The official high-capacity battery for the Wii U GamePad is now available in the U.S. The $32 part increases the GamePad’s battery life from between three and five hours to a luxurious eight. For a solution that doesn’t involve unscrewing the GamePad, there’s always the Nyko Uboost.

Here’s what’s going on Talk Amongst Yourselves, our reader-written blog: Souls lets us in on how Assassin’s Creed IV made him cry. FoolProofAdam talks about how spoiling The Last of Us made it an even better experience. And Cill Bosby sings the praises of The Knights of the Old Republic Don’t forget that you can…

Tomb Raider Makes An Excellent Argument For iOS Controllers

Last week, Square Enix quietly released the original Tomb Raider for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. You can almost see the game through the haze of virtual controls. Might be time for a gamepad. Gamepad support, recently introduced to the platform with iOS 7, is likely why we’re seeing the original Tomb Raider being…

WoW Hacker Group Mastermind Sentenced To Two Years In Chinese Prison

Late last week, in Zhejiang province’s Songyang county court, ten men were sentenced to prison terms of up to two years. These men didn’t commit super heinous crimes, but they did commit a terrible one: they were found guilty of hacking and defrauding over 10,000 World of WarCraft accounts. The sentence hearing and the results…

93-Year-Old Chinese Man Poses Nude For Art

Ninety-three year-old Li is more than meets the eye. Li has worked a myriad of jobs, from making rat poison to collecting garbage, also volunteering for the army. But now, Li’s famous for his latest job: working as a semi-nude model. First appearing on Chinese image board TTmop, Li’s story is an interesting one. Originally…

4.7 Million Stolen Passwords, Turned Into Fancy Books

Forgot Your Password? is an eight-volume set of light reading by artist Aram Bartholl. Inside those eight volumes you’ll find every single Linkedin password that was stolen then leaked online last year. All 4.7 million of them. Not that Aram stole them. They were just easy enough to find that he found them and had…

Track: Godzilla | Album: Godzilla (EP) | Artist: Fu Manchu Kotaku Soundtrack is a selection of the stuff we’re listening to – and gaming to – at the moment.

There Are Special Effects Artists In Video Games Too, You Know

In the movie business, there are artists who design things, then there are special effects artists who blow them up, light them and get them wet. It’s no different for video games. While this feature usually promotes concept art – it’s very pretty, after all – it’d be unfair not to also acknowledge the tireless…

A Very NSFW Xbox One Christmas

Reader Andy thought he was performing a pretty typical search on his Xbox One. It’s the holiday season, so he wanted to search for some Christmas music. He did not getwhat he was expecting. I’m picturing a very happy family, all gathered around the tree, some Bing Crosby playing softly in the background. Father says…

Auctions of eight Capcom Cup tournament edition fight sticks—awarded only to top finishers of the tournament last week—haveso far raised $18,000 for relief to the Phillippines in its recovery from Typhoon Haiyan. Four more auctions close tomorrow, and will raise at least $6,300 more.

Problem Gaming: When You Take Five iPads Into The Shower

“I hate my job,” George Yao told The New York Times. After moving across the country to a tiny apartment, to a city where he had no friends, he found an outlet in Clash of Clans. Then Yao found himself standing in the shower with five iPads—individually bagged—struggling to preserve his No. 1 ranking in…

Nine Years Later, Latin America’s Leagues Keep MVP Baseball Alive

We are nearing the 10-year anniversary of the licensing deal that killed MVP Baseball, yet still the game lives on—on PC, even—thanks to “MVP Caribe,” a celebration of Latin American baseball that just published its seventh “total conversion” mod. “MVP Caribe,” the work of a team of modders from across Latin America, replaces teams in…