Speaker 1: Hey, everybody. Welcome to Game and Former Show, a weekly
podcast covering the video game industry. Join us each and
every week for a discussion of the gaming latest gaming news, reviews,
and exclusive reveals with Game and Former staff and special
guests from around the industry. I'm your host, Marcus Stewart.
I am joined by the news hound Wesley LeBlanc.
Speaker 2: Hello, Hello, Hello, I'm back from the Eternal Perils of
review hell for a game we will talk about soon.
Speaker 1: And also joining us is the GI spy who loved me,
Brian Shay. How are you.
Speaker 3: I'll take it. I will take that intro.
Speaker 1: I'm good.
Speaker 3: A little under the weather, but good otherwise.
Speaker 1: Okay, And joining us a special guest, Giant Bomb's own
Jan o'choa.
Speaker 4: Hello, sir, Hello, thanks for having me, guys. Very happy
to be.
Speaker 1: Here, Yes, first time when the Gi Choubin wanted to
get you on for a while. Happy to have you.
How you doing.
Speaker 4: I'm doing well as well as you can be right now.
Ready to talk about video games and ready to hang
out with y'all.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, we're gonna talk about video games and video
game accessories. Maybe I don't know, but listen, I wanted
to make a King of a Hill reference. I don't
get to talk about King of Hill as much as
you guys think that I would like to believe it
or not.
Speaker 3: Let's start at King of the Hill podcast side project.
Speaker 4: Hey, I I started watching King of the Hill for
the first time recently.
Speaker 3: Something.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Okay, do you like it so far? Yes?
Speaker 4: Yes, I think Bobby Hill is a generational character.
Speaker 1: Okay, give us all your King of the Hill hot
takes right here. Bobby Hill, great character. Yes? Are you
working your way to the new season? That is that
what's inspired this?
Speaker 4: Or yes, that is the motivation because I saw, well
there's obviously a time skip in the new season, right
and I think I may the bold claim that I
think Bobby Hill could beat Bobby Flay.
Speaker 1: I ooh, I yeah, you know what. Yeah, I agree
with that. Bobby Flay's lost to like quote unquote like
regular chefs or like not yeh chefs. So why yeah,
I think so, Brian, you could beat Bobby Flay. You're
a pretty good cook too. I've seen you post your
fancy food photos on social media and stuff.
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm okay.
Speaker 5: Bobby Flay is a professional culinary artist though, so it
might be a knockdown, drag out fight in the kitchen,
but uh yeah, I think I do.
Speaker 1: Okay. I mean, if I started paying you for your food,
you'd be a professional chef too. Technically, that's a good point.
That is a very good point saying. But yes, if
you too would like to know if you can beat
Bobby Flay, I probably a good way to do that
or to find that out. And this is a little
bit of false advertising, so I'm gonna veer away from this,
but you know what you can do to support Game
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We've also gone to our latest cover story that we're
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seven First Light. And if you would like to read
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Informer dot com slash subscribe, get yourself a magazine subscription
two day. And of course, speaking of magazine covers, Brian Shay,
you have traveled to go to io Interactive over in
Copenhagen to check out Double O seven First Light, our
next big cover story game. Tell us all about it.
How is James Bond's origin story? I guess how was
that shaping up? Yeah?
Speaker 5: So this was a game, like I'm assuming, much like
everybody on this call, a James Bond game has played
a significant role in my life as a gamer. I
think for a lot of us it was Golden I
Double O seven on N sixty four. I think for
Wes it was Agent Underfire Ones.
Speaker 3: Twos two right.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and Marcus, what was your James Bond game of choice?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 1: It was Golden E as a kid, but I will
shout out I think it was night Fire on PS
two that had the cool like slingshody grapple hook thing
that was like stupidly fun.
Speaker 2: Well, agender Fire had a really good grapple hook too.
Night Fire came out. It was like the sequel to
agender Fire, and it was also very good. But it's
multiplayer sweet not as good as Agender Fire.
Speaker 3: Jan what about you?
Speaker 4: Actually, my uncle played a lot. This is one of
the games he commandeered my PS one four, but he
played a lot of Tomorrow Never Dies.
Speaker 1: Oh. I played that one. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 4: Where my friends would be talking about how cool siphon
filter was, I'd be on the other side of the
player ground being like, no, guys, Tomorrow Never Dies. It's
pretty cool too. But it was pretty neat. I mean
it had all the James Bond trappings for sure.
Speaker 1: I played that before I saw the moot. Oh I see,
I played that before I saw the movie, and I
remember really liking the newspaper, like the printing press like
section yeah, and then seeing the movie and like legitimately
kind of marking out because I don't know, maybe I
didn't think that would be in the movie, but I
were like, that's the level from the game that I
really liked, Oh it's happening.
Speaker 5: But getting back to Double O seven First Light, you know,
it is a game that I think when it was announced,
everybody was kind of like, oh, that makes sense. Like
Io Interactive has been doing this like kind of globe
trotting agent sandbox style game for like twenty five years now.
And you know, the Hitman franchise obviously has a different
flavor than the James Bond franchise, but like a lot
of the like the core tenants are in the the
recipe of hit Man and they can just kind of
transpose that over to Double O seven and in they
seem like they're doing that a lot with Double O
seven First Light. And you know, we had a great
time sitting down and talking with the developers, really diving
deep into like their way of kind of like developing
these sandbox situations, which again are different than what you'll
see in hit Man, but definitely you can see the
DNA is still there from this this studio and like
the way they think about these games as like these
encounters as like puzzles, which is great because like that's
kind of how I think a lot of us approach
those situations. In Hitman games is like, okay, here's like
a you know, it's pattern recognition, it's it's taking opportunities
that are given to you. It's using your tools and
skill sets, and then once you have your plan in place,
you know, executing it with precision. Like that stuff is
all part of both puzzle solving and also stealth, and
I think nobody does it as well as Io Interactive
in terms of like bringing it all together delivering it
with such consistency, Like every single level in the hit
Man World of Assassination trilogy capitalizes on all those core tenets.
And I got to see an extended demo of the
State of Play that they put out, and it really
did seem like they are doubling down on what that
studio is known for.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 5: It's like in the State of Play, we see him
like access this giant hotel by kind of like creating
a diversion and then climbing up into a window. The
other way that we saw in the in this this
behind closed Doors demo that we attended in Copenhagen, was
he kind of like overheard somebody that he eavesdropped on
somebody on the call saying that there was a whistleblower
trying to gain access to this chest tournament, and oh,
well he has a press pass hidden in like a
flower pot. So as soon as you got that, it
highlighted all the flower pots around the courtyard. That was like, oh, like,
we got a tip that you know, I overheard somebody
say it. There's a press badge in the flower pot,
so now I need to go check all the flower pots.
So it's like all of the intel that James Bond
has from doing his kind of spy stuff is kind
of highlighted and surface to the player, so you feel
like you're inside the head of Bond. And that's a
really really cool way of surfacing that so you're not
you know, bouncing between menus being like all right, well,
I know I got a tip somewhere along the lines,
and then you have to like dig through like a
compendium or some sort of like glossary. It's like no,
it's immediately like surfaced right on the ui of like
flower pot. Okay, got it, and then you go over
you find it, and then you just walk right in
through security, and you know, there's all kinds of different
gameplay systems that are at play with this title, because
like you know, we see the early sequence is him
driving up the mountain and it's like, you know, kind
of like just cinematic conversation happening, and then you know
it's it's this stealth sequence where you have to try
to figure out a way to get into this hotel
where the chess tournament's happening. Then you've got to sneak
past all the guards and everything and not get spotted
by your.
Speaker 3: Teammates because you're not even supposed to be in the tournament.
Speaker 5: You're supposed to be out in the parking lot like
kind of keeping an eye on the perimeter. But James
Bond is gonna do what James Bond's gonna do, of course,
so you know, you can't be spotted by your target,
you can't be spotted by your teammates, so you're kind
of like trying to maintain a low profile in that regard.
Then there's conversations that you can have, like you know,
you go up to the bartender, and you can get
intel from the bartender because you know, bartenders hear things
in the process of doing their jobs, so you know,
you have that conversation aspect. Then there's you know, the
driving sequence that we saw where Bond is in a
car chase following his target, and you know, it looks
like they've done a good job with the driving mechanics.
Like I didn't get a chance to play the driving
mechanics or really anything of the game yet, but you know,
it does look like from watching the developer and like
watching how they're playing it, it does look like the
mechanics are responsive, like he was drifting around the corners
pretty pretty well. It didn't seem like there was any
stiffness or rigidity to the driving mechanics. And then the
climax of that demo, if you recall, was a like
a gunfight on an airstrip, and it's all about like
the set piece moments and the improvisation and like, okay,
like you get out into this area and as soon
as an enemy draws their weapon on you, you're given the
license to kill because your life is in danger. So
big words flash across the screen just says license to kill,
and then you're good to go at that point because
your life was under threat, because like the whole story
is this is James Bond becoming Double O seven and
earning his license to kill. In Her Majesty's Secret Service,
So you were granted a temporary license to kill if
you are put in danger in the line of duty,
and that's what happens at the end of this demo.
And so like the gunfight looks extremely fun, Like there's
explosive barrels everywhere that the environment was surprisingly destructible. You
can go in like hand to hand combat. There's like
a sequence where Bond runs up and like tackles the
guy on a ledge and then uses his body as
a cushion so he can drop down from like the
ledge down to like the ground level, which was kind
of cool, and that also acts as a takedown.
Speaker 3: To the target that you were fighting.
Speaker 5: And then like a big set piece moment where he
basically causes a his target's plane to lose altitude and
crash and he has to skydive out to chase down
a guy with a parachute. Like it's just so many
gameplay systems in place, and the thing that we got
to look at, and this isn't anything that like we
really talked about in the cover story, but like they
have their their proprietary engine that they use and it
allows them to toy around with the different stage elements
in real time. So it's not even like, all right,
I got to bounce back and reset everything. It's like, no,
it all updates in real time. So if there's a
thing that is not working just the way it needs
to in the Sandbox and they're like, oh, something's not
right right here, they can just pause the action, go in,
tweak that, and then keep going where they were at.
Speaker 3: It's just it.
Speaker 5: Seems like it's a really intuitive tool for a game
that is so built around like sandbox creativity and sandbox
environments that like encourage experimentation within the player base. Like it,
it seems like that is such an essential tool for them.
But then you know, talking to the art director, talking
to the audio director, the game director, the gameplay and
narrative designer, like it was a full day of just
like diving deep into how they decided on doing a
James Bond origin story, how they decided like what their
James Bond was going to be like, because the whole
struggle that they had was they came to the conclusion
when they started digging into who James Bond really is,
they were like, this is a guy who's defined by
his experiences. You know, he always knows what to do
at every time because he's been through everything, He's seen everything,
and he's like, so, all right, well, what is that
character like when you strip away all that experience, because
you're talking about a guy who's, you know, probably in
his early twenties and hasn't really done a whole lot
doesn't have a whole lot of life experience, isn't in
the in six as a double O agent. Yet you know,
he is just a stubborn, brash, like charming and reckless guy.
It's like, all right, well, how do we make that
feel like the James Bond that we've seen depicted by
like Daniel Craig and Sean Connery and Pierce Brosnan and
not just feel like some sort of knockoff version of that.
And I will say that, like, from what I've seen
and what I've talked to the developers about, they've really
done a great job. And I think Patrick Gibson, who
is the actor that plays James Bond in this game,
he was also a young Dexter Morgan in Dexter Original Sin,
which is a prequel series to the or the Showtime
series Dexter.
Speaker 3: He really does nail it.
Speaker 5: I had my concerns about him going into this, but
it really does seem like he's doing a great job
and he's he lays on the charm, but he also
has like kind of that signature coldness that Bond has.
But it's it really does feel like it's a less
controlled Bond. So they've they've nailed that aspect of it.
They've nailed the audio of it. I think the visual
elements of it. The gadgets they told me, like, you know,
you're not going to just get like, all right, well
you're going in you're gonna need like a laser for
this mission. So here you're gonna have a laser in
your load out for this level. It's like, no, they
want you to choose what gadgets you're equipping going into
a mission so you can experiment and see how they
all interact. So there's just a lot of stuff at
play that it's definitely more of a linear, cinematic kind
of like set peace driven experience than the Hitman franchise.
But still, like I said, so much of that IO
and Hitman DNA kind of permeates the experience and allowing
players to experiment and approach things.
Speaker 1: How they want nice. I'm glad I was gonna ask
you about Bond himself, because that was also one of
my concerns when he announced, like, yeah, this is a
young Bond who you know, maybe doesn't always follow the rules.
And I just had like mild flashbacks to like Perfect
Dark Zero, which had a similar premise of like, we're
going to tell you the origin of this really like
capable spy, and she, at least in that gang, kind
of came off as a little like, you know, a
little too much like kind of teenage, like you're not
my real dad kind of eyes, like I'll do what
I want. And I was like, I wouldn't think they
would do that with this Bond, But there's always that
fear of like, we're just gonna make him like almost
two attitude and normal. But it's at least from what
you've seen, it sounds like that's that's not really the case.
Speaker 5: So yeah, and I like there were times where like
you would just absolutely be like, oh, that is James Bond,
Like the way that he responded to this person, you
could see another Bond actor doing that. But the way
that the narrative designer or narrative director told me is like,
you know, he has all that charm, he has all
that coldness, but he doesn't really have the control that
the older version of the character has. So like, you know,
he's an extremely charming guy when he's talking to somebody,
but he doesn't he's not fully aware that he's like
projecting all that charm, and so he doesn't he hasn't
really weaponized it the way that like an older Bond has.
Speaker 2: Do you have any idea what kind of what their
older Bond like, what they're aiming for since there's so
many iterations of Bond, you know, the classic Bond is
very much like a ladies man, you know, suave, sexy,
all that kind of stuff, whereas like Daniel Craig's is
all that but also tackling the mental toll and the
loneliness that comes up being Bond. Do you have any
idea where they're trying to take this Bond.
Speaker 5: Well, they mentioned that, like you know, the narrative director
was like, yeah, the first thing I did when I
found out that because I guess it's been six and
a half years that since they found out that they
were making a James Bond game, And he's like, yeah,
the first thing we did was like I went and
bought the box set of the movies. I went and
bought the box set of the books, and then I
started reading the comics.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and watch.
Speaker 5: James wat Junior played James Pond, and you know he's like,
basically the first thing he did was he read all
that stuff. He watched all the movies, and then he
was he was like, well, I just need to drill
into like the core traits, which you know he's you know,
going to take risks, and he's like, yeah. Basically, like
the younger version of James Bond basically like, hey, here
the verse.
Speaker 3: Here the core rates.
Speaker 5: That James Bond we think he has across all depictions,
and here's how we see a younger version portraying that.
So like whereas like an older James Bond takes risks,
it's usually more of a calculated thing, right where it's like, Okay,
if I jump out of this plane, I could see
I'm gonna go get that guy and take his parachute
and then I'll get safely to the ground, whereas the
younger James Bond is kind of like reckless, like Okay, well,
I guess I'll jump out of this plane because that is,
in my head, the next logical step to take down
this bad guy, and then he has to kind of
think of a solution on his feet.
Speaker 3: So it's kind of like.
Speaker 5: That, and like you know the fact that like he
doesn't quite have the level of coldness that like a
Sean Connery, James Bond has or a Pierce Brosnan, but
he does have flashes of that. Like there's a moment
where when the car chase is beginning, you see him
trying to hot wire a car and this woman who's
with a French secret service secret intelligence gets in the
car and she just holds up the keys like looking
for these like like she has the keys to the
car he's trying to hot wire. He just continues hot
wiring it, immediately gets it to start, and then just
kind of flashes like a steely gaze at her like
I got this, don't worry. Like it's like you can
tell he's not nearly as refined, but he has all
of those flashes where it's like, oh, yeah, this could
be like a Bond that evolves into the version that
we see in.
Speaker 3: Pictures.
Speaker 5: But yeah, they definitely were going for a younger version
because I even brought up like, oh, well, I think
like Daniel Craig is supposed to be the youngest version
of Bond that we've seen on pictures or on motion pictures,
because Casino Royale is originally his the first book in
the timeline, right, And they were like, well, yeah, well,
even Daniel Craig was like way early, way older than
the Bond that we wanted to depict, because he was
like very brash, he was very like, you know, he
does play by his own rules the way that it
seems like Io's is going to. But he's still like
I don't know, it doesn't feel like this, Like he
feels a little bit older than what they were going for.
So they deaged that by i want to say, like
another like five or ten years, and like took away
even more experience than what that version of Bond has.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like Brian over ahead, Joe Brian.
Speaker 4: One of my favorite parts of the James Bond, I
guess the whole franchise is the interplay between Bond and
his allies, whether it's like his tech crew, the fem Fatale.
I don't know if you saw any of that in
the preview you saw, but was there any hint of
that of what those relationships are going to look like.
Speaker 5: It does seem like they are keeping a lot of
those intact, like in terms of like the dynamics. I've
got to bring up the actual list of characters here
because I know, like Q and M and all them
in Moneypenny, but like there are a lot of characters
that they've got like casts, Like sorry, I'm bringing up here,
Like I know that they've announced like Lenny Kravitz's Bauma,
which is kind of cool because you know they needed
a charismatic villain basically, and they're like, can we get
Lenny Kravitz.
Speaker 1: Which is the villain that can play the guitar is
really important to us for some reason.
Speaker 5: I really hope it's like a Jack Black esque like, hey,
we're just gonna have the bad guy sing a song.
Speaker 1: Now he sings his plan to Bond during the Inevitable
Seeing where Bond gets caught and the villain explains what
he's doing. It's just gonna be a concert. Yeah.
Speaker 5: So basically, there's this thing that happens at the beginning
called the Iceland incident, and it happens right before the
sequence that I saw and Basically that gets M's attention,
like it's the loose depiction of the Iceland incident is
on our cover this month Game Informers cover. You can
see the helicopter crash in the background. Something thing happens there.
We don't know exactly what it is, but whatever it is,
Bond emerges as the hero of that incident, and em
gets takes notice like, oh, this is a guy that
maybe we should recruit for I six And what he
ends up what ends up happening is they send Bond
off to this training facility in Malta, and.
Speaker 3: You know it's it.
Speaker 5: Basically, he gets there and all the other Double OH
prospects are already training there. They've been training there for
six months, and this is already like, you know, the
cream of the crop, and they have a six month
head start on him, so early on he kind of
has to play catch up, and you know, a lot
of the other Double O agents kind of seem like
they may look down on him a little bit. I mean,
that wasn't explicitly stated, but it was kind of like
like they were the other Double O agents on this
mission that you get to play that I was describing earlier.
They get to go in and be on the ground
and like pursue Double oh nine is this rogue agent
who you know, used to be one of the best
Double O agents around, but he's kind of gone off
and gone off the books, so they're tracking him, and
like they get to go in on the ground and
they're like, James, just stay in the parking lot, you know,
like watch the perimeter.
Speaker 3: That's an important job. Stay in there.
Speaker 5: And then James notices like a suspicious bell hop and
he takes matters into his own hands. But it seems
like they're kind of like, yeah, this guy's not really
on our level, but like you know, they kind of
like it's almost like when you're you give like your
control the second controller to your little little sibling and
you're like, oh, yeah, playing his tails is just as
cool as playing his sonic and like it almost feels
like that. But I mean maybe there's maybe that was
just me reading between the lines a little bit.
Speaker 4: Actually, sure, you get to see controller, you have to
play tails, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3: So m Q moneypenny.
Speaker 5: You know you're gonna get your gadgets from q uh
Moneypenny is kind of like, you know, in communication with
Bond pretty frequently.
Speaker 3: Then there there's a lot of communication.
Speaker 5: Back and forth between the Double O agents in the demo,
like just like like them being.
Speaker 3: Like Bond, what are you doing?
Speaker 5: Stay where you are, Stay where you're supposed to be stationed.
And then there's also a character named John Greenway who
is played by Lenny James, who you may know from
The Walking Dead or Snatch, and he is kind of
like Bond's mentor, and he also seems like he's on
the ground as well for this and I think this
is the character that's like the French intelligent lady, intelligence lady.
Speaker 3: But miss Roth.
Speaker 5: Is the woman that gets into the car with him,
and she seems like she's going to play a pretty significant.
Speaker 3: Role as well.
Speaker 5: She gives me like kind of like the he is
She's like going to emerge as like maybe Bond's like
counterpart on the French side. But we'll have to wait
and see how that plays out. But yeah, I mean
I didn't get like a too grade of a sense,
but it does seem like they are going to fill
a lot of the traditional roles. I've not seen Gemma
Chan's character who is Selena tan is her character's name,
But yeah, I mean, we're gonna have to wait and
see what she is. But all the other characters feel
like they slot into that very traditional like roles that
you would see from them in the movies.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: Did you hear a theme song?
Speaker 5: Oh, just kind of like a cinematic like kind of
like orchestral version, like slow and kind of plotting as
he jumps out of the plane at the end of
the demo, And you can hear that in the State
of play as well, like that that that version, but
it's not it doesn't seem like it's the official version.
But then there's also there's all these reports that they're
going to be having like an actual like theme for
First Light, but they were very cagy when I asked about, like, Hey,
is there gonna be like a James.
Speaker 3: Bond song for this game? And I did not get
an answer.
Speaker 1: What do you think that I think.
Speaker 2: Sabrina Carpenter would be that's the twenty twenty sixth choice
for sure, that would be.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've heard those rumors of Lana del Rey as well, but.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but she'd been trying to make one for like
over a decade. I mean I used to be a
big fan of herson, like twenty fourteen or first two albums,
and I was like, she just is singing James Bond songs.
I don't know where she's at today.
Speaker 3: But yeah, Summertime Sadness definitely a Bond song.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, yeah for a younger Bond putting that and
there's wired headphones and everything. Yeah, is he sitting in
the car pouting yes, yeah, subtweeting.
Speaker 3: We need a millennial Bond.
Speaker 4: Uh, Brian. I'm curious did the if the dev shared
if there were any other external influences outside of like
the source material, because like you know, we've had movies
like Kingsman, which is like another twist on like the
Bond formula. I'm curious if they shared any other stuff
that they're kind of incorporating into the game.
Speaker 5: Oh man, I don't think they did.
Speaker 3: I did you know?
Speaker 5: I asked like, hey, like you know, Hitman is obviously
like a big, big franchise for you guys, but like
you also have like Canaan Lynch and you have like
mini Ninjas and stuff like, did you pull inspiration from
any of those games for your like your your action
sequences or your driving or anything. And basically it was
like not really like it was basically like Hitman and
then like trying to figure out, how do we make
our gun play better, how do we do driving because like,
basically the way they told me that they approached the
driving was they brought in outside talent, and same thing
for the gun play. They brought in outside talent for
that as well. But then they're like people who have
worked on games with great shooting and people who have
worked on games with great driving mechanics. And but they
also have a history because like they have a lot
of internal like h you know, prototyping and concepting, and
he's like, you know, a lot of the games that
we we concept in prototype do see the light of day, but.
Speaker 3: Some of them don't.
Speaker 5: Also, like we've never announced like a lot of the
games that we've prototyped and we canceled them before they
really got into production. And some of those games had
driving mechanics. So it's like we haven't released a game
or like fully developed a game that had driving mechanics,
but we've we've messed around with it in the past.
Is basically what they told me. So you know, there's
a lot of uh kind of internal influence and then
bringing in people who have experienced at those other areas
as well.
Speaker 1: What was that was it?
Speaker 2: Did you see a live demo? When you yes, did
it see? How did it seem to run? Because I
know one of the bigger things out of the state
of play was like, wow, they'd showed a good bit
of footage with like some choppiness, and it's like the
state of play where you could have chosen otherwise. So
I'm curious, like you've presumably seen a more updated build,
how it looked on screen?
Speaker 5: You know, I think it ran fine, Like I mean,
I'm sure there were still some hiccups. Like my memories
a little bit bluryuse it's been a full month since
I was at Copenhagen or in Copenhagen at the studio,
but I remember it running pretty well. But like, I'm
sure there were a few hiccups here and there, but
that's to be expected of any any indevelopment game. And
you know, we just saw them delay at a couple
of months from March until May. And one of the
last things that a lot of development studios do is
you know, fix bugs and optimize. So I'm assuming that
it will only get better from here, and you know,
get less buggy and presumably that's the reason that they
delayed it, right, Like they didn't explicitly say that, because
the news of the delay came out after I was
in the studio, but like you've got to presume any
time a game a couple months out is delayed, it's
just to allow for extra polish and optimization.
Speaker 1: Yeah, did you get a sense for the weapon where
because it sounds like they're they're trying to hit all
the like classic Bond weapons. Was there any like just
new stuff, like any new weapons that we just have
never seen in any Bond media.
Speaker 5: I don't think I got to see anything that was new.
It was pretty standard because like the mission that I
saw is the mission that's out there. I just saw
like a different route through it basically, and like a
little bit of an extended version. On the front end,
it seems like it's pretty like in that first stage,
it seems pretty standard, like you know, shotguns, automatic rifles, pistols.
I mean, Bond has a pistol. I don't know if
it's like a PP seven or whatever, but like you know,
like it seems like it's it's fairly straightforward reponry at
this point. But I'm assuming the gadgets. I mean, you know,
have you have like smoke bombs, you have lasers. Let
me let me see if I can.
Speaker 4: As long as there's a laser, I'm fine.
Speaker 3: Okay, So let me let me look at my notes here.
Speaker 1: Can you play the slappers only?
Speaker 5: So there's the smoke pods that let him slip away
from detection. There's a laser that can like unlock doors
and blind enemies. His phone can shoot darts at enemies,
like from like if you're like in stealth, you can
like shoot a dart.
Speaker 3: At an enemy from your phone.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and it makes them sick, so like they get
nauseous and they have to like go throw up. And
then his watch can tack devices like he can like
create diversions or shut down like security cameras and stuff
like that. That's only what I've seen so far, So
I'm sure there's more than that, right, This is it's
all about like figuring out like which ones you want
to bring in. So like if you want to bring
in like the darts, then you you're you're planning to
go in with a certain type of approach. If you're
wanting to go with smoke pods, maybe you're like thinking,
like you, you have a higher chance of being spotted,
you might need to slip away, So like you, it's
all gonna be tailored down to like how you want
to approach each level.
Speaker 1: I think cool, right, And for no that don't know this,
this game is set like in modern day. This isn't
like you know, in the sixties or anything like that. Yeah,
so I assume his his like blow Dart phone is
like an iPhone or something right now.
Speaker 5: It has a full rotary phone that he carries with
an that shoots starts. People ask about it, but he's like,
I don't worry about it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, awesome. Anything else you want to share about Double
oh seven First Light.
Speaker 3: No, I think I'm just like overall impressed by how
it's looking so far.
Speaker 5: Like anytime a major studio picks up a license, like
there's always a little bit of hesitance from from my end,
you know, Like I was burned extremely bad by the
Crystal Dynamics Avengers game as Avengers being like, you know,
one of my favorite overall properties or Marvel in general,
I guess just being one of my favorite overall properties,
and like, you know, feeling kind of burned by that
and of several several several other examples of like you know,
major licenses or ip being picked up by like a
well respected studio.
Speaker 3: I think that this.
Speaker 5: One is buoyed a little bit, and at least my
optimism is outside of what I saw by the fact
that this is not some like major publisher dictating or
mandating to the studio that they have to make this
game the way like it maybe it was the way
that like it was with uh, Marvels Avengers, where like
Square Enix was like telling Crystal Dynamics, you've got to
make this a live service game, and like we've got
to make this just a game that people were supposed
to play forever. This is you know, developed by io Interactive,
it's published by io Interactive. The only like major corporation
that seems to be involved is probably Amazon because they
are the rights owners and the owner of MGM. But
it doesn't seem like from my I tried to get
into like how is like the collaboration and like communication
process like and they're like, yeah, it's been the same
as it was when MGM was kind of like an
independent entity and Eon Productions was like, you know, not
under the Amazon Umbrella, and it's like they've they've kind
of allowed them to do what they want to do.
So it doesn't seem like this is going to have
any kind of like noticeable corporate meddling the way that
other major licensed games from respected studios have been. So
I think that that, combined with all the stuff that
I've seen, has me tremely optimistic and excited for this game.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, I hope this is the case of like
another Indiana Jones, where like Indiana Jones is a massive
hit versus any of the other previous stinkers you mentioned, Brad.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And I mean this is a studio that I
think it's safe to say they are firing on all cylinders.
You know, they had this weird transitional period shortly after
they released the first hit Man game under the World
of Assassination trilogy back in twenty sixteen where Square Knix
just basically was like, this did not meet our expectations.
We are going to withdraw all funding from Io Interactive
and put them up for sale, and then Io bought
their own independence, and then you know, they released hit
Man two and hit Man three, and it's like, Yeah,
this is a studio that has really hit its stride
with its last like two or three games, and I
don't have any reason to believe that like they're going
to stop that momentum with this game.
Speaker 1: Awesome. Well, Yes, our digital issue of Double seven First
Light magazine is available now to read, and it should
be going out to subscribers physical issues to mailboxes and
stores within the next few weeks, so keep an eye
out for that.
Speaker 5: Yes, and also you can go to Gaminformer dot com
slash Double O seven First Light that will if you're
a subscriber, and you'll be able to access the full
issue there if you want to read digitally, and there
will also be some online extras, both written and video
that we are going to be putting in that hub
if you want to keep up with like more in
depth stuff. I should have a thing up by the
time this episode comes out, just talking more about how
Io Interactive settled on like what their version of Young
James Bond is going to be like. So if you
want to hear more directly from the developers, you can
go on game Informer dot com slash Double oh seven
First Light to read that article right now.
Speaker 1: Awesome, Well, we're going to take a quick break and
when we come back, we're going to talk about our
hands on time with Resident Evil Requiem and then discuss
our review of Code Vein two. We'll be right back. Hey,
welcome back to the Game Informer show, and we are
going to be taking a detour to the mean streets
of Raccoon City or what's left of it, because Wesley
and Jan, you both had a chance to go play
what was it like a two three hours of Resident
Evil Requiem at a recent event? Jan, how was that?
How you feeling about this? Are you a big RI fan?
And what are you What is your first impressions of
this game so far?
Speaker 4: So I went into this demo being very scared because
the last time I went to an Ari Requiem preview event,
I played very poorly. I was scared the whole time.
So it was very worried that I'd be wouldn't be
that great the performance? Anxiety sorry kicking in, But thankfully
this session went very well, Very very excited for the game.
I'm excited to hear Wes's thoughts, but I think they're
gonna pull it off in meshing and mashing together these
two different styles of Resident Evil where you have the
more action packed side with Leon, and then you have
more of the plodding, tense gameplay that you have come
to expect from seven in Village with Grace's side. Also, Wes,
I'm curious did this game? Did it seem like they
amped up the blood in this Yes?
Speaker 2: When you play, Yeah, there's yeah, there is. I even
wrote in my previous specifically. So it starts off with
Leon and a bunch of zombies and there's a chainsaw,
and that chainsaw does so much damage, like the walls,
the plants, the office chairs, like I was painting it
red for lack of better cliche, but like, yes, there's
so much blood and gore. There's also a way to explode.
They're not the scarlet heads or whatever they're called in
this game.
Speaker 1: They're different, but crimson heads.
Speaker 2: Crimson heads. Yeah, in this game, there's a similar mechanic
where zombies can come back as a more terrifying, dangerous form. Okay,
but you can pop their heads with like a vaccine
that stops that transformation from happening. And it is so
bloody when you explode the heads. So yes, so much blood.
Speaker 4: Jan Okay, yeah, and I think you can use those
like injector things as like a stealth kill two and
I thought that the zombies would kind of just like
slump over, but no, they explode like a water balloon.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, so much blood. Where did they tell you
or get a sense of like where in the game
the sections you played took place because you played as
both Leon and Grace and like separate demos.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, well, I don't it takes place early in
the game. It's not the beginning. I did ask about that,
and I don't even think it's separate demos. You start
as Leon, who is in this care facility, and we
can't we can't go too much into like the embargo
is kind of weird with spoilers and like step by step,
but basically Leon in this facility. Something's wrong and he's
trying to get help. All hell breaks loose. Leon has
to do what he does, which is kill a bunch
of zombies. He then runs into Grace in the care
facility and then some stuff happens and you switch perspectives
at that point. So then you play as Grace again
for a much longer like to almost two hours. Yeah,
and then at the end of her section you switch
back to Leon and see what he's doing during this,
So I think it was like an A to B
two C type of story we were following. But yeah,
somewhere in the beginning, it's not the opening, which it
didn't give me opening vibes, Like, it's very clear we
were kind of thrown into some very interesting story stuff happening.
Speaker 4: Yeah, the vibe where Leon is introduced, it feels like
when how he's going to be first introduced into the game.
So I'm assuming it's still close to the beginning of
the story, just the way that the Leon reveal is treated.
When the demo started, it's like, ah, here he is, guys,
we know that, you know he's here, and he does
roll in on his Porsche and then he does check
his Hamilton watch.
Speaker 2: It was like it's like the Arkham Asylum beginning where
it's showing a bunch of stuff and you know it's Leon,
like you know it's Batman, but it's like, here's this
cool car driving by. Oh, someone's boots are stepping out
of this car.
Speaker 1: Pan up.
Speaker 2: Wow, this person's really cool and suave. And then boom,
it's a you know, very it's a it's a more mature,
older uh Leon with a sporting a Hamilton watch, which
the promo placement. I didn't watch the State of Play
because I was busy with work stuff or the showcase,
and I saw in our slack Charles and Kyle were
talking about exclusive limited edition watches, and I was like,
was it a Hamilton because in this preview there is
such a blatant like he's like, what's the time, Oh,
let me check my Hamilton Chronograph edition Blue Sea watch
to see and it's like, yeah, but it's Leon. Yeah,
it's it does feel like his like introduction in the game. Curiously,
this was like a very put together facility and like
what we know of Requiem is it's Raccoon City twenty
twenty five years after Ari two, which got nuked. I
don't I'm I don't know where this is, Like, I
don't know if this facility is in Raccoon City or
maybe we start here and then go into Raccoon City
because it didn't seem to be in the remnants of
a nuked city.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I didn't get the vibe of geographically where this
was supposed to be if this was like on the
outskirts of Raccoon City within it, And also no that
maybe two spoilers actually, but it's interesting I think for
folks that are out there that are a little bit
disappointed that we're going back to the Ari four formula.
And like the third person gameplay with Leon, you can
change the perspective for both characters. So if you want
to play Leon in first person, you can. If you
want to play Graces third person, that is also an option.
Speaker 1: Yeah, first person sounds weird the only as like third
person over the shoulder, and I associated like the recent
number games with first person that you'll be weird to
play those games. Switch like I'm gonna be Grace third
person and Leon first person.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they so, like Jan mentioned Leon's third person Grace's
first person. I asked the devs because I interviewed the
director Koshi Nakanishi after, and I asked, like, is that
on purpose or like are we because you can switch
back and forth, but are they intending for people to
do first person with Grace and third for Leon? And
they said no, they said there really is no preference.
And in fact, when you start the game, before you
even go hands on with a character, it tells you
like do you want to be first or third? For Leon?
First and third for Grace. However, thematically, I do think
Grace as first person feels better and makes more sense
because her sections are way more tense and horror filled,
and I think first person does a better job. But that,
whereas Leon is roundhouse kicking and stabbing chainsaws into zombies,
I didn't get to do a roundhouse kick in first person.
But how that would look like is it just the
screen spins real quick?
Speaker 1: That'd be so sick, it's like swinging across the screen. Yeah.
Speaker 4: I think I switched in the first person for a
little bit, and I think it'll still pull out to
third person when he does the roundhouse or any of
those like contact sensitive stuff. Otherwise I think I'd be
throwing up the whole time.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, so.
Speaker 5: You feel like they could just like throw the leg
up and be like, okay, you understand what that is,
rather than having like the camera do.
Speaker 1: A full three sixty him doing a super kick a
spartan kick.
Speaker 4: I'd be okay with that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's if you haven't picked up on
my tone yet, Like, I'm very, very thrilled with what
I played so far. It was one of those previews
where it was three hours long. Which I typically hate
because it's usually long enough for my brain to be like,
you're playing this whole thing, enjoy and then I get
to like the ending and I'm like, ah, dang it, no,
and now to wait a month or however long until
codes come in. You know, we're a month away from
release now, and yeah, it's just doing all the right things.
That said, I do think as any Resident Evil fan knows,
and I ended my preview with this, like, I'm really
enjoying the narrative things they're doing and setting up. There's
some weird stuff going on. It's a very strange game
so far, which I love. But Resident Evil, what is
awesome and fun and strange and interesting in the first
half can often become too far out there, off the walls,
unenjoyable in the second half.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I feel like, yeah, the first half.
Speaker 2: Of Resident Evil games pretty much are always better than
the second half in my opinion. And so like I'm struggling,
I'm not struggling, I'm just nervous where this might go.
I hope it doesn't go this way because right now
it feels like the best of four two and the
Ethan Winters games put together into one package. Which is
like a dream come true. But what does that mean
for the second half? This could easily who knows where
it goes.
Speaker 4: I'm also curious about how they're going to handle the pacing,
because at least in the preview that we checked out,
I felt like I had kind of reached my stamina
in terms of creepiness that I can and take on
as someone that doesn't like scary games, and then it
felt like the perfect switch when they pivoted over to Leon.
I'm curious as to how they're going to juggle both
of those because they are two very different playing characters, like,
for instance, Leon's whole inventory system and his health meter
at least is very much that Ari four Petra style
type of inventory, while Grace is the Ethan Winter style
like little pips that.
Speaker 2: You get, yeah, and Leon just in general controls he
feels like somebody who's made to kill a bunch of zombies,
whereas Grace feels like she's just trying to survive and
stumbling through this house. And I agree with your point
about the ten and like it was about two is
showers an hour and forty five of Grace and it
is like very tense, methodically going to this station, finding
random crystals and solving puzzles, and like, right when you're
like at your limit, they switch to Leon. There's a
big monster thing. They give you a shotgun and some stuff,
and they're like, just blow this dude's head off and
it feels really good and you can stop being scared
and you can unrelease the controller a little bit. That
is it. They they did a really good job nailing
that balance in this three hour preview. But again, yeah,
if this is a fifteen to twenty hour game, however
long it ends up being, that will be like the
deciding factor I think on how great thish mashup of
gameplay is.
Speaker 1: Is that balance I assumed Leon is. Could you tell
or did you know if he's voiced by the same
performer that played him in like the remake or.
Speaker 4: I want to say it sounded like the same voice
actor as the remake.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, did he drop any sick, corny one liners?
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, that's like exclusive what he does in.
Speaker 4: This Yeah, where where Grace is kind of like awe,
struck of like I can't believe this is happening to me.
Leon just seems to be like a quip machine.
Speaker 1: Yes.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Also in terms of Leon, they open his gameplay
that we played with a zombie that has a chainsaw,
and then you kill that zombie, the chainsaw falls. This
was so sick. It starts spinning violently because it's still going.
A zombie like walks by, it loses a leg, which
just paints that area of blood blood red. They drop
to the ground. I shoot them, and then you get
to pick up the chainsaw. Finally, finally you get to
just destroy and devistrate zombies.
Speaker 1: I hope narratively it's like change or Leon's first time
using a chainsaw, Like he's so used to being chased
by them that when he has like the same moment
of like, oh I finally get to use one of
these things. Is yeah, I thought these.
Speaker 2: He seems pretty pro with it. And even when it's
like out of it's you have like a little gauge
of how much you have left. He jams it into
a zombie and it like continues ripping through them as
he like pushes them away with the kick and stuff.
It's very it's very.
Speaker 5: Leon should the first time you cut into a zombie
should be like, oh so that's what that feels like.
Speaker 4: I'm glad you mentioned it West, because the same thing
happened in mind, but a zombie picked up the chainsaw
a different zombie picked up before I got to it,
and when that zombie was trying to swing at Leon,
she arked back too far that the chainsaw got stuck
in another zombie. Wow, I'm so curious as to the
different context sensitive situations and hilarity that's going to pop up,
asking about like the go ahead.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was gonna say.
Speaker 2: I asked them about the physics of the chainsaw and
other situations like that, and they said it was really
cool that I picked up on that and that they
look forward to me playing the rest of the game.
So I'm assuming there's more context specific physics interactions that
I look forward. It was a very cheeky, like smile
wink type of answer, so we'll see. Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 4: Oh, I was marcus to to build off of the
quippiness I think in the I think we saw it
in the showcase. But Leon, when he sees a zombie
fie doctor, he drops the line of like I'm going
to need a second opinion. Yeah I can't. I can't
stand you, but let's go.
Speaker 1: Yes, that's my that's that's my Leon what I like
to Yeah.
Speaker 2: It's still the whole thing feels so Resident Evil still
like it's the twenty is the twenty fifth anniversary or
the thirtieth this year?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, so it feels it feels like the greatest hits,
like getting the Band, Like it's this is a lot
of different are you games put into one that you
know and love? The humor is definitely absolutely still there.
I think when the zombie outbreak happens, Leon's with like, uh,
doctor and she sees one stumbling that's very clearly a zombie,
and she's like talking to him like, hey, what's wrong,
what's going on? Like what's and it's like, lady, this
is a zombie, Like let Leon shoot this dude's head
off please.
Speaker 1: It feels like because I would say Village felt like that,
like Village felt like the celebration of all the styles
of Resident Evil in one game, whereas this one almost
feels like and forgive me, but I've been on an
outcast kick lately. It feels like the speaker box leve
below of actually Evil.
Speaker 3: Wow, that's.
Speaker 4: That's brilliant. Yeah that's what this feels like. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like it's even going to like the characters having
different inventory styles that are evocative two very different resident
evil like eras. I guess, but it was just like,
oh yeah, this is just like a just a double
album of just like here both styles of game or
present yeah in one box, which is exciting. And I'm
I'm still a little like a little worry just in
terms of like cohesion or like total cohesion as someone
that does love or like I love ARI four, like
already four is the best one probably for me, but
I also I adore seven, like I adore the kind
of like Ethan games and how oppressive they feel, like
the dollhouse and village. I love this terrifying as terrifying
as it was, so I hope they find like a
nice balance between the kind of ARI four like action
and the just the like helplessness of like the Grace stuff.
I guess. My last question this is just for me.
Did you get any any Alyssa Ashcroft stuff in this
demo that you're allowed to talk about?
Speaker 4: Uh No, it's pretty contained to just Grace and Leon
in terms of like people that you're hearing talk and
just playing as Yeah damn.
Speaker 2: It, Yeah we did. We did see the Matt Eye
moody guy, no real context for what's going on with him,
but like he was there and he was cool as
a I have no idea what his place in the
story is good or bad, but like he was a
fun scenes deealer.
Speaker 3: He was.
Speaker 2: He's designed and he's the.
Speaker 1: Dude in a trailer that's like sitting in front of
his back turn to the TV or whatever.
Speaker 2: I think. So, yeah, he's got the Littles look and
head piece.
Speaker 4: Right, he's chewing up the scenery a lot. Yeah, the
scenes that he's in.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I asked about Alyssa, like, Jan, I don't know
if you're aware, but I recently streamed the entirety of
Residuval Outbreak alongside Oh Charles Hart, because that's the game
that Alyssa is introduced in. So we went into that
being like, oh, man, they're bringing her back for this game.
She must suddenly must be an important character. We should
play this game so that we'll know all about her
and it will like be like a good setup for Requiem,
and then three months later realizing that we know maybe
less about her because the game is not very much
a character development. She's just kind of there it's like
a multiplayer game, so she's just like spouting things like
give me that and I need this to your partners
for items, and then occasionally get a cut scene where
she's just like writing for her paper, being like, man,
it's pretty messed up what's happening here in Racoon City?
And Charles and I were like, I don't know if
we probably thought we were gonna get from this character.
I guess it's interesting that they went through the trouble
of not only bringing her back, we're giving her a
daughter and making her the star. Okay, well, I still
I'm still looking forward to, like Charles and I being
the only people that will like have a legitimate like
mark out when she appears on screen, like we know
who that is.
Speaker 2: I mean, it has it has to matter, right, Like
why are the pool They could have made this any
character they wanted him, they specifically made it Grace Ashcroft.
So I'm sure it will have some payoff. Will it
have been worth playing through outbreak?
Speaker 4: Probably not?
Speaker 1: But you know, yeah, a very frustrating PS two formerly
online only or not only only, but like online focus
the multiplayer game.
Speaker 4: Maybe Grace will have a skin that is just her
Mom from Outbreak, so y'all will have familiar knowledge with
that and can point to.
Speaker 2: That the context.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, we're really we're really hoping some of the
other Outbreak playable characters show up. Like there's like a
whole thing where like Alyssa's like, oh yeah, your godfather
or your godmother is Yoko, who was the character that
had the most inventory slots and the fault made her
the best. Like we just want little things like they're like, oh, Yoka,
she's back. Or Jim the really panicky guy that showed
up for one scenario and just kept complaining about how
awful his life is. Let's let's get some let's get
some Outbreak up in this game please to justify the
time he's been playing it. But awesome, Wes, you wrote
your impressions up on the site as well as some
some other sort of like interview breakouts that we encourage
people to go to game before we're not to check
out and yeah that game comes out god, Like you said,
it's like what end of February forget the a month.
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh I've slash my birthday.
Speaker 2: Oh gosh, that's gonna be a busy day because Brian's birthday.
Speaker 1: You don't have to play a party.
Speaker 4: We're also celebrating at a giant bomb. I don't know
if you know, Brian, I have.
Speaker 2: One more thing about Requiem. So in my interview with
Koshi Nakanishi, at the end of it, it was like
a thirty minute interview, but they asked me to only
prepare twenty five minutes of questions, which is not how
interview's work anyway. But once I got to the end there,
they were like, the director would actually like to share
something with you, and I'm like, okay, what's about what's
going on? And it was basically not a prepared statement,
but he was basically saying, we here at the team
are very aware of rumors that this might be an
open world game, and we've seen speculation and blah blah blah.
He's like, I just want to let you know this
is not an open world game. Okay. They're like, you
will be exploring Raccoon City and various locations or whatever
in different ways, but it is not an open world game,
which I just thought was interesting that you typically just
don't see a dev address online speculation in that manner,
But it seemed very important to them. To do so, so, yeah,
if you were worried about open world are don't. It's
not an open world game.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: And if you done if his what would you've done
if his thing? Like he was like, hey, he he
has something that's really important. He'd like to end this
interview with like sharing this with you. And it was
just him busting into teach me how to Dougy like
just some sort of like crazy karaoke sov You're like, well,
thank you so much for shaving off five minutes of
my interview time With that, I'd be really.
Speaker 2: Stoked and really upset that I wasn't able to video
record it, because that would be that would give the
numbers that would that would make my day. That'd be
like a career all time moment. If this director, the
famously for horror games, is like, let me hit this Doug,
you real quick.
Speaker 1: He's like, this might seem weird, but I guarantee you
this will have plot significance. Just you know, yeah, pay
attention to you played a game well awsome.
Speaker 5: Well, my biggest takeaway from this is that we need
outcasts to come back.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, I listen.
Speaker 4: I think that every day. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, unless Andre puts out another Flud album which I
did listen to.
Speaker 2: The Flood albums aren't doing it for me. Nod respect, but.
Speaker 1: Not for me. Yeah. I appreciate your art, but I
don't want it up. And you know what, speaking of
art that we may or may not want, Wesley, you
review Code Vein Too? Yeah, what a means set for
this game? Yeah, but yes, you publish your review. You
weren't all that hot on it. You gave it a
five five point five, right, yeah, five point of ten.
Explain yourself, why why don't you like this game? What's
wrong with Codevein Too? Wesley?
Speaker 2: Like everything, everything is wrong with it? I don't It
does maybe one or two things well, a lot of
things not well, and then most of the game kind
of just falls as like just mediocre. It is very
I beat it last week and I have dropped. I've
drained it from my brain already. I have no intentions
to ever think about this game beyond this podcast. It
is a souls like follow up to twenty nineteen's Code Vein,
and if Code Vein was like a more open, dark
souls like game, it is very clear to me that
Code Vein two's team saw Elden Ring. It was like,
we want to try something like that now, because this
is very much a jump from Souls to Elder and
Ring in terms of code. Vein two's progression unfortunately did
not make such a saw, such a nice landing that
elden Ring did with from software, it is a boring
open overworld to explore. It is poorly put together and
extremely difficult and annoying to navigate because of invisible walls
and cliffs that are not shown on the map and
pathways that you're traveling in the you're in the present
trying to stop the end of the world by going
one hundred years.
Speaker 1: In the past.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, you got to save some heroes and then
see what happens in the president and see if you're
like changing time in the right way. Annoyingly, a lot
of the exploration happens in the present and in the
past differently, so like you might think you can get
here in the present by following this road, but that
road's blocked off. When you get there, you learn that,
and then it's you only can do that in the past.
But the game isn't like you can't go here because
you're in the present. You just have to one eventually realize, oh,
I was never meant to go here in the present.
I'm just supposed to go in the past, even though
they made this entire world explorable, so like it's it's
it sucks to get around and you're on a motorcycle
for some reason, I have no idea why it's a
cool motorcycle at least, and you walk around, and I
just did not engage or enjoy the open world whatsoever,
Like the enemy placement sucks, the overworld bosses suck, the
pathing sucks, like everything about it was a bore. And
on top of that, it is visually I would say,
visually unpleasant, which I don't. I mean, it's even some
of my least favorite games I have visuals that, like
I can appreciate as art. This game is so distractingly
garish and ugly that I just really didn't care for
what I was seeing on screen. You have anime esque
character design clashing with like kind of photorealistic environments, and
then it's all like the color scheme, Like I just
it was so strange to me. I was kind of
bewildered with everything I was seeing on screen because there's
just no harmony whatsoever.
Speaker 3: Is.
Speaker 2: It hurts my eye as I'm playing, and there's a
character at the end. I don't even care. I'm not
gonna spoil what he is. But like in this very
souls like baroque esque world operatic adventure, this dude appears
with a freaking cat mask, like an electronic draft punk
draft punk style cat mask. His cape, yeah, his cape
is led and flashing rainbow colors. I was just like, dude,
what is going on?
Speaker 4: Why?
Speaker 1: Future?
Speaker 2: No, it's just no, not to my knowledge, and I
put forty two hours in this game, but.
Speaker 4: It was just did he just leave rave or something?
Speaker 2: Maybe he does have a musical moment. I'll say, like
you guys, do no not the Dougie.
Speaker 1: No that director for a game feature.
Speaker 2: That's a ten out of ten if if there was
a doug An It's that simple. That's that's why I've
been holding out on giving out my first ten No
Dougies in games yet.
Speaker 1: By the way, do you guys remember just ants? Do
you guys remember when wolf Blitzer did the Dougie had
like a awards I will find this after.
Speaker 5: I remember Larry King trying to rap with Snoop Dogg.
That was a highlight of of CNN.
Speaker 2: Sounds about right, yes, so yeah, that is I didn't
enjoy looking at this game. The voice cast is not
really selling the ambitious steaks the story is going for.
The music's cool. I did like the music. It was
like a rock infused baroque orchestral suite which was fun.
A lot of repeat tracks though, so it doesn't necessarily
hold up over forty two hours. The Me and Potatoes
is obviously this souls like combat, and to the game's credit,
it is doing some unique things and I do enjoy
some of its systems. So similar to the first game,
you have like it's now called your jail, which is
the special third weapon you have that sucks blood or
or from enemies wear.
Speaker 1: And it's not like your heart and your you have
like your heart in your backpack. It's visually, it's it's interesting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's something, and that's and the the I core
is how you use your abilities, which it's you know,
it's kind of like your manna essentially and any other RPG.
You have your primary weapon, your secondary weapon. You have
a blood code, which I actually do like the blood
code system. You can equip different ones you get throughout
the world, and they drastically change your stats. So like
if I had to take it out of this games,
like in universe terms, you can equip a blood code
that turns you into a warrior, or a blood code
that turns you into a mage, or a blood code
that turns you into like somebody who's really good with
the hammer. Because when you level up, it's just you
just hit up, like you just go from level one
to two. You don't apply it to stats like you
do in a typical Soul's game, because your blood code
is what changes those stats, which I enjoy because it's like, oh,
I have a new weapon arranged weapon, but i've and
I'm not currently equipped to do range damage. You can
just change your blood code and now you have a
build that works with range. I think it's a really
cool system and it allows for some flexibility I don't
think you see often in these types of games. That said,
for all the systems and ways you have to interact
with killing enemies, man does it get boring and stale quick.
The dungeons are very unimaginative and very boring. I mean
we're talking like underground water plant, underground power plant, underground prison,
underground church. Some of them are on laboratory, some of
them are.
Speaker 1: Because when I played this game for a few hours
for a preview, and it was in like an underground
like water works place, and yeah it was bland, but
also it was like really confusing and navigate where I
kept getting turned around, and even with the because they
give you like a little guiding line thing where they
they'll show you like the path ahead, but also simultaneously
show you the steps you've already taken, which which works.
Speaker 2: In practice in theory, it works in theory, in practice
terrible because it shows you everything you've done for like, yeah, no,
everything you've done for the past five minutes is on
the ground. You can't really see where you've been. You
just see you just painted the floor gold with like
your previously traced steps. You can't.
Speaker 1: It's a wild network of lines. If you've been running
around in the same areas over and over, you're just like,
I don't know where to go.
Speaker 2: It looks ridiculous, and to your point, they are. The
dungeons and the overworld are hard to navigate because everything
is obscured until you find a tree that you hit,
and then the tree unveils the map which is silly
because if if I have to go seventy percent into
a dungeon to find the map, that's seventy percent of
this dungeon I'm struggling through and having a hard time
navigating because I don't have the map, and when I get.
Speaker 1: It, yeah, well this is not holiday.
Speaker 2: And I just found that incredibly frustrating, especially in this genre,
this souls like genre, were like, your dungeons above all else.
Your dungeons need to be cream of the crop, like
that's where you need to really hit the marks, and
this game does not. There's a couple standout moments. The
game is a bunch of like sub arcs that evolve
into like one big arc, and there's one in particular
that I actually enjoyed that had a lot of heart,
but the rest of them fall flat due to characters
I just didn't care about, or poor pacing. And it's
one of those things where big things happen and the
game is like giving the game time to be like, yeah,
this is pretty cool, huh, and I'm like, no, I
don't care. I'm not invested at all. Why are you
doing this? Which is kind of disappointing. Yeah, it's a
game where I can see a lot of ambition, like
on a whiteboard. I just don't know if any of
it panned out in the final thing, Like it's frustrating
to play. It's frustrating, it's annoying, it's still it's boring.
Rarely was I like this is fun. It was always
something going on, whether it's you know, the PS five's
performance not doing so well, which also apparently is not
performing well on PC either, even with people with like
super bfpcs. The cameras, the camera is atrocious in boss fights.
Speaker 1: Because I think the boss fights, at least when I
played the preview, that was like one of the few
things I thought was better because I didn't think the
moment of moment kind of like grunt enemies were exciting.
But I thought at least the two boss fights I played,
it was like, oh, there's this is all right, Like
this there's a lot more going on here, is more
strategy involved, it's tough. Like I enjoyed those probably more
than anything else of what I am.
Speaker 2: The bosses. Yeah, the bosses at the end of each arc,
like the final bosses of each arc, I actually really
liked and I thought they were well designed, but the
other bosses like in between not so great, and I
was actually reading I originally had this in my review
funny enough, but it was kind of just wordy and
I couldn't find a way to condense it. But in
Igian's review by Michael Hyam, he reviewed the game and
he talked about the bosses are able to hit you
in moments where you can't do anything. So and I
almost mentioned this because it was so frustrating and I'm
glad I'm not alone. But so, when a boss knocks
you over, your character has an animation of them getting up.
You can't roll out of that, you can't move, you
can't do anything until that animation is done. But the
boss can hit you and damage you more while that's happening.
I died so many times because my character was getting
up and the boss hit me again.
Speaker 1: It was in fear.
Speaker 2: I almost reached out to pr to be like, this
must be a bug, right, this is something. This is
not okay in a Soul's game where I'm being knocked
over a lot.
Speaker 1: It also plays in two because I think one thing
you haven't mentioned yet with the combat is that you
have like the was it the partner system where you
have like, y, yeah, a little buddy that tags along
with you, that lives inside of your weird jail backpack thing,
and you can either summon them at will and they'll
like fight alongside you as an AI companion, or you
can absorb them and you get like stat buffs.
Speaker 2: And you can switch back and forth freely.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like you can any time. But I also like,
and I was wondering if there was if this changed
in the main game, but I never found really an
argument to not just have an AOG partner at all times,
like even with the benefits of like, oh, if you
go Sola, you'll get like extra attack points, and I
was like, yeah, that's not nearly as good as just
having someone that can draw agro or be a distraction
and you know, just can do things and that. And
then during boss fights though, like when you get knocked
down or when you get like like you get killed,
basically they can revive you.
Speaker 2: So it just kind of felt like that's that's even
outside of bosses. Oh yes, you're yeah, you're right. The
game kind of tees you up to be like, well,
when you're fighting bosses, absorb them so you can have
the stat buff and then when you're fighting a bunch
of enemies, summon them so they can help Agro. But
that's not how I would want to want to tackle
a boss at all, if anything, especially when these bosses
are not well designed, where I have no interest in
trying to learn what they're putting down, like they just
don't work like that. Yes, I'm gonna summon and just
let them take Agro and then I'll just go swing
at this dude's heels. The only time I ever absorbed
them was when I was in the overworld just trying
to get somewhere, because killing the mobs would be even
easier if I was buffed up. But for the most part, yeah,
I kept my summon out. And another you did mention
the revived thing. I do think that's pretty cool and
kind of a something that I think will help people
that maybe struggle in this type of combat a bit more.
Is when you die, your buddy will revive you with
like half health, and if they die again, they have
a longer cool down, but then they'll revive you again
with even a little bit with a little bit less health,
And you can do that over and over, which kind
of keeps you in the fight and stops you from
running through your estes flask equivalent. That said, though, I mean,
these fights aren't really begging you to get that strategic
or anything. Like. All the experimentation and mechanical fun I
had and found was just me forcing myself to do it,
to test out and flex the systems. The game in
no way requires thought in terms of like combat, which
is the biggest spummer of all in a game like this.
Speaker 4: That's unfortunate to hear, because I mean, the souls like
genre is so densely populated at this point that even
a new release can still get overtaken by like the
huge library at this point of other souls like games.
Like if anything, this is making me want to go
back to play like a different one, like pick up
the Lives of p DLC that I missed from last year.
But also there's like with if this one doesn't hit,
there's at least two to three more down the pipeline
this year alone. Yeah yeah, oh yeah, Neo three is soon,
Phantom Blade zero is soon as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, the dust Bud's got yeah, and el ring
on switch tartarst edition apparently right, but yeah, you're you're
right with this, yeah, with with this genre, and it's
kind of similar to like metroidvany as, I feel, just
because they're so saturated at this point. If you aren't
coming out like really strong, like if you don't have
something that's going to hit, you're kind of shooting yourself
in the foot because we have so many others that
we can play at any moment. I may not even
put in my review. If I wasn't reviewing this, I
would have put this game down a long time ago,
Like if your soul is like, not only are you
competing with a beloved developer in from Software who kind
of helped create this genre, but like we're at the
point now in that genre's lifespan where other devs are really, really,
really really making some special stuff Like Lives of P.
I think that game's fantastic, And if you're going to
come out and put out a mediocre one of these,
that's an even bigger miss in my opinion than just
a regular release.
Speaker 5: I was about to say when when you mentioned Lies
of P, you're speaking Wesley's language.
Speaker 2: Yes, on the Lives of P, Siko and overture of
the expansion from two years ago last year, very good.
I had it in my top ten. I think if
I remember, yeah, go play Lies of p anybody that
hasn't listening, don't don't pick up Code Vein to go
play lives ape instead.
Speaker 4: It's especially a bummer because I'm looking at like reviews
for the original Code Vein and those were fairly high
in comparison to how Code Vein two is scoring. So yeah,
I can't speak to that. I know a lot of
Code Vein heads out there, but they're definitely going to
be disappointed with the same one.
Speaker 2: I think it's a I think it's a situation where
they got a little bit tantalized by stuff happening outside
of Code Vein, like elden Ring and that type of exploration,
and instead of maybe sticking to what people liked about
Code Vein and really expanding on that, they just kind
of went in a more wide direction, which can be
can be a downfall.
Speaker 1: I feels weird. I feels like we are moving and like,
you know, for the long time, we were sort of
like in the post Dark Souls world of everyone's trying
to do the Dark Souls template. But elden Ring's been
out long enough where we're starting to see more of like, oh,
the post elden Ring effect because like the three, they're
doing a bigger like They're big thing is bigger world,
more open ended, free form exploration, and like I'm sure
that'll continue with like other Souls likes now, like, oh,
let's just do it open like kind of like you've
been saying more like open world games kind of take
lessons from Breath of the Wild and Tear to the King.
It seems like, yeah, when doing a Soul's likes and
be like, maybe we could do some Elton Ring stuff too,
so it'll be.
Speaker 2: Funny because it's like I didn't even I was nervous
about from software doing that because like going open world
with something is typically a turn off for me. But
it's from software, so I trusted them and they nailed
it like any other dev Like don't if you're making
a Souls like, don't go with the elden Ring route.
That's a really high bar to hit, Like, yeah, that's
what I love so much about Liza p is it's
like the traditional Dark Souls Bloodborne esque route where it's
like you're gonna watch this. I prefer a world opening
up through shortcuts and connections then I do just a
big map that I can traverse wherever I want, and yeah,
I want. I don't want this elden Ring lesson to
apply to every Soul's like Movie Forward.
Speaker 1: Well, Wes.
Speaker 5: Crazy thing is I just looked at the Metacritic and
Code Vein two has a higher metacritic than codeven and one.
Oh really, seventy two is the Codevein two metacritic. Seventy
is the Code Vein one metacritic.
Speaker 2: Okay, so that's about That's yeah. I saw some I
saw some ten out of tens for Code Vein two,
which I was reading just to be like, you know,
to check out what other people are saying. And so
there's people out there that enjoyed it, not me, But
you know, I'm not gonna yuck their young shout out.
I'm glad you liked it. I did not, And I
am very excited to lete this off my hard drive
once I have the go ahead of the more video persons,
I don't need to capture anymore.
Speaker 1: West On as Stadium one any elden Ring likes. But
hear me out, how would you like a Strand game
that was a Soul's Like.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm a strand. Guy, I'm a big I'm
a big fan of those strands, so I'll take you.
Speaker 1: Could build bridges while dodge rolling enemies. I'm just so.
Speaker 4: What if doing the Dougie gives you I frames like
a dodge roll bood?
Speaker 2: Oh my god. We're really onto something here, We're really
onto something here.
Speaker 1: Well, awesome, Thank you, Wes. You can read Wes's full
Code Vein two review right now on gaminformer dot com.
Speaker 2: And if you watch the video on our YouTube channel
by the time you're seeing.
Speaker 1: This, Oh okay, we have a video review. Awesome. Yes, yeah, okay,
well yeah go check that out as well, and that'll
wrap up this week's show. Folks, thank you so much
for watching. Once again, if you want to support Gameformer,
game Informer dot com slash subscribe, get yourself a magazine subscription.
Of course, double seven first Light digital issue available now
coming in mailboxes and stores and over the next few weeks.
But yes, you can get yourself a beautiful, glossy and
thick with two c's printed magazine by going to Gameforma
dot com slash subscribe. Ten is is a year delivered
right to you. Jan. Thank you so much man for
joining us on the show. Is there anything you want
to plug with what you got going on over there?
A giant Bomb.
Speaker 4: Yeah, for folks that don't know giant bomb dot com
or an independent games media website. We stream possibly too much,
so if you ever need any backgrowd noise, we're there
for you. One of our biggest series right now, we
call it Blake Club. We subject three of our staff
members to play some of the worst games to completion,
so I suggest you go check that out. We also
have a bunch of pods if you're curious and you
need some more audio to fill up your life. I
do want to say we're all big fans of a
Game Informer over at GB, but y'all have the nicest magazine,
not just in terms of content but actually the paper.
It is the nicest magazine I have ever touched. So
be proud of that.
Speaker 2: When we came back, we wanted to do that, and
I remember matt O Rider in chief, got like advanced
and our design team got advanced looks on that, and
they just kept telling us how much nicer it is
and how much better that Peoper is. But we didn't
have it yet. And when I finally got it, I
was like, Yo, we might actually have the cleanest magazine.
Speaker 5: Yeah, And like yeah, at the end of our last era,
it was like getting cut so much in terms of
like our budget for like the paper that we could afford.
It was like it was not where we wanted it
to be. So that was like a huge priority for
us when when we came back under a different parent company.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and when I saw it at the I saw
it at my local Barnes and Noble. And not just
because I know it's y'all, it's stuck out to me,
but it stuck out because of the glossy, nice paper.
Speaker 1: Oh awesome.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, we appreciate that.
Speaker 2: I was prepared to hate jam because when this podcast
started because in the kind of funny Games Daily Awards
we were in the Game of Former was a finalist
for Best Website, and so was Giant Bomb, and Giant
Bomb beat us. Giant Bomb won that. But you know
what I think I'm turning. I'm turning a corner, Jaan.
Then Giant bar Folks are pretty cool.
Speaker 4: Okay, all right, Well, Wesley, if I if and when
I see you in person, I hope instead of like
an olive branch or a handshake. We can just hit
the Duggie together.
Speaker 2: No one around us will have any idea what we're doing.
Speaker 4: But but I hope it inspires everyone else around us
to join.
Speaker 1: In the mass hysteria.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, massive Dougie hysteria.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's coming back, much like the Harlem Shake.
Speaker 4: Oh okay, I'm excited forcast for sure.
Speaker 5: It's the collaboration that gamers have been dying for. Giant
Game and former staff coming together to hit the Dougie.
Speaker 1: The Douggie that would do numbers.
Speaker 2: Hold on now album this.
Speaker 1: Year director, Yeah, talk off air, get that set set
for SG Yeah, well, thank you, Janny. Yes, please go
to support Giant Bomb. They put out awesome content. It's
a long time BombCast listener. Myself, I love I love
the show. You guys always crack me off. You guys
have some great, great conversations about and often not video
games that are extremely entertaining. Love all the videos and
streams you guys put out. So please go support a
Giant Bomb who they themselves are out independent. You guys
went independent not to after we came back, so it
felt really cool to like come back and see another
outlet kind of like you know, like I said, seemingly
on the brink of going away and then coming back
better than ever. So love seeing what you guys are
doing over there.
Speaker 4: Thank y'all, thanks for having me and I love seeing
what y'all are doing over here at Game Informer. Fantastic
awe inspiring stuff, constantly awesome.
Speaker 1: And if you want to follow a jan Jan what
does your social media handle? Folks want to reach out for.
Speaker 4: You, primarily on Blue Sky. That's just at Janochoa dot
bsky dot social, but just look for giant Bomb. Don't
actually look for a giant Bomb unfortunate naming. Can't get
rid of it at this point, but giant bomb on
all socials were on Instagram, TikTok sky. I think those
are the big three, as well as YouTube of course,
But just go to giant bomb dot com. You can
find us and all the stuff we make over there awesome.
Speaker 1: You can follow me on Blue Sky as well at
Marcus Stewart's seven. You can find Wesley at is it
Wesley Wesley Woodblog? What is Wesley Blah? Just Wesley Lebloc
and Brian at Brian Pichet or did you drop the
p Brian?
Speaker 3: Nope, it's still there.
Speaker 5: Just because I was that was Brian Piche across all
of their platforms, so I was like, I don't want
to confuse, like what on different platforms, so I just
kept it consistent.
Speaker 1: Okay, well at Brian Piche on Socials and yeah, we
were going to get the heck out of here. But
we'll be back next week with an episode of the
Game and former show. Thank you so much for listening
and watching, and we'll see you then. Bye.