Peter Tieryas

Where, When, And How To Watch Summer Games Done Quick 2019

Summer Games Done Quick is back! Speedrunners will be playing through a mix of modern and retro games and doing amazing things all around while racing against the clock. This year’s event just started with Spyro Reignited Trilogy and will run from today until the 30th where the event will end with a speedrun of…

Root Letter Is About Catfishing Gone Terribly Wrong

Root Letter made me miss Japan. Developed by Kadokawa Games for the PS Vita and PlayStation 4, the visual novel adventure takes place in the city of Matsue within the Shimane Prefecture. The protagonist, referred to as Max, is looking for his high school pen pal, Aya Fumino, after he finds a 15-year old letter…

What I’m Most Looking Forward To Re-Experiencing In The Final Fantasy VII Remake

I bought the original PlayStation just so I could play Final Fantasy VII. Until then, all I’d had was a SNES and a Genesis, so I was in awe when the opening cutscene for FFVII began. The rest of the game was equally stunning, the visuals beyond anything I’d thought possible in a game. I…

Elite Beat Agents Is About Saving The World With Music And Dance

The world is in ruin, relationships are in tatters, and dreams are being crushed. How to help all these people? According to Elite Beat Agents, it’s through the power of love- er, music. Released in 2006 for the Nintendo DS and developed by iNiS, Elite Beat Agents is a wacky rhythm game revolving around a…

Speedrunners Helped Me To Better Understand The Weird Games Of My Childhood

Summer Games Done Quick starts this Sunday at 11:30AM CDT and will be livestreamed on GamesDoneQuick’s Twitch Channel here. The event runs from June 23rd to the 30th and is raising money for Doctors Without Borders. I’m honestly in awe of speedrunners. The dedication, skill, and stamina they show in their playthroughs is impressive. There’s…

Neon Genesis Evangelion Is About The Cost And Trauma Of Existence

Neon Genesis Evangelion’s characters suffer a lot. I learned about the series from one of my co-workers back in my LucasArts days. I’d seen some mecha anime, but nothing like Neon Genesis Evangelion. On the surface, it seemed to hit a lot of the trope checklist with a frustrated young pilot, Shinji Ikari, who’s essentially…

What Is Your Favorite Game On A Portable System?

Up until recently, I didn’t play many portable games. Even when I did, I liked to play them on a TV screen, which is why I used the Game Boy Player for my GameCube to play many of my favorite GBA games like Metroid Fusion, Astro Boy: Omega Factor, The Legend of Zelda: The Minish…

Final Fantasy V Reminds Me Of What I Loved About The Series

Talking about Final Fantasy has become complicated. A lot of my favorite Final Fantasy memories are from games in the series that are over a decade old. I’ve played through most of the main series Final Fantasy games, aside from FFV and the online ones. I genuinely enjoyed most of them (even XIII), though none…

A Wishlist For The Legend of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild Sequel

How do you improve the seeming perfection of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild? Breath of the Wild took everything that was great about the Zelda series and made it grander and more epic. Like the clever puzzles that make up their dungeons? How about 120 shrines that distill them into their purest…

The Difficult Dilemma Of Dragon Quest XI’s Post Credit Sequence

Dragon Quest XI is a very long game full of tragic twists and turns, so when my journey finally came to an end, it felt like a real accomplishment. The credits rolled. I’d defeated the main villain and brought peace to the land. I actually felt sad that my time with my companions was coming…

Death Mark Reminds Us That We Can Never Vanquish Our Ghosts

There was a time I was obsessed with American urban legends, especially the horror-themed ones. Learning more about their roots and origins, and how a story evolves over time to fit the social mores of its time was fascinating, if terrifying. Death Mark is kind of like a mix track of creepy Japanese urban legends…

In Defense of Castlevania 2: Simon’s Quest

The original Castlevania was one of the first NES games I played. So when the sequel came out for the NES in December 1988, I knew I had to play it. Simon’s Quest mixed up the first game’s action-platforming formula and gave players a Metroidvania-style game with RPG mechanics, revolving around a curse that Dracula…

Hotel Dusk: Room 215 Is A Compelling Story About Loss And Guilt

I still have a classic Nintendo DS that even plays the old GBA games, but I only take it out when I go on airplanes. Recently having finished Phoenix Wright: Trials and Tribulations, I turned to Hotel Dusk: Room 215, knowing nothing about the game. I quickly became addicted to the mystery interactive novel developed…

The Classic JRPG About Two Scientists Saving The World

A mix of The Legend of Zelda and the works of Hayao Miyazaki, Crystalis was an incredible action RPG for the NES whose surprisingly complex story helped elevate it above many of its peers. It’s also one of the games I most fondly recall from my childhood, so re-playing it on the SNK 40th Anniversary…

Hi Kotaku readers, that’s it for me today! Thanks so much for letting me share my love for some retro and modern games, as well as sharing some personal stories about fatherhood. I was also pleasantly surprised that so many readers had enjoyed Herzog Zwei! I hope I can play some of you in online Herzog…

What’s The Scariest Moment You’ve Experienced In A Game?

I like zombie games. I like open world experiences. Mixing them together gives you The Evil Within 2 Sebastian Castellanos’s plunge back into the shared reality of STEM takes you into a Twin Peakesque town called Union that is as distorted as your fractured psyche. There’s a killer photographer on the loose who’s murdering his…

The Amazing Legacy of Phantasy Star IV’s Fallen Utopia

There are too many amazing JRPGs in the 16-bit era to crown one the best. But there is a pantheon that includes classics like Final Fantasy IV through VI, Chrono Trigger, Terranigma, Breath of Fire, and the Phantasy Star games. Phantasy Star IV for the Sega Genesis was easily the best JRPG on the system,…

Silent Hill:Downpour Made You The Monster

Playing the Resident Evil 2 remake has been incredible. It’s also made me pine for a new installment in another one of my favorite horror series, Silent Hill. I know Silent Hills would have been that new installment, but as that’s cancelled, I’ve been going back and playing some of the older Silent Hill games.…

Some Of The Ways I’m Sharing My Love Of Gaming With My Baby

When I was growing up in the 80s, many of the adults around me were disparaging towards video games, considering them a bad influence that detracted from school work. I don’t want to over-generalize, but many of my friends were, like myself, Asian-American, and their parents wanted them to pursue more “serious” careers like becoming…

A Tribute To JRPG Villages That Were Annihilated

The life of an NPC is tough. Perpetually stuck with one or two interesting things to say. Trapped in houses or stores, or making idle chatter around the town’s well. The most excitement that may happen is when the troublesome village kid runs off. But don’t worry, the protagonists will save them. Oh, but what’s…