Garden Warfare 2‘s Coolest New Addition Is The Bit Between Battles

The console beta for Popcap’s Plants Vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare 2 is live this weekend, giving players a tiny taste of the new maps and modes in next month’s shooter sequel. My favorite part so far? The free-roaming playground that’s replaced the first game’s menus. The original Plants Vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare is pretty great.…

Fallout 4‘s Commonwealth Versus A 20,000 Strong Robot Army

Youtube’s Cosmic Contrarian spent upwards of 120 hours planning, recording and implementing this spectacular Fallout 4 battle, in which a 20,000 strong Synth/Assaultron robot army march on the Commonwealth. Then things blow up. A lot. The first four minutes of the epic 24 minute video are shots of robots marching, which would annoy me if…

Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: A Rift In Your Bank Account: Winners!

The $600 Oculus Rift is a pricey piece of equipment at launch, but it could be worse. Much, much worse, as our Photoshop-friendly community demonstrates in the winning entries from last week’s ‘shop contest. Good old Hundredgunner slapped a Rift on the head of former asshole pharmaceutical CEO Martin Shkreli (clearly the name of a…

Sunday Comics: It’s Not Like Anyone’s Getting Hurt

Welcome to Kotaku’s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best webcomicsl. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon. Nerf NOW!! by Josué Pereira. Guest comic published January 16. Read more of Nerf NOW!! Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published January 11. Read more of Awkward Zombie Penny Arcade by Jerry…

Supreme Court To Hear Microsoft’s Appeal Of Xbox 360 Disc Scratching Lawsuit

Way back in 2007 lawyers gathered together a group of gamers angry with Microsoft over scratched Xbox 360 discs to form a class action lawsuit. Nine years later the Supreme Court is preparing to hear Microsoft’s plea to have the case dismissed for a second time. Along with the infamous red ring of death, early…

Lightning isn’t the only gaming icon getting her fake fashion interview on. Well-played, VentureBeat.

Who’s Your Favorite Video Game Dragon?

According to theofficial calendar of shady holidays, today is Appreciate a Dragon Day, the one day a year when we can all stop, picture a dragon in our heads and nod appreciatively. Which video game dragon do you appreciate the most? I’ll never forget my first video game dragon. Sure, he looked a bit like…

The Dramatic Opening Moments Of Blade & Soul

Wildly popular Korean fantasy MMOBlade & Soul finally launches in North America and Europe this Tuesday. Check out the thrilling opening sequence players in the early head start are experiencing over and over right now. Rather than speak over the action, I went ahead and recorded the opening sequence of the game without commentary, as…

TMNT: Mutants In Manhattan Screens Leak, Because Of Course They Do

Add cel=shaded screenshots to the Australian rating, achievements and cover art for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants In Manhattan. The still unannounced gamehas leaked so much I’m beginning to suspect Activision is trying out a new viral marketing technique. Perhaps last year’s pre-E3 leak of Transformers: Devastation worked out so well that somewhere behind-the-scenes there’s…

This Week In The Business: Digging Just The Right-Sized Hole

QUOTE | “We don’t want to dig too big a hole.” – Oculus VP of product Nate Mitchell, explaining why the company isn’t selling the Rift hardware below cost, at least for now. Elsewhere in the business of gaming this week… STAT | 38% – GameStop’s year-over-year increase in holiday software sales for Xbox One…

Report: Iran Frees Imprisoned American Game Developer

Amir Hekmati, the former U.S. Marine and one-time game developer, has been freed from an Iranian prison after more than four years in captivity, according to an Iranian news report. The Iranian-American was serving a 10-year prison term, reduced from a death sentence, related to charges of espionage against Iran. His family and the U.S.…

After Years Of Injuries, One Of The UFC’s Most Intriguing Fighters Is Back

This weekend’s UFC fight has been four years in the making. Dominick Cruz pioneered a nigh-untouchable Matrix-like fighting style and dominated a whole division with it. Then he got injured. For years. While he was away, TJ Dillashaw claimed his belt with remarkably similar moves. Now, they’re finally gonna fight. I’ve written about TJ Dillashaw…

ARK: Survival Evolved On Xbox One Gets First Big Update, More Servers Coming

The absurdly popular Xbox One early access game ARK Survival Evolved is supposed to be getting more than a hundred extra servers, according to a press release today. They’re not live yet, as the game’s several hundred servers remain stuffed. The promise of added support should give people a slightly better chance to get into…

Slime Rancher Is A Very Cute Game About Ranching Slimes

Slime Rancher is a popular new Steam game where you adventure around, vacuum up smiley little slime creatures, plop them in a cage, and harvest their, um, poop. All the while, you try to stop them from growing miserable. It kills me to see them frown. A well-crafted start screen, I think, can provide a…

Oh Hey, A Bunch Of People Played The Division 

A few days ago a bunch of members of the gaming press went and played Ubisoft’s upcoming tactical shooter/RPG Tom Clancy’s The Division. Let’s see what they thought of it. We didn’t attend the preview event (obviously) but the embargo lifted this morning and there are enough substantive hands-on demo videos out there that I…

Some Of The Coolest Stuff That Was Cut From Fallout 4

Fallout 4 was not always the game that we actually got to play. Like most games, it changed and morphed during development—and it’s fun to look back on what could have been. In this video, I show a few things that never made it into the post-apocalyptic trash collecting game, from quests to alternate character…

Nintendo Is Deleting People’s Mario Maker Stages Without Telling Them Why

When Mario Maker launched, Nintendo warned players it could remove stages from the game for a variety of reasons, including ones that were merely unpopular. Nintendo has made good on that threat, but folks in the Mario Maker community are upset because it’s not really clear what “unpopular” means. Here’s what Nintendo originally outlined: Notice…