Welcome to the Best of Kotaku, where I round up all of this week's best content.
I just had to showcase the awesome Scribbelnauts mash-up art with all of you one more time as this week's best image.
Moving on to our Best Of content this week, we kick things off as usual with a comment from the community.
The Best Comment From The Community
Our favorite comment of this week comes to you from JonathanPonikvar on our Talk Amongst Yourselves forum:
Hi, I'm Jonathan, and I'm a recovering Achievements addict.
In 48 hours alone, the Wii U has completely shattered my addiction to achievements. For the past 6 years I've always preferred to buy multi-platform games on the 360 just so I could keep racking up those points, purely for my own completionist enjoyment. Yet after accumulating a 50K+ Gamerscore, the Wii U has managed to completely gut my desire for more, all thanks to Miiverse.
As it turns out, social networking is more enjoyable than an arbitrary point total.
I never figured social interaction would factor into my enjoyment of gaming. I always had more friends on my XBox Live list, simply because everyone I knew through college (and even within my own family) all owned 360's. Conversely, my PS3 friends list has about 8 people on it, most of which haven't logged in within the past 6 months. Actually meeting new people in random online matches and making friends on either system was a gamble of whether or not they would have a microphone to talk, or what kind of game you were playing, or any number of other factors. As such I rarely played online games with random people if I could help it.
Enter the Wii U with the Miiverse. An entire social community of gamers opens up. Dedicated message boards for individual games. In-game graffiti. You can leave sketches in public posts and instantly have responses. Suddenly everyone can talk, whether or not they own a microphone. A note arrives in your inbox or a comment is posted, the Home button on the tablet glows blue, and pressing it pauses the game to let you sketch up a reply on-the-fly.
And suddenly I care a whole lot less about achievements.
Day 1 of the Wii U: Everything You Need to Know
We collectively give you everything you need to know about the Wii U, from our hardware review by Stephen Totilo to game impressions to the nitty gritty details of what you can do online, how you add friends and what that day one firmware update is all about. More »
Nintendo Boss Declares Wii U The Start of the Next Console Generation, Teases Looming Surprises
Stephen interviews Reggie Fils-Aime who discusses the next console generation and the Wii U's launch issues. More »
Yes, the Wii's Going Away But It Did Pretty Good Things For Mickey Mouse and Warren Spector
Evan Narcisse talks to Warren Spector about what the Wii did for Mickey Mouse. More »
Borderlands 2: Mr. Torgue's Campaign of Carnage: The Kotaku Review
Tina Amini has to write the most negative thing about Borderlands 2 she's ever written. But it's still worth playing. More »
What Skyrim Looks Like When You're Running 100 Mods At Once
Luke Plunkett shares images of a gorgeous mod. More »
Return To New Vegas: Social Experiments Bring Out The Worst In People
Patricia Hernandez explains what the vaults in New Vegas say about people and humanity. More »
The State of the Wii U, Just Three Days In
Stephen sums up what's great and what needs work with the Wii U. More »
PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale: The Kotaku Review
Tina enjoys wacking PlayStation characters upside the head. More »
In A Desperate Last Fight For Survival, The Walking Dead Asks You To Make The Hardest Decisions Yet
Tina hits a hard place in the final episode of this season of Telltale's The Walking Dead. More »
Adventure Time: Hey Ice King! Why'd You Steal Our Garbage?!: The Kotaku Review
Tina finds this Adventure Time game to be quaint and fun, even if it was clearly made for a kid. More »
Take A Glimpse At Your Likely Video Game Future
Zac Gorman predicts our future. More »
Far Cry 3: The Kotaku Review
Kirk Hamilton says Far Cry 3 is a polished, empowering and often exhilarating open-world adventure. More »
Why We Like To Shoot
Stephen ponders why we like first-person shooters. More »
Kotaku Reviews All Of This Year's Biggest Games
So many big games. So many reviews of those big games. More »
How Square Enix Screwed Up Black Ops II for Japan
Square Enix localized Black Ops II for Japan. The results are not so good. More »