Giant Bombcast 10-25-2011

[0] Tuesday, October the 25th, 2011, and you are listening to The Giant Bombcast.

[1] I'm Ryan Davis.

[2] Let's take it around the table.

[3] Minnie Caravelle is here.

[4] You're listening to The Giant Bombcast.

[5] Jeff Gerstman is here.

[6] I'm not listening to The Giant Bombcast.

[7] You're not.

[8] You're making it happen.

[9] Whoa.

[10] You don't listen to it.

[11] You live it.

[12] And Brad Shoemaker is here.

[13] Brad, tell us about eating too many Altoids.

[14] Why would you eat?

[15] First of all, I compulsively eat Altoids.

[16] Okay.

[17] So know that.

[18] Yeah.

[19] So I just ate like eight or ten of them.

[20] It's easy.

[21] In like two minutes?

[22] Once you get into like a good Altoids habit, it's way too easy to start up in the ante of just like, yeah, like five at a time.

[23] Put them in here, crunch, crunch, crunch.

[24] Three at a time minimum for me now.

[25] Oh, no. You build up tolerance.

[26] It's like Blistex or any kind of lip balm.

[27] Like once you get on it, it's hard to get off.

[28] You're on it.

[29] Yeah.

[30] Because the lips will just fry.

[31] So a bunch of Altoids is one thing, but then to drink a cold glass of water directly after.

[32] I once made myself pass out by eating a bunch of Altoids really quickly and then taking like three or four deep breaths.

[33] Really?

[34] It just caused the hyperventilation effect to happen way more quickly.

[35] A little head rush?

[36] Yeah.

[37] Wow.

[38] Just like had such an extreme head rush.

[39] I'll be right back.

[40] It's not working.

[41] This was like a fun high school trick.

[42] Vinny, how you doing?

[43] Doing all right.

[44] You eating too many Altoids lately?

[45] No, never.

[46] This guy's clean.

[47] You don't like Altoids?

[48] I don't need Altoids to have a good time.

[49] You know, it just enhances it.

[50] We're having fun anyway.

[51] It just makes it better.

[52] Whatever.

[53] Dumb that chicken, you're a turkey.

[54] It just makes your breath that much fresher.

[55] I don't want to hang around with you guys anymore.

[56] You know what?

[57] That's your right.

[58] And as your friend.

[59] That's not how it's supposed to play out.

[60] I'll let you.

[61] That's okay.

[62] I understand.

[63] Look at the nerd over there with the bad breath.

[64] All right.

[65] So there you go.

[66] That's the correct way for this after school special to end.

[67] He is shunned, but he's a better person for it.

[68] And then Jeff dies in a car crash.

[69] In front of the library.

[70] Oh, man. I don't know what to do, Brad.

[71] They want me to take Altoids.

[72] Fucking eat eight.

[73] I'm on nine right now.

[74] Oh, no. I got to tell you, man. You got to stay off these Altoids, kid.

[75] Once you start eating them, you can't stop.

[76] I'm out of here.

[77] Let's go play some video games.

[78] I played Batman.

[79] Did you play some Batman?

[80] Yeah, like the rest of the world.

[81] Did you enjoy your Batman?

[82] I'm enjoying it.

[83] Yeah.

[84] Yeah, I'm hunting down things like Batman.

[85] Are you sticking to the...

[86] To the ring in every last bit of collectibles out of it.

[87] Everything that pops up on that map, get to Batman.

[88] I got to go get that.

[89] Yeah.

[90] So you've given that game 1 ,000 Batman?

[91] Oh, man. One Batman for every time you see something?

[92] 1 ,000 Batman hours.

[93] I've spent a lot of time just roaming around that city doing stupid things.

[94] There are a lot of Riddler trophies in that game.

[95] Yep.

[96] Too many, I'm going to say.

[97] I would agree.

[98] Yeah.

[99] And then there are Riddler riddles.

[100] Not enough of those.

[101] And then there are Catwoman trophy, Riddler trophies.

[102] Yeah, there should be zero Catwoman trophies.

[103] And then there are balloons you can pop.

[104] And there are penguins you can bust.

[105] And then there are...

[106] Harley Quinn heads.

[107] Everything.

[108] Wait, do you get anything for doing that stuff?

[109] Respect.

[110] That's it.

[111] The Riddler.

[112] Self -respect.

[113] The Riddler loves it when you bust up stuff.

[114] Yeah, those are all part of the Riddler challenge.

[115] Vinny doesn't have to flip on and off the light switch ten times before he goes to bed now.

[116] No, I still have to do that.

[117] So the...

[118] I don't understand how it's broken out in those lines.

[119] I don't either.

[120] I didn't complete any one of those lines.

[121] I don't know what happens when you complete a line.

[122] No idea.

[123] Is that how you unlock the challenge rooms?

[124] I don't know.

[125] Don't care.

[126] It's a lot of stuff for the Riddler.

[127] He wants you to do a lot of stuff.

[128] And then he's got his own little thing.

[129] The Riddler's demanding.

[130] So you know what it does do?

[131] And I don't know if it's just trophies or not, but it progresses the next step in the Riddler side.

[132] Yeah, he's taking a bunch of hostages.

[133] Then you get to do some really kind of easy little...

[134] So after you complete a number of Riddler challenge -y things, he comes up and says, all right, you can come play my next game.

[135] So, yeah, I'm enjoying the Batman.

[136] I've been doing like three of those by the time you're done.

[137] Okay, I've only done two, and I keep feeling like, man, there's like 400 Riddler trophies.

[138] It's a lot.

[139] I don't know.

[140] It's a lot.

[141] I had 130 or something by the end or something.

[142] So even though you can see them, some of them you can't get until you get special gadgets and stuff too, which is kind of frustrating because you don't know what the gadget's going to be and you don't know if you have it or not.

[143] I actually spent a good portion of the game expecting there to be a gadget that didn't exist.

[144] I've kind of been waiting for some stuff too.

[145] And then realized like, oh wait, no, I just need to use the remote control batarang in a different way than I've been using it.

[146] I had a revelation that you could use the spray gel to trigger those – to bust those question marks.

[147] Oh.

[148] Yeah.

[149] And you could lay down three spray gels at a time.

[150] Well, shit.

[151] Yeah, exactly.

[152] And I was like, oh, this is much easier than trying to fling three really quick batarangs and just pop them all at the same time.

[153] So there's a pro tip.

[154] Read my guide.

[155] Subscribe to my channel.

[156] Yeah.

[157] I accidentally did it and I was like – Oh, shit.

[158] Motherfucker.

[159] This is not hard at all.

[160] No, now these ones where I've been like, because a lot of them you click one and it's like, you got five seconds to get the rest of them.

[161] You just pop.

[162] You can't, yeah.

[163] And it's like, I got three at a time.

[164] What do you want?

[165] Man. So, yeah.

[166] World's greatest detective, eh?

[167] Tell me about it.

[168] So the problem with the world's greatest detective is that the world's greatest detective only frustrates me. This clenchingly frustrating when you've spent all this time trying to track down this psychopathic killer.

[169] There are many of them in this city.

[170] Guys are brutal.

[171] Full of psychopathic killers.

[172] They're brutal.

[173] And they're just cutting dudes up.

[174] They're taunting you with hanging bodies.

[175] And they're just cutting cops in front of you.

[176] And you get them after all this nonsense.

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

[178] Take a seat because I don't kill people.

[179] That's not how Batman does.

[180] Sit in this corner and...

[181] Don't escape.

[182] Don't escape.

[183] I'm going to wag my finger at you.

[184] I'm going to go get this other guy.

[185] Don't leave.

[186] You're going to sit there and think about what you did.

[187] You're already in a prison.

[188] Until I come back.

[189] Yeah, which is also kind of weird.

[190] I don't know.

[191] The whole conceit with the Arkham City thing.

[192] It is weird.

[193] They try and explain it and they try and weave a story around it and they've got a lot of gravitas.

[194] They kind of don't.

[195] But they're just – well, they kind of do.

[196] You end up finding stuff along the way that explains what I imagine must have been in the comic book.

[197] I have no idea.

[198] So they put out comics.

[199] What?

[200] That's set up.

[201] They put out a Batman comic book?

[202] Exactly.

[203] What the fuck is all this co -marketing shit?

[204] I got it.

[205] I got it.

[206] At least they weren't motion comics.

[207] I got it with my copy of Batman that I got from Amazon.

[208] So you have a comic.

[209] I have to give.

[210] Drew credit for that joke too when he said, there's a Batman comic book.

[211] Jesus.

[212] I laughed.

[213] So does that stuff set up?

[214] I haven't read it.

[215] Apparently it sets up why Arkham City is happening because doesn't it just seem like the worst idea in the world?

[216] Like how did Hugo Strange – like first off, Hugo Strange.

[217] Let's blow the whistle on putting him in charge of the crazies.

[218] Yeah.

[219] And then also like why would we cut off – like this seems like a pretty big part of Gotham and pretty prime real estate.

[220] Right.

[221] had Arkham Asylum, that was already a place designed for the crazies.

[222] Why anybody let him do that does seem a little questionable, but it is explained immediately.

[223] But minute one, it seems like it's just a front for something more nefarious.

[224] I have found enough stuff to flesh out how he was able to get away with it.

[225] But it's comic book style.

[226] Hey, guess what?

[227] 90 % of these guys can control your mind.

[228] Is that all in the game?

[229] Yeah, I found stuff.

[230] There's all these Arkham City story things, little vignettes you can read.

[231] But it's all side stuff that you collect, and then you can go read some text about it.

[232] And there was a ton of that stuff in Arkham Asylum as well.

[233] That's true.

[234] There's definitely a lot of collectible stuff and some audio recording stuff.

[235] Terrible idea.

[236] The part where the population allows it to happen.

[237] Okay, we'll move out.

[238] Right.

[239] Yeah, that's – I don't know.

[240] The mayor is saying it's probably a good idea.

[241] I don't – yeah.

[242] Put all these guys in this giant death city.

[243] Okay.

[244] Yeah, okay.

[245] In the middle of our – Just a third of our city.

[246] We'll just wall it off.

[247] That's fine.

[248] Yeah.

[249] I haven't really quite found the – Yes, in my backyard.

[250] To be fair, Gotham kind of sucks already.

[251] It's not like they were – rolling into Metropolis, not going to some nice place.

[252] It's like it's fucking Gotham.

[253] Like, yeah, I guess whatever.

[254] And this takes place not too long after Asylum, right?

[255] Six months.

[256] And then they got those walls up real quick because the whole city has these gigantic walls around it.

[257] Nanotechnology.

[258] Yes, they're fast.

[259] I don't know.

[260] Anyway, after you get past that part, the part where you...

[261] Hugo Strange's Contract and Buddies.

[262] They're good.

[263] That's what it's all about.

[264] No, no, no. Everyone's in everyone else's back pocket.

[265] No, because all those contracting buddies get locked up and then they're political prisoners that you have to save.

[266] That's right.

[267] Which I love the idea of political prisoners.

[268] The good prisoners?

[269] Yeah, yeah.

[270] Like how they justify like, well, you're trying to save this guy.

[271] How do we convey to the player that he's not a raper?

[272] There is an oracle conversation though where she's like, why are you worried about saving these prisoners?

[273] And Batman is kind of like, well, some of these guys got thrown in here because they were just enemies of the same.

[274] It's like lines of dialogue that they had to come up with.

[275] They probably realized one day like, oh, man. And she's kind of like.

[276] Okay.

[277] Yeah.

[278] Whatever.

[279] But you know there was someone there who was like, no, he should just say because I'm fucking Batman.

[280] Any decision that I make is based on the fact that I'm Batman.

[281] He kind of does.

[282] He's more of a dick in this one than he was in Arkham Style.

[283] Like he's got a couple of guys that are like, you know, chipping in for him, right?

[284] And every time he's like, are you sure about this, Batman?

[285] Yes.

[286] Well, how do you?

[287] Listen, I'm sure.

[288] Cut.

[289] And like he just goes off.

[290] He is the Batman.

[291] He is.

[292] And he's kind of a dick, a real big dick to a lot of people.

[293] He was a big meanie to Bane.

[294] I met Bane last night for the first time.

[295] For a guy that doesn't kill people, he hurts with his words.

[296] He really does.

[297] He hurts more of these scars.

[298] This game doesn't have as many moments as the first one did where someone says, he's going to go do this.

[299] No, he's not.

[300] He doesn't have as much of that.

[301] Enough of it where you're like...

[302] You know what's worse than when Batman's angry at you is when he's disappointed.

[303] That hurts the most.

[304] Yeah, when he just walks away and you're just yelling at me. No, yell at me. Shaking his head.

[305] Just yell at me. Punch me in the face.

[306] Tell me I did something wrong, Batman.

[307] I'm going to escape in three months.

[308] See you in the next game.

[309] So that part's really frustrating.

[310] I'll just be a collectible then.

[311] Is the game just kind of overwhelming to anybody at all?

[312] It seems like there's a lot going on at one time.

[313] They definitely launch into, hey, you can do all the side stuff right from the get -go.

[314] Kind of.

[315] But at this point now, I have the paths I'm going.

[316] I have threads I can follow if I want.

[317] Because some stuff comes to a dead end and they're like, okay, you can't complete this until some more stuff happens.

[318] The Riddler stuff just keeps popping up all over the place, though.

[319] That's overwhelming.

[320] I just stopped spending time getting trophies.

[321] If there's a trophy I can easily get, I get it, but I'm not going to spend any time on any of this stuff.

[322] The nice thing is you can track it to your map, which is cool.

[323] If you see one, you're like, I'm not doing Riddler stuff now.

[324] You can kind of take a picture of it and it'll put it on your map forever.

[325] Or if you interrogate the Riddler guys, you just get a whole section filled in with question marks.

[326] Are there incremental milestones with collecting trophies?

[327] Like every 50 trophies you get X?

[328] Collecting the trophies and completing that stuff is what triggers the Riddler side missions.

[329] Okay.

[330] And I don't know if that stuff actually gets you.

[331] I guess what I'm asking is there are reasons to start getting the Riddler trophies even if you don't intend to get all of the trophies.

[332] Sure.

[333] Okay.

[334] Yeah.

[335] I mean, whatever.

[336] At some point, I would like to punch the Riddler in the face.

[337] At some point, I'd like to take the Riddler out, but that's not going to happen.

[338] Yeah, you have to do everything to do that.

[339] So, I don't know.

[340] Some cool scenes happen.

[341] There was one scene that was kind of funny with having gotten rid of other stuff.

[342] There's a part, and I guess I'll just ask you later, the tiger security part.

[343] So there's some stuff that's almost like Metroid style.

[344] Like you can't access any of this stuff because you don't have the codes or the weapon or whatever.

[345] That stuff can be frustrating because...

[346] It's not like it comes up and says, I should come back here when I have the certain weapon.

[347] Some stuff does.

[348] Some stuff he's like, I don't have the code for this.

[349] But some stuff I spent a couple of minutes just trying to be like, there's got to be a way to get around here.

[350] And then finally just gave up on it and been like, all right, probably need something else to do.

[351] But there's totally stuff like that in Arkham Asylum as well.

[352] Yeah.

[353] Like he didn't have the right upgrade for the Batarang or whatever.

[354] Yeah.

[355] Although that was usually pretty clear of like this is a different textured wall or this has a target on it that I can't.

[356] Right.

[357] This is more like – That I don't recognize.

[358] This is a little more of like you don't have the optional upgrade to get this and like you don't even know you don't have the optional upgrade.

[359] There's an upgrade for the line gun or whatever that shoots – there's this gun that shoots a tightrope behind you and forward.

[360] There's an upgrade that you can get to stand on it.

[361] And you need that to get a couple of trophies.

[362] And I didn't even realize that was a thing until I checked it out.

[363] So get those upgrades.

[364] Still ripping off lots of grates and crawling through tight spaces.

[365] Choking dudes out.

[366] Doing Batman shit.

[367] Hammer that A button.

[368] RB.

[369] A lot.

[370] A lot of Batclaw on this one because it's all the city.

[371] I do not like grappling while flying.

[372] I think it's not.

[373] It's handled especially well.

[374] It was one of those things that for the early parts of the game, it seems a little clunky, but as soon as you get used to it, it's totally fine.

[375] The issue seems to be, I don't know if the camera's actually locked while you're gliding or if it's just you're preoccupied with trying to glide as opposed to move the camera around, but it seems like you end up grappling onto things you can't see a lot of the time.

[376] Yeah, that's true.

[377] But they give you that icon letting you know when there's stuff around to grapple onto.

[378] It's doable.

[379] The only thing...

[380] You get a lot of gadgets.

[381] I'm at a point where I get a lot.

[382] You start with a lot.

[383] Yeah, and then you kind of double up that wheel pretty quickly.

[384] So I've got a lot of stuff, and they map in the fights.

[385] They map a lot of stuff to at least four things to the quick shot.

[386] Five things.

[387] Five things?

[388] Is it the RB gets one too?

[389] Nope.

[390] It's a double tap left trigger, double tap right trigger, and then hold down left trigger.

[391] I don't know if I know what double tap right trigger is.

[392] Yeah, you haven't gotten that yet.

[393] Okay.

[394] And so that stuff, man, they give you a lot.

[395] And you have more that you can select from the menus.

[396] So it's probably a good thing.

[397] I find it a little, I don't know, counter and punch dudes a lot.

[398] Yeah, there were a lot of things that I pretty much never used, like the disruptor.

[399] It's really cool and kind of a funny thing to do, but not all that useful in practice.

[400] Or I didn't use it a lot in print.

[401] Yeah, so I'm still trying to figure out exactly how best to use that stuff.

[402] So far the best method for me is definitely...

[403] sneak until you get caught.

[404] Like basically snuff guys out until they find you and then kind of Batman or Arkham Asylum style if it gets too hairy you get the hell out of there and wait for them to kind of go off and do their thing and try and sneak back in.

[405] Take out the guys with the guns.

[406] Guns will still take you down.

[407] I think it's funny that, Jeff, you had no issue with the gliding stuff and, Brad, you took issue with it because I feel like this is the flip -flop from Just Cause 2 where, Jeff, you were never able to get a grip of the gliding mechanics there.

[408] It seems like there's a pretty close parallel as far as how those mechanics ought to work of kind of grabbing lower stuff and then – or I guess in this case you're grabbing higher stuff and stepping up to it.

[409] Letting go as you're kind of reaching the apex and then using that momentum.

[410] Well, when you boost, he automatically shoots past it.

[411] So basically you get this upgrade for your grapple gun.

[412] If you don't have it, you just zip into something and he grabs it, right?

[413] And once you get the upgrade, you can double tap the A button.

[414] So you hit A once to launch into it and you can hit A again while you're zooming.

[415] And he always shoots past it.

[416] So he'll always just go whoop.

[417] It's really just for blowing past stuff.

[418] You move pretty quickly.

[419] I don't know.

[420] The diving, gliding stuff.

[421] I don't use it all that often.

[422] It's not as useful as it might initially seem.

[423] Yeah.

[424] As opposed to just grappling on everything.

[425] Going around that way.

[426] Right.

[427] Yep.

[428] But it's fun.

[429] There's a lot of side stuff to do that I found that's keeping me occupied.

[430] The Riddler stuff is kind of all the trophies.

[431] It's overwhelming.

[432] It's overkill.

[433] Yeah.

[434] It's just too much.

[435] It's like everywhere you look, there's like three more just sitting out in the city.

[436] Yeah.

[437] I would have been happy with a quarter of the trophies and even as many as the Riddles.

[438] The Riddles are kind of more fun than the trophies maybe because there's just fewer of them.

[439] The detective mode stuff, I don't know.

[440] I'm liking it.

[441] It's got great polish on it.

[442] My bad suit's getting all messed up and torn up and ripped up.

[443] The realizations of the main characters, not even being a huge DC fan, are fun.

[444] They're over the top and ridiculous and stupid.

[445] I don't know where they find all these guys who have such crazy personalities, but they're out there.

[446] You want to talk about Rocksmith?

[447] Yes.

[448] So we got some Rocksmith.

[449] We played a bunch.

[450] We actually did record some stuff for it, but I think...

[451] I think we're going to re -record some stuff for it.

[452] Ryan, you sat in with me with recording.

[453] Yeah, we did a quick look, recorded a quick look last week of Rocksmith, which is Ubisoft's, not a game, but a guitar trainer.

[454] I'd say more like a teaching aid.

[455] It's more like edutainment in a way.

[456] Because there are some kind of mini -game stuff.

[457] You do play some stuff, but it's all meant to be in service of learning guitar.

[458] This is how you play guitar.

[459] Right.

[460] Because you're plugging an actual electric guitar in.

[461] There's a quarter -inch to USB adapter that comes with it.

[462] the game.

[463] You plug that into your console and then it just starts picking up whatever you're outputting.

[464] Here's a weird thing.

[465] I don't know how this happened.

[466] I don't know enough about how this all works.

[467] I turned the volume up at home kind of loud and started getting feedback.

[468] I guess it would make sense if it was loud enough that it would vibrate the strings at the same pitch.

[469] Man, it wasn't that loud.

[470] I know it was weird.

[471] Anyway.

[472] Your real light gauge strings on that guitar.

[473] That's super light.

[474] Maybe it was just standing real close to the speakers.

[475] That was fun.

[476] And you get feedback on a video game.

[477] Maybe it's totally simulated.

[478] I'm sure my neighbors love it.

[479] Maybe it's simulated.

[480] Maybe it's not even a real feedback.

[481] So, yeah, just to get it out of the way, we will definitely put something up, some kind of coverage of that game up without.

[482] our normal setup for recording.

[483] It was kind of a bear and problems abound in that thing.

[484] But I did take it home and I played a lot more of it and it's cool.

[485] It does what I think that piece of software intends to do.

[486] But it's not really going to be interesting to people who aren't out to learn guitar.

[487] A, you probably won't have a guitar, and you'd have to buy the big bundle, which would come with a guitar.

[488] Do you know what the bundle guitar is?

[489] I think it's Les Paul, and I think it's some kind of, well, it's probably an Epiphone style of Les Paul.

[490] I think it's like a $200 game and a guitar.

[491] Yeah, so I wouldn't expect anything too great.

[492] The game makes you tune, since it's all pitch -based.

[493] It's not MIDI or anything like that.

[494] It's all detecting pitch from the guitar.

[495] It makes you tune your strings every time you start something new.

[496] Every new song.

[497] Are you using any weird alternate tunings?

[498] The game hasn't presented any of that stuff, so I don't know if they will at some point.

[499] I haven't gotten that far to have them do that.

[500] It's a guitar rock game.

[501] You've got to get your drop D on at some point.

[502] It would be interesting if they did.

[503] It doesn't seem like that's the kind of rock that's in that soundtrack.

[504] It's weird.

[505] I did see stuff that when we were going through that song list, some stuff did, mostly it said standard tuning, standard tuning.

[506] So it might.

[507] So it does detect pitch, and you tune the guitar through the game.

[508] But it's very fast.

[509] It's just like, all right, pluck each string one at a time very quickly, and it's like, cool, you're still in tune.

[510] So I do kind of wish there was an option or something that kept track of, like, okay, your guitar is good enough to stay in tune.

[511] We're going to trust that, you know.

[512] You're cool on this.

[513] Maybe every other.

[514] Yeah, we'll start off every other.

[515] I can't understand because you would have a terrible experience if your Guitar War had a tune you didn't know.

[516] And the game is really interesting in the way it progresses you.

[517] And this is, again, part of why this probably is not best classified as a game.

[518] Every song starts you off mildly.

[519] It's not like you select a difficulty setting.

[520] It's like we're going to drop you in with just single notes and we're going to work you up to kind of more advanced stuff for every song you start.

[521] And if you're doing well during a song.

[522] During a certain phrase of a song, by that I just mean like the riff you're playing, every time that riff appears, if you have done well on the first time, you'll get the more advanced version later on in the song.

[523] But if you're up to a new riff, you've got to prove yourself.

[524] You're literally starting with holding one string.

[525] You're not even doing simple chords.

[526] For this early stuff, yeah.

[527] Later on it gets more advanced.

[528] And you can just go in and practice a song until you master it, which is kind of fun.

[529] Just each little riff.

[530] And it'll start off again pretty easy.

[531] And you're just playing that riff over and over again.

[532] And it's like, all right, you level, literally just like level up.

[533] And it starts throwing more at you.

[534] It's like, all right, level up.

[535] And you get like five lives to do it in, which I think is kind of weird.

[536] So they are trying to throw some game stuff in there at you.

[537] But, again, if your ultimate goal really isn't to learn how to play guitar, it's not a party game.

[538] But by no means, unless you are hanging out with all guitar friends and are like, let's all see how well we can play in bloom.

[539] Yeah.

[540] All right.

[541] Whatever, man. I could play that while I was dead.

[542] It's so easy.

[543] And then you're like, yeah, check out my, you know, Rocksmith Point collection, which, you know, it's all kind of in the service of learning to play an instrument, which I think is fantastic.

[544] But I don't think it's something that you're, like, going to buy for somebody who is like, oh, I bought you, you know.

[545] You like the rock band.

[546] Right.

[547] You really like rock band.

[548] And now, here, try this game out.

[549] I'm like, this is hurting my fingers a lot.

[550] It sounds like it's, yeah, it's an application.

[551] This is not.

[552] But it's well done.

[553] Yeah.

[554] There are, like, mini games in it.

[555] that try and help you, again, in the service of learning your instrument, which are kind of goofy.

[556] And, you know, it's like you got to shoot ducks going down a track by striking the right fret on a single string.

[557] And it's like just basically to make you not look at the guitar neck and look at the screen.

[558] And it'll be like 1 to, you know, whatever it is, 21.

[559] And you just got to shoot them.

[560] You know, they're goofy.

[561] It looks like, you know, it's like a Galaga ripoff or whatever.

[562] Right.

[563] It's a good way to build up muscle memory.

[564] That's exactly what they're trying to do.

[565] 80%.

[566] Yeah.

[567] Well, maybe not that much, but it's a lot.

[568] It's a lot of playing.

[569] It's that repetition, just doing it over and over again.

[570] And they're trying to, like they've, you know, everybody has done since the dawn of time is to try and make that fun for people, right?

[571] It's like, here's this really shitty thing you're going to have to do.

[572] Practice.

[573] It's an exercise.

[574] Hey, like what if I make it bright colors and like try and fool you into like practicing every day?

[575] And it's like, okay, you got me. Creating some sort of metagame to make you keep doing it.

[576] But I'm enjoying it.

[577] And it really is one of those things where once you are playing the song on 100 % mastery, you are really playing that song.

[578] And this time, for real, on a guitar.

[579] And it does chords and it does everything else.

[580] And since it's pitch -based, you can bend strings and do all sorts of nonsense like that.

[581] If you have a guitar and you're interested in something to...

[582] compliment your learning or just kind of have fun with it i do recommend it it's uh it's pretty cool but you don't think it's suitable as a standalone uh teaching tool uh it's hard for me to say yeah you know i'm kind of coming at it with with a little more knowledge than is probably the ideal level yeah Well, I don't know.

[583] It does start off really slowly and you can't skip.

[584] I've started it twice now and you kind of can't skip through some of that early stuff and that's kind of a pain.

[585] But I don't know.

[586] It would be interesting to toss it to somebody who's never played a guitar before and see if this doesn't make any sense to me. This is overwhelming.

[587] The way the notes come down are completely different than Rock Band or Guitar Hero for good reason.

[588] You probably don't want to pay all that licensing.

[589] But also the...

[590] I feel like it's a different way of presenting that information, but when you think about it, trying to present that much information, there's a lot that you need to say of this string, this fret, and we're going to show you three or four strings at once that you need to hit at this specific time.

[591] I think it's actually really good.

[592] The timing on the spinning bars seems like it's at least helpful.

[593] You have a visual representation of, okay, that's...

[594] That's this many beats away when it's in this position.

[595] It's kind of hard to explain how it comes down, but it does give you a little more heads up too into what's coming.

[596] Instead of just like trying to sight read this stuff, it does show you what to anticipate is coming up.

[597] It's kind of hard to explain.

[598] We'll do some more video of it and explain it.

[599] better that way.

[600] But again, it's cool.

[601] And that's Xbox, PS3, and I think PC as well.

[602] It's on all of them.

[603] Lag is a little weird if you're...

[604] And they repeat this throughout all the packaging and even in the game.

[605] They want you to run out analog audio into...

[606] Whatever sound system you have and don't go through the HDMI to try and reduce the lag as much as possible.

[607] Again, it's repeated throughout everything that has a setup in this game.

[608] The worst thing you could do apparently according to the game is go HDMI into your TV.

[609] I guess that introduces the worst lag of everything.

[610] Yeah, so I don't know.

[611] At least this is the direction on the PS3 version.

[612] We don't know if this carries across everything.

[613] 360, but I looked it up, and I think they want you to use the analog outs from the 360 as well.

[614] Consult your manual.

[615] Yeah, so heads up on that.

[616] I'm running it HDMI into my sound system, which takes HDMI in, and then HDMI out of that into the TV, and that's fine.

[617] There is a little bit of lag, but it's not killing it for me. And again, it's kind of a teaching tool, and they give you a lot of leeway.

[618] You can ring the string.

[619] before the note hits, and since it's pitch -based, it detects that that pitch is being played and gives it to you.

[620] It's pretty forgiving, and I don't mind because I'm not trying to get five stars on a song.

[621] I'm trying to learn how to play in bloom again.

[622] 20 years later.

[623] Have you all over again for the first time learned how to play in Bloom?

[624] I have.

[625] It's funny.

[626] First up, tune your six string down to D. That's right.

[627] No, in Bloom, Nirvana, I think they actually did tune a half step down, but they're not drop D as far as I know.

[628] It's fun.

[629] It's a cool piece of software.

[630] But not a game.

[631] I would not buy this for anybody and say, hey, win this game.

[632] Or have fun with this game.

[633] Well, I think you can have fun, but again, You need to have fun in the context of like, man, I really wanted to learn guitar.

[634] This is a fun way to learn.

[635] Instead of like, break out Rocksmith for my party.

[636] Right.

[637] Don't use my guitar because I don't want you to break it.

[638] Clap your hands.

[639] What guitar are you playing with?

[640] I've tried it only on, I've got just, it's funny, it's probably a similar guitar that comes with, it's an Epiphone Les Paul.

[641] I haven't hooked it up to any of my other guitars yet, but I assume it works.

[642] Works with your cheapest guitar.

[643] Hey, don't call my guitars cheap.

[644] Weirdest part of that whole game, I realize now that I've had that guitar for 20 years.

[645] Which is weird.

[646] That guitar played in bloom when it was first out and you were trying to figure it out.

[647] When I was opening up books.

[648] When they had the tablature for in bloom in like guitar magazine.

[649] Like, hey, learn how to play Black Hole Sun.

[650] 20 hot riffs.

[651] So, yeah, it's fun.

[652] It's cool.

[653] It's cool.

[654] And, yeah, we'll get a video up of it sometime in the near future.

[655] Did you mess with the amp modeling stuff at all?

[656] We did.

[657] Yeah.

[658] It's interesting.

[659] It's interesting.

[660] It's like anybody knows what a pod is.

[661] It's very similar to that.

[662] It's just.

[663] They're modeling different pedals.

[664] I think all the pedals are modeled after real -world analogs, but they're not – Named.

[665] They're not licensed.

[666] It's almost like Reason where it's like, hey, check out whatever fake – looks exactly like the real thing, but it's a fake name.

[667] It's got the grill designs on everything are evocative.

[668] It also says modeling software, like that sort of stuff, is some of my favorite stuff to use.

[669] I just don't ever run guitars through it.

[670] So the kind of cool part about – The Rocksmith with the amp modeling stuff is they will model the appropriate setup for each song so your guitar sounds appropriate in that song.

[671] And that's actually another kind of cool thing.

[672] So when you're playing Nirvana stuff, you don't sound like you're playing blues.

[673] You sound like your guitar has the right amount of distortion on it.

[674] And when you're playing songs that have like a flanger on it or something spacey or something weird, they have that on there.

[675] So it is really neat.

[676] It's well thought out.

[677] Not a game.

[678] But is it a game, Vinny Caraville?

[679] Yes.

[680] Okay.

[681] Totally.

[682] Any other games?

[683] Did you win at it?

[684] No. Oh.

[685] No. No, I lost terribly.

[686] Well, if there's any games that you want.

[687] Unless you want to talk about other software.

[688] If you want to talk about...

[689] Mavis.

[690] Mavis Beacon.

[691] Mavis Beacon.

[692] Yeah.

[693] That's pretty good stuff.

[694] Siri.

[695] That's all right.

[696] Is that how you learned how to type?

[697] Was it with Mavis Beacon?

[698] No. I used Broder Buns.

[699] Type!

[700] Exclamation point.

[701] Yeah.

[702] Did you take typing in school?

[703] I absolutely did.

[704] Was it on a typewriter?

[705] No, no. I was always on computers.

[706] Did you guys typewriter?

[707] Anybody typewriter?

[708] No, no, no, no. 286.

[709] Oh, really?

[710] By the time it came time for them to try to teach me how to type quickly, I could already type really quickly.

[711] Did you have to take a class, though, or did you just skip it?

[712] It was like part of the computer class I took in high school.

[713] Did you develop like really bad habits by teaching yourself?

[714] Were you all like two fingers?

[715] I wasn't two fingers, but I wasn't quite proper.

[716] But they weren't interested in that because all the software is like, hey, are you fast or what?

[717] Are you making mistakes or not?

[718] And I wasn't.

[719] Our class was on an electric typewriter.

[720] Wow.

[721] Like 40?

[722] Yeah.

[723] And it was typing slash shorthand.

[724] Whoa.

[725] Yeah.

[726] Do you know shorthand?

[727] No. They threw the oldest, most, like, could not.

[728] fire you because of tenure, but you're too young to retire.

[729] Teacher, they could at that class.

[730] So she was like 99, sleeping in the front of the classroom.

[731] And she said, if you could type the entire alphabet without looking at the keys, you get an A. And I did it on the first day.

[732] And that was it.

[733] So no, I don't know shorthand, but I could type the whole alphabet.

[734] But at that point as well, I could type the entire thing.

[735] And so it's just like, yeah, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, E, G. She's like, oh.

[736] All right.

[737] But everybody else just had...

[738] I'm going to go hang out by the lockers up front.

[739] It was a bad class.

[740] People were throwing books out the window while she was sleeping.

[741] It was on the third floor.

[742] The computer class I was in had – because they used it for typing.

[743] They had like plastic book holders that would hold books up at a proper angle.

[744] Yeah.

[745] And dude would like snap those in half, stuff like that.

[746] Typing classes – they must be gone now, right?

[747] See, I didn't have this savage fucking typing class experience, you guys.

[748] Like my first typing class was probably like fifth grade or something.

[749] I had plenty of experience with computers, but it was never in the context of we're going to teach you how to type.

[750] It was always like, we're going to teach you how to program.

[751] which I already knew that stuff too because they're freaking Apple IIs.

[752] How hard is it?

[753] By the time I got to high school, though, I think there were no more of the typing -specific classes.

[754] I had taken fifth grade, sixth grade, and I think maybe junior high I had a typing class.

[755] I'm sure not long after I took that class, they phased out whatever typing portion of it there was.

[756] I had it in ninth grade, but it wasn't called typing.

[757] It was called keyboarding.

[758] Wow.

[759] No shorthand for you, though?

[760] No. My stenographer's career just went down the drain.

[761] I don't know what my shorthand book is.

[762] Anyway.

[763] Does Alex still type with just his index fingers?

[764] I don't know.

[765] That was always the weirdest thing to me. He doesn't even look at the keyboard.

[766] Really?

[767] He just has two fingers.

[768] It's like going crazy.

[769] It's that drummer in there.

[770] Yeah, that seems like something a drummer would do.

[771] He types off time, too.

[772] My dad is a two -finger typist, but can get some good speed out of it because he's just been doing it for too damn long.

[773] Typing.

[774] Those bad habits.

[775] Schools.

[776] Vinny Caravella.

[777] So if no typing assisting software, we're going to have to move on unless there are other games.

[778] No, it was Rocksmith.

[779] And the Batman.

[780] It's hard to tear myself away from Batman.

[781] Yeah.

[782] It's very hard.

[783] Jeff Gerstman.

[784] Hello.

[785] What's going on in Skyland?

[786] I have saved the Skylands from the evil Chaos.

[787] Okay.

[788] And I have brushed back the darkness by building the core of light.

[789] Do they spell Chaos weird?

[790] K -A -O -S.

[791] Okay.

[792] So no. Fair enough.

[793] Does that mean you beat Skylanders?

[794] I did.

[795] I completed Skylanders.

[796] I saved the Skylands.

[797] You had to prevent the completion of Homefront.

[798] So what you're saying is that the...

[799] Yeah.

[800] Yes.

[801] So how...

[802] Fight chaos and make sure that's a lot of work.

[803] How are they going to get more money from you?

[804] I'm going to buy the rest of the stuff.

[805] At this point, easily.

[806] They've already gotten most of this.

[807] So he might as well finish it off.

[808] I'm waiting on one more package to arrive, but I have everything.

[809] That is available now.

[810] That is available now.

[811] There are still two more level packs and about 12 more characters.

[812] How many do you have?

[813] I have 24.

[814] Come on, really?

[815] 24 Skylanders?

[816] There will be 37 in all because that's counting all the variants.

[817] The DS version gives that away.

[818] Oh.

[819] The 3DS version, rather.

[820] Which I bought.

[821] You really have over 20 Skylanders?

[822] Yeah.

[823] How many?

[824] And two variants of each?

[825] I was out.

[826] No, there are not two variants of each.

[827] There are three Spyros.

[828] There are two Bashes, two Chop Chops, and two Trigger Happys.

[829] They have not released Legendary Trigger Happy, but he is mentioned in the 3DS version.

[830] How about Stealth Elf?

[831] I have Stealth Elf.

[832] Did you buy the 3DS version?

[833] Talk about Stealth Elf.

[834] I bought the 3DS version.

[835] It came with Stealth Elf.

[836] Oh, it did?

[837] Yeah.

[838] It's part of why he bought the 3DS version.

[839] Also, at that point, he had to know what the 3DS version looked like.

[840] I had to know.

[841] And it comes with a portal?

[842] Yeah.

[843] It's an infrared wireless portal.

[844] Oh, wow.

[845] And basically you can store two dudes on the 3DS version at all times, and it writes back to the toy every time you go back to sync it up or whatever.

[846] Wow.

[847] And you have to point it kind of directly at it.

[848] It's not great.

[849] It doesn't feel like magic the same way the console versions do.

[850] So that's a bit of a letdown.

[851] But it's nice because it's a little bit smaller, so I can keep that one hooked up to my PC for when I want to play the Flash minigame.

[852] So not to pull back the curtain here on the Magic.

[853] But you have deduced that they're storing in the toy, in the figurine?

[854] Yes, they are definitely storing in the figure.

[855] Okay, so there's something in there.

[856] Skylander, you have your legendary Chop Chop or whatever.

[857] It's writing back to it every time you drop it on there.

[858] Does it say that these things tie themselves to a gamer tag?

[859] It's not to a gamer tag.

[860] There is some sort of concept of ownership, and you can transfer that ownership to someone else.

[861] But yeah, so it'll all sync up to accounts and figure out who you are and such.

[862] And the first thing that you found was Chop Chop gear, right?

[863] And then when you started playing, it was like...

[864] Yeah, it was like one of the first.

[865] It's not gear.

[866] What you find are soul gems, which you can then use.

[867] That unlocks the ability for you to purchase the upgrade that...

[868] The final upgrade for each one of the characters.

[869] Oh, what does that do?

[870] It's, you know, like there are like 10 upgrades for each guy.

[871] So it'll be like, now you have infinite ammo for the golden minigun for trigger happy.

[872] That sounds pretty good.

[873] Yeah, it's not bad.

[874] So run on Chop Chop.

[875] I'm calling it.

[876] It's the first thing that you find, right?

[877] So that's the first one everybody's going to have.

[878] Right, the first one everyone goes, oh, I'm going to go.

[879] Oh, now I'm going to get a Chop Chop.

[880] Yeah.

[881] And then if you end up at Toys R Us, that's where they sell the legendary three pack.

[882] That has a rare Chop Chop in it.

[883] Or rarer, theoretically.

[884] That's how it happened for me. So what do you think?

[885] It's good.

[886] You know what?

[887] It is really well made.

[888] It is insidious and dark in a lot of ways.

[889] If you think about it in a gaming context, if this didn't have the toy side to it, everyone would be trying to set Activision on fire right now.

[890] Because all of it's on the disc.

[891] Right.

[892] And it's $20 for a level and they're going to put out four levels.

[893] Oh, you're saying if this was just $20 to get a piece of content.

[894] If they were just selling unlock keys, people would lose it.

[895] Wow.

[896] It would be the end of everything.

[897] But because they've come up with this novel toy -based system and it works really well and it's kind of surprisingly kind of cool, they get away with it.

[898] Right.

[899] What is the early word on the popularity of this stuff?

[900] Any idea?

[901] I don't really know.

[902] Is it really catching on?

[903] I don't know.

[904] We'll see here.

[905] Jeff loves it.

[906] The Toys R Us that we bought, that we made two of our Skylander runs on, there was a distinct change in stock between the two visits.

[907] I don't know where I read it.

[908] I forget.

[909] Somebody told me this or I read something about a Toys R Us shelf looking like raccoons.

[910] Gabe from Penny Arcade tweeted that they couldn't find any Skylanders anywhere because they're all...

[911] Had to jump on it early.

[912] So there are two retailer exclusive – or there's three – Toys R Us has a couple of exclusive things that only they sell.

[913] But then Walmart has a figure and Target has a figure.

[914] So Friday night I was at Walmart getting Drill Sergeant as well as Zap, which is not retailer exclusive, but it was the one I was missing.

[915] She had to buy a solo.

[916] Yeah, so I had to buy a handful of – I bought four solo figures, I think, at this point.

[917] And they're $12 or $7?

[918] No, they're $8, $7 .99, something like that.

[919] Though Amazon prices went up to like $13 last week, and they're all sold by third -party retailers.

[920] You're tracking the market.

[921] But I opened everything, so whatever.

[922] The portal will read things through the box, so you actually don't have to open anything if you don't want to.

[923] So you could have fat leveled up.

[924] Inbox.

[925] Inbox, chop -chops.

[926] Yeah.

[927] But that I'm not...

[928] Play with your toys.

[929] Yeah, I'm not crazy like that.

[930] Well, so what was the...

[931] You said Target and Walmart?

[932] Yeah.

[933] Target has Whirlwind, which I had to order online and has not arrived yet.

[934] That's the one?

[935] That's the last one that I'm waiting on.

[936] And then there are a handful of dudes that just straight up haven't released yet.

[937] Like Wornado, who looks like Gamera, but tiny.

[938] And what are you going to do with them?

[939] Are you going to go through the game again with these guys?

[940] I don't know, man. I don't know.

[941] What am I going to do with anything?

[942] I don't know.

[943] It's real.

[944] Yeah.

[945] Existential all of a sudden.

[946] I don't know.

[947] What question are you really asking?

[948] I don't know.

[949] I really don't know.

[950] What has Skylanders made you question at this point?

[951] Everything, man. A lot of stuff.

[952] All of it.

[953] It got me thinking because it's pretty well made.

[954] It's not a difficult game, but games aren't difficult.

[955] So I started thinking about the things that – there were a couple of spots in that game where I died a bunch.

[956] And your Skylander will have to rest.

[957] For the rest of that level, meaning you've got to swap on another Skylighter.

[958] Really?

[959] Yeah.

[960] If you run out of hit points with a guy, he's out.

[961] You've got to take him out and put it in a swap in another guy.

[962] What if you go through all three?

[963] Then you have to restart the chapter.

[964] Then you have to go beg your parents to go buy you more Skylighters.

[965] So can you keep it like paused on that menu while you run out to Toys R Us?

[966] Sure.

[967] Okay.

[968] Yeah.

[969] Wow.

[970] So it's almost like buying another life.

[971] Yeah.

[972] Totally.

[973] Wow.

[974] It absolutely is.

[975] Wow.

[976] You've got plenty now.

[977] But I ran out of, like, my high -level guys in a couple of spots.

[978] Because there was, like, a tight area where guys are just making bombs fall out of the sky.

[979] They're hitting for, like, 100 damage each time.

[980] And it got really crazy.

[981] Like, I died five, six times in one little area.

[982] Can you rip him off before he dies?

[983] Yeah.

[984] There's no benefit to that, though.

[985] No, no, no. The health stays static for that level.

[986] Thought of everything.

[987] I know.

[988] And, you know, so there's a couple spots that were, you know, I wouldn't say difficult, but spots where I died a fair amount of times.

[989] And think about Gears of War 3.

[990] Not a hard game.

[991] A couple of spots where you might die a lot.

[992] But in the grand scheme of things, this game on the difficulty scale, not that different from something like Gears of War's default setting.

[993] Right.

[994] But those seem to have gotten a bit easier.

[995] Yeah.

[996] Games are designed to be finished.

[997] So with that in mind, this game is reasonably well made.

[998] It's charming.

[999] It looks nice enough.

[1000] And it was fun to go through.

[1001] It's got a good hook.

[1002] Yeah, it's got a really, really good hook.

[1003] Yeah, I don't know.

[1004] It's not perfect.

[1005] But the more I thought about it, the more I was like, yeah, I mean, yeah, it's kind of designed for kids.

[1006] But...

[1007] It's pretty good.

[1008] What if that hook is Activision's next thing?

[1009] In the long line of Tony Hawk and Spider -Man and Guitar Hero, in terms of their cash -down properties, what if this catches on and this is the thing?

[1010] They have the Transformers license.

[1011] Not necessarily the Spyro version of it, but just the general concept.

[1012] The funny thing is Spyro has such little to...

[1013] If you don't have Spyro on the portal, it's not a Spyro game anymore.

[1014] It's a chop -chop game.

[1015] So it's kind of ridiculous.

[1016] I saw some of the comments from people going like, I can't believe what they did to Spyro, which really I found alarming because it was like, wait, people give a fuck about Spyro?

[1017] What is wrong with you?

[1018] Yeah, I don't know.

[1019] It's pretty well made, and actually I like the design of the dudes.

[1020] Not all of them are winners, but enough of them look pretty awesome for little dudes for kids.

[1021] The actual toys you made?

[1022] Yeah, and the game too.

[1023] I think there are worse things like – I think we talked about this a bunch.

[1024] But if they were to start – I don't know how you get the portal injected natively into the consoles, like next generation consoles or whatever that have this – not RFID.

[1025] What was it called?

[1026] Near field communication.

[1027] Yeah, whatever that is into the console.

[1028] Make the collector's editions relevant again by putting some kind of tag in the statue of Marcus that you could put on your console and get your – in -game DLC that way.

[1029] Don't have to punch in a code?

[1030] Yeah, and the statue actually does something except take up room.

[1031] I think it would be easier for them to print QR codes on things instead of 25 character codes and then you just hold it up in front of your Kinect.

[1032] I agree.

[1033] I've been saying that for at least a year.

[1034] You know, whatever.

[1035] That's kind of cool, too.

[1036] I'll put a statue of Marcus on my 360 and go.

[1037] And the ability to write back to that stuff, I think, is the thing that only works because it's a kid's game.

[1038] And there's that theory of you might take this over to a friend's house and play local.

[1039] In person?

[1040] What?

[1041] Where it's like Gears of War.

[1042] Like, who's doing that?

[1043] No one's doing that.

[1044] Yeah.

[1045] So that's where the tech becomes a little needless when you remove it from the context of it being a kid's game.

[1046] I don't know.

[1047] If you told me that, and this is, again, maybe this is just something that we run into, that Microsoft would sell me a bobblehead of my avatar that you can write all my save data to, and that's my profile, and I could just bring that around with me instead of a USB key.

[1048] Because that's more convenient.

[1049] I bet we could actually rig that up right now.

[1050] With Will?

[1051] Yeah.

[1052] Well, maybe not with Will.

[1053] I don't know.

[1054] Because it's probably pretty intense.

[1055] But, like, some sort of, like, encrypted USB key that is hooked up to an NFC thing that decrypts when you hold, you know, when you put your NFC device on it.

[1056] And then it would decrypt and you'd be able to log in.

[1057] In the cloud.

[1058] Right.

[1059] I want a giant 13 -inch figurine.

[1060] Well, I mean, you would still keep it.

[1061] You'd be the best of both worlds because this would just be unlocking the USB key that then logs in.

[1062] But, yeah, your stuff is still all the fun.

[1063] Yep.

[1064] I'm in.

[1065] And then I'll just replace my pinky with that.

[1066] Yeah.

[1067] Yeah.

[1068] Done.

[1069] Totally.

[1070] Yeah.

[1071] Start reading it.

[1072] Ballpark, how much have you invested into Skyland?

[1073] Well, they sent the 360 version of the game, which was $70 right there.

[1074] Right.

[1075] So that's – I don't know.

[1076] If we take that out of the equation, it has been, let's say, $160, $170 maybe.

[1077] Jeez.

[1078] And there's another – Like I said, there's $40 worth of level packs coming.

[1079] Those are going to be like a level, then some magic items and a character each.

[1080] Do they sell a giant bundle?

[1081] Because I saw some unboxings online and some people had some party packs.

[1082] I couldn't tell if they were like...

[1083] What, party packs?

[1084] I couldn't tell if they were like sent by Activision or if there's just some kind of like...

[1085] No, what was it?

[1086] Was it like...

[1087] It was like a...

[1088] Big old thing that opened up and there were like 10 Skylanders.

[1089] Yeah.

[1090] Is that one of those things where you become a brand ambassador?

[1091] I don't know.

[1092] I couldn't tell.

[1093] You've got to prove that like your house is like the happening house on the neighborhood.

[1094] A lot of people excited about Skylanders out there.

[1095] And wrestling.

[1096] If you want to find out what the crowd is like for Skylanders, just.

[1097] Skylander unboxing on YouTube.

[1098] Or if we want to find out what happened in Raw last time.

[1099] Clear yourself an afternoon and have a good time.

[1100] Yeah, it's a really well -made thing.

[1101] It's the sort of thing that, like I said, when you pick it apart and look at the business of it, it's the sort of thing that people should probably be getting outraged about because it's in the gaming context anyway, but removed from that one step.

[1102] and then taking into account that on some level all kids' toys are total rip -off things.

[1103] Yeah, it's hard to get so incensed about it when it's been this way for 30 years.

[1104] Right.

[1105] They killed off Optimus Prime so they could make a whole new set of Transformers to sell again.

[1106] Exactly.

[1107] Maybe if the toys were a little more articulated and you could play with them.

[1108] That would really go a long way.

[1109] I was thinking if they were, like, posable, you know, the actual action figures.

[1110] You could play with them outside of the game or something.

[1111] Guys, I don't want to spoil anything, but, you know, they leave it open for a sequel at the end.

[1112] So...

[1113] Wait, hold on.

[1114] You're saying there could be the further adventures of Spyro and Skyland?

[1115] They're very welcome.

[1116] Homefront 2 is going to be made.

[1117] You're saying I need to buy you a Curio or something to start storing?

[1118] Skylander storage has become an issue over the past couple of days.

[1119] And of the licensed things they sell to hold Skylanders, not large enough.

[1120] Oh, even the castle tower?

[1121] The castle, I think, only holds eight dudes.

[1122] Oh, Jesus Christ.

[1123] Wait, did you buy that?

[1124] No, hell no. That's also not a level you can't pick it up.

[1125] I was trying to talk him into that.

[1126] He would have asked.

[1127] Outgrown that immediately.

[1128] I'm glad he held off.

[1129] Yeah.

[1130] You need something, though.

[1131] Yeah, I need just a sack of some kind.

[1132] Are you still taking that base back and forth?

[1133] No, I left it at home.

[1134] It's progress.

[1135] I'm not lugging it around.

[1136] It's taking an important step.

[1137] Yeah, I mean, some of the stuff around it is kind of trashy.

[1138] Like the web game thing they did is just like a bunch of bad Flash minigames built into this weird...

[1139] You see other human players running around as Skylanders in this little isometric flash game world.

[1140] Do you interact with that if you haven't purchased any of the other SKUs?

[1141] Is that something I could just go do without?

[1142] Yeah, you could.

[1143] I think you would.

[1144] It's a portal into World of Skylanders?

[1145] Yeah, I think you would only get Spyro or something like that if you did that.

[1146] Or you might have to.

[1147] I'm not sure how that would work.

[1148] Get some chump Skylander.

[1149] But if you have your portal hooked up.

[1150] You can just drop another dude on there and swap on the fly in the world, which I like to do to let people know around me how deep I am in Skylanders.

[1151] Swap through all three Spyros in front of a room full of people.

[1152] Let them know who's real.

[1153] Right here.

[1154] I got Dark Spyro.

[1155] I got Legendary Spyro.

[1156] I got Spyro -ass Spyro.

[1157] Spyro, Spyro, Spyro .com.

[1158] Yes.

[1159] You've got some Skylanders.

[1160] I have all of the Skylanders.

[1161] All right.

[1162] I don't want to talk about Skylanders anymore.

[1163] I'm with you.

[1164] I think this has to stop.

[1165] Skylanders is pretty cool.

[1166] If you have kids that like toys and games or if you just don't give a F. Dan Teasdale from Twisted Pixel was talking about having extended conversations in the Skylanders section of his local Toys R Us with another adult about what the best Skylanders were.

[1167] It's Drobot.

[1168] Drobot is the illest.

[1169] He's a dragon and a robot.

[1170] Yeah.

[1171] So the thing with the Skylanders is after you buy the first four upgrades, there is a path decision you have to make.

[1172] There are two upgrade paths, and you can only choose one.

[1173] So you have to buy two of each one?

[1174] Yeah.

[1175] No. And Drobot, you can either spec in the direction of his afterburner jets, which make flying faster, but speed is not really an issue.

[1176] It's actually his gear attack, so it's these gears.

[1177] They don't shoot straight.

[1178] They shoot at an angle, which makes them pretty much worthless, except if you're in tight quarters because they bounce off walls.

[1179] The laser path, though, you get four lasers instead of two.

[1180] How do you not choose that?

[1181] That's double lasers.

[1182] That's quad lasers.

[1183] You are all the way across the level shooting quad lasers, laying waste to everything in your path.

[1184] So Drobot?

[1185] Drobot.

[1186] That sounds advantageous.

[1187] Drobot.

[1188] Beginner tip.

[1189] If you're going to get your stuff, get a Drobot.

[1190] Trigger Happy is fine, too.

[1191] He also is a projectile -based dude.

[1192] But, like, you know, Chop Chop is all melee, but he can block, so he can actually handle it.

[1193] A lot of the other melee characters can't block.

[1194] It's like Ignitor and Stealth Elf.

[1195] are at a bit of a disadvantage stealth elf can turn invisible though stealth yeah uh so with that it's like it basically creates a uh a clone of like you turn into eyeballs because you're invisible and then just but a a decoy of stealth elf goes running in the direction that you were pointed so everyone follows that and then you come up from behind and yoke them it's a bit deeper than i would have assumed yeah it's it's there's like a there's a kind of a combo system to that game for the melee dudes it's like i said They did a good job at making that thing.

[1196] They probably didn't have to go this far for a kid's game, but you really get the sense that they wanted to make something enduring.

[1197] But I would argue that they absolutely had to.

[1198] The toys wouldn't sell if the game didn't back it up.

[1199] Yeah, if there wasn't a reason in the game for you to have these characters or if it wasn't meaningful to the experience, then yeah.

[1200] And that makes really the whole toy gambit on this way crazier because it's like – Yeah, exactly.

[1201] If you think about all this stuff – Totally.

[1202] For all this stuff to come together, yeah, absolutely.

[1203] Where's the cartoon?

[1204] There's really no – I don't know.

[1205] That is crazy.

[1206] I don't know.

[1207] There may or may not be one.

[1208] I didn't want to dig any deeper.

[1209] And he has to start buying Skylander DVDs.

[1210] No, because you know Spyro will be the star of that, and I'm not interested.

[1211] You want that Drobot spinoff?

[1212] That's right.

[1213] Drobot runs a cafe.

[1214] We have to get the Drobot manga then, because that stuff is amazing.

[1215] What they need to do is make cartoons, but then it works with the portal, so you can put your dude on there, and then it's like, here's Drobot wearing a beret.

[1216] Captain Power.

[1217] Captain Power.

[1218] Exactly.

[1219] Apparently the original Captain Power stuff is coming out on DVD at the end of this year.

[1220] Wow.

[1221] We should get it and play it.

[1222] So we can get DVD quality versions.

[1223] And apparently this is potentially leading up to a relaunch of Captain Power.

[1224] All new Captain Power toys.

[1225] That's a horrible idea.

[1226] All new Captain Power toys.

[1227] What a great time to be a kid.

[1228] That's the worst idea in the world.

[1229] Let's do it.

[1230] Let's buy it all.

[1231] That'd be a video game tie -in.

[1232] Jeff, any other games you want to talk about?

[1233] Trackmania is still pretty good.

[1234] Still keeping your attention?

[1235] Battlefield 3.

[1236] Mm -hmm.

[1237] Yeah.

[1238] We did a quick look.

[1239] Yeah, got a quick look at that.

[1240] Should be up on the site by now.

[1241] Of the 360 version, because as of this recording, they sent an origin code that doesn't unlock until midnight.

[1242] So a pretty good email.

[1243] Yeah.

[1244] It was, here is a code for the PC version of the game that unlocks at midnight.

[1245] The embargo for all reviews is 1201.

[1246] You have one minute.

[1247] One minute.

[1248] Go.

[1249] One minute review.

[1250] The intro screen is quite good.

[1251] The way it's meant to be played, the way it says all that stuff, it's awesome.

[1252] In the 60 seconds I got to see, it was fantastic.

[1253] So the quick look is of the console version of the game, which is interesting in its own way.

[1254] I think there's a lot of questions about that thing.

[1255] And we played the 360 version and had to install the...

[1256] 1 .5 gig or however big it is texture pack to make it look not like ass.

[1257] Seriously, go look up the YouTube comparison videos of the low texture version.

[1258] It doesn't look good.

[1259] And there are spots in high texture that don't look great either.

[1260] That's something they had to do because they couldn't install on everything?

[1261] It's something they had to do because of...

[1262] I imagine it's sort of similar to the Rage situation where you notice the textures kind of going from low to high.

[1263] This is just their way to ensure that it's high.

[1264] Got it.

[1265] Is by asking you to install this stuff.

[1266] And they can't force the install because they can't assume that every Xbox 360 owner has a hard drive.

[1267] So it's that limitation caused someone a whole lot of work that I bet they were really unhappy to have to do.

[1268] But PS3 version doesn't have this option.

[1269] It's just PS3 just installs because those all have hard drives.

[1270] Right, right.

[1271] So not an issue.

[1272] Assuming it is installing textures and stuff like that.

[1273] I don't know what it installs.

[1274] But, yeah, it's a little grungy on the 360.

[1275] Parts of it look good.

[1276] Lighting is real nice.

[1277] And two discs on the 360.

[1278] Yeah, two discs.

[1279] Disc one is multiplayer and co -op.

[1280] Disc two is single player.

[1281] Letting you know where the priorities lie.

[1282] Yeah, that's funny.

[1283] Which I thought was pretty interesting.

[1284] But yeah, we just got that.

[1285] Yeah.

[1286] So no idea.

[1287] That whole process, that entire, everything related to reviews for Battlefield 3.

[1288] Pretty gross.

[1289] Bottom five review experiences of my entire career.

[1290] Wow, all time.

[1291] Probably.

[1292] Jeez.

[1293] Like the way that that's been handled.

[1294] Gnarly, huh?

[1295] The way that some people got PC version and then some people didn't despite us saying, well, you could.

[1296] The reasons we got back from them as to why we were not getting it were all pretty flimsy.

[1297] So when the book is written, this is a good chapter.

[1298] This whole thing is a full paragraph and there's stuff about it that – there's stuff about this week specifically that – well.

[1299] So adding to the fun, I'm not going to be here this week.

[1300] I'm hitting the road tomorrow for an event and – or hitting the road today I guess by the time people hear this.

[1301] Back when you booked the trip.

[1302] It was like, you're leaving the day as Battlefield comes out, but we'll clearly be done by then.

[1303] We'll have had the game for like two weeks at that point.

[1304] What could go wrong?

[1305] Everything.

[1306] Everything.

[1307] They're also releasing Trollbot 2.

[1308] Terrible.

[1309] Yeah, so the last week has been this weird limbo for me because it was like I was expecting to be getting Battlefield 3 done and doing all that stuff.

[1310] And then they kept holding it back and holding it back and holding it back.

[1311] And then it was like, well, plenty of time to play fucking Skylanders.

[1312] It does seem weird and also it does not seem...

[1313] There's a lot of stuff flying around out there that adds to the whole mystique to this.

[1314] Mystique is probably the wrong word for lack of...

[1315] another word to use right now mystique of this whole launch i mean it's definitely not in isolated to this building uh oh yeah yeah definitely there's just weird stuff going on and then just to have like the the internet being the internet layered on top of that like with them having kind of half the story about this stuff no everyone just hates battlefield but i love battlefield i'm getting it anyway like no you don't understand why why people are saying the things they're saying like some yeah some weird stuff you are about as misinformed about the way this is going as you possibly could be.

[1316] That's power marketing.

[1317] But be on the call.

[1318] So no, then.

[1319] No other games besides Skylanders that you wanted to talk about.

[1320] I mean, that brief bit with Battlefield 3, even with it being the 360 version, we played some multiplayer, you'll see it in the quick looks.

[1321] Fucking crashed a jet into a control point, flew a helicopter into the ground.

[1322] Did some Battlefield -ass stuff that was a whole lot of fun.

[1323] So it got me excited to see the PC version of that game.

[1324] Heard the campaign is kind of rotten.

[1325] Despite it getting nines.

[1326] And tens.

[1327] Nines and tens from people saying they don't like the campaign.

[1328] We're just going to ignore two -thirds of the disc.

[1329] Maybe it's great, though.

[1330] I don't know.

[1331] I haven't played it.

[1332] All right.

[1333] Brad Shoemaker.

[1334] Hello.

[1335] Dazzle me with Uncharted 3.

[1336] You want me to blow your mind?

[1337] Yes.

[1338] Can I?

[1339] Yes.

[1340] Yeah, you ready?

[1341] Uh -huh.

[1342] They made another really good Uncharted game.

[1343] Hot goddammit.

[1344] Yeah.

[1345] That makes me so excited.

[1346] But, like, they just made another really good Uncharted game.

[1347] I'm totally fine.

[1348] Which is fine.

[1349] Is that enough anymore?

[1350] Probably fine.

[1351] Well, I mean, they only made one so far.

[1352] Sure, yes.

[1353] So I think two totally gets passed, right?

[1354] Yeah.

[1355] Well, yeah, sure.

[1356] I'm totally ready for Uncharted 2 2.

[1357] Let's not totally marginalize the first game.

[1358] Are there blue dudes?

[1359] No. No blue dudes.

[1360] Are there blue dude equivalents?

[1361] Not really.

[1362] There are red dudes.

[1363] Not really.

[1364] Red dudes this time.

[1365] Oh, no. All right, let's stop that line of questioning right now.

[1366] So anyway.

[1367] So you're saying, I think.

[1368] Is there a combat twist at the end of this game that will make me not want to finish it?

[1369] I was going to ask, was it the mechanics of the blue dudes or the weird supernatural appearance of them?

[1370] I thought the supernatural stuff was a little...

[1371] out of place, but all this archaeological stuff eventually goes supernatural.

[1372] So that's not the end of the world.

[1373] It was literally fighting them and not enjoying...

[1374] Yeah, you could get their crossbows and take them out with that, but that was not a fun combat situation.

[1375] There are a couple twists, but they're nothing like that.

[1376] Well, conceptually a little similar.

[1377] It's not going to drive you crazy.

[1378] Right.

[1379] And I was still willing to suffer that stuff for the rest of the high points.

[1380] I was not.

[1381] That was what broke me on that game.

[1382] Wait.

[1383] You finished it, right?

[1384] What?

[1385] Nope.

[1386] Dude, that's like 30 minutes from the end of the game.

[1387] I know.

[1388] Wow.

[1389] I had a lot of other stuff going on.

[1390] It made that game really easy to put down.

[1391] Yeah, I guess so.

[1392] And then I got distracted with something else and just never went back.

[1393] The little crossbow was the solution.

[1394] You're right.

[1395] They all died in one hit.

[1396] But it was not a fun solution to use.

[1397] I just died a bunch of times on one checkpoint.

[1398] I just went, ah, I'll come back to this.

[1399] And that didn't.

[1400] A lot of set -piece globetrotting.

[1401] It is the formula that they hammered out into.

[1402] They ran through it again.

[1403] You probably go to five different countries.

[1404] You raid some tombs.

[1405] Do you shimmy sideways?

[1406] Absolutely.

[1407] You climb all over a lot of stuff that doesn't initially look like it should be climbed on.

[1408] And yet somehow you make it.

[1409] And does he just barely make it?

[1410] Oh my god, dude.

[1411] Every time he's like, oh no!

[1412] Nathan Drake knows how to get into scrapes.

[1413] I don't know if you've noticed that.

[1414] I feel like he always knows how to grab that ledge that's just barely going to hold him.

[1415] Are there any goofy little gags like the Marco Polo stuff?

[1416] Yeah.

[1417] There's a reference to that gag specifically.

[1418] Outstanding.

[1419] Really?

[1420] Yeah.

[1421] And another trophy attached to that action.

[1422] Oh, man. But there's some other good humor where...

[1423] Like, you're doing stuff within the framework of the mechanics they've got, like the climbing over stuff and the fact that Drake is always the one that has to go do all the dirty work and everything.

[1424] And, like, they find ways to even poke fun at that from time to time.

[1425] It's really smart.

[1426] That's always the really tough thing to do is poking fun at the...

[1427] repetitive nature of tasks in games because at some point the solution should have been design something else.

[1428] Did you ever feel like...

[1429] I think poking fun at the repetitiveness is one thing, but if you poke fun at the absurdity of a situation...

[1430] Yeah, that's more what it is.

[1431] Then it's just Bruce Willis.

[1432] How does the same shit happen to the same guy?

[1433] Three times.

[1434] Stuff like that, yeah.

[1435] Instead of these guys just keep on coming.

[1436] Yeah, I know.

[1437] Come on.

[1438] I've been here shooting these guys for 20 minutes.

[1439] Climbing another unclimbable wall, eh?

[1440] Yeah.

[1441] So it's pretty sharp dialogue?

[1442] Yeah.

[1443] Everything about it is pretty much top -notch, just like the last one.

[1444] But it is, again, just like the last one.

[1445] What was the line I love from the grenade line?

[1446] Do you have a plan to go with that grenade?

[1447] Yeah, tons of stuff like that.

[1448] Constantly.

[1449] Constantly.

[1450] Just great, sharp, witty, artful dialogue.

[1451] That game and Batman both, any sort of bellyaching about it's the same experience.

[1452] I get that some people don't want more of that.

[1453] I am so totally fine.

[1454] Those were the two best experiences of two years ago.

[1455] Yeah, I had so much fun with the last games in that series that if they want to take me on that trip again, I'm on board.

[1456] At the same time, I can't help but feel like a little...

[1457] I mean, they're kind of inherently less exciting this time.

[1458] On one end, nothing has really matched those games at doing those things.

[1459] But then, I really like Batman.

[1460] But I hope they don't make a third Batman game.

[1461] I am totally with you on this game as well.

[1462] Same thing.

[1463] I think if they make another Batman game, they have to do something.

[1464] Maybe not as dramatic as they did with Arkham Asylum, though that would be nice, but they have to do something more than they did with Arkham City.

[1465] But, I mean, yeah, you're right.

[1466] It is inherently less exciting the second time around for Batman.

[1467] And, you know, in the case of Uncharted, like, yeah, it's the third one, but they didn't really hammer.

[1468] Uncharted 2 was the one that.

[1469] Yeah, Uncharted 2 is where they really hammered out the formula.

[1470] I didn't mean to marginalize the first game at the beginning of the discussion, but it is a different game.

[1471] Yeah.

[1472] Like, they actually, in the behind -the -scenes videos, they even acknowledged that.

[1473] They were like, yeah, we made that first game, and, you know, it was fine, but there was, like, this 30 -second sequence in it that everybody loved.

[1474] So we looked at that, and we were like, all right, we're making that the entire next game.

[1475] Yeah.

[1476] Yeah, there were totally moments, and there were things about Uncharted 1 that looked great, and things about that didn't look awesome, but...

[1477] 2 was a watershed.

[1478] Yeah.

[1479] Yeah, well, I feel like 2 just...

[1480] It had so much more personality, right?

[1481] One, it seemed like they were working on it, and two, it seemed like they were having fun.

[1482] Well, one, it was still like, okay, you are secondhand Indiana Jones with the wisecracks and all.

[1483] But I feel like by the time you get to two, he's got a little more identity.

[1484] There was a confidence in two that was really great.

[1485] Sure, yeah, absolutely.

[1486] There's some good range to pretty much all the characters in this.

[1487] There's some cool backstory.

[1488] There's some playable flashbacks.

[1489] I don't want to give too much away because, I mean, Playing this game is playing this game.

[1490] If you play it once, you've played it.

[1491] You can't go back and see everything again.

[1492] You cannot unplay it.

[1493] Oh, no. You cannot unplay what has been.

[1494] Is it DLC?

[1495] It comes with a hammer.

[1496] Unplay it.

[1497] Finish the game.

[1498] Hit yourself in the head with a hammer until you don't remember playing the game.

[1499] Point being, giving away a lot of this game is a disservice to the experience because going through it yourself and seeing it all, I'm kind of of two minds about the way they marketed it because they've shown...

[1500] Probably half of the really impressive set pieces in this game have been out there in some form.

[1501] I feel like I haven't seen that much, just the flooding.

[1502] The ship, the burning chateau.

[1503] I haven't seen too much of that stuff.

[1504] So that's the thing.

[1505] Everything that I've seen has been very much out of context.

[1506] It's been beat, beat, beat.

[1507] You're right, you're right.

[1508] So you see, okay, I know that there's this thing, but I don't know how crazy it gets.

[1509] It's the chateau, the ship, and then the cargo plane sequence they showed at E3.

[1510] The multiplayer stuff?

[1511] That map is derived from that.

[1512] But that sequence in the campaign is probably more impressive than anything I remember from Uncharted 2.

[1513] That one thing.

[1514] But it's still the same style of thing.

[1515] To the point that you can only see so many of those before it's like...

[1516] So you're saying that they've upped the ante even on their set pieces.

[1517] They have, yeah.

[1518] But it's...

[1519] It's in that...

[1520] But yeah, like you said, it's in that same style.

[1521] How do you feel about Golden Abyss?

[1522] Like as kind of our premier Uncharted player.

[1523] Does the notion of another tale of Nathan Drake coming so soon, potentially with a reduction in scale due to being on a handheld, do you think that works?

[1524] For one thing, you have to back up and ask how much I want to play Vita games, which is not very much.

[1525] And also, this is an Uncharted game coming from a different developer, so who knows how well they can nail the specific personality -driven stuff that makes this.

[1526] this game so good.

[1527] Right.

[1528] Do we know if Naughty Dog has had any sort of fingerprints on that thing?

[1529] I don't know if there's any oversight or not there.

[1530] I think they do have some.

[1531] I'm sure, yeah.

[1532] I'm sure they're signing off on parts of it.

[1533] Those guys in Bend have obviously proven themselves.

[1534] Oh, yeah.

[1535] Handheld games.

[1536] Super capable.

[1537] But I don't know about an Uncharted game.

[1538] Right.

[1539] But, yeah, I mean, like, I could use some more time away from these guys.

[1540] You know, like, once every two years seems like a good interval to me. Like, I felt the same way about Batman.

[1541] Yeah.

[1542] And that extends to all media.

[1543] Like, no interest in any other Batman -related material.

[1544] Just give me one terrific Batman game every two years, and I'll happily reconnect with that character for that 15 -hour period.

[1545] To a point.

[1546] And then we can forget about it.

[1547] But like you said, you know, next iteration.

[1548] Next iteration.

[1549] Time to change some stuff up.

[1550] I think they very easily could get away with it again.

[1551] I just would hope that they would realize to not go back to the well over time.

[1552] Arkham World.

[1553] The entire world is now.

[1554] You mean Arkham Planet.

[1555] I don't know.

[1556] That sounds like a good idea.

[1557] We don't really need Earth.

[1558] We're just making a prison.

[1559] It's just all Batmans?

[1560] Yeah.

[1561] I don't know.

[1562] Arkham Mania.

[1563] Yeah.

[1564] Okay.

[1565] All right.

[1566] Yeah.

[1567] Oh, dude.

[1568] They showed the Shoot Mania level editor in France over the weekend.

[1569] Tell me about it.

[1570] The EWSC, ESWC.

[1571] You're supposed to be the esports editor.

[1572] Don't look at me. Esports and anime.

[1573] Not in Europe.

[1574] Anyway, I think it's the place where they debuted Trackmania 2 footage last year.

[1575] They showed Shootmania, a little bit of the level editor.

[1576] Looks okay.

[1577] Looks kind of like Trackmania with no track.

[1578] And a gun.

[1579] And no, no gun, because it's just a map editor.

[1580] It says nothing about how it's played or what it even is, but it is Shootmania Storm.

[1581] Are you playing?

[1582] Wait, that's the name of the game?

[1583] Because it's Shoot Mania.

[1584] Just like Track Mania 2 is Track Mania 2 Canyon.

[1585] Right.

[1586] They're going to do three environments for each game.

[1587] Okay.

[1588] So there'll be Track Mania 2 Stadium, you know, like whatever.

[1589] So this is just Storm is the name of this one.

[1590] And it looked to be, I don't know, there were trees.

[1591] It was outdoors.

[1592] So I don't know if it's like a Storm the Castle thing and they're doing castle parts or if it's just raining.

[1593] Was it raining?

[1594] It was not raining.

[1595] But maybe the rain's not in yet.

[1596] Okay.

[1597] It could still be working on that part.

[1598] Yeah, I don't know.

[1599] So you watched 15 minutes of Shoot Mania level editor's video.

[1600] I watched about four minutes of Shoot Mania.

[1601] It sounds like you don't know anything more about Shoot Mania.

[1602] I don't speak French.

[1603] That's a hindrance for sure.

[1604] I don't know.

[1605] Seems okay.

[1606] All right.

[1607] Well, we'll check back in with you.

[1608] When I come back from Montreal.

[1609] Yes.

[1610] Let you know how my not speaking French went.

[1611] Those Track Mania guys wouldn't tell me shit at the airport.

[1612] They're in France anyway.

[1613] Kept going.

[1614] Like Trackmania, and they said nothing back there.

[1615] You guys speak French.

[1616] You have to know about this stuff, right?

[1617] Qu 'est -ce que c 'est Trackmania?

[1618] Je m 'appelle Trackmaniac 420.

[1619] Oh, yeah!

[1620] Then you're in.

[1621] They show you the handshake and keys to the city.

[1622] It's all yours.

[1623] They're your world points.

[1624] Limpest handshake.

[1625] So, yeah, I guess I don't want to...

[1626] tax you Brad too much more on Uncharted 3 stuff because yeah it's just I mean talk about specific I want to play it yeah you absolutely should I don't know it's weird to think that all of a sudden they have like Naughty Dog has basically completed the Naughty Dog cycle on this game right they basically their thing is to come up with a new IP for a new platform and make three of them then they're out right so is this it I think it probably is.

[1627] I bet they don't make an Uncharted 4, but I bet there is an Uncharted 4.

[1628] Yeah, that's too valuable not to do something with at this point.

[1629] And I imagine those dudes are just so burned out on making Uncharted stuff.

[1630] They could probably just, like, just as much as they could have used a Jack palette cleanser.

[1631] Like, I'm sure they wanted a, they're looking forward to a little bit of a break from Nathan Drake.

[1632] At the same time, though, I mean, who knows when the next PlayStation is coming.

[1633] Who knows how much time Naughty Dog has to kill.

[1634] I do.

[1635] I bet you do.

[1636] Don't, don't, don't.

[1637] I'm ready.

[1638] How long?

[1639] How long?

[1640] How much money you got?

[1641] How many world points?

[1642] None.

[1643] Then forget it.

[1644] How much?

[1645] How many Skylanders?

[1646] Trackmania 420.

[1647] How many?

[1648] I've got 110 ,000 planets.

[1649] All right.

[1650] February 16th, 2014.

[1651] All right.

[1652] See?

[1653] It's that easy.

[1654] See, I didn't even have to give you any of my planets.

[1655] Wait, you heard that?

[1656] Yeah, I heard that too.

[1657] What?

[1658] These microphones are all connected to these headphones.

[1659] Fuck it, you didn't tell me that.

[1660] Also, it's recording this, so everyone else is going to get to know this as well.

[1661] It's kind of how this has been set up.

[1662] Is that just how Sony's going to launch all its consoles now, February?

[1663] Yeah, February.

[1664] 22nd for the Vita.

[1665] Really?

[1666] Yeah.

[1667] See, I was so close.

[1668] Put it out on Valentine's Day.

[1669] Yeah.

[1670] PlayStation is for lovers.

[1671] I'm ready to close the book on a lot of these franchises, these current -gen franchises.

[1672] Gears.

[1673] Yeah, like there's the kind of...

[1674] Killzone.

[1675] Playing Uncharted, it makes you wonder, like, I mean, these guys are at the top of their game, but it kind of seems like they've done all they can do with this hardware.

[1676] Yeah.

[1677] You know?

[1678] Or, I mean, even if they could squeeze a little more out of it.

[1679] Maybe a little bit more, but it's diminishing returns, that's for sure, with all this stuff.

[1680] Well, they've been around so long, right?

[1681] This generation has been pretty good and pretty long in the tooth.

[1682] So they have made their trilogies and some on this console.

[1683] So I think we are all kind of like...

[1684] Battlefield is really like a stark reminder that this generation would normally be over.

[1685] Just because of the disparity between the console and the PC versions.

[1686] Even Batman's got a little extra kick in the pants on the PC with some of the physics stuff.

[1687] There are things that are happening outside of this console generation.

[1688] But it's like they built Frostbite 2 specifically to be kind of a next generation sort of thing on PC.

[1689] Consoles can't.

[1690] handle it at the same level that the PC can.

[1691] So it's one of those things where right about now would be the time where you're like, maybe if we have a new console next Christmas, that might be all right.

[1692] It's funny that it seems like it's not a lack of technical ability that's driving this so much as people are just sick of these ideas.

[1693] They want new stuff, but nobody's willing to put new IPs out there until they've got a new platform to do it on.

[1694] I think that'll be the thing that ends up driving the start of the next generation.

[1695] sooner rather than later will be like this time it's not going to always be like oh well sales have trickled off to a point where we have to do it you know sales for this stuff are still going strong in kind of a scary sort of way and they're still putting out plenty of great games but not everything is hitting the way it used to you know third parties will probably start griping a little bit about like hey these guys need to put out something new because we need the rush of The influx of interest in this sector that happens when new consoles come out and then on the backs of that, people start buying ads on websites and people start doing all this other stuff because there's a whole new generation out there and all this money that has to be spent that is not being spent right now.

[1696] So you have a lot of – I think it's a weird health of the industry sort of thing.

[1697] Well, it's a scary thing because we don't have the – the PC isn't there as a strong platform to kind of kick it off.

[1698] So it is entirely – Yeah.

[1699] like at the impetus of the console manufacturers to start it up.

[1700] Like, hey, all right, now's the time.

[1701] Now, you know, we've done the research.

[1702] People will be willing to spend this much money on a console.

[1703] And like you said, like the economy is not in the crapper as much as it is.

[1704] They have to decide to take that risk.

[1705] Like launching a new console is a considerable risk.

[1706] Right.

[1707] And right now they are making money on consoles and they're making money on games and they're selling a whole shitload of games because they have massive fucking install bases.

[1708] So to get to the point where it's like, okay, Microsoft, we really need you to make a new platform.

[1709] Like there has to be a lot of pressure for that to seem like a thing that they would want to do at this point.

[1710] Yeah, I think so.

[1711] But I still, I think 2013 starts to make a lot of sense.

[1712] Yep.

[1713] That's my money.

[1714] Yeah.

[1715] Holiday.

[1716] Which one?

[1717] Both?

[1718] Both.

[1719] Sony won't let it happen again.

[1720] You think?

[1721] You think like both, like six months both?

[1722] Or both like 2013, 2014?

[1723] Oh, really?

[1724] Like day and date both?

[1725] Head -to -head launch.

[1726] That'd be crazy.

[1727] That'd be nuts.

[1728] Wow.

[1729] I mean, we and PlayStation 3 were like two weeks apart.

[1730] Yeah.

[1731] Little did we know those weren't even really came into the same markets.

[1732] I think, yeah, those felt different even at the launch.

[1733] It was like pick up both and serve two different masters.

[1734] Yeah, I guess so.

[1735] I would love to see what comes next.

[1736] I kind of just want to see what the – I feel like we're at such a point in the industry where we really hit some real big mainstream.

[1737] veins in this generation what do you do next how big of a leap do you make i mean that's always very exciting right like does the mainstream care about a full generational shift yeah if it means a 500 console probably not right you know that's not that's so not necessary now yeah like it's been so long and like gpus and stuff have advanced to such a degree Will Smith came in.

[1738] Will Smith was really good at coming in and slinging a bunch of numbers around and making you understand.

[1739] He was talking about the advances in GPU technology since the stuff was spec locked.

[1740] When they finalized the hardware and these things.

[1741] Knowing that, do you think you do a refresh and keep the branding?

[1742] These things have penetrated so deeply.

[1743] A 360 has...

[1744] Great brand recognition, right?

[1745] So it's like, do you do a refresh on the 360 with new hardware in it that's like, you know, instead of going Xbox 720 or whatever people have said, is it like more like a 360 2 or like a 360 X?

[1746] Xbox 360 squared or something?

[1747] Something like that that's more of like, is this like fully compatible?

[1748] No, that's just...

[1749] Are you just talking about just a matter of branding?

[1750] I'm talking about branding where you're like, this isn't like the next thing that's like, you know, this is like, hey, it's a better 360.

[1751] I think Xbox and PlayStation are the brands.

[1752] Like, that's what people know.

[1753] Yeah, totally.

[1754] And we'll have to do it all over again, but the naming on this stuff is just getting even weirder and weirder.

[1755] Because Sony can get away with PlayStation 4, but Microsoft couldn't go to Xbox 3 from here, could they?

[1756] 720 is a really dumb...

[1757] Even as a joke code name sort of thing is really stupid.

[1758] I don't know.

[1759] Just call it Xbox.

[1760] Drop everything.

[1761] Call it the Xbox, and then you have the different models.

[1762] You have your Xbox S. You have your Xbox XL.

[1763] I mean, because at that point, you're getting, like, almost 10 years away from the original Xbox.

[1764] Yeah.

[1765] And that thing didn't sell great, you know.

[1766] Yeah.

[1767] Didn't move necessarily a ton of software.

[1768] Yeah.

[1769] Kind of Halo and Fable were the brands to make it out alive of that generation.

[1770] And you have, like, two camps of people.

[1771] Some people that just called this current machine the Xbox or the 360.

[1772] Yeah.

[1773] But you can't call it the 362.

[1774] You can't just call it the Xbox.

[1775] The Xbox is the name of the division.

[1776] They're not going to throw out the Xbox name because they see that as being valuable.

[1777] Xbox 420.

[1778] I think, Vinny, I think you're right, though.

[1779] I think there is...

[1780] There, then you get a 4, so it matters.

[1781] Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

[1782] I mean, that was certainly the marketing think behind the 360.

[1783] Yeah.

[1784] So I don't know if they're going to go for that again.

[1785] Who knows?

[1786] It's like the PlayStation 3 plus a little more.

[1787] A little extra on the back end.

[1788] But if they announce before Sony...

[1789] Like they're just going to have to come up with something on their own as opposed to some kind of like marketing response to what the competition is doing.

[1790] Yeah, I don't know.

[1791] It'll be interesting.

[1792] And it's very exciting because I just love – launches are probably one of my favorite things in the industry.

[1793] When it's a big console, kind of like, all right, let's put up our best – We're going to show you things that will never happen, that will never come out on this console.

[1794] Here's the dream.

[1795] Here's our insane nightmare vision of the future and what games will look like and how you will play them.

[1796] It's going to be so awesome.

[1797] Get super excited.

[1798] You'll be like, that's crazy.

[1799] There's no way you'll get this.

[1800] I'm on board.

[1801] Usually I agree with you, but looking at something like Uncharted 3, when these consoles came out, I never would have thought that the stuff that we'd be playing would look like that while we were still on these consoles.

[1802] Some stuff.

[1803] I don't know.

[1804] I feel like...

[1805] There are some really good developers out there now.

[1806] Oh, fantastic.

[1807] These guys have got their pipeline down to the point that, like, holy shit.

[1808] Well, that's also another thing is, like, stuff just gets more complicated every generation, right?

[1809] And I don't know...

[1810] But I think this time it's not going to, like, the development is not going to necessarily get that much more complicated, especially for the developers that have been making PC games all along.

[1811] Like, the next generation in there?

[1812] It's, like, asset generation, you know?

[1813] Like, they're already generating it at 1080.

[1814] Right.

[1815] In a lot of cases, you know?

[1816] So they don't need to go out and generate.

[1817] more higher res assets.

[1818] I hope not because it would be a real bummer if that happened.

[1819] Suddenly there's a new video spec out there.

[1820] It probably just makes sense that this next generation will be the one where all the work everyone learned over the past five years really starts to pay off.

[1821] That'd be great.

[1822] I mean, but there will be things like, I'm sure there will be new physics models and stuff like that.

[1823] A lot of that's just middleware.

[1824] I mean, developers are having to get up to speed on that stuff kind of all the time throughout a generation.

[1825] Maybe there will be 27 cores you've got to program for.

[1826] I don't know.

[1827] I mean, you can't make too many predictions too far out.

[1828] You're right.

[1829] Because new hardware capabilities enable radically different, I hate to say, paradigms or whatever.

[1830] But I mean, something like Assassin's Creed, like the idea of like...

[1831] complicated crowd technology like that like one or two generations ago it was just like unthought of because you just couldn't do it now you can state of emergency dude and then they're all just at the silly little things like we learned how to exploit this shader and it's like yeah oh cool great that came like seven games after you know uh i don't know i hope it happens sooner than later because uh like i said i i will not stand another gears kill zone resistance The number's getting too damn high.

[1832] You'll get all that stuff on the next generation of consoles.

[1833] I hope.

[1834] Maybe not Resistance, but you'll certainly, maybe not Killzone.

[1835] I don't know.

[1836] I hope.

[1837] It'll probably Killzone.

[1838] But all you do is add another different console to it, and I'm totally excited again.

[1839] You say it's on the same brand of consoles, and I'm like, ah.

[1840] Well, I mean, if 13 happens, we've got one more holiday.

[1841] without new consoles next year.

[1842] And we practically know what all the big games are next year at this point, right?

[1843] With a few exceptions.

[1844] Yeah, yeah.

[1845] Hopefully there'll be some more announcements.

[1846] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1847] I mean, we know a lot of big stuff that's coming out next year.

[1848] And it would kind of be the off year anyway for a lot of those brands.

[1849] Well, you know Halo 4's coming out.

[1850] Bioshock.

[1851] Bioshock.

[1852] I mean, for the stuff that came out this year, it would be the development year anyway.

[1853] Hopefully they wouldn't turn out another one of any of those things I just mentioned in a year.

[1854] Maybe they would.

[1855] I don't know.

[1856] Anyway, next – 2013?

[1857] Well, it's weird because I feel like I'm hearing that sentiment coming out of the development community of like, yeah, like these folks don't want to make another one of these games for this hardware.

[1858] Like they want to have their next – version of whatever it is that they're making to be the bigger, better on new hardware.

[1859] But I don't feel like I have it out around launch when it benefits from that effect, the launch effect of selling to everyone who bought one.

[1860] But I also feel like I haven't heard any of the rumblings of, yeah, Sony's coming around with some stuff and Microsoft's got some stuff.

[1861] Yeah, you'll be real excited next.

[1862] Yeah, I feel like those two things, I've seen this happen before and I feel like those two things kind of happen in lockstep to a certain degree of like, okay, we...

[1863] We did our last hurrah that we are going to do on the PlayStation 2.

[1864] We made the last Grand Theft Auto game we're going to make there, so we're going to start planning for the future.

[1865] And right around that same time, you start hearing, hey, cell processors, isn't that some crazy shit?

[1866] If anything, we've heard the opposite, it seems like.

[1867] Yeah.

[1868] We've heard, you know, Kinect did super well, and then they kind of pushed back plans.

[1869] They're kind of staving off all that, spending all that money for as long as they can.

[1870] Yep.

[1871] We'll see what happens.

[1872] It's time.

[1873] Play Uncharted 3.

[1874] Okay.

[1875] You should.

[1876] Okay.

[1877] You totally should.

[1878] It's next week?

[1879] Yes.

[1880] It's a week from today.

[1881] Fantastic.

[1882] They got it out there early.

[1883] If you went to that movie theater event in a major city last week, it's probably on the way to your house right now.

[1884] Oh, right.

[1885] It's kind of a cool idea.

[1886] They're giving out vouchers and stuff.

[1887] It's a very cool idea.

[1888] I went to the one here.

[1889] I went to the one in San Francisco.

[1890] So wait, that was like a fan thing?

[1891] Yeah.

[1892] So it was different from Vinny and I went to the one in 2009 for two, which was I think free.

[1893] I think it was just like members of the PlayStation community.

[1894] I don't know if you had to have an invite or what, but basically they have a big tournament in a movie theater, and they project the game up on the screen.

[1895] Right on.

[1896] It's pretty crazy.

[1897] And at that one, like at the end of the night, they were just, oh, by the way, everybody's here, gets the game right now.

[1898] You get a game.

[1899] It was like a week before it came out.

[1900] That's very cool.

[1901] So this time it was a lot more structured and you had to buy into it.

[1902] You had to, you could actually, I think you could buy tickets at a box office at a movie theater, if I'm not mistaken.

[1903] But the ticket got you the game.

[1904] But yeah, so it was a $60 ticket.

[1905] I think you could buy like a $15 or $20 ticket to just go and get like a gift bag or whatever.

[1906] But if you paid $60, you can go for this evening thing where a couple of Naughty Dog guys come out and you play in the tournament and blah, blah, blah.

[1907] And then they ship you the game like a week before it hits retail.

[1908] So you're not walking out with the game, but you're getting it.

[1909] Not in this case.

[1910] Okay.

[1911] But you're still getting it a week ahead of time, and you're just paying what you would have paid at retail anyway.

[1912] That's kind of for super fans.

[1913] Yeah, it's like a really, really decent fan outreach kind of thing.

[1914] Yeah, that seems great.

[1915] Well, the Call of Duty event, they did a similar thing.

[1916] Yeah, everyone who went to Call of Duty Elite got a copy of Hardened Edition.

[1917] Not right there on the spot, but they will be getting one.

[1918] That is the highest tier version of the game.

[1919] They're not doing a $150 night vision goggle pack this year.

[1920] Oh, really?

[1921] Yeah.

[1922] Good for them.

[1923] They just ran out of stuff, I think.

[1924] Yeah.

[1925] What are they going to put in it?

[1926] It's for the best.

[1927] Yeah.

[1928] That car sucked.

[1929] That broke it?

[1930] The car sucked.

[1931] I really need less giant things in my...

[1932] I've got my Call of Duty...

[1933] I've got my night vision goggles out somewhere.

[1934] Yeah, it might have been prominently placed since that game.

[1935] Yeah, they're in my living room and I keep looking and I'm like, what the fuck am I going to do with these?

[1936] Stupid things.

[1937] I don't want these out anymore.

[1938] You wait!

[1939] But that Harden Edition version comes with a year of Call of Duty Elite, so that means you get all the DLC that's coming out for that game over the next year also.

[1940] So as a thing for, you know, you got for going to this crazy event that they were giving a lot of money to charity anyway.

[1941] Good deal.

[1942] They've done right by those people, I'd say.

[1943] Do you guys want to talk about BlizzCon any?

[1944] Oh, yeah.

[1945] That happened.

[1946] None of us went.

[1947] I'm going to BlitzCon.

[1948] Is that your one -man NFL Blitz convention?

[1949] Yeah, it's where I play Blitz and get Blitz.

[1950] Sounds like a pretty good con. Yeah, it's pretty awesome.

[1951] Cosplay is pretty intense.

[1952] But what can we say about what happened at BlitzCon?

[1953] Well, a new WoW expansion.

[1954] Yes, the Mists of Pandaria.

[1955] Yeah, which I guess was revealed through Trademark.

[1956] Yeah, we saw the name a while ago, and I'm all bitchy.

[1957] You've been waiting for years.

[1958] Yeah, I have been on the forefront of pro -Pandarian relations class representation.

[1959] Ambassador.

[1960] within the World of Warcraft.

[1961] Finally getting theirs.

[1962] Guys, they discovered a new landmass in World of Warcraft.

[1963] Somehow, they've been...

[1964] They've appeared.

[1965] Somehow, they've been...

[1966] Takes us far to the east.

[1967] People have been swimming around in the oceans of this world for literally years.

[1968] We have been to another dimension and to an undersea kingdom and to the top of the world, but we never noticed this other continent hanging out.

[1969] There are pandas and monks and chi there.

[1970] Are there geese?

[1971] Probably, dude.

[1972] Okay.

[1973] That panda has a bow staff.

[1974] He fucks shit up with it.

[1975] I can play a panda.

[1976] That is dope.

[1977] That is racist.

[1978] Yeah.

[1979] It's profoundly racist.

[1980] So there's a monk?

[1981] Yeah.

[1982] That's the new thing.

[1983] No auto attack on the monk, I heard.

[1984] But there's no brewmaster?

[1985] I don't think you can play as the brewmaster.

[1986] I'm sure you will go roll on some fucking brewmaster.

[1987] There's only one brewmaster.

[1988] Come on.

[1989] He's just the brewmaster?

[1990] That's crazy.

[1991] I don't know.

[1992] They've gone goofy.

[1993] A while ago.

[1994] That game started a long time ago.

[1995] It's games that are full of weird jokes.

[1996] Yeah, nothing about this, I feel like.

[1997] Maybe pre -World of Warcraft, suggesting that you would play, like, that was an absurdity, but Warcraft, since at least Warcraft, whatever, since Warcraft 2 has had some goofy shit in it, it has just bubbled up further to the surface.

[1998] Well, even the first one, if you clicked on a guy enough times, he said goofy stuff.

[1999] Yeah.

[2000] It's kind of always been there.

[2001] But there's no more pretense.

[2002] No. Once they start having goblins riding fucking motorcycles through Azeroth, it's like, oh, okay, so it's just craziness now.

[2003] Now it's whatever fucking batshit stuff you want to throw in there, you're throwing it in there, which is fine.

[2004] With the game as mature as it is now, it makes sense for them to just throw everything at it.

[2005] Here you go, yeah.

[2006] The game's best minds are working on Titan now, so that game...

[2007] Does it feel safe to say World of Warcraft has peaked?

[2008] Yeah.

[2009] In that they're not rapidly accruing new subscribers?

[2010] Yeah, probably.

[2011] I think they are down.

[2012] I don't mean that as a bad thing.

[2013] I just mean that game has been around for a long -ass time.

[2014] Nothing lasts forever.

[2015] It's going to keep going for a while, too.

[2016] Exactly.

[2017] They still release EverQuest 1 expansions.

[2018] Would not be surprised to see World of Warcraft go on to enjoy a life at least as long as that.

[2019] Well, the thing is, I mean, the infrastructure and all the people to support the game, all that stuff is so well established at this point that if they continue to drop off on subscriber count, they can probably proportionally scale that stuff back and still remain...

[2020] Oh, sure.

[2021] Quite profitable on that thing.

[2022] I'm sure it scales pretty well.

[2023] You would think that they would be rolling a lot of those people over onto the game that they're ramping up on.

[2024] Well, I'm talking about just literally like customer support and data centers and all that stuff.

[2025] Right.

[2026] Just the infrastructure.

[2027] That stuff probably scales to the number of players pretty directly.

[2028] So there's that, which is New Playable Race, which can be either Horde or Alliance, right?

[2029] I'm pretty sure.

[2030] I didn't actually read anything.

[2031] But I think they always drop in some other stuff.

[2032] So I think there's like pet battles now?

[2033] Yeah.

[2034] Like attacking pets or something like that.

[2035] They put Pokemon into the game.

[2036] Yeah.

[2037] Which is – okay.

[2038] Yeah.

[2039] If I could go buy the figures for these pets and then drop them on some sort of device.

[2040] This is an Activision.

[2041] This is an Activision products.

[2042] Put your Murloc on the portal.

[2043] Portal of Power.

[2044] Gilgrunt looks a lot like a Murloc.

[2045] Just saying.

[2046] Yeah.

[2047] You've got a harpoon gun.

[2048] I wonder if this is the first of their more frequent but smaller boxed expansions.

[2049] Yeah, I don't know.

[2050] Because they kind of talked about that.

[2051] Did they do something to the talent tree, too?

[2052] Yeah, the stuff's been in flex for quite a while.

[2053] They said that they're looking to redesign artwork on a lot of the existing classes because they've kind of gotten more complicated with the newer stuff, and they're going to go back and refresh the old stuff, but no timetable.

[2054] Fucking pandas.

[2055] You know, it's funny.

[2056] Battle pandas.

[2057] I feel like I know they did it first, but it's really hard not to just kung fu panda that whole thing.

[2058] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[2059] Jack Black in the back of your head.

[2060] The stuff they put up is like, yeah, you're right.

[2061] You're not wrong.

[2062] How's it feel now, Blizzard?

[2063] Yeah, I was going to say, I didn't want to be that mean, but it's kind of a little bite in the ass of like, well, you guys just ripped off kung fu panda.

[2064] He was first.

[2065] Fuck Jesus.

[2066] Jeez.

[2067] Whatever, World of Warcraft expansions.

[2068] Starcraft.

[2069] Yeah, World of Warcraft expansion not bringing me back to the game.

[2070] I'll say it here and now.

[2071] Yeah, same here.

[2072] Well, the response seems...

[2073] Thomas went down there, too, and he's a big World of Warcraft guy.

[2074] It just seems like the general response is like...

[2075] Kind of soon, and also kind of maybe not as much as it's been in other stuff.

[2076] Well, that's what I'm saying.

[2077] They've been out there saying in the past, like, we're going to start ramping up on the frequency of these releases because, I mean, like, the anecdotal evidence, I even saw it, like, playing, because StarCraft and WoW share a friend's list.

[2078] So, like, logging on to play StarCraft at home after Cataclysm came out for the first three weeks or a month, it was, like, 20 people on my friends list that were never there.

[2079] Right.

[2080] And they were all playing WoW for, like, a month, and then, like, clockwork, they all just vanished.

[2081] So you think they're just like, we've got to hit it.

[2082] We've got to hit it hard.

[2083] It's the content in those boxes that's getting people back into the game and playing it, and once they level through all of it, they go.

[2084] Like, those people aren't going to hang around and run that raiding treadmill waiting for, like, content patches.

[2085] This is 90 now, right?

[2086] That level cap just went up.

[2087] 85.

[2088] So it only went up to five levels in the last one.

[2089] But people have become so efficient.

[2090] at running up that level tree.

[2091] Oh yeah, you always hear like, oh, here's the world first guy to hit the new level cap.

[2092] It's always like 18 hours after the game came out.

[2093] Interesting.

[2094] So StarCraft?

[2095] But I feel like they've been doing this for so long that it's not even just like the crazy most, because like first expansion pack, when that happened, it's like, oh, well, it's just a lunatic that's...

[2096] running up the level tree so quickly.

[2097] But they've put out so many of these expansions, so people have re -rolled so many times.

[2098] Even, I think, post -cataclysm, they just have it wired.

[2099] I don't think you have to be that hardcore a WoW player that if you've stuck with it for any length of time, you probably know what that path is.

[2100] Yeah, you fly through it.

[2101] And then they've got that new annual subscription they announced for that.

[2102] They want you to go on contract.

[2103] Yeah.

[2104] For WoW.

[2105] And you get Diablo 3 free if you do it.

[2106] Oh, that's a pass thing or whatever, right?

[2107] WoW Pass.

[2108] Is that what they're calling it?

[2109] Yeah, I think so.

[2110] I think so.

[2111] I don't know.

[2112] World of Warcraft Online Pass?

[2113] Yeah.

[2114] All right, Brad, so no one gives a shit about pandas.

[2115] I'll roll a panda.

[2116] Everybody cares about hydralisks.

[2117] Tell me about the shocking changes that are being made to StarCraft 2.

[2118] There are some crazy fucking changes being made.

[2119] I heard you and Norm losing your goddamn minds in the office last week.

[2120] I don't know if it's the appropriate venue.

[2121] The motherships are gone.

[2122] They took the mothership out.

[2123] Holy shit.

[2124] They took out the carrier.

[2125] You know what?

[2126] That sounds big.

[2127] Like a mothership sounds like a significant thing.

[2128] You say they don't have those anymore?

[2129] The carrier like the Yamato?

[2130] No, that's the Battlecruiser.

[2131] Battlecruiser is still in there.

[2132] Battlecruiser got a speed upgrade, which is kind of crazy because those things are beefy as hell.

[2133] So being slow is kind of the one disadvantage.

[2134] Right.

[2135] Anyway, the mothership being taken out is crazy in that it was a super unit.

[2136] It was like the fabled super unit, which is the thing you can only have one at a time.

[2137] But nobody ever, ever used it for anything ever.

[2138] It was basically a joke every time it came out.

[2139] It was like, oh man, I got rushed to Mothership or whatever.

[2140] Did they replace it?

[2141] Not specifically.

[2142] So they took that out and the carrier, which is like, carrier was in Starcraft 1, if you remember.

[2143] It was this big sort of almost cone -shaped ship that has tons of tiny little flyers swarming around it.

[2144] Nobody ever used those things either?

[2145] Gone.

[2146] They made some pretty...

[2147] well, I was going to say bolt cuts, but if nobody's using those units, maybe not a huge deal.

[2148] They took out the Overseer for the Zerg, which is a huge deal because people use the Overseer all the fucking time.

[2149] It is a very important part of the Zerg process.

[2150] So they're replacing that in some interesting ways.

[2151] There's basically three new units on each faction.

[2152] The Overseer is the floating gas bag that gives you vision, right?

[2153] The Overlord is the basic flying farm version, but then you morph that thing into the Overseer, which is the only way that Zerg can detect invisible stuff.

[2154] It's the only way you get detection outside of a couple structures.

[2155] But that's not the thing that spawns the Banelings?

[2156] No, Zerglings morph into Banelings.

[2157] What's the thing that shoots little things on the ground?

[2158] Broodlord.

[2159] Broodlord's still in there, pretty much unchanged.

[2160] They made a new thing called the Swarm Host, which is basically a burrowing version of the...

[2161] Broodlord.

[2162] Like it burrs underground so you can't see it, but it spits out a bunch of kind of stuff.

[2163] Broodling style little creepy crawlies.

[2164] So the three units they added are not in addition to the other changes they're tweaking?

[2165] Well, there's nine units.

[2166] There's three per faction.

[2167] And then a ton of the existing units got changes.

[2168] Like the Hellion is this really fast little thing that shoots, this little car thing that shoots a jet of flame.

[2169] And it's super weak.

[2170] It's really good against light units.

[2171] But at late game, it had not a lot of uses because there's not as many light units around in most cases.

[2172] So that thing can transform into a robot now.

[2173] They're like, fuck it.

[2174] Let's just...

[2175] Yeah, we'll just come up with some crazy...

[2176] Some of the excuses they came up with for the existence of these abilities and new units and stuff is kind of ridiculous, but whatever.

[2177] Do you think it'll be in the single player of the...

[2178] Like, hey man, we got an upgrade.

[2179] It's all Zerg, so you'll probably fight some of it, but...

[2180] Some of that stuff, probably not.

[2181] But the craziest sounding thing in this whole expansion is this thing called the Replicant for the Protoss, which can turn into any unit that you can see.

[2182] Okay.

[2183] For any faction.

[2184] So spy?

[2185] No, no. It's like you are literally...

[2186] Gets the abilities.

[2187] It's becoming this unit permanently.

[2188] Oh, permanently.

[2189] Fucking crazy.

[2190] Wow.

[2191] Well, whatever.

[2192] Is there a different cost associated with turning into a bigger unit?

[2193] No, no, it's the same cost.

[2194] It's really expensive to buy that.

[2195] Okay, so the unit's expensive, and you just have to hope that someone drives something insane your way and then turn into it immediately.

[2196] Well, I mean, like the idea of Protoss, like the Protoss Death Ball, which is like the kind of jokey name for just like if you get up to 200 supply with Protoss, like you're pretty much going to murder anything that exists.

[2197] So already having offense like that and having like a line of siege tanks behind it.

[2198] getting a bunch of medevacs to heal you as you're attacking and stuff.

[2199] It's just insane.

[2200] I don't know how that thing is going to survive into the shipping game like it is.

[2201] It just seems like there's too much crazy stuff you could do.

[2202] Well, it just seems like they'll have to make the other factions just as crazy.

[2203] Yeah.

[2204] So they're announcing all this stuff prior to any sort of beta test process for the Heart of the Swarm.

[2205] There will be a public beta, and I'm sure that stuff will change before that beta even rolls around, and then I'm sure it'll change dramatically during the beta.

[2206] Who knows?

[2207] Like, some of these units...

[2208] So you're saying, like, you don't think this is even, like, the state that things will be in by the time the public beta happens?

[2209] Probably not.

[2210] Probably not.

[2211] Yeah.

[2212] Like, some of these units might not even make it into the beta that we actually get to play.

[2213] So what the fuck are they actually announcing, then, with all this stuff?

[2214] They're just saying, like...

[2215] Here's the direction we're going.

[2216] They're very honest and open that here's what we've got right now.

[2217] This is the best stuff we've got working.

[2218] We'd love it if this works.

[2219] But they're very forthcoming about, yeah, we can't quite figure out how to balance this thing right now.

[2220] And if we can't balance it, it's coming out of the game.

[2221] So this is about letting the folks that would come to BlizzCon know what's up.

[2222] And the greater StarCraft community, which is rabid for this stuff.

[2223] Because these are dramatic changes to this game.

[2224] So did they say how this...

[2225] Does this replace StarCraft 2?

[2226] This becomes StarCraft 2?

[2227] You mean at the pro level and stuff?

[2228] I'm sure they will.

[2229] It's weird, because Brood War is still widely played in Korea.

[2230] It's a different case.

[2231] You're right.

[2232] That's like some people still play Super Turbo at fighting game tournaments, but no one's playing...

[2233] second impact.

[2234] Like, do you think I launched Battle .net, I don't have Heart of the Swarm installed, I just don't play against those people?

[2235] You don't play against those people?

[2236] Oh, yeah.

[2237] Or those people, well...

[2238] People on the new game?

[2239] With Broom War, you could opt to join non -Broom Wars.

[2240] So if I have Heart of the Swarm, I can choose.

[2241] And you want to play with a friend, you could probably choose one or the other, but I'm sure they'll let you choose.

[2242] Interesting.

[2243] But, I mean, the mind share is going to move on.

[2244] All the meaningful play is going to happen.

[2245] And you think they'll split the leaderboard or they'll keep the Starcraft 2?

[2246] The league stuff, yeah.

[2247] I mean, this is a very different game.

[2248] So it'll be a Wings of Liberty.

[2249] They'll keep whatever they have now.

[2250] Yeah, just like, you know, same thing with Warcraft 3.

[2251] But so there is going to be kind of like this dead drop point for the Wings of Liberty.

[2252] Right.

[2253] Where, like, okay, this is what Starcraft 2 multiplayer was.

[2254] Up to this point, we stopped and now all future developments go into part of the swarm.

[2255] Unless it's like security fixes and stuff because you think about they still put out Diablo 2 patches in some weird way.

[2256] I'm sure that sort of stuff they would still address in all products.

[2257] But it's sort of balanced stuff.

[2258] Like if someone figures out that there is some crazy exploit.

[2259] Yeah.

[2260] Like, do you think they would absolutely have to fix that?

[2261] Go back and touch that?

[2262] They totally would.

[2263] But, I mean, yeah, the day that Heart of the Swarm comes out, I'm sure Wings of Liberty is considered, like, an archival version of StarCraft II, and it's just kind of on the shelf at that point.

[2264] So you think any sort of, like, big, meaningful balance changes, other than to address game -breaking shit, it's done?

[2265] They will cease active, like, balance and design work on that game.

[2266] They talk about pricing at all?

[2267] They've said from the beginning, as soon as they announced the very controversial three -game model or whatever, they said that you can think of the other two as expansions.

[2268] So $40.

[2269] I can almost guarantee it.

[2270] But man, some of the changes they're making are so exciting to people who are really into this game.

[2271] Again, I'm not going to bore you with all of it.

[2272] Holy shit.

[2273] Is it more than the units?

[2274] Is there anything else?

[2275] Yeah, just so many abilities, so many changes to everything.

[2276] Practically everything seems like it's gotten a change of some kind.

[2277] So we do have a story up on the site about BlizzCon.

[2278] Yes, thanks to a friend of the site, Brian Leahy, was down there and is way better and more hardcore about StarCraft than I am.

[2279] And he dug into that stuff.

[2280] Impossible, sir.

[2281] So we've got a lengthy story authored by him on the site where you can learn.

[2282] Dive deep into the Starcraft 2 business.

[2283] I think he did the best thing that you could do with something like this, which is just to list out a bunch of the crazy stuff that happened while he was playing it.

[2284] Just like, here's a situation I was in, and here's the kind of brainstorm I had in the moment with the new tools I had to find a way out of it and stuff like that.

[2285] They announced anything else, like the Titan stuff, or talk about any of their other properties?

[2286] Like Diablo stuff come out of it?

[2287] Diablo, there's very little new Diablo stuff shown there.

[2288] So this was a StarCraft 2 pretty much.

[2289] Well, I guess the mist.

[2290] Yeah, that was the biggest announcement.

[2291] And then they were showing the StarCraft stuff.

[2292] Like they had a little bit of new PvP stuff for Diablo.

[2293] But my understanding is, I mean, they're trying to get that game done.

[2294] They don't have time to be busting out another playable demo.

[2295] It sounds like they were not shy about desires to put that game out on consoles.

[2296] Yeah, I guess they talked about that.

[2297] Officially?

[2298] No. Not saying it's definitely happening.

[2299] More just saying, yeah, we think we can do it.

[2300] Hey, do you think we would ever come out to consoles?

[2301] We'd really like to do it.

[2302] We've been talking about that.

[2303] The thing that I heard was the consistent message was, yeah, obviously we want to, but we're not going to announce anything until we are rock solid on how we're going to do that.

[2304] That'll be after the PC version.

[2305] is out, I'm sure.

[2306] So they're like, let's finish that PC version first and then we'll start thinking about console stuff.

[2307] So not taking the focus off that at all.

[2308] Whatever.

[2309] I'm very happy to play that game on a PC.

[2310] Totally.

[2311] But there's nothing wrong with direct control.

[2312] It's proven effective in games like that.

[2313] As long as they have to play it works.

[2314] As long as they have to click in the right stick to attack.

[2315] The old Diablo games.

[2316] Click, click, click.

[2317] Hopefully everybody remembers at this point because it's been...

[2318] Everybody has reminded each other enough at this point that the old Diablo games came out on consoles and were fine.

[2319] Yeah, they were fine.

[2320] They were kind of cool.

[2321] It was one of those things that you weren't really sure if it was going to work or not.

[2322] It was like, oh, no, Diablo totally doesn't look as good and all that stuff.

[2323] They'll play on a PS1.

[2324] PlayStation.

[2325] I'm sorry, on a PlayStation?

[2326] Or the PS1 if you have one of those.

[2327] There you go.

[2328] There's a name for the new console, PSX.

[2329] Yes.

[2330] No, for the Xbox.

[2331] Okay.

[2332] Sorry.

[2333] Misunderstood.

[2334] It's the PlayStation Xbox.

[2335] Yes, it stands for PlayStation X. It's probably the second Xbox.

[2336] That's what it is.

[2337] Do you know what the code was?

[2338] People must have gotten something.

[2339] I don't know.

[2340] There was something.

[2341] I don't know.

[2342] Yeah.

[2343] What is it?

[2344] Damn it.

[2345] I remember seeing.

[2346] Golden Spyro.

[2347] I want to say it was another Murloc or something.

[2348] You got Spyro.

[2349] I heard some fresh Murloc buzz out on the street.

[2350] It was some kind of Murloc thing.

[2351] It would be awesome if you could watch Spyro as a pet.

[2352] That was the limpest Murloc sound ever made.

[2353] That was not a great Murloc sound.

[2354] Can I give it another shot?

[2355] Oh, that was by design, but I guess I could try it.

[2356] Oh, geez.

[2357] That's better.

[2358] A little more Gollum in there.

[2359] Blizzard Dota was the other thing.

[2360] Right.

[2361] There were actually four products there, although it's weird.

[2362] We live in the craziest times, gentlemen.

[2363] I know.

[2364] There is Dota 2 from Valve.

[2365] So you want to know what's even better?

[2366] What?

[2367] Brian was down there waiting in line to play Blizzard Dota.

[2368] Who does he run into?

[2369] Gabe Newell.

[2370] Oh, fuck.

[2371] Also waiting in line to play Blizzard Dota.

[2372] Waiting to play Dota.

[2373] Oh, fuck.

[2374] Yeah, he was.

[2375] He chatted with Gabe a little bit about Blizzard Dota.

[2376] What the hell's going on?

[2377] See what I mean, man?

[2378] There are now like two premier products from two premier developers, Valve and Blizzard, both making things called Dota.

[2379] With Dota in the name.

[2380] Not even just like, yes, Blizzard Dota is the name.

[2381] We're not just calling it Dota.

[2382] So it's technically Blizzard Defense of the Ancients.

[2383] Yes, it's yes.

[2384] Yes, you're right.

[2385] Even though there are no ancients in this thing.

[2386] I don't know.

[2387] Some of those characters are pretty ancient.

[2388] But this looks, I mean, what's crazy.

[2389] I mean, Blizzard Dota is their all -star Blizzard.

[2390] It is characters that you know from Blizzard games in a Dota context.

[2391] Is Olaf in it?

[2392] Does he unleash Hot Fury?

[2393] I sure hope so.

[2394] I don't know if they put the full roster out yet.

[2395] Olaf Warden?

[2396] If I had to guess, they went Diablo Warcraft StarCraft, which is sad.

[2397] No, no, no. Because if it's Dota, you need to have like a million fucking heroes.

[2398] You're right.

[2399] We're only doing 30.

[2400] So that's the weird thing about this is that it's not like a commercial product.

[2401] It's just an add -on for StarCraft.

[2402] Oh, weird.

[2403] I'm not real sure what they're going to do with it right now.

[2404] Like how they're going to distribute it, if it's going to be a...

[2405] There's so many variables to consider.

[2406] We have a page for it on the site right now, but at some point in the future we may have to delete it.

[2407] I feel like we've reached the point with both of these things where there's this insane brinksmanship where both companies are like, we're going to fucking develop this thing, we're going to make it.

[2408] We really have no idea if or how we're going to sell it, but we're going to have a million dollar tournament over here and we're going to announce it at our big annual...

[2409] convention here.

[2410] Well, I mean, don't be mistaken.

[2411] I don't think in any way Blizzard Dota is being positioned as a competitor, like a serious competitor to Dota 2.

[2412] No, but still, these are things being developed where it's like, what?

[2413] It is crazy.

[2414] What do we do?

[2415] I don't know.

[2416] We'll figure it out.

[2417] Before StarCraft 2 came out, they were talking about that Battle .net marketplace where people would be able to sell their mods and stuff.

[2418] So, I mean, who knows?

[2419] There's every possibility this thing could come out and usher that thing in.

[2420] Right.

[2421] Or maybe they just do it for the fans and put it out there and that's it.

[2422] I don't know.

[2423] Gosh, it would be really weird if they released that for just free.

[2424] This is a free.

[2425] It's Dota.

[2426] It's free.

[2427] Why would you pay money for anything else?

[2428] Also, why don't you play our other game?

[2429] This game is also free to play.

[2430] Yeah.

[2431] Crazy.

[2432] Yeah, it's bizarre.

[2433] I don't know.

[2434] It's hard to process.

[2435] I don't understand.

[2436] The trailer they put out is super tongue -in -cheek for that.

[2437] At least.

[2438] What did Brian have to say to Gabe, or vice versa?

[2439] They talk about the game a little bit, just other personal stuff.

[2440] I love that Gabe's...

[2441] You just want to hear some Gabe stories?

[2442] No, I just love that Gabe's out there, on the fucking streets.

[2443] I want to see this.

[2444] I want to see what the thing is like.

[2445] I know Blizzard's not going to talk to me. I want to record from one of my guys about it.

[2446] I want to go see it.

[2447] I want to play it, because I like it.

[2448] Fly me down to Anaheim, I'm going to go stand in line, and then I'm going to play some Dota, someone else's Dota.

[2449] Dota.

[2450] You think he's armed?

[2451] Always.

[2452] That's right.

[2453] He doesn't fly commercial for that very reason because he can't carry those blades.

[2454] Maybe he just can't get enough concealed underneath your cargo pants.

[2455] I feel like we need to stop talking about Gabe Newell and knives because it's going to just go.

[2456] See, it will bite us in the eyes at some point.

[2457] That's not a bite.

[2458] It's more of a stab.

[2459] It feels like it.

[2460] Sting.

[2461] He just can't get enough Dota.

[2462] He's burnt out on his own supplies.

[2463] I play the shit out of this Dota.

[2464] I need fresh Dota.

[2465] I need more Dota.

[2466] This League of Legends stuff, whatever.

[2467] I'm going to fire you.

[2468] They're going to hire you.

[2469] You're going to make a Dota game for Blizzard.

[2470] I need somebody else's Dota.

[2471] Go over there and...

[2472] Make a Dota game.

[2473] The world needs to make...

[2474] We're going to give you half of this code and a gun.

[2475] Go get a job at Blizzard.

[2476] I want to see what they can do.

[2477] Something different.

[2478] I'm done with this.

[2479] That is some marketplace confusion.

[2480] Delicious marketplace.

[2481] So weird.

[2482] But what marketplace?

[2483] I don't know.

[2484] Where is it that it's being confused other than?

[2485] This weird Dota world that we live in.

[2486] Yeah, they're catering to an audience that's used to not paying for the game.

[2487] Yeah.

[2488] And they're catering to an audience that is probably savvy enough to know the difference and all that stuff.

[2489] Neither of these games is going to really get marketed.

[2490] You're not going to see TV ads for Dota.

[2491] Right?

[2492] Not while they're both.

[2493] Oh, dude, I hope so.

[2494] Not while there are these two things.

[2495] That are both.

[2496] Oh, Valve's gotten way into TV advertising.

[2497] Dota Billboard on 101.

[2498] Picture it.

[2499] Above and beyond the blizzard.

[2500] One of these needs to shake out before the other starts doing that because then it's way too easy to capitalize on someone else's marketing efforts.

[2501] But I think once you shake it out, I don't think that's.

[2502] They're not going to shake it out.

[2503] Yeah.

[2504] But Valve still doesn't have a business model for.

[2505] They're Dota, yeah, right?

[2506] Not that they're talking about it.

[2507] No one has anything!

[2508] They've spent millions of dollars on research and development.

[2509] They'll sell characters.

[2510] They'll create a Team Fortress 2 style store for Dota and sell bits and pieces of it.

[2511] Core game free.

[2512] Core game free.

[2513] And they'll open up a workshop style thing and let people submit new stuff for Dota like they do for Team Fortress.

[2514] And then community creators will make millions of fucking dollars.

[2515] Millions!

[2516] I think I speak hyperbole when I say they have no idea what they're doing as far as where this is going.

[2517] Clearly, there's huge fucking business plans on both ends.

[2518] There is a dark plan behind all of this.

[2519] There may or may not be one plan.

[2520] I was going to say, I imagine there's about a half dozen plans on each side of like, okay, we could go this route, that might work, or we could go this route, but none of them is like put it in a box, put it on store shelves, sell it for 50 bucks.

[2521] Done.

[2522] None of them are...

[2523] You guys want to pre -order Dota 2?

[2524] None of them are a traditional product.

[2525] Are you suggesting they're playing both sides against the middle?

[2526] Yeah.

[2527] Are you saying that...

[2528] I'm saying there's really only one Dota.

[2529] Are you saying whoever wins, we lose?

[2530] Yes.

[2531] Mobamania.

[2532] Fuck.

[2533] Look for it.

[2534] Mobamania Storm.

[2535] Yeah, the fourth secret world from...

[2536] Stormy Canyon.

[2537] From Mania Planet.

[2538] The seventh seal has been broken.

[2539] There's a map editor, but it only makes one map.

[2540] So you open it up and you press the button there.

[2541] You've made your Dota map.

[2542] Everybody makes the same map.

[2543] You sell it on the marketplace for a nickel.

[2544] You become a millionaire.

[2545] It's a weird world we live in.

[2546] I love it.

[2547] I love this weirdness.

[2548] Let's talk about some other weirdness in the news.

[2549] What say you?

[2550] Sure.

[2551] I've got a little portal news here.

[2552] They announced what the second free pack for Portal 2 will be earlier.

[2553] This month, yeah.

[2554] Earlier this month, they put out the peer review DLC, which was co -op -focused stuff.

[2555] They have now announced an in -game map editor that's going to be coming out next year for Portal 2.

[2556] And there's some screenshots.

[2557] We have a news story.

[2558] You should check it out.

[2559] It has some screenshots of ostensibly what this level editor looks like.

[2560] And it's crazy because it doesn't seem like they are...

[2561] playing this from the first -person perspective, but they've created these kind of like little isometric boxes in which you are going to alter the geometry kind of in a block, out a block, because everything in Portal works in kind of grid -based logic.

[2562] Yeah.

[2563] It looked like – what I saw looked like the – Those videos they put out that demonstrate the weapons and stuff like that?

[2564] Like the first Portal, all of the Aperture -themed instructional video stuff.

[2565] Actually, the stuff that's even in Portal 2 that you see in the video walls.

[2566] They put some trailers out like that, too.

[2567] Yeah, they put some trailers, but even inside the game, there's some Aperture Science -branded stuff that looks like that, and it looks awesome and crazy and potentially a really easy way to cook up your own damn Portal levels.

[2568] Upload them and share them.

[2569] I bet they have an evil plan behind this too.

[2570] That's right.

[2571] They always do.

[2572] Make StarCraft maps.

[2573] Yes.

[2574] Portal 2 level editor.

[2575] Hold not for Portal Dota.

[2576] I'd play Portal Dota.

[2577] What have you.

[2578] Oh, let's see here.

[2579] Movie rights for Assassin's Creed getting bought.

[2580] I can't say that's too surprising.

[2581] I thought I would have assumed it had happened already.

[2582] Right.

[2583] I was like, really?

[2584] I guess Sony bought it, according to Variety.

[2585] Yeah, Sony Pictures.

[2586] Exclusive.

[2587] They've also got Uncharted stuff in the works.

[2588] So PlayStation 4 font will look like the Assassin's Creed movie font.

[2589] Whatever that happens to be.

[2590] Yeah.

[2591] Which will not be the Assassin's Creed game font.

[2592] No. Oh, man. I came so close to buying a new PlayStation 3 by the end of the Uncharted review process.

[2593] Oh, is your launch?

[2594] My old PS3 sounds like fucking shit.

[2595] Sounds like a jet taking on.

[2596] It's so bad.

[2597] Oh, God.

[2598] I got to the point where I plugged headphones into my receiver because that was the best way to hear the game only and not the system.

[2599] I tried to find a fan replacement online.

[2600] I couldn't find anybody that sells them.

[2601] I'll happily open that thing up and swap it out if I can find one.

[2602] Yeah, we're starting to get just kind of circling back to what we talked about before and not to derail the news.

[2603] It's getting a little too late to buy replacement consoles.

[2604] It's a little scary.

[2605] I mean, A, this thing works perfectly fine, so it's hard to justify buying a new one in the first place, and B, how many more PS3 exclusives are there going to be that I'm going to want to play before it's on?

[2606] I just feel like mine could last me until the end of this.

[2607] Yeah, that's kind of how I was feeling.

[2608] Yeah, I don't want to buy a new PlayStation 3.

[2609] As nice as those slims look and everything else.

[2610] And as noisy as my goddamn...

[2611] Well, yeah, since I have the fresher one, that's not an issue.

[2612] If I had gotten a refresh, was it a year ago on the PS3?

[2613] At least.

[2614] If I had gotten that, I feel like I would feel a lot better about making it through.

[2615] But now mine is super loud, too.

[2616] I've come damn close to being like, man...

[2617] I can't take it anymore.

[2618] I could use another Blu -ray player.

[2619] I got that slim, and I got my launch PS3 still both hooked up to CVs.

[2620] I mean, the launch PS3, I feel like, still works fine.

[2621] It's just that it can get so damn loud.

[2622] Mine works flawlessly.

[2623] As Jeff had mentioned earlier, February 22nd, 2012, is U .S. launch date for the PlayStation Vita.

[2624] I think it's everywhere except for Japan.

[2625] Yeah, yeah, that's December 17th, Japan.

[2626] Yeah, yeah, it's coming a lot quicker, about, well, three months earlier in, two months earlier in Japan.

[2627] Vita or Old Republic, pick your poison.

[2628] See the roar.

[2629] Pass, pass.

[2630] Old Republic would be cheaper.

[2631] Initially.

[2632] Whatever, I'll get a Vita.

[2633] A Japanese one?

[2634] Nah.

[2635] Region stuff has gotten a little weird.

[2636] I think the region stuff is fine.

[2637] I think it is region -free.

[2638] But the store stuff wouldn't be.

[2639] Right.

[2640] Well, that's weird.

[2641] I remember when we got our first Japanese PS3s.

[2642] It was like, okay, no one knows what everything...

[2643] What happens if you put this disc in it?

[2644] Does it work or not?

[2645] Because that's when they kind of started...

[2646] That's when Sony at least started getting loose about, like, all right, we're not going to region code any of our games.

[2647] Like, fuck it.

[2648] But there's still a lot of region throttling on.

[2649] When it being the important part, the services part.

[2650] So I would suck to add.

[2651] I think if we can find someone to sell us a Vita that is not grossly overpriced and is around launch so that we could get one in here for coverage purposes, I would entertain that.

[2652] What are their games on?

[2653] What's the little cards?

[2654] This is actually a last week story, but we kind of missed it.

[2655] The announcement that Ni No Kuni, a Japanese RPG from Level 5 and Studio Ghibli, your Professor Layton people and my neighbor Totoro Miyazaki, those two camps coming together.

[2656] And some screenshots and stuff came out for this, and it looks crazy good.

[2657] as you would kind of expect, I guess, from Level 5 stuff.

[2658] They make really sharp -looking things.

[2659] And then Namco's doing that here?

[2660] Is that what the...

[2661] Yes, Namco Bandai's...

[2662] That's the announcement.

[2663] That's the announcement is that they're putting that out in the U .S. Ni No Kuni, Wrath of the White Witch, coming out next year here, thanks to them.

[2664] Renaming it?

[2665] I think they're just adding a subtitle to it.

[2666] So I think they're still calling it Ni No Kuni.

[2667] Wow.

[2668] But then also...

[2669] Throwing a little extra fun on there.

[2670] And Leighton Brothers Mystery Room is coming to IOS.

[2671] Hold on for Super Leighton Brothers.

[2672] That's right.

[2673] Wait, Leighton has a brother?

[2674] Yeah.

[2675] Just now, motherfucker.

[2676] Evil crabs, you've got to hit them twice.

[2677] And then the flies, they jump.

[2678] And then you've got to hit them when they're on the ground.

[2679] Herschel and Horace.

[2680] And then you're an asshole.

[2681] partner just hits the pow block four times in a row.

[2682] It's like, thanks for nothing.

[2683] Everyone's just alive again, and then I'm dead.

[2684] Thanks a lot, Leighton.

[2685] You'd believe that, though, right?

[2686] Horace?

[2687] Yeah.

[2688] Horace and Herschel?

[2689] Yeah.

[2690] I mean, we know Herschel.

[2691] Yeah.

[2692] What else?

[2693] I was just saying it out loud for the pairing.

[2694] Does Horace work?

[2695] That works.

[2696] And also, is it obscure enough?

[2697] Hector's not obscure enough.

[2698] Horace is definitely...

[2699] How about...

[2700] That matches...

[2701] How about...

[2702] Horatio?

[2703] Herbert?

[2704] Hey, I'm Herb Layton.

[2705] How about Mike?

[2706] Come on down to Herb Layton.

[2707] If you guys are looking to buy a boat, you can come down to see me on a boat sale at the fairgrounds.

[2708] We're down here all weekend.

[2709] You need top hats?

[2710] I got top hats.

[2711] Great deals on boats.

[2712] You need matchsticks?

[2713] I got matchsticks.

[2714] These boats come with no matchsticks.

[2715] I can guarantee no matchsticks.

[2716] But if you can solve this matchstick puzzle, you'll get 10 % off your boat.

[2717] Professor, what's wrong with your brother?

[2718] He's drowning because he's not wearing one of my lab jackets.

[2719] Take me home, professor!

[2720] I'm the professor of boats!

[2721] Say a blast, Mignol!

[2722] Yeah, his brother clearly not a professor.

[2723] Make no mistake about that one.

[2724] I'm going to go move my car.

[2725] Okay, why don't we just take a break because I can move my car too.

[2726] Great!

[2727] All right, we'll be back in a second with more of this.

[2728] Thank you.

[2729] Alright guys, and we're back, and that's news, so let's move on and talk about some new releases for this week.

[2730] As previously mentioned, Battlefield 3, available this week for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and I think the personal computer?

[2731] Yes, the most personal of computers.

[2732] I'm not sure about that.

[2733] Dragon Ball Z Ultimate Tenkaichi for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

[2734] I can't believe this is the first Ultimate.

[2735] I don't know that that's true.

[2736] Ultimate Battle 22 for the original PlayStation.

[2737] Is this the Ultimate Tenkaichi?

[2738] Apparently, this is the ultimate Tenkaichi.

[2739] We're not going to get any better.

[2740] Like, last year was penultimate Tenkaichi, so...

[2741] I bet they have to still be telling the same sagas, right?

[2742] I bet.

[2743] No, this one's all new.

[2744] No way.

[2745] I bet you're going to find it.

[2746] They just came up with it.

[2747] Akira stormed in the office and said, Guys, I have this great new idea for Goku and all his pals.

[2748] Sell games, too.

[2749] What if they fight this guy called Frieza?

[2750] We did that already.

[2751] Robo Frieza.

[2752] Oh, okay.

[2753] Ultimate Frieza?

[2754] Mecha Frieza.

[2755] Yeah, we did that also.

[2756] Brought back Frieza in.

[2757] Well, then fuck it.

[2758] Let's just make that again.

[2759] Fine.

[2760] Thank you, Mr. Thanks for coming in, Mr. Toriyama.

[2761] Shut up or I'll kill you.

[2762] Stronghold 3 for the PC.

[2763] Drew, I handed off code to him last week.

[2764] So hopefully he is already knee deep in.

[2765] I know he was muttering earlier about putting together that trebuchet that came with our copies of.

[2766] Stronghold 3.

[2767] And then he said, man, I've got to dig deep.

[2768] I've got to go deeper into Stronghold.

[2769] This is getting all weird.

[2770] Oh, so he's in it, but he's not in deep enough yet?

[2771] He said he's not ready yet.

[2772] He's got to go deeper.

[2773] Okay.

[2774] You need to get the portal, and then you put the trebuchet on the portal.

[2775] And you've got to spawn that unit?

[2776] Yeah.

[2777] Okay.

[2778] We'll check in with him later.

[2779] Centipede Infestation for the Nintendo Wii.

[2780] Atari apparently is still doing great things with its classic titles.

[2781] Great.

[2782] Like a new centipede game.

[2783] Just Dance Kids 2 for the Nintendo Wii.

[2784] It's the second Just Dance Kids.

[2785] It's like 100 Just Dance games at this point.

[2786] Motion Explosion for Xbox 360 from Majesco.

[2787] It's an explosion of motion.

[2788] How many wrestling themed minigames are in a motion explosion?

[2789] Was it 505 to Hulk?

[2790] No, that's also Majesco.

[2791] Fantastic.

[2792] That's one way to describe it.

[2793] That's great stuff.

[2794] Captain America Super Soldier for Nintendo 3DS.

[2795] It's radically different from the other Captain America games that they've already put out.

[2796] I'm just playing.

[2797] Heavy Fire Afghanistan The Chosen Few for PC, Wii, and PlayStation 3.

[2798] I can't make this stuff up, folks.

[2799] Oh, I'm sorry.

[2800] I missed this.

[2801] Just Dance Kids 2, also available for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

[2802] The Cursed Crusade from Atlus for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3.

[2803] Back to the Future, those Telltale Adventure games, they've gotten bundled up this week for PS3 and Wii.

[2804] You can get those on a disc for $20.

[2805] And that's the whole of the Back to the Future saga.

[2806] That's the season.

[2807] Yeah, I mean, given a little bit of time.

[2808] And for fucking $20, I feel like that's kind of...

[2809] Yeah, I didn't play any of those.

[2810] Kind of can't lose if you are down for some classic adventure game, styled adventure games.

[2811] I tell myself that I am, but I think we all know the answer to that question.

[2812] Yeah, yeah.

[2813] Grease Dance.

[2814] Gross.

[2815] Featuring hot hits from the popular musical Grease.

[2816] Damn, girl, I'm going to take you back for a Grease Dance.

[2817] Brad Schumacher, did you know that Dead Rising 2 off the record was coming out for the PC this week?

[2818] What?

[2819] Dead Rising 2 off the record.

[2820] Yeah, I think Retail might have.

[2821] Oh, okay.

[2822] If you need that game on a disc, you can get it this week.

[2823] Good.

[2824] I have it on a disc.

[2825] A different kind of disc.

[2826] It came out on Steam.

[2827] Day and date.

[2828] Day and date with the Xbox.

[2829] Both day and date.

[2830] Both of them.

[2831] Both of them?

[2832] Yeah.

[2833] Well, fantastic.

[2834] They're the same thing, it turns out.

[2835] What?

[2836] Then why do we say it twice like that?

[2837] That's silly.

[2838] Day and date.

[2839] I never actually understood that.

[2840] Puss in boots for Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Nintendo DS.

[2841] Hell yeah.

[2842] You're like, I'm tired of these Shrek movies.

[2843] They're like, well, how about one?

[2844] How about a Shrek movie without any Shrek in it?

[2845] Or maybe like probably a little bit of Shrek in it because you can't put out...

[2846] Antonio Banderas can't carry a movie anymore, goddammit.

[2847] I thought it was a prequel.

[2848] I'm down for a grease dance.

[2849] You know now infinitely more about the Puss in Boots movie than anyone I would care to associate myself with with Shoemaker.

[2850] I actually don't even know that.

[2851] You're wild speculation.

[2852] Yeah, you know that because your girlfriend knows that.

[2853] No, she doesn't.

[2854] I seriously have no idea.

[2855] Disney Universe for Xbox 360, Nintendo Wii, and PlayStation 3.

[2856] I don't know what that is, but I've got a copy of it on my desk, so I'll look at that.

[2857] We'll find out.

[2858] Yes.

[2859] House of the Dead Overkill Extended Cut.

[2860] This is for the PlayStation 3.

[2861] House of the Dead Overkill came out for the Wii a couple years ago.

[2862] They're doing a beefier version of it, I guess, for the PlayStation 3.

[2863] Maybe adding more cursing to it because I don't think it had enough before.

[2864] Oh, is that what it was?

[2865] Yeah.

[2866] I'm just trying to remember what the thing was with that game other than me not liking it.

[2867] It was super cursy.

[2868] All right.

[2869] I mean, yeah, whatever.

[2870] It was a...

[2871] on -rails shooter.

[2872] It was a House of the Dead game that they had some weird grindhouse trappings for.

[2873] Dance Central 2 out this week for Xbox 360.

[2874] Connect, of course.

[2875] Review that up on the site.

[2876] Indeed.

[2877] That's giantbomb .com.

[2878] That's the site?

[2879] Yeah.

[2880] Fantastic.

[2881] That's the website.

[2882] Type that into an internet browser on the web.

[2883] Go down to the library.

[2884] Find it.

[2885] Click on the button.

[2886] You type it into the search field.

[2887] You type Dance Central 2 and up there.

[2888] Yeah.

[2889] Might be.

[2890] No, do it.

[2891] We'll wait.

[2892] Click it.

[2893] Click it again.

[2894] That's the wrong one.

[2895] That's Grease Dance.

[2896] Connect Sports Season 2 from Big Park and Rare.

[2897] I imagine Big Park probably doing the heavy lifting this time.

[2898] I guess they kind of did last time.

[2899] No idea how they split that stuff.

[2900] No idea what Rare is.

[2901] Although the rumors about the next Xbox were swirling last week.

[2902] They were one of the three studios named as being hard at work on a project.

[2903] Yeah, you need higher -res avatars.

[2904] Shut up.

[2905] Also, centipede infestation also available for the 3DS this week.

[2906] We in 3DS for that barn burner.

[2907] Human centipede infestation.

[2908] Might sell more copies at this point.

[2909] They should just cop the license and slap it on this game.

[2910] Waiting for the DX version.

[2911] Better music.

[2912] That'll be enough.

[2913] If you touch a mushroom that's been touched by a scorpion, it's poison, and the centipedes go down to the bottom of the screen real fast.

[2914] Shit in your mouth.

[2915] So what do you think they do at the bottom of the screen?

[2916] That's why you lose when they get there.

[2917] It just makes more heads appear.

[2918] That's what I've got for retail releases.

[2919] I have no idea what's going on for digital stuff.

[2920] Daytona.

[2921] Daytona.

[2922] War of the Worlds this week.

[2923] Is it War of the Worlds this week?

[2924] Or is that next week?

[2925] No, I think that's this week.

[2926] I believe that's this week.

[2927] Gosh.

[2928] War of the Worlds.

[2929] It was on our site.

[2930] That's coming out this week.

[2931] All right, then.

[2932] For what that's worth.

[2933] Quick look EX up on the site with Mike Micah of OtherOcean that I recommend you watch.

[2934] We had a fun time.

[2935] Yeah.

[2936] PixelJunk Shooter.

[2937] JoshBomb .com.

[2938] Side -scroller.

[2939] Side -scroller.

[2940] It's the name of the website.

[2941] That game looks cool.

[2942] It's a whole site.

[2943] You could go look at it.

[2944] We're there, too.

[2945] Sounds all right.

[2946] When did we do that?

[2947] We do this thing where we talk into microphones, but sometimes we talk into microphones while we play video games.

[2948] You should really try it out.

[2949] It's pretty hot.

[2950] Grease dance.

[2951] Check it out.

[2952] It's a lot of fun.

[2953] Much like these emails that we read every week here on the show.

[2954] Bombcast at giantbomb .com is the email address if you would care to send in your emails.

[2955] First one coming in from Scott Meter, hot from Richmond, Virginia, VA.

[2956] Hey, Bombcast.

[2957] Ain't shit to do but cook.

[2958] Hey, Bombcast, since it has been the topic of discussion before, I have another question about what a certain development studio did for a game.

[2959] I recently finished Batman Arkham City and noticed that NetherRealms was part of the credits and the idea of what they specifically did for that game.

[2960] And on top of that, why aren't they properly mentioned in the opening of Batman Arkham City?

[2961] I think they did some engine stuff, like Mike Boone is credited on that game.

[2962] Wait.

[2963] Yeah.

[2964] I'm sorry.

[2965] Who's Mike Boone?

[2966] Ed Boone's brother.

[2967] Really?

[2968] Also works.

[2969] Wow.

[2970] Yeah, there's a handful of dudes from NetherRealm that are credited in the end of that game, and I think it is all engine credits and stuff.

[2971] Those guys also work in Unreal.

[2972] Serious Unreal experience.

[2973] So I imagine it's just that sort of stuff.

[2974] No idea.

[2975] I mean, you see just more and more of that, of multiple studios being listed, and they're just there for punch -up work or consulting work, tweak and stuff.

[2976] Yeah, we had to bring these guys in for six weeks to make this work or that sort of stuff.

[2977] You guys do good capes.

[2978] I'll tell you, the end credits of Skylanders go for a while.

[2979] Oh, yeah?

[2980] There are a lot of people to thank.

[2981] There's a lot of...

[2982] Yeah, there's a lot of different...

[2983] A lot of Skylander babies.

[2984] Yes, there were some...

[2985] Took a while.

[2986] Yes.

[2987] My controller turned off during the credits of Uncharted.

[2988] Yeah.

[2989] That's always a sign of a good game.

[2990] The credits are that long.

[2991] Takes a village.

[2992] Like the credits is directly equitable to reviews.

[2993] Resistance.

[2994] TMNT, Turtles in Time.

[2995] Scott Pilgrim for PS3.

[2996] It's the highest scoring game.

[2997] Most Ubisoft games, really, they knock them out of the park when it comes to credit length.

[2998] They know how to make a lot of dudes work on one game.

[2999] Next email comes in from Bo.

[3000] He says, hey, my name is Bo, and this is my question for the podcast.

[3001] With World of Warcraft subscriber numbers now on the decline, it's got me thinking if there will ever be another MMO that can break the 10 million plus subscriber mark.

[3002] Looking back, WoW's success may have been helped by releasing it at the right.

[3003] place at the right time with the current saturation of the MMO landscape, I would be surprised if even Blizzard's next MMO could reach these numbers again.

[3004] Well, that's assuming it's even the same kind of game.

[3005] Who knows what that game is?

[3006] It's interesting because that 10 ,000 subscriber number, whatever the subscriber number was, was something to be brandished for WoW and for any MMO because that's how many monthly dollars you were getting in.

[3007] You knew, I have 10 million subscribers.

[3008] Doing okay.

[3009] For most of those people, I'm getting $10 to $15 a month.

[3010] So you can extrapolate out based on maintenance costs and whatever your initial investment and blah, blah, blah.

[3011] I'm making some fucking money off of that.

[3012] It's a chunk of change.

[3013] But the MMO landscape has changed.

[3014] Exactly.

[3015] It's walking around money.

[3016] The landscape's changed.

[3017] We're rapidly saying you can't just make a monthly subscription -based MMO and ride off of that anymore.

[3018] People just don't care.

[3019] Like they care less and less for WoW.

[3020] It seems like the conversation we had earlier about just the way people are playing that game.

[3021] And it went so mainstream that that vein has kind of been tapped.

[3022] So it's how do you re -engage that mainstream audience and are those people willing to pay $15 a month for anything anymore or did they have that experience and move on?

[3023] I think that's the – Like, WoW was the first MMO for probably the vast, vast majority of people who played it.

[3024] Right.

[3025] And that's the, I mean, like it or not, that is the big question mark for Old Republic.

[3026] Like, who is it going to attract?

[3027] How many of them will it attract?

[3028] How long will they stay attracted?

[3029] I do think you'll get, what is it, 10 million is the number that we're saying?

[3030] Yeah.

[3031] Is that what it is?

[3032] 11 or something?

[3033] Yeah.

[3034] I think they hit, like, maybe almost 12 at some point.

[3035] I do think that there will be 12 million people subscribed to something related to games at some point.

[3036] Is it an MMO?

[3037] Who knows?

[3038] MMOs might be dead, but at some point something will be dead.

[3039] I think the thing that – whatever the thing is, it will not resemble WoW.

[3040] But I think that number is meaningless if it isn't attached to a dollar map.

[3041] Who cares if you have 10 million subscribers to your free thing unless that – Right, like how many of them are you monetizing?

[3042] I think it's how many of them are whales.

[3043] Yes, exactly.

[3044] Like, okay, maybe you have 10 million players on your free -to -play thing, but how many of those people, like how much money are those people on average spending?

[3045] It's your conversion.

[3046] Exactly.

[3047] There's all sorts of terms and figures and stuff.

[3048] I still think that's a good number, though.

[3049] When you start hearing it broken down by people that are working on those games, it's just like, ah.

[3050] The buckets you have to put different people into?

[3051] It all sounds like a business and not a game anymore.

[3052] Low -hanging fruit.

[3053] What about your low -hanging fruit?

[3054] It's a motion explosion.

[3055] Ian in Bethlehem, PA.

[3056] Hey, Bombcast.

[3057] I've noticed rumors about the next generation of system ramp -up lately.

[3058] And if true, I wonder how this affects games in the middle of development.

[3059] Specifically, I'm thinking about Bioshock Infinite.

[3060] Would a game this ambitious benefit from waiting until the next generation so it can take advantage of the beefier hardware, or would other factors deter them from this choice?

[3061] How do companies weigh the pros and cons when they're on the cusp of the next generation?

[3062] You invert the levels and release it on the other consoles.

[3063] Exactly.

[3064] No, I mean, they're building it to the specification of current consoles and stuff, so it's not really...

[3065] So, like, scope and scale are all designed with the current stuff explicitly in mind.

[3066] Like, the best you could probably get out of it is run it at 1080p at 60 frames a second.

[3067] Yeah, which, you know, a PC version of that game will be able to...

[3068] to do anyway.

[3069] Not that big of a deal.

[3070] I don't think it's that hard except in cases where you start development on a game and it ends up getting pushed back unexpectedly and all of a sudden you're trying to release it after those systems are out.

[3071] That becomes a very different prospect I guess.

[3072] And you see that stuff happen.

[3073] I feel like Nintendo has all of the most classic examples of We were going to make this on the N64, but then we made it on the GameCube.

[3074] Yeah, right.

[3075] Star Fox Adventures.

[3076] We were going to make this on the GameCube, but we made it on the Wii.

[3077] Or like Zelda, they made it on both.

[3078] Right.

[3079] A lot of third -party stuff with that.

[3080] Remember all those Activision games and stuff?

[3081] Yeah.

[3082] Gun.

[3083] Gun.

[3084] Things like that.

[3085] Then there were the weird things where they're like, okay, we...

[3086] This actually was made for the old consoles.

[3087] We specced Just Cause for the Xbox, but we're still going to crank out a 360 version because we can just up -res stuff a little bit.

[3088] Just Cause came out on...

[3089] It came out on the PS2, the Xbox, and the Xbox 360.

[3090] That was a weird time.

[3091] What does PS2 Just Cause look like?

[3092] I don't want to know.

[3093] You know what?

[3094] You're good.

[3095] I don't want to know.

[3096] Yeah, Gun.

[3097] That's another great example of that kind of...

[3098] The Tony Hawk game that came out?

[3099] 2X?

[3100] No, I mean the one that came out, the first one for 360.

[3101] Oh, right, right.

[3102] American Wasteland.

[3103] Same type deal where there's these half -step up ports.

[3104] Even the original software at launch of the 360 was nothing like what we've got now.

[3105] Yeah, totally.

[3106] Remember the outfit?

[3107] Yeah, I do.

[3108] That being said, I am ready.

[3109] Oh, yeah.

[3110] That weird time.

[3111] I hope the launch is better this time.

[3112] I really do.

[3113] I hope that maybe the hardware specs are not as much of a moving target or the processes are more mature or whatever.

[3114] Something yields better launch games than we've had in the past.

[3115] Surprise, you've got more RAM than we told you you'd have.

[3116] Now you have no time left to take advantage of it.

[3117] That'd be great.

[3118] Like pleasant surprises.

[3119] It's like, this is a whole other processor in here.

[3120] Just don't worry about it.

[3121] It's great.

[3122] But then they're like, oh, we could have made it so much.

[3123] This would have been so much easier.

[3124] Oh, fuck.

[3125] We already spent all this work doing this.

[3126] I guess we don't have to optimize now.

[3127] Great.

[3128] Ship it.

[3129] This next email comes in from Tim in Los Angeles.

[3130] Howdy, Bob Squad.

[3131] I am currently in grad school for library and information studies, and I've been thinking about an idea of integrating video games in public libraries, seeing as how they are becoming a much more mainstream and culturally important form of expression.

[3132] I was just curious to hear any thoughts you guys might have on the idea.

[3133] It seems like this would not only be an interesting way of preserving the history of gaming and exposing the younger generation, who will probably be making our games in the future, to the roots of gaming, but also using...

[3134] it as a way to get them into libraries to expose them to other educational topics do you think this is something that game developers would support or would it just seem like another way to get kids to play their games for free libraries carry many more media formats than books these days so it seems like video games are the next logical step yeah i mean you know i'm always trying to expose myself to kids and i think that you know if they can figure out a way to you know Use libraries.

[3135] Make it public.

[3136] Yeah.

[3137] That's – I mean – Not on the internet anymore.

[3138] I think the Dewey Decimal System presents an interesting quandary as it relates to classifying these sort of things.

[3139] Well, I think this still comes back to the notion of trying to archive this stuff in any format of like how do you – unlike so many other things, like unlike books or – recorded audio or film or anything like that, it's not that hard to get it from one to the other, whereas there is this weird underlying technical layer to all games that you have to suss out before you can...

[3140] You have to treat it like microfiche.

[3141] You just have the consoles there at the library and then you can just use them.

[3142] You can't take them home, but if you want to just grab an Intellivision game and check it out.

[3143] Yeah, but it's this weird thing where right now, yeah, the...

[3144] It becomes harder and harder to play an Intellivision game in its original state every passing day because the hardware becomes more and more rare.

[3145] At the same time, they're emulating and trying to make it available on other platforms, but you start to wonder how far away from the original do you get the more times you emulate and are trying to guess what this was originally supposed to look like.

[3146] I feel like it is an interesting challenge that specifically games have to take that a lot of other media just don't even have to consider.

[3147] I think it's an interesting idea, but I think trying to position it as something for kids.

[3148] I don't know how many old -ass games kids have the patience to look at.

[3149] This seems like a meaningful thing at a full sale or a digi -pen or something.

[3150] Well, the Smithsonian is getting into the act.

[3151] They've got a gaming thing.

[3152] going um but i mean you would have to already be interested in a gaming focused curriculum to the point that like okay history of games is of significant enough interest that you're going to want to go those many layers deep and have those sort of resources at your disposal right that regularly so and i don't know all of the public libraries i used to go to have been closed down so really yeah the public library one's still open i think that's sad yeah i agree that's no good yeah So I am more concerned about just the existence of public libraries at this point.

[3153] Public libraries are on Kindle books now.

[3154] Isn't that crazy?

[3155] Yeah, the San Francisco one does.

[3156] Yeah.

[3157] They're adapting.

[3158] How do you do that?

[3159] I know.

[3160] Do you get it for a second time?

[3161] Is it on my Kindle?

[3162] It's not like I borrow one of their fucking...

[3163] No, it's yours.

[3164] I don't know what the process is to get your device connected to them and all that stuff.

[3165] But then it's time limited?

[3166] It's just like over the internet.

[3167] I think it's time limited.

[3168] But they do have a finite number of...

[3169] copies to lend out.

[3170] I think it's a great idea.

[3171] I think it's a license.

[3172] They have X number of licenses for this book.

[3173] That's how it works.

[3174] It's a business thing.

[3175] It's not some weird throwback.

[3176] They are adapting.

[3177] Sure, sure.

[3178] I don't know how many books it's for and that kind of thing.

[3179] I don't have a Kindle.

[3180] Have you tried it?

[3181] No, I haven't tried it yet.

[3182] Do you just go there to do it?

[3183] I don't think so.

[3184] I think you could do it online.

[3185] Good on them.

[3186] Do you have a library card?

[3187] I think you do.

[3188] Nice.

[3189] Still do.

[3190] I hope you do.

[3191] I have a library card.

[3192] It's punched.

[3193] I never had a San Francisco library card.

[3194] Really?

[3195] Yeah.

[3196] Man. There's that library that's right around the corner from there, too.

[3197] They rebuilt it, too.

[3198] It's beautiful.

[3199] Oh, did they?

[3200] Oh, because it was kind of a shithole before.

[3201] Oh, man. No, they completely rebuilt it.

[3202] Oh, damn.

[3203] That in a safe way.

[3204] They're keeping the grounds.

[3205] It looks amazing.

[3206] Yeah, it is nice.

[3207] Phil Waddle from Santa Cruz, California says, hey, guys.

[3208] Just wondering if you can confirm for me what characters Nolan North voices in Arkham City.

[3209] I saw his name in the game's credits, but all the voice actors were just listed without indicating what characters they portrayed.

[3210] IMDb lists him as playing the Penguin, though I'm a little hesitant to believe that since Penguin's Cockney draw in Arkham City sounds nothing like that trademark North voice work we've come to recognize and love in the majority of the games we play every year.

[3211] However, if he actually did provide the voice of Mr. Cobblepot, I would like to say that his performance could easily upset Untraded 3 for this year's Northie, as it is certainly the most un -Nolan North, Nolan North voice I've heard yet.

[3212] Thanks, guys, and keep going.

[3213] up the excellent work.

[3214] Really?

[3215] Confirmed.

[3216] I had no idea that was it.

[3217] Confirmed he is the penguin as well as thugs.

[3218] So apparently this is the second iteration of you can have Nolan North talking to Nolan North.

[3219] After Mafia 2.

[3220] That's a good pair.

[3221] You can have him have both pairs.

[3222] Good on him.

[3223] I don't know if people realize this, but Noel North is a master of his craft.

[3224] Yeah, but he's not a guy who's a serious voice actor.

[3225] He doesn't have to just sound like Nathan Drake.

[3226] I thought they all got the animated cast or something for the entire game.

[3227] Good for him.

[3228] He does a great job.

[3229] Fantastic.

[3230] But I still got to say Space Orb.

[3231] As far as, if we're going to start talking early northeast.

[3232] Oh, yeah.

[3233] Space sphere.

[3234] You're tipping your hand a bit?

[3235] Yes.

[3236] I thought he was just the adventure sphere.

[3237] Nope.

[3238] Wait.

[3239] Isn't he all spheres?

[3240] I don't think he's all of them.

[3241] I don't think he's all, but I'm pretty sure he is space sphere.

[3242] If he's all, wouldn't they be talking to each other again?

[3243] They don't ever really talk to each other.

[3244] No, they kind of have their little...

[3245] Monologues.

[3246] Yeah.

[3247] Well, because they're just all in that...

[3248] Bucket and then you grab one.

[3249] They talk to you.

[3250] Yeah.

[3251] All right.

[3252] I guess there is – I guess whatever.

[3253] There is a little bit at the very, very end.

[3254] Jeez.

[3255] All right.

[3256] Anyway.

[3257] Getting ahead of yourself.

[3258] Anyway.

[3259] Yeah.

[3260] I'm just saying.

[3261] I did a little Nolan North research earlier today because I was trying to remember like what else has he done this year because we got to start thinking about Northies.

[3262] The important awards are coming up.

[3263] I'm like almost getting chills thinking about the end of that game.

[3264] That shit was so awesome.

[3265] It was good stuff.

[3266] Oh, my God.

[3267] Yeah.

[3268] Say whatever you want about the rest of that game, the last five minutes of it.

[3269] Man. Yeah, they topped it off nicely.

[3270] Yeah, so confirmed.

[3271] Nolan North is the penguin in that game.

[3272] Let's see here.

[3273] Guy bitching about pandas.

[3274] Jeff from Indianapolis, Indiana.

[3275] Howdy, guys.

[3276] With the recent talk about The Simpsons ending only to be renewed again for two more seasons, it got me thinking whether or not we'll ever see another Simpsons video game.

[3277] From the infamous arcade game to the slew of games that were released in the 90s, such as Crusty's Funhouse and Virtual Bart, and the most recent games, such as Simpsons Road Rash and Simpsons Hit and Run, it would be really nice to see one more final Simpsons game that's actually good before the show ends.

[3278] It will eventually.

[3279] What are your thoughts on this, and what Simpsons games did you enjoy?

[3280] Love the show, and thank you.

[3281] I want to see an all -new Virtual Bart. Virtual Bart 2 .0.

[3282] Yep.

[3283] Finally.

[3284] You know, that Simpsons the game.

[3285] Yeah, the EA one.

[3286] The EA one was okay.

[3287] That wasn't a total whiff?

[3288] Not a total whiff.

[3289] And there's some actually very funny shit and some very knowledgeable video game stuff in there.

[3290] That stuff's cool.

[3291] Still worth playing?

[3292] I still agree with Jeff here who says that Hit and Run is the best Simpsons game because they basically made Simpsons Grand Theft Auto and that was...

[3293] Kind of crazy good.

[3294] Who was it that made that?

[3295] Is that High Voltage?

[3296] No, I don't think so.

[3297] High Voltage did Road Rash, I think.

[3298] It wasn't...

[3299] Oh, Simpsons Road Rash.

[3300] So yeah, Simpsons Road Rash, sorry.

[3301] The Prototype Guys, what was...

[3302] Radical, is it?

[3303] It might have been fucking Radical.

[3304] Well, that's kind of a bummer of a story then.

[3305] Considering they all but shut down now, right?

[3306] Yeah, well, everyone...

[3307] Survival...

[3308] Who's doing Prototype 2?

[3309] Maybe it's still them.

[3310] Maybe they didn't get shut down.

[3311] Maybe they just had layoffs.

[3312] Vinny, any thoughts on Simpsons games?

[3313] Is that what it was called?

[3314] The Simpsons?

[3315] I think it was, yeah.

[3316] Yeah, that was good.

[3317] I think it was The Simpsons, the game.

[3318] I've got a copy of it I've never played.

[3319] I don't know.

[3320] You get five points for a pushing start.

[3321] There's some funny knowing stuff in there.

[3322] Some good gags.

[3323] I can't remember.

[3324] Maybe.

[3325] Maybe.

[3326] There is a great Will Wright gag.

[3327] Oh, man. Really?

[3328] Yes.

[3329] Now I want to play it.

[3330] Yeah.

[3331] Actually, I was reading this email earlier and thinking about it.

[3332] I was like, fuck, that Will Wright part was amazing.

[3333] That's like better than anything that would be in the show itself these days, probably.

[3334] I wouldn't know.

[3335] The show, I mean, I don't watch it.

[3336] religiously or anything, but every time I see the more recent ones, it's still really fucking good.

[3337] Really?

[3338] Yeah, alarmingly so.

[3339] I probably haven't watched that show with any regularity in 10 years.

[3340] That's going to be a really expensive Blu -ray collection.

[3341] The Simpsons ones?

[3342] Yeah.

[3343] That's like a $500 investment.

[3344] That's like the Law & Order set.

[3345] How much is that?

[3346] $200.

[3347] How many seasons was that?

[3348] 20 -something.

[3349] Jesus, really?

[3350] Like, 89.

[3351] 89 is when that started.

[3352] Oh, wow.

[3353] Wow.

[3354] Just a little over 20.

[3355] All right, then that's cheaper than I thought.

[3356] Okay.

[3357] At a certain point, you can't...

[3358] You can't just charge...

[3359] You can't just say, a million dollars!

[3360] And you're like, well, fucking, I'm not going to buy that.

[3361] They go like $60 season one.

[3362] Yeah, $60 season two.

[3363] Star Trek is obscenely expensive on disc.

[3364] Yeah, they goose you for that stuff.

[3365] I don't even want to think about what next generation in high def is going to cost.

[3366] Mmm, all of it.

[3367] God.

[3368] It's going to cost all of it.

[3369] Oh, dude.

[3370] Whatever you've got.

[3371] It's on DVD, just like the old standard deaf versions on DVD.

[3372] Six years ago, it was like $130 a season.

[3373] Simpsons is 20 -something?

[3374] 25?

[3375] For seasons, yeah.

[3376] Oh, dollars?

[3377] No, no, no. It was running.

[3378] Yeah, because that started around the same time.

[3379] It started at 91, 92.

[3380] Are you sure?

[3381] Yeah, I remember watching the Christmas special in Hawaii.

[3382] Okay, yeah, yeah.

[3383] So that would be like 22 seasons.

[3384] It's not quite 25 yet.

[3385] Damn.

[3386] But they'll probably make it there with the seasons deal they have.

[3387] You cap the Tracy Ullman show?

[3388] No. No, because the Christmas special happened after the Tracy Ullman show appearances.

[3389] And also they were so radically different.

[3390] Yeah.

[3391] Going to look at that stuff is weird.

[3392] I don't want it.

[3393] Even just looking at early Simpsons stuff is weird looking at this point.

[3394] For the way that art style kind of changed some.

[3395] But yes, Brad, if you haven't, obviously not right now, but...

[3396] Sometime next year, why don't you check out the Simpsons game?

[3397] I'll play the Simpsons game when I'm done.

[3398] You know, going into that recording booth, doing BART lines for 22 years.

[3399] Getting paid millions and millions of dollars.

[3400] Do you know how much money they make?

[3401] A lot.

[3402] $650 ,000 an episode or thereabouts, I believe.

[3403] Well, at least I am led to believe by the terrible final season of Entourage that that's how much they make for episodes.

[3404] I thought it was $800 ,000.

[3405] Maybe it is.

[3406] I don't know.

[3407] I thought that came up in the...

[3408] when they were talking about canceling it or something.

[3409] Yeah, they did.

[3410] They didn't renegotiate.

[3411] I mean, are the Simpsons that relevant?

[3412] Like, can they possibly be making their money back?

[3413] I mean, the ratings are up.

[3414] Or if the ratings are there, you know, it doesn't matter.

[3415] Like, they charge X amount of dollars for ad space during shows with some ratings.

[3416] Right, and it gets syndicated out.

[3417] I guess.

[3418] Oh, man. Their ASCAP check must be awesome.

[3419] Languages.

[3420] Oh, yeah, those guys, the back end.

[3421] SAG checks in there.

[3422] Jeez.

[3423] But then, yeah, the whole, like, The contract negotiation stuff ended up coming down to being about profit.

[3424] Whoever wrote that theme song.

[3425] They wanted some percentage of profit participation, and they were not getting any, and they're like, we're the fucking voices of the Simpsons.

[3426] Did they get it?

[3427] I don't know.

[3428] I don't even understand at that point.

[3429] What are you going to do with more money?

[3430] Unless it's just an ego thing.

[3431] I think it's just you look at how much money they're getting out of it.

[3432] Other people are making this money because of percentages, and you're like, hey, wait a minute.

[3433] If this much money is being made off of this thing that I am helping create, I should get a piece of that pot.

[3434] Well, also, maybe if you're getting a percentage, then you can stop doing it and still get residuals.

[3435] They could have stopped doing it 15, well, maybe it's like 10 years ago.

[3436] But maybe you wouldn't be able to live the lifestyle you've then become accustomed to.

[3437] I don't know what lifestyle it is that needs that much more money.

[3438] Burning $400 ,000 a day.

[3439] Bringing in several million dollars a year.

[3440] Yeah, I don't know.

[3441] Scientology, bro.

[3442] That's a good point.

[3443] Residual Scientology.

[3444] I wish I had just played saxophone on that intro.

[3445] I could retire.

[3446] I'm not clear yet, man. Nope.

[3447] Keep dumping money into this.

[3448] I'm only OT4.

[3449] Mervin from Bloomington, Indiana.

[3450] Hey, guys.

[3451] I work at a store called Kroger.

[3452] Does this make me a Krogan?

[3453] What does Kroger sell?

[3454] The phage.

[3455] I'm not buying it.

[3456] Good pull.

[3457] Yeah, it's a really bad plate.

[3458] No one should go to that store, honestly.

[3459] I don't know why it's even open.

[3460] If I could get it to go and then give it to somebody else, then maybe.

[3461] No, no, they've got to give you the phage there.

[3462] No, I'm not going.

[3463] Do they have a drive -thru?

[3464] Yeah, but you've still got to call it in.

[3465] Oh, forget it.

[3466] It's like going to the pharmacy at the Walgreens.

[3467] Like, yeah, you can drive through, but you've already got to have your thing going there.

[3468] No, thanks.

[3469] I know.

[3470] I know.

[3471] Gavin from Scottsdale, Arizona.

[3472] Dear Bombcast, in the same vein as the long -fought GIF -JIF and Gib -Jib debates, I must ask how the Final Fantasy currency, the Gil, is meant to be pronounced.

[3473] Patrick pronounced it Jill on the recent Bombcast, and that really threw me. Thanks for your help.

[3474] Patrick's not here to defend himself.

[3475] I don't recall that happening.

[3476] I heard it.

[3477] Yeah, okay.

[3478] So we are all in agreement.

[3479] Gil?

[3480] Gil.

[3481] I always said Gil.

[3482] Gil.

[3483] Gil.

[3484] It's a G. Like a fish.

[3485] Gil.

[3486] Gil Gerard.

[3487] Gil.

[3488] Yeah, like Gilgrunt.

[3489] Yes, like your favorite Skylander.

[3490] Come on.

[3491] He's not my favorite.

[3492] He's up there.

[3493] I was saying to the audience.

[3494] He's my favorite of the starters, which I thought was going to be trigger -happy, but he's got a water jetpack.

[3495] So it's like Mario?

[3496] Yeah.

[3497] Like an off -brand Mario?

[3498] Yeah, it's like an off -brand Mario Sunshine because he's got a water jetpack and a water hose.

[3499] You can kill stuff with it.

[3500] And that's it for emails.

[3501] Thanks to everyone who wrote in bombcast at giantbomb .com.

[3502] I got a lot of emails in this week.

[3503] That was good.

[3504] And that's it for the show.

[3505] Thanks for listening.

[3506] Jeff, have a safe trip.

[3507] I hope, yes.

[3508] I hope so.

[3509] And we will see all of you next Tuesday in another exciting edition of the Giant Bomb Cast.

[3510] Is that the action -packed one?

[3511] The action -packed stunning conclusion to the Giant Bomb Cast.