Episode #13: YellowOptimist Joins the Show! The Future of Marathon Discussions

Oldtown and Truebatman are back at it again! In episode 13 the squad brings in fellow listener and fan of the podcast YellowOptimist and asks serious of questions pertaining to Marathon. The trio discusses the season 2 Mid-Season preview and all the news that has been released by Bungie.  

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Howdy and welcome everybody to running out of breath, episode 13, baby. Hope you all are doing good out there. Here in the state of Tennessee, we have been getting thunderstorms and scattered rains, and it's been crazy out here, but the weather is always crazy in Tennessee. Welcome in. If you're a returning listener or you are a new listener, we welcome you to the cult of Running Out of Breath with open arms. And man, are we building a family and a cult. I'm your host, Old Town South. Great to have you all back wherever you are listening to us right now. Atlas, keep cutting that grass, dude. I see you. Keep cutting that grass. Fallen, keep lifting those weights at Jim, at the gym. If you're riding in the car, listening to us while you're working on the farm. Wink, wink, wink, working on the farm wherever you are getting your uh marathon listening ears on. We appreciate you. We appreciate you all very, very much. Tonight, we got a little we got a little something for y'all. We always got a little something for y'all. But of course, here in episode 13, we got a little something for y'all. We got the usual, myself and the dark knight bat. He is back with us yet again for another adventure. And we have for this episode, baby, pulled in a listener, a fan, a cult member. Bat. Let's give a warm a warm uh w applause and that didn't come out right. Let's clap it up for yellow Optimus, baby! Let's go. He's here. He's here. Man, Yellow, welcome to the show, buddy. Welcome to the show, and we are so happy to have you. When I um throughout the week, when I was kind of building the notes and kind of uh getting my mind ready for tonight's episode, I was kind of like, okay, like I've got some questions that I'm gonna, I'm gonna we'll we'll do the usual. We'll talk about some war stories, and I've got some questions. We'll we'll kind of kind of like an interview kind of style with yellow, but I'm sitting here like, man, I don't know, like what else are we gonna talk about, you know, uh outside of that. And uh man, like literally, I believe it's today, we have literally had breaking news from Bungie development team, some mid-season uh a mid-season preview. They basically gave us a little teaser of uh uh uh of what's to come. So that will be um that will be really, really fun for us to get into. I think we'll we'll we'll start tonight with uh here's kind of gonna be the template. Everybody, here we go. Template for tonight. We will start with some questions. We're gonna let everybody get to know Yellow, and we will even get to know him a little bit more through some of these questions. And then we will probably from there we'll we won't bury the lead and we'll immediately get into the mid-season preview, what we have been shown from Bungie today. We're gonna talk a little bit. I've got a few other notes on vault breakers. We'll talk about that a little bit, and we may end it. We which we I say we're gonna do it this way, we may change our order, but at some point along the way, we'll either end it or we'll throw in the importance of season three for the future of Marathon. But without further ado, Yellow, it is so great to have you here, man. I I we're gonna start with a simple question. Sir, how you been doing? How your marathon's runs been going?

SPEAKER_01 3:40

Well, thanks for having me, guys. I am really excited to uh be with you on the podcast virtually here. It's funny, I listen to oh man, I'm probably thousands of hours into listen podcasts at this point, so but this is my first time. My uh my initial uh podcast uh journey here.

SPEAKER_00 4:03

So no pressure!

SPEAKER_02 4:05

You're live, baby, now you own it, you own a podcast now, baby.

SPEAKER_01 4:10

Uh Marathon's been pretty good this week. I haven't gotten a lot in this past week. Um, just life and whatnot popping up. Um big meetings coming up or yeah, just happened this week. So I will say the couple nights I was able to hop on, it was, and you know, we can uh get more into this during the war stories, but it was uh, I guess I felt like I kind of got the full spectrum of marathon. You know, a very, you know, hey, that was a hundred out of a hundred run. Couldn't ask for a better run on that one. And then the total, like, well, that was absolute garbage. So, you know, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, and sometimes you need that.

SPEAKER_02 4:57

I I I'm gonna immediately piggyback off something you've said because you took the words right out of my mouth. Me and you and I, we've been playing a lot together. Um, in the in the past, I'd say, week and a half, like me and you have been linking up. I mean, there's been nights where it's just like been me and you, and nobody else is on, and we like D the third, you know. So me and you, we've been we've been playing a lot, and you you hit the nail on the head. It has been a it has been a a combination of like high highs and low lows. We have had really great games, uh memorable moments, and then we've had some that it's like we we've had some where we just got smoked, and then we've had some that like I think these are the ones that stick with me the most, where like it was going good. We were on a roll, uh, but we couldn't finish. You know, something happened. You know, we lost like that next PvP engagement and we we couldn't close out. Me and Bat have that that's been a lot of our sh. We've had a lot of nights like that. Uh more so in season one, summoned to season two, where it's like, gosh darn, like we are doing good. We are winning our initial uh team fight engagements, but for whatever reason, we can't win the second engagement or we just we can't beat that next team that challenges us or they catch us off guard or something. So you and I uh we especially that one game in particular where we were running with uh what was his name? He um Pete Pete Petey Petey our bad beat. Hey Pete, if you if this it shout out to you if this ever gets to you out there in Canada. Um yeah, we had several games where we where we ran with Pete, and there was one man where like we beat the first team we fought. Oh man, we had good loot. I think we even hit a supply crate and we were not far off from getting ready to X-Fill, and I saw a third team. That first fight we won was actually very hard fought. I think you clutched up. I think you were the final man standing in.

SPEAKER_01 7:12

Yeah, in that final fight, that 1v2.

SPEAKER_02 7:14

Yeah, and you clutched it, and it I was so proud of you for having that hero moment. We you resed us, you we all reset, we we got the loot, and we were actually getting ready to get out of there. And here comes the thing, here comes the third, and what was probably the final team, and we unfortunately could not win that engagement with them.

SPEAKER_01 7:35

So I I will say Petey will live in my mind uh from here on out as the as the match where uh Yumi and Petey got uh taken out by uh John Rook. That that 1v3 where he just he just domed all three of us. I'll never forget it. It was John Rook is back Petey the whole time, you know. I I love Petey's accent. I you know, rep rep to Canada, but that whole time in his thick uh accent is just saying rook, rook, rook, and I was like, Yes, Petey. We just got to be a good thing.

SPEAKER_00 8:09

But where Petey himself where is where is the rook? I don't know, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 8:17

That was a highlight.

SPEAKER_02 8:18

That was a highlight of the week for sure. Bad um good Lord have mercy. Bat, I'm turning it to you for a minute. That was another game, dude. I'm sorry, I'm happy you weren't there, Bat. Oh, I'm glad you didn't live through this fight.

SPEAKER_00 8:31

It was another game where we were doing good.

SPEAKER_02 8:37

We were we had loot, we beat the geared team that we had to fight. And we got 1v3 by John Rook at Overflow. He got Pete. We wrote this dude named Pete. He got him the rook. John Rook got him down somewhere, and he was calling out Rook, Rook, Rook. I'm like, where, where, where? I don't know, I don't know. And I was trying to go up the you know that main ladder in Overflow. When you take that main ladder and it you take you get on top of that roof, and you have like that huge side, it's kind of like the meta almost. Yeah. That's what I was trying to do. I was like, okay, let me come up here, let me just get my bearings, let me just see what's going on. What happened to Pete? Why is he down? Where's this rook? What's going on? The rook shot me as I was going up that ladder, and buddy, he didn't miss. And then he downed me. And then it turned into a 1v1, and and then he got yellow, dude. All right, and he literally wiped all three of us. He struck the plague of the rook. God, dude. Speaking of rooks, man, and then I'm gonna say this real quick, unless y'all have anything y'all want to add, and we'll get into the questions for yellow. So let me tell you what has been going good for me and what has not been going good for me. What has not been going good for me is solos, like just pure you you queue up as a regular shell and you play solos. Man, I don't know. Uh, I've just been fumbling. I and and like there'll be some games where like I will uh eliminate the first runner I have to fight, but I just can't eliminate the second runner I have to fight. Either they win a fair one-on-one or I just get caught. They just get angle on me. I never saw they were there and they they take me down. I lost a lot of shields, man. I lost a lot of I lost a lot of loot trying to attempt solos. I probably should have been doing free kits to keep it real, instead of queuing up as blue shield every time and like, you know, the actually decent guns. I should have probably dialed that back because I think I went on like an 0-5 loss streak where I lost like five solos. And so that's where all my shields I've kind of been in a shield crisis lately. Like I've got these good guns and now I have backpacks, but my shields, I'm still do kind of struggling on shields. Uh thank goodness me falling and one of his homies had uh a good outpost run where like they knew I needed shields, and like every time we eliminated an enemy team, they would give me the shield. So I came out of that one game with like four to five shields. I was like, God bless y'all, God bless you. I needed this so bad. So uh I I was in a little bit of a drought there, man. The other thing, so that's what's not been going good is solo runs. Okay, this one's wild. What has been going good for me is Rook runs. I've been coming home, man, on my lunch. Uh, you know, I got a little time on my really, I got time for like one game, and then I can claim my dailies, and then you know, I got it's time to go back. I I've been X-film a lot lately with Rook. Now I've been playing him real passively. I'm kind of just getting in. I'm really just almost kind of looting the area that it spawns me in. I might venture out a little bit, but I don't know, dude. Um, I've been doing really good with Rook. Not in the sense of like I'm a limit, I I'm 1v3 in teams, just in the sense of like I'm getting in, I'm grabbing a few useful things, and I'm getting out. And I'm doing this consistently, and it's actually been adding up. So yeah, that that's out of the ordinary for me, but I've been cueing his Rook a little bit lately, and they've been going good. They've been going good. So well, okay, let's uh let's go ahead and dive into the questions for our man here, yellow. Okay, yellow. Uh we'll start right here. Gaming journey. Tell us and the listeners a little bit about yourself, how long have you been gaming, and what are the main game genres you usually find yourself sinking time into? So basically, what's your what's your gaming history?

SPEAKER_01 12:51

Yeah, so I grew up a Nintendo kid. Um that was the big thing on my block. Uh, and gaming for me, ever since I was a kid, was always a social event. Um so that it was always just, you know, hey, we're all going to Michael's house today, right? We're gonna go play, I don't know, battle tanks or road rage or whatever it might be at the time. Um hey, everyone's coming to my house today, and we're gonna, you know, see who can get the fastest level clear on Spider-Man on the PS1, like whatever it might be. But um good movies. My house was usually more of a Nintendo house, and so doing the social gaming was always fun. But then, you know, when it was like I got 20 minutes left, friends just you know took off. Uh, I got 20 minutes till dinner. What am I gonna play? My go-to as a kid was the Mega Man series. Yeah. My uh my real I I don't want to say addiction, but it's what really pulled me in. That was my my go-to game. Uh, especially once we kind of upgraded to the Super Nintendo. Remember getting Mega Man X, uh, I think it was a birthday present. I really only got games at birthdays and Christmas. So, you know, you gotta you had to make those games count.

SPEAKER_04 14:09

Right. Uh right.

SPEAKER_01 14:11

And uh yeah, I I have beaten Mega Man X at least a couple hundred times at this point in my life. I'll still go back and play it, you know. Sunday afternoon, hanging out with the the kids. I'll throw on Mega Man X. Uh, you know, I'll pick one of them and and run through it. Um but it it kind of integrated two main things for me um that really bloomed later in life, kind of when technology caught up and games caught up in. Number one was map design. It really showed me what makes a good level, a good multiplayer map in a game that really stuck with me, and then I'll kind of full circle with Marathon here in a minute. And then um just kind of like the difficulty. I liked Mega Man because it, you know, it was tough. It was it, you know, you jumps were precise. The platforming was very tight. Uh yeah, it was you you take that loss and like you know, you're going back to the start, right? Um, you lose run out of lives, you're going back to main menu. Like it was, it was uh it felt rewarding. Again, that'll kind of circle back to marathon, or I feel like marathon still has a sensation of it is rewarding. Um then later in life, uh the Souls games, you know, came out. I got into those and it was that same idea. Amazing map design, great environments, throws you straight into the action. Um, you know, as soon as you start, pick your pick your classic, you're in, you're in the game. Uh, I really like games that you know don't have a lot of the whole hand holding. There's not a whole, you know, let's do this two-hour tutorial. Like, I like you know, games that are like, here you go, here's our world, go explore, figure it out. Um so again, Dark Souls amazing map design. I think the first one is probably my favorite, DS1. I think the map design in that game is um outstanding. Uh and and that was kind of who I was kind of as a kid, was like, hey, come over, I got this new multiplayer game, let's play it. And so, you know, my first question is like, what are the maps like? You know, how are the maps? Um a big one for me was like Medal of Honor Frontline. I love the maps in that game, but I would really judge games by by map design. And so these last few years, as I've kind of gotten into these extraction shooters, uh, a lot of that has been a raw uh evolved around map design. Like how how do the maps feel and flow? Where where are combats happening? You know, I love um you know what what makes the map unique. Um, so certain games kind of turn me off. You know, I try on playing with some friends, and um you could just tell the map was just there to facilitate the competitive uh action, right? Like this game just wants to be an esport. Like that's what this is really going for. Like in games like you know, Counter Strike, even Overwatch to a point. Like, yeah, there are some maps in there that are you know really, really incredible. They they really stand out, and then you know, the rest of them are like, well, they just here, they just they they service, they're serviceable, they do what they're supposed to do, but there's not much more. Um and then I remember trying the beta for marathon, and Perimeter hooked me in. I was like, this is it. Like, here's atmosphere, here's a map that makes sense with what it's supposed to be, uh, lore-wise. Um, you know, it is strange, it does not quite make sense. Why would things be built like this or that? Well, why wouldn't it? You know, we're we're on this futuristic planet, things shouldn't look like how you expect them to look. Uh, but it's still services, the action, right? There's still sight lines. There's still, hey, do you know you can take this vent up through here and drop in on a guy that was, you know, might be camping here or shielding up back in this hallway? Like there's you know, all these little nooks and crannies and secret ways and routes are are planned out. Like you can tell the the design team who made these maps really put some love and attention to them. And I, you know, I see some criticism. Like, hey, there's really only a handful of maps. One of them's only available on the weekend. Um, but when you really sit down and like get into the maps, I mean, I think they're bar none some of the best out there uh currently in gaming. And that's honestly what really helped me discover Marathon. Like, I just wanted to go explore more of this world. I wanted to, you know, take my time and like explore perimeter and then dire marsh, like, oh my gosh, this you know, perimeter was cool. Look at dire marsh, and now we have nightmarsh. Okay, what's different about this? Okay, this is you know, the fauna is different. I'm hearing new sounds, and like you know, the whole ecosystem changes at night. Um, and again, it's still doing what it's supposed to be doing. I'm still having engaging combat, I'm still enjoying looting and and running around with my squad, but I'm doing it on a map that like I'm excited to go. Like, I wonder what I'm gonna see in this run that I might not have noticed before, right? Like, I wonder what new little details gonna stick out to me.

SPEAKER_02 19:16

Awesome.

SPEAKER_01 19:17

Yeah, yeah, dude. So that's kind of yeah, basic journey into marathon. The maps really, the artwork, the the just the environment of marathon really, really grabbed me. And then once I started, like, okay, so this is how you build a kit. All right, there's different shells. Okay, see what we're doing here. Okay, we still got that little floaty feel, you know. Dustine Halo kind of imbued, I like that. And then it was okay, this is great. Like, I'm hooked. Let's let's do it.

SPEAKER_02 19:45

That's what I'm that's what I'm telling you. That's what I'm talking about, man. Yeah, great feedback. So, kind of this next question kind of immediately say um is a good segue into kind of the piggybacking off of what you just said. So, discovering marathon, how how did you discover marathon? Did you just stumble across it? Were you kind of like Atlas? Did you kind of like see the beta and then that's I mean, you kind of talked about in the beta, you really enjoy Prebor. Or were you tracking this game for a while and had you been hyped for it long before the release?

SPEAKER_01 20:17

No, I was not tracking it that early on. I um uh a core group of friends and I have been really into Hunt Showdown, another extraction shooter. Very different, very different pacing uh than Marathon. Uh, but still, in a nutshell, you know, it is the same thing. Um, we're loading in, we have a goal, we're going to either get that objective and extract, or we're going to die trying, right? I mean, there's it's basically kind of what we're doing in Marathon. Uh, and we've played that since release. I mean, we've put years worth of it into uh at this point. Um, and while we all enjoy it, it was kind of like, well, what's next? Like, okay, you know, we're playing a lot of this, but it's kind of getting to this point where we're still enjoying it. We're dipping back in, but we're not playing it like we, you know, like we were when we first really got into it, where you know, I couldn't wait to hop back on. Um so then I guess that was around the time ARK came out, and so a few of us went over there, tried it. I will still say uh I'm not a huge fan of the maps and ARK. I just think they are uh just literal sandboxes with not a lot going on. Uh so it was definitely more of a social thing. If my you know, if if some buddies were on, some friends were on, hey, we're hopping on ARC, we got a free spot, yeah. I'll hop on, I'll socialize, I'll chill. Again, growing up, like gaming's always been a social thing for me. So it's uh it's a way to keep in touch with people across the country. It's a way to, you know, hey, you know, what you know, what what movie did you recently see? Or what were your thoughts on this? Or hey, you know, how's your D D character going right now? Whatever it might be. Uh and then someone sent me a trailer of Marathon. They're like, Did you see that Bungie's making an extraction? Shooter isn't the game that you're really into. Isn't that an extraction shooter? I was like, yeah, Hunt, Hunt, Showdown. Yeah, it's an extraction shooter. I'll check this out. So watch the trailer. Okay. Then uh, oh okay, they got a beta type thing coming out. That looks cool. I'll I'll try that out. So had one other friend who I played hunt with, played ARC with, you know, hey, let's go try this out. You know, it's beta. We'll just see. If we don't like it, you know, we'll delete it, we'll move on, we'll go back to whatever, you know, we whatever we're getting into.

SPEAKER_02 22:29

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 22:30

And we, I remember we were, you know, we're in perimeter, we're playing through it. We get into our first team fight, you know, and we're sitting there looting, and he's real quiet. And I'm like, all right, I can't really gauge like how he's enjoying it. I'm looking around like I'm already enamored by Perimeter. I'm just, this map is great. I just, what is that over there? What's making this noise? I gotta go, I gotta go explore more. Uh and I'm like, hey, how are you feeling about it? He goes, I think we have I think we we need to make a decision right now. I'm like, oh, okay, what's up? We either need to delete this game and move on and act like it doesn't exist, or we need to be okay with the fact that we're gonna pour well over a couple thousand hours in this game. And I was like, yeah, alright. I think he's in. I think I think we know the answer here. So uh I haven't checked in a while, you know, what my playtime is at this point. Um, I know the PS5 kind of gives you that general. Last I looked, uh, might have been when we last uh played that Sunday afternoon old time, and I think I was around 120 hours at that point. So not not quite to a thousand yet, but you know, we're we're climbing up there. Um but yeah, you know, he he bought in and I was like, all right, my social boxes checked, right? I've got a I've got a buddy, got someone to play with, I'm gonna go for it. And then I found myself playing Marathon when no friends were on, you know, it wasn't even a social thing at that point. It was just like, I'm gonna go in as a rook, and I just want to go explore some more of these maps. Or I'm gonna go in and I'm just gonna try some new loadouts, you know, and see, see what's up. I wasn't doing that in ARC, I wasn't doing that in Hunt Showdown. I wasn't just going in solo to, you know, try new things or explore experiment. Um, and that's when it really stuck to me that, like, hey, this game's really kind of taken that spot that, you know, maybe old school Destiny had for me or old school Overwatch had for me, where I just wanted to, you know, boot it up and play when I had some free time.

SPEAKER_02 24:37

That's awesome, man. That's when you know that's when you know you really like a game, is when your buddies are not on and you still want to play that game by yourself. That's when you know. Um, I haven't asked, uh I haven't asked nobody this question in a while. Does game uh does a game's active player-based numbers impact your decision on whether you invest your time and money? Why or why not? Please do not let I know you're uh you're an active listener of the show. Please do not let me and Batman's opinions influence whatever you're about to say. Like, are you like do you do do do are you a person that you really pay attention to to Steam numbers? Does that does that matter to you whether if you go if you make a decision if you're gonna go try game matter or not, based off maybe what you've heard on YouTube or or or whatever? Well, what what how do you feel about that?

SPEAKER_01 25:33

Uh it really doesn't. Honestly, before I really got into marathon and and joined uh the Discord, and you know, there's a there's another couple Discords out there, I think I'm in, you know, and I'll see people bring it up, or I'll see a screenshot of Steam numbers, or I'll see a quote, you know, half of player base uh not accounted for on Steam, and I'm just like, if I can hop on and I can cue in and play a game, I'm happy. Like I'm I'm good. Like I've I'm already a hundred hours in, I've gotten my money's worth. If if Bunchie came out, you know, Monday morning and said, hey, we tried, we really enjoyed making this experience, but uh, we're gonna have to shut the servers down, you know, next week. I'd be like, oh, that's a bummer. I'm gonna really miss it, but hey, I got my fill. You know, I definitely got my money's worth out of it, is kind of my my take on it. I mean, my handle is literally yellow optimist. You know, I'm always gonna take the optimistic approach. So, you know, it's gonna be a I'm not gonna worry about it if it gets to that point, if it's so dire that I just can't find a match, or you know, I'm just fighting bots at that point, you know, maybe I'll I'll re re-examine it. But I'm also someone that's been gaming since the you know NES days. Like, I remember early uh Xbox Live Q times, you know what I mean? Like I've I've been around the block on that, so that's not gonna bother me. You know, I can understand some people are like, what do you mean I have to get in and and wait, you know, more than three minutes to get a match?

SPEAKER_02 27:04

And I'm like, I mean, some of those cue times were rough back in the day, dude, on Xbox 360.

SPEAKER_01 27:12

Um, oh man. I some of my favorite nights back on the early live days were like you would be in your time zone, and no one, you know, only so many other people were in that active time zone playing when you are, so you would just keep seeing them in the same Halo lobby, and it would be like, yo, what's up, Yellow Opti if they came in catching you on this one too, huh? You know, like it was just so much fun.

unknown 27:35

Uh you know.

SPEAKER_02 27:36

That's awesome, dude. Great, great feedback. And I have gone on record on this podcast and I have stated that if this I I I you know, you you kinda me and you are kind of your brain kind of operates real similar to mine. Um like I I've went on record and said if this game ended tomorrow or next month, much like you said, I have had such a great and if people want to clown on me for for making a podcast about this game, for supporting this game, I can't believe Old Town, you're you're supporting a dead game or you're trying to talk up uh this or what whatever. What they want to throw a steam chart in my face, what however they want to come at me. You know what? That's fine because I have had an absolute blast. If this game ended tomorrow, I have had a blast building this little community. I have had a blast all these memories with all my friends. I've had an amazing time on Marathon, and I ain't ready to quit on this game. And I and I I think there's still a lot left in the tank, hopefully. Um we'll we'll get into that. We'll get into that more later. But that that's cool, man. Um uh I like it.

SPEAKER_01 28:47

One one last thing I want to put here at this segment before we hop over to the next. Uh if you are someone who's really, you know, impacted on numbers, you you don't have a lot of time to play. You need to know that your queue time's gonna be quick, right? Uh, hey, I only get to hop on an hour tops if I'm 15 minutes of that's going to queue time. I get that. Um, you f you were really into another game and the player base died out and they closed the servers, and you just kind of felt like, well, you know, here's all this work effort I put in. I get that too. I could see that. I I would advise doing larger research. There's a lot going on in the industry as a whole right now, and that affects these numbers. It's easy to just go on Steam charts and see, okay, where's it at? Where's the all-time high? What's the all-time low? Uh and I'm just gonna take that snapshot, and that's gonna influence my opinion on you know, marathon or or dead game and things like that. And with everything going on in the industry as it is, I mean, video games aren't video games like they were when we were younger. Video games aren't video games like they were 10 years ago, right? Right. Ever since the ecosystem that World of Warcraft created, everything now is like we need to make this thing to create an ecosystem to pull players in. And then once they're in our ecosystem, we don't we want to retain them, right? Think of destiny. Like we're making destiny, and we want to pull you in, and then we don't want to let you go. Uh and so now we're in this place where the gaming fatigue has moved past that. I don't want to be sucked in the in the well, I want to try this game out, but I can't fall behind in destiny, or I can't fall behind in my guild on Mortal Warcraft, or I can't fall behind in Warframe or Heists on Grand Theft Auto, whatever it might be, whatever ecosystem you might be in. And so we're we're moving out of that era as kind of a whole, uh, a market of gamers. But the problem is the gaming, you know, industry hasn't moved out of that yet. They're still used to taking seven to ten years to make a video game. When I we were younger, you know, those Super Nintendo days, those Sega Genesis games, it felt like games were coming out left and right. Not everyone was a winner, but I mean, I remember just being like, man, like people are just like taking stuff and making it. Like, what is Metroid? This is crazy. What? You're some kind of like space person? I'll give it a shot. You know what I mean? Like it was rust all over. And now it's kind of like, all right, so where are we at with the next Elder Scrolls? It's been how many years now? Um, so it's just like games are expanding. We need more people, we need more money, we need more time. Uh, and then when some come uh when a developer tries something a little lower, a little maybe more risky, takes a bigger swing like Marathon, it's almost this like, well, if it doesn't hit this number by this like day within the first month, it's a dead game. And I I think that's just really overreacting on you know saying something stead, just judging it that quickly.

SPEAKER_02 31:56

I'm gonna bring up, I'm gonna bring up a little bit of the past here, and I I don't have, you know, I I didn't, I'm sure there's some data somewhere you could look at what was the player base in early Destiny 2 days when that newness wore off, but for the Forsaken DLC had not quite hit yet. If memory serves me right, that's even Destiny 2 was in a rough place. Bungie had kind of changed how the way the game felt, and it was actually kind of getting at a low a little bit, and people were actually concerned about the well-being for Destiny 2. Now keep in mind, uh, this is before the for the Forsaken DLC is what uh brought it back to life, and that's what restored everybody's faith back on the Destiny and brought it back to the old its former glory, like we all knew it to be. But like, you know, I uh what the reason I say that and the reason I bring up that point is uh i if the big if the Almighty Destiny when it launched kind of got in a rough place, people it wasn't getting good reviews, it wasn't quite the same game people remember Destiny 1 to be, but they made that comeback with Forsaken. I I don't remember how long, I think it was like a year or so. Don't quote me on that. I I don't remember how long it took for Forsaken to come out after the launch of Destiny 2, but what I'm trying to say is I I feel like uh Bungie can do that for Marathon. I feel like Bungie, I mean, they've got plans, man. They're gonna they're they're gonna fight, they're gonna fight with everything they can to bring us some content to get to to rise the numbers and to bring some new gamers in and keep retaining the people they have. I'm just excited, man. I uh it just bums me out to see some of the the the negative things that said sometimes. We won't go into that because I just think the the game personally's got a lot in store for it, but we will see. We will see. Um, okay, so uh this what what kind of power to to kind of uh keep on schedule the best we can? So these next two questions I'll I'll kind of combine it into one. As a listener, what is a hot taker piece of advice Batman or I have dropped on the show that you low-key or secretly disagreed with while you listen to? And on the flip side, what is a piece of advice in Marathon on the podcast that has helped you uh improve your gameplay, or maybe we talked about something that you didn't know.

SPEAKER_01 34:25

Uh yeah. So I think to answer this, I'm gonna do this uh in the classic sandwich. Alright, we're gonna we're gonna start on a high, we're gonna dip down to a little bit of a low, and then we're gonna end on a high here. Uh love it. So uh, alright. Uh you know what? We'll do it, we'll do an analogy. So I'm I'm a Tennessee man. Uh I'm a southern southern fella, like my man Old Town. Uh I really enjoy NASCAR. Love, love some NASCAR. I love racing in general, but we'll take we'll take NASCAR for here. So NASCAR, you got three key uh people, uh positions, whatever you want to call them, components to your team. These are the three key. You got the driver. So for this scenario, I'm gonna be the driver. I am the player of Marathon. All right. I want Batman as my spotter. All right. In NASCAR, you got someone who's up above who's just feeding constant information to the driver, right? You're clear on left side. You got two car links to the next guy. You got one, you know, Big Rec behind you. Keep pushing, right? You need to go inside. Whatever it is, they're just instant. I mean, it is just constant information stream. Um, so Batman, I would want as my my spotter, just you know, whenever we play together as a trio, I think Batman has great call-outs. And then on the podcast, I think Batman has really good takes on, you know, this is working, this is not working. That shell might be, you know, not the best for this situation. Um, or maybe avoid this shell on you know, this map or with this weapon. I I I find that you know, I'm I'm out working on the uh the farm and I'm nodding my head like, yep, I agree with that. All right, you got it.

SPEAKER_00 36:11

Bat naked going on one of his promos.

SPEAKER_01 36:14

Um yes, sir. Uh now, we're gonna get to a little bit of the meat here, a little bit of the downside. Uh, my big hot take that I highly disagree, and I think you were both kinda on this hill.

SPEAKER_02 36:26

Um, I can't wait to hear this.

SPEAKER_01 36:30

I think you're both overlooking Sentinel as a shell. Okay. And I think Sentinel is fabulous on perimeter. Okay. I had a feeling right now. He is my he is my solo go-to. Nobody's on, no, no, no friends are on, no one discords quiet. All right, I'm gonna load it, solo, gonna take sentinel. And I'm just gonna say, I've made some really, really good plays uh on perimeter as as a sentinel. I and and no, it may be, I was thinking about it today, actually, it may be that a lot of people agree with you too. Like, hey, you don't do sentinel on perimeter, that's not a strong suit. So when one shows up, it may just be like a I didn't even know, I didn't even expect that. Like, I yep, okay, I'm dead. Well, you know, and it's more of the the shock value that, like, oh, this sentinel just pushed me at North Relay. Like, what is this? Um, yeah. Uh I especially like him in Holler. Uh love using my heartbeat tracker. I love throwing my traps down, especially with the uh core, you know, let you have two traps, and like just making Holler my personal fortress. And someone's gonna push in there, a rook or another solo runner, especially um, you know, assassins who invis, they sneak in, and I got them on the tracker, and it's just like, all right, here we go. Um, so that's my my hot take, and then we're gonna end it with our another piece of uh bun here on our whopper. So back to our analogy here of our NASCAR team. We got Batman as the spotter, he is feeding the info. Uh, the other key position along with the spotter and driver is the pit chief. All right, so you gotta have someone who they are calling the shots in the pits. They are the ones that are usually your hype man, they're the ones that are usually saying, hey, this is what I'm seeing other teams doing, or hey, this is what I'm seeing, you know, this team and pinwell, they look like they're going this way, and it looks like they're using this. How do we want to play this, right? Um, they are they're not they're not there to just give constant feedback like the spotter. They're more there to be like, hey, what are you thinking of this situation? All right, maybe we should fall back, soft reset. All right, what do you what do you want to do from here? And that is where I see Old Town right there. Just like, I'm here, I'm steady, I'm consistent, um, I'm here to have fun. I'm here to, you know, this is a video game. We're playing games, we're getting the opportunity to sit down and play a game together, we're gonna have fun doing it. But at the same time, like, I want to win, right? I want to get pitched. I want to win, baby! You know, you gotta talk to your pit shift like they're your best friend, but you're also both there knowing like we're here to win, right? Like, there's a trophy at stake, we're gonna get that, you know. For marathon, it's there's loot at stake, we're gonna get that loot, right? That it's our turn with that loot.

SPEAKER_00 39:17

Um so W tanks! Let's clap it up, bat. W takes the pit. Honestly. Bat the spotter, all pounds. That's beautiful.

SPEAKER_03 39:34

It's crazy. Hey, yo, he can he he hyped you up, bat.

SPEAKER_02 39:38

How do you feel about that?

SPEAKER_03 39:40

Delicious. As I like to say. But I think he's spot on with you too. Like, honestly.

SPEAKER_02 39:48

Yeah, I mean, yeah, I mean, I was such a good analogy. I was sitting there listening, I'm I'm like, I mean, yeah, he I was like, yeah, yeah, that's me. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 39:57

That's crazy. That was a good question, though. Is is Sentinel more like your play style in other games, or are you more of an aggressive player?

SPEAKER_01 40:08

Hmm, that's a good question. Um solo in other games. I'm trying to think. I guess the only other game I really put solo time in that's an extraction shooter is probably Hunt Showdown. And that's really tough because Hunt is very different in the way there's really only one objective, period. You know, there is like it is either you're looting other hunters uh after you've taken them out or come across them, or you're getting what is called the bounty that appears on the map and you're extracting with it. Like, that is the main goal. It's not like Marathon where there's like we could do contracts, we could go hunt other players, we could try to get into pinwheel and up our armory a little bit, right? There's there's multiple things you can kind of do in a run on Marathon, whereas hunt is very straightforward. Like, here's the bounty, it's gonna appear someone on the map, you need to be the first one there, you need to get the bounty, and you need to get it off the map. Um I will say typically sentinel is not what I would go like playstyle in other games. It honestly surprised me that I enjoyed Sentinel as much as I do. Um I think a better comparison would be Overwatch, Old Town and I have talked about, and I and I think you as well, Bat, have talked about our time with Overwatch. You know, Overwatch, I'm usually playing a support or I'm playing a flanker. Uh, you know, I'm running Tracer if we are good on the support on our team, or I'm running like Zenyada or a Mercy. Okay. Um so I'm not running tanks, I'm not running people who hold things down, right? Who are more zone support. That's not really my go-to. But when he came out in season two, I was like, all right, this looks interesting. Heartback tracker, all right. I like Alien, that's cool. Uh, let's give it a whirl. And I just found that when I'm playing solo, I I like his kit a lot. I like kind of having these, you know, built-in things to help you hold uh an area. I also really like, uh, especially on maps like Perimeter or Outpost, um, I really like throwing people off in solos. You put that trap down uh in a building and you leave the building, and then you watch the building with your long shot. You see someone, they open the door, they look at that trap, they get real cautious, right? They're gonna they start sneaking, they're looking around, and then you line up your shot, right? You weren't even in that building. That trap was just bait. Um, you know, little little things like that you can play with him. Um it's pretty great. I actually did that the last night. I was hot, I had hopped on, I pulled off one of those shots, uh, and as I was coming up to finish him off, he hops on Proc Shat and was like, Man, I I'm not even mad. That was great. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 42:59

So I mean that that answers my question because I I've honestly kind of just looked at him more like, you know, if you're somebody that is this playstyle, this is the perfect fit for you, and probably nobody else is gonna be able to use him. You're the contrary to that. So um, yeah, I mean, I'd say he's slept on, and I don't know if it's really because you know of our input, but you know, I just I don't play him, so I don't see the value of the shell. And I'm kind of that way with other ones. But yeah, I mean, if somebody thinks that they can take him in and you know, pull off some cheeky moves with him, by all means, go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 43:44

Yeah, next time we play a trio, you know, if we get someone else running triage, you know, I would I would like to I I I'll try to hop over to him and and be like, you know, here's here's something I've done before. I like to pull this and and just show a little bit more of what I do with this kit. Uh but typically if I if we're playing trio, we got a full group, I I am going full triage, full full support tree and my and cooldown tree in my cradle, and I'm just like, how many buffs can I have going constantly this match? Right, that's kind of my my go-to there. Uh just because honestly, it makes such a big difference, especially when you're fighting another trio that has a good triage. Sometimes it kind of comes down to who can triage best out of these two triages, right? Right, right, right. Um, and I've seen that a lot and just watching watching, you know, other streamers play and things, like it can really come down to that. And it honestly, that it really reminds me of Overwatch. Whose support is outsupporting the other team's support, right? Yeah uh is is really pushing that. And I don't think you know Sentinel can really shine a light in that trio versus trio. I'm I'll be very curious as Vault Breakers, which we're talking about, I guess, a little later. You know, maybe we'll see some in red shells that we don't utilize as much in certain ways. Maybe we'll kind of see them shine a little bit in that mode.

SPEAKER_02 45:09

You you've already read my mind. I would say what he he could be an interesting pick in Vault Breakers. That could be the that could be the playlist where maybe me and Bat give him a whirl. And you bring you brought up an interesting point. You talk you said I kind of like actually using him in solos with the traps and the sensor. And I remember saying, I think it was our last episode, the the shell tier list. I actually do remember, of course, me and him uh we both agree we were a little indifferent on him, but I remember throwing in a little bit of a caveat on solos. I was like, I think he could be interesting in solos because he's got that sensor. So interesting that you kind of uh I don't know if confirmed that is the word, but you kind of built off of that comment that I made in the last episode. So interesting, very interesting.

SPEAKER_03 46:04

And I've died to a sentinel just because he had the heartbeat on solo. So uh it's very, very believable.

SPEAKER_02 46:12

Yeah, for sure. Well, we're gonna ask uh we're we're sitting at 46. Oh my god, have we really been talking 46 minutes? That's crazy. Okay, I'm gonna ask him one more question, and we're gonna get into the mid-season preview. Uh Sagella, what is your what what's a gun? If you could no, I'm gonna ask it this way. In the notes, it's worded, what do you kind of what do you get excited about when you find what what when you find a certain weapon? Feel free to answer that too. I think I'm gonna change it up a little bit. I'm gonna ask you, if you could really have it your way almost every game, what what what guns are you bringing in? What is there a certain implant, attachments? Walk us through. If you could really have it your way, obviously, obviously, gold, right? Like gold shield, gold. Realistically, you know, normal games. What kind of guns do you like to rock and everything?

SPEAKER_01 47:12

Yeah, the you know, the season two. I'm just gonna go with season two right now, where we're at. The gun that has surprised me the most because I really I never picked him up in season one. If I did get one from a contract, you know, I usually just sell it. Uh, is the Magman. Okay. I have found myself using it more and more. And and you know, it's not my primary, it's I consider it more my light ammo weapon, I guess, uh, when thinking of destiny terms. Um but it's really come in clutch for me this season. Um, a lot of I also feel like I don't know uh if you guys have been feeling the same way on this, but I feel like I'm having more encounters inside in closer quarters this season than I did in season one.

SPEAKER_03 48:02

Yeah, and I think a lot of that has to do with the meta shift this season. Kind of straying further from the long shot and the outland and the volley rifle. Um a lot of it, I think, is close quarters base, which is why they brought in the um the new SMG to kind of battle shotguns.

SPEAKER_01 48:26

Right.

SPEAKER_03 48:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:28

Um yes, I have won a lot of a lot of good uh, you know, indoor, a little closer, a little corridor type fights with a magnum, especially going up against more shoddy users, right? They're pushing you, they're trying to get in their range, and you're just doming them with that magnum. And um, so my my go-to lately has been something uh you know, like a scar. I like to, you know, especially when I'm running triage who I run a lot, um using that overload on that scar, zapping those shields, and then switching to the magnum to try to get the the final two headshots. I like that. It's kind of been my go-to. I like that. Uh also you find a lot of magnums. People just leave them, you know, you'll find them on free kits, you know, and so no one's looting them, and I'm just like, hey, you're helping me out, like saving me a little bit of credit, you know. Right, right, right. Um that's kind of nice. Uh that I keep like I, you know, have always got a surplus in my vault. Um But I will say the the thing with the Magnum, I think we you even mentioned this last time we played. Old Town was like, you gotta hit your shots. Like if you're if you whiff, I mean it's you don't have that. There's no time. There's no time to really come back on it. But if you can really hit your shots, I mean you can it's amazing the fall off that thing has.

SPEAKER_02 49:47

It's a little bit of a skill check gun. I could see that, yeah. Not to an extreme, but it it you you said that yeah, you gotta hit your shot. You're you're kind of cooked, especially if you're going up against something that's automatic, like an M77, a bully. You you you you gotta hit your shots. With that, with that hand, but with I I see me too, hand cannon, um, with that magnum. But yes, a little bit of a skill check gun, but no, yeah, uh, you're right. Uh I think you got a little bit of a fun little hot take there, because I'm like you, I see them everywhere. So you find them everywhere, people drop them, people leave them.

SPEAKER_03 50:24

So I will say finding them even in like uh wall lockers, which I wasn't finding those very mid in the last season.

SPEAKER_01 50:32

Oh, interesting. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 50:33

Yeah, like they're everywhere. That that's kind of nuts. They really are. I wish I would see more of other weapons, but I'm not mad at it. And I've definitely lost matches just because I whiffed my shots. So yeah, if you're gonna run it, you better hit them.

SPEAKER_02 50:52

Is there something is there a weapon that you guys, because Bungie was supposedly supposed to switch this around. We've kind of talked about the Magnum. This is what I'm about to say. This is the here we go. Time to get into free ball stuff here. Open discussion. Is there weapons you guys are are seeing less of that you saw a lot of in in season one, and vice versa? Are you seeing a lot of in season two that you couldn't find in season one? Bat, go ahead. Oh, go ahead. Yeah, go ahead, bat.

SPEAKER_03 51:23

Um, I'm gonna say that the one that I'm seeing a lot more this season is probably gonna be the Zeus. I've been seeing those a lot. Okay. Um the one that I wish I was seeing more of is the M77. Because I saw those a lot last season. And I'm struggling to find one. I don't even have one in my vault right now.

SPEAKER_02 51:47

Yeah. I have I have three, but I I but I still agree with that take. The only uh I half agree with you. I agree that I don't see M77s, and I wish I saw more. I'm still not seeing Zeus's a lot, but I'm seeing a lot of Aries RGs. Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_03 52:04

Because it seems like I get them confused all the time. Yeah, just one of the rail guns.

SPEAKER_02 52:11

One of the railguns, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 52:12

I that's I don't care which one it is.

SPEAKER_02 52:14

The Aries is it's one of the vendors, is constant. That's their free weapon. Uh-huh. They're always trying to give you. I think it's an Aries RG. So that weapon is very lucrative. I I do agree with that. That one's very lucrative.

SPEAKER_03 52:29

There's one more that I'd say that I haven't seen a lot of, and that's the the volley rifle, which I'm very sad about.

SPEAKER_02 52:35

Agreed. I'm not seeing the volley rifle as much either. I agree. Yeah. Uh yellow, what about you? Any any you're you what what's that look like for any you're not seeing as much that you were seeing in season one, or something you're seeing a lot more of?

SPEAKER_01 52:51

Uh the big one I'm seeing a lot more of, and maybe this is just because I'm I'm on the lookout more for Magnums using that heavy ammo, is the hard line. I feel like I see a lot more runners running the hard line. And interestingly, I I feel like a lot of people are trying to use the hard line as almost a finisher, right? So they'll I don't know, they'll use a strider or maybe a uh a volley to try to like hit you at range while they're closing in. Then it's like, I'm gonna switch to my hard line and try to finish this guy off. Um, which again, I mean, that hard line it hits hard, but you gotta if you whiff that shot, I mean you whiff the shot, and Batman over there has got you know a long shot zoomed in on you. Uh it's over at that point.

SPEAKER_02 53:39

Building off that, that that was another gun that I remember you telling when we did our season when we did our season one gun tier list. Uh, please uh build off of what I'm about to say. That was a gun you disagreed with me and him on. Me and him graded the hard line kind of low. Uh hey, but but you you dig that and I and I'm all and I'm all for it. That that's awesome. I like the disagreement. Um right, you were the one. You like the hard line, correct? Yes. I was thinking so. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um it's a gun that I really did not like in season one. It's grown on me a little bit more in season two. I still think it's booty if if you ain't got you it's one of those guns, man, you almost gotta have attachments. You need a scope on it.

SPEAKER_01 54:28

Yes, absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 54:29

You you need a mag, you know, something. It needs a little help, but but if you give it a little help, it's grown on me a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 54:37

To to cap that off as well, I th I personally think any weapon that uses the heavy ammo has got to have attachments. You've gotta make sure it's dialed in. And that the attachments can vary from playstyle to playstyle, whatever you feel best with. Um, but if you're just going in, hey, I found this in a locker, it's it's gray, no attachments, you're gonna have a rough time. Like it's gonna you're gonna need a little bit of a prayer when you're trying to get those headshots. Um so I do think that is a caveat, because there are some guns that you could just pick out of a locker gray, and it's gonna feel great in your hands. Um77. M77, I think the volley rifle feels great right off the bat. I think the battle pistol, obviously. Oh yeah. Uh, as far as weapons I'm not seeing in season two, there are actually two guns I have yet to find in any match. I have yet to find them in a locker. I have yet to see them on a runner. Um guessing because they've already been looted. And that is the circuit breaker. I have yet to find a circuit breaker this season. Agreed. And I have yet to find an impact H A R on a runner this season. So I don't know if that was the gun. I don't know if people are picking them up like hotcakes. Uh, but you know, your boy's over here loving heavy, and he can't find an impact to save his life.

SPEAKER_02 55:56

So I'm so glad he said that because I would not have remembered. I have also where the heck is the impact H A R it's gone. I wonder if people aren't running them. But here's the thing apparently it got buffed, and we didn't know. Oh I saw a video.

SPEAKER_01 56:16

That's why you don't see it because everyone's gunning you down with it, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 56:19

I guess so. I I ain't seen it, but apparently it got buffed. And and and nobody's and like very few people until now. Hi world, until very few people have figured out that gun got buffed. Apparently, now it don't bounce nowhere near. But it makes sense when me and Bat a couple episodes ago was do- Oh my god, it's all coming back to me. The poof was in the pudding. They said they were gonna bungee said in the patch notes of season two they were gonna change the impact H AR, but I'm not seeing it, so I've not really got to try it. Okay, but I've heard it's I've heard it slaps now, though.

SPEAKER_01 57:02

What is the schema require to craft? What do you need to make one?

SPEAKER_03 57:07

Um, so that's that's a good point, and I want to bring this up actually since you're talking about it. Uh, one of the things that I highly, highly dislike about this season, and yes, I am throwing Bungie under the bus because I don't know why they thought this was a good idea, but regardless of what schema you have, you have to use resources now instead of credits.

SPEAKER_01 57:32

Yeah. Taking a note from uh our creators is what I initially thought, like, hey, they do crafting resources, and then our players will go get more resources. And I think people are just like, uh, no thanks, Spongy.

SPEAKER_03 57:46

I'm not doing that. The thing is, like at the end of the season, if I've got all these schemas that I could possibly use to like just go in and play. Now I don't have the stupid resources because I've been spending them all season on the the upgrades.

SPEAKER_01 58:02

Right, absolutely.

SPEAKER_03 58:04

I'd rather just spend my credits on it. Because at the end of the season, I mean, I'm sitting at 500 and something just in my wallet right now. I'm gonna have credits. Help a brother out. Um, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 58:20

Some of them, some of the schemas are not easy to craft. I mean, it's you know, it's it's a lot of blue components. A couple I've heard, and unless they change this, like require, you know, quite a few components and a purple component. And it's like, I've got this one purple component. Do I get this upgrade that could really help down the road? Or do I buy this gun that I could lose? Right? Exactly. That's I mean, mmm.

SPEAKER_03 58:45

And you know, I think that one of the things that they did correctly this season, um, which I think a lot of people are taking for granted, and they're I've actually heard a lot of people disliking it, is the fact that you know those purple um resources are a little bit easier to come by this season. I don't know why people are hating on that.

SPEAKER_01 59:08

Yeah, it's a little weird.

SPEAKER_03 59:10

Because um I think I've touched on this last season, I didn't finish a single upgrade uh screen completely because I couldn't find any resources. And it yeah, it irritated me to just no end because I didn't finish a single upgrade screen. There's six to choose from.

SPEAKER_01 59:35

Yeah, there's a lot. That's actually uh you guys kind of talked earlier this season about like what's your seasonal goal, right? Are you trying to hit a certain title? Uh what what is your you know, what's your overall like if I can do this before season three, you'll feel like you can check it off. And so I was actually telling Batman last time we played my my current goal is to hit VIP with all the factions and do all the regular upgrades, right? The special things that don't unlock to level what is what it is, 12, 13. I'm not probably not gonna hit that. Uh and so as of right now, I think by the time we hit um August, I I should have that goal completed. But part of that is because these purple components have been a little easier to find. Like I kind of have it mapped out. Like if okay, I spawned here on Outpost. If I can get here first before it's been looted, whatever it might be, this armory or this part of pinwheel, there's a good chance I'm gonna get this purple piece that I need. Um, there is one that I still really need. Got one, Bat and I got it in uh Red Room. You know, I was like, man, I really hope this piece is here. If you guys see this piece, let me know. Hey, if you see a runner that had this piece on him, I'd really appreciate it. The whole match. We get there, it's on the table. I got it. Batman, we got it. We got it in the bag. It's me. It's it's uh RyzeCon. It's Bat. We we cleared the lobby, we defeated all the teams. Oh god, we hit armory. We took, I mean, pinwheel was ours, like no one had touched it. We are just looting, and then Bat's like, all right, we gotta go. Time for final X-Fill. Oh, final X-Fill went on that side, not this side. Well, there goes that loop. And so I just watched this uh purple salvage just disappear.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:32

Ballistic turbine. I'll never forget.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:35

Oh man, you know, I I was thinking about it. That match happened within the same week that Bat and I ran with Fallen in cryo and also had an amazing cryo match, opened a vault, and then didn't make it to extract in time. That was I was with you on that one. Yes, yes, you were. Yes, you were. Uh yeah, we just we just stared at the extract uh in the distance as we timed out. And I was like, man, time is just against me this week.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:03

For everybody, I'm uh I'm gonna I'm gonna say this real quick. Um, that finally I did, I'm happy to say, uh, as Yellow said, I finally got into a vault in Cryo Archive. Uh myself, Yellow and Fallen. We went in there. Um, we we act we we had the key, we found all the batteries, we did, we did all the requirements, and it was so fun, man. We got in. I had a dervish. I think uh yellow got the got the gold bat pack. I mean, yo, we were we were we were gooped up. We had some good stuff, man. Uh, we had some really good stuff, and uh unfortunately kind of comes back to my thing. I I I've I I've tested the waters with Bungie about potentially adding uh five minutes to the clock. Uh we just we ran out of time, man. We um a team stole our X-Fill terminal, and we couldn't, the decision wasn't clear on what to do. Should we chase these guys? Should we tell these guys and try to take their extraction, or do we try to get final extraction? Do we try to find a different terminal? The decision wasn't clear, and that's where honestly I have got to step up and I have got to start playing more cryo to start being able to help provide more ideas. But I didn't know, man. It was a tough scenario. We we bought yes, vault breakers, vault breakers. I'm pumped, man. My mind is kind of shifting since we did that episode. My my opinion has honestly kind of shifted. I'm actually really pumped about vault breakers, man.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:30

Um, should we just get into it? Should we just launch into some vault breaker here?

SPEAKER_03 1:03:34

Yeah, I mean, hey, that that that's a great segue for anybody quick. I just want to clap it up for old town for getting into his first vault.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:42

Yeah, that was our first vault together, too. I was also yelling.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:49

I've finally been in a vault.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:51

Got in. Yes. Uh didn't next time we'll get out, old town.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:55

We will. Oh, yeah, we will. And did it fair and square too? Like, we brought in the key, we did the required tasks, and we yeah, it was it felt good. We did it. We finally feel good. That that's a goal. That was one of my goals at the beginning of season two. I was like, I really want to get it. I don't care if it's just vault one and at one time. I was like, I really I don't care if I get out. I just want to get, I want to be able to say I got in a vault. We did it. We did, we got in. And now, hopefully, like you said, next time we'll extract with the loot. So okay, so for anybody that is not up to date, uh, we'll we'll talk about vault breakers real quick, and then we're gonna get into the meat. I think the real good meat of this episode, what has been announced today. So, vault breakers. If anybody new in here they don't know, um this is Bungie's kind of this is gonna kind of be their jab at another PVE experience. It's gonna be on Cryo Archive. You can queue up as a solo, a duo, full crew to take on a series of difficult vaults. Um you must use a special sponsored kit to play, and you cannot keep any of the gear or weapons you find inside the vault when you exfil. So they're gonna have something called vault data currency. The only thing you do keep is vault data, a new currency found inside the vault. You extract you extract this to purchase upgrades for your vault breaker kit, or to buy gear to take into your standard matches. Um yeah, so I'm super interested. Basically, you have two routes you can go, which is good. Options are fun. You can invest the vault data that you're gonna get into making your kit better to uh take on more difficult challenges. Vault. Vaults and vault breakers, or you need some gear, you can use this vault data to help get you some gear. Man, I'm gonna tell you, I'm just gonna say and then I'm gonna turn it to you two. I've been struggling with shield. It's been a weird I I talked about it earlier, but it's just really I'm gonna I'm gonna revisit that. It's been a weird problem. I've got guns, I've got cash, I got money, I got resources, but I I just don't but uh I just don't have blue shields. And uh so if this game mode allows me another avenue, it's okay if it ain't gold, it's okay if it ain't purples, it's okay if it ain't gold. That's fine, that's fine. But if this is another avenue where I can get some blue shields, dude, man, that'd be nice. That would be really nice. So I think this is gonna be really good, man, and I am so gosh darn pumped about doing vault breakers with you guys. Bat, what you think about it?

SPEAKER_03 1:07:02

Alright, well, as the standalone PDE god, yes, um I'm I am so excited for this, dude. Oh my god, I can't even tell you. Like, it's been so hard for me to play this game in the last two weeks because I I I just want Vault Breakers already. Right. Like, I don't want to face other people, I just want my PvE back. Cause I have thrived in this game with the PvE this season. Sure. Um, I love it. But you know, something that I haven't really seen that's been clarified that now that I'm thinking about it kind of worries me. Is I hope that it's not on the same timetable as regular cryo, where it's only available two or three days a week, because that is going to irritate me.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:02

Very good question.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:03

From what what I saw from the patch note preview today, it seems that it will be full time uh for the first two weeks, and then I don't know what comes after that. I don't know if it gets taken down, you know, to kind of be like, hey, this is where we need to improve it, or now it's gonna be a rotating, you know, thing. I'm not sure. But for the first two weeks, we can for sure, you know, run it hard and and really explore what all it has to offer. Much like sponsored survival farm farm it while it's there.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:38

And the other thing is that like while I'm super excited for vault breakers and learning all this stuff and you know, doing the progression that it's gonna, you know, evolve and you know, earning the skins and stuff and whatnot. Um, sorry, that's the cradle. Um but you know, doing all that stuff, I also feel like especially for casual players, unfortunately I think that everybody's gonna be in there and I'm gonna like make no progression on the regular game. So that also scares me. Right, right, right. You know, I still need to fatten up my vault a little bit. So I'm excited, but there's that give and take. So maybe after two weeks I'll be like, okay, thank god I don't I don't have the option to go in there anymore. Because I need to do other stuff. But it could also be like, why did they take it from me? Yeah I mean we're just gonna have to wait to see, but yeah, dude. I'm I'm so pumped. Like, I just want to get the next week over with. I'm so looking forward to to it starting. Um and also apologies to everybody in in our little um group that we have that we play with. I have been so busy in my day-to-day life. Um, I have been coming home late and doing stuff around the house and then going to bed early. So I'm not dead tired the next day. It's just been a recurring thing. I'm hoping that once vault breakers drops, that will stop. But it's been a rough couple weeks, so hopefully I will start playing more.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:35

Yeah, I hope that turns around a little bit for you.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:38

Yeah, because it's been it's been rough.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:41

And that's why I think a lot of people can relate to us, man. Like, that's what we can bring to the table. Like, yeah, I mean, we have I'll bless. I mean, it's kind of been me too, man. Like, it this has been this has been a busy week. Uh, even on my side, we got a lot going on right now. A lot of things are going on. I was that there was even a point today. I was concerned, like, could it can I make it to the podcast tonight? Um, like it's been wild here too. And I think a lot of people can relate to us because, like, hey, we are the grinders, we got mouth to feed, we got obligated, we got bit bills to pay, mouths to feed, places to be, things to do, obligations to meet. So, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:14

Our time with games is precious. I felt so bad when you guys said that you've been needing a third because I've been sleeping. Um, yeah, hopefully I will start be able to be able to play a little bit more, but you know, there's I do have other obligations I gotta take care of. So just bear with me and I'll be there. No, I promise. May not be today, may not be tomorrow, but I'll be there.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:43

He'll come back around. And hey, everybody, I say this like hey, you by the time you all fine listeners will be listening to this episode, it will be Ferrari Day. So you can think of this podcast episode as Christmas Eve before this mid-season package. Christmas Eve! Crap it up for Christmas Eve, baby! Christmas Eve, let's go.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:04

Oh, uh, and real quick, speaking of the podcast, um, I just want to give a quick shout out, because I don't know if you've mentioned it. Uh, we officially hit 750 downloads.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:15

Oh, yeah, let's go. Let's go.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:18

We gotta clap out of 12 episodes right now. That's nice. For anybody. Thank you. Thank you to the little cult that we have growing. Um, it's really cool to get those updates from from Old Town just randomly, kind of. Um so yeah, just stick around with us if you like this.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:39

Uh if you don't mind, I'd like to throw something in there. I really appreciate Old Town how transparent you are with the podcast. Um, again, I'm someone that you know podcasts are my my go-to. They're my window, they're my hey, I need some me time. You know, I have some uh I have some audio processing issues uh in life. So putting in some uh noise canceling, you know, AirPods or whatever it might be and listening to a podcast is like it's been my go-to for years. And you don't get a lot of that transparency on the other end with most podcasts out there, right? It's it's you know, hey, we don't really talk about our download numbers, hey, we don't really talk about how the podcast is, you know, made. We don't really want you to see that side. We just want you to see the finished product and and the here's this hour of content, uh and and that's what you get. So hey, kudos to you for really kind of showing like this is what goes into it, this is where we're at. You know, I'm I'm you know, I I'm uh a family guy, I've got these other responsibilities, and the podcast is is this passion project, and I want that to be something the whole community kind of feels a little bit of investment in. And um, yeah, I really, really appreciate that.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:59

Yeah, man. Thank you, thank you so much. That means a lot to me. Yeah, I I do. Um, yeah, I do. Uh I don't mind being transparent. Uh, I I feel like that people a lot, most more so than not, people appreciate that. Like, I don't care to share, like, yeah, yo, we we've got seven our pot the podcast reached 750 downloads. That's that's nothing to some people. To me, that's everything, dude. I never thought back in April, dude, we would get to a point where this pod were 700, well, not 750 people, but that this podcast has hit 750 downloads, and we're on our way to 1k, man. Like, that's just that's awesome. I I don't never mind sharing, like, hey, yeah, I got billed today. I've okay, we got six hours to play with. It's like minutes on a foe, baby.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:52

Like, I'm running out of minutes, guys.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:56

Gotta get to that night and weekend time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So yeah, um, yeah, but hey, you say I I've never heard no nobody has said that to me. So I I do appreciate that feedback. I I really genuinely do. Um, all right. Well, man, uh, all great stuff. Good grief. All great stuff. So today, Bungie, literally breaking news. Bungie has gave us uh an appetizer to the mid-season preview of what's coming this coming Tuesday, I believe, July 21st. Am I correct, gentlemen? July 21st. Sorry, sir. Okay, all right. So I wrote down nine specific things from that little video that they shared us. So I don't know if you guys caught some of these things. So, number one, I noticed a bubble shield nerf. I noticed a quality of life improvement. I I'm gonna here's what we're gonna do. I'm gonna name all of them and then let's start talking about them. I noticed a bubble shield nerf. I noticed a quality of a quality of life improvement where you can now equip a sponsored kit with like the push of a button instead of having to go back into the vendor and re-equip it. That's a really great great quality of life change. I I got excited when I saw that. And that ain't much, but but still, it it a good little improvement. I saw implant icons. Very interesting, looks good. I feel like that's gonna be a banger. In time, we're gonna learn what those icons mean, and we won't even have to read into it as much. We'll just know, like, hey, this is an implant that increases your melee, or you know, based off the icon. Um I kind of chuckle at myself. I noticed an assassin nerf. I noticed um, I noticed an assassin nerf. I noticed the uh the cradle evolution. I noticed Thief Drone Dark Sight in Nightmarsh. I noticed there's there's only two more. I noticed loadout limited equipment, meaning you can they're they're they're finally capping how many grenades, like really putting a hard cap on how many grenades you can bring into a game. This last one, obviously the very last one is Vault Breakers, but we've done talked about that. Uh so number eight on my list, this one surprised me. I noticed it's coming back, boys. I noticed a WSTR buff. There at the end of that video. I guess we'll start right there. At the end of that video, it was a clip of somebody running up on another runner with a purple shield, and they had an LMG with an active shield protecting them. The waster, the waster dropped them. Two hit. The waster two hit them.

SPEAKER_01 1:18:12

Uh according to the patch note previews, um, the WSTR will now be a two-meter two-hit kill on purple shields, no attachments. Oh, and a four-meter on max range attach. It's coming back. Okay. So full attachments within four meters. You can now double top uh a purple shield. Oh that dude, it's coming back. When vandals get their hand on that thing, it's gonna be. I mean, it's you're gonna have to hit your shots with that magnum.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:46

That's Barry, we need that trading range, baby. We gotta get our hand down path because the waist. This SMG ain't doing jack. Yo, wait, what's that gun called that they tried to what's that silent SNG called? KKV. KKV, what you got to say about that?

SPEAKER_03 1:19:07

This ain't doing anything, bro. They're just looking at me and I'm dead.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:16

Yeah, I don't even know how I so there I I think it it's common um everybody's on the same page. This has not been confirmed, I don't think, by Bungie, but I think we all know deep down a Mizzy nerf is coming. But it's so interesting, but they're about to buff the waster.

SPEAKER_01 1:19:34

So um, I I if you don't mind me interjecting here, I'm wondering if it's gonna be a hey, the Mizzy and the battle pistol are not in line with everything else. So we're gonna we're gonna bring those down a tad, but what we're gonna try to do is bring some other things up a tad, right? We're gonna kind of meet in the middle. Um, I think Bungie really learned their lesson early on in um Destiny 1, especially Destiny 2, where it was like if you nerf something into the ground, people are just gonna drop, drop whole segments of your game. They're just going to, you know, rage, they're gonna all these things. So instead, we're gonna, you know, hey, let's elevate, let's bring the floor up, and not just, you know, I mean, I don't know if you guys played back in the DS1 era, but do you remember like fusion rifles just getting absolutely uh molished there for a bit? And like, I mean, it just doesn't feel good, right? Especially in a game like Destiny, where hey, maybe you really worked hard to get that exotic, you know, uh hand cannon, right? And then the next patch comes out, and that said hand cannon is now nerfed to the point where it just might as well sit in your vault. Like, that's not fun. Um, so I'm really hoping it's it's more of this case that we're gonna get the patch notes next week and we're all just gonna be a little blown away with like, oh, everything is getting touched. Bungie is really on the board here, dialing in you know, numbers, and um that's what I'm you know really optimistic for right now. Go ahead, Bat.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:12

See, I I actually think Overwatch could take a note from Marathon, because they'll take a uh character and they'll just nerf him to the ground. You'll never see that character again until they're agreed.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:25

Agreed. Yep. And then whenever the new the new character comes out, they're always you know overpowered because gotta make that money.

SPEAKER_02 1:21:33

Yeah, it's malga. Oh freaking Malga, dude. Oh, Jesus.

SPEAKER_01 1:21:42

Yeah, those were the things I caught as well, uh, old town, just to get back to your list. The bubble nerf shirt, uh uh nerf. Uh, I'm not sure about the invis. I don't know if that's maybe a tweak. Like, hey, we're not nerfing Assassin Invis, but you gotta be a bit more careful with like how you use it, might be coming out. Um, some people in the comments kind of spotted like, well, he was walking through water, he had bright light on him, so now is it more of a shroud? Like, hey, you're in shadow, you're still, but you're in bright light, now you're a little bit more visible. Like, maybe that's the way we're going with it.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:19

I think it's any time that they're gonna be in water.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:23

Water? That would be interesting. Yeah, that'd be interesting.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:26

Think about Dire Marsh. Yeah, you ain't gonna be walk be walking anywhere invis. I cannot wait if that's the way that it works, because Assassin's gonna get some payback.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:38

So I can't wait. I think I think the answer is actually bad for me, great for y'all. I think the the reality is even worse. I'll tell you what I noticed about that assassin nerf. It looked like to me, you can no longer sprint with active cloak, and you just you can only okay. For example, Rook, when Rook uses his uh IMUSC or whatever that power is called, he can't run. He can't sprint, he has to does that make sense, like he has to go at regular speed.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:17

Yes, that would also be detrimental to an assassin.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:21

That's a I that's what I think I noticed. I I don't think in that if that is if my assessment is correct, and Assassin can come this patch, can no longer sprint with active camo, that's a big hit. That's a big hit to assassin. That's so interesting.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:44

You know what would even be a bigger brain move with that is introduce this. You know, you want to invis, you gotta be walking speed, right? Uh, you're sprinting, it's losing. But but old town, we know you love your invis, so we're gonna we're gonna help you out a little bit. Here's a gold core that if you have it equipped, you can sprint. But now everyone in the lobby sees you sprinting in vis and says, that guy's got a gold core.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:10

Yeah, uh, I I think you hit the nail on the head. It it does seem like that's the direction they're going. I I think they're about to nerf assassin. I could misread it. I I could not be looking at the video correctly. We will see July 21st, but I think an assassin nerf is coming. Uh, and and obviously, he is who I've maimed this season. Um good job. I'm I'll clap it up. Like I I'm cool. I really am cool with this. Um, because I genuinely love all of the runner shells. I understand, I can see the big picture. I know assassin is a big pain point for a lot of players, especially in solos. So if they felt like a nerf was necessary for them, totally cool with me, man. Absolutely, totally cool. And honestly, that was probably one of the fairest things they could have done. It's like, okay, how can we bring assassin down without totally killing him? So if that's true, and you can no longer, which to me, that's a pretty big nerf. Because that because to me, that that totally changes how you gotta think about assassin. You can't go, you can't cloak, you can't sprint into fights, you can't slide no more. Dude, this is this is actually a pretty big change to Assassin, and I think you're gonna see um people will rejoice. I want people to be happy. That's why I said that's why I clapped it up. Um, if more people are happy that Assassin get Assassin's getting nerfed, hey, awesome, good, cool with me. Um, I I think you're gonna see you might see a drop-off of assassins because you're gonna have to think about how when and how you use that camo more now. And people maybe even including myself, that's not gonna feel as good because you're used to playing them the old way, and you might see y'all. This might y'all might see a shift. We might come up on a new meta. You might see a lot of people drop assassin and start picking up new shells.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:14

Yeah, I can see that. Uh, I will say that this buff to thief uh really caught me off guard, but I like it. The the dark sight uh on the drone. Yeah. I mean Dire Marsh Knight, that's awesome. Upper complex, right? Doing the hidden numbers. Uh, there you go. You don't need no dark sight scope, you just have a thief. Um I think that's really cool.

SPEAKER_02 1:26:37

Yeah, yeah, that is that is cool. Bad any thought, any comments get the buttons with her drone?

SPEAKER_01 1:26:43

That's a good question. How great would that be?

SPEAKER_02 1:26:46

That would be broken.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:49

Wait, wait, wait, what bit? Right there, Bungie. What buttons in upper complex. Yeah, when like the turns turn green, when all the buttons turn green and whatnot, you have to hit so the dark site would let you see the numbers that are labeled that you can only see in dark site. So, those listening, if you're not familiar, upper complex is its whole its own little raid, and and part of it is these rooms you work through, you hit a master button, and then buttons throughout the rooms that you're in will flash. You have to hit the buttons one that are turning the green color or whatever color you have it set to. And then you progress. However, if you have something that has dark sight, uh like a scope, or now the thief um drone, you can see these numbers written to them. If you hit the buttons in the correct order, um so one through six, one through five, whatever it might be. Uh, when you finish off the dungeon, you kill the boss, uh, there will be an extra spawn room, or not spawn room, I'm sorry, treasure room for you to hit some extra loot, some goodies. For your effort. Um, I mean, we we were just up there the other night, the three of us, and it's it's chaotic. I mean, it's crazy. But if you could be like, hey, I'm gonna go hide in this corner, I'm gonna throw my drone out, I'll take care of all the buttons. You know, you two just kill ads, like that'd be pretty clutch. I you know, that would be pretty cool.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:22

That ain't a bad strategy. That ain't bad. They do better. Um, yeah, no, all great, great feedback, man. Thank you for thank you for breaking that down. For uh, thank you for breaking that down for all of our listeners. Bat, I can't wait to ask you this. I can't wait to ask you this. Bat, they literally showcased cradle evolution. It does indeed go back to zero. What do you think about that?

SPEAKER_03 1:28:52

Prestige. Oh, I'm I'm gonna try not to be emotional.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:56

Prestige Batman skins.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:59

I'm gonna do it.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:00

Dragging rice.

SPEAKER_03 1:29:01

I'm and I'm gonna I'm gonna hate all life for the time that it takes me to fill it back up. But one thing that I will say is that right now I have a pretty juicy vault. Which is great. Because now when I prestige, I'm gonna have a big jump.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:24

Um we kind of skipped straight into this from the vaultbreakers, but something I'm wondering, and and we're not gonna know this, I don't think, till we're fully in the patch notes and playing vault breakers, is do you all think there will be contracts for vault breakers? Do you think Cyber is going to send us in or Seki is gonna be like, hey, we need you to go in and do these things, knock out these contracts, because that's an awesome way to go ahead and start getting that cradle built back up. I love that.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:01

I think it needs to be Maida.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:04

Mida has to see. You know my love for Batman. He likes bombs, explosions. I do. I do love Maida.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:12

I want you to break into their bolts, steal their stuff, and tell no one.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:17

I don't know if you were watching uh the other night, Batman, but we played it was RyzeCon, Bat, and I, and we played with him just voice acting Mida, and it was fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 1:30:30

Bat would like this. Go with that. I love you to bring up Font on the face. Don't tell no one.

SPEAKER_01 1:30:40

My favorite faction, which kind of goes, I guess they're optimistic. I guess it links together. Um they're optimistic in their own way. Uh but yeah, I do I do really like Mida. But I, you know, I was thinking, you know, Vault Breakers, it's this roguelite mode. I personally love roguelites, you know, games like Soros and Returnal Hades. And so I was like, yeah, that's cool. We get this new currency, we can like keep building our kits. Uh you could take it over, buy stuff for the PvP lobbies. But then I was just sitting there today, I was like, you know, I wonder if we'll get actual contracts. Like Dyer Marsh Knight gave us contracts, right? Like we got contracts for that. Um, so it'd be really cool to see some of these contracts that really want you to push yourself to get like to the you know end game of this mode, um, and then rewarding you with that.

SPEAKER_03 1:31:32

I like it. You know, I really like it. I just thought of this like as we're talking about it, but you know, a lot of people were were upset with this season because there wasn't a lot of progression with the story. Well, they just presented a possibility to do that with ball breakers. There could be a whole nother storyline where it's like runner, go in there, steal their stuff, and then leave.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:07

Speaking of story, I definitely have some uh I I think I'll save that when we get to our season three uh segment here, but yes, uh I do like this idea, Batman, of hey, here's a PvE mode, like let's let's throw that Lorne exposition at him.

SPEAKER_03 1:32:22

Yeah, and you could like you could explore it more because you're not faced with the threat of these other runners.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:31

Absolutely. Um I will warn the community right now, the Discord community, if you match in with me, you know, and I'm sitting solo and I'm we what we go in, there's a good chance you're gonna be like, where'd yellow go? I'm just gonna be breathing in cryo. Like I'm I don't have to worry about other players. I'm not rushed to get out of my spawn. I'm just gonna be like, all right, let's see what this map's really got, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:32:55

Oh, this is really cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:32:56

I like this design. You might want to wait until like the third or fourth day to to link up with yellow when I'm actually like, all right, yeah, let's go play the objective. I've I've seen all the pretty things now.

SPEAKER_03 1:33:07

I'll be right there with you because one of the things that I'm looking forward to the most is learning the map. Like I want to learn where all the secret spots are where I can run away and hide, or this is a good place to push.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:20

Peak lines, where where can we get a peak that someone might not expect, your sight lines you don't understand, where you know, where exfils are most likely, you know, your best exfil routes, yeah, all that stuff. I mean, I do love cryo. I love the the chaotic energy of it. I love the pressure when you load in of like, all right, we gotta be on it. But it it will be really nice to kind of slow down a little bit for this mode.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:44

Because I feel like like what you guys are describing, like I feel like that's our biggest hurdle right now with crop with cryo. Like we just us three in here talking right now, we just don't know the map very good, and that's our biggest struggle. We don't know how to navigate it in in in high intensity situations when we're trying to get out. And my hope is that Vault Breakers really helps us out in this department.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:08

Cause I mean, I felt it in the sponsored survival mode, both with Dyer and Perimeter. Like, I don't know if you've noticed, but I feel slightly more comfortable on Dyer now. Even during the day. Agreed. I'm not as scared to go in. Like, I've learned a lot of places that I didn't know before.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:30

Um it's just that repetition and and having the time to really soak it in for sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:34:38

Uh the the Dire Marsh has not been nowhere near, and I'm happy to say this, Dire Marsh has not been nowhere near as bad this in season two as it was in season one. Yeah. Nowhere near. Nowhere near.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:52

So um uh kind of going back to the cradle. Um, I I am excited to do it. I'm gonna hate seeing all my colors go away. Because it's it's just beautiful the way it is right now, and I love looking at it.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:11

That's so cool. Um uh do you mind if I ask Old Town where are you at on your cradle?

unknown 1:35:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:18

I'm at like level 67 right now on my very halfway to 68. So I am c closing in on the end.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:26

You are closing in. That's impressive. Nice job.

SPEAKER_02 1:35:29

Just get ready for that 210,000 XP on that little 69. Oh, speak hey, hey, hey, I'm gonna interrupt for a minute. We did not talk, hey, they did, I think they announced they are reverting the the 25% nerf.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:47

That's gonna really help, dude. So wait, if that nerf gets reverted, we're back to beginning of season cradle. And then on top of that, if you prestige, you get some bump, whatever that might be. That's that's pretty great.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:02

Plus, if you've progressed far enough in Sekagucchi and unlocked it, you have more progression.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:10

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's right about that. Like Batman. Oh no, guys. Now I'm starting to flirt with the idea of prestige.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:16

Unfortunately, Batman knew this was coming and he's mad about it, but he's gonna do it. It's the only flex he has this season.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:26

It's a good flex, man. It's a good flex.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:29

I'm gonna tell you, speaking of flexes, I'll tell you a stat. I can't it it if mine are terrible. I I hope it is because that'll make it even funnier. I can't wait to see what stat like Bungie has told us we're getting stats, like we're getting rugged.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:44

I can't wait to see my dude. I'm excited. Mine are gonna be so bad.

SPEAKER_02 1:36:48

I can't wait. No, I can't wait to see mine. How bad?

SPEAKER_01 1:36:53

This kind of segues into our like season three for the future of marathon here. Um, but on top of stats, something I would really like. You know, we talked about Overwatch taking a note from Bungie. Something I think Marilyn could take a note from Overwatch is I would like accolades at the end of a match. I would like to like slap a you know best team player on Old Town. I'd like to put a you know best shot on Batman, whatever it is, you know, some some accolades, and I think that they should translate into giving you a little bit um of the carry points. Um I think they'd have to do it in a way where it's like if us three, you know, we ran a whole night, we can't just sit there and keep loading each other up with you know accolades and carry points. But maybe it's like, hey, the first time you give a new player within 24 hours an accolade, they get you know 15 extra carry points. After that, you know, it goes down to five or or even two or three. But I think it's just you know, it's a way when you're playing with randos to be like, hey, I saw you, I saw that effort, hey, I saw what you really clutched up there, and and throwing that on at the end, or you know, hey, you played a really good triage, like great heels. Um yeah, and just kind of you know, we're talking about like we want this community to grow, we want the community to to be a place that isn't, you know, uh there's some aspects from Overwatch I like. I do not miss the Overwatch community personally. So I don't I don't want to go that route, but I would love to take a few things that might boost some community engagement in Marathon. And and it's so easy to do at the end of a match, just hey, here's a few carry points, great job. You know, maybe you throw some funny ones in there, some meme ones, um, you know, just to keep it fresh. But you know, if we if we got our stats and I can see your stats, you can see my stats, and then we're throwing accolades at each other, you know, now we're starting to kind of build a little bit more of that virtual community.

SPEAKER_02 1:38:56

I mean, we really truly are some like-minded individuals because when you said like I basically you alluded to I love Overwatch, but I don't, but I don't want its community, that's basically exactly how I feel. I just I love Overwatch. Um it's an amazing game. There are some amazing people. There are some amazing people that play Overwatch, but as a whole, I I this might be a hot take. I I just don't like the Overwatch community. There is a lot of individuals on that game, dude. The culture, I don't know if it, I don't know who's to blame for this, but like the culture of that game, there's some people just some piss poor attitude. I've come from some games, dude, with some people some toxic behavior, some just piss people with just piss poor whiny attitudes. And I'm just like, y'all, I'm too old for this. Like, yeah, I'm too old. It's a game, yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:56

As a support main, I can only take so much of a Genji asking me for heels. So I just I gotta shut it off eventually.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:03

And you know, we uh not to make this an overwatch. By the way, we gotta play some Overwatch sometime. That'd be fun. We we need to break some. Yo, we did we'll we'll we'll go bring in some running out of breath community and we'll we'll have an we'll have like an overwatch night every once in a you know what would be fun is if you had like if there was like a monthly game night.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:21

Hey, for August, we're playing this game that's you know not marathon during you know this night or whatever, if you if you want to hop over. That would be pretty cool. Just that would be shake it up a little bit. Yeah, of course. Some of those games allow you know bigger teams so we can kind of break free of the the trio and get you know five, six people in.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:39

Yes, yes. We could have you. I mean, I've I think even Fallen has shown some interest in playing this LOB. Yo, we could roll like five deep, baby. We could roll like five deep on Overwatch, that'd be so fun. But I uh last thing I'm gonna say about Overwatch, I am a take tank main, so you can only imagine the things people say to me. I'm bashed, baby.

SPEAKER_00 1:41:01

You can only imagine if I'm not bashed, baby.

SPEAKER_02 1:41:10

Hey, I don't always have the best games, and God knows if I'm playing rank sometimes in quick play. If I make a bad play on Reinhardt, I'm gonna hear about it. Tank gift, tank gift, you're terrible, trash tank. GG, GG tanks trash. Anyways, alrighty. Our final segment tonight for everybody is uh Yellow's kind of teased it already. Uh, it's called Open Discussion. How important is season three for the future of Marathon? There's somebody that I want to give credit to off the pop, because I I think it's always important if you pull from other people to be sure and reference those those people or reference your sources of where you got the information from. So some of the ideas that I'm going to be bringing to the table today is from a YouTuber that I found named Noan Chancer? I think it says that's how you say his last name. Known Chancer put out a um about three days ago, he put out a video called How Marathon Survives Beyond 2026. And I I think he had some really interesting discussions in that video, and he had some really good points, some really good solutions to maybe some pain points that the game has right now. So here's a lot of some of the ideas that was talked about in that video. Um, high the gear PvP PvP players are gatekeeping casual players by wiping the lobbies with top-tier builds. One of the uh the uh a proposed fix. Uh loot and he's not the only one I've heard. I've heard a couple of other content creators say something along the lines of loot value graded matchmaking system. If you queue up with a cheap budget kit, you should be placed in lobbies with other budget players. If you load in with gold tier gear, you get thrown in with alpha predators. Um, let's just hone in on that for a minute. Loot value graded matchmaking system. I've heard other people uh c coin it like shield lock modes, like if you if you have a blue shield, you're only gonna go against other people with blue shields. You know, man, um I'm not opposed to this. Um there's there this is a this uh this is a double-edged sword because like you could look at it uh with the way of yeah, that sounds amazing. If I load in with a cheap kit, I only want to go against other players with cheap with cheap kits. So I feel I got a fair match. Or you know, if I load in with with with um deluxe gear, I want to go against people with like-minded deluxe gear. But then there's the other side of the coin, and and there's in most of these solutions, there's always gonna be both sides of the coin. The other side of the coin is like, no, that's the thrill I like. I like the thrill of I can go from zero to hero. I can cue in with an arachne-sponsored kit with a magnum, and if I play my cards right, especially in solos, I can take out somebody. If I get angle, I can take out somebody with a blue, maybe even a purple or a purple shield player, and I can take all their stuff. What I think if if Bungie, and I want you guys to chime in, this is the last thing I'm gonna say about it. I think this is an interesting idea. I think this, I think a loot value graded matchmaking system is something they should test. They should have another, you know, they do all these experimental cues, they do all these experimental tests. This is something Bungie, I really think, should play around with and see how people vibe with it. Uh, what what do you guys think about that?

SPEAKER_01 1:44:59

I am someone who I mentioned before coming from the Souls and Souls light games, like really, really into those these last ten years or so. And in Souls games and in the Dark Souls games and and those like it, you come in weak and you're constantly fighting things stronger than you until you kind of get to end game and you are, you know, hey, I am, you know, a boss in my own right now. I am this kind of alpha predator. Uh and so to kind of equate that to marathon, I like I like the thrill um of going in. Hey, it's our first round of the night. We're going free kit. We're gonna go see what we can what we can take off people, right? I'm going in. You have stuff I want, other players, right? I am coming for you. Um, I'm not worrying about a contract right now. I'm not trying to take out, you know, a commander. I am I am hunting you down. I like that play personally. I also like the ver the variety of how chaotic multi-team fights get when we all are rocking different kits. Uh we roll in as a trio, the three of us. We're you know, we're going we're going diet kits, a little mix smash, but we're all rocking blue shields. Hey, here's a team. We got the jump on them. Uh we got two blues and a purple shield. Oh man, third team just pushed in from North Relay. They are rocking full purples. Uh apparently there's a random rook here that's got a green shield on. Uh, and then there's we hear a third team on the way, we're not sure what they have right now. Right now you're in this interesting mix of like, you know, I can pop this guy and then maybe get that last shot off to finish him, but this guy's got full purple, and and and now we're really kind of you know having this little dance of what's what. I will say I like this idea for ranked. I think when you go into a ranked match, you should kind of have a tier that you are like, I'm in this tier, I'm rocking this gear, I'm gonna be with people in this tier with this gear. I think rank should always be at the highest point that you are currently at in your marathon career for that season. So when you are climbing up the rank and you're up there with gold, you're fighting gold, right? And you're rocking your gold shields and your gold gear. Uh, and then you know, same with purple, whatever. Um so I think you know, there could be a little bit of both worlds are here. Here's the mix mash, here's the pool, you're not sure what you're gonna get. And hey, you know what? I'm rested, I'm feeling good, I'm warmed up, old town's here, Batman's here. Let's go do some ranked, like let's really put our our vault to the test here tonight. And you know, we're queuing into ranked and and we're putting our gear on the line, but we're gonna steal some really nice gear too, right? If we if we pull the W.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:02

So interesting feedback. Matt, what you think?

SPEAKER_03 1:48:06

Um I feel very similar to him. Um one of the things that I think needs to be mentioned, um, I don't know. I feel like it would be very difficult for them to pull off, if I'm being a hundred percent honest. Um in the sense of if they're gonna do it by color gradient. Do you know how many times we've loaded into a game? And I don't have stuff to bring in. So now you guys are loaded, kidding, I'm running with a free kid. That's gonna be difficult.

SPEAKER_02 1:48:49

Very good point.

SPEAKER_03 1:48:51

Right now, you've mentioned you're you're you're out of blue blue shields. Yes. All I've got is blue shields. Also gonna be difficult. Gonna be difficult. Very good point. But on the other flip side, if they try to do it like with credit-based, people are gonna find ways to to manipulate that to where they're loading in with the cheapest weapons they can find, but the highest quality heals. Or you know, they're gonna bring in a bubble shield, and they're still gonna be in the lower output, but fighting on a higher skill level because of what they brought in.

SPEAKER_02 1:49:32

Because of things you both have stated, and you both did a great job of representing both sides of the coin, up the the positives and the negatives. I think this is something Bungie should be careful with. And if they're if they want to take the community feedback on a potential loot value graded matchmaking system. I don't think it should be I don't think it should fully control the whole game. I think it should be like something like ex definitely experiment with it first. Experiment with it. See see how see how it's received. If it's received well, make it make it a rotation. Make it to where it don't become the permanent portion of the game and it possibly kills the identity of the game. But you know, it's something that comes around every so every ever every other week or so and for the people that do like it. I don't know. Hopefully that's a pretty fair take, what I said right there. But that that is interesting.

SPEAKER_03 1:50:31

Yeah. I mean, I'm I'm interested in trying it. I just don't know what kind of direction they would go with the variety that's posed in the game. I don't know how they would like lock that down. Right. So it'd be interesting to see.

SPEAKER_02 1:50:48

In this in this individual's video, he also mentioned a pure PvP mode. Would the game benefit from a pure PvP mode where you can load in and fight other players without the gear fear problem that many casuals experience? Would this hurt the identity of the game? These are really tough questions. I will say the PvP is my favorite part of the game. I um um yellow earlier in hit when he was talking, he he said like the thrill of the hunt. I am coming after you. I love that rush of if I beat you, what you got is mine. Um, I love the PvP and the fighting in this game. And I would be interested if they wanted to throw in something where you're you're not gonna lose your stuff, but you can rank up somehow, some way, and you can you can you can hone, you can sharpen your gun skills, you can sharpen your mechanics, and you can fight other people in an arena almost type of mode or whatever. This is something that's attainable. I think this is pretty attainable. They could use a map they already have, or they could use outpost, or uh they could cut off a segment. I don't know that they could do something. I think this one is probably a little bit more far-fetched than some of the others that that we've got listed on here. I'm open for it, but that's because I love the PvP. Would this hurt the identity of the game? They would have to be careful with that. Um, they they they would have to be careful with like splitting the player base real bad, especially if the number, hey, if the if we can find a way to get the numbers up, no harm, no foul. But if the numbers remain you know in a rough spot like we are at this current time, they would have to be very careful if they start you know toying around that. I think this is also something they should experiment with it. You know, you'll test it out, see how it's received. So I'll ask you guys real quick, what do you think about some what do you think about like a pure like a like a pure PvP, like no bots, like you're just fighting other people in maybe a smaller environment.

SPEAKER_01 1:53:07

Uh go ahead, Batman, take this one first.

SPEAKER_03 1:53:11

Um, I think that it would be very, very interesting. Um one of the things that I that I really liked about um PvE is the fact that I could go in and I could like you know use a different shell or use a different gun and kind of you know test myself and see what I liked, what I don't like. Um you would have the same experience in just a PvP. Um because you would find like oh, I like to use this weapon against a triage, or I like to use this weapon more against a destroyer, or this is not a good option for the thief because I can't trap him.

SPEAKER_02 1:53:57

Very good point.

SPEAKER_03 1:53:58

Um I think it would be cool if not to like morph it into like a Call of Duty sense, but I think it would be cool if it was like a specific weapon only mode. So like everybody loads in with the Zeus or everybody loads in with the bullet punch, or everybody loads in with the volley rifle, so that everybody is on the same level playing field and now it's just pure skill. I think that would be cool, but I don't want it to take over the game. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_02 1:54:39

It makes perfect sense, and I agree with you. What'd you think, Yellow?

SPEAKER_01 1:54:45

Yeah, so I had mentioned before that before kind of getting into Marathon, the extraction shooter I was playing the most for the last few years now was Hunt Showdown, and they actually added something like this. Um the something got the community kind of rallied around, hey, could we try this? Maybe do an event around it. Um, and it became a permanent mode. And the way it works is one POI on the map will randomly you know be chosen. Um everyone spawns around that POI, and it's just it's just a fight, you know, to the last man standing most of the time. You you can extract, there's usually like one, sometimes two extracts, uh, but your chances of getting out are slim to numb unless you know you're the last one standing or you've crippled the last couple couple players to the point where they're not really a threat, and you can, you know, take your time. Now, the one big thing that the community learned was you have to really decide, hey, I'm going into this, and the you know, the odds are never guaranteed you're getting out on a norm, but now they're even like more not in your favor, right? Because it's just it's once the fighting starts, once you get in there, it's it's not stopping till you're either you know a a bag or you're looting the bags. So it it does kind of change your playstyle, uh, which you know could be good for some. Some might enjoy that. Hey, that's fresh. Hey, hey, old town, we're having a bad, bad couple runs right now. Like we're just you know, outpost is just rough for us tonight. Let's go play some of this mode. Let's just let's just load in there with some guns, you know. We're not super attached to. Let's just let's just have some fun. Like, let's just go get our aim, you know, locked in. Let's go see if we can uh you know take some take some teams out and get out in this, you know, more chaotic, action-packed way. It could be a good way to warm up for the night. That's what we used this clash mode in hunt for quite often. Uh, hey, it's been a while, haven't played hunt in a while. Let's warm up a couple times on on this clash mode, right? Let's just take shotguns in. We know it's gonna be in a in a one POI, so we're just gonna sprint in there with our shoddies and and get the blood flowing a little bit. Um it's also kind of great. You mentioned earlier, some days you just get home on your lunch break. Hey, I got 20 minutes. What can I do? I could do a quick clash, right? Those are so fast. I mean, let me load in, put together a quick, you know, low-key kit, jump in there, play, and and then I'm I'm heading back out to do whatever I gotta do that day. Um, so I could definitely see the value. The big thing is I don't think it could be a permanent mode because again, we're splitting the players, right? We're we're increasing queue times. Not everybody's okay with waiting around on a queue time, but I definitely think it could be something that cycles through. Uh honestly, I think it would be really cool if we had, hey, cryo is always gonna be our weekend thing. It's Thursday, it's cryo day. Hey, this is the first week of the month, so we've got vault breakers going for the week. After this, we have Clash coming out, where it's our PvP only mode. After that, we've got, you know, whatever the other thing is. Um, you know, maybe it's sponsored survival. Uh, and then we circle back. So every week you're kind of dipping into a different mode, but you're not splitting the player base into five different things, right? Um, I think Arc Raiders kind of learned to wrest in with that. They just kept pumping out, well, you can do this, and you can do this on this map, and now there's this weather on this map, and you can try this, and now they've learned, hey, we gotta time gate things, we gotta let things, you know, hey, in six hours this will open up and that will close. Because people were getting in matches and no one else was there, you know what I mean? They kind of walked around this ghost town, yeah.

SPEAKER_04 1:58:51

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:58:52

Maybe, maybe I heard a shot across the map. I'm not gonna go chase that down. Like, there just wasn't enough player interaction, so we gotta avoid that. Um, but I could definitely see it being like a fun thing, you know, especially if you're just like, guys, I have been playing cryo all weekend. I need a break. Can we just like have a night where we're just we're grabbing our favorite shotguns and let's go run into this clash mode or whatever it's called, and let's just go, let's just go cowboy it up, shooting and rooting and tootin' for a night, you know? And and that could be really fun, right? That could be a good healthy break of of the normal thing. Just like Vault Breaker, I think's gonna be this fun. Like, this is different. I'm still playing Marathon, I'm still enjoying the gameplay of this game that I love, but I'm getting to try something due. I'm I'm flexing a couple different muscles I'm not using when I'm running around perimeter, you know, tricking people with my minds as Sentinel.

SPEAKER_02 1:59:51

Oh, great feedback, great, yeah, great, great breakdown and bringing that multiple, and clearly there, as you stay there, like clearly there's upsides to that. Uh, and I agree with you. I think I think that they would just have to be careful, not not split up the player base too too much. So I'm gonna ask a very broad question here, and it it it it it kind of is what I kind of struggle with in my mind. It's kind of what I go back and forth with. So, like you know, we talk a lot about not wanting to change the identity of the game. And I think a lot of people, especially in our circle, are very passionate about not changing the identity of the game. But here's what I go back and forth about. Um, it it's like, okay, we are low, we are loving the identity of the game, but the reality is not enough casuals unfortunately are enjoying the current identity of the game. Therefore, it's forcing Bungie's hand to get out there and really experiment with things. So I don't know. Uh ultimately, when push comes to shove, at the end of the day, I want this game to survive, I want this game to flourish, and whatever they think they gotta do, even if it comes at the cost of maybe how I like the game a little bit, but to get more people in here, I'm willing to make that sacrifice. Um, if if if if a pure PvP mode would bring a lot of people in, send it. If uh if a loot value graded system would bring an influx of people in, send it. If if if making PVE permanent would bring in a whole bunch of more people, you know, send it. Um, I don't know. That's what I go back and forth with. Like like obviously us three right now, well, we wouldn't be here right now if we didn't. You know, we enjoy this, we love the crap out of this game, and and we love the identity of this game, but the reality is not enough, Kat. For whatever re Again, we talked about the numbers. The numbers don't matter to us. We have to do I I do think it is important to acknowledge we need players, though. We do need more players to keep this game healthy. And the more players we can get, dude, it's gonna make this game so much more fun. Um, I don't want to get I don't want to get too ahead of myself, but I th I think that's why we're seeing this. I think Bungie really is gonna they got a tall task ahead of them. All right, but it's but it's never too late. Uh I've seen lots of games that people were down on, and they Destiny 2. A lot of people forget about that. People were down on Destiny 2 when it first uh after a little while when it first came out, and uh it was player base on it dropped really, really bad, but then Forsaken came out, that big DLC that everybody was asking for and everybody won it, and it and it shot the player base up, and it stayed really up for a v for years to come. On I mean, that's where Batman got into the game was Forsaken. Um so uh I'm gonna ask you guys another with w now we're kind of getting into these deep discussions like this. Um do you guys think that do you guys think season three uh is a make or break season for Bungie? Uh-huh. I mean, some people are saying that. Some people are saying season three might be do or die. That that this might be the season where where this ship sinks or fails. Sinks or sinks or sails. What do you guys think? Do you guys think season three is is uh is a really big one, like a really big make or break one?

SPEAKER_01 2:03:41

Go ahead. Uh yeah, I'm I'm not sure. I think that that's me. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, I don't I don't, you know, I'm not plugged into this industry. I am you know I'm not plugged into how the back end of all these businesses work. But uh two things I will say. Number one, I think the timing is perfect. September, early September. If you look just in general at video game release dates this fall, you know, mid-September through late October is packed. I mean, there are there are some big hitters in the indie um kind of genre in um double A genre and the triple A game genre are all kind of releasing because everyone's trying to make sure their products out there and they get enough kind of breath before Rockstar releases GTA 6, right, in November. That's that's everyone's moving moving aside. And it makes sense, right? You you want your game to you worked hard on this game. You you know, maybe you don't own the company, maybe you're you're just you know a dev, but you're still putting your time and energy into this, and you want it you want it to really have a fighting chance. So you're not gonna go against the behemoth that is GTA, makes total sense. And I think they were barely key on marathon. Hey, we're gonna get in a little bit ahead of all these other other releases, we're gonna get in way ahead of GTA 6. You know, GTA 6 releases, we see a dip in our players because they're all gonna go check that out. That's okay. Like they have really dug into season three. Um, and you know, we'll get them on the backside, right? When that when that wow factor, that new factor of GA6 starts to dim down a little bit.

unknown 2:05:32

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 2:05:33

The other thing I'll say is as far as threes go, I'm a big podcast guy. I like to load up on podcasts the night before I head out to the farm. I'm gonna be out there, I'm gonna have no service. I'm gonna, you know, it's six to eight hours of just all right, what did I, you know, and what am I listening to? It's how I found this podcast, right? I searched Marathon, hey, they got a few episodes. So there's a couple things I look for when I do podcasts. I don't look at reviews. Uh a lot of times I don't even look at the genre. I'll just go to like new releases. What's new? What's going on in the world of podcasts that's either just getting started, or hey, we're just starting a new season of this, and I'll download, you know, the however many are out there and I'll go listen. But the big thing I'll look for with podcasts is the first three. Uh, a lot of podcasts have kind of caught onto this, and now they'll release the first three episodes. Hey, a new season starts blah, blah, blah. First three episodes out that you know, day one, then then weekly or bi-weekly, whatever their schedule is. Because they know, hey, if you're engaged by the third one, if you've listened to the third one, you're like, hey, I want more. Hey, I'm into this, I'm really enjoying this content. Then you know, like, you're you're in. This is something I'm gonna follow. If I listen to the third one and I'm like, you know, I could leave it or or take it, or uh, that was good. I don't really feel hooked. I I give it some time. I gave it three three episodes. That's usually equating, you know, podcast-wise, to anywhere between three to six hours. Um, I will say, running out of breath, you know. I I tore through uh I think I think I started when you guys were around episode nine. So I think it was like within two days. I was like, I'm caught up. Where's the next episode? What's going on here? Like, let me get in there, guys. Uh it was great. But again, you know, one episode would have been like, hey, that was fun. Let me go on to the next thing and maybe gets lost in the shuffle. Two episodes. Okay. I'm I'm digging in. Okay, now we're really getting. So I'm hoping the season three kind of like gets that momentum. Your core player base, they're already here, they're excited. We're we're ready for more. Like, what do you got for us, Bongy?

SPEAKER_02 2:07:38

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:07:38

But I'm hoping it's these people that are like, hey, I picked it up during the free weekend. Hey, I tried the beta. Oh, my friend talks about it a lot. Oh, new season. Oh, this looks cool. Hey, they're trying. Oh, okay, got new some new onboarding. Uh, you know what? Fall break's coming up. I got the holidays. I'm gonna have some time off around the corner. Hey, let's you know, let's give it a try. Let's let's let's jump in in September, right? That's what I'm really hoping we start to kind of see. I'm not expecting crazy numbers. I'm not expecting like, you know, marathon beats Destiny 2 launch player count or something like that. What I am hoping for is just a steady line of like, hey, we're kind of going up and we're kind of holding here, right? We're we're retaining to where the community is feeling good. No one's over here just constantly spreading, like, look at the numbers today, look at the numbers today. Is it a dead game? Is it a dead game? Like, to me, that's the same as you're the person that when we play Overwatch and you take a nick of damage, you're asking me for heals as the Genji. Like, dude, I get it, I see that, I understand. You don't you don't have to keep spamming, right? And and I think we need to move away from that as a community and just focus on like, hey, this game's fun, this is cool. I'm really glad Bungie took a swing. I'm I'm really enjoying this. My thoughts, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 2:08:57

My thoughts exactly.

SPEAKER_01 2:08:58

And I'm really hoping like season three brings more of that. Just like more, this is great. Like more cake to add on to the cake I'm already eating.

SPEAKER_02 2:09:07

Oh, yeah, yeah. I mean, uh at my core, if I enjoy a game, that's what I want to play. That's what I'm gonna choose to play. I'm not, I'm not like I can, I, I can acknowledge, I'm not dumb. I can acknowledge player counts look, player counts low. We definitely need to find a way to get more players to keep this game alive and healthy. But even with that, even with that being said, I'm still having a great time. I I, old town south, am having a great time. I'm having fun with this game. That it's a tough question. Do you think season three is is a potential make or break?

SPEAKER_03 2:09:43

If I'm being completely honest, I I don't think it is. Um personally, I think the game is in a really good spot for what it is. Regardless of the player counts. Um you know, obviously, even though I haven't been the last couple weeks, really, I I've wanted to be, um, I've just been exhausted. And you know, I I've kind of been preaching this since, you know, kind of the beginning of the podcast, but you know, Bungie is is so proactive with Marathon more than I see other game companies maybe. Um the amount of different testing that they do in this game, the amount of different content that they that they are desperately trying to bring to the community. Um this new Vault Breakers, I think, is such a big huge you know, I want to say like commodation to the player base, like, hey, we see the struggles that you're having, but we want you to experience this. We want you to see the game. So we're gonna do this so that that you can experience it for yourself without that struggle. Um and to be honest with you, I I love Bungie for this because that's that's my bread and butter. I am an easy game playing guy, I don't do hard mode, I don't do veteran, I've never been good at that type of stuff. Um and the way that they go about things I think is really good. But I've also heard some of the things, you know, that are hopefully coming in season three. You know, they're gonna have more of the story coming out, they're gonna have different contracts. Um, with the fact that they just did a meta shift this season. I'm excited to see what the next one's gonna be. Um I don't know if they'll Keep the cradle or if that's just gonna be something in this season. Either way, I'm okay. Right. Uh I would love to see a new map. Don't know if that'll come. Uh maybe a new enemy type. There's there's so many things that they can bring to the table with season three. And I think a lot of people are going to see it and they're gonna say, Oh, okay. This is what we're doing. This is the direction they're going. I'm here for it. Right. Right. One of the best parts about Marathon to me is the art style. I love it. Uh one of the reasons that I played a lot of uh Borderlands games is because the art style was so unique and I think you know Marathon knocked out of the park. It's just it's so different, it's clean, everything moves so well. Um for the long haul, I mean I'm here, I'm I'm gonna be here because I'm gonna play it, I'm gonna love it. Do I have moments where I'm like, okay, this sucks? Yeah. We all do. Everybody does. But as a whole, this game is just I can't express it enough. If you haven't tried it, you because it's so good. There are parts of it that are difficult to learn at the beginning, but once you learn them, it's a second feature. And it's like that with every game. You just gotta give it a chance. And once you do, I think you'll be surprised. I've seen a lot of Destiny 2 players coming over and trying Marathon and they're like, I don't know what I was mad about. This game's great. Yeah, yeah. I've I've been seeing it a lot lately, which is such a good feeling. Um I'm I'm super excited about everything that's on the way. But personally, I I don't think it's gonna be a make or break. I think it's just gonna be the next season, next season, next season. And I'm gonna love it every season that comes.

SPEAKER_02 2:14:17

Love it, man. Great feedback. Great feedback. Um, we are going for about almost now two hours and 15 minutes. Y'all gonna keep it real. Your boy, old town's wearing down. I'm tired, dude. I'm tired, I'm tired. I'm tired, boss. What do we got left here, old town? What do we got to hit? I'm tired, boss. Uh but yes. Um notes anymore. I think um we had a little more of the notes here. We we we just about got to the end of it. I will say um, I will say a shooting range, and I wrote, uh, yes, please. I would I I see no downside to a shooting range. Absolutely agree.

SPEAKER_01 2:14:59

I uh let people play with weapons, let people see what feels good, have all the attachments available, let people find, like, ooh, I never really thought of this, or I've never really played with this combo of attachments. That that's just a no-brainer. Yeah, that's a no-brainer.

SPEAKER_03 2:15:13

Even if it just sits there and nobody uses it, I mean it it can't be taking up that much space. It can't be.

SPEAKER_02 2:15:20

I agree, I wholeheartedly agree. This is something uh we talk about okay, what's realistic, right? Like what's something that actually attainable? A shooting range. Yes. Send it bungee. Yeah, yeah. Like, and I sorry, I didn't mean to like that had to come off bad. Like, yes, like I want that, but I want that bungee. Like, that would be a very pleasant, that would be a very pleasant addition to the game. That's that's a way we could get warmed up, we could get dialed in. We talk, you know, we've talked about uh the PvP mode, like that way getting dialed in, but like, yo, just give us a shooting range. That that could be a way where we can test out some guns, just kind of get locked in to get ready for runs. I I would I personally would eat it up.

SPEAKER_03 2:16:04

Um, I it would even help me like some nights. Like I get on and I go into the shooting range, and I'm like, oh, my aim is trash tonight. I'm gonna go do PvE because I ain't facing nobody. Or like I am locked in. There is nobody gonna mess with me tonight. I'm I'm going at a ranked.

SPEAKER_02 2:16:25

Right. You know, um, it was talked about um some a lore accurate social space. Um Bungie needs to could potentially lean into the lore side of things, uh, since runners are digitalized minds and build digital visual, like a build like a like a hub. Like like we got the tower, the tower in destiny. You know, some is some kind of hub where where runners could could come together, you know. That would that would definitely be be interesting. I I'm down for any of that, man. Uh, I think that one is more that one's probably a little bit more of a pipe dream. That one's a little bit more far out there, but um who knows.

SPEAKER_01 2:17:04

Maybe a bit of a a bit of a hot take, but I actually am a bit not pro the lore accurate social space. Um, first of all, uh it makes me think of ARC, where it's like, alright, I'm in my lobby, I can see my my mates join in. I can already do that in Marathon, right? I can see what shells they're rocking, I can see their their kit. Uh that's good. Now I want to go, oh, I need to go get grab that attachment real quick. Right now it's just flick over to Traxxas, grab it, good to go. In ARC, it's like, I gotta go to the vendor page. So I'm on the vendor page, I gotta like, oh, they want credits, now they want this, that, blah, blah, blah. I don't need more menus. I just I'm the less menus the better. One thing I like about the presentation of Marathon is how etheral everything kind of feels because we are these cybernetic, you know, avatars. Um, but also how clean everything feels, right? It's it's like destiny. Destiny had amazing splash pages when you got to your your like login screen, right? It just felt clean, it wasn't cluttered. There wasn't, hey, you need to go to this menu and then click on this menu, then talk to this person. Now you need to back out of these menus and go crash the thing you just bought. There wasn't none of that. It was just a very clean you log in. I don't know if we really need a whole social thing like the tower. I I think the nice thing about marathon is how quick and snappy it is just to get back in a match with your squad. Hey, we're in the lobby, we're throwing this on, grab this kit. Cool. One thing I would like to see is let us go ahead and pre-make kits. Let us have some. Uh oh, what is the word I am looking for? A loadout ready.

SPEAKER_02 2:18:43

Customer.

SPEAKER_01 2:18:43

A loadout. Let us have loadouts for quicker turnaround. Hey, it's cryo night. Batman wants to go do cryo. I'm gonna go ahead and make sure I have two loadouts to go on cryo. Good to go. Let's do that, right? Yeah, yeah. I like um I think that would would kind of solve a little bit of that. Well, I don't really like going around and just pulling stuff from my thing, and I would rather go with something. Do we need more to interact with? Like we're playing an extraction shooter. We're not, you know, it's it's different when you're looking at a game like Destiny where there's a lot of character development happening in these NPCs. These AI from these corporations, they don't really care about us, right? They care about themselves. I don't really need drive. I don't need to know how Traxis is feeling today. Um, what I will say when we move into this last point is a little bit more on that lore side of things that does not involve a social space.

SPEAKER_02 2:19:38

Yeah, yeah. Um, it it's it yeah, the last thing I'll say in bat, I heard Bat he wants to say something. I'm kind of with you. Um it it I kind of like the way it is personally right now. Again, I'm willing to I'm willing to sack it. If if 10 that if 10 to 20 to 30,000 players like, we want a lower space, we want a social space. Uh hey, yes, fine, okay, okay. You know, hey, send you.

SPEAKER_01 2:20:04

If 10,000 people sign a petition that they'll go get marathon downloaded for uh a a tower 2.0, you take that tower. All right, I'll over that tower.

SPEAKER_02 2:20:16

If that's what it takes. I will meet you at the tower, I will meet you at the tower, and I will let Maida tell me how much of a dupe I am. That's right. Yeah, hey, uh that that's me. Um I I'm kind of with you. Um it to me I don't know. Sorry, sorry, I mean it's getting late. My my I'm not as sharp as I normally am, but um, yeah, I that don't that's that wasn't on the top of top of my bucket list. I actually like the other thing you said. I would like loadouts, and nobody's talking about that. I also would love to have have a loadout ready to go that I've built uh maybe even a couple of days beforehand that I knew I was gonna run cryo archive Friday night with my friends, and I've had this loadout built ready to go for that. I'm down with that. I uh destiny did this. It took them a while, it took them years to do it, but Destiny 2 eventually got around to loadout builds, like where you would select something and it would automatically equip everything that you've done. Bat what you got, man.

SPEAKER_03 2:21:26

Um, I was just gonna kind of say that I don't know if if like a tower really fits the aesthetic or like the demeanor of an extraction shooter. I I don't really know if it fits just in general. You know?

SPEAKER_02 2:21:46

Yeah, I know. Like, does it eat does it does it even fit?

SPEAKER_03 2:21:49

Yeah, I mean I don't know. I don't want them to take too much inspiration from other games because I I want it to be its own entity, and I think staying away from stuff like that would keep it that way. You know, I don't want this to be Fortnite. I don't want this to be Call of Duty, I don't want this to be Destiny. That's the whole reason that it's different.

SPEAKER_04 2:22:15

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_02 2:22:17

Well, last but definitely not least, uh, I can tell we're all yawning. We all we're getting tired, son. We getting tired. I I'm exhausted. I'm gonna keep it real, y'all. I'm exhausted. I am so tired. The last thing, and then we're gonna put a big fat bow tie on this episode. Uh, encouraging friendly encounters. Uh, right now, Marathon is basically 100% shoot on site. True. Uh the video uh video highlights that uh for the game to survive, Bungie uh should Bungie build mechanics that reward players to occasionally working together or letting a solo player go. Um basically um should Bungie add things in there to help encourage more team play. I'm down with it. Again, uh I I if this is what people are interested in want, I'm down for it. It would be cool for there to be uh a game mode where there's a a big bad boss and you load into it, and every other team you see is an ally, and all the runner shells work together to take down said boss. I'm down with that. That's cool. I'm down. I I I've really got no complaints with that. What do y'all think?

SPEAKER_01 2:23:25

Batman, you go first. I'll finish this off because I got a I got a big thought for this one.

SPEAKER_03 2:23:30

Um I think it would be interesting to have like a mode where enemy fire was turned off, like three different teams load in, and then like everybody meets in the middle and they're like, hey, do you guys want to do this, or do you want to do this, or do you want to do this? And then there's not even an option to kill each other. Yeah. Um because then like, you know, two teams could go kill this boss, and then the other one could go do their contract, you know, something like that. Um I don't know. I don't know, it's it's a weird one, but I don't know. That just popped into my head. I was like, that might be cool. Yeah, no, goodly. Then again, it might it might take away from the identity too, so I don't know.

SPEAKER_02 2:24:25

Again, it's a tough.

SPEAKER_03 2:24:26

It's and these are all Yeah, that's a tough one.

SPEAKER_02 2:24:29

It's a a lot of the some of these are some of them are easy, like shooting range. Yes, please. Yeah. Look value graded matchmaking. I'll be honest, I think that's coming. I think that is an experiment because a lot of people are talking about that one. I think that is something they will experiment with. Some of these are a little more far-fetched, um, but uh like I think especially the social space, I think that one could be a little out there. But hey, I who knows? Maybe they're cooking into that ground.

SPEAKER_03 2:25:00

It kind of sounds like they're wanting to introduce like a altruistic side to like the carry system. You know, like which is weird, and I don't know if I particularly like that. Um, because you know, I can get that altruistic, you know, points or whatever, and then five minutes later that guy comes and kills me. What was the point?

SPEAKER_02 2:25:28

Right, right, right.

SPEAKER_03 2:25:30

And that would be my luck. So I don't know. It's it's a very weird kind of concept, and I'm just gonna kind of leave it there and hand it over.

SPEAKER_01 2:25:41

Yeah, I have an idea for this, for this uh and encounters, friendly encounters. So uh Bungie, if you're listening, you feel free, take it, put it in the game. You're welcome.

SPEAKER_03 2:25:51

They just want to met it.

SPEAKER_01 2:25:52

Absolutely. Here we go. We're gonna mix the lore, we're gonna keep TvP as it is. We don't need to create a new game mode for this. Um, and not only that, we're gonna dive more into the factions with this. So, my thought on this is going back to my Nintendo roots um and kind of lifting an idea from Splatoon, the weird inky uh shooter uh from Nintendo. So, Splatoon used to have a thing called Splatfest, and Splatfest was basically a hey, it's Splatfest for the next three weeks. Sometimes Splatfest would even last a month. You typically it was two to three weeks. Um, you know, and they happened sporadically, they weren't constant. Uh, but I would think for Marathon, you would have kind of a rotating schedule that you could kind of look out and get an idea of when these were coming up. Basically, during this time, Marathon calls it whatever they decide to call it, is two of the factions are against one another. Traxus has is up, is done with Mida. And Traxus just kind of puts out a thing for runners. All runners who side with Traxus, you know, and take out Mida uh runners, aligned runners, get these, you know, rewards, whatever it might be. Maybe you get extra cradle XP, maybe you get extra account XP, maybe you get extra carry points, however they want to do it. Same thing with Mida. But here's some incentives you could throw in. If you extract with other MITA runners, you get these rewards right now. Hey, our team, we're rocking MITA right now. Hey, there's another team. And that team over there in Overflow, we know is Traxxas, because we saw this earlier. Let's Prox chat these guys. Hey, we're MITA homies. Let's go take out these Traxus guys. We'll loot them. We'll head out together. We all get extra goodies, right? Working together. We're still within the lore of the game, right? We're just picking between, oh, hey, another traction faction war coming up. I think I'm gonna go, you know, Nucleoric because I really could use some more nuclear XP. I'm trying to unlock all their tree. Uh, okay, dude, I'll go with you. So you lock in nucleoric, that's who you're with, that faction war, and you're going against Seki, right? And and you just kind of build it that way. So you're, again, you don't have to work with your other nucleoric people, but it kind of incentivizes you to like during this time, hey, work with nucleuric, take out the other guy. Um I think it could kind of show the tension that the lore talks about between these factions, right? They they work together, but they don't like that they have to work together. Um, you could kind of dive more into some of their ideals, Seki. You know, is maybe, hey, you're working with other Seki guys, we're gonna give you more shields to protect these precious shells that you have. So, hey, did you see that like if you get to the end of Seki's thing, this this this faction war, like you get a guaranteed gold shield, like I'm all on that, you know. So I'm gonna grab that. Or maybe Arcane's like, hey, I'm gonna give you gold mod of your choice for a weapon of your choice, because you're you know, I want you to go out there and kill more shells. Um, so you could kind of dive more into what each faction kind of represents, and then just kind of have these, you know, again, two or three-week periods where faction war is coming up, and it could honestly be fun like in minor communities, like our Discord, for instance. You know, Old Town throws out, hey guys, Bungie, just the next next Fashion War. Who's everybody going with? And then we're all in, uh, dude, I'm going cyber acne this time, or hey, I'm I'm going, you know, this. And like, you know, then you're building conversation, you're building a little bit of community. Faction war ends, we all go back to normal, we're back to our neutral shells, neutral runners. And then we're already like kind of talking about we wonder what next faction war is gonna be. What are the two they're gonna select, right? Like, who are we going up against?

SPEAKER_02 2:29:53

That that that sounds real I don't know about you, Bat. That sounds really fun to me. Uh I'm I I'm all about a faction war, and however they wanted to shake that. That that hey that sounds fun, dude.

SPEAKER_01 2:30:05

Again, Bungie, take take it, Bungie. Just you know, throw my yellow optimist, throw it in the credits.

SPEAKER_03 2:30:11

Um I don't need revenue or anything.

SPEAKER_01 2:30:16

No, no, no revenue. Just want my name. I want my name in the credits of uh AAA video game. That's good enough.

SPEAKER_02 2:30:22

That's awesome. That's uh yellow. It is great. It was great, man. We we have literally free balled and we have talked, can you believe for two hours and 30 minutes?

SPEAKER_00 2:30:33

Woo!

SPEAKER_02 2:30:34

Two hours and 30 minutes. We have we have sit here and freeballed and talked. It was great having you on the show. I just I love what we're building, man. I love how we're taking uh uh we're taking listeners and fans of the show, and by God, we're we're bringing them live into the war room with us. We're we're bringing them into the podcast, and everybody we've brought on has been a banger. You did not disappoint. I knew you wouldn't disappoint. You matter of fact, you came in guns loaded. Those a couple of points where I just kind of flipped my mic up and I'm like, hey, he's got it. He's taking over. Like he he he he's the host, like he's got it. So you done great, man.

SPEAKER_03 2:31:11

I can't believe that NASCAR analogy. That's crazy.

SPEAKER_02 2:31:14

That NASCAR analogy had me thinking, like, I literally wrote down pit boss.

SPEAKER_04 2:31:20

Pit chief, no pit chief.

SPEAKER_02 2:31:22

Pit chief. I am the pit chief. I am thank you guys.

SPEAKER_01 2:31:28

Thank you guys for having me. This was this was wonderful. Congrats again on 750 downloads. And hey, how about I will I'll go and plan on being back when you hit that 1500, right? When we hit when you hit the double, double from now, I'll be back. Oh, yeah, man.

SPEAKER_03 2:31:45

Locking in his spot right there. That's crazy. Locking it in.

SPEAKER_02 2:31:48

He's ready, he's been he's ready for more. He's ready to come back. Well, we will definitely have you back, man. Go ahead, Bat. What you got?

SPEAKER_03 2:31:57

I was gonna tell you when I first joined uh Yellow here, he was introducing me to correct me if I'm wrong, it's Ryzicon.

SPEAKER_01 2:32:07

Yes, sir.

SPEAKER_03 2:32:08

Uh he's like, this is Batman from the famous podcast. I was like, famous is all.

SPEAKER_02 2:32:19

I just had to throw that in there because that was kind of a surreal moment. And who knows? Maybe we'll be at TwitchPom one day. That's the running out of breath, guys. Yeah, something. Yeah, it's those two idiots that don't know what to talk about. That's more realistic. Oh my god. That's great. Well, hey, yeah, again, Yellow, great having you on, man. Uh, thank you for, I know it's really late for you right now. Thank you for staying up late with us and and and um and and being a part of this journey with us. So you know how I always end these things. Uh Yellow, is there any is there any platforms that you would like to share with our listeners where maybe people can link up with you, maybe people could follow you, anything, no pressure. If you don't have anything, that's fine. But I definitely wanted to open up this opportunity to you if you have one to share. Bungie ID, if you want to share anything.

SPEAKER_01 2:33:13

I yeah, I don't have any platforms, no, no content, no following of that uh nature. You are more than welcome to uh add me on Bungie. Uh, I'll throw that out real quick. I am in the you know old town discord as well. Um I'm I usually try to hop in at the very least to throw out a Monday morning question, so you'll see me see me at least on a on a weekly basis. Um my bungee idea is yellow optimus, capital Y, capital O, and then 9361 is the hashtag. Uh a little bit different, not really a a plug or a content, but if anyone in the community is interested um in D, like you've always wanted to. Play, but you've never had a group, or you've been curious, or you had a group and it fell apart. Uh, I actually run two online games um a week, and I am always happy to, you know, have someone come sit in and just kind of see how the game goes, or you know, teach a new player, or help someone get started, or whatever it might be. Um, I'm just kind of trying to, you know, again, games are always a social thing for me ever since I was a kid, and DD is just a great way to be like, hey, you love marathon, you like the idea of different shells and classes. Let me introduce you to, you know, some sci-fi DD or some, you know, whatever it might be is your flavor. We will help you get linked up with uh a group and a community um and keep it keep it going that way. So I hope to see people join the Discord. I hope to see more downloads on this podcast. You guys have been great. Thanks again for having me.

SPEAKER_02 2:34:57

Absolutely, man. Yo, I might come over. You I you got my attention. I might come over and check out the DD. Because I'm a I'm a guy that falls on the side of the fence of I've always been interested in it, but I've never got the I don't know who to go to. I don't know how to play and who to go to. So I I I followed it.

SPEAKER_01 2:35:14

We'll get you in there. Uh, there's not a pit chief class, but we can make one.

SPEAKER_03 2:35:19

Yes, me and uh my female friend have always wanted to try it, but yo, me and Bat might just have to come over and be mages, dude.

SPEAKER_02 2:35:29

Dude. Talk about yeah. I'll be like a healer of I'll be like a support class, a healer of some kind. So that sounds really fun. Now, hey, one more thing. Hey, now yellow is there something like a Discord or something where these people can reach out to you to get involved with this?

SPEAKER_01 2:35:53

Yes, I do. I do actually have a Discord, all D D based uh Discord. I will I will link that. Ooh. I don't know how I want to do that. I might message you later this weekend and maybe we'll throw a link in the current Discord community there. So, you know, people into already in the Discord or getting into the podcast, join the Discord and then decide, hey, this this is a cool spot. Uh, you know, let's go try this out, then they can can hop on over. Um so we might do it that way.

SPEAKER_02 2:36:27

Okay, okay, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. We'll see uh we'll see what we can get going with that right there. So awesome, awesome, awesome. Batman, my man, my my my my the the guy that's been here, the the get the guy the guy the guy that's been here since the beginning. Where can people find you, man?

SPEAKER_03 2:36:43

As always, you can find me over on Twitch. Um, I've been trying to stream a little more often this last two weeks. Uh not a great um example, but I I have been trying to do some more things. I'm pretty slow um in the content creator kind of world, but um I do have that video on YouTube that we talked about in the last podcast. Um I think I looked at it and it's got like 31 views, so that's like my second highest channel. Um so that's pretty cool. Um and I plan on trying to do more as I can when I the time allows me.

SPEAKER_02 2:37:33

Um but I think that's it. Okay, awesome, awesome. Well, true bat uh yellow optimist and true batman44, everybody. Go uh friend yellow op on uh on with his bungee ID that he provided. If you would ever like to play some games with him, uh go over and and follow true Batman4444's YouTube channel. Um come on over and follow Bat uh True Batman4444's Twitch channel and a uh get get uh get in that live chat. Get your butt up in there. I know he would uh I know he would love and appreciate that. Well as always, um everybody, thank you all for thank you everybody for being here. I'm your host, old old underscore town south. And you can find me over on Twitch, Old Underscore Town South. I typically, not every Friday, I finally broke the streak. I I didn't get I didn't get to go live last Friday, but I'm gonna try to fix that tomorrow. I'm gonna try to fix that. Or technically today, Lord have mercy, technically now, today. We're in fry we're in Friday now. This is crazy. But uh yeah, yeah, be kept we watching out for my live streams. I would love to see our listener appear in my live chat. I love it, I love to see that. Love it, love it, love it. Uh, you guys can also find me on YouTube, old underscore town south. Come on over and come come subscribe to the YouTube. Um, I I haven't got to post a whole lot of content recently, but I do have some fun content on there. The uh the last video I uploaded was called This Time We Were Ready, and that was the tunnel room, uh, the the tunnel key room massacre that I talked about in one of the episodes that we had to fight off two teams at one time. That video is now live on YouTube if you want to go watch that. And you can also find me on TikTok, uh old underscore town south. Uh, I upload a lot of funny shorts there. Some of them are uh me popping off, some of them is me getting my face kicked in. It's a it's a it's a balanced combination of of both. Um thank you all, especially if you've made it to this point right here for listening. We appreciate you listening to us very much. Thank you to the running out of breath cult, the running out of breath family, everybody that's in our Discord, our little group. It just continues to grow and it just really warms my heart. Um if you know somebody that digs this kind of content, put on more steam, share it with a cousin, share it with a friend, share it with an uncle. But uh yeah, we will see you guys very soon. This you could almost think of this episode as a little bit of an appetizer or as a salad, as a banger as this one's been. We're gonna have a lot of fun on episode fourteen. We'll be talking about mid season, season two of mid season patch and how it's going and what we think about it. We love you all. Thank you so much for giving us a listen, as always. Stay classy. We'll see you on episode fourteen. See ya.