Culture

Nintendo’s Artists Are Being Cool

For decades, Nintendo’s artists have been stuck churning out cartoon art to fill the halls of the Mushroom Kingdom. Which is fine! But in recent years, the company has let them off the leash on games like Splatoon and ARMS, and the results have been nothing short of extraordinary. Nintendo, the home of Mario and…

Thousands Of People Are ‘Playing’ A Hidden Steam Game

Spacewar is a game that draws thousands of players every day. If you search for it on the Steam store, though, you’ll never find it. You might recognize the name. Spacewar is, after all, Valve’s take on an influential early video game that went by the same name. It’s an extremely basic space shooter where…

The Bootleg Amiibo Business Is Booming, Thanks To Nintendo

With Legend of Zelda Amiibo figures perpetually sold out and fetching prohibitively high prices on eBay, many fans are turning to bootlegged “Amiibo cards” instead. Many sellers of these cards see themselves not as mere pirates, but as modern-day Robin Hoods, providing fans with the in-game content that Nintendo won’t sell them. One seller from…

One Shot, One Kill

Wang Ling, aka WLOP, is an artist from China currently based in Hong Kong. You can see more of WLOP’s art at his ArtStation and Deviantart pages To see the images in their native resolution, click on the “expand” button in the top-left corner. Fine Art is a celebration of the work of video game…

D.Va Walks Out Of Overwatch, Into YouTube Video

Here’s a cosplay team from Korea (AZA and ACROWN) who, instead of just making an Overwatch gallery, decided to shoot a little short movie about D.Va instead. This is one of the best D.Va costumes I’ve seen, since it goes way beyond simply buying a suit, as it also involves making sure all the little…

Fallout 4 Rifle Is A Work Of Art

This replica of a Fallout 4 Tesla Rifle, by Wasted Props, doesn’t just look like the real (well, you know) thing. It spins and “charges” like it as well. Look at it go! For the record, the thing is to scale, measuring in at over 1m (40 inches) long.

Time To Enjoy This GTA Hot Tub And Take A Big Sip Of Beer

Today on Highlight Reel we have Titanfall ass kickings, Battlegrounds rain, hot tub surprises and much more! Watch the video then talk about your favorite highlight in the comments below. Be sure to check out, like, and share the original videos via the links below. Subscribe to Kotaku on YouTube for more! The Last of…

Valve Making Big Changes To Steam Trading Cards To Combat ‘Fake Games’

Steam is littered with games of, shall we say, questionable quality. This has been a known issue for quite some time. Only recently, however, has Valve begun to directly address it. Last month, they said they’re taking aim at so-called “fake games.” Now they’ve detailed their first plan of attack. As Steam users have long…

Torment: Tides of Numenera just got a big update. It’s free and includes a new companion, Oom, as well as a codex. There are also improvements to crises, character progression, and the UI. If you want to try the new stuff—especially Oom—inXile recommends that you start a new game.

Boys Just Wanna Have Fun

When they’re not saving the galaxy and throwing ninja stars at cartoon characters, Master Chief and Genji like to unwind like tiny little children. Cosplay by Shagohod Cosplay (MC) and Rider Break Cosplay (Genji), photos by Lock.VII Projects

Track: Crushed Glass | Artist: Freddie Gibbs | Album: You Only Live 2wice Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to at the moment.

An Entire Fantasy World, Sketched Over One Year

For 366 consecutive days, former Blizzard artist Even Mehl Amundsen drew a series of images sketching out the framework and characters for a fantasy universe. He’s now collecting them into a series of books. They’re called TEGN, and the first of three volumes is now up on Kickstarter, having already gone past its asking amount.…

Here Come The Buffs

While we’ve seen a ton of Japanese Persona 5 cosplay, the game has been out long enough in the West now for a fresh wave to come rolling in. This is Sea Of Rabbitz as P5’s Futaba, with photos by The Will Box The costume and room decor are perfect! But that meal looks way…

Stick To Cammy, Cammy

Dylan Ekren is an artist based in LA who has worked for Disney on movies like Frozen, Big Hero 6 and Zootopia We’re here, though, for his series of Street Fighter sketches, in which he’s drawing a different Chun-Li for every day in May. You’ll find his progress so far below, but for a similar…

The Week In Games: Injustice For All

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: who do you think would win in a fight, Batman or Superman? It’s been almost a decades since Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe first unleashed the Man of Steel and the Caped Crusader upon one another within the gritty context of the Midway fighter universe but the…

Podcast: Let’s Spoil Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Join us, won’t you, for a Kotaku Splitscreen spoilercast of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, a video game about a mute young man who obsessively collects seeds. First, Kirk and I talk this week’s news including the rocky future of Mass Effect (5:20), an eleven-year-old getting GTA V and finding a bag…

Sunday Comics: Forced Fusion Tutorial

Welcome to Kotaku’s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best webcomics that usually occurs on Sunday except when it doesn’t. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon. Nerf NOW!! by Josué Pereira. Published May 12. Read more of Nerf NOW!! Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published May 12. Read more…

This Week In The Business: VR’s Virtual Diversity

QUOTE | “Part of my job involves funding content and my heart sinks when someone brings me something that’s a shooter, because a shooter is almost the lowest common denominator at this point.” – Oculus’ Callum Underwood says it’s time for VR devs to move on and consider new styles of gameplay. QUOTE | “I…

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

The weekend is for packing because you’re going on a solo vacation to Iceland next week, which is exciting and a little scary! But planning is stressful, so probably video games. I’m finally done with my review of Prey, but I’m really excited to play it again a lot slower so I can check out all…

What We Liked (And Didn’t Like) About Breath Of The Wild’s Final Boss

On this week’s Kotaku Splitscreen, Jason and I were joined by our boss Stephen Totilo to talk about The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild with full spoilers. We started with the final boss fight. You can listen to our discussion starting at 22:56, and the full Zelda conversation actually goes on quite a…