Episode 08 – Super Smash Bros. Brawl

To kick off Season 2, Tanner, Carter, and Jerad jump into Super Smash Bros. Brawl on the Nintendo Wii. They talk about what made Brawl such a huge hit, from the stacked roster and wild stages to Subspace Emissary and countless hours of multiplayer chaos. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:06

Welcome everybody to the Retro Jammers Podcast. Today we're going to be kicking off season two with my pick, Super Smash Bros. Brawl on the Nintendo Wii. Alright, boys, we had a little bit of a hiatus to kick this uh season off. I think it's been a little over two weeks. It's Memorial Day weekend. What have y'all been doing recently?

SPEAKER_03 0:22

Anything been going on? Been playing a lot of God of War Ragnarok. I think I'm getting fairly close to beating it now.

SPEAKER_02 0:29

If you don't mind, Carter, and I guess you can do a non-spoiler if you want. Uh, where are you at in the game right now?

SPEAKER_03 0:34

Well, uh, non-spoiler, I am in Vanaheim.

SPEAKER_02 0:39

And it's been about two or three years since I've beaten it, so I'm trying to register where that is.

SPEAKER_03 0:44

I just killed a god. Put it that way. The one that can predict everything. Well, it's the one that predicts everything when you attack him. Again, I don't want to spoil it or anything, but um basically he doesn't want to kill him because he's trying to avoid Jesus. It's so hard not to spoil this game. I'm like, yeah, I'm 30 hours into it. How about that? I'm getting close. Okay, okay.

SPEAKER_02 1:05

You're getting I would say you're probably getting close, if I had to guess. 30 hours.

SPEAKER_03 1:09

That's probably like a 40-ish hour game, if I had to guess. And I do all the extra stuff too. Like I can't just go into a place and then they're like, oh, there's a quest out here in the Alfheim desert if you wanted to go do it. Okay, I do.

SPEAKER_02 1:20

For me, I mean, played Brawl, and we I I beat the subspace emissary mode, and we'll get in all that later on in the review section. But I dug out my Wii U for this, and God, man, it's been such a blast of nostalgia playing that fucking Wii U. Cause I have not touched it in a long, long time. It stays in its original box in my closet, and I just kind of keep it there with all my games and controllers and stuff, and I just don't touch it. But for this, I'm like, it's it's better to play Wii games on the Wii U because it kind of converts, it's not like 1080p, but it makes it, it up raises it for an HD TV, if that makes sense. Like you're using an HDMI cable, so it looks better than like a traditional Wii. So I'm like, yeah, that's perfect, and that's why I keep it. But man, I like going back through the Wii U and looking at like the uh what is it called? The UI of like the system and all that stuff. Yeah. Yeah. The music, all that shit. I'm like, man, this was a good ass little system. That just said that.

SPEAKER_03 2:17

Because like for me, I'll you know I had a Wii U, and I I mean, right now it makes you want to play Xenoblade Chronicles X, because that's really all I played on it. But uh yeah, basically. But I went back and played uh like every now and then when I'm at work, I'll go to YouTube and I'll put in like PS Vita home music and just let it run in the background while I'm working. Yeah. But I miss having the Vita and play, just listen to the home music, just the nostalgia trip. It's not like there's nothing on the Vita anymore that you can't play elsewhere, so it's kind of like it's ran its course now. But I mean it's just so nostalgia to think to see the home screen, see all the bubbles.

SPEAKER_02 2:50

I know the PS5 has their own little, it's not even really a song, it's more or less like an ambience, which that's like a typical Sony thing. But Nintendo, like with the Wii and all that stuff, they used to have these little like menu songs and stuff, and like the UI was different. The Switch to me is so fucking bland. It's just like a black screen with nothing. It's just dead silence. You click the game and it you're done. That's it. But with the Wii U, it was a lot more I don't know what you would call it, like had a lot more personality to it.

SPEAKER_03 3:17

Yeah, yeah. And that's like the PS3. Like if you load it up, it has like that kind of like a piano or something that plays when it first boots up and then it's just dead silent. Really, it's just silence. Then the PS4 has its own theme music.

SPEAKER_02 3:30

So that's weird. Yeah, it's like the PS3 kind of like skipped that. I haven't thought of it. Because the PS2 and the PS1 are some of the most iconic intro boot-up screens ever. Like you can't beat those.

SPEAKER_03 3:41

Right. The PS3 has like it does have a boot-up sound, but it's just like uh I don't know, you'd have to hear it. I don't know how to explain it.

SPEAKER_02 3:47

You know, I'm gonna add I'm gonna add it to the episode. Fuck it. Just give people it a little remote. Yeah. But uh yeah, like that that to me has been a huge blast because I went through all of my Miis and stuff. It's so funny because you can like name who made what me. So I'm like, I probably made about half, and then Jared made about half of my Miis. And a lot of the Miis that he made was from a night that we talked about on a previous podcast episode where a buddy of ours, Brock, and his friends came over and we were like trying to platinum these games. I forgot that we even Jared like got them to play the Wii U that night.

SPEAKER_00 4:27

Yeah, that surprised me to see like I have no recollection of making that group.

SPEAKER_02 4:32

If I had to guess, the game that we played was probably Wii Party You, a game that is notoriously hilarious to us because there's an inside joke with that game. I'm gonna quit I'm gonna go into side tangent real quick. In that game, it's like a party game on the Wii U, but like one of them is like you make a face and then the people have to guess what face you're making. So it could be like you're you're cringing or something, and then they'll give you four options and people gotta vote. It'd be like, is he sad? Is he happy? Is he confused? I'll never forget my prompt. This is verbatim when it said. I swear to God, unless my memory's failing me. The face you make when you have a semi. I was like, excuse me? I was like, what the like are you see? This is a rated E for everyone Nintendo party game. I just like made like a and Jared looked at it and had that like wide-eyed expression. He's like, uh uh. And then he just started like dying laughing when he seen that. That is crazy. Yeah, I was like, what the f it came out of nowhere. I want to go back and play that party game and refresh that shit over and over and over till I get that same prompt just to see if I'm not like crazy.

SPEAKER_03 5:38

You know, by the way, before we jump off this whole nostalgia trip we're on, I think when I'm playing on the PC, that's the one thing that it's really missing is that nostalgia factor of booting up like a PS3, a PS4, a PS2. You turn your PC on, and I mean the you can play, I can take my laptop right now and play games from 2001, 2000. So the games are there, but like for some reason it just doesn't have that nostalgia, like something missing. You know what I mean? Like, I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 6:03

Yeah, definitely. The PC, it it's great. I mean, in terms of just performance, if you if you have a really good PC, like it can run anything. You can have any game that you want. Like there's a long list of like pros, but there is that one little like piece of like something missing.

SPEAKER_03 6:19

You don't have that uh PS Vita home screen booting up or something, you know, you just got your your your PC booting up like it always has. Yeah. And it just doesn't feel like, oh, I'm back in time playing when I was a kid. It's just like, no, you're on your new PC playing games from when you were a kid.

SPEAKER_02 6:33

Which this this has nothing to do with our review about Brawl, but that that's how you play Brawl this time around, right? Well, no, you went to Jared's and stuff and we'll get into that, but how was it? Like, did you have to download the Dolphin emulator or was it like how was it? Did it run well?

SPEAKER_03 6:46

Oh, it ran fantastic. Like you talked about the upscale, and I noticed a huge difference between it running upscaled at 4K on my gaming monitor in 4K versus uh going over to Jared's and playing on his HD TV.

SPEAKER_02 6:58

Right.

SPEAKER_03 6:58

It looked crisp, clean, and perfect on there. The only hard thing was, of course, it's made for a which we'll get into it, but uh later. But uh it's just the way it with the way the game is designed, it was not designed for an Xbox controller, I'll put it that way.

unknown 7:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:12

And you gotta think the Wii was a it was what what are those things called? The RCA cables? It didn't have an HDMI, and that's what it was designed for. It was kind of the more CRT TVs.

SPEAKER_03 7:22

That reminds me of a story from when I got my PS3 when we were in high school. So the PS3 came with the RCA cable, and you had to get an HDMI cable separate back when they first launched, right? Uh they changed that later on because HD TVs became popular. But anyway, I had my PS3 set up for an HD TV because we finally got one at the house. I think it was like back when the early days when it was 720p, but a pretty big deal back then just to have an HD TV. So I get the cables and set my PS3 up to it. Well, I'll bring my PS3 to Jared's house because you know nobody else has one at the time. Everyone else was playing their Xboxes and their Wii's. Uh because 360 was huge when it first came launched like it was it killed PS3 in the beginning. So Jared has his 360, and I'm like, well, I'll bring my PS3 over. There's a bunch of people over at Jared's house. I go there and we hook my PS3 up, and it looks like shit, it's in black and white. And we're like, what the hell? So we ended up getting on his computer at the time, which Jared, I think you had the Sysnet back then. I remember that PC. Um it had just some cheap knockoff cysnet TV. It's really random. We looked it up, and it turns out you had to reset the uh output by holding like the power button until it beeps a few times to get it to reset to give an SD signal because it was set up to HD. So just reminded me of that. Like the PS3, you had to kind of do it that way to get it to change its actual TV settings, which I think they did like firmware updates and stuff that fixed that later on. But yeah, pretty crazy when it first came out. Yeah, and it looked like shit because it was just in black and white, and we're like, what the hell?

SPEAKER_00 8:52

I do remember that.

SPEAKER_03 8:54

And it was a hundred percent because it wasn't outputting an SD signal, it was trying to do HDMI on the TV that you had, which wasn't an HD TV.

SPEAKER_02 9:02

Holy shit, dude. Like it's crazy because that's like gaming over the years has those jumps, like you you go from the 2D to the 3D and then the HD. Like that was kind of a big jump once you get to that like 1080p like crystal uh clear look and it's widescreen, it looks great. I remember that jump for me, and I discovered it so fucking late was the first time I thought to use an HDMI cable. I had an Xbox 360, and I remember I was playing Red Dead Redemption 1. This was in probably late 2009, early 2010, and I had a fucking flat screen TV and an HDMI cord, but I did not think to use it for whatever reason. I just always assumed like this is it, the RCA, I'm gonna put it in. And I was just like, wait a minute, I have an HDMI, let me see if this works. And I remember the first time seeing that clear screen and being like, oh my god, like it completely changed.

SPEAKER_03 9:48

Future is now.

SPEAKER_02 9:49

Seriously. I was like, what have I been missing for fucking years? I could go along.

SPEAKER_03 9:55

That's why when they talk about like newer systems and newer consoles that keep coming out, like there was a huge leap, obviously, from like Sega Genesis, Super Nintendo, that era, to the 3D world of like PS1, Nintendo 64. Then we jump over to like PS2 and stuff where it does like the um they kind of perfected 3D. Like if you went from 64 to the GameCube, that's a huge leap. Then they go to the next generation where they start doing HD TVs and stuff, they start getting HDMI set up, and it's like, oh my god, this is crazy. And then ever since it's been like the games have been getting sharper, they've been getting more clear, and now they're starting to do 4K and stuff. But I mean, it just seems like they went from uh doing all these awesome jumps to now it's just like, oh, now it's just a lot faster. It'll just load your game faster. But graphically and stuff, it's not like, whoa, can you believe it?

SPEAKER_02 10:39

Yeah, the there have been some games recently where I'm like, okay, this looks freaking good. Like, I'm not gonna like Ragnarok was one of them games for me.

SPEAKER_03 10:46

Oh, don't get me wrong. Like, if you go back, we we played God of War recently. Yeah, the PS2 version, even the PS3 version of God of War 3 and Ascension, those look nothing like Ragnarok. Ragnarok's incredible looking and they can do some crazy stuff now. I just mean like it feels like once you hit those big open worlds of like the PS3 360 days, it seems like those games still would hold up now. You know what I mean? Like versus like a PS1 game, really kind of doesn't.

SPEAKER_02 11:12

Honestly, I do not think in my lifetime, again, I will have the same kind of reaction as whenever I first booted up like Oblivion for the first time.

SPEAKER_03 11:20

Yeah, that's that's what I'm saying. Like that I obviously games look a whole heck of a lot better than I didn't think.

SPEAKER_02 11:25

Oblivion looks like it's made of play-doh today, but I mean back then I was just like, oh my god, this is yeah, insane.

SPEAKER_03 11:31

Like you're seeing incredible stuff like Ragnarok when I'm playing on this my laptop with that OLED display is like the greatest thing I've ever seen to date. But at the same time, it's like it's not killing me like whenever I first booted up, like like you said, Oblivion, and I'm like, oh my god, I can just go anywhere and do everything. I got this whole world to explore. It's like they've just done the same thing over and over now, but it just I have the whole world to explore, and it just looks a lot better than it did. But it's not like the mind-blowing, like, oh my god, this is new.

SPEAKER_02 11:57

Which I feel like in this day and age, a lot of the times people are trying to go back to like the 16-bit era, like, you know, with games like Stardew and stuff. It's they're like, I feel like people are kind of getting a little, I don't know, oversaturated with all those fucking 200-hour games to the point where they're wanting something a little bit more simple. They're just like, okay, well, I kind of want to just go back to how games were a little bit more digestible. Like, that's one thing with this wheel I'm very excited about is we have some games like Little Nemo and Earthworm Gym. I because every season I always go back and I look, I'm like, okay, how long do these games take to beat? Just so I know, like, can I beat them or not? I think it said Earthworm Gym takes an hour or two. I'm like, that's that's good. Like it's good, it's good to have that balance, it's good to have that mix. It's not like a 40-hour fucking game.

SPEAKER_03 12:40

It's just hard to find time nowadays. Like you said, there's a lot of people making games now that you can just pick up, play. Uh Dead Cells is a good one to that I think of. I don't know if you guys have played Dead Cells before, but you can do a run, and if you die, like you got you made progress, but you know, you can you're done. You can come back to it later whenever you want. Play 10 minutes, play 20 minutes, play two hours. It's up to you, and it doesn't really affect anything.

SPEAKER_02 13:00

My go-to is um the Sonic Origins collection. Like it has the first three and s and uh Sonic C D. I love those games, and I go back to them. Like, that's literally by like turn off my game, turn off my game, turn off my brain, turn it off my damn game. Turn off my game brain. Uh, turn off the game for that bullshit.

SPEAKER_03 13:23

But yeah, that's all. Like you said, it's just crazy to not like I don't know if I'm ever gonna get that. Oh my god, my mind is being blown right now. Bragnarok's the closest.

SPEAKER_02 13:31

I mean, there's always that possibility with you know the the next generation PS6 and Nintendo Switch 3 and all that fucking bullshit.

SPEAKER_03 13:37

Yeah, but I'm a little worried how that's gonna go though, because I mean video games used to be like you go, you buy a two, three hundred dollar system and you play whatever you want. It's gonna be hard for the PS6 to not be a thousand, twelve hundred bucks. Like for me, that's not near as fun as it used to be. Not just the price, it's just oh my god, like why? Why? Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 13:56

I I think that's why we do a podcast like this, you know, because we we we love video games and we want to keep playing them. And I think sometimes there's more charm in these older games than newer games. There's something more to it to go back and play games that you never played before and just you know explore that. Like it doesn't you don't always have to be modern all the time, you know. It's good to have mixed.

SPEAKER_03 14:16

It's not like now where a lot of games, I don't want to say they're cookie cutter because they're not. I mean, people are coming up with new stuff, but at the same time, like when it comes to like 3D platformers and 3D stuff, this is when they were creating that stuff. So we're going back and playing like when they're like peak of creativity and stuff. Like they're like, we've never done 3D games before. Let's try this. Let me get to figure that out. Nowadays it's like, what's gonna make us the most money?

SPEAKER_02 14:39

Exactly. And the uh like a big part of the fun is obviously we discover a lot of the good games and the classics, but sometimes we're gonna discover some shit from time to time, and that's great too. Like, you know what I mean? I like seeing all I want to see the range. I agree. Well, one thing I was gonna say, and this is a first for our podcast. This was the first time not only that we ever touched a Wii game, but this is the first time we've ever touched a game from this generation. For the longest time with our podcast, we always said PS2 GameCube back. That was like our limit forever. And now with this like rebooted podcast, we wanted to expand it to you know the next generation because if you think on it, now the Wii is 20 years old.

SPEAKER_03 15:16

Yeah, it's it's hit the 20-year-old. I I consider it retro now. Damn, 20 years old. Yep. We're fucking old as dirt, guys.

SPEAKER_02 15:23

I mean, we're we're getting there, we're getting old as shit. Yep. The PS oh no no, I think the 360 is 21 years old, so he can drink now. So well, uh didn't they change that, the tobacco thing, to where you have to be 21 now to smoke?

SPEAKER_00 15:37

I think Carter's too old to care.

SPEAKER_02 15:40

Yeah, I was gonna say that made that law.

SPEAKER_00 15:41

We were we're good. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 15:43

The reason I say that I have a cousin, I think, who like who vaped and stuff, and he just whenever he's about to turn 18, I think they changed it. And he's motherfucker, wait three more years.

SPEAKER_03 15:53

Yeah, there's a no, we can talk about that all day, like how I feel about the 18 to 21 stuff. All I'm saying is uh there's definitely a huge difference between an 18-year-old and 21 year old hell, even a 26-year-old, at least for me. When I was 18, 21, and 26. But then at the same time, like, hey, if you can join the military, you should be able to do whatever you want to.

SPEAKER_02 16:12

So what if they changed the game rating though? Imagine that. They change it from 17 to 21. Like, you can't buy GTA 6 unless you're 21 years old.

SPEAKER_03 16:20

They were being up. Oh they would be hell to pay for that one because there would be so many people like you're gonna cost them millions of money, millions of dollars. People who can't buy the game, even though you know somebody's gonna buy it for them. And if it feels like when I was a kid, I would go into a game stop and buy a game that was rated like M for mature, and I'm clearly like 12, 13 years old, and they would just be like, Here you go, bud.

SPEAKER_02 16:40

Really? See, I've all I've always looked young my whole life. I've never had that.

SPEAKER_00 16:44

I don't even think it's about looking old. It's like people didn't care.

SPEAKER_03 16:48

Yeah, that's it. That's what I was saying. Like the album when I was 12 years old, I looked, you know, 12 years old. Yeah. And they were just like, Here, man, yeah, you're gonna enjoy Grand Theft Auto.

SPEAKER_00 16:57

Yeah, I agree with the order. That never was an issue with us. Like, you're 12 and you get a rated M game just by yourself with no no issue. Yep. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_02 17:08

I I remember when Skyrim came out, my dad had to go in there with me. Fucking Skyrim. It's not even that Skyrim has no sex, Skyrim has none of that shit, but they would not let me get it. Like, I'm sorry, dude. We're gonna need your parents. And I remember my dad came in there, and the it was that classic GameStop dude, he was like trying too hard. He's like, I just want to warn you, this game has some violence. It gets there's some uh you know, not so great language, and dad's like, I don't care about that shit.

SPEAKER_00 17:34

Like now that you say that, I I do remember Carter and I had a peer, one of our buddies, who went to buy Grand Theft Auto San Andreas, and it was at a Toys R Us, if I'm not mistaken, and like the cashier like stopped his parents and like explained everything in the game, like before he saw and I remember the guy was like telling it back to me that he was so scared that he wasn't gonna get this game. But but like I mean his parents ended up buying it, but he was like, What like shut the hell up in his mind while this 25-year-old cashier is just like there's a lot of sex, there's blood, you're killing hookers.

SPEAKER_03 18:14

Could you imagine if they'd have told Tammy that? Jared would have not played this game growing up.

SPEAKER_00 18:19

Oh, yeah. I do uh have I ever told you my story on San Andreas?

SPEAKER_03 18:24

No, told me if it's the right one where she watched you play. Is this the story?

SPEAKER_00 18:28

Oh, well, I mean, there's that, but like so I pre-ordered San Andreas and was supposed to pick it up the day of release. Like, my mom specifically takes me to Beckley to go get it.

SPEAKER_03 18:39

I know this story too. Okay, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 18:41

So, yeah, like, and she's like, I'll just run in there and get it, Jared. So I just sit in the car and like I end up sitting there for like 45 minutes, and I was wondering what was up. Well, then she comes out and she hands me the game, and I was like, Oh crap, like something happened. She was like, So I went to GameStop and I told them we had it reserved, and they told me they had already sold all the copies that came to that store. And my mom, being the type of person she is, is like, well, listen, I'm going to JCPenney's, I'll be back in 20 minutes. You better have a copy of my game, or I'm calling blah blah blah blah blah. So she goes to JC Penny's and then comes back, and all of a sudden they actually have a copy.

SPEAKER_03 19:25

So that's crazy. One of the employees wanted to keep that bad boy.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

I guess so, but like I'd reserved the game. Like I uh probably a year before it came out had paid. But yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:37

Amy's always been like that. This is a complete side tangent, and then we'll get back into what I was talking about. I remember when she took me and Littlebrook to the midnight release of the final Harry Potter movie. It was at the midnight premiere. There was probably, I'm not even shitting you, a thousand people there waiting outside. It was insane. There were so many people. And I remember a dude came outside and he's like, Taylor, party of three, we got your tickets. And she was like, right here, and took these fucking people's tickets and we got in. I was like, what is happening right now? Holy shit, that's awesome. She she gets it done. She does. We wouldn't, we would have absolutely not seen that movie if she hadn't done that.

SPEAKER_03 20:12

Is that I feel like that's a thing of the past now for like those midnight release video games. I feel like that doesn't happen anymore because you just didn't.

SPEAKER_02 20:18

It doesn't. The last one I went to was in uh 2022 for Pokemon um Scarlet and Violet. That one was pretty it probably had about 50 people there. It was decent. But like, unless it's like I would say GTA 6 will probably have a midnight release easily. It takes a specific game.

SPEAKER_03 20:36

I feel like something like that should have a midnight release because that's awesome. But at the same time, I also feel like if you go there the next day, you're gonna have a copy.

SPEAKER_02 20:42

Yeah, exactly. They're gonna be printing millions of them anyway. I think you you go for the experience of it.

SPEAKER_03 20:48

Oh, yeah, yeah. Especially now. That's what I mean. Like before those midnight releases were like, hey, if you're not there at midnight, you're not getting the game.

SPEAKER_02 20:55

Like, for instance, I I would say the one that was the most like a party for me was uh the Fallout 4 midnight release. I went to that one and they were having like a QA and shit like that, and you would win prizes for stuff. I remember one of them was uh I got I got a little like badge or something. They were like, What's the name of Butch's clan in Fallout 3? I was like, the Tunnel Snakes, and then they gave me a badge or whatever for it.

SPEAKER_03 21:17

Nice.

SPEAKER_02 21:17

But yeah, that shit was just so fun. I love that. People out like sitting outside, like eating pizza and talking and shit. It's just so it's a really fun experience. But anyway, what I was saying uh uh earlier about like how this was the first game of this era and like the first Wii game we've ever had. I was wanting to talk to y'all a little bit because we we talk about the Wii quite a bit, actually, me and Jared especially. You all were in high school when the Wii dropped in 2006. Were you all like juniors or sophomores?

SPEAKER_03 21:40

Junior. Juniors for sure. I went to trade school at the time. Spring of 06.

SPEAKER_02 21:46

Yeah, I was eight years old, so I have my own little uh like tale about it. But what do you all remember about the Wii's launch? Like, was it a big deal? Was it a lot of people hyped for it, or was your range of age kind of like not really into it?

SPEAKER_00 22:00

We didn't care for it, did we, Carter? Like, I mean, it was cool. Like, basically, my experience with it was like Dee Dee had bought one for Tanner, so it's at my grandma's house. And I would take like a friend or two to my grandma's house to play this new system just to play Wii Sports to sh like just to experience it. And then, like, oh, this is cool. And then, well, let's go home and get on to Call of Duty with the boys.

SPEAKER_03 22:28

Yeah. Call of Duty was like, this wasn't like, you know how nowadays there's Call of Duty, it's just like everyone's like, Call of Duty is the same as the previous game. Well, this was the first Call of Duty. Like it was modern, it was fourth one, I guess. Call of Duty 4. Uh-huh. But it feels like the first actual, like, all of us being online playing together, type of real big Call of Duty nights. First time that came around. But yeah, that was on 360, and that was basically what we were all doing at the time.

SPEAKER_02 22:51

Because I'm I'm sure your little sister got it too, maybe that Christmas as well. But yeah, that's what I remember especially was like I was a GameCube kid. I hadn't had any other system up until that point. So this was like a huge deal for me. I remember the first time I ever heard about the Wii or seen it was like internet was a thing then, but I just wasn't on it for whatever reason. So I remember going to the mall with my mom and going in GameStop, and there was this kiosk of the Wii just sitting there. I'm like, what is this? Like, what is this shit? It was like white with the blue lights and stuff on it. It said Nintendo. I was like, holy fuck. Like this was my first time ever going from one system to another. So it was just kind of like a new experience to me. But I remember the game on it was a game called Excite Truck. I think it was a it was like a spiritual successor to have y'all ever heard of the NES game Excite Bike?

SPEAKER_03 23:37

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:38

It was in that same s sort of series. And I remember playing it and like could not grasp the idea of motion controls at all. I had no idea what the hell I was doing. Like I was running into walls and shit. I'm like, what is this? I I didn't like really care for it that much whenever I first played it. I'm just like, this is odd. Like this is really strange. But I think the more and more like I got Nintendo powers and stuff, and I started the hype started to build and build and build for this thing to the point where I remember it was a receipt from Walmart. I remember seeing it, and it was like uh a Nintendo Wii, two Nintendo Wii's, like the receipt that she bought for that Christmas for me and my stepbrother, and I was like, oh my god, I'm getting this fucking Wii. I remember this the Christmas getting it. I got Wii Sports, that was the packing game, and then Twilight Princess, the Zelda game, which is one of the best 3D Zelda games. Y'all haven't played it, which is insane to me. But yeah, man, that was a fun ass night, dude. Just playing the Wii for the first time, and and that's a very nostalgic system for me, for sure.

SPEAKER_03 24:34

That's awesome, man. That's really awesome. Like my first experience with the Wii was actually I said trade school because that's where I first ever touched a Nintendo Wii was at trade school. Um towards the end of the year, you know, everyone brings in stuff to like Wii, where we were in the Oracle class or the Cisco Oracle class, we hooked our Xbox up to the class that was doing like the hardware PC stuff. So we did a LAN party that way, so we had like Halo set up and we were all playing Us Against Them. Someone brought in Guitar Hero because Guitar Hero was huge in 2006 and everybody was playing that, so that's another thing Jared mentioned before. That was something else we were doing at that time. My teacher there, he brought in the Nintendo Wii because he won he got one. And I just remember us like bowling and just doing the Wii sports stuff and being like, This is freaking crazy, man. I'm actually bowling. I was like, because I remember us talking, like, how do you do it? They're like, Do you like your bowling? You hold it and you let it go like you're letting go of the ball. And we were like, holy shit, this is crazy.

SPEAKER_02 25:31

Nowadays, people shit because even like motion controls, they're in modern day controllers. Like the PlayStation 5 has motion functionality in it. Like there's some games where you gotta like shake the controller and that that functions like that. But at the time, yeah, it was like really crazy like to wrap your mind around this like motion concept. You look at it now, it's more or less just it acts as a button, but you just fucking waggle the damn thing. It's not that crazy anymore, but back then it really was. It was like, okay, this is pretty cool, very different. Uh that's just one of them weird Nintendo decisions or or innovations or whatever you want to call it. Sometimes they strike out and it fails, like the virtual boy and the Wii U and shit. But sometimes, sometimes they'll they'll you know take a swing for something and it works. And the Wii Using.

SPEAKER_00 26:19

They go to bat swinging.

SPEAKER_02 26:21

Usually with each system, they'll introduce something, like a little Nintendo gimmick that sometimes I roll my eyes and I'm like, Nintendo, please, just be normal.

SPEAKER_00 26:30

What was the fucking cardboard ship from Switch called, Tanner?

SPEAKER_02 26:34

We talked about that. The the Labo, Nintendo Labo.

SPEAKER_00 26:37

Labo. That was shitty.

SPEAKER_02 26:39

Yeah. That's just one of the Nintendo things. They, you know, they shoot for the stars and then see what happens, and then it either it works out or it it sucks. But this was definitely one of those that worked out because I think this is their second best-selling system behind the switch.

SPEAKER_03 26:53

Yeah, it sold like crazy, man. It was uh I think it was $200 for the system at the time, and it was just it was a good time. I think it was basically what the the the only like I remember when it first came out, you asked like what were some of the opinions on it. I know a lot of people were talking about how it was like a GameCube with motion controls, like it wasn't really a graphical upgrade or anything.

SPEAKER_01 27:11

No.

SPEAKER_03 27:11

And then because at the time that's what they were pushing, the other systems like PS3 and 360 were pushing HD, and this is the new era, and then everyone's like, well, you can get HD with these new systems, or you can get a Nintendo E that's the exact same as a GameCube.

SPEAKER_00 27:24

This was the first like series of consoles where Nintendo got passed up significantly graphically, and that's what everybody was pushing, like more and more, more than. Now we've kind of reached kind of the peak, I guess, and now you want that innovation. Like, there's several games that couldn't be on the Wii that were on PS3 and Xbox 360.

SPEAKER_02 27:46

Or if they were, they're like the worst ports ever. Like the Call of Duty games on the fucking Wii look like PS1 games. Like they're horrible.

SPEAKER_00 27:53

The Wii held its place, man, with its innovation, and like you mentioned, I mean, top Nintendo selling console until the Switch came. But here's what I remember. So like I did kind of bullshit around and say like I didn't have much interest in it. I would come and show a friend, this is Wii Sports, this is Wii Sports. But fast forward to 2010, and I'm in a college dorm and I'm living with four people, and we've got like 12 guys on our dorm floor that are all buddies. And I went out and bought a like a Wii. I bought a Wii just for my college dorm, and we had a fucking blast. Like still to this day, the Wii I have now isn't from high school. I think maybe Littlebrook got one and it was called it was basically called her console, my little sister at the time. But the uh the Wii for me was I got it in college, and to this day everything saved on it as far as Mii's and records and Wii Sports and Sports Resort go is from college.

SPEAKER_02 28:55

I think you figured out what the Wii is as a college. The Wii is not a single player system. I mean, it has some excellent single player games on it, but what it's primarily made for is that what you all did yesterday. Get buds over, crack open a few beers, and play some local multiplayer games.

SPEAKER_00 29:13

I'd hate to see how many hours were spent in our college dorm on the three-point shot contest on sports resort with the Wii Motion Plus.

SPEAKER_02 29:22

And the thing that's so crazy to me is that game is so simple. It's so fucking simple, but what I don't understand what makes it so fun. Like I really don't. I think it's the whole concept of Miis, honestly. Those like Wii games, like the Miis alone make 60% of the fun.

SPEAKER_00 29:38

Yeah, I mean, look at Ty Dachi Life. It's based off the Miis.

SPEAKER_02 29:42

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 29:43

It's super successful.

SPEAKER_02 29:45

Yeah, it's that customizable aspect of it. Like you every video you were sending last night, you're like, oh, here comes Josh Kelly up to bat. What is he gonna do? It's that little tiny fucking thing that adds that much like fun and humor to it. That's one thing I think Xbox tried to do. I think they called them avatars, but they didn't really reach the the height of the Mies. Like they tried to kind of do that, but they never got close.

SPEAKER_00 30:07

Yeah. Classic Microsoft just copying whatever everyone else does.

SPEAKER_02 30:14

With the Connect, the Xbox Connect that tried to be like Boy.

SPEAKER_00 30:18

Yeah, they tried to capitalize hard off the Wii, but they didn't do it good. To this day, I've never really I mean probably less than two hours I've spent with a Xbox Connect.

SPEAKER_02 30:28

Me to me like I went over my buddy Nick's house whenever I was like 13 and he had one. He said the only reason or he he got it for you know the it was a new piece of tech and you know it would look cool or whatever, but uh after a while, um I would say he probably played it for like you said, two or three hours and then never again. I think it was kind of like what VR is today.

SPEAKER_03 30:48

You get a VR headset, it's cool, you look around, it's it's cool, but and then it just sits there and collects dust. I'm really glad that VR didn't catch on. That was one thing I never could get into. Like, I love the immersions idea of gaming, right? Like I got a huge monitor, and sometimes I'll hook my laptop up to it, even if I gotta turn my settings way down to play on it. Putting on a VR headset, and then you got your headphones where you can't hear anything is just makes me too paranoid.

SPEAKER_02 31:15

Yeah, I've had uh one good experience on the VR. I I bought the PS VR one and I'm like, I'm never making this mistake again because I only beat one game on it, and that was Resident Evil 7.

SPEAKER_00 31:24

It's like an expensive like investment. Like it's as much as a console, pretty much.

SPEAKER_02 31:30

At the time it came out, it was $500, and that's what I bought it for.

SPEAKER_00 31:33

But dude, I'm telling you, if you all were to say, hey Jared, we're buying the Oculus, whatever it's called, uh there's a first-person shooter, which I know are available there, or there's a golf game on there that we're gonna start playing. Do you want to buy one and get in on this? Hell yeah. Like, I'm in. My thing with VR is I think it's fucking amazing. Even the bullshit free games. What's that playground bullshit called? I don't know. You know what I'm talking about? That like I do.

SPEAKER_02 32:03

I know what you're saying. I just I'm not entirely sure what you're or what it's called. Is it Rec Room?

SPEAKER_00 32:08

Rec Room, Rec Room, Rec Room, yeah, LL.

SPEAKER_02 32:11

You know that game shut down this month?

SPEAKER_00 32:13

Really?

SPEAKER_02 32:13

Yeah, it went under. I think it said like not a lot of people were playing it anymore, so it they've it finally shut its first down.

SPEAKER_00 32:20

It goes to show how much I'm in the VR community, but like if y'all were to tell me, like, hey, we're we're buying this Oculus, we're logging on to Rec Room. Do you want to play? Let's get the paintball boys and let's have a fucking blast. Like, that's the same thing.

SPEAKER_02 32:32

I remember the first time I brought my VR headset to your house and you had never touched a VR headset in your life. I remember that you played the uh PlayStation demo. It was a demo disc and had five different like preset mini games on it. One of them was like you're going underwater in this shark tank or shark cage and the shark is swimming around you. One of them is like kind of an espionage, sort of like that's the one you loved. And I remember there's a scene where this big buffed bald dude has a gun to your head, and I remember you looked at me with the VR headset on your head, and you took the VR headset off so I could see your eyes, and you had a tear going down your eyes. I was like, this shit is getting to him hard right now. This is crazy.

SPEAKER_00 33:17

I'm telling you, right now, damn, how much is an Oculus? If you all were to say, Jared, let's get an Oculus, what are they called?

SPEAKER_02 33:26

Oculus Rift.

SPEAKER_00 33:28

Yeah, whatever it is. Like, and there's a shooter on there to where it's basically like a Call of Duty type game, and it's us together. You gotta take out the magazine of your gun with your little handset and then let's put a new magazine in and fire a weapon and crawl and hide. Dude, this upstairs room would be a fucking VR room.

SPEAKER_02 33:50

Yeah, you have the space for it. That's for sure. You definitely have the space. That's one thing you need for VRs a lot of space. Otherwise, it's not gonna work.

SPEAKER_03 33:56

The only game that I would probably play on it is how they got Arc running on it perfectly now. Oh I'm just kidding. No, no, no, not at all.

SPEAKER_02 34:05

They do have something that they do have an Arc VR game, but it's not on something. Yeah, it's called Arc Park, but it's like it's its own little side thing. It's not multiplayer, nothing like that.

SPEAKER_00 34:15

Carter got me.

SPEAKER_02 34:18

Imagine like a roller coaster tycoon uh game in VR, though. You build it and then you can walk around it in VR and you ride your roller coasters like that shit would be awesome.

SPEAKER_00 34:27

Stop talking about roller coaster tycoon. I'm still pissed off. Somebody, either you or Carter teased the fact you were going to add roller coaster tycoons in the world.

SPEAKER_02 34:34

That was Carter because he bought it for me and bought it.

SPEAKER_00 34:37

Dang it, Bobby. I made sure we all had it. Yeah. Hey, do you got roller coaster tycoon? Like, uh, it's cool when you're gonna be.

SPEAKER_03 34:50

I think we should have mulligan uh fix every now and then. I mean, yeah I think that's one thing. Side co side note for everyone listening to the podcast as well. Sometimes we get um these hiatuses, and by the time we get to our games, it's just like, hey, I would like to change my game because I don't want to play that one anymore. But anyway, I'm cool with both of these.

SPEAKER_02 35:08

This is the start. This is the first game of the season. I I completely would understand if you was like, okay, I'm changing Vice City to Road Caster Tycoon for the rest of the season.

SPEAKER_00 35:15

Man, Vice City's like kind of relevant though to GTA coming out this year, the 80s.

SPEAKER_02 35:20

Change Metropolis Mania.

SPEAKER_00 35:22

It's been too long. We've put that off too long.

SPEAKER_03 35:26

Yeah. I mean, let's just make sure we get to another season. Hey.

SPEAKER_00 35:32

Yeah, I guess I'll play Roller Caster Tycoon next year.

SPEAKER_03 35:35

I'll put it this way, Jared. I've not played Metropolis Mania, and I've not played Vice City, so do with that what you will.

SPEAKER_02 35:41

Alrighty, boys, we're 40 minutes in the pod. Let's go ahead and hop into the game here. We talked about the Wii and stuff, and this was a game, Super Smash Bros. Brawl. This was a game that I played the uh ever-loving shit out of. Going back to my history with Smash, I my first Smash game was Smash Melee on the GameCube. Loved it. I think that the game was a huge education for me in terms of like pretty much all those Nintendo franchises that wasn't Mario or Pokemon or Zelda, like everything else, I had no idea what the hell they were until I played Smash. So this series has always been a huge part of my life and Nintendo. And this is the game that I played the most by far growing up. This was the one that is considered the black sheep of the series. A lot of people think this is the worst. I I completely disagree, and we'll get into that. But um, yeah, this was one that I got the day it came out. I remember watching trailers for it, super fucking excited. Um now, what about you all? Because like Carter has a long I'm more interested in hearing about you all because Carter has a long history of absolutely hating Smash Brothers. And I want to know, like Carter, where did you first play it? Like where where did you like like you grew to hate it?

SPEAKER_03 36:50

I tried playing it so many different places. I remember uh we had a buddy named Corey in high school, Jared. Actually it was in uh gosh, way before high school and middle school even. And his mom used to come pick me up and let me come to their house and hang out. And we played Smash Brothers there. Um I know I probably touched it at Jared's house a time or two. Uh just a lot of people play Smash, and every time I go around and play it, um this experience, by the way, was very similar to the experience I've always had with Smash, where you're not really controlling your character, you're just kind of pushing buttons and stuff will happen. If you push A or two or whatever the button is, something will happen. And if you push it again, something else will happen. So it's like you're not even controlling the character, you're just kind of on here.

SPEAKER_02 37:35

Which I think we'll well, Jared can go ahead and talk about his well, we'll talk about the game in a second. But Jared, where did you come learn about Smash? What did you play the original? Because I never did growing up.

SPEAKER_00 37:45

I never had it. I think I've got it now in the collection, but like I never had it back then. Basically, anytime a friend came over to stay or stay the night, or I went to a friend's to stay the night, that's what we played, or they would bring it to my house to play on my system. So I'm very aware of the game. That's at the height of Pokemon. So like I can remember specifically like kind of taking turns on like my TV and me learning how to unscrew and screw back in the A V output for video in the cable little thing, whatever that's called, Carter. The Kovacs cable, like yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But like, like so me switching between playing Pokemon Gold on a on the Super Nintendo Game Boy player and then going back to Smash. And then like, okay, let's play Pokemon Gold again. Like having a few buddies over it. So like that was my like Smashed, and I'm like you, Tanner, like like my main as a kid was Ness. And I had really I had no clue where Ness came from. Yeah. And like I didn't learn that till years later. But I just like the kid with a baseball tap on backwards, probably a little harvest moon, kind of backwards hat, little kid.

SPEAKER_03 39:08

Little Jared. Little Jared.

SPEAKER_00 39:11

You could bring out a baseball bat, the lightning, PK Thunder.

SPEAKER_02 39:15

PK Thunder. Yeah, that shit. Like that's crazy to me because Ness is one of those characters that's kind of hard. That's like one of the harder characters to play. And that was your main.

SPEAKER_00 39:24

So I'm not saying I was good at the game. I mean I'm nine, ten years old, but like Ness and Kirby were my two to go between. And I remember Melee very well because I would go to like some friends' house and we would just play and just to like pause it in certain scenes and like use the camera to rotate around on how cool it looked of us like swinging at each other. And then if you fast forward to the Wii version, which is what we're on today, my first memory is with you probably at Dee Dee's house, like in that back room watching you go through the story mode.

SPEAKER_02 40:03

That sounds about right. Like around that little like year or two that you live with Didi, we we played this quite a bit every time I would uh come down. But yeah, I it's crazy you say that with the camera thing, because that's what me and Wash used to do all the time when we were like seven, eight years old. We wouldn't even fight. Like what we would do was we would kind of like we would pick two characters that kind of were related to each other and we'd pick a map and we would like pretend like we were acting out a scene, wrapping around the map, and like you know, like we would like pause it to take like little like screenshots of our characters and that kind of stuff. Yeah, you just unlocked a memory for me that I forgot about. Pretty much, yeah. That's what that was a big part of what we did. But yeah, like I said earlier about Brawl being like the black sheep of the series, there was a lot of things that they added to this game that people hated, but it was mostly in terms of the gameplay. Uh, this game is way noticeably slower than all the other Smash games. I don't know if y'all picked up on that, how floaty and slow it is. All the other ones are a whole lot faster than this one. And there was one thing that he added in terms of I don't even know why, but the the creator said he wanted the game to be more casual because Melee is an extremely, even today, that's one of the most popular competitive fighting games out there. That's the one that people are insanely like passionate about and they still have huge tournament tournaments for and it's extremely fast-paced.

SPEAKER_01 41:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:20

But he added a thing to where the characters will randomly trip out of nowhere for no reason. Like you'll just fall over and it will like fuck up what you're trying to do. And he thought that would kind of like and make it more for everybody, but of course the competit like competitive people fucking hated that and they're like, no, I don't want this. But this game is so slept on, in my opinion, for all the things that it adds, because everything that people take for granted about Smash today came from here. Like Brawl introduced, like, do you all know that the Smash Ball item to where whenever you break it, like each character has their own little ultimate attack to where like it's their final smash or whatever? It came from this. Like there wasn't in any in any other Smash game. Those assist trophies, did you when you all were playing last night? Did you ever see those little like white capsules that if you grab it, it unlocks like a character from either Nintendo or like a third party to help you fight?

SPEAKER_01 42:07

Yeah, I love that. I love it. I do too.

SPEAKER_02 42:10

Like there's one of them that's a Nintendo that jumps up on the screen and blocks everything. Yeah, you can't see anything. Like that kind of shit is so creative and so cool, and it just adds a lot of like chaos to it. The last thing this game added that is huge in what Smash is known for now are the third-party characters. They randomly added Snake from Metal Gear Solid and then Sonic from Sonic the Hedgehog, which was a huge deal back in the day. But now Smash is kind of like this global event. Anytime there's a new Smash Brothers game, there's these huge trailers, this hype and stuff. People want to know who they're gonna add next, who they're gonna add next. It's gotten so crazy with this series that like they've added fucking Steve from Minecraft, damn Sora from Kingdom Hearts, Cloud from Final Fantasy, Joker from Persona. Carter character, yeah, exactly. Minecraft Steve.

SPEAKER_00 42:57

Tell the audience like our like theory, like every new character there for like a good couple years was aimed at Carter and he hates the game.

SPEAKER_02 43:06

It's true because Carter fucking hates Smash. And I remember Carter would say these things. I don't know if there's a direct correlation if he said specific characters, but I remember he would be this is like an instance, what he would say. I'll get Smash whenever they add Joker from Persona to Smash. Lo and behold, here comes a fucking announcement trailer, Joker from Persona, and then Carter will push the goalpost. Well, if they add Dragon Quest, I'll get it. Here comes Nintendo with a big ass Dragon Quest E3.

SPEAKER_03 43:36

That is 100% accurate. Nothing, obviously, I'm not looking up anything. I don't know what's getting ready to be announced, but I was always like, if they would announce this game and this game and this game, then I'll do it. And then they announce all those, and I'm like, well, hell.

SPEAKER_01 43:49

They're begging Carter to play.

SPEAKER_02 43:51

It was insane. I was just like every fucking time. And this was the game I guess they tried but even back in 2008 to get Carter. They're like, Okay, well, that's all. Snake. Maybe he'll he'll get it then.

SPEAKER_03 44:04

Sucks for Nintendo.

SPEAKER_02 44:05

I never owned uh a system, so now last night you all had a huge night playing the Wii and playing this game. How like honestly, like how was it? But in terms of just like a little get together sort of thing. Was it fun for you, Carter, or was it more or less the same? But like I do not enjoy this.

SPEAKER_03 44:22

Are you talking about Smash or the Wii? Smash. Smash. Um I mean, I won once as Wolf, but I mean, I still couldn't tell you how I won. It just like all of a sudden they were like, hey, there's a winner there, and it happened to be me.

SPEAKER_02 44:38

That's the thing about Smash. It's not a traditional fighting game. In in traditional fighting games, there's a health bar. You beat the fuck out of somebody until their health bar is done, and then that's it. In this game, it's based on a percentage system. So you start out at 0%, and if you hit one of the other fighters, it will knock it up to let's say 20 and then 40% and then 60. Once you get around to that 70-80 range, your character, the every time they get hit, they fly even farther. And that's how you lose lives in this game. Is like once you fly out of the screen, that's how you lose a life. The higher your percentages, the farther you you like fly out. So I get what you're saying in terms of like I hit a button and then I'm just like, oh, I'm across the screen now. Like it's like so all over the place in terms of like how it is. But I think Smash is one of the most customizable fighting games there is. You can treat it as a party game, or you can treat it as like a serious fighting game, especially in today's day and age, because there's so many fucking customization options that you can go in and change. Like you can change, like you can obviously turn off the time to go to where it's like the life-based system, but you can like turn all the items off. You can make it to where it's just one-on-one, where it's just you and your opponent. There's no craziness, there's no nothing, there's no stage hazards that's gonna like fuck you up. And that's kind of what I like about it. It's kind of like if you just want to turn off your brain and have a fun little party game, then you can do that, or you can treat it more like serious.

SPEAKER_03 45:59

Like for me, the experience with it was uh so I played it with an Xbox controller, uh, obviously on my laptop, and I was like, clearly, this is not made for an Xbox controller. This is just not at all. Um, not a good time. Uh like I would hit like I guess it's the menu button or something, and it would just spawn in the second controller or the second player. So I'm like, okay. So obviously I know how what a Nintendo Switch looks like, so I can understand why it's happening.

unknown 46:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 46:23

Then I go over to Jared's and I'm like, okay, now we're gonna play it on the Wii. Then I was playing it and I was like, I don't think they designed this game to be played on a Nintendo Wii. It feels like terrible, but obviously it's a Wii game. But I was like, these controls are just not. I don't know, it just did not feel good.

SPEAKER_02 46:39

No, it because I think you all played it with what the Wii remote on its side. Yeah, that's ugh. That's awful, dude. Because you have two buttons and you have a D-pad. That's it. And you're cramming so many buttons into that. It's like I couldn't imagine playing it like that. I honestly couldn't. That's why the GameCube controller is so popular for Smash Brothers. They keep the GameCube controller relevant for this series and this series only. Every single system since the GameCube has had a converter to where that's what professional Smash Brothers players play is with the GameCube controller.

SPEAKER_00 47:09

At the same time, for what it is, like in our instance of last night, or even a couple of weekends ago, when I had a bunch of my boys had like a sleepover and they played Smash literally all night on the Wii. You get four Wii modes, you turn to the side, and you have a blast with just like random Smash battles against each other. Like I still find it fun.

SPEAKER_02 47:31

I do too. It's definitely a game for me. I can absolutely see if it's not your cup of tea, like like it isn't for Carter. But to me, Smash is just larger than a game, in my opinion. I think Smash is kind of like I said, this gaming, you know, event. Every single time there's this new like it's so everyone's so fucking pumped for a new Smash game. And I think it's like the hype way outweighs what the game is. Like once the game comes out, I'm I'm like, okay, cool, it's fun. I like the lead up to the game way more than playing the game, if that makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 48:01

I've seen something where they're like supposedly there's rumors that like they're developing a new Smash, but something I was gonna kind of break off to a little bit off topic. But do you remember PlayStation's attempt at like rivaling Smash?

SPEAKER_03 48:16

Yep, PlayStation All-Stars, Battle Royale.

SPEAKER_00 48:19

Sack Boys. Yep, yep, yep.

SPEAKER_03 48:23

I remember because I remember I know that game specifically because it was out on Vita and stuff, and I remember like I downloaded it because I got it for the PlayStation Plus once, and I was messing, I was trying to mess with Tanner. I was like, oh my god, you guys have got to play PlayStation All-Stars Battle Royale. This is the best game I've ever played.

SPEAKER_02 48:38

Carter knows that.

SPEAKER_03 48:38

It's literally Smash Bros. It's literally Smash Bros. only with the PlayStation guys.

SPEAKER_02 48:43

Yeah, I think they had like Ratchet and Clank and fucking yeah, yeah, like Sly Cooper's in there and like all those Sony characters. But I remember back then, because like console wars and stuff was way bigger back then, but especially for me at the time being a 12, 13 year old, whenever that game was coming out, I hated it. I was like, fuck this fucking bullshit. They're trying to copy Nintendo. I remember specifically you all know that um that thing I used to talk about on the Wii U, that message board miverse where you can make posts and stuff.

SPEAKER_01 49:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 49:12

My biggest post, I remembered it specifically. I got like over 150 likes on my post. I remember saying like hit it was called Yes. It was you know on Facebook it's called likes. On that, it was called Yes. I was like, hit the yeah button if you think uh Sony All-Stars is like shit or like trash or something like that. There was all these Nintendo boys like loving it, like fuck that game. And I was just like, oh my god, I got a little viral post on this Meverse.

SPEAKER_03 49:40

I was a Sony boy at the time, and even I was like, fuck that game.

SPEAKER_02 49:46

And the one thing like I like wanted to tailor to this game because I'm like, I want to pick Smash because it's such a big franchise, but I don't really know how to do it. This is the only game in the series that ever had like a I guess you could call it a single player mode. Like there has been Smash has tons of modes, and there's a lot of them that you can do single player, like the classic mode, the adventure mode, and stuff like that, but nothing that was like a true campaign to where it's multiple hours, there's cutscenes and that kind of shit. This is the only one that ever had that. So I was just like, fuck it. I mean, I guess that will be my thing to choose for this, just so we can play it. Carter, I know you played it probably an hour and a half of it or something. You got pretty decently into it. What was your thoughts on it?

SPEAKER_03 50:24

Well, Tanner, to be honest with you. I was playing it on the Xbox, right? Or Xbox controller, so I'm not going to say the controls were all terrible because of that. Because they they should have been. They shouldn't have been good.

SPEAKER_04 50:34

Right.

SPEAKER_03 50:35

But I didn't know what was going on storyline-wise for a long time. Still was a little bit confused. I know they were shooting some error that was turning them into like a chess piece, it looks like, or something.

SPEAKER_02 50:44

Yeah, it's like little trophy pieces. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 50:46

So I know that's what was going on. Some of the levels, because at first I was like, does he think I was like, they called it a beat-em up, but then later I seem like, okay, yeah, it is kind of like a beat-em-up once you get into it, but not a very well done one. Um like even the platformer that jumps, I was just like, I mean, it it works, but it's nothing uh I would expect it to be a little bit better because it was almost like something like I could make that, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_02 51:08

Like to me, I th you're not you're not wrong, dude. It to me, it's like they took Smash's engine and used some sort of separate like RPG maker ass like level creator and like tried their best to make these levels with like these preset generic assets and these random generic enemies.

SPEAKER_03 51:29

And I think you're nailing it. It's Smash isn't that kind of game, like it's not designed to be like what they were making that to be. I mean, like I said, I know uh it's kind of cool that they were trying it that way, and it's interesting to see how that went. But I was just like, it's like a the platforming wasn't good, like all of that was just like, hey, the story's not really good, the platform is not good.

SPEAKER_02 51:49

But I will say that the cutscenes hold up. Like it's that's the best part about it for sure. Cutscenes were fine. Yeah. Like for 2007, like little CGI cutscenes, I'm like, these are pretty well made. Like they're not there's no crazy story going on here, but it's it's entertaining to watch these Nintendo characters kind of do random shit, I guess.

SPEAKER_03 52:08

Yeah, and it's pretty cool. Like you said that I guess I freed Zelda first. Yeah. So I like I guess there's different paths. I don't know if it's that same way later on.

SPEAKER_02 52:16

Yeah, there are different little tiny like uh things you can do that's like different based on your choices and stuff. But yeah, I kind of had that too, because me and Jared's sister, Watch, we played this two-player growing up and we loved it. We because like it was kind of like this little two-player side scroller, beat 'em up style thing. I remember really enjoying it. But whenever I was playing it by myself, in today's day and age, I'm just like, yeah, this is not. This feels very generic, very cookie-cutter. I'm like, the only reason I'm continuing on are these cutscenes, and that's it. Just to see like, and like I like how they drip feed you the characters because that's another thing about Smash that is huge, is like they start you out with a very, very small amount of characters. And there's a lot of ways that you can unlock them for your your main overall roster. And this was kind of an the easiest way to do it was like if they wanted you to go and play through this story mode, and every time you unlock a new character, they it adds it to your actual like main fighting mode. So that was kind of like a good incentive to just go like okay, well, I guess I'm just gonna play this and unlock all the characters. But whenever you know nowadays like what characters are in the game, there's no excitement anymore. It's just like, oh, there's Wario. That's like okay.

SPEAKER_03 53:27

Well, that's why a lot of franchises die over time. Uh Nintendo, I don't know how they keep going with some of their stuff, but they do. And I mean, they come up with a new Smash Brothers, like, who are they gonna add? Mario, Luigi.

SPEAKER_02 53:37

I mean, I don't know what all they'll add, but well, they're at the point now that where they're having that like hit up Square Enix and be like, hey, can we get some of your stuff?

SPEAKER_03 53:44

That's what I mean. Like, they've got to do stuff like that to add new characters, but at the same time, like they're gonna have such a huge character pool that like basically the next game just has to pretty much get rid of all the characters they've got and then just make some new ones, you know what I mean? Like they're still gonna keep their main Nintendo characters, of course.

unknown 53:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 53:59

I mean, like, I I really don't know how they keep a game like this so fresh, but I mean there's so many people that love Smash, and I'm I'm not one of them, but I totally get how some people are.

SPEAKER_02 54:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 54:08

And I mean, if they put out a new Smash Brothers and it was the same thing, um, and they just released it as a Switch 2 version with enhanced whatever, it would sell out.

SPEAKER_02 54:16

So I agree. Because I mean at this day and age, or when this game came out, there wasn't many characters in the one prior to this brawl. I think there was like 22 or 24 characters, so there were still a lot of Nintendo characters they could access at this point in time. I think some of the new ones to this game was Diddy Kong, Olimar from Pikmin. That was like a new series they added him. Wario was a new one, Lucas from Earthbound, and I think like Pokemon Trainer was new. I remember that character specifically. I was like, this is so cool because you could switch between three different Pokemon with one character. It was like Squirtle, Venus War, and Charizard in one character. That was like one of my go-to fighters whenever I was a kid because I thought that was such a cool concept. But yeah, they're at the point now to where it's like there's nothing left, really. It's like, what are you gonna do?

SPEAKER_03 54:59

Add toad or add they gotta get new characters, yeah. They gotta get some new Nintendo franchises of their own.

SPEAKER_02 55:05

Like uh they do have some like even Splatoon and stuff, they they have them in there already, like those newer franchises. That's what I mean.

SPEAKER_03 55:11

Like, I know that's in there. Like maybe that new Dustblade game is coming out, they can get a character from that. Throw in there, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_00 55:18

Like a Harvest Moon Farmer. I mean that wouldn't be so crazy, would it?

SPEAKER_02 55:24

No, it would not. At this point, they have probably a Stardew Valley farm. Add it in there. Harvest Moon was a big franchise for Nintendo at one point. Add it. What the fuck?

SPEAKER_03 55:35

I could see them doing a Stardew Valley one. I'd see that. But yeah, I don't know what they're gonna do. That's what I mean. Like, I don't know. They'll have to change the gameplay up a little bit. Not gameplay, like the because they keep it decor Smash gameplay, because that's what people like. Yeah. But uh they'll have to add some new mechanics and stuff into the new game to make it, you know.

SPEAKER_02 55:54

But yeah, uh I I'm excited to see it. I'm always excited for a new Smash game. Even like I said, I don't I don't even have a Switch 2. I don't have any plans on getting one. But if they announce a new Smash game, to me, it's just kind of like the hype of it. It's just kind of like okay, Nintendo, you've added everything. What can you do to impress us now? It's kind of like and they put a lot of cool attention to detail in their trailers. They're really well made. And that was another thing this game introduced was like the trailers and stuff for the characters. But anyway, let's go ahead and hop into our scores. I'll kick us off, or this is my game. Like I said, I have a lot of nostalgia for this game. I still think it's a quality game. There's a ton of content, I think over 30 fighters, 30 to 40 stages. There's a whole story mode, there's all the side modes, a ton of like remixed music from all these various Nintendo franchises and stuff. This game, like a lot of people say, is the black sheep of the series. And Smash is kind of like one of them series, unless you're into it competitively, there's no reason to go back and play the older ones. But this has the Subspace Emissary mode, which the other Smashes don't. So if you want to go through like a six-hour little campaign with somebody and just see what it was like, I I wouldn't I wouldn't not recommend it, but it's not gonna rock your world or nothing. It's pretty bare bones, but it it's it's there and it's unique to this game. Like if you if you have a Wii, like Jared was saying, and you play a lot of local multiplayer games, this is definitely not a bad one to add to the rotation. It this is easily the cheapest Smash Brothers game. I didn't have this game whenever we were playing it. I I looked in my case, I couldn't find my fucking disc. So I was like, well, shit, I'm gonna have to go to the store and and buy it. So I went and looked and it was 25 bucks. For Smash, that's nothing. I think like Melee is like $80 or $90. So if you want a cheaper Smash game that's actually really well made and has its own unique features and content to it, definitely consider getting it. Uh I'm gonna give it I'm gonna give it a 7.5. I think that's where I'm at. Alrighty, boys, who's up? It's Smash, T.

SPEAKER_00 57:54

Smash, but when it smash, I think it's a great game still to this day. Like, like I said, like what really shocked me is seeing four kids between the age of 11 and 12 spend a whole night, and I literally mean a whole night uh playing Smash. So like I go to bed at like midnight and they're playing Smash for the like second hour. I wake up at 7 a.m. and they're still playing Smash. That's no lie.

SPEAKER_02 58:25

They were playing it for nine to ten hours straight.

SPEAKER_00 58:27

Yes. And that shocked the hell out of me. Like, to me, like uh uh today's race.

SPEAKER_02 58:34

For its demographic, it holds the test or stands the test of time.

SPEAKER_00 58:37

So I'm gonna give it an eight, Tanner.

SPEAKER_03 58:40

I like it. Alrighty, Carter. All right. Well, like I said, I I think I missed the boat with the Wii entirely. Because whenever I think of a Wii, I think of just like playing the sports games and stuff and getting together and playing those kind of games, the party games. When it comes to a game like Smash, and apparently you're supposed to use, I'm assuming you use a nunchuck along with the Wii controller, and that's the way you're supposed to play.

SPEAKER_02 59:00

Well, no, no, that's one thing I will say, and uh it and I don't mean to cut dive into what you're saying. Like I was talking about the customization options, that's another one, is how many control options you have. Like it's like you can play with the Wii Remote Nunchuck, the Wii Remote Sideways, the GameCube controller, the classic controller. There are a lot of ways to control this game, and I think you all pick the worst one. But yeah, I see I see what you're saying, but you have to buy a ton of accessories just to play one game. You have to buy four GameCube controllers, it's very expensive.

SPEAKER_03 59:26

Oh, yeah, yeah. And that's and I'm like I said, I'm fine with all that. It's just uh every time I played a Smash Brothers game, I don't get it. And I like fighting games. I like uh side scrolling beat-em-ups and stuff. And every time I play a Smash run, it's just like I feel like if you took the characters out and made them just generic characters, nobody would ever have put picked up the series in the first place and played it. But again, it's hard for me to tell because I played it on an Xbox and then on a sideways controller on a sideways Wiimote. So I'll give it a bonus point for me not really knowing. And I mean, like Jared said, even when we played together, like it wasn't like we're all not having fun. It's just I'm like, hey, I don't even know what's going on, but I'm here for it. It's kind of like that game. Uh gosh, there's a new game out where you're all just a bunch of jelly dudes around. You said I think Gang Beast.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:11

Gang Beast, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:12

Yeah. Similar to that, and I had zero fun playing Gang Beast. Like, I hate that game. Um, so yeah, I'll give it a I'll bump it up to a five out of ten.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:21

Okay. I thought it was gonna be way worse. I'm gonna be honest. The five, we'll take it. That's like mediocre. That's just, you know, it's right there. You will play it if everyone's playing it, but you're not gonna like it. You're gonna be like, all right, this is I guess it's like I'm not gonna play it.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:34

Yeah, I'm not playing it by myself.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:36

And I'm not playing Smash by myself either.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:38

If there's a bunch of people together playing it, I'm still not gonna like go out of my way to come play it. Like, I'll let everybody else play and I'll hang out. But if someone's like, hey Carter, here's a controller and you can play, I'd be like, oh, okay, I'll play.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:52

I wouldn't like other than unlocking characters, Smash for me by myself is boring as hell. I do agree with Carter with that. Like the only upside to me is like a group of people are playing and we're having a blast.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:07

Yeah, I agree with that. And uh I think that's pretty that's that's fair. That's fair from both of you. All right, Carter. Uh let's get to what I've been looking forward to. I've been done with that I've been done with Smash for over a week. I've been ready for a new game.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:20

You beat this one quick.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:22

Yeah, uh I was quick.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:23

Let's see. Jared, last chance. Are you changing your game?

SPEAKER_00 1:01:27

No, but I thought we had ten games and somehow Roller Coaster Tycoon was a community suggestion.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:36

Uh, don't think I can get away with doing that one, Jared. But we have Earthworm Gym, Zombies Ate My Neighbors, Little Nemo Dreammaster, Metroid Fusion, Bioshock, Digimon World, Grand Theft Auto, Vice City, Metropolis Mania, and Luigi's Mansion. There it is. All good. A lot of good shots. Alright, and here we go.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:03

If you guys are ready, let's spin the wheel. No Lester. We are playing Bioshock. Ooh.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:14

Bioshock. This is a game I already have on my PlayStation 5 hard drive, ready to go. Yep, and I'm pretty sure Jared. Yep. It's on PC.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:25

I think you can download it.

unknown 1:02:26

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:26

Um, yeah, I got it on PC, so I'll be ready to go.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:30

Okay, I'm excited. This is another game in the same generation. Uh, this let me look it up real quick. Uh did this game come out the same year that Brawl came out? It may have.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:40

I don't know what year it came out. I want to say 2007.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:42

No, 2007. So this was a year older than than Brawl. Okay. So this is a game I've played. I I think I've beaten it once a long time ago, but it I don't remember jack shit about it. The one that I played the most was Bioshock Infinite, which was the third game in the series, and I love that one.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:59

Uh yeah, I've not played this one since, gosh, I want to say 2010, which we'll cover on the episode where it came from, but like it's been a long time. I beat it once and it's been 16 years ago.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:10

Alrighty, I'm gonna get started on it right now, actually. Real quick, let's look up how long this game is. I think it was in kind of the middle territory. I don't think it was that long.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:18

I don't think it was super long, if I'm not mistaken.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:21

Uh this game is 12 hours. Okay. I think that's decent. Not bad. I think Digimon World was 35 hours.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:30

Yeah, that one I don't expect us to beat, but uh I beat it before, but I mean, I just want you guys to experience. Well, Jared's experienced it. He's probably ready to go for that one too.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:38

Yeah. I'm I'm pumped card. I love Bio. I actually really like Bioshock. I think it's gonna be a lot of fun.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:44

All right.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:44

Alrighty, see y'all in a week or two.