Episode 09 – BioShock

This week, Tanner and Carter descend into the underwater city of Rapture to discuss BioShock. They talk about what made the game an instant classic, from its unforgettable atmosphere and thought-provoking story to the terrifying Splicers, Big Daddies, and game-changing moral choices. The guys also share their favorite moments and why BioShock remains one of the most influential and immersive games ever made. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:06

Welcome everybody to the Retro Jamers Podcast. Today we're going to be talking about Carter's Pick, Bioshock on the PS3 and Xbox 360.

SPEAKER_02 0:13

Well, Carter, this is a Jared list episode. It's just us today. Yep. I sent a message in the chat being like, I know that Bioshock and Metroid Fusion are like the two games that like Jared is just not going to be into. I knew he wouldn't touch. But like, because I don't know. I think where Bioshock is kind of like a little bit. It's not a horror game, and we'll get into that, but it it it does have some of those like horror elements to it, and it's kind of just like I didn't remember that part of it when I picked it.

SPEAKER_04 0:42

I just remembered it being a first-person shooter. And I remembered you could like customize your character so you can kind of do a different build, which is really cool because you can then you could do different runs and try different things. I remembered all that about it. And I do remember that there was like I knew it was like one of those edgy, scary type of like underwater thing, but I didn't know it was like as horror as it was. There was parts of the game and we'll get into it where I was just like, I really don't want to go to this next part because there's gonna be a ton of those uh running around and I'm gonna die. It gets into that really later on.

SPEAKER_02 1:12

Yeah. And Jared gave us his blessing. He's like, Yeah, go ahead, move on, and then hopefully to God he'll be back for the next episode because we always we love Jared. We love him in these episodes. He makes them a lot of the time, so you know, hopefully he'll be back.

SPEAKER_04 1:24

Yeah, yeah. He should. He's uh he's busy like we've been. I mean, I almost forgot like what episode are we on again? What game did I be on?

SPEAKER_02 1:30

I think this is episode nine. I think we're in episode nine now. This is the second episode of the season. We kicked off with Smash Bros. Brawl, and now we're moving into Bioshock, and yeah, it's been great. But we had a little three to four week hiatus. My life has been a little hectic. With uh I just started my summer classes. I got two math classes, a speech class, and a computer class, and it's it's been very chaotic because with summer classes, you know, they're not the traditional five months like a typical college semester. It's two months, so it's accelerated. So there's so much fucking work at all times. I just gotta constantly be grinding it out. And I hate I hate public speaking. It's weird. I'm sitting here on the fucking podcast letting people listen to me, but this isn't I don't consider this to be public speaking. This is just us chatting.

SPEAKER_04 2:10

You know what I mean? Yeah, it's me and you talking about video games, and we're uploading it somewhere. It's not me and you talking about video games in front of like 10 people or you by yourself and you're gonna go through like, hey guys, I'm gonna talk to you all about Yoshi's Island today.

SPEAKER_02 2:24

Well, it's crazy because uh two of my speeches I gave were kind of centered around the podcast in a weird way. One of my speeches, I I'll get off the side tangent in a second, but one of my speeches was a demonstrative speech. It was like something like explain to the audience how to do something with like visual aid examples. And I was just like, what do I know to do? I don't I don't can't play an instrument, I can't cook, I can't do any of this. I was like, Oh yeah, how to start a podcast. And that was what one of my speeches was about. Hey, that's pretty cool. No, that's that's awesome. See, you're leveling up doing it. Yeah, yeah, because my visual aid was like, I was like, well, here is my shitty $25 Walmart mic I started with. It got the job done, but then I held held up my other microphone that was like the $150 mic. I'm like, this is definitely better. I was like uh showing them in the background like audacity and or yeah, that's what it's called, right? The editing software.

SPEAKER_04 3:13

Yeah, audacity for editing all that stuff.

SPEAKER_02 3:15

I was just like, it's very simple, you just gotta get going and all that, and and I did that. But then my second speech was it had to be a story, and I was just like, fuck, I don't know a story, like it but had to be around like a family member. And then I thought about for those old school retro jammer fans who remember on the Harvest Moon and Wonderful Life episode, there was a story where Jared's dad, unfortunately, he passed away, you know, whenever Jared was really young, and one of the last games that he got Jared was Harvest Moon and Wonderful Life, and Jared, you know, sunk a lot of time in that game just trying to escape it. And there was a painting in the in there, and whenever you click it, it says Harvest, yeah, Harvest Sprites Dancing with Fire by Jeff. That's what it says whenever you click it, and that was Jared's dad's name, was Jeff. So I remember him telling me that story one night, and that really like touched me. It's uh, you know, just one of them stores you remember. And I was like, you know what? It would be a cool thing if I could get my grandma to paint that same painting because she's an artist. I asked her and I showed her a shitty little picture I took with my iPhone of a PS2 game. I was like, Do you think you can paint that painting? Like, is it possible? And she's like, Yeah, I think so. Just go buy me the paints and the canvas and stuff. And uh, yeah, I I went and I painted it, and I don't even know if I gave it to Jared yet or not, because where I don't really come in all that much, but I need to check with him. And that was the story I chose. But anyway, that's side tangent.

SPEAKER_04 4:32

That's awesome. See, see what you miss, Jared, when you don't get on the podcast. It's about you, man.

SPEAKER_02 4:38

Uh anyway, Carter, so what have you been doing uh in our little hiatus? Have you been playing anything other than Bioshock?

SPEAKER_04 4:43

Well, I beat Bioshock and I even uh watched some YouTube videos of it. Uh been a few weeks, but I was what I got really into it because I mean, just uh other the story and everything is really cool. But I beat Bioshock, beat God of War Ragnarok. I I'm a big Souls fan. Like I love Elden Ring, I love the Souls light games, like I love Bloodborne. I've loved these Souls games, but I've never beaten a Dark Souls game, which is kind of like almost sacrilege. So I bought Dark Souls Remastered, beat Dark Souls Remastered, and it was really incredible.

SPEAKER_02 5:14

Like yet when you said that you beat that game, the only Souls game I've beaten is Demon's Souls, the remake on the PS5. I've beaten that one. It and it's considered to be kind of easy. It's like one of the easier Dark Souls games. Uh, because it typically with Dark Souls games, and you can agree with me or not, I think they say that the the bosses are what what's hard and the levels are kind of like easier, like you can get through them a little bit easier than the bosses. Well, Demon's Souls is kind of flipped. The levels are fucking brutal, but the bosses are cupcakes. It's like by the time you get to the boss, it's just like it's not that challenging at all. But the the thing I was thinking of, which I don't think it's entirely accurate, is I cannot believe you beat Dark Souls 1 because the fucking what's that one level where you're underground and it's like you're standing on these like balconies and shit? Blighttown? Ugh. Oh my god. That was as far as I made it in Dark Souls. I couldn't go any further. It was so hard. I I couldn't do it. I could not do it.

SPEAKER_04 6:08

Buddy, it doesn't get any better. Like honestly, like it was crazy because uh you gotta ring the bell, right? You go to the top tower, you ring the bell, then you gotta go down through Blight Town and down through that to ring the second bell. And that's kind of they call it like the intro to the game, sort of, to get through those things. And it's accurate, like the game really goes from there, like it just blows up to this incredible story. I was expecting that to be a lot more straightforward. Shoot, we could have probably done a podcast on this one. Um Absent Jared.

SPEAKER_02 6:35

But um Yeah, we already know it.

SPEAKER_04 6:38

Yeah, that one would be that would that one would be tough. When I went through it, like I was expecting it to be this really slow, like it's an older game, so I wasn't expecting it to be as good as it was. Uh kind of like Demon's Souls, because I got it on PS3 and I hadn't beat it, but I got pretty far into it. So I expected it to be something similar to that. But no, it was really um really cool how the the enemies they kind of evolved throughout the game. The uh the bosses were really cool. The level design was incredible. Like they always talk about how masterful the level design was for Dark Souls, and they're right, like it just everything ties together so seamlessly, it's really cool.

SPEAKER_02 7:10

I think Dark Souls in that whole series is one of them games that's like it's a moment-to-moment game where every single enemy you see is like you brace yourself, and it's like you're like going in life or death, this is all or nothing. Because you know, if you're playing like a Zelda game and you're walking through a dungeon and you see a little fucking enemy or whatever, it's just like okay, it's a hack slash, hack slash, whatever, they're gone. If I see one enemy, I'm sitting there like plotting in my head, okay, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this. Like, it's so intense. Like you don't ever get arrest. The only time you get arrested is whenever you go to one of them bonfires or something. The rest is just like you are on edge.

SPEAKER_04 7:45

Yeah, yeah. Elden Ring, like this huge open world game, and I love beating Elden Ring. I thought gosh, I probably got 300 hours into it. But it's this huge open world of that. Like, you could be like you could beat the game, then you go back to the first part and just do something stupid, and you know, something dumb will kill you. Like everything can kill you at all times. It's pretty wild.

SPEAKER_02 8:04

The enemy, yeah, especially like the bosses and stuff, they're so memorable. It's just like they're always these like unique designs, and you have to fight them all in a very unique way. And you God, you kind of make me make me want to go back and play a Dark Souls game. The only ones I've played are Dark Souls, like I said, Dark Souls 1. I beat Demon Souls, I got really far in Bloodborne, and that's it. I haven't played any of the other.

SPEAKER_04 8:24

Oh man, Bloodborne was the first one I actually played. And oh my gosh, that's a that's a different game all to itself. I mean, it's it's a souls game, it's got the same controls, you know, the same stuff they use. But it's a lot more fast-paced, and it's definitely what do they call that era? Like the top the style of game it is. It's not it's not steampunk, is it? No, it's not really steampunk.

SPEAKER_02 8:44

It's kind of gothic-y. It's kind of like a kind like Victorian, something like that.

SPEAKER_04 8:49

Victorian, yeah, yeah. Yeah. So um it's that theme where, you know, werewolves, vampire, that kind of stuff. But man, it's so, so, so good. Like, I'll that's still to this day my favorite one out of the whole series. Debatable, of course, because Elden Ring was phenomenal. Dark Souls that just beat it, phenomenal. Like, I don't ever have a bad time playing those. I mean, even the PS3 version of Demon's Souls is fun once you get into it. Um but like you said, the levels though, like the first time I ever played those games was Jeff Elkins. It's his copy of Demon's Souls. He just you know got rid of his PS3 and gave it to me. Played it at his house, and we were just like, What the hell are you supposed to do? Like, I meet one thing and it kills me. Like, we would kill the skeletons, and we go up to where that there was a knight on up top, and he would kill us in one hit every time. We're just like, What the fuck? This game sucks. But really, after you know, I beat Bloodborne, I went back to it and I was like, No, it doesn't suck, we do. So it's really cool.

SPEAKER_02 9:40

You know, like old school NES games like Ninja Gaiden and Mega Man and that kind of shit, how it's like super hard. And if you beat those games, it's like kind of a badge of uh like an accomplishment. That's how I view it. It's like the modern day Castlevania, Mega Man, Ninja Gaiden, like those type of games. That's how I view it.

SPEAKER_04 9:56

It feels good whenever you are taking on a boss and you're just like pounding your head against the wall a hundred times over and it's just killing you left and right, and you know there's nothing you can do except try again. I mean, there's no other there's no other option. Like you can't do anything. Yeah, so anyway, I beat Souls. We know Souls is awesome, I love it. And now, right now, I'm currently I'm trying to I'm playing through Dead Cells just because where I'm a dad and I'm busy. Dead cells you can pick up, play a run through, die, get killed, whatever, beat it, get a boss cell, it doesn't matter. The game it's one of those games where you can progress, you can unlock some weapons, and then if you die, you know, hey, you unlocked a few weapons that run, and then do another run. You know, you just go through and it it'll generate a new level every time you run through it. Like they're randomly generated, so it's really cool. So roguelike, I guess, Metro Vene roguelike.

SPEAKER_02 10:41

Um That sounds like the perfect in-between like pod game. Like, you know what I mean? Like you just go back to it. It's kind of like what we were talking about with RuneScape. It's kind of like one of them great buffer games where you can just go back to it anytime.

SPEAKER_04 10:52

Yeah, and that's why I've been playing them. It's one of those games where you don't really have to like get engrossed. Like Ragnarok was like, okay, I want to play this game and I want to beat it, and I don't really want to do anything else. These other games are just like, hey, you pick it up, play it, put it down, come back to it later. Don't come back to it later, it doesn't matter. So I've been playing Dead Cells, um, and I picked up a game that's on Game Pass that had these insanely high ratings. Like IGN gave it a 10 out of 10, some other places did, and Metacritic it's like a 88. But it's called Pentiment, and it's not like a a game where you're actually playing it. You're um you're a guy named Andreas, you're walking through the town, and so far I just know I'm an artist and I don't know what's happening yet. I just know I'm walking through and talking to a bunch of people and they're and it's building a story. I don't know where it's going though. So that's a interesting thing. Yeah, I want to see how it goes. Um so far, like I said, it's interesting. The artwork's really cool, um, easy to run. Obviously, it's not like it's like a more of a it looks like an indie title, really. But um, like I said, it's got really good reviews, so I'm gonna assume the story gets stellar. So I'm just waiting for it to hit.

SPEAKER_02 11:53

Next podcast, like let me know if I should like you know, look into getting it for sure. That's definitely like my kind of game. I love those kind of games. Yeah, for sure. Well, what have you been up to? Well, uh like we said, it's been a three to four week hiatus, and I like to play the game on the back burner. I I I love video games, and when I'm not playing something for weeks on end, I get kind of an itch. I'm just like, okay, there's only so many Madden quick plays I can play online. Like I'm getting old of this shit.

SPEAKER_03 12:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 12:18

So I went to a game store, a local game store that just opened up, and it's really nice. They have a bunch of cool shit in there. And I I spent like an hour, and I it was one of those times where I was just kind of like taking myself back to the 2000s or 90s. Like if you go in a store and you're looking at the box arts, you're reading them and shit. Like you you really want to leave the phone down.

SPEAKER_04 12:39

Yeah, don't pick the phone up, just look at the box art and decide.

SPEAKER_02 12:43

Exactly. And it's one of those stores, it's not like it's behind like a Walmart glass where you can't grab them. You can just grab a case, look at it, and you know, go on your way. But the one game that ended up choosing was um Dragon Quest III, HD 2D. And I knew that you would love it because you told me, I think it may be in the previous podcast, you picked it, and we never got around to playing it, the original Dragon Quest III. But I was just like, okay, this is perfect because this is one of the games in the series that people love. They say it's like a classic, and they recently released Dragon Quest HD 2D 1 and 2. And if I'm not mistaken, Cara, you can correct me, you're supposed to play them 3-1-2 for the story, right?

SPEAKER_04 13:22

So back in the day it was Dragon Warrior, then there was some copyright thing, now it's all Dragon Quest, but it's the same game, same series. So they had that Dragon Warrior 1 and 2, and then 3 is technically the prequel to 1 and 2. So yeah. So 3 is storyline-wise, the prequel, but gameplay-wise, definitely. Well, I don't know how the remakes are, but I know gameplay-wise, three was better than one and two. But they all have that same system. Dragon Warrior, Dragon Quest, they all do the same thing.

SPEAKER_02 13:48

And the reason I knew that, and I I was so confused at the time, was uh whenever they first revealed those games, with I think it was during a Nintendo Direct, and they said Dragon Quest III, HD2D, coming out September, and also one and two coming out next year. I'm like, why the fuck are you not releasing one and two now and then three? And then I looked and I was just like, oh, okay, so that's how the story set up. So I'm like, okay, it's perfect. I'm gonna grab three and then go from there. My th whole thing with Dragon Quest is I love Final Fantasy, and I would say, wouldn't you say those two are kind of like competitors? Dragon Quest Final Fantasy, you know, kind of sort of.

SPEAKER_04 14:22

They're both square enix, they're both the same title, like under the same banner, I guess. Like when they first came out, like Final Fantasy was an RPG like back in the day with like the red mage, the black mage, you could set up your party that way. Yeah. And Dragon Warrior was also like back in the day, just an old school RPG. So they both came from kind of the same veil, I guess. I know there's a lot of people that'll probably know the history in and out, like how they're related, how they go back because they're from the same company, same era.

SPEAKER_02 14:46

The only thing I know about Final Fantasy is because they called it the reason they called it Final Fantasy was because Square Enix was about to go down and they were like, you know what, we're gonna make our dream game, and if this sinks us, so be it. Whatever. This is our Final Fantasy, and they ended up saving their company. That's the only thing I know. Like, I don't know if Dragon Quest comes first or if Final Fantasy comes first. I think Dragon Quest, right?

SPEAKER_04 15:05

I'm pretty sure Dragon Warrior, like Dragon Warrior 1, the first one. Pretty sure it was like the first really big like uh for NES for sure. But yeah, and I beat the uh original Dragon Warrior NES version as well, which was really fun.

SPEAKER_02 15:18

That's awesome. That's a commitment, because those aren't those older games kind of hard. They're grindy.

SPEAKER_04 15:23

You done grindy grind. Yes. Um that's the thing. It's just uh like the original Dragon Quest or Dragon Warrior, which however you want to call it, I mean, and Final Fantasy came out in 1987, Dragon Warrior came out in 1986. Anyway, look that up really quick. So Dragon Warriors first. You play as one person in the very first one, you are one guy, and you just walk around, you fight monsters, you get to the next village, you train up on monsters, you get enough money to buy the newest set of armor, newest sword, and then you go to the next spot, and literally buying that new armor and stuff, you'll level up along the way, makes you stronger, and it's literally just a rinse and repeat until you beat the game. But I mean, 1986, this is like when they were first doing it, so it's not like that seems really old.

SPEAKER_02 16:05

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_04 16:06

Yeah. That's what I'm saying. This form the formula they came up with, which is what always blows my mind, that formula they had in 1986, they still use that formula it's throughout Dragon Quest today. Like it's the same formula. You you know you get to a new town, you get new equipment, you're just training, blah yada yada. They just started adding, you know, more characters, you get a party going on, you can start getting different, you know, synergies off of that. Like you'll have a mage, you'll have your tank, and yada yada yada. So it's really cool to see the evolution from Dragon War to what it is now, because I beat 11 and I've beat the first one. So I've played them all for the most part.

SPEAKER_02 16:37

But uh, well, that was what that was what I loved about it, was because like whenever I started, it was uh, you know, it's very traditional because it's the first. You know, I th I consider Dragon Quest to be kind of the godfather of RPG. So of course it's gonna be if you think in your head, fantasy RPG is exactly what Dragon Quest is. Like if you're gonna go with vanilla traditional as possible with what you think. It has no bells and whistles, it's just straight up traditional RPG. And if you're into it, you're gonna love it. And I so far, I probably have about four or five hours into it. I love it, Carter. It's fucking awesome. One of my favorite things is like how you create your classes and stuff. You go up to this building and you go in and you just you it's kind of like you you're buying these like people off the market, and you can create them however you want. You can make like what they look like and their names. I have you, Jared, and Jeff on my squad. Jared is my priest, you're my mage, and Jeff is my warrior. And I'm just the you know, the traditional hero. I tried to make them look just like you and as much as I could.

SPEAKER_04 17:36

That's awesome, man. So for me, Dragon Quest, Dragon Warrior, the very first game that I ever saw was Dragon Warrior was Dragon Warrior Monsters that Jared played on the Game Boy. And I wanted it, so I go, me and mom's at Walmart like a week or two later, and I'm looking for it, and all I see is Dragon Warrior 3. And I'm like, well, that's not the Waterly one I want, but I'll take it. Turns out the game was phenomenal. Like, absolutely loved it. Love going to the tavern and getting the just creating your people. You can, you know, you can make a uh like a fighter and just dump stats into his strength and make him just one shot everything just about from the beginning. Obviously, the game is a little more deep once the further you go. And you're four or five hours in, I'm not gonna ruin anything for you. I'll let you keep playing it. You just give me enough focus. I absolutely loved it. And that's the one thing about Dragon Warrior, the Dragon Quest, the whole series, is every single game, like what you're playing now is the same feel of every game. Like if you went and bought Dragon Quest XI right now, you're gonna get the same feel. Like it's gonna be your classic traditional RPG. They're all the same when it comes to that. Just a new story, new land, new monsters and stuff, new bosses, new storylines, and that's an interest game.

SPEAKER_02 18:44

Because that's what I want. I love JRPGs, and that's what I want. But you can correct me if I'm wrong though, but in this game, you can catch monsters and you can fight them in the monster arena. I don't know if that was in the original, but that's something that they added to this game, and that's something that I've I've been collecting these monsters, and each town you go to, they have like these monster rancher style fights, and you can fight these monsters and raise them up.

SPEAKER_04 19:04

Not in the original. I did not know that. Yep. It is awesome, dude. I've been kicking the tires on buying it just because I mean, even if they didn't do anything except bring it into the new age with that HD 3D, I wanted it bad or HD2D. But uh, I didn't know they added that because that's kind of like um Dragon Quest VIII had something similar to that too, where you can get monsters and battle them a little bit. I beat it recently too. Phenomenal game.

SPEAKER_02 19:27

I can already visualize in my head Jared driving to work and he's listening to this podcast and he just heard that. He's getting his phone, he's going to the PlayStation store, and he just purchased it right now from hearing that.

SPEAKER_04 19:37

I hope so. I'm I'm probably doing the same thing. I was like, man, because it's been on sale on Steam a few times, and I've been like, I don't know, I don't know. Because I'm like, I've already beat the game, I know the story, but every time I see it though, I'm like, it's such a good game, though.

SPEAKER_02 19:50

They add a lot. It's fully voice acted, you know, completely orchestrated, score, all that shit. The the graphics look so beautiful. It's like basically the game that you know on the NES, but just completely facelifted, looks insane, sounds insane. Like it's just an awesome game. I highly recommend them.

SPEAKER_04 20:07

Well, I'm glad you're enjoying it. Like I said, it's one of the ones that I started with really, and it's absolutely been one of my favorite games of all time. It's in it's in that list.

SPEAKER_02 20:15

That's one thing I'll say for people out there who are craving the JRPG and haven't touched Dragon Quest. I think that game is a good place to start. But like Carter said, if you want something that's not with sort of that retro feel, I would say Dragon Quest XI. If you want more of a modern take on it, I would go that route.

SPEAKER_04 20:30

Yes. Man's under you've not played 11 yet, have you?

SPEAKER_02 20:34

I own it and I dabbled in it, and I probably played a little bit, you know, at the very beginning when you and that girl go to the top of the mountain with the dog.

SPEAKER_03 20:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 20:40

Like that's the whole idea. I I barely played it. So I love what I played. 30 minutes on.

SPEAKER_04 20:46

Well, like you it's similar to what you're playing now, really. But uh, but yeah, it gets really good. And if you beat the older Dragon Quest first, like uh 11 ties a lot of stuff together. And like I said, for someone who's have been a fan of the series forever, when I beat Eleven, it went from being like, This is really incredible to okay, this is probably my favorite game of all time right now. Because it the way the story does, and and it's nostalgia from the previous games and how it ties everything together really nice. Uh phenomenal game.

SPEAKER_02 21:14

That's one thing about me that I love, absolutely love, is whenever I get into a franchise. And that one of my examples is Resident Evil. Whenever I bought Resident Evil 2 remake, I loved it, and then it's kind of like you have this whole entire series at your disposal, and you're like, oh man, I got so much to play now. Like I have so much, like I'm I'm hooked, I'm in, and now I've got probably 10 to 15 games to dive into now, like to get into that series. That's kind of how I feel about Dragon Quest. You know what I mean? Because I I haven't played them. So now it's just like here I'm into it. Now I've got the whole series at my disposal. And they're doing what Capcom does with the Resident Evil games, they're remaking all the new Dragon Quest games. Like they just remade eight or seven, I think. It was seven, yeah. It was reimagined, I think.

SPEAKER_04 21:58

Mm hmm.

SPEAKER_02 21:59

Mm hmm. So I'm like Like, damn. Like I have hundreds of hours at my disposal. I can dive into at any moment. I love it.

SPEAKER_04 22:05

Yeah, that's that's awesome, man. I love getting into series like that. Like you said, like you get into one, you're like, this game was fucking phenomenal. They're like, oh well, there's eight other, and they're all just like it. It's like, oh, okay.

SPEAKER_02 22:15

Yeah, so that's what we've been playing. It's been great, but now we're ready to get back into the podcast and you know play the pod games because that's what I love doing as well. But uh in between our session, we basically had an E3. We basically had an E3. That's basically what we had four days. Yeah, there was the Xbox game showcase, the fucking PlayStation State to play, the Nintendo Direct. I would say there's at least 75 games that got revealed at at the bare minimum, and it was just like overload. Like this year is insane.

SPEAKER_04 22:46

It finally got to where like I'll be honest with you, games, gaming felt like it was at a lull, like, you know, like who cares? Like, oh yeah, video games are video games, it doesn't really matter. But this those all those shows at the same time and all the stuff they shut off in the different directions was kind of exciting. Like it got to where stuff's happening now. You know what I mean? Like uh well, I mean, Xbox, I don't know what the hell they're doing right now, to be honest with you, because uh they went from and this isn't like I don't care, it is what it is. Like I'm not one of those who hates one, loves the other, it doesn't matter. But obviously I my Xbox is like an extension of my PC that I primarily game on, but I like using Game Pass that I can come relax on the couch and play it, continue the same game on my Xbox, which is really cool. For sure. But they started releasing all their stuff on PlayStation, which I'm like, okay, it's fine, it's whatever, because I don't really like everyone. It doesn't affect me. Exactly. I'm like, who cares? I like I think it would be awesome if they're all on one system that we only need that one system. But anyway, they were releasing games everywhere pretty much, and I'm like, yeah, I don't blame them because I think some of their games for a while there were like the best selling games on PlayStation were Microsoft games. Oh and then they kind of reversed it because they got a new person in charge, I guess. So now it's like, okay, so what what are you guys doing? So they're doing a hundred day reset, and uh no one really knows what they're doing. So I guess that'll be interesting.

SPEAKER_02 24:04

From from that showcase, and I w I'll this is spoiler alert. Uh we watched all three of them. Me, you and Jared did, and we kept pretty much in contact as we was watching them. I think Xbox won. And I can't believe I'm saying that. I honestly can't, because whenever it first started, they were just showing Gears of War, Fable, Halo. I'm like, okay, I'm sitting there checking checking my watch out.

SPEAKER_04 24:23

I think I said this is a Microsoft showcase. There it is.

SPEAKER_02 24:27

I was like, after they showed fucking like Call of Duty, or I think that was the end game Call of Duty. Well, after they showed Halo, I was just like, okay, whatever, this is gonna be boring as fuck. But then they just cranked that shit up at towards the end, like okay, here's here's a few of what caught my eye. Obviously, we love Persona. They're coming out with Persona 4 and Persona 6.

SPEAKER_04 24:48

They and they announced that on the Xbox showcase. Like, that's where this stuff gets announced. That is incredible.

SPEAKER_02 24:54

Now, why why does Xbox have that? It's not exclusive to Xbox, but why do they have do they own the company? Atlas?

SPEAKER_04 25:01

No, they don't own the company at all. Um actually Atlas Sega, I think they're the same thing. They don't own it, but I do know they've got some stuff in place because those games, the reason why they were on the Xbox Showcase, the only thing I can think of is because they got a deal in place because they're going on the Game Pass, right? Like when they get released on day one, they'll be on Game Pass, which is pretty freaking cool. So uh for me, anyway, like it's I'm sucks for me.

SPEAKER_02 25:25

Like when I seen those two games, when I seen those two games, I'm like, okay, well, there's let me do the math my hit $140 right there. Let me just uh spin that real quick.

SPEAKER_04 25:33

Right. And um where I'm on Game Pass, I'll just you know download them and play them, which is why the whole point for me having a Game Pass is that because and plus my kids like he can just download whatever he wants. That's if it's on there, he can download it, whatever, it doesn't matter. Um they showed off what Fable, which is pretty freaking cool too.

SPEAKER_02 25:48

Fable looks awesome. Uh they showed the new Spyro game, which I know you're a huge Spyro fan. It's a new Spyro platformer.

SPEAKER_04 25:56

I mean, their showcase was banger after banger after banger. Like you said, it started with like gears and stuff. I'm just like, yeah, okay. I mean, like, I'm not the biggest fan of them, but I know they're they have them, but I'm just like, well, they have a fan base Call of Duty. But everything in between, though, was just like, damn, that's something I'm interested in, something I'm interested in, something I'm interested in, something I'm interested in. You know what I mean? Like over and over. I'm like, okay.

SPEAKER_02 26:17

Even the fucking crazy, crazy taxi Jeff Elkins game, I was like, this looks fucking awesome. If I had Game Pass, I would be downloading this shit right now.

SPEAKER_04 26:23

That's the reason why I keep Game Pass, because realistically, like, I just don't think I don't know why it's not more popular. I know they raised the prices, but then they dropped the prices back down. I don't know. There's just so much good on it.

SPEAKER_02 26:34

Anyway, about what like Xbox and stuff, what you were saying, like Xbox to me recently, before they changed what you said, like the the head of the company or whatever, they were kind of just like they seemed like they were just kind of giving up. They're just like, okay, well, we're just gonna own the fact that we're the PC guys, essentially, and we're just gonna kind of bow out. But in this showcase, I think they're stepping their foot back into the ring. They're like, you know what? We're not done yet. We're coming back and we're gonna fucking you know what I mean? It had that kind of energy to it.

SPEAKER_04 27:02

That's what it felt like happened because uh that Gears of War game apparently was supposed to be. Um, I don't know, because they Xbox said no, but PlayStation was pissed about it. The e-day was supposed to be on PlayStation, like that was supposed to be a PlayStation release, and the person took over said, no, pull that from your show. We're not doing that anymore. That's in the console exclusive. So that's why I said I don't know what they're doing because they were supposed to do all this releasing on other console. Which I could do.

SPEAKER_02 27:25

And if I'm not mistaken, Sony did the same move, right? Like they started putting their shit out on PC and then they stopped doing that.

SPEAKER_04 27:31

And then they pulled back the range, yeah, because they wanted to make sure their console still sold.

unknown 27:35

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 27:36

I don't like it. I mean, someone like me, like yeah, like I would have, I would loved, like I would have probably had a PS5 just to play Ragnarok, but they were putting it on PC, so I was like, okay, I'm good. But uh, so I get why. I mean that's just personal perspective. That's that was me. But most people probably don't care, like, right? Like they'd have been like, whatever. I don't know, man. Like they they put them on PC and then they sell the hell out of these games and their console's still selling. Like, I don't know if they were seeing a drop or something, but the only drop when their console sells would be the fact that they raised them to a thousand bucks. I mean, like that's your problem.

SPEAKER_02 28:10

It kind of excited me because I missed the days of the 360 era to where like that generation felt like they were fucking like in the ring, just like it's it's kind of like the Sega Genesis Super Nintendo days where you had a true console war and then they were kind of like, it's good to have competition. If there's a monopoly, it's gonna be messy. It's gonna turn into Nintendo.

SPEAKER_04 28:30

Like it's it drives innovation, yeah. Yeah, that's a good segue. We we had a Nintendo show.

SPEAKER_02 28:37

Okay, I this is what I said, Jared, before this started. I am not a Switch 2 fan at all. I have nothing like uh I have no problem with the hardware. You know, it's it's a handheld, it looks cool. If I owned one, I'd probably play it, you know, but it's too expensive. It's going up in price. I'm like, they have to sell me. They have to fucking sell me on this thing because right now they have nothing but garbage and nothing on the horizon. So let's go into this, Nintendo. Show me what you got. And it was the most flaccid ass direct I have ever seen in my life. There was a few good shit. I love Zelda Ocarina of Time. You know, the remake that's cool. I would if I owned a Switch, I would be getting that day one. Is that a system seller to me? No. I've beaten the game three times already, and it's gonna look beautiful, I'm sure. It's gonna be great, but that is not a system seller. It's a remake of a game I played to death. What else did they show? Xenoblade Genesis. I'm not the biggest Xenoblade guy. You like it way more than me. So I mean that I was like, okay, that's a game Carter can get behind. It's like a Xenoblade game, I guess. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:37

If you're still on in the middle of your rant, don't let me stop you. Because I I'm in that thing.

SPEAKER_02 29:43

I feel like you're rolling. Okay, yeah, yeah. They they opened the show with fucking rhythm heaven groove, something that looks like that would be on my iPod touch back in 2007. And I'm like, is this really how what we're starting this shit on? Like a fucking rhythm game that they also showed fucking uh one game that I know that Jared is gonna be interested in, the Nintendo Switch Resort game where it's like Wii Sports Resort. Yeah. But the thing about the direct, I was cracking up. They spent probably three to four minutes showing the president and the Nintendo playing a fucking thumb wrestling game, eating precious time during the time. Like, what is going on? Get off of this shit. You're killing time.

SPEAKER_04 30:20

Yeah, they had thumb wrestling. That was we were literally in our chat like messaging each other going, what the fuck are we watching right now?

SPEAKER_02 30:27

I was like, I was like my cheeks was getting red with how embarrassed I was. Like, I'm like, I feel like I am the president of Nintendo watching this, and I'm getting like cringed out watching this shit, how embarrassing it was. Like reading the list right here, like there's nothing, nothing good. It was all basically re-releases, remasters, ports.

SPEAKER_04 30:46

I'm like, God, this is I think uh now I think there's been because I I looked up like reviews of the because I try to look at it from not just a me perspective, because they're not just selling to me, right? They're not just selling to you. They're trying to sell, you know, what what do people want that has the Switch 2? And there's some people that were really excited just because that's their only system is a Nintendo Switch. Sure. Switch 2. So like all those games, like like I think I've I said it in our chat, I was like, is this like a 2022 showcase? Is that what we're showing right now? Because it was all games that were never been on Nintendo that can now run on Nintendo, so they're coming to Nintendo. Um, but it's all games that have been out for years. And I was like, okay, I mean, cool. Like, and then some people online were excited.

SPEAKER_02 31:24

You cannot expect the audience to get excited, like, woo, they're adding, you know, like you know, bullshit that's already been out. There's no way.

SPEAKER_04 31:31

It was like I don't know what they were. For me, there were two huge games announced. Well, not announced, just they showed they talked more about Dust Bloods, I think. Is that what's called Dust Bloods?

SPEAKER_02 31:40

Dust Bloods, I'm I'm pretty sure, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 31:42

That game I would buy, which we just talked about, uh Souls games and stuff, and that's the same company from software. So I would love that. That's awesome. Obviously, Ocarina of Time. Uh like you said, I beat the game. If it's just like, you know how they kind of did what was it, Crash, Spyro, uh, stuff like that.

SPEAKER_02 31:59

It's a very pretty version of the same game.

SPEAKER_04 32:01

Yeah, if that's what it is, that kind of sucks. But if it's kind of like how they did Final Fantasy VII and they completely remake it and kind of tweak the story a little bit, then that is fucking awesome. And I don't know what they're doing with it. I really don't. They just showed Link way in there, like the Triforce in his hand, and then that was it. And I think throughout the show, I even put in our chat, I said, this show sucks, and it's going to continue to be just whatever, trashy. I don't like what's going on. But all they'll do is flash a logo of Ocarina of Time at the end, and it'll be a success. And that's what happened.

SPEAKER_02 32:30

It's what happened because I went on Facebook and I looked at the like the reveal trailer for Ocarina of Time, and then there everyone, okay, Nintendo, you sold me. You won me over. I'm buying a switch. That's all they had to do.

SPEAKER_04 32:41

People knew that's all that. People are people are big on it. And like I said, I I could see if like all I had was a Switch 2, and there's a bunch of games I hadn't played that are coming to it. If they are pri if if I have a Switch, I guess I don't I don't give a shit about prices, but if they were coming over there, I've like they're gonna be like fifty, seventy, eighty dollars for these games that have been out for years, that kind of that sucks.

SPEAKER_02 33:02

Like I said, let's face it, I don't care. The Switch 2, it's enhanced version of the Switch 1 or whatever, it's more powerful. These versions of these games are still gonna be worse than the A PS5 and Xbox versions. I mean, they just are. It's not powerful enough. The only thing that's cool is obviously it's on the go, which is cool. Like you can play these, you know, triple A games on the go, which is awesome, but they're not gonna be the most, you know, visually pretty, the high fidelity. It's just not gonna be the case. It can't do it. It's not powerful.

SPEAKER_04 33:31

Yeah, and I think and I think one thing that kind of lost the shine a little bit was where it was uh it's 550 bucks now, right? Mm-hmm. Seam Deck just raised up to like 750 bucks. Mm-hmm. So it's got way expensive, and I'd say the other handheld PCs are going to be expensive too. So Switch 2 is still kind of the cheapest option. Yeah, because everything's getting expensive. I think an Xbox's new CEO, whatever she is, was talking about how to build an Xbox series console when they launched, it has now cost them five times as much to build it today. Just because of the way the hardware prices are. So I mean, if you think about it, that's ridiculous. I get why the prices are going up. And again, they said Nintendo mentioned like 40 some games that were newly announced coming out to the Switch 2. So they were they threw what they had, they threw it out there. So and a lot of people, if you're into it, there you go. They're they're doing it. But if you're not, like me, I was like, it's still Dust Bloods and Ocarina of Time going into it, that's what I was thinking, and coming out of it. Same thing. I think we mentioned it, like a lot of those games they were announcing, like Xenoblade, Fire Emblem was announced. Like if you have a Switch, you're you're definitely getting them. You're like, ah yeah, that's cool. I would definitely own that. But you're not like, I'm gonna go buy the system to play Fire Emblem. Like, I'm not buying the system to play Xenoblade. It's just if I have a system, I will buy those also because I like them. They're good. Right. I will also say I pre I would love to see those games come to PC or something. Or, you know, another system. That'd be dope. It just seemed like they were just did they when did they announce their show anyway? Was it just kind of like a last second, like, oh, everybody?

SPEAKER_02 35:05

It was it was literally, I think it was two days after the expo, everyone like went showed their shit off. They're like, okay, well, we're gonna step in. And I was just like, okay, Nintendo's about to drop a nuclear bomb. Like, this is gonna be insane. Instead, they had like a firecracker. It's just like, oh, well, things.

SPEAKER_04 35:19

All right. I think they literally showed you what they had. Like, I think they just said, okay, we're gonna take everything we got and put it in the showcase. Because I mean the dude was thumb wrestling.

SPEAKER_03 35:29

Yeah, they had to kill some time somehow.

SPEAKER_04 35:31

Yeah, and again, I'm not uh like I said, I'm not trying to be like, you know, my only gripe with Nintendo is just the prices and stuff, right? Like I don't really hate like any of these companies. Like Sony's fine, Xbox is fine, it's all good.

SPEAKER_02 35:43

You probably is I feel like a dad. Like I love you, but I'm disappointed. You know, like I used to love Nintendo. I'm like, you're better than this, son. You used to be so great, you know.

SPEAKER_04 35:56

Lukewarm, I guess. It wasn't like nothing was crazy, but then they announced Occarino of Time and it's like, all is forgiven.

SPEAKER_03 36:02

Yeah, pretty much.

SPEAKER_04 36:03

Even though, like I said, it just depends where where they go with it. If it's an actual remake, like Final Fantasy VII did, then okay, Tanner, they showed us something.

SPEAKER_02 36:11

We didn't know it, but because they didn't say anything else about it. But and then the one thing I'm interested in, all they show is fucking a kid link falling asleep. I'm like, will you at least show the fucking game? Like, give me some. Yeah. Yeah. At least they give me some hype, not just like a little screenshot. But anyway, I guess we can quickly go over PlayStations. PlayStations, I think, was in the middle. It wasn't as good as Xbox's, but it wasn't as bad as Nintendo's. They showed a lot of cool stuff, like the Marvel Wolverine game. I'm a fan of the Spider-Man games that Sony make. They're really fun, they're really well made. Yeah. It looks cool. Uh the now, this is something I was wanting to ask about you. The God of War game. God of War La Laffree Laffey or what are they called?

SPEAKER_04 36:49

Loffy, I think. Lofi.

SPEAKER_02 36:52

You're not playing as Kratos in a God of War game, which I was just like, wow. Okay. This is different. What was your thoughts on it? Because we're you're the God of War fan.

SPEAKER_04 37:00

For me, this isn't really like a uh I don't think it's like, you know, God of War Five or God of War whatever. This is literally just uh side game. It's a side game, yeah. Like it's like I think the Norse mythology they were pretty much almost done with anyway. Like they're going to have Kratos do something else next. We'll we'll see whatever they do, because they probably aren't there yet because they're doing this side thing with Loffy, whatever, Kratos' wife. I mean, the gameplay and everything, the graphics, I mean, everything looked cool. It didn't look bad.

SPEAKER_02 37:26

Yeah. You already know that they're get they're remaking the older God of War games with Kratos and stuff. Like you're getting the Kratos stuff. You know it's on the line, like coming. So like why are you this upset that this other game with another character's coming out? You know, it's like don't but obviously don't buy it if you don't want it, but it's it still looks like a cool game. It's definitely something I would keep an eye on.

SPEAKER_04 37:46

For sure. And if you played God of War and then there's the 2018 God of War and then Ragnarok, like this ties into that story. So I mean, like me, I'd love to see how that story goes. Like it's a really good story, and if this ties into it and she has something to whatever to add to it, then I would be fine playing. I'd love to play it. It might be a PlayStation exclusive though, because they're kind of doing that now, but I would love to see it come to PC and I would buy it and play it. Some games, like when they replace the main character, it's just they kind of lose their their edge. We played Metal Gear Solid 2. What'd you think about Raiden? Not Solid Snake. You know what I mean? Like Ryden's not Solid Snake. And this one is, I mean, I don't know how I'm gonna feel about Loffy. She's not Kratos, and Kratos is like my favorite character, so I'm not playing as him sucks. But it just sucks because it's not Kratos. You could have said, it could have been God of War Atreus' adventure, you know? And I'd have been like, uh, I don't really want to play as Atreus for 30, 40, 50 hours, but guess I can. You know, I'd rather play as Kratos. So that's that's what I mean.

SPEAKER_02 38:46

And everything else was pretty much the horror showcase. And for me as a horror game fan, I was eating this shit up. Until Dawn 2, the remake of Resident Evil Code Veronica. Oh my god, I cannot wait for that fucking game. Holy shit. That's awesome. That's one of the most that's one of the most anticipated games that's coming out. Because that's, in my opinion, one of the hardest Resident Evil games. No, I honestly it is the hardest. If you go back and play that game, brutal, brutal fucking game. It's harder than Dino Crisis, in my opinion. Damn. It's a brutal game.

SPEAKER_04 39:14

It's one of those games that came out. Like you said, when it started hitting those horror runs, I think I was like, Tanner game, Tanner game. Every one of them, everyone, every one of them.

SPEAKER_02 39:23

Yeah, they were showing some really good ones though. Um new Silent Hill, uh Silent Hill Townfall. They're also coming out with that uh crazy game. It's just said Dino Crisis. It's like a dinosaur horror game. It looks incredible. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 39:37

I forgot the name of it, but it's crazy that we're we play Dino Crisis and we're not getting Dino Crisis. The pods the pod didn't do us that, but it did get us this game.

SPEAKER_02 39:45

It gen it generated basically a Dino Crisis clone of some kind.

SPEAKER_04 39:50

But no, that game looked horrifying. Like, like I said, dinosaur games, like, could you imagine if they made the Dino Crisis like that? I mean, it would be horrific.

SPEAKER_02 39:59

Which they are. That's what I'm assuming. This is what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_04 40:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 40:03

It looks horrific. Uh, but those are all those games are on brand for something I'm like, damn, those are all good. Silent Hill Resident Evil. Until Dawn 2, I beat the first one, and I'm excited about it too. Like, awesome stuff.

SPEAKER_02 40:16

It's just a lot of good shit. And the uh uh Alien Isolation is getting a sequel. The original Alien Isolation is one of the scariest games I've ever played. The AI on the uh Xenomorph on that game, like you can't trick it. It's one of the scariest stalker games ever because that alien is always breathing down your neck, and you cannot do anything to save yourself. It's just so scary. And the fact that game's getting uh I think that's one of the only horror games I was too scared to beat. I never beat it. I was like, I can't do this. This is just traumatizing. I can't do it. So maybe I'll have to uh not be a pussy and go back and beat the original if I plan on getting the sequel. But yeah, we're fucking almost 50 minutes in this podcast. That's how much news has dropped.

SPEAKER_04 40:57

Yeah, and overall, just before I know we're getting ready to talk about we should be talking about Bioshock. I was like, this is supposed to be a Bioshock episode. Uh but uh but man, Sony's overall, it felt like there was everything they announced, like nothing was like where I looked at and like, oh that's shit. Everything, but nothing I looked at was like, damn, I need a PlayStation. All of it was just like, man, if I had a PlayStation, I'd play that.

SPEAKER_02 41:19

Like everything was like, I think the main reason is it showed up some great shit, but it's third party stuff. You know, it's not like this is just Sony stuff, this is all third party.

SPEAKER_04 41:28

That's what I mean. They didn't have like that big Sony bang. Like even the God of War game would usually be the huge thing, but it was just like it's the side quest game, I guess. Like it's a what do they call that? It's not it's not the main storyline, it's like a spin-off. It's the spin-off series, yeah. Right. That's what it is, and that's that's why it's not like as big a hype as it was. Like if it was a new, like, the biggest game they showed was Wolverine.

SPEAKER_02 41:52

You know, that's yeah, that's the biggest exclusive they showed.

SPEAKER_04 41:55

Yeah, and that's a good exclusive. Like it's awesome, but it's for some reason it just felt like nothing was just like, whoa. It was just like, oh yeah, what because but you knew about Wolverine too. It wasn't like brand new, like, oh, there's a new Wolverine game. It was just more gameplay than the game you've seen. But pretty cool. It was good though.

SPEAKER_02 42:10

Yeah, so that's that's it for the news. A lot of gamers out there are gonna be satiated for at least the three years to come with the games that are coming out. But anyway, let's go, let's get into Bioshock here. Okay, so well, you know what, Carter, let's make this a let's go into this. I was wanting to talk about this. This is our first ever game that was ever on the uh Xbox 360. I think this is our first ever Xbox 360 game. And we did this sort of similar discussion whenever we got on Bra with the Wii. What was your exposure to Xbox as a company? Because this is a this is a company that that didn't show up until you was like 11 or 12. Like this was, you know, okay. It was kind of diff.

SPEAKER_04 42:51

Well, like what did you first learn about Xbox? So Xbox for me, I was first exposed to it by our buddy Austin. Never he didn't have a PS2, I don't believe, or he might have got one later, but I'm pretty sure he grew up, he had the Xbox. And the first time I ever got exposed to Xbox was we were in probably sixth, seventh, eighth grade or something, maybe fifth. I don't know. We were young, young, like middle school for sure. And I just remember going over to his house, and Jared lived right across the street from him. I mean, they literally could they were at each other's house all the time. I mean, they literally were next door neighbors. He was already going over there a lot, and I walked, I had a little bit of a walk from my house to get over there, so I couldn't go all the time because again, I was like, you know, 12. But I get over there and he's playing a game and he had like all these different controllers. I'm like, oh my god, it's got four controllers just like the uh Nintendo 64. That's cool. Um and it was an Xbox, which I knew about, but I didn't know anything about it, all right? Like everyone knew the Xbox was a thing. But I think Austin's only kid I could remember that had one. He's playing a game called Halo, Combat Evolved. That was a an experience, just that was the first first person shooter I may have ever played, period. And we were all playing it together. Yeah. And we were playing it together, and we were playing it like there's that one map that everyone knows about where you have the two bases on both sides. I can't remember the name of it.

SPEAKER_02 44:09

It's like the red versus blue like classic.

SPEAKER_04 44:11

Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 44:12

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 44:12

Exactly. We were playing there, and I just remember all the different maps. I remember us scrolling through the campaign and stuff. And I think there was a time where me and me and him tried to play through the campaign, if I'm not mistaken, or I played through it with somebody. I think it was him. But yeah, that was my first exposure to the Xbox, was just playing it at Austin's house a few times, and he had a few different games for it. Some of the classics for Xbox. Morawind, obviously. He showed off Morawind, and I that game blew my fucking mind. I was like, oh my god. I'm like, hold on. I just remember thinking, so if you want to raise your acrobats, you jump. Yeah. So if you keep jumping, you're going to get that stat higher. It knows that to raise that stat. And it's like, yeah, that's how impressive it was back then. It wasn't like a like that's common now, right? But back then it was like, so if you use a short sword, it'll make your short blade higher. Oh my gosh. This is basically like real life.

SPEAKER_02 45:03

You go and work out your biceps. Your biceps are going to increase in size.

SPEAKER_04 45:07

Exactly the same sort of thing. That game blew my mind. That was incredible. Seeing more wind, I mean the Xbox was in my head when I seen it was just incredible. I feel like it might have been more expensive back then than like the PS2 and stuff. Because I remember not being able to get one. And I did ask for one, and that didn't happen.

SPEAKER_02 45:25

Xbox, I think that original Xbox, it gets kind of slept on. Like I feel like it had a ton of cool shit on it. Like the thing is, I have three, it was basically the three boys. It was me, Corey, I mentioned all the time, and then Brandon. I had the GameCube, Corey had the PS2, Brandon had the Xbox. And I remember going to his house and watching the Xbox and being so amazed by it, but I was so scared. I don't know if you remember the dashboard of the original Xbox that looked kind of like a spaceship.

SPEAKER_00 45:51

And the audio track would have these alien sound effects like go in the background making these weird noises and shit, and that shit creaked me the fuck out.

SPEAKER_02 46:08

But the the cool thing about it was Xbox Live. Like he had that on the original Xbox, and I was just like, what the fuck is this? Like you can play shit online and play Halo online. And the one thing that I'll never forget about that that amazed me was like CDs. Obviously, that's how people listen to music back then. You could burn a CD on your Xbox and listen to it.

unknown 46:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 46:30

I think that was that was one of the things that was that kind of hurt it a little bit. Not just that it was uh could do all that stuff. Because that all that shit, I don't want to say hurt it, that's incredible, right? But I remember thinking, I just remember as a kid, for some reason it was seen as a computer and not really a console as much, even though it was a computer.

SPEAKER_02 46:46

That's always been kind of Microsoft's like they leaned more into like this is a console, but like they always have that 20%, like it's kind of like a computer.

SPEAKER_04 46:54

They're like, This is a console, you can watch uh Netflix, you can browse the internet, you can burn DVDs on, you can burn CDs, and we're just like, that's not like what is it? What do you got, PlayStation? We're a video game console where it's a PS2 and it's a few.

SPEAKER_02 47:07

We can play DVDs.

SPEAKER_04 47:08

Well, yeah, yeah. It's like, holy shit, and you only cost $199. I just remember it, and I don't even remember the Xbox had the hard drive built in, and that was another computer-esque thing, even though realistically looking back, phenomenal. Phenomenal they had that. That was my experience with it, though. I mean, you get a bunch of 12-year-olds playing Halo together. I mean, you're having a good time.

SPEAKER_02 47:30

So, like, okay, so you go from that Xbox, you see it at Steffi's, and now it's in your brain, you know what the Xbox is, but then when the 360 comes out, did you get the 360? Because that that we're going to what Bioshock's on, which is on the 360. Did you get the 360 or did you get the PS3 during that generation?

SPEAKER_04 47:45

So obviously I had I went with the PS2 instead of the Xbox. The prices and everything, my brother had the PS2 that I got eventually got my own PS2. Yeah. And I got it for Metal Gear Solid 2, and I played it there, Metal Gear Solid 3, all those. So I love my PlayStation. Then when the PS3 and 360 was announced, I think the 360 came out maybe a year earlier or six months. It had a 2005 start. Yeah, it had a huge head start on it, which and it sold like crazy, especially because it had stuff like Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare, which was huge. Um, yeah, so it had a lot of crazy games that came out, and you could only play them on 360 unless you wanted to wait a year on the PS3 to come out and then pay like $600 for the PS3. So Sony did the they shot themselves in the foot big time. But I know I wanted a PS3, I did not want the 360, and you know, you only pick one. So I waited and I got my PS3 probably 2006-ish later. It wasn't the first console because mine wasn't backwards compatible, because I think originally they were, but they kind of broke them down a little bit, made them cheaper. And mine was the Metal Gear Solid 4 Guns of the Patriots PS3. Oh, it's the 40 gigabyte hard drive. It wasn't backwards compatible, it was the Fatmon. And it recently died on me, probably a year ago, maybe. Like not the house, I had a house fire, but it wasn't the house fire, it just died on its own. I wish I'd have known, I'd probably been able to take it apart and do some stuff. I tried later, but it was too late. It once they die and that happens, it's over. Kind of like the red ring of the 360. Another thing that kept me from buying it, everybody was having that problem. Like everybody. That was not just a oh yeah, I knew 10 people and two of them had that problem. Like, no, I knew 10 people and like nine of them had red rings of death. It was that bad. Oh, it was bad. Yeah, it was bad. Um, but yeah, so I had the PS3 and did not have the 360. But I didn't know what it's like.

SPEAKER_02 49:29

Okay, so you did end up getting it. You did uh end up getting one.

SPEAKER_04 49:32

So when you're a kid, you want to play with your friends, right? So I had the PS3, but I was mostly playing by myself because nobody else had the PS3. They all bought 360s. So after a while, I'm working at Taco Bella making my own money. I uh end up where I'm going to college at the time. I ended up buying one off of somebody so I could play um with Jared and Austin and all of them. They were all playing on 360, so uh by one. And he had a bunch of games already, and a few titles stood out. There's a title called Blue Dragon. I don't know if you've heard of it. I've seen that, yes, I've heard of it. Phenomenal R JRPG. I think it's from the same people that make like uh Dragon Quests and stuff. I mean, I know the artworks Toriyama, so really cool game. So I had he had Blue Dragon, I got it. Have you ever played, gosh, what is that game that is so good? Mass Effect, my god. Mass Effect.

SPEAKER_02 50:21

I beaten two and I beaten three.

SPEAKER_04 50:23

I love those games. I beaten one, and that was back when I had my 360 one. Yeah, it was uh outstanding game. So there was Mass Effect, I had Call of Duty, I had Blue Dragon, um, a few other Xbox games, but uh mostly it was those that I played, and then I eventually sold my 360.

SPEAKER_02 50:41

So Okay. Yeah, it's a similar thing for me. Like I, you know, I got I started on the GameCube, then I got a Wii. And then eventually, I remember as a kid being like, I was the last one to jump off the Wii boat because all my f friends were getting older and they wanted to play online like more mature games and like you know, play online and stuff. So everyone had a Wii, but then eventually like they started getting 360s, and then in school they're like, Okay, you're gonna get on Call of Duty later, you're gonna get on Halo, and I'm sitting there like, but I'm playing Mario Kart, like that kind of shit.

SPEAKER_04 51:10

Like Okay, well, your little brother will play with you.

SPEAKER_02 51:15

Exactly. It was one of them things because I was in middle school and I think like fifth or sixth grade, and eventually I'm like, okay. And I started I would go over my friend Nick's house and I would watch him play Oblivion and Fallout 3 and you know all these crazy uh Call of Duty. Yes, and and I was just like, I don't know if you know that SpongeBob made and like I need it. It's like I need this thing already.

SPEAKER_04 51:37

Because you mentioned Fallout 3 and all those awesome games. I was just gonna mention real quick that uh I was working young adult, you know, getting into my 20s, and I love gaming, and that's when I started buying a lot of games for my PS3. And I mentioned the other day in our chat that uh I think the library for it, either it's me looking back on it probably with Rose 10 of glasses, but I'm like, that had the best library. Like I've never enjoyed gaming like that ever again. Like Oblivion, Fallout 3, Uncharted, Uncharted 2, all those games, God of War 3, God of War Ascension, like all those games that were out on the PS3, I never got to that level of enjoyment again.

SPEAKER_02 52:13

Like, no, that generation was special, dude, because that was just like it was the beginning of HD gaming. It was the kind of really the beginning of widespread online multiplayer. But I remember getting my 360, and the thing is about 360 back in the day, I don't know if you remember this, they had three different models. They had the arcade model, they had the normal, then they had the premium. The premium was black. Uh I got the middle. Right? It did, it did. It had the biggest hard drive. The arcade had two gigs on it.

SPEAKER_04 52:39

Like it was it was it was like you had to have a memory card to play games on it, which was weird at that point in time. But I guess it was made for just like, hey, you don't know if you want to play video games or not, buy those.

SPEAKER_02 52:51

It was literally, because the reason it was called arcade is whenever you looked at the box on uh Xbox Live Marketplace, like they would sell a lot of these older arcade games like Pac-Man, Frogger. That was kind of like what they were marketing that system for. They're like, okay, well, you can buy all these arcade games, but it's only on a two gigabyte, not even a hard drive. It's like whatever the fuck they put in the system storage to give you flash memory or something. Flash memory, yeah. But I knew better at the time because I was advised by my friends and stuff, like, no, don't get the fucking arcade, you won't be able to play anything, get this. So I got my 360 and it was just off to the fucking races. Like it was like no looking back. I love Nintendo still, and I continue to get Nintendo systems, but I'm like, okay, I have grown up, I'm now a big kid. It's pretty much like I I just love the 360. It it exposed me to so many games and and genres that I never was exposed to, like RPGs, first-person shooters, sports games, just you know, broadened my horizons a lot. But to segue into Bioshock, this is the story of how I learned about Bioshock. I never played the the first one until this podcast, but I did beat and play the second and I played uh Infinite whenever they came out. But the reason I got into Bioshock was I bought this game called Duke Nukem Forever whenever it dropped. And it was absolute shit. That game was so bad, I hated it. I was just like, oh my god, this is like so, so god awful. So I went to school and I was talking to this guy. Uh well, I was gonna say his name, I won't say his name. But I was talking to him and he was saying something about like, man, that new Duke Nukem game, it looks so fucking good, it looks so good, and I kind of scammed him. I was just like, Well, I got it. You know, it's it's it's awesome, dude. I love it, it's awesome. Like, I'll trade you for something for to get rid of this Duke Nukem game.

SPEAKER_04 54:38

Oh yeah, the Bioshock.

SPEAKER_02 54:39

Oh, I tra uh I traded him for Bioshock 2. Oh God, imagine. Oh my god. Yes, and I remember he brought the game in, and I brought him uh Duke Nukem Forever, and I was just like, here you go, man, have fun. And I brought Bioshock 2 home and I I loved it. It was awesome. It's pretty much like what this game is, but you're playing as a big daddy. And yeah, like a little sister.

SPEAKER_04 55:00

I've I played two, phenomenal.

SPEAKER_02 55:03

Anyway, before we get into Bioshock, how did you get exposed to Bioshock? Like, was it through the PS3 or through 60, or like how'd you learn about it?

SPEAKER_04 55:10

Neither of those systems. Um, I heard of Bioshock, but honestly, I don't remember any of my friends or anybody really playing Bioshock. Um, even though it was apparently it was it's always been held as like this big masterpiece game, right? But I that's I don't I don't think Jared had it, Austin. I don't remember anybody uh from my friend group that was actually like sitting down and playing Bioshock. I joined the military around 2010, right? And then or yeah, 2009, 2010, I gosh, I forget. But anyway, while I'm over there in uh I did boot camp and then I'm doing what they call A School, which is your AIT training in the barracks. I bought a laptop to play video games on, right? I bought a Sony bio and I didn't know enough about them to know what a good gaming laptop was. It turned out to be a pretty decent machine. So I get it and I play a few games on it. I ended up getting Morawind, which I played on it. A lot of the games that in a lot of these games are going to sound familiar because it was the ones that I saw Austin playing. So Morawind was one of them, and I knew I had to have it. Finally got to get into it really hardcore. I had a I think I got Oblivion on it. Yes, I did get Oblivion for sure, because Skyrim was uh getting ready to be released. Yep, so next year. Obviously, some Bethesda. Yep. So I got some Bethesda games, Fallout New Vegas as well, played it on my PC and beat it on my laptop. Also had uh they had Bioshock there, and someone I was in the Navy with told me it was really good. So I picked up Bioshock then, so around 2010, about three years after it was released, and uh played it on my laptop. That was my first exposure to it. Just happened to randomly see it in the Next, which was our Navy exchange, so that's where I bought my laptop. Bioshock was there, I think it was on sale, and I was like, yeah, I'll give that a shot. So I bought it, and I loved it. Ended up playing it, and then later I actually revisited it, I think, on the PS3. Me and Jimmy, a guy I worked with when we did security, we actually beat Bioshock 1 and 2 together, and the way we did that was uh so we worked on the same mind site and there really wasn't nothing to do. We had cameras set up, motion detectors, and all that, and we would order pizza and play video games sometimes. We beat Bioshock together by just taking turns. We would just build the guy the sales, you know, spend our eve on whatever we both agreed on, and we would just go through the level playing it together. We did that with Bioshock and Bioshock 2. So that's how I beat both of those. But but yeah, absolutely loved the series from that. Never played Infinite though. Like I had it downloaded on my PS3 and was it's always one of those games. No, it's always one of those games I was supposed to I wanted to get around to, but I just kept putting it back, pushing back. But yeah, I mean I love Bioshock, Bioshock 2. So I know I'm gonna love Infinite. It's like it's kind of like one of those games.

SPEAKER_02 57:37

It's very different because you're not in Rapture, you're in the sit you're in the city in the sky.

SPEAKER_04 57:41

Yeah, I started it on the PS3 because I think it was on Game Pass, or not Game Pass, PlayStation Network, PlayStation Plus. So I downloaded it for free, and I had it on my hard drive because I put a huge hard drive in my PS3. Um so I had it downloaded, ready to go, and then my PS3 crapped out. But I mean, it was always there, and I started it and I'd play it, and I'm like, oh, this is gonna be good. This is gonna be damn good. Then just never actually played it.

SPEAKER_02 58:05

Yeah, Bioshock is such a unique game. I guess getting into it now. It's like one of them games that's like a mix of like a c like, you know, a traditional first-person shooter type of game, but it incorporates all these elements and it has such a cool story and such a cool world, and it's just like I've never played a first-person shooter like this before.

SPEAKER_04 58:26

It is a first-person shooter RPG legit, not like a like, oh, it's gonna be a first-person shooter game that has a campaign to it, but then you can play online. It's like, no, this is this has got an awesome story, and you just happen to be a first-person shooter as well, with all these different powers you can get and stuff. So you can literally if you want to go through it and sling bees at everybody, you can do that. You can make them get mad and fight each other. You can uh freeze them. I mean, there's so many different powers you can do, and you don't even have to use a gun if you don't want to freeze them and walk up and whack them up.

SPEAKER_02 58:54

I mean, exactly. And and where this is kind of the first game in the series, obviously the gun play, that's one of my tiny little complaints. It wasn't as good as like, you know, what we're used to today. It's a little dated.

SPEAKER_03 59:05

Oh, yeah, no.

SPEAKER_02 59:06

But the thing is, the plasmids, what you're talking about, all these powers and stuff, is what makes it. Because like it's really not a first person. It's like you're combining, it's like you're sort of like a wizard and like you're using a gun at the same time. Like you have all these abilities from these different plasmids that you find, like you were saying the winter blast, or there was one where it was a target dummy. That was one of the ones I used the absolute most, was where like you would throw out this like fake version of yourself, and all these enemies would start swarming it and start shooting it, and then you could just sit there and sit back and just unload. You just constantly are unlocking all these new like powers and stuff, and that shit made the game so fucking fun.

SPEAKER_04 59:42

Yes, that's what I mean. And that gives it the replayability too, if you wanted to go back and play through it again. Um, you just got all this stuff unlocked so you can play through it differently. Because there's a lot of stuff in the beginning you can't do in a new game just because you don't have it unlocked, but if you come back to it later, you'd be like, oh hell, I can I can just also there is a new game plus like you can just go back with all your shit.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:01

Okay, that's cool. That's awesome. Because there's so many weapons in the game. Like that you start out with the wrench, then you get the revolver, then the shotgun, then the Tommy gun, then the grenade launcher, then the crossbow, then the chemical thrower. They just constantly are giving you shit over it. Like it's just like such a deep game.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:17

The story nor the gameplay got old because it kept throwing this new, like, okay, well, here's a revolver. Well, like you said, here's a shotgun, here's a Tommy gun. Um, here's new enemies. Well, here's the new slicers that are gonna come down from the ceiling. Here's the Big Daddy, you know, it kept all this it kept building the game so the whole game flows really smooth and it never gets to where you're just killing the same enemy over and over, and you just get so powerful it gets easy. Uh later on it gets like hell hellishly hard, to be honest with you.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:42

Oh, dude, dude, that was a thing. I I could not believe how hard this game was. I could I contemplated because I think I picked the normal difficulty. Uh I contemplated turning it down halfway through it. I'm like, I don't know if I can do this. I don't. But what I ended up doing was I was kind of a dumbass. I didn't really spin my atom very well. Like I was just kind of very wishy-washy with it, and or my money too. Like I wasn't really it's you kind of have to be strategic in a way in what you buy and like what you upgrade, because you can also upgrade the guns too. Like it's not even like the base gun is all you have. You can upgrade them with these different upgrades. And you have to really get creative with the plasmids and the the abilities. You have to use them. Like you can't just not, you know, you have to get really, really creative with them.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:26

Yeah, you will not beat the game if you don't like upgrade your stuff and use your plasmids and stuff. And you gotta use like you said, there's a certain way to use them. Electricity is useful throughout just about if you wanted to. Um, but it I do think uh I stopped using it after a while, even though it depends how you upgrade it, right? Because they got different versions. I think you can upgrade it twice, if I'm not mistaken, to a third version. So they get even more powerful as you go. So if you like a certain plasmid, you can generally upgrade it to something way more powerful that'll maintain its use. So you can keep your same gameplay loop if you like that kind of thing. But I love like honestly, I would crack up because I would sling bees out all the time, even though they were kind of not useful.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:04

I didn't use that one all that much. I think I tried it twice and I'm like, okay, I'm gonna go back to my freeze and my lightning.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:10

I just love slinging out the bees and then they'd start screaming like, what the hell? They would just start running all over the place screaming, and I'm like, okay, this feels good. It felt good to do that, but oh man, it was just the storyline here too. Like, this is one of those games where you're just like, what kind of game is it? Oh, it's a survival horror, first person shooter, RPG. It's and it works.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:32

The basic story is like, you know, you're this random guy named Jack, and you crash, like your plane crash lands in the ocean, and then you just see this lighthouse randomly, and you're like, okay, well, I'm gonna swim this lighthouse. You go down it, you get in this little like submarine style pod thing, and then you just go down to this entire city that's underwater called Rapture, and as you are going through it, you're being directed by Atlas.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:54

Yes, Atlas. The guy who's who's giving you the information and trying to help you. And if you're listening to the podcast, we're about to spoil it for you, but it's a very popular, like most people know this game. It's been a game's almost 20 years old. Yeah, and it and it's a very popular twist, like one of the best, like it's one of those legendary twists that most people know about. But anyway, continue.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:13

Yeah, yeah. So you're being directed by this guy, Atlas, basically to help you survive, and you're learning more and more about this place because this game uses a lot of like environmental storytelling. And it I was kind of mixed on how they handled the storytelling, to be honest, because I had no problem with whenever they're directly talking to you because you're a silent protagonist, you never really speak, so they're just kind of talking to you and describing shit. But the number one way that you have to learn about the the shit and what's going on, because everything in this rapture, like these people are basically seem like they're on heroin or meth or something, like they're like, you know, fucking drugged out, crazy, uh insane. You don't really know the slicers and that shit, and then you see the big daddies, and you're like, what is this shit? Like, what's going on? But the way that you learn about it is by finding these little audio logs and you gotta sit there and listen to them. And you gave me a great piece of advice that I learned too little too late, and then I think that's why I did not get the full scope of the story was I couldn't hear shit half the time.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:11

Yeah, it's it's ridiculous. I remember when I first and I knew it from my first couple playthroughs a long time ago. If you don't turn the voice up and you just, you know, keep it to the default volume and stuff, or if you don't have subtitles on or something, which are I don't know if subtitles are available on the version you play, it depends.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:27

Oh yeah, they yeah, they they were, but I don't think I had them on for whatever reason.

SPEAKER_04 1:04:30

Like I said, yeah, if you don't have them on, you'll be in a gunfight because it's like he'll be like, So here's what I need you to do, and then you'll have a bunch of stuff grunting and boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. And you miss his entire conversations, so you'll get an error like here's what you're supposed to be doing right now, but you miss his whole spiel about hey, my family, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. So that does suck. Like, I feel like they should like the default shouldn't be that. The default should be something else. Like the subtitle should be on by default, or the voice on the radio should be a lot louder by default, because you really can't hear shit.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:03

No, that's that's just a piece of advice for people out there who are going to play this for the first time. Just make sure you turn the audio log up if you want to know what's going on. Otherwise, you're just kind of like you'll hear it from time to time and shit. But that yeah, the story was just incredible. You wanted to learn more and more and more about this this place and the twists and the turns.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:21

Though I've watched some uh backstory on this to try to get a little bit more out of the story, because I love the storyline, it's awesome. I wanted to know more about it. So, Andrew Ryan basically, throughout the war that was going on at the time, he decides that what's going on is ridiculous and he wants to create like a utopia underwater that no government is over. It's you know, that's why it says no god, just man, because he doesn't want religion, nothing. He just wants it to be like a scientific utopia with the greatest minds on earth.

unknown 1:05:48

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 1:05:49

Well, they find these uh I forget exactly there's these little creatures that they got the atom from, and that is what everyone's tripping on. Uh they start figuring out, oh my god, this gives you superhuman abilities. We can do so much stuff by splicing our jeans. And that's why everyone there is on it and they're all losing their minds and going crazy. But Andrew Ryan is still running the show, and the guy that you've been talking to the whole time, Atlas, is actually an evil piece of shit, and you don't know it. Andrew Ryan's not really like he's not a good guy by no means, but he's not actually the villain either. The villain has been doing the whole would you kindly throughout the whole thing. So you find out later that the reason the plane crashed, um, I don't know if you know this or not. I don't know how much into the story you read, but you know in the beginning when you open up, like you have a birthday gift sitting there. Yeah. The rest of the message says, like, would you kindly do this at like 5 p.m.? So you are the one who crashes the plane, basically. Uh there's a gun in that box and everything. Yeah. So there's a gun in the box, and your character is the one who you are Angie Ryan's kid, actually, and you were raised to you had this like uh suggestion thing throughout your whole childhood. So that would you kindly is ingrained in you when you hear that, you do whatever's said without question. Um so you get sent to topside to live until a certain day, which is when you're activated, which is when you read that message, and you grab the gun and you take the plane down. So then the plane's down and you come there, and then that's why every now and then you'll hear that Atlas guy say, Would you kindly go there and stop him? He's taking my family, blah, blah. So he says that throughout the thing, and you kind of realize that's why you've been mind-controlled and doing what you're doing. Yeah, because you get to Andrew Ryan, and when you first meet him, he says, Are you a man or are you uh a slave? A slave does what he's told, a man thinks. He goes, So would you kindly kill me and you do it? He tells you to run and stop, and your guy does it perfectly. So you find it's a whole brainwash thing. Then you have to come out of it too. So that guy becomes Frank Fontaine, he tells he's laughing at you, whatever. He's like, Thank you, buddy, but you gotta go now. So it's really cool. Huge twist, by the way, huge massive twist.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:58

If you haven't played it before, thank you for expanding on that, Carter. Yeah, thank you. Because that that just makes the story that much more awesome, honestly, for me.

SPEAKER_04 1:08:05

Yes, yeah. A lot of games I love when they do that when you're just like, I guess you just kind of arrive and that's how they had to get the game going. It's like, no, there's actually a huge backstory here. So because Angie Ryan created the place, they found those, and that's when all this kind of started going sideways. But really freaking cool.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:18

Even this game has two different endings, but the whole Atlas thing, like whenever you first encounter a big daddy and you kill it, and then you first see the little sister, he's sitting there telling you to harvest the little sister. Because you can do one or two things, you can save them or you can harvest them. But depending on what you do, it affects the ending of the game. The good ending is where you save them, but the guy who you think is your friend and is like trying to help you is telling you to harvest it to get the item to get more powerful. But I knew from the get-go, it just because I I don't know, maybe I just wanted to do the good thing, I was just like, I'm just gonna save them. You know, I d I don't want to do this. But it I thought like I would get nothing from it. It was just a good like choice to do, but that's not the case at all. Like, like we said, you get the good ending, but also every three of them that you save, the doctor was her name, Tinnenbaum or Dr. Tinnenbaum, I think is her name. Yeah, she'll send you a care package with not only 200 atom, but like unique plasmids you can't get it from anywhere else. It's just from if you save them.

SPEAKER_04 1:09:13

Yep. So you get the good ending. It's it's definitely better to save them. So if you're playing this game, save them. Don't kill 'em. Now, there is technically people call it three endings. So if you kill them all and you get to the end or whatever, the only difference is you get the same exact ending as if you just killed a few and save the rest. Because if you kill a few, you don't get the good ending. You have to save them all. The good ending, of course, you go up, yada yada yada. All the little sisters are happy, you raise them, you die happy. It's all good. The uh the bad ending is when you kind of use everyone, all the slicers and stuff, you take over, and you pretty much take over the world. You just go and destroy the world. The bad ending basically, uh, there's guys that are at the wreckage, and then these like I guess submarines arrive at the top, and then they open up, and then all these slicers jump out of the top and just start stabbing people left and right and start killing everybody. So you kind of start war on earth. Start Armageddon. Yeah, so that's the bad ending. But the two different bad endings, one of them, she just basically tells you, she's like, I should have expected the same thing. You didn't just show them kindness, yada yada yada. And of course, you hand the world the same thing you showed them, cruelty. Then the other one is the exact same thing, only she's like screaming at you, she's mad about it because you killed them all, but it's the exact same ending. So I was like, eh, three endings, kinda, but not really.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:29

Yeah, there's a dialogue change, a little character basically change there. Yeah, yeah. That's still cool though. And I like I like that kind of morale systems in games. Like I Fallout has it, Red Dead has it, this game has it, where you like you can choose to be good or bad, and then you get some sort of responsibility like or at the end, like there's something that comes from it, you know.

SPEAKER_04 1:10:47

I love it. Yeah, yeah, you get that reward. Yeah. I love the multiple ending thing, like, so you can truly that's why I love playing games for the first time. Like even Pentium it, I don't know what's going on, but I'm gonna play through it without any looking up anything, just play it how you want to. Yes. And one thing that ruins games for me a lot is I'll play through a game and I'll pick something like, Did I make the right decision? And the whole rest of the game playthrough, I'm like, I need to go back and fix that. I need to go back and fix that. But really, if you just play through it, just go with it, just let it happen. Mm-hmm. Like Bioshock was the same way for me. Like, I'm like, uh, I want to upgrade this plasma. I'm like, I'll just do it. I mean it you can go back and play it again if you want to, no big deal.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:22

The only thing was like early game, uh, you kind of have to be a little bit smarter because of how difficult it is. But then, once you get all your weapons and stuff, it's pretty like like you're you're off to the races, you're good. But early on, I would be a little bit more conservative on what you kind of like spend your shit on.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:38

Oh, yeah, I didn't mean it that way for sure. You definitely got to take care of yourself, especially if you're playing on normal. Uh, and there is a hard mode, God forbid, people who get faced with that.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:47

I couldn't imagine it.

SPEAKER_04 1:11:48

Because uh they give you a lot less resources on normal than on easy. Like if you play through it on easy, you'll not really have too much problems finding ammo, um, getting through with all the different plasmas and stuff. You don't really have much of an issue. Playing on medium, I was or normal, I was struggling. I was like, I'm out of health. I gotta get I gotta something's gotta give here. I gotta go buy some stuff, and I don't have money, I don't have ammo.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:10

You know what I found to be one of the hardest things about the game, and you may not even agree with me or even think about this. This was my number one complaint in the game. Hands down, by far, okay, well, it's two part was the goddamn turrets and spotlights and the hacking system in this game. I fucking hated it. I could not stand hacking shit in this game because it was so difficult. They try to give you plasmids to like increase, or maybe it's like uh upgrades or something that you can buy to like help the hacking and shit. Yes. I can I I don't know if I've passed a single hacking mini game. I don't know if I passed it once.

SPEAKER_04 1:12:43

What hacking middle game did you get? Because there's two different mini games depending on the version you play.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:48

There's one where you're unveiling the pipes and stuff, whether you got to like connect the pipes to the other pipe at the end, you know what I'm saying?

SPEAKER_04 1:12:54

Yeah, that's the one I I got really good at that one to where I could fly through it pretty much, but there's some that like I had all the upgrades though to make it slow down, do all the stuff for it. So it would work.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:04

Maybe that's my problem. I didn't buy any of the upgrades.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:06

So I definitely did. So I was able to hack those pretty good. So maybe if you do another playthrough, you get those upgrades and you might be like, okay, that's okay. That's not as bad.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:16

Right.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:17

Because it would definitely it did a lot.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:18

They give you it's it if they didn't give you an option to make that easier, then yeah, that would be a complaint. But I guess that's just more of a me problem. I didn't choose to upgrade it, so obviously it's gonna be fucking brutal. And anytime you were on a spotlight uh and it would go off, the alarm would go off, it would be a minute-long timer, and they would just get swarmed by these fucking person.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:37

Oh my god, I hated it. They would just keep coming and coming and coming. I like I said, I upgraded all my stuff to where I would drop one and then hack it, drop the second one and hack it. So I'd have two of those fight and they would just be fighting each other, but man, it would just be relentless for a minute. It would just keep coming, keep coming, keep coming.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:54

Another thing that I don't know if you use Carter, but this helped me tremendously was that research camera. Where if you take pictures of enemies, you would get like, oh my god, I use that so much.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:04

You'd get bonuses to damage and stuff, right? Yes. Yes, I did that constantly. I'd be taking pictures. If I'd kill them and forget, I'd go back and snap their photo just to get a little bit more.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:14

Me too. Especially with the big daddies, because every time you would before you would go to a new area, and this is kind of a smart way of the game implying that the little sisters were important, because at first I didn't think they were important. I thought they were just kind of a little side thing to give you more atom. But before you go to a new area, if you didn't save all the little sisters, it'd be like, Are you sure you want to leave? Because if you do, then this is gonna be hard as fuck. So I was just like, Well, I might as well turn around and and get them. But I think that's a smart way of the game like making you do it so you get the good ending, because they're just like, We're not gonna tell you that this involves the ending, but we're gonna strongly advise if you don't do this, you're gonna get your ass kicked.

SPEAKER_04 1:14:52

Yeah, this is the atom too. Like you need that to get like your plasmas and stuff powered up. So without it, you would just be like, Oh, I guess I'll just shoot this guy. Or whatever. Really difficult to beat the game that way.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:06

Yeah. But all in all, dude, like I've really enjoyed it. I'm I'm happy you picked this game. I'm happy I went back and played the original. I think I may like this. Is probably my ranking. I think two is last, one is in the middle, and infinite is my favorite. This game h holds up remarkably well. Well, actually, let's just go ahead. You want to get to our scores? Yeah, yeah, we could do that.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:25

And by the way, I was gonna say, I've I've only played one and two, and I think one is definitely better than two. Like two's not bad, but one is definitely the better game.

SPEAKER_02 1:15:32

Me too.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:33

Anyway, but uh it's your game. Yeah, by the way. So um so I beat the game on my Windows 7 PC way back in 2010, 2011. I beat it again later on PlayStation 3, and I most recently beat it on my new PC, which was incredible with the OLED display.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:49

And the remastered version.

SPEAKER_04 1:15:51

And it was the remastered version, yes. So I beat the remastered version. That's why I was telling you, I literally, after I beat the game, I looked up some YouTube video to get some more story about it because it's just I know it's a it's a damn good story. Just that twist and everything. And this was like one of the most iconic twists in gaming history, too. Like it's just so crazy. So yeah, I absolutely love this game. It is like Tanner mentioned, the gameplay and stuff is definitely it's aged well. It's not bad because of the plasmas, the the first version shooter aspect. Nothing's bad here, but they definitely have better stuff out now. Um but the remastered version was incredible. Like I said, this was a very fun game. I think the story's incredible. I give it an 8.5.

SPEAKER_02 1:16:28

That's that's respectable, Carter. I I almost I'm almost right there with you. Graphically, I think the game looks insanely good for a 20-year-old game. Like, that's where we're at in this day and age. Like, in my mind, you say 20 years old, I'm thinking fucking Super Nintendo. No, this is the 20-year-old game, which is insane. You know, we're at that point now to where you look at this game and it still looks like it could be released today.

SPEAKER_04 1:16:51

Yes, they did a good job with the different like levels you would get to just be completely different. Like there was the uh where you had all the trees in that one, one place was on fire pretty much. Uh just really, really good job of just uh even though it's the one big beautiful underwater thing, every place you went to is different. Even that crazy bastard in the with the uh what was that he did? He did his masterpiece where you have to take pictures and he'd come down like, oh, it's finally done.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:13

Like Yeah, there was a ton of those enemies where they were creepy, like the doctor, and you'd listen to his fucking tape where he's just like gradually getting more and more crazy and like just wants to like people up and shit. Okay, this is really unsettling.

SPEAKER_04 1:17:26

Yes, and that's the story with those plasmas just kind of messing their brain up and making them get crazier and crazier as time went on. Really good, really good done. It all comes together well. I agree.

SPEAKER_02 1:17:35

Graphically, it looks awesome. Like this game was just it basically created a world in a game. Like this is its own, you know, world. It's it's awesome. I love that kind of like 1940s Fallout aesthetic that it goes for with the music and the vibe and stuff. I love that kind of stuff. It's just high quality game, awesome story, fun gameplay. I had a few little minor complaints, but it was more, like I said, more of a me thing. The gameplay is slightly dated, especially if you'll play if Carter plays Bioshock Infinite and compares that gameplay to this, Bioshock Infinite's gameplay is insanely good. It's it's amazing. But and I I wasn't a huge fan of the hacking, but that that's a me thing. I I didn't upgrade it, so of course I hated it. So yeah, I'm gonna give it an 8.0. I'm I'm right almost right there with you. A little bit below you, but I I loved it.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:21

Yeah, that's fair. Like I said, this is one of those games to where I can't tell you anything about it where I'd where I'd say it's bad. Like I'm like, oh, was the gameplay good? Yeah, everything about this game is great. I loved everything. But the reason I don't give a 10 because it just doesn't feel like in this day and age, like I'm not picking that game up and be like, oh, this is a 10 experience right now. It just feels like an 8.5, which is fantastic, by the way. I love the game. Anyway, so we landed at 8.25, which is like like I said, that feels great in 2026. Five shock. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:48

Definitely go back and play it. All right, Carter. Let's go ahead. Let's uh remind the audience real fast what we have left. I am excited for this, and whatever we get, I likely am I gonna be starting it tonight because I'm itching to play something.

SPEAKER_04 1:18:59

Oh yeah, me too. Me too. That's why I'm glad we're doing it today and not tomorrow. It gives me time. Let me pull this wheel back up. I had it up earlier. Let me see if I still got it in my recent app so I don't have to hunt for it. There it is. Okay. So what we got left. Sorry, I've got so I use this same wheel for work as well because sometimes we try to decide where we're eating for lunch and nobody wants to make their mind up. So a wheel. Here we go. So we have Earthworm Gym, Zombies Ate My Neighbors, Little Nemo Dream Master, Metroid Fusion, Digimon World, PS1, Grand Theft Auto by City, Metropolismania, and Luigi's Mansion. So a lot of the uh community games still left, all of them. So pretty cool. So here we go. Ready for the spin? Because it's coming now. I'm ready. Oh shit. I've been ready.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:46

I think it's gonna be a community game. That's my that's what I think. Am I wrong? Let's see.

SPEAKER_04 1:19:52

We are playing one of my favorites, Little Nemo Dream Master for the PS.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:00

Okay, this is the game I know fucking nothing about. Not a damn thing.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:05

All I know is it's on the NES. I have a lot to say, but the memory is from literally when I was Elliot's age, like five. So and I played it later throughout life. It's on the Nintendo Switch, I'm pretty sure. So easy for someone to pick up and play. I'm pretty sure. I I might be wrong, but it's an old NES game. You can emulate it, I'm sure. Well, is it NES? I hope you can.

SPEAKER_03 1:20:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:24

Have a calculator that can run it. But uh But yeah, it's uh I'm excited for you guys to play it. I hope it's I I I don't know, I don't remember the difficulty scale of it. I mean it's an NES game, it's probably hard. So But yeah, I'm pretty pumped. We finally got to record Bioshock and very long episode, and we get to play Dave's pick on the NES.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:45

What I want to do, Carter, is I want to try to get Dave on. If we can record this next week, I'm gonna shoot him a message and be like, hey man, we're on your game and let him know. And if he's like, if he can find time to squeeze in a slight little interview, we need to try to do it.

SPEAKER_04 1:20:56

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_02 1:20:57

But anyway, man, uh good episode, good, good return, an hour and thirty minutes. I love it.

SPEAKER_04 1:21:02

Yeah, me too. Me something to listen to when I drive to work. Yep. Alrighty. On the little Nemo.