Respawn Entertainment has confirmed that, as we reported yesterday, Jason West has left the studio for family issues

This Assassin’s Creed IV Rap Drops Rhymes From Kingston To Bristol

If you follow video games, you’re probably aware of Dan Bull, the Brit rapper who drops sick rhymes about the hottest new video games. Or, you know, “sick,” if you’re not that into this sort of kitschy thing. But I gotta say his latest for Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag has got some good stuff…

Holy Crap, The Zerg Are Attacking France

Watch out, France. There are mutalisks in your cities. Either this is a fake video created by Blizzard to help build up hype for StarCraft II: Heart of the Swarm (out March 12 for PC (and, hey, is that Day9?)) or France had seriously better get their stim packs ready.

Introducing ‘The Multiplayer,’ Your Weekly Destination For Games We Play With Each Other

Rules, mechanics, interaction—games are complicated beasts. And so are we, the players. When we play games with each other—that’s when truly fascinating things happen. We can’t help ourselves: anything we touch becomes a messy affair. Games are no exception. Sometimes what happens is poignant—like finding and losing a friend in Journey Sometimes it’s ridiculous, as…

The Madworld-meets-Shank-style beat ’em up Aztez has a new teaser trailer. Punch! Kick! Slam!

The Most Atmospheric and Relaxing Aquatic Locations In Video Games

Water levels can be pain in the ass, especially when unnecessarily complex gameplay mechanics meet blurry, monotonous graphics. But that’s not always the case. Truth is, there are water levels (or places where water plays a key role) that look really refreshing, relaxing, and that might even possess a special, eerie atmosphere (several parts of…

Nixed My Little Pony Fighting Game Gets Help from Friendship is Magic Creator

Shut down by the lawyer-mans at the beginning of February, the My Little Pony fan-made fighting game still lives. The glum backers and developers of Fighting is Magic may have to go on without using MLP art or characters—but they will have the creator of the current animated series in their corner. “Mane6,” the coalition…

EA Got My SimCity Back, So I Killed It With a Giant Fire-Lizard

Following a struggle with the tech folks following a fault in the SimCity press servers, the lost city of Fahey’s Folly—aka the SimCity on the Edge of Forever—was found once again. In celebration, I unleashed red-hot dino fury. Since I’ll be using my own Origin account and retail servers for our upcoming SimCity review, Fahey’s…

Hey, Aliens: Colonial Marines Is Pretty Good As A Three-Part Comedy

The consensus seems to be that Aliens: Colonial Marines isn’t a very good game. But that doesn’t mean Aliens can’t make for entertaining playthrough videos. Ah, the wonders of YouTube. Enter the always-amusing Criken, who has been uploading his playthrough of Aliens: Colonial Marines to YouTube for the past couple of weeks. He just finished…

First-Graders Are Learning How To Write Video Game Reviews Now

My friend John found this hanging in a first-grade classroom here in NYC. It’s for the kids’ writing workshop. I think we’re going to start using it as the Official Kotaku Review Guide from now on. The best part? No mention of review scores.

These Tomb Raider Minimates—seen at ArtAsylum—really need a bow & arrow. Best weapon in the game. C’mon, guys.

The Journey Composer Walks You Through His Entire Soundtrack

Journey wasn’t just one of the best games of 2012, it also had easily one of the best soundtracks. Composer Austin Wintory assembled a remarkable collection of instruments and tonalities, the sort of holistic musical concoction we rarely get in games. With this new video, you can listen to the entire Grammy-nominated soundtrack and follow…

He Worked on Call of Duty, And Now He’s Making a Game About Dreams

Check out The Adventures of Dash, a puzzle-platformer where you control a narcoleptic boy. Every dream has a different art style. The game is from former Infinity Ward (Call of Duty) creative strategist Robert Bowling’s new development studio, Robotoki. Here’s the Kickstarter.

Based on the Nickelodeon series, TMNT: Out of the Shadows for XBLA, PSN and Steam is coming this summer. [Digital Spy]

At Least One Gamer Is Pissed At Sony For A Small, But Misleading Vita Description

Earlier this year, Kotaku reader Lewis bought a PlayStation Vita. He bought two 32 GB memory cards: one for games and applications, and the other for music. “I figured I could use it as an mp3 player as well as a gaming console,” Lewis told us. “Unfortunately, that is not the case.” As Lewis soon…

Well, that didn’t take long, Crysis 3 is already discounted (to $41.99), all versions (PS3, 360, PC and PC download).

Mass Effect 3: Citadel DLC Gives Commander Shepard a Glorious Send-Off

The newest single-player add-on for Mass Effect 3 comes out this week and it assembles characters from the previous ME games for an all-new adventure. Here’s the official description: When a sinister conspiracy targets Commander Shepard, you and your team must uncover the truth, through battles and intrigue that range from the glamour of the…

Hey Pokémon fans! Get thee to a GameStop between today and March 24 to get your legendary Meloetta before she’s gone.

Skyrim‘s 1.9 update adds a new difficulty setting to the hit action/RPG and fixes a ton of bugs.

Every One of Us is Dead at the Beginning of The Silent Age

Plenty of video games have toyed with a desolate future in which an extinction level event has wiped humanity from the face of the Earth. The Silent Age isn’t about the future. It’s about right now. Bang, you’re dead. Well, maybe bang, possibly whimper. Discovering the how and why is the mission of a mustachioed…