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Fallout 3’s Deathclaw Creator Horrified, Impressed By Its Porn
The Deathclaw is one of the most feared monsters in the Fallout video games. They are able to rip apart low-level or unprepared players in seconds with their long claws and powerful limbs. But did you know that a subset of Fallout players finds the Deathclaws hot? Sexy, even? It’s true—and one of the creators behind the creatures shared their thoughts on all the Deathclaw porn floating around the seedier corners of the web.
Released in 2008, Fallout 3 is not the first game in the franchise but it reintroduced the post-apocalyptic RPG series to modern gamers. And many players coming into Fallout 3 didn’t know that lurking in its wasteland were giant, lizard-like monsters that were extremely deadly and scary. These mutated creatures appeared in past Fallout titles but were redesigned to be more menacing and powerful for Fallout 3. Bethesda artists Jonah Lobe and the late Adam Adamowicz worked together to create the new Deathclaws that would go on to scare players in Fallout: New Vegas, Fallout 4, and Fallout 76. Well, they scared most players. Some had a very different reaction to the monsters.
On August 6, an Instagram account dedicated to Fallout memes and jokes shared an image that made fun of all the Deathclaw porn that exists. The image was a screenshot of Bethesda asking for Deathclaw fan art and then comically reacting to the nasty images it received. And in the comments of this post, Lobe shared his thoughts on all the Deathclaw porn that is out there. (And yes, there’s a lot. Just know if you go looking for it, all of it is NSFW.)
“As the creator of the Deathclaw, I’ve been silently impressed/horrified at the sheer tonnage of Deathclaw porn out there…” commented Lobe.
He later retweeted a response from a cursed Fallout image account that the artist follows. The account, Draco Deathclaw, is a big fan of the creatures and shared the initial image, so they felt responsible for getting Lobe involved. The former Bethesda artist confirmed that this account had “absolutely” something to do with the response.
The Deathclaw’s creator explains why people find it sexy
In an Instagram message to Kotaku, Lobe explained that he designed the Deathclaw to be “beautiful and terrifying” in a “National Geographic sort of way.”
“I gave it a hulking, long-armed physique, a toothy scowl, and lion-like eyes that regarded the player—not with hate— but as if they were food,” said Lobe.
“But some people enjoy being looked at that way—it can be, dare I say it, titillating? And if you pair that gaze with lion-like eyes and a hulking (although fit) body, well then I can see how that might, er, arouse your interest.”
Lobe also explained that Deathclaws—which he told Kotaku were his favorite monsters he’s ever created—have “soft skin” on their underbelly and a “hint of tender pink” around their noses and nostrils. He added these elements to make them seem more “realistic” but he suspects it might have also added a sense of “touchability” to monsters. And while the monster has always been a fan favorite and has even appeared in a recent Tenacious D video, he never expected people would love Deathclaws this much.
“I mean, I’m just scrolling through Google images and I’m… yeah, I guess ‘impressed’ is probably the right word,” said Lobe. “Unsettled, definitely, but I’m not going to yuck anyone’s yum.
Lobe hasn’t posted any specific pieces of Deathclaw porn on social media or YouTube, yet. But he isn’t lying. There is a “tonnage” of the stuff out on the web, along with people commenting on Reddit and elsewhere about how hot they find the large, radioactive lizards.
I don’t want to kink shame, but I’ll offer a warning: If you meet a real Deathclaw and want to fuck it, be prepared for some rough stuff. You are going to need to have an open mind and a lot of stimpacks.
“I suppose I’m grateful that at least some people out there are giving my baby some love! Still, what has been seen cannot be unseen,” admitted Lobe.
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Creator Of Massively Popular Starfield DLSS Mod Defends Paywall
“Starfield Upscaler” is the second-most popular mod for Bethesda’s open-world RPG, but its creator sparked controversy earlier this month because the best version of it was locked behind a $5 Patreon subscription paywall. In a new interview with IGN he defends the practice, and threatens users who try to pirate his work with “hidden mines” that will break the mod.
Starfield released without support for Nvidia’s DLSS upscaling technology that lets players get better framerate performance on PC without sacrificing much image quality. There was a big backlash, and Bethesda has since promised to add official support in an upcoming patch. In the meantime, however, players have flocked to a mod for the feature by NexusMods creator PureDark.
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He released a free version that supported DLSS 2, but access to DLSS 3 support, the newest version, was exclusive to his personal Patreon. Drama ensued and pirates who normally focus on “cracking” the DRM protecting games like Starfield instead took a moment to “crack” the “Starfield Upscaler” mod itself.
“It’s funny that people think this is new, I’ve been providing it as a service for more than 10 months, way before Starfield,” PureDark told IGN. He makes DLSS support mods for all sorts of games, amassing what he calls a small Game Pass-like library of mods worth paying for. “I’ve been making new mods and keeping mods updated for months for my subscribers, is $5 too much for such a service?”
Lots of people don’t agree, and an ethos of “free work, free mods” permeates the creator space around them. More than one company, including Bethesda, has gotten in trouble with fans in the past for going about trying to monetize the community in ways many feel goes against the spirit of it. Some even responded to PureDark’s paywall by making free alternatives of their own, like modder LukeFZ.
Those who still insist on trying to get PureDark’s DLSS 3 mod for Starfield for free better watch out. “From now on I will place hidden mines in all my mods to make it harder for these people,” he told IGN. “The cracked mods will sometimes work, sometimes fail, sometimes work but [be] very wonky, sometimes even crash and they won’t even know if it’s a bug or just them using the cracked version, and they will never have the support I’ve been always providing to my subscribers.”
Update 9/28/2023 2:10 p.m. ET: PureDark’s feelings have apparently changed. In a new interview with Wccftech, the modder says his original comments were made in anger a week ago and he’s since calmed down.
“The interview with IGN was conducted more than a week ago, and it was what I said back when I was angry at haters and those who cracked my Starfield mod,” he now says. “I did think about doing that at some point, but then I stopped doing it. It’s been a long time, and I’ve calmed my mind.”
He added that actually booby-trapping the mod would be a lot of work and not worth the effort. “It’s really not worth it to waste my time fighting or getting back to those people,” PureDark said. “I might as well focus on making new mods and updates.”
Hatoful Boyfriend Creator Says Epic Games Owes Her Royalties
Mediatonic is best known for the colorful battle royale Fall Guys. Long before it was purchased by Epic Games, however, the UK-based studio created the international HD remaster of the cult-hit dating sim about pigeons that go to high school, Hatoful Boyfriend. The game’s original creator, manga artist Hato Moa, now says she hasn’t received a paycheck for sales of the remaster in two years.
“I’ve got no royalty payment for Hatoful Boyfriend from Epic since they acquired Mediatonic back in spring 2021,” Moa tweeted last week after Epic Games announced over 800 layoffs, with Mediatonic particularly hard-hit. “I don’t think the sales have been zero for two years?” She also said she had previously reached out to Epic but it had never responded. The company did respond to her tweets, however, promising to look into the matter.
A spokesperson for the company directed Kotaku to that tweet when asked to elaborate on the situation.
Released in 2011 on PC, Hatoful Boyfriend sees players navigate romantic relationships as a human student at a school where all of their classmates are birds. Branching storylines reveal secrets about the characters, as well as a horror twist. It quickly became a cult sensation, getting translated into English by fans. When then-Mediatonic creative designer Ed Fear played it, he lobbied the studio to work with Moa on an international remake for a wider release. Fear was one of those laid off by Epic last week.
After Mediatonic was acquired by Epic, its remaster was removed from iOS, Android, and PlayStation stores, leaving Steam as the last place to buy the game. Moa speculated that ongoing sales for the game are probably not much, although recent user reviews which give the game a rating of 97 percent positive indicate that new players are still buying it there.
“Don’t worry, I’m totally fine,” Moa tweeted. “I just wish I had been strong and influential enough to support all of [the] nice people from Mediatonic. They’ve been always nice to me and Hatoful.”
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Bayonetta Creator ‘Over’ Old Job, Starting YouTube Channel
After announcing that he would do so late last month, Bayonetta director Hideki Kamiya left his job as vice president at PlatinumGames on October 12. And the very same day he became free of the studio he’d co-founded, he also hard-launched a new YouTube channel, “Hideki Kamiya Channel.” Its first and only video (which has two versions, with English or Japanese subtitles) features Kamiya explaining his decision to leave Platinum, what he’ll do now that he’s left, and his extended thoughts on making curry.
“[I] made CURRY the other day,” English subtitles say. “I had cravings for homemade curry. […] I went to the supermarket and bought ingredients while looking at the recipe on my phone. It says one onion, or maybe it was one-and-a-half, and one potato…”
Yeah, Kamiya doesn’t seem anguished about leaving Platinum, where he directed action-adventure game The Wonderful 101 and supervised every Bayonetta follow-up. The video shows him carrying a box stuffed with collectible figurines and plushies down from the Platinum office, about which he can only say, “I’m over it. I’m so over it.”
Later in the video, Kamiya—with his silver sport sunglasses on—says that it’s been three months since he settled on quitting Platinum, which he wanted to do out of his “beliefs as a game creator.”
“I’m not going to retire yet,” he says. “I want to keep creating games,” though “reasons” he couldn’t elaborate on—probably a non-compete clause attached to his contract at Platinum—prevent him from working in the gaming industry for at least a year. For now, Kamiya, who’s been in the gaming industry for some 30 years, says he’s feeling “very refreshed” watching Netflix instead of “[attending] those boring meetings with all kinds of important people.” He promises to post only “completely useless” information on his YouTube channel.
“[My channel] won’t be help to anyone wanting to be in the gaming industry,” he says. (Shots fired, Sakurai.) Then he drives his sour cherry red Lamborghini into frame. He pushes open one of its batwing doors to speak to the camera: “Off to the UNEMPLOYMENT CENTER. See ya!”
I’m happy for him—the only thing more fulfilling than spending decades of your life becoming a major, powerful figure in a cutthroat, creative industry is doing absolutely nothing.
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Gears of War Creator Suggests Series Needs ‘A Bit Of A Reboot’
Gears of War creator Cliff Bleszinski thinks the series needs to be rebooted and get the same treatment Sony gave God of War in 2018. And he’s willing to help consult on that theoretical reboot if it happens. For Gears fans who haven’t had a new game in the main series for nearly four years, that might sound like a tempting offer.
The original Gears of War and its two sequels were developed by Epic and released between 2006 and 2011 on the Xbox 360. (A spin-off, Judgement, was co-developed by Epic and then-subsidiary studio People Can Fly and released in 2013.) The third-person cover shooters featuring big dudes with chainsaw guns fighting weird bug-people was one of Xbox’s biggest franchises. However, after the original Xbox 360 trilogy and spin-off, Epic went off to do Fortnite and Microsoft created a whole new studio, The Coalition, which took over the series, developed two more sequels, and helped with some spin-offs.
And while many assume a sixth game is coming, eventually, the last main entry—Gears 5—was released in September 2019. The game reviewed well and even outsold Gears of War 4. Since then, we’ve not heard any official word about a Gears of War 6 and now the franchise’s creator thinks it’s time to press the reset button.
In a recent interview with Comicbook.com, Bleszinski was asked if he would ever return to the world of Gears of War, maybe to write a new story for a possible comic book set in the universe. Bleszinski seemed open to coming back to help, but suggested partially rebooting the game franchise instead.
“I believe [Gears of War] needs a little bit of a reboot, like God of War had,” Bleszinski said. “And I’ve always said, [Xbox Boss] Phil Spencer has my number, I’m happy to consult. Gears will always be near and dear to my heart.”
Bleszinski further added that, after drinking a mimosa or two, he sometimes goes on YouTube and rewatches “key cut scenes” from past Gears of War games, including the scene where (spoilers for Gears of War 3) Dom sacrifices himself to save the rest of the squad.
“Reading the comments on those cut scenes from Gears of War when Dom dies, people are like, ‘I had to put the controller down, my friend and I just sat there silenced and stunned.’ For people to actually get tattoos of something that you made on their bodies is the most flattering thing.”
The Gears of War creator also explained that one of the things he’s creatively most proud of is his decision to kill off Dom, who he called a broken man who needed to go out with a meaningful sacrifice.
“It’s just become, in my opinion, one of the most powerful scenes in gaming history,” Bleszinski said. “I’m so very, very proud of it. Just to know that I reached through that screen and that controller and could affect people in a good way and make a lot of them just stop and even tear up means the fucking world to me. Gears Nation, I’ll always love you guys.”
When the interviewer mentioned to Bleszinski that he was 10 years old when he played Gears of War 3 and Dom’s death was the first scene in a video game to ever make him cry, the Gears creator was touched and responded: “That means a fucking lot to me, even though I’m wearing a shirt that says, ‘I eat ass’ in Japanese.”
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