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Kotaku EastJapanMan Arrested After Threatening To Kill Square Enix Staff
A 25-year-old nursing care worker has been arrested after allegedly emailing Square Enix, threatening to kill staff. According to Livedoor News, the man is accused of sending an email on February 5 to Square Enix’s Tokyo office that read, “Hey staff tomorrow I’m going to kill you get ready [for your punishment]” [SIC]. In Japanese,…
By Brian Ashcraft Published April 3, 2019 -
Kotaku EastJapanFormer Esports Champ Allegedly Turned To A Life Of Crime
Back in 2005, Tomoyuki Inui was the best Dead or Alive Ultimate player in the world. Now 33 years 0ld, he was recently arrested for alleged theft. Playing under the name Katuninken, Inui represented Japan in Singapore at the 2005 World Cyber Games, where he was crowned Dead or Alive Ultimate world champ. Inui continued…
By Brian Ashcraft Published April 3, 2019 -
Kotaku EastK-Pop Pick Of The Day: Vanishing Paycheck
Whimsy and innocence? In K-Pop? Stranger things have happened. We’ve heard Stella Jang before, first with the wonderfully moody-cum-jazzy Monsieur, then with the 1980s nostalgia trip that was Beautiful. Vanishing Paycheck is more contemporary than either of them, but that doesn’t mean it’s anywhere close to mainstream K-Pop. It opens with a solitary accordion trill,…
By Seung Park Published April 3, 2019 -
CultureSuper Mario Lost Levels, Punch-Out!! Heading To Switch This Month
Punch-Out!!, Star Soldier, and Super Mario Bros.: The Lost Levels, aka the Japanese Super Mario Bros. 2, are the next games coming to Nintendo’s NES library on Switch Online, on April 10. In other words, it’s another fairly safe, predictable month for Nintendo, with no especially surprising releases and nothing that hasn’t already been in…
By Chris Kohler Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedSomehow, You Can Buy Official Homeworld LEGO
Brick Formations is a company that takes LEGO pieces and somehow manages to put them together and sell them as licensed products, with LEGO having nothing to do with it. It’s a weird place to be in, so it’s nice to see their first products are official, Gearbox-sanctioned Homeworld sets. There are currently sets based…
By Luke Plunkett Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedAlcatraz Island Proves Call Of Duty Blackout Works Great In Close Quarters
Alcatraz Island has arrived in Call of Duty: Black Ops 4. It’s based on a Zombies map, but this version is for the Blackout battle royale mode. You wouldn’t think it, but the smaller map makes for an intense, close-quarters battle royale experience. Alcatraz, a free map, is currently available on PlayStation 4, with Xbox…
By S.E. Doster Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedCivilization VI Saves Games Now Across Both The PC And Nintendo Switch
Microsoft does something similar with its Xbox/PC multiplatform releases, but for some reason this sounds a lot cooler to me: you can now play a game of Civilization VI on your PC, save it, quit, pick up your Switch and keep right on playing the same game. Summoning the will to save your game and…
By Luke Plunkett Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedAn Easy Mode Has Never Ruined A Game
In video games, easy is a dirty word, even when it shouldn’t be. There’s something about the word “easy” that rubs some players as condescending, something that we should maybe leave behind—except where we shouldn’t. Like in FromSoftware games and Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice, a game that finds itself plagued by a debate that is, by…
By Joshua Rivera Published April 2, 2019 -
OpinionImpressionsI Played No Man’s Sky VR And Almost Punched Sean Murray In The Face
I did not punch Sean Murray in the face when I played No Man’s Sky in PlayStation 4 virtual reality last week at a demo event in New York. I almost did, as I reached out to open the canopy of the spaceship I was virtually sitting in, but from the sound he made, I…
By Stephen Totilo Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedFirst-Time Tournament Attendee Beats Dragon Ball FighterZ World Champ
Over 800 fighting game players competed in San Jose, California last weekend at NorCal Regionals, an annual event first established in 2003. One of these competitors was the recent winner of the Dragon Ball FighterZ world championships. Another was a totally unknown player attending his very first tournament. These two competitors couldn’t have been more different,…
By Ian Walker Published April 2, 2019 -
OpinionImpressionsOperencia Is A Treat For Fans Of Old-School Dungeon Crawlers
It’s as true today as it was in the early ‘80s—there’s nothing quite like the exquisite tension of exploring a creepy, creature- and trap-filled dungeon, square-by-square, in first-person. Operencia: The Stolen Sun, Zen Studios’ modern take on the classic dungeon crawler, is sleek, challenging, and incredibly charming. Players have been advancing through fantasy dungeons one…
By Mike Fahey Published April 2, 2019 -
CultureMagic: The Gathering‘s Next Expansion Will Radically Alter The Game
Wizards of the Coast is pulling out all the stops for Magic: The Gathering’s April 25 expansion, Ravnica: War of the Spark. The latest is a beautifully animated cinematic lore trailer that launched at PAX East over the weekend. In it, a brooding, sinister take on Linkin Park’s “In The End” plays while Planeswalker Liliana…
By Joshua Calixto Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedSims Players Are Building Adorable Dollhouses
Like any other fandom, the Sims community often gets swept by trends. This time, the new hotness is dollhouses, all inspired by a Simmer on Tumblr called Smart Milk. The results are absolutely adorable. Smart Milk was so inspired by JMW327’s isometric pixel art of bedrooms that she made some cute bedrooms with cutaway walls.…
By Gita Jackson Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedDevil May Cry 5‘s Bloody Palace Is A Fabulous Hack And Slash Playground
The Bloody Palace has been a fixture of Devil May Cry ever since 2003’s Devil May Cry 2. It’s a mode that involves an exhausting climb through monster-filled rooms with hundreds of enemy arrangements and bosses along the way. But it’s also the best place to play around with combos test your skills in real-time.…
By Heather Alexandra Published April 2, 2019 -
CultureKotaku Game DiaryElder Scrolls Online Used To Be A Bad Theme Park And Now It’s A Great Theme Park
I flippin’ love theme parks. I loved them as a kid, and I love them as a grown-ass man. I also love anything that reminds me of a theme park—and for me, the game that feels most like a theme park is The Elder Scrolls Online. Unfortunately, when it first launched on consoles four years…
By Joshua Rivera Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedHow BioWare’s Anthem Went Wrong
It wasn’t even supposed to be called Anthem. Just days before the annual E3 convention in June of 2017, when the storied studio BioWare would reveal its newest game, the plan had been to go with a different title: Beyond. They’d even printed out Beyond T-shirts for the staff. Then, less than a week before…
By Jason Schreier Published April 2, 2019
