Almost Gamers
Join us in a casual conversation with friends about gaming. It's a humorous journey into what we are currently playing, sometimes poorly and not usually on trend. We also talk new and upcoming releases, gaming news, best of lists, and are never afraid to go off on crazy tangents.
Almost Gamers
Episode Twenty: Gathering For Battle
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Join us as the party gathers 'round to give thanks. Matt and Andrew are plenty thankful for Hades II as they dive pretty deep into this GOTY contender. Matt finally boards the Monster Train, and they both find their own Vampire Survivors clones. This Boss Battle is a blind top ten pick: RPGs for The Doc, FPS for The Andman. The debate gets hot. Somehow, GTA is still in the news, but so is Mick Gordon, so all is well. Future quests are a bit light, but the party is about to take on The Game Awards, so a rest at camp is needed.
So your daughter would be thrilled to know that for like the past week I've had golden stuck in my head from uh K-pop demon hunters.
SPEAKER_04I we we talk about this all the time. I'll wake up sometimes and it'll be in my head. And I don't yeah, I don't even know why. It's just in my head all the time. I mean it it is I I I I like the movie.
SPEAKER_03So you watched it? Yeah, I did I did finally finish watching uh the whole thing. I haven't watched it. Oh really? Yeah, how not even like accidentally, like just like it's always on in the background. Yeah, like for me, like frozen. I've never technically watched Frozen, but I've been around kids long enough to see so many scenes incongruous. I'm getting to that point. Okay, but technically I haven't watched it through, as we guess once. That's crazy to me. But the music is really good.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, well, I've listened to the soundtrack probably about 50 times.
SPEAKER_03And it's funny I don't know if you notice like the the the popular version of Golden is the David Gaeta remix, who he's a big uh EDM guy from like the mid-2000s. Uh I guess he's always I don't know. I I I I kind of I listen to that genre a lot in like the mid 08s BPM on serious music. Oh yeah, you do. Yeah. Um, and I haven't really listened to it since, and and now I have Sirius back and up on BPM like that popped up with Danigator doing the golden remix.
SPEAKER_01Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_03I didn't know there was a remix. Yeah, yeah. Um, and beyond that, I've I've pulled it up on Spotify, all this all the tracks. I uh I don't know, man. It's yeah, it's a good it's good, it's good music. Yeah, and it's it you know what? And it's uh it's I always say this a lot of times there's a lot of songs for like little kids that the kit look become popular, but they're not a good message. Yeah, the artists aren't good people, yeah. And I always said like Terra Swift, great influence. Yeah, K-pop demon hunters, oddly enough. That's why it's a good message, it really is.
SPEAKER_04That's what that's what Haley says, and I agree with her. The music's a good message. So there we go. Yeah, go Lily.
SPEAKER_03Woo Golden
Intro
SPEAKER_03Gobble, gobble, gobble, motherfuckers. Coming in hot, we're coming in hot. Hot like a turkey right out of the deep fryer.
SPEAKER_05Woo!
SPEAKER_03Don't fry it frozen. Oh, yeah, it won't it explode? It will.
SPEAKER_04The grease will bubble over.
SPEAKER_03Before you know it, your house is on fire. Uh yeah, don't do that. Or uh don't do uh shout out to my cousin Matt, who uh uh the one year for Thanksgiving, they um he wondered why the turkeys were so small. So they had to buy several of them.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_03Um it was later that day when someone else coming over to dinner uh you know looked in the trash and yeah, they were chickens. He bought chickens. Which actually I think tastes better. I mean, I'd rather have a chicken, honestly.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. I I never liked turkey, to be honest. It's okay.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's yeah, it's it's it's fine. Fine.
SPEAKER_04Especially Thanksgiving turkey, I guess.
SPEAKER_03I don't yeah, it's more about the uh uh the tradition than anything.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah. I mean stuffing pie. The science actually win.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, oh yeah, for for sure, for sure, for sure. And actually, my uh niece's old exchange student uh Denise is in um the United States. She's from uh Germany. She actually flew in, I think, just yesterday to have Thanksgiving. Because believe it or not, they don't do Thanksgiving anywhere but the U.S. I don't know if people realize that because we're very US centralists. Yes. But that is very much so a United States holiday. Yeah. So shout out to Denise. I don't know if you listen. We don't have any Germany plays. No. So let's get that German plays Germany on Denise. Uh I'll see you Thursday. So I'll make sure to tell you to watch this episode because we shout you out. Yes, yeah. All right, where we're conquering the podcast world one country at a time.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we do have a couple, we're international, man.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, we're international. Three countries so far.
SPEAKER_04Well, I think it's pretty impressive.
SPEAKER_03And uh two dudes, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Just in Lincoln, please.
SPEAKER_03Speaking of uh engagement with the audience members, we have to announce finally, someone found our secret word. Yeah, and the winner is Lindsay Kelly, longtime listener, one time uh participant. She was involved in the beach battle. Uh yeah, she won, so that was impressive. She gets a chance.
SPEAKER_04And all she had to do was listen to our lovely voices.
SPEAKER_03That's right, and that's all you have to. We should definitely do another one of those. I think we should. We'll have to come up with another prize. Yeah, something else. Maybe it can be like that pumpkin right there. This pumpkin. That pumpkin. We'll autograph it and uh and uh auction it off to uh someone. All right, all right, yeah. Well, man, that's how you get engagement, Gan. It's just crazy, crazy gifts. Right. T-shirts, plastic pumpkins, whatever you guys want. We got it. All right, cool.
SPEAKER_05Right.
SPEAKER_03But the channel is doing good, and I want to thank everyone for that. Yes. Uh people are actually watching us on YouTube. Uh, you know, it's been going, it's been going. It's steady. It's steady, it's surprisingly steady for such a you know silly silly podcast. Yeah, silly, silly podcast. And uh, well, we do want to so the previous episode we had our softball picks. Yes. And um, I'm going to put up on Reddit. Probably the easiest way is start a Reddit poll and uh have everyone vote on uh who they think would win of that uh softball uh league. No, yeah, tournament. I don't know. We picked teams. We made teams. It was almost like a fantasy draft, but not a fantasy draft. Yeah, we weren't real strict about it. Yeah, but uh it was just for fun. Yeah, so have have you at home vote for who you think uh would actually win in a game. Yeah. Not a season, not a fight to the death. Just a game. Just a game. One game. One game. That's right. Okay. Uh anything else there you want to bring to the table while we're in the uh intramatic zone?
SPEAKER_04I don't think so. That was pretty thorough.
SPEAKER_03Okay, we did it all. We won. We won the intro. If you can win an intro, we won.
What Yinz Playin
SPEAKER_00What's it's playing?
SPEAKER_03All right. This is uh time to talk about what we've been playing. And I know we've both been playing some Hades 2. That's right. Ooh. Woo! Still loving it? I'm still loving it. Yes.
SPEAKER_04All right, but I'm gonna take a hot take. Oh. I have a hot take. Oh shit. All right. This is gonna get real. Okay. This is where we're gonna get some YouTube hates. I'm looking forward to it. I'll grab some ice. There you go. Uh, I don't think it's gonna win game of the year. That's my hot take. Okay. Only, I will admit, it feels a little too much of the same for me. I feel like there's not enough difference from the first game for it to really. I feel like that that uh obscure 33. What is it? I thought I wouldn't have to say it again.
SPEAKER_03I thought you finally got it and you're excited you'd never have to say it again. And I never Claire Obscure. Ah, whatever. Fuck that game. It's gonna win.
SPEAKER_04I know, I know. Yeah, I feel like it's going to be. From a I I didn't play it, but it sounds like it r really innovated the genre. Yeah. And I think that that says it. Hades made, you know, is is an amazing game, but I I think it's too much of the same. And I I find it a little DLC for me. It like it feels more. And I don't know. I I like it.
SPEAKER_03I'm not I'm not like I can't disagree with that, but I love it.
SPEAKER_04I mean, that's what I mean. It works, and it's uh it's a fun game. So it didn't take me long to really get back into the grind and have get back at it, but I just feel like I'm still playing Hades, the original. It's just there's some differences, there are some strong differences. Yeah, but yeah, it almost is like an extended DLC. And okay. So I don't know. I just don't think that's enough to get you the game. That's I'm not saying it's not a good game. I still think it's a fantastic game. But my hot take is that I don't think it's gonna win. Based. But I haven't played that game, the other game, so I I can't say officially. But I just I don't know. And I I think somebody else was saying that. I think Paul Tassey, because Paul Tassey weighed in on the games of the year for his one of his articles, and he said the same thing, and I agree with him. I just I don't think Hades does enough different to to warrant a game of the year. But I don't know. Yeah, we don't we don't know, but yeah, that does that does seem it seems pretty, yeah. But I love it. Have you gotten to the surface?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so I um which is a neat so alright, here's here's what we're gonna do. I'm gonna put a um a uh uh mark, a chapter marker um for when we're done talking about Hades, but still in the news. Okay. Um, because I I've I I want to talk about this game. Right. And it usually when we talk about a game, it's old enough that spoilers don't matter, but I think it's new enough now. Yes that so spoiler warning, if you don't want to hear about Hades 2, skip to the next chapter. We're not gonna go too deep in spoilers because neither one of us have beaten it fully. I I well I beat the Kronos. Okay. So I got I've got it's funny, um, I was sucking so much. Me too, yeah. But um all of a sudden I got through I finally beat the sirens.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that was tough.
SPEAKER_03And then I went straight through what Aspho Fields. Yeah, and then beat Cerberus, and then got the Kronos. Like I was sucking, and all of a sudden, oh, I'm at the end. Yeah, that's how it kind of went with. Yeah, and then I I could barely damage him, man. He was tough. But once you get I've gotten to him a couple times now, yeah. And I've gotten to so for the surface end, I've gotten to oh, Prometheus. I don't know if that's the end boss or not. No. Ah, okay He's tough. He is tough.
SPEAKER_04Oh, he was an asshole.
SPEAKER_03Um, but the surface is neat because it is just very different.
SPEAKER_04Yes, yes, and that's another good change.
SPEAKER_03Those are different changes that are well worth playing in. And you talked about it um before how so every level you have a buddy that helps you, but you also have your nemesis who is nemesis. Yeah, and that's a neat change up because sometimes you'll get into it. Sometimes it's annoying because um Kronos, when you take a boon from Kronos, you have to clear so many encounters before the the the I guess you call it a uh curse goes away and you get the bone benefits. Chaos, chaos, chaos. I'm sorry, chaos, chaos. And it's funny, like because I'm like, oh, here's an encounter, clear this real quick. And Nemesis is there, and she's like, all right, beat this shit. Yeah, and you don't get credit for it. Right, yeah, yeah. I know, but then she does usually have something to make it kind of sort of worth it, but it's a neat changeup. I wasn't expecting something like that.
SPEAKER_04I think that's yeah, you you stated it right there. I think there's enough changes that makes it well worth it. It's fantastic, but yeah, yeah, I I don't know anything. Uh you said everything I was probably gonna say.
SPEAKER_03Honestly, yeah. I I have noticed that, and this is why I think I'm not good at the game, but the games you have to do quite a bit of emphasis on avoiding getting hit more so than hitting.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Like avoiding the bullets, almost like a bullet hell game. It is a bullet hell game. And once I finally wrap my head around right, Matt, you can't just attack, attack, attack. You it's all about trying to stay alive. Right. Like that the one level um by yeah, before I even got to the sirens, I had almost 300 hit points.
SPEAKER_04Oh wow.
SPEAKER_03Max hit points. Yeah. I should I should say, but I could never go, you know, yeah. I was I couldn't get quite back up to that level. Like, I'm gonna crush this. And I just and I and that's and also at that point, it wasn't the mentality of defense, I was all offense, and it sucked.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I I I struggled and then I started learning it, and it's weird how those kind of these kind of games work because it's a rogue and you rogue kind of game where you keep playing over and over the same stuff, and I'm at a point. I did you get the board where you can add difficult parameters to your runs?
SPEAKER_03I don't know if you unlocked that. I can't remember. I know there was a one where you can play specific runs where they uh they enforce parameters. Okay. Is that Joel? It's the dark Joel. Yeah, okay. That's not what you're talking about. All right, I'd remember that from the first Hades, but not from this one. So no, I haven't done that yet.
SPEAKER_04So, but now I could pretty much beat the the underworld or whatever uh without much difficulty.
SPEAKER_03I there was a challenge just in the the fates, the loom of fates, whatever it's called, school of fate, to beat the first boss without using Arcana.
SPEAKER_04Uh okay.
SPEAKER_03I it took a couple tries, but I did do that. I was so proud of myself for doing that.
SPEAKER_04I haven't really focused on them. I've done them, but I just haven't really focused on those. But I you you got a lot of something I wanted.
SPEAKER_03I can't remember what it was, but I wanted it. I'm like, all right, I'm gonna try to get currency, yeah. And that that's a great that's a great loop that maybe try something I wouldn't normally try.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Yeah, I like that kind of aspect to this game. So but yeah, I um it's funny because bosses have a really easy now. And so I have ramped up some difficult parameters to and then you get more rewards, yeah. You get more like I think some of them will get you ability. You have to get whatever to upgrade your weapon, you know, those kind of things. So it's worth it, but I but it's funny how that game works. Like you get so good, so consistent after a while because you try so much. But I did struggle quite a bit. Yeah, I um what's your favorite weapon? Oh, I sh I don't know. I I haven't found one yet myself either. Actually, based on your like last time we talked, I tried the backstabbing weapon, and I had a lot of fun. I didn't think I would have fun with that weapon.
SPEAKER_03You gotta get a good build on it, though.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and that's the key with this kind of a game. But I ended up trying the the axe. I don't know what it's called. Yeah, I kind of enjoy the axe. And I beat Cronus the most with the axe. Okay. I just got so good with it because I played with it mostly.
SPEAKER_03See, maybe I need to pick one, but I'm having fun switching back and forth.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Um the skull is so weird. I've I haven't tried it. Yeah, it's I I just said this could be weird. It is weird, but it makes it neat. I'm actually, I think it might be my I might stick with it. Sometimes that's how it works. Yeah, it's it's it's very interesting.
SPEAKER_04I mean, they do that, they're so good.
SPEAKER_03They're just so there's a lot of things I I wouldn't try, but I did try in this game. Sometimes just you're stuck with an ability like I don't use it. Like charm was one.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_03I think that's one of the uh the serene serene. Remember the moon? Yeah, the moon. Oh, that whole system's neat. Well, that's a whole upgrade system within itself. Yeah, that was cool. That's really neat. I like that. Yeah, but one of those is I is you can charm someone.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And it's like, eh. But you can charm, like when you fight the uh the sirens, yeah. You can charm the other members of the band. Yeah, yeah. And like I just kind of sat there and let them like kill each other. It was like, oh, okay.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's pretty good.
SPEAKER_03Same with um Cerberus, he spawns a uh a really tough sub-enemy. You can charm him.
SPEAKER_04Okay, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03I was doing terrible in that fight, but once I That's the dog, right? Yeah, the dog. Yeah, yeah. Three-headed dog. Three-headed dog. Yeah, but yeah, he just he killed Cerberus for me. Like, I'll take it.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. I've I I on the s a couple on the surface, I think he's not.
SPEAKER_03Oh no, he's not on the surface.
SPEAKER_04No, he's not on the surface. No.
SPEAKER_03Wait, no, no, no. No, no, no. He yeah, he's done. Yeah, Cyclops is the first one. I might be thinking actually of the Cyclops, something the Cyclops spawned it. Yeah, he spawns a bunch of enemies sometimes.
SPEAKER_04Anyways, yeah. Yeah, Cyclops was kind of annoying, but he he's pretty easy now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Most of the surface isn't too bad, but uh Prometheus is he's tough. Yeah, I mean I think it was the last. There's that memorized memorization spot. Did he do that with you? Oh no. Yeah, it's kind of like he he shows his attacks. They're like full screen attacks, but they're they are basically like upper upper quadrant, lower, and then middle. And so like it'll flash. He's gonna he's gonna fly across the screen on the upper part, then the lower part, then the middle part.
SPEAKER_03Maybe I did. I kind of remember that. I think I think fighting him for the first time was where I ended the night. So I might have been a little drinky in uh at that point.
SPEAKER_04That's a game where you you want to drink a little more than you should because once you get too much, you're gonna have to. Yeah, it's a good game. Yeah, I'm enjoying it. I just don't I don't think it's gonna win.
SPEAKER_03Oh, speaking of drinking, I have yet to come across um uh the drinking god. What's his name? Um Dino something. Uh Dionysus. I'm looking forward to him. So he does he does? Uh huh. Okay, good. I tell you. And I'll tell you this. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04I was not prepared. He has a major bulge in his he's wearing a speedo and he has a major bulge. Nice. So you get to look forward to a big bulge. Okay. But just how many big-breasted women you see in video games? Why not throw throw a bulge in there for the women?
SPEAKER_03Yep, go for it. All right, I'm excited for that. He and he's he's he's he's funny. Uh, we'll say I'm in the music getting better and better. Ah, the music is fantastic.
SPEAKER_04Did you get the Cronus? I talked about I I eliminated it from the last episode, but did you hear Cronus' level? The weird synthesizer kind of a music. Do you remember it all?
SPEAKER_03I think I'm so like no, I don't remember.
SPEAKER_04It's just it's a lot of weird synth sounds, it's really cool.
SPEAKER_03But finding the sirens is neat because it changes.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I was gonna say that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, the first song is like nice, and the second one is making fun of you. Yeah, it's a diss track. It's a diss track.
SPEAKER_04And then um, oh, so you haven't gone to the board, but there's an option on the board to do even more difficult bosses.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And once you do that, they all some of them change and she changes, and then the song changes, and it's a really emotional, really good song. Oh, okay. Yeah, and I was like, I like this song a lot. Alright. So that's something to look forward to. Uh, but yeah There's so many things they do.
SPEAKER_03You meet Echo. Yeah, Echo and that music, and it did it remind you of an old endangered minds song of ours. Honestly, I don't remember I didn't even register. Uh called Sneaky. Remember when Sneaky had that uh repeating stereo effect on the guitar? Yeah, yeah. That's what the guitar sounds like on in that.
SPEAKER_04I don't even know if I registered the music in that area. I'll have to let's check it out.
SPEAKER_03I mean, that's late run. You probably run under her once or twice. So yeah. I didn't, yeah. That and the music on Mount Olympus um reminded me so much of John Williams. Like it just had that kind of you know, Star Wars kind of epic, epic uh orchestral. It was a big orchestral. A lot of his music is very guitar and bass and synth and so on. But that one was more traditional orchestra. Yeah, and I do wanted to look in, I don't know if he um you know got back with you know composer and and and actually had a whole orchestra, or if it's you know, fake orchestra or yeah. I I don't know. Something to look into, man. There you go. And update the update. Wow. So there we go. I think that was a good uh and um Yeah Hades.
SPEAKER_04Oh enjoy it. If it's your first time, it's well worth it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Would you say someone should play they should play Hades 1 first? You think they should? I don't think they'll have to.
SPEAKER_04I don't see why you would need to. No, there's nothing Well the end game I'm not the end game, but the actual beating the game run into what's his name from the first one. I don't know, it might help. But I only I'm still discovering that storyline. Yeah, I don't know how it plays out.
SPEAKER_03And it wouldn't hit as hard although some moments as people, yeah, you know. So yeah, you should play the first one, but you don't have to. You jump right in. No, I think you could just jump right in. Time is limited, go ahead and jump right back in. Yeah. All right. Fine. All right, let's uh
Hades II Spoiler Skip
SPEAKER_03welcome back for those of you that needed to skip ahead from the Hades 2 spoilers. Um, yeah, you missed out some good shit. So go ahead play that game and then play it, and then listen again to us uh play talking about how's we likes it. All right, and man, what else? I heard you got something else, don't you? I got something fun for you, man. Uh oh. You ready? I'm ready.
SPEAKER_00This is for the YouTubers.
SPEAKER_03Oh no. All right. I I will describe play by play for those of you just listening. He is leaving the room, which is always great for uh any sort of media. One of the main actors just leaves the set and walks on off. He he's he's picking up something. I hear something. Wait, okay. I I have no idea.
SPEAKER_04What Jin's playing. What Jin's been playing isn't I've been really busy in the forge. Oh my god. So Andy brought in. Is that a scimitar? No, not quite.
SPEAKER_02So I've been he brought in a sword, folks. He brought in, there's no no two ways about it. It is a sword.
SPEAKER_04So I've been at the forge more than gaming. And I thought you're a knife man slash. I guess a knife. Yeah, I'd say uh what?
SPEAKER_03Oh wow. Do you recognize this?
SPEAKER_04I I kind of do, but I I I Okay. So I was gonna actually see if it was.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_04It's a curved blade. So this is my attempt at like an elvish blade. Okay. And this is a specifically design from Aragorn. Aragorn, yeah. From Lord of the Rings. Okay. And do you remember when he fought? Oh, I actually wrote the name now so I don't have to respawn. Oh. Urticai lurts from the fellowship when the guy who killed Boromir with the arrows. Yeah. And then he killed, and then Aragorn fights him and chops his head off. Yeah, that's that's that's the weapon. That's the knife. Like, if I don't know if you remember a knife he used to stab him in the leg, and then the guy, the Orticai alerts, pulls it out, and throws it, and then Aragorn smacks it out of the air with his sword. Oh, yeah, okay. So that was the knife. And I was just trying to ultimately I was just trying to make an Elvish blade, and I just did a random search, and that kept popping up. And I was like, that's a cool design. I'm gonna try to forge that. And so that's what I've done for the last couple weeks. Um Wow, wow, wow.
SPEAKER_03And so I Well, bring it, bring it up close to the camera for the uh yeah, show it off.
SPEAKER_04Let's uh so folks, so there it is. So yeah, I just wanted to say that it's not supposed to be a replica. This is kind of my own twist on it. No, that's even better, you know. Everyone does replicas. So I know how much Matt loves knives and stuff like this.
SPEAKER_02Oh, he's leaving again. What are we gonna do a real world fruit ninja?
SPEAKER_04So we're gonna do our own Marvel, and after the credits, I figure Matt's gonna try to slice the head off of Lurz.
SPEAKER_03So he so he has an Orukai paper uh st uh stabbed into a small watermelon. Is that what that is? Okay.
SPEAKER_04I tried to find a cheap fruit for you to cut. I'm excited. So Matt is notorious for throwing knives and also hacking walls with swords. Yes. Alright, so we're gonna have it. We're gonna do an end credit scene of Matt testing the have it at with an orkai.
SPEAKER_03I love it. Okay. Alright, let's uh put this one right on top of the record player.
SPEAKER_02Maybe.
SPEAKER_03If it's balanced.
SPEAKER_04That it makes it scarier. Alright. So um that was one thing I did. You've been forging. So I've been forging. I already forged out another one of those. So um Oh, really? Yeah, so we can do a little battle. Yeah, we can fight with our sword. We can cross swords, as they say. That sounds great. Okay. Uh well, I'll let you go because that was a long segment. I have something else I actually played. Video game wise, sorry.
SPEAKER_03Um, and I'm also wearing my forged shirt. All right, let me uh oh, I forgot I played two games. Okay. Um, I'll start with the first one here. Right, right, right. I uh I had some time to kill, and I'm like, you know what I'm gonna do? Monster Train 2. Oh, you finally did it. I finally did it. So what's your thoughts? I really enjoyed it. Okay. Uh it um so it's a lot. There's so much. At first, I'm like, I have no idea what I'm doing. That's what I said. I said, give it a little bit of time. I was overwhelmed, and then but it's somehow, but I think they they knew that, and that somehow I beat the first boss. Yeah, I think you know, they kind of probably script it that way because I'm like, I don't even know what's going on. I'm gonna die, and all of a sudden I won. I'm like, okay, that doesn't seem right. Yeah, but it keeps keeps you going. Yeah. Um, I also had a little bit of trouble getting my controller to work at first. I thought it had to be wired, but no, I think I just had some weird issues. Yeah, but so I was able to use both the Xbox and the PlayStation controller fully supported. Uh, it does uh support ultra widescreen. I always like to add that little tidbit for those. Nice. Um, but it is yeah, I I really enjoyed it. I got it got sunk into it. It does remind me a lot of uh Slay the Spire crossed with I don't know, just RPGs in general. But yeah, I had a lot of fun. We played for a couple hours. Um I I don't think I think I got pretty far maybe to the last boss. I think I got to, you know, on the that stage, and there was a whole lot of different characters and whatnot. But I enjoyed, I enjoyed. I mainly did like a pyrogel build, which is neat how that kind of stacks up, and I yeah, that was a lot of fun.
SPEAKER_04I like how you mix different card decks, like you can mix them. Yeah, I see.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I I just that's kind of just opened up to me, but I hadn't done that quite yet. I did learn early on just spend the money, don't hoard it, just buy shit.
SPEAKER_01Oh yeah, yeah for sure.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you definitely need those. Um, but the thing that was doing me in was hitting the wrong button a lot because there's I forget what I kept. Oh, I kept wanting to I activate my ability. Okay, and I'd instead I would end turn. Oh yeah. End turn I feel should be a hold. Okay. Or maybe it is, and I was still doing it. Yeah. I think it is. I've done that in many games. Yeah, but there's so many times like oh but it's neat, yeah. I I love a lot about once I got my head wrapped around a lot of the mechanics, I'm like, oh, this is cool.
SPEAKER_04One thing I loved about them that I didn't realize they did exclusively in when we went back at the beach. If you want to go listen to the beach episode, but at the beach, uh and played uh Slay the Spire, and they're more rigorous, but this game, they let you rewind. You can undo. I should there's an undo button. I didn't realize that till um yeah, late. And that's makes the game much more enjoyable. But Slay the Spire doesn't let you do that, so it's like you make a mistake, you're screwed. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03But I But you can only you're gonna re- that that's that that turn, right?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's not it's not like infinite.
SPEAKER_03So if you end turn, you're screwed. Yeah, yeah, right. But if you're like, oh, I should have done this first or done that.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah, you can undo the cards you played. Yeah. If you're like, oh, I didn't like that. Which is nice. Yeah. So it makes it a little more, I guess, easier for people who aren't hardcore about the game. Right. So I I liked it, to be honest.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, a lot of fun. So thank you for that recommendation.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's a good solid card game, deck game, whatever.
unknownDeck builder.
SPEAKER_04Deck builder. All right. Uh will you uh uh well I played Hades and then the game I played the the most recently in the last actually the last couple days mostly because I've been really busy with that, uh was Halls of the Tournament. Did you ever hear that? I don't think I've ever even heard of that. Yeah, uh this isn't that old, it's 2024, I think. Um you've played Vampire Survivor, right? Yes. It's a clone. But if you cloned it with Diablo. Okay. So it's a little more it's in in case people haven't played Vampire Survivor, so it's such a interesting game. It became a phenomenon.
SPEAKER_03To the point where it it's become its own genre. Yeah, really, but no one's agreed on what to call that genre. Yeah. A lot of people want to say survivors, but that sounds it's too much a survival horror, survival, uh survival game. Yeah. So it's weird. It's a sh it's an un unnamed genre.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's a unique thing. And the guy I work with told me he said the guy who created it actually designed slot machines. And so he wanted to make sense. And he wanted to create a video game with lots of flash and lots of lights so that you like similar to flock games. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, like sounds, and so I guess that's kind of where he came up with that. But so Vampire Survivors is kind of an action RPG, in a way, rogue-light game where you're you just run around and you kill enemies and you level up, and then there's a boss at the end of the level.
SPEAKER_03I I think the that um differentiates it between all the other games of that, is you don't have control over your attacking.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_03You only control over your movement.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's like it's kind of like those old games where you just move and you your gun shoots and you don't really have much control over it. Yeah, you just dodge a lot.
SPEAKER_03It's like bullet hell, too. Yeah, but there's no you get no directionality of your attacks. Well, there is a little bit.
SPEAKER_04And that's where this game is a little different. You can direct it actually gives you the option to control your aiming and your weapon. Oh. But I choose to let the weapon fire automatically because it's just a con constant shooting, but I control where he's aiming. Okay. Or it's aiming, whatever. Yeah, there's multiple characters to choose, like vampire survivors. But yeah, so like there's enemy hordes and they just bombard you with enemies. It's constant, it's overwhelming, and it's supposed to be. And you kill them and you get experience every time you kill an enemy, and then you level up, and it's very quick leveling. So you you're building this, and then you it gives you random choices, and you pick level this up, and you can you know, the the part of the fun is like choosing certain builds in the moment, and it's all real rapid fire. But this game is very similar to that. The difference is it has quests, and they're really stupid so far. Like, I mean, they're not like that in-depth quest-wise. Uh it's it's and it looks kind of stylistically, it looks like Diablo 2 with better a little bit better graphics. Okay. So it's like meant to be retro.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, most of these games are very retro. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Um and then there's equipment, which is different. Okay. So you can when you beat an in-game boss and or in-level boss, they'll give you a helmet or gauntlets, and they have special abilities. So there's a little more to it than vampire survivors. And I like it. And I I'm into it. And there's a lot of it seems there's a lot of levels, and you can find reasons, and every area has quests like do X amount of fire damage and then it unlocks something. So there's incentive to keep playing. Okay. It's a little more in-depth. Yeah, it's it's just enough, like I said, Diablo-esque enough that it's different, but yet if you like vampire survivors, it's well worth your time. Wow. So if you're looking for it, it's very cheap. Okay. That's the other thing. Oh. And the only reason I played it was on Xbox. Um Game Pass. And Haley still has that. She still won't. Because he forgot to quit. She still keeps forgetting. That's what it is. And I was like, well, she has it. I'm gonna. I actually it's been on my wish list on Steam for a long time. And then I was just like, I think well, I just checked new games on on Game Pass because I was like, I I I should play something for the podcast. And I was on there and I was like, oh, I've been wanting to play it. So you have Game Pass.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I think it's if you're gonna have a drink.
SPEAKER_04It's hard to drink and play because it's con it like Vampire Survivors constant bombardment, but you can find ways.
SPEAKER_03I think it's a good idea I play vampire survivors while drinking.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, so that might be a good one. Yeah, um, this one you can make it like I said, you can make it true to Vampire Survivor where it aims and it shoots, so all you gotta do is move. Um but you can also do both if you want to do both and control everything.
SPEAKER_03Interesting, so you have the option of making a little more. Okay. But I think you would like it. Yeah, I mean it it it sounds great, except guess what game I've been playing? What's that? A clone of vampire survivors called Megabonk.
SPEAKER_02I was gonna ask, I was on my list.
SPEAKER_04Is that another one? Yes, it's another one. Really? It's I saw you playing it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's uh I was going to your trophy. It's it's gone. A lot of people told me to play it. Uh Paul Tossi mentioned it once, actually. Um so it's Vampire Survivors, but uh third person perspective, and that's really the only difference. Like, I'm almost annoyed because it is very much so a ripoff.
SPEAKER_01Wow.
SPEAKER_03Even like the, you know, um, in vampire survivors when you open up a chest, because that dude did it. There's like three chests, like it's the exact same screen. Really? What the hell's going on here? Seems like there is some controversy, if you will. So it was nominated for indie, one of the indie game of the year. Okay, but the developer was like, this actually isn't my first game. I just been going against it.
SPEAKER_04Oh, that was my news. I'll cross it off.
SPEAKER_03Oh, yeah, he's like a bengo different game. I was wondering if you had anything to say about that. So he might be someone else. Yeah. We don't think he's the vampire survivors game guy. That's a little bit a little too weird. Okay, yeah. But I'm this guy's fully aware of what this game is. And he had it's like four dollars. So I guess you're all burnt out. Uh yeah, so I might wait a little bit. Um it does have widescreen support, ultra widescreen support. It has it has so it has rarity on the pickups. I can't remember if vampire survivors do this or not. So does the uh you know, white, green, uh, blue, purple, orange. Oh, which neat because it is even more rapid fire than vampire survivors for picking up the power-ups. Yeah. So what is when you get a power-up, you get three choices. Do you want to upgrade this thing, this thing, or that thing? Okay. And the upgrades are marked by color, like how far they up. So you might like, oh, I would love to upgrade my sword, but it's only a blue, but my shield is a purple. So I'm gonna get more of that upgrade. Okay. So it helps for like the quick fire. Yeah, yeah, because it happens pretty quick, at least early on. Yeah, and it was confusing at first because of the whole third person kind of review, and there was a jump, and it's a very awkward, like you know, that era of games that it looks like kind of jump.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Um, but uh yeah, I I I it it's you can definitely play this one drunk.
SPEAKER_04So it's on my list. I I do intend to maybe play that one, but I didn't know that was a vampire survivor. Very, very much so. So I'm kind of the same way. I'm like, okay. Yeah. Because I'm getting a little bit tired of Yeah, that's why you'll wait. They're fun, but they're not.
SPEAKER_03Right. This one to me more was like, hey, I haven't played vampire survivors in a while. Me too. What was gonna change it up a little bit, but there's a a little bit.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, this this game's similar, very similar in that sense. There we go. All right, well, we both played the same-ish game. You come to Vampire Slayer. I don't know. That seems almost Halloween-y.
SPEAKER_03That was our last episode. Yeah, this is thanks. We're thankful for vampire survivors, knives and knives and uh and pump cans.
Boss Battle Blind Ranking
SPEAKER_03Alright. It's a uh feathery boss battle today. Because of the turkeys, I guess. That's the only reason. Your turkey looks like it's been working out. That's that's right. So it's gotta build up the muscles so we can eat it. It does look pissed, like you're gonna eat me. Bought this like six hours ago. It's very orange. Yeah, it is. I like it.
SPEAKER_04It happens when you're uh it's rare to get an orange shirt, other than construction.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's true. That's true. Or Steve buys it for you. Steve. He loves his orange shirts and Hutchison, Officer Hutcheson. I think he stopped listening to that. Oh, or maybe he moved to uh Singapore. I haven't talked to him a while. Yeah, you never know. That's true. Uh uh, anyways, moving on. Boss battle. BB. BB. So what are you calling these? This is uh like a um blind ranking. Blind ranking. Right. These are all the rage with the cool kids, um, apparently. Probably 10 years ago. Yeah. We're uh we're up on them trends. This ain't no six seven.
SPEAKER_04But uh six seven. I learned a little bit about six seven. Do we want to talk about that? Uh sure. My daughter, who's into the YouTube. Oh, yeah, she should be at that age. Yes, right. Well, she's a little younger. She's seven. She's not six. Wow. All right. Uh she says it means so-so. So it's like so-so.
SPEAKER_03So I interesting. That's what she says. Yeah, I've heard I've heard other things from it means nothing to it just it's interesting because I think, you know, when we were younger at that age, yeah, we had things that were regionally came up with and it meant something to us that meant it made something different.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I feel like it changes probably, but the latest thing that I could put a definition on was it means so so.
SPEAKER_03But again, it probably doesn't that I'm pretty sure it was my hockey jersey number. Really?
SPEAKER_04I I can't remember because I couldn't. 76, I thought was it. 76, right? No, 77.
SPEAKER_03I wanted 77. That's Paul. Paul Coffee. But uh Sean took 77, I remember. So I think my I think I went with 67, which is in between Mara Lemieux and Yarmur Yager. Oh 66 and 68, so 67 was in between. Nice. So between two greats, if you will. That's right. That's what 6'7 means to me. All right. And on that note, speaking of two greats, all right. Who wants to go first? Well, we gotta explain what the hell's going on.
SPEAKER_04A little bit more hair, sir. Oh, and by the way, you're the video editor. Uh-oh. You gotta do right here something when we pick to show up on a list.
SPEAKER_03Can you do that? Yeah. Yes. Yes. I can make a list. What I can't do is change the list without the list turning off and back on again.
SPEAKER_04I don't know what the fuck that means.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, well, you'll you'll see it, folks, unless I learn some North skills. But I think people would like a visual aid.
SPEAKER_04I'll try. I'll try. For the YouTubers, by the way, podcasters. Sorry. If you're listening, that doesn't really pertain to you. Yeah. But for YouTube, it'd be nice to have like a little pop-up that's like, yeah, I can make a pop-up.
SPEAKER_03Well, it's gonna be good. I don't know. I mean, you've seen my edits. I need I'm um like on Cubase, I'm a 10. Da Vinci Resolve, I'm like a He's a 6'7! Uh six seven. All right, point six seven. So we are gonna do all right, so blind rankings. Basically, we're gonna list to the other person ten games. Yes. And they're gonna have to put them in order of number one to number ten. Yeah. But you don't know what's coming, so you don't want to just give oh, I love that game one. Right. And then later on, there's a little more thought. Later on, it's gonna pop up. I'm like, oh no, that should have been number one. Yeah. And uh good job, man. I am going to be naming FPSs, which are first person shooters, and Andy's going to be ranking them.
SPEAKER_04And I will be naming RPGs, and Matt will be ranking RPGs. Role playing games. Oh, sorry, role-playing games. And I will admit before we begin, some of these games I you know, they kind of genre blend. But I looked on Wikipedia, and if it said role playing slash whatever, okay, that to me is a role playing game. Okay, okay. So that's a little I don't know. Oh, and I heard you uh you stalked me a little bit. I did. Well, I looked on your PlayStation account because I was hurting and I just wanted to find really pertinent. Games to you.
SPEAKER_03So I looked on your uh trophies and what you I looked that is scary that you can look up and see not only the games I've played but how many hours I've played these games.
SPEAKER_04I've looked at percentage of trophies. Oh if it was like fifty or sixty percent, I said, Oh, he really put some time into this game. Oh, all right. Now I'm oh okay. So some games in there I don't think you're gonna think of. Interesting.
SPEAKER_03If I pick them, but I have to make some games that have like really easy trophies.
SPEAKER_04That's the other thing. I did look at the number of trophies too, because like some of them only had like eight trophies, and so the percentage would be skewed. So I did a little Matt just came up with his list about 10 minutes ago. Yeah, I forgot completely.
SPEAKER_03Um I was thinking about a little bit all week, but uh yeah. Uh yeah. So I gotta who's going first? You you because you're Mr. Prepared here.
SPEAKER_04Alright, so I'm gonna I'm gonna write down so I remember what's going on because I don't have a fun graphic right here. Let's do that. Alright, so I'm gonna do a little number one, two. Sorry, folks, if you're bored. All right, I'm ready. Okay. This is intense.
SPEAKER_03Bioshock Infinite. Ooh. That's a strong start. I know. I figured I'm gonna hit a good one. That's a four. Number four.
SPEAKER_04I don't think that would be number one. Yeah, yeah. That's pretty strong now. Okay.
unknownAlright.
SPEAKER_04Oh, I thought we'd go back and forth. No, so I do the list and then you do your list. Oh, shit. Unless you want to do it that way. We're figuring this out, folks. I was thinking back and forth. Alright, let's do back and forth. Yeah. Okay. That sounds like fun too. Alright, alright. Let's go with um. I want to start you with Darksiders 2. Fuck!
SPEAKER_01Technically, that's an RPG.
SPEAKER_03I will give you that because I feel like, oh man. I think Damn, I didn't know you were gonna do that! Okay. Shit, Darksiders 2. I said it had role-playing in this screen. One with the Yesper kid soundtrack. Of course you did. Oh, they get tough. I just be caught up number. Five. Five. I was gonna say four. Ooh. Go in the middle. Yeah. I already forgot what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna end up picking. Here's what's gonna happen.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_03I'm gonna end up, you're gonna name a bunch of shitty ones that I'm gonna have to put in the top, and then I've nowhere else to put, so I'm gonna have to put one of my favorite games of all time, or it's gonna be number 10. That's how it goes.
SPEAKER_04Did you remember what I said for bio? I already forgot what I said for bio.
SPEAKER_03Four.
SPEAKER_04I was gonna say four for mine, but I dropped it out one. Okay, so yours is five. You're gonna middle. You're writing yours down. I'm not gonna write yours down. All right, go ahead. Sorry.
SPEAKER_03Okay. Um yeah, we'll go. Alright. Halo 2. I've now I know that the only tag we really played that much was, but you played a lot of it. Yeah, I did. The multiplayer, the sword ball.
SPEAKER_04And I'll I'll rank it because we did a lot of and that was a classic game for us as a crew, especially Haley. Haley played that. Yeah, one of the few FPSs she'd play. So I'll go nine. Because it like I said, I didn't play the campaign.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so I figured this would be a good uh out there one, if you will.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's fine. All right, Matt. Let's see, where should I go next? I have so many torturous ones for you. Alright, let's go. Alright, let's go Mass Effect 2.
SPEAKER_03One. That's your number one. That's my number one game, probably ever.
SPEAKER_04My thoughts. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03It switches from time to time with um Assassin's Creed, uh, Brotherhood, and um Alan Wake now, too. I wouldn't call those technically RPGs, although if you could put them on, then I'd fucking have to have to kill myself. Well, I looked in Assassin's Creed and it did not put out. Assassin's Creed is not RPG at all. So I did not put any Assassin's Creed. Yeah, but yeah, that's easy. That's that's my one, man.
SPEAKER_04I thought that might be.
SPEAKER_03Yep, yep, yep. All right. Oh. All right. Um, this might have to switch it up. Doom original. Like the old school. The original original original. Yeah, I don't know if you played that one.
SPEAKER_04Oh, I played it. I thought so.
SPEAKER_03All right.
SPEAKER_04I did. Um it's not real high. So that's a 10.
SPEAKER_03Interesting. Because sometimes it's you know, how much does nostalgia play into it, you know? How many games are good? How many games just you remember them being good?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I played it late and I just played it to play it. I didn't really love it. Because it wasn't I guess.
SPEAKER_03Some people like that is their like their zen. Like they have a hard day at work, they will come home and just shotgun, yeah, you know, I like people for an hour.
SPEAKER_04But yeah, I definitely like other people. Okay, okay. All right, so you said, how about the Witcher three wild hunt? Where's that?
SPEAKER_03This is tough, man. This is tough. Because it's up there, but I don't know what you got coming. I don't know what you got coming, but I can't disrespect it. So I gotta three. I'll put on a three. Alright, that's your three. I'm gonna regret that. I mean, not I can't believe that's three.
SPEAKER_04I thought that might fight for number one.
unknownWow.
SPEAKER_03Because I don't know what's coming. I don't know. I don't know what's coming. Yeah. All right, all right, all right. Um portal two.
SPEAKER_04Oh, portal two. That's high. Assuming I remember. I know this is the first time you play it or the second first time you played it. But I it doesn't matter all the portal games. I'll just it doesn't really matter. I'm gonna go with I don't want to go too high because I feel like some really good ones are coming. So I'll go six.
unknownOoh.
SPEAKER_04I feel like some I feel like some really amazing ones are coming. So I don't want to go too high. How about for you? Um Deus X, Mankind Divided.
SPEAKER_03According to Wikipedia, that's an RPG. I'll I'll give it that. Technically, that game is an immersive sim. Oh. But yeah, it may mean immersive sims are definitely RPGs. They're just that's their sub-genre, if you're subgenre. Um oh shit. Okay.
SPEAKER_04Where's it ranked? Six. Okay, we're just below Darksiders. Wow, I didn't think that. I thought it'd be a little higher. Me too. All right, it's fair. It's getting hot in here.
SPEAKER_03Um yeah, that was the second one.
SPEAKER_04I don't know. I just picked one random one.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so um, I didn't play any. Yeah, uh, Human Revolution was the first, what the first reboot. Oh, the reboots. Yeah. Oh. I don't know anything about them. Yeah, Day S is like a classic, classic. Oh, I see what you're saying. Yeah, I think I do know that. Yeah, yeah, reboot with uh Mankind Human Revolution and Mankind Divided.
SPEAKER_04All right.
SPEAKER_03Woof, all right. Anyways, um, it's me telling you. Borderlands three. I always was gonna do four. Let's hit BL three.
SPEAKER_04That's gotta be three. Aha, three for three. I get it. It's I played it probably the most out of all the games I've ever played, but it's I agree with a lot of the criticisms of it. So I can't rank it too high. Okay for you, Matt. Let's go with so many good ones. How about how about Final Fantasy VII O Ridge? We're going to Ridge.
SPEAKER_03Well, tough ones because is this I mean it was uh shit. Shit, shit. We're gonna put in day sex, especially Mankind Divided. It was a human revolution. See, I think, uh, seven for seven. Seven, okay. Wow, I mean, it's again, it's not one of those ones where it's nostalgia. It is an amazing game, though. But it isn't as formative as others, so yeah, seven for seven.
unknownInteresting.
SPEAKER_04All right, um, I guess it's my turn now.
SPEAKER_03So far, we got um see this one I'm worried because I don't know that you played it, so I'll I'll call an Audible if you haven't. System Shock. Never played it. See, I think we made plans to play it, but yeah, we never played it. Sorry, I never played it. All right. Similar era-ish, and I don't know if you played this. No. Dark Forces. Never even heard of it. Oh, it's Star Wars. It's the Star Wars FPS.
SPEAKER_04No, sorry. My FPS game isn't as good as Yeah. It should be.
SPEAKER_03Okay. We're gonna hit some Rocky Road. Yeah, we are gonna hit some Rocky Road because you gotta think of something else. I've got to think of something else, and I'm going to say that game that happened that one year that they came out.
SPEAKER_04Well, if you need time to think, I'll do another one. Yeah. Is that better?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_04There's no rules here. We're just having fun. All right, all right. I'll go through one transistor. That's technically really it as an RPG. Transistor.
SPEAKER_03Oh man. Man, really. I looked it up. Alright, I'm gonna go then with eight. Only because, yeah. Wow, that's low. Because it went to comes, well, first of all, everything else is taken. And because, yeah, I guess as a favorite RPG, I wouldn't put that high. As a favorite game, I'd put higher. If that makes any sense. I got it.
SPEAKER_04It's not as an RPG, it doesn't rank as high. Got it. Did you think of anything else?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I mean, I have others, I just didn't want to do them yet, but I'll I'll I'll go ahead and do uh the next one here. Um time splitters two.
SPEAKER_04So many good memories. But I still think that's not super high.
SPEAKER_03Seven time splitters two with a seven, folks. Sorry. Oh shite.
SPEAKER_04That's good.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_04I just uh I you know okay.
SPEAKER_03I thought TS2 was a little better than your mems. It could be.
SPEAKER_04But my memory is not great, so all right, Matt. How about I'm gonna throw one in here.
SPEAKER_03So I only got I don't know, I have four spots. Yeah, you have four.
SPEAKER_04We've done six. So we're two, four, nine, and ten. Okay, let's go with cyberpunk 277.
SPEAKER_03Nine. Wow. Pretty low. Alright. Yeah, another I would have rated it higher as a shooter as an uh as uh as an RPG.
SPEAKER_04See, Matt's he's he's working on levels we don't even understand. That is right. That's how much of a gamer he is.
SPEAKER_03Alright, I'm gonna go now to Tiny Tina's Wonderland. You expect me to pick that?
SPEAKER_04No, I wasn't. And I'm glad you did because I really enjoyed that game. And in fact, that sucks. But I gotta give it number two because it's I like it a little better than BL3. Yeah. I don't think I'm ranking it this high, but I do like it better than BL3, so I have to rank it higher. Okay. Okay. At least from story and a little bit of gameplay.
SPEAKER_03Right, right. That makes sense.
SPEAKER_04I mean, I don't I don't think I played it as much as BL3, but right. You didn't have to play a lot to love it. Um for you, Matt, how about we go with Child of Light?
SPEAKER_03You really consider that an RPG?
SPEAKER_04I said RPG in there.
SPEAKER_03I don't can there's no RPG elements.
SPEAKER_04If you want to veto it, I'll let you veto. You get a couple vetoes.
SPEAKER_03I mean, I know exactly where I'd put it, but I just don't.
unknownFuck.
SPEAKER_03I mean, put that at. I don't want to You're killing me. That's what I said. I know, because I I mean I would obviously say it number two, because it probably is it's up there in my top five games of all time. But I knew that. There there is just there's no RPG element to that game. I don't feel.
SPEAKER_04Sorry.
SPEAKER_03Um, but five fuck it. No, all right, two, two, two, two.
unknownAll right.
SPEAKER_03RPG. I think I pissed it mad off. RPG is technically it's very hard to define.
SPEAKER_04Well, that's the other thing is I feel like some of these are genre, like cross genres a little bit. I don't know. I never played Child of Light, so I don't know that one very well.
SPEAKER_03But if ever it's role-playing, are you playing a role? Are you putting yourself in that person? Are you making choices? You not at all. There's no choices in that game at all. But fuck it.
SPEAKER_04You said I mean I I looked on Wikipedia and some of them said role-playing game. To some extent. Alright. If it's not, right hay on the game.
SPEAKER_03Alright, so well, technically I only have yeah, two left, number four and number ten. Which ones do you have left?
SPEAKER_04I have one, five, and eight. Okay. I haven't ranked my number one yet. I'm holding off. I feel like there's a good one coming. All right, all right. A super good one, I should say. They're all good so far.
SPEAKER_03So Destiny 2.
SPEAKER_04Oh, destiny. Ah, damn it. Alright, that's eight. Probably would be 10 if I am you had known. Yeah. Yeah, but that's part of the fun. That's still I we had a little bit of fun. I I feel like we could have gave it more.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I just once we got so far, we're like, eh, we're done. We're done.
SPEAKER_04We're not that kind of a, I don't know, those online type games.
SPEAKER_03Uh yeah, I basically just played multiple, like me and you. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04We already did like the we didn't do much more. Alright. Let's get. Seems like this has been too easy on you. Let's go with Elder Scrolls 5, Skyrim.
SPEAKER_03What do I got left? Four and ten? Well, four then. Four. I thought you liked it. I did. I mean, it's obviously not ten. Well, we'll see. This is where it this is where it gets tough, man. This is where it gets tough.
SPEAKER_04So you only have one more left. And I have two. You have two. Because we skipped. You have not picked the number one.
SPEAKER_03No, or a or a what? Five. Five, yeah. Five. Okay. All right. Let's see if this is interesting or it's gonna be. Here we go. I like this now. Starfield.
SPEAKER_04Oh. I guess technically on some level, that is a first person shooter.
SPEAKER_03Hey, if I give you child a light, you're getting starfield.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. I'm not complaining. I just didn't expect it. Or five. Well, I gotta go five. As much as I enjoyed it, I feel like as far as a first person shooter, it's a five.
SPEAKER_03There you go. Like you said. Yeah, there it is. So all right. What's Andy? What is my worst? So you only have ten? I'm a ten, and you only have one, right? Yeah. So our last picks are gonna be my worst, my most hated and your favorite.
SPEAKER_04So, what should I make sure your most hated one is? Let's make the one that hurt the most.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's that's that's where it is, man. That's where it is. Yeah, here we go. Assault and Sanctuary. Uh I'm fine with that.
SPEAKER_04Really?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, because again, I don't know.
SPEAKER_04I picked one between Borderlands 2. I should have gone Borderlands.
SPEAKER_03Oh, you said that an RPG technically, Borderlands games are RPG. Man, you're you're fast and loose with the RPGness. It said RPG in its description. Okay, okay. You're loose.
SPEAKER_02Alright, Andy.
SPEAKER_03Okay, my number one first person shooter of all time is serious Sam 4. Oh god. You know what? I thought we were friends. Now I hate you. I had that one on here. I didn't know when to say it. And when I realized, oh, he's he's leaving one open. I'm gonna leave serious Sam open. I think we played that together at least twice.
SPEAKER_05Yes.
SPEAKER_02Maybe for a total of about three hours. Oh, why would you do that to me? I'm embarrassed.
SPEAKER_04When was Starfield? Shut up. I thought you were gonna maybe go one of the newer dooms. I thought about it. Nah. Too easy. You're too easy.
SPEAKER_03PSOS. Oh well. I'm gonna buy you some serious Sam. I think it's the bomb is the symbol. Is that right? Yeah, I'm gonna buy you a bomb. It was fine. It was worth. No, I think you actually did pay money for it.
SPEAKER_04I think we all.
SPEAKER_03No, no, I didn't. I made we I made us share it like that that uh PlayStation thing. So I keep buying this. And now it's my number one shooter of all time. It's your number one first person shooter of all time. Yep. It's K. Alright, folks. That was the list. Some questionable choices and decisions. Matt made it right here. But uh hey, I guess you're right. RPGs are tough, and uh first person shooters are uh a dime a dozen sometimes. Yeah. I kept off all Call of Duty because I knew you didn't I think you played one. Played two. I played Call of Duty too a little bit. But that wouldn't be high. All right. Well, folks, that's uh that's the way it rolls when you do a blind ranking ranking. Thank you. I
Respawn
SPEAKER_03spawn. Alright, amen. You're ready to talk about some uh past regrets. I have two big ones. Oh, big ones, and they're on me. Oh, mine are uh also on me, but minor. I don't I haven't lost sleep on them. Have you? Have you not been sleeping well?
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_04But I take things a little more.
SPEAKER_03Unload your burdens. Yes.
SPEAKER_04So the one less minor-ish one, I guess, as far as seriousness, is uh which uh is kind of funny. You found a super mutant with a bat.
SPEAKER_03An image. I know. I'm very proud of some of those images I found. I actually found a Dolcim throwing a pitch. Oh, really? But it was it was uh I I I can't remember there's a reason I didn't pick it. I can't remember what it was, but yeah. Your images were really good, by the way. I'm talking about the softball boss battle.
SPEAKER_04And go back and listen. I think it's worth it. This is a good one. Um but I was like debating the next day or a couple days later after I listened to the podcast, and I was like, do they actually carry baseball bats? And I looked on Wikipedia, according to like Fallout Wiki. Yeah, super mutants do not. have baseball bats.
SPEAKER_03Ever oh that's well it's funny because I think the picture I found was like him not just holding a bat but like in a mass. So it was obviously not in the game.
SPEAKER_04Yeah it's not in the game real oh and I felt kind of bad but they do carry they do carry a melee and it's just the mall in a spiked mall. That's typically what they can make. And it's always hanging off their back. If you look there's like a handle and my memory whatever so they're swinging a stick ish thing. It's it's just a mall it's not a baseball bat. And I looked and even the compan there's a companion super mutant in four he doesn't have one either so I I thought maybe I was rem I was trying to think where I but just the memories of mess maybe it was a picture that I found.
SPEAKER_03Yes you've seen that before maybe but either way fan art super mutants don't really at least in the game don't carry yeah minor minor exact on on that same note though uh I don't have noticed on Instagram uh the illustrious unsung aka Steve Miller um corrected us because remember we could not remember what Mario's role was he was a ref like he was some sort of a ref or something like that yeah yeah in in baseball they're umpires they're umpires but actually it pained me to listen to us talk about referees in a baseball game and then I actually was funny is when we recapped you called him an umpire. Oh really yeah you used it correctly figured it out eventually eventually at the end you called it right and I I sat there and I was like oh we're calling them refs this is baseball we're gamers whatever almost gamers we almost follow sports that's right that's right well and I have another sports related but go ahead you go all right uh my next one is um it's it's just more of an apology so I usually try to look I try to listen to these episodes right before we broadcast the next one so it kind of refreshes my memory about what we talked about. Sometimes there's some drinking involved and I don't remember it all. But it's just funny like I realized watching eventually I just watched episode nine and realized that I had no memory of the end of episode eight when we talked about Hades quite a bit no recollection that's why in episode nine I was talking about all the stuff about Hades and you know Homer being in isn't that so cool we talked about it nope nope so I'm sorry I'm like I came in episode nine like let's talk about this new game called Hades 2 yeah it felt that way yeah it wasn't so I'm sorry for that's not a problem people expect that yeah I guess I assume anyone watching those episodes back to back are like what yeah that's true it would be interesting to see what people think all right well what uh what's your next pain uh this is a little more painful just because I I oh yeah I wanted to pull it on my phone so sorry um let's get it queued up thank you uh Dustin Ryden shout out I don't know if you watch this but this was your uh gift for um being in your wedding party and you are drinking out of the gift for being in your wedding party a lot of weddings a lot of weddings I'm in they're not part you're not the main cast everybody they're not the lead and I'm fine with that thank you so we talked about another fallout thing and this is why it pains me these are both fallout things and I'm a huge fallout nut so I a little bit that's why they're a little more painful.
SPEAKER_04We talked about Fallout night at a hockey game oh yeah yeah okay and I said that it was an NHL team and it was not oh Texas Stars is the Dallas Stars they're like their I don't know how we call them the baby penguins minor league yeah the uh the farm league the farm oh so I didn't even catch that Texas but we both talked about how the star but the stars have changed they've moved around a little bit and I just was under the assumption because I don't I loved talk it one time yeah same here but you were yeah you might not up it and I just assume they maybe moved once again from Dallas to somewhere else and they call them Texas Stars and that easier. Yeah they can just move freely now Texas Stars is the Dallas Stars actually makes more sense at a minor league minor league for those fun and I felt really kind of embarrassed because it was in the article but a lot of times I just bookmark these and I kind of read them real quick and I just want to put it on the episode and I didn't really research it but it's not an NHL team.
SPEAKER_03Texas Stars is a farm AHL is the term AHL not NHL I bet I don't know I just I I used to be such a hockey guy and it's a little embarrassing a little bit okay that I didn't but again I don't follow it and teams do close and move up yeah I know it's and if not up on it I mean that's yeah so and we're we're we're too busy gaming that's right we're gamers on we're more gamers than sports sports gaming sports gaming but that's that's it for me you said you had one more I got one more and it is I'm I'm I'm I'm kind of sad about this I actually already fixed it on the video I I popped up my uh like pop-up video I popped up my correction so I wanted to make a a correction you know the things that always bother me are the music references the composer and he wrote what there's a lot of and there was a point where I was talking about Austin Wintree and how he had uh he was the um we already paused so this is a present it's just um he helped he conducted oh the Darren Corb recording at Abbey Road story Abbey Road Studios when they did the like the best of hits for Supergiant games yes and I had listened some of Austin Wintree's past accompliments just accomplishments good luck editing this episode there's no editing yeah just leave it it's fine and I said that he had composed the music for Ori and that was that was absolutely wrong um I had corrected this on the YouTube video um so I caught it then but Ori was actually composed by Gareth Coker um who's also done he did Halo Infinite which I actually never played in the ARC that's a kind of big series but he's also worked with Airship Syndicate uh which did Darksiders Genesis um Ruin King which is a League of Legends spin-offs I'm a big fan of Airship Syndicate they make some really good games they're kind of the spin-off of um the the the the the the the team that's gone that did the whole Darksiders thing like they kind of spun off and like some of them joined that okay so yeah he's on that kind of and actually he did some music for Minecraft. Oh really yes I guess some of the DLCs or I know Minecraft is like an empire I'm sure there's like 4000 people that worked on it. Yeah even though the game itself was created by one guy one dude yeah back in the way back so yeah interesting just wanted to give a shout out to uh Gareth Coker and say that yeah he's done some great stuff not Ori. No he did do Ori He did Ori He did Ori Austin Wintree has also done some good stuff not Ori. Not Ori Most of the people don't give a shit I'm sorry but I can only off the top of my head name 95% of the video game composers out there. Matt does have a good brain sometimes when there's something in this little cup. Yeah sometimes wires I even that didn't have I would probably got that wrong it's alright good job Matt that was respawn I think unless you have anything else no that was it those are my uh thick ups I'm sure people will call us out those and they weren't wrong yeah we're almost okay about stuff that's right so uh moving on moving on
News
SPEAKER_03now it's time for the news bump bump bum news I like it I've I'm sure the audience loves it when we play the intro and then you morally mimic it like it doesn't drive anyone insane I'm sure well if you if it does drive you insane feel free to comment on our YouTube or somewhere else all right uh Bandrew Walters is that something I should know I was trying to like combine Barbara Walters with Andy and uh now I get it that was that was the best I had Bandrew Walters Walter Wildcrite Balter Wildkrite Wild yeah anyway what do you got for news for us here we go I'm gonna do this the couple quick ones so I don't know if you've watched this but Twisted Metal is officially coming back for season three I kind of forgot that was a show I've heard good things but that's on like what like Paramount Plus or something weird it's either that or Apple I don't think it's on Apple I would I I occasionally subscribe and quit to Apple okay so it's not Apple but it doesn't matter so you haven't watched it. Anthony Mackey right I don't know I'm pretty sure um cool we should probably watch it I feel like we should just watch it one night yeah go through all of it it's surprisingly I think got really decent yeah I I didn't get a didn't get a lot of hate no that's what you but I think not a lot of people just didn't watch it yeah it's on it's on either um Paramount Plus or the least known was that MGM uh yeah MGM yeah um Kurt and um from I think they are the two people that actually watch that show and love it. Really uh yeah it I I actually watched first season of that says peacock peacock oh there yeah no chance I'm watching it on Peacock man but I don't know if that's I just see source peacock on the article. No that actually kind of makes sense at the time something I mean yeah I didn't watch it but it's a video game ref you know it's a video game a game known for its deep story more actually it was a fun game but it was a fun game those of you who know uh we we would call that a vehicular battle game I guess Steve loved it yeah that was fun he just drove around blowing up other content everybody yeah everybody just had fun it was a classic fun game it was uh of that era kind of a game yeah it was nineties fun yeah good times good times but uh yeah I'll watch apparently the show I would probably I I keep forgetting about it but yeah same here um yeah I'll I'd I if I had an ability yeah but you know I'm gonna pay nine dollars to screen peacock for a month yeah this is another quick hitter for Matt this is no real news but I guess uh what's his name from Elder Scrolls what's his name Todd Howard Todd Howard officially kind of came out and said ah Elder Scrolls 6 is a long long yeah yeah I saw that I didn't want to bring out the bummer news but I mean big bummer for everybody who cares. I get again I uh I get it we all want it to come out when it's good it's just it's insane at this point it has been already 14 years since the last game came out I believe it's six since the teaser trailer yeah six or seven yeah it's at least six or seven years and he even even said he regrets putting out that trailer but it's still it's a long time between games and now he's just I don't know man but what what can you do?
SPEAKER_04Yeah I don't know uh yeah I don't I man it sucks yeah we got a couple years we got a couple years years yeah I I I was hoping maybe next year we'd get something but I did see he did say he's open to another shadow drop he likes the shadow drop so if it's gonna be released it's gonna be probably released very quickly that so yeah that's why I tell oh yeah you know I'll do a shadow drop for that in 2028 yeah that's what we'll do yeah yeah I feel like it's not gonna be anytime soon shadow drop but yeah he's but when it does happen yeah he because I think he loved the reception of uh Oblivion so well you can't technically you can't shadow drop that Todd it has been in the works you've already had a teaser you can't shadow drop we know you're working on it yeah that's true oh well but I think it's gonna it's gonna be a quick turnaround so that's kind of hopeful is like they'll they're not gonna do another thing it's gonna be 10 more years yeah but hey well uh let's see what else quick ones we could do the GTA did you hear about all the GTA stuff I mean it's been delayed that's the huge news yeah but there was a little news where they fired I think like 30 or 40 employees did you hear about that?
SPEAKER_03Oh we didn't hear some scuttle butt yeah so they fired 30 or 40 people the employees that were still employees said it was union busting they were trying to bust the union they were creating that gets ugly on both sides and so that was nasty then they said no it's not about that it's about they were leaking information about the new GTA 6 so I don't know I don't know what what yeah don't know what to make of that because it could be so you haven't really been following it so you can't really no I meant I didn't I didn't catch that so it's uh it's uh it's an interesting I wouldn't be surprised if they're union busting because that's a lot of people do now yeah especially in the game yeah they do not want to work as unionized because then they can't work 80 hours a week 90 hours a week and crunch to the end so sad we work uh I mean sometimes these these podcasts take three or four hours to record so and that's every three weeks so man that's that's hard work hard work listening to man getting shit wrong and then not know as composers. I know goddamn Gareth so uh all right go ahead you have anything yeah I got uh so um it was it's been rumored for a while and then it actually happened Steam is releasing some hardware okay yeah I have that and I'm good I I figured you would talk about that. Yeah it's interesting it's interesting to me because I don't know if you remember this so Steam this isn't their first foreign hardware they obviously do have uh a VR and they have the the Steam Deck yeah and they've had they have VR uh headset it's kind of like on the top end but not really talked about a whole lot uh and but they had a Steam machine they called it in the past which was basically a standalone uh PC-ish that was meant to you know boot up not with Windows boot up just a Steam OS and so you could it was purpose built to only play Steam games okay and it didn't do very well and it was never marketed very well it was very strange but a lot of people said and I agree it was their answer to be like hey Microsoft we don't need you we we we don't need Windows you know Steam is uh kind of king it kind of worked in a way okay it I don't know if you remember Windows used to have a a a a vibrant gaming marketplace at that time and they don't like no one buys games off of Windows anymore. I didn't even know that was an option I didn't know that was I don't know if it still is but the time it worked it was basically them throwing their weight around yeah it was interesting to watch a progression of that yeah so to see it come back yeah is even interesting because now we're at a time where like I feel like Microsoft is trying to get away from the hardware entirely okay you know and just hey just you know buy a PC and get the game pass and play it on that and now all of a sudden Steam's like nah fuck that again here's a Steam machine you don't even have Windows just bypass that shit entirely Steam games yeah so and it's interesting um to me it makes a lot of sense like if you just want a game you don't need all that other shit you know you just need something that boots up to Steam and plays Steam Yeah I I often wonder about that. That's that's a good selling part so it's it's meant to basically sit in your living room you know and hook up to your TV or your gaming monitor whatever and just just have at it. Yeah um and they've come out with uh a second generation of the steam controller okay which I know I know if that's gone away they've had it before I don't know if in the interim if there's been iterations I I don't think but now they've done it again. It looks neat. I don't know how you looked at it at all. It kind of so the idea is instead of a D pad D-pads their touch pads so it can kind of double as a as a mouse pointer. So it's easier to to mouse around because they're like touch pads. That's cool. Plus it had a lot of other buttons um that you can assignable because I know a lot of people buy those elite controllers that have the uh so basically you can map the jump button yeah to underneath where you can use like your middle finger to jump that freeze your other fingers. So it has a lot of a lot of neat interesting things about it. And the steam frame is a new VR headset kind of competing with the um the the MetaQuest because it's fully pep formed. That doesn't sound right it's wireless it's it's all you put on your head and that's all it is. Okay. And it's interesting because the uh what they're trying to do is to cut down a computing power it has eye tracking yeah I heard about that and it only renders where your eyes are looking I did hear about that. So you know where you're actually focused it really super works on that. So that's like at the highest resolution and your periphery is your periphery and as you move your eyes it like follows that and changes it. So it doesn't have to render a wide field of view what you're looking at. And it's both brilliant and awesome and like mind boggling. Yeah does it actually work I don't know I I there's been some earlier views I it seems to be pretty pretty cool. What do you think is that your next up I mean I've I've only my my MataQuII is only a year old I ain't looking for anything new yet and these are coming out early next year with no prices as far as I can tell. Yeah I haven't seen anything but I'm excited that means that just people are still working on VR they haven't given up on it they're still iterating on it.
SPEAKER_04The one thing and I guess and again again the guy who talks a lot about games to me I didn't realize this but he made this a point and I it kind of sold me a little bit more on VR was he said you could put those headsets on and this one will for sure you can watch a movie and the screen of the movie will be the size of whatever the hell your living room is. Oh yeah like it just projects the screen and you could like watch your movies and crazy I've never bothered because I just thought that's no I never bothered yeah I don't know why but that kind of was like that's a cool idea like in the VR you could watch a movie and the screen could be whatever size you want it to be and I I thought that's kind of a selling point on the go like you'd be on an airplane yeah watching a yeah you could watch it on a big screen and I thought that was pretty cool selling point and I and then I read a the article about the VR and then we said this is nothing new and I was like oh I didn't know that was I should um maybe I'll try that.
SPEAKER_03That sounds pretty cool for the for the next podcast. I'll try it and see. So I have But I mean my TV for my room is actually kind of for my where my couch is, it's actually kind of small. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Well, no, I think it's small, yeah. Yeah. So nothing against it. It's a good TV.
SPEAKER_03Um Yeah, I'll try that. And and then but the thing is, you know, it's a surround sound. I love my my big ass system. So you can't play through that? I don't know if I can do both. We'll try it. There you go. Or very it's the next emporium. Yeah. Oh. This is kind of Emporium-esque. I'll be dressed up as a turkey. Yes. I'll get a turkey outfit and uh sit in my living room and just watch um.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. I don't know. I don't know, but that kind of like I mean, VR to me is just so specific, but that that opens you up to maybe something that you might be like, hey, that'd be kind of cool. Yeah. Every once in a while.
SPEAKER_03Check it out. And I'll uh see if it's neat. No if it sucks or not.
SPEAKER_04Probably sucks. Alright, Andrew. All right. Give us some uh that we're still on the news. We're still on the news. That was a big news. So that was good. That that crossed off a lot. Because um, let's see. You got that, VR console and Kickstarter. Oh yeah, there was some shade thrown at GTA 6. Speaking to GTA. Uh let's GTA hate. Well, it was just funny because um uh the Empire State Building threw some shade. And it's what? Yeah. So that's the biggest news is it's you know, in case you didn't know, GTA is delayed yet again. And then um the Empire State Building's official X account, which I didn't even know the X. Wow. Okay. Did you know they had one? No, believe it or not, I don't follow the. And they tweeted at the effect, they tweeted at their announcement they were delayed on X, and they said it took one year to build me. That's good. Yeah, that's good. That was good, and then um somebody else threw some shade. And you know, like funny shade. Let me look. Uh Cyberpunk did too. Oh, oh um let's see if I can find it real quick. Sorry if this takes a minute. Um yeah, they said they just said no more delays are happening. I guess in jest that they had a lot of delays and they understand. So there's some Yeah. Yeah. People understand. It's a billion dollar game. Yeah, somebody somebody I also knew said they they're yeah, it's on a scale of like they've spent probably a billion dollars on this game so far.
SPEAKER_03If yeah, I mean that's not surprising considering that GTA 5 makes that yearly. Yeah, so I I feel like it's just a billion dollar investment for a 10, what, $10 billion return. Not not surprising. Okay. Did you have any more? Or shall I go through the rest? Uh I got one that I don't want to I don't want to go too in deep because this is still ongoing, but I've talked about it before. Okay. Is the Subnautica 2.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. I saw something about that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it is getting so we we said before what had happened was the the founders were ousted.
SPEAKER_04Yes.
SPEAKER_03Uh allegedly claiming that they weren't focused on the game. They were doing side projects, and the game was delayed. Right. And the founders were denied their $250 million bonus, which they they the founders claim they're gonna share with the entire company. Yeah, so a lot more has come out, quite a bit more now that it's in court. There's a lot of suing going on. And it's interesting because it is not looking good for Crafton. Crafton is the company that bought the Subnautica studio. And I'm gonna kind of generalize it because again, some of these are facts, some aren't, but I'm feeling like this is basically what happened. What happens a lot of time with takeovers, like you buy a company, you promise, you know, this money, this money, that money, and you set goals. Like, okay, if you release the game within so-and-so time, you get so-and-so much money. Yeah, that's what happened here. They were like, Okay, we'll buy your company, you make Subnautica 2. If it's released within this time, it's me, you know, it's good quality, you guys get $250 million. And it's it was part of the buyout, it's not like a bonus bonus per se. It's kind of like a yeah, we'll sell you it. Here's the money you're gonna get, the money you're expecting, right? You know, to sell this game. Yeah, apparently it was doing great, and it was en route to release on time, and the buyers were like, fuck.
SPEAKER_02Why? You know, they're like, oh shit, we gotta pay them this money now.
SPEAKER_04Uh yeah, one of those deals.
SPEAKER_03Yes, to the point where the the um the CEO, and this is on record, and he admitted to it because he was caught on court, he used Chat GPT to find a way out of paying them. He's like, hey chat BGPT, um, here's the stitch. How do I not pay them?
SPEAKER_04Oh my god. And other hey, an interesting news about chat GPT. Yes. This lady she decided to use chat GPT to help her pick lottery numbers. Did you hear about this? No, and she won. It's crazy. Crazy. But the the the the heartwarming part is she's donating every single dollar to charity. That's I don't know how much it was, but it was a sizable amount.
SPEAKER_03So were we playing the lottery tonight? Apparently, Jack is maybe take it. Maybe help you be a millionaire. Yeah, it you know what it can't do? Yeah, help you weasel out of a deal that you've made. That's come back, mother. So basically what it was is that in the end, he was like, Oh, uh, we're gonna delay the game. Because that was one of the things where the founders were like, why are you delaying the game? Right. They're like, oh, because we want to do this and this and that to it. And they're like, that's not that's not that kind of a game. Right. Like, no, it needs to be that kind of a game. And now it's coming out. They purposely delayed it because they delayed the game, it didn't hit the mark, they wouldn't have to pay them. Wow. So even more reason not to pay them. Yeah, I mean there might be more coming out, but so far it is not looking good. Like, and then some employees have have have admitted to like, you know, their CA CEO sat down, like, how can we get out of this? What a world. I just it's so again, I don't know in the end, but right now, for sure, I'm not playing this game. Not me. I'm not giving them any money. Interesting. Yeah, I thought uh yeah, so that's uh that's all I have for news. I bring the I bring the hatred.
SPEAKER_04So are you familiar with John Romero? Yeah. I guess he's Doom, Matt one of the masters of Doom. So he uh he guess he weighed in on who what the best or the most satisfying, I should say, weapon in gaming history is.
SPEAKER_03Oh, okay, interesting to hear. I mean, most people think it's his super shotgun from Doom series. So what did what did he say?
SPEAKER_04And I let's see. The super shotgun. Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_03It is though, it is, man. It is, it is there's nothing better than that. So you get headshots on that? Oh they know what they're doing, they do. I mean, he's he's he's a bit of a kook and has been for many years. And it's just so funny to me that like you know, so Doom was created by John Romero and John Carmack. Um and like John Carmack is literally a rocket scientist. Like, wow, oh yeah, yeah. He's with like he's early guy, SpaceX, and he developed uh a lot of the VR technology. I think it was him and Lucky Palmer in the quest. I yeah, I probably get this all wrong. But yeah, he's he's a brilliant motherfucker. And like John Romero was just like the passion guy. He need one of those. Yeah, and it just them two worked very well for a while together until they didn't. That's where they, you know, yeah. John Romero went off to do whatever it is he does now, and John Carmack, you know, yeah, is trying to go to this trying to go to Mars.
SPEAKER_04Maybe he'll find some movies. He did it, yeah.
SPEAKER_03There was actually a funny quote. There was someone asking him something about a video game engine that he helped work on. What I he he he did a thing is like it's not rocket science. That's funny.
SPEAKER_04Uh I talked about this guy quite a bit, and he's finally back in the game again. Uh-oh. Mick Gordon. Oh, yeah. Oh, oh, good, good. He uh he's on a game getting and apparently this is his first, at least credited soundtrack since Doom Eternal. Oh, what's he doing? Uh let's see, what game is it called? Ooh, Atomic Heart. Oh, the the sequel to Atomic Heart. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03No, wait, was he just doing what?
SPEAKER_04Absolute Absalom? Absolut. Absolutely. I don't know. Absolutely. Really? Yeah, so that's the name of the game. So he's doing that and he is exploring, you know, themes of how extreme you can get.
SPEAKER_03So you know, my uh I think Atomic Hart was pre-this podcast.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Um Yeah, I don't remember you.
SPEAKER_03I would actually like to do a segment. Listeners, let me know if if you if you're into this. I would like to do a segment where we talk and rate about games that were a little, you know, just pre pre this podcast. And atomic heart was one I'd love to talk about.
SPEAKER_04Okay, well.
SPEAKER_03Um it was yeah. But uh mix, mix into the soundtrack.
SPEAKER_04So yeah, it's a cyberpunk FPS.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. It was it's it's the very, it's a very, very okay.
SPEAKER_04So here we go. Yeah. All right. So I'm I'm I'm kinda like I didn't read, I read him, but I've forgotten it because it was a while ago. But he said he's he's working on the next full video game soundtrack for the ambitious umcupping upcoming cyberpunk FPS defect. The game is called Defect. Oh, it's not Atomic Heart? Well, let's see.
SPEAKER_03Is it a spin-off of Atomic Heart?
SPEAKER_04Yeah. So he contributed to those soundtracks. Okay, that makes more sense. So he hasn't actually been a full you know, like he hasn't done the whole soundtrack. I fear they already have their own. So I'm sorry. So like those games, I guess he's part of it, but this is his full, like he's getting the defect. Yeah, it's a cyberpunk game.
SPEAKER_03Do you know anything who it's by or I guess it's the real I don't see anything. You know, if you um I don't know if you know sometimes we get some uh spam emails by like companies saying about our podcasts or like and they give our rankings and whatnot. Yeah. And it's one because one of the key we are one of the top podcasts in the nation for the keyword McGordon. All right, Mick.
SPEAKER_02I'm like, all right. We like Mick. Come on here, buddy. I would talk to Mick.
SPEAKER_00I would talk to him.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely, dude. By the way, well that reminds me, one of the things I never mentioned when I was trying to create boss battle music, one of the things that made Mick's music more extreme was he had an H string guitar. Oh, ooh. It was like, I think it was eight or nine. It was something ridiculous. Yeah, okay. So I was like, Yeah, you I was like, there's I can't recreate it. I tried recreating with I mean, is that lower than a baritone even? Yeah. And I was like, I try, like some people said you can use a detuner, you know, like software, but it's not quite the same. No, it's not. So big part of creating that sound is using ridiculously low guitars.
SPEAKER_03I'll tell you what, yeah, now that I have a new five-string, um, yeah, I I I I agree with that. Like there's a difference. Dropping to C sharp on a on a four-string bass is not the same. No, that's what I was like.
SPEAKER_04I dropped my guitar down to I even tried experimenting with that, just detuning my guitar down to something ridiculous. Yeah, it's just not the same. Yeah. So that was a big part. Yeah, makes sense. I think somebody gave it to him. It's not a good position to be in. So he's like, here's a guitar. Yeah, play this. Try this on your next soundtrack. And he was like, okay. And it worked. Uh let's see. Other news. Oh yeah. This is kind of random. Did you play um Pillars of Eternity at all?
SPEAKER_03No. No, I never have.
SPEAKER_04Okay. Well, this will be quick. They've re recently released a patch and it added the feature of turn-based. The game is not turn-based. You can pause the game, but it's not turn-based. It's one of those RPGs where you pause and you can maybe pick where people fight, but it wasn't actually true turn-based. Okay. So now it's officially turn-based.
SPEAKER_03Interesting. I guess people have trusted that. It can't be an easy just drop in. I mean, it has to be like a whole thing. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And that's why it's I think it's seven or eight years later.
SPEAKER_03Now, Pillows of Eternity, um, that's Obsidian. Yeah, which you play quite a bit. Yeah, and um Avowed is in that realm. Avowed is in that realm. Yeah, take place in that world. And that was on my one of my RPGs for you. Ooh, that would have been yeah, I should have thrown that one in there. I wouldn't, I have no idea where we'll put that one. Yeah. Oof. Oof. Oof guard. Oof kata.
SPEAKER_01So yeah.
SPEAKER_04Alright, man. Another quick one. Borderlands is has a crossover. What? Yeah, there are how did I not hear what? There's apparently a crossover event. And I don't think you would ever get this game, but PGA tour 2K25.
SPEAKER_03Oh, yeah, obviously. Because I'm every time I think Borderlands, I think golf. Golf. So what? There it is. Figure it out, folks. I'm not gonna explain it anymore. You know what? That reminds me. I have another news. I forgot to write it down. Another crossover event is with Hitman. Really? And Eminem. No. Yes. Not sure that is. Hitman Eminem asks uh agent 60 57 13. Hitman, the hitman. The hit man. Eminem asks the hitman to kill his alter ego. Slim Shady. Is this real? It is real. I saw it. I'm like, nah. And then I was watching uh Game Ranks and Jake Valdino was talking about it. And I'm like, oh, that wasn't a dream. That needs to be that sounds like a movie. I mean, honestly, if I was in Hitman, I would I would a hundred million percent play. That's like 90s. No, uh so Slim Shady, that's like mid-2000s. Yeah, 2000s. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Right. Remember, it was always, you know, my roommates at the Yellow House, we talked about before, were big uh, especially Chad was a big Eminem fan. So when it was just like his rap, his hardcore like rap shit, yeah, right. He was Eminem.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_03When it was silly shit, it was Slim Shady. And when it was serious, he was Marshall Mathers. I didn't know all these egos. So in and if you've ever wanted to cli kill the Slim Shady character, now you can in Hitman. I think it's a free DLC. I know it's free. You don't have to pay, you don't have to pay to kill. I don't think I would pay.
SPEAKER_04That's interesting.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so there you go, folks. Bonus news. Okay. You're welcome.
SPEAKER_04So here's another one off of Matt's Hot News. Um King and Come deliverance to Well to, but it doesn't matter. The King than Come, I guess, game. The uh somebody part of I guess the boss, it says the boss. He was over underwhelmed by Outer Worlds 2. Did you actually end up playing that?
SPEAKER_03No. Uh I will, but it's just it's it's it's far off my radar.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it kind of got uh it was a little stinging. He was basically saying, like, as far as RPGs, they're not reinventing the wheel, and it's so safe and just not.
SPEAKER_03I can see that having just played Avowed, I can see that. I mean I will I'll I will play it. I enjoyed Outer Worlds 1, but yeah.
SPEAKER_04But to somebody I came to their defense and said, actually, honestly, they come up with and I heard one of the mechanics, and I thought, that is a pretty genius.
SPEAKER_05Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And so I don't know why he's coming out with such aggressive, you know, hate hate. But one of the things was is if you kneel, for example, like in Skyroom, if you crouch too long, yeah, you get a perk. Not a perk, but a like a boon, or what's the other version? But either way, he you're you get like bad knees.
SPEAKER_03Oh, I have heard about those. I forget what they're called, but yeah, there's a lot of things you don't have to, you can turn them off. Oh, okay. There's a lot of things in this game, like if you do shit you shouldn't do in real life, yeah, you it'll create a permanent bad perk. Yeah. I've heard about that.
SPEAKER_04And so I was like, somebody was saying, like, I don't agree with them, those are pretty inventive.
SPEAKER_03This is this is the guy that made Kingdom Come Deliverance 2. Well, yeah. Okay, can I just stop right there? Everyone can make a game that makes you die from uh everything. I agree.
SPEAKER_04But I I don't know why he went after them.
SPEAKER_03That's weird. Because Obsidian is generally a beloved company.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, they're not gonna, like I we always say, they're not gonna win awards, but they're they make really good, solid games.
SPEAKER_03I think the problem, the biggest problem with Outer Worlds 2 is that it came out this year. Yeah. There's been like I forgot. I like I completely like it. It's just there's so much good shit this year that it's it's it I feel bad for it. Yeah. But I will I will definitely play it. Okay, just real quick, let's end the news segment with the official game of the year nominees. Yeah, because we talk about it a lot. We talk, and there's a lot, I mean, obviously, there's a lot of there's like the the the golden joystick, and like there's a lot of places that do games of the year. Right. But for the past couple years, I feel like the the game awards, end quote, the game awards with Jeff Keely has been like the the Oscars of video games. Yeah, and love it or hate it, it's had some growing pains, but I feel he does a great job. And it is, it is like the closer we're gonna get to the definitive, yeah, and it's been fun. It's been it's been a lot of fun. I've enjoyed it at least. So these are the official nominees, and it I will agree, it's been a tough year. Like there's been so many good games. Yeah, it's one of them. But uh, here we go. Here's our six Claire Obscure Expedition 33. Yeah, no surprise there. Death Stranding 2 on the beach, Donkey Kong Bonanza, Hades 2, Hollow Knight Silksong, and Kingdom Come Deliverance 2.
SPEAKER_04That's the fighter.
SPEAKER_03Now, the funny part to me is So Donkey Kong Bonanza, I wouldn't call it a sequel. It's not a two, but technically it it's it it is a sequel.
SPEAKER_04Okay.
SPEAKER_03So Expedition 33 is the only Non-sequel on this list. And literally four of them are two. Oh, yeah. They all necessarily have two in the title because Hollow Knight is Silk Song. Yeah. But it's Hollow Knight too. It is. I found that weird. Like they're all part two. And Donkey Kong is at least a sequel, but yeah.
SPEAKER_04I didn't even think about that.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it is it's Clearing Up Screw is the only new IP.
SPEAKER_04You know what? We're gonna do a special, and me and Matt and my wife, we've for the past what three, four years now, we've predicted even if we don't know anything about it, but we just have fun. Gotta bet. Bet, yeah, we bet. But my bet goes towards Claire Obscura. Obscure. Sorry. Yeah, probably me too. Yeah. I'm gonna go to the last one. I hate to say it. But my heart wants to go Kingdom Come, but they they could because they deserve it. I think they deserve it, but I just You don't see them actually winning it.
SPEAKER_03No. Yeah, I th I think Claire's gonna win. But I I don't know. It's it's it's tough. I don't want to weigh in on my game of the year. And we will, you know, we'll we'll we're gonna do our own. We'll do our own little thing. We'll end up the season. Season season one's coming to a close, man.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, we're almost coming to an end.
SPEAKER_03And I might have to stop uh change my naming scheme once we finish season one. What is your new naming scheme? I don't know. I don't know yet, man. I don't even know how I'm still going with this this naming scheme. We're we're moving. So yeah, so those are the game of the year uh nominees. And you know, like it or not, I mean you you got you gotta narrow it down. You gotta narrow it down. You do.
SPEAKER_04I mean, I don't have a problem with those.
SPEAKER_03No, I know uh split fiction didn't make it on there. Yeah, that's kind of weird. But I mean, again, you gotta eliminate somebody. You gotta limit, you gotta limit. So yeah, we'll uh we'll bring some more uh we'll bring that back uh at a later time when we see who actually wins. Ooh, all right. So I think that news be done's
Future Quests
SPEAKER_03future quests. Right and Mander 10. Woo! Let's talk a little bit about coming games. So things that are just appeared on radar or we're just trying to finish up, or you know, because you gotta have goals. Yeah, you gotta have goals, otherwise your week will just, you know, you're like clean the house and paint or make swords. You can't be doing that shit. You gotta game. Gaming is the real game. I know, obviously, and hopefully immediately after this, we're gonna do some Borderlands. It's on the cook. I am definitely gonna do some Hades. And maybe, maybe, you know, in the breaks in between, I will do some monster train.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_03Good. And um, and at the ends of nights, I will definitely do some mega donk. Megabonk? Megabonk. Megabonk. There's a lot of bonking going on. Bonk, you bonk.
SPEAKER_04And um yeah, so what do you got? So I'm not much I like I'm not very different, so not megabunk, but Halls of Torment. Yeah I'm still tinkering and having a little bit of fun. So I I I think I'll keep going. Short-lived though. Yeah, I don't really see it going much longer. I ain't putting 100 hours in the megabunk. No. Uh one of the interesting games I have written down. Well, one of them for you, I won't play this. And I was just it's a future game. I feel like for you, definitely, because of Lindsay, is Lum Lumines.
SPEAKER_03So we've we've right, Lumines. I am uh 90% sure now that it is luminous. Oh, it's luminous, it's luminous.
SPEAKER_04Um I get confused.
SPEAKER_03But there's there's a whole thing I want to talk about. We're gonna talk about that. A future quest will be future quests. But so uh a future quest will be a future quest about luminous, but it is out. So it's technically, yeah. So but I do recommend people checking it out. We'll tell we'll we'll come back with it a little more. Yeah. Um, because I I I'm my research ain't complete yet.
SPEAKER_04I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_03But um, no, no, no. I just it looks awesome and Lindsay's going down.
SPEAKER_04No, Lindsay. You might have won a t-shirt, but you're gonna lose luminous. Another t-shirt. I don't know. So Fake Keeper. I talked about Fake Keeper.
SPEAKER_03Was that the game where you you brought it up to only say that it's delayed forever?
SPEAKER_04Well, I just brought it up thinking, oh, that's a new game, I should play it.
SPEAKER_03Okay.
SPEAKER_04And then I realized it's not even close to being. And it's still not, but they did another trailer, and it looks really good. What kind of game is this? It's a first person RPG. Okay. Like, like Skyrim-esque. Oh, okay, okay. Um, but the game, like the the and maybe later when we're, you know, just chilling, I'll show you the trailer. But it just really looks really good. The combat looks good. The you know, it looks graphically amazing. So they just released another trailer. So I recommend it. It's still on my whenever, but it doesn't have a release date, unfortunately. But the other game, which I don't know if it has an release date either. It's very similar to my aesthetic of medieval, which is the other game I just talked about. But I don't even know how to pronounce it. It's called the Verney Horn.
SPEAKER_03Oh, yes! Yes, I actually just saw something about that. Yeah, it looks like it could be it's a very medieval-ish, but um, you know. So it uh this is the one where they hired swordmasters for the mocap. So yeah, it looks good. Yeah, almost too good. Probably one of those deals. Yeah, I'm not 100% sure. But yeah, I'm I'm on board. I'm gonna watch it. Yeah, it's on my radar. There you go. It's it's uh future watch.
SPEAKER_04Yes, yes, no, so that one caught my eye just recently. And I forgot about that one.
SPEAKER_03Um I it's one of the ones you need to write down because you're not gonna remember that fucking name.
SPEAKER_04That name is ridiculous, and I probably said it wrong somehow, even though. Either way. But yeah, those are the couple games. They're still on my radar. They're not released yet. Right. I mean, that's that's that's it's the future. That's why it's future. I I assume future means in the future.
SPEAKER_03Whenever. So I uh I have one that's very in keeping with this episode. Yeah, it is uh Vampire Crawlers. I haven't even heard of it. It is the sequel uh spiritual successor to Vampire Survivors. Oh, really? Yes, the trailer we were definitely watching this trailer later. I saw only snippets of it. So obviously, this guy it's Vampire Survivors, which is saying it was made by one person who was very camera shy. He actually did an interview with um my boy uh Daniel Dwyer from No Clip. Oh, yeah, you have to talk about it. In fact, we talked about him before, but that the there was an amazing segue there that I missed. Yeah, he's super Irish because we were just talking about Ireland before that. Anyways, they did an interview with him, and he didn't want to be on camera, so they bought a puppet. But he's a very humble guy, but apparently I guess he got some money, you know, got with a big developer. I I I um I don't know too many details about this game yet. Right. So, you know, you were thinking, oh, they're gonna go, what are they gonna go all all out? And the trailer starts like huge, like Skyrim cinematic. Nice and it shows like this like wizard, and you see he has he has this wizard staff, and in the in the and the cusp of the wizard staff is a bulb of garlic. And then it cuts to the actual game, it's more the same, you know, voxel kind of pixel stuff, but it's more first person and more developed, and has uh CGM, so uh collectible card game. C C C collectible card CGG, so it involves cards and stuff where you collect cards and stuff. That could be neat. Um I can see that gameplay mechanic. Yeah, you know, working with some cards, you collect the cards, yeah. So I'm in. I'm I'm in. I mean, again, I don't know if this game's also gonna be five dollars. Hopefully he bumps it up to like ten. Uh, and on that news, um, Vampire Survivors is on VR.
SPEAKER_04Uh yeah, I saw that. I'm curious. Yeah, I'm surprised you didn't check that out.
SPEAKER_03I think I think that is like $10, which is like a hundred percent increase. So fuck that guy in his greedy ass. Yeah. But seriously, though, I might just buy it just to support him because I mean, yeah, I almost feel bad that it only spent $5. Yeah, that seems too much. I mean, too little.
SPEAKER_02I mean, it was. I spent a lot of time on it. Yeah, me too.
SPEAKER_03So I don't know. Apparently, it's maybe tonight. We should just fucking download that. Let's do it. I mean, yeah. All right, folks, we're doing it. We'll let you know the channel. And we'll talk about it next episode. Yeah, we will! An actual future quest guarantee.
SPEAKER_02Unless my internet goes down or the quest breaks, or any number of things are probably gonna happen tonight.
SPEAKER_03We don't need to know about that. Or if I injure myself.
SPEAKER_04Or Matt chopped his arm off.
SPEAKER_03Apparently, in about six minutes from now, I have to kill watermelon with a homeforged knife.
SPEAKER_00Look at that guy.
SPEAKER_03How many podcasts can you say that's gonna happen on, folks?
SPEAKER_02That is right.
SPEAKER_03You can only get that here. That's it. We bring it. On the number one gaming podcast in Singapore.
SPEAKER_05Singapore.
SPEAKER_04We are number one in Singapore. Something that we're gonna have a live from Singapore episode.
SPEAKER_03I think I would love it. Like the street food there. Oh, I'd love to sit. Oh man, that'd be amazing. Let's do it. Let's do it. Let's do it. All right, all right, folks. Happy, happy thanksgiving. Give thanks for this podcast. Yes, and you are all very, very welcome. All right, I'm Matty Flames, Andrew Wilde. And remember, if it's not a pumpkin, it can also be a gourd.
SPEAKER_04That's true. Good.
SPEAKER_03Sure.