Hello, and welcome to side Quest. This is our weekly video game show
here at geek Erst. I'm your host, Dyll must Night with Me Kid
Xbox Taylor Field. How is it going, my friend? It's going good.
It's going good. I'm happy to be here as always, and I'm
excited to talk this week's topics with you. Yeah, we have a nice
mix bag today, you know, it's funny on Friday or Saturday or something.
I messaged you and I was like, Taylor, got any ideas for
side Quest Monday, Like there's nothing in the news. I haven't really been
playing a lot of games, Like what are we gonna talk about? And
You're like, I don't know. I don't really have many ideas myself.
And so I was looking through my backlog of many many side Quest notes for
potential topic ideas. But then all of a sudden, just random news things
popped up that I thought could be pretty interesting to talk about. And I
played some other games over the weekend, so I'm I'm excited for this one.
It's gonna be fun. Mix bad guys. I said, just a
few quick shot outs here join the discord. You know it's a good place
to discuss all this good stuff. Join the Patreon to get episodes early and
add free. You can leave a review for the podcast to help it grow.
You can go leave a wishless on my game on Steam. It's called
Potion Problem in the in the description there, I'm gonna announce release it very
soon, I promise, And the game's coming out soon as well, so
you know, keep keep your eyes out for that. And then I don't
even know what do we doing this week? We have the season of X
so, we got all sorts of X Men things coming out in our newscaster
are Go and break down, the new Wolverine and Deadpool trailer, which I
haven't watched yet, So that's what we got in the news. I think
there's a movie coming out soon. I'm seeing Challengers this week, but I
don't even know it's nothing's coming out this week. Maybe in the next couple
of weeks. We've got some other stuff there. Okay, that's a very
video game related so yeah, is that is that a binger or is that
a week by week? Week by week? Okay? Yeah, I'm not
sure if Kirkland's on board with that, I don't know who else is on
board with it or who's joining. If k is all with you, are
you doing it so long? I'm tempted to. Yeah, on a week
to week basis, that would be a lot. Maybe, Like that's how
you do your bad Batch sometimes. Yeah, maybe I might do that.
If he's not committed to it, then I might. I might switch the
formula up a little bit. Yeah, he got someone's gonna go back to
formula and somebody's going to switch with the formula altogether. But yeah, either
way, I just stay tuned to the the fee, the fiends, the
feeds, uh to uh see all that stuff as it drops. Okay,
let's get into it. The first thing I wanted to do is last week
myself, Travis and Kirkland talked about the latest Star Wars Outlaws trailer, and
in that we talked about this kind of controversy around this jab of the Hut
mission and whatnot, which is like apparently exclusive, But then I don't know,
the director someone related the game has come out and said that all was
still in the game for everyone, even if you don't have the special edition.
But I guess there's like a there is still an exclusive quest that's in
this special edition, but just a correction that we were being pretty hard on
them for this thing last week, and it seems like maybe Job is still
in the game to some extent, so it's maybe not quite as grimy as
we said. So I just wanted to put that correction out there. Did
you watch that trailer at all, that that newest trailer for Outlaws? Any
any thoughts on that to change your hype level a little? I mean,
to me, it gave it gave me Jedi Fallen Order vibes, except you're
not playing as a Jedi, You're just existing in the same time period,
which that's that's fair. I'm not hugely sold on this. Kind of the
smuggler life in Star Wars is not really kind of my avenue. I mean,
is a cool character, but I'm more of a like bounty hunter,
bubeffect kind of guy. Sure, but I think I think you guys are
rightfully positioned to call it grimy. I still think that any kind of mission
that's at least something like this that's kind of back behind like a paywall,
to some degree, I think it's still pretty grimy. It's not fair because
I'm sure you can act with Jaba in other regards, but I just think
that you should be able to access everything, and I thought we were past
these days, like the odd like bonus mission to get an item which doesn't
have like a main impact on the story. That's fine, but if your
bonus mission is like a huge character in a Star Wars icon, that kind
of sucks. So it's it's it's weird that I feel like it's been happening
more. Again, maybe I'm just cherry picking here, but like Hogwarts Legacy
had that exclusive quest which was like a horror theme haunted house thing, which
is like, that's a very I still haven't gone back and downloaded the game
again since uh they've added that to Xbox to try it out myself. But
it's weird that that was a thing too, and it seemed like a really
interesting thing that I wasn't quite like, Oh, here's this big character that
you know in love that they're putting up in these trailers. But yeah,
it's it's something that I hope, I hope just the backlash that they got
from this announcement is assigned to other companies, at least hopefully within Ubisophnia and
all those kind of guys that like, yeah, don't do that, you
know you can have a DLC come out later, but it's weird to have
exclusive content and then put that in your like main trailer is a big selling
point when your game doesn't have a ton of other, like huge established characters.
So anyway, I hope, hopefully, hopefully that scares people off from
doing a similar thing. Next up, let's talk about some Fallout. So
there's a few different things here with Fallout. One is, of course,
the TV show came out recently. Meo and Travis did a review on that,
and season two has officially been confirmed, which is great if you go
back to that review, I we all really enjoyed it, but I definitely
had a couple things holding me back, which was that mainly the ending of
it was left very open in a lot of character storylines, it felt like
not even really a cliffhanger, it was just like the middle of the story.
So it's good to see that that is going to be the case,
and we're all getting another season at least another season to help go deeper into
some of those stories. Very excited for that, especially with some of the
teases. I don't think we need to spoil the ending of it necessarily,
but yeah, that's pretty cool, And I don't know, I'm sure you're
happy about that too, right, you enjoyed the show just as much as
me and Travis. But I also wanted to check this out. So the
the the through the Followout Shelter, which when it forgets is like the mobile
game that they released around the time of Fallout four. Uh. I guess
puts like known characters in that along with like the random settlers and whatnot that
I'll appear in there. And they added four characters from the show in the
game, so that through that we can derive the stats of these characters as
they would appear in a Follout game, which is a fun thought experiment to
look at. So we have, of course Lucy the Ghoul, and Maximus
the three protagonists, and then randomly Ma June, who's like from Philly.
She's like the shopkeeper there. So it's like, I don't know why she
was like the fourth character in this, and maybe they'll add more over time,
but it seems weird that they have like, yeah, here's the three
big protagonists, the people on the poster, and then Ma is like there
as well, very very strange. Before we break down these stats, I
gotta ask you where do you think you know? Fallout is an RPG.
When you start the game, you have stats, and as you love love
you get more stats. When we look at these stats, like where do
you think these are in the character's journey? Like if we look at Lucy's
stats, is that her fresh out the vault? Or is that her at
the end of the series, or is that if there's more seasons, is
this like her in the future, Like what do you think we should look
at for that? I take it that this is literally Lucy fresh out of
the vaults. When I look at this stuff, I think that I think
it's all there, and it all kind of makes sense with just who she
is. And I mean were looking at how she survived in that vault too,
and how she had all the information, all the training and clubs she
was in. I think it fits. Okay, so let's see how that
stands up. So Lucy, here are her stats strength four, perception seven,
endurance six, charisma five, intelligence six, agility five, and luck
seven. I mean, just right off the bat is very much like this
is kind of the stats like Mario would have if he was in follow in
terms of just being like the protagonist that has very balanced stats, like most
of these are close to five or like one off, and at most you
have two that are off and none that even dropped to like the three status.
So she's not bad at anything particularly, but she doesn't excel anything as
kind of what these stats are telling me. Is there anything weird or off
about these stats too? Well, not necessarily except for luck. I guess
she's considered lucky to survive the wasteland, but she definitely didn't have a lot
of luck at the start though that's for daying sure. Yeah, And luck
is even in other scrolls or followed, is such a weird stat where you
can never really see what it's doing, whereas like other stats are more clear
of like oh, if I upgrade my agility, maybe I'll like have higher
accuracy with a one handed weapons, or like i'll take let's fall damage like
those kind of things you can like notice them when you're playing, But luck
is never really that obvious, like even I think in elder scrolls, it's
just like and maybe even the description and followed, it just affects everything you
do in a small way, and it's just like kind of how they describe
it. So personally and you know, actually, maybe maybe the reason is
I've never noticed it is because I never really put stats into luck, And
maybe if you did a luck play through, maybe you couldn't notice that kind
of thing more. But to me, it always just seemed like kind of
like a dumpstat, like I'm not really gonna put my my hard earned points
into that. For me, I feel like maybe agility I would give her
some I don't want to spoil too much of the show, but I'll just
say this. There's one point where she gets caught and maybe that's bad agilly,
but there's another point where she like fights off a robot in a way
that feels very agility like extensive to me. So I feel like maybe maybe
i'd bump her agility. I think she's smart, and I think perception like
those are good stats. But of course she comes from like a different background,
so it makes sense that she doesn't have as much kind of knowledge around
the stuff out in the wasteland. So I can understand that I'm just gonna
bring this up now that really the only weird stat for her with me is
the charisma of being five, and it's directly because of Maximus. So let's
get into Maximus. Maximus's stats next, He's got seven strength six, perceptions
six, endurance five, charisma four, intelligence, agility seven, and luck
five. I just I just don't see a world where Maximus and Lucy have
the same charisma stat. That just does not track for the TV show that
I watched. Personally, I agree, I don't think the charisma was there.
I feel like his intelligence should have been like a little bit lower because
he was even lower than a four, even lower than a four. I
mean, he did not have many many points put into that in the show
with how he's operating and working as a night So yeah, and there's,
you know, the tricky thing of like charisma and like perception, because I
feel like Maximus is like social perception is particularly weak. And I don't know
if you'd consider that like a charisma stat or a perception stat, but I
would definitely drop ear. I would agree with you intelligence, I dropped that
by one. I drop his charisma by one as well. I might even
maybe maybe I'll give him an extra endurance point or something. He goes through
a lot in that show and he kind of endures. What I agree,
I think the strength should come down just a little bit, and then the
endurance should be bumped up a little bit more. Yeah, and then luck,
I mean I don't know, is he unlucky? Is he lucky?
I think five's fine good enough there right in the middle, right m hm.
And the agility is weird one too, because for any like Brotherhood type
characters, like they're just so big and chunky and bulky that you don't really
think of them as particularly agile. And he of course he does spend time
outside the armor as well, but uh yeah, that's there's just some weird
stuff with the charisma stat overall, and then jumping over the ghoul, the
Great Walton Goggins has a strength of five perception six, endurance seven, charisma
seven, intelligence for agility seven and luck for to me, this is way
off. This is this is a huge miss. Like I just feel like
the Ghoule should be a way higher level character than these guys. Like if
there's tears within follow out shelter of characters are getting, he would be like
a legendary. I mean, he's been around for so long. He's way
smarter than a four, probably a good amount stronger than a five. Perception
I'd say should be higher than a six. Endurance and charismat seven, Okay,
that's pretty high stat I'll give him that agility. I didn't even give
him a bonus point there and say luck. I guess it's kind of he
got unlucky, But I don't think he is generally an unlucky guy. I
think the base on him being a ghoul. I think that's why they're saying
that lack is so low. I don't know. I mean, I'll think
I'll throw you to the opposite way. We see so many times in follow
if you're walking around this is the TV show over the games. If you're
just walking around, the amount of times you see like a skeleton, you
know, someone who just just got killed from the bombs going off in that
moment, they're dead in their kitchen table, that kind of thing. He
survived that and now he has like essentially eternal life. To me, that's
lucky. He got out pretty well relative to other people who just died because
of the last and from what we see, because it's like a spoiler or
an episode one thing, right, Like, it's pretty lucky. I think
that he survived that situation at all. But does that factor in his endurance?
That's seven points he's got there. You're right, maybe that's more of
an endurance thing than is a luck thing. And maybe his perception should be
bad because of not seeing the bomb thing originally. His kid found at first,
and she's like a little kid, you know, she's distracted. Yeah,
I mean when I guess it's a spoiler red stuff, it's like,
you know that's fair enough, you know. Yeah's a lot of red flags
for him. So yeah, perception maybe we a little lower. But like,
do you agree with me in general though, that his stats should he
like, he should be a really high level type of character. He should,
absolutely, because his intelligence is lower than Lucy's. And I just I
don't buy that. Lucy that's six and he's four. That's pretty whack for
sure. But yeah, charisma, I think charisma could honestly make it higher
because he was so charismatic. I was loving it. Yeah, it's true
he was. But I also feel like he's the kind of guy who know
this is the thing too. Once again, like Elder scrolls, that kind
of like they delineate in these stats more. But there's like intimidation part of
charisma like or related to like in Elder Scrolls is the personality stat and so
if you're good, if you ever really had a personality set, you're better
intimidating people. And that's where I feel like his strength is is with intimidation.
Now within fallout, I think that would actually usually go to more of
a strength thing, like if you had a speech check that was, like
you intimidating someone, I think it would more often be a strength than a
charisma. But I'd have to go play the games again and see what kind
of interactions they are. But yeah, I think you're I think you're right.
But I think even his strength, like you know, he's more of
a gunslinger type guy, but like at least a six, Like come on,
like he's a he's a pretty tough, pretty tough guy. Yeah,
and then mo June the Great Modune strength five, perception seven, endurance five,
charisma seven, intelligence six, agility four, and luck six. The
hardest one with this is, like, you know, she's not in the
show a whole lot. She's in one episode. I think maybe maybe it
stretches into two episodes, but not into a lot, so it's hard to
gain too much information. But I don't know if she's that charismatic that seems
high. And I also, that's really the only one that speaks because maybe
she's super smart. I don't know, she seems smart enough, but charisma
seven seems like, Okay, that's a bit that's being a bit kind to
missus June. Here she's I look at her SATs and I look at Lucy's,
and I feel like they're quite similar. But again she's got higher strength,
same perception, lord endurance, higher charisma, same intelligence, which again
I don't feel like that is warranted because she's she's a shop owner up there,
she should be a lot more smarter than what Lucy's bringing to the table.
I would imagine. Yeah, if anything, i'd bump, I'd give
her like an extra endurance for her ability to like survive out out there.
And maybe you drop the intelligence by by a smidge, But maybe I don't
know. If she you is being a shopkeeper as her way to survive in
the way sound like maybe that maybe you need some You probably need some smarts
to be a good shop owner, especially in a town like this when anyone
such as the ghoul can just come through at any point and blow stuff up,
you know, yeah, yeah, And who knows if she's lucky or
not. I mean, that's how can any of us say any any thoughts
on this? Is there any any characters you would like to see from the
show in particular that you'd like to see them add to Shelter. Maybe they're
already in Shelter. I don't even know. I don't know who's in there
currently, but yeah, anyone you want to see from the show get added.
I'd like to see maybe Lucy's brother, just for the for the fun
of it, that'd be fun. I'd like to definitely her dad. I'd
like to see her dad in there. Yeah, that as well. I'm
trying to think. Who else are some fun characters in there? Maybe the
other, maybe the other. The Squire Maximus is funny homie there. That
could be funny because he I could see him having like comically low stats.
And there's one I want to say, but it might be a spoiler,
so I'll say, if you know, you know, there's one one guy
in particular that i'd really like to see what his stats would be. Do
robots get our robots characters get stats. When I played Shelter back in twenty
fifteen or sixteen, when it came out, I don't remember there being a
robot in My Like as a recruitable character in the way that these characters are.
That seems like a miss if they haven't added robot characters this far in
the game's life cycle. So hopefully they add that kind of thing. I'm
not sure, but I think a couple of robots could be fun to add
in there, you know. And then lastly, on the Fallout side of
things, I wanted to shout this out. So of course the show has
been a big success. People are really enjoying it, and then on top
of that, it's getting good reviews. Seems like the viewership's clearly there enough
for them to go ahead with a season two confirmation at this point. Because
of that, naturally a lot of people are flocking to the games. They
want to get more and more Fallout, and so a lot of these Follout
games have been getting really just high play counts on Steam, which is one
of the easiest places to track that kind of thing, and I think for
in particular, New Vegas I believe has hit the highest ever concurrent player account
that it's ever had, at least through Steam. I'm guessing when the game
first came out across all the platforms. There's more people playing than there is
today necessarily, but still that's really cool to see a bump like that for
a game that came out in twenty ten, twenty eleven, and then Fallout
four as well, definitely not breaking its concurrent count, but still having a
ton of new players followed. Seventy six has a bunch of players jumping in
there as well. I'm sure Fallout three is as well, So it's interesting
to see this kind of thing. And obviously we talked about last week how
they have this next gen patch coming out for Fallout four, so that's a
lot of people are gonna jump in for that as well, coming out in
just a few to short days here. But otherwise it's like, man,
there was Season two coming out, and clearly, like you know, Bethesa's
working on all this Rold six right now, that's gonna be another years before
that comes out, and then another few years after that would be their next
follow game. It's like, man, it seems like a total whiff that
they didn't have any other followout games kind of in development from other studios.
I think spinoffs would be a great opportunity for them to be doing these kind
of things right now, and maybe they are and we just haven't seen that
announcement yet, but clearly nothing was ready to line up with season one,
and I just can't imagine that, like the next Follout game from Bethesda at
least is going to be ready in the time of season two. Is that'll
probably be what two three years from now that kind of thing, maybe a
bit longer because it's a take, like the sets are huge and the production
value is crazy. So maybe let's say three years out twenty twenty seven is
when that that Season two comes out. There's no way the next mainline follow
game is going to come out, So like, I don't know, do
you do you have any ideas, like what what should Bethesda and now I
guess now Xbox as the parent company be doing to kind of capitalize on this
this I don't know, fervor from fans wanting more follow right now? Uh.
I mean yeah, if you were to time it with with some big
expansion or something in game, that would have been ideal. I mean,
I with Prime games, they put Fallout seventy six excuse me on Xbox and
PC for free and so I redeem both. I don't know if we were
going to get around to them, but and I think I'll say too,
is I think Xbox, like on their claim rewards thing whatever that is,
there's currently like a bundle for seventy six on there for oh some items,
So if you do, you should at least claim that and then when you
jump in you'll have some bonus things you can use. And I think that
was sent that was branded around the TV show, so that was like kind
of their their best offering, along with the follow for a next gen or
current gen version. I guess those are kind of the things they did have.
Yeah, for what it's worth, but that's a good showed out as
well. That there's for free to get into seventy six. That's a good
thing for a micro transaction y game like that. And I think that's just
making it easily accessible, is what you want to do, because I think
it's Yeah, how many Fallouts are on games Pass? Is it? Four?
I mean all of them? I mean really all of them, although
follow one and two and tens wouldn't be on like Xbox like they were ever
reported or anything like that, but yeah, on Xbox at least Series X
and I imagine Xbox One, you'd have followed three, four, seventy six
in New Vegas, and then on PC. I'm sure they have all those
old ones as well, like one two Tactics, and then I mean,
yeah, Shelter wouldn't really make sense. And then I don't know if any
other followut games exist. I might be missing one or two. Yeah,
well, yeah, I just think you make them very easily accessible. Having
a big expansion would have been really really ideal, because yeah, I mean
that anything game related. I mean, seventy six is the latest one,
and I don't know when the last expansion came out for that, Yeah,
seventy six. It did have the Atlantic City that was last year at some
point. I believe that came out, so it's pretty recent. But I
think I think people generally want like obviously there's people flocking in seventy six right
now, but I don't know if that's I don't know if that's what people
want necessarily when they when they want to jump back into Fallout, right.
Yeah. Yeah, I mean I've mentioned this before and I'll say it again
that like, man, they really I think the best thing they can do
in a short period of time, Like let's say they didn't really Let's say
they couldn't really conceive of how successful this show would be and how much people
would be flocking into these games. What can they do? Let's say they
hadn't started anything yet. What can they do before season two comes out?
I think the best thing they should and can do is just having a full
on remaster, not a remake. I think remaster's fine, but maybe maybe
you do got to do a bit of a remake energy for it for both
Fallout three and New Vegas. And I say those two because they're on the
same engine, and I imagine it's you know, it's quite a big project
for either of them, but I think it's a bit of a two Birds
one or two yeah, two birds one stone situation where if you can figure
out the tech for one of them, ideally you can kind of do it
for the other one as well. And I think a big thing for those
games is they both had a ton of DLC, like I think four DLC
packs each, like maybe three four. And even me, I'm a huge
Follout fan, I've played those games a lot, but it's one of those
situations where I play the games at launch, like before that DLC was there,
and then when I go back nowadays, it's like, Okay, I'm
just gonna go back. I want to play through the main story again or
something, and I never get around to the DLCs. I've never played any
of the DLC for New Vegas or Fallout three, two games that I love.
Yeah, New Vegas won and Fair Games. Ever, maybe I've dipped
in a tiny bit. And so I think if you have that remaster where
you bundle in you Game of the Year edition, it right, have all
the DLC in there, better frame rates, fix some more of those bugs,
four K textures and whatnot. You could add some extra bells and whistles.
I don't really think you need to, but I think that's that's the
move, and you have both of those come out. Of course they drop
in a game pass, but those would be also a perfect thing. Like
put that on PlayStation as well. Who cares? Like that's you know,
they've been doing that more and more. Those are things where like, okay,
those legacy titles exist on PlayStation already, fuck it, put them on
there. Try and get it on a switch to you know, by the
time season two comes out, the Switch sequel will be out there as well
well, and I think that would be that would be huge people would I
would buy both those games again, I mean they're on game Pass. Actually
I wouldn't, but I would play them both again. I'd buy it an
extra aversion to get some bonus content maybe. So I think that's the easiest
thing that they should do. But I also just think, now that it's
under the Xbox umbrella, like, give that ip to other studios. Let
the Wasteland team, I mean, they have another cool looking game, that
Clockwork game coming out, but give them Yeah, let them make a Fallout
game. Why not they some of those people worked on the original games right
back in the day, so it makes sense there. But yeah, just
all sorts of other spinoffs. I don't know, Let em city and make
another Fallout game, or just some other studio. There's so many. Let
tangle game works make some like Horror Fallout shorter experience. That'd be so cool.
So I think they should just crack open the doors. Be a little
less protective would be ideally the thing. And you know, if you have
cannon issues with it, then make the game in like the UK or something
where we haven't been before and cool. Yeah, let people do whatever they
want with it, Like that would be maybe be the route, but I
think that's that seems like the easiest thing is just a remaster for three and
New Vegas. Those games are old enough now where I think you could get
away with that, and some better gun play in general would really do those
games well in the modern setting. Mm hmm. Yeah, I didn't even
think about going through like another continent. That would be one of the coolest
things actually in retrospect. Yeah, and like I couldn't tell you off the
top of my head in the lore, like what the other parts of the
world are looking like. I think Canada got like majorly fucked up and is
now like owned by the States. I think that is one thing that was
Cannon. But those places still exist, right, they would just be not
Canadian anymore, I guess. But yeah, I don't know in the Cannon
if they've established like what's going on with New Zealand as a place. But
I think that could be cool. But also I think it's just who cares
just say it's like a non cannon game or whatever. You can just let
other things happen within that realm and connect it later. Like I think that
was even a thing recently where like New Vegas, I guess it's like never
technically been Cannon according to Bethesda, but then like Todd Howard is saying like,
oh, yeah, it's like Cannon. But then it like that opens
a can of wormstuff, like, well, New Vegas has different endings,
like drastically different endings on like Fallout three and four that you know, different
slight different change changes can happen based on your choices, but yeah, New
Vegas is like wildly different. So but they're just like, oh, yeah,
it's canon, and then it's like, well, what do you mean
you got to pick an ending? Like then they're not going to go that
far of course. So yeah, I don't know. That's that's what I
would like to see. Maybe that'd be a fun like full topic someday is
to pitch like full spin offs. So maybe I'll put that in the canon.
We could do that again sometime, but I think, yeah, the
easy answer for now is definitely a remaster. There you go, there's some
Fallout, Fallout fun stuff. Let's talk about Uh, let's talk about some
of the games you've been playing, Taylor. Do you want to you want
to start any any games you've been playing you want to shout out here.
Yeah, I can't remember how long ago it was, but I think I
mentioned in passing that I was kind of getting back into Pokemon violence a little
bit. Yes, I remember that. Yeah, so I've I've kind of
been expanding upon that. I've just been kind of getting more into the Pokemon
world a little bit again. I'm going back and playing a little bit more
of my Alpha Sapphire and a little bit of my Pokemon uh sword as well.
So there's just been a few Silkmon things. Sorry, just be couldn't
when you say Alf Sapphire, like, do you mean like you're going back
to an old playthrough and you're just playing more in it, or are you're
starting a new thing or what's going on? Not starting a new thing,
but just going back and just trying to like like do a little shiny hunting,
collect a few more things stuff like that. So I'm just kind of
like getting back and reimmersed into Pokemon. I've been I've taken up maybe like
a little venture that I'm gonna try and build upon, uh and with regards
to Pokemon, but we'll see how it comes. Yeah. Interesting, So
I gotta ask. You got back into Pokemon a little bit because of Sorry,
which one do you have Scarlet or Violet? I have just Scarlet.
So you got into it. I said Violet. I said Violet. You
said Violet, but you meant Scarlett. I need to look at my game
case because you I can't read Redder Purple. Okay, so you've been playing
Redder Purple and but now you're going back to older one. So doesn't mean
does that mean you're not playing Scarlet and or a Violet. You're just you.
It got it broke, it broke down the dam. But now you're
just like, actually, I want to go play. Well that's pretty much
shit. It's like every so often I see Pokemon pages I follow, they
have mystery gift codes, and so that's kind of my my segue back into
playing Pokemon Violet. So I will put the code in, I'll redeem the
Pokemon from mystery gift to the internet and just stock pile them. Because I'm
a Pokemon collector. I've got a very I think we joked about this a
long long time ago with pokem starting with Pokemon Sapphire, like almost two decades
ago. I started collecting Pokemon and keeping the event Pokemon, mythical Pokemon,
and like they're untouched forms, so they don't even have like a smidge of
XP on them. They haven't been used in any combat. They're just there
the raw, pure form. They're collectibles in my opinion. So and you
keep them in the case you don't battle with them or no, no,
no, don't battle. Yeah, yeah, so I keep them, keep
them mints like that, And I've been doing that since the original Pokemon Sapphire,
and I've just been migrating them from game to game to game. And
now we've got Pokemon Bank, which is great because it's all just in the
cloud now. But yeah, well what what what is elf Sapphire on?
What's the console for that? That's three D s okay, so what does
that mean with the because they just shut off the online stuff? So can
you still like do all that trading? And I haven't tried, but I'm
curious, And this is that's one of the reasons why I'm curious how it's
going to work out, because I've got everything still there, like the apps
on the on the DS, and so I'm curious. But I can still
do the migration, not at the end of the world. If I can't,
I'm not I'm not going back to necessarily try and like bring things over,
but I'm going back to just try and like explore a couple of little
things. There's a few videos I've been watching where if you have certain Pokemon
in the game doing certain things, then you can you can access certain other
things in the game and stuff like that, And there's a few other things.
I want to just explore certain areas that were not in the original Pokemon
Sapphire, and I've just been kind of feeling that nostalgia a little bit nice.
So, yeah, tell me what does a what does shiny hunting look
like? For you? Because to me, when I pictured that, I
feel like, you got guides open, You're going to like a specific spot.
You're like, you know, running around in circles in this specific part
of like piece of grass, and it's very grindy, which to me is
not what I really associate with Taylor Field as a gamer, like doesn't seem
like really you, So what does your shiny hunting regimen look like? I
kind of got a knack for doing the fishing and I managed to get oh
what is it? It was called a dragulge, I believe, and he's
that a pokemon. I've never heard of that in my life. Yeah,
dragal he's kind of like he's a poison dragon type and he's kind of like
a what would you call it, like a you we kind of looking dragon
like. He is a seeweed looking guy. He's cool. I've never now
so I menaginedly got a shiny one of him, and then I've gotten,
uh what else did I get? I got a few others, like a
corsola, got one of them shiny one, and there's a couple others.
I personally find that the fishing was a lot easier, and there's certain spots
that are more yielding than others. But I remember, you gotta be you
always got to be paying attention and careful because I've accidentally killed a shiny It
was a boodoo, which is what evolves into like the rosalie rosalia, and
I remember I popped up and I didn't think anything of it, and I
killed it and I continued on. But I thought, in retrospect, I'm
like, ma'am, it was green, but the one color on it was
a different color than I remember, and I googled it it was a shiny.
I thought, man, are you idiot? You idiot? That's heartbreaking.
Yeah, I don't think I've ever encountered a shiny. I mean I've
I've played a you know, two or three folk games, really not not
a ton. I've played more of the spinoffs than i've played like the mainline
games. But I don't think I've ever seen a shiny in the while.
Even my Pokemon Go days and I went pretty ham in the Go days when
it first came out. At least they've had a lot, yeah, a
lot more in Pokemon Go, which I mean, that's something I still I
still do play. I think that's interesting how they've they've merged that with the
mainline games. I haven't transferred from Pokemon Go into the main games. I
don't know how that. How often do you play Go? Whenever I'm in
a new city, whenever I'm on vacation, I whip it out always,
Okay, but not in Klona. The in Clona I do whenever. For
example, like whenever I am kind of like out on my own just walking
around, or I'm downtown, I'll whip it out events too. I'm usually
that sounds in appropriate. I want to I want to clip that whenever.
Whenever there's a kind of like events going on, I'll see what kind of
raids are happening nearby and that sort of stuff. So I try I keep
my foot in the door for the most part. But uh, yeah,
I think that it's just it's something I'm not ever going to be sure if
I can just like give up. I mean, Pokemon is just such a
it's such a wonderful thing. I'm just like I'm pulled up my Pokemon home
because I'm trying to see give you an example of a shiny I mean,
I definitely I usually they're like kind of like a purple teal. I feel
like that's that. I mean that they're probably very different depending on the Pokemon
they Yeah, they changed. So like here's an example. I don't know
how about you can see that, but there's like regular ray Quasa. Yeah,
and we got like the shiny ones. That's cool, very very nice.
So nice. There's there's a whole there's a whole nostalgic kick for me,
Like Pokemon Blue was was my first Pokemon game on my my nice purple
game boy color. I remember those days and the save didn't work on it,
so I would always get as far as I could, but it was
busted. It wouldn't save, so when I would turn it off, turn
it bout gone and have to research from the beginning. And it was very
unfortunate. Right, Yeah, that's too bad. I wish they would add
more Pokemon games to Nintendo Switch Online. That seems to be like a blind
spot where they have the Game Boy Trading Card game on there, I think,
which I should go check that out actually, just to see what it's
like. But I really want them to add what does the emeralds on the
GBA, right, which I've heard from a lot of people is like their
favorite of the best, And I also I just love the GBA so much
that I would go ham on that if they added such a thing. But
I don't know if they will because I feel like they do so many of
these remakes and they make so much money off Pokemon that's probably doesn't make sense
financially to just drop a big, expensive game like that on there. But
then there's other ones that I say this, like, they could get a
lot of money if they just sold those games, but they just drop them
on that service as well. So it's yeah, it's weird what they choose
to do and not do. But I hope they do add more of that
stuff on there. They do like the spinoffs, right, They've Coliseum and
whatnot on there, but they don't have any of the mainline games. I
don't think that's a shame. I have a few couple of years ago,
I started collecting some of those old games. I got Pokemon Yellow, I
got ruby sapphires, of course, I got Emerald uh fire red leaf green
like Pokemon black white, and then yeah, all the some of the other
later ones. I got rid of a couple a while ago, and I
wish I didn't. They're like Pomon White two stuff like that. But yeah,
I've just got a I've got a thing for collecting those older Pokemon games.
And I got Heart Gold Souls Silver, which I love it. It's
actually like it's like mint in the box. It's not I opened it up,
of course, but I got the poke Walker with it and everything like
that. Nice. And yeah, yeah, Pokemon kind of a weird spot
because I feel like the three DS was a huge era for Pokemon because you
got like three mainline games, and by three you know it turns into like
six, and then there's like all these other versions I think right, there's
like because Black and White was on the Pearl I think was the first one
that first generation on there, and then yeah, black and White, then
Black and White two, which the now whatever you were saying earlier alf of
South Fire, Yeah, just a remake one, right, So that's like,
yeah, that's a lot of games that are now you just cannot purchase
anymore. So I wonder if they're gonna swipe in with any like switch remakes
or additions of any of those now that they're not acceptable or acceptable that's not
the right word, now that you can't just go and purchase them as easily.
I mean, the shop's been down for a while, but now the
online's off too, obviously, So cool I was. That was a fun
Actually one more Pokemon question for you. I as you know, we had
it back in the day, back in the target days we had we're really
into Yugio for a while, me and Jessica whatnot playing some Yugio. Get
back into that. So we have cards and I've collected some other cards.
I have some the Lord of the Rings magic cards. I got like some
inscription cards, which are really cool. I'm not I don't really care as
much for my Pokemon cards, to be honest, Like I'm not just nostalgic
for them, though I did collect some of them growing up. Is it
like a prime seller's market? Should I just get rid of these things?
So when I was alluding to this venture, I've been spending the past week
doing research and looking Pokemon cards, and there is like, as far as
I don't want to say, like the boat has sailed, because if you
were to get into Pokemon in like twenty seventeen, like pre pandemic time,
you would have made bank. Right now, you can still make bank because
some of these cards, if you have them, are very, very valuable.
And this is the kind of thing I am I'm looking into. I'm
looking at certain trainer boxes that are worthwhile to hold onto for a little bit
because there's still a huge focus on Pokemon now. With your cards, if
they are like the base set and they're in really good condition and you get
them graded with like a PSA rating and you get like a really high grade
on them, you can get a serious return on those cards. Right,
So if you have some stuff that's like base sets, I would look into
that. Just do like a card price check. Some of that stuff is
exceptionally valuable. Yeah, I'll have to take a look. I imagine mine
aren't like original run kind of thing, just because of the age I was
and the age when they came out to see that that first edition on there.
Maybe you traded with someone and he gave up one of them. But
if you see that little first edition stamp on there, like, that's that's
huge, that's money. Okay, I'll look into that. I don't I
don't have a ton like I have way more you Goo cards of course than
I do uh Pokemon ones. But anyway, I'll have to look into that.
Okay, cool. How about how will we take a break here,
we come back, We'll talk about some other games we've been playing. We'll
right back. Okay, we are back, Taylor, was anything else you
wanted to show out? And you've been playing war Zone of course, but
anything else mostly Pokemon and Rebirth Island. Nice? Yeah? For myself,
I got two games to show out here. One first one here is called
Open Roads. These are both game pass games actually, which is nice,
easily accessible. Open Roads came out, I want to say, three weeks
ago. I think it came out in April, early April. This is
an interesting game. This would be a considered a walking simulator, which we've
talked about on side Quest before or even before that, me and Kirkland did
a whole episode on walking simulators like What Remains to Be to Finch and Gone
Home and other Firewatch other games like that, and we talked about it again
earlier actually in June, because I finally played through Deer Esther, which is
another classic walking sim in the genre. There these are kind of like these
first person narrative focus games, usually very short, like two to four hours
maximum in terms of the game time there. So Open Roads, yeah,
is from a development team They're called the Open Roads Team, published by Annapurna.
And the story of this is kind of interesting. I didn't even know
this stuff until I was done the game and I was looking it up.
But Open Roads this is from a lot of the team that made Gone Home,
which is one of the kind of quintessential walking sims. So they made
Gone Home and then they made Tacoma was their next game, which I haven't
played, and then it looks like they say were working on Open Roads with
that studio and then there was just all sorts of contra with that studio,
and a bunch of that team left the studio and in a weird turn of
fate you don't really see this happen often, where all these people left the
studio, but they got to bring the game with them of ok Roes.
So now the studio that was like, you know, making these things,
they're doing whatever, who knows what they're doing. Now it's kind of all
this controversy. Maybe they're just gonna go under or something weird like that.
But it's kind of like a nice story in a way that you know,
the silver lining, I suppose is that these people didn't like this work environment
was pretty toxic and whatnot, and so they left, but they got to
bring the game with them and continue it and finish it and then you know,
published by Anna Perna, which is a great publisher to have too.
So kind of an interesting story in that way and interesting to track the lineage
of this where yeah, it's a lot of the same people that maybe it
worked on Gone Home, but it's a different name and different code of paint,
you could say. But yeah, I played through this once again.
It is very short, maybe two three hours at most. This game kind
of takes a different spin on the genre. There's this a very small niche
genre, but even then it's still very trophy or often you're like going back
to a family member's old decrepit abandoned house and you're discovering like this old family
mystery that's kind of like the classic thing. It's usually like maybe a bit
scary, but not really horror. It's like kind of right on the edge
there, very narrative focused. Usually you're not like seeing other characters. Usually
it's just you and your kind of introspective investigation of all this stuff going on.
So in that way, this game is similar and that there is like
a family mystery. It's related to very much around like the grandmother on your
mom's side, which is like kind of the same as what Remains to Be
to the Finch, which is a funny thing. There you're visiting grandma's old
decrepit house, which is once again a very trophy thing within the genre.
But I think that it takes a much different deviation by being kind of a
road trip game actually, so you have like these different walking sim situations where
you're walking around a house like environment, picking up different posts, cards and
letters and reading these things on covering things about the past. But then you're
going to like different environments, so you're in like your family's house, you're
going to these grandma's house, you're going to the other couple other places as
well. And then in between that, you're in the car. You play
as like the daughter in this family and you're going on this road trip with
your mom, and so you're having conversations. So that kind of breaks up
the journey. It makes it feel a bit grander in its scale, which
I really enjoyed. I like that kind of seeing these different environments. That
was a cool thing to kind of change up the genre a little bit there
rather than kind of just being in one environment the whole time. It's kind
of got that same thing of like really highly detailed three D environments, really
beautiful stuff, a lot of little details, like every shelf, every corner
has like some little bit of storytelling in it. But then another thing too
that they kind of change up the art from the from the genre is like
the character art is kind of like these two D hand painted sort of characters,
which is weird, Like at first it's quite jarring if you'd like see
a trailer for this, look it up. You'll see that, like,
man, these characters stand out in a way, like way different than the
environments, like the two D characters with these three D environments. And then
the characters themselves, like when they're talking or doing stuff, it's like they're
very low frame rate in an attentional way, and it makes everything feel very
exaggerated, which is cool. Like every movement that they take is, you
know, just this very standout frame that lasts. It kind of sticks with
you, and at first it kind of weird to me O because like the
characters it's you know, very highly detailed and stuff, but like when they're
talking, like their mouths aren't moving, it's more just like they will express
certain emotions and it threw me off. But then what kind of brought me
back in is that the voice acting is really good in this. You have
the create the great Caitlin Deaver in this, who we've been talking about a
lot recently from that No One Can Save Save You movie last year. I
always for the name of it, but she's cast as Abby in the Last
of Us Season two of the TV show. And then Carrie Russell, who's
been in like a million things, is like the mom in this if you
go on our IMDb, she's like in all these huge movies, right,
So yeah, I have like really high level actors in this, and they
do a really good job. Especially Kaitlyn Deever just like brings so much personality
and like youthfulness to this character who's supposed to be like a teenage girl.
She does like a really good job of it. And you know, the
game, the game is kind of like melodramatic and like exaggerated in its tone,
and she like helps bring that to life in a big way. So
all that presentation stuff I really enjoyed as well. I think maybe where this
game is a bit weaker than some of its contemporaries like Gone Home, like
if Edith Finish or Firewatch, is that like the central narrative of it isn't
quite as gripping. It's, like I mentioned, like kind of that tropy
thing of like trying to figure out this secret life of your grandma and uncovering
like what that means for your family, and it's like it's all right,
and it kind of strings you along, but like the final reveals of it
aren't all that mind blowing. But I think the better part about the story,
the part that was more engaging to me, is kind of the stuff
along the way, Like there's a lot of in this game about your mom
and the divorce that she had with your father, and that's explored from a
lot of different angles that I thought were interesting, And even like thinking about
the studio afterwards and the story they've gone on and how like they kind of
had this split up with their studio, right, and this kind of like
almost like divorce between the people working on the game and like the original founder
of the company and this company they were working for. And so I feel
like maybe I'm getting two into the weeds on it, but I felt like
there's maybe some meta element there where they're kind of commenting on like this separation
they had in the game development part of it. But I thought all those
themes are really well done. And then like the idea of like cycles within
your within the families, and like grief, because you're doing a lot of
this, like right after the grandmother passes away, that's kind of like the
setup of the beginning of the story and spending time with your mom on this
on this adventure, and so I thought those kind of like a mini those
themes or like those side stories within this, which is pretty impressive for like
a game that's like two to four hours long that there's like enough packed in
like the little in the seams, you could say that is worthy of praise.
So I thought that was really cool part of it. But yeah,
I would definitely recommend this game, like it's short and sweet, and so
maybe I don't know how much it is, Like I don't know if I
could recommend buying it out right, because there's like other games i'd recommend first
if you haven't played the ones I've mentioned previously, but you know, if
you're a game Pass subscriber, definitely check it out. I really had a
good time with it. Took me like two or three sittings to get through
the whole thing, of course. And yeah, I really hope that this
isn't a situation where this team broke off. They got to finish their game,
and maybe that's like the the Catharsists they needed. They finished the game,
then they can go off and go do a million other things with their
careers. I hope that the Open Roads team, you know, sticks around,
and even though they named their studio after this game that they're just releasing,
hopefully they can go off and make other things, and I think they've
maybe are set up for making just bigger and better and cooler things going forward
to that land a bit more. But like overall, it's a really impressive
game and really fun, and yeah, I just I of a short experience,
like a short, powerful experience like this. So so yeah, there
you go, there's open Roads. I had a really good time with this
one, and I definitely recommend it nice. Yeah, maybe not necessarily tailor
game. I don't think you've really ever played any of these kind of walking
sim games, right, I don't think so. When I didn't even realize
walking sim was the official title for that. When you say Sam, I'm
thinking, like, is that like a farming simulator but you're walking. Yeah,
it's kind of like a it's kind of like a derogatory term almost,
I feel like, because it's like there's not really a lot of gameplay aments
usually just like you're just walking around an environment and like reading stuff and taking
in story, and so I feel like the name started as like almost just
like a joke, and then that just kind of became what it was called
and I hate that. And in that out of Man episode that me and
Kirklan did talking about the genre, we had a longer discussion on like how
bad the genre is, and we in that we were pitching like other genre
titles for it, but like, who am I at sidequist here to like
start using this other genre name and people to know what I'm talking about.
It just doesn't really make sense. So I'll just say games that are like
what Remade to be a finished very much like Gone Home, like some bigger
games in the genre. It's kind of the best way to say it,
unfortunately, but yeah, they're kind of just like a modern take on like
an adventure game is another way that I would think about it, where it's
like low gameplay, more about the setting and the story of it and just
clicking on things more than like fighting things, you know, right, Yeah,
but yeah, there you go. Check that one out. And then
the other game I wanted to shout out here is another new release. This
just came out a few days ago. It's called Harold Hellibit, which is
a funny name. And I've talked about this before because it's been in some
showcase maybe a summer game fest but I feel like I've known about it for
a few years. It's kind of just been lingering. I think it had
a long development cycle. This is developed and published by Slow Bros. I
think this is like their first game as a studio. If anyone forgets what
this game is, definitely YouTube a trailer. You have to see it to
believe it. And Taylor, you should do the same too if you forget
this one. But maybe you've seen it because it just dropped on game Pass
as well. But yeah, the coolest part about this game is that the
way they made the art style of it is by like actually making claymation figures
and doing stop motion animation for like everything in it, putting like claymation,
putting like fabric on these characters, and then like doing the stop motion for
all of the animations in it, and then like somehow pourting that into a
game engine and then like putting the finishing touches on it and making it a
playable game. But it's essentially like a stop motion like a Wes Anderson type
of thing that you get to play, So in that way, it's like
incredibly unique. And from I'm like two or three hours in and like,
yeah, the aesthetic is like my favorite part of it. It's just such
a weird, cool thing. But it all it's very much lending to the
story and the world that they're developing too. But even like the liquid,
like you're underwater in this game and like a rapture type city, and like
the way the water flows in like looks really silly and interesting. And the
characters all look very goofy and clay mationity as you as you expect is that's
what they are. So it's just like the aesthetic is the is the thing,
and I so far it's not just style over substance, Like it's a
cool game too, and I'm liking the story and the characters, but yeah,
like that's what you got to talk about first with the game for sure,
is just like wow, it looks so weird and different and interesting.
I've never seen a game like it before, and that's an impressive thing to
say in the year twenty twenty four, and I've played hundreds of games that
this game comes out and looks and feels and plays like something I haven't played
before, So that's that's pretty cool. Any any interest from this from just
seeing the trailer and wanting to go jump in and check it out. Looks
like the time to invest in this game like building it, Yeah, blows
my mind and blows mind. It looks fantastic though, really really cool.
Yeah, when every time I'm I'm just wondering, like, okay, how
much of this like is that stop motion versus what is things that they did
in the game engine afterwards? And like I don't know where that line is.
It's impossible to tell. But that's what makes it even more compelling is
that it just feels so it's the sixty frames playing game, you know,
like it feels good and moves well. But so it's like, how do
they pull this off? It's really really cool. But but yeah, I
definitely recommend checking it out. Once again, I'm not done it, like
I said, so who knows how it's gonna keep going. I don't know
how long this game is either, but so far you're in this rapture like
city. The setup of the game, this is maybe minor spoilers for some
early stuff, is that this civilization that you're in, this underground, this
underwater city is not on Earth, but Earth was you know, climate change
and all this Earth was going to hell, and so these people built this
corporation, built this ship, this vessel, and just sailed off into space.
And they didn't know where they were going exactly, but they're like,
Okay, we'll make this sustaining ship and we'll figure out where we're going later
on. And it's like one hundred and fifty or two hundred years whatever it
is passed, and eventually this space faring ship, you know, different generations
at this point have found a planet that looks good enough they're gonna go make
this their habitable planet. And then they get there and they realize that there's
no land on this planet whatsoever, so it's just water. And then like
the atmosphere is like completely toxic, so they pretty much just have to go
underwater. So now this underwater rapture is pretty much just like the ship that's
been converted and I guess just falling. The ship has fallen in and you're
espentially just like in this spaceship that's now underwater and that's been turned into like
shops and towns and laboratories and all these different things that you need in these
in this ship. So the setting of it is great, and this is
a bit of a spoiler for something that happens a bit later on. But
I think the tone of this game is very silly. It actually feels like
very inspired by Wes Anderson two in terms of like the tone and the characters.
Like there's one character in here that feels like Obi from Loki season two.
He's kind of got that sort of energy about his character, and like
the game's funny. It's made me laugh a few times, just in terms
of like the subject matter, but also like the individual lines. It feels
very much like a TV show in the way that things are going along.
But I think one of my favorite things about it is like you're just going
through and for the first time, like an incightening event. I guess you
could say, is that for the first time ever, this space station or
this new civilization is like getting a message back from Earth. They have never
communicated with Earth since they've left, and the message they get is just like
Earth being like, yeah, you guys left, things are looking bad,
but like it actually worked out okay, and we're good now. And so
now you're in just like this hell underwater, this worst place ever. Harold's
like living this like bad life is not like and stuff and then Earth's like,
you know what, you guys could have stayed, but now it's like,
well, now you're fucked. You're underwater, there's no way you can
leave. You're not getting back to Earth. Anyone on this it would take
more than their lifetime to get back there anyway. So it's like that's just
like the perfect kind of encapsulation of the tone of this. And then in
that way, it feels very much like and maybe this part's a bit on
the noses. I just like everything these days is about like corporations are bad,
and that's like the theme of so many TV shows and games and movies
that we've talked about in the last few years, and this is definitely that
too, where like the company that runs this spaceship and this town the city
now is like very corrupt and just like screwing people over constantly and not sharing
information with people, and like they have these ulterior motives and they're evil and
all this stuff, and so I'm curious to see how that stuff will Like
that's what that's what the setup has been, and I'm curious to see what
they do with that and if this is like a story of them overcoming that.
But I don't really see how positive the message could be given everything I've
been set up with so far. But I think the lightheartedness of it kind
of takes away from I guess some of that what would otherwise be kind of
traumatic stuff going on. But even in that happens and Harold's like, he's
chill with it. He's like, yeah, whatever, this is my life,
you know, this is where I live, this is the life I
live. I'm just gonna go I gotta go find his rock now, because
that's what he was doing before that announcement came on. Now he's gonna go
back and try and find this rock again. So so yeah, I definitely
I'll report back on this game when I've played more of it, maybe next
week, maybe two weeks from now, when I've finished it. I don't
know how long it is, Like I said, but yeah, really weird,
interesting game. And yeah, the story, the characters, but then
also like the setting or the visuals of it are just unlike a game any
other game I've ever played before. So for that reason, I'm very intrigued
in it and definitely going to keep playing through and hopefully see it to the
end. There you go, there's Harold Hallibit. Like I said, I'll
report back, but a really really cool, interesting, weird game that people
should definitely be checking out. Yeah, there you go. Next, up,
let's jump into some news. We have kind of three topics here.
Let's start with this Tales of the Shire. Taylor. Have you heard of
this game before? Did you know about this game before today? I had
no idea this existed. Yeah. I think I talked about it with Kirkland
a couple of times, and maybe even Travis at some point on side Quest.
But I think whenever it's been relevant in the news, you haven't been
on that episode, which is why that makes sense to me. But this
is essentially like a farming sim a stardew Valley like type of game, you
could say, animal crossing like, set within the world of Lord of the
Rings, set within specifically the Shire in what I think is the city or
town you're in. It's called Bywater, which I haven't heard of before.
So I think they're, you know, trying not to go to beg In
or like the known locations from the movies and books and such, but instead
trying to go to some other place so they can kind of create their own
world. But we finally we had a teaser before, but now we have
official trailer on this. What did you think of Tales of the Shire.
I think it looks like it's it's just gonna be a lot of fun,
just to kind of a kickback experience. Looks to my surprise, again with
the name, I didn't know what to expect, but it just seems like
it's a very simple life in the Shire with doing different building, farming kind
of stuff like that. There's a day and night cycle, looks like there's
a season cycle, so it's It kind of took me by surprise seeing all
that, because I feel like the track record for Lord of the Rings related
games hasn't maybe I shouldn't say hasn't been great, but it's been kind of
up and down. I don't know how the Moria game went. I know
that the Golam game was absolutely a bust, but I know that then you
have Shadows of War and Shadows of Middle Earth that are like really great titles.
So yeah, I hit or miss, But yeah, it's been a
it's been a weird mixed bag for Lord of the Rings games recently, especially
under the Embracer group, which we'll talk about shortly here as well. I
I'm glad that you were more positive on this. I I have been excited
for this game. I've been very much looking forward to it. I think
this is a great idea to take, like, Okay, let's go with
a wholesome, non combat Lord of the Rings game, because why not?
Why not have some team make this cool looking game. But I was just
really unimpressed with the trailer itself and the footage of it, and for me
also the variety. And you know, this is the first trailer, and
so I'm sure we'll get more information as things go on, but you know,
the things they're highlighting here is like they had this kind of pun where
they said that they said forage friendships in it, which I think was like
two things. So they're showing that you're like foraging ingredients, which makes sense
as like this hunter gatherer type. Then there's also the friendships part of it.
But I didn't really get much of a vibe of like personalities or characters,
Like it doesn't seem like there's voice acting. We didn't really see what
the dialogue is like. We don't really know what like quests are like,
or what characters are gonna be like in general, but I guess I wasn't
grabbed by any character in here, and we see a Gandolf looking type at
one point, so I don't know how much they're gonna use established characters,
but I guess I didn't really vibe with the characters and the design of them.
I wasn't particularly into just visually speaking, So that's one thing. I
think. The part that I'm most interested in is like the decorating your home
part of it, because I like doing that in games, and I think
building like a Shier home seems pretty fun. It seems like it's more centator
on the inside rather than the outside, which makes sense because you're kind of
just tucked in a hill there. But that part seemed alright, But I
guess, you know, my biggest takeaway is like I didn't really get Lord
of the Rings vibes from this trailer outside of like, okay, guy kind
of looked like Gandalf a little bit, and like I know what a Shire
home looks like like, I don't know. I guess the Chibby art style
like makes it not necessarily look like Hobbits and more just like a Chibby art
style kind of game. I'm trying to remember the name of the game that
MUDs was playing recently, and I can't remember off the top of my head
if Fay Farm was the one that she's been playing, which is like another
one of these farming and sim cozy games, and this looks exactly like that,
which like nothing wrong with that, But now I'm thinking this game looks
more like Fay Farm than it does a Lord of the Rings thing, so
I guess that's I don't know, maybe that's my issue, and it's like
I'm not expecting dwarves and elves in this, like I want it to be
a Shire specific game, but I also want there to be like some more
Lord of the Rings iconography to it. So I don't know, maybe I'm
asking for too much there, but I maybe got to see more. And
then they kind of just had the ambiguous like explore bywater, so I don't
know how much you're gonna explore beyond the town itself into like woods or the
fields and farms and other things like that. But there just wasn't a whole
lot in the gameplay side of things that really called to me. And even
like the farming, some elements in terms of like mid maxine farming and planting
different crops, Like we didn't really see a lot of that here, right,
It's more just like hanging out. So so yeah, I don't know.
I'm I'm there's a good chance I buy this if it's like a lower
priced game, which I think it should be based on, like seems like
how much there is here. But yeah, I was hoping that this first
trail, like I I feel like I had very low expectation that it somehow
let those down. So maybe that's not a good sign for once again the
state of Lord of the Rings games. But I don't know, do do
you see this as a game that you would pick up, because I don't.
I don't think you're big into like the cozy games the genre. I
don't think I would necessarily pick it up, but if it were to drop
on games Pass, then maybe I could try it, because again, it
gives me kind of the Harvest Moon vibes, not necessarily animal cross. Sure,
yeah, to that extent, but that's enough to kind of entice me
to my toes. And especially because it's Low of the Rings and I'm curious
with that, I doubt we would get anything where like DLC were like ur
Achaia attack or something like that. It's just I'm just gonna be very lighthearted.
That would be crazy. I don't I don't think i'd want to see
that. But yeah, I mean I hope that we get you know,
as we have more trailers and more just interviews with the developers and stuff,
we get more information here that's more engaging because like I said, like I
don't want combat in it. It's not what I'm looking for. But I
think just more decoration, more like intriguing stuff that you're doing with these characters.
Maybe a little bit more with the exploration and seeing these different environments,
and I don't know, maybe even just like I'll get attached to some of
the characters. But I don't know, I feel like I need a little
bit more than what was given to me here in this first trailer today.
So yeah, there you go. And then along with that Embracer Group,
who we just hate because Embracery Group is just the worst. Here's here's the
timeline, well not an exact timeline, but Embracer Group frame forgets. This
company has a lot of money somehow, no one knows where this money comes
from, and they start buying up all these studios, They start buying up
all this ip and then sometime last year they I guess, we're expecting like
this big deal to come through with like a couple of billion dollars that would
help them, and I guess that deal didn't come through, and then they
just started laying people off like crazy, like laying off an insane amount of
people. I think they've had the most layoffs out of anyone in what has
been two years of an insane amount of layoffs. So it's just like,
fuck you, why did you acquire this stuff? Why are you doing all
this? You have no business plan clearly, like this is just such a
mess and I hate all this. They're just the worst. And then at
some point they sold Gearbox I guess to make some more capital, hopefully so
they don't have to layoff as many people. But now their new thing is
that they one thing that hopefully is gonna help them and not have to do
as many layoffs is by splitting off into kind of three sub companies and they're
going to kind of focus on their specific niche. So the first one,
as as Mood Group is what they're calling it, And this is more focused
on like board games, because I guess they have like a bunch of board
game IP and stuff, so we don't really talk about that. But that's
one of the three arms. The other two is what they're One of them
is called Middle Earth Enterprises and Friends, and they describe this, I'm getting
this information from the Verge shows to the Verge here. This company, which
will be renamed from Embracer Group, is described as the creative powerhouse and Triple
A game development and publishing, so they will retain ownership of things like Dead
Island, Killing Floor, Kingdom, Come Deliverance, tomb Raider, the Lord
of the Rings EPs. So those are some of the biggest ips that they
own as a as a Embracer Group, you know. And so that's one
helm of it. The other side of it is going to be what they're
calling Coffee Stain and Friends, and this is described as a diverse gaming entity
that will focus on indie, mid market and free to play games, So
that would include things that they currently have such as Deep Rockalactic, Goat Simulator,
Satisfactory, Reckfest, Teardown, Valheim. So yeah, there's kind of
like I guess what you call the indie label and then like the Triple A
label. I think that makes sense to a certain extent, and hopefully because
they can divide and conquer, they can get some better leadership for these different
companies and they can help focus on those things, and you know, the
coffee stain one, like the indie one, can hopefully kind of go in
that more Anapurna or Devolver Digital type of realm and just focus on that indie
stuff. And then you have the Middle Earth Enterprises in front, which is
a weird name to pick for that. Like, I guess they're just picking
like their biggest ip and naming it after that, but it just it's just
weird. I don't I don't think it makes a whole lot of sense.
But I guess they want to get away from the embrasor group name and get
people to forget about that name. That's probably a big part of this.
And so you have yeah, yeah, the indie side and then like the
more Triple A side. Does that make sense? But then the part where
I get worried about this is later on you're like, a quote from the
founder of the CEO, is this the move has been made with the intention
un least the full potential of each team and provide them with their own leadership
and state decision or direction. Okay, that sounds good, But then this,
this is the start of a new chapter, a chapter that I intend
to remain part of as an active, committed and supportive shareholder of all three
new entities. So it's like, okay, well, this Dufus is still
you know, at the hell level, he's still got at the wheel directing
all these things and ultimately making a lot of these big decisions. So hopefully
that doesn't end up being the case, and there's more power put into the
people who are the leaders of this. But then you got to hope that
they get the right leaders, and then there's all these other things that still
only to line up. So I don't see this being a huge change overall,
but I hope that this helps them by like being able to focus on
these different divisions within this. And maybe the last thing I'll say before you
can share your thoughts is that I know that they like also have some sort
of rights to do with some movie or TV related thing, Like I think
they have the movie rights for Lord of the Rings. I believe, and
I could be wrong. I'd love for someone to fact check me on that,
But like what does that mean for that? Like are they just gonna
sell that off and give that to someone else? I think that would be
a good thing for them to do. You know, you want to spread
your self tooth in here, and they're already trying to do that, like
address them that issue that they have by doing that, But like I don't
know what that means for like a Lord of Rings movie. Obviously there's Lord
of Rings TV stuff. Amazon has some ownership of that right with Rings of
Power. But I don't know where the movie stuff falls in. So we'll
keep an eye on some of that stuff too. But I know I threw
a lot at you here, But what do you think about this? And
this is this hopeful or do you think not much is gonna change? I
don't think much is gonna change because I feel like when you're a business owner,
you can benefit by being an umbrella company and kind of diversifying and splitting
off in the multiple smaller companies. I want to say that there are there
are definite probably like financial tax benefits to doing such a thing maybe, And
so I mean, if it's coming from the goodness of their heart to come
out with a different division focusing on different things, like you said, like
Triple A titles and E mobile gaming stable tops. I think that that's maybe,
hopefully in the longer room, that's good because then you're getting the dedicated
minds behind these certain types of games to be working on them instead of just
a whole mixed bag. But I don't know, I'm not sticking with the
optimistic approach with this one necessarily. Yeah, yeah, I mean really,
I guess my main hope at this point would just be that, like they
don't continue to close studios and lay people off, because they've done so much
of that already, and so hopefully like this, maybe the tax write offs
are good for them and that helps them be more sustainable and helps them not
have to do as many layoffs. But then I could also see the opposite
way, where they save some money on taxes there then they can still lay
people off, and then they can just make more money to the CEO.
So it's like, I don't know, I just can't look at this in
an optimistic lens, just because of the history of this freaking group over the
last like three or four years has just been like almost exclusively bad news.
And not good for the industry, and we haven't really seen too much of
value that come out from them that's been like big new releases either like if
anything, it's been like things that they've acquired already like Midway or that were
already finished development have got like new updates or something like that. So hopefully
they can turn it around here. But I'd be curious to see you if
they get anyone of note in these roles, like people that we would know
of, because I mean, this is like I think a Sweden based thing,
like the owner of this or something like that, Norway something like that.
So I don't know. Maybe they would just get other people that they
already have, but I feel like they kind of need some new people in
these positions, maybe based on how things have looked so far. But yeah,
so there you go. I think it's interesting information and I'll definitely keep
an eye on that. But I guess the other thing to be wary about
is like going forward, if you ever see the company name Middle Earth Enterprises
and Friends, know that as Embracer group they're trying to hide between these new
masks. Probably they buy some faith from the public audience and whatnot. Public
facing stuff, but it's still the same old Embracer. It's the same guy
who's gonna make the same decisions, and so hopefully things can change and hopefully
this is a new good path for them. But yeah, we'll see how
that goes. And then lastly, I wanted to save this for last,
and actually maybe we'll take our last ad break and then we'll come back and
get into our last piece of news. Will be right back. Okay,
we are back. So, like I said, I wanted to save this
to last because this is potential spoilers. People might not want to hear some
of these things, so if so, you can bow out. But we
are gonna be talking about some Xbox leaks that have happened. So this is
the leaks of the potential or the upcoming showcase I should say, the June
Classic Summer showcase that Xbox does. Here are some leaks from that from things.
So if you don't want to hear that, thanks for joining us thus
far, and we'll see you next week. But Taylor, we'll go into
this first time about the Call of Duty stuff. So two things here.
One is apparently the next Call of Duty game, So I guess coming out
this year is gonna be Call of Duty, Black Ops Golf War, So,
yeah, what do you think about that? Does that interest you just
in terms of like the setting there it being a Black Ops game, but
it also the the Golf War, I think is like a nineties thing.
I don't know if we have we ever had a Call of Duty game in
the nineties. This is a very specific question, but I feel like,
you know, Cold War, the World War ones and two's advanced war for
modern warfare, Like, I feel like we've never really had a nineties sort
of setting. The Black Ops two is the early nineteen nineties apparently, okay,
Black Ops. Cold War is yeah, eighteen or nineteen eighties, Okay,
the nineties. So there's there's a couple in there. But it feels
like maybe the Grassman straws a little bit with the Golf War, but at
some point we really when you release a game everywhere, game every year,
you are grasping at straws. So I don't know, does that interest you
at all that we're going back to Black Ops and or the goal for part
of it. I like Black Ops. I do enjoy it, and as
long as it's not World War two, I'm very happy with that. I
mean there's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven
titles that are all World War two based Call of Duty. So that's that's
one too many. If you ask me, do you think six is the
perfect number? You think sevens just that's where the straw the camel's back there,
you know. I would I would take six. I would. I
think Caldy w W two is too much Calledity Vanguard. I really did like
Vanguard and the other ones you go World of War called Call of Duty one,
two and three, those original ones on the xbox. So I think
it. I think it legit has one too many. The but Golf,
I think any addition to the Black Ops series I'm happy with. I hated
Calderty Ghosts, so we don't need anything with that. But Black Ops has
gone from I mean the seventies up to like the year two thousand and seventies
with Black Ops four. Right, they've they've was black Ops four? Or
is that? Which one? Is that? What? An advanced warfare?
Is that not advanced? There was two advanced warfares? Right? Or was
there just one? There's just infinite warfare and then advanced warfare. Advanced warfare
is twenty sixty and I think this person just put Black Ops four in there
twice. But anyways, I think that there is definitely a place now for
them to do these kind of like modern day Call Duty titles and then these
previous year dated Call Duty titles. I think that now that they've got this
kind of this platform, when you go into the Call of Duty Hub and
you basically just install your next Call Duty game in there, and it's just
one giant interface, and this is just gonna feel like a massive upgrade to
what we've gotten so far, because we got Modern War for two and then
they dropped Mono War for three after and it's just so my mind is still
blown away at how imprecedent this is. Where you have the game just kind
of like Moneral War for two is still relevant, but it's just upgrade to
basically to a new Call Duty title. All the old guns from those games
are pourted over into the new game. Your everything that you've unlocked ports over,
and that's same I'm imagining is going to happen here. So I don't
feel like I'm necessarily at any kind of a loss. I just feel like
my collection is just growing and I can have more more access. I don't.
I don't play Call of Duties necessarily for the story, even though I
heard Monofair the Monoalafair titles definitely have an interesting story. While I haven't beaten
all of them, I still have that on my list of topics one days
to do that retro with you of Modern Warfare. Oh, I'd love to
do the retro for that. Yeah, but I'm excited for this. I
am m hmm, yeah. I mean I I think what I'm most curious
about with this is outside the game itself, but it's just that this is
gonna be the first Call of Duty game releasing post acquisition going through right now
that acquisitions finally happen in Dablafore's on game Pass right, So I'm just very
like I I've been in the camp where I think they're gonna put the new
Call of Duty on Game Pass day one. And yes it's still in PlayStation
for many years, maybe on the switch to who knows. They've talked about
how they're gonna continue doing that as well, but I do think they're gonna
put it into game Pass day one, So I'm just very curious what that's
gonna mean for the numbers and the sales and if that's like like, I
just don't think game Pass is big enough yet for that to be a huge
issue for them in terms of like losing sales, and in fact, I
think it'll get more people, if anything, more people play in the game,
because you'll have people who have been on the fence like me, who
are The only investment I'm putting into call dues is playing war Zone, but
I'm not putting any dollars. I haven't put a dollar into Call of Duty
in like a decade like that. I will definitely play this day one on
game Pass, play through the story for the first time in a very long
time, and that will be fun and I'm excited to hopefully do that with
you if it is truly on game Pass. Of course that's all assuming because
we still haven't got that confirmation. But yeah, that's the thing I'm most
curious about. I think the setting. I mean, I don't know if
it means a lot to me because Black Ops. I love that first Black
Op, but that was like the last Call of Duty game I played until
war Zone, so I haven't played two, three, four, five,
six, seven eight. However, many Black Ops games there are, So
it's like, I'm not super invested in it, but that first one is
like one of my favorite Call of Duty games. It's a great game overall,
So I think it's it's cool that we're going back to that. I'm
interested in it, and I don't really know much about the goal for in
terms of setting or things like that, so I can't really comment too much
on like what that would look like in terms of the campaign side of things.
But yeah, I'm really curious to see what that looks like. I
think that makes sense, and I think that'd be a like that's pretty cool.
It's good for Xbox that they can have that kind of thing at their
showcase now, right, it's locked in. That's something they can put out
because that's that's a big deal. Normally Call of Duty events have kind of
been like more scattered into other places or they're kind of on their own because
they're so big. But I think it's a really good piece of the puzzle
that they can put that in their showcase, and something like that would be
a great closer or opener. Part of the rumor too, is that we're
gonna hear about this game prior to that event and that'll be like where you
get more information. So I could see that being a situation where it's like,
here's a two minute trailer, here's the name of the game it's coming
out this year, and then tune in at the Xbox event for fifteen minutes
of additional information. I think that would make a lot of sense. I
think that's a good move as well, because that's a good bit of marketing
leading into that as well, So looking forward to see what that looks like.
And then along with this is that apparently this would be the time when
they would bring Call of Duty games to Game Pass in a big way.
So still to this point, as of April twenty second, the only thing
we've seen is Diablo four in terms of that acquisition stuff coming to the platform
so far, and so I think Call of Duties are really good if you're
going to prioritize anything. Diablo four makes sense because I was a newer game
still. But then I think after that, Call of Duty makes sense of
get all that back catalog on there, get all those games in there,
because that would bring a lot of people to that subscription service, especially like
I said, with the new one being day one, that would bring a
lot of people in I think to want to subscribe and check that out.
So that's pretty exciting for me because that's a lot of games and I've not
played a lot of them, so i'd definitely jump and play some old campaigns
or jump and play the zombies. Is maybe a big highlight for me because
I've missed a lot of those newer zombie maps and I want to play those
with you particularly. But yeah, I think there's just so many of these
games that I've missed over the last few years. I'd love to just jump
in and just see what they feel like, see what I missed in those
years. And so I think this would be a huge hit if they can
say like that could be a huge day one or day yeah, same day
drop of Like during the showcase, say here's fifteen Call of Duty games in
game Pass right now, you can go download them in this moment. So
yeah, like I said, I think it'd be a good priority for them
if they're gonna focus on there's so much Activision Blizzard stuff, like it's gonna
take a long time for them to get all that into the service, But
I think Call of Duty makes sense as the priority there. But you've kind
of owned all these games, Like, does this excite you at all that
you're getting them in there? I've gotten Yeah, I've gotten everyone since World
of War probably, and I've played through them religiously and it doesn't matter to
me if they're on there. I hope that they do go on there if
I had an actual say on the matter, because yeah, like then we
could play zombies and whatnot. And I don't think it's any strange coincidence that
all the old Call Duty games got their servers back up and running. I
think that there is something in the world, and does happened, oh twenty
twenty three, because I remember when they went and booted them back to the
post acquisition, but prior to it being it was post acquisition yea, because
I went. I went back and was playing Zombies online again and it was
just easy as I was. I was loving it. So yeah, I'm
very much looking forward to doing that with you and these things dropped. This
is pure speculation part, but do you think that this would be a day
one drop as I mentioned, or do you think it'd be like still later
in the year kind of thing when they would actually hit the service. I
could see it being day one, I mean, just going hard. Yeah,
I think in general they want that they want to have something that you
can go play today, and I think that would make sense, and I
hope that is the case too, because then I feel like that opens up
the door for later this year for other drops, because I that's I'm just
so excited to see all the random games, games that I don't even think
about as Activision Blizzard hitting that service and I just love browsing that game pass
library and downloading new and old things that I've never played before, and dabbling
and all sorts of things. So I'm very just excited to do that.
So hopefully that does start happening soon. I mean, hopefully we even get
stuff before for the showcase, even if there's other non call of duty things
that they want to do prior to that. Next up is, uh,
Gears of War six is rumored to be here. Tell me about this.
I thought we were gonna get this a long time ago, to be honest,
I'm Gears five r oh, I think so before series X, So
yeah, it's definitely a good minute ago. And that's the first Gears game
I did not buy because they dropped it on Games Past Day one. I
enjoyed the multiplayer, though I remember I feel like at this point, I
remember it being kind of like a cult following. Now at this stage,
I think Gears four definitely brought a lot of the old fan base back.
And again, I'm not speaking from any statistically factual position here, but I
just feel like Gears five might have kind of like fuzzed out a little bit,
And then when you add such a delay on getting that sixth one,
I don't know if the hype is necessarily still there. I hope it is,
because I think whatever story that they've been telling so far, they need
to kind of wrap it up. So I think a Gear six would definitely
work. But if it drops on games Pass, I'll definitely get it.
I'll try it out, but I don't think i'd buy the game at this
point. I think Gears four maybe the last one that i'd buy. Yeah,
how into the multiplayer? Did you get a five from that come out?
Oh? Was that like a thing where you're playing for like a couple
of weekends or is it more like a few months of like really trying to
get into it. I was in there for a few weekends. Nothing will
ever compare to Gears three. When that dropped and I went hard, I
was skipping school just to be playing all player. I was in the zone
with that. Gears four, though I enjoyed it, Like Gears five,
I probably played more multiplayer than I actually engaged with my time in the campaign,
to be honest. And they had some cool dlc they terminator Sarah Connor
like Arnold's. That actually fits really well with that. It does, it
really really does. Yeah. I think they even Dave Batista was a character
in there too, so wow. Interesting. Yeah, Yeah, they did
some cool crossovers. Yeah, it's I feel like Batista to me still feels
like more newly a huge celebrity, you know, post wrestling into like the
actor stuff. It's like Man Guardians one came up so long ago now that
I guess he's been like in the zeitgeist for a long time at this point,
So I need to think about that. Yeah, Gears, I haven't
talked about it in a while, I guess. But I'm not really a
huge gearshead, as people longtime listeners will know, so I'm not particularly excited
about this, but I think it. I think it makes sense. The
timing on it makes sense. I did look it up, and yet twenty
nineteen was Gears five, and I don't think there was any DLC for that
really, Like maybe there was some like rand skins, but I do remember
there being like a huge role out of DLC. But yeah, now that
I'm in the Xbox ecosystem on one game pass, I'll definitely check this out
day one. I'd love to jump in there for a review with you.
I don't know if i'd play through the whole thing, but you know,
impressions of the story, and definitely play a few weekends of the multiplayer.
I've never loved the multiplayer, but you know, it's a new game.
I'd love to check it out, jump in. So yeah, I think
that that's huge for them as well. That's once again like that could start
around the show. That could be one of those big heavy hitters. And
I think Gears still is huge for Xbox as an exclusive, even though they
now technically own a ton of other exclusives. But in terms of it being
like an identity piece for Xbox, Halo and Gears are still that one in
two even if there's like other bigger things that are owned by them now as
a company. So I think it's important to keep that going. And like
I think Tactics came out Post five, right, because that came out,
yeah, more recently, but there hasn't been a ton of Gears stuff in
the meantime. It's been fairly quiet, and so I think this is a
good timing for it. Do you think this would be something that would be
potentially ready this year they've already announced, like other I'm gonna immediately answer my
own questions that I don't think so, because I feel like they would have
wanted maybe that showcase they did back in January where they talked about those games.
I feel like they maybe would have want to put Gears there if it
was going to come out this year. So I'm gonna say announcement this year,
releasing next year twenty twenty five. Is there a traditional time when those
games come out? Like are they a November drop? I feel like they
might be Round Gears one and two or November. Gears three is April.
Here's four was October again, so if I had to say, Gears five
was September. Fall is definitely the the high percentage here of right states.
I think with Xbox it's more it's less about like trying to hit those dates
anymore and more about just like trying to line up their release dates across the
calendar year and trying to have something big in every quarter. So I could
see them pushing it forward or back, and we don't really have any release
dates for them in twenty twenty five. We know of games that are probably
gonna come out that year, but we don't really have release dates yet.
So I think I could see I could see at some point twenty point to
five being the release date for a Gear's six. I agree. I think
this is for sure a twenty twenty five title. Mm hmm. Nice.
Yeah, so we'll keep an eye on that. I think that'd be a
big, fun, excitement, uh excited hype announcement to see. And then
the last one here we have is State of Decay three is apparently gonna be
at the showcase. And this was the most exciting thing for me at this
uh just looking through the leaks. I still have not played one or two,
but that's still that first trailer that we got at like two or three
years ago now with like that dead deer in the snow whatever, Like I
haven't gone back and watched it or anything recently, but that was a great
trailer. Like, I'm really excited. I think that like a snow weed
setting for the zombie like apocalypse sort of game could be really fun. And
I think the multiplayer element I think will be really fun. Considering me,
you and Travis at least wrong game pass, so we could go check that
out together. So I and I've been saying for a while, like,
man, where the frick is this game? Why have they not been showing
it for so long? And so hopefully it's a situation where they showed it
to get it out there to say, hey, this is what the studio
is working on, and then we're going hibernating until this game is done and
ready to go. And so hopefully this is a similar situation where it's stated
at K three here huge new trailer two three minutes long, and then twenty
twenty five release date. Once again, I don't think it'd be a fall
hitter for this year, but I think setting up that twenty twenty five year
between Gears and State of k could be like a really nice kind of early
setup because they already have a good amount of things coming out this year,
right, So so, yeah, what do you think about that as the
actual guy who's played a lot of stated d K. I hope twenty twenty
five is that, I hope we get this review here for it again and
just add some more excitement onto the fire. I love State of the K
two and I remember I remember back on Games Passed, me and my friend
we were just looking for games that we could play together, and we just
download a whole bunch of multiplayer titles they had there, and this is one
of them. He tried it and he was just having a blast, and
so he told me about it. It got me on there, and then
we were both in the same on his world, on his map, and
we're going around clearing nests and just the world building kind of aspect here where
you're just trying to recruit survivors do missions, and feeling that there's certain zombie
games that have really had an impact on me. Dying light when you're out
at nighttime is one of the scariest things alive. And then when you're playing
this game and you're out at nighttime and you're running low on gas in your
car and you got to just run around, you have no proper safety net.
And if you if you die, you have other characters you can jump
to in your world. But your characters are all unique and have certain attributes
and statistics, and they definitely level up as you progress, but you don't
want to lose your characters. A funny little thing that I appreciate it is
like when my friend we're trying to get like cars and escape and like I
remember him dying, his body reanimated to his zombie and like comes at you.
It's just fun, that's cool. It's cool. Yeah. So there's
lots of amazing little things in this franchise, and yet just to get the
snow element, I'm hoping we'll get like seasons changing, because there's definitely a
big day and night cycle and you forging for supplies is such a tricky thing,
but it's it's it's really a really, really nice, nice game.
And so I never got around to the first one, but I played the
heck and daylights out of the second one and it definitely had a has still
a strong community behind it. So this is easily one of my most anticipated
whenever they announced a date for it. Yeah, yeah, I mean once
again, like State of K two, I'm just gonna look up some release
dates here before we close off the day, because Stay of K two came
up twenty eighteen undid Labs as the developer here, and they have not had
a game in between that time, so you know, it sounds like a
game that they've been supporting, I assume if it's kind of like online multiplayer
focused. But yeah, five years between one and two. We're now sitting
in at six years between two and three with no actual lay announcement. We're
assuming twenty twenty five things, So I think that timeline does make sense.
You know, games are getting bigger and harder to make because the days go
on, and this is probably the most ambitious one yet. And maybe they
got more funding from Xbox and maybe they've just been given more development time because
of that safety net of having Xbox or Microsoft as their parent company now,
so that that's changed for sure since staved K two. But yeah, I
think this is a potential opportunity here for like a really really sweet game for
them. And yeah, I had so much fun playing Dead Island to recently
that I'm very very much itching for more more zombie related stuff. So yeah,
we'll keep an eye on that one. And uh yeah, I think
even if you have those four things, and obviously you have a lot more
out of showcase, but that's shaping up to be like a really a really
strong June Showcase, I think. And even if this the wind is taking
out of the sales a little bit because of the league here, I'm still
very much looking forward to uh to that one, and I hope we do
see all of those games plus some extra bonus stuff as well. I'm sure
we'll get a big new E trailer for Indie and all these other games that
they showed at that January direct as well. So yeah, any any final
thoughts on that stuff there, Taylor, No, No, I think I'm
good right on. Well, this is a very this is a very fun
episode, very impromptu topics, but I think it worked out really nicely for
us. Next week we'll have some more side quest for you. Thank you
everyone for listening, and we'll see you again next time. Bye.