Oh, They’re Just Defusing A Bomb Through The Floor

This isn’t a new trick (it’s almost a decade old!), but it’s still a good, clean look at a tactic that, while often outlawed competitively, is still awesome considering the teamwork and timing required. (Below is a gfycat, so if you’re on mobile and it’s not auto-playing, just tap on the thumb and it’ll take…

Physical Boxes For Your Digital Steam Games

Steam games are digital. They exist entirely on your PC or servers. But they don’t always have to. Steam Game Covers is a site dedicated to the creation and hosting of templates people can use to make their own physical cases for Steam games. Just back up your game on a disc, print out a…

The Next League Of Legends’ Patch Is Trying To Break The Whole Meta

League of Legends patches are normally relatively minor incremental things at this point—tweaking an item or two, rebalancing a handful of characters, maybe dropping a few new skins in. Not this week. Riot’s 5.16 patch notes make it sound like a patch on steroids. There’s a lot of ground to cover here, so I’m going…

Even Without A GamePad, ZombiU Holds Up

ZombiU was a fantastic game when it launched alongside the Wii U. Years later, it’s arrived on other platforms with minor tweaks, including a new name: Zombi. As it turns out, it’s still great. Here’s the short version of what to expect from Zombi, which I played for an hour today on the PC: it’s…

Read a Short Story Where Video Game Cats Save Peoples’ Souls

A crippling disease has made the body of Grace’s wife a prison for her erratic, reclusive brain. The only hope for their marriage? A video game where she rules over kingdom of cats. Written by iO9 editor-in-chief Charlie Jane Anders, “Rat Catcher’s Yellows” is part of Press Start to Play, an anthology of game-centric short…

Here Is A Thing That Happens In The New Tales From The Borderlands Episode

Yesterday I talked about a very heavy moment in the latest Tales from the Borderlands episode. Today, I bring you a polka-dotted clown hanky to dry your tears. (Warning: Tales from the Borderlands episode four spoilers ahead.) The latest episode is uniformly excellent, juggling drama and comedy in almost equal measure. A few pacing issues…

How Destiny Levels And Gear Will Change In The Taken King

Destiny, a yearlong beta for a video game that will be released this September, is getting some major overhauls that we should probably talk about. Today on a Twitch stream, Bungie’s designers discussed some of the ways our characters will change when The Taken King launches next month, starting with an explanation of what lLight…

Gears of War Weapons, Ranked

As a series, Gears of War likely has the best weapons in any shooter, period. Many of these weapons are surprisingly creative—a chainsaw on an assault rifle?!—and nearly all of them feel great to use. What I’m saying is: ranking the Gears of War arsenal is tough. In any other game, many of these weapons…

Heroes Of The Storm’s New Monk Is A Ton Of Fun

Originally a playable character class in Diablo III, the Monk arrived in Blizzard’s new MOBA Heroes of the Storm last night as a melee support named “Kharazim.” More than any other character I’ve seen in the game so far, he’s defined by his impressive versatility. Kharazim is the first HOTS character that can select one…

Spider-Man’s Daughter Just Wants to Be Like Her Dad

Let’s hope Annie May doesn’t have the ol’ Parker luck like her famous, web-slinging father. The newest issue of Renew Your Vows—the what-if comic where Spider-man stayed married to Mary Jane instead having their relationship done away with via faustian bargain—show Mr. and Mrs. Peter Parker being overprotective helicopter parents. BUt, given that they live…

Final Fantasy VII Comes To iOS Today

Final Fantasy VII, a video game about an angry man with mommy issues, will come to iPhone and iPad tonight with the next Apple Store update, publisher Square Enix announced today. This is a port of the PC version, and it should be sufficient distraction for FFVII fans until the remake, which is currently scheduled…

Velocity 2X: The Kotaku Review

Level 26 of Velocity 2X has taken over my day. I wish I could just let go and move on with my life, but I am literally ONE SECOND away from a gold Perfect medal. A SECOND. I have been chasing that second for about an hour, now. This post originally appeared on Kotaku UK…

Inspired by Black Mesa’s Steam re-release, modder Hezus decided to return to his 2012 remake of Half-Life’s “Uplink” demo, Black Mesa Uplink, to update it with extra content. Above is his first screenshot, showing off the mod’s new look. You can follow the mod’s progress (or give the old version a try) over at Mod…

One Piece Rendered in Realistic 3D

You might have seen One Piece before, but you’ve probably never seen it like this. In the scene, we have Ace, Gold Roger, and Garp. Chinese artist Zhong Zhengxiang created the image, using tools like Maya, Mudbox, ZBrush, and Photoshop. It’s an original tableau, and on ZBrush Central, the artist explains what the work means:…