You know, we're not a gummy beer. It's the Internet. You're busy.
Let's do this for July eighteenth, twenty twenty two. For the next
hour or so, let me help you sort through the world of gaming on
Game mess Mornings Live with Me Jeff Grub Today, I didn't put a new
thing here, so I'm just gonna say I love you all very much,
but first please join me and welcoming today's co host to Game Mess Mornings.
It's Barrett Courtney from Kind of Funny Everybody. Barrett, how are you doing,
Jeff grab I'm doing great today. Thank you so much for having me
on the show. I've been actively listening to all the new iteration of Giant
bombs, so Yeah Messy Mornings. I've been trying to keep up to date
with listening to the Yeah getting messy every morning. Uh listen to the Giant
Bomb cast with you on it. It's been a it's been a cool uh
iteration of giant bomb in a in twenty twenty two. I'm very excited to
uh kind of hang out for a little bit and uh kind of uh you
know, get my hands into the Messy Morning. Yes, Jeff, Yes,
absolutely, I'm looking forward to it. Yeah, it's been it's been
fun. It's been going well. We're just kind of doing our best,
trying to put out a lot of stuff, and it's been, uh,
the response has been great. It's been it's been really fun though. I'm
glad you've been listening. It's uh, it's it's weird, like, hey,
we're gonna put together some shows and try to figure some stuff out,
and we're gonna have this morning show to anchor stuff. And I'm like,
when I was doing, I'm like, I'm just gonna do it kind of
funny. He's doing, I'm just gonna I'm just gonna do kind of funny
games down and let's just do that. And that's seem to work out pretty
well exactly. It's it's a good it's a good basis for a show.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. When we were like talking about, like,
hey, we need to we like we'd like to have something like as a
daily anchor, it's like it was kind of hard to think of anything else
that would just work. It's like, hey, we talk about games every
day. That makes sense, right, so let's do it. But yeah,
I don't know. We were coming into a Monday it's like I never
know like that transition, like, Okay, what do we talk about because
there's like usually not a lot of news happening on the weekend. There's enough
today. But did you do anything fun on the weekend? Well, here's
the thing, Jeff Grub. Yeah, I had a pretty nice weekend.
You know, hung out with my dog a lot. That's why, you
know, the weekends are spent taking her on outings and and things of that
nature. Played a lot with my steam deck this weekend. First, I
got it last week, so I got it in the middle of like a
really busy work week, so I didn't really like get a lot of like
actual like just like sit down time with it for like a long extended period
of time. So I got to play around with that, doing some cybercrime
on the steam deck, which is great. But here's the thing, Jeff
Grub. For those who don't know me, I'm Barrett Courtney from kind of
Funny. I'm a technical director kind of Funny, So that means I'm the
guy usually on the other side of the podcast making sure everybody looks great,
sounds great, making sure the podcast is recording all that stuff all and everything
exactly exactly everything Jeff Grubb is doing while hosting at the same time, you
know, which is which is? Yeah, exactly, And so you might
be wondering, oh, like you are, do you have insider knowledge,
Barrett, Like do you have, like you know, tenured history in journalism
in this industry? The answers know, I'm pretty much like a professional peanut
gallery on the on you know, the kind of funny x cast games cast
ps, I love you xox so you canna kind of hear me, like
butt into conversations and give my two cents. And so you might be wondering,
well, Barrett, than why are you on this new show about video
games? And that's because of one thing and one thing only. I want
to call out Jeff Grub for something. So I started this game. I
saw you playing this, all right, go ahead. I played a little
game on the switch at first called Neon White sure possibly indie game in the
year and yeah, and so I played it there didn't skip any of the
story like you heathens like you and Andy Cortez to skip it, press an
F to skip in through the cut scenes and stuff like that. But here's
the thing. No one else is playing on the Nintendo Switch. So the
only leaderboard that I have to go up against on the Switch is the worldwide
leader boards, where I did have like some of the number ones for some
of the levels and stuff like that. And I kept hearing Big Game about
Andy your times, Dan Reicherts, and so I was like, you know
what, I'm gonna get the game on Steam. I'm gonna get used to
mouse and keyboard for the first time since Portal two came out. That's how
dedicated. Okay, yeah, I'm not a mouse and keyboard person, but
I was going to be for this game. And so, you know,
playing through the first few missions, getting through all these times, seeing like
some of your scores, feeling good about like probably beating some of your scores.
Definitely beat two of your scores last night. But then you know,
I'm excited to see the latter half of the game where I'm like, oh,
I wonder what Jeff's time is gonna be on like the final boss.
You haven't beaten me on White yet. You're only halfway through the game,
Jeff, come on, man, and this is it's this is my sickness,
is that, like I get so I've got read to developer times,
and at almost every level I've played. If I don't, it's like one
or two levels that I don't, and it's just because like, oh,
something happened where I like I accidentally like went forward in the story. But
I play until I get the dev time, and then I start playing until
I beat everyone else on my on my leaderboard, and so then I I
got distracted, and no, I s thought, I've played eighty hours or
so of like Astro's Playroom because of these speed running stuff in there. I
never beat Astro's Playroom. That's like a three hour game. It's like,
there's no excuse for that. But because here's my thing, it's only because
the speed running stuff gets so much more fun the further you get in,
Because yeah, so that's really just what I want for you. I want
you to live your best life being able to get into some of those really
fun levels. In the latter half of the game, I was I was
watching Mike stream it last night and he said he beat it last night,
and sure is good, and some of those later things, I'm like,
wow, this is so different than all the things I've been doing. So
and then Dan Record call me a weirdo and chat that is offensive coming from
him. Yeah, I will get to I plan to play some today Monday's
I usually have a little bit of time in the afternoon and I'm gonna play
a little bit and then get back to work and all that stuff. But
I'll make I promise to make advancements towards the end at least, so who
knows when I'll whenever, I'll beat it. We'll see, all right,
before we get into the mess, let's explain ourselves. Each weekday, I,
Jeff Greb will help peace or gaming life back together. That includes breaking
news, the ketchup, where we discuss the biggest topics consuming the lives of
gamers everywhere, and maybe even bring some of our own original reporting. For
all these topics, I'll get the input from 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 Games Mornings,
or find the RSS on giant bomb dot com. You can also catch
the show later with chapters and timestamps on YouTube. If you were watching on
there, please be sure to hit that leg button. It helps people find
the show Okay, we have a lot of getting into, so let's start
the morning mess with skate forward. Data mining reveals that the game might actually
have lootboxes after all. So there is a couple of here and I'll bring
it up here, go and transition to the back end. And I don't
know if this is a back end slide show or whatever, but you could
see the words unlockables and product boxes and a skate dev team has previously said
that they are going free to play, but they will not have things like
lootboxes. Now that gets into how do we define loot boxes and all that,
and it's and and then it gets into what will this actually be in
the shipping product or is this just something they were testing? But we'll talk
about all that. The data minding shows that the game at one point had
unlockables and product boxes. And here's what the slide show says. You can
earn taps by exploring fun City and completing FCCC challenges, exchange taps for product
boxes in the main menu by going to the store. Each product box you
open will have a random unlockable item inside. Check out the new stuff you
unlocked in the build kit and customization screens, So like that sounds like lootboxes.
But what do you think happen here? I could see it a couple
of different ways, right, is that either this was an early idea that
they were getting into and then probably had like a lot of just seeing it
of like the dev's not wanting it and having the constant back and forth between
higher ups. So they want it because it's you have to at least test
it, right, the high up state you have to at least test this
and if you have a better way of doing it, prove it. But
we need to see the side by side comparison, right, that's possible exactly,
And so I imagine there's something going on with like maybe them looking into
not a season pass because I don't know if that would make exact sense for
skate, but I imagine there's a different system that's not like very loopboxy that
they're trying to still figure out. Because it is free to play, they
have to, you know, be able to justify to the higher ups that
like, hey, this is worth making and this is like the money that's
gonna you know, uh, this is the money that is going to make
over years and years and years because of the system that we have set up
here. So that's what I feel like is most likely going on here,
especially if they did say it would not have loop boxes. I feel like
if it was if that line had come from a higher up, I would
have been like, we'll see. But the fact that, like the dev
team themselves are like, hey, like we're not doing Louke boxes even though
it's going free to play, even though he A is very known for having
Luke boxes. That's that's the vibe I get here. I really want to
know what FCCC it stands for. Yeah, like chat trying to figure it
out too. What do you think is it like the Federal Communications Commission City?
Fun City is the name of like the overall area you're going to be
in in the game, So fun city something, and obviously community college pops
the mind immediately, but it's fun City community Challenges. That was a pretty
good guest in chat, So I don't know. Yeah, I want to
know as well. I'll say that like I feel like, you know,
we could really give the benefit of the doubt here, but have they earned
that? No? So I don't blame anybody for being like, okay,
EA has already found a way to goof this up and be like, oh,
there's like you can't buy product boxes, but you can buy taps,
and then you can use taps to buy product boxes. If that's what they're
doing here, they are off to the like they're getting off to a bad
start. That is stepping out with the wrong foot. This is a bad
look immediately because when you say no lootboxes, that there's a certain implication there
that we expect there to be sort of no real way to get into the
loop of spending money to earn lootboxes in whatever way that actually works. I
think that the likely thing here is that this stuff probably all is on the
free side of things, and this is just or it's not going to be
in the final shipping product at all, like you were saying. But if
it is, it's like maybe taps will just always be the free currency,
and then the real money you spend on will just be like there will be
a store where you could buy stuff directly and you'll buy the thing you want,
and then there's gonna be a battle pass. That is my expectation based
on like Apex legends. Now I'm not like super familiar with Apex legends.
These days. But I don't think Apex Legends has lootboxes, right, I
don't. That would be a question for Blessing ado Age. Yeah, Apex
is one where I've dipped my tone to a couple of times and say never
enough to like actually dig into like what they're kind of like storefront or whatever
it is. Tokeimiki and chaceas, why aren't they called skate crates, which
so yeah, of course, there you go, scrates. Get yourself a
scraight. Oh I like that. Yeah, that's got a good mouth feel.
No, that's just the words straight. Reminds me. What's the word
when you know you kind of like leave a little stain in your your underwear?
What's that? Yes? Uh god, a streak? A streak market
yeah, streak, Yeah, streak. Bars said that, that's what That's
what comes to mind when I hear screat skid marks. That's what marks around
here. We call those Paul Reicherts. Just so you know, we call
those Paul, We call those dads dads. Uh uh, I mean listen,
I'm still like, okay, this game is years off, right,
That's what I've heard. They haven't said that explicitly, but they've been like,
hey, it's very early, this is pretty pre pre alpha and all
that stuff. But yeah, I've heard it's years off. There's gonna be
a lot of time for anything mentioned to change, let alone things that they
said explicitly wouldn't be in the game. Now, that doesn't mean people shouldn't
criticize and shouldn't have these fears, because that's how they get EA to change.
And we'll talk a little bit about like other stuff that's happening with with
loot boxes in terms of government government regulation on the show today, But mostly
the way things change in video games, at least is by people yelling and
criticizing. So if you don't want this stuff to show up in the final
version of Hashtag Skate four, then yell about it. Yeah, that's that
totally is fair. I think it does definitely feel right now like a monkey's
pause situation and we want skate back. But here's here's what skate is in
the twenty twenties, you know, And I think that's what like when you
talk to people who have really are like really in the skate scene and really
want this game to come. They knew that monkey poff from the beginning.
They knew like, if we were going to get this, it was always
going to be free to play. It was always going to be long term
monetization, where you know, the people who spend a lot of time in
that game are going to be able to spend a thousand dollars over the course
of years and stuff like that. So they knew that and they mostly accepted
it. I think, all right, let's move on to Sucker Punch Production
announces it's sold nine point seven three million copies of Ghosts of Sushima. This
weekend marks two years since the release of Ghosts of Sushima. We are blown
away by all the sports since then and are so grateful for all of you.
Thank you to everyone who has played and shared this journey with us.
That comes from a tweet from Sucker Punch. That is a pretty good number
for a brand new ip sort of no matter what there's a handful of like
Splatoon is on another like like relatively recent new ip that sort of went did
about that number over time to kind of like have this come out of nowhere
and be like, hey, it's just going to take over that It's really
impressive and that ten million market's getting right to that ten million mark. Where
you are now a one of a kind, massive blockbuster. Only a handful
of games really get there, but they are the biggest games and the other
kinds of games that Sony and EA and ACTIVI should all want, games that
at least sell ten million dollars. I was talking to Mron about that last
week. That's the number they all want. So this is pretty pretty good
stuff for sucker Punch, right, Yeah, especially like what you were saying,
like a new ip I'm trying to They're they're the ones who do infamous,
correct, and so like for like that being the first game that they
had also made since uh second son and the DLC after that and stuff like
that, and them going quiet for a while, like this is awesome.
I think it's also like this was a game that wasn't just like a big
thing in the US market, right, Like this was also like hitting like
Japan really well, uh and other like Eastern markets like really well, Like
they were all really excited and really loving this game. So I think the
fact that they were kind of able to reach across multiple different markets, I
think they know that they have something special with this, And yeah, it
makes even more sense now of you know them being like, yeah, we're
not doing Sly anytime soon. We're not doing Infamous anytime soon, probably never.
No one else is working on those ips. Keep those ips dead.
Hashtag ghosts Tsushima for life. We're just gonna keep making them until people are
stopped going to be interesting. So yeah, it's I think you nailed it
to with the global appeal. It is the thing that Sony has explicitly said
a couple of times. I think Jim Ryan's kind of talked about it,
and they mentioned it when they were closing down like the japan studios and stuff
like that. We want games to have a global appeal. Goes to Sushima
absolutely checked every box when it came to that, and you're right, the
Japanese market when Gaga for this game, and that's enough. But it's like,
oh, it can push a game that was going to be a success
in like one territory if it success, if it's a pretty good success everywhere,
it can get that like two point five million here, two point five
million there, two million here, and get to ten million copies sold.
And yeah, it's been two years. It's not a Nintendo game, so
it's gone on sale. But that doesn't that's ten million mark doesn't really matter
no matter what you get to, no matter how like what the price is
getting to ten million or you know right around there. Yeah, it's it's
a TV show getting to one hundred episodes, Like you're syndicated at that point,
baby, Like you have no worries after that point, And yes,
they guarantees that that that's what they're working on next. There is no world
in which there is not an active team working on Ghosts of Sushima two right
now, Like that is happening. Are they still supporting the online stuff?
Do you know? I think so? We were actually looking into Like I
was like, hey, I want to like look into maybe doing I never
played it, and the last I heard is like, yeah, it seems
like they are still like updating it, making sure that it's up and running
and all that stuff. I don't think they're adding new content too much.
But it also was like never supposed to be a It never seemed like it
was supposed to be like this ongoing live service game, right, It was
always supposed to be, Oh, we are going to add this feature that
is opens up the possibility of ghost Soshima in new and interesting ways. But
like most people buy in this game are going to go to the single player
and if they want to keep playing, well, now here's this multiplayer thing
to the side. So I think they kind of supported as much as they
were ever going to in terms of content. But yeah, definitely still up
and running and all that stuff and still working just fine. So yeah,
uh, let's see. Sonic team is promising to address complaints with the Sonic
Origin collection. In response to a fan asking about a patch, Sonic social
media manager Katie Cruz Chris Truz said, hey, thanks for the patients.
The team's been listening and it's working on fixing a variety of issues right now.
We'll make sure to get some more official messaging out once we have more
info for everyone. So have you played Sonic Origins. I've not, but
the people I know who've played it don't actually have that many complaints about it.
I've seen complaints from one of the studios working on it said like,
hey, this is below our standards. And there was a couple of like
big stories of like a fan was working on a mod for the game,
He's like this crash. I think I remember like im Roun tweeting out about
that of like, you know, it's bad when like a fan is like,
you know, it's like screwed this, Like I'm done like trying to
fix this game and money and stuff like that. I you know, I've
I'm coming on here as you know, a person who only thinks that the
only good Sonic game is Sonic Mania. I'm gonna be honest. So,
like I'm not a huge Sonic person, and so I've only heard about the
origins tobacco through you know, the internets and stuff like that. I have
from heard from Tim and bless Over a kind of funny that I don't think
they've personally dealt with a lot. I think Blessing might have run into a
thing or two, but they are such on the level of like loving Sonic
that it wasn't enough for them to be like super dissuaded by it. Like
I think they're both trying to get the platinum for it on PlayStation because it's
seems like super obtainable and stuff like that. So, yeah, it might
be one of those weird ones where you know, it's it's a different situation
for different people, and you know, it might just happen to be a
lot of people are are getting the same kind of like issues. But you
know the hand, the lucky few who we actually like hear and talk from
are are not getting those those same issues. Like it reminds me of you
know, like we all loved Spider Man, Uh what was that twenty eighteen.
No problems with that on a technical level, But then a personal buddy
of mine, every single cut scene none of the character models like acted properly.
They would all like kind of just like float around and stuff like that
while the voice acting the cut scene was going on, and I'm pretty sure
he was the only one who dealt with that problem. So there is weird
stuff like that that like we don't see from like our ends, like on
the industry side, But then like fans are getting like yeah, some weird
bugs and stuff like that that we would just don't see this one, and
this one seems like it's a similar situation. I think at based on like
my understanding is they most and someone chat was mentioned this, and I think
it's a good point. As a casual fan, you probably won't even notice
most of the issues that's from argent end, And I think that's right.
I think you have to be a sonic like super fan and in that scene,
and someone who might make a mod, and like the community dev team
that like has a history of working on this stuff that's Sonic, that say,
Goat hired to do this, Like that's that studio that was like,
this is below our standards. I give to be like really tapped in to
notice most of the issues because they are like, oh, the game used
to work like this, and now it's it's slightly tweaked, and now it
works like that, and so yeah, Okay, that could frustrate people who
are those super fans. But I think for the most part, this game
seems like it might be one of the better Sonic collections overall. And and
in that regard, while it seems like it's getting a lot of negative press,
I say, if they just give it a little bit more love,
can easily get it to like where it needs to be in terms of being
like, oh, this is the Sonic game that the Sonic collection that fans
and casual fans will come back to for years to come. I think it
has like the put the potential of getting to that that tier of providing stuff
for Sonic fans. It'll earn all of the different versions that you can buy
that have all of the different things that you can collect, and remember that
Jeff grab that was insane to me. I think the one thing I remember
when Tim Getty saying was that I think it's Sonic three and knuckles is that
the one where there's supposedly some Michael Jackson produced music that they replace. Apparently
that music is also just like very bad, and so if they also work
on make Tim that would make Tim very happy. Yeah, yeah, I
do a better version of that those new songs whatever, you really, what
does it matter though? When Sonic one has the best muskin he has Sonic
ones like blows all the rest of the music away. As far as I
can't argue that, even with being very anti anti Sonic and being pro Sanic
Cornell, like, the music in Sonic is very iconic and very good.
Nintendo reassures fans more in sixty four games will be added to Switch Online.
This is by Liam Doolin from Nintendo Life. Nintendo last week's surprise Switch Online
expansion pack subscribers with the announcement of Pokemon Puzzle League, but we're now at
a point where we don't know what's coming next, even Japan's lineup has now
been completed with the release of the first two custom Robo games. This has
got some fans wondering how much longer Nintendo will will continue to support the Nintendo
sixty four Expansion Pack library. Fortunately, there's no need to panic. The
company today issued a message via social media reassuring fans it will continue to deliver
in sixty four games and the message is in six Nintendo sixty four games will
be added to Nintendo Switch Online plus Expansion Pack. Stay tuned. I wonder
what inside Nintendo like convinced and they needed to send this tweet. Very why
did they need to tell us that more we're coming. I just assumed that
more we're coming. What is happening here? Uh? This is them being
like more are coming, yeah later, right, very much later? This
yeah yeah. And that tells me of like, we're not going to hear
anything major for a while, and the next things that we will hear are
going to be like the weird smaller games that like, you know for the
nes online and s and as online, where it's like, why are you
still adding these games when there's all of these other like Prime Nintendo games on
these consoles that you could be adding, but you're adding like Golf three on
the NS for whatever reason two years later. So that's what that tells me.
Like where like the big next big update is going to be like Tonic
Trouble from the n sixty four made by Ebisoft and not Rayman or something like
that or not or Wave Race sixty four or d K sixty four, which
I know they own the license, do they Like People are like, well,
Barrett, it's it's a you know, a Rares on there that but
also you know they also re release d K sixty four for the WEU,
so like they have it, they have right for that. Yeah. Yeah,
so it's not like they can't because Rare made it. Like god it
they're Nintendo is the weirdest when it comes to this stuff. It's I don't
know what they're like the behind the scenes of like why they're making the decisions
that they make. They don't even like I'm not even a Diddy Kong racing
guy, but I'm pretty sure it's didd Kong racing even on there. No,
it's one I always thought it was and then we went back and look
like five times, like I finally, no, it's not on there,
but you know, they clearly have a deal with Rare. They talked to
Pancho KAZOOI I do think Golden Night does end up there in some form eventually,
but really, yeah, I think that's being held up because of the
war. So like the you know, the Russian content, Okay, okay,
yeah, so I think right, so it's like, you know,
there's a lot of Russian military iconography in the Golden Eye, and so they're
like, oh, we probably should hold off, and we're dealing with Microsoft,
and neither company wants to embarrass the other one. But you know,
also, I'll guess is that game's what twenty thirtieth anniversary, Probably the thirtieth
anniversary's twenty fifth anniversary, and so maybe that's possible it comes out in August.
I have no idea at that point, but uh, you know,
there are a lot of games that are obvious and do still need to come.
And it's like, yeah, are we are we at a point where
they are going to take a significant break? I hope not, but it
does seem like that's one of the reasons they might say this if games are
still coming. It's very much of like please clap energy, right, it's
like all right, and send where are we? Where are we going from
here on out? Because it does feel like when we get to Pokemon Puzzle.
You can no hate to Pokemon puzzly because I do hear from friends that
it is a very fun game, good game. But like when you're getting
to that level of like the Pokemon games on the end sixty four, it's
like, all right, so we're we're going nowhere else from here, right,
Like that's where that's the level that we're out of releasing these game.
So yeah, and again like excite, like sixty four a game they should
have zero I mean, okay, Site Bike and wave Race. Maybe there
are some licensing issues with like Kalisaki or something, but they've released those before
in the past and figured it out, so I would hope they would just
figure it out here as well. But get the true best racing game on
the N sixty four a wave Race on there at least come on Wave Races,
probably the honestly the best in sixty four game. I think maybe all
right, let's see here. EA is patenting a way to generate content based
on playstyle. This comes from Chris Scollion at VGC EA has filed a patent
for a technique that generates in game content based on how our player approaches a
game. The patent application, titled Persona Driven Dynamic Content Framework, was originally
published in April, as spotted by opi Attack, and was republished this month
as spotted by exputer. According to its description and supporting diagrams, the patent
is for a system that determines a player persona based on gameplay information for the
user. It then, for example, performs dynamic content generation or additional product
recommendations based on the player persona. Barret, I gotta say, reading this,
I kind of assumed all this stuff was already happening a little bit,
right, So when you were reading this, I was just like, so
is EA making like a third party persona game? Like keep saying, yeah,
that's getting me like not really excited because it's ta Yeah. It's interesting
that, Like when I was reading this before we started the show, it
did feel like a this does feel like something that like EA was already doing.
The The idea of it is interesting. I think for things like like
rogue lights and stuff like that I very much am into and rogue lights for
me personally, are things that or like, what is it like randomly generated
things that a little bit yeah, procedual generation, but now procedural generation based
on your play style I think is an interesting concept. But I'm very much
of like, I really like curated experiences, so it's one of those.
It's like, it is very much like, yes, we're in twenty twenty
two and they're coming up with, like is super just like really weird things
to test out with game development stuff like that. But yeah, I'm surprised
it's not already something that they're like that they've been implementing, which yeah,
yeah, which is weird. Personas included in the example include Explorer, competitor,
collector, Support, combatant, tank slash, lead commander, and completionists.
And basically I think of this sort like the AI just could watch Thank
Yourself. I'm a combatant, right exactly. It reminds me of that old
Xbox Alive like three sixty like what like what, oh my god? That
unlocked to memory? Are you competitive or are you underground? Are you a
family gamer? Like whatever, whatever the hell they were called. It reminds
me of that. But after determining this stuff, it's like, okay,
well, if you fit into one of these personas. We know that it's
more like you'll like this game. So obviously this is talking about advertising games
with marketing games to you, which, of course it is like that is
the number one thing they're trying to do is sell people who buy games more
games. But then it's also, yeah, they do. They do talk
about, hey, procedural generation could lead to specific content being aimed at you,
and I don't I get that. I like that to a certain extent.
I'm someone who has had an interesting idea, for sure, but it's
also like, I know what you mean about curated experiences, but I almost
want like it means more to me if I choose my own path. And
yeah, maybe I do fit into one of these personas, but all the
other stuff in the game kind of needs to be there as well for me
to ignore it. Do you know what I mean? Like, by ignoring
it, I am like defining myself and I don't want the game to be
like, oh, well we've defined you, so now the game will just
be all that stuff you like, you're helping the game put you in a
box, Jeff Grab, And if there's anything Jeff Grab does not want to
be put in the box, speaking of which I just love that. Dan
Ryker. In response to you saying Wave raises the best game on sixty four,
he responded, that's the most insane thing you've ever said. I mean,
listen, I will defend that Waiver sixty four and whatever fea it feels
so good. It's it's probably the best feeling game on any platform of that
generation. It feels incredible. To this day, it still feels one of
the ones that like, uh like still feels good to play, even after
all this time. Because a lot of earth it's inexcusable, he says,
it's inexcusable. In excuseable, I mean, we know that DK sixty four
is actually the best game on there, but again, just feeling, I
get it, I get the argument. Jeff, Yeah, thank you.
I appreciate it. Thank you for coming to somewhat of my defense. I
appreciate it. I expect he A to do more with this, but like,
this is the kind of thing where I see a patent and I,
like I said, I think, I'm like, I bet they're already doing
some stuff like this. That's definitely truth, Like, uh, Blizzard would
do the thing where like they patented it. Hey, we're gonna make it
so we we you make more connections, you are communicating with people online.
I'm like, I'm pretty sure you've done that for years because I remember playing
Overwatch and always getting matched with other people randomly that had the name grub or
I would type in chat like I would make some reference to like RuPaul's Drag
Race, and then all of a sudden, I look and like half the
people on my team would have names of drag queens from RuPaul's Drag Race.
But what is going Like I just talked about that now that and maybe it's
like coincidence and I'm just and it's a confirmation bias or whatever, but I
don't think so, I really really don't listening. It would so benefit like
a game like that to make you have good social experiences because that's what keeps
you playing for longer. So why wouldn't they have been investing in that stuff
for a very long time? But yeah, we'll see micro. Microsoft's Activision
buyout could be approved by the FTEC as soon as next month. This is
from Chris Scullion at VGC. The FTEC asked Microsoft in Activision Blizzard for additional
information in March as it continue to review their proposed acquisition deal, and according
to paywalled merger news provider deal Reporter, Microsoft has now provided the FTEC with
the information it was looking for. As noted by the ftec's own guidance,
this means the body now has thirty days to challenge the acquisition, otherwise the
deal can continue. There are some caveats to this, and this is important
and why it might close. It also very well might not, and it's
just as a reminder. Originally Microsoft said this deal will probably take about eighteen
months, which takes it into like Juno next year, So there are some
caveats to this. As the ftec's guidance on the process points out, both
companies have to provide the required information before the thirty day countdown can begin.
It's not clear yet whether Activision has provided its share of the requested information.
If not, the thirty day window will presumably only begin when that happens.
This feels like to me, this still feels pretty inevitable. Barrett, Where
are you at with it? I know a lot of people are still growing
more skeptical of if it's actually going to go through. I think there's no
way it doesn't go through in our modern times ruled by capitalism, it's only
gonna be it's gonna only benefit those ideals of you know, just uh,
you know, growth, growth, growth, growth, and growth. Because
the argument is of you know, like it feels like a monopoly, but
you know, the other argument is like, oh, well there's still competition,
right, and so I think that is going to be the thing that's
like, yeah, there's no way this doesn't go through at this point.
It'll be interesting to see, Yeah, if like, if you know,
this thirty day countdown actually begins anytime soon. I feel like because activism Blizzard
is still technically its own thing, and all of the fires that they're continuing
to put out over there and trying to you know, give them information about
you know, like what the FTC wants. I wonder like what specifically they're
they're looking for when it comes to that, and like what they need to
provide, and there might be something there or they need to kind of get
their ducks in a row before they actually provide that information. So I wonder
if that's what Xbox was almost like antics or Microsoft was anticipating with like acquiring
them, knowing and understanding where they're at as a company right now, and
knowing that maybe the process is going to take a while because of their end
of things, and so that like, yeah, we could see it next
month, but I would be surprised if it happens before the end of this
year, you know. Yeah, So yeah, we are what like almost
six months from when the deal was announced, right, it was very early
this year or something like that. So yes, the end of this year
at the earliest is kind of where I'm out where I'm right there with you.
Yeah, it could happen anytime between now and then if everything goes smoothly,
But I would expect the FTC actually to bring up at least one or
two more objections and stuff like that, saying, hey, in this new
material, we're just can you clarify some things. I think they to appear
like they are being more dogged about this stuff. But also I think there's
a strong chance that the consolidation that these these watchdogs are worried about is somewhat
going to, at least in their eyes, solve itself. With the industries
being so now worried about their their future and worried about the recession and worried
about cost cutting all this stuff, and so instead of spending all their money
on trying to acquire new businesses, they're probably gonna use that money to shore
up everything else. And a lot of these acquisitions are probably going to slow
down here pretty soon and at least, and I think that's the to them,
that's like, well, then that's out of our re election cycle.
So we're gonna wash our hands of it, and we're not gonna worry about
it because until it's actually a problem again, and so they'll probably be like,
Okay, let this one just go by. No one actually cares about
this anymore. Everyone's too busy worried about gas prices. What's your face?
What's your face? Really cares about it though. Elizabeth Warren, Yes,
Elizabeth Warren, it's really key. Her eyes could grasp on it too.
She's she noted it like specifically, she didn't say monopoly, because this would
not have been a monopoly. She said monopsony, which is the idea that
there's one buyer in a market instead of one seller in a market. And
the idea will be like, Okay, all these developers are creating games,
and if they want a chance to succeed. There's one buyer, Microsoft and
you have to go through them. Even that's like, we're really far away
from that. But this is clearly everyone sees like, oh, this is
maybe on a path to that happening. It's not really we I think we
all know in our hearts that like gaming only sort of ads business models,
it never really nothing really goes away forever, Like we're still going to be
buying physical games in one way or another for forever while digital games continues to
grow alongside it and all that stuff. So and so, yeah, I
think that she's right though, to get a little bit talking about this stuff
and to say let's actually look into it, and that's what's happening still,
and it's going to continue to happen until the deal actually goes through, which
I agree it seems inevitable, all right. Numerous Pokemon Scarlet slash Violet details
and images leak from an anonymous source. This comes from Quince at Go Nintendo.
More and more supposed leaks regarding the upcoming Pokemon Scarlet and Violet have been
servicing online over the past week. As usual, none of these are verifiable,
but they're being shared by multiple accounts and definitely had some have some traction
in the Pokemon community. The source of the leaks is an anonymous Twitter account
who has become known by most as mister k but who changes his handle on
a regular basis to avoid getting too much attention, which I have to say,
if you're trying to avoid get into attention, leaking Pokemon stuff is not
the right way to do that. You're kind of get attention. The majority
of these leaks come in the form of extremely blurry screenshots, which I'm not
going to show here because they are extremely blurly and blurry, and also I'm
just Pokemon Company. It's kind of a notorious I don't want to deal with
them, but you can't see enough in there anyhow, So it's like,
if you want to go look for him, go for it. But there's
just most of the interesting detail comes from some of this like bullet pointed list
that I'll get to in a second. Including these screenshots are images of new
Pokemon evolutions, gym leaders, and more. There's also some unconfirmed info regarding
the new games structures, features and options, and that includes gems will be
able to be completed in any order, although their difficulty won't change no matter
when when you attempt them. There will be around four hundred Pokemon in the
regional Poke deecks. No previous generation starters will be included. A special new
item will give Pokemon a crystal aura boosting a single type for use in battle
temporarily. So okay, I'll tell you the things that stand out to me
is being able to complete gems in any order and having no previous generation starters
included. That seems pretty wild. Uh yeah, the no previous generation starters
being included is pretty insane because they love putting chariz Ard and Charmander into every
single Pokemon game, which I don't blame them for. He's still the best
Pokemon, but I kind of like that. Like that they're like, hey,
like, let's try to focus on a little more of the newer stuff
and you know, not try to rely so much on the classics that everybody
loves. Know you were you old enough to be part of Like when the
Transformers movie came out and they're like, we're gonna kill off all the old
ones, so you have to buy the new toys, and that didn't work
very well. So we're talking about the Shile of Booth movie. No,
okay, no, the animated movie from the eighties. Yes, so I
was born Jeff grop I was born in nineteen ninety five. Okay, just
makes you feel a little old. So, yeah, I grew up with
the shild of Boof movie. But I do remember. I do remember watching
the animated Transformers movies at a movie as a kid, but it was like
it was blurs at that point. It was blurs. The whole idea of
the movie is like, oh, you have all these toys from the first
generation that everyone loved, and now we're gonna do a movie. But we're
doing a movie. We gotta get our money's worth. We're a toy company,
God damn it. So we are going to kill off all those whole
characters to introduce a whole new crop of awesome characters hot Rodimus Prime or whatever
Rodimus Prime. And it just did it didn't It didn't work very well.
I think Pokemon has been around long enough that it kind of can work a
little bit, but it definitely seems like that's what they're doing again, like,
hey, we have new Pokemon to sell new toys, right, yeah,
exactly, And you know, I don't blame them for that. And
I'm also just like personally excited to just get get attached to some more new
Pokemon, hopefully that aren't based off of key chains and ceiling lamps and so
yeah, the exciting thing definitely is being able to complete gyms in any order.
You know, there's speculation about, you know, are are they doing
the capture Pokemon capture system that we saw in Legends RCS where it's a little
more open you can actually sneak around and like catch the Pokemon. At least
I think that's what's implied. I don't know if Nintendo actually confirmed that's what's
going on in that game from the trailer, but then also including gyms and
stuff like that that we didn't really see in the Legends RCS and being able
to complete in any order is awesome because it definitely it'll give you agency to
really feel like you're going on your Pokemon journey rather than you know, I'm
actually going against what I said earlier of like I like a curated experience.
This is still curated to an extent, but know it's it's taking that curation
in kind of like any order that you want, do you want your desserts
first, or do you want you know, the actual mule first? And
I'm into that, you know, you were yelling at kind of funny for
the slander. It gave link between worlds and link between worlds. That's like
one of the cool things. It's like when you actually, I think,
get past the first three dungeons, you can complete any of the like the
rest of the seven dungeons and any order. And I thought that was like
a really smart way to actually feel like you're going on your own adventure rather
than link to the past, where it really feels like, all right,
you went to this place, and now you go to this this place,
and now you go to this place. So the fact that they're doing that
based on a property that is about kids going on their own adventure and finding
their own way, I really dig that. So that makes me even more
excited for this game, which I was already pretty excited about. Now I
think I have noticed, like Kan Hiwen and Chat is pointing out, and
I think some people are worried about this. I like this, but yes,
you complete the gyms in any order, but they do not scale with
your skills, so they like that last gym still gonna be very hard.
You will probably have to have very powerful Pokemon. I kind of I kind
of like that. I think that's like, oh, yeah, I want
I don't want it always to be this milk toast difficulty. I want to
be like, oh, I've stepped into a place I don't belong yet.
Can I push my way through? Can I figure out some stuff to do?
You get to pull this off that works for me? Yeah, I'm
I'm personally like not like super against that too, Like you know, like
you could go to Giovanni's gym first, but you know, is it gonna
be as easy as going to to Brox Jim. No, It's gonna be
much harder. So I'm again I'm into that. And again it just it
gives a little bit of the set dressing of feeling like you're going on your
your own adventure there. So I'm into it, even though if, like
you know, I get to the really hard gym area first and it gets
really scary, I'm probably gonna run away like that really big what was it?
The what's the really big pony Pokemon and legends rsist that you see like
right when you turn yes, yeah, and then you run away because it's
really scary. So that's that's one of the best moments in games this year
is when I saw that Pony too, and I was just like, I'm
scared and somewhat excited at the same time. What's happening? All right,
let's get to the ketchup where we talk about what everyone's talking about. I
kind of wanted to give everybody quick up. They here, Bungie has officially
joined PlayStation So that was always going to happen. That deal has gone through
and now it's completed. Bungee is part of Sony. They tweeted. We
are proud to officially join the incredible team at PlayStation. We are excited for
the future of our company, and we are inspired to bring together players from
all over the world to form lasting friendships and memories. So yeah, not
like, not much new news here, but it is say, this is
the beginning of that relationship, and I would expect very quickly for Sony to
do what it does, which is take the expertise of one of its teams
and they get the global expertise of every developer at Sony. Right, Yeah,
especially with you know them saying, oh what was it not games as
a service. What's the all the games that they have and development live service
games right that they're doing, and uh, does Bungee count Bungee working on
Destiny? Does that count underneath all the live service games that Tony is working
They actually specifically have said that it doesn't count, so like they're doing more
beyond that, yes, And so it's an exciting moment for them to finally
get you know, Bungee actually like in the door, to be like,
hey, this is all the live service stuff that we're doing. Maybe some
things are on fire. Can you help us? Because you guys know what
you're doing for sure. You know, if you ask a certain Destiny fans,
and if you ask other Destiny fans, they're like, no, they
absolutely no idea what they're doing. And so I think it's definitely just an
official exciting moment to you know, have Bungee be a part of the team
and you know, coordinate with other studios about like what they're working on for
the future of police station live service games, which will be interesting and if
hey, if like you know, just like a little pushes here and there
from Bungee to to other studios to help them out and figure out some ideas
like that makes me at least a little more excited for what the future of
live service for PlayStation looks like. Again, I'm more of like a single
player, curated experience type of guy, but I did get into Destiny too
real hard. They did it definitely like have something special, not special enough
to like really get me in what is it four years later or whatever it
is, how long or how long ever that game has been out, But
they do know what they're doing, and so I'm it makes me a little
more hopeful. Whereas like if this bungee thing wasn't happening, and if it
didn't happen and PlayStation was like, hey, we're working on a bunch of
live service games, we'll be like, oh no, Like they were gonna
have to go they were gonna have to go through that learning process like you
were saying, they were gonna have to like do it the hard way.
And now there's sort of no excuse you kind of can't. Like you you
paid this money specifically to bypass doing things the hard way. So when your
live service game launches, your big life service games again like coming out,
I don't really want to see that growing pains period I still expect that to
happen a little bit though, because it's so difficult. Even when when with
Bungee, it's probably still gonna happen, but you would hope that they would
be able to bypass that. Weis Man also points out in the chat live
service games equals games as a service. I know, but I wanted to
specifically use their wording for it, because, yeah, so the games of
the services as a term that has sort of been deprecated by most of the
industry. They don't sort of say that anymore, although because I was like
the early term before, like everyone's like, what's the more slick marketing term
live service? And now they let even say that anymore either, they say
living games. Okay, real quick. John Rictello apologized. He wrote a
big apology for what he said. We talked about this. I kind of
felt like, yeah, of course he was gonna do this. He was
getting a lot of hot water for basically recap for anyone who might not have
listened to the show last week. He said that the debs were fucking idiots
if they're not considering monetization from the beginning of designing their game. He said
it in a way that was like, I'm arguing with my friends and then
I think you're a fucking idiot. My friend, now he's agree with a
group of people that don't I think, consider him to be their friend.
So it was like this weird. So it's one of those things where like
the boss things of themselves as one of the worst. They don't they don't
they can't read the room and realize that they're the boss. So like that's
that feeling is not reciprocated. It's the classic Michael Scott scenarios. Yes,
I think that a lot of you know, a lot of white men who
fail upwards in life, who can't read the room correctly in big corporations.
So that's that's what we call that in a in a professional industry terms.
Yes, exactly. He's got like a bull pointed list. He who says
that first, I have a great respect for game developers, and then goes
on say, second, game developers working incredibly hard, and I should have
really recognized that. Third, sometimes all a game developers want to do is
have a handful of friends enjoy a game. I think I was probably a
common thing, but I also know for a fact that's not who he was
talking to. He was not talking to the people who were responding like I
don't care. I just want like like handful of people play by game.
I don't care if it ever makes any money. That's not who he was
really talking to. But fair enough and then forth. What I was trying
to say and clearly failed at same is that there are better ways for game
developers to get an early read on what players think of their game, to
learn from their feedback, and if the developers wants, if the develop developers
want to adjust the game based on this feedback, it's a choice to listen
and act or just to listen. Again, both are very valid choices.
If I had been smarter in choosing my words, I would have just said
this, we are working to provide developers with tools so they can better understand
what their players think, and it is up to them to act or not
based on this feedback. Anyway, That's it. Lots of words and a
sentence that I wish I had never said. So clearly he was like kind
of getting like, hey, John, this sucks. You have to go
do something about this, and yeah, dead so gamers are made. You
gotta apologize, even if you don't mean it, and in this specific case,
the game developers are mad and there are our customer. They're the ones
who we really make money from. Although by combining with Iron for Ryon Source
whoever, now they're an advertising company, so their real product is going to
be us in the long run. I don't know, I've lost track.
Uh Okay. New Xbox game pass titles as Dust Falls, Ashes of the
Singularity, Escalation and Watchdogs two are coming tomorrow on July nineteenth. On July
twenty first, you can get Moto GP twenty two and Torments Tied Tides of
Newmanera and an Inside on July twenty nine. That's just a quick update.
And then finally, the UK government says the games industry must act on loot
boxes or face legislation. I'm putting this in the ketchup because it feels like
this is like a conversation we had years ago that a government is just sort
of finally catching up with. But I'll just I'll read it real quick.
On Sunday, the government called for the purchase of loot boxes to be made
unavailable to children and young people unless they are approved by a parent or guardian.
While cultures, While culture Secretary Nadine Dories highlighted that she expects many companies
to do more to ensure children can't make purchases without parental consent. No formal
actions has been taken to tighten restrictions around digital purchases, let's see doctor Joe
Twist, CEO of Trade Body Yuki, said, as a responsible industry,
we have committed to exploring additional ways to support players and parents to build on
our existing work developing and raising awareness of parent parental controls. We look forward
to engage in closely with the government and other organizations in the Working Group and
on the Video Games Research Framework. So this has got so many facets to
it, but it's like, for the one part, this is the industry
still saying, hey, we can regulate ourselves. Tell us what you want
us to do, and we'll do it. And then there's the other thing
of this is a conversation that really feels like it's past its prime in terms
of there was a time when even just the threat of regulation could have done
a lot of good, and it did. I think it did a little.
But they were like at the time gamers were able to get loud enough
to attract attention of a handful of people in government to say, yeah,
we'll look into this, and I think that was enough to scare many of
these companies away from the idea and had them look into other ways of doing
things. Now have loot boxes gone away entirely, of course not. FIFA
still has them. A lot of games on mobile which may or may not
be aimed at kids still have them, absolutely, but it does feel like
the vestige of the way of doing things and not like the primary way of
doing business for a lot of these companies. And you know that said,
if people still feel like they needs to be regulated, yeah, go for
it. I think that's fine. I just think there is something indicative about
This was a big problem five years ago and now the government's here to show
up and rest and save the day. Kind It was a big problem when
Battlefront two came out, Yes, and the Sea of Disney was like,
what the hell are lootboxes? Yeah, and the industry kind of had to
like figured stuff out. The Netherlands. I think it was the Netherlands that
might have banned them, because there's a few others. Yes, Yeah,
because when you brought up the UK, I was like, I thought they
did that already, but I guess it knows some other EU countries there,
yes, and so uh yeah, I definitely feel like it's definitely you know,
like you said, not entirely gone away, but it's definitely cooled down
a little bit since like the especially the Battlefront to fiasco. I think that
was like when the almost the industry as a whole kind of was like,
right, oh, throw throw that away, throw that idea away, because
everybody's crapping on EA right now. We don't want to be them. We
don't want to be them. And it's like, and that's the way this
is really going to keep working. As much as it's an imperfect system.
Uh, we found that, like lobby in our government, it's not nearly
as effective as getting really loud as gamers and saying, hey, this is
if you make this choice under a capitalist system, I wish that going to
fully true. Yeah, well yes, in every system, right, yeah,
in every way, yes, But in gaming, these corporations are so
scared of risk and so scared of losing their reputation because they know it sticks
for decades. EA is still thought of as thea that was like the worst
corporation in America. Or whatever two three years running. That stuff sticks for
such a long time, it's like really hard to undo. So they'll do
everything they can to make sure they get off that track. If they're on
the track towards becoming this this terrible entity that everyone used them as. So
yeah, and now so they figure out other ways of doing it. We
get battle passes, we get all kinds of other monetization schemes. And that
doesn't mean that this regulation isn't needed. Maybe it is. I think the
I think the research does show that loop boxes aimed at kids are very very
effective at getting them into this subconscious loop of dopamine receptors and their their brains
aren't developed enough to sort of deal with what is happening to them. And
so yeah, if you want to do something about that, yeah, go
for it. And I hope it doesn't have any backward effect. But also
if it does, the industry sort of made its bed and has to lay
in it right right, all right. See, we asked a question on
Friday, Let's go ahead and bring that up. Are you actively playing any
free to play games? Forty nine point one percent said yes, fifty point
nine percent said no. I bet many of the people who said no actually
are and they just don't consider you free to play a game because I saw
a lot of people are like, well, if you count Destiny maybe,
well yes, play game. Yeah, And it's like, so where are
you at with this period? Are you playing free to play games? I
voted no because I remember voting on this on Friday, And that's because the
key word there for me is active actively, right, you know, I
played Fortnite once every few months with the rest of the KF crew, like
on stream on content, not even for like my own like personal stuff.
And then outside of that, like I picked up Knockout City, but that
was also like right before it when free to play, and then that's been
it for for free to play games. Like I'm not even really playing like
Rocket League anymore or anything like that. So that's kind of where I'm at
personally with with free to play games. Not that I'm anti free to play
it, but that's just you know, it's I'm looking for more again.
The word of the day of kids is curate curated experiences doing cyber crimes on
my Steam deck, maybe hanging out with a very angry man who's about to
have a sequel later this year. So yes, there you go. Yeah,
every game's free. If you go to archive dot organ you're doing crimes.
So yeah, there you go. All right, let's see I need
to come up with a new one for this week. I was thinking maybe
asking about about lou boxes. Let's do it. Let's just say, do
you do you think the government still needs to do something about lou boxes,
like the like the still needs to do something about lout boxes? Is everyone
hearing this typing sound opera GX the browser for gamers? Uh? Yes,
I think. I think it does a digital typing sound, which is the
weirdest choice in the world, I think. But I'm whatever, I'm for
it. I'm not gonna turn it off. I'm not gonna look how to
turn it off. Yes they do. Yes, you guys can hearing.
Oh my god, I use this because they're like, Okay, I have
a separate browser just for news assets. So if you guys wanted to,
like I wanted to play a trailer for you, I could just have it
in this one browser. And I just can't believe that they do that.
They do this, so whatever, Okay, here we go, all right,
Game mess Mornings. All right, there we go, let's tweet that
and we'll talk about it tomorrow. Okay, Barrett. Where can people find
you? Where can people hang out with you? On the Internet. People
can hang out with me over on Twitter dot com at sad boy Barrett,
where they can see me just tweeting about, you know, just a bunch
of random stuff. You can find me over on YouTube dot com Slash kind
of Funny Games, where again I'm a technical director for our game shows like
ps I Love You x ox so kind of Funny gamescast, kind of funny
ex casts, so on and so forth. You can also catch me over
on twitch dot tv Slash kind of Funny Games every once in a while playing
some Fortnite, maybe every once in a while playing a playthrough of a game.
You can go over to YouTube dot com Slash kind of Funny Plays,
where you can find our entire play through series of the metal Gear Solid game
one through four, which I've never seen before. Yeah, and so yeah,
if you want to see my very first play through of metal Gear Solid
one through four, you can check that out over there, which was a
fun time. Yeah. That was like me, uh, snowbike Mike tomorrow
was on that blessing was on that. I think maybe Imron might have popped
up a time or two. But yeah, that was a that was a
really fun one. Go over there and check that out because I was.
That was a fun time. Will I ever play five? Maybe I have
it on my Steam dec Yeah, it's good on the Steam deck. It's
actually fantastic on the Steam decks. That's the way. Yeah, but you
know its stream it too. We want we want watch you play it.
It's an open world game though this time around, Jeff, it's gonna take
so long to stream through it. Yeah, but it's like then you get
to see all the interesting decisions you make. It's so good. I'm actually
gonna go to a meeting right now to find out what's going on Giant Bomb
this week. But you guys know, we'll have the bomb cast tomorrow.
Well have voicemailt dumb Trunk on Thursday, we have upf of some sort.
On Friday, we'll decide all the rest. We'll gout for some quick looks.
We'll probably stream something I don't know. Checkout giant bomb dot com