If Studio Ghibli Made Pixar Films, They’d Look Like This

Studio Ghibli still uses traditional animation techniques. You know, hand-drawn. And while it did loan out Totoro—well, a plush toy version—from My Neighbor Totoro to Pixar’s computer boffins for Toy Story 3, don’t look to Studio Ghibli to go all digital anytime soon. But if Studio Ghibli does, its characters would probably look something like…

According to MCVUK and Eurogamer, SimCity‘s UK launch seems “fine” and working “for now”. Wait until this weekend…

Hacking the Japanese Voices Back into the Games

Let’s face it, over the years there have been some pretty terrible English dubs of Japanese games. Moreover, these horrible dubs often replace an excellent Japanese voice cast. Now while there is nothing wrong with liking your Japanese games in English with English voices, have you ever wished you could just play some of your…

Why South Korean Gamers Are So Pissed about SimCity

Upset about the rocky SimCity rollout? Take heart. You are not alone. Gamers in South Korea are also not happy campers. But it’s not just due to the inability to play. Here’s what happened: When South Korean gamers couldn’t connect to servers, the official SimCity Korean Facebook page called out the country for piracy. You…

Oh My, How the Pokémon Anime Has Changed

The Pokémon anime debuted on Japanese television what seems like ages ago. The year 1996 is a distant memory. But last night, it came flooding back. As previously mentioned, Ash’s Charizard is returning to the Pokémon animated series as a regular character, er, Pocket Monster. What last night’s episode illustrated was just how different the…

Assassin’s Creed’s New Protagonist Sure Looks Like This Porn Star

At first glance, Edward Kenway—the protagonist of the upcoming Assassin’s Creed IV game—looks like your typical leading dude. Stoic, beefy, masculine. Nothing special, right? Those with more astute observation skills over at Reddit, like zinadello13, noticed that Kenway bears a striking resemblance to Capt. Edward Reynolds from Pirates. As in, the (in)famous porn from 2005…

This Tomb Raider Rap Is Pretty Damn Good

Yes, yes. Another day, another rap-tribute to a video game. But this one’s particularly good. Alabama rapper Kadesh Flow goes beyond “fun and/or goofy” and enters the realm of “real chops.” Give it a watch. (Thanks, Tai!)

I Didn’t Know Disney Helped Make The New Mass Effect 3 DLC

One of the best parts of Mass Effect 3‘s new ‘Citadel’ add-on—and there are a lot of good parts —comes near the end, when you have an opportunity to spend some quality one-on-one time with each of your companions from throughout the entire series. I liked all of the interactions that I saw, but this…

This funny Fire Emblem: Awakening text-adventure faithfully captures the experience of playing the game itself.

Nvidia has announced that the PlayStation 4 will support their nifty PhysX physics software.

Here’s an interesting short feature on the father of video games, Ralph Baer.

SimCity Makers Address Launch Fiasco, Vow To Continue Adding Servers Over The Weekend

The head of the studio behind the troubled new SimCity told Kotaku today that efforts to solve the game’s server woes will continue aggressively into the weekend. The statement, from Maxis general manager Lucy Bradshaw, indicates that some people are in fact playing the game but that EA has a long way to go to…

The Most Hilarious Skateboarding Glitches, Now In Motion

Video games that rely on a lot of physics-driven character animations tend to have some pretty funny glitches. Last week, we shared a selection of the most awesome classic sport game glitches, so it only made sense to do a follow-up, featuring skateboarding games. Lots of animated stuff here, it might take a few seconds…

NFL Punter Kicks The Crap Out Of EA And SimCity

Everybody’s sick of this SimCity disaster. Everybody! Even Chris Kluwe, a punter for the Minnesota Vikings and big gamer, has taken to Twitter to say some… colorful things about SimCity, and about EA’s decision not to let people play the game offline. Behold: Gotta love a guy who isn’t afraid to speak his mind.

Valiant Comics Celebrates Its First Crossover with Awesome Homage Covers and Mobile Retro Game

Who was expecting the relaunch of 1990s comics imprint Valiant Comics to be one of the best things to happen to Wednesdays in a good long time? Oh, you were? And you? And you? Okay, good. The reborn publisher’s managed to attract great talent who have delivered sharp updates to the Valiant universe and its…

Age of Ultron #1 Delivers My Favorite Panel in Comics This Week. What’s Yours?

This panel tells you all you need to know about Age of Ultron #1. The staging in the panel immediately communicate a desperate tenison and exhaustion of the characters in the scene. You don’t even really need the dialogue but it does let you know that the Avengers in this scene are former allies who…

A Brand-New Cartoon Shows Video Game Heroes Hate Annoying Help Messages, Too

First, Bravoman appeared in Japanese arcades in the late ‘80s. Then, the obscure Namco character showed up in a TurboGrafx port two years later. As of last year, he wound up launching the ShiftyLook line of webcomics dedicated to characters from old-school Namco Bandai games. Now, the stretchy-limbed hero is making the jump to an…

How To Survive Tomb Raider’s Annoying PC Quicktime Events

If you’re playing the PC version of Tomb Raider, you may be having trouble with the quicktime events—enough that you’re just watching Lara die over and over again every time a QTE pops up. Not fun. At some point early in the game, Tomb Raider tells you what to press during QTEs: the “F” key.…

This Week’s Android Charts: A Vector of Change

Vector‘s appearance as one of two new games in this week’s Android chart has got me thinking about switching things up. There’s just not enough variety in the traditional week-to-week top games rankings, so starting next week I’ll be tracking top new games instead. It’ll be a little more work — I’ll have to reference…

Double Fine has announced a new music game called Dropchord for iOS and Leap controller. There’ll be a demo at PAX East.