Culture

Delicious Meal. Kyoto, Japan. By ShuYung Wu. JPGs is a photo peek into wherever gamers might find interesting. If you’re a photographer and have images you want to share, drop us a line! 

Time Buddies

Raul Aguiar is an illustrator and graphic designer from Brazil who has worked in video games, children’s books and magazines. You can see more of Raul’s stuff at his Behance page

Valve Is Making Its Own Version Of Dota Auto Chess

Late last year, Valve launched the collectible card game Artifact, a spinoff of Dota 2. It flopped so hard that Valve is now revamping it from the ground up. Earlier this year, Dota’s community beat Valve at its own game, creating Dota Auto Chess, a similarly strategic spin-off that, unlike Artifact, has become one of…

Meet The Modder Painstakingly Rebuilding Fallout 76 In Fallout 4

Fallout 76 had a rocky launch, but it’s since established a community that’s making do with what they’ve been given. Still, some of those fans don’t see Fallout 76 as a proper Fallout game, which, for one fan, gave rise to an idea: What if Fallout 76‘s setting of Appalachia was in a proper Fallout…

Valve has posted a lengthy rundown of its thinking surrounding “positive” review bombs, ala what happened to Assassin’s Creed Unity in the wake of Ubisoft’s Notre-Dame efforts. In short, Valve isn’t sure how to handle them: “It doesn’t actually seem to be a review bomb in the way we’ve previously defined them, but maybe that’s…

Overwatch‘s New Anniversary Skins Are All Over The Place

Overwatch’s third anniversary event is live, and it is as Britney Spears once famously said: “The taste of your lips, I’m on a ride. [Roadhog]’s toxic, I’m slipping under.” The new batch of skins runs the gamut from cutesy (albeit infantilizing, when it comes to some fans’ takes on D.Va’s schoolgirl outfit) to literally toxic…

Blizzard Will Release Significant Hearthstone Buffs For The First Time Since 2014

Yesterday, Blizzard announced that it would be nerfing some of the most powerful cards in Hearthstone in an attempt to break up the dominance of two classes: Rogue and Warrior. If you’ve played the game at all since the release of its latest “Rise of Shadows” expansion, you know that these decks were so powerful…

Stop Quitting Magic: Arena Games Before I Can Beat You Properly

Magic: The Gathering is a game about slowly (or quickly) squeezing the life out of your opponent until they’re demoralized, defeated, and feeling the weight of their many, many mistakes. That’s why I am unhappy with the lot of you serial conceders depriving me of that. I’m not a great player of Magic Arena, the…

Track: Shape Of My Heart (My Songs Version) | Artist: Sting | Album: My Songs Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

Kiyomizudera. Kyoto, Japan. By ShuYung Wu. JPGs is a photo peek into wherever gamers might find interesting. If you’re a photographer and have images you want to share, drop us a line! 

Track: 始発まで (until the first train) | Artist: Go Yama | Album: Transcendental Train Tracks Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

An Unfair Fight

Steve Shi is a concept artist and illustrator who has done work for companies like Bethesda, Treyarch and Amazon. You can see more of Steve’s stuff at his personal site and ArtStation page

The Sharpest, Shiniest Cosplay

Cosplayer Polygon Forgespecialises in polygonal representations of video game characters; so imagine if every game ever made had come out on the PS1 and you’ll be getting pretty warm. This is her take on an original design for an action figure, done by artists R-one studio and Hui Zou, which looks like this: And after…

Popular Streamer Sues FaZe Clan Over ‘Illegal’ Contract, But The Organization Says The Contract Is Fine

With over six million followers, Fortnite pro Turner “Tfue” Tenney, 21, is far and away one of the most popular streamers on all of Twitch. Now he’s suing FaZe Clan, the esports organization that signed him, over a contract that he and his attorney feel is “oppressive” and, in some cases, “illegal.” Tenney’s main grievances…

Game of Thrones Just Needed More Time

Game of Thrones has come to an end, and with it, so has Kotaku Splitscreen’s very special run of bonus recaps. BUT FIRST: The final episode. Kirk and I discuss the events of “The Iron Throne,” the series finale of Game of Thrones. We talk about what we liked (the first 20 minutes) and what…

I’m A Little Tired Of This One Assassin’s Creed Odyssey Bow

There may have been a time, a week or two ago, when I was excited to score my first Precursor Reflex Bow in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey. Thirty-seven Precursor Reflex Bows later? Not so much. While playing Odyssey’s Fate of Atlantis expansion, which takes the ancient Greek setting of this action-role-playing-game into an otherworldly realm crafted…

The Week In Games: Race Together, Die Alone

Get ready to go fast! Team Sonic Racing is speeding into stores this week for all major platforms. Our own Mike Fahey enjoyed the game, calling it “…a very good kart racer with a game-changing co-op twist.” So we are getting a new kart racer featuring Sonic and then in June another kart racer starring…

Track: You Are Mother F**ker (Note: Probably NSFW!) | Artist: The Lethal Weapons | Album: Back To The 80’s Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

Sardine Run. Mactan Island, Cebu. By Mar.lin Chen | Instagram  JPGs is a photo peek into wherever gamers might find interesting. If you’re a photographer and have images you want to share, drop us a line! 

‘Shop Contest: Game Of Thrones Finale

Game Of Thrones is coming to an end. Many will watch. Few will enjoy it. Let us celebrate the end of this popular show with a contest dedicated to doing one thing. Your challenge this week: Add video game characters to Game Of Thrones. I don’t watch GoT, as the kids call it, so I…