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I Cry Every Time A Legendary JRPG Series Goes Mobile
Over the weekend, Square Enix held a live Star Ocean event in Japan that brought together fans of the RPG series with creators and voice actors for a day of livestreamed festivities. Fans hoping to get news on a new Star Ocean for consoles had their hopes dashed, though, as the spotlight was firmly pointed…
By Ethan Gach Published May 21, 2018 -
UncategorizedSome of Vine’s Most Famous Videos, Recreated In Fortnite
One intrepid Fortnite player combined the game with the greatest lost artform of our generation: Vines. It’s a masterpiece. It was really only a matter of time until Vine and Fortnite came together. Vines as a platform hosted often hilarious and irreverent six second videos, and although the platform closed in January 2017, these jokes…
By Gita Jackson Published May 21, 2018 - Uncategorized
Unhewn Throne Is One Of The Best Fantasy Series I’ve Ever Read
I have read many fantasy books over the years, many of them mediocre, and few as captivating as George R.R. Martin’s now-ubiquitous A Song of Ice and Fire. So it was refreshing and thrilling to discover a trilogy that’s nearly as good: Chronicle of the Unhewn Throne, one of the best fantasy book series I’ve…
By Jason Schreier Published May 21, 2018 -
UncategorizedOverwatch Fans Love Moira And Symmetra’s New Looks
As the Overwatch Anniversary skins and emotes trickle out, fans are getting hyped over a few specific ones. Moira’s new dance emote and Symmetra’s magician skin are sending the fandom into a whirlwind of jokes and fanart. Moira’s dance emote was leaked over the weekend. Whether or not it’s real, Overwatch fans find the idea…
By Gita Jackson Published May 21, 2018 - Uncategorized
I Enjoyed The New Devil May Cry Even More By Waiting A Few Years To Play It
I’m a big fan of action games, and the cream of the crop is Devil May Cry. The series has always had the right mix of tricky combo creation and carefree fun. When developer Ninja Theory reimagined the series in 2013’s DmC: Devil May Cry, an anarchic mood and redesigned Dante upset some fans, including…
By Heather Alexandra Published May 21, 2018 - Culture
The Week In Games: Mega Man And Other Androids
There’s a wide variety of games out this week, from art puzzler Gorogoa to a set of Mega Man collections to the much-anticipated Dark Souls Remastered This week continues the trend of taking old games and putting them on contemporary platforms. Dark Souls Remastered, the Mega Man Legacy collections, and even an enhanced Space Hulk…
By Cameron Kunzelman Published May 21, 2018 - Uncategorized
A Look Inside The Hello Kitty Bullet Train
Previously, Kotaku reported that Japan is getting a Hello Kitty bullet train. All we saw was the outside. Now, we get concept art showing what inside the train looks like. The train will begin service between Osaka and Hakata on June 30. The train’s first car is called “Hello! Plaza!” and features a Hello Kitty…
By Brian Ashcraft Published May 21, 2018 -
Kotaku EastHayao Miyazaki Is The Toughest Critic
Make no mistake. Hayao Miyazaki of Studio Ghibli fame doesn’t seem easy to please—even if you are his son. Rather, especially if you are his son. Stills from the documentary How Ponyo Was Born have circulated online in Japan. The documentary is not new, and the images are from the sequence in which Hayao Miyazaki…
By Brian Ashcraft Published May 21, 2018 - Uncategorized
Japanese Maid Outfits, A Serious Look
Artist Ray Tatsumi has done an exhaustive in-depth study of Japanese maid outfits, tracing their origins from the UK and the USA. Tatsumi has been working on this chart for a while, and here is the third version: At the top right, you can see how maid outfits originate in the UK, but by the…
By Brian Ashcraft Published May 21, 2018 -
UncategorizedWant to wander around the Japanese countryside? Nostalgic Train is a self-described “mysterious walking simulator” that’s set in rural Japan that might be filled with nostalgia, but not with people. The game is out on Steam this June, but currently only has Japanese language support.
By Brian Ashcraft Published May 21, 2018 -
UncategorizedResident Evil 7 Is Coming To Nintendo Switch As A Streaming Game
Capcom’s Resident Evil 7 is getting a Switch release in Japan later this week. It’s a weird thing, though; users will only have to install a 45MB game file, while gameplay will be streamed via the cloud. So while it won’t take up much storage space (or cost much, since it’ll be selling for around…
By Luke Plunkett Published May 21, 2018 -
UncategorizedAnimated Dungeons & Dragons Boards Look Like The Future
Paper? Cardboard? Plastic models? That’s some 20th century D&D shit. The adventures of the future look like this. Dynamic Dungeons is a one-man effort to get tabletop gaming looking as good as possible through the use of animated maps. Birds fly overhead, water rolls in, that sort of thing. Here’s a woodland scene, for example,…
By Luke Plunkett Published May 20, 2018 -
UncategorizedCrusader Kings II Is Now A Board Game, So You Can Murder Your Friends In Person
Crusader Kings II, a sprawling PC game with around 17,534 buttons and menus, is coming to tabletops, and has been condensed so much that it’ll be playable in 2-3 hours. Not that this is a bad thing! If I want to spend dozens of hours managing an empire I’ve got the video game for that.…
By Luke Plunkett Published May 20, 2018 - Uncategorized
Broken Nintendo Handhelds Turned Into Beautiful Game Boys
The hinges on old Nintendo DS handhelds were notoriously weak and would often give way, but where most would bee a broken console, modder Joe Bleeps sees an opportunity to salvage the hardware and create something new: the Neon Advance. Because the bottom half of the unit is still intact, and because the older DS…
By Luke Plunkett Published May 20, 2018 - CultureCosplay
Some Very 2018 Cosplay
I love this so much. That’s itsvictra with the memeplay, but know that this is not his first attempt at cosplay that is both terrible and incredible at once. Here’s Exodia from Yu-Gi-Oh: And maybe my favourite Smash cosplay of all time:
By Luke Plunkett Published May 20, 2018 -
UncategorizedParadox’s Next Big Strategy Game Is Set In Rome
Paradox, makers of epics like Crusader Kings and Europa Universalis, have a new grand strategy game coming called Imperator: Rome The debut trailer doesn’t show much (actually it doesn’t show anything), but Paradox fans should know what to expect: granular control over all aspects of your faction, as you “relive the pageantry and challenges of…
By Luke Plunkett Published May 20, 2018