Giant Bombcast 09-21-2010

[0] Hey, everyone.

[1] It is Tuesday, September the 21st, 2010, and you're listening to The Giant Bobcast.

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

[3] That's true.

[4] Better than ever.

[5] Look out.

[6] Jeff S .D. Gerstman.

[7] I'm only four by three, but I haven't gotten many complaints.

[8] And Brad E .D. Shoemaker.

[9] Dude, why did you make me the thing that doesn't actually exist?

[10] With the erectile dysfunction?

[11] Oh, it's very real.

[12] Yes, that was not.

[13] Far too real.

[14] Doesn't that undermine.

[15] Between me and my doctor.

[16] Very serious.

[17] Enhanced definition.

[18] Oh.

[19] Excelsior.

[20] If your definition is enhanced for longer than four hours, discontinue the use of Brad Shoemaker and contact your physician.

[21] I mean, I don't recommend anyone use Brad Shoemaker for more than four hours at a time.

[22] Four hours?

[23] I'm just getting started.

[24] I mean, I'm just, you know, he'll get sleepy and just the excessive wear and tear on your Brad.

[25] It's not good for your Brad.

[26] It's not good for you.

[27] No, no. It's not what Brad was meant for.

[28] You should let your Brad rest.

[29] Absolutely.

[30] All right.

[31] No more euphemisms for Brad.

[32] I don't even know what we're talking about.

[33] Neither do I, but people can.

[34] Extrapolate.

[35] People can map their own dysfunctional.

[36] Just hear what they want to hear, man. Just see what you want to see.

[37] Just words, people.

[38] We just hold a mirror up to society, and we draw a boner on that mirror.

[39] Right where your head was.

[40] Just right there.

[41] Nah.

[42] Boner where your head was.

[43] Sucker.

[44] Why would I want to learn how to fart?

[45] I already know how.

[46] I'm pretty good at it.

[47] Self -taught.

[48] Best thing I've ever heard anyone say.

[49] Best appraisal of the bomb cast ever is why I want to learn how to fart.

[50] It's about how useful we are.

[51] Super damn sure.

[52] If you want to learn how to fart, come listen to the Giant Bombcast.

[53] Vinny, how you doing?

[54] Doing all right.

[55] How was your weekend?

[56] Man, I played some.

[57] I was going to say, don't answer that because I know how your weekend was because I watched you stay up all night Saturday night playing Civ V. True, and then I shut the blinds and you were like, oh.

[58] No, just on our Steam friends list, I watched as you booted up Civ V about midday Saturday.

[59] Yeah.

[60] and then would periodically go back and check in.

[61] I know this one because I also did not sleep on Saturday night.

[62] Well, here's a little...

[63] Watched how that went down.

[64] Did it say playing Civ V for you?

[65] Yeah.

[66] Because you also have it.

[67] See, I don't, so it just says in -game for all you guys.

[68] No. It doesn't actually list...

[69] Oh, I think it does say in -game, but when he launches it, when he launched it, I saw that it said...

[70] Oh, weird.

[71] Okay.

[72] I assumed it was because I was not on the short list.

[73] No, my copy disappeared over the weekend.

[74] My press copy, I had weirdness.

[75] It was on my Steam list, and then I went to check it out on Sunday, and it was just not there.

[76] I was like, did they move it?

[77] Is it under C?

[78] Is it under S?

[79] Yeah, I was looking forward to ramping up for a big -ass Civ 5 weekend myself, but was brutally rebuffed.

[80] Big Civ party.

[81] You had your Civ party.

[82] Vinny, now that you've spent a night or a weekend or however much, how many hours did you say ballpark Civ 5?

[83] I don't know.

[84] I could check on my slash played.

[85] I suppose you could.

[86] I don't know.

[87] I actually booted it up for a while and was playing something else.

[88] Just had it sitting in the background.

[89] But a while.

[90] I spent about, let's see, 5 ,000 years.

[91] All right.

[92] All right.

[93] When did you start?

[94] Did you start 3 ,500?

[95] I think you started 4 ,000.

[96] Yeah?

[97] I think you started 4 ,000 BC.

[98] About 5 ,500 years.

[99] But keep in mind, it also scales.

[100] The passage of time ramps up or it becomes more granular the closer you get to now.

[101] Oh, is that right?

[102] Yeah, because it's like you're moving in bigger increments when you are in like 4000 BC.

[103] It's all a blur, man. But then you start getting up into like, you know, 1900s.

[104] It's going like decade by decade just to give you.

[105] It's one by quickly.

[106] It did.

[107] Those years, they grew up so fast.

[108] What do you think?

[109] What do you think so far?

[110] I think it's the best Civilization V I've ever played.

[111] You can quote me on that.

[112] Wow.

[113] Put that on the back of the gigantic box that they put out for it.

[114] It's a great version of Civ.

[115] I never played Civ Rev, and this takes all the parts about the Civ games that were always such a task to kind of get through, so daunting, and puts them way in the background but not inaccessible.

[116] It doesn't eliminate them.

[117] They're there.

[118] They're driving the strategy.

[119] It brings the things that you...

[120] want to do the most up front, like the next button.

[121] Big ass next button.

[122] And it makes the interface really nice and slick.

[123] It's, you know, click on a thing, right click to move it.

[124] It shows you how many turns it's going to take to get there and then release the mouse and the dude takes off.

[125] I'll say this, like even above Civ Rev. Actually, I want to ask you what your Civ pedigree is.

[126] What Civ games have you played?

[127] All except Civ Rev and there was one on the iPhone, wasn't there?

[128] Yeah, Civ Rev. Oh, the same thing?

[129] Yeah.

[130] I'm pretty sure I made it one, two, three, and four.

[131] Wow.

[132] Well, let's just say I bought them all.

[133] Okay, fair enough.

[134] Does Alpha Centauri count?

[135] Sure.

[136] Okay.

[137] That's basically the same thing.

[138] That one was crazy.

[139] I don't know if you guys spent some time in there.

[140] It was in space.

[141] And then you build your own vehicles.

[142] What?

[143] That one.

[144] You mean like Spore?

[145] Had a creature creator?

[146] Kind of.

[147] Kind of.

[148] Alpha Centauri, creature creator.

[149] Well, I don't know if this is.

[150] me misremembering the other sip games but it seemed like the ai was not respecting my authority as much as it should be when i was clearly dominating the world and i would be like just give me a gold piece no way come kill me all right i think you have to can do yeah i think you have to assert it a little bit yeah but there's no yeah that's the problem there was no like we'll do it or is i gonna come kill you there's just like no like all right well Well, we're at war.

[151] Well, I think after you whip their ass for a few turns, they go, oh, hey, so maybe we could end this war.

[152] I've got some stuff.

[153] Then the list is like, I'll give you 10 gold.

[154] And it's like, no, dude, you need to give me everything.

[155] And now you need to prostrate yourself in front of me. Well, I was telling you, my best experience with Civ V was when Germany attacked me, took over a bunch of my cities.

[156] I was able to turn the tide.

[157] And then Germany was like, hey, you want to end this war?

[158] I'm like, no, fuck you.

[159] We're going to keep fighting.

[160] And then eventually it got to the point where.

[161] where Germany offered me like half their cities just to stop this war.

[162] And I'm like, yeah, that's right.

[163] Walk away.

[164] Walk away.

[165] Yeah, but I didn't want that crap at that point.

[166] All I wanted was the humility.

[167] I want to bleed them.

[168] You want the world to know that they're following me. I was going to say, obviously, then you were not representing your intentions very well if they weren't.

[169] Like were you being a military might?

[170] Were you out there beating all of the other countries?

[171] Oh, yeah.

[172] And then you're just like, oh, Mr. Bully, what do you want from me?

[173] I want to make war with you.

[174] But they'll also do stuff like they'll like – If you have a weak army, you'll get other leaders just, like, popping in to say, like, your shit's weak.

[175] I hope you know that.

[176] I just want to let you know.

[177] Yeah, and, like, the options are, like, thanks.

[178] Or, like, well, we'll try and make them stronger.

[179] Yeah.

[180] No, I'm not saying I don't like the game.

[181] It's just that's one part of it that, like, you want to feel, like, really powerful after you spend all this, you know, 3 ,000 years building up your army.

[182] And you want people to be, like, dude, no, you're the man. I'll give you whatever you want.

[183] Please don't kill me. And a lot of times they seem like – and it's just weird because the scale is so off because they show you how much gold somebody else has and it's like their entire civilization has 200 gold.

[184] My civilization had 70 ,000.

[185] Because at that point I had pretty much exploited the entire game, right?

[186] Right.

[187] And it was just still like, you know, just give me something.

[188] No way!

[189] So I was just buying everything at that point.

[190] I was going to say, or maybe they just knew like what – What difference does it make?

[191] He's just going to take us over anyways.

[192] I know.

[193] They should have things that are just, like, humiliate.

[194] Like, dance for me. Dance for me or I'm taking over your city.

[195] Fine.

[196] All right.

[197] The animations are great.

[198] It's snappier than other Civ games.

[199] I think your point about the interface, I think, is maybe the most important one about Civ 5, though.

[200] I had not played any Civ IV before I started playing this, and I went back for that video we did a while back, and holy shit.

[201] It was just like people have been asking, like, should I play Civ IV to get ready for Civ V?

[202] I was like, no. No, that will do the opposite of help you because the interface has been so completely redone, and it's so much more intuitive and stuff like the – You click on a unit to go fight another unit, and as you hover over the other unit, it gives you like – a win -loss percentage.

[203] This is a decisive victory for you.

[204] You'll do pretty well here.

[205] And if you want, you can start reading down why, but in big, bold letters, it's like, bad idea.

[206] Yeah, good idea.

[207] Is there any randomization in that?

[208] Absolutely.

[209] Sure.

[210] There are dice rolls or whatever going on.

[211] There is a margin, for sure.

[212] But at least you'll know that when you take your horses and you try to attack Pikemen, it'll be like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Bad idea, bad idea.

[213] That's going to not shake out well for you.

[214] But then if there's one...

[215] pikeman left and you have like a thing of horses like yeah you could just kill that guy is this stuff all part of like a newbie mode or is that just no this is just uh this is just like inherent to how i mean they've got stuff like advisors for all of the different aspects of your civilization that are being like like you know you'll go to your production order for a city of like all right what do you want the city to work on next and there will be like little icons next to like okay your economic advisor says that if you want to increase your economy you should probably build one of these if you want to increase your military might you should probably build one of these And you don't have to follow it word for word or anything, but it's definitely – Usually I ignored it until everybody was like, no, no, you should probably build this.

[216] Yeah, and then you'll see something like this one thing that all of your advisors say, build this.

[217] You know what?

[218] Maybe I should – maybe I will do that.

[219] Maybe you're right.

[220] Maybe toilets would be – No!

[221] The best thing that I can say about Civ V is that in any turn -based strategy game, I always find myself like – telling unit to do something or expecting a unit to do something and then it does not do that or it's like it just does not function that way and i'm bewildered as to why i'd never had like everything made complete sense to me in civ 5 yeah it like i said it does It's really smart when you go and you drag past like one turn's worth of stuff, which is indicated by like literally like a blue outline about like, okay, you can make it here in one turn.

[222] Once you go past there, it literally says like little circles that will be like, here's where you make it on the third turn, fourth turn, and it will take you five turns to get here.

[223] Drag yourself all the way across the map and be like, okay, I need to get this guy here.

[224] I now know how many turns it's going to take.

[225] I can initiate that.

[226] It's really smart.

[227] Step away and we'll take care of that.

[228] I found in previous Civ games, I definitely remember going through.

[229] And snoozing dudes, I was just like, I don't have anything to do with you.

[230] Snooze, snooze, snooze.

[231] Now there's like – and this may have been in Civ IV.

[232] I didn't play that much.

[233] The auto -explore stuff.

[234] There's auto -explore, but there's also like fortify.

[235] There's alert where you can put just a dude on like, okay, just stay here.

[236] I don't want to worry about you.

[237] But if you see an enemy, go attack him.

[238] And it's just like alert mode.

[239] There are tons of things where you're just not hitting the space bar to snooze a dude and be like, I don't have anything to do with you.

[240] Snooze, snooze, snooze.

[241] I really liked like the auto -improve on the workers.

[242] That's been around forever because that is the micromanaging those.

[243] Because everybody wants you to build workers.

[244] That's what they default to after a while.

[245] And you need it.

[246] And you do need it because once you look 5 ,000 years later, everything is covered with something, some kind of structure.

[247] And they'll build roads and do all that stuff.

[248] They're not the smartest, though.

[249] I did notice that, like, they'll build half a road and then they'll walk away and start building a farm.

[250] And they'll be like, all right, well, hey.

[251] We still need the rest of that road.

[252] Workers got to eat, though.

[253] Yeah.

[254] But you can.

[255] at least i think this is what i was doing when mine i don't think it was a bug uh you can tell idle um platoons of soldiers and stuff to build roads to be like oh really i don't have anybody to fight you but just go build a fucking road oh really i didn't know that yeah shit i was like all right cool they built the road i had no idea all the things you can learn and uh it's a lot smarter with these um City states.

[256] And again, I don't know if this was in Sephora.

[257] This is a new thing.

[258] City states is now.

[259] And it was kind of weird at first.

[260] There are these little independent nations that aren't part of the bigger.

[261] And it's just like one city.

[262] It's on its own.

[263] And it's usually that city or that city state has some beef with some other city state.

[264] It seemed like they're always kind of coming up in pairs.

[265] It's a little gamey.

[266] It's a little contrived at points because it's like, okay, here's the independent.

[267] A nation of Long Island, let's just say.

[268] Brussels.

[269] Yeah, Brussels.

[270] And they'll be like, where are Brussels?

[271] We really like silk.

[272] If you get a silk, maybe you'll get something good.

[273] And so that's the kind of really gamey part.

[274] Brussels wants silk.

[275] And you're like, all right.

[276] We'll go try and find some silk.

[277] So it's actually cool because it gives you a little direction where you're like, all right.

[278] Well, if I go to Germany here, they've got silk.

[279] I'll try and do this.

[280] And then you get silk, and they're like, that's awesome.

[281] But then you could just say, well, I don't have silk, but I do have the sharp end of this blade.

[282] Sure.

[283] So you could take them over, but I did find – I took over about two, and then I realized they are actually more important alive than dead.

[284] So they're more useful because they'll kick you out.

[285] Units, they'll give you stuff.

[286] Yeah, being allied with a city -state can be helpful.

[287] Although also you need to do that stuff.

[288] You have to decide one way or the other early on because – I definitely found myself in situations where there was a city -state very near where my cities were that was then— Harassing you?

[289] Oh, it was allied with France.

[290] So it was like any time I would go to mess with them, then I always had France on my ass.

[291] I just paid them all off.

[292] Sure, you can pay them off.

[293] That's another route you can go.

[294] I paid them all off, and then when you declare war on somebody, they all declare war on them.

[295] So you're like, all right.

[296] But then they don't do anything.

[297] They're just a little city -state.

[298] Yeah, yeah.

[299] Little dudes on bicycles trying to— But yeah, it just mixes it up.

[300] Little variety.

[301] Yeah.

[302] It's all just like huge empires.

[303] Yeah.

[304] And so there are those weird things where they're like, it'll say a bunch of your towns really want peanut butter.

[305] And you're like, and it's always the thing that like you don't have, right?

[306] So it's like you get peanut butter for them and then they're like, we love the King Day on all these places.

[307] And then like a year later, they're like, now we really want jelly.

[308] And so then you go find Jelly and they're like, we love the King Day.

[309] And you get the special people.

[310] They pop up.

[311] That seems new.

[312] Special people?

[313] Special people.

[314] They're hard workers.

[315] That was at least a lot of heart.

[316] That was at least a Civ Rev thing.

[317] I don't know how much further back they go.

[318] But it's important.

[319] So it's like Leonardo da Vinci appeared in your town.

[320] Yeah.

[321] Tupac Shakur appeared in your town.

[322] And it's like they have like a couple of special abilities.

[323] Usually they – It depends.

[324] Like you can have – You expend them.

[325] You can have like important generals.

[326] You have like military.

[327] You can have cultural.

[328] I think they basically just line up with all of the different like – Yeah.

[329] There are like five of them.

[330] They're like artisans, scientists, engineers, merchants.

[331] You can have them build monuments for you that are awesome.

[332] You can have them like – you can basically like use them up.

[333] to accelerate production of something.

[334] Generals have a bunch of different uses.

[335] Generals will buff like nearby military units, but the other ones you waste to get some kind of other benefit or, you know, expend them.

[336] But the best one I found was a scientist who like just gives you a free tech.

[337] So it's like blow that scientist off and you're just like, you know.

[338] I don't know.

[339] Again, for a Civ player, once you're deep into it, you're like, man, this piece of tech that I want that's available to me is going to take me like 83 turns to develop.

[340] I can do that at once.

[341] That's a big deal.

[342] It's exciting.

[343] Anyway.

[344] So you're in the 1500s right now?

[345] Closing off, I think, maybe 16.

[346] So wait, is this the first game of Civ 5 you've ever played?

[347] Yeah.

[348] Really?

[349] Yeah.

[350] Is that just par for the course?

[351] Like a days -long session?

[352] Oh, at least.

[353] Really?

[354] At least.

[355] Really?

[356] This is on whatever the default difficulty is.

[357] You can accelerate.

[358] They have short ones.

[359] I, in fact, finished a game of Civ V in less than a day.

[360] Pretty excited about that.

[361] I think that's one of the things they were pitching, too.

[362] They were saying that you can have shorter matches.

[363] I want to play this game.

[364] It just sounds impossible.

[365] Well, also, it depends what you want to do.

[366] Make the map really small.

[367] Think of it as like a campaign.

[368] Like one game is a campaign.

[369] And that's fairly – like that is a full civilization being built up and an earth being conquered or not.

[370] That's 6 ,000 years of culture.

[371] Like that's something that takes a little bit of time.

[372] It was really fun because it's like I started off, it was kind of rocky.

[373] And like I didn't think – I thought I made a lot of mistakes.

[374] And I was like, oh, man, this is going to go poorly for me. And then you turn that corner where you start making more money than you're spending.

[375] You realize that you're way ahead of everybody else, and then, yeah, you just crushed it.

[376] Then you just steamroll them.

[377] Obviously, you've got a lot of Civ experience, but, I mean, that's kind of my question.

[378] Like, as a new player, are you apt to make a bunch of mistakes that are just going to, like, doom?

[379] Like, you're going to put days into your first game, but are you just going to, like, doom yourself by the end of it?

[380] Here's the thing.

[381] For me, at least, like, I lost my first.

[382] game of Civ V miserably.

[383] So was that crushing after all the time you put into it?

[384] No, I still really enjoyed the game.

[385] Nothing about it was like, oh, I could have done this better.

[386] I definitely thought about it after the fact of if I had focused more on this and there was this one turn where that went bad.

[387] I think the things I would say...

[388] A better Civ player, a more experienced person might disagree with me. But the things I would say to keep in mind are don't underestimate the workers.

[389] They're basically like StarCraft.

[390] You just always want to have dudes doing stuff in the background, like building roads and stuff like that.

[391] More Vespian guys.

[392] Yeah, it's kind of like that because they'll build roads and all kinds of improvements that will actually let you produce stuff a lot faster.

[393] And that's kind of the whole game, whoever can produce stuff the fastest.

[394] Take advantage of the resources that you have.

[395] Yeah.

[396] Because you'll see all sorts of like, here are, you know, there's horses here.

[397] So if you can take advantage of that.

[398] You're talking about the in -game resources.

[399] Yeah.

[400] Okay.

[401] Pay attention to your happiness.

[402] There's a happiness and disgruntled.

[403] And this has been in all this of games.

[404] It's actually.

[405] really stripped down on this one.

[406] So just keep people happy.

[407] That's the happiness of your population.

[408] Yeah.

[409] And there are like structures you can build that can keep them happy.

[410] Yeah, like theaters, coliseums, stuff like that.

[411] It used to be like when you had a bigger army.

[412] I think this is right.

[413] Your happiness would go down when you garrison them that would go down.

[414] I don't think that's in this one.

[415] I think it still affects it.

[416] Really?

[417] Again, I think a lot of that stuff is not surfaced.

[418] Okay.

[419] But I'm pretty sure because I garrison a lot because I'm protective of my cities because I don't.

[420] like go out a lot.

[421] So it's just like, I keep, I keep my military at home.

[422] Yeah.

[423] But now the cities can just bombard dudes who are coming in, which is cool.

[424] Sure.

[425] Sure.

[426] I mean, you can do that for like from afar from when you're dealing with like, with like naval attackers or whatever, but people can still just walk up and be like, Hey, this is my city now.

[427] Yeah.

[428] And that's the worst.

[429] That's the best when you're doing it.

[430] Uh, so pay attention to the happiness.

[431] It's all about keeping your production efficient, uh, and, and getting the turns down.

[432] Like you don't want 180 turns to make something you want 20.

[433] So basically the more efficient you are in production, the fewer turns it's going to take to build something.

[434] It's not a static number.

[435] It's dynamic based on the resources and people you have.

[436] Oh, so there are like different components you need to assemble and – Well, just like if you want to build a – It's like the resources that you have at your disposal.

[437] Like one of those is like you get a certain number of – production points from each square that belongs i'm sorry each hex that belongs to that city and so like how you are taking advantage of that depending on like okay am i building like uh you know trading post here am i building uh you know an animal corral like what what is it that's being built on this you have to feed people sounds like so much it's not though because it really isn't like it's slow because it introduces things so slowly like this and it's in the background and like you don't even have to do like i didn't start doing that stuff until way later in the game when i was like okay I don't even have to worry about anything anymore.

[438] Now I'm going to get into micromanaging where people are going.

[439] Basically, it'll take care of it for you.

[440] Occasionally, you'll be like, your people are starving.

[441] And you're like, all right.

[442] And again, they have the advisors for all of the relevant stuff that if you're straying completely from the path, they'll be like, hey, yeah, people are starving here.

[443] Or you are running a deficit, and so you're having to eliminate units.

[444] You shouldn't do that.

[445] And it'll kind of point you in the right direction as to where you need to go.

[446] I think even more than Civ Rev, I think this is an incredibly accessible game.

[447] It's highly approachable.

[448] The Civipedia or whatever.

[449] call it a little lacking maybe they're still filling it out but it was like you click on like the great engineer and like all right what does he do and it's like this guy's great and it was like see like hot link to something else like what are his things it's like why'd you even why'd you even take me here yeah i know he's a great engineer it's fantastic i didn't look at too much of the simipedia stuff well i want to know what their benefits were because i didn't know that stuff it's You guys, it's great.

[450] It's actually really fun.

[451] Sounds pretty awesome.

[452] All right, so I don't want to turn this into Civ 5 tutorial hour, but last quick questions.

[453] I mean, new player, never played a Civ before.

[454] You sit down to this, you see the main menu.

[455] What do you click on?

[456] Is there a tutorial option or a new game?

[457] Start game.

[458] There is a play now button, which is literally just like...

[459] Random leader, random map, go.

[460] So you don't even have to pick time period and all that stuff.

[461] I don't know.

[462] That's not how I like to play.

[463] I'm saying for first player, don't sweat the details just yet.

[464] That one literally just puts you into the game.

[465] That will be the most vanilla, random game of Civ V that you can have.

[466] I like playing as the Romans.

[467] All the stuff is built in.

[468] I like playing as the Americans.

[469] What buffs do you get as Americans?

[470] You get some military stuff.

[471] That's pretty good.

[472] There's a few other things.

[473] God, and then there's just like the social policies.

[474] Yeah, but again, that stuff is like it's only really if you want to get into it.

[475] You don't even have to choose it.

[476] But it's awesome though because some of the buffs you get from that stuff is really, really effective.

[477] But it's all spelled out there.

[478] It's all like plus one happiness.

[479] They rate it all.

[480] It seems like it's tool -tipped all to hell.

[481] It is super tool -tipped and it lays everything out to you in very plain language.

[482] It's very, very easy to pick up.

[483] I think people look at this and they think, oh, it's going to be so complicated and so hard to get into.

[484] But if you like something like Advanced Wars, that is a very stripped down, pretty straightforward turn -based strategy game.

[485] If you can handle Advanced Wars, you can handle Civ V. I didn't build 75 % of the units I could have.

[486] I built the dudes I needed to build.

[487] I didn't even build any military units until about 1 ,000 years into the game.

[488] I'll say that.

[489] I think you can kind of fall down that rabbit hole some if you just start looking at all of the options for stuff you can build.

[490] Don't sweat most of that because you won't use a good majority of it.

[491] Build workers.

[492] Build settlers.

[493] You need settlers to build more towns.

[494] Don't wait too long to build a new town.

[495] If you don't expand in the first 20 minutes, you've already lost.

[496] Build a couple pylons.

[497] Actually, if you haven't done it in the first three hours.

[498] Let's say the first 800 turns.

[499] The first day.

[500] Okay, fair enough.

[501] Like expanding within like your first day.

[502] Yeah, I'm used to working in scales of seconds and minutes.

[503] This is the anti.

[504] So you're playing like a six corral.

[505] Well, because like the thing is like you'll be sitting there and you'll think you're doing well and then suddenly Alexander the Great shows up and you're like, shit, fuck, that means he's expanded way past where I am.

[506] And then he's just like, yo, what's up?

[507] I'm just going to walk by.

[508] I just wanted to say hey.

[509] Yeah, I just wanted to say hey.

[510] I saw you're new in the neighborhood, and I'm Alexander.

[511] Some people think I'm pretty great.

[512] Maybe you should explore more.

[513] Yeah, get out there.

[514] You should come out with us.

[515] No, I don't want to.

[516] We should come out sometime.

[517] It's so much fun.

[518] You're going to love it.

[519] Kill him.

[520] I like the little pompous.

[521] leader videos that you get whenever you meet a new civilization.

[522] Can you mix and match the leaders with civilizations?

[523] Nope.

[524] They're all tied together.

[525] You can rename your towns to something else.

[526] No, they definitely fix a lot of that stuff.

[527] You can't have Cleopatra leading the...

[528] I mean, you can name yourself whatever you want.

[529] But no, no. The civilization and the leader are George Washington and Mesopotamia.

[530] Yeah, again, you go and take over Mesopotamia and then George Washington is running that shit.

[531] I was a little bummed in passive games that the American leader has been Abe Lincoln.

[532] And as an Abe Lincoln fan, I was a little bummed that they went with Washington.

[533] They're afraid.

[534] They're actually just getting out of the way.

[535] Of any other Lincoln -based products.

[536] That's, you know, very wise of them.

[537] I hope this game does well.

[538] I hope that people check it out.

[539] I know that it seems like 2K is pushing it pretty hard.

[540] And I think it's, you know, I think it's easy for people.

[541] You know, there is a certain pedigree to the Civilization name, but I think it's easy for people to get intimidated by what the history of Civ has been and kind of, I guess, you know, what the audience for Civ has been.

[542] But I think this is...

[543] I think Firaxis has made a very, very easy approachable, easy to play approachable game.

[544] It's really rewarding.

[545] It's nice to see the fruits of your labor.

[546] And it just chews the shit out of your time, man. It's that blinking next button.

[547] So anyway, what else?

[548] Anything else?

[549] So I played some Dark Void.

[550] That's cool.

[551] How far are you in that?

[552] I think I'm right near the end.

[553] I don't know.

[554] Kind of like it.

[555] Totally casual hide behind cover shoot dudes between like Civ matches.

[556] Between turns.

[557] Yeah, just kind of like jumping in.

[558] It was bringing my computer to its knees at a couple points.

[559] Oh, you're playing a PC version?

[560] No, on Civ.

[561] Oh.

[562] Like during like when it was like has to calculate all the things.

[563] I was like, all right.

[564] The screen just goes dark and it flickers for a while and then it comes up in video chess as well as its next move.

[565] Actually, how much time is there between your interactive parts?

[566] It's not so bad.

[567] You can't go do some push -ups or something.

[568] No, no, no. It used to be real bad.

[569] It's pretty fast.

[570] But yeah, Dark Void.

[571] It does increase, though, as you progress and as the civilizations get bigger.

[572] You get the sense that just the math that's going on is so intense under the hood that it actually takes some time.

[573] Oh, yeah.

[574] There's a view.

[575] There's just a lot of moving parts.

[576] If you have like 10 to 12 civilizations on an active map.

[577] And each one of them...

[578] Is moving workers around.

[579] Is moving workers and expanding.

[580] Does it actually animate everything the computer is doing as well?

[581] On screen.

[582] Yeah, yeah.

[583] So if you just put it into...

[584] But I'm saying even just like the calculations of like okay...

[585] The Russians did this, this, this, and this in their turn.

[586] And then as such – because there could be civilizations fucking fighting and taking each other over and revolutions happening in parts of the world that you haven't even seen yet.

[587] They call them Unmet Player.

[588] Unmet Player has died.

[589] Oh, wow.

[590] Yeah, you could have – yeah.

[591] Yeah, you'll learn about like – about invasions that are happening while you are still fucking rubbing sticks together.

[592] I was hours and – like six or seven hours in before I was able to leave my continent and meet the other half of the players in the world.

[593] We should try multiplayer at some point.

[594] How many players does that allow?

[595] I don't know.

[596] I don't know.

[597] We should give that a shot.

[598] I need to play some of that, but we were joking about doing that for TNT this week, which would be hilarious.

[599] Yes, it would just be a week.

[600] Yeah, so there's this hex view that you can just look at that's literally like a tabletop game.

[601] It gets rid of all animations.

[602] I started playing in that after a while.

[603] Like starts, finish?

[604] Not just while the computer was moving?

[605] No, because at some point I was just dominating.

[606] I was just hitting next to get my next thing.

[607] I just need to research this tech.

[608] Just go, go, go, go, go, go, go.

[609] Don't care about anything else that's going on.

[610] Just put it in the corner of the world and grind.

[611] Is it pretty, though?

[612] It looks like they've done a lot of work into that.

[613] And it scales up and down really well, too.

[614] I played it with some low -end stuff, and then I went crazy on it.

[615] I think it looks good.

[616] I mean, it still has that kind of Civ scale.

[617] It's not like you're going to zoom in, and you're like, I'm on the city streets of New York, or anything like that.

[618] It's pretty close.

[619] Yeah, yeah.

[620] But it's still like, here's a little dude standing on top of the...

[621] the geometry of what you're saying.

[622] I don't need to see guys stabbing each other when they fight.

[623] I think the water looks really good.

[624] Yeah, and you can, but again, they're kind of avatars for like, okay, it's understood.

[625] It's like a board game, basically.

[626] Yeah, yeah.

[627] But the level of detail in that stuff is good.

[628] And just stuff like the way they use the clouds for the areas that you haven't seen yet.

[629] It's clever.

[630] Unexplored areas.

[631] It's good.

[632] Yeah, I think it's a good looking game.

[633] No Dark Void.

[634] It's no Dark Void.

[635] It is no Dark Void.

[636] So why did you play Dark Void?

[637] It was a gameplay.

[638] Yeah.

[639] It was on sale.

[640] I bought it.

[641] So wait.

[642] So you paid money for it.

[643] I did.

[644] It's not a terrible game.

[645] You paid money to rent it.

[646] Actually, I would say I like it.

[647] Yeah.

[648] You bought it.

[649] Yeah.

[650] It was like for nine bucks or whatever.

[651] I might buy it too for that.

[652] It's totally like after coming off.

[653] So I beat Halo Reach 2.

[654] And like after coming off of that.

[655] Wow, you beat Halo Reach 2?

[656] Yeah, man. I'm ahead of the game.

[657] I played Civ for a long time.

[658] So I beat that as well.

[659] And so after coming off of that on Heroic, it's really nice to just slip back into Dark Void where I can close my eyes.

[660] I'm just going to mow these alien robot guys down.

[661] Pretty much just walk up to everybody and one hit melee them and kill everybody.

[662] Not having a problem with Dark Void.

[663] Reach though, man, that was a motherfucker.

[664] I started playing it on Sunday.

[665] So happy to just play it on normal.

[666] That's the way to have fun with it.

[667] That's what I'm doing.

[668] Yeah, the heroic thing, like, I don't care if you're, you can't shame me. This is the way it's supposed to be played.

[669] Why don't you call it that normal if that's how it's supposed to be played?

[670] Well, the language is how, this is how it's meant to be played.

[671] It's the same thing, though.

[672] I mean, meant or supposed to, it's still kind of the same.

[673] This is how real men play it, you old sissy.

[674] Yeah, I mean, they definitely.

[675] If you want to, like, have, like, a subpar experience with our masterpiece of a game.

[676] That's just them taking the Doom difficulty settings into, like.

[677] the next generation.

[678] That's all that was.

[679] You can't blame him for that.

[680] But there's something so much less...

[681] John Romero is to blame for what you're complaining about.

[682] But John Romero did it in such an over -the -top, like, funny way.

[683] Like, this just seems like jock -asshole shit.

[684] Well, but in their defense, I mean, it is a technically complex enough game that it does reward higher levels of play.

[685] It's also a case where so many people play Halo that it makes sense for them to make normal normal.

[686] I don't doubt that the...

[687] Yeah, but I also don't doubt that, like, the hardcore...

[688] There's also a lot of people that play a whole lot of Halo.

[689] Those dudes, Heroic is probably a...

[690] Like nothing.

[691] Yeah.

[692] I don't know.

[693] I want to see somebody play through that on Heroic.

[694] There were just points when I was doing that where it was just like, this can't just be me. I know I'm bad, but this can't just be me. To its credit, though.

[695] Halo Reach reloads very fast.

[696] It does.

[697] Oh, yeah.

[698] That's been a trademark of the Halo series.

[699] They're really good about that stuff.

[700] You were playing on Heroic, right?

[701] Yeah, I finished it on Heroic.

[702] I finished one mission on Legendary.

[703] I mean, I know people who have finished it solo on Legendary already.

[704] That's crazy.

[705] Yeah, that is crazy.

[706] It's a great achievement.

[707] Some people really get off on playing games that way.

[708] I'm just kind of, I don't know.

[709] Yeah, it left a sour taste in my mouth for that experience.

[710] I think I would like that game.

[711] Like the combat's good, but the kind of reloading a checkpoint 20 times at some point just becomes like, why am I doing this?

[712] I mean, I definitely ran into the issue that you had a few times of just like death coming out of nowhere.

[713] Like elite that you didn't even know was there comes up and stabs you before you even see him.

[714] Right.

[715] Like fuel rod to the face as soon as you walk around a corner or something like that.

[716] But then like seven fuel rods to like the bad guy and he still doesn't go down.

[717] Yeah, and it's kind of demoralizing, but yeah.

[718] Come on.

[719] Well, more importantly, I think it kills the game's momentum.

[720] It can, yeah.

[721] Like that's an experience that I think needs to keep moving for it to be fun.

[722] Right, because otherwise you start, once you redo that stuff so many times, you really start to see the...

[723] the behind the scenes too much of like wave after wave where it's like I just spent a half hour fighting off this first wave and now we're going to sit here and be like another wave coming in and you're like oh fucking A really like I thought that was the end of that and then it's like alright well I made it past this guy one more wave and it's like I think I'm done it's weird you do the second to last objective in the entire game which seems like the last thing you would do and then they're like alright there's just one other thing you gotta do And on the way to go do that thing is like six really, really hard elites that took me like 30 minutes to beat.

[724] It's pretty screwed up.

[725] I think I know what you're talking about.

[726] Is it when you're on your way up to...

[727] Yes, you're going up.

[728] Yeah, totally.

[729] It's like, okay, this has to be the end of the game.

[730] It's like, oh, no, wait.

[731] now I have to go do this thing.

[732] Well, it's not, it's not just that you had another thing to go do.

[733] It's that like they squandered all the sort of dramatic momentum they had by, I mean, I'm glad I played it on heroic.

[734] It was, it feels like I accomplished something, but like it took me so long credits, five grand.

[735] It was a challenge.

[736] Oh yeah.

[737] I finished that weekly challenge.

[738] Those challenges are genius.

[739] Like absolutely genius.

[740] The daily stuff.

[741] Like it was jacking that stuff from rock band.

[742] I guess so.

[743] But I'm not saying it's not genius.

[744] But no one's done it like that for a person who's shooter.

[745] And the way that they spread it across firefight, multiplayer, campaign.

[746] Oh, yeah.

[747] The challenges are like it's just a grab bag of like here's some neat stuff to go do.

[748] It inspires you to continue playing a lot of different modes rather than just getting complacent with one style.

[749] I felt I really, really enjoy that like my ranking stuff went up as I was playing the campaign.

[750] Like, knowing that, okay, I'm getting something out of this that's going to contribute to my overall Halo -ness.

[751] And, like, I didn't realize that they were going to do the crazy shit with Waypoint that they're doing of, like, the more achievements you have in more Halo games, the more stuff that you can unlock here.

[752] Like, that's a pretty clever way to...

[753] So that's a little weird because it is tied to specific achievements from other Halo games.

[754] It's, like, some of that gear.

[755] So it's, like, you have to have finished ODST on Heroic, I think.

[756] Oh, sure.

[757] Well, I mean, I get it.

[758] It's the, like, you know...

[759] We want you to like Halo in all formats.

[760] Though none of them are tied to Halo Wars.

[761] Okay, well then that's fine.

[762] I have all of the other game specific achievements that I would need to unlock the stuff in Halo Reach.

[763] I just need to finish Halo Reach on Legendary to unlock that last armor set or whatever.

[764] You'll do that.

[765] I don't know.

[766] I left the disc here when I left town.

[767] So I wanted to play some...

[768] yesterday and couldn't and uh i don't know like i kind of want to play some more of it but i want to play some co -ops i would love to play some co -ops speaking about what you were saying about momentum and the kind of near the end of the game i don't want to spoil anything but the very very end of the game i'm very close i'll try and say without spoiling anything but like uh there are some bits there's a bit after the credits yeah at that point i was just like fuck knowing how well this has gone for me the rest of the game I'm fucked here.

[769] And so I think I just put the controller down and it's like, well, this game's over, right?

[770] Yeah.

[771] I thought that was pretty well done.

[772] Oh, I loved it.

[773] I think that's a great moment.

[774] It was a great part, but like having the kind of like by centimeters, like made my way through that game, like inch by inch.

[775] That last part for me was like, well, fuck.

[776] You know what they say, inch by inch, Halo's a cinch.

[777] Really?

[778] Yard by yard.

[779] Halo is hard.

[780] Sure, I'll take that.

[781] I don't know.

[782] I think the emotional tone that they must have been going for with the ending of that game I think is exactly what they achieved.

[783] It was kind of poignant at the end.

[784] It's pretty bittersweet.

[785] I don't know if I should say it or not.

[786] It's not a story thing.

[787] It's not a story thing at all.

[788] There's a little token of Bungie's appreciation in there for the fan base that was just, like, kind of bittersweet.

[789] The part that you mentioned about some other games, too, where...

[790] cut scene stuff versus gameplay stuff um in terms of like well dude you've been fighting this whole time beside me and now you know joe blow over here just takes a shot to the leg and now you're dead like you just took 800 bullets over here pretty bad about that stuff like that game more than most yeah uh Because you do have a whole squad of dudes.

[791] Well, you also have a whole squad of dudes that are effectively invincible in gameplay.

[792] Right.

[793] I don't have to worry about him.

[794] He's going to take care of himself.

[795] I'm going to go over here and shoot dudes.

[796] I'm going to hang back here and let my shields recharge and hope that maybe the AI actually kills some guys for a change.

[797] And then some dude chokes on a pretzel and you're dead for the game.

[798] What?

[799] I can't go.

[800] It's going without me. I think they, I mean, again, I'm like two missions.

[801] away from the end of the game, but I think that they set up the kind of, you know, suicide squad.

[802] There's a good, like, rolling, building sense of doom.

[803] Yeah, yeah.

[804] And it gets, like, again, I just finished, like, the eighth mission, and it gets fucking buck wild.

[805] It gets pretty...

[806] Definitely, story -wise, I feel like it's some of the best work they've ever done.

[807] It is the best.

[808] Yeah, yeah.

[809] But pacing -wise for the gameplay, I think that they...

[810] have done better before do you think that it's just like one mission too many maybe i think some of the missions near the end you get to a point where you're like all right wrap it up i agree with you on on that point specifically but i still think it's the best campaign they've done i wish they would easily the most varied i mean with all the vehicle action well yeah yeah okay i mean yes it's varied because they've got the whole flying bit yeah and And that's by default more varied than what they've done.

[811] But at the same time, it's like, here's the level where you drive the Scorpion.

[812] Here's the level where you do this.

[813] Driving Scorpions is still fun, though.

[814] It is.

[815] But they also like the ability.

[816] Parts of it feel like they were checking off boxes on things a Halo campaign needs to have.

[817] But, I mean, it's their last chance to make those things.

[818] Right.

[819] So you can't fault them for it.

[820] I think in some cases, like maybe taken together as a whole, it's their best.

[821] But I think in certain cases, like I think the Scorpion level.

[822] from Halo 3 was probably better.

[823] Oh, yeah, yeah, I probably agree.

[824] I mean, yeah, some missions are absolutely better than others.

[825] Yeah, so it's definitely, like, the pacing and that sort of stuff is what feels off about it.

[826] I wish they had in the back, you know, quarter of the game, I feel like Bungie has done this before, when the shit hits the fan, let you...

[827] The odds are so overwhelming that you just have to run through stuff.

[828] And at the end of the game, you literally had to kill everybody.

[829] Like everybody that's presented to you.

[830] And like I thought I could run.

[831] So I didn't kill everybody at the very end of the game.

[832] Oh, really?

[833] And it made the very end of the game difficult as a result.

[834] Just like dudes piling up on you?

[835] Yeah.

[836] Yeah, like I feel like – was Halo on the Warthog escape where you're just driving through?

[837] Yes, and then Halo 3 had one.

[838] Yeah, so I feel like they've done it before where it's just like shit's gone real bad and like you can't kill everyone.

[839] And I thought that's where it was going at some point.

[840] Yeah, especially because they give you vehicles at one point and you're like, oh, okay, here it is.

[841] But then you get to this point – like that was literally the part where I was like, what the – okay, fine.

[842] Where – It seemed like it was moving towards that style of sequence.

[843] And it's like, oh, no, wait.

[844] You have to get off and fight.

[845] It's like, well, I don't want to.

[846] No, we're done here.

[847] You've already peeled back all the layers on the story.

[848] Like, let's just wrap it up.

[849] You have to finish the fight.

[850] Let's just finish the fucking fight.

[851] Finish the fight.

[852] So, like, that was, yeah.

[853] I have a quick question.

[854] Just a Halo lore thing.

[855] Maybe someone can answer because I wasn't sure.

[856] And this is not a spoiler.

[857] basically the beginning of the game but is the is the implication that uh that the member of the team of noble that you're replacing is master chief no it's not it's a different guy um they in some of the stuff leading up to this game's release they released vignettes about what that guy went and did okay oh that's what that whole live action yeah Because at the beginning they kind of talk about how like, you know, some people would rather not see his position replaced or whatever.

[858] Yeah, big shoes to fill.

[859] Yeah, so I kind of thought like, oh, were they like.

[860] Yeah, go watch.

[861] It's on the site.

[862] Go watch that live action commercial they did.

[863] Oh, really?

[864] That depicts the end of the previous Noble Six.

[865] Okay, interesting.

[866] He sacrificed himself for something.

[867] Oh, that's what, okay, okay.

[868] Like I've seen like some of the, I haven't seen like the narrative, but I've seen the imagery from some of that stuff.

[869] And the very end of that game picks up, is that the very beginning of Halo 1?

[870] Is that the, is that like seamless?

[871] Literally.

[872] I mean, kind of.

[873] Pretty much.

[874] I can't remember.

[875] It seemed like it was.

[876] It's like minutes later.

[877] We shouldn't even say that.

[878] I feel like we should cut that part out, actually.

[879] You think that's spoilers?

[880] Kind of.

[881] Also, Reach gets destroyed.

[882] Wait, what?

[883] Well, they've said publicly this game ends minutes before Halo 1 begins.

[884] Halo 1.

[885] All right.

[886] Well, fine.

[887] People knew that.

[888] Whatever.

[889] The timeline on that stuff was never clear to me. We've said worse things about Halo Reach, spoiler -wise, before that right now.

[890] We just said nothing about their specific depiction of events in this game, so that doesn't really give anything.

[891] Also, I was just confused about it, so I don't know if it's a spoiler or if I'm not even sure.

[892] Master Chief is a woman, right?

[893] Yeah, that's right.

[894] I wish...

[895] Whoever at Bungie, if anybody's listening that handles audio stuff, like Marty or whoever up there, put in some audio mix options.

[896] Let me turn down the music.

[897] Come on.

[898] I was going to say for the voice work, the voice work in all the cut scenes, I was constantly distracted by how very close and clear all of the dialogue options were.

[899] I've missed a lot of dialogue.

[900] That might have been your audio setup or something.

[901] Because if you're playing that, were you playing on two speakers?

[902] Yeah.

[903] Stereo.

[904] Like on stereo setups, the audio mix on that game is fucked.

[905] It's really unfortunate.

[906] Really?

[907] Okay.

[908] Then play on a 5 .1 because then all the audio is coming out of the proper channels and you can hear the voices a lot better and you can hear stuff.

[909] No, my issue is that the voices are super clear.

[910] It sounds too much like I'm listening to them in a studio.

[911] Okay, weird.

[912] Yeah, but when we had it hooked up out here just on...

[913] We were recording that quick look.

[914] It just gets buried?

[915] Yeah, all the voice work was just getting buried.

[916] You can even hear it on the quick look.

[917] It's really unfortunate.

[918] I wonder if there's an option.

[919] There's nothing.

[920] There are no subtitles.

[921] There's no way to balance the music against the voices or the sound effects or any of that stuff.

[922] That's really odd.

[923] It's really sad.

[924] It's really weird.

[925] Otherwise, this is their most direct and effective...

[926] method of storytelling so far you know it's their it's the best job they've done dudes that take off their helmets and say well yeah i'm a dude and i'm gonna talk to you they characterize the spartans really well but also like you get a really good sense of what's going on all the time i mean granted there's no like religious mumbo jumbo or talking plants involved right which is just like sure so i mean you know it's inherently an easier story to understand but It's not about understanding.

[927] Well, the story is like...

[928] Oh, I understood the part about the stupid plan.

[929] I was going to say...

[930] I understood that it was junk.

[931] The story is...

[932] Ah, Covenant.

[933] Pretty much, yeah.

[934] I mean, you know, moment to moment, there are different scenarios they're playing out.

[935] The scenario is Covenant's over there.

[936] But...

[937] Yeah, they were...

[938] Why are they here?

[939] I don't...

[940] You know?

[941] They're there.

[942] We think they're here for this.

[943] Well, let's get this out of here.

[944] Whatever.

[945] Again, you have the benefit of having understood everything everybody said.

[946] Yeah, yeah.

[947] Which I didn't.

[948] Which sucks, because...

[949] Although, yeah, I still...

[950] I knew that I was going to move forward to you, dude.

[951] But your point is still completely valid.

[952] No, I definitely felt that.

[953] you know noble doesn't want to see where this is going to go like fight your fight you did a good thing you don't want to see this all like religious nonsense that's going to happen later on like just get what you need to get done you did a good job and that's actually what i felt i was like by the end of that game you really do feel like man these guys did a really good job and what they had to do like this situation was completely fucked it definitely repaints the whole idea of of what reach is yeah it seemed like it seemed like it's like oh it's this massive loss and yeah it's like oh no it was actually actually like super key like there's plenty of stuff that if those guys hadn't done what they did.

[954] And also like Master Chief you had it easy.

[955] I always felt like Master Chief is a pretty one dimensional character though and not just because he doesn't take his helmet off.

[956] Yeah.

[957] Like he's kind of equipping like an all powerful badass whereas like these guys like the dynamic between the leader and cat like there's interesting stuff going on there.

[958] The stuff with George was pretty good like they set up some of that stuff nicely like.

[959] They humanize those guys well as you kind of see them accepting the inevitability of what's going to happen over time.

[960] I feel like over the course of the Halo trilogy, they do flesh out Master Chief a bit.

[961] To humanize them a little.

[962] By the end of Halo 3, you're like, oh.

[963] But you're also not playing as these other...

[964] It's the benefit of having the squad in reach where you can like...

[965] you know, Noble Six isn't much of a character at all because it's the avatar for the player.

[966] But then there's all these other characters like, you know, yeah, Master Chief isn't my favorite Halo character from the main Halo games.

[967] It's, you know, Cortana.

[968] It's one of the other supporting characters.

[969] It's Keith David.

[970] All right.

[971] He's up there.

[972] So yeah, Halo Reach.

[973] That's a pretty good Halo game.

[974] Somebody play some Legendary with me. I'll play some Legendary.

[975] Looking for some co -op action for sure.

[976] Oh, God.

[977] I played the first mission on Legendary.

[978] Alone?

[979] You know what?

[980] Yes.

[981] You know what?

[982] I changed my mind.

[983] Let's not play that.

[984] I think because I did that on Halo 3.

[985] I played Halo 3 on normal and then did a bunch of co -op stuff on Legendary.

[986] And with four players, you get a posse in there together.

[987] It's a fun challenge with four people, but they put in that god -awful achievement, which makes you want to play it by yourself.

[988] Dude, that is just a hateful, hateful game on Legendary by yourself.

[989] Most games aren't on that.

[990] Especially because there's a fucking Avatar award in there for finishing a legendary mission without dying, which is what I was trying to get yesterday, which made me almost break my control.

[991] I appreciate the way that game kicks out the Avatar awards.

[992] They packed a bunch in there.

[993] But all the Avatar Awards are helmets, and they're selling all the armor.

[994] Yeah, you have to buy the armor to match the armor.

[995] I just got the hoodie.

[996] I'm just rocking the hoodie.

[997] Oh, there's a hoodie?

[998] Yeah, there's a...

[999] Just like the green Reach hoodie?

[1000] No, no. It's a hoodie with like a t -shirt under it, and the t -shirt has like two little Spartan helmets and a heart behind it.

[1001] Are you sure you didn't get that out of Waypoint?

[1002] Oh, that came out of Waypoint?

[1003] There's only five in the game proper, and they're all the helmets of Noble Team.

[1004] Yeah.

[1005] I got...

[1006] Oh, I checked.

[1007] That's...

[1008] But I just remember getting like, oh, yeah, maybe it was a, I don't know.

[1009] Waypoint has a bunch.

[1010] My halo kind of blurs together from this weekend.

[1011] Jeff.

[1012] Hey.

[1013] How you doing?

[1014] All right.

[1015] How was your weekend?

[1016] Good.

[1017] Wait, I also played Puzzle Bots.

[1018] Oh, you played some Puzzle Bots from the PAX 10?

[1019] I did.

[1020] What'd you think?

[1021] It was charming.

[1022] Yeah, it's cute.

[1023] Yeah.

[1024] It's cute.

[1025] It's a little short, maybe.

[1026] Yeah.

[1027] It's 10 bucks.

[1028] Did you buy it from the site, developer site?

[1029] Yeah, just go straight to them.

[1030] Go check out Puzzle Bots.

[1031] It's cute.

[1032] You can get a good demo version of it for free.

[1033] So check it out.

[1034] Get a taste of it.

[1035] Venture gaming.

[1036] Kind of.

[1037] Pretty much.

[1038] Kind of.

[1039] Like adventure puzzle solving.

[1040] But it's adventure gaming.

[1041] I mean, it's more, I mean, you know, it's, it's, it's Leighton -y.

[1042] It is latently Leighton.

[1043] I don't know.

[1044] Leighton for the layman.

[1045] Yes.

[1046] Leighton, layman, Leighton for, oh, gotta stop saying it.

[1047] Leighton's lament.

[1048] Jeff Kirsten.

[1049] I played some APB.

[1050] What?

[1051] Wow.

[1052] Can you still play that?

[1053] You can still play it.

[1054] In fact, they've taken all their accounts and set them all to be active until 12 -31 -2020.

[1055] Wow.

[1056] Wait, what?

[1057] No rush.

[1058] So they're not pulling the cord on the server?

[1059] Not just yet.

[1060] Just not taking new accounts?

[1061] Yeah, I guess.

[1062] And, you know, I went and looked at the EB.

[1063] and they are not selling copies of APB there anymore.

[1064] So I was thrown into the game, joined an action district, started a mission, which they revamped some of the mission starting stuff since I last played it, and was immediately matched up with a guy who was dressed up like a Nazi.

[1065] Perfect.

[1066] Full -on armband everything.

[1067] I was like, yeah, that about sums it up.

[1068] Oh, poor.

[1069] Well.

[1070] APB.

[1071] Yeah, so I ended up playing like another half hour of that.

[1072] Nope, this is still not a game I would want to play and still not a game I can understand anyone ever wanting to play.

[1073] It's just that now the chat, instead of being filled with people just being like randomly racist and hateful, is now people talking about how the game is not going to be up for much longer.

[1074] Which was preferable.

[1075] I was going to say, it's probably a galvanizing thing for the burgeoning two and a half month old.

[1076] APB community.

[1077] Yeah, it's old schoolers.

[1078] It's not a good game.

[1079] The best part of that, though, was, I'm sure you got this too, Jeff, was an email went out from the Global Agenda guys.

[1080] That's not even the best part.

[1081] That's the fucking worst part.

[1082] It's the best worst part, though.

[1083] It's fucking disgusting.

[1084] It is.

[1085] It is.

[1086] Basically...

[1087] They're trying to lure away.

[1088] Yeah, they still have this thing saying like, you know, all us shooters slash MMO fans need to band together as one of our fallen brethren.

[1089] Something, something, something.

[1090] 30 % off global agenda.

[1091] Like, fuck you.

[1092] Is that a blanket offer?

[1093] Like, they're not checking to see that you're an APB.

[1094] No, it's a blanket offer.

[1095] It's just anybody that wants to sign up right now.

[1096] I thought they were giving that game away for free at some point.

[1097] They're still charging?

[1098] I don't know.

[1099] They should.

[1100] I've actually got the email here.

[1101] I almost feel bad talking about it because I don't.

[1102] Right, want to promote it?

[1103] Promote this shit.

[1104] No, no. But yeah, the subject is an open letter to shooter slash MMO fans.

[1105] Think about that already.

[1106] You said it in the car this morning.

[1107] Who is that?

[1108] Who is that guy who's like, man, I only like my shooters when they're also MMOs?

[1109] Because I don't think I would really call either Global Agenda or APB an MMO.

[1110] No, but their marketers would.

[1111] Yeah, 30 % off.

[1112] Enter promo code, long live shooter MMOs.

[1113] Fuck you.

[1114] Yeah, complete fuck you.

[1115] They have come to us on numerous occasions asking us to take another look at that game, saying like, oh, you know, we know you didn't like it the first time.

[1116] Maybe take a look at it again.

[1117] How about never?

[1118] Yikes.

[1119] How about never?

[1120] Now, how about never?

[1121] That's the worst.

[1122] This is dirtbaggy.

[1123] The corpse is still warm.

[1124] Yeah.

[1125] And here you are attempting to fuck it.

[1126] All right, I'm back here.

[1127] I, on the other hand, I have to go.

[1128] Vinny's going to start playing Global Agenda exclusively now.

[1129] It's cold.

[1130] I was lied to.

[1131] Uh, yeah, that, yeah, it's...

[1132] But, like, on the APB side, like, so they've updated the patching screen and they put out some stuff with, like, quotes from the team that worked on that game.

[1133] And one of them is like, I hope the game's remembered for what it...

[1134] was meant to be and not what it was.

[1135] That's the thing a crazy person says!

[1136] What?

[1137] I feel horrible.

[1138] A lot of people lost their jobs and that's too bad.

[1139] They were ambitious and it didn't work out.

[1140] The business model was too crazy.

[1141] The game was not good.

[1142] That guy being like, I tried my best.

[1143] There's a current or maybe former employee of Real Time Worlds running a blog series on exactly what, at least in his eyes, went wrong.

[1144] Top to bottom.

[1145] Well, I'm sure it's not a thing.

[1146] No, no, no. It's a series of blog entries.

[1147] It is.

[1148] It's a long list of things.

[1149] And each entry had numerous points within it.

[1150] But I'm sure you ask point one, he'll deny that it was his fault, and then you ask point two, the person.

[1151] I mean it just sounds like a general failure of organization.

[1152] Yeah, but when you get into an organization that's in that state, it is just full finger pointing on everyone.

[1153] It's like, well, marketing thinks that design didn't do right.

[1154] and design things that biz dev and the only thing that i look at that game and go well that part was well made is like the the character editor stuff which is no surprise that for a good long time that's all they were showing from that game yeah because that stuff is is intense and you can go a really long way with it and then you take those characters into a world that is not fun to be in or use yeah so like 10 out of 10 for making dudes just like four actually yeah totally yes It is sport character creator.

[1155] I want to say that I heard somewhere that they're going to license that character creation stuff.

[1156] I'd be good.

[1157] Somebody is.

[1158] I'm not sure.

[1159] It's not the worst idea in the world.

[1160] I mean, you know, like any person at the same time, like a lot of that stuff just comes directly out of like stuff like Forza.

[1161] You know, it's not.

[1162] Well, I don't know.

[1163] Maybe it is easier to license it than to build it, but nothing about that seems.

[1164] Like they just applied it to dudes really well.

[1165] It seems like now that that's done, anyone could look at that and go, yeah, we could do that.

[1166] Yeah, but I mean, people license middleware to make trees.

[1167] It's true.

[1168] It's true.

[1169] Yeah, but making trees 500 times.

[1170] I will not have speed tree.

[1171] Don't look at me. I'm defending the middleware market.

[1172] Maybe you license that character creator and then use it to auto -generate NPCs.

[1173] Speed dude.

[1174] Nigel Blackley from Guilleford, when he buys that from the British government, he can go ahead and license that out.

[1175] Okay.

[1176] As they are the – because they're in bankruptcy, so their government is going to sell off all their assets.

[1177] Well, yeah, yeah.

[1178] I guess the statement was that they got it down to six people that were interested.

[1179] or six companies or something that were interested in taking it, but not as a live thing.

[1180] Oh, yeah.

[1181] Not as parts of it that they like, but not the part where they have to run APB.

[1182] So to get your last minutes with APB checking back in, anything?

[1183] Well, 2020 you said, right?

[1184] Yeah, exactly.

[1185] Then I started looking for other shooter slash MMOs.

[1186] Such a rich market.

[1187] Such a lively community.

[1188] Right.

[1189] At what point do all the people still playing Crimecraft go...

[1190] At least we're not caught up in this shit.

[1191] That could have been us.

[1192] We're still here.

[1193] Two and a half months.

[1194] Two and a half months.

[1195] That's rough.

[1196] Is Tabula Rasa still around?

[1197] No. Didn't they shut that down?

[1198] They shut that down in a glorious...

[1199] They actually had, by all accounts, a very awesome endgame where it was basically just turned into a horrible siege by aliens that could not be won, and just as people were getting picked off in this battle, this kind of...

[1200] Like permadeath?

[1201] Yeah, like you die and you...

[1202] Couldn't come back in.

[1203] Most of the MMOs of the last two or three years are still up, right?

[1204] Age of Conan still going?

[1205] Yeah, really?

[1206] Age of Conan still kicking around.

[1207] Didn't they take a chunk of that free -to -play?

[1208] I think maybe the first ten levels or something like that they went free -to -play.

[1209] Lord of the Rings Online just went free -to -play.

[1210] EverQuest 2, although that's pretty old at this point.

[1211] Warhammer.

[1212] Warhammer's still going.

[1213] Isn't there something else?

[1214] Ion?

[1215] Ion.

[1216] Yeah, that's pretty new.

[1217] Is Final Fantasy still going?

[1218] Final Fantasy XIV comes out in a matter of days.

[1219] And then are they killing XI or whatever?

[1220] No, I don't think so.

[1221] I'm sure there are plenty of people who are invested at this point.

[1222] Don't want to give up their pointy -eared dude.

[1223] Oh, that furry, furry -headed cat person.

[1224] They could get pointy ears with more polygons.

[1225] Rabbit guy.

[1226] I know a lot of people who are really into that.

[1227] Really?

[1228] Into which?

[1229] Final Fantasy XI.

[1230] You're bad people.

[1231] Weirdos.

[1232] Yeah, my little brother.

[1233] I think he pre -ordered 14.

[1234] I think he's ready to go.

[1235] Loaded up, ready to rock.

[1236] He might be in.

[1237] Pre -orders get in early.

[1238] I don't know.

[1239] I couldn't understand it.

[1240] When I watched the cinematics, I was like, oh, this looks kind of cool, but the things look like giant turds whenever you're fighting those big poopy things.

[1241] I just remember when we did a live show where we installed Final Fantasy XI.

[1242] Yeah, breaking news.

[1243] That's right.

[1244] I actually took all that stuff home.

[1245] I bought all that stuff.

[1246] They sent us a beta or something like that.

[1247] I went home to try and install it.

[1248] I was installing a World of Warcraft beta at the same time.

[1249] That works out time frame wise, doesn't it?

[1250] Yes.

[1251] Those are contemporaries.

[1252] And the WoW beta finished first, so I never played Final Fantasy XI.

[1253] And the rest was history.

[1254] As Dave says, you know, it's all about speed.

[1255] It's all about loading those pages quickly.

[1256] Keep people clicking.

[1257] That thing was, oh, yeah.

[1258] And that was even the 360 version.

[1259] We weren't even, because it had come out on the PS2.

[1260] No, I'm talking about the PS2 version.

[1261] Then that's...

[1262] That's not right?

[1263] That could be right.

[1264] That was 04.

[1265] That's not...

[1266] Early 04 is when the WoW beta went away.

[1267] Okay.

[1268] Okay.

[1269] Maybe.

[1270] I was saying for the video, though, it was the 360 version that we did.

[1271] Oh.

[1272] That WoW shut down yet?

[1273] Is that still going?

[1274] Yeah.

[1275] Any day now.

[1276] 2020.

[1277] Circling the drain.

[1278] There are a lot of developers out there asking that question.

[1279] They shut that WoW down yet?

[1280] Fuck.

[1281] Because when they do, we're going to ship our game.

[1282] I don't think the developers are the ones asking that question.

[1283] Yeah.

[1284] Right.

[1285] Yeah.

[1286] MMOs.

[1287] So yeah, I played a little APB, but that was after I got back from my whirlwind tour of the Boston area.

[1288] Beantown.

[1289] I saw some beans at one point.

[1290] I saw one.

[1291] Were they the best beans you ever had?

[1292] I didn't eat them myself, but I watched Ben Coelho eat beans.

[1293] You gotta pay for that.

[1294] What kind of beans are we talking about here?

[1295] I didn't get a close look.

[1296] Pork and?

[1297] No, I don't believe it was a pork and.

[1298] What do they eat up in Boston?

[1299] Beanie weenies.

[1300] What they eat in Boston are steak tips.

[1301] Oh yeah, word.

[1302] I like good steak tips.

[1303] I've never heard the term steak tips outside of.

[1304] In Kansas City, they call them burnt ends.

[1305] What do they call them here?

[1306] They don't beef.

[1307] Because we were driving past places that said, we've got the best steak tips in town.

[1308] And apparently it's just a lot of stuff that refers to steak tips throughout Boston.

[1309] I'm sure it's like lobster roll.

[1310] It's one of those regional things.

[1311] I guess.

[1312] Did you have any steak tips?

[1313] I did.

[1314] How were the steak tips?

[1315] They were fine.

[1316] They were really good.

[1317] They were good steak tips.

[1318] A little bit of steak, small pieces of beef.

[1319] How was Boston?

[1320] It was really good.

[1321] You took off Thursday morning?

[1322] Yeah.

[1323] Yes, Thursday morning went out there.

[1324] Primarily going out there to take a look at Bioshock Infinite.

[1325] We went out there and visited with Irrational Games and sat down and got a look at the demo that they showed off at Gamescom.

[1326] The demo they took to Germany.

[1327] It's also the demo that is...

[1328] uh now available uh on your xbox if you want to download that video of that demo you can watch it yeah that's the unfortunate timing of this recording as of right now you're the only one in this room that has seen that yeah by the time this goes up everyone everywhere will have seen so let me just talk directly to the people that's pretty awesome right yeah we have nothing to add to this we'll just lean back yeah uh i think that part with the horse is pretty key i think that part with the floating shotgun is pretty key um You talked to Ken Levine for a long -ass time.

[1329] We talked for about an hour about the game and about some of the – just a little bit of the business stuff behind the game.

[1330] And we're putting that up on Wednesday so people will be able to watch that.

[1331] Yeah, it's one of those things that I felt very skeptical when that game was announced.

[1332] Because of just like, you know, it's like they were the ones that said we don't want to do Bioshock 2, yet here's another game with Bioshock in the name.

[1333] Like, what kind of weird business -y business is that?

[1334] Are they just slapping the name onto anything now, like Final Fantasy style?

[1335] So it's very easy to get cynical looking at that stuff and trying to go like, oh, they're just going to cram in Andrew Ryan here.

[1336] But after talking to them at length about it and seeing that gameplay demo, It's fucking awesome.

[1337] It looks really good.

[1338] From what you've told me about it, I'm excited.

[1339] Yeah.

[1340] I'm excited.

[1341] It sounds like they aren't just like, all right, you know how Bioshock controls.

[1342] Now here it is in the sky.

[1343] Yeah, no. It sounds like they're making some significant meaningful changes to the gameplay and kind of the pacing of the game.

[1344] Yeah.

[1345] But even still, it's like I was talking to Jeff earlier and it was.

[1346] that's kind of what i also want is just give me this crazy world to explore and like that's kind of why it turned me off a little bit about bioshock too is i've seen this world already i've been on this ride and that as it turns out is like one of the things that that irrational views as key to the bioshock experience is that kind of like what the fuck like sense of discovery exploration stuff this place is messed up why taking it back to rapture doesn't make any sense for them it didn't it didn't make any sense for them so that they ended up passing on doing Right.

[1347] A sequel.

[1348] A direct sequel like that.

[1349] Also kind of didn't – Bioshock 2 didn't excite me for that same reason.

[1350] It was like I wasn't thrilled by the gameplay so much in Bioshock.

[1351] And I really liked Bioshock.

[1352] But it was more of like, man, this place is crazy.

[1353] And this is an awesome place to discover and walk around.

[1354] See what's going on.

[1355] The vibe.

[1356] The best moments.

[1357] I mean, yeah.

[1358] It was atmosphere.

[1359] What defined Bioshock was the weirdness of the atmosphere and the twists in the story.

[1360] And once you had those, once you knew all that stuff, it was like, well – Right.

[1361] Yeah, I mean, the gameplay in Bioshock took place at a very specific pace and usually at a very specific range.

[1362] Sure.

[1363] If you think about it, just because of the nature of the world, the corridors, the way the game never got as open as even this sequence that they're putting out of Infinite shows you.

[1364] Yeah.

[1365] And we talked a lot about that stuff and talked a lot about kind of how they're going about building weapons and powers and encounters for the game.

[1366] They're filling out what they...

[1367] continually referred to as the circle of hate.

[1368] They've built this graph about, you know, it's like, okay, this enemy at this range, this weapon, this enemy at this range, this weapon, and, you know, trying to figure out where all the powers and where all the things fit on the chart and saying, like, if you look at Bioshock 1, like, everything took place from this range and at this pace and this, so it all ended up on this part of the chart, but now they're trying to, like, they've realized that that is an issue, that there was, I mean, and I talk very candidly, you know, like, when I played through the first Bioshock, I primarily used the wrench and electro bolt.

[1369] Right.

[1370] The two things you start that game with were the things that ended up being most useful throughout the bulk of the game for me. I mean, you could upgrade them.

[1371] Absolutely.

[1372] They got more powerful.

[1373] But at the same time, it was still the same basic experience.

[1374] And that was unfortunate because there was a lot of other stuff in that game.

[1375] But there wasn't a lot of incentive to use them unless he was like, oh, well, I want to get creative with how I kill these guys.

[1376] It's like, well, being creative with how I kill these guys doesn't get me to the next story point.

[1377] It actually takes longer.

[1378] And I'm very invested in seeing how this story ends.

[1379] Sure.

[1380] So hearing that they're working to address that specific issue, I think, says a lot about where they're headed with this.

[1381] It's like they seem to get that.

[1382] And looking at Bioshock Infinite, looking at that gameplay footage, and it was actually played live in front of me. Oh, cool.

[1383] So I didn't just go there and watch the video, I guess.

[1384] Come to Boston to watch this quick time.

[1385] Seeing it actually played and seeing the range that, you know, it's like sometimes you're going to be right up in some guy's face, but then he might just jump on the skyline and whisk away from you.

[1386] And then all of a sudden it's like, well, now I need a sniper rifle or something because this shotgun is worthless.

[1387] Yeah.

[1388] Or maybe I'm going to be fighting this giant monster on this bridge and I could just fight him directly or tear the bridge apart.

[1389] There are giant monsters.

[1390] Yes.

[1391] How messed up is Columbia?

[1392] messed up that's awesome like you know the whole thing starts you're just watching this guy in like a little gazebo area or something like giving some sort of speech yeah like political speech to a bunch of empty chairs okay and he's like totally oblivious to your presence and you walk up and he's got like a barrel full of guns next to him nice and they're saying like you know all the other candidates gonna take your guns like all the signs around there gonna take your guns and take your wife But as soon as you walk up and grab a gun, he, like, turns to you and his face starts flipping out and his eyes start glowing.

[1393] Like, uh -oh.

[1394] And all of a sudden, there's a man firing crows at you.

[1395] And you're just like, yeah, this is a fucking gun!

[1396] Goddamn!

[1397] So, you know what?

[1398] I didn't think that you could one -up fucking magic bee arm.

[1399] Yeah.

[1400] Mind bees.

[1401] But shooting crows.

[1402] And the fact that they call it a murder of crows.

[1403] Yeah, so right there in that sequence, you get the ability, you know, like, after killing that guy, like, he telekniased.

[1404] Telekinetically moved the murder of crows up to him and then all of a sudden you control the power of the crows.

[1405] So what's wrong with Kevin Levine?

[1406] Who does he hate?

[1407] Himself, his dad.

[1408] Everything is terrible.

[1409] The government.

[1410] It's all lies and everything anyway.

[1411] Did they give any background on what generates all this madness?

[1412] Kevin Levine.

[1413] No, but in the game world there was sort of the MacGuffin style.

[1414] Like the plasma people like Adam, the Adam substance.

[1415] Oh, like, like why there are powers on.

[1416] Yeah.

[1417] What is the root originator?

[1418] No, we didn't get into that stuff.

[1419] I have to imagine that will come up.

[1420] Yeah.

[1421] But I like, like with the first Bioshock, like I, I want to tread lightly around that stuff and I hope that they are, you know.

[1422] are wise enough to do that as well.

[1423] Because, yeah, because the mystery of the setting of like, give me some stuff out of context of like, that looks crazy or whatever.

[1424] I understand you have to keep people engaged and thinking about Bioshock.

[1425] But I feel with those games specifically, you give too much away.

[1426] It adversely affects the game experience.

[1427] Well, what you were telling me before, is that stuff all for a game to talk about in terms of the story, like the setup and who you are?

[1428] Yeah, yeah.

[1429] I mean, all that stuff's been out there.

[1430] Yeah, you're this ex -Pinkerton agent.

[1431] Like, that's awesome already.

[1432] Like, you're just this guy, like, investigating this.

[1433] We talked about this a little bit.

[1434] Like, the real world.

[1435] What we suspect is nature's laws.

[1436] Yeah, exactly.

[1437] We assume.

[1438] Yeah, we assume there is some kind of...

[1439] Hard to assume.

[1440] But yeah, you're a voiced character in this game.

[1441] Like, that's neat.

[1442] I like that.

[1443] Booker speaks.

[1444] Also, what's the name again?

[1445] Booker DeWitt.

[1446] Fucking love that name.

[1447] It's a great name.

[1448] Fucking such a great name.

[1449] But I like the kind of like dude put in this absurd place.

[1450] Just kind of like what the hell is going on?

[1451] But I wonder because you really don't see or know that much about the outside world.

[1452] in in you know the in andrew ryan's bioshock well i wonder i wonder if we'll see more of that this time because i mean it was stated that like basically this whole adventure gets set off because you're a private investigator someone comes to your office and says i need you to find this girl and she's on this floating city that's been missing for years and i know how to find it and know how to get you there right and obviously things are slightly different if there is an acknowledged floating city in the united states at some point just step outside into this hot air balloon and we'll be on our way Yeah, yeah.

[1453] So, I mean, yeah, it's not like exact mapping back to real history.

[1454] But it seems like it's rooted in some kind of reality where a man that controls crows, you'd be like, this is not how it's supposed to be.

[1455] This is not a normal thing that's happening here.

[1456] This ain't Christian.

[1457] Yeah.

[1458] And, of course, like the story will revolve around this girl, Elizabeth, who they showed in the trailer.

[1459] She's the woman in the trailer that's coming out for you in the roses and stuff.

[1460] And she'll be with you for some chunk of the game.

[1461] It sounds like a lot of it.

[1462] You don't necessarily have to save her at the very end of the game.

[1463] You find her and she comes with you.

[1464] And again, they're very quick to point out this is not some big long escort mission.

[1465] It's not like she's constantly about to die.

[1466] It sounds like she'll be able to take care of herself and you don't need to worry about that.

[1467] She's just kind of there to offer like an even greater set of tools for you to do things to the world.

[1468] Co -op with AI.

[1469] It's not a two -player.

[1470] No, they said absolutely not?

[1471] Absolutely not.

[1472] They're not ruling out any kind of multiplayer.

[1473] Not for that.

[1474] Yeah, not for that.

[1475] It sounds like they'll have to come up with something that they believe in before they develop it as a proper multiplayer component.

[1476] And she'll be around and she'll kind of lead you through and sort of suggest things to you along the way.

[1477] Like she suggests like, hey, maybe you should take this bridge down.

[1478] Instead of just fighting this guy head on.

[1479] And you can be like, whatever, I'm going to fight this dude head on.

[1480] But you might just want to take the bridge out.

[1481] All right.

[1482] I didn't want to talk about it.

[1483] Yeah, just watch that on Wednesday.

[1484] Watch the video.

[1485] Watch our...

[1486] Definitely listen to what Ken Levine has to say about the game.

[1487] I think that's...

[1488] It's interesting.

[1489] I think if you just see that video, it looks great.

[1490] but it'll be probably very easy to look at it and go like, well, how much of this is actually being controlled and how much of this is scripted stuff?

[1491] And hearing them talk more about the game, I think it'll, like it did with me, you will understand a lot more about where they're coming from and why they're developing the game they're developing if you sit there and listen to the conversation we had.

[1492] I agree.

[1493] I think that people should listen to it.

[1494] whatever conversation you and Ken Levine had that we can post, whatever part of that is.

[1495] But I was going to say, I think it's very wise of them to show actual gameplay so close after the announcement of the game.

[1496] I feel like with the first Bioshock...

[1497] Oh, stop the speculation.

[1498] We went a long fucking time.

[1499] It's like a couple of years.

[1500] And a couple of trailers, a couple of well -produced trailers.

[1501] I remember...

[1502] That we're like, this is what we're trying to do.

[1503] It's like the X05 in Amsterdam, was it?

[1504] Go all the way over there, and it's like big, kind of Xbox exclusive sort of thing.

[1505] And it's like, oh man, we're finally going to see it.

[1506] And it's just like another CG trailer.

[1507] Great trailers.

[1508] Fucking amazing trailers.

[1509] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1510] But it's like you flew halfway around the world.

[1511] You wanted to see the game.

[1512] That first Bioshock trailer is still totally amazing to me. But yeah, excited to see some of the actual game that everyone else that's listening to this has already seen.

[1513] Damn you guys.

[1514] So in all of your jet setting ways and going to Boston.

[1515] You had to play some Rock Band 3.

[1516] I did.

[1517] Yeah, I also played a little Rock Band 3 while I was in Boston.

[1518] Good place to do it.

[1519] Yeah.

[1520] I mean, that is where they're making it.

[1521] So it makes sense.

[1522] Went there and freaked out our friends at Harmonix.

[1523] Yeah.

[1524] Just kind of crashed.

[1525] So every third Thursday they have an event at an improv theater in town.

[1526] Improv Boston.

[1527] Let's plug it for them because it sounds like it's an awesome time.

[1528] Improv.

[1529] If you're in the Boston area, Improv Boston every third Thursday.

[1530] Rock band night.

[1531] 10 o 'clock.

[1532] Seven bucks.

[1533] It's like come one, come all.

[1534] Yeah.

[1535] But not doing improv.

[1536] Well, yeah.

[1537] I mean, you know, kind of.

[1538] You're playing rock band.

[1539] You're signing up with bands and then they have like a bunch of costumes and stuff there.

[1540] So if you want to play in a costume, go for it.

[1541] And then some smattering of harmonics people or theater running people will be there to judge you at the end.

[1542] So I was a guest judge for a little while.

[1543] And they get colorful with the judging.

[1544] So it's not like you're playing as something.

[1545] Give me an occupation.

[1546] No, no, it's not like that.

[1547] You're a lawyer.

[1548] You're bacon frying.

[1549] Okay.

[1550] No, it wasn't.

[1551] Yeah.

[1552] It wasn't quite like that.

[1553] No one was doing the full Herald while playing their songs.

[1554] Oh, I hope someone does.

[1555] So that was a lot of fun.

[1556] And also I didn't directly tell any of them that I was going to be in town at all.

[1557] So I just kind of like showed up, which was pretty funny.

[1558] Excellent.

[1559] Excellent.

[1560] You get to play any other games, man?

[1561] Recently?

[1562] No, that's...

[1563] APB.

[1564] Just crash 38 Studios and say, show me what the hell you're working on.

[1565] I saw the outside of 38 Studios.

[1566] Show me what the hell I saw the outside of the building.

[1567] So it's a real building.

[1568] It's a place.

[1569] It's a building with the 38 Studios logo on it.

[1570] Front.

[1571] It's all front.

[1572] This is just a long con. There's a fluff factory in there.

[1573] Oh, not like they make inconsequential things in there.

[1574] They literally make fluff.

[1575] Oh, yeah.

[1576] Marshmallow fluff.

[1577] Yeah.

[1578] That's a good business to be in.

[1579] The McDonald's near their office is gone.

[1580] They closed it and burned it all out.

[1581] There's a big sign up that says, like, coming soon, the world's newest McDonald's.

[1582] Like, what the fuck?

[1583] They keep doing that.

[1584] It's just an empty lot, but the Playland is still there.

[1585] It's all fenced off.

[1586] They couldn't tear that.

[1587] Like, we can't.

[1588] We can't find those parts, so we've got to keep that stuff.

[1589] It's actually going to be in the sky.

[1590] We tried to bulldoze it.

[1591] We tried to burn it down.

[1592] We tried explosives.

[1593] Playland is not moving.

[1594] Every morning they came back and it was there again.

[1595] Mayor McCheese.

[1596] Fucking crow's nest is tough to knock down.

[1597] Do you guys ever go in the Playland stuff?

[1598] Hell yeah.

[1599] All right.

[1600] It's fun to go drunk.

[1601] For sure.

[1602] Yeah, what's all this past tense?

[1603] Ever since we've all been permanently banned from all the dumb Playlands.

[1604] Yeah, I have my picture up at most of them now.

[1605] Just hide inside.

[1606] Giant head.

[1607] They even have a picture of me with my knife.

[1608] They even have a picture of me with my false beard.

[1609] That's how thorough they are.

[1610] Haven't they taken swabs of the ball pit and found just like the worst urine?

[1611] Oh, I don't doubt it.

[1612] It's dirty.

[1613] Is it the worst urine or is it just urine?

[1614] Why would you take swabs of that?

[1615] You know it's in there.

[1616] Just don't even.

[1617] Just keep your mouth shut.

[1618] Do you think they sterilized the ball pit?

[1619] No. Hardly sterilized the food surfaces.

[1620] I'm like, fuck yeah, I'm going to shit my pants when I jump in that ball pit.

[1621] That's America.

[1622] It's fun.

[1623] You're so relaxed in there.

[1624] Whenever I'm having fun.

[1625] It's just shit.

[1626] So we did not stop and go to the ball pit.

[1627] Maybe I could learn how to fart better.

[1628] Maybe I should be listening to the bomb cast.

[1629] But we were on our way to New Hampshire out of there.

[1630] Yeah.

[1631] Not because I'm excited about New Hampshire.

[1632] Yeah, New Hampshire.

[1633] Live free or die.

[1634] State run liquor store.

[1635] There was a fireworks place that was open year round there too.

[1636] I immediately thought like, man. I can always tell I'm in a good state when it's like.

[1637] You want to buy fireworks?

[1638] It's October.

[1639] We don't care what you need them for.

[1640] We got them.

[1641] And immediately I'm sitting there thinking, man, I should just go in there and buy hundreds of dollars worth of fireworks and then ship them back to California and hope for the best.

[1642] Sure.

[1643] No return address.

[1644] Just pack it full of coffee grounds.

[1645] I don't know what you got to do.

[1646] What you use to protect that shipment.

[1647] Giant bomb.

[1648] I don't know.

[1649] I ended up not doing any of that.

[1650] We did go to the fun spot.

[1651] Yeah.

[1652] Yeah.

[1653] Which, for those who don't know, the famous arcade.

[1654] Yes.

[1655] Where the King of Kong largely took place.

[1656] Yeah.

[1657] Is where a lot of world records are set.

[1658] Quite a spot for fun.

[1659] Those Twin Galaxies guys, seems like they're...

[1660] They're based pretty close to there.

[1661] Twin Galaxies is based in New Hampshire.

[1662] That makes sense.

[1663] Yeah.

[1664] And literally, their motto is Fun Spot, the spot for fun.

[1665] Boom.

[1666] I wonder how long, I wonder how much market research, how much time, how much focus testing.

[1667] Years of branding.

[1668] Clearly.

[1669] Years.

[1670] That place is pretty cool.

[1671] They've got, it's kind of weird because they build one floor of it as like, this is the arcade video game history museum or something like that.

[1672] And all the games are still a quarter or a token rather.

[1673] and some of them have been don't like they have placards on some of them saying this machine was generously donated by this person and this person to the museum it's like dude you're running a arcade it's not right you're still charging a quarter it's not like you're paying to get into the museum and then seeing all these exhibits it's like you still have to put the money into super zaxon if you want to play super zaxon how is super zaxon It's hard.

[1674] I don't think I ever played Super Zaxxon.

[1675] It's so much faster than regular Zaxxon.

[1676] Oh, man. You want to see the dragon at the end because they added that dragon, but then you get into the tunnel.

[1677] Jeff, I don't know if you know this about me. I always want to see the dragon.

[1678] I know you want to see the dragon.

[1679] I always want to be seeing the dragon.

[1680] Yeah.

[1681] That's what's so heartbreaking about Super Zaxxon is it's really...

[1682] No, like right now, the fact that I'm not seeing a dragon, it's not...

[1683] I'm not in the best place I could be.

[1684] I know.

[1685] I know.

[1686] Dragon's tough to catch.

[1687] Vin, if you were a dragon, I got to a point where I was sending pictures.

[1688] Like, Vinny, I sent you a picture of a working joust cocktail machine.

[1689] That thing was beat up.

[1690] It was sad.

[1691] Yeah.

[1692] There was some stuff there that was beat up.

[1693] There was some stuff there that was broken.

[1694] CTO.

[1695] I can't remember.

[1696] But the overlays looked all right.

[1697] You should have stole the sound card.

[1698] I thought about it.

[1699] I was immediately looking around going like, cause there weren't a lot of people upstairs in there.

[1700] Cause you know, it's like they have ski ball and ticket redemption.

[1701] There were like a bunch of families and stuff there, uh, which amounted to like a bunch of kids looking psyched and a bunch of like the most dead eyed mothers I have seen since that one time I went to that halfway house.

[1702] Uh, and they're just like walking around this place just going.

[1703] Is there a mini golf?

[1704] Yeah.

[1705] And a go -kart?

[1706] They have an indoor mini golf, as well as a weird self -service super ghetto mini golf thing.

[1707] There's a bingo hall across the street, across the parking lot even.

[1708] New Hampshire's the spot to be.

[1709] Set off fireworks, go play bingo.

[1710] I had a bottle of Moxie, which is bitter.

[1711] Moxie's a little bitter.

[1712] I like Moxie.

[1713] It's pretty good.

[1714] Are there go -karts there?

[1715] No, I don't think so.

[1716] What?

[1717] And, yeah, so they had one of the sit -down Space Harrier machines that had the pneumatic move around stuff.

[1718] That's awesome.

[1719] Like working?

[1720] No, no, working, and that one was two tokens.

[1721] Oh, wow.

[1722] But, you know, they give you like 100 tokens for $20, and then we had coupons that got us 50 more each.

[1723] So basically about three -quarters of the way through the day, it was like, all right, let's just get a bunch of tickets.

[1724] So we started playing Smokin' Token and a bunch of other redemption machines.

[1725] Did you get a spider ring?

[1726] No, we got a gigantic dog.

[1727] What?

[1728] Yeah.

[1729] Spider rings are only 25 tickets, man. I can get 25 tickets with like two tokens, man. Was it a giant dog filled with the really small styrofoam thing?

[1730] So it's like really hard.

[1731] Yeah, really hard.

[1732] Yeah, absolutely.

[1733] It is exactly that dog.

[1734] And I guess that dog is going to live in 38 studios.

[1735] Oh, yeah?

[1736] Yeah, so that was a lot of fun.

[1737] Not a real big contingent of fighting games.

[1738] They had a row that had Mortal Kombat 1, 2, and Ultimate.

[1739] But no Street Fighter there at all.

[1740] No DDR, really, at all.

[1741] Well, it sounds like maybe not so much the Japanese stuff.

[1742] I could totally see them being much like California Extreme.

[1743] That's New Hampshire, man. Just a lot more.

[1744] Focusing on the American stuff.

[1745] Focusing on, like, you know, Bally Midway.

[1746] Definitely on the older floor, there was a good mix of, you know, like, they had a crazy climber.

[1747] Although, I guess, you know, if they're going to have...

[1748] They had a really cherry Space Invaders machine.

[1749] Ooh, those are nice.

[1750] They had, like, two Ms. Pac -Mans, one Pac -Man, one Pac -Man Plus, a Super Pac -Man, and a Baby Pac -Man, like, all in a row.

[1751] Super Pac.

[1752] Yeah.

[1753] You know, but, like, some of the machines were kind of jacked.

[1754] Sure.

[1755] I filmed it like...

[1756] Are you saying they're not all museum grade?

[1757] They're not all museum grade.

[1758] But I also filmed a Cloak and Dagger quick look.

[1759] Oh, fuck.

[1760] A working Cloak and Dagger machine?

[1761] Yeah, yeah.

[1762] Awesome.

[1763] Like original cabinet and stuff.

[1764] Rich and I played that for a while.

[1765] So, yeah.

[1766] I shot a bunch of footage there.

[1767] We should post that because looking at...

[1768] Cloak and Dagger is not a self -apparent game in a lot of ways.

[1769] Yeah, like it's basically...

[1770] It's like four and a half minutes of me describing to Rich exactly how to play the game.

[1771] Sure.

[1772] So...

[1773] uh and that game is awesome so it's always been one of my favorites um so yeah i shot a chunk of footage there and uh another chunk of footage at the the rock band night uh that that i need to sift through and and see if it's all you i suspect it's gonna be a case where I'm going to have to shoot a lot more of me standing there going like, and then this happened and cut to clip because there's no way to, to stitch this stuff together into anything, especially the rock band night stuff where it's just like, Oh, John Drake is about to curse at this man. I need to turn this camera on immediately and just get that.

[1774] So it's like no context of the person's awful performance, just the judges reacting to how awful it was.

[1775] Just hate crimes.

[1776] Just absolute hate crimes against Snoop Dogg's What's My Name were committed at that event.

[1777] For what it was supposed to be.

[1778] Yeah, remember it.

[1779] Precisely.

[1780] Also, someone totally kicked over an Xbox, like the Xbox, and gouged the disc, I guess, that had Rockman 3 on it.

[1781] I was going to say, I bet that guy got a great appraisal from the judges.

[1782] Fucking up the disc.

[1783] That was definitely a lot of fun.

[1784] There were a lot of rowdy but not dickish rock band aficionados.

[1785] I had talked to some of those guys and I guess they had posted a video of this recurring rock band night that they have a while ago.

[1786] Fuck, this looks like a ton of fun.

[1787] I performed in a paintball mask.

[1788] I saw photos.

[1789] I don't know that I've seen the photos of that.

[1790] I saw at least a photo of you with the paintball mask on.

[1791] Okay.

[1792] All right.

[1793] I'll find that.

[1794] Brad Shoemaker.

[1795] Hey.

[1796] Look alive.

[1797] I tried.

[1798] Maybe I just need to reverse.

[1799] Maybe I need to start talking to Brad first.

[1800] How do you know I won't fall asleep?

[1801] Because you're livelier.

[1802] Brad is like a tanuki already where it's just like you get him too comfortable and even if it's totally bright out, he'll just start.

[1803] Just kind of fall asleep.

[1804] I think we need to unscrew some of the light bulbs in this room.

[1805] That's not going to help the Brad situation.

[1806] What would that accomplish?

[1807] I think if it was a little more dim, you'd have to think to stay awake.

[1808] It's true.

[1809] That doesn't make any sense to me, but I'm going to agree with you.

[1810] It's beating down on you and making you more tired.

[1811] I wonder if it makes it hotter in here.

[1812] Light and heat are like the same thing.

[1813] But they're fluorescents, and fluorescents don't get that hot.

[1814] That hot is a relative term.

[1815] Our hot bodies.

[1816] He only asked, does it make it hotter in here?

[1817] And I'm saying yes.

[1818] Okay.

[1819] True.

[1820] I'll just start timing my second wind a little bit.

[1821] Brad, what are you going to play?

[1822] Speaking of co -op with AI, because I guess that's...

[1823] Is that a thing now?

[1824] Yeah, I guess so.

[1825] There are at least two games.

[1826] It must be a thing.

[1827] Enslaved.

[1828] Odyssey to the West.

[1829] Ah, yes.

[1830] The new Ninja Theory game.

[1831] Ninja Theory, yeah.

[1832] The Heavenly Sword guys.

[1833] Did anybody play Heavenly Sword?

[1834] You know, I always wanted to.

[1835] Yeah.

[1836] Maybe I'll game for it.

[1837] I played a little bit, I think, before it came out.

[1838] He wasn't really into it.

[1839] Yeah, I mean, I don't know if this is an unfair expectation, but I didn't think that there would be much to this game because it seemed like the reception was kind of tepid for Heavenly Sword.

[1840] Is that unfair?

[1841] I seem to remember people being sort of like...

[1842] I think it was an issue of what the expectations were because, you know, Sony...

[1843] PS3 launch.

[1844] They ramped that game up pretty hard.

[1845] It's a decent character action game.

[1846] It's God of War derivative or whatever.

[1847] That game still looked phenomenal.

[1848] Was that a launch game?

[1849] Shortly after.

[1850] No, it wasn't launched.

[1851] It wasn't launched.

[1852] It's still like a first generation game.

[1853] Definitely year one.

[1854] Maybe that's being unfair to Ninja Theory, but I didn't...

[1855] I didn't expect a ton from Enslaved.

[1856] Yeah.

[1857] I played that game before E3, and I also did not expect a ton from that game.

[1858] Did you like it?

[1859] After playing it, it was like, eh, it seems okay.

[1860] There's a lot of unique stuff going on there.

[1861] I don't know what you saw.

[1862] I saw stuff where you were basically ordering this woman to draw fire by running somewhere, and then you were flanking a guy to kill him.

[1863] Yeah, there's a lot of that.

[1864] It was just like, okay, I did that twice, and I was like, I already don't want to do this.

[1865] Negative Nelly over here.

[1866] Well, you know.

[1867] It seemed like a really base mechanic.

[1868] And you're going to get three more powers.

[1869] So I just started playing it today.

[1870] I've only put about an hour into it so far.

[1871] They're still rolling out the mechanics, but I think the premise of it is pretty interesting.

[1872] It's the post -apocalypse.

[1873] Maybe you're familiar with it.

[1874] Which version?

[1875] Sort of like overgrown with jungle New York City, like submerged Statue of Liberty.

[1876] Okay, so we're talking like if it's post -apocalyptic, it's like...

[1877] way past it's not like we're trying to rebuild it's hundreds we have forgotten hundreds of thousands of years oh it's like we are jungle people with technology it's almost like it's like water world without the pervasive water got it way after day after although it's weird because there's like it's like half tribal but half like super high technology okay i don't maybe they'll explain that stuff like there are mechs after you there are like robots coming after you i'm gonna start calling now the pre -apocalypse yeah we're living in the pre -apocalypse i mean sure get used to it Are you sure that it hasn't happened already?

[1878] Or maybe it's happening.

[1879] Maybe we're in the apocalypse.

[1880] Maybe the apocalypse just rolls out real slow.

[1881] Or, yeah, maybe we're in the post.

[1882] I don't think we're in post.

[1883] I think yesterday could have been apocalyptic.

[1884] Who knows?

[1885] Who knows how it started?

[1886] I was not near my computer most of yesterday.

[1887] Check Twitter?

[1888] No, not really.

[1889] Shit, I miss everything.

[1890] Apocalypse.

[1891] Oh, man. Now we're in the post.

[1892] What am I going to wear?

[1893] I don't have any tires.

[1894] Bandoliers and, I don't know, leather pants, I think.

[1895] So is it that kind of post -apocalypse?

[1896] According to this game, kind.

[1897] Yeah, dude, I'm confused by it because like...

[1898] It's an S &M post -apocalypse?

[1899] Like your guy looks fairly tribal.

[1900] He's got like face paint and stuff, but he also has like an energy shield he can pop up.

[1901] And this girl that follows you around has like a little computer that is made out of nothing that just like pops like a holographic screen up in front of her face and she goes all...

[1902] We don't even know at what point in this timeline the apocalypse happened.

[1903] How futuristic it was by the time the apocalypse came.

[1904] There's a beat up car but also an energy sword.

[1905] It's so new that it's old again.

[1906] And not Chewbacca.

[1907] I fought some robots in what's left Grand Central Station at one point.

[1908] Oh, so it's even that recognizable.

[1909] You see, you literally fly by part of the Statue of Liberty sticking up out of the water.

[1910] Maybe this is the fifth apocalypse or something.

[1911] Maybe it just keeps happening.

[1912] Do you have a second apocalypse?

[1913] Sure, why not?

[1914] Is it just post -post -apocalypse?

[1915] It would be the post -apocalypse apocalypse.

[1916] The apocalypse is supposed to end everything, so it's already pretty stupid that you can have a post -apocalypse.

[1917] Then it wasn't the apocalypse?

[1918] That wasn't really the apocalypse.

[1919] A false apocalypse?

[1920] Post -mass extinction event doesn't have the same ring to it.

[1921] Yeah.

[1922] Post -bad thing.

[1923] Shit, I thought this was the apocalypse.

[1924] No, that wasn't the apocalypse.

[1925] I mean, it was bad, but it wasn't the apocalypse.

[1926] I sold everything.

[1927] I sold it all.

[1928] So I guess technically you can't even have a post -apocalypse, let alone multiple apocalypse.

[1929] I guess it's a little Mad Max.

[1930] You could get a little bit of a Mad Max kind of vibe from it.

[1931] I also watched The Road this weekend.

[1932] Is that super depressing?

[1933] Oh, my God.

[1934] Dude, you have no idea.

[1935] I've only read the book, but it is grim.

[1936] It is.

[1937] It's not fun.

[1938] Anyway.

[1939] It's unsettling.

[1940] Enslaved.

[1941] So the setup is weird.

[1942] Like, it starts out on there's, like, a slaver ship that crash lands.

[1943] You're a slave.

[1944] You're this guy, Monkey.

[1945] What?

[1946] His name is Monkey.

[1947] Oh, no. But he's just, like, this wisecracking.

[1948] They're street smart.

[1949] Sorry, although there are no streets.

[1950] But he's, like, really.

[1951] Savvy.

[1952] Capable, savvy, like, combat guy.

[1953] He is like a bruiser, basically.

[1954] You crash land on the ship, and you wake up, and this girl, who was also a prisoner, has put, like, this mind control device on you.

[1955] Okay.

[1956] And she needs to get to her village, which is, like, a farming community, like, 300 miles, I don't know, like, west of New York or whatever.

[1957] Whatever's left of New York.

[1958] Let's go.

[1959] They don't even know what New York is.

[1960] Why does she have to mind control you?

[1961] Because she wants you to help.

[1962] her basically that's all i got from it but it's it's a weird setup because he is both the brains and the brawn of the operation she's not like this like super nimble like like melee fighter or anything like she doesn't know what the hell she's doing in combat so she has control over you through this device but it becomes apparent quickly that like she needs to listen to what your character is telling her to do if she's going to live Which one do you play as?

[1963] You're the dude.

[1964] Oh, so you have full control over him.

[1965] So it's weird.

[1966] It's like you're giving her orders even though she has the veto power, if that makes sense.

[1967] Sure.

[1968] On the gameplay side, you're kind of telling her what to do, but in the narrative sense, she's sort of running the show.

[1969] I get it.

[1970] It's kind of a weird dynamic.

[1971] It seems cool, and the writing seems really snappy.

[1972] There's some good banter.

[1973] Looks good.

[1974] It looks pretty nice.

[1975] It's Unreal Engine 3.

[1976] The combat is pretty standard character action stuff.

[1977] But, I mean, that was the thing about Heavenly Sword is, you know, because they mo -capped the living holy hell out of all that stuff and to an incredible level of fidelity, like, you know, all their cut scenes looked really sharp.

[1978] They had really good -looking character models.

[1979] It looks great.

[1980] They love their animations.

[1981] Like, it's a little animation, like a little frame -heavy.

[1982] Sure.

[1983] Like, you know, like climbing up things probably takes longer than you might want it to.

[1984] It's not super snappy, but it's really, like, yeah, the story and the setup and, like, the world seem pretty unique.

[1985] It's not something you've exactly seen before.

[1986] So I'm kind of...

[1987] Quick look.

[1988] So what powers have you gotten so far?

[1989] Like I said, hour in, all I can do is...

[1990] With her, she can project like a holographic...

[1991] It's like a hologram of something.

[1992] I couldn't tell what it was, but it basically draws fire from the robots.

[1993] It's like a decoy kind of thing.

[1994] Oh, okay.

[1995] Oh, she has an EMP also.

[1996] So if the robots get on her, she can trigger an EMP and it'll kind of stun them for a second.

[1997] Because the weird...

[1998] thing about the mind control device that she puts on you is that it's tied to her heart beat so if her heart stops beating then it like zaps you and kills you so that's a bummer when she dies you die so you're like it's paramount to keep her alive who are the enslavers uh i don't know they're they're building up to that like you're on this prison ship at the beginning which crashes but you don't know who the people are that just becomes planet of the apes that mystery yeah and there's robots out there i don't know it seems like i don't know i'm really curious to see how the story plays out it seems really well told so far Cool.

[1999] How's your StarCraft?

[2000] I'm doing pretty good.

[2001] Like 40 seconds or something.

[2002] Are you still playing?

[2003] When I have time.

[2004] Not every day, sadly.

[2005] Patch.

[2006] Well, maybe we should wait for news.

[2007] It's time for news.

[2008] Almost.

[2009] The day this podcast goes up is StarCraft Patch Day.

[2010] That's true.

[2011] We'll get to that in a second.

[2012] After our last conversation about Dota Rising 2 Case Zero over the weekend, Went back to it and got through it and actually ended up S -ranking it.

[2013] That's a good S -rank.

[2014] Yeah, it's not that hard.

[2015] It's not super hard.

[2016] That's fun.

[2017] But yeah, I think the game's structure clicked with me. And I will also say that after that, I was emboldened enough to go into play, to load back up the original Dead Rising, which I had barely made it through any of the...

[2018] campaign originally.

[2019] I remember you buying that and, like, not playing it for two months.

[2020] Yeah, yeah.

[2021] Every day I was loving it.

[2022] I was like, did you play it yet?

[2023] Did you play it yet?

[2024] Like, that and Oblivion were two big early Xbox games that, like, I bought as soon as they came out and then did not touch for a long time.

[2025] But I was also reassured of my original position on the first Dead Rising after loading it back up because, like, compared to Case Zero, like, that game is still so fucked.

[2026] Just as far as certain difficulties and like the biggest thing that I noticed is that survivors can actually survive in Dead Rising to case zero.

[2027] Like if as soon as a single zombie touches one of your followers in Dead Rising, either you're going to have to like kill every single one of those zombies plus the ones that gather around while you're killing those zombies.

[2028] Without killing the dude.

[2029] Yeah, without killing the dude or you just say peace.

[2030] You say, oh, that guy's dead.

[2031] Goodbye.

[2032] I remember parts...

[2033] That's just realistic, man. I remember parts where you had to take weapons away from the survivors because they would shoot other survivors.

[2034] Remember that?

[2035] Like, don't give that dude the shotgun.

[2036] Don't give him the shotgun.

[2037] And then like, oh, he shot Molly.

[2038] So like, yeah, that was a...

[2039] Going back to Dead Rising and having the experience of that, I still got further into it.

[2040] And I'm also...

[2041] It was like my enjoyment of the first Dead Rising has increased just because I have like...

[2042] I have succumbed.

[2043] I have come to grips with...

[2044] Dead Rising Fever?

[2045] Well, just the rhythms of it.

[2046] Yeah, the way you have to play that game, which is really unlike any other game.

[2047] But also, how about that weird trailer they put out, the tease for the Frank West stuff?

[2048] Yeah.

[2049] Oh, I forgot to watch that too.

[2050] Did that inspire you?

[2051] I want to know what happened to Frank West.

[2052] It just reminded me of, like, I really like Frank West as a character.

[2053] Good old Frank.

[2054] He's taking pee -pee pictures.

[2055] He's a good character.

[2056] Chuck Green is.

[2057] Chuck Green ain't bad either.

[2058] I thought I wasn't going to like the replacement, but I like Chuck Green quite a bit.

[2059] Tell me about these pee -pee pictures.

[2060] Well, they're sexy.

[2061] No, they're erotica.

[2062] Oh, is it erotica?

[2063] Erotica is what those ones are called.

[2064] So, yeah, and that game is still super weird.

[2065] And also just, like, yeah, it's punishing in weird random ways.

[2066] The first Dead Rising has the issue of, for one thing, the very stringent save system.

[2067] Not just not being able to have multiple saves, but you can only save in these very specific spots, and there's not really a huge number of them.

[2068] One per section of them all.

[2069] You'll be out like, oh, I'm going to go and try and save this person, and then you'll run into some story trigger event, and like, oh, suddenly I have to fight this psychopath.

[2070] with a deadly shopping cart that I had no idea was going to be here, and then, whoops, got to do that now, and then I die.

[2071] The only way to learn that lesson is to go through that and experience that, even if you had no way of anticipating.

[2072] Or wait a month after the game comes out for somebody to write a FAQ or something.

[2073] Or spend your first few hours with that game running over zombies, and then get the Mega Buster.

[2074] Yeah, I mean your first 40 hours.

[2075] Yeah, and then play the game.

[2076] The way it was meant to be.

[2077] This reminds me how much...

[2078] I hope people remember Dead Rising.

[2079] What it was meant to be.

[2080] As opposed to...

[2081] What it actually was.

[2082] This reminds me how seemingly small, but in actuality very meaningful a change it is that you've got multiple save slots in the new game.

[2083] To be able to stagger your saves and to be able to go back to the previous one if you don't like what's going on, that's huge.

[2084] Even though it's just limited...

[2085] I'd be curious to see if that stuff actually carries over to the full game or if they are dicks again.

[2086] Oh, man, it has to.

[2087] I would assume.

[2088] I would assume.

[2089] That would suck.

[2090] But even though it's still limited to, like, three slots, that's something.

[2091] That's more quarter than the first game gave.

[2092] Yeah, if just every time you save, you save on the next slot down, like, over and over, you know, you're always going to have those backups to go back to.

[2093] That makes a big difference.

[2094] And, you know, after my first playthrough on Case Zero, which was one where, you know, a bunch of people died.

[2095] I didn't get Zombrex to Katie, so it was basically like the F ending.

[2096] Oh, man. I wanted to see that.

[2097] What happens?

[2098] He just kind of looks at his watch.

[2099] He goes, oh, no, and looks up into the sky, and then it's over.

[2100] You don't ever get to see zombie little girl.

[2101] Or military or anything?

[2102] No, I mean, because that timer runs out before the military timer does.

[2103] Oh, right, right.

[2104] Okay, so she's dead.

[2105] Yeah, so she's just, or whatever it is that happens to her.

[2106] So I had that playthrough restarted, and then on that next playthrough, I was able to easily save everyone and get the A -plus best ending.

[2107] That seemed reasonable to me. Yeah, liked that game a lot.

[2108] Worth the five bucks.

[2109] And then I played two missions of Starcraft 2 and said, I don't really want to play this game.

[2110] So, yeah.

[2111] I just realized that game's not for me. Beautiful.

[2112] Expertly produced.

[2113] It's still a real -time strategy game.

[2114] You didn't even get to Good Park, though, if you only played two missions.

[2115] you at least have to get on the ship and have it like open up the branching missions before it's like, I know it was, I was, I was really good.

[2116] Probably not.

[2117] I'll, I'll give it another one.

[2118] I clearly it's, it's great.

[2119] So it has nothing to do with that, but I just, wherever my mind was at, I was like, eh, I'm just going to build.

[2120] Yep.

[2121] I'm going to harvest resources and build things.

[2122] And then I'm going to take all my dudes over to this base and shoot all their dudes.

[2123] And this is what this is.

[2124] They, they, they didn't.

[2125] Yeah.

[2126] Both hands above the table, please.

[2127] Come on.

[2128] All right, let's move on to some news.

[2129] That's it for playing stuff for most of the show.

[2130] Again, we've managed to run along here.

[2131] Brad, StarCraft patch notes, what's up?

[2132] Yeah, again, recording this early, we were kind of ill -equipped to talk about this because they have not detailed the full patch notes as of this time.

[2133] Although, by the time you hear this, the patch will be out there and you'll know what's going on.

[2134] Maybe they said there'd be some NVIDIA 3D Vision stuff.

[2135] Yeah, I mean, they're adding some features, some tech stuff like that.

[2136] Left -handed hotkeys.

[2137] Yeah, yeah, okay.

[2138] I mean, there's a lot of stuff coming in there, but I mean, all that really matters to people who really play that game is the balance changes.

[2139] And we know a handful of those, but...

[2140] Oh, so that's not the complete list?

[2141] No, no. Well...

[2142] It could be, but I highly doubt it.

[2143] I mean, it's been out for two months now.

[2144] Are they getting rid of that build queuing thing you mentioned last time?

[2145] Oh, you know, I haven't seen them address that.

[2146] Although it was funny.

[2147] I'm not playing until they fix it.

[2148] Don't blame me. The day after that, I guess you call it an exploit, whatever you call it, that weird consequence of the game mechanics came out.

[2149] Apocalypse.

[2150] I saw another video of somebody playing.

[2151] and warping in, like, all kinds of weird units with warp gates, which is...

[2152] Like, things that you weren't supposed to...

[2153] Yeah, like, apparently the stuff was, like, left over from the alpha builds of the game, and they just sort of, like, effectively commented it out of the retail build, but it was still actually in there.

[2154] On a Battle .net -sponsored...

[2155] I don't know.

[2156] I mean, it could have been, like, some kind of weird custom game.

[2157] I don't know how they were doing it, but, like, the very next day, Blizzard sent out an email saying, like, just so you know, bans are coming soon.

[2158] Like, anybody caught using modified game clients on Battle .net are done, so...

[2159] There are some weird exploits floating around out there right now.

[2160] But yeah.

[2161] Balance changes.

[2162] I wish I knew what they were.

[2163] Moving on.

[2164] TGS happened last week.

[2165] The Tokyo Game Show.

[2166] Yeah.

[2167] We didn't go.

[2168] But some stuff happened.

[2169] Yeah.

[2170] Despite us not going.

[2171] I went.

[2172] I think some more stuff happened than I think...

[2173] People had originally anticipated.

[2174] I know more than I had anticipated, and that was based off of what the past two or three years have looked like.

[2175] A lot of shit came out of there.

[2176] Yeah.

[2177] Such as the aforementioned Frank West, Dead Rising 2 Case West.

[2178] as they are calling it, a brief teaser basically suggesting that Chuck Green and Frank West are going to posse up on some fucking zombies.

[2179] I wanted a photographer to help him clear his name.

[2180] Yeah.

[2181] So I wonder if this is going to be more pre -LC or if this will be like a post -release thing of...

[2182] like continuing the story after the end of Dead Rising 2.

[2183] Wait, so they announced it and didn't say anything about like how or in what form it's coming out?

[2184] It's meant to be an epilogue to take place after Dead Rising 2.

[2185] But it's not an add -on for the disc game, right?

[2186] Or it is.

[2187] I don't know that they've necessarily said.

[2188] Seems weird to announce it and not clarify that stuff.

[2189] I don't know.

[2190] That's pretty Japan of just saying like something's happening.

[2191] There's a teaser.

[2192] What it's actually going to be.

[2193] But...

[2194] Like, it's weird because I saw a number of comments about Case Zero from people saying, like, this is the perfect price and length for me to get my fill of Dead Rising.

[2195] And I'm going to buy this and play it and then not, like, no, I don't need the full game.

[2196] So if they put out another one of those and people can spend another five or ten bucks and get, like, that much more of it, like, I can almost see it incentivizing some people to not buy the game.

[2197] Oh, maybe.

[2198] I don't know.

[2199] That's weird.

[2200] I mean, I was definitely the opposite with Casey.

[2201] Oh, no, me too.

[2202] Mine was like, all right.

[2203] I played it and I was just like, dude, give me that game.

[2204] Quetted my appetite forever.

[2205] Maybe you could play through all of Dead Rising 2 as Frank West.

[2206] Or as Knuckles.

[2207] Big, big, big cat.

[2208] I'm more of a big man myself.

[2209] Capcom also bought the developer.

[2210] Yes.

[2211] They bought Blue Castle.

[2212] I don't know how to rename it.

[2213] It's like Capcom Studios Vancouver or Capcom Game Studios Vancouver.

[2214] Northwest.

[2215] Yeah.

[2216] But yeah, it sounds like no real official, other than Blue Castle working on it, no real details about Case West, about whether it'll be co -op or where or when it will necessarily take place.

[2217] But fun teaser, and I would say a turn I did not anticipate.

[2218] Yeah.

[2219] The world needs more Frank West.

[2220] That much is clear.

[2221] Yeah.

[2222] He's covered wars, you know.

[2223] Yeah.

[2224] Yeah, a whole shitload of Kinect games got announced.

[2225] Yeah, Microsoft announced a pile of those, including a new Steel Battalion.

[2226] What?

[2227] Steel Battalion, heavy armor.

[2228] What?

[2229] We went from a controller with all the buttons in the world to now there aren't even sticks, let alone buttons.

[2230] And From Software is developing that.

[2231] Did they do the original?

[2232] Still going to have to pull an invisible lever to eject at the last second.

[2233] You have to flip up an imaginary plastic cover over a button and hit the button to get out or it deletes your save.

[2234] You're just going to wave to shoot.

[2235] That whole thing just seems...

[2236] It's like you have to recognize the tank and wave at it and then it kills the other tank for you.

[2237] I think it's a great idea of them to make a mech game that uses Kinect.

[2238] whether they should have called it steel battalion or not maybe uh maybe that's the connect right yes you're saying that's the rub uh yeah because if you look at what steel battalion was it was as about as hardcore as a console like vehicle combat simulator could get like they could make it like yeah it's like you had to have this gigantic ass controller right pedals like all this stuff crazy expensive yeah crazy expensive like super unforgiving with how it handled like saves and just like you know like all that sort of stuff i forgot about that um you actually blow up your mech right So they made this game totally ridiculous, and now it's like, yeah, you know, stand and play, dance.

[2239] What if it's like a mech party game?

[2240] That'd be really good.

[2241] Get five mechs together.

[2242] Mech mini -golf!

[2243] I think it's one of the situations where the people that remember those Steel Battalion games fondly, which is not a huge number, in the grand scheme of things, it's not some huge mainstream success.

[2244] High level of entry for that.

[2245] They're just sitting there going like, man. fuck you guys.

[2246] Yeah, it's not like, yeah, yeah.

[2247] The audience, although I would think that that same audience would take some comfort in the fact that From is working on it because if there is a modern game developer that can make some grognard ass, unforgiving fucking video games.

[2248] Didn't they make Chromehounds?

[2249] Yes.

[2250] They also made Demon's Souls.

[2251] So if you want to make brutal games in the year 2010.

[2252] Hit up From.

[2253] I would say From seems like a good...

[2254] They know their mechs.

[2255] They know Brutal and Unforgiving.

[2256] Speaking of Demon's Souls, they announced something called Project Dark, which looks like it is a spiritual successor of sorts to Demon's Souls.

[2257] An Alice game?

[2258] Just basically everything except for the Demon's Souls name is on it.

[2259] Is that a Kinect game?

[2260] No. Okay.

[2261] No, that's a separate.

[2262] That's a PS3.

[2263] Oh, wait a minute.

[2264] Who developed Demon's Souls?

[2265] From.

[2266] Who published it?

[2267] Atlus.

[2268] In Japan?

[2269] Sony, right?

[2270] So Sony probably owns some part of that IP.

[2271] Yeah, probably.

[2272] Yeah, so that got announced, so people were pretty pumped for that.

[2273] But yeah, there's other Kinect stuff.

[2274] There's Codename D, which is Grasshopper.

[2275] That's sued as Posse.

[2276] One of two, man, two Grasshopper games.

[2277] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2278] Project Draco, which looks like some Panzer Dragoon -ass business.

[2279] It is.

[2280] I mean, it's the dude.

[2281] That dude.

[2282] Yeah.

[2283] It's the dude that made it.

[2284] And even just like the concept art stuff they showed off of like, okay, these look like those style of dragons.

[2285] Is that an MGS game?

[2286] Please.

[2287] Dragoons.

[2288] Sorry.

[2289] No, grounding.

[2290] Right.

[2291] MGS is publishing, I think.

[2292] Yeah.

[2293] Microsoft's handling that.

[2294] Grounding Inc. is developing.

[2295] Sega has nothing to do with it as well.

[2296] Yes.

[2297] Haunt is the Nana Ancha, like, goofy haunted house game.

[2298] Yeah.

[2299] And then Rise of Nightmares is the Sega proper haunted house game.

[2300] They turned around and announced Rise of Nightmares for a U .S. release as well.

[2301] I don't think this other stuff is necessarily...

[2302] That's what I was going to ask.

[2303] So some of this stuff is not day and date US?

[2304] Right.

[2305] Okay.

[2306] That's not yet.

[2307] And also they said that Radiant Silver Gun is coming to Xbox Live Arcade.

[2308] So eight people that have weird, super rare copies of that.

[2309] Is that good buy?

[2310] Yeah.

[2311] Fire Pro Wrestling with Avatars.

[2312] Yes.

[2313] Fire Pro Wrestling.

[2314] Spike is making a new Fire Pro Wrestling game.

[2315] Spike is making a new Fire Pro Wrestling game, which if you like wrestling and you like video games, you should probably check one of those out.

[2316] Or wait for this one.

[2317] Because it'll have Avatar support.

[2318] And that's weird.

[2319] That is very weird.

[2320] Because, I mean, those games have always been about, like, 2D sprites of unlicensed versions of actual wrestlers.

[2321] Yeah.

[2322] So it's just like...

[2323] And you can rename and redo logos.

[2324] So it's like...

[2325] All highly unlicensed.

[2326] Yeah.

[2327] If you spend enough time, you can make those guys like, okay, now it really is Kevin Nash.

[2328] Now it's not just this dude who is obviously supposed to be Kevin Nash.

[2329] It just is that guy.

[2330] So I don't know how you do that with avatars.

[2331] Well, I mean, whatever.

[2332] Avatars are meant to be customizable as well.

[2333] There's no way you can make an avatar look just like Kevin Nash.

[2334] But is it going to be only with avatars?

[2335] I don't know.

[2336] That's a good question.

[2337] I would agree that if it was just with avatars, that doesn't seem right.

[2338] And I don't believe that was announced as a Kinect game.

[2339] No, no, no, no. Neither was Radiant Silvergun.

[2340] I'm just saying of the stuff that Microsoft did during their press conference.

[2341] Sony similarly announced a bunch of stuff.

[2342] I think a thing that got a lot of people excited was the Eco and Shadow of the Colossus HD re -releases that are forthcoming now.

[2343] Hand -holding has never looked this good.

[2344] I guess not.

[2345] Didn't they say something about redoing textures in that?

[2346] More than just like they're running it at 720p, right?

[2347] It's all fully voiced now.

[2348] It was fully voiced.

[2349] No, no, no. They fixed it.

[2350] They got the celebrity voice actors that they always wanted.

[2351] Jennifer Love Hewitt.

[2352] Kevin Costner.

[2353] And Mario Van Peebles.

[2354] Yeah.

[2355] As the solo.

[2356] They added him to the campaign.

[2357] They felt that this was what it was missing.

[2358] Yeah, I know.

[2359] He loves Solo.

[2360] And so that's just what these games have always been missing.

[2361] Cybernetic black guys.

[2362] Literally.

[2363] Mario Van Peebles.

[2364] I don't know what else Sony announced.

[2365] There was that.

[2366] Last Guardian is coming out on holiday next year.

[2367] They're still saying that that's going to come out.

[2368] They changed the protagonist in that.

[2369] They changed it from a girl to a guy or anything crazy like that.

[2370] In fact, nothing about that game appears to have ever changed in the last two years.

[2371] They show the same tech demo.

[2372] Same area.

[2373] Same little weird temple and waterfall.

[2374] Same giant cat bird thing.

[2375] Same kid.

[2376] Doing the same stuff.

[2377] Same music.

[2378] Dude, show something.

[2379] Proof that there's a game there.

[2380] You've got like a year now.

[2381] Guys, Sega is putting out Phantasy Star Online 2.

[2382] Yes.

[2383] Okay.

[2384] Finally.

[2385] For the PC.

[2386] The sequel to Phantasy Star Online.

[2387] The second Phantasy Star Online game.

[2388] Phantasy Star Online 2.

[2389] It's coming out.

[2390] What?

[2391] For the PC.

[2392] Jeff, thoughts?

[2393] You know, if they return to form, if they take it all the way back to the first, if this is a true sequel to Phantasy Star Online and they don't charge an ongoing fee to play it, then great.

[2394] I feel like that was a series of games that has fallen apart as they've tried to charge for Phantasy Star Universe.

[2395] I mean, some people have gotten way into that stuff, but I always, like anytime I...

[2396] went and paid for any of that stuff, be it like PSO episode two or blue burst or any of that other stuff that's, that's come out along the way.

[2397] The content they add to those games always sucks.

[2398] So their whole thing of like, Hey, you should pay us to, to like support this on an ongoing basis so that we can use these tools to cobble together really shitty content.

[2399] And for you to not enjoy, uh, like that game is basically Diablo in structure.

[2400] It's four players.

[2401] with a lobby system you know i guess it grew to six or something in fantasy star universe maybe i don't remember squandered goodwill at this point i feel they did you know it just uh like they need to look at guild wars as an example of how they should be running that game like business wise uh when that when it comes time for them to make this sequel did they say anything about this coming to the states because uh no they did not japan's got all sorts of online stuff it does yes Everything is online.

[2402] And they only announced it for PC also.

[2403] No Dreamcast version.

[2404] What the hell's up with that?

[2405] Their core audience, they're just completely ignoring them.

[2406] I know, I know.

[2407] Way to service the fans.

[2408] It's weird that they still make those games with such an alarming frequency.

[2409] Like, Phantasy Star Portable 2 just came out here.

[2410] And at TGS, they were showing Phantasy Star Portable 2 unleashed some other bonus version of PSP 2.

[2411] They've got the DS and the PSP series churning at their own regular rate.

[2412] They've been doing the universe.

[2413] They did some add -ons for universe.

[2414] They never stopped with all that stuff.

[2415] But none of it's been as good as that original game was back in the day.

[2416] And none of it caught like that.

[2417] That stuff was...

[2418] It was seminal.

[2419] Yes.

[2420] It was revelatory when it came out.

[2421] You're like, oh, man, I'm doing this on a console.

[2422] This is incredible.

[2423] They accounted for the language barrier in some sense with my ability to throw out Thundercats logos.

[2424] You can communicate with Thundercats.

[2425] You can say Thundercats ho so easily in a way that everyone could understand.

[2426] And keyboard support.

[2427] It was important for consoles.

[2428] to have that game out there.

[2429] But where they went with it business -wise, I feel just like it was not something that was worth continuing to support because a lot of that content was poor.

[2430] Yeah, I don't know.

[2431] Like, they should just make Phantasy Star 5.

[2432] Oh, do you really want the people who are controlling the destiny of the Phantasy Star name at this point?

[2433] I guess not.

[2434] Continuing the core original Phantasy Star.

[2435] Plus, I mean, what Phantasy...

[2436] Let's just get like Sakaguchi or something.

[2437] Let's just get like as many ex -Final Fantasy dudes as possible and say, let's make a new Phantasy Star game.

[2438] Like Lost Odyssey or Blue Dragon or something.

[2439] That's what happens when you put those guys together.

[2440] Yeah, you're right.

[2441] Nothing good happens from that.

[2442] And I think probably the most controversial and...

[2443] I guess...

[2444] The flame -baiting announcement of the show was Capcom is making...

[2445] They're rebooting the Devil May Cry franchise.

[2446] Oh, you mean DMC.

[2447] Yes.

[2448] Yes, I do.

[2449] Devastating my control.

[2450] That's the one.

[2451] Pork pie hats and oversized glasses.

[2452] Man, if they had redesigned the game in that direction, no one would have complained.

[2453] I was kind of hoping that they would have some sort of acronym that spelled run before DMC.

[2454] So it would be...

[2455] Like real underground.

[2456] Rivals Unleashed Neo.

[2457] Yeah.

[2458] Rivals Unleashed Neo, Devil May Cry.

[2459] So that's my hope.

[2460] So as we had mentioned earlier, as Brad was talking about Enslaved, a game being developed by Ninja Theory.

[2461] Ninja Theory is also handling development on this new Devil May Cry game.

[2462] And they've completely redid the look of the world.

[2463] I think the thing that's got everyone pissed off is that they've totally redesigned Dante.

[2464] He's a lot younger looking.

[2465] Dark hair.

[2466] Dark hair.

[2467] Did they say it's like a retelling, like a reboot was starting over?

[2468] I mean, they're calling it Devil May Cry.

[2469] Oh.

[2470] I didn't pay attention to this.

[2471] Yeah, they're not continuing whatever was going on.

[2472] Or even Devil May Cry Zero.

[2473] Right, or like Gundam Wing style.

[2474] No, he's got dark hair.

[2475] He's a different dude.

[2476] I could never keep...

[2477] Who's the other Virgil?

[2478] The other one?

[2479] I don't know.

[2480] Yeah.

[2481] Like that was – yeah, like the thing for me that like everyone getting up like, you told me we did it bad.

[2482] It's like the discerning taste of the very vocal and I'm sure minority of the Devil May Cry audience.

[2483] Like if they were satiated by the fact that they introduced a new hero in the last Devil May Cry game.

[2484] who still had white hair and a red jacket.

[2485] If they want completely different characters to still look exactly the same as Dante, then no. I don't have to listen to you.

[2486] I feel like probably it just seems like at that point they should just not make any more Devil May Cry games, maybe.

[2487] I don't know.

[2488] I've always been pretty dismissive of the Devil May Cry series because I don't much care for it.

[2489] I don't know enough about it.

[2490] I know they're kind of hard.

[2491] I really tried to get into 4.

[2492] Yeah.

[2493] Because I had a chunk of free time and tried to play a bunch of 4 and really, no. First one was a pretty, I guess you'd call it an important game.

[2494] I mean.

[2495] I guess I just didn't get it at the time.

[2496] It's just like the camera angle stuff just got in the way too much.

[2497] I really liked the, I mean, the notion of sword launch guy into air, keep him up there with pistols.

[2498] That's awesome.

[2499] You're a man that can appreciate some juggles.

[2500] Plenty of games have gone on to be inspired by that precise form of juggling.

[2501] That's why it's a seminal game.

[2502] God of War exists because of Devil May Cry.

[2503] They pretty much invented character action with that.

[2504] I like a lot of things about Devil May Cry and concept action.

[2505] In practice, it went off the rails at some point.

[2506] The second one was awful.

[2507] Never able to get into it personally.

[2508] So, yeah, none of us have that longstanding affinity for Devil May Cry.

[2509] I'm left kind of interested in it, even though, well, I don't know, hearing you say positive things about Enslaved maybe makes me a little more interested in Devil May Cry.

[2510] Enslaved seems cool.

[2511] I mean, it's an early build.

[2512] What I played, granted, was very short.

[2513] But, yeah, just...

[2514] I'm not saying it's necessarily going to be a great game.

[2515] The frame rate's a little dodgy in this build, and the control, like I said, is not as responsive as you might want, so we'll see.

[2516] You know, I think that there's just great potential.

[2517] Like, clearly they hit a creative dead end with Devil May Cry.

[2518] If you're getting to the fourth one, it's like, we have a new guy, and he looks exactly like the old guy.

[2519] But also you can still unlock the old guy if you like him better, even though he's the same guy.

[2520] But he had a crazy hand, didn't he?

[2521] You end up playing through the second half of the game as Dante.

[2522] I think that's what it was, yeah.

[2523] Dante came back at some point.

[2524] And it's kind of the same levels.

[2525] You're like, what?

[2526] I don't know.

[2527] I don't know enough.

[2528] Yo Bayonetta.

[2529] Maybe you've heard of it.

[2530] Check that out.

[2531] That's where it goes from here.

[2532] I like that game.

[2533] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2534] No, I mean, and you can take it somewhere for sure, but...

[2535] Yeah, especially if you look in the wake of something like Bayonetta, for people to get all mad because someone's doing something dramatic to Devil May Cry, that's precisely what needs to be done.

[2536] And I think the Ninja Theory guys make incredibly good -looking games, and I think that having...

[2537] If the way that Dead Rising 2 seems to be panning out is any indication of how Capcom's going to do some of this stuff...

[2538] I think there's good potential.

[2539] I think that they could make something fun here.

[2540] Also, I think that young Dante is one of my favorite rappers right now that's out.

[2541] ATL.

[2542] Yeah.

[2543] He's coming out of ATL.

[2544] I mean, he's inside right now.

[2545] He's on lockdown.

[2546] But when young Dante gets out, he's going to spit fire.

[2547] Dante, I got you.

[2548] Blaze on this microphone.

[2549] So, yeah.

[2550] Those are some of the highlights from TGS.

[2551] Let's take it to new releases, gents.

[2552] When I say it like that, it sounds way less exciting.

[2553] And those were the highlights from TGS.

[2554] Let's take it to new releases.

[2555] What a year.

[2556] What a year.

[2557] I'm jet lagged and I didn't even go.

[2558] Most exciting thing about TGS was that we didn't go to TGS.

[2559] You know what?

[2560] I was like, when all of these announcements were cranking out, I was kind of like, fuck.

[2561] I think they were letting people play Catherine also.

[2562] Not that we would have been able to get much out of it.

[2563] I would have learned Japanese.

[2564] I've been thinking that maybe we should try.

[2565] Oh, you're totally going to import that game.

[2566] Wait, try learning Japanese?

[2567] Get some Rosetta Stone.

[2568] Brad, you know some Japanese, right?

[2569] God, it's been a while.

[2570] For two and a half years in college.

[2571] Konnichiwa, bitches.

[2572] There you go.

[2573] What's bitches mean?

[2574] Same.

[2575] It translates directly.

[2576] Wow, awesome.

[2577] A lot of words in Japanese are like that.

[2578] Oh, really?

[2579] Yeah, it's easy.

[2580] It's basically pig Latin.

[2581] Yeah, people make a big deal out of it.

[2582] Like all those crazy characters, you hold it up to a mirror and it's just English.

[2583] It's accents in the wrong place.

[2584] It's like you have to hold it sideways and in a mirror because it goes up and down.

[2585] But if you just hold it sideways and it's like, oh, okay.

[2586] That's just a weird mirror then.

[2587] I carry a mirror with me. That same mirror that we're holding up to the world with all the dicks drawn on it.

[2588] Oh, I can't read anything on that.

[2589] It's just penises.

[2590] 720p -nesses.

[2591] New releases for the week of September the 20th include Civilization V. All right.

[2592] Sid Meier's Civilization V. Oh, both of them are out?

[2593] Make sure you look in your Steam thing under Sid Meier's.

[2594] Yes.

[2595] You might miss it.

[2596] And, yes, we've been playing the Steam version, and then we also received the special edition box.

[2597] There is only the Steam version, even the boxed one.

[2598] It's a code?

[2599] Well.

[2600] It probably has a serial number.

[2601] Steamworks required.

[2602] So it's one of those where even if you buy, just fair warning.

[2603] Cloud support.

[2604] If you buy the box version, you still have to like run it through Steam.

[2605] Man. Unless you get the special edition, in which case you get like pewter figurines and art books.

[2606] Like tabletop.

[2607] Don't need no Steam to look at a pewter figurine.

[2608] Five metal figurines.

[2609] Wow.

[2610] Come with a special.

[2611] And also, maybe my favorite part is that it comes in a like.

[2612] When you look at it, you're like, this is a giant box.

[2613] And you're like, wait, this is what old PC boxes.

[2614] It's a little bit bigger than theirs.

[2615] That's like a book.

[2616] That thing is like a hard.

[2617] It's big, though.

[2618] I got my copy of The Fortress of Dr. Radiaki in the mail.

[2619] I don't think you can just bust that out because I think we only talked about that in private.

[2620] I don't think we ever talked about that.

[2621] I ordered it off of Amazon.

[2622] You have to tell people what The Fortress of Dr. Radiaki is.

[2623] It's a really shitty first -person shooter that came out around like 94.

[2624] And all the guards.

[2625] PC.

[2626] So I can't even install DOS boxes.

[2627] I was going to say, is it like floppies?

[2628] No, it's a CD.

[2629] Oh, wow.

[2630] Compact disc, optical media, way of the future.

[2631] And when the enemies activate, when they see you, they all say, cuidado, and come at you.

[2632] And I remember being total dog shit.

[2633] What engine is that running on?

[2634] I think it's a separate.

[2635] Really?

[2636] It's not build.

[2637] I think it's a separate engine.

[2638] I've heard of that somewhere.

[2639] The Fortress.

[2640] The Fortress of Dr. Radiaki.

[2641] Of Dr. Radiaki.

[2642] And I got it because we didn't have a good box shot of it on the site.

[2643] There you go.

[2644] In stores now.

[2645] In stores now.

[2646] Go get your copy.

[2647] Also in stores now.

[2648] I just want to say how bummed are you now that Abe Lincoln's not in the game because you could have had a little pewter Abe Lincoln.

[2649] I know.

[2650] Think about that.

[2651] Don't worry, we'll eventually generate our own computer Abe Lincoln.

[2652] I mean, we're going to need to make a maquette to scan into the...

[2653] That's true.

[2654] We'll get Will to 3D print it out of...

[2655] Yeah, I wonder if we could make it with sort of an Abe Lincoln we could make with the MakerBot.

[2656] ABS or whatever.

[2657] Shitty one.

[2658] I'll take a shitty Abe Lincoln.

[2659] Stick a dime in him, he can open bottles too.

[2660] That'd be a useful Abe Lincoln.

[2661] Yeah, that'd be awesome.

[2662] This is getting better and better.

[2663] Check it out.

[2664] Not only is it Abe Lincoln, totally opened that beer bottle for you.

[2665] Etrian Odyssey 3, The Drowned City.

[2666] Four score and seven beers ago.

[2667] You know what I'm saying?

[2668] For the Nintendo DS, a quick look of this is up on the site already.

[2669] It's the cartography RPG.

[2670] We did a quick look of that?

[2671] We did a quick look.

[2672] How long ago?

[2673] It was me and Matt Kessler.

[2674] Wow.

[2675] Sat down and did a quick look of that.

[2676] Oh, Etrian Odyssey 3.

[2677] Etrian Odyssey 3.

[2678] Okay, yeah.

[2679] Cartography.

[2680] Mapping Dungeons.

[2681] It's a car RPG.

[2682] Yes.

[2683] And F1 2010 for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

[2684] Not PC?

[2685] I thought I said something about PC.

[2686] It might be a PC also.

[2687] It's Codemasters.

[2688] I can neither confirm nor deny.

[2689] Xbox Live Arcade this week.

[2690] Now I'm having, I received some word on these from parties other than Microsoft.

[2691] Because Microsoft is incredibly shitty about releasing information about their – It's random.

[2692] It's just sometimes like here's the next six weeks of stuff missing like week five.

[2693] And then they'll mention nothing about it like the week that it's actually happening.

[2694] They'll just be like radio silence about it.

[2695] But like four weeks earlier, they'll tell you everything that's coming out.

[2696] Yeah, it's – yeah, their release information is madness.

[2697] So I'm getting this from third parties.

[2698] So I'm just – I'm prefacing this by saying.

[2699] Oh, this isn't official.

[2700] This is not official.

[2701] Or it's partially official.

[2702] Yeah, partially.

[2703] Some of these have been announced.

[2704] Blade Kitten.

[2705] Yeah.

[2706] For the Xbox Live Arcade.

[2707] Alien Breed 2 Assault.

[2708] Hmm.

[2709] Huh.

[2710] For Xbox Live Arcade.

[2711] Death Spank Thong of Virtue.

[2712] Now, they've officially announced that one.

[2713] That one's on the reel.

[2714] I know Alien Breed is definitely coming to Steam.

[2715] Yeah, I know it's coming.

[2716] They said it was coming to PC and Xbox Live Arcade soon, and I saw that same stuff.

[2717] So Thong of Virtue.

[2718] That is a sequel?

[2719] It's a sequel.

[2720] A sequel that was developed in parallel with the original Death Spank.

[2721] Okay.

[2722] Which there's a really crazy line on the PlayStation blog from one of the guys at Hothead where he says, because Death Spank Thong of Virtue was developed concurrently with the first game, we have been able to...

[2723] like respond to or you know like basically feedback like basically implying that the second game learn our lessons yeah yeah it's like how is that even possible if you made them both at the same time or or had some sort of overlap like their time wouldn't this game be like close to done maybe by the time i don't yeah i don't maybe there was a consecutive apostrophe t missing from some sentence some word in that sentence currently and then Serious Sam Episode 2 HD.

[2724] That never came out over there?

[2725] Not on Xbox.

[2726] So Blade Kitten, Alien Breed are 800 points, so that's $10.

[2727] What's Blade Kitten?

[2728] Slide scroller.

[2729] Yeah.

[2730] It doesn't look very good.

[2731] Okay.

[2732] And then Death Spank and Serious Sam are $15.

[2733] Jeff, do you want to know what the Game Room releases are this week?

[2734] Is it nothing?

[2735] Again, this is the unofficial official.

[2736] This is from Weird Channels.

[2737] We'll lay it out.

[2738] Galactic Warriors.

[2739] It's an arcade game.

[2740] Bowling for the 2600.

[2741] All right, all right.

[2742] Plack Attack for the 2600.

[2743] And Intellivision Horse Racing.

[2744] Yeah.

[2745] That's back down to that medium tone.

[2746] That's right where I want you thinking about.

[2747] In Plak Attack, the more you shoot, the more the toothpaste tube rolls up.

[2748] So you eventually run out of ammo.

[2749] That's pretty dope.

[2750] PlayStation Network is also getting Blade Kitten and Death Spank Thong of Virtue as well as Sonic Adventure.

[2751] Which, hey, so we did that quick look last week.

[2752] We did.

[2753] We made fun of like downloadable content.

[2754] Turns out the downloadable content is real and was released and it's five bucks and it's for the DX add -ons.

[2755] I don't know if you remember, they released a Sonic Adventure DX.

[2756] I think that was just for the GameCube.

[2757] Yeah.

[2758] Where it was like director's cut.

[2759] They added a bunch of shit into it.

[2760] Yeah.

[2761] And they had the balls not to just release that as the version, but to release that extra stuff for five bucks as DLC for their suck -ass port of a middling game at best.

[2762] It's like based on the PC version or something.

[2763] Wait, so for 50 % of the purchase price of it?

[2764] Yeah, you get this fucking Director's Cut bullshit for this game that already fucking sucks ass.

[2765] Scandalous fucks.

[2766] Oh, my God.

[2767] Maybe when Crazy Taxi comes out, they'll sell all the Crazy Box stuff separately.

[2768] Even though that was on the Dreamcast.

[2769] But a bunch of douchebags.

[2770] Just flagrant and just cynical.

[2771] At least make it like 99 cents or so.

[2772] Really abusive.

[2773] At least make it like free.

[2774] Like, hey, sorry we fucking raped you.

[2775] Sorry we made this game in the first place.

[2776] I'm sorry.

[2777] That's not how I want to put that.

[2778] I'm saying.

[2779] That was maybe a little harsh.

[2780] Game that we put out originally that wasn't great.

[2781] And then we're re -releasing it.

[2782] For half the price of it.

[2783] 15 bucks.

[2784] That's a little rough.

[2785] Guarantee you could get an actual copy of that game significantly less.

[2786] I'll just wait for it to come to Game Room.

[2787] Yeah, all those Dreamcast games are totally coming to Game Room.

[2788] Oh, remember Game Room for what it was supposed to be.

[2789] Not for what it is.

[2790] All right, Jeff.

[2791] Oh, there's also this 101 Megamix for, I believe, just the PSP.

[2792] That looks kind of cool.

[2793] 101 minigames.

[2794] Yeah.

[2795] Which I'm curious why you think it looks cool because I saw that.

[2796] Is it Atlas?

[2797] Yeah, it is from Atlas.

[2798] That has to be terrible because I bet it's like more like 20 minigames that we then have five variants of each.

[2799] You get two tanks in this one.

[2800] Yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.

[2801] It was just like, there's 100 games in combat.

[2802] Well, there's like...

[2803] There's like two, and then one you're invisible.

[2804] But there's something about that weird kind of just like, here's all this crazy bootleg -looking variety that we generated out of nowhere that interests me when someone says we have over 100 minigames.

[2805] I guess the scale helps, even if the reality is still like, well, yeah.

[2806] Can you download it to your PSP?

[2807] It's just on a desk.

[2808] Yeah, it's a PlayStation Network release.

[2809] Anything that supports.

[2810] Yeah, this is not a good old Go.

[2811] I don't know where my Go is.

[2812] Still, I think we talked about that last week.

[2813] It continues to be missing.

[2814] It's really cramping your lifestyle.

[2815] I actually don't know where any of my PSPs are right now.

[2816] I think I have three of them.

[2817] I was going to say, how many do you have?

[2818] I think I have a launch Japanese one.

[2819] Yeah.

[2820] Didn't you get that Kratos one?

[2821] Yeah, you got that God of War one.

[2822] Yeah, I have that Kratos one somewhere.

[2823] Yeah.

[2824] Get the go.

[2825] I'd get the go.

[2826] All right, that white one that got stolen.

[2827] All right, well, that doesn't really count anymore.

[2828] And then you'll be getting a PSP2.

[2829] Right.

[2830] Yeah, exactly.

[2831] As soon as they bring that thing in.

[2832] Yeah.

[2833] Because obviously people have it now.

[2834] Right.

[2835] Yeah, I don't know if you guys saw that.

[2836] There was a quote out of PAX from Sean Hemrick, who was on the team at NetherRealm, the executive producer over there.

[2837] Oh, yes, Sean.

[2838] That guy's crazy.

[2839] Yeah.

[2840] Well, he went ahead and said, yeah, we have a PSP2.

[2841] Wait till you hear this.

[2842] It's really powerful.

[2843] We're looking at our engine and thinking about things we can do with it.

[2844] It seems like it's pretty powerful.

[2845] We don't have a 3DS yet, but just interview out of PAX.

[2846] Just dropping that stuff.

[2847] I think we can all agree it is inevitable that there will be a PSP2.

[2848] But damn, dude.

[2849] I'm just imagining the steep hill and the size of the ball of shit that is currently rolling down from Sony and all of the Sony PR and then all of the Warner Brothers PR.

[2850] It's like, what did you do?

[2851] That it is rolling over as it flies down this hill.

[2852] It's probably just been a continuous stream of feces as from a fire hose on that guy since this happened.

[2853] I imagine that guy is kind of like, eh, whatever.

[2854] It seems like a very Chicago way to treat it.

[2855] Like, fuck it.

[2856] But I imagine the poor handlers and people who do not have the executive producer clout to just be like, whatever, deal with it.

[2857] I thought that was pretty funny.

[2858] I guess I'm saying I feel bad for Tally because she probably has to deal with some sort of repercussions on that.

[2859] Yeah, it's true.

[2860] That's true.

[2861] But that's my thought.

[2862] Jeff, it's time for some Nintendo download new releases.

[2863] All right.

[2864] What have you got for us?

[2865] I've got WiiWare up front.

[2866] WiiWare up top.

[2867] Hit me with it.

[2868] Triple throwing sports.

[2869] Is it sports in which you throw three times?

[2870] Triple throwing sports.

[2871] So it's like throwing three ways?

[2872] It's like an amuse -bouche of throwing?

[2873] From the Code Monkeys Limited.

[2874] I had to spit it out.

[2875] What three?

[2876] Got a throwing reduction.

[2877] On the side, there's a rim -a -lot of throwing.

[2878] It's got candy throwing here.

[2879] You and your fucking throwing foams.

[2880] Yes, with a foam.

[2881] Triple Throwing Sports is the most advanced recreational throwing game available for the WiiWare service.

[2882] I know you've played a lot of other recreational throwing games.

[2883] This one is the most advanced.

[2884] I'm more interested in industrial throwing games.

[2885] You take that copy of Let's Catch.

[2886] Yeah.

[2887] Roll it.

[2888] Is that one of the games?

[2889] Garbage.

[2890] Throwing copies of Let's Catch out of the window.

[2891] Yeah, that is.

[2892] Oh, okay.

[2893] Three at a time, though.

[2894] It's the whole game.

[2895] I do that professionally, so I don't know if that counts.

[2896] Immersing players in the world of competitive projectile throwing.

[2897] The second half of that sentence was as good as the first half.

[2898] Most Olympic events consist of activities that are traditionally derived from hunting and combat skills.

[2899] All right, that's not really related, but thanks.

[2900] Thousands of millions of years ago, the Earth's core cooled and crushed form.

[2901] Over time, these practices have evolved into a variety of competitive sports that include javelin, discus, shot put, and hammer.

[2902] That's four.

[2903] That's four, yeah.

[2904] As with real life throwing events, you will have full control over the aim of the projectile.

[2905] You must also take into account the angle, release point, and power.

[2906] All of these factors can influence the success of your throw.

[2907] That's four games.

[2908] At no point do they say what triple throwing...

[2909] Maybe, is there like a...

[2910] But at no point do they even say that that's in the game.

[2911] It just says, over time, these practices have evolved to include things like javelins.

[2912] Yeah, that's true.

[2913] They don't even say, and these are the games in our game.

[2914] All they say about the game is that you must take into account the angle, release point, and power, and that it is the most advanced recreational throwing game available for the WiiWare service, immersing players in the world of competitive projectile throwing.

[2915] Maybe it makes more sense.

[2916] And it's got a history lesson about the Olympics in the middle.

[2917] Maybe there are pictures.

[2918] Jesus Christ, man. You'd think that Nintendo would just take them to the side and say, all right, you realize we have to send this out to people.

[2919] Could you at least just come up with maybe a few alternate names?

[2920] Just, you know, whatever.

[2921] Just spitball some stuff around the office and get back to it.

[2922] Well, it's got three games and you throw in them.

[2923] No, I feel like this is their first draft.

[2924] I feel like this is like...

[2925] Triple.

[2926] It's like triple throwing sports and then one coder, like one dude came in on a weekend and said, dude, I added Discus.

[2927] Like, at the last minute, it's like, well, we already did the trademark search on the name.

[2928] We can't change the name.

[2929] Yeah, we already, like, the title screen's done.

[2930] That's locked in.

[2931] So we can't.

[2932] It's still going to be triple throwing sports.

[2933] Whatever, man. I just want to.

[2934] Maybe we can sell a DLC or something.

[2935] Add on.

[2936] The Very Hungry Caterpillar's ABCs.

[2937] Okay.

[2938] I like The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

[2939] I hope this isn't.

[2940] From Cybert Company Limited, rated EC.

[2941] Oh, no, it's dirty.

[2942] Do you remember that book?

[2943] The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

[2944] The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

[2945] Yeah, I know the one you're talking about.

[2946] Oh, is this like a thing?

[2947] You've actually heard of this thing?

[2948] Yeah, it's the same thing.

[2949] If that's the same thing, maybe it's not.

[2950] I'm going to Google it.

[2951] Go ahead.

[2952] Okay, I mean, it's 800 wee points.

[2953] Just know that going in.

[2954] Okay.

[2955] The Very Hungry Caterpillar's ABCs is an educational game based on the children's book The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

[2956] It allows parents to help children learn basic English while enjoying a game together.

[2957] The game consists of four parts.

[2958] Quadruple.

[2959] Discus.

[2960] Discus.

[2961] The Olympics.

[2962] Including alphabet flashcards featuring colored letters and pictures by Eric Carle.

[2963] Plus a vocabulary quiz for preschool -aged children that includes numbers, colors, shapes, animal names, and simple verbs and adjectives.

[2964] A lot more than ABCs.

[2965] Young players can also engage in fun activities such as erasing parts of a colored screen to reveal a hidden illustration.

[2966] Thank you.

[2967] Or placing a variety of animal stamps on the screen.

[2968] Like Def Jam Rap Star.

[2969] Finally, parents can use the To the Parents option to check their children's progress in remembering vocabulary words.

[2970] Your whole family is sure to appreciate the colorful illustrations by Eric Carle, internationally renowned as a creator of beautifully illustrated and innovatively designed picture books for children.

[2971] I feel like this should have described who that dude was on first mention.

[2972] Yeah, yeah.

[2973] He's the guy who wrote The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

[2974] Okay, okay.

[2975] And yes, The Very Hungry Caterpillar is a seminal children's book.

[2976] A lot of seminiferous.

[2977] Yeah, things happening this week.

[2978] I feel like this already came out, but here we're on to virtual console.

[2979] That's happened before.

[2980] Is it Arrow the Acrobat?

[2981] It's Arrow the Acrobat 2.

[2982] Okay, I don't think we've had 2.

[2983] It's just the first one.

[2984] More pages in this Arrow the Acrobat?

[2985] 1500 people.

[2986] That's right.

[2987] Arrow the Acrobat 10.

[2988] This is for Sunsoft, also 800 Wii points, rated E, mild cartoon violence.

[2989] The aerialist extreme Arrow the Acrobat bounce back into the spotlight once again to stop the wicked industrialist.

[2990] Edgar Ektor.

[2991] Arrow has entered a new realm of enchantment and now must use all of his acrobatic prowess to foil a criminal plot known only as Plan B. Keeping teens from getting pregnant.

[2992] That's pretty good.

[2993] Join Arrow as he discovers new friends and enemies in a world custom -built for his high -flying adventures.

[2994] There are 45 levels of acrobatic fun, including bonus rounds, chant stages, and hidden chambers.

[2995] Discover new villains and original digitized character voices.

[2996] A password feature allows you to return to any level.

[2997] The Chillin' Snowboarding Stage adds a new twist to Arrow's style, and you'll find new moves and fighting techniques for Arrow's attacks.

[2998] Jeff, I don't mean to interrupt you here, but did they describe the snowboarding levels as Chillin'?

[2999] Chillin' is in caps.

[3000] It's Chillin' Snowboarding Stage is all capital letters.

[3001] I think that might be the full name of it.

[3002] Okay, that's just the name of that level, yeah.

[3003] They also capitalized bonus rounds, chance stages, and hidden chambers.

[3004] Got it.

[3005] All right, DSi where?

[3006] DSi.

[3007] I haven't looked at these at all, so this is all surprise information.

[3008] Nintendo countdown calendar from Nintendo.

[3009] ESRB rating?

[3010] Not rated.

[3011] What?

[3012] Holy shit.

[3013] Unrated content.

[3014] Out of Nintendo.

[3015] Whoa.

[3016] Think about it.

[3017] Are these titties in it?

[3018] He's just like bloody...

[3019] It is your calendar.

[3020] Bloody titties.

[3021] Check out November.

[3022] With like a swastika behind him.

[3023] Yes.

[3024] Yeah, that's pretty much...

[3025] Couldn't get this rated by anyone.

[3026] With Nintendo Countdown Calendar, you can add and track all of your important events in a fun and exciting countdown format.

[3027] Simply set up your personal profile.

[3028] and then start entering events.

[3029] Adding events is easy.

[3030] Choose a date for the event.

[3031] Decide whether it will be an open event, which you name yourself, or a set event, chosen from the school, work, or general events categories.

[3032] And select an icon from the wide variety of available options.

[3033] If necessary, you can set the recurrence of the event or even move the event to the hidden events list.

[3034] From there, the calendar does the rest.

[3035] Rest, just watch the day's countdown.

[3036] On subsequent visits to the application, you may see special greetings or suggested seasonal events you can choose to add to your calendar.

[3037] All events added to the calendar are displayed chronologically so you can quickly view all of your upcoming events in one place.

[3038] All I could think of was like putting the dates of really horrible events in there and then just like dreading.

[3039] That's the day that I have to go with Jenny to get her abortion.

[3040] Countdown to that.

[3041] It's not the buildup of excitement that they want.

[3042] It's just, oh, God, I am not looking forward to that day.

[3043] I've only got four left until I've got to go.

[3044] Fifteen more days until I can give blood again.

[3045] Go!

[3046] Series 10 -second run from GameBridge!

[3047] 200 Nintendo DSi points.

[3048] Wait, hold on.

[3049] I blacked out.

[3050] What were you saying?

[3051] Go series.

[3052] 10 second run from GameBridge.

[3053] 200 Nintendo DSi points.

[3054] Dude, it totally just happened again.

[3055] Give it to me one more time.

[3056] Go series.

[3057] 10 second run from GameBridge.

[3058] Okay.

[3059] 200 Nintendo DSi points.

[3060] I got it that time, but I think it's the way that you say go series.

[3061] I can't hear anything immediately after you say that, but I picked it up.

[3062] Go ahead.

[3063] Capital O. Go.

[3064] Okay.

[3065] Benji.

[3066] Is there an exclamation point?

[3067] No. Got it.

[3068] Run like the wind in this unique twist on the classic platform game.

[3069] Take control of a stick man and run for your life across an obstacle course to reach the goal within 10 seconds.

[3070] Run for your life for 10 seconds.

[3071] Dash across platforms and avoid various hazards, desperately trying to reach the exit in time.

[3072] 10 seconds is all you've got.

[3073] Go flat out over 50 stages and three game modes.

[3074] Do you have what it takes to reach the finish line?

[3075] Stickman.

[3076] 50 10 -second stages.

[3077] That's too much.

[3078] And last but not least, Everyday Soccer from Axis Games.

[3079] Rated E for everyone, 500 Nintendo DSi points.

[3080] Play soccer against teams from all over the world.

[3081] Customize your characters to be normally sized, small, tall, or muscular.

[3082] You can also customize their shirts, shorts, and shoes.

[3083] Take advantage of your players' specific traits as dictated by their body types.

[3084] Assembling a well -balanced team is the key to becoming world champions.

[3085] There are many teams to play against, so keep your mind sharp and your kicking foot sharper.

[3086] That's dangerous.

[3087] I popped the ball again.

[3088] Damn you and your sharp...

[3089] You're supposed to hit it with the side of your foot, not the toe.

[3090] The side is the sharpest part.

[3091] I'll sharpen it some more.

[3092] Play against friends via DS download play and find out who's the true soccer champion.

[3093] That's DS Iwer.

[3094] Thank you, Jeff Gerstman.

[3095] As always, a pleasure.

[3096] Now it's time to take it to some e -mail.

[3097] Thank you, Brad Shoemaker.

[3098] Bombcast at GiantBomb .com is the name on it.

[3099] First e -mail comes in from Arohan Patla from Washington, D .C. Hi, Bombcast.

[3100] I recently read an article about Bobby Kotick laying out plans to monetize a previously untapped part of games.

[3101] Oh, God.

[3102] Cut scenes.

[3103] Remember that?

[3104] To his credit.

[3105] That was the dumbest thing ever.

[3106] To his credit, he didn't tap dance around the idea and seemed openly excited about the possibility of charging people for shit that used to be free.

[3107] Really?

[3108] To his credit?

[3109] A choice quote.

[3110] I think a credit that he did not dance around it.

[3111] He was straight up like, man, we could charge him for this.

[3112] A choice quote.

[3113] If we were to take that hour or hour and a half, take it out of the game and we were to go to our audiences for whom we have their credit card information as well as a direct relationship and ask, would you like to have the Starcraft movie?

[3114] My guess is that you'd have the biggest opening weekend of any film ever.

[3115] So before we move on, before we hit the question.

[3116] Yes.

[3117] I had this conversation, I think, with you.

[3118] Yeah, I was part of that.

[3119] And the only way I could rationalize this was to imagine that somebody had been like, do you ever think video games will beat movies, make its most movies opening day?

[3120] What do you think about that, Bobby Cody?

[3121] Do you think you could sell a StarCraft movie?

[3122] And then he would say his thing where he goes, well, we were to rip this whatever out from these players or whatever and we could charge for it and do whatever.

[3123] So otherwise.

[3124] I think that there's a case to be made for someone could go make a CG -based StarCraft movie.

[3125] Sure.

[3126] As a movie.

[3127] As a movie.

[3128] Yes.

[3129] But if you were to take what he said at face value, if you were to take it literally and take all of the cut scenes out of StarCraft and string them together and release it, it would be a fucking piece of shit.

[3130] It would look kind of cool in spots.

[3131] It would be nonsensical.

[3132] Yeah, it would be fucking crazy.

[3133] Also, you would be the biggest asshole in the world because the only reason I play StarCraft is to make it to the next country.

[3134] Yeah, it's like, guess what?

[3135] You're already selling that game for $60.

[3136] So why don't you just be happy with that?

[3137] Yeah.

[3138] And would you sell it if you literally did what he said?

[3139] Yeah.

[3140] How many of the people that bought the game and played it would then go, oh yeah, I'll pay for that again?

[3141] I don't know.

[3142] Does it say StarCraft on the box?

[3143] I mean, I guess we're talking about the stuff that actually comes with the collector's edition, right?

[3144] Isn't there a cinematics CD?

[3145] Yeah, all those cinematics are on the DVD.

[3146] So they already did that.

[3147] So, I mean, you could take it that way, or you could also take it of him basically saying, our production values are fucking incredibly high.

[3148] That's what I was taking as.

[3149] Our shit looks so good that if we were to rip it out and, you know, throw it out there to people, that we would fucking make a killing on it.

[3150] But if what he's talking about is their CG stuff, which...

[3151] to be fair, is of Hollywood caliber.

[3152] Yeah.

[3153] I mean, Blizzard's CG department is fucking amazing.

[3154] Yeah.

[3155] But there's about three minutes of actual CG in StarCraft II.

[3156] Sure.

[3157] And most of that stuff is just in -engine stuff.

[3158] So if he's looking at Pixar stuff and thinking, yeah, we are able to do that, you're not.

[3159] I would just like to put a moratorium on taking stuff Bobby Kotick says seriously.

[3160] Yeah, I mean...

[3161] Because he just says crazy things and then people get so upset about it.

[3162] But yeah, he's not wrong in the sense that if they were to sit down and try to generate a feature -length StarCraft CG movie, I bet that they would sell a lot of copies of that for $15 or $30 or something like that.

[3163] But you know, yeah.

[3164] Square first.

[3165] Square made Advent Children, yeah.

[3166] Yeah, but they also made Spheres Within.

[3167] That was just a bad movie.

[3168] They made that.

[3169] It was not, you know...

[3170] So that happened.

[3171] Yeah, but Paramount had a part of that too.

[3172] Yeah, I guess.

[3173] They made that with movie people.

[3174] Well, isn't the StarCraft movie, or no, the World of Warcraft movie paired up with Sam Raimi?

[3175] Legendary pictures.

[3176] Legendary.

[3177] I mean, you need a movie, like a studio, to get a movie made and distributed and stuff.

[3178] But yeah, if you just wanted to release it directly to your own huge fan base, they could go that route.

[3179] They could do that.

[3180] Resident Evil, they did it.

[3181] But that's not at all what he's talking about, of course.

[3182] He's literally talking about something they already made and they made the investment in creating and they sold to people.

[3183] He just wants to sell it again.

[3184] There's a context missing from this.

[3185] It has to be.

[3186] I think what he's really talking about is obviously selling it to people who have no interest in playing the game.

[3187] They just want to see, like, an hour of pretty stuff.

[3188] I guess.

[3189] But at that point, like, why would those people already be Activision customers?

[3190] Why would they already have the direct relationship and the credit card info?

[3191] Never mind that, like...

[3192] He's literally talking about World of Warcraft subscribers because those are the only people that they have a direct relationship with.

[3193] Those are the only credit card numbers they have.

[3194] Well, I mean, to...

[3195] And I hate to have to do this, but, you know, to Bobby Kotick's defense, from his perspective...

[3196] You slap the name fucking World of Warcraft on literally anything, and they sell out almost immediately.

[3197] So from that perspective of, man, these fuckers will just buy anything if we put World of Warcraft on it, I can kind of see how you might start hitting these kind of points of logic.

[3198] What was our friend's question?

[3199] There really wasn't one.

[3200] Just throw that out there.

[3201] I just feel like all this stuff he says reveals how deep his understanding is of the products he's peddling.

[3202] Yeah.

[3203] Oh, yeah.

[3204] Like, this has zero visibility.

[3205] This and the thing about how quickly he would like to monetize Call of Duty on a monthly basis.

[3206] Right.

[3207] Like, both of those things reveal that he has no fucking clue, like, why these things are popular.

[3208] Or how games actually really work.

[3209] Right.

[3210] Who is he saying this to?

[3211] He's at, like, investor conferences and stuff.

[3212] I mean, he came from packaged goods.

[3213] He came from...

[3214] When you look at it in that sense, it's been effective.

[3215] I'm not even saying, oh, he just doesn't love games and doesn't understand why this is morally wrong.

[3216] That's not the thing.

[3217] It's that he literally doesn't seem to understand the game, the market.

[3218] Why the games that sell so well are successful.

[3219] If these are the sorts of things that he's extracting from that, like, oh, we just take this part and do it.

[3220] Or, oh, we can just slap a monthly fee on what's there already and do it.

[3221] It's like, you know what?

[3222] And the weird truth is like, yeah, I bet if they said, hey, you now have to pay a monthly fee to play Call of Duty online, they would get some number of people.

[3223] I mean, it would drastically reduce the size of their audience.

[3224] But, you know, you have to weigh that out and go like, is the money we're pulling in, is that better than – the recurring money we're pulling in, is that more than what we would get at retail?

[3225] I think right now it's no. Yeah.

[3226] But – I mean, when you say packaged goods, you know, we're talking about laundry detergent and fucking cheese crackers.

[3227] Right, yeah.

[3228] It's a business.

[3229] It's just people need.

[3230] Well, but also it's a business built around increasing the sales of a product that never changes.

[3231] Yeah.

[3232] So, like, what do you do?

[3233] Like, you slap a prettier logo on the box.

[3234] So you're talking about StarCraft.

[3235] Right.

[3236] You find a more attractive way to packaging.

[3237] So, like, Guitar Hero or Tony Hawk or Spider -Man or StarCraft.

[3238] Or StarCraft.

[3239] So, I mean, if that's what he knows, then, you know, I guess it's no surprise that's what he's trying to do to video games.

[3240] Sure.

[3241] Commoditize.

[3242] Bivnith.

[3243] That's right.

[3244] Business is booming.

[3245] Sad.

[3246] Next email comes in from Matthew Potter in St. Charles Moe.

[3247] Potter?

[3248] Last week, it was mentioned that Reach got out to the pirate community incredibly early, way before the press got their hands on it.

[3249] I have to wonder where exactly do these early leaks come from?

[3250] Our Halo Hungry Hackers.

[3251] That's a good one.

[3252] Yeah, Halo Hungry Hackers.

[3253] My favorite board game.

[3254] Are Halo -hungry hackers actually attacking Bungie, scrounging their servers for disk images, or is it potentially further down the line on the distributors?

[3255] And also for other games, do these leaks generally pop up when the press get their copy?

[3256] I think they usually end up hitting before we get our copy.

[3257] Because it's somewhere in manufacture.

[3258] Yeah, most commonly it's people in a factory where discs are being made.

[3259] But this is a very particular one, right?

[3260] I think this case, my understanding is that they ended up putting a version of the game up on their servers.

[3261] On Marketplace.

[3262] On Marketplace.

[3263] Public Marketplace.

[3264] Yeah, on Public Marketplace with the intent of sending out codes to reviewers that would allow them to download it, but never putting it up for sale for average people.

[3265] Which is what they did with...

[3266] They did it with Crackdown 2.

[3267] It was kind of awesome.

[3268] It worked amazingly well for our purposes.

[3269] Yeah, but now it'll probably never happen again because apparently people found a way to trick those servers somehow into giving them the Halo Reach files.

[3270] Yeah, that's what happened.

[3271] That's why, yeah.

[3272] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[3273] Because I remember that.

[3274] I was thinking like, oh, awesome.

[3275] This is how Microsoft's going to do all their stuff going forward.

[3276] Yeah, probably was until that happened.

[3277] Well, hopefully they'll figure out how to close the loophole.

[3278] Damn you, internet hacker games.

[3279] I know, yeah.

[3280] But then on top of that, I think a disc -based version of it also leaked out.

[3281] Well, that happened with Halo 3.

[3282] You've got like, what, three weeks before it came out?

[3283] Yeah, yeah.

[3284] Like a French version.

[3285] And it's especially when they're making these.

[3286] gigantic worldwide releases make so many copies so many goddamn discs they have to start so early that as soon as that game goes gold as soon as it gets handed off to some kind of manufacturing facility someone's going to yoink it off a line and you know sell it to the russian mafia or which at one point i yeah it's like i did a panel years and years ago talking about like software security and it was like ps1 ps2 days and One of the guys said no and kind of backed it up and said this actually happens.

[3287] A lot of this piracy, there is that element of like, oh, we're hacker gangs and we're releasing stuff because, yeah, information.

[3288] But there's also an organized crime element.

[3289] Serious criminal element.

[3290] Yeah, to this stuff where they are selling hacked consoles in countries that don't get legitimate consoles and that they are also the software suppliers.

[3291] So they want to be the first ones to have the game.

[3292] to sell it to all of their clients and all that sort of stuff.

[3293] So there are multiple nefarious elements involved in software piracy.

[3294] It's not just, you know, I downloaded a torrent, Razer 1911 in a fair light, zero day.

[3295] Nobody broke into Bungie, though.

[3296] Looking for help.

[3297] Yeah, no, it was not a Half -Life scenario.

[3298] Yeah, that happened with Half -Life 2, and the reason that was as big a news item as it was is because that doesn't happen.

[3299] That was so radical.

[3300] That was so crazy.

[3301] That was just crazy.

[3302] That was heartbreaking.

[3303] Felt so bad for those poor guys, but still was like, man, that is an insane story.

[3304] Mind -blowing that that happened.

[3305] That was a keylogger?

[3306] Yeah, like somebody had installed, yeah.

[3307] There's a book in all that.

[3308] There's a book in Half -Life 2 development story.

[3309] A couple books going around, yeah.

[3310] That guy, whoever was the main perpetrator of that took a hard fall over that.

[3311] Like, they finally got him, like, a year or two ago.

[3312] Yeah, yeah.

[3313] I think he's going down for the count.

[3314] Like, they coerced the Duke Nukem, or the Half -Life guy.

[3315] They said, like, oh, you know, you're really smooth.

[3316] We want to come out and we want to maybe talk to you about a job.

[3317] Yeah, I think he was from, like, Germany or something.

[3318] Yeah, so they got him to fly in.

[3319] And he's like, oh, check this out.

[3320] The cops are waiting for you.

[3321] We still think you're really clever.

[3322] Yeah.

[3323] But we are apparently more clever.

[3324] The cops would like to talk to you about your cleverness.

[3325] Next email comes in from Andrew B. Fort Wayne, Indiana.

[3326] Hello, Bombcast.

[3327] Hello.

[3328] So the other day I was riding my bike and pondering life's great mysteries when I realized bikes are never used in post -apocalyptic games or movies.

[3329] Since gas would be very scarce and most riding animals dead, wouldn't bikes make a practical mode of transportation?

[3330] So would you guys like to see more bikes used in the post -apocalyptic setting, or should bikes just be in every game?

[3331] The roads are too unpredictable for bikes.

[3332] Mountain bike.

[3333] Also, tires are difficult to come by.

[3334] There is a bike in Enslaved.

[3335] Is there?

[3336] Is it like a hover bike?

[3337] But you also don't need tires to ride a bike.

[3338] It has an engine, so you might call it a motorcycle.

[3339] If you go, yeah.

[3340] I've seen plenty of people ride lots of bikes with no rubber wheels on them.

[3341] Just like plastic?

[3342] Like a big wheel?

[3343] No, just like, you know, on the rims.

[3344] What?

[3345] What are you talking about?

[3346] You go to Europe, where they just have bikes lying around, where it's not any dude's bike, but it's like, if you want to use a bike, there's a bike right there.

[3347] Get on a bike.

[3348] They have one of those big, huge front tires, too, and a little back one.

[3349] Yeah, you have to be wearing a single -strap unitard, have a big handlebar mustache.

[3350] Top hat, coattails.

[3351] Top hat, all these things.

[3352] I think in the...

[3353] Pre -apocalypse bikes are useful because things are close to each other.

[3354] But in the post -apocalypse, it seems like everything is real spread out.

[3355] And if you were just riding a bike, somebody would chop you in half and then eat you.

[3356] There's no protection.

[3357] You can't put spikes on a bike real well.

[3358] I mean, bikes are not good on rugged terrain, which is all there is in the post -apocalypse.

[3359] And just like dirt for miles and miles and miles.

[3360] Even the best mountain bike.

[3361] I don't know, but whatever.

[3362] I'd take a bike.

[3363] You bust up Fifth Avenue, you got all those vines growing out of it and stuff.

[3364] His bike is of limited use.

[3365] Jungle bike.

[3366] I don't know what I'm going to do.

[3367] I think it's just more of an – I think a bike would actually be incredibly useful in the post -apocalypse.

[3368] I think it's more of an aesthetic issue of you want the post -apocalypse to look super hard and tough and it's like, I'm riding my bike.

[3369] I bet there's a bike in Mad Max.

[3370] I bet there's a bike somewhere.

[3371] No, they're all – if it's a bike, it's like super like to make fun of the bike.

[3372] Maybe.

[3373] But I bet it's somewhere.

[3374] It's because it's all muscle cars and being brutal and Australian.

[3375] Bike and Tank Girl.

[3376] Seems like it would have a bike.

[3377] I would have to watch Tank Girl to define the information.

[3378] Is there a bike in Bike Boy?

[3379] Oh, the Fogtown Flyer?

[3380] Yeah.

[3381] Bike Boy and the Fogtown Flyer.

[3382] Bike Boy and the Fogtown Flyer.

[3383] If we say that enough times, something horrible will happen.

[3384] Bike Boy and the Fogtown Flyer.

[3385] You'll find that tape.

[3386] You've got to find that tape.

[3387] Are they opening for my yellow nightmare?

[3388] What was it?

[3389] Dude, you can't say that.

[3390] What was it?

[3391] I don't know because now I have to cut this part out.

[3392] Next email comes in from Chase.

[3393] Chase?

[3394] Chase Vallone.

[3395] Oh, okay.

[3396] In Fort Worth.

[3397] I'm sorry.

[3398] Damn.

[3399] Chase Vallone in Lake Worth, Florida.

[3400] You can see how I started saying Fort Worth.

[3401] Because it was Fort Wayne earlier.

[3402] Fort Wayne.

[3403] But also because it's Florida.

[3404] That starts with an F sound.

[3405] Lord Wayne.

[3406] Hey, Bombcast.

[3407] Hey.

[3408] Hey.

[3409] Hi.

[3410] He actually, in fact, included in parentheses after that your hey.

[3411] So I had to wait for you to say it.

[3412] All right.

[3413] This is all scripted.

[3414] Does he have the answer scripted, too?

[3415] No, no, no. I need my size.

[3416] It would have been easier.

[3417] I didn't get my line.

[3418] I've always been curious why Microsoft has never tried to capitalize on the portable gaming market.

[3419] Nintendo has had tremendous success in the major territories with their portable systems, and the PSP has...

[3420] at least survived in the U .S. and been quite successful in Japan.

[3421] Is this something that they're prototyping?

[3422] I just don't know.

[3423] I know it would be a gamble, but they've managed to remain competitive in every other gaming aspect, so why not even try?

[3424] They haven't exactly dominated the console market yet.

[3425] No. They've had a pretty good...

[3426] They're doing...

[3427] 2010, I feel, has been pretty kind to...

[3428] Especially compared to the first Xbox.

[3429] Yeah.

[3430] They're doing gangbusters, but, I mean, it's still very competitive with Sony and, like, Wii as far and away out in first place.

[3431] Sure, sure.

[3432] How many initiatives can they juggle at one time?

[3433] And look at the PSP.

[3434] That is not...

[3435] Well, I mean, they're also getting ready to launch Windows Phone 7, which is going to tie into Achievement stuff.

[3436] They're making a crackdown game specifically for that.

[3437] That's more the answer.

[3438] I think that they're more in the consumer.

[3439] There's almost a borderline of toy when you start getting into the portable stuff, when it's a dedicated portable handheld.

[3440] And the market is becoming such that, you know, Playing games on your phone ain't that odd anymore.

[3441] So I think that if they're going to put their gaming eggs in any sort of basket as far as portable stuff goes, it's clearly going to be there.

[3442] They did do some games on Zoom also.

[3443] Yeah.

[3444] They tried their hand at that.

[3445] And that didn't catch fire.

[3446] There's been rumors off and on about like, oh, they're doing the X -Boy.

[3447] Yeah.

[3448] God.

[3449] And all that stuff.

[3450] I don't know.

[3451] It just never really seemed like the timing was right.

[3452] The handheld races always just seem like it's Nintendo and then whatever else is going on.

[3453] Also, let's not forget that it's only been in the last 12 or 18 months that the Xbox division or the division it's in has even turned a profit.

[3454] They've been in this thing for 10 years and they're just now starting to make money at it.

[3455] Is the PSP doing well in Japan?

[3456] Is that a seller?

[3457] I don't know.

[3458] People like Monster Hunter.

[3459] I figured maybe the handheld thing is really big.

[3460] In Japan, where you have the DS and Japanese companies still in it, I don't really know what the sales is.

[3461] The DS still whips its ass.

[3462] No, I'm sure.

[3463] But maybe Microsoft is like, we have no penetration in Japan.

[3464] Maybe it's just a situation where they go to third parties and say, hey, would you guys want to develop for this thing?

[3465] If we really got behind it and built this thing, they're like, we're kind of already...

[3466] tied up in you know psp stuff even though we don't want to be and ds stuff because it actually does really well for us so no what if i told you you can make my notebook in hd oh i'm in all right i'm on board that's one that's one we see i don't know like like you know you had them off working on like tablets and stuff that got killed and you know then couriers yeah yeah and then you know like their all their phone stuff has been what let's just say garbage i guess i would say when yeah the the windows mobile platform has never quite clicked yeah i mean windows phone 7 seems like their best shot to have any kind of meaningful handheld yeah or meaningful portable game thing but even that's going to be like iphone style touchscreen uh stuff you're not going to get like here's a you know halo side scroller that is actually Fun to play because you have a D -pad.

[3467] It's because Jay Allard's not there anymore.

[3468] Totally.

[3469] Who else is going to evangelize?

[3470] Who else in the tribe is going to make that happen?

[3471] But also, yeah, it's a market that I think the best point that you made here is that that is a market that no one other than Nintendo has ever succeeded in.

[3472] Yeah.

[3473] Since Nintendo said there's a portable gaming market by putting out the Game Boy.

[3474] Right.

[3475] But they invented it.

[3476] And then other people tried it, and it didn't work for them.

[3477] Tiger was in there.

[3478] Nintendo had the Game & Watch well before Tiger.

[3479] How about those little football games?

[3480] Okay, Mattel was the...

[3481] But in terms of, like, cartridge -based handheld stuff, like, they...

[3482] So, yeah, like, they invented it and were successful with that, and then anyone else that's kind of tried at it, like, you know, PSP is the most successful.

[3483] Yeah, like I don't know that I would call the PSP a failure.

[3484] No, no, no, not at all.

[3485] And just like I don't know that I would necessarily call like the Game Gear a failure.

[3486] How about the Lynx?

[3487] The Lynx I might.

[3488] We're getting close to failure territory.

[3489] But I really like the Lynx.

[3490] Does Nomad even count?

[3491] No, Nomad doesn't count.

[3492] It's Genesis.

[3493] TurboGrafx have their Turbo Express.

[3494] It doesn't count because it's just a TV tuner.

[3495] Yeah.

[3496] Oh, my God.

[3497] Well, I think Nintendo was pretty smart in, like, always keeping it focused on being a game platform.

[3498] DS is kind of wandering into some weird territory.

[3499] But, like, I feel like Sony always promoted it as, like, a portable media player.

[3500] As, like, you know, UMD and all this, you know, watch Spider -Man on it.

[3501] And Nintendo was like, ah.

[3502] It's cute, and you play games on it.

[3503] It's tiny.

[3504] It's got two buttons.

[3505] Yeah, and I think it's ended up being...

[3506] It was the thing that got everyone excited about the PSP and then ended up being its biggest misstep was that they were able to produce something that resembled console -quality games.

[3507] Yeah, but then like...

[3508] Then it was like, wait.

[3509] It's too close.

[3510] How would I just play this on a console?

[3511] Now it just looks like a bad console.

[3512] The people that they marketed that thing to are not people that necessarily want to play all their games on a handheld.

[3513] Kids buy the DS, which is why it's successful.

[3514] Everything started looking like a last generation game.

[3515] This just looks like a bad...

[3516] It's kind of grungy, but it's close enough to a PS3 game where you notice.

[3517] Whereas DS games are so abstracted from...

[3518] Or you're surprised when they do something 3D.

[3519] You're like, why is 3D in this game?

[3520] Whoa, whoa.

[3521] Hey.

[3522] Picross 3D is amazing.

[3523] Also, PSP games don't play especially well.

[3524] Yeah.

[3525] Next to their console counterparts.

[3526] Right.

[3527] Well, mostly I think because of the dual analog stuff where you're like, here's this thing that's...

[3528] Well, that's the problem.

[3529] That's where the console comparisons bite it in the ass of like, wow, this looks really close to a console game.

[3530] But not quite.

[3531] But I don't have all of the controls that I'm used to on a console game.

[3532] Kind of plays like a console game, but not quite.

[3533] Yeah.

[3534] Kind of plays like an old console game or something.

[3535] Yeah, I don't know.

[3536] It's a weird spot.

[3537] But it's one of those things like really early on when you started seeing those games, you're like, dude, Ridge Racer is amazing.

[3538] They just went out and made Ridge Racer.

[3539] It was like an interesting tech demo that lost its novelty.

[3540] Yeah, totally.

[3541] Once you bought it and played it for a couple days.

[3542] And realized how long the battery lasted and how long the load times were.

[3543] You're like, man. All right.

[3544] One more email and we're out because we're almost out of time.

[3545] Jeff, you have to go get your car.

[3546] That's right.

[3547] I have mentions of moving cars.

[3548] Man. Haven't had one of those on here in a while.

[3549] Is it really that close to 8 o 'clock?

[3550] It's getting there.

[3551] Oh, wow.

[3552] Really?

[3553] Last email comes in from Brent Leonardo in Columbus, Ohio.

[3554] Hey, Bombcast.

[3555] A burning question.

[3556] Does iced tea actually even like iced tea, the beverage?

[3557] That would be weird as hell if he didn't.

[3558] I don't know.

[3559] Why don't you answer it?

[3560] Jeff?

[3561] The part of the gag that you didn't get there, the home listener, is that Vinny started moving his microphone like he was going to give it to Ice -T.

[3562] You don't think it reads?

[3563] I don't think that reads.

[3564] Sorry.

[3565] Pull back the curtain on that amazing piece of pantomime that we got there.

[3566] Do it again.

[3567] Like he has the self -control to sit there the whole show.

[3568] I don't know.

[3569] But that's a question that I probably would not ask Ice -T.

[3570] Yeah.

[3571] Not off the bat.

[3572] It's not going to be my first question.

[3573] Let's just say that.

[3574] Or even like your 50th or 500th.

[3575] Maybe you just have to do it real sly.

[3576] Be like, hey, you want something to drink?

[3577] I got lemonade.

[3578] We got some Lipton's.

[3579] That's kind of crap, though.

[3580] We have some fruit punch, which is kind of old.

[3581] Snapple.

[3582] Do you want some Nesty or something?

[3583] Do you like that stuff?

[3584] Yes, that's how it's going to happen.

[3585] Or I'll just fill a fridge full of name brand products that happen to have iced tea in them.

[3586] I'll just see what happens.

[3587] You want like an Arnold Palmer?

[3588] Some Nestea.

[3589] Yeah, I've got some Lipton Brisk, some Nestea.

[3590] Some Arizona.

[3591] I've got these Arizonas.

[3592] I've got some Snapple.

[3593] Some Sobe.

[3594] Yeah, I've got these Sobe.

[3595] Yeah, I'll take a peach Snapple.

[3596] Crap!

[3597] And that's it for emails.

[3598] Thanks, everyone, who wrote in.

[3599] Once again, bombcast at giantbomb .com is the address, and we're done.

[3600] Again, two for two of ridiculously overlong podcasts.

[3601] Chance, I want to thank you again for sitting through all that talk.

[3602] I think it's when we start late, and we just end up.

[3603] I think it feels weird.

[3604] Yeah, I don't know.

[3605] Well, I think we've had games that we've wanted to talk a lot about.

[3606] I guess it's just that season, right?

[3607] Last week we talked a lot about Halo Reach.

[3608] This week we talked a lot about Civ and then also a lot about Halo Reach.

[3609] So that kind of did it.

[3610] It's the last Halo game from them.

[3611] Yeah.

[3612] It's crazy.

[3613] Thanks to you, of course, the listener, for listening.

[3614] I guess that's all you can do.

[3615] And we'll be back next week.

[3616] They make it all possible.

[3617] We'll be back next week, they certainly do, with another edition of The Giant Podcast.