Gaming The System - The Feminist Gaming Podcast

233 - Summer slowdown, sexbots and Switch 2 scrutiny - June News Round-Up (Part 1)

• Gaming The System - The Feminist Gaming Podcast

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In this episode of Gaming the System, Jem, Alex, and Matt look at recent gaming news. Diving into one of the hottest stories in gaming this June: the release of the Nintendo Switch 2.

But first, it’s time for a “what we’re playing” check-in—complete with chill puzzle games, board game obsessions, and Matt’s first ever game of Warhammer 40K.

What we’re playing - Old favourites, cozy summer gaming and Jem's scattergun approach. 

Nintendo Switch 2 - We explore some of the controversy of Nintendo's newest console. Have consoles reached the end of the road?

Join us for Part 2 - where we'll discuss the tentative SAG-AFTRA agreement, our take on Take-Two Interactive's removal of DEI from their Annual Report and Stellar Blade's PC Mods. 

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Jem:

Hello and welcome back to another episode of Gaming the System, the podcast where three intersectional feminists examine gaming and games through a feminist lens. I'm your host for today. I'm Gem, and I'm here with my friends Alex and Matt. So before we get started, if you want to support us, you can subscribe to our patron at patron.com/gaming the system for some exclusive content. Or you can send us a one-off donation via PayPal to our email address. We are gaming the system@gmail.com. this session we thought we would have a look at some of the interesting and exciting headlines that have been making the gaming news recently. So we've selected a few that we think might. Intrigue and provide a interesting discussion point for our favorite topics. And then if anyone's got any other ones they want to bring to the table, feel free to do that and we'll chat about those. before we get started, I thought that we were very overdue. A, what are we playing Check-in because I haven't heard from either of you about what you're playing other than to a T,

Alex:

i've had a bit of a gaming drought, honestly, apart from to a t that we talked about in the previous episode. I've just been pood about here and there. And in a little to the left, I've still got a bit of the last ELC that I haven't finished. And i'll tell you why. You know what time of year it is? It's basically this, the move from the clay season in tennis into the grass season, which is a very busy time of year for a tennis fan to be watching lots of tennis. So I haven't necessarily been spending a lot of time gaming, but the gaming that I have done has been very chill and sort of non-committal, it's not very story heavy. So it's been very chilled and nice. I definitely haven't been locked into gaming as much as I am at other times of year, I would say. But yes, I'd love to hear about what everyone else is doing.

Jem:

I think summer is one of those times when other things tend to get in the way The the

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

Dark evenings and the warmer weather, I have my setup in the lounge and

Alex:

You can see the sun in mine right now is coming straight and through. Yeah.

Jem:

It gets quite difficult to play like anything to intense, because you've got the sun streaming Getting in the way.

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

So what about you, Matt? What have you been playing?

Matt:

I've been having a very exciting time because I've at last played Fallout New Vegas.

Alex:

Oh

Matt:

a hundred hours in it.

Alex:

wow.

Jem:

Oh wow.

Matt:

mind it for. For every of it. although Fin probably tell me a billion things that I've missed,'cause I believe they said that it was their favorite RPG before boulder's gate three.

Alex:

Wow.

Matt:

So that was

Alex:

gosh.

Matt:

interesting really interesting take on it. And I loved it. It's a bloody masterpiece I took a screenshot of every bit of awesome writing that I found, and I've got hundreds of screenshots. It's just that, just right tone of surrealism one of my favorite things is you have to go and there's a hotel that has a client that wants. A, a sex robot, and they're called, they're just called sex bots, but they're quite rare to find. you have to go and find one and you reprogram it to be a sex bot and it's, its name is and F-I-S-T-O. So it is just called Fist o, the sex bot. And so that's just one of those things I burst out laughing multiple times. Doing it. it's awesome and big and fun. And the o it crashed a lot, but I worked out that the only thing that I really needed for it was to move a little bit faster.'cause in the Fallout and fallout New Vegas, there's one movement speed. There's no sprint.

Alex:

oh yeah.

Matt:

And so I literally just installed the one mod, which was move a little bit faster, and then that allowed me to like with a fair bit of stability, fight my way through the wasteland and find all Awesome things. But the most exciting development is I went into the Warhammer store. Away from the train with me and played my first ever game of war Hammer 40

Alex:

Oh wow. That's so cool.

Matt:

in store.

Alex:

Well done. That's amazing. That's so good.

Matt:

And

Alex:

How was it?

Matt:

building up to that for such a

Jem:

Yeah.

Matt:

go and do it, it feels awesome.

Jem:

That is awesome.

Matt:

we played like a 10 minute game with two units

Alex:

Ah,

Matt:

each other,

Alex:

nice.

Matt:

straight away, it's just awesome. I'm really excited,

Alex:

Oh, brilliant.

Matt:

that I've added a new unit to my little army.

Alex:

Uhhuh. Oh wow.

Matt:

is Typhus, the Herald of Nle. He's

Alex:

very cool. Did you paint it yourself as well?

Matt:

no,

Alex:

Ah.

Matt:

I, that's the one part of the hobby that I

Alex:

Fair enough.

Matt:

care less about.

Alex:

Yeah, it's very time consuming painting him,

Matt:

Yeah, it's

Alex:

but yeah, it's very cool.

Matt:

I was scarred by making model airplanes as a child, and there's just something about the smell of that paint that A bit sick, which

Alex:

it is quite strong.

Matt:

sense for these pestilential. They're the death guard the legion of contagion of pestilence. So it would fit them really nicely.

Alex:

Yeah.

Matt:

that's a massively exciting development.

Alex:

Brilliant.

Matt:

had,

Jem:

So did you have to arrange with them before? Did you have to say I'm coming in and, is there anything going on or did you just turn up and somebody was available to, to play or, I've never done, never been.

Matt:

I just sent a message to their Facebook page And he said come along sometime next week when he's in the store and just said he, he works there from. Tuesday to Saturday and just said come in at some point next week and we'll have a chat and I'll walk you through a game.

Alex:

Awesome.

Matt:

went okay. Picked a time, went in, it was empty when I got there, which was just a bit of luck. And Able to have a little conversation with me. He's called Gary. Really nice guy. Really good, very well suited to. Being the first point of contact for people and'cause everyone comes at, comes into the Warhammer 40 K universe a different way. some people only do the painting. Some people like just to collect the model. Some people play, some people read and some people only play the video games and he was just brilliant. So it went on and just went really well, and I'm really glad I did it.

Alex:

Nice.

Jem:

Oh,

Alex:

That's lovely.

Jem:

That's awesome. Yeah, my, my game gaming is a bit not all video games, so I've been a bit fickle with my video games and anyone who see, knows me on Steam

Alex:

Hmm.

Jem:

Would've seen me bouncing about all over the place I've been in, in and out of all sorts of stuff. So I've been playing a little bit of Rim world today and

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

and before I went away I'd been playing a lot of Valheim and then we were playing a lot of grounded, then we went on holiday. So then that kind of put a break in there. I've also downloaded 12 minutes.

Alex:

Heard about that. Yeah.

Jem:

yeah it's fun. And I'm playing it on my I started playing it on my mobile, but I'm now playing it on my tablet'cause it's so Diddy on the mobile, it's just

Alex:

Mm-hmm.

Jem:

Actually move the guy around. I'm doing really badly at it. I'm so bad, at these kind of puzzle games, I got it through Netflix games and I dunno

Alex:

Really

Jem:

come across that, but if you have a

Alex:

no.

Jem:

account, then you can access games that elsewhere you have to pay for. You know that, they're not all massively expensive games, but some of them are ones that I have bought through Steam already and I'm oh, I wish I knew about this.'cause I just got it through Netflix. That's just a little tip. If you're thinking about getting a game, don't assume that it's all just the little, like rubbish games. It's Of the more sort of complicated ones that you will see on steam. So yeah check that out if you have a Netflix account. But I've also been. Quite obsessively playing two board games on board game arena, which I don't know if either of you have come across, but. game Arena is excellent for playing board games online with friends or strangers, but it's also Good way to try out games that you might not want to go out and buy because you get to go through the tutorial and you get To give them a go. And obviously, the, some of these games cost 50 quid and up, they're comparable to, to video games really in their prices when you're buying a box. So it's quite a good way to, to test it out without having to shell out loads of money. And I've been playing Rez and Terraforming Mars and I'm playing with a couple of friends Finn and Caroline. It's been really fun. Just As soon as we finish one game, we immediately start all over again. And it's just, you just do your moves whenever you can, you take it in turns, but you do your moves and you have time. So sometimes people are away or they've got work or whatever, so then it takes longer. So it can take three weeks to get through a game. It can be a bit confusing remembering what you were gonna do and where you got to and everything. But it's been quite fun to do that. And I can do that on my mobile, so I can just do that wherever I am as well. I'm feeling that kind of gaming itch at the moment, but I'm not haven't quite found. The game That's right for me. Like we were saying earlier, I think it might just also be the weather, Time of the

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

So thank you so much for that. It was really nice

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

updates and, well done, Matt. I'm really

Alex:

Hmm.

Jem:

You'll be down there all the time before you know it.

Matt:

Fingers crossed.

Jem:

So shall we get on with some of these news

Alex:

Mm-hmm.

Jem:

Okay. So the first one I thought we could kick off with is the Nintendo Switch two which has just come out on the 5th of June. So just last week. And it's already sold a ridiculous amount of units. I think it's sold three and a half million,

Alex:

Wow.

Jem:

units sold in the first

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

It's. The UK is one of their worst areas, one of their worst sort of zones, but this is Nintendo. But even here they've sold 160,000 units, which

Alex:

Hmm.

Jem:

To, I think around 110,000 that they sold of the switch. So it's a massive increase really. Those sales probably aren't helped by the fact that there's been a lot of problem with people getting hold of units.

Alex:

A bit like when we all tried to get PlayStation fives.

Jem:

Apparently game had taken a load of pre-orders and then just canceled them all

Alex:

Oh no.

Jem:

any explanation.

Alex:

That's awful.

Jem:

upset a lot of people. I dunno whether you've heard, but there's been a little bit of controversy around the switch 2. Because they want to use game Cards. rather than giving you a card that has the whole game on it, they want to give you a card which gives you an access code to download the game. When combined with the fact that in their EULA they appear to say that they can disable consoles if they think that you are pirating or modding. Some people have got very concerned that this meant that effectively you didn't own your switch, that they own it and they can just switch it off if they want to. Nintendo have come back and said, no, that's not how it is. They're not only gonna be doing

Alex:

Hmm.

Jem:

You will be able to resell your game key cards and other people will be able to then download the games and also no they're not planning to just switch your Nintendo switches off if you. something that upsets them, but it

Alex:

Hmm.

Jem:

This big controversy. So yeah, I was wondering have you heard anything about it? What are your thoughts on the switch to, do you think it's something that we need? Is it bringing more energy to the games industry? Some people have said, it's a little bit iterative. It's nothing new. But maybe we don't need anything new. Have we reached the edge of consoles? I'm just opening the floor to you both.

Alex:

I'm not a Nintendo player. If I had to say what I was, I'd probably say a game mostly on PlayStation. But when you were saying about the controversy over the rules around people modding and that sort of thing and how they might get funny. It sparked a memory for me. I think we were doing an episode on eSports. And I remember there was a lot of outcry from the dis disability community. Because in some of the sort of smaller competitions that they were running, disabled gamers weren't allowed to use their adapted controllers because they were like a modification that wasn't allowed. So they have a track record for this anti, modding attitude, but I don't know whether that comes from there they do tend to be quite hot on, on that sort of thing, I've heard also that it's not too different from the switch one or the original switch, but I think Nintendo has a valid place within the gaming pantheon, if you wanna call it that. Because it has quite a large and dedicated fan base, I would say. And I think they're always, Nintendo are always really good for multiplayer party games and just bringing people together in that way. And they've got ips that everyone knows, like Mario. And legend ofs and stuff like that. So

Matt:

Okay.

Alex:

yeah, they definitely have a place within gaming. But I don't know whether, like you say, have we reached the edge of consoles? It's a big question, I'm not sure as far as that goes. They have tried to innovate slightly with. The little things that you hold, there was one game I noticed has come out, I think it's called Drag and Drive, but it's written down as drag X drive, but apparently it's pronounced. And for some reason but it's basically you play a wheelchair basketballer, and to control the chair, you have to push each of the controllers along as if you are wheeling yourself and you can turn. So that's quite innovative. It's one of those games where I suspect there's a lot of novelty to begin with, but once you've done it for like maybe a couple of hours, you've done it. And yeah, it's nice to see though. I think it's cool that they're trying to feature, that kind of representation in gaming as well. And the mechanics behind it are good, but I could definitely see me as a wheelchair user, having used manual chairs, getting to grips faster with perhaps the way to turn the chair and things like that than someone who isn't a wheelchair user but yeah, that's one of the things I picked up from the release. And also, they've got their Mario cart world that's like their flagship thing. And the graphics have improved slightly, but not massively. I'm not sure how big a difference'cause it's quite a price difference, isn't it?

Jem:

That was one of the things that, people were quite angry about

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

apparently it started out 4, 4 9, 9

Alex:

Yeah,

Jem:

and

Alex:

that's, yeah.

Jem:

300 some,$350 or something That, which is

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

pounds.

Alex:

Yeah.

Jem:

That's a, and also their repairability. Has dropped to three out of 10. I'm not

Alex:

Oh dear.

Jem:

previous one was, but I

Alex:

No.

Jem:

Three out of 10 is, is a really low score.

Alex:

Yeah, it's pretty poor. That's a worry as well, isn't it? Because of course the switches are very portable and so the likelihood of them being damaged is probably quite high, I should expect.

Jem:

Absolutely.

Alex:

a worry for me if I was looking into it. Yeah.

Jem:

There's a general increase in people's awareness and appreciation of the environmental impact of gaming. Do we need a new switch? Yeah. The cost of the EL electronics and the Of building the switch to replace the new one is environmentally very high. If it's not that different and it's. It can't be fixed as

Alex:

Mm

Jem:

then, Then there's, there is quite a big environmental cost to buying a switch. We haven't really thought a lot about these things in the past, but people are beginning to think about this stuff Little bit more carefully, a little bit more mindful about do I need to buy that new bit of kit or can I just carry on with my existing one? What do you think Matt?

Matt:

The Nintendo switches have never appealed to me. I used to have the original Game Boy the Game Boy Advance, and then I. Played a fair bit on the Nintendo Ds a little bit on the three Ds as well. has always been the only thing that I've really cared for from Nintendo. Nintendo has a very strange place in the gaming market because. It's tried a few consoles over the years, but none of them have stuck the way that the Nintendo Switch has. And that's clearly it's very popular. The kind of games and the kind of gaming that the Switch allows people to do. And Nintendo is always, has got a track record they have a very old person's perspective on what gaming should be is going right. We've made our games, you buy our games and there's no flexibility in their terms of their business of allowing differences. And people like with Balder's Gate three, they literally build the ability to make mods into it.'cause that's what they want people to be able to do. so they limit themselves and their players and customers unnecessarily. And they also don't do it very well because are an unbelievable number of emulators and places to download. Those, these old games for free and the core thing with the switch, which is why the increases in prices in, especially in terms of the games.'cause the new Mario game's gonna be$80 for the standard edition, and it's not like with. With PlayStation or Xbox or PC games, if you buy God of War Ragnarok, you're getting a 200 gigabyte game that is pushing the boundaries of what is possible. when you spend big money on any console or PC game, the expectation is that they're gonna be pushing the envelope in some way. They're gonna be using the latest technology to create something that is worth that amount of money. Whereas with a console that is only handheld, they've got a very limited technical capacity to build into. So you can't make a game like a Mario game. Make it only for a handheld console and make it enough to be worth the same as a console game. It just feels like they want to be alongside the consoles and PCs now that go up, because when the PlayStation five comes out, it's a generation ahead of the last one. And when a new graphics card comes out, it's gonna be a generation ahead of ones that even were like five years ago. So massive boundaries are being moved consistently in these other areas. But the switch, you just can't justify it. It hasn't even got the same resolution as my phone does. It is getting to the point where most new phones are gonna be as powerful, if not more

Alex:

Hmm.

Matt:

Than this, and more versatile, and you'll be able to get a, an emulator on your phone and do anything that you can with this. So it's just a very odd place in the market and people are buying it so good for them. But it's just one of those places where you go this could be so much better. And it just isn't for no reason.

Jem:

So I'm obviously the only switch owner in this group and I'm not gonna be rushing out to buy the switch 2. I don't think that it adds anything that's needed. So I think we got our switch in the early days of the pandemic, Primarily for animal crossing. And I think you're right that one of the things that I noticed quite early on was that I was like, oh, I could stream my gaming or something. No, you can't do that. Nintendo, lock all that stuff down. They'll let you record a few seconds, but they won't let you take any more than that. And so they are really closed in how and, and what you can do and I think part of that means that they've got this sort of separate. World which they have control of what games you can and can't use. So if you are into the Nintendo universe then that's great. You're gonna their kit and buy their games and all of that. But obviously it's less likely to pull people in from other universes and. For me, I don't feel that the Switch two is offering anything new right now. I'm not very into the Nintendo world, it games wise. I like the concept of the handheld ness of the switch saying that I almost always play it plugged into the tv. I think if you want a handheld. Console then the steam deck or a mobile phone or a tablet are all perfectly viable options these days for most games. And I certainly wouldn't, I know you can play some of the high end AAA games on the switch but as you said, Matt, you lose all the graphics, even if you're playing it on a tv. Screen, it still doesn't have the same sort of power as a PlayStation or Xbox or pc. So why would you spend almost as much? Because that was the other thing about Nintendo traditionally was that was a cheaper console and it was a social gaming tool, but these days it's, it, a lot of those things have gone out the window and yes, it is still cheaper than your PlayStations and your Xbox, but not enough. And as you've said, you are still paying 80 quid for a game, then it's comes down to is it really worth it, especially when you can, get an emulator and play a lot of the games on other formats, which is obviously not legal.

Matt:

This is quite serendipitous'cause my sister has gotten massively into playing Fortnite. All of The last few weeks I. She's been back into gaming for nearly a year now, and she's been playing on my PS five and she got a laptop, new laptop recently and I was trying to convince her to invest in a cheap gaming laptop. She can get one that is a graphics card for two years ago for 700 pounds. So an incredibly ultra powerful but affordable. PC game gaming thing. And she went, oh no, I don't want to invest in that. And I was like, okay, fine. she's just come to me recently and said, oh, what kind of handheld gaming consoles did you think of and the options for those. And I immediately go the new switch is stupid expensive. She's already got a switch, but she wants something that she could play Fortnite on and plug it into her into a tv. So it needs to have an HDMI cable. And so she's got a new switch to, to buy or she can buy a steam deck but no matter what they're gonna be 400 plus pounds. And you go right I'm going to the minimum, I'm gonna have to invest 400 pounds into this thing. I may as well go for this same, a little bit more of this, I can get something that is wildly more powerful, wildly more versatile and just is better on every single like metric you can have go. Oh, but I The switch. I like Nintendo, I want to play the Nintendo games. It's just, it's, it gets harder and harder as the prices go up and up to make that.

Alex:

Justifiable choice. Yeah.

Matt:

choice. Yeah.