He'll be a gon be bea. It's the Internet. You're busy. Let's
do this for October twenty six, twenty twenty three. For the next hour
or so, let me help you sort through the world of gaming on Game
Mess Mornings Live with me Jeff Grubb. Today Allen Wake two reviews are out
and each Uban is taking a loan out from Tom Nook. But first,
please join me in welcoming today's co host of Game Mess Mornings. It's Jana
Choa. Everybody, Jan how are you doing? I was gonna comically sip
my coffee, but then I realized I reheated it, so it was a
little too hot to do that, and I didn't want my mouth to burn.
What's the strata, great grub, what's the strata on reheating coffee and
just pop in the Mikey, I just pop it and chef Mike, you
know, give it to him for a little bit, let him heat him
up. I've always been curious whether or not I should just put my coffee
at home in a to keep it warmer, like you know, ushi joint.
Yeah, I think it's a totally fine move. Yeah, why not?
Just yeah, I guess you associated with like, Okay, I'm gonna
go out and do manual labor or something. Yeah, and I'm not about
manual labor. Like, my hands have become soft, and I intend to
keep them this way exactly. It took a lot of work to get them
this soft exactly, other people's work, specifically, but exactly. And I've
been curious. Folks at home, please let me know if you've had one
of those mugs that stay warm or whatever, like an ember mug I think
they're called. Are those are the ones that have like the USB ports or
whatever. Yeah, like the little heating plate for sure, Like, let
me know if those are good. I've been curious. It seems like the
kind of thing you're just gonna end up with as a Christmas gift eventually,
Jan It's just gonna appear in front of you. It's shocking. I haven't.
Yeah, I'm a little bit surprised. That's a commentary on my friends.
Do you think do you think that they're afraid to get your coffee stuff
because you're just so honed in. Yeah, it's one of those It's like
you can't get a hobbyist a gift that involves their hobby, like I wouldn't
get Jeff backlar anything to do with keyboard. No, no, no,
he would scoff. He'd be like, you got me? What this is?
Me? Do you switchers? This is PCB plastic, this is horseshit?
How dare you offend me with this? And I'm like, I know,
I'm sorry, I didn't know. I didn't know. I'm sorry.
I just I thought he would like it. It would goes click any clack,
like the keyboards you like. Uh, he chimes in, but there
it is no notes. All right, Let's explain what we do here most
weekdays, I, Jeff Greb, will help piece your gaming life back together.
That includes breaking news and maybe even some of our own original reporting.
For all these topics, I'll get the input of a bona fide expert who
will make me look smart. If you are watching live on twitch welcome.
You can always listen to the show later on podcast feeds by searching for Game
Mess Mornings, or find the RSS on giant bomb dot com. You can
also catch the show later with chapters and timestamps on YouTube. Hello YouTube.
Okay, we have a lot to get into, so let's start the Morning
Mess with Alan Wake two review roundup critics way in on a sequel thirteen years
in the making. This is from Eddie mcoo at game Spot. Remedy's long
awaited horror game, alan Wick two is launching tomorrow, October twenty seventh.
Ahead of that, reviews for the game have begun to appear online, shining
the light on the critical reaction to the title. Here. A game Spot
allen Wake two received a ten out of ten. Reviewer Mark Delaney said allen
Wick two is a miracle illuminated with visually striking worlds across its dual campaigns.
Delaney also praised the game for being extremely meta in a way that should please
longtime fans of the series and longtime fans of Remedy. What was that,
I honestly have no idea. It sounded like a cat crime. Oh Niko,
what are you doing down here? Big guy? Hey, com here.
He's got food coming today. So I had to give him a food
cup, like a wet food and he's like, no, I want my
normal food, And so I think he's kind of freaking out. What's up?
Hambo? Okay, he's heading off, all right? Yeah, that
guy's he's like twenty five, twenty six pounds. He's a big boy.
That's a big go. That's a big piece of meat over there, just
a little bag of rice. Yes, he's a Norwegian forest cat. They're
big anyhow, and he's big for a Norwegian forest cat. They are just
he's got a lot going on over there. Okay, let's see. So
the game is doing very well, Jen, can your favorite check the Metacritic
while I go through some of these Yeah games, So I gave it a
ten. It said, Yeah, the mere existence of alan Wick two would
have, at different points over the years, felt like a minor miracle.
But for it to be this one that feels singular in its achievements and coming
from a studio that refuses to shy away from the paths less traveled, makes
alan Wake to a miracle. Illuminated game rate. Gam Rent game Rant,
meanwhile, gaving a two point five out of five, said pro's absolutely stunning
graphics, incredible audio design, brutal and engaging combat, while the cons are
disappointing story, some areas are confusing to navigate, frustrating technical problems, and
too many cheap scares. And GameRant apparently ran into a lot of technical issues
with the game and that's one of the main reasons that their score is at
that point. IGN gave it a nine out of ten, says Allen Wick.
Two is a superb survival horror sequel that makes the cult classic original seem
like little more than a rough first draft. By Comparison, and games Hub
gave it a five out of five, said Alan Wake two almost feels mad
in its approach, with an overwhelming array of threads in the tail that threatened
to collapse under the pressure at any moment. Yet with clear and incisive logic
match with a devotion to delightfully delightful absurdity, the team at Remedy has managed
to craft a breathtaking story. VGC gave it a five out of five.
The Guardian gave it a four out of five. Games Radar gave it a
five out of five. How's it doing over there on Metacritic? It is
sitting currently at eighty nine. That is really impressive stuff for It's really hard
to get that on Metacritic, and anything like eighty nine and above is a
huge success. Jan You've been playing now like two as I a little bit,
I've not gotten to the titular parts yet, so I'm still pretty early
on How are you doing, Jeff Grub? Again, I don't review website
or I don't review, but I don't review. He does review websites,
but not publicly. He just does this in our slack. He's like,
this one fucking sucks, guys, this one's bad. These guys, what
the fuck? But I don't review video games on the website. I'm merely
just giving my impressions on Tuesdays. I would give this a five out of
five wholeheartedly. Jeff Grub, I haven't really had time to codify my thoughts.
But I also don't know where in the grand scheme of this game I
am in. I'm about like ten to fifteen ish hours in, and a
lot of that is just me just bit basking in the obbiance of this world.
But Jeff Grub, I think this is a heavy hitting year and I
was trying to explain that to my partner. Weird, how like, in
the past week we've had someone here in Chatch playing like just efforts. Going
by Metacritic, it's like a ninety three and an eighty nine in the last
week, right, Yeah, yeah, what an insane run? You know,
that's like and it's it's amazing to be witnessing it and like being taking
part and living through this amazing time in video games. And you know,
I don't want to put words in anyone's mouth, but this can be a
very exhausting style of job where you just have to kind of churn through and
play as many video games as possible to to, you know, help give
an opinion on them. But it's this year that is kind of giving me
a love of video games back and just really remind me and give me a
waypoint of as to and remap where I stand on video games and how much
I love them right and how effective they are as a medium. But Alan
Wake two specifically, Jeff Grubb, I think very well, maybe my game
of the year. Man, that's because so crazy. It's like there's been
like seven of those for you this year, and I'm not exactly it seemed
like I was playing, I'm like, this just got so much atmosphere and
attitude, and then you were like, why did anyone tell me this is
so my shit? So I'm like, okay, jans into it. And
so here's the thing, Like, for to give context to folks, I
have not played through Quantum Break. I remember playing an hour of Alan Wake
one thirteen years ago at a friend's house and being too spooked. And then
I did play through all of Control and I really enjoyed Control. Yeah,
Alan Wake two, like just jumping into it pretty fresh given that context,
it was still able to sink its hooks in me and pull me in in
such a way that like I haven't been able to look away grub and you
know what, Give Sam Lake every fucking award, Give that man all of
his flowers, Give that whole team at Remedy all of their fucking flowers because
they've fucking stuck the landing. And then some I sure I can see there
are some frustrations with some of the level design and being a little bit stuck,
but like it is a game that really rewards you for exploring when you
do get stuck and just taking the time to just bask in all of the
darkness of everything. Like this really ackles like a lot of weird parts of
being a creative and just really embracing how being a creative can really bring out
the darkness in people, but like in a good way, in like harnessing
that darkness and like really utilizing that to in someone's ability to tell a story,
and I think it's really it's a fantastic, gorgeous looking game, but
also the underlying messages underneath it, of like existing as a creative and like
having to deal with having that creative block of there being thirteen years since the
last Alan Wait game and contending with that and contending with the pressure and contending
with all of that surrounding you, but being able to stick the landing.
And also, you know, some of the reviews I've read through today talk
about how it handles being meta in a very unique way, and that is
not an easy thing to do, especially melding gameplay with live action cutscenes and
having you sit through them and having like all this meta context of like,
hey, these people are in the game, those people are in the game,
this is also happening. That's also happening. This is all kind of
all in one jumbled universe. But it makes sense. It just it's awe
inspiring, and it especially where we are in movies where the whole thing is
just like all these multiverses and everything. And I'm a Marvel fan, so
I'm not pooh poohing on all of that, but it just becomes very oversaturated.
The way that the team is able to pull this off absolutely amazing and
it just it fits. It works, Grub. This is a hard fucking
year award any type of game of the Year, and I was just thinking
that, like we were like, I'm glad we changed to what we did
last year, where it's like, let's just narrow down to twenty games and
then we'll go in there and do Eurovision. Even getting to that twenty games,
like at that twenty twenty one, twenty two to twenty three spot,
there's gonna be some hard cuts this year. Actually, it's gonna be kind
of tough to get to get to. People are gonna have their like like
I got my Shadows of a Doubt, which is early access. I'm gonna
be okay with that one not making the top twenty. But it's like,
man, any other year, I would be like, no, that should
be in the top twenty. That's doing some real wild stuff. That is
It blows me away. It's the game I've always wanted, I've always imagined
it, But this year's like, no, no way, no way,
is that gonna make a top twenty. And it's like, so it's like
if I'm cutting stuff like that already there's gonna be some harder cuts in there.
Yeah, and that's and that's with twenty games. So it's gonna be
difficult to argue that this is not the best year in gaming. And really,
I mean, as as a wise poet once said best time maybe playing
video games, it really is. Yeah, And and you know, like,
maybe we'll have time if the rest of the crew can continue to play
through Alan Awake too, maybe we can sit down and have like another little
review cast or whatever. But I'm very, very interested in trying to put
together a spoiler cast, maybe with like the AFT game spot after Dark Homies
yea as well. I'm you know what, I'm gonna blaze through this thing.
So I'm gonna like, this is the game I'm playing now. I
did start it. I was kind of hanging out in Discord after I was
recording something with Mike and we was playing it and it was like, man,
this is this is They're doing some cool stuff here, and I'm and
really it's like the all the Twin Peaks coded stuff of yeah, look,
I get the guys and they're drinking their coffee. But then it's like,
oh, this lady's just gonna be really weird and like, well, what's
that string? What's that thread? And then obviously like one of the main
things is like, oh, the pages are describing what's going on. That's
a classic Allen Wake thing and yet still very intriguing. I can't wait to
see how these characters react to it, what it means for them. I
think Saga is a great character immediately, fantastic name, yes, cook really
good name, and of course they like set her up like wait is there
more going on with her? Like they know the tropes they're playing with them,
and you can only do that if you're someone who's been doing this for
a really long time, and I mean makes it. It kind of gets
me to a point where I look at you know, it's you know,
Sam like his whole creative team. But Sam Wake and his creative team remind
me a lot of like Wes Anderson, not in terms of like the product
they're putting on there, but like they go back to the same toolbox every
time, and then they use those tools in new ways every time and explore
it. They go deeper and deeper and deeper and going back and always having
like the like you said the real time live action video and mixed it with
gameplay, and so, okay, you were doing that again. No,
it's not like that. It's not like, oh, we're just doing that
again. It is they are using it and yet another way to unveil new
ways to feel about a video game. So just popping hard for this game,
really enjoying what they have so far. In similar ways where I felt
like, and again I'm not familiar with Quantum Break or Alan Wake one,
semi familiar with control, but I do feel like the parts where it is
live action, where there are illusions to stuff like Twin Peaks and other pieces
of film or media like that, it just feels like a love letter to
film too, noir, to mystery stuff like that. In the same way,
I felt like Immortality was really like throwing flowers at the movie industry and
really kind of like showing how you can meld movies, cinema, TV and
video games together. And this is like a perfect execution of that. Yep,
totally agree. And so you said you're about fifteen hours in that range.
You feel like you said, you no real idea of like when it's
going to wrap up on you, mostly because like I'm just basking in everything,
and I'm just pouring over every single thing, And despite this game spooking
me a lot and me being very intense wle playing through it, I'm just
trying to comb through every single piece just so I have my precious resources because
I'm a scaredy cat. Yep. And it's true. It really is a
super duper survival horror game. They said they were going to make one of
those, and they did, and that means it is. I think I
find it very scary and also you know, you are going to be scraping
by trying to get through these these enemy encounters. So yep. My prediction
is alan Wick two is about to blow the hell up. It is going
to be one of these horror franchises in gaming that is now going to be
a staple that people are going to be asking for more of for the rest
of time. Alongside you know, obviously like Resident Evil, but like Silent
Hill, fear of fear not fear effect. Maybe this with the camera one
fatal frame fatal frame fear effects, the one about the lesbians jam we always
get those mixed up over here. I'm always thinking about them. I'm always
thinking about them, but it's it is going to be in that canon now
coming out of this game, I think, and that's an achievement of its
own. This is I started grubb. I started taking notes as if I
was going to write a review for this kid. I mean, why not.
I want to write a review about Mario. So I'm like, man,
I should take some time to do that. But we'll see. We'll
go ask everyone for writing advice. There you go. Absolutely, Okay,
let's move along here. Japanese charts have Super Mario Brothers Wonder absolutely smashing in
its debut. This is from Ali Reynolds at Nintendo Life. The latest Japanese
charts are here courtesy of Famitsu, and it showcases in absolutely stellar debut from
Super Mario Brothers Wonder. Nintendo's latest flagship platformer has managed the shift in astonishing
six hundred and sixty eight thousand, six hundred and thirty four units since its
launch, and that's just physical units, that managing a full six hundred thousand
more than Marvel Spider Man two, which debuted at number two. The only
other newcomer this week is Sega's Sonic Superstars for the Nintendo Switch, which managed
managed to shift four and twenty eight units, not quite as many. It's
not the most spectacular of start for the Blue bur Blue Blue Blur, But
Sega's mascot has always been more popular in the West than in Japan, so
maybe don't take that to be indicative of what that game is going to do
elsewhere. So, yes, one week on the chart for supermar Brothers Wonder,
you know, not even a full week. Six hundred and sixty eight
thousand units sold. That is really good. I mean to put in perspective.
We've been talking about how great Pickman four has been doing in Japan,
and it has been doing very very well in Japan. It continues to do
very very well. But it's at nine hundred and twenty two thousand after months
of being on the chart, and that's like week after week of being number
one or number two on the chart, and most of the time number one.
So I'm selling everything and it's only about three hundred thousand copies ahead.
This is the least surprising thing in the world. Jam, we got another
story coming up at right after this effect. Let's just do it right now.
Super Mario Brothers Wonder is the fastest selling the Super Mario game in Europe
fast fell selling Super Mario game in Europe. This is from Nintendo Everything.
Nintendo has just announced that Super Mario Brothers Wonder is off to a great start
in Europe. In its first three days, it has already become the fastest
selling Super Mario game in the region, overtaking twenty seventeen's Super Mario Odyssey.
Not the least bit surprising because two D Mario is always just such a massive
seller for Nintendo. This is this was definitely true in like the wee days,
where like Super Mario brother and New Super Mario Brothers, we would just
sell and sell and sell and that got to like twenty million copies or something,
and everything else was in even like half of that except for Mario Kart.
So not too surprising. Yeah, part of me was like, maybe
maybe the audience has moved on to and like Odyssey will kind of actually outperform
this pretty easily. Seems like it could be on a path to outsell just
about everything. This game could get to twenty five million copies sold pretty easily.
Yeah, I meant, part of what helps this is like the massive
install base for within right, But on top of that, it's an amazing
game. It's a wonderful game. But the appetite for a proper two D
Mario game is out there. And when you compile that with all of the
Polish and all of everything that's been added to this game, it is absolutely
no brainer. Also, add that to the rising popularity of the Mario movie
from was that this year last year? Last year, No, that was
earlier, this is before summer, but it was this year, this year,
it was this year. Yeah, And and combine that with like the
popularity of the Universal Studios park in Japan and here the upcoming one in Florida's
Universal Studios. It's a hot time for Mario. Yes, it's all right,
it's all coming together, and it's like, even if it wasn't all
coming together, the expectations for this game would be pretty similar in terms of,
yeah, maybe being the fastest selling Mario game of all time, but
boy that that it does have the wind at its back right now. Clearly
Jamie H. Christmas even Chad points out that Odyssey did two point five million
worldwide in three days. So if we kind of like look at, oh,
fastest selling in Europe, you know, six hundred thousand, six hundred
eighty thousand whatever it was in Japan, just physical at another four hundred thousand
top on that to be conservative, a million in Japan alone already, it's
crushing it. It's crushing. That's that's physical copies, right, hundred thousand,
six hundred thousands physical only in Japan. Yes, insane, one county
happen. And obviously Japan huge on Mario, but boy they're not. I
mean, they used to be huge on a lot of things that they're not
huge on anymore. Mario maintaining in a way that very few things actually do.
It's insane to think, like, you know, then perspective which you
were talking about with Pickman four, and I feel like we've talked about Pickman
four being number one of the sales charts for weeks since it came out,
yep, since it came out, and for Super Mario Brothers Wonder to absolutely
obliterate that is insane yep. And it's it goes to show like Nintendo's very
good at turning these some of it's i want to say new or Pickman's twenty
years old, some of it's lesser franchises. It makeing him feel bigger on
the switch and in Japan. They've had a lot of success doing that.
Around the world, they've had a lot of success doing that. But it's
not like that's to the detriment or to the lessening of what happens with Mario
and Zelda. No, those are big and also getting bigger at all times,
So pretty good for this game. Also, it's like, man,
why didn't you do this a long time ago? Why why didn't you have
a new but not new Super Mario Brothers game at the two D game at
the beginning of this generation for the Switch, you probably would have done even
better and this thing would still be selling, Like this thing's going to sell
for years. I just I'm like so confused, like what they're gonna do
with that transition for the new system and how these games are going to look
on the shelf. If they sort of just be like, no, that
game is gonna work on here so you could keep buying it, or if
there's gonna be a new version of it or something, they might deluxe it
like they did Mario Kart. Either way, they will find a way to
keep selling this game, though, jan for sure, Well it's it really
cements grub Switch one of the like mount Rushmore of consoles at this point.
Oh yeah, oh yes, that's kind of without a doubt at this point
in my mind. But I'm like, I want to like talk it out
and like see what else could he even be up there? Boy? Yeah
Switch? Uh. I have not had a better time with a console this
consistently ever. I mean maybe the Xbox three sixties up there, that was
really good thanks to all that good online stuff. And that's when back when
playing online games on console was really fun. There's some other stuff that's not
fun anymore. There's some other stuff that like we can have in that conversation,
but yeah, Switch feels like number one with a bullet right now.
All right, talk to Mario. We talked alan wake two. We got
a lot more coming up, but first we're going to take a quick break.
We'll get back to it right after this. Wake up, jan We're
back. Our boy got a nap. That means we can continue along with
a little bit more Mario news paper Mario the Thousand Year Door has already been
rated for Switch. This is from Liam Dulan at Nintendo Life in case you
somehow missed it. The highly praised GameCube exclusive paper Mario the thousand year Door
is making a return on the Switch at some point next year. In an
update, it's been revealed that the turn based RPG has now been rated in
both Brazil and Korea. South Korea specifically, I don't know if North Korea's
rating games out there, suggesting everything is running on schedule. The title was
originally announced during Nintendo's September Direct showcase. When it does eventually arrive, fans
can expect the same classic game with updated graphics. It's a similar approach to
the one Nintendo seems to be taking with Super Mario RPG, due out next
month on the Switch. As highlighted by the person who posted posts this on
Twitter, this earlier than expected classification for rating could mean the GameCube hit might
be returning a lot sooner in twenty twenty four than people were expecting. I
was expecting sometime in summer. Usually the way it works out with these ratings
is the rating happens, and then it's six to ten weeks we get the
game. So maybe early twenty twenty four we're getting this that that timing might
change here or there, but I think I've heard that timeframe in the past
for the stuff and when you kind of look back, like, oh,
got rated in South Korea and then we get an announcement and it comes out
pretty soon afterward, so hey, we might be playing this pretty early in
the year next year. That kind of just leaves that Princess Peach game,
which I think is slated for next summer, and then the Luigi's Mansion to
re release from three DS onto the Switch. Not probably not much else is
going to be happy with the Switch, but yeah, get that out early
and not I think it's smart to do this jam because the last time that
they had a big RPG Mario remake at the end of the generation and overlapped
with the Switch launching, that game got completely lost and Alpha Dream made those
Mario Luigi games had to close down because the game's performed so poorly. So
getting this out early and then leaving a lot of room for the Switch to
to do whatever it's doing later in the year makes a lot of sense,
right, Yeah, especially when you are riding off the momentum of Mario right
now. Yeah, and there's an appetite for more Mario games, and this
is definitely the thousand of Your Door is definitely going to be a title that
people will be visiting for the very first time. So getting that way before
any inklings of a switch to or any solid inklings of a switch to coming
out will We'll continue that momentum and you know, hopefully this will reach audiences
that it missed the first time or is hitting for the first time. Yeap.
People pointed out that Peaches March twenty second, which is my birthday.
Thanks thanks Marino, Thanks super Bummy, Superlummy. Yeah, uh super Helmy.
Uh yeah, I listen. I think Mario getting like kind of a
bang bang bang bang game releases, especially since those genres can be so disparate,
uh, that that makes a lot of sense. It just makes me
wonder, like, why are they like one Zelda per year and sometimes not
even that I know that, like in the past they said like one Zelda
per year, and I say that like kind of thinking. Also at the
same time, Nintendo treats Zelda with a little bit more reverence than it even
does Mario. Yeah, like the Mario three D collection Super Mario three D
All Stars, it's kind of a bummer collection when you get into it and
it's like, man, it's super mart Sunshine's still gonna be thirty frames per
second. You didn't even want to do anything about that. But then like
the Zelda remix are like, hey, we we hd we hdd everything,
and we made the game better in all these really subtle ways. We went
in there and edited it and curated it and made sure that like all these
things that weren't quite as fun are now super fun. And it's like they
never do that with with the Mario games. But at the same time,
then we do get Mario game after Mario game, and I don't know,
do you think, well, how do you think Nintendo views of Mario something
they can always rely on on trotting now and it's never gonna wear at its
welcome. I think they treat Mario that way and that they have to be.
Sometimes it feels like they are more precious about how they roll out Zelda,
and sometimes it just feels like they forget about all the other stuff that
they have in their pocket, Like you could be rolling out more spinoff Metroid
games, right, you could be rolling off out more spinoff Zelda games.
Especially. It's weird and it's interesting to see how you have so many spinoff
Mario games, like you have the Home Tour Live Tour Circuit whatever it's called,
still don't remember. But you have like the mobile game Mario Run and
all these experiments where I think Mario has proven to be a known quantity that
they can consistently rely on it and the Mario family to produce returns for them,
Like that's why we have so many Mario playing so many sports with his
homies. What Zelda doing, you know how comes Zelda link could be playing
lacrosse perhaps, And and that I mean obviously part of that is back of
the day on you know, Game Boy Advance on Super Nintendo in sixty four,
even Tho Wei. Those games were easier to produce than it requires many
you know, heart like difficult assets, like you know, making HD assets
is more time consuming. They're going to be moving on maybe to like four
K assets, although we'll see I have no idea what the next system,
and that's gonna be more time consuming. So these companies, I think Nintendo's
like, ah, we're gonna be more picky and choosy about what we do
with these things, and maybe we don't get a Metroid pinball game anymore because
of that. I'm like, oh, I hope they just continue to find
a way to do that stuff. They do do it with Mario do Doo
like, and then that includes like the Oreo games and all these other things,
this extended universe, and I'm like, Okay, I'm glad that they
still do that with with with that those characters. I just wish maybe they
could get in there and mixed up with with Zelda and even Metraid a little
bit. I remember thinking when Cadence of Hirol came out, being very excited
because of what the possibilities would come from one hundred percent with you from that
afterwards, Right. I was such a fool for thinking that that would be
like were that was indicative? Yeah, we were so innocent and didn't know
where our stupid pretty low heads knew nothing. Completely empty. Uh. Sean
does point out that I'm I completely forgot that Metro Prime four is still supposed
to come out. Uh. And I when I think about it, I'm
like, when I actually think about that game, which I try not to
because they don't talk about it, so why should I think about it?
I don't want to get my hopes up, But when I think about it,
I'm like, no, that will still come out on the switch.
They would have said something by now if that wasn't going to happen, Uh,
I mean, I guess they don't have to. Maybe then after they
announced the next systems, when they would maybe do that, maybe announce it
at the same time. But my head it's like, no, that thing's
probably still going to come out on the switch. So I suppose that's their
big game for next year. All right, we'll see. Hey, there's
some breaking news over from Tom Warren at the Verge. Microsoft reorgs its Xbox
and marketing team to prepare for an AI and gaming future. Let's take a
look here. Microsoft is reorganizing its Xbox gaming and market leadership less than two
weeks after requiring activision Blizzard. Microsoft is promoting Matt Booty to President of Game
Content and Studios, including the new responsibility of ZeniMax. Sarah Bond is being
promoted to Xbox President, overseeing all Xbox platform and hardware work. On the
marketing side, Chief marketing Officer Chris Copasela is stepping down after thirty two years
at Microsoft. The Xbox changes mean Booty will now lead an expanded organization inside
Microsoft Gaming that now includes Zenni Max and Bethesda zinny Max will continue to operate
as a limited integration entity led by Jamie Letter, President and CEO reporting to
Matt, explains Microsoft's Gaming CEO Phil Spencer in an internal memo obtained by The
Verge. Booty's expanded role should help Microsoft Gaming avoid scenarios like Redfall in the
future. With Microsoft clearly focusing on better collaboration between the teams that acquired with
Zinimax at Slash Betesta acquisition, great games are fundamental to everything we do,
explain Spencer and his memo. We believe that an expanded gaming content organization one
then enables Xbox game studios and Zinimax's development studios to collaborate effectively. Together will
empower those world class studios to do their best work in the growing and growing
our portfolio of games players love. Bond will now take over the hardware and
software platform of Xbox to manage the platform of today and build the platform up
tomorrow. We are bringing together the team that will make this possible, explain
Spencer. Sarah Bond will lead this team as President of Xbox, bringing together
devices, player and creator experiences, platform engineering, strategy, business planning,
data and analytics, and business development. I think we know now, or
at least have an idea. Now, why, oh my god, his
name is escaping me. Homeboy just left Bethesda just announced his retirements. It's
still gonna escape me. But yes, Pete Heines, thank you, Yes,
thank you, Chad, thank you Jan. It is also the kind
of thing that I think fans of Xbox and critics of Xbox have sort of
been asking for, at least when it comes to how Zenni Max is being
handled. Hey, you don't have to go in there and micromanage, but
have hands on the reins a little bit. How does a red fall happen?
And I think we are all still pretty confused about how a red fall
happens. You spend all this money buying this buying this company, they are
working on this game. You don't tell them to cancel the game. You
let them keep working on it, presumably thinking that it's going to be you
know, good good, But then, like you, you couldn't go there
and see for yourself that it probably wasn't going to be, and then you
did nothing about it. So this seems like an answer to that, But
I don't know, how do you feel about it? Chan? It's similar
to how it it feels baffling that Disney announced to like, hey, we're
gonna have showrunners for all of these shows. Now we're gonna every show is
gonna have a bible, one million production bible. Yes. What it's like
you threw all that money to solve a problem, but you weren't actually solving
the problem. And and you know, I'm not a fan of micromanaging,
but you're right, grub some light reins. Maybe put them, uh,
put people on a train track and they can go right, give them a
destination. Yeah, and build processes that processes that people can rely on to
be like, here's how we solve this, here's how we create these ideas
and things like that. And if there's if there's a Tim Shafer out there
that you know is gonna be doing Tim Shafer shit, be like, no,
no, you don't. You don't do this process. You do your
own thing. You have your own thing. And it's been fine. But
if like we're working with these other teams and they're feeling a little bit lost
or like looking for some guidance, just have support there all up and down
the chain of like here's what that looks like. And again, I think
you're with not no micromanagement. I think typically the people working on the problem
better understand the issues with the problems itself than anyone from a central location looking
down and telling them what to do. But like, in terms of establishing
a certain level of expectations, heavy high expectations is beneficial, you know.
I always think about the Year of the Dragon thing, where it's like in
China when kids are born, they're born into a certain year and like,
oh, the year the rat, you're the wolf or whatever. I don't
know them off the top of my head, but the year of the Dragon
one is like, oh, those kids actually always perform super well, and
they're like, is there something special about the year of Dragon. It's like,
yeah, the parents have high expectations, so they put a lot more
effort into those kids, and they like they get them tutors and all these
other things because they think, no, you're a dragon kid, You're gonna
do really well. High expectations work. So establishing those expectations and then and
then providing the hand to like pull the studio up to those expectations can make
a difference. But that was not happening with something like Redfall obviously. Yeah,
the other hope is that creating some type of process or having some type
of oversight can also prevent studios from being employees, specifically from being exploited and
preventing crunch that if there are proper measures put into place that like hey,
hey, hey, hey, like you know, like this is the timeline
for this, or like there are people overseeing studios of like yo, stop
being a dick. And you know, there has been a lot of complaints
and cases brought up within an activision Blizzard, allocations of very very disappointing and
bad behavior that hopefully shit like that gets tamped out. Yeah, you would
like I also hope like, hey, now Sarah Bond and being in charge
of Xbox, you know, a prominent woman in gaming who has been in
a leadership position for a long time, clearly has the chops now coming in.
She can establish some a culture that spreads throughout the entire organization. And
then this this tip, this reorganization that doesn't seem like it involves layoffs.
So I guess that's something. You know, the one person did say they
were stepping down, although that was after decades, thirty two years, kind
of maybe a natural stepping off point anyhow, Yeah, I hope that they're
able to accomplish exactly exactly what you described. Just Hey, let's be the
mature company that we always claim Microsoft is. These days, we say this
all the time. Were we're the adults in the room. Twitter is a
mess, and Facebook wants all your weird shit, and Apple charges you way
too much money for hardware. We're the adults, and in Congress you could
trust us, regulators, you could trust us. Even after this whole uh,
you know, the TIF, with the with with the activision, still
it's like they're coming out of that looking pretty clean, and I think they
want to project that that that vision of themselves. Well, now it's time
to like for the rubber to meet the road and actually accomplish that. So,
uh, we'll see. Uh. I think that this is a sign
that they are actively They're active in trying to establish Xbox as a long term
success and not being like, well, we spend all that money, now
it's just gonna happen, right. It's the opposite of the Embraser situation.
Yeah, yeah, where Embracer literally threw money and act acquiring several many many
studios and because they did not deliver, because there was no type of oversight,
right, or any any type of care put into those studios, no
vision whatsoever, no vision, and just leading an expectation for them to have
some type of return that. Of course, now they're trying to get rid
of all of that and Embracer is pooping the bed. Meanwhile, the hope
is that Microsoft can can deliver. And we talked about this on the bomb
cast, but like with the head of Microsoft saying like we're doubling down on
games, Uh, this definitely feels this very structured reorg feels like hopefully feel
like a step in the right direction. Yeah, I hate that. I
still see Bobby Ka's face on this graph though, yes, uh yeah,
I agree to take a look at that. Actually, what a goober.
Yeah, that's a real shame he is. They keep saying he's gonna be
out by the beginning of next year. So yeah, it's like Phil Spencer
at the top, and then yeah, they're probably like Bobby kotticks there because
that is a slot that exists, and then Bobb Kotta's gonna leave and we're
not gonna just like absorb Activision Blizzard into like that's not gonna be Phil's responsibility,
so there will be someone in that spot hopefully. But you're right,
I hate seeing this stupid goddamn face. All right, let's move along here.
You don't body shame, but I Bobby's shame. Yeah, we got
a Bobby shame. We gotta keep Bobby shaming as a tool in our toolbox
as well. Over here. All right, there was an Xbox Developer Partner
showcase yesterday with a bunch of third party games. It was pretty good.
I had a pretty good time watching that because it was brisk and fast,
and they showed a cop some like things I wasn't expecting, Like it wasn't
new announcements for the most part, but like, oh, I was not
expecting to see metal Gear Solid Delta's first in engine look, and it makes
it all worth the wait. And that's from Christina Ebanez at twin finit.
If you were already blown away by metal Gear Solid Delta's first reveal, then
you'll undoubtedly be more astonished by its first in engine look, taking you back
to the jungles of Soviet Russia. This trailer I thought looked really good,
but this is this is our first chance to actually see this game really in
action and John I thought it looked fantastic all the It's really the details on
everything and how alive the game looks and feels, which is important for a
game that does take place in a jungle. M hm. I can't help
but be ever so slightly hesitant, though grub just knowing that Gema is no
longer involved, and of course Nomy is still involved. I mean I'm still
very involved. Yep. Where I feel or I hope that a lot of
the intentions of the game are still intact and that it's not just like it's
just metal Gear again, but you're just killing dudes without all the weird shit.
Yeah. I think it'll be very easy for them to do paint by
numbers here with that stuff. But we know like what metal Gear looks like
without Kojima, and it's metal Gear Survive, and that's not what I want
personally. I think that game has some defenders. I think for like what
it was trying to do, but not necessarily for trying to be a metal
Gear game. When it comes to this one. I think Virtuous, which
is the studio in South Korea I believe who's doing this. They seem to
just be like, hey, let's make that game again, but let's make
it look as beautiful as possible, and I think they can pull that off.
I'm just worried about what happens with Metal Gear going forward after this point,
Like if they try to make Ariel sequel or something like that, or
continue that story, then they're going to be completely lost in the woods.
Kanami is not going to know what to do with that stuff. They have
enough games so that they can remake for now that it's probably gonna be just
fine. You know, this happens. Time moves on these games, the
great move on to other stuff, the IP still exists, and then we
have to be like, Okay, they're just gonna go away forever, and
obviously it never does. So I kind of hope for the best case scenario
of it feels true to the original vision, which this does seem like it
is according to people who know a bunch of the story. Actually here.
Christina Abana is from twein Finite, huge Metal Gear, Solid three Snake Eater
fan, and she kind of goes through a bunch of stuff with like how
she's feeling pretty good about what she sees here and why I heard the same
from like you know Dan and Mike yesterday, so good to hear, yes
exactly. Also from that Xbox event, the new Yakuza game goes full animal
crossing. This is from James car at GameSpot. Like a Dragon, Infinite
Wealth will feature a side activity called Do Don't Go Do Dooco Yeah, don
Doco Island, which looks like an animal crossing game. Don'dko Island features in
island life sim separate from the usual crime field chaos of the Yakuza series,
giving the characters a chance to relax. And we say that goes full animal
crossing. It's just so animal crossing in such a cool way. The idea
of like, yeah, Yakuza can be anything like a dragon. Now it's
what it's called, but yeah, like a dragon could be anything you can.
These characters have the breadth to be very serious and have stories about their
traumas and then in the next moment you can be doing you know, fun
dance parties or you know, running a bar or something like that. The
reality of man have the duality of man, So them like recognizing that that's
a strength of this series and leaning into it hard and be like what if
we just we love animal crossing? What if we just did one of those.
I'm really excited about this jan Yeah, and I'd like a fresh take
on the animal crossing formula and combined with the silliness that comes with the Yakuza
series. I just can't wait for each e ball and to take a loan
to just get an island. Nope, get deep into debt and then just
pay it back by just slowly getting apples off of trees. Just really up
upsetting Mike Manatti. It's gonna be good stuff. I can't wait to party
with Ichiban on an island. Me too. I mean, listen, go
in Hawaii with this franchise alone, Like that's really interesting. I mean,
just the idea that they're getting out of the coma road show that they've been
in. It's like, listen, I like that they had that same setting
for game after game after game. I thought that made a ton of sense.
It's working for Spider Man, works for Yakuza, but they look like
they're putting a ton of love into this Hawaii setting and then having this whole
other separate island mini game in there. It's very cool. Grub. Why
is Sega so confusing? I don't, I mean because they're they're relatively pretty
good at making video games. They're just bad at figuring out what to do
with those video games. A lot of times, they're just bad at being
running a business. Really, it's the big guys. It's so silly over
the silly is what they are. A bunch of silly gooses, all right.
Our Survival assnd did launches to mixed reviews on Steam due to trash optimization.
This is another game that kind of had it moment at that Xbox event.
This comes from Kyle Knight at Dual Shockers some tidbits here. Arc Survival
Ascended. The Unreal Engine five remaster of Arc Survival Evolved has been heavily criticized
for poor optimization and stuttering frames. The game received backlash for its original price
and lack of included DLC packs, causing delays in its release. Studio Wildcard
has also announced the delay and the console release of of Survival Ascended due to
critical issues in the multiplayer version of the game. This seems like if you're
gonna, if you're gonna like not rush a game at any point in history,
it feels like right now is the time not to rush a game,
because you're gonna rush this out into this climate. Now, I suppose survival
games have the survival game audience and they are separate from everyone else that that
survive or built the surviv They are built different. But still, man,
you could have just released it early next year, take a little bit more
time and not have come out in a week where we had three games that
are eighty nine a Metacritic or higher, and then you've got several more still
coming and you have like twenty Game of the Year considerations already happening. But
whatever, this game is also going to be completely fine. This stuff is
going to happen, They're gonna fix it, and then this game's gonna have
fifty thousand to one hundred thousand concurrent players every day three years from now.
So I at the same point, it's like, Okay, this doesn't ever
really hurt these things all that much, so why wouldn't they do it this
way? It's so baffling, rob whenever you re like come across forks in
this industry where it's like, Wow, there's a whole mess of people over
there. How the fuck did they get here? Why are they there?
And it is very interesting. I'd love to see like a piece on the
ARC heads out there that our ride or die for ARC. Because at the
same time, I have zero interest in this that trailer that they showed yesterday.
Anything I've ever heard from ARC zero interesting, nothings can ever grab me.
Even though I am okay with Vin Diesel and support the Fast family,
ARC does nothing for me. But you said it perfectly, Grubb. Three
years from now, this game is still going to have an obscene and shocking
amount of people still playing it because reasons. Yep, Because I mean,
yeah, it's a kind of game that you could just play like my dad
played golf, right, you just get down there with your friends and you
go out there and you're doing kind of the same stuff. You're going through
the patterns, but it's it's still challenging and there's fun challenges you could take
on. So yeah, and we say all this ARC Survival Ascended is the
top selling game on Steam right now, so that's how it goes. I
actually want to see if it's on the most played because yesterday we talked about
this when it's like, oh, it had like fifty thousand for ARC Survival
Evolved. Now ARC Survival Ascended has forty eight thousand concurrent players for eight hundred
and that's its highest point ever, so it's still on the rise. See
where it settles in later today maybe, but it's at number twenty four on
the mostplayed games on Steam at the moment. Right above, let's see Lost
Arc, which is not confusing, and right behind Love is All Around,
which looks like an FMV game where pretty ladies kiss you from Japan. What
I'll say it to you, Jane, I'll seck it se you. Don't
worrybody, anyone got our code for this? Okay? But finally from this
The Finals open beta kicks off this week, with unlocked rewards carrying forward to
launch. This is from Camera Co at GameSpot. This is another game in
that Xbox showcase. The Finals, the free to play shooter from developer in
Bark Studios, will kick off its open beta on October twenty sixth. It
will be the game's first beta test, supporting cross platform play and cross progression
between current gen consoles and PC. Players will be able to test out the
fast paced action shooter from the x Battlefield devs for a little over a week,
with the beta ending on November fifth. There's still no release date for
this game jan But I have to imagine if this is like a carrying over
from the beta situation, they're probably going to announce a really state soon for
this thing. It's probably out before the end of the year. Didn't this
one strike your fancy at all? It was just kind of a cacophonous noise
to me. I couldn't really make heads or tails of it. Mildly interested.
It shows very well, but you are right about the cafist nature of
it. It seems like a lot of flash in the pan, and it's
going to be interesting to see when it is slowed down how it actually plays,
like right, because you can make as flashy of a trailer as possible,
but when you're playing something actually like Siege, you know there is a
lot of slow down and there is a lot of quieter moments in the games.
I'm wondering how this will take with like the greater audience, also,
especially if it's a free to play game, which can go one of two
ways, actually one of several ways these days. But also it's like,
is the appetite there for style of game? Is the appsite there for Battle
Royales still? And I know that PUBG is one of the most played games
on Steam right now. Yeah, Fortnite is still incredibly, incredibly popular.
But those are behemoths. Those are machines that have already been set into place
and have their player bases like arc I guess that are still tuning in.
It's going to be very hard and it's an uphill battle for the finals to
uh to try and stick the landing here. Also, what was that Ubisoft
game that had to delay their beta even Oh, there's so many fine oh
y X defiant X Fine got like it's it's delayed indefinitely in terms of like
we don't know, like it's it hasn't been defined its new release date,
but it's got got pushed way off to the point where it's like, eh,
maybe next year sometime or something like that, and not not canceled or
anything like that, not even on ice, just delayed indefinitely. Also,
Grub, I just saw what you put on the screen, and I thought
you were showing my screen at first, and I got a little scared.
Uh, I was gonna bring your screen, jan because I'm looking at the
same trailer audio listeners. I grub temporarily put up The love is all around
trailer on Steam, and I was gonna bring this up before grub asked me
a question. But there's some intentional marketing going around and intentional color schemes going
around for a game with pretty ladies in it to have maybe a menu color
palette of white, black, an orange, you know, and it's a
very specific queue of orange. It's gonna I'm not put that out. I'm
not in like, I understand what's what he's getting at here, but I
don't. I don't know if i'm you'll know what I'm talking about. There's
a specific sound, all right, yeah, totally, Oh yeah, of
course, yeah, my bookmarks here, Okay, there we go. Uh,
fair enough. They're definitely trying to suggest it here. But this one
is not even like it's just single player dating some and visual novel FMB.
So this one doesn't even get to like the porny stuff. I think it's
just like, hey, girlfriend experienced sort of thing. So knock yourselves out,
kids. That is one of the most played games on Steam right now.
Steam is a magical place. I just can't be mad at it.
Ever, speaking of asked it for the asking for it, We'll just avoid
it. No, Sean folly. Well, there we go. Love is
all around. Girlfriend experience is very porny stuff greb Okay, hey, lesson
learned, all right? I put stuff out there. You correct me.
That's how this works, That's how we do this show. Uh. Valve
is speaking of Steam. Valve is dropping Turkish and Argentinian currencies on Steam.
This is from Sophie McAvoy at Games in the Street dot biz. Valve is
changing the currency used for sales in Argentina and Turkey on Steam to US dollars
next month due to ext exchange rate volatility. Really, what this means is
people in Argentina have been the peso is very up and down. I know
this because because Christian, but also I listen to the news a little bit.
I don't know what's going on with Turkey. I assume it's probably something
pretty similar. Lots of inflation causing the like one day you have this amount
of money and the next day you can't even buy anywhere near this is the
thing you were going to get yesterday. Like that's pretty volatile, and Valve
has done pretty good job of like trying to like keep that stuff like still
like hey, we're still going to use it. We're still going to use
it. Hey, it's reached a breaking point where they just can't do it
anymore. The same thing happened when they were like we're accepting bitcoin, and
like, okay, we'll accept bitcoin, and then it was like, by
the time the time between when you bought the game for bitcoin and when we
received the bitcoin, it dropped fifty five percent. We can't do this anymore.
So I think they're trying to avoid situations like that, and the reality
is there's no there's no end in sight for the volatility of many of these
currencies. So yeah, it's it's rough stuff out there. What it means
for other people is, hey, if you were doing the thing of setting
your region to Argentina and buying games really cheap over there, they have gotten
rid of that loophole. So yeah, that was definitely happening. People are
definitely doing a lot of that. Okay. I well, he kept saying
love is all around, and I wanted to sing the Mary Tyler Moore theme
song, but then you started talking about serious things again. I was like,
maybe I'd better just let that lode Hub. Isn't that serious, Mike.
I know you considered very serious, but bub is all around, No
need to waste it. You can have the town. Why don't you take
it? Jeff's gonna make it, after all, I am the Mary Tyler
Moore giant bomb. I voice considered myself that Jack, we say this about
you all the time. Thank you for that, Mikey. All right,
we have a pull question from some point this week, yesterday even I'm gonna
bring that up right now, after I get it resized, after I tried
to make love is all Around fit into this screen. There we go.
What do you want Insomnia to make after Wolverine? That is that's from yesterday,
right, that's the one from yesterday? Or I posted yesterday. Let
me refresh here, let me do that. There it is there, I
found it. I'm a very smart boy. Who was cooler? Kyle Katar
dash Rendar? Or who the hell are these people? Fifty two percent said
who the hell are these people? Because I'm old, thirty percent said Kyle
kataran and just eighteen percent said dash Rendar. I personally voted for dash Rendar,
even though I know Kyle Katar is cooler. I know it, I
know, I get it. Dash Rendar feels like a knockoff. Of a
Star Wars character. We totally and yet I love him all the same,
A deep, deep respect for dash Rendar. It's Mike, Okay, he
just keeps saying, oh no a lot does he? Did he realize he's
old? I think he might be realizing he's old. That seems possible.
Yeah, that's totally seems likely here. All right, let's see it.
What do we have going on a giant bomb this week? While we get
the next potally realize I'm old. I come in here singing the fucking Mary
Tyler Moore theme song, and now that people don't know who dash Rendar is,
it's not good. I'm dying. Ah. I did wonder why,
like he seemed committed to this Mary Tyler Moore thing. I saw him in
chat saying that. I'm like, he's gonna realize that that's going to get
him called a boomer by and he's going to give up on it. But
it's Mike. He doesn't give up. And I respect that about him.
I yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, I respect that about Mike as
well. Jan What do we have happening? What we have happening today is
another episode of the Voicemail Dump Truck followed by Friday Night forking. Everybody,
it's the fork in July. Get your forks out. Nothing bad can happen
with Jeff Backlar. But before the dump truck. Today we have the Mario
Wonder Grand Prix. What that's gonna look like still up in the air.
We're figure now some ideas and gosh, what else is going on? Games
mornings tomorrow as well as a UPF which looks like we might be busting some
stuff. I think we should do that. I would love to do that.
We just gotta we got to also find some spots in this calendar for
Allen Lake too, because people are gonna I might want to stream some of
me playing that from the very beginning. Just we can do a stream like
that so people don't forget worry about spoilers. There's a setting. Oh there's
okay, there's a setting. There's a little there's a specific You started the
game, right, yeah, I started it. I saw it. Well,
it starts with a certain A lot of the that's a penis. Yes,
I think there is a setting to hide all of that. There's a
puritan setting, okay, set the puritanity to one hundred. Please for us
here in America that boy had. That's a big boy, slightly bigger than
my cat, just slightly. All right, let's see here, new poll
question. Let's see I wrote it down here. Okay, have you played
the original Alan Wake before? Yes? Or no? I'm just kind of
curious going into this game what people are going to be bringing into it.
Uh, Jen, you said you played an hour of it. Have you
felt to lost? Have you felt like a boy? I wish I would
have played Allan Wake or even like watched something about it. How are you
feeling about it? I think initially I wish there was some type of last
time on Allan Wake type of like some because I feel like, yes,
the series kind of lends itself to it, But I didn't find myself too
lost, especially because you know, you jump in initially as Saga and she's
new to everything, so it's like, Okay, well you are like you're
you're an analog for the player jumping into this, and you, through Osmosis
have picked up on stuff regarding Alan Awake, so yep, it mirrored my
own experience. Yeah, And I'm I'm like, I don't think people should
hold themselves back from playing Allen Lake to at all, jump into it.
It is a game worthy of the scores it's getting and the praise it's getting.
And don't like be like, oh well I got to play on wink
from even allow it go and allow myself to play this one. No,
you're gonna be fine. Yeah. The game's spot crews put together a bunch
of videos as well to kind of catch you up on the lore of everything.
So I highly suggest you go watch those. Yeah, they hate Allen
Lake over there, and I'll just despise it's all remedy games. Don't have
any love for them at all. Yeah, so joke, because that's all
they talk. They love those games over there. Very excited about this,
and I'm excited for them, all right. Anything else we mentioned, Although
we got the Mario pre coming grant pre coming up later today? What time
is that? We said one pm? One pm or maybe one thirty.
It's going to be happening a little bit later, guys, at least an
hour from now, but we might move it around a little bit to accommodate
schedules. So just keep an eye on our social media, keep an eye
on the Twitch page. We'll have that going live in the meantime. Though,
Jan, thank you so much for spending time today with talking with me
about video games. I appreciate it. Man. Thank you Jef Greb.
It's the best way to start a Thursday morning. Thank you all for watching.
You are the best audience in gaming. Until next time, have a
good one. Take care of yourself. And is delaying the game? Maybe
a Star Wars game. We don't know. We'll talk about it tomorrow. Goodbye,