University Of Utah To Offer Varsity League Scholarship

The University of Utah has announced a varsity esports program, starting with League of Legends. Part of the Pac-12 Conference, Utah is the first Power Five school to sponsor this type of program, and it doesn’t plan on stopping at one game. The team, sponsored by the EAE video game development program, hopes to expand…

Mass Effect: Andromeda’s Tired Face Lady Now Looks Slightly Less Tired

After early footage of Mass Effect Andromeda went out into the wild, everyone latched onto Foster Addison, a character who snapped at the player because she felt tired. Addison became a running joke thanks to her blank stare and lack of emoting, which, paired with her dialogue, was pretty ironic. Thanks tothe newest Mass Effect…

Microsoft Officially Bans Emulators From Windows Store

Microsoft has revised Windows Store policy to remove emulators. The new rules bar any applications that emulate preexisting game systems, resulting in the removal of a popular program that supported games from Nintendo and Sega consoles. The new policies explicitly disallow emulators on “any device family.” It’s a wide reaching change that stymies emulation efforts…

Anime Fighting Games Are About To Get A Great Chance To Shine On The Competitive Scene

A group of event organizers have taken it upon themselves to establish a tournament circuit for a trio of overlooked fighting games, hoping to provide them a greater platform for success and raise their profile in the process. Burst League is a circuit devoted to a fighting game trio including Guilty Gear Xrd, BlazBlue: Central…

Here Is Some Edgy Fashion Inspired By 4Chan Culture

The culture of 4chan is unavoidable across the internet—and now you can hang it in your closet. Kara Quinteros is a freshman at Parsons School of Design in New York. Her boyfriend frequently visits 4chan, and she initially thought of creating a line of clothing inspired by it as a joke. The idea of exploring…

Podcast: Farewell, Destiny

Destiny YouTuber Datto joins us today for what might be the last-ever Destiny-focused episode of Kotaku Splitscreen. Until Destiny 2, that is. First we’re talking the week’s news, from Palmer Luckey leaving Oculus (9:39) to Atlus blocking Persona 5 streaming (13:11) and Mass Effect: Andromeda’s big patch plans (17:20), followed by our first Amazing Game…

How EVE Players Trashed $17,000 Worth of Ships In Just Three Easy Steps

One of EVE Online’s most powerful alliances dealt a heavy blow to an opposing group yesterday, luring their opponents into a very costly trap that destroyed nearly $17,000 worth of virtual ships. Five Titan Class ships, the largest and most expensive ships in the game, were destroyed in just a few minutes, with the attacking…

Microsoft Reveals Xbox Scorpio’s Impressive Specs

Microsoft has promised that their next console, Scorpio, will be “the most powerful console ever,” and today the company delivered on that promise, revealing a set of beefy specs that, in terms of raw power, surpass any video game console on the market today. In a PR reveal with Eurogamer’s Digital Foundry, Microsoft unveiled that…

The Castle In The Sky Figure You’ve Always Wanted

The robotfrom Studio Ghibli’s iconic 1986 film The Castle In The Sky now has a fully poseable figure. Thank goodness for that! According to Famitsu, Bandai is releasing a “Full Action Ver.” Robot Solider this October, with pre-orders kicking off this week.  Priced at 7,560 yen (US$68), this isn’t the first Castle in the Sky…

Snow On Mount Fuji. Japan. By Robert Rubsam JPGs is a photo peek into wherever gamers might find interesting. If you’re a photographer and have images you want to share, drop us a line!

Hearthstone‘s Volcanosaur Launches Early, Causes 24 Hours of Mayhem

In the lead-up to this week’s launch of Hearthstone’s new Journey to Un’Goro expansion, Blizzard Entertainment ran a limited-time promotion that rewarded players with unique prizes for each day they logged in. April 5’s prize was a free Un’Goro card called the Volcanosaur. Giving the card away for free was certainly a generous move on…

Zarya, You Look…Balder

Genderbent Overwatch cosplay is good. Doubly so when it is strong, like Zarya. Cosplay by Thousand-Faces (with an assist on the armour and gun by Wulfgar Weapons), photos by Insomniac

A Dire Warning About Final Fantasy’s Black Magic

Let’s go back. To a time before Jack Thompson, before age ratings. Back to 1980s Canada, when the most pressing concern with video game content—and how it was destroying the youth—was the black magic found in Final Fantasy. “And once again, it’s about how you can get in touch with your wizard”. If you’re short on…

Gearbox Hit With Backlash For Partnering With Controversial Game Key Seller G2A

Recently, Gearbox announced that they’re partnering with game key re-seller G2A for a collector’s edition of Bulletstorm. Problem: over the years, G2A has been subject to widespread criticism for lax security, enabling fraud, and making money at developers’ expense. Predictably, Gearbox has taken serious flack for the partnership. G2A’s reputation has fallen so far down…

Computer Creates Fake Video Games That Sound Better Than Real Video Games

Remember how someone taught a nueral network to name Pokemon? Someone else has taught one to name video games, and I would buy almost all of them. Starting with a port of Sega’s hit 2008 arcade game Christ disexplications took this ambitious attempt to name every video game ever made and fed it to a…

SimCity 2000 Is The Most Important Game I’ve Ever Played

The same game can be different things to different people, with gender, history, age, cultural background and political beliefs working to influence and funnel its messages and meanings for every unique player. This post originally appeared on Kotaku UK, on January 27, 2015 Games can provide us with many things: entertainment, escapism, an arena for…