This Week in the Business: “Soften the difficulty a smidge when you return.”

What’s happened in the business of video games this past week… QUOTE | “Put the screws to Sony in next console war.” – Panoptic Management Consultants analyst Asif Khan’s thinking that Microsoft may gain the upper hand against a PlayStation 4 next round. TWIST | Modern Warfare 3‘s big reveal came and went this week…

What Are You Playing This Weekend?

Looks like I might be up to my eyeballs in lens flare this weekend if I play some Dungeon Siege III, as I intend to do. There’s an Xbox 360 build I haven’t gotten to yet, which I shall correct. I also need to spend a lot more time with L.A. Noire. Good thing this…

Watch the Cars of Dirt 3 Skid Along the Mediterranean

Ah, Monaco. A charming Principality, famous for its azure harbors, Grace Kelly and…car rallies. Lots and lots of car rallies. The folks over at Codemasters would like to invite you to this car-racing paradise in their newest gameplay trailer for Dirt 3, giving a glimpse of the title’s Rallycross, Gymkhana and Head 2 Head stages.…

Mafia Wars Set To Evolve With a Little Help From Mutant Friends

The already-extraordinary X-Men have gained a new ability: the mutant power to dispense loot. Players of social game Mafia Wars can look out for “loot to heighten your defenses like Magneto and strengthen your attack like Beast!” thanks to X-Men: First Class. [Mafia Wars]

Duke Nukem Had Eggs For Breakfast, Your Mom Had Sausage

Hail to the king baby, 2K Games just released a a Duke Nukem Forever Soundboard for the iPhone and iPad. The free app includes such darling phrases as: “I’ve got balls of steel” Anybody mind if I take off my pants?” “I had eggs for breakfast, your mom had sausage” “My job is to kick…

Damn, The House of the Dead: Overkill‘s Coming to the Fucking PlayStation Move

One of the Wii’s better light gun-style games is coming to the PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Move in all of its gory, foul-mouthed glory. Sega’s The House of the Dead Overkill – Extended Cut arrives this October. The Extended Cut in this remake’s title comes from the two new scenarios added to the Wii original.…

The Week in Gaming Apps

The long holiday weekend here in the states is perfect for getting together with your relatives. Mobile gaming is the perfect way to take your mind off that horrible possibility. Let’s see what we’ve played this week, shall we? Only four games were showcased this week instead of the normal five, but one of them…

Fittingly, There Is Little Time Left to Join the Achron Beta

A couple of years ago, I saw an amazing demonstration of a real-time strategy game that involved time travel. But there’s no time to talk about that now. The deadline to join a beta tournament for the game expires at 5pm ET. So just go sign up for it, then jump back in time and…

Hulk Hogan’s Kinect Game Teaches the Fine Art of Wrestling Showmanship

Being a successful professional wrestler takes more than having the right moves in the ring, and no one knows that better than the legendary Hulk Hogan. That’s why the Kinect-powered Hulk Hogan’s Main Event focuses as much on winning the crowd as it does winning the match. Terry Gene Bollea didn’t become one of the…

The Miami Heat Appear To Have Messed Up the Gears of War 3 Hype [UPDATE]

LeBron James, first you upset the people of Cleveland by abandoning their basketball team. Now you’ve helped the Miami Heat beat the Chicago Bulls in five games, closing the series out last night with an 83-80 victory. That means there’s no sixth game of the NBA Eastern Conference Finals happening this Saturday. And that means……

Fishing Cactus Resurrects Artificial Life with Creatures 4

The adorable Norns return as Belgian development studio Fishing Cactus announces Creatures 4, the first new entry in the popular artificial life simulator series since 1999. The free-to-play game will be available this winter for iOS devices, PC and Mac.

The Life and Times of a Star Wars: The Old Republic Trooper

Long before the clones started fighting the robots, Republic Troopers roamed the galaxy, keeping the peace with the aid of the finest weapons and sexiest armor this side of a Bounty Hunter. Let’s take a look at how Troopers progress in Star Wars: The Old Republic You don’t start out with the good stuff. You…

Controlling the Breath of a God with From Dust

Being a god in Ubisoft’s From Dust ain’t easy. Though you can manipulate the elements of this world, you’ll sometimes feel less like an all-powerful deity than you might a hopeful local politician, a cog in a powerful, sluggish, bureaucratic machine. You may feel as powerful as a child on a beach, building a sand…

It’s Nice to See Mortal Kombat Putting Skin On for Once

As reported yesterday, the new Mortal Kombat‘s first dose of downloadable content delivers new skins for the game’s wacky human ninja crew, in honor of the early 90’s law of ninja costume conservation. In order to keep this from being the laziest collection of downloadable content ever, the MK team has also brought three classic…

In The Virtual World, His Fiancée Never Died

“Obviously, I can’t bring people back to life,” Jon Jacobs recently told me. Obviously. It was morning when he told me that. He was on his way to work in Los Angeles, chatting with me on his cell phone. His wife, a singer named Cheri, was driving him to work that day. He and I…

Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale: Hacking, Slashing, Looting and Leveling

Dungeons & Dragons: Daggerdale, released this week, provides a fun (if somewhat predictable) dose of RPG action based on D&D 4th edition rules. Team up with friends to save the Dalelands from the Zhentarim threat, and see how many times you laugh out loud at the stilted dialogue. Daggerdale is a straightforward hack and slash…

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Talk Amongst Yourselves

Welcome to Talk Amongst Yourselves. This is a forum for gamers to come together and talk about any gaming topic. Enjoy! Thank you Incursor for our TAYpic of the day. Wanna get your TAYpic on Kotaku? Submit your pic to #TAYpics (Read this thread for directions on how to do a TAYpic.)

The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings: The Kotaku Review

The stench hits me first. Before the gurgle and hiss, the skittering of twisted claws against bare stone, the stale air of the abandoned mine delivers a stomach-churning whiff of the creatures’ breath, the miasmal scent of spoiled flesh between rotting teeth. Rotfiends. Eaters of the dead. They overwhelm two of my senses, so I…

Hydro Thunder Go is Definitely a Must-Have Windows Phone 7 Game

After launching out of the starting gate with an impressive collection of titles the release of quality Xbox Live-enabled games for the Windows Phone 7 slowed to a trickle. Now Microsoft speeds things up a bit with six weeks of “Must-Have” Windows Phone games, and what better way to increase velocity than with the action-packed…