Mass Effect: Andromeda’s new North American release date is Tuesday, March 21, 2017 for the PS4, Xbox One, and Windows PC. Europe gets it on the 23rd.

The 12 Best Video Games Of 2016

First, we spent a year playing video games. Then we spent a couple weeks debating which ones were best. Here, in alphabetical order, are Kotaku’s top 12 games of 2016. BoxBoxBoy Civilization VI Darkest Dungeon Dishonored 2 Doom Dragon Quest Builders Hitman Inside Overwatch Pokémon Sun and Moon Stardew Valley The Witness

Hallmark Says They Did Not Copy Yuri On Ice, Had No Idea What It Is

Fans of blockbuster queer ice skating anime Yuri on Ice were enraged this week because they believed an upcoming Hallmark movie,Love on Ice, copied the anime’s premise and name. On Twitter, fans called Love on Ice a “whitewashed” and “homophobic” Yuri on Ice rip-off. A Hallmark representative told Kotaku nobody on the movie’s team had…

Porn DVD In Splatoon Box Ruins Little Girl’s Christmas

In what now seems to be a sad holiday tradition, a mother in West Chester, Ohio, tried to buy her seven year-old daughter a video game for Christmas, only for her child to discover a porn DVD when she opened the box. Kristy Greider told WLWT that she bought Splatoon for her daughter at a…

A Brand-New Unofficial Vanilla World Of Warcraft Server Launches This Saturday

Havingsuccessfully resurrected the popular Nostalrius vanilla World of Warcraft servers followinglast year’s Blizzard shutdown, Project Elysium gives players a chance to take a fresh stab at old school player-versus-player with a brand new vanilla PVP server. It’s going to be so crowded. World of Warcraft has come a long way since it launched back in…

Blizzard Is Finally Nerfing Overwatch’s Roadhog

Blizzard is finally nerfing the best thing in Overwatch: Roadhog’s hook. It’s about time—despite the hook’s awesome power, it is most definitely broken. On Blizzard’s forums, Overwatch principal designer Geoff Goodman announced the details of “Hook 2.0,” soon to be released on the PTR. Players have complained for months that Roadhog’s hook defies known laws…

Custom Titanfall LEGO Is Great

There’s a lot to love about Titanfall 2, but one of the best things is the design of the game’s mechs. And while we wait for expensive action figures to hit, we can pass the time with these awesome LEGO models built by Marius Herrmann Via makers, Herrmann has recreated many of the game’s signature…

Damn, Look At These Super Nintendo Sneakers

Just as there must be balance in life, so too must there be balance in sneaker concept posts on Kotaku.com, a website that is occasionally about video games. We have had Adidas designs recently, so now we must share these very nice Jordans. They’re the work of custom sneaker specialists Freaker Sneaks (via Nicekicks), and…

Some Of 2016’s Best Cosplay In Motion

WhileI’ve already rounded up the absolute best cosplay of 2016, that was mostly a collection of static images. And I’m just one guy in Australia. Mineralbluwent to most of the big cons in the US (and some beyond), and took his video camera with him. The video below covers 14 conventions from America and Japan,…

13 Good Games You Can Play On Laptops And Low-End PCs

Sometimes you’ll find yourself out of the house, with nothing but a laptop and a whole lot of time. And while laptops are getting more and more powerful, most are still low-spec machines when it comes to gaming. But just because you’re living out of home with an integrated GPU doesn’t mean you have to…

Tiny Heist Breaks Down Stealth Games

Tiny Heist, by Terry Cavanagh (VVVVVV, Super Hexagon) is a simple but addictive little stealth game which takes some of the genre’s most established ideas and whittles them down into what feels like Metal Gear vs Pac-Man There are guards with search patterns, cameras tracking movement and locked doors, but overcoming most of these is…

It’s Wednesday Addams

Here’s Sladkoslava with some very unexpected (if also perfect) cosplay: Christina Ricci’s Wednesday from the 1991 Addams Family movie.

Civ VI’s Neo Tokyo Is About To Explode

One of the more pleasant surprises with how good Civ VI has been out of the gates has been the game’s urban planning system. Something Haphaz77 has shown off here to terrific effect. This is a game he won as Japan (over 300 turns) using a modified version of the “one city rule”, something that…

Power Grid, A Game About Big Coal (And Big Garbage)

I got around to playing the classic German board game Power Grid (aka Funkenschlag) on the weekend, and absolutely loved it. It’s a game about building and then supplying juice to a power network that stretches across the land. Every turn players first compete in auctions to buy power stations, then buy the resources (oil,…

Hearthstone Devs Want To Be More Open, But Are Worried About Harassment

The Internet is not always a kind place, especially when you’re a public figure. In the wake of questions about Blizzard’s “Designer Insights” video series, Hearthstone game director Ben Brode articulated a sentiment that’s far too common in the world of game development. He and other members of the dev team, he said, would like…

Surprise, 2017 Is Also The Year Of Witcher 3 Cosplay

I know, 2016 was The Year Of Witcher 3 cosplay. But so was 2015. And so too will 2018. And every year after that, until we sit under the fading trees, all the world changed and the long years of our lives utterly spent. This is T-T-F as Yennefer. Photos by ayashige

How To Win At Game Of Thrones (The Board Game)

Game of Thronesis not like other board games. While there are plenty of strategy games out there, and plenty of games where people have to be dicks to each other, none walk the line between them as well as Fantasy Flight’s classic. Which can make it tough to get your head around. So I’m here…

Overwatch Players Are Sick Of Mei’s Ice Wall Exploit

If you’re a frequent player of Overwatch’s 3v3 mode, you’ve probably experienced the Mei ice wall glitch. It allows players to get outside the level, at which point they can shoot you, but you can’t shoot them. It is, in short, total bullshit. The glitch has been an issue for weeks now, but it only…

Mafia III’s Story Works Because Of The Open World

Mafia III’s perspective on racial tensions in the United States is something rarely seen in games. Accordingly, somereviewers haveargued that the actual gameplay of Mafia III wasn’t nearly as innovative as the narrative. While I agree that Mafia III’s narrative takes more risks than the gameplay, the two function as a whole. The open-world setting…