• Kotaku East

  The People Who Make Your Game Consoles Still Make Next to Nothing

  Taiwanese company Foxconn, the maker of most of the worlds electronics and our favorite gaming consoles, announced that it had raised the wages of junior level factory workers in Shenzhen from 1,800RMB (US$290) to 2,200RMB ($349) a month. The move to raise wages comes at no surprise as Foxconn and many of Apple’s suppliers in…

  By Eric Jou Published February 20, 2012
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  iPhone Belts? iPhone Flashlights? iPad Concrete? Oh China.

  China’s Proview is taking Apple to court over the iPad moniker. While that looks to be one of Apple’s biggest legal headaches in China, it’s not its only one: Chinese companies are using patent law right and left to create a whole host of iPhone and iPad products. These products could ultimately dilute the iPad…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published February 20, 2012
• Kotaku East

  So, I Want To Build a LEGO Table

  Yep. My two sons really, really love LEGO. And I figured that if I’m going to build them something, it should be a LEGO table. Building stuff is kind of hard in Japan, because most people that live in cities live in apartment buildings. That means, they don’t have a garage per se, and need…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published February 20, 2012
• Kotaku East

  Teen Bought Video Game. Mother Got Angry. Teen Stabbed Mother.

  On Feb. 19 in Japan’s Aichi Prefecture, police arrested a fourteen year-old boy. Earlier that evening, he apparently stabbed his mother with a sashimi knife. The cause? A dispute over a video game purchase. At 5:35pm, the teen stabbed his mother in the back one time, reported Yomiuri News. The mother, age 50, suffered serious…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published February 20, 2012
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  Kotaku East

  China is Linsane. It’s Trying To Claim Jeremy Lin.

  If you’re a basketball fan, or a New Yorker, you’ve definitely heard about Linsanity. It’s the underdog story of a Chinese American Harvard graduate being undrafted and cut from NBA teams before exploding in, well, “Linsanity”. And for the past two weeks, it has been the talk of the sports world. No one saw Jeremy…

  By Eric Jou Published February 20, 2012
• Kotaku East

  Are You a Woman? Would You Like a Role in Yakuza 5?

  SEGA is currently holding an audition for to decide on a new female character to appear on is upcoming game, Yakuza 5. From last November to this January, Sega received over a thousand applications. It’s been narrowed down to 200 applicants from across the country. On the 18th, four judges oversaw the audition in Tokyo…

  By Toshitaka Tachibana Published February 20, 2012
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  Breaking: Gabe Newell Grows Beard

  Progress Score: Initially startling, but apprehension soon gives way to an appreciation of its wispy whiteness. Post-apocalyptic desert ranger meets Santa Claus. Most likely not a Half-Life Episode 3 tease. Most likely Valve’s Gabe Newell [Penny Arcade Report | Pic by Dabe Alan] UPDATE – Wow. This little thing generated some unexpected responses. For what…

  By Luke Plunkett Published February 20, 2012
• Kotaku East

  Weirdo Pikachus in Tokyo, Taking Trains and Eating Burgers

  Tokyo is pretty normal. Though, sometimes, there’s the occasional oddness. In year’s past, people would simply mutter to themselves, “Boy that was strange.” Now they take photos and paste them on the internet. Progress! This weekend, a group of individual dressed as Pikachu, along with a sole Ash cosplayer, took to the Tokyo streets, popping…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published February 20, 2012
• Kotaku East

  War of the Farts

  Today, we are lucky. For entertainment, we have television, video games, and the internet. Back in olden times, people had to be more creative with their diversions—make that, very creative. Scholars at elite institute Waseda University posted images from an Edo-era proto-manga scroll “War of the Farts”. Manga’s nascent beginnings are grounded in picture scrolls.…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published February 20, 2012
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  Pokémon on iTunes. Hello Scam!

  While Pocket Monsters company GameFreak brought its monsters to iTunes last summer with Pokémon Say Tap?, this is not that app. Rather, this app is from “The House of Anime” and Daniel Burford. The hell? A quick iTunes search shows that this is the same outfit responsible for app versions of Digimon and Yu-Gi-Oh, including…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published February 20, 2012
• Kotaku East

  The 3DS Is Not a Failure in Japan. It’s a 5 Million Sold Success.

  While the 3DS had a rocky start—and any momentum it had was disrupted by March 2011’s tragic earthquake—the console has been on the uptick. You could even say it’s now going gangbusters in its native Japan. Today, Nintendo revealed that the 3DS has sold over 5 million units in Japan. It is the fastest Nintendo…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published February 20, 2012
• Kotaku East

  Kotaku East Starts Now

  Kotaku East runs from 4am to 8am EST. For more info about Kotaku East click here

  By Brian Ashcraft Published February 20, 2012
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  The Quality of Life in Virtual Worlds

  They say that in life, nothing is certain but death and taxes. The cost of living in the real world seems to get harder each year as prices go up and the rich get richer. We, the little people, just have to deal with it. Virtual worlds don’t have troubles like ours, though. Sure, they…

  Patrick Davidson Published February 20, 2012
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  Yankees Pitcher has one Hell of a Custom PlayStation 3

  Yankees pitcher CC Sabathia – who we already know takes his video games seriously – has a very special, one-of-a-kind PlayStation 3. And it’s one that speaks directly to my tastes It’s wood-panelled! Pimped out like an old Telstar Classic. Sony made the console for Sabathia and emblazoned it with his number, a crown and…

  By Luke Plunkett Published February 20, 2012
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  BioWare Trio Leave to Make a Strategy…RPG…Thing

  Arnie Jorgensen, Alex Thomas and John Watson just spent over five years working on Star Wars: The Old Republic at BioWare. After which the perfect palette-cleanser seems to be leaving the studio to make their own game. That game is The Banner Saga, which the trio’s studio Stoic describes as “role-playing meets turn-based strategy, wrapped…

  By Luke Plunkett Published February 20, 2012
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  The Very Best In Cosplay: Echow88

  Today’s feature on the very best cosplayers in the world takes us to Indonesia, where we’re taking a look at the astounding work of Echow88. While some cosplayers can get by modelling characters with “basic” costumes, Echow88 goes all-out, appearing as the stars of games like Star Ocean 4, Kingdom hearts, Lineage II and Aion,…

  By Luke Plunkett Published February 20, 2012
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  Want Your PS3 Games to Run Faster? Buy an SSD

  The Xbox 360 and Wii are, if you want to stay under warranty, locked entities. You can’t upgrade them at all. The PS3, though, lets you swap out a hard drive, and with the coming of the age of solid state drives (SSD), this can result in big performance gains. Running a series of tests…

  By Luke Plunkett Published February 20, 2012
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  Old Nintendo Game Contains Heart-Warming, Hand-Written Note

  The story on a Reddit post from over the weekend goes like this. “My girlfriend bought an old copy of Animal Crossing. The surprise we found inside just made our day.” It’s made our day too. Located inside the box, and written in a style that to someone who once worked in childcare for six…

  By Luke Plunkett Published February 20, 2012
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  This Amazing GoldenEye Homage Totally Nails it

  If you’ve ever played the original GoldenEye on the Nintendo 64 – or even seen someone playing it – you’ll quickly see just how great this clip is. The fact it doesn’t just serve up the game itself, but YouTube playthroughs at the same time, only makes it twice as good.

  By Luke Plunkett Published February 19, 2012
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  Pikachu, Wario, Snake and Mega Man Find Comfort With Kindred Spirits

  Fresh off his explorations of droids with feelings and adorable video game weapons, artist Chris Gerringer is back with some heart-felt fist-bumps from some emotional little characters realising that, hey, they’re not alone in the world/universe after all. I know that feel, bro [Paperbeatsscissors]

  By Luke Plunkett Published February 19, 2012