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  Miss Finland Must Cosplay as Lara Croft

  Eidos, the company behind Tomb Raider, killed off its real-life Lara Croft spokesgirls. They’ll “never happen again”, said Eidos. In Finland, they live on. According to Finish tabloid Iltalehti, the 2012 Miss Finland candidates were rounded up, dressed in Lara Croft-inspired gear, and taken out to the arctic circle for a few “Lara Croft themed…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published January 25, 2012
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  Why Farmville Turns Humans Into Lab Rats

  Do you like playing Zynga’s Facebook games? There’s something wrong with you. Not because you enjoy them, what you do in your spare time is your business. Your problem comes in thinking they’re games. They are not games. They are specifically-engineered programs designed to take your money and compel you to advertise the product to…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 25, 2012
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  Will Make Games For Food… Or Funding

  Republished from Kotaku Australia You want to make a game. You don’t have a publisher. The government won’t help and your bank account is full of tumbleweed. It might be time to look beyond traditional funding options… it might be time to look to the crowd. The game Battle Command is in a position that…

  Tracey Lien Published January 25, 2012
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  The Return of the Neo-Geo

  SNK Playmore is once again in the hardware business. The Osaka-based game company is licensing a new (well, sort of) portable Neo-Geo gaming system. This is it. The handheld sports a 4.3 inch LCD screen, 2GB of onboard memory, and an SD card slot. There are twenty pre-loaded games, all of them old Neo-Geo classics.…

  By Brian Ashcraft Published January 25, 2012
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  These Real PokéBalls Will Set Your Hands On Fire

  Aussie artist Barry Wazzy, who floored us with his photoshopped PokéBalls earlier in the month, is flooring us again this week with another helping. This time many of the balls are themed, so for instance we’ve got a PokéBall based on The Dark Knight, one on Harry Potter and another on Dragonball Z! wazzy88 [DeviantArt,…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 25, 2012
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  Dr. Mario is now Performing Black Market Liver Transplants

  Cute puzzle games, even those starring Nintendo icons, just don’t make the money they used to. So when a man’s gotta eat, he has to turn to his training… Black Market Liver Transplants [neatorama]

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 25, 2012
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  This Xbox 360 Controller Dispenses Hot Pockets

  It’s…it’s like a dream come true. Master craftsman Ben Heck has built this custom Xbox 360 controller which contains a rather useful add-on: a hot pocket dispenser. Which I guess would work just as well for kebabs, sausage rolls, etc, depending on where you live! You’ll never have to take your hands of the controller…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 25, 2012
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  The Coolest Gaming Station I’ve Ever Seen

  The MWE Emperor 200 may be labelled a “workstation”, but don’t let that fool you. It’s being demoed using video games for a reason: this is not for work. It’s for playing video games. In the future. Note I did not say it was practical. Where you can put a desk and a chair you…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 24, 2012
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  EA’s Origin Signs Up Some Very, Very PC Games

  In a rather obvious attempt to court a more demanding PC gaming crowd, EA’s Origin service today announced it has signed up eleven new publishers for its online marketplace. Among them are CD Projekt, of The Witcher fame, and Paradox Interactive, of hardcore historical strategy game fame. Joining them will be Trion Worlds, Robot Entertainment,…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 24, 2012
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  Zynga Totally Rips Off Tiny Tower

  Tiny Tower is one of the cutest and most successful iPhone games around. So, naturally, someone is shamelessly ripping it off. Only, the company doing the ripping off isn’t some shady Chinese or Russian company. It’s social gaming powerhouse Zynga. Zynga’s new game Dream Heights isn’t a homage to NimbleBit’s game. It’s almost a clone,…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 24, 2012
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  Your First Good Look at the LEGO Lord of the Rings Minifigs

  When LEGO’s Lord of the Rings sets were first announced, we only got a look at what Frodo and Aragorn would look like as the company’s iconic minifigs. Now we’ve got a much better look! The UK Toy Fair has kicked off this week and it’s there this photo of the entire Fellowship was snapped.…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 24, 2012
• CultureTotal Recall

  Cock’in. This was a Real Game, Once.

  Cock’in. For the Commodore 64 and Spectrum. You take the eggs, and then the fish bites you on the elbow, and then you wear chicken hats, and what? Oh, that’s just the box art. The actual game had you playing as a cock, protecting your brood of eggs from things like rats and foxes, and…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 24, 2012
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  Zelda’s Travel Bureau Makes Beautiful Posters

  Artist Dean Walton has put together these wonderful mock vintage travel posters, advertising the land of Hyrule (specifically, its Ocarina of Time incarnation) as a travel destination. Available for purchase either individually or as prints, you can order them from the link below. Hyrulean Travel – Full Series [GamerPrint]

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 24, 2012
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  Next Xbox Out In Oct/Nov 2013, Chips Already Being Made

  Time for the latest instalment of “shit people are saying/guessing about the next Xbox console”! This week we have two reports, one from IGN and the other from Fudzilla. The IGN rumour says the next console will be out in October or November next year, and that it’s graphics processor will be based on the…

  By Luke Plunkett Published January 24, 2012
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  On Death and Gaming

  One of my earliest memories of videogames is also one of the last clear memories I have of my aunt, my father’s sister, Donna. It was cold out, but not quite the holidays. We were sitting on the shag carpet in my grandparents’ house, where she lived, playing Smurf: Rescue in Gargamel’s Castle. The ColecoVision…

  Stu Horvath | Unwinnable Published January 24, 2012
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  Hello, NBC

  Spotted | NBC News folks were in our offices today for a piece about Gawker Media (our parent company). The reporter said she’d only ever played Pac-Man and Ms. Pac-Man, but I trumped her wacky fact by telling her that there are two Kotaku staffers with Masters in journalism. —Stephen (Image by Gizmodo editor Joe…

  By Stephen Totilo Published January 24, 2012
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  To-Do In New York: Be Part of a 200-Person Sci-Fi Video Game in a Planetarium

  What are you doing on Thursday evening? If you’re in New York City or the surrounding area, consider going to Cosmic Cocktails and Space Arcade, an event at the American Museum of Natural History’s Rose Center for Earth and Space. To put it another way: Go play a 200-person video game inside a planetarium! Here’s…

  By Stephen Totilo Published January 24, 2012
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  The 3DS Didn’t Destroy Your Eyes, So Now Nintendo’s Going to Plan B

  Say hello to the boxart for March Wii game Mario Party 9. Is it colorful enough for you? (Via the Twitter feed of a Nintendo PR person).

  By Stephen Totilo Published January 24, 2012
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  QuakeCon 2012 Dated for Early August

  Id’s annual celebration of virtual people shooting other virtual people will take place August 2 – 5 at the Hilton Anatole Hotel in Dallas, Texas. If you start studying up for John Carmack’s annual keynote right now you should be able to understand it by then! [QuakeCon]

  By Mike Fahey Published January 24, 2012
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  Nine Inch Nails Adds Background Noise to The Darkness II Launch Trailer

  Remember back in 1996 when Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails fame did the music for Quake? His music in the launch trailer for The Darkness II sounds pretty much just like that. I don’t think it’s that Trent Reznor hasn’t grown significantly as an artist in the past 16 years. Knowing Reznor is a…

  By Mike Fahey Published January 24, 2012