Ape Escape 2 Is Better Than I Remember

Oh how I long to relive those days chasing danger, and launching stealthy attacks on those damned dirty apes of Ape Escape on the PSN. Sadly, I’m still waiting for that release. In the meanwhile, the primates of Ape Escape 2 can terrorize me instead. I hold the first Ape Escape in high regards. Until…

Gravity Falls‘ “Summerween” Is An Excellent, Spooky Adventure

Lately, I’ve become enamored with cultural experiences associated with Summer—namely, the spookiness of ghost stories and myths, where wild imaginations help whittle away the hot days. Re-watching Gravity Falls fuels my interest, and its “Summerween” episode is a perfect nightmare—with a twist. It’s difficult to talk about a single episode of Gravity Falls being a…

Helllooo, Kotaku!

My name’s Narelle, and I’ve crawled my way from the Upside Down known as TAY to be your Guest Weekend Editor. Wait…is TAY the Upside Down, or is it the other way around…? Puzzling life questions aside, I’m a freelance writer, and an admin over on Kotaku’s wonderful Reader-run community blog, TAY. You may already…

This Week In The Business: Pokemon Stop!

QUOTE | “Nobody gets sleep anymore. How is this acceptable? … They hang out on our lawns, trample landscaping, look in vehicles… We don’t feel safe… I don’t feel safe sitting on our porch.” – A lawsuit filed by a Detroit-area couple because Pokemon Go put Pokestops and gyms near their property and players had…

UFC 202 Isn’t Conor McGregor’s Show, It’s Nate Diaz’s

This weekend at UFC 202, Conor McGregor takes on Nate Diaz in a rematch of their first slobberknocker, which McGregor lost in dramatic fashion even though Diaz took the fight on extremely short notice. Last time, the lead-up was all McGregor. This time around, it couldn’t be any more different. This fight is a strange…

The New Sandcastle Pokémon Is Terrifying

It is 2016 and official Pokémon art now depicts Pikachu DYING. What a time to be alive (or not, in this case!) We’d already heard that Pokémon Sun and Moon would include a haunted sandcastle Pokémon, but today The Pokémon Company unveiled footage showing the critter in action: The official Pokémon website also updated with…

Game Freak’s Latest Non-Pokémon Joint Is This Odd Early Access Puzzle Platformer 

Releasedyesterday via Steam’s Early Access program, Giga Wrecker is a messy little puzzle platforming game with messy dialogue, questionable physics and some strange design decisions. Other than all that, it shows promise. Every once in a while the folks at Game Freak, known primarily for those pocket monsters, likes to flex its creative muscle and…

This week on Kotaku Splitscreen, Jason and I were joined by former NFL punter and all around cool dude Chris Kluwe. We spent a good chunk of time talking about No Man’s Sky—what we like, what we don’t like, and all the things we wish were in the game. Video excerpt above; find the full…

Super Girls

Taraneh Karimi is a concept artist from Iran who works in video games. You can see more of Karimi’s work at her ArtStation page. Oh, and her studio is alsolaunching a Kickstarter soon for Lona: Realm of Colors, an adventure game about exploring a young girl’s memories. It looks cool! To see the images in…

The No Man’s Sky Player Who Still Hasn’t Left His First Planet 

The planets in No Man’s Sky are so vast, that one player has spent 30 hours adventuring on his starter planet. It’s amazing. Meet Kahbaatangs: Discovered by 27-year-old gamer Jorgen Fernandez, Kahbaatangs is a mostly barren desert with a 24 hour rain cycle. “The worst thing about my planet was the lifelessness and lack of…

Nintendo Once Published A Game Featuring Nazis, Baby Jesus And The KKK

In 1991, Nintendo published an adventure game (developed by Pax Softnica) in Japan for the Famicom Disk System called Time Twist. It is not the kind of game Nintendo would publish in 2016. Hardcore Gaming played through it the other day, and say “it seems like they took a look at Nintendo of America’s censorship…

Here Are Some Things You Can Do In Deus Ex: Mankind Divided

The newest Deus Ex game, Mankind Divided, comes out next week. It tells the gripping tale of a man with robot arms and his quest to steal alcohol from every apartment in Prague. I’ve completed Mankind Divided’s story (took me about 26 hours on the middle difficulty), as well as a bunch of the included…

Metroid Prime: Federation Force: The Kotaku Review

Despite abundant expectations that it would be bad, Nintendo’s new Metroid spin-off turns out to be very good. Metroid Prime Federation Force, which runs on the 3DS, is the first game with the M-word in its title since 2010. It is barely a Metroid game, something series fans sniffed out the moment it was first…

No Man’s Sky Proves Games Don’t Have To Be About Winning

What does it take to be a game? Win states? Rules? The questions pop up again and again. And as expectations for games grow, we try to answer these questions with increasing confidence. Are games just code, or are they something more poetic? Titles like No Man’s Sky or Abzu offer richly realized spaces to…

Style Savvy: Fashion Forward Certainly Keeps A Girl Busy

This is me, 43-year-old bearded man Mike Fahey, taking a short break from being a fashion boutique manager, hair stylist, makeup artist, clothing designer and interior decorator in Style Savvy: Fashion Forward. I can’t imagine how I found the time. The third installment of Nintendo’s Style Savvy franchise has arrived, transporting us to a magical…