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The Angry Birds Cartoon is Launching Next Month. Take Cover.

You know what the most recognizable characters in mobile gaming are lacking? Character. Debuting March 16 and 17, Rovio’s Angry Birds Toons series will define Red, Black, Blue, White, Yellow and the pigs by their story arcs instead of their parabolic arcs. Yeah, I’ve been waiting to use that forever. As much as many of…

I Used To Smoke Pot Every Time I Played A Video Game. Here’s Why I Stopped.

I started smoking pot during my junior year of college, after a loud and messy breakup with my first girlfriend that sent me into an absolutely manic rage. It was shortly after she left, bawling, that one of my roommates asked if I wanted to get high. I guess that was his way of trying…

The Wii Mini—aka the “most pointless console upgrade of all time“—goes on sale in Europe next month.

Conan O’Brien Wants to Protect the New Lara Croft (from Throat Impalement)

Conan O’Brien’s breezy “Clueless Gamer” review of Tomb Raider begins and proceeds predictably enough, with the late night host remarking on Lara Croft’s physique and a camera optimized for showing it off. Then he gets to one of the game’s infamous sequences, the spike-filled flume ride, which ends in a cringe-inducing death if you choose…

This Week’s iPhone Charts: Cheating is Charting

The free iPhone word game 4 Pics 1 Word is pretty damn popular. So popular that an app that allows players to cheat in the game debuts this week at number six on the free iPhone game charts. Sheesh. Mobile gaming is a wild and unruly frontier. One week you’re the game that copied that…

You Are Over-Encumbered. Drop Your iPhone.

I don’t own an iPhone anymore. I suddenly wish I did. This case costs $40, but the joke makes it almost totally worth it. iPhone Stats (Skyrim) by SkinnyJoe [Red Bubble] Skyrim [All The World’s A Stage, via Gamefreaks]

Irrational’s Ken Levine tells IGN that BioShock for the Vita isn’t happening until funding is secured. (via VG247)

Thank AMD for the Best Video Game Hair Ever

Video game hair, generally speaking, looks awful. It really does. But computer giant AMD is changing all that with some fancy new hair tech. Oh yes, hair tech As AMD points out, making realistic hair is really, really hard. You need a bunch of math and calculations to make it happen in a natural and…

Japan’s Coffin Apartments Are Not for Claustrophobes

Tokyo is dense. Packed. And crowded. If you don’t have much money and want to live in places like Shibuya, you could live in a box. Literally. A Japanese news program recently showed off an “extremely cramped share house” (“geki-sema share house” or 激せまシャアハウス in Japanese). There’s a communal toilet and bath for the residents,…

Your Crazy Childhood Nerd Arguments Are Now A Card Game

“I’M OPTIMUS PRIME AND I SHOT YOU IN THE FACE”, “WELL I’M A NINJA TURTLE AND I BLOCKED IT THEN KICKED HIII-YAH”, “WELL I USED MY FORCEFIELD TO STOP IT THEN TURNED INTO A TRUCK AND VVRROOMMM DROVE OVER YOUR LEGS”. That’s how I remember most playground lunchbreaks beginning, and ending, when I was a…

The Cold, Mechanical Terror Of A LEGO Robot That Can Draw Things

Inspired by the work of famous 18th-century automata builders Pierre Jacquet-Droz and Henri Maillardet, Italian engineer Daniele Benedettelli built this LEGO robot called LEGONARDO. He is programmed to draw. And he will not stop until you are dead (or stop giving him drawings to draw). It is as impressive as it is unnerving. LEGONARDO [Site,…

Ah, So That’s Why Crysis 3’s First Level Is So Terribly Slow

If you’ve played Crysis 3 on the PC, you’ve probably noticed that the first level, even on a powerful system, chugs. Badly. It gets you off on the wrong foot with the game, because you start worrying more about hardware than the experience, and that sucks. Stick with it, though; bizarrely, as the first level’s…

There Are 26 Famous Video Game Locations In This Terrific Video. See If You Can Name Them.

Last year, Dutch artist Tim Hijlkema created an amazing video called Video Game Planets. This year, he’s gone one better, with a compilation of 26 famous video game locations. The idea is that you try and name them all, but even if you have no idea what Bullworth Academy looks like, you’ll still be able…

Remember, The PS4 And Next Xbox Have More To Offer Than Just Prettier Graphics

It’s such a crude yardstick, yet it’s the one most people use when trying to gauge the leap between console generations. Graphics. How a game looks. It’s great for sizzle reels and screenshot comparisons, but at the end of the day, it’s not where the real leaps in video games are made. Those are made…

How Valve Hires, And Fires, Its Employees

There’s no company quite like Valve. Super successful and with an organisation some would call crazy, there’s also no company quite as interesting. So hearing about how Valve hires, and fires people, is far more educational than it would be for just about any other video game company. Writing on Gamasutra, the company’s economist Yanis…

Yup, Patton Oswalt Is Pretty Cool

Feels like everywhere I turn these days, I see Patton Oswalt. He’s on Portlandia, he’s killing it on Justified. He has a role in the hotly-anticipated-by-me game Metro Last Light I like the guy a lot, and so I enjoyed this short documentary “To Be Loved & Understood,” which was released today by The Thrash…

More Games Should Release Their Multiplayer As A Standalone, Like This Indie Game

The Banner Saga—that beautiful strategy game made by ex-Bioware devs—is releasing sometime later this year. But you can play the multiplayer segment of the game right now, if you want. It’s out on Steam, on its own—for free, to boot. Check out the launch trailer above. I’m a big fan of this move. In fact,…

Fire Emblem: Awakening Has One Hell Of A Grand Finale

The grand finale of Fire Emblem: Awakening made me feel things. Emotional things. In fact, it made me feel so many things it kinda knocked me out. This was unexpected. It took me about 27 hours to complete the game. If, about halfway through, you had told me that the ending was going to make…

Bond Takes All Comers In A Real-Life Reenactment Of The N64 GoldenEye

I always figured I’d be pretty crap if I had to survive in a real-life version of GoldenEye. I was pretty solid at the N64 game back in the day (or at least, I think I was), but give me an actual Klobb and set me loose, and I’d be done for. In honor of…

It’s That Goofy Tow Truck From Cars, Destroying Liberty City

I have to say, while I enjoyed watching Woody from Toy Story wreaking havoc in Liberty City, I didn’t really think I’d like watching Mater from Cars do the same. Come to think of it, I think I figured my relative enjoyment would be about on par with the difference between my enjoyment of Toy…