Microsoft Gaming Reverts Back to Xbox Branding

<v Speaker 1>Hey, everybody, Welcome to Game Mess Mornings with Me Jeff Greub,
<v Speaker 1>your host from GiantBomb dot com. Thank you for tuning in.
<v Speaker 1>In this episode, we're going to be talking about reviews
<v Speaker 1>for the next big PlayStation five exclusive and how we
<v Speaker 1>shouldn't be killing games. It's gonna be a good one
<v Speaker 1>because we have Eric van Allen on the show. Eric,
<v Speaker 1>how are you doing?
<v Speaker 2>I'm doing all right.
<v Speaker 3>I was just talking about how cold brew has like
<v Speaker 3>nitrous oxide in it or something. They put something different
<v Speaker 3>in that thing. It's a beast, So I'm weak and
<v Speaker 3>alert right now.
<v Speaker 1>I'm like, I'm in in one of those moments where
<v Speaker 1>it's like I'll be browsing the internet or on social
<v Speaker 1>media and the term nitrous oxide has been getting to
<v Speaker 1>me a lot, like for some reason, that's like one
<v Speaker 1>of the I think it's the latest for health influencers, like,
<v Speaker 1>oh yeah, nitrous oxide's.
<v Speaker 2>Super good for I'm like, okay, what do I Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>I don't know.
<v Speaker 3>The stuff they put in the cars in fast right, yes, right, okay,
<v Speaker 3>maybe I should be on oas.
<v Speaker 1>Maybe that's what I need to like really get me going.
<v Speaker 1>Turns something do put that in the coffee? I look
<v Speaker 1>I'm if I see like the handles at like a
<v Speaker 1>self served coffee thing, and there's coffee and there's col brew,
<v Speaker 1>and then there's one that just says nitro.
<v Speaker 2>I'm gonna do the one that says nitro.
<v Speaker 1>And I don't know what the difference is, Like why
<v Speaker 1>does nitrous oxide in the coffee make a difference? Doesn't matter,
<v Speaker 1>I don't care. I just like the fact that it
<v Speaker 1>says nitro. H. I have not had a cold brew
<v Speaker 1>this morning?
<v Speaker 2>You have? How are you feeling?
<v Speaker 3>Oh, I'm feeling really really awake.
<v Speaker 2>Sorry.
<v Speaker 3>Poe is my cat and he has to make self
<v Speaker 3>known whenever I'm on a stream. So this is Poe.
<v Speaker 2>Now we appreciate that. Yeah.
<v Speaker 3>No, I'm super awake, super alert, ready to talk sorrows
<v Speaker 3>and whatever else is happening today. There's a lot of
<v Speaker 3>news happening in the last couple of days.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, we actually got quite a bit here for a
<v Speaker 1>Friday Gang. So you know what, let's get into it
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<v Speaker 2>Thank you.
<v Speaker 1>Everybody who does support us means the world. As far
<v Speaker 1>as this show goes. Most weekdays, I Jeff Grub will
<v Speaker 1>piece your gaming life back together, and that includes breaking
<v Speaker 1>news and maybe even some of our own original reporting.
<v Speaker 1>For all these topics, I'll get the input of a
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<v Speaker 1>giant bomb dot com. You can also catch the show
<v Speaker 1>later with chapters and timestamps on YouTube. Hello YouTube. All right,
<v Speaker 1>we have a lot to get into, so let's start
<v Speaker 1>the morning mess with those Sorrows reviews. They are in
<v Speaker 1>quite a few there right at launch. I've been playing
<v Speaker 1>the game. I'm not ready to review it, but I
<v Speaker 1>definitely have some thoughts. But let's get to the critic
<v Speaker 1>consensus here. First has a ninety on open critic on Metacritic.
<v Speaker 1>I believe it had an eighty eight, so somewhere in
<v Speaker 1>that range, very high eighties to low nineties.
<v Speaker 2>Very well received so far.
<v Speaker 1>Four stars from Rick Lane at Eurogamer, who said Sorrows's
<v Speaker 1>narrative often feels at odds with the kind of experience
<v Speaker 1>it wants to be, but there's no denying that it's
<v Speaker 1>another top tier action game from Housemark. Michael hyam Over
<v Speaker 1>at IGN gave it a seven out of ten and
<v Speaker 1>says Sorrows tries at an interesting and ambitious story it
<v Speaker 1>isn't always able to effectively tell, but Housemark has once
<v Speaker 1>again proved that It's bullet health sensibilities mesh incredibly well
<v Speaker 1>with fluid and challenging action. I got a nine out
<v Speaker 1>of ten from Richard Wakelan at game Spot a nine
<v Speaker 1>out of ten in from Stefan Ellet the.
<v Speaker 2>Six Access, who writes Sorrows builds.
<v Speaker 1>On the excellence of Returnal further in Housemarks blend of
<v Speaker 1>third person action, bullet Hell and Rogue Light with a
<v Speaker 1>more broadly told and ambitious story, a subtly more accessible
<v Speaker 1>path for newcomers, and still plenty of challenge for those
<v Speaker 1>who crave it. Echoing the game's tagline, house Mark has
<v Speaker 1>come back Stronger and then. Giovanni col Antonio over at
<v Speaker 1>Polygon writes, Sorrows's biggest change from Returnal is that has
<v Speaker 1>it has significantly more metaprogression. Every time you die, you'll
<v Speaker 1>walk away with thousands of lucinite that can be spent
<v Speaker 1>to unlock nodes on an enormous skill tree. Some of
<v Speaker 1>those nodes amount to basic health and defense boost, and
<v Speaker 1>others are more impactful. One permanently unlocks the ability to
<v Speaker 1>revive once after dying, a perk that you had to
<v Speaker 1>find during a run in Returnal, while another abused Devrage's
<v Speaker 1>melee with explosive properties. Survival isn't so much a matter
<v Speaker 1>of learning enemy behaviors and mastering movement. It's about buying
<v Speaker 1>a ton of upgrades early in the game. I'd usually
<v Speaker 1>only reach a boss and diet and to it before
<v Speaker 1>becoming more powerful enough to return and beat it thanks
<v Speaker 1>to picking up a dozen of grades. Have you touched Sorrows?
<v Speaker 1>Have you been reading these reviews? Where are you at
<v Speaker 1>with it?
<v Speaker 2>Eric?
<v Speaker 3>I haven't played it yet. I edited the video review
<v Speaker 3>for us over a game before we can go check
<v Speaker 3>that out. It's a fun little video and it's six minutes,
<v Speaker 3>which we love to do. We love the short video reviews.
<v Speaker 3>Oh yeah, getting former, so go check those out. But
<v Speaker 3>Cal Hilliard wrote our review. I think give it a
<v Speaker 3>nine two five. And the takeaway I had after talking
<v Speaker 3>to him editing his video review and all that is
<v Speaker 3>kind of something I've been feeling broadly in the rogue
<v Speaker 3>like space, which is there's been a lot of like
<v Speaker 3>getting back to smoothing out a lot of stuff, I think,
<v Speaker 3>especially because Returnal had a lot of things that people
<v Speaker 3>maybe who don't play a lot of rogue legs, or
<v Speaker 3>even if they do play a lot of roguelikes, they
<v Speaker 3>didn't like specific things about Reternal and so Sorrows, to
<v Speaker 3>my understanding, kind of smooths those things out and So
<v Speaker 3>if you like that friction, you might be a little disappointed.
<v Speaker 3>But if you, yes, we're taken aback by the forty
<v Speaker 3>minute runs and stuff like that, and like the heavy
<v Speaker 3>roguish nature of Reternal, then Sorrows might be doing a
<v Speaker 3>little bit more for you because it sounds a little
<v Speaker 3>bit more like a third person shooter that has some
<v Speaker 3>rogue mechanics, but you will have a lot more permanent
<v Speaker 3>progression and building up and picking up speed across the
<v Speaker 3>length of your play. So that's what's kind of interesting
<v Speaker 3>me is I think it's symptomatic of a larger sentiment
<v Speaker 3>among these games, and especially because this is a game
<v Speaker 3>that is trying to appeal to a broader swath of
<v Speaker 3>players than I think maybe something like a binding of
<v Speaker 3>Isaac naturally would.
<v Speaker 2>Absolutely.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I mean you're echoing exactly how I feel. I
<v Speaker 1>mean you said it's a broader movement here, Yeah, Hades two.
<v Speaker 1>At the same progression, right from Hades one to Haightes two,
<v Speaker 1>They're like, let's make it more, let's make it bigger.
<v Speaker 1>But let's also think of all the ways we can
<v Speaker 1>make this the friendliest rogue light ever. And I would
<v Speaker 1>say this is the second friendliest Rogue Light ever made
<v Speaker 1>after Hades two. It very much just wants to make
<v Speaker 1>sure that you feel like you are always moving forward,
<v Speaker 1>even when you go back to the beginning. I will say,
<v Speaker 1>like when I was like performing my early thoughts, because
<v Speaker 1>I do still plan to write a review for this everybody,
<v Speaker 1>as I'm performing in my early thoughts, and like, I
<v Speaker 1>think I might open up with be like, how can
<v Speaker 1>anyone think.
<v Speaker 2>That reviews are objective?
<v Speaker 1>You bring so much to these games, people are gonna
<v Speaker 1>have such wildly different opinions on this game. And then
<v Speaker 1>I open up the reviews today it's nine nine nine
<v Speaker 1>nine nine. It was almost universally nine. It's like I
<v Speaker 1>did include a couple of the sevens here. Sure go
<v Speaker 1>look at the vast majority of reviews. It's right there,
<v Speaker 1>right around nine. People just like this game. I say
<v Speaker 1>that I do. I'm enjoying it. The more I play,
<v Speaker 1>the more I'm enjoying it, for sure. But I was
<v Speaker 1>certainly feeling that, oh, is this what I want from
<v Speaker 1>a Rugue Light.
<v Speaker 2>I don't. I don't think so. I want something to
<v Speaker 2>be a little bit rougher.
<v Speaker 1>I want to feel like it is about me learning
<v Speaker 1>the game, and I am certainly leaning toward the uh
<v Speaker 1>spelunky side of the spectrum these days, where it's like, hey,
<v Speaker 1>I want to I want the progression to feel like
<v Speaker 1>it is about I am getting educated in the way
<v Speaker 1>that someone put this world together. And this game is
<v Speaker 1>very much like, here are the numbers for your health,
<v Speaker 1>here's the numbers for the power the damage you do,
<v Speaker 1>and here's the number for how much money you're making
<v Speaker 1>per run. And as you do a run, you can
<v Speaker 1>find upgrades to boost up those numbers. But as Giovanni
<v Speaker 1>pointed out in his review, a big part of the
<v Speaker 1>game is going back with that money spending it so
<v Speaker 1>you start with a higher baseline number for all three
<v Speaker 1>of those those buckets, and it just feels like, oh okay,
<v Speaker 1>so I'm just like I'm just gonna get stronger and
<v Speaker 1>that's going to really be what the game is. And
<v Speaker 1>I begin to feel like am I why am I
<v Speaker 1>putting my time into it? Because it's like I'm just
<v Speaker 1>on this natural ladder, this natural stare step of I'll
<v Speaker 1>play it and I'll get I well, sure I'll get better,
<v Speaker 1>but I will also really be feeling like I'm advancing
<v Speaker 1>more here because my character was just like baseline more
<v Speaker 1>powerful Now.
<v Speaker 2>I think that's what a lot of.
<v Speaker 1>People do want, and I secretly think I want that
<v Speaker 1>as well. I want the game to sort of make
<v Speaker 1>me feel though, like I'm advancing because of my improved skills.
<v Speaker 1>And I think that's always going to be a line
<v Speaker 1>that these Rogue Lights have to walk, because that's been
<v Speaker 1>the secret all along is they give you reasons to
<v Speaker 1>think that you're getting more powerful because your character's getting
<v Speaker 1>more powerful, but secretly, you were learning the game and
<v Speaker 1>you were getting better, and that's really what actually is
<v Speaker 1>making a difference here.
<v Speaker 2>And the truth is, for sorrows that still holds true.
<v Speaker 1>It just doesn't feel like it holds true early on
<v Speaker 1>because I'm so focused on those upgrades now.
<v Speaker 2>Again, like I said, I was getting more and more
<v Speaker 2>into this game the more I played.
<v Speaker 1>The boss fights are very good. They're very good, and
<v Speaker 1>that's kind of the thing that really clicked it for me.
<v Speaker 1>It's like, man, I cannot wait to get back to
<v Speaker 1>that boss and really crush it.
<v Speaker 2>And they're not like super challenging. They're not among the
<v Speaker 2>hardest bosses ever, but they are I think.
<v Speaker 1>They're right in that sweet spot of I'm gonna try
<v Speaker 1>three or four times, gonna learn these patterns. And now
<v Speaker 1>I know the patterns, I could just go execute and yeah,
<v Speaker 1>that fifth try, that fourth try, I crushed.
<v Speaker 2>It, barely got hit.
<v Speaker 1>I went in with like half health and no revive
<v Speaker 1>and it wasn't a problem because I just know this
<v Speaker 1>boss well and that's a very satisfying thing. So yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I'm I'm into Sorrows and I'm looking forward to seeing
<v Speaker 1>what other people are thinking.
<v Speaker 2>It's this one that you're going to jump on right away.
<v Speaker 3>It's probably not just because I have so little time
<v Speaker 3>in my life for games nowadays that aren't part of work,
<v Speaker 3>and my out of work stuff has been completely consumed
<v Speaker 3>by a different rogue Lke. I've been playing so much
<v Speaker 3>Slay the Spire too, Like I see cards in my
<v Speaker 3>sleep right now, and I find that version of roguelike
<v Speaker 3>a little bit more comforting to me, where it just
<v Speaker 3>gets harder as I keep going, and it gets more
<v Speaker 3>difficult and I have to keep finding ways to twist
<v Speaker 3>the system and make it work. And weirdly enough, like
<v Speaker 3>that that works better for me than something that I
<v Speaker 3>like that Sorrows seems like it's built for people to
<v Speaker 3>see the end, you know, especially in a story driven thing.
<v Speaker 3>I think a game that wants people to get to
<v Speaker 3>the end and maybe like experience some of these systems
<v Speaker 3>but still be able to feel like they have progressed
<v Speaker 3>and gotten there is really cool and I like that
<v Speaker 3>a lot. But for me, I it's it is my
<v Speaker 3>I talked before the show went live about how I
<v Speaker 3>drink like just black coffee hot every day, and that's
<v Speaker 3>kind of like my taste of rogue legs right now.
<v Speaker 3>Is I just need like the cold, the bitter, the
<v Speaker 3>bitter cup of McDonald's coffee of rogue legs. That's what
<v Speaker 3>I crave right now.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah.
<v Speaker 1>I mean again, that's like me saying like, oh, you
<v Speaker 1>bring so much to these games when you're reviewing them,
<v Speaker 1>how you feel about them. It's impot like I can't
<v Speaker 1>help but bring sectory to this game at this point,
<v Speaker 1>a game that is kind of bare. Yeah, it's barely
<v Speaker 1>a Rogue Light, but it is definitely still a Rogue
<v Speaker 1>Light in that there's some progression between you know, the
<v Speaker 1>metaproggression really just unlocking stuff, and then it's run based.
<v Speaker 1>You know, it's a run based game, arcade style. That's
<v Speaker 1>where House Smart comes from. Yeah, score attacks. Sectory is
<v Speaker 1>a former house Smart developer, and it's like, that's just
<v Speaker 1>to my taste right now, and I recognize that that
<v Speaker 1>is a niche within a niche at this point. So
<v Speaker 1>when people are thinking about spending, however, this game is
<v Speaker 1>what a full price game, right it's like seventy dollars,
<v Speaker 1>I think that the right choice probably is to make
<v Speaker 1>the friendliest roguelite you possibly can. And then what they
<v Speaker 1>do is, it seems to me as I play more
<v Speaker 1>of the game, is they hide they do hide it
<v Speaker 1>because it's not there when you first started the game
<v Speaker 1>ways to make the game more challenging. And then there's
<v Speaker 1>like the little system where it's like you can add
<v Speaker 1>trials or you can add these buffs to make the
<v Speaker 1>game easier or more difficult. And it's not even in
<v Speaker 1>the accessibility menu. It's just like one of these built
<v Speaker 1>in menu options in the game of like, oh, the
<v Speaker 1>character Devrage whatever his name is, is just adding these things
<v Speaker 1>to his run and you can customize it to your taste.
<v Speaker 2>I'm I'm just not.
<v Speaker 1>At a point where I'm like, oh, if I really
<v Speaker 1>just want a game that is going to challenge me
<v Speaker 1>in the exact right way, I know where those games are,
<v Speaker 1>I'll go play them. I'm not sure if I'm ready
<v Speaker 1>to learn Sorrows to the point where I'm going to
<v Speaker 1>dial that difficulty and exactly where i want it, because
<v Speaker 1>I just don't know. But I will say out of
<v Speaker 1>the gate, them building a game to see the end
<v Speaker 1>is probably the right choice, and I appreciate that as
<v Speaker 1>I'm like going through and trying to review it as well. Alright, absolutely,
<v Speaker 1>this is like, you know, one of the big games
<v Speaker 1>from from PlayStation this year. Welst did they have Wolverine?
<v Speaker 1>Right between this and Wolverine?
<v Speaker 2>What? What? What other games do they have?
<v Speaker 3>Trying to think through the PlayStation slate right now, and
<v Speaker 3>it's kind of kind of slim. It's kind of I
<v Speaker 3>mean everywhere slim everywhere. So yes, it's yeah, I imagine
<v Speaker 3>we'll probably hear some more stuff this summer, and there's
<v Speaker 3>there's always kind of the back half of the year
<v Speaker 3>slated up. Marathon people are right there, they're shouting Marathon
<v Speaker 3>into the I.
<v Speaker 2>Mean that's them.
<v Speaker 1>That's the one of their releases at this point. Obviously
<v Speaker 1>it's everywhere, but yeah, Marathon and in token Marvel Token.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, published under them, right, Yes, they are.
<v Speaker 2>Publishing that game. It's uh, it's PlayStation? Is it? Is
<v Speaker 2>it at launch? Chat? I think it is? But it
<v Speaker 2>is Yeah, you know that that hardly matters for because the.
<v Speaker 1>Token fighting games. Yes, I'm I continue to look forward
<v Speaker 1>to it. I hope it hits really hard. Uh again,
<v Speaker 1>looking forward to seeing what the wider.
<v Speaker 2>Community thinks of Sorrow.
<v Speaker 1>So this will be one that we can like have
<v Speaker 1>a conversation about, like where you started with it?
<v Speaker 2>Where Hey, what do we want from broguelites right now?
<v Speaker 1>As they do get more expensive, do they have to
<v Speaker 1>necessarily change to meet a broader audience? Feels like they
<v Speaker 1>probably do, and at the very least for a game
<v Speaker 1>like this, I think they mostly figured it out, as
<v Speaker 1>evidenced by the reviews so far. All right, let's get
<v Speaker 1>to this next story. Gang of Dragon trailer and Negotia
<v Speaker 1>Studios YouTube channel vanish amid funding crisis. This is from
<v Speaker 1>Joshua Robertson at The Gamer. It's been a little over
<v Speaker 1>four months since Negotia Studios revealed Gang of Dragon at
<v Speaker 1>the Game Awards, but during that time, the game's future
<v Speaker 1>has already been thrown into complete chaos. That's mostly due
<v Speaker 1>to the game struggles to receive funding. Last month, it
<v Speaker 1>was reported that Gang of dragonbacker net Ease has ended
<v Speaker 1>up pulling funding for the game after it was told
<v Speaker 1>that Neagostia Studios needed another seven billion yen roughly forty
<v Speaker 1>four point four million dollars to actually finish development. That
<v Speaker 1>figure had clearly spooked net Ease, leaving Neagostia Studios treading
<v Speaker 1>water and in need of a new backer. Negostia Studio
<v Speaker 1>seems to have deleted its YouTube channel of course a backer.
<v Speaker 1>Of course, a backer pulling funding for a game isn't
<v Speaker 1>inherently the death of a project, but as it's possible
<v Speaker 1>that another big publisher out there could pick it up
<v Speaker 1>and save Negotia's bacon. Game of Dragon was a high
<v Speaker 1>profile enough. It was high profile profile enough excuse me
<v Speaker 1>to snag a world premiere trailer at the Game Awards
<v Speaker 1>after all, after all, and we know that those spots
<v Speaker 1>don't come cheap. I mean, I don't even know if
<v Speaker 1>they pay for That seems like one where because I
<v Speaker 1>don't think even at that point net Ease wasn't spending
<v Speaker 1>money on this game. As my understanding, I think that's
<v Speaker 1>one where someone shows up to Keilly' store and says, hey,
<v Speaker 1>I got a cool game, you know me? And he says, yeah, sure,
<v Speaker 1>we'll put that in here, but I don't know for sure.
<v Speaker 1>This as a reminder, is Nagoshi, who was at RGG
<v Speaker 1>working on the Yakuza games like a Dragon games, sort
<v Speaker 1>of trying to replicate that here under net Ease.
<v Speaker 2>With a new studio. It had a trailer.
<v Speaker 1>It's like, yeah, that looks like a Yakuza kind of
<v Speaker 1>can't wait to see what they're going to do with it.
<v Speaker 1>And then the story started coming out that Ease has
<v Speaker 1>immediately lost interest in these studios that they helped start,
<v Speaker 1>which is, you know, this is one of those and
<v Speaker 1>they weren't going to publish the game, they weren't going
<v Speaker 1>to help market it or any of that stuff. And
<v Speaker 1>they're like, but hey, if you, as a studio want
<v Speaker 1>to figure that stuff out on your own, you can.
<v Speaker 1>And now we're at this point where it's like, I
<v Speaker 1>think we're gonna have to wait with baited breath to
<v Speaker 1>see what's happening here because they close down the YouTube channel,
<v Speaker 1>does that mean that they've sort of broken their deal?
<v Speaker 1>And now Negotia Studio doesn't want any references to net
<v Speaker 1>Ease on its YouTube channel, which it probably had a
<v Speaker 1>bunch of Or is that just the mark of, oh,
<v Speaker 1>this game actually is crashing and burning and we're never
<v Speaker 1>going to see it.
<v Speaker 2>What do you think?
<v Speaker 3>Eric? There was an update to this. I want to
<v Speaker 3>put in real quick that Red Valentine over at Kataku now,
<v Speaker 3>which is weird to say that's the cod and put
<v Speaker 3>up which is that the video is now back on YouTube.
<v Speaker 2>Okay okayo, and things.
<v Speaker 3>Are like the channel is back up, or I should
<v Speaker 3>say the channel's back up. There are no listed videos
<v Speaker 3>on it, but you can watch the music video of
<v Speaker 3>the direct link if you have it. So and according
<v Speaker 3>to reb she reached out to comment did not receive
<v Speaker 3>comment from either Negoti Studios or net Ease. So this
<v Speaker 3>is all kind of just strange. I mean, it was
<v Speaker 3>like reported a while back that net Ease was pulling
<v Speaker 3>back on a number of its gaming investments, right that
<v Speaker 3>there was kind of a general sentiment of a shifting
<v Speaker 3>perception after so many acquisitions and bringing in these big
<v Speaker 3>names in these big studios, and I think there's been
<v Speaker 3>kind of some weariness. There's always weariness. This is the
<v Speaker 3>cycle of you knows games studios. Is they spin up,
<v Speaker 3>they look really promising, and then all of a sudden,
<v Speaker 3>the industry starts to shake a little bit. There's a tremor,
<v Speaker 3>and then everybody panics. And so I don't know if
<v Speaker 3>this is a chicken little situation, or if this is
<v Speaker 3>just something weird happened, or if there's a shifting just
<v Speaker 3>behind the scenes in terms of ownership of a channel
<v Speaker 3>or something like that. There are a lot of weird
<v Speaker 3>reasons that stuff like this can happen. So I don't
<v Speaker 3>know if this is necessy the canary and the coal mines,
<v Speaker 3>but certainly a bird singing.
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, yeah, it's saying something we just don't We
<v Speaker 1>just don't know what right. And it's like we can
<v Speaker 1>draw the connection here because we know there are funding problems.
<v Speaker 2>Is this related to them?
<v Speaker 1>We really don't know, But yeah, God, it would be
<v Speaker 1>a shame if we never saw this game. And at
<v Speaker 1>the same time, it's still needing forty million dollars at
<v Speaker 1>least to get out the door.
<v Speaker 2>You could see a.
<v Speaker 1>Lot of companies that might have been willing to step
<v Speaker 1>in at a lower price going God, that is that's
<v Speaker 1>a lot and there's no guarantees here, and really I
<v Speaker 1>don't even know who would. It's not like there's a
<v Speaker 1>lot of those big companies out there that are stepping
<v Speaker 1>into this space, and the ones that are doing well
<v Speaker 1>in that space, like a Capcom.
<v Speaker 2>You know, this is not the business they're in of like.
<v Speaker 1>Publishing half finished games working in another engine. They got
<v Speaker 1>all their own stuff going on and they want to
<v Speaker 1>have control of it. So I just I don't know
<v Speaker 1>what it looks like for us to actually get this game,
<v Speaker 1>but I hope they can figure it out, because I
<v Speaker 1>I want a studio like this to be like, are
<v Speaker 1>multiple studios like this to be working in the space
<v Speaker 1>of creating cool action adventure, story first, character first games
<v Speaker 1>that aren't the biggest, most expensive games in the world,
<v Speaker 1>like a Naughty Dog, And so yeah, I just I
<v Speaker 1>don't know, what do you think the chances are of
<v Speaker 1>us actually seeing this one day?
<v Speaker 3>I would like to hope in the chances, but like
<v Speaker 3>right now, Mike gut says that it's pretty low. I'm
<v Speaker 3>trying to think through my head of how many like
<v Speaker 3>high profile cancelations there have been recently, because usually it's
<v Speaker 3>just kind of quiet shuddering and then something gets at
<v Speaker 3>the door eventually. I'm thinking of stuff like bud Lines two,
<v Speaker 3>where you know, something just kind of gets shuffled around
<v Speaker 3>and passed around, eventually lands on somebody's desk and somebody
<v Speaker 3>gets it across the finish line. And I think with
<v Speaker 3>Negoti attached, that's like the big reason why this could
<v Speaker 3>still succeed is that Yakaza still carries a lot of
<v Speaker 3>really goodwill for games. I do like the chatter who
<v Speaker 3>said Sega has the chance to do the funniest thing
<v Speaker 3>right now, they do. They do have the chance to
<v Speaker 3>do something, but I'd be surprised if that happens. I
<v Speaker 3>think realistically, this is something that kind of gets across
<v Speaker 3>the finish line the way that's something like a Sheen
<v Speaker 3>Mu three did.
<v Speaker 1>So we'll see right, and it's you know, this is
<v Speaker 1>one of those ones like Nacon could step in if
<v Speaker 1>they wanted to, or there was a world once where
<v Speaker 1>Embracer Yeah, exactly, yes, and again we'll see it. The
<v Speaker 1>steam page is still up right, the steam but you
<v Speaker 1>can go wishless. This thing still right now, It still
<v Speaker 1>says coming soon, Negoti Studio still listen to the publisher
<v Speaker 1>there as.
<v Speaker 2>It always was. Again, net East was once going to
<v Speaker 2>publish it. They decided not to.
<v Speaker 1>Said you've got to do it yourself, so they said, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>we'll do it ourselves. So hopefully this is a sign
<v Speaker 1>that this game still exists. They believe it's going to
<v Speaker 1>come out, and they're just working through some changes as
<v Speaker 1>they find someone else to come in with some funding.
<v Speaker 2>But we'll find out all right.
<v Speaker 1>Up next, Stop Killing Games movement celebrates as the Crew
<v Speaker 1>two sees further offline mode support added.
<v Speaker 2>This comes from Connor macarr at Eurogamer.
<v Speaker 1>The Stop Killing Games movement, which recently made its its
<v Speaker 1>case convincingly convincingly in European Parliament, has claimed some kind
<v Speaker 1>of responsibility for Ubisoft's ongoing offline support for the Crew two. Yesterday,
<v Speaker 1>You've Besoft rolled out update and update to the Crew
<v Speaker 1>two Hybrid mode, which it introduced last October, which makes
<v Speaker 1>the game available offline as well as online. The update
<v Speaker 1>makes livery tweaks available offline, DRIVERSUS statistics available offline, and
<v Speaker 1>adds an innocuous sounding back to log in button which
<v Speaker 1>saves you having to reboot the game when you try
<v Speaker 1>to change from online to offline mode. The Stop Killing
<v Speaker 1>Games Twitter account reacted to this update, taking a portion
<v Speaker 1>of credit for the existence and continued support of the
<v Speaker 1>Crew two's hybrid mode. The post features two videos of
<v Speaker 1>Stop Killing Games founder Ross Scott, who in the updated
<v Speaker 1>video says, we inadvertently saved two games. The other game
<v Speaker 1>he's referring to is Crew Motorfest, which is due to
<v Speaker 1>receive an online mode but hasn't yet. Yeah, this so
<v Speaker 1>this one definitely has piqued my interest a little bit here, Eric,
<v Speaker 1>because you be Soft leading the way and the other
<v Speaker 1>company sort of doing interesting, interesting stuff in the space
<v Speaker 1>of taking an online game and then preserving it in
<v Speaker 1>an offline mode for you know, forever is Nintendo with
<v Speaker 1>Animal Crossing, Pocket Camp Complete, like the It's it's odd
<v Speaker 1>because it's like it's Nintendo and you be Soft, and
<v Speaker 1>these are not usually the vanguards of preservation and ensuring
<v Speaker 1>that they respond to the needs of their consumers who
<v Speaker 1>are worried about losing access to a game that maybe
<v Speaker 1>they didn't even pay for in the case of Animal Crossing,
<v Speaker 1>but they may be spent a lot of money on,
<v Speaker 1>or that you know, was always positioned as an online
<v Speaker 1>game like The Crew. Now, of course you be Soft
<v Speaker 1>got into a lot of hot water over the Crew
<v Speaker 1>one because that game did get delisted. People who do
<v Speaker 1>who own that game can no longer play it because
<v Speaker 1>the servers did get shut down. The UBI Soft has
<v Speaker 1>done a little bit of a one eighty here for
<v Speaker 1>the Crew too, and put out that hybrid update in October.
<v Speaker 1>And when I when I see it's like okay, And
<v Speaker 1>now they're update that, they're listening to feedback, they're making
<v Speaker 1>the changes. This is the case being born out that
<v Speaker 1>we're never saying that you've got to keep the servers
<v Speaker 1>up forever, right, That is not the argument. The argument
<v Speaker 1>has always been people have bought these games, find some
<v Speaker 1>way to make sure that they are as playable as
<v Speaker 1>possible when those servers do go offline. And now Ubisoft's
<v Speaker 1>not only doing that with like a one time PR
<v Speaker 1>update back in October.
<v Speaker 2>They're listening to feedback and there.
<v Speaker 1>Are just filling in the gaps here and there on
<v Speaker 1>a couple of things they missed the first time around
<v Speaker 1>and making it a little bit better. And again it
<v Speaker 1>doesn't seem like much, and it's all people are really asking,
<v Speaker 1>and it is.
<v Speaker 2>Good PR, goodwill so far. So what do you make
<v Speaker 2>of this?
<v Speaker 1>Because I would say if Nintendo and Ubisoft can do this,
<v Speaker 1>What excuse does any other big company have because they
<v Speaker 1>are so conservative and so back backwards in a lot
<v Speaker 1>of ways.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, there's been some cool history of this over the
<v Speaker 3>last few years. I mean, so you have like kind
<v Speaker 3>of Capcom also did the same. I think when Exo
<v Speaker 3>Primal finally stop getting updates, they basically say I didn't
<v Speaker 3>realize that on life support. But I think you can
<v Speaker 3>still go play Exoprimal if you want to. And Matters
<v Speaker 3>have been around doing stuff for a while, I want
<v Speaker 3>to say it for all, and some other stuff are
<v Speaker 3>still like available online because of that. And then you
<v Speaker 3>have the weird Square Enix takes a mobile game and
<v Speaker 3>then repackages it into a single player game, like with
<v Speaker 3>Octopath Traveler zero and stuff like that. And I do
<v Speaker 3>think all of these stories are kind of in conversation
<v Speaker 3>with each other because I think there is the pr side,
<v Speaker 3>which is that, yeah, it looks bad if you're taking
<v Speaker 3>things down from like a consumer perspective and saying you
<v Speaker 3>can't play this thing anymore. What was the platinum game
<v Speaker 3>that came out with Babylon's Time, Yeah, you can't boot
<v Speaker 3>that anymore. Anthem is now completely offline like that always
<v Speaker 3>just looks bad for people who still want to go
<v Speaker 3>back to it, even if it's a small sum of people.
<v Speaker 3>But also there is like a sense of this being
<v Speaker 3>somewhat good for business that if you can just keep
<v Speaker 3>it online running somewhere and people are still engaging with it,
<v Speaker 3>then maybe you're still getting something out of that, even
<v Speaker 3>if the end result is just goodwill. But as somebody
<v Speaker 3>who grew up playing online games, like before I ever
<v Speaker 3>had consoles, I had a PC in my house and
<v Speaker 3>I played Quake servers and Medal of Honor, Allied Assault
<v Speaker 3>servers and StarCraft and stuff like that, And so the
<v Speaker 3>idea of these games always being available and online, I
<v Speaker 3>could boot up Allied Assault on my PC right now
<v Speaker 3>and go find a server and go play it. And
<v Speaker 3>that is what I would hope for a lot of games.
<v Speaker 3>But even regardless of that, having just access to the
<v Speaker 3>thing that you have paid for is like a big deal.
<v Speaker 3>So I'm happy that there's some wins happening in this arena.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, there's there's definitely been, like some recent examples, and
<v Speaker 1>I'm struggling to remember specific examples, but games that had server
<v Speaker 1>based matchmaking as they were going into the end of life,
<v Speaker 1>adding that peer to peer matchmaking, that sort of that
<v Speaker 1>runs on its own. A lot of indie games just
<v Speaker 1>have that out of the box, and they're like, hey,
<v Speaker 1>these big games could use the same thing. And again,
<v Speaker 1>it's like that's always been the argument here for especially
<v Speaker 1>for the you know, official Capital Skgeeves Stop Killing Games movement,
<v Speaker 1>which is a you know, almost a political movement. They're
<v Speaker 1>just saying, hey, we know for a fact that there
<v Speaker 1>are ways to do this, because as you pointed out,
<v Speaker 1>there's a lot of motors who make these things work.
<v Speaker 1>All we're asking for is these companies to think about that,
<v Speaker 1>maybe from the beginning, but at the very least once
<v Speaker 1>they are shutting a game down in terms of its
<v Speaker 1>online functionality, just we're not we know it's not as
<v Speaker 1>easy as flipping a switch, but we do know there's
<v Speaker 1>some stuff you can.
<v Speaker 2>Do to make it as playable as possible.
<v Speaker 1>And once again, yes, over and over again, we're seeing, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>it is possible, and these companies kind of can't keep
<v Speaker 1>arguing that it's sounding great expense because it's just not.
<v Speaker 2>We know it.
<v Speaker 3>A big one for me was a little known game
<v Speaker 3>called Fuser that came out years ago. That was Harmonx's
<v Speaker 3>stab at basically turning drop Mix into a full game,
<v Speaker 3>and when that came down, it was a huge disappointment.
<v Speaker 3>And the matters have completely just revitalized it in and
<v Speaker 3>of itself, and I still love playing Fuser. I play
<v Speaker 3>it like pretty often these days, and it might be
<v Speaker 3>like in the higher play like our account of my
<v Speaker 3>stuff now, and that is purely from support and community
<v Speaker 3>and people wanting to keep a cool thing alive.
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, yeah, Nikky Grace will do some Fuser Fridays
<v Speaker 1>every once in a while.
<v Speaker 2>We love those for sure. Yeah.
<v Speaker 1>I mean all those music games get that eventually, right,
<v Speaker 1>I have that for a DDR on my other computer
<v Speaker 1>here where it's like I got the version of DDR
<v Speaker 1>that just brings in all the music from all the
<v Speaker 1>games and let's see, plug in a USB thing and
<v Speaker 1>just play it on the computer. It's fantastic and it's
<v Speaker 1>so yeah, eventually once these games, especially the ones that
<v Speaker 1>were made for arcades like DDR, and it's so yeah,
<v Speaker 1>there were home versions, but I want that experience and
<v Speaker 1>I just wanted to work in perpetuity and the community
<v Speaker 1>usually figures it out, but these companies you also need
<v Speaker 1>to step in, Like animal crossing pocket camp would have
<v Speaker 1>been a weird one, right had they. It's like, how
<v Speaker 1>do you sort of mod that make it easily accessible
<v Speaker 1>for the person that wants to do it? And Nintendo
<v Speaker 1>doing the work themselves and selling it, It's like, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>that sets a precedent that other companies could be following.
<v Speaker 1>Of course, Nintendo has an advantage there because they are
<v Speaker 1>a game as a product company first, as opposed to
<v Speaker 1>a game as a service company. But so they have
<v Speaker 1>a lot of experience making that sort of thing, so
<v Speaker 1>they probably knew what to do here. But still so, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>other companies can figure it out. All right, let's go
<v Speaker 1>ahead and take a break. There's plenty of headlines to
<v Speaker 1>get into after this. If you want to skip out
<v Speaker 1>on these messages, you could do so. Johnbum dot com
<v Speaker 1>slus joined tocome premium member at reversions of the show
<v Speaker 1>on the website.
<v Speaker 2>We will be right back.
<v Speaker 1>We're back. It's Game mess Mornings. That's Eric van Allen.
<v Speaker 1>I'm Jeff Grubb. Let's get on to the next story here.
<v Speaker 1>Microsoft Gaming reverts to Xbox branding as part of new
<v Speaker 1>mission statement. This is from Sophie McAvoy at Games Industry Dot.
<v Speaker 1>Is Microsoft Gaming the you know that's what it was
<v Speaker 1>called for a little bit. There is now reverting back
<v Speaker 1>to Xbox under its new leadership, it has announced as
<v Speaker 1>part of a sweeping new mission statement shared with staff.
<v Speaker 1>The company adopted the Microsoft Gaming brand in January twenty
<v Speaker 1>twenty two. Got it was that long ago now, following
<v Speaker 1>its acquisition of Activision Blizzard. In a memo to employees
<v Speaker 1>published on the Xbox Wire, CEO Ashes Sharma and CCO
<v Speaker 1>Matt Booty said Microsoft Gaming describes our structure, but it
<v Speaker 1>does not describe our ambition. Sharma and Booty stated that
<v Speaker 1>xboxes New north Star will be daily active players and
<v Speaker 1>prioritizing improvements in hardware, content experiences, and services. The console
<v Speaker 1>remains central to Xbox's future plans and will be built
<v Speaker 1>to be affordable, personal, and open. The model that got
<v Speaker 1>us here won't be the one that takes us forward,
<v Speaker 1>wrote Sharma and Booty. The executives added, along the way,
<v Speaker 1>we will reevaluate our approach to exclusivity, windowing and AI
<v Speaker 1>and share more as we learn and decide. It's like
<v Speaker 1>you could have just not said AI right there, Like yeah, okay,
<v Speaker 1>I'm at a point with this story, Eric where I'm like,
<v Speaker 1>every day I put together this show and like this
<v Speaker 1>stuff is, it feels less and less newsworthy every day.
<v Speaker 1>The fact, oh, things are changing over at Xbox. It's stilling. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>it's a whole lot of talk, right, But there was
<v Speaker 1>a time where it's like, oh, Xbox is at least
<v Speaker 1>the company that's trying stuff. They're throwing the Hey, we
<v Speaker 1>have a different equation for how things can work, so
<v Speaker 1>we're going to try this game pass thing.
<v Speaker 2>So everything that we're sort of trying was.
<v Speaker 1>Newsworthy because it was different and it had the potential
<v Speaker 1>to shake up the industry. And we've come to the
<v Speaker 1>end of that story really and there isn't some new
<v Speaker 1>shake up that they have planned other than they need
<v Speaker 1>to figure out their own future, and they don't seem
<v Speaker 1>to really know what it is other than we're going
<v Speaker 1>to try something different than what we were just doing.
<v Speaker 1>So it's like, Okay, at a certain point, we're going
<v Speaker 1>to get to get to a place where Asha Sharma
<v Speaker 1>says something and I just am not going to include
<v Speaker 1>it in this show anymore. We're close, We're not quite
<v Speaker 1>there yet, but as they say, things like, Okay, we're
<v Speaker 1>going from a Microsoft game into Xbox.
<v Speaker 2>What do you think they're trying to say by that?
<v Speaker 2>What do you think that means?
<v Speaker 1>It doesn't have any effect on how anyone should approach
<v Speaker 1>this brand going forward.
<v Speaker 3>I the way this letter came out was very funny
<v Speaker 3>to me. I just want to say that upfront that
<v Speaker 3>this was the sort of thing that would normally, you know,
<v Speaker 3>it gets sent around internally, but you know that it's
<v Speaker 3>sent out with a wide enough net that the right
<v Speaker 3>people are going to pick it up and then publish
<v Speaker 3>it on their blogs and things like that. So they
<v Speaker 3>were just like, oh, let's just boast it on the
<v Speaker 3>Xbox wire and cut out the middleman, and that that
<v Speaker 3>did make me chuckle a bit. But yeah, it's I
<v Speaker 3>feel like I've been hearing this song and dance from
<v Speaker 3>Xbox for a while. This is kind of always the
<v Speaker 3>posturing of Xbox is that like, we're changing gears and
<v Speaker 3>we really believe in the future, and then we get
<v Speaker 3>back in the cycle. And granted every company goes through this,
<v Speaker 3>I'm not particularly interested in any sort of like standard
<v Speaker 3>shaking console war stuff going on. That could not interest
<v Speaker 3>me less. But with Xbox I it's had some of
<v Speaker 3>the biggest headlines of the last few years, and how
<v Speaker 3>it is drastically tried to augment its gaming studios, add
<v Speaker 3>new people to the mix, change its strategies. It feels
<v Speaker 3>like it is honestly always trying to make headlines with
<v Speaker 3>like this is the year of Xbox, and then the
<v Speaker 3>next year is this is the year of Xbox, and
<v Speaker 3>I'll just believe it when I see it, and like
<v Speaker 3>they have some cool games coming up by you know,
<v Speaker 3>up down for a fable that'd be nice, and and
<v Speaker 3>I sure hope all the developers under Xbox are doing
<v Speaker 3>all right because Xbox has also had a lot of
<v Speaker 3>layoffs and a lot of I believe there's a report
<v Speaker 3>going around the other day from Microsoft about voluntary buyouts
<v Speaker 3>at the company, and that is like that's happening, yep,
<v Speaker 3>concerning uh so this is always you know, the sugar
<v Speaker 3>pill comes before the bitter pill, and we'll we'll see
<v Speaker 3>where any of this goes. But yeah, this is just
<v Speaker 3>a lot of trying to tone set heading into the summer.
<v Speaker 3>And that's all I read it as.
<v Speaker 2>Yep, it's it is.
<v Speaker 1>There are a bunch of dip switches that that you
<v Speaker 1>can flip, hey, we're Microsoft Gaming.
<v Speaker 2>No, we're back to Xbox.
<v Speaker 1>And it's like it could always flip back to, you know,
<v Speaker 1>some other form of Microsoft gaming in the future. As
<v Speaker 1>leaderships just try to put their the new leadership tries
<v Speaker 1>to put their stamps on things, of course, and these
<v Speaker 1>ones are they don't feel like they amount to really anything.
<v Speaker 1>This is just branding. No one was really calling Xbox
<v Speaker 1>Microsoft gaming in the first place.
<v Speaker 2>That never really mattered.
<v Speaker 1>What did matter was they had a lot of people
<v Speaker 1>making games, and now it sounds like they want to
<v Speaker 1>have fewer people making games because some of those layoffs
<v Speaker 1>are going to hit Xbox. Those layoffs being the voluntary retirements,
<v Speaker 1>the voluntary buyouts, right, but that is that's a layoff,
<v Speaker 1>and it's like, okay, yeah, that's that seems like the
<v Speaker 1>more important story here, and that goes a hand in
<v Speaker 1>hand with now they're charging less for game Pass. Do
<v Speaker 1>they expect a lot of growth from game Pass now
<v Speaker 1>because they lowered the price to make up for the
<v Speaker 1>difference of money that they were bringing in for that
<v Speaker 1>It seems like maybe they don't expect that because they're
<v Speaker 1>doing voluntary buyouts. That's you know, the real stuff of
<v Speaker 1>the choices being made over there that actually matter and
<v Speaker 1>affect people. And this is the stuff that they can
<v Speaker 1>put into a blog and say, hey, we have a
<v Speaker 1>vision for the future, and it starts with Xbox is back.
<v Speaker 1>Very easy to say, well, you know, and it's very
<v Speaker 1>easy to like even feel that going into something like
<v Speaker 1>Summer Game Fest where they have a good show and
<v Speaker 1>they have some good games and uh, maybe they string
<v Speaker 1>a couple of good well reviewed games in a row
<v Speaker 1>back to back and all that stuff, and that at
<v Speaker 1>this point, it just doesn't feel.
<v Speaker 2>Like any of that's going to change their fate.
<v Speaker 1>It's gonna have to be long sustained excitement for a
<v Speaker 1>brand that.
<v Speaker 2>Just has failed to excite people.
<v Speaker 1>Over and over again, at least to the point of
<v Speaker 1>it could stand next to a PS five in a
<v Speaker 1>long term way.
<v Speaker 3>They are kind of playing the hits a little bit.
<v Speaker 3>Halo one, Yeah, you make is a whole thing, and
<v Speaker 3>and like Gears is eventually going to happen, and and
<v Speaker 3>there's like a lot of like big things that that
<v Speaker 3>they can theoretically do, right, so.
<v Speaker 1>Yep, I mean, and they do seem like they are
<v Speaker 1>fully committed to this next Xbox you know, built to
<v Speaker 1>be affordable, personal, and open. You know that sounds like
<v Speaker 1>I mean, that sounds good in some ways. And open
<v Speaker 1>is definitely one of the things they've made a big
<v Speaker 1>point of of the Hey, it's going to be basically
<v Speaker 1>a PC and you can put whatever you want on there,
<v Speaker 1>whatever store you want on there.
<v Speaker 2>It's open, do what you want with it. Okay. The
<v Speaker 2>affordable thing is like, what does that look like? Is
<v Speaker 2>this going to be a PC?
<v Speaker 1>Is it going to be an Xbox first with some
<v Speaker 1>PC features that are opened up through the kernel or something.
<v Speaker 1>We really we really don't know. We're gonna have to
<v Speaker 1>see for ourselves, but they seem committed to another Xbox.
<v Speaker 1>I really want to see what that actually ends up
<v Speaker 1>looking like, because I think that that was really what
<v Speaker 1>led us to this moment of new leadership, is that
<v Speaker 1>that team was going in a direction of everything's an
<v Speaker 1>Xbox and this is going to be one of those things,
<v Speaker 1>this next Xbox.
<v Speaker 2>Who cares? And now there the point of conversation.
<v Speaker 1>Is this is a PC and it's it. This is
<v Speaker 1>the Xbox and everyone should care. And I don't know
<v Speaker 1>what else has actually changed.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, yeah, I think Xbox kind of drifting into this
<v Speaker 3>PC realm makes the most sense in that regard and
<v Speaker 3>them trying to just well, know, if you can't necessarily
<v Speaker 3>beat Sony's PlayStation in PC strategy, then just try and
<v Speaker 3>co opt the bit of it yourself and sideways position
<v Speaker 3>yourself there, because then what if an Xbox that can
<v Speaker 3>play PC games then also played PlayStation games, and then
<v Speaker 3>you kind of have the best of everything and they
<v Speaker 3>just move in that way. You could see that. But yeah,
<v Speaker 3>I think with a lot of the hardware shortages and
<v Speaker 3>other things going on right now, a lot of hardware
<v Speaker 3>questions are up in the air at the moment too,
<v Speaker 3>so we'll see how it all lands.
<v Speaker 1>Next story here, Invincible Versus will come with a story
<v Speaker 1>mode from the team behind the animated series from Alex Hopley,
<v Speaker 1>a game reactor, coming fresh off the heels of the
<v Speaker 1>show's highly celebrated for season, Invincible Versus, which.
<v Speaker 2>Is the latest cover story on Game and Form.
<v Speaker 3>I got my issue. Look at that, Look at that.
<v Speaker 3>It's beautiful. It's beauty, credible, incredible art.
<v Speaker 1>Invincible Versus is going to give us a new story
<v Speaker 1>in the Invincible universe, and even if it won't exactly
<v Speaker 1>let us play through the episodes of the show as
<v Speaker 1>we might have liked. We'll be getting something brand new
<v Speaker 1>from the team behind the show to that team that
<v Speaker 1>the creative team that worked on the show writing a
<v Speaker 1>story for this game and fighting games always sort of
<v Speaker 1>struggle with how how do they present as a single
<v Speaker 1>player experience. I think this is novel enough to be like, oh, okay,
<v Speaker 1>that makes sense for for Invincible, which is I'm I'm
<v Speaker 1>a huge fan of the comics. I really like that
<v Speaker 1>book a whole, a whole bunch. I think the show
<v Speaker 1>is pretty good, so I'm I'm ready to get in
<v Speaker 1>there and see this. You know, at this point it's
<v Speaker 1>like my adult dragon Ball series. So if they have
<v Speaker 1>a cool new story to tell with a new enemy,
<v Speaker 1>I will show up for that for sure, sayings, yes,
<v Speaker 1>I see a million Yes, it's one million percent just
<v Speaker 1>that story for sure and in a good way.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah.
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, you You've got a pretty good look at
<v Speaker 1>Invincible Verses.
<v Speaker 2>How are you feeling about it?
<v Speaker 3>I'm feeling pretty good. It's it's a really interesting game
<v Speaker 3>that I think I'm going to need to see, Like, like,
<v Speaker 3>there's kind of two questions when it comes to that,
<v Speaker 3>will the normies like it? And will the FGC like it,
<v Speaker 3>and and those answers don't always link up, because I
<v Speaker 3>think the easiest comparison point to draw is that Mortal
<v Speaker 3>Kombat is like one of the best selling fighting game
<v Speaker 3>series of all times. But you look at the player
<v Speaker 3>counts at EVO for Mortal Kombat and they've been declining
<v Speaker 3>steadily year over year over year, And so with Invincible Verses,
<v Speaker 3>I do think it's got some really cool ideas about
<v Speaker 3>how you take mechanics of a killer instinct and then
<v Speaker 3>put them in a three v three fighter and do
<v Speaker 3>some tag stuff in there. And I remember feeling a
<v Speaker 3>bit overwhelmed at first when we got to go hands
<v Speaker 3>on with it, but it quickly became like a little
<v Speaker 3>bit I wouldn't say second nature, but it started to flow.
<v Speaker 3>It makes sense, and I do I really like what
<v Speaker 3>they did with the Viltrumites in this game. I was
<v Speaker 3>worried going in that would have kind of that fire
<v Speaker 3>emblem mirror character issue of like hure a want of
<v Speaker 3>characters who all do the same thing. But they found
<v Speaker 3>really cool ways to take these Viltrumites and how they
<v Speaker 3>fight in the show and in the comics and say,
<v Speaker 3>what are these like defining features that we can turn
<v Speaker 3>them into and kind of pull some fighting game archetypes
<v Speaker 3>out of that. And I think that worked really really well.
<v Speaker 3>He did, Mike will let in our rapid Fire interview,
<v Speaker 3>go check that out. It's fun, didn't It was like
<v Speaker 3>cagy on how canonical this story is, but also certain
<v Speaker 3>characters being present in the game will kind of give
<v Speaker 3>you an idea of where this is taking place in
<v Speaker 3>the timeline. But story mode was one thing that they
<v Speaker 3>were kind of holding back on suir bit, I think
<v Speaker 3>just because they didn't want details to get out, especially
<v Speaker 3>for a fighting game story like even Mortal Kombat, which
<v Speaker 3>has a pretty robust story mode, is still maybe like
<v Speaker 3>a six hour affair at the end of the day,
<v Speaker 3>and so there's only so much you can tell without
<v Speaker 3>you know, tipping the bean can too far. And so
<v Speaker 3>I think it looks interesting. I'm definitely going to be
<v Speaker 3>following this one, especially to see what it's long term
<v Speaker 3>prospects are. Because we were talking before the show came
<v Speaker 3>up about kind of an era of fighting games that
<v Speaker 3>were you're like kind of B tier fighting games, but
<v Speaker 3>like the weird kind of spinoffs and weirdo games. Your
<v Speaker 3>bloody roars and things like that.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, and.
<v Speaker 3>Versus for some reason gives me that energy where it's
<v Speaker 3>like a team of fighting game fans are trying to
<v Speaker 3>make like kind of a mid budget fighting game that
<v Speaker 3>can like really speak to the people who like fighting
<v Speaker 3>games and also like this property and want to see
<v Speaker 3>something a little bit cool, a little bit different, a
<v Speaker 3>little bit novel in the space. And so it's it's
<v Speaker 3>really interesting.
<v Speaker 2>To me for that.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, and if there's a time where that kind of
<v Speaker 1>fighting game, that that tier of fighting game can come.
<v Speaker 2>Back, it's now.
<v Speaker 1>Fighting games are having a renaissance, and you know that
<v Speaker 1>that community is very very strong and they are always
<v Speaker 1>looking for a particular kind of thing. And yeah, someone
<v Speaker 1>in chat was saying, hey, there's no new Marvel versus Capcom,
<v Speaker 1>so they're kind of hoping this can fill in that
<v Speaker 1>gap a little bit.
<v Speaker 2>You know, that's always the hope for sure.
<v Speaker 1>But it's going to be a little bit different than that,
<v Speaker 1>but it's different in its own way, and I hope
<v Speaker 1>it can find its footing because I do want to
<v Speaker 1>see more weird, you know, out of left field fighting
<v Speaker 1>games pop up, and this will be a sort of
<v Speaker 1>a case study for that.
<v Speaker 2>In a lot of ways, exactly exactly.
<v Speaker 1>Way please, Assassin's Creed Black Flag Recinct differs from Ubisoft's
<v Speaker 1>original pirate adventure. This comes from Jordan Remay at GameSpot
<v Speaker 1>kind of read a quick thing here about what is
<v Speaker 1>new in this version of Black Flag, titled recinc It
<v Speaker 1>is described by Ubisoft as a faithful remake rather than
<v Speaker 1>applying the new RPG stuff from the recent Assassin's Creed
<v Speaker 1>back into this game.
<v Speaker 2>That's not happening. Yeah, it's not happening.
<v Speaker 1>They're saying they're avoiding the ability focus combat and romance
<v Speaker 1>options found in newer titles like Odyssey or Valhalla. Well,
<v Speaker 1>the core story of Edward Kinway remains intact. The game
<v Speaker 1>has been completely rebuilt in the Ubisoft Anvil engine, resulting
<v Speaker 1>in significant visual changes, particularly more detailed but cleaner character
<v Speaker 1>models and brighter, more detailed city environments. Gameplay enhancements include
<v Speaker 1>a faster combat system with a focus on parrying, new
<v Speaker 1>Parker moves like manual ejex, and the addition of a
<v Speaker 1>crouch mechanic. Basically you can go into crouch when you want.
<v Speaker 1>In the original game, it was like automated. I can't
<v Speaker 1>remember exactly. Notably, yeah, it's been a minute to play.
<v Speaker 1>That's like thirteen years ago. Notably, the remake addresses fan
<v Speaker 1>criticism by removing automatic mission failure for a failure for
<v Speaker 1>tailing objectives, and adds new content such as three recruitable
<v Speaker 1>characters for the Jackdaw and their own loyalty missions, new
<v Speaker 1>story arcs involving Blackbeard instead upon it, and the ability
<v Speaker 1>to adopt a pet monkey or a cat.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, never mind, I'm buying this thing for sure. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>that sounds good.
<v Speaker 3>You can do that in real life too, nothing is
<v Speaker 3>stopping you.
<v Speaker 1>Well, the monkey one got the I'm a sovereign citizen.
<v Speaker 1>Let me have all the monkeys I want exactly.
<v Speaker 2>This day. This seems pretty cool.
<v Speaker 1>I think this is the right way to approach one
<v Speaker 1>of these Thirteen years actually is quite a bit bit
<v Speaker 1>a go, So it's not insane that they are bringing
<v Speaker 1>this game back to me anymore.
<v Speaker 2>And yeah, the edits make sense, right. The getting rid
<v Speaker 2>of the automatic.
<v Speaker 1>Failure when someone spots you in a mission where you're
<v Speaker 1>tailing them perfect. Yeah, that's the exact kind of edit
<v Speaker 1>that will make this game actually better. And it doesn't
<v Speaker 1>sound like it stops there. It's like, oh, Yeah, the
<v Speaker 1>yellow hue that was in all those games back in
<v Speaker 1>the day on the Xbox three sixty. And I know
<v Speaker 1>this game is also on like Xbox one and PS four,
<v Speaker 1>but it was still that version that was built for
<v Speaker 1>Xbox three sixty that's gone, and visually it just looks
<v Speaker 1>cleaner and crisper, and say, oh, yeah, okay, so this
<v Speaker 1>is going to feel like a new experience maybe just
<v Speaker 1>because of that, And now they're taking this opportunity to
<v Speaker 1>make it a better game in all these subtle ways. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>this is the right thing to do with Black Flag.
<v Speaker 2>In my opinion, What do you think?
<v Speaker 3>I Assassin's Creed is a series that if you ask me,
<v Speaker 3>are you an Assassin's Creed fan, I'll say I'm not sure,
<v Speaker 3>but I have played almost every single one of them.
<v Speaker 3>Black Flag is in my top five, possibly top three,
<v Speaker 3>of all of those games that I've played. Yeah, so
<v Speaker 3>I'm definitely interested. I don't know that I would say
<v Speaker 3>it's an Assassin's Creed game. I would say it's a
<v Speaker 3>really good byate action game. Yeah, and it does that
<v Speaker 3>super well. But I am interested in this. I think
<v Speaker 3>the big thing they're not talking about is some of
<v Speaker 3>the modern worlds. Did they say anything about the real
<v Speaker 3>world stuff? Because I like that a lot. I think
<v Speaker 3>that is a really cool aspect of that game.
<v Speaker 2>Chat, Am I making this up?
<v Speaker 1>It was one of the reports that they were taking
<v Speaker 1>that stuff out of this version of the game.
<v Speaker 2>Am I making that up? I might be making that up.
<v Speaker 1>It's so, yeah, they cut out all the Absturgo stuff,
<v Speaker 1>says Marino.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, so it's over.
<v Speaker 3>Oh no, oh god, come on that.
<v Speaker 2>That was such a great like pace breaker in that game.
<v Speaker 1>We're not breaker in like a bad way, but like
<v Speaker 1>it just broke up the game in fun where it's like, ma'am,
<v Speaker 1>I'm just inside what is clearly you be soft and
<v Speaker 1>we're getting some we're getting some dirt on how this
<v Speaker 1>place works.
<v Speaker 3>Like that, That to me was one of the hallmarks
<v Speaker 3>of Assassin's Creed.
<v Speaker 2>Was you got this? Really? We lost you? Jan? Have
<v Speaker 2>you lost me as well? Or am I still here?
<v Speaker 2>You're still here?
<v Speaker 3>Here?
<v Speaker 2>Have I been disconnected? Uh? No? I hear you?
<v Speaker 3>Okay, Hello, Hi.
<v Speaker 2>Jeff, I'm back. I can hear you. Guys, Okay, you
<v Speaker 2>can hear us? Never left?
<v Speaker 1>I oh yes, I kind of assume that might have
<v Speaker 1>been the case. We always hear Jan and I've always
<v Speaker 1>been here for you guys. Okay, sorry, yeah, Eric, you
<v Speaker 1>just froze for me, and I guess people were able
<v Speaker 1>to hear it.
<v Speaker 2>Just kind of give me a brief recap of what
<v Speaker 2>you were saying.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, Assassin's Creed, the alternate Hiss, not alternate history, but
<v Speaker 3>like real world stuff, the Obsturgo stuff was always a
<v Speaker 3>hallmark of that series for me because it was the
<v Speaker 3>like creeping tension behind all of it. There's the great part,
<v Speaker 3>I think, in AC one where you use the vision
<v Speaker 3>in the real world for the first time and right
<v Speaker 3>some cool stuff, and then in AC two you're picking
<v Speaker 3>up all the scattered fragments of a TikTok short of
<v Speaker 3>people parkouring through super evil future and stuff like that.
<v Speaker 3>It's it's so fun, and it adds this layer of
<v Speaker 3>you are invested in the story, but then you're also like,
<v Speaker 3>there's something else going on here, and yeah, it's like,
<v Speaker 3>you know, it's a much like a ten percent, like
<v Speaker 3>like a one percent version of inscription, right of yes,
<v Speaker 3>there's something happening here that I want to like pull out,
<v Speaker 3>even though I think, like I'm not supposed to be.
<v Speaker 3>I think this is like dangerous in a way that's
<v Speaker 3>kind of exciting and fun, and the games have started
<v Speaker 3>to take that out in a lot of ways, in
<v Speaker 3>ways that I have not enjoyed. And so I love
<v Speaker 3>Black Flag. I think it's a really fun campaign, but
<v Speaker 3>I think yanking that out does kind of lose some
<v Speaker 3>of the heart and soul of what makes Assassins different
<v Speaker 3>from a lot of games that have now just started
<v Speaker 3>to copy Assassin's Creed. And that is my concern here,
<v Speaker 3>is that like this, this is maybe the big thing
<v Speaker 3>for Ubisoft in general, is that so many games saw
<v Speaker 3>their success in their in their peak, in their their
<v Speaker 3>highest era, and said we're going to do stuff like that,
<v Speaker 3>And now as they kind of smooth that stuff out,
<v Speaker 3>there's not a lot to differentiate themselves from what everyone
<v Speaker 3>else is doing, and some of the absturgo weirder stuff
<v Speaker 3>can be that thing that makes Assassin's Creed still feel
<v Speaker 3>a little bit different and keep like a tonal through
<v Speaker 3>line through the whole series, because otherwise, like I'm just
<v Speaker 3>playing a historical action and that's fun, and those can
<v Speaker 3>be fun, but there's a lot of.
<v Speaker 1>Those, yeah, And it's like I begin to think about
<v Speaker 1>it and it's like, why would they why would they
<v Speaker 1>take it out? And it's like, you know the reason
<v Speaker 1>it was there in the first place. It always served
<v Speaker 1>a mechanism. It was always there to do the thing
<v Speaker 1>you're talking about framing de Yeah, a framing device and
<v Speaker 1>to be that enticing little treat that might be waiting
<v Speaker 1>for me at the end. And they can't it's the
<v Speaker 1>will they won't they they can't actually deliver on the
<v Speaker 1>will they because then the magic's gone, the chase is gone.
<v Speaker 2>You have to have the chase there.
<v Speaker 1>And so going back to this and keeping that absturgo
<v Speaker 1>stuff at the same as it was what was probably
<v Speaker 1>like a difficult thing for them because they're like, we've
<v Speaker 1>changed up, like what the enticing metastory is so much
<v Speaker 1>so many times to kind of go back and re
<v Speaker 1>establish what it was back in twenty thirteen or whatever
<v Speaker 1>year it was what kind of put us back into
<v Speaker 1>a corner and we don't we just don't want to
<v Speaker 1>deal with that. So, yeah, it's a mechanism there to
<v Speaker 1>like make players go, man, what is inside of this
<v Speaker 1>mystery box?
<v Speaker 2>And the second you have you'd.
<v Speaker 1>Be like, hey, it's been thirty years. Obviously we have
<v Speaker 1>some answers to the ones that we're in this game.
<v Speaker 1>It's like, well, no, we don't because we never meant
<v Speaker 1>to answer him. That's not why it's there in the
<v Speaker 1>first place, and say, okay, I get it. But it
<v Speaker 1>does kind of show the weakness of that strategy, and
<v Speaker 1>it feels like maybe you should start thinking about delivering
<v Speaker 1>on these things, so you could start up a new
<v Speaker 1>mystery so people can have some conclusion, because I do
<v Speaker 1>think people get burnt out on that side of Assassin's
<v Speaker 1>Creed of they just keep drawing it on, or they
<v Speaker 1>change the game, or are they changed the story so
<v Speaker 1>much that it's like the stuff that I cared about
<v Speaker 1>once they don't care about anymore.
<v Speaker 2>But I do agree that that is still core.
<v Speaker 1>To Assassin's Creed and they should find ways to keep
<v Speaker 1>that stuff in there as much as they can. All Right,
<v Speaker 1>last couple of stories here, BioWare project director explains why
<v Speaker 1>we've not seen a proper mass effect for T's yet.
<v Speaker 1>This is from Alex Hopley at Game Reactor.
<v Speaker 2>But this is let's see here, what does he say?
<v Speaker 1>This is Michael Gamble, I believe it is his name,
<v Speaker 1>the project director he tweeted or was Blue Sky just
<v Speaker 1>busy working, not a lot of time for teas And yeah,
<v Speaker 1>this goes back to what I always tell people that
<v Speaker 1>stuff doesn't have zero costs associated with it. Building an
<v Speaker 1>asset of any kind, even if you're outsourcing to a
<v Speaker 1>third party company that is going to make a pre
<v Speaker 1>rendered video, that stuff takes a lot of time away
<v Speaker 1>from the core development team. Months of work goes into
<v Speaker 1>that stuff, and a lot of times these companies just
<v Speaker 1>decide that's not worth it. They're not going to like
<v Speaker 1>do that in disrupt game development. So that seems to
<v Speaker 1>be where mass Effect four still is. When do you
<v Speaker 1>think we actually do hear.
<v Speaker 3>About this mass Effect five? The Andromeda erasures get.
<v Speaker 2>I'm on your side on this.
<v Speaker 1>Yes, the headline sysspect for You're right, this is Masspect five.
<v Speaker 2>We're talking about it.
<v Speaker 3>I'm out here fighting the good fight. Kenni Shepperd would
<v Speaker 3>be very thank you if I wasn't. Yeh No, I
<v Speaker 3>mean I get why directors sometimes do this when they
<v Speaker 3>tweet things and they're saying it publicly, which makes it
<v Speaker 3>like available to news people to use for headline. But
<v Speaker 3>then they're like, why are people treating this like such?
<v Speaker 3>Because you posted online. That's what you do when you
<v Speaker 3>step into a directorial role and then start posting online.
<v Speaker 3>But what I will say is that for this the
<v Speaker 3>surprise should also not be a shock because Biowear, like
<v Speaker 3>where it is right now, like Dragon Age of the
<v Speaker 3>Veilguard came out, had just the hugest dust up around
<v Speaker 3>its launch and had the longest development in recent games memory,
<v Speaker 3>and a very troubled development that was often reported on
<v Speaker 3>at that So all eyes are going to be on
<v Speaker 3>Mass Effects like that's just natural. And I think being
<v Speaker 3>a BioWare fan as I've been for a while, if
<v Speaker 3>you want to listen to Normandy FM over on your
<v Speaker 3>podcatcher of choice, you get used to just kind of
<v Speaker 3>subsisting on crumbs for a very long time. I mean,
<v Speaker 3>in the time since we made norm DYFM, there have
<v Speaker 3>only been so many biowear games that have come out,
<v Speaker 3>and we've podcasted through most of them, and this is
<v Speaker 3>the long winning game, and Mass Effect five is probably
<v Speaker 3>still a ways off. It is, I have no real
<v Speaker 3>hope for it coming out in any fashion anytime soon.
<v Speaker 3>But when you start teasing it, when you start posting things,
<v Speaker 3>a lot of people are going to start to get antsy.
<v Speaker 3>They're going to be like, where is it. You showed
<v Speaker 3>us a cut scene, you showed us a trailer, you
<v Speaker 3>showed us promo art. Are we ever going to see
<v Speaker 3>this thing? And I think people forget how close like
<v Speaker 3>the reveal of Veilguard was the actual launch of Vail
<v Speaker 3>guarder at the time, it was even called Dreadwolf because
<v Speaker 3>they changed the name. I like the original name, but
<v Speaker 3>it is going to be one of those things that
<v Speaker 3>it's just going to carry on for a long time
<v Speaker 3>and everyone's going to have to live on crumbs because
<v Speaker 3>I don't know what else you do. BioWare is kind
<v Speaker 3>of in a between a rock and a hard place.
<v Speaker 3>It has to deliver in a way that makes people
<v Speaker 3>feel like BioWare is back, but it also has to
<v Speaker 3>deliver with some of the highest expectations around And yeah,
<v Speaker 3>I don't know this. This is what it's going to
<v Speaker 3>be like for the next two three years, I imagine,
<v Speaker 3>is just more of this, just little little CRuMs, little pieces,
<v Speaker 3>people asking, hey, where's this game? It'll be ready when
<v Speaker 3>it's ready, that's the best answer.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, And by where fans are truly passionate just I
<v Speaker 1>mean for mass effect, I remember you know, when I
<v Speaker 1>was getting started in in my reporting on Rumors Era,
<v Speaker 1>I had a bunch of stories where it's like, hey, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I got some leaks, here's some stuff, here's what's going
<v Speaker 1>on with Battlefield and all that stuff, and it never
<v Speaker 1>got much notice, got some but not much, and then
<v Speaker 1>started talking about Mass Effect Legendary Edition, and that's when people,
<v Speaker 1>what the hell is this? And then I started getting
<v Speaker 1>a lot of tension, like, oh, I did not realize
<v Speaker 1>how crazy the BioWare fan base is about these games
<v Speaker 1>still to that day, to this day. And now I
<v Speaker 1>know better, And I imagine being in that position of
<v Speaker 1>mister Gamble here of having to be the director on
<v Speaker 1>this project and knowing the thirst for information about this thing,
<v Speaker 1>as well as the anxiety that surrounds it's potential fate
<v Speaker 1>and whether or not it ever even comes out. Like
<v Speaker 1>I'm sure he wants to just show people everything. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>we're doing good work, we're excited about it. You should
<v Speaker 1>believe in it. And at the same time, you can't
<v Speaker 1>say a damn word about it because anything you do say,
<v Speaker 1>you'll be held to it. And so he's just gotta
<v Speaker 1>be like, we are working on it, and that's all
<v Speaker 1>we can say, and you're right, that's gonna have to
<v Speaker 1>be the answer for multiple years, because, yeah, as you
<v Speaker 1>pointed out, Dragon Age did not come out that long ago.
<v Speaker 1>Most of the team at Bay Where was working on
<v Speaker 1>that game, with probably just a handful of people continuing
<v Speaker 1>continuing to build out ideas for what.
<v Speaker 2>Mass Effect five was going to be. We'll uh just see.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, when do you like put a timeline on it, Eric,
<v Speaker 1>I really don't know, but I would be guessing as well,
<v Speaker 1>when do you think we see this thing next.
<v Speaker 3>Shot in the dark, like like when we see it
<v Speaker 3>now when it comes out, when we see let's do a.
<v Speaker 2>Little bit of both.
<v Speaker 3>I think we see it like a trailer for it.
<v Speaker 3>And when I say trailer, I mean like a thirty
<v Speaker 3>second teasers Teacher Awards or something like that. Not This
<v Speaker 3>Game Awards, but Next Game Award. And I think it'll
<v Speaker 3>target twenty eight or twenty nine, like that's that's my guess.
<v Speaker 1>But yes, and then and then comes out in like
<v Speaker 1>twenty thirty, Yeah exactly, Yeah.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, yeah, it's it is a big undertaking that it
<v Speaker 3>is going to take a while, especially for what is
<v Speaker 3>left of BioWare after the exodus of so many employees
<v Speaker 3>and the shiftings at Electronic Arts like writ Large and
<v Speaker 3>all that, Like, there's been a lot of changes under
<v Speaker 3>those umbrellas, and I think that means it's going to
<v Speaker 3>take a while for any of this to see the
<v Speaker 3>light of day.
<v Speaker 2>So yeah, I think that sense about right to me
<v Speaker 2>as well.
<v Speaker 1>I I like mass Effect a whole bunch, and I
<v Speaker 1>hope this one delivers.
<v Speaker 2>I would really like that.
<v Speaker 1>But we're going to We're gonna to wait and see
<v Speaker 1>because it's just it's one of those where Electronic Arts
<v Speaker 1>interest in keeping this game going could change it any moment.
<v Speaker 1>We really really don't know what to expect from there. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>from that side of the equation.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, all right.
<v Speaker 1>Last story, Claire Obscure Expedition thirty three sales top eight
<v Speaker 1>million copies. This is from sal Ramano at Kamatsu. Total
<v Speaker 1>sales for the turn based RPG Claire Obscure Expedition thirty
<v Speaker 1>three have surpassed eight million units. That's according to publisher
<v Speaker 1>Kepler Interactive and developer Sandfall Interactive announced They announced that
<v Speaker 1>on the game's first anniversary, which is today. In addition
<v Speaker 1>to that, the game is also getting a free minor
<v Speaker 1>update on all platforms. That includes a new anniversary haircut
<v Speaker 1>for each playable character.
<v Speaker 2>So there you go.
<v Speaker 1>To access the new haircuts, players must purchase them from
<v Speaker 1>a gestural merchants.
<v Speaker 2>In the game world. But you could do that now.
<v Speaker 1>Eight eight million copies in a year ain't nothing to
<v Speaker 1>sneeze at. This is the kind of thing where big
<v Speaker 1>publishers do see this and they start thinking, how can
<v Speaker 1>we get in on that action? And I don't know
<v Speaker 1>what the answer to that is other than hey, this
<v Speaker 1>was a really well made game that knew what it
<v Speaker 1>was going for.
<v Speaker 2>Can you do more of that?
<v Speaker 1>And there's a handful of publishers that can do that,
<v Speaker 1>and there's a lot that are just like Lost in
<v Speaker 1>the Woods like an EA, Right.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, there's a kind of double edged sword with this
<v Speaker 3>where it's like, oh cool, more publishers might pay attention
<v Speaker 3>to single player RPG games and then oh no, more
<v Speaker 3>publishers might have Expedition thirty three expectations, like same with
<v Speaker 3>Balderskate three exactly. That takes off and suddenly people are like,
<v Speaker 3>a make a boulder skate and it's like, I don't
<v Speaker 3>think you understand what that means. Like Larian took a
<v Speaker 3>lot of games to get to Balderskate three, And you know,
<v Speaker 3>clarib Skier was the first game from sand Fall, but
<v Speaker 3>it certainly wasn't a lot of people on that team's
<v Speaker 3>first game, and I think it takes time to get there.
<v Speaker 3>But if anything like, I think for me, the shows
<v Speaker 3>that there is a market for a wide budget of
<v Speaker 3>games and certainly a version of Triple A that is
<v Speaker 3>not chasing excess, if that makes sense. Like clarib Skier
<v Speaker 3>was in many ways targeted to not be on the
<v Speaker 3>level of say, the highest of high Triple A's. I
<v Speaker 3>love that there are things that exist like Rebirth and
<v Speaker 3>Resident Evil nine that are those super high fidelities, super
<v Speaker 3>well made, like top of the line games, pushing as
<v Speaker 3>far as they can at all times. But Claire ub
<v Speaker 3>Scire kind of found like a good like two thirds
<v Speaker 3>way up that scale and targeted just that and and
<v Speaker 3>that's awesome. I love that that's the dream right there.
<v Speaker 3>So hopefully that is the takeaway. But broadly, you know,
<v Speaker 3>just more interest in independent studios would be a start,
<v Speaker 3>and especially hopefully this puts more attention on independent studios
<v Speaker 3>that don't have to come in By saying like we
<v Speaker 3>have people from Moviesoft and Riot or Blizzard and so
<v Speaker 3>and so. But like we you know, we just have
<v Speaker 3>a really solid vision for a thing we want to make.
<v Speaker 3>And that's always the tricky part because usually people want
<v Speaker 3>to hear the former before they hear the latter. And
<v Speaker 3>and there's a lot of great indie studios making great
<v Speaker 3>games that struggle to get funding, so I would hope
<v Speaker 3>that they can ride some of this rising tide as well.
<v Speaker 3>But yeahs as far as ourpgs go, I mean, it's
<v Speaker 3>it's funny a lot of people still have that whole
<v Speaker 3>thing about like, well, term based RPGs, how are they
<v Speaker 3>doing lately? Or term based rpg still.
<v Speaker 2>I was going to ask you as the RPG guy, like.
<v Speaker 3>Turn based RPGs have been goady contenders. We have Metaphor,
<v Speaker 3>we have clear Obscure, we have balders Gate three. Every year,
<v Speaker 3>like some turn based RPG comes out and blows everyone
<v Speaker 3>out of the water, and that's exciting. Like I, RPGs
<v Speaker 3>writ large have been in a really good place from
<v Speaker 3>from your higher ends like lower end stuff like Quartet
<v Speaker 3>and things like that, it's been a really good time
<v Speaker 3>in the RPG space and it's never been a better
<v Speaker 3>time to be playing RPG's. I'm always saying that.
<v Speaker 2>I mean, you're also right.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, it's the kind of thing where when I think
<v Speaker 1>about this a little bit too much, like people choose
<v Speaker 1>turn based in the real world all the time. Like
<v Speaker 1>you could go play a sport where it's live action,
<v Speaker 1>or you could play a card game. Yeah, turn baseball
<v Speaker 1>is turn based, or you go play a card game,
<v Speaker 1>and a lot of people I will play a card game.
<v Speaker 1>Millions of people play poker, millions of people play all
<v Speaker 1>kinds of games where it's your turn to play your hand.
<v Speaker 1>This is something that we're very, very familiar with. It's
<v Speaker 1>not some scary concept. And yeah, the fact that these publishers,
<v Speaker 1>especially the ones that made their money with turn based games,
<v Speaker 1>suddenly talking themselves or working themselves into a shoot on
<v Speaker 1>this was always like what.
<v Speaker 2>You just don't seem to believe in yourself.
<v Speaker 1>Now, of course it's more complicated than that, and you
<v Speaker 1>want to try different things, and one of the different
<v Speaker 1>things if you are making it turn based Final Fantasy
<v Speaker 1>for years and years, and then obviously that like transforming
<v Speaker 1>into a bunch of different hybrid versions of their combat
<v Speaker 1>system of course you try a real time action based
<v Speaker 1>one with Final Fantasy sixteen, but I.
<v Speaker 3>Feel like sixteen a lot. Yes, I'm actually a sixteen defender,
<v Speaker 3>and it's like I thought the combat was a lot
<v Speaker 3>of fun. Yeah, exactly, and it's uh, it worked for
<v Speaker 3>that game.
<v Speaker 1>But I do think that Final Fantasy would be in
<v Speaker 1>a stronger place if they sort of just grabbed the
<v Speaker 1>reins and just said, no, Final Fantasy is for the
<v Speaker 1>Final Fantasy sikos, and we're going to be more Final
<v Speaker 1>Fantasy than we've ever been before, and then have other
<v Speaker 1>ways of expressing those other gameplays types. But I think
<v Speaker 1>the next Final Fantasy game is going to.
<v Speaker 2>Be turn based. What do you think?
<v Speaker 3>I would love for that to be the case, honestly,
<v Speaker 3>because I think they might have found accidentally the happy
<v Speaker 3>medium of saying, well, f seven the remake trilogy is
<v Speaker 3>kind of our Kingdom Hearts adjacent action hybrid that works
<v Speaker 3>and kind of captures that, and also eventually Kingdom before
<v Speaker 3>Kingdom Heart's for has to come out, right, Like they can't.
<v Speaker 2>Just not ye, but that will actually come out.
<v Speaker 3>It would be funny if they never did that, but
<v Speaker 3>and then say like, yeah, maybe not even just a
<v Speaker 3>Final Fantasy seventeen. But you know they put a Final
<v Speaker 3>Fantasy out there. This is like, hey, we're we're gonna
<v Speaker 3>do a turn based thing and kind of see how
<v Speaker 3>it goes at the scale of maybe a Clare obscurity.
<v Speaker 3>That'd be kind of exciting. I will tell you if
<v Speaker 3>you're somebody who's been like, I want Classic Final Fantasy back,
<v Speaker 3>I want Turnbase back. Octapath Traveler Too is currently several
<v Speaker 3>different platforms and it will be the time of your life.
<v Speaker 3>You will have a wonderful time with Octopath Traveler too.
<v Speaker 3>But yeah, I would like to see them kind of
<v Speaker 3>get back to that. I don't know that I exactly
<v Speaker 3>have high hopes for it, but that's only because I
<v Speaker 3>have no idea what you do with the Final Fantasy seventeen.
<v Speaker 3>I don't want to have a person in the room
<v Speaker 3>that has to side that's shit. It's been challenging.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I agree, that's not I do not envy the
<v Speaker 1>person that has to navigate that, because I do still
<v Speaker 1>think that they believe and they said it with the
<v Speaker 1>last one, Like one of the key factors of a
<v Speaker 1>Final Fantasy game is it just is more expensive than
<v Speaker 1>any other game.
<v Speaker 2>It's okay, cool. Doing that, you.
<v Speaker 1>Do get at a lot of risk averse positions where
<v Speaker 1>it's like, okay, it's very expensive. It has to appeal
<v Speaker 1>to as many people as possible, and that becomes.
<v Speaker 2>The guiding principle.
<v Speaker 1>And I think if anything, these recent RPGs, the metaphors,
<v Speaker 1>the clare ob securities have proven no, get into your bullshit.
<v Speaker 1>That's where the magic happens. But Final and Final Fantasy
<v Speaker 1>can regain that magic. I'm sure it can. But we'll see.
<v Speaker 1>All right, we need to wrap the show up. We're
<v Speaker 1>gonna get to the bomb twelve here in a second.
<v Speaker 1>Everybody just hold your horses for that. Let's do the
<v Speaker 1>poll question from yesterday. Are you more excited about Yoshi
<v Speaker 1>and the Mysterious book now after the previews?
<v Speaker 2>Yes?
<v Speaker 1>Well that was thirty percent of the respond It's then
<v Speaker 1>thirty one percent said no, and thirty nine percent said
<v Speaker 1>I'm not reading all that. They didn't check out the
<v Speaker 1>previews at all, so well, thirty percent kind of swayed
<v Speaker 1>by the previews. I certainly was one of those. Did
<v Speaker 1>you did you see how this game plays?
<v Speaker 2>Eric? Yeah?
<v Speaker 3>I did not preview it myself, but I heard from
<v Speaker 3>several people who did preview it, including good front of
<v Speaker 3>the show Jesse Vitelli here, Yeah, who told me all
<v Speaker 3>about Hank and the goodness of Hank. I it's such
<v Speaker 3>a weird one. I feel like Nintendo is doing so
<v Speaker 3>much weird fun stuff right now, and it's in such
<v Speaker 3>a weird place because the switch to launch slate has
<v Speaker 3>been its own thing that you could do an entire
<v Speaker 3>podcast episode about. But I think this looks delightful. I
<v Speaker 3>think it looks enjoyable. I think it looks fun. If anything,
<v Speaker 3>the launch of the switch to has been very wacky
<v Speaker 3>and very strange from Nintendo. A lot of you know,
<v Speaker 3>Tomadacci Life and things like that that you would not
<v Speaker 3>normally expect to take off have been kind of the
<v Speaker 3>defining games for the console. And so if if Yoshi's
<v Speaker 3>Mysterious book comes out and everybody loves just naming shy
<v Speaker 3>guys Hank the then more power to them. I'm down
<v Speaker 3>for that me too.
<v Speaker 1>It's it definitely is like a weird angle for this
<v Speaker 1>kind of platformer. And I mean that with a parenthesis positive, like, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>go go ahead and try that.
<v Speaker 2>That seems cool to me.
<v Speaker 1>All right, No new poll question, because as I said,
<v Speaker 1>we're gonna do the Bomb twelve here in a second.
<v Speaker 1>So let's see here. Let's wrap up our show by saying, Hey,
<v Speaker 1>what's happening on Giant Bomb. There's a bunch of stuff
<v Speaker 1>that's going to pop off early in the week. Next
<v Speaker 1>week as we're able to post stuff about more stuff
<v Speaker 1>about sorrows. We'll have some other videos for some hardware
<v Speaker 1>that's coming up. There's some cool things happening on the
<v Speaker 1>website everybody, so make sure you're ready to go on Monday.
<v Speaker 1>For today, we have UPF. We're gonna play some Kiln,
<v Speaker 1>maybe a couple other things. I think Sean has debt
<v Speaker 1>is Disco, which I still don't know much about. He says,
<v Speaker 1>there's like some creative aspects in there that we're going
<v Speaker 1>to show off next to the creative stuff in Kiln.
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, well hang out. It'll be a UPF. It'll
<v Speaker 1>be unprofessional. I can't wait to see you all there.
<v Speaker 1>All right, with all that out of the way, let's
<v Speaker 1>go ahead and ask you, Eric, where can people find
<v Speaker 1>you on the internet? What do you have going on
<v Speaker 1>and all that good stuff.
<v Speaker 3>I am Eric Van Allen. I'm a video editor at
<v Speaker 3>Game Informer, which still feels weird to say, even though
<v Speaker 3>I think I'm coming up on my one year anniversary here.
<v Speaker 2>Isn't there right? Yeah?
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, yeah, it's been a wild, weird year for me.
<v Speaker 3>It's been really cool. Go check out Game Informer, Game
<v Speaker 3>Informer dot com, slash subscribe. You can also pick it
<v Speaker 3>up at your local bookseller Barnes and Noble Books a
<v Speaker 3>million and some other stores who cares what they're and
<v Speaker 3>if you want to go check that out in other places.
<v Speaker 3>If you want to go abroad and find out and
<v Speaker 3>tell us where they are, please tell us because I
<v Speaker 3>mean I found one in the Amsterdam airport the other
<v Speaker 3>week and that was pretty cool. Oh cool, So that
<v Speaker 3>was pretty exciting. Also shout outs for Acts of the
<v Speaker 3>Blood God and Independent RPG podcast. We're recording tomorrow, publishing Monday.
<v Speaker 3>It'll be a an episode of just me and Austin
<v Speaker 3>Walker talking about realities, his new tabletop hell yef Fantastic System.
<v Speaker 3>It'll be really fun. We have a lot of coverage
<v Speaker 3>coming out of f F fourteen fan Fest on the way
<v Speaker 3>as well, so keep an eye out for that. And
<v Speaker 3>Norman DFM, a game club podcast. We are currently playing
<v Speaker 3>through Dragon Age the Veilguard, but we have seasons going
<v Speaker 3>through everything from a bunch of BioWare games like Mass
<v Speaker 3>Effect and Dragon Age to random other games that we've
<v Speaker 3>done like Cyberpunk, Final Fantasy ten, The Last of Us,
<v Speaker 3>just whatever games spark our fancy. I make can play
<v Speaker 3>all of Near and Near Automato because he had onto,
<v Speaker 3>but I love those games, so I cashed in my bunch.
<v Speaker 2>Car yes, or near replicant.
<v Speaker 3>It was near replicant. I it was the one act
<v Speaker 3>of mercy. And I didn't make him play Dragon Guard either.
<v Speaker 3>That would have been good. The true torture. Yeah, he
<v Speaker 3>doesn't realize it how much worse it could have been.
<v Speaker 1>It could have been a lot worse and fantastic stuff.
<v Speaker 1>All right, excellent, people should go check all that stuff out.
<v Speaker 1>With all that out of the way, though, yeah, it's time, everybody,
<v Speaker 1>let's wrap up the week with the bomb twelve. These
<v Speaker 1>are the twelve games that really matter to people who
<v Speaker 1>are really.
<v Speaker 2>Playing video games.
<v Speaker 1>Shout outs to jan for helping me get this ready
<v Speaker 1>because I forgot to do it before the.
<v Speaker 2>Show, but we got it ready for you now. Everybody
<v Speaker 2>check it out.
<v Speaker 1>Number twelve, wind Rows, number eleven, Crimson Desert Number ten
<v Speaker 1>is replaced. Then we have Hades two. Then number eight
<v Speaker 1>is Slave Aspire two. Number seven is Pokemon Champions, Number
<v Speaker 1>six is Dark Souls two. Number five is Tomadaci Life
<v Speaker 1>Living the Dream. Then number four I got to order here.
<v Speaker 1>Number three excuse me a Vampire Crawlers. Number two is
<v Speaker 1>Marathon and number one is prag Matta.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah kind of six was Dark Souls two.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah.
<v Speaker 1>Listen, sometimes the community will do things and we don't
<v Speaker 1>stop them.
<v Speaker 2>Here. It's like total Request Live. If that's Tucker Plans.
<v Speaker 3>We talk a base no scholar of the first in
<v Speaker 3>We're just going.
<v Speaker 1>No, well, we got the first sios, we got the
<v Speaker 1>true weirdos out there, That's what I'm talking about.
<v Speaker 3>It.
<v Speaker 2>I did I post this a.
<v Speaker 1>Late, so that always makes it a little bit more
<v Speaker 1>likely for one of the weird ones to slip in.
<v Speaker 2>So yeah, Hey, if you.
<v Speaker 1>Guys want to try to get one of your weird
<v Speaker 1>games on next week's chart, you should try that.
<v Speaker 2>Just go to giant bomb dot com.
<v Speaker 1>If you scroll down, you can see this week's list,
<v Speaker 1>and on the left hand side there it says vote here.
<v Speaker 2>It'll take you to a.
<v Speaker 1>Form where you can add your game for consideration for
<v Speaker 1>the next week's Bomb twelve.
<v Speaker 2>We'll do that then. Thank you all so much.
<v Speaker 1>All right, Eric, thank you for hanging out with me
<v Speaker 1>today and talking about video games.
<v Speaker 2>Man, I really appreciate it, appreciate you.
<v Speaker 3>Thank you.
<v Speaker 1>So we'll make it happen again soon. Everybody, that was great.
<v Speaker 1>Thank you all for watching and listening. You're the best
<v Speaker 1>audience in gaming. Until next time, have a good one,
<v Speaker 1>take care of yourself and goodbye.