Funcom’s Three MMO Worlds Are In His Hands. What Will He Do?

Just a few short years ago, Funcom’s Joel Bylos was in charge of level 20 through 40 of Age of Conan, a massively multiplayer online game that was, at launch, widely criticized for a lack of quality content past level 20. Now he’s the creative director in charge of Age of Conan, Anarchy Online and…

EA Admits Games Can Do Better For The LGBT Community

Yesterday in New York City, Electronic Arts held a special event focused on queer issues in gaming. And it happened mostly because the company itself was willing to face its own stumbles in presenting gay characters in its video games. The impetus for Thursday’s Full Spectrum event—co-sponsored by the Entertainment Software Association and the Human…

BioWare’s final Mass Effect 3 meeting is happening right now. Read Tweets from it and about it

The Many Ways We Didn’t Get To Play SimCity This Week

Looking back on this week’s SimCity launch debacle, it isn’t just remarkable that the game’s servers failed, it’s remarkable how many different ways they failed. The spectre of Diablo III has loomed over this entire affair, as Blizzard’s action-RPG is certainly the easiest point of reference for an always-online PC game that fell on its…

The Noisiest, Dirtiest Bars and Taverns in Video Games

Bars, clubs and noisy taverns are always crucial locations in a story-driven game. They are save points, places where we can sell useless stuff from our inventory, gather information, meet a key character, or just simply get into trouble. We have selected bars and inns that look the grittiest. Bars that are perhaps most memorable…

This Animated, Sixty Second Version Of The Matrix Is Better Than The Actual Movies

It’s been a long while since I watched the Matrix movies, but watching this ‘speedrun’ rendition by 1A4STUDIO brings it all back to me—including how silly and absurd some parts of the movies are. Also—obviously, the bullet time in the movies is rather ‘video gamey,’ but this highlights that those aren’t the only things that…

Proof That American Gamers Really Do Want Japanese RPGs

Does the world still care about Japanese role-playing games? Do people still want to buy them? Do they still deserve our attention? Ask your average gamer—or your average game developer—and they’ll tell you that the JRPG is a dying genre. They’ll tell you that Japanese RPGs haven’t evolved, or that nobody buys them anymore. That…

Report: EA Suspends SimCity Marketing In Light Of Launch Disaster

In light of SimCity‘s disastrous launch week, publisher Electronic Arts has suspended the marketing campaign for the game, according to an internal email obtained by Polygon The email, which was sent to all of EA’s marketing affiliate partners, informs them that EA is deactivating links through LinkShare and that “we ask you to please remove…

EA shoots down more SimCity banning theories, won’t ban gamers for bank disputes.

Epic Violinists Dressed Up As Journey Characters Epically Playing Journey Music

I always felt as though my Journey character would’ve been pretty good at the violin. And what do you know, that seems to be the case, as demonstrated by violinist Taylor Davis in this new video tribute. I liked this video, partly because it’s more reserved than the more histrionic exploits of Lindsey Stirling, as…

In This Lovely Fairy Tale Game, Your Right Thumb Is Your Little Brother

I’ve been waiting to see more of the world of Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons. The downloadable game looks so different than most of the games that Starbreeze has put out and seems to be an eye-catching mix of exploration and co-operative puzzle-solving. The twist, though, is that you’ll need to co-operate with yourself.…

Aliens: Colonial Marines has a new patch update that might make the game a more pleasant experience for Xbox players.

A Survival Horror Game That Never Plays The Same Way Twice

The fear of the unknown is powerful. Darkwood takes that idea to heart: it’s a top-down procedurally generated survival horror game. This means that every time you play, you’ll experience something different. Adding to the tension is the fact that the game features roguelike elements and permadeath. You’ll also be able to craft items, build…

Now That SimCity Has Curved Roads, It Also Can Have…

The city in the above image was created in the beta for the new SimCity and demonstrated that, as always, if gamers can draw some male genitalia into a game, they will. Really, they will Previous SimCity games only let players draw straight rodes into their cities. The new game lets you draw curved roads,…

This Animated Zelda Cake Is The Most Impressive Thing You’ll See Today

Holy crap. Kotaku reader Will Turnbow and his wife made this cake for their daughter’s tenth birthday, and I think it’s no exaggeration to say this is the coolest thing you’ll see today. Based on The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, the cake includes Skyloft, the Sealed Grounds, the Faron Woods, and a ton of…

In a Week of Big-Name Runner Games, This Indie is On Fire

It’s been a huge week for mobile running games. There’s a new Temple Run that’s tied to Disney’s Oz: The Great and Powerful. Mini Ninjas went for a jog, Sonic the Hedgehog busted out time-tested moves, and the Monday Night Combat folks launched the Outland Games. All of these running games based on popular properties,…

Ultima Creator Richard Garriott Revolutionized Video Game RPGs. Now He Wants To Do It Again.

The man known as Lord British has been gone from video games a long time. Yeah, he’s had the whole space travel thing going on. And there was a messy bit of business where he got half a million dollars stolen from him to buy fancy magician paraphernalia. But it seemed really weird that Richard…

They Want $250,000 To Make A DRM-Free Clone Of SimCity

A team of developers is looking to make a single-player city-building game that seems like the anti-SimCity—and they’re asking for $250,000 on Kickstarter to make it happen. Called Civitas, the project promises to be a SimCity clone that you can actually play offline, which might come as welcome news to fans burned by the recent…

Don’t Worry, God of War Isn’t Going to Run Out of Deities to Beat Up Anytime Soon

There have been five God of War games and, in each one, Kratos slaughters his way through significant portions of the Greco-Roman pantheon. Wow, you might say, is there anybody left for the Ghost of Sparta to be mad at? Yeah, there is. In a post on the PlayStation Blog, God of Ascension lead combat…

This Stunning Life-Sized Princess Zelda Statue Is Entirely Made Of Paper

According to papercraft-master minidelirium, even with instructions and templates it took more than 200 hours to build this stunning life-sized Princess Zelda. That’s a labor of love right there. She is 5’6″ tall (~170cm), made of really strong paper, and looks just like her equivalent in Super Smash Bros. Brawl And what did minidelirium do…