Giant Bombcast 10-19-2010

[0] Hey, everyone.

[1] It is Tuesday, October the 19th, 2010, and you're listening to the Giant Bombcast, where you get two mics for the price of one.

[2] I'm your host, Ryan Davis, joined by mic master Vinny Caravella.

[3] Yo, what up?

[4] Jeff Gerstman.

[5] This is a really funny joke.

[6] And Brad Shoemaker.

[7] I forgot to laugh.

[8] And special guest Alex Navarro.

[9] Yo, what up?

[10] We decided to bring him in because he's been playing.

[11] and writing about a shitload of games.

[12] I'm playing games, dude.

[13] It seemed relevant.

[14] Games are movies.

[15] I know, right?

[16] Alex, welcome to the BombCast.

[17] It's been a while since we've had you.

[18] Happy to bring you back into the fold here.

[19] It has.

[20] I don't think I've been on since I first started at Whiskey, actually.

[21] It has been some days.

[22] It's been a considerable time.

[23] So welcome back, sir.

[24] So what the fuck took so long?

[25] Seriously.

[26] You weren't playing any games.

[27] What were we going to talk to you about?

[28] And movie games suck, so having you on, we don't need you here to explain.

[29] What about video game movies, huh?

[30] Yeah, we got that covered.

[31] Vinny, how you doing?

[32] Doing all right.

[33] Yeah.

[34] How you doing?

[35] I'm good.

[36] Yeah?

[37] How was your weekend?

[38] I'm...

[39] I didn't really sleep last night.

[40] Why not?

[41] I don't know.

[42] I was up until about 4 .30, just unable to sleep.

[43] Just hit the bed and couldn't do it?

[44] Yeah, just...

[45] Couldn't perform?

[46] Yeah, just couldn't throw down.

[47] Yeah.

[48] Couldn't fall asleep.

[49] It's not your fault.

[50] It happens to everyone sometimes.

[51] Stress and whatever.

[52] I've had some trouble sleeping recently, too, and it's the worst.

[53] I never had it before in my life.

[54] Yeah, no, no, usually...

[55] When did I start here?

[56] Yeah, about then.

[57] No, just like the last year or so, just like...

[58] It's scary because I used to be able to fall asleep like that.

[59] Oh, yeah.

[60] Head hits the pillow and you're down.

[61] And now it's like I'll be really tired, go to bed, sleep for like five minutes, and then wake up.

[62] And then doomed.

[63] Like this weird cascading like, oh, my God.

[64] Like I can't stop.

[65] I can't stop thinking about something.

[66] No, yeah.

[67] It's like you can't stop thinking about how you can't fall asleep.

[68] And then that's all you're thinking about is how you can't fall asleep.

[69] Oh, no. And then I try reading.

[70] Have you tried talking to anyone about it?

[71] Like a medical professional?

[72] No. Have they recommended anything to you?

[73] Go to sleep.

[74] Get a sleep study done.

[75] I was having trouble sleeping for a while.

[76] I took some herbal junk.

[77] And it worked?

[78] Yeah, actually.

[79] Got that herbal junk.

[80] Yeah, it was pretty good.

[81] It helped me fall asleep.

[82] So you've got a club card now.

[83] For herbal junk?

[84] Herbal junk.

[85] Let's just say I'm on some lists.

[86] If the SFPD and a certain proposition were to not pass, I might have some issues.

[87] That herbal junk just makes it worse.

[88] Oh my god, I swallowed my tongue!

[89] I'm talking about the shit you buy at Walgreens.

[90] My heart's beating too fast.

[91] Why is my heart beating so fast?

[92] Is anybody else's nose bleeding inside their throat?

[93] Every night.

[94] That's the only way I can get to sleep.

[95] Anybody afraid they're going to choke on their own blood?

[96] Add some valerian root.

[97] Yeah.

[98] Sure.

[99] That'll help you out.

[100] Coughing up blood clots every morning.

[101] Get some melatonin.

[102] Yeah, we'll do that melatonin action.

[103] Oh, yeah, that stuff will...

[104] That stuff's good.

[105] Give you the business.

[106] Get that drank.

[107] Get that lean.

[108] That's right.

[109] Just don't take too much.

[110] Oh, yeah.

[111] I would drink a can of drank, and that would absolutely knock me right the hell out of me. Oh, some of that purple drank.

[112] Yes.

[113] The purple stuff.

[114] Actually, the purple stuff didn't really do anything for me. Oh, that perp.

[115] But...

[116] Works for Jamarcus Russell.

[117] Vinny, do you have anything to say about video games?

[118] I think they're art. Bullshit!

[119] Fuck you!

[120] Let's see, video games.

[121] So, what else is going on?

[122] What else?

[123] See any good movies lately?

[124] Anybody here from Borderlands?

[125] Do you hear Borderlands?

[126] Alright, so what's the deal?

[127] I'm now...

[128] Am I right?

[129] Am I right?

[130] Level six in Borderlands.

[131] You played it for about eight minutes?

[132] Yeah, I think I'm up to the third or fourth quest.

[133] That game's pretty good.

[134] I don't know.

[135] I'm really enjoying it.

[136] Wait, hold on.

[137] I like that you bought it when it came out.

[138] I did, but you just now realized.

[139] I bought the definitive version, but now I have the more definitive version.

[140] Wait.

[141] Are you really just now starting to play Borderlands?

[142] Well, I bought it on the PC, and I did not have a fun experience with it.

[143] But now on the console, the 360 in particular, a lot of fun.

[144] Enjoying it.

[145] Dave, I think, said the same thing.

[146] Oh, really?

[147] Once he started playing on console, he was like, oh, okay, I get it.

[148] Yeah.

[149] This game's great.

[150] Yeah.

[151] So the Game of the Year edition, which comes with...

[152] Wait, how much of the PC version did you play?

[153] Like three missions.

[154] Oh, geez.

[155] Oh, okay.

[156] So about four minutes.

[157] Yeah, so I was level five and a half.

[158] So you hadn't even left the town yet.

[159] You were still...

[160] I'd gone out a bit.

[161] It just literally was the interface stuff that was annoying me. I couldn't scroll text.

[162] It gets worse.

[163] It's funny that you were able to pick.

[164] It actually took me a lot longer of playing it to just go like, ah, this is not just going bad.

[165] PC version's like, ah, it's jacked.

[166] It's a bummer.

[167] The only bummer about the Game of the Year thing is it comes with like four codes for all this.

[168] Yeah, which is kind of what they said was going to happen.

[169] They said the first three were just going to be on the disc.

[170] Does the disc look any different?

[171] Did they stamp it Game of the Year?

[172] I wonder if they just had a warehouse full of discs somewhere.

[173] That is my assumption.

[174] So the manual is different because the manual has text for all the DLC.

[175] I didn't really check the disc too much.

[176] I have that PS3 copy also.

[177] I'll crack that open and take a look.

[178] Does it say like, yo, Xbox Live required?

[179] On the box?

[180] Yeah.

[181] The box says tokens included for download packs, so they at least...

[182] Because I was saying, like, part of the idea with the Game of the Year edition is, like, I get everything on the disc.

[183] I don't have to worry about being on the internet.

[184] No, that's not how it works.

[185] That is not how this works.

[186] I was even expecting just, like, a code.

[187] The fact that I have to punch in, like, four separate fucking codes.

[188] Those are not short codes either.

[189] There's something about...

[190] That's 100 characters you're punching in.

[191] There's something about the way that stuff works on Marketplace.

[192] Because, like, when I was working on Harmonix, like, when we had to do all those DLC packs...

[193] Drop more names, please.

[194] When I was working on Harmonix.

[195] When we do, like, those...

[196] Back when I sat near John Drake.

[197] You know.

[198] The celebrity John Drake.

[199] No, but whenever we do all those deals.

[200] They're in Cambridge.

[201] Maybe you've heard of it.

[202] Whenever we would do those trackbacks.

[203] A little company called MTV.

[204] Music Television.

[205] Viacom.

[206] Look them up.

[207] Maybe you heard of Adam Curry.

[208] I met him once.

[209] I haven't heard of it.

[210] What's he like?

[211] How did he do?

[212] I heard you got emails from Kurt Loder.

[213] He was on our email list, yeah.

[214] Tabitha?

[215] No, she's long gone.

[216] Can I tell my story now?

[217] I don't know.

[218] This is more fun.

[219] Interrupting your stupid story.

[220] What's Martha Quinn really like?

[221] Surprisingly, a lot like Sway.

[222] Whoa.

[223] That's just where Sway picked up all of his mannerisms was from Martha Quinn.

[224] All I was going to say is all the track packs we did, those export things were always just downloads.

[225] They were always marketplace downloads because they were like, apparently that's a million times easier than trying to put that content on the desk.

[226] To get data.

[227] Yeah.

[228] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[229] Well, I mean it seemed like – I just exported Green Day Rock Band a couple of weeks ago.

[230] That's a download.

[231] Yes.

[232] It's a big old download.

[233] I did that and I did Lego both.

[234] Yeah, they just – which is really like so much easier because – Yeah.

[235] Because Rock Band 1, it was like the disk export thing and that was – It was a time -consuming process of ripping all that stuff off.

[236] So now you just download it and go to the background.

[237] It was something that I always found just a little bit counterintuitive, though, because the whole idea of some of those track packs, especially stuff like the country track pack and whatever, was that it was aimed for people who do not know how to buy DLC or have their consoles connected to things.

[238] So it's sort of like when you...

[239] Oh, you're saying like even for...

[240] So for all of that, those disc -based...

[241] Yeah, those disc -based track packs.

[242] I'm saying the exports were all downloaded.

[243] files from Xbox Live.

[244] I don't think I knew that you could export those.

[245] Yeah, you can.

[246] You can export ACDC also, right?

[247] Beatles is the only thing you can't export.

[248] And will never be able to.

[249] More than likely not.

[250] I didn't know that.

[251] That's crazy.

[252] But yeah, so that was what was always weird to me. Was it like, hey, you know, we're selling this to people who, you know, don't have their consoles connected, but you need Xbox Live to Xbox.

[253] Well, you know, it ends up being, you know, someone always ends up getting that as a gift from someone.

[254] I know you like the rock band, so I got you the ACDC, because I know you like the ACDC, and you're like, oh.

[255] fine, but I don't want to put the stupid disc in.

[256] It's good that it's there.

[257] If you're savvy enough to get to that point, if it's not just like, I just want to play the country songs and that's enough.

[258] For me, it's the part where you have to put in the disc for the old game to export.

[259] I'm sitting there with Rockman 3 and entering the code off the back of Rockman 2 and it was like, what are you doing?

[260] I'm like, come on, let's do this.

[261] But that's because the game's not out yet.

[262] That just doesn't work.

[263] That will not work just yet.

[264] It will soon.

[265] I'm told.

[266] Yes.

[267] Vinny.

[268] Borderlands.

[269] It just goes back to why there should be one of those barcode things that you just scan in with here.

[270] That's why you want to put your QR codes up to the connection.

[271] They're just going to have the backs of the manuals have positions that you need to stand in, and it'll be 25 different positions, and you get in front of your connector.

[272] Like, okay, now I'm making a Y shape.

[273] Now I'm making an M. No, it's an R. It's an R. Fuck!

[274] You're going to have to learn a lot of semaphore stuff.

[275] It takes a full second of you holding the position before it registers.

[276] It comes with flags.

[277] That'd be great.

[278] After the orange flags.

[279] Then it just deletes the entire one of your characters.

[280] This is not a valid code.

[281] Come on.

[282] Just buy this online.

[283] I support your idea Vinny.

[284] I support just like put a visual thing on it.

[285] Let the console register it.

[286] Go.

[287] Just go.

[288] Come on.

[289] Why not?

[290] Come on.

[291] What's the problem?

[292] I don't get it.

[293] Anyway.

[294] Borderlands is fun.

[295] Played more Civ V. Still going.

[296] Is it still that one crazy epic game that you started weeks ago?

[297] I have lost that one, but I restarted now.

[298] It basically has come down to Rome versus the Iroquois.

[299] As usual.

[300] At Hiawatha.

[301] Yeah, man, he's vicious.

[302] Son of a gun.

[303] It's weird because it's the first time.

[304] in playing this game that I reloaded an old save.

[305] I lost.

[306] I made a bad choice.

[307] I reloaded an old save, and I felt kind of guilty about it.

[308] Like, maybe I should just push on, but I was like, man, he really tore up my fucking town.

[309] Why do you always make a hard save right before you declare war?

[310] Yeah, which was basically called It's On or something like that, and then felt really stupid reloading It's On when I just got trapped.

[311] It is less on now.

[312] War's over.

[313] So that's fun.

[314] I played some of that, and then we'll talk about this more, I'm sure, but some of that Super Meatball.

[315] No, we are not talking about that game.

[316] Moving on.

[317] That game.

[318] It's mean.

[319] Yeah, it's mean.

[320] It's mean.

[321] It's pretty.

[322] I don't know.

[323] I think it's brilliant.

[324] You guys should have been here yesterday.

[325] You have no idea.

[326] I have some idea.

[327] I watched the first 15 minutes of that quick look this morning while laying in bed.

[328] Ponder that.

[329] And it seemed like I was getting right up to the point where it was going totally sideways.

[330] Stuff in the Quick Look is nothing compared to the stuff I found later.

[331] The best thing in the Quick Look is that weird hacked ROM.

[332] I had one of those happen.

[333] It's a kill screen.

[334] Team Meat calls it a kill screen.

[335] They watched the Quick Look and tweeted about it.

[336] Did you find out how you accessed it?

[337] think it's random i don't know where i got one in a totally different level yeah uh but same type deal like getting the girl and then it just happens yeah and i did not finish those that set of levels so that was uh yeah that was fun uh that game is uh is is great and terrible it's great and terrible uh like like oz I put it in and I play a couple of levels and then I just kind of take a break.

[338] And it's very unlike my play style, but it's the only way I think to do it.

[339] I also have that fear that as I'm going through levels and I'm dying over and over and over again, that if I take a break, I will start worse than I am now.

[340] Like, oh, I've kind of got this part down.

[341] It's all, I'm in the groove.

[342] You've found your rhythm.

[343] But it's actually, I think, the complete opposite.

[344] You have to come in fresh.

[345] Yeah, take a break and it's just like, oh, I beat it in like five minutes.

[346] I don't know what was so scary about that.

[347] I don't know what your problem is, Brad.

[348] Just don't jump into the spikes.

[349] Okay, thanks for the tip.

[350] That's helpful.

[351] That's what's beautiful about it, though.

[352] It's also simple.

[353] It's just like, just hop up the walls and then...

[354] You know what?

[355] There are levels later on where you look at them and it's baffling and you don't know what to do.

[356] It's kind of a bummer.

[357] It is amazing watching you play some of that stuff, like how quickly you navigate, the confidence with which you navigate certain parts.

[358] You play a level like 200 times in a row.

[359] Oh, man. Slow down.

[360] Stop.

[361] Have you unlocked any more characters?

[362] Let's see.

[363] Got Jill got gish got commander video We got the kid from I Want to Be the Guy.

[364] We saw it.

[365] We could not finish that.

[366] Could not finish that Warp Zone.

[367] Did a giant Mike Tyson punch you in the face or something?

[368] Or an apple fall out of the sky and land on you?

[369] I'm going to show it to you later.

[370] I feel like this is one of those games that's actually making you a better person.

[371] It's one of those things that grow your Midwest.

[372] It's one of those chores they give you to build character.

[373] You're building character.

[374] Gotta move pipe.

[375] Breaking you down and building you back up in its own image.

[376] The water out on the back 40.

[377] Let's do this.

[378] Video game equivalent of digging ditches.

[379] Yeah, totally.

[380] This is character building right here.

[381] I'll lock you in the closet with a giant carton of Marlboros and then you come out.

[382] I don't know how much more of that I want to play, but I'm so glad that it exists and that it does what it does.

[383] It's weird how much of it you have to relinquish as you go through the game.

[384] It's like you start out and you're like, man, this is awesome.

[385] I'm going to do every level.

[386] I'm going to do the Dark World version of every level.

[387] I'm going to do all the Warp Zones.

[388] I'm going to get all those characters.

[389] At some point, you're like, maybe I won't finish all the Dark World levels.

[390] And then at some point after that, you're like, maybe I won't even get to all the Dark World levels.

[391] I saw a Dark World level, and then I left.

[392] I visited and was like, I don't want to live.

[393] It's too dark.

[394] Oh, my God.

[395] Flip this game over.

[396] And I left bandages behind.

[397] It's crazy.

[398] I started at that position where I was just like, whatever, I'm finishing these levels.

[399] I saw bandages and said, F it, I'm going.

[400] It definitely seems like a game that you can't have that completionist mindset about.

[401] Unless you can.

[402] Well, like I would not.

[403] If you're psychotic.

[404] I think you have to have a certain psychosis.

[405] I would not go through with that like the first way.

[406] Like I would come back and get some of that stuff later on because like.

[407] Okay, I'm saying you can do that, but not if you want to have fun.

[408] Yeah.

[409] Well, because you gain skills later on that will help you get those bandages.

[410] And like if you're.

[411] There are just little things in the controls that you'll figure out as you kind of move along.

[412] Seriously, not like you gain skills.

[413] Yeah, like you really do.

[414] And the air control, like the controls are, this is going to sound completely idiotic, but the controls are really tight and really loose at the same time.

[415] He's slippery, and he slides around a lot, but they're also kind of tight with the level of fidelity that you'll have.

[416] There's so much finesse you can apply to how you fall.

[417] But he also has a ton of momentum, so you just overcompensate, and that part is incredibly...

[418] I think the big problem is that everyone refuses to stop running.

[419] I know, yeah.

[420] I keep that run button pegged and I might as well just tape that button down.

[421] If the developers are out there, t -shirt idea, just a picture of the meat boy and the words never not running.

[422] There are levels later on where you can't run or you can't make it through.

[423] But there's like...

[424] Never not running.

[425] When he jumps up against the wall and he sticks to the wall, right?

[426] He like slides up like five pixels.

[427] You have to use that.

[428] And like that's something that you kind of learn later on.

[429] Like, oh man, like that is literally two pixels up is just the amount I need to go to reach this little nook here.

[430] It's crazy.

[431] I don't know.

[432] There's an achievement in that game for getting 100 % of everything.

[433] Of course there is.

[434] And I can't wait to see what the tail looks like on that achievement.

[435] Like how many people get that over time?

[436] Because I bet it won't be many.

[437] Yeah.

[438] And they're selling it for $10.

[439] It's supposed to be $15, but it's going to be $10 for a little while before they raise it up.

[440] I think the first month, actually, until late November.

[441] The music is amazing.

[442] The art style is great.

[443] The little homages and cut scenes are really funny.

[444] The gameplay, I think, is what it is.

[445] You're either going to be into it or you're just going to be like, oh, that's fun.

[446] I mean, it's amazing for what it is, but it's absolutely not for everybody.

[447] You should play the demo before you commit money to this thing.

[448] It's expertly crafted torture is what it sounds like.

[449] MassoCore, they call it.

[450] Yeah, I guess we have a concept page for that.

[451] The fact that they have those other playable characters for, I'd say, I don't know, probably the majority of the levels, right?

[452] You can't use them in warp zones.

[453] You can't use them somewhere else.

[454] I think really kind of opens up that game, adds a lot of depth to it.

[455] Because just the handling is so much different.

[456] They're very unique, yeah.

[457] Each guy is completely different.

[458] Yeah, like the kid has a double jump.

[459] Gish can stick to walls.

[460] Commander Video has his floaty thing.

[461] Yeah, Jill can do air brakes.

[462] Yeah, yeah.

[463] They're really different, which actually scares me into switching characters because I feel like you'll get so used to using Meat Boy.

[464] As soon as you switch characters, you're like, if you learn that other character, you can never go back.

[465] I played a bunch with Jill.

[466] I kind of like her, but she's slow.

[467] She's a slow worker, but she's not slow.

[468] She's not slow.

[469] Oh, shit.

[470] Wait, no. Never mind.

[471] That would be great.

[472] I just realized how good she'd be on the level I'm stuck on, which is the last level, but you can't select characters there.

[473] You're locked out.

[474] I see how it kind of works through the different art styles.

[475] Is there any sort of self -awareness of it being a game in there, or is it just it's an adventure?

[476] Dr. Fetus, he's...

[477] Dr. Zetas is a great fucking character, by the way.

[478] No, that guy is a dick.

[479] But he's an incredibly designed character.

[480] I felt terrible at the end of the second world.

[481] There's the cut scene where you fight the boss in a little ball form.

[482] That was hilarious.

[483] I felt so bad.

[484] I was like, oh, cute little ball guy.

[485] Kick.

[486] Fucking dead.

[487] It's twitching and all covered in.

[488] It's a sadistic game for sure.

[489] Yeah.

[490] In every way.

[491] Every conceivable way.

[492] Out this week.

[493] Xbox 360.

[494] This game is what happens when you don't send your kids to therapy.

[495] So, yeah.

[496] If I ever meet the people who made this game.

[497] Meet, huh?

[498] Right?

[499] I have some words.

[500] I get you.

[501] Boy.

[502] I would really like to know about their childhood trauma.

[503] I already let the guy know that Super Mario Boy is a motherfucker.

[504] And he said, well, I'm sorry that it fucked your mother.

[505] I'm sure that apology extends to you, too.

[506] Is anybody going to finish that game?

[507] Besides me. I'm going to try to.

[508] What is finished?

[509] Like, just make it to the last world?

[510] Yeah.

[511] Okay.

[512] There's the five regular worlds with, like, 20 levels each, and then I thought I was done after that last night, and then it's like, oh, hey, no, there's another level or another world.

[513] Can you beat the game on the dark world?

[514] Is there, like, a dark world last level?

[515] Well, there's an ending and then get true ending.

[516] Oh, no, really?

[517] There's separate achievements for that stuff, isn't there?

[518] Well, no, the phrasing is just...

[519] beat the game, and then beat the Dark World, I think.

[520] Okay.

[521] I already blew it with G .A., so I don't think I'm getting a true end.

[522] Yeah, forget it.

[523] The world I'm in now is called The End.

[524] S -Rank.

[525] Did anything else?

[526] I did not play Dead Rising 2, and I feel bad about that.

[527] Whatever.

[528] It's slowly moving its way backwards now.

[529] The stack of discs that wind up next to my 360.

[530] It's near the bottom.

[531] Yeah, it's getting there, and it's like, crap.

[532] No. Oh, no. So that's kind of a bummer.

[533] But I think that's about it for me this weekend.

[534] Alex Navarro, let's talk about Kirby's Epic Yarn.

[535] Yeah, okay.

[536] That's a game that I've been playing or was playing for a little bit there.

[537] You played it and reviewed it?

[538] I did.

[539] And it seemed like you really liked it?

[540] Okay, so you and I did that quick look.

[541] We did do that quick look.

[542] Which, from what I can tell, everyone had a certain...

[543] Affinity for watching two grown men basically coo like little baby children.

[544] It's so goddamn cute.

[545] Goddamn that game.

[546] Goddamn Kirby.

[547] Really cursy children just going, aww.

[548] Stand -up comic Todd Glass does a great bit about something being so cute that you just kind of want to, like you can't get the cute out of it just by petting it.

[549] That's not doing it.

[550] It's not.

[551] It's like, what am I going to do?

[552] I have to get inside of this.

[553] I want skin.

[554] much want to consume it right yeah like paging dr freud right yeah exactly god damn it but yeah no kirby's uh kirby's epic yarn is by far the most adorable game i've played in quite some time and it's also like so you know how nintendo is pretty good about making games that are you know pretty tight and pretty fun and aren't really fucked up in any particular way and you know kind of consistent the whole way through it's it's that It's an all -ages.

[555] It's a solid product.

[556] It's a solid all -ages.

[557] It's a good co -op game.

[558] If you've got a loved one with you that you want to play some pretty decent platforming with.

[559] I think what's just so cool about it, apart from the obvious art style, which is very unique, like the whole patchwork arts and crafts thing going on, which does not at all look like LittleBigPlanet, despite the fact that it's a similar concept, is just that...

[560] There's actually a pretty decent variety of crap to do in that game.

[561] There's all the traversal stuff, like finding little buttons and threads to pull to find new platforms to jump and all the little hidden areas.

[562] But also the fact that Kirby can turn into all this weird crap.

[563] You jump into these vortexes and you're like, oh hey, now you're an off -road racer and you're off -road racing all these other dudes.

[564] Or you're a giant Kirby tank and launching yarn missiles at these bad guys.

[565] And there's all sorts of stuff like that in there, and it's all really cool.

[566] I liked all of it.

[567] Excellent.

[568] I think I need some of that game.

[569] That seems like a good palate cleanser after Screaming Boy.

[570] I need to cleanse myself.

[571] Dude, that game is just pure catharsis.

[572] I just sat there, and I had a big doofy grin on my face the whole time.

[573] The only thing I could think of is that it would be, or going into it, that I was thinking it could be a little easy.

[574] It is.

[575] It's not an overly challenging game, and you can't die.

[576] It's not designed for that.

[577] The way it punishes you is if you're collecting these beads, which are just big shiny gems throughout the level, and there's like...

[578] almost an embarrassment number of them throughout each level.

[579] But every time you get hit or you fall down a pit or something, you lose a ton of them.

[580] And every time that would happen, I would be like, no!

[581] I want all those.

[582] So it's just score -based.

[583] It's score -based.

[584] But when I would get a substandard score at the end of the level, I'd be like, I want to play that level again.

[585] I want to go back again and do this.

[586] So, yeah.

[587] I think it's super effective at what it does.

[588] It's super effective.

[589] I just want to hug it.

[590] I just want to hug that game.

[591] That's a little more G -rated than some of the comments I saw.

[592] Yeah, I don't know.

[593] About what you'd like to do with Kirby.

[594] Yeah, there were some pretty messed up suggestions about what people might want to do with Kirby in there.

[595] There's some...

[596] You don't want to know.

[597] There's a few creepy people floating around.

[598] He's not fit for the air.

[599] Why you guys got to make it dirty?

[600] I know.

[601] Come on.

[602] It's what the internet do.

[603] You just enjoy something for what it is for once.

[604] Someone right now out there has got a copy of Photoshop open and they're doing bad things.

[605] They're yarn dicks.

[606] The thing I really appreciate about Nintendo and its franchises over the last few years is putting all their main characters into these crazy absurd worlds.

[607] I just like Kirby getting some fucking props.

[608] I feel like Kirby is the 2003.

[609] It was the last time he was on a home console.

[610] But he was always pretty good in Smash Brothers, wasn't he?

[611] I mean, he's always been kind of, I guess, around, but I feel like he's kind of, he's never gotten his props.

[612] Sure.

[613] He's never, like, kind of elevated to the...

[614] Big marshmallow.

[615] To the level of a lot of the other...

[616] Kirby just launched at a weird time.

[617] It was, like, a really, like, late model NES game when that came out.

[618] And, you know, it was always kind of associated with the handheld stuff.

[619] It just never...

[620] I don't know.

[621] He's the grimace of Nintendo characters.

[622] Like, he's just that guy that's sort of in the background and, like, you know, he has a few...

[623] What does he do?

[624] I don't know.

[625] He's there.

[626] He's there.

[627] He's kind of cute.

[628] Whatever.

[629] But, yeah, I mean, he hasn't been in a home console title since Kirby's friggin' Air Ride, which was not even really, you know, a traditional Kirby game by any stretch.

[630] Right.

[631] So it's like Kirby 64, I think, is the last time that he was, like, actually in a platformer on a home system.

[632] That's a long -ass time.

[633] That is a long time.

[634] Vinny, you're right.

[635] Their willingness to just say, all right.

[636] Whatever.

[637] We're going to put you in a weird -ass game.

[638] But my favorite part is the, like, five seconds of setup for that.

[639] Like, a character is like, oh, my God, everything's made of yarn.

[640] Yep.

[641] Like, something gym sock.

[642] Yeah.

[643] A yarn.

[644] I made of paper.

[645] Yeah, that's crazy, right?

[646] Yeah.

[647] The world feels like pants.

[648] Go.

[649] We're all babies.

[650] All right.

[651] He actually says that, doesn't he?

[652] Yeah, it's like, the world feels like pants.

[653] Oh, my God.

[654] Aww.

[655] He doesn't wear pants, right?

[656] Pants don't necessarily feel great.

[657] That doesn't ring, that doesn't do anything for me in a like, yeah, alright.

[658] Also, pants made of yarn?

[659] No, no, no. It's just packed.

[660] It's just like it could be denim floor.

[661] There appears to be a lot of denim in that game.

[662] I knit you pants.

[663] I want denim flooring in my house.

[664] I'm replacing all the carpeting.

[665] Are you going to stonewash it?

[666] You already got all that leather flooring.

[667] Are you going to use button fly or are you going to use traditional all zippers?

[668] Quarterly ceiling?

[669] Yeah.

[670] No, no, you want the corduroy on the wall so you can feel it.

[671] Are you going to get it professionally distressed?

[672] Corduroy ceiling is just wasteful.

[673] No, ceiling is vinyl.

[674] That's just silly.

[675] I'm buying all of my denim flooring straight from Japan, so it's nice.

[676] Raw selvage flooring.

[677] Never wash it.

[678] Make sure you never ever wash it.

[679] Oh, no, no, absolutely.

[680] You get the flooring dry cleaned.

[681] Do not spill any water on the denim floor.

[682] Is it going to have pockets on it so you can find loose change once in a while?

[683] Oh, man. Oh, hey, look.

[684] Somebody left a quarter in my floor.

[685] That's where that key was.

[686] That was in my other other pants.

[687] It was in my other floor.

[688] Crap.

[689] All right, Alex.

[690] So, yeah, that's pretty much Kirby in a nutshell.

[691] While we're on the cuteness tip.

[692] Let's talk about some other games.

[693] Let's talk about Costume Quest.

[694] Yeah, so I took Costume Quest home with me last night, and then I finished Costume Quest.

[695] Good job.

[696] Yeah, you came back in with the debug this morning, and you're like, well, I'm done with that.

[697] I was just like, what?

[698] Yeah, I started playing that game at like, I don't know, I'll say like 7 .30 last night, and then with a couple of little breaks in between, I looked at the clock when I'd finished the game, and I was like, oh, it's almost two.

[699] I'm like, okay.

[700] That's a pretty decent.

[701] Yeah, it's probably about five to six hours, somewhere in there.

[702] This is Double Fine's downloadable My First RPG type game.

[703] It's a very simple sort of, you know...

[704] uh, style of RPG, but it's, it's all about, you know, kids on Halloween going around trying to collect candy, but there are monsters that are stealing all the candy.

[705] We, we played the, or I played like the first, uh, hour or maybe a little more than that.

[706] Yeah.

[707] And, uh, we have, you were still in the neighborhood during all of that, right?

[708] Quick look up of that.

[709] Yeah.

[710] Yeah.

[711] Yeah.

[712] Do you leave the neighborhood?

[713] You leave the neighborhood, you go to the mall.

[714] Oh no. Um, and after that you go to a, a village out in the, in the, in the country.

[715] Uh, score that candy, bro.

[716] Yeah.

[717] I just...

[718] You gotta go over to the west side.

[719] Those guys are giving out full -size Snickers.

[720] Oh, man. Oh, snap.

[721] You gotta go to rich neighborhoods where people are too lazy and they just leave those...

[722] Please take one.

[723] D Street.

[724] D Street.

[725] We're going to D Street.

[726] How much character development is there?

[727] I mean, not in terms of the narrative, but...

[728] As an RPG, you level up, do you pick skills?

[729] Yeah, you level up.

[730] The game only goes to level 10, as far as I can tell.

[731] Gotta raise that level cap.

[732] That's where I hit when I got to the last boss.

[733] Yeah, DLC.

[734] There's not really skills, but there are different...

[735] The costumes are sort of your different styles of fighting, basically.

[736] As you earn new costumes, if you have the robot costume on, when you fight a bad guy, you turn into a giant Gundam -looking thing.

[737] Uh, or like, you know, if you're wearing the kitty costume, you turn into like this sort of black Panther type thing.

[738] Uh, it all depends on, you know, and there's a whole bunch of different costumes to collect throughout the game.

[739] And then as you're, uh, as you're going, you can buy these battle patches from this girl who has like a little stand set up, sort of like, uh, uh, sort of like Lucy or whoever, whoever it was in peanuts that has the doctor is inside.

[740] Yeah.

[741] uh and she sells you these battle patches which give you added abilities like you know you can uh do splash damage or you know add a splash damage or you can like stun certain enemies or a greater chance to make them run away does she call you blockhead sadly no um But yeah, there's a little bit of combat depth there.

[742] I will say that I mostly stuck to three costumes that I liked throughout the entire game, and I mostly stuck to three or four battle patches that I liked throughout the game.

[743] It didn't seem like, yeah, from what I played of it, there was a huge amount of depth.

[744] It seemed like it was like, yeah, we are a standard RPG, but the stuff seemed well done.

[745] It is.

[746] And again, it's...

[747] double fine and doesn't really excel at super sophisticated original gameplay systems.

[748] They're good at taking an existing genre and then adding huge amounts of personality and humor to it.

[749] And that's the thing.

[750] I won't say it's uproariously funny or anything, but there's a lot of little clever jokes in there, a lot of funny little dialogue bits.

[751] And it's just very cute.

[752] It's just fun to wander around in the world and go trick -or -treating.

[753] wonder if you're gonna get like an adult that gives you candy or to get and that's basically how the game handles random encounters is you have to go knock on all the doors and sometimes it's like hey it's an adult and they say something funny and they give you candy or oh hey it's a monster and they say something funny and then you have to fight them which is which is pretty good um but yeah and there's like a couple little decent side quests in there there's some some a couple of mini games It's fun.

[754] It's a fun little game.

[755] $15 on PSN and on the Xbox.

[756] Yeah, out this week.

[757] Is that this week?

[758] That's this week.

[759] I expect I will have a review of that probably by tomorrow.

[760] Sounds good.

[761] Just in time for Thanksgiving.

[762] Yep.

[763] Yes.

[764] I just love that these guys are doing this.

[765] This seems like the perfect outlet for what Double Fine does.

[766] Like small, like don't wear out, it's welcome.

[767] And that's the thing.

[768] I think the smaller scale of it.

[769] leads to a more technically I hate to use this word but polished experience because it is like there's very little to that game that feels like you know out of place like it all is constructed well the battles work the way they're supposed to they feel good maybe a little repetitive but at the same time I never got tired of the fights so that's probably saying something I yeah I don't know I really enjoyed playing it To the point where I stopped looking at the time and it was like, oh, hey, I'm done with this game.

[770] And it's like 2 in the morning.

[771] So Robot Unicorn wasn't one of your go -tos?

[772] I actually...

[773] You never saw it?

[774] I never saw Robot Unicorn.

[775] In one of the trailers.

[776] I've never seen it in the game myself.

[777] That's weird.

[778] I thought I got the achievement for unlocking all costumes, but maybe I didn't.

[779] I thought I did.

[780] That's DLC.

[781] Maybe.

[782] Yeah.

[783] I don't know.

[784] I know the unicorn you're talking about.

[785] I saw it in the trailer.

[786] I just remember that, but yeah, I never got that one.

[787] I think you're just a unicorn when you're in the costume, but then when you go into fantasy battle worlds.

[788] Giant robotic unicorn.

[789] I think my favorite is the french fry costume because you turn into a giant french fry spider.

[790] Oh, God.

[791] Wow.

[792] All right, I don't want to hear about any more costumes.

[793] That's terrifying, and also I want to see those.

[794] You can crawl inside here anytime.

[795] Okay.

[796] You.

[797] I'm looking at you.

[798] I'm going to get in there.

[799] Alex, anything else?

[800] Do it.

[801] Do it.

[802] Yeah, so Castlevania.

[803] Oh, Castlevania Lords of Shadow.

[804] I hope we want to talk about that for a minute.

[805] Yeah, I played a decent amount of that too.

[806] Yeah, I've been great.

[807] I've been kind of trying to slog through that one for a while now.

[808] That was my make or break Gamefly game.

[809] I still have this horrible problem where I keep thinking that game is on the Wii.

[810] I'm constantly just confused.

[811] Oh, right.

[812] That's the one.

[813] You're thinking of Castlevania Judgment.

[814] Or Castlevania.

[815] That's true.

[816] Castlevania is on the Wii.

[817] I don't know.

[818] I can't.

[819] Mental block.

[820] And then every time I see that, what game is that?

[821] That's like, oh, right.

[822] Yeah.

[823] It's the Castlevania game that looks like all those other action games.

[824] Yeah, I mean, it's so...

[825] I don't know.

[826] I've been playing a bunch of it since we did that quick look and trying to get through it.

[827] Are you on disc two yet?

[828] I am on disc two.

[829] Holy shit, there's two discs?

[830] What I hear about this Castlevania is that this game is exceptionally long.

[831] There's a ton of FMV.

[832] Oh, okay.

[833] Yeah, a ton of FMV.

[834] Like, the environmental detail is, like, almost excruciating in detail.

[835] The environments look amazing.

[836] They do look amazing when the camera isn't zooming a million feet back from everything.

[837] Yeah, so the camera angles are really bad and the frame rate, at least on the Xbox.

[838] is not good.

[839] It's janky.

[840] Like, easily sub 30 frames a second a lot of times.

[841] Here's what I'll say about Castlevania.

[842] I'm sort of determined to get to the end because everyone tells me the ending of that game is what sort of, like, redeems it.

[843] Like, it has a really great last bit, and I'm like, alright, fine, I'll see it.

[844] But up to this point, it's just God of War light.

[845] It's just Devil May Cry light.

[846] Like, they're just kind of reusing concepts a lot and, like, with a little too much emphasis on traversal.

[847] like way too much climbing around ledges and stuff which doesn't seem like the strong part of the game because the controls for that no but they do a lot of it and the thing and the thing i'll say is it's it feels just too long it's like one of those games that makes me really appreciate pacing in games and i know it's like sort of weird to complain about the length of a game like being too long but this is a game where it feels like there's a lot of filler There's a lot of levels.

[848] Like it's worn out its welcome or something.

[849] Yeah, it's already kind of worn out its welcome with me, and it's not just because at one point I had to solve a mirror puzzle that was broken, and I had to turn the mirrors backwards, and that somehow made it work.

[850] Seven years bad luck.

[851] Like the light was shining from the back of the mirror, and that didn't make any sense, but it worked.

[852] So what you're saying is that it's a mixed bag that needs more polish?

[853] It's a mixed bag that needs more polish.

[854] It's just not compelling enough?

[855] It fails to engage.

[856] No, I don't know.

[857] I mean, it's not a bad game.

[858] It lacks immersion.

[859] It's not a bad game.

[860] So you would not recommend the Castlevania fans rejoice?

[861] No. I see where you're going with this.

[862] But if you're a fan of Castlevania games.

[863] If you're a fan of cutting things.

[864] From when they first showed it, my feeling was, this looks like it could be kind of cool, but it also doesn't look like Castlevania.

[865] No. It looks like we wanted to make a God of War game.

[866] Yeah, actually, I read a lot into the, or I read back about the development of the game, and it is a full -on quote -unquote reboot.

[867] Yeah.

[868] The guy is named Belmont, but other than that, like, total restart for Castlevania.

[869] But, I mean, like, I think I've aired this on this podcast even.

[870] Like, if you were going to try and reboot Castlevania, like, Castlevania had such a specific gameplay style to just say, all right, we're starting over by stealing this other existing franchise's, you know, gameplay style and, you know, reappropriating that and then not really...

[871] And, like, Dracula is not even the primary antagonist, so...

[872] Fuck that.

[873] Right off the bat.

[874] One of the Lords of Shadow is the Lord of the Vampires.

[875] Yeah, there are vampires.

[876] So Dracula is not a...

[877] If Dracula is no longer a threat...

[878] Dracula is a minor threat.

[879] He is one of several threats.

[880] Is the Grim Reaper a threat?

[881] Dracula is a minor threat.

[882] With Igor on his...

[883] Seriously.

[884] Neck in there.

[885] Do you get a whip?

[886] I know who the...

[887] I'm sure.

[888] Well, no. Yeah, you don't even fight with a whip.

[889] You have this cross thing.

[890] It's the combat cross.

[891] Which has like a chain at the end that you can kind of whip around.

[892] So it's sort of like this weird bladed chain thing.

[893] But this is 3D.

[894] It's like a whip.

[895] That's your like clearing attack or something.

[896] It functions like a whip, but it's not a whip.

[897] It's your multi -tool, right?

[898] It basically is just like...

[899] Yeah, it's your all -purpose everything cross.

[900] It's also a grappling hook.

[901] Yeah.

[902] It's your Leatherman.

[903] Yeah, totally.

[904] It's also like a religious talisman.

[905] Yeah, it's immediately a Leatherman, totally.

[906] And the thing I'll say is that there's all these combos you can buy, and there's all this supposed depth to the combo system.

[907] I have mostly gotten through that game on the normal difficulty level by just mashing on buttons and not even really paying much attention to blocking or doing the counter moves or stuff.

[908] It's just sort of like, I'm just going to keep hitting stuff, and I'm going to use the magic, and then everything's dead.

[909] All right, great.

[910] It's not a bad game.

[911] It's just not really...

[912] I don't think it's a great game.

[913] I don't think it's a great game either.

[914] I think it's sort of like...

[915] It's a decent action title that probably shouldn't really be called Castlevania.

[916] That's where I come off on it.

[917] I don't want to talk about Castlevania.

[918] All right, let's not talk about Castlevania anymore.

[919] Jeff.

[920] Hello.

[921] I want to talk about Fallout.

[922] All right.

[923] Uh -oh.

[924] I want to talk about Fallout 3.

[925] Fallout 3.

[926] All right.

[927] I put in Fallout 3 the other night.

[928] Yeah?

[929] Yeah, I finished it.

[930] Oh, did you really?

[931] Yeah.

[932] Finally.

[933] You're going to start on some DLC?

[934] Yeah, I've got all the DLC to play.

[935] Holy shit.

[936] So what do you think?

[937] I guess...

[938] With the DLC?

[939] Well, I'm not even done with all the regular side quests in Fallout 3 yet.

[940] I've still got like half a dozen of those.

[941] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[942] So did you...

[943] You guys played through the game before the DLC came out, right?

[944] Oh, really?

[945] I've got to talk about Fallout 3.

[946] Yeah, yeah.

[947] Dude, how about that ending?

[948] Fuck.

[949] Which one?

[950] Oh, no, that was...

[951] The new ending or the old ending?

[952] The new ending does not fix the problem with the old ending.

[953] They added an option, right?

[954] Once the Broken Steel DLC came out, is that right?

[955] Was the option to send in Fox?

[956] Yep.

[957] That was not present in the original game?

[958] Yes, you could not do that.

[959] He said, you have to do this yourself.

[960] I think the option was there.

[961] They let you select it, but he would not do it.

[962] What was the rationale?

[963] He didn't want to deprive you of your moment of glory, which isn't that exactly what happens in Broken Steel?

[964] It's your chance to die.

[965] I haven't played into Broken Steel yet.

[966] Well, so...

[967] Yeah, so it's...

[968] But, I mean, you finish the game and you add Broken Steel installed.

[969] Yes, when you pick that option...

[970] Like, you get, like, the bad, like, the dude...

[971] If you pick that option, he's just like...

[972] Oh yeah, my resistance to radiation does make me the ideal candidate.

[973] He just goes in there and presses the button.

[974] But then you get the bad narrative.

[975] But then during the Ron Perlman narration, they totally chastise you about it.

[976] He was a total pussy.

[977] He was fucking smarter than anybody else.

[978] What an asshole.

[979] It literally is like the Lone Wanderer did not uphold his father's ideals of self -sacrifice.

[980] He let someone else go in and do the job.

[981] Your dad is stupid then.

[982] Yeah.

[983] That stuff is dumb.

[984] Sorry.

[985] No doubt, no doubt.

[986] Well, yeah, I think the Broken Steel stuff's not a bad starting point if you're going to get into the DLC.

[987] Yeah, I like the spaceship one.

[988] Oh, yeah, Mothership Zeta.

[989] I'm looking forward to Point Lookout.

[990] Everybody says that's the best.

[991] Oh, Point Lookout is a lot of fun.

[992] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[993] Oh, yeah, because the main thread through Point Lookout is a delight.

[994] It's the back and forth with the two forces in that one.

[995] Broken Steel is, I think, the ending of that game, right, at this point.

[996] Yeah, I guess so.

[997] I mean, they're done adding on to it, if that's what I mean.

[998] Well, I just mean, like, that is it.

[999] Well, it's the only thing that kind of, like, wires into the main story at all.

[1000] If you finish the Broken Steel quest line, is that it?

[1001] Can you keep going, or it doesn't lock you out?

[1002] Yeah, no, that game never ends.

[1003] Because Fallout New Vegas does end, right?

[1004] Oh, yeah.

[1005] And then you're done?

[1006] Yeah, it ends and you're done.

[1007] Just like Fallout 3 did.

[1008] For now?

[1009] For now, yeah.

[1010] It does the same type deal as the end of Fallout 3 does where it kind of breaks stuff down.

[1011] But I think it's done way better.

[1012] Oh, good.

[1013] So how did Obsidian do?

[1014] Obsidian does how Obsidian do.

[1015] That game is really well written and kind of broken.

[1016] But so was as we've gone over.

[1017] I don't know that you can necessarily pin it.

[1018] And not that it matters.

[1019] I mean, you know, people shouldn't have to go out and buy broken games.

[1020] It kind of doesn't matter whose fault it is.

[1021] But, you know, they're working on an engine that is well known for being fucked.

[1022] So that's true.

[1023] That's the code name of that engine, right?

[1024] Right.

[1025] Fucked.

[1026] Fucked engine.

[1027] 2 .3.

[1028] Try to license that.

[1029] We're licensing the fucked engine for get some middleware here.

[1030] Speed tree.

[1031] Did you toggle the lock it up button?

[1032] Because it's an option now.

[1033] It's set to on.

[1034] If you want a license.

[1035] And you can uncheck it, but it's still actually on.

[1036] We recommend you keep it on for most of this.

[1037] It's always good to have a reboot.

[1038] These games are long.

[1039] We want to give people good hard stops to get up and reassess their lives.

[1040] Which is what I did every time the game came out.

[1041] So that's crazy.

[1042] That's a level of busted that Fallout 3 was not.

[1043] The locking up?

[1044] Well, I mean, the frequency with it, it sounds like you were experiencing.

[1045] It probably locked up about 10 times, 12 times, something like that.

[1046] That's a lot.

[1047] Over the course of about 36, 38 hours.

[1048] That's a lot.

[1049] It sounds like you were doing kind of consecutive, right?

[1050] You were playing that game.

[1051] Yes, yeah.

[1052] It was definitely...

[1053] Yeah, yeah.

[1054] By the end of the first day, after I had played it for about 12 hours straight, it started running real bad.

[1055] And I thought, oh, well, you know, maybe it's just a memory leak.

[1056] It's not going to run well for 12 hours straight.

[1057] And then restarted it, and it was still just as bad.

[1058] It kind of just degrades over time.

[1059] The load times get longer.

[1060] The game kind of hitches up in really weird ways.

[1061] The frame rate gets a little worse in spots.

[1062] I think you should play Fallout New Vegas.

[1063] That's the worst part.

[1064] And that's a telling thing.

[1065] Yeah, the story is really great.

[1066] The characters are awesome.

[1067] Largely the game is identical to Fallout 3 in how you play it, but they've made some smart additions to how you deal with companions, and there's options in there for additional crafting stuff and weapon mods, which I didn't really find to be all that key to the experience, but they are there.

[1068] Still the same things like encumbrance and weight limits and stuff like that.

[1069] If you're encumbered, you can't fast travel.

[1070] There's a perk for that.

[1071] There's actually a perk for you can fast travel while holding too much stuff.

[1072] Really?

[1073] Just make it back to your...

[1074] Limp back to your drawers.

[1075] I don't want to talk too much about the story.

[1076] All you got to do then is fast travel back to your house and dump the stuff.

[1077] If you have a house.

[1078] I don't want to get too much into the story stuff because that's clearly the meat here.

[1079] That's what's compelling.

[1080] But do they kind of establish...

[1081] a different tone from Fallout 3?

[1082] Yeah, because the UI is amber instead of green.

[1083] Don't worry, don't worry.

[1084] You can still set it to blue and everything will be okay.

[1085] But it defaults to amber?

[1086] Yeah.

[1087] That's fucking awesome.

[1088] Yeah, I know.

[1089] Green was the color of Fallout 3.

[1090] That was what you played in Fallout 3 and it was in green.

[1091] And you played New Vegas in amber.

[1092] I will totally play that in amber.

[1093] That's awesome.

[1094] I've switched it to blue before even starting the game.

[1095] Something about an amber monochrome just says country and western to me. Absolutely.

[1096] I don't know.

[1097] Yeah, I mean, totally it's a very different story.

[1098] You know, just the nature of who your character is as a courier.

[1099] I mean, the game opens with you getting shot in the head.

[1100] It's West Coast shit, man. Yeah, exactly.

[1101] Dumping bodies in the desert.

[1102] That's right.

[1103] Bodies getting buried in the desert.

[1104] No more of this politics.

[1105] It's kind of cool because, you know, they're going through the opening kind of speech and stuff.

[1106] And, you know, you see a guy getting buried in the desert.

[1107] It's like, oh, so it's just like old Vegas.

[1108] And then it's like, oh, by the way, that's fucking you.

[1109] Oh, God.

[1110] But you don't die.

[1111] obviously yeah pretty short game is it does it reference the first one at all like in any kind of like timeline three oh yeah fallout three sorry no so there's no kind of i found there might be some loose occasionally talk about the you know like the one of the loading screens that like mentions like the enclave hasn't really been seen seen out seen out west for a while it's presumed they went back east it takes place after uh or is it just i did not i did not work out the timeline it didn't i'm just starting to wonder with all the fallout it's like 2281 Oh, sure.

[1112] Let me check my timeline.

[1113] I think that's pretty close to Fallout 3.

[1114] It's late 2270s, I think.

[1115] Do we know any idea off the head what the time difference is between the first Fallouts and 3?

[1116] No, no idea.

[1117] I'm pretty sure 3 is supposed to be like 100 -something years after.

[1118] It's a good chunk of time.

[1119] I'm just starting to wonder with Fallout 1, 2, and 3, the way those stories went with bringing life back in this post -apocalyptic world.

[1120] Are things getting better?

[1121] New Vegas is a slightly different situation because as it turns out, the Strip didn't necessarily get directly hit with missiles.

[1122] I don't think that area in general of the country wasn't really that hard hit.

[1123] And you find out why over the course of the game.

[1124] People like to gamble.

[1125] And that's a pretty interesting bit of the story all its own.

[1126] But you find clean water.

[1127] That's it?

[1128] There's clean water there immediately.

[1129] At no point are you finding a GECK.

[1130] Good.

[1131] I'm glad we've done it like three times.

[1132] I don't need a new pump because the one in the vault failed.

[1133] Exactly.

[1134] You're set up.

[1135] So is there no radioactive water?

[1136] There's plenty of radioactive water.

[1137] This isn't a community crisis?

[1138] Yeah, exactly.

[1139] And you're not a vault dweller?

[1140] You are not a vault dweller.

[1141] Are there vaults?

[1142] There are vaults.

[1143] Do you ever go in the vault?

[1144] Absolutely.

[1145] All right.

[1146] Isn't the big the same as the vaults?

[1147] Knowing the layout of how vaults are will benefit you in Fallout New Vegas.

[1148] Because it's the same.

[1149] Yes.

[1150] Well, they're all vault tech, right?

[1151] They collapse in different ways, so they force you to go around certain things.

[1152] You're like, oh, I know the overseer's officer will be right here, but fuck.

[1153] Isn't...

[1154] This is maybe a little off topic, but isn't the big like NORAD or whatever thing in Nevada?

[1155] Crystal Palace.

[1156] Yeah.

[1157] Do they ever reference that?

[1158] NORAD's in Colorado.

[1159] It's Colorado.

[1160] Bummer.

[1161] I thought there was a Nevada one.

[1162] That's like some.

[1163] I was like Groom Lake.

[1164] I mean, it's like Area 51 and that sort of stuff.

[1165] It's a hole up in there.

[1166] The president's still alive.

[1167] Right.

[1168] John Connor.

[1169] So this game's a lot more about factions.

[1170] They've introduced a new reputation system to the game, so you kind of earn and lose favor.

[1171] Yeah, exactly.

[1172] You've got a lot of rep to earn.

[1173] With these different factions, there are kind of two core factions that matter the most, and that's the New California Republic and Kaiser's Legion, or Caesar's Legion.

[1174] So his own people pronounce it Kaisar most of the time.

[1175] But there are some spots where they clearly just fucked up recording dialogue.

[1176] Like his own man, they say Caesar.

[1177] I think the split is supposed to be anyone who's part of it says Kaisar.

[1178] But everyone else is just like, no, it's fucking Caesar.

[1179] Like, what are you talking about?

[1180] But then there are a few guys in his own legion that say, in my mind, they were just new guys.

[1181] You wrote your own narrative for that.

[1182] I win a no prize.

[1183] How does Matthew Perry say it?

[1184] I don't know.

[1185] Even though who his character was.

[1186] I figured it out at the end, but did not realize it over the course.

[1187] Didn't make an impact.

[1188] Yeah.

[1189] None of the celebrity voices really stood out as like, oh, that's that person except for Michael Dorn.

[1190] That strikes me as an excellent thing.

[1191] Really?

[1192] Yeah.

[1193] I hate it when it's like, oh, it's that actor that I know.

[1194] Then I just think of that actor whenever I look at that character.

[1195] Unless it's Keith David.

[1196] I think that some of it will end up being your familiarity with how some of the voices sound.

[1197] Like the companion, I had this girl, Veronica, that was my companion for most of the game.

[1198] I was like, man, the voice acting is really good.

[1199] And it turns out it's Felicia Day.

[1200] I'm like, okay, if it's good, that's fine.

[1201] Like, that made me worry that, like, the delivery was flat.

[1202] I'm just not really familiar with anything else that she does.

[1203] So it might be a case where you listen and go, like, that's totally Felicia Day.

[1204] But I wouldn't know.

[1205] So the rep system, how does that work with the Karma system?

[1206] The Karma system is still there, but I don't know why.

[1207] I didn't really get a sense at any point during the game why it mattered.

[1208] And, in fact, it's implemented in kind of a weird...

[1209] It comes up in some weird times.

[1210] So there's a quest at some point in the game where I have to pick a lock at a casino to get into this back area because someone's going to be eaten.

[1211] And I want to put a stop to that.

[1212] But I lost karma for picking the lock.

[1213] Did it matter at all?

[1214] No, I don't think so.

[1215] No, it's karma.

[1216] I imagine that maybe there'll be some companions that might.

[1217] That's typically how it was that some companions wouldn't.

[1218] partner up with you if your karma was bad but it also rep factors into it like veronica's part of the brotherhood of steel and if you're bad with them she's like hey You know, whenever you're trying to implement a system like that, like Fable 2 had similar issues.

[1219] Where like you're doing something good, but you're getting bad points.

[1220] Where like I'm defending this lady, but then because I murdered that dude, my alliance goes down.

[1221] It's kind of busted that way still.

[1222] Like they have like, okay, like in absolute terms, picking locks is bad.

[1223] But in this context where I need to pick this lock, it doesn't recognize that it's in service of something else.

[1224] Exactly.

[1225] So it still does that, which is unfortunate.

[1226] I lost a lot more karma than I gained.

[1227] There's no absolute number or anything, but definitely the number of pop -ups that said, like, yo, man, what are you doing?

[1228] Were way more than a couple of times where I got positive karma.

[1229] Brandishing.

[1230] Yeah.

[1231] Vegas is tough.

[1232] Pulling out guns in the casino.

[1233] Right.

[1234] Touching the girls.

[1235] Walking around the metal detector.

[1236] Got guns up in the club.

[1237] You cannot touch the girls.

[1238] So you can totally sneak guns into the casino.

[1239] Anytime you enter a casino, they take all your weapons.

[1240] But I believe it's governed by your sneak skill.

[1241] The higher it is, you're like, yeah, I'm just keeping all these pistols.

[1242] How about that?

[1243] True or false?

[1244] Fallout New Vegas is an expansion pack for Fallout 3.

[1245] Does it feel that way to you?

[1246] It depends on how you look at it.

[1247] I'm not talking about the breadth of the content or whatever.

[1248] Tech -wise, absolutely, sure.

[1249] If you strip away all the quality of the writing and the art of it and just get down to the nuts and bolts, yeah, they bolted on three new systems and shipped it.

[1250] Content -wise, it is a full game.

[1251] Absolutely.

[1252] I didn't mean to imply it.

[1253] I spent 38 hours or more with it.

[1254] It seems more like the...

[1255] the Vice City to GTA 3.

[1256] Yeah, kind of.

[1257] Yeah, they took that engine and made a new game with it, but a lot of the systems are still the same, and you know what?

[1258] You probably wouldn't want those to change that much.

[1259] Well, like, everything in Vice City looked new, whereas, like, the little medkit boxes in New Vegas are straight out of Fallout 3.

[1260] Oh, you're talking about, yeah, it's just, like, kind of reusing of certain...

[1261] Tons of art assets brought over and stuff like that.

[1262] It's like Awakening for...

[1263] Dragon Age where that was like...

[1264] Well, that is an actual expansion.

[1265] But it actually was an expansion.

[1266] Right, but it's a weird thing in today's kind of game market where you have DLC popping up all over the place where...

[1267] I mean, I forget how much that was.

[1268] That was like $30 for Awakening or $40.

[1269] I think trying to level that as a criticism of like, oh, this would have just been an expansion.

[1270] That's old thinking.

[1271] Shit's changed since then.

[1272] I don't mean it in a negative sense necessarily.

[1273] It's just kind of a...

[1274] It's a weird follow -up in a way.

[1275] Do you mean it in the sense that I just finished playing Fallout 3?

[1276] Am I going to get burnt out?

[1277] on New Vegas.

[1278] I'm not done playing Fallout 3.

[1279] No, you're not.

[1280] I hope that this ends up being kind of the last hurrah for this technology.

[1281] At this point, they're like, okay, we're going to make Fallout 4, we're going to go make Elder Scrolls 5, and goddammit, it's going to be all new tech, because what the fuck?

[1282] Hopefully, yeah, because at this point, if Obsidian's making this game, it's already been two years since Fallout 3, it's probably going to be at least another couple years.

[1283] Four years to make a new game.

[1284] let's get a new platform right yeah um but elder scrolls or fallout what would i rather probably what do you think that's coming i want to know would you rather have is it rather or what do you think yeah i mean they're only gonna make one next game you know it's it's assuming it's either or and not so i bet the fallout stuff sells so much better than the elder scrolls that's my guess i don't know i thought oblivion did pretty well pretty well but i bet fallout three so otherwise they probably would have shifted gears already right i don't know I say Elder Scrolls.

[1285] Yeah, I guess because we've had two games back -to -back.

[1286] Yeah, but what is the market now for fantasy RPGs?

[1287] I don't know.

[1288] I mean, ask Dragon Age.

[1289] Yeah, well, they're switching over to their action RPG, right?

[1290] I feel like Bethesda kind of makes its own market in a way.

[1291] Their games are so huge and so unique that there's a player base out there for anything they're going to make.

[1292] I bet if Dragon Age had done way better, they would immediately be like, oh, we need to get our PC Elder Scrolls.

[1293] two console kind of port on and now the dragon age is going console kind of like wait a minute it's going linear well i'm saying like if they if the dragon age had done really well on it sold more on consoles than on pcs right i believe that's the case uh i bet they would have been like let's focus on a pc elder scrolls and like we'll bring it to consoles but i feel like since dragon age is going the other way where they're like well we really have to cater to consoles.

[1294] No one's going the, we need to make this more PC -ish direction.

[1295] But that's what they've been doing since Oblivion.

[1296] There were all those complaints when Oblivion came out that the UI was too controller -oriented.

[1297] Right, so I feel like they will go...

[1298] They made that decision like five years ago.

[1299] More that direction, you know, with Fallout and the way they're going now, and keep going now on that train.

[1300] It seems like they've struck a pretty healthy balance right now.

[1301] Between...

[1302] What they've got now seems to be working really well on both sides.

[1303] I think, I don't know.

[1304] I just personally did not like Oblivion as much, I think, as a lot of other people.

[1305] Keep in mind that that game is now five years old.

[1306] It was a lot jankier back then.

[1307] It's just the combat.

[1308] It's basically the sword combat in that kind of game to me is just not fun.

[1309] Melee combat, not really great.

[1310] It's okay with Fallout because you're shooting dudes.

[1311] That's helped a lot.

[1312] And what would you do?

[1313] Vats for a sword?

[1314] You can do Vats for Melee and Fallout.

[1315] That's kind of cool.

[1316] Maybe they do.

[1317] Maybe they roll Vats back into the next Elder Scrolls.

[1318] I don't know.

[1319] Where would that be?

[1320] Some version of it.

[1321] Yeah, it wouldn't be the same.

[1322] Vats is such a specific Fallout thing from the Fallout universe.

[1323] You've got a Pip -Boy.

[1324] I'd play that game.

[1325] I'd play that game if it was just medieval Fallout.

[1326] Take your character from New Vegas.

[1327] You travel through time.

[1328] Got it.

[1329] Check.

[1330] I'll be really interested to see how the new Dragon Age does and if it's going more like the gothic route or if it's going to be more kind of RPG.

[1331] It's interesting.

[1332] I don't know.

[1333] They're bringing it in here on Friday, so we're about to find out.

[1334] I feel like that'll dictate how that stuff does, what direction they go in.

[1335] If I were them, I'd probably stick with the Fallout stuff.

[1336] This is just like, I have no numbers to back this up, but I think sci -fi is just the sort of thing that probably appeals to a wider range of people than fantasy stuff.

[1337] Yeah.

[1338] To some extent.

[1339] I mean, when fantasy hits, it hits big.

[1340] Yeah.

[1341] You know, you're Lord of the Rings and whatever, but.

[1342] Warcraft.

[1343] Yes.

[1344] Yeah.

[1345] But sci -fi is like an easier sell in a commercial.

[1346] It's basically just guns versus swords.

[1347] Like, I think people really enjoy shooting stuff more than they like swords.

[1348] I think that's the market we're in right now.

[1349] I think it's easier to pull off the sci -fi stuff.

[1350] But yeah, when you do great fantasy, when you are trundling through the countryside with your sword and battle -axing orcs and ogres and shit, it's awesome.

[1351] Yeah.

[1352] Throwing spells at dudes and dungeon crawling and guilds.

[1353] So you vote Elder Scrolls?

[1354] Yeah, I could go for some Elder Scrolls.

[1355] I would like to see a new Elder Scrolls.

[1356] I think they'll do Fallout.

[1357] I think especially since...

[1358] And I would like to see more Morrowind, less Oblivion, like in the kind of...

[1359] What I would want from him.

[1360] Now I don't even know what you're saying anymore.

[1361] Now you're just making...

[1362] It's just...

[1363] You're not making sense anymore.

[1364] I just...

[1365] Vinny, honey, are you feeling okay?

[1366] I just liked Morrowind.

[1367] Why?

[1368] Oh, it was great.

[1369] I read all those books.

[1370] Kind of went on stride.

[1371] Books.

[1372] So at what point is the game part good?

[1373] Oh, it's like the...

[1374] Combat in Oblivion was so...

[1375] Okay, but what makes Morrowind good?

[1376] I don't know if it's better.

[1377] I can't remember.

[1378] Other than dissing Oblivion, I want to hear the positives of Morrowind.

[1379] You don't actually know.

[1380] I just don't want to read someone's term paper on it.

[1381] I don't know.

[1382] What made Oblivion better than Morrowind?

[1383] You can play it.

[1384] It was less ugly.

[1385] You didn't have to fucking walk everywhere.

[1386] They streamlined systems so that it was not completely punishing all the time.

[1387] Yeah, but like every place I felt in Oblivion looked exactly the same.

[1388] It was like template after template after template.

[1389] Like every cavern you walked in was exactly the same as every other place you'd been.

[1390] Every character encounter was exactly – it was just repetitive.

[1391] How many of those – what was the story like?

[1392] How many of those things did you – taken and checked out.

[1393] Oh yeah, I didn't do any of the story stuff.

[1394] There were like two of those.

[1395] But all of the side content was brilliant.

[1396] The only great side content I thought was the Dark Brotherhood.

[1397] And that was the majority I felt of Morrowind was engaging narrative stuff in it.

[1398] And the Dark Brotherhood was the only kind of engaging narrative in that.

[1399] The problem was the barrier for entry for Morrowind was much, much steeper.

[1400] It was also a different time.

[1401] Yeah, they've broadened the audience significantly since then.

[1402] It's because Oblivion did so well that they were able to carry this stuff forward.

[1403] I can't really fault them for going that direction, but the times we live in, dedicated servers for more away.

[1404] All right, so Fallout New Vegas, in stores now.

[1405] Yeah.

[1406] Review on the site.

[1407] Review up on the site.

[1408] That's right, you can read that business.

[1409] Quick look somewhere.

[1410] Read that thing.

[1411] Indeed.

[1412] Anything else?

[1413] I've been playing some EA Sports MMA.

[1414] Yes, that's also out this week.

[1415] I started playing a bunch of that and then rolled off of that onto Fallout and now I'm rolling back onto MMA.

[1416] How does it compare?

[1417] To Fallout?

[1418] It's less apocalyptic.

[1419] People get stuck in the mat.

[1420] It's still kind of messed up in some spots.

[1421] How does it compare to UFC?

[1422] It is a very different game.

[1423] I think it ends up...

[1424] The thing I've noticed is that some of the matches in MMA end up looking, as a spectator, end up looking a little more realistic than the fights in UFC.

[1425] Yeah.

[1426] But that doesn't necessarily say anything about the way it plays or anything like that.

[1427] UFC is a very mashy game.

[1428] It's got strike combos and a lot of stuff like that.

[1429] But it's also, I've got to rotate the right stick as fast as I can to get out of this thing.

[1430] I've got to hammer on this button to do this.

[1431] And that's just the kind of game it is.

[1432] It makes a lot of sense for some of the struggling and some of the things you're doing in a mixed martial arts fight for that to be represented by the mashing of buttons.

[1433] EA decided to go the other way of it and said, there's no mashing in this game.

[1434] It's all timing based.

[1435] Technical MMR.

[1436] And so they've moved all the strikes and stuff to the right stick like Fight Night style.

[1437] Okay.

[1438] And basically they've created a universal set of controls where you're kind of hitting the A button on the Xbox version, X on PS3, to kind of go down, to go into a lower, better position.

[1439] So if you want to bring a guy down, you hit A. Okay.

[1440] And you'll try and shoot in on him and try and take him down.

[1441] both standing up in a clinch position.

[1442] If you hit A, you will try to trip him and take him down.

[1443] If you are on top of a guy, you will hit A to get in a better, you'll kind of work through his guard and get on top of him in a better, more advantageous position.

[1444] It almost sounds kind of like Assassin's Creed or like Mirror's Edge, like up -down movement.

[1445] A little bit.

[1446] So Y is the opposite.

[1447] Why is your I want to stand the fuck up button?

[1448] or I want to get this guy who's on top of me. I want to get him into a less advantageous position.

[1449] So you're trying to do that, try and get up.

[1450] Or if you're on the bottom, you can hit A to try and sweep him, roll him over, and then take control.

[1451] Does it react when you hit those?

[1452] That's kind of the problem with it.

[1453] Since it's so timing -based, there's a very specific timing to everything, and the game is...

[1454] at teaching you the timing for when to do what.

[1455] Like the feedback?

[1456] Yeah, it's really bad about giving feedback because, you know, the animation is kind of always going.

[1457] They're not static.

[1458] They're always kind of struggling a little bit just as part of like almost their idle animation when you're on top of a guy.

[1459] So you'll hit the button and you're not really sure if it's working until it happens.

[1460] You're like, oh, I rolled it.

[1461] Okay, okay.

[1462] And part of that just kind of comes with time.

[1463] The game has a really awful tutorial that doesn't...

[1464] You showed me a little bit of that.

[1465] It doesn't show you what the buttons do until you've done it.

[1466] So it's like when you hit A, it comes up and says, here's how A is used.

[1467] I'm like...

[1468] i'm already using it yeah you didn't i don't really told me this before right this should be like hey now do this so as it turns out there's a career mode and there's a bunch of training exercises in the career that you use to make your fighter better those actually are really good at teaching you what everything does and and and in some cases when to use it so for not being for for kind of styling itself uh to not be like a button mashy kind of thing do you find yourself just repeatedly hitting the button because you're not sure if it took yeah sort of but not mashing it just kind of hitting it and then going like well is it do i need to hit it again and then hitting it one more time they're like well i think that's okay i'll probably hit it one more time but if you do that too much you end up uh gassing yourself you end up draining your stamina oh so it's it's kind of a weird thing at times that game's like the game feels like dragon's lair without the like flashing lights on the doorway or the beep noise that says you hit the button oh no where you're just like it's animating and i did i do it i don't know oh wait i turned into a skeleton oh god So, yeah, not entirely positive with that stuff, but it's basically like the more I learn, the longer I play it, the better it gets.

[1469] It made a completely awful, awful, awful first impression.

[1470] Interesting.

[1471] But now that I'm kind of getting better at it and playing through the career mode, I'm starting to enjoy it.

[1472] And the smart thing to do with training exercises, so like Fight Night, like all these other games that I've had training, it just sucks.

[1473] You know, going through all these stupid fucking training mini games and they're just annoying.

[1474] They're not fun.

[1475] And they also don't seem like they ever make you better at the game.

[1476] Right.

[1477] So not only are these training exercises good at kind of teaching you the basics of the game and teaching you a little bit more situational awareness.

[1478] Once you've done them properly and get an A rank in them, you can simulate them at that A rank.

[1479] Oh, nice.

[1480] If you simulate them and have not done them at all, you only get a D. You won't get as much out of it.

[1481] But all you have to do is do it right once.

[1482] And then for the rest of the game, you can just simulate those exercises over and over again to get your fighter stats up, which is great.

[1483] Is that great?

[1484] That is great.

[1485] Really?

[1486] Yeah.

[1487] But why should you have to basically just sit there grinding button presses?

[1488] Well, I mean, so there's eight weeks before a fight, and there are a bunch of different training exercises.

[1489] And each week it comes up and says, like, which exercise do you want to do to do this thing?

[1490] So there's some kind of, you know, if you're getting ready for a specific type of fight, you want to have that level of control over your training.

[1491] Okay.

[1492] But are you still having to go through like a bunch of layers of menus to select those?

[1493] So the menus are not great.

[1494] But the fact that I don't have to sit there and ace every single one of these training exercises is huge.

[1495] That's fine.

[1496] It's huge for that stuff.

[1497] It still sounds like some level of busy work.

[1498] Yeah, it is.

[1499] I mean, that stuff could have been done.

[1500] Yeah, you're right.

[1501] It still could have been done better.

[1502] That's a lot of fight game career modes are.

[1503] I mean it's kind of telling that it's a huge bonus that you get to skip part of the game.

[1504] Yeah.

[1505] Like all of those.

[1506] But all those games.

[1507] Because the part where you're fighting is the part you care about.

[1508] Right.

[1509] So you have to have other shit if you're going to call it a career mode though.

[1510] Right.

[1511] Yeah.

[1512] You have to.

[1513] You have to throw that stuff in there.

[1514] Some calendar's got to be in there somewhere.

[1515] Yeah, you've got to have some sort of calendar.

[1516] You've got to have a calendar.

[1517] Basically, in this case, you have an HTC phone that comes up.

[1518] Oh, good.

[1519] And, you know, Boss Rutan calls you and tells you things.

[1520] I want Boss Rutan to call me and tell me things.

[1521] And the things he calls you up and tells you, I wish he would call me, too.

[1522] Hey, it's El Wapo!

[1523] Does he really say that?

[1524] He does.

[1525] That's fucking great.

[1526] Now, there's obviously a lot of different disciplines and stuff in MMA.

[1527] Some of the advertising for that game has shown people like...

[1528] learning jujitsu and learning Thai kickboxing and stuff.

[1529] It looked like there was some in -game stuff where you're in a kickboxing ring.

[1530] How does that stuff factor in?

[1531] It has multiple rings, so it's got the boxing ring, it's got a circular ring, and it has an octagon.

[1532] Depending on what league you're in.

[1533] But is there stuff where you go and you learn different styles for your character?

[1534] That's just part of the training stuff.

[1535] So basically at the start of any eight -week sequence between fights, you can opt to travel to a specific gym.

[1536] And then there's...

[1537] just a training exercise and you learn a special move there so you learn a special move but you don't so basically you pick a discipline and then you're like pick which move from that discipline you want to learn that's kind of how you're building your own custom fighters like i want a superman punch so i need to go to the mai tai school and and do and complete a training exercise to learn it and you can only learn 16 moves per fighter so you kind of have to pick and choose what you want what makes the most sense for your style of play.

[1538] It's not necessarily like, I'm learning a lot about kickboxing.

[1539] I know kung fu.

[1540] Is it mostly grappling, like MMA seems to be?

[1541] It's going to wind up on the ground at some point and you're going to have a tap out?

[1542] You can strike in the game.

[1543] If you put all your time and effort into just being a really good boxer and then really good at getting in on a guy and jacking him, you can knock him the fuck out.

[1544] You can do that.

[1545] But the guy I made is just a monster on the ground and can submit force.

[1546] Well, I'll say it.

[1547] He's a beast when he's on top.

[1548] Not much of a power bottom.

[1549] No, he's powerful on the bottom as well.

[1550] Very good.

[1551] Brazilian Jiu -Jitsu, is that the winning combo?

[1552] I haven't watched MMA in, I don't know, 40 years.

[1553] I believe they just call it.

[1554] Jiu -Jitsu, I don't think they'd full -on call it EJJ.

[1555] But yeah, there is a Gracie in the game.

[1556] Hicks and Gracie is in the game, I believe.

[1557] That's not the Gracie you want necessarily.

[1558] Ken and Frank Shamrock are in there.

[1559] My favorite Shamrocks.

[1560] Yeah.

[1561] It's not bad.

[1562] I don't know.

[1563] I need to play some more of it to know for sure, just kind of see how far it goes.

[1564] And now that it's coming out, I can try out the online stuff.

[1565] They're doing something real crazy with the online mode in it, which is...

[1566] And I think someone will probably do it better later on.

[1567] But basically they're going to be hosting live broadcasts.

[1568] Right.

[1569] They talked about this at E3 about how they were going to do these like pro -commentated scheduled fights and people are going to do hype videos.

[1570] So I've been watching some of these.

[1571] They've been kind of hosting fake ones for reviewers.

[1572] Like the devs are doing.

[1573] I caught a little piece of one.

[1574] Yeah.

[1575] So basically, like, you know, you can go to their website and you can upload your hype video, which is just you just create a video of you talking shit.

[1576] And then if it's really good, they might invite you to one of the and I'm sure, you know, they'll look at your online record or something like that, too.

[1577] But they might invite you to a live event.

[1578] And at these events, like they are live commentary.

[1579] They're streaming audio to you from the commentators.

[1580] And they're showing you the hype videos.

[1581] They're basically putting on a presentation.

[1582] And then at some point, players are playing the game against each other as part of it.

[1583] And these live commentators are still going and talking about the fight.

[1584] Now, is it like custom dudes only or are you going to be able to play as like the dudes in the game?

[1585] I think he plays the dudes in the game.

[1586] Okay.

[1587] So you haven't seen this in practice yet, right?

[1588] This is still...

[1589] I mean, I've watched some of the broadcasts and stuff and it is just kind of developers taking on each other and some of the press taking on each other.

[1590] But like the announcers aren't...

[1591] It's not necessarily a key part of the game.

[1592] Cashman style?

[1593] Yeah.

[1594] I mean, it is.

[1595] It's live.

[1596] But it's not like between the matches there's a real dude, then during the match?

[1597] No. During the match, it's real dudes.

[1598] Good.

[1599] These dudes are talking.

[1600] Yeah, exactly.

[1601] It doesn't just throw back to...

[1602] Wow, that was a crazy fight.

[1603] Now back to you, Cortana.

[1604] Yeah.

[1605] It's not that at all.

[1606] That's a really cool idea.

[1607] It's a really cool idea.

[1608] The stuff I've seen looks terrible.

[1609] Yeah, I don't know if this is the game for it.

[1610] But it just seems so resource intensive to make work.

[1611] Well, I think you're going to have a community team.

[1612] So you probably have a couple of guys or one guy or something that's watching these hype videos and keeping a look at the leaderboards and picking guys out.

[1613] And then you have two commentators that come on once a month or something like that for an hour or two hours.

[1614] But how many matches is that?

[1615] Is that like five, ten matches?

[1616] I think they set.

[1617] The ones that they were setting had two.

[1618] I would have imagined they would have something longer, something more like a real fight card.

[1619] Eight fights or something like that.

[1620] I don't know.

[1621] It seems like the kind of thing that sounds awesome on paper and that no one at EA is expecting to last more than six months.

[1622] past like the game's release right like when unless it really takes off yeah i don't know we'll see i haven't really heard from them it's one of those features that just seems like it again it's kind of resource intensive and you know putting on those cards and like it's going to depend on the number of people that like actually want to watch these things more that even then when those who want to participate they've also got something there's an option there called prize fights where this just straight up like enter a contest like give us your email address enter your full name and we will send it to rockstar the energy drink people and they're going to have some sort of like series of fight like some kind of sponsored event also.

[1623] So they're at least going for it in terms of coming up with new things to put in -game.

[1624] People have been trying to broadcast game tournaments and stuff like that.

[1625] I feel like a lot of them have gone about it all wrong.

[1626] But if you integrate it into the game this way and run it yourself as the publisher, it's kind of cool.

[1627] I think this is a great game for EA Sports to experiment on because I think the MMA stuff, at least from a gameplay perspective, is potentially more interesting to watch to...

[1628] a layperson than certain other sports that they might do.

[1629] It's also – I think the MMA game is a fairly low – I don't want to say low investment.

[1630] But they've already got these other franchises going.

[1631] Like low stakes?

[1632] Yeah, the stakes.

[1633] If this goes, ah, this didn't really work out so great, it's not like, oh, this feature in Madden completely fucked it up and shat the bed on this thing.

[1634] Or it could elevate it if it really takes off.

[1635] Sure, or if it takes off, it can up the stakes for MMA.

[1636] And then they'll be like, okay, now we know what works, what we learned from this, and then we can implement it in a different way.

[1637] I think the big problem that game will run into for the layperson is that it doesn't have the fighters.

[1638] You know, like Randy Couture's on the box and Fedor and stuff.

[1639] They've got a couple of big names here, like Bobby Lashley's in it.

[1640] But they have the guys from Strikeforce.

[1641] As a casual MMA fan myself, I don't know any of those dudes.

[1642] Granted, I also only know a quarter of the guys in the UFC game, but that's a much higher number than I recognize in this.

[1643] Half the reason I recognize guys in EA Sports MMA is because they're like, we got Ken Shamrock and Boss Rootin.

[1644] You remember those guys, right?

[1645] Randy Couture.

[1646] He was in the Expendables.

[1647] Pat Miletic is a teacher.

[1648] You can maybe unlock him somewhere.

[1649] I don't know.

[1650] It's kind of like they're relying on these older fighters that aren't necessarily...

[1651] Yeah, having the Shamrocks in there is telling.

[1652] Is Don Frye in there somewhere?

[1653] Probably, dude.

[1654] I don't know.

[1655] I don't know.

[1656] No, isn't he wrestling in Japan or something?

[1657] I don't know.

[1658] As far as I know, that dude is alive somewhere.

[1659] Somewhere doing a Magnum PI impression.

[1660] I mean, yeah, I think kind of the bummer, like the end of this conversation is it didn't have the UFC license, so UFC.

[1661] perform better.

[1662] Yeah, kind of.

[1663] It's kind of like regardless of what they try with the gameplay.

[1664] Strikeforce is on the rise.

[1665] I've watched a little bit of Strikeforce and the fights are good.

[1666] The fights are fine.

[1667] But the UFC name carries...

[1668] But it's the WCW.

[1669] Like the 90s WCW of all of this.

[1670] These guys painted on the back wall to look like they're sitting in chairs.

[1671] Yeah, totally.

[1672] Maybe not quite.

[1673] It's like the brand here is EA Sports.

[1674] Yeah.

[1675] It's not called Strikeforce MMA for a pretty good reason.

[1676] So you just call it...

[1677] Is the EA Sports brand more powerful than UFC?

[1678] And right now, no. Clearly not.

[1679] Plus those THQ guys.

[1680] Made a great game.

[1681] UFC is fantastic.

[1682] The bummer is they have made a great game.

[1683] It sounds like this is potentially at least a good game.

[1684] It's not here for no reason.

[1685] It's obviously on the heels of some of that MMA money that they saw THQ make.

[1686] They also ran smack into the second year of UFC didn't do the numbers that they thought.

[1687] It's been in development.

[1688] Maybe this isn't an annual franchise.

[1689] You're damn right it's not.

[1690] Same reason Fight Night doesn't come out every year.

[1691] It's funny because I feel like they learned that lesson in the early 2000s when the first UFC games came out and they tried cranking them out and then everyone was like, I don't give a shit.

[1692] The first one was awesome, but no, this year I don't care.

[1693] The last two UFC games, like the original ones, were some of the most half -assed pieces of shit.

[1694] Crave -ass Crave games.

[1695] Crave -ass Crave games.

[1696] I reviewed the last one and I was like, what happened?

[1697] What happened to this?

[1698] We thought we could bring it to PS1.

[1699] Good luck.

[1700] Crave.

[1701] Hey, remember Crave?

[1702] Crave still totally exists.

[1703] Crave is still a company.

[1704] Crave totally exists.

[1705] What did they put out?

[1706] I don't remember.

[1707] Published acclaim games.

[1708] You heard it like new acclaim also went under.

[1709] You heard about that, right?

[1710] Yeah.

[1711] That was going to happen.

[1712] Yeah, that's not a big surprise.

[1713] Anything else, Jeff, that you've spent any time with?

[1714] The polynomial.

[1715] What?

[1716] I downloaded it on a whim yesterday while I was writing the Fallout review.

[1717] What is that?

[1718] It's like a music -based shooter.

[1719] Oh, okay.

[1720] Audio surf.

[1721] Not really, but yeah.

[1722] Beat hazard.

[1723] Yeah, that type of thing, which I'm always a sucker for.

[1724] Sure.

[1725] I saw it on the Steam store featured list, clicked on it, saw about a second and a half of gameplay, and saw basically...

[1726] space sim meets mp3 visualizer and went fucking okay i watched the trailer after you tweeted yeah yeah it was just like i could play this it's uh it's weird it's weird yeah what is called polynomial the I'm sorry, the polynomial.

[1727] So it's not like some mission -based space sim or anything like that.

[1728] You're kind of flying around this 3D space and you have throttle control and you can shoot and you can roll and that's it.

[1729] That's less like a math problem than I thought this was going to be.

[1730] But basically you are flying around inside a big MP3 visualizer shooting black Pac -Mans.

[1731] Pac -Man, you might say.

[1732] That's racist.

[1733] I feel like someone should have stepped in at some point and just told these guys, nah, kids, you need to snap your name, something catchy.

[1734] Well, it has a subtitle like Sound of the Space or some crazy thing like that.

[1735] You're the Wonders now, all right?

[1736] Just leave it alone.

[1737] Actually, I think the name fits for...

[1738] Not in any logical way, but it's like, yeah, this game should be named something completely off the chain.

[1739] Yeah, you need to scare some people away from this.

[1740] And you can import your own MP3s.

[1741] Yeah, and then the waves will kind of move in the way you dictate.

[1742] You can actually go and kind of create your own visualizers.

[1743] They have a language in there or some kind of thing in there where you can kind of set up your own stuff.

[1744] There's like $35 or $36 in there already.

[1745] Five bucks.

[1746] It looks fucking beautiful.

[1747] It's $10.

[1748] It is gorgeous.

[1749] Just the particle effects and just the way the lights look, it looks like something out of Tron, but somehow better.

[1750] As you're dying, the picture starts losing its vertical hold and rolling all cool.

[1751] But it looks...

[1752] Like, you know, when games try to approximate effects like that, like, oh, the view is getting all shot up and it's starting to get all staticky and stuff.

[1753] It looks fake.

[1754] It doesn't look like something that actually has static.

[1755] This looks like something that actually is getting staticky and fucked up.

[1756] And as the picture starts to roll and stuff, like in a digital way, like a digital roll and digital is just like, oh, man, this is getting like all like the picture gets noisy in a very believable and really cool way.

[1757] It's kind of a weird thing to.

[1758] Call out, I guess, but it's like a lot of games don't get that done in a believable way.

[1759] It's like, okay, yeah, all right, it looks like this.

[1760] Well, and as we've learned, that's one of the key features in 2010 in a game is you've got to have your simulated digital noise and channels.

[1761] Yes, this is the Kane and Lynch 2 of indie music -based shooters.

[1762] I wonder if at some point those effects will look as weird and cheesy as film burn.

[1763] Like just kind of like dated and like – Or when all the games had – they tried to do the stupid fake like – Film rolling.

[1764] Well, like – yeah.

[1765] And like, you know – Like Wet had all that film scratching.

[1766] Yeah.

[1767] Like even before that, just like film strip style stuff where you're like, oh, okay.

[1768] But obviously this is dated and like whatever.

[1769] Like I wonder if at some point like artifacting and compression will look like, oh, yeah.

[1770] This is obviously from the like – early two thousands and like nothing.

[1771] I don't even understand.

[1772] Right.

[1773] You know, yeah.

[1774] We'll have to figure out as just signal gets cleaner and stronger and better.

[1775] What will it look like when it goes bad?

[1776] Yeah.

[1777] Well, it artifact up still, or will there be something else?

[1778] Like that's, that's kind of the thing is the display standard.

[1779] We'll have to change again for, it's funny.

[1780] I don't know.

[1781] I hope, I hope.

[1782] That happened.

[1783] So $10 PC only?

[1784] Yeah, $10 on the PC.

[1785] The Polynomial?

[1786] The Polynomial.

[1787] It's interesting.

[1788] I don't know that I'd recommend it, but we should probably do some video of it because it looks crazy.

[1789] It sounds like the name of a bad guy in the Matrix.

[1790] Yeah, sort of.

[1791] Does it come with like five or ten songs or something?

[1792] It's like ten songs it comes with, yeah.

[1793] And the importing songs could have handled a little smoother, but they'll probably get there.

[1794] Brad Shoemaker.

[1795] Hello.

[1796] Anything other than Super Meat Boy you want to talk about?

[1797] Oh, man. Mostly been living in a meat hell for the last week.

[1798] Sounds like it.

[1799] Sounds delicious.

[1800] Season 2 of the GSL started yesterday.

[1801] Signed up for that.

[1802] There's your meat hell.

[1803] Speaking of broadcasting tournaments of video games.

[1804] Way better this season.

[1805] They're offering full 720p video of the matches.

[1806] So that's awesome.

[1807] How often are they doing matches in these quote unquote seasons?

[1808] It is overwhelming.

[1809] If you're worried about getting your $20 worth, don't, because you probably won't have time to watch all the matches that they put in there.

[1810] So it's like daily?

[1811] Yeah, yeah.

[1812] Okay.

[1813] Because they start out with, it starts on the round of 64, so that's 64 players.

[1814] That's like 32 matchups in this round.

[1815] And they're showing all of those?

[1816] Playing best two out of three each.

[1817] God.

[1818] Oh, dear.

[1819] So 32 matchups times two to three games.

[1820] And for those who don't know, we're talking about StarCraft II here.

[1821] Yes, this is StarCraft.

[1822] This is Brad's StarCraft 2.

[1823] You know, if somebody runs the series, it's only going to be two.

[1824] I didn't think we were talking about Madden.

[1825] Excuse me, the set.

[1826] If one of the players runs the set, it's only two games.

[1827] But even two games, and there's commentary beforehand, and sometimes there are interviews with the winner after, so even two games is a good 30, 45 minutes.

[1828] Hey, you guys want to join my fantasy StarCraft League?

[1829] I'm in.

[1830] I'm in.

[1831] It's a really, like...

[1832] I call Korea.

[1833] So you're a fruit dealer versus boxer at BlizzCon?

[1834] Like, really?

[1835] Yeah, like...

[1836] Actually?

[1837] Like, just a separate exhibition match series?

[1838] Are you serious?

[1839] Now I really wish I was going to...

[1840] Does that mean somebody's going to get booted from a league or something?

[1841] Those are basically the two biggest names in competitive StarCraft right now.

[1842] Boxer, because Boxer is the legend of the original StarCraft.

[1843] Like, he is the reason that he's...

[1844] Is he good?

[1845] Yeah.

[1846] At StarCraft 2?

[1847] A, he's considered the best Terran player of all time.

[1848] Seriously, he is.

[1849] I'm not laughing because it's not true.

[1850] Yeah, yeah.

[1851] He is laughing because it's fucking absurd.

[1852] He brings viewers out in Korea.

[1853] When he's playing, people come out in droves.

[1854] He puts butts in seats.

[1855] Yeah.

[1856] But he also is credited with essentially...

[1857] He's got a lot of stroke around these butts.

[1858] Yep.

[1859] He's pretty much the reason that...

[1860] quote -unquote esports is a thing in Korea.

[1861] He set up that whole team system back in the day and stuff like that.

[1862] He helped build that stuff up.

[1863] Godfather.

[1864] He is.

[1865] He totally is.

[1866] He was essentially, I think he was kind of in retirement, so he came back out for StarCraft 2.

[1867] So that's a big deal, but then Fruit Dealer is like the new...

[1868] The young buck, the rising star.

[1869] Yes, he is the rising star of StarCraft 2.

[1870] So having the old guard play the new blood in a competitive match, that's crazy.

[1871] And they've got their separate 16 -person invitational tournament going.

[1872] They announced the names for that.

[1873] Okay, I've got to go look at that later.

[1874] But yeah, it's kind of a bummer.

[1875] There's only three foreigners in this season of the GSL.

[1876] There's one guy from Germany, one guy from America, and one from China.

[1877] Everybody else is Korean.

[1878] Still mostly a Korean thing, but I hope to see it globalized at some point.

[1879] And they have Sony Ericsson sponsoring it this time.

[1880] Weird.

[1881] Big corporate sponsors getting in there.

[1882] I liked the GSL back when it was pure.

[1883] Yeah.

[1884] I can't trust it now.

[1885] Free agents are ruining the game.

[1886] Really nice video quality this time.

[1887] Ridiculous amount of really high quality matches.

[1888] Great commentary.

[1889] If you care about StarCraft, you should sign up.

[1890] Actually, now I really, really, really, really want to start a fantasy StarCraft League.

[1891] I think that would be fucking funny as shit.

[1892] Is that possible, Brad?

[1893] You'd pick a bracket.

[1894] You'd have to do it like tournament basketball style.

[1895] It's not like you can field a team.

[1896] I feel like I don't know enough about fantasy sports or StarCraft 2 to know if this is actually even...

[1897] Me neither.

[1898] The idea is very exciting to me. Can we get a segment on ESPN where President Obama is picking his StarCraft brackets?

[1899] Can I draft Rainer?

[1900] Is that something?

[1901] In our fantasy StarCraft League, sure.

[1902] Okay, great.

[1903] That's allowed.

[1904] We'll allow it because there are no rules.

[1905] Any damage done by Marines go to you.

[1906] Okay.

[1907] So I've been playing Vanquish, which is the new platinum games.

[1908] Was it Shinji Mikami?

[1909] That's the Slidy game, right?

[1910] That's the, yeah, rock it around on your ass thing.

[1911] Yeah.

[1912] That game.

[1913] So, I mean, it's a cover -based third -person shooter for the most part.

[1914] Like, it's...

[1915] Very Gears reminiscent, but in a far way better way than Quantum Theory was.

[1916] Way more Japanese.

[1917] Far more Japanese.

[1918] Oh, Quantum Theory.

[1919] Oh, yeah.

[1920] Quantum Theory.

[1921] Yeah, it's basically like they strap on these two concepts, which are the rocket knee slide thing, which makes it easy to get from point A to point B. You just slide right up into cover and slide up staircases and all kinds of ways.

[1922] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1923] You can slide pretty much anywhere.

[1924] And then also the ability to kind of do a – like basically stop and slow down time so you can pick shots.

[1925] Like when your health gets to a certain – like if you lose a certain amount of health, it will automatically kick in the time -slowing thing so you can more easily get to – to save cover.

[1926] That's generous of them as opposed to the opposite thing where they usually just muddy up your screen and allow you to die fast.

[1927] I mean, it goes red also, but also goes slow.

[1928] So it's like, hey, you're in bad shape.

[1929] You need to get out of here.

[1930] You need to get the hell out of here.

[1931] They've got to like, the levels.

[1932] The levels can be pretty big, but it's like the scope of the world around the levels that can be fucking incredible.

[1933] Like you'll be fighting a bunch of dudes and then a giant starship will just crash into the ground like right beside you.

[1934] Like sometimes it'll just be a background thing, but sometimes it'll actually impact the world.

[1935] Be like, oh, this building is falling on you.

[1936] You better get out of the way of this building using your rocket legs.

[1937] Can I pause for a second?

[1938] Yes.

[1939] What was the game?

[1940] And I have asked this like three times even on this podcast.

[1941] Castlevania is not on the Wii.

[1942] Are you sure?

[1943] Not on the Wii.

[1944] Okay.

[1945] Mondation Razors already came out.

[1946] Sorry.

[1947] So what's the game at E3?

[1948] This might even be like E3 like 2007 at this point where there was a game where stuff was supposed to crash around you, not into you to give you like immersion.

[1949] Like cars would flip out and kind of land near you.

[1950] Home front.

[1951] What?

[1952] That was last year.

[1953] That was Homefront.

[1954] Was it really Homefront?

[1955] Where, like, stuff would, like, wouldn't they call that?

[1956] They focus the ambient action toward your perspective.

[1957] Yeah.

[1958] So, like, if somebody shoots an RPG and blows up a Jeep, like, they will sort of finesse the trajectory of the Jeep so it just barely flies.

[1959] Okay, sorry.

[1960] I thought it might have been this game.

[1961] But stuff like that, and, like, that's kind of, like, the shooting is fine.

[1962] Like it's competent.

[1963] But actually what's kind of cool is there's an upgrade system where usually in a game like that.

[1964] So you've got like three slots.

[1965] You don't hold three weapons.

[1966] There's maybe like six or seven weapons total.

[1967] But you don't even hold weapons.

[1968] Your gun transforms.

[1969] Yeah, you're scanning weapons and then adding them to like your weird future guns.

[1970] That's a cool gun.

[1971] And it looks cool as shit whenever you change it.

[1972] It's too bad that you don't see it as much because usually you're, you know.

[1973] You're too busy trying to murder horrible Russian robots.

[1974] Is it super hard?

[1975] Those are the worst robots.

[1976] They're really horrible?

[1977] Fucking, I hate Russian robots.

[1978] Is it super hard?

[1979] No. Not Bayonetta hard?

[1980] No, no. I mean, I've died numerous times, but no, no, no. It's far, on normal, it's far more approachable than something like Bayonetta.

[1981] Do the robots speak Russian?

[1982] The robots don't really talk, but there are Russian dudes that get all Russian -y at you.

[1983] What are you?

[1984] You work for DARPA.

[1985] Really?

[1986] Yeah.

[1987] Are you the DARPA chief?

[1988] You work for DARPA and you're going around with a bunch of Marines and the Marines don't really like you because you're the fancy DARPA guy with all his future tech.

[1989] Rocket knees.

[1990] They don't all have that tech?

[1991] No, no, no. I am a special dude with special equipment that was made by this scientist who created this energy source that everything runs off of.

[1992] So you're the master chief?

[1993] Kind of, except you smoke.

[1994] So it's like you're the master chief.

[1995] In the helmet?

[1996] No, the helmet kind of like peels away.

[1997] It does like that.

[1998] like slide up and pull aside things you can see specifically for smoking i would imagine specifically for it's only for when he needs to smoke that he pulls that out so he's like way cooler than master chief then but then it's like it's it's yes it is it is japan trying to do an american action movie so it has like there's references to ebay Made in there.

[1999] All right.

[2000] There's just weird cultural shit that doesn't make any sense because this is like the far -flung future.

[2001] You're on a giant fucking space – Oh, you don't think eBay is going to make it?

[2002] You're on a giant fucking space station in this game and – I'm going to go home and eat a hamburger.

[2003] It just doesn't seem.

[2004] There's some anachronistic stuff with some of the tone.

[2005] Is one of your fellow soldiers trying to win a vintage vinyl on eBay?

[2006] Fitting all these Jordans, son.

[2007] Got to get these J's.

[2008] It's pretty early in the game.

[2009] You are rescuing a guy, and he's like, ah, they're actually in some sort of contraption.

[2010] And the guy says, ah, it actually was straight down my back.

[2011] And your character says, hey, you can pick one of those things up on eBay.

[2012] What?

[2013] What?

[2014] What?

[2015] Yeah.

[2016] Some of that stuff strikes me as a little odd, but the game actually that I would rather talk about right now is Game Dev Story.

[2017] Wait.

[2018] Oh, yes.

[2019] I just want to know, is Vanquish as short as everybody's saying it is?

[2020] I mean, I'd put it at about six hours or so.

[2021] All right.

[2022] But no multiplayer, right?

[2023] Yeah.

[2024] Oh.

[2025] Phone.

[2026] Phone.

[2027] Yeah, no, I mean, I don't think those systems will work for a multiplayer thing.

[2028] It's not massively long, but...

[2029] It feels satisfying.

[2030] Yeah, I find it.

[2031] It feels like enough games.

[2032] Giant robot bosses and...

[2033] Yeah, yeah, I like it.

[2034] I think it's fun.

[2035] I think it's solid.

[2036] And it looks great.

[2037] Like, all of the heat wash effects and particle stuff that they have looks crazy and...

[2038] Yeah, it just gives that game some great atmosphere.

[2039] So game dev story, though, I was not expecting it to get up on me like this.

[2040] Have you heard of this at all?

[2041] Yeah, I saw a bunch of people on Twitter.

[2042] Every game developer I know on Twitter has been talking about it.

[2043] Yeah, a bunch of people said it was eating their entire weekend.

[2044] Yeah, it's surprising how, because it's just a little iPhone game, and you're basically just like watching numbers go.

[2045] It's just like, all right, I'm going to make a game.

[2046] I'm going to hire staff, and this is the type of game we're going to make, and this is who I'm going to have.

[2047] Do this part of it.

[2048] Yeah, it's just a lot of watching graphs fill and stuff like that.

[2049] Tycoon game?

[2050] Basically, but it's game development, and it's oddly very engaging.

[2051] iPhone only?

[2052] It's like $4.

[2053] I don't know if it exists elsewhere.

[2054] I don't think so.

[2055] That sounds like a lot of numbers and stuff to cram onto an iPhone screen.

[2056] They, you know, they, I don't know, not virtualize, but they cover it up with little graphics when need be of like, ah, you earned five trumpets so the sound will be better.

[2057] Did you make a game?

[2058] I've made like 25 games.

[2059] Is there a review process in the game?

[2060] Is there like a Metacritic part?

[2061] Yeah.

[2062] Actually, after you ship your game, you get your four review scores back from the major pubs.

[2063] Oh, wow.

[2064] And if it's below 75, you fire your entire stack.

[2065] And you don't make your bonus.

[2066] And if you get certain scores, it raises your fan awareness, so you sell more units.

[2067] And if you hit a certain score level, then your game enters the Hall of Fame, and then you can then create sequels to that game.

[2068] Can you buy promos?

[2069] No, but there's – advertising is part of the process.

[2070] So like once you ship a game, you definitely want to go and spend some money on ads and there's a full scale of that stuff.

[2071] And there's demographics to consider for the types of games and there are different genre and game types that mix better than others.

[2072] Like robot shooter is a great, very populous genre.

[2073] You can choose – there's like – eight different eight or ten different fields like before you get into development of like okay I want to put a lot of my points towards like polish or accessibility or simplicity or niche appeal you hire staff and you level up your staff's abilities and then the types of games that you make the genre and type both level up the more you do them but if you use them too much then people get tired of your games There's a lot of stuff going on in this weird little game.

[2074] You have to contend with piracy, and can you implement DRM?

[2075] No and no, but there are new consoles on the regular, and you have to deal with licensing fees, and you have to consider install base, because if you have a bigger install base, you can potentially sell more copies.

[2076] But if you have a smaller install base, it's easier for you to have a hit on that system.

[2077] Can I invest in a really crappy game and then hold back review copies and just give them out to fanzines to get that day one score up?

[2078] I know, but if you run out of money, you can run out of money during development and you'll have to cancel your game.

[2079] Oh, you have to cancel it?

[2080] Or you can ship games early before you finish debugging, so you might save some time on development, but you'll ship a buggy game.

[2081] Can I lay off people?

[2082] Oh, yes.

[2083] In stores now.

[2084] You do a lot of hiring and firing.

[2085] You have to make sure they're happy before I fire them.

[2086] If you use someone to – oh, yeah, absolutely.

[2087] Get blowback.

[2088] That affects – if you use someone for a specific job too many times, they start getting worn out and they start doing a poorer job.

[2089] Yeah, yeah.

[2090] It just kind of keeps going and going and going.

[2091] You have to go to trade shows.

[2092] There are annual awards.

[2093] How popular is the game dev sim genre in making those games?

[2094] Actually, I made a couple of them, and they're pretty good.

[2095] Yeah, they do well.

[2096] Yeah, Game Co. is one of the types.

[2097] So I made a Game Co. simulation, and it did all right.

[2098] All right.

[2099] I find it incredibly sick.

[2100] that real game developers are getting super obsessed about this thing.

[2101] It's also awesome, but it's just a little bit bizarre.

[2102] It's great that they have consoles in it that kind of map back to the real thing.

[2103] Yeah, and everything is like, it's a nod in a week, like Senga or Intendro and Sunny are all the companies that are making the consoles.

[2104] And the consoles basically map back to...

[2105] It's like a Nintendo baseball game or something.

[2106] Yeah, yeah.

[2107] They're all very aware.

[2108] All of the game names from the other companies that exist in the world are just slight spins on...

[2109] On real game titles.

[2110] Can you make a console at some point?

[2111] Yes.

[2112] No. You can actually develop your own console.

[2113] Really?

[2114] I'm at the point where I can.

[2115] I just need a hardware engineer.

[2116] So that's the tough part.

[2117] They're tough.

[2118] Is getting a hardware engineer to come work for me. Hardware teams are expensive, man. I know.

[2119] How many copies did your poncho?

[2120] A little under four million.

[2121] Audio novel.

[2122] So Poncho Villain, my poncho -based audio novel, sold a little under four million.

[2123] My previous game, Great Play.

[2124] Did over $4 million.

[2125] So that's still my best -selling game.

[2126] And you have to name the game?

[2127] You can name your games, yes.

[2128] Are there conferences?

[2129] Is there an E3?

[2130] I mean, there's game decks.

[2131] And you have to decide if you're going to have a booth, how much you're going to spend on your booth, and then what the dividends of that are going to be.

[2132] God, I...

[2133] This is the worst.

[2134] No, this is shit that I had...

[2135] These are meetings I literally had to sit in on.

[2136] And now it's a game!

[2137] But it's all presented in, like, that cute, like, kind of Habbo Hotel, like, isometric Japanese twee kind of...

[2138] So you just named all of your games Pools Closed?

[2139] How much is it?

[2140] It's like four bucks.

[2141] So it's actually...

[2142] It's more than I generally like to spend on iPhone games, but it has already...

[2143] Does it have Game Center support?

[2144] Earned its keep.

[2145] No. No, I don't believe it does.

[2146] No sale.

[2147] What's its meta -critic rating?

[2148] I don't believe it's.

[2149] It's probably not listed at the moment.

[2150] But, yeah, I found that game oddly compelling.

[2151] I heard a few people talking about it last week, and I was like, oh, that actually sounds pretty cool.

[2152] And then hearing you talk about it in the car this morning, I'll probably end up picking it up.

[2153] Yeah.

[2154] That's right.

[2155] Localizer games?

[2156] No. No. Seems like there's a lot of room for a sequel.

[2157] Sure.

[2158] Depending on how crazy they want to go.

[2159] It's really impressive what they do.

[2160] I think we only have critiques of ways to embellish on it because we know how much more there is.

[2161] But pen angry letter to reviewer telling him he took food off your table.

[2162] Well, like how cynical does it feel?

[2163] Does it have like a kind of snark to it or is it just like – it's a sim.

[2164] It's like a kind of – I mean it's not – no, no. It doesn't have anything.

[2165] There's no politics in it really.

[2166] It's like knowing but it's not – Well, yeah, there's clearly insight into the process, but it is not cynical.

[2167] Like you could be developing a game and then your team finds out that a game just shipped that uses the same genre and concept.

[2168] And so your team gets bummed out and then also it potentially impacts your sales.

[2169] But that can be good.

[2170] How about can you do marketplace confusion?

[2171] Change box art?

[2172] Nope.

[2173] Oh, bummer.

[2174] Make box art look like other box art. Create marketplace confusion, change name.

[2175] No, nothing like that.

[2176] It's just – Poncho revolution.

[2177] It doesn't get into that stuff.

[2178] It's all about like, okay, these stats.

[2179] Here are the four stat numbers for your game, and then here is what you're – you have market demographics that you have to consider.

[2180] So you have both male and female for different age groups, and your consumers get older.

[2181] So over time, whoever was in like your five to eight – uh, demographic eventually becomes, you know, your, your nine to 12 demographic.

[2182] So you have to, you know, constantly reintroduce yourself to these younger players or else they, uh, you know, you'll just end up having an old ass audience.

[2183] Interesting stuff.

[2184] Right.

[2185] Let's talk about something.

[2186] I think, I think I kind of want my super cynical version of that.

[2187] Yeah.

[2188] Where you make a sequel anyway, even if it doesn't make the Hall of Fame.

[2189] You still get to make a sequel.

[2190] By get to, we mean you're doing it.

[2191] Someone on your team has an anonymous blog.

[2192] Fire them.

[2193] You paid for a movie license.

[2194] Go.

[2195] End game.

[2196] You have two months to make this game.

[2197] It's already a fair amount of inside baseball.

[2198] I don't know if that game would play to anyone that isn't in this.

[2199] I highly recommend the game dev story.

[2200] It's fun and cute and knowing.

[2201] Interesting.

[2202] Yes.

[2203] As sinister as you want it to be.

[2204] That's true.

[2205] You can name your games whatever you want.

[2206] Feel free.

[2207] All right, news.

[2208] I have to.

[2209] What's up?

[2210] Later.

[2211] I have a meeting with some people.

[2212] Oh, geez.

[2213] Okay.

[2214] Who make video games.

[2215] Bye, Brad.

[2216] Thanks for joining us.

[2217] Go talk to game people.

[2218] Yeah, I will.

[2219] Yeah.

[2220] Later.

[2221] Ask him about that other thing.

[2222] Tell me what you told me. Don't forget the first thing either.

[2223] Yeah.

[2224] Don't forget the first thing, but ask about that other thing.

[2225] Hey, game dev story.

[2226] All right.

[2227] Let's see here.

[2228] DLC stuff.

[2229] They just announced some Civ 5 DLC.

[2230] They just said that.

[2231] It's still really crazy to me that PC add -ons get called DLC.

[2232] Like it's still like a hard.

[2233] Yep.

[2234] You mean that expansion?

[2235] Yeah, exactly.

[2236] But they're not expansion size, right?

[2237] No, it's like it's a...

[2238] Not Civ V. It's a...

[2239] Rome 8 of the ancients.

[2240] No, no, no, no. It's a race.

[2241] It's one Civ.

[2242] What is it?

[2243] Or it's a couple of Civs.

[2244] So you get the Mongolians and the...

[2245] It was the other one that was just in the digital deluxe edition.

[2246] Oh, okay.

[2247] Yeah.

[2248] The Babylonians.

[2249] Yep.

[2250] World is crowded enough, man. Got enough.

[2251] I guess there's some scenarios that are associated with that.

[2252] Also announced on launch day that Fallout New Vegas DLC would be coming starting this holiday season and would be, at least for the time being, exclusive to the Xbox 360.

[2253] So crazy.

[2254] Did they not come out?

[2255] I thought they came out and said it would be timed.

[2256] I guess they did.

[2257] It will eventually come to all platforms.

[2258] They did clarify that.

[2259] But still.

[2260] It will happen just later.

[2261] I don't know if it's justified to be upset or angry at that.

[2262] I think it's really shitty to do it day of release.

[2263] Because then all the people that have already made their platform decision are already boned.

[2264] Would you rather...

[2265] It's funky the other way, too.

[2266] You do it beforehand, then your other platforms are fucking pissed.

[2267] You do it.

[2268] Let's break it down.

[2269] Game dev story.

[2270] What poncho villain.

[2271] If you do it way after.

[2272] Yeah, you can't do any multi -platform development.

[2273] You have to choose what platform you're developing for.

[2274] That's the way it ought to be.

[2275] There's no multiplayer in that game, right?

[2276] No, there is not.

[2277] Okay, I can't compete against you.

[2278] I don't think so.

[2279] I'm going to make a shooter.

[2280] Oh, no. Oh, fucker.

[2281] So, yeah, I don't.

[2282] So what is the timed exclusive stuff?

[2283] Is that just promotional?

[2284] That's the benefit?

[2285] Like some.

[2286] Yeah, so Microsoft has a reason to get behind it as a, this is why you should play games on our platform.

[2287] Right, and they'll promote it and they'll help out.

[2288] Yeah, it's pure marketing, sort of like synergy.

[2289] Yeah.

[2290] It's pure checks being cut.

[2291] Yeah, from Microsoft to Bethesda.

[2292] Yeah, let us help you help yourselves by not helping yourselves, but you'll help us and we'll give you the money to offset whatever pain you will experience.

[2293] I just feel like I'm always caught on the wrong side of this somehow.

[2294] Like, crap!

[2295] I just got it on the PC, you know?

[2296] But then on the other side of it, it's like, well, you know what?

[2297] Maybe I'll wait a little bit to play.

[2298] I don't think I'd want to jump into this DLC right away anyway.

[2299] What is it?

[2300] They say?

[2301] Downloadable content.

[2302] Is that what DLC is?

[2303] Downloadable?

[2304] I mean, I assume they don't really say what exactly it will be, but I assume that it will just be like what they did for 3.

[2305] To change the ending and let you play on.

[2306] I wonder if...

[2307] I mean, I guess they'll probably have to...

[2308] They wouldn't have to change the ending that much.

[2309] But...

[2310] Well, I don't know.

[2311] I guess I shouldn't say.

[2312] It probably ends in a lot of different ways.

[2313] But...

[2314] Yeah.

[2315] I mean, you can't play after the credits.

[2316] So they would have to change that, I guess.

[2317] Because the other option is you should load up a save.

[2318] Hopefully you have a good late game save where you're capable but not...

[2319] past this certain point yeah that'd be kind of weird maybe that's the change the ending maybe that's the hope with the kind of like day of release dlc is like you won't have too many people who've finished the game already it's not day of release it's coming this holiday season they've just announced that it's they announced it on the oh oh yeah there's anything out right now i'm saying that they like all right hey game's out so guess what dlc's coming holiday season but on the 360 and they said the first of it would become this holiday so i thought they were which is i mean it makes kind of i don't know it I'll be curious to see what the implementation is like because clearly if they're announcing this on day of, they have been planning for DLC since the beginning.

[2320] There has been a team working on some sort of DLC scenarios for a while.

[2321] So someone had to have considered what is the best way to integrate this shit into this game, especially if they're going to stick with the hard stop ending that Fallout 3 kind of backpedaled on.

[2322] Yeah.

[2323] Maybe they load it up separately.

[2324] Maybe they can just take a character out of a save and drop them in.

[2325] Broken Steel, was that the first?

[2326] DLC?

[2327] Operation Anchorage was the first one.

[2328] You had to reload a save.

[2329] That's less than ideal.

[2330] It's funky.

[2331] It's not the way you want to do it.

[2332] Certainly.

[2333] It'd be nice to take your character back in that you've spent all that time with.

[2334] I think it's a good time for them to release DLC.

[2335] holiday season, they put out something like mid -December or something like that.

[2336] Right around Christmas, you get those people that are getting the game as a gift, plus all those people that bought it at launch that are now kind of well done with it.

[2337] Chewed through most of the time.

[2338] Stop them from selling it back used.

[2339] Yeah, I don't know.

[2340] That's the big thing, right?

[2341] They want DLC not only to make money on its own merits or whatever, but also to keep people from selling it used to some extent.

[2342] It just makes you wonder.

[2343] If subscription services, like if they were really, really get serious about DLC, like take something like Call of Duty.

[2344] Modern Warfare 2 had two map packs, like 10 maps over the course of its life.

[2345] What if instead they released one map pack a month for eight months, and then that gave them four months for you to play all those maps while simultaneously hyping people up for the next Call of Duty?

[2346] You mean not releasing those as like discrete downloads, but saying like...

[2347] have the call of duty subscription and either way you know maybe they maybe they offer it one way so if you want to pick and choose you can do that but you know just let people subscribe up front and get some kind of discount like it's not well like mass effect 2 and that's only single player uh Maybe I'm just a special case, but I really enjoyed all the DLC they kept putting out for that.

[2348] And there was a lot of stuff they kept putting out for that.

[2349] And what was the split on that between free and paid?

[2350] Someone was designed as the you bought it new bonus.

[2351] Yeah.

[2352] It's tough to recall, but I think at one point...

[2353] With the Mass Effect 2 stuff?

[2354] Yeah, probably at 75%.

[2355] They also released a shitload of stuff that was just stuff.

[2356] It released a lot of just...

[2357] Here's a gun.

[2358] Here's a gun.

[2359] Here's some armor.

[2360] But they've done the three mission packs story stuff.

[2361] Yeah, and they put out paid weapon armor packs.

[2362] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2363] There's paid packs for that.

[2364] I think that's going to be the thing.

[2365] People talk about, like, we'd love to make Call of Duty a subscription -based game.

[2366] We'd love to make so -and -so a subscription -based game.

[2367] I think that's the only right way to do that without totally dismantling what makes those games those games and not...

[2368] rebuilding them as some kind of mmo or something is yeah like you need to totally dedicate yourself to regular updates yeah and and the mass effect stuff even had that weird uh i can't remember what it's called now that uh card it comes with the servers yeah the servers network where uh you have to pay for that if you're buying it used to get in on that stuff it's weird i you know and it circumvents the kind of weird interface that microsoft has for dlc stuff and you get it in game right you're purchasing stuff through there But yes, I was way into the support that that game had.

[2369] It's weird for something like Call of Duty or Modern Warfare where if you're playing that game online, would a map pack stop you from selling it or something like that?

[2370] Or do you just get bored of the multiplayer?

[2371] There's no narrative in it, let's say.

[2372] I mean, there's still plenty of people playing Modern Warfare 2 right now.

[2373] Right.

[2374] So you think the incentive of getting maps down the line is something that would make those people hold on to or not sell a game?

[2375] If you charge them up front for all of it, absolutely.

[2376] So they're just like, I'm going to get new maps.

[2377] Like, I just feel like they just said, like, we're going to release two maps a month for eight months.

[2378] You know, if they could actually be super up front about what you're going to get and not say, like, you'll get a year's worth of so -and -so.

[2379] Right.

[2380] If they just said, like, commit to it.

[2381] We're putting out 16 maps over the course of this game.

[2382] You'll be able to buy them.

[2383] two at a time for this much money or, you know, just like Sam and Max style, like make it episodic or something in a way, you know, if you, if you buy the season of DLC, it's something that, uh, that SmackDown is kind of doing this year with that fan access pack.

[2384] Like they're saying like, Hey, you'll get access to all this DLC.

[2385] Just pay us, you know, this, this bit up front.

[2386] I think that it could work – I think a system like that could work really well.

[2387] I think that there's also – if anyone is going to seriously go down that path, there's going to be I think a pretty steep learning curve on both the publisher and the consumer end on like what are the expectations?

[2388] What will the market allow for?

[2389] You know, how how greedy can we get with this stuff?

[2390] Yeah.

[2391] Like it has to be like that.

[2392] That's the thing is it has to be spelled out up front exactly what you're going to get.

[2393] And then they have to hit it.

[2394] Yeah.

[2395] You know, they actually have to put all that stuff out.

[2396] So they have to hire Telltale to write.

[2397] How do you do it?

[2398] Show us what you're doing.

[2399] Just if you could take these maps you have here, I guess we could call them maps.

[2400] Right.

[2401] And just if you could remove the dog and the bunny and then put in a rocket launcher here and like a Marty McFly P90 here.

[2402] Done.

[2403] In non -DLC news, I guess maybe not really news, the story originally broke that Visceral Games was working on a CNC title.

[2404] I did not hear that.

[2405] Visceral Games is not working on a CNC title.

[2406] Oh, they actually came out and said, no. They still have not heard that.

[2407] It's something being developed in LA.

[2408] Oh, but someone is.

[2409] So there is a CNC title that's being worked on.

[2410] Yes, yes.

[2411] Early work on a CNC game is being done and is not being done by Visceral.

[2412] But it's being done, like, was the whole, because the rest of that story was saying that, like, it's something we're trying called insourcing, where we've got, like, five different EA studios all working on parts of this game, which worked really well for Medal of Honor.

[2413] Yeah.

[2414] Like, is that...

[2415] sold through 1 .5 million.

[2416] So I guess it did.

[2417] I guess so.

[2418] They need to hit three before they can make a sequel though.

[2419] Did they say that explicitly?

[2420] So is that part of the story still true?

[2421] Is that LA is working on it now and eventually Visceral will be working on part of it or something?

[2422] They're just going to work on the blood parts.

[2423] They're just going to do the UI.

[2424] They're real good at that.

[2425] Congratulations, Dino.

[2426] You get to work on CNC.

[2427] They'll be the ones adding the demon babies to the CNC.

[2428] That's what it's been missing all along.

[2429] Finally.

[2430] I don't know what the specifics are.

[2431] I don't have these answers for you, Jeff.

[2432] But it's interesting to me that EA is willing to get right back on.

[2433] the cnc horse well dude yeah that's no small horse like after after yeah but like four you look at you look at uh starcraft 2 coming out and you think at some point somebody just like pretty much turns around is like You know what?

[2434] We can do another RTS.

[2435] To me the story is that there's still a team that could actually do an RTS out of LA.

[2436] I thought that all those guys were gone.

[2437] Oh, you mean like that's the news?

[2438] Yeah, to me that's the news.

[2439] Like, oh, you're actually still capable?

[2440] I was like, oh, of course it would have to be someone like Visceral because there's nothing left.

[2441] I'm like, oh, okay.

[2442] Apparently they're still there.

[2443] I guess you're right about like the kind of the being developed across EA thing.

[2444] That's still accurate.

[2445] It was a question of ownership because it was this guy.

[2446] Nick Earl, who is, I guess, like, label head or something for Visceral.

[2447] I mean, he was just speaking broadly about EA, not specifically about Visceral.

[2448] Right, okay.

[2449] But yeah, currently an LA team is doing something, and it's supposedly way, way far off also.

[2450] Maybe it's a shooter, and maybe that's what the Medal of Honor team is.

[2451] I guess they would just call it Danger Close at that point.

[2452] They wouldn't call it EALA.

[2453] That's crazy.

[2454] Yeah, yeah.

[2455] RTS games.

[2456] Who are you?

[2457] I don't even know who you are.

[2458] Well, I don't know that they necessarily even said EALA, but just a Los Angeles -based team.

[2459] Oh.

[2460] Maybe they're going to reboot it.

[2461] Finally going to do that CNC shooter.

[2462] They're just spinning right back around.

[2463] Let's reboot the original Command & Conquer.

[2464] Like, we finished it.

[2465] Now let's redo it.

[2466] Reboot it for the fourth time.

[2467] Yeah.

[2468] It's a seek boot.

[2469] We're going to reboot the Generals series.

[2470] Yeah.

[2471] There you go.

[2472] Mad technicals all over this piece.

[2473] Yikes.

[2474] Yeah, yeah.

[2475] I guess for me, the story is, holy shit, EA has not given up entirely on Command & Conquer.

[2476] It's a good name.

[2477] Seen better days, but...

[2478] Certainly.

[2479] So, some bad business in the world of game development, specifically...

[2480] Wait, what?

[2481] Everyone's being shut down, apparently.

[2482] Everyone.

[2483] Much to Jeff's chagrin, Chrome.

[2484] Australian -based developer.

[2485] People keep sending me this story and I keep not telling them but keep yelling at my screen, this changes nothing.

[2486] This is because they were involved with Game Room.

[2487] They built it.

[2488] But were they still doing all the emulation on all the...

[2489] I think the emulation...

[2490] I don't know.

[2491] My guess is that all the work that has been licensed is done.

[2492] And has been done since they launched this thing.

[2493] So they've just been slowly turning the nozzle.

[2494] Here's three more.

[2495] I turned the nozzle a little more this week so you get five games.

[2496] This week it's three.

[2497] I think the impact for this is that it reinforces the dead stop on game room that we all already knew was coming.

[2498] Yeah, I think that's the case.

[2499] I mean, obviously Microsoft, if they really wanted to get behind Game Room, they would have already.

[2500] They could find another developer for it and give it another shot or something.

[2501] But that's not going to happen.

[2502] I think they would make Game Room work.

[2503] So many things would have to change.

[2504] You might as well just.

[2505] bring it back in five years at something else.

[2506] Like just sounds like the, the five years, like actually it might make more sense to do that stuff.

[2507] Cause I think you're running into a lot of cases where companies think that their games are worth more than the $3 that, that Microsoft selling everything for.

[2508] I bet they're right.

[2509] I bet, I bet in the, I bet they make more money right now.

[2510] Yeah.

[2511] For years, I think everybody realized like, ah, you know, maybe crappy robot fighting game is not worth more than $3.

[2512] Uh, and then, uh, propaganda, the guys who are working on the, the Tron.

[2513] Evolution?

[2514] Yep.

[2515] The Tron Evolution of the video game.

[2516] Right.

[2517] That one.

[2518] I was confusing it with something else.

[2519] Yeah.

[2520] The Pirates of the Caribbean game that they were working on was canceled, and then a bunch of people got laid off there also.

[2521] Icky.

[2522] And I hear things are not great at Robomodo these days either.

[2523] Yeah.

[2524] I don't know if anything public has been said there.

[2525] Now, did they make the new Tony Hawk that's coming out?

[2526] Yes, they did.

[2527] That was them.

[2528] And that is it for them with Tony Hawk.

[2529] Okay.

[2530] So no more.

[2531] No more motion board specialists.

[2532] You know, I hear Neversoft's looking for something to do.

[2533] Yeah?

[2534] You mean closed down?

[2535] Yeah.

[2536] Actually, yes, I do.

[2537] Yeah, I've heard the same thing.

[2538] Yeah.

[2539] It's too bad.

[2540] How great would it be if Neversoft retook Tony Hawk and then rebuilt it and it was bigger and better than ever?

[2541] It'd be great.

[2542] Like if that actually...

[2543] Like these were just the dark years and then now this is where the phoenix rises from the ashes kind of thing.

[2544] Yeah, exactly.

[2545] It's like we're reclaiming our past glory.

[2546] Gun 2 is real!

[2547] Now is the time.

[2548] It's, yeah, you know.

[2549] I used to love Neversoft.

[2550] Yep.

[2551] There was a time when they were very lovable.

[2552] Best in the business of doing that stuff.

[2553] They were very lovable.

[2554] Crazy eyeball.

[2555] Man. I used to love those guys, and it's a shame.

[2556] And they looked like they were having a fucking great time doing it.

[2557] Yeah.

[2558] Like, you know, all the videos that were packed into the games and stuff, there was just a lot of effort, a lot of love that went into those Tony Hawk games.

[2559] You were just like, man. That energy.

[2560] That looks awesome.

[2561] Can you pinpoint the moment where that energy seemed to dissipate?

[2562] Or?

[2563] Guitar Hero.

[2564] I think it's somewhere between 4 and Guitar Hero.

[2565] I think it's around Thug era is when it seemed like they kind of started to turn the dark corner.

[2566] And it's been a bummer watching this same cycle happen anew with Guitar Hero.

[2567] They're like, well, we've got to crank out another one.

[2568] We've got no more fucking ideas.

[2569] Warriors are rock.

[2570] Here we go.

[2571] This is the sequel to 3 we always wanted to make, I guess.

[2572] Some of those post -pro skater Some of those games were good.

[2573] Thug was good.

[2574] Some of those were good.

[2575] Thug 2 was pretty good, too.

[2576] It was...

[2577] I can't even remember what the fucking subtitles were after Thug.

[2578] All right, so...

[2579] Hold on, hold on.

[2580] So there's...

[2581] Project 8 was the eighth one.

[2582] So there's...

[2583] Thug and Thug 2 were 5 and 6.

[2584] There's Thug and Thug 2.

[2585] And then there's Thaw?

[2586] Thaw.

[2587] There was American Wasteland.

[2588] Then there was Project 8.

[2589] Then there was Proving Ground was 9.

[2590] Yeah.

[2591] And then...

[2592] It was Ride.

[2593] Tony Hawk X. It was not 10.

[2594] They're going to come back and they're going to make Tony Hawk X. It's going to be skateboarding on the fucking moon.

[2595] It's going to be awesome.

[2596] It's going to be like Sonic 4 is the fourth Sonic game.

[2597] I remember about eight years ago talking to Tony Hawk and saying, you just signed this 15 -year contract with Activision.

[2598] Where's that going?

[2599] In retrospect, I kind of asked some obvious questions about like, Like, how the fuck do you keep making skateboarding games for 15 years and keep it fresh?

[2600] And he's kind of like, I don't need to let these guys do it.

[2601] I'm fucking Tony Hawk.

[2602] I'm here to get paid.

[2603] The check's clear, motherfucker.

[2604] Yeah, so I asked him, like, does it go sci -fi?

[2605] And he's like, I don't.

[2606] But I sure hope so.

[2607] Skateboarding on the fucking moon.

[2608] No, they just need to take it all the way back.

[2609] But it needs to be, like, they can't just take it all the way back and then make skate.

[2610] They have to take it all the way back and make it the crazy combo -based.

[2611] Sure.

[2612] Like, intense.

[2613] fast action game that those first three Tony Hawk games were.

[2614] But I want to get back on...

[2615] But I'm the only one who wants to play that game, apparently.

[2616] No, I want to play that game, too.

[2617] I totally want to play that game.

[2618] It's two of us.

[2619] Playing a little Sean White skateboarding definitely made me think back to old...

[2620] That game just looked weird, though.

[2621] It's super weird.

[2622] I mean, that's an entirely different fucking game.

[2623] In a way, it's almost more...

[2624] It's not a racing game, but it almost feels more like an SSX or something than...

[2625] Sure, sure.

[2626] Like, it's not a hardcore trick -based game.

[2627] It's traversal.

[2628] All I saw was you playing the game, and basically you were writing that fucking green line from all those financial investment commercials.

[2629] That's right.

[2630] And somehow that line would turn into ramp sometimes.

[2631] Yep.

[2632] So basically you were skating your financial future.

[2633] I think it's got some good style to it, but yeah, that's a weird game.

[2634] But I want to get back to the fact that it's bullshit that Pirates of the Caribbean Armada of the Damned has been canceled.

[2635] Sure.

[2636] Just from what you were saying, if you say, yeah, it's kind of like Mass Effect, but with pirates set in this world.

[2637] It seemed really fun.

[2638] I played it before E3, and they had two demos set up showing off the dreaded side and whatever the light side was.

[2639] and they looked fairly different, and they were showing off.

[2640] They had a good example of like, and if you play this this way, here's what happens.

[2641] If you play it this way, here's what happens.

[2642] It was pretty cool.

[2643] They hadn't shown any like the ship combat stuff yet.

[2644] The volcano and the idol or something.

[2645] Yeah, that stuff sounded cool.

[2646] Like the combat seemed pretty good.

[2647] That game was promising, I guess.

[2648] I don't want to ask you to take a guess as to what Disney's decision -making was, but what do you think maybe it was about that game that they weren't confident in?

[2649] Do you think it was just too expensive?

[2650] Do you think it was just not shaping up the way they wanted it?

[2651] Was it just cost -cutting?

[2652] I don't really know.

[2653] There's another movie coming out, isn't there?

[2654] But this wasn't attached to that.

[2655] They could have ridden the coattails.

[2656] I don't know.

[2657] It'll be interesting to see what happens to propaganda at this point because Tron's basically done and they're not necessarily big enough to take on another project to that size, I think.

[2658] Especially after little layoffs.

[2659] Right, that's what I'm saying.

[2660] After canceling that game and laying off a bunch of people, what does propaganda do at this point?

[2661] I'll be weird.

[2662] Lastly...

[2663] Yes.

[2664] Polyphony goddamn fucking digital.

[2665] Oh, yeah.

[2666] They still make games?

[2667] No. No. They delay them constantly.

[2668] Yeah.

[2669] Fuck out my perfectly good bets.

[2670] They talk about games that don't exist.

[2671] Some of the...

[2672] It was a stupid bet.

[2673] What are you doing?

[2674] It was a dumb bet.

[2675] You broke down and your heart said, you know what?

[2676] They can't.

[2677] And you know what?

[2678] You got hurt.

[2679] You got burned again.

[2680] Never listen to your heart.

[2681] Fuck you guys for not thinking that I was making the right choice.

[2682] That was totally the right choice.

[2683] I think you totally made the right choice.

[2684] I don't think so at all.

[2685] But now that it's gone wrong, I'm not surprised at all that it has.

[2686] You opened up your heart again.

[2687] You said, you know what?

[2688] I'm ready to love again.

[2689] And you totally got burned.

[2690] God damn it.

[2691] They seemed pretty firm on that date when they were saying it.

[2692] Girls are jerks.

[2693] They don't hurt you.

[2694] And after six years of development, you don't announce a date like that and then push it back a month.

[2695] or two.

[2696] Because that's what they're saying.

[2697] They're saying, oh, it's still going to come out holiday.

[2698] That's what I'm saying for now.

[2699] Would you take that bet again?

[2700] Keep in mind, they've gone back to not saying a day and date anymore.

[2701] Double or nothing?

[2702] Double or nothing holiday season.

[2703] I don't know how I double or nothing that bet.

[2704] Yeah, I could figure out a couple of ways.

[2705] I have to draw two Johnnies.

[2706] Johnny gets like front page skin on the site.

[2707] Our designers have to come up with a full John Vignocchi campaign.

[2708] Oh, the full Vignocchi?

[2709] No one wants the full Vignocchi.

[2710] So yeah, no release date.

[2711] Holiday.

[2712] Could be.

[2713] 2010 could be 2011.

[2714] Kotaku asks like, so does that mean 2010?

[2715] And there's a no comment.

[2716] I have to imagine anyone in any kind of...

[2717] position to give comment on that is just like, whatever.

[2718] Is Duke Nukem going to be in that game?

[2719] Yes.

[2720] Someone actually did Photoshop a Duke Nukem in a car for that one.

[2721] So that game's coming out.

[2722] Right.

[2723] So at some point, Gearbox is just going to announce that they have taken over Gran Turismo.

[2724] We're going to put it out.

[2725] Saving it all.

[2726] Six months.

[2727] This is just fucking farce.

[2728] This is just farce at this point.

[2729] Although I did tell, I think I told Vinny that I recently had a dream.

[2730] In the past week, I had a dream that Sony and Polyphony Digital got their shit together and actually made their November 2nd date.

[2731] Somehow they fixed it and they did whatever they needed to do and said, yes, we can still make that release date.

[2732] This is pretty crippling for Sony's holiday lineup.

[2733] They have no games coming out this year.

[2734] They have move stuff.

[2735] It's the move stuff, yeah.

[2736] So they have no...

[2737] But I mean, yeah, they have the move stuff.

[2738] This was it.

[2739] LittleBigPlanet already got pushed back.

[2740] This was the one kind of traditional game where you're like, okay, here's a car game where you drive cars and you use a controller or a wheel if you're crazy.

[2741] Go.

[2742] It's called Gran Turismo.

[2743] That's right.

[2744] It's a brand you know.

[2745] Is MotorStorm this year?

[2746] No. Yeah.

[2747] All right.

[2748] The Fight this year?

[2749] Yeah.

[2750] Yes, but that's more move stuff.

[2751] Yeah, the move stuff is more of a gamble.

[2752] Yeah, they have no...

[2753] Sure thing.

[2754] They have no big exclusive things here.

[2755] I would love to know what's up with that game.

[2756] What's up with Gran Turismo that they can't ship it?

[2757] Is it something related to the game?

[2758] Do they run some numbers and realize, oh God, no one cares about Gran Turismo.

[2759] We've got to do something.

[2760] Manufacturing or something?

[2761] Raise awareness?

[2762] Yeah.

[2763] Is there something exciting?

[2764] Gran Turismo is a long -running brand, and it certainly has its fans.

[2765] It certainly has people that are still looking forward to its return.

[2766] But as a lot of those people have kind of drifted away to other games, do they need some kind of big campaign to win those people back?

[2767] Are those people all ready to come back?

[2768] Like, hey, I ain't no focus tester.

[2769] I don't know.

[2770] Maybe everyone's totally chomping at the bit to get Gran Turismo back, but I don't necessarily get that impression.

[2771] It's at the point now where...

[2772] People on message boards when they say things like, I can't wait to play Gran Turismo 5.

[2773] They seem like crazy people.

[2774] Well, I mean, hasn't Microsoft released like three damn Forza games since the last one?

[2775] The Forza series has existed entirely since the last Gran Turismo.

[2776] Since the last proper.

[2777] I mean, they did Prolog and they did Gran Turismo.

[2778] And those are fantastic games.

[2779] Like, it's not necessarily...

[2780] Obviously, that's the big competition, but it kind of doesn't matter because it doesn't exist on the PlayStation 3.

[2781] It's like, whatever.

[2782] Like, people that...

[2783] People getting excited about Forza can only help Gran Turismo in a sense because it gets people excited about those types of games.

[2784] Yeah, that style of game.

[2785] Those are really the only two that really matter.

[2786] Everything else is a lot more arcade -y and a lot more...

[2787] Do you guys know how long it's been?

[2788] How long have people been waiting on Gran Turismo?

[2789] It depends on how you measure it.

[2790] If you go back to just GT5 Prologue, it's been like 2008.

[2791] It's got to go before that.

[2792] But if you go back to Gran Turismo 4, Like six years.

[2793] Yeah.

[2794] Six years?

[2795] Yeah.

[2796] Actually less than I thought it was.

[2797] Long fucking time.

[2798] It was a long time for a driving game.

[2799] Put out this driving game.

[2800] Hey, man. They say it's their commitment to perfection, and I don't doubt that those guys are OCD about that kind of stuff.

[2801] But at some point.

[2802] What could it have been?

[2803] Maybe car gear.

[2804] Manufacturing.

[2805] I mean, it could be any number.

[2806] That's my question is like what.

[2807] If you've been at this for six years, what is it at the last minute that you go, shit, we can't make this date because we need to fix something.

[2808] We need to do something that is only going to take us this much time.

[2809] The antennas don't raise up.

[2810] When you turn the car on, the antennas are all supposed to come out.

[2811] They're adding hydraulics to everything.

[2812] All right, I'm in.

[2813] Take all the time you need.

[2814] You know, I thought a lot about this, and I can't feel it.

[2815] I can't figure out what the fuck it could possibly be.

[2816] Only if it's a big picture of exhibit saying, hang that shit.

[2817] And then you got to hang that shit.

[2818] Maybe it failed certification for something.

[2819] Maybe it's like it came back and Sony was like, what the fuck did you do?

[2820] You can't crash like this.

[2821] What do you mean?

[2822] They found out that they put the Koran as a car in there.

[2823] We can't have that in there.

[2824] It'd be funny.

[2825] It's funny.

[2826] It's what people want.

[2827] You guys are out of touch.

[2828] Shit's hilarious.

[2829] This car also happens to take the most damage of all when you wreck into it.

[2830] We thought that'd be cool.

[2831] That's what?

[2832] No. No, no, no. Well, then we're blaming you.

[2833] You know what?

[2834] We've got to move on.

[2835] But there's all that Valve, Dota, insanity.

[2836] Yeah.

[2837] Dota 2.

[2838] Yes.

[2839] I feel like we need Brad in the room for that one.

[2840] He's the most incensed about the whole concept.

[2841] And I like poking at him about that stuff.

[2842] I'm like, eh, whatever.

[2843] I mean, I agree it's fucked, but I was like, eh, who cares?

[2844] He's like, oh, no, it's worse.

[2845] I've only heard the kind of bickering and kind of fuming from Brad.

[2846] Just really briefly, it's like they are making a Dota 2.

[2847] So they're making commercialized Dota 2.

[2848] They're calling it Dota.

[2849] They're not calling it Defense of the Ancients.

[2850] They're calling it Dota 2.

[2851] And a lot of the concept art looks like Warcraft 3 art because that's what Dota.

[2852] was.

[2853] It was a Warcraft 3 mod.

[2854] And it's the guys who made Dota?

[2855] No. Okay.

[2856] So this guy, IceFrog, was I guess like after all of the Dota team went off to go make League of Legends, which is basically Dota.

[2857] It's basically commercialized Dota.

[2858] They said, alright, you can keep...

[2859] Or do they make New Earth?

[2860] I always get those two confused.

[2861] Heroes of New Earth, I thought.

[2862] One of those.

[2863] Whatever one of those games was that they went on to make, they made a game.

[2864] I don't care.

[2865] Kind of the bottom line for me is I kind of don't give a shit.

[2866] Yeah.

[2867] Because it's like, eh, it's that one, you guys made that one game and now you're making it like different ways.

[2868] To me it's the part where they're generating concept art that looks like a Blizzard game.

[2869] Yeah.

[2870] Like a little, they're just like, dude, what the fuck is going on?

[2871] It's just so un -valved.

[2872] Yeah.

[2873] Yeah, yeah, yeah, that part is.

[2874] I guess everything else of like scooping up the people who made some, you know, kind of niche hit.

[2875] Right.

[2876] And then valving it up.

[2877] Putting it up, yeah.

[2878] The problem is that this IceFrog guy didn't really invent Dota and he was just kind of supposed to be the caretaker of.

[2879] Dota the free mod stuff and then he went and I guess you know sold a bill of goods or something I don't know George Brassard says nah so I believe him last week was a big week for anonymous entries that read like a lot of shit so yeah sourcing on any of that stuff is hard to say absolutely but the actual announcement the part where yes Valve is making this game called Dota 2 and Game Informer has a bunch of coverage of it and stuff like that part seems crazy on its own like you don't need to go read some anonymous sketchy blog about it what's that shooter you were talking about that was free and then somebody wanted to commercialize nexius nexius yeah that's a yeah that's a whole other bag of tricks that's kind of that's that's kind of the same thing it's a pretty weird situation too but like that's the guy that actually has been the head of the project all along like he did but i guess the there was some people in the community yeah there was a lot of community contributions that are like hey this is kind of ours too and it's like well check it out No. I mean it's kind of – I think that's the – where all of this gets dirty is it's, you know, stuff that started off as like the entitlement as, as free and community driven.

[2880] Well, you know, and to a certain degree of these communities made these games.

[2881] Yeah.

[2882] It's not, it's not entitlement in the sense that like, we like this game being free.

[2883] Fuck you for making money off it.

[2884] It's like the, I made maps for this product and helped make this game what it is.

[2885] And I'm like, that's great.

[2886] That's a great map.

[2887] I'm going to go sell that to somebody.

[2888] Well, I think the content, like none of the maps are making it over.

[2889] as far as I can tell.

[2890] It's all just...

[2891] And in fact, I played the new Nexius at PAX.

[2892] It doesn't fucking even resemble the old one.

[2893] It's like it now runs on CryEngine 3, whereas original Nexius runs on a modified Quake 1 engine.

[2894] So it's kind of a dramatic...

[2895] That's kind of a difference.

[2896] But they're still calling it Nexius?

[2897] They're still calling it Nexius, which has zero name recognition to anyone that's going to be buying a downloadable shooter for consoles.

[2898] Also, especially with the way it's spelled.

[2899] So it has no value.

[2900] Was it N -E -C -K?

[2901] And Raphael Sadiq is publishing it.

[2902] What?

[2903] Ilphonic, the company that's doing all this, is Raphael Sadiq's company.

[2904] By the way.

[2905] What?

[2906] I think it's kind of like what we're seeing is when...

[2907] They're saying that some of his guys might have music involvement in it.

[2908] Oh, great.

[2909] When community and business collide.

[2910] Some people get unhappy about it.

[2911] And a Power Man 5000 song starts.

[2912] Yes.

[2913] All right.

[2914] Let's talk about new releases.

[2915] Who was it?

[2916] There was another.

[2917] There was a musician.

[2918] We put an interview up on the site that I think says, talks more about the music of that game, but whatever.

[2919] It's a crazy thing.

[2920] New things, new releases, new games.

[2921] There's a whole shitload of games coming out this week, including Dragon Ball Z, Tenkaichi Tag Team for the PSP.

[2922] I've got a copy on my desk if you want to check that out.

[2923] Vanquish for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

[2924] That's coming out.

[2925] Sega.

[2926] Arcania.

[2927] Gothic 4 for the PC and Xbox 360.

[2928] I think we're going to do a quick look at that.

[2929] Dave's been playing it.

[2930] Has he really?

[2931] Yeah.

[2932] DJ Hero 2 for the Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, and PlayStation 3.

[2933] We just got a copy of that in today.

[2934] Yeah, looking good.

[2935] Crack that open.

[2936] I saw that a couple weeks ago.

[2937] It's DJ Hero.

[2938] I liked that first DJ Hero game.

[2939] Yes.

[2940] This is more of that.

[2941] Great.

[2942] Yeah, the freestyle stuff.

[2943] Is there a price on that bundle?

[2944] It's cool.

[2945] There is.

[2946] What is it?

[2947] I don't know.

[2948] There's multiple bundles.

[2949] The bundle that we have the two turntables and a microphone.

[2950] Is it two or is it just the back of the day?

[2951] It's the party bundle.

[2952] That's awesome.

[2953] Because it is, you know, that's the whole thing is it's three player now and all that stuff.

[2954] I guess it's three player four, but not really.

[2955] Turntables change?

[2956] Are they the same?

[2957] No, same turntables.

[2958] Same turntables.

[2959] Same turntables.

[2960] Same turntables.

[2961] Okay, same turntables.

[2962] Fallout New Vegas for the PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3.

[2963] The Shoot!

[2964] from Sony.

[2965] We've got that along with the cool gun attachment for the move controller.

[2966] Have you seen that thing?

[2967] I've seen pictures of it.

[2968] Do you mean goofy as hell?

[2969] It makes it all look all fucking Marvin the Martian.

[2970] All they need to have to be bad Buck Rogers sci -fi with that thing.

[2971] It's Flash Gordon shit, right?

[2972] It needs to have a big ring too.

[2973] They need to ship it with a theremin.

[2974] I don't know.

[2975] It's just making me think of the Wii Zapper all over again.

[2976] It's a similar type deal, but it's not as big and goofy and elaborate.

[2977] And it actually looks kind of cool.

[2978] It's the shot of the guy on the box holding it all serious style.

[2979] That's the thing.

[2980] But it's not like any game you play that's like a serious shooter with it.

[2981] It's going to just come across as super dopey.

[2982] It's like short and stubby in this big bulbous end.

[2983] Well, I was just excited from what I saw at least of pictures of it.

[2984] Unlike the Wii Zapper, it doesn't make it giant.

[2985] But at least if you see yourself on screen, maybe they can track a real cool looking gun onto it.

[2986] It looks like a gun is chewing bubble gum.

[2987] That's what that whole thing looks like to me. That's awesome.

[2988] I had that dream also.

[2989] All right, moving on.

[2990] It's Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Ninja Storm 2.

[2991] I've got to copy that on my desk.

[2992] I also have a PS3 version of that, so you can check out both platforms.

[2993] I've got a 360, PS3, and some anime.

[2994] Wait, close your eyes and say the name of that game again.

[2995] Naruto Shippuden 2.

[2996] No, Ninja Storm.

[2997] Ultimate Ninja Storm 2.

[2998] There you go.

[2999] You got it.

[3000] Stop taunting them, Benny.

[3001] EA Sports MMA.

[3002] He's not taunting us.

[3003] He's taunting Naruto.

[3004] EA Sports MMA for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

[3005] Time Crisis Raising Storm for the PlayStation 3.

[3006] Quick look at that up on the site.

[3007] Shoot some guns.

[3008] Saw 2.

[3009] They did this in the last one, too.

[3010] In Time Crisis, there's a full other mode where it's a fucking first -person shooter.

[3011] Weird.

[3012] Like you run around like dual analog sticks.

[3013] Or you can use the move, I guess.

[3014] Same levels?

[3015] No, not even the same levels.

[3016] Completely different mechanics.

[3017] Terribly made.

[3018] Don't do that.

[3019] Come for the Time Crisis action if you want that.

[3020] Don't stay for the other crap.

[3021] Some of the other crap is like other games.

[3022] Yeah, yeah.

[3023] It's three games in one.

[3024] They included two other arcade games.

[3025] Time Crisis 4 is in there in its entirety as well as Deadwater Pirates or something.

[3026] So those have Move support as well, right?

[3027] You don't need the guns?

[3028] That's right.

[3029] Okay, because they obviously released Time Crisis 4 on the PS3 before.

[3030] That's right.

[3031] But that one probably wouldn't work with Move.

[3032] I imagine they probably aren't going back and patching that in.

[3033] Saw II Flesh and Blood for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

[3034] Just in time for Saw 3D next weekend.

[3035] That's right.

[3036] That's right.

[3037] Pro Evolution Soccer 2011 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360.

[3038] Got a copy of that on my desk.

[3039] I want to check it out.

[3040] TV Superstars for the PlayStation 3.

[3041] That's more move stuff.

[3042] Yep.

[3043] Minigames.

[3044] Cabela's Dangerous Hunts 11 for the PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Nintendo DS.

[3045] Now the dangerous hunts follow you wherever you go.

[3046] Shouldn't it be like dangerous shunts then?

[3047] What?

[3048] It'd be DS.

[3049] Oh, I hear you.

[3050] Power Gig Rise of the Sixth String for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

[3051] That is out this week.

[3052] That exists.

[3053] That exists.

[3054] We've got that.

[3055] We do.

[3056] I played some of that.

[3057] There's a guitar.

[3058] There is the guitar.

[3059] I haven't touched it yet.

[3060] They gave you that guitar.

[3061] I guess we'll probably talk about that next week, huh?

[3062] It's $150 for the game and the guitar.

[3063] What about the drums?

[3064] That's more.

[3065] That's like 230 if you want microphone drums or 220 or something like that.

[3066] Rock of the Dead for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

[3067] It's like typing of the dead but with guitars.

[3068] That's kind of cool.

[3069] That sounds great.

[3070] CSI, Fatal Conspiracy, Nintendo Wii, Telltale, paying some bills.

[3071] Yep.

[3072] We make the games that we have to so we can make the games that we want.

[3073] You can do worse.

[3074] Those CSI games are alright.

[3075] Some of them are.

[3076] I bought them from my parents.

[3077] Sometimes they're not.

[3078] They're kind of fucked up, but if they sell, it's like, I do not fault you for this telltale.

[3079] As far as licensed games go, it's like the procedural...

[3080] And I also played them when I bought them for my parents.

[3081] And Dragon's Lair Trilogy.

[3082] Yeah.

[3083] On which platform?

[3084] Oh, good.

[3085] Dragon's Lair 3 finally getting a release.

[3086] Nope.

[3087] Nope.

[3088] They just put Space Ace in there and said, it's a trilogy.

[3089] It's pretty much the same thing.

[3090] That's for the Nintendo Wii and DVD players.

[3091] I don't know.

[3092] Pioneer laser active.

[3093] Xbox Live Arcade this week.

[3094] We already know Super Meat Boy and Costume Quest.

[3095] Costume Quest, 15 bucks, and Super Meat Boy, 10 for the time being.

[3096] So if punishment is your flavor, enjoy Super Meat Boy.

[3097] Jeff, are you ready to hear this week's Game Room releases?

[3098] Sure.

[3099] Jackal.

[3100] Pour one out, Jackal.

[3101] Great game.

[3102] For Arcade.

[3103] Arcade version of Jackal, a great game.

[3104] NES version, really good too.

[3105] It's the Jeeps and the shooting stuff.

[3106] So you're being serious.

[3107] Yeah, Jackal.

[3108] Jackal's awesome.

[3109] Also cool art. Yeah.

[3110] Some side art on that.

[3111] I like cool art. You play as the Jackal Squad, which is made up of four members.

[3112] Colonel Decker, Sergeant Quint, Lieutenant Bob.

[3113] My favorite.

[3114] And Corporal Gray.

[3115] Isn't that just the cast of Jaws?

[3116] Yes.

[3117] Decker.

[3118] Quint.

[3119] Breakout for the 2600.

[3120] Fuck you.

[3121] Double Dunk also for the 2600.

[3122] Okay.

[3123] 1989 release.

[3124] Oh.

[3125] From Atari.

[3126] The 1989 release of Double Dunk was one of the last Atari 2600 games published and developed directly by Atari.

[3127] The game was programmed by Matthew Hubbard and featured an interesting endgame sequence in which the winning team's player danced and talked trash.

[3128] For example, Yo Mama.

[3129] Wow.

[3130] We're going to see some Nintendo Yo Mama or Atari Yo Mama just like blocks.

[3131] Yeah, just takes up the entire screen for it to say, spell out Yo Mama.

[3132] And then you walk off the screen to the left and it says, programmed by Warren Robinette.

[3133] PlayStation Network also is getting Costume Quest this week as well as Aquapanic.

[3134] Cool.

[3135] Is that like hydrophobia, but...

[3136] A little less, but different.

[3137] A little chilled out.

[3138] It's a prequel.

[3139] Yeah.

[3140] And they're doing, they're still doing those crazy PlayStation 1 import games.

[3141] So, Shine Ryu, I don't know if that's saying that correctly, and Tall Unlimited.

[3142] What?

[3143] Weird Japanese PS1 games.

[3144] All right.

[3145] They're importing and then saying like, we don't know if you're going to be able to know how to play this game because it could all just be in Japanese.

[3146] So, good luck.

[3147] At least they know that they don't care anymore.

[3148] Who they're selling that stuff to.

[3149] I think it's kind of neat that they're doing that weird shit.

[3150] Yeah, just look on the internet.

[3151] They should figure out a way to make Vib Ribbon work on a PS3 and sell that.

[3152] You're not wrong about that.

[3153] Get my copy of Ill Communication.

[3154] Yes.

[3155] No, don't do that.

[3156] It's so fucking hard.

[3157] Jeff Gerstman, let's hear about what's going on in the world of Nintendo.

[3158] It is a big week over here in Nintendo Download Land.

[3159] Let me brace myself.

[3160] Shit.

[3161] Virtual console released this week, people.

[3162] Okay.

[3163] Final Fantasy Mystic Quest.

[3164] For the Super NES.

[3165] Really?

[3166] Mystic Quest.

[3167] Mystic Quest.

[3168] I remember that one.

[3169] The easy one.

[3170] I played through that.

[3171] Yeah.

[3172] 800 Wii points from Square Enix.

[3173] Return to a time of classic action and adventure.

[3174] Young Benjamin in the house.

[3175] Young Benjamin.

[3176] Young B. Young B. Yo, Benji!

[3177] Embarks on a quest to reclaim the stolen crystals that are the key to balancing the four elements of the world.

[3178] Experience this treasured Super NES game on the Wii system and save the world once more.

[3179] I won't be doing that.

[3180] Now let's talk about WiiWare.

[3181] Okay.

[3182] Alright.

[3183] Through Space.

[3184] From...

[3185] T -H -R -U.

[3186] T -H -R -U.

[3187] Capital S. Is there an exclamation point?

[3188] All one word.

[3189] Camel case.

[3190] Okay.

[3191] Sidebar, game dev story.

[3192] I put exclamation points on all of my game titles.

[3193] Oh, good.

[3194] You're smart.

[3195] Good, good, good, good, good, good.

[3196] I'm going to buy it and I'm just going to make sequels to games that deserve sequels.

[3197] I'm going to make Oink 2.

[3198] But sequels to games that had exclamation points in them.

[3199] Yes.

[3200] Oink 2.

[3201] Oink 2.

[3202] Oink 2.

[3203] It'll be two exclamation points.

[3204] Wow.

[3205] Two times the fun.

[3206] 800 wee points for Through Space from Nintendo.

[3207] Through Space is an exciting puzzle game in which you move and rotate an object called a keydron.

[3208] Through gaps in walls, putting your key drawn through a gap earns you points, but mastering this ability allows you to perform combos, picking up pairs of crystals simultaneously, and tricks, rotating the key drawn so that its shadow covers all of the gap before passing through it, which are key to achieving high scores.

[3209] Refine your skills in multiple game modes, normal, endless, and trick challenge, brush up on the rules in key drawn tutorial, or watch replay data in key drawn memories.

[3210] As the game progresses, the number of available key drawings, background, stages, and levels will increase.

[3211] If you have a broadband internet connection, you can register your high scores on the leaderboard via Nintendo Wi -Fi connection and compare scores with other through -space players.

[3212] I've only got dial -up.

[3213] The game is easy to play but difficult to master.

[3214] What?

[3215] Okay.

[3216] Good to include that line, just in case.

[3217] Do you have the skills and reflexes necessary to overcome the increasingly complex challenges of through space?

[3218] I feel like that description does a terrible job of explaining what that game is, but it sounds like that game could be neat.

[3219] Yeah, it sounds like the thing where people are dressed up like Tetris blocks and have to bend in weird ways to fit through gaps.

[3220] That's kind of what I was thinking, yeah.

[3221] And that's the thing.

[3222] What else?

[3223] Nintendo made it.

[3224] Okay.

[3225] So that's, you know.

[3226] Man, Nintendo.

[3227] representing this week.

[3228] Also for WiiWare, Triple H. What?

[3229] Triple H is coming to WiiWare.

[3230] Finally.

[3231] It's time to play the game!

[3232] Do they spell it out as in...

[3233] Happy Holidays Halloween from 505 Games.

[3234] One player rated E for everyone.

[3235] 500 Wii points.

[3236] I've been Hornswoggled.

[3237] Create and send fun Halloween cards.

[3238] Use your imagination and dress your character in different costumes.

[3239] Then decorate the card, choosing a background, music, and lots of stickers.

[3240] This is slowly going, or rapidly going from Transylvania.

[3241] Using the Wii Remote Controller, you can easily navigate through the different menus and add stickers in the position and size of your choice.

[3242] It stopped in Jamaica.

[3243] And then moved to Somalia.

[3244] Once the card is finished, write a personal note and send it to your friends.

[3245] And then South Central.

[3246] Yeah.

[3247] Generalissimo Dracula.

[3248] Yeah.

[3249] Generalissimo Dracula.

[3250] So wait, it's a card -making game?

[3251] It's like...

[3252] Send your best e -card.

[3253] I wasn't even listening.

[3254] It's Print Shop.

[3255] Yeah, create and send fun Halloween cards.

[3256] Print Shop without the printing.

[3257] Write a personal note and send it to your friends.

[3258] I can do that already on the Wii.

[3259] Not like this you can't.

[3260] I wonder if your friends have to also own this or if it goes right to the Wii channel.

[3261] Go buy it.

[3262] Buy it.

[3263] I sent you something awesome.

[3264] If you could spend $5.

[3265] Triple H. Come on.

[3266] Now you ready for DSiWare?

[3267] Is that it?

[3268] That's it for WiiWare?

[3269] That's it for WiiWare.

[3270] All right.

[3271] Yeah, I guess so.

[3272] Snapdots.

[3273] Aw, SnapDots.

[3274] From Nintendo.

[3275] 500 Nintendo DSi points.

[3276] Welcome to SnapDots.

[3277] Thank you.

[3278] Complete dozens of puzzle pictures by rotating the puzzle to find the best angle and shooting blocks from your UFO.

[3279] If the placement isn't quite right, use the UFO to retrieve blocks and shoot them in different spots.

[3280] Adding to the challenge, puzzles often contain several types of blocks and spots.

[3281] Each with its own characteristics.

[3282] Journey to multiple planets to tackle puzzles individually in puzzle mode, or try to clear as many puzzles as you can within a time limit in the frenetic time attack mode.

[3283] This kind of sounds like through space again.

[3284] Yeah, a little bit.

[3285] Except you can shoot.

[3286] In either mode, strategy and action combine to create a classic puzzle game that definitely hits the spot.

[3287] Snapdots.

[3288] Yeah, I feel for people who have to write descriptions of puzzle games.

[3289] Armada from Zoo Games, Inc. One player, 500 Nintendo DSi points.

[3290] Armada platoon command of a military aircraft carrier.

[3291] It's up to you to safely land and refuel fighters, bombers, and medical helicopters.

[3292] Avoid deadly collisions, battle turbulent weather conditions, and engage the enemy.

[3293] With your reputation on the line and lives at stake, you'll need quick thinking and smart strategies in order to protect and direct the military aircraft to safety.

[3294] If you aren't careful.

[3295] Enemies will surround your character and sabotage your carrier and sabotage your mission.

[3296] Take control and prove yourself a hero.

[3297] Kind of sounded like flight control for a second there.

[3298] But not.

[3299] But kind of.

[3300] I do like me some flight control.

[3301] But you engage the enemy, which is different.

[3302] Also Armada, not the Dreamcast game.

[3303] Okay.

[3304] Not the Dreamcast game Armada.

[3305] I do.

[3306] Yeah.

[3307] That game was supposed to be so much more than it was.

[3308] Like we said of a lot of Dreamcast games.

[3309] Remember Armada for what it wanted to be.

[3310] Academy Tic -Tac -Toe.

[3311] From Game Lion.

[3312] How does Tic -Tac -Toe work?

[3313] Sure, go ahead.

[3314] From Game Lion.

[3315] Rawr!

[3316] It's not really...

[3317] It's an implied rawr.

[3318] Through space is...

[3319] Wait.

[3320] Oh no. We're just looping back now.

[3321] One player in 200 Nintendo DSi points.

[3322] One of the world's most famous pen and paper games for two players can now be in your pocket wherever you go.

[3323] Fuck you.

[3324] If there's no one around to play the game with you, don't worry.

[3325] Skillful AI players will gladly play with you in any of the four tic -tac -toe variants available.

[3326] Oh, there are variants!

[3327] Tell me about them!

[3328] If a single 3x3 playing field makes you claustrophobic, try the new 9 board mode.

[3329] It does make me claustrophobic because I'm a crazy person.

[3330] Which adds a nice twist and more strategic depth to the game.

[3331] Prove you're a worthy tic -tac -toe player by entering the tic -tac -toe league and advancing from the initial school club league through academic, city, national, and world leagues.

[3332] all the way up to the Superstars League.

[3333] Claim the top spot and become the tic -tac -toe champ.

[3334] Why do this for tic -tac -toe?

[3335] Why do this for, like, I get, it's easy.

[3336] Can I enter number of players zero?

[3337] The only way to win is not to play.

[3338] Music on!

[3339] Playing piano.

[3340] From Abulite.

[3341] Okay.

[3342] One player.

[3343] Rated E for everyone.

[3344] 200 Nintendo DSi points.

[3345] The long line of music on.

[3346] Playing the piano has never been so easy and so much fun.

[3347] Never.

[3348] It says never.

[3349] This new collection of 15 popular songs allows you to enjoy a complete musical experience even if you have no prior knowledge of the piano.

[3350] Notes transformed into rectangles appear over the piano keys to show you where, when, and how to play them.

[3351] Song speed increases depending on the game's level.

[3352] Music on playing piano is an easy and intuitive game that will challenge your auditory and visual coordination.

[3353] So they say 15, they don't say what?

[3354] No, 15 songs.

[3355] No. Popular songs, they specify.

[3356] Single ladies.

[3357] I'm sure it's all license free.

[3358] Single ladies.

[3359] You think?

[3360] All the single ladies?

[3361] All the single ladies?

[3362] And the rest is all Moby.

[3363] All the single ladies.

[3364] All the single ladies.

[3365] Why tic -tac -toe?

[3366] Why would you go through all that trouble?

[3367] I'm going to tic -tac -toe Academy.

[3368] You want tic -tac -toe?

[3369] Is that like Tool Academy?

[3370] It's a lot like Tool Academy.

[3371] If the variants were Hollywood Squares, tic -tac -toe, tic -tac -toe, and war games mode, I would buy it.

[3372] But whatever, we played the Hollywood Squares variant already, and that was no good.

[3373] I mean, what if it was better?

[3374] What if Brad Garrett wasn't in it?

[3375] Right.

[3376] You know what?

[3377] It's not just that it's Brad Garrett.

[3378] It's the implementation of the Brad Garrett that really makes it terrible.

[3379] Brad Garrett is pretty poorly implemented.

[3380] I like the idea of the Brad Garrett.

[3381] As a factor.

[3382] We're adding component scores and the Brad Garrett factor is pretty much the key component.

[3383] It gets the red face.

[3384] That whole Hollywood Squares experience really did not do good things for me. You've been in a bad place ever since.

[3385] Yeah, seriously.

[3386] It made me start rethinking so much about my life.

[3387] Did I ever like Hollywood Squares?

[3388] It was Hollywood Squares really just literally just softballs to kind of C and B comics.

[3389] Just kind of like, here's this.

[3390] I'm going to say this thing.

[3391] Just reply.

[3392] I don't know.

[3393] Whatever you think is funny.

[3394] Your mother.

[3395] Okay.

[3396] Do you think it's your mother?

[3397] No, I disagree.

[3398] That circle gets a square.

[3399] All right.

[3400] All right.

[3401] Next one.

[3402] Yeah, that is it.

[3403] That is all.

[3404] This man said, I can't believe it's been 12 years since I got this out.

[3405] Brad Garrett, butter.

[3406] I can't believe it's not 12 years.

[3407] It's a famous butter product.

[3408] Butter.

[3409] Brad Garrett says butter.

[3410] You think it's butter?

[3411] I don't think it's butter.

[3412] All right.

[3413] That's what that game came down to.

[3414] It was literally like bad setups for Jim J. Well, it didn't help that they were all super fucking obvious.

[3415] And so terrible.

[3416] And, yeah, and all of the ha -ha comedic bits were just awful.

[3417] And just, like, the cutaways that people, like, put in hand, like, the kind of face -palming kind of.

[3418] Oh, no. Oh, it's so wrong.

[3419] I can't believe he said that.

[3420] I can't believe he said that.

[3421] Oh, just what?

[3422] What?

[3423] All right.

[3424] Ray.

[3425] Let's read some emails.

[3426] Bombcast at GiantBomb .com is the email address.

[3427] First one comes in from Richard Bradley in Dallas, Texas.

[3428] He says that our podcast got him a girlfriend.

[3429] What?

[3430] He was at a local fast food eatery listening to an episode of the Bombcast through his car stereo using the auxiliary input from his iPhone.

[3431] Very important.

[3432] What kind of cables were you using?

[3433] Like a true stereo?

[3434] Like a mono cable?

[3435] How long is the cable?

[3436] I know it's an incredible level of detail.

[3437] When the girl came to deliver my delicious food, she heard your voice and said, oh, hey, you listened to the Bombcast through what I assumed was mostly luck and magic.

[3438] I attained her phone number.

[3439] and we have been dating for about two weeks.

[3440] I want photos.

[3441] This is hot.

[3442] In conclusion, I wish to thank you, gents, as I'm sure this is your plan all along.

[3443] You're welcome, Richard.

[3444] I have never dated a girl from the drive -up window, and that sounds like kind of the best thing ever.

[3445] They're like a Sonic.

[3446] Even still.

[3447] Just saying.

[3448] You just drive up there anytime you want and you're like, hook me up.

[3449] I want to see these two kids in love.

[3450] I want to see them.

[3451] I want to see their happy, like, I'm holding the camera out here photos.

[3452] What, graphic, photographic evidence?

[3453] Yes.

[3454] Oh, congratulations.

[3455] That's great.

[3456] Oh, God.

[3457] Fantastic.

[3458] I don't know.

[3459] Bringing people together.

[3460] This is not the first one, right?

[3461] I think we've heard similar.

[3462] Bleeding through the headphones are loud, ridiculous voices.

[3463] Something like that.

[3464] Oh, is that that really annoying podcast?

[3465] Sure is.

[3466] These guys are garrulous.

[3467] It's kind of charming.

[3468] Could you please turn that podcast off?

[3469] Whatever that shrill sound is coming out of your headphones, please stop it.

[3470] Couldn't agree more.

[3471] I will go out with you.

[3472] People literally just turn this off.

[3473] Turn it off.

[3474] Next email comes in.

[3475] We need to refocus this to the people that are on the podcast instead of the people that are listening to it.

[3476] You know what I'm saying?

[3477] Yes.

[3478] Start cashing in.

[3479] Next email is from Wes.

[3480] Groupie City.

[3481] Wes Martin.

[3482] Hey, guys.

[3483] Hey.

[3484] I could really use your help on this one.

[3485] My roommate can't remember the name of this arcade game, and I certainly have no idea.

[3486] Journey.

[3487] In his words.

[3488] Radar Lock.

[3489] I know what the game is.

[3490] I just can't remember the title of it.

[3491] The End.

[3492] Bad Dudes.

[3493] Tapper.

[3494] You're not fucking far off.

[3495] Really?

[3496] Super Bad Dudes.

[3497] Okay.

[3498] Two Crude Dudes.

[3499] Suave American secret agent dude.

[3500] The president has been kidnapped by terrorists.

[3501] Oh, wow.

[3502] First level starts with you parachuting down the Lincoln Memorial where you proceed to kill more dudes.

[3503] After that, you chase down a limousine on a motorcycle.

[3504] There might also be a scuba level.

[3505] Rolling Thunder.

[3506] Isn't that Rolling Thunder?

[3507] Is it like the Memorial?

[3508] I mean, it's the game that is...

[3509] Sly Spy?

[3510] It's the bad dude's engine, basically.

[3511] It looks a lot like that.

[3512] No, Rolling Thunder's Namco, then.

[3513] So it couldn't be that, because it's Data East.

[3514] But yeah, I totally have played the game you're talking about.

[3515] I don't think I have.

[3516] Sly Spy?

[3517] Sly Spy.

[3518] That might be it.

[3519] If I can find an image of it, I will know if that's...

[3520] It'll trigger it?

[3521] Yeah.

[3522] The site's running so slow.

[3523] Do you think it's Sly Spy?

[3524] Sly Spy.

[3525] Circle gets a square.

[3526] Yes.

[3527] Yes.

[3528] It is?

[3529] Yes.

[3530] Sly Spy is the name of the game you're thinking about.

[3531] There's also a skydiving sequence and a few other things.

[3532] Yeah, I played that.

[3533] There you go.

[3534] Hopefully that's the game you're thinking of because I think that's the game you're thinking of.

[3535] Was there a bet online or just a hold in there?

[3536] They just couldn't remember it.

[3537] Just couldn't remember it.

[3538] Next email comes in from...

[3539] I love it when we get those.

[3540] I love it when we can hit it.

[3541] I hate it when it's like, I don't, I'm not sure.

[3542] This next email comes in from Michael Larry.

[3543] Hey, Bombcast Crew, I was wondering what you guys thought of the new Ice Cube album.

[3544] Jeff, any thoughts?

[3545] It's all right.

[3546] I don't know.

[3547] It's not great.

[3548] It's not great.

[3549] His sons rap well on it.

[3550] Yes.

[3551] It's a family affair.

[3552] That's my favorite thing about that album, even though I've heard very little of it.

[3553] Little Cubes?

[3554] The idea of...

[3555] One of them is better than the other, and one of them is named Doughboy, which is fucking perfect.

[3556] If you're going to be Ice Cube's son and you're going to be a rapper, your name is fucking Doughboy.

[3557] That is perfect.

[3558] What's the other one's name?

[3559] The other one's named OMG, which is kind of lame.

[3560] Yeah, it's kind of bad.

[3561] And also inspires a little too much remembrance of OMC.

[3562] Or AMG.

[3563] Or AMC.

[3564] How bizarre.

[3565] How bizarre.

[3566] He's doing the soundtrack to Matt, Ben.

[3567] Matt from the UK.

[3568] Hey, Giant Bombcast.

[3569] Love the Bombcast.

[3570] I ask a simple question.

[3571] For something to be considered gross, Must it first be wet?

[3572] Moist.

[3573] Is wetness a key factor in something being gross?

[3574] Moistness certainly is, I think.

[3575] Clearly it can contribute, but is it a necessity?

[3576] This is a great question.

[3577] I'm trying to think of something gross that's really dry.

[3578] Like maggots, do you consider maggots already moist?

[3579] I consider them gross.

[3580] They're definitely gross.

[3581] Taking a stand.

[3582] Maggots are gross.

[3583] And they definitely...

[3584] But they're moist.

[3585] Well, they're going to be attracted to somewhere where there's moisture.

[3586] And usually anything fresh kills are mostly moist, right?

[3587] Yeah, they're very...

[3588] But how do you feel about dried up, like, sort of nasty, shriveled up corpses, like that all the moisture is gone from the body?

[3589] Is that still pretty gross?

[3590] It's not as gross, though.

[3591] How about...

[3592] But is it still gross?

[3593] That's nasty.

[3594] That's not gross.

[3595] That's nasty.

[3596] How about a dried up booger, like, on the toilet urinal?

[3597] Yeah, I guess that's pretty gross.

[3598] That's pretty gross.

[3599] But is it gross because the toilet urinal is usually kind of wet?

[3600] No, it's the hard booger.

[3601] All right.

[3602] What about, like, dried up vomit, like, in your car?

[3603] That's gross.

[3604] That stinks.

[3605] I think that's gross.

[3606] But it was once moist.

[3607] But so was the corpse.

[3608] I'm just saying, like, it was getting gross.

[3609] I think you can be gross without being wet.

[3610] You have to have been wet at one time.

[3611] Your grossness, yes, absolutely.

[3612] There had to have been wetness at some point.

[3613] Arrow pointing down.

[3614] Can't start dry.

[3615] Yeah, you can't start dry.

[3616] There had to have been wetness at some point.

[3617] And the wetter it is, the chances of being gross increases astronomically.

[3618] I don't think that's true.

[3619] I think you pass a viscosity threshold where if you're just pure liquid, you're not as gross as you were when you were kind of sludgy.

[3620] That's true.

[3621] There's definitely diminishing returns at some point.

[3622] Sludginess is definitely a big factor.

[3623] Squishy.

[3624] Instead of just running water.

[3625] Moistness is a great...

[3626] a great, uh, metric for you.

[3627] Cause you could take something beautiful and make it moist.

[3628] I'm actually, I said moist specifically because I want to see how many people on the comments for this comment on how much they hate the word moist.

[3629] Cause I know a ton of people that hate that word.

[3630] Just moist.

[3631] They don't like the word moist and I, it bothers me not at all.

[3632] Damp.

[3633] And I don't understand like what it is about that word.

[3634] There was a, uh, like a cake, a brand of like cake in a box.

[3635] There was like moist.

[3636] Try to make it moist.

[3637] Duncan Hines.

[3638] But there are some people that are super, Super grossed out by that word, and I don't really know why.

[3639] Moist.

[3640] It's because they have bad brains.

[3641] I guess.

[3642] Their minds are broken.

[3643] They can only think of filthy stuff.

[3644] Moist.

[3645] Think of delicious, moist food.

[3646] Moist.

[3647] How about a dried tongue?

[3648] That's actually something that's actually way cooler wet, but then if it's dried out, it's kind of gross.

[3649] Dried out?

[3650] I don't know.

[3651] A dried tongue is kind of gnarly.

[3652] It's not gross.

[3653] How about dried eyeballs?

[3654] This goes back to the dry corpse thing.

[3655] Here's the thing, though, is that eyeballs are still gross.

[3656] Eyeballs are totally gross.

[3657] It's on their own.

[3658] Tongues and eyeballs are kind of gross.

[3659] Totally gross.

[3660] Let me lick your eyeball.

[3661] No, because that's fucking gross.

[3662] Well, no, because your tongue is kind of gross.

[3663] Last person wanted to do that, I slapped across the face.

[3664] Get out of here.

[3665] This is not what I'm paying for.

[3666] I'm trying to think of things that are not as gross moist, but when they dry out, actually become grosser.

[3667] Dead slug.

[3668] I'll let you keep...

[3669] I'd rather step on a dry slug than a wet one.

[3670] I took two dry slugs.

[3671] I'd rather slip on a dry slug than a wet one.

[3672] Material rights itself.

[3673] Alright, we have to stop.

[3674] I'll let you continue pondering the...

[3675] Brad Garrett.

[3676] The grossest.

[3677] Give me a moist Brad Garrett.

[3678] And all that notes.

[3679] We bring, close another episode of the Giant Bombcast.

[3680] Alex Navarro, thanks for joining us.

[3681] It was a blast.

[3682] And contributing and helping fill the brad -shaped hole that has occurred here in the last part of the show.

[3683] He and I do have a similar build.

[3684] Indeed.

[3685] He's out doing an important thing.

[3686] He is, absolutely.

[3687] Akiagon?

[3688] What can you fit in a brad -shaped hole?

[3689] Aki, what is it?

[3690] Akionomial?

[3691] What's that thing?

[3692] Hexa, hexa.

[3693] Polynomial.

[3694] The polynomial.

[3695] The polynomial.

[3696] Akiagon.

[3697] The Kedron.

[3698] Kedron, yeah.

[3699] Brad is shaped like a Kedron is what you're saying?

[3700] It's in a Brad -shaped.

[3701] A Brad -shaped Kedron.

[3702] Only a dry one, though.

[3703] Do not get moist Kedron.

[3704] Brad -shaped Kedron is the name of my new album.

[3705] Yeah, do not get your Brad wet.

[3706] That should have been Ice Cube Stunz.

[3707] What's that collider, that giant thing?

[3708] It's the Kedron collider.

[3709] The Large Kedron.

[3710] The Large Kedron Collider.

[3711] Sure.

[3712] Bradadagon.

[3713] Vinny, Jeff, thank you guys as well.

[3714] Thanks for having us again.

[3715] Thanks for the listeners for listening and come back next Tuesday for another edition of the Giant Bobcast.

[3716] Moist.