Gun Week is our week-long exploration of video games' signature obsession: guns. Even gamers who wouldn't own a gun usually love to shoot the virtual ones. Here are the stories, images and videos that attest to that.
(This post will be updated throughout the week.)
So Long, Gun Week
I know what you're thinking. It's Friday. Gun Week must be over, right? Or do we have one more post in the barrel, another celebration of video gaming's obsession with firearms?
The Guns Of Our Forefathers
When you think of guns in video games, you think of assault rifles, plasma rifles, rocket launchers or machine guns. Why is it you never think of, say, a musket?
The Cases Of The Missing Bullets
If a video game contains guns, does it also contain bullets? Not necessarily. Well, not necessarily - get this - depending on your philosophical take on what it means for a bullet to exist.
This Only Works In John Woo Movies
If I learned anything from Unreal Tournament, it's that two automatic pistols are better than one, and holding them sideways makes them fire faster. It's two popular handgun fallacies in one!
Miniguns In The Desert: How Video Game Guns Are Made
In many genres, the gun is the point where the gamer meets the game, making it the single most important element in a given title. That makes the guys who make the guns important, too.
Our Video Game Gun Rack
So many games, so many guns. Most are good, but some have to be the best, and it's only the best that we've decided to hang on our Kotaku Gun Rack. Keep the crows off our porch.
The Man Who Invented Home Video Games Knew His Guns
The man who invented home video games may have known more about real guns than any other game creator in history. But, he tells Kotaku, that's not why the first game console had a gun.
With This Gun, Your First-Person Shooters Can Surround You
In Dallas, last month, I spotted a big inflatable igloo. It had been erected by a company called Microvision on the exhibition floor at QuakeCon. Inside of it, I discovered, was a man holding this gun.
Out Of Ammo: Our Favorite Shooter Melee Weapons
Whether you're seriously low on ammo or just want to make someone's life completely miserable, there's nothing quite like bringing a hammer, crowbar, or chainsaw to a gun fight. Here are some of our favorite gun alternatives.
In Search Of The First Video Game Gun
What was the first video game gun? There are three ways to try to answer that question.
Getting Shot: A 103-Second Retrospective
What's it look like to get shot in a video game? The portrait of pain has been changing over the years. We took a bullet in 18 years' worth of games to bring you this montage.
Building The Perfect Kill House With Video Games
Armed with M-4 automatic rifles, swathed in body armor and combat fatigues, the five man U.S. Special Forces Airborne entry team stacks up outside the entrance to the house.
The Video Game Ad Too Violent For Print?
As mentioned in our recent History of Headshots article, the 2000 video game Soldier of Fortune was a pioneer - a bloody pioneer - in the technological art of connecting a gamer's virtual gun with various enemy body parts.
"That's Not The Way You Play the Game"
Long before there were video games about people shooting one another in war, there were wars with people shooting one another.
A Fistful of Zombies: Gunplay in Dead Rising 2: Case 0
A lot of people loved killing zombies in the original Dead Rising. But almost just as many hated using guns to do so. Why? The controls.
What Do Game Developers Know About Real Guns? In game after game, there they are: guns. Weapons are a common trope. They are a catalyst for action and an instrument for destruction. In-game guns and, well, guns are different. What do game developers know about the real deal?
Look At (Almost) All The Light Guns
One of the experiences that unites gamers is that so many of us have picked up a plastic gun and pointed it at our TV. History has given us dozens of light guns. Here, a gallery of greats and not-so-greats...
Gunfusion: They Gave Sonic The Hedgehog A Handgun, Sort Of
Gunfusion: More Info Than We Need To Know, Boss
Gunfusion: The Force Feedback, Pistol-Gripped, 3D Mouse Controller
Gunfusion: The Doom Rickroll
Gunfusion: Meet the Heavy
The History of Headshots, Gaming's Favorite Act Of Unreal Violence
It may seem ghoulish to the outsider. It will seem essential to the gamer. One of the most popular things to do in video games is to aim for the head with a gun and fire. Who thought of that? And why do people like doing it so much?
Welcome To Gun Week
Gamers and the people who make games are crazy about guns. Visit a gaming shop and you'll see walls of boxes that feature, somewhere on them, guns. Have the last five video games you've played included guns? Most of them, probably yes.
(This post will be updated throughout the week.)