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  What the Holy Hell is Zack Wearing in Dead or Alive 5?

  I always figured Zack’s ridiculous clothing in Dead or Alive was due to the influence of series creator Tomonobu Itagaki. Turns out he might have been the only thing holding the rest of the team back. In Dead or Alive 5, Zack is a clown with a flower afro. Lei Fang’s in here too, but…

  By Mike Fahey Published May 24, 2012
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  Freakin’ Amazing StarCraft Statue Now Looms Outside Blizzard Office

  Blizzard’s company HQ has an enormous Warcraft statue out front. It’s incredible. Making it officially a “thing”, Blizzard’s offices in Versailles, France now have one too. Only it’s from StarCraft An enormous Queen of Blades now guards the front courtyard. She was designed by renowned Hollywood effects man Steve Wang, who even got to sign…

  By Luke Plunkett Published May 24, 2012
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  Here is the Worst Sports Theme of All Time, Video Game or Otherwise

  It is 2006. You are 2K Sports, the newly created challenger to EA Sports. You’ve been cleaved from Sega, bought up by Take-Two, given an exclusive license to make Major League Baseball games. You’re young and ready, lean and hungry, ready to establish a new order. The title card announcing games under the new 2K…

  By Owen Good Published May 24, 2012
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  Here Now, A Guy Playing a 4-Story Pipe Organ With Kinect

  I’ve seen plenty of people playing a theremin, but never someone playing an organ with Microsoft’s Kinect motion-controller Yet that’s just what Chris Vik does, reprogramming a Kinect to control a 4-story pipe organ. Yow! Conductors already control an orchestra with only their hands, but this takes things to a new level. (Via Kinect Hacks,…

  By Kirk Hamilton Published May 24, 2012
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  Growing the Jazz Audience ‘Can’t Be Done.’ Maybe That’s Okay?

  Look, I’m under no illusions about jazz music’s unpopularity. I grew up playing jazz, went to school to study jazz, made a living as a jazz musician for a while out of school. Jazz is beautiful, jazz is the best. And people, by and large, don’t care about it at all. Here at Kotaku Melodic,…

  By Kirk Hamilton Published May 24, 2012
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  “Hacker” May Have Asked for Microsoft’s Help Breaking Into Call of Duty Creator’s Emails

  According to a report from Robert Schwartz, the lawyer currently representing Call of Duty creators Jason West and Vince Zampella in their big case against Activision, the notorious “Project Icebreaker” sounds even crazier than we first thought. Schwartz tells Game Informer that Thomas Fenady, the Activision IT expert approached to hack into Infinity Ward’s email…

  By Luke Plunkett Published May 24, 2012
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  This Amazing Trials Evolution Level is a Musical Marvel

  Even though I’m on the record saying that Trials Evolution‘s soundtrack is so bad it’s like they were kidding, the game itself is a blast, and some of the user-generated levels are truly spectacular. Like this one, from YouTuber TheJonDeezie, who has made this video of “Desert of Music,” a very challenging track laid out…

  By Kirk Hamilton Published May 24, 2012
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  Max Payne 3‘s Astonishing Soundtrack Flattens The Competition

  Hot damn, am I enjoying Max Payne 3. Though… well, “enjoying” might be the wrong word for it, you know? It has me in a vice-grip, and every time I play I find myself locked in a tense, curse-shouting battle with the deadly enemies inside of my Xbox 360. The game is relentless, always pushing…

  By Kirk Hamilton Published May 24, 2012
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  Get ready for Blip Festival 2012

  This upcoming Friday/Saturday/Sunday is Memorial Day weekend, and New Yorkers especially will have plenty of options at their disposal. Here’s a suggestion: the 6th annual Blip Festival. You say you’ve never heard of the Blip Festival? Let me explain. What’s the Blip Festival? Simply put, for the past five years, Blip Fest has become the…

  Matt Hawkins Published May 24, 2012
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  Somehow The Video For The Song From Robot Unicorn Attack Is Even Weirder Than Robot Unicorn Attack

  I adore Robot Unicorn Attack. I also adore its sequel, Robot Unicorn Evolution. I like these games for a lot of reasons, but the biggest one has got to the the song that plays as you leap and bound through them—Erasure’s “Always.” It’s the strangest thing, that song. It’s at once memorable and hooky, terrible…

  By Kirk Hamilton Published May 24, 2012
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  The Kotaku Mixtape Vol 9: Tommy Tallarico

  Growing up, there were certain game composers I was aware of. Uematsu? Check. Koshiro? Check. But Tommy Tallarico wasn’t one of them. A lot of that is because he was a sound designer first, dipping his hands in everything from Prince of Persia to the best of Shiny Entertainment. He also co-founded Videogames Live, which…

  By Chris Person Published May 24, 2012
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  Kotaku Melodic Begins

  It’s Thursday at 7PM Eastern, do you know where your music coverage is? That’s right, it’s here! Welcome to Kotaku Melodic, your one-stop-spot for all things “Kotaku” and all things “Melodic.” Curious about Kotaku Melodic? Find everything you want to know right here. Sit back, turn up your speakers, and enjoy the music.

  By Kirk Hamilton Published May 24, 2012
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  Check Out Blake Griffin’s Best Dunks as If They Happened in the Original NBA Jam

  News and notes from around the world of sports video gaming: • SB Nation put together that delightful compilation of chiptunes and pixelated highlights to give us Blake Griffin’s theoretical NBA Jam highlight reel from the 1993 classic. Enjoy. [SB Nation] • NHL 13‘s cover vote is down to its final four. Claude Giroux and…

  By Owen Good Published May 24, 2012
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  Curt Schilling’s Role-Playing Game Supposedly Needed to Sell 3 Million Copies to Not Fail

  Yesterday, Curt Schilling bragged that Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning beat EA’s sales expectations. Today, Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee told reporters that Amalur needed to sell more than double that number just to break even. Governor Chafee spoke to reporters today during a press conference about the game studio run by Curt Schilling that has…

  Stephen Totilo and Owen Good Published May 24, 2012
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  If We Won’t Have MLB 2K to Kick Around Next Year, Here’s What The Show Must Do

  Baseball fans have started to come to terms with the idea that MLB 13 The Show will be their only video game option next year. MLB 13 The Show needs to come to terms with that, too. Consistently well reviewed, The Show‘s dirty secret is that there are areas of its product that are growing…

  By Owen Good Published May 24, 2012
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  Time Now for Sportaku

  From the Worldwide Leader in Sports … Video Games, your 6 p.m. Sportaku begins now.

  By Owen Good Published May 24, 2012
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  Here’s Me Shooting a Bow and Swinging a Sword From Horseback in Skyrim. It’s Pretty Sweet.

  Bethesda announced today that along with the 1.6 update for Skyrim, players will finally have the ability to use their weapons while on horseback. I think I speak for all Skyrim diehards when I say: Finally! I went ahead and opted in for the patch on Steam so that I could try it out, and…

  By Kirk Hamilton Published May 24, 2012
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  Microsoft Could Totally Pull Off Its Own Super Smash Bros. Clone

  With Sony doing it’s own Super Smash Bros. type game with PlayStation All-Stars, Xbox-loving commenter rbranyan3to wonders if it wouldn’t be impossible for Microsoft to do the same. How would it work? Let’s brainstorm in today’s Speak Up on Kotaku. I was reading online about the Playstation All-Stars game and in the comments people were…

  Speak Up Published May 24, 2012
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  People Thought Hideo Kojima Was “Crazy” When He Said He Wanted to Make Video Games

  When Hideo Kojima started out in the games industry, he met a lot of people like himself, would-be creators like him who had set other life goals for themselves. The famed game designer wanted to make movies but never found a path to that aspiration and he worked with many others who got into games…

  By Evan Narcisse Published May 24, 2012
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  One Man’s Quest to Draw Something Becomes Draw Everything

  Unlike me, Bora can actually draw. And also unlike me, and unlike several million other players, Bora has stuck with Draw Something He’s on a mission to draw every single word in the Draw Something dictionary, a quest that can end only in madness. Words repeat, and many can be quite dull. Still, as his…

  By Kate Cox Published May 24, 2012