best of 2023

Mistress Isabella Brooks Image Credit: LeAnn Mueller for Rolling Stone Drag has been under attack in various parts of the United States, with laws aiming to restrict public performance popping up in Tennessee, Arkansas, Texas, and Kentucky, among many others. Rolling Stone talked to Mistress Isabella Brooks and other drag stars about fighting back Read the article Mistress Isabella Brooks Image Credit: LeAnn Mueller for Rolling Stone Drag has been under attack in various…

From Emmy-nominated zombie dramas to billion-dollar children’s blockbusters, these are the adaptations that elevated gaming’s Hollywood presence in 2023 In the past, when you’d think of “video game movies,” your mind likely shuddered at the thought of John Leguizamo’s cringey slapstick in 1993’s Super Mario Bros. or Raul Julia’s scenery-chewing final role as M. Bison in the disastrous Street Fighter. Over the last thirty-odd years, Hollywood has floundered in their attempts to…

2023 was an incredible year for games, with each month grabbing our attention with a defining entry — be it sequels, remakes, or highly-anticipated blockbusters. Since the Holiday season is here, we asked the folks at Gadgets 360 what their highlights were, only to be met with some truly compelling takes. One of them is an award hoarder pushing the role-playing medium forward and alarming the larger AAA gaming industry, while the other is an indie game about fishing, whose deep waters hide some Lovecraftian…

From iconic reprisals to bizarre publicity stunts, and some great performances in between, here are the year’s biggest gaming cameos, ranked from worst to best Since the early days of gaming, movie tie-ins and celebrity appearances have made for an imperfect pop culture marriage. What once amounted to cover art and blocky polygonal renderings that sort of seemed like your favorite actor with a squint has, thanks to the acceleration of motion capture and facial scanning…

Ask anyone who works at Rolling Stone what they’ve been listening to lately, and you’re guaranteed to get an interesting answer. In the final weeks of the year, more than 30 colleagues from across the departments that make RS submitted their personal picks for the 10 best albums of 2023. You’ll find practically every sound imaginable represented somewhere on these lists, from the biggest pop hits to the brightest DIY gold and everything in between. Think of this as a fun counterpart to our official list of the year’s…

Let’s get this out of the way: Taylor Swift dominated the year in music, and it wasn’t even close. Four-year-old songs of hers topped the charts. She sold physical albums at a head-spinning rate. Her Eras Tour was an economic stimulus in every city she played, and reignited conversations around the deeply broken ticketing marketplace as fans scrambled to purchase tickets. Her relationship with Kansas City Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce created a frenzy around a celebrity simply attending NFL games. And she also released…

When you think about seminal years in gaming, a few instantly come to mind. There’s 1986, the year that gave us 8-bit classics like Metroid, Dragon Quest, The Legend of Zelda, Castlevania, and Adventure Island. Or there’s 2013, which brought modern epics like Grant Theft Auto V, The Last of Us, Bioshock Infinite, Dota 2, and revamped Tomb Raider. In a world where gaming is a commodity, with more platforms in everyone’s grasp and development tools available to the masses, it takes a lot to stand…

Happy New Year! 2023 is here — and that means there's a lot to look forward to in the new year. For instance, what are the biggest upcoming games in 2023? Whether you're on mobile, PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, or Xbox Series S/X, there are a lot of new games headed your way in 2023. We will take to the Indian Ocean in Skull and Bones, head to a galaxy far, far away with Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, and get the best of both worlds in Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile.Elsewhere, 2023 heralds the…