Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance Adds 75 Hours of New Content

Amy Beer, it's the Internet. You're busy. Let's do this for April
twenty fourth, twenty twenty four. For the next hour or so, let
me help you sort through the world of gaming on Game Mess Mornings Live with
Me Jeff Grubb. Today we finally found out exactly how stellar The Blade really
is, and fans are divided about smooching in a video game. But first,
please join me and welcoming today's co host the Game Mess Mornings. It's
Amron Kahn. Everybody. Imron. How are you doing. I'm doing quite
well? How about you, Jeff? I'm doing I was doing better before.
I remember that you beat us in a Game Mess Jeopardy that one time.
You're one of the few people that beat us. I don't like that.
That's upsetting to me. But also I was one of the few people
that lost to you, So that's right. I revenge, Yes, one
of the few people who that's absolutely the good, right way to put it
too. Uh yeah, but yeah, how you've been recently had with long
time no talk? Actually ah, yeah, I've been good. I have
come back to games writing, so I'm just kind of doing that full time
now. I you know, just kind of like enjoying time playing video games.
I started putting a person to Forgotten Lost Crown recently, and that game.
I know a lot of people have told me like, hey, this
game is incredible, and I'm like, yeah, sure, I'm sure it's
incredible, but like it's a Ubi Soft game. Oh wait, I kind
of regret waiting a little bit. That game is actually incredible. It's really
good. It's it's still my favorite of the year so far, although I
starting to get some stuff that like could compete with it, but it's it's
just such a me game. I'm glad. I'm glad. I saw you
on Twitter talking about Hey, I'm going to give this game a try.
I'm like, yes, another one who's definitely gonna fall in love with it.
It really is just so well done. Yeah, it is. It
is probably the best Ubisoft game I've played in like maybe five years. Any
more than that. Yeah, it just it just feels like they sat down,
like, let's forget all this other stuff, forget all these things that
we're always trying to cram into these games. Let's just make a really good
video game and Jean and just do the best things in that genre that we
can. And they really nailed all that, all those aspects. It's it
just feels so good. The pacing's so well done, it's just well thought
out game. Yeah, I absolutely love it. Getting back into games writing.
What was that process? Like? Was it painful? These days?
So? Is it like calling up old friends? How does that work?
It's mostly like tugging on old network strings. Basically, it is like a
lot of well so that there are more people right now freelancing than ever have
been, which very much sucks for so many reasons. But it's a lot
of like, hey, I want to you know, do you guys have
any reviews available? Do you have like I have this pitch idea? Can
we get started on this? So stuff like that like a Stellar Blade reviews?
Would you were going to talk about momentarily where a thing like Tam just
contacted me It is like, hey, do you want to reave for GameSpot?
I said sure, and we're off to the races. Then it's games
writing, is I think the thing I want to do most. I've at
this point dabbled in pretty and much every side of the end, like PR
Development Agency PR. I like writing about games more than I like pretty much
anything else. Yeah, I've I've tried to like put myself in because I
was like kind of paying attention to what you were doing a little bit,
put myself in your shoes. Like I'm trying to figure out, you know,
who knows when I have to move on from whatever job in the future.
It's like, would I be able to make that shift? And I'm
like, I don't know if I could do what Imrom's doing with with like
even like the dabbling. So I'm like, ah, god, I just
figured a way to make this stuff work, and so far, so good.
But it's it is the thing I like doing the most, and this
point, you know, the skill set is so limited. I'm like,
I better make it work. But I can't do anything else. I'd be
screwed. That's the thing. I'm having a household of two games journalists.
If we constantly have that conversation of like, okay, so what do we
do with this, I'll collapse in this but right, yeah, exactly,
And there's not much to be done. And thankfully though it's like okay,
it seems like it's working and you got the the review done. Do you
have like other stuff like lined up or is it like what is it like
out there is it? Like, I know you said there's a lot of
freelancers. Does that mean that there's just less work than what you would have
imagined it? Yeah, it does. It means that everyone is kind of
like you ever see one of those movies where like they approach the shark tank
or the purana tank or whatever and like throw in a drop of blood and
like the water starts bubbling. That is pretty much every single video game woe
and every single idea you could possibly have, because I cannot count the number
of times I emailed and ed or being like, hey I had this pitch
for a feature, what if we did something like this? And they're like,
hey, this sounds great, I already made this picture like this deal
with someone else. I'm basically the same subject, which is understandable because we're
all kind of living through like a hell world right now. But like everyone's
talking about the hell world too, so then we can't really Like it's very
hard to make forward momentum unless you're kind of trying to climb up the backs
of the people, and I ideally don't want to do that. So where
we're you know, it is a rough situation out there but it's still workable
at least the moment. Yeah, it's the kind of thing where it's I
always like, try try to put the ladder back down, and it's like,
uh, okay, I'm putting the ladder back down, and I,
oh, but I should warn you there's nothing up here. There's literally nothing
left up here. It's all honestly, it's just there wasn't even scraps what
I got here, and now it's less than that. Uh, and so
it's like I don't know what the climb up really looks like anymore. So
yeah, I think like to survive to twenty five is our mantre. We'll
get there, does it make it better? I have no idea, no
idea. I think we'll bounce back at some point, because, like I
think at some point, So I was talking to a studio head which I
don't want to like name, but they were saying something like we're going to
bounce back next or in a year or two, because right now everyone's realizing
that they've fired everybody and they need to actually make video games soon. So
like I think Games Real is ever gonna lag about a year or two behind
that for the games to actually like yeah, show up, but we are
going to get to the point where we're going to need games writers again,
and they can't just uh can't just have AI right guides or whatever for the
next couple of years because it's not gonna be sustainable because as cynical and stupid
as it doesn't say, those guys think something to trade off of, and
unfortunately, games writing is gonna be that thing for a while. Yep,
Like you're not wrong, but man, that feels bad to say, but
you're one hundred percent right. All right, let's explain what we do here
most weekdays, I, Jeff Greb, will help piece your gaming life back
together. That includes breaking news and maybe even some of our own original reporting.
For all these topics, I'll get the input of a bona fide expert
who will make me look smart. If you were watching live on twitch welcome.
You can always listen to the show later on podcast feeds by searching for
Game Mess Mornings, or find the RSS on gimebomb dot com. You could
also catch the show later with chapters and timestamps on YouTube. Hello YouTube.
All right, we have a lot to get into, so let's start the
Morning Mess with Stellar Blade review. Roundup. I think it when I last
looked ahead an eighty two on Metacritic. I think it has an eighty four
on Open Critic, which is right around where I was expecting based on like
playing the demo and playing a little bit of the final game in the last
night or two. And let's get into these reviews real quick, and then
I'll see what Imron thinks. Emron, you reviewed this for game Spot,
right, I did, which is the one side I can, like Kata
talk about it in hear that no one has a problem with. Yeah,
all right, let's start here with us. Stephen Mills at Destructoy, who
gave it an a out of ten and said overall, Stellar Blade is a
journey worth experiencing. I feel like, with some improvements in certain areas,
Stellar Blade could be a legendary landmark experience like those, and clearly it clearly
draws inspiration from But even in its current form, Stellar Blade offers a fast
paced action combat system in a unique world with a rewarding narrative. It's not
quite Stellar, but it's certainly solid solid blade, which well done, Steven.
We were all thinking it. Uh Yeah. Seven out of ten from
Gareth Chadwick AT's the sixth ath Access, who says Stellar Blade is a pretty
enjoyable game to swing your hair hair band sword at, so long as you
don't mind the obvious sexualization. That there's a few rough areas, but nothing
to spoil things over, and there's plenty of interesting story to uncover as you
find your way through giant fight your way through giant monsters with circular saws for
heads and weird tentacles for legs. I'm gonna jump down here to the tech
Raptor, where Austin Suther gave it a nine out of ten. It said
Stellar Blade stands toe to toe with some of the best games of the character
action genre. This package offers a satisfying combat system with plenty of progression,
beautiful visuals, and one of the best soundtracks in years. And then Tom
Reagan at VGC gave it four stars. For those who wish that God of
War Ragnarok offered a bit more challenge, or that Beyonetta had a bit more
weight to its combat, this slick sci fi slasher is the perfect tonic,
offering both the perfect entry point into the souls like genre and a refreshing refinement
of the well worn character action formula. It may lack the naval gazing intelligence
of the excellent Neu Automata Automata Automata, but when you're having this much fun,
it's hard to care. I am liking this game am Ron from what
I've played, and again near the beginning. But I streamed the demo a
few weeks back and I was like, oh man, things feel a little
off, and I'm like, I wonder if it's like playing in this obs
window, which just a little bit of de lay, because I'm like,
I'm big into like the Perry systems in these games, and that like is
what like where it lives or dies? For me, it's like, does
the Perry system feel good? I don't care if it's a tight window.
I just want to be able to predict it and work with it a little
bit. And then I played it on the TV, you know, with
no lag at all, and it like, oh, everything clicked. It
feels really good. And then it's like from there it's like, oh,
yeah, okay, this is a decent, like upgrade system. I could
see a lot of like potential here. I think the world does look pretty
interesting for me. One hundred percent, this thing is is taking from Near.
It's like someone played Near and then they made this game, And I'm
fine with that. For the most part. It's not as interesting as Near
in a lot of ways, but I think personally the combat's more fun.
That's me. People can yell at me, you review this game, what
do you think? So, yeah, it is unabashedly taking from here.
It is like absolutely that thing of don't copy my home, or if you're
gonna come my home, make it a little different. They didn't make it
different enough now, but like it. I think that is actually one of
my bigger disappointments of the game. And I like this. Going to game
Spot, I wrote a whole review. I gave it an eight, But
like, I think it tries so hard to be Near, but it doesn't
realize that why Near was successful, why that story actually matter to people,
Why like they're saying no. It tries to do this like kind of sci
fi pulp story that I think just kind of falls flat on its space a
last minute twist that I won't spoil, but it like just makes things seem
laughable in a weird way, and like the voice acting doesn't help. None
of It's like a great story, but where it does shine is the gameplay
that com system is. It is nowhere close to immaculate, but it is
fun. It is I love the idea that everything you do to survive in
battle, in terms of like dodging and pairying and all that, it all
fees into a larger system of needing to eventually fight back, and you're using
like powering up those beta booves that you have that are actually like fun to
use, interesting like to decide when to use them. I think like this
game has a ton of potential for a sequel. I know what everyone is
going to want me to talk about, and it's going to be about the
sexualization of that game. In my review, I didn't literally make a huge
point about it. It's just it's there. Well, I mean, let's
be real, like the response to this is a bunch of nerds being like,
I have a boner and this that's the most important thing in the world,
and that's what we're going to talk about. And it's like, as
most people come to this game, they'm like, yeah, it's a sexy
video game character that's as old as time at this point, that's not that
big a deal. So of course you're not like in a vacuum, you
wouldn't make a big deal about it. So I'm not surprised to hear you
say that if you're playing this game bricked up, you can get better standards
for porn. Yeah, Like, there is no reason to play this video
game for the sexuality at all. I think what they put there is a
little over the top. I think that like they absolutely could have pulled it
back twenty percent and still been like, still gotten the same attention to the
sexuality that they wanted. But like it's there. It's for me. I
just ended up tuning it out after like a couple of hours of this game.
Then you put on a new outfit. It's like, huh, they
really went a direction with this. Huh. Yeah, And like I I
understand critics who do take that a lot more sure, it's definitely something worth
talking about. It's like I always think about like a cuphead, where it's
like, hey, some of this stuff is inspired by cartoons that were racist,
Let's have a conversation about that. It's like, look, let's have
a conversation about that. That's completely fine. It's very similar to me where
if you want to have a conversation about this there's something there worth talking about,
right. I also respect critics who don't do that are who did say
it right, there's a good game here. Whether you can get past the
rest of it is entirely up to you. I actually spent some time like
once I agreed this review, like kind of dreading the idea, like,
oh hath the audience is going to tear me apart whether I like this or
not, and like that's kind of bearing out. Some people think I didn't
give it high enough score, some people think I gave it too high.
So like at the end of the day, with reviewers, it kind of
just reviewed the game in front of you. But I absolutely do understand where
people are coming from, and they're like distaste for this game, And I
think if you do have a destation of this game based on previews, you're
not going to end up liking the full game. If you do think you
like, you want to move past that, you can move past that.
You want to play a decent action game. This game is that, Like
it is absolutely a fun game with moment to moment gameplay that's actually really interesting,
and it dials like it takes the spectacle dial that Bayaa has it kind
of moves it a little bit. Does it quite go that far, but
it moves it right, it does. I don't know if is it going
up or down. It kind of just like shifts it to like latterly right.
It's like it's a different kind of spectacle. Yeah, towards the end
of the game, it starts going like more platinum and less like I'm trying
to think of an action game that is not spectacle these days. It definitely
goes more platinum towards the end, but I do think like it doesn't do
anything as good as like the Platinum portfolio, Ouverra, whatever you want to
call it. Like it's it's there. It's clearly inspired. But for me
personally, I would rather play Bane and again than I would probably play thorough
Blade. But again, I didn't dislike this game in anyway. I think
it is an actually really good game. It just it needs to get off
certain on phrasing. It needs to get a get away from certain ideals that
it wants to hit, and one of those ideals was to become a like
or have a sexy main character who I think they take a little too far
here and there. Yeah, I think it's I'm mostly encouraged by this game.
And when I look at it, cause it's this is a studio that
primarily made mobile games before this, but they it's a studio that also always
seemed like they grew up playing games, you know, that were on console
or on PC that were like that felt like, oh, you know,
quote unquote real games. And now here they are making one inspired by those
and doing a pretty good job and it's okay. And it's a team that
previously wasn't doing this. They came into the space, now they are doing
it. It's a sign that, like as other studios feel like they are,
they can't grow anymore and they can't do the same thing over and over
again. That's sad. But there are new teams coming in here and replacing
them and doing interesting stuff, and I don't think it's quite as interesting and
it's definitely derivative. But at the same time, I kind of will I'll
take that over, like that's like a gap in the market just being created
because people don't want to do that stuff anymore. So I find it encouraging
and I'm having a pretty decent time with it. Do you think you think
this like moves the needle for like the PlayStation five fans that are like looking
for a game right now for their PS five after feeling like it's like a
little bit of a rut for them. Is this filling in that gap?
I don't think this is gonna be like a game change of like we just
came off like a birth and Dragonstad and stuff like that, Like we you
you have better options sisters of video games. This is not a bad option,
but like if you're looking for an action game, this is a serviceable
like service this is a good action game. I don't think that like people
were going to be talking about this game in five years, ten years,
Yeah, like they'll they'll be like, hey, soa Blaye was cool,
Sola play two was better, or you know. I think what this game
is notable for is it's going to be like when we first started talking about
South Korea as a country for game development, We're going to be talking about
this and lies of p as like these first opening styles of games that were
like oh that kind of came out of nowhere and it was actually pretty good.
So I think we're gonna like start getting more of that direction and honestly
great for South Korea. There are accepts of this game. I wish we
wish we're changed, which we're culturally different too. But it is interesting as
a fan of video games to watch another country like so suddenly start getting into
console development in a big way, yep, in a way that's like,
you know, it wasn't necessarily like, oh, of course they're gonna do
that. It's like, no, South Korea's console culture is a little bit
I muted compared to like PC. Of course. It's so they're making these
games and they're right there, PlayStations five exclusive. That's awesome. Lies of
P is the other conversation I wanted to have here. Lies of P feels
like one that like got a little bit closer to its MOREK than this does.
But it's again again star Blade's not like missing it by some long shot.
It's just you, they're both derivative. I think lives P feels a
little bit more interesting. Is that accurate to you? I think Eliza P
is like from the get go, just a more interesting idea of like a
soul's Like it is based on like a what's the word free like license that
you can just use whenever you want. Like I think maybe that would have
benefited Instontar Blade to like go use something established versus like trying to make its
own story point. But like it Eliza P I think is I'm incredibly excited
for Liza for the inevitable lies of P too. I don't know anything about
any new game coming out, but I'm credentally excited for that more than I'm
excited for Stellar Blade too, which I feel like must exist because that game
ends on a cliffhanger and you really use the word their journey continues or whatever.
So like I, I, well, one hundred percent play in the
still a Blade, but like, I don't think it's a knockout of the
park that a lot of people wanted it to be. Yeah, when my
eyes rolled when it was like all these characters called Adam and Eve, is
that going to continue for me in the story as I play it? Yes,
Okay, I just wanted to. I also like it signals way too
much of like what they're gonna do, and it's like you treat this plot
twist like it's a big thing, but also you basically told me this is
gonna happen earlier in the game, so it's, uh, yeah, it
feels sort of like I'm trying to say this without making it sound mean,
but it's like it's kind of cute. Like the attempt here is like,
yeah, they win for it, Good for them, and that's like very
I think it's shitty. It's shitty to say it like that, but I
mean it in a positive way. This is I think they went for something
and they have to the sure the sexiness and all that stuff. And if
that kind of bothers you, I don't blame you. But it's like I
get what they're going for here, and I think they seemingly mostly pulled it
off. I'm gonna keep playing it. Yeah, I think that, like
this is one hundred percent. It's an example of like how we have different
standards for different developers because of like let's say Sony Santa Monica put this game
out. We would all be like what happened? But what are you guys
doing right now? But like, since it is a new game from a
developer that's only made mobile game that is coming from South Korea, that like
we're going, Okay, we're gonna give this a chance. We'll give this
a little bit of a benefit of doubt. A lot of people are going
to do that. I think that's fine. But I do think that,
like for the people who are looking for like an action game, you're looking
at this with like different glasses than you would look at a Platinum game or
a God of War or what have you. Because we're just the way it
is. That's just the game industry. We have to kind of not strangle
everything in the cradle that we had, yeah exactly, kind of let these
things have room to grow and breathe and figure things out on their own.
I think that's I think this is this game is absolutely going to get that
chance. I think it's going to do way better than they ever would have
imagined when they first started the project. So yeah, good for that.
It's unfortunate that there is a culture war around it. If you remove from
the culture war, it's still a fine game. Yeah exactly. And it's
like, you know, we were on the BombCast this week and like mentioned
the culture war to like Dan who doesn't really pay a hitch to this stuff
on Twitter. It's like, what do you guys talk about? What people
It's like, oh, man, that's right. There's a lot most people
actually probably have no idea about the weird reactionaries talking about this game, and
you know we'll get through today. I bet they still won't be happy with
what is a very good review response to this game. You know, eighty
two. I'm sure you are, Yeah, eighty two on meta it's come
like that sounds pretty good. Like that's Liza p Territory, which was exactly
what I was expecting for this game. So interesting. I am, like
I said, I'm gonna keep playing it. We'll see. We'll play some
more of it on the website tomorrow as well. It's gonna be part of
our grant bag. Everybody, all right? Moving on here. Embracer's CEO
says he deserves criticism after mass layoffs and game cancelations novel. This is from
Eddie mcoo at GameSpot. The video game industry has been beset with layoffs and
canceled projects in twenty twenty four, and one company in particular, Embracer,
has received a wave of criticism per laying off staff, closing studios, and
canceling games after a huge hiring spree and growth period years earlier. Embracer's CEO,
Lars Wingefers, said in a new interview that as the CEO, he
deserves criticism. He says, there's a job to be done, and he's
plotting ahead to try to always maximize shareholder value and in any given situation a
noble cause there. It's been painful, he told Gibiz or Gibiz, but
I still believe in what we do. I believe in my teams and the
vision we set out. I also believe the public markets, if we do
it right, are a fantastic place to finance your business and tap into investors
and the debt market. But you need to execute well. If you do
it could be a fantastic platform to enable growth and to really have a competitive
edge. And I think, for as much of a word sell it as
that is, I think it's pretty illustrative of where this company is coming from.
Emron he you know, starts by saying, oh yeah, I'll take
my criticism, but you know, kind of immediately shifts to talking about like,
I think what is the he says, the word vision. We've never
had a vision for Embracerver, right, That's been always been the issues,
like everyone's like, what is how is this all going to work? It
seems like it won't. You must know something we don't. And the entire
time. It's like I don't actually, no one thinks we actually do know
what you're doing, and then everyone's proven right there in the end. Unfortunately
now and then he shifts too. And the public markets are a great place
to raise money, which is why they're splitting into these three companies. That
makes it a little bit easier for them to finagle more value out of the
market by raising stock shares and stuff like that. That is the vision,
right, That's the whole idea here is is get more money flowing in and
then we'll figure out the rest later. It sounds like the same old Embracer
group to me, Amron, what do you think it Actually, I've been
following Embracers for years at this point, because like when they first started coming
out buying all the TSHT and Nordic stuff, I'm like, some part of
this doesn't sound right. Yeah. Then what they started to do is take
in a bunch of loans without a actual plan to pay those loans back.
The capita was super cheap, yeah yeah, and then they wanted to use
like Saudi Arabia Arabia investment to pay back those loans, and that didn't work
out. What essentially I'm hearing from Lars wing first is saying him saying,
yeah, those last five things didn't work, but its identical plan might work
better. And I don't. I mean, obviously there's no good CEOs.
There are a lot of like really really really bad CEOs and a lot of
really dumb CEOs. And I think last week's for just kind of if he
had not already been on the right the side of dumb CEOs, he is
there now. Yeah, because I agree, Lord of the Rings is a
goodbye that makes sense to have. It's funny that they've worked around for about
half a decade from using that multiple head hydra idea of having like coffee Stain
and Coke Media and all that like operate as interoperable but also independent heads of
GmbH the TSQ Nordic Group, but also like not really getting each other's way
to being one monolith that completely fell apart because it was way too top heavy,
among other reasons, and like now they're just back to where they were.
It doesn't I don't understand really how this is going to work any better,
except for the idea that Lord of the Rings is a big property and
now that they're managing that they can't fail in theory, and I think that's
a dangerous way for any CEO to come back at it. Yeah, and
again it's like we talked about this on a BombCast yesterday. It's like,
you know, as Embracer Group, when you are listed on the Nasdak in
Stockholm or whatever wherever it is, it's like, Okay, they've sort of
maximized like the interest in that by breaking it down, separating it out,
you get a new chance to sort of pitch these smaller entities to potential shareholders,
and then you could raise money that way. And it is about raising
money, so like that is the strategy. It's just like we I think
our question continues to be what next? How does this like, how does
this benefit like the people making your games? How does this increase the quality
of your games going forward? I suppose, you know, as a benefit
of like shifting things down a little bit and making things a little bit smaller,
a game like Dead Island two coming out and selling a couple of million
copies will look a little bit more like fruitful on a bottom line than it
did before. Where As you mentioned, the Embraser group was so top heavy
that successful games just didn't make any sort of dent in that structure at all.
So it's like, okay, that's another benefit, but again that just
feels like a byproduct of the current strategy of making it easier to raise money.
What is the actual vision? We just continue to hear nothing about that,
So, like it's an ill omen to begin with when you name your
company THHQ, Like if you're starting off, you mean, come on,
what's wrong with that? If you're starting off from the idea of we want
to get double A games back, we want to bring them back into the
industry, and then that fails, like your only choices at that point are
to scale down or scale up. And it doesn't sound if they're scaling down.
It doesn't sound like they're thinking, oh, we fail because we put
too much money into a Kingdom of amalor remaster that nobody bought the first time
around. Like it's they don't I think, have a good sense of what
the audience will buy. They don't have a good sense of what things will
cost them in the end. So I'd like, yeah, they're going on
a tear right now, and like close studios and firing developers and all that
jazz but I think the main problem is that they're they're, like you said,
still ultimately no vision for that company as a whole, and they're still
trying to push double A. Yeah, there might be some success there,
but it's not enough to like sustain a large company, right, And it's
you know, the businesses that it's stayed in, that it remained in,
that it didn't shed or close or sell or send off on its own,
are the ones that seem to already have lucrative deals. So it's like Crystal
Dynamics and Idos, these things are either making tomb Raider, or they have
a deal with with Amazon, or they're working with Microsoft in perfect dark already.
Again, it's like a visionless way of doing things where it's like,
Okay, we already have the money coming in there and we have agreements,
let's just stick with that. I think that they like, Okay, do
you have like a plan to then follow any of these things up in the
future. Lord of the Rings right, sort of just runs itself at a
certain point. Make several Lord of the Rings games, maybe similar to the
Warhammer operates, and one or two of those will hit pretty hard out of
the ten, and that'll fund the rest. I can kind of see that
that's just like normal business, like running something with a big ip. I
sort of don't blame you. Everyone is trying to figure out how to do
that right now. It's just everything else is such a mess. And I
don't think that they have presented an answer here. This just feels a little
bit like a fugazi house of mirrors, like they've shaken things up and trying
to like make us feel differently about it and making specifically investors feel differently about
it. And I think most gamers continue to look at this situation being like,
I know what this is. It's the same thing it just was,
which is something I never trusted in the first place, and rightfully so.
There's also like a brain train argument to make here, because like, if
you're a talented developer and you have your experience at shipping Triple A games,
why would you go work on a Lord of the Rings game for Embracer?
Like that's what we're hoping for, is a good Lord of the Rings game.
But good games come from good people. And if good people don't want
to are they they're worried about a job security even before a project ends,
they're not gonna want to like up and move to wherever they're making a Lord
of the Rings game. They're not gonna want to work with producers who don't
know what they're doing. They're going to want to like just say, like,
I don't know responds making a new thing, I want to go try
that instead. Yeah, and it's and I mean, would you risk it?
Because I mean, I'm like looking at one of the paragraphs in this
story, one of the last paragraphs here. Some of the most high profile
moves from Embracer included the reported cancelation of A Day of Sex game, the
closures of Saints Row studio Volition, and as well as the closure of Times
Splitter's developer Free Radical. It's like, Okay, a Saints Row game came
out, didn't do very well, kind of missed the mark. Instead of
trying again, close the studio, DA sex is a serious people are asking
for again. They were trying it, they were making it. Close that
down. Times Splitters a series that people were asking to come back. You
know, some people are asking to come back. They were making it.
They gave up on it. It's like you're gonna come in there with like
a passion to try to make something for Embracer and it seems like a bracer
if they get a little bit of cold feet, the first plan is cut
out the things that have like maybe the probably were the biggest budgets there.
And again they're they're just they're operating backwards from money and it's a business whatever.
But it feels like a long term strategy is not going to pan out
for them. So you're right, why would people that have talent, especially
the h in high demand still even like with everyone getting laid off, senior
developers in such high demand, still, why would they go do? They
wouldn't They just wouldn't. Yeah, if I got offered a job an Embraser,
I would probably take it just to be like, yeah, let's see,
that's until the wheels fall off kind of thing. But like the wheels
are gonna fall off. Yeah, they do not have a sustainable model going,
so I don't know where they have an amount of unearned confidence in themselves
that I don't think will bear out yep. And and all of this is
borne out of like the cheap capital mentioned earlier, and the like the stock
markets in Europe kind of being like sort of depressed compared to the rest of
the world, so it made it very easy for them to make these moves.
And then as soon as like everything flipped and it's like those depressed markets
turned into economies with massive inflation and they had to like raise interest rates super
high. It's like it was just this perfect recipe for them to be screwed.
And none of that stuff has been answered for, like, none of
that has been solved, these macroeconomic issues, and so they're still trying to
operate in there and do kind of like we keep saying the same thing under
a slightly different form. I don't think that. But yeah, like you
said, the wheels are going to come off, Yeah, I like they
recently, just like Saber split off from them. Saber was working tons of
stuff that in theory would revitalize their double A, triple A hybrid model.
But if Saber was like, hey, we don't want to deal with this
anymore, then no one's going to want to deal with it. Yep.
Yeah, And Sabers, like the one that does, seem to have a
pretty decent idea of like how to accomplish that stuff and how to get how
to ship these games got space marines to still come in that I think,
you know, I think that's one of the games that Embracer, what what's
left of Embracer is still involved with to some degree. But that's not really
what we're saying here. Yes, Saber is the kind of thing where it's
like, if if that's the double A that can make sense if they can't
work under Embracer, You're right, no one can. Yeah, All right,
moving along here, there were some more Metaphor Refundasio news, including the
Collector's edition. Pre order is going live. This is from Darren bob Use
at GameSpot. Atlas has been on fire lately with its Persona games and various
other entries in the JRPG genre, and its next title metaphor Refundasio, refound
Tasio or Refantasio. I don't know. I would assume refund Tasio. Yeah,
must refund Tasio. Yeah. Are live for PS five, n Xbox
Series X, and there's a handsome Collector's edition up for grabs that may interest
long time at liss fans. There's the Launch Edition, which is seventy dollars.
The standard seventy dollars Launch Edition is available to pre order now at GameStop
for PS five and Nextbox Series X. And then there's the one hundred and
fifty dollars Collector's Edition that comes to the Steel Books, soundtrack, art book,
Homo Tinta Botellic pins, sticker sheet, Kingdom of Ukronia cloth map.
I always like a good cloth map in a video game Collector's Edition costume and
battle background music set DLC voucher. There's a history book for Atlas's thirty fifth
anniversary, all that stuff. Hey, people seem excited about metaphor refound Tasio.
Did you think that they had? That last showing really has put this
in kind of up there, like right below the tier Persona and Shimmagami tense,
where it's like, hey, this is another tier for Atlas. We'll
see I mean like they didn't. When you take Hahanoe out of Persona and
you say, hey, make a new thing, they probably have very high
expectations of what that new thing would be. I think they do, so,
like it's always an uphill battle to sell a new ip, and it
sounds like there they've at least got the first part of it down where they've
tied that new ip to a thing people already like, So now they're going
to like say, like, hey, you like Persona, Let's try it
in a different setting right now. And I don't know how the audience will
take to it. It's it's a day one game pass game, right I
know that when it got announced, it was right around the time that also
that that Capcom Path of the Goddess game is the Day one game Pass game,
and I was like, I thought there was another one? Is it
this? It might be? Yeah, I know it was revealed on a
Microsoft event, shown for the first time in a Microsoft is Yes, that
experts the Summer Showcase. Yes, And I always have trouble remembering if,
like Phil Spencer said, every game will be on a game pass or whatever
before the beginning of a show, because sometimes he does sometimes he does it.
It's real confusing. But I don't I think they've gotten over the hardest
hump so far, whether this game actually does because Persona took a long time
to build up name Cachet, one of this game has that same name Cachet,
especially being the most expensive version of one of these games they've ever made
at seventy dollars plus whatever for the custom or special edition. Like I don't
I have hoped for the best. I also have hopes that maybe they avoid
the worst pratfalls in percent of games when they're making this, and that's also
up in the air until we actually see it, so we'll see where this
goes. I'm surprisingly I want to play the game. Of course, I
will play it when it comes out. I not that excited for it,
actually, Like what is it missing for you? Again? As a new
IP I don't have a thing to hold on to for the world yet,
sure, and like, I know what I'm getting in the Persona game.
It's gonna be a blank game set in Japan about teenagers with the color green
or whatever, and like it will be about existentialism as much as it's about
like does that girl in class like me? For Fantagio, I know there's
a train, and I know there's weird looking monsters. Beyond that, I
don't really have like I'll play it because of the lineage, but I don't
have a sense of what what is this game world offering me yet? Real
quick Urbashaw mentioned that this is why I was like, Yeah, that sounds
familiar. But Persona three reload and what it was. It was day one
and they announced these things like right next to each other or talked about them
right next to each other in that Xbox showcase. But this one is just
a co marketing deal with Xbox, so not day day one in game Pass.
I feel like that's becoming a thing that like a lot of publishers are
worried about, is getting the idea, get getting mistaken or being a game
Pass game when you're not. Actually, I think I think it seems like
Japanese publishers are a little bit like cooler, like a little bit less worried
about that than than some because you know, Sega's returned to it multiple times
now, and obviously Atlas has had some games Day one Persona three reload,
and Sega seems to really like game Pass. But you're right, like once
that, uh, like that conversation does happen, You're right that they're very
worried about that because they do have to sell the game. I think,
uh, they're at a point there where they're they're with metaphor refan tasio that
people do seem mostly pretty excited. I think people know the wait for Persona
six is going to continue to be pretty long. So Okay, we're getting
this game. Let's see what's in there, and I bet once it hits
If it hits the mark for most people, they'll be pretty happy. There
is conversations about this game continuing, though fans are divided after learning metaphor refund
Tasio won't have romance. This is from Kenneth Sheppard at Kotaku One to the
Nasty Boys. Metaphor Refundasio, the upcoming RPG for from the developer Atlas's Persona
team, will bring in a lot of elements from its predecessor when it launches
in October. This includes turn based combat, social elements called bonds, and
a time management mechanic as you live out individual days. But one thing that
won't be returning is a romantic relationship system. And while that might sound like
a bummer, the reaction for Persona fans has actually been mixed. News of
this came from a Japanese Q and a presentation with the development team thanks to
Silicon Era. During the segment, the question of romances came up and host
Mafia could confirm that love will not be in the air as you travel across
Metaphors Fantasy World in hopes of winning an election. Your mission is notable for
two reasons. Metaphors, social elements seemed mostly identical to personas, albeit with
different perks in the game's original archetype system until this point, and romance has
historically been a big part of the Persona fandom, even if it has mostly
been perfunctory, it has been perfunctory in the games themselves. I see this
both ways, am Ron. I'm like, mostly kind of curious, because
I think what this offers them is an opportunity to write a main narrative that
does include a canon romance that could be maybe more fleshed out. Does that
sound like maybe what they're going to go for here? I probably. I
think they recognize rightfully that some degree of wife wu Wars is marketing, and
they either want to avoid that this first time around or don't want this game
to be bogged down by that. I one of my most one of my
most controversial takes is that I think most romance and video games is bad,
like Persona bywear games, all that stuff. I think what it does it
turns actual human interaction into a like game faxible like dialogue tree. And I
think that to put the good coin in until you get the sex that's yeah,
you say, yeah, you put you put coins into a vending machine
until sex falls out. Yes, and like I think like that there is
a place for that in some games. Yeah, but I think it gets
pretty old after a while, right, Yeah, And like I never it's
not a deal break with me. I still love Balder's Gate. I still
tried the romance Carlac. It doesn't matter. Like, but ultimately, I
think, like, if you can make a good romance without having to go
okay, well you the main character, can romance all fifteen of these girls.
The ideal way is for you to like look up a fact and never
say the wrong things, they get it all on time. I think that
sucks. I think that's not necessary. I think metaphor is begging away from
romance specifically to tell a better story. Then go for it. I think
that's like an interesting idea that I will happily look into. I think the
most more interesting romance is something bespoke and designed and written for a story.
Yeah. I get to a point where, like, for me, my
major interaction with romance options and video games has been still fire on them,
awakening and then fire them. Ever since then has felt like, oh,
we have to we're beholden to the fans who remember that and like came into
the series because of that, and we've sort of tried to replicate it in
various ways ever since then, and it's never I don't know, it feels
like they're doing it because they feel obligated at a certain point, and sometimes
they get further away from it, and sometimes they come back to it,
but most of them, just like it was great in Awakening, maybe don't
feel like you have to do that every time. There's still like the social
links and fire them. There's still gonna be bonds in this game, similar
to the social links in Persona, and for me it's probably enough. And
then if they have a like a canon written romance, that's probably going to
be more fleshed out and better. Anyhow. Yeah, Honestly, of all
the games that do this sort of thing, I think Haites probably does it
best because I never felt like at the beginning, like the problem with say
a mass effect is that I look at my crew and I think which one
do I want to bang? Which is the creepiest thought you could have in
the real life situation, Like if you are build the game to make you
have that thought too, And it's like I'm fully engaged with that. But
yeah, it's weird. Yeah, it's like getting a lineup of all your
friends and being like, okay, I could I could fuck one of you,
and like that is I think a real weird thing. But like Haites,
I never I feel like I'm kind of earning a relationship with these people
in a way beyond I chose the right dialogue thing. Great it is,
I gave them like X number of scented pasta or whatever the hell that thing
is. But like it is a it feels like a more natural digression into
we are we find that we have a romantic because you can't have chemistry with
a videogame character like you can, but you you actually can't. Really chemistry
does not work that way. Yeah, but if to replace it, you
need a game mechanic and I don't think most games ever do that. Well,
yeah, it's it's definitely something where I mean, listen, it's better
than it used to be, but it's not saying much right, That's where
we're at with with the way that stuff works. And this is like I
think we're both like very like criticism, Like if games have this stuff,
it's like not a deal breaker, and it's not even really a bad thing.
It's just like, yeah, I think we tried that. It was
maybe finding that one game, but building these games in such a way that
it's like, no, they have to have that to be in this genre
or to be in this series, and gets where it kind of holds things
back a little bit. And if metaphor Refountasio is this opportunity for them to
work in a different setting and that enables them to then try things a little
bit different that it's seemingly that they wanted to try for a while and now
they have this chance. That seems good to me. It seems a good
God. Yeah, sometimes taking this swing for things means omitting things, and
I think that's that has every game developers right to try that. Yeah,
And it creates space and for other things to maybe happen in the future as
well, to improve these things or or try something completely different. Yeah,
all right. More our RPG news Shimmagami ten say five Vengeance adds seventy five
hours of new content. Mother of God. This is from Alberto Garrido at
Game Reactor. And does all this fit on a NATO switch cartridge? That's
the question on my mind after new details were revealed by producer Shinjiro Takata,
director Shigo Komori, and composer Rioda Kozuka about Shimmagami Tinsea five Vengeance. The
trio of series historians at Atlas have been at the reigns of this new version
of Shimagami Tense five, and in an interview with game Spot, they shared
some truly surprising facts for starters. The estimated time it will take you to
play through the new content is estimated to be around seventy five hours, so
we can already call this version of royal, call it the royal treatment that
made Persona five great. However, we know that they're there, they hear.
The new story doesn't overlap with the original and runs on a different path,
which also gives it the main differentiating element from the studio's other work and
it's g RPG series. But it's not just new features, enemies and characters
such as the new party member that Vengeance is packed with. They're also reritten.
They've also rewritten eighty percent of Shimmagami Tensay five's themes and added a whole
bunch more to a soundtrack famous for its mix of styles. For me,
it's like, man, that's flabbergasting, but it's actually kind of pretty par
for the course, for the way that this company does these things right.
Yeah, for Atlas, it is one of those things of yeah, you
can buy the first run, you're gonna miss things out when you get this
like the inevitable second version. But like, I don't know, I like
Schinn't Gummy ten say more than our like five, cifically more than most.
I don't think that game's problem was that it needed seventy five more hours of
things. It needed better pacing in general. I don't feel like adding an
entirely separate track to that makes that better. But we'll see. Maybe it's
turned This is one of those things where like, actually the extra content is
the best thing in the game. I I'm not going to play it to
find out. I like, I gave that game my sixty hours or whatever
already. I don't like That's that's the other side of that Atlas like extra
content thing. I've already done this. I bought Persona five Royal, probably
not gonna play it. Like It's like I didn't largely dislike that game.
It's just there's so many other like I was saying, I played prince Ll
Fergia. If playing a new version of a game I've already played Sacrifices an
existing game that I have not played, then like, it's probably just not
worth it for me. There are mega fans, mega fans that are going
to really like want this and want this new version, or they didn't play
the original because it was on switch or it ran badly or whatever reason you
wanted to have. But like for me, as someone who's played this game,
I don't I don't need another seventy five hours, right. It requires
a certain amount of love to like get something out of that, and people
I like I've whenever I talk to someone about Persona five Royal, most people
who've played both don't have any regrets. They're glad they did that. They
really like Persona five and they like Royal even more. They thought it was
worth their time. And there will, like you said, there will be
tensay fans out there that do that, but well, you know that's not
gonna be everybody. And at a certain point, seeing that seventy five hour
number is maybe a little scary for people who might be on the fence.
Yeah, I imagine like Atlas clearly does this all the time, so clearly
they see a marketing plan and like an increase in sales or something for this
kind of thing, And it doesn't make sense for a developer to just like,
hey, what if we spend the next two years on something that's like
mostly already done and just like build on that foundation that used to be sequels
but now it's like remastered content. I think for most people, they are
going to look at this and they're going to go, I've never played in
Macaba tesday five. This seem's like the version to get Whether they actually get
to that or get through all that is a totally different question that I don't
think Alice cares about, but this does seem to work for them. Yes,
absolutely, Uh breaking news real quick. I forgot to talk about this
in the Stellar play review round up earlier. There's a section of the game
where someone where you could go up to a shop and the word hard appears
next to the letter R and then shop and it just so it looks like
it says hard R shop And a lot of people are pointing this out online
and they're like, that's probably gonna get patched out. Turns out it has
already been patched out. It now says crime R shop and the crime.
To be fair that the hard was always a graffiti next to the R.
This was I think likely a coincidence. It's the kind of thing where that
that hard graffiti shows up in a lot of places in that world. But
did you see this when you were playing the game? Yeah? So actually
the reason this got patched out was I saw this immediately called upstairs to my
wife, is like, hey, you should fucking see this thing that I'm
looking at right now. She reached out to Sony and like they're like,
oh, we didn't know about this, and yeah, but like there's an
article on g dot com about it. But I I think that was probably
intentional, but not intentional in the racism way. I think it was intentional
in the for them hard are a mistake you have made as well? I
correct meant are rated? Are rated? There are a few places in this
game where it's a very clear and environmental artist was very cheeky and wanted to
wanted to do something that like did not make a whole lot. Like there's
a a library that for some reason they put a sign of a bookstore on
it's like book Buyers or something like that on there, but the lights are
the lights are out, so it says boo bees And like I looked at
that hilarious. It's like very clearly someone is trying to make a joke here.
I think the same thing was happening with this stuff, because like,
yeah, that that graffiti does show up everywhere. It is weird that like
it's it entertainable with the word crime. But like I I don't think they
made anything bad by it. It was really stupid though, and very clumsy.
Yeah, clumsy, which is like yeah, and I think, you
know, the hard art thing is something that has had the shift in meaning
in the last ten years, especially in the United States, mostly because of
the podcast or like that that joke originated, and it's like that's just not
going to perpetuate everywhere, and it's going to be easy to make that blunder.
Still we've seen multiple people do it, not just me. I know
Linus tech Tips thought it meant the other our word and it was an our
word instead of what it actually means. It's a mistake that could be made.
I'm just I'm not ready to like assign you know, complete guilt to
this based on what we know, and they've already changed it. I do
think though, that the graffiti of the word crime is also amazing, just
so just spray painting crime. If I was a coffreedy artist, that's the
word, I'd be spray painting everywhere. That would be my tag. Yeah,
the game there's a lot of good environmental art in it, but there's
a lot of things that are like, you guys had stickers, and you
just you put these stickers everywhere and in places that don't always make sense.
I think this was probably intentional in a way that like was not great,
but like not racist either. But I don't know. It's one of those
things where because they made a game that is already so like repellent to so
many people, they are not going to get that. They're not getting the
benefit of doubt from a lot of people. Now. I think Sony recognized
that it was immediately like you you need to change this now, Oh yeah,
And I bet they've got no pushback like, oh yeah, we didn't
know it meant that. Uh yeah. I also shout out to the professionals
with the Giant Bomb production team for not putting hard r above me on the
outline here, so instead just it just says breaking if you're an audio listener,
instead of the headline, which is sony patched out hard R. I
appreciate that. That's just good clean thinking there, all right. Two K
faces community backlash after banning leading WWE two K twenty four creator. This is
from Jordan Midler ATVGC. Two K is facing a community backlash following its decision
to ban the popular creator on April twenty second. What's the Status? A
creator known for uploading content that is usually inaccessible to players, took the x
took the Twitter to announce that all of his uploads, which amounted to dozens
of wrestlers and other content, had been removed from the game without warning.
The following day, he claimed that he'd been permanently banned for playing the game
online, thus losing all access to the community creators a functionality, and with
no option to appeal. There's not a lot to go on about why he
was banned. There is speculation he often does take characters that are in the
game, like the announcers, and then uploads them as wrestlers so you could
play as them when you couldn't play as them. Before characters that are hidden
that maybe like instead of like taking them out, which might break the game,
he just he takes those and rips them and puts them in the game.
He also takes I think women wrestlers and uploads them as male wrestlers.
So now that you can have genderless battles in the game, any one of
those could be the thing that like we're like, well we got to take
this out. Who knows. I think the bigger question here though, is,
you know, community driven content is is you know, a bigger and
bigger thing, but it's also a messier, messier thing. When someboding like
this happens, it could like break a game like WW two two K twenty
four, a game that people are accustomed to, Like I get that game,
I immediately go online, download all the wrestlers I really want and go
and play it. And if one of the top creators is getting banned,
it's the kind of thing where I think that that this is like the trouble
with this whole idea in the first place, this is someone who is essentially
making the game for you. Is how many people view it. It's a
tough tough line to walk. What do you think you always have to be
careful with community stuff because like especially if you don't decide not to explain why
something happened. There could be a dozen reasons. It could be they don't
like fan mods, which is gonna be like kind of a stab in the
heart to that game. It could be that, like certain wrestlers have really
complicated appearance rights or things like that, that by doing all this stuff,
they are making that harder to do. I think by if you're gonna be
quiet about it, if you're not gonna say the actual reason, you have
to say, like you have to be one hundred percent sure you maintain the
moral high ground, which I don't think they have when they, like I
was reading like your notes here, they have vinsic man models like still in
the game, and like those are fine. Like as far as I haven't
played this game, I played the single player of story Mode. As far
as I know, the single player of story Mode has brought lessener like really
involved with it. Right, Yeah, I'm trying to remember what Dance said
about it, Like he definitely is in there, but I think they blow
out his face in some of the video footage. But I think you still
wrestle against him, Yeah, I think so. And like I don't know
if you actually did end up reading that that court document that came out,
Yeah, it is a disgusting awful It is visually terrible. Gave me like
actual bad dreams. It was traumatic to read just to read it. Yes,
And like brock Lizards well not named in that document, there's like a
good indication that he is the person being talked about in a lot of those
things. And like, if you're gonna have that in the game, you
need to like tell people why they're getting banned for things like that. That's
not a good one to one it'd be sort of thing, but it is
like you don't have the moral high ground and stuff. All you have is
your community. You got to treat the community right, yep. And it's
a tough thing, but you're right. I think you have to establish that
baseline communication to really make this whole thing work, because that is how this
game thrives in the first place. So, and this is only gonna be
a more troublesome thing in the future as games rely more and more on user
generated content, which seems like it's going to be more of a more of
a thing as more copies, like, look at the value of something like
a roadblocks, like, how can we get in on that action? How
can we exploit these teams means Yeah, I think that this is gonna be
something they're gonna have to figure out in the meantime. This this is what
I'm sure this is very frustrating to people who just want to play a game
and go get these characters and are used to doing that. It's something that
I don't think they've really had a situation like this in the past where they've
taken down a lot of the content put in the game by a community creator.
It's been kind of a wild West. Anything goes to the point where
it's like there's a lot of like racist imagery and stuff that doesn't get cleared
out of like signs and stuff like that in the past. It's like,
well, you could at least do that. Are are you taking care of
that on top of this or is this just like some lawyer called you so
now you're taking it seriously, which I get the sense that's what's happening here.
Balancing legal matters and a community that is used to doing what they want
is always going to be very difficult. They handle this badly, as like
about as badly as you could. You can't even if it is a legal
matter, even if it is like things that are you know, more complicated,
and it might behoove you to be silent. In some cases, you
need to have an answer for people that is at least better than we're just
not talking about it. Yep, absolutely so I did forget to take the
ad break, So I'm not just I'm just gonna do it. I think
jam off to cut it in or dehean w have to cut it in earlier.
That's just how it goes sometimes, real quick. I just want to
mention this story. FTC banned non compete clauses. Yeah, that's something that
should have happened. It's just when you think about it, like I always
like, look at it in like a micro situation of Okay, what if
there was non compete clauses for sports players where it's like once you leave this
team, once your contract is up, you can't go play for another sports
team for six months to a year. It's like, well, of course
that would depress their pay, and that's why they don't have that sort of
thing. They only have like, oh, once you're contractor for a team,
you're on that team, and once that contract is up, you're a
free agent. And there's and they do depress the pay by having actual some
non compete stuff for like younger players until they get older they have to graduate
into that. So it's like there's an obvious reason why you do that,
and it is to depress pay. So this is only a good thing and
it and like the concern I think these companies always argue and bron is that
they have proprietary knowledge they could take to our competitors and at a certain point,
so what like I'm I dad, that's your problem. May a person
keep them there? Well, we'll see how this goes, because I get
the feeling the Chamber of Commerce is probably going to bring a lawsuit and with
this Supreme Court, who the hell knows, but we will see. I
am tentatively very excited non competes. I've always been a legal in California,
so I've never really sweated them, but like companies still use them for like
basic do you want to work with us at all, then you have to
agree with this non compete kind of thing. I think it's it's always sucked.
The game industry has had a lot of those. There have been developers
that have been like laid off and had their non competes like inforced or not
enforced threatened to their the new studio, and I've heard some real bad stories
about that. But yeah, this is this is overall a good thing.
I'm really optimistic and hopeful that it stays. Yep, it would, it
would. It makes a ton of sense. It's the kind of thing where
uh, I only see benefits to businesses, and it's it's how does this
help anyone else? And you know I say that, and it's like,
well, that's the kind of thing that you're right, this Supreme Court would
you can find a cat? But we'll see. All right, let's get
to the poll question. Well, like get that set up, em Ron,
whyn't you tell people where they can find you what you have going on?
Remind them about the review, all that good stuff. You can find
me on Elon's health site, at Imorn's EUMG. You can find me on
blue Sky at imran con dot blue sky dot com. I don't forget how
blue Sky. You can find my Patreon, which I've not hit for a
while, but I do intend to relaunch it on points soon at pros proscons
dot wait, prosanconns dot com, p R O s E kh k h
A n s dot com. You can find my review for Stellar Blade at
GameSpot dot com, which is sister site the Giant Bomb. So actually you
were obligated to go visit that I have two. Yes, that's right.
You can't watch the show you now if you if you were a member of
this website in any way or in any way just watching this, you should
go if you it and then yell at me on Twitter because I don't check
engines there. Uh. I think that's it for things. You can check
out my lovely wife stop at ign dot com as well. Hell yes,
and you should do that as well. All right, we got the full
question here. This is from you from Monday. Excuse me? Do you
want another Watchdogs game? Twenty five percent said yes, seventy five percent said
no. And I think we ever answer for why they're not making another one
of those. That's a tough yeah, that's a tough hell to climb right
there. Right, they should have followed up on two rather than making Legion.
Yeah, I think like I think they know that. But like when
Clint Hawking says, I have a great idea for a thing, Yeah,
you go with it. But Legion was a really good system around a not
great open world game. Watchdogs two was overall just great. I think I
hated Watchdogs one, so like it was a big improvement. They they poisoned
the well. They poisoned the well initially by trying to pretend like one had
this gravitas to it, like this nostalgia remember the Aid and Pierce iconic cap
stuff. I will never forget his iconic cap of course. But like they
they try to tell people, yeah, you loved Watchdogs one, right,
and people were like, no, I don't recall loving that that which didn't
do well for Watchdogs too. Then they didn't actually like follow up on what
people liked about Watchdogs two, So that series is, unfortunately, I think,
kind of dead, and let's like, twenty years later we get a
mobile game about it from Yeah yeah it's I think that that's a good diagnosis
of what went down there. I think Legion is the kind of game where
I'm like, if there were like a huge mod scene for that, I
bet I could return to that game have a lot of fun. I doubt
there's a very active mod scene though, Yeah, I would love to like
if you could recruit say Superman or something like that in that game through like
a PC mod, that would immediately make that game more fun, because the
problem is they thought the granny attacking guards is the funniest thing in the world,
and it is funny once funny one, and then after that it's just
thirty five more hours of gameplay of basically the same thing. Yep. And
it's like, you get the sense like they had this idea and they wanted
to flesh it out, but they shipped the game instead, which is what
you have to do in that situation. Yeah, all right, New Bool
excuse me, Newpole. Question, are you getting Stellar Blade? Yes or
no? I know we did the are you gonna play the demo a few
weeks back, But now that the reviews are out there and you've had a
chance to digest that and play the demo, just yes or no? Are
you going to get Stellar Blade? We'll discuss that on Game Mess Mornings on
Giant Bomb tomorrow. Speaking to Giant Bomb later today. Blake Club does return.
It is Wednesday. Yeah, Blake Club returns. Dan's gonna get back
in Super Dan sixty four, the Dana Steel. He's on the last level.
We'll see if he's able to beat it. It looks like I looked
into it a little bit. It looks like some real horseshit, and I'm
very excited about that. Did I say, I've known long, like long,
how bad that game is supposed to be. Until I started watching the
videos, I had no idea it was that bad. Yes, I think
that's what we've kind of all learned about that game is that it's like,
you have this idea in your head. It's like, yeah, it's the
Rings, it's boring and bad, and it's like, no, it goes
so much deeper than that. And that's that's what that's what Blake Club is
all about. So yeah, thanks, thanks for watching. I appreciate that.
And then oh yeah, before that, I will be playing some more
Fall at New Vegas today, so tune in for that. It's going to
have be happening very soon after this. I'll have to get that set up,
but we'll get going with that very soon. Tomorrow. We'll have,
of course, voicemail dump Truck. We're gonna do a grab bag play a
bunch of different games in the afternoon and then on Friday, expect upf BombCast
revenge Ince all that good stuff, and Ron, thank you so much for
spitting today talk with me about video games. Man, I really appreciate it.
Now you were having me always a fun time. Absolutely, And actually
you're gonna be on BombCast Revengeance this Friday to talk about more about Star Blay.
We're gonna do our review cast for that on there, so everyone look
out for that. Yeah, hell yeah. And then thank you all for
watching. You're the best audience in gaming. Until next time, have a
good one, take care of yourself and goodbye.