DDoS Attacker Will Spend Two Years In Prison

One of the men behind a series of 2013 attacks on games like League of Legends and DOTA 2 has been sentenced to 27 months in jail, and must pay $95,000 in restitution to another of his victims. Via Polygon, in a statement released by the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of California…

Dota Underlords, As Told By Steam Reviews

Are you someone who still battles in video games by using your fingers to directly input commands, like some kind of barbarian? That’s old hat. Today, auto-battlers are all the rage. Simply buy some guys, arrange said guys, and they (the guys) will do the battling for you. With Dota Underlords, Valve rushed to capitalize…

Let’s See How Much Fun We Can Squeeze Out Of The Last Half Hour Of E3

Yes, E3 2019 ended three weeks ago. However, in my nightmares, I’m still there, slamming energy drinks and binge-sitting in every gamer chair my eyes can see. As long as my neck still hurts from the flight back, I cannot refrain from scraping the bottom of the E3 barrel. Watch me try and fail to…

A Dog, A Duck, And A Wario Walk Into A Smash Tournament…

This week, America celebrates declaring its independence from England with hot dogs, fireworks, and, apparently, tanks stationed around the National Mall in Washington, D.C. But don’t let that stop you from catching Europe’s biggest Smash Bros. tournament of the year go down at Emirates Stadium in London. Currently boasting over 1,000 entrants, Albion 4 will…

Good Luck Stopping Students From Playing Stadia Games In Class

If Google Stadia games work as advertised, it’ll become all too easy for students everywhere to play video games on their school-issue laptops instead of listening to their teachers’ lectures. On this week’s Kotaku Splitscreen, we answer questions from listeners, including one from a high school teacher about how much of a pain Stadia will…

Netflix Japan had the Stranger Things kids meet up with Japan’s most famous gamer Takahashi-meijin, he of the “16 shots in one second” and star of Hudson’s Adventure Island. Watch the brief video to see who had the best Famicom skills.

Apex Legends’ New Battle Pass Has Cooler Rewards

A lot of Apex players were disappointed with the first season’s battle pass. Rewards were mostly lackluster character and weapon skins. There were no challenges to complete to level up, or emotes or other fun things you could earn. Overall the battle pass didn’t offer much incentive to play more during the season. Season 2…

Mordhau Developers Address Controversy, Saying They Won’t Add Gender Or Race Filters

After a controversial interview with PC Gamer discussing Mordhau players’ use of slurs and the potential implementation of a race or gender toggle, the game’s developers issued a statement this morning to clarify their stances. They now say they had no plans to add an ethnicity toggle to Mordhau, adding in a statement that they…

I Love When Video Game Music Is So Good I Forget To Actually Play The Game

One of my favorite games of the last several years is Facepalm Games’ The Swapper.I like it for a lot of reasons: it’s got this beautiful stop-motion clay art style, an immediately compelling hook in the titular Swapper, a gun that lets you clone yourself and zap your consciousness between those clones, and a disconcerting…

The Secret To The World’s Lightest Gaming Mouse Is Lots Of Holes

In order to create what it calls “the world’s lightest gaming mouse,” the engineers at peripheral maker Glorious PC Gaming Race took a mouse and put holes all in it. The result is the Model O, a very good gaming mouse that weighs only 67 grams and may trigger trypophobia. “You’ll barely feel the holes,”…

Blizzard Responds To Accusations Of Censorship In Hearthstone‘s Latest Patch

In the lead-up to Hearthstone’s upcoming “Saviors of Uldum” expansion, Blizzard Entertainment released a patch yesterday that ran a couple housekeeping alterations to make way for the new content. The update removed some older cards from the game’s Standard mode, added some new cards to the game’s Classic set, and in a move that’s stirred…

Ronald McDonald’s Name Is Slightly Different In Japan

One of the world’s most famous corporate mascots has a slightly different name in Japan, where Ronald McDonald is known as Donald McDonald. In Japanese, the character’s name is written as ドナルド・マクドナルド (Donarudo Makudonarudo). Similarly, the McDonald’s backed charity is locally known as the Donald McDonald House. The burger chain first came to Japan in…

The Curse Of The Yakuza Games

The Yakuza games and their spin-offs have long starred some of Japan’s biggest celebrities. Now that some of those celebs have ended up in trouble, there are rumblings of a Yakuza curse. Dun dun dun. Earlier this year, actor and musician Pierre Taki, who appeared in the Yakuza spin-off Judgment, was picked up on drug…

Tako Tako Osaka, Japan. By Brian Ashcraft | Twitter JPGs is a photo peek into wherever gamers might find interesting. If you’re a photographer and have images you want to share, drop us a line!

Apologies in advance, as I expect my latest Super Mario Maker 2 level to occupy much of the video game discourse for months to come. I anticipate many a thinkpiece. If you want to try for yourself, it’s 7JF-QBH-34G. Just know that you, the “player,” are implicated in all that happens.