Hello, and welcome to side Quest. This is our weekly video game show
here at Geek First. Today we're talking about all the Xbox Developer Direct for
twenty twenty four. I'm your host Til Muss, and have with me the
Destney Temple's last raider of the Doom Circle, Travis Snell. How's it going?
Took good? Good good. It took me a while to figure out
how can I get every single Indiana Jones something from the subtitle in there?
Dasty Temple came in late because I couldn't figure out how to do those RIGI
which the other one, but I'm like, no, I thought that works.
There could be the great circle in there. I got circle, so
I took one. Okay, yeah, yeah, there's so many. I
couldn't get the entirety so and I had to take up my header because it
wouldn't even let me have Traspy Snell. But yes, I am. I'm
here where you talked about some some Xbox, some indie war specifically for myself.
But I'm excited to be here and there is Indy. It's Taylor Field.
How's it going? Jones? Jones? Thank you for having me,
love it, love it. Yeah for the second year row you're here joining
me for this Xbox Developer director, which seems at this point like it's gonna
be maybe a yearly thing, a January or early February situation where they give
us kind of the breakdown of what we're gonna see for the rest of the
year. So uh yeah, really, no no plugs for this. Just
make sure to hit up Patronice episodes early in ad free join our discord where
you know, whenever there's a show case like this going on, we're always
talking in there about the announcements and the excitement in there, and uh yeah,
Main Feed. There's all sorts of stuff, all sorts of Golden Geeks
things occurring right now, MCU DCUs Main Golden Geeks. I Travis. There's
a Travis Told You episode yesterday, so yeah, keep him busy on.
I swear I'd listened to a YouTube video that just came out. Am I
wrong about that? I think you are, unless I did it in my
sleep. But there is one coming out this week all about the oscars,
So check out out. I think maybe my YouTube algorithm put one at the
top of my page and I was like, oh, I should check this
out. There's some relevant news here. So I was listening to a bit
of it. But figure out my secret. I have a time machine.
I already filmed the traft sold you on. You guys got my secret.
That's how I do all this stuff. I got a time machine. You
know. Well there you go, uh yeah, all sorts of other stuff.
So with that, let's uh, let's talk about it. So,
like I said, this is the second year we've got this technically there,
this is the third one because they they called that Starfield Directed a developer direct
as well, though it is only about one specific game rather than being about
five games that we saw today, and I think it was four games last
year that they had as part of their thing. So just in terms of
uh, I don't know, first impressions in that way, Taylor, now,
second year watching this this direct here, what did you think of this?
You like, like in the format? Any big changes since the last
one that you can remember. So I found that I think I was vocal
about this in the discord that I found the first half to be just kind
of like slow and a little bit boring. I was really hoping for a
little bit more of like a pick me up. But I again I understand
that this it's a developer direct so you get more of that behind the scenes,
you get more of them covering a lot more in depth of point A
to point B. They're talking about the music, we're talking about just the
team that's been investing the time into the different mechanics of the games. So
it's always important to just put that in the back of your mind as you're
watching this. I think people are maybe used to like that the vga's like
your E three's where it's just like one, two, three, four,
just going on going. Uh. It was cool to also get a little
bit of like a couple of surprises in here. Well I guess just one
surprise really, but even that seemed to be kind of a disappointment when people
didn't seem to be thrilled with that game, which I'm sure we'll talk more
about it, but overall, what started off to be kind of boring,
it definitely did pick up and I got more excited, especially when we got
to like the back half and we got into like Indie, So I'm excited
to talk about it. Drives. Did you watch the showcase last year's January
Drives? Oh? Oh lash, what can you dave me like a game
or two that was on there and that would job well. Hi Fi Rush
was the big like shadow Drop they had Minecraft Legends in there Redfall, because
I remember hearing about the shadow Drops. That's how I know. I didn't
experience it live, and I know that game got some praise and whatnot,
so considered like a really fun thing. So no, I didn't watch that
one last year. So okay, well, what do you think of the
What do you think of the format of this Yeah, I just had to
YouTube because I want to see how long it was, and it was forty
five minutes, which felt like I guess it seems about right. It felt
like a little shorter. So I think that's a good thing. I think
it's I think it's a pro and a con. I think overall it's good.
I like the format of the show. I don't think I think they
give each developer like pretty much the right amount of time. It's like India
the End got a little bit more. But that kind of makes sense because
it's like one of their bigger games this year, if not like yeah,
i'd say next to Vow that's probably their biggest game that is public right now,
right maybe there's some like, oh, Gears of War we don't know
about or something like that, but yeah, so I think I liked it.
I think the only tough thing is they did the surprise sing what she'll
talk about. But it's tough that if I think you gotta watch that because
one you don't want everyone to expect each direct that might happen. And two
it's stuff that you uld think you should save surprises for something that's more four
quadrants for everybody where this felt like a very specific surprise. But I think
it is a good thing that they announced that hed, hey, these are
the four things we're talking about. These are games, is what to expect.
I think that's why maybe with last year they did something similar, and
that's why I didn't really tune in because I wasn't feeling Red Faull and the
other stuff when there wasn't for me. So I think that is for a
viewership wise, it's a damned if you do, damned if you don't,
because if you show these four and people aren't into them, then they go,
oh, well, what a disappointment. Where if you, you know,
announce them ahead of time, maybe people don't check it out. But
the people that are like it. So over all the show I liked it.
It didn't feel like a drag. I agree too, there is it's
tough because like there was parts that drag, but it was more so just
because I know this is a game that's not for me at all, right,
And that's what we talked about before, where we've seen great conferences,
but you still got to feed everybody, or feed people that are in our
audience. So it's like when four as it gets out there or something like
that, go Okay, this is for somebody, it's just not for us.
That's why when I take out okay, what I actually want to see
the game wise is the actual developing the show. I like that. It's
a good mix of quickness and hearing from the devs, and I don't think
anything really overstated. It's welcome, maybe other than the surprise. To be
honest, I thought that was a little too long. But no, I
like this one. I think it's a good way of doing it. It's
closer to Nintendo Direct. It doesn't have like the charm that Nintendo Drek has.
It's a much more official one. But yeah, which state of play
feels like that's more announcements announcement eregal but they usually have a bit more there,
so overall it's like a thumbs up for me, but it's not one
I would be remembering if Indy wasn't there, just because the pacing is very
kind of basic game developer, rinse and repeat. So definitely, yeah,
I continue to like this format because I like the deep dives into these games,
and I think for the most part, between this year and last year,
I think they do a good job of they you know, they announced
the games that they're going to be talking about prior to or at least they
announced the studio like they did last year with the Ifi Rush Studio, and
and I feel like for those games, I always get all the answers I
possibly want, And I think there was a couple there was a couple of
things with this one where I think that actually kind of went against that with
specifically Avowed and Visions of Mona, which we'll of course get into all these
games. So I think they maybe dropped the ball slightly in a couple of
those ways. But then I think they really nailed it on the Showcase of
Jones and hell Blait. I mean, I think all anyone wanted was a
release date at this point, and we got that, and then I think
Ara was kind of a surprise. I didn't really know much about that game,
and they showed me everything I could possibly want to know about it,
and now I'm like very excited about it. So I think in that way
it was pretty successful. And I hope they do more of this. And
I'm curious what other kind of games will get that Starfield treatment of getting the
forty minute direct just for themselves. I mean, forty minutes is a lot,
but even if they just do a twenty or twenty five minute one for
some of these other games, I'm trying to picture a game that's of such
a big scale that they could really talk for that long about it. I
don't know which. I don't think any of them really have that hype level
currently. I think they're all like far out those ones, right, Like
that'd be an Elder Scrolls, that'd be like a fabe. Yeah, the
games that we have no kind of like touching. That's that's a good show
out. Obviously that game is still like very far away, it seems like,
but I think that could be one that would get its own uh like
maybe it has like a quicker one here, a five ten minute thing,
and then later on in the air three months later or something, do a
bigger drop where you get kind of the full vertical slice of it rather than
just maybe that that first gameplay showcase. Yeah, can I ask you,
because I don't know what I'm trying to look up when it was revealed.
How come every time we talk about Fable, you're always like, oh,
it's very far away. When did I Why did I feel like it was
like two years ago? Am I wrong? Was it very recently got there?
It might have been announced three years ago at this point, I mean
still though we've seen it twice, because there was that initial teaser trailer with
like the frog getting the ferry. Yeah, and then just like the title
card, and then there there was another trailer. I guess it was last
summer at Summer Game Fest. It was I see that, yeah, yeah,
and even when they got revealed February. So that's the reason it's one
I've seen July twenty twenty that was official announced. Oh wow, jeez.
Yeah, it's always would for that teaser because then I feel like it was
a couple of years of nothing and I don't know that summers. The reason
I don't think it's close is a couple of reasons. One is the Summer
game Fest thing we had last year, Like, there wasn't gameplay in there.
Now some people argue there is, but when I watch that, and
I've watched it multiple times like that, it's not gameplay to me, like
that, that is a couple that's a couple of cinematics that look like they're
trying to seem like gameplay, but to me, it's not proof of that.
And then we've just heard a lot of like shuffling behind the scenes of
like creative directors leaving, writers leaving that. I feel like there's been a
ton of turnover and change, which makes sense because That's studio has made only
racing games for like one hundred years, so it makes sense that you're trying
to bring in some new people, maybe some other people who aren't interested in
making a game like this. So those are kind of the reasons why I
think it's further away. You know, maybe maybe late twenty twenty five or
twenty twenty six, but that's kind of where I guess twenty twenty six would
be like a safe prediction for me, So it feels that feels far away
still, but it's just crazy to hear like practically a four year old announcement,
and every time you talk about you're like, oh, it's so far
away, and I just like in my mind, like that doesn't make sense
at all. But well, I mean think about right, like the Elder
Scrolls six announcement was before Fable, and that's like we're probably not even gonna
hear about that for another at least two or three years before we even get
like the first inkling of any sort of information. But who knows how Xbox
is gonna roll that out compared to Bethesda. But we should get into this
showcase here though I've always done let us know anything Fables coming a little think
that's in the video game discord. Let us know we're gonna go out of
order here. They save this for the end, which I think was the
right move because it is the big hype one. It's the one that I
think most people were tuning in for Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. So
we're gonna start here. This is announced for twenty twenty four. No window,
but just that other than you know, the yearly window, I suppose
this is the first we've seen or got really any meaningful info about this game.
So, uh, Taylor, one of you first like, what did
you think about this? We got like, I don't know, ten minutes
of gameplay mixed with some a bunch of info from developers, and then there's
been more info on articles and stuff posted since then. So, yeah,
what are you thinking of Indie so far? Yeah? This was This was
definitely the highlight I was. I was super excited. I was not expecting
the first person view. That was definitely the big kicker for me, and
so I was I'm understanding it because I've seen some people talk about how they
didn't want to go with that uncharted vibe and just make it kind of I
guess me like a copy of that to a degree, And when you put
this game in the third person, I could very much see how it it
would fit that vibe of being uncharted. But I like the idea of using
the whip in first person. I like the idea of just being able to
do all these puzzles and they just explore it in this field of view.
So that's definitely a huge highlight for me. I'm not a fan of the
title. I don't know why they rock the Great Circle. Yeah, I'm
not a fan of that. You describe why you don't like it. I
just think it's very Uh, it's too simple when I think, like Dial
Destiny right now, I was playing with it in my mind, like what's
another like good idea they could do, like uh, like Earth's axis or
like the Earth's I don't know, something something that yeah, maybe or Earth
they could keep in workshop or get access out of there. I feel like
it's like we talked about a couple of years ago when they did reveal Dial
Destiny. I just think Indiana Jones and James Bonds are two franchises where you
just like the name of you don't and it's just like a vibe. It's
just something where it's just like, oh yeah, you can't really describe.
There's certain times where it's like insidious the Devil made me do it, Like
that's obviously a bad title, but for something like Great Circle, like I
I because that's in one way that I just feel like, I don't know
if I feel like I'm out of touch or something, but I just feel
like many people saying the titles ship people are so mad about the first person,
and I just don't get I don't get it at all, and I
don't I don't know. I haven't heard like a compelling arguments. That's why
I wanted to see you had one. But I know with something like that,
it is strictly vibes. I want to ask you, just quick ten
second of dendum, how do you feel about the Conjuring last rights doing that?
Is that a new title of that's the next one? Yeah, I
just want to know. Don't see any calling anything. The last is a
bit generic at this point. I do like I do like rights. It's
the rights that what we're what version of that R I t e s.
So it's like a yeah, it's got to be. It's got to be.
I think it's fine. It's a little it's a little generic, but
I think that's okay. I think it's a good title. Like I'm not
gonna I'm not mad about it. That's it. I was just curious because
I know, damn the Conjuring one, So I just want to know.
So I hadn't heard about that title. That's a fresh one. I mean
yeah, as far as my only con really being just the name of this
game, it's not gonna knock points off for me where it takes place that
has me super excited. I love that we're going in between the two films.
I love that it's it's a Cannon story. And just seeing familiar faces
like Marcus and and everyone just pop it in there was really just it was
so wonderful to just see how intensive they were to this world and they really
want to trying to dive into that. So I guess like them bringing in
like the the Nazis and whatnot is just like classic Indiana Jones. I feel
like they're just gonna, Yeah, they're gonna hit a lot of things right
on the nose that people are familiar with. I think that's that's wonderful,
and I hope that this game does a good job at bringing in new fans
that maybe haven't seen Indiana Jones or they've watched Style of Destiny, but like
I don't, I don't know much about this character, and they don't necessarily
want to go back and watch the originals. Just the game is another medium
that can really have bold strategy. Yeah, it's just another format that can
bring in new new fans, new fandoms and and and players and whatnot.
But I said that it reminds me of like an Uncharted meets far Cry because
of just how interactive the world seems with what you're doing, and I want
to know how far that really extends, Like how much of the world are
you interacting with and what what are you Like are you limited to, like
you're in an area where you have to unlock this door, for example,
are you limited to just being able to pick up this one thing associated with
unlocking this door? Or can you just be collecting things over time and like
apply them to different scenarios. I guess that's what I want to know more
about, because we didn't get anything further than just what that basic showcase should
like displayed for us, right, Yeah, I mean that's We've got like
a couple more slight details and articles, but nothing about like level design or
anything like that. But that is that definitely one of my bigger questions.
I want to ask you guys about that too, in terms of just what
is the structure of this game, so we can talk about that later.
There's definitely a lot of questions, but I think they did a good job
of providing more answers than I got questions out of the out of the showcase,
which other games I maybe that is not the case for So, yeah,
is that your peace, Taylor, any any other I mean thought in
closing, I I hope that it comes out this year. This is definitely
like a day one for me. I want to be immersed in this and
I feel like if it does anything like feeling like you're in a movie,
I mean, I'm just I'm there. It just it looks like such a
fun time. So nice. Yeah, so I should mention this as well
that if you want to hear our thoughts on the Indiana Jones movie, Boy,
do I have a retrospective view? Last year, in preparation for Dial
Destiny, we went back into retro for all of the movies, so all
that's available in the feeding and search that. But yeah, Travis, what
are you thinking about Indy? Yeah? I think what you said your last
point doing where how much they're revealed is what I was happy with because I
knew we were getting to see someone and I think we the idea of like
first person versus third somehow plays the PLoud and everything. I kind of hadea,
Okay, we get that, but I had in my mind we could
get half of what we end up getting. So I was very happy with
what we got because it could have been easily. We need something big for
the direct show that and then we could get the coming twenty twenty five right.
I was actually fully prepared even if it's early, and it still could
be right because right now it's fault through the than twenty four, so things
happen. But I feel I don't know why I did draft it's so maybe
that's why I'm just putting out of the universe. I feel confident it's gonna
hit this year, just because we've talked about this before, where of course
summer things will come, but there's a lot of open slats, and I
think this is a great year for this game to come up, because next
year, just like movies like twenty twenty five is just like stacked loading up
right, It's like, oh, just even Grand Theft aut all alone,
It's like, do you really want to be coming out around that same time?
So I think it has a good from what I saw, it has
a really good possibility to be the equivalent of what Spider Man was for you
know, the game to the combook character. Same thing from the game for
Andy to the movies. I know that's been like a big debate, and
it's so funny that you know how much has changed in the podcast. I'm
somebody that's on the side of not necessarily on the side of first person,
but I'm fine with it here, Like I could see a case for either
one. I didn't think it was gonna be third just because the history of
the company, you know, like I never I never really questioned that.
I just kind of assumed, like that's what's gonna be. Even the first
teaser was like kind from a perst person perspective, right, it was the
map and the compass. Then when he grabs the way, like so I
didn't mind that, and I liked what I saw for the majority of the
part. I was actually I know they had to partner with Lucasfilm everything,
but I wasn't one hundred percent of convinced it was gonna be Indiana Jones' face
or Indiana Jones Harrison Ford's face. I know it's not his voice, but
I didn't think I had to go that route. Same way as like,
uh, who's the hit Man? People that are making the Bond game right
now? It's interactive, right, Yeah, same thing as like they just
said, hey, it's a new Bond, new actor, Like, it's
not anything tied. I thought they easily could have done that. I've just
taken India as a character and done that. So that's kind of like a
fun bonus. And that's when I love playing characters from the the like the
third perspective. But if you're getting the cut scenes with Harrison Ford's face,
like that kind of scratches that itch for me in a way. Right,
So, overall, what I saw I liked. I think I'm hoping the
puzzle stuff is really good. I'm hoping it's not just like Level or Lego
material, where like Lego has puzzles, but it's like they're also made for
like eight year old kids to solve, right, Like I would like some
sort of thinking. I would like, Hey, I am stuck here,
what do I do? So I hope it's not just like a oh,
whip this rocked into this hole, you know. I hope there's a little
bit of that. And the combat, too, is the only thing I
want to see a bit more of because there's at times it looked like,
I don't want to say clunky, but just a little slow, and I
just That's why I'm hoping the exploration and the puzzles really good, because the
combat didn't look great enough where it's like I could find myself getting I don't
want to say bored, but just kind of maybe on purpose avoiding battles because
the action looked like the least interesting thing to me in this one. It
was just a lot of punching. You have the gun, so maybe in
game it'll feel better, but just kind of felt almost like a like Scandy
Arcadie of just like moving around. The whip did look good, though,
so I give them that that maybe that will be the go to I'll just
want to whip. So overall I think it looks good, but I think
it's the brahma like I said, where we always talk about the Spider Man
games that they're always great, but they're never gonna get to like Game the
Year level. That's what I'm expecting from this is a great Jones experience.
I think we could talk about it maybe be my third Game of the Year.
But I'm also not going in there thinking, oh, they're going to
reinvent the wheel and we're gonna be talking then this game Award of Year or
Game of the year awards come, you know, next December or this December.
I guess. So I liked it. There's also a day one.
For me, it was usually gonna be Day one unless it just looked awful.
And I don't. I don't think it looks awful. I'm happy with
what we got. So no, I mean I for me, I was
always known it was a game pass. I'm like, oh, of course
I'll jump in there no matter what. Day one. All right, yeah,
game pass, baby, it just saves me a bunch of money.
I forgot about that, it really does. H Yeah. I I thought
it was a really good showing for the game. They, like I mentioned
earlier, like they answered all my questions. I think they really showed a
good amount of what the puzzles are gonna be, like, what the levels
to an extent they are gonna be, like the combat, seeing all that
stuff, answering most of the major questions. So I was and I think
it will be a fun game for me. I think it's it's the kind
of mix of gameplay that I really like. You know, they use that
classic verbiage of like play your way, you can steal through the encounters,
or you can you know, go in Guns of Blaze, and that's just
like every Arcane game is designed with that eight those So I really like that
this is gonna be like that Machine games. You know, in terms of
a company is such a not a wildcover for me. I just have not
played any of their games prior to this, so I don't really have the
four knowledge going in. But you know, the three of us have talked
and it sounds like we might be doing a one off retrospective episode for one
of their prior Wolfenstein games to kind of lead into this. So I'm very
excited to jump in and see how those games feel in the gameplay and the
combat and if that stuff's great, which from everything I've heard it is great,
I'm sure that will carry over here. And so that's why I really
like the first person and to me, that kind of tells you a little
bit more about what kind of combat system it's gonna be. It seems like
it is gonna be more about using your wits or using the whip doing silly
things, goofy things, over the top things, rather than it being like
a cover shooter. And I don't really want a third person cover shooter right
now. I'm just not relating to those things like an arn charter that just
bores the hell out of me. So to me, that's like a good.
That's a good, like there are games that are a third person that
have guns that I do enjoy. I'm not making a blanket statement in that
way, but I think for all the of course, Uncharted is like based
off Indiana Jones. Now talking about a game of Indiana Jones being based off
Uncharted. I definitely wanted to take things from Uncharted, like big set pieces
and a focus on story, but I didn't really want them to bring over
just like the covered shooter gameplay of it, and so I feel like just
going a first person perspective is gonna help facilitate that as well. So I
would say I'm pretty excited for this. One thing that maybe didn't blow me
away was the visual quality. It just didn't look like a three sixty game.
But it definitely looked like an Xbox one game or like a PS four
era game, which is not the end of the world. I think it
looks totally fine. Hopefully it has a good frame rate because of that.
If it's thirty and it looks like this, I'll be a little salty.
But if it hits sixty with this, then I'm sure I'll be pretty happy
with it. And I'm sure to look a lot better on the four K
TV than like my monitor that I was watching it on. So, talking
more specifically about some of this stuff. So Taylor, you're talking about the
puzzles or I guess you both of you talked about the puzzles a bit.
I really liked what they said that there are going to be optional puzzles and
then there's like, you know, mandatory puzzles as part of going through the
main story, and the optional puzzles, the bonus ones you can do,
those are gonna be like the much harder, much more challenging ones, ones
that could really stump you. I think that's that's an amazing idea, because
in a game like this, I think that can sometimes get in the way.
And then you go the whole opposite direction of making the puzzles so brain
dead easy that they're not even worth doing, Like God of War got a
lot of criticism for that, and I would agree it's like, take all
these puzzles out because they suck, but they don't want to make them too
hard because they don't want people to get stuck in God of War like doing
this freaking block puzzle, you know, so it makes sense, and to
me, like the solution that was was Steve Sarr's last year where it had
a ton of bonus, optional hidden puzzles that are off the main path that
you can do post game and stuff like that, and that's where the most
those the best, most interesting, and most difficult puzzles were. That was
fantastic because it was all optional, so you could just go there when you're
ready and if one was true, then go do something else and come back
to it later, and it's not preventing you from being in the game.
So to me, that seems seems great. So far, we haven't really
seen much like picking up items and putting them in slots and turning dials and
stuff. But I just think being in these really cool ancient ruins and crips
and things like that is gonna make for some a really fun setting, and
to me, I think the first person setting is really good for that as
well. I think puzzle games in first person work really really well, and
there's a ton of examples of that. So I'm looking forward to the puzzle
element of this game more than other Triple A games right now, that seem
to put them in there as a necessity rather than because they actually want to.
But it's so important to the character of Indie, right. Yeah,
I liked like what you said with the optional because there is gonna be people
that just like Indy and that might be one of the four games they buy
that year, right and they might want want they might not want to do
the whole I'm stuck here for half an hour trying to figure out things,
especially if they like the story, if they you know, it's Harrison Ford
in a sense. So I do like that. Now. I hope that
they kind of back it up because I do want them to be hard.
I hope it's not just like I said, it's like the story ones are
literally move one rock and you're done. Because that's one thing we talked about
in the Indian Jones retro. That's most of our favorite parts of the maybe,
you know, seeing Indy and Harrison react and act to some things is
those most like That's probably still my favorite scene is the very first opening of
Ray's Lost Dark. It's just, you know, you got the ball everything,
so it's like it's a different medium, because of course it's gonna be
first person, but I think you can still put Indie through similar events like
that, and if you're seeing it through his eyes, I just want them
to try to If they can capture I think even like seventy five percent of
that feeling, then I think it's like a win. So I really hope
that those harder puzzles because this is a game that I what do you think
the story would be like length wise in this Like I feel it's not gonna
be a massive store, right, So that's where it's like, I feel
like I'm gonna really every time a puzzle pops up, I think I'm gonna
do it unless I hear it's like a thirty hour game. I just I
really don't think so when we talk about Wolf and Sign even like fifteen hours
or something around there. Yeah, even Spider Man. I was sure in
my opinion this year. So that's why when those pop up, I'm gonna
be just unless there's something in the game where you can't do a certain puzzle
until you got a certain thing. But I'm gonna be looking for those puzzles
left, right and center. You know, how do you think, how
do you think they work in the optional puzzle element, like, because I
would think that this game is linear of you you go to Rome and you
do some stuff in Rome, you go to Egypt, you do some stuff
there, and then there's cut scenes in between. So it's like, can
you go to revisit areas or is it just like within this Greater Tomb there's
just like this whole extra side section that you don't need to do, but
you can go do a puzzle there, or are these gonna because Tay,
you're making that comparison too far. I think you mean more in in terms
of the gameplay and the freedom of encounters and stuff, But I don't know
in terms of like the openness of areas. Do you think that could play
a role in this too, in terms of where this optional stuff comes in?
Well? Yeah, It's it's interesting because I I when I think of
this game, I'm instantly kind of just imagine like, oh, well,
you're gonna be You're gonna be doing these puzzles to unlock and progress forward like
you would be in like an uncharted game. So just to kind of look
and observe this as like, hey, you can go to certain areas and
you can do certain things. Those certain things will not necessarily haven't. Maybe
they'll enhance your time to progress in the narrative, I guess I. Or
maybe they'll offer you certain pieces of equipment, just certain things that will make
it easier to progress. Yeah, because it's just it's it's weird costumes exactly.
Yeah, because it's weird to think about something that's not going to affect
your your ability to finish the game. It's just weird for me to think
like that. Do you think you're gonna have stuff? Because I think it's
gonna be literally, I think it's gonna be funny enough, very similar to
I'm not sure, like I guess you guys have played Golden Liye. I
feel like it's gonna be very similar to like James Bond type of games where
you get a set mission, you start to in franch and then you just
go cutscene into the next one. Like I don't think they'll be Yeah,
they'll be exploring, but not in the sense that we think. Do you
think Indy's just gonna be a base character? Do you think there's gonna be
stuff like, oh, enhance like your whip strength, en hands, how
many bolts you can stew because I wonder that stuff you could hide in between
these puzzles too, right where it's like, Okay, you could still complete
the game, but if you want a little extra speed, you want the
whip to be stronger if you want. And again I think costumes as well
too. I feel like that stuff they would put in And to your question
of where I feel like you might have to replay the whole mission because I
don't know if they'd have just a a puzzle base. I'm not sure that's
something that he's doing like Lower of the Rings games where it's like, oh,
you can just go back and do all air gorns like waves and like
everything that was special hand it was just like all the menu. I guess
the story story wise, they could just like Indy could have a little journal
or something and you like open up the journal and he's like revisiting the memory
and then you like zoom in and then you get put in that memory,
you know, and you kind of get put back there. Or maybe it's
just like when you beat the game, then you can kind of go chapter
select and go to that. Cause yeah, I think you're right in terms
of that setting of like you're gonna have a set piece, you're gonna have
cut scene, and then you're into like the open, more open area of
that which might have some calm bat puzzles, some some rooms and whatnot.
And I feel like it probably is gonna stick to that structure, especially if
we're going to all these different places in the world. They also makes me
feel like you're gonna get two or three missions in each location, and that
makes for a good run time and good variety and that sort of thing.
Mm hmmm hmm. Yeah. I guess it's in terms of the upgrades.
I don't know, because all we saw here was technically like punching the whip
and the one pistol right like the revolver. So I don't know, like
I cause it's like, do they just have a b yeah, do they
have upgrades with a pistol or are you getting other guns and other weapons.
It doesn't seem like they are trying to highlight the action as being this huge,
bombastic thing with all these different cue you know, tons of movement options
and dashing and dodging and all these weapons. So I would say, I
I think that they're gonna keep it more simplistic. But then there's gotta be
like some sort of metaprogression. I don't even like something like skins too.
It's not like Indie's known for having. I guess he does have a few,
like iconic costumes, but even though with the first person element of it,
yeah, I guess it's like I don't think I don't see that as
much as a focus. But you just see when he's climbing a pole and
it's like, oh, he's in his white suit from Indie too. But
I and the cut scenes I would feel like would have their specific character looks,
it would be off. So yeah, I just feel like we've been
seeing this more and more for Xbox games that are of course if they went
into game Pass and they want to have some reason for you to buy something
additional on top of that. And I feel like with Indie or for most
games, like they have like some sort of skins like Red Fall or Starfield
Head this kind of thing. So I feel like they would maybe want to
do something like that, but hopefully within the game as well there's some sort
of customization. But I don't know with what I was shown here, Like,
I don't even know if I want or need or care about that kind
of stuff. If it's there, it's exciting, But you're right, sort
of progression YEA, what do you put there then? Right? Is it
just little stuff like extra ammo extra like strength of the way up, more
stealth because they say you can seek out like is it just stuff like that
just character base like attributes them. Yeah. I mean, I guess they
can do like story story elements. Story beats could be a thing that they
do there. But I don't know. I really don't know what the reward
would be for doing those things. Like if it's story beats, would that
would that be at risk of detracting from your overall experience? I mean,
I guess I don't think they would hide like cut scenes behind them. I
just mean more like you know, notes and things that you can read to
get a little bit more info on these these places or these artifacts that you're
finding. M h. I Also, do you guys, like with all
these indie things always having some amount of paranormal uh element to them, do
you think there's gonna be anything like that in this game that like goes into
your character and how you play through the game, or do you think maybe
that would be part of the story, but not necessarily change your play style
at all. I could see a specific level mission doing that, like the
way at the end of Temp Dune and he gets taken over and he's like,
you know, voodoo magic and stuff. I could see something like you
get bit or curse get on you and maybe you're stronger, fast or something
like that. But I hope it's nothing like level two you get some curse
in the whole game. It's like yeah, and he has this secret fire
ring and it's like, oh, I don't want that. So I think
they'll definitely be supernatural stuff. I think Tony Todd, you know great Tony
Todd, Kenny Man, he just did Venom, like already this bigger dude.
There was creepy stuff around and felt like, Okay, he's gonna have
some supernatural stuff going on. But I hope if that happens with Indy,
it's one very curated, specific level slash mission. I wouldn't want it the
whole time, I think, or even if it's like if you have like
some sort of I don't know, like lantern that does something like blind your
opponents, like I don't know what whatever magic mumbo jumbo it is. I
don't want. I don't want that on the side. M h. What
else. They also showed some a couple of like set pieces, you know.
We saw one where you're in the back of a car manning the machine
gun taking down a Plane's one where you're jumping from one plane to another.
So I feel like, in that very uncharted way, we're gonna get some
of those fun set pieces that you need. Because it's Indian. That's a
big part of it as well, So I think those are gonna be fun,
even if like gameplay wise, mechanically they're not that interesting. Hopefully they're
able to capture that that scale of it and make it feel grand and big,
swelling music and whatnot that will make it feel epic. I'm looking forward
to some of that stuff. Yeah, and that's one thing you mentioned too.
We didn't talk about, but I'm looking forward all that set piece stuff
because I think that's something you have to nail. Some of the best ball
Honk games did that. But what you are so, I was like,
in so far as obviously it's not well John Williams coming back, but they
stress that they're very happy with this composer and from most of the music other
that was other than the India Jones theme. It felt like it fit with
the vibe and everything. So I was enjoying that, and I like the
I don't know because I guess like I feel like, technically, if they
got Harrison Ford's face, they could have just bought the soundtrack from probably all
five movies and just used tracks from it, right, They could have just
recycled, done anything. So I do like that specifically, they're getting the
crew to come in and do specific music beats that should add to things like
the set piece and character moments and everything. So but yeah, I'm excited
to say they're cooking. I'm hoping there's gonna be something that is like a
very memorable set piece where even if you don't love the game, it's like,
oh, but that one level had you had to do this and this
and this, So hopefully don't blend together, and hopefully they I think space
them apart in a good manner as well too. M definitely what else we
got that the voice actor for Indy is played by the great Troy Baker,
who's, you know, just the most famous voice actor in games right now
for the last few years. It does all these iconic Roles. I think
he fucking nailed it and is I mean, he's the perfect casting now because
of how good he is at capturing the Harrison Ford isms, the little things
listening back to the trailer post because I didn't catch that it was Troy Baker
when I was watching the trailer for the first time, but watching it back
knowing that and I'm like, Okay, I can notice it's Troy Baker now,
but just little thing he does to capture the certain way Harrison Ford.
I don't even know how to describe these things. Only a master like Kim
and voice work could really describe these things, I'm sure, but I think
like ten out of ten absolutely nailed it. And I I would happy,
be happy if you played this character for a trilogy of games, like he's
so good at it trilogy putting it out there. Oh yeah, yeah,
I was happy. I again, it's just another one of those things that
it's just it does justice to the original character. And I think it's great
because when you can have like new new actors and new just people in general
come forward and be able to just capture and deliver on such a great tribute
tribute tribulative, tributative honorable way. Yeah, I think you could just want
to attribute tribute. Yeah, that's perfect. Yeah, they contribute to the
the original very very well. And I think that that that just speaks to
OG fans new fans alike. So I'm very happy with that because I feel
like, like I said, that helps because I think people still have been
excited if it was any game. But the fourth thing does help. I
forgot to mention because Taya mention it to the I like the connuity verts taking
place because there's like a longer gap between. Like it's weird because one and
three because technically two is a prequel, right, so there's this long time
in between. So I think that's fun. I think there's a couple of
characters you've seen be four, but a lot of the main cast is new,
so I think that's smart. Well, yeah, what do you what
do you guys in terms of story content, what do you think there's anything
into mine in between that timeline there, specifically between Raiders and Last Crusade that
you hope they go into, or you or you think they'll go into.
It's really tough because I don't I don't think you can really touch upon the
father stuff because I feel like they say that for three and it seems like
they're leaving Marianne out of that right, and yeah, that's why you have
your new kind of I don't know if she'll be a love interest, but
female protagonists there, so I really don't and I'm very curious to I feel
like it's going to be more in an adventure. I think it's gonna be
more of a venture and Cadmill's game purely just because I feel like at least
one, three and five and even four there they always have some sort of
you know, journey with INDI my favorites two and it doesn't have that much
of a journey. But I don't know what you can do development why so
I feel like is they also the crazy one point we're really stressing, like
we love this villain. He's a thinker, you know, he's always outsmarting
Indy. So I don't think it. Yeah, I don't think it's gonna
be so much of an emotional journey and more just learning some sort of skills.
So as far as far as storyline stuff, no, I'm kind of
just fine if it's weird, because I'm a story guy and I want a
good story but at the same time, I am kind of fine if it's
just like a basic adventure that Indy say, you know, survives but doesn't
win in the end, you know, maybe I'm more interested where they have
to hit the story point is, Yeah, the villain Tony Todd, what
is the great Circle? I think that's the stuff I need a home run
on, where with the last movie it's like, well, I need the
character stuff because this is Ford's last outing, so I want them to deliver
on that, which for me they did. So I think for me it's
more just hit that adventure fall in love with the journey. So yeah,
it's interesting looking at the timeline because Raiders the Lost Dark is nineteen thirty six
and Crusade is nineteen thirty eight, so you have that two year period right
in between of this game is going to be taking place with. So I
think that there's so much you could explore here and you like an average Indiana
Jones adventure. I mean, obviously it's a it's a few weeks time that
condensed into like an hour and a half two hour long film, but even
a few weeks, he could slide in so many different things that are occurring
his teaching in between. So I'm just curious if we're going to see Henry
Jones Senior pop in here or something. I don't think so, you don't
think so. I think I'm not saying that. Yeah, I don't know.
I guess it depends how size of the role. I just feel like
with three, it's like they've been a strange gymp seeing each other in a
while, right, So you don't want to lessen the impact there. But
true, if he does appear, who's who's voicing them? No, well,
clearly not Sean Conray. Well no, I bet if he's in their
first small amount, I bet Troy could do it and they just pay him
for both cool. I think they'll stay in there lane for the most part,
Stay in lane, stay in lane. But yeah, no, I
think the villain they showed off there looks cool. Gina is the kind of
sidekick we also in one of the temples, you hear her voice and she's
like offering some tip to India. So it seems like she'll join on on
some of these adventures to some extent. I don't know if she'll be there
in combat shooting down enemies too, or if she's just there in like a
maybe she's just there in like the more tutorial temple or that ruin that sort
of thing. Not sure, I bet she'll you will be like some like
looking at the side and maybe she's off shooting somewhere definitely in like cutscenes and
whatnot. But hopefully she makes it in there in a big way for some
of these other things. And then yeah, Taylor, you mentioned too that
like the different locations, so on the map they go, they go to
Rome. They mentioned the Himalayas. There's some kind of Mayan looking temples,
the pyramids of Egypt, so just you know, a bunch of iconic locations.
You get a good variety there of just the classic Indiana Jones type temple
things, the Himalayas, like yeah, the Himalays, like the Maye temples
Egypt, Like we've seen all that stuff before. I can't remember if we've
been to like Rome. Have we been to Rome? Probably right, I
don't know if we have. I even thought, like, have we been
have we been to Africa? We've been in Africa? Right, because when
he said that the villain South Africa, I was like, I don't recall
like even a set piece I know of course we get the plane map that
goes like a lot of plays, But I mean, has there an extended
sequence like with Rome, same thing, don't. I don't think anything long
extended. So I feel like, yeah, I feel like those two are
missing something there, which is good. That's good. That's the first one
of the first things you should do. And you're starting out the story of
Okay, what what has Indy not done? You know, because you don't
want to make it just the exact same. You want to capture the spirit,
but have it. I feel like you were doing something different. Mm
hmmmm. I mean, well, I was just curious because like apparently people
just say he's been to a role many a time, but like Syracuse in
dial of Destiny and he goes back in time. I think that's pretty close
to home. Oh yeah, sure, why not? I won't count that
one a different, different style. That's the whole game. You just go
back in time and you're Indie, you know, doing that stuff. Yeah,
it's like not the first time he's traveled back in time apparently, now
if we reconned it, yeah, the last uh yeah. Once again,
the release date twenty twenty four. They didn't say anything else for other games.
They did specifically say Fall. When we were talking in discord, we
all seem to think summer a different time June, July, August one of
those. August I took. Yeah, I feel like I feel pretty solid
about that after a few days thinking on it. I I don't think they
want too much going on in the Fall, so I think it makes sense
to space it out. I think India is a perfect summer drop as well,
so and I kind of hope it is too, And I think that
would be I think that'd be good for them, like maybe just right after
I guess right after like Summer game Fest and all that stuff, like you
do one last trailer and then you have a big release in July or August.
I think that would be a really good timing. So I hope they
fall game then because I was with, is that what our ours in there?
Yeah? They said Fall for about an hour okay, So yeah,
So why why wouldn't they just say like summer Because they put Visions in Man
as Summer twenty twenty four and then SENDU as Saga as they put May,
So why wouldn't they just drop the month? Well, I don't think they
want to delay things. Ever, again, I think they've had too many
bad optics delays in the last couple of years, So that's why I don't
think they're I think they're just playing it safe and they just don't know yet,
so they're just gonna say twenty twenty four. You know, it could
be a twenty twenty four. We're very much reading into this where I just
feel like, Okay, if they're gonna say twenty twenty four not fall,
then it got if it's gotta be summer, right, if you already have
your May release or it's twenty twenty four so late that it's very pushable,
and I think there's a good chance that it does get pushed as well.
But if it is twenty twenty four, I would I'm still I'm assuming summer
if that is to be believed, But who knows if that's gonna stick.
I mean, we saw a lot of the game, like obviously they're showing
us a very curated amount, but in terms of like the way I look
at Fable, I'm my, ah, it's not ready for a long time.
I look at this, I'm like, oh, that looks like a
that looks like a launch trailer, Like let's let's get this shadow dropping in
releasing right now. That would be insane. If they shadow dropping Indiana,
Oh oh my god, be available after this direct ends, that would be
people go crazy. I don't think you could do that. You can do
it for High Fire Rush, but yeah, doing that for Jones, I
don't think Disney and stuff would have to go that lack of marketing budget.
Yeah. So yeah, And it's funny because like just the game pass thing
I kind of forgot about. So I'm just curious of, like wonder what
Disney views as like a sign of success with that, you know, because
we have that with Blade, which I feel like couldn't even talk about play,
but with at least with Spider Man's like, well, okay, you're
getting all these copies you're selling, right, Midnight Suns, You're getting all
these copies you're not selling. But at least there's like, hey, what
do we get in return? And That's what I'd be curious of, Like
how does game pass work for in the business in general? But when you
got someone that is a third party that there's not many lucasfilm games right now.
They're very specific to certain companies. With Star Wars I wonder what they
what is Bethesda Todd Howard, because he said he pitched it to them.
He said he's this is the game and he's been droom to make forever.
He's a huge fan. So that's great. Hopefully that's all true, But
like I wonder what the well, like everyone says, I we're going to
game right, but I hope it to genuinely like, hey, I love
Indy. I'd love to do this for somebody's like, oh yeah, of
course. It's been a big sense. It's an easy franchise to be like,
yeah, I love Indy. So that's my I would love to be
a fly on the wall. See like what does Lucasfilm get out of it?
You know, like I'm not sure there's some profit, but like how
do you measure that in the game pass like subscriptions and everything. So that's
I mean, that's where I think those those add ons that they've been doing
coming into a effect where it's just you know, you the outright game,
like the ninety dollars game is what it is, but then you can get
that upgrade to the Legendary Edition whatever they call it, or you have like
that, you know, fifty dollars thing or forty dollars whatever was that they
had for Red Fall and Starfield. So obviously that's a smaller chunk of money
there, but obviously for Xbox it makes sense. So yeah, you're right.
When they're bringing in different partners, it definitely brings up that question of
how does the money get split. I'm not sure. Is also just it
dropping on Steam, which I'm sure that'll do pretty well. I think it'll
do very well in Steam as a game as well. I could see that
being a thing a lot of people want to mod as well, so get
it on there, So yeah, I think I think in that way it'll
it'll probably have some good sales still, and we've even seen that tons of
games that drop in a game past still sell a ton of copies. People,
you know you're going to get that like the most downloaded in twenty four.
Like I don't think it's gonna be Starfield, but it will be like
in twenty twenty four, the most downloaded first played in five hours. I'm
sure there's a lot of people that have all the Indiana Jones movies DVD's on
their shelf and they want to they want to add the newest thing in there,
right, and they need to make sure because people will miss this Xbox
when it comes out. Every time you open your up your Xbox. There
needs to be an ad for this game so people that they've even missed it,
Oh there's Indiana Jones game and once they learn, it's to click away.
If they have nice theme, a nice theme for the front page.
Game pass is the first thing you gotta do that for like until about out.
I feel like, if you want to really make this a big deal,
yeah, I'd be very very interested in seeing if they have like a
nice physical special edition it comes like an indie statue and all that kind of
stuff, Golden Idol, or even if they add like usually specialists coming the
soundtracks now too y circle. So I've been like a game like this including
the soundtrack to Dalla would be super super hype. But you mentioned mods.
Could you guys imagine if they did like a Captain America mod where you're like,
the main villain is just like Reskin is Red Skull and then India's Reskin
is Captain in America. Man, you're getting some ideas. Get out there
of Xbox didn't want to make a Marvel game one now the dude with blade,
but yeah, that could be. That could be the way they do
it. You get anything else character in there, but leave them in whatever
that movie is called. Any any other thoughts on Indie, No, I'm
excited. It was like I'll say it, like exceeded expectations by a little
bit, not in the way like Blew me Away, but I was like,
Okay, I'm happy with this and then went a little bit more so
I'm we're on the right track. So I'm really excited to play it,
and I I hope it's good. So where's this on your most anticipated list?
Now? For just game releases, not for this year, but just
in general. Oh, it was like top five a good side quest,
just like even just in general throw like anything else. I don't know if
it's like I guess it depends on the status of Nights or Republic, but
like, I know I got Grand Theft Auto in there. I know there's
the Wolverine game. I think it might be a top ten because I fel
like there's already other ones where it's like there's replaced somewhere in there. You
know, hopefully you know that's a tough thing, but I guess an now
it's things I'd say definitely ten, but we should yeah one time, if
we ever slow week, we should do just overall because I don't have that
list of my mind right now. I got for this year, but for
like the overall years, you know, like where's beyond good and evil?
You know, yeah, who knows skulls? Top five for you? Top
ten? I'd say this could be top five, but again I got to
revisit, just examine my my list. But this one's definitely got me hyped.
Good stuff. Okay, what the hobbout? We take our first break.
We'll be right back. Okay, we are back. Next up,
let's talk about Avowed. So this game is coming out in fall of this
year. Is what they said here today. I'm a huge Obsidian fan.
Obviously I loved Grounded. I think Pentiment was a really cool game. The
Outer World was a good time follow a New Vegas one of my favorite games
of time. So this is a studio I'm a big fan of, and
I just think they do a lot of cool, weird, unique stuff,
and when it comes to RPG's, they do a lot of those kind of
things. In terms of your dialogue choices have impact on the world and all
these things that you know you want to see from a game like this avowed
though as a game. You know, originally we got the first trailer for
it, and it was a teaser trailer but looked really cool. I was
like, man avout or sorry, Obsidian is making their version of Elder Scrolls
their Skyrim, and that got me super super hyped, And just over the
last couple of years, I think my expectations have been put more in check
just because we've heard that, oh, actually, this game's like kind of
a smaller scale. It's about the same scale as an Outer World, so
it's like, Okay, that's not anywhere close to an Elder Scrolls then in
that way. And I think because of that, like my expectations have kind
of been not my hype levels, not necessarily going down a lot, but
just that expectation. I just don't foresee this being like an all time great
game for me. I just think it's gonna be like solid, and I
like the fantasy setting more so in Outer World, but I did enjoy my
time with that game too, so I guess going into this showcase here,
I didn't really know what we'd get here. But I was pretty pretty disappointed
in what they showed up that I think it looks bad, but I just
don't feel like they really tackled a lot of what this game is. Like
they they talked a lot about the combat, and they showed some like dialogue
option stuff like that was kind of it, Like, I didn't feel like
this is a very vertical, slicic, all encompassing look in the way that
Indie we kind of saw a little bit of everything or our history and told
we kind of got a little bit of all the different mechanics and things going
on. This is the one for me where I just I feel like they
kind of dropped the ball in showing the scope of this thing because I imagine
it's gonna have a bunch of RPG elements to it. There's gonna be all
these cool companions, and I feel like we didn't see any of that stuff,
and that's what's kind of disappointing to me. So obviously we'll talk about
what they show what they showed here, but what did you guys think of
this this showcase? Like I think that you mentioned that pretty spot on with
just what they were showing, but I also think that just what I got
to see, it didn't really maximize what I would have hoped to have seen
them differentiate from other games like Elder Schools and whatnot. When I look at
this, it just feels like it is that smaller scale of what I'm already
familiar with and what I've seen. That being said, Elder Schools is definitely
my go to out of all those, but that's the like you're like just
Fallouts and whatnot, Like I love Elder Schools, but with this, it
just seems like, yeah, it's a much more simpler version of that,
which I can from credit. Maybe this is their foot in the door to
doing something bigger down the road, but that shouldn't be the case. This
should be them tackling this head on and making a little bit more larger.
You make a great point with the Outer World as being a smaller kind of
contained setting, and this to kind of follow suit with that. It is
upsetting because I feel like there's so much opportunity with this seeing a little bit
more like the combat system was kind of pool. I enjoyed that, like
the guns, the magic and the sword fighting and just and the dual combat
kind of set up with our dual handed combat was kind of cool, but
there was dual wand wilding. They were yeah, so though those are some
highlights for sure, and the world was really neat to be able to just
see what they had built, but yeah, I just feel like they were
there was some sustenance, some juice missing from it. Still for me,
I'd like, I'm definitely gonna still try it because I need to get my
my older scrolls fixed. That's not being satisfied as of late, but that's
where I currently am after this ring jump an elm ring give that a go,
you know, sure, I don't want to lose my hair. I
don't know. Yeah, So, Travis, I don't think you've ever played
in the City and game. I can't call if you ever have, So
what do you? Then I'll go to my story where I remember Outer Outer
Worlds I was really excited about and you really liked and it's a game that
I want to play again because I played about a few hours and it just
didn't grab me, and I just feel like it was also the time where
I was very busy, so I've always had it on my list of like
even recently I've been like, I really want to get something because I do
have star Field, but I wanted something. Again. What my issue with
Starfield was there's sometimes where the choice didn't really matter, right, There's sometimes
it didn't and sometimes it didn't. I'm not saying every single thing has to
matter, but it just felt like, Okay, I never we talked about
right where I never got to feel like I got to play as like the
bad guy of the thing. And I'm not sure if you can do that
in our worlds, but so to some extent, yeah, and that's where
Starfield's like, you're always kind of going mostly one way. So so that's
the only one I played, and it didn't necessarily grab me, but I
didn't think it was bad. So I want to get back to this and
this one I've been waiting because it's not just you. I just feel like
on my timeline people have just been really hyping this game up, and even
podcasts. I listened to it, and I think I'm like today where I
just haven't anytime really been connected with the magic of it all. And it
should be a game because I want RPGs where I have choice. I love
the dialogue trees like you've talked about, Dylan, because of then it's like,
Okay, we've got more options. I showed four, so I'm like,
okay, four. That's like a like that could be a good route
as long as it's not just a similar response to each of them. I
like when they show the scenario of, hey, you gotta trust this guy
and if you do, this happens. But if he was bad and you
trust him, this happened, So I could be interested in that. I
have to this one will definitely be word of mouth, but just looks that's
an unfortunate thing. Like Tia Summo's Elder scroll thing. It kind of looks
like the like the I won't say straight to DVD version or B rate version,
but just a lesser than because it's not that it definitely looks higher budget
and I'm sure will be a good game, but I mean it's just like
the scale is way smaller, Like Outer Rolds is like a twenty hour game,
right, which yeah, that too, like an Elder Scrolls or fall
Out, like twenty hours in you're just you barely don't even Starfield, right,
remember talk about like the first second Wars is like what have I done?
Right? So would you say it's like you get the main game on
console, and now like the handheld, like the Vita gets like a spin
off, like a smaller scale version. Yeah, like every every like superhero
game on the game pub had like some three D beat him up, and
then the Yeah boy game was like some platform. I won't say that far.
I don't think I had that negative of opinion, but I just I've
just been waiting to be hooked and it just not for me. The best
thing about this was the poster they released. I really dug that, but
yeah, I just I don't know. I thought, like you said,
I was interested to hear your thoughts still, but I kind of thought,
if I'm gonna get hooked, this could be the time. Like it's wrecked,
It's kind of viewed as the biggest one, I think, even more
so than India a little bit, because India is like, of course it's
a big title and people are hyped from that, but that's purely because it's
like attached to an eyep right for a peer. This is a gaming eyepe,
something new. This is the biggest one, that's one of their bigger
releases. So here's the best example. And I don't think it'll be this
quality. I just got a lot of Red Fall vibes, and I don't
think it's gonna be like that, but just that same way where it never
hooked with me, and then when it came out, it got And I
don't think this game will get that, but I think I could come out
and get very kind of good, like middling good reviews. I don't I
don't see this as a game of Year right. Outer Worlds was right.
I think it like cracked the top six there that year or was it wrong?
Maybe like the main show? Okay, well then never mind. It's
definitely another game they or one, so I guess. Yeah, I'm just
waiting to see, but I think this one i'll be word of mouth.
But even then I'll be checking out Our Worlds out first again because I want
to give that game more of a more of a fair shot this time.
So yeah, Older Worlds was a game that I quite enjoyed the first time
around, and then I came back like a year or two afterwards when there
was like the big two big DEALC packs that came out, and then I
became a little more sour on the game just because I feel like my choices,
well, you can make different choices I didn't feel like it changed things
in I don't know, too huge a way. I suppose they didn't.
Yeah, I don't know that you can. You can make some decent choices,
but I guess it it. I just feel like the world is so
small that it that hurts some of the reactivity of some of those things.
But in terms of like Outer World is a game where you can kill like
literally every single NPC in the game will like canntinue on, and I think
that stuff's kind of cool. In terms of making the quests go on if
you killed the quest giver is pretty is pretty cool. But then when I
got through the DLCs, one of them I thought was fantastic and some of
my favorite content in the whole game, and then one was like a real
dud, And that was like the second one I did, so I kind
of left me in a bit of sour spot on it. But yeah,
Obsidian, it's it's weird because I, like, you know, follow out
New Vegas. The game became so long ago. Now I've played that game
a million times over, and that is a game, Oh my god,
like decisions, choices matter, choices scaling out into all over the place,
huge scale because one day you could go back to it. I think it's
a game that still do I go back to it? Though? How do
I acquire said game? You know, game pass on your content to game
pass. It's the first party it's first party game. So yeah, was
there not a time where it wasn't though? Because it felt like I had
this conversation it was the city and got acquired in twenty nineteen, so prior
to twenty nineteen or twenty eighteen, whenever they got acquired, it wouldn't have
been on there. Prior to that. I just thought there was a time
where we're like, oh, yeah, hopefully one day it'll be on that.
I thought it was like a two but okay maybe, but but yeah,
I mean, I just feel like I've always especially when I saw Outer
Worlds, I'm like, oh man, they're finally doing this again after all
these years. Very exciting, like the first person the open, open world,
that sort of thing. But it's like New Vegas was so different because
that was built off of where it was using Bethesda's engine. It was using
a lot of assets from Followed three, which I'm sure made the development a
lot easier, but also that engine was just built for the bigger scale,
and then when they got to their own engine whatever, and then engine they're
using for Outer Worlds and avowed it's just not quite the same. Uh,
And so I hope that, Okay, they did Outer Worlds, here's their
next game using this first person this engine, that sort of stuff. Hopefully
they can iterate and expand and just make it make it better in all the
different ways, and hopefully it's like a little bit bigger, a little more
expansive, or feels more expansive, and then Outer Worlds two can be even
bigger and better. And I just hope they can climb that up game to
game as as you know, you would expect they should. All had to
say, let's talk about some of the actual things kind of shown off here.
So so, yeah, the combat was a big focus. They showed,
uh the yeah, the wand kind of magic combat where there's you just
kind of shoot your wand and just like kind of does a generic little beam
almost like a bullet, right as they alluded to. Or you can do
more magic abilities like freezing enemies or using the root and ability which looked really
fun, fireballs, that sort of classic stuff. And then there's you know,
the classic melee combat. You got your shields, which they're they're really
highlighting. And then there's even guns which I did not expect, like simple
guns like big chunky, heavy revolvers. Right. I don't think there's gonna
be like a full LMG or anything like that in here, but yeah,
and then they they really stressed this load out system where you can like make
different pre built things, so you can have your build with your sword and
your shield and you can quickly switch over to your like double wand thing,
and so it seems like it's gonna be very frantic combat, very uh on
the fly. And to me, it seems like they're building a lot of
these combat sequences like little D and D encounters, like they're really taking into
account the environment that you're in and how it's going to change the fight.
And I think that element of it seems really fun. And I think this
does look like a good improvement over Outer World just in terms of game feel.
I think it looks really solid. I'm excited to mess around with all
these different weapon types. I think that'll be I think that'll be fun,
and it seems like you don't really need to do multiple play throughs to access
to really like try out some of these things in meaningful ways. It seems
like they're trying to make it so you can at least put your toes into
all these different types of combat and build it out. So I was pretty
impressed with that. I like the combat they're showing against these lizards. Even
with the combat, though, like they really didn't show a ton of different
enemy types and stuff. It seemed like they tried to show like this one
sort of encounter against these specific lizard guys a lot of that. So I
don't know if they're really trying to hold back here so they can have like
some other bigger showcase in a few months where they show off a lot more
or something. But yeah, I guess maybe it was a little bit limited,
But I was pretty impressed with what they showed with the combat. I
think it looks fun. It looks like a good even maybe a bit of
an evolution over Skyrim system of really building up that dual wielding part of it,
which is the big thing that Skyrim did over you know, Oblivion and
stuff. So I'm I'm pretty, uh, pretty excited for the combat of
it. See, And that's where for me it's like I go back to
my roots where like the indie game for the most part of the okay,
I can get into that, I can see this where this was like,
this doesn't look like anything I want to do in first person. I don't
know why, it just was not. It didn't necessarily look bad, but
it just didn't look like something for me. I guess I just I didn't
love the dual wanting like everyone else. I did actually really like the inclusion
of guns. I know, like you said, there little ones, but
that kind of took me out a little, which I know, like you
know, closer to it's a supernatural medieval fantasy world, so you can include
them, but I was kind of like, eh, like, and I
guess I don't have to use them, but I just wonder if I would
have preferred them building some sort of other more magical esque weapon that could shoot.
I mean, there's still a bone arrow as well, but yeah,
I know you got wands with it, just even something a little bit creative.
But yeah, for me, it was the RPGM and stuff that were
the things that would have you know, got me. But nothing nothing wing
wise was really I was the opposite that that kind of pushed me out actually,
so that's where I was on that one. I can appreciate the quick
changeups of just your your setups for weaponry, because that's with older scrolls.
That's always something I find, like I'm frantically doing. You pause, then
you go and you got to like change your spells or like swap make sure
the right things on either hand and your favorites tab and then it cans.
Yeah, absolutely, so it can get very chaotic. So I like the
focus that they're they're doing with that for this time around. I think that's
really really nice, and I imagine that, Yeah, there's something they really
did want to focus on is you're going to be dealing with different enemy types
in these situations, so the their weaknesses are and certain advantages you can get
and one ups on enemy types is going to be changing drastically and quickly.
So I do like that it looked like too and maybe I'm mistaking that they
were able to like lock onto certain targets at times. I thought I could
see like I thought at certain times like they were just like casting spells are
attacking, but also looked like like a circle will kind of like hone in
on like an enemy type at times when they were like attacking, maybe it
was just part of just the weapon they were using or something completely irrelevant,
but that I'm sure once maybe to some extent we'll have like homing missiles.
Yeah, that makes sense. One, you know, big question I had
was like a huge part of Outer World is one of my probably my favorite
individual part of that game is the companions. I think that is so well
done, where the voice acting is really good. They all kind of have
their individual quests that you can go do. There's like travel banter when you're
just going through the world and they'll be talking about some random they have some
random conversation and it could get interrupted by some random enemy encounter and then they
like they'll pick up the conversation and a very natural It was like amazing stuff,
and so I was I was. The thing I was surprised to Nazee
here at all is they didn't mention companions. I'm sure this game is gonna
have it, But even in like the combat, I was curious to see
how would that evolve or change, especially in like the fantasy setting that's so
much about you know, having a team composition of you got your healer back
here you got your tank, barbarian type, all these different kind of classes.
And I think that's a very fun thing to do in Outer world is
build your characters out and you can choose like how far behind you they stand,
if they're really far back and they don't fight, or if they stand
right behind you and they're kind of like your bodyguard. You know, so
much customization, and so I'm sure that stuffs gonna be there the same one
an out of Worlds, hopefully even a bit better. So I'm sure that
I'll hopefully make the combat stand out a bit more as well when we see
some of that stuff, and I'm excited to see what kind of weird companions
you can get, because there's a couple especially weird ones in the Outer Worlds.
And then the RPG stuff was like, to me, maybe the biggest
omission and maybe they just wanted a bit more of a at quick glance showcase
here, but I feel like you have so much time like show off what
some of the skill trees look like, or what you're trying to do here.
How it's kind of a skill trees, I do. Man, that
stuff is so exciting for me, and once again something I thought was really
really well done. Crazy in outer worlds, we're like just character building,
picking your stats at the beginning of the perks and all that stuff. Leveling
up I thought was really well done because Upsidian has made a million RPGs,
They're really good at doing that sort of stuff, and I just wanted to
see it. So that was another thing that was kind of an omission here
that I think will be exciting. And then one the other. So they
showed combat. The other big thing they showed was, uh, they're trying
to really show off like dialog, options and choice, and I just think
this is one thing that does not show well at all in a showcase,
right, and a developer direct makes more sense than a regular trailer kind of
thing in a summer game fest. But it's one of those things where it's
like I don't know these characters. I don't know the situation, I don't
know the town or factions they're part of, so none of this really has
any meanings. So we're just showing me like making this choice. It just
doesn't work. So like I I appreciate that they tried, but I feel
like they shouldn't have showed that, and they should have showed other more exciting
things and just mentioned like your choice will have consequence because we we know that,
and with a city, and like we should just even believe it by
default. So I felt like trying to show it was maybe a misstep here,
and I would have liked to see like, for example, we didn't
see a single town or a city in this game pretty much. Yeah,
yeah, the one like kind of desert area and then then a little bit
more of the fauna and whatnot. But yeah, even the areas, we
didn't get a ton of variety. In my opinion, like I said,
I thought that the developer tried her best to explain what the difference would be
as far as like the consequence of that, because this guy is like a
yeah, like quiet individuals, so it's like, oh, could you have
been a turn code this night? So I think they showed it. I
agree with you, it's hard to show, but then they tried to explain
like, hey, this could be what would happen if you picked this run.
I almost wish, though, as somebody that did like it, to
make it better, if they would have showed both, because they just showed
the one. We're like, oh, let meet you back Home basically leaves
like edit of it so it doesn't take forever, but yes, quickly show.
Yeah, I think that would have been better. But I agree with
you that it did seem I know, we said the other game is smaller,
but it seemed like very secluded to very just certain areas, very certa
because I just sat there's a lot of like that that brownish like whatever bright
dirt is like. It wasn't like I don't know what the like. Yeah,
Sam, it's like video game dirt, you know, where it's like
this, like the world doesn't look like there's been games. Yeah. No,
I do feel like the world was definitely lacking some life to it,
And so hopefully I'm hoping that this was just kind of a bad showing and
the game is a lot better than this. You know, I should be
like the hardest defender of this game, and I just, you know,
this is how I'm feeling. So I think that's probably not the best indicator.
But once again, I'm hoping they're just holding back so that when they
they really pump out some bigger content closer to the actual game release, it
doesn't need a full like direct like Starfield Goup, but give it like another
ten to fifteen minutes solo direct or. I'm sure it'll pop up at every
Xbox showcase or summer game that's the rest of the year, so we'll see
that stuff. But I think they there's a room for a bit more here.
But any other thoughts on about here. You you mentioned the dialogue there,
and it looked like there's some dialogue had like icons next to it as
well. Yeah, maybe that's tied into like the skill tree if you can
do like speech persuade improvements or something persuad. It's a huge part of of
New Vegas, a huge part of Outer Worlds, and Outer Worlds is great
about that where it's like if you give your character like one intelligence, like
the lowest intelligence, you get all sorts of like stupid dumb character options of
all these you can't even like speak correctly because you're just so dumb and or
based on like the stats you have or you're gonna get it'll pull that in.
So that stuff's all there, and like I imagine it's gonna be there
in the way it was an Outer Worlds, but uh so, yeah,
I think that stuff's gonna be pretty well done. Your character classes and your
your choices in that way are gonna matter in conversations, So that's cool.
Visions of Man, I don't think we can we need to talk about this
too much. This was the surprise game here, and when I first saw
it, I was like, Oh, this is kind of a weird surprise
pick. Maybe not super exciting because we just got it at the Game Awards,
but I was like, you know what, cool, it's like it's
gonna be a game pass thing. I'm sure, like that's that's pretty cool,
but it's not. It's not a game pass thing. It's not even
exclusive. So I did feel like it was a weird inclusion here. You
know, it could be one of tho things they're trying to butty up close
to the score Nix, who knows there's an acquisition down the road, or
even just you know. One thing that Xbox has lacked for the entire history
of Xbox existing is that they've never really had a huge piece of the pie
of the Japanese market. That's always been a very very small piece of the
puzzle there. You look at the numbers of like PS fours sold there rether
to Xbox Xbox ones, and like it's just it's a very sad number for
Xbox, and I think that goes for every generations, just not a huge
console there. And so I think they've done a good job of, you
know, putting munch of Persona games on game Pass. They had all the
Hoosa games, and they're trying to get more of the j RPG stuff,
and I think getting the New Mana game on their console is is pretty cool.
But also like, this is not the A tier or S tier top
tier of the j RPG game and it's not even like a game past Day
one thing. I mean, maybe it is, and they didn't announce it
here, but you think if they have that contract sign that they would have
announced it at this time. So so yeah, it felt like a weird
inclusion for me. I think the game looks great. It looks really fun.
If it was on game passed, I would happily jump in ninety bucks.
It's kind of hard to justify, but I think the combat look really
solid. I love the visuals. I think the music is fantastic. This
looks really really fun. I just I don't know if I'm gonna pick it
up if it's not a game Pass title. Was that ninety bucks our price
or American why these games costing so much maydi dollars median just checking where Yeah,
I think unless your theory is right as far as I'm trying to buddy
out with Square Index, then I go, okay, I get to play
there completely understand. I think it's just then it's odd because, like you
said, if it's something that's not on games Passes, I'm like, hey,
you gotta buy separately. It's not in our home studio. That's why
if it has to be something bigger and it wasn't, so I don't know
if it would have been better for them to say, oh, this is
gonna be part of the showcase and people like yeah. I don't know,
because like I just felt like I remember on Artistscorp. That surprise it's like,
oh, man, like here we go. That's just like because I
was expecting like, oh, here's Elders, Yeah, elder scrolls, like
nothing like that. But I just thought something like something you know, to
an amount of like a even a replaced like that mayb would have been hype,
but something of that equivalent where it's like in Indie it's a smaller studio
or some sue something exclusive so yeah, not a game for me, and
also was a kind of a letdown where that was like, okay, that's
where I think the it could have been a great one, which is the
four games. So yeah, nothing nothing to add for me, sorry,
unfortunately nothing not my type of game so far. So mm hm tay there
any additional thoughts on that one. I would just be following the same footsteps
as mister Snell. There. I respect that. Moving on then, are
a history. I'm told this is a four X strategy game from Oxide Games,
who they said, you know, makers of many great tactic or four
X games such as Civilization five. Like I like that. They just they
said they set it up as if they've made all these games, and I'm
sure they have, but they are like only mentioned one game, which I
found kind of a funny setup for it. But uh, yeah, you
got very much. And you gotta do that when you promote your games in
the future, when you make your second game, like from the creator of
and it's just the game, you know, from the creator of Geek for
side Quest comes the latest RPG adventure from the mind. Yeah, so this
is uh, this is yeah, very civ like game. Surprise, Surprise,
based on what they've worked on before. All thirty guys first on this
one, Taylor, I know you're like tangentially into like you're like into RTS
games, but I don't know if you're really a CIV guy or this are
four X strategy kind of guy. I played SIV a little bit, and
yeah, I wasn't able to really get you know what, remember what you
played? Oh yes, let me pull up a picture of it. I
do remember one, two, three, five, six, Civilization Revolution,
the Space one or whatever it's called. Are they all the air of like
you talk about how you like Napoleon? Are they all in that type of
air of warn every thing like that? Like they go through like history,
like you start in like Caveman era and you go all the way up to
uh and you go all the way up to like putting a satellite or a
spaceship on the moon, that kind of thing. Yeah, the era one
time. This could be your time. Just look because I'll be doing Dune
soon. But I'm looking for that next great RTS that I just love,
you know, and I know this is not RT. Sorry just to put
just to stop you that, No, it's not an artist no turn based
right, there is a turn based, turn based strategy based what's that is?
Right? No, civilizations is always turn based. Yeah, this was
This genre is called like the four X genre where I forget what the four
ex's stands for. But it's like a grand strategy game, turn based on
a grid or more of a hex hex sort of grid turn based. Uh
yeah, you're building towns, you're doing war. But that sort of thing.
Can't you do that in real time time strategy games? Build towns and
stuff? You can, yeah, but it's not real time. What's not
real time civisation because it's turn based? No, No, I just now
I get it. I mean we're like there's arts games where you can't do
said thing, right, yes, okay, sure, yeah, like I
gage vampires, I think is kind of that's a closer connection than like StarCraft
or I just had a I just have had an ego crisis because it's like,
have I been referring to this genre the whole time? Like the Battle
Famill Earth to that one. That's an RTS, Okay, but that's where
you can also build towns and stuff RTS. Yeah, that's but in Lord
of the Rings you build towns and towers stuff, so I was like,
fuck, have I been wrong for the past like twenty four years of my
life? But we figured it out. Got Empire might be more of mind.
You can't remember what sieve but you're not necessarily huge stive guy, But
what do you think about this? I remember like one of them was like
Sieve for Beyond the Sword and like stuff like that, so around that that
I don't even know what that These are like two thousand and seven, thousand
and nine Sieve games because there I remember, I went to Walmart and I
got like a four pack of them, and this is when I dived in
and tried them out. I was like, yeah, these aren't really for
me. And that being said, I another I was looking into some other
games that ox I had done because I was like, this sounds familiar and
and behold, they did Ashes of Singularity, which is a game I picked
up a couple of years ago on PC and I love that game fun.
It's a fast paced I guess, so yeah, it's a fast paced RTS
game. I really enjoy it. So that's peaqued my interest enough to see
what this one is really going to be able to expand upon, and enough
that yeah, Okay, maybe I'll dip my toes back into like the turn
based stuff because lately I've been it's not like major games. I'm playing turn
based mobile games with some of my friends and it's it's been a lot of
fun doing that. So I think that there is maybe something there for me
to to try out. And while I love the rush of just setting the
troops in the battle, just having it like all out, like they're real
sins are pouring in, it's just chaos ensues, but I like also the
end can appreciate the slow paced intensity that comes with those turn based tragic games
because there's a little bit of like a slow burn involved with it. It
reminds me sort of like playing a game of Katan, and I can respect
that also. So I think this one has definitely shot up my list of
anticipated that I would like to at least really try and get a feel for
it. Yeah, nice, Travis, anymore thoughts on this one? As
we discovered, I thought it was a different game, but you know,
I have to look into U now the specific differences of that in turn Base
and URTS, so that'll be a different cast. I may all talk about
it, but so there's definitely. I think aspects of turn base that I
would like because if there's similarities to RTS. But this one just didn't,
didn't ring any of my bells, didn't hook me, didn't. This is
one that was too much for me. So I'll look forward to uh tear
or you play it. So yeah, well I wanted you guys go first,
but this is I thought this was an amazing showcase, and this is
now one of my most anticipated games. I thought this looked fucking phenomenal.
I love Civilization growing up as a game, I played like CIV three,
a ton, played a ton of CIV five, one of my most played
games of all time, and then I've played some CIV six, but I
didn't really love the direction that CIV six went in terms of the genre or
series. And I think that seems to make a lot of sense because it
seems like a lot of people that made SIV five, the game that I
love, left the studio after that and went to make this company and are
now making other games, and so to me, it seems like if there's
a divergence, you know, in the timeline there, the forking out seems
like CIV five one direction is like Okay, that studio went on to make
CIV six, which makes sense, and then this studio branched off and they're
kind of making to me what looks like the sequel to CIV five very specifically,
so I could not be more excited about this. I think this looks
amazing in so many ways. It feels like that in terms of the gameplay,
the focus, but also like the art style, like CIV six went
more cartoony and like exaggerated, like almost like Pixar looking characters or something.
But I feel like this is keeping their art style that I really really enjoyed
about CIV five. So I honestly I can talk about this for hours,
so I'll kind of rifle through some of my points here, but I think
this looks just amazing. Like I said, one of my most anticipaid games.
I think the living world element of it is fantastic. That's something I
always really loved about Save three is like you could go in and click on
like your city map, and it would show you like all this buildings you've
built, and I always liked as a kid, like you didn't need to
see this stuff, but it's just like visually, like to see all the
little town and your civilization building up these cities, and then CIV five,
I think that was something that has done pretty well of seeing all the little
farms, you're building, the roads, and like the way they've expanded that
here in terms of all the creatures and animals that are roaming around in the
fields and you see your people walking around in the streets, Like that's something
CIV five or any CIV game has ever really had before. Even CIV six
didn't have kind of that level of realism, and I feel like just makes
it look really immersive. It's caught those freaking resource icons, which is one
of my favorite parts about CIVI five That sounds so stupid, but just like
the micromanaging of different resources and being efficient or you know, pushing into food
to get a bunch of growth into your population, or switching over production to
get this building built really quick. That kind of micromanaging one of my favorite
things about that game. And I see those icons and it looks like it's
gonna be a very similar system, which I really enjoy. The pristy the
prestige system is what they called it here. I think this is a really
great idea. So basically in Civilization with the Past, even into like Civilization
six, there's always like a set of victory conditions, like that's how you
win the game. It's either you do the science of victory by building all
the spaceship parts and flying to the moon, or your culture You get the
culture victory because you had such a huge culture output that you're taking over the
world, or you could have the war one by just killing every other civilization.
But in this rather than having one set wing condition and you're playing a
game that's like, Okay, I guess I'm playing for science win this game,
or I'm playing for culture win this game. Instead, you're kind of
having like a cumulative score that's a combination of all these different things. So
now you're making like a Really it seems like you're gonna be incentivized for making
a I guess you could go still all into science if you want to,
But instead it seems like, Okay, I'm gonna try and balance out my
civilization and make sure I have a really balanced kingdom. And I think that's
very exciting and it's gonna make for a lot more variety than even SIEV five
had, which is a game that I love. They mentioned a crafting system,
which I've never really seen in a four X game like this, so
I don't know how to feel about that yet, but it seems like it
seems like a cool thing. I'm into it. They talked about the kind
of simultaneous turns, which is a big problem that SIV has always had a
really long waiting for enemy turns or if you're playing with a friend or playing
online, like just long ass turns waiting for people to do stuff. But
then the simultaneous stuff was like you could do it, but it was a
bit janky, and it seems like they've just kind of refined that here.
So everything about this, in every little way, all the little details are
like lining up for me that I I cannot wait for this because I've I've
played so much CIVI five at this point, and I still go back to
it every once in a while. It's just one of those evergreen games for
me. But I I just this feels like a sequel to CIV five,
and that's why it's so exciting. So I cannot wait for this. I
wish it was coming out sooner, but unfortunately it looks like it's coming out
in Fall, which I'm gonna be splitting my time between this and a vowed.
At that point, it looks like it's only gonna be PC coming out
in the Fall. I guess that makes sense. I didn't. I didn't
catch that in the direct. I was hoping they would have, you know,
console controls for this, but uh, yeah, man, I hope
this runs on my computer. If if not, man, it's definitely incentivized
me to upgrade that computer. I really really want to play this. I'm
just trying to look. I could see it being a thing that comes console
later. But always games like this, like control scheme has always been built
for keyboard and mouse. So but hopefully they get it over over to Xbox
at some point if it's if it's not their day one, yeah, just
because yeah, when you click on their website it has their page and it's
just coming Fall two twenty four and then PC and as the game pass stuff
like that. Because it was console, I would have I would have jumped
in because, like I said, I'm jumping up now as I hear you
talk about it more and like there's aspects, it's like, Okay, where
where's the place I want to jump into? So if it was on the
console, I would have I would have been jumping in for review here just
to try it out. Yeah okay, well because it's it has touchdowns and
things I like, and it's just thinking like okay, I gotta start somewhere,
right, So it's like, you know, i'd like to uh cause
like that's where it's to a very lesser degree. But don't want to talk
about my wrestling games the GM mode, like when you're talking about all the
little things you have to do, Like I love those type of games where
it's like, okay, do I got enough money for this? All this
superstar is not happy, Oh someone's injured, Okay, all this Arena's book,
Okay, what I do here? Okay, I can only do this
and that, like I love the whole Like I'm checking all my emails this
so like I know it's a different, but I like when you were describing
them like my, uh my brain's firing race. Yeah, it's like okay,
so keep me up there on that if we get any of that,
because I didn't maybe love the showcase, but you're selling more for me than
maybe I was anticipating. So yeah, no, I just think it was
one of those showcases that once again, like I said, like tackled every
element that I could possibly think of and they answered all those questions. So
and it was a game I didn't really know anything about either, So that's
like, that's why it's such a big shock for me, because I'm sure
I heard about the game I know is announced prior to this, but I
guess I hadn't paid attention because there's so many other CIV like games that come
out or announce and I'm always like somewhat interested, but there's always some part
that I'm not super into. So to have it in front of me here
because I'm going to tune into this Xbox thing and and get that breakdown in
like ten fifteen minutes, it was just perfect. It did because of your
talking about being announced. It did have an initial release date for twenty twenty
three, so at one point it sounds like, oh, maybe they were
hoping for earlier, but yeah, I got pushed back. So do those
CIV games they pop up on game Pass and stuff like that. I think
SIV six has potentially okay because they're on console, so I know six.
I mean I've seen like even because I know I had it like wish listed
on the switch, and I know it's gone on sale for like fifteen bucks
or something crazy, so you can get it. Those are games also that
have like a million DLC packs that you don't need, but they definitely enhance
it. But yeah, I don't know. I'll keep an eye out if
if I see one drop on the game passes open. Good, thank you.
Any any other thoughts on the history I'm told here no cool the last
game senu As Saga Helblay two. This is the one thing that actually got
a solid release date, and I feel like this is a seems like a
pretty solid one of May twenty first of this year. Yeah, I don't
think this is a game that we need to see in terms of we already
knew everything. I think we need to know about it, But I think
we did get some good details here recently. Recently it was the biggest thing.
But we also know that this is a a cheaper game. It's it's
fifty bucks fifty US dollars, a digital only game. Of course it's on
game Pass as well. They talked about how it is a shorter game,
so I think maybe they said like seven or eight hours is kind of what
you can expect here for playing through the story of this and then you know,
we saw a little bit of combat, We saw a little bit of
their studio and some of the mo cap and that sort of stuff behind the
scenes. But for me, it was really like, if they don't have
a release date here, what the heck you doing? They had their release
date, it's pretty soon. I I on all for shorter games. I
think it's cool too that they had a shorter game and they decided to price
it in that in the way that they feel as fair as well. I
think that's that's pretty cool. You see a lot of games that end up
being shorter but still charge that eighty ninety bucks, So I think it's cool
what they did here. So I can't wait for this. I still haven't
played the first game, but I know I was going to leading up to
this game. I just wanted to play it closer to the second one release,
and now that I have the release date, I'm sure I'll be playing
it pretty soon. And yeah, since this is a shorter game, I
will definitely play through it, and I think it looks fantastic. I like
the combat that they showed here. They talked about how you're gonna barely scrape
through every fight, and I think they really showed that, and I think
that's that's cool. I'm into that. I think that's that separates it from
other combat systems that we've seen recently. So I think it looks fantastic,
which is not surprising, and I'm excited for it to come up pretty soon.
Here, what's the date again, May first, May twenty first.
Yeah, I've always wanted to try this, so we'll see around that time
if I because I'd like I'm saying that you never did the first game because
I've said this before. Now it's different because they have uh oh god,
it's Kagmas game. It's OD right coming up like OD Xbox. I feel
like it is starting to venture different routes. But this is what I remember.
The first one came out on all consoles, right, and then the
thing I think it actually was a PlayStation exclusive for a bit before it came
Yeah, I think you're right timed. Yeah, And that's where for me,
the vibe everything about this game always feels like a PlayStation game. Like
to me, it's like the most Xbox PlayStation game they have, maybe change
it and a few other things because now they got like obviously they have a
god who they buy this year? Oh I not enough, who's the big
one? They've both Activision. I know that I'm saying, like that's like
a PlayStation game, but those are like Activision Blizzard games right like when the
Xbox because those become Xbox games now, even stuff like Blayward's Okay, this
could be a little bit different, but this feels like very much like a
Sony game. So yeah, what I saw here. Every time I've seen
this game, I enjoy what I see. I think I'm with you down
where this was the right time because this was like the cap of me seeing
it now of like I don't need to see anymore, and if you show
it again, it's almost too much and I get oversaturated on it. Now
it's like okay, and I'm sure we could see it here or there,
but like may that's for me. It's like, okay, that's just part
of now the marketing cycle of Kate. We're very close. We're three months
away, so yeah, I'm hope if there's time, because I was looking
at the schedule there, I'd like to dip my toes into because being sure
is good obviously it's on games Pascal, I check with you, But even
if it's not, it's fifty bucks, so like that's a nice thing too,
where it's like, hey, if you for some reason don't have that,
then it doesn't cost as much. And that's where it's like, to
me, it's fine if a game short as long as the quality's there.
It's the bummer when it I'm short and it sucks or it's just kind of
fine. And that's where it's like, I didn't really get anything here,
but from when I heard this first game and then what this looks like,
I feel like that, you know, eight nine, whatever hours it's gonna
be, looks like it'll be worth that experience. So yeah, I got
my eyes on this. This just comes down to just what is going on
around that time. But with it being games passed obviously it makes it a
bit easier. So we'll see. I potentially would like to, like I
said, dip my toes in the hell latency first game interest to be about
eight hours as well, so yeah, easy to catch up. Yeah,
any one, Taylor, any thoughts on this one? It I don't know
if this is my kind of game, no, but yeah, no,
Travis, you know me, And yeah, it's not my kind of game,
but I'm not gonna deny the fact that it just looks beautiful. And
I really I really enjoyed seeing this in this direct and seeing just the people
behind the scenes, like just doing the mo cap and the work that they're
investing into this game, because I could I could feel there's so much passion,
and I liked when they're the staff is coming together and saying like,
you know what, and it's a certain degree like I am Senua, and
they're also like I'm Senua. And and it's true because they all have created
this character. I'm sure they don't really like believe like I'm Senue. I'm
Senu. I'm sure. Yeah, it seems like a very traumatic character,
traumatic stories that would be sad. Well, yeah, and I think,
like I hope that there's well I'm sure that they're they're really reaching deep into
their individual souls to pull this pain that is just portrayed into this character that
they have to trek through and overcome. Then that's one of the greatest things
about video games is you can portray these these tribulations from your experiences and just
created an interesting story and engaging story that's emotional. But this just seems like
there's so much going on. That's just yeah, I mean, it's it's
there's definely individuals out there that are gonna love this game. I'm sitting with
them right now, and I'm just I'm not denying it's the game that What
does that even mean? Does that mean I'm sitting with them? Right?
I guess, But that's it. That's that's it's you guys. But yeah,
it's just it looks fantastic. We should do like an I am geek
first campaign, like for a nine year tenure, you know, all the
way that I'm saying, you know, I'm first, I'm geek first.
Let's workshop that. Let's workshop it. Okay, I think that that pretty
much does it for the showcase here. Any any final thoughts? Uh?
Any final thoughts here? No? I think this is a good show.
I like it. It's I am curious to ever see like you said they
did that one year Starfield, I'm curious to see one year well one because
you do this in the beginning, if they ever get to a point where
they do even to a year, and then because they have like the Xbox
Showcase the E three thing, and yeah, that's true. And then throughout
the year sometimes they just do like those I can't remember what they call,
but they sit down with developed like they're live on couches. Yeah, they
do stuff. They do all sorts of things. So I think it makes
sense, like to have boom start of the year, here's like four to
five games, really deep dive, and then the summer is when you get
just a shit ton of announcements and now you're right from that ship to an
announcement, it's pick four or five things to the next January. Like it's
a nice it's a nice cycle, and I hope they can stick to it.
They should. I mean, now that they have Activision Blizzard in there
too, they have a ton of studios to pick from. I'm sure they'll
always have games to show off. I was gonna say, yeah, this
is gonna be get beef here and Beef Furious. So for me, I
overall is the thumbs up. I didn't love everything here, but not because
of necessary like looking awful, just like it comes down to a certain taste.
But and I think it started right because start with a vow, didn't
it right? That was what the game they started with yeah, Vow,
Yeahvout, then hell Blade, then Visions than Are than Indy, right yeah,
And to me that was like the perfect wave. You start with a
Vowed, which is one of your bigger ones, you hope, and then
Indy, which is like a surprise one. I think that's the best way.
Like the it's just carbon copy of that every time, Middle be whatever.
But the first game always lead with something that's kind of been out there
already. People know some stuff, what's more details. Last game is that
Okay, here you know, you know it's out there, but here's you
know, the full reveal of it. So no, I thought it was
a good show overall. Nice, nice Taylor, good over there. Yeah
yeah, I I like I said, it was slow at the start,
but it just it picked up for me moving on when we got into some
RTS and some Indiana Jones. So that's that's definitely that was up my alley.
Getting into that back half of this show, it really started to pick
it up for me. But yeah, I mean, as you guys already
said, I mean, it's it's January. This is just kind of kickstarting
wants to come and just build some hype for the for the year, and
yeah, yeah, thank you ever for listening. Let us know what you
were hyped for from this, and yeah, next week, I think Taylor
will be joining me. We'll talk about I don't even know next week's topic
A little up in the air. I'm sure we'll come up with something fun,
though, so make sure to tune in. Thank you ever for listening.
We'll see you next time. Bye bye bye