What Do We Owe Completion: Life, Games, Or Ourselves

Ever notice how a week of sunshine can make your entire life plan feel negotiable? We come back from warm skies into a New England blizzard and wrestle with the real calculus of moving: Florida’s zero state income tax, lower average salaries, housing swings, insurance shocks, and the gravity of family roots. St. Augustine tempts us, but so do the nearby burbs where hockey rinks sit within a short drive and mornings don’t hurt. On the road we snuck into DC at daybreak for quiet monuments and kid wonder, then crowned Buc-ee’s as the clean-bathroom boss of travel side quests.

Back home the games take over. A Steam Deck detour turns Final Fantasy muscle memory into Elden Ring panic heals, and we laugh at how quickly a button swap humbles you. Then we push into a bigger question: why DLC so often misses our momentum even when the stories are great. A cloud-sync disaster nukes a hard-mode save in Final Fantasy VII Remake, forcing a full replay and exposing the line between stubbornness and grit. We trade notes on PS5 storage pain, the lure of a fresh PC, and the deeper tradeoff between console stability and PC tinkering.

Underneath it all runs completionism. Some of us need a perfect side quest grid before advancing the story; others edge sidewalks every mow but outsource laundry without guilt. We ask what games reveal about our standards at home, why certain goals feel too low until life makes them just right, and how play becomes a mirror we can actually read. Joy snaps back with WWE 2K26 hype, father–kid trash talk, and trampoline suplexes, then we check in on SWOTOR’s small-team rhythm—slow story, smart events, and just enough pull to log back in with a hybrid class.

Hit play to travel from sunshine math to save-file heartbreak, from clean gas stations to clean trophy lists, and from side quests that delight to main quests that define. If the conversation lands, subscribe, share with a friend, and drop a review telling us your next main quest.

Transcript

Warm Vacations And New England Doubts

SPEAKER_01 0:00

So how was the holiday? Like, I okay, so like the real talk, like this is like the no this is like the no joke talk. Every time I go somewhere warm, I ask myself, why the fuck do I live in New England?

SPEAKER_00 0:17

Why do you live in New England? Because I went for a walk in my short sleeves because my office felt warm today. Think about that. Actually, you know what? Don't just think about that. Suck on that, Marcus. Yes. I did that too. He was down there for a week. He knows exactly what it was. He didn't he didn't swing by. I was totally ready every night. Let's go get a coffee. It was a very busy trip.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

But that's okay.

SPEAKER_00 0:49

Yeah. Yeah, you don't need to be in New England, Marcus. I'm gonna be stuck on that the whole rest of the talk.

SPEAKER_01 0:58

Oh, I agree with you. I completely agree. It's but I guess what I'm trying to say is I put a lot of I've been putting a lot of thought into it, and even my kids are like, Mom, why do we live here? And what it comes down to is we're here because of my wife. But because I and like you could say because of my job, but not really my job, right?

SPEAKER_00 1:25

You get jobs so easy no matter where you are. It's a ridiculous superpower that I don't even understand.

SPEAKER_01 1:34

But I guess what I'm saying is I don't really care, you know what I mean? I don't know. I just for me, I just wanna it sucks. Like coming okay, so we drove down and it we the first day we got there, it was like 65 and windy, which was fine. I was still in a t-shirt, right? Like loving life. But the reality of all of it is that when we came back in the next morning, we got hit with a blizzard.

SPEAKER_04 2:12

Mm-hmm.

Cost Of Living And State Tax Math

SPEAKER_01 2:13

Yeah. And just the funny stuff is when I was at when I was down there in Florida, I was researching where all the hockey rinks were, and there were three hockey rinks within 35 minutes of me. I'm like, perfect, I can still play hockey, it's fine. Yeah. And I and I went on indeed and looked at the jobs. Just the only thing that I did notice is my job down there does not pay as much as it does up here. So I don't know if Florida is. I'm trying to think of the way right way to say this. I don't know if Florida is cheaper to live in than New England. Probably isn't it? Do you have state tax?

SPEAKER_03 3:06

It might be payless, but is it the proportional to the cost of living?

SPEAKER_00 3:15

Florida has zero state tax, so that's one thing to think about if you're coming from state income. Yeah, if you're used to seven percent of your paycheck going to state income tax, you get to keep that. So it's like you gotta raise. Right.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

But that's what I'm saying. So it's the point, all I guess at the end of the day, guys, all I'm trying to say is I'm over it. And I don't know if North Carolina and South Carolina scare me because every single time a hurricane comes up the coast, it hits those states. Yeah. Georgia's intriguing to me. I would love to move to Florida. I really like there's a town in Florida called St. Augustine. I really like that town.

St. Augustine Dreams And Nearby Burbs

SPEAKER_00 4:09

Like you're educating us about St. Augustine. It's the oldest city in the United States, Marcus. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

Well, what I'm saying is it's like of all the towns, like I think I'd like that town.

SPEAKER_00 4:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 4:23

It's really nice. It does, but it does have a higher cost of living just because it's uh it is very tourist driven. So it does have a bit higher cost of living.

SPEAKER_01 4:35

Yeah, and when I say Augustine, you don't need to live in. Right, but you don't need to be in St. Augustine. You could be the next town over, like the Burb. It could be Ashwash Awashawash or whatever town it is. There it is. You know what I mean? Like you could I could move there.

SPEAKER_00 5:01

I like Marcus's version better just for the record.

SPEAKER_01 5:04

Well, because when you drive to Florida, when you drive to Florida, you see all these crazy town names, Hoochie Coochie Kachika, and like all these like different state and town names, and it's just hilarious to me.

SPEAKER_00 5:21

Tribal influence, Marcus. That's all that is.

SPEAKER_01 5:26

I don't care what it is, I just think it's funny names.

SPEAKER_00 5:29

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 5:30

Like we have Boston and Worcester in Springfield, like normal names. We don't have Hacha Watcha, Watchu, Watcha Watcha. And it's like, how the hell do you even say that? Because however I say it, I'm butchering it. I'm sure there is, but those are easy to say.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Because there's fewer than five syllables.

SPEAKER_03 5:56

It doesn't taxing ability.

SPEAKER_01 6:00

Yes. I know I opened the door for you. But something cool that we did, and I'm just gonna preference this. Please don't put your politics in this bullshit because I don't want to hear it. But we stopped in DC. It was like 8.05 in the morning, and we got to see the Lincoln Memorial. That's cool. Uh, the White House, like we got a selfie, because it's 8 15 in the morning. The streets are empty on a Saturday morning. We got a selfie in front of the White House. Like, that shit's cool. Like, I've never seen that ever in my life in front of my face. You know what I mean? So that was pretty cool. And what's it, the Washington Monument, big towel? Yeah, we saw it. You should see my kids, they were like, I'm looking straight up and they were like, How did they build that? And I'm like, I don't know. Magic. Very carefully. Fairies. Lots of fairies flying around, tinkerbells, like carrying the load, using their magic. The pixie.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

Imagine a version of Washington, DC where fairies are allowed.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

But either way, so that was like, but those are the things, and Buckeys. I think we stopped at Bucky's. Every Bucky's on the gas station. Yeah, Bucky's is awesome. Yeah, they have one in South Carolina, Georgia, and two in Florida. Did you stop at all of them? No. Okay. On the way down, we stopped in South Carolina, and then we stopped at the one in St. Augustine. It just happened to work. On the way back, we actually just got gas at those two. You know what it is? The Buckeys, I don't know what they do. This is not relevant to video games, but I'll get there. Part of questing is called a side quest. Yes. And I'm not a side guy.

SPEAKER_00 7:45

Yeah, you took a massive side quest and left the main quest to the rest of your party last week. Yeah.

Buc-ee’s Detour And Side Quest Joy

SPEAKER_01 7:50

That's and it was so cool because Bucky's is different, right? Like it's packed. It's like a shopping mall in one store. Anything you can imagine is at Bucky's. But the one thing that I will give Bucky's a lot of credit for is they have the cleanest bathrooms I've ever been in in any gas station ever.

SPEAKER_03 8:10

That is a typical, uh typical evaluation of Bucky's.

SPEAKER_01 8:14

Yeah. It was rad. It was good. As I said, I would circle back to video games. I was on my Steam Deck, and I was just hanging out, and I wasn't tired at all. And I was like, almost done with filling the fantasy, but I was just like, I don't feel like playing that. So I loaded up Elden Ring. I'll never play it on. Yeah. Okay. Let me tell you, after playing like Phil the Fantasy, and the dash button is A.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

Oh no.

Steam Deck Sessions And Elden Ring Whiplash

SPEAKER_01 8:48

Excuse me. And like all the button, like my mindset wasn't ready for it. And I was in some, it wasn't like a dungeon. I don't know. It's in the DLC, but it's like a not a cave, but it was like a building, and there's these giant rock guys, and then they have this little like hole in their lower back that you have to hit behind them. And I was it was fine. I had I was just laughing because I was so terrible at it. Eventually, like it took me like three or four tries to get through the thing, but it was just so funny because I forgot how much concentration Elden Ring needs to play it. And I was hitting A to dash instead of B to roll, and I was just healing myself, just getting annihilated. It was funny.

SPEAKER_03 9:36

Oh, the muscle memory you're going to play a different game with the same controls.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

Yeah. I've watched you on screen share, Marcus, and I'm pretty sure what you're describing, I wouldn't have noticed a difference.

SPEAKER_01 9:56

I don't mess up what the roll button is. You don't panic heal. No, I don't ever panic heal. I don't heal.

SPEAKER_00 10:04

You don't panic salute.

SPEAKER_01 10:05

Like just so me.

SPEAKER_00 10:11

I love that you played it though. I've been trying to get you to do that for weeks, it feels like I guess what I'm hoping for is someday you'll give new game plus a remote.

SPEAKER_01 10:23

Well, so I okay, so going with that, I've been thinking about that, and I don't know if New Game Plus is like a now thing, but I definitely am not as interested in the DLC.

SPEAKER_00 10:42

Yeah, I agree with you. I've I've had a really hard time with DLCs that extend games that I already feel like I'm done with, and I want to tack on to that, Marcus. It is not just Elden Ring. Same thing happened with Claire Obscure Expedition 33. I never went back to Final Fantasy 16 for the endgame DLC or after game DLC. I never did it for God of War Ragnarok. The all these games have a thing in common, which is I beat the game once or twice and had moved on, and then this extra little story that sounds really cool got added to the game, and it just didn't draw me back in. Also, Resident Evil 8. I never played the DLC for that, and that's a big deal because you know what comes out in two hours and 47 minutes, everybody. Are you gonna play it at midnight? I'm not gonna play it at midnight. I'm going to play it tomorrow morning at twitch.tv slash doctorgamology. And for anyone who doesn't know, I wrote a book, it won an award, and on the cover of the book, there is an umbrella logo on one of the towers in the background. It's not big and it's actually a little bit blocked, but it's there. And I always tell people that you can tell exactly what games made me because they're all hidden on the front and back cover of my book somewhere. Like those are the dock games if they're on there.

DLC Fatigue Across Big Franchises

SPEAKER_01 12:19

I don't know what made you, but you complete me. Oh, that's so nice. Going with your point, because I want I think I know Dorito's take on this, but I want to hear it from him. But as much as I agree with you, would you say what's my favorite trilogy of games ever? Oh, favorite trilogy.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

Is it Castlevania?

SPEAKER_01 12:41

Trilogy of thank you. Mass Effect. Yeah, sorry. They have DLCs for yeah, so they have DLCs for I think two and three. I never played them. Zero interest. Yeah. Like it just didn't do anything for me. So I do agree with you. The DLCs.

SPEAKER_03 13:03

Two were okay. Actually, you did I like playing them too. I like playing the DLCs in Mass Effect 2 because when I played Andromeda, they actually talk about every single one of the DLCs. There's a storyline tie-in for them. So that was interesting because I played them, like, oh, hey, I remember that. Kind of like if you haven't been to a town that you grew up in, or if I went to visit the where I went to college up in Tennessee, that yeah, oh, I remember when this was whatever sandwich shop or whatever that is. But here in but take that kind of nostalgia reminiscing and plopping that in the video game was cool because hey, I did that DLC, I did that DLC. I remember doing that. And hearing how they tried to weave it into Andromeda.

SPEAKER_00 14:04

Someday I should play Mass Effect, huh?

SPEAKER_01 14:08

Yeah, you should, but I'm believe it or not, I'm I'm okay with you not. Because what does that mean? I'm giving you sh I've come to grips that you're never gonna play that game. And it's okay. I've moved on. I look at it like this. It's your loss. You're missing out on some of the greatest story content ever. But you have also invested so much time into games for their stories that I will never play. You know what I mean? And maybe I'm just getting old, right? And it makes me think about how Doritos plays a game, gets a hundred percent, completes it the entire game, then does all the DLC, completes that a hundred percent, and then he goes to his job and he completes all of his tasks to a hundred percent, leaving nothing left behind. Oh, if I could do that a hundred percent at work, that'd be great. You do, and then they pile 10 more things on you, but you're I'm guessing, and I don't know this, but I'm guessing you're a completionist at home as well.

Save Corruption Setback And Restart Grit

SPEAKER_02 15:35

Yes, it drives me nuts when my wife and kids leave projects half done. I'm looking at, okay, I got you the drywall, fix the hole in the wall. I've shown you how to do it, fix the hole in the wall. I ain't doing it for ya. Daughter.

SPEAKER_00 15:49

That's funny. There's a circular hole, and you come back and it's only 66% filled.

SPEAKER_03 15:58

Now I'm trying to teach my kids how to repair home things properly, and my daughter's having a hard time learning. I love teenagers, they're great.

Storage Woes, PC Plans, And Platform Tradeoffs

SPEAKER_00 16:12

That is interesting, though, that the desire to get things done completely is mimicked in video games or it's parallel in video games. I guess I shouldn't be surprised because my whole thing actually is that we are still exactly who we are in the way we play video games. We just have to put the mirror up and take the time to think about why we do the things we do. Actually, that whole 100% thing, I do have a segue. We have to update the community on where we're at with the tragedy of Final Fantasy VII remake. I have completed my re-normal run through. So now I'm on hard difficulty, and I've gotten through chapter three. So I had the conversation with Tifa to get her to select dress number two, which means I need to hop to chapter eight and nine so I can get Cloud and Aerith's dress number two, and then I need to redo chapter three, get Aerith's dress number three, do chapter eight and nine, get cloud and ereth's dress number three, then I'll have dress to the nines done, and I will just have two enemy skills to steal from later in the game, and then I will have the platinum trophy, despite the universe deciding to corrupt my 89 hour save file, and I will have it. The thing is, Resident Evil 9 is coming out, and I know I'm gonna take a little break from Final Fantasy VII to play something that's new, but I'm almost there. Wow, that is awesome. That was a lot that didn't take long. Were you here, Marcus, when the whole thing happened that I'm talking about? Not sure. Okay, so I beat the game on hard, but then when my save went up into PlayStation Plus, it uploaded as a corrupted save file. Which means on my one PS5, I have a corrupted save file, and then PS Plus has a corrupted save file. And then when I downloaded that from the cloud, that cloud file is corrupted, so it ruined my save on the other PS5. So then I had no save file after beating the game on hard.

SPEAKER_01 18:36

Did you contact PlayStation? No, why would I do that? Because if it's saved to the cloud, they can probably restore it.

SPEAKER_00 18:46

No, I didn't. I just started the game over and beat the whole game on normal. Wow. He's that good.

SPEAKER_01 18:56

Hey, that wouldn't have happened on an Xbox.

SPEAKER_00 19:00

Wow. Well you're right, because you've had the game for a month on Xbox.

SPEAKER_01 19:05

I've had I don't think I have it. I don't know, actually, Final Fantasy VII remake. I actually bought it on the PlayStation. I never I like did the opening area and I was just like, why am I playing this game? I need to beat Elden Ring. It seems to be the story of my life.

SPEAKER_00 19:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:29

Like once I get it. It took a long time. That's a big milestone, but it no, when I get start playing a game, I can't play anything else. Yeah. I don't want to.

SPEAKER_00 19:44

Yeah, I feel the same way. I usually try to decide the hard drives on both my PS5s feel very small. Or the games are very big. And so you have to choose which ones do you want to have on the hard drive. And I'm constantly deleting games and re-downloading them.

SPEAKER_01 20:03

Can I just ask one quick question?

unknown 20:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:06

Why not buy a bigger hard drive for your PlayStation? It's like if PlayStation does like the easy swap where it's literally one pin, pull it out, pop the new one in, and pop the pin in.

SPEAKER_00 20:21

I don't know. That just sounds complicated to me. It's actually not with the PlayStation. But either way. How many years left do we have in the PS5 to where if I did this it would be worth my time, or are we I guess they did just say they're delaying PlayStation 6 by a couple years.

SPEAKER_01 20:41

Because they're just starting to make PlayStation 5 only games, like in the last year. WWE 2K26 is finally just coming out for two the new Xbox Switch 2 and the PlayStation 5. There's no more PS4 game.

SPEAKER_00 21:07

Yeah. Sony always has done a pretty good job of letting the previous era kind of linger.

SPEAKER_01 21:15

I guess for me, more of the question would be are you planning on buying a new PC in the next year?

SPEAKER_00 21:25

It would be really smart if the answer to that question was yes.

SPEAKER_01 21:29

Because if you are, then I wouldn't buy a hard drive for your PlayStation. Because once you have a PC, a new PC, you're gonna be buying games on Steam again. You won't be playing on your PlayStation.

SPEAKER_00 21:41

Yeah, one of the big reasons that I'm even on the PlayStation is because my computer started to struggle with streaming. Yeah. Yep. I get it. But I really do the guarantee that the games are gonna work correctly. Sometimes Sometimes when you're playing games on PC, the first hour or two of playing is just restarting the game over and trying to get settings to work right.

SPEAKER_01 22:10

Sometimes. Believe it or not, I haven't had that problem in a long time.

SPEAKER_00 22:16

Okay. Like in terms of streaming, like one of the big ones is does the game have full screen window to where the audio will continue if I click onto a different monitor.

SPEAKER_03 22:31

All of them do now.

SPEAKER_00 22:32

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 22:34

Yeah, we get them to work can be a little wonky sometimes. Yeah, for sure. If you get with driver updates and this and that, it gets can be frustrating.

Completionism At Home And In Games

SPEAKER_01 22:43

Yes. Like me, I just I just downloaded Marathon. They have a server slam this weekend. It's like kind of it's an extraction shooter. And I'm gonna play that because I just want to try it. I'm probably not gonna play it again, but I just want to check it out. But I guarantee I'm gonna have to do some driver updates for my graphics card prior to playing that game. It's a little more work, it's a little more work involved. But I want to come back to this question. Doritos. Does it bother does it bother you when things aren't complete in your real life?

SPEAKER_03 23:24

To a degree. Yeah. I gotta see things finished. I don't like seeing things 80% done, 95% done. So I I need to stitch it out.

SPEAKER_01 23:40

Okay, let me ask you a question. Okay, that was done. Yeah. This will define it. When you mow your lawn, right? Do you weed whack every mow? Because that's the difference between going 80% and 100%. I do it probably every other.

SPEAKER_03 24:00

Okay. And I usually I'll weed it before I cut the grass, so that way the lawnmower picks up all the clippings. Sure.

SPEAKER_00 24:10

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 24:10

It's very methodical. It is. Yes. But that's the 80-20%, 80 hundred percent thing.

SPEAKER_03 24:19

So I'll edge the sidewalk and driveway every time. I'll weed it every other time. And yeah, I yep. That's that it that's it. That's just part of doing it in my opinion.

SPEAKER_01 24:29

And for me, Moldhalan. Who gives a shit about weed whacking? It's about grinding that line on the driveway. I could give a shit. Let the grass grow over the edgeway. Awful.

SPEAKER_00 24:42

Sadist. I can't tell if he's just trolling you or not.

SPEAKER_03 24:48

Oh no, I was like, it's probably not on this.

SPEAKER_00 24:51

This is probably everyone. I was doing supervision with someone, and this is a brand new counselor, right? We're doing supervision. We're talking about cases. I'm looking at her treatment plan. She's working with this guy who's got some gambling issue and relationship problem with the wife. The relationship problem with the wife is that she's the go-getter, and he's a bum. And the treatment goals literally were like walk the dogs and clean up after them once a week. I was like, why would you like what does that mean? She's like walks them in the backyard and they'll go to the bathroom and he needs to go out there and clean it at least once a week. I was like, why wouldn't you clean it in real time so that you can walk around in your yard? And then, okay. So she's some people are like that. And then the next goal on the treatment plan is he'll do the dishes once a week. I was like, What does this even mean? You're going to a mental health counselor, and these are the kinds of goals you're talking about. He doesn't do anything in the house, and he came up with this goal, and he's really motivated to do it. And then I was like, Why is this woman with this guy? So I'm just like, and she's like, She's not everybody's like you. I was like, the bar cannot possibly be this low.

SPEAKER_01 26:13

But you could also say that about me with video games.

SPEAKER_00 26:19

Knowing that You beat Elden Ring, Marcus, eventually. That's a lot more impressive than doing the dishes once a month. Let me give you another example. Please.

SPEAKER_01 26:30

I'm in Stormvell Castle. Right? There's an item off to the right, over the river, through the woods, past grandma's house, right there. And I could just turn right to go get that item. And that is a talesman that's gonna help me give me 30% more HP, whatever that is. This is all hypothetical. What do I do? Turn left because that's towards the end of the dungeon. Because if I die, that means I have to start this stupid bullshit over again.

SPEAKER_00 27:06

You did quit the entire game all because you died once in a 30-minute stretch, and that bothered you.

Checkpoints, Tough Dungeons, And Rage Quits

SPEAKER_01 27:14

That was but everybody listening, this is him trolling me because this is after three weeks of dying against this putrid tree avatar that is not hard to beat, but I could not beat this boss for three weeks, caused me to rage. And then I decided to turn it on one day, and Doc happened to be there for it, and I fought this boss once. I died, and I just put it down. I said, Nope, not ready for this game again.

SPEAKER_00 27:44

I was talking about the DLC and how they didn't have enough save points. But that's the I like that story too.

SPEAKER_01 27:51

But that's the stupid dungeon in the DLC that has these like pots on chains, and the dungeon is like an hour and a half long, and if you die, you have to start all the way over. Dumbest thing ever. There's halfway point. I'm sorry, I'm a save point kind of guy. If you have an hour and a half point kind of guy, yeah, like the shirt. Yeah, I would. If you have a dungeon that's an hour long, halfway through, there should be somewhere to stop and say, hey, checkpoint.

SPEAKER_00 28:21

Marcus, if you had turned to the right, you would have found a save point.

SPEAKER_01 28:25

No, there's not a I Googled that shit. There is no save, there is no grease in that dungeon.

SPEAKER_00 28:31

Grandmother's house has a nice little save point that was waiting for you, and you turned left. And then the crucible knight killed me 9,999 times. That's just because you gotta panic with you gotta roll with poise and not panic.

SPEAKER_01 28:47

Believe it or not. Oh. And then so to into the DLC, I forgot. So I beat this stupid dungeon thing, got the whatever they gave me, stabbed my sword into this lava pit and it gave me something. I don't even read what it is. I didn't even care. But then I did something, so I started riding this road and I went somewhere and it says some elden ring thing is broken. What that means, I don't know. And I walked into this room and this freaking hippopotamus attacked me. But all I'm thinking is I broke a break great room. That means I screwed up a bunch of side quests, I'm sure, by doing that.

SPEAKER_00 29:23

That's why you gotta do a new game plus.

SPEAKER_03 29:25

And take you anywhere.

Side Quests, Standards, And Self-Worth

SPEAKER_00 29:28

I don't know what it means. So I really enjoy symmetry, things being congruent, things being complete, things looking nice on both the left side and the right side. But when it comes to checklists and things, it's really hard for me to purposefully pass something. So no matter how many times I've played Final Fantasy VII Remake, the way they display the side quests is they put it in a grid, three across, and then however many rows, depending on so there's one chapter has six side quests, another has nine, but it's always three, six, nine, and that's how it is. And I have never ever finished one of those chapters without completing all the side quests available. Because the idea that there's a quest in that chapter, and I'm just choosing to go straight for the story and say, screw you, I'm not helping you with your laundry, I'm not helping you track down the cats, I'm not gonna corral your chickens, I'm not gonna paint your walls, and I'm not gonna break all your boxes with the time limit and get a high score. I have to do all those stupid things. I can't just end the chapter and move on. Not mentally capable of being that subpar. And that's why I have a PhD, and that's why I judge pathetic treatment goals where people are like, I'm gonna function for five minutes today, and that's gonna be progress.

SPEAKER_02 31:12

But what if that is a good idea?

SPEAKER_00 31:13

And I'm actually I for them, yeah. Okay, like how far can the bar sink? There are so many authority roles that I've had at this point where my job is to enforce expectations and help people dig deep and excel. And I'm telling you, the bar is actually so low that from where I'm seeing, sometimes I can't even see where it is for other people. It is just like pathetic dominates because people don't have the mindset that it takes to be good at gaming, and they want life to be this game that's basically a Lego game where I'm gonna get busted into a million pieces and there is no consequence. And how dare you expect me to do this game well? I agree a hundred percent. So many people I know go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 32:08

I love Lego games, by the way, but I've tried to play the Lego games like Lego's Adventures, Star Wars One, and I always get to a point where I have no idea what I'm supposed to do, and I just I'm like, Alright, I'm done. Shut it off.

SPEAKER_00 32:28

The very first Lego game came out when I was in college, and it was Lego Star Wars, and it was so good, and I got hooked, and up until like Lego Batman 2, I had played all of them. Then they just started to come so fast, and I have not played them all now. But back to that's a video game, it's a video game designed to appeal to children and people with nostalgia for their favorite movies. I just think in life, you should never wake up in the morning or go sleep at night realizing that you tried harder at a video game than you did in life. And if you don't play video games, I don't know where that mentality comes from, but there's just a level of Did I do what I'm aiming for? And there are some people that have never reflected on that question. But then again, if you really read between the lines of the gamer's journey, there's a tragic story in there about a kid who had to explain over and over again that I'm trying to be great, and if you pay attention to how I play video games, you'll see that all I ever wanted to do is make you proud of me. And that maybe there's a level of sucking where I would lose the ability to be loved. So as a result, I just kept excelling, and I never tested what would happen if I didn't do well. And so here we are. And maybe the people they're like, maybe I'll do the dishes once a month. Maybe they're living a much happier life than I am.

SPEAKER_03 34:21

Maybe not.

SPEAKER_01 34:22

I just I don't know. I just feel that I've learned that everybody's different, and I believe that not everybody views life the way we do or individually do. And you just certain people don't do the dishes. Certain people don't do the dishes. Certain people don't complete video games, some people don't do laundry. I don't do fucking laundry. If I wasn't married, it would go to the laundromat, they wash and fold that shit, and it comes out perfect.

SPEAKER_00 35:00

That's crazy that you'd outsource the laundry before learning to do it yourself, Marcus. I have zero interest. Zero. When you were saying about how everyone does things differently, I was looking at us, there's three of us, columns on the screen, right? And I was thinking, like, some of us play Mass Effect, some of us Platinum Trophy Horizon Zero Dawn, some of us just play Final Fantasy VII over and over. That's a really interesting way to think about it.

SPEAKER_01 35:34

But I know one thing that we're gonna be playing next Saturday morning.

SPEAKER_00 35:39

Oh, tell me.

SPEAKER_01 35:41

WWE 2K26.

SPEAKER_00 35:44

What's the first match you're planning to do, Marcus?

SPEAKER_01 35:46

Inferno match, Kane versus Undertaker Inferno match. Second match, that's good. Three stages of hell. I get to pick. I'll be Matt Cardona. My son will probably be whoever has three health bars. We've got a we were I was gonna let him take the day off of school, but the early access doesn't start until midnight Eastern time on the 6th, so we'll be playing it Saturday morning.

SPEAKER_00 36:10

Have you ever played a WWE game that had Inferno matches in it? No, it's been gone for 11 years, yeah.

Laundry, Outsourcing, And Different Play Styles

SPEAKER_01 36:18

And I have to buy my I have to buy the super edition because that's the only edition that comes with 98 Kane. Oh boy. My kid, that's the one he wants. I can't wait for the game. We every time there's a new WWE 2K26 trailer that comes out, like I get notified, and me and Rhino watch it. And he ends up watching it like nine times because he gets so amped. That's awesome. Oh, I can't wait for the game.

SPEAKER_00 36:47

This one looks like it's gonna be really good. Plus, the attitude era theming, that's when I started watching wrestling. And I think the CM Punk mode is gonna be fun. I think they've done a lot of improvements to my GM. There's just so many things I'm excited to try out in this one.

SPEAKER_01 37:03

You know what I do? Individual matches. That's what I do. I know I've never done the showcase mode, I've never done my rise, I've never done career mode, I've never done GM mode, nothing. All I do is matches with my man, and he whoops my ass.

SPEAKER_00 37:21

Showcase mode, though, does unlock characters and alternate versions, costumes, and whatever. You don't care. Arenas.

SPEAKER_01 37:29

We just play. I like unlocking the stuff, Marcus. I could care less. You know what I like? It's playing with my kid and me talking trash to him when I give him a Mexican destroyer, and then he's stunned and I win, and then I rub it in his face.

SPEAKER_00 37:45

Wow. Oh, yeah. Hyper competitive.

SPEAKER_01 37:48

Oh, dude, he gets dude. He'll to distract me, he'll straight up gunther chop me right to the chest. Boom. And I'll pick it up like in real life. Oh, yeah. No, he beats the living shit out of me on the regular. That's fun. Oh yeah, dude. We have when we're outside on the trampoline, that's our wrestling ring. It's awesome. Because like I legit like power bomb him on the trampoline. But like here, we have this thing. If you guys Google the Nugget Couch, it's like a modular couch, and it comes with two pyramid like pillows. It's the ends of the couch or the back. And then it has a thick mat and a thin mat, and it folds into like triangles, and you can make your own four. It's our wrestling ring. The and the triangle pillars are the ring posters. So yeah, and I throw them into it or bash his head into it, or he'll use it as a steel chair. Oh, yeah. It's brutal. Do you ever sell for him so that he every single move he does to me? I sell it. And he knows sells everything.

SPEAKER_00 38:45

Oh man, he's such a bad teammate.

SPEAKER_01 38:47

That's what I tell him. Dude, I was like, I just gave you a brain buster and you got up and dropkicked me.

SPEAKER_00 38:54

And like when I tell you, Oh, so he's Brock Lesnar, basically.

SPEAKER_01 38:57

When I tell you this kid, he hits me and Carrie looks at me and goes, and that hurt. And I'll show her, I'll be like, I'm all red. She'll be like, why do you let him do that? Because he knows how strong he is now. And he knows that's how it is. Yeah. But next week, I can't wait. And then we have Elimination Chamber.

SPEAKER_00 39:26

That's tomorrow, right? Saturday. Oh my gosh, it's still Thursday. Everybody, I've been having a week.

SPEAKER_01 39:37

Doc, you have a week.

WWE 2K26 Hype And Family Matches

SPEAKER_00 39:38

I don't even want to elaborate. I don't want to talk about it. Hey Doritos, do you watch wrestling now?

SPEAKER_01 39:47

I'm trying here. No?

SPEAKER_00 39:52

Actually, you know what? Saturday is a big deal for me because also Scream 7 is gonna be my afternoon. Then straight into the elimination chamber.

SPEAKER_01 40:02

Nice. Doritos.

SPEAKER_00 40:04

It's gonna be great.

SPEAKER_01 40:04

Wrestling? Yes? Do what? Do you watch wrestling yet with your kid? No. Oh. They don't have an interest in it.

SPEAKER_00 40:15

And that's okay. You just gotta put it on and let them watch it. We'll be your kids and watch wrestling with you, Doritos.

SPEAKER_01 40:23

That would be fun if like a Monday night we just watched Monday night Raw on the dirt Discord. Or Friday night Smackdown. I love that shit.

SPEAKER_00 40:34

I always fall asleep during SmackDown now, ever since they switched it to three hours. Oh yeah, everybody does. It's fine. Everybody does.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

And I'm gonna I'm gonna bring something back. So there's two two I have two announcements, but in SWOTOR news, this week, SWOTOR did a live stream for their upcoming 7.8.1. I was there. I listened to it. I watched some of it on my phone while I was working, but I had my earbuds in and I listened to it. Yeah, they've got a lot of for a small team, huh? Go ahead. You said for a small team. For a small team, yeah, the story content is like slug speed USA. But other than the story content, they're doing a good job, in my opinion.

SPEAKER_00 41:26

So, like the structure of keeping the MMO MO ing, they're doing a good job. Yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:31

I think they're doing a good job. There some people have been saying it's dead since year two, but there's they're they've been saying it's dead since week three, right? But they're updating the game. Yes, they're not giving us a shit ton of new content all the time. But they are giving you enough content. I still don't think the subscription-based model for the game is worth it if you were to pay for it unless you raid. Because other than raiding, you don't really need to sub. Nope. It's the only reason you could pay your$15 once and then just get all the story content, and you have hours of gameplay.

SPEAKER_00 42:09

That's true. I did have I got their invite to the content creator call, and I really wanted to attend it because I've been to the last few, but this time around I was just too work busy to fit it in, and that's just my reality now. I hope they still love me enough to keep me involved because I really enjoyed when I dipped back into the game in January.

SPEAKER_01 42:34

That's a game that I just need to get into it. But Doritos, what did you think of the Twitch stream? For Doc brings us on a sidebar.

SPEAKER_03 42:43

It was good. Very curious to see how they choose how they communicate the additional releases because they did say that 8 0 is going to be coming out. If you look in your crystal ball, it's probably going to be holiday, would make a lot of sense. For the 15th of your anniversary for the game, December 11th. They're trying to put a good conclusion to the storyline in release seven. So it's it has been a little sluggish, but again, small team, they're doing a good job of keeping it moving. And they're they've also with the events they've added, so they have their springtime event, they have their the summer event, which is the nightlife event, they've got their fall event, they got their Christmas events. So they're adding a few more of those to I'll say artificially inflate the content, but it is artificial content because it doesn't relate to the in game, but it's still activities where you can go get costumes, get decorations for your in game housing and other stuff. So I think they're I feel like they're still doing a good job. I'm still playing it on the regular.

SWOTOR Updates And Live Service Pace

SPEAKER_01 44:00

Well, I'm going to. I I'm I've been really interested in going back. And I think I just need to finish up the date of all the story stuff and play it and then maybe do some flashpoints because I do miss it. And hearing the new stuff always makes me excited.

SPEAKER_00 44:22

I just really enjoyed making my the sorcerer that can also be a juggernaut. I think that's the coolest thing ever.

SPEAKER_03 44:30

You were very happy when you made that one.

SPEAKER_01 44:31

Oh look at this. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 44:34

Yeah. Just the idea of having a character in Swotor that can tank heal and DPS is the coolest thing to me. But I got busy with other things.

SPEAKER_01 44:47

That's life. And the big news is I have orchestrated a working class nerd's reunion episode. Oh man. So who's going to be on it? Oh well. That's he's the wild card that we don't necessarily know. Him and I were supposed to get we had plans for a week to get together on Tuesday, and he got the he did the no show, but that's okay. We're going to move forward. But no matter what, I'm doing it. So it's going to be Atrax, Rayu, Feta, myself. And if Nick can grace us with his presence, then fantastic. If he can't, then we're just going to do it without him. So where are you doing it? I would say in the coming weeks, we're giving Nick till the end of the week to show up in the text chat. And if he doesn't, then we're just going to pick a date. The real there's a couple reasons why I want to do it. One, the main reason is because I want to let the working class nerds community know that I'm still talking a lot on this show, and that I beat Elden Ring. Hmm. But I need that I want to complete my story with working class nerds of me finishing Elden Ring.

SPEAKER_00 46:04

That makes perfect sense to me. So you do like to complete things. Well, maybe not mowing the lawn, maybe not DLC. But you want to complete your podcast.

SPEAKER_01 46:16

Yeah, I want to end it. I need to, it's been looming on my head for a little while that it's over, but it's not over to me. You know what I mean? And I don't. And to be honest, if I ever did a podcast again, it would be like gaming and hockey, and that's not really. I don't know if I would use the working class nerds tag. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:44

I think about stuff like that all the time. There's some work-related stuff where having a different podcast that's adjacent to this would make a lot of sense.

SPEAKER_01 46:53

Yeah.

Class Flexibility, Nostalgia, And Return Plans

SPEAKER_00 46:54

But I don't feel the energy in me right now to manage two podcasts. You just hit me handle one. That's right. By the way, though, we're completely caught up. I got two episodes out this week. I got two episodes out last week. It's just this one. I might get into a rhythm where I start editing it much quicker so people can get our conversation a lot closer to when it happens, so that when I get to run laps like predicting the Royal Rumble or a new game comes out, they're not getting that 10 days after the game's already been old. That's like a personal goal. That's an excellent one. Yeah. I've just been reflecting a lot about what content things are getting the attention and focus because not just like this kind of content, the podcast, but the gambling training is live and people are taking it now. And so there's already conversation about what the next bundle of trainings that I build for work are gonna be, and I think they're gonna be about video game addiction. But of course, whenever I talk about video game addiction, I also include a really heavy focus on what video games can be psychologically as a good thing. Right. But using games to teach about games is because there's a lot of things that you actually play in the gambling training. Just reflecting, it's like a crossroads.