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The Best Starting Pokémon, According To Science
It’s the agonizing choice and neverending debate of a generation: Bulbasaur, Charmander, or Squirtle? Picking one of the Kanto starter Pokémon is usually a gut choice, based on past experience or which one looks cooler. But what if there was a way to know, objectively, the best one? Well, now we do, thanks to science.…
By Owen Good -
Indie Game Without an Ending Removed from Steam Store
Dark Matter, the indie game accused by customers of releasing unfinished last week, has been pulled off of Steam until it gets a proper ending, and Steam users say they’re getting refunds if they ask for them. A report by Gamasutra also says the development studio, which blamed Dark Matter‘s abrupt conclusion on the fact…
By Owen Good -
Downloading the “GTA V PC Torrent” is 18GB Worth of Bad Ideas
About the only thing I can see that’s wrong with this diabolical plot is the fact suckers have to download an 18GB torrent before the malware is unleashed. Otherwise, there’s a bogus torrent of Grand Theft Auto V‘s nonexistent PC version that’s claimed several victims of late. It bears mentioning one should not download this.…
By Owen Good -
Online Passes Treated Every Customer Like a Shoplifter
Every time I bring home a new video game I have this ritual: I take a fish boning knife and slide it under a fold in the shrinkwrap, then twist. Then I try to remove all of the cellophane in one piece, like it’s the world’s biggest peel-and-eat shrimp. If it’s an Xbox 360 game,…
By Owen Good -
Local TV: Sexy Game Characters ‘Worse Than Watching Miley Cyrus Twerk’
This local news report has all of the ingredients: Sex, teenage girls, the exploitation of them, video games, and a respected university’s research. Here to synthesize it all for us is Life Coach Jenn Lee: “This is even worse than watching Miley Cyrus twerk.” If you’re wondering why a “Life Coach” is competent to speak…
By Owen Good -
Halo‘s Half-Assed ‘Mister Chief’ Immortalized as an Xbox Live Avatar
Mister Chief came to us nearly 10 years ago, filling in for a Halo 2 promotional poster on the good ol’ Bungie Weekly Update. “A terrible idea that snowballed out of control,” says his creator. Now Mister Chief’s perpetually constipated, teeth-gritting expression finds its way to an Xbox Live avatar costume. Mister C. is the…
By Owen Good -
The good news is there’s going to be a lot of extra stuff in WWE 2K14 The bad news is they want you to buy a $20 season pass for it. Three packs contain extra wrestlers—including the NWO—and others will have customization options and loads of extra wrestling moves. Details here and in this video.
By Owen Good -
A Look Back at Eighteen Years of PlayStation (to Make You Feel Old)
Sony Europe released this tribute video today, a stylized look at 18 years of gaming with PlayStation consoles on that continent. Wait a minute, this dude has lived in the same room for 18 years? Kidding; this isn’t meant to be taken literally, it’s just an amalgamation of all the things you might remember about…
By Owen Good -
Search Engine Update Turns Your iPad into a Pokédex
Yes, there’s a Pokedex app for iOS—two actually, one official, another (better) one fan made. But you don’t need to download either to turn an iPhone or an iPad into a Pokédex. Just ask Siri. That’s because, as VentureBeat points out, the Wolfram Alpha database just added data for all Pokémon through their first five…
By Owen Good -
Creepy Suspect Blamed for Electronics Going Haywire
Crime is a constant feature of video games writing. Somewhere, someone is doing something illicit with them—sometimes comically stupid, sometimes tragic. Kotaku‘s Police Blotter is here to round up the latest in games crime. All suspects are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. leads Slender in suspicious Man sighting MASON, Mich.—Cops responding…
By Owen Good -
Space Invaders‘ Creator Says He Would Have Made It ‘Far Easier’
At 69, Tomohiro Nishikado readily admits he’s bad at video games. That’s not unusual for a man his age, but he was bad at them when he was making them, specifically Space Invaders. “Had it been left up to me, Space Invaders would have been a far easier game,” he told The New Yorker Nishikado…
By Owen Good -
Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: BatDad: Arkham Origins
Didn’t really spy anything super-useful this week so we’ll have to go with a bit of a wild card. Everyone’s familiar with BatDad, right? Well, Arkham Origins releasing on Friday provides the opportunity for a timely and ridiculous mash-up. To the ‘Shop-poles! For those not in the know, BatDad is Blake Wilson of Atlanta, well…
By Owen Good -
Culture
Sunday Comics: Kids These Days
Welcome to Kotaku‘s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best webcomics. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon. Penny Arcade by Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik. Published Oct. 16. Read more of Penny Arcade Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published Oct. 14. Read more of Awkward Zombie Brawl In The…
By Owen Good -
The studio behind Dark Matter, criticized by many as an incomplete game released on Steam earlier this week, has given a statement on the matter. While “it is simply not true that the game is unfinished,” InterWave Studios acknowledged its ending “may cause confusion and is not satisfactory.” They’re working on a fix.
By Owen Good -
Arnold Schwarzenegger Re-Records His Most Famous Lines for Fans
Yesterday in a Reddit AMA, Col. Matrix took requests to repeat his most iconic lines of the past three decades. Among them: Predator (above), Conan the Barbarian (but not the prayer to Crom) Kindergarten Cop and, of course, The Terminator. How in the hell did nothing from Commando make it? Here are all the videos.…
By Owen Good -
Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: I Thee Choose: The Winners
Last week’s challenge was to do something tasteful with a proposal at the gala launch event for Pokémon X and Y. Many of you were able to pull that off. (Many others were not.) Most of the finalists were … subtle, so look closely, but overall No. 1 halfbeast definitely hits you like an axe.…
By Owen Good -
Politician Out to Scare Parents Makes a Great Pitch for GTA Instead
I don’t know where to begin with this, but it’s hilarious. The state’s attorney for a southern Chicago suburb on Thursday gathered middle school parents to urge an “economic boycott” of Grand Theft Auto, which has already made, like, a billion dollars. It sounds like a scared-straight lecture straight out of 1958. The assembly took…
By Owen Good -
Indie Studio Says Failed Kickstarter is Why Its Game Looks Incomplete [Update]
A jolting conclusion awaits anyone who bought Dark Matter, an indie game released two days ago on Steam. About four hours in, gamers were abruptly slapped with a wall of text signifying the end of the game. The game’s maker says the hard stop is because the studio’s Kickstarter failed and they ran out of…
By Owen Good
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