- Uncategorized
Week in Games: Heroes, Guitar and Otherwise
Guitar Hero 5 hits this coming week. So does Champions Online, pressing ahead with the PC release and still no word on when/if ever it’ll hit Xbox 360. Other highlights include Section 8, and the PSP’s Soulcalibur: Broken Destiny. This week’s count: four for PS3, and 360, two for Wii, two for PC and PSP,…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
ESA Annual Report Highlights Success in State Legislatures
The Entertainment Software Association released its annual report last week, and it shows a very impressive winning streak against anti-games legislation at the state level in the U.S. In the ESA’s last fiscal year, state legislatures introduced 43 bills that would have regulated the content or access to video games. No bill regulating sales became…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
MC Hammer. Zombies. Achievement. That is All.
MC Hammer once had a house atop a hill off the 680 near Fremont, Calif., and every time I passed it I’d say to myself, “Self, some day I’ll write a Kotaku post about MC Hammer.” That day has come. MC Hammer, or at least his silhouette anyway, will make an appearance in the achievements…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
The Making of Guitar Hero 5’s Playboy Commercial
This 7-minute video shows you the technical detail and painstaking direction it took to film Guitar Hero 5’s Playboy ad. But you probably don’t give a crap for that. It has 22 takes with teh wimmen on screen. Enjoy. If you’re here strictly for girls in lingerie cavorting with plastic instruments, that’s at the four…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
LostWinds’ Wintry WiiWare Sequel Confirmed
The latest issue of Edge Magazine takes a long look at LostWinds: Winter of the Melodias, which is the sequel to last year’s WiiWare hit LostWinds. No release date was announced. When it arrives, Winter of the Melodias will allow you, as the game’s protagonist Toku, to change the seasons from summer to winter and…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Brütal Legend Makes a Brütal Offer
Oh, Brütal Legend. We thought you were going to be different. You’re a rebel. You’re rokken. You’re not supposed to be … corporate. So why are you doing this cheesy pay-for-access-to-the-demo thing that other pinhead games started? Reader Crashbanito, and others signed up on the Brütal Legend email, got word this morning that pre-ordering the…
By Owen Good -
UncategorizedIs PS3 Slim Slower than PS3 Phat?
Yes and no, say some comparison videos that hit YouTube yesterday. In the startup (above) and DVD loading, you see the Slim marginally trails the Phat. But in starting and loading Batman: Arkham Asylum, it’s faster. DVD Comparison – PS3 Slim vs. Phat Batman: Arkham Asylum – Game Bootup and Level Load The Slim’s bootup…
By Owen Good - Culture
Sunday Comics
Penny Arcade published Aug. 28 PvPonline published Aug. 28 ActionTrip published Aug. 24 Digital Unrest published Aug. 24 DotGif published Aug. 24 Little Gamers published Aug. 24 EXTRALIFE published Aug. 27 GU Comics published Aug. 25 2P Start published Aug. 26 Nerf NOW published Aug. 26 Rooster Teeth published Aug. 25 Looking for Group published…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Kotaku Approval Ratings: The RPGs, MMO and Otherwise
No secret we have console- and shooter-heavy preferences here. But one genre, antipodal to run-and-gun action, but still found in heavy rotation, and with a long tradition on the consoles, is the RPG. Let’s see how you feel about them. Again, you will not see the results of these polls after you vote. They will…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
A Look at Final Fantasy XIII’s Combat System and Strategy
The English localization is almost done. But the Japanese build of Final Fantasy XIII, shown off at Gamescom, gives you a good idea of what to expect in the gameplay when the title releases next year for Xbox 360 an PS3. FFXIII’s developer notes the game’s combat mechanism employs something they call the “paradigm shift”…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
DJ Hero’s DJ AM Found Dead in New York
DJ AM, a playable character in Activision’s forthcoming DJ Hero, was found dead in his Manhattan apartment Friday. Adam Goldstein, as he was known in real life, was a performer with a well-known history of drug addiction, and recovery from it. He was 36. Tim Riley, the Activision vice president of music affairs, released a…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Here’s Your NBA Live 10 Tracklist
NBA Live 10‘s tracklist was revealed today, showing the scratch-my-back nature of EA Sports soundtracks. Some tunes are from superstar artists, making the game look good. Some are from acts on the move, giving them a feather in their cap. EA first gave the set to gaming/hip-hop site The Koalition. And with Snoop, Mos Def,…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Kotaku’s Top 5 List of Top 10 Lists
Each week throws off several new video game lists ranging from the humorous to the trivial. What’s better? A list of those. Here’s a roundup of the rundowns out there. •Advertising 101: 10 Awesome Game Trailers to Learn From [The Bits, Bytes, Pixels and Sprites] Game trailers have emerged as a kind of art form…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Nananana nananana — ARKHAM!!!!
Danny Elfman can piss off. I roll with Neal Hefti’s theme from the 1960 TV show, and here someone’s set it to Arkham Asylum gameplay in an attempt to mimic the show’s opening. It doesn’t get good until the POW SOCK OOF sequence, and the onamotapoeics are replaced with wirdy-dirds, so I guess this gets…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
EyePet Brings the Dawwww Nov. 17
Sony’s given a release date and two pricing schemes for EyePet, its augmented-reality, cute widdle fuzzy wuzkins-ownership sim. North America gets it Nov. 17, price is $39.99 without PlayStation Eye, $59.99 bundled with. The announcement on the official PlayStation blog yesterday was accompanied by a developer demo vid, embedded below. It’s a pretty sharp inducement…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Fansites Get the First Gay Tony Screens, and They’re Fabulous
I don’t see much differentiation in these four screens versus the rest of Grand Theft Auto IV. GTA4Net got these, and IGN says fansites were given them first. Looks like you’ll have a gay old time blowing up lotsa crap. First Gay Tony Screenshots [GTA4.net]
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Fashion Model Says Beaterator’s Coming to iPhone
We break rumor without prejudice to the source, and this one comes from Vogue. Model Jacquetta Wheeler is friends with Sam Houser’s wife, Anouchka, and during a visit, she says Sam showed Beaterator to her – on an iPhone. Now, we already know that Beaterator, produced with Timbaland, is on the way to the PSP…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Fallout 3 Trophies Pop Up; DLC Soon?
The last word on when Fallout 3’s PS3 DLC would arrive was Bethesda “hoping” to have it out by “the end of of September.” Trophies pegged to all the expansions have shown up. Perhaps they indicate a sooner release? Earlier this week, tipster Dan M. snapped that screen pic of the 22 trophies. Tipster Player…
By Owen Good - Uncategorized
Brütal Bus will Race in Soap Box Derby
A team of three college friends is building one bad-assed model of Brütal Legend’s Ironheade Tour Bus, and will race it in a soap box derby in Los Angeles. Holy catfish, they have actually cast molten metal for this thing. The team, Christine Phelan, 25, Andrew Cook, 25, Sean Feeley, 26, and Luke Nalker, 30,…
By Owen Good