Hello, and welcome to sign Quest. This is our weekly video game show
here at Geekers. I'm your host Dyl Musk, and I have with me
Showtime kirklem Patzer. How you doing? My friend feeling very pink today?
And that's that's not a Barbie reason, that's a Princess Peach reason. I'm
very excited to talk to you about this game. I've been I've been quiet
on the coms all weekend about it, but yeah, I know I'm excited.
I didn't know if I was going to get that Monday message of it.
Hey, I didn't actually end up buying this game, like can we
pivot on side quest? But glad to hear that you that you said that
because part of me that today I'm like, I wonder if it should just
troll Dylan since I haven't talked to him about it, like at all this
weekend. I was like, oh, wait, when's that Peach coming game
coming out? I was thinking about saying, yeah, my heart healed.
Yeah, yeah, So what we're talking about Princess Peach Showtime of course the
latest Nintendo game also Marvel nineteen forty three. We're talking about this trailer that
came up for that and then the games we've been playing as well. So
just a nice classic side quest episode here, not a whole lot of plugs.
You know. Make sure join the patroon episodes early in ad free can
leave a review to help the show grow. Halo we just finished that second
season, so you can go check out all those episodes now if you want
to hear our thoughts on that whole show. And for my game that I've
been talking about, Potion Problem, I finally have the trailer ready and it
is up there on YouTube, so you can go check it out and see
what the game actually looks like when you're playing it, or if you go
on the Steam page, the video is up there as well, so either
or trailer. Thanks checking it out. I was checking it out yesterday,
Yeah, yesterday, and yeah, I know you did such a great job
of just showcasing like the key elements of it and kind of what you can
do with the game, and greet music to go along with it. Yeah,
it was really pressed. Yeah, shout outs to Amanda who made just
absolutely killer soundtrack for the game. So of course I used a good classic
song in there for the trailer as well. You know, when I was
making it I thought it would be like, I'm gonna do like a forty
five second long trailer, and then when I was actually making it then it
was like two like over two minutes. I'm like that's too much, and
so I ended up cutting it down to like a minute forty five, which
feels good. I feel like it does yeah, a good job of showing
off all the different stuff, and uh yeah, I'm I haven't edited like
a video in a while, and I'm using this like new software. So
it took me a few days there to get that sorted out, but overall,
I'm pretty happy with it. Gets a job done. It felt like
a video game trailer, so you're you're doing it real. I definitely like
watch this Splunky two trailer and I was like, I'm gonna call be this
like pacing beat for beat. Yeah, to get some inspiration there. So
that's good. That's good that it fit the genre. So yeah, you
can go check out that trailer, and then if you would like, you
can wish the game on Steam. Helps me helps like boost the game up
when people are searching. There's all sorts of potion games out there these days,
so get me up that list. So when people search for potions on
Steam they find my game before others. Uh and uh yeah, any any
shout outs from you, Kirklem shout outs? I don't think so nothing really
well, I mean, we got our retros and full swing on the on
the main feeds there we got mad Max planning of the apes you already mentioned
Halo. That's that mission's over. We'll see if we got another season that
but that was a journey and a half. But yeah, I don't know.
Go check out the feeds. Yeah, it's the season of X We're
doing the X Men and his show. The first two episodes we reviewed last
week. We have a newscast happening this week where there's some other juicy news
and trailers and whatnot. So yeah, just subscribe and then you can see
all that stuff easily. Okay, Kirklam. Before we get into the main
topic, you want to hear about my latest gaming rabbit hole here. Yes,
I recently learned about this game, and I'm gonna screenshaw this for the
YouTube audience and you guys should google this if you are not on YouTube.
I learned about this game I came out in the eighties called Rings of Power
check the things of Power like Rings on series Rings of Power. So look
at this. This is like kind of a Lord of the Rings looking thing,
you know, it's kind of like, I don't know, tactics strategy.
Look at this, like Hobbit looking character. This is not a Lord
of the Rings game though. Really, this is not not associated with Lord
of the Rings in any way. This is just a clear knockoff of the
brand, which I find absolutely hilarious. Even this Aragon looking guy over here.
There was an image I saw at one point that like spitting image for
Gandalf. I mean, I guess it's a generic gray sort of wizard,
but yeah, still crazy right, such a weird oddity from the eighties.
Kirkland, take a guess who do you think developed this game? Ah,
say, like Sega. I don't know. It wouldn't be Sega if it
was just the Rings of Power ripoff. I have no idea. This game
was developed by Naughty Dog. Really yeah, like a way different Naughty Dog
than we than we see, the one that had this as their logo apparently,
which I didn't even realize putting the naughty and Naughty Dog just like presumably
Naked Lady as their logo, Like just right out of the eighties for sure.
Wow, Yeah, it seems like a fake, uh you know,
like a spoof type thing. Yeah, I wonder if this would fly nowadays
or just back in the eighties. Is a different time on these early video
so anyway, that's part of this rabbit hole is like, I, I,
what the hell is this game? I can't believe this exists. But
because of that, I wanted to, uh see if you could like play
it or buy it anywhere, And so I went on Steam and I certain
for it, and it's not on Steam. It's probably not playable in any
sort of hardware these days. But in my search I found another game called
Rings of Powder, which is very much once again borrowing the Lord of the
Rings kind of vision and stuff, like it's got the same logo here or
the same font I should say, it's got the ring in the title.
And then you know, just watching this trailer here, like it's essentially looks
like a like the Minds of Moria, like dungeon simulator sort of game.
Yeah, this came out last year, though this is like a more recent
thing, and you know, it looks pretty janky, but it also looks
like kind of fun and obviously it has like very much the Minds of Maria
sort of esthetic to it. But there you go. There's another game,
Rings of Power and Rings of Powder. If you're looking for some cheap Lord
of the Rings knockoffs. It makes me wonder what other games out there that
I just don't know the titles of that are knocking off Lord of the Rings
or just keep searching rings and then you know, leave like the last blank
and you'll get more and more searches. M that's so funny. I've not
heard of any of those titles. Yeah, I put Rings of Powder on
my wish list, and when it goes like five dollars or less, I
will I will pick it up and I will check it out. Uh.
And they in the descriptions and stuff that make a big point about being it
being very ironic, and I'm like, I don't know if like just blatant
ip theft is not irony, but sure, man, whenever you say,
but yeah, it looks like a good time. So there you go.
There's two games. That was my latest rabbit hole. But enough of that,
Enough of that, let's talk about this so Nintendo, uh, you
know, more more specifically, Peach, she's had a couple of games.
She had a DS game back and I think theyre maybe gone a SEQL for
that, which we've talked about here on side Quest before, because say really
enjoyed that game or had as a kid. And here we are, all
these years later and there's finally a new Princess Peach game. This is not
a sequel to UH. I think it was just called Super Princess Peach.
This is a new situation where Peach is going to the theater UH and then
all these hygiene occur. So, yeah, you've been playing this thing over
the weekend. I checked out the demo, so I've played like the first
half an hour of the game, which is not that meaningful, but yeah,
tell me about your your time with Princess Peach Showtime. How much how
much have you played and what are you thinking so far? Yeah, So
for Princess Peach Showtime, I think I've played about five or six hours into
it, so pretty pretty lengthy amount of time. I did backtrack because it's
been it's it's got a classic marioism where there's like star or like collectibles on
the missions that if you don't necessarily have to get them all but there's like
a lot because normally there's like maybe three in tomorrow level, but it seems
like there's sometimes ten or something. Yeah, so each level has ten.
So there's been times I've just been like, Wow, let's go back and
collect all those before I keep moving on. But yeah, I know,
five or six hours and I've been I guess I should preface with saying like
the lead up to this game got me extremely hype because I wasn't always the
biggest like specifically Princess Peach fan, but just through recent years, I've definitely
grown to have her in my my s tier catalog when it comes to Mario
characters. I absolutely love Peach. She's my go to whenever I play a
Mario game these days, and just like the announcement of this game just got
me so excited because obviously now she's like one of my favorite characters in Mario
and to just have her own like standalone. I did play the one way
back in the day on the DS. I thought it was all right,
but like nothing too spectacular, but just a new modern version of Peach.
I feel like she's even more relevant now because of of course Anya Taylor Joy
playing her in the Mario movie, like she'd a big role in that movie,
definitely boost the stock of that character, I think overall, and just
what this game was kind of marketed as was really interesting that it's it is
like a play that you know that you're doing different plays and along that comes
different to tire and like different stories I guess that you're going on. And
just the fact that it was a Princess Peach game and the aesthetic just totally
had me sold. I showed Shaye the trailer, She's like, oh my
god, we're getting that. We're getting that day one, so she was
super stoked. She was working like over the weekends, so she doesn't fully
got the chance to dive into it. She played a little bit, but
I think she was saying tomorrow because she's at work right now, so tomorrow
she's gonna be jumping into this pretty hardcore and there's no co op in it,
right it is. Yeah, we're a little bit bummed by that because
lately, like her and I had been going through these Mario games together,
like Mario Wonder, like just co op in that sense, it has been
lots of fun. It would have been cool Daisy was in there as that
we were talking about Daisy never really gets the time to shine either, and
we talked about how in wonder she finally got like the playable slot on the
roster there. Yeah, it would have been a cool update, but I
don't know they could do it in the future. I guess with this gameplay
wise too, Like it totally would have been fine to have her in there.
Doesn't seem like it would have been too challenging to work her in there,
but whatever, maybe the next one. But no, anyways, get
getting onto the me playing this game now. I I've honestly it's surpassed my
expectations of this. I really liked what was shown there, but some of
the gameplay it just seemed like it was gonna be like very kitty and like
not really a challenge. I don't know, Like there was different plays that
were shown in the trailer, but it just didn't have too much pizazz over
the fact that it was just like a standalone Peach game with some cool costumes.
But I absolutely love this game so much and I highly recommend it to
Peach fans, but also just like Mario fans in general, I think that
this very much fits in that same well it is a Mario game, but
like it feels like a Mario game in the sense of difficulty, where I
feel like Mario games, like they are family oriented, so they're never really
going to be too challenging. But it's a little bit more than just like
a super super easy sky side scroller where there's nothing more to it. There's
certain just challenges that you kind of have to come across depending on which play
you're on. Like there's a it's called like Detective Peach or like like that's
that transformation, but it's kind of like a Sherlock Holmes inspired world, and
I was getting so like just totally puzzled on like some of these puzzles.
There's a couple other ones that I was not necessarily like bashing my head against
the wall, but I kind of had to scratch my head and figure out
how to tackle the situation. So that was kind of surprising. I think
the first world that I did, it was super easy, so I was
a little bit worried of like, Okay, this is gonna be just kind
of turned my brain off and just advanced through this game. But it's a
lot more to that, and I think the key reason being like these different
plays that you do, and there's only ten transformations across the board. I
haven't experienced all of them. There's a couple, like I think big like
story ones that come near the end. Just by googling, that's how that's
kind of how it seems it's gonna be. But but yeah, no,
just just the different costumes that you get. I think it's seriously a highlight
of mine in this game, just the different attire and the different abilities that
you have on Peach. Just just like, man, when you go like
Ninja Peach, I'm just like, I want to stand alone Ninja Peach game,
Like this is so sick, and like just the aesthetic to it,
as well as how it feels like the little new mechanics that you get on
Peach is just it's it's so fun. It's it's so awesome. And I
think that was the biggest surprise for me, because I knew it was gonna
be cool to kind of see Peach in these different outfits and just these different
worlds that you go in through these plays, but to actually be playing it
and just doing these like stealth attacks as Peach like in a Mario game,
it's just oh wow, I never I never really thought that this would be,
you know, a game that I'm playing, But here we are,
and No, I think they did a really good job with just the whole
esthetic that it is a play. It kind of reminds me of I think
it's called Battle Block Theater. Have you ever played that game. It's like
a platformer. No, I haven't played it co op, but like same
sort of thing that there's a theater going on, so like there's there's viewers
and they just like I don't know, there's certain little quality of uh not
quit life, little just little things that I guess like just boost the immersion
that it is a play, and this game has that littered throughout, like
whether there's like you're riding a horror when you're in like the the Western world,
but like it's on like strings as if it's just like a play going
on. Right, all of that stuff I think is really really fun.
That's that's kind of like a fun throwback too, because like Super Mario Bros.
Three is like framed as a play essentially, Like the opening title card
of that game, right, is like them pulling back the curtain and you're
like going behind the scene and with the white blocks and stuff. So it's
kind of interesting that I don't I can't recall time that Mario's ever gone back
to that sort of setting. Ye, it's fun that this is kind of
a fun reprisal of that. I guess the difference that would be like that
whole game is like based to be a play. Where is this one like
she's going to the theater? Yeah, of course something happens and this game
actually is meaningful with that, whereas Mario three it's like I guess when you
get to the end of the level, like you go off stage and that's
like about about as much as it goes, like connects to that theme other
than the opening. Yeah. But but yeah, so back to this one,
I think that just like the synopsis, like the plot like it's nothing
too it's like game. But it's kind of funny how Mario games usually go
trend where like our characters are at somewhere and they're like having a good time
and then like a big bad comes in and then just like just like corrupts
it a little bit, and then that's like the challenge of the game.
I've noticed that just throughout the years, it seems like they kind of follow
that theme, but it works, you know, it's definitely the Mario thing
to it. You get a new companion in this game. Her name is
Stella. That's the the little star thing that floats with you. She's really
cute. I really like that character to be the little tag along Mario.
Wonder you had the Prince I forget his name, but Florian I think Florian,
that's right. I like Stell a lot more than Florian. Florian was
a little obnoxious, I agree, but but yeah, I know, I
think gameplay wise, like again, it's it's not going to be like super
super challenging. Maybe one day we'll be getting a difficulty selector in a Mario
game. Today is not that day. But I think it's it's a good
enough challenge where there has been a couple of times that I've had to like
redo a level, not just because I missed one of the double stars,
but because I actually just like failed it. Whereas there is certain missions that
maybe they feel super easy, but I think the fact that there is so
many different ones and you have very different mechanics depending on what the uh the
play is that you're doing, I think it doesn't feel repetitive in that way
at all, which is which is really nice because it's it's really just motivated
me to keep wanting to go. So yeah, I mentioned the theater that
you're at how you progress through the game is there's different floors of the theater.
There's a basement level as well, but I think those are like the
later stages, like maybe even postgame stuff like some like even Mario Wonder it
had like the tricky level area. Yeah, the hidden areas. I think
it's gonna be something similar to that. I haven't done any of the basement
levels yet, but I'm on the third floor and just through googling, I
found out that there's there's five floors total, and each one has like five
stages to it, and then of course there's like the ten collectible stars on
each one. So yeah, that's kind of like your frame of reference for
how long the game is each level. I was asking Shaye about this as
we're going along with it. It's like, how would you compare these level
lengths to like some of the Mario Wonder levels for example, And I think
some of them are like significantly longer than the Mario Wonder levels. But there
has also been someone that I've like really breezed through and it seems shorter than
certain Mario Wonder levels, So I think all, like overall, it's pretty
similar in length, maybe a little bit longer than the Mario Wonder levels,
which is just like kind of your standard Mario you know, platform or type
type level lengths. They all kind of feel like a similar It's not like
one that's two minutes once, it's like fifteen minutes. It's not out less
trials, you know, where you could be going for an hour plus or
forty minutes or whatever it is. Yeah, well, considering there are ten
is it stars are the collecktable in this? Yeah, considering there's ten in
every level, Like, I don't know if you're trying to get all those
would that put you in a level for like fifteen twenty minutes if you're trying
to find them or is it not so complicated to get them? Not so
complicated? Like for me, there's been a few times where I'm just going
through the levels and then it's the same thing in like the other Marder games
where there's three coins for example, and let's say you get one and then
it gives you the second coin. You're like oh, I missed the first
one. I'm gonna for that. There's there's only been a few times where
I get to a point I'm like, oh, I just missed two stars,
like I don't even know where I miss them or anything like that.
There has been instances where you have to do a certain like sequence of things
to get that one extra star and I just like missed it or something,
and it doesn't come back until you like read the level. So it's like,
oh, okay, well, well that kind of sucks. But at
least I know what to look out for for next time. But you know,
like like the game is still pretty well. It is very linear.
It is still kind of like a side scroller for the most part, with
a little bit more I don't know what, deman, it's kind of like
a crash pandiculet really yeah, yeah, exactly, which is kind of a
surprise to me. I really thought it was going to be mostly just like
a side scroller with a little bit of you know, depth to it,
like you can go backwards a little bit, which there is a lot of
levels that Dove that does have that. But there's there's also, like you
mentioned the crash crash Bandicoot reference, I think is is definitely uh right on.
So yeah, I know, so I'm like I said, I'm on
the third floor. There's ten transformations total. I think two of those are
like the big Story ones. But obviously if there's only ten transformations, like
certain theaters, they come up multiple times, which which is great because,
like I said, like the new Jitch my gosh, the Ninjitsu one where
where you're Ninja Peach, that that one's just so fun, and those levels
I really look forward to. Surprisingly, I think my favorite transformation though well
or like maybe maybe I maybe it'd be hard for me to choose one favorite,
but like the s tier of the transformations for me is actually figure Skater
Peach. Those levels are so fun to me, just the movement that she
does and the animation that they have, Like it's not like she's just doing
like one skating animation. Like sometimes if she's going around a corner, she'll
like switch to going backwards and she's like looking backwards as she's skating backwards,
and then she'll be like a little spin. The big like air quote challenge
in that level is like you kind of have to do like a it's not
a recital is it, but like like a figure skating dance, I guess,
and like you have to do certain spins or jumps and then you you're
kind of like in sync with these other like NPC characters that are kind of
your allies, and it just I don't know, like the animations to it,
the music, just how it feels to like hit those those those dead
on like little tricks that you have to do and just just peaches outfit and
it is so Phenomenal's very much like Elsa from Frozen, Like it seems the
overall aesthetic is like that. But I mean, as I was mentioning earlier,
I think all of the suits are just or transformations I guess, are
just phenomenal. I think they they did such a good job with the uniqueness
of it. It really just makes me like, obviously you want more of
it, but for like Mario or Luigi, you know, like I want
to see Luigi as the as the Ninja version, and like just just the
I don't know, the stories that you could tell from these different things.
Like I was mentioned earlier, I would just take like a full on Ninja
Peach game. And I thought about that with like the Detective Peach sequence.
Like I it's I just think it's really fun like putting these characters that we
know and love in these different environments and give them like these different mechanics.
Like for the Ninja one, for example, she is like a stealth mechanic.
She can like jump out like off walls to like scale just just things,
and she's got her coon eye, so she's like dangerous. There's Kung
Fu Peach in there as well. There's like a superhero one. I forget
what that one's called. Yeah, yeah, but yeah, I know.
All of the different transformations are so phenomenal. I oh the sword for any
one that that one's phenomenal too. I love it. It gave like a
dodge mechanic to the game. This one, Like it's not too challenging.
It's not like you're playing elden Ring or like near Automata where you have like
really time those like the dodge button with it. It's kind of just like
your attack button, so as you're just like button smashing everyone small, you
do this like really awesome likedgibility. Esthetically it's super pleasing, but it's not
the most like obviously gameplay challenging and funny you say that when I was playing
through, because that's one of the the two transformations that are in the demo,
or sword Fighter and Patisserie or I don't know how you pronounced that exactly,
but yeah, like the first guy, like Mini Boss, you have
to fight with the sword Fighter and you have to like Dodge has hit like
right at the right time, and then she'll like jump on his head or
something, and that's how you win the fight. I I took me like
two three minutes like figure that out, because I just like I was buton
meashing when I'm hitting him all the time, I'm like, I don't know
what I have to do here. I was like surprised at how unintuitive that
was for me. So I can definitely see where some challenges could come in,
even if it's maybe not how they intended it to be. Just once
I figured that out though, that I like through the rest of the game,
I wouldn't have that issue again with that particular mode exactly, like the
mini enemies that you just like kind of one shot, like they'll just come
at you and if you're already attacking, like if they eventually attack, I'll
just do like the Dodge but for bosses, I guess they do. You
kind of have like a dodge window, but it is super forgiving, like
they kind of like wind up and then pause for like a second, and
then as long as you kind of hit it in that timeframe, you'll do
the little war pability. But you know, it's still still visually pleasing.
But but yeah, I think, uh, I mean, I guess I
should reference my notes. Well, yeah I can. I can bring a
couple of questions at yeah too, so absolutely so. Yeah. The other
thing that surprised me when I was playing it is when I got into that
Petissier section when you have like a decorate a bunch of cakes. Yeah,
and I think I was like on my phone for like ten seconds or something.
Then I didn't realize that the whole thing was like on a timer,
and I was like, ohh and then and then I was freaking out and
I didn't end up finishing it. I mean, if you just I think
if the time runs out at all, you could probably progress. But if
you want to get like all the Stars, you had to complete it like
in a certain amount of time, So I don't know how hard that would
be. I didn't like restart the level to try it again. But I
was I thought that was cool like thing to throw in there, because that
could add some difficulty to where they can put some time some more tricky challenges
because once again, you have ten stars. So even if like a kid's
playing this game, they're gonna be happy because they got five or six or
something like, they're like, oh, look at all the stars I got.
But then for someone like people like us who are maybe looking for a
little bit more challenge at times, it seems like with ten stars, it
gives them a lot of room to do that. So I found that for
sure. With the that baking section, which was really cute. That was
like it reminded me of like cooking Mama and decorating the cakes you do the
puzzle, it was really fun. When it's stressful and you have the timeframe,
it's more like overcooked. I feel like I was totally stressing and like
going back and forth. But yeah, I know, just to your point,
with like the collectibles throughout the level, I feel like a big part
of it too. I mean, the fact that they have ten stars there
and like if like some of them, if you miss, like you just
can't backtrack, So it's almost like you have to like like really think about
them as you're going along the level, because they are pretty evenly spaced out.
I feel like just as you go along, like you will pick them
up, you know, as long as you find them and you hit all
the markers when you should. But there has been times when, especially that
baking what you mentioned, like I don't know if it was the same mission
or if it was on like one of the other floors, but like the
baking one where you have to do the challenge, I had to redo it
like three different times because the first time I did it and then I like
just screwed up. And then I realized it's like, okay, well I'm
not gonna get the start, so I'm just gonna restart here now that I
know how to do it. And then I did that, and I was
still just getting totally screwed up on certain parts. And and but like as
you mentioned, like it it it does kind of feel like a different game,
like Cooking Mama or or I mean I brought up overcook but it's just
like a it's like a Mario Party mini game too, Like, yeah,
some of these levels, and I think that that probably is a Mario Party
mini game in one of the games, Yeah, I would imagine, oh
for sure. And all of that kind of leads into the fact that,
like, this game is just fun to kind of progress on because although maybe
you don't like like one of the themes, like you don't really have to
do them in a certain order. Well, I guess by the end of
the floor you have to finish all five. But it's not like you and
lock the first one and then go to the second one. I like it.
You go to the floor and they're just kind of all open. So
for me, if I see like a transformation that I really like playing,
I'll probably go to that one first, for example. And yeah, it
just you kind of know what mechanics to expect depending on if you had played
that transformation before and if you haven't, it's something new. So yeah,
that's yeah question for you here because you know, so I guess for me
my perspective, you're like going to this scene the trailers as like, I
don't know, this game looks a bit too simple, Like I don't think
gameplay wise, I personally am gonna enjoy it. So that's where I liked
that they had a demo so I could check it out for myself. And
I mean, I from what you're saying, it sounds like it gets more
interesting like pretty quickly after those first couple levels, so I'm sure I would
enjoy my time more. It was like just okay from what I played of
it, But I also like had very low expectations for it, and I
think it's just for like eighty bucks, you know, ninety whatever with tax
It's like it's hard for me to justify that when I like played the demos,
like, ah, this is so so. But one thing that really
bothered me was a frame rate, Like it was really choppy run it was
like thirty but feels more like twenty a lot of the time, and for
how little detail there is, and like the visuals and how much how little
there is on screen an even time, even the like the basic lobby and
stuff. That was really surprising to me and kind of a bummer. Now
for a game that you know you're talking about, how like how forgiving the
Perry window is like sword fighter mode, so it's not going to really affect
the game play in a huge way, but it was like it was surprising
for me. I don't think I've played a switch game with that bad of
performance in a while, so I'm surprised this from a first party game like
Zelda chops at times, but this was even more hose boll than that.
No. It it definitely was like one of the first things I even noticed
on It's like because you boot it up and then it plays like the little
entry video right away. I wasn't sure if it was just like a design
choice for it to be like certain, and then I realized it was just
the frames and you know, of course, just spent like eighty bucks a
lof this. You're gonna come into this brand new game and you're like,
really, this is what I'm getting. I will say, I don't know
if I'm just used to it or if it gets or if it like stabled
out at one point for me, but I really don't notice it like at
all anymore, which is good because, like, like you mentioned, like
that was the first thing I did notice. Even just moving through like the
first level, it felt really bad. I just like rate like you kind
of you kind of get used to it, but I I think it was
like when I was playing Red Fall last year, I'm like, man,
this game is choppy, but like you eventually get used. I'm like,
it doesn't feel too bad. Then I go play hit Man and it was
so smooth. Eve when she's a sixty, I'm like, oh god,
it becomes so noticeable once again. But yeah, if that's all you're playing,
you do kind of adjust to it over time. And like, I
think another thing that helps too is that the facts that this game isn't It's
not like a like a Dark Souls or something where like every little frame could
matter, like depending on like if you're getting hit. Like like it is
a simple game. And I mean I was mentioning earlier with hip box and
help forgiving and that stuff. Is like this game can't be very forgiving because
it is for just families in general, maybe younger audiences, and that helps,
but still that that that shouldn't be an excuse by any means, Like
this game should feel, especially that it's a Nintendo game, it should feel
really refined on their own system and even just like the low times. I
know you mentioned this on like previous episodes, but like, man, I'm
just such a glutton for my my SSDs now like in my in my systems.
That switch to thought we needed to switch to for Princess Peach showtime.
Yeah, that's pretty laughable. But I'm just so used to like these past
load times now that if anytime it isn't, it's like, oh man,
this is this is rough and it feels dated. So unfortunately I kind of
had that thought, which is definitely a bummer. But uh, I guess
that would be my biggest negative on this game, Soule, That's something that's
good. I man, hearing you talk about all these transformations in the ninja
on and stuff, like, even when I was seeing the trailer for this
game, I'm like, man, I hope the next Smash game like revitalizes
Peaches move set, cause she's had the same move set since Melee, like
minor tiny little differences, but yeah, man, I hope they take a
bunch of these crazy forms or even just like us one move like throwing the
the shuracan or whatever, and just incorporate the her move set and then like
you know, Daisy can keep that that traditional Peach move set and still you
know, people who like that can still have that that move set. But
man, I really hope they incorporate some of these crazy new films into her
her move set going forward. I want like an agile fighter Peach. I'd
be sweet man like, take the dress up not and not like a nude
way, but you know, put her like her action suit on that she
has in the Mario movie, and yeah, get some of these more agile
moves would be really cool. That'd be really sweet on it, or like
even just make it more of kind of a transformy type character that can have
different too, just I guess play styles as you go along. I don't
know how you balance that. Obviously smashes a competitive game, that might be
tricky, but I mean, I guess they already have multiple forms like they
have POKEMONA they do. I mean for characters like they usually just yeah,
I wouldn't change the costume necessarily, but they would just like have the different
moves from the different games and they kind of blend them nicely. And then
I guess you could just make it like her separate costumes at the character select
screen, like you could pick Ninja Peach and that would be a different variation
you could have, which would be a cool way to do it. But
yeah, I hope you see something like that. And then on the transformations,
so the way your describe it sounds like each So there's five levels per
floor. So when you any one of those five levels, like you're kind
of going in there and you're Detective Peach for that level, there isn't much
of like Detective Peach for one little section and the switch to Patisserie Peach and
then maybe do Ninja Peach for like a jumping sequence. It's kind of like
confined. Each level is one theme. Yeah, you got it. So
I don't know how it was in the demo for you, Like did you
have the main hub in the demo where just the main lobby area, which
yeah, did have I think five levels and it like the staircase going up.
Okay, yeah, so it's basically that like going up. They have
like different themes, so it's different colors or whatnot. But like at the
door before you enter, like I guess the theater, I guess it would
be, it has like a little emblem so you know like which one it
is going into it. Okay, like the figure skate, Uh, it'll
just have a figure skate on there, so you know that you're getting the
figure skate level. And it's usually like a snow or ice theme obviously to
go hand in hand with it, which but like again I just I really
like it because you kind of know what you're jumping into and then and then
it's just the theme of that play is you know X For example, like
if you're doing the Cowgirl Beach, it's it's Western times and no I like
it. Like it's got different music depending on what level you're on. I
feel like Mario games, they just have some phenomenal music sometimes. Yeah,
what is the Cowboy peach? Like? Because because for each form it's like
you're always just moving, You've a jump button, then like an action button,
Like it's pretty simple, right, what is the Cowboy one? What
is the action button for? So you got you got a whip or not?
I guess it's not a lasso, Yeah, exactly. So so you're
you're last sewing uh an object and then tossing it. So it's most of
the time it's it's either enemies or like barrels or something that you'll grab.
And then like a big part of that level is you jump on a horse
and then you're you're kind of doing like a pursuit in that sense, you
got to jump over things kind of like it's a moving stage kind of situation,
so you're like avoiding obstacles and then your your last sewing objects, and
yeah, well I think it's I think it's fun. It's not my favorite
by any mean, but uh, you know, it's no figure skating,
but that's for sure, but uh yeah, I know it's still really fun.
What else was I gonna say? Oh, yeah, just on the
topic of like the transformations. Obviously you get different outfits and and such,
and something that I think is new to a Mario game. Maybe maybe you
can correct me. You played a lot of more games in your day,
but you can like customize your outfit, like not necessarily the transformation, but
like just Princess Peaches dress like as as you go on. If you beat
like one of the one of the bosses of the first level, it's it's
called like disco wing, so it's like a disco et like boss battle that
you do, and then after that you get like the disco version of like
Peach's dress, So it just kind of changes the pattern. It doesn't it
doesn't change anything too much. But I was still just like shocked at the
fact that I'm like, I don't think I've ever played a game that you
can just like customize the outfit of a character. Like it's not super It's
no red Dead Redemption by any means where you're like selecting what kind of like
armband you want to wear, or no Bawler's Gate where you can pick what
penis you want. Yeah, there's no penis sliders in the Peach Show time
by any means. But still it was just kind of like a shock because
you're right, most like Mario games. It's like if it's a two D
platformer, you're not gonna have that because you know, you grab a mushroom
term bag, you grab fire YouTube to like fire Mario. But yeah,
the only one I can think of is like Mario Odyssey off the top of
my head, because you're going to the shop and buying all sorts of different
costumes there and you can just wear them at any given time. But yeah,
I don't I don't know if I can recall another one off the top
of my house, and then like, uh, I guess Mario Kart,
like some characters can change their color or something, and like Mario Golf,
the one on the switch has like one costume per characters, Like, I
don't know, it's it is pretty minimal, So that's that's a fun element
of customization. I think. Yeah, I think I was just kind of
shocked that I went to this one store and the only thing was like costumes.
I'm like, oh, that's kind of interesting. You can even change
like Stella has a ribbon, you can kind of change the color of a
ribbon. Nice. I mean I even unlocked anything for Stella. But I'm
sure if you can unlock like more things for Peach, there's no reason why
you wouldn't be able to do it for Stella as well. And yeah,
I don't know, it's just it's super minor, Like, it's not gameplay
changing by any means, but it's it's a nice little addition to to the
Mario universe. Maybee maybe a little bit behind, but still, I I
it was a nice addition for sure. And yeah, anything else on this
game, what will I say? Oh, one really minor thing, little
like quality of life improvement. I don't know if you notice this in the
demo, but you can like slide down ratings. Now, there's a lot
of stairs in this game, so it'll be like you can run down the
stairs. I just accidentally went to the railing and she just like hopped on
and slid down super minor like again, but I think I did that like
twice the first time I realized is that more in the fun in the lobby
area, like going down those stairs, you mean, or like just any
staircase, any staircase. Yeah, so it's mostly in like the theater that
you encountered those things, but there has been a couple levels that I've I've
seen them, and yeah, she just hops right on there slides down.
I'm like, this is sweet, another like little minor thing. I don't
know if they've done this in previous Mario or Princess Peach games, but she
like lifts her dress up when she runs. Now, I noticed that a
lot. I really like that up in front of her. Yeah, it
was exactly like just those little details. Mario Wonder added a few like things
like that with a little great animation details, and it's just like I like
when the ad when they add these things the staircase. That's smart because I
feel like that's a classic thing in games. It's so hard to get characters
like walk downstairs accurately like UK four did it, and it was like it's
so slow because it's so accurate. I just end up jumping on the stairs
anyway and take a bit of damage. So I think that's like a that's
a clever solution to like, you know what, it's gonna look bad,
Let's just have them slide down the railing because that will always look good.
So I like that. It's kind of a two and one solution there.
It's faster, more convenient, but also probably from the animation perspective, makes
it look a bit better too. Yeah, no, absolutely agree. The
little it's like, you know, every Mario game has just like like the
what would I call them, just the civilians I guess of the world.
Like in Wonder they had the flower, yeah what else? So in this
one, at least they're called teeths I think, or maybe I should pull
that up, so I don't. It was something weird that does feats,
That's what it is. Yeah, kind of h E E T. And
to me, they just look like the head of those like caterpillar type things
that you encounter, the yellow ones, but like it's just the head,
so it's just like a ball with like the big nose. The nose glows
a lot of the time like their world pretty much. Yeah, Peaches visiting
right, Yeah, exactly, So they're they're littered throughout the world. They're
like the the good guys that you'll rescue throughout. You're saving a lot of
them throughout the game as well. And uh like I recognize the character just
because of what I reference, like the little caterpillars that you encounter in Mario
games. Wiggler, Yeah, the Wiggler. But like they've been lots of
fun too. I feel like the fact that they are pretty animated, Like
their noses will glow and flash and do different things if you don't have your
transformation. Like Peach is just kind of who she is. She has this
little ribbon that that gives her, like the Sparkle power to just kind of
interact with objects in the world. You kind of just bring light to some
certain darkness thing. It's how you interact with a lot of objects, is
you know, you just hit B and you'll kind of spin your ribbon around
and yeah, like they'll just react through that. But they've been I feel
like one of my one of my more liked little nvcs in the Mario world.
A lot of them are just kind of knowing, you know, like
we've seen a lot of toads. I'm glad that we're kind of spreading out
into into the universe and and experiencing some other creatures out there. It's not
like there's feats and then like a bunch of different like just different species pofo
the Mario world here. But I like them for their inclusion in this game.
I think they I don't know, they're just kind of colorful and unique
and super vibrant obviously with their noses always flashing, kind of a rude alph
effect there. Nice, cool, awesome. Should we move on for today?
Oh last thing I'll say, Actually, I'm glad I caught this,
but when you do your transformation do you have any experience with Sailor Moon at
all? Very little? I love the aesthetic though, Should you point this
out to me? And I did, and like as soon as she pointed
out to me, it just like blew my mind. There is there is
so many Sailor Moon type like references in this game. And I don't know
if that's just like across the board and like previous Princess Peach adaptations, but
the font like for the game Princess Peach is basically like the exact same font
of Sailor Moon when like when you do your transformation, she she kind of
like grabs uh Stella's ribbon and then like spins around and turns like this like
bright blue color, and it kind of does her transformation. It's the exact
same way that Sailor Moon and the other sailors like turn into their outfit.
They have a ribbon and they just kind of like spin around and then glob
blue and then they turn into their costume. Oh there was something else too.
I'm so by my normal I should I should have wrote down these little
details like the similarities there, and like obviously it could just be like heavily
inspired by by that. But as soon as she she told it to me,
I'm like, oh my gosh, this game is just Sailor Moon.
This is hilarious. The dress that you wear and like the figure skating one
and it kind of feels like a Sailor Moon outfit as well. But yeah,
I know, I I mean, Shay loves Sailor Moon. I've seen
quite a bit of the first show, and it's just another thing that I
guess I like about about this game, the little Sailor Muon references there.
But yeah, yeah, nice. Yeah, it sounds like you're getting close
to the end of this game. I don't know, seems like you still
have like another four or five hours ago, and then who knows what the
heck's going on in the basement there. Yeah, so yeah, hopefully next
time you're on side Quest you can share the rest of your journey with it.
Absolutely, And like, I think I was kind of surprised too,
like how much content there was. I think initially when I was doing the
levels, I thought maybe there'd be like three floors or something, and then
I got there and then there were like still more staircases going up. And
then obviously I knew about the basement. I kind of explored it, but
they're just kind of these paintings that are glowing purple. More is gonna happen.
Yeah, So I'm like, okay, there must be levels of unlock
later on, curious what that is to or what's in there. But yeah,
and then I just googled and there's like five floors plus like the boss
battles that happened. It's like, oh wow, that's like there's some good
content here. I'm definitely definitely glad that I'm getting my money's worth out of
it, nonetheless, And I mean I've already enjoyed it so much that I
feel like I have gotten the money's worth out of it in that sense.
But yeah, a lot more content still to explore. And definitely glad that
I picked this up. And I think anyone out there that you know is
a little bit on the fence, but they are a Princess Beach fan.
I think this is a great entry to carry on with the legacy that is
the OG Princess. And yeah, nice, Yeah, I know. I'm
excited to see, hopefully this becomes a series or at least gets a sequel,
and see some other ideas with it in the future. But how about
that we take an intermission here and we'll be right back. Okay, we
are back, so let's talk about some news and then we'll get back to
other games we've been playing. So Marvel nineteen forty three, Rise of Hydra.
Don't you dare forget the name that title, because it's so memorable.
This game was announced, oh man, it could have been last year,
it might have been two years ago at this point. This is Amy Hennig's
studio, so previously have uncharted. She worked on some of those games in
this game previously didn't have a title. We just kind of called it King
Captain, Soldier, Spy because that's what like the stinger at the end of
the initial trailer what it it just said that, and I love that name,
and I knew it was never for the actual title, but I was
hoping that they would keep it because I love that, and I think this
new title does not roll off the tongue, but that's not super important here.
But yeah, do you remember seeing this game previously or is this series
is kind of your first time seeing it here? At like while I was
watching the trailer, I do remember, like seeing some of the imagery,
I guess of the characters, but no, like I completely had forgotten about
that until I was watching the trailer. So just seeing like the actual name
there was was a big shocker because obviously, you know, like we had
just done that the what if review and the what if in that season has
is it nineteen forty three as well? Is at that same date? I
can't remember? Oh man, h no, sorry, never mind, it
was like eighteen something. When they're like in the medieval ages. I don't
know why those teams, Well, maybe you're thinking of like X Men,
because X Men had like that that episode where Wolverine goes back in time with
it must have been splicing in my brain, honestly, the thing. Yeah,
so never mind scratch everything I just said there. But uh, yeah,
no, I did not really know what to expect into this one.
I mean, it's been very quiet since then, and like I said,
that's been a while ago now, So this was a very specifically a story
trailer. There was no gameplay in here whatsoever. Now there's a couple shots
that maybe can give us some a clue of what the gameplay could be like
here, But yeah, we kind of got a bigger show into this.
We have the title now and they've said it's coming out twenty twenty five,
so I imagine we're going to get a lot more of it soon. Like
I think a summer game fest seems kind of imminent to get like a gameplay
trailer or game wards at the latest, unless maybe they're targeting like a fall
twenty twenty five, in which case could be next year at a summer game
fester or something like that that we would get more info on this. But
yeah, what did you what did you think of the story trailer. Did
this grab you? Does this pull you in? Are you excited for this
game? You know? I was. I was going through a little bit
of a roller coaster ride. I think on this one like a super like
easy one, kind of like a Disney coaster, not like a six flag
type experience where it's like, what's going on kind of when they can pull
into a parking lot. Whe Yeah, like it's that easy exactly, And
that's how I was feeling this trailer. First off, I think just it
looked beautiful. I think the Unreal engine looked really really superb, and they
did a great job just with all like the characters faces and just all those
like cinematics that their showcase. It's like, man, this looks beautiful,
and I'm excited for just games of the future. Just the fact that this
looks like this. We've seen beautiful games in the past, so I'm not
gonna say this looked like like the next thing that I you know, just
blew my mind. It's not gameplay. You never know like how it translate.
Yeah, no, exactly. It's it's funny, not not in the
story trailer, but I think it's like the state of play or like talk
that they did. They brought Amy Amy Hnning is that her name? Hen
hennig uh. She was just saying like, oh, just so you know,
like like that wasn't like a demo that we polished for this, that
was our game. And I'm like, well, it was a cinematic as
well. It's not like it's gameplay, we haven't seen that yet, but
just the way they market that. But anyways, I'm going off tangent here,
but yeah, I just thought it looked phenomenal. I really did like
the story that was kind of showing just the fact that you have it's not
To'challa, right, it would be his father. I think it's to Chaka.
Yeah, yeah, okay, so King Tachaka as well as like Cap
and them just kind of doing this like almost cat and mouse thing at the
start in this, like you know, kind of well, I guess it's
Hydra, but just like World War two, like occupied France type setting,
it just is a really really cool setting for a game like this with cool
characters. But as it was going on and by the time it got to
the end, I was just kind of like, I don't know if I
would pick this game up. Actually, Like I I don't know. Obviously,
I really need to see gameplay before I really make that determination. But
this was a beautiful trailer, but it still wasn't quite enough to really win
me over. And I don't know if I'm just evolving as I'm getting older
and just like right away being like, I know this looks pretty, but
like I'm not gonna put all my chips. You gotta finish Night Sunds first,
that's the that's the problem. Oh my gosh, I have one hundred
games before I would even consider that. But or like this not not Midnight
Sounds. But I think maybe the lack of other superheroes might have been another
thing too, Like I do like Tap and the Chaka. But but yeah,
even then, like and I think we knew this before that I don't
think the Soldier is Bucky, Like I think the Soldier part of this King
Captain Soldier Spy is just not just gonna say some other guy like I'm sure
he's relative, he's important to some compook run or something, but I don't
know much about him. And then also like I believe when they were confirming
the characters before they said that, like and there's a door milage here that's
a sustine black Panther, but I don't I don't think it's like a I
mean timeline wise again, so it makes sense for it to be in Ni
Kia or Koy or someone that we know. So yeah, I guess that's
also like a character that I'm not really familiar with. So I think that's
interesting to me, Like, Okay, cool an opportunity to get introduced to
some new characters here, and also to choca a black panther I'm not really
too familiar with myself. Cap, of course we've seen him a million times
before, but yeah, I'm I'm excited for it in that way. But
you're right, it does seem pretty light on the rest of the superhero part
of it. And even then, like you know, the setup of this
trailer is really showing like Cap and Black Panther going at it. They're battling
that The ending like sizzle thing at the end of the trailer is them fighting
on a bridge, a very classic kind of Marvel battle thing to do.
But yeah, it's like, Okay, that's not against a Red Skull or
some other big Marvel villain, it's against each other there, So I mean,
I guarantee this game is gonna pull the uh you know, Batman vs.
Superman thing where they end up teaming up to fight the big guy big
bad like a Red Skull or whoever. I mean, red Skull does make
the most sense. I don't know who else it would be. I'm sure
that's where we're going with it, but I so but I think this is
like a cool place to start of establishing this part of the game that there
is at least gonna be a section of the game where these kind of characters
are battling against each other. And I believe we have confirmation that you're like
you're gonna play as all four of these character at different points in the game,
and it's gonna be very guided, like Okay, this section, you're
playing as cap this section you're playing as the Dormlage character, rather than like,
Okay, this next I'm on level three and I can pick whatever the
four characters I want. Like it's more guided in that way. So when
you come down to a moment like that, I'm curious how that's gonna play
of, Like who am I playing in that battle? If these are both
kind of protagonists for this game. So I don't know. There's definitely still
a lot of answers that we need, and I'm I'm kind of with you,
like I'm I'm lukewarm on this at the moment. I'm I'm interested for
sure because I love Marvel stuff. This time period in setting is not necessarily
my favorite, but I do want to play as Black Panther in a game
because super fun and ultimate line, super fun Marvel's Avengers, and I mean
there is a Black Panther game coming as well, so maybe I just wait
and get that one instead. CAP is always fun in these kind of games
too, So yeah, I also imagine this game is gonna be very uncharted
e and that's you know, basing it off Amy Hanaig and whatnot, but
just very cinematic focus, like big set piece sort of things, really the
character driven and whatnot. And so I hope that means that the combat and
gameplay is fun, because I don't really like the gameplay much in the uncharted
games, but I don't know, this is definitely a setting and I enjoy
more so I've definitely got my eyes open here, but definitely need to see
gameplay before I make any sort of decision. Of course, It's it's funny
that you meant like just the clash I guess of Cap and and Black Panther,
Like that's that's like the whole kind of I guess mini story in this
trailer, right is the fact that like Cap knows that there's another super out
there and then he's chasing this one down and then uh, Black Panther are
I guess it's the normalage character to the Black Panther. It's like, oh,
like the you know, the American is on your tail, and like
while I'm watching this lead up to like the bridge, you know, clash
that they have, I'm just like, you know, you like, why
is this game called Rise of the Hydra. Like it's just just be like
basically Batman, sorry, Superman. Like this whole trailer is just they're in
France, but they're just like after each other. Like it's kind of seems
strange and in that in that way, but uh, that's a very good
point. I guess the beauty of the trailer, you know, it kind
of masked what was going on, but the more I stowed on it,
it was just like that's a really strange trailer to show off, especially the
story, right, Like Yeah, if it's called Rise of Hydra and the
big end off is like them almost like a Civil War type event, right,
it's it is kind of strange their decision. Yeah, I hope they're
just trying to pace their announcements and make sure that you know, like red
Skull on screen is gonna be a big hype moment, so they want to
save that for some other showcase. When this gives us a lot to chew
on or a decent amount of chow on for the time being, that makes
sense. I will say, Black Panther at the Cape no good. I
don't like it. I agree, it's weird, especially it's like very short,
it goes to like middle of his back. Yeah, don't like it.
Don't like it. Hopefully I can customize my character and take that off.
I would like expect that, honestly, in this day and age,
with how many like superhero games there are that you can just change your outfits,
Spider Man obviously being a big one. But uh, yeah, it
made me think of the Prowler sort of from uh a little bit, yeah,
and like I love it on the Prowler. There, I maybe your
assisment of like it being a little bit shorter looks strange also, just when
he was kind of jumping from rooftop and then kind of entering a bit of
a stealth sequence, it just seems strange. It seems like something that you
would wear in the throne room, you know, but then like once you're
going kick assure, you take off the cloak not to be warned during battle.
In The Incredibles they explain why capes are such a bad idea, and
like, I just picture that happened to chocolate here. At least his is
short, so he's not gonna like trip on it or hopefully that's and he's
not flying your airplanes like that one girl, and incredibly he should be safe.
But yeah, I also got the vibe that there's gonna be a lot
of stealth in this game, which would once again makes sense for that kind
of uncharted thing where you're sneaking around these areas and then once you tack someone
then it goes into all out warfare. But just the way Black Panthers jumping
around around rooftops and sneaking up on people, that is exciting for me.
That prospect. I just think like Black Panther as a stealth based character seems
like a really cool idea, especially on these like the yeah rooftops in this
kind of nineteen forty three France, Like, it seems like a really fun
setting to kind of jump round, very kind of dishonored esk in that way.
So there's definitely some things I'm excited for here. But uh yeah,
hopefully hopefully we get more at Summer Gamefest. I think that'd be a good,
good pacing. So yeah, there you go. There's Marvel nineteen forty
three. Any final thoughts on that or do you want to move on?
No, I'm ready to go. Okay, so let's talk about some other
games we've been playing. Sounds like you went pretty hard on Peach over the
weekend, but anything anything else you've been playing you want to shout out here?
I don't. Yeah, I don't think so I'm a shout out.
I was gonna shout out. I finally dabbled into this is gonna be very
niche audience out there. But you know on the podcast, that's running joke
that I'm a big F one fan, which I am, you know,
to defend myself, and I recently had gotten I think it was like the
holiday sale I picked up F one Manager twenty three. It's kind of like
the FIFA Managers. Like there's so many of these these manager type games out
there, and this one, like I'm not even gonna dive into it because
I'm just gonna sound like such a nerd here, but like I finally just
took the time to kind of learn. I watched a couple of YouTube videos
while I was cooking dinner, you know, and like just slowly build up
my knowledge before I could like jump into a game like this, and it
it is so great. I've only played like a couple hours in it,
but it's it's super super fun and it's super strategic and I just really really
digging it. But yeah, I just want to shout that out. Other
than Peach, that's kind of all I'd really played I Unfortunately I didn't join
the boys for out Last Trials this last weekend, I decided to jump back
in there. But yeah, it's kind of just been my yeah it on
games. I this there's this racing game I've had my wishless for years and
years that looks really fun and I don't for some reason, I've never picked
it up, but I saw that that team's new game is like an F
one game, So I'll send you a link to that, because absolutely,
if it's anything like their their previous game, I think it will be a
cool aesthetic for F one, a little more cartoony, but still like good
mechanics and went on. So I'll look into that. Yeah, I I,
as you said, out Last Trials, did play that over the weekend
a couple of nights there. Last night was a real, a real situation
because we were playing, you know, as we are where Travis and Taylor
have kids and we're busy adults and all of jobs. Like our gaming time
as a group always happens on the weekends, always Friday and Saturday night.
You know, it's just free and yeah, always like the hour ten sometimes
if we're lucky, but usually eleven or later, so you know, not
the best for my sleep schedule sometimes when it's you know, two am kind
of night there. But we were like, you know what, we didn't
get to play on Saturday, Well, we're going to And then I was
like I'm tired, guys, I'm sorry, I'm bailing. You were like
yeah, maybe, and then just who knows where you went? I saw
the couch again, just like Friday night, Travis disappeared and then Taylor the
next day was like, you guys bailed on me. I was all alone.
Then he went and completed one of the single player trial things. But
but yeah, so we played a little bit on Sunday, and you know,
it was like I in my head, I had like a heart out
of like I'm gonna go ten thirties. That's like a good time. I
gotta go to sleep so I can work. The next day we had finished
one. It was like ten ten, I'm like, okay, let's let's
see. And we did another one and it was really quick. It's like
ten twelve minutes. I'm like, perfect, So I'll do I'll do one.
One last game here. This freaking mission took one whole hour. It's
an entire freaking hour. Is that when we've gone to the police station,
you go to a court room, you go to collect some acid, and
then you have to get those scanners. You got to kill the witness,
remember that one with the scanner, And then there's a thing past that,
and yeah, I gotta go crank these wheels. And you know the saddest
part of this, Kirkland, we died at the very end. No,
and so we didn't complete the mission and we gotta do it again. So
hopefully next weekend you can join us and help us beat this freaking mission.
Yeah, it's it was. It was brutal. I mean we still got
experience and I did get love look from that, so I got a new
perk from it, so it was worth it in the end. But it
was especially man, it was like, oh man, now I'm going to
be so late. I didn't even beat the mission. It's just like double
Salt in the Moon. There. Great to start of the week. Yeah,
no, truly not, but no, it is I don't think I
have too much to add since last time. We did kind of confirm that
once you do that once again. I guess Ford who didn't listen last week.
We did a review for out Last Trials, so you can go check
that out for the deeper discussion. So yeah, like I said, I
don't have too much new to share here, but we did go through.
Travis and Taylor both beat that single player mission which rolls into the next difficulty
level, and we did, unfortunately confirm that it is the same levels,
so there isn't any new levels past what we played. They of course remixed
stuff. Things are in different places, enemies are different, like doors,
more doors, a trap. There's other mechanics that kind of get introduced,
but it's not a ton But really it's just like having the higher difficulty does
make the game a lot more intense and differing. You have to play a
lot smarter, so that's been fun to get into and just getting more deeper
in the weeds of like the RPG mechanics of it, the different ways you
can level up and power up your character. We discovered that the healing rig
that Travis had at the time and now I have ant Taylor has, it's
actually an AOI, so it heals, like you can heal the whole team
with it. Oh wow. On top of that, if you upgrade that
rig a bunch of times, you can get the it's called detox and it
it replicates the antidotes, so you can cure yourself to psychosis. And that
too is an AOI, so you can like heal your whole squad of psychosis
with that. So yeah, that was like a huge thing to discover.
We all put points into that, which has made it a lot easier.
But then also like we don't have much variety because we all have the same
rig on, so we need to maybe spread the wealth of it because I'm
sure the other ones have good upgrades just like that as well. So yeah,
it's been fun getting deeper into the into the mechanics of it. It's
a really fun game. I think we'll probably keep playing it for a few
weeks here. Like it's even though it's the same levels, it's still fun
to go through there and try and master some of these things. Yeah,
that's I mean, it's a little bit of a bummer that there's not more
variety on the levels, but I don't know, I mean, it's not
a full price game, right, So yeah, I feel like already I've
gotten my value out of it and just enjoyment. But as you mentioned,
just because like we only did the one like super challenging one when I was
playing and the weekly challenging that one was difficult, it was how did it
how did that compare to like this next level for you guys? Was it
kind of similar difficulty wise, harder, easier? I yeah, I guess
I would say it's about similar. That might maybe it was a bit harder
just in terms of like the damage enemies are doing like they are doing a
lot more damage now, but it's not like that. That weekly challenge was
freaking brutal. But there has been a couple levels real, Yeah, like
enemies are respawned immediately. There's a lot more this. Yeah, this mission
was so freaking hard and we're barely getting through it and we're like abusing this
healing mechanic now and we're still kind of getting wreck So yeah, it's it's
definitely And there's like another whole difficulty above this. I don't I don't think
there's one above that. I think there is three levels, but I could
see them adding something like that down the line too. But yeah, it's
it's pretty crazy stuff. So it's fun, it's good ability to it nice.
And then yeah, two other games I wanted to shout out here.
This is probably a quick show here, but this game I was on game
Pass. It's called You Suck at Parking. I don't know if you've seen
this one before. It came out like I think two or three years ago.
It's a number of radar and this is just like a janky, fun
like puzzle physics game. And I love a good physics game, like Trials
or like lonely mountain downhill or like you know, like that bridge Builder portal
game. I was telling you, just like bridge building games in general,
I just I just love a good physics game, and this is definitely that.
Where you're set up in this level and you have to park your car
into these different parking spots, and it starts out pretty simple. You know,
you're just going through like this, like a pretty simple obstacle course,
dodging some codes, bounce and off some tires trying to get there. But
then as you play more and more of it, it's getting a bit harder
as that are layering on the mechanics of it, but just like really fun
combination of mechanics where there's essentially like a gas meter you have for each of
these levels, and so some of these parking spots are really far away,
so you have to like be really precise in your movements and try and avoid
that janky bouncing off walls and whatnot, but then also like trying to find
different shortcuts. But then also like the best feeling ever is when you're like
you run out of gas so you can't hit the accelerate anymore, but you
maybe just have enough speed to just slowly slide into that parking spot and get
in there, and then you still get like full marks for that doesn't matter
if you run out of gas, as long as you made it there.
So that's that's a great feeling. And then yeah, I just think that
there's like a just this level of mastery to it, of trying to figure
out the most optimal roots and be able to nail them each time. It's
just really fun. I don't think I have much more to say in that.
It's just like it's just a video game at its core. So highly
recommend that one. It's been a lot of fun. There's a lot to
it, a lot of mechanics that you get in there, cop cars eventually
smashing India and land mines and all this crazy stuff. It gets wild pretty
quick, that's funny. I just pulled it up and it kind of reminds
me of like over Cooked or like Moving Out like that. Definitely. Yeah.
I had to double check to make sure it wasn't the same developer,
which it's not. But uh yeah, though this this looks wild as you're
describing of just like different parking it it reminded me of a game way back
in the Flash Days, So maybe you've played it, but I think it
was just called Driver's Ed and you'd basically just do like different challenges, like
you'd parallel park one of them, you'd reverse park, and like there's different
driving. I do remember this man that was like me and my sister like
always playing on like whatever. It was maybe like addicting games dot com like
like something like that. And yeah, I know, just as you were
describing this game, it just took me back to that world and there was
the yeah, the like the teacher guy. Yeah exactly, and like if
you got close look at that one, if you got close to like the
edge, he would start like mumbling his mouth and like obviously he would give
out different demerits. That's yeah, that's exactly the game. That's so yeah,
I definitely remember this game. No, I definitely I love like a
because you know, there's like racing games, but I feel like driving games
are kind of underrated where it's just about like either precision or like a little
puzzle. This is very much like a puzzle game mixed with like a janky
physics game at the same time. So I think it's kind of like an
underrated like subgenre. There that I really enjoy, so once again on game
Pass, go check it out. And then lastly, I you know,
as I said, I played the Princess Peach demo. The other demo I
checked out is for Sandland, which is coming out next month. I think
I've talked to you about Sandlin on like a I forget if it's a Nintendo
director with some showcase. I feel like we talked about it. But Sandlin
is an old Akira Toriami like manga I believe, and yeah, rest in
peace, and so I don't know if they I think this developer actually put
this demo out early, because they put it out like a couple of days
after he had passed, probably just you know, honoring, we got some
people, Hey, you want to just love something that he may like,
go check out this demo right now kind of thing, which is pretty cool.
Maybe it was just convenient because the game is coming out like in a
month, so maybe that's I don't it seemed early for a demo, so
to me, it seemed like a cool little just a little gift they were
doing for the community almost. But yeah, sand Land once again has that
kind of dragon Ball sort of esthetic to it. Totally but yeah, I've
had this game on my radar. I would I would just you you mentioned
Mad Max earlier that were doing the retro for that, or you guys rather
are doing the retro for that, And this game reminds me a lot of
a Mad Max sort of thing where you're just in these sand dunes and you
have all these crazy different vehicles that you're using. You're just cruising around destroying
people. And at least in this demo, like, what's interesting about this
demo because a lot of demos, like the Peach one for example, it's
like, here's just the first thirty minutes of the game, a totally fine
way to do a demo. Of course, this feels like it just throws
you, like ten hours in and just throws you at a section randomly in
the open world, and it's like, yeah, just screw around for a
few hours and see if you're into this kind of gameplay. So yeah,
it doesn't mess around by like Okay, here's the first vehicle and like here's
some tutorials. It just there's no toatorial just drops you in there. It
says, you know, go have fun with this, go check it out,
which is it is super fun it's really great. Like you have your
kind in the demo, you start with three vehicles, and so you have
like a speeder bike that's like gets you across the ground pretty quickly. Of
course it has guns and bombs on it and stuff too. And then you
have like a tank that you can use, which is pretty straightforward, it's
really fun. And then you have like sort of like a battle bot sort
of thing, like it's a more standing up sort of robot, has like
a big uppercut and you can kind of quickly switch between these vehicles. I
don't even know what the overarching theme or story or like progression of the game
is. It just seems like kind of like an open world these sort of
things. So I'm sure you're just doing quest, doing side quest, doing
fetch quests. And like I said, the demo doesn't really introduce really what
the format of the game is. It just lets you play around in this
sandbox so to speak. Pun intended there, but yeah, it's like the
gameplay is super fun. The gameplay is like it's super snappy, even when
you're just outside of your vehicle, like the run, the double jump,
the dash, like all that feels really really solid. The vehicles are super
fun. There's like different upgrades, so many differ and upgrades you can get
for them, Like the enemy type is really fun, good variety in there,
and just like just amazing vibes of course that that Toriyama art like done
in like beautiful kind of like four K sort of textures, really good looking
game. The music is really great, so huge shout out to Sandline.
I like once again eighty bucks, so it's like, ah, every game
is so expensive. Really, I got got to side if it's worth it.
But I really really enjoyed my you know, hour or two mess around
in this game. It is. It is a super fun, just great
game feel so big shout at to sand Land there. Yeah, I completely
forgot about this that we that we had talked about this before, but just
seeing like Yakira Toriami like artwork to go with it, it's it's just it
looks so beautiful. And the fact that they have like the three D models,
yeah, they're just auto racus essentially, like yeah, like like like
the dune that they're on. It's just it looks beautiful even though it is
just like a baron land, and I just I love the style of his
character they're all so unique and like colorful in their own sense. And just
like the way that he had done vehicles. I remember there was so much
like little side art that he had done, like just kind of well,
it probably wasn't side art. It's probably things for like dragon quests and just
other projects that he had done, but I had seen like a lot of
splices amongst like dragon Ball characters with those with those objects, I'm like,
I just want more like vehicles and and like architecture from this guy, the
way that he that he would do, like those types of buildings, they're
they're very bubbly and and kind of like hmmm, I don't know, they
look alien sort of thing, and uh yeah, just it's beautiful and yeah,
yeah, they're they're they're they're kind of given like this cute sort of
esthetic over top of it because of those shapes. But yeah, even like
watching a trailer afterwards and just seeing like all the other vehicles, because that's
kind of what the focus of the game is, getting these different vehicles,
powering them up. So rather than like your character progression necessarily, it's more
about finding and getting new vehicles, and it's like it's essentially like Pokemon,
like you just throw out this ball and then like in that same Pokemon animation
in the car like out of it, and then you can just hop in.
So it's like really quick to switch between them, which is cool.
Yeah, it's it's really interesting. And then you know, when I was
playing it too, I'm like, I love this sand aesthetic, but that's
like kind of bold to have a big open world game that's like just sand
and like different rock formations. But then like a couple of days after I
saw that they posted like a new trailer that was like a forest trailer,
and so there's like this whole forested section that you can go to which looks
very dragon questy obviously, like very bright greens, lush forests and whatnot.
So it seems like there is gonna be other biomes. I could see a
snow biome making a lot of sense as well for this kind of game,
So I'm excited to see what other sort of things there is. So this
is a game that I'm definitely gonna pick up at some point. Yeah,
day one might be hard to justify, but I think like, even I
don't know, twenty five fifty percent off, I could see myself picking it
up hopefully later this year and I can play it before the year ends.
But yeah, like, don't sleep on this one. It's really interesting.
Like I said, the demo was really good, so go go check it
out, go play it for yourself, and you'll see just how mooth and
fun the gameplay is of it. It's a it's a really really good time.
So there you go. And I think that's I think that's gonna be
it for this episode of side Quest. You're a little short and sweet sort
of episode. I think next week I'll be joined by Taylor Field and who
knows what the heck we're gonna talk about, so you just got to tune
in to find out. But thank you Kirkland for joining me, thank you
everyone for listening, and we'll see you again next time. Bye bye,