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My Five Favorite Kotaku Stories From Last Week

Last week was… interesting. We ran some huge reviews, discovered a flaw in a widely-reported piece of news and stirred up some controversy over some blacklist. Now it’s Thanksgiving week and time’s been short today. This round-up is going up laughably late. This one’s for posterity, at least. Why A ‘Bad’ Steam Game Has Good…

Thanks Rock Band And Guitar Hero, I’m Playing A Real Guitar Now

Rock Band 4 got me ready to pick up an instrument again. Guitar Hero Live got my fingers moving back and forth. Together they convinced me to take the next step—buying the cheapest guitar possible and a copy of Rocksmith I got my first real six string. Bought it via Amazon Prime. Played it til…

Blizzard Is Hurting Heroes Of The Storm By Refusing To Call It A ‘MOBA’

Ever since they changed Heroes of the Storm’s name from Blizzard All-Stars and, even more regrettably, Blizzard Dota, Blizzard has insisted on calling its excellent new MOBA a “hero brawler” and therefore not calling it a MOBA. It was a silly choice when Blizzard first made it. Now, it’s become a damaging one. The term…

Assassin’s Creed Syndicate Runs Pretty Well On PC

If there’s been one constant with the Assassin’s Creed games over the last few years, it’s that they’ve run like shit on PC. Assassin’s Creed III didn’t do that great, Assassin’s Creed IV was very poorly optimised (and had some very bizarre troubleshooting) and the less we say about Assassin’s Creed Unity’s disastrous port the…

Fallout 4‘s User Interface Is Truly Terrible

You’ll spend a lot of Fallout 4 fighting irradiated super mutants, giant killer cockroaches, and deadly cyborgs. You’ll spend just as much time fighting the game’s awful user interface. The fact that Fallout 4 has cumbersome, counterintuitive menus won’t come as a surprise to anyone who played Fallout 3 or Fallout: New Vegas. In most…

Riot’s putting out its first update for League of Legends after the massive game-changing 5.22 patch, and it looks like 5.23 will dial back a lot of the super-powerful new marksman champions. They’re also starting to resize a buttload of champions so they look more like they’re supposed to in the game’s lore. Finally!

Unofficial Remote Play App Brings PS4 Games To PC, But It’ll Cost You

Playing PlayStation 4 games on your Vita is nice. Playing them on your PC with mouse and keyboard would be even nicer. Independent developer Twisted plans to release an unofficial Remote Play app for PC this week, but it won’t be free. Several developers have had success developing Android apps that mimic the PlayStation Vita’s…

The State Of The Vita In 2015

On February 15, 2012, Sony of America launched the PlayStation Vita, a powerhouse portable that they promised would deliver “console-quality gaming” to commutes everywhere. Nearly four years later, it’s safe to say they failed. But the Vita is a great machine—even without Sony’s help. This is part of our 2015 “State of” series, a look…

Payday 2‘s Controversial Microtransactions Aren’t Going Away, Devs Say, But Might Get Changed

It’s been a rough time for Payday 2. Adding microtransactions to a game that promised to never have them, combined with the developer’s inability to respond to any criticism, seemed like it might prove fatal. As an olive branch, the developers have issued a formal apology—a step in the right direction. Lemme catch you up.…

Battlefront Easter Egg Celebrates One of Star Wars’ Best Bloopers

Blink and you’ll miss one of the best easter eggs in Star Wars: Battlefront. Spotted by GamesRadar, here’s a silly background moment that happens in a Battlefront cutscene: Bonk! As Star Wars fans already know, that’s totally a nod to one of the most famous slip-ups in Star Wars. Pay attention to the right side…

Sneak Attack In Heroes of the Storm Goes Horribly Wrong

“Backdooring” is a common strategy in Heroes of the Storm and other similar MOBAs by which one or more players try to sneak past the enemy team and attack their base before they have a chance to respond. It can be an ingenious way to save a game at the last possible minute. Key word:…

Damn, This Halo 5 Snipe Is Dirty

Watch in awe as a Halo 5 player gets absolutely demolished by a ridiculous snipe shot. Holy cow. This clip, uploaded by SingleHaloClips and recorded by 34Miniman, shows what happened to a relentless player who made the mistake of chasing down the wrong person in Halo 5: Not only does 34Miniman use a grenade to…

Our Favorite Holiday Video Game Console Bundles

It’s actually not always that easy to just buy a video game console. Almost every console on offer comes bundled with some game or other. That’s not a bad thing, of course, but it can make the process of picking out a gift a little tricky. When picking a new console as a gift, your…

Monstress Is A Gorgeous Comic Book About Racism, War and Slavery

Everybody has a little bit of caged, writhing terribleness inside of them, frightening for what it can reveal about oneself. Monstress makes that metaphor literal and shows the struggle of one young woman trying to make her demons serve her angels. This article contains mild nudity and other scenes that some readers might find disturbing.…

Nintendo’s 80s Christmas Parties Sounded Wild

Younger readers were spared the hassle/cost, but older folks will remember that people used to have to make phone calls to get tips and strategies for tough video games. The most famous was Nintendo’s Power Line, and over the weekend the AV Club spoke with three former employees about what life was like working for…

Bloodborne’s DLC Is The Game’s Toughest Challenge Yet

It’s been almost eight months since the release of Bloodborne, From Software’s excellent reinvention of the formula it developed with Demon’s Souls. That formula? Kick your ass until you learn from your mistakes. Bloodborne’s sole DLC, The Old Hunters, doesn’t deviate from this; it’s more hardcore than ever. My plan was to publish a full…

14-Year-Old Sets New Rubik’s Cube World Record Of 4.90 Seconds

Speedcuber Lucas Etter was able to complete the Rubik’s Cube mind-blowingly fast. Solving it in 4.90 seconds is not just one of his bests so far but it’s a new world record. And here’s footage of it, taken at River Hill Fall in Maryland. It basically takes longer for the kids around him to realize…

Replica Fallout Plasma Rifle Looks Hot

The gooifying energy-based weapons of the Fallout games don’t look like the safest things to use. But they sure look neat, especially in real life. Made by cosplayer TheAnti-Lily, at first it might look like 3D art, but the WIP pics below prove that it’s actually wood, PVC pipe bits, electric cables and green lights.…

Up Close, 3D Minecraft Art Gets Pretty Freaky

The above gif progresses as follows: Minecraft 3D art as it’s meant to be viewed, as a 2D-ish render; Minecraft 3D art in-game; Minecraft 3D art in-game, but closer. It’s quite the transformation. The build, made by Tober888 of the MysticAbsents group, is a riff on Roy Lichtenstein’s famous Pop Art piece, the Drowning Girl.…

The Side of Anime Life You Never See

When you watch anime, you are used to seeing anime characters living and breathing in animated worlds. Let’s change that. According to Japanese Twitter user Kibaichi, All Nationz, and My Game News Flash, folks over on 4chan have been Photoshopping anime characters in, as one anonymous forum member wrote, “places they are not usually seen.”…