9, 2020 -
CultureWhat One Artist’s Work On The Last Of Us Part 2 Looked Like
We took a big look at the art behind The Last Of Us Part 2 last week, but given the way Fine Art tends to be a feature that deals in scale and volume, I thought it might also be cool to take a deeper dive into the game and find out what a single…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 8, 2020 -
Culture“OK” Hand Gesture Removed From Call Of Duty
The “OK” hand gesture, added to both Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Call of Duty: Warzone earlier this year, has been removed from the games, presumably because of its growing association with white supremacists While neither Activision nor developers Infinity Ward have yet to comment on the removal, as Eurogamer report it’s been missing…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 8, 2020 -
CultureDonkey Kong Country Is Coming To Nintendo Switch Online
OK, we can all stop asking now (for this game, anyway). Nintendo just announced that Donkey Kong Country is coming to the Switch Online’s catalogue of retro games on July 15. It’ll be joined by SNES game Natsume Championship Wrestling, while The Immortal—which you may know more for its box art than the game itself—is…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 7, 2020 -
CultureOdds and EndsThe Full Adidas x Pokémon Collab Is So Good
While the odd piece has released through 2020—a pair of sneakers here, some slides there—what looks like the full range of Adidas’ Pokémon collab has dropped on the company’s Japanese store, and it’s great There are shirts, bags, shorts and tracksuits! There are multiple pairs of sneakers, stuff for men, women and kids too. I…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 7, 2020 -
CultureOdds and EndsFan Builds His Own SNES x PS1 Hybrid
We’ve recently taken a very detailed look at the “Nintendo PlayStation”, perhaps the most notorious of all unreleased consoles, but something from the same era that’s even rarer is Nintendo’s repeated efforts to create a CD-ROM add-on for the SNES, which ultimately came to nothing. As Chris said at the conclusion of his feature, “the…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 7, 2020 -
CultureOdds and EndsThe Last Jedi’s Director Made A Pokémon Go Trailer
Pokémon Go has made over $3 billion since launching back in 2016, and that kind of money means you can just walk out and hire Star Wars director Rian Johnson to direct a 30-second commercial for your phone game. Specifically it’s for Pokémon Go Fest 2020, and if you’re wondering whether this was a flex…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 7, 2020 -
CultureCosplayA Cosplay Coloring Book!
Put together by Milynn Sarley and featuring art by Emily Claus, Starlight Guild is a new colouring book that turns some excellent fantasy cosplay into some excellent, crafty art. Cosplayers and costume designers featured include aliciamariebody, fireflypath, hendoart and _fairytas. “I took my real life friends who have made strides in the world as professional…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 6, 2020 -
Boom! It’s Super Mario Bros. With John Madden’s Commentary
There’s a generation of kids who will only know John Madden as the guy whose name is on the football game’s box, and not as one of the best commentators to have ever worked in professional sports. For them (and all of us, really): a guy impersonating Madden talking Mario through level 1-1 of Super Mario…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 6, 2020 -
CultureOdds and EndsDark Souls Is Presumably Easier With Assault Rifles
A crossbow is an elegant weapon for a more civilized age, but it also lacks the stopping power of, say, an M16. Via PC Gamer, this mod called Modern Firearm by Forsakensilver does what it says on the box: it replaces a bunch of Dark Souls’ ranged weapons with “modern” (though some examples are stretching…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 6, 2020 -
CultureManor Lords Is A City-Builder With Medieval Battles
Hello, Manor Lords, and welcome to my wheelhouse. This upcoming PC strategy game is impressive for a number of reasons. Firstly because it’s combining two of my favourite types of game (city-builder and Total-War-style real-time combat), and secondly because it’s being made by one guy It’s currently in Early Access, and is due sometime in…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 5, 2020 -
CulturePersona 5’s Anime Is Finally Getting A $300 English Dub
While Persona 5’s anime has been out for over two years now, it’s only been available to watch with subtitles. The show’s upcoming Blu-ray release in the West is changing that, bringing back most of the game’s English-language cast for a dubbed release that…is going to cost you. I’m not really down on the pricing…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 5, 2020 -
ReviewsMultiplatformPokémon Smile: The Kotaku Review
Maybe you thought it would be easy to write/laugh this one off as a dumb gimmick, but for real: Pokémon Smile is one of the most important video games to have entered my household in years I have two kids, one 9, the other 7, and while both are beautiful, wonderful little people, both of…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 2, 2020 -
CultureNBA 2K21 Has Two Cover Stars, And One Of Them Is Rookie Zion Williamson
Like previous years, NBA 2K21 will feature multiple cover stars. Current-gen versions will have the Blazer’s Dame Lillard on the front, while the next-gen editions will feature Zion Williamson, who in any other year would be coming up on his second season, but in this current hellscape is still a rookie. That’s kinda notable, because…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 1, 2020
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