PlayStation

There’s a Musical Surprise In Skylanders: Swap Force

I was not expecting this at all. Don’t click if you don’t want to spoil it. As if aintricately lovely score by Lorne Balfe — the man behind the music for the first two Skylanders games, Assassin’s Creed III and Beyond: Two Souls — wasn’t enough, Vicarious Visions audio designer Matt Pirog put together this…

That was probably a bad idea. These silly GTA V mansions. Although there are several solutions for this, lifting it out with a cargo helicopter and not dropping it into the pool would be the funniest. Dayshot is an image-based feature that runs every morning, showcasing some of the prettiest,funniest game-related screenshots and art that…

How To Access Your Vita’s Battery

Thanks to hackers, the words “portable console” and “removable battery” used to spell “nightmare” for Sony. The battery of the PSP famously offered hackers an easy back door into the console that until then required hard-to-find exploits in games. It’s no wonder the PSP Go was a closed system. So what about its younger brother,…

How Japanese Gamers Felt After Touching the PS4 and Xbox One

The PS4 and Xbox One won’t be out in Japan until next year, but many attendees to last month’s Tokyo Game Show got to try out the upcoming consoles and voice their opinions. Here’s what they thought. This week, Weekly Famitsu published the results from its TGS 2013 poll. One of the questions were on…

GTA V‘s Trevor Sure Likes Forklifting Some Weird Things

My new favorite Tumblr find of this week? Why, it’s “Trevor Lifting Stuff.” On it, Trevor lifts all kinds of stuff. Like a stepladder, for instance. The Tumblr is actually titled “Trevor soulève des trucs” in French, but it depicts the international language of lifting. Trevor lifts up a garden table. A cow. A mailbox.…

Is PS4 Launch Game DriveClub Delayed To 2014? [UPDATE: Yes.]

Has one of the PlayStation 4’s big launch exclusives has been pushed back to next year? Rumors are swirling that DriveClub has been delayed to 2014, but Sony won’t comment on the matter. UPDATE (10/18): Sony has confirmed the delay A website called The Same Coin sparked the rumor earlier today, claiming they’d heard from…

Xbox One Or PS4? Top Comic Artists Chime In.

Sure, they may be able to do render amazing versions of Superman, Batman and Spider-Man but comic-book artists are just like you and me. Some of them even use their talented fingers for video gaming. And, like game enthusiasts everywhere, the visual stylists who contribute DC, Marvel, Image and others are excited for the Xbox…

GTA V Demolition Derbies Are Better On Skyscrapers

What’s needed for a GTA Online skyscraper battle royale, like the one above, is only a few friends (and their cars), a cargo helicopter, and the biggest building in the game. The fun, shared by YouTuber Kyoto-Moto, starts around the 3:00 mark in the video below. And yes, they fight until only one car remains:…

Over 15 Minutes Of The PS4 Dashboard. Menus, Menus, Menus! [Update]

Whoever said “shoes are the window to the soul” was full of crap. Because system menus are the window to the soul. They’re the first thing we see every time we boot a system up, and are the tools by which we do pretty much everything to do with a console outside of actually playing…

Zebras Made My PS3 More Beautiful

One of the key games used by Sony to demonstrate the graphical prowess of the PlayStation 3 prior to its North American release, Majesco’s safari simulator Afrika came out three years after the console launched and wasn’t very good. It’s dynamic theme, on the other hand, is exquisite. This was originally to be a post…

Motion Controls, The Most Popular And Most Broken Idea Gaming Ever Had

It was an idea so good that it vaulted Nintendo into first place last-gen with a console using last-last-gen technology. It was an idea so flawed that a Kotaku reader—the moment this series of best and worst features of the outgoing console generation was announced—shredded it. Motion controls… boy did they mostly suck. If you…

We’re Finally Excited About a WWII Game Again. It’s… Minecraft?

World War II is not something we see every day in the ocean of blocky castles and rollercoasters that usually make up Minecraft‘s visually compelling constructions. That makes this WWII-themed Minecraft map that much more unique and amazing. It was made by two friends, Rythma and Sycoinc, who compiled this dramatic video to show off…

This is what a timelapse day-night cycle of Los Santos looks like in GTA V. That is, if you climb Vinewood Hills, stand there for hours, and take pictures with the in-game phone—just as Plonkey on the GTA V subreddit did. Incredible! Dayshot is an image-based feature that runs every morning, showcasing some of the…

Arcadias no Ikusahime is Pretty, Light-Hearted, and Fun to Play

The past week or so, I’ve had a lot to say about Arcadias no Ikusahime (The Warrior Princess of Arcadias). I’ve praised the art style and music, and have taken an in-depth look at the gameplay. But even after all that, there’s still much more to say about a game that is just so enjoyable…

Ubisoft’s new Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag story trailer shows a colorful Caribbean setting, the game’s young captain’s fight for glory and how he got drawn into the war between the Assassins and Templars. An action packed trailer, so what better song than “Two Steps From Hell?” Edward Kenway story trailer | Assassin’s Creed IV…

The New PS Vita Torn Apart

The new PS Vita was recently released in Japan. You probably know it has a new LCD screen. But what do the rest of its innards look like? Blue, orange, black, and gray, it seems! Japanese site 4Gamer took apart the new Vita for your viewing pleasure. In case you missed it, here are Kotaku‘s…

The Latest PS4 Commercial Is Also A Musical

This PS4 commercial debuted on Monday Night Football roughly 60 seconds ago. Not bad, huh? Makes me want to sing more than it makes me want a PS4, but hey. The next PlayStation is out November 15. Just a month away. Tick tock.

We Tried The Dark Souls 2 Beta. Brutal, But Fun.

I’m going to drop some big news here, are you ready? Dark Souls 2 is really difficult. There, I said it. Of course it’s also fun, if you’re into the particular brand of masochistic fun that From Software provides. I spent two hours playing the beta and trying to get a handle on the changes,…

The North American Tales of Symphonia Chronicles $100 Collector’s Edition for the PS3 is epic. If four Chibi Kyun Chara figures, a novel detailing what happened between Tales of Symphonia and Dawn of the New World, a multi-disc soundtrack and special collector’s packaging isn’t enough to get you to re-buy two games you’ve already played,…

The Best And Worst of the Last Generation of Gaming

PlayStation 3. Xbox 360. Wii. Over the past eight years, electronic boxes wearing one of those three brands came to occupy space in the entertainment centers of millions of people around the world. They were the heralds of the most innovative, occasionally uncomfortable, undeniably exciting era in video game history. That era is finally nearing…