The Grinns Tale is the Most Charming RPG I’ve Played in Years

Those delightful little creatures with their strange cross-time clothing choices and maniacal grimaces are more than just the player characters in one of the finest social role-playing games going — they’re also my friends. Nexon’s The Grinns Tale is a twisted little turn-based role-playing game with a little town-building thrown in for good measure. Players…

GameStop Cancels All Midnight Openings For Assassin’s Creed III In The Northeast

If you live anywhere in the path of Hurricane Sandy, don’t go to GameStop for Assassin’s Creed III tonight. The gaming retailer has cancelled all midnight launches for the new action-adventure game. I pinged GameStop this afternoon to ask for their plans in the wake of the vicious storm that is currently approaching New York…

FarmVille Fortune Teller: Everything You Need to Know

A brand new event has launched in FarmVille, giving players a chance to deal with the past, present and future by collecting Tarot Cards for their Fortune Teller booth. This feature is like a puzzle, as you’ll need to collect dozens or even hundreds of Tarot Cards that fall into one of three categories. From…

Steam Is Having A Halloween Sale

Happy Halloween! In case your backlog isn’t scary enough, Steam’s having a new sale to spook you into buying more video games. You can get games like Prototype 2 and Left 4 Dead 2 for 50% and 75% off. Costume Quest is a wonderful deal at $7.49, as is the Fallout: New Vegas ultimate edition…

Save-Erasing Bug Hits Borderlands 2, Travels Through Xbox 360 Multiplayer

There’s a nasty bug going around among Xbox 360 players of Borderlands 2. The bug travels like a virus, and erases players’ save game data. Gearbox staff explained on their forums that the bug originates from certain players using “an external application to maliciously disrupt the experience and sabotage characters of legitimate Borderlands 2 players…

F-Zero and Yoshi Return (Sort Of) in the Wii U’s Nintendo Land

While Nintendo’s making sure to have at least one big first-party title available for the launch of their new console in the form of New Super Mario Bros U, some of the company’s other heavy hitters are quite as lucky. Metroid Blast—part of the themed mini-game collection Nintendo Land—isn’t quite a full Samus Aran adventure…

The first mobile game from the makers of Quantum Conundrum, PIXLD is now available on iTunes. Yum.

Gaming’s Most Impressive Storms

With most of New York City shut down—no trains, no buses, some evacuations—those of us at Kotaku who normally work in the main office are working from home. That’s me, Evan, Jason, Chris and Tina. So we’re home, looking out our windows as trees begin to bend, winds begin to howl and… is that rain…

You Can Help Bring About the Glorious Return of Arcade Racing

Last fall, eyeballs got seriously smacked by the neon-flecked awesome of Nitronic Rush, an arcade racer built by students at DigiPen. Some of those same developers are making a spiritual sequel to that game called Distance You can really see the beginnings of a stronger approach to the same gameplay idea in this pre-alpha trailer.…

Skylanders Gets More Mobile With Two New Games and a Bluetooth Portal

Building upon the success of last year’s Skylanders Cloud Patrol, Activision is preparing to unleash the full force of its toys-meets-video-games franchise on mobile devices, with two new titles due out next month, a mobile-friendly Portal of Power and a rejuvenation of Cloud Patrol courtesy of the Activate community service. We’ve already seen the first…

This Is The Official Launch Trailer For Assassin’s Creed III

Here’s the official launch trailer for Assassin’s Creed III, which comes out tomorrow for PS3 and Xbox 360. Meet Ratonhnhaké:ton, adopted name Connor. Meet George Washington. Muskets. Axes. Large ships. Bloody killings. All that jazz. I’ve never been a huge fan of Assassin’s Creed, but there’s something really appealing about this setting. I’m pretty psyched…

At Least One Member Of Anonymous Wants To Take Down Zynga

Some people don’t like Zynga very much. In the wake of news last week that the FarmVille makers laid off 5% of their worldwide staff (around 150 people), some people really don’t like Zynga very much. At least one person is channeling that hatred into a full-on threat, posting on the Anon-News forums that he…

Luke and Leia Use the Force in This First Taste of Angry Birds Star Wars

Now kiss! Rovio doesn’t deliver sibling smooching in this first gameplay teaser for Angry Birds Star Wars, but they do give us Lightsaber swinging and pink Force-pulling, so I’ll forgive them. Is it possible for a pair of cartoon birds to possess a smoldering sexual tension? You probably shouldn’t answer that. Just enjoy the strangeness…

Punch Quest, The Latest iPhone Game Everyone is Talking About, Is a Knockout

Whenever starting one of these App of the Day pieces, it’s sometimes good to have a lead sentence that eases the reader into the article. Not this time. I’ll get right to the point: Punch Quest might be one of the most enjoyable iOS games I’ve played all year. I guess the game would fall…

Nintendo and “Bohemian Rhapsody” Go Together A Lot Better Than You’d Think

Did you love the NES era? Sure you did. And even if you didn’t, you do now, because that’s how nostalgia works. But do you love it enough to rock out to it Queen-style? Because on a day like this, we could all use more singing cartridges and reminders that actually, a bunch of the…

Final Fantasy XIV‘s New ‘Grand Finale’ Will End This Sorry Era of Square’s Troubled MMO

Today brings news, in the form of an official Square-Enix press release, that Final Fantasy XIV‘s “grand finale,” which seems like an odd thing for a company to be announcing regarding their embarrassingly flawed, overly complex and just not very well-liked massively multiplayer online game. But when Square refers to a “grand finale”, they really…

Robert Downey Jr. Flies A Jet In This Call of Duty: Black Ops II Trailer

It’s called “Surprise” and it was directed by Guy Ritchie and it involves a lot of people blowing each other up, including Tony Stark. That’s about all you need to know. Black Ops II is out on November 13 for just about every platform you can think of. Now I need your help. I recognize…

Buddha Finger, a Mobile Martial Arts Rhythm Game Developed by Kick-Ass Moms

Anna Marsh and Sarah van Rompaey are a pair of video game industry veterans, having worked on big-budget titles including Tomb Raider Anniversary and Underworld. Together with graphic artist Gabriella Pavan they formed Lady Shotgun, a part-time game studio run by full-time moms. Here’s their first game. Buddha Finger is a rhythm game inspired by…

Call of Duty: Black Ops II Gets Sold Early in Slovakia

Charlie Intel—via callofduty.4players.de and N4G—reports that a PS3 version of Call of Duty: Black Ops II‘s Hardened Edition has broken cover several weeks early. It looks like the special edition of Activision’s hotly-anticipated military FPS was legitimately purchased ahead of time in Slovakia

Welcome to Russia, Where Most of Your Friends Are Video Game Pirates

Editor’s note: A couple of weeks ago, we published a story about people who pirate Halo 4. The game has not been officially released, but people were pirating it left and right. A former video game reporter and critic in Russia named Tim Seyfelmlyukov read that story and reached out to me. There was nothing…