Welcome to the February 2010 edition of K Monthly, a look back at some of the best original coverage, including reviews, previews, features, weekly columns and more, from Kotaku.
Don't miss our reporting from this year's DICE summit, where video game industry vets reveal secrets about their games and speak frankly about the industry. For some of February's biggest announcements, make sure to read our X10 coverage for everything new on the Xbox 360 and the latest details from Nintendo's Q1 media summit, packed with new games and new releases. Plus, we took a pile of pictures for our posts from Toy Fair 2010. And we've been playing each of the 31 games nominated for the Independent Games Festival as we travel down the Road to the IGF.
Finally, don't forget about our twin theme weeks. First came a week dedicated to Star Trek, and then came Love Week, our special Valentine's Day-themed week long look at the romantic side of video games.
——
TABLE OF CONTENTS
February 2010
FEATURES
- 2010: A Video Gamer's Guide
- Judging The Covers Of Games, And How To Make Them Better
- The Search For The Video Game Auteurs
REVIEWS
- No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle Review: Repetitious Rebel
- MAG Review: World of Shadow Warcraft
- Glory of Heracles Review: A Forgetful Adventure
- Blood Bowl Review: No Fun League
- Starship Defense Micro-Review: The Most HD DS Game
- BioShock 2 Review: In Case Of Rapture
- White Knight Chronicles Review: Workin' On Our Knight Moves
- Dante's Inferno Review: Big Ideas, Small Problems
- Heavy Rain Review: No Wrong Conclusion
- Tatsunoko vs. Capcom: Ultimate All-Stars Review: FanFic Comes to Life
- SOCOM: U.S. Navy Seals Fireteam Bravo 3 Review: Fire In The Hole!
- Chime Review: Tune In, Drop Out
- STALKER: Call Of Pripyat Review: Third Time's A Charm?
- Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief Review: A Muddled Mess
- Aliens Vs. Predator Review: Too Human
- Endless Ocean: Blue World Review: The Wii Game You're Wrong About
- Plants Vs. Zombies iPhone Micro-Review: Touch The Dead
- Resident Evil 5: Lost In Nightmares Micro-Review: Less Fighting, More Frightening
- Assassin's Creed II: Bonfire Of The Vanities Micro-Review: Once More, With Fleeing
- The Misadventures of P.B. Winterbottom Micro-review: Snack Of The Clones
- Star Trek Online Review: A Piece Of The Action
PREVIEWS & IMPRESSIONS
- An Eyes-On Sneak Peek At Tron Legacy... In 3D!!!
- Transformers: War For Cybertron DS Preview: Grimlock Goes Portable
- Transformers: War For Cybertron Preview: A World Without Michael Bay's Robots
- FlingSmash: It's All In the Elbow
- Disney's Guilty Party: Family-Friendly and Fun...Really.
- The Wii's Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands Is Not a Ported Prince
- Super Mario Galaxy 2: Yoshi's Back...and He Brought a Drill!
- Metroid: Other M: A Change of Perspective
- Command & Conquer 4: Tiberian Twilight Hands On: A Less Cheesy Three-way Dip
- Just Cause 2: The Difference Between A Pinata Kill And A Hang Kill
- Hands-On, Sword Out With Red Steel 2
- Alan Wake Preview: The First Full Episode
- Battlefield Bad Company 2 Impressions: The Tougher Battle
- Alpha Protocol Impressions: Looks Deceive
- Infinite Space Preview: Seems Vast And Charty
- Tournament of Legends Preview: Two-Fisted Combat
Op-Ed
Ron Jeremy: Sex, Not Violence, Is Beautiful and Natural
COLUMNS
WELL PLAYED by Brian Crecente
- The Once and Future Sim
- Love In Hell: Dante's Inferno's Take on Romance
- Motion Control in Gaming: Rationalizing a New Dissonance
STICK JOCKEY by Owen Good
- Olbermann, Ripping Me Softly For This Column
- Stick Jockey's Super Sim Spectacular
- Plenty of Contractions, and a Lower Birth Rate in Sports Gaming
- Imaginary Triumphs: Sports As A Role-Playing Game
- More Than Money, Licenses Give a League Control
TIM ROGERS
LEIGH ALEXANDER