Culture

NBA Players Are Living The 2K Life

One of the weirdest (and worst!) things about the NBA 2K series is how the whole experience is built around the idea of a “neighbourhood” of stores, most of them heavily branded in-game advertisements. It’s not how the real world looks or works! But then, the NBA in 2020 isn’t living in the real world.…

U.S. Navy Follows Army In Banning Twitch Viewers Asking About War Crimes [UPDATE]

The U.S. Army and Navy might have different express purposes and a football rivalry, but they’re united in their shared passion for avoiding talk of war crimes. Soon after the Army took flak for banning viewers who asked about war crimes from its Twitch channel, the Navy is employing a similar tactic. Like the Army,…

NHL 21 Isn’t Getting A PS5 Or Xbox Series X Version

EA’s latest hockey game, NHL 21, won’t be out until October this year, and it’s not going to have a special version for the PS5 or Xbox Series X consoles, the publisher announced in an update its website today. “For NHL 21, we made the decision to focus on adding innovation and new features rather…

Rapper Logic Signs Exclusive Deal With Twitch

A few days ago, popular musician Logic, real name Sir Robert Bryson Hall II, retired, saying that it’s time for him to focus on being “a great father.” He must be taking inspiration from people like Ben “DrLupo” Lupo, the daddest man on Twitch, because his post-retirement fatherhood plans now include an exclusive deal with…

Nintendo Hid Today’s Best-Looking Switch Game In The Japanese Direct

The best-looking game in today’s Nintendo Direct Mini might have been the action-platformer-farming (!) game Sakuna: Of Rice And Ruin, but you wouldn’t have seen it if you were watching the North American version of the Direct. It wasn’t in there. In Japan, though, it kicked off the presentation. It’s unclear why that is, because…

The Full Bugsnax Song Is Out And It Slaps

2020 has been a year filled with pain, suffering, bad news, murder hornets, disease, and overall bad vibes. Luckily we got a small break in the form of Bugsnax and specifically its wonderful, catchy theme song. And now, I’m happy to report the full song is available. You can listen to it now. You should.…

Everything Announced During Today’s Nintendo Direct Mini

Today, Nintendo hosted an 8-minute Direct focused on third-party games. That means we didn’t get a look at Metroid Prime 4, the Breath of the Wild sequel, new Smash Fighters Pass characters, Pokémon’s Crown Tundra DLC, or any of the reportedly 9,000 Mario remasters in the works. Still, it was a Nintendo Direct! In 2020!…

Shin Megami Tensei V Is Coming To Switch In 2021

It’s been a long time since we got a look at Shin Megami Tensei V, but in today’s Nintendo Mini Direct series publisher Atlus confirmed the game is still on its way and due out sometime in 2021. Originally announced back in 2017 with a trailer, we haven’t heard much about Shin Megami Tensei V…

How’s It Going?: Reading Edition

Here we are at Monday again, alas. Welcome back to our daily open thread. Pretty much all I did this weekend was read and bake a cake, which was really nice. I finished two books: The Only Good Indians and Fleishman Is In Trouble. They’re both not my usual thing: the first is a horror…

The Week In Games: Become A Deadly Monster In Carrion

Carrion is a game where you play as a giant, powerful and deadly monster killing evil humans. Sounds like just the thing a lot of folks need right now in 2020. Every time I see a gif of this game pop up on Twitter I’m always excited to play it and now it’s actually coming…

Originally set to come out this week, Dying Light’s Hellraid DLC has been delayed until next month. Techland announced a new release date of August 13 for PC so that it work in feedback from the DLC’s beta. Hellraid is a dungeon mode based on a previously cancelled standalone game.

At 10am ET/7am PT on Monday, Nintendo will be hosting the first ever Nintendo Direct Mini: Partner Showcase, “a series focused on titles from our development & publishing partners,” where there’ll be “updates on a small group of previously-announced Nintendo Switch games”.

Yyyyaaarrrrrgghhhhhh

Roberto Gatto is an artist from Italy working in the games business. You can see more of Gatto’s stuff at his personal site and ArtStation page

Wear A Damn Mask

I don’t care if you’re in Michigan, Manchester or Melbourne, if you have to leave your home and can’t stay away from other people, wear a mask. It’s not hard! And to help illustrate this, here’s every single Smash Bros. Ultimate character wearing one. And these guys are doing sweaty work. This is courtesy of aliigleed,…

Minecraft Players Think They’ve Found The Game’s Title Screen World

Nine years after it first popped up in the background of the game’s main menu screen, some Minecraft players think they’ve finally found the exact same world in the game itself. Some members of the Minecraft@Home team made the discovery over the weekend, using volunteers’ idle computers to help crunch numbers in the name of…

It Can Take Nearly 12 Years To Spawn A Demon In Doom II Thanks To A Small Programming Quirk

At the end of Doom II players face off against The Icon of Sin, which is really just a large and creepy texture that spits out demons. But this boss fight has some odd mechanics and quirks, including a small programming oversight that could lead to players having to wait over a decade for a…

‘Shop Contest: Special Eyes

One of my favorite Twitter accounts I follow is Supper Mario Broth, an account that tweets out weird and tiny details and facts from various Mario games. Recently they tweeted about Mario and Luigi’s incredible eyes. Your challenge this week: Do something with this eye texture. You probably expected something cake related? Well, while I…

How’s It Going?: Too Damn Hot Edition

Grab a cold beverage, take a seat, and come chat with us in our daily open thread. It’s too hot. Around here in Kansas, we have been getting multiple days in the mid-90s and it’s not great! Making it worse is having to wear a mask. I fully support and encourage everyone to wear a…

Yarntown Is A Free 2D Zelda-Like Remake of Bloodborne

Bloodborne is a dark and difficult action RPG set in a highly detailed 3D world. Yarntown, a free indie game released yesterday, takes part of that world and reimagines it as a top-down, colorful, Zelda-inspired adventure. Developed by Max Mraz, Yarntown was built using the Solarus engine and is a colorful remake of Central Yharnam from…

Sunday Comics: Oh…Sorry

Hello! It’s time for Kotaku’s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best webcomics. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon. Corpse Run by Alex Di Stasi. Published July 16. Read more of Corpse Run Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published July 13. Read more of Awkward Zombie Clueless Hero by…