Nathan Grayson

Track: Human Convention | Album: Happy However After | Artist: Kindo Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to – and gaming to – at the moment.

Shameless (in a good way) Tribes-alike Midair is finally releasing. It’s hitting version 1.0 and going free-to-play on Steam tomorrow, meaning that blue plate specials are back on the menu again after Tribes: Ascend died, came back to life like a glorious phoenix, and then died again just to rub it in.

20 Years Of Crunch Take Their Toll On A Game Developer

Game developer Shane Neville is no stranger to crunch. He claims that while he was at Electronic Arts in the late ‘90s, he once worked nearly four months without a day off, averaging 90 to 110 hours per week making Need For Speed: Porsche Unleashed. Eventually, after seeing the toll it took on him, he…

Korean Overwatch Hackers Arrested, Hit With $10,000 Fine

South Korea’s new law that takes aim at those who hack online games in order to cheat at them, which went into effect last June, has hackers in hot water. Earlier this year, 13 Overwatch offenders were arrested, and now two have received their sentences. According to a post from Blizzard Korea—which worked with the…

Brigitte Arrives In Overwatch‘s Competitive Mode, Makes Tanks Miserable

Yesterday, Overwatch’s 10th competitive season kicked off, bringing the game’s newest hero, flail-swinging stun machine Brigitte, into the mix. Today, Reinhardt mains are threatening to quit. If you’re a big ol’ block of meat hoping to hunker down on the frontline, consider yourself on an involuntary hunker strike. Brigitte is highly adept at wading through…

Elite: Dangerous Player Spends A Month Drawing Game’s Logo In Space

Imagine if you could explore the universe at your leisure. Where would you go? How would you leave your mark? One Elite: Dangerous player decided to draw the game’s logo across the infinite night. It took him a month. Elite: Dangerous is massive. Thanks to procedural generation rooted in actual scientific principles, the multiplayer space…

What We Liked And Didn’t Like About Avengers: Infinity War

Marvel actually did it. The reigning king of planet blockbuster crammed 30-plus superheroes into a single sardine tin of a movie. Did it work, though? Was it any good? Compete staff writer Maddy Myers, Kotaku social media editor Seung Park, and I sat down to discuss the lengthy punchfest’s ample highs and lows. Nathan Grayson:…

Seoul-Philly Was Some Sloppy, Weird Overwatch

Last night’s showdown between slumping juggernaut Seoul Dynasty and season-long punchers-above-their-weight Philadelphia Fusion might have been the first match of its kind in this first Overwatch League season. On their best nights, both of these teams can be extraordinarily good. Seoul slowly but surely dissects its opponents, while Philly’s aggression is fueled by wild moments…

Steam Spy Is Back, But Not As Accurate As Before

Steam Spy, the PC gaming sales-tracking mainstay loved by some developers and loathed by others, was recently presumed dead by its creator, Sergey Galyonkin, after an update to Steam’s privacy defaults. It is now coming back, but it’ll be different. The old Steam Spy estimated a PC game’s sales by sweeping publicly viewable Steam profiles…

Overwatch‘s Retribution Mode Uses AI Tricks To Make You Feel Cool

Overwatch’s Retribution PVE mode can make you feel so on-fire that you ought to be signed by an OWL team. Talon soldiers fall like bowling pins to your blade, shotgun, revolver, or alarmingly pointy hand. I almost hate to break it to you that Retribution’s AI is tricking you. Speaking with Variety, Retribution lead designer…

The Two-Month Hunt To Beat A Puzzle Game And Win $9,000

When players took their first steps into MonteCrypto’s gargantuan puzzle labyrinth, they had no idea what they were getting into. The game’s creators were equally in the dark. They knew it’d end with somebody winning roughly $9,000, but they had no clue when or how. Unlike most video games, MonteCrypto offered a tangibly tantalizing light…

Track: Babygirl | Artist: Anthony Green | Album: Studio 4 Acoustic Session Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

Who would win in a fight between Overwatch and Team Fortress 2? It’s kind of a tired question at this point, but The Winglet used it as the foundation for a charming and funny SFM video that pokes fun at both games. The scene that depicts an encounter with Mei as a horror movie is…

After Latest Update, Fortnite Matches Keep Freezing At The Worst Possible Moments

You’re creeping through Fortnite’s Tilted Towers, and you see somebody absentmindedly clomping along. It’s go time. You drop down with your shotgun primed, but then—at the worst possible moment—your screen freezes. Seconds later, you’re dead. Situations like this one have been unfolding all across Fortnite’s map recently, seemingly on both PC and console—especially in the…

Overwatch‘s Symmetra Mains Agree: The Problem Is Other Players

Despite striving for order and balance in all things, Symmetra has always been the odd woman out on Overwatch’s hero roster. On the verge of yet another rework, Symmetra mains—often the butt of verbal abuse—say that despite everything, they don’t want her to change all that much. Symmetra is a character who just can’t seem…

Fortnite Players Are Using New Sticky Grenades To Suicide Bomb Enemies

Today Fortnite added sticky grenades, the secret best shooter weapon of all time as proven by Halo. The game’s player base, composed of every human currently alive and a few long thought dead, has already come up with devious ways to use them. Clinger grenades, as they’re known in Fortnite, stick to any character you…

StarCraft II Gets Paid Custom Maps

Way back in 2009, Blizzard announced that StarCraft II would include a map marketplace with options to buy and sell custom maps. Years later, the StarCraft II team is finally following through. StarCraft II’s arcade, which allows players to create and play custom maps at no extra charge, will add premium fan-made maps alongside the…

Overwatch‘s New Map Is A Beautiful But Imbalanced Deathtrap

Among Overwatch fans, King’s Row is generally regarded as the game’s best map. It doesn’t do any one thing perfectly, but each of its points emphasizes different heroes’ strengths and strategies. The game’s new map, Rialto, seems to want to be a balmier King’s Row, but I don’t feel like it’s quite there yet. Rialto,…

Game Studio’s ‘Joke’ About 90-Hour Work Weeks Did Not Go Over Well

Crunch is one of the gaming industry’s biggest issues. Devs work countless extra hours to get games out the door, wringing themselves dry of blood, sweat, and tears for weeks or months at a time. It destroys people. Development studio Neocore was reminded of this when it announced earlier this week what it planned to…

We’re streaming Overwatch’s new map, Rialto, on Twitch The map, which is a payload-pushing revamp of the map from Retribution’s PVE mode, just went up on the PTR today. We’re going in blind, so you can see if we think it’s any good in real time