Knack is as Charming as Ever on Late-Night TV

Upcoming PS4-exclusive family-oriented action game Knack was the focus of the PS4’s (and Mark Cerny’s) appearance on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon earlier tonight. There was much rejoicing. A good experience, overall: Fallon and the audience had a great time, and we also got to know that Knack is actually an homage to the Stay…

Don’t Update Your PS3 Today! [Update: Firmware Pulled]

As of, oh, right now, there should be a prompt on your PS3 asking you to upgrade to 4.45. Whatever you do, don’t accept it. Not yet, anyway. We’ve started getting reports from some readers that the update is bricking their system, locking their consoles on the boot-up “ribbon” screen, and a thread on Sony’s…

Books All About The Games You (Well, Some People) Love

You can read plenty of books about video games, but there aren’t many books all about one individual video game. Which is exactly why Boss Fight books want to step in and fix that. Boss Fight wants to be “the 33 1/3 of video games”, bringing together passionate authors to write a whole book about…

An Entire British Town Has Been Turned Into A Zelda Map

As part of the Switch Fringe festival in Ipswich, England, artist The Decibel Kid drew this map of the city to help attendees find their way around and track down shows and events. While most aspects are actual parts of Ipswich rendered in 16-bit style, keep your eyes out for the odd Nintendo cameo, like…

Check Out Some Great Arkham City Concept Art

Having previously worked for companies like NCSoft, artist Kan Muftic’s last major piece of gaming work was being one of those helping define Rocksteady’s take on the Batman universe in the two excellent Arkham games. He’s since moved onto a bit of movie work, including the upcoming Godzilla reboot. You can see more of his…

A Game Whose Patch Notes Are Actually Worth Reading

Indie stealth-puzzler Gunpoint hassome of the best achievements going around, but did you know it also has some of the best patch notes? Normally something to be ignored, or at best glanced over, creator Tom Francis obviously found enough spare time between counting dollar bills to write patch notes that sound like they were written…

Nintendo Is Releasing A Free-To-Play Game

Yup. You can wail “SAY IT AIN’T SO”, but Nintendo can easily wail back – if they ever decided to begin wailing directly to consumers – “THE TIMES THEY ARE A CHANGIN'”. Speaking with IGN at E3 last week, Nintendo designer Shigeru Miyamoto revealed that the company’s first foray into the business model, popular with…

Steam Might Soon Let You Share Your Games With Your Friends

You can lend your friends a console disc. You can not lend them a game you buy on Steam. Or at least, you haven’t been able to previously. That might soon be about to change. Some code buried in the latest Steam client beta (pictured above), first spotted by NeoGAF poster Grief.exe but which I…

A Million More Reasons Why Blanka Sucks

I’m sure it’s a familiar story. You or your friend gets a Super Nintendo with Street Fighter II. A horde of friends bumrush your house to play. One little bastard always figured out how Blanka’s electricity move didn’t he? And proceeded to dominate everyone before we figured out how to Hadouken. Screw that kid. Ever…

The Last Of Us Turned Into A Six-Hour “Movie”

This is a six-hour video that shows you most of The Last Of Us, beginning to end. It’s achieved by recording linear gameplay (no dawdling or getting stuck or dying) and including all the cutscenes and story elements. Why would you watch this, when half the fun is playing through the game’s combat and exploration?…

The Official LEGO Movie Looks Amazing, Guys

This is the real deal. A real LEGO movie. It’s out next year. Just when you thought Hollywood would go the inevitable shiny and obvious CG route, they surprise us with this. It looks great! 1980’s Space Guy!

This LEGO Star Wars Trench-Run Is One In A Million

While I’m impressed by the attention to detail in this re-creation of Star Wars‘ iconic last ditch torpedo-shot (as displayed at the Brickworld LEGO convention and photographed by Peter Mowry), I’m almost more impressed with how effectively it captures the mess of grey junk that covers the exterior of the Death Star. The full LEGO…

MIT developed this program which allows users to interface with a 3D character that judges your body language—it’s called MACH and it’s meant to help you socialize better. Reminds me of project Milo a little bit—can you imagine having games where the characters can read your body language like this? It’s probably coming, judging from…

Goodbye, GameCube Controller. It’s Been Fun.

Like any Smash Bros. fan, I’ve taken in the news of a Wii U iteration with great joy. Look at the awesome new characters! No tripping? Hooray! It’ll find a sweet spot between casual and hardcore play? Excellent! And yet, there’s a tinge of melancholy about it all: the Wii U doesn’t have a GameCube…

A Fresh Look At Gravity Ghost, The Little Indie Mario Galaxy That Could

It’s been a full year since we last checked in with Gravity Ghost, developer Erin Robinson‘s 2D take on gravitation-influenced platforming and Mario Galaxy-like star-collecting. We caught up with Robinson again at E3 2013 to see how the game is shaping up. Short version: It’s looking great. Before we shot the video above, I played…

State of Decay Still En Route To PC, Though Who Knows When

I first watched Chris playing the enjoyable-looking (and hugely popular) Xbox 360 zombie survival game State of Decay, I’ve wanted to dive in and play it. But I’ve also wanted to wait for it to come to PC. Good news, then: The game is certainly going to arrive on Steam, though it’s still not clear…

Nintendo Wants To Re-Convince You The Wii U Gamepad Is Cool

Nintendo has been having a bit of a tough time communicating just what the Wii U is all about. In particular, the company still seems unable to clearly articulate just why the Wii U’s gamepad—a combination game-controller and touchscreen—makes their system worth buying. Perhaps, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata suggests, it’s time for some new ideas.…

A New Camera Angle Steals the Scene in NCAA Football‘s Running Game

The biggest breakthrough for your running game in NCAA Football 14 may not be smarter line blocking, the return of a speed burst, or the introduction of real-time physics. It may be as simple as a new camera angle, available today in the game’s demo. You should see it. You should play with it. It’s…

What If There Were Tons Of Cats Roaming E3 And No One Noticed?

With the tens of thousands of people that descend on the Los Angeles Convention Center every year for the Electronic Entertainment Expo, it can be easy to miss seeing a few people. But this year was a little different. Cats roamed the showfloor and no one even seemed to notice. Let’s look at the evidence,…

Sony Actually Has A Very Different Future In Mind For PlayStation 4

Sony’s successful, if counter-intuitive next-gen message for the PlayStation 4 at last week’s E3 is that things won’t change. No disc DRM changes. No new online checks for PS4. You might think Sony doesn’t want gaming to change in the PS4 era. Oh, but they do. In fact, if you listen closely, they’re veering closer…