Adapting any well-known property is always going to be a big feat, especially when it comes to video games. It’s one thing to adapt a comic or TV show, it’s another thing to adapt a series of games, which come with a greater degree of self-expression. You can please some fans, but you can’t please all of the fans, as we’ve seen with basically every game-to-TV/film adaptation within the last five years.
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Talking to T3, Westworld co-creator Jonathan Nolan said as such about the upcoming Fallout show. Like many, he came into the series with Fallout 3 all the way back in 2008, which he said consumed roughly a year of his life back in the day. At the time, he would’ve been working on quite a few projects, and he was frank in saying the RPG “almost derailed my entire career.” Fallout fans have been divided on the series for some time (see early reactions to Fallout 76), and Nolan similarly it was impossible for the show to please the whole community.
“It’s a fool’s errand,” he said. “You’ve got to make yourself happy.” with Fallout, he continued, was for everyone to “come into this trying to make the show that you want to make.” Considering previous interviews, it doesn’t sound like this show is going to wildly diverge from those games, but they are going to have their own spin on series staples that’ll likely rankle longtime lovers. Between this and his Batman work, he called it a “rare and unbelievable thing…to take something that you love and get a chance to play in that universe, to create your own version.”
No doubt he’d like for it to be a big multi-season hit like Westworld and Person of Interest, but he sounded honest in saying he was “very happy” with how this series has turned out. We’ll find out whether he should be happy when all eight episodes of Fallout will hit Prime Video on April 11.
Image: Atlus, Atlus, Screenshot: Square Enix / Claire Jackson / Kotaku, Square Enix / Claire Jackson / Kotaku, Square Enix / Claire Jackson / Kotaku, Square Enix / Claire Jackson / Kotaku
We get it, you’re probably very into Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth and Unicorn Overlord this week. So are we. And if you’re stuck on a tricky boss fight, unsure of who to take out on a date, or want to finish that capture quest, we’ve got you covered.
We’ve got guides on the games to play after finishing Unicorn Overlord and how to level fast in that very same game. We’ve also got tips for getting all those Cactuar Caper locations, and how not to suck at one of FF7 Rebirth’s mini games. Scroll through for all the best tips that came out of this week.
Once you’ve assembled all your troops, it’s time to configure the marching order for the parade. Hit L2 to start arranging them. Different assemblies will influence the difficulty of the upcoming parade sequence across three performances. The higher the difficulty, the better the reward—and and the boost toyour relationship levels with Tifa and Aerith.
If you choose security officers across the whole lineup, you’ll get the easiest parade sequences for all three performances. The difficulty levels will change in real time as you adjust the soldiers. So you can pick something that’s more balanced. But the most challenging and rewarding lineup consists of two grenadiers, two riot troopers, and one flame trooper.
The parade sequence isn’t easy, especially considering all the running around you have to do to gather up your troops. While you may miss out on a chance to improve your relationship with Tifa and Aerith if you don’t perform well the first time, you can always go back to the parade sequence by selecting Chapter 4 from the chapter select after finishing the game.
It was a rather big week in gaming, this last one in February—mostly because we got Final Fantasy 7: Rebirth, and everyone came out of the woodwork to spout their hottest take and spiciest opinion about the Square Enix RPG. Is Cid redeemed? Is Aerith a goat lady? Is jank good?
It wasn’t all FF7 all the time: We also had some things to say about third-person shooter Helldivers 2, this week, because we’re a well-rounded bunch. Click through to see our most opinionated stories of the week.
2024’s most anticipated game is finally here, and the further adventures of Cloud Strife and his besties has launched on PS5. Final Fantasy VII Rebirthexpands and enhances the middle section of the 1997 classic, and there’s a big, beautiful world to see. If you’re looking to spend a few dozen hours in Square Enix’s…
Image: Kotaku / Xbox / Thomas Mucha / Lukasz Pawel Szczepanski (Shutterstock)
Over the February 3 weekend, reports from different outlets and insiders claimed that a number of big, Xbox exclusives—like Starfield and Gears of War—could possibly end up on PlayStation 5 in the near future. Once the news spread around the internet, the most Xbox-pilled users and creators began theorizing, denying, mourning, and ranting to those within their Church Of Xbox circle and beyond. Then, Xbox boss Phil Spencer posted a vague statement, seemingly confirming something was happening but the faithful would have to wait until next week to hear what. Perhaps he thought this would calm the masses. It didn’t. Instead, for some devoted Xbox fans, it was confirmation that the brand they worshiped was leaving them behind. And they aren’t taking it well (though some remain pretty chill about the prospect of Starfield coming to PS5). – Zack Zwiezen Read More
This week we’re going back to school,collecting Pals, and being reborn—that’s a lot of stuff to do without some tips. Palworld, the breakout hit from developer PocketPair, got a handful of major bug fixes that will make your creature-collecting a lot easier. And Atlus’ recent Persona 3 Reloadrelease means you’ll want to make sure you’re a Grade A student and a damn good friend—luckily we’re here to help you with all of that. The week also saw the surprise-debut of a Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth demo, and with progress carrying over to the main game, you’ll want to make sure you do everything you can with Sephiroth and company.
That’s why we’ve gathered the biggest, best, and most helpful Kotaku tips of the week, all in one spot. You’re welcome.
Tekken 8 has been out since January 26 for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S. While you might be tempted to jump straight into its online matches, which you’re not prepared for—trust me—you should check out the game’s story mode first. Not only does it introduce you to many ofTekken 8‘s characters and themes, but it also sets up a bombastic, relentlessly over-the-top narrative about breaking the chains that hold us back. And it’s a great way to acclimate yourself to some of the game’s new mechanics. This is a story mode you shouldn’t miss. – Levi Winslow Read More
Were you bummed Final Fantasy VII Rebirth didn’t make an appearance? Well you’re not alone. Good news, though! On February 6, 2024, we’ll be treated to yet another State of Play showing, this time with a closer look at the upcoming second chapter of the Final Fantasy VII remake project.
And that wraps everything we saw at tonight’s State of Play. Which games are you most excited about?
It’s time for a second trip to Seattle in The Last of Us Part IIRemastered. Originally shipped in 2020, Part II amps up the scope of the series, as well as the violence. The result is a dynamic, stealthy survival horror romp that takes place decades after a world-ending pandemic. It can be a tough game to play, and Remastered also includes a new roguelike mode for those who want an even greater challenge. – Ari Notis Read More
Think the first week of January is a slow one for news? Think again. A 13-year-old Tetris phenom has boldly gone where no one has gone before, beating the NES version of the classic puzzler by reaching a “kill screen” on level 157. Steam announced the occasionally baffling results of its annual players’ choice awards, and The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall got a free-to-play, fan-made remaster.
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Before Starfield, before Skyrim, before Fallout 3 and Oblivion, before your parents even knew how to make you, there was The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall. It was, and remains, Bethesda’s biggest-ever game, and now a fan-made rebuilding of the entire vast world in Unity has reached its 1.0 release. Oh, and it’s entirely free, and won’t be destroyed by lawyers! This new Daggerfall is an almighty achievement, and exactly the excuse you needed to return to Tamriel. – John Walker Read More
The results of 2023’s Steam Awards are in. Each year, Steam turns to the community to vote on the year’s best games across a wide variety of categories. This year saw Larian Studios’ RPG Baldur’s Gate 3 grab game of the year, while Lethal Company, a first-person cooperative horror game,got the “Better With Friends Award” for its co-op gameplay. The Last of Us Part I snagged Best Soundtrack, which seems odd because it came out in 2013, but it technically wasn’t added to Steam until 2023. – Claire Jackson Read More
Just two months after the third-person action-horror game Stray Souls came out, developer Jukai Studio abruptly shuttered its doors, citing myriad issues including poor game sales and multiple cyberattacks from an unknown perpetrator.The developer took to X/Twitter on December 22 to announce the sudden closure. Part of the problem, Jukai Studio said, was Stray Souls’ abysmal reception and sales, which made the team “completely unable to sustain the company.” – Levi Winslow Read More
Classic puzzle game Tetris has been around for over three decades, and in that time, plenty of people have reached its various endings, usually by clearing four rows of bricks at once like a digital demolitioner. That’s a challenge in and of itself, but now, someone has taken the concept of “beating Tetris” to the extreme by playing the NES game so hard it straight-up crashed, a phenomenon also known as the “kill screen.” – Levi Winslow Read More
Forever-in-development space sim Star Citizenmight not be finished after over a decade of dev work and announcements, but it does already contain a lot of expensive ships you can buy and fly around in. And if you want all of those ships in one big DLC pack, Star Citizen has an option for you. Just be prepared to spend over $48,000. – Zack Zwiezen Read More
Here’s something unironically wonderful. Via a post by Larian Studios writer Rachel Quirke, we’ve just learned of a deeply moving tribute to a player’s father that appears in the studios’ award-winning RPG Baldur’s Gate 3. In October 2020, a member of the Larian forums posted to thank the developer for releasing the first act of the game in Early Access, because it allowed them to enjoy one last adventure with their father, who had recently been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. – John Walker Read More
Screenshot: Ubisoft Massive Entertainment / Kotaku
Star Wars Outlaws, Ubisoft’s upcoming action-adventure game that follows scoundrel Kay Vess between The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi, previously had no release date beyond a very broad “2024” window. Today, however, a Disney Parks blog post quietly announced that it would launch in “late 2024.” This didn’t last long, as Ubisoft promptly swooped in to correct the record and re-assert the general 2024 timeframe. – Levi Winslow Read More
City of Heroes was a beloved MMORPG that launched in April 2004 and lasted just over eight years. In that time it won a dedicated community of players who, even after the game died, kept playing the MMO via private servers that existed in a weird legal gray area. But now, the developers behind City of Heroes have given one private server the official thumbs-up to keep on keeping on. – Zack Zwiezen Read More
A new month is nearly here, as well as a new year, and that means updates to the PlayStation Plus catalog. January kicks off 2024 with three new games available for Premium, Extra, and Essential members to download starting on January 2, as well as some goodies if you happen to be a space ninja. – Claire Jackson Read More
The Last of Us Online is dead. Naughty Dog announced today that the multiplayer spin-off of the hit series is no longer in development, citing concerns about managing ongoing content for a live-service game while still trying to produce the single-player blockbusters the PlayStation studio is famous for.
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“We realize many of you have been anticipating news around the project that we’ve been calling The Last of Us Online,” Naughty Dog wrote in a December 14 update. “There’s no easy way to say this: We’ve made the incredibly difficult decision to stop development on that game.”
The studio said that as production on the project ramped up, it became clear that “we’d have to put all our studio resources behind supporting post launch content for years to come, severely impacting development on future single-player games.” The choices were apparently between becoming a “solely live-service games studio” in the mold of modern day Bungie, which makes Destiny 2, or “continue to focus on single-player narrative games that have defined Naughty Dog’s heritage.”
The Last Of Us Online, which many many fans previously referred to as Factions after the multiplayer mode from the original 2013 PlayStation 3 game, was first announced during Summer Game Fest 2022. The spin-off was billed as the studio’s “biggest online experience” ever, and as large as any of its single-player games.
But Naughty Dog never showed the game beyond vague statements and concept art. Then in May of this year, Bloomberg reported that the production team on the game had be scaled back following negative feedback from an internal review by Bungie, which Sony acquired last year. At the time, the studio posted a statement on Twitter saying that while things were progressing well, the game required more time. By October, however, Kotaku reported that the project had been “put on ice” amid some internal reshuffling and dozens of contracted developers being laid off.
The Last of Us Online was one of a number of new multiplayer projects in development across Sony’s studios as the PlayStation 5 maker invested in a massive shift toward more live-service games. In November, Sony revealed during an earnings call that half of the roughly dozen online games it was working on would be delayed past 2025.
In the meantime, Naughty Dog is still working on a “brand-new single-player game” it plans to reveal sometime in the future.
We realize many of you have been anticipating news around the project that we’ve been calling The Last of Us Online. There’s no easy way to say this: We’ve made the incredibly difficult decision to stop development on that game.
We know this news will be tough for many, especially our dedicated The Last of Us Factions community, who have been following our multiplayer ambitions ardently. We’re equally crushed at the studio as we were looking forward to putting it in your hands. We wanted to share with you some background of how we came to this decision.
The multiplayer team has been in pre-production with this game since we were working on The Last of Us Part II – crafting an experience we felt was unique and had tremendous potential. As the multiplayer team iterated on their concept for The Last of Us Online during this time, their vision crystalized, the gameplay got more refined and satisfying, and we were enthusiastic about the direction in which we were headed.
In ramping up to full production, the massive scope of our ambition became clear. To release and support The Last of Us Online we’d have to put all our studio resources behind supporting post launch content for years to come, severely impacting development on future single-player games. So, we had two paths in front of us: become a solely live service games studio or continue to focus on single-player narrative games that have defined Naughty Dog’s heritage.
We are immensely proud of everyone at the studio that touched this project. The learnings and investments in technology from this game will carry into how we develop our projects and will be invaluable in the direction we are headed as a studio. We have more than one ambitious, brand new single player game that we’re working on here at Naughty Dog, and we cannot wait to share more about what comes next when we’re ready.
Until then, we’re incredibly thankful to our community for your support throughout the years.
It was a big week for the scantily clad at Kotaku this week, with both GTA 6 and Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth giving players plenty of skin. We’re also feeling veryexcited about the new Fallout show, but decidedly less enthusiastic about the minimal focus on the actual awards at this week’s Game Awards.
Grand Theft Auto 6 Comments: A Dramatic Reading
These are the week’s most interesting perspectives on the wild, wonderful, and sometimes weird world of video game news.
Grand Theft Auto 6 looks gorgeous. Unless its debut trailer this week was faked, it might end up being one of the best-looking games of this console generation when it comes out in 2025. By that time, my Xbox Series S will be five years old. I shudder to think of that sleek little white box trying to play Rockstar Games’ latest open-world blockbuster. – Ethan Gach Read More
I’ve played about six hours of Ubisoft’s new Avatar: Frontiers Of Pandoraand my big takeaway is that Avatar sickos will love this game, Far Cry Primal fans will get a kick out of Ubisoft returning to this formula, and everyone else, well… uh…dang, the game sure is pretty, huh? – Zack Zwiezen Read More
An intimate moment in GTA 6.Screenshot: Rockstar / Kotaku
Good news, everyone! Unless you’ve been living in a monastery, you’re likely aware that 2023 is the year that video games got horny again. And no, I don’t mean tastefully Hades frisky, I mean Leisure Suit Larry and Night Traplevels of unhinged lust, the likes of which “mainstream” gaming (whatever that means) hasn’t seen since the 1990s. – Jen Glennon Read More
Historically, TV and film adaptations of video games don’t have the greatest track record. The last few years, however, have started turning that around. Pikachu, Sonic, and Mario have all starred in successful movies, and earlier this year The Last of Us got a proper prestige adaptation that certainly left a mark on fans. – Claire Jackson Read More
And so that’s that. The Game Awards 2023 are over. 32 awards were handed out over three and a half hours. You might think, with that much time to spare, the show took its time and truly celebrated all the creators and games nominated for what the show calls “Gaming’s Biggest Night.” Nope. Instead, more so than before, the show sped through them at a rapid pace, making me wonder why it still pretends to be an award show at all. – Zack Zwiezen Read More
Final Fantasy Tactics is one of the best games Square Enix ever produced, and it’s not available anywhere on modern consoles or PC. A remaster is an obvious way to fix that problem, and it seemed like all signs were pointing to one getting announced any day now. So it’s an especially cruel twist of fate that the original game’s director, Yasumi Matsuno, keeps toying with fans’ emotions about whether a remaster is actually happening or not. – Ethan Gach Read More
Cyberpunk 2077 is in a pretty good spot these days. After a dumpster fire of a launch, the next-gen update, 2.0 patch, and Phantom Liberty expansion have gotten CD Projekt Red’s open-world RPG to a respectable state. The 2.1 patch that launched this week adds a nice little bow to the game as its “last big update.” It has long-requested features like a working subway you can take across Night City, and it also lets V, its mercenary protagonist, spend a little time with their lover in their apartment. The results are an adorable stay-at-home date with your paramour, but for as sweet as it is, these hangouts underline something that felt left out of the Cyberpunk 2077 redemption arc: the romance. – Kenneth Shepard Read More
The first trailer for Rockstar’s next Grand Theft Auto game, likely to be named GTA VI, comes out December 5. What can we expect the trailer to reveal? Well, based on Rockstar’s past GTA trailers, which are fantastic, there’s a pattern that can help us predict what we might see during GTA VI’s official debut. – Zack Zwiezen Read More
Earlier this week, we asked you all to give us your choice for the best video game sequel. Any sequel would count and everyone was free to suggest any game they wanted, no matter how old, obscure, or divisive. And we tallied up all the answers, crunched the numbers, and figured out your top ten sequels. – Zack Zwiezen Read More
Sultry singlets everywhere, oh my!Screenshot: Sega
The secret is out: the Yakuza / Like a Dragon series has great minigames. Whether you enjoy playing retro arcade brawlers like Virtua Fighter, dumping dozens of hours into becoming a real-estate tycoon, or chatting up bodacious babes at the hostess club, Sega’s goofy action series has plenty of pleasant timesinks to wile away the hours. Though it’s still several weeks away, it’s already clear that the upcoming Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth is no exception to that rule. – Jen Glennon Read More
Gaming’s biggest night has come and gone, and perhaps the biggest surprise of all was just how little time devs were given to thank their family, fans, and recently deceased colleagues during their acceptance speeches. But before that, we finally got our first in-depth look at Rockstar’s GTA 6, the most anticipated game in a decade. Here’s your cheat sheet to the week’s biggest news.
Rockstar Games has confirmed that, at least at launch, the company’s long-awaited open-world crime sim, Grand Theft Auto VI, will launch on Xbox Series X/S and PS5 only, with no mention of a PC version. – Zack Zwiezen Read More
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time is often heralded as one of the best adventure games of the past 25 years. With the nefarious Ganon once again scheming to conquer the land, it’s up to Link to traverse through time, space, and yet another aggravating water temple to save the Kingdom of Hyrule. While the epic for the N64 is celebrating a major birthday this year, inspiring tribute mash-up videos and social media celebrations, another classic Zelda title is quietly celebrating a major milestone of its own. – Jen Glennon Read More
The Day Before kicked off 2023 as one of the most wishlisted games on Steam. Now, after endless controversies, the self-proclaimed open-world survival-horror MMO styled after The Last of Us is finally in Steam Early Access, and it’s getting panned. The first players to lay hands on the much-hyped zombie shooter are sharing footage of game-breaking glitches and leaving thousands of negative reviews. – Ethan Gach Read More
Overwatch 2 season eight begins today, December 5, but Blizzard showed off its new skins, events, and latest tank hero, Mauga, before kick-off. And the sentiment from players about the skins for season eight has been mixed—Baptiste’s formal wear is a standout, but it’s sandwiched between some real stinkers and an unremarkable Mythic Skin. But one cosmetic has stood out for all the wrong reasons: Mercy’s Year of the Dragon event skin. – Kenneth Shepard Read More
2023’s The Game Awards just wrapped. Did you watch it? Well, no worries if you missed it (or had something better to do) as we’ve rounded up every major game trailer and world premiere you could want to watch in a single sitting. So if you’re looking to check out a new trailer or catch up on all the games that were announced this year, you’re in the right place. – Claire Jackson Read More
A seven-second TikTok reverberated across the internet over the weekend, after it claimed to show the “first look” at in-game footage of a city in Grand Theft Auto VI, the open-world blockbuster whose official trailer is just a day away. Frantic speculation about whether the footage was real or not ensued, including unverified rumors that the leak involved a Rockstar Games developer’s own kid. – Ethan Gach Read More
While Sony acquired Destiny 2 maker Bungie for $3.6 billion in 2022, it repeatedly claimed the creator of Halo and other hits would remain an “independent subsidiary.” Now IGN reports that if Bungie’s sci-fi MMO keeps failing revenue targets, Sony could dissolve its existing board of directors and take full control of the roughly 1,100 person studio. – Ethan Gach Read More
After a long and tumultuous road, Cyberpunk 2077 appears to be getting its final major update today. The sprawling patch includes a new ridable metro system and more romance options, as well as a host of other tweaks, changes, and additions. Unless it ends up breaking something big in the game, consider patch 2.1 Night City’s last overhaul until Cyberpunk 2 arrives a decade or so from now. – Ethan Gach Read More
It’s been 15 years since the last proper game in the Mana series, and that one wasn’t even any good. The Final Fantasy action-RPG spin-off’s legacy has been marked by more downs than ups, but the peaks still burn so brightly in fans’ memories that it’s hard to believe the franchise won’t one day make good on its earlier promise. Visions of Mana is being pitched as exactly that. I hope it doesn’t let us down.
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Officially revealed during last night’s Game Awards ceremony, I initially mistook Visions of Mana for a Dragon Quest game. The trailer looked very pretty without being overly busy, and showed open environments and real-time combat that found a nice balance between barren PS2-era 3D zones and modern arenas bursting with too much detail. Not quite a big-budget blockbuster or a bold retro HD-2D reimagining, it seems to be charting a humble new beginning for the verdant fantasy franchise.
Mana series illustrator Airi Yoshioka’s designs sported glow-ups befitting the current PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S console generations, while snippets of a score by returning composers Hiroki Kikuta, Tsuyoshi Sekito and Ryo Yamazaki sounded promising. The action, meanwhile, centered on the massive Mana tree and a handful of fights bookended by familiar Rabites and a Mantis Ant boss.
Visions of Mana will come to PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, and PC sometime in 2024, at a time when Square Enix has been dipping into the back catalog more than usual. We recently got Star Ocean: The Divine Force and Valkyrie Elysium, fine games that were nice for longtime fans but didn’t exactly set the world on fire. Will the return of Mana be any different?
The series began as Final Fantasy Adventure on the Game Boy in 1991 before getting its own title and a breakout hit on SNES called Secret of Mana. The top-down action-adventure was like The Legend of Zelda with an RPG twist, including a leveling system, weapon combos, and a varied magic system. Instead of traveling alone you were accompanied by two AI companions, and like Final Fantasy there was an overworld map you could eventually traverse via a flying dragon.
The pixel art was gorgeous. The music was beautiful. To this day it has some of the best scored environments of any RPG. And despite a clumsily localized script, the dungeons, destinations, and pacing made it an unforgettable journey. The series continued with a Japan-only sequel (Trials of Mana), an experimental PS1 game (Legend of Mana), and a fantastic Game Boy Advance remake of the first game (Sword of Mana). Then things quickly unraveled.
Screenshot: Square Enix
The 2006 DS game Children of Mana was a randomly generated dungeon crawler that felt unimaginative and repetitive, and 2007 PS2 game Dawn of Mana took the series into 3D with a clumsy targeting system and character progression that reset after every chapter. A 2007 real-time strategy game for the DS called Heroes of Mana was overly simplistic and bland. The series’ identity fell apart outside of its unique art-style, pretty music, and familiar monster designs.
To rebuild, Square Enix returned to basics by remastering and porting the original games. In recent years fans were blessed with the Adventures of Mana remake, Collections of Mana ports, a Secret of Mana remake, a Trials of Mana remake, and the HD remaster of Legend of Mana. The series’ highlights have been assembled and modernized on every platform. The only thing missing was a new Mana game to rival the ones from 20 years ago.
“The development team have been working hard to ensure that Visions ofMana remains faithful to the series that players know and love while also offering fans and newcomers a fresh new experience with an all-new story, characters, and gameplay mechanics,” Mana series producer Masaru Oyamada said alongside the game’s announcement. It’s a promising start. But Mana fans have been burned plenty of times before. Please don’t let this be one of them.
The long awaited (official) debut of Grand Theft Auto 6 is nearly upon us, Starfield is shedding like a bad wig, and Coral Island has hunks in every direction.
The Top 10 Most-Played Games On Steam Deck: October 2023 Edition
These are the week’s most interesting perspectives on the wild, wonderful, and sometimes weird world of video game news.
In the weeks following the launch of Skyrim developer Bethesda’s highly anticipated RPG Starfield, the game has caught a bit of attention for its plummeting player numbers on Steam. Its ranking from user reviews has also dropped on Valve’s digital storefront, falling from “Positive” into the pale orange of “Mixed.” Why is one of the biggest RPGs of the last few years seemingly falling out of favor with players so soon? Read More
One of my favorite Black Friday traditions is scrolling through GameStop on my phone and getting a bunch of cool games for cheap. Usually it works out just fine. Last weekend it was a nightmare. It’s hard to convey just how terrible navigating the experience of trying to buy something from GameStop has become in 2023, but I’m going to try. Read More
Wish, the 62nd film released by Walt Disney Animation Studios, is a bad movie. The film is meant to celebrate the studio’s 100th anniversary, but instead, its incoherent story and reliance on millennial cliches for cheap jokes come off like it was fed into an AI generator and spat out onto the big screen. And the music, always a staple in Disney films, has some really lovely parts that are sadly weighed down by terrible lyrics. Read More
Coral Island, the new farming and dating sim by Stairway Games, is the latest example of a game in which pursuing a handsome lad is enough to drag me through something I’m otherwise lukewarm on. I’ve spent chunks of my playtime chopping trees trying to make a real farm out of my designated plot of land. But I do not wish to chop trees, I simply wish to climb Coral Island’s residents like trees. Read More
I don’t have a lot of complaints about Baldur’s Gate 3, but the original ending is probably my biggest issue with Larian Studios’ excellent RPG. Though I was content with the ways the story concluded, its rushed execution left me wanting more, which was even more readily apparent when I tried the game’s “evil” ending and it was about as fleshed out as an intrusive thought. Larian has been adding new content to the ending since launch, including a new scene dedicated to Karlach, but in Patch #5, the studio has created an entirely new epilogue that feels like the debrief the original game was missing. Read More
I assume most of you reading this have played at least a few video game sequels in your life and while you might have enjoyed them all, this week at Kotaku we want to know: What do you think is the best video game sequel of all time? Read More
It’s that time of year again. Today, November 29, Spotify users all over are sharing their year-end “Wrapped” recaps, which try to sum up your past year of musical taste by giving stats and rankings on your most-listened-to artists and songs, alongside a sleek graphic to share on all your socials. I look forward to it every year. But as Spotify Wrapped has practically become an internet holiday, I can’t help but notice that it’s gamified how we listen to music throughout the year. Read More
At long last, the GTA VI rumor mill can slow down. Rockstar Games officially announced the sequel in February 2022, but the studio just confirmed that a trailer for the long-awaited crime sim sequel will arrive on December 5. As we gear up for GTA VI‘s reveal, we at Kotaku have just one question: What do y’all want to see from the game? Read More
Amouranth bought an orchard for a cool $17 mill, Bethesda’s attempting to win the hearts and minds of disaffected Starfield players on Steam, and Dan Houser is back! In podcast form!
Diablo IV – Bear Bender Build
Here’s your cheat sheet for the week’s most important stories in gaming.
In a newly released preview of Amazon Prime’s upcoming Fallout TV show, we learned a lot of new details about the world, characters, and story of the highly anticipated live-action adaptation of Bethesda’s popular post-apocalyptic RPG franchise. For example, the show is considered canon with the games. And Walter Goggins still looks good, even as an undead ghoul. Read More
An intense debate ignited November 13, when The Game Awards host Geoff Keighley announced the nominees for this year’s trophy ceremony. While some folks were surprised Pikachu face byStarfield’s absence, most people were shook by one particular title offered up for the “Best Independent Game” category. Now, after a couple weeks of silence, Keighley has tossed his two cents into the discourse. Read More
Reader, if you don’t mind a quick look into my personal neurosis, let me tell you that when I’m really looking forward to something, I get a great deal of anxiety about possibly dying before I get to experience it. I’ve felt this about video games, movies, albums, concerts, and pretty much anything else worth being excited about. Right now, the third live-action Sonic the Hedgehog movie is near the top of my list of Things I Must Survive Long Enough To Experience. This isn’t because I think the movie will be great, or even good, it’s because Shadow the Hedgehog, the best character in the franchise, is set to appear as a main character. All those feelings of excitement and existential dread have been roused today, as Paramount has released a picture of the angsty, broody, gun-toting king on set…well, his feet, at least. Read More
The meta-narrative around Starfield just took a very weird turn. Steam reviews for the sprawling sci-fi RPG recently fell to “mixed” on Valve’s storefront, and now Bethesda employees are arguing with players in the comments about why the game isn’t as boring and soulless as some of them claim. Read More
The hardest thing about Destiny 2 is getting any of your friends to play it. Fans of Bungie’s ambitious and imaginative sci-fi shooter have long hoped for a simple on-ramp that would make it easier to get lapsed players and newcomers back into its universe. Destiny 2’s new “Starter Pack” might sound like exactly that. Instead, it’s a pricey bundle of random items that fans can’t stop dunking on. Read More
When Overwatch 2 shifted the hero shooter’s economy away from loot boxes and into a seasonal battle pass, the customizable Mythic Skins unlocked at the end of that pass were framed as the light at the end of the grindy tunnel. Unlike any other Overwatch skin, these would be somewhat customizable, offering a few style and color options for players to make them their own. In the game’s first year, seven of its iconic heroes have gotten one of these Mythic skins, which mostly been well-received. But after Blizzard revealed season eight’s skin for tank character Orisa, players are noticing a downward trend in Mythic Skin quality. Read More
Photo: Absurd Ventures / Kotaku / Patrick McMullan (Getty Images)
Dan Houser, who co-founded Rockstar Games and was the lead writer on multiple Grand Theft Autoand Red Dead Redemption games, has finally revealed what his new studio is working on. If you were expecting a video game…well, you’ll have to keep waiting. Read More
Dragon’s Dogma 2 looks awesome, right? The much anticipated action role-playing game about dragons and pawns came out swinging with a hefty new gameplay showcase on November 28, showing off the impressive character creator and some spectacular combat and officially revealing a March 24, 2024 release date. One thing that isn’t so awesome, however, is the game’s relatively high price tag of $70, which marks the first game from Capcom at this price. Read More
The November 10 launch of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare III reignited the seemingly endless debate about multiplayer matchmaking, with players demanding Activision and Infinity Ward provide details, or even abolish it entirely. This conversation has perpetuated across multiple Call of Duty releases, but the team behind the popular first-person shooter has yet to properly acknowledge it—until now. On November 30, an official statement was shared by popular CoD website CharlieIntel on X (formerly Twitter). Read More
The hardest thing about Destiny 2 is getting any of your friends to play it. Fans of Bungie’s ambitious and imaginative sci-fi shooter have long hoped for a simple on-ramp that would make it easier to get lapsed players and newcomers back into its universe. Destiny 2’s new “Starter Pack” might sound like exactly that. Instead, it’s a pricey bundle of random items that fans can’t stop dunking on.
Diablo IV – Bear Bender Build
Season of the Wish went live today with an exciting trailer and new missions revolving around collecting dragon eggs to win over an old enemy. But players also quietly noticed a new DLC add-on on PSN, Xbox, and Steam that went live alongside the latest update. It’s called the Destiny 2 Starter Pack, it costs $15, and it’s one of the more ridiculous microtransactions I’ve seen. Contrary to what its name might suggest, the Starter Pack does not include any expansions, missions, or story content. It’s just a random assortment of stuff meant to “supercharge” players’ arsenals. Here’s what’s included:
Traveler’s Chosen
Ruinous Effigy
Sleeper Simulant
Exotic Ship
Exotic Sparrow
Exotic Ghost Shell
125,000 Glimmer
50 Enhancement Cores
5 Enhancement Prisms
1 Ascendant Shard
Image: Bungie
Those first three items are all old Exotic weapons that have been in the game since 2019 or before. They are mostly fine but only synergize with specific builds and can all be acquired from the Tower kiosk without too much fuss. The ship, sparrow, and ghost shell are purely cosmetic and completely dependent on personal taste. In my opinion at least, the ones in the Starter Pack are far from some of the game’s better designs.
The materials, meanwhile, are pretty stingy. Glimmer is Destiny 2’s main in-game currency, earned by doing anything and everything. Cores, prisms, and Ascendant Shards (what players lovingly call “golf balls”) are for focusing engrams, rerolling gear, and crafting new items, none of which is particularly helpful for new players, nor very meaningful in the quantities offered. It’s not even enough to fully masterwork a new piece of armor. It’s a bizarre array of accouterments to buy for more than the cost of an entire season of the game.
“I’d say this is pay to win, but really it’s just a waste of money,” wrote one player on the Destiny subreddit. “Pay to lose.” Another wrote, “This is pathetic. 3 mid exotics, a few crap cosmetics and some materials is not worth that much. A real starter pack would be guns and old DLCs.”
There are three broad obstacles to players getting back into Destiny 2. The first is that most of the story is no longer in the game due to content vaulting. The second is that Destiny 2’s “New Light” campaign remains pretty barebones and offers no real direction with end-game activities. And the third is that despite ostensibly being free-to-play, all of the expansions are paid and unlocking access to everything is still quite expensive. Shadowkeep, the underwhelming 2019 expansion, is still normally $25. The Starter Pack just adds to the noise, confusing players with misleading descriptions like “Fly between destinations in your new Exotic ship.” Narrator voice: Exotic ships are just custom loading screen animations.
The Starter Pack also comes in the context of layoffs at Bungie amid the delay of 2024’s The Final Shape expansion and reported revenue shortfalls. At a time when the studio is apparently desperate for money, the $15 bundle just underlines the gulf between players and whoever is leading Destiny 2’s monetization strategy. It’s one thing to milk whales, but as Destiny 2 players are pointing out, the new Starter Pack seems squarely aimed at taking advantage of new players who won’t know any better. In the words of one of them, “This is some mobile game shit.”
Update 11/29/2023 6:09 p.m. ET: Bungie appears to have removed Destiny 2’s controvertial Starter Pack from storefornts, including Valve’s storefront. “Notice: Destiny 2: Starter Pack is no longer available on the Steam store,” reads an update on the Steam listing. PlayStation Store listings, meanwhile, return error pages.
Screenshot: Valve / Kotaku
In addition to roasting the microtransaction on social media and Reddit, some players had also attempted to review-bomb the bundle and change the Steam tags for it to things like “psychological horror.”
Wish, the 62nd film released by Walt Disney Animation Studios, is a bad movie. The film is meant to celebrate the studio’s 100th anniversary, but instead, its incoherent story and reliance on millennial cliches for cheap jokes come off like it was fed into an AI generator and spat out onto the big screen. And the music, always a staple in Disney films, has some really lovely parts that are sadly weighed down by terrible lyrics.
The Most Sought After Elden Ring Sword Has A Storied History
Overall, Wish is a hot mess, but for Kingdom Hearts fans, its core premise could have significant implications for Square Enix’s Disney and Final Fantasy crossover—that is, if Tetsuya Nomura and friends decide to incorporate it into future Kingdom Hearts games.
What is Wish about?
Wish is set in the kingdom of Rosas, where King Magnifico, a sorcerer with the power to grant wishes given to him by the common folk, hoards wishes as magical orbs and refuses to grant ones he doesn’t believe will be good for the kingdom. When a citizen turns 18, they give Magnifico their wish for “safekeeping” in his study until the day he decides to grant it. While he might believe himself righteous, as protagonist Asha points out, Magnifico has created a system in which he controls the fate of everyone in Rosas, rendering the townsfolk hopeless as they wait for their wishes to be granted. As the film progresses, the king’s true nature as an egomaniacal bastard becomes apparent and Asha leads a rebellion against his tyranny.
But what does this have to do with Kingdom Hearts? As Asha learns more about the wishes in Magnifico’s clutches, it becomes clear that some of these wishes have to do with events that lead into various Disney movies. One Rosas civilian wants to fly, wears a green tunic, and is named Peter like Peter Pan. Valentino, Asha’s pet goat who gains the ability to speak because of magical shenanigans, wishes for a place where all mammals live equally, referencing the idyllic vision of 2016’s Zootopia. Asha herself becomes a Fairy Godmother and dons a cloak similar to the character from Cinderella.
Disney
There are other references, like Asha’s group of friends all dressing and acting similarly to the seven dwarves from Snow White. And when Magnifico is defeated, he’s trapped in a mirror, basically becoming the Magic Mirror from the same movie. There’s even a split-second frame in which his face is outlined to look like the mask that inhabits the mirror in the 1937 film.
What does Wish mean for Kingdom Hearts’ Disney universe?
All of this (and the 90 minutes of other Disney movie references) is part of the purpose of Wish—to celebrate Disney’s history—but there’s a larger implication here: Rosas is the center of a connected Disney universe. According to co-directors Chris Buck and Fawn Veerasunthorn, as well as co-writer Jennifer Lee, Wish isn’t hardwired as a multiverse launch pad, but it does imply characters like Peter Pan, places like Zootopia, and songs like “When You Wish Upon A Star” are the dreams of the citizens of Rosas. Prior to this, Disney has featured the occasional crossover detail before, like Frozen featuring characters from Tangled in a crowd shot, which Disney has mostly acknowledged as cute nods. But Wish makes an entire plot point out of Disney’s most beloved characters and worlds having an inception within its kingdom.
This raises questions as to how that world would function in a potential Kingdom Hearts’ crossover. Will Kingdom Hearts play with the abstract ideas Wish hints at? In Square Enix’s RPG series, protagonist Sora and his friends Donald and Goofy travel to various Disney worlds on a spaceship. But before these worlds were separated, they originated from Scala ad Caelum, which featured heavily in Kingdom Hearts Union χ and in the final section of Kingdom Hearts III.
Image: Square Enix / Kingdom Hearts wiki
Incorporating Wish and Rosas into Kingdom Hearts’ world would require a great deal of retconning, as Square Enix has already been building out its own connected lore for 20 years. It’s unclear if it will even have to reckon with it anytime soon given Kingdom Hearts IV has been in development concurrently alongside the movie, and Disney began work on Wish in 2018, a year before Kingdom Hearts III launched. While we don’t know what Disney worlds will appear in the next game, we can reasonably assume Disney and Square have been talking about Kingdom Hearts IV while Wish was in production.
Kingdom Hearts has released plenty of prequels and midquels in between its numbered entries that help recontextualize story beats or fill in gaps, but Scala ad Caelum’s place as the root of Kingdom Hearts’ Disney crossover is pretty well-established. So it might just be easier for Square Enix to ignore Rosas and Wish’s Disney cinematic universe entirely. However, the series is no stranger to tweaking characters, worlds, and relationships to fit its own narrative. On top of weaving the existence of the shadow-like enemy Heartless into Disney movie plots, Kingdom Hearts has continued to fold new movies into its storytelling.
The first game made the Seven Princesses of Heart (which included Alice, Snow White, Jasmine, Belle, Cinderella, and Aurora) into a unified, magical force that affected the entire known Kingdom Hearts universe. Kingdom Hearts III made sure to add newcomers Rapunzel, Anna, and Elsa as part of the New Seven Hearts meant to take up the mantle. So Rosas could realistically be molded to fit the needs of a new story arc—perhaps it could be the origin point of the new worlds Sora will explore in Kingdom Hearts IV, further explaining the expanding lore without stepping on the toes of the story the series told before.
Image: Disney
Wish attempts what Kingdom Hearts pulled off over 20 years ago
Kingdom Hearts’ interconnected Disney universe was a pretty novel idea back in 2002 when the first game was released. But nowadays, crossovers are so common they’re having diminishing returns. Take a look at recent Marvel Cinematic Universe box office numbers and you’ll see people are less infatuated with the concept of everything they watch and play weaving into one another. A shared Disney universe is a core theme in newer games like Disney Dreamlight Valleyand Disney Mirrorverse, but Kingdom Hearts is one of the few examples where those worlds feel cleverly woven into each other, rather than thrown together in a disconnected pocket dimension. Now that Wish is at least toying with the idea of Rosas as the source of characters and ideas seen in previous Disney films, Kingdom Hearts is in an interesting position. It has to either reckon with one of the movies it may feature eating its lunch—albeit with its hands instead of a perfectly good fork and knife and just generally making a mess of the table—or find a way to wiggle out of the bind it’s put the series in.
I do wonder if, given Wish’s middling reception and box office performance, Square Enix might opt not to touch the movie or its characters at all, as it would complicate things in ways that are probably not worth the trouble. But Kingdom Hearts has put some mid-ass Disney movies in its games in one way or another, so who knows? Yes, I’m looking at you, Chicken Little. In the meantime, let’s hope whatever Disney is cooking for 2024 doesn’t read like it was written by ChatGPT.
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