Giant Bombcast 05-31-2011

[0] It's May 31st, 2011, and you are listening to The Giant Bombcast.

[1] I didn't even say it was Tuesday, did I?

[2] Take it from the top.

[3] All right.

[4] Hey, everyone.

[5] It's Tuesday, May the 31st, 2011, and you are listening to The Giant Bombcast.

[6] I'm your host, Ryan Davis, joining me in the studio.

[7] I'm staring at him and his beautiful Sean Pate.

[8] Hey.

[9] Mr. Vinnie Caravella.

[10] That's right.

[11] You look like you should be walking around knocking doors in your neighborhood and telling everyone that you just moved there.

[12] I have to tell you this.

[13] It's by law.

[14] I just want to let you know.

[15] I played Demon's Souls.

[16] Just by law.

[17] All the way through.

[18] I have to tell everybody.

[19] Jeff Gerstman's in the house.

[20] Looking as much like a serial offender as he normally does.

[21] Great, yeah.

[22] No better, no worse.

[23] Okay, good.

[24] I ordered an electric shaver.

[25] I call that giving up.

[26] But that's where we're at on that.

[27] And Brad Shoemaker.

[28] Hi, hello.

[29] Waiting for Vinny to show us his guitar string tattoos.

[30] They're on my prison tats.

[31] Oh, his prison tats.

[32] It's E3 -do, man. Just no fuss.

[33] No fuss.

[34] No, no, no. It makes sense.

[35] Because you know all the fuss I had to do before.

[36] There was a lot of muss.

[37] There was definitely a lot of muss.

[38] More muss than fuss.

[39] Yeah.

[40] But now, forget it.

[41] You really should call it muss and fuss.

[42] You should see my comb.

[43] It's real small.

[44] Do you own one?

[45] No. Does anybody own a comb?

[46] I have a comb.

[47] Do you have a comb?

[48] I have a brush.

[49] Like a comb comb?

[50] Like a comb comb.

[51] I wish I had a comb.

[52] It was hard for me to buy just one comb.

[53] It was kind of like, here's five combs in different sizes.

[54] I'm like, what do you...

[55] I barely need a comb, let alone an assortment of combs.

[56] What about you, Brad?

[57] Combs?

[58] Brushes?

[59] Nothing.

[60] Nothing at all?

[61] Probably eight years ago, I devised a hairstyle that required no maintenance whatsoever.

[62] I like that you talk about this as though you invented it.

[63] No, no. Just have to find something that works for me. Gentlemen.

[64] I've discovered something amazing.

[65] The goal was to get out of the shower and towel the hair and then never touch it.

[66] Not going to go into the science of it.

[67] Not going to bore you with the details.

[68] Years of research and development.

[69] Check this out.

[70] Billions of dollars.

[71] Lockheed Martin.

[72] Long story short, I could fly.

[73] With this haircut.

[74] With this haircut.

[75] You are due for an E3 haircut.

[76] It's getting shaggy.

[77] As soon as I start playing with it in the back is when I know that it has to go.

[78] It's getting brad shaggy.

[79] I wouldn't say it's getting like...

[80] Relatively.

[81] Relatively.

[82] I'm trying to decide if I need to go get one more haircut before E3.

[83] I think I'm going to go get a haircut before E3 just so that I can make Matt Kessler also go get a haircut before E3.

[84] Wait, how does that work?

[85] I'm going to drag him to the haircutter and make him get a haircut.

[86] Oh, yeah.

[87] I guess he can't really say no. No. No, he can't.

[88] Patrick can, though.

[89] I came in here and saw Vinny this morning and declared we were all shaving our heads for E3, and Patrick was just like, no. No. Which would be the best haircut.

[90] I'd take some of that hair.

[91] You take some of Patrick's hair?

[92] Oh, yeah.

[93] Yeah, sure.

[94] It's good hair.

[95] Yeah, it looks good.

[96] But he would not look good with a shaved head.

[97] Maybe not.

[98] You never know until you try.

[99] He would not look good with a shaved head.

[100] That's the thing.

[101] I don't even want to try.

[102] There's some folks that you just, you know.

[103] I don't think I would look very good with a shaved head.

[104] I don't think it would work.

[105] I don't know.

[106] I have a feeling it would be pointy.

[107] Your head?

[108] Yeah, I guess you don't really know what the shape of your own head is until you...

[109] I shaved my head a lot in high school, so I have a fairly good idea of what...

[110] my head looks like underneath all this i don't know jeff i think you could pull it off yeah i don't know well i think you'd be better like balding than bald i think if we if we gave you like the the accountant kind of kind of reach around thing the little little horseshoe little horseshoe yeah yeah yeah exactly No thanks.

[111] If it gets to that point, I will shave the rest of it off.

[112] False comb over.

[113] I don't think it'll get to that point.

[114] Do the Gallagher.

[115] It's just long.

[116] You mean the dance?

[117] It's like this.

[118] Well, both is what I mean.

[119] I want both the dance.

[120] Make this watermelon smashing motion.

[121] Yep.

[122] With long but also no hair.

[123] I started with the normal.

[124] Kind of trimming the hair.

[125] And then I was trimming my facial hair with a different buzzer.

[126] And then it went up too high.

[127] Is that how this started?

[128] That's how it started.

[129] And then it's up.

[130] Maybe I can fade it.

[131] Nope.

[132] And then I walked out of the bathroom and said, does this look all right, Jess?

[133] No. Just go all the way.

[134] So I was in the shower yesterday and looking at my razor.

[135] And I just went, I'm tired of this.

[136] Tired of this.

[137] Shit.

[138] Basically, I'm at a point where my facial hair grows slow enough that I probably only have to really do anything to it every four days.

[139] And I have this crappy beard trimmer I've been using to just kind of stem it back, so I'm just kind of constantly crappy stubbly.

[140] It doesn't look too neck beardy, I think.

[141] I can usually get it down low enough that it doesn't look too sloppy.

[142] But I just said, you know what?

[143] I just need to give up on this whole real razor thing and just see if electric shaver technology has advanced since the last time I tried it.

[144] I think it has.

[145] Something acceptable.

[146] You know, I think that the quality is good.

[147] It just always seems like using electric razor takes forever.

[148] It always seems like – Like you're going over the same spot multiple times.

[149] Like to get it to the point that you want it.

[150] If you're going to actually bother with a full shave, that the electric razor seems like you always got to just cycle and cycle and cycle.

[151] I get a lot of irritation from that, too.

[152] You're just grinding this thing into your skin over and over.

[153] What'd you get?

[154] I don't know.

[155] I spent like $250 on some Norelco thing.

[156] That's the other thing.

[157] They're so crazy expensive.

[158] And they had an old line.

[159] I was looking on Amazon.

[160] They have this line of different models.

[161] I got the second highest one because it looked like it had some kind of auto -cleaning cycle.

[162] And I said, that looks like fun.

[163] But the other one was like $300.

[164] I'm like, what's going on?

[165] And isn't there like a crazy huge jump?

[166] Isn't it like you can get them for like $15, $75, $400?

[167] Yeah, so for $300.

[168] I wanted to get something good.

[169] I figured if I'm going to judge has shaver technology gotten to a point where I can feel good about using an electric shaver instead of feeling like a total failure, then I should probably get a good one.

[170] So, I don't know.

[171] I bought a good one, I guess.

[172] Or an expensive one.

[173] I understand it's being advertised on television by baseball players.

[174] So you know it must be good.

[175] So it must be good.

[176] I like that that's the gold standard for...

[177] This was after the fact.

[178] This did not lead to the purchase.

[179] But I'm saying like as far as face shaving technology goes for your spokesperson baseball players.

[180] They have some amazing facial hair.

[181] Yeah.

[182] Except for that one guy.

[183] He doesn't shave at all.

[184] No. And his beard's gotten crazy.

[185] I didn't realize that he wasn't trimming it.

[186] And I saw how crazy that beard has gotten.

[187] I think he should be forced to shave his beard until he starts pitching better.

[188] If I didn't have such a fear of them, I'd just get a big straight razor.

[189] Like a nice old straight.

[190] Like 40s style?

[191] Yeah.

[192] So there's a shop near here where designer Alexis gets his haircut that's all like 40s zoot suited out.

[193] And the dude, I think, will teach you how to use a straight razor.

[194] I'd love to.

[195] Every time I look at them, I just think of people getting their necks slit.

[196] You just think of just, yeah, cutting your own throat.

[197] Yep.

[198] Must be the Italian in me. That's not a personal hygiene device.

[199] That's a weapon.

[200] Yeah.

[201] Might as well shave with a kitchen knife.

[202] Probably teach you how to shave with a kitchen knife too.

[203] Do you think?

[204] Do it Croc Dundee style.

[205] How about a bayonet?

[206] When you're in the trench?

[207] I think the last thing I'd worry about is shaving.

[208] How about like a tin can lid?

[209] Yep.

[210] There's a guy outside.

[211] It'll teach you how to do that.

[212] Shave with a stapler.

[213] With the staples?

[214] Sure.

[215] Why not?

[216] I don't know.

[217] Week 43.

[218] Speaking of staples, soon we'll all be right next to the Staples Center.

[219] Shape with the Staples Center.

[220] That's good.

[221] You know, I give that like a three out of five.

[222] Thank you.

[223] I give that like that.

[224] That was.

[225] Yeah.

[226] It was quick.

[227] Hey.

[228] I'm not good.

[229] I'm just quick.

[230] You didn't quite stick the landing, but like nice improvisation.

[231] Nobody got hurt.

[232] That's right.

[233] Your knees didn't bend back the other way.

[234] I had no point in my saying, hey, this is high -quality stuff.

[235] I'm just saying I can be quick with it.

[236] If you want something quick and serviceable, I'm here.

[237] Get the job done.

[238] Move it on.

[239] Say that on your business cards.

[240] Quick and serviceable.

[241] You need someone to say something from Beverly Hills Cop or figure out some kind of shitty segue.

[242] I'm a man. I'm okay.

[243] You could do worse.

[244] We just got off of a hot three.

[245] We're actually recording this on a Tuesday.

[246] Yeah.

[247] It's actual Tuesday.

[248] It's extra breaking.

[249] Yeah.

[250] Extra current.

[251] It is realer than real because three -day weekend here in the States, Memorial Day weekend.

[252] V, did you do anything for your Memorial Day weekend?

[253] I did.

[254] My mother -in -law was in town with friends.

[255] Oh, awesome.

[256] Yeah, so we did like the kind of San Francisco tour.

[257] Went to the theater.

[258] Wait, the TRE theater?

[259] What's the cutoff?

[260] When's the RE theater coming to us?

[261] Were there live people on a stage?

[262] Did you go see Thor?

[263] No. Okay.

[264] Then Tier 3?

[265] Then TRE.

[266] Did you go see the Blue Man Group?

[267] Nope.

[268] That might still be TRE.

[269] You think?

[270] Blue Man Group?

[271] Yeah.

[272] I mean, like, low end.

[273] Oh, yeah.

[274] That's still RE.

[275] Absolutely.

[276] I just saw that they were in town.

[277] Oh, are they really?

[278] Yeah.

[279] I don't think it was the Blue Man Group.

[280] How many Blue Men are there?

[281] Three?

[282] So that's the thing.

[283] The public appearance is that there's three of them, right?

[284] There's like a million of them.

[285] They could be anybody, right?

[286] Yeah.

[287] They do regular tryouts.

[288] That's not just a made -up thing.

[289] I don't even know what they do.

[290] They're the Globetrotters, but with didgeridoos instead of basketball.

[291] It's all like...

[292] It's all found sound PVC pipes that make noise.

[293] We made these percussion instruments out of weird stuff, and then we bang on it and act bizarre.

[294] Blue.

[295] We should go see the Blue Man Group sometime.

[296] I've seen them.

[297] No. You've seen them?

[298] Yeah.

[299] I want to go see them.

[300] That was a Capcom trip.

[301] I was going to say it sounds like an event.

[302] Yeah.

[303] It sounds like we're in Vegas.

[304] Hey, guys.

[305] After dinner, we're going to see the Blue Man Group.

[306] Okay.

[307] That very specifically sounds like a female PR rep really wanted to go see the Blue Man Group.

[308] And so the trip became let's go see the Blue Man Group.

[309] That's how I saw O. Yeah.

[310] That sounds about the right speed as well.

[311] Anyway, back to the holiday.

[312] What did you see?

[313] Was it something?

[314] Tales of the City.

[315] Oh, okay.

[316] Yeah.

[317] Which was pretty good.

[318] That's what you see here.

[319] Yeah.

[320] You bring people from out of town.

[321] It's either that or a beach playing at Babylon.

[322] They actually bought the tickets.

[323] My wife and I just showed up.

[324] No, no, no. That's exactly.

[325] That's a thing that you don't know exists, but you're out of town.

[326] It's like climbing the Coit Tower or going out to Alcatraz or whatever.

[327] It's a good show.

[328] If anybody's looking to go to the Theath Ray.

[329] Do you know which Theath Ray it was?

[330] It was a downtown one.

[331] Orphium?

[332] It was near the.

[333] Union Square.

[334] That's kind of the theater district.

[335] Theater row.

[336] Then we ate, and then the next day we ate again, and then we did the car tour stuff, Muir Woods and Twin Peaks and kind of the city stuff.

[337] Then we went to Oakland.

[338] The O!

[339] Went to Oakland and found some good Mexican food in Oakland, in the Mexican parts of Oakland, which were fun.

[340] Which was fun.

[341] You doing any grilling?

[342] No, and then Monday I just totally video -gamed it up.

[343] Okay, so that was Saturday and Sunday.

[344] So that was Saturday and Sunday, and then I beat L .A. Noire, done.

[345] Finished it.

[346] Closed the case file.

[347] Closed the book.

[348] Although today just released the first two DLC.

[349] They announced what it is?

[350] It's Naked City and Slip of the Tongue.

[351] Those were pre -order cases.

[352] Yeah, those have been out.

[353] Okay.

[354] I already played through Naked City.

[355] So my pre -order case I still haven't been able to get, or my PlayStation exclusive case.

[356] Yeah, you can't get that until the store's back out.

[357] Oh, you've got the PS3 version?

[358] In fact, you can't get any of the PS3 DLC.

[359] No, that's great.

[360] No, no, no. I mean, it sucks because of the cases.

[361] I played both versions, and the PS3 version is better.

[362] It's a great game.

[363] Also, now that, you know.

[364] Once you get to that point where you're through the game and you want to go back and play previous cases.

[365] I thought I'd go back and clean up even the side mission stuff, but I think I'm kind of done.

[366] What was your reaction to the ending?

[367] It wasn't as...

[368] I really liked the game a lot, and the ending I liked less so.

[369] Yeah, the ending is off the strongest part of that game.

[370] Yeah.

[371] I really liked it.

[372] Yeah?

[373] It's not bad.

[374] It could be handled a little more deftly than they do.

[375] It's actually pretty dense.

[376] There's a lot of stuff to kind of...

[377] It's kind of like, but for the genre...

[378] There's a very genre -appropriate sort of irony to the way it ends.

[379] It is kind of perfect.

[380] It's more of the way the ending is presented.

[381] It kind of happens a little...

[382] It's all a little faster.

[383] I thought the last scene...

[384] It feels kind of rushed.

[385] Like, the last 10, 20 minutes of that game feel a little rushed.

[386] It was more the last scene.

[387] I just wanted a little more closure.

[388] I wanted those title cards to come up and be like, he went on to go be judge of, you know...

[389] Yeah, yeah.

[390] Whatever can be.

[391] Thematically, it makes sense.

[392] It's just not presented as cleanly.

[393] And it probably speaks to the character development throughout the game.

[394] I just wanted to know what happened to the rest of those guys and what they thought about the ending.

[395] I wanted to know what the characters thought about everything.

[396] Noir is kind of all about loose ends.

[397] Ending keeps that noir going.

[398] Discomfort.

[399] Kind of like a dissatisfaction with the way things turned out.

[400] But I really...

[401] I don't know.

[402] When that game shifts, I became far more excited about it and far more invested.

[403] There was definitely a whole lot of like, what the hell?

[404] What's going on now?

[405] I just knew at that point.

[406] I'm like, okay, yeah.

[407] They're really getting into...

[408] There's kind of this...

[409] There's a lot of kind of facile noir trappings throughout that game, but the deeper story, once that switch happens about two -thirds through, is...

[410] is really, really exciting.

[411] I should say the post -credits scene was actually redeemed a lot of the ending for me. I liked the scene after the credits.

[412] I thought that actually tied up pretty much.

[413] But actually, yeah, that filled in a few blanks.

[414] Yeah, a lot of the story.

[415] But yeah, I had a lot of fun going through it.

[416] Longer than I thought.

[417] Way longer than I thought.

[418] What was your playtime?

[419] I don't remember, but it felt like I was never running out of, like, oh, this must be the end, and then nope.

[420] It's a long game.

[421] Yeah, it's long.

[422] Do you have interest in going back and playing cases?

[423] Maybe.

[424] I don't know.

[425] It depends what they're like, how they're sold to me, what the description is.

[426] If it's just more climbing up drain pipes and chasing down dudes, probably not.

[427] How long is the Naked City?

[428] Case length?

[429] Yeah, yeah.

[430] So since I already had that one cashed in beforehand, that one did just integrate into my playthrough.

[431] Well, some of those cases are longer than others.

[432] That's true.

[433] Some can be real long.

[434] Yeah, Naked City is a pretty significant one.

[435] It's substantial.

[436] But Rockstar Pass is a surprisingly good deal.

[437] I mean, it's four cases.

[438] It's like, you know, I mean, the guns and costumes are kind of whatever.

[439] But even at four full extra cases for $10, that's...

[440] Pretty good deal.

[441] Plus the other stuff.

[442] I never got the achievement or the trophy for using all the weapons, which I thought was weird.

[443] Did you use the flame?

[444] Yeah, I used everything.

[445] Huh.

[446] And I just never got...

[447] Just your fists.

[448] Your fists are a weapon.

[449] I definitely fisted a couple of guys.

[450] I didn't get that one either.

[451] I don't know.

[452] The weapons one, yeah.

[453] So I don't know if it's a...

[454] Maybe it's tied into some of the DLC.

[455] I'd like to talk to somebody who got it.

[456] Definitely people have it.

[457] There's a full list of what the weapons are.

[458] It didn't seem like there were that many.

[459] It seemed like there were four weapons.

[460] There's a couple that are very similar.

[461] I think there's two versions of Tommy Gun.

[462] I think I got both of those.

[463] The one with the round clip and the straight clip.

[464] I think you're thinking of the BAR.

[465] Maybe.

[466] I don't know.

[467] I tried to make sure I got everything.

[468] I was just running through dropping guns.

[469] I think there's a Tommy gun with a magazine and then a Tommy gun with the drum clip.

[470] I'm not sure.

[471] Drum magazine.

[472] I'm not sure.

[473] I don't know.

[474] Aside from all that, yeah, I had a lot of fun with it.

[475] I'm all the way in for all that DLC.

[476] I feel like it's a kind of stop.

[477] Check out this game in terms of where video games are.

[478] Check it out.

[479] This is an important piece of video game timeline right here.

[480] And I guess we'll see in the future how much of that stuff plays forward.

[481] But genre bending.

[482] That game is going to age horribly.

[483] You think?

[484] I think so.

[485] I think the technology in that game.

[486] One of those turning points of technology.

[487] I think the technology in that game looks amazing right now.

[488] But I think being kind of first run, I have a feeling that it's just.

[489] Like two years from now, you look back on it and go, oh, jeez, all these.

[490] It's like everyone that has any kind of faces in it will eventually go that route.

[491] So it'll just be everywhere, and that'll be the first example of it, and it'll look.

[492] I don't know if it's going to be that pervasive.

[493] I mean, it's owned by this company that made the game.

[494] Right, right.

[495] For one thing.

[496] So, like, if Rockstar buys that developer and owns that technology, like, it'd probably be a proprietary thing.

[497] Yeah, but somebody will iterate on it.

[498] There's a lot of stuff in that game.

[499] People are like, oh, we can do that.

[500] Like, oh, you just put, like, 32 cameras?

[501] Or we put 33 cameras.

[502] Boom.

[503] Type 32 in the quality field.

[504] And put 15 cameras on their body, too.

[505] The only moments when that stuff broke down for me is when...

[506] the few cases where there were two people that you were interacting with at once uh there were a couple of like interrogations where like interrogation interviews where there was someone else sitting there next to the person you were talking to and they were just like they were sitting there and they're sitting right next to each other but they were in completely different worlds just just like I'm trying to remember an instance of that.

[507] It couldn't do just like someone was saying something that would be shocking and then the person would appropriately react.

[508] Because they all acted them out individually.

[509] Right.

[510] It kind of betrays the process they went through to capture these performances of everyone is super isolated, which isn't a problem when you're doing one -on -ones or even when it's just sort of conversational.

[511] But when someone – I think it's super hard in that sort of a setting to – to background act.

[512] Sure.

[513] If you know what I mean.

[514] When it's just like, okay, you're going to sit in the middle of this room, now act casual.

[515] Right, right.

[516] You know, act surprised.

[517] Like, at least you need stand -ins there giving you prompts and stuff.

[518] Sure.

[519] But I think even more than the technology, just the format, like, is as an...

[520] which is pretty much an adventure game.

[521] It's kind of the 2011 point -and -click adventure game.

[522] Yeah, I mean, this is like one possible route for that genre to go along.

[523] So I think we'll probably see some more of that.

[524] Like, instead of just, you know...

[525] Sam and Max next season, super realistic rabbit faces.

[526] Well, that's the thing.

[527] Real rabbits.

[528] That's the thing.

[529] Like, those guys are over there doing the point -and -click thing still.

[530] Right.

[531] That's kind of the old way to make an adventure game.

[532] And it's weird because you did see some of that in the Sam & Max stuff where there was one episode where you were shaking down people and you had to see if they were lying or telling the truth.

[533] So that's not that novel, but I felt like it was executed really well.

[534] And I thought nothing ever seemed completely contrived with the notebook and all that stuff.

[535] I thought the whole thing was just very well done.

[536] But, I mean, it does have...

[537] like, five tricks.

[538] Like, that game boils down to a handful of ideas.

[539] Like, conversation scenes, collecting evidence, like, you know, the first person shooting and chases and stuff.

[540] Like, it's a, yeah, it's a small...

[541] I thought that was actually...

[542] The car chase, the car following, the foot chase, the fist fighting, like...

[543] I actually thought those parts were probably the weakest, the actiony bits.

[544] I think it's presented so well that I'd...

[545] It was exciting to watch, even though it's not mechanically complicated.

[546] For me, it's whenever someone says, like...

[547] How could you prove that I was there?

[548] That's when the FMV game part of L .A. Noire surfaces the most.

[549] The video pauses for a second.

[550] Well, what do you think?

[551] What evidence do you have?

[552] Make my music video.

[553] I actually did appreciate though when you hit lie, they would set up exactly what evidence you need to – do you have evidence that I was the one who made this bill to go to the thing?

[554] Because a lot of times – Can you prove that I was there?

[555] A lot of times I'd hit lie thinking I have a piece of evidence and then they'd state exactly the two sides of like, oh, no, I don't have that at all.

[556] I don't have the thing.

[557] I'm fishing for something else here.

[558] It's not like you have the pair of my torn panties that I stuffed into my purse.

[559] Right.

[560] So like I'd have – piece of evidence that was like I have this guy's testimony that says you were totally there, and then you'd hit lie, and the guy would be like, well, do you have a ticket that says that I was at the theater?

[561] I don't think it gets that specific.

[562] It gets pretty specific.

[563] They don't name the item.

[564] No, but they always at least direct you towards what the two sides are.

[565] And I boned it up a lot of times on that stuff.

[566] How many times did you turn off your system?

[567] About four.

[568] Especially towards the end.

[569] Wait, you actually hit power, did you?

[570] I bailed.

[571] I hit quit.

[572] All you have to do is pause it and go to quit and then resume.

[573] Yeah, that's what I did.

[574] And it pops you straight back into exactly where you were.

[575] Well, sometimes you have to sit through all that.

[576] You can't skip a lot of those.

[577] Well, the beginning of that conversation.

[578] But it checkpoints every time you get to a new location.

[579] I usually did it once.

[580] I started effing up repeatedly, like two wrong in a row.

[581] And then I was like, ah, this is just.

[582] When I got to three, when I was just like, oh, I'm just killing it here.

[583] I'm just doing awful here.

[584] This is the worst.

[585] And it's, you know, there are.

[586] You just feel like a dirtbag.

[587] Because there are the interviews where it's like.

[588] All right, I'm just going to ask this guy, like, two questions.

[589] He's kind of an incidental witness or information source.

[590] But it's when you get to, like, the proper suspects where there's, like, six questions you're going to ask this dude.

[591] And you've already messed up.

[592] And I fucked up, like, half of them.

[593] I'm like, oh.

[594] Like, I don't care if I with, like, you know, I get zero out of two on, you know, the bartender or whatever.

[595] I'm like, all right, I'll make up the difference later.

[596] It's no big deal.

[597] But then you get those music cues.

[598] It's just, oh.

[599] But you're right.

[600] You're right.

[601] I definitely became.

[602] super attuned.

[603] We talked about this last week, the little two notes, the little harmony that comes up when you get it right.

[604] I'm like, oh, thank God.

[605] No, that stuff is good.

[606] I burned through all my intuition points as well.

[607] You should kind of save those up a bit, I think.

[608] Yeah, because you can't grind them.

[609] There's a set number you can get in the whole game.

[610] Yeah, and I was down to just one and then zero the entire time at the end there.

[611] I think I burned through them too quickly.

[612] But when you go back to cases, you'll have full five.

[613] Oh, okay.

[614] Interesting.

[615] I have to try to redo it.

[616] When you replay, which, you know.

[617] When you get to earlier cases, you couldn't have even had five integration points at that point.

[618] I'm super excited for more DLC for that game.

[619] I'll play as many cases as they put out.

[620] Say what you will about the overarching narrative.

[621] Although, again, I think that they capture the namesake of L .A. Noire.

[622] That game is entirely.

[623] Yeah, totally.

[624] And they pay homage to some of the greats and some really specific.

[625] still very inventive ways with kind of the overarching plot.

[626] It's just terrific stuff.

[627] Somebody was saying, I won't say which case, even though it's not critical to the main storyline, but there's a case where the name of the case is also the name of a fairly well -known movie of that genre, and they're both about the exact same thing.

[628] I feel like there are a couple of those.

[629] It's the setup.

[630] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[631] I don't know if there's...

[632] I mean, you know, the big sleep is on half the marquees of the theaters in town.

[633] They are winking and nodding at you about that stuff constantly.

[634] I feel like the longer I wait to play the game, the better experience I'm going to have because they keep releasing all this stuff that integrates into the story.

[635] Yeah, that's the crazy part.

[636] If you wait until all four of those cases are out and then play the game, it's going to make it that much longer.

[637] I don't know how you feel about that.

[638] If it's that good, that's fine.

[639] I think more than...

[640] Any of the...

[641] Yeah, I mean, I wish I could have those other three integrated.

[642] Because having just Naked City in there, I'm like, oh, bonus.

[643] I know that my playthrough here is going to be just a little bit...

[644] And that case is great.

[645] That case is a lot of fun.

[646] It pulls in...

[647] You see a lot of returning characters from past cases.

[648] So it's got some continuity to it.

[649] If that's the standard for the DLC cases, I'm excited to see what the other ones are like.

[650] The last case is called Reefer Madness.

[651] I know.

[652] Can't wait to see what that is.

[653] Plus it's a Vice case, and I love Vice.

[654] Vice is probably my favorite.

[655] I think the main story throughout the whole thing, the larger narrative, I thought it was really powerful.

[656] I thought it was very mature and very kind of...

[657] Well, and convoluted.

[658] There's a lot of moving parts to that.

[659] Very gray.

[660] But every single part ties into it.

[661] There is nothing that you were shown in that game.

[662] The individual cases, a lot of them are just like, that's an isolated case.

[663] But all the character development, all the...

[664] All the weird flashback stuff, like, all the kind of side stuff that they show you.

[665] Like, it all happens for a reason.

[666] It all ties, like, going back and replaying older cases and seeing some of that stuff, I was shocked to realize how much.

[667] How much is tying in?

[668] Yeah.

[669] I just thought it was, like, an adult piece of content done well.

[670] Truly mature.

[671] Yeah.

[672] And not with, like, blood and boobs.

[673] There's blood and boobs.

[674] There's plenty of blood and there are plenty of boobs.

[675] Are there bloody boobs?

[676] There are plenty of bloody boobs.

[677] In fact, that's the only time there are boobs.

[678] Awesome.

[679] They're bloody.

[680] But I think it's done tastefully.

[681] It's all given the appropriate gravity.

[682] Yeah, and that story is pretty heavy.

[683] It's a pretty...

[684] It's good stuff.

[685] Yeah.

[686] It's really good.

[687] Yeah.

[688] And so then I switched gears and went back to The Witcher 1.

[689] How's that treat you?

[690] How are the novels?

[691] I haven't started them yet.

[692] What?

[693] Yeah.

[694] Well, you've got to read the books before you play the game.

[695] It's not going to make any sense.

[696] It's not going to make any sense to you in the original Polish.

[697] I mean, these novels...

[698] First, I need to go through and brush up on my Polish.

[699] First, I need to learn Polish.

[700] Have you learned Polish yet?

[701] Well, I'm working on that.

[702] None of this is going to make any sense to you.

[703] Well, first, I need to go to Polish.

[704] I mean, those books were not written as promotional material for this game.

[705] No, it's books first.

[706] Like, yeah, they existed.

[707] And so somebody...

[708] I don't think you got...

[709] These are exempt from mockery, I think, because of that.

[710] I'm mocking him.

[711] That's perfectly fine.

[712] I'm mocking Vinny for his need to play The Witcher 1 before playing Witcher 2.

[713] There are two things that put the books on a bit of a hold.

[714] I also want to clear the air here.

[715] I'm not making fun of The Witcher 1 either.

[716] I understand it's a very great game and very liked.

[717] It's just this is Vinny's habit of going down these crazy rabbit holes of completionism.

[718] Which I like.

[719] which is good.

[720] How much time do you spend with The Witcher?

[721] I spent probably another five or six hours this weekend with it.

[722] That game's cool.

[723] I'm playing it for the story, not really so much for the gameplay because I do think there are better versions of that gameplay.

[724] It's dense.

[725] Gameplay is dense in that game, but I'm enjoying it.

[726] And I'll get to the books at some point.

[727] Apparently only like two out of five have been translated, so I kind of...

[728] Took a little wind out of my sails.

[729] Plus, when somebody told me that the books are in the same universe, same character and stuff, but it's not like a retelling.

[730] The game isn't a version of the books.

[731] It gave me a little more time to be like, well, I can always go back and read these.

[732] If I play the game, I'm not going to spoil the book.

[733] Or if I read the book, I'm not going to spoil the game.

[734] A lot of flights and car trips coming up.

[735] I know.

[736] You mean they're not retellings?

[737] Yeah.

[738] Or the game isn't a retelling?

[739] From what I understand.

[740] So, yeah, it seems like that universe is fleshed out really well.

[741] And I can't wait to really dive into it.

[742] But I know as soon as we come back from E3, there are so many other games that that's the only thing that worries me. Spending time playing The Witcher 1 and then looking forward to playing The Witcher 2 when just this barrage of games are going to come out.

[743] Well, then don't worry because after that barrage is a two -month wasteland.

[744] That's true.

[745] Yeah.

[746] Of no releases.

[747] Yeah.

[748] July and August looking pretty.

[749] Pretty slim.

[750] Like old school.

[751] Yeah.

[752] July and August.

[753] Like old school July and August.

[754] When does Madden come out?

[755] Is that end of August?

[756] That's end of August.

[757] Yeah.

[758] That's usually the kickback.

[759] That's right.

[760] That's when everyone goes back to school.

[761] That's when people start selling games again.

[762] They announced their Hall of Fame edition for Madden today.

[763] Does it come with a football?

[764] No. Does it come with.

[765] Because of football phone.

[766] No, it comes with some autographed card and foil cover.

[767] Who's the cover artist?

[768] The cover footballist?

[769] Football artist.

[770] I don't remember.

[771] I think it might even be a different guy on the Hall of Fame edition.

[772] So who gets...

[773] Injured then, if there's two.

[774] Well, I think the guy in the Hall of Fame is no longer playing.

[775] Everyone in the Hall of Fame.

[776] Is it like Marshall Falk or something?

[777] Anyway.

[778] They're doing some very interesting stuff.

[779] It's one of the things I saw during my week out was Madden.

[780] It's like a lot of it, chunks of it were lost on me, but it seems like they really are going for it this year, even though there might not be any real football.

[781] It seems like they're kind of using that as an excuse to do a lot of stuff.

[782] to that game that they might not do on an annual basis.

[783] You mean like landmines or mutants?

[784] Yeah.

[785] Sweet.

[786] So they're redoing camera stuff in that game pretty intensely.

[787] They actually showed that they were motion capturing a guy on a 50 -yard field, and this guy's like an NFL Films dude with a camera rig that's got a monitor showing the game on it.

[788] So he's filming guys running out of the entrance tunnels and stuff, and they're just dropping his camera data directly into the game.

[789] Weird.

[790] I thought that was pretty cool.

[791] That's interesting.

[792] So just trying to get it to look more like NFL film stuff.

[793] No problem with that.

[794] That should always look awesome.

[795] He's got gyroscopter tracking stuff on the camera.

[796] So it knows where in the world it is and all that stuff.

[797] So they're capping that, which I thought was really neat.

[798] That's interesting.

[799] So it's like they said there was some case of him getting out of the way of players running at him and stuff, which is kind of neat.

[800] That's interesting.

[801] That's exactly what YouTube want him to do.

[802] Yeah.

[803] It sounds like they're doing a lot of cool stuff with that game this year.

[804] Nope, clip through.

[805] So EA obviously has to have separate deals then with NFL and the Players Association.

[806] Yeah, I think that's still separate.

[807] Those are separate deals, I think.

[808] NFL, PA.

[809] I imagine they have to be because that's where the beef is coming from, right?

[810] Is between owners and players.

[811] The deals are the deals.

[812] I don't know.

[813] I'm just wondering how the lockout is going to...

[814] Well, I think it would probably affect stuff like roster updates if there are no rosters to update.

[815] Sure.

[816] They would have to kind of launch with...

[817] Well, I was thinking more just like kind of broader big picture, like how this would affect their ability to change things or tweak things about the game on a larger scale.

[818] Well, yeah.

[819] I mean, I think, yeah, it definitely...

[820] They would have no real league to react to.

[821] So if they wanted to go like, okay, this player is suddenly having a breakout season.

[822] We need to make it better.

[823] They don't have to worry about that.

[824] It's probably almost better in some weird way.

[825] More liberties for them.

[826] Right, because they just get to make it right once and then don't have to sit there and sweat that stuff.

[827] I don't know.

[828] You know, to hear them describe it, it's like, you know, they're kind of like planning for the worst case scenario.

[829] Like if there's no football, this game's still going to be awesome for football fans.

[830] If there's no football, they should charge $90 a copy.

[831] Well, that's what the Hall of Fame edition is.

[832] No, basic edition of that game is $90.

[833] It's the only game in town.

[834] You fucking want football this year.

[835] Guess what?

[836] Madden.

[837] That's what.

[838] Arena football.

[839] Or they should just do an alternate universe Madden for this year if there's no football.

[840] Imagine if robots and mutants outplayed.

[841] They should just do that anyway.

[842] It was all a dream.

[843] I'm imagining.

[844] Keep going.

[845] There's one robot who's got tank trips.

[846] Save it for NFL Blitz.

[847] Is that coming back?

[848] Yeah.

[849] Did that have players?

[850] You mean Blitz.

[851] No, I think I mean NFL Blitz.

[852] Oh, yeah?

[853] Yeah.

[854] We'll see.

[855] MLB Blitz.

[856] Yes, MLB Blitz.

[857] We couldn't get NFL players, so check it out.

[858] That would be the best.

[859] CFL Blitz.

[860] Just all hockey players.

[861] Madden MLB.

[862] Yeah.

[863] All right, we bought.

[864] We put baseball players.

[865] What if baseball players had to play football?

[866] Well, we've got all these other stats.

[867] I guess we'll figure out how to translate those into these stats.

[868] Great facial hair.

[869] C .C. Sabathia would play something like this.

[870] Just guys like self -pitching the football and dropping it out to receivers.

[871] I'd play that game.

[872] Yeah?

[873] I'd play that game.

[874] All right.

[875] Are you suggesting we should give football players baseball bats?

[876] Because I am in.

[877] No, give the baseball players baseball bats and put them in a football and put them on the field.

[878] Well, yeah.

[879] I mean, I don't care.

[880] Get the guys who know how to use them.

[881] I don't care where the players are coming from.

[882] Let's get inmates and put them on a football field and give them baseball bats.

[883] All right, now you're on to something.

[884] I'm talking about the next great American sport is what I'm talking about, goddammit.

[885] Whatever team win gets parole.

[886] That's right.

[887] Oh, thrash ball.

[888] I'm inventing thrash ball right now.

[889] This is how it happens.

[890] This is how it happens.

[891] NFL strike.

[892] NFL strike.

[893] And it's just like, you know, Sunday in the park, pickup league, games of thrashball.

[894] In 2011, due to the NFL strike.

[895] What if we put spikes on these pads?

[896] At halftime, cars went into the field.

[897] We need something more extreme.

[898] Can we make this game take place in 20XX?

[899] We may take place in 20XX and it happens on a mountain of burning amplifiers.

[900] I love this game.

[901] This is what you saw?

[902] This is what they wanted the show.

[903] No, this is T -shirt guns that kill people.

[904] I could not talk about some of the other things I saw.

[905] Jeff, what can you talk about?

[906] Oh, God.

[907] It's such a weird list.

[908] You know what?

[909] What do you want to talk about?

[910] Yeah, well, today was the day for the Call of Duty Elite reveal.

[911] Yes, which caused a bit of a kerfuffle.

[912] Yeah.

[913] I think we can call it a kerfuffle.

[914] Sure.

[915] I think it's reached kerfuffle status.

[916] Do you think it at any point got to Donnybrook?

[917] No, it hasn't quite reached full -on Donnybrook yet.

[918] Way beyond Boondoggle.

[919] Oh, it's, well, yeah.

[920] I'd say it's, yeah, it's definitely.

[921] It's past Boondoggle.

[922] Past Boondoggle.

[923] I feel like Boondoggle's way past Kerfluffle, man. Yeah, I think it probably.

[924] Because Boondoggle is only a couple of steps away from FUBAR.

[925] Yeah, is it FUBAR yet?

[926] It's not FUBAR.

[927] Because at the end of it, it's people kind of freaking out about half the story or kind of being willfully ignorant about what Call of Duty Elite actually is.

[928] I don't even know which part you're talking about being freaked over because there was the whole Wall Street Journal embargo break and...

[929] That wasn't even embargoes being broken.

[930] Wall Street Journal had the exclusive yesterday.

[931] Right, but people took it that way.

[932] And that story, you know, it being written by the Wall Street Journal was more focused on the business aspects of this being a subscription -based service.

[933] So it didn't necessarily put, you know, it put in the spotlight that this actually doesn't change anything about the way you play Call of Duty today.

[934] And that's the thing, you know, if you just want to...

[935] play that game on the internet and shoot people and then buy map packs or not buy map packs.

[936] Like, Modern Warfare 3 still functions exactly like that.

[937] And then they're building this additional service around it, some of which will be free, some of which will be not.

[938] So it's like they're building, basically, I mean, you know how Bungie handles stats for Halo?

[939] I think so.

[940] Like, they have a whole site full of heat maps and game viewer and all this crazy stuff that's totally free.

[941] And it's awesome.

[942] If you're into Halo, it's killer.

[943] You go look at it, you're like, oh, man. It's all kind of comparable to take it back to Battle .net stuff as far as stat tracking and replays and things of that nature.

[944] Yeah, sort of.

[945] I mean, neither service really offers full -on replay capability from the site or anything like that.

[946] So this subscription service doesn't necessarily affect any of the gameplay.

[947] It's more of a meta layer on top of that.

[948] Right.

[949] It's a layer on top that...

[950] Like I said, they haven't necessarily been too clear about where they're going to draw the line as to what's free and what's not, which is probably compounding some of this.

[951] They don't really have their shit together for this announcement.

[952] Yeah, talking to you about it some this morning, it sounds like they're figuring out where that line is.

[953] Yeah, so it's like all they're saying is that it will be priced lower than comparable services.

[954] And I look at, like, well, what are comparable services?

[955] And you look at, like, okay, so this basically takes the stat tracking stuff from what Bungie's done, which is free.

[956] It takes kind of the group functionality from something like Steam, which is free.

[957] And then if you are a subscriber, you will also get access to all the map packs, which are not free.

[958] With your subscription.

[959] With your subscription.

[960] At release?

[961] No, like, early access?

[962] Yeah, it sounds like it'll be at release.

[963] I think they should probably just give them.

[964] to subscribers a week earlier or something like that.

[965] Like the people willing to pay that fee, like, you know, it's, it doesn't split the player base for very long.

[966] You know, those people would probably be the people that would, you know, be most likely to care about that sort of stuff and, and go from there.

[967] But that's a good bonus for people who are way into call of duty.

[968] I think that that, that at that point, I think makes the service even, you know, it makes the service attractive because right now.

[969] For me, if they charge any more than what those map packs cost on their own, they're charging too much.

[970] You figure they do three map packs over the life of Modern Warfare 3, so that's $45 right there.

[971] But anytime I say to anyone, they shouldn't charge more than that, they look at me like I'm crazy and go, they're going to charge $5 a month.

[972] Don't be stupid.

[973] They haven't announced it, but that seems like a likely scenario, I guess.

[974] I'm not even sure that a monthly...

[975] makes the most sense for that.

[976] Get all the money up front.

[977] The big part of what they want to do with this on a business...

[978] I'm sure from a business perspective, is get all that map pack money out of you on day one while you are pumped about Call of Duty.

[979] And locking you into buying all three map packs.

[980] And then locking you into maybe not selling back your copy of the game used because you've paid for this year of stuff.

[981] Also, for every person who gets that stuff up front, that is $105 per sale instead of $60.

[982] Or $110 or whatever it is.

[983] Or a RC car with night vision strapped to it.

[984] A knife with a stick of dynamite.

[985] taped to it, whatever it is.

[986] But especially it's that much extra money on the next earnings report.

[987] Right.

[988] Yeah.

[989] So have they said if this would just be for that game?

[990] So they're going to roll this out.

[991] It'll be for Black Ops and for Modern Warfare 3.

[992] Okay.

[993] So they've actually been tracking Black Ops stats since launch and that stuff will be in there.

[994] So it's kind of like a Call of Duty subscription?

[995] That makes a little more sense.

[996] It's not tied to any particular game.

[997] This is their ongoing service, evolving service.

[998] They've got an iPhone app.

[999] This is a web page, basically, where you're going and looking at all the stats and joining groups and doing all that stuff.

[1000] The other thing is they'll have leagues and tournaments with real prizes, which I imagine that would be on the other side of the paywall.

[1001] Also, they didn't really say what the prizes would be, but in the placeholder stuff, they had a Jeep.

[1002] Or a belt buckle, you know, stuff like that.

[1003] It seems like as long as they're not sucking or taking stuff that, you know, gameplay functionality out of the core game, like they're not charging just for multiplayer or something like that, if there are people who want that stuff, I don't know, it's hard to have a problem with it.

[1004] Yeah, it sounds like a more robust Bungie Pro to me. Right.

[1005] Nobody who plays Halo but doesn't sign up for Bungie Pro is suffering or missing out on anything fundamental.

[1006] But at the same time, Bungie Pro was really just extra file share space.

[1007] Yeah, yeah.

[1008] That's what I'm saying.

[1009] This offers clearly a lot more than that and probably will be priced accordingly.

[1010] It's also hard for me to tell because I kind of have no interest in that at all.

[1011] So, like, if it were for something and I was like, that would be awesome, but I have to pay for it, I could see people kind of getting upset.

[1012] But it sounds like a...

[1013] It sounds like most of this stuff is going to probably end up being free anyway, and it's really just the stuff that you would have to pay money to access anyway, like map hacks and stuff that would get you prizes, which – but they're just positioning it in really weird ways.

[1014] They're talking about like, well, one of the reasons that this has to be a premium service is because we're building such a huge customer service organization to support it.

[1015] I'm like, no one fucking cares about that.

[1016] And really, what is your – Why?

[1017] What are you servicing?

[1018] Unless you're going to implement Call of Duty gameplay counselors that I can call up and go, dude, I just can't shoot people right.

[1019] Dude, shoot them better.

[1020] Yeah, if there's someone on the phone with a binder that they flip through, yeah.

[1021] If Gary Witt is on the other end and he goes, well, have you tried getting him?

[1022] Oh, thanks.

[1023] All right.

[1024] You know, because this notion of like, oh, well, you know, if we're going to start this service, there's going to be a lot of people calling up.

[1025] It's like, well, what do you have to deal with?

[1026] Like, I lost my password?

[1027] Yeah, like, yeah.

[1028] It's like, you'll have some of that stuff, but.

[1029] Yeah, I'm not sure.

[1030] Like, how?

[1031] If you're starting this paid service to support the organization that will have to support your paid service, then maybe you've gone about it wrong.

[1032] Or maybe there's something that they're.

[1033] Or paid service is expensive to run.

[1034] We need more money.

[1035] Yeah.

[1036] Maybe there's some other thing that they just haven't announced that needs that customer support.

[1037] I have no idea.

[1038] Or maybe they just know that the kind of mainstream Call of Duty fan base is the type of people that will just call you up to curse at you over something and they need people to handle that.

[1039] Or therapists on the other end.

[1040] I really don't know.

[1041] That'd be great.

[1042] Who's just like therapists?

[1043] Or like Jimmy Kimmel.

[1044] Just call them up.

[1045] I like doing that ad for this game.

[1046] Get Cody in there.

[1047] Right.

[1048] Yeah, so they haven't done a great job of really kind of positioning this stuff and saying what exactly it's going to be.

[1049] I mean like they showed it to you and they showed it to the Wall Street Journal and they showed it to – obviously not just you but when I say you, like a bunch of enthusiast press.

[1050] Yeah, yeah.

[1051] And there seems to be – No clear consensus of – Well, the minute you say, hey, we're charging money for a thing related to Call of Duty, everyone immediately goes worst case scenario and just starts like, I'm charging money to play the game.

[1052] I feel bad for like Robert Bowling in this case because he's still kind of the community face for Infinity Ward products.

[1053] And if you look at his Twitter, it's just like one -to -one responses to people saying, no, we're not charging to play the game.

[1054] Like in like five different ways.

[1055] It's not even a form letter.

[1056] He's taking time to just go, no, dude.

[1057] Which, you know, God bless him.

[1058] He's good at doing that.

[1059] That's what they have to pay for.

[1060] That's what's going to happen.

[1061] Right, yeah.

[1062] It's just like they need to duplicate him 20 times, 2 ,000 times to get on Twitter.

[1063] Activision has the technology to clone Robert Bowling.

[1064] I would pay for that.

[1065] I would totally pay for that.

[1066] But wasn't there – there was a quote.

[1067] If my money goes to making more Robert Bowlings and making that watch work, then what else would it?

[1068] Wasn't there a quote that came out of Activision about a year or two ago that was just something – off -the -record kind of quote that was just like, yeah, if we could charge for the multiplayer, we would totally do it.

[1069] Oh, it was a on -the -record Bobby Kotick.

[1070] I mean, they have not been shy about...

[1071] I think that doesn't help.

[1072] We need to make money off of people playing our game all the time.

[1073] Yeah, but, you know, it's like standards being, you know, even with the franchises, you just call it duty.

[1074] they couldn't just do that.

[1075] They would probably make more money for a little bit, but they would turn off so many players over the process.

[1076] In a year where people are, at least people that are very tapped into what's going on with upcoming games, this is going to be the year that they face their biggest challenge yet in Battlefield 3.

[1077] And it would be...

[1078] A bad move for them to go full -on subscription only for that multiplayer, considering no one else is really in a position to do that and no one else has to do that and no one else will do that.

[1079] It would leave them out in the cold.

[1080] They're just not going to do that.

[1081] The basics of how the console business works would have to...

[1082] changed so dramatically for us to get to a point where people are paying to play 16 -player multiplayer games.

[1083] On a subscription basis.

[1084] On a subscription basis.

[1085] On top of what they are already paying to do that on an Xbox.

[1086] Right.

[1087] Well, pretty much everybody's doing the pass thing now, right?

[1088] That's like across.

[1089] That's Warner Brothers doing it.

[1090] Activision does.

[1091] EA does it.

[1092] Right?

[1093] They all have the included online pass stuff.

[1094] Yeah.

[1095] Codemasters does it.

[1096] THQ's done it.

[1097] But they're just distributed through THQ.

[1098] And you can buy that.

[1099] After the fact, right?

[1100] If you don't have that code, you can buy it after the fact.

[1101] One of the startup messages in Black Ops, they have the stats and stuff that will go across the bottom.

[1102] One of them even seemed like a swipe at that.

[1103] It was just like, multiplayer, free in every box.

[1104] Really?

[1105] That's really funny.

[1106] They've said it time and time again.

[1107] Anytime anyone will ask them or anytime anyone is listening, they will say, we have no intent to charge to play the basic multiplayer, which is true.

[1108] right up until the moment where they change it.

[1109] But I don't think the business will be there for them to make that change anytime soon.

[1110] By the time that this business has changed so much that they can charge for individual games like that, Call of Duty will not be a factor anymore.

[1111] It'll kind of already...

[1112] gone off into the night or something.

[1113] So did you see the game proper?

[1114] Like, just regular game that you can talk about?

[1115] I mean, yeah, I saw them on World War 3.

[1116] They demoed two levels of the single player.

[1117] They didn't talk about multiplayer at all.

[1118] Except for Spec Ops.

[1119] That'll be back.

[1120] Oh, cool.

[1121] Yeah.

[1122] I like that part.

[1123] Game looked pretty good.

[1124] Looks okay.

[1125] It looked like a Call of Duty game.

[1126] It's interesting.

[1127] They didn't really focus on any real kind of story stuff other than to say that conflict is all over the world, which is their teasers have kind of reflected that.

[1128] And it's a continuation of Modern Warfare 2?

[1129] Yeah, but they didn't show anything related to soap or price.

[1130] It was just like, here are some Delta Force soldiers taking Wall Street back from the Russians.

[1131] and here are some British SAS guys chasing down a train.

[1132] If you've got a first -person shooter where you've actually managed to create characters that people give a shit about, you save those.

[1133] I don't think you trot those out for the...

[1134] Yeah, maybe not.

[1135] That's the price reveal in 2.

[1136] Right.

[1137] When you finally get to him, it's such a great oh shit moment.

[1138] But that leaked script claims that this game picks up moments after the end of the second game.

[1139] That it's not...

[1140] And also that they're not necessarily huge characters in the game, which seems kind of crazy.

[1141] You know, I don't know where this is going.

[1142] I mean, I don't know what the fate of Modern Warfare 3 is going to be.

[1143] Because arguably, after Black Ops, Call of Duty is bigger than it has ever been.

[1144] But I feel like we are...

[1145] in the middle of a really hard backlash from a lot of people on the enthusiast side.

[1146] Yeah, that's kind of the other thing.

[1147] I have to imagine that Activision expects a lot of this reaction, because any time you say, hey, we're charging for anything, we all know the internet doesn't like that.

[1148] But how many of those people have actually been turned off to the point where they're not going to buy the game, where they were going to buy the game and now won't?

[1149] And how many of them will just, oh, we'll buy it.

[1150] Or are even aware of any of this stuff at all.

[1151] Right.

[1152] That's the thing.

[1153] I think so many people that play Call of Duty don't pay any attention to any news about video games other than when is that coming out.

[1154] And they learn about that from commercials during the NBA.

[1155] Right.

[1156] Did I hear, or what were you saying?

[1157] I thought I got the impression somewhere that the game that is being made was sort of mapped out.

[1158] pre -calamity at Infinity War.

[1159] Oh, I don't know.

[1160] I hadn't heard that.

[1161] Because that happened the following spring after Modern Warfare 2, is that right?

[1162] So they probably could have had a rough outline at that point.

[1163] I ask because you see this final product coming out after there has been such a sea change in the development staff.

[1164] I personally won't be able to look at this game without thinking, is this...

[1165] roughly the game that would have been made if that hadn't happened.

[1166] How is this different?

[1167] That is how this game is oddly damaged.

[1168] It's hard to extract it knowing that there was this huge creative change behind the scenes.

[1169] You're left wondering, was this game really made by Infinity Ward as I know it?

[1170] The two people on stage introducing this demo were Robert Bowling from Infinity Ward and Glenn Schofield of...

[1171] of Sledgehammer games.

[1172] Who last made a Dead Space game.

[1173] Right.

[1174] Yeah.

[1175] So, you know, it's a PR guy and creative strategist.

[1176] Community guy and head of another studio.

[1177] Head of another studio, yeah.

[1178] You know, so they've divvied up the...

[1179] the tasks accordingly and are kind of working on that game across studios and they're outsourcing a bunch of stuff to other people and even though it was not mentioned at all during this presentation apparently Raven is still working on some portion of this game as well.

[1180] They were not represented on stage though.

[1181] I thought Raven died.

[1182] I thought they killed Raven.

[1183] No. Well, Modern Warfare 2 ended with everything going to hell and Soap and Price leaving to go do their own thing.

[1184] To get the hell out of there because everyone was after them.

[1185] So maybe Infinity Ward was writing it into the game.

[1186] Predicting the future.

[1187] Maybe that's why we haven't seen them in anything of the new stuff.

[1188] You're saying Modern Warfare 3 is a parable for the meltdown of Infinity Ward?

[1189] I'm saying Modern Warfare 2 was, and maybe we'll see Modern Warfare 3 be like, some press are dead.

[1190] They're dead.

[1191] We're not going to mention them.

[1192] They're doing their own thing.

[1193] It's okay.

[1194] They retired.

[1195] Here's some new characters.

[1196] We don't care.

[1197] Yeah, we don't care.

[1198] Check these new guys out.

[1199] Yeah, I don't know.

[1200] It looked fine.

[1201] The demo looked fine, but it looked very standard.

[1202] It looked like, okay, I'm...

[1203] Working my way up this street.

[1204] I'm shooting these guys.

[1205] None of it looked new.

[1206] The tech didn't necessarily look like it had advanced too far.

[1207] It looked nice.

[1208] It was 60 frames a second like you expect.

[1209] But basically it all looked as you expect, which I guess maybe with all the turmoil that has come to the studios involved and kind of how this game has come together, maybe that's enough.

[1210] Maybe that's all that they can do.

[1211] That's all they can hope for.

[1212] Yeah, they're probably stoked to have that.

[1213] There's no huge new gameplay thing.

[1214] We introduced lock and shock.

[1215] What would that be?

[1216] Lock and shock?

[1217] You lock on to a guy, and then everybody rushes in.

[1218] It's like shock and awe.

[1219] There you go.

[1220] So is it like you're controlling your squad tactics?

[1221] You point out a guy, you aim at him, and then you hit a button, and then everybody targets him, and then you run to cover.

[1222] Are you using that as a distraction or are you using that to punch a hole?

[1223] Either, man. You decide how to use lock and chalk.

[1224] That's the beauty of it.

[1225] I like it.

[1226] It's up to the player.

[1227] What governs lock and shock use?

[1228] Can you just pump it out as often as you want?

[1229] You can only do it when you have three or more guys.

[1230] An icon will come up.

[1231] How do I charge up my lock and shock gear?

[1232] No, just an icon will come up.

[1233] It's like breaching a door.

[1234] So it's scripted?

[1235] It's scripted, yeah.

[1236] It's not really up to me. It's just at this one point I can hit the button.

[1237] Save questions for the end.

[1238] We're going to roll a lock and shock demo right now.

[1239] This is a little bit later into the game.

[1240] Will this game have multiplayer?

[1241] We're going to skip ahead a little bit.

[1242] How many players?

[1243] We'll save questions for the end.

[1244] So as you can see now.

[1245] We're going to jump ahead now a little bit.

[1246] So kind of the new thing they showed was that in the Manhattan sequence, the guy was holding a rifle that had a full -on scope on it, and he slapped it out of the way.

[1247] The scope.

[1248] Yeah, like down to the side of the gun, and there was a red dot sight there behind it.

[1249] So you kind of go back and forth between if you wanted good magnification or just a red dot sight on that weapon.

[1250] That's interesting.

[1251] Sure.

[1252] It's a thing.

[1253] Yeah.

[1254] Well, it's a thing.

[1255] Yeah.

[1256] And there were a lot of, like, rail shooting sequences.

[1257] Like, you got up to this rooftop and planted explosives on this tower, and then a helicopter came in, and you were shooting out of the door of a helicopter.

[1258] You launched missiles from a Reaper drone, just like you've done in past games.

[1259] The whole train tunnel sequence was all on rails.

[1260] It was just you're in the back of a pickup truck shooting at a train.

[1261] I don't think you're going to win that fight.

[1262] They've done some pretty cool on -rails sequences in the past.

[1263] Or even just like vehicle stuff.

[1264] Like the snowmobile thing was neat.

[1265] So there is a modern warfare expectation of having something like that.

[1266] Yeah, but to have that...

[1267] percentage of your demo taken up by that.

[1268] Well, I mean, the trailer, like, half the things that you see, I'm like, okay, that's gotta be an on -rails vehicle sequence, that's gotta be an on -rails vehicle sequence.

[1269] Yeah, and some of the stuff is, yeah, most of the stuff I saw is in the trailer in some form, or at least in bits and pieces.

[1270] You know, but like we were talking about with Mass Effect 3, by the time you get to the third one, you're not reinventing anything, you know?

[1271] You are, you have an established audience, they kind of know what they like.

[1272] That's fine, but at the same time...

[1273] this whole thing is getting pretty tired.

[1274] Yeah.

[1275] Yeah, I don't think it's the same because I don't expect a Mass Effect 4 to be very similar if they go for Mass Effect 4 to even take place with the same characters or whatever.

[1276] I suspect that's a narrative that will get wrapped up.

[1277] This, I suspect, Call of Duty, they would keep making.

[1278] Yeah, at the same time.

[1279] I believe this is supposed to be the conclusion of the Modern Warfare arc. Okay.

[1280] But I mean, to say that Modern Warfare differentiates or...

[1281] It splits off from Black Ops in any meaningful way in the gameplay.

[1282] It's not that you're looking for it to split off.

[1283] It's that you're looking for it to make advancements in a genre where those advancements are kind of expected and kind of continually being made.

[1284] It's the changeover from Call of Duty 3 to Call of Duty 4.

[1285] That's what we need right now.

[1286] Yeah.

[1287] And, you know, it's like people are starting to look to Battlefield 3 thinking like, well, maybe this is going to get us on a different track and hopefully do something else.

[1288] And I think Battlefield 3 looks awesome.

[1289] I'm just not 100%.

[1290] sold on it yet.

[1291] They've shown campaign stuff.

[1292] That's not what I want to see out of a Battlefield game either.

[1293] And arguably, the majority of the people that want to play Marvel 4 3 don't give a shit about any of this campaign stuff.

[1294] Yeah, it's kind of where I wound up with Call of Duty now is that's kind of become a rental for me because I don't spend time in the multiplayer and the campaign stuff usually winds up being four or five hours.

[1295] So I wind up with a copy of Modern Warfare that I've beaten one night and then kind of put down and never touch again.

[1296] And some would say, well, that game is not for you or whatever.

[1297] But the campaign stuff is usually all right.

[1298] I usually want to play it.

[1299] I don't know if I want to play it.

[1300] It's bombastic.

[1301] It's ridiculous.

[1302] I just wish that more of this demo that they showed.

[1303] that they showed had some element of that.

[1304] Like there really wasn't that.

[1305] There was a train derailing at the end that looked okay.

[1306] It was a space train.

[1307] Yeah, exactly.

[1308] Yeah.

[1309] There was nothing where you're like, Oh, fucking what?

[1310] Like there was no moment like that in anything they showed.

[1311] So without that, you're kind of left sitting there going like, okay, you're making another one of those.

[1312] Great.

[1313] Like I, right.

[1314] We did the war in America thing last time.

[1315] So that can't be the big, like, Oh, It's on American soil.

[1316] That's the thing.

[1317] Now it's war everywhere.

[1318] Now it's war in America.

[1319] It's war in London.

[1320] It's war in Germany, France.

[1321] Everybody's hometown.

[1322] Exactly.

[1323] It's like they're taking the sense of scale to a whole new level.

[1324] But I think the weird thing is everybody else has had war on their soil except for us.

[1325] So the weird novel thing is, wow, war in America.

[1326] That's crazy.

[1327] London and Paris have been bombed.

[1328] It's happened.

[1329] It sucks.

[1330] It's terrible.

[1331] It's not romantic at all.

[1332] We had to hide in a McDonald's.

[1333] That sucked.

[1334] But regardless of the, you know, whatever the quality of the game is, you will be able to play it online for free.

[1335] Right.

[1336] Yeah, that's the...

[1337] That's the key takeaway.

[1338] The key takeaway is nothing's really changing.

[1339] And I mean that about all of it.

[1340] The whole thing never changes.

[1341] Like, so far, nothing's really changing.

[1342] Though Spec Ops mode will have a wave -based survival mode in it, like a horde mode kind of thing.

[1343] Zombies?

[1344] No. That they've said yet.

[1345] Yeah, that they've said yet.

[1346] I want to know when that gap gets crossed, when it's just like, all right, this whole Infinity Ward versus Treyarch weird thing.

[1347] When Modern Warfare gets infected.

[1348] Okay, we can't have it, so every other year the fire tech is really good and there are zombies.

[1349] Let's just merge this.

[1350] Let's stop being stupid.

[1351] That's where this game ends.

[1352] Yeah, zombie invasion.

[1353] Price gets bit, and then now there's zombies.

[1354] Modern zombies.

[1355] Call of zombies.

[1356] I don't even want to talk about this.

[1357] Is there anything else you want to talk about?

[1358] Let's see.

[1359] I saw a brief demo of Metro Last Light.

[1360] A sequel to Metro 2033.

[1361] Yeah.

[1362] Very brief to the point where it's...

[1363] It's really hard to get a sense for what they're changing in that game other than they said that they want to try to, and this is not their words, but they want to try and take some of that jank out of it.

[1364] That game was kind of messed up in some ways that made it a little endearing but were maybe a little crazy.

[1365] It seems like they're faced with a pretty impossible task.

[1366] They say they want to keep it quirky and keep the things that people liked about the previous game while making it more accessible.

[1367] And someone asked specifically about the economy system with bullets and how all that works.

[1368] And they kind of would not commit to that being the same, which I think will serve the purpose of making it more accessible.

[1369] That shit was pretty crazy.

[1370] Is that based off an existing fiction before 2033?

[1371] Yeah, books.

[1372] Okay.

[1373] The economy even came directly from the books.

[1374] From the books?

[1375] Okay.

[1376] But it's one of those things that, you know, for a game where they want you to – and this is how they said it.

[1377] They said, like, you know, we kind of want – we create these guns.

[1378] We want you to shoot them.

[1379] Like, if people are just, like, saving all this good ammo to trade for dirt ammo because they can get a lot more of it, like, clearly, you know, as a game, as a design for a game, it's maybe not the best way to do it.

[1380] So they're – If that is on the table for things that they're willing to change, then as far as I'm concerned, every single thing about that game is on the table.

[1381] And the demo they showed had a little bit of stealth, had a little bit of action, but it kind of looked like some more Metro.

[1382] It looked nice.

[1383] Tech looked good.

[1384] They showed it on PC?

[1385] Yeah.

[1386] But it was strung together.

[1387] It didn't really get a good sense for what was really going on.

[1388] It just kind of looked like Metro.

[1389] They're making another Metro, and I think the changes they make are...

[1390] We'll end up being risky because a lot of the stuff that people liked about the game were the things that made it kind of impenetrable for, let's say, the average Call of Duty player.

[1391] What else?

[1392] It was too Eastern European for me. It was.

[1393] Yeah, absolutely.

[1394] But some people really like that.

[1395] Yeah.

[1396] Sometimes it's really nice.

[1397] It's one of those things, if you can get over that hump, that there's an unforgivingness to...

[1398] to games developed in Eastern Europe, I find that if you can get past that, that there's usually some really awesome shit.

[1399] Yeah, I feel like there's a depth there sometimes, but you just have to dig deep enough.

[1400] Or just a darkness or an atmosphere.

[1401] Maybe even we're guilty of it sometimes.

[1402] I just think that a lot of players don't want depth in that way.

[1403] That's not the part they're looking to push back against them.

[1404] This interface is kind of weird.

[1405] It's not necessarily bad.

[1406] It's just so different and crazy that it's going to take me a long time to get up to speed on it.

[1407] But I do appreciate something different in a first -person shooter.

[1408] We'll add something here.

[1409] The more they try to make it more like Call of Duty, I think the less interested I become.

[1410] I don't think they're necessarily doing that, so I wouldn't worry too much about that.

[1411] But, yeah, I don't know.

[1412] That'll be an interesting one to see kind of how it comes out.

[1413] And that's announced for consoles and PC?

[1414] Yeah.

[1415] Yeah.

[1416] Gosh.

[1417] There'll be some stuff later this week that I'll be writing about that'll be, you know, interesting new games for a new platform and that sort of stuff.

[1418] You know, and I saw Mass Effect 3, but can't talk about that.

[1419] What else?

[1420] Yeah.

[1421] We'll check back in with you.

[1422] We'll have...

[1423] I saw Batman.

[1424] We'll have so much more to talk about.

[1425] As E3 gets closer and closer.

[1426] Yeah, the closer and closer E3 gets.

[1427] The hassle is that I actually was intending to spend this entire long weekend writing up all that stuff that I saw, but was sick the entire time instead.

[1428] So now I'm like three days behind on getting that shit done.

[1429] So it's just like...

[1430] Getting sick on your Memorial Day weekend sucks, too.

[1431] It does, but I had that moment of just like, well...

[1432] It's a good thing I'm sick now because I won't have time to be sick any other time but right now.

[1433] Yeah, I was freaking out last week thinking I was getting sick, and then I just realized it was just hay fever.

[1434] Yeah, I feel like you should have just called up everybody.

[1435] I'll go to your house and cuddle up next to you.

[1436] Everybody get sick now.

[1437] Just get inoculated to it.

[1438] Just keep an eye on your lymph nodes.

[1439] That's the telltale side.

[1440] Yeah.

[1441] They'll start swelling up, then you've got an issue.

[1442] If I go in the E3 clean, then what, it takes like 24 hours, 48 hours at least for incubation.

[1443] So probably Thursday or Friday when we're getting ready to leave, and that's fine.

[1444] I can fall on the floor then.

[1445] Our Thursday schedule, not real busy.

[1446] So far.

[1447] I've still got some stuff to tuck in there.

[1448] The crappy part is I have a plane ride on Sunday, so plane rides are always terrible for getting sick.

[1449] If you pick it up on Sunday, I think you'll pretty much be clear at E3.

[1450] To Wednesday, Thursday.

[1451] Before it really kicks in.

[1452] I'll be a good case zero.

[1453] Thanks.

[1454] Vector that shit right into this office.

[1455] Yep.

[1456] I'm just going to be drinking hand sanitizer between now and how is that any different from any other week.

[1457] Good alcohol content.

[1458] I'm doing it for science.

[1459] Brad Shoemaker.

[1460] Hello.

[1461] How you doing?

[1462] I'm pretty good.

[1463] You fucking went to Blizzard last week.

[1464] I did.

[1465] And I had a super long -winded segue set up from Call of Duty to this.

[1466] And then you had to go and mention Metro.

[1467] Do you still want to use it?

[1468] I don't even remember all of it.

[1469] No?

[1470] It was something to the effect of speaking of Activision -related games with a clear split between the audience for campaign and multiplayer.

[1471] Wow.

[1472] That was pretty long -winded.

[1473] And games.

[1474] Oh, wait, we're not done yet.

[1475] And games that had events at which they showed two story -related missions and refused to talk about multiplayer.

[1476] Go on.

[1477] I saw the new StarCraft expansion.

[1478] So is that the way to address this?

[1479] Is it an expansion?

[1480] They are straight up calling it an expansion.

[1481] Okay, so does this require the previous game?

[1482] Yes, in territories where there is a boxed ownership model.

[1483] Right.

[1484] Because there are parts of Asia.

[1485] So not Korea.

[1486] I guess...

[1487] I think Korea had a box, but also there was some kind of like monthly fee that you could...

[1488] Ah, dude, I don't know.

[1489] So if I own...

[1490] Yes, yes.

[1491] To the people that are listening to this podcast.

[1492] I've got it.

[1493] You need to have that.

[1494] Well, it's just, I mean, you know, it's a testament to how big Blizzard is in those territories that the answer to that question was not simply yes.

[1495] Right.

[1496] When people say, do I need the first one?

[1497] They don't just go, yep.

[1498] So did they say anything?

[1499] I'm going to expect a big no about how they'll package this.

[1500] Will they package this in with Wings of Liberty for a full retail bundle?

[1501] Will it be a mini battle chest?

[1502] I don't think they can do a battle chest until they're done with everything.

[1503] So you think they'll sell these as two individual things?

[1504] The real question to me is if this is an expansion, how much does this cost?

[1505] $40.

[1506] They haven't said anything, but I guarantee I would put money on this costing $40.

[1507] Would you put $40 on this costing $40?

[1508] Possibly more than that.

[1509] Oh, wait, so they have not given you a number?

[1510] No. Okay, so this is Brad.

[1511] But, I mean, they've had three WoW expansions.

[1512] 40 Brad bucks?

[1513] Brad money.

[1514] You don't want to know what the exchange rate is.

[1515] It's terrible.

[1516] They've had three World of Warcraft expansions at 40 bucks.

[1517] Right.

[1518] Like, that model is well established.

[1519] Sure.

[1520] They are using the term expansion.

[1521] And how have they handled that?

[1522] I haven't kept track, but how have they handled that in terms of packaging in the originals?

[1523] They keep them all separate?

[1524] They keep them all separate.

[1525] I think there is a way to buy them all, right?

[1526] You could digitally buy the expansions.

[1527] But you don't get a deal or something like that?

[1528] Yeah, I mean, traditionally going back like 10, 12 years, like the Blizzard Battle Chest, you know, like you see it at every Best Buy in the world.

[1529] It's always like once they reach the clear end of that development cycle, there's nothing else coming out, then we're going to put this in the chest.

[1530] And the game is like 10 years old already.

[1531] Yeah.

[1532] Well, actually, it's more like once it's like a year past everything coming out.

[1533] Right.

[1534] Oh, I just mean the original game.

[1535] By the time they get to the final Diablo 2 expansion, yeah.

[1536] It's like five years old.

[1537] Yeah, the original game is still coming.

[1538] The Diablo 2 expansion.

[1539] Still working on it.

[1540] They still patch that game frequently.

[1541] Rory was just playing it this weekend.

[1542] Yeah.

[1543] Hell of a game.

[1544] I know exactly where my Diablo 2 disc is.

[1545] Discs.

[1546] So do I, actually.

[1547] Did you bind it to your Battle .net account?

[1548] I did.

[1549] Yeah.

[1550] That thing is awesome.

[1551] So tell me more about, what's the name of it?

[1552] Heart of the Swarm?

[1553] It's called Heart of the Swarm.

[1554] It's the Zerg box.

[1555] In keeping with the expansion -like pricing and format, it is roughly two -thirds of the length of the Terran game, which was 29 missions, and this is going to be 20 -ish.

[1556] The turn was pretty long.

[1557] It was a long game.

[1558] It was certainly not short.

[1559] This will not be as long.

[1560] How is the...

[1561] The missions, I assume, are the missions.

[1562] They're going to be RTS missions.

[1563] Pretty much.

[1564] With their own slant on it.

[1565] The two I played, yeah, definitely.

[1566] Just like the Terran game, each mission has really specific, unique stuff going on.

[1567] Even if it's all just down to weird map triggers that they scripted and stuff like that.

[1568] What's the arcade game hidden in the Zerg lair?

[1569] What can I go play?

[1570] That's a good question.

[1571] It would have to be Centipede, right?

[1572] Yeah.

[1573] I guess it would have to be.

[1574] Pretty much.

[1575] So what's the...

[1576] How do you keep telling this story, which is, you know, after the first chapter, it's being told from the Terran perspective and is so focused on the Terran characters.

[1577] But let's be honest.

[1578] The Terran characters are kind of the characters.

[1579] Pretty.

[1580] But enough of those characters.

[1581] I mean, by the end of the human campaign of StarCraft II, like the transition over to Zerg seems to make a whole lot of sense.

[1582] Absolutely.

[1583] They have definitely.

[1584] Like, that's baked in.

[1585] Yeah, they seeded a Zerg -focused story with the thing that happens.

[1586] But, I mean, my question is, Zerg being Zerg, how do you tell that story?

[1587] Yeah, there aren't a lot of Zerg characters.

[1588] I mean, like, a person who stands up.

[1589] Like, Zerg stands up and says, well, let me tell you what's going on.

[1590] I mean, you've got Kerrigan for that.

[1591] That's why they, like, yeah, you are Kerrigan in this.

[1592] Like, she is absolutely the focal point.

[1593] I mean, even going back to, like, Brood War, like, what did you have?

[1594] The Overmind.

[1595] The Overmind.

[1596] It had, yeah.

[1597] And, like, random cerebrates would talk.

[1598] They had their lines.

[1599] It was all Terran and Protoss, like, named characters.

[1600] Theoretically, by this point, it wouldn't necessarily be totally out of character, and I guess maybe we're talking...

[1601] pretty specifically about the events of StarCraft 2 at this point, but Jim Rayner could be around for this, and it wouldn't be too weird.

[1602] They showed a teaser trailer that's got Rayner in it quite a bit.

[1603] Nova, the ghost, that was supposed to be in StarCraft Ghost, she's in this.

[1604] And there was all sorts of, even like Brad said back in Brood War, there was all Zerg on Zerg campaign stuff that you just were like, you know, these are the good Zerg, these are the bad Zerg, these are the bad, bad Zerg.

[1605] I guess I just meant more of like, you know, who do you prop up to actually tell the story?

[1606] What you're asking is, what is the binding agent between the missions?

[1607] Yes, that's partially what I'm asking.

[1608] Where's the ship?

[1609] What do you do?

[1610] What's the ship and, yeah, what's the dialogue tree?

[1611] I guess, I don't know where this came from in the fiction, but I guess Zerg used these things called Leviathans to get between planets, which are basically just giant living spaceships.

[1612] So you'll be on one of those.

[1613] So you're on the Zerg ship.

[1614] I'm going to be on a greasy ship.

[1615] It looks like a pulsating ship, and there'll be a jukebox there playing this kind of weird hillbilly.

[1616] So, I mean, yeah.

[1617] No, the Zerger just did the hardcore rap.

[1618] Everyone knows that.

[1619] Oh, that would be awesome.

[1620] Like, honestly, functionally, that stuff, not really that different in this.

[1621] I mean, I can't wait to see that stuff.

[1622] I mean, there's video of it up on the site.

[1623] I want to see, like, the breeding chambers in the ship.

[1624] Yeah, so that's all in there.

[1625] Changes to the way upgrades work and stuff.

[1626] Yeah, so that's where the differences are.

[1627] I mean...

[1628] First game you were on the ship, you had a research lab, you had a garage, you know, like it was pretty obvious how the R &D stuff went down.

[1629] And this one, like you still got the interface where like Kerrigan's in the middle, like here's like your kind of advisor thing coming out of the ceiling.

[1630] Okay.

[1631] Like attached to a giant tentacle or whatever.

[1632] Of course.

[1633] Here is, like, the Evolution Master over here is, like, this giant beetle -looking thing.

[1634] But they talk.

[1635] They have names.

[1636] Like, you click on them and dialogue happens.

[1637] I'm Robbie.

[1638] Yeah, totally.

[1639] You want to make the Zerglings tougher if we give them 15 more hit points and they can hatch faster?

[1640] Do you want to be able to build on Not Creep?

[1641] Talk to me. All voiced by Nolan North.

[1642] I hope so.

[1643] I hope so.

[1644] Actually, a bunch of the dialogue in this was, like, temp dialogue from Diablo recording sessions.

[1645] Like, they had been doing a bunch of Diablo dialogue, and these guys had, like, some lines written, and they were like, we've got to get this demo together.

[1646] Could you just, like, lay these down for us?

[1647] Like, stay a while and listen?

[1648] Well, I mean, you know, they're in character.

[1649] It's not like...

[1650] Shee -wee for upgrades.

[1651] Yeah, yeah.

[1652] I mean, it's, yeah.

[1653] But, yeah, the upgrades are...

[1654] So every unit evolves individually now.

[1655] It's not like...

[1656] So like in the Terran when you had a linear upgrade path where every iteration you had to pick one of two choices.

[1657] But it was kind of random effects.

[1658] You get this new unit or you change this other arbitrary unit.

[1659] They weren't really connected.

[1660] There was no logical progression.

[1661] In this, each unit evolves by itself.

[1662] Like, totally independent of what you do with all the other units.

[1663] Are you talking, like, on a mission -to -mission basis?

[1664] Yeah, it's still, like, you out -collecting stuff.

[1665] Yeah, you're, like, doing secondary objectives and missions and stuff earns you, like, mutagen is what they call it.

[1666] But, I mean, it's not just, like, I mean, like, specifically a unit or are you talking, like, a unit type?

[1667] What do you mean?

[1668] A unit -type?

[1669] Yeah, it's not like you're evolving hero units.

[1670] Also, actually, there's a split.

[1671] So you're evolving.

[1672] They only showed the Zergling, the Baneling, and the Roach, which are the most basic Zerg units.

[1673] Been in the game since the beginning.

[1674] I didn't see any new units, which is a bummer, because people really want to know if the Lurker is going to be back in there and all this stuff, but that's getting pretty esoteric.

[1675] Kerrigan is a full -on hero -style unit that you're going to use in basically every mission.

[1676] She's super powerful.

[1677] It's not like she can't die.

[1678] It's not like she dies and the mission's over.

[1679] She just sort of burrows into the ground and comes back.

[1680] Can we just talk about...

[1681] It's been almost a year, right?

[1682] Yeah.

[1683] She's basically human again now.

[1684] And so she's in her full -on ghost outfit.

[1685] It's got the little blue energy lines going up and down it and stuff.

[1686] But she's still got the tentacle hair.

[1687] Right.

[1688] So it's not really clear.

[1689] She's mostly human, but she's still commanding the Zerg.

[1690] That makes sense.

[1691] Everybody still hates her.

[1692] It's weird.

[1693] She still had some sway over the Borg after they took all that out of him.

[1694] But it's weird.

[1695] All the Zerg advisors she's talking to kind of don't recognize her.

[1696] They're like, oh, your genetic sequence is different.

[1697] You don't smell the same anymore, that kind of thing.

[1698] So she's supposed to be undercover or something?

[1699] No, she's trying to regain control of everything.

[1700] The Zerg factions are all sort of feral and fighting with each other.

[1701] She still hates the Terrans.

[1702] Oh, really?

[1703] They're still on the Zerg homeworld from the end of the first game.

[1704] They're still there, just slaughtering every Zerg they can find.

[1705] Who knows where Rainer's at?

[1706] He's in that teaser trailer.

[1707] But the demo was just this vertical slice of two missions, like five missions into the game.

[1708] No indication of what's going on with the power dynamics or anything.

[1709] Did they mention any?

[1710] What's the mix now?

[1711] The kind of cross...

[1712] Oh, the hybrid processor thing?

[1713] No mention of any of that stuff whatsoever.

[1714] That's where I feel like this is all headed.

[1715] Yeah, it seems like it's totally...

[1716] It's totally going toward all the existing factions have to unite.

[1717] Right, some common enemy if you're going to play as all these things.

[1718] Seems like kind of a boilerplate sort of conclusion to head toward.

[1719] So how do you feel about...

[1720] full game focused on Zerg shit.

[1721] I'm way into it, because I don't play Zerg online, and this hopefully will be a good excuse to finally...

[1722] I mean, I understand the mechanics, but a lot of it is just getting the hotkeys down and stuff like that.

[1723] I don't want to learn Zerg, I want to burn Zerg.

[1724] And you said that they spoke nothing of multiplayer, but it seems like the common assumption is that this is going to make...

[1725] some significant changes to the way the multiplayer is going to handle.

[1726] The crazy stuff is, I mean, so like Brood War came out, Frozen Throne came out, like they have a long history in their RTSs of putting in new units, which, you know, balancing this game as it is is already like a high wire act, you know, super precarious to begin with.

[1727] So putting even more units in there makes it that much harder.

[1728] But the crazy thing that they would kind of cop to was that they are not opposed to like taking stuff out of the game.

[1729] Oh, so there may be units that they would remove?

[1730] They've said publicly there are units in there that they don't like that much anymore.

[1731] Like, they kind of changed some values, and they're not working like they used to, and it's just they can't think of a good role within the race that they belong to for them to be there.

[1732] So...

[1733] Stuff could disappear.

[1734] Which would be crazy.

[1735] That's totally insane that there are units in a shipping game that's being played for hundreds of thousands of dollars that could change that dramatically.

[1736] Do you believe that they'll have two separate launchers or games from their Battle .net thing?

[1737] Do you want to play Wings of Liberty?

[1738] I think they've always just had you launch an executable and you kind of pick which one you want to go into.

[1739] But you think there will be matches that are Wings of Liberty and matches that will be Heart of the Swarm?

[1740] Yeah, I think because there will be people that don't buy Heart of the Swarm.

[1741] You don't have to be able to play.

[1742] I'm just wondering if they would go back and patch out Wings of Liberty multiplayer to match.

[1743] I don't know.

[1744] It's hard to say.

[1745] I think if they add content, that's probably a tough move.

[1746] I would say no because they need to sell.

[1747] That's the biggest reason for most people to buy a copy of Heart of the Swan.

[1748] If you don't buy this.

[1749] No, you won't get any of that stuff without buying this expansion.

[1750] Absolutely not.

[1751] What do you think?

[1752] Side question.

[1753] What do you think of tournament stuff?

[1754] Do they always just go to latest?

[1755] build or will they stick with Wings of Liberty?

[1756] Especially with so much Blizzard money behind all the big tournaments and stuff.

[1757] They'll just move on.

[1758] I mean, they have an esports department.

[1759] They have a vested interest in keeping the stuff up to date.

[1760] Yeah, I bet everybody will.

[1761] Do you think they'll be giving those guys early access to start making the transition?

[1762] I don't know.

[1763] It's hard to say.

[1764] It was weird.

[1765] They had three days of press demos.

[1766] Asia was the day before ours, and there were actual pros that I'm well aware of and have watched a bunch of matches of that were at Blizzard.

[1767] Can we drop some names?

[1768] Sin was there.

[1769] Sela, who's the coach of Slayers, was a fruit dealer.

[1770] Fruit Dealer is kind of old news.

[1771] Man, fuck you.

[1772] He's been underperforming for months.

[1773] Fair weather Fruit Dealer fans, man. All those jerseys.

[1774] They fucking hop on board when everything's going great.

[1775] The guy in ST that I interviewed when I was over there, he is still a baller.

[1776] He is kicking ass on the pro scene.

[1777] Nothing super surprising about the stuff that I played.

[1778] If you played through the first one, it's...

[1779] Pretty consistent with that stuff.

[1780] Right.

[1781] Probably not a huge surprise.

[1782] Different UI?

[1783] Like Zerg -looking UI?

[1784] I didn't actually look at any of the footage.

[1785] Like the buttons and stuff, totally.

[1786] Just StarCraft -looking buttons.

[1787] But I mean, yeah, the environments that you're moving Kerrigan around in between the missions and stuff, it looks like you're inside a stomach or something.

[1788] What were you fighting?

[1789] It was Protoss in one mission and Zerg in another.

[1790] They always mix that stuff up really well.

[1791] You think you'll find weird things that let you play as Protoss?

[1792] Protoss?

[1793] They said no plans for, you mean like the little Protoss campaign?

[1794] Yeah, like the crystals and stuff.

[1795] They said no plans for it's just Zerg.

[1796] I mean, with a reduced mission count, it kind of makes sense that they would focus on that.

[1797] So the Kerrigan thing I was going to mention, she's a hero unit.

[1798] She has kind of disciplines in a way.

[1799] They only showed two.

[1800] She's got a spec ops discipline and then a corruption one.

[1801] And the Spec Ops is like a ghost thing.

[1802] And obviously Corruption, like Zerg -focused stuff.

[1803] But it totally determines what set of abilities she has in the mission.

[1804] And you totally just pick before you go in.

[1805] So very different styles of play for her.

[1806] She's super powerful, obviously.

[1807] But a lot of control in how you want her to play and what kind of stuff she can do.

[1808] Can I import my save game?

[1809] I don't know.

[1810] I doubt it.

[1811] I made a decision.

[1812] I highly doubt it.

[1813] Oh, yeah, that stuff.

[1814] No, no, that stuff is...

[1815] It was like Nova was one decision.

[1816] Oh, in fact, you know what?

[1817] In fact, I think I saw them saying somewhere that they had, like, picked what the decisions were that are canon for that stuff because some of that stuff will...

[1818] Oh, that's too bad.

[1819] Now I have to replay it.

[1820] It doesn't carry decisions in.

[1821] Yeah, I guess that might have been...

[1822] I mean, it would have been better if they had just kind of written around those decisions so they didn't necessarily...

[1823] Yeah, well, I don't...

[1824] I'm trying to remember if any of those decisions actually made that big of a difference.

[1825] There was one in particular where somebody would be dead if you picked a certain thing or not.

[1826] I don't know.

[1827] We'll see how it goes.

[1828] They didn't seem to carry that much weight.

[1829] Not really.

[1830] It was all kind of minor characters and stuff.

[1831] Also announced during this, $9 a match to play StarCraft 2.

[1832] Dude, whatever.

[1833] Shut up.

[1834] Wait.

[1835] Shut up.

[1836] No, that's not really.

[1837] I would be so broke.

[1838] What?

[1839] But if you win, you get four of those dollars back.

[1840] It's not subscription -based.

[1841] It's just...

[1842] We link it up to your credit card or your PayPal account every time you want to play a match.

[1843] Nine dollars.

[1844] It was really a shame.

[1845] Are those Brad Bucks?

[1846] Yeah, so that's basically like...

[1847] That's USDs.

[1848] Pennies on the dollar there.

[1849] It's a shame they had the demo they had there.

[1850] It was locked to normal difficulty.

[1851] It's not normal.

[1852] It's pretty fucking easy.

[1853] I don't know what you guys played the first one on, but I thought normal even in the first one was just like...

[1854] Yeah, I definitely cruised through a lot of it on normal.

[1855] It was not challenging at all.

[1856] I have not necessarily kept sharp.

[1857] I think you need higher difficulty on that thing to make it worthwhile.

[1858] Yeah, for me anyway.

[1859] But yeah, it was a lot of fun.

[1860] The missions were really unique.

[1861] Some of the upgrades on the different units are totally insane.

[1862] Zergling, you can...

[1863] You can combine enough upgrades on the Zergling to the point that it trains instantly out of, like, as soon as you build it, it pops out.

[1864] Yeah.

[1865] When they die, they will burst into little Broodlings, which are extra, like, attacking units.

[1866] Gross.

[1867] And they can jump, like, the last ten feet to close the distance on their targets.

[1868] Like, all those upgrades on that unit at the same time.

[1869] Obviously, single player.

[1870] Yeah, this would totally, like, fuck the balance in multiplayer.

[1871] But, like, they change in really dramatic ways.

[1872] So it's going to be a lot of fun to play with that stuff.

[1873] And out.

[1874] Out in 2012.

[1875] They said probably not this year.

[1876] Out at Blizzard time.

[1877] Their words, like the words of the director specifically, probably not this year.

[1878] But I guess they're not ruling it out.

[1879] I don't know.

[1880] It's a really weird thing to say.

[1881] Probably not this year.

[1882] I don't know.

[1883] I'm sure they have an internal target, but, you know.

[1884] I'm sure Activision would love it if they could ship the second part of this game this year.

[1885] Diablo would probably be out this year.

[1886] They'll be fine.

[1887] Activision will get its money eventually one way or the other.

[1888] That game doesn't...

[1889] Yeah, but that doesn't mean that Activision wouldn't still be saying, it would be really awesome if you guys could get this out for Holiday 11.

[1890] We would really enjoy that.

[1891] Let's start working on the next one and get that out for next year.

[1892] And then if you could have the next one out for Holiday 12, that would be also awesome.

[1893] The fourth one.

[1894] Right.

[1895] The fourth part of the trilogy, 2013.

[1896] I mean, if Diablo really is imminent, maybe not a bad idea to spread that stuff out a little bit.

[1897] I don't know.

[1898] It's such a difference.

[1899] I mean, you know, obviously all coming from Blizzard.

[1900] I'm coming from Blizzard, and I realize that there is kind of, there's a fan base, like with, I don't know, Valve or something, for just this developer.

[1901] I don't know, they're pretty different games.

[1902] They're pretty different, but at the same time, you know, it's like a huge -ass PC game, regardless of genre.

[1903] Sure, sure.

[1904] You don't want to clutter, put those too close to each other.

[1905] I mean, yeah, a lot of people will just buy every Blizzard game site unseen, but Diablo also has a lot more PvP -focused stuff in it that I could see them pushing as some sort of esport as well.

[1906] Oh, wow.

[1907] I have no awareness of that game.

[1908] Oh, yeah.

[1909] But I want to play it.

[1910] It being announced after StarCraft II, I just assumed, like, okay, that's the fucking far -flung future.

[1911] My children will play that.

[1912] Yeah, flying cars and...

[1913] I think it's probably closer than you think.

[1914] Yeah, the notion that it would even be out this year is a surprise to me. Well, the beta is launching in, was it September?

[1915] I have no idea.

[1916] I think they said.

[1917] Yeah, I think it's like late September for the beta.

[1918] I bet it's out.

[1919] You'll have health and mana.

[1920] You click on dudes.

[1921] Will there be potions?

[1922] Dude, there will be so many potions.

[1923] What's the potion key?

[1924] One.

[1925] P. Is it?

[1926] Potion.

[1927] I thought it was F. I thought F was for potion.

[1928] No, I think you just slotted it.

[1929] Yeah, you slotted it on the hotbar.

[1930] That's on the hotbar, right.

[1931] So, yeah.

[1932] One.

[1933] One.

[1934] Or five.

[1935] Whatever your fingers feel.

[1936] Depending on how your keyboard breaks.

[1937] I haven't seen anything.

[1938] Like you said, I'm in the dark too, but I'm going to guess one would activate some kind of power in the new Diablo game.

[1939] Wasn't one always potion?

[1940] That's what I thought.

[1941] I thought you could just drag and drop.

[1942] I think you can assign them, but I think by default.

[1943] Yeah, I'm pretty sure.

[1944] Like one, two.

[1945] How about there would be powers?

[1946] Yeah.

[1947] Like warrior scream is on one and two is...

[1948] No. Shield bash.

[1949] Lock and Shock.

[1950] Lock and Shock is on four.

[1951] Berserker's Rage is a good one.

[1952] That'll be in there for someone.

[1953] Some kind of rage.

[1954] I'm going to say Berserker's Rage.

[1955] Power of the Elven.

[1956] That'll be Power of the Elders.

[1957] Oh, for the wizard or something?

[1958] Yeah.

[1959] I wish I knew more.

[1960] Sit here and just come up with Diablo buff names.

[1961] Of the wolf.

[1962] Yes.

[1963] Whatever it is.

[1964] Of the wolf.

[1965] And then of the eagle.

[1966] And then of the snake.

[1967] Of the bear.

[1968] I was going to say, and then of the bear.

[1969] Gotta have the bear.

[1970] Bear loot was always the best loot.

[1971] Is it?

[1972] I didn't know there was a hierarchy.

[1973] No, it was like specific stats associated with each one.

[1974] If I remember correctly.

[1975] When you do it by animal type like that, that's always...

[1976] Bear gets the top?

[1977] Well, no. No, no. It's just bear has a specific...

[1978] Eagle sees better.

[1979] Eagle is like...

[1980] Perception.

[1981] Right, right, right.

[1982] Where does the whale fit into all of this?

[1983] Whale gives you health and sings.

[1984] Like fish do.

[1985] Omega -3 fatty ass.

[1986] Like the band?

[1987] Yeah.

[1988] Bradley, anything else that you want to talk about other than L .A. Noire and StarCraft 2?

[1989] I almost finished that Red Faction.

[1990] What's it called?

[1991] Red Faction.

[1992] Armageddon.

[1993] Armageddon.

[1994] We can't, by a matter of hours, we still can't really hard force on that game.

[1995] The embargo is up at midnight tonight.

[1996] Just finished that game.

[1997] So stay tuned on the site.

[1998] I have almost finished it.

[1999] I'm not even reviewing that game.

[2000] I have languidly taken my time.

[2001] I was sick over the weekend, and I was so bored that I played through Red Faction Armageddon.

[2002] Did that?

[2003] I don't even know if I can ask.

[2004] So stay tuned on the site.

[2005] I'm not writing the review, but I think that you should wait for the review on that game and maybe read some reviews before making a purchasing decision regarding Red Faction Armageddon.

[2006] I actually played a ton of Red Faction this weekend because I almost also finished Guerrilla.

[2007] which I was kind of playing for research and also just because I always meant to play it.

[2008] Now, Red Faction Guerrilla, that's a cool game.

[2009] So, yeah, it was weird.

[2010] I was literally going back and forth playing Guerrilla and Armageddon pretty much concurrently.

[2011] I had a lot of fun playing Red Faction Guerrilla.

[2012] Yeah.

[2013] It's a good game.

[2014] And that's, I guess, all I can say.

[2015] It's fun.

[2016] Fantastic.

[2017] Let's take it to news.

[2018] News.

[2019] No, you don't have to.

[2020] That's where I say my world -famous news catchphrase.

[2021] We're all waiting for it.

[2022] It's your favorite part of the show.

[2023] No, we don't do my favorite part of the show anymore.

[2024] You don't do the favorite part of your show anymore.

[2025] This is all your fault.

[2026] Nope.

[2027] Valet Parking 1989 is out this week.

[2028] What?

[2029] valet parking 1989 is out this week on dsiware really yes that's really that's really the name of a fucking game well of a thing it's a product that they're selling like it was a game sure well it's it's an electronic interactive product theoretically i don't you know it's an electronic product it's a digital digitally digitally distributed you could trade money for points and trade points for valet parking 1989 Spec Ops The Line.

[2030] Remember that?

[2031] I feel like we were just talking about how we hadn't heard anything about Spec Ops The Line in a really long time.

[2032] Why aren't they booking appointments for Spec Ops The Line?

[2033] Because we started E3 last year.

[2034] It's like, oh, because that game's dead?

[2035] It's got to be dead, right?

[2036] No, no, it's not dead.

[2037] It's not dead, but they're pushing it back until sometime after March 31st, 2012.

[2038] Okay.

[2039] So at this point, it will have been enough time to make an entirely different game since we saw it last.

[2040] That's a long time away.

[2041] This time there's no sand.

[2042] We took out the sand and replaced it with buildings you can break apart with a hammer.

[2043] They also said that Bioshock Infinite will ship this year, this fiscal year.

[2044] Really?

[2045] Oh, I'm sorry.

[2046] No, no. No, no. It's definitely not this year.

[2047] No, no, no. It is calendar year 12.

[2048] Oh, okay.

[2049] I'm sorry.

[2050] That's what I meant.

[2051] Not fiscal.

[2052] Yeah, yeah.

[2053] Calendar year 12.

[2054] So that's any time next year.

[2055] Yeah.

[2056] Any time next year.

[2057] And that XCOM will come out before March 31, 2012.

[2058] Hmm.

[2059] So that is your early 12 game.

[2060] If not this holiday.

[2061] Are they showing XCOM?

[2062] We have a meeting to see XCOM.

[2063] I would love to know what XCOM is like.

[2064] Yeah, yeah.

[2065] Wait, so there were three games.

[2066] So which one?

[2067] Bioshock is the calendar year?

[2068] Bioshock's coming out calendar 12.

[2069] Okay.

[2070] Spec Ops got pushed pretty much indefinitely.

[2071] Spec Ops is coming out after March 31st, 2012.

[2072] XCOM is before.

[2073] XCOM is before March 31st, 2012.

[2074] So XCOM could be out this holiday or could be out early next year.

[2075] Right.

[2076] Could be out tomorrow.

[2077] I bet it's out third to fourth week of March next year.

[2078] That sounds about right.

[2079] That's my guess.

[2080] March 31st.

[2081] Whether it's done or not.

[2082] What's the last Tuesday in March?

[2083] It's really odd.

[2084] Spec Ops is a game that I thought looked pretty much like they were wrapping up the last time I saw it.

[2085] Yeah, that bit of it looked cool.

[2086] You guys are pretty much on the road home here.

[2087] Let's get going.

[2088] XCOM didn't even seem like it was a game yet.

[2089] And they were like, how does this look?

[2090] XCOM looked like cool ideas, though.

[2091] Yeah, but it was like, they seemed even like, I don't know, what do you think of this stuff?

[2092] Like, we can make a game out of this.

[2093] And to have that game be like, that's coming out.

[2094] We got this home base.

[2095] So you need to research stuff.

[2096] It's the 50s.

[2097] Goo Monster.

[2098] Yeah, there's black goo monsters.

[2099] So March 27th.

[2100] March 27th?

[2101] Yeah, that's the date.

[2102] For XCOM?

[2103] For XCOM.

[2104] No, no, that's our anticipated date.

[2105] Not anything officially announced.

[2106] How many Brad Bucks are you willing to lay down on this XCOM date?

[2107] I'm going to put all the marbles out for this one.

[2108] Wait, marbles?

[2109] How many marbles?

[2110] I'm going to put a coffee can full of nickels on this one.

[2111] And do you think Spec Ops will ever come out?

[2112] God, I don't know.

[2113] No change in development, right?

[2114] Still Jaeger?

[2115] And they're not showing it?

[2116] No appointments?

[2117] No. Not at E3.

[2118] Can we, I mean, I guess, can we talk about some of that stuff?

[2119] Can we talk about, I guess there's kind of an implicit embargo on some stuff of, like, well, some stuff they just don't tell us, like, you're going to come have an appointment at E3, and you don't get to know what that appointment is for.

[2120] You just have to take it on faith that it'll be something you care about.

[2121] And then, you get there, you're like, there are probably four or five meetings on our schedule for unannounced game.

[2122] Right, secret game.

[2123] Yep.

[2124] But we are totally having an appointment to go see XCOM.

[2125] And we have some appointments on our schedule for unannounced games, but we know what the games are.

[2126] Well, in that case, we can't talk about that.

[2127] I think it's probably fine to mention because if that game's not coming out until next year, they've said that publicly and it's probably safe to assume they're not ready to show it.

[2128] Which is crazy because I totally played that game.

[2129] Which one are we talking about?

[2130] Spec Ops.

[2131] Yeah.

[2132] Crazy.

[2133] Because they had voice work and everything.

[2134] Nolan North was in that.

[2135] Nolan North was in that.

[2136] So if they have to go re -record stuff, man, whatever.

[2137] I mean, you know, the Nolan North waiting list is like six months long.

[2138] Maybe that's what happened.

[2139] They just had one line they needed to get him to do.

[2140] We're not going to make our windows scrap it.

[2141] It's probably, you know, they lost their publisher side producer and the whole thing went, no. Ouch.

[2142] Ouch.

[2143] No. It can look interesting.

[2144] It would be a shame if it never sees the light of day.

[2145] Strauss Zelnick, CEO of Take -Two, said that...

[2146] Big Strauss?

[2147] Yep, yep.

[2148] The one and only basically popped in to say, yeah, we're still making Max Payne 3.

[2149] Also, we're still making that game Agent that Sony put up during their E3 press conference in 2009.

[2150] Good to know.

[2151] I would have pegged that game for dead.

[2152] Agent?

[2153] Yeah, really.

[2154] But you know what?

[2155] I would have done the exact same thing to L .A. Noire.

[2156] I went back and I look at our forums for L .A. Noire and there are posts going back to the inception of the entire website going, is this game still coming?

[2157] Right.

[2158] Like, what's happening?

[2159] I mean, Rockstar just has a very specific and very weird...

[2160] like, kind of promotional cycle of there is that initial announcement, which I feel like they get cajoled into by whoever they're making a deal with.

[2161] Like, all right, we will help fund your thing if you make it exclusive for our platform for X amount of time or whatever.

[2162] We have to announce that because we have to get people excited right now.

[2163] Yeah, we need to talk about it now.

[2164] I don't care if you can only give us a logo.

[2165] Right.

[2166] Or a piece of, like, painted art. Yeah.

[2167] We need something.

[2168] I wonder if we'll see more agent at the Sony keynote.

[2169] Which one's agent?

[2170] It's the one with the logo?

[2171] Yeah.

[2172] Okay.

[2173] It's got a gun in the logo.

[2174] The G, there's like a silhouette of a gun inside.

[2175] You are the agent.

[2176] It's the new Rockstar PlayStation 3 exclusive.

[2177] Oh, agent.

[2178] Agent.

[2179] Okay.

[2180] Since they lost exclusivity on the last one.

[2181] Agent.

[2182] Agent.

[2183] All right.

[2184] That's not the one that definitely got canceled.

[2185] That's not the agency.

[2186] Agency.

[2187] Okay.

[2188] Totally different company.

[2189] That's an SOE game.

[2190] Completely different everything.

[2191] That is dead.

[2192] That's dead.

[2193] Which I can understand with that dying, you would assume that the game called Agent would go in kind.

[2194] I have no idea.

[2195] Maybe Rockstar Skunk Works.

[2196] We can't have this fucking game called The Agency come out when we're working on Agent.

[2197] So half of our development...

[2198] Why would I play a game about an agent when I could play as a whole agency?

[2199] So half of our development cost for this game is going to be...

[2200] Getting skullduggerous motherfuckers into the agency organization and ruining that game's development until they shut it down.

[2201] So that agent is the only one left.

[2202] Yeah, bring it down from the inside.

[2203] That's like an agency thing.

[2204] That's agent.

[2205] That's the game.

[2206] They were also secretly behind Crackdown 2 being kind of crappy.

[2207] Because that game says agent so much.

[2208] We can't have that.

[2209] If they make Crackdown 3, this whole deal's off.

[2210] We don't care.

[2211] As crappy as Crackdown 2 was, I...

[2212] Reading agent, that's all I can think of is agent.

[2213] Oh, it's been weirding me out playing Gorilla because the leader of the resistance in Gorilla is the agent guy from Crackdown.

[2214] Oh, yeah.

[2215] Oh, I can't not hear it.

[2216] I played some other game.

[2217] I don't remember what it was.

[2218] I played some other game with that dude.

[2219] He's got a real awesome authoritative radio guy voice.

[2220] Was he infamous?

[2221] Does he do any VO infamous?

[2222] Not that I remember.

[2223] I remember hearing them somewhere else, too.

[2224] Anyway.

[2225] Anyway, Hothead's doing some stuff.

[2226] Yeah, they are.

[2227] They've got the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy license.

[2228] Right.

[2229] Which, if you look at the title to that page, it's called The New Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

[2230] Like, the page title.

[2231] Which makes me wonder if they're making some kind of, like...

[2232] Continuation?

[2233] Continuation, or some new thing.

[2234] You mean on, like, the Hothead site?

[2235] No, like the...

[2236] Yeah, their official site for it that's got the little...

[2237] Flash animation crap on it.

[2238] The page title for that, I'm pretty sure, says The New Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which the end of those books was about a new edition of The Hitchhiker's Guide.

[2239] I'd be way more into that than them trying to retell and mine the old series for jokes and stuff like that.

[2240] That would be the...

[2241] But can they?

[2242] I mean, can anybody come along and recreate that stuff?

[2243] They'd have a better chance at that.

[2244] The last half of the last Hitchhiker's book is not even Douglas Adams written.

[2245] I thought the whole thing wasn't even him.

[2246] The sixth book?

[2247] I thought the core idea was his, but maybe he didn't actually write any of it or something.

[2248] And that was only because the one before that ended so bleakly.

[2249] But they definitely have a better shot at just doing something new than trying to recreate.

[2250] Other than the Infocom text adventure, every single thing that's related to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy that is not the book, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, or The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

[2251] is garbage.

[2252] Oh, that's not true at all.

[2253] You're saying every other book in the series?

[2254] No, not even the books.

[2255] But the BBC miniseries is hard to watch.

[2256] It's hard to watch, but so is a lot of stuff from that era of BBC sci -fi.

[2257] The modern movie that they made with most death is hard to watch.

[2258] That movie's okay.

[2259] They had to make changes.

[2260] They had the radio play too, didn't they?

[2261] The radio play is great.

[2262] Well, the radio play predates the books.

[2263] The radio play is where it actually started.

[2264] That was originally a radio play.

[2265] Is that true?

[2266] Yeah.

[2267] Well, I've got the, like, the complete fucking thing, and, like, the foreword on that talks about the genesis of the whole thing.

[2268] Yeah, so that stuff's great.

[2269] Sure.

[2270] I'm just saying, like, people trying to mind the Douglas Adams stuff, just, they can't, I've never seen anyone successfully do it.

[2271] Like, truly.

[2272] Like you see like little shadows of like, oh, here's the things that he said that were funny and we've managed to get those on the screen or on the page or in the game somehow.

[2273] But it's never as good.

[2274] It's always just like – I thought even the text adventure really – like it got away from the books in some weird ways.

[2275] And now I mix the two up in my mind a lot because of the puzzles in the game.

[2276] I'm just like, okay, I'm going to put the satchel over the grate and then push the buttons.

[2277] The towel's got to go here.

[2278] I really do think it's a smart move to do.

[2279] It's just a new one.

[2280] New characters, new writers.

[2281] It's just like Arthur Dead's Daughter.

[2282] That's how they kind of wrap up that series to some extent.

[2283] As long as they went off in that direction, they could do that.

[2284] I don't know who you have write that material.

[2285] does that can do that style yeah they can do that style and can do you know the original material justice like it's that stuff is so good so well written it's it's like go back and read those first few hitchhikers books yeah even still it's nuts how good they are can i do that now because i've never read it absolutely it will fucking blow your mind they don't like age no no no no not at all they're pretty good they're He's doing a better job of selling it than you are.

[2286] Maybe it's just they got me at the right age.

[2287] I reread them fairly recently, and they're still pretty funny.

[2288] Maybe it's because I'm rereading it for the second time.

[2289] They're goofy as hell.

[2290] They're goofy, but there's the asides, just the absurdity of it.

[2291] They are absurd as hell as well.

[2292] So good.

[2293] descriptions of, like, the descriptions of the absurd things go to such absurd detail.

[2294] In that very kind of dry British way.

[2295] Yeah, British way.

[2296] It's, I think, yeah, I think when I read them the first time, I just never read anything like it.

[2297] And it was like some whacked out, like, this, my school's making me read all this trash.

[2298] Well, how come we're not reading this?

[2299] Yeah.

[2300] And then going back.

[2301] It's entertaining and propulsive and bizarre.

[2302] And then anyone you told you were reading that looked at you like you were not to be talked to.

[2303] And then all those kids are just carrying around towels.

[2304] I don't want to be that kid.

[2305] Oh, you know what, Brad?

[2306] I will lend you my thick -ass Hitchhiker's Guide book.

[2307] Do you have, like, the complete?

[2308] Yeah.

[2309] Wow.

[2310] I'll take it to E3.

[2311] You will chew through the first book because it's really short.

[2312] Yeah.

[2313] Oh.

[2314] But you'll also just, it's an easy, it's a page -turner, it's a single reader.

[2315] You sit down and you will just burn through it.

[2316] All right.

[2317] I can't remember the names of them.

[2318] There's Restaurant, there's So Long, Thanks for All the Fish.

[2319] Yeah.

[2320] When's the bad one?

[2321] The sixth one?

[2322] I thought the fourth one was where it kind of got rotten.

[2323] I think the third is when I stopped.

[2324] I feel like if I read all this stuff, I'm instantly going to get about 30 ,000 jokes from the last 10 or 15 years of other things that I have consumed.

[2325] I mean, you not being familiar with Hitchhiker's Guide is tantamount to never seeing Money Python.

[2326] I thought you were making a Hitchhiker's joke with the whale comment before, so you're already making jokes about it.

[2327] I mean, even hearing you guys talk about just the titles of the books and stuff, it's all so...

[2328] like blended into sort of the cultural fabric of the last, like how old are these books?

[2329] 20 years, 20, 30?

[2330] It's like 30 years.

[2331] 30 years.

[2332] There's a lot of stuff I think that's referenced.

[2333] Yeah, like even not having read them, I'm familiar with a lot of the stuff, but like, you know, 42 and all that stuff.

[2334] He does a great job, and there's no way you can even explain what goes on, but he does a great job of making the spectacular mundane.

[2335] There's a lot of bureaucracy.

[2336] The whole of the series is about there are these fantastical places, but it's all still run by the same shitheads.

[2337] Even if they're aliens, they still have the bad human characteristics that you expect from people.

[2338] And there's just, like Jeff said, this driving story of just rolling with it.

[2339] Everybody just rolls with everything.

[2340] There's very little conflict because everybody's like, okay, well, I guess that's what happens.

[2341] And then the world blew up.

[2342] Most things end with indifference.

[2343] Yeah, shrugging of shoulders.

[2344] It's like, here we are now.

[2345] I guess.

[2346] I thought that movie was all right.

[2347] By necessity, it had to be a very different thing.

[2348] I guess just the departures that they made.

[2349] It's hard to do two heads.

[2350] I hated the way they did two heads.

[2351] But I thought the ship looked good.

[2352] There was a lot of fantastic looking stuff.

[2353] I guess for me it was just like the stuff that they added.

[2354] I'm like, why did you add this?

[2355] Why were certain parts cut and then why did you add this?

[2356] They needed some – because I mean that book and like the early parts of that series, like nothing really happens.

[2357] There's no good natural stopping point for a movie.

[2358] But I mean the best parts of that movie are when they go into the Hitchhiker's Guide itself.

[2359] Like that's really when that movie shines the most.

[2360] They do that stuff well.

[2361] Yeah.

[2362] Like narrator.

[2363] Oh, when they're like, here's this reference.

[2364] When they do the whale scene.

[2365] That's one of the better parts of that movie.

[2366] And all those books bleed together.

[2367] But they cover a lot of ground in that movie.

[2368] Yeah.

[2369] That's a really shitty task to be saddled with.

[2370] Oh, yeah.

[2371] I'm not saying it's an easy thing to do.

[2372] And I think that's, to me, that speaks to why I'm hesitant about this hothead deal is because that stuff.

[2373] is so hard to adapt to anything.

[2374] You don't want thong jokes in your Hitchhiker's Guide?

[2375] I don't mind.

[2376] You know what, the thing that pissed me off in that movie was the scene on the planet where there were those, the underground, like, whatever, like the spatula paddle creatures that would come up from the sand and whack them.

[2377] Right.

[2378] Like, just this slapstick scene out of nowhere.

[2379] I'm just like, why is this happening?

[2380] Why is this here?

[2381] Like, how is this?

[2382] worthwhile connective tissue for whatever the two scenes were that it was between.

[2383] To me, it kind of spoke to what was wrong with that movie's priorities.

[2384] They took some liberties for sure.

[2385] But yeah, and you know, that's the danger and that's the risk when you try and tackle something that is so beloved like that is expectations are freaking high.

[2386] Yeah.

[2387] I guess it's just between the later books, at least the one, like I said, I didn't read the sixth one, but it's like the later books being kind of bad.

[2388] I definitely didn't like them very much outside of the original three.

[2389] I really like it, but there's not a reverence or super attachment to it.

[2390] I'm willing to go along with people that want to try to do something new with that stuff.

[2391] So I think I was more accepting of the movie.

[2392] Yeah, it wasn't.

[2393] I guess the thing for me is that I'm less interested in that universe and more interested in, like, Douglas Adams' writing.

[2394] Yeah.

[2395] Like, it's not like, oh, I love Zaphod Beeblebrox.

[2396] He's my favorite.

[2397] And, you know, Marvin the Paranoid Android is so great.

[2398] It's like, no, the way Douglas Adams wrote those characters or wrote about those characters.

[2399] Oh, God.

[2400] My head is exploding.

[2401] Just hearing phrases like paranoid android coming at him.

[2402] He's a great character.

[2403] I should have just read all this stuff 20 years ago.

[2404] He's one of the best.

[2405] Everything else in the world would have made sense.

[2406] I can't wait until E3 comes and Brad's mind is just...

[2407] Completely blown.

[2408] I'm not even going to the show.

[2409] I'm just going to sit in the house.

[2410] Layers just melting away.

[2411] Read all of those books.

[2412] It's like he can now see through the universe.

[2413] Every pop culture reference just kind of like, oh my god.

[2414] It all clicked in his mind.

[2415] My god, it's full of stars.

[2416] Wait.

[2417] Is that a poet?

[2418] No. No, that is not.

[2419] That's a 2001 reference.

[2420] Oh, God, I'm exhausted already.

[2421] Sorry about that.

[2422] It's getting really hot in here.

[2423] Thinking about this stuff.

[2424] To give you just some context, though, along the same time that Hothead announced that they were making a Hitchhiker's Guide game, they also announced that they're making another Death Spank.

[2425] Don't say it.

[2426] No. So that is maybe part of where my concerns about this game come from.

[2427] Yeah.

[2428] That in parallel with Hitchhiker's Guide is...

[2429] Comes the hothead name.

[2430] Comes, yeah, well, you know.

[2431] There was already one Death Spank too many.

[2432] Yeah.

[2433] Yeah.

[2434] They didn't need another one.

[2435] This one's not even called Death Spank.

[2436] Oh, right?

[2437] It's...

[2438] It's called The Bacon -ing.

[2439] It's really funny.

[2440] Bacon.

[2441] Bacon.

[2442] Goes with everything, guys.

[2443] I swear.

[2444] Now imagine if these guys got a hold of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

[2445] All right, fine.

[2446] What, is Ron Gilbert still attached to it?

[2447] No, Ron Gilbert hasn't been attached to hothead stuff in a while.

[2448] Yeah, he's not in there, so.

[2449] I don't know.

[2450] We'll see.

[2451] Like that Penny Arcade game.

[2452] I like both of those Penny Arcade chapters very much.

[2453] Can't wait for the next one.

[2454] I'm fucking still...

[2455] I'm still bitter about not finishing that series.

[2456] Get those guys and talk to the Penny Arcade guys and be like, what the fuck happened?

[2457] I think they said that.

[2458] Steve Maretsky is like one of the hothead guys, right?

[2459] He's the guy that did the Infocom game.

[2460] Right?

[2461] Is he?

[2462] I don't know what the hothead makeup is like these days.

[2463] I think that's...

[2464] I think that's the thing that makes you kind of go like, oh, maybe.

[2465] Maybe.

[2466] My vibe was that the Penny Arcade guys were pretty much happy to take a break from all that stuff.

[2467] I don't think they liked making games.

[2468] It's like, you know what?

[2469] We're done.

[2470] Expos are real cool.

[2471] I just wish they would have finished.

[2472] Somewhere there's a script.

[2473] No, they ended up putting out pages of the story, like continuing story.

[2474] Oh, really?

[2475] I think they did a comic or maybe even a motion comic that kept that stuff going.

[2476] Comic seems all right.

[2477] I like the game.

[2478] I also like Uncharted.

[2479] Do you?

[2480] Yeah.

[2481] That's pretty good.

[2482] I also like that David O. Russell is no longer attached to make the Uncharted movie.

[2483] I'm not familiar with his work.

[2484] Yes, you are.

[2485] Three Kings.

[2486] Okay.

[2487] I like Three Kings.

[2488] It's a good movie.

[2489] Yeah.

[2490] What else has he done?

[2491] Didn't he do I Heart Huckabees?

[2492] He did I Heart Huckabees.

[2493] He's a fairly prolific director.

[2494] I like him.

[2495] I don't like what he was saying about what he was going to make Uncharted into.

[2496] His whole thing was like, it's a family story.

[2497] Yeah, yeah.

[2498] Family of Treasure Hunters or something like that?

[2499] Yeah, Family of Treasure Hunters.

[2500] Mark Wahlberg and Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci.

[2501] Sounds so bad.

[2502] Oh, my God.

[2503] That's not.

[2504] No. That sounds like.

[2505] Well, you know what?

[2506] That would probably be an okay movie, actually.

[2507] Whatever that movie that was rattling around in his brain probably would have been fine.

[2508] So not uncharted.

[2509] I mean, it sounds like they're jettisoning even every character archetype that was in there.

[2510] Mark Wahlberg is no longer attached to this either.

[2511] Oh, really?

[2512] Yeah.

[2513] That's great.

[2514] Confirmed?

[2515] Yes.

[2516] I like Mark Wahlberg.

[2517] Mark Wahlberg only came in because of David O. Russell.

[2518] Oh, wow.

[2519] And the same with De Niro.

[2520] They're all buddies, so this whole thing was just...

[2521] A project with him.

[2522] David O. Russell pulling all the people that he likes to make this movie.

[2523] But he's out, so now everyone else is out.

[2524] Cool.

[2525] Somebody get Nolan North into a gym.

[2526] Get some abs on that guy and get him into this movie.

[2527] Whatever, they'll just do biodigital jazz his face.

[2528] Make it look like Drake.

[2529] Or Nathan Fillion.

[2530] I think he's too old.

[2531] I don't even care.

[2532] Get Nathan Fillion and have him do it as a flashback.

[2533] I don't even care if it's Nathan Fillion.

[2534] I like him.

[2535] He's whatever.

[2536] He's cheesy, but kind of deliberately so.

[2537] So is Drake.

[2538] I don't even know if I could watch it.

[2539] I mean, I would just see Nathan Fillion because he would just be playing himself.

[2540] That's fine.

[2541] He would be playing every character he's ever played, which is pretty much Drake, though.

[2542] But more to the point, I just want not Mark Wahlberg in that role.

[2543] Yes, I'm absolutely with you on that.

[2544] There is a time for Mark Wahlberg.

[2545] That time is now.

[2546] I don't care what the picture is.

[2547] Yes.

[2548] Dude, you can't.

[2549] You can't have the same guy playing Max Payne and Nathan Drake.

[2550] I think this just opens up the possibilities for the big hit, too, which I'm really looking forward to.

[2551] Get Bokeem Wubheim on the phone.

[2552] I don't know.

[2553] China Chow aged out of that one.

[2554] Oh, come on!

[2555] Do you think this movie's dead now?

[2556] The next China Chow!

[2557] Yeah.

[2558] Devin Aoki?

[2559] No. No. No. The next David Aoki at this point.

[2560] It would have to be.

[2561] You should go online and look for some of the apocryphal tales of David O. Russell's douchebaggery on set because it is unbelievable.

[2562] I think I did catch some of that.

[2563] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[2564] That stuff's famous.

[2565] I guess I did catch some of that.

[2566] Yeah, that stuff's pretty vicious.

[2567] Huckabee's Three Kings.

[2568] George Clooney hit him in the face.

[2569] Oh, right.

[2570] Yeah, yeah.

[2571] Yeah, I remember that.

[2572] It was maybe like George Clooney.

[2573] It's weird because that stuff happens, and then after the fact, everyone pretty much says, like, he's a genius.

[2574] I will never work with him again.

[2575] I mean, the movies are uniformly pretty good.

[2576] Yeah.

[2577] He's not a bad filmmaker.

[2578] He just sounds like a bad people person.

[2579] Sounds insufferable.

[2580] Yeah.

[2581] Hulk Hogan's main event for Xbox Kinect.

[2582] Jeff, I'm throwing it over to you in the wrestling corner.

[2583] That's right, brother.

[2584] Majesco, your friends and mine.

[2585] Oh, God, really?

[2586] The makers of SpongeBob SquarePants video carts for Game Boy Advance and Advent Rising.

[2587] I bet those carts are still paying the bills over there.

[2588] Grab the 24 -inch pythons running to Kinect this holiday season.

[2589] Dude.

[2590] So...

[2591] Well, you know something, Majesco Brothers.

[2592] Do you think there will be a Yappa Pie Indian strap match?

[2593] When I put my name on the dotted line to sign the contract for this, brother.

[2594] Yes, the Yappa Pie Indian strap match will be strongly featured.

[2595] You'll have to get your body into the proper position for the strapation, dude.

[2596] They said so...

[2597] Like, painfully little about what this game even is.

[2598] Well, they've said enough in saying that Panic Button, makers of Attack of the Movies 3D, is developing this.

[2599] Yeah, there you go.

[2600] So...

[2601] Wow.

[2602] Only bangers.

[2603] That sounds like a pretty good combination.

[2604] So that's, yeah.

[2605] So it's a rail shooter for Kinect.

[2606] Which you gotta spin your hand around and hold it up to your ear to kill aliens.

[2607] So Hulk Hogan, not WWE.

[2608] Not even TNA.

[2609] No. Which is where he is now.

[2610] Hulk Hogan is the only brand.

[2611] Not even Suburban Commando.

[2612] Zeus will not be in this game.

[2613] Now, don't make these claims before you know all the facts.

[2614] Because that's something that if they said, and Zeus is in it, I'd be like, yeah.

[2615] Yeah, he is.

[2616] They could get Tiny Lister at this point.

[2617] Trying to decide.

[2618] How I feel about that.

[2619] I mean, yeah, what is this game?

[2620] That's the question.

[2621] Who does he wrestle?

[2622] Maybe he doesn't wrestle.

[2623] He made up wrestlers.

[2624] How do you know?

[2625] Does it say it's a wrestling game?

[2626] It kind of doesn't.

[2627] Yeah, so maybe it's just Hulk Hogan shooting guys.

[2628] Is he actively wrestling in TNA?

[2629] No, he's like an on -camera leader.

[2630] He's the man. He's oppressing wrestlers.

[2631] Okay.

[2632] So he just comes out and takes up way too much air time.

[2633] Saying, well, you know something, brother?

[2634] You're not going to get this match because I run the things around here, dude.

[2635] He's kind of too physically messed up to wrestle at this point, right?

[2636] Doesn't he have just incredible back problems?

[2637] It sounds like it, yeah.

[2638] But if he wanted to get one more match, it made a whole lot of sense.

[2639] He could do some stuff.

[2640] But, you know, he was never, like, the most nimble, amazing wrestler in the world anyway.

[2641] He's also, like, in a real hard -up financial situation, right?

[2642] I guess.

[2643] Yeah.

[2644] His ex -wife just, like, totally cleaned him out.

[2645] Like, that happened and all the stuff with his son in the car.

[2646] Breaking the illusion, man. Like, there's all kinds of...

[2647] Yeah, oh, that's right.

[2648] I mean, Ric Flair is still, like, in TNA.

[2649] They don't even call it TNA anymore.

[2650] They changed their name.

[2651] It's just Impact Wrestling.

[2652] Hmm.

[2653] Because they're like so reactionary they caught wind of some internal memo apparently or that Vince McMahon didn't want people to use wrestling in conjunction with the product because they're trying to seem like mainstream entertainment.

[2654] So let's just call it entertainment.

[2655] So now the TNA slogan is now wrestling matters.

[2656] Like so it's reactionary to a memo that me and like nine other people get the reference of and care about.

[2657] But everyone else is like you're stupid.

[2658] This is stupid.

[2659] What is this thing?

[2660] What am I watching now?

[2661] So I actually started watching TNA a couple weeks ago because I wanted to prove to myself that I can only watch the worst television possible.

[2662] So Farm Report.

[2663] Farm Report.

[2664] Big Joe Polka Show.

[2665] Yeah.

[2666] Hee Haw.

[2667] Hee Haw.

[2668] Well.

[2669] Hee Haw's good.

[2670] Hee Haw's good.

[2671] It's a classic.

[2672] And now, like, the worst wrestling imaginable is just like, let me pay for as much shit as I've talked about how bad, like, the WWE is.

[2673] Like, man. They put on a coordinated, exciting show.

[2674] There is production quality.

[2675] Things make at least some – things make wrestling sense.

[2676] At least.

[2677] Wrestling logic is a tenuous logic already.

[2678] Whereas the things going on, it's just like – Is it just everyone walking out and getting hit by unmarked Lincoln Town cars?

[2679] That would be way better.

[2680] That would be way better than anything going on in wrestling right now.

[2681] The end of every match, whoever the winner is, walks out of the ring.

[2682] They walk out and get run down.

[2683] Who drove that car?

[2684] Maybe we'll find out next week.

[2685] And they never mention it again.

[2686] That's it.

[2687] They just always come back.

[2688] That's the Kenny dying of wrestling.

[2689] Whereas in TNA, they're calling back to bad...

[2690] WCW shit where they have the guy who used to be Mr. Kennedy in the WWE who used to be kind of good.

[2691] He's coming out dressed up like old Sting to get in current Sting's head.

[2692] Like Dayglo Sting?

[2693] Yeah.

[2694] Ultimate Warrior face paint looking Sting.

[2695] Bleached.

[2696] Does he even have the bleached high top?

[2697] It's kind of funny.

[2698] But it's just like done so shoddily.

[2699] It's just like, what the fuck is even going on?

[2700] Yeah, I don't know.

[2701] Women in trances.

[2702] I don't know.

[2703] She's been taken over by this evil other woman.

[2704] That's why she's got dark circles under her eyes now.

[2705] She snapped and wrestled this other girl.

[2706] It's fucking so stupid.

[2707] Wait, you're saying wrestling's dumb?

[2708] I'm saying that wrestling is...

[2709] Dumber than ever.

[2710] It's 2011, y 'all.

[2711] It is astounding to me that it still exists.

[2712] That they're still able to build some kind of business off of these dumb ideas.

[2713] Never go broke playing to the cheap seats, my friend.

[2714] I guess.

[2715] I guess.

[2716] And I'm certainly not above it.

[2717] For those spare moments.

[2718] Jesus.

[2719] They never fail.

[2720] To make me feel like the biggest idiot possible.

[2721] Why did I just watch that?

[2722] And if there's ever any moment where you might, where you even accidentally get invested in something related to wrestling, it's going to fucking go as wrong as it possibly could.

[2723] And you'll be like, why did I care about this?

[2724] God, I'm an idiot.

[2725] Why did I think this was going to end up awesome?

[2726] Yeah.

[2727] It's not awesome.

[2728] This is your PSA.

[2729] Kids, it's not cool to watch wrestling.

[2730] Wrestling's not awesome.

[2731] Don't let them tell you otherwise.

[2732] I was looking at screenshots of WWE 12 this morning and going like, it looks like this.

[2733] Actually, it's all right.

[2734] They're making some smart changes.

[2735] This is the year.

[2736] This is the year.

[2737] Like, wait, no. Fucking god damn it.

[2738] Shame on you, Jeff.

[2739] Moving on to more E3 business.

[2740] We've had announcements from Valve saying, we are not going to E3.

[2741] And Bungie saying, we are not showing anything at E3.

[2742] Add Hideo Kojima to the list.

[2743] Dude says, you know what?

[2744] I'm not going to E3.

[2745] That's crazy because E3 is like Christmas for that guy.

[2746] Also, Metal Gear Solid stuff for me. Don't expect to see too much of that.

[2747] He was on Twitter talking about how something that he had been working on is dead or something.

[2748] Yeah.

[2749] There was some allusion to a project not happening or something like that.

[2750] Or it could just be like he was shopping for a new leather jacket and that fell through.

[2751] I mean, who knows.

[2752] So, I mean, don't count out Metal Gear Solid stuff during the Konami press conference, which is happening before E3.

[2753] Right.

[2754] But...

[2755] It sounds like Kojima himself will not be.

[2756] But it sounds like that they have recorded some message from Kojima ahead of time.

[2757] Yeah.

[2758] With 8 -4's Mark McDonald.

[2759] It does sound like that.

[2760] I don't know what the contents of that are.

[2761] But it's kind of weird.

[2762] I can't remember any year past where people have felt compelled to announce that we are not going.

[2763] We will not be here.

[2764] How many Brad Bucks do we want to lay down on the notion that Metal Gear Solid Rising is never going to come out?

[2765] Oh, man. I mean, I could see that rapidly turning into a StarCraft Ghost kind of situation.

[2766] They showed it, though.

[2767] They made such a big deal out of it.

[2768] People had played StarCraft Ghost.

[2769] They brought StarCraft Ghost to our office.

[2770] But this is a Japanese company.

[2771] I think they have to finish what they started.

[2772] I think they would lose too much face by canceling this game.

[2773] Did they announce it for the move?

[2774] Was that a move -supported game?

[2775] The craziest rumor that I have seen about, did you guys see this on Twitter over the weekend, that Platinum Games is supposedly taking over development of that game?

[2776] Huh.

[2777] That's rising?

[2778] That's one way to go, I guess.

[2779] Total hearsay.

[2780] I just saw some people, granted people who might know, saying that they had heard such things.

[2781] That'd be one way to finish it, I guess.

[2782] But it's just weird that that game, I mean, it's been at E3 and kind of like nowhere else, right?

[2783] They didn't really...

[2784] Yeah, they showed it last year at the Microsoft conference.

[2785] Yeah.

[2786] Did they show it the year before that, or they just announced it the year before that?

[2787] They announced it the year before that.

[2788] Yeah, they showed all the cutting of watermelons, which was not a game.

[2789] Was there a site with lightning and big teaser sites?

[2790] Yeah, they did all that stuff.

[2791] But...

[2792] nothing they've showed has necessarily looked like a game.

[2793] The thing last year was a tech demo, basically.

[2794] Right.

[2795] You haven't really been hearing tons of people talking about, oh, I hear Rising's going to be this and Rising's going to be that.

[2796] I just feel like the further we get away from 4, the less relevant that game, Metal Gear Solid 4, the less relevant the whole franchise.

[2797] Well, even that character becomes, he was like Ninja Raiden, right?

[2798] He was like all Cyber Ninja Raiden.

[2799] Yeah, he was awesome.

[2800] Now it's like...

[2801] Why was he in it?

[2802] I can't even remember what happened.

[2803] Did he get crushed by a rock or something?

[2804] The most likely Metal Gear thing we're going to hear is related to the 3DS game.

[2805] That's what I would say.

[2806] They're showing that.

[2807] That'll be a D3.

[2808] That's on a 3DS release list.

[2809] But that's just 3 with some extra stuff.

[2810] That's an existing game, basically.

[2811] They're just setting the stage for Acid 3.

[2812] D. I enjoyed Metal Gear Solid 4 as much as the next guy, but I wonder about overall relevance.

[2813] Yeah, totally with you.

[2814] I'd be curious.

[2815] I don't really know what the sales were for that game, but I wonder if they look back on that project and how much it cost to develop and what they got out of it, how that project is viewed.

[2816] If it is viewed as a total success, or is it not?

[2817] Fine questions.

[2818] I'd like to know that as well.

[2819] I really like that game.

[2820] I would be into playing another game that has that sense of scope and that sense of crazy to it.

[2821] Could you do without Solid Snake?

[2822] Yeah.

[2823] Completely?

[2824] Just nowhere to be seen?

[2825] Sure.

[2826] All right.

[2827] Or, you know, maybe he's the voice over the codec or something, ordering, riding around or something like that.

[2828] I don't think you have to play as Snake.

[2829] Or, you know, you reboot Snake because he's a clone and you can do that.

[2830] He's a clone.

[2831] You can do that.

[2832] You could have a young snake running around without that many leaps of logic, considering how many leaps of logic that game takes in its first 20 minutes.

[2833] But should you?

[2834] What you should do is Big Boss' dad.

[2835] Go back even further.

[2836] Ultra Boss.

[2837] That's right.

[2838] But you're a clone of him, so you don't know any of the Solid Snake stuff.

[2839] All the Solid Snake stuff is unbeknownst to you.

[2840] You're young Big Boss' dad.

[2841] In the near future.

[2842] In the far -flung future.

[2843] Wait, which one?

[2844] Is that the woman?

[2845] Starhawk.

[2846] No, Big Boss is who Solid Snake is cloned from.

[2847] Okay, he's the eyepatch.

[2848] Big Boss is the star of Metal Gear Solid 3.

[2849] Right.

[2850] What's the woman's name?

[2851] Just Boss?

[2852] She's the Boss.

[2853] The Boss.

[2854] Okay.

[2855] Yeah, some really great naming conventions in there.

[2856] And where does Bruce Springsteen fit in?

[2857] He is...

[2858] Also the Boss.

[2859] The Boss.

[2860] Okay.

[2861] But that's in a different...

[2862] Separate timeline?

[2863] Different continuum.

[2864] Okay.

[2865] Different continuum.

[2866] He's the Boss North American chapter.

[2867] Yeah.

[2868] Yeah, so when he goes out of the...

[2869] But he's good on a motorcycle.

[2870] When he goes out of the country, he has to say the boss US.

[2871] But when he's in the US, he can just say the boss.

[2872] And then Hugo Boss.

[2873] Final item.

[2874] PlayStation Vita.

[2875] Vita?

[2876] Vita.

[2877] Vita.

[2878] I wasn't really paying too much attention to this over the weekend, but basically the name for what we were calling the NGP, Sony's new handheld.

[2879] there's a decent amount of evidence and circumstantial evidence that they are going to be calling it the PlayStation Vita.

[2880] Vita?

[2881] V -I -T -A?

[2882] V -I -T -A.

[2883] Vita.

[2884] As in Viva La. Something to that effect.

[2885] What?

[2886] No, that would be Vita.

[2887] Oh, yeah.

[2888] With a D. You're right, I guess so.

[2889] I don't know where this is coming from.

[2890] Oh, my God.

[2891] Vita with a T. Yeah, you're right.

[2892] Like vitamins.

[2893] Like vitamins.

[2894] Yeah.

[2895] Like life in Latin.

[2896] Vitamins.

[2897] So they're just trying to say, this is a healthy product.

[2898] You should invest in this.

[2899] They're trying to say, from the people that brought you the bloggy.

[2900] Right.

[2901] The PlayStation Vita.

[2902] From the people that brought you lots of other badly named things.

[2903] So I guess Patrick did some research into this and it seems like the Vita name was used early on as a code name.

[2904] Before NGP.

[2905] Before NGP.

[2906] So there is some history there with it.

[2907] And if you go to their dev site but put Vita .on it, it goes somewhere.

[2908] Right.

[2909] So they have mapped that domain to go somewhere, which all that really says is, yes, they have used that name at some point.

[2910] It doesn't necessarily say that this is the final name.

[2911] I'm going to put some Brad Bucks down that that's the final name.

[2912] Vita?

[2913] I'm now more curious for the Sony press conference at E3 to see, because there has to be some sort of spiel associated with why they're calling it the Vita.

[2914] And it's definitely not Vita?

[2915] I feel like when they...

[2916] I'm going to say it's like vitality.

[2917] No, it's like Vita, like the same root word, but not pronounced like vitamin.

[2918] Okay.

[2919] Vita, which sounds, you know, sleek, light, airy.

[2920] It sounds like a Italian sports car or a Samsung phone.

[2921] I like Vito, like a big fat Italian guy.

[2922] Yeah.

[2923] Okay.

[2924] Yeah.

[2925] The PlayStation Vito.

[2926] That's actually the bigger version of it.

[2927] Meatball stains on his wife beater.

[2928] That's right.

[2929] The back is all just kind of oily.

[2930] That's when they do the PlayStation.

[2931] When they do the Vita Go.

[2932] It's called the Vito for short.

[2933] Carried around memory sticks.

[2934] Forget about it.

[2935] Just download it with the Vito.

[2936] There'll definitely be a lot.

[2937] I feel like I hear you, Ryan.

[2938] There'll be like slideshows of people running.

[2939] Oh, yeah.

[2940] I'm picturing they've already had that, though.

[2941] For the NGP rollout, there was video of people running and sitting on buses.

[2942] Oh, I didn't see that.

[2943] All this kind of light, airy.

[2944] I'm already picturing baby chicks hashing from eggs and time -lapse photography of flowers blooming.

[2945] I'm thinking of Central Park runners.

[2946] Maybe it's just me, but all I can think of is I Love Lucy and Vitamita Vegemen.

[2947] Maybe that's their own campaign.

[2948] That's the first reference that I think of when you tell me the name of this thing.

[2949] That's it.

[2950] That's what they're going to roll.

[2951] But, you know, who fucking cares what it's actually called?

[2952] Yeah, yeah.

[2953] What names brands are meaningless.

[2954] I feel like this is the one that finally broke me on giving a fuck about what platforms are called.

[2955] And I feel bad.

[2956] There's so much time we spent over the years of bitching about names.

[2957] And I sat down and thought, well, obviously they can't just call it PSP2.

[2958] Yeah.

[2959] And there's no good name for anything ever.

[2960] All the names are bad.

[2961] If you sit down and look at them, PlayStation was kind of the last good one.

[2962] Yeah.

[2963] Even that, the first time you heard it, sounds a little bit like a Fisher -Price children's toy.

[2964] I think it's pretty good.

[2965] I think PlayStation's pretty good.

[2966] It's all right.

[2967] PlayStation became great because of what it symbolizes.

[2968] It took a while.

[2969] Xbox also.

[2970] It's a great brand name now.

[2971] That's also another case of a code name becoming a real name.

[2972] The Commodore.

[2973] Best name for a platform ever.

[2974] Hello, Commodore!

[2975] You brought some games!

[2976] The Commodore 64 was...

[2977] The greatest game platform ever released.

[2978] Shows some goddamn respect.

[2979] I'm saying.

[2980] That is a great one.

[2981] Commodore 128.

[2982] Also pretty good.

[2983] Because it had 64 modes.

[2984] The Commodore.

[2985] Yeah.

[2986] I just.

[2987] I feel.

[2988] I don't know.

[2989] I don't know what on me got soft.

[2990] But I can't.

[2991] I cannot rile up any sort of rage about this name.

[2992] Oh, yeah.

[2993] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[2994] It's.

[2995] I'm kind of with you.

[2996] It's why I bring up the Samsung stuff.

[2997] I just imagine them trying to position this alongside smartphones and alongside other handheld devices, which all have really dumbass names.

[2998] Well, they all have super disposable names.

[2999] Yeah.

[3000] Because you're not, you know, Samsung.

[3001] Focus.

[3002] HTC Thunderbolt.

[3003] Those might as well be chipset names.

[3004] They all live on six month product cycles.

[3005] They're always about to be replaced.

[3006] That's just the container for...

[3007] what you really care about, which is, like, oh, you have an Android phone.

[3008] Like, that's...

[3009] Right.

[3010] The thing around it isn't as relevant as, like, okay, you have the latest version of...

[3011] And maybe it's not a perfect analogy, because, I mean, hopefully this platform will last longer than the average smartphone, but...

[3012] Hmm.

[3013] I'm just bummed because it doesn't acronym into anything.

[3014] Like, what...

[3015] It sounds like a...

[3016] It's not PS3, it's not PSP.

[3017] It was only two syllables.

[3018] It's not the PSV.

[3019] Oh.

[3020] It sounds like a sexually transmitted disease.

[3021] I had a really bad case of PS Vita.

[3022] PlayStation VD.

[3023] Yeah.

[3024] So you think it would be a PlayStation Vita, not a Sony Vita?

[3025] It would be a PlayStation Vita.

[3026] The mock -ups, which, granted, could be Photoshop's, straight up said, like, PS Vita.

[3027] Oh, really?

[3028] Yeah.

[3029] I like PS Vita.

[3030] I like that better than PS V. We'll all be used to it in a week after they announce it, and we'll never think about it again.

[3031] Yeah, you know, after...

[3032] Just say it enough times and then it's the we.

[3033] Yeah.

[3034] The we.

[3035] Yeah.

[3036] The we.

[3037] The ultimate example of it really doesn't matter.

[3038] It really doesn't matter.

[3039] I don't know.

[3040] It's all that down with the we.

[3041] Dreamcast was fucking phenomenally dumb.

[3042] That was the one.

[3043] That was the one where it was like, all right, I'm going to drive myself crazy or I'm going to stop caring.

[3044] And I went with stop caring.

[3045] I drove myself crazy.

[3046] And that dumb swirl.

[3047] Dreamcast.

[3048] Ugh.

[3049] Dreamcatcher controller.

[3050] Smells like patchouli.

[3051] And that's when, honestly, in retrospect, I've come to really love the name Dreamcast.

[3052] At the time, I was like, this is the Sega, you idiots.

[3053] This is the dumbest, hokiest shit.

[3054] But after the time, Dreamcast was kind of cool.

[3055] I liked that.

[3056] We burned through all the good names early.

[3057] Commodore 64.

[3058] We're just kind of out of names for everything.

[3059] And you're right.

[3060] Intellivision.

[3061] Intelligent television.

[3062] Fucking perfect.

[3063] You can't not put the PlayStation name on it in some capacity.

[3064] It has to be PlayStation blank.

[3065] You know what bugs me is the pervasiveness of certain...

[3066] The branding hierarchy that goes on now.

[3067] It's like...

[3068] Well, video cards have been really bad about it.

[3069] They've made about 50 GeForce models in the last 10 years.

[3070] GeForce is meaningless to me now because I'm like, I've got a GX540.

[3071] Oh, that's shit.

[3072] You need to have the FX620.

[3073] If you're on the current numbering, if you're at least in the current basic...

[3074] recent generation than just like, okay, seven series, nine series.

[3075] Like, like it's, it's almost like cars, but it, but it's, they go weird stuff where it's like, well, this is the hundreds.

[3076] Now we're in the thousands, but the thousands are not as good as the hundreds.

[3077] Like there's, but like they made that change a while ago and then now it's, they're done with working back up.

[3078] Yeah.

[3079] Yeah, they switched over.

[3080] That was one thing that happened.

[3081] Just drill that into your head that that thing happened, and everything since they made that change makes a lot more sense.

[3082] To be fair, I just don't care about video cards either.

[3083] It's not as convoluted as it initially seems.

[3084] Now that I've gotten through two video cards in the current numbering scheme, I'd feel a lot more comfortable with how it all works.

[3085] Nintendo's pretty good about letting go of their old brands, but...

[3086] You get endless iterations of PlayStation products.

[3087] It's like brands and then sub -brands that exist underneath them.

[3088] It's because Nintendo is the top company.

[3089] It's because there's a PlayStation division of Sony.

[3090] Right.

[3091] Those people identify themselves as, I work for PlayStation.

[3092] Well, that's fair.

[3093] Which is a crazy thing to say.

[3094] I was thinking like the DS.

[3095] They readily dropped the Game Boy name and came up with this whole new thing.

[3096] Which is crazy because the Game Boy name was still extremely strong at that point.

[3097] But probably not as strong as the Nintendo name.

[3098] You know, it's like you didn't necessarily confuse people by dropping the Game Boy name as long as it said Nintendo somewhere.

[3099] You're right.

[3100] You're right.

[3101] You can still have that.

[3102] I'm just thinking more generally of, you know, at that point when they were introducing the DS, like you're talking post -GameCube, which was not great for them.

[3103] Right.

[3104] Pre -Wii.

[3105] So, you know, Game Boy was the strongest brand, aside from, you know, hierarchically Nintendo at the top.

[3106] Right, right, right.

[3107] You know, to get to the DS and go, yeah, no more, yeah, we're, you know.

[3108] Game Boy Micro, and we'll put some lip service to, oh, we're going to keep using the Game Boy name.

[3109] I think at some point you just get to a point where you have released so many products that say Game Boy on them that it's hard to tell people why this one is more expensive than the other one.

[3110] Yeah.

[3111] You know, because they didn't roll out a numbering scheme with it.

[3112] Game Boy to Game Boy Advance, you know, discounting Game Boy Color and the stuff that happened along the way.

[3113] It makes the switch to the DSC much more dramatic.

[3114] Right.

[3115] Of like, no, this is no longer a Game Boy.

[3116] This is something else.

[3117] Yeah.

[3118] They could have called it the Game Boy DS or the Game Boy Duel.

[3119] There's all kinds of...

[3120] horrible roads that could have gone down.

[3121] I assume that's what Sony's doing, right?

[3122] Just trying to distance itself a bit from the PSP and be like, this is a whole new product.

[3123] That's why they can't call it the PSP.

[3124] That was a good name.

[3125] That was a fine name for what that product was.

[3126] But outside of Japan, there are a lot of people that are going to shrug if you say, hey, we got a new PSP coming out.

[3127] Too damaged at this point.

[3128] But I don't know if those people are going to be then enticed by the PlayStation Vita.

[3129] That sounds sexy.

[3130] I don't think it does.

[3131] Vita.

[3132] I don't think it does at all.

[3133] Sounds like a bad car.

[3134] It does.

[3135] It sounds like a released in Europe by Ford car.

[3136] I don't know.

[3137] Cars have pretty bad names these days, too.

[3138] It's like a Vauxhall Nova.

[3139] It's like a Ford Salsa.

[3140] Who is it that's making the Leaf?

[3141] Nissan.

[3142] Nissan Leaf.

[3143] Nissan Leaf.

[3144] What the fuck?

[3145] I think that's actually a cool name.

[3146] It's an all -electric car.

[3147] I know it is.

[3148] I feel like, though, you could smell the product testing and focus group stuff coming off of that stuff.

[3149] Vita fits with some of the Japanese -only car names that don't make it over here.

[3150] I guess it's like, I just think like Vita water and stuff like that.

[3151] Like that prefix just maybe seems done already.

[3152] Which is why I don't think you're ever going to hear anyone call it Vita.

[3153] Vita.

[3154] We're in Vita.

[3155] Except for at the Target when I try and buy one and say, give me that PlayStation Vita.

[3156] Yeah.

[3157] And the lady's like, okay, I know what you're talking about.

[3158] Yeah.

[3159] The Vita, what the fuck is that?

[3160] But no one mispronounces we anymore.

[3161] There was some confusion about that up front.

[3162] Was there?

[3163] Why are they calling that?

[3164] There was strong messaging from them like the day of the announcement.

[3165] Yeah, they had to.

[3166] This is how you pronounce this.

[3167] This is how you pronounce it.

[3168] Do not call it the we.

[3169] Call it the Nintendo we.

[3170] Call it the, yeah, like all kinds of how to use this word in a sentence.

[3171] Contact your PR rep if you have any questions.

[3172] So that's the last of our pre -E3 news.

[3173] Next stop, E3.

[3174] Yeah.

[3175] That's right.

[3176] What?

[3177] The next one of these that we record will be in the city and county of Los Angeles.

[3178] Let's do this.

[3179] California.

[3180] Into the breach.

[3181] That's true.

[3182] USA.

[3183] It's going to be fun, man. There's some stuff that you guys need to see.

[3184] Yeah.

[3185] There's some stuff that I really want to see.

[3186] And I'm super excited about some of the stuff we're lining up for podcasts and live shows during E3.

[3187] Yeah.

[3188] Which we will be doing nightly.

[3189] Some stuff you're all going to want to see.

[3190] Yeah.

[3191] Yeah.

[3192] Yeah.

[3193] Everyone.

[3194] I want to see it.

[3195] Like big shows Monday through Thursday.

[3196] But we might do something Sunday.

[3197] We have the big show.

[3198] Anyway.

[3199] Yeah.

[3200] Big show is coming on.

[3201] Big show is coming on.

[3202] He's going to tell us why wrestling is so fucked up.

[3203] In an exclusive heart -to -heart.

[3204] Well, you see, originally they tried to say I was Andre the Giant's son.

[3205] And it all started from there.

[3206] And a car's going to crash into the wall.

[3207] Run him over.

[3208] That's right.

[3209] Unmarked, black, Lincoln Town car.

[3210] We'll clip him.

[3211] And then, fortunately, we got the unmarked Lincoln Town car on for Wednesday.

[3212] Yeah.

[3213] Which should be pretty exclusive.

[3214] We'll be interviewing him.

[3215] But it's going to be hit by a tank truck.

[3216] Who was driving that big rig?

[3217] Stone Cold on the forklift.

[3218] I can't feel my tires.

[3219] They'll never drive again.

[3220] New releases this week.

[3221] Week before E3.

[3222] Somehow less releases than the week of E3.

[3223] Yeah.

[3224] We have hunted demons.

[3225] Forge.

[3226] Forge?

[3227] Forge.

[3228] Forge.

[3229] I'm going to give my first impressions of this game, and I want you to know, I'm going to say this up front, this comes from like the first five minutes.

[3230] Okay.

[3231] Like literally five minutes.

[3232] Literally five minutes.

[3233] We got it today.

[3234] I put it in.

[3235] I started playing through it.

[3236] I'm not out of it.

[3237] It's paused back at my desk.

[3238] Not blowing me away.

[3239] So first five minutes of Hunted the Demon's Forge.

[3240] Was there a cutscene in there?

[3241] Oh, yeah.

[3242] There's some cut scenes and it kind of looks like an Xbox One game in spots.

[3243] Well, that's a little harsh.

[3244] But the lighting and textures.

[3245] But do you know if Brian Fargo worked on it?

[3246] His name is up first in the credits.

[3247] Okay.

[3248] I can confirm that.

[3249] That's all I need to know.

[3250] That game.

[3251] I have my suspicions about the quality of that game.

[3252] You have reservations.

[3253] About maybe it will get immediately awesome after that.

[3254] I cannot say for sure.

[3255] It does have loot.

[3256] All right.

[3257] Okay.

[3258] If it has loot, then maybe that'll be better.

[3259] Because right now, walking around one -shotting everyone with this bow I've got has not been satisfying in the least.

[3260] We'll look at a little more of that.

[3261] Yeah.

[3262] We'll see.

[3263] I intend to play it probably to completion.

[3264] On Xbox Live Arcade this week.

[3265] Yeah.

[3266] Crazy Machines colon Elements.

[3267] Oh.

[3268] Which I guess is essential.

[3269] Wait, you mean Alien War?

[3270] What?

[3271] You see that?

[3272] Right.

[3273] That was the box shot that was on Xbox Live and Xbox .com for, like, until about three days after L .A. Noire came out for L .A. Noire.

[3274] Oh, no, I missed that.

[3275] I thought it was a pre -release gaffe because I had a copy a couple days before the game came out, but it hit shelves and that did not get fixed.

[3276] And they were like...

[3277] eight people on my friend's thing playing Crazy Machine's Elements at one point.

[3278] Oh, you mean it was actually even listing the text and the achievements all fit to L .A. Noire, but just the box shot.

[3279] But if you look at that friend's channel or whatever, you would see just like an endless sea of this box art. So this is some sort of like Incredible Machine style game, puzzle -y game.

[3280] Yeah, I think so.

[3281] I think they did this on phone first.

[3282] Sounds like it.

[3283] Oh, they're doing a Summer of Arcade on Windows Phone 7.

[3284] They are.

[3285] Hydra Thunder is part of it.

[3286] Yeah.

[3287] So last year's Summer of Arcade is this year's.

[3288] No, Hydro Thunder Go.

[3289] Summer of Arcade.

[3290] That's all I know about for coming out this week.

[3291] There was a crazy interlude on the Tested podcast a couple weeks ago about how Will Smith kind of thinks that Windows Phone 7 might be the successor to the mobile crown.

[3292] When?

[3293] I don't know.

[3294] It was all in the wake of this Mango announcement.

[3295] There was like 500 new improvements to the thing.

[3296] If they can come out with a sweeping batch of devices that sell it to people, yeah.

[3297] Well, there's the whole thing about them, Microsoft acquiring Nokia's mobile division and putting serious muscle behind it.

[3298] Wait, if you acquire Nokia's mobile division, what else is there left of Nokia?

[3299] I don't know.

[3300] I don't understand.

[3301] Is it Nokia or Nokia?

[3302] Nokia.

[3303] I always say Nokia, but everybody else says Nokia, so I started thinking, oh man, I must be wrong.

[3304] I think it is supposed to be Nokia.

[3305] Yeah.

[3306] Really?

[3307] That's what I've always said.

[3308] Asus.

[3309] Vita.

[3310] But I would rather land on it.

[3311] I would rather call it Asus, Nokia, and Vita.

[3312] Asus is way harder for me to deal with than Nokia.

[3313] Yeah.

[3314] Hyundai?

[3315] Asus.

[3316] Anyway, what if Windows Phone 7 becomes popular?

[3317] If it's a good phone, so far it's not really.

[3318] It's got a solid base.

[3319] It's not a terrible phone.

[3320] It's just not as good as an iPhone.

[3321] I don't like a lot of their interface stuff.

[3322] It's slick and clever, but I definitely don't prefer it to iPhone.

[3323] I feel like they still need to find their...

[3324] You've got to start with a niche.

[3325] You've got to figure out what it is that separates you from both Android and iPhone, because those are both things to...

[3326] to consider in that market.

[3327] They are, yeah.

[3328] I mean, I guess iPhone specifically has seen flat or maybe even negative growth in the recent past.

[3329] Android has exploded.

[3330] I mean, I would say that, you know, I mean, I haven't had a ton of experience with Android phones, but from what I've used of those, I would take a Windows Phone 7 device over Android.

[3331] That's the question they were putting forth was all these people who are getting Android phones now, are they going to be willing to buy another Android phone after this?

[3332] Right.

[3333] And if not...

[3334] Windows Phone 7 kind of seems like a natural place for them to land.

[3335] Maybe.

[3336] We'll see.

[3337] It does have points.

[3338] That's kind of what I'm getting at.

[3339] All right, let's take it to emails.

[3340] Bombcast at giantbomb .com.

[3341] Anthony from Bloomington, Illinois.

[3342] Why does it always fall upon Jeff?

[3343] To buy a new technology for the ability to professionally comment upon it.

[3344] The PSP Go and 3D TV are examples that come to mind.

[3345] Did he draw the short straw at the very beginning?

[3346] Does he value his journalistic integrity more than the rest of you?

[3347] Or does he just hate money and buy all this stuff by choice?

[3348] I'd say it's a heady melange of all three.

[3349] Bless you.

[3350] Excuse me. I'm allergic to this question.

[3351] This question gives you hay fever?

[3352] Brad didn't even buy a Wii, so...

[3353] I've been surrounded by Wii since they came out.

[3354] You haven't needed to buy one.

[3355] An awash in Wii.

[3356] Wii.

[3357] If not me, who?

[3358] If not now, when?

[3359] Good answer.

[3360] Good answer.

[3361] Good, yeah, terrific answer.

[3362] Next email comes in from Adam in Des Moines, Iowa.

[3363] Over the weekend, my 7 -year -old stepson was playing New Super Mario Bros., and at one point he asked me, what are these little numbers that come up when I stomp on the enemies?

[3364] I told him that those are points.

[3365] He then asked me what they are for, and I had to take a moment to try and explain the concept of scoring points on a video game.

[3366] I told him that they were used so you could tell how good you were at a game, and when you play games with friends, you can compare your score.

[3367] He understood, but still didn't see the point of it.

[3368] My question is this.

[3369] Do points matter anymore?

[3370] Have they simply become another box to be checked on a list of requirements featured in a retro -style game?

[3371] Will we simply remember scores in games to be the precursor to achievements and trophies, or is there still the possibility for points to matter?

[3372] Sounds like you've got to teach your kid about goals.

[3373] About getting points?

[3374] Yeah, about scoring.

[3375] About being better than other people?

[3376] About putting everybody else to shame.

[3377] I think in certain games, they're still totally relevant.

[3378] I just don't happen to play those games.

[3379] I mean, games that are purely based on an exhibition of skill, like Geometry Wars.

[3380] That's the only way to track your progress is how high are your points because there are no story milestones or anything.

[3381] I mean, they could have set it up to be just time.

[3382] Or time or wave -based.

[3383] Or like bullet hell shooters and all those games.

[3384] But that game specifically revolves around multipliers, and that's hard to represent with something like time.

[3385] It's the easiest way.

[3386] Numbers are pretty clearly hierarchical.

[3387] I'm less interested in the actual question here than I am in this notion of the video game high score being so far removed from modern games anymore.

[3388] We have shifted that progression into these other kind of metrics, I guess.

[3389] Yeah, the rise of the story -based game.

[3390] Scoring doesn't really matter.

[3391] You're not going to go back through even something like Gears of War.

[3392] You're not going to play the entire story over again to get a score, which is why they break that stuff out into horde mode and some of these other points -based modes that they can kind of build for that stuff for that purpose.

[3393] But I think it also kind of represents the shift in how games are made, whereas it is about the experience.

[3394] Yeah, it's not about skill in most cases.

[3395] The thing about high scores is being ranked now for multiplayer games where you're just like, that dude's ranked 18.

[3396] That's pretty good.

[3397] He's ranked 18 million points.

[3398] Yeah, but even that, it's not necessarily an indicator of skill.

[3399] It's an indicator of time spent in a lot of cases.

[3400] So even that's not perfect.

[3401] That was one of the appeals of the achievement point system to begin with was that it brought score into games that didn't lend themselves to that and gave you that kind of base point to compare to other people.

[3402] It brought that bragging rights, that sense of bragging back to games.

[3403] And that's probably the coolest part about it is going to – cool is a relative term I suppose.

[3404] But being able to go to people and say, hey, I got all these points in this game because I played the shit out of it and did these things that you didn't do.

[3405] It's an easy way to kind of plant your flag and lay down challenges to other people and stuff.

[3406] You also don't get free lives anymore when you get a certain score.

[3407] Yeah.

[3408] You also don't really get lives.

[3409] Geometry Wars you do.

[3410] Also, you barely even have health bars.

[3411] Also, you don't really get Geometry Wars anymore.

[3412] It's kind of a bummer.

[3413] Hiram in Lubbock, Texas.

[3414] Dear Bomb Crew, Michael Pachter, who was on last week.

[3415] I'm sorry you guys missed that, but we had Michael Pachter in the house.

[3416] I saw Michael Pachter.

[3417] He said he was sorry for missing my birthday.

[3418] Generating headlines.

[3419] I excused him.

[3420] That's what he does.

[3421] At least forum topics.

[3422] He walked into this room and said a bunch of crazy shit.

[3423] Man, is that all it takes?

[3424] Just say some crazy shit.

[3425] If you're Michael Pachter.

[3426] You've got to look good doing it.

[3427] You've got to say it with a certain amount of authority.

[3428] You've got to get yourself two suits to get them pressed.

[3429] Yep.

[3430] I would actually like to once again thank Michael Pachter for coming through last week.

[3431] That was a delight for me personally.

[3432] I don't think he's always right.

[3433] I think he's often extremely wrong, and I think he often knows that.

[3434] But I still think he's an interesting character with a unique perspective on this industry that I think is worth considering.

[3435] Yeah.

[3436] At the very least.

[3437] A welcome perspective.

[3438] Yeah, absolutely.

[3439] He is looking at it from an angle, from kind of a blended angle of both the kind of hard economics as well as a feel for the culture side of it that I don't think anyone else is doing in quite the same way.

[3440] And he was the guy kind of saying they will find a way to monetize Call of Duty multiplayer sooner or later just you watch.

[3441] And he was right.

[3442] You're saying I have to pay for multiplayer?

[3443] Yep.

[3444] $9 a game.

[3445] Yeah, $9 a game.

[3446] And then 50 cents a bullet.

[3447] So just like micro transactions on the iPhone.

[3448] Yeah.

[3449] Pay $2 for this rocket launcher.

[3450] Anyway, Michael Packer raised the question that I was wondering what your thoughts were, on which I was wondering what your thoughts were.

[3451] Can a video game console come out that's just video games and still survive, or does it have to be a multimedia entertainment box a la the 360?

[3452] Like the Wii?

[3453] What was the number that Microsoft put out today that 40 % of Xbox 360 usage is non -gaming?

[3454] Is that what they were saying?

[3455] Yeah.

[3456] Crazy.

[3457] I think that's what Will was saying.

[3458] Some press release the boat out.

[3459] Well, they're also saying like 20 % of all peak internet usage is because of Netflix streaming, which a lot of that has to be coming through the 360 because that's kind of one of the broadest platforms that you can do that through other than doing it on your computer.

[3460] So that means a lot of people have to be doing it.

[3461] I feel like any time I turn on my Xbox, I go look at my friends list, at least one person is watching something on Netflix.

[3462] Yeah, I wonder, you know, I think it's safe to assume that the next Nintendo console will play DVDs.

[3463] Put some money down on that.

[3464] I don't know, the Wii did not, right?

[3465] I know, exactly.

[3466] I think now's the time.

[3467] Do you think they suffer for that?

[3468] The licensing has got cheap enough that they can just, you know, it'll be...

[3469] But not Blu -rays.

[3470] Well, we'll see what the Wii has.

[3471] And do you think they'll have internal storage to do, like, streaming and download movies?

[3472] Not enough.

[3473] I mean, if it's going to be comparable with the existing consoles, like they're saying, it'll have to use something.

[3474] Blu -ray, right?

[3475] I mean...

[3476] I don't know.

[3477] I shrug my shoulders.

[3478] You could use a proprietary disc format at this point.

[3479] Who knows?

[3480] But it needs to be sufficiently massive to accommodate those games.

[3481] I'm sticking to my...

[3482] Yeah, I'm sticking to carts.

[3483] I think it'll just be fucking...

[3484] But, you know, what's a modern cart?

[3485] It's an SD card.

[3486] It's a USB thumbstick.

[3487] Oh, I would hope really huge, like Neo Geo size.

[3488] You want it to be a big -ass thing you got to slam in there?

[3489] Yeah.

[3490] You want it to look expensive.

[3491] Yeah.

[3492] And hard to lose.

[3493] It would be kind of awesome if there's fucking carts.

[3494] Giant carts.

[3495] Big fucking carts.

[3496] Sticks of RAM in there.

[3497] Really, we've gotten to the point where the storage technology for that stuff is cheap and easy and fast.

[3498] The cheap stuff is too unreliable, though.

[3499] Well, the cheapest stuff.

[3500] It would be more expensive than discs still.

[3501] That's always been the thing.

[3502] Wouldn't it be cheaper, though, for them to ship on discs but put an SSD in the box?

[3503] To get the speed of a cartridge.

[3504] You and your SSD obsession.

[3505] I don't think you're right.

[3506] No way it's going to happen.

[3507] I don't know.

[3508] No way it's going to happen on the Nintendo platform, for sure.

[3509] Wait, you're talking about in the console?

[3510] Yeah.

[3511] Yeah, it's too expensive, too many technical issues.

[3512] I'm hoping the new HD Wii, or whatever they're going to call it, the HD Vita, is going to be, you open the box, and it's an HDMI cable and a power supply.

[3513] And then you buy the game, you just plug that shit right into the cart.

[3514] The game's got the controller on it.

[3515] It's got no controller.

[3516] You just watch a movie.

[3517] Watch somebody else play.

[3518] That'll be the difference.

[3519] Nintendo will call it the Vita.

[3520] It'll be the PlayStation Vita and the Nintendo Vita.

[3521] But it's one big vitality sensor.

[3522] For the movie to keep playing, you have to put your finger into the slot.

[3523] Insufficient heart rate to continue playback.

[3524] Yeah.

[3525] Are you dead?

[3526] Yes, no. Each card is a self -contained system.

[3527] To your point, yeah.

[3528] The Wii is the example of it does games.

[3529] Kind of.

[3530] If that's what you're looking for.

[3531] Mini games.

[3532] It does have Netflix streaming and web browser.

[3533] Yeah, even they got a little bit into that stuff.

[3534] It's disc -free.

[3535] No, it's disc free on the PS3 now, but it's still a disc on the Wii.

[3536] Is it still a disc on the Wii?

[3537] Yeah.

[3538] Okay.

[3539] I don't think there's anywhere to store it, is there?

[3540] And so we made a Netflix channel, though.

[3541] And you just watch them in SD, that's it?

[3542] Yeah, it only does up to 480p.

[3543] Wow.

[3544] What are you guys Netflix on?

[3545] Either.

[3546] Yeah, whatever system is on.

[3547] Whichever one you have.

[3548] Yeah, that's pretty much it for me. I don't really care.

[3549] 360 is more responsive, but I kind of like the PS3 better.

[3550] Yeah, kind of with you.

[3551] I have not tried the PS3 Netflix out since right around the time they launched it, and I thought it looked bad and did not perform well.

[3552] I kind of like the interface on PS3.

[3553] PS3 is nice if you don't want to fish your profile out of your bag if you have it on a stick.

[3554] That'll be why I'll do that, is the, like, ugh, I don't want to have to.

[3555] The thing with the thing.

[3556] If I have to get off this couch and turn on Netflix.

[3557] I can just brush any button on this PlayStation remote.

[3558] Hit all of them.

[3559] And then I'll hear the beep, and I'm like, okay, good, the Netflix box is warming up.

[3560] Time to watch some Twilight Zone.

[3561] Oh, my PS3 is so loud, though.

[3562] Yeah, mine is like a goddamn jet engine.

[3563] I was at a friend's house yesterday who has an old bottle PS3, and his is nice and quiet.

[3564] I don't know what the difference is.

[3565] But anybody knows any tips for quietening down a wet towel?

[3566] Slim PS3.

[3567] I almost tried to go get in on that crazy Target deal.

[3568] Just get a quieter PS3, because mine is so fucking loud.

[3569] Isn't there supposed to be something where if you cover the vent end of the PS3, it'll go into some jet mode?

[3570] Yeah, like it spins the fans all the way up.

[3571] Yeah.

[3572] Like vertically upside down for some period of time.

[3573] Supposedly blows all the dust out or something.

[3574] I don't know.

[3575] Well, I just remember when we first got a PS3, that happened accidentally.

[3576] Right.

[3577] Like, uh -oh, put it on the ground and started making this noise.

[3578] Like, oh, God, this doesn't sound like a good noise for this thing to be making.

[3579] And then we realized, well, that's because we're covering the exhaust port with all this carpet.

[3580] I feel like this next generation coming out of consoles, everything will be so digital that, like.

[3581] The distinction between being just a game machine and anything else that plays movies or something will just be gone.

[3582] That line will just blur.

[3583] Yeah, I don't think it's...

[3584] I tend to agree.

[3585] I think that we've reached the point where...

[3586] Your console will have an interface.

[3587] Guys, guess what?

[3588] The set -top box dream finally came true, and it's video games.

[3589] You'll just download your apps or whatever to your front end.

[3590] Well, it's everything.

[3591] Yeah, it's TVs themselves.

[3592] Rokus, and there's a zillion options.

[3593] Sure.

[3594] Everybody's got one.

[3595] is going to be a boxy TV.

[3596] Like, the boxy box wasn't enough.

[3597] They're building boxy software directly into a model of television.

[3598] When that seems like the next step is, like...

[3599] Well, I want all that Netflix stuff, but I honestly don't give a shit about video games.

[3600] Build that shit into the TV.

[3601] I know they're talking apps for TVs is the hot thing at CES this year.

[3602] Just hold a hard drive or read a thumbstick and just boot up apps for your TV on whatever operating system.

[3603] Yeah, there are TVs out there that actually have put out dev kits and they let developers kind of code their own apps.

[3604] They've got Wi -Fi on them.

[3605] Sounds awesome.

[3606] Linux, Ubuntu.

[3607] Yeah, you can put Ubuntu on your TV.

[3608] Can my TV run Doom?

[3609] I guarantee already somebody is running Doom on a TV.

[3610] Great.

[3611] On like the remote, the firmware in the remote.

[3612] Okay.

[3613] I think we have to end this podcast.

[3614] We're out of time.

[3615] We're out of time.

[3616] We're out of time.

[3617] You're saving up time for the E3 podcast?

[3618] You're banking it?

[3619] What?

[3620] No. This was a long goddamn podcast.

[3621] As per usual.

[3622] This is our last chance for E3 predictions.

[3623] This is our last chance for E3 predictions.

[3624] Don't start with me. What was the prevailing?

[3625] theme of that podcast.

[3626] I haven't listened until last week's.

[3627] Oh, the special podcast.

[3628] What came out of that?

[3629] Anything mind -blowing besides his headline -making Nintendo prediction?

[3630] Oh, about Nintendo getting out of the hardware business?

[3631] He predicted...

[3632] I didn't listen to that.

[3633] He said something predicted.

[3634] I would say he predicted that.

[3635] You see, he kind of floated it as like, yeah, you know, this is a potential future for them.

[3636] Going third party.

[3637] Sega style.

[3638] I've said that for years.

[3639] He's biting my stuff.

[3640] Well, everybody said that after the GameCube.

[3641] He said it from that chair.

[3642] Oh, really?

[3643] Yeah.

[3644] Great minds.

[3645] I'm thinking alike.

[3646] I left my notes on his chair.

[3647] I don't remember what else got said during that thing.

[3648] Press conferences will happen.

[3649] Ubisoft will be ridiculous.

[3650] Should we just do our E3 press conference predictions?

[3651] That seems to be just the biggest thing, right?

[3652] Yeah.

[3653] Do you think Microsoft's going to have anything big?

[3654] to counter the hardware announcements at the other press conferences.

[3655] Because I think it's pure software from Microsoft this year.

[3656] Yeah, it's really...

[3657] You back up the Kinect.

[3658] You've got Gears.

[3659] So at least one big major Kinect title?

[3660] I think you have to have like a fucking quarter of that press conference at least dedicated to Kinect stuff.

[3661] They sold a bunch of those.

[3662] They haven't had any good software support for it post -launch.

[3663] Yeah, but you sold them already.

[3664] Move on.

[3665] They need to...

[3666] Well, if they want to sell more, they need to keep – they need to prove it at some point.

[3667] And this is, I think, where they can do that.

[3668] And other than that, it's you trot out your dudes that you've already got on the hook.

[3669] You've got – Dan Greenewald will come out and say some crazy shit about Forza and Cliff will say something about gears and Peter Molyneux will say something about his balls.

[3670] They talk about the Windows 7 phone and all?

[3671] tie that into their gaming platform.

[3672] That's on the screen at one point.

[3673] They might want to appeal to the gaming side of it.

[3674] I don't think much time gets spent on that at all.

[3675] I think literally that's...

[3676] Windows Phone 7 is part of the rich ecosystem.

[3677] Better than ever.

[3678] More importantly, it's a different business unit within Microsoft.

[3679] Those are not the people running this press conference, so they don't care about...

[3680] pushing that thing.

[3681] Is there a pie chart during the press conference?

[3682] Hell yeah.

[3683] Yeah?

[3684] Microsoft does pie charts?

[3685] No, there's no pie chart.

[3686] Bar graph.

[3687] They have to announce something software -wise.

[3688] I mean, everybody already knows about Gears and Forza.

[3689] Yeah.

[3690] There's got to be something else.

[3691] There'll be a slate of connected announcements, both from them and from third parties.

[3692] And I think the connected announcement...

[3693] ties into a new oh yeah totally something a new dashboardy thing yeah that'll tie into the connect and be like dashboard type stuff I think if the thousand friend thing's gonna happen this will be the place where they announce it that would be crazy and like so I bet there's gonna be didn't they show this at like part connect party room or whatever where you're like sitting oh yeah that was a CES that's that has a launch date that's how is that coming that soonish whole press conference end of June I think that's yeah they have to they have to say something about what 343's been up to right yeah Yeah.

[3694] Agreed.

[3695] Hopefully, yeah.

[3696] Do they update the Xbox 360 hardware at all?

[3697] Nope.

[3698] Not this year.

[3699] New HDMI port to make 3D easier.

[3700] This year's model going straight up car model on that stuff.

[3701] I don't think it's too soon.

[3702] You know, there could be a refresh, but I don't think that's something that you really try and double underline during the press conference.

[3703] What do they even do to it?

[3704] What else is there to do?

[3705] They fixed it.

[3706] It works now, and it doesn't die every six months.

[3707] Bigger hard drive?

[3708] Yeah, but Sony pushes out new SKUs with hard drives every six months or a year.

[3709] I'm not saying you make a big deal about it.

[3710] Meaningful changes, though.

[3711] I don't think there's much else to do.

[3712] A Kinect bundle for $299.

[3713] I think that already exists.

[3714] They have, though, yeah.

[3715] They totally have had that since last holiday.

[3716] Is that retailer -specific?

[3717] No. I think that's just a 4 -game.

[3718] Well, that's the 4 -game console.

[3719] Target right now.

[3720] I thought I saw some ad that had the $250 at $299 with Kinect.

[3721] Jeez, that's crazy.

[3722] What's crazy is that they're still selling Xbox 360s for $300 a pop.

[3723] And some, like, kind of a lot of them.

[3724] That's crazy.

[3725] Yeah, it is crazy.

[3726] I don't buy into those sales figures because so many people are replacing old Xboxes.

[3727] Yeah, I mean, I'm not saying that that turns into, like, software sales every single time, but they're still selling.

[3728] It's an impressive number on its face, yeah.

[3729] It's kind of impressive that if your Xbox breaks, you go back and buy another fucking Xbox.

[3730] Yeah, sure.

[3731] You don't just say, all right, fuck this.

[3732] Cloud support on 360?

[3733] Profile cloud support, where it's like you don't need your profile on a thumbstick.

[3734] That's your next generational characteristic.

[3735] The infrastructure is too set in stone, I think, for a lot of those changes to be meaningful at this point.

[3736] I think we'll be lucky if we see that thousand friend bump.

[3737] Yeah, new dash.

[3738] New dash.

[3739] I definitely expect some new.

[3740] Well, like more Kinect -enabled dash, because right now the Kinect stuff on the dashboard is terrible.

[3741] You know what?

[3742] Everything about the dashboard is terrible.

[3743] Everything about that dashboard right now is the fact that I have to navigate just to start a game.

[3744] The fact that I start on a row of ads.

[3745] Yes.

[3746] They have been beta testing some kind of new dashboard.

[3747] Anything new avatar related?

[3748] Aside from the little chat room stuff.

[3749] You know what?

[3750] That'll be where your bar graph shows up.

[3751] And they show, this is fucking how much money we make off this crazy Avatar stuff.

[3752] Can you believe this?

[3753] Can you fucking believe this?

[3754] And we continue to.

[3755] We're opening a new Avatar mall.

[3756] I just can't help but think, like, what if they got suckered in by the whole 3D thing and want to update the console, specifically just to update the HDMI to make it automatically switch to 3D?

[3757] Nah.

[3758] I'm not saying it's a change that's going to revolutionize.

[3759] No one's going to go out and buy a new Xbox, but if that stuff's gotten cheap enough, and if they're going to be dedicated to this platform for a few more years...

[3760] Why not throw in a couple of things like that to try and maintain the perception of value and keep their prices up and that sort of stuff?

[3761] I don't know because it seems like – Do a 500 -gig drive while you're at it.

[3762] Microsoft hasn't done much with 3D up to now anyway.

[3763] They don't have that Sony impetus.

[3764] Right.

[3765] You're right.

[3766] It's a huge focus for their direct competition.

[3767] I think if they were to do it, it would be something where they would have gotten suckered in by Sony's involvement in that stuff and be like, we've got to be there.

[3768] and are just now getting to it or something like that.

[3769] I think they missed that boat.

[3770] Maybe you're right.

[3771] I'm not saying that they should do that either.

[3772] You're just wondering if they took that turn?

[3773] Yeah.

[3774] I'm wondering if they fell for that at some point and went like, oh, dude, we've got to get out ahead of this.

[3775] I mean, we're not out ahead of this.

[3776] We've got to get out ahead of something.

[3777] I think even if they had been doing it based on the way, like the 3D backlash that's been happening this summer in film, they would not mention that at E3.

[3778] They would be like, okay, this is under internal review for whether this project continues.

[3779] Or maybe they make the change and never even say anything about it.

[3780] Yeah, seeing that stuff about the lenses and having dim 2D movies because no one takes the lens off at theaters and stuff.

[3781] Fucking crazy.

[3782] Well, also just like the past three weekends or something.

[3783] The 2D's doing better.

[3784] Yeah, the 2D movies, despite having less screens, are outperforming the 3D version.

[3785] Pirates and Kung Fu Panda 2 both outperforming.

[3786] Yeah, the 2D's outperforming the 3D despite more 3D screens.

[3787] Plus fewer screens.

[3788] Wow.

[3789] And lower price.

[3790] That's how much people are like, fuck you to 3D right now.

[3791] And so the financials are all reacting to that right now.

[3792] It's a complete...

[3793] Yeah, I saw like real D stock.

[3794] A complete clusterfuck.

[3795] So even if they had been devoting resources to that, Microsoft opens up the Wall Street Journal today and says, okay, this 20 -minute chump we need to fill with something else.

[3796] Alan Wake, whatever.

[3797] I don't know.

[3798] Let's take this off the slate.

[3799] PlayStation, obviously, the Vita is a big focus for them.

[3800] That one is, yeah.

[3801] I mean, that one is like, what, 10 to 20 minutes of mea culpa about PSN, and then 10 to 20 minutes, five tops.

[3802] Really?

[3803] Two minutes.

[3804] Two minutes, maybe a gag.

[3805] No gags.

[3806] Five minutes, no gags.

[3807] I'll concede the shorter time, but no fucking way are they going to come out and make light of that situation.

[3808] At all?

[3809] I will put money on it.

[3810] I will reiterate my prediction from earlier.

[3811] Jack Tretton will murder the actor who plays Kevin Butler.

[3812] Yeah.

[3813] You will actually murder him.

[3814] That's not a gag, man. I think, yeah, Kevin Butler takes a fall.

[3815] No, you will murder him by strangling him.

[3816] Okay.

[3817] I think you push that off onto a fictional character.

[3818] It's the way to do it.

[3819] You know, they're still responding to Senate.

[3820] They can't look like they don't give a fuck.

[3821] They're like, ah, you know, whatever.

[3822] It's a good time.

[3823] Yay, Sony.

[3824] No, they still have to at least.

[3825] So there's like single spotlight.

[3826] Jack Trent rolls up the sleeves and sits down.

[3827] Everybody pulls a chair.

[3828] You know what?

[3829] I think there's acknowledgement.

[3830] I don't think there's apology.

[3831] We're coming back better than ever.

[3832] Just look through the future.

[3833] Things are great.

[3834] You don't ignore it outright, but at some point they will say thank you for your patience to everyone in attendance.

[3835] I think that's totally right.

[3836] But yeah, obviously a lot of Vita, Vita, Vita, Vita.

[3837] It seems like PS3 software would take a backseat because that stuff's all known for this year.

[3838] Uncharted is coming.

[3839] Infamous will be launching the next day.

[3840] Uncharted coming later in the year.

[3841] This would be a good time for them to, like, roll out more of Starhawk or something like that.

[3842] But, I mean, all these games have been announced and are on the schedule.

[3843] Like, maybe some new move stuff.

[3844] I don't know.

[3845] I think they'll probably do new XMB stuff.

[3846] And I just mean, like, better integration with some stuff.

[3847] And I think they'll roll from the PlayStation Network being down to the coming back better than ever.

[3848] And, like, here are the new features you can expect coming up in next year.

[3849] Here's the core stuff.

[3850] Here's, like, better friend stuff, better trophy stuff.

[3851] Better, you know, whatever, Twitter, ESPN, whatever they're going to put in there to be like, here's...

[3852] Features.

[3853] It was down.

[3854] Look how awesome it's going to be in the future.

[3855] Integration with the Vita.

[3856] I don't know.

[3857] And then, you know, Nintendo will be, you know, new console and a lot of proof of concept software.

[3858] And some actual 3DS games.

[3859] You think they abandoned the Wii or they just hit the Wii?

[3860] You know, they'll mention Skyward Sword.

[3861] Coming to the new Nintendo console.

[3862] Reverse levels.

[3863] You can't Twilight Princess that game.

[3864] You can't.

[3865] Mirrored levels.

[3866] I can't.

[3867] Oh, no. Don't do that.

[3868] Nintendo can't.

[3869] I don't think they will.

[3870] You don't think so?

[3871] I don't think they will.

[3872] I mean, that's assuming that the new console will even be equipped to play that game.

[3873] I think they've said as much that they will replicate all of those controls.

[3874] There'll be some way to do that.

[3875] So you think they lead new console stuff and it's like, that doesn't mean we're not supporting the Wii.

[3876] We've got a great lineup coming up.

[3877] I bet Skyward Sword and 3DS come before.

[3878] They waited until the last 20 minutes of that press conference for 3DS last year.

[3879] And I imagine it'll be close to that, if not maybe a little more in -depth as far as what you actually see of that system compared to the 3DS.

[3880] It's going to be the wall of logos.

[3881] It'll be a quick trailer roll.

[3882] Will Harmonix be on that wall also?

[3883] I mean, if the system is a year or two, year and a half out, then it's a whole 128 Mario scenario of what this thing can do.

[3884] It'll be tech demo -y stuff that's familiar things.

[3885] Captain Ortega.

[3886] 128 taco shells on screen.

[3887] Yeah, that's...

[3888] Vinny, any other predictions?

[3889] Predictions about Ubisoft.

[3890] I don't think they can go really heavy on Nintendo tech demo stuff for that thing if it's going to be out this year.

[3891] It's not out.

[3892] It's out next year.

[3893] It's out early next year, though.

[3894] No, they said in 2012.

[3895] That's all they've said.

[3896] You think it'll be out before another E3?

[3897] It could go all the way to holiday 2012.

[3898] I thought it was fiscal.

[3899] No. Okay.

[3900] Pretty sure it's calendar.

[3901] All right.

[3902] I think they spend a lot of time on it, but I bet they'll show at least three real games for it.

[3903] Maybe.

[3904] Demo one game maybe, but footage from at least three.

[3905] I mean, if that thing is 18 months out, then those real games barely exist at this point.

[3906] But I feel like they have to show something.

[3907] They're so weak on their software all the time.

[3908] I think, like, yeah, I don't know.

[3909] Proof of concept, like Mario Kart type thing.

[3910] Like, not a name, like, you know.

[3911] Mario Kart Wii 2 or whatever they call it, you know, work in progress.

[3912] Right.

[3913] Here's what we could do on it.

[3914] I think that they'll probably, like, it won't be something like Mario Kart.

[3915] It'll be some other franchise that hasn't been around for a while.

[3916] Not even Star Fox.

[3917] What else is there?

[3918] F -Zero.

[3919] Really?

[3920] F -Zero.

[3921] Sure.

[3922] That's a good frame rate.

[3923] It's a good time for F -Zero to come back.

[3924] Like, F -Zero 64 was all about how many, like, carts, whatever you want to call them.

[3925] How many ships they could get on the screen at once.

[3926] Yeah.

[3927] You know.

[3928] Yeah.

[3929] Bring back F -Zero.

[3930] People would get excited about F -Zero.

[3931] I'd be stoked for a new F -Zero.

[3932] I'll dust off my copy of Dookie.

[3933] I'll sit back down and listen to a bunch of Dookie and play a bunch of F -Zero.

[3934] I think this year will be fewer celebrity guests and fewer social network.

[3935] tie -ins on the console.

[3936] No more Felicia Day.

[3937] I think no more Felicia Day, Steven Spielberg, James Cameron, the Beatles.

[3938] I think we'll go, I think this year will be more about just the games and hopefully fewer social network hooks.

[3939] Hulk Hogan's going to be there.

[3940] Last year it wasn't even about that.

[3941] Last year you think about those press conferences, it was just like you're trotting out Ted Price and the Harmonix guys.

[3942] Last year all I remember is motion stuff.

[3943] But also last year was just like motion, motion, motion.

[3944] big focus on that.

[3945] Move at Sony?

[3946] I guess some lip service to move.

[3947] Yeah, they'll have to do something, right?

[3948] They can't just completely abandon it yet.

[3949] Sports 2, whatever, with the motion sports deuce.

[3950] Sorcery.

[3951] You know what?

[3952] It's going to be like...

[3953] And move support in all of these popular franchises.

[3954] I don't even know that they will have move specific devos.

[3955] Yeah, I mean, they've had plenty of move games.

[3956] It's just not in games that you want to use the move with.

[3957] They will tout the fact that a lot of games are used to move.

[3958] You could use it, right?

[3959] You could too.

[3960] Come on.

[3961] Now we really have to end this podcast.

[3962] Yeah, we're in L .A. next week for E3.

[3963] Maybe you've heard of it.

[3964] Look for us then.

[3965] Content kicks off next week.

[3966] Yeah.

[3967] Maybe.

[3968] It's probably Sunday.

[3969] Maybe Sunday.

[3970] Look for us Sunday, but Monday is when the press conferences begin in earnest.

[3971] And we will be there in force.

[3972] So look for that then.

[3973] And that's going to do it for this week's edition of the Giant Bombcast.

[3974] Next week, E3!

[3975] Valley Parking 1989 is stores now.