What Are You Playing This Weekend?

The weekend is for usually writing some funny thing here about your weekend and then also mentioning video games, but you’re playing Prey for review so that’s all you’ve got. I’m playing Prey. I streamed some of it earlier today and it was a lot of fun, though I wish the mimics would jump like…

In This Fighting Game Tournament, Each Round Lasts Two Seconds

Fighting game matches can come in many forms, from quick blowouts to drawn-out bouts, but one Japanese arcade has introduced something quite unique, holding tournaments for the game Galaxy Fight in which the rounds last only two seconds each. Mikado, located in the Tokyo neighborhood of Takadanobaba, is holy ground for fighting game fans. With…

Three Hours With Prey

One of the first things you should know about Prey is that it’s really tough. If you’re anything like me, you may find yourself stuck in an area called the Trauma Center, dying over and over again because all you’ve got is a wrench and you have no idea how to get past that dumbass…

The Long Dark Pisses Off Players With Unsatisfying Teaser

This week, The Long Dark developer Hinterland learned a tough lesson: If you’re going to put a weeks-long countdown clock on your game’s homepage, it should be counting down to something amazing—not another countdown. A little over 20 days ago, wilderness survival sim The Long Dark started a mysterious countdown on its home page. For…

If You’re Playing Prey, Try Turning Off Mission Objectives

The new sci-fi thrillerPrey is all about exploring an intricately designed space station. Unfortunately, it seems to want to lead you around that space station by the nose. That’s right, it’s me! The guy who’s always telling you to try playing games without minimaps and other navigational aids. I’ve played a couple hours of Prey…

My Final Fantasy Keyboard Has Quina Instead Of A Q

Along with giving folks a comfortable means of typing for hours on end, a decorated mechanical keyboard can also reflect the passions of the user. Since no existing keysets adequately reflected my love of Final Fantasy, I made my own. A nice set of keycaps can completely change the look and feel of a mechanical…

Legendary Mario 64 Record For Collecting All The Stars Finally Broken

For years, speedrunners have been trying to collect 120 Mario 64 stars in under 1:40:00. People have come close, but nobody was able to break the barrier—until now. Allan “Cheese05″ Alvarez just earned his place in Mario 64 history by collecting all the stars in a record 1:39:57, as you can see below: To understand…

Why Mario Kart Is So Fun

Mario Kart has been around for 25 years and the fun has never let up. How has the beloved racing manage to stay so exciting over the years? We take a look in this critical video. Transcript: There’s something inherently exciting about a Mario Kart race. The breakneck speed leads to frantic chases towards the…

You can now dress Kat from Gravity Rush 2 up like 2B from Nier: Automata. Visor and no-visor variants of 2B’s fashionable outfit are available as a free download from the PlayStation Store. Unfortunately, no corresponding outfit to make Raven look like 9S.

Blizzard Reveals Overwatch Loot Box Odds In China

Overwatch loot boxes feel like goddamn Christmas to open. Then a bunch of garbage spills out, and you feel like a jackass. Some people suspect that they’re rigged. Blizzard, however, insists they’re not, and they’ve finally released official loot box odds to back that up. At least, for China. As part of a new law…

Watch Someone Speedrun Portal Without Using Any Portals

Speedrunner 097AceOfSpades beat Portal in 52 minutes using no portals and a lot of airboat cheats. Usually, Portal takes about three hours to complete. And, as the title implies, you complete it by using portals to solve the game’s tricky puzzle-based campaign mode. 097AceOfSpades relies on one main hack to get through the game sans…

The 3DS’ Pikmin Sidescroller Seems Fine, Unclear Why It Isn’t Also For Switch

At an event in a New York City hotel meeting room engineered by Nintendo to hype the July launch of the New 2DSXL, we played one of the new games also coming out that month: Hey! Pikmin. And we were left wondering, hey, why not also have these games run on Nintendo’s portable Switch? Hey!…

Here’s A Big Sign That Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga Is Coming To 3DS

Last week, a dataminer who goes by the handle SciresM reported that he’d discovered an apparent port or remake of the GBA game Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga in a 3DS file database. Although we can’t confirm this rumor, we did discover a new bit of evidence this week that makes it seem very likely.…

Hands-On With The New 2DS XL

The newly announced New 2DS XL looks sort of like an iPhone attached to a 3DS bottom, as you can see in the above video, which Kotaku boss Stephen Totilo and I shot at a Nintendo event in New York City this week. If you’re in the market for one of these New 2DS XLs,…

Palmer Luckey Cosplays As Quiet From Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain

Where in the world is Palmer Luckey? He’s at Machi Asobi, an annual anime event held in Tokushima, cosplaying as Quiet. And he’s actually wearing shoes. Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am.

Insanely Real Manga Drawings Of Japan

In the manga Yotsuba&!, artist Kiyohiko Azuma draws characters in a stylized, not-so-realistic way. But the backgrounds, however, are insanely realistic. According to Spoon & Tamago, in a2014 interview, Azuma explained this contrast, saying, “I lean toward realism, but at the same time, it’s not like I’m trying to make things actually realistic–what I’m going…