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Kotaku's Weekend Guide: 9 Incredible Games We Can’t Stop Thinking About
10.5.2024
Whether you have a bunch of free time or hardly any at all, whether you’re playing on console or PC, there are plenty of great games to obsess over right now. Our recommendations for what to play this weekend include everything from sci-fi thrillers and loot-driven action-RPGs to esoteric puzzle...
Nintendo Pres Doug Bowser Gets Into LinkedIn Brawl Over Flight Etiquette
9.5.2024
We’ve all, at one point or another in our time on the internet, seen a post or comment so mean, shitty, or just bad that we can’t help but start clacking the keys and writing up a response. It turns out, even Nintendo of America’s president—Doug Bowser—can’t always resist the siren song of hopping...
Big Shakeup At Nintendo Testing Center Ahead Of Switch 2
27.3.2024
Nintendo of America is restructuring the small army of contractors that helps test its games and hardware in its Washington state headquarters, the company confirmed to Kotaku. According to four current and former contractors, the result is a massive downsizing that comes amid layoffs across...
Nintendo Is Bringing A Highly Requested Game To Switch Online...But Only In Japan
21.2.2024
Nintendo Directs are often different across different regions. The order of games presented may be a bit rearranged, or there may even be wholly different titles announced in one region than another. Today’s Partner Showcase may have featured the single biggest such discrepancy of all time. Why?...
The State Of The Nintendo Switch In 2023
27.12.2023
The Switch is going out with a bang. Ahead of the likely reveal of the Nintendo handheld hybrid’s successor next year, the aging hardware continued receiving an amazing slate of new games in 2023, including The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, one of the best entries to date in...
2023's Biggest Video Game Leaks, From Wolverine To GTA
20.12.2023
2023 is nearly a wrap. As we close the books on what was an outstanding year of video games, we also note that 2023 was a year rife with something else: leaked information about video games. Oftentimes very big leaks. This year was lousy with them.Read more
Starfield Testers Had To Unionize To Get A Copy Of The Game
8.12.2023
Microsoft has agreed to add 77 temporary game testers the recently established quality assurance union at ZeniMax Studios. In a breakthrough moment for the industry’s growing labor movement, 23 of the workers will become full-time, while all will get raises and free copies of Starfield,...
Nintendo Accounts Will ‘Ease’ Transition To Next Console, Exec Says
20.10.2023
One of the biggest questions about Nintendo’s next console is how it will treat everyone who’s built up a massive library of games on the Switch. Nintendo of America President Doug Bowser isn’t ready to spill the beans about the Switch 2 yet, but he is teasing a smoother transition to the company’s...
Nintendo’s Genius Plan To Sell More Switches Depends On Kids Fighting
6.9.2023
The Nintendo Switch has sold an unprecedented 125 million units so far, putting it right behind the Nintendo DS (154 million) and Sony’s PlayStation 2 (over 155 million) on a list of best-selling consoles of all-time. Could the handheld hybrid surpass them and become the best-selling gaming device...
Nintendo’s Genius Plan To Sell More Switches Depends On Kids Fighting
6.9.2023
The Nintendo Switch has sold an unprecedented 125 million units so far, putting it right behind the Nintendo DS (154 million) and Sony’s PlayStation 2 (over 155 million) on a list of best-selling consoles of all-time. Could the handheld hybrid surpass them and become the best-selling gaming device...
Microsoft Promises To Play Nice With Future Unions Too
2.6.2022
Microsoft is trying to strike a more conciliatory tone with organized labor as it looks to get its $69 billion mega video game merger with Activision Blizzard OK’d by the Federal Trade Commission. Vice chairman and president Brad Smith wrote that the company is “committed to creative...
Gaming Gets Its First Union At A Major U.S. Studio
23.5.2022
Despite months of negative talking points by Call of Duty publisher Activision Blizzard, quality assurance staff at its Raven Software studio voted to unionize Monday, becoming the first union at a big studio in the U.S. The successful vote comes with talk of labor organizing picking up across...
Nintendo Still Silent On Workplace Allegations Despite Acknowledging Them Internally
12.5.2022
It’s been nearly a month since a former employee filed a National Labor Relations Board complaint against Nintendo alleging surveillance, coercion, and retaliation. Outside of an initial statement denying the company engaged in union-busting, the house of Mario has remained publicly silent in...
Reggie Fils-Aimé And Satoru Iwata's Great Nintendo Friendship
3.5.2022
It started with an unheard-of request. Reggie Fils-Aimé wasn’t yet president of Nintendo of America. Heck, he wasn’t even an employee—but rather, interviewing for a job. Yet he wanted to speak with Satoru Iwata.Read more
Dragon Age 4 QA Devs Say They're Unionizing Over Bad Pay And Covid Safety
27.4.2022
The video game industry is currently undergoing a small but unprecedented wave of developer organizing. Last week it even reached the halls of famed RPG maker BioWare, where a group of QA contractors working on Dragon Age 4 revealed their intention to unionize. The two biggest reasons why? Bad...
BioWare Contractors Supporting On Games Like Mass Effect Seek To Unionize
25.4.2022
Keywords Studios developers working in support of Dragon Age 4 maker BioWare are seeking to unionize. That’s according to an April 20 application filed with the Alberta Labor Relations Board. The staff is preparing for a union vote following recent labor organizing efforts at other game...
The Nintendo of America Contractors Who Feel Like Second Class Workers
22.4.2022
A union-busting complaint recently filed with the National Labor Relations Board accused Nintendo of America and contract worker agency Aston Carter of surveillance, retaliation, and other unfair labor practices. According to four sources familiar with the incident, that complaint, first reported...
GameStop’s Meme Stock Is Back With A Vengeance
1.4.2022
People have been waiting for the GameStop bubble to pop for over a year now. Instead, the ailing brick and mortar video game retailer just posted another record week on Wall Street. Earnings are down. Employee morale is in the pits. But the company’s stock went from $78 per share last month to over...
Nintendo’s Reggie Kicked Too Much Ass For GameStop Suits
14.3.2022
When former Nintendo of America president, Reggie Fils-Aimé, joined GameStop’s board of directors in 2020 the video game retailer was trading at less than $5 a share. A year later the stock was over $150 and Fils-Aimé was headed for the door. Why did he get out when things were so hot? Apparently...
The Game Awards Won't Take Sides On Activision Fallout To Focus On Reveals
3.12.2021
As Geoff Keighley’s annual Game Awards show enters its eighth year, the creator and host told The Washington Post today that he’s still thinking about how to “navigate” Activision Blizzard’s involvement in the ceremony following the latest reports of sexual misconduct at the publisher.Read more