Speaker 1: What do you know? Robert Lowe. We are back with
the fire Escape Cast. It's episode one hundred and twenty eight.
I'm Mike Maharty, your host is always here with Dan Riker.
Why are you laughing?
Speaker 2: Oh? Just I just think you're a funny guy, Mike.
Speaker 1: Thanks, Harry Kish.
Speaker 3: It gets me every time.
Speaker 1: Hi, Mary? Hi?
Speaker 3: What did I do?
Speaker 1: No? You just you continued a different sentence. I thought
you'd say hi to me, But it's fine.
Speaker 3: It gets me every time. And I and how do
you do? Michael?
Speaker 1: That doesn't rhyme?
Speaker 2: What's going on? I was about to say Stanley Kwan
and that's just a guy that worked at CBS Interactive
like ten years ago. This doesn't work. No, no, no,
that's why I can't do improv. But what improv part
of that party?
Speaker 3: Michael Maharty.
Speaker 1: That one's good.
Speaker 2: There's gotta be something with don't don't help me with this?
What's going on? Michelle Kwan?
Speaker 1: Nice? You're it's the same last name, just the.
Speaker 2: First step on Bill Hayder's character from mestonel Oh nice.
Speaker 1: This podcast has everything terrible intros.
Speaker 2: There's gotta be the last names that Ryan was on
awkward pauses, Pierre.
Speaker 1: Going on is a wine maker in the Rhan Valley.
But I knew you were going to think of that
one eventually.
Speaker 2: On Pierce bros Non, Yeah, that's.
Speaker 1: Good, that's good. Judy den chon, that's right, everyone, yeah, immediately,
Daniel Craig on Yeah, Sean Connery.
Speaker 2: I don't think you can rhyme with the first syllable
rap I've ever heard.
Speaker 1: Timothy Dalton that kind of works. It's the stupidest thing.
Let's restart. Jake cut all this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, got everything.
Speaker 1: No, we're back. It's episode one d and twenty eight.
You guys, I'm not gonna be here next episode, but
you guys are. You're prepping for the New Orleans trip,
which I didn't get invited to.
Speaker 2: Oh oh yeah, yeah, No, no, no, we never. We
should have brought that up, Mary. We should have asked
him to come.
Speaker 3: It's an awkward topic for to start the podcast.
Speaker 2: But yeah, a bunch of a bunch of people that
are coming know Mike and our friends with them too.
It's really why do we blank on him?
Speaker 3: It's my fucking I'm.
Speaker 4: Forgettable and I don't want him there. I'm doing a
birthday trip. I invited a bunch of peeps. Mike, you
are going on so many different work trips in the
next few weeks, and I just think the scheduling was
too much to bear.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah.
Speaker 4: Nevertheless, all of my true friends will be in Nola
for my birth, which is really lovely, and so I'll
be partying it up. We'll be We'll pour one out
for our homie.
Speaker 2: I might drink an alcoholic drink and I might be
there any way and just go to all the same
restaurants as you and sip by myself at a nearby table.
Speaker 3: If you pop out of a cake naked.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, fully access to the Google sheet I made.
He doesn't know where we're going to be.
Speaker 1: What's holding that cake? Guck my boner? Guapo?
Speaker 3: Why did you name your boner.
Speaker 1: Because it's handsome? What else would it mean? A handsome
ship came to New Orleans? Escape him?
Speaker 2: I don't think that's going to work for him. As
as Angels three, Guapo goes to New.
Speaker 1: Orleans played by Timothy Dahtong.
Speaker 3: Timothy dull Dong.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm gonna a Warriors game on Sunday.
Speaker 3: It would be cool if you mm hmm and masson.
Speaker 1: Square Garden against the Knicks. Okay, Steph Curry is injured though,
I'm not going to see him, but I'm still excited
to see the Warriors and it'll be fun to be
in a next game and Medison Square Gardens see Spike
Lee on the sidelines say something insulting about do the
right thing.
Speaker 2: But I've been at MSG with you, right.
Speaker 1: Yes, we talked about last episode the wrestling we got locked.
Speaker 2: Out, that's right. Yes, Chad wouldn't let us back in,
that's right, yes, yes, yeah, I don't think I've been
to MSG for a non wrestling thing. Now.
Speaker 1: I've been in for concerts before. Jake and I went
and saw Portugal to man who else? I saw a few,
but yeah, I've never been there for basketball or hockey,
both of which are played there.
Speaker 2: It's where the Godzilla babies were born in that movie.
Speaker 1: Which one that's actually low key.
Speaker 3: I like that movie.
Speaker 2: I have fond memories of it. That soundtrack, it's a
fun cast Matthew Broderick and his area. Yea, and yeah,
it's it's kind of fun.
Speaker 1: Was the one with the first with Green Day, the
song Doukie and the credits.
Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure no, the credits were the like Cash
Mirror by Zeppelin, but with puff Daddy.
Speaker 4: How do you know that's such specific details about this
ridiculous film, Dude.
Speaker 2: They had Rage against the Machine on the soundtrack. They
had Puff Daddy doing that Zepplin cover with Jimmy Page,
which is terrible. It's a hell of a soundtrack.
Speaker 1: It's a great well cut Sward green Day was in
there somewhere. Look this up because this might be like,
this might be a villa.
Speaker 2: It's a oh they Yeah, they did brain stew brains
like Green Days.
Speaker 3: They probably yeah a diddy guy, aren't you dan?
Speaker 2: No, that's up letting rage against the Machine? I was?
I was, I was.
Speaker 3: You loved that soundtrack?
Speaker 2: I did love the soundtrack. It was weird seeing Jimmy
Page and Puff Daddy ONESNL doing that song. But led
Zeppelin's very good.
Speaker 1: Was Dukie was brainstew on Dukie? The album? Mary? Do
you know remember? I?
Speaker 3: I think so because that was their banger album.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it has to be. I believe they was on
Dukie or was it said it was from ninety five?
There's no way Dukeie was like early.
Speaker 1: Nineties, was follow up Soft or Slump?
Speaker 2: It was on Insomniac their studio album.
Speaker 3: I don't even think I bought that album.
Speaker 1: I wait, I was waiting. I was born waiting for
American Idiot.
Speaker 2: After September eleven. American Idiot after September eleventh. Brain Slew
was one of the big list of songs that you
couldn't play on the radio.
Speaker 1: Really did they mention the twin towers in the song?
Speaker 2: I don't know that weird? They were really they were
really casting a wide net with the songs during that
that was a huge band list for a while.
Speaker 1: What's it the what is a biggie? Like? He talks
about the first the parking garage bombing.
Speaker 2: Oh, the world people blow up like the World Trade.
Speaker 1: Yeah, trying to get paved up like the World Trade,
And people are like, how did he fucking know? Like
there was a whole other thing before.
Speaker 2: It was also a very famous terrorist attack. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they kind of just got usurped a bit in
the headlines.
Speaker 2: That turn from Godzilla to nine to eleven.
Speaker 1: What I don't know, big giant buildings.
Speaker 2: And that Godzilla movie was set in New York, so
it's not the wildest thing. I guess.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've I've seen I saw that way back in
the day, and then I saw the one with Brian
Cranston when they do the Halo jump. I liked that one.
Speaker 2: I saw that one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was the Garrett Edwards, the one who was good.
He was slated to do Rise of Skywalker, but then J. J.
Abrams took back over. Okay, I might be talking his name.
Speaker 2: Those are the ones. Two got Zilla movies I think
I've seen in full where the Brian Cranston one and
the Matthew Broderick one. I just went to go You
Got Zyla Minus one after our live show in LA
and I fell asleep because it was a very busy day.
Speaker 4: Minus one is so good. But I think the Matthew
Broderick one, if you can just let go of reality,
you have to really let it go. You have to
accept that it is a silly movie for silly people.
It's a good ride.
Speaker 2: It was made by the Independence Day guy. It's like,
I don't really know what people were expecting, like it
was gonna be a big, dumb summer blockbuster.
Speaker 4: I think they were expecting a better movie. Like I
think Independence Day is like a slam dunk. It is
ridiculously good and this Godzilla movie is not in.
Speaker 2: Independence Day is definitely better. It's much much better. Speaking
of nine to eleven and movies with New York you can.
Speaker 1: Talk about this is why I host transitions to me,
I don't know how to transition that we're talking about
terrorist attacks. I'm not sorry, Yeah, yeah, continue, I'm so
my interest is piqued. Ye.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she does involve nine to eleven and New York.
Weirdly enough, Gangs of New York Bank and I watched that.
Speaker 1: Recently.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we watched it like last week.
Speaker 1: Do you mind me asking? Is that the first time
since your anxiety attack?
Speaker 2: Yeah? It actually is shit, Okay, yeah, yeah. My first
thing is that that's a very specific thing you remember there. Yeah,
that was my.
Speaker 1: Favorite motherfucker published author on my podcast. I'm familiar with
his overlaw that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my first panic attack was in the climax of
Gangs of New York. So it was interesting. Turned to
bok happening attack.
Speaker 1: Was also during a climax. Sorry sorry, sorry, so sorry
you and BOK watched it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so there was a part of the end there's
like a good five or ten minutes. Who was like,
oh this is when I was sitting on the toilet
and I thought I was gonna die. I didn't know
what was happening. But have you guys seen this movie?
Speaker 1: Yeah, a few times. I don't like it.
Speaker 2: It's I don't. We walked away from that being like
it should be so much But it's a Scorsese. It's
Daniel day Lewis, who was like, definitely the best part
of the movie. He's just having a lot of fun.
Is build a Butcher. But it's like it's the Cap Johnson,
who the guy who made Ado lessons that just want
a golden globe for that. He's one of the gang guys.
But it's like it should be so much better than
it is. It's over long, it's trying to do too
much shit. If it was just a revenge story, it'd
be one thing. But it's like he tries to kill
Bill a butcher at the end, and then there's like
forty more minutes of stuff about like elections and stuff,
and it's like, what are we doing here? And then
it's got the nine to eleventh thing at the end,
which is weird, but.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it shows that it doesn't it show like a
modern day It's the Tombstone's still there. In Brooklyn looking
at the towers in this it's overground.
Speaker 4: I actually think that that SHOT's pretty sick, just like
the super fast motion cameras of showing the building of
time lapse.
Speaker 2: I kind of remember, just kind of fade, cross fade. Yeah, yeah, camera.
Speaker 1: Set up Scorsese's crossfade.
Speaker 3: What a crazy, crazy director move to have a go pro.
Speaker 1: In the fucking crazy thing about that shot and why
it's so famous. They actually had to put a camera
there back in the like seventeen hundreds and it had
to record until two thousand and two or whatever.
Speaker 3: That's our joke.
Speaker 1: We were just doing that.
Speaker 2: We were making about them putting the go pro there
and how ridiculous it would be to do that in
the eighteen hundreds. Are you on this podcast?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't really pay attention to what you're saying.
That'd be a funny bit, though, if I just repeat
the joke every time right after you. I don't like
that movie though.
Speaker 4: You know what's crazy is they actually went back in
time to put a camera back.
Speaker 1: Joke. That's my fucking joke.
Speaker 2: That remind me because I get this mixed up because
I remember that was kind of controversial because that was
that came out in like, you know, late O two,
So it was like one of the first movies, big
movies to kind of even reference the Twin Towers or anything.
Speaker 3: Watching Risky Take Everything Out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But then I also remember I was trying to remember, like,
is this the movie that has like a weird rat
at the end, and it's like, no, That Departed, which
is also Scorsese, And was that also the skyline of
Newark or was that.
Speaker 1: Just a separate Boston courthouse in the background.
Speaker 2: Boston and they just did a CG rat?
Speaker 1: Oh is the rat not real? I didn't know that.
Speaker 2: I just remember people talking about hating a CG rat.
So that's another one I want to go back to,
Is That Departed? Because I remember loving That Departed?
Speaker 1: Still awesome. We we rewatched that movie pretty often. Okay, okay,
after you watch that, it would be a fun thing
if you watched Infernal Affairs in the movie at the Yeah,
I think so, yeah, that is based on I remember
watching that.
Speaker 2: I like that they made a few of those. Yeah,
I've always been curious about that.
Speaker 1: Gas to New York. To your point, though, it was
always that movie, one of those movies by him that
I really really tried hard to like but just couldn't,
like stylistically, even during the fight scenes, it's got that
like blur effect that I'm like this.
Speaker 2: Fast motion, very oh two kind of Yeah, it's weird.
Speaker 1: Like when you when I learned that was your first panic, Like,
I guess I wasn't that surprised because that movie really
is like not a pleasant it's excessful. It's not a
one to one thing with the panic that but like
I remember, like, oh that kind of hung on the.
Speaker 4: There's like some tortury kind of stuff too, like the
guy it's like hung on the fence. Like it's kind
of like I don't want to watch that for a
long period of time.
Speaker 2: I mean it could be for other people. For me,
my anxiety is never like triggered by something like that.
It's always just like it's more like being in a movie.
And like like I remembering Center Row like opening night,
and I couldn't get out of that. I couldn't easily leave,
And that's when I started feeling there's nothing in the movie.
But it did happen the next week or two because
Lord of the Rings Two Towers came out, another long movie.
I was in the middle on opening weekend, and uh
that I just had a panic atta because I didn't
know movies could be that bad. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean.
Speaker 3: The idea of comparing Gangs of New York to any
of the Lord of the Ring. Jesus, I don't Eve
think you're gonna get mirked on the street these days.
Speaker 2: On a good day. Gangs in New York is a
three out of five star on letterbox. It's better than
any Lord of the Rings by far.
Speaker 3: That's insane.
Speaker 4: The Lord of the Rings is the only movie that
actually holds up to its run time where it's actually
like it makes sense that everything is so long because
there's such thick books for you to understand all of
the fantastic detail of why these characters are the way
they are. There's no reason to have a twenty minute
scene where Cameron Diaz pickpockets people.
Speaker 3: That could have been done in ten seconds.
Speaker 4: It could have just been showing her pickpocket once, but
they had to show her on a fucking bus or
whatever it is, and she had to go into Firsta's
house and pretend to be a nurse or whatever.
Speaker 2: It doesn't.
Speaker 3: Stupid.
Speaker 4: And I'm even going like I will even say I
just don't think she was very good in that role.
Speaker 3: I don't.
Speaker 2: I don't.
Speaker 4: I think there are times when, like Cameron Diaz is
a completely reasonable actress, not in that much she does
not do she nails it in the mask. She doesn't
nail this part, like she just I don't buy it.
Speaker 2: I was kind of talent bonk that where it's like
it is a weird thing because like I feel like
she got really big around that time for doing like
kind of just fun like you know, Charlie's Angels. She
was always like a very just like everyone likes her,
but it's never in like super challenging roles. She was
never the like Oscar bait movie type thing, you know.
And this was her kind of like out of her
element in a way. And she's not like terror. It's
not like Keanu Reeves in Dracula levels bad accent, but
it's a bad accent. And she's also it doesn't help
to be surrounded by like Daniel D Lewis and and DiCaprio,
Liamba at the beginning.
Speaker 4: That's really hard to out act those masters. But I
actually believe that the reason Cameron Diaz was not able
to be in all of these really important films is
because she's so damn tall, and I think she makes
all of her co stars look like little shrewd boys,
and they don't like that. And there's only so many
apple boxes in Hollywood to shove all these men on,
So I think they give them to tiny women.
Speaker 1: Eyes white shut with Nicole Kidman, didn't they and Tom
Cruise didn't they have to? Like, wasn't that like half
the production efforts went into making him not that much
shorter than.
Speaker 4: Her, elongating his stunted legs, And yeah.
Speaker 3: I believe it caused their divorce.
Speaker 1: Did you hear did you hear the story though? Where? Apparently?
Uh much of the production was dedicated to it long
and it led to their divorces.
Speaker 3: I love coming. You guys were talking about the rat.
Speaker 4: I was like, can you believe that Scorsese became that
rat for one day to get that shot?
Speaker 3: Then I was like, that's not very funny.
Speaker 1: I didn't say, I just go for it.
Speaker 4: You have like all these I'm just like hindered by
these concerns of not being funny or smart, and you're
just not burdened by these weights.
Speaker 2: No, I want to challenge it. Mary said something interesting
about a movie that earns its run time, and talking
about Lord of Arn has been three hours, I'm like,
I'm looking at lists, like I'm trying to think of
good examples of ones that are like, yeah, that should
have been three hours. Like I remember that second Avatar
being very fun in the theaters.
Speaker 3: I think, wait, are you saying it should have been longer?
Speaker 2: Or are you just saying it doesn't feel like Gangs
in New York felt unnecessarily long?
Speaker 3: It's unnecessary.
Speaker 1: I remember I only saw it once in imax. I
felt like Oppenheimer earned its h No. I like the
movie Appenheimer, but I remember like the pacing was very
weird because the last thirty minutes were all that trial,
which I realized that's what the movie was building toward.
But it did feel like, oh man, this is kind
of a come.
Speaker 2: Down yemer iris hours.
Speaker 1: I'm like an irishman apologist, but even I would say
that movie is too long?
Speaker 2: Are are are three hours and seven minutes? I remember
that it was a lot of fun pretty much the
whole time. I don't I saw that.
Speaker 3: Could justify it.
Speaker 4: Apocalypse now is apparently over three hours. That was fucking
fantastic directors.
Speaker 2: The over like three hours ones are like these weird
cuts that like I hate those cuts. They actually does
fuck up the pacing. The theatrical cut of Apocalypse Now
is not that long, and that's definitely the best one.
Speaker 1: The Blade Runner has all the different ones, I don't
think Blade Runner ever got close to three in any
of them. Though.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's not a sound like Brave Heart. I remember
anytime I remember like a movie coming in two VHS's
like Titanic and Brave Heart, Like I wonder how Brave
Heart holds up, just because it's like I just watched.
Speaker 4: It because I bought the double VHS for my fucking
CRT and it's shockingly long and it's so funny that
it's just like he like is like you killed my
wife and then it just goes to black and.
Speaker 1: It's like the second half.
Speaker 2: Or is it like very like nineties like it would
be like at Dances with Wolves or something back then.
It's very important and good.
Speaker 4: You know, it's trophy because it did things before. I
think it was a joke to do things like that, right,
Like I think I I was kind of shocked to
see all these these moments that I believe inspired Game
of Thrones, and I said that like out loud a
couple times where I was like, oh, I think that
the Game of Thrones. People watched this movie and we're like,
we got to do a scene just like this with
the action shots and the war shots. Very very well done.
But it is so early nineties it doesn't not everything
ages very well. I was surprised of all the times
where yeah, they're just showing like women getting abused or
almost essayed, and they're just showing it for a real
long period of time because they're like, that's Hollywood baby,
and I'm.
Speaker 1: He's like, that's my laf.
Speaker 3: It's weird.
Speaker 2: Would take.
Speaker 3: Where he says they'll never take my freedom.
Speaker 1: I remember Killers of the Flower Moon. I thought that
was way too long.
Speaker 2: That's what I think. One of the only movies I've
fallen asleep in the theater for outs.
Speaker 1: Granted, I saw a ten o'clock showing and that went
till one am, and I had like six streaks before him, and.
Speaker 4: That movie is too long, and I think that even
though it is an important subject matter, I think.
Speaker 3: It is just absolutely exhausting.
Speaker 4: And there's an entire additional scene that's like and now
it's a play, and it's just like shut up, Like
you don't need to make all these additional scenes to
hammer home your point.
Speaker 2: It's some good old like The Deer Hunter, the Godfather
Part two like those those are good, are good, the
bad and the ugly. That's fantastic, Like a bunch of
old ones could pull it, pull it off.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, good Godfather Part two for sure.
Speaker 2: Seven Samurai Yeah.
Speaker 1: Seven Samurai, seven Samurai good. Like the first like half
of that movie is them actually like training the village
and setting up the defenses, and then the second half
is like the actual defense And shit.
Speaker 4: Are we truly confident that that movie couldn't have been
shaved down by like twelve minutes though?
Speaker 1: Seven Samurai or Godfather Part two or are you making
a point that nothing should be three hours?
Speaker 4: I just think it's really difficult to justify every minute
over three hours. That is a long time to make
humans sit and focus people's attentions.
Speaker 1: Man, we're probably better during Godfather Part two.
Speaker 3: They have to pee.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the Avengers in game is over three hours. Jesus
fucking tries.
Speaker 3: No way that earns it.
Speaker 4: One that I do think is an interesting concept is Grindhouse,
which is a double features.
Speaker 2: Different and it is a different event.
Speaker 4: That's because it's an event and it has an intermission,
and it's like go pee, reset, get a drink, and
come back for a second fun film.
Speaker 2: That's sick. The trailers and everythinglers before the second movie.
Speaker 3: Like trailers.
Speaker 1: That was.
Speaker 2: That was a great time. That was awesome.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I hateful eate the was is very long I've
been does not know. I can't.
Speaker 3: That should not have been as long as it was.
Speaker 1: You know what movie has grown on me a lot
is Once upon a Time in Hollywood I watched I
like that movie quite a bit now it's find it hilarious.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I didn't super love it the first time.
I should see it again because I like everyone in
that Yeah, wall Street, I remember that being I always.
Speaker 1: Had good cocaine, adult energy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it makes sense.
Speaker 1: Anyway. But yeah, it's a various point, like you should
not aim for that one.
Speaker 3: I don't think they shouldn't.
Speaker 4: I think that this is an example of a director
who's just so important and make such wonderful things that
no one has the guts.
Speaker 3: To be like do you need to keep that scene?
Speaker 4: I just feel like they have no one wants to
mess with scorc And Scorsese is on this list a lot.
Speaker 2: This dude makes long aspects the Irishman. What was that
like closer to four or something like that.
Speaker 3: He is just like someone tell him to you know.
Speaker 2: Who's going same with like James Cameron, Like, who's gonna
fucking oh every one of the top grossing movies of
all times is one dude? You didn't tell him how
to cut his movie.
Speaker 4: I assume that's how he responds to the PA that says, hey,
are you sure you need this scene? He's like, oh,
you're gonna tell the person who makes the most top
grossing movies of all time that they need to shave
ten minutes.
Speaker 2: And to be honest, fair, I mean, he's got a
pretty good argument. You know, it's pretty bullet brou I.
Speaker 3: Have to pee James Cameron.
Speaker 1: The irony is Scorsese has a very famous editor that
he's worked with for like years and years now. Uh, Thelma,
Thelma scoon Maker like and she's known for thrashing stuff.
But when she works with him, Yeah, I don't know
what that relationship is.
Speaker 4: Like, can I say something that is a bit ironic?
I think that our podcast often goes into the three
hours oh no, And I wonder if some of our
listeners are like.
Speaker 2: You know, no, you should hear the rock cuts. The
rock cuts are seven hours, like yeah, cuts it down like.
Speaker 1: Thelma. Yeah, he has to get in there and get
his hand instantly editing.
Speaker 3: But nothing from me, God, damn.
Speaker 1: It, get you spit gold everything.
Speaker 3: That was my pedigree.
Speaker 4: I'm with the biggest uh run times of all podcast history.
Will fucking touch a minute of what I say. Also,
unlike a movie where it's like you're in the theater,
you're actually meant to listen to this on the toilet, like.
Speaker 2: Go nuts, you want to go on a run, take
a shirt, drive somewhere.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, scratch away.
Speaker 2: Not doing that. During the Irishman, Yeah you park your
you took us wherever it needs to be. I was
aur I saw Marty's course says he's a cameo and
I'm working on the Sopranos now and there's a part
where like Christopher's waiting to get into a club and
he's like, you know the line or whatever. Then Marty
like pulls up in a limo and they let him
in and they call him like hey, Marty or whatever. Okay,
wonder what someone like Marty would have got, like season one,
before Sopranos was super established, like bringing this esteemed you know,
my movie to act like it wasn't.
Speaker 1: Uh what a Chrissy says, like, hey, mean Streets loved
it like that.
Speaker 2: It's a good cut. Yeah, mean Streets. By the way,
I forget Mary, have you seen Springs? I forget? I
know I brought it up recently.
Speaker 4: This is the show that I have quit several times.
I have started it like four times. I think it's great,
but every time, somewhere around season two, I.
Speaker 3: Just fall off.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, we're going. I assume Mike, I'm supposed to
fucking hate Christopher, right, He's a fucking dumb ass.
Speaker 1: So the show. The show is incredible because, like the
running joke is that by your third rewatch, the show
becomes the comedy at watching.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I just watched the one where Christopher's trying
to help Adriana like set up the like music producing career.
Speaker 1: Oh that that whole plot line yeah with oh yeah,
his uh what's the song up? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, don't be so gay. It's really stupid.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's really what's their names? Because yeah, the guys
are ranking about yeah, the ranting about how the Beatles are.
You're sick of hearing about the Beatles.
Speaker 2: Yeah, used to be the Filer was the band and
they changed, and we're.
Speaker 1: Coming to defile, defile you. I hate it sounds like
making with me.
Speaker 4: It sounds it sounds like it's an always sunny episode.
Speaker 2: That comedy aspect of it, Like I'm laughing frequently. And
this is like the old music producer because, like Christopher,
the young mob guy's girlfriend, they come into a bunch
of money basically, and she wants to become a music producer,
and so he's trying to fund it. And she's like, oh,
this band of this guy I know is like so
good and they're playing these demos and everything and it's
just the worst ship you've ever heard.
Speaker 1: And my producer wants to hook up with her, so
he's flattering her, thinking she had taste.
Speaker 2: All these idiots that are all these stupid, enabling terrible taste. Yeah,
I just died. When they take it the hash, you know,
the old music producer guy and he's listening to it
and he just goes, yeah, it's uh it's not good.
Speaker 1: It's like he's like, he's like, there's some some songs
are hits. Yeah, you know when you hear it this
it's not a hit. And then at the end of
the episode they come back to it. I forget what
It's like a third Eye Blind song is playing at
the at the bar and he's.
Speaker 2: Like, that's a hit.
Speaker 1: That's a hit.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I love the show so much. I can already
tell him.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, dude, I'm trying to think. So that's
what season three.
Speaker 2: I have two episodes left in season one.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, that's that early Jesus Christ. Okay, yeah,
so you haven't. There's some all timers. I'm sure you've
heard of, like reference like the Pine.
Speaker 2: I've heard that references like Pine Barns and stuff like that.
I really don't have a lot of I know a
couple of scenes that are Fancus. Yeah, and that was
the most conversial thing in the world back then. But yeah, yeah,
I'm just loving it.
Speaker 1: The show gets so much, like, so much funnier and also, yeah,
Pine Barrens, I would love to watch that with you
because it's the funniest forty minutes of entertainment. I've ever
scene in my life. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, I love
that show. But I remember we rewatched it last year,
and there's certain characters I fucking couldn't stand the first
few times I watched it, like Olivia Tony's mom, she's awful.
Oh yeah, But like the more I rewatched the show
and the more I'm like, just it's fucking hilarious how
awful she is and how like woe is me? Pity party?
She throws yea, but yeah, no, Chrissy's the funk up.
He's the Fredo for sure.
Speaker 2: Oh sure, I love Junior. Junior cracks Man.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Junior's hilarious.
Speaker 2: The one where he's so afraid that people are gonna
find out that he goes down on his girlfriend. Yeah,
it's incredible. He's like deadly serious, but he's like wanting
to put hits out on people, but don't tell anyone
about that.
Speaker 1: And then Tony and him are having the feud and
Tony's getting ready to TF on the golf course. He's
fucking he's like south of a bought. Uh, just like,
what what the fuck did he say?
Speaker 3: I have no idea.
Speaker 2: Give another suck because I've started it a few times too,
and this is like it's like a call salting with me,
where it's like everyone's told me forever it's good. I've
start a better call sault like two or three times
before I finally just sat down, like I'm gonna fucking
watch this show.
Speaker 3: Yeah you know I can't half watch it.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I think that's what's fucking with me because we are
in a We're in a time where it's so easy
for me to get my little switch or my Steam
deck and play a game, and when I do that
with certain shows, they lose me and that is unfortunate.
And I think that is what happens each time I
try and watch this.
Speaker 3: It's just sometimes it's a little slow, but it is.
Speaker 2: But I think it's important. I mean it's it's uh
that is Bonkai are treating it like when we watch movies,
which is like hard rule, like we've never look at
our phones, no text, which have I brought it up
on here before? How I feel and like I'm not
insane about this right, Like I brought this up on
a giant bomb where it's like, oh yeah, when we
watch movies, it's like neither of us like phones are
day are away and every like I am on an
island where everyone's like, that's crazy. You don't understand how
life is.
Speaker 1: It's just like, oh yeah, I have.
Speaker 2: Every fucking time we do.
Speaker 1: That, I appreciate it. And not only do I support you,
I appreciate you fighting the good. I do the same thing.
I like Amanda, will occasion for're getting like a text
because we're still technically like there's people working late or something.
Then that's different. But like generally speaking, no, I don't
look at my phone while we're watching something like I
don't know I I if I'm I cheat, I'm unwinding.
At the end of the day, I don't want to
keep paying it. I don't give you shit different.
Speaker 4: I know exactly why you're doing what you're doing, and
I think it's better for your brain and it's better
for your ability to focus and watch what's going on.
I I don't know how to describe it, but there
is there is a serotonin that you can get from
having like three devices on at the same time that's
kind of like overwhelmingly relaxing.
Speaker 2: That is a different things and we do that too,
and I get that because it's like I'll put on
like a comedy.
Speaker 4: Pad phone and I have like three different things and
I can watch any of them at any time.
Speaker 2: And we'll certain like games and show combos will do
that where it's like, let's say, like there's a new
like Chris Fleming special in nh FBO. I've been curiously
to check them out for a long time. Oh so
I was taking like that'd be a good time. Like
let's say Bonk and I are playing Pacopia or something,
put on a comedy special in the background, or like
rewatching Arrested Development, Like rewatching something's good for that, and
then you're just kind of playing a game like Pocopia
where it's like you don't really have to be worried
about cut scenes or music or anything like That is
a really fun name, but that's a whole different feeling.
That's a whole different type of entertainment to me than
sitting down to watch a movie or a show like
The Sopranos, you know, like, yeah, I see what you're saying, Mary,
like that. That is a very relaxing thing.
Speaker 4: It's an excuse for multi device and I think that
you kind of like drinking. It's like addictive to have
lots of screens and it's like all these people vying
for my time.
Speaker 3: I'm so popularly took up my phone. But I can
also look at Netflix.
Speaker 4: And I can also look at my game, and I
have like so much to give all these different things,
and I find that relaxing. But I will concede the
amount of times that I've missed an important plot point
in a movie that I was looking forward to because
I wasn't fully.
Speaker 3: Paying attention as a bummer.
Speaker 4: And the movies that I remember liking the most is
when I go to a movie theater.
Speaker 3: And I sit down and it is all of my attention.
Speaker 4: And so I think you are you're like respecting the
media more by doing what you are doing. I will
make a sad case for multi screen. Uh, I don't know,
like you're just a gluttonous like it's a you know,
you're just being really gross with lots of screens, but
it feels good.
Speaker 2: But I also think it's obvious based on the media
that you're taking in. Like, look, if you go to
watch the Sopranos for the first time or something, that's
the thing to pay attention to. If you're just putting
on it's a random thing it's a slippery it's kind
of obvious. Typically, if it's a rewatch, I think that's
always a decent excuse for like, oh we're going to
have the son in the background, you know, if it's
a first time and it's like a good like you know,
good movies versus like you know, you can put on
a fast and FEUs or whatever in the background whatever,
but like if you're watching.
Speaker 4: You need to you can be blackout drunk and watch
The Furious And every time.
Speaker 3: I believe it's wrong, I I agree with you.
Speaker 4: I think these are all truths, and I yeah, I
don't have like a good case for it.
Speaker 3: I just there. There have been so many times where.
Speaker 4: Especially forever reason, it's kind of like a stressful movie.
Speaker 3: It's kind of like I'll.
Speaker 4: Just get out of this stress for a second by
looking looking at Reddit and then and then you get
to go back to the stressful film and you're less scared.
Speaker 2: Because we talked about Marty Supreme and like how I
like like uncut Gems and if I had legs at KQ,
those like extremely stressful movies. That's when I most liked,
like all the lights off, I don't have any distractions
just I'm marinating in this love.
Speaker 1: You need to watch what we do in the Shadows.
You're like, uh, Jack Proch, No, Jack Proach, Mark Proch
like his energy vampire Colin. He just thrives on stress
when it's around, and he tries.
Speaker 3: To cause it miserable.
Speaker 4: And I agree, like, I think you're you're going to
enjoy the experience more.
Speaker 3: I think that is the way to do it.
Speaker 4: And when I the last movie I saw in theaters
was Nirvana, the band, the show, the movie, and it
was I had never seen the show before and it
truly was one of those immersive I walked out of
that movie theater and I was just like, I think
that's the best movie I have seen in a long time.
And I think part of it was just that I
was focused. I was just so focused on every I
heard every joke.
Speaker 2: And that's a great example because it's like there's so
many little psych gags and stuff and subtle things in
that like glances at the camera or the background, the
GTA four ad in two thousand and eight, you know,
stuff like that like that, like if you're half paying
attention to be so easy to miss these incredibly good
moments you know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, visual gags are fun.
Speaker 4: I so many people have recommended Smiling Friends to me,
this this animated show, and every time I watch it,
I think I've been distracted. I've usually had my phone
or something, and so every time I've watched it, I
haven't thought it was very funny and the and this
weekend I was like, no phone, watch this fucking show
and determined for yourself if you actually think it's stupid,
because I've tried three times and I don't think it's funny.
You guys, it's funny. I just wasn't paying attention. It's
pretty funny.
Speaker 3: You just have to you have to focus.
Speaker 4: Here's what I would say, you know, like when you
play a game on Steam, it will say that you
bought the game to like confirm and how many hours
you played, to like justify that you're not a piece
of shit. I think that before you review a movie
on Rotten Tomatoes, you should find some kind of proof
that you didn't have your phone near you, because anytime
someone's like I didn't really get three body problem, and
it's like, well, you fucking had six devices, and it
shows right here that a door dash came at two pm,
Like you don't deserve to review this game.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Dan, I think you're being like judicial and how
you're you're acknowledging both sides. But I do have to
say I think it's a fucking plague the way people
watch shit with like three different screens. I also I
resent how it's actually affecting the way people write shows now.
It's like the number of exposition, the repeated exposition in
every episode of a show. I'm like, I fucking remember this.
I just watched it. Like I also just speaking completely anecdotally,
and I'm definitely projecting because I used to my attention
span during like a lot of stuff I watch would
be rough, it'd be short. I find it very very
meditative to just focus on the one thing and then
I get at the end of the day. I'm so
much more mentally fried when I am between like eight
screens at once. And I think that's why, like something
like Sopranos, which the subtext, the subtle character quirks, the
the like web of relationships that you're sort of keeping
track of, that's why there is a meditative aspect to that,
because it does demand your attention in a way. I'm like, Okay,
that's why I love shows like that, The Wire, Sopranos,
mad Men, even what do we watch list year that
I like, I we started, Oh the Marvelous Missus masl
I remember we started it. I'm like, I don't think
I'm wann to like this, And then like the more
I watched them, like, oh shit, this is actually like legit.
Speaker 3: Very good visual gags in that show too.
Speaker 2: You have to yeah, no, yeah, I feel like I've
got the energy of like that David Lynch thing where's
like you're gonna watch a movie on your fucking phone.
Like I see that, and I'm like, yeah, I like
to carry that energy in respect movie.
Speaker 3: That's that's what I'm getting older and older.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we had the email question a few episodes ago.
It's like, what are some things you're like stubbornly old
fashioned about. I think that's just like watch one thing
at a time? Is mine?
Speaker 2: One thousand percent?
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 2: One more quick note on The Sopranos I was thinking
about was that I was watching it and it was
like there's a craft to the way every episode feels
like a little mini movie almost in a way where
it's like an episode will have a theme where it's
like there's the one where it's like Tony is trying
to break out of his normal routine and trying to
hang out with the guys at the country club and
not necessarily mobster guys and stuff like that. In the
same episode, Carmela is kind of like to play the
stock market, like, oh, I've never really done this before,
and like Christopher's trying to write a movie and get
out of the mob, and so Adriana is trying to
do them. Like that is the episode where they're all
trying to kind of like challenge you know, what they
are and who they've their identity has been the whole time,
like and every episode kind of has that almost theme
to it, you know, Like the college episode feels like
like a little kind of mini movie, a self contained thing.
It's that's the same one where Carmelo's with the priest
at home, you know, talking about you know, just the
double life stuff and every Yeah, and it made me
think about like current like I watched Prestige TV and
stuff now, but it's like you watch the stuff that's
big now, like like a Game of Thrones or a
House Dragons or any you know, show like that, it
feels like a long movie. It just feels like a
really long movie with big story points, just kind of
like uh, a flag posted out. But with Sopranos, I
feel like it's got the overarching story. I mean, it
was one of the first serialized big budget shows. I
think OZ might have been the first, you know, the
popularized it. But like it does feel like a bunch
of little movies that have an overarching like the story
I think is. I don't know if I've seen one
that does it as good as as Sopranos.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I'll still throw on just the Pine Barrens
every few months when I'm not even like really watching
the show or I forget the name of the episode.
They go to this lake house at one point and
then Canada happens and stuff like that, and I'm like, Okay, yeah,
that's something I want to watch right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: No it It's also like there's stuff going on in
that show that's telling the story. I don't know, like subtext,
meta text, I don't know. I'll leave that to the
Austin Walkers of the world to explain the the subtle
stuff that's going on beneath the surface. And that show
is so fucking good.
Speaker 2: It's here about the dudes that that like watch cuts
of it that remove all the therapy scenes do oh yeah, yeah,
can you imagine these types of I just want to
see the cool mod I think these girls with like
scarface posters on the.
Speaker 1: Fucking Bill Simmons does that, and like that makes a
lot of sense.
Speaker 2: That is such a critical part of what that show is.
Speaker 1: That's the whole pitch that when he gave the pitch
to Warner Brothers. No, I forget, I don't think it
was Warner Brothers. Whatever, Yeah, Warner Brothers, and he was like,
it's gonna be about a mobster who needs to go
to therapy. That was the elevator pitch. Yeah, yeah, perfect
nuts And yeah, well, Melfie's one of the most important characters.
There's an episode I know, the Employee the Month. I
think that's season two three. That's not an episode I
go back to rewatch often, but one of the best
episodes of TV I've ever seen. You'll know when you
get to it.
Speaker 2: But I'm just glad I'm on I'm talking to adults
here who know when to turn off the goddamn phone.
What I am agreeing with you too, Mary? When you're
doing it. That makes sense too.
Speaker 4: There are times I wasn't paying attention she was on
the TikTok. I was looking at Rotten Tomatoes scores.
Speaker 2: For different Sopranos episodes research for film listen.
Speaker 4: If you guys are going to get really deep into
Sopranos episodes, I am going to look at review scores.
Speaker 1: Dan call me once you finished up Pine Bearns.
Speaker 2: Like the normal Will I will? That's great?
Speaker 1: All right? Uh? Do you want to talk about video games?
Let's do it, all right? I see both of you.
Weirdo has been playing Pocopia. Yeah, that is about it,
because I actually it seems like a game I'd like
a lot. I just have not got around playing it.
Speaker 2: So, Mary, are you a Pokemon person? Like I feel
like this might be the first time we've said Pokemon
on this podcast.
Speaker 3: It's very rare.
Speaker 4: You and I actually have similar alignments on it. But
I will go even riskier and say I'm not I'm
not a dissenter, but I don't play a lot of
Pokemon games. But I also don't like a lot of
those like Nintendo casual games. I was like one of
the few people that just didn't care for animal crossing.
Speaker 2: Which is so odd.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I know, I think it's boring, is my answer.
Speaker 1: You're a Star Dew fan and the game can kind
of limits you what you could do per day.
Speaker 2: Ah, I'm sensing something here. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it's just like I don't like to
be limited and I like to have very clear. Started
was always like, well, you need to get these things
created by the end of the season, you know, and
people are waiting for your crops and there's like a
big festival, and I was like, oh, I have all
these things to do. Animal Crossing it's like whatever, you know, like,
don't worry about it.
Speaker 3: And it's like, what do you want me to fucking do.
I wasn't going to buy this.
Speaker 4: I was not going to buy Pocopia, uh, because everyone's
comparing it to Animal Crossing and I was like, oh,
that's not for me.
Speaker 3: And uh. I saw some funny.
Speaker 4: Like clips and I saw some screen shots that made
me laugh, and I thought to myself, girl, you were
just saying how you need a cozy game.
Speaker 3: You need a cozy game so bad.
Speaker 4: Here it is like, let's just give it a shot.
And I will say, this is a big pill for
me to swallow. This game is seventy dollars, and that's
if you have a switch to. If you don't have
a switch to, this is like six seven hundred dollars.
Speaker 3: Pill to swallow to play this game, and hope you
really like it. I already had a switch too. I
bought it for Mario Kart.
Speaker 4: And because I'm a hardware junkie and I kind of
just wanted the switch to anyway, so I already had it.
So this was just seventy bucks. But seventy bucks is
seventy bucks. I'm happy to report after about eight maybe
nine hours with it, I actually do think it's It's
pretty entertaining, and it solves a lot of the issues
I had with Animal Crossing, not that anybody else had
any issues with that game, but I was satisfied with
the amount of things that they said, we have a
plan for you.
Speaker 3: We want you to accomplish this.
Speaker 4: We need you to solve these puzzles, and we want
you to figure out where these pokemon are. And I
have enjoyed exploring the world and creating environments and then
discovering Pokemon in those environments and you get to ask them.
They're comfort level and they'll be like, I could use
a toy, and it's like, you got it, girl, And
I'll go run and build them a toy and bring
it to them, and they get so excited, very wholesome.
They literally will stop me and just say, hey, I
just want to let you know. I just love hanging
out with you and it's been so awesome being your friend.
Here's ten rocks, and I'm like, girl.
Speaker 3: Thank you, it's.
Speaker 2: I got something. It means the world to me, and
I hope it means the world view. Here's a sturdy stick.
Speaker 4: Yeah, oh, it's like bulbosre. Like they're just like for
these little ding dongs in the grass. Like I don't
think they have really cool stuff to give me, but
I think it's very endearing that they do give me
what they have. And certain pokemon give you different things,
like the bee pokemon will give you honey. This should
shock no one. They each give you different things. The
girder and the ones that are like good builders they
build all the houses. I mean, they're all helpful in
their own ways, and so it is. It is nice
to discern which pokemon are better for which different bene
fits that I need them for.
Speaker 3: But I think you kind of don't use them to
an end.
Speaker 4: You get to to enjoy their company and make them happy.
Speaker 3: It's a kind of a feel good Yeah.
Speaker 2: It's it's cool because it's like I think you touch
on something with like you know, animal crossing is kind
of aimless, you know, where Stardu gives you some direction
where it's like, hey, you need to do this for
the season. We've got this festival coming up, you need
this thing or whatever. And this rides that line really well.
Like if you just want to zone the fuck out,
or like we were talking about earlier, kind of background viewing,
you know, you're kind of watching something you can just
walk around. You can kind of just you know, oh,
I'm going to build a new path to my house,
I'm going to talk some Pokemon whatever. You can just
kind of fuck around and have a good time with it.
Or it's like there are pretty clear objectives where it's like, oh,
we found this weird building on the beach here, and
it's got this weird slot that's asking for like fruits,
and then this thing and then this thing, and there
will be like a progression where it's like oh, this guy,
this Onyx is stuck in this cave. How do we
get him out of here? You know, they like that
was the real objectives, you know.
Speaker 3: Puzzle, and they give you good guidance.
Speaker 4: Lost like a couple of times, but generally speaking, there's
a very clear guy with glasses and it's like, I
don't know what to do, and it's like, maybe I
should ask this obvious professor creature that is seven times
larger than all Pokemon, so you cannot lose him, and
he will tell you what.
Speaker 3: To do next. So the game gives you lots of guidance.
Speaker 2: Have you seen the search feature? This is the thing
I heard a lot of people are missing where it's like,
let's say, you know, you got to find the caterpillar
with the cut of the arms, you know.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, we're going to piss off people because
I don't know that.
Speaker 1: No, no, no, well I'm here.
Speaker 2: Honestly. I think the fact that we're not Pokemon people
and we're liking this game, I think that's that's.
Speaker 1: I'm the most posumount office. I got Bulbasor Planter right
up here.
Speaker 3: Obviously not because you didn't play the game.
Speaker 1: Yeah, very true.
Speaker 2: Actually, let's say fourth, you have to find Bulbasor you
can go find him on your poke deck, so you
can just pause, go to the poke decks, go to him,
and then you press the plus button and activates a
search function, which makes any time you talk to any
other Pokemon, it'll give you an option, and it's like
I'm looking for Bulbasor and it will literally turn the
camera and be like, I think I saw him over there. Wow,
it's an easy way to find any Pokemon.
Speaker 3: I didn't know that that.
Speaker 4: That does make the game a lot easier because I
am constantly looking for the Pokemon that I want. But
the world is very calm, it's very serene, It's very Minecraft.
I think people have said this a lot, but the
game reminds me has a day night cycle just like Minecraft.
Speaker 3: Everything is malleable.
Speaker 4: You can break every every block, every brick, you can
kind of you can rip apart and you kind of
suck it up into your weird diddo form, which I
do want to talk about. And it's a pleasant experience
to be in the world, even if you're lost, even
if you don't know what you're doing. I have been
very happy building things in this space. But but can
we talk a little bit about what a little freak.
Speaker 2: Ditto is, Yeah, it's fucked up.
Speaker 3: It's fucked up.
Speaker 4: We were just talking the other day about how some
of these Nintendo games they have like kind of a
stark past or history, and they're like covering it up.
This is the darkest Pokemon world I've ever heard. Humans
are extinct. Ditto is taking the skin of a human
and then when they make a friend that's a Pokemon,
they steal their their skill by like absorbing their body parts,
and then they can now punch bricks and cut grass.
Speaker 3: But they have these soulless eyes of a doll's and
mimic humans.
Speaker 2: I can till. I can till the soil by turning
my arms into this weird armadillo thing I talked. I
learned how to squirt from this, and so now I
can squirt and that that's like all the dry plants
and stuff.
Speaker 1: What Bonnie Rotten thought you had to squirt? I'm sorry, God,
never mind.
Speaker 2: Louise, I'm talking about Pokemon here, Mike, Yeah, sorry, Your
head butting trees weird, Like.
Speaker 3: Kirby, how you get the apples out of them?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you have, and then it's like you'll get a
bunch of like you know, logs and stuff and dirt
piles and stuff, and you just like Hoover Kirby.
Speaker 4: Suck them up like kind of in a week. And
if you turn the camera around, it's.
Speaker 1: Weird looking sounds like Kirby.
Speaker 4: I like, this is it's very weird all of the
So you'll find pieces of paper notebooks, and it'll be
from humanity, which is gone, and the people.
Speaker 3: Will be like getting a little worried.
Speaker 4: The weather's getting kind of bad, and it's just like
the last diary entry into entries of.
Speaker 3: Dead people.
Speaker 2: Tasty, strange, strange.
Speaker 4: Yeah, everyone said that we need to be careful about
this trash, but I you know, I'm not worried about it.
Speaker 3: Last entry.
Speaker 4: Hey, we should do something about all this trash because
there's a typhoon coming and then there's no more entries. Yeah,
I'm telling you, Nintendo has crossed like a barrier. This
is like they're getting to this point where they're like, actually,
our children are not going to have water. We need
to warn the kids in this Pokemon game that if
they do not take better care of the environment and
they do not give a shit about this planet and
about like the world around them, it won't.
Speaker 3: They won't fucking be here. It's to me.
Speaker 4: I find this game slightly political in a good way,
which is just like, yeah, teach them young that they
have to give a shit or they will die, and
so will the Pokemon.
Speaker 1: Yeah, maybe Procopia will change people's minds, hearts and minds.
Speaker 2: It's going to fix everything, I hope.
Speaker 1: So if you go on the fence.
Speaker 4: It's that's the only part that's not cozy. But I
find it fascinating and interesting that they made such a
strong choice to include the death of humanity and that
Dudo is this like mimic that just has taken over
the skin of a person and makes people think that
there's still humans in the world. And maybe that's for
the comfort of the children that will play this game.
But you are not playing a human child. You are
playing a Pokemon that has disguised itself as a human
to just make you relaxed as you recognize that humanity
has dissolved beneath our feet.
Speaker 3: It's a strange.
Speaker 2: Situation, the midsummer situation. You're wearing the skin of a
human as you go around.
Speaker 4: But pretending and and and absolutely in every way pretending
that you are the Last Person on Earth. It's a
very odd I wonder what's going to happen in this game.
Speaker 1: I haven't.
Speaker 3: I'm not that far in it, but I have. Have
you made it rain yet?
Speaker 4: That's kind of like the Okay, so there's like an Onyx.
You you were eluding. This is the first puzzle the game.
It's the first puzzle in the game. I don't think
it's a huge deal.
Speaker 2: I need to that is My current objective is to
make it right.
Speaker 3: You're current objective.
Speaker 1: You're like eight hours in. How do you not do
the first puzzle.
Speaker 4: Because you you don't breed, you make spaces and get
Pokemon for like at least the first several hours.
Speaker 2: Of learning how to till the soils?
Speaker 1: Yeah's a game from the outset.
Speaker 2: No, it's like, right now, my thing is I need
to put like beans and stuff into this building in
an effort. Got Yeah, I think eventually make it rain.
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Okay, yeah, I generally speaking, yeah, and I don't. I
don't think this is a huge spoiler and you can't
skip ahead or anything like that.
Speaker 3: As far as I'm aware.
Speaker 4: The Onyx is stuck in rocks and the game is like, oh,
if only we could like loosen the soil, and it's like, okay,
we need to make it rain and so and it's
not raining because the weather's fucked up because the goddamn
dead humans have ruined the planet, and and so you're
like figuring out how you're gonna do that. I finally
got that done. It's a really silly and funny sequence.
I laughed out loud multiple times, because you have to
like figure out which Pokemon are the best. You have
to solve their problems, get them to do the things
you need to do to get them to rain. I
was it's a cheeky, funny game. I don't want I
don't want to ruin it for you.
Speaker 2: But writing is funny, Like when you talked, they all
have their own personalities. The writing and the localization is
really good. I'm finding myself like I've always like the
Pokemon designs and stuff, and like that's it seems like
there's a really cool variety. I like the way they
look and stuff, but like I feel like talking to
them in this game. It's like endearing these Pokemon to me.
It's like I like's the first.
Speaker 4: Time Pokemon have talked like people like Mike. You can
correct me if I'm wrong, But I believe Pokemon say
like Jarmander, and this is like the first time that
Charmander has like a voice and says how he feels
about the world and the things around him. And they
have personalities. Some of them are shy, some of them
are cheeky, some of them are like funny.
Speaker 3: But they speak words they are they are talking.
Speaker 1: It's usually you're usually a human speaking to them, which
is why I think they just don't make sense to you.
Speaker 2: Inst ghetto like yeah yeah.
Speaker 3: And they like try and use their the.
Speaker 4: Tone this time, they use the tone in their voice
to like guide you into how they're feeling. But in
this game, they just literally say like I love this house.
And so I'll be like, do you want to live here?
And they'll be like me and it's like, yes, I
saw you say I love this house like eight times.
I know you want to move in. You can have
this house if it means that much to you. But
like to your point with how they're giving them character,
Charmander in my game threw up and it had a
little voice and it just it said I threw up,
like f r e W, I threw up.
Speaker 1: It's very cute because he's the first evolution. He's a baby.
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 4: I mean, I just think it's sweet enough that in
the translations they were like, he doesn't say throw up.
He says I threw up but a lot, which is
like not a normal term that you would say. And
I'm surprised again in the translations that they were like,
it's you want to call him bud. It's like, but
it's short for buddy, which is kind of like a friend.
And it's just like they're using slang that works. Oh
one of them. If you ask them to join you,
they go just me and my bestie hanging out for
an adventure, like they like they knew that to use
the word bestie.
Speaker 3: It's cute.
Speaker 2: And then like you'll see like hitman Chan is like
up against the heavy bag, like just going nuts on it,
and you'll talk to him and he'll teach you. And
then you have boxing gloves that you can switch to
and that is how you kind of deform the environment.
And Mary, have you done the thing? Have you done
mouse mode on this? Uh? Like when you break the
joy cons off and you use them as a mouse.
Speaker 3: No, I haven't done that.
Speaker 2: So it's cool because like when you're breaking down like
let's say a big hill or something like that, you
can there's like a little dotted, you know, outline and
so you know which thing you're going to break down
or whatever. Yes, and you can look up and look
down with the right sticking. Like that's good for basic stuff.
But if you need to do like intensive stuff and
that goes for decorating as well, like your house and
things like that, you can so easily break off that
right joycon and it goes into mouse mode and then
you just are moving this cursor around and deciding like, oh,
that's what I'm punching, that's what I'm punching, that's where
I'm placing this thing, like just makes it a little
more you know, minute adjustments and stuff interesting.
Speaker 3: I do.
Speaker 4: I like that decorating is not, at least at this point,
it's just a heavy ask. It's more like build spaces
and things that your pokemon need. Yeah, but you can
tell that they're eluding that you're going to be able
to build some really cool Minecraft adjacent shit because you
keep stumbling across half broken like a quarter of a house,
and you'll find items and instinctively all players will be
like I'm taking these windows and this bed and this
dresser because this is good stuff.
Speaker 1: For my house.
Speaker 3: And so I'm like acquiring.
Speaker 4: I'm stealing and pilfering from every house that I find
because I want all these items in my house, which
I haven't built yet, but like I'm preparing myself for
like all of the cool items that I'm going to
put in my sick ass space.
Speaker 2: I have like three security cameras now, and I'm like,
what am I doing with the What do I need
a security camera for that? Like it says like in
the menu, you can go and like watch what's happening,
like you can watch.
Speaker 4: Your Pokemon, but it doesn't work yet. So I I travel.
I'm not here yet in the game, so I don't
know what happens. But when I first learned to dig
through tunnels, I decided to dig through a mountain I
because I can and I wanted to, And so I
dug through an entire mountain too, an entire different area.
Speaker 3: Have you tried to do this?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 3: And I got to a.
Speaker 4: New area and I don't think I'm supposed to be
there yet, and there's like lights and stuff, none of
them are on electricity is.
Speaker 2: Totally common because I've just seen the like mushroom lights
and stuff like that so far.
Speaker 4: I know, I think there's like a whole other world
of this game that we don't.
Speaker 2: Know about yet.
Speaker 1: Well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and another thing we didn't touch on is I
think it's really cool the way that like it'll give
you the habitat info where it's like, oh, a Pokemon
might show up if there were four flower patches on
a beach next to water, or if there is a
log seat here and then like a first aid kit
next to it, it might attract a certain Pokemon. So
like by the wall grass.
Speaker 3: On a mountain might attract this certain creature.
Speaker 4: And it gives you a stilhouette, which is very funny
because that's very that who's that Pokemon?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like they just seem to really know what they're
doing here. Like I can't imagine being someone who grew
up with Pokemon and having such a because I don't
have an attachment to these characters, and I still find
it so endearing. So it's gotta be so fun for
Pokemon fans, Like I think this is a really really
cool project.
Speaker 4: I recommend this as an easy wreck for Pokemon fans,
but I would even go beyond that and say, even
if that's not something that you grew up with, I'm
finding this to be a very comforting, very enjoyable, very cheeky,
funny game that I could easily spend. I'm gonna probably
spend a lot of hours in this. It's a huge world,
and I don't even think I've scratched the surface of
this game, not including the fact that, like probably once
you're done with the game, you can just build shit
like you can in Minecraft.
Speaker 3: So I believe it's just going to.
Speaker 2: Be endless, and I'm not in a rush. I think
it's gonna be an easy one to just like pick
up on a plane six months from now and come
right back to it. You did mention it's seventy dollars,
or it could be over one hundred and twenty dollars
if you were my sister Kayla, because she buys things physically.
She went to GameStop Lovely Corporation. We Assault of the Earth.
We all love.
Speaker 3: Gamesh Oh they're doing so well.
Speaker 2: Oh they're just the best, oh, the best readership and
everything always been great. And she went there and they're like, oh, hey,
you can't. She was on a stream when I heard
the story. She goes, I didn't know you had to
buy like a little micro chippy thing to play this,
And me and everyone in her chat were like, what
did they tell you? And she was like, oh, something
about like the GameCube, and we're like that doesn't sound
right well, And then it turns out what she was
saying was that they pointed at the bottom of the
case and it says game key card and they said, oh,
this means you need to buy this, and they sold
her a fifty dollars microSD card and said she couldn't
play the game without it, so her, not knowing any better,
bought that brought it home. Mentioned that on stream about like, oh,
that's where do you got to buy this microchip? Like
you need to go in there tomorrow, and like she
went in there.
Speaker 1: Get the store number. Manager.
Speaker 2: I mean I I was ready to go nuclear with
it if I needed to, but like the manager was,
I can't return it. It's opened. And then she explained
what happened and they gave a refund. But then she
left the store and she saw in the parking lot
the guy who lied to her was sitting in his
car eating ice cream and she just drove up in
front of him, flipped him off and just like piled out.
Speaker 1: Yeah fuck yeah what kind of car, Like.
Speaker 4: A yeah yeah, all that SD money, he's killing it.
Speaker 1: He's probably fifty dollars ice cream with that ship.
Speaker 4: When parents are buying those like uh fiber cables that
are like the fastest Ethernet cables alive, and it's just
a it's just one hundred dollars Ethernet cable.
Speaker 2: That's one hundred dollars on ANTMI cable. When I got
my PS three and I didn't really know HTMI stuff
at all, they're like, you need to get this monster cable.
There's no point in having a PS three if you're
gonna have the like shitty built in cables that come
with it. And I bought it one hundred dollars, thing
like yeah, yeah, it's like it's easy. It's I mean,
Kayla is someone who plays video games all the time,
but she's not like a tech minded person. I grew
up playing every fucking video game and I bought the
PS three and like, I don't know TV tech at
the time, and HG stuff was new to me. You know,
do you think this.
Speaker 4: Will change her mind about buying physical or do you
think she's still adamant about buying fit. I will say,
I'll acknowledge, like there is something nice about physical copy
right that makes you feel like I'll be able to
play this even in an apocalyptic scenario.
Speaker 2: But I think for her it's more she does like
owning the physical thing, and also she tends to just
kind of help afford future games and stuff to be
able to trade it in. So she'll buy a game,
beat it quickly, return at the game stop, and put
it towards the neck, which is how I always did
it growing up. You know, although I wonder if you
can do it with that game key card shit with switch.
I don't know if she knows about that or if
that even works.
Speaker 4: Like, yeah, they're getting wise to that as well. They
probably I don't want you returning the game.
Speaker 2: Oh they never liked the used game market. I mean
fact that was the Xbox One's whole thing. A but
like not allowing used games originally, and you know, like
that's it's never been good.
Speaker 3: For them because they well for them.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, Xbox has only been on the up and
up since the Xbox One.
Speaker 1: Up and up. All right, I do want to play Popia,
but uh, let's also talk about Dan. You played Marathon.
Speaker 2: I did.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is another big one.
Speaker 2: It's an interesting one. I yeah, I probably I'm level
like eight or nine or something in it right now?
Speaker 1: There are signal progress.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Mike, You're probably way more experienced in extraction shooters
than me, right because I've only played.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I played Escape from Tarkov, our creators this, Uh,
played the Hunt showdown for work we we. I also
like played a lot I wouldn't have otherwise, But I
would say.
Speaker 2: Do you like Do you like them in general? Yeah?
Speaker 1: I like the idea of many of them more than
I like the actual games. But I do like Tarkov
quite a bit. I think there's some quality of life
stuff that Marathon could be learning from other games that
it doesn't have at the moment. But I've played a
lot of Marathon. At this point, we can get into
my new show. But I'm curious Dan, how you feel
about the game in general.
Speaker 2: I think it looks incredible. I think the art design
is one of the coolest I've seen in an FBS.
I do think maybe it's just me being old or whatever,
but like I would have. I would like this so
much more. I'd be so much more excited if it
was like I want a campaign with this Bunge campaigns
can be very very good historically, and it's just some
more standard death match moms. Like I don't I've played
enough extraction now. And granted there's this art creators in this,
but I put a good amount of time into both that, Like,
I don't know if this genre is for me. I
like the idea, like you said, Mike, but I've never
felt like I need I've had a valuable thing that
I need to extract with It's always just been a
collection of like, well, this thing of duct tape is rare,
so I better bring it back, you know, where it's like, oh,
I got to bring this seed to my rooster. So
does something and unlocks the new menu or whatever. Like
I never like the part in between where it's just
I'm just like looking at a giant grid of shit
and I'm trying to parse out what matters, what I sell,
what goes towards something. I do think Marathon does a
good job of, like the faction contract stuff that is
a pretty clear readable like Okay, this is like these
are skill trees. These are I'm accepting a thing at
a time, and I know when I go in, this
is going to be the thing I'm going for. It's
almost like in Fortnite, like you're not going to go
in and win every time, but like you're going to
go in like accomplish a couple quests, like oh, I'm
going to do a couple of weeklies or whatever, so
even if you don't win, you accomplish something where it's
like Arc Raiders, and you know, I don't think that's
always the case. So I like doing the faction stuff
and leveling up the factions and getting the new rewards
and you know, the skill tree stuff. That's cool, but
like all this stuff just feels like junk to me.
It's like, here's a bunch of m O. I feel
like I'm just doing inventory management as a huge part
of these games, and that's the part that I don't
have fun with, and it's why I don't see myself
playing them for long. I just I would of a
campaign and give me some death match mode, some objective
base modes, and then I can ignore the attraction stuff,
you know, and that's just not what this is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, one of the game's weaknesses i'd say is they
throw a lot of junk. I would say Arc Graders
does this too, but Marathon to even more egregious extent,
they throw a lot of junk at you. You play like,
you play a lot of this game, and you start
to realize what items are valuable for what purpose, and
you realize like, oh, this is actually really good to
have to upgrade Seca Gucci once you get to a
certain point in their progression tree. Completing contracts is not enough.
You actually need the credits plus these rare items that
are basically trade in items to get that skill you
want from Seca Gucci. The game could do a much, much,
much better job of conveying the value of those items
early on. I also don't even think they should be
dropping those items early on when those are like level
thirty things you should be worrying about.
Speaker 2: I could have put these things up and had no
fucking idea it. Yeah, yeah, I just I don't know. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I also think like the UI could do some work
in terms of when you really break down the inventory,
it actually does fall neatly into categories of Okay, these
are just basically automatic cells for credits.
Speaker 2: That's nice. I like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, these are these are biomass stuff that you turn
into this faction. These are more like robotic things you
turn into this faction. I just don't think the game
does a good enough job of conveying that in the UI,
because it can't get pretty cluttered. I do think the game.
I love the game's design. I love it's our direction.
It's such a weird like nineteen nineties doss meats graphic designers,
fever dream meats, primary colors splashed in the most compelling ways.
Speaker 2: It's with the hylastopian corporate stuff, like you know when
I unlock, like the newcloric stuff and seeing like there
is a reel of weird artificial plants they're making in
food and just the way they talk about it in
this really kind of cold product kind of way.
Speaker 1: Tis Trasis is like a death stranding, like she's connected
to this digital line in via umbilical cord. Did you
get unlocked them yet?
Speaker 2: No? I mean, I've just stuff. I'm like, I'm curious
about this, Like it's all seems very cool.
Speaker 1: Honestly, Like I spend a decent amount of time with
the they called a codex or whatever. It is like
reading the laura of the game is really cool. It's
like the art direction and the vibes of the game
were so potent that they push me to actually read
laura bits, which I never fucking do. But going back
to the inventory, it's like, you play that game long enough,
and I took it for granted that I played Tarkov
enough that I just know what everything is. I forgot
what it's like to jump into an extraction shooter fresh
and trying to figure that out. None of that is
even acknowledging the fact that most of the time you're
first seeing these items is in a chest, often when
there's AI lurking around, or maybe you're in a PvP firefight,
so you just kind of grab shit. You don't have
the time to read what it is, what it's what
its purpose is when you're in the open world. So
going back to base, all of a sudden, Yeah, to
your point, you just have this wilt of different items
that you have to like parse through. So they could
definitely do a better job upfront. And also you mentioned
the contracts. How many times I've spawned into a map,
whether it's perimeter or dire marsh or outpost, and I'm like, okay,
I've got this seca Gucci contract and they want me
to go gather this from Relay A, and then I
need to bring that data to Relay B and then
kill the commander that it summons. Oftentimes you spawn across
the map where from where that objective A is, in
which case I get it. To your point, you're not
going to have a successful run every time. The point
of this genre is to really impart that sense of
risk reward. But to your point A, early on, you're
not getting items that are just compelling on in their
surface value unless you know the rules of the game,
which you don't because you've been playing for three hours,
So you're not really getting that risk reward like oh fuck,
should I stick around or should I go try to
get one more biomass sell? But also if you spot
on the wrong side of the map, which is are,
it's it's all RNG the game. You can't control where
you're spawning. It's holy shit, I have to track across
all of perimeter. I just want to function to equip
a second contract, that's all. Just if you could equip
two contracts, that would solve the problem. Sure, you would
still get drops where okay, both objectives around the other
side of the map. I just want options because if
that happens, if you're playing with a full fire team
of three or solo, And to be clear, I actually
like this game better solo weirdly enough, but it's it's
still good in terms of a.
Speaker 2: Fire play by the rook or you're just going in
like I use.
Speaker 1: Recon, I use Assassin and solo and then yeah, I
don't I turn off crew phill. It makes it much
more tense in its own way, Like dire Marsh becomes
much more fun because as opposed to perimeter, which is
very much like varying elevations and verticality and those canyons
you're going between and the like, some really fun firefights
can break out in those canyons. Dire Marsh to me,
is more about concealment, where when you're solo, it's much
more tense to actually be crouching through high grass and
moving between outposts. It's just a much more immersive experience.
It feels almost like death stranding levels of kind of
slower pacing. I just wish I could equip two contracts
so that if I'm playing by myself, I don't have
to trek across the map to get to objective A
likely and a lot of these objectives, like Tarkov has
these infamous objectives missions early on, where it's like they
know that all the rookies playing the game are gonna
go do this loot recovery at this one specific truck,
so they'll camp that truck for easy kills. This game
at least gives you options for missions, so not everybody
playing the game the first week is converging on that one.
There's still a lot of people going to that same outpost, though,
So if I'm playing solo, it's much more fun for
me to get up to the outpost, kind of like
do a little bit of reco wait on the outside
for the both the gunshots to subside, get in there,
and then it becomes much more tense because I know
what I'm trying to do and I know that I
could easily be outnumbered, and then that lends a bit
of tension to the otherwise style experience of trekking across
the map. But had the second objective, I could go
right to perimeter wall or whatever and do that and
get out. It would still be successful outside of that though,
And I think this game is definitely leaning towards the
people who do enjoy PvP because I do encounter other players,
and unlike Arc Raiders, proximity chat is not super encouraged here.
Speaker 2: No, that's the things like that was the gimmick with
Arc Raiders that I think a lot of people are like, Wow,
what a fun new feeling here is that prox chat
and this and like this, It's just not like it's
there that features. Yeah, Like it's not at all. They're like,
are you cool? Are you cool? Like are we going
to work together? Like none of that happens.
Speaker 1: The time I know, the time to kill us too
fast in Marathon also is built like a much faster
paced game, so I think people feel compelled to kill
everything they see on site. And thirdly, Art Greater is
a thing that people don't always talk about. It doesn't
just encourage cooperation, and the fact that it has proximity chat,
many of the enemies are too difficult for just one
team to take down by themselves. So yeah, yeah, yeah,
Marathon it's like it's occasionally I'll come into these commanders
they're called, or the cloaking enemies, but you could still
take them out even in solo. I'm fine with them.
There's no there's nothing in the world really encouraging you
to team up with other players. In fact, Seca Gucci,
one of the factions their entire the first like mainline
quest for them is telling you to kill other players.
So there's a lot of impetus in this game, in
the very design that Bunge's put in place to kill
other players on site. In fact, I don't I don't
know what the proximity chat is for when the rest
of the game is like strictly pushing you toward killing
other players.
Speaker 3: Yeah, shoot first, ask questions like, yeah.
Speaker 2: A single one of those merry where it's like the
Arc Raiders things where the prox chat, Like, I've never
had an encounter where we're talking back and forth, even
talking really not saying I haven't had a good one
a bad one. I'm saying I have not had a
single time where it's like, well, hey, what's your deal there?
Like where Arc Raiders. I feel like pretty much every
time there's.
Speaker 4: A little and it's so cheeky and funny, like it's
really I think it's kind of one of the humorous
parts of that game is that it's a serious situation
and someone's running by being.
Speaker 3: Like those guys are bad, those are and you like
hear them saying things to each other.
Speaker 4: It adds like a lightness, you know, a little bit
of a joke to what's going on? Is this game
like just straight up serious solo shoot?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, there's nothing funny about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's nothing funny about it.
Speaker 2: You were talking any game.
Speaker 3: Bonk likes to play Arc Greader solo.
Speaker 4: Do you think she would like to play Marathon because
it could be played more solo?
Speaker 2: Hard to say, and she's kind of moved on from
ourc Raiders right now. So yeah.
Speaker 1: It's also the fact that, like it's funny because Marathon
when it is like firing on all cylinders. I like
the game quite a bit. Like there's missions later on
in certain factions' main quest lines where it starts to
congeal what you're chasing in each contract or in each
faction's ecosystem. You start to learn what individual items are for,
you start to learn the strengths and weaknesses of the
eighteen different weapons whatever it is something like that. But
even before that, there's times when I'm on dire marsh
and I'm like, okay, it's a three part mission. I
need to go to this place and I need to
download this satellite data and then a drop ship's gonna
come in. Then I gotta jump on top of it
and plant some C four on top of it. Blow
that up. That's gonna piss this commander off. He's gonna
come out of hiding. I gotta kill him. And sometimes
that's with a fire team, and I'm playing with two
people that I know well, and the game does encourage
It's difficult enough where it encourages cooperation. The fact that
not even to mention the fact that another team could
come ambush us, which makes it all the more tense
in some situations. But like there's times when everything in
this game coalesces and it's extremely fun and there is tension,
there is a risk reward factor. We'll be like, Okay,
how are your inventories looking. I just found a purple backpack.
Holy shit, I have like sixteen more slots I can fill. Now,
let's get out of here. I have awesome stuff. We
didn't even completely objective, but we have inventory that we
understand and we know how valuable it is. So it
makes the situation all that more intense because you really
want to fucking get out. And then you see that
it's a guarded x fill, so we got to fight AI.
But it's also the last one remaining with four minutes
left in this match, so there might be a team
or two that we're going to run into. So then
it becomes the rules of the game. Once the player
understands them, they can then kind of understand how tense
things really are. The problem is, I don't think the
game does the best job of onboarding you and teaching
you what things are for and how the stakes can
raise from that ecosystem. But it's like, just like Destiny,
it feels great, Like it's a good feeling shooter. Bungee
doesn't make anything else really like.
Speaker 2: And I think that's part of what like I don't
like is that, man, it's so good, it looks so
good and it feels so good. The gunplay is that
kind of classic Bungee, like, man, nobody's really doing it
quite like them, and that like there's almost this wistfulness
for like, ooh, but what if they had a campaign
and that looked and felt like this, you know, and
like that's my overwhelming feeling with this game is like,
there's so much good here. I wish they put it
in a form factor that.
Speaker 1: I like, you know, yeah for sure. And I also
think it had the same has the same problem that
the First Destiny had when it came out. It's like,
there are cool ideas here, but there's also just not
that much content, not a ton of longevity. There's four
maps three four the Perimeter dire marsh Outpost, and there's
one coming yeah, yeah, some stuff coming down the road,
and it's just I just wish, yeah, I wish they're
working on the onboarding. I saw today they added today
or yesterday I saw they added increasing the amount of
AMMO lying around the world and that enemies drop, and
I think they're lowering the health of the AI enemies
the UEESC. I think people are having problems with the
Ammo retention early on, and also Ammo's expensive. If you
don't find in the world, you have to buy it,
and that's another part of the loop that I wish
I knew earlier on was that important was like you
should be getting the upgrades in the factions that unlock
items for free in the shop, so you sign on
daily and you get a ton of free shit. I
didn't know that when I was like my friend gues.
Speaker 4: That's like the trick with R graders as well, which
is you always use the free kit, but you might
be tempted, especially as a young player, to be like, well,
I just got this sick new gun, I'll bring it
with me, and then you die and you lose your
precious gun. Yeah, and that's really defeating for an early player.
So it's important to have that info if you're gonna
give it a try.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. But yeah, all which is to say,
it's like, there's some really cool stuff here, not without
its flaws, for sure. I just I think it would
hook more people early on if they paved over some
onboarding obstacles and then it's a lot.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like I imagine, like you know, first person shooters
and online multiplayer first person shooters have historically been one that, like,
you know, Halo was you know, a hardcore you know
gamers and stuff would love it. But also people that
buy two games a year loved Halo, and I can't
imagine if you're one of those gamers that buys like
GTA every ten years and Madden every couple of years
and then you get this. It's just speaking a language
that like, I play video games for living and I
my head is spinning when it's like this is starting up,
and I'm like, wait, what what is this? What do
I need? Like I cannot imagine being like a more
casual gamer and loading this up and being like, what
even is this? This is why the Halo guys, what
the fuck is this? Yeah?
Speaker 1: No, game is a kind of needs to be a commitment,
and a lot of people hear that and they get excited.
A lot of people hear that and they're like, ah,
I think, yeah, yeah, no, fair enough. I uh, I
just I you know, I was I've been playing with
people and I and I know extraction shooters enough to
sort of see through the matrix with some parts early on.
I do think because it's Bungee, because they're making a
very good looking game that's absolutely going to attract people
that don't really know extraction shooters, I do think there's
still more work to be done on the front end
to ease their transition into this very very punishing world. Sure, yeah,
but uh, Mary, what is a big walk similar to
a marathon? It is?
Speaker 3: This is a great Now.
Speaker 2: That's that's a host. God fuck, I'm so good that, Jane.
Speaker 4: We don't traditionally cover games in early access or like
demos and things like that, so this is a different
one for me. And I will preface it with like,
this game isn't out yet, I haven't played this full thing,
but this is from the people who made untitled Goose game,
which I adored that game and I like that game studio,
and they just.
Speaker 3: So happen to have a playable.
Speaker 4: Experience in Portland and invited me to go play this
game for an hour with three of my friends.
Speaker 3: And I was like, oh, I should do this. It's
a cool experience.
Speaker 1: Once again, I didn't get an invite.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's in Portland.
Speaker 4: I mean it's very It's not often that Portland gets
a sick game demo.
Speaker 3: I was like, this is so cool and this never
happens here.
Speaker 2: I mean they did it online too, we did it
with Giant Bomb, but you know, it's.
Speaker 3: The in person experience is unbelievable.
Speaker 1: Though.
Speaker 4: The in person experience was really cool and you'll never
be able to have the joy that I had with it.
Speaker 1: I'm drinking gin from Portland right now.
Speaker 4: They did a lot of cool stuff, but that's not
what I'll talk about because I don't care at it. Oh,
I do want to hear about this.
Speaker 1: Gin though Freeland. Freeland spirits shaped like a tear drop.
You can get a green bottle of forest gin. It's
really good.
Speaker 2: They're going to balance that on a shelf.
Speaker 1: It's like the wide spots at the bottom.
Speaker 2: Oh they got flat stuff.
Speaker 3: Ye kind of vessel anyway.
Speaker 4: A Big Walk is a multiplayer game that you would
play online with other people. You kind of look like ants,
but I don't think you're You're a nondescript.
Speaker 2: Look like the birds with the what the Homer when
the Big Homer episode?
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, the ones that with the bobble and they.
Speaker 1: Did yeah yeah, yeah Yeah.
Speaker 4: They kind of look like that, and it has it
has proximity chats, so your idea is to kind of
find them. I find this game very sweet and endearing,
where at least the component that I played was about
an hour.
Speaker 3: They don't really tell you what to do or how
to do it. They just drop you off.
Speaker 4: And so when we eventually found each other and we
played around in this world, we had to.
Speaker 3: Figure out what to do.
Speaker 4: You go out into this grassy world, and you kind
of naturally learn over time that you can do fun
things like stand on each other's shoulders. You'll come across
these structures where there's a very obvious button, but it's
too tall for you to you know, push.
Speaker 3: The button on your own, and so you do.
Speaker 4: Eventually, you know, recognize you need to pick each other
up and help each other achieve these goals, these very
loose puzzles in this type of game, Unlike so many
of these games like Peak, which I also like, there's
no hunger, there's no stamina, there's no death, there's no enemies.
This is very lighthearted, casual fun that you could play
with a true gamer friend. I think you could also
play this with a kid, not too young, but I
think you could play this with like a ten year
old and they would figure it.
Speaker 2: Out and like cooperative puzzle solving.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's it's really enjoyable, and I thought it was
a thoughtful little romp.
Speaker 3: What I also really liked about it.
Speaker 4: Was after we had solved some puzzles and we were
just walking around.
Speaker 3: This game does have day night cycles.
Speaker 4: The path diverged left and right, and we decided to
go right and it was just a nice ocean view
with the sun rising, and we sat there and we
watched the sunrise together as the four of us, and
we talked about, you know, our favorite moments in gaming,
and we just kind of bonded for a little bit.
And I was like, I don't know the last time
I've ever had a moment like that with friends and
games because I'm always so worried about dying.
Speaker 3: In this type of game.
Speaker 4: Because it's so chill, you can take the time to
just hey, oh, you saw painting, and you notice that
you could paint each other's bodies. You could just do
that for twenty minutes if you wanted to without ever
worrying about time.
Speaker 2: I think that's really cool because like you are starting
to see more like I don't want to say, like
all in the friends slop genre or whatever. That is
such a specific thing, you know, and that makes me
think of Rebo and Peek and stuff, but like they're
games like a sledding game. Have you heard of this?
Speaker 3: I haven't played that, but we played.
Speaker 2: It recently and it is very much a like multiplayer
hangout thing where it's like a little dart games and stuff,
or you can go sledding. You can do a little race,
you can go hang out here, or you can just
kind of sit by the fire and talk proc chat
and stuff like that. So like, I think it's really
cool that games are doing that now, but I've mainly
seen ones like sledding game and there's another one that
I'm blinking on, but like where it is just about
hanging out with no objective, whereas like Big Walk is
one of the first ones I've seen where we we
Jeff Packler did the preview event thing and we talked
over his his footage of it, and it looks awesome
and it looks like you can get that sense of
like you sitting around with your friends talking about gaming
memories by the fire or watching a sunset or something.
But then you can see like a weird playground looking
thing with a bunch of buttons and keys over here,
and you can go like, oh, there's something to do here.
Speaker 4: There's there's a puzzle this going on. Yeah, there's some
kind of it's all visual. There's no text on anything.
It doesn't say like.
Speaker 3: Find the three heads to you know, to get the mystery.
No one of it is explained. It's all visual.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I speaking of visual I love the look
of it. I think, like you talked about the things
just looking like these these kind of weird, almost cartoony
trash figures. But then it's also set across like fairly
realistic looking art style like hills and mountains and rivers
and sunsets and things like that. So it's just got
this really peaceful vibe to it. And it's got the
prox chat thing where you got got like a little
beak basically that's come when you talk. Yeah, I've saw
some stuff where it's like there was like you had
to stay on this one button and then you had
to send someone like way across this chasm to the
other and you're like looking through like binoculars and you
can't talk to them because they're so far away, but
like you seem like, yeah, he's over there, he's about
to get to the thing. Like. It makes me very,
very interested in that game. It seems like a great
mix of just like fun goofy friends slop esque Proxchat shenanigans,
and also like, hey, there's some puzzles to solve here,
And I think it's interesting that every puzzle I heard
can go up to four players. So let's say you're
playing with four people. There will be four buttons, four
keys that need to be manipulated, and you can add more.
I can't remember. It goes up to eight or twelve
or something like that.
Speaker 3: A certain amount. I think it might be twelve, but
the puzzle maxes.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so you so what's neat about is you could
have someone who's like you could like have again, you
could have like your ten year old nephew join and
maybe he's stupid, like a real stupid kid, but he
can sit with you and you can solve the puzzles
without yelling at him to.
Speaker 3: Like pick up the thing. You can do it to like,
you could just hang out.
Speaker 2: It's not like like a portal co op thing where
it's like both parties need to be fucking you have
to be.
Speaker 4: Functional, and it takes to play that with another person.
In this game, a real ding dong can just hang
out with you. They can even probably kind of mess
you up and mess with you a little bit and
you'd still be able to get through it.
Speaker 2: That's a good point that, like, yeah, if the Caps
had a four puzzle, wise you can have four like
adult friends that are going to like do the puzzles
and then like somebody could literally just be hanging out
or like, hey, buddy, why don't you go you go
watch us from over here and you tell us, you know,
if you see this thing light up or whatever, but like, well, tell.
Speaker 4: Me about your day, because I don't see you enough,
and I like you. I'm actually playing this puzzle with
my friends, but like ump, jump in and join us
and just in, you.
Speaker 2: Know, not to hurt anything. Yeah, I think this has
the potential to be a very special one, Like I
really do. Like I kind of don't like the friend
slop term necessarily since it does seem to kind of
like it seems insulting almost in a way. It was
the word slop for what it's worth.
Speaker 1: I do think it's going the route of walking simulators,
which made themselves at first word derogatory, but then they
embraced it, much like punk rock was derogatory and they
embraced it. So I do think friend slop is kind
of becoming part of the vernacular.
Speaker 2: And for the record, like friend slop stuff like pure
ass friend slop Repo and Lethal Company and all that shit.
I like that stuff. I think that's fine. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
I think this seems like a meaningful evolution of that
where it has kind of the hallmarks of it with
the prox chat and the silly stuff and everything, but
like it seems like it's going to have an interesting,
like larger kind of object within it. You know, I'm
very excited about this.
Speaker 4: You can see where it's going. So originally, when we
do it, you get nothing. You have nothing in your hand.
You get a light that you can like turn on
and off, which you need sometimes when it's really dark
and you can't see. But towards the end, we were
like stumbling across like a whiteboard where you could like
write on the board and lift it above your head,
and so I could be like, imagine a world where
prox chat exists, Right, I can't yell at you Dan
at the other end of the chasm where I should
be my dick. I would write that on a I
would write that on a whiteboard above my head, and
you would be able to read it and then and
then react to it. So it's like different methods of
communication from a whiteboard to maybe a walkie talkie, uh,
maybe a speaker that only goes one way. And so
they're toying with the ways you can talk to each other.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and just like the hands going up and down,
like doing like you know, air traffic control type stuff.
Speaker 4: I was doing all sorts of hand signals. I was,
you know, anything I could do there.
Speaker 3: You're you have like little ball fists, so you can't
like do obscene gestures. But I think you can make
it out.
Speaker 4: I think you could expect you could kind of put
two and two together.
Speaker 2: This seems like one that we need to make sure
to get us and Jake together and play some of
this this.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think, Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 2: I'm excited definitely.
Speaker 3: Mike.
Speaker 4: I gotta ask you, because everybody's talking about this game.
Speaker 3: You're playing Slay This Fire too.
Speaker 2: Mm hmmm.
Speaker 1: Pretty hooked on it. I started it, got an early
access on Sunday, meant to play just a couple hours.
Check it out, talk about it tonight on the show.
I think I'm on like twelve hours now. I like
it quite a bit. It's funny. I don't think it's
doing it's not doing anything majorly new since the first
game or since any other you know, like the first
game wasn't the first deck builder RPG. But I do
think it helped popularize it. Now that I'm playing the
second game, like people are saying, Okay, what's like the
main new thing with the first is like it's almost
like Haites two. It's just like every little thing feels
like a refinement of the first game. I will also
say I think this game is really good at giving
you several paths you can go down. You get the epochs.
You can unlock new characters or unlock new items by
completing these specific objectives like defeat the first two bosses
with the Silenced, or defeat the first boss with Ironclad,
or get this many kills in one run with the Regent.
I only have three characters right now, but yeah, it's
it's incredible. It's extremely sleek. I'm unlocking new cards at
a pace that's on par with like Blatro. I feel
like I'm starting to feel like I'm mastering a character,
and then all of a sudden, they throw three new
cards at me, or a new enemy that's doing something
I've never seen an enemy do, or a mechanic is introduced,
like okay, I get what thorns do. Then they're like,
oh shit, what do what are automatons? What's that? Effect,
and then I'll of a sudden, I have to account
for that when I'm building a deck with a character,
because I know I'm going through an area with them.
I just finally, I just did my second run through
the Deep Well I think it's called, which is like
all like the Sewers of the Spire, and that's a
lot of weird, fucked up aquatic enemies. And the game's
also incredible in the way that I will fall. I
will start falling into comfortable habits with the silence. It's
the dual Dagger it was in the first game. It's
a dual dagger deer mask poison based class. And I'm like, okay, cool,
I can just keep building around these shives, which you
play a card like. I barely remember any of their names,
but it's like you play a card that Okay, I
apply eight block to my character and then I'm gonna
draw a shive, and then I'm gonna play another card
where it's like, okay, draw four shives. And also every
shive does double the damage. Shives are amazing because they
do not cost any action points energy in this game.
So all of a sudden, I have nine shives in
my hand. And I could play them all for free
and they're doing double damage. I'm like, okay, shives are
the way to go with this character. Then all of
a sudden you're encountering enemies that put this effect called
ringing on you. They basically like audio stun you, so
you can only play one card in a hand. And
I'm like, well, fuck, shives won't help me because I
can't throw like eight of them at them. Similar to
how you'll get a what's it called a boss? What
are the boss is called? In Bilatro? Uh?
Speaker 2: No, jokers? Are the fucking I think they're called bosses?
Aren't the boss? Or like they were a blind?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Blind?
Speaker 3: I think, I don't know you think they have blind but.
Speaker 1: You'll you'll think you're gonna have a successful run no
matter what. You're like, I can't see anybody beating me.
And then all of a sudden you get to the
blind or the boss in this game, one of the
first two. Well I've only ever beat two bosses so far.
It's like, well fuck, their entire m O completely contradicts
what I've built and I had no idea this was
going to happen, and like it's the game is still
good about giving you a enough experience and unlocks after
those runs where it doesn't feel unfair, but it still
is very good at keeping you on your toes. And
it is a game in which you can easily fall
into comfortable habits with different characters, but again introduces new
cards that kind of unlock a new dimension to each
of these characters, and introduces enemies that counter all these dimensions.
That it does make you actively think as you're playing.
It's really good. I also say, like of any deck
builder I've ever played that has combat involved, so Billatro
not really but sort of. I've thought about defense in
this game and blocking more than anything else I played,
including Monster Train. What was the one that the Steam
World quest like. I'm usually always like on the offensive,
just kill like it's a numbers game. Take out one
enemy this turn, so there's one less enemy that can
hurt you. Take out second one, just whittle them down
this game. I've found that my favorite builds are ones
that are focused almost entirely around playing defense, so building
up my block to negate damage and then finding those
little openings to counterattack, which has It's very unusual for me.
I'm very much an impatient player in these kind of games,
I just want to kill people as quickly as possible,
And the fact that it's actually getting me out of
my comfort zone is really impressive.
Speaker 4: Like, yeah, when you lose around because it's like the
first game, right, you lose it all and you have
to start over. Is that is there still like enough
rewards to get you to like want to play that
second round and not feel two defeated.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, it's very much a one more turn game.
But you'll get an experience meter that once it fills up,
it'll go. You'll unlock a new epoch, which is like
there it's shown like a timeline of lore, but you're
actually unlocking. You'll unlock one, you'll click on it, it'll
say it'll give you a little bit of lore bit
and then will actually lead to tangible unlocks, whether it's
a new character. Right now, in early access, they're only five.
I have three of them, Ironclad, the Silence, and I
cannot remember if the Regent was in the first game,
so the triangular head guy in the chair he might
have been. But you're also unlocking like new relics, which
are the items that are not you know, they're character agnostic.
They're just things you can equip that will have these
wide ranging effects. Like one will say, like, okay, beat
five elite enemies and this sword will evolve into something crazy.
I still have not evolved it. Or hey, you could
take this egg. It's not gonna do shit until you
get to a rest campfire, and then hatchet and then
who knows what it's going to be, And then all
of a sudden, I did hatch it, and I had
a fucking really powerful bird minion at my side. So
I don't think there was a single run, even the
runs where I really just got fucked up early on
in like the fifth node and I only filled up
the experience meter or I only leveled up like a
fifth of the way there. Even then, there are enough
cards that it showed me that I didn't choose for
my deck that I'm still so curious about the character
I could build with those that I'm ready to jump
into a new run. Ever I play every time I play,
it's very very sticky game, Like I like it quite
a bit.
Speaker 2: Do you know when it's coming out? Because I don't
do early access, so like do you know?
Speaker 1: I don't know, and I don't either. I read a
lot of people saying if they didn't know as early access, they.
Speaker 2: I hear that all the time. But it's like I
have always been happy when I've waited, and I have
been burned when I've gone into early access, and so
I've just adopted a full on like I just don't
do early ACSS. Like I understand its value, I understand
why it's enticing to go in early and stuff like that,
but like just personally, like I I'm very excited about
this game, but I'm just not touching it.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Done.
Speaker 1: I had, like, speaking anecdotally, I said the same thing.
I was like, people, the people, the same people that
were telling me, the same people that held out on
Hades two with me, are the people who recommended this
game to me, Which is why I was like, which
is why I was like, all right, I'll go in,
And I think the thing here is I could play
for it feels like I could play it for thirty
hours and get my money's worth out of it and
feel like I saw what this version has to see
or no, sorry, let me rephrase that. I feel like
I could play for thirty hours and see a lot
of this game, but I still think there'll be so
much left in this version that I haven't seen that
it doesn't matter that, like the full launch content is
not here, because I don't know how I would still
see all the content that's in there right now, I see,
So I mean, yeah, no, it's your prerogative. And like
I was pretty dead set on holding out for full launch,
but I genuinely shaved yet. Yeah, and I'm kind of
glad I did because I'm I'm like, I'm stuck on
this game. It's it's great. It I like I said,
I played eight hour like Monster Trained two. I talked
to Bonk a lot about that game. That was one
of my favorite games last year, Like the different permutations
of each character I've already built in just eight hours.
And there's you know, like Bolatro, Monster Trained two, Slay
the Spire one. In these games, you see those cards
that you never take, and you're like, that's not gonna
fit my play style. It never will. I'm not that
kind of player in this game. Every card I don't
take is just enticing enough that I'm like, oh, I'm
kind of theory crafting. When I'm like in the shower
or leaving to go out to get lunch or something
I'm like, oh shit, if I combine that with this
or like mugenics, I was like, oh fuck, I could
make my character unstoppable if I did the if I
got these cards. Obviously rang is involved with the deck
aspect makes it random, but like, my favorite so far
is I have one card. There's certain cards and upgrades
you could do with the silence that character I really
like where it's like, Okay, you get it. There's a
card trait called Innate. It just means you start every
single combat encounter with that card in your hand, no
matter what. I also got a relic that makes all
Innate cards cost zero energy, so you literally play them
for free. I also got another I also got a
card that I would allow Innate cards to deal double damage.
The problem with that card is it's not Innate, so
I won't automatically get it. However, I got to a
random encounter where it's just like, oh, you could do
this or this or this, and I was like, oh shit,
you could choose a card to grant innate. It's like,
oh my god, I'm killing most enemies in the first
hand now. Of course, then I get to the boss,
it's like, oh, you can only play one card per turn,
so it's not like I could throw all eight free
cards at them and do one hundred and eighty damage,
so stuff like that. It's it's just the game is
so good already, even in early access, of making it
feel like there's this iceberg below the surface of this
character that I really don't even understand yet. And yeah
I can't. I can't say yet whether I like it
as much as like Manzara Train two is probably my
favorite game of that and look, outside of Balatro, I mean,
we've said enough about Pilatro on this show, and everybody
else has everywhere that game is a masterpiece. But like
this game is, I'm already I'm already digging this game
in in that vein. I like it a lot. But yeah,
if you're gonna hold out, keep holding out because I
don't have to add more characters, they'll I'm sure there'll
be more cards.
Speaker 2: And I'm sure I'm gonna be over the moon about
it when I play it. But it's like I do
almost like that feeling of like when it's out out
and I started being like it's all here, and yeah, yeah,
I love that.
Speaker 1: You are a very different player type than me where
like I feel like, once you know you have everything,
you like to get everything and try everything as much
as possible. I think I burn out a bit before
that point. So maybe that's also why I don't mind
playing this right now. But sure, Yeah, I haven't even
tried the third character I haven't locked, which is the Regent. Yeah.
Just the excellent game reminded me of Hades two in
the way that there are no major innovations, at least
that I'm aware of. I don't remember the first game
that much. I remember loving it, but so many of
these games have kind of come and gone since then
that it's far my memory. It just feels like a
refinement on every level and in all the minutia and
the details, and it's really well made game. Good job
to them.
Speaker 4: Good job speaking of everybody says this game is supposed
to be perfect.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's great, speaking of good jobs, Dan. Many shoot adventures.
Speaker 2: Uh, just real short. I know I probably talked about
this familiar. Yeah it's the one where Zelda Geometry War.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I talked about this.
Speaker 1: You like this?
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah a while ago and it's on switch
to now, so I'm playing it again. Just a reminder
if you don't have a Steam deck or didn't play
it back, then get it on switch to or it's
on switch one. Actually, just it's a breezy fun time.
It is just a video game boiled down to the
most video game elements, immediately having fun with it. I yeah,
it's rare that. I I am very excited to play
three game a second time. I was so ready to
do this again as soon as it came out.
Speaker 4: How much is it on the switch to because it's
it's like fifteen bucks on Steam Like, this is a
good price.
Speaker 3: I assume it's equal across the board.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure, but whatever it is, it'd be weird
for them. Three hundred dollars, it's worth it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, your sister paid forty five dollars to play this.
Speaker 2: It's got six many chips to play Mini shoot Adventures. No,
it's it's tremendous. It's I feel like, I say, Zelda
plus Geometry Wars like top down Zelda like linked to
the past original Zelda plus Geometry Wars. If you hear
that and it activates your brain the way it does mine,
you will not be disappointed. It is a tremendous game.
Speaker 4: So it's a very It's a very fun game, and
I remember playing it around the same time as you
a couple of years ago, and I really I also
really liked it.
Speaker 3: Much like a Metroid.
Speaker 4: You can get lost and be like, I don't know
where I'm supposed to go, but you always end up
figuring it out and there's really good upgrades and stuff.
Speaker 1: Like that too.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm glad it's cool that it's on switch yep.
Speaker 2: Check it out.
Speaker 1: And what about WWE two six?
Speaker 2: No bad, It's no like it's the same serviceable at
best wrestling engine that it's been since twenty two. It's
just it is just a full blown fucking casino now.
It is insane. I said it's on gime Bomb, But
it's like, as someone who doesn't play these sports games
or FIFA or NBA two K, this whole idea of
these billion micro transaction Ultimate Team card pack things is
so alien and gross to me that, like, I just
go into a wrestling video game and I just want
to pick my wrestlers and make them fight each other,
pick a match type, pick my wrestlers, and to be
inundated with five thousand Get your virtual currencies, get your
triple A ring side passed, get this, and then get
this super team and then you get unlocked the border
for your play ricon and then you can do this
near my faction. And it is so fucking shitty to me.
And it's like, we got over four hundred wrestlers. I'm like, oh, great,
I can put together all these dream matches and stuff. Nope,
every fucking wrestler you go through. I mean, it's got
like a base amount of like the current superstars, but like, oh,
I want to pick Kevin ash Or I want to
pick this guy from you know, the add Tude era
or whatever. He's like, well, you need to get this
guy in my rise by getting the super duper Pass,
and you need It's just it is insane, the level
of just greedy casino card pack bullshit. It is fucking awful.
I really really hate it. And even if the game
was very, very good, this shit is so aggressive it
would turn me off. But the game itself is middling
at best, and it's just I have no fucking time
for this horseshit. I you love wrestling, I love video games.
This makes me hate both of them.
Speaker 1: Me my cash grab every time, I like, I think
I have a good understanding and grasp on the video
game industry. I'll see that like FIFA Ultimate before they
drop the name made seven billion dollars in twenty twenty two,
And I'm like, I don't understand people's habits at all.
Who is playing this? And obviously I know FIFA's big
on a it was big on a level that like
we we can't confirm.
Speaker 2: But the NBA two K like you know, like that's
more like people watch basketball in this country and like
I'm sure those people are all over this country and
spending a lounch of money on this and I don't
know who these people are. It seems it's it's just
a few whales that are keeping this thing up and
making billions.
Speaker 4: The NFL like Coach simulator games that are like exploding
people love sports really, my god, Coach sims are huge.
Speaker 2: Oh.
Speaker 1: I don't mean I'm surprised that many people like playing
sports games. I'm surprised there's that many people spending money
and Ultimate Team on these cards that generates seven billion
dollars in a year.
Speaker 2: It's fucking nuts.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's crazy.
Speaker 2: I don't know, what does it seem like? I like
every ad I see now is for some gambling thing now,
and it's just like, this feels like gambling. It's like shit,
apparently gambling is real popular these days.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh god, I fucking hate it. It's ruining the
viewing experience for my State Warriors.
Speaker 4: Gambling has been in games for a really long time,
and it's just one of those like edge cases where
I don't really have a problem with loot boxes and
things like that.
Speaker 3: I just think that there is a level.
Speaker 4: Of greed that we are rewarding game companies when they
are making this amount of money where we're like, I
think we're learning the wrong lessons here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, don't No, I don't either, But Mary, what
creature kitchen?
Speaker 3: Creature kitchen?
Speaker 1: Old timing Like it wasn't my head.
Speaker 3: It kind of has a weird vibe.
Speaker 4: I'm really I'm trying to describe it, but it's a strange,
strange game surreal I'm gonna say it's like a sci
fi otherworldly universe game where you go to a cabin.
Speaker 3: In the middle of the night, in the middle of
the woods.
Speaker 4: It's dark, but it's not too creepy vibe.
Speaker 2: It's always making me think of mouth washing a little
bit just like that weird kind of low poly vibe.
Speaker 1: You know, es, what was the what was the game
Fred is watching?
Speaker 2: Or Fred?
Speaker 1: Oh? Yeah, like last year he's looking No, no, no, no, sorry,
he's looking as he's looking in the windhill neighbor. Was
that it? No, he was looking at Mary you talked
about look outside.
Speaker 4: Yes, that's what its okay, okay, yeah, I'm with you.
Speaker 3: I I think that this game is is cozier than
it looks on the onset.
Speaker 4: You might be like, oh, is this like a creepy
game with ghosts and like there are like weird ethereal
creatures out there, but check this.
Speaker 3: You need to take a photo of them on a polaroid.
Speaker 4: If you can successfully get a photo of them, your
secret book will tell you the foods.
Speaker 2: That they like.
Speaker 3: And then you go to your kitchen.
Speaker 4: You make foods with uh, the stuff that's in your pantry,
and you find more food as the game goes on.
But you make these like you'll make a dish like
macaroni and cheese or a cheese sandwich, simple ones.
Speaker 3: At first, you give them to the creatures.
Speaker 4: They'll give you a key to unlock new pantry doors
to give you more ingredients so.
Speaker 3: You can find more animals and make more food for them.
And that's the game. You guys.
Speaker 2: It sounds like what was a clover pit, but instead
of like playing a slot machine so you don't die,
it sounds like you're just a bunch of raccoons.
Speaker 3: Keep bringing up really scary games.
Speaker 4: This game is so it's not scary, but it has
I did get I actually times post.
Speaker 3: It's a I consider this a very wholesome game.
Speaker 4: You'll you'll run across a ghost by the rat zone.
Speaker 3: The rat zone in this game, they're killing.
Speaker 1: Look, it's a compelling looking game that I want to
play it.
Speaker 3: It's very cute, you guys.
Speaker 1: I was.
Speaker 4: I was surprised at what a delightful experience.
Speaker 3: I'm so glad you guys are doing this.
Speaker 1: No, no, not because your records someone else for a while, Mike,
was it you that told me about Creature Kitchen?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm gonna get.
Speaker 1: It because I was telling you, like how I say
creature kitchen?
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah yeah, try it out?
Speaker 1: Try it out. Oh yeah, I promise. It's cozy. It's
it's cozy, creepy. There's a there's a there's a cute
raccoon and you could just sit with your friends and
take it all in.
Speaker 2: That's that is what I.
Speaker 3: Was going to say.
Speaker 1: Sorry, this looks really good. Thank you for the record
for both of you.
Speaker 4: I think it's I think it's a delightful game.
Speaker 3: I was surprised.
Speaker 4: And you can beat it in about a night, so
like again, I I think you could beat this in
like five six hours.
Speaker 3: I don't know, depending on how good, how how good
at games you are.
Speaker 4: And also the kitchen stuff has chopping, it has like blending.
It's a funky kitchen. It's a magical kitchen. So if
you're making like, I don't know, a guacamole, for example,
you'll put like an avocado and mix it with salt
in a mixer and that makes squawk.
Speaker 3: Obviously there's more to it, but that's enough for the game.
Speaker 4: And then if you put that in the oven with nachos,
it makes nachos. So it's like it bends the rules
of cooking. You don't actually have to like be a
good kitchen person to figure this out, but it's just
enough that makes it exciting to make a dish.
Speaker 2: It's good on steam Deck, Yes it is. Okay, I'm in.
Speaker 3: I liked it. I'm glad.
Speaker 4: I'm glad that you guys are interested in it. I
felt like this was a hidden to me. I felt
like this was a hidden gem. I hadn't heard too
many people talk about this, but I really like it.
Speaker 1: Only fucking and thirty seven of them give me positive reviews.
Speaker 4: I mean, I would say, it's no uh, marathon or
whatever you guys are talking about what.
Speaker 2: I'm probably gonna like this more than marathon.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I want to play this other fucking Okay, in
the video on Steam, the way, the fucking the crow
was flying toward the front porch, toward like the player
and to land, he just like crashed on his chest
and then got up as if he was fine.
Speaker 2: Oh, there's like chopping carrots mini games, and this is
some Maria ware ship.
Speaker 4: I like, you have to flip the pan if you so,
when you cook like an egg, you have to successfully
flip the pan to cook the egg, and if you don't,
you burn it, then you have to throw it out
and get a new egg.
Speaker 1: I saw you playing this on stream. I saw the
egg thing, and you completely fucked it up.
Speaker 4: I'm actually not great at cooking eggs and flipping them
in this game, and it was a bit frustrating, but
I figured it out over time.
Speaker 1: But yeah, you make both puzzles.
Speaker 3: You. Oh, there's little old puzzles throughout.
Speaker 4: You'll be like, what's this plot of grand ground And
it looks like maybe I might need to like do
some planting, Like they keep giving you little there's little
puzzles throughout. I only got stuck once. There was one
puzzle that I like, I got really stuck on, but
everything else I figured it out and I felt really
smart when you when you do it. And yeah, there's
like little ghosts and stuff, but they're not too creepy,
but they'll they might surprise you.
Speaker 1: There's like a little like an underground network of pantries.
It looks like.
Speaker 4: There's it's essentially an endless Barbarian basically, it's an endless
sentry and there is a there is like a pantry
being as well, like hopefully you can find them.
Speaker 1: That's a back rooms.
Speaker 3: There's secrets everywhere. It's it's cute.
Speaker 4: You'll see like the book contains a lot of secrets
for you to know. Oh, I've never seen this creature
in person before, and yeah, I don't want to give
it away because I very long game.
Speaker 2: I I'm in. I'm playing this, okay good.
Speaker 3: I think you guys will like it.
Speaker 1: Speaking of cozy games, Mary, you have don't spoil any
thing because I have not played yet, but you finished Requiem.
Speaker 3: I will not spoil it.
Speaker 4: I just wanted to let you both know because the
last time we were here, Dan, you had beaten it
and reviewed it, and I had only played I want
to say, like nine hours of it. I have completed
the game. I think it's phenomenal. It might be my
favorite Resident Evil. I think it's I think it's just
that damn good. I really don't have a lot of
issues with it. I will say the front half is
just by far my favorite part, but I think the
second half is funny, and there's like a real fun
like motorcycle sequence where you like chasing people and there's a.
Speaker 3: Lot of action.
Speaker 4: It has a lot of nods to earlier Resident Evils,
which I appreciate and respect, and I even think, like
the final boss fight was pretty fun. So I won't
get into it, but I just want to let you
guys know. I just I think it's fantastic and I
can't wait. I can't wait to experience it again, which
I know I will all play again, but yeah, very good,
very good.
Speaker 2: It is such a fun one when you've played through it,
like it's incredible play through your first time, and then
like to watch people knowing what's coming up, So like
I've been watching Kyles stream and I've been went Boks
playing it, so I've been like, you know, if I'm
walking up and I see she's playing, I'm sitting on
the couch, I'm like, oh, I know it's coming up
here early act and we talked about a ton me
and her, and it's so cool that like every time
she feels like she's like just barely scraping by, it's
like she has no health items, she has one bullet.
There's three fucking zombies in that hallway. How the fuck
am I going to get through there? The game is
so good at writing that line of always keeping as grace,
specifically of like keeping like how the fuck am I
supposed to do this? I'm fucking dead, and like yet
you always are progressing and it's doing some voodoo in
the background where it's like making it all work, and
like whether it's like giving you more mo if you've
died a few times, or making that thing a little.
Speaker 3: Yes, they're kind to you, but it's secret, secret.
Speaker 2: Not in your face at all, and it's like you
will always progress. There's not a lot of like banging
your head against the thing and I've died here ten
times in a row, like it is pulling whatever strings
it's been doing in the background in a very subtle way.
That like the just the pacing, the difficulty it is,
this is a masterful fucking game.
Speaker 4: Yeah, the amount of detail as well that they've done,
even with little things.
Speaker 3: If I guess I was learning, if you.
Speaker 4: Stay in the save room long enough, you unload your
weapon because you're not using it, and then if you
leave the save room, you reload your weapon. And it's
just a custom animation that they made for zero point
zero one percent of the player base that would sit
in the waiting room for that long.
Speaker 3: But to me, that's a good example of like these
devs put a lot.
Speaker 4: Of energy into the behind the scenes, the animation styles,
the story. It's all very calculated. It's very plotted out.
This like you said, this is a masterclass. This is
a highly refined experience. They thought about everything and there's
some really good throwbacks that I can't wait.
Speaker 1: For you to experience.
Speaker 3: Mike. It's a it's a fantastic game.
Speaker 4: So yeah, really really happy with when I rolled credits
and there's a couple of different credit sequences and you
get this.
Speaker 2: Isn't a spoiler, but boy, the bad one. It's like,
I think I got the bad ending. It's it's yeah,
you did, It's insane. Well immediately it tells you. It's
like you can go back and try something else if
you want to do.
Speaker 3: You want to try again, it's up to you. And
it's just like I think I do. I'm amazed to
even let you roll credits. I'm surprised.
Speaker 4: It's not like you lose, but it like literally lets
you roll credits.
Speaker 2: It's kind of nuts.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but anyway, I can't wait to play it. I'm
holding off. I'll play at some point soon ish maybe
not yep.
Speaker 4: I think there's a lot on our plates, especially with
all the travel, but UH definitely can't wait for for
uh you.
Speaker 3: To experience it and for us to talk about it.
Speaker 1: Same do you want to talk about emails?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Alright. As a reminder, you can run through Firescape cast
at gmail for questions to be read on the show.
Got a bunch of good ones since the last episode,
thank you. In fact, this email section is quite the rollercoaster,
so let's dive right in.
Speaker 2: Mary.
Speaker 1: Do you to read this first one? This? Yeah?
Speaker 2: All right?
Speaker 3: How dare you?
Speaker 1: Hey?
Speaker 4: Fucker's Day one listener, big fan of y'all. Deal breaker
scenario if you're with the perfect partner and every way imaginable,
but they have to have sex with you every single
day and they have to constantly talk like Scooby Doo
during it, and you have to go along with it.
Speaker 3: Do you think you.
Speaker 4: Would survive asking for a friend? Allie from Toronto ps.
When you finish, they yell rotro.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd survive surviving certainly request that we're all fantasy,
we're all happily. I trothed? Is that the word? So
I'm trying to a picture before that. Okay, let's say
I'm I'm eighteen, I'm looking to meet someone. I don't
have a girlfriend or anything, and this is the situation.
Is it? It's just like a thing I'm thinking way
back to when I'm a young man looking to meet
someone and things like that. You know, I get a
girlfriend and all that I'm trying to think, is this like,
are we looking for marriage material or are we just
doing Is this just a xenion atop situation?
Speaker 1: What do you mean? Is it? What? What do you mean? Like?
Speaker 2: Are you looking for marrying stuff? Or is it just
like sheer lost Genie onotop.
Speaker 4: You're basically saying that you could do it for a
certain period of time, but you probably wouldn't want to
marry this individual. But if you were to date this person,
you could bang them every day.
Speaker 2: I mean, but even if everything was perfect and it
was a marriage and be with them every day thing.
I don't think that's the worst faith.
Speaker 1: I don't know that everything would be perfect if they're
speaking like a cartoon mystery solving dog every time we
have sex every day?
Speaker 2: I don't want it, but it's like, is that the
most important thing?
Speaker 1: I kind of want it? No part of the ship,
damn kind I kind of want it. Uh yeah, if
I'm if I'm imparting this on my wife, it's pretty funny,
but I yeah, it would be odd if she saidt
row every time not but not a deal breaker.
Speaker 4: I would say, what if like when you like, whip
it out and she's like rocks.
Speaker 1: It's like I could come back to your school, Sapa.
Speaker 2: None of us is setting the mood I want in there.
Speaker 4: No, no, yeah, you have to like separate your mind
into two different pieces. It reminds me of like that
scene from Scary Movie where there's like a gross, scary
monster that comes out from the shadows, but she's got
a banging body, and then like it just shows him
a scene later having sex with her and he just
puts a on her head, like.
Speaker 3: Sure, sure, don't you think you just put some headphones in?
Speaker 1: So you're telling me I need to dissociate during sex.
Speaker 3: Or like cover up that one component ballgag.
Speaker 2: I think it's the spirit. I think that's against the spirit.
I think it needs I don't have.
Speaker 3: To embrace that freaky shit.
Speaker 4: I can add my own freaky shit and beat their
freaky shit to the punch.
Speaker 2: Now you're getting Scooby Doo whispers in your ear, you know,
like these are the sweet nothlings here?
Speaker 1: Which movie was it? It's a scary movie, he said.
Speaker 3: I think it's the first one. Do you know what
I'm talking about?
Speaker 2: It's ionic seeing that movie back when I came out
and I don't remember this, but I completely believe that
that sounds like the most scary movie joke.
Speaker 3: I guess it's an iconic like sequence.
Speaker 4: He's it's the I think it's yeah, one of the ways,
and he's like, it's a creepy ghosty monster. And her
face she's got a tongue that's really long and fucked up,
but her body is incredible, and.
Speaker 3: When he sees it, he's like and like, yeah, I think.
Speaker 4: A couple scenes later they're doing it and he just
put a bag over her head.
Speaker 3: Like I think you could.
Speaker 4: I could see myself wearing headphones and dealing with a
really great partner in life and love and being like
I can handle all of this, but I am going
to put in my headphones.
Speaker 2: So what do you think that would hurt the feelings.
Speaker 3: It's just like they have to compromise. That's marriage, I guess.
Speaker 4: Yeah, And they're weird and like I would, I would
openly say I love you very much and like let's
get it on. Uh now it's time for the headphones
and your ballgag.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's none of that Scooby Doo shit.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean they can do it.
Speaker 4: They can try, but they have to get past the
ballgag and my noise proof headphones and you know all
the other stuff I have going on in my ears.
Speaker 2: Good luck, it's a weird situation going on in there.
Speaker 4: Well, I would embrace it in that sense, like I
would accept them.
Speaker 2: But I would Yeah, deal breaker.
Speaker 4: No, I don't think it's a deal breaker. I think
there's like worse things that you could experience. There's a
lot of real miserable people out there.
Speaker 2: Lack of common interests, you know, different values, and yeah, definitely.
Speaker 4: Yeah, we're just like a meanie, like a person who's
not nice, or like that person alcoholic or something like that,
saying row when you come.
Speaker 3: It's like I can work around.
Speaker 2: It's a quirk. It's a quirk.
Speaker 1: Reminds me fine.
Speaker 3: I love them. I love you, baby.
Speaker 1: There's the fucking Jackie Gleason having sex with Scooby Doo.
I remember in college. I'm not gonna say which year
because that would out them. One of my not out them,
but one of my roommates we overheard him with a
woman and we discovered that when it's about to happen,
what he says is here it comes. That's his, that's his, Like, yeah,
that's now.
Speaker 3: That's a deal breaker.
Speaker 2: Is you're trying to funny or is that just what
is like?
Speaker 1: Don't you know?
Speaker 2: Lizard Brain says at the time.
Speaker 1: He didn't know we had gotten home and we heard
him in the room.
Speaker 2: It's shoot, but it's kind of in the same discussion
here it.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, thank you Ali shut. Do you want
to read this one from cold stare?
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm sure we've all seen something not hit our
expectations or fail, and you ask yourself how those in
charge could fuck up that badly? Obviously you knew better,
and if only those people in charge had access to
the knowledge you hold in your head, it would be
so simple. Are there any media properties, whether movies, music,
or games that you think could improve if you were
put in charge? Cheers? K hold star I think Twisted
Metal and I think Starfox are two series that I
deeply loved at a certain time, actually kind of around
the same period of the mid to late nineties and
maybe early two thousands that both lost their way going
past the first couple entries. And I think I I
think I have a good idea of like what made
those early games work and what made the later ones
not work? And I think there's just some very basic
things that like, if I could be like a creative director,
I could make those better.
Speaker 4: You know, I have a bit of a hubrist to me,
and I feel I love those I think that I
believe you. I actually like, can we just all pretend
that we have like an actual mind for this and
could do it? Like, I'm not a designer, I'm not
a director. I believe pretty strongly that I could fix
the Silent Hill movies, the Resident Evil movies, and the
movies they do need to be fixed.
Speaker 1: The Dune movies. You don't like, the Doom movies, Doom Oh,
Doom Oh, It's like, Okay, I didn't even know you
read the Doom books.
Speaker 4: Dune, Doom with the rock, Dune with their rock. I
believe I can fix that. I I think that they
just misunderstand the content. And I think there was a
really annoying producer or like owner in the space that
was like, I think I know what Resident Evil needs,
and it needs.
Speaker 3: Like a hot lady with a bunch of guns.
Speaker 4: And they weren't wrong, but I just think they like
fucked up all of the other material and went the
wrong direction with the Resident Evil franchise films, and I
do think that we could make such a good movie
with the original source material.
Speaker 1: The Barbarian director now m is and weapons director is
doing the next Resident Evil.
Speaker 3: I'm hoping.
Speaker 4: I'm hoping, and they called me, and I think that
the two of us together, I'm gonna really knock it
out of the park.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm genuinely hoping. His interview he gave or he
was saying, like the thing that all that are other
directors like forget, is that like it's survival horror. So
I really want to like convey the horror of like
being low on supplies but knowing you need to go
into a zombie infested basement and stuff like that. I'm like,
all right, seems like he knows what he's doing, so
like Keith feel yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: He's so smart.
Speaker 4: And he went back in time four thousand years put
a go pro in Raccoon City so that you can
actually see everything time.
Speaker 1: That's smart.
Speaker 3: And he put the Twin Towers in it.
Speaker 2: Symbolism, Oh, symbolism, symbolism.
Speaker 1: I think I could uh do a better job of
managing the Golden State Warriors, for sure, Mike, I don't
know if I've.
Speaker 2: Ever heard of you talk about the Golden State Warriors,
and this is the third separate time this loves them.
Speaker 1: No, I like the Warriors a lot. I just don't
talk about them to you guys because I know it
would fall on deaf ears. That's fair, okay, But I've
also been thinking about we're going to see them on Sunday. Okay,
that's probably why I'm going to see them. Finally, I
can't believe.
Speaker 4: You didn't say like you feel like you could have
made like a shabblie better than they do it.
Speaker 1: Then, who I don't know. I'm not gonna make a
better than Raveno, that's fucking That's like saying I'm gonna
make a fucking better strand game than Hideo Kojima.
Speaker 3: No, I could give him a run for his money.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's some, there's some. There's some chateaus there that
I could some producers I could probably out Shablee for sure.
I won't. I won't not say I could, but not
like the top places.
Speaker 3: Not the top places.
Speaker 2: No, I'm not.
Speaker 1: Gonna make a fucking Barollo better than Mascarello.
Speaker 2: Are these Golden State Warriors?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Those talk still Okay, so lost, Yeah, we know
you are.
Speaker 5: And here comes Mascarello passes to Mascarello and the three
Oh my god, Louis Roderer with a slam dunk.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's exactly what they sound like.
Speaker 1: Is that both click at the free throw line?
Speaker 2: Long yolo?
Speaker 1: Okay, I'm uh yeah, no I I I also think
I could probably do a better job. What's like a
video game franchise that has lost its way? Zelda has
lost its way better than the Breath of a Wild tears.
Speaker 3: Ko a couple of things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I could probably do a better job of
what's it was like a TV show?
Speaker 2: I feel like Terminator lost its way big time, but
like they're in a rough spot right now because it's
like Terminator one and two, two very different vibes, but
nailed both of them, every one of them passed, then
just totally missed what made one and two great?
Speaker 3: But do you think you can solve it?
Speaker 2: I think that's what makes Terminator especially hard, is like
you could go in there with the best of intentions
and try to do just like kind of that horror
of the first one of this thing that will not
stop until you're dead, or kind of the big budget,
you know, crazy Spectacle of two. But no matter how
good of intentions you are and how much of a
budget you have and how good of a writer you have,
it's an Arnold problem because he is so iconic that
like that is why once he was post Governor and everything,
like you know, Genesis and Dark Fight and stuff, they
kept bringing him back because it's like you talk about
a actor who is tied to a role inextricably. I
don't think even the best written and directed remake or
reimagining a Terminator would work if it's not Arnold.
Speaker 3: You know, you don't think so.
Speaker 4: You don't think there's any other actor that you could
like be Like this new Terminator has a different look.
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess it could be done. I don't.
I still think it's like Arnold's alive. I think maybe
like twenty years from now, with like a new generation
that doesn't really know about Arnold or anything, may need to.
Speaker 3: Wait until he croaks. You just get a younger.
Speaker 2: Hotter would maybe be the Terminator.
Speaker 3: Now it happens to women, all.
Speaker 2: Marty Supreme Terminator style. I would totally watch that.
Speaker 1: I can see right be Jordan doing it.
Speaker 2: Oh, that'd be kind of cool.
Speaker 1: Actually, yeah, So I still find it funny that I've
never seen Terminator two when I first met you, and
then flash forward a month and I had seen it
six times.
Speaker 2: I still have not seen it all with me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I still have not seen the first movie. Really
m m oh, you spend all those times shoving two
down my throat, which I enjoyed.
Speaker 2: I mean.
Speaker 1: The difference. I know it's much grittier and scarier.
Speaker 2: But I think you would appreciate it. It's fun like,
and I've appreciated more as I've gotten older and watched
it more. It is like it's doing some really cool ship.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I want to watch it. I just put it
off for so long now it's this looming specter having.
Speaker 2: I'm watching Sopranos.
Speaker 1: You watch Terminator Yeah, true, okay, I will, uh well,
thank you.
Speaker 4: I feel like there's more answers to that. It's just
like those are the ones that we have. But I
actually think we could answer this exact same question again
with more thought and be like I could fix this book,
I could fix this song, I could fix this you know.
Speaker 3: What I mean.
Speaker 4: I think there's lots of media where I'd be like
with my hubrews.
Speaker 3: I think I could be like, I think I.
Speaker 2: Could do it, Marathon. Let's get rid of this extraction
shit and just give me a fucking campaign and we
do it every week.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's actually what the podcast is, all.
Speaker 1: Right, Thank you, Cold Sarah. Next one, Hi, I'm Morgan
from the San Francisco Bay Area. I almost bled to
death recently and it was bonkers, but not nearly as
scary or painful as I thought a near death experience
would be. Honestly, the worst of it was they didn't
let me eat for three days post surgery. I was
super pissed off. So what's the worst thing that's happened
to you that was much less terrifying than your imagination
made it out to be.
Speaker 3: That's terrifying. I'm glad they're okay.
Speaker 2: I'll say in a non horrifying version of this, I
think a lot of people are afraid A lot of
people are afraid of and I think all three of
us can relate to this. The idea of moving away
from your hometown, I think a lot of people get
very eimidated by that. It's like, this is where I
grew up, this is where my family, this is where
my friends are and things like that, and like, you know,
it was nine, I moved up here in Minneapolis, and
I did this numerous times since then, and it is
it is a scary concept, but like I don't know,
move for a reason. You know. Let there be like
a job or something that brings you out. You'll meet people,
you'll find a new life and things like that. You
can always go back. It's it is a terrifying thing
to a lot of people. And then I have found
it to be like I haven't regretted a single move
I've ever done. Like it's they've all had their mostly ups.
Like really, even like I didn't love Connecticut, but it
was an important part of my life. I don't like
San Francisco as a city, but like that was a
super critical part of my life and everything. So it's
like I've never regretted a move for a moment. So
to take the plunge, make the move, even if it
sounds scary, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, looking back, it's like crazy that I was not
more afraid moving to the opposite coast by myself when
I was like twenty two. But sure, yeah it worked out.
I wouldn't be living here, right now if I didn't
go there first.
Speaker 2: My alternative is way scarier, where it's like there's so
many people that just like, well, they've never lived outside
of this county they grew up in, and that's just
where they're always going to be, and it's like, well
that just sounds boring as hell.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I yeah. I'm a big proponent of if you
can get out and travel or move or see more
in the world that I feel like it's almost a responsibility.
If you can not everybody can. There's financial or like
family ties keeping you or like health issues, et cetera.
But if you can, I think it's it's it's well
worth pursuing mine. Minor lore stakes. When I was younger,
I was like terrified of dancing publicly, like at weddings
and stuff. I was, oh, like that's mine. It's like
oh once I started actually just like giving out the
idea that the whole room was watching me and like
acknowledging that everybody was just the whole point was to
make a full of yourself and have fun and let
go like, oh man, I love it now.
Speaker 2: And it was that's such a weird thing because it's
like that is this thing that is left over in
my brain from that like super like anxious, awkward, you know,
high school kid that was afraid of me. I'm gonna
make a fool out of myself, and now like that
made sense when you're an awkward like high schooler. Now
I'm coming. I've done twenty two years or whatever of
making a fool out of myself publicly for a living,
and I still have this leftover thing in my brain
where it's like I can't dance. I don't know what
I'm doing. It's gonna be you know, like I don't
know why I still have that thing, and I'm not
just out there just having a blast and being a goofball.
Speaker 1: You know, you guys were at my wedding. I was
making a fool of myself more than anybody. But like
every like a lot of people are dancing and stuff
like it. That's I have a lot of fun doing it.
Now I'm not a good dancer. But similar thing with
like karaoke. I was terrified to doing that at first,
but then of course, like Amanda and I have done
a few duets recently at like parties, the wine Bar
party we did, we did talking Head Surprise. It's always
terrifying on the way up. Then you're up there, it's like, oh,
the whole room singing with you, and nobody there is
our good singers unless you work for game Spot and
there's like six people who are professional singers making everybody
else look bad at the post e three party. But
outside of that, it's the public stuff, public speaking rather
in person. Like I got over my fear of public
speaking pretty early on, but it was definitely terrifying at first.
But I feel like that's is most people's biggest fear. Yeah, yeah,
that's extremely universal. But yeah, Similarly, dancing in karaoke and
just like performing in front of people was Once I
did it, I was like, oh, it's actually really freeing
and therapeutic.
Speaker 4: Those are both really wholesome examples of things that are
like scary to so many people.
Speaker 3: Mine is not.
Speaker 4: Death, but it is like something that truly scared me
when I was learning how to scuba dive, which I
was terrified that if something went wrong under the water
that I would literally die down there. And my biggest
fear was that something would go wrong with my oxygen
or my what's it called the regulator, the the peace
that goes in your mouth. What happens when your mouth
is full of water?
Speaker 3: How do you get rid of it? That's so scary.
Speaker 4: And so you practice in a pool and they teach
you that there's like a button you can press in it.
It pushes a bunch of air in your mouth so
that you can essentially open your mouth underwater, and it
just puts so much air in your mouth that it's okay,
and it'll push out all the water and you can
keep going.
Speaker 3: But when you are being.
Speaker 4: Pushed underwater, And what happened to me, at least the
very first time I ever scuba dove scuba dived, was
I couldn't sink, and so he held my vest and
started sinking and dragging me down to the depths of.
Speaker 2: Them trying to kill in it retrospect, I don't think
I knew you scuba dove.
Speaker 1: I don't.
Speaker 4: I'm no longer certified, but I learned when I was
like twenty four, you know, it was a long time ago,
and I was so terrified of this experience, and I had,
like maybe even had like dreams or nightmares of like
what happens if I can't breathe down there?
Speaker 3: Like you can't just swim to the top right.
Speaker 4: You will hurt yourself and you will you will pass
out and probably die.
Speaker 3: You have to figure it out.
Speaker 4: So when I got down there, as it happens, it
is bound to happen. This is why you practice in
a pool. My mouth got a bunch of water in it.
My mouth got water in it, and I needed to
I needed to expunge with the with the regulator, and
I got my heart was like pacing and I was like,
oh my god, oh my god. If I don't do
this right, I'll fucking die. You push the button, the
air gets pushes all the water out of your mouth.
And I was fine, and I had a really good experience.
And uh the scuba instructor checked my oxygen and was like, wow,
it's pretty low, so we're gonna slowly go back up.
And I was like, okay, that's also a nightmare situation.
It was fine. We had more than fifteen minutes of oxygen.
We slowly made our way back up and it was
a great experience that I get to have for the
rest of my life. And I'm really glad that I
did it. I'd be down with doing scuba diving again.
But I will say like for people who probably think
about this. It is absolutely a nightmare scenario of what
happens when your regulator doesn't work or if you get
a bunch of fucking water in your mouth. But they
are as long as you keep your shit together, if
you don't panic. They have buttons and systems to get
you to solve small problems like that, and they're prepared
for you.
Speaker 3: But that's why they make you do so much training
in the pool, because if you panic, that's how you die.
Speaker 1: Have I told you my story about my test, my
certification test. It was in March twenty fifteen in Lake
Skinny Atlas say, very very deep. It's one of the
finger lakes, so it's very deep, still very cold in March,
and weird in our drysuits. And you know the joke,
it's like, what's the worst time to have a heart
attack is during a game of charades. I was. We
were at the bottom and we had to show that
we knew how to do all the hand signals to
show that your oxygen was out or you needed something.
And these hand signals, oh thunder, sorry, these hand signals
are to tell your partner that your diving buddy that yeah,
you need their primary tube. You got. Your primary tube
comes directly from the tank over your shoulder, and the
longer one you got a secondary one that's strapped to
your BC the BUO and s bully.
Speaker 3: Someone in case your regulator goes down. Everybody has two.
Like a parachute, you get two just in case.
Speaker 1: So during the part where we had to do the
hand signal to tell our buddy that we were out
of air or our primary tube wasn't working, turns out
my something in my primary tube actually did freeze. So
it wasn't like I got a lot of water in
my mouth, Like the tube actually stopped working. And I was,
I want to say, fifty feet below the surface. And
so I'm like doing the thing I was doing that
you'd get their attention. Then you do this, and then
he the he saw me. He's like, yeah, yeah, good job.
And by this point but okay, so by this point,
like I was like, oh wait a minute, right, I
have the secondary right here, so pull it up, and
that was working. It's not as comfortable because it's tight
to the vest. So you're kind of like so he
saw me do that, and he's like, oh shit, his
his is actually fucked. So my buddy swam over and
actually gave me his primary, so that was much more comfortable. So,
like the idea is you get the primary, you get
the breath there, and then you go back up slowly.
We weren't down far enough where we were ever going
to get like the bends if we went up too quickly.
But that was definitely like a bad time to have
problems was during the test where you're trying to show
that you can hypothetically convey that you're having problems.
Speaker 2: I love scuba diving, scuba having to be It's like
I'm big on like overcoming fears and stuff like that,
and I am afraid of the idea of scuba diving,
but I kind of also need to know that there's
something I'm excited about on the other end, and like
I don't have like desire to scooba, Like I've had
desires to skydive, and that's why I've done that like
seven times outside of you know, despite my fears of
it scooba having I don't really.
Speaker 3: You want to hang out with the fees like.
Speaker 2: In there there's other ways to see fits.
Speaker 1: Yeah, It's it's like a like a pretty ethereal experience.
Like being down exploring, especially like a lake that deep.
It was like there's stuff that's.
Speaker 3: Around coral and into caves and stuff.
Speaker 2: I bet it is awesome. I bet if I did it,
I would love it. But it's like, I think there
is a combination of like of this stuff you're talking about,
and also like I think that definitely triggers the anxiety
type thing I talked about, like not being able to
eat take out a movie theater row.
Speaker 4: You cannot easily leave the bottom of a deep Oh yeah.
Speaker 2: Really intimidating to me.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think I wouldn't recommend it for you.
Speaker 3: I really could not.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I love a problem you're coming from the other end.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but you can't do it.
Speaker 4: Either, Like if you panic in the ocean, you can
genuinely hurt yourself by being like I'm going up and
like swimming up without.
Speaker 2: An instrum, no matter what they trained me to do.
If I had a panic attack at the bottom of
the ocean, I would be sprinting to the.
Speaker 1: At the bottom of the ocean to be clear.
Speaker 2: The bottom of the ocean as fast as I can.
Speaker 4: You also can't sprint to the top. You would be
swimming and you can't swim. If you swim that fast
like I think you, you can like get really sick,
you can pass out, like all these bad things happen
to you.
Speaker 2: Then I'm grabbing a fucking the closest turtle Mario sixty four,
and I'm just pointing it up and I'm going like
and he goes.
Speaker 3: He goes, he goes back down because he's like, dude,
let's get tubular.
Speaker 1: And what brings you on this fine day?
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's like wop master.
Speaker 4: Like turtles like you guys are like testing out your
gear and stuff and you your regulator isn't working. It's
that's exactly the hand signal you should use.
Speaker 1: Did Yeah you pointed up like Polly Walnuts like, hey, Tod,
do you hear me? I just said his fucking respirators
not working? Okay, Well, thank you Morgan. Write your name
for a second because I didn't have the email up.
All right. Well that's our emails, all three of them.
Thank you Morgan, Thank you, Call Sarah, thank you Allie.
You can write into fire skip cast at gmail dot com.
Get a bunch since last episode, but keep them coming.
Keep that inbox, girthy. We are going to be back
in a cos we're gonna be back in a couple
of weeks. You can go to fire Escape cast dot com.
If you're not a patron, you want to get ad
free episodes or the bonus version of these episodes. You
can also just treat it like a tip jar. If
you appreciate what we do. You can also get fire
skate merch at fireskate merch dot com. I think. If not,
you can just search fire Escape on fourth Wall. Get
some shirts, get some water bottles, get some bikinis, get
those keene get those keenes ready for the summer for
almost a Kienie season. I want to see you in
your banana hams and your sweet little keynes. Will be
will be keeping an eye out. We'll be keeping an
eye on those nude beaches for those Kenes flying off
into the into the salty surf. Mary, what do you
have going on.
Speaker 3: A lot of travel, so we'll be really busy.
Speaker 4: It's exciting. It's a wonderful upcoming amount of stuff. I'm
going to south By Southwest. I'm gonna miss a couple streams.
I do love streaming on Mondays, but I'll be doing
south By Southwestern Austin I'll be doing New Orleans for
my b day and I will be doing Boston for
packs East. Both Hacks and south By Southwest have Twitch parties.
Consider looking them up on meetups, dot twitch, dot tv.
Speaker 3: I go to all those. They're really fun and I'll
be there if you want to stay.
Speaker 1: Hi, Dan, what about you?
Speaker 2: I am a giant bomb dot com doing a lot
of great stuff over there. Blake Club I should be
playing soon, so check that out. I'm doing a lot
of the same travel Mary's doing actually, and then possibly
a mysterious travel beyond that.
Speaker 1: So have fun.
Speaker 2: So yeah, giant bomb dot com is the main thing.
Speaker 1: Sweet.
Speaker 2: The whole second ROP playthrough is on my YouTube if
you want to.
Speaker 1: Oh fuck, I'm so sorry I didn't ask about that
during the game section.
Speaker 2: One of the greatest games I've ever played, one of
my favorite gaming experiences I've ever had. I'm so glad
I did it. I beat the Demon of Hatred, I
beat each and I did the whole deal and what
a ride it was from beginning to end. I will
play it again. I will do my dying day be
talking about that as one of the great gaming apearances.
Speaker 1: Good Now, just listen to us when we first tell
you it's good.
Speaker 2: Isn't anyone Mike, I know, but like just do it
in the future. That's probably smart.
Speaker 1: Yeah. No, I've convinced you to play a few games
you wouldn't have.
Speaker 2: That is actually true. You've actually a lot of ones
that I went I don't think loving Oder Wilds you
were the one.
Speaker 1: That Yeah, all right, well we've been back with episode
one hundred and twenty nine in two weeks. I won't
be here, but Dan and Mary will I'm gonna be traveling.
I've got I'll be in Sorry what then?
Speaker 2: Oh, I was gonna say, uh, you will not be here.
But I did get confirmation while we were recording that one.
Michael Manatti will be taking your place, trading one Mic
for another. So we got Mikey he'll be coming in here.
I have a child that's Mike. He'll be co hosting
on the.
Speaker 1: You're trading out, You're trading out the uh, the babyface
of video games. I'll live another name's Mike, you know,
for the bad boy of video games is coming out.
Make him make him hosts, Yeah, make him hosts as
me the entire show.
Speaker 2: Oh, I don't think he can do that.
Speaker 1: Now, that's just the narcissistan me. I want to hear it. Sure,
but we're back in a couple episodes. I will be
back in or I'll be back in a couple episodes.
We'll be back in a couple of weeks. I'm going
to be in uh, Paris and Florida and doing a
few other things on the home front. Gonna miss you, guys.
Can't wait to hear about New Orleans.
Speaker 2: Have some stories coming out of New Orleans. I think
and company will probably have some drinks and have a
good time.
Speaker 3: I'm stone sober Nola.
Speaker 2: I'm slightly intimidated by the group we have in New Orleans.
It's going on.
Speaker 4: We're going to be a sloppy, jaloppy group, and there's
gonna be a lot of beignets and probably some some
daytime streak drinking.
Speaker 2: Every day with a frozen Irish coffee from Mollie's. Then
we'll see where the day takes us.
Speaker 1: Have fun, and we'll see everybody else in a couple
of weeks. Bye Bye,