Microsoft

Halo 5: The Kotaku Re-Review

Each new Halo game since 2007’s Halo 3 gets some praise, then fades, and then is pointed to as a sign that the Xbox’s once-unstoppable franchise is hitting a wall. Halo 5, released in 2015, deserves a different reputation. The first new Halo game on Xbox One got the accolades three years ago, then faded as…

Yakuza Was Also Pitched To Nintendo & Microsoft

Sure,it’s on PC now, but the Yakuza series is synonymous with three generations of PlayStation consoles. And for good reason: Nintendo and Microsoft had their chance, but simply weren’t interested in the Japanese gangster saga. The latest issue of Edge magazine has an enormous interview with series creator Toshihiro Nagoshi, where he reveals for the…

Sea of Thieves‘ New Update Finally Makes Things Feel Dangerous

Sea of Thieves is full of jerk playersand giant sharks, but the game has never felt all that dangerous. The latest update, Cursed Sails, mostly corrects that. The addition of terrifying skeleton threats, battles packed with cursed cannonballs, and a brand new player ship brings a welcome sense of urgency to a game that often…

After briefly getting the world excited over the prospect of a new hardware announcement at Gamescom next month, Microsoft has changed a line in its blog post from promising “all-new Xbox hardware and accessories” to “new Xbox One bundles and accessories.” Whoops!

The Xbox Game Pass Library Has Gotten Much Better

Rocket League and Warhammer: Vermintide 2 came to Xbox Game Pass this week. Game Pass lets you pay $10 a month for access to a library of over 100 Xbox games. As long as you keep your subscription active, you can download and play any of them. Game Pass was an interesting idea when Microsoft…

There’s a better type of HDR streaming and Microsoft plans to add support for it to Xbox One S and Xbox One X. The company announced yesterday it’s bringing Dolby Vision to the consoles which allows for better colors and higher contrasts than standard HDR. Netflix has updated its Xbox One app in kind.

Microsoft is working with Showtime on a Halo TV show set to go into production next year The project, which has been bouncing around in one form or another since 2013, is finally moving ahead with Steven Spielberg still attached along with Rise of the Planet of the Apes director Rupert Wyatt.

Nintendo And Microsoft Are Rubbing Sony’s Face In It

We’re conditioned to expect console manufacturers to be bitter rivals, constantly at each other’s throats in a battle for market supremacy. But sometimes, the enemy of an enemy can be a friend. We got a reminder during E3 that the PS4, unlike most other platforms on Earth, does not support crossplay between consoles. That means…

Proposed EU Copyright Law Could Cause Problems For Fan Content In Games

Yesterday, the European Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs voted to approve a controversial new copyright directive that, if made into law, could change the internet as we know it. Just one of the many potential terrible results of the directive, which tasks companies to monitor user-submitted content for copyright infringement, could be a radical alteration…

Let’s Remember Some Xbox 360 Games

I think we all took the Xbox 360 for granted. Other all-time greats like the SNES and PS2 seem to be remembered more fondly than Microsoft’s console, which tends to be recalled as more of a thing that happened than a platform to be treasured. I wonder if that’s down to recency. It could have…

Sea of Thieves‘ New Event Is All About Exploration

Sea of Thieves is slowly expanding with new monsters and new events aiming to bring excitement and color to a game derided for repetitive content. A new event involving exploring and hunting down hidden thrones throughout the world shows one way the controversial pirate game could build a community. Part of the fun in Sea…

Nike Made Some Xbox Air Jordans

Just so you know they’re not playing favourites, Nike is following up its PlayStation AF1s with some Xbox-branded Air Jordan 1s. It’s not just that these are green sneakers; there’s Xbox branding on the insole and aglets: And the sole glows in the dark as well: These were worn by various Xbox reps at E3…

The Xbox One’s new avatars are almost here. An editoris rolling out to Xbox Insiders now that lets them build and tweak their avatars ahead of the actual release of the mascots, which MS says is coming “soon”. Related: if you’d like to read about the creation of Xbox avatars themselves, here’s an old feature…

How Rare Hopes To Keep Up With Demand For New Sea Of Thieves Stuff

At Microsoft’s E3 press conference on Sunday, Sea of Thieves studio Rare showed off some of the latest DLC coming to its piratey Xbox One/PC game. Later at the show, we talked with the game’s executive producer about how the studio plans to keep that pace up over the months to come. As part of…

Forza Horizon 4‘s British Setting Makes It Feel Like Racing In A Witcher Game

The Forza Horizon games are great non-racing games. You try to drive really fast along a predetermined path, but they’re not about hugging turns or calibrating tire pressure the way the main Forza Motorsport games are. Forza Horizon 4 is no different, but it’s a little more beautiful. It’s better in some ways, as all…

Podcast: We React To Xbox And EA At E3 2018

We’re two press conferences into E3 2018, and there’s already so much to talk about. Won’t you join us? On the first episode of Kotaku Splitscreen’s special E3 coverage, Jason Schreier and I talked about everything we liked (and didn’t like) about EA’s press conference yesterday and Microsoft’s conference today. Listen below, and download an…

Everything Microsoft Showed At E3 2018

Microsoft just showed off a ton of stuff at their E3 2018 Xbox press conference, including new Halo and Gears of War games, Fallout 76, The Division 2, Dying Light 2, a shiny Cyberpunk 2077 trailer, and a new samurai action game from the makers of Dark Souls. Personally speaking, I’m most excited about that last…

Microsoft Reveals Gears Of War 5 (And Two Spinoffs)

Microsoft announced Gears of War 5 at its E3 Media Briefing today with a story trailer and is slated to arrive next year on Xbox One. But that’s not all: Microsoft-owned studio The Coalition is also working on two Gears of War spin-offs, Gears Pop, a mobile game, and Gears Tactics, a strategy game for…

Microsoft just announced a new Battletoads It’ll have 2.5D graphics and couch co-op. They didn’t show or say much else. It’ll be out next year.

Dying Light 2 Announced

Parkour zombie game Dying Light is getting a sequel. We don’t know much about Dying Light 2 but based on the trailer it looks like a colorful return to another violent undead world. And you thought the sustained flood of zombie games had ebbed. Chris Avellone, one of the narrative masterminds Planescape: Torment and Star…