It’s Just A Cool-Looking Racing Game Until Things Get…Weird

The graphical insanity in the video above isn’t part of any game that coming out soon. But it’s an example of what accomplished coders can make on hardware that’s similar to what’s inside next-gen consoles. “Apocalypse When” comes from a coder named “Smash”, aka Matt Swoboda, principal engineer at Sony Computer Entertainment Europe. It’s an…

Burger King has unveiled Satisfries, a new potato product aimed at making people feel better about eating them using percentages and downward-pointing arrows. I feel healthier already. Thanks, numbers and arrows! Find out more here, while I prepare for a short road trip to see if they’re the saddest fries.

What Do You Get When You Combine a Speeder Bike and a Pinball Table? You get a rather slick sub-level in Return of the Jedi, (at 1:00 of this gameplay video) due sometime this fall in the next set of three tables for Zen Studios’ Star Wars Pinball.

Here’s what’s going on Talk Among Yourselves, our reader-written blog: Voltaire Crescent brings you along on his latest Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn adventures, Joshua Rivera continues to report on being a newbie getting into sports games, and Etchedchamp shares some gaming traditions

Toys For A Game We’ve Not Yet Seen

Our first official look at Angry Birds Go! comes not from a trailer or in-game screenshots, but from Hasbro’s upcoming line of Telepods and Jenga toys based on the kart-based spin-off. Strange. Like Angry Birds Star Wars II, Angry Birds Go! will have the ability to scan in physical toys for use in the game,…

Despite Last Year’s Disaster, Sony Teams Up With Taco Bell Again

Remember last year, when a debacle of a partnership between Taco Bell and Sony left some PlayStation fans feeling cheated and misled? The two companies are partnering again—and the collaboration sure sounds familiar. This time around it’s a contest to win free PlayStation 4s: The “Play the Future First” promotion runs in the U.S. from…

Great Britain In Minecraft Is One Of Gaming’s Largest Worlds

86,000 square miles of blockiness, approximately 215 times the map size of Just Cause 2, or 1000 Azeroths from WoW. That’s not exactly small, yet Joseph Braybrook, using Ordnance Survey terrain data, was able to make a geographically accurate, 1:1 Minecraft map of Great Britain in just two weeks. Here’s how London and different parts…

Let’s Watch The Opening Of Lightning Returns And Make Oooo Noises

Square Enix has lost a substantial amount of mojo over the years, their ability to create spectacular cinematic game openings remains intact. Watch them open the hell out of Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII. It’s not in English, but you don’t really need to know Japanese to get what’s going on here. Lightning has returned,…

Time for a heist Scooby, they won’t suspect a thing! Made by Steam user Tatsuto, this Scooby-Doo-themed reskin of the escape van must be the funniest mod for Payday 2 out there. The next thing he should add is Shaggy, Daphne, Velma and Fred masks to replace the clown ones. Dayshot is an image-based feature…

NBA 2K14: The Kotaku Review

It’s possible that basketball fans have been spoiled by the NBA 2K series, which over the preceding four titles has churned out some of the most conspicuous year-to-year improvements from the brutal treadmill of annual sports video games development. Looking back, the highly polished gameplay and presentation that other series would kill for seems almost…

The Death Star’s Trenches, Through the Eyes of the Oculus Rift

If you think about it, flight simulators, with their fully-realized cockpits and scenic locations, are a perfect fit for the Oculus Rift. So are space sims, for the same reason. Developer Boone Calhoun, realizing this, promptly went to work on an Oculus Rift demo of the Death Star trench run from Star Wars Here’s one…

Seventeen Years of Pokemon in a Single Image

Has it been seventeen years? The time has just flown by. Here’s how the in-game maps have evolved. The above image was uploaded by Japanese Twitter user @Ugusyan and has been retweeted over ten thousand times. ポケモン17年の歴史 [Twitter] To contact the author of this post, write to bashcraftATkotaku.com or find him on Twitter @Brian_Ashcraft Kotaku…

Super Smash Bros. Melee Is Great. But Why Is It Great?

The aptly named Really Freakin’ Clever webseries is back, this time focusing on the second entry in Nintendo’s all-star brawler franchise—Smash Bros. Melee While I agree with the notion that having all these celebrated and massively nostalgic characters in one place is a hell of a selling point, it’s important not to overlook Melee’s rather…

Oh My Goodness, These Trees Look Like Totoro

If you’ve seen the Studio Ghibli anime, you are certainly familiar with Totoro. Did you know there are several trees in Japan that resemble the iconic character? Located in the village of Sakegawa in Yamagata Prefecture, the above tree is nicknamed “The Totoro Tree” (トトロの木 or Totoro no Ki). It’s a cedar tree that is…

Metal Gear Solid V Cosplay Kept Ya Waiting, Huh?

Metal Gear Solid V isn’t out yet. Heck, there wasn’t even a playable demo at this year’s Tokyo Game Show. Until we get our hands on it, all we can do is wait. Good thing there are talented cosplayers to help pass the time. At this year’s Tokyo Game Show, Metal Gear cosplay queen Omi…

China’s Capital Makes For One Big, Beautiful Toy City

The stereotype is that Beijing is all smog. That, of course, is not true. For instance, there are little toy people going about their business. Little toy cars hurrying to their destinations. And don’t forget the little toy skyscrapers, defiantly reaching into the sky as the music swells in the background. Of course, the video…

These Japanese Wii U Bundles Are a Good Deal

Nintendo is releasing a Wii U Family Premium set. And hey, it looks like a bargain. The 32GB Wii U comes packed with New Super Mario Bros. U, Wii Party U, a Wii Remote Plus, a thirty day pass for Wii Karaoke U, and a Sensor Bar. The bundle is available in white or black,…

Got Twenty Minutes? Here, Kick Some Zombie Ass on YouTube

Hellraid, the game which attempts to mix the combat of Dead Island with the setting of Dark Messiah (or Heretic, or Hexen), has a prequel that you can play right now. The catch? It’s an interactive movie. Don’t worry though, it’s lotsa fun. Techland released the choose-your-own-adventure series on YouTube as a lead-up to the…

The Most Blatant Utada Hikaru Ripoff I’ve Ever Seen

Stealing from Utada Hikaru is not cool. But, I guess, if you are going to do it, then dammit, be incredibly obvious like one Korean singer was. Obvious is funny! Back in March 1999, Utada Hikaru released her debut album First Love. It was a smash hit, selling over ten million copies worldwide and spawning…

How Microsoft Could Be Jumping Over China’s Console Ban

In China, video game consoles are banned. Recently, there’s been chatter than the ban will be lifted. But who needs home consoles when there’s already a workaround: Ditch the game machines completely. This week, Microsoft announced (via WSJ.com) that it was partnering with China’s BesTV to create “family games and related services.” According to Reuters,…