Manhunt‘s Publisher Fails to Retake 10-Year-Old Promo Site [Update]

This is weird. valiant-ent.tv was a bogus VHS snuff-porn site Rockstar established way back in 2003 to promote the infamous Manhunt series until it let the registration lapse. Last month someone took over the domain and they’re using it to flack a petition for a sequel. Now Manhunt‘s publisher is trying to regain control of…

Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: Canine Countenances

Alright, I’m back from vacation. I didn’t say it was a vacation because when you publicly state you’re out of town, people tend to come over and borrow things. Permanently. But thank you all for the impromptu ‘Shops of my activities while I was away; it’s always nice to be missed. This may not be…

Users of Older Xbox 360s Say Grand Theft Auto V Crashes Their Console

It seems the launch week of a hotly anticipated game can’t pass without a problem keeping some folks from playing. Several tips and complaints we’ve received, and a long forum thread backing them up, allude to a specific problem facing Grand Theft Auto V: the game appears to crash on older models of the Xbox…

Sunday Comics: The Best Medicine?

Welcome to Kotaku‘s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best webcomics. Remember to vote this week in our annual remake of the page. We need at least two new features, and you get to choose them. Nerd Rage by Andy Kluthe. Published Sept. 20. Read more of Nerd Rage Penny Arcade by Jerry Holkins…

College Footballers Show Support for Those Suing EA Sports and NCAA

Several college football players yesterday showed support for the National Collegiate Players Association, writing the initials of the group’s slogan—”All Players United”—on parts of their uniform. It’s a show of solidarity with those suing over the use of player likenesses in the NCAA Football series.

Those who have Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 might want to jump in at some point this weekend to take advantage of the double XP boost in online matches, and the free trial of the game’s Uprising DLC, which offers four maps, plus the “Mob of the Dead” mode.

NBA Live Dribbles Out a First Look at Actual Gameplay

NBA Live 14 announced its launch date earlier this week—Nov. 19, which is curious, as that is four days after the PlayStation 4 launches and still there’s a PS4/NBA Live 14 launch bundle (currently sold out) due to drop on Nov. 15. OK, well, while we get that sorted out, here’s the first look at…

The Legend of Zelda’s abysmal CD-i adaptation from 20 years ago—Link: The Faces of Evil and Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon—were KGB’d out of Hyrule Historia, the series’ canonical volume. MTV Multiplayer asked series director Eiji Aonuma why, and got a rare comment from Nintendo about one of the worst games of all time.

Yep. Madden‘s Eyebrow-Shaving Bet Was B.S. After All

We said we’d keep any eye on this nutball wager between Madden endorsers Colin Kaepernick and Russell Wilson, who met last week. Looks like no one lost anything, thanks to the magic of digital editing. Check out the comments on that YouTube video. Some folks are seriously hacked off that Kaepernick didn’t do the deed…

Why I Created the ‘Washington Whiteskins’ in a Football Video Game

A few months ago a guy reached out to me over Twitter with a common question, but for an unusual purpose. He asked if gamers can create or rename teams in Madden NFL. No, I replied, that hasn’t been a feature for several years. His reason for asking is probably why: the guy wanted to…

Capcom’s PS4-Exclusive Deep Down Will Be Free-to-Play

Deep Down, Capcom’s strange, beautiful, displaced-time online RPG, is going to be free-to-play, and its beta will appear “near the launch of the PlayStation 4 in Japan,” Sony’s president of worldwide studios said via Twitter after the news was announced at Tokyo Game Show earlier today. As was revealed earlier this week, PlayStation 4 will…

Why the PS4 is Waiting Until February to Launch in Japan

A dearth of Japan-focused titles is why Sony is slowing the roll of the PlayStation 4 there until Feb. 22. In fact, western appetite for a next-generation console well outpaces that in Sony’s home country, said company executives to Eurogamer “Perhaps you could say that a few western developers have been more aggresive in readying…

Vote on Your New Sunday Comics Lineup!

OK, first a mea culpa. It was dumb of me to open a call for nominations for new strips in our Sunday Comics feature and then go on vacation. I promise I did not forget about this. In fact, we’ve got a good list of nine new candidates, and right now you get to vote…

One of Metal Gear Solid‘s Most Iconic Tropes Was Almost Axed

Looking at its gameplay, Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain and its prologue, Ground Zeroes capture the spirit of the Metal Gear series despite worries arising from director Hideo Kojima’s announcement that the game would be open world. However, a staple of the series—the exclamation point—was almost not included in Metal Gear Solid 5…

This Week in the Business: ‘The Most Overtly Sexist Environment Ever’

What’s happened in the business of video games this past week … QUOTE | “When I first started playing in 1999, it was the most overtly sexist environment ever.”—Linda Carlson, SOE director of global community relations, on EverQuest and how online communities are changing QUOTE | “You don’t force anything, you don’t drive anything, you…

PS4 or Xbox One? We Poll The Tokyo Game Show

Thirty-two responses later, we had one very clear answer. Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am. To contact the author of this post, write to [email protected] or find him on Twitter @BiggestinJapan

Lock Your New iPhone with Nipples (Apparently!)

Apple’s new scanning security tech is pretty clever. It’s not only smart enough to identify different fingers, but supposedly also clever to i.d. different nipples. Welcome to the future! According to Japanese site Rocket News, the new iPhones can recognize your nipples (um, okay!), keeping it locked for different nipples. In the above video, you…

The Best of Kotaku, The Week of September 16

Morning, Kotaku. How are you doing? Still playing GTA V? Since last night? Haven’t slept or ate at all? Oh, ok, glad we’re on the same page then. When you’re taking breaks in between, how about browsing some of our best content from over the week, collected over at Kotaku Selects? Our guys in Asia…

The New Theatrhythm is More of the Same

Undoubtedly one of the best features of the Final Fantasy series is its amazing soundtrack—hence the creation of last year’s music game Theatrhythm Final Fantasy. Of course, even with over 70 songs in the game, that was just the tip of the iceberg: hence the creation of its upcoming sequel, Theatrhythm Final Fantasy: Curtain Call…

So Far, Titanfall Is Getting Thumbs Up from Japan

Japan knows a good giant mecha when it sees one. And from the sound of it, the country’s gamers are more than pleased with what they are seeing with Titanfall Today is the first public day of the Tokyo Game Show and the first time that Respawn Entertainment has shown its mecha-filled FPS Titanfall in…