From the Vault #5 Old School RuneScape – [2022 Archive]

From the Vault is our series where we revisit and re-release older episodes from the podcast archive. This episode was originally recorded in 2022 and is now making its return from the vault.

In this episode, Tanner, Carter, and Jerad look back on their time with Old School RuneScape—sharing personal stories from their grinds, early memories with the game, and the moments that kept pulling them back in.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:08

Welcome back everybody to a long awaited episode. RuneScape, suggested to us by our friend Austin Steffi. Let's start this off a slightly different, just to set the stage, because we're probably never going to be able to cover this topic again. Do you all have any past experience with MMO RPGs other than RuneScape? Like, did you all ever grow up playing World of Warcraft or like, oh yeah, me and Jared actually did play one there for a short period of time on that beta we can talk about? Final Fantasy 14. You got banned.

SPEAKER_01 0:38

Do you have the hiccups right now, Taylor?

SPEAKER_02 0:40

Yeah, I do. I do. I should not have drank that fucking Pepsi before doing this, but yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:46

You got it down the Pepsi. And guess what happens when you drink a Pepsi? You can open up the cap and leave in a review. And I'm gonna plug that real quick. If you like this podcast and you uh listen to this nonsense shit that we talk about, uh leave us a review and send it to us on uh what you can leave it on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, take a screenshot, send it to us on uh Facebook or Twitter, and uh I'll stop interrupting now so we can get down to all school runescape. But anyway, back to your question, Tanner.

SPEAKER_01 1:11

This was definitely the first MMO RPG, maybe the first online, anything like multiplayer online. Uh I don't want to say that, but definitely the first MMO game I had ever seen, and I was fucking mind-blown. I couldn't believe I remember, I remember where I was the first time I ever watched kids play this, and it blew my absolute fucking mind that in 2002 to 2003, somewhere in that time range, that there were literally hundreds to thousands of people walking around being able to talk to each other, type to each other, and like in a game setting, I it blew my mind. Like I remember the day where I was. I'll I'll go ahead and go into it if you all don't care. Yeah, go ahead. Um, I was in sixth or seventh grade. Yes, you were, yeah, and I we were in a class that our teacher had to leave early that day. So we got sent to a class with older kids, like the grade above us. So, like, whatever class I was in, it was later in the day, it was late afternoon, already after lunch, probably sixth or seventh period. I'm in this class, and I guess the teacher, because they sent us over, she didn't give a shit about like teaching her class that day. So the older kids are on a computer, and I go over because we knew one, Andrew Alfrey sitting there playing. Motherfucker, my story is your story. Yeah, we were together. So, like uh he's playing with uh another kid, I think JB Brown was there, and they're sitting there, and I was like, What is this? And they're explaining, and I was like, I look at the URL and I'm like, oh, runescape.com. Run escape, runescape.com. They're like, no, it's RuneScape, you fucking dumbass. But they're like clicking around, and I'm like, Y'all can see each other on the like you see his guy, and he sees your guy, and they're like, Yeah, yeah, like there's hundreds of people on here, and they walk in the town of Iraq, and there's just a shit ton of people, like uh coal for sale, 200 GP each, or all that shit. And I was mind blown, man. I could not believe. I was like, I don't know why. You all know me with my little like Tanner mentioned it once, like my genre of games is like not farming, but like social simulator like type shit. I was like, Can you like buy a house and like put your furniture and shit in it? That was my first question. Like, could you do that?

SPEAKER_02 3:45

A lot of resting or the RPG element. Can you design a house in this game?

SPEAKER_01 3:51

Yeah, no sword fighting. And I remember JB, like you couldn't at the time, but of course, kids fucking lie back then. He's like, Yeah, I'll I'll show you my house in a second. He walks out and finds some abandoned house. He's like, Yeah, this is mine. I was like, holy fucking shit, I got I want this game.

SPEAKER_02 4:07

So he was lying, like that was just an NPC house, but he tricked you. That that was his type of game.

SPEAKER_01 4:12

Yeah, I was like, I'm getting this game.

SPEAKER_02 4:15

Yeah, okay. So here, I wanted to ask this question because I jumped on what they call now old school RuneScape that you can play. That was probably Gen 2. Did you all play the original original game?

SPEAKER_00 4:25

Yes, that's what Jared's talking about. Yeah, OG, like it looks like an 8-bit online game, like old as hell. Like that was God, that's the one that I remember. That's the one that gives me the most nostalgia. It's gone now. But my gosh, they just like I looked up an old YouTube video on it to see because I was like, it was older than this because when we were just playing old school runescape, they like I guess took the classic service down. It was called RuneScape Classic instead of like old school runescape. And they actually took the service down because there weren't enough people playing it. And uh, I watched a YouTube video of like the last day, and everyone was on there talking and they were like, Well, see you later, guys. And they were like, nothing's happening, haha, they lied, and then all of a sudden the whole game just goes black.

SPEAKER_02 5:01

So you you said, Jared, this was your first MMORPG, and by far the one you got into the most. Quickly, if you do you want to talk about the Final Fantasy XIV story real quick, just so I mean we'll probably never have this chance again.

SPEAKER_01 5:12

Tanner, before you get started, you mentioned any other history. I don't know about you and Carter. I've tried WoW. We had I had a landlord who owned the house that I lived in college. You know how we always talk about Dave Mathis and he listens to this. Yeah. Jason, his older brother, who he's probably at least 10 years older than me, if not maybe maybe a little bit more, was like, I think he was heavily into wow. I don't know if it's that age range that was a little bit older than us, or Jason just got into it. But like I've heard some stories where he was like deep, like you know how we were deep in the trenches in ARC. Yeah, he was like ate up in wow for maybe years. I don't know. I can't like you know, a hundred percent say that, but I know that was a uh a crazy MMO RPG. But yeah, let's talk about our little Final Fantasy adventure here.

SPEAKER_02 6:04

Okay, now that this game has changed a lot since then because that was the early beta, like that was whenever the game first came out. Yeah, but uh me and you we were just like, oh, let's check out this little MMO RPG. The thing is, I remember it in the beginning of it when you're creating your character, you can choose between these three different, I'm pretty sure they're alliances or something, or it it will depending on the race you pick. I'm not 100% sure.

SPEAKER_01 6:24

Yeah, that's what it is. There were multiple races and multiple, like I don't want to say jobs, but like classes, yeah. Probably well, pretty much, and two, the reason to go back, the reason we picked this is we had both just gotten PS4s and it was early. Yes, that's what I wanted to say. That like there was nothing to play. So we're like, let's get into this, Tanner, because we could play it together.

SPEAKER_02 6:48

Well, the thing I remember the most is of the three alliances, we picked maybe the same one or something because the the cool thing is, depending on which one of these you pick, you start out in a completely different area of the map. So me and Jared start out in this forest area, and we just this is like Lumbridge in RuneScape, like everyone starts here, like this is like the default place. Not exactly because your sister Watt, she wanted to join us, so she picks another alliance to be different from us, and she's like, Hey guys, I'm uh in the middle of this city, blah blah blah. I'm like, City? What fucking city? What are you talking about? Like me and Jerry were like, I think you may have picked the wrong server, or you're you're not doing something right because we're in a forest. And eventually we find out that depending on what alliance you pick, it spawns you in one of three different areas in this humongous fucking world. And me and Jared were like, this is so cool. So what we did was we put we packed up, we got all of the our equipment, our items, and stuff, and we're like, we're gonna take off and explore this world and find watch. And that's that's specifically what I remember. Like the key memory for me was that uh I love that little thing where people spawn in different areas depending on what race you were.

SPEAKER_01 7:54

Well, see, it was it was the thing is the thing that blows my mind is you're saying an alliance. I'm pretty sure you don't pick an alliance, you just basically pick a class, and of course I pick something like an archer, and you pick something. I think well, there's three different starting zones, and it's not random, but like I think they may have had like nine classes total. So three of the classes start in the forest, three start in this desert town that Watch did, and then the other three start somewhere else. I think I could be totally wrong. But we me and you just got lucky and assumed that everybody started where we did because we started the game together, and like we thought that was the only place. And the other thing is the funny thing about us like packing up to go find once we realized that hey, Watch is fucking miles and miles away from us, um we had to like adventure into the game that was way too outpowered for us. Like every the further away you get from your starting point, the higher level the enemies go. So me and Tanner are like maybe level 10, I'm just guessing. And like once we like get out to the middle, there's like level 50 and 60 and 70 shit that it turns into a Metal Gear Solid game out of nowhere when we're out there leaving these I have like crazy ass enemies. We're like Link trying to break into the castle on uh Ocarina time, like the guards, like learning the enemy's path and like shooting around them to get to Watch in this desert village. But yeah, and again, like this whole game, it's so it's a big experience because one, it was like an MMO on PS4, but two, it was like you said, it's just so funny how we got lucky and started together. Didn't think Watch had an idea or clue on what the hell she's doing to tell us. Like we thought she was totally like bullshitting on her in this other village. But three, we kind of got lucky on finding the path to her town instead of the other one. We just kind of stumbled upon it.

SPEAKER_02 9:58

Like the average person today would just look it up online, like, how do you get to blah blah blah? We was just like, no, let's just go and go in this world and see if we can find her on our own. Because that means that's all we knew is that she was out there somewhere, but we just didn't know where. But yeah, I guess to summarize the whole Final Fantasy XIV thing for me, uh, I was actually really, really getting into the game. It was probably on the verge of getting to that scary place for MMORPGs. Like I could have seen myself like losing my life to that game, but luckily enough, out of nowhere, I go to log into it one day and I just get blocked due to sexual assault shit. I'm like, what? Excuse me? I don't I didn't talk to anybody in this fucking game. I was like, I did not ever say anything. So I was like, it's probably for a good call or like a good reason that I got kicked off of that, but I was like, that is bullshit. I did not, and then they just completely banned my account and I never could play it again.

SPEAKER_01 10:46

Tanner was out there looking for cyber sex and got caught.

SPEAKER_02 10:50

I was literally out there with Watch, like fucking doing quests and shit, and then one day I log on and it's just nope, can't play no more.

SPEAKER_00 10:56

Fucking trade, I'll believe you, Tanner. Fucking training chocobos for sex out there.

SPEAKER_02 11:02

So yeah, what about you, Carter? Did you ever play any other MMORPG besides old school RuneScape?

SPEAKER_00 11:08

Well, kind of. Um, I remember because like when me and Jerry were talking about seeing other people talking to other people, this isn't like, you know, like a lot of people, if you're like, you know, 20 some years old, you've always had the internet, I guess. So it's but this was like this shit was new, like it was new as new could be.

SPEAKER_03 11:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:25

The fact that you could play a game with somebody else, even though it was like 8-bit and it looked like old as hell, but you couldn't do that shit before then. So um just seeing somebody else and you're actually able to walk around because some of the older games that I played, and I'm getting a little bit off topic, was uh Neopets.

SPEAKER_02 11:40

Oh fuck, I used to collect those toys, but yeah, same.

SPEAKER_01 11:43

That Neopets was the you're right. I I had completely forgot. You're dead on. That was the online game before RuneScape was Neo Pets.

SPEAKER_00 11:53

Yeah, that's like late 90s online when online was very, very new, right? I'm talking like Windows 98, uh 2000. I know the internet's been out for a while, but I mean as far as the online gaming goes, like MMOs and stuff, I remember I played Neopets and I used to play with Travis Whitten all the time, my cousin, because you could battle Neo Pets, but it wasn't like an actual like control thing. You would just sync up and you're going to battle, and like let's say you got your you would select your equipment and things like that, and then you would click battle, and then when they click battle, it would refresh and it would let you know what happened. Like the page pull up and let you know what happened.

SPEAKER_02 12:26

It sounds like a monster ranger type game, is it sort of like that?

SPEAKER_01 12:29

Yeah, it is. You gotta pick a monster, and Neopets was awesome, dude. You would click a monster, but sometimes like the more popular ones, they would like pop up as like, nah, too many people have picked this monster already. Like, you gotta pick some other little bullshit. Yeah, yeah, that's a fact. I'm telling you, Neopets was was the shit back then. I can remember, I I never could because I'm that age, like Carter say, 99, 2000. I'm probably nine, ten, eleven years old. I couldn't even remember a password to keep up with an account on Neo Pets. So every time I played it, I just started over. But like the the whole concept is what blew my mind of like okay, I'm gonna know your friends. Yeah, I'm here. I picked a little monster friend, which that's at the height of Pokemon and all that shit. So you're you know, everybody wants to control some or have a little monster friend. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 13:24

That's what made it so big.

SPEAKER_01 13:26

Yeah, so I'm here, got my monster guy. I'm gonna go play some mini games and earn some money to buy this little monster fuck some food and a t-shirt.

SPEAKER_00 13:37

And here's the thing though about that experience though, like when we're talking about like how you you it's just like a page that refreshes when you do anything, there's no real like walk, like you're moving around a map, but you're just clicking around a map, and it's not really an inner it's interactive in a way that when you click on something, a new page loads. So it's kind of unplayable now, I would uh definitely. But back then, like when you're online connecting with other people like that, this isn't this is like fresh off of like PS1, uh Super Nintendo. The only way you could play with your friends was literally on a split screen playing a game in person.

SPEAKER_03 14:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:07

This was literally like the first time you're actually on the internet playing with somebody else. It was like mind-blowingly awesome.

SPEAKER_02 14:14

Yeah. So like whenever you all eventually went on to RuneScape, did you all have like a discussion? Like, because I I think Jared, if I'm not mistaken, you were always kind of the swordsman type of guy. Like you you were just like a sword and shield guy.

SPEAKER_01 14:26

I was always the mage. I loved getting runes and learning magic, but that wasn't until what you call old school RuneScape came out, which to me is RuneScape 2. Yeah. Now, in that in that original RuneScape, I'll never forget. Like I remember the day it transferred over from what Carter's talking about, that eight-bit bullshit RuneScape, to the new quote, new RuneScape, RuneScape 2, which is now old school RuneScape. But like magic became a lot more powerful because I can I'll never forget. I had this little specialized magic guy on the old RuneScape, and you would go around and I would cast these spells, and I'd hit like two, threes, fours damage wise. And the first day it like transferred over, I went out and I was hitting like 10, 11, 12, 14, 13 damage, and I was like, what the hell? Like, I like this. I remember that.

SPEAKER_00 15:23

Yeah. I forgot about that. How they changed the hit point system and the damage. Holy shit, Jared. You're spot on. I'll never forget that.

SPEAKER_01 15:31

Yeah. That was the first day I hopped on the new RuneScape. I walked out to the wild just north of Iraq, went in, attacked a guy, and I couldn't fucking believe how much damage I was doing. Because in the past, I was just kind of like a I don't know, an assistant to everybody. Support, exactly. That's the word I was looking for. Yeah, support character, just like two, three, four damage here, but I was in the background not getting hit, but all of a sudden, like wham, the magic like really got vamped up, and I was like, hell yeah.

SPEAKER_02 16:03

So that was like pre-balancing and all that. So right off the bat, whenever all when RuneScape 2 came out, mages were fucking crazy. You might be right.

SPEAKER_01 16:10

And then they eventually, like, like you said, balanced it out to where range or archers could really do some damage to mages. But if you're just a regular guy and you got armor and shit on, you're gonna get your ass ate by some mages in the wild.

SPEAKER_00 16:26

And that's still true, by the way. If you wear your armor, you're like a minus whatever to magic. So a mage will light you up. You gotta take your armor off when you're fighting somebody who's a mage and you're using like just a shield.

SPEAKER_01 16:36

Yeah sword. And I mean ass ate in a bad way. I know that's uh different nowadays. But uh anyway, I just went to uh neopets.com, it's still up, like it still runs.

SPEAKER_00 16:48

Well, there's some other ones too. Like I hate to I know that we've talked about it, but like there was a battleon.com. I remember that one. There was one called uh Jared, you'll probably remember this one. You always called it Gia Online, but I think it was Gaia Online, and we would go on and you would like trick out a car and actually race with it. And we would uh we have a pretty good story with that one.

SPEAKER_01 17:08

Yeah, well, Gaia, Gaia, Gia, whatever you want to call it.

SPEAKER_00 17:12

G A I A. You could have your own house on that one, and you can invite people over.

SPEAKER_01 17:16

It was basically like Sims Online. Yeah, but that's a big that's a good description. Yeah, but like, I mean, you're just this guy, you make money through shit, and but the thing, the biggest thing is is we were old when we played this card, and by old I mean like 16, 17. I can remember us like maybe even our senior year of high school with some other seniors, like just and it was for fun. Like, I think my guy just walked around in nothing but a thong going.

SPEAKER_00 17:46

We pretty much were just getting on there and just acting stupid on this server, just so it was like a cooler way of MSN messaging.

SPEAKER_02 17:52

That was like PlayStation Home to me.

SPEAKER_00 17:54

Yeah, that's what it was perfect.

SPEAKER_01 17:56

That's pretty much it. PlayStation Home, except you could instead of spending your real damn money on PS Home, you were spending money like that you earn, like Carter was saying. But I always tried like my biggest thing was I love to scam people out of their money so I didn't have to work. So, Carter, I'll let you tell the scam story.

SPEAKER_02 18:17

Like scam real money on this game?

SPEAKER_01 18:19

The currency game currency. I was a piece of shit in this guy.

SPEAKER_02 18:23

You're a piece of shit on everything, but well, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:25

No, no, you're not wrong. Don't worry. We'll I'll get into my um RuneScape story in a minute. We'll find out what a piece of shit I was at that game. But um so there's this like because I guess on Gaia Online, like it's pretty much just a racing sim. Do you remember that, Jerry? There's like a place you can go to it's not a racing sim, but I mean like there's a place you can go to actually race your like little was it like little box, those little box, um uh what are those cars called? I forget what the name of them are. Kia soul, maybe? Yeah it was, yeah, it was.

SPEAKER_01 18:52

They must have been sponsoring the game at that. They were because you but you can trick out a soul and like put whatever you want on it. Exactly. And you could like sit there. I'm sure there were other ways of making money, but I think that's what we preferred back then was to go to this like little uh nighttime downtown of a city or like street racing thing.

SPEAKER_00 19:12

And people were standing around like, yo, it's my girlfriend, yo.

SPEAKER_01 19:16

Yeah, yeah. It was like that was big when uh Fast and Furious, probably two and three were out, Tokyo Drift, all that bullshit.

SPEAKER_02 19:24

They're just begging to be fucking like trolled, essentially. Like to go up to like whenever they're they're like the cool guys of the game, so you just want to go up to them and fuck with them.

SPEAKER_00 19:32

Yeah, like they had all like the uh nice like leather jackets on and stuff, stuff you had to like spend a lot of like in-game money for, and they would just be standing around doing whatever. Back to the scam. So there was this girl there, and uh, everyone was like, yo, this is my girlfriend. So we were trying to get money off of people, and I remember like talking to this girl, and she was like, Come back to my place. I was like, okay. And I go over there and uh uh I was talking to her and I was like, ah fuck. She's like, What's wrong? I was like, Well, Big Doug needs his money. And Jared just Jared, I invite him to the room that we're at, and Jared shows up and he's like, Jared says all this shit. So I'm sitting there and Jared pops up, he goes, Hey, Matt, because I think my name was Matt on that one. Yeah. And he goes, Big Doug needs his money. And I and she was like, What the hell are you talking about? And I was like, Well, here's what's going on. Jared leaves, right? And I tell her, and I'm like, here's what's going on. I've got to give this guy like 3,000 gold. And he always like he scams the game and he actually turns it into millions. I was like, but I've got to give him his money now, or he's gonna like do something to me. Like, I forgot what our whole We were acting like he was some big fucking drug lord type that was. I'm a fucking Gia Online game or guy online. And uh anyway, I tell her I was like, she's like, I all I have is like if she had like 2,500 coins or something, which I think you start with what, a thousand? Yeah, so that was big money to us. Yeah, so I was like, uh I was like, hold on. And I actually like I was like, yeah, I think that'll work. I think that'll hold him off. So she gives me that money, and I leave her house and never talk to her again. Like that was so like it sounds more lame now that I'm talking about it out loud, kind of.

SPEAKER_02 21:03

Oh, it's fucking big Doug. Like, where the hell did that even come from?

SPEAKER_01 21:07

We had a buddy. Well, it's funny, it's RuneScape episode. Uh Doug Walker was a good friend of ours. He played football with us, and he was a bigger guy. He was a lineman, like you know, a defensive lineman. He was huge into RuneScape, and I guess he was big, big into RuneScape.

SPEAKER_00 21:23

He was the best RuneScape style character.

SPEAKER_01 21:25

Yeah, he was the best RuneScape like player as far as like I think he was walking around in like the level one 130, 140s, yeah, if that's possible, maybe 120s. I don't remember. Like Carter said, he was basically maxed out on the game, but it was kind of in memory of him of just calling that guy like that. Yeah, so we we played off of him because he was still alive. I'm a fucking idiot, but like you know, just like in I don't know, we were thinking of him.

SPEAKER_00 21:52

Yeah, reference to his RuneScape might. We were like, This is money because he was so rich on RuneScape, so we just got But in the moment, though, that was like that was extremely fun in the moment. Like, I don't know how to explain it. That was just a badass time, even though it was kind of sounding like a big thing.

SPEAKER_02 22:07

Anything that's online online like that, like doing scams is some of the biggest adrenaline rush you can have in games. And and whenever you get away with it, because we always talk about art because we would read people, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:17

I knew it. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 22:19

Anything that you can fuck with people and get away with it, it's just the biggest like adrenaline rush. Because it takes planning, it takes like a little bit of charisma. Like it, you got to really think about it. I don't know. It's really, really fun to do that kind of shit.

SPEAKER_00 22:31

And well, uh before I know we're probably gonna get ready to talk about the actual gameplay of the current RuneScape, old school RuneScape, but I actually had my first account banned on RuneScape.

SPEAKER_01 22:42

Oh, really? For what? For sexual assault?

SPEAKER_00 22:44

I can remember this. Not like you, Tanner. No, I'm not a little pervert. Um, but uh all I was literally like uh I was there was this kid who had a bunch of iron and he was like, hey man, can you smell iron for me? And I was like, sure, buddy. And he gave me like a shit ton of it, like a shit ton of iron. And I was like, eh, none of it smelled it, because when you smelled it, it says like it's impure. Yeah. So I just took a I took all of his iron, said, Ah, none of it smelled it, and I left. But he wasn't the only person I scammed. I scammed people like left and right. I was like, hey, if you need me to do this for you, I will. And they'd hand me stuff and I'd just be like, all right, and I'd leave. Um because I didn't think nothing of it. So I remember uh I was finally wearing like full black, I had a mithril two-hander, and I showed Jared one time, and Jared was like, Holy shit, how'd you get all this stuff? And it was like badass, and I remember leaving Verock with my character. I logged out. The next day I logged in and it said, Your account has been banned for cheating or abuse. And what got me what got me was that kid that I took that iron from. I took his iron. I'm going back between Verock and uh Lumbridge because I that was my route when I was doing like my smithing, training that up. Yeah, you missed it. Real quick, Carter, your username is it Matt Carter 2? That one never got banned.

SPEAKER_01 23:57

It was Okay, never mind, never mind. Continue, sorry.

SPEAKER_00 24:00

Matt Matt Carter 2 got created because Matt Carter got banned. Okay, okay. So anyway, I'm over there and I'm in Verock and I'm like smithing all that iron that I stole from that kid that chased me all the way from Lumbridge to Verock. 10, 15 minutes goes by, and Travis messaged me and he goes, Huh, that was a pretty good prank. And I'm like, what are you talking about? And that kid was over at Lumbridge going, report Matt Carter, report Matt Carter. He took all my iron and he didn't give me anything for it. He said he was going to smelt it, and he never did. And I was and Travis messaged me all that and I was like, LOL. I was like, Yep, sure did. And uh I guess everybody was over there like reporting me. So then they looked into it and they seen that, yeah, he's scammed him, and they probably seen all the other shit that I was doing on the side, and I couldn't log in anymore. It said, Your account's been banned for cheating and abuse, and I was like, Oh shit.

SPEAKER_02 24:48

I put a stop to your crimes, Carter.

SPEAKER_00 24:50

They did. I mean, I did all kinds of stupid shit. Like, if there was a way to screw somebody over, that's like that's what I did. That was how I had fun with the game.

SPEAKER_02 24:56

So So how long did that account last versus Matt Carter 2? Like was that just like a few months, or was that years of fucking like this character?

SPEAKER_00 25:04

No, that wasn't years. That was that was months. That I had played Matt Carter for months, and I finally just got to where I was getting black and uh like full black armor, and I got a Mythral 2 inner because I could finally equip it. And yeah, I just remember we always had bronze and iron until then, so like I was like showing off, even though like there was other kids that were obviously way more advanced than we were, but me and Jared, like we really weren't that into it, I guess.

SPEAKER_01 25:25

We didn't know I I'll be a little bit more than a little bit. I didn't know how to do anything. Yeah, I did I never knew it took me months, if not a year or two, of playing to realize that this game you have to repetitively do stuff to level up. Yep, I didn't know that you had to keep fighting shit to get stronger just because I'd never played a game like that before, like an online game like this. Like I didn't know that hey, just go keep clicking these rats, grind. Yeah, I I never understood that. I agree. Therefore, I stayed a level three and just bullshitted around like socially. Same. And the thing is, like, Carter was a bad influence on me because I never thought to like go and scam people. Oh, how times have changed.

SPEAKER_02 26:09

Carter may be the originator of the asshole Jared.

SPEAKER_01 26:12

Yeah, maybe so. I never realized I never realized like, hey, like it would be fun to go basically steal from people. Like once he got banned and told me the story at school, I was dying. So I was like, well shit, I'm gonna try to fucking steal off some people. So like like that was kind of later on in the runescape career, and I kind of like realized like, hey, do magic or get runes to up your magic. So I would go around and I would meet the like my thing was like I was real shy in real life, but I was a fucking horn dog, like secretly. Oh shit. I wanted every girl I ever saw, but I like was so shy I couldn't talk to them. So RuneScape was my way to go and talk to all these like who were probably guys looking back, but they were fucking girl characters. But I would talk to every girl on the game and like talk to them and get them to go to the bar and virock with me. But anyway, I started like scamming them. Like I was like, hey, I'm this mage. I was like, you got this, you know, bronze or iron or black or even myth armor on. It's like if you give it to me, I know the spell to turn that to rune. That was my trick. So they give me their armor, and I'd be like, hold on, let me go to the bank and get the runes. I'd fucking run off and then log off and then log back on later on and have their shit.

SPEAKER_02 27:30

That was my like I know the spell. There was probably no fucking spell like that.

SPEAKER_01 27:34

Yeah, there's no spell that you change the armor to the next rune or next level up. The badass.

SPEAKER_02 27:41

Well, I had a question because like I guess going along with the timeline, because I've heard you you all complain about this shit. Like, you all played the original RuneScape, then you went on RuneScape 2. That was pre-grand exchange, wasn't it? Yes. Okay, okay. So describe to me, because I've whenever I got on board, the Grand Exchange was already a thing. What would you because you I remember you talking to Jared whenever we were playing recently to another person that Grand Exchange ruined the game. What what made it like bad and worse? Like, what did that do?

SPEAKER_01 28:06

I'm gonna sound like the old man here that's just like political and like screaming like you're ruining this. Yeah, yeah. But I I know a lot of people like get a lot of benefit off the Grand Exchange, but literally my favorite thing was to find a resource that like was needed or like not a lot of people could buy, but was like sought after, and I would get that resource, and then I would sell it for somebody who desperately needed it for more than what it was worth. Like I love to go and mine coal, mine my ass off, Jeff Elkin style, get a thousand to two thousand coal. You know, I knew the running price was between a hundred and fifty to two hundred GP on a K of coal, like a thousand coal. But like I would love to find the buyer who was fucking desperate in the streets of Iraq and be like, nah, you're gonna give me 400 GP if you want this K of coal. Like that was my thing. And then the Great Exchange comes along and it levels the playing, like it it basically ruined player trade to me because like you're not gonna go and have to search and really spend some time to like find an item. It's just right there. Like Yeah, there is no uh player trade anymore.

SPEAKER_00 29:20

Like I've I played it recently for a few months there, and uh not one time did I go up to somebody that I wanted to trade with. There's no point. That and that was the game to me, it was like, hey, like uh meeting other players and actually talking to like him like on a one-on-one level. Like I agree with that. That's pretty badass. Because I remember I don't know if you remember the certs you used to be able to go get. Like you would get so much, and I think it took like 15 iron to make one iron cert, and you could hold all the certs you wanted, so that's how you had to used to do that. Yeah, I kinda I I kind of do. It was something like that. That's how you had to kind of because your inventory only held twenty-eight. So they had this place over there it was in. Um then they have the grand and then you would sell those to individual people however you had to sell them, and then they switched up the grand exchange, so that kind of did eliminate player trade a hundred percent in that game.

SPEAKER_01 30:08

Yeah, yeah. I used to love like in every like server who had a decent amount of people, like you would walk in Verak and it would just be hundreds, like you know, a server will hold 2,000 people, hundreds, if not a thousand people in Virack screening what they want to trade.

SPEAKER_00 30:28

What they wanted to buy, yeah, it was what they were selling, and you would see like those were wavy, like they would like make their uh yes, they could change the text, they could change it to like blinking colors.

SPEAKER_01 30:39

Oh shit, yeah. Yeah, and they were just like buying this like it over and over and over again. And I fucking love like it was just like it's like in a classic movie of some third world country, like where where it's like a marketplace and like people are screaming like what they're selling. Like that's what I thought of, like me walking through, like hey, what I got.

SPEAKER_02 31:01

Is it any different? Like, is there any reason for you to go for one of those guys versus the grand exchange?

SPEAKER_01 31:06

No, because what they do is like now it's just like, hey, I've got this much shit, I want to sell it. I can set a minimum price for it, and then maybe it'll eventually hit, but the buyer's gonna choose their like max price of buying. It eliminated trade and it made it I don't know, I think it changed like this sounds really stupid, but it changed even the economics of the game. Like money almost like right now, what you're seeing, like in inflation, like money became money became more available and it was worth less of what it used to be. Like 200k back in our time was amazing, and now like people walk around with millions and millions of coins like it's nothing. Right like it really changed.

SPEAKER_00 31:50

That's ridiculous, but it's the truth. Like RuneScape has its own economy in there, and it actually the Grand Exchange made it like a completely different I don't know, but you're right, it's completely different. Like, yeah, the value of the RuneScape gold is not near as what it used to be back in the day.

SPEAKER_01 32:06

That's what changed the game for me, and and of course, me getting older and my interests and time to put in shit changed, but like that's what really changed the game. I used to love RuneScape 2. That was the the peak of that would have probably been what Carter, our freshman and sophomore year. Yeah, I can remember me and Carter, like we would meet, me, Carter, Andrew Alfrey. Like you mentioned this while ago. Did we plan Dragonblade? Yeah, Dragonblade. We would meet like in our little street and just talk about what we were gonna like plan for to do on RuneScape tonight. Like old Dragonblade, Andrew Alfrey would be like, hey, I'm gonna go fish some lobbies and gonna save up, and I'd be like, okay, well, you know, they just made up to where you can mine rune S. So I'm gonna go mine some rune essence and I'm gonna save up and I'm gonna make a bunch of fucking chaos runes tonight. Because we would always, I don't know why, like we never really leveled up high. We would always hover around that level 20 to 30 for the PvP aspect of it. Like that was the and that I can even go into that some. I will real quickly. One of my favorite scams was to get a noob who had a few thousand coins or something. It wasn't anything to me, because I always kept around once I got into the game, I kept around 200k coins, maybe close to a mil every now and then, but I always kept that amount of my bank. My favorite thing was to get a newbie guy who had, you know, five, ten, twenty thousand coins, talk him into getting all his coins out and taking them into the wild to where I would just obliterate his ass and then take his coins. But it was always like I could always like come up with a different story of why you need to get those coins out and come with me.

SPEAKER_02 33:56

Did you have a go-to story like that?

SPEAKER_01 33:58

Always worked. One of my favorites was the strip club in the wild. Like uh I mean, it sells man, they're gonna go for it. You need you need to get all your coins out. There's a strip club out in the like level 20 wild. There's girls out there, you can pay to get anything, man. Like, come on, let's see.

SPEAKER_02 34:21

Some little horny 13-year-old's like, hell yeah. Well, around that time frame, because like I haven't even talked much, was around the time I hopped on, was whenever you was in high school, probably like junior, senior, because I would come over to your house and I would be with hanging out with Watch. And I swear to God, one of my like top 10 favorite gaming memories of all time of the first time I've ever seen RuneScape was on your laptop on that fucking on the main menu screen with that music, that iconic, chill-inducing fucking music. And the two flames that would change the different colors on the sides. I was like, what is this shit? And I remember you showing me it and how it was online and all that. And I like you all, I was blown away, never seen anything like this in my life. So I created my character, Mario Shelton, which sadly is no longer with us. I was a big Mario kid. I made him look just like Mario, had fucking pants on, red shirt, mustache, brown hair, looked identical to fucking Mario walking around. And my scam was so innocent compared to you're all's. I've said it on the show, but five GP for a poop joke. I would stand on the side of the road in Lumbridge. Sometimes someone would give me five GP, and I thought I fucking like struck a jackpot. But that was my little scam. But when I remember whenever I would play with Jared, it would be very, very rare because I was uh probably eight years old. Jared was around 17, so he's mostly playing with Carter and those guys. But whenever I would see Jared, he was like a god in this game to me because he would walk in town, he would be like meet me in Varric or Ver, what's it called? Varrock? Verrock.

SPEAKER_01 36:09

We always call it Verrock.

SPEAKER_02 36:10

Very probably in the shitty, like standard blue robes, and then I see this guy in solid black armor with gold trim walking down the street to me. I'm like, holy shit, look at this guy. He's like Elvis Presley in this video game.

SPEAKER_01 36:25

There would be noobs like get their uh trumpets out and I'll be like, holy shit, it's him. And then you're now arriving, Sir J-Rod89.

SPEAKER_02 36:44

It was not far from the truth, man. And then I would have he would just walk me around, show me a few things, and then I would ask him for a link to a uh like a fucking website of like Flash Games because I didn't know how to copy and paste leaks.

SPEAKER_01 36:57

You you know how you felt about me? That's how I felt about Doug Walker, like we mentioned Doug a while ago. Yeah, if he would ever like show up in my server and like be talking to me at like level 126, you're like, that's easier to talk to me than I felt the same way. There were fucking 12 servants like with their trumpets now arriving. DLW 24870 or whatever his name was.

SPEAKER_02 37:25

Yeah, I just remember that because whenever that's why I asked if you had sword and shield, because the uh you always carried that shield around. It was like black armor with gold trimmed.

SPEAKER_01 37:34

That was always for the women though. Like that just showed that yeah, that would that was to show that I had money in the game because that armor was like worth a lot, like the black trimmed and gold, and it looked good. But me personally, like I would always like my character, I would get my defense up to 10 and leave it there just so I could wear that armor, yeah, and then I was all magic after that. Okay, but yeah, yeah, that was just for the ladies.

SPEAKER_02 38:00

I attempted to be a mage, but I didn't understand how it worked. I remember you always telling me, like, yeah, man, it's expensive to be a mage because you had to buy all those runes and shit. Like, it's it's not like you get a sword and you can just use it at all times and you don't have to spend any more money. It's like you have to invest into being a mage with the runes and the the spells and the rings and the all that shit.

SPEAKER_01 38:18

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 38:19

So, like, how long did you all play until it sort of fizzled out for you all? Was that around the time high school ended? Was that when you all stopped playing?

SPEAKER_00 38:25

Sort of. Because you know, you you graduate high school, you start getting into like college or getting different things.

SPEAKER_03 38:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:31

Um, I actually played a little bit when I was in my barracks up in uh Chicago or up in the Great Lakes when I was in the Navy. I remember I set up a bot for one of my accounts. Might have been uh Mac Carter 2. Because I had that file, that was the one I had for years and years and years. The only reason I don't have it now is because I guess I forgot the password. But what about MacDaddy008? Was that one? That might have been the one I had for a while. Jerry, you made that one for me, didn't you?

SPEAKER_01 38:55

Like I did because it was like in anticipation. Like what people don't realize, especially earlier on, like Carter was mentioning early RuneScape with dial up, for me, my parents were strict, and I had to plan like when I was gonna be on because it was gonna take away the phone from my house. So up until probably the first two or three or maybe four years of RuneScape, I would have to like really like that. Like my mom, of course, she was super strict, and I had to like get a time set out to where it was okay. But with MacDaddy 08, I remember Carter was busy or something, and I was like, okay, I'm gonna fucking make this guy for him so that when and get him to the tutorial so that like tonight when he gets on, he's ready to like take this archer and like start just training him. He was an archer, pure archer.

SPEAKER_00 39:57

That was our play. He was an archer, you're gonna be the mage, and who else did we have that was gonna be the upfront? We had somebody else, yeah, yeah. That's probably it. It was Steffi Shorter or Andrew Alfrey, yeah. One of those. That's what I mean. Like it was one of those for sure.

SPEAKER_02 40:10

Yeah, Steffi was the one who chose this game. Would you all say that he is now well beyond what that one guy you said was like a god to you all? Doug?

SPEAKER_01 40:20

I don't know. He's probably on the same level of a Dougie now, but Dougie was then in 2005 or four, what Austin is now. But Doug Doug had some hours invested in in that game for sure.

SPEAKER_00 40:35

To get into how it is currently, I guess, because I mean that guess that's the only thing we really haven't talked about, right? Did you have another story before I cut you off there, Jared? Sorry.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

I'm just thinking of what Austin is now. Like Austin has put the time in. He I see Austin as a strong. Um I don't think Doug, if Doug had a level 100 of something completely maxed out, he never talked about it. But Austin has mining at least, which is fucking crazy.

SPEAKER_00 41:02

Yeah, he said he sat down in the those mines and mined for uh months, like never left, just months straight, had like 30,000 of coal and gold and everything.

SPEAKER_02 41:12

That's what's so crazy about today's times. Like you all were talking about you had to plan out your shit to play this game that graphically looks like shit now, but now it's on your phone. You can just whip it out whenever you want, play it.

SPEAKER_00 41:23

So much more accessible now. You can just pick up your phone.

SPEAKER_01 41:26

Yeah, that's that cracks me up to think about. Like, I would have to fucking beg, like, please, can I log on the internet? Please. And my mom of 90% of the time would say, No, uh, what if we get a phone call? Yep, my mom too. Even if it was nine or ten o'clock at night and nobody's has fucking business calling. Yeah. But like every now and then I would get like I would get it pre-approved almost. Like I would already have it set in stone, like, hey, uh, okay, Jared, Saturday night, you can start about eight o'clock and be on there for a few hours.

SPEAKER_00 41:59

Yeah, because I think like uh if your mom was like my mom, they would let everybody else know, like, hey, my phone line's probably gonna be tied up.

SPEAKER_01 42:07

But that's the only way I get to play is get those little pre-approved hours.

SPEAKER_00 42:12

Getting into how it is currently though, like where it's on your phone, it's actually it's a good time sink. That's why Austin plays so much.

SPEAKER_02 42:18

Yeah, this is the few months, like the session that we were supposed to be playing. I'm gonna be honest, I didn't I probably put total two hours in just because I I don't know. I feel like this was a game that was crucial for m me growing up, and I really I still love this game, don't get me wrong. I have so much nostalgia for it, but now I don't know if I can uh play it like I used to anymore. I don't know. It's like one of them things I feel like the b the ship has sailed for me on Instagram.

SPEAKER_01 42:42

I feel the same way you do, Tanner. I tried, I know Carter really got into it with his job, yeah. But I tried and I just like I have fun with it, and it's like a huge nostalgia rush, I guess. But like I can't play it like with the excitement and like that's anticipation and all those different emotions like I used to. Like it just it don't hit the same.

SPEAKER_00 43:06

No, yeah, that's the truth, because uh I I got into it pretty hard, as you know, just because it was like a good way to kill time. Like I would literally be like, I'm working, I'm like working tickets and everything, and I would just look over and my guy's fishing and he'll stop, and I'll just click on another pool and just let it keep going. So I would literally grind. What I think Austin kept calling that AFK, maybe where you just kind of let it go so you can do other things. Literally, uh, it would just go on for weeks. I played and I just like because I got my fishing up to the 70s and my cooking was in the 70s. Oh shit. Um yeah, and then my uh my combat and everything, I got my strength up to like 55 because I would just literally like while I'm at work, I would just let my guy click around and just kind of build up. But it's really not because I wanted to get up to where I could, you know, do some boss battles with Austin, and I still will if he wants to. But for me, the free world was incredible, like going to Port Sarum and discovering that and going to the barbarian village. And once you get into the members world, like Like you realize how small the free world is, but uh I don't know, like the the free servers was the where the nostalgia at, and that's where I wanted to play. And when I went out past that, I'm just like, I mean, it's cool, but it I don't know, like it's definitely not it doesn't carry the same weight that it used to with me, even though I played it, I played it to death and I have a good time. Even now I can still like while I'm at work, I can just have it in the background, it kind of keeps me occupied. So I kind of that's what I mean. Like I it's perfect for that. And for Austin, like he has those where he had those meetings all the time. Um he would sit there on his phone and just kind of keep RuneScape going. So he had a good time with that. So if you're just like chilling and you want to kill a few hours or you're just kind of you know waiting on something to happen, like where he was in those meetings, like I'm at work waiting on a phone call. RuneScape's perfect for that kind of thing, I feel.

SPEAKER_02 44:43

Of the three of us, you're the only one who works from home. So it's like perfect for I think that's why you got so much time into it, is because you had that little bit of free time in between calls, so you'd look over, you get a little, you can play it a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 44:54

Yeah, and it's not uh and it's not an intense game that you have to actually stay on top of. You don't have to like like if you were to play something like just like Elden Ring that I played recently, I'm not you're not going to stop playing that game. You can't pause it while you're in the middle of it. Like you're not, you're just dead. Um, you just kind of have to uh stay on top of that one. This one, you can just, you know, you're clicking on a pool of water and your guy's fishing. You know, you come back to it 10 minutes later, you just click on another pool of water and your guy goes and keeps fishing and it just grinds up your level. So that sounds boring, but it's kind of a good time kill.

SPEAKER_02 45:25

Right. Yeah, like another thing that kind of struck me was that how limited the quests were if you're not a member. Because uh, especially if you're trying to go towards a a certain class, because like I said, I wanted to be a mage, so I was like, I don't know which of these quests I should do. So I looked it up on YouTube, and there was like a list of quests, probably 10 quests or so, but I could only do two of them being not a member. And the thing is, I remember doing those quests whenever I was a kid, so it wasn't like it wasn't really fun to go back and redo these quests that I've already done before because the majority of them I already remembered, so I'm like, Yeah, I don't know what I'm really doing. And I I didn't really get that much like excitement out of grinding that much. And I tried to the social aspect, and me and Jared did have a handful of little fun uh social encounters with some people. We we told them we about the podcast and that we were uh playing this for the game, and they were really, really cool people. But some people are just assholes on that game and they don't want nothing to do with you. Like I would go to somebody trying to strike up a conversation and they just walk right past you.

SPEAKER_00 46:22

I'm like, well, that's that's constant on that game, but uh that's because they're doing what I'm doing, probably. They're just kind of sticking around, not really trying to talk to nobody, they're just kind of keeping it going. Like I said, I had a good time with it though, even over these past few months. I was a member for three or four months there. I canceled it just because I was like, eh, I don't really want to keep going with it. But you're right about those quests though, because you have to get you have to get like 32 quest points to take the Dragon Slayer quest. And that's what you need to wear like full rune armor, like the rune plate. But yeah, if you don't do the quest though, and and to me the quests aren't really that interesting. Like, I'm not like, oh man, I can't wait to do this next quest.

SPEAKER_02 46:55

I'm just like find this, go here, do that, go there, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:58

Yeah, it's like like here, take this uh crab on the other side of the map, and then he's gonna give you something you should take back here. And then that guy's like, oh, I left it here. You're gonna have to go down south, and it's just literally a big like I'm just really walking all over the map and not really getting nothing done. I just didn't like that.

SPEAKER_02 47:14

I still though I I love that Steffi chose this because this was definitely a a good walk down memory lane, because this is in my top five most nostalgic games of all time, easily. The little bit of play that had a blast with it, and I love talking about these memories and all that stuff.

SPEAKER_00 47:28

Yeah, that's that this was this honestly, I'm I'm having a blast talking about just this was like an Animal Crossing episode to me.

SPEAKER_02 47:33

It's like we that game's kind of sailed at ship, but but those memories will stay with us forever. You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_01 47:38

Oh, for sure. I agree with that. Really fast. Uh Carter mentioned a while ago, like the uh the free-to-play map versus the paid map or whatever, right?

unknown 47:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:49

Or the members members map.

SPEAKER_03 47:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:51

What's funny is I can't remember one time. Sometimes I would log off in the same place, which was kind of between Lumbridge and Virack, and uh over top of that desert town, kind of in between that desert town and Verack. Yeah. One day I log off and I log back on, and I'm stuck. Like I wasn't a member because my mom and parents and shit were too afraid to put in a credit card to online. But I can remember they had expanded or added, they had like added like new members' like worlds, but they had put a new fence in that it like been out from the free world. I was trapped in the members' world, like on the members side of a free world. Oh my god. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:39

Also it was a pay to come back and play.

SPEAKER_01 48:41

Yeah, well, like like I was just kind of stuck there until I somehow find a way to like kill myself to like get back to people, like what's going on? Like, yes, that's exactly what happened. The guy I was playing with that night was Matt Stewart, and like I private messaged him, I was like, You ain't gonna believe this shit. Please come to here right now and look at me. And like I got him to come over, and I was like, What the fuck am I supposed to do? I'm behind this fence that's like you know, members only, and I couldn't get back into the free world until I died, which really would have pissed me off if I had some valuable shit on myself at the time.

SPEAKER_02 49:17

Yeah, yeah. You would have had to pay for the membership just across the bridge to save the shit. Yeah, but yeah, that's wild. Uh a good way to uh put a stopper to RuneScape is uh that you know you all know that uh MMO or not MMO, that game I played, AMOBA, Smite. Their next battle pass is old school RuneScape. I don't know what the fuck they're gonna be doing on it. So if people out there play Smite, they're gonna be bringing in some uh RuneScape skins. So that's something to look forward to. I'm probably gonna buy that battle pass just for the hell of it. That's not that's not bad. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 49:46

I'm on Neopets now. My name's Jared Cook, spelled just like my name.

SPEAKER_00 49:51

Uh that's what I mean. This uh this episode's been so much fun because we're talking about like because I almost forgot Neopets. I just brought it up out of nowhere and was thinking, holy shit, yeah, I played Neopeds and Gaia Online or Gaia Gia.

SPEAKER_01 50:05

I've got a little frog monster. His name is Jiggle Jiggle Wiggle. Jiggle was taken, Jiggle Jiggle was taken, so I had a jiggle jiggle wiggle.

SPEAKER_02 50:13

Watch had all those toys of Neopets, and my favorite was always the green dragon. Do you remember those? She had a toys.

SPEAKER_00 50:19

I think there was a T-Rex too. Yeah, there was the one to get in.

SPEAKER_01 50:23

Yeah, oh yeah. There was a few different ones, and like I said, every time I would try to pick it, it would be like, oh, this monster's too many people had this monster. You need to take the little generic.

SPEAKER_00 50:36

There really is Neopets right now. I just went to the website. I'm like, it's still alive.

SPEAKER_02 50:40

I'm on. I just logged in. I'm gonna have to make Neopets account.

SPEAKER_00 50:44

Next episode, Neopets. We'll just skip the wheel.

SPEAKER_02 50:47

No, no, no. Oh, we gotta remind people of that. Yeah, like I guess moving on from RuneScape. Yeah, wonderful game. Loved it. It was great. But moving on.

SPEAKER_00 50:55

Long wheel for nothing. It took a long time. Well, we got I got like I got plenty of time in it, and I'll still play RuneScape. Like it was a good, I know we're not going to really give a score to it, but uh, I guess if I did, like we talked about it before, I'd get it around a seven and a half to an eight, just because it's still like a good time, and I still I'm gonna keep playing it just because I can just chill out and it's a good relaxing time to me. Oh, yeah. Time kill.

SPEAKER_02 51:16

Well, Carter, do you want to do the honors of telling the people what's left on the RPG wheel at the moment? Because Austin Steffi's game pick uh won, and now it's just our three picks, and then we're gonna continue with whatever it lands on. So hang on.

SPEAKER_00 51:28

Oh yeah, so um, so I'm gonna start with Tanner's game because that's the game I know nothing about yet. Uh well I know I know who the star of it is, it's Link, but it's um Twilight Princess for GameCube slash whatever other system it's on, because I think it's on a few different systems. We talked about that a little bit because we were going over these games, but there's Twilight Princesses left, that's gonna be a good time. Like none of these is gonna be a bad time, so I'm pumped for whatever we land on is great. Um my game is Dragon Warrior slash quest three, and you can actually get that on the uh Switch if you wanted to. You can get it on mobile, it's on your phones. Um so it's an easy game. I picked it because it's easy for anybody to play. Uh I was gonna pick Persona 4, but that's one you'd have to some you'd have to buy it. You can't really emulate that one. But it is on Steam for like 20 bucks now, which is kind of cool. Or on Vita if you want to get spend all that money, or get it on PS2, I guess. Um, but anyway, so there I I went with Dragon Warrior 3, which is you can play it just about anywhere, emulate it, whatever you want to do. Um, Game Boy Caller is the version that I like the best, but I'm gonna play it on Switch probably. Uh and then uh the game that I may even be more excited for than my own game, and that's we call it Arcanum, and I think it's actually Arcanum. Um, and that is a damn good PC game, and it's on Steam, so if you've never played it, you need to download that shit. That's a good game. It's an old game, it's like point and click, but it is like it's one of those where you're gonna look at it first if you've never played it before and be like, uh, I don't know about this, but once you get into it, it is so deep. That is a that is that game is rich. Like, there's so yeah, you'll never win, Jared.

SPEAKER_02 52:55

What did you say we're gonna be doing? Like, because we're gonna do something slightly like Age of Empires 2, right?

SPEAKER_01 53:00

Yeah, we we will we've we've done this in the past when we tried to introduce this game to Tanner. What we'll do is we'll draw for but we last time we did three options for each of us as far as like a character background goes. It's kind of like got some DD vibes, right, Carter, Dungeons and Dragons.

SPEAKER_00 53:19

Yeah, because it it it even goes like uh on DD, there's like uh like the higher your like decks, for instance, like a 10's like a zero bonus and stuff, and then the higher it is and get up to 20, that's like a 10 bonus or a five bonus. But yeah, it's like it's a lot like DD vibes there, and you get different backgrounds and stuff, different character classes.

SPEAKER_01 53:36

We'll we'll do that again. We'll we'll spend some time if Arcanum graces us on this next wheel. We'll spend some time and get Tanner set up. We might have to take a little break, but we'll add it to the end of this episode of us drawing for three characters and like choosing which one. That'll be fun. Yeah, I'll be fun.

SPEAKER_02 53:53

Alrighty, guys. Here we go. I got the screen recording going now. Three, two, one. Arcane them. All right.

SPEAKER_00 54:06

I'm fucking pumped. I can move.

SPEAKER_02 54:08

I knew it. I saved it for last year. I'm sending you all the vid.

SPEAKER_01 54:12

Hold okay. Hey, now I'm gonna have to get this wheel set up. We might have to take a small break because I'm gonna have to get the options up. But I also I gotta pee bad in this episode. I've been holding it.

SPEAKER_00 54:23

Let me go ahead and uh pause it. Commercial break for the non-commercial that we got. Let's keep it in here that we want a commercial break. So a word from our sponsors. And we're back from commercial break. And if you didn't hear anything, that's because we don't have a sponsor.

SPEAKER_01 54:47

If you'd like to sponsor us, just message our Facebook or uh Twitter page there.

SPEAKER_00 54:52

We don't cost much. We're what even if you just say, hey, will you shout us out? Sure.

SPEAKER_02 55:00

Alrighty, Jared. How are we doing this?

SPEAKER_01 55:03

Okay, so what Arcadum or Arcanum, as we've always called it, is is it's a it's an old PC RPG game. We've already talked about it a little bit. It's kind of got some like DD vibes, like Dungeons and Dragons. Like you pick a character, your character will have a background. Everybody starts in the same place, and there's a same main storyline to it, kind of like a Skyrim, Morrowind, Oblivion, Elder Scrolls vibe. But you can always branch out and do your own shit.

SPEAKER_00 55:36

Um I know we're gonna get into it on the episode, but Jared, when I first ever played the game, you little, I said, What do I do? And you literally said, Do whatever the hell you want.

SPEAKER_01 55:45

That's a good way to describe it. Yeah, okay. So what we're gonna do now that we that this game actually landed on the podcast is we're going to spin for three options to each of us for a background and then a race on top of that. So the races go as human, Carter, help me out here. I don't have it pulled up. Elf, half elf, dwarf, gnome, gnome, half ogre, halfling, half ogre, and half orc, I think are the eight, right? I'm pretty sure. Yes. You can be male or female, but for us where we're trying to get into it, we might exclude some of the female. Yeah, no hate. No, yeah, I just want to be my guy, if that's okay.

SPEAKER_00 56:28

Yeah, yeah, that's it.

SPEAKER_01 56:29

So I'm gonna start. Let's go alphabetical order, I guess, and let's get three Carter backgrounds and races. Okay. Okay, so first one, there's 64 different backgrounds to start with on this game.

SPEAKER_00 56:43

Yeah, this game is so deep.

SPEAKER_01 56:45

It's deep. It's a deep, deep game, Tanner. So if you have any questions, ask us because there's a lot to learn with this. So first number Carter gets now. Generate 60. So we're going down to the bottom.

SPEAKER_02 56:58

So this is his background, correct? 60.

SPEAKER_01 57:02

Yes, that's one of 60 is technophobia. You were raised on a potato farm in the rustic backwaters of a distant land. You worked hard, gaining a bonus to strength plus one and constitution, which is basically defense plus one, but you never experienced any technology of any kind. Subsequently, you are afraid of technological items and cannot bring yourself to even pick up one. So, plus one strength, plus one constitution, cannot add any tech items to your inventory. There are four possible races that you can get with this, which I will do right now.

SPEAKER_02 57:42

And yet, his character still has a podcast.

SPEAKER_01 57:44

It's a three, you would be a half orc technophobia, Carter. Okay, that kind of fits together, right?

SPEAKER_00 57:53

Like that's that's okay.

SPEAKER_02 57:54

Yeah. Orcs aren't very smart.

SPEAKER_00 57:59

Oh, and if you're an orc listen to this, you're you're we don't mean that.

SPEAKER_01 58:05

Okay, that's a good one, man. I love this. Is this might be my favorite episode or or part of the episode ever. So on to your second option, Carter. Are you ready?

SPEAKER_00 58:16

Yeah, I'm ready.

SPEAKER_01 58:17

24 is next.

SPEAKER_00 58:20

Jesus.

SPEAKER_01 58:20

So let's go with it.

SPEAKER_00 58:22

I'm so nervous.

SPEAKER_01 58:23

Escaped lunatic, only available to humans, so we don't have to draw for the race. You have escaped from an insane asylum and stowed away aboard of the F or the IFS uh Zephyr Zepher. Which is so to give you all a quick background, what the game is, is you just start on this blimp that crashes in like the is it the late 1800s, Carter? Early 1900s, something like that.

SPEAKER_00 58:52

Yeah, it's it's based on like a different world, even I'd say. Yeah, but yeah, pretty much like that era is kind of the vibe it gives out. It's like very uh would you say like steampunk Victorian era?

SPEAKER_01 59:02

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, so you've you're stowed away on the board of the IFS Zypher. You are extremely resistant to damage, plus 25% to normal fire, electrical, and poison resistance, but you have absolutely no money, you have stolen some cheap clothing, and most people are frightened or repulsed to even see you, minus 25 reaction to anybody that's surprised.

SPEAKER_00 59:29

That's a pretty big negative there. That's a tough one.

SPEAKER_01 59:32

That would be a tough one. So, escaped lunatic human is your second option. Okay. I'm writing it down so we don't forget. And last number generated, three. Let's go up to three. Three is an apprentice to a blacksmith available at all races. That's kind of cool. So here it goes. Your master is a hard man, you gain a bonus to strength plus one, and a bonus to re repair skill, but you suffer a penalty to dexterity minus two due to strenuous and repetitive hard labor. So a quick background. You can be any race, so I'm gonna roll for that next. You got a plus one strength, a plus two repair, a minus two uh dexterity or speed agility. Your race would be one through eight here and go through with it six. So you're going to be one, two, three, four, five, six, a half elf apprentice to a blacksmith. So, Carter, just to recap. You can be a half or technophobia where you're really scared of technology, but are a little bit strong because you were raised on a potato farm. You can be an escaped lunatic from an asylum as a human, who like everybody's afraid of, but you're really like you got some good defense, nothing hurts your skin, you're tough skin. And you can also be a half-elfrentice to a blacksmith.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:06

Okay, and he gets a little bit of strength, a little bit of repair, but minus two to decks. I don't like that. But you can do what you want with that character.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:14

Yeah, that one's more open than the other two.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:16

So he's the most standard of the of the three.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:19

He's yeah, more averaged.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:22

I agree. So I guess all that being said, then I'll just go ahead and go with the escape lunatic. No, I'm just kidding. That one threw me off. No, that would be interesting to play, I think, but like I feel like that would be a good one.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:35

Everyone who sees you are just repulsed.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:37

Oh my god. It would be tough to uh play the game because I like the character interactions of the game.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:42

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:43

Um, I'd almost say that that reason would make me want to choose the half elf, but I might just go with a half orc technophobia.

unknown 1:01:51

Ooh.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:53

That's not what I expected. I'll just make him like a I can just make him like a strong whatever, and I don't use techno technology, but whatever. Me got axe. Me got axe, exactly. Get a big axe and just run through it. Heavy armor, no technology, and just go kick ass.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:09

Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:10

Because I want to beat the game, and I almost beat it before my save file got corrupt. So this is kind of like a going back to that.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:17

Tanner? Yep. Do you want me to go or you to go?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:20

I can go. You can go last.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:22

Okay, I'll go last. I like I like like seeing your all. Tanner up next. I'm hitting generate now. Background number 11, which in alphabetical order is born under a sign. Available to all races. So we'll do a one through eight here in a second. But you were born during an astounding uh astronomical. Is that a word?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:46

Um I think it's astronomical.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:48

Astronomical. There you go. Thank you, Carter. Uh, as a result, you experience fewer. I can't read for shit. I'm more mathematical. As a result, you experience fewer critical hits and critical misses, but when you do get them, their results tend to be spectacular. So what you have is a minus ten to chance of critical hit success or failure, and plus ten for modifier of critical hit or failure effect.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:17

So it's either gray or awful.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:19

Right. Under a sign, and your race is next, one through eight, and you got two a gnome. So a gnome who was born under a sign.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:34

I don't know why gnome is the most hilarious race to me, but you racist.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:39

But on to the back.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:41

Not a halfling.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:42

Next number is 57 for Tanner, and that background is special person. Tanner's familiar with this one.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:52

You cannot be serious.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:54

I am a hundred percent.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:00

I don't know what it is you don't even have to read this shit. There's no way I'm picking it.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:05

Well, just to give Tanner. Before in the past, we tried to do this probably three or four years ago with this same set of standards way before we even thought of starting a podcast. But we wanted us to play through Arc or Arc damn Arcanum again, but Tanner never played it. So we came up with this way to play it. Well, lo and behold, this is the this is the background that Tanner ended up choosing because the other two were so awful. So I I don't remember what the other two were, but I remember him basically having to go with this. So what it says a special person. You have suffered uh brain damage, you lack intelligence, minus two, but you receive more praise when you do good deeds, resulting in better reactions from people. So intelligence is minus two, good reaction times two. So every time you do something, let's say somebody like people have like a reaction gauge on them.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:06

They give you double.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:08

They're like, good job, you don't want to play as yourself, though.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:13

Nah, nah. I'm in this for the role-playing aspect, not for me.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:17

Yeah, you don't want to play as yourself. That's lame.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:19

You your race was a six, which is a half elf. So a half elf special person.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:25

Okay, definitely not going with that one, but cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:28

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:29

That's good stuff.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:30

Okay, last one, Tanner. Tanner's 57. It is 57 again. No, just kidding. 40. 40 is a nature mage. Oh, I like this. You were born with a magical aptitude that has an affinity for nature. While standing on a natural surface, you possess a 20% bonus to magic, but on a man made surface, you suffer a 20% penalty. To your magical attitude. So that's a nature.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:03

I'm living in the woods with this guy.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:05

It's available to all except dwarfs. So one through seven.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:10

Okay. God, if you land on a half ogre, that would be hilarious.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:14

Your number was three, which is one, two, three. It's a human. Human nature mage.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:21

Well, I'm going with the human nature mage. That's like that's sounds like Avatar to me. I'm going with that.

unknown 1:06:28

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:29

I'm happy with mine.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:30

Very happy.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:31

Good. We'll get you in the game this time.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:34

Now, if Tander goes through this, magic is something I've never done. Have you ever had a magical character, Carter?

SPEAKER_00 1:06:40

Yeah, for a little bit, but I never got too far with them. I never like it's one of those files I started up and never played, I guess. So honestly, I'll say no. Yeah, but there's equally more into it than other ones. This game came out so such a long time ago, and I'd say it's more in-depth than games that come out today.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:08

Yeah. I can remember getting this in like 98, well, probably 99 to 2000, somewhere around that age or era. Okay, on to me.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:17

So Jared's a suave ladies' man.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:21

55 was the first one. Ladies man. 55 is buff bodybuilder. I wish. 55 is a sky mage.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:31

Ooh.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:32

Available to all except dwarfs, just like you. You were born with a magical aptitude that has an affinity for open sky. While outside and in clear view of the sky, you possess a 20% bonus to magic. But while underground, indoors, or even under a heavy forest canopy, you suffer minus 20%.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:53

Damn, that's just thinking about the levels of this game. That's rough.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:56

Yeah, Sky Mage and my race. Half elf.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:04

Jared's always a wood elf on uh Skyrim.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:06

That's true, true.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:08

That first one was more like, Aang, that sounds like an airbender to me, Sky Mage.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:12

27 is feral child. As an infant, your parents abandon you in the middle of the forest. Having been raised by a pack of wolves gives you a considerable bonus to dexterity, plus three, as well as slight bonuses in the thieving skills of prowling and pickpocketing. Oblivious of table manners and rules of the society, you receive a severe penalty to intelligence, minus six.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:44

You don't want to play yourself.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:48

As well as slight penalties in the social skills of persuasion and haggle. You begin with half the normal starting wealth. So minus six intelligence, minus one persuasion, minus one haggle, plus three dexterity, plus one prowling, plus one pick pocket, minus two hundred gold to start. So starting with only two hundred.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:10

Damn.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:11

It's only available to humans, half elves, gnomes, half orcs, and half ogres. So I'll roll that real fast.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:18

This one doesn't sound like a Jared character to me.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:21

Human. Feral child human. Gosh, I hope I get something good here.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:26

You're gonna be the sky child.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:28

14 is my last one. Let's scroll up. What's 14?

SPEAKER_02 1:09:33

James Bond.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:35

Uh Charlatan's protege. Um available to all races except half orcs and half ogres. Here we go. Having been convinced by a traveling salesman, DJ Shorter, to become his apprentice, you've given up your life in the military academy that you were enrolled in. You gain a major bonus to charisma, plus six. Physical skills, minus two strength, minus two constitution, as well as taking slight penalties to combat skills. So this will be a plus six charisma, minus two strength, minus two constitution, which is defense, minus one melee uh skill, minus one dodge skill, minus one bow skill, minus one throwing skill. So basically all the melee skills you take a hit on. Yeah. You take a hit to two strength and two defense, but you get plus six constitution.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:29

So you're a smooth talking peddler.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:32

Pretty much. So that's that one would be heavily involved with like uh having to talk to people and like working your way through things.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:39

That would be about getting a good team around you, which I'm probably leaning towards right now, but let's see what race I will be with that.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:46

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:47

A half elf.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:49

Same as the first, right?

SPEAKER_01 1:10:51

Yep. So just half elf sky mage, human feral child, half elf, uh DJ Shorter protege. I guess shorter saved me from the military, and my dad was an elf, so I like it, man.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:11

So uh a recap of all of ours. Carter, what are you?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:14

I am a half orc technophobia.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:19

Carter is the funniest by far.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:21

Yeah. He made he picked the most off the wall one.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:24

I know. I'm a human nature mage. Right. And Jared is a smooth talking peddler. Son of a gun. Yeah, you are. I'm gonna have to buy this game, and uh I'm looking forward to playing it. So our our big games now, go moving on from where we are right now, is Sly Cooper on the PS2, and now Arcanum. That'll be our background game.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:46

Yeah, so this Arcanum episode won't be out for a while because we're that's our long game.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:51

Yeah, we'll probably pay play this over the next month, month and a half, probably six six to eight weeks, I would say. Yeah, yeah, that's fair. And it's only six dollars right now on Steam. That's it? Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:06

Yeah, it's not bad. Alrighty, guys, I'm pumped for this. Let's just let's do it. All right.