Culture

Our Gameplay Data Should Be Harder To Sell

Video game developers can collect our data, and for now, they can sell it to advertisers. But that may not be as easy in the future due to California’s new data privacy law. On this week’s Kotaku Splitscreen, we do a follow-up episode after last week’s analysis of the state of gameplay data and privacy.…

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

The weekend is for a three-day weekend, the best form of weekend. That’s so much time to do so many things and play video games. It’s still The Witcher 3, again. I’d also like to finish Katana Zero and play some Apex Legends, but there’s all that Witcher 3 to get through (again)… What about…

I Both Love And Feel Embarrassed About All The Video Game Music On My Phone

An eight-hour road trip I recently took with a friend quickly turned into a musical deep dive. As we flew through conversations about bachata, gospel, R&B, soul, house, and more, my friend mentioned that ’90s music made up a significant portion of his palate. “You know, there’s a lot of anime and video game music…

Track: Story | Artist: Never Young Beach | Album: Story  Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

I Love Anime. Akihabara, Tokyo. By nerdydesi. 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! 

Arise, Sir Goodboye Of Dogginton

Maria Zolotukhina is a freelance illustrator and 3D artist from Russia. You can see more of Maria’s work at her ArtStation page

Popular Twitch Streamer Tfue’s Contract With FaZe Leaks As Public Dispute Rages On

Earlier this week, Turner “Tfue” Tenney, a 21-year-old Fortnite pro who is one of the most popular streamers on Twitch, sued FaZe, the esports organization to which he is currently signed. The suit says that the contract between Tenney and FaZe is “oppressive” and “illegal,” arguing that FaZe is in violation of California’s Talent Agency…

30 Years Of Driving Around The Same Video Game Race Track

Silverstone has been home to the British Grand Prix for most of the race’s history, meaning there are over 30 year’s worth of games that let you drive around it. So Chris Rae had the brilliant idea of doing just that, driving one lap around the circuit in eight different games, the first released in…

My Strange Year In A Strictly-Regimented Day Of Defeat Troop

As I was growing up, I hated sports. When I was nine, I quit football after two weeks to my dad’s disappointment. By the time I got to high school, I wasn’t playing any sports or in any clubs. I was a happy person with dear friends, but I had never been a part of…

Warframe’s Gas City Is Now Stalked By A Giant Robotic Bird

The Ropalolyst stalks the Corpus Gas City on Jupiter occasionally feasting on the metropolis’ machinery as if the place were made of worms. Part of Warframe’s latest update, the Jovian Concord, the gigantic bird comes from an ancient race of AI terraformers called the Sentient. It’s also one of the game’s best new boss fights.…

Track: The Robots | Artist: Kraftwerk | Album: The Man-Machine Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

Detective Pikachu’s Pokemon Designs Are Disgustingly Cute

Stephen Molyneaux was one of the artists on Detective Pikachu, and his work—helping “translate the wonderful designs by Ken Sugimori into the real world”—is so cute I can barely look at it. It’s like staring into the sun. Only the sun is small, and covered in fur. Eevee is a particular hazard. While the designs…

Mordhau Players Glitch Out Of Map To Troll Each Other

One upside of multiplayer games from smaller developers is that they can take risks bigger games might not. Mordhau fits that bill, eschewing traditional shooter mechanics in favor of finely-honed sword swinging and lute plucking. The downside is that smaller games can end up jankier than their bigger counterparts. Case in point: Mordhau players have…

Track: Tori to Hebi to Buta | Artist: Ringo Sheena | Album: Sandokushi Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

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…