Giant Bombcast 03-15-2011

[0] What's up, everybody?

[1] It's the Giant Bombcast.

[2] Still your only source for news and views from the world of the Penny Arcade Expo East 2011.

[3] It is March 15th.

[4] I'm your host, Jeff Gerstmann.

[5] Ryan Davis out on PAX injured reserve.

[6] Out on...

[7] Can't feel his face.

[8] It's a PAXical.

[9] Yeah.

[10] PAX app.

[11] Yeah.

[12] Yeah, nice.

[13] Nice one, Vinny Carolella.

[14] That's me. It's so quiet in here now.

[15] Seems really silent without people yelling things.

[16] Brad, yell something.

[17] There we go.

[18] That's better.

[19] All right.

[20] So let's do a quick health check.

[21] Brad, you appear to be at about 20%.

[22] Some of us with Paxitis have still dragged ourselves into the office, which is probably the wrong thing to do.

[23] I think his brand of Paxitis prevents him from standing up.

[24] Okay.

[25] All right.

[26] Well, mine is rapidly approaching that point as well.

[27] Yeah.

[28] There's a lot of stuff going on today.

[29] You have 20 % of your Kung Fu left.

[30] Is that where you're at?

[31] I need to drink some whiskey to regain health.

[32] Yes, definitely.

[33] Vinny?

[34] I'm mentally blocking.

[35] I'm pushing past.

[36] I can't tell if it's just tired or rundown.

[37] See, I thought it was just tired yesterday.

[38] We got in at, like, what, 11?

[39] Yeah, like 11 .30 on Sunday night.

[40] I got home at 11 .30, 12.

[41] Oh, yeah, I got home about 12 .30 on Sunday night from PAX.

[42] Yeah, I went to bed at, like, 1, got up at 8, felt like I had to sleep another eight hours easily.

[43] Yeah.

[44] But otherwise felt pretty okay yesterday and today.

[45] It just hit.

[46] Death.

[47] Yeah, it's that second day that'll take out of you.

[48] I'm starting to feel muscle fatigue in weird places.

[49] But again, I just can't tell if I just need a good night's sleep or what.

[50] Yeah, I woke up like an hour early this morning against my own free will.

[51] And I feel pretty much fine, but there's moments of like, wait, no, that's...

[52] Wait, I'm totally – Yeah, that's not normal.

[53] Which it feels like a continuation of how I felt during GDC week where it was like I clearly had a fever and actually went under the thermometer and said, yes, I definitely have a fever but felt totally okay otherwise other than occasionally hot and cold flashes.

[54] A little bit of dizziness.

[55] Yeah.

[56] A few body aches.

[57] Yeah.

[58] Kind of operating under Ink Out Time to Bleed mode.

[59] Yep.

[60] Yeah, a lot of stuff to edit and a lot of stuff from PAX.

[61] Sadly, that should have been the mantra for the last three weeks, and then this should have been the week where...

[62] Hi, Will Smith.

[63] Will Smith brings a mouse.

[64] Hello.

[65] He brings a mouse.

[66] I have your mouse here.

[67] Do you need it back?

[68] You're welcome to use it for as long as you need it.

[69] Fantastic.

[70] I'll bring it back.

[71] Enjoy, sir.

[72] Thank you.

[73] What were we talking about?

[74] Now we have two mice in this room.

[75] Oh, man. Keeping it together.

[76] Rodents are disease carriers.

[77] Get them out of here.

[78] Yes, definitely keeping it together.

[79] We still have some stuff from GDC that we shot that has not gone up on the site yet.

[80] Do we have times for that yet?

[81] No, it's still the Batman thing, which has gone on to this ridiculous extreme.

[82] And the thing that they're waiting to reveal, which is not even in the coverage we have, I don't think.

[83] Really?

[84] I think that we might be able to actually run it.

[85] I don't know.

[86] If we don't talk about this one thing.

[87] Well, I remember when we were there, and then we asked them if that thing would prevent all that stuff from going up, and they were like, no, no, all the coverage is under that same embargo.

[88] I think the thing they sent out most recently actually said, like, interviews that cover this material are— I should cut the five frames where that thing would get mentioned because it's, like, so short and so silly.

[89] So that's— The horrible side – I don't want to like – I feel like I'm almost like tipping the hand on the announcement by even talking about it this much.

[90] But it is – like it's not worth it.

[91] If you're out there thinking like, oh, man, they're holding back this amazing thing and thinking that it's going to be something totally amazing.

[92] set your expectations appropriately.

[93] I still think it's a good interview with Dax again from Rock City.

[94] That guy is great.

[95] Is that thing cut yet?

[96] No. Is his mic check going to make it into the interview?

[97] Probably.

[98] Unless that's embargoed.

[99] We should run that right now.

[100] We should run that right now.

[101] But yeah, it just seems like at this point it's getting so far away where it's like you shouldn't have included that stuff at the show.

[102] Well, if I had to guess, there were some other people speculating this during GDC that this has everything to do with Batman being a thing that multiple companies have their hands on.

[103] So if it has to go through DC, it has to go through – they're putting out a movie and all this other stuff that there's probably – A lot of people that have to say, well, I don't know.

[104] I don't think I like this.

[105] You need to re -edit it and put it in.

[106] Everyone's got to feel that their voice has been heard, right?

[107] At some point, yeah, we should check the fine print and see if we can work around it and do something.

[108] Just to get it out of our lives.

[109] Right now it has moved to the back of the queue and back of PAC stuff, which can go up now.

[110] It is a quizzical situation.

[111] Yes, there are.

[112] Giant question marks looming over it.

[113] You have summed it up succinctly.

[114] So games at PAX.

[115] We did see a good batch of games there.

[116] When we were making our way around, shot a fair amount of interviews while we were there too.

[117] Yeah, not a lot of floor stuff.

[118] It was a weird setup for trying to get the wacky floor hijinks.

[119] Different than – this was my first time there.

[120] You went there last year.

[121] Different conventions.

[122] Yeah, different building and everything.

[123] There were no just kind of like bigger spaces where you can kind of hang out and catch people.

[124] It was all just kind of like either you're packed in densely onto the floor or it just spread out for miles.

[125] That's what it felt like.

[126] It was a weird distribution because – It seemed like there was floor space equal to the actual show floor devoted to just like tables.

[127] Yeah.

[128] And queues for like – Couldn't you guys have spread out the actual booths a little bit?

[129] Yeah.

[130] So it didn't make for like kind of spinning around and catching people on the floor or even doing like a floor tour.

[131] Right.

[132] It seemed real tough.

[133] But a very cool show, and like you just said, a lot of stuff.

[134] Yeah, I mean, I've got a list here of just stuff we can talk about briefly.

[135] Some of this we covered on our panel, which is up in its entirety now?

[136] I think part three should be up now, yeah.

[137] Okay, is that the final part?

[138] Yeah, part three is the ender.

[139] Okay, so yeah, that whole panel's up there.

[140] Definitely check it out.

[141] We had a good time doing that.

[142] And there's some guests there, too.

[143] Yeah.

[144] Informative.

[145] Yeah.

[146] No, not really.

[147] Guild Wars 2.

[148] That was the first thing we saw at PAX when we went to the show floor and then immediately off the show floor to this meeting room with very comfortable couches.

[149] Yes, they were.

[150] And snacks.

[151] And this is the first time I've seen Guild Wars 2 for any real length of time.

[152] Last time I was presented with it was on a show floor where I looked at it for like five minutes and went, man, that looks really cool, but I don't want to wait in or force my way through this line to get a closer look just yet.

[153] Also, MMOs don't play very well in short bursts on trade show floors.

[154] Well, I guess that's the thing about this game.

[155] It is kind of an MMO.

[156] I think it totally is an MMO.

[157] Which is weird to me because the last game was like...

[158] Diablo or something more or less.

[159] Or an MMO that isn't – it's not an MMO.

[160] It's like four -player, six -player, whatever it was.

[161] Like communal towns but all the combat is instanced.

[162] Right.

[163] Like all the towns are just chat rooms.

[164] It's like Phantasy Star Online style sort of thing or something like that.

[165] But this, they're talking about with their kind of big open – you know, it was like save the town from pirates stuff.

[166] They're like, if you have 60 players here, it'll be way harder than if you had three, which the moment for me was like, wait, you're going to have to be able to have 60 players.

[167] Like, that sounds pretty awesome, but they're not going to charge a monthly fee.

[168] They are going to microtransact around it like they've been doing with the first game.

[169] I think that game looks really cool, even though I dozed off for a moment during the demo, which has gotten around.

[170] Oh, really?

[171] Yeah, because whoever mentioned it to Alex Ryan must have...

[172] told the story around, or I think we actually mentioned it on the panel also, so I shouldn't be surprised, but someone from ArenaNet yesterday wrote me on Twitter and said, hey, I'm interested to hear what you guys think of the game, even though you fell asleep.

[173] I'm like, fuck.

[174] It was entirely the fault of the comfy couches and the harmonics.

[175] The awful night previous.

[176] Basically, we got to Boston all day, full day of travel.

[177] settled in for a little bit, went and got something to eat, and then immediately went off to judge Rock Band Night at the Brattle Theater, which was a lot of fun.

[178] Maybe the top five, top three drunk Brad moments I've ever been witness to.

[179] Let's not talk about it.

[180] You were wearing that captain's hat.

[181] Man, how did that happen?

[182] And there's some great photography out of that event.

[183] Real classy stuff.

[184] Yeah, very classy.

[185] Very classy photos of people doing not very classy things.

[186] Yeah, that pretty much sums it up.

[187] It wound up being a late night though.

[188] And then that's the night that Japan got hit with its earthquake.

[189] Oh, God, yeah.

[190] So that night ended with like getting back and very sobering to the TV.

[191] Yeah, and so the morning was kind of crazy.

[192] And then here we are at this panel all kind of like disoriented and confused or the meeting room and sitting on couches with snacks.

[193] It was very comfortable.

[194] So, yeah, there was that moment where I was like spent a good chunk of time kind of fighting my eyes to keep them open.

[195] And there was a moment where Drew, who was sitting a little bit behind us, leaned forward to Brad and said, hey, can you grab me a Clif Bar out of the basket of little food things on the table?

[196] And that was enough for me to like snap my eyes open in that way that you only do if you have actually been asleep.

[197] So then I immediately leaned forward to make the couch less comfortable.

[198] woke up for the rest of that demo.

[199] Reiterate again, no fault of the demo.

[200] No, certainly not.

[201] I think that game does, they were showing the thief class.

[202] I actually don't think I actually missed any information either.

[203] So they were showing off the thief class, which apparently will be able to steal abilities or items or stuff from guys and turn them against them.

[204] So one of the skills would be like, you know, jack this sword and then hit you with it.

[205] It's like the thief is Kirby.

[206] Every enemy comes along.

[207] A dual wielding Kirby.

[208] Yeah.

[209] You just suck up some ability from them and turn them loose.

[210] But what they were talking about with – they're talking about things where you don't necessarily need to party up to get credit for stuff, which is very much like DC Universe Online or like the Warhammer Online public quests where it's just like there's going to be stuff for you to – And as long as you're participating in these events, you will get an appropriate amount of credit for doing so.

[211] You don't necessarily have to go join a guild and find all these people, which is good for me because I like playing solo most of the time.

[212] But then I want those big event -type moments that you can only get with a group.

[213] So if they can strike that balance properly and then not charge a monthly fee and, like, I think visually that game looks really awesome, like, basically.

[214] they're nailing it.

[215] They're my, my favorite part was probably this world of Warcraft crap out of business.

[216] Well, Hey, we're not Nazareth anymore.

[217] God, what a, as soon as you walk into the convention center, there's a big rift banner and the rift slogan is we're not in Azeroth anymore, which, um, yeah, I don't know.

[218] I guess, you know, some people are always going to base their marketing around taking shots at the leader, but I think it just makes them look.

[219] weak i just don't know what that even means is that a good thing or a bad thing right is it like because a lot of people like being in yeah i know it's kind of if you told me like you're not in like this burger king anymore i might be kind of bummed yeah you know it's like oh but i needed to get yeah another fries yeah you're not in this land of unlimited whoppers and oh you can eat pizza like that wait is that in world of warcraft now because i'll go sign up you take your motorcycle there okay uh like yeah nomagon's been turned into a Giant Burger King.

[220] Just type slash chicken fries and you'll be taken care of.

[221] Oh, man. Yeah, I just don't understand.

[222] Why would you say that you're not in this awesome thing anymore?

[223] Right.

[224] Where am I?

[225] Well, it's like Kansas.

[226] Like, we're not in Kansas anymore.

[227] Yeah, but Kansas is kind of boring.

[228] That's the whole point of The Wizard of Oz.

[229] You're not in Kansas, you're in...

[230] Well, yeah, well, Azeroth is kind of boring.

[231] That's what they're saying, man. It's edgy.

[232] Oh, yeah, I don't know.

[233] I'm sure from their perspective of working on this game that they're super stoked about, it probably makes sense in that way.

[234] But, yeah, for everyone else, you're just like...

[235] It's almost like you're not in Oz anymore.

[236] Where am I?

[237] Kansas?

[238] Oh.

[239] Oh.

[240] How do I get back to Oz?

[241] Is it that way?

[242] I don't know.

[243] I haven't seen the game, so I really can't say anything.

[244] You've had the box sitting on your desk for a couple weeks now.

[245] How does it look?

[246] It's shiny.

[247] Great, because it's still in the shrink wrap.

[248] Great.

[249] Sorry.

[250] That box is not in Azeroth anymore.

[251] My favorite part of Guild Wars 2, the art style in the cut scenes looks really awesome.

[252] Yeah.

[253] All the graphic stuff looks really, really good.

[254] And I thought they went through character creation a little bit and showed kind of the intro video and how it reflected your choices.

[255] Yeah, it was cool.

[256] I thought it was really interesting.

[257] It was really well done.

[258] Some of the cut scene stuff in game, some of the voice work and stuff was not hitting for me as much.

[259] Some of the little characters on either side and kind of like – Right.

[260] Yeah, they were almost like – gay warrior you know japanese rpg cut scene yeah like old 16 bit like here's guy standing here guy standing here uh during that same demo they showed a uh a new uh rendering pass on uh ion is that how you say it yes uh which i guess that's getting kind of a facelift right yeah so that that's i guess in the client now or soonish and there'll be a toggle you know you can turn it on If you don't like the way it looks, you can turn it off.

[261] And the side -by -side stuff looked great.

[262] They made that game pop a little bit more.

[263] Like a little bit more, but it looked like a filter.

[264] It didn't look...

[265] It looked like they boosted the mid -levels on everything because everything seemed like a 50 % gray or black was over everything else.

[266] Yeah, like the old looked dingy, whereas this looked new, which makes me wonder.

[267] I don't remember.

[268] Granted, I didn't spend a ton of time looking at Ion, but it didn't look...

[269] So I wonder if they almost dinged it down.

[270] I don't know.

[271] But yeah, Guild Wars 2, interesting.

[272] I'm very confused by it.

[273] I kind of need to – my mind isn't firing on all cylinders, but I'm just confused at how that's all going to work.

[274] Yeah, I mean it looks like they're changing the way that all the classes work too.

[275] You were able to do a class in the previous game and it's like I won't be a mesmer and a dude with a sword.

[276] Yeah, now it's the way the skills work seem totally different.

[277] Of course, for people that have been following Guild Wars 2, they're probably like, yeah, no fucking shit.

[278] But this is the most I've seen of it.

[279] since they've been working on it.

[280] You tell me I can buy a box copy and play without having to play a monthly fee.

[281] Totally.

[282] I'm getting in there.

[283] Yeah, I mean, that's part of the reason why I played so much of the original Guild Wars.

[284] Because you could.

[285] Yeah.

[286] Any time.

[287] Yeah.

[288] I actually reinstalled.

[289] And the installer for Guild Wars was crazy.

[290] It was like one of the first ones that did that whole, like, just download this 200K thing and run it.

[291] And it's going to download the starting area, like base area stuff, and that will take some time.

[292] But it's going to just stream the rest of the game to you as you get there.

[293] Piss around in the main area.

[294] Which I thought was really cool.

[295] I remember when I first got one of those EVDO cards for mobile internet stuff, threw that on a laptop and said, I'm going to go download that Guild Wars installer.

[296] Just like see how long it takes to stream it down.

[297] Yeah, no, I have a lot of fond memories of that first game.

[298] So that's looking good.

[299] Warp from Trapdoor up in Montreal.

[300] We took a look at that.

[301] I didn't see that at all, but I heard you guys talking some good stuff about it.

[302] It looks real cool.

[303] What's the concept?

[304] So you're like an escaped lab experiment, this little guy, little cute little dude.

[305] And you're in this lab, at least in the very short demo they're showing.

[306] You're in this lab, and there are lab technicians and dudes with guns and barrels.

[307] All right.

[308] Your ability is to warp.

[309] So you can jump through walls, like basically just like teleport to the other side of a wall.

[310] And as a top -down, like Metal Gear Solid 1 kind of thing.

[311] So you can warp through walls, warp over obstacles if you need to, and also warp into these objects.

[312] So the barrels.

[313] The lab techs and the soldiers, guards or whatever.

[314] Like warp inside them?

[315] You can get in them.

[316] Oh, no. You can inhabit them.

[317] Oh, no. And when you're inside of them, you can warp out, which is fine.

[318] But if you shake the left stick around, you can make the thing blow up.

[319] Like a dude?

[320] So you explode out of it.

[321] And that's handy with barrels because you can do things like wiggle the barrel a little bit and guys will go like, hey, what's that?

[322] And get over to it and then wiggle it a bunch more and make the barrel explode.

[323] You don't blow up.

[324] No, you come bursting out of it like, hey.

[325] And that will stun the guys around you.

[326] Or you can warp into dudes and do the exact same thing.

[327] And they don't live.

[328] They do not live.

[329] You are then covered in blood.

[330] So kind of dark, huh?

[331] Yeah, I guess it seemed pretty whimsical to me. I thought the blood looked really good.

[332] There's like a pretty neat effect where, you know, you are covered in blood after bursting out of a person.

[333] But then the next time you warp, the blood does not warp with you and kind of splashes to the ground.

[334] So what's the point?

[335] Like a puzzle game?

[336] Yeah, sort of.

[337] Like each room is kind of its own little puzzle.

[338] Like here's these guards walking this, you know, it's like stealth puzzle sort of thing.

[339] And there will be shields both on guys so you can't warp through the shields.

[340] Oh, okay.

[341] But the shield won't cover their back or something like that.

[342] So it's like, how do I get behind this guy?

[343] Or there will be doors that are shielded that you'll need to be able to warp through.

[344] But you can't until you go find the power source and blow it up.

[345] Interesting.

[346] Okay.

[347] Yeah.

[348] Our style seems sort of like somewhere between Portal and Explosion Man. Yeah.

[349] Lab -coded guys and tile facilities.

[350] Yeah.

[351] EA Partners is publishing that.

[352] It's Trapdoor's first non -iPhone game, I think.

[353] And that'll be downloadable?

[354] Yeah.

[355] Cool.

[356] Yeah, that seems like it has a lot of potential to be really cool.

[357] What else?

[358] Our friends from Supergiant Games were there showing off Bastion, the latest version of that.

[359] And they have signed their publishing deal.

[360] Yeah, congratulations.

[361] Warner Brothers is going to be bringing that game out.

[362] They've announced it so far for...

[363] Xbox Live Arcade and PC.

[364] I guess the emphasis there is so far.

[365] But yeah, it was interesting to see.

[366] I mean, you know, seeing that those guys...

[367] go from IGF stuff and all this, and now they just have straight up their own booth, their own stand on the floor with multiple TVs and headphones so people can hear the narration.

[368] Giant banner behind them.

[369] Yeah, big old banner with the logo on it, and they're giving out 10 ,000 bandanas at the show and stuff.

[370] Bandanas.

[371] Kind of cool seeing those guys.

[372] The game is apparently playable start to finish.

[373] Yeah.

[374] So they're just in kind of the tweak phase on that.

[375] They're still showing that same kind of demo area that we have footage up on the site, but it actually looks pretty different now in terms of just like layers on top of it of UI and here you are getting experience and here's this and this and that sort of stuff.

[376] It's cool to see it come together.

[377] I'm glad we have a record.

[378] There's a recorded history of that coming together.

[379] It's kind of fun.

[380] It will be interesting to see the final game and see if things are in it or got cut that we did see something like the whip or whatever, if that ever actually made it in or stuff like that.

[381] We saw some of the animations from Building the Bastion, like the frog flipping and all that stuff.

[382] So it will be cool to see how that works out.

[383] Yeah, we'll have them back on last Friday of the month, I guess.

[384] We can talk about what it was like signing a publishing deal a little bit.

[385] I bet they're happy.

[386] Yeah, yeah.

[387] They'd probably be psyched.

[388] Yeah, it sounds like it's the right deal for them.

[389] It sounds like for guys who were going to make that game with or without anyone's help, it seems like they found the right guys for that.

[390] Warner had some other stuff there, of course, Mortal Kombat, which Brad and I did not actually play.

[391] Very long line.

[392] What build did they have on the floor?

[393] It's the same from GDC.

[394] Okay.

[395] So it had the 16 characters in it.

[396] but it's still relatively old in the grand scheme of things.

[397] That demo has since come out on PlayStation Network, and as of today, it's available to everyone.

[398] And that's four characters.

[399] That's four characters, yeah.

[400] Two stages.

[401] Yeah, yeah.

[402] And even with that, I guess you're seeing some of these combo videos come out of people doing 60%, 70%, stuff like that, and guys on the team, Ed Boon and company, are saying, yeah, that doesn't.

[403] work like that anymore, but it does in that demo.

[404] Weird.

[405] It's an older build, so damage numbers are different now.

[406] Oh, so it might be exponential or something?

[407] Yeah, yeah.

[408] They're still tuning stuff, so maybe those combos won't be quite as crazy when the final game comes out.

[409] It's kind of cool to see in a way, because it means people are getting into it, and some people love...

[410] You know, a good fighting game, whatever.

[411] I don't really know what I'm talking about, but it seems like people enjoy being able to show off and do sick shit in those games.

[412] And I enjoy watching that stuff.

[413] The same reason I enjoy watching Marvel versus Capcom to sometimes see like, holy shit, that's incredible.

[414] Yeah.

[415] It seems like the reaction, it's always weird because, you know, it's like I've been following Mortal Kombat for a very long time, like the Grateful Dead.

[416] Some would say.

[417] Get some tapes.

[418] Yeah.

[419] Selling some tapes in the parking lot if you want.

[420] Some live sides if you're into that.

[421] So I don't really have a great perspective on what other people think of it.

[422] It's like the game always sold well through the PS2 and Xbox era.

[423] But it got to that point where you're like, no one really cares about MK anymore but me. So it almost felt like this underdog sort of game when DC Universe came out.

[424] There weren't a ton of people going, yeah!

[425] But that game ended up selling a million copies or something like that too.

[426] But at the same time, this game seems like it's back.

[427] The more people that play it, watching people kind of walk away from it at PAX and some of the reaction, just talking about it with people at our bar thing and some other stuff, people seem...

[428] really into it yeah i was really on the fence about it um i had never been a huge uh mortal combat guy i mean i played a bunch of it and then uh like you were saying it's been around for a while in some form or another and sometimes not so great and 20 years of mortal combat next year i think and it's not like it just went away you know it had resurfaced right uh and then it was gdc when we played that build there that uh it felt great Like it really did.

[429] It's something about it felt real snappy.

[430] And I think I was telling you after we played it, I didn't really quite know exactly what I was doing, but I felt like it was doing exactly what I was doing with a stick.

[431] I don't know.

[432] I'm not vocalizing as well, but it seemed like I was in control and that's what I want from a fighting game.

[433] It seems like if I were to learn the moves well, I could do exactly what I wanted to do.

[434] instead of hitting buttons and dudes flailing around.

[435] It has a methodical pacing to it.

[436] Yeah, but also there's something that's real snappy.

[437] As soon as you hit that move and dude's in his animation, some of that stuff seems fast.

[438] Some of the other stuff did seem a little slow, but it seemed intentional.

[439] Brad, you've mentioned before too, the wind -up for Sub -Zero's ice ball.

[440] It seems like it goes into a longer animation.

[441] But the punches and stuff just seem...

[442] I don't know.

[443] It feels good.

[444] The hits feel hard in that game.

[445] Yeah.

[446] Which is something I guess MK has always been pretty good at.

[447] So that was there.

[448] Fear 3 was there.

[449] They're showing off some of the multiplayer in that.

[450] I spent a little bit of time looking at it.

[451] It looks kind of cool.

[452] They haven't really shown Fear 3 in a pretty long time now that I think about it.

[453] The last time I saw it personally and actually played it was E3 last year.

[454] I haven't seen much of it at all.

[455] Yeah.

[456] I did see it on the floor, too.

[457] Firefall was there again.

[458] Red Fives game.

[459] I think they showed that for the first time at PAX in Seattle.

[460] They're showing off a team deathmatch mode in that.

[461] I don't know.

[462] I like the style, the kind of cartoonish graphical look that the dudes have.

[463] I think it suits it.

[464] Yeah, maybe a little.

[465] They're cel -shaded kind of looking.

[466] I didn't actually play it for myself.

[467] People that I talked to that had kind of didn't necessarily have good things to say about it, which is too bad.

[468] The other game is in beta right now.

[469] They're taking sign -ups on their site.

[470] It's so hard to get past their signage.

[471] The StarCraft logo?

[472] Yeah.

[473] Really?

[474] It's just like – Well, they are ex -Blizzard guys.

[475] Yeah, but they take their font library and like – Yeah, I don't know.

[476] Yeah, the game logo is really kind of – And just the way they even put it up there on like big blue misty kind of stuff with dudes in big like power armor.

[477] Kind of do a double take when you see it.

[478] But I guess unless it's something – I'm pretty sure that game is supposed to be free to play and all that stuff.

[479] So let's see how that turns out.

[480] Brad, you checked out Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet.

[481] Yeah, that's a mouthful.

[482] Yeah.

[483] I keep wanting to call it Incredibly Strange Shadow Planet.

[484] I will also accept that answer.

[485] For whatever reason.

[486] Yeah.

[487] I think it's that damn zine.

[488] What is that game?

[489] I'm going to – I'll just steal this line from Vinny.

[490] It says – it seems like – oh, god.

[491] What were the three games?

[492] I've totally forgotten.

[493] Shadow Complex meets Limbo meets Pixel Junk Shooter.

[494] OK.

[495] So – You have kind of the art style of Limbo.

[496] Like silhouetted everything is – a lot of people were comparing it to Patapon.

[497] Damn.

[498] Although apparently the guy doing the art, the art director, he's actually not even part of the developer.

[499] Like he is from Hollywood.

[500] So he has his own like production company.

[501] Hollywood.

[502] I don't know.

[503] He worked on Iron Giant.

[504] He was an art director at Pixar for a long time.

[505] So he's got some chops.

[506] But I guess he put out a short film in like 2005 with that same art style.

[507] So like people crying rip off or whatever.

[508] Really?

[509] Yeah.

[510] Even though he did it?

[511] Some people in the comments were like, oh, it just rips off Patapon.

[512] It seems like he's dark.

[513] I'm not really seeing Pat upon him.

[514] I didn't immediately think that either, yeah.

[515] Anyway, it's got that silhouetted art style, and the thing you do is fly a UFO instead of running a guy around.

[516] So like the physics -y kind of movement is a little pixel junky.

[517] It's pretty floaty, so it definitely feels like pixel junk.

[518] But then it's got this map system, which is kind of the shadow complex -y part.

[519] It is straight up a map drawn on graph paper.

[520] As soon as I see that, you got me. So you'll get weapons and items that will let you access different areas.

[521] Tons of running into a pile of rocks you can't get through until you get the buzzsaw, and then you can cut your way through that.

[522] I still like games like that, but it's great to see someone taking that style of game and not just having it be a dude with a whip and or gun.

[523] I don't know if they condensed this stuff for the demo, but it felt like I was getting a new upgrade every five minutes.

[524] Come to think of it, it seems crazy that it would...

[525] uh, meet that stuff out that fast.

[526] But it was like, I got the Ray gun and then I got like a health upgrade and then I got the buzzsaw and then I got another upgrade for the Ray gun.

[527] What are you fighting?

[528] What are the enemies?

[529] Uh, it's a bunch of, it's a bunch of like flow looking single cell organism me kind of just weird stuff.

[530] Like a lot of tentacles.

[531] Yeah.

[532] A lot of tentacles, a lot of like hard shells.

[533] I thought maybe with like the look of that UFO that maybe it would be just like 1950s earth or something like that, that that would be the big reveal.

[534] But if they're crazy organisms, then.

[535] Yeah, I don't know.

[536] It is sort of maybe a 50s sci -fi looking alien kind of milieu or whatever.

[537] But it was cool that it seemed like the upgrades play in the combat.

[538] Like there are these enemies with like a big hard shell on the front that would like charge at you.

[539] So you just sort of have to dodge as they charge.

[540] And then before they turn around, shoot them in the soft spot.

[541] Okay.

[542] Microphone.

[543] Careful.

[544] Calamity.

[545] Careful.

[546] 18 % of your kung fu left.

[547] But as soon as you got the buzzsaw, which all the weapons have a really tactile feel.

[548] It's all dual joystick, and you have this buzzsaw on an arm, and you can just swing the arm around all over the place.

[549] So you can just charge through with the buzzsaw and just knock those things all over the place with impunity.

[550] And the animation, understandably, is amazing.

[551] Just watching the game.

[552] Super, super fluid.

[553] Really nicely animated stuff.

[554] Well, interview on that to come.

[555] Two cameras.

[556] Two cameras shoot for that one.

[557] Blow it out of the water.

[558] Great.

[559] Take an extra day to cut that one together.

[560] That's what happens when you've got three microphones and two audio inputs per camera.

[561] That's right.

[562] As you shoot two camera interviews.

[563] Fire Pro Wrestling was there.

[564] Before you get all excited, think back to TG.

[565] And I don't mean you guys.

[566] I mean the folks at home because I know.

[567] You guys hate – you have no joy in your hearts.

[568] Remember they announced Fire Pro Wrestling back at TGS and it's avatar -based.

[569] So it's an Xbox Live Arcade game where your Xbox 360 avatars wrestle each other.

[570] As opposed to being like this weird factory full of bootleg wrestlers of like, here's a guy who is very clearly and obviously The Rock, but we are not going to call him that because we do not have this license.

[571] All these Japanese wrestlers and all these American wrestlers and like all these guys coming together in this ridiculously deep 2D wrestling game that, to be honest, I've never been able to really get much out of because it is a very deep game.

[572] Yeah, I don't know.

[573] I liked creating characters and renaming them all to their right names and all that stuff.

[574] But when it came time to actually play it, it was like, I don't know.

[575] But now they're doing it with avatars.

[576] It seems like some of the gameplay is sort of the same, but it's maybe a little less timing based and a little – yeah, I don't know.

[577] Is it – so I think you mentioned a little bit on the panel.

[578] Isn't there an avatar guidelines thing about the use of those guys?

[579] Avatars aren't supposed to speak and there was some violence sort of stuff like they can't have guns and things like that.

[580] But obviously I'm not sure if this goes directly against those stated guidelines or not because they're not armed or anything like that.

[581] But I wonder if you have violence against – That's comic mischief.

[582] Yeah, it certainly is.

[583] Yeah.

[584] It's something like that.

[585] Though, I don't know, maybe you won't be able to bash chairs over each other's skulls or something like that.

[586] Who can say?

[587] So the thing is in your entrance it will show your accessories or whatever.

[588] So if you've got a boom box or one of those Halo Banshees or something like that, that will show up there I guess.

[589] With a new animation or just the animation?

[590] I can't imagine a new animation.

[591] Yeah, that would be real hard.

[592] Yeah.

[593] But they've got a lot of options for customizing your moveset and stuff like that.

[594] You'll level up your wrestlers and gain access to new stuff that way.

[595] But I played it.

[596] It did not grab me. And that's due out later this year.

[597] I guess this summer sometime or something like that.

[598] And that was right next to Trenched.

[599] Which we shot a follow -up interview.

[600] An informative piece on Trench.

[601] We clearly screwed up.

[602] Yeah.

[603] Our coverage is going downhill.

[604] Yeah.

[605] If we're starting to inform, then we need to walk that horse back in the barn.

[606] Brad, you played some more, right?

[607] For the first time.

[608] That was my first time.

[609] I think Ryan got to play more at Double Fine.

[610] All they had on the floor was a three -player co -op level with one of the in -between stuff, which is where you customize your trench.

[611] Okay, so what we played at Double Fine was a four -player.

[612] It was probably the exact same level.

[613] Microsoft just did not give them four kiosks.

[614] Right, right, right.

[615] I remember actually they mentioned that while we were at Double Fine.

[616] I was like, you just smuggle a TV in there while Teamsters aren't looking and set up a fourth one.

[617] But they weren't showing any of the loot stuff.

[618] I guess you do that stuff between missions.

[619] Yeah.

[620] It was just like, play this mission, it's over.

[621] So as I hear more and more about this game, I haven't played it yet, but is it like Monday Night Combat style where you have a gun, you have the Mac, obviously.

[622] Yeah, it's like the Blitz mode in Monday Night Combat, which was just team.

[623] human player stuff against AI.

[624] You can set up defenses and turrets, but you also can engage in direct combat.

[625] You're pointing a reticle and shooting.

[626] The difference is that Monday Night Combat only lets you build turrets in specific locations.

[627] You can put them anywhere.

[628] It's the same type deal of what you would expect, tower defense turrets.

[629] They were showing flak turrets that will take down airborne enemies, shotgun turrets for stuff that gets up close.

[630] They have like a field dampener sort of thing which emits a radius that as soon as any monster enters it, it slows them down.

[631] So the whole thing of I'm going to put that here and this shotgun turret next to it so you're moving slower and getting shot up.

[632] And they're trying to work their way to some object.

[633] In the case of this mission, it was like some kind of tower.

[634] So you have to defend.

[635] You have to defend.

[636] All right.

[637] All right.

[638] I'm putting it together.

[639] All right.

[640] And then, yeah, there were like loot crates and stuff that they didn't really say what that would necessarily do.

[641] But I imagine that will be where the hats come in.

[642] The lobby, they actually showed us very briefly at Double Fine.

[643] I thought that was kind of cool.

[644] It's like a big walking aircraft carrier where you will walk around just actually as a dude and you can pull the right trigger to salute.

[645] Great.

[646] And it's very quickly just like analog trigger saluting of this.

[647] You know, putting your right arm up and down and up and down and up and down.

[648] And you'll be able to customize your mechs there.

[649] You know, they're kind of comparing it.

[650] Well, you know, they mentioned stuff like Chrome Hounds, but it's not a very serious mech game.

[651] Once you're in there and shooting, you're not worrying about heat or any of that sort of stuff.

[652] But you are customizing.

[653] your mech to kind of extremes in some cases.

[654] Is it kind of just like legs, left arm, right arm?

[655] Yeah, different weapons and that sort of stuff.

[656] And the class of mech you take in will kind of determine some abilities.

[657] So like the medium one that I was using, if you hit the A button, it'll stomp down on the ground and stun guys around it.

[658] So you'll have kind of chassis -specific abilities or something like that.

[659] And that's max for people?

[660] Yeah, as a four -player game.

[661] And it seems like the sort of deal where if you have four people in there all shooting, it's a lot less strategy and a lot more shooting.

[662] It was a lot more of a shooter when I played it, but yeah, people were saying by yourself, it's a lot more dropping turrets and strategizing.

[663] I think that's what they said in the interview as well.

[664] And story -wise or stylistically, it's really cool.

[665] It's all sort of rooted in World War I era, like men's magazine artwork, propaganda posters and stuff.

[666] Yeah, and it's like these two guys who were code breakers sitting there listening to enemy transmissions, and they get zapped by some crazy transmission that makes them both super smart.

[667] Like a transmission from space, I think.

[668] Yeah, I don't know if they specify, but whatever it is, yeah.

[669] So one of them decides to go in the direction of, and neither of them can walk.

[670] They're both paralyzed.

[671] They're both paralyzed in the war.

[672] So one of them decides he's going to make a mobile trench.

[673] So he's got to take trench warfare.

[674] And make it mobile.

[675] So he invents mechs.

[676] All right.

[677] And, you know, he becomes a hero to the world.

[678] And, you know, the White House shows up.

[679] So the White House, you know, he's getting a medal at the White House in a scene.

[680] The other guy goes the other way and invents the television and brings the world to him, as they put it, instead of being able to go out to the world.

[681] And this is where the struggle forms.

[682] Wait, are you fighting against the TVs?

[683] He's fighting against TV monsters.

[684] Yeah.

[685] Monovisions, they call them, because there's only one channel.

[686] I would fight against that.

[687] Yeah.

[688] So this other guy is making crazy creatures out of TV screens and they look like crazy alien beasts and all this stuff and you're blowing them up and TVs are flying out and TVs are the currency you use to build turrets.

[689] So you're fighting TVs and you use TVs as currency?

[690] To build your turrets.

[691] But the turrets don't look like TVs.

[692] It's just best to stop there.

[693] Portal 2.

[694] They showed, I guess, the first six minutes and then another six minutes or so from somewhere later on in the game.

[695] This was actually regular single -player campaign stuff, not the co -op with the robots.

[696] This is Chell waking up and kind of picking up where the first game left off, but way, way later.

[697] I got to say, visually, the engine looks...

[698] Like the tech looks awesome.

[699] There's some stuff very early on where kind of the room that you've been kind of in stasis in gets ripped apart.

[700] And behind it is a gigantic area.

[701] And so the act of this room being ripped apart so you can see outside looks really amazing.

[702] Like the destruction looks really nice.

[703] But then when you see this huge area, it also looks amazing.

[704] So I wasn't necessarily expecting it to be.

[705] like visually as strong as, as it was.

[706] Uh, so I wonder if that's kind of an indicator of, you know, they are continuing to pump a lot of time into developing the source engine and, and what that means for, for valves, future games, I think, uh, bodes pretty well.

[707] They're showing it on a PC.

[708] Uh, they were showing it on a blu -ray disc that was rendered video.

[709] It was not, not a real time demo.

[710] Um, and, uh, Gosh, what else?

[711] They showed Wheatley, who's the personality sphere that I believe they have shown him before.

[712] He's a Stephen Merchant character.

[713] Very funny.

[714] Very funny.

[715] When they kind of warp ahead a little bit, you're introduced to Cave Johnson, who you may remember as the president and founder of Aperture Science.

[716] Some of the lore stuff before they were really talking about Portal 2 and they were doing all their crazy ARG, BBS, you know, photo stuff and some of the other stuff prior to that.

[717] There were mentions of Cave Johnson, I think even maybe even during Portal 1.

[718] And he is voiced by J .K. Simmons of Oz fame.

[719] Great.

[720] And he's just kind of barking at you the whole time.

[721] It seems like.

[722] They don't show him in person.

[723] He's just kind of the voice kind of guiding you on, sort of like GLaDOS was in the first game, at least in some of the stuff they showed.

[724] But it's hard to tell when you'll encounter his voice or if you'll encounter him in person and what state he is in when you encounter him.

[725] But the lore is such that if he is still in human form, he is very old.

[726] So I have my suspicions about what form he will eventually take if you...

[727] let's say, were to fight him at the end of that game or something like that.

[728] But also that game's done, certified, finished.

[729] It's a couple of weeks, right?

[730] It's like a month.

[731] April 19th.

[732] It's like a month.

[733] So they're done with Portal 2, which, man, they should just put out Portal 2.

[734] Switch on Steam tonight.

[735] Right.

[736] You know, they need to build in all that unlock stuff for Half -Life.

[737] Right.

[738] Yeah.

[739] All the hooks.

[740] Right.

[741] I thought that looked really nice.

[742] We shot an interview for that with Eric Wolpaw where we talk about Oz and the penitentiary series of films.

[743] Mr. Wolpaw recommended that I not watch the demo.

[744] I think we also filmed...

[745] You guys had just watched it and I was like, oh, I'll just go into the next one.

[746] He was like, you know what?

[747] If you're going to play it in a month, maybe you should just not.

[748] Since it is just the first season.

[749] Because this is what you're going to see when you start the game.

[750] The stuff, man. I think we did film that demo.

[751] We did film that demo and we will put it up.

[752] Or at least the footage will be in the interview.

[753] If you're already, like, if you already have faith that this game is going to be a game you're going to play and you're already kind of on board with it, then yeah, I can see that.

[754] I'm glad that I saw it.

[755] I mean, not that I wasn't going to play Portal 2, but...

[756] Now you're extra going to play it.

[757] Yeah, now I'm like, I'm super excited for it, even though I know, like, the first five jokes or something.

[758] Like, it's...

[759] It's really funny.

[760] Also, if that game just goes downhill after the first six minutes, we'll all be real sad.

[761] Hopefully there's a lot more game than that.

[762] Yeah.

[763] And, of course, there is still a game part to the game where you are shooting portals and stuff like that.

[764] And the things they showed from the later portion of the game, it did not look like lab stuff.

[765] And it didn't necessarily look like the back half of Portal 1 either.

[766] It had a really...

[767] interesting look to it uh but yeah uh watch that video if you're if you're having uh doubts or or second thoughts about portal 2 i think check that out it is shot off the screen so you know that going in i don't know how the audio is either but but i think that there's uh oh yeah i guess i don't know how the audio is maybe we won't put it up if the audio is all bad uh well at the very least we will put that footage over the interview yes so you will see while you talk about oz yes watch some of the demo right um Man. Yeah, so it came out of that extra excitement renewed for Portal 2.

[768] It's one of those things that kind of like foregone conclusion, like I will play Portal 2.

[769] I'm looking forward to Portal 2.

[770] It is the only game that Valve makes that I actually care about at this point is Portal, which was a weird realization to come to.

[771] Are they putting that simultaneously on consoles?

[772] Yeah, that's the thing where if you buy the PS3 version of the game, you get the PC version for free with it.

[773] But if you buy the PC version, you don't get the PS3 version?

[774] No. But I imagine maybe the PS3 version will be $10 more because it will be $60 and probably $50 on PC.

[775] All right.

[776] Anyway, Darkest 2, they're showing that in the theater.

[777] And – well, actually, no. It was like you had to line up to wait to play it.

[778] They actually were letting – Well, you guys saw a demo.

[779] Yeah, we saw a demo and then went through and played the exact same stuff.

[780] Oh, was it the same part?

[781] Yeah.

[782] Okay.

[783] Which – that was fine.

[784] I like the way that game looks.

[785] I had my doubts when they announced kind of the new developer and all that sort of stuff for that game.

[786] And it's been so long.

[787] It seems like it's been – Ages.

[788] Seems like a generation ago.

[789] When was that?

[790] That was like 2006?

[791] Maybe seven.

[792] It's been a while.

[793] Yeah.

[794] Either way, like that game.

[795] Yeah.

[796] It's been a long time since the previous darkness and kind of forgot about it.

[797] It's got a cool look to it.

[798] Hand painted textures.

[799] They're talking.

[800] Yeah.

[801] Like thick black outlines around the characters.

[802] Yeah.

[803] Sort of graphic novel style.

[804] Kind of remind me of 13.

[805] Yeah.

[806] Which is not.

[807] Which I immediately go, oh god, 13 was not a good game.

[808] I thought the demon heads looked way better.

[809] Yeah.

[810] Like the way they interact with each other, they'll sort of like nip at each other.

[811] That was in the first game.

[812] Yeah, but I thought this is better.

[813] Sort of exaggerated, cartoony look to that stuff.

[814] They give you a little more direct control over kind of the melee attacks with the demon stuff.

[815] Like you hold down the right bumper and kind of move the right stick around.

[816] You can get different angles on it.

[817] So you'll be able to...

[818] lift like slash guys in specific directions if you want or you use it to solve puzzles like they had you cutting open a like a wire on a wire box to it's a connect support for that yeah exactly my hands around um what else uh yeah so you have a execution moves in that game where if you sneak up behind a guy hold down the left bumper Or if you stun him by shooting him a couple of times or something like that, you can also do it.

[819] And depending on where you are pointed, when you grab him, it will pick him up on a different limb and then do a different execution as a result.

[820] So if you get him by the leg, he's hanging upside down there, and you kind of walk around, use him as a bullet shield, and then hold down the left bumper to have the other demon arm grab his other leg and totally rip him in half.

[821] And you're still eating hearts, right?

[822] Yeah, you are still totally eating hearts.

[823] You are still totally shooting out light sources to stay in the darkness.

[824] Yep.

[825] And it's all set against – at least this demo was.

[826] They said it wouldn't be like this in the full game.

[827] But it was like a bunch of action sequences tied together by a guy trying to steal the darkness from you.

[828] Oh, right.

[829] That was in the demo they showed.

[830] Yeah.

[831] Some weird -looking dude.

[832] Yeah, some creepy -looking dude who wants the darkness for himself.

[833] Wants Mike Patton inside him.

[834] Hey, who doesn't?

[835] Oh, man. I saw you getting ready to say it.

[836] I thought better of it.

[837] You need more kung fu.

[838] That's right.

[839] Everybody's a little slow today.

[840] I was ready to say it.

[841] I thought it was too much.

[842] Lob that softball out there and see who's that bad.

[843] For the record.

[844] I'm feeling a little frail right now.

[845] I wasn't capable.

[846] Yeah.

[847] That's more or less it for games from PAX.

[848] We definitely shot some more interviews than that.

[849] It'll be going up on the site.

[850] And we've talked about it kind of in the PAX panel and some other stuff here and there.

[851] Booth Babes.

[852] I have written down here under PAX.

[853] What about them?

[854] Yeah, they were there.

[855] I didn't really see you.

[856] I guess it was like the Duke Nukem booth and it was like the IGN Sprint area.

[857] I had some ladies there.

[858] Turtle Beach had a little lady.

[859] Yeah.

[860] They were just showing off some product.

[861] I don't know.

[862] It's hard for us.

[863] There were definitely some people who had.

[864] Some outrage about it.

[865] I think it's hard for me to register because it seems like so expected at every conference.

[866] There are millions of them.

[867] There are plenty of booth babes.

[868] And so it doesn't even register that they should or should not be there until somebody said it to me. I was like, oh, right.

[869] That's totally one of the rules of PAX was they were supposed to.

[870] So I guess the rule technically was like if it's in the game, it's fine.

[871] So in the case of Duke Nukem, I think it just could have been naked probably.

[872] It makes sense to me too for that show when you've got little kids walking around and you're trying to do family -friendly stuff and you don't really want.

[873] And I think it's a show that – well, I mean you could argue the same thing about E3 but maybe not soundly.

[874] It's supposed to be a show where the games are kind of the stars and the people there are people that are already interested in video games.

[875] So to go through this whole rigmarole of we need to entice you to our booth with free crap and girls like it was some kind of boat show is maybe a little less necessary.

[876] There's a lot of businessing happening there.

[877] I don't know if you noticed, but Ubisoft was doing it.

[878] Warner was doing it.

[879] They were just straight up taking preorders for games there.

[880] There was a big fat GameStop logo at the Warner booth.

[881] Right.

[882] Where you would go in and if so, if you pre -ordered Call of Juarez while you were there, you got a $20 gift or you would get a $20 gift card from GameStop.

[883] That's an odd direction.

[884] I'm not really sure how I feel about that.

[885] Yeah, I thought it was kind of gross considering that like they weren't even letting us play Call of Juarez and what they were showing to the average person seemed like even less.

[886] Like, how are you going to...

[887] Make a purchasing decision.

[888] But they had the ladder and they were updating the number of pre -orders we got number at the top of their booth when we were there for that interview.

[889] So it looked like they had gotten close to 200.

[890] Yeah.

[891] I mean, I think pre -orders, as someone who reviews games, you might expect me to say, hey, pre -orders are disgusting.

[892] And sure enough, I think pre -orders are disgusting.

[893] It's not even necessary anymore.

[894] Pre -orders?

[895] What purpose does it really serve?

[896] When Amazon will just ship you your game.

[897] Amazon will usually get it to you day of.

[898] Usually walk into a Best Buy.

[899] Even if you kind of order a day before.

[900] Sometimes you can order it as late as a day or two before and they'll still guarantee.

[901] Some stuff will dry up.

[902] I went to Best Buy day of looking for limited edition copies of Marvel vs. Capcom 360 and they didn't have it.

[903] They had some PS3 ones left over but I already had a PS3 limited.

[904] um when we were doing the review stuff but um and but yeah some so much of it just seems so like and it's not getting better maybe maybe it's different if you're not in the kind of a city where you have multiple buying opportunities maybe if there's like one store that's kind of your local store it can sell out more but yeah amazon ships everywhere it's true but like you know And then you get the pre -order bonuses on top of that.

[905] That's the part that's just – I mean nine times out of ten at a GameStop, you're not going to get those anyway because they run out.

[906] Do they really?

[907] Oh, yeah.

[908] Like – Yeah, they have the cards for the codes.

[909] Really?

[910] You can pre -order stuff and then not get that bonus?

[911] Yeah, most of the pre -orders that I've ever made with the intent of getting the bonus were not fulfilled.

[912] Get out of here.

[913] Yeah, totally.

[914] That is the worst, really?

[915] Yeah.

[916] My girlfriend even pre -ordered the last Harvest Moon.

[917] which I was very proud of.

[918] And it came with, like, a stuffed chicken or something, and they totally got, like, three of them in.

[919] Did you get, like, money off the game or something?

[920] No, no, they don't do anything but say sorry.

[921] You're kidding me. No, I'm totally serious.

[922] That is incredible.

[923] Yeah.

[924] I've never preordered anything.

[925] I actually even kind of hate when I order something on Amazon early and they call it a preorder because it's like, no, I just send it to me on release, and they're like, you preordered.

[926] Here's your bonus.

[927] I'm like, I don't really pre, I don't, I guess.

[928] So there's that and then EA has kind of fallen down the rabbit hole even further with kind of the marketing bonus Facebook tie -in.

[929] Like here's ways to get stuff.

[930] There's a pretty crazy video showing off like all the Dragon Age 2 stuff.

[931] It's like, hey, you get these items through Facebook.

[932] You get this item through Dr. Pepper.

[933] You get all this stuff through this.

[934] I got as far as before we left just installing that game at home on the PC.

[935] You go into the – there's a new game, continue, unlockables and options, and you click on unlockables, and it's just this row.

[936] that you can scroll through of things that are grayed out and the things that you have unlocked.

[937] And it doesn't really tell you exactly how you get them.

[938] It says, for more information, visit Bioware or EA slash whatever, whatever.

[939] But it's long.

[940] It's like 10 or 15 things that you're scrolling through, like rings and daggers, and there's Isaac's armor, and there's all this stuff.

[941] It's crazy.

[942] It is, I don't know.

[943] As somebody who wants to play a game as complete as possible, So I think that EA seems to be figuring this out or I don't know.

[944] So Fight Night Champion has the same type deal where there are boxers that you can unlock through a Dr. Pepper thing or whatever.

[945] Dead Space has a bunch of that stuff too.

[946] Yeah.

[947] But the difference with Fight Night is they actually are also selling all of that stuff.

[948] So if you just want to buy it, you can.

[949] And on one hand, I'm like, Well, now you're just like making me pay for stuff that should have been in the game.

[950] But at the same time, like this is stuff that in a lot of cases maybe wouldn't be.

[951] And maybe it's okay that they're at least offering the option if you don't want to jump through their stupid hoops.

[952] Like let me just pay my way through it.

[953] Screw you.

[954] Take your stupid blood money.

[955] Or maybe I just won't buy it at all.

[956] Like that's kind of the other thing.

[957] I'm coming to terms with not caring about bonus sword.

[958] Yeah, that kind of stuff I don't mind.

[959] Extra gun.

[960] It's just five days of bonus XP and whatever.

[961] That stuff I think is fine because a lot of that stuff too, especially in an RPG, you come in and out of like it's good for some levels and then you're past it or whatever.

[962] And it's more quest or character stuff that's just kind of like, man, you're going to lock me out of this whole.

[963] you know, art that you made specifically for this thing.

[964] And like, I kind of want to see it.

[965] So when they do that, it's just, and when you have to like pre -order from seven different places to kind of try and wrangle everything, what are you doing?

[966] Yeah.

[967] I mean, that's, you know, that's, I definitely want all the Mortal Kombat stuff, but I'm not going to pre -order from three different places.

[968] I was talking to some users at PAX and they were like, yeah, you know, I pre -order and then I buy the game and I just return it.

[969] So I take the content and then I just return it.

[970] And sometimes I get lucky and I get the full price back or whatever like that.

[971] And it's like, is that what you want people to do?

[972] Is this where you're driving people to basically rip out these codes?

[973] If you're actually opening the box and ripping out these codes, all you're doing is creating used sales.

[974] Yeah, and then you're making it so that's when you try to bring something back after you've taken a shrimp wrap off and you haven't even played it.

[975] And they're like, that's a used game.

[976] I can't take full price for that.

[977] Yeah, yeah.

[978] I don't know.

[979] It's a bad system.

[980] Yeah.

[981] So PAX was fun beyond all that.

[982] Good times.

[983] Thanks again for everyone who came out to our panel and to our bar adventure.

[984] Yeah, absolutely.

[985] It was fun talking to everybody.

[986] Yeah.

[987] A lot of good stories.

[988] Yeah.

[989] Let's quickly go over a little bit of news here.

[990] Not too much going on, I guess, with PAX and GDC kind of out of the way.

[991] But Prey 2 has been announced.

[992] Yeah.

[993] Human Head is working on Prey 2.

[994] Apparently that's what they've been doing this whole time maybe.

[995] I don't – they haven't shipped anything since.

[996] Prey 1 is like what?

[997] 2006?

[998] Sure.

[999] I think.

[1000] That sounds right.

[1001] Prey 1 is immortal.

[1002] Wasn't that like announced like 2003 or 1999?

[1003] Prey 1?

[1004] Yeah.

[1005] It was like a 97, 98 timeframe.

[1006] Yeah.

[1007] So they're doing another Prey.

[1008] I don't – that doesn't – Did you see this?

[1009] I just saw it on Twitter.

[1010] This is all I know.

[1011] Somebody said on Twitter right before we came in here that the rumor is that you play a human bounty hunter in that game.

[1012] I think it is supposed to be Tommy, but he's been totally redesigned.

[1013] I can't remember what happened at the end of the parade except for some bad news with the girlfriend.

[1014] That wasn't even at the end.

[1015] Yeah, that was like two -thirds of the way through.

[1016] I don't know.

[1017] This made it sound like you'd be some kind of alien in charge.

[1018] Oh, that you wouldn't necessarily even be Tommy?

[1019] Hunting down humans.

[1020] Okay, so maybe...

[1021] I may have interpreted that wrong.

[1022] Maybe the tables have turned and now you're fighting Tommy, like Prototype 2.

[1023] I don't know.

[1024] I did not like Prey enough to think that it warranted a sequel.

[1025] Yeah, it was okay.

[1026] But if this is using IdTech 5...

[1027] I don't think they actually came out and said that.

[1028] Yeah, they say it's using the cutting -edge IdTech technology, but they don't say what revision it is.

[1029] So if this is just like the Quake 4 engine...

[1030] Dude, they can't.

[1031] No way.

[1032] I don't think they can get away with that.

[1033] Well, whatever.

[1034] It's like Call of Duty still has some elements of the Quake 3 engine deep down in there.

[1035] It's so extensively modified.

[1036] Yeah, yeah.

[1037] But who's to say that they haven't been modifying the hell out of it?

[1038] I mean, think about when Prey came out and now they're just getting around to announcing what Human Head's next game is.

[1039] They haven't been doing something this whole time.

[1040] I think Brink is on Doom 3, right?

[1041] Is it?

[1042] Yeah, yeah.

[1043] I'm pretty sure.

[1044] Maybe it is.

[1045] Some modification thereof.

[1046] Jeez.

[1047] Yeah, so that got announced.

[1048] You know, just straight -up gut reaction, not knowing anything other than the name.

[1049] Like, Prey was not a game that maybe even needed to ship in the first place, and I don't necessarily know that I'm, like, on board for a sequel.

[1050] I'm definitely not on board for a sequel.

[1051] Like, maybe it'll end up being awesome, and we will look back on these statements six months from now and go, you're a fucking asshole.

[1052] I'm just saying.

[1053] When you say to me, pray too, I say.

[1054] Oh, no. Come on.

[1055] Really?

[1056] No. I didn't mind praying so much.

[1057] I'll give it a look.

[1058] Yeah.

[1059] Whatever.

[1060] I'm always excited until it turns out.

[1061] I'm not saying I won't give it a look.

[1062] Sure.

[1063] You're saying managed expectations?

[1064] I'm saying that.

[1065] you know, in terms of, like, games on the covers of French magazines that are, you know, designed to just, like, build up some excitement for it when you say, hey, man, we got the Prey 2 cover.

[1066] My reaction is, wow.

[1067] Nice going.

[1068] I would like to see more games running on that engine.

[1069] Yes.

[1070] Assuming it is a tech five, like that seems like a weird and cool engine enough that I would like to see more than just rage on it.

[1071] Yeah.

[1072] I wish I could remember more prey and maybe that speaks to prey, but I just, I remember some portal stuff in it.

[1073] Yeah.

[1074] I really liked the first hour or two of it.

[1075] The jukebox in the bar.

[1076] Yeah.

[1077] Alien abduction scene at the very beginning.

[1078] I thought it was really cool.

[1079] Yeah.

[1080] There was some stuff.

[1081] Yeah.

[1082] And then later on spirit walking.

[1083] And it felt like it just dragged on.

[1084] Yeah.

[1085] Too long.

[1086] Uh, tell me. PlayStation 3 firmware 3 .60 is now available.

[1087] PlayStation 360.

[1088] Yes, PlayStation 3 360 is now ready for you.

[1089] And they've added cloud saves for PlayStation Plus members, which was the rumored thing now for a little while.

[1090] It turns out, yes.

[1091] How does that work?

[1092] I don't know.

[1093] I actually signed up for PlayStation Plus.

[1094] Right before we left for PAX, going like, okay, cloud saves.

[1095] As someone who has to transfer saves a lot because we have PlayStation 3s here in the office and I've got PlayStation 3s at home, this is perfect.

[1096] This is great.

[1097] And also transferring saves on a PS3, not fun.

[1098] Not fun.

[1099] Let me tell you right now, one of the reasons that we often review games on the 360 is because of how easy it is to move save games from work to home and back.

[1100] Or at least demoing them.

[1101] Some games actually just lock it down even.

[1102] Yeah, yeah.

[1103] I mean, you know, on there you can just save directly to a USB stick, load from that, just plug it in your console and go.

[1104] You have to save to the hard drive on the PS3.

[1105] Some saves can't be moved.

[1106] There is no copy all per game function, which is, that's the worst.

[1107] Somebody asked at PAX how we prepare for video reviews, and the preferred solution if the game lets you save more than once is to save constantly.

[1108] Stagger your saves, yeah.

[1109] Back when it looked like we might do a Final Fantasy XIII video review, I must have 40 or 50 saves for that game.

[1110] And there's no copy all function.

[1111] So I had to literally sit there and hit about five buttons per save.

[1112] At that point, just bring your system with you.

[1113] I think I ended up doing that.

[1114] Well, then it's very hard even, too, to pull the saves and be like, are these the ones I want to sort by date?

[1115] Like, I don't even know.

[1116] Right.

[1117] So you haven't tried it yet?

[1118] I haven't tried it yet.

[1119] Some of the language they're using to describe how that works has me a little concerned when they talk about you can only restore your saves once every 24 hours because I would.

[1120] So the process for me will hopefully work like I will play at home.

[1121] Then I will come into here.

[1122] It will automatically push it up to your cloud or whatever?

[1123] I think future games will support the cloud stuff kind of natively.

[1124] Maybe that will sidestep this whole issue, but I think for older games you may have to copy it.

[1125] It basically just looks like a folder on your system, and you can copy things to that as a destination.

[1126] They give you 150 megs of storage, which is not tons.

[1127] I don't know how big the saves is.

[1128] Yeah, it varies, varies per game for sure.

[1129] The thing about only being able to access it once per 24 hours, though.

[1130] So I think they say restore every 24 hours.

[1131] So to me, that says download to your system.

[1132] But like I said, I haven't tried it.

[1133] But so it's hopefully for me, it'll work like, like I said, play at home, come in, download the save here, play here, go home, like upload at the end of the day, go home, download again and play.

[1134] And, you know, kind of ad nauseum.

[1135] So you don't think you can just do it?

[1136] So if downloading is what they mean when they say that, then I won't be able to do that because that will be twice in 24 hours.

[1137] You don't think it's something that eventually you'll just be able to do, save it directly online?

[1138] I think that's what they're talking about with future games, just having support for it directly.

[1139] And at that point, maybe it will be less of an issue.

[1140] That would be amazing.

[1141] Like I said, but also those will be two different saves over that 24 -hour period.

[1142] So maybe it doesn't count.

[1143] And it's something that I really need to test because it's something that has been kind of concerning me for a little bit now.

[1144] But, yeah, I'll try it out.

[1145] And hopefully that's just it's written weird when they're describing it and that's not really the case.

[1146] It sounds to me maybe more it's like a safeguard against just duping saves over and over again.

[1147] Like, you know.

[1148] Plug in this other PS3 download off the server.

[1149] Now I have a save on there.

[1150] Go take it.

[1151] Plug in another PS3 download off the server.

[1152] The other nice thing is this will work with all the copy protected saves and all the other saves that have been locked down to systems.

[1153] So like my little big planet one save that didn't transfer when I went from my launch PS3 to my slim PS3, I will apparently now be able to.

[1154] So you basically at this point for legacy stuff, you'll just have like a virtual drive somewhere that you can access online.

[1155] Yeah, that's sort of the.

[1156] how it seems to be working it's kind of cool it's cool yeah and it got me to sign up for playstation plus which has some nice stuff um in terms of just like here's some free little psp minis and some free bonus crap here and there like not all of it's great how much is that it's like 50 bucks a year um and they give you well you pay for 12 months and they give you 15 okay And, yeah, you know, like the access to DLC and some of the stuff they're giving you, like you kind of look at it and go, oh, this is totally free or, oh, this is like discounted like $3 because I'm a member.

[1157] Like it seems like the sort of thing that would end up paying for itself if you are a heavy user.

[1158] So, yeah, it's – yeah, I'm kind of into it.

[1159] Ubisoft has announced a rhythm game because, hey, it's 2011 and, you know, it's hot right now.

[1160] These are hot.

[1161] I hear guitar games.

[1162] Prey 2 and Rocksmith.

[1163] What?

[1164] Rocksmith.

[1165] This is going to be a game that lets you plug in real guitars.

[1166] Like any guitar?

[1167] Any guitar.

[1168] I didn't understand that.

[1169] Okay.

[1170] So it seems like it'll be a game that comes with a quarter -inch jack to PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360 adapter, and you plug in your guitar.

[1171] They'll bundle it with a guitar also if you want to go that route.

[1172] But, yeah, you will need to tune your guitar.

[1173] I find that hard to believe.

[1174] That's an analog signal.

[1175] This is something that apparently existed in previous form as Guitar Rising, which was a project that had been kind of coming to PC in various forms.

[1176] They kind of prototyped it a few different times.

[1177] My understanding is that this is just the signed up and commercialized version of that.

[1178] And they're kind of going to spin it as an educational tool.

[1179] There's got to be some kind of box in between there, though, that's analog -to -digital converter that is...

[1180] I'm not literally saying it's just going to put a quarter -inch jack on your USB thing.

[1181] No, no, but I mean it's some kind of interpretation that is, I guess, sensing pitch or something like that and sending out weird signals.

[1182] You can analyze the waveform, right?

[1183] I don't know.

[1184] Match it to whatever the software expects.

[1185] I have no idea.

[1186] I'm still amazed the Rock Band one works, and that's muting all the strings and stuff.

[1187] This one...

[1188] Whereas – I'm sorry.

[1189] That's capacitance on the neck.

[1190] That's not even pitch.

[1191] Yeah.

[1192] So I don't know how they'll do it.

[1193] Whereas the rock band stuff was sort of like keep playing the game and sort of learn while you're doing it.

[1194] Like this – the wording of this just sounds like straight up teaching tool and that's it.

[1195] Right.

[1196] I don't know if that's – It's the miracle piano teaching system.

[1197] Sure.

[1198] But for guitars.

[1199] Draw this turtle.

[1200] Mavis Beacon teaches shredding.

[1201] Cool.

[1202] Benefit of the doubt.

[1203] Let's see it.

[1204] Sure.

[1205] I'm excited.

[1206] In a market where people are turning away from, even the people that make the games are turning away from the genre in droves, it seems super crazy to come out and announce that game.

[1207] If it's less game and more tool, maybe they'll find a way.

[1208] Yes, it's actually a We Dare sequel.

[1209] It's We Dare colon guitar.

[1210] Spank the guitar.

[1211] Right.

[1212] I'll volunteer myself if you like to go through all of it.

[1213] What if it's terrible?

[1214] I mean, then I'll let you know.

[1215] But, I mean, I am, like, barely competent on a guitar, but I don't play regularly.

[1216] Do you have an electric guitar at home?

[1217] I would need to borrow one.

[1218] Okay, I think we have some in the office.

[1219] I've got a few at home, too.

[1220] At the moment, I have a beat -up old classical guitar at home.

[1221] I wonder what will happen if you plug a bass into it.

[1222] It'll just explode.

[1223] It'll just be like...

[1224] No one wants to learn how to play bass.

[1225] Please unplug.

[1226] To show you how to stand there and look cool.

[1227] Yeah, you need to have a good bass face.

[1228] There's a Kinect game in that.

[1229] Kind of lips poked out a little bit.

[1230] Yeah, just head, bass face.

[1231] Back and forth.

[1232] Very good.

[1233] Very good.

[1234] Now we're about to hit the bridge.

[1235] Okay.

[1236] Here's the change.

[1237] All right.

[1238] That's it for news.

[1239] Awesome.

[1240] Here's the stuff that's out this week.

[1241] MotoGP 10 slash 11 for PlayStation 3.

[1242] The 360 version seems like it's not coming to the U .S. It is coming to Europe.

[1243] It's motorcycle racing.

[1244] I don't know.

[1245] R. Tonelico Koga.

[1246] Nell of R. Uh -huh.

[1247] CL.

[1248] R. Tonelico fans, you guys.

[1249] Huge.

[1250] The biggest.

[1251] Tonelico.

[1252] Tommy Tonelico Rico.

[1253] Ars Technica.

[1254] Those are RPGs, right?

[1255] Sure.

[1256] That's a bullet hell shooter, right?

[1257] Sure.

[1258] No, that's a bullet heaven shooter.

[1259] Oh, man. Finally.

[1260] Shogun 2 Total War.

[1261] Yakuza 4.

[1262] Top Spin 4.

[1263] So Tennis.

[1264] That actually has 3D support.

[1265] I know you guys are big fans of that.

[1266] Homefront.

[1267] Review that on the site now.

[1268] Alex played it.

[1269] Alex played it.

[1270] We reviewed it.

[1271] I can't tell if I'm excited to play Homefront or excited to finally see an end to the advertising for Homefront.

[1272] It is everywhere.

[1273] Blanket it.

[1274] I wonder how other cities get it this bad.

[1275] I don't know.

[1276] It seems like they're really just trying to slam it down people's throats.

[1277] She's more pervasive than Rockstar, which is typically the market leader in blanketing urban areas.

[1278] I feel like at one point I was at like a Homefront, walking by a Homefront event.

[1279] where the in between a home front bus stop sign and a home front cab pulled up yeah and it was like and there was a home front billboard above me and then it made a blimp or something you know from the sounds of the game from via the review and from from talking to alex over the past week maybe they should have spent that money on the game i don't know i haven't read a review i've heard short maybe short campaign four to five it's like four to five hours which is kind of average for These kind of marquee multiplayer -focused shooters, I guess.

[1280] It's kind of sad that that's the average, though.

[1281] I know.

[1282] It's not a TV commercial for it, too.

[1283] Yeah, and they've been doing television for, like, a really long time.

[1284] Like, three, four months.

[1285] Easy.

[1286] No gameplay in that TV ad.

[1287] Yeah.

[1288] Just a little kid.

[1289] Sounds like the multiplayer is not half bad, but...

[1290] But odds are people have kind of selected a multiplayer shooter of choice by now between the Battlefield and Call of Duty split.

[1291] Like, if this isn't...

[1292] And Crysis out next week, I mean...

[1293] Right.

[1294] They're shooters.

[1295] If they haven't found a way to crack that nut and actually stand out on their own, I really question how that game is going to do long -term in terms of multiplayer draw.

[1296] Full House Poker is your Xbox Live Arcade and Windows Phone 7 release this week.

[1297] Up now, I think.

[1298] Can't talk anymore.

[1299] My kung fu is gone.

[1300] Brad is now laying his head on the table.

[1301] It is gone.

[1302] It's going horrible for him.

[1303] I'm dying.

[1304] Really looking forward to the St. Patrick's Day party that we're having on Thursday.

[1305] It's going to be a good time.

[1306] It'll be a good place to kill what else to sleep.

[1307] I don't know if I'll be here for that at this point.

[1308] This is, ugh.

[1309] Full House Poker is poker.

[1310] It's got avatars on the 360.

[1311] They've got some kind of live event.

[1312] I actually played in one of the live events last night with that.

[1313] How's that?

[1314] You play poker for 30 minutes, and you kind of move up and down tables from the diamond to the double diamond, and the stakes are different on each one, and you earn experience points for every hand, and basically you just want to have the most XP at the end.

[1315] So if you fold at the right times, you get bonus experience points and sort of stuff like that.

[1316] What kind of hooks are in there?

[1317] Is there any persistent stuff?

[1318] Your bankroll is persistent and your experience points unlock you additional animations and clothes and extra stuff for your casino.

[1319] And it seems pretty well done.

[1320] So these episodes last half an hour.

[1321] There's no live announcer.

[1322] It's not like Chris Cashman is back or anything like that.

[1323] It feels more like the...

[1324] uh, the other sessions they were running that were not the really live sessions where it's just kind of, they have an announcer and you still see a video that for right now is a video of full house poker.

[1325] But I have to imagine as soon as this thing launches, that's going to be an ad.

[1326] Um, even though they're making people pay $10 for the game.

[1327] So thanks for that.

[1328] Um, I guess I should wait until it actually is an ad before I actually start getting mad about it.

[1329] Right.

[1330] I don't know.

[1331] How long, how long is the video?

[1332] Like a couple of minutes, a minute.

[1333] It's like, it's like one of the tutorial videos from the game.

[1334] Okay.

[1335] So maybe that'll be an ad eventually.

[1336] Maybe not.

[1337] Slam Bolt Scrappers is out on PSN.

[1338] We got a code for that.

[1339] We should probably get a hold of that and do something with it.

[1340] I heard that was pretty good.

[1341] Yeah.

[1342] I don't know what it is.

[1343] It looks kind of cool.

[1344] And Plants vs. Zombies is out on DS Eyewear.

[1345] What?

[1346] Didn't it already come out on DS Retail Cart?

[1347] It did.

[1348] Yeah.

[1349] Yes, it did.

[1350] Well, now you can get it for $10.

[1351] Weird.

[1352] Which I'm only calling out specifically because it is the best written paragraph in Nintendo digital release history.

[1353] You say that without a hint of sarcasm.

[1354] It is a sharply written thing.

[1355] It says in here, the fun never dies.

[1356] That's pretty funny.

[1357] Get ready to soil your plants.

[1358] Oh, man. Is this where this is going?

[1359] I'm putting my head back down.

[1360] Tell me more.

[1361] Give me more.

[1362] The only defense is your arsenal of home garden plants.

[1363] That's G -U -A -R -D -I -N apostrophe.

[1364] All right.

[1365] Home garden.

[1366] Like garden.

[1367] Garden.

[1368] Yeah.

[1369] And there's something you can make your own zombie called the Zombitar TM.

[1370] That's fun.

[1371] So I don't know.

[1372] I actually don't like Plants vs. Zombies at all as a game, but as someone who spends a fair amount of time reading some of the most amazing paragraphs of text that just seem to come from video game hell.

[1373] Yeah, got a lot of good pun going on here.

[1374] That one's pretty good.

[1375] That one's pretty good.

[1376] I love that game, but it is way past time for something new.

[1377] Have they made a sequel to it?

[1378] Is there just a straight up Plants vs. Zombies 2?

[1379] I think they've updated it, but no, there's definitely no 2.

[1380] It's Michael Jackson.

[1381] No two yet.

[1382] Oh.

[1383] They took him out.

[1384] Yeah.

[1385] They replaced him with like a disco.

[1386] All right.

[1387] Disco zombie.

[1388] Which gets the job done, but it's not the same.

[1389] Yeah.

[1390] So we have a 3DS.

[1391] Oh.

[1392] It's sitting right there.

[1393] Yeah.

[1394] I wanted to open it up and play the music.

[1395] I wanted to play with it, but I didn't think it would be polite to handle it right now.

[1396] Does it look like there's an extra?

[1397] You guys probably have.

[1398] Fight request has been turned off.

[1399] Please note that closing the system will turn fight request off.

[1400] So I have Street Fighter 4 running here.

[1401] One thing I'll say, the speaker doesn't seem as loud as I can remember the DS being.

[1402] That's full volume?

[1403] It's full volume.

[1404] Granted, we're on headphones, so.

[1405] Sounds like Street Fighter.

[1406] Sounds like Street Fighter, right?

[1407] That's not really useful to anyone.

[1408] So the internet stuff is all TBD.

[1409] Yeah, it has a button for the web browser that says this will be added in a later update.

[1410] It actually has a button marked DSiWare, which I was really excited about, and I pushed that and it said this will come in a later update.

[1411] That's it?

[1412] Not even like a – Also, the system transfer button is there, but that will come in a later update.

[1413] I created a me using a photo of myself.

[1414] I take the photo and then it approximates that as a me. Yeah?

[1415] I don't think it really looks – Can I see?

[1416] Yeah.

[1417] This will really play really well on this here podcast.

[1418] Now you have your thumbnail for the podcast.

[1419] True, yeah.

[1420] Can you export these photos to something?

[1421] No, I'm just going to give you a look at the Mii running around.

[1422] Can you spit it to my...

[1423] Oh, just one more thing.

[1424] In addition to Mii characters met via StreetPass, you can also invite Mii characters from other games to your plaza.

[1425] Invite Mii characters from other games to your plaza?

[1426] Yes.

[1427] Okay, sure.

[1428] This will be added later on.

[1429] Is this the plaza music?

[1430] Yeah.

[1431] That's not bad.

[1432] But there's no shop.

[1433] So until they launch the shop, we can't.

[1434] So it's not even like it takes you to a front end that says coming soon.

[1435] It's just literally text that says you can't cook this.

[1436] Right.

[1437] I had to pick the hair and stuff like that.

[1438] It was just the facial features that it gleaned from the photo, and I didn't pick the right hair.

[1439] But anyway.

[1440] I'm turning it 3D off.

[1441] Yeah.

[1442] Yeah.

[1443] Yeah.

[1444] Yeah.

[1445] Anything, Brad?

[1446] Not so much.

[1447] Yeah, I wouldn't call that out.

[1448] I think that – so I'm actually really terrible at making anything that looks like me in any kind of avatar format because I don't spend a lot of time looking at myself.

[1449] Because it's hard.

[1450] My eyes are a part of my face.

[1451] And I think that there needs to be some sort of way for – like they should crowdsource me creation.

[1452] So like I should add a bunch of friends to my list and then it should just pop up and say, what do you think this person looks like?

[1453] And they should all make it and then it should average them together and say, here's what people think you look like.

[1454] And then you go, oh god.

[1455] Or it could just put that picture of you up and then you lay stuff on top of it to try and match facial features.

[1456] So it actually – when you take the photo, it kind of creates a block.

[1457] There's like a 3D block floating in 3D space because it's in 3D with the photo of your face on it.

[1458] And then that clamps around a Mii's head.

[1459] And then the Mii kind of struggles around like going like, oh, God, get this one out of me. And then it pops off and it's got the head based on it.

[1460] That was not great.

[1461] Did you take any 3D photos?

[1462] No, not yet.

[1463] We just got this thing this morning, here Tuesday morning.

[1464] I think that's up on the site now.

[1465] You can relive our delivery.

[1466] That was interesting.

[1467] Did you cut it?

[1468] No, it's cut.

[1469] It is my interpretation of our 3DS delivery.

[1470] Kind of a weird morning.

[1471] Yeah, it was exciting.

[1472] So we got a bunch of games with it.

[1473] Yeah, so we have Street Fighter.

[1474] That's the only one I've played so far is Super Street Fighter 4 3D, which I immediately just went in and got on.

[1475] the internet and played against someone because it's out in Japan.

[1476] And got matched up with someone, beat the living crap out of him for a couple of rounds.

[1477] And right at the end he quit.

[1478] So full on rage quit.

[1479] I get no battle points.

[1480] That still happens.

[1481] Any new network stuff in there?

[1482] Is it fun getting on our internal network here?

[1483] I got on the public one that was not protected.

[1484] But I would assume that this thing supports modern current standards, right?

[1485] I gotta hope.

[1486] I will try it out tonight at home where I have security.

[1487] We also have Nintendogs and cats.

[1488] Toy poodle and new friends.

[1489] Steel Diver, Pilotwings Resort, and Madden NFL Football.

[1490] Oh, you know what?

[1491] I didn't write it down, but we also have a Lego Star Wars 3.

[1492] That's right.

[1493] So I saw you guys when you busted it out.

[1494] The 3DS power supply is similar to the...

[1495] Same as.

[1496] Same as, okay.

[1497] Did you check voltage or anything on it?

[1498] Or there's no warning?

[1499] No, there's no warning.

[1500] It plugs right in.

[1501] So I assume it's the exact same.

[1502] So I wonder if you can trickle that off on a USB...

[1503] Yeah, we should dry that out.

[1504] We'll have to bust out Brad's retractable cable.

[1505] And you have a retractable stylus now, though not as big as Bradley's.

[1506] Yes, that's all in the video.

[1507] All these comparisons are already done already.

[1508] Yeah, so I think that's going to do it for us here at the Giant Bomb podcast room.

[1509] I don't have emails because Ryan has all that stuff.

[1510] Let me double check my email real quick.

[1511] Make sure you didn't send something in.

[1512] Nope, but I do have some great emails with people reading their own favorite Nintendo downloadable things if you want to hear those.

[1513] What?

[1514] We'll save it for next week.

[1515] Matt from England writes in to ask, do you think full retail games for the Wii and DS will ever be released as downloadable titles?

[1516] I want to download Pokemon through the air.

[1517] It's a beautiful dream, but come on.

[1518] They just got the Game Boy.

[1519] Yeah.

[1520] Dude, it's going to be a while.

[1521] It's going to be a little bit.

[1522] Like, seriously.

[1523] They'll finally break this tradition of only portable stuff on portables.

[1524] Yeah, that's the thing that bugs me. Well, the TurboGrafx -16 is on that list, which is not a portable system, even though they made a portable version of it.

[1525] The games did come on cards.

[1526] So there's some kind of precedent there, but I don't understand why they're not putting out SNES games.

[1527] Maybe it's because they're putting them out on the Wii.

[1528] Maybe they don't want to get into this weird game of people raging because they bought it on the Wii and want it automatically on the 3DS, which should happen.

[1529] I was going to say, hey.

[1530] That would be smart.

[1531] I think.

[1532] I would have a good time with that.

[1533] I might buy some more things, especially since I find it easier to buy stuff on the 3DS than on the Wii for some reason.

[1534] Or the DS.

[1535] Yeah, maybe you're right.

[1536] What are you going to do now with all your DS's?

[1537] Burn them.

[1538] I don't know.

[1539] No, I don't know.

[1540] Slam them together.

[1541] Yeah.

[1542] That one looks weird.

[1543] It looks like a sandwich.

[1544] I'm not digging the layer in between.

[1545] Like the different colored bottom.

[1546] This is the black one we're looking at here.

[1547] Sort of like bulges on the top.

[1548] Yeah, it doesn't look very elegant.

[1549] Like the top is a little wider or something, just like a lip.

[1550] Yeah.

[1551] It can't be that SP.

[1552] SP?

[1553] Yeah, GBAs, really?

[1554] Yeah.

[1555] I think the DSi.

[1556] Really?

[1557] So far is the pinnacle of Nintendo handheld design.

[1558] I still like that little clamshell.

[1559] I don't like the finish on the DSi, but everything else about it is great.

[1560] Are you guys playing anything right now?

[1561] Are you looking forward to playing anything?

[1562] I'm going to get into Dragon Age 2.

[1563] Like I said, I just had time to install it before we got out of there and wrapping up Bulletstorm.

[1564] That's kind of where I'm at.

[1565] I'm going to go play like 18 hours of sleep after this.

[1566] Sounds good.

[1567] Updated ratings.

[1568] Do you guys feel better or worse after this podcast?

[1569] Would you recommend this podcast to a friend?

[1570] Yes.

[1571] Okay.

[1572] I feel a little warmer, but I think that's the room.

[1573] Yeah.

[1574] So I imagine by tomorrow we will all have caught whatever each other has.

[1575] Oh, you've got it already.

[1576] Yeah.

[1577] We all have it.

[1578] So I just – I don't know.

[1579] Yeah.

[1580] Yeah.

[1581] I'm looking forward to building this PC.

[1582] Yeah.

[1583] That's soon.

[1584] That's in an hour or so.

[1585] We're going to get live on Tested.

[1586] So probably by the time you hear this, you...

[1587] It will have already happened.

[1588] Yeah.

[1589] Because I'm going to be doing that instead of editing this podcast.

[1590] Actually, you know what?

[1591] Maybe I can fit it in between now and then.

[1592] Oh, this will be crazy.

[1593] You could be listening to this right now while it's streaming live.

[1594] I know.

[1595] So say hi to us.

[1596] So super excited.

[1597] I'm getting this, you know...

[1598] I got a new PC.

[1599] We're going to put it all together.

[1600] What are you going to play at?

[1601] What do you test?

[1602] Crisis.

[1603] Can it run Crisis?

[1604] That's pretty much, yep.

[1605] There's no game that you just like die in the sea?

[1606] Trackmania.

[1607] All right.

[1608] No, I don't know.

[1609] No, there's really no one game.

[1610] It just felt like the right time.

[1611] I think we've reached the point in that cycle, in the console cycle and in the video game cycle that...

[1612] I'm waiting for Battlefield 3 to come out and then find out.

[1613] That was the catalyst.

[1614] I think I will buy a new video card when Battlefield comes out or something like that if there's movement to be made there.

[1615] But I'm also thinking about getting a new monitor, like a new bigger monitor.

[1616] Get like a 27 -inch Dell or something like that.

[1617] 3D.

[1618] No. You're a 3D world though, man. No, man. You've got the most 3D out of anybody I know.

[1619] It's true.

[1620] Yeah.

[1621] Welcome to it.

[1622] I need to be able to comment on 3D.

[1623] I don't even know you anymore.

[1624] I'm out of here.

[1625] Come with me to the future.

[1626] All right, fine.

[1627] Then you can hear all about that on my 3D -specific podcast that I'm starting.

[1628] I can't even see color yet.

[1629] 3D.

[1630] Yeah.

[1631] All right, that's it for us.

[1632] We will be back next week.

[1633] Hopefully return to full strength.

[1634] God damn it, man. I hope so.

[1635] It should be quiet for the next couple of weeks before we got to get out and Capcom Bethesda stuff coming up soon.

[1636] We're going to regroup.

[1637] All of Whiskey Media is going to regroup.

[1638] Joey will be back and Matt Rory.

[1639] Yeah, Matt Rory is back today from South by Southwest.

[1640] This office, man. Ravaged by disease.

[1641] Yeah, and travel.

[1642] Everyone's been scattered and sick.

[1643] Cyborg Ryan will be here.

[1644] Brand new tank tread legs.

[1645] Looking forward to that.

[1646] Thanks for listening and see you next Tuesday.