This World War II Dogfighter Barely Feels Like a Mad Catz Game Anymore

When peripheral maker Mad Catz first announced it was going into the game publishing business, I laughed. When I got my first look last year at what was then called War Wings: Hell Catz, I laughed harder. Last week I got a chance to play the newly-renamed Damage Inc.: Pacific Squadron WWII, I’m not laughing…

Damage Gallery

Gaming’s Top Screenshot Artist Has Been Capturing Dishonored

Well, this is pretty cool. Duncan Harris, the man who runs the eye-popping website Dead End Thrills (and whose work you’ll see from time to time right here at Kotaku), has been working with Bethesda to create in-game photography from their upcoming game Dishonored In what feels like an uncommon move for a publisher, Harris…

The Best Zombie Mod in Gaming Now Has a Wicked-Cool Cinematic Trailer

Hopefully you’ve been following along with the saga of DayZ, Dean Hall’s amazing, brutal Arma II mod that adds zombies to the already intense and realistic open-ended shooter. In case you haven’t played it yet and are curious, you can now watch an extended, gritty-as-hell trailer that effectively scratches the surface of just what makes…

Holy Talking Minifigs, LEGO Batman 2!

This is what will keep me from losing interest in LEGO Batman 2: DC Super Heroes as I did other LEGO games. Love the toys, love the concept, but I need talking, preferably of the witty variety. This’ll do.

Can Nintendo Convince Us To Care About The Wii U?

For this week’s Burning Questions, Jason and Kirk return from E3 to talk about their impressions of Nintendo’s next big console. What kinds of new games will the Wii U make possible? What will it take for the Wii U to be a success for gamers? Why can’t any company but Microsoft make an easy-to-use…

Atlus’s Newest Game Is A Lovely Strategy-RPG

Here’s the latest trailer for Gungnir, a new strategy role-playing game that Atlus released today for PSP. Yes, PSP. It’s aliiiiiiiivvvvveeee

Intense, Yes. Unique? Maybe…

Here is a video game soldier, rifle in hands, taking cover. A helicopter explodes behind him. The word “intense” might describe this scene from the TV commercial for the new shooter Spec Ops: The Line, but “unique”? The unsolicited point here is not to beat up on IGN, whose quote may well suit the sandstorm-filled…

Dawn of the Seeker is Best for the Lore-Crazy Dragon Age Fan

With games, the whole “ancillary media” thing is usually just not my style. I read and loved all of the Myst books, way back in the day, and for something like a decade that was it. But then came Dragon Age. I’m one of those rare sorts who really enjoyed both games—not just the first…

I Played Ten Minutes Of Studio Ghibli’s Stunning, Dreamy Ni no Kuni

Not unlike reading a Murakami book or watching a Miyazaki film, playing Ni no Kuni is sort of like wandering into a dream. This makes sense, because Ni no Kuni mostly takes place in a dream world. It’s a fascinating place conjured up by the folks at Studio Ghibli, the charming animation studio behind flicks…

Skyrim Director Wishes Console Gamers Could Experience PC Mods

Skyrim‘s vast, lush world is a wonderful thing made all the more remarkable by the fact that it continues to grow and expand, constantly changing in unexpected ways. This is not only due to the downloadable content that Bethesda has planned for the game (the first one, Dawnguard, looks pretty terrific). Skyrim keeps growing because…

Sell! Sell! Diablo III‘s Real-Money Auction House is Now Live

Rejoice, well-moneyed individuals—Diablo III‘s real-money auction house, which lets players exchange real cash for in-game items, is now live in the Americas Blizzard has posted a guide for new users here, which lays out how to use the auction house, as well as how to attach the required Battle.net authenticator. Players with more questions can…

We’ve Got Too Many DVDs, It’s Time for a New Monster Rancher

In today’s randomly-selected-via-CD episode of Speak Up on Kotaku, commenter Daemon_Gildas wonders where the hell our current-generation, Blu-ray scanning edition of Tecmo Koei’s Monster Rancher series is. You know what series needs to come back? Like right now? Monster Rancher Seriously, that game was goddamn AMAZING! Put in a disc, BAM, you got yourself a…

Sony Says PlayStation Vita Burials Were Premature, Predicts Good Things

The headlines about the PlayStation Vita are often harsh these days, especially the headlines that deem the system is “almost D.O.A.” That’s a brutal assessment of a machine that’s been out for only about four months in America and is very likely the most impressive piece of portable gaming technology ever sold. “I think, unfortunately,…

Here’s Why You Should Get Cards Against Humanity, The Hilarious Hyde to Apples to Apples‘ Jeckyll

Just yesterday, the long-out-of-stock card game Cards Against Humanity came became available at Amazon. I had been waiting to order the game ever since I first played it at a party about a month ago, so I jumped on the opportunity. What do you know, my deck of cards arrived today! So, I thought I’d…

Seven Comics That Will Inspire Your Inner Hero This Week

If you’re here in the Panel Discussion programming block, you might be a lapsed comics reader, trying to find a way back to the JLA Satellite. Or you might someone killing time until you pick up your weekly Wednesday pull list. Or maybe you’ve said goodbye to dozens of longboxes to embrace the promise of…

Farewell, My Comic Book Longboxes (You Kind of Sucked)

This past weekend, I transferred my six longboxes of comics from white cardboard longboxes to black, plastic ones. This was the one bit of protection I am giving to my comics collection, which is being moved—deep breath—to the basement. Aside from the years I was in college, I’ve never lived far from my longboxes. They’ve…

New Avengers #30 Puts Three of My Favorite Marvel Superheroes in One Place At the End of the World

To my mind, the best episodes of a big-deal, all-hands-on-deck superhero crossover event are the ones that focus on the ground-level repercussions of the world-threatening chaos. I remember reading a great issue of Gotham Central when DC’s Infinite Crisis event was happening that showed riots and madness in the streets of Batman’s hometown and how…

The Dark Knight Surprises As a Talking Toy in New Lego Batman 2 Trailer

So Lego Batman 2 will be the first toy-centric video game developed by Traveler’s Tales that features voice acting. Now, given that the silent comedy was a big part of the appeal in previous Lego games, there might be some worry about such a change. But as the trailer above shows, the upcoming game looks…

Faster than a Speeding Bullet, Panel Discussion Starts Now!

Are we still pretending that comics and video games don’t have anything to do with each other? Not anymore, we’re not. Welcome to Panel Discussion, where the focus will be on comic books and sequential art, whether they connect directly to video games or not. Confused? Read this