Pikmin 
3 is taking root with critics.
The oft-delayed, heavily-anticipated, uber-cute strategy title hit retail shelves this weekend in the U.S., and gamers — even the most jaded — are smitten.
The game currently boasts an 87 rating on Metacritic, making it one of the five best reviewed console games of 2013 and the highest rated title to come out for the Wii U thus far.
Roller 
coasters can be scary. The high climbs, the steep drops, and the feel of your body being rattled back and forth is too much for some people.
It turns out, though, that the terrifying part might well be just in your head.
If 
a group of fans get their wish, the Regginator could be headed to the next Super Smash Bros.
A petition asking Nintendo to add Reggie Fils-Aime, president and COO of Nintendo of America, to the fighting game’s roster is gathering steam, having collected over 23,000 of the targeted 25,000 electronic signatures. And a Twitter campaign supporting that petition is proving popular as well.
Nintendo’s 
Wii U woes are dire.
As part of a quarterly earnings announcement Wednesday, Nintendo said that in the three-month period ending June 30, consumers worldwide bought just 160,000 units of its next-generation console.
The 
story of Booker DeWitt and Elizabeth, so far, has largely taken place high above the earth, in a floating city hidden amongst the clouds. For their next chapter, though, they’re headed down to Rapture.
Irrational Games surprised fans Tuesday by announcing the release of new downloadable content for BioShock Infinite — including a trip back to the same underwater city as the original BioShock– after maintaining a virtual cone of silence since the critical hit’s release.
In 
1983, video game companies were riding high. U.S. sales hit a peak of $3.2 billion (the equivalent of $7.3 billion today) and developers couldn’t make games quickly enough.
No one knew it at the time, but the industry was about to dive into a crisis that remains the most serious publishers, developers, and console makers have ever faced.
The crash that followed 1983 almost destroyed the video game industry, nearly relegating video games to the same cultural scrap heap as Pet Rocks and bell bottoms. It came about due to a confluence of events — some eerily similar to where the industry finds itself today.
High-profile 
Twitter meltdowns are fairly common, but they don’t often result in the cancellation of entire projects.
But that’s exactly what happened over the weekend when Phil Fish, the mercurial creator of indie game sensation Fez, was so affected by an escalating series of tirades on Twitter that he declared he was quitting the industry and canceling development of Fez II.
New 
Zynga CEO Don Mattrick has a lot of work ahead of him.
As the company continues to see users abandon its games at an alarming rate, it has reversed course on its plan to pursue real-money casino games in the U.S., a combination that led to investors punishing the stock Friday.
Bobby 
Kotick, the sometimes controversial CEO of Activision-Blizzard, is leading an $8.2 billion buyout from parent company Vivendi, a move that will restore independence to the world’s largest video game publisher.
The agreement will occur in a pair of purchases. Activision, as a company, will acquire 429 million shares for $5.83 billion in cash, while an investor group headed by Kotick and co-chairman Brian Kelly will separately purchase another 172 million shares for $2.34 billion. Kotick and Kelly have personally invested a combined $100 million into the company.
By 
almost any measurement, 2013 has been an embarrassment of riches for gamers. The Last of Us earned some of the highest scores of any game this generation, BioShock Infinite is a critical darling, and the reboot of Tomb Raider was masterfully done.
But while the hit to miss ratio has been skewed towards hits, the misses have been painful. The only thing worse than a bad game is a game that was supposed to be good, but totally failed to deliver on its promise. You know, like these five stinkers:
Chris Morris: Journalist 