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UncategorizedFirst-Time Tournament Attendee Beats Dragon Ball FighterZ World Champ
Over 800 fighting game players competed in San Jose, California last weekend at NorCal Regionals, an annual event first established in 2003. One of these competitors was the recent winner of the Dragon Ball FighterZ world championships. Another was a totally unknown player attending his very first tournament. These two competitors couldn’t have been more different,…
By Ian Walker Published April 2, 2019 -
OpinionImpressionsOperencia Is A Treat For Fans Of Old-School Dungeon Crawlers
It’s as true today as it was in the early ‘80s—there’s nothing quite like the exquisite tension of exploring a creepy, creature- and trap-filled dungeon, square-by-square, in first-person. Operencia: The Stolen Sun, Zen Studios’ modern take on the classic dungeon crawler, is sleek, challenging, and incredibly charming. Players have been advancing through fantasy dungeons one…
By Mike Fahey Published April 2, 2019 -
CultureMagic: The Gathering‘s Next Expansion Will Radically Alter The Game
Wizards of the Coast is pulling out all the stops for Magic: The Gathering’s April 25 expansion, Ravnica: War of the Spark. The latest is a beautifully animated cinematic lore trailer that launched at PAX East over the weekend. In it, a brooding, sinister take on Linkin Park’s “In The End” plays while Planeswalker Liliana…
By Joshua Calixto Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedSims Players Are Building Adorable Dollhouses
Like any other fandom, the Sims community often gets swept by trends. This time, the new hotness is dollhouses, all inspired by a Simmer on Tumblr called Smart Milk. The results are absolutely adorable. Smart Milk was so inspired by JMW327’s isometric pixel art of bedrooms that she made some cute bedrooms with cutaway walls.…
By Gita Jackson Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedDevil May Cry 5‘s Bloody Palace Is A Fabulous Hack And Slash Playground
The Bloody Palace has been a fixture of Devil May Cry ever since 2003’s Devil May Cry 2. It’s a mode that involves an exhausting climb through monster-filled rooms with hundreds of enemy arrangements and bosses along the way. But it’s also the best place to play around with combos test your skills in real-time.…
By Heather Alexandra Published April 2, 2019 -
CultureKotaku Game DiaryElder Scrolls Online Used To Be A Bad Theme Park And Now It’s A Great Theme Park
I flippin’ love theme parks. I loved them as a kid, and I love them as a grown-ass man. I also love anything that reminds me of a theme park—and for me, the game that feels most like a theme park is The Elder Scrolls Online. Unfortunately, when it first launched on consoles four years…
By Joshua Rivera Published April 2, 2019 -
UncategorizedHow BioWare’s Anthem Went Wrong
It wasn’t even supposed to be called Anthem. Just days before the annual E3 convention in June of 2017, when the storied studio BioWare would reveal its newest game, the plan had been to go with a different title: Beyond. They’d even printed out Beyond T-shirts for the staff. Then, less than a week before…
By Jason Schreier Published April 2, 2019 -
OpinionImpressionsThe PS4 Exclusive Iron Man VR Makes A Surprisingly Good First Impression
“We’re not making a rail-shooter. We’re not making an amusement park game. We’re not making a short demo or an experimental Iron Man ‘experience,’” game developer Ryan Payton told me last week in New York City after I had finished a demo of his studio’s forthcoming game, Iron Man VR “We’re making a full game…
By Stephen Totilo Published April 2, 2019 -
CultureCosplayThat Is A Lot Of Shy Guy Cosplay
For the last few years, an ever-growing group of cosplayers have been using April Fool’s day as an excuse to team up all over the internet, pulling off massive showcases of characters like Nurse Joy and Misty. This year, the focus was on Shy Guy. Here’s Nurse Joy, for example: And Misty: The group has…
By Luke Plunkett Published April 1, 2019 -
CultureTotally Accurate Battle Simulator Is Finally On Steam, And It’s Great
You might think that four gangly muppets pushing wheelbarrows have no place on the same battlefield as a battalion of catapults, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned from my time with Totally Accurate Battle Simulator, it’s that strategy requires an open mind. It also requires that you accept a fundamental truth of the universe:…
By Nathan Grayson Published April 1, 2019 -
UncategorizedThe Game Of Thrones Board Game Is Now Bigger And Better
Game of Thrones was already one of the best board games around, but the release of the game’s third expansion—Mother of Dragons—changes everything. It’s enormous, and adds so much cool and interesting stuff to the experience that it almost feels like an all-new (or at least third edition) of the classic. In case you’re new…
By Luke Plunkett Published April 1, 2019 -
Uncategorized2019 Game Is A Tribute To PS2 Horror
The Glass Staircase is a new release that’s inspired by two things: PS2-era horror games and Italian zombie movies. Specifically, stuff like Silent Hill and Clock Tower from the former, and Burial Grounds: Nights of Terror and House by the Cemetery from the latter. Despite those influences, I’m also getting a strong Alone in the…
By Luke Plunkett Published April 1, 2019 -
OpinionImpressions15 Games That Grabbed My Attention At PAX East
I spent the weekend at PAX East, and while I didn’t play nearly all of the games I wanted to, I got to play quite a lot and even discovered a few I’d never heard of that I’m now extremely excited about. Here’s a brief rundown of some of them, which is still only a…
By Ethan Gach Published April 1, 2019 -
UncategorizedThe Truth About Kirby’s Feet Is ‘Top Secret,’ Developer Says
I recently contacted Nintendo to see if I could get an interview with the Kirby development team. To my surprise, they replied by offering three interviews. During one of them, I asked what Kirby’s feet look like and the reply was another swerve. “It’s definitely a unique question,” Shinya Kumazaki, chief creator at Kirby studio…
By Stephen Totilo Published April 1, 2019 -
UncategorizedMelee Player Quits Match Over Opponent’s Jigglypuff Stalling
Over the weekend, an entire venue of Super Smash Bros. competitors and spectators lost their collective minds over the actions of one Jigglypuff player. Did he cheat in some way? Go overboard after a win? Destroy a CRT? Yell obscenities at the audience? No, he simply played to the Pokémon’s strengths in a favorable matchup,…
By Ian Walker Published April 1, 2019
