- Esports
‘Smoke Gank Not Weed’ And Other Sights From Dota 2‘s International Tournament
The International 7 has come and gone, crowning a new victor in Team Liquid along the way. Whether you were on the ground in Seattle at the Key Arena or watching from home, there were plenty of sights and sounds to take in, as well as a few good signs. The Juggernaut statue overlooked one…
By Eric Van Allen Published August 13, 2017 - Culture
Speedrunner Successfully Completes Deathmarch Through Pokémon Emerald‘s Battle Frontier In One Sitting
Pokémon games area all about players collecting small creatures and commanding them in battle, but in the end-game section of Pokémon Emerald called the Battle Frontier it’s the Pokémon who call the shots. Always up for a mind-bending challenge, one speedrunner decided to speedrun it. Mark “Werster” McKenzie is no stranger to the series and…
By Ethan Gach Published August 13, 2017 - CultureSplitscreen
Podcast: Love In The Age Of Splatoon 2
It’s time for a super-sized episode of Kotaku Splitscreen full of special guests, dating advice, and squid-kid conspiracy theories. Jason and I start out talking about how much he loves Final Fantasy Tactics on his phone and how impressed I’ve been with the first couple hours of Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice. Then we talk about the…
By Kirk Hamilton Published August 13, 2017 - Culture
Sunday Comics: Silent Strike
Welcome to Kotaku’s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best webcomics that usually occurs on Sunday except when it doesn’t. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon. Nerf NOW!! by Josué Pereira. Published August 8. Read more of Nerf NOW!! Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published August 7. Read more…
By Ethan Gach Published August 13, 2017 - Esports
The Tradition Of Terrible Esports Champagne Celebrations Continues
The players on Team Liquid just won the most money for a single match in the history of esports, but at the staged champagne celebration they stumbled around like sleep deprived zombies. This is Ivan Borislavov “MinD_ContRoL” Ivanov, a truly inventive player who was nothing short of integral to the team’s success at this year’s…
By Ethan Gach Published August 13, 2017 -
UncategorizedFan Video Recreates Old Character Intros In Street Fighter V
Capcom abandoned most of the Street Fighter series’ iconic character intros over time, so one fan decided to recreate them using the latest game. SigmaG19 makes a lot of Street Fighter V videos, including this one critiquing a lot of the Capcom’s choices with the game. The latest tries to recreate some of the series’…
By Ethan Gach Published August 12, 2017 -
EsportsTeam Liquid Wins Over $10 Million At International Dota 2 Tournament
Team Liquid are the victors of The International 7, a Dota 2 tournament with over $24 million in prize pool. The European squad will take home the lion’s share at $10,806,301 after an historic 3-0 sweep of team Newbee. Coming up through the loser’s bracket, the five players of Liquid are both the first team…
By Eric Van Allen Published August 12, 2017 - Esports
Dota 2‘s Furion Will Wreck You
He’s the most bad-ass tree in video games and today’s lower bracket finals at this year’s International showed-off everything that makes the hero one of Dota’s best. Team Liquid has never made it to the top four at the game’s biggest annual tournament before, but today they made it all the way to the grand…
By Ethan Gach Published August 12, 2017 -
UncategorizedCanceled PS4 Game Would Have Let You Play Team Deathmatch As Gnomes
Did you know a game about gnomes killing each other almost made it to the PS4? In the latest Unseen64 video, Liam Robertson reports that a shooter with the working title “Gnomageddon” was in development at Sony San Diego up until late last year. Originally rumored to be a new game from Sucker Punch, the…
By Ethan Gach Published August 12, 2017 -
EsportsAn AI Is Beating Some Of The Best Dota Players In The World
OpenAI used the action at this year’s Dota 2 championships as an opportunity to show off its work by having top players lose repeatedly to its in-game bot. Dota’s normally a team game with a heavy emphasis on coordination and communication, but for players interested in beefing up their pure, technical ability, the game also…
By Ethan Gach Published August 12, 2017 - Esports
The Weekend In Esports: TI7 Grand Finals, Call Of Duty Championship, And More
A year of practice and a week of stiff competition in the main event all comes down to this as Dota 2‘s TI7 closes in on a winner later today. While home soil favorites EG were tossed out of the proceedings earlier on, a resurgent Team Liquid who has managed an inspiring run through the…
By Ethan Gach Published August 12, 2017 - Culture
This Week In The Business: The Long Dark Road Out Of Early Access
QUOTE | “We should be out there, and we want to be out there. But I’ll draw the line, also beyond a certain point, I don’t think I owe people to be a punching bag for them when they’re feeling upset.” – Hinterland Studio’s Raphael van Lierop talks about dealing with the toxic atmosphere on…
Matthew Handrahan Published August 12, 2017 -
UncategorizedDoom Mod Replaces Every Enemy With Shrieking Crash Bandicoot
Watching this video of an army of Crash Bandicoots leaping at a man who has a gun but is unable to escape the screams—oh god, the screams—it strikes me that what’s considered scary in the year 2017 is very different from what frightened us back in ‘90s, when the original Doom first came out. The…
By Nathan Grayson Published August 11, 2017 -
UncategorizedMissing The Days of Friending Strangers On Xbox Live
When I was younger, I used to play online games with strangers. By the end of the match, I’d add them to my friends list, and we’d become close friends—even if they were absolute jerks to me. That almost never happens anymore. Why is that? Today I am happy to announce a project helmed by…
By Patricia Hernandez Published August 11, 2017 - Uncategorized
Pyre Developer Explains Why There’s No ‘Best’ Ending
There’s no such thing as a happy ending—at least, not for everybody. Warning: this article contains Pyre spoilers. Go to any story-driven game’s forum, and you’ll come across multiple threads asking the same thing: “How do I get the best ending?” Who, they ponder, should they rescue, backstab, and/or have sex with to avoid producing…
By Nathan Grayson Published August 11, 2017 - Culture
What Are You Playing This Weekend?
The weekend is for cleaning the house. No, really. Really this time. Also, video games. I’ve got some games to check out for next week, but I’ll also be playing more The Long Dark, because there are a lot of places in the new map where I haven’t died yet. I’m also pretty keen on…
By Riley MacLeod Published August 11, 2017 - Uncategorized
No Man’s Sky’s Story Overhaul Gives The Game Focus
As No Man’s Sky has developed, it’s struggled to balance the appeal of its mystery with the utility that makes it playable. With today’s update, Atlas Rising, it feels like the game has finally struck that balance. The 1.3 update for No Man’s Sky comes with a lot of changes, small and large. Most exciting…
By Gita Jackson Published August 11, 2017 -
CultureZelda Speedrunners Are Mastering Breath Of The Wild’s New Difficulty
Breath of the Wild’s difficult Master Mode makes monsters tougher and the world much more dangerous than before. For speedrunners attempting to complete the game quickly, this provides new challenges and opportunities. Different speedrunning routes try to complete various challenges. Two popular categories in Breath of the Wild are Any%, which seeks to beat the…
By Heather Alexandra Published August 11, 2017
