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The Wonderful Place Where Diablo III Meets Robots

Phroilan Gardner spent a few years at Blizzard as a concept artist, working on stuff like World of Warcraft and Diablo III, as well as spin-off projects like trading cards and novels. He’s not there anymore, but his art – and the stuff he’s come up with since – lives on! Gardner, who now works…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 8, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

Before Menu Screens, we Adjusted Consoles With Buttons

These wonderful shots are courtesy of Bleeping Relics, and show the control boards of a trio of old Pong consoles. These old analog systems weren’t adjusted via menu screens or fancy UI systems. If you wanted to change something, well, there was a button right there on the console. Bleeping Relics [Flickr]

By Luke Plunkett Published May 7, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

Straight from 1990, One Kid’s Adorable Painstaking VHS Guide for Beating Mega Man

Before the internet existed, millions of players toiled away in lonely obscurity to find the best way to beat the oh-so-hard games of yesteryear. Lots of us scribbled in notebooks, drew our own maps and called tips lines to figure out how to beat the games we were obsessed with. And then we shared this…

By Evan Narcisse Published May 7, 2012

Culture

Have a Lollipop, Batman. You’ve Earned it.

Leonid “leopardsnow” Enin is currently working as a concept artist with mobile gaming powerhouse Gameloft. He’s also done work for other video game companies like Sidhe and Realtime Worlds. Say what you will about Gameloft’s games, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with this artwork. On the contrary. It’s fantastic, even if a lot of it is…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 7, 2012

Culture

What’s Yours is Mine

Mother’s Day isn’t typically a huge sales weekend for video games and the upcoming launch schedule reflects that. Minecraft‘s console release is the week’s only highlight. Tuesday Warlock: Master of the Arcane (PC) Asura’s Wrath: Lost Episode 1 – At Last, Someone Angrier Than Me (PSN, XBLA) Datura (PS3) Wednesday Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition (360)…

By Owen Good Published May 6, 2012

Culture

Sunday Comics: Crowded Source

Welcome to your Sunday read of the week’s best in web comics. Make sure to click on the expand button in the bottom right to enlarge each comic. Penny Arcade by Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik published May 4.—Read more of Penny Arcade Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich published April 30.—Read more of Awkward Zombie…

By Owen Good Published May 6, 2012

Culture

This Week in the Business: ‘Games like Call of Duty Need New Console Hardware’

What’s happened in the business of video games this past week … QUOTE | “Games like Call of Duty need new console hardware.”—RW Baird analyst Colin Sebastian on one of the reasons that Call of Duty: Black Ops II may not set any new sales records for Activision this holiday QUOTE | “The hardcore gamer…

Steve Peterson Published May 5, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

The Moment When Max Payne Realized He Was In a Video Game

It’s not that common that a video game character realizes that he’s actually in a video game. And like any fourth-wall breaking shenanigans, it can be a tricky maneuver to pull off. Leave it to Remedy, the guys running the Max Payne franchise before Rockstar took over, to put their own paranoid protagonist through the…

By Kirk Hamilton Published May 5, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

The Forgotten TV Debut of the Original Star Wars Game

Happy Star Wars day! There have been, to date, one jillion Star Wars video games. (That figure is approximate). But in many ways, there was only one—the 1983 Atari game Star Wars. I played this game when I was barely old enough to understand the films, much less do well at any of the levels,…

By Kirk Hamilton Published May 4, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

Cut a Rug to All of the Greatest Video Game Dance Routines

You know what the world needs more of? Choreographed dance routines. You know what I’m talking about. This is what I’m talking about. In the storied history of video games, there have been a surprising number of amazing dance numbers. Just for you, Chris edited together this video of… pretty much all of them. Sit…

By Kirk Hamilton Published May 4, 2012

Culture

From EVE Online to…Deadwood?

Andrei Cristea is a lead character artist at CCP, the developers behind EVE Online. You know those awesome human face screenshots we showed you the other day? That’s the team Andrei is on, with work pioneered by guys like Jeff Miller and Vigfus Omarsson. But pretty faces and hair aren’t all Andrei can do. So…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 4, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

Cover Your Eyes, it’s the Horror of Third-Party N64 Contollers

I hated the N64 pad. Hated it. Didn’t like the button placement, didn’t like the ergonomics, really didin’t like the fact the little joystick was broken on half the controllers you ever picked up. But you know what? I could easily live with it if I had the choice between Nintendo’s official pad and those…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 3, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

“Celebrate” May 4th With Possibly the Worst Star Wars Video Game Ever Made

There are loads of terrible Star Wars games. We’ve talked about them here before. But there’s different reasons someone can say a game is terrible. They might not like the genre, or the platform, or the way the game has treated the Star Wars canon. One thing many will agree on, though, is that the…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 3, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

Welcome to Total Recall

Total Recall is Kotaku’s nightly look back at the history of video games. Think you know where video games come from? You might know a little, but our aim with Total Recall is to dig a little deeper and shine a light on some of the more bizarre and interesting elements of this medium’s past.…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 3, 2012

Culture

Legend of the Time Star is a New Game With Old Visuals

Currently in development (sort of) at New York-based indie outfit Attack Mountain, Legend of the Time Star is a love letter to old 16-bit, side-scrolling RPGs, particularly those coming out of Japan. Thanks to the input of Jake “virt” Kaufman it’s already sounding like its inspiration, but it’s thanks to Brazilan artist Dudu Torres that…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 3, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

A Booze Company Smuggled the Sega Mega Drive Into India

Take a look at this commercial, for the Sega Mega Drive (Genesis). It’s for the Indian market, and while it’s a little rough around the edges, it’s mostly what you’d expect from the mid-90s. Except for that weird “Shaw Wallace” business. That’s not a YouTube uploader’s watermark, it’s the name of the company that handled…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 2, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

What Assassin’s Creed Looked Like in 2004

Nothing will make you realise just how old this console generation is than today’s Total Recall, which looks at the very first concept art ever put down on paper/computer for the project that would become Assassin’s Creed It was put down in 2004 That’s eight years ago, and while a lot has changed for the…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 2, 2012

Culture

The Astounding Video Game Art of Yang Qi

Yang Qi is a concept artist working in the video game industry. Currently based in Shenzen, he’s most recently worked on Asura Online, a Chinese game. Note in some of these that, in addition to his character artwork, Qi has even dropped in mock screenshots or dioramas featuring the characters or places in question. Neat…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 2, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

Sega Debuts the World’s First Hologram Video Game

We’ve looked at Sega’s pioneering role in the world of 3D gaming before here on Total Recall, but only briefly stopped on Time Traveler, one of the company’s two and only attempts at holographic, 3D arcade gaming. This antique video, from Time Traveler’s 1991 debut, gives only a few hints as to how unsuccessful these…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 1, 2012

CultureTotal Recall

Just How Many Damn Call of Duty Games is This Now, Anyway?

Call of Duty: Black Ops II. Activision and Treyarch will spend the next six months telling you this game is a sequel, but the fact the game’s name starts with “Call of Duty” reminds us we’re way past the point of using the number “II” when it comes to these shooters. Unless it’s XII. Or,…

By Luke Plunkett Published May 1, 2012