Culture

Host Geoff Keighley announced the 2020 Game Awards nominations today, including Final Fantasy VII: Remake, Ghost of Tsushima, Hades, The Last of Us Part II, Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and Doom Eternal for Game of the Year You can checkout the full list here.  

Apple Will Reduce Its App Store Cut For Smaller Developers

Apple announced today that it’s halving its App Store cut for developers who earn under $1 million, from 30% to 15%. The company has been under fire for its App Store policies recently, notably from Fortnite developer Epic. The App Store Small Business Program will launch on January 1. App developers who make under $1…

Massive Pokémon GO Update Raises Level Cap, Adds Gen 6 Pokémon

Pokémon GO gets its biggest update ever on November 30. Niantic’s “GO Beyond” update raises the game’s level cap from 40 to 50, introduces seasons that change every three months, and introduces pocket monsters originally found in the Kalos region, including Chespin, Fennekin, Froakie, Fletchling, Pyroar, and more. They had me at Fennekin. Pokémon GO…

Ubisoft Removes Managing Director Of Its Skull And Bones Studio

Hugues Ricour, the man in charge of overseeing Ubisoft’s Singapore studio, which is currently developing Skull and Bones, has been removed from that position following the result of a “leadership audit,” according to a copy of an internal company email sent out earlier this week and obtained by Kotaku Ricour had been in that role…

Gris’ Ethereal Soundtrack Fits Together Like An Extremely Pretty Puzzle

Welcome to Morning Music, Kotaku’s daily hangout for folks who love video games and the cool-ass sounds they make. Let’s start today off slow with the soundtrack from Gris, Nomada Studio’s ethereal, contemplative platformer. Maybe you’ve heard that playing through Gris is like playing through a poem, or a painting, or just a really, really…

Track: Future Pop | Artist: Perfume | Album: Future Pop 

The Art Of League Of Legends’ K/DA

League of Legends’ fake girl group, K/DA, have some new music videos out, and recently got some new skins and events. Seeing as we haven’t taken a look at League of Legends for a while here on Fine Art, I figured tonight might be a good time to look at the work that went into…

NFL Cancels Pro Bowl, Will Play It In Madden Instead

While the NFL has been 100% fine with risking the health and lives of players and staff during the 2020 regular season, the annual Pro Bowl game—supposed to be have been played before the Super Bowl in early 2021—has been marked as expendable. In a statement released earlier today, the NFL said that despite cancelling…

The Xbox Elite Controller Was Premium, And I Respect That

For a multi-billion dollar industry that is supposedly at the vanguard of 21st-century technology advancement, video games sure like to keep things basic. Think about it: there’s very little that’s premium about console video gaming. You can’t buy a fancier version of the Switch with an OLED screen and stronger buttons. You can’t buy a…

PS5 Demon’s Souls Player Almost Glitches Past Mysterious Door

Over the weekend, Demon’s Souls players discovered a secret door in the PlayStation 5 remake that wasn’t in the original game. Abusing photo mode revealed that there’s an item beyond this door, but no one’s figured out how to open it yet. A speedrunner named Distortion2, however, very nearly reached this new area, only to…

Streamers Baffled By New Twitch Option To Buy Affiliate Status

The latter portion of Twitch’s 2020 has been characterized by two seismic shifts: a big push to make money off ads and deals, and creator-unfriendly capitulation to the music industry. The company’s latest announcement, a deal with music label Monstercat that allows streamers to purchase affiliate status instead of earning it, combines both. Monstercat outlined…

It’s Really Fun To Crush Foes With Your Fists In Demon’s Souls Now

One of the best things about the Demon’s Souls remake is that every weapon now has unique animations. And not only does attacking look different on PlayStation 5, but so does backstabbing and riposting after a parry. This small change has encouraged me to try out new equipment, but, as in real life, nothing so…

Destiny 2 Will Be Stadia’s First Actually Free-To-Play Game

Destiny 2‘s base game will be free to anyone with an internet connection and access to a Chrome browser through Stadia starting November 19, Google announced today. Called Destiny 2: New Light, free-to-play Destiny lets players explore all of the game’s locations and participate in a number of multiplayer activities like Crucible matches and strike…

PlayStation Boss Won’t Say If Next God Of War Will Be On PS4 Too

God of War: Ragnarok is set to come to come to PS5 some time next year. Could it come to PS4 as well? The head of PlayStation isn’t saying. In an interview with the Telegraph published today, Sony Interactive Entertainment president and CEO, Jim Ryan, was asked point blank whether God of War Ragnarok will…

Animal Crossing‘s Winter Update Brings New Hair, More Storage, And Save Data Transfers

Along with the expected Turkey Day and Toy Day seasonal celebrations, the free winter update for Animal Crossing: New Horizons, launching November 19, adds 800 more slots of home storage, a bunch of new emotes and hairstyles, and the long-awaited ability to transfer save data between systems. Why celebrate Thanksgiving by traveling and risking getting…

Sega CD Silpheed Was Largely Just Spectacle, But That’s Okay

Welcome to Morning Music, Kotaku’s daily hangout for folks who love video games and the cool-ass sounds they make. I was hoping to write a quickie today, but Silpheed is so interesting that wouldn’t have done it justice. Ready to blast off? (Spaceship metaphor.) When I was a kid my shit-filters weren’t yet calibrated, so…

Track: The Private Psychedelic Reel | Artist: The Chemical Brothers | Album: Dig Your Own Hole

Super Mario Sunshine Gets GameCube Controller Support In Super Mario 3D All-Stars

Super Mario 3D All-Stars was already pretty great, but a new update adds a feature that players have been clamoring for since its release last September: GameCube controller support in Super Mario Sunshine In addition to inverted controls across all three games, today’s Super Mario 3D All-Stars patch makes it so that you can play…

Twitch’s Digital Convention Was A Day-Long Commercial That Left Streamers Feeling Frustrated

Its location, size, and Pokimane pizza lines have varied, but since 2015, Twitch has hosted some form of convention every year. 2020 is not like other years, to put it mildly. Of all activities people could choose to perform in our pandemic-stricken nation right now, conventions might actually be the most out of the question.…

Dear Sony, Here’s Our PlayStation 5 Wishlist

The PlayStation 5 is officially out. It’s a tremendous boon for progress, a near-universal step above its predecessor, the PlayStation 4 (well, if you can look past the performance issues of Assassin’s Creed Syndicate). Still, the new user interface could use some improvements. Seeing as it’s the season for making wishlists, we at Kotaku thought…