Why Cats Love Sitting on Keyboards

Any cat owner will tell you: those felines love keyboards. They love sitting on them. They love walking on them. They adore them! Over on Yahoo! Answers, the top answers state the obvious: cats want your attention. That’s no doubt true. Recently, Japanese site My Navi examined this issue that has confronted cat owners as…

Horribly Racist Arcade Machines Are Nothing New In China

Earlier today, Rocket News 24, a Japanese news site, uploaded photos of an arcade machine spotted in Myanmar. The arcade machine at first glance looks pretty much like every cheap arcade game out there—however, upon closer inspection, one can see that it’s horribly racist. Towards the Japanese. The arcade machine in question, PK918, isn’t a…

Marvel at this Japanese Nerd Dancing

If you’ve ever been to an idol (virtual or real!) concert, you are familiar with Japanese nerd dancing. It’s called “otagei” (オタ芸) or “wotagei” (ヲタ芸), which is short for “otaku” (geek) and “gei” (芸), which can mean “performance” in Japanese. In short, it’s a bunch of geeks dancing! Above, you can see some truly impressive…

Here’s a look at the newest entry in the Atelier series. It’s currently dubbed “Project A15”.

Meet WarStorm, the Unreal Engine 3 FPS Created by One Chinese Guy

The Chinese blogosphere is abuzz with excitement over a demo for a new single player first-person shooter. That’s right, there is a lot of buzz for a demo. So what exactly makes this demo so exciting for Chinese players? It’s a domestically made FPS, done by a one man studio over the course of one…

Final Fantasy Versus XIII Turned into FFXV by a Fashion Label’s Mistake

Ah, the world of fashion! The clothes. The models. The typos? According to Japanese clothing brand Roen, that’s exactly what caused a recent kerfuffle. Back in 2008, Roen announced that it would be making Final Fantasy Versus XIII threads like the game’s protagonists wear. Recently, however, something peculiar was spotted while surfing Roen’s website. On…

This Year’s Craziest Video Game Conspiracy Theory, the Uncanny Valley, and, Oh Yeah, Metal Gear

The next generation is around the corner. And with it, video gamers will get wrinkles, hair follicles, and pores like they’ve never seen before. Before we know it, the Uncanny Valley will become the new normal. But, as some are wondering online, is it already here? And did we just watch a digital game developer…

DRM-free SimCity clone Civitas’ Kickstarter has been cancelled; the studio “has been able to secure private funding.”

King Arthur’s Gold, the indie lovechild of Team Fortress 2 and Minecraft, is coming to Steam. More details here

How Do You Make Majora’s Mask Even More Disturbing? Add Nicolas Cage.

This is… I don’t even know what to say. Just watch. Sheer genius. Kudos to YouTuber Criken, who somehow managed to make the creepy The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask even creepier, Cage style. (via NeoGAF)

A Telltale Heartbeat Informs the Latest Hero of Ace Attorney

Taking a page from Matt Murdock, the latest hero of the Ace Attorney series is a lawyer who can listen to heartbeats to determine if they’re telling the truth. That said, Kizuki Kokone is not yet an expert at doing so, says the game’s official web page, in a post revealing her arrival in Ace…

Missile Command‘s 31-Year-Old All-Time Record Has Fallen [Update]

Victor Sandberg of Sweden has been playing Missile Command for more than 52 hours on a single coin, chasing a record that has stood since 1982. The all-time high world record high score of 80.5 million points is held by another Victor, in this case someone named Victor Ali. [Update] Victor Sandberg is the new…

Coder Discovers Mandatory 20-Minute Offline Timeout in SimCity

Last week, two of our writers played SimCity and deliberately turned off their Internet connections, both finding their games continued normally and then abruptly ended after 20 minutes. Someone now has posted what appears to be code for the game that orders a shutdown after a disconnection exactly that long. That allegation further punctures the…

The Week in Games: There are a Million Bricks in LEGO City …

God of War got its prequel last week; Gears of War gets one Tuesday. We’ve also been charmed by LEGO City: Undercover on Wii U, available on Monday. Monday • LEGO City: Undercover (Wii U) Tuesday • Gears of War: Judgment (360) • The Walking Dead: Survival Instinct (360, PS3, Wii U, PC) • Assassin’s…

Machinarium comes to PS Vita on March 26 with features specific to the handheld. It’ll be $6.99 on the PlayStation Store

Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: Pope Francish

Hey, don’t say I didn’t warn you. When the College of Cardinals selected the 266th pope on Wednesday, video gamers all around the world had the same reaction: Francis? The implacable, lisping video game nerd who issues weekly encyclicals bemoaning the worldly excesses of video gaming? (And yes, we know he’s a comedian.) Perfect choice.…

Sunday Comics: Corrosive Effect

Welcome to your Sunday read of the week’s best in web comics. Make sure to click on the expand button in the bottom right to enlarge each comic. Corpse Run by Alex Di Stasi. Published March 14. Read more of Corpse Run Penny Arcade by Jerry Holkins and Mike Krahulik. Published March 13. Read more…

Kotaku ‘Shop Contest: The Emperor Has No Pants: The Winners

This week’s Kotaku ‘Shop Contest, like the rest of the site, requires an always-on Internet connection to access. Of course, our servers actually work, so this isn’t much of a problem. Last week our smart ‘Shoppers pantsed SimCity with 18 mayoral portraits, including overall winner Josh Alsarona’s! androidpk AnxiousLogic AnxiousLogic arniejolt arniejolt azureguy Dafishies eraofmattitude…

The hacker who made SimCity run offline now says the game’s region features can run without an Internet connection, too.

She Hacked The Legend of Zelda So It Now Stars Zelda, Saving Link

This is one of those things that seems so obvious, it feels like someone should have done it before. After all, just last week someone finally got the idea to mod a Donkey Kong ROM so that Pauline could save Mario. That’s exactly what inspired Kenna W., a professional animator, to mod a Legend of…