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Nolan Bushnell Rejoins the Atari Force
Nolan Bushnell, who founded the original Atari Inc. in 1972, has returned to the company masthead as a member of Atari S.A.’s board of directors. “Original Atari” and “Atari S.A.” have to be specified because technically they’re not the same company. It’s complicated but it all has to do with Infogrames’ 2008 acquisition of Atari…
By Owen Good -
Here’s 45 Seconds of Guys Getting Kneed in the Balls
New iPhone? Pfft. How about three pairs of sweaty men humping kicking the crap out of each other? Wait! Wait! Calm down! Form an orderly line or you’ll crash the Internet! This is 45 seconds of mostly in-game footage from EA Sports MMA, featuring Jake Shields, whose entourage went all Sharks and Jets with Jason…
By Owen Good -
Losing the Triple Crown
To: Luke From: Owen Re: Hawaii My cousin and his wife just had their first baby this week, a tiny little guy who looks uncommonly serene in all the pictures of him so far. My cousin and I share the same middle name, which is also Mom’s middle name. The coincidence there was that we…
By Owen Good -
Reminder: Our WarioWare D.I.Y. Contest Ends at Midnight
That’s midnight Kotaku time, so, seven hours from now. If you’ve been perfecting your Kotaku-themed WarioWare D.I.Y. mini-game to win the enormous grand prize package Nintendo’s put up, now’s the time to wrap things up and go gold. So be sure to visit the contest page – where you’ll find all the rules and conditions…
By Owen Good -
Filmmaker’s Blog Outs Canoeing-Style Project Natal Game
Remember James Gunn? The filmmaker who called Microsoft “the most dreadful, non-talent friendly company I’ve ever worked for“? Apparently they patched up. Microsoft invited him to try Natal, and Gunn’s spilled the beans on a game called “River Rush.” On his personal blog, Gunn describes River Rush as two player kayaking type game where both…
By Owen Good -
Week in Games: Monster Week
In name only. Just nine titles drop in the coming seven days, but Capcom’s Monster Hunter Tri for the Wii is among them, on Tuesday. Afterburner comes to Xbox Live Arcade and the PlayStation Network this week, too. This week’s count: Two for Wii, 360 and DS, One for PSP, PS3 and PC. Monday (April…
By Owen Good -
Kotaku’s Top 5 List of Top 10 Lists
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 8-bit Boss Battle Themes [ScrewAttack] Check it out, Screw Attack sent along a video compiling their selections, with special guest lyrics from the…
By Owen Good -
Activision Exec: Our Developers are Treated ‘Extremely Well’
A top Activision executive, speaking late this week after mass defections from Modern Warfare studio Infinity Ward eviscerated morale there, defended the company’s treatment of its developers, saying they’re paid better under Activision than anywhere else. “We treat our developers extremely well,” Thomas Tippl (pictured), Activision’s chief operating officer and chief financial officer, told the…
By Owen Good -
Splinter Cell Stunt Almost Gets Someone Shot
Note to flacks: Cops aren’t considering concepts like viral marketing or cosplay when an actor staggers into a pub district to point a plastic gun at the patrons. Promoters of Splinter Cell Conviction just learned this in New Zealand. The New Zealand Herald reports that the stunt provoked an armed police response to Auckland’s Viaduct…
By Owen Good -
Where Have All the Good Bad Guys Gone?
Every adventure requires an antagonist, someone or something corrupting the world you’re in. It’s a basic need. Yet why do so many games serve up foes whose evildoing provides more of a chore to be undone than a memorable struggle? Writing on his personal blog, Greg Kasavin, a producer for 2K Games (and the former…
By Owen Good -
Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: Legal Warfare Edition
This week, Call of Duty‘s best and brightest bolted their studio like it was a track meet. There’s plenty of suin’ and stuff left that’ll inevitably make this tale of woe even more entertaining. Why wait until court’s in session? Today, class, your assignment is to create your best interpretation of Zampella et al. v.…
By Owen Good -
Culture
Sunday Comics
Penny Arcade published April 14 PvPonline published April 13 ActionTrip published April 12 Digital Unrest published April 12 EXTRALIFE published April 11 GU Comics published April 13 Dotgif published April 16 Dueling Analogs published April 15 Nerf NOW published April 14 Rooster Teeth published April 17 Monday Night Crew published April 16 Virtual Shackles published…
By Owen Good -
Kotaku Off-Topic: With a Paddle
Texas is bringing back corporal punishment, reports the Washington Post. Stories about paddling in public schools are guaranteed to make me feel old as hell. Everyone treats it like a practice banned after 1932, but I was paddled repeatedly. Even as a high school freshman. Yes, really. In shop class, I was kicked back in…
By Owen Good -
Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: Metal Gear Solid Product Placement Edition Winners
I’d expect a ton of submissions for a product-placement ‘shop idea. But for a geriatric video game character, appearing on Sony’s console you can triple the number of joke possibilities. Which were infinite to begin with. Our most recent ‘Shop Contest challenge returned nearly 1,000 replies. Not all of them were submissions but it damn…
By Owen Good -
Snag Final Fight‘s Awesome Remixed Soundtrack
Reviewing Final Fight: Double Impact this week, I failed to mention the game’s remixed soundtrack as a definite plus. It’s the product of Simon Viklund, who delivered the outstanding techno score of Bionic Commando: Rearmed. It’s available for download, free. Not only that, you can snag Viklund’s take on the songs for Magic Sword, also…
By Owen Good -
Tecmo Throwback Achievements Reward Work Done Long Ago
If Tecmo Bowl Throwback actually plays like its 1991 cousin, with similar players, then in addition to destroying everything on earth with the Run-and-Shoot Houston Oilers, I guarantee I’ll get eight of the game’s 12 achievements in my first game. I’ve never seen a set of expectations more basic than these. Even the weakest members…
By Owen Good -
Cop Who Made Video Games Dies at 83
In the mid-1990s Daryl Gates was like the John Madden of law enforcement. His name appeared above PC games made by Sierra. Better known as the Los Angeles police chief during the Rodney King crisis, Gates died Friday at 83. Police Quest: Open Season of 1993 was the fourth game of that series and the…
By Owen Good -
Working the Angles to Make Video Game Baseball Look More Like TV
Maybe no other sport is influenced this much by irregular stadium dimensions. Maybe no other sport has fans who’d care about this. But how you see a baseball game on TV is unique, park-to-park. In video games, however, it’s uniform. This dawned on me when my pitcher was promoted out of Indianapolis a few weeks…
By Owen Good
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