Sunday Comics: The Magic Word

Welcome to Kotaku‘s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best gaming-themed webcomics. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon. Nerf NOW!! by Josué Pereira. Published Dec. 26. Read more of Nerf NOW!! Awkward Zombie by Katie Tiedrich. Published Dec. 23. Read more of Awkward Zombie Penny Arcade by Jerry Holkins…

Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: ‘Shop Talk: The Winners

Nintendo’s first electronic toy bravely took the bullet for this week’s ‘Shop Contest. We’ve dialed up 21 winners for you, plus overall No. 1 QCSRK! One note: It’s just not the same without uscg_pa, who didn’t enter this week for the first time in forever. Last week’s disappointing roundup may have had something to do…

Hello Games, the indie studio flooded out on Christmas Eve, said its insurance company won’t cover the damage to its office. Even if work on No Man’s Sky was backed up remotely, this doesn’t sound good. We’ve reached out to ask how things are going. A beloved office couch is among the casualties.

Resogun on the PS4 has been compared (favorably) to Defender, another sidescrolling, save-the-humans shooter. How does an old-school Defender champion feel about the new game? Well, for starters, it doesn’t suffer from any framerate drop when everything explodes …

Indianapolis: Home of Next-Generation Console Heists, Apparently

A month after bandits stole nine PlayStation 4s from an Indianapolis GameStop, armed robbers stormed another store in the same city, making off with 15 Xbox Ones in a pre-Christmas heist that left employees and customers tied up in a store room. The robbery happened just after 10 p.m. on Monday, Indianapolis police said. Two…

Ten Grand Theft Auto Online Jobs Get Rockstar’s Seal of Approval

Ten user-created jobs in Grand Theft Auto Online were “officially certified” by Rockstar Games yesterday, meaning all players on all platforms will be able to play them. They’re the first gigs to get the Rockstar stamp of approval since the GTA Online Creator toolkit released. Six races and four deathmatches compose the first 10, chosen…

Battlefield 4 ‘Illegal’ in China, But It Wasn’t For Sale There Anyway

To the surprise of no one, China’s Ministry of Culture has formally banned Battlefield 4—though “condemned” may be a more accurate term considering the game never was formally for sale there. Anyway, the game is henceforth “illegal,” according to reports from the country. China.com, one of the country’s oldest and largest online news sites, reported…

Don’t Forget To Vote! Voting for our Reader’s Choice Award will be open until Midnight Eastern this Sunday night. If you haven’t yet voted, be sure to. We’ll be publishing the results early next week.

Track: Vacation | Album: Get Olde | Artist: Crying Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to – and gaming to – at the moment.

Our demented friends at sister site Deadspin have once again sifted through public records in order to present a very disturbing list of things people got stuck in various bodily orifices in the past year. Read here. Warning: it’s not safe for the faint of heart.

Maybe You Won’t Hate Breath Of Fire 6 So Much

Earlier this year Capcom announced the eagerly awaited sixth installment of its popular role-playing game series would be an online game for mobile and PC. Fans were angry. Will fresh information and screens of Breath of Fire 6: Guardians of the White Dragon make them happy? Oh come on, it’s got Nina in it. I…

Ballpoint Universe Brings Doodles To Life And Sends Them To War

Ballpoint Universe brings together a collection of weird drawings of bullets, boots and spaceships and throws them together into a shoot-em-up. It’s a cool art style, and the game has a weird humor that matches it perfectly. Ballpoint Universe: Infinite was funded on Kickstarter and is available now on Steam, Desura and the App Store.

Stephen’s Top 10 Games of 2013

Sorry, Super Mario 3D World. Hundreds? Hell of a game. You were grand, Tearaway. I liked so many games in 2013 that I can’t put all the great ones on my Top 10. But I can put, uh, 10. (Actually, I’m going with 11.) Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag Pirates! More modern-day stuff that only…

Another Christmas Ruined By A Porn-Filled Nintendo 3DS

Another year, another Nintendo handheld packed with pornography under the Christmas tree. Last year it was a five-year-old and a used 3DS. This year it’s an eight-year-old and a supposedly brand-new 3DS. According to a report from WAVY10 News, Tom Mayhew purchased a “new” Nintendo 3DS for his eight-year-old son from a Walmart in Hampton,…

Video-Game Violence: What Does It Mean? I wrote an article about meaningful game violence as part of The New York Times‘ year-in-review series. It focuses on a few games we’ve talked about a lot here, from The Last of Us to BioShock Infinite to Consensual Torture Simulator

There’s A Little Catherine In The Latest Persona Q Trailer

Chibi-fied characters from Persona 3 and 4 aren’t the only things to drool over in the latest trailer for Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth for the 3DS — there’s a little Vincent in there as well. A very little Vincent, along with some of his sheepy friends, and while the characters only appear in…

Predictions For 2016’s Winners and Losers Of The New Console Generation

Bookmark this post and re-check it in 2016. Eminently quotable games business analyst Michael Pachter doesn’t just host fun shows on GameTrailers. He crunches numbers, gives stock advice and forecasts the future of the gaming industry. Today, he revealed his mathematical model’s predictions for the new console generation. The following is from an e-mail he…