Culture

Think Of The Most Horrible Chip Flavors Imaginable

Last year Lay’s “Do Us A Flavor” contest awarded the wrong person a million dollars for suggesting potato chips that tastedvaguely like garlic bread. Now the contest returns, and we have a chance for redemption. Flavor showdowns. Wayne Brady singing about potato chip flavors. And most important, a place where your bizarre tastes can shine…

Four-Person Super Metroid Speedrun May Consume Next Hour Of Your Life

Four people race through the Super Nintendo classic Super Metroid. Who wins? Also, how in the world do they do this stuff? The video above, uploaded by YouTuber Charles English, shows the four-person Super Metroid speedrun that went down last weekend as part of the Awesome Games Done Quick charity event. I started watching and…

Ask Dr. Nerdlove: How To Do Online Dating Right

What’s going on, Kotaku? Hello and welcome to the first installment of Ask Dr. NerdLove, an advice column specifically for your geeky relationship issues. To kick things off, this week we’re going to talk a little about getting the results you want from online dating. Hey Doc, I’m a video game programmer, and general nerd,…

That’s Some Motley Crew You’ve Got There, Boy

Damian Audino is a concept artist who’s only just started out working in the games business. Prior to that, he’s been doing freelance work. I wish Eelboy was a thing I could read/play/watch right now. You can see more of Damian’s work at his personal site To see the larger pics in all their glory…

When East Meets West Meets An Acid Trip

Arnaud Valette is a freelance concept artist who has worked in both games and film, most recently on card games for Applibot and movies like Guardians of the Galaxy and Man of Steel. He’s also got to work on Game of Thrones. Lucky sod. Arnauld recently published a book of his works called Red Mescaline…

Track: I | Album: Glaciers | Artist: Blue Sky Black Death Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to—and gaming to—at the moment.

Gaming’s Greatest Unsung Heroine

It would be a real shame to forget about Cate Archer. Over the past week, I’ve been replaying the spy game No One Lives Forever for the first time since it came out in 2000. I’m struck not only by how well the first-person espionage-fest holds up all these years later, but how audacious it…

Track: Unsilent Death | Album: Unsilent Death | Artist: Nails Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to—and gaming to—at the moment.

FOR LEASE: Old Castle (No Deer, Sorry)

Polish artist Mathias Zamęcki is a freelancer who has worked both for local games studios as well as board games company Fantasy Flight. You can see more of his work at his personal site and CGHub page To see the larger pics in all their glory (or, if they’re big enough, so you can save…

Awesome Games Done Quick wrapped up its weeklong speedrun extravaganza yesterday, and it succeeded in raising $1 million—$1,008,320.99 exactly—for the Prevent Cancer Foundation. All of the runs are listed, with links to video, in this thread, or check out Punch-Out!! while blindfolded, and a world record in Goldeneye.

The Week in Games: With Liberation for All

We’re still in hibernation for major new releases, so our recap will again be more forward looking than focused on the present. Assassin’s Creed Liberation gets a console release this week. More to come later. Jan. 14 Assassin’s Creed Liberation HD (PSN) Broken Age Act One (PC, Ouya, for Kickstarter backers) The Banner Saga (PC)…

Sunday Comics: Blinded With Science

Welcome to Kotaku‘s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best video gaming webcomics. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon. Corpse Run by Alex Di Stasi. Published Jan. 9. Read more of Corpse Run Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published Jan. 6. Read more of Awkward Zombie Penny Arcade by…

Watch Two Players Team Up to Run Goldeneye in World-Record Time

Awesome Games Done Quick has, no lie, delivered some absolutely compelling video game theater this weekend already. That’s a genuine roar from the audience when these runs are finished, and the cheering is richly deserved. Early this morning we got another instant classic: A world-record run of Goldeneye. Ryan White and Alex Anderson of the…

This Week in the Business: $1 Million Worth of Pizza Sold on Xbox Live

STAT | $1 million—Amount of sales that Pizza Hut’s Xbox 360 app has generated in 4 months by allowing people to order pizza from Xbox Live; “It’s been a source of unbelievable growth for us,” said Pizza Hut And elsewhere in the business of video games this past week … QUOTE | “I don’t think…

Incredible Gamer Takes On Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out While Blindfolded

Not only is master gamer Sinister1 playing Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out!! while blindfolded and crushing it, he’s moving through the game as quickly as possible. I’m speechless. Part one is up top, and here’s the rest of the run, where things get hairy: Sinister1’s full-run attempt happened today during Awesome Games Done Quick 2014, a speedrunning…

Watch Super People Play Super Games Super Fast

If you haven’t been tuning into this year’s Awesome Games Done Quick, you are missing out on some serious rapid-fire video gaming. All week the fine folks at AGDQ have been speedrunning their way through new games like Metal Gear Rising, classics like Super Mario World, and exercises in self-destruction like Battletoads The marathon ends…

The Man Who Helped Change The Look Of Halo

It’s not often that video game artists make the headlines, but Kenneth Scott made a few this week when he left his post as art director at 343 studios. That’s kind of a big deal for fans because he was in charge of shaping the series’ visual identity. It’s far from terrible news – his…

Looking for advice on your love life? Good news! Kotaku is bringing on the one and only Dr. Nerdlove for a recurring column answering your questions about love, life, and dating. He’s taking questions for his first column via email, so send him queries at [email protected] and put the word “Kotaku” in the subject.

Nice Day For A White Wedding

Lukas Esch is an artist at OnePixelBrush, a studio we’ve featuredrecently on Fine Art for their work on games like BioShock Infinite and Ryse. You can see more of Lukas’ work at his personal site and CGHub page To see the larger pics in all their glory (or, if they’re big enough, so you can…

The Dreamcast Wasn’t The First Time Sega Quit A Hardware Business

The day Sega stopped making video game hardware was a sad one, but it’s worth remembering that, like former rivals Nintendo, video game hardware wasn’t the only thing Sega had ever made. Sega’s history is likewise littered with other stuff, from slot machines to photobooths, but one of the coolest has got to be the…