You Only Live Once in XCOM. No, Really. You Only Live Once.

Video game permadeath is not a concept unique to XCOM but it has, perhaps, its most visceral application in that series. Like its predecessors, if one of your men die in The Bureau: XCOM Declassified, that is it. He is gone for good. This can be a tragedy. Or, in the case of this video,…

Watch Us Play Cloudberry Kingdom, The Cute Game That Will Destroy You

I’m not the type of person who plays a game for hundreds of hours, but if I was, Cloudberry Kingdom would be happy to give me plenty of game to play. I knew that it could randomly generate levels of varying difficulty, but I was amazed at the extent of ways to customize this game.…

Finally, An Honest Trailer For The Worst Batman Movie

Batman’s been doing okay lately. His recent movies have been mostly good, and his recent games have been outstanding. So it’s easy to forget just how bad it got for a while there. Fortunately, the folks at Screen Junkies haven’t forgotten. They’ve made another of their “honest trailers,” for Joel Schumacher’s 1997 cinematic crash-landing Batman…

With Top Players Accused Of Collusion, Fighting Game Scene Cracks Down

Major media outlets in the fighting game community are threatening to boycott coverage of tournaments that don’t establish rules to prevent collusion, following an incident last weekend in which two top fighting game players were accused of collaborating and splitting their winnings in the Marvel vs. Capcom 3 finals. The accusations, which occurred during the…

Breaking Bad’s Lead Actor Talks About Cosplaying As His Own Character

Last week, we all took notice of Bryan Cranston’s time at Comic-Con: the man behind Breaking Bad’s meth-making Walter White went around the convention wearing a mask of…well, Walter White. And on David Letterman last night, Cranston talked about what that whole experience was like. The reasons why he would do this are obvious: he’d…

Industry luminary Ian Bogost demonstrates why I put the words “industry luminary” in front of his name, with this beautiful answer to a nagging Facebook survey question.

16-Bit Characters Fit Perfectly In Real-Life Environments

Mixing old video game sprites with real life is not one of the most difficult artforms, but if you’re creative enough the results can be immensely atmospheric, just as the latest pieces from deviantART user Victor Sauron show. Duke Nukem in the night shot above is awesome, but check the rest below. The roller coasters…

Wii U Arkham Origins Won’t Have Multiplayer, But Will It Cost Less?

Holy smaller video game, Batman! Warner Bros. has confirmed that the newly-revealed multiplayer modes for Batman: Arkham Origins won’t be included in the Wii U version of the game. As spotted by Eurogamer and IGN, the official press release accompanying the multiplayer announcement indicated that Arkham Origins‘ multiplayer modes will only be available on PS3,…

Definitely butter a guy up before you bring him crashing down

Cranston, the kinda-Ostrich-thing, invited himself over to my palace yesterday. He immediately told me how great my life is. Thanks, Cranston! It’s because I put green things to the south of my home. Like my trusty desert cactus. Are you talking shit about my cactus? Oh yeah, you’re definitely talking shit about my cactus. Have…

EA Sports’ First Amendment Defense in College Lawsuits Shot Down Again

For the second time, a federal appeals court has struck down a key defense Electronic Arts has used in its long-running legal fight against college athletes who say their likenesses have been used in EA Sports video games without their permission. Electronic Arts had claimed a First Amendment right of artistic expression in how it…

Where BioShock Infinite‘s Been and Where It’s Going

Even though he just announced DLC that will bring players back to the iconic undersea metropolis of Rapture, Ken Levine says he doesn’t feel trapped inside the BioShock franchise. In so much as there’s a template for Levine’s signature first-person games, he says it he’s not interested in re-using it “unless I think of an…

Moneysaver: Next-Gen Pre-orders, Humble Bundle, Hundreds, Recettear

Come with me, and you’ll be, in a world of price decrementation. Take a look, and you’ll see, widespread price deflation. If you want to save on paradise, simply read this post and do it, whatever you want to buy, click through it. Want all the best deals? There’s nothing to it. It’s definitely a…

Who’s Angrier: Call of Duty Fans Or One Direction Fans?

Last week, a patch hit Black Ops II that enraged some unreasonable Call of Duty fans so much, they started sending death threats to the game’s design director, David Vonderhaar. While unfortunate, it’s also not the only recent case of enraged fans spewing ridiculous threats at something. Yesterday, men’s fashion and style magazine GQunveiled the…

The Number One Rule For Changing Your Villagers’ Greetings

You must, by all means, make them say something stupid. Olivia, the gossiping cat, asked me to change her greeting recently. I came up with something that I think feels suitable for her. Sounds good to me so far, Olivia. Oh, the best of friends, Olivia. I think you’re pretty accurate there, Olivia.

Watch Wayne Brady Pretend He’s In Grand Theft Auto

On last night’s Whose Line Is It Anyway? (now hosted by the excellent Aisha Tyler) Wayne Brady was tasked with pretending he was a character in a Grand Theft Auto game. For improvising off the top of his head, he did a pretty good job—even throwing in a Hot Coffee reference for good measure. It’s…

Nintendo’s Brighter Gaming Future

Amid much ado about Nintendo’s high 3DS sales and low Wii U sales, we’ve also got an updated chart of game release dates from the House of Mario. This one shows the major releases for both Nintendo consoles, though it surely omits most of the surprise downloadable releases the company loves to dole out. What…

The Best Tower Defense Game On iOS Gets New Content Tomorrow

Kingdom Rush is basically my favorite game on iOS, so it made my week to hear news that Frontiers (the “sequel” that is essentially just more Kingdom Rush) is getting more levels and heroes tomorrow. Trailer above. You can check out Kingdom Rush: Frontiers on iOS for $2.99. I strongly recommend it.

PS4 Vs Xbox One: A Hypothetical Graphics Comparison

Maybe you’re burning to know how the PS4 and Xbox One’s graphics will stack up against each other. Maybe the way each console handles lighting, textures and detail will be what makes you pick one over the other. Sadly, we don’t even know when the next-gen machines are coming out. But, hey, you could conceivably…

Moneysaver One-Shot: Your New TV’s

Slim bezels, slimmer prices. We’ve got a slew of sets for you to choose from today, and as our own Corey Foster of Deals.Kinja put it, these are “Black Friday level” prices, especially that Westinghouse. Here’s the current Moneysaver • LG 60″ 120Hz LED 1080p TV ($800) | Best Buy via Deals Kinja • Westinghouse…

The Porsche of the Board Game World

“Part of our brand,” explains the sonorous French voice on the phone, “is coming from the fact we do very few things. Porsche is the most successful car company in the world from the business standpoint, but they do very few models… we take the same approach in the board game business.” Yes, board games.…