Blizzard artist Rene Koiter is also one heck of a cosplayer, which he showed once again this year by taking out (along with co-worker Jaime Scheffler) the company’s internal Halloween contest dressed as Negan from The Walking Dead.
[Clowns...Halloween...you know where this is going ~ JuIc3]
Have you heard that there’s a creepy clown epidemic going on? It’s true, the media is going crazy reporting scary looking clowns menacing small children and adults alike. As someone who has a fear of clowns, sometimes referred to as “coulrophobia,” this is not a good time for yours truly.
Ace Attorney 6: Spirit of Justice is out and appears to hold the same high-quality the series has always had. I am a little behind, yet to play Apollo Justice, Dual Destinies, Dai Gyakuten Saiban, Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright, and now this one. What I have played so far I have loved and has quickly become one of my favorite franchises.
I was convinced to play within minutes of seeing footage of the first game for the first time. Until then, I thought the “Objection!” images and jokes and all the stuff about Phoenix Wright was either from Harvey Birdman or some similar show. I was surprised to find it was a game where you battle in court over murder cases. However that concept alone was not what pulled me or many of its fans in.
Unsurprisingly, Skyrim: Special Edition quickly became one of the most popular games on Steam over the weekend. And given that she had already established herself as a channel for older gamers and Skyrim fans, it made sense that Shirley Curry, aka Grandma Shirley, would return to Skyrim.
Five years ago, danrharvey wanted to “get stuck into a creative mode build” in Minecraft. Looking back on it today, he’s built something that’s not only original, but beautiful.
I've never been fond of EA's Origin service, updates or not. I don't like the company, most of its games, or its software; it has always rubbed me as the kind of company that would delete my existence if possible. Turns out, gamers in Myanmar have had that exact thing happen.
According to Reddit user trivial_sublime, he can no longer access his Origin account. He had acquired around 20 games over the years, but those have vanished into the ether. As he went to access his account, he was constantly receiving messages of access being denied.
When he posed the question on EA's official site, the first response was, "I'm sorry but Origin is no longer available in Myanmar." Now, that didn't come from an EA official, but trivial_sublime had also Googled why his account was denied and found the same answer.
Apparently, new US laws have banned Origin in some countries (despite those sanctions being lifted). I can't find a lot of corroborating evidence for this, nor can I locate a list of which countries were affected.
Kotaku has gotten a hold of EA and it seems the issue is simply an error. According to its recent post an EA spokesperson responded with, "We are working to restore access to Origin for our players in Myanmar. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, and we’ll share updates on timing as soon as possible."
That may be a bit of pre-baked PR nonsense, but thankfully the situation isn't permanent. I suppose this is a reality we will be facing moving forward. If all games are limited to digital marketplaces, changing licenses and shifts in attitudes can lead to a lot of titles being lost to time. To make matters worse, some countries might be blocked for little to no reason.
The Splinter Cell series for PC went on sale this weekend on Steam. Every game was discounted at 75% off, including Splinter Cell: Blacklist, the most recent game which Kirk Hamilton called in his review a sort of “greatest hits” collection borrowing the most successful parts from each previous game.
Dragon Ball games have been a part of my entire life. I played classics such as the Super Butoden series on the SNES and more recent but classic titles like the Budokai series. Throughout the years I’ve also experienced terrible Dragon Ball games: Ultimate Battle 22, Final Bout, Legacy of Goku (the two sequels were wonderful, though), Taiketsu, Sagas, Ultimate Tenkaichi, Kinect, and Battle of Z. While it’s far from my favorite anime series compared to back in the day, the Dragon Ball franchise will always have a place in my heart so that’s why I’m always interested when a new game gets revealed.
After the disasters that came out post-Raging Blast 2, I just lost all hope for the games. Raging Blast 2 was far from being one of the best games either, but it was still enjoyable as it didn’t have obnoxious gameplay and stripped features. Then comes Xenoverse, which had its issues, but it resurrected my faith for Dragon Ball games to be above average once again. Additionally, it brought a feature that a lot of fans had been requesting for a while: the ability to finally create your own character. While there’s Dragon Ball Online, it wasn’t easily accessible.
Although it has fixed many problems and improved gameplay, Xenoverse 2, unfortunately, comes with its own problems as well. There were things that the first game did right and that should have been kept unchanged. Still, Xenoverse 2 keeps the dream alive that Dragon Ball games might return to their former glory. With Dragon Ball Super on-going, there’s plenty of content that can be added. The first DLC pack is already confirmed to have characters from Dragon Ball Super, even.
For the most part, Brett and I were allowed to be dumb Americans when we were in Poland, able to get by with only a few Polish words ('Dziękuję' means thank you, and I had to say it each of the thousand times I was handed vodka). From my experience, if you can find someone younger than thirty, they probably spoke English. When I went to see Telepaths Trees' Inner Chains, this assumption finally bit me in the ass.
I appreciate the developer's effort. As I started to play the game, he told me "Medieval...caste...Egypt?" He did his best to accommodate my lack of knowledge, so it was my fault for not knowing what the hell was going on. I told him it was alright and that I'd just try and play it and figure out what it was all about. Maybe not my best idea in hindsight!
I walked out of a tomb with what looked like a parasitic bracelet on my right hand. The world looked completely ravaged, with smoke, flame, and hellish structures as far as I could see. Walking along cliffsides, I came across what looked like bladed mechanical tree roots writhing in the earth, eager to see my insides with a quick slice. Navigating past them, I came across corpselike humans that communicated with me nonverbally. They seemed to be expecting me, ushering me forward. Turning around a corner, a monolithic structure wreathed in flame loomed in the distance, beckoning me forth. The demo ended here.
It was certainly atmospheric, and the lack of combat had me wondering if it would be more of a horror puzzler. Upon further research, I found the Inner Chains Kickstarter and have gleaned more information. It appears that later on it will become more of a shooter, using parasitic weapons that feed off of your lifeforce, such as flamethrowers, shotguns, and electroguns. There's a small bit of gunplay in the trailer below.
Steins;Gate 0 will finally release in North America on November 29. The visual novel will be available next month on PS4 and Vita according to a post on the PlayStation blog by localization lead, Adam Lensenmayer. The game is a sequel to Steins;Gate. You can read our review of the imported Japanese version here.
Samsung Galaxy fought great, but SK Telecom T1 was hands-down the better fighter. And after adding a third championship to their name in just four years, it’s safe to say they are the best team in League of Legends history. That outcome seemed just as inevitable before last night’s finals as after them. Of course SKT would take the series. Of course Lee “Faker” Sanghyeok was going to win MVP of the tournament and solidify his legacy as the best player in League of Legends history.
Some gamers are learning first-hand about the dangers of trusting your game library to a copy-protected service: you're at the mercy of that service and its interpretation of the law. Players living in Myanmar have discovered that EA started blocking access to Origin in the country sometime in September. Even if you started your account elsewhere, you aren't allowed to either visit the Origin store or use any of your purchased games. You can use a virtual private network to get around the restriction, but that could easily bog down your connection while playing online. Thankfully, the headache is only momentary.
Source: Reddit, EA Answers HQ (1), (2)
Last year, Senran Kagura producer Kenichiro Takaki pledged to continue making games with tenderness and his unchanging love for boobs. After spending several hours with Valkyrie Drive: Bhikkhuni, I can say he kept his word because the boobs here are fantastic.
Maybe next year he can pledge to make a game with a decent story.
Electronic Arts says they’re working to fix Origin in Myanmar in the wake of recent news that players could not access their EA PC games in the Southeast Asian country.
I've been playing the hell out of Titanfall 2 since release trying to get my thoughts together for my review. In my time with the game I've been experimenting with different kits, game modes, and abilities to get the feel for what the game has to offer. But, one thing that didn't take me long to figure out was my favorite mech.
I want to be buried in my Ion.
I know I should give the other Titans more of a chance. I like Ronin's style, Tone seems like a wrecking ball, and the idea of raining justice down on my enemies as Northstar is certainly appealing, but I just can't say no to lasers. Ion's ability to erase pilots with a quick zap of its shoulder laser, control the battlefield with tripwires, and hurl missiles back at foes with the vortex shield is everything I want in a mech. Also, because I'm a huge MechWarrior nerd, I kind of like having an extra gauge to keep track of.
The lead in this week's Weekend Deals is recently released Titanfall 2. PC gamers can pick up 18% off at either GMG or DLGamer with a drop from $60 to $48.99 on the 2nd installment to Respawn's mech FPS. The Origin keys are both shipped straight from EA and is available region wide (except apparently Myanmar?).
Early reviews suggest the underhyped game from EA is pretty good, but you should always run through your favorite review sources before you hand the hard-earn cash - particularly on Triple-A like these.
Two other Friday releases are getting price drops as well this weekend: Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 and Skyrim: Special Edition. In the case of Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2, PC gamers can again take a big discount. The deal on Xenoverse 2 is at GamesPlanet, where after a rare coupon code price reduce the game to 27.99 GBP, and since you can buy world wide this translates to about $34.19 for a pretty big 32% launch weekend deal. Not too bad on a Bandai Namco title. The latter mentioned remastered Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Edition has its best discount yet from GMG on PC with a 15% drop from $40 to $33.99. But if you're not in a hurry to buy Skyrim yet again, we'd wait as a 50% discount will appear sooner rather than later.
In other weekend deal news, PC gaming Halloween Sales are running amok plus there's a rare and giant Best Buy PS3/Xbox 360 pre-owned sale.. At Best Buy this weekend, they launched about 600 PS3 titles on sale for $5 or less, plus 600 Xbox 360 titles similarly at $5 or less - some goodies includes $5 Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. In PC gaming land, the aforementioned Halloween sales are being run at multiple retailers: GMG, GamersGate, GameStop, WinGameStore, and of course Steam Store.
Console Hardware Deals
GMG Halloween Sale
GameStop Halloween Sale
GamersGate Halloween Sale
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PS4
Xbox One
Game deals from Dealzon. Sales help support Destructoid.
My love for survival horror games began with the first Resident Evil. As a kid I hated everything related to horror, but, after Resident Evil, I came to love and even seek out horror games.
Ana is everybody’s favorite Overwatch sniper mom, and what better way to show off those motherly instincts than by telling Genji to gtfo when the ninja pop’s in uninvited.
Using a build idea from the element14 Community, Ben takes an ESP8266 module and creates the ultimate all-in-one retro gaming controller for the Super Nintendo, Sega Megadrive / Genesis and Nintendo Entertainment System. To get the digital signals from the buttons across the wireless transmission to the receiver, Ben will have to use shift registers such as the 74HC595 to combine the bits into a data stream. It's not all straightforward, though: Felix steps in to help with LUA scripting and the team hits a snag with the programming. Fortunately, designing the enclosure is a lot simpler thanks to Autodesk Fusion 360. After a lot of testing, soldering and taking apart a Sega controller, the team creates a controller of wonder. Which consoles would you control? Would you design it any differently? Suggest a build on the element14 Community.
Whenever a game gets remastered or upgraded, it’s not always immediately obvious what makes the new version so much better. While a couple side-by-side screenshot comparisons can show surface level improvements in lighting and textures, more nuanced improvements can usually take a while to pick out.
View-Master VR, Kindle mysteries and thrillers, and hundreds of pieces of activewear lead off Sunday’s best deals.
Harry Potter, eat your heart out. Google made a cat wizard game and it's so cute you're going to want to punch your eyes in. Like on most holidays, Google has rolled out a new homepage (not sure if this link works outside of the US) with a little Halloween film featurette that leads to a gesture-based ghostbusting game.
The mechanic is simple: ghosts appear with a pattern over their heads, like a horizontal stripe or a v-shape, and you must draw the pattern with a mouse (our touchpad) gesture before they touch your pussy. This starts easy enough, but soon you'll get into boss fights with sentence-like patterns a-la Parappa. Just when you think you've got the hang of it the bastards will dash with increasing complexity and speed, and there's five different zones to move through. The cat somehow reminds me of the boss that appears in back of What The Heck (which has the best elevator music of the 90's).
If you waste an hour of your weekend as I have, post your high scores in the comments. Happy Halloween!
Welcome to Kotaku’s Sunday Comics, your weekly roundup of the best webcomics. The images enlarge if you click on the magnifying glass icon.
Today’s selection of articles from Kotaku’s reader run community: Hot Take: Pokemon Sun & Moon Demo (3DS eShop) • Unboxing: Stranger Of Sword City • Discussion: So Many Questions About The Switch
