Speaker 1: What is going on? Everybody? Welcome to the Game Informer Show,
a weekly podcast covering the video game industry. Join us
every Thursday for a discussion of the latest gaming news, reviews,
and exclusive reveals, alongside Game Informer staff and special guests
from around the industry. I'm your host today, Alex van Aken,
joined by Marcus Stewart. How are you doing, Marcus?
Speaker 2: Feeling good? Proud to be on the longest running episodic
weekly podcast in Game Former history.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true, that is true. Rounding us out as
always Kyle Hilliard.
Speaker 3: As sometimes Kyle as most of the off.
Speaker 1: It, with a staff as small as as we are.
You know, we we do what we do.
Speaker 2: I thought you're playing a Kyle Hide like an alter
ego this week. This week he's Kyle, but sometimes.
Speaker 1: Else sometimes he's more like Jackal.
Speaker 3: I'm rapidly googling Garth Brooks's alter.
Speaker 2: Jack Is that what you said, Jackal? It was like,
is that his alter ego?
Speaker 1: Jackal Jackyl?
Speaker 3: Oh Jackyl like doctor Jackyll doctor.
Speaker 1: I was like, I'm from the South, all right, I
mispronounced some things.
Speaker 2: Sometimes I want to see the Jackal side of Kyle.
Speaker 1: Jacqueline Hide, Jack I mean Jekyl, doctor Jack and mister
h k y l l sounds like a j M
for like laughter. I've been jackling all day.
Speaker 3: Come on, this is a family show, Alex. We talk
about jackling.
Speaker 2: It kind of sounds like Cats the musical because they
say jel jel Yeah, which we all know what Jelico is,
of course. Yeah, stop talking about it.
Speaker 1: My favorite character from rudd Racks, Red Racks.
Speaker 2: What is wrong with me today?
Speaker 1: Rug Rats, the botleg version. I like, I like, I
like rug Rats with someone.
Speaker 3: Surely someone sells racks for like to display rugs at
a carpet store, and it's called.
Speaker 2: I want to start a rug store just to do that,
and it will just look like the Rugrats logo.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's a good idea.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, welcome to the show everybody. Thanks for tuning in.
It's been a busy few weeks for the Game and
former crew. We've got a lot of travel going on.
People are out, as you know. I was out last week,
and I'm sure I'll be out again soon.
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess I'm out at the time that
you're listening to this.
Speaker 3: That's true.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'll be away. Yeah, yeah, you'll be away, but
we make it work. Everybody pitches in, puts on a
good show. Thank you for listening everyone, We really appreciate it.
Today on the show, we're going to talk about Big
Topics going to be our our midyear Game of the
Year awards. Marcus came up with this idea. I thought
it was a good idea to revisit kind of our
Game of the Year awards last year and kind of
using that to what do we think about the current
games that we played for the first six months of
this year. So we go through those. That'll be fun.
We're going to chat about Rusty's retirement a bit and
then but first we're going to talk about Angerfoot, which
is a game I have a lot of interest in.
This is the Devolver Digital published game from I believe
Free Lives, which I believe Free Lives is one of
Devolver's secret secret weapons. They're down there and I think
Cape Town, South Africa, I believe, And they worked on
anger Foot, which is really good. They've worked on taror Nil,
They've got a lot going on.
Speaker 2: Those are very different games. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's it's it's pretty cool and why wait, wait,
I might be wrong. On that hold on.
Speaker 2: No, yeah, Tarnell, Yeah.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah yeah yeah.
Speaker 2: Gorn yeah, bro Force Genital of course.
Speaker 1: Sticking to the stick man. Yeah, I think, like, yeah, yeah,
they're doing their thing. But Marcus, even playing this game,
I played a demo like two Steam x Festigo or
when they first released it and really enjoyed it. But
I you've like played it properly, right.
Speaker 2: Oh, I've not only finished it, but as of right
now you can read my review up on the website.
I gave I love this game. Yeah, I gave it
a nine out of ten.
Speaker 1: That's awesome. That makes me so excited.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you you brought that up.
Speaker 3: I think it was in a morning meeting or something,
and it's like Anger Foot has always looked cool to
me and interesting, but I was surprised when you're like, no, no,
this is like this is getting over the eight cresting
like into the nine zones, which is special.
Speaker 2: I think it is. It's it's a game I've had
my eye on two because it's just such a weird,
simple premise of the idea of this's like this first
person game where you just play as this really angry
sneaker head who just kicks things, and that's you're just
going around kicking people and you send them flying, and
that's the game basically, but it is more than that. So,
like the general premise is that you live in this
place called Crime City, and this world everyone is okay,
well it's it's believe it or not. It's actually better
than that that place. Really, yeah, he would have thought,
but no, Michael Madson, No, but everyone is a criminal,
including yourself or some form of deviant and you get
your prized collection of like sneaker stolen by these four
different gangs. There's a game that's just called the Crime Game,
and then there's another gang that's like the Debauchery Gang,
and one is the Business Gang, which is like I guess,
like white collar crime. And so you go out to
try to get your shoes back. And the best way
I can describe this game is that it's like a
mix of like Hotline Miami with a bit of Doom okay,
where it's like a first person and you're going into
these worlds or these levels, I should say, and they're
all pretty small, but they're very densely packed, and some
of them are pretty almost like labyrinthine like they have
like some of them at different levels. Some of them
have like alternate routes you can go and you're just
trying to plow your way through those and kill everybody
in there and reach the exit in one piece. And
if you would like to as quickly as possible, you
don't have to go fast, but there are like optional
rewards for completely getting under like a minute or even
in some cases it'll be like, hey, if you can
finish this thirty seconds, you'll get like a gold star.
So it's like, okay, I could I actually do that?
And I use the hotline Maami comparison specifically because it's
like playing a first person version of that game where
you can go you can die in like one or
two hits, depending on you know what you're getting hit by.
All the enemies have different weapons like guns and other
weird things that they're thrown at you, and you know
you've got your foot that you can just run up
and just kick people and you can send them flying
and it kills them in one hit. So it's about
like just entering a room and seeing like how quickly
can I kill everyone in here before they can kill me,
and just like it. So it's like constant movement and
just like very like making split second decisions about like Okay,
who's in here, which enemy type is there? Who should
I what's the order of operations to like get in
and out of this room without getting shot? Like should
I take out the shield guy first, or should I
take out the crossbow person up on the perch somehow?
And if they can't shoot me. But then also there's
a gas car gas barrel in here, maybe I just
shoot that and kill everybody and just move on. And
you can also use guns too, despite the name, like
you don't have to just kick everything. You can pick
up all the weapons that the enemies drop, and the
gunplay feels really good. And that's where I kind of
use the Doom comparison, because it's like it's so fast,
like the game's only on PC for now, and it
runs so well, and it's all about just like speed
and just like very quickly like just popping off headshots,
moving on popping off headshots, moving on, blasting them with
a shotgun. And then when you run out of bullets,
you can throw the guns at people and it stuns them.
So that's like a strategy and itself like shoot you shoot,
throw the gun. This guy's done, I'm gonna kick him
in the face, move on, or you can Sometimes a'll
just throw a gun even when has bullets, because sometimes
it's like I don't know, my brain's like it's actually
maybe quicker if I just throw a gun at you
and trying to shoot, yeah, because I don't want to
have to worry about missing bullets. But like it like
more accurate throwing a gun.
Speaker 3: Is it in with the hotline man? In comparison? Is
it also a game where you're like dying and restarting
a level often, yes, quickly.
Speaker 2: You are dying very quickly and you're starting very quickly.
It's like itawn because when you die, you do start
the stage from the beginning because they're not that long,
which can sting when you're going through like a very
difficult like gauntlet of enemies and you feel like you've
cracked the code, like in Hotlin Mammy, we're like, oh,
I've finally gotten past that weird like choke point or
bottling that I kept getting killed in and now have
this like last room that I haven't quite solved the
like how do I get past this? And then you
die and you got to do it all over again.
But I think the thing that kind of sealed the
deal for me with this game was I never felt
discouraged from trying again, Like every time I died, no
matter how much it sucked, I was always so excited
to jump back in because, on top of it playing
so well, it has just like this fun chaos about
it because we're one every almost everything is destructible, Like
there's such fun destructibility, Like you're kicking, dude, You're like
kicking doors, Like every time you go through a door,
you just kick it off the hinges and send it
flying into whoever'son other side. But there's a strategy there too,
because you can kick it at an angle and send
it like I'm gonna hit the guy that I know
is in the corner of this room, so I'm gonna
kick the door and just kill him immediately. With this,
you can kick like you can break objects with you
can kick gas barrels into things, and like when the
game is just like at its most like just gleefully entertaining,
things are just like breaking up like around you and
exploding around you. Like the this is like a physics
show piece because everything just ragged dolls when you kick it,
whether it's enemies or just like just weird things like
gas can like uh, not even gas, but god like
oxygen tanks that you can kick and it just flying
all over the room and it might kill you. You
don't know. It's just like you just gotta stay away
or it might take somebody out. The enemies can kill
each other too, so you can set them up like that,
like just killing friend yeah, like friendly fire, so like
I kicked people in the path of like incoming projectile
so they could take it for me or stuff like that.
Like there's so many little things to play with, and
there's so much It's one of those games where like
the longer you play, like you can play this pretty mindlessly.
I'm just going to go in a room and kick
and shoot people. But then the more you replay a room,
you start to see the depth of strategy where it's like, actually,
there's more I could do here if I like study
like what's around me. Like this game does a good
job of encouraging you use your surroundings around you. And
even like I mentioned before, with the alternate routes, like
you'll go down one hallway and you'll see like just
a door that maybe takes an alternate hallway that might
put you behind the people that were in front of
you before, so you can like flank people or surprise them,
so then you can kind of like just speed up
your time or just increase your survivability. But then also
when I mentioned before about like completing optional objectives, like
either just finishing the stage, but finishing it either without
dying or taking damage, you're earning these stars that are
used to unlock these kind of like ability granting shoes,
and you can love them. Yeah, and there's these are
like the real game changes because you can only wear
one at a time, and they either have like perks
like oh, you can respawn after die, or like you
can die you prety much get in an extra life
so if you get killed, you'll immediately come back and
keep going, or some of them are like cheat codes,
or like one of them just activates basically big Head
mode for all the enemies. All the enemies have like
giant heads, so it makes it easier to get head
shots in One turns off the gravity, so like everything
including yourself is just floating around you, so you're just
kind of like swimming through stages, kicking people and then
that completely changes the dynamic of how we encounters work.
My maybe my favorite one is when you kick doors,
they explode, So I take that helps so much with
clearing like rooms of enemies. You would just kick the
door down and then it would just explode immediately. It
could kill you too, if maybe the room on the
other side wasn't that big, So you're just taking an
explosion into your face. So but I like the chaos
of like I don't know if this is going to
kill me or not, but I'm gonna do it because
the success rate is generally pretty high. Yeah, So it
just created a really cool incentive. They're like I want
to get some I want to see how many of
these shoes I can unlock it. There's like a I
want to say that I believe there's like there's over
twenty maybe like twenty five ish. But they're all like
fun and they all do weird little things, and like
I tried them all once, and even the ones that
didn't like sing with me in the moment, I would
find like a use for them later on of like
oh this state this shoe that negates fire damage. I'm
in a world where like I'm running into flamethrower enemies
for the first time. Maybe I'll just wear the shoes on.
That's one lest thing that can kill me, and then
I'll combine with just the the stage variety, like they
introduce new like stage gimmicks, whether it's like dodging a
sniper rifle like fire on a rooftop, or there's one
where you're navigating like a busy subway and you're like
hopping across incoming subway trains and trying not to get
run over on top of just trying to kill everyone
and then also trying to manipulate the enemies to get
hit by the trains and they're like popping off the
cars and stuff like that. Like there's there's some really
cool just like variety, and they also don't really repeat
ideas that often either, Like generally, if you see something
like a big thing, they'll do it once, maybe twice,
but they they tend to keep it moving and it's
it's just fun. It's one of those games where you're
just like I'm just like smiling and I'm like this
is just gleeful fun, just carnage, and it plays tight
and it feels just really satisfying. Constantly like everything you do,
whether you're like you're kicking dude. You can kick like
five guys at once if you line them up once
and you just send them flying over a cliff or
just like get like a crossbowman and pale like ten guys,
and like the physics break in ways that doesn't even
feel like a bug, or if it is a bug,
that it feels like they were like, ah, keep it
and it makes it fun. Is like enemies will just
go straight like spaghetti moods. Sometimes you just hit them
in such a way or and it just adds to
just the overall chaotic theme at a game. But it
is it is a well made game, Like the design
is really nice. There are times where like some of
the enemy placements a little questionable where it's like I
don't know if I could have gotten through that without
getting hit at all, just because like some enemies will
just be in blind spots that you know. Again, going
back to Hotline Miami, some of the success comes from
like trial and error of like, well, there's no way
I would have known that guy was there to shoot me,
so the first time I'm gonna get killed by them,
But now I know and I can plan for it,
Like there definitely is an element of that which you
know can be annoying, but I kind of let it
mostly slide for this game, because again, every time I died,
I was like it was like that split second of
like damn it, and then like, well I get to
play that cool sequence again. So I'm okay.
Speaker 1: Is it?
Speaker 2: Is it hard?
Speaker 3: Because like Hotline, Miammy is a game that I've neither
of the games I was able to ever finish. I
kind of just lost traction because it just became too
challenging at a certain point.
Speaker 2: It is. It is hard. It is, And I will
say it gets hard quicker than you think, Like I
would say within the first like world, because there's worlds
and each world has about fifteen levels, and I'd say
even by like halfway through the first world, you're you're
gonna be like, oh man, I'm dying a lot. And
maybe that's you know, you're getting used to the flow
of the game too. But there were sequence or there
were multiple levels where I was like, I'm on, I've
been on this for half hour. Like this level I
can get through like under a minute. I've been stuck
on it for a half hour. Yeah, I mean that's
not a bad thing necessarily. I was just just curious
what to expect if I dive into this thing, you know. Yeah,
and it again, I think the challenge is like the
challenge was always my fault. Like every time I died,
I was like, Okay, I know what I should do different,
and then you fall into the trap of making the
same mistakes agags, you either forget what you said you
were going to do this time or just like stuff
like that. Like it was like it was always like
I could identify, like, Okay, I know what I have
to do here. I just have to to execute, okay,
and then once you nail it, you're like, all right,
I did, and it feels like a genuine accomplishment. But yes,
it is. It is a challenging game, but it's a
challenge that I enjoyed for the most part. And yeah,
it was it's fun, man, It is a It is
a fun game.
Speaker 1: That's awesome. Yeah, I I really want to play it.
Speaker 2: Said, right, yes, I watch. Yeah, Yeah, I don't know
what the platform plans are beyond that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well didn't taror Nill was just PC at first, right,
Yeah that sounds right. Came later, Yeah, that that's super cool.
Speaker 2: I am.
Speaker 1: I love that you loved it so much because it's
one of those ones we're like, man, I really hope
this pans out because the idea is super cool.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: And just hearing how they implement like shoe culture into
this game that's all about kicking people, it just like
makes total sense.
Speaker 2: But is that what shoe culture's about?
Speaker 1: No, but I mean like anger foot Let's yeah, it's
just like it. It makes sense within that world. Uh,
and it and it it kind of elevates, uh, elevates
the mechanics as well, because it's like, oh, they're sneaker
heads and you can do new sneakers to get new effects.
That's super cool, I think, And I really want to
play it really bad.
Speaker 2: The only thing I'm surprised that this game doesn't have
is like a leaderboard system, because this feels like something
like a Neon White where it's like you want to
compare your performance with other players, Like I got through
the stage into thirty seconds, it took no damage to
you know, try to beat that. It's because it's so
it has that speed running element. I'm surprised there isn't
anything like that. I feel like that would have been
a nice touch.
Speaker 1: But and how long did you say it took to beat? Uh?
Speaker 2: Probably it took me around ten hours.
Speaker 1: Oh cool, so pretty meaty.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and maybe you know, I guess depends on how
good you are. But I I kind of flew through
it too, like I didn't replay stages very often, you know,
just and also because I was on a deadline, so
I kept it moving. But yeah, about ten hours.
Speaker 1: Awesome. Well, I've been playing a game called Rusty's Retirement.
I bet Marcus has heard of this, have you, Kyle?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I'm familiar with this. It's like a like
a passive kind of farming.
Speaker 1: Game, right, yeah, yeah, I've.
Speaker 2: Been not confused with a Rusty Rabbit that other Oh.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Rusty's Retirement is the one that plays.
Speaker 3: Three D S game with a Rusty character in it
as well, where you could have all it was like
a free to play Nintendo game, actual prices.
Speaker 2: It was a dog I think.
Speaker 3: But anyway, yeah, this is not those games.
Speaker 1: No, no, this is this is in the same little
universe as Haiku the Robot. I think it was like
a metro as a side scroller of some kind, and
that if you've played that game. That character is in
this little game. But I actually want to pull up
the fact sheet real quick so I get the credit
the developer because it's a it's a very small game.
It's mister Morris Games. Uh so it's like this this
game to have, dude. He put out Haiku the Robot
on Switching Steam and now Rusty's Retirement out on Steam.
But it's a little passive gardening kind of farm builder.
It takes up i'd say, I mean, it's on the bottom.
It's been on the bottom of my screen for days,
including right now. It's probably like a fourth of my
screen the bottom of my screen, and the rest is
just my normal desktop. So yeah, it's it's it's a
bit weird in that way because it's playing over top,
but it's almost like an ar experience in a way, right,
Like you're playing this game over top of your normal desktop.
But it's a it's a passive game mostly. You you
start out with the plot of land and you are
slowly building plots to plant seeds, and so you start
off with like wheat, and you get like beats and
lettuce and you know, carrots and onions eventually, and Rusty
is the character that you start with, and he's just
a little little farmer guy. He is processing your food,
he's helping to grow it, and you are slowly building
up two resources biofuel and currency like money. And there
is a little conversion where you can you can convert
biofuel into money. But all those both of those resources
are for like using robots, like you can have you
can have like a watering bot that flies around your
farm and waters things. You can have a harvest bot
which harvests the fully grown plants, and then you can
have like another there's there's a lot of them, right,
and so your biofuel will fuel those those helpers. There's
also other uh you know, things that you can build
on your farm that uses both of those currencies. For instance,
like you can build each of the characters kind of
unlocks a different section, different functionality if you're farm. So
the first one you get is Haiku. That's that's the
robot from the other game. Haiku will help you water
and harvest and build, so just like a general helper.
The next one you can get is Sonnets Shop and
she will sell you decorations for your farm. So if
you want to like spruce it up that sort of thing.
You can unlock that shop, and all of these are
like your choice, they aren't you know, they don't have
to be an order. These are just the order I
did them in. And then there's one, two, three, four,
five other houses you can unlock. Some of them will
help you get statistics for your farm so you can
better understand, you know, what's going on behind the scenes
if you want to, like mid Max, what's going on
in your farm. Another one will you know, help upgrade
your robots to make them more efficient. Others will like, oh,
you can dig for fossils scattered around the farm, very
like animal crossing in that way, right, and you know,
similar progressions like you are slowly building up your little
plot your uh there's eventually I think you can like
unlock you can expand it. But it's just a little
fun game. I've really enjoyed it. The soundtrack is like
really it reminds me of Minecraft's soundtrack, like that ambient piano,
very relaxing, and so I just keep it on in
the background on It's been on this whole time we've
been podcasting. Yea say, like great music playing.
Speaker 2: Honestly, like looking up on Steam like I didn't know
the feature where it just sits at the bottom of
your screen and like the game's actively almost encouraging you to, like, hey,
do other things while this is running. Like we've designed
an interface where it only takes up like a third
of your screen so you can do other things. And
I'm like, I don't know if any other game has
any ever done that. Maybe it's the first time I've
ever seen it, but that's such a good idea. Ye,
Like I'm like hovering over the buy button now, and
also because it's on sale for like five fifty nine,
but I like, oh I want to that sounds like
so nice.
Speaker 1: Nice. Yeah, it's it's sort of yeah, yeah, there's definitely
a lot more going on than just that. Yeah, you're
really like you're directing things and then you are essentially
hiring the little workers to do it for you, right,
and so.
Speaker 3: You can set you can I was gonna say, that's
my question is like are you making like decisions every
five minutes?
Speaker 2: How are you how much are you engaged?
Speaker 1: Like right now we've been talking, since we've been talking
about this game, they have harvested one of my little
four by four plots, So right now as we talk,
I'm gonna go and plant more radishes. I'm clicking my
radish button right now, and I've just planted all of
my radishes. Oh my corn, I need to plant a
little corn here.
Speaker 2: Done.
Speaker 1: No, I'm done for another five minutes.
Speaker 2: Probably gotcha.
Speaker 1: But I on my screen, they're like, I'm watching them,
you know, go and ghost they're watering them right now. Yeah,
my bio fuels going up. Yeah, could you if.
Speaker 2: You play your cards right just a point where you
almost never have to touch it?
Speaker 1: Like, I don't know, I haven't gotten that far.
Speaker 2: Yeah, can you do like Final Fantasy Gambit system of
like I got my gam so on point that I
barely have to touch the controller? Eight they got it?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't. I don't know. It definitely seems to
be like that. There's like one, two, three, four, five, six, seven.
There's like there's seven I would say content menus where
it's like each of these seven tabs has a different function,
and I've got three of them that still haven't been unlocked.
And then there's like a another tab or you can
it has all your characters on there that that help
you and you can adjust their behavior. So for instance, Rusty,
I have his order. His order is the default order
that he comes with when the game starts. So his
first priority is to move things. Then his second priority
is to build things, then to collect biofuel, then harvest,
than water and then for Haiku, I've got Haiku kind
of the opposite. Haiku's first priority is to water things,
then harvest, then move, then bio fuel, then build. And
I don't know if so far I only have two
characters that let me kind of do that. I don't
know if that's like it's not a large game, so
that might be the extent of that. But like on
the side, on the left and right sides of my
screen as well, there's oh, I see the button now,
So if I get six thousand coins, I can clear
a bunch of space on this farm to be able
to do I guess, build more things. So but it's fun,
it's cool. I'm enjoying it a lot. Like Marcus said,
it's pretty cheap on Steam five bucks or so. I
mean for the soundtrack alone, I think it's nice.
Speaker 2: So I just added it. And I think you guys
know that I keep a list of like pretty much
my own like evolving goody list of like category and
stuff like just help me remember to revisit when we
get to that. Yeah, and one of my columns is
the best mechanic and I have added the multitask mode
from this game to that because I so love I'm
so in love with that idea. There are several games
that I play regularly and I'm like, and I wish
they had, you know, you had a finangle it your
something like oh, I'll put this on my second screen
or whatever. But it's like, man if Bilato had that
or or something where I'm usually always watching something when
I'm playing those or that'd be pretty good.
Speaker 1: So yeah, there's also a focus mode on there. So
in the settings options, there's a focus mode which doubles
the production time of all the things in the game.
So if you're playing the game a little too much
and you're getting distracted, you can click back button and
it will take longer to do things, so you're checking
in less.
Speaker 2: That's cool, like that idea, like you're doing way too
much slow down. Yeah, yeah, that kind of game. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a you can like customize like how big
the taskbar is, how big a sidebar is. You can
select it so it's always on top of your applications
or not if you want to cover it up, like
if you open certain things. Yeah, it's cool, pretty robust,
little little toy here that we got, so I recommend it.
Check it out Rusty's retirement. But I guess that's all
the game, that's all the things we've had.
Speaker 2: It's a light it's a light week. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, I I could say like I've kind of
bounced around on things lately, like just looking at my steam.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: I've played a little more super Vibe. I talked about
that a couple of weeks ago. There's been betas for
that that I've been playing. I've really been enjoying that.
But I kind of just been bouncing off of a
lot of stuff I've been playing. It's mostly been playing Fortnite,
sadly to say, despite all the great games out I
just yeah, so having a little game that's that's uh,
some something new like rust of his retirement, but is chill.
It is nice.
Speaker 2: I've been using this sort of like low lever in
for the summer to try to finish the games that
I started earlier in the year, which are pretty much
all the gigantic RPGs that all came out at the
same time. Like I've been playing Final Fantasy Rebirth and
have been making good progress there and then and like
Stellar Blade, which I never got to finish either. Yeah,
so I'm trying to like use this before we get
to the falls. There's like big stuff like Dragon Age
and Avowed and then a few other things that's like.
Speaker 3: A little window here, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, that's like let's just grab it by the neck.
Speaker 3: Yeah, one site all the juice that My plan is
once I finish elden Ring, which I am on the
Final Bots, I'm going to go back to Persona three reload,
which I am about like twelve hours in or something
like I'm really I'm trying to do. I want to
do Yakuza, Final Fantasy and Persona this year. That's like
my is to do all three of those. I'm so
jealous that you've done Final Fantasy and Yakuza.
Speaker 2: Yeah two out of three so far. Yeah, Yakuza, I'm
like further or like I've put less time into than
Final I've committed to Final Fantasy first and then going
back to to like a Dragon, So yeah, we'll see
you're doing it wrong.
Speaker 3: I just I'm already not to spoiler, not to spoil
our conversation about our favorite games of the year so far.
Speaker 1: But yeah, let's let's go ahead and get into that topic.
So yeah, like I said, Marcus had a good idea
to do our middle mid Year Geet Midyear Goaty awards.
Speaker 2: Say right, yeah, I mean the idea behind this, and
I I feel like this is our like an abridged
version of what it would sound like if we actually
recorded our Game into Year conversations. Okay, uh, because you know,
I enjoy listening to those talks from like other outlets,
so we don't do that for our own reasons and
a lot of work. But I figar like, hey, you know,
it's we're over mid year. Technically, let's check in where
are we at exactly what people are liking, and it's
seeing what everyone's Game of the Year list is. And
then this will give like the viewers a glimpse into
maybe how we determine our categories. I mean, obviously we
do when we really do it. We have the full
editorial staff and it goes on for hours and hours
over multiple meetings, but like this is like the samper
version of it. There's only three of us here, right,
It's like not nothing set in stone here, but just
more than just the opinions of us three, right, I
guess exactly. And it will be interesting to see if
anything that we say today winds up sticking when we
do get to November December, and then we can say
that we called it the three of us only.
Speaker 3: I mean we are a vote, you know, part of
the voting body, so it won't be that.
Speaker 2: We can't influence that.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, I also liked your idea, Marcus, of using
like our our categories that we ended up on last year,
which are categories always shift and move year to year.
There's a couple that will there's a lot that will
be consistent forever in theory, but there's a we will
we will make new categories and delete old categories depending
on what the year looked like, you know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I just grab some like if you guys
want to throw anything that we did last year that
that isn't here, feel free. But yeah, we can jump right.
Should we start with the big one with everyone's current
game of the year. Do we want to start there
or do you want to work up to that?
Speaker 3: I maybe work up to I actually wasn't ready for
it to I don't know.
Speaker 1: If I pull up my app.
Speaker 2: Yeah. See, this is why I keep this list because
I actually I have every I have a list of
every game I've beaten in every game I've played in
general this year.
Speaker 3: Yeah see, I have a list I've been curating since
two thousand and nine of every game I've ever beaten.
Same but I don't put years on there. I just
it's an alphabetical list, ordered by console, of every game
I've ever been Okay, yeah, which I which I accidentally
deleted once in my Google drive like a year ago,
but I found it in like the deleted files I was.
Speaker 2: It was.
Speaker 3: It was a scary moment in my life that I
almost lost that file. I make I make backups.
Speaker 2: Now, well what if we if well, how about we
saved Gody for last and we start with like genres
like best genre. Let's do Yeah, I was all right,
how about this, We'll start with best action game. What
do you guys think is the best action game of
the year so far? Because right off the bat, I'm
gonna throw in there it's for me, it's either anger
Foot and I'm I'm gonna be hesitant there because I
could consider that a shooter too. Yeah, if we divide those.
But also I think Stellar Blade is a serious contender
and there I really like the combat in Stellar Blade.
Speaker 3: I think it's Stellar Blade for me even over this
might be highly controversial, but like I think elden Ring
Shout of the ar Tree is certainly allowed to enter
all these categories. But I like Stellar Blades combat and
action more than I like elden Rings. I the thing
that I love about elder Ring is exploring and that world, sure,
you know, and Stellar Blades world is kind of whatever.
It's it's it's interesting, but it's mostly forgettable. But like,
I had a lot more satisfying action moments in Stellar
Blades so far this year, so I would lean Stellar
Blade myself.
Speaker 1: Are we counting early access for Hades too? Are now?
Speaker 2: Sure?
Speaker 1: I mean that would be mine.
Speaker 2: Early access is bigger than the base finished Hades one
for me. That's a good call. I didn't think about
Hades that's who.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I have not. I don't really like
playing early access games. And it's funny that that that
metric that people use mark as I hear a lot
of like, hey, Hades two is early access, but it
already has more content than Haites one, And I'm like,
I don't care if it's eight times as long. If
it doesn't have a conclusion, I don't want to start
the race, you know, like I just don't want to.
I don't want to start running the marathon if it
ends at you know, like two miles before it's supposed to.
Speaker 2: You know, it has a conclusion. It's just a big
sign that says, come back later when we've made more stuff.
Speaker 3: Oh, and you know what I do. That's I love
when films have that at the end of them. You know,
it's like alias, like we're actually going to cut the
credits early and you know we'll come back to it.
But yeah, So I have only given Hades to like
an hour with the intention of just like giving this
a shot. I'm not really committing to this, And in
that like one hour, I was struggling to get a
handle on the combat because it is a lot different
from Hades one. So it rubbed me the wrong way
a little bit. But that's that's me also acknowledging I
just need to learn it, Like I just need to
figure out what's different about it and embrace it. You know,
I think if we lead this to a vote, as
we do in our real discussions, I think I might
still lean Stellar Blade only because I feel like and
and maybe correct me if I'm wrong, but like, I
feel like we never really count early access titles in
a lot of these categories.
Speaker 2: Generally we don't. Am I misremembering? Okay, yeah, I mean
we can. We can that vision for the purpose change that. Yeah,
we do. We that's true.
Speaker 1: But you know a game that I really like that's
an action game, I would say Astro Duel too, would
be in the conversation for me. Yeah, I haven't played
Stellar Blade or I haven't started Eldon Ring yet, so
uh yeah, so I'm pretty limited on the action category.
But it sounds like Stellar Blade is the front runner
for for the purposes of this conversation, let's.
Speaker 2: Lock it is to their temporary reward. I guess this
is like, don't hold it for I'll get don't you
can hold it?
Speaker 1: You can you can hold money when we're doing our
game of the year category, or is will like bold
certain things to come back to, or like oh that's
a lock for sure, or that's got a it's not
for sure in but it's above others in this conversation.
So it's yeah, right, what's X Marcus.
Speaker 2: Let's do best RPG because that is going to be
that is already a competitive category and we're only halfway
through the year.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean big, big ones to shout out at
the start. Uh, Dragon's Dogma two Persona three Yakuza or
like a Dragon rather Final Fantasy, Final Fantasy Paper, Mario.
I really need to play that paper.
Speaker 2: Mario Unicorn. Oh for lord, yeah, I forget. Technically that's
more strategy, but it's also.
Speaker 3: Ye yeah, yeah, I I my, I have my answer
with the bullet.
Speaker 2: I know which one stands out for me?
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, it's like a Dragon like that that
has been That has been my favorite. Not to get
ahead of ourselves here, but probably my favorite game of
the year so far.
Speaker 2: Favorite RPG.
Speaker 3: I like the speed of the combat in that game,
and like I always was enjoying the combat. But there's
another RPG in that list that you just mentioned, Alex,
where sometimes I would get kind of annoyed with the combat.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which one is?
Speaker 2: It's a rebirth.
Speaker 3: The rebirth would kind of uh grade on me sometimes
and get frustrating unnecessarily but I really like A Dragon
is my personal.
Speaker 2: Favorite RPG so far this year. Yeah, you know what,
I think, I'll I'll hop on that train because I
I I've played enough like A Drive, Like I'm several
chapters into it, and I do love like they they
have like perfected that system from what I've played so far,
Like whatever rough edges were in that first game are
pretty much gone, and they've made it better with the
way you can lie, you can like purposely line people
up and like knock them into things or into your
your teammates in really fun ways. And also just beyond
the combat, just like the RPGs of like you know,
assembling your party and kidding them out and doing all
the open world side stuff is so much fun. And
I haven't even like I haven't even unlocked the like
animal crossing stuff, so I still haven't even seen everything
in the game like has to offer on like that
in And I do like Rebirth a lot and I'm
enjoying it. But yeah, yeah, because again from what I've
played of it, I'm like, yeah, and again I'm only
committing to finishing Rebirth first because I'm just further along
and it's it just makes sense. It's also the more
spoilable one, you know what I mean? Yeah, I don't care. Yeah,
like I've that's probably the real motivation. Like I've not
been spoiled about the ending. I just know that people
seem torn on it. So I'm just trying to just
get to it as quickly and thoroughly as a can.
So I think i'll i'll co sign Like a Dragon A.
Do you feel strongly in any direction, Alex Or have
you not played a lot of the RPGs this here?
Speaker 1: I mean, I've played a good amount of Persona three.
I really liked it. I haven't finished any of the
major ones. Yeah, I mean, I'm I'm planning to sew
just for context. I'm I have two goals for the
end of the year. One is to beat Like Dragon,
which requires me to start it, but I want to
beat that by the end of the year. And I
want to beat metaphor Refantasio. Oh those are my two
RPGs on my list this year. There's a couple of
other smaller ones that are kind of rpg ish, like
on that list, maybe right that you, Yeah, I need
to buy it because I didn't get a code.
Speaker 2: We might talk about paper Mario in another category.
Speaker 1: So it's all right interesting. There's a lot of weirder
games that came out this year that like what category
does this fit in? There's a lot of games I've
been enjoying, like small all our things. Uh, you know,
obviously we'll get into like Balatro and stuff like that
and uh Pacific Drive. Yeah, Summer House. There's been there's
been some cool things. I'm looking through my steam play
right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm trying to avoid like, I mean, we don't
do this anyway usually, like but I don't want to
be like, oh, just indies.
Speaker 1: It's like, oh that's yeah, yeah, a thousand extrasists I
want to finish.
Speaker 2: Oh right, yeah, which that's more of like a visual novel.
Speaker 1: Whatever cryptomaster, Like what would that fit into? You know,
there's a lot of cool games coming out, but.
Speaker 2: Technically at RPG like a dungeon crawler and into something
just from what I've played of it. But yeah, I
think so are you for for the RPG specifically? Are
you what was? Where are you all at like a
dragon like a dragon camp?
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, I'm down with that. I mean, I I
feel like I'm out of that conver station mostly just
based on what I've played. I'd probably give it to
Persona because nothing else is really contesting it for me.
But I don't like it enough to try to go
to bat. Yeah, like not that I don't like it,
but like I'm I wasn't in love with it. Like
I really liked the social sim stuff, I like the setting.
I didn't love the dungeons in that one. So I'm
really looking forward to Metaphor. And I've said this on
the show before. I want to play Persona five Royal
for the custom built dungeons, like the handmade dungeons, right, rather.
Speaker 2: Than the randomization.
Speaker 1: It's just like, not that it doesn't do much for me there.
I think if that piece was different in Persona three,
I probably would have stuck with it and beat it
because I was really enjoying everything else about it. But
but yeah, I think I think y'all have a good
pick there.
Speaker 2: We did. We're doing a Kyle well this if I've
thrown down the list, this next one I think is
more of an Alex category than me, at least I don't. Yeah, yeah,
I mean honestly, so I was gonna the next is
best shooter? Should we just like wrap this up and
give it the hell divers and just move on.
Speaker 1: No, no, we shouldn't. No, okay, okay, no, no, we
definitely shouldn't because.
Speaker 2: Come out so far.
Speaker 1: Well you know this is the curse by the December
release the Finals, which came out before our right after
our end of year conversations last year.
Speaker 2: That's right. I remember we had a discussion, but do
we We weren't sure Whinning was coming out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it was allowed to be on It was on.
Speaker 2: Early it was in early access at that point, but
I think it was.
Speaker 1: Allowed to be on personal lists or whatever. But we
said we would revisit it next year. This year, and
let me tell you, I've been playing the Finals all year.
It is such a good place. They've continually added new modes,
new weapons. They've they've added this new UH. One of
the characters has like a spear and a grappling hook
that you can hook people with or you can like
pull the UH for for reference. The Finals. Have you missed?
It came out in December at the Game Awards at
like the I think it came out like right after
the Game Awards. It's stealth dropped and it's like an
it's it's a very uh man. I haven't talked to
talk about the finals in a while. It's a team
based shooter where like all of the classes are split
into different body types, and so you've got the small
guy that's won the medium in the heavy and they
all play a different role, and you are vying for
these cash boxes around this map, this ever changing map
because it's got like the it's got physics based destruction
and like, let me tell you, you can raise these
levels to the ground. And the fights and the the
emergent moments that this game offers are so fun. Me
and Leovader play it a lot, and I think I've
put like fifty hours into it this year. I've really
loved it, and I think the player base is kind
of like I think it's still pretty solid, Like I
never have issues getting getting matches. But they've added in
like really cool new modes, like I said, a lot
of new maps and characters. They've added in, like new
weather they like. There's certain one of the cool things
about this game is there are a lot of level modifiers.
So this is this Las Vegas map where sometimes you're
in like this Las Vegas strip and sometimes it's the
Sandstorm version where everything's just covered in sand dunes because
it's kind of set in the future and just like
you know, climate change.
Speaker 2: I remember seeing that, Clay. I've only played this game
once and it is with you out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is my number one shooter with a bullet
this year. I do think like Hell Divers two is
a good multiplayer game. It is a fun shooter as well.
I think a lot of the moments in that weren't
necessarily because I don't know. I don't want to disparage
Hell Divers. It's a good game, but for my pick,
as far as a shooter goes, like, the finals is
what I've continually gone back to, even amidst playing Hell Divers.
You know, I go back and play more finals.
Speaker 3: Well, Alex, I'm sorry to break this to you. I'm sorry.
This is how you learn. But two out of three
of us have beaten a shooter this year, and since
it just it wins by default because Marcus and I
have beaten it. And of course it's Suicide Squad killed
Justice League.
Speaker 2: Sorry.
Speaker 3: I was looking down the list, I was like, what
shooters have I played this year? And I was like,
oh my gosh, truly suicide squad. It's like the only
shooter I've played and beaten this year. The game is
The game is many things, and I guess a shooter
is one of them. No, I like, I think, I
like the finals. I think that's a good a good pick.
Speaker 2: You know I will like. And I say that I
have not played nearly enough Hell Divers, like I've played
a couple sessions, but not nearly as much as I
should or would like. But I did play that one
night with you, Alex in the finals, and it was
very impressive what I played. I only stuck with it
because I'm not the biggest multiplayer guy in general, but
for what I played, if it like everything you described,
I was like, oh, this is like really cool. Like
the destructibility in a game I think is super impressive.
Speaker 1: And also the way that they let me. I wish
I could boot up the game to double check. I'm
pretty sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah, because I've done this. They
also have like some very like consumer friendly practices with
their live service. So if you unlock a battle pass,
am I right in that? No, I'm wrong in that.
I'm wrong in that that's Halo that lets you keep
your battle path after and continue it. But I do
really like the cosmetics in The Finals, and they and
everything's priced pretty fairly. And the cool thing about their
cosmetics is when you buy outfits, each of the pieces
like your head, your chest, your bottoms, your wrists, whatever,
can mostly be mixed and matched with any other costume,
and so you get like these cool like, yeah, it's
just just fun. And they've they've supported the game really well.
There will have been a lot of content and yeah,
I just I I know that game is going to
get buried by Hell Divers too, but I think it's
it's my favorite. The Finals is my favorite shooter. I
think the I think Hell Divers will maybe be on
my top ten.
Speaker 2: Do you think you'll maintain this to the end of
the year, like this is still the best, like of
all the shooters still yet to come this year, you
think this.
Speaker 1: Will There's a couple that I'm interested in. I think
Wild Bastards. It's a single player shooter, but it's the
follow up to Void Bastards, and I played the demo
of that and really liked it. But that almost strikes
me as more of like a action game rather than shooter.
I don't know. There's a lot of systems going on there.
Speaker 2: I don't like that.
Speaker 1: We Yeah, it's gonna be tough.
Speaker 2: About shooters can only be dumb and simple.
Speaker 1: I'm saying Wild Bastards has a lot of other things
going on.
Speaker 3: It transcends just shooter, right, It's kind of.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm also keeping my eye on Call
of Duty. I guess, but I uh and I guess there.
I don't know if you want to count it as
a shooter Buckshot Roulette, I wouldn't say it is, but
it does feature a shot. And have y'all seen this game.
It's very inscription coded.
Speaker 3: Okay, like it kind of looks like, uh, this is
like a horror game. Oh interesting, I was thinking it
was like a deer Hunter kind of thing.
Speaker 2: Oh yes, I have seen this, okay, yeah, yes, this
is this came out.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, it's out now for two dollars.
Speaker 2: It's got positive Oh I should check this out. Let's
just bite us because it's only two dollars. Yeah, but
positive reviews. I'm good with that.
Speaker 3: I like the finals as being our best shooter on
this unofficial list. That could change in any of.
Speaker 1: You know, I think I'm gonna get like when we
do the whole game. In former staff, I have a
feeling I'm gonna lose to hell Divers.
Speaker 3: To you, now, I don't know if there's like a
lot of I think I think West likes hell Divers,
but I don't know if there's like a lot of
devoted hell Divers.
Speaker 1: Okay, because I will go to Bachelor finals.
Speaker 2: I think it's you and you and West.
Speaker 1: They are going to get into a fist fight if
you're playing, like if you're playing Apex or Siege your
call of duty and you're kind of wanting something new.
And he didn't play the finals, go and play the finals.
It's so good. I love it.
Speaker 2: That was That's a longer. It was one of the categories.
I thought it would be like, oh, hell Divers, move
on next.
Speaker 3: But yeah, speaking to move on next X Defiant Okay,
So best puzzle.
Speaker 2: Is an interesting category. I mean, I have not played
this game, but Loreline it layser eyes for hearing everything
that you've said, Kyle, and everyone I know that I
trust and generally like line up with in terms of taste, Like,
I know I will love this games. I also love
puzzle games. And everything I've heard is like, yeah, I
love everything you're describing to me.
Speaker 3: Well, here's there, here's my grenade I'll throw in. There
is Balatro puzzle game.
Speaker 2: See.
Speaker 3: I was going to bring this up for strategy game
or maybe road. Do we have best road.
Speaker 1: Strategy game?
Speaker 2: Strategy Belatro is closer to a strategy game. Personally, If
I had to sign it's something.
Speaker 3: I'm good with that because I would love to see
Lareli and the Laser Eyes take puzzle because I love
Laura Lyne. The Laser Eyes. The rare instance of a
game that I started.
Speaker 1: About Lorli and the Laser Eyes.
Speaker 2: You may, is it gonna hurt my feelings?
Speaker 1: I'm I'm scared to play it because I think it
looks ugly.
Speaker 2: I don't tell you, man, it's got an awesome style.
Speaker 1: I need you to tell me that. No, Alex, you're
being dumb. Oh see it in motion and play it.
It's you can look at trailers and see it in motion.
I mean it's it's. It's it's a really cool noir.
It's it's a game that just like exudes mood. It's
just got obviously exaggerating I say it, Yeah, it looks bad.
Speaker 3: No, I love the way it's one of the highlights.
For me, it is like exploring that creepy mansion with
that noir black and white style. I really like, is
it a third person or first person? It's third person.
It feels a little it feels like you're playing a
resume of one a little bit right, Like the controls
are better than that, but it's isometric cameras in a
creepy mansion and you're walking around solving puzzles. You're never
in danger.
Speaker 2: Well, but I've heard someone say, like it's Resident Evil
without the combat.
Speaker 3: It's Resumeal without zombies, with with really cool rewarding puzzles
and and a narrative that sneaks up on you. Like
it's like one of those things that.
Speaker 1: Is anyone that I should play by the end of
the year, Like is this It's gonna be a big time.
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolute, I mean it is a game that I
don't flat out recommend to everybody. It's like if you
don't like puzzles, you know what I mean, Like if
you don't get joy out of Like, oh, I found
this note in this room on the second floor that
like had a clue for how I need to arrange
things in this room downstairs, Like I don't.
Speaker 2: I do.
Speaker 3: I don't think it's necessarily like flat out for everybody.
But I really liked it, Like I don't I all
of us we are dabblers, right. We start games and
we don't finish them, like that is a big thing
that we do. And this is like a rare instance
of a game that I played like an hour up
and I was like, well, I'm finishing this thing. I
was not assigned to review that game. I loved it
so much that I played it.
Speaker 2: And beat it and reviewed it.
Speaker 3: And I really, especially as I've been doing this for
as long as I have, I don't do that, you know.
I mean, I'm just like if I if I'm like
I'm not really feeling this game, I piece out because
I got other things to move on to. And Laura,
I really just sung to me, and I really liked
it a lot.
Speaker 2: So I will I will co sign your Lorelei enthusiasm,
because well, I can't think of any other big puzzle
game those Botany manner right, which you say like Botany
manor which she thought, God, that's right, that's right. I forgot. Yeah,
I didn't really like that. That'll be interesting. I really
like the game and given an eight seven five. I
have not been. I haven't. Yeah, that's it because like
we haven't played the other ones game. Yeah, we should
commit to that.
Speaker 3: I'll play botany manner you play Laura Lee.
Speaker 1: I'm sure we're gonna include it in Platformer. But Animal, well,
it is a pretty big puzzle game.
Speaker 2: That is.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I wouldn't it's I wouldn't put it as a
puzzle myself personally. I like Animal wel a lot, to
be clear, and it has tons of puzzles.
Speaker 2: I would say it is because it is like you're
not really doing combat in a game. You're just jumping
to rooms and solving puzzles. It's like a puzzle. It
is closer to like a fezz than a metric, like
everything you do is some weird riddle.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I still yeah, I don't know. Something feels off
about calling it a puzzle game to me, but I
don't think you guys are wrong at the same time, Yeah.
Speaker 1: Because if that's in the running, then that gets my
vote because that's probably my favorite game of the year
right now. Yeah, for the sake of this conversation, we
could call it the platformer if you want.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, it's I mean, I do have I
do have best platformer as a as a thing we
can discuss, but even then it almost feels weird to
put it there. That is not what I need. Game
four is like you can't wait to jump around.
Speaker 3: It's that funky thing where like I like Laureli puzzles
system better. I like solving puzzles in Laura l I more.
But I like Animal Well, like holistically, like in total
everything about you know, although yeah, I still think I
like Laurali Moore. I think Laura I just clicked with
me a little more. Which is that thing of like,
that's not me saying I didn't like Animal Well, Animal
L was great. I liked Animal L a lot.
Speaker 2: You know, let's just put let's just how about that
botany have all grown some flowers after solving a really cool.
Speaker 3: I mean, can we do best Metroidvania this year? You know,
Prince of Persia, Animal Well can kind of be in there.
I feel like there was another one too this year.
Speaker 1: We had this conversation on the behind Souls.
Speaker 2: He could we could do that if we want, we need.
Speaker 1: To have like best toy or best experimental for some
of the ones that are like hard to.
Speaker 2: Play Best Miscellaneous.
Speaker 1: I think are like Shushino the Learn Japanese with Photography
game Summer House. There's been a couple we're not.
Speaker 2: We can't just give out participation trophies. You're just making
up awards for everybody.
Speaker 1: Well, what do you what would you put a summer
House into? What would you put I mean that's like
Ashineo in I mean, well for the first one Summer House.
Speaker 2: That's like a sim basically like a like a city builder.
It's basically a city builder, like a very small version,
but it's a city builder.
Speaker 1: I mean it's not like you're not managing systems or anything.
You're just placing things for the joy of making.
Speaker 2: I mean it's like I said, that's like the core.
It's like the city builder at its purest form. If
you have all the complicated stuff. It's like a shooter, right.
It's it's shooters are only good when they take all
the systems out of My favorite shooter.
Speaker 3: Is uh is damn it? What is that game called that?
I've played so much of Content Warning because you aim
your camera at monsters I've played. I've actually played a
surprising amount of Content Warning this year because my daughter
loves it, so we play a lot of content.
Speaker 1: Warning that's cool.
Speaker 2: So we're we are on best platformer right now? Which
are there a.
Speaker 1: Lot of them? There is a couple of games. So
that's a couple of games I have not finished that
I that are going to be in the conversation at
the end of the year. That wouldn't be in it
right now for me, probably number one Rooftops and Alleyways,
the Parkour game, although them are maybe more sports game
is Tiny Terry's Turbo Trip. Is that a platform or
is that more of an adventure?
Speaker 2: I don't even know what that is? Like a game
you made up is Little Kiddy Big City a platformer
that is more adventure game? Adventure game? Okay? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Uh animal Well, Yellow Taxi goes.
Speaker 2: Yellow Taxi goes room. You talked about a lot.
Speaker 3: I mean for me, I mean I am ole and
Prince of Persia Lost Crown.
Speaker 1: Is like a breakaways in the conversation.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like as far as like jumping around, I don't
know that I've had more Funia.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good call. That is a two D
platformer and the the platforming feels so good in that
game with the especially when you get more of the
abilities and stuff. But that actually might I think that
is my number one or my pick for that. This
tiny terry game.
Speaker 1: Looks got to win something.
Speaker 2: Man, it's got it's I mean, it's it's more of
a puzzle game than a platformer. And we already gave
that award at Okay, when we were.
Speaker 1: Going the it was that was not clear that we
were we are considering for that category.
Speaker 2: I mean, it is a platform in the sense like
it is a puzzle game wrapped around I feel.
Speaker 1: I feel like, how.
Speaker 2: Many platforming I'm just saying, but I mean, even then,
are you, Prince of Persia's platforming to me kind of
stomps all over animal wells it's.
Speaker 3: A better platformer, but focuses like platform.
Speaker 2: You conspired against me, perst of all you should This
is how these meetings work. Is you should notice by.
Speaker 4: Now knives are drawn, alliances or how about a category
best game published by a YouTuber's.
Speaker 2: Best donkey, best donkey published games are the options here?
Speaker 1: We need a best experimental.
Speaker 3: That is that's interesting. Best experimental is an interesting idea.
Speaker 1: That's like music experimental music, alternative genre alternatives platforms.
Speaker 2: So's like we have the best platform. We have best alternatives.
Speaker 1: I think best experimental should be a category.
Speaker 2: I think I honestly, I think puzzle is where Animal will.
I think that's where it that's its lane. And again
this is this is on year, mid year. By the
end of the year, when more people have plot.
Speaker 1: I will be I will stand on guard. At the
end of the year, I won't be.
Speaker 2: Lola I hasn't. They don't. They're renting the trophy.
Speaker 1: That's well, la la Land situation.
Speaker 2: You've played Animal, well, right, did you finish? Yeah? I
beat it.
Speaker 3: You beat it, okay, So I I because, like if
we wanted to like put it to a vote, but
you haven't really played Laurel.
Speaker 2: I though, right, I haven't played it yet.
Speaker 3: Because you could like be the tie breaker. But it's
kind of unfair to put it on you because.
Speaker 2: You Yeah, I mean, I'm only going by your enthusiasm
and everything I've seen and heard about Loralai and just
like I think the puzzles in that game sound so
cool and it is, like hell, it's.
Speaker 3: Sometimes in Laurel and the Laser Eyes. To solve a puzzle,
you have to enter an old school PS one game
and play the PS one game. Does Animal well do that? No,
maybe it might.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of secrets in that game.
Speaker 2: Someone's yelling like, uh dug, all right.
Speaker 1: I won't derail us again.
Speaker 2: No, it's fine.
Speaker 1: It's I like Prince of Persia going there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, give the princess due for a while. That is
one that I like. Even as I was.
Speaker 2: Playing it in what January, I was like, we got
to make sure we don't forget about uh lost crown
here later this year, you know, because it's going to
feel so long by the time December rolls around. But
I really liked that game a lot. I also have
This isn't something that is in this list, but that
game is also in my personal list of best mechanics.
That dimensional claw thing that you can do where you
can just suck up enemies into another dimension and then
spit them out wherever you want. I love that thing.
I was like, that's such a cool idea. All right, category, Yeah,
we got a we can invent this one best remake
slash remaster, because we've gotten quite a few of those already,
So I guess to sort of lay out the field,
there's the paper Mario. Yeah, okay, there's Mario versus Donkey Kong,
which is a remake. Yeah, there's Persona three reload. There
is oh gosh, hold on, are you trying to avoid
the elephant in the room? Are you like saving it
for last or you're talking about Final Fantasy? I mean
I guess there is that. Yeah, Final Rebirth. That is
is Absolutely it's a rebirth. Some might say they're like,
it's beyond a remake, which I didn't play. God, everyone
would like to. I keep forgetting that game came out
now the studios around anymore. Unfortunately, another Code recollection, two
remakes and one I beat that first.
Speaker 3: Or rather than rather than a third of a remake
and one.
Speaker 2: It's more remakes. So it's better than Final Fantasy. I mean,
is is the answer of Rebirth? For me?
Speaker 1: It'd be Persona?
Speaker 2: Yeah. Are you saying have you played Rebirth?
Speaker 1: I have?
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm just curious both okay.
Speaker 1: I mean, Rebirth is really impressive, but and almost feels
just like an entirely different game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well you can say the same about Rebirth.
Speaker 3: Yeah, or I'm talking about Rebirth you are talking about
you talking about yeah, okay, in a.
Speaker 1: Way that almost I don't want to get into I'm
not going to say anything else.
Speaker 2: Territory kind of yeah, okay, I mean is that is
that a a thing that we hold against Remax is
like the how faithful it is, even if it's by
design not meant to be totally faithful.
Speaker 1: It's so it's weird because I think Persona three Reload
brings a game that was very hard to play, uh
and makes it, you know, accessible as a fantastic sound
Best soundtrack of the year, I think, which is a
different category.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we do best music, which probably yes to Rebirth.
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah I did best music here and yeah, well,
I mean Haities two has some really good music, but yeah, yeah,
Rebirth soundtrack is fantastic.
Speaker 1: Rebirth is just so different from what it came from. Yeah,
it's just it's hard to It's just it's like apples
and oranges.
Speaker 2: I guess depends what you if you're down for what
that game is doing, and I guess this would apply
like were you down with remake like the first game?
Speaker 1: As like, but how about like all the mini games?
I mean, they're they've bloated this game. They've like they've
inflated it. Right, it's done a good job. Remaking those
mini games at a point that there might be too.
Speaker 2: Many of them. They had to. Yeah, but they did
a good job with the at least remaking the existing ones.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean I I I didn't play the original,
so like y'all will have to tell me, like what
is it was a category? Y'all probably decide. Yeah, I
really like Persona three because it brings that game that,
even though Final Fantasy seven is leaps and bounds like
very impressive, I could play the og Final Fantasy seven easily,
but again, it's like apples and oranges to what this
new thing is said.
Speaker 2: I got Final Fantasy seven at home.
Speaker 1: Where Persona three was really hard to play, and it's
cool to be able to play that now with the
content and added content and all that.
Speaker 3: I mean, I idle and rebirth myself. And this is
someone who's only played about ten to twelve hours of
reload Persona three, where Persona three kind of kind of
feels like an older game to me at times. And
that's okay, But rebirth, sure, I mean, the highs of
rebirth are high and the lows are frustrating.
Speaker 2: I certainly had plenty of lows with rebirth and moments
of frustration.
Speaker 1: But also disclaimer, one of my best friends works on Rebirth,
so I'm like trying.
Speaker 2: To stick in it to him.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but yeah, I mean that if we're taking you know,
this isn't necessarily a vote, right, it's it's a matter
of discussing, uh, excitement and stuff like that. But I
think I would lean Rebirth personally in terms of all
the remakes that I've sort of looked at and played.
Speaker 2: This year, I mean Rebirth, Yeah, pretty amazing. I have
not played either version of Person of Three, so I
cannot compare them unfortunately, but I guess as a final
Fantasy seven fan that has not finished Rebirth yet, so
I don't know where I'm going to land on that
ending that seems to have split the fan base and
have them fighting each other. But from when I played
so far, like you mentioned, like very high highs, some
frustrating lows, but like as a re just as a
reimagining of that world, it is, I am constantly just
like gobsmacked of like, wow, look what they did with
this thing that looked like crap, like or you know,
it was old, Like you're like, oh my god, look
at the gold saucer like what they did to it,
or they did the Cosmo Canyon in all these places,
so it's less like which I guess like that's like
the purest distillation of like a good remake is when
I look at it and then run around in there,
I'm like, Wow, this is the game that I always
imagined it was playing it the first time as a kid.
But now the technology is called up to my imagination.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you know yea, And the gap between Persona three's
PS two release and this one is smaller than you
know seven and Rebirth.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so give give Cloud in his co his temporary trophy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, all this could change. Maybe good months, I'll be like,
you know what, I finished person of three on that game.
Speaker 2: Silent Hill too is coming out in October. Maybe everyone's
down on Silent Hill, wait till they prove you wrong.
And it's and and technically metal Gear Solid three is
still slated for this year. We'll see, right, technically coming
out this year. Love confidence there for me, but we'll see.
All right, what about I have best hero slash Villains
slash dork. We could just condense that to favorite character.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well I did, I did?
Speaker 3: I know? I was sort of giving Suicide Squad a
hard time earlier. But I do think Captain Rang is
like a great dork. Yeah, Like he was like a
highlight for me of of an otherwise disappointing game. I
was like, I I hate this guy for all the
right reasons, if that makes sense. Like he's he's he's obnoxious,
but in a fun way. That like ended up being
like a highlight of the game for me. But I
wouldn't he was not my favorite character, but he's my
favorite dork, you.
Speaker 1: Know, because if the game was finished, I would say
Molina Way, I really like her for favorite character, you
give her.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's a temporary award for a game that
is temporary.
Speaker 1: They definitely want they've said they are. Yeah, the announcer
in the finals.
Speaker 2: That's you know what? Uh India the character I.
Speaker 1: Heard I was talking to. I was at Leo's place
last weekend and he was telling me about that game
and I really want to play it.
Speaker 2: Hey, Kyle, did you ever get around him?
Speaker 3: No, I want to play it. Yeah, I have it.
I got it and I have it downloaded and everything.
I want to play it.
Speaker 2: Okay, she her, Well, I mean I really liked that
game a lot and but her as a character. She
is on my like short list of like at the
end of the year, I will bring her up as
like best hero I guess or whatever we decided to
call it this year. But yeah, India, the character is
is pretty high up. Yeah. And also I mean he's
he's not much different from his original introduction. But Itchi
ban is is like just.
Speaker 1: Like yeah, I was just thinking it was like, yeah.
Speaker 2: He's like the free Space. I mean, this category, it's name,
it's it's best character presented by ich Ban Kasika.
Speaker 1: Like another Crabs, Treasure has a lot of good characters
in it. I really like Krill. That's the main the
main character, I.
Speaker 2: Believe, and he has like personality, like he has dialogue.
Speaker 1: And oh yeah, it's like it's a really really funny game.
Like the charter, your character talks to people.
Speaker 2: I wasn't sure if he was defined, you know, but
it sounds.
Speaker 1: Like oh very much, so very much so.
Speaker 2: I like the Joker and Bilattro that like Taunty, when
you lose, you always makes some puns about just you
sucking at the game, even when you do well, like
you can get to Auntie Aid and lose and he doesn't.
He doesn't give you any credit.
Speaker 3: Well, so here's what do chi bond best character, Melon,
Melon Away, best hero and Captain boom Range, best dork.
Speaker 2: There you go? Sure that did we have? Was it? Character?
We have? Hero? Villain?
Speaker 3: Dork is what we have, which you know, we can
define it however we want. But uh, the best character
represented by Ichibon. It's like, yeah, Electronic Gaming Monthly used
to give the annual ICO Award or they're just like
they just kept giving ICO an award every year.
Speaker 1: This is the show where everything's made up and the
points still matter.
Speaker 2: Let's see best is again? This is when I expected
to be a runaway but best DLC Slash expansion. I mean,
does it even any competition? Honestly? You know for.
Speaker 1: Google?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was typing it in or is that you guys?
But truly, I don't know if there's any is there even.
Speaker 2: DLC? I finished over the Break that was very good
and very fun and in another if elden Ring hadn't happened,
it probably would get it. Yeah. Yeah, I mean I
gave the game just shy of a ten Shadow of
the Tree. It's it's incredible, So yeah, we can just
I mean, I would be shocked if that changes at
the end of the year, honestly, Like, I can't immediately
think of any other DLCs planned other than this second
part of Allen Wake the Lake the Lake House one
that I think it's supposed to be like a bigger thing, right,
But yeah, I think Elden Rings probably they could probably
just not show up at the actual award shows early.
You're done, just say that's not Yeah, it's hard to.
Speaker 4: Do.
Speaker 3: We want to get into They're just like, psych do
you have some DLC.
Speaker 2: I mean I would, I wouldn't say no to it.
I don't think that's happening. We could jump to our goaties.
The other only categories I have left are the console
exclusive or platform exclusive, so like best Sony Exclusive, Best Microsoft,
which I mean, we could probably fly through those. Yeah,
I would say, like Best Sony Exclusive. I mean, it
probably comes down to Final Fantasy or Stellar Blade or
Hell Divers Hell Divers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Hell Divers. But that's because of personal preference.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think.
Speaker 3: I think I think maybe surprisingly among those.
Speaker 2: Three, I really like Stellar Blade. Stellar Blade is kind
of where I'm leaning to as much as I like,
but I would be surprised if it wasn't Hell Divers.
By the end of it feels like hell Divers, Like
there's nothing objective about these awards. But that's the closest
to like almost an objective answer because of just the
impact it's had of like it's it almost feel like weird.
It would just come down to like, oh, maybe we're
not all like the diehard fans, but there's no denying
that game's success the like. But then also, like, these
are our awards, nobody the other editors are. This is
just this is just what we like, right, Yeah, and
this might be the only time we could give it
the Stellar Blade before everybody else shows up and says
idiots and hell divers. Yeah, I don't know what Alex
or are we steamrolling you? Do you feel strongly?
Speaker 1: I don't feel steamrolled. I The only one I cared
about making sure my voice is heard on was best Shooter.
Speaker 2: There you Go, which I wrote down. We gave it
a suicide squad by accident.
Speaker 1: He slid out.
Speaker 2: The real Captain Boomerang, move right there? Oh he might
there is here all right?
Speaker 3: Now, here's the best Microsoft exclusive is going to be
just a matter of figure out if that exists, truly,
Blade help Blade the first part.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, actually it might be. I think he did it.
I think the puzzle best puzzle game of the year
was figuring out the best Microsoft.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go to bat probably for a Word of
Warcraft at the end of the year, or Call of
Duty probably for best Microsoft Exclusive.
Speaker 2: Oh but those aren't soft exclusives, right, that's your your
that's a technicality, right, call of Duty is going to
be on every platform. Yeah, that said that's on everything. Yeah,
they said that's on everything. That That was one of
the reasons why they bought that deal went through with,
like no, no, no, we're not.
Speaker 1: Gonna Warcraft is only available on the on the launcher
that is owned by Microsoft.
Speaker 3: Now, I mean they're only there are other best PC though, Yeah,
I would. I would think of that as PC can
you play they have they have other stuff like they
on a console.
Speaker 1: Well, no, I think I'm getting into the and the least.
I think we need to rename these categories the best
Xbox Exclusive best.
Speaker 3: Well, that's what we used to that's what we used
to call it, but we changed it because it's like
there's console and PC exclusives now, right, like, yeah, so
it's like there's some games. Yeah, it's funky.
Speaker 1: It's weird because Microsoft, yes, clean weighted, I mean Microsoft
implies Xbox. I'm I'm being I'm a little turd.
Speaker 2: I know, you mean a little captain boomerang, Yeah boom
is it? Is it help Blade by Default? I like,
I mean right now, I mean it is, Yeah, all right, congratulations,
Let's help Blake. Like a game that you go like, oh,
I guess that technically is only on Xbox right now.
I just didn't think about that.
Speaker 1: I haven't turned my Xbox on once this year.
Speaker 2: Uh is the record or huh? Are you going to
break the streak er best Nintendo Exclusive? Yeah, I was.
Speaker 3: I was thinking Paper Mario. Actually, I was trying to
think of because like Princess Peach was man, Yeah, Marvus
Donkey Kong was generally liked. There's stuff coming out later
that I'm very excited for.
Speaker 1: I can't wait for that Zelda game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Zelda, And yeah, there's a Mario and Luis Mari
versus Donkey Kong.
Speaker 3: I mean I feel like it comes right now at
the half point, the halfway point. I think it's mar
Versus and thousand Your door, which I lean very much
thousand your door in that situation.
Speaker 2: Sure, I can sure. And some of these are just
sort of like victim of circumstances. Yeah yeah, and again
this is probably it's temper ary. It's a little you know,
these are by default almost paper awards, so it only
makes sense that Paper Mario gets his little cardboard cutout.
I guess you could also throw Luigi's Mansion two in
that discussion, which is again, that's a fine game. I
don't think that's going to beat it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, congratulations to Paper Mario that that's in your door.
Not to be confused with the GameCube game from a
decade ago, what was that one called?
Speaker 2: It was? It was the same title. I was trying
to get you to say the title again. Is there
a piece best piece? See exclusive? There has to be surely.
Speaker 3: Kind of this is the this is the Alex category.
When we have these discussions for like Alex, what do you.
Speaker 1: What do you think best PC?
Speaker 2: Actually right now, Anchor Foot only on PC? And I
love that game. Yeah, no, that's on everything. Yeah, I
played on Switch.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I'm dumb, dumb, yeah, yeah, it was a
power that's early Axis. Oh, I forgot yeah, yeah, what
about I.
Speaker 2: Haven't played or I haven't played the full game, but
Children of the Sun.
Speaker 1: I didn't really like that game, No, I thought. I
played it for roughly two hours. It didn't click with me. Sure, unfortunately.
Speaker 2: Many shoot Adventures is a switch.
Speaker 3: I don't think it is. I think it's just no
PC because I.
Speaker 2: Think that's one of the things I like tilted my
head out of. Was like, really only on you see
this game? Right, you're right?
Speaker 3: Yeah, because I haven't played it yet, because it sounds
like I would love it, but I just haven't because
I just haven't broken out the uh steam deck is Probably.
Speaker 2: That's is one too where I'm going off reputations. I
have not gotten around to it, but I want to play.
But everyone everyone has gone like nuts for this game,
so I almost like, well, I guess everyone else likes it,
so I guess it's good.
Speaker 1: I think. I think based on what we've played, it
sounds like it's anger foot.
Speaker 3: Yeah for people who have played it on this call, right, because.
Speaker 2: I loved it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I love the demo, so I think based on that.
Speaker 3: I think it's for the temporary win.
Speaker 1: Out of Rusty's retirement. The only one I think.
Speaker 2: He's early axis.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, there is a lot of There are
a lot.
Speaker 2: I mean there are several Early After category for best
Early Access Games, so there's quite a few of those.
So but yeah, let's give it the anger foot. Let's
get angry at how excited we are to give it
this award that we're angry. He nailed it. It's like
the Arsenio Hall bit from Chappelle Show where he went
to the party and he enjoyed the free cheese so
much that it made him angry and he just started
slapping people because they didn't help him how good the
cheese was. Actually, don't all right, let's get to the
big one, guys, the moment everybody has been waiting for
for at least the first six months of the year.
Game of the year parentheses so far, so.
Speaker 3: Far brackets for these three Game Reform editors that is like, yeah,
I don't know if we want to just throw out
like I don't know if we each have a single pick.
Speaker 1: I think we should do that.
Speaker 3: I think for me, at the six month point of
the year, mine is is like a dragon infinite.
Speaker 2: Well, I think yeah, actually it's seven months k.
Speaker 3: That's that's where I'm at but I yeah, I would
love to hear if you guys, because I'm guessing we're
all gonna have three different picks.
Speaker 2: Mine has been the goady with a bullet and only
one game has challenged this, and it's going to come
down to semantics. But it's Blatro that has been my
game of the year since I played it. The only
game that has even attempted or has approached its position
is elden Ring. But again the semantics thing of like,
and you know, we'll figure this out way, I guess
when we get there. Of like the years when we
can an expansion win Game of a Year or a
DLC can win Game of the Year, do we is
it even worth arguing? Is that going to get its
own thing? And you know we'll crossed that bridge when
we get to it. But other than that, those are
one and two for sure so far so bat I.
Speaker 1: Think my my my top three right now and this
this will change, I'm sure, but number three my top
three is are the finals, Animal Wel and Balatrow, and
I think Balatro wins for me. I think it's my
current game of the year. Wow, Okay, I about thirty
five hours clocked in it, not as much as some people,
but I really really have enjoyed that.
Speaker 2: I think I've got about ninety between the Steam and
Switch because I have some versions of it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've beaten it several times, like I've beatn Mini runs. Yeah,
I'm I go like the sixth or seventh difficulty on
one of my decks, now fifth, the fifth.
Speaker 2: I think I still play it regularly. I guess still
my like, oh I just want to play something, but
I don't know what yet. I'll play around a b
lootro and then gets yeah back into what you're like, Oh, yeah,
this game's awesome.
Speaker 1: So Balatrow is my end of night play while watching
TV kind of game. And recently I've replaced that time
I've been doing like making art and Blender for like
my game, and so if I wasn't doing that, I
would be playing Balatrow. Game is awesome.
Speaker 3: I honestly like, I like Bollatrow as ours our you know,
million asterisks game of the year so far, option I.
Speaker 2: Think I like.
Speaker 3: I I really like Bollatrow a lot. And it's like
I don't like card games, I you know it, like
I don't like poker. I don't play poker, but like that,
I got into Balatrow and it's like and it's a
testament to its design and it's sort of style and
like I I beat what do you guys call like
a run? Like I beat I got through a run
after playing it, like after it kept me up late
for like you know, a week or two, and once
I hit that point, I felt comfortable sort of backing
away and I was like, all right, I I completed
that goal. So I haven't returned to it very much,
but like, I really had a great time with it,
and I love I love when a game like I
think Marcus and your review or when we were discussing
it early on, it's like it reminds me a little
bit of Vampire Survivors of just this like left field,
like whoa this is? This is fantastic? Where did this
come from?
Speaker 2: You know? Not only that, but also the power escalation. Yeah,
like you start out with like you're not really doing much,
but then when you get enough jokers and you've got
you know, you've you've strategically picked your jokers to where
you're popping off effects left and right, and you're like
scoring just an obscene like obscenely high score paying like
a pair of twos. It's like, I my master plan
has come together. This is going as.
Speaker 3: It's nice when you focus in on one ability, right,
like just playing pears and you're like, I'm leveling the
crap out of pairs and so like even if you
could do like a full house, you're like, I'm I'm
doing pairs because it's going to be more points.
Speaker 2: You know, You're like, this isn't even my full power.
I got this whole hand. I know that you control
over that. I should have the score meter catching fire
to my best mechanics, because they really does. When I
see that thing, just like light, it makes me so
happy and it's got that NBA jam kind of quality
to it in that sense.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So yeah, Balatro, I like, I mean, yeah, you guys
feel good about that, right, Like for podcast choice, Yeah.
Speaker 2: Our interim interim interim Game of Year, like yeah, boxing
there's like interim champions sometimes of course of course.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is the things to boxing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we love boxing on this podcast. Boxing and Hope.
For my two favorite things my favorite.
Speaker 1: Boxers, Yeah, yeah, I love it.
Speaker 2: One of them one of them is wrestler.
Speaker 1: I mean I do I do think boxing is cool.
I don't watch it. There's a lot of sports like
that that that I think are cool that I don't
watch hockey. I love I should watch hockey. I should.
I should watch hockey. I should watch boxing. I wish
I watched basketball more.
Speaker 2: I mean, do you need to no like I should?
Like you want?
Speaker 1: I just like I like them, you know, the Mighty Ducks.
Speaker 2: Will do it for me.
Speaker 1: For Rocky Fair Fair, we should.
Speaker 2: I was gonna say, what are we gonna say, Kyle?
Speaker 3: Oh, this was more just sort of like, I'm not
saying we should discuss who should win. But I do
wonder if at the end of this year, if there
if we do have like an early access category or something,
you know, I just didn't get Flowers to like eighties
and there might hyper Light might be out later this
year too, and the out there there's Manner Lords, Like
there's a lot of cool early access titles and any
and rogue titles, Like we could even just blend it
down even more, you know, and just focus it on
early access rogue titles that we wanted to, you know, But.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm gonna buy for our best experimental There's another
game I think that's interesting to define.
Speaker 2: The parameters of what what constantly experiment.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it just doesn't in one of those games,
it doesn't fit well into the other categories.
Speaker 2: That misfit Basically that sounds the Island of Lost Toys
sort of thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we can forge of like yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I like genre, like best genre to fire or something.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, you know, and.
Speaker 2: We you think we could get away. We call it
best miscellaneous and we just put the abbreviate like m
I sc period maybe in charge.
Speaker 3: Man, we can do whatever we want. You know, it's
all we could. We could explain it in the text.
You know, We've got a couple of sentence ourselves.
Speaker 2: Uh for familiar with like our game of the year,
like if maybe if this you've come to Game Informer
this year and you haven't seen our game of the
Year stuff. These are not all the categories that we
normally have. We have other stuff like that. I just
excluded just I just want to take a time. But
you know, we have like best developer, best publisher best,
like music best and like, uh, we make up categories
based on the year of like oh, there was a
lot of this kind of thing this year. Let's do
a category for like we're discussing now with early access stuff.
Speaker 1: We also normally have like five of these conversations before
we nail things down.
Speaker 3: Yeah, people go off and play games. I haven't had
a chance to play, and we probably I.
Speaker 1: Would say, like collectively, we probably spend like ten hours
at least like discussing.
Speaker 2: Oh, if this was the real thing, we'd still be
on best like RPG.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it starts like two months out. Really, yeah,
I would say, and like we take breaks, we go
play other games that are like in the running. We Yeah,
it's a big process, but this is like a very
condensed you know, this is a good exercise.
Speaker 2: It reminds me of things that I need to sort
of like prioritiz Yeah.
Speaker 1: It reminds me of neny den Alla. You all pull
the wool over my eyes when it comes to best
puzzle game at the end of the year.
Speaker 2: So a year to figure out that animal well is
one hundred percent of puzzle games. And there's no getting
around it. I mean, you gotta play Laurel I.
Speaker 1: And see if.
Speaker 2: You hate the art direction or whatever your hangout is
with it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I taste is like subjective entirely. But
I am surprised to hear that that's the thing that's
kind of turns you away, because like that is a
I thought was like one of the more enticing things
about it.
Speaker 1: But like green shots might not be doing it for me,
but in motion, you know, I might like it.
Speaker 2: Alex is like more like Laurel. I and to close
my eyes thing, Well, no, I mean I.
Speaker 1: Don't, don't. I I don't want to disrespect the artists
like they're better than me what they do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, try it out. I'm gonna try out Bondy.
Speaker 1: Their for their first game Hearts. I thought the our
direction was phenomenal in that I love the way it looked.
Speaker 2: So if you sap some of the color from that,
like that's kind of where you're at.
Speaker 1: That's the vibe. Ok.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because you're kind of like Laurel. This is a
weird you play as Laurel, I think, right, Yeah, the
woman that you are playing as in the game, like
she fits that kind of style of Cinar Hearts kind
But anyway, yes, second.
Speaker 2: Just remind me of another category that we discussed is
like best art slash graphics. That is always an interesting
conversation because it's it's that weird divide of like like
technical fidelity versus like art direction.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I I do want to give a big update
on Russy's retirement. I have now built I built Echo's
workshop during the time of this podcast. Echo helps upgrade
robots to make them more efficient, so I built his workshop.
It looks really cool, but Echo himself is like a
giant worm. That's kind of disgusting. Now, I don't know
if I like it.
Speaker 2: Was it challenging to make the workshop with that constitute
a puzzle?
Speaker 1: Would you say, no, it's a puzzle game strategy. Maybe
I don't know. I don't know, but I don't like
the worms, So I might not recommend this game because
I just got and I hate him.
Speaker 2: No, sorry, because he's a worm.
Speaker 1: He's weird looking.
Speaker 2: Have you watched Due Maybe you shouldn't watch Dune.
Speaker 1: I loved because they keep the worms in the sand.
You know where they belong?
Speaker 2: Wow, lines in the I guess in the sand. I like,
I like to think of lowly worm for busy world.
Richard scared people like.
Speaker 1: No, I love that worm. That's a great worm. First
one I loved, okay, I thought was, remember this is
an abomination kind of worm unless he's retirement.
Speaker 2: Yeah, bet worm is it?
Speaker 1: Is it?
Speaker 2: Earthworm? Jim?
Speaker 1: The best worm is the Richard Scary wormah.
Speaker 2: With the best worm in media?
Speaker 1: I guess, yeah, yeah, definitely trimmer worms.
Speaker 2: Yeah, those are those are.
Speaker 1: I think at this point cultural relevancy. The dune worms
have a popcorn bucket made after them. Who else can
say that they are backed by?
Speaker 2: Is that hard to do? I mean, I guess the
popcorn bucket part, I guess specifically, but I was like.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm talking about.
Speaker 2: Intend to just give those out to anyone pretty much?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 3: What other worms have been so iconic that they get
a poppy they inspired that?
Speaker 2: I don't know. Richard Scary worm popcorn bucket. That's because
he's animated Busy World film starring Chris Pratt as Low.
It's kind of any day now right, any day now?
Speaker 1: All right, well, any day now this podcast will end.
Let me tell you should.
Speaker 2: We run down or real quick or winners temporary winners
for just just list them? Yeah, they'll do the outro. Okay,
so game Informers, mid Year Game of the Award winners.
Speaker 1: Which can three staff editors.
Speaker 2: Yes, and also are temporary slash, interim slash. They don't
mean very much. Yeah, nothing counts. Don't take it at
phase value. Yes. Our game of the year so far
is Balatro, the best Sony Exclusive, Stellar Blade, Best Microsoft
Exclusive It's Newest Saga, hell Blay two, Best Nintendo Exclusive paper,
Mario twe thousand Year Door Remaster. I guess in parentheses,
Best PC exclusive Angerfoot, Best DLC slash Expansion Elder Ringshadow
of the Er Tree, best remake slash remaster of Final
Fantasy seven Rebirth, Best Hero, I guess best hero.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like character hero. We kind of let this one
slide it kind of.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, best hero Echibon Kazaga best but also maybe
Melina Way because she's not a villain. But then best
dork is I think, unanimously Captain Boomerang, Best Action, Stellar Blade,
best RPG Like a Dragon, Infinite well, best shooter the Finals,
best puzzle or Lie and the laser on controversy. There
absolutely not best platformer. Prince of Persia the Lost Crown,
and that is it. So if you want to God
for now.
Speaker 1: Already say that he started.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean you want a sandwich like bookended, So yeah,
Cards exactly, so I guess we'll see what sticks at
the end of the year. Guys, we should not tell
any of the other editors about this and assume they
don't listen to the podcast. Yeah, and then we can
say a.
Speaker 1: Couple of them do.
Speaker 3: But be cool, guys, be cool, just be cool.
Speaker 2: Yeah these picks and be like we already figured it out, guys. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, thank you all for listening or watching this
episode of the Game and Former show. If you enjoyed
it and you want to support us, please consider grabbing
a magazine subscription. You can get a print magazine subscription
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keep the lights on, keep funding all of the coverage
that we provide for free, and uh yeah, like this podcast.
Follow us on Twitch, twitch tv. Slash game Informer replays
on Fridays, though not this Friday because Marcus is out
of town. But I think Style is going to be
doing some Yeah yeah, sure, YouTube, dot com, slash game Informer.
We've got a lot of cool videos going up there.
We had a last week, we had a Hadies two
interview with gen Z that has been getting pretty good traction. Yeah,
so go check that out. We've gotten more. We've got
some dragon Age interviews coming up as well as you know,
always putting up MGTs whenever there's something to show off.
So uh yeah, do all that. Follow the crew here.
Follow Kyle at Kyle M. Hilliard, Follow Marcus at Marcus
Stewart seven, Follow me at It's Van Aiken. Shout out
to Matt Storm aka DJ Storm at getting our podcast editor.
Go listen to their podcasts, Fun and Games, Reignite podcast,
which is a BioWare focused podcast, and that's gonna do it.
Thanks all, appreciate you have a good week. Bye,