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Paper Munchers Trips on the Line Between Addiction and Obligation
After one level you see clearly the inspiration for Paper Munchers. It’s a physics puzzle that places a premium on completion in the fewest turns. Ergo, Angry Birds, and why not. It’s the ultimate lottery winner in mobile games development. The difference is Angry Birds, though it may require some ridiculously precise shots, at least…
By Owen Good -
Good Vibrations
A cymbal flutters like a pancake after being struck in this video, taken at 1000 frames per second, by the Fluke Corporation, makers of sophisticated testing instruments. (via Neatorama) Stick Jockey: Don’t Hate the Game, Hate the Player Even as sports games implement more deterministic controls, more realistic ratings and more authentic player performances, little…
By Owen Good -
Some of Ocarina‘s Original Glitches Were Deliberately Kept in 3DS Version
In building the 3D remake of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, the mandate for the developer Grezzo was to preserve fans’ memories of the original as much as possible. That meant, where possible, that bugs from the original Nintendo 64 game were intentionally left in. “As programmers, we wanted to get rid of…
By Owen Good -
Unearthed, the Saudi-Made Uncharted Knockoff, is Available for Everything but the 360
Does this look familiar? Aside from the wooden animations, of course. This is Unearthed: The Trail of Ibn Battuta by Saudi Arabia-based Semaphore, and even this Uncharted copy won’t be playable on the Xbox 360. Unearthed has versions on everything else it seems: PC/Mac, iPhone/iPad and Android, and PlayStation 3. The game follows fortune hunter…
By Owen Good -
Culture
Summertime in the Arcade
The Arcade Edition of Super Street Fighter IV arrives for Xbox 360 and PS3 this week. Another anticipated drop is the “Annihilation” map pack for Call of Duty: Black Ops; it delivers another five maps, one of them a zombie level. After that, you’re looking at maybe Dynasty Warriors: Gundam 3 Tuesday • Super Street…
By Owen Good -
Flow It, Show It, Long as I Can Grow It
Each week throws off several new video game lists ranging from the humorous to the trivial. What’s better? A list of those. Here’s a roundup of the rundowns out there. •Top 10 Outrageous Haircuts in Gaming [Gaming Bolt] How come I’m not on this list? Hell, how come Crecente isn’t on this list? •Top 10…
By Owen Good -
Lulzsec Hackers Call It Quits
Whether planned retirement (or, more likely, hounded into disbanding), Lulzsec, the unlovable clowns behind hack operations against BioWare, Sony, Nintendo, EVE Online and Minecraft, ended its brief reign of semi-terror today with its final dump of stolen data, highlighted by 550,000 user names and passwords for the Battlefield Heroes beta of 2009. Another 50,000 users’…
By Owen Good -
EA Sports Won’t Say MMA’s Dead, but Won’t Say It’s Getting a Sequel, Either
To many, the UFC’s acquisition of the competing fight series Strikeforce in March spelled the end of EA Sports MMA. While EA Sports’ chief of development did not say that a sequel is in development, he did not say the label was quitting the sport altogether. “A world where we’re not involved in fighting is…
By Owen Good -
Inside the Seven-Year Labor Pains of L.A. Noire
It took seven years. It spanned two console generations. It was the biggest undertaking in Australian games development. And the seven years it took to bring L.A. Noire to store shelves was consistently an unhappy time for many who worked on the game, reports IGN. The freelance journalist Andrew McMillen, writing for IGN, gives a…
By Owen Good -
Caught ‘Em
This week the FBI finally bagged the notorious gangster Whitey Bulger, after he had spent nearly 16 years on the lam. We’re gonna try to get topical here for the latest Kotaku ‘Shop Contest. Yes, given this theme and the headline, Pokémon are fair game. But the overall gist of this exercise will be to…
By Owen Good -
Weekend Talk Amongst Yourselves
Hey folks. Welcome to Sunday morning, and another reminder that Talk Amongst Yourselves, the official Kotaku forum, is now open for business. It always is, at the tag #tay, but a little morning reminder never hurt. Feel free to discuss anything on your mind in the world of video games. Once again, thanks to Incursor…
By Owen Good -
Culture
Sunday Comics
Welcome to your Sunday read of the week’s best in web comics. Make sure to click on the expand button in the bottom right to enlarge each comic. Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich published June 20. — Read more of Awkward Zombie Nerf NOW!! by Josué Pereira published June 25. — Read more of Nerf…
By Owen Good -
Bobbyball Winners
The big moosie slobbering all over me, that was Bob. Kotick. Rattled by the Activision CEO’s cameo appearance in Moneyball, we decide to revise Hollywood history before it was revised for us. That meant inserting Bobby Kotick into Brad Pitt movies in last week’s ‘Shop Contest, or vice versa if necessary. Turned out vice versa…
By Owen Good -
Don’t Hate the Game, Hate the Player
The lie I faced on the seventh green at Costa Navarino was so steep, it’s a wonder I didn’t need rappelling gear to address the ball. My caddy, who has recommended twisting shots that skip over bunkers and thread between trees, suddenly had no advice. Without any starting point for my read, I had no…
By Owen Good -
The Week in Gaming Apps
Whoops! Week in Gaming Apps returns, sans your usual host Fahey, who has been playing with the high-stakes tamagotchi called “newborn babies.” When they cry, you had better goddamn well feed ’em. What games offer less risk (and, admittedly, not as much reward?) This week I flicked some balls on a virtual golf course, Luke…
By Owen Good -
Chrome Skins are Gears of War 3‘s Unlockable Reward for Loyal Gears Players
In December, Epic Games creative boss Cliff Bleszinski said Gears of War 3 would feature unlockables that fans can acquire by playing other Epic games, such as the first two Gears of War. Yesterday, Gears 3‘s executive producer let slip what some of them will be. “If you did something in ‘Gears’ PC you get…
By Owen Good -
Is ‘Familyville’ Zynga’s Answer to The Sims on Facebook?
Some URL sleuthing by the domain-watching site Fusible revealed that the domain familyville.com has changed hands and hosts in a manner similar to URLs for Zynga properties like Cityville What most ties familyville.com to Zynga was its brief ownership, in March, by IPCybercrime, which acquired the domain cityville.com on behalf of Zynga in June 2010…
By Owen Good -
By Wisdom and Courage
Giving hope to a hopeless franchise is part of what makes season modes in sports video gaming so fun. But in FIFA, a side that comes up from nothing finds itself with new big-league obligations, and when the money runs out, can answer them only with heart. Sean (Kotaku user seanomatopoeia) created an 18-year-old Be…
By Owen Good
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