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When Nintendo Is Your Penpal
Remember life before email? Like when people wrote letters? On paper? Kotaku reader Matthew does. Because during the early 1990s, he was a little kid writing them to Nintendo. While going through his old things for a yard sale, Matthew (not pictured) found a couple letters from Nintendo of America—replies. Matthew did things like ask…
By Brian Ashcraft Published July 15, 2011 -
UncategorizedThe Latest Castlevania Game Originally Had Simon Belmont In It
Castlevania: Lords of Shadow, released last year, ended up starring Gabriel Belmont, and was let’s say…different from most other games in the franchise. Fans will be interested to see, then, that developers Mercury Steam and publishers Konami originally had other plans for the game, with series legend Simon Belmont cast in the lead role. The…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 15, 2011 - Uncategorized
Can Anyone Replace Hello Kitty?
In 1975, a coin purse featuring an expressionless cat with its head turned sideways and sitting next to a fish bowl went on sale in Japan. The company was Sanrio. The designer was Yuko Yamaguchi. The cat became known as “Kitty-chan”, and outside Japan as Hello Kitty. Decades later, is the cat still cute? Hello…
By Brian Ashcraft Published July 15, 2011 - Uncategorized
The Assassin’s Creed 3DS Game is Dead (But Some Parts Live On!)
When the Nintendo 3DS was first unveiled, one of Ubisoft’s first games for the handheld was supposed to be Assassin’s Creed: Lost Legacy. It won’t be any more, because that game’s been shitcanned. Speaking with Joystiq, Ubisoft writer Darby McDevitt has said that Lost Legacy is no more. Rather than being wasted, though, he says…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 15, 2011 -
CultureTotal RecallLet’s Watch Old Japanese Nintendo Commercials
July 15, 1983. If that’s your birthday, happy birthday! If it’s not, that’s cool. It’s still a very special date in history. Because it’s the day the Nintendo Famicom first went on sale in Japan. Later released in the West as the Nintendo Entertainment System (or NES), the Famicom is where things really got serious…
By Luke Plunkett Published July 15, 2011 - Uncategorized
Sony Exec Calls PSN Hack ‘A Great Experience,’ Quickly Clarifies Himself
Losing the entire PlayStation Network service for 23 days and its online marketplace for more than a month is not many people’s idea of a good time. Nor is it Tim Schaff’s, though the Sony Network Entertainment boss called it “a great experience,” at a forum before, as the politicians say, he revised and extended…
By Owen Good Published July 14, 2011 - Uncategorized
The Thing (2011)
Greetings, Kotaku readers. Got time to join us in another off-topic thread? Good. Maybe we can talk about movies, since this post happens to be movie-centric. So, that first trailer for The Thing (linked below) is out and it looks… alright. A few too many moments of people being yanked into the darkness by some…
By Michael McWhertor Published July 14, 2011 - Uncategorized
Miyamoto’s, Where You Know Everybody’s Name
For its cover of this week’s edition (on newsstands today) the Portland Mercury commissioned this painting, an homage to Edward Hopper’s Nighthawks with Donkey Kong creator Shigeru Miyamoto and three characters he introduced to America 30 years ago this week. The cover highlights a story about GameOn 2.0, a playable history of video games showing…
By Owen Good Published July 14, 2011 -
UncategorizedCall of Duty Elite Trailer is Like a Simile Wrapped in a Metaphor
Call of Duty Elite beta began a “staged launch” today and to kick it off, Activision unloaded this two minute trailer that spends one minute cracking jokes and another minute answering questions except for the biggie: How much is this damn thing going to cost? For now, it’s free; for now, it’s in beta. You…
By Owen Good Published July 14, 2011 - Culture
The Concept Art of Matt Codd, the Artist in Charge at Respawn Entertainment
Respawn Entertainment, the studio birthed by the fired founders of Infinity Ward, have a new art director with a very impressive resume. Matt Codd, Respawn’s new art director, has contributed to films Saving Private Ryan, Serenity, Chronicles of Riddick, Transformers 3, and many, many… many more. The official Respawn web site has a new interview…
By Michael McWhertor Published July 14, 2011 - Uncategorized
Survey Says You’ll Spend About Two Years Playing Video Games
A promotional survey taken by a video game price comparison site turns up an interesting stat: The average gamer will spend just under two years of his or her life, in combined time, playing video games. That’s based on a couple of assumptions, largely that the survey population of 1,452 begins gaming around age 9…
By Owen Good Published July 14, 2011 -
UncategorizedIn Bomberman: The Movie, Only a Cop on the Edge Can Save a City in Danger
The Country Club and The Game Station, filmmakers with a flair for dressing up video-game classics in action-film tropes, have struck again with this Bomberman trailer, and it is outstanding. [h/t OMGWTFOTL]
By Owen Good Published July 14, 2011 - Uncategorized
UbiQ
A Little Tenderness – Kotaku editorial director Joel Johnson whispers sweet nothings into the ear of deputy editor Stephen Totilo after a Ubisoft event in New York City where alcohol was clearly served. (Photo by Brian Crecente) Magnetic Baby, An iOS Platformer With Gravitational Pull and A Portal or Two If an iPhone game can…
By Brian Crecente Published July 14, 2011 - Uncategorized
Chrono Trigger Meets Futurama In A Moment of Spacy Serendipity
Artist Nina “spacecoyote” Matsumoto, an occasional Simpsons Comics contributor, has good news, everyone! She’s finally managed to mash-up beloved RPG Chrono Trigger with Futurama in a surprisingly good fit. Matsumoto explains her Chrono Futurama fan art is “Inspired by the names of my current Chrono Trigger team. No, I haven’t gotten to Magus yet.” She…
By Michael McWhertor Published July 14, 2011 -
UncategorizedSee the Single-Player Side of Reflections’ Driver: San Francisco
Ubisoft’s Driver: San Francisco is a strange thing, what with its comatose protagonist and the supernatural ability of our driver to leap from car to car to car via the game’s “Shift” system. Weirder is the game’s single-player trailer narration. Sure, it gets the job done, explaining the intricacies of Driver: San Francisco‘s lonelier mode.…
By Michael McWhertor Published July 14, 2011 - Uncategorized
In the Future, Your Phone Could Control Your Robot Butler With A Next-Gen Kinect
Last year, Microsoft bought a company called Canesta. Canesta, a gesture-recognition company, is the way to the future. The company is responsible for the software that might power the next generation of Kinect, the Xbox 360’s motion control accessory. Because they’re creating hardware that’s smaller and faster than Kinect’s current tech, PrimeSense’s PrimeSensor, this makes…
By Jen Schiller Published July 14, 2011 - Uncategorized
World of Warcraft Daily Quests Are Guilt-Free Gaming for a Massively Multiplayer New Dad
Finding time to play normal video games as the father of newborn baby boys is tough enough as it is. I was certain my thirst for massively multiplayer online role-playing games would go unquenched in the face of fatherhood. Then I discovered the joy of dailies. Daily quests have been a feature of World of…
By Mike Fahey Published July 14, 2011 -
UncategorizedThere’s More than One Sexy Cosplay Costume, Ladies
Following Nathan Fillion’s important PSA last week, The Big Bang Theory‘s Kaley Cuoco addresses an important problem facing the ladies of cosplay—the impulse to dress like Slave Leia without thinking. Just in time for you to reconsider before packing for San Diego Comic-Con.
By Jen Schiller Published July 14, 2011 - Uncategorized
Christian Game Developers Want to Leave Bad Games Behind
Heading north on Interstate 5 toward Newberg, Ore. last week, I wasn’t sure what exactly I’d encounter at Christian Game Developers Conference 2011. Would it have a show floor? Would they be showcasing new games? Would there be a Kinect-enabled Bible study game with 1:1 praying-hands control? Is a third sequel to the Left Behind…
By Owen Good Published July 14, 2011