Maddy Myers

Soulcalibur VI Is A Fresh Reboot Of Its Eternally Retold Tale

The Soulcalibur franchise needed either a hard reboot or an adrenaline shot, and Soulcalibur VI is both. The latest entry in the fighting game series, available October 19, circles back for a do-over of the first few Soulcalibur games, retelling the major characters’ stories all over again and even putting everyone back in their original…

Meet SonicFox, The Queer Furry Who’s Destroying Everyone Else At Fighting Games

Dominique “SonicFox” McLean competed in his first Mortal Kombat tournament in 2011 at age 13. Back then, his opponents didn’t know what they were up against. But SonicFox knew his own truth: he was queer, he was a furry, and he rocked at fighting games. Seven years later, the four-time Evo champion has shown the…

Total War: Rome II has responded to the recent influx of negative Steam reviews concerning female generals: “Female characters appear throughout the game, but have between a 10 and 15% chance of appearing as recruitable generals for some of the playable factions… We have no plans to patch this out”

Mario Kart Has Voice Chat Now And It’s Very Wholesome

This week, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe got online voice chat as part of Nintendo Switch Online. Before now, I didn’t think I would want to hear from any of my competitors in Mario Kart. Turns out, it rules. I like to play Mario Kart online. Starting with Mario Kart 8, I’d lie in bed playing…

The Washington D.C. Overwatch League team just announced their new coach, Molly “AVALLA” Kim, former coach of Meta Bellum, an Overwtach Contenders team that made it into play-offs this year. She will be the first female coach in the league.

League of Legends star Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng told his fans he got hacked, lost $200,000 from his bank account, and lost all of his Coinbase cryptocurrency. He may need to rewrite his infamous catchphrase, “money in the bank / pimpin’ ain’t easy.”

Beware The Worst Kart In Mario Kart 8 Deluxe

The Standard ATV with Cyber Slick wheels used to be my favorite kart combination in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. In my quest to find the game’s best kart, I learned that my build is not ideal. Thanks to further data analysis via the gaming blog SNSG, I now know that it’s one of the worst builds…

Samus Aran’s Gunship Should Have Had A Name

Most stories featuring ships tend to give them a name: the Millennium Falcon, the Great Fox, the USS Enterprise, the Blackbird, the Pequod. But Samus Aran’s iconic gunship doesn’t have one. Samus has a gunship in almost every Metroid game, although it has undergone several repairs and upgrades over the course of her career. Zero…

No, Master Chief’s Suit Does Not Jerk Him Off

An erroneous piece of Halo lore began with a joke by the Twitter account dril, posted on May 11, 2017: “my main issue with ‘master chief fucks cortana’ is if you read the halo novels youd know the space suit automatically jacks master chief off.” By the next day, Halo fans had begun circulating a…

Children Can Always Make Bayek Smile In Assassin’s Creed: Origins

Bayek’s motivation in Assassin’s Creed: Origins gets revealed early on: he seeks revenge for the death of his young son. He’s not alone among video game protagonists in wanting revenge. Samus Aran lost her parents; Joel Last-Of-Us lost his daughter; Mario Mario lost multiple girlfriends to multiple muscle-bound monsters. Somehow, though, Bayek has kept his…

After An Unlikely Tie, Fortnite Summer Skirmish Grand Finalist Got Determined By Coin Flip

Yesterday, two Fortnite players tied for the 33rd qualifying spot in today’s Summer Skirmish grand finals: The_Real_Cryohme and SSG Colton. The 33rd slot wins a minimum of $5,000 and the potential to win far more; today’s first prize winner will take home $225,000. Only 33 players could advance to the final stage, though. Epic Games…

It is I, Kotaku editor Maddy Myers, who will serve as your host on this Labor Day holiday. It’s not going to be a full day of posts about Metroid. But it’s not not going to be that.

Popular PUBG Streamers Face Off This Weekend In The Broadcaster Royale Finals

The three-day finals for Broadcaster Royale, a PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds tournament featuring 80 duo teams of streamers from around the world, unfolds this weekend at PAX West’s Paramount Theater. The matches start today at 2 pm ET, streaming on the Broadcaster Royale Twitch channel and also on each competitor’s individual Twitch channel. Several well-known PUBG players…

After Jacksonville Shooting, Gaming Event Organizers Pledge Better Security

Citing a need to review security plans, Electronic Arts is canceling the three remaining qualifying events for its Madden NFL 19 tournament after two players were killed at one in Jacksonville, Florida on Sunday. Other esports organizations are also talking more about security for their events. “We will work with our partners and our internal…

The Original Metroid Has No Map, But Samus Wouldn’t Need One

I’ve played through the first Metroid three times, but I’ve never played it without a map. Yesterday, I was wondering how the game’s original players even coped and what it says about Metroid, and about Samus Aran, that the first game doesn’t have one. The first Metroid game, which came out in 1986 on the…

The Xbox One package of the first four Halo games—Halo: The Master Chief Collection—will be available to Xbox Game Pass members on September 1. The trailer promises several updates, including “improved matchmaking” (good news for those who remember the collection’s initial launch).

The Weekend In Esports: Smash Never Stops

It’s a muggy, sleepy summer here in video game land, but esports does not rest. This weekend brings us a packed lineup of Smash, League, Heroes, and Fortnite, as well as multiple PUBG and Rocket League tournaments. Super Smash Brothers While most other fighting game pros are still catching up on sleep after Evo 2018…

Madden NFL 19‘s Story Mode Sequel Lacks The Spark Of The Original

Last year, Madden NFL 18 featured the series’ first-ever story mode, “Longshot.” It took four years to make, featured the acting talents of Moonlight’s Mahershala Ali and Friday Night Lights’ Scott Porter, and broke up its poignant cutscenes with interactive dialogue trees, practice challenges, and football games. One year later, Madden 19 has a sequel…

Rathalos of Monster Hunter will appear in Smash Ultimate as both a boss and an assist trophy. Shovel Knight will also appear as an assist trophy.

For The First Time, Evo’s Top Street Fighter Player Is From The United Kingdom

The eight Street Fighter V competitors that made it into Evo 2018’s finals today looked very different from last year’s lineup. Aside from last year’s winner, Hajime “Tokido” Taniguchi, every single one of the other finalists wasn’t on last year’s stage. Everybody assumed Tokido would win. But Evo 2018 finals have proven assumptions to be…