DayZ Standalone Update: Reworked Servers, Improved Graphics And More

The people working on DayZ have posted a chunky update about the game’s standalone version, along with some lovely-looking new screenshots. (You can see a nice comparison between the original game and the new one using the slider up top.) Here’s the full thing, as posted by DayZ creator Dean “Rocket” Hall: This is the…

Coulton Says Fox Won’t Apologize For Ripping Him Off On Glee

Songwriter Jonathan Coulton has posted an update on his personal blog in which he says Fox is unrepentant after blatantly stealing his arrangement of “Baby Got Back” for last night’s “Sadie Hawkins” episode of Glee The full update from Coulton’s website: Well, they aired it, seemingly unchanged. And it’s now for sale in the US…

SimCity‘s Visual Filters Mean No Colorblind Gamer is Left Behind

If you have it, color blindness is extremely frustrating to a video gamer. I’ve written about this before. No, it’s not a debilitating condition, nor does designing games for a perfectly color-sighted majority constitute a moral injustice or the worst insensitivity video gaming shows to its diverse constituency. But man, in minimaps, friendly/hostile apparel, puzzles,…

The publisher of L.A. Noire is disputing a director’s claims of a legal threat over his planned L.A. Noir TV show.

Science Isn’t Sure Yet If Gaming Addiction Is A Real Mental Disorder

What is gaming addiction, exactly? There is an easy answer to that question, but there is also, naturally, much debate about whether or not it is even a thing. Psychology can at times be an inexact science, and it seems as though there is always room for debate within that world. As of today, gaming…

ChefVille ‘Burger Station Upgrade’ Quests: Everything You Need to Know

Even with bugs, the show in ChefVille must go on, which is the case this week when it comes to Bello’s Burger event that has been available over the past couple of weeks. While some of the quests in this multi-stage event have been allowed to expire and disappear from the game, there’s another series…

StarCraft’s New Replay System Lets You Pretend To Be A Pro

In a patch to the Heart of the Swarm beta released yesterday, Blizzard added some much-needed—and dare I say awesome—new features to StarCraft II. And they all had to do with replay. We’ve known for a while now that Blizzard was planning to introduce a system where a dropped game could be recovered from a…

You Can’t Be Serious—You Can Not Be Serious—Playing Tennis in the Face

My father has been a tennis umpire for more than 25 years. He’s seen and penalized plenty of bad behavior, both professional and college. But I doubt he’s ever seen anything like Pete Pagassi, the protagonist of Tennis in the Face “If a player hits a ball at a court official or a ballkid, is…

The Ouya Controller Will Change, Because Developers Complained About It

In a post on their website yesterday, the team behind open source console Ouya announced some changes to their controller based on repeated complaints they’ve received from developers. As one of the highest funded Kickstarter projects ever, the Ouya team has been insistent on working with their investors, and at least for now seems to…

Walking to Work in New York City: The Game

Coming to the iPhone and iPad in February, Gutpela’s Sidewalker: Late to Work is a painstakingly accurate recreation of what I felt like when I visited New York City last month to hang at the Kotaku main office, right down to the lack of pants. Gutpela says this is an endless walking game, like a…

Still Waiting For Your Ni no Kuni Special Edition? This eBayer Has Sold Over 200 Of Them

Many of the people who pre-ordered the special edition of Ni no Kuni from publisher Namco Bandai’s online store still haven’t received their copies. There seem to be all sorts of issues surrounding inventory and distribution of the new PS3 role-playing game. A lot of people are pissed off. Now there’s a new wrinkle: some…

Leland Yee, Who Wrote Unconstitutional Anti-Game Law, Tells Gamers ‘Quiet Down.’

Remember the law California passed in 2005 criminalizing the sale of violent video games to kids? The one that got thrown out in 2011 by the Supreme Court? The thing that led to the Supreme Court declaring games were protected speech, an artistic expression? Right. Well, the author of that legislation has something to say…

PS3 or Xbox 360: Compare Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance‘s Looks on Two Consoles

Yes, Raiden’s return to a starring role in a Metal Gear game features a seemingly unkillable cat. But which console will all that hacking and slashing look best on? CVG offers up the same in-game sequence as played on both the PS3 and Xbox 360. If you’ve got both the Microsoft and Sony game machines…

This Week’s iPad Charts: Do the Banana Kong

As Temple Run 2 continues to tear up the free iPad charts, a different sort of endless running game makes its paid chart debut. Video game fans love their giant monkeys. Looks like channeling Nintendo’s Donkey Kong Country is doing the trick for Banana Kong. I did not expect to see the game hit the…

My Day With The New SimCity

Last week, I headed over to Maxis headquarters in Emeryville to spend a big chunk of time playing SimCity. I decided that rather than attempt to list all of the features of a game this dense, I’d just keep a journal of my day. So that’s what I did. Who’s ready for some hot city-planning…

Why I Always Keep Coming Back to Chrono Trigger

Over the course of my 28 years of life, I’ve beaten more video games than I can count. I’ve never been the type of gamer who finds one game and sticks with it for months or years. Rather, from childhood on, I was the kid who would rent a different game from the local Blockbuster…

Run for Money Evokes Memories of Pac-Man and Mario Kart

Run for Money Toshochu: Escape the Greatest Hunters in History is one of the most popular 3DS games released in Japan in 2012. Just like the popular Japanese game show it’s based on, Run for Money pits players against Matrix-like agents (called “hunters”) in an over-the-top game of tag. What results is a game that…

Magi is Like Being Showered in Pure Imagination (And it’s Only Half Done)

From Lodoss War to Slayers, Claymore to Berserk, there are a lot of fantasy anime out there. But for better or worse, a large chunk of fantasy anime are built around the Western-based fantasy framework—with knights, dragons, wizards, castles, and princesses populating these tales. But this year, one of the most popular anime currently airing…

Forget The Numbers, This D&D Game Looks Great

Part of the appeal of playing a game like Dungeons & Dragons is that you’ve got to use your imagination. If there’s a representation of your character at all, chances are it’s pretty basic. These illustrations by artist M S Corley, though, are fantastic. If they’re not exactly what you’d imagine a character to look…

See The Stuff Terraria Gets On Console That It’s (Probably) Not Getting On PC

It was, quietly, one of the biggest PC games of 2011 (and 2012), so it’s little surprise that Terraria is heading to consoles This clip shows some of the new features coming to the console. Features that, incidentally, weren’t originally planned to be coming to the PC version, which has been “finished” for some time…