Tiger and Bunny: The Beginning is Half-Rehash and Half-Filler (But Not Half Bad)

Without a doubt, Tiger & Bunny was one of the most popular anime of 2011. It took the idea of superheroes and mixed it with reality TV to create what amounts to a buddy-cop anime series. Now a year after the series’ end, the heroes are making their leap to the silver screen with Tiger…

Resident Evil 6: The Kotaku Review

The old dread isn’t coming back. You remember it, don’t you? The shock of terror when you stumbled in on a zombie chomping on a corpse in the first Resident Evil. Or when the undead dogs jumped through the window? Those are signature moments—along with the compulsive hoarding of typewriter ribbon—that anyone who’s played the…

This is What Happens When You Cross Scrabble with Tron‘s Light Cycles

The rise of Words with Friends has brought the slow and plodding casual word game genre into the spotlight. With Lexatron, Fictorial‘s Brian Hammond seeks to add a little excitement to the scene with a keen competitive twist. Rather than trying to fill a board with expensive words, the goal in Lexatron is to make…

Dumb Running Sonic Meets an Untimely End

Call me crazy, but this is the kind of realism I want from my Sonic games, not regrettable mouth-kissing or a never-ending sense of crushing disappointment. Silly Sonic [DeviantArt, via insanely gaming]

One of the Nerdiest Restaurant Discounts Japan Has Ever Had

Monteroza, which owns a handful of izakaya restaurants like Shirokiya and Wara Wara, is offering a special deal at many of its eateries: If you have the same name as a Neon Genesis Evangelion characters, it will discount your bill. The characters include Rei Ayanami, Shinji Ikari, Kaworu Nagisa, Soryu Asuka Langley, and Makinami Mari…

Even EA Couldn’t Kill This Japanese Dating Game

A few years back, EA (of Japan!) was slated to publish a Nintendo DS game dubbed Hachi Koi in which you touch various girls. It was the least EA game EA was ever to release. But by 2009, EA got cold feet—or something—and the game was shelved. Fast forward to October 1. Hachi Koi resurfaced…

Accel World Starts Strong, But Ends Wrong

I have made no secret of how much I have been enjoying Sword Art Online—going so far as to call it the smartest anime in years. When fellow Kotaku East writer Toshi Nakamura told me that there was another anime by the same author also about online games called Accel World, I began watching it…

Hironobu Sakaguchi made Blade Guardian because he *hearts* tower defense games.

Japan’s Panty Vending Machines: The Unreal Hyperbole (and Honest Truth)

Los Angeles. Summer 1997. There was this guy named Kevin in the office I worked at who was obsessed with the notion of panty vending machines. He even wrote a screenplay about them, complete with, as he explained, a scene at the panty vending machine factory. He said, “Dude, in Japan, they’re on every corner.”…

A Spiffy PSP Value Pack for You, Japan

Oh, now this is nice! Look at that red. And the black. And that neat little cloth. Like I said, nice! On November 22, a new Red/Black PSP-3000 value pack is hitting Japan for ¥14,800. Note that quantities are limited. M’kay, noted! “PSP「プレイステーション・ポータブル」（PSP-3000）バリューパック” [4Gamer] Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you…

You Won’t Believe How Nice Notch’s Office Is

Well, maybe you will. Mojang, the folks behind Minecraft, is a success story. Great news for them! That not only means Mojang honcho Notch (aka Markus Persson) can afford nicer hats, it also means the studio can afford nicer digs. And boy, look a these digs. The studio recently moved to a bigger pad, MCV…

You Got Your JRPG in my Dating Sim!

Since the plot of the light novel/anime series Accel World revolves around an MMO fighting game, one would think any games based on the series would fall into the fighting game genre. However, the first game of the franchise, Accel World: Awakening of the Silver Wings, mixes two completely different genres instead: traditional dating sims…

It’s Ladies Only at Tokyo’s Dream Party

On September 30, the twice-a-year DreamParty roared through Tokyo. The fall event is aimed at bishoujo (beautiful girl) video games, and it celebrates bishoujo figurines and cosplay. So, if you are hoping to see some hunky male cosplayers in this gallery (courtesy of an array of Japanese cosplay sites), you’ll be disappointed. Sorry! The DreamParty…

Two of the Ugliest PS3s I’ve Ever Seen

Hello tacky! Sony is readying two PS3 super slim specials (one for Yakuza 5 and the other for Ken’s Rage). Both are shockingly unattractive. Why are they so ugly? Well, for starters, Sony has always been really good about releasing cool looking PS3 special editions. However, with the new hardware, the ribbed face makes decoration…

Steve Jobs Spotted in the Back of a Truck. In China. [Update]

Late fall, Steve Jobs sadly moved on from this world. He’s gone and missed. Yet, a photo of Jobs in the back of a truck is now making the internet rounds in China. Could this be the information age’s equivalent of Elvis sightings? The photo was apparently taken on September 26 in the city of…

It Won’t Be Long Until An Elder Scrolls-Size Game is Running on a Phone

Sure, it’s not going to be the same size as something like Skyrim, or even Morrowind. But the upcoming sequel to Ravensword: The Fallen King, called Ravensword: Shadowlands, isn’t for PC. It’s for mobile phones. The rate at which these mobile devices are catching up to other platforms is more than a little terrifying. ‘Ravensword:…

What Happens When Mario Galaxy Meets Minecraft

This is MaK (pronounced “Make”), an upcoming game from indie outfit Verge Game Studio. Primarily a “third-person physics sandbox game with an action focus”, it’s based around the idea of building, customising and moving around some tiny little planets. Which means, yeah, you can build stuff out of blocks, but because the game’s got a…

Official StarGate Games Suck, so These Fans Are Making Their Own

For a movie/series with such a cult following, you’d think Stargate would have been better served by the world of video games, but nope. Fans have long been left wanting. Which is probably why a bunch of them have been modding the original Crysis for four years to make their own. The result is StarCry,…

It’s Not Just EVE Online’s Screenshots That Are Gorgeous

Icelandic artist Borkur Eiriksson works at CCP, the custodians of the EVE franchise. Featured in today’s gallery, then, will be images from both EVE and its shooter spin-off, Dust514, along with the World of Darkness RPG, with the usual mix of personal work thrown in as well. If you dig it, you can see more…

Chivalry is Trying Very Hard to be the World’s First Successful First-Person Stabber

I’ve been spending quite a bit of time with Chivalry: Medieval Warfare lately. And with good reason: it’s got a first-person combat mechanic that isn’t entirely awful. Think back to the last time you played a first-person game involving melee combat that was fun. Or even tolerable. There’s… well, recent Elder Scrolls games are OK,…