From time to time, I'll make a stunt out of my interviews with video game professionals. I'll do this when they're bunched together for a week-long event such as Game Developers Conference or the huge E3 show in Los Angeles. I'll convince every executive and game designer I speak to at one of these things to ask a question for the next person I'm talking to. Or I'll cajole a parade of all-star game creators to play Tic-Tac-Toe. In June, I asked a who's who of developers, some of them rivals, to help draw one sketch.

The two biggest names in gaming are gearing up for a heated head-to-head battle in the lead-up to Christmas.

In one corner is Microsoft with the 4K-enabled Xbox One X. That goes up against Sony's PlayStation 4 Pro which launched last year, and while Sony has undoubtedly come out on top in terms of number of consoles sold so far this hardware generation, Microsoft will soon have the most powerful machine.

Attendees walking in with badges obscured. Security declining to approach an injured show-goer. Robberies, one allegedly carried out by security guards. No metal detectors, no bag checks. E3 2017, by many accounts, had significant issues with crowd control and security.

I love asking questions almost as much as I love listening to answers. Last week at the Electronic Entertainment Expo (AKA "E3", AKA "Electronic Three"), I got to do both of those things.

I love asking questions almost as much as I love listening to answers. Last week at E3, I got to do both!

Every June, the giant video game images adorning the walls of the Hotel Figueroa in LA are one of the stars of E3. I'd always thought they were just enormous posters, but nope, turns out they're actually painted by hand.

Clifford "Cliffy B" Bleszinski once described video game guns' profound appeal with this simple sentiment: "Reach out and touch someone... with your gun." Since the early 1990s, guns have pretty much been the telephone of choice for video game characters: They speak to their rivals with bangs, booms and headshots.

One of the world's top Super Smash Bros. players recently knocked Nintendo for not sufficiently supporting the scene and said he hoped that Nintendo heard him. Last week in Los Angeles, they did — after we played a clip of his speech to Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime.

We've seen all the E3 trailers, announcement and gameplay demos, but one question remains: Which game characters were the best dressed? Here's a few of my favourite looks from the games we saw.

It's the first day of E3. I'm walking the show floor — or more accurately, oozing across it, slug-like, followed by a trail of my own sweat. I'm shoulder-to-shoulder with swathes of people. Across the way, crowds of people whoop and holler, each of them hoping to win swag they can stuff in their floor-length swag bags. 15,000 new people are in attendance this year.

Every couple of Fridays, we have Jackbox games on the chill-out TV in the middle of our office. Anyone that wants to play brings their phone to tap answers in Quiplash and maybe draw one or two things in Bidiots. It's simple and fun, for an hour or maybe two. It brings people together.

Sony's PlayLink does exactly that, but with more depth — like serious, long games like Hidden Agenda (from the team that made Until Dawn) as well as party games like Knowledge is Power and That's You! If you've got a PS4 and some friends or family or maybe strangers to play with, it's a tempting proposition.

This week at E3, my Kotaku Splitscreen co-host Jason Schreier sat down with Bungie's Luke Smith, game director on Destiny 2. They hit a wide variety of topics including what The Darkness is, how the game's open world levels will work, and why they're taking away Jason's Sunsinger res.

E3 isn't just about new games. It's also about new headsets, keyboards, mice, controllers, speakers and storage solutions. Let's take a look at some of the coolest new hardware announced during the show.

We've written a lot about E3 this week and covered a lot of games, including Super Mario Odyssey. Still, here's one more post about that game, because it's too cool not to share with you.

E3 is over, and we made it through alive. On this final episode of Kotaku Splitscreen's E3 blowout, Jason and I discuss what we thought of the show overall before he sits down with a pair of developers working on Uncharted: Lost Legacy and Crackdown 3.

We've seen Splatoon 2's competitive game and co-op Salmon Run mode, but what about those of us who'd rather go it alone? Here's 30 minutes of Splatoon 2's story mode, direct from the Nintendo E3 2017 Treehouse stream.

An invitational was hosted earlier this week on Nintendo's E3 stream for Splatoon 2, featuring four teams competing for a sweet silver squid trophy. Surprisingly, it was a strong showing for the game's competitive aspirations.

Blitzball is coming to Final Fantasy 14, but director Naoki Yoshida doesn't know how to make it happen. He's torn between two options, he says, and both of them sound pretty good.

We've almost survived E3 2017! Just a couple more weeks to go. Today on Kotaku Splitscreen, Jason sits down with two more game developers: The director of South Park: The Fractured But Whole, and the executive producer/lead programmer of Pillars of Eternity 2.