- Kotaku EastJapan
Japan Is Getting Yet Another Hello Kitty Train
Last year, a Hello Kitty theme bullet train service began in Japan. This year, an airport express train does likewise. As Japan Trends reports, the train is a Hello Kitty-covered Haruka Direct Express train that transports travelers from Kyoto to Kansai International Airport. The outside is Hello Kitty themed and inside walls are tastefully decorated…
By Brian Ashcraft Published January 30, 2019 -
Kotaku EastK-Pop Pick Of The Day: I Don’t Need A Man
Every decent-sized agency has a “forgotten” artist: someone under their label that doesn’t quite get the investment that their bigger and more popular labelmates might. SM Entertainment had TRAX and CSJH. YG has iKon. And, perhaps most infamously, JYP Entertainment had Miss A. While Miss A had a relatively short lifespan—from 2010 to 2015—they left…
By Seung Park Published January 30, 2019 - Uncategorized
Smash Bros. Ultimate Update Adds Piranha Plant, Features Enormous List Of Actual Patch Notes
Nintendo’s patch notes are notorious for saying pretty much nothing. So the latest Smash Ultimate update—which also marks the release of Piranha Plant—contains a nice surprise: a lengthy and detailed breakdown of everything that’s changing, down to each fighter’s specific tweaks. The 2.0.0. patch notescan be found in full here, and really are enormous. Every…
By Luke Plunkett Published January 29, 2019 - Culture
A Very Studio Ghibli Road Trip
Artur Sadlos is an artist based in Japan. He’s worked on stuff like League of Legends, The Witcher 3 and For Honor, but alsothat wonderful Ghibli x Oregon tourism ad from last year We actually featured Sadlos’ work as one of the first ever Fine Art posts, butsince that was eight years ago I figured…
By Luke Plunkett Published January 29, 2019 -
UncategorizedMod Creates “HD” Final Fantasy VII Using AI Neural Networks
We’ve seen the original Doom made “HD” using AI neural networks, now it’s the turn of Final Fantasy VII, with a mod for the PC version of the game creating backgrounds that have 4x the resolution. The mod’s creator CaptRobau explains how it works: The Remako HD Graphics Mod is a mod that completely revamps…
By Luke Plunkett Published January 29, 2019 - Uncategorized
French Man Sentenced To Four Months In Prison For Replacing PS4 Price Tag With $10 Fruit Sticker
Sometimes, it is better to let dreams be dreams. A 19-year-old man from Nice, France learned that the hard way when he got the wild idea to take a PlayStation 4 off the shelf of a supermarket, walk to the fruit section, weigh it, print out a price tag sticker, put it on the box,…
By Nathan Grayson Published January 29, 2019 - Uncategorized
14 Year-Old Kid Found Apple’s Facetime Bug During Fortnite Session, Tried To Warn Apple
Apple’s massive Facetime bug, which “allows for users to eavesdrop on others while a call is still ringing”, was found as early as last week by a 14 year-old kid who was trying to get his friends together for a Fortnite session. The Wall Street Journal reports that Grant Thompson, from Tucson, was “setting up…
By Luke Plunkett Published January 29, 2019 - Uncategorized
Woman Gets Impressive PlayStation Care Package After Freak Golfing Accident
Taryn Martsella was surprised when she recently received a PS4 Pro, a PlayStation Platinum wireless headset, a gift card for Maui Jim sunglasses and 10 games in the mail. But that, she says, is what she got after getting a scary injury at a Sony-sponsored pro golf tournament. Her injury had been nasty. She’d been…
By Gita Jackson Published January 29, 2019 -
UncategorizedShadow of the Colussus-inspired Praey For The Gods will come to Steam Early Access on January 31. The last we heard of the icy survival game its developers were being forced to change the title because Bethesda owned the Trademark for “Prey.” Based on the trailer, Praey appears to be coming along nicely.
By Ethan Gach Published January 29, 2019 -
UncategorizedDreams Beta Players Are Building Jupiter’s Moons And Beautiful Fried Eggs
Dreams, Media Molecule’s sandbox for people to create, share, and play one another’s games, has been in closed beta since December 2018. Now that the non-disclosure agreement for that initial beta has expired, Dreams beta players can finally give everybody else a better look at what the game actually is, and it looks pretty damn…
By Ethan Gach Published January 29, 2019 - CultureTwitch
For Streamers Dealing With Stalkers, Twitch’s Solutions Fall Short
For the last 41 days, a Twitch user named Mosheddy has been persistently harassing a streamer named Tanya DePass. She quickly banned him from her channel, but now he lurks, follows her to other people’s Twitch chats, sends private messages to everyone he can, and has friends drop into chat with messages “from Mosheddy.” Twitch…
By Nathan Grayson Published January 29, 2019 - Uncategorized
A Game Where You Are The Boulder Sisyphus Must Push
Let’s Play: Ancient Greek Punishment: Inversion Edition is a browser-based game where you play not as the punished, but the punisher. It puts you in the perspective of a god, an inscrutable being of unimaginable power, and then lets you marvel in how unsatisfying that experience must be. Greek mythology is littered with stories of…
By Gita Jackson Published January 29, 2019 -
UncategorizedWhat tricks went into making one of the best games ever? YouTube channel Boundary Break has peered behind the scenes of the N64and the DS versions of Super Mario 64 to show off secret rooms, hidden NPCs, and the inner workings of Peach’s Castle.
By Heather Alexandra Published January 29, 2019 -
UncategorizedTop Smash Bros. Commentator Is No Longer Accepting Feedback On Her Speaking Voice
Victoria “VikkiKitty” Perez had been competing at Super Smash Bros. 4 for five months when local tournament organizers plucked her out of the contender’s pool and threw her on stage to commentate. Over the PA one 2015 tournament in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, everybody heard the words, “Victoria, come into the stream room.” It wasn’t a…
By Cecilia D'Anastasio Published January 29, 2019 -
UncategorizedThe Real Story Behind Pioneer, The Troubled Sci-Fi Game Teased In Watch Dogs 2
A tweet two weeks ago from a former Ubisoft director led the gaming world to believe that Pioneer, the sci-fi game that was teased inside of Watch Dogs 2, was canceled. Is it, though? The answer to that question is hazy, and may depend on your definition of “canceled.” Some background: In November 2016, a…
By Jason Schreier Published January 29, 2019 -
UncategorizedResident Evil 2 “No-Hit” Playthrough Is A Masterclass In Zombie Dodging
The Resident Evil 2 remake might not have the teeming hordes of the original, but it’s still packed with zombies and other monsters that can wreck your day. Surviving can be tricky, but one speedrunner made it a point to breeze through one of the game’s route on the highest difficulty without taking a single…
By Heather Alexandra Published January 29, 2019 - Uncategorized
EA has announced it will stop selling FIFA Points on January 31 in Belgium after previously saying it would fight claims by the country’s regulators that FIFA’s loot boxes constituted gambling. The company apologized to players in the country “for any inconvenience caused by this change.”
By Ethan Gach Published January 29, 2019 - CultureKotaku Game Diary
Chrono Trigger’s Writer Made A Mobile JRPG That’s Not Defined By Its Microtransactions
Can two of the people who helped make Chrono Trigger one of the most amazing games of all time find a balance on mobile between the nostalgic appeal of classic Japanese role-playing games and the economics of free-to-play? Based on a couple hours with Another Eden: The Cat Beyond Time and Space, the answer is:…
By Ethan Gach Published January 29, 2019
