Game Mess Mornings 10/05/23

Better. It's the internet. You're busy. Let's do this for October fifth,
twenty twenty three. 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, Diablo for is heading to a new store, and it's
time to do a run on the Pokemon Bank. But first please join me
and welcoming today's co host the Game Mess Mornings. It's Jena Choa. Jan
How are you doing. I'm doing great. We're having emotional breakthroughs. Yes,
we are boweens all over the place. It's emotional breakdown week at Giant
Bomb. Everybody exactly exactly, We're gonna become better. Oh yeah, I
mean you can't become better without first becoming worse. So exactly, you have
to destroy everything for everything else to be reborn. Jane, you know,
it's it's a lot of a lot of games coming out, but been busy.
I'm at a point though, I'm like, I played a lot of
games already. I'm gonna take I'm just gonna take a breather. I'm just
kind of playing like old stuff now all of a sudden, it's bad.
I'm getting a way behind on things. I do have my little trip coming.
I think balder Skate three is going to be the game for that.
Looking forward to it. But also I'm like, that's still not gonna be
enough time to really put a dent in that thing. Oh well, you
know what, I don't need to think about it that way. I'm just
gonna play what I want to play and see what happens. What you want
to play exactly. Yeah. Also, don't you don't have to play anything
while you're while you're I don't want to. I'm definitely not going to,
but I do have like, oh my god, it'd be nice to kind
of get away and just kind of kicking kickback in a hammock in the woods
and maybe play something on the ally or the steam deck. We'll see,
We'll see what I end up bring. I'm only going to bring one.
Well, I haven't made this decisions. Yes, looking forward to it.
It's gonna be a good time. It's actually it's a it's a treehouse cabin.
It's a pretty cool thing. Yeah, Like they build these cabins into
these trees and make it look all not fancy. Fun fun is the word.
I make it look fun and I'm like, oh yeah, but the
kids are gonna be into this, and then we're gonna be like, let's
go. We are not fancy but fun fun, That's right, Jan.
I think I'm gonna 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 speeds by searching for Game Mess Mornings, or find the
RSS on giant bomb dot com. You can 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 Diablo four is
coming to Steam in time for season two. This comes from Cameron co at
GameSpot. Diablo four will release on Steam on October seventeenth, the same day
of the game's second season, Season of Blood, arrives on all platforms.
The Season of Blood is upon us jan It's emotional breakthrough week, and next
week is Season the Blood. Blood. The Steam page is now live.
Fusions of Love Okay. Those who purchased the game on Steam will still need
to set up a Battlenet account, of course, if they don't already have
one, in order to play. This enables cross platform play between those playing
via Battlenet as well as on consoles. Diablo four on Steam will support achievements,
as well as the ability to invite Steam friends play using Steam's friends list
and all that stuff. Diablo four is a game about slain nightmares creatures that
acquire powerful gear, but also about four gene memories with new and old friends.
Blizzard rights in a blog announcing the game Steam launch, we want to
break down barriers to make it easier for wanderers everywhere to defend sanctuary. This
game is the second game I believe of Blizzards to make the big move from
Battlenet exclusively over to Steam. They did it with Overwatch two, now Diablo
two. Diablo two is one that's like, oh, Dabble four. Duble
four is like a It's a really big one. It's their most recent game,
a huge success. No reason to think, oh, they're doing this
because they're desperate. This is just the strategy now jan Yeah, they're they
got the folks that are going to pay one hundred dollars plus for early access,
the special big box editions, physical editions, whatever else have you.
And now they're just going to widen the net yep, exactly what get more?
You know, that's the thing with Steam. All these companies have tried
to do their own thing, and very few of them have had the success
that that Blizzards had of establishing its own platform. You know though, I
think the only company that's had I'm probably wrong here, but the only company
I can think of that has had a more success is Riot with League of
Legends and Valorant this, and that's just like this free to play thing that
basically comes pre installed when a college kid buys a laptop. I think,
I think that's how that works. So like, yeah, that's still doing
its own thing. But in terms of having a store where you could sell
games outside of Steam, it's Battle Neet. It's really the one that has
really succeeded, and that's just carrying over the legacy of World of Warcraft and
that the power of that enabling them to put games like even like Call of
Duty in there. Now even Blizzard is recognizing we are leaving too much money
on the table because Steam has done so much work of attracting people who are
willing to spend money on games, and yeah, they're gonna take a bigger
cut and that stinks. But this strategy of still putting games on Battlenet first
and then launching it on Steam later doesn't seem like a bad one. Seems
like it should totally work. It should work fine. Do you think they
get to a point here pretty quickly though, where every game is just launching
day and date on Battlenet and Steam in the foreseeable future. I don't see
that happening like a day and date release onto Steam as well, because I
think Activision Blizzard still sees and I don't mean to use the term fleece but
release core members of their audience to want to get in that early access period
or make it seem more attractive. I feel like there's also a weird sense
of tribalism when it comes to using battlenets specifically definitely to launch these these games,
so they want to maintain that for whatever reason. Uh, And again
I don't want to use the word exploit, but exploit that core audience to
get more money out of them and eventually just appeal to the wider audience.
Like I know, they're also like, I don't want to say weirdos.
I'm saying a lot of things I don't want to say today, Greb.
You know it's it's Thursday. It doesn't matter anymore. We can we can
say what we want. We're punching down. We're punching down. But also
like the folks that can only only choose to play Blizard games on console,
like a PS five version of Diablo four, like will specifically only want to
play it there, and they're gonna get those people. But then eventually,
you know, you'll see, oh it's a Season of Blood on Steam.
I guess I'll I guess I'll participate. Man, I can't wait for the
Season of Blood event in over or Overcooked. Excuse me, I'm like,
yeah, season of Blood in all these different games, it's gonna be great.
Yeah yeah. I mean people pointing out Call of Duty is already doing
this. That's not really a Blizzard game kind of what we were talking about.
Obviously, it was in Battle Neet for a couple of years where it's
like that's the only place where you could get it at least on PC obviously,
and now that is day and date on Steam, and of course that's
overall. That is the trend. Overall, that's the trend of things moving
back towards Valve. It's this waxing and waning of companies. Hey, we're
gonna move away, we're gonna do our own store. We're gonna go back
to Steam. And then a couple of years later, we're gonna try own
our own store again because there's new leadership and they believe that this initiative will
actually work this time. And as always we talked about on the show,
every day at this plant feels like getting people to change their behaviors a very,
very tough task. And even when you do have people who are loyal
to you and are willing, like you know, Mike, Mike, Mike
or not, He's like battle Neet is the thing that he was using more
than Steam for forever and ever and ever. He was a World of Warcraft
guy, and then we would just play their games. It just sort of
naturally happened that way. But like, yeah, you're gonna have those people,
but it's like, if you want to attract a new audience. If
you are looking at growth and you're not going to Steam on PC, it's
clearly you're leaving people behind at a certain point. So yeah, this is
the part of the waxing back towards back towards Steam. And I think that
this will only We're only going to see more and more from like games from
Blizzard and Activision obviously ending up on Steam and clicker and in more ways.
This then sinking this up with season two is a example of them like,
hey, this could be like a secondary launch because there's a lot of stuff
happening with the season two, including inventory management getting much easier in season two.
Some of the changes outlined, like converting gyms into crafting materials so they
don't take up inventory and stash space, has been previously discussed, but other
major changes, like the addition of stashes to many of the game's smaller towns,
were not. So they're gonna They're trying to make it easier for you
to carry a bunch of stuff and then to store a bunch of stuff,
and to make more room by making things not take up inventory space and complain.
I guess among Diablo four fans I didn't play a ton of Diabolo four,
but I liked what I did play. And then Diablo four Season two
is also going to massively reduce the in game grind. Some of the changes
outlined or of this managed to repeated that they're sweetening the deal of improving the
end game grind by essentially all of Diablo Forces. In game activities are going
to become more rewarding. They're also going to I think they're making stuff a
little bit easier kind of across the board. So yeah, just basically shifting
things around, making the game sweeter to come back to for people who've played
a lot, and enticing people who are going to be kicking out one steam
for the first time. Be like, this is going to be a much
better experience even than the people who really liked Diablo four when it launched,
than what they had. So it's yeah, I think this is a way
that they could be like, Oh, let's have another bite of the apple,
and I think it's going to work, right, Oh, one hundred
percent, this is going to work. Like for as much as we were
talking about tribalism, there are also people that don't want to use battle neet.
They only want to use steam and this popping onto there, it's going
to be an excuse to like, oh, right, well, I guess
I'll trick it out. It also baffles me Grub Jeffrey Grub that Diablo four
came out this year. Yeah, it's wile. Yeah, as far as
I can tell amongst the staff, there is no appetite or it is on
no one's radar to circle back to. Yeah, I think it's I wonder
what that is when I try to think about it for myself, it's,
you know, action RPGs are the kind of thing I think I would I
had a good time playing Diablo three couch co op a couple of years ago,
more than that now, and I'm like, ah, that's kind of
I almost have my fills still from that and don't have the need to go
back to Diablo for personally. And I know people who Diablo four really hit
with them and they had a really good time and they were they probably were
playing couch co op with friends or their wives or whatever, and it's like,
oh, yeah, that's that sounds like a great experience. But I'm
it's a known quantity at a certain point. I think for me, where
I'm like, I know what I'm gonna get out of Diabolo for, and
I'm like, want to try some of these other things, like balder Skate
three is clearly going to be for me up there above, Like I want
to get to that before I go back to something like Diabolo four, Diablo
four not, You're right, not really on the list for me of things
I want to circle back to. Yeah, I and I remember really really
being into Diablo three a lot when it originally launched, and I was playing
that on like an old ass MacBook Pro that could barely handle it. Yea.
And we fired up Diablo four. I think we even did a stream
of it, right, we did. I think it was yeah, me
U backalare, I think, and I think Dan was there. There were
bones, there were bones, Yeah, they're Dan bones. Dan bones.
But after that initial stream hasn't really grabbed grabbed me. Since I think I
will invest my time to trying balders Gate three. Yeah again, Yeah,
given a real go college try in the old boulders Gate three. All right,
let's get back to the theme of this week, which is a lot
of things are fucked up, all unionized Dragon Age, Dreadwolf QA workers have
been laid off. This is from Nicole Carbenter at Polygic Game. Yep,
this is just it's baffling all of Keywords Studios who unionized QA workers were laid
off from the studio in late September after Dragon Aged Dreadwolf developer BioWare declined to
continue its contract in August. The QA workers were contracted to assist with play
testing and quality assurance at BioWare. Edmonton won their union vote in and they
won their union vote in June of twenty twenty two. All sixteen eligible voters
said yes to joining United Food and Commercial Workers Canada Union Local number four oh
one. It was a historic vote, making the group the first games industry
union in Canada. Keywords Studios workers were in bargaining with the company when they
were laid off. Following the news of fifty job cuts at Byowear itself,
a UFCW representative told Polygon that thirteen people were laid off. Everyone supporting BioWare
was included in that. Liz Corlis, Keyword Studios Global head of Marketing,
confirmed that thirteen Edmonton based QA workers were laid off. We could confirm that
regardably the thirteen Edmonton based staff have now left the business following the end of
a fixed urn client contract. Corlis wrote in an email the group of workers
were laid off on September twenty seventh. Russworm added that Keyword Studios has taken
the decision there has taken the position there is no more work available. We
know that QA is kind of getting hit hard across a bunch of studios right
now, but the boy, that just feels like a convenient way to not
have to deal with a union right on. I always feel terrible that it
feels like at studios QA workers are always treated the worst, and I just
hear horror stories of that throughout all time, and it's especially unfortunate. And
it feels really illegal to lay off a whole group that have unionized. I'm
not an expert in law the law grub, but that feels mighty icky.
I mean, it's it's risky for Bywear and EA because listen, you these
companies are allowed to make job cuts. That is legal it or there is
ever and if these people were to say sue for because they were, they
feel like there was this was a reprisal, right if they feel like this
was a way to get back at them for unionizing. They could sue for
that, and you know, I'm not sure about Canada. I'll say that
this is how I think it works here. They could sue for that retaliation
retaliation right, yes, And if there is uh a evidence in email that
is that it happens that they discover in the discovery process, that would be
very very illegal here with that retaliation, that reprisal in writing saying let's just
let's just fire them, let's just cut them, cut their jobs instead of
having to deal with this, that would get them in a lot of trouble.
I would imagine that EA and buy Aware are unfortunately clever enough to probably
just do that wordlessly. Uh And that would you know, that doesn't mean
they couldn't they couldn't fight it, and that they wouldn't be able to prove
that this was done in court and get a you know, a jury or
whoever would discuss who whatever, you know, to adjudicate that to come to
the side the people who were laid off here, it's just much more challenging.
And these people probably had their lives and they were like, let's just
move on. It's the end of the contract. Anyhow, that we knew
this was a possibility. Uh, but yeah, I'm with you because we
know we know what really happened here, right, Yeah, yeah they did.
They did not want to give into the union's demands for better page is
better working conditions. And the thing that's uh especially unfortunate is QA is such
an underappreciated and necessary job and game development. Yeah, and I don't want
to point fingers, but especially in a game that uh isn't even out yet,
grub yep. And it keeps keeps getting pushed back, it keeps getting
delayed and internally internal delays. Again, they worked publicly, but nope,
it's it is getting delayed, getting pushed back. And yeah, I mean
this is from the team that did Andromeda, right, and there's still I
first I understand this, yes, because mass effect is the one that's going
to use unreal right that I'm trying to remember my own reporting chance mass effect
is going to be unreal, But I'm pretty sure dragon Age is still frostbite.
Frostbite notoriously difficult for BioWare that it's a it's a tough tool set in
terms of animations and and things along those lines. And that was that plagued
Andromeda and sunk that game before it had a chance to prove itself. And
when you know, once they had a chance to prove itself, it didn't
live up to that at that point either. It was a disciplining game across
the board, but the thing like that that just demolished it right out of
the gate, where the memes of boy, my face is tired because that
the ladies has to say that because the animation is so bad, and the
team knows that, they put in excuses for why the game is gonna look
silly. Uh, and now you're gonna not have QA there to like even
have a safety net. I mean, you know, they'll probably contract some
other new QA studio here in a couple of months. Uh yeah, or
you know that, you know that's what they'll probably end up doing, and
and and and this. So now at that point we'll really know, yeah,
you needed these people, you just didn't want to deal with the union.
Yeah, of course that's one hundred percent what they're gonna do. They're
gonna reach out to a cheaper QA studio or QA group and exploit them rather
than wanting to pay actual employees, Like it's gonna be the whole contractor purge
cycle all over again, and it's especially unfortunate and ah god, this industry
is fucking frustrating as shit grub yep, yep, for for real. Uh,
I mean I think that you could probably point to, hey, this
is just how contracted gigs work. That that uh, these things just end
up uh once the once the contract is up, you have to move on.
Uh Yeah, that that's a problem in itself. Like that is like
the why do we think that happens? Well, that happens because it is,
uh, the usually a legal skirting around of responsibilities that you would have
to actual employees. And that's that the union from the the the QA workers
was definitely going to try to deal with that, with those issues and say
well, well can we get a little bit more because we were doing this
similar kind of work and we wanted you to or the spirit of the law
that says, hey, you need to if you hire someone or work with
someone for this long, you need to be able to hire them on or
give them some sort of benefit or something like that. And well, let's
get We're going to come to the table and try to earn some of that
and ask for you for some of that, and it's like, well,
the whole reason they do these contract gigs in the first place is to avoid
those issues and avoid having to spend that money. And it's like, okay,
well that the whole system is a problem here and this is just an
example of that manifesting, all right. Sticking with this, laid off Dragon
Age Dreadwolf developers sue Buy Aware for better severance. This comes from Steven T.
Wrighte at game Spot back in August, buy where laid off fifty employees
that were reportedly working on Dragon Age Dreadwolf. Now, seven of those employees
are suing the studio in Alberta, claiming that severance pay they received was too
low. According to Games Industry dop is, the plaintiffs say that the say
that most cases of termination without cause in Alberta give the effected employee at least
one month of Severn's pay per year of service, plus full value of all
benefits included. The plaintiffs further claimed that the severance that they received was significantly
less than that. The plaintiffs reportedly each have an average tenure of fourteen years
at BioWare. In a statement, the staff also alleged that BioWare would would
not negotiate the severants offer and offered once. One said that the NDA surrounding
the high profile Dreadwolf project means that they can't show any recent work from the
game in their portfolios, which makes them very concerned about their prospects for finding
another industry job. The group's council are Alex Kennedy further stated that BioWare may
not have included provisions in these agreements that are or may have included provisions in
these agreements that are contrary to the Employment Standards Code. So far, BioWare
has not publicly responded to these allegations. If the company does, we will
update this piece accordingly. Dragon h Redwolf was first announced as the game wards
in twenty eighteen, apparently as part of this jen E. Someone at EA,
some EA negotiator like that was talking to these people as they were getting
the little severance that they were receiving, was saying, you know, one
of the reasons the severance is maybe not as big as you were expecting is
that we're trying not to take money from the rest of the team and from
the rest of the game, basically laying a guilt trip on the people who
are being laid off here, and this is alleged alleged guilt trip saying oh,
yeah, we don't want to hurt the game by giving you more of
a severance. And so these people are they're using the employees remaining at the
studio to take away stuff from the people that they're laying off. Well,
just scummy allegedly fuck you exactly. Yes, that's that is the deeply,
deeply just dirty, dirty stuff. I really hate like this kind of thing.
And it's something like we're seeing more and more of like these companies have
been slapped on the wrist of the past, but they and in the end
they're going to come back. And this is the default behavior for someone like
Yeah, it's it's terrible and it just reminds me of the story we were
talking about earlier with the developer behind Hyenas and that being Sega's most expensive game,
right, Yes, that's right. Hyenas is the most the biggest budget
game in Sega's history apparently, which is absolutely insane, unbelievable. I the
thing is, I I there's two parts of me. There's two wolves in
me here grub that wants this game to fail because of the mistreatment of folks
that have been laid off, the QA union being laid off and not two
hyenas. You're right within me, there's just cackling and wanting this game to
fail, but also feeling terrible for the folks, folks that are still there
and knowing the crunch, and like the extreme pressure that they are now also
under because now they're getting all this bullshit about like, wow, you know,
we can't give your former coworkers all the money because we need the money
for the game, and that just being like a bunch of bunch of bullshit
all across the board, because whether or not this game will perform well,
if and when it eventually releases, it's gonna have a stink to it because
of all of this stuff leading up to it. I don't think they even
needed to announce this game as early as they did. Yeah that's it's just
gonna this game is already tainted. Grub yep, it's and yeah, does
aren't gonna the devs are gonna get the full blame, right, Oh yeah,
yeah, it'll go back to being like this isn't BioWare anymore. Let's
uh, let's wrap this up. We don't need this studio and things like
that. Yeah, And it's it's unfortunate because the people that are left at
BioWare now are the ones that have done the rescuing repeatedly to games that have
misstepped and came out feeling underbaked. It's it's primarily people, not primary,
but it's a lot of people who are at like BioWare Austin and we're saving
Star Wars the Old Republic, And now they got rewarded with hey, well
listen, we believe in you because of what you've done in the past.
But I think overall EA's faith in Buyowears is much lower, and so it's
like, oh man, they might even get a chance to really prove that
they can get something right in the first place instead of just rescuing someone else's
mess. We'll see Draggedy Shreadwolf I will again. I've heard internally the people
who work on that game are pretty happy with it. They think that is
a pretty good game that they have on their hands. They just want to
take a little bit extra time. But every one of these moves feels like
it's moving, it's putting another obstacle in front of the studio. Studio's ability
to actually execute on it, and it's like they don't need that. They've
they've had enough obstacles in the past. And so but ea, like every
other publisher just looking around, and we talked about this with BioWare Buy where
did spend a lot of money over the last several years, hasn't had a
lot to show for it, and so Yeah, but like the by where
the people at Buywhere that they were in charge bywear not blameless, Like I
should say that that is something they also believe at that studio. They know
that there is some blame to go around for the way that they were designing
some of these games. But it is it feels like again the people left
there were the ones that just kind of do know what they're doing, and
they deserve a chance, I think, and I hope that they get it.
I hope that that this actually comes out and can prove that they know
what they're doing. All Right, We're gonna take a quick break when we
get back. We're gonna talk about the Pokemon Bank and Deep rockalactic sequels that
are maybe a rogue light that sounds very good to me. Look at all
of that right after this and We're back, Janachoa. It's time for you
to check on the status of your Pokemon Bank because users have been encouraged to
transfer Pokemon to Pokemon Home asap. This is from Liam Dulan at Nintendo Life.
Yesterday, Nintendo announced they would be ending online play and other functionality for
the three DS and WEU in early April of next year. Although a lot
of different parts of the three DS online service will be impacted, one that
won't be in the foreseeable f future is Pokemon Bank for the three DS.
As noted in the original announcement, the service will still be available even after
other online services end. The official Play Pokemon social media account has now shared
a new post about this to spread awareness while advising trainers to still transfer their
Pokemon to Pokemon Home on switch and mobile devices as soon as possible. Nintendo
three DS online services will be discontinued in April twenty twenty four, while Pokemon
Bank can be used beyond that date. We encourage players to transfer their Pokemon
to Pokemon Home at their earliest convenience. Why is that so ominous? It's
like, wait, you said it's gonna work, and you're like, but
hey, man, I don't know. Hey, shit could go screwy.
You should get your stuff out of there. I think it's a way.
Well, you're not gonna fix it if it breaks, and you know,
to be fair, Nintendo's if like Nintendo Online Services break on the three DS
or were you before April twenty twenty four, we might not fix them.
So it sounds like maybe that could come for Pokemon Bank as well. Jand
you have any beloved post pocket monsters in Pokemon Bank right now? I have
already withdrawn all of my beloved Pokemon that may have existed in a bank at
one time or another, no interest on them. All. Are all still
fuzzy, scaly and lovely. I've transferred them home. I've brought them home.
Yeah, you keep them in the freezer now, that's just keep them
in the freezer. Yeah yeah, yeah, still got tons of swimmers.
I don't trust the Pokemon Company, so I would urge any and everyone if
you do have Pokemon that still exists in the bank, take those bad boys
out now, because I feel like the Pokemon Company or game freak whoever,
is going to fuck up flip the wrong switch. Yes, and all of
your lovely Pokemon are going to be uh put out to pasture, So do
that because I don't trust. I don't trust the Pokemon company. Jim.
What is the difference between Pokemon Bank and Pokemon Home. So, Pokemon Home
is the newer service that is supposed to easily connect with Let's Go Pikachu,
Let's Go Evy, Pokemon Go Sword Shield, Scarlet Violet, and make that
easier to transfer Pokemon in and around the games there. Pokemon Bank was the
previous system that they had put into place. And I believe that's correct.
I'm going to say that's correct. No, correct me? Please? Yeah?
Yeah. I don't need that in my life right now. And if
I recall correctly, I don't believe there being a cost to Pokemon Bank,
but Pokemon Home it is an additional charge on top of your Nintendo Switch online
service that, despite me not enjoying a Pokemon game in quite a while,
I am still fucking paying for it because I need my shinies to my shiny
shuckle to be preserved. Shuckle up, Jan, Well it's a shuckle.
What a shuckle? Is a weird looking turtle? Oh? I would like
it? Okay, never mind that, give me all your shuckles everybody you
know how I love to Uncle duck Well, shuckle duckle. Okay, let's
keep moving along here. Deep Rock Galactic Rogue Core has been announced for PC.
This comes from Sal Ramano at Kamatsu ghost Ship Publishing and developer ghost Ship
Games have announced a Deep Rock Galactic Rogue Core, a competitive, cooperative rogue
light first person shooter spin off of Deep Rock Galactic. It will launch an
early access for PC via stem in November twenty twenty four. So Far Away.
Deep Rock Galactic ro Core is a spin off of Deep Rock Galactic with
a rogue light twist. In each mission, you start from basics and cooperatively
build up powers and abilities for the team. The story is about a team
of elite Dwarven reclaimers called a call to Planet Hawks's four to deal with the
situation. The gameplay involves selecting your load out, fighting your way down multiple
procedurally generated stages, and reclaiming dig sites. Between missions, you return to
your ship and research new jan This sounds like so much of my shit.
Deep Rockalactic grow cores in early development and we'll have closed alpha testing, all
right, We'll get into that. Join the driven Reclaimers for a deeper,
darker, and more dangerous experience. I'm like, I'm realizing more and more
every day, jan that Rogue Light is my complete jam. It's it is
everything I want a game. Let me, let me go onto a world
and struggle. Get me like one little thing, it's gonna make it easier
next time. Let me go back home, equip it, maybe upgrade a
thing or two, get a little bit more HP, go back out in
the world, and let me get a little bit further. And I know
the entire time that really I'm getting further, probably mostly because I'm getting better
at the game, but having the idea of like, well, no,
I just upgraded things, so now it's going to be easier. Is this
little, nice little mental trick of like I know it's going to be easier,
so I'll go again. But really, I'm just learning more. I'm
getting better, and I'm getting more experienced, like actual playing experience, and
that's making the difference. It's like such this peanut butter and jelly situation of
a video gaming thing, and I think it's such a good idea here.
This sounds like the Rogue Light version of Steam World Dig two that and that's
one of my favorite games ever. It's like, yeah, go down dig
it's procedurally generated. Next time we'll go down a little bit further. Yeah,
I want this real bad, Jan, how about you? I I
love feeling the enthusiasm and the happiness describing this grub because now I want to
play it. Yeah right, I did have no interest in Deep Rogalactic,
but hearing your enthusiasm about the prospects of this turning into a roguelike, it's
it's it's fascinating and I love it. Isn't life Grub just a roguelike?
Again? Every day is a roguelike. Yeah, and get a little bit
more experienced, maybe you get a little bit baupgrades. Yeah, the same
shit every day. You know what, I'm gonna do it a little bit
different today at different upgrade my phone and that's gonna make things a little bit
easier. And it's like, no, it doesn't. It doesn't actually change
anything. It's it's you get better. That's what's actually changing. At Pixel
eight Pro. I don't need it, Jan, I don't need the shooting
log you No, it's got video boost in the cloud. That's what I
need. Right, Okay, let's keep Okay, this one I'm also excited
about. Here's a first look at the Animal Crossing lego sets from Nicole Carpenter
at Polygon. After a successful line of Mario Lego, Nintendo's teaming up with
the Brick Company once again to create Animal Crossing lego sets. Nintendo posted a
sneak peek at the upcoming collaboration on its social media pages Thursday, excuse me,
showing a short clip featuring eight Animal Crossing minifigs celebrating as a balloon lifted
presence flies up into the sky. There is Rosy Bunny Marshall, a fan
favorite from Animal Crossing, New Horizons, Kappa Fauna, Julian Isabelle, and
Tom Nook. I'm gonna try to get this up for everybody, But jan
how are you feeling about Animal Crossing Lego Crossover? Do it? Just do
it? Yeah? I mean doing with New Horizons right, yep, absolutely
nothing. So just my ties the people even more so, monetize the show.
I did show uh before this, before I knew this was happening.
Last night, I showed Emmy some some of the cat characters from Animal Crossing,
and she's back on the kind of like I don't play video games.
I'm like, she's like, I'm too girly to play video games, and
I keep trying to tell her that's not a real thing. But whatever,
I'm not gonna I'm not gonna try to force her to play games either.
But I showed her this and she's like, that might be the only video
game I play. Like, okay, yeah, let's let's let's get some
animal crossing going. And now we have some legos to make it even better.
Look at these little guys this. I like these animal crossing figs a
lot. Yeah, I'm there's I see in like the Grand Calculus of the
universe, grub where I could have skewed off and become a worse or maybe
a better person than I am today. Uh, there easily could have been
a world where I was obsessed in trying to collect minifigs all the time.
Oh sure, yeah, that could have been real, real dangerous for you.
I think. No, see if I clicked this about, is that
going to be anything? No, it doesn't make it anything. Got that
video, Okay, I'll say that. Yes, I am all for this.
This seems like a pretty good idea. I don't know if animal crossing
would have been like the first natural thing after Mario for me. But now
seeing it, I'm like, I'm definitely excited about it, and it is
the kind of thing where I know I can play this stuff with my kids
and they would be interested in it still, Like if it was Metroid sh
I mean, hey, give me a METROI Legos absolutely let me build Samus's
ship. I want that real bad. But it's not like, oh,
well, I can't really justify that by being like, well, I'll get
that me and the kids will play with it together. They're not going to
care about Samus's ship at least not yet. Let's see here, look at
some details. There's no official release date or pricing information available just yet,
but Lego leakers did suggest in August the animal crossing sets were coming in March
twenty twenty four. The leaked information set to expect five kits, ranging from
one hundred and seventy piece kit for fifteen dollars to a five hundred and thirty
five piece kit for seventy five dollars. Beyond the minifigs and a few other
details like the cute fruit trees and floating present, there's not much to go
on regarding what to expect from the collaboration. Of course, there are plenty
of buildings that could be recreated in Lego form, like the iconic nooks Cranny.
A fan created version of nooks Cranny was highlighted by Lego Ideas Blog in
September twenty twenty. Lego builders are able to submit ideas to the Lego Ideas
Program, and if they get enough support from other builders, Lego will review
them. If Lego likes to build enough, the company may create a set
inspired by it. Isabel's office at Town Hall would be another obvious choice for
a Lego set, but I'm hoping to see them The Island Museum fit with
Brewsters, the Roost Coffee Shop, and Jolly Red's boat. I think all
of those sound really great. The museum is the one I would probably want
to see the most. I don't well. I guess they could probably just
do like a corner of the museum and the Roost coffee thing. Maybe that
could be five hundred and thirty five pieces. I could see that be impossible.
But yeah, Kim, were you a big animal crossing guy? Jan?
Have you ever played much animal crossing? Not so much played New Horizons
because like everyone was playing and then a little bit disappointed about how multiplayers was
handled there. It was bad. It was bad for implementation. Also,
it quickly became bedlam because of how people were exploiting the stock market. So
it's just like real life. But this definitely seems like a no brainer grub
because I have friends where their only game ever was Animal Crossing and they went
Google Gaga for the trading cards and then the San Rio tie in. I
think so any type of animal crossing whatever they will go wild for. I
could also see them doing like a tile set or like I guess, a
Lego set of like, here's a small island, here's a bunch of pieces.
Go build your own island with like hills and trees. God, the
Lego trees with the little fruits in him. Man, that'd be cool.
Were you I can't remember if it was you. Were you the one playing
the Hello Kitty Animal Crossing like game on? Yes? It was okay?
Yes, So I'm thinking like Emmy was interested in Animal Crossing, but I
know she would she would go Gaga for the Hello Kitty version of that.
Is that something that's friendly for someone who's just learning to read and write,
Oh, I think like a lot of it. You could just like fus
around with the I don't remember the timers on like the day to day stuff
being as restrictive as starting new horizons, because like I could see that being
very frustrating. Yeah. Yeah, but they barely have a concept of time,
Like she's just learning to like what ten minutes is. Yeah, I
barely have a concept here. I don't. I don't like I cannot put
myself on a timeline. That's a problem. Yeah, But I think the
Hello Kitty Adventure Island, I think that's what it's called, uh is a
good launching point for someone. Animal crossing keys I think so too, So
I might look into that. I was like wondering because when you said the
animal crossing san Rio Crossover, I'm like, oh, well, I completely
forgot about that. Looks like these are some cute cards. I might look
into this myself. Okay, let's keep going here. Mario producer calls Sonic
release date in interesting coincidence, which sounds threatening, I think. From Andy
Robinson at VGC, Super Mario Brothers Wonder producer Takashi Tezuka has called Tesska excuse
me, there we go has called the game's proximity to Sega's own side scrolling
revival Sonic Superstars and interesting coincidence. The two classic platforming giants are set to
go head to head for the first time in decades this month, was Sega's
game, releasing on October seventeenth, and Mario Brothers Wonder days later on October
twentieth. Speaking in the latest issue of Game Informer, which is available to
purchase now, series producer Tessica, who's worked on every Mario game since the
nineteen eighty five original and He's my fucking boy loved, Tessica said he will
welcomed more side scrolling games to the market and that he wants as many people
as possible to play them. I think it's an interesting coincidence, he said.
We've been creating two D action games for a long time, and we,
of course one as many players possible to enjoy these games. We're looking
forward to as many people as possible having the opportunity to play these two D
sides growing action games. Mario or Otherwise. Wonder, of Course is the
first two D Mario games since New Super Mario Brothers You in twenty twelve,
and appears to be even that jan that's so crazy that it's like eleven years
since the last two D Mario of any kind and then we're I mean we
are. It's got to be that missed means it's got to be more than
two decades since the last Mario that wasn't a new Super Mario Brothers to Dy
Mario. It's yeah, I don't get it either, but here we are,
and wonder I think it's about to pop off. Do you think like
this could inspire a new golden age of two D platformers because I don't know
if I'm like on that wavelength. I hope so I would like that,
but I don't think so. I don't think so. Unfortunately, I feel
like, and I'm even looking at the indies that are popping out out there,
and like a lot of them are aping or being inspired by like Nintendo
sixty four style platformers. I feel like that, yes, wavelength is is
moving towards like now going to start moving towards like the PS two GameCube era,
like that one that one game grub Super Hi or oh yeah, god,
I can't remember I know what you mean, but we can never remember
the name. Okay, but that feels like it's going after like a Billy
Hatcher style of platform er. Yeah, it from from the team Mania,
Yeah, the SoC Media team. Yes right, it's like but you're right
though, like that we are now entering the Billy Hatcher game cube platform er
uh inspired era, which you know we got it quite a handful of in
sixty four and PlayStation once. Those are still happening. But you're right,
we hadn't had many that were inspired by something like a Billy Hatcher or Super
Mario Sunshine or something like that. So I think that that three D nostalgia.
I think we'll continue to override the two D platform or stuff. But
I don't know. Maybe wonder Sonic Superstars comes out, or yeah, Sonic
Superstars comes out and and inspires a whole new generation. But like I did
love two D platforms, maybe actually make my Super Mario World inspired game.
Mm hmm, yeah, I could see that. At the same time,
I think it's absolutely insane that we haven't seen too many ripoffs or inspired bys
of something like Super Mario Sunshine. Like I know that there is a game
dev out there somewhere that has fired up Super Mario Sunshine and wants blood again.
Yeah, so give me sly Cooper, give me an inspired sly Cooper.
All right, see this, this is what I need to do.
I've never played the sly Cooper Sly Cooper games. I need to go back
and like actually play the PS two era of platforming games because I think I've
missed out on a whole bunch. And by the time I'm doing that,
then that means we will get a bunch of games that are inspired by that.
Jan what's your history with like Jack and Ratchet? While I try to
fix this TV for my kid? Oh, no problem at all. I'm
ready to vamp baby. I always wanted to be part and live in the
Jack camp of things folks, Ratchet and Clank. Maybe this is the hipster
and me and everything all right, But like I thought, Ratchet, Ratchet's
getting too big for his breeches. Ratchet's too good. And also maybe it's
a little bit vain of me because Jack is another three letter J name,
just like myself. First one, absolutely great, fantastic. I think I
tried playing it recently, didn't feel like it held up for me. But
maybe that's just my unfamiliarity and everything, and maybe my brain has just been
tuned a different way. But oddly enough, I also enjoyed Jack three.
Strangely enough, I don't know what Naughty the Huck's trying to do. I
don't know why they went GTA Full Guns. Maybe it's because they saw the
success of Ratchet, but Ratchet also still was able to maintain a lot of
like the platforming goodness in that. So I think I'm I'm in the Ratchet
camp, but I'm longingly looking at Jack. And yeah, Jack is another
series I mostly have missed, and I got to make some content that's based
around me replaying these games, so I have a good excuse to go back
and just play through all of them, because I would enjoy that immensely.
I know, I would like all those games. You know. It just
crossing my head and I'm I'm, I'm I don't like it. Tell me,
tell me I'm excited. Jan and Danster like that. Let's go boy
oh boy. I'm But also people should at least check out Sly Cooper one
and two. Yeah, I the Sly Cooper ones are the ones I want
to play the most. It's something about it just seems so appealing and I
kind of like, I don't get why I never actually went back and played
those games. Uh. It's one of those things where it's like, okay,
we went PlayStation, went from having one mascot being Crash and then like
all right, cool, there's Sparrow and now those two were standing off across
the board that now it's like, all right, you're either you're a wretch
guy a jack guy, and no one's a slight Cooper dude. Yeah.
Yeah, that's weird how that happened. It's unfortunate. I wish there was
an I wish you didn't have to pick your camp, but it felt like,
you know, obviously, games cost money, so people pick their camp
because like, but it's within the same camp, which is stupid. Yeah
well yeah, yeah, right, here you go, kiddo, there you
go. All right, let's see, you know what of these I have
to play Sonic Superstars first because I lost some stupid bet I made, but
I will be happy to play Sonic Superstars back to back with Super Mario Brothers.
Wonder's let's do a two D platform in week and a half, but
it probably won't to be that long. Two D platformers are usually pretty short,
so I'm looking forward to this all right. Let's see here, Cyberpunk
twenty seventy seven, Phantom Liberty Clear is twenty oh No, that's your Cyberpunk
twenty seventy seven Clear twenty five million sales, and Phantom Liberty hits three million
in its first week. This is from Tom, I've been at VGC.
Cyberbunk twenty seventy seven is clear twenty five million sales, CD Project claimed on
Thursday. The figure is up from eighteen million sales report by the company last
April and million sales reported in September. C CEO Adam Kazinski announced the new
milestone during an investor presentation yesterday. The phenomenal Witcher three achieved a similar level
in four point five years, and here, in Cyberpunk's case, a little
bit over two years since its release. So we are selling far faster than
we are selling the Witcher game, he said. Cyberpunk twenty seventy seven was
built as one of the biggest titles of the last console generation, with the
heavily anticipated game selling eight million copies via pre order alone. According to CD
Project, That total rose to thirteen million during the game's launch month in December
twenty twenty, Chief financial Officer Peter Nibblewich also announced today that the game's first
and only expansioned Phantom Liberty, sold three million copies between its release on September
twenty sixth and October third. Sales for the first week until October third were
three million copies. To cotectualize this, we estimated how many gamers we now
have on the main game, main game on PC or the new consoles,
all the platforms that allow you to play it, and it's twenty million.
That's pretty good for DLC JAN. They also pointed out that the split of
ownership, I guess around like sixty eight to seventy percent own it on PC,
and then it's about twenty percent for PlayStation and thirteen percent for Xbox.
So big, big PC game. Obviously that's a CD project, grands brand
butter, but that day a lot of people showing up for Phantom Liberty.
Yeah, this is the game that I wish I had more time to play,
because I think I am realizing I may be like a cyberpunk style type
of pervert, and I think I may even despite being like two three,
three four hours into the original campaign into cyberpunk for the first time, thinking
about just starting again and making a female female presenting character because I've heard that
the voice acting is ever so slightly better on the female side. There's more
character to it. I think, Yeah, there's more, there's more happening
there. Yeah, that that version of V's supposedly better. Yeah, grub.
I wish I had time to just pay cyberpunk. I know I do
too. Phantom Liberties one where I'm like, I know, we have a
bunch bunch of people in staff who seem to have that covered, and I'm
like, God, I mean, I'm into it, but it's like I'm
if I had time, I'd be very happy to be playing it. But
it's like with all these other options, I keep thinking I should play something
else, but I had a good time with what I've played so far.
Phantom Liberty is the ideal way to play uh cyberpunk, though, like Mike,
Mike was like, I'm gonna just try to play the bass game and
he had a bad time because he was really bored up front, and that's
not gonna be everyone's experience. But I think if you are afraid of that,
just go right into Fantom Liberty. It's going to be a much much
better time. For just about anyone. They really figured out the way to
get you into the story faster and then just get you going with the cool
powers and the cool combat sandbox, which is where that game is at its
best, when it's at its best when you're in the cool combat sandbox,
or when you're having cool character moments where it's really well animated and stuff like
that. How do we become voices in cyberpunk Grub? I want to manifest
it right? All right, we're doing this, Grub and I throw Dan,
throw Mike, throw back Laura in Lucy and Tam as well. Put
us, put us in the game. We like it, giant bomb,
it's in the game. Let's make it happen. I'm looking forward to it.
Dan can be two voices. Look at the vocal range on that gentleman.
I do a good old man. Oh you do a great old man.
I do a fine old lady. I'm a cyberpunk. It will be
the couple Grub just walking down the street bickering. I love it, murders.
Where did I put my saying I can't speak up? Turn your ear?
Argument? Can you get the bread? You know? I mean my
bread to take my pills god Bread doesn't exist, and then Cyberbread maybe we
should have been in the game. Okay, let's go along here. Last
couple of stories are Modern Warfare Stories, Modern Warfare three beta release date,
start time, and how to play from Kyle Knight over our Duel Shockers.
Here's some service journalism for you. Ahead of its November tenth release date,
Activision is gearing up to host back to back beta weekends for the next mainline
Call of Duty game, Modern Warfare three. PlayStation users will be granted early
access to the beta, whilst Xbox and PC players will need to wait a
little bit longer before they can jump in. I think I have all of
this data right here. Here we go. Open Beta early access begins early
week one weekend one on PlayStation on October six through seventh. Then the open
beta on PlayStation is October eighth through the tenth. On other platforms platforms including
it will still include PlayStation at this point. Early access is October twelfth and
thirteenth, and then the open beta excuse me, October fourteenth through sixteenth.
To get access to this early period on either platform, you're gonna have to
pre order the game. That's how it works. Maybe they'll hand out cos
they've done that in the past, but it seems mostly about pre orders these
days. I'm interested to just to see what this game is about. I
like the idea of going back to all the old modern warfare two maps.
I think that's what they're doing. I want to like see those again.
I don't know if I'm like dying to get in there, but I know
a lot of people still Call Duty fans. So there you go. And
if you are a Call of Duty fan, well, how does this sound?
Call of Duty boss says Activision fielded Call of Duty theme park pitches.
This is from Steven T. Wright at GameSpot. There's no doubt that Call
of Duty is one of the biggest franchises in gaming in the series is about
to celebrate its twentieth anniversary. However, some of the ideas offered to Activision
can be downright strange. In an interview with games feat, Activision president ron
Rob Kostisch said that the company heard a proposal for a Call of Duty theme
park. This fact came as part of a question that regarded Call of Duty
as a multimedia multimedia franchise. Costish said the following in response, we've looked
at a lot of those things. We've looked at multimedia. We've had proposals
on theme parks throughout the years. We've always got the most benef when we
just focused on our core gameplay. Blah blah blah jam, What the hell
does a Call of Duty theme park look like? People are learning the wrong
lessons all over again. Yes, just because Nintendo has a fun little portion
of a theme park doesn't mean you can adapt your franchise to one. Yeah
right, I'm thinking about like the Star Wars hotel where you go in there
and you lost cruise locked, the cruiser rip. I wish I was in
there. It was uh like that, But for Call of Duty where you
just going there. Everyone gets a gun and a vest and now you used
to go out there and I'm like, this is bad. We can't do
this. We kill like a UA V. You can do many games and
earn a chill streak, and it's just get a play a role plane to
fly over. Actually, some of the stuff sounds pretty cool. I mean,
I guess like this sounds okay at like a universal backlot tour style thing,
but not something where you're interacting with people. Think about the sickos that
you interact with when you're playing war Zone, right, and that you never
want to meet them in real life. Well, here meet them in real
life. Oh that reminds me of our poll question today, which we'll get
to in a second after we talk about our pull question from yesterday. Where
do I have it? I actually make it that up right now while I'm
doing that, Jan, why you tell people we have happening on Giant Bomb
for the rest of today and tomorrow and all that. Goodness? What we
got going on the rest of today? Today, we have another tn T
with TF two. That's right, Thursday Night Throwdown happening in the middle of
the day with Titan Fault. Yes, TF two back on TNT. We're
going to be rolling with the PC version. Yeah, PC Social Game Pass
works the because that all go through the EA play thing, so the EA
play version works and Steam version all should communicate with one another. Yes,
it's gonna be popping off an hour after this if you're on watching Lives right,
So that's ten am Pacific Standard time. I don't know what the fuck
that is across in the other time. Thursday Noon Central Throwdown is what Sean
keeps saying, oh, fantastic, fantastic, gosh voicemail dumb truck popping off
later today. No episode of Gay Mess Mornings tomorrow, but we will have
a unprofessional Fridays. You're right, You're right. I should definitely be packing,
so I'm gonna be gone. I'm going on a little trip, everybody,
So no Game Mess tomorrow, Monday or too. Well, Tuesday will
be BombCast, but I won't be on the BombCast either. So you got
something to the news on your own, thanks Chance, so look out for
that. Wednesday also probably won't have a Game Mess Mornings almost certainly, so
I'll be back on Thursday of next week. I look forward to seeing y'all
then. But typicitely keep tuning in the BombCast. These guys, what so
fun things going on? I look forward to catching up on all of it
when I get back. Anything else we need to talk about before we get
to the poll, I don't believe, So we'll try, imply player,
we'll try and play Payday three tomorrow. Yeah, and I think the crew
is going to consist of myself, Dan, Mike, and I guess Bailey.
No, Well, good luck with that, have fun, I guess
all right, the poll question from yesterday, which three DS slash we you
online game will you miss the most? Mario Kart seven got seventeen percent of
the vote, Animal Crossing New Leave got eighteen percent of the vote, Splatoon
got eleven percent of the vote, and Super Mario Maker the Original got fifty
four percent of the vote. And I think that is the canonically correct answer.
Super Mario Maker two is great, but the idea of losing all the
levels made in Super Mario Maker one is a legitimate tragedy and they should do
something about that. Yeah, yeah, did step? I hate that.
I hate that. I hate that. We'll see that, We'll see what.
Nintenda's not gonna do anything about it, you know. I hope the
community does something about it. The community has been working on their own,
like open source version of Nintendo's sweat Nintendo Online Services. Maybe they could do
that with Super Mario Maker. All right, Jae, I got a poll
for tomorrow. All right, I'm sorry, probably for next Thursday. Yeah,
next Thursday. What kind of ride would you want at a Call of
Duty theme park? Gilly suit experience getting yelled at by children? Simulator Nicki
minaj or gun or gun everybody all right, we'll talk about that when I
could back. I'm sure. I'm sure I'll remember the context and everything at
that point, almost certainly. Don't worry. I'll be here, so I'll
give the THEA. Do we spell Nicki Minaj wrong? Almost certainly? But
what is it? Who cares? Everyone knows, everyone gets it. Nick
won't see it? Yeah, Nicki Minaj? Oh man, I hope she
doesn't see it, and I'll be disappointed. If she was ever disappointed to
me, it would hurt my feelings so bad. Yeah, we'll get on
that. We'll get that next Thursday. We are told you what's happened on
Giant Bombs, so we'll see you in an hour. If you're watching live
for Thursday noon Central Throwdown, get titan Fall two installed. Let's make it
and we'll do private matches however it works until then, though, Jan,
thank you so much for speaking with me today about video games. You know
I appreciate it, and I appreciate you Greb, thank you all for watching.
You are the best audience in gaming. Until next time, have a
good one, take care of yourself, and goodbye.