Speaker 1: Hello, everyone, Welcome to the Game and Former Show, a
weekly podcast covering the video game industry. Join us each
and every week for a discussion on the latest gaming news, reviews,
and exclusive reveals with Game and Former staff and special
guests from around the industry. I am your host this week,
Marcus Stewart. I am joined by the King of the
Hilliard himself, Kyle Hilliard.
Speaker 2: Hello, Hello, King of the Hilliard. All right, I'll take it.
I'm the king. I did it.
Speaker 1: And what's the king without another king? Because we have
the King of Hearts himself, Charles Hart Heart.
Speaker 2: I like that.
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, Kyle, do you feel like the
king and your family dynamic?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 3: I was gonna say, I don't know, because I feel
like you talk about your wife and daughter enough that
I'm like, I don't know.
Speaker 2: They're in charge, man, I don't know. Don't making decisions?
Are you kidding me?
Speaker 3: I'm the only heart that lives in my house. So
I feel fine being the king of.
Speaker 2: Well for now, mister Gage. If she decides to take
your last name, I suppose she's going to so now nice.
Speaker 1: Well, Hello everyone, Welcome to the Game Informer Show. We
have a absolutely stacked episode. This week, We've got Ghost
of Yo Take. Kyle Hillary reviewed the game. He's gonna
be talking about that. We've got the one point zero
launch of Hades two. Charles Hart you review that. I've
got Silent hill f which also came out this week
that I reviewed. We're gonna be talking about Baby Steps,
We're gonna be talking about Hotel Barcelona, and maybe we
might talk about the state of play. Who knows. But yes,
it's a very big, very big week. So before we
jump right into it. Of course, if you want to
support Game Informer, the best way to do it is
to go to GameInformer dot com, slash subscribe and sign
up for a magazine subscription. As you can see Charles
Hart holding up our recent Ninja Go four issue. Kyle
Hillier has got our Vampire to Masquerade Bloodliness two issue.
Of course, recently we announced our next cover story, which
we'll actually have to leave go live digitally next week,
which is on the Outer World Too, which I wrote.
You can get ten issues a year, physical and digital
delivered to you by signing up for a magazine subscription.
You can also sign up for it just the digital
edition for a reduced price. But it's the best way
to support Game Informer as an outlet, and with the
improved paper quality and just over eighty pages of in
depth features, previews, reviews, and more, it's, dare I say,
the best way to keep up with video game news.
Speaker 2: I'm going to day hot exclusive. I'm going to tease
a feature in the Outer World's two issue, Toby Fox interview.
That's all I'll say. Yeah, that's pretty cool, pretty good
creator of Undertail.
Speaker 1: Yeah, until he has he never shown his face.
Speaker 2: No, I don't think so.
Speaker 3: I think they just did a stream and maybe I
could be totally wrong. I think they just did an Anniversaryshima
Undertail and he's represented on the couch as like his
little dog persona A right, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: I was opening d like a god mister near Automata
with the moon helmet. I was opening day like that,
but with a sands.
Speaker 2: That'd be good.
Speaker 1: That'd be pretty good. But yes, keep an eye a
for that in our Outer World's issue. Like I said,
goes live digitally next week. But Kyle hilly or without
further ado. Ghost of Yote, the sequel to Ghosts of Shushima,
one of the PlayStation four's best games. It is is
it out this week or is it next week or October?
Speaker 2: October second?
Speaker 1: I believe October second. Yeah, yeah, is Embargo looked pretty early?
Speaker 2: I guess today, I think, yeah, it's.
Speaker 1: Pretty yeah, yeah, week from today. But yes, you played it,
you finish it. Your review is up on the site
tell us. Is this a good game? Should we be
excited for Ghost of Yota?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Absolutely, it is a fantastic game. I loved Ghost
of Yote. I I this is uh yeah, I really
loved Ghost of Sushima, and I really loved Infamous Second
son and I really loved Infamous, and I really loved
uh Sly Cooper three and Sly Cooper two and Sly
Cooper one. And I've never played Rocket Rubino Wheels. But
that's all to say I've always a fake fan. I've
always admired Sucker Punch a lot. I think in a
way they're kind of underrated because they're not really spoken
with in the same breadth as like Naughty Dog and Insomniac,
But like they're like maybe my favorite Sony like owned
developer in that sort of you know, triumph it.
Speaker 3: I think, like, honestly, I even more than Sony Santa Monica.
Speaker 2: Wow, man, that's a tough Yeah, that's tough. That's tough.
I don't know, Like, but they're like I I just
like I love their games, and like Ghost of Susho
was my game of the Year the year it came out,
and I kind of had high expectations for Ghost of
Yote and like I loved it. I love this game,
Like I don't know if I'm ready to call it
my game of the year, Like I think Claire Obscure
maybe still takes that title for me for reasons we
can get into later in the year. But this is like,
if it's not number one, it's certainly like a close
number two. But yeah, I love this game. Like it's
just like there's so many cool things about it, right,
Like it's not this radical reinvention of what worked in Sushima,
but it's just like it's just really good. Like this
the world is fun to explore. There's like there's no
loading times at all for fast travel, which means the
pace is just like sprinting all the time. Like it
is constantly fun to just be doing stuff in the world.
There's no there's no like there's there's barriers in the
sense that like you're kind of going through a narrative,
so like you are going along like a story track,
but there's no barriers in terms of like the player
interacting with the game, if that makes sense, you know
what I mean. Like there's never there's never a moment
to like be bored. If you don't want to be bored,
If you want to be bored and you kind of
just take in the scenery and not really focus on anything,
you can totally do that. But like it's one of
those games. It was interesting to play because you know,
I had a review deadline that I was trying to hit.
I knew it was a big game, but like I
could not stop myself from doing all this side stuff,
Like I just couldn't focus on the main story in
a complimentary way where it's because it's like if you're
riding your horse to like that point, like you're gonna
get distracted by something that's worthwhile, like whether that's just
like following a golden bird to get like, you know,
find a hot spring that gives you more health, or
if it's like a side story that they're like all
the little side quests are really engaging and interesting in
the sense that they're there. Really isn't a lot of
repeated things of like, oh this person needs like five flowers,
go get them five flowers. Like every single side story
just has kind of a unique interesting twist to it.
And because there's no loading screens and the fast travels instantaneous,
it's really easy to just like pop around and get
distracted and then get right back to what you were doing.
And then on top of all that, like I think
the narrative just really does out does Sushima in a
big way.
Speaker 1: Like I well, what I want to ask us this
is set like a couple one hundred years after I
think it's Sushima. Yeah, three hundred years and you're playing
as a new protagonist Atsu.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what year is it? Do you know? I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean I think it. I think it's like fifteen
or sixteen hundreds because Sushima was twelve hundreds, Yeah, wasn't it.
Speaker 2: I mean it's yeah, it's a it's a significant amount
of time and it's a different area, so I mean
there's no there's no tie really.
Speaker 1: Yeah, sixteen oh three, okay, said Charles.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean and like I but the thing
I was I was getting at is just like the
story of the game is like is really engaged good
and I like Atsu a lot, Like I like her
more than Gin. She's a much more interesting, sort of
well realized protagonist that I really just liked being with
and hanging out with. And there were like there were
times that in the game that like really got me,
like really were making me cry and like brought me
to tears and things like that. I kind of I do.
I cry pretty easily when it comes to like fiction,
so like I'll you know, maybe not everyone will have
that experience, but like I I met, I was messaging
Haley over at min Max because she got really far,
She's almost beaten it at this point, and we were
both kind of like, yeah, there's there's at least one
part that, like you know, was was making us tier up,
and I bet I was. I messaged her. I was like,
I bet it was this part, wasn't it. She's like, yeah,
it was em so like I'm not spoiling anything obviously,
but I mean, it's just it's just one of those
games that I went into with high expectations and they
were exceeded, you know, like I love it. It's so good.
Speaker 1: Does this came get into the because one thing. So
I'm gonna preface saying I really liked Ghostusushima, but I
think I've always been on the lower end of my likes.
I know people have a love affair of the game,
and I was always just like, it's pretty, it's good,
it's really good.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: One of the things that annoyed me about the game
was sort of the premise of the like like debating
whether to use like stealth or just facing enemy's head
on and sort of the story concede around it was
like inforiating to me because I hated Jen's uncles so much,
just because of how anti stealthy was in a way
that just made no sense to me. Yeah, Like, are
you is there still that sort of like no balance
of like you're choosing what style to go through and
it's like a weird moral decision at all or do
they just say like kill whoever you want. No, that's
I mean, that's the thing that That's one of the
reasons I like ad Too so much, is like she
doesn't care about that stuff, Like she doesn't folks. Her
focus is so specific and like extremely sort of defined
of like I was a kid and these six men
killed my parents and my brother in front of me,
and they and they used a sword to stick me
to a tree that they set on fire. And I
have spent my whole life trying to get back at them,
And that is like and She's gonna do whatever it
takes to do that. Like she is mad for totally
justifiable reasons that I totally believe in in the game,
because it's so good at like setting you up, Like
because the way it's not just like the cut you know,
you don't just get a cut scene flashback like they've
talked about this before, right, Like you actually go into
the past and you get to live, you know, see
her family and what her life was like before this incident,
and then you get to live through that incident as well,
like by literally playing as young Atsu. So like she's
so focused on this singular goal that it's like as
a like a narrative and also it's like a video
game sort of premise. It's like great because it's like
I know exactly why she needs to do this, and
I'm totally I totally understand why she needs to do this,
and I'm gonna help her do it, and I'm gonna
do whatever it takes to get results, which was kind
of like in the narrative of Sushima, that was kind
of the thing. It was like Jin's uncle kept being like,
you can't do it this way, and Jin would like
point behind him and be like yeah, but like it's working,
Like what do you want from me?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Also, they don't play like Jin's uncle was basically the
main villain as far as I was, like, you're just
enabling the murder of your people by being so stubborn.
Is she is she had samurai or a ninja, like.
Speaker 2: She's an on real she's a ghost Marcus. Okay, exactly,
I mean she's a mercenary, she's a samurai basically.
Speaker 1: You know. Yeah, I didn't know if this counted in
the Year of the Ninjas.
Speaker 2: She was like closer to a snob. It does in
the sort of in the world of Ghosts of Sushima.
Gin is kind of the original ninja, like he was
the first one to kind of decide to do this
and become a proper ninja, if that makes sense, And
like Jin had who kind of like toes the line
between she has ninja abilities. You know, you could call
her ninja and you would you wouldn't be offending anybody,
but she's she's basically a mercenary samurai is kind of
like the best way to find her. She's walking around,
you know, with swords and not really being sneaky. But
if you want to dress up in all black and
be sneaky, can that's an option? Nice?
Speaker 1: Yeah, And you mentioned the side content earlier being better.
That was actually one of my problems in the first
game is that I thought the side content outside of
the main like ally missions, I thought everything else was
pretty boilerplate in a way that I found disappointing, Like
are you still doing those like big ally missions, like
like loyalty missions. I guess, for lack of a better term.
Speaker 2: They're not as defined. But there are a handful of
characters that you do sort of go on missions with.
There's really only like two primary allies, I guess you
could say, which is like good, you know, it's like
sort of paars it down to just like the really
important ones, and those two are like really important in interest.
Speaker 1: Is there a comedic relief?
Speaker 2: Not really? Actually, I mean Odds is pretty funny because
she's so brash and just like you know, like doesn't
really care. I guess you could say, you know, and
she gets oh, okay. There's a lot of people who
will just be like oh a woman, and she'd be
like yeah, and I'm gonna kill you in like five seconds,
so like let's get through those, which is like a
fun dynamic have you know, So there's not really like
a comic relief character. Really, ultimately, it's not. It's a
pretty dour game. It's not without its light moments, but
it but it takes itself very seriously and in an
effective way. I would argue, I think it works.
Speaker 1: Right, and the combat's the same, like switching between the different
sword stances and whatnot.
Speaker 2: Or yeah, I mean that's like I guess you could
call it a complaint if I didn't like Sushima so much, right, Like,
I think like a lot of the mechanics of Sushima
I think worked really well. I thought the stealth was
a lot of fun in Sushima because it really prioritizes
like like there's so many stealth games that are very
punishing to sort of make the stealth more intense, right,
it's like, if you get caught, it's over. Where Sushima
and Yote are very much like we're gonna make stealth
pretty breezy and fun and if and if things go wrong,
like you're a badass, like you're gonna be fine, and
it doesn't feel like you've failed, right, Like I feel
like both of the games are pretty good at making
you not feel like a failure even if you don't
succeed in being stealth healthy as you planned, which I like.
And by the end of the game, you know, when
I'm trying to just like wrap up a few things,
I did often just walk into a camp and just
basically yell and be like, hey, let's come on, try
to fight me. You know, Like I wouldn't even bother
doing stealth at a certain point because and because it's
like and if I'm in the mood for stealth, you
know that's available. But you know, I kind of got
sidetracked there. But like it doesn't like radically reinvent anything
in Sushima, right, Like you have different weapons, but that idea,
that rock paper scissor idea of like switching between them
mid fight is still present and super fun and like cool,
and like it's really fun to use like the new
weapons to just bash through someone's shield, you know, and
stuff like that. And you have new things, like you
have a gun instead of not instead of but alongside
like a bow and arrow, you know, like it's it's
not like a radical reinvention, but it's like but it's
just like iterated on a little bit where it's just
improved somewhat. Same with like navigation with the wind. You know,
it's like the wind was like one of the most
memorable interesting parts of Sushima, So like that maintains here
and it's still very good and very sort of lets
you just focus on the world, which looks fantastic. It's
a lot of things of like it is. It is
an iterative sequel in a complimentary way where I think
I think I can say pretty easily that they improved
on everything right, Maybe not in like massive ways, but
it's like the story's better, the main character is more interesting,
the combat smoother, like you know, all those things are
just like better overall in general awesome.
Speaker 1: It's it's mentioning the win. Is it surprising to you
guys that goes to Shushimo was five years ago and
no other game has ripped that off. Like that's got
a while to me because of how that's such a
great idea and such an easy idea to just pluck
and put into your game, I know, and unless i'm
unless I'm I don't know if maybe there's something I
don't know of, But it's like, how has that not
just been ripped off yet? Like this is only the
second game to do it.
Speaker 3: I mean, it's so it's very much people take like
an all or nothing approach to the maps nowadays, where
it's like either you're going all the way and you're
like getting the towers and clearing all the sections off,
or people were like, we hate towers and clearing sections off,
so we're not gonna give you any map and you're
gonna have to figure it out all by yourself. And
sometimes that's fun and sometimes it's not fun. But I
really like the balance the Ghost of Souci Moodeyestra.
Speaker 2: Like you can't. I never really pulled out my sort
of telescope and just marked the map and just went
in that direction. I think there's only like one little
side mission I did it for, but like that's you
could totally do it that way, and you can see,
like you can look out in the distance and see
like you know, smoke rising up in the air, and
that's like always a signal that there's something interesting there, right,
but you could also just like use the map and
mark it and like, like I said, fast travels instantaneous.
There's never a barrier of like maybe I should just
ride my horse over there. It'll be quicker than watching
a loading screen. Like it's all. It's like, it's it's insane,
Like I don't I don't know how they pulled it off,
where like it's just everything is instantaneous. It's wild.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess they figure that out with Spider
Man because that also had the instantaneous like yeah, wellload
that nobody used because the traversal was actually really fun.
Speaker 2: I mean, Sushima has that acqu loading too, but it
still feels magical. Like I it's it's wild that you
can just like press a button and you're there, Like
it's it's crazy, it is.
Speaker 3: It's it is interesting how how much of a like
modern gaming thing that is that I've started to get
really used to. And then like Marcus and I will
be streaming Resident Evil Outbreak and to move between one
room and another room is like ten seconds of loading
screen per room.
Speaker 2: And it's like, you know, they just don't do that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, the heartbeat is literally counting on a number of
heartbeats that you have waiting for the next scene to
load in.
Speaker 2: Awesome.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I have not been able to fire up my
copy yet, which I was I was hoping to before this,
but just busy with my own stuff. But I'm super excited. Yeah,
I'm super excited to get to it. Like I said,
I I liked Sushim a lot, but I it was
just like short of just falling in full love with it.
But everything you're saying sounds awesome and like, actually, I
guess the last question I have was like that original trailer,
Remember that first trailer had that really kind of like
that soundtrack, but like the kind of Western eye, yeah,
kind of vibe, Like does that is that indicative like
the tone of the game, because I mean the idea
of the Revenge Quest sounds like something that could be
like a spaghetti western of like going on. Does it
have like that Western vibe or you think that was
just sort of a I mean I don't want off
for that trailer.
Speaker 2: It does for sure, like, especially like the the sort
of climax of the game, like the final sort of
confrontations and stuff like that definitely have sort of a
Western kind of tone. And when I say Western, I'm
talking about like the film genre, right, yeah, like they did.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that is like the I think samurai films es
are what Westerns are kind of based off of. So
it is cool to like, Yeah, you take it in
the old version into the new version, Yeah, and it
works well. And then I didn't dig too much into
it because I didn't want to not have the sort
of proper experience.
Speaker 2: But the uh, what a Nabe mode? Is that right?
Speaker 3: That's what I was gonna I was gonna ask about
the director.
Speaker 2: The one that I was interested in, Yeah, is what
a Nabe? Which has the like it's he's the anime
director who created Cowboy Bebop and more specifically Samurai Champlu,
which was like they basically yeah, great show that like
they basically if you turn that on, it makes the
soundtrack like was it like chill beats to you know?
Speaker 1: Does it just add like music? Like he was the
producer that that the all the soundtrack for? Is it
just Yeah, basically I'm a big fan of this. That
would actually be incredible to play the game with his music.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I like I turned it on for a
little while to do some side quests and stuff, and
I was like, I think I kind of want to
keep this on, you know, like you get that that
just that chill sort of hip hop stuff, like is
it's so good, it works so well, and they have
and it's like it's like, you know, they have like
you know, the combat music, they have the Wata Nabe
version of the combat music, so it's like you could
totally keep it on and it would be like a
seamless soundtrack. I think maybe some of the cutscenes might
go back to like the sort of orchestrated soundtrack, which
is like great, But I was like really impressed by
like the tone that the music change sets for the game.
But like then like the the Curasawa mode and the
the other mode who's the director's I name, I can't
remember off the top of my head. Those I was
like less interested in, you know, like I didn't really
want to change the whole visual style of the game.
But yeah, I would definitely recommend turning on a Wata
Nabbe mode at least for a little while. I think
now that I've beaten the game, and I'm gonna go
and like mop up everything because I do I this
is one of those games that I finished and you guys,
I'm sure you've had this before where you're like, I
don't want to not be in this world. I'm not
ready to leave as yet. Like that is one hundred
percent how I feel like. I'm just like I was
putting off beating the game for so long, even though
I had to for review, because I just didn't want
the journey to be over, and like I don't really
have as I get older, like that video game experience
kind of becomes rarer and rarer, Like I am very
much a like see credits, move on to the next thing.
We're here, Like I'm gonna look for every excuse to
like not be playing Ghost of Yota, Like I just
want to see everything it has to offer, you know.
But now that now that I've seen credits, I'm gonna
I'll probably just leave water on mode on all the
time because the soundtrack is so cool.
Speaker 3: I do like because I remember, uh like probably with
like Spider Man two or something like a game where
I'm like, I want to keep playing this and I'm
gonna just one hundred percent I if I've played it
long enough, I do kind of get to the point
where I'm like, all right, I'm gonna listen to my
podcast and just kind of do the busy work of
figuring this out. And I like the idea that it's
like you can make it visually audibly interesting that's separate
from the other thing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's just cool. I mean it is. And there
is like a lot of Spider Man in the game
in an odd way. Spider Man's in this game. I'm
literally Charles, I'm sorry. I mean he's just so excited.
But like just the like and not tone is the
wrong word, but just like the experience of playing where
Spider Man and Spider Man two are so like seamless, right,
Like there's just like you're just in that we're having
a great time, and it's like there's and you're just
kind of always upgrading yourself and doing things like this
has that kind of gameplay tone, like not not like
narrative tone or world tone, but just like gameplay tone
of just like, yeah, we're gonna let you in here.
There's always gonna be something fun to do. You're never
gonna not be having fun, whether that's you know, solving
a puzzle or like stopping a crime. Like there's always
gonna be some cool distraction that you're gonna want to
be engaged with, and like you can even you know,
skip the little things that maybe you don't want to do,
and the loading is instantaneous so you have no excuse.
But yeah, a great game, Like it'll definitely be one
that I'll be, you know, pushing forward the end of
the year for accolades and talking about a lot like
I this is definitely like I said this and Claire
for me are like my my one and two for
twenty twenty five. So far Metroit Prime still has to
be in my hands. See how that goes. That's true.
Speaker 3: I wanted to ask, are you also are you an
Erica fan of like outside of game?
Speaker 2: No, I am, now, I was like because I like
her as Atsu so much, but I was completely unfamiliar
with her until until playing Yote.
Speaker 3: If if you ever watch dropout stuff, Erica does a
lot of like comedy things and actual play like tabletop stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, she's like a D and D person right, Like
she's she's been on.
Speaker 3: Critical role in Mention twenty and she's she's on my
favorite show Worlds beyond Number.
Speaker 2: She's great. It was a fantastic performance. I was really
impressed by it.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, oh yeah, well Ghost of Shushima, like we
mentioned out October seven, Yota PlayStation clearer ghost Ghost of.
Speaker 2: Clear also out if you can play Ghost of Sushi also.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, so October second, Ghost of Yote for PlayStation five.
Speaker 2: Real quick, Oh, Charles, are you a Sushima guy? Are
you gonna play Yote? Yeah?
Speaker 3: So, I I didn't play Sushermo when it came out,
and I don't really remember why. I don't know what
was going on in my life at that point. I
thought I was still in college, so I think it
was just like literally busy. But I played it a
few years after and I got like fifteen or so
hours in and then I was like, I'm done. I
think I like finished the first act or like the
first major section, and it kind of opened up a
new part of the world. And I remember having the
thought where I'm.
Speaker 2: Like, I'm good.
Speaker 3: I don't really feel the need to I don't know.
I liked it, but it didn't really get its hooks
in me, and I was more playing it because I
knew people liked it so much, and I was like,
I got to get around to it, and I ultimately
was like it kind of felt like another open world game,
and I both wasn't really in the mood and wasn't
like super blown away. I think that this story you
were saying it's so good it's that is just immediately
more compelling to me, like the story level I think about.
And yeah, I genuinely can't remember the story of Ghost
Sushi off the top of my head right now. I
assume it was a similar revenge story, but I some yeah,
distinctly remember when I played through all of the Assassin's
Creed games a few years ago that there's a pretty clear,
uh like linear graph of how much I enjoy the
game and how much revenge is like a palpable part
of the plot line where I'm like, like an Assassin
Creed revelations at he I wasn't really trying to get
revenge on anyone anymore, and I feel like he's not
like driven to do all this crazy killing and stuff. Yeah,
when there is that, I'm like, I'm so into it.
And you're saying that that was like a major part
of ots who's character is like, I'm like much more.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they lock it in really well, It's it's they
do a good job with that cool. Well, yeah, I didn't.
I didn't mean that sort of sidetrack us, but like
to hear your opinion. But I was curious, Charles. But yeah,
good game. Alrighty well, thank you, Kyle H.
Speaker 1: Charles. I'm gonna throw it to you now because you
have been playing the one point zero version of Hades two,
which drops this week in a much like a in
a hollow, Hollow night silk song fashion out of nowhere
more or less. Super Giant Games announcing just a couple
of weeks ago that Hades two, which went into early
access last spring, would be yeah, last May, coming out
in one point zero, which they did keep to their
schedule they were. They always told everyone, including us when
we did the cover story, that it would be out
sometime next year, which I was confident about, just because
they were saying, like one day went into early access
a lot later than they did with Hades one, which
is why it was so robust even when it first
went in early access, and also just them having a
template to build on. I know greg Is often was
telling me when I was there, just like, yeah, we
don't really need to keep it an early access as
long it should be, it should be out sometimes twenty five,
but it is here. You've been playing it, you finished it?
What do you think?
Speaker 2: Yes, I played it.
Speaker 3: I really really really like it. I was really talking
about it was a lot.
Speaker 2: I'm serious.
Speaker 3: Kyle was saying all this stuff about Ghost of Yote
and I was like, oh, he's taking all my talking
points for Hades two.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well did you before we started? Did you? Were
you a Hades one guy?
Speaker 2: Absolutely? I love Hades one.
Speaker 3: It's like one of my one of my favorite games
of all time, Hades one, all time. All right, So
I at the time of this recording, by the time
this is out, the review will have been published. At
the time of this recording, I have not really.
Speaker 2: Settled on a score all the way.
Speaker 3: But this is the first time I have reviewed a
game and seriously considered a ten. All right, kind I'm
up there, I'm kind of jumping around. I had a
conversation with Brian, who's like in charge of reviews here,
and I was like, I'm thinking about this. I don't know,
I don't know, not asking him like permission necessarily, but
it's like a big deal to give a game to
tell you yeah, And so we had the conversation and
having just finished it, I'm leaning more ten than I
was before I had finished it now that I've kind
of like seen it through to the end. But yeah,
this game rocks. It is the it is like the
perfect roguelike. It's I couldn't I have thought really hard about,
like like a a game getting atten necessarily mean it's perfect.
But a thing I usually start when I'm reviewing a
game is I'm like, how much do I like it?
And then how much are things I dislike about it?
Like kind of bumping points off of that, like are
there little you know, quality of life things I think
could be better? Do I just actively dislike this part
of it? How my feeling with playing the game, And like,
the more I think about Hades two, the more I
cannot come with a good like thing I would change
about it, even on like a micro level. And whenever
I'm not playing it thinking about playing it, And I
also don't I don't leave the game feeling upset. I
never leave the game being like, oh I'm mad at
how that went. There's games where like.
Speaker 2: And isn't really a perfect Charles. I think that's why
it is.
Speaker 3: It's like erase is that like I don't know that
major point where of like like when when I'm playing
games casually, like not for review, I usually give myself
like three of those, like I'm not really feeling this game,
I'm going to turn it off. And once I have
the third time where I'm like not really vibing with
the game anymore, that's usually when I'm like done with it.
And just the fact that I did not even really
have one of those of Hades two is like really
telling of how much I like it. If you don't know,
I guess I'll like explain the concept of Hades and
Hates two. You are in this game you're playing is Mulinaway,
who's a daughter of Hades, and in this story Chronos,
who's like the father of Hades and a lot of
like the major gods in Greek mythology.
Speaker 2: Titan is a.
Speaker 3: Titan of time. He has basically imprisoned Hades Zagary, all
the characters you know in Love from Hades one are
somewhere imprisoned down in the underworld. And Melina Way was
raised in the Crossroads, which is like the shadow plane
between like the overworld and the underworld, and has basically
been training as a witch her whole life to kill Kronos,
and instead of breaking out of hell like you do
in the first game, you're now breaking into hell. So
it's a lot of like familiar kind of areas. It's
like new twists on characters that you knew before, and
it's just really really good. It feels good. There's new weapons,
there's a lot of new mechanics, but they're introduced so
gradually that it's like I never felt overwhelmed or bored
by them. Like a paragraph I had in my review is,
on my fortieth run of this game, I unlocked a
new weapon and then also discovered a new god to
get boons from. Like I was forty runs in and
it was like completely different than every other run I
had done, And that last weapon ends up being my
favorite weapon. But I'd already I already the game up
until that point. So for it to go that many
hours in and be like, here's your new favorite thing
and it will remain your favorite thing is just bonkers.
And it's a game that, like I said, I never
left it feeling bad, but it is like such a
almost to the point where I'm like, you ever play
a game that's so good like I feel this way.
Speaker 2: With like Vampire Survivors.
Speaker 3: I'm like, ah, maybe there's something wrong about video games
that it's making my brain feel this way like maybe
this is too good where I'm like every whenever you
lose the game, it's like, well, you lost, but now
you can just spend all that currency you got on
upgrades and you willunlock this new thing and you can
get this new thing, and you're like one thing away
from this new thing, so you.
Speaker 2: Should probably just start a new run immediately.
Speaker 3: And it's like everyone feels like that in a way
that I'm like, I don't know, they just did it.
Speaker 2: They just made a very very good game. They nailed it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that's incredible to hear. It's like I'm
I'm with you in terms of like I adore Hades,
I adore Super Giant in general. I love all their games,
but Haites is easily my favorite of the bunch. It
was my game of the Year in twenty twenty when
it went one point oh that year. And I played
a good bit of Hades two when it first went
into early access, a lot of it for the cover
story and was like floored then by it of like oh, yeah,
this is yeah, this is better in every way. And
this just came out in early Access, and I haven't
touched it much since that first month, just because I
didn't want to burn out on it basically, So I
I like, I have like did you keep up with
it at all throughout early Access or did you take
a similar break? Like I wonder like if you played
in the beginning, how much change has like how much
has been changed about the game since it first went
in early access.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I.
Speaker 3: I also, as I'm saying this, there's I was talking
about new things you unlock and how it's kind of gradual.
There's some things about like the nature of Hades two
that I don't want to spoil that I think other
views will probably talk about. But I think it's so
fun to just discover stuff in this game.
Speaker 1: There's a big thing that happens that was any origin
the original early Access launched that I yeah, it is
public knowledge in terms of like the places you go. Yeah,
but even then, I guess we don't need to go
out a way to spoil it, even though I guess
it's been out.
Speaker 2: There for a year. But yeah, it's also good. Yeah,
it's also good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, But so I when I had played the Early Access,
I did not exhaust all of the Early Access content,
and I wasn't many an updates. So I played like
the first build of Early Access for like twenty hours
and I really liked it, and I came back and
I've been playing, and then also my fiance has been
playing like also on my switch, on her own profile,
which has been a nice way for me to like
see the natural like early stages of the game again
without me having to replay them, and for her to
have all like the natural like discovery of stuff and
being like, oh, that's how we meet that character. Oh
that's how this happens, et cetera. But for the most part,
it is the same. It feels very similar. I would
say the main thing that they changed that I like more,
and this is I think a relatively early update to
the game, is there's a gathering tools, so when you
leave to start a run, you can get like a
pickaxe or a shovel, and that lets you collect certain
types of resources that will like let you upgrade your
weapons or you know, cast some kind of spell in
the cauldron. And it used to be you had to
pick one and that was the only type of resource
you could get through a whole run, and now they're like,
that's dumb.
Speaker 2: You can just have all of them.
Speaker 3: You can just do all of them all the time,
and it feels way better. And it was the one
thing where like you would you would encounter the type
of resource and it's like, you can't get that this run,
and that would be kind of the gist of it.
So that's one thing that's changed. I think the feel
is probably about the same. I remember when I think
when you did the cover story, because I edited that
rapid Fire, which you should check out listeners, is very good.
They I think they mentioned like about like the balance
of the game. They were like, aw, fastest might be
too good right now because we just added him in,
but he still feels really good.
Speaker 2: So if they nerfed him, I couldn't tell. I don't know.
Speaker 3: All this is to say, there's a lot of words
to say. It hasn't really changed that much, but it
was already good, so I'm not really like surprised, But
it has the feel of a game where you're like,
I can tell this has been you know, extensively play tested,
and there's been a lot of feedback to make it
feels good as it does, also noting I played it
on switch To. I played my first twenty or so
hours in early access on steam Deck, and then I
played this on switch To. No performance issues runs like
a dream loads up quick and it is a switch.
Speaker 1: To like there was a switch to native version because
it's also on switch yeahe two.
Speaker 3: It's something crazy like it it supports like.
Speaker 2: I love that game.
Speaker 3: There's a a if you have like a TV that
supports one hundred and twenty fps, like this game runs
that that they like announced on switch To.
Speaker 1: That's crazy on switch too, and I think only when
doc yeah, of course, yeahah, And I don't have.
Speaker 3: A TV that does that, so I didn't test that out,
but that's probably cool. I don't know, Yeah, I think,
but yeah, I think. I know you're kind of the
roguelike hater of the book kind of.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like I I certainly have many that I have
fallen in love with a in a big way, hades.
It was one that I liked, like I never quite
crust it into like love affair. I beat it, you know,
like I saw it to credits and I was like,
that was good, and that was sort of my sort
of relationship with Hades, but hearing you talk about it,
and like I was like, Hades two was on that
my cue of like I gotta play this, and it's like,
am I really going to get around to it? I
don't know, Like that's kind of one of those games.
But I think hearing you talk about Charles, I think
Hollow Knight's gotta go, man, I think I think I
gotta Like That's what I've been playing on my which too.
I've been making really slow progress and it's like it's
not that I dislike it or anything, but I'm just
like every time I play it, I'm like, I don't
think I'm in the headspace for a challenge like this
right now. Yeah, I think I think I'm I think
I'm gonna switch over. Haites two is gonna become my
switch to game now, I think. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Ilk song is a perfect example of the I felt
bad putting this game down yeah too many times, and
that's what I'm doing a lot. Yeah yeah, where I'm
like I just don't like and once I beat this boss,
I think that was the thing is I went from
being mad at one boss to being mad at the
next boss, and I never had a moment between more like, man,
I'm so good at Silk Song, I'm so satisfied, and
we'll talk about this. We'll get to Baby Steps later,
which is the game I also reviewed this week. But
I think there are just some people that have a
much uh more inherent sense of satisfaction in a game
of completing a task where they don't need the game
to then reward them for it, or to be further incentivized,
like to have a challenge and complete a challenge is
like fun. And I feel that way about some things,
and it depends on the game, and I feel about
the style of game, but to have like an incentive
in there makes me want to play it more, obviously,
And Hades two is like the most I think the
Besties podcasts with the maclroy's and some Polygon folks I
guess now former Polygon folks. But when Hades one came out,
Justin McElroy said that I think Hades might be the
funnest game of all time, and I think about that
all the time. I'm like, you know, I could try
to be critical about it, just as the funnest game.
And that's your review headline, right, the funnest that's my
review The Funnest.
Speaker 2: Alright, I guess this is the more the funnierrest gig
It's better. Yeah, funnery, funderiest love. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3: The story also is I was gonna say, you can
see you see a lot more of it now that
the game is in like a completed state. There's just
like more stages that you can reach and stuff. And
I like the ending a lot. I think it's like
a I think with Hades one. Also, once you kind
of see all the areas and all the bosses you're
gonna fight, you kind of have an image in your
head of like, this is what success in the game
will be like. And the way that Hades two kind
of flips it on its head and it's like, uh,
it's not there's not necessarily an easy, straightforward solution to
this sort of thing. Is a thing where I was like, oh,
I feel like I know everyone's smart and the writers
are very smart.
Speaker 2: About making smart or something.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm the first to say.
Speaker 1: It hot take. Yeah, good writer. No, that's exciting. I
like to your point about Hollo Night is it is
like delightfully diabolical that those two games launched as close
together as they have Because I'm so early in Hollow Night,
and not for a different reason. I've just been tied
up with review games.
Speaker 2: I just haven't had time.
Speaker 1: I'm in there too, to get back into it. Yeah,
like otherwise i'd be ANXI. I do like what I've
played of it, and I'm a Hollow Night fan in general.
But like now that I have hollow Ight or Holiday
Haites two on my switch to as well Inson Steam version,
which there is cross saves between her two, which is awesome. Yeah,
because I'm gonna just I'm thinking I might just start
over from scratch because I just don't I just kind
of want to see the beginning and it's completed state
now and I never finished the early access content when
it first came out, and also it's an excuse to
play more eighties two. So it's like I think, I
was like, I think I might just wipe my save
and just start from scratch and then just transfer my
data to switch to and just go back and forth
between the you know, depending on if I want to
lay in bed and play some hades.
Speaker 3: They do have multiple save files, I will say, so
if you do want to move it over really started.
So what I did, I started a fresh save, and
then I was like, I want all my old stuff again,
so I went back to my existing stave. I do
think like to this note, I don't know how long
it would take to start because I played the early
access version and I didn't like exhaust all the content
of that. But I play about fifty hours to reach
the credits, which is a long time. Yeah, and I
think if you were better, if you were better at
the game, you would probably do it faster. Not that
I was terrible once I got like a childs.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you noticed about me.
Speaker 2: Pretty good at video games, are pretty good at video games.
Marcus hard games a lot.
Speaker 1: I might have heard my name is some sort You
might have seen some Marcade leader boards. I said, all
that was you.
Speaker 2: You're ever sing one of them?
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's sorry, big reveal, exclusive reveal, that is meet
this whole time.
Speaker 2: That's that's a joke, Marcus that I'm mad I haven't
heard before. That so funny, just claiming that you're a
A A that's marks middle name, ah A for Marcus,
A for Stewart. There's an A in there, and.
Speaker 1: My middle name does have two a's or three a's.
Speaker 2: If anyone would know, I think it would be you
you're asking.
Speaker 1: I have two I have two middle names that are hyphenated,
so it's jamal Lamar. So there are four a's total
in there.
Speaker 3: WHOA, you're like the like the GTA six of people.
Speaker 1: Highly anticipated and people expect more of me than I
could probably deliver.
Speaker 2: But somehow you always live up to those expectations.
Speaker 1: MARKO awesome. Yes, uh so yeah haities to everyone. Keep
an eye out on Gimingformer dot com for Charles's full review.
See if if it got that coveted ten or not.
We'll see.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, I'm I'm super stoked to play this game. Uh.
Speaker 1: Moving on to yet another big game that came out
this week, Silent Hill F the new mainline entry in
a Silent Hill series, the first one in like over
thirteen years. Because we've i mean won, we we we
stopped getting Silent Hill games for a long time, and
then we got the uh, the very good Silent Hill
to remake last year, and we've gotten like smaller side
projects in that time, like that free uh the short
message game, and then that uh, that streaming one that
nobody liked. I don't remember what that one was called.
Speaker 2: I looked at a list on I think it was
Etcetera had like a list according to Metacritic of the
Oh I don't remember where the list was sourced from,
but that Silent Hill streaming game was like at the bottom,
Like people really did not like that game at all.
Speaker 1: Do you think it's like, objectively the worst Islent Hill game?
Speaker 2: Have you seen it? Marcus?
Speaker 1: I saw, but like very little bits of it. I didn't.
Speaker 2: I think it's not like any Long Force, I mean,
the other competitor not to go down to. Like let's
talk about the cool Silent Hill game that you generally liked.
But like there was also that Vita twin Stick Shooter
which was like pretty pretty too.
Speaker 1: Yeah I forgot what that one was called.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so did literally everyone in the universe, Marcus. But
I want to hear about sound Hill F, which is
like for me, my next I've finished with quote unquote finished.
That is what I want to play next. Is if
I'm playing on console, I'm playing Sound Hill F. If
I'm playing on my switch to, which is also a console,
I'm playing Haities two starting today. Yeah.
Speaker 1: You know, have you ever I'm sure you guys have
had this as fellow games reviewers where there are certain
games sometimes where you're almost more interested and excited to
see what other people think about it than your own
opinion of it. Like this game was the Yeah, Like
this game was the prime example of that, because of
just the wild swings that it makes in its storytelling
and and even just its premise. But then also on
the flip side, for me, there were things that were
so kind of underwhelming that it was like, I like
trying to weigh like this, this aspect of the game,
particularly the combat is so prevalent and is so like
kind of flat compared to the other things going on
in this game that like it, it knocks it down
quite a bit. Yeah, in a way that is disappointing,
And then wondering like how much that's gonna matter for
other people, especially more like fans that are bigger Silent
Hill fans than I am, because I'm a more recent
Silent Hill, but I'm a huge survival horror guy and
a big horror guy in general. You know, Like I've
played Silent Hill to the original Silent Hill too. I
have not played the remake yet, but I played that
last year and then I you know, Kyle, we did
our Silent Hill super replay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like my play through of the original, my first
play through the original. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So because I was on that, I've seen the
entirety of Silent Hill one and seen that story and
I played I mean pt if we want to count that,
and I played the short message last year. So I'm
getting on a Silent Hill bandwagon and all it that
is to say that silent What's nice about Silent Hill
F is that it is incredibly newcomer friendly because it
is so divorced from the I don't even know if
you say cannon, because my understanding is that the Silent
Hills series is kind of all over the place in
terms of like, like how much does the cannon matter
outside of at least as far as I know, Silent
Hill one in three being kind of direct, you know,
having a direct linear Yeah yeah yeah, and the rest
of them all yeah, pretty standalone. So you can come
into Silent Hill F as like this can be your
first Silent Hill, and I think it's a like a
totally fine and respectable entry. So it set in nineteen
sixties Japan. It's in this rural village. He plays this
teenage girl named Hinniko, who kind of like lives in
an abusive household because her dad is kind of a monster,
her mom is subservient to him, so she resents her
mom for allowing it to happen, hates her dad, only
loves her older sister. But she has since moved out
to get married and sort of like she's carrying all
this baggage, a lot of it dealing with like sort
of like gender roles of the time. Like a lot
of this game gets into some interesting sort of like
commentary and symbolism around like feminism and like Hinniko's entire
personality and how rebellious she is, Like she's she's very masculine,
and it's something her friends or some of her friends
almost make fun of her for because she just prefers
the company of boys, just because seeing how her father
treats her mother. He's like, oh, is that what I
have to look forward to when I get married? Well,
I don't want to screw that, you know, like why
do we even put up with that? And you know,
she meets up with her friends and the big sinister
fog rolls into her town. Literally it's a very abrupt start,
like the fog just shows up and you're like, oh, okay,
we're just getting right into it. I don't know why
is this happening? And then you know, transforms the entire
town and and you know, a bunch of the sort
of like somebody familiar Silent Hill creatures like the creepy
fleshy mannequin show up and just other weird, disturbing horrors.
And from a presentational standpoint, this game is awesome. Like,
I think the art direction is phenomenal. I think the
cinematography and the cut scenes is really well done, and
this is a very well shot game. The soundtrack by
you know, long Time Composure a Kira Yamioka top notch,
very different tou he gets to play around with sort
of the the Jazzjapanese aesthetic a bit, but just like
a lot more of just Japanese sounding like string instruments
and other just like era specific intrumentation that really sets
it apart from the older Silent Hills, Like this was
a game that I never got tired of just looking
and listening to, Like it's just it's just a very
very pretty game. Sort of the main contention point with
it even before, like when the preview beat came out
and everyone was talking about the combat. This is kind
of it seems like there's been a line in the
sam with the Silent Hill community from what I'd say,
because everyone who has been nervous about like, oh, is
this like Dark Souls combat? Just because it's such a reliance,
like it's melee, only you don't use guns and everything
you do is dictated by a staminometer, which in of
itself is not does not automatically make it a Soul's like.
But I think because it's such an oversaturated genre at
this point.
Speaker 2: That challenge plus stamina just feels soulsy kind of you know, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And like I'm gonna just reiter it again, this
is not a Soul's like game. You're not like losing
experience and going to collect them, and even the enemies
are not overly difficult, depending on the difficulty you choose,
which I'll get into in a second. But it is
like weighty. It's deliberate in a way that I actually likes.
I think it fits the character because Hennego is this
teenage girl who's not a teenage fighter or a train fighter,
excuse me, and it is just a bunch of her
just swinging for defenses and just bashing these these monsters
that are coming at her, and like it. I think
it feels good, and I think managing the stamina, at
least on the difficulty I played, was totally fine. And
also like it. It makes battles feel a little bit
more interesting and more like a fight because one the
level design in this village is a lot more narrow
and claustrophobic. One of the problems I with the when
I played OG Silent Hill too, even watching just the
older games, is that when you get into the open
world of Silent Hill, a lot of the monsters you
can just so easily just bypass them that they're not
even scary, yeah, because the streets are so wide, like
you just you're like on the opposite side of the
screen and this thing's like shambling by, and you're just
like all right. It's like you're like, you know what,
I'm gonna go to the other side of the street
if there's another person there exactly, I don't know. Yeah,
Whereas in this game they funnel you into threats, like
there's like this tiny alley way and there's like a
weird creature at the end.
Speaker 2: You're like, well, you.
Speaker 1: Gotta go through them, and you know you can either
fight them or you can dodge through them. You got
this kind of like perfect dodge that you can use
to evade threats. And there's even like a like a
time counter attack that you can do that's kind of cool,
like they kind of force you to read in any
new movements because at certain points in their attacks they'll
do they're kind of like glow red, like this kind
of red staticky thing that pops up for a second,
and if you attack that window, you'll do this like
stunt attack that stops them for a second, and you
can use that as a chance to either escape or
to finish them off because they take increase damage when
you're stune like that. There's also a sanity meter, which
is probably the biggest new thing in combat, where you
have a focus mechanic where you can basically like hold
a button to like really lock in on an enemy
and it basically makes the counter window easier to spot
and it lasts a little longer. But the longer you
hold that button now it drains this little meter, and
when that meter runs out, you start taking when you
take damage, it starts affecting your health instead. Of just
affecting your sanity, and I guess I think contextually the
idea is like, oh, you're staring at this really horrific
creature for a long time, so it's chipping away at
her psyche and you can only replant. Yeah, and if
you take damage while you're doing this focus, you not
only lose health, but you lose like a chunk of
your overall sandy. And the only way to replenish that
is to go to these prayer shrines that you save at,
and you have to spend this currency called faith to
replenish it. You can only use faith to buy these
like equippable charms that you can use to kind of
build like very simple character builds, like oh, I got
these charms that focus on health regeneration or once it
give me more staminta like help with stamata management. And
you can only have one at a time, but you
can eventually unlock up to three like that I think
is cool. But the problem is that the sanity meter
is only lost behind the hard difficulty, and that's kind
of one of my biggest gripes with this game is
the way they communicate the two difficulties. So there's two
difficulties types for each style of play, so there's action
and puzzle solving each. You choose the difficulty for each
one at the beginning, okay, and you can choose either
story difficulty or you can use hard difficulty. Now immediately,
I have a problem with those labels because usually in
most games, that usually means the game is gonna be
too easy or too hard, and it's like, is there,
like is there normal? Like I don't necessarily want either
of these if they mean what they usually need these.
Speaker 3: I just like if you went to a restaurant with
spicy food and the two flavors were like no spice
and burn your face off.
Speaker 1: No season yeah yeah, and like bland are too spicy?
The like I neither and but for story, so for
the action difficulty, story is labeled as the traditional Silent
Hill experience. So in my mind, I'm like, Okay, I
guess that means normal because it's saying like this is
what you expect in these games. I was like, I
guess I'll pick that one. And then also Une the
review guide told us like you should play story actions.
I was like, okay, I trust you guys. But for puzzles,
hard difficulty is described as the traditional silent hill. So
like the compast, the combination is like Story Action hard puzzle. Okay,
the puzzle difficulty five. Like I think the puzzles in
this game are generally pretty clever, and you're playing it
on hard. Is hard puzzle?
Speaker 2: Hard puzzle? Okay?
Speaker 3: What does what does the difficulty change for the puzzles?
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I haven't messed around with the Story puzzle yet I
have to. I don't remember what their description was of it,
but I would imagine maybe there were some puzzles where
you do them multiple times and it just gets a
little harder if I maybe they cut out the number
of times you have to do it. Like there's a
scarecrow puzzle you have to do where you're trying to
find the correct scarecrow in like a field of them,
using these really vague clues, and you have to do
that five times before you get the puzzle to get
to the other side of it. Maybe only have to
do it like three times in Story. Don't quote me
on that. I'm just guessing, because yeah, I don't know
how you would just thinking about the puzzle in this game,
I don't know how you would design them to make
them easier structurally, you know, but yeah, I no, no,
I didn't mess with it. But for at least the combat.
The difference between story and hard is that the story
difficulty removes the sanity stuff, like you still have it
and it still drains, but it's basically a non factor
because you don't lose it when you get attacked the
way that you do and hard difficulty, And in hard
difficulty you pretty much just have to manage it more
like it's more of a it's more of an important resource,
whereas in story is just kind of there. And I
think that fundamentally changes the combat in this game, because
I think it's story to combat's way too easy. Like
most things go down, Yeah, to me, most things go
down pretty quick. Your stamina doesn't drain, it's quite as fast.
But it trivialized the monsters to the point where they
just stopped being scary because like you just roll up
on something and you're just like, I could fight this thing.
The only thing that might discourage you from finding is
that all the weapons are breakable and you can only
have the three at a time, so you can have
like pipes, bats, sickles, kitchen knie just random ord eary
things you find and they all degrade over time, and
some degrade faster than others. There's repair kits you can
find that you can use to fix some, but those
are kind of few and barred between. But between the
enemies dropping faster, and also story mode gives you like
an abundance of health items, like they're everywhere, Like I
was constantly filled to the brim with health items where
I was having to put them down more often than not.
I was just like, oh, I like again, as a
survival horror fan, I like feeling like I kind of
have to ration my resources and that you're making hard
decisions about like am I gonna heal now or should
I maybe hold out for a bit until I get
to a checkpoint or whatever, And there's not really any
of that in this game, and in a way that
Silent Hill too has. So I was disappointed. And you
can't change the difficulty in mid game, like once you commit,
that's it. You have to Yeah, you have to start
a new game if you want to see the other ones.
I was like, oh, I guess I'm stuck with this.
But again, this is what they said was the traditional
Silent Hill experience, but at least playing og Silent Hill too,
I was like there was a lot more pushback on
that than there is here. So my recommendation is, if
you're a fan, or even if you want any symbols
of challenge, just go for the hard difficulty. I think
managing the sanity meter makes it a lot more of
a tense and interesting experience than it is in story mode.
But even then, the other big problem to have with
the game is that the enemy variety is really small
in a way that was like kind of really disappointing,
a little shocking. Like there's probably six different enemy types
in the game, and it's not a long game. It's
about ten hours, like I beat it just shy of
ten hours, but you see pretty much everything in the
first half and then they say like one enemy type
for like the last couple hours. But yeah, and it's
like there's variations of each one, Like there's like three
different Mannikins, but they're the same in the sense of like, oh,
they animate the same, they just hit harder, like one
of them just covering the more of those weird flowers,
and then one of them is a little more otherworldly.
But it's like it's a man again. You know what
they're gonna do pretty much, and that's the case for
pretty much all the enemy types. And that was another
thing that kind dulled the scares, Like I like to
be scared in games, like I think it's fair if
I'm playing a horror game, I would really love it
if you scared the crap out of me. And in
the early hours of Silent Hill, it's like, oh, when
you don't know what to expect things, you're creepy and tense.
But then after the first few hours, you start running
into the same things over and over, and so I
stopped dreading what was coming around a corner. Like there's
so many times they set things up, but you're like
hearing things in distance or like a weird groan and
you're like, oh, man, what could that be? And then
to be this thing that I seen like fifty times,
you're like, oh, well, yeah, of course it is. I
guess there really isn't anything else. So that was just
the letdown for me, Like it just became it was
just diminishing returns over time, and I would almost get
frustrated because there were the sound design is so good
that it felt like, Okay, this has to be something different.
This sounds crazy up ahead, and then to be this
other thing that I'm saying, it's like, damn it, like
stop making me think you have new stuff. The only
exception are like there's a very small handful of like
proper boss battles that are pretty cool, like design wise
and just like challenge wise, like they they're like more
interesting tests of the combat. So, like the reason I'm
knocking it so much is that combat is so prevalent
in this game. Like this game is fair, it emphasizes
combat a lot. There are straight up moments where you're
like in like they lock you into a combat encounter
where you're fighting like little waves of enemies that they're
coming at you, and even some of the level design,
we're like, yeah, you could dodge certain enemies, but a
lot of times it's better to just kill them so
that you can focus on like puzzle solving. Like it's
a little hard to just leave them roaming around, so
you almost feel like you're encouraged to be like just
get rid of them, especially when you're inside of interiors,
like there's like a middle school you explore at one point,
So it was just like if the combat was if
you had if it was less one note, this game
would have scored higher with me. I gave it a
seven point five out of ten overall, by the way,
but the story stuff is is better. But it's also
this is one of those times where sometimes I feel
like I don't know if you guys feel the same,
Like discussing a narrative in a review can be really
tricky sometimes because like everything, everything in a game is subjective,
but I narrative can kind of be the most objective,
especially for a game that is intentionally trying to go
for like you know, it's intentionally unclear, it's it's sort
of like meant to like you're supposed to read between
the lines, or it's going for like symbolism and metaphors
and all that good stuff to try to instead of
telling things more directly, which is fine, but I also
think you're a kind of at the mercy of.
Speaker 2: Like, am I do I just am I just dumb?
Do I not just get with it laying down there?
You know?
Speaker 1: And then you are like, am I the problem? Or
is it them?
Speaker 3: Like?
Speaker 2: Am I just not?
Speaker 1: Am I just not graspiness? Because of me? And I
think this game has a lot of that. There are
there without getting into specifics, there are moments in the
story where you're kind of Hinniko is sort of like bounce,
like grappling with her identity and sort of her sense
of reality in a way that about midway through for
me specifically, it kind of lost me, like wait, okay,
I thought I thought I was on track, and now
I'm kind of like wait, what, like when are we?
When are we now? And is she the same Hinniko?
Are we?
Speaker 2: What is happening? Like It's like like it was confusing
in a way that's like wasn't engaging, right, because there
is a line where it's like sometimes that ambiguity can
be like kind of get you in this strange dream
like zone, right, yeah, and it just wasn't you're saying,
it just wasn't quite doing that in this instance, not
for me.
Speaker 1: And this was one as once I posted my review,
I was checking out other outlets reviews because again, just
super curious to see where it's gonna land. Because this
game overall like scored really well, like I'm on the
lower end of the review spectrum, like it's which is
great for the game, but hearing like the story is
beginning universally praised is like the best thing, Like people
like this is maybe one of the best narratives of
the year, Like I loved it. It it did this
and that and again. If you guys have ever felt
this when you're sort of like reading other people's impressions
and you're just almost like, man, I wish I had that.
It's like.
Speaker 2: Marcus, I've I've been there another horror. I guess horror
that happens with horror.
Speaker 1: I guess, yeah, Like you almost feel like you're outside
the party house looking through the window as everyone's doing
cartwheels for this story and going like I man, maybe
it just went over my head. I I don't know,
but I was just like, oh, it's cool. But like
by the end, like the final cutscene, I literally was
just like what, Like I audibly said what, like like
what happened? Like I don't understand, Like I just felt
like nothing, and I just felt confused, like and I don't.
I don't know if you're supposed to replay it multiple
times to get it it, you know, there are multiple
endings at the game in traditional Silent Hill fashion, but
the first time you play through it, you get a
canonical ending that everybody sees, and the optional endings only
open up in New Game Plus to where your actions
will dictate where.
Speaker 2: The conclusion lands.
Speaker 1: There's like five of them, and one of them's the
UFO ending, the like silly ending that's been another Silent
Hill games. But this isn't like a near automomous situation
where like the fact that you're supposed to replay the
games like built into the narrative. Like it literally is
like you beat the game, here is new Game Plus.
You can play it again with all your stuff, and
who knows, maybe you'll get a different ending. So it's
like like, fans, you're gonna replay this game no matter what,
because that's just what you do with Silent No do
you want to see all the different like permutations of
the ending. But at the same time, it's like I
feel like if you can't get me the first time,
which is like the majority of players are probably going
to play this once and because that's just you know, statistically,
that's just how it goes, and it's like if I'm
the first go around, I'm just kind of like huh,
like what like what was that? It's like, am I Like,
I may be more inclined to replay it just to
sort of clear to follog, but I also feel like
I shouldn't.
Speaker 2: Have to do that. Sure, Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: I try to remind myself when I'm in like situations
where I'm like, am I I don't know, like not
getting the story?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Am I not smart enough for this game?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: I'm like, like objectively speaking, as like when our job
is reviewing games. Compared to like other game reviewers, it's
kind of hard to say, but compared to like the
general public, it's like I do play more games than
most people, and I do experience more game stories than
most people. So if I don't understand it, it's not
like there's gonna.
Speaker 2: Be other people that don't understand it.
Speaker 3: So I think it's not like that crazy for you
to be like I didn't get it, and that's confusing
because then people will be reading the This is a
crazy thing to bring up, but one time, when I
was like eleven, I was downloading games on my mom's
phone and there was a Spider Man game. And this
was like twenty eleven, so there weren't like real Spider
Man games on Android phones. And all the reviews were
like I love this game. This is really great, five
out of five stars, and one of the like thirty
reviews was like, guys, do not buy this game. It
is in Spanish. You can't change the language away from Spanish.
I can't understand the game. And I was like, I'm
gonna download the game and it'll be fine. And the
game was in Spanish. All the reviews were Niglish with
the all time games in Spanish. So it is nice
because like someone's gonna play this game and be like
I have no idea what's going on, and we'll read
the game and form review and be like, Okay, this
other person also didn't know what's going on, so at
least I feel better about that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's like I again, it's like I
paid attention, I swear.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And there are moment there are moments in the story
that I think hit There's one moment midwave where like
something really wild happens, and there's one particular scene that
I think could be a Moment of the Year contender
for just the sheer brutality and like shock of it.
But yeah, I just wish I I wish I was
able to take away what other people seem to be
taking away from it, I guess is ultimately Yeah, and
then you wonder, like who's whose job is that?
Speaker 2: I guess.
Speaker 1: I guess ultimately it's their job. But I guess they
did fulfill that for those people, maybe just not for me.
But that is all to say, like overall, like I
think this is a it is a fun, enjoyable Silent
Hill game, Like it is a good survival horror game.
Like my misgivings aside, Like it takes some really fun
leaps of the franchise that I I I think are admirable,
Like it's not just them, sort of like diving into
the well again of what worked in like Silent Hill too,
Like they the swings, even if they don't always hit,
I respect, you know. Yeah, and yeah, it's sounds like.
Speaker 3: A game with a lot of big swings from the
combat to the story. Comic is the weapons. It sounds
like swinging a lot of blunt Yeah.
Speaker 1: You swing a lot of blunt objects that take your stamina.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Silent Hill left. You can check out my full review.
It's on the website. Seven point five out of ten.
It's like Kyle, when you started I when you finished
on I'm I want to talk to you so much
about this game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm excited to play it because it's like you're
also like, it seems like the right length for Silent Hill,
right about ten hours or so give her take.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, which I think people I've seen are bummed by.
I'm I'm not too like. I've always been the firm
believer that horror game should be on the shorter end, yeah,
to maintain their kind of like scares and momentum. Yeah,
but I do think this one again go back to
the story stuff, maybe because by halfway I was kind
of like, what is happening? Like it starts ramping up
to its big inclusion pretty like around like our seven
hour six or seven. We're like, it feels like we're
already building to the crescendo. It's like, are we really
winding this down already? Because maybe because the combat felt
still felt like the same as it had in the
first couple hours that I thought, Hu, surely we're gonna
start seeing some like later game enemies or some like
big surprises. And again there is a big mid game
thing that happens that changes the combat dramatically but it's temporary.
But outside of that, it's like, oh, we're still kind
of I'm still engaging with this game in the same.
Speaker 2: Way I had in the beginning.
Speaker 1: So that's probably fed into my disbelief of like, oh,
we're wrapping up. Oh okay, huh. But yeah, it's I
almost want to say, polarizing game. But at the same time,
I think more people seem to like it than are
a little more down than so maybe it's not so
polarizing it counts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Sound Hills just an apprising to be fair, It's
just like it's supposed to be like a weird, ambiguous,
like hard to parse, like what did I just experience?
Like that's what I want from Silent Hill to a
certain degree. So I'm still it makes it more interesting. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
definitely makes a more interesting game for sure. But yeah,
Silent Hill f out today. Also out this week is
Baby Steps Charles who.
Speaker 3: Got got another horror game. According to Charles, it freaking
felt like it man. Yeah, I reviewed Baby Steps.
Speaker 2: This is a game, by the way, Charles, After reading
a review, I just want to say, I'm I'm sorry
that you had to review Baby It's okay, you get
to review Hades.
Speaker 3: I did get to review Hades, so it was all
I mean, imagine reviewing Baby Steps and the whole time
you have Hades downloaded on your switch to Oh, I
know I could be playing Hades.
Speaker 1: I might have a similar experience with a game I'll
talk about after this.
Speaker 3: So this is developed by uh Maxi Boch, Gabe Kutzillo
or Kutzio I don't know how you pronounce, and Bennett Foddy.
Bennett Foddy being the ones who's touch you can feel
the most. He's known for getting over it.
Speaker 2: And Quop.
Speaker 1: And Gabe were the minds behind ape Out, which okay,
okay also worked on.
Speaker 3: Okay, well there you go, ape Out, ape Out two.
Speaker 1: Love ape Out.
Speaker 3: So it's it's, uh a game where you control this
guy and you walk him one foot at a time,
and it's a physics based game and it is difficult,
and the whole point is that it's hard and uh,
this goofy guy is gonna fall down constantly trying to
do like the most basic tasks. And it starts off
being like ho hah, but you can't walk up this
path without slipping and falling in the mud. And by
the ending, it's like doing this elaborate balancing on this.
Like there's one part that's inside of a like massive
sand castle, and sand is a texture. The textures of
the ground are really important. Say, is very slippery, so
if you misstep even a little bit, or you walk
too slowly or too quickly, you're just gonna slip and
slide all the way.
Speaker 2: Back to them, to the botto. You have to do
it over and over again.
Speaker 3: It is well what I would classify as a rage
bait game. It is supposed to be frustrating and make
you angry. So it's hard to review that kind of
thing because I'm like, I hate this, but it's.
Speaker 1: Like intentionally supposed to be difficult or like not difficult, but.
Speaker 2: Like it did what it says.
Speaker 1: It's difficult, right, Yeah, Like it's supposed to be hard
to play and push against you, and yeah, in a
way that would be considered bad in a game where
that was not the intent.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So and Marks, did you you play this a
little bit too?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I played like the first I mean, it took
me an hour to get to this point, but I
got to the first like campfire segment. But I was
also like taking the time to kind of like walk
around like I found a hat, oh yeah that I
went out of my way to find, and then like
that unlocked, like I guess, like an optional little cut
scene when I when I slept at the fire, yeah,
which I guess I should probably mention that this game
is basically any it is.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So yeah.
Speaker 3: The main character, Nate is like in his parents' basement
and he's got like a.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the TV.
Speaker 3: It's the Netflix screen, and it's like, would you like
to continue watching One Piece?
Speaker 2: That's just like that says yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh I didn't I saw it said something.
Speaker 2: I didn't realize it literally does it does? Yeah, he
zoned out watching one Piece.
Speaker 3: Uh, And then like he just kind of blinks and
all of a sudden, he's in this like big puddle
of water. He just falls in this random cave. And
the thing I do like about the game is the story.
Nate is so awkward that he like needs help, and
this is like a metaphor for the whole his life.
It ends up being turns out he needs help so
badly and it's so clear, and it every given opportunity,
he just kind of casually pushes it.
Speaker 2: Away, so it'll be like hey, you fell down here.
Are you good?
Speaker 3: He's like, oh, yeah, I'm good, and he's like welcome,
let me show you around. He's like, oh no, I'm
just gonna Can I just leave? And the guy's like what.
Speaker 2: He's like, yeah, I'm just gonna leave. It's fine. And
he's like do you want shoes? He's like no, no,
I'm good. I'll just get on out of here.
Speaker 1: And there's like a map guy that I met at
the fire ye, like a really funny exchange where he's like, yeah,
I'm a climber. I got this map. He's like, yeah,
I give you a mini map. It shows everywhere. And
for a second, they regular mini map pops up on
the screen with like all these icons.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and then Nate just turns it down and then
you never get that map. Yeah. Over and over again.
It's like, do you want like climbing gear. He's like no,
I don't need it. I'm good. And then you play
the game.
Speaker 3: You're like, Nate, you you dumb dumb boy. You only
needed all of these things, and they still have a
hard time.
Speaker 1: Yeah. It's like a very good example of like social anxiety. Yeah,
like you don't like people are like I said, people
are trying to help you, but you're like, I don't
know if you feel like you're in conveniencing them even
though they're offering it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean I can relate, but yeah, no, it's
very relatable.
Speaker 3: It's I I also like I comment, I called him
a pathetic character who lives in his parent's basement, and
someone commented on the review and said, like, uh, in
this economy, it's not pathetic to live with your parents.
It's actually totally fine. And I want to clarify that.
I think he's pathetic. And also he lives with his parents.
Speaker 1: He's not doing anything to contribute to like as far
as it seems like based on what we saw, he's
not like helping around the house or try to like
pull his weet there. He's just mooching off his parents,
you know. And there is a difference, guys.
Speaker 2: But One Piece has like a thousand episodes, like you
gotta really so he's that's basically a full time job. Yeah,
to get through One Piece. Uh So, story's funny.
Speaker 3: And then also I should say, Marcus, you're pretty early
on it gets so bizarre, which also kind of it's
into the metaphor of like He's just going out in
the world and it is like so strange and alien
to him, and like to see people he doesn't recognize.
He's like, I don't want to be near them. Spoilers
for my next sentence. If you're really concerned about the
cannon stuff of Baby Steps, most of the characters you
meet in this game have horse heads and are bottomless
from the waist down, and they're all men. So there's
a lot of penises in this game. Yeah, there allow
nudity on.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in the beginning, This first thing the game asks
you is would you like to turn nudity.
Speaker 2: On or off? Yeah?
Speaker 3: And if you keep it off, there's just a big
black bar that just kind of has it maintains it
maintains the physics as far as I can tell. But
it's just like a big sensor bar. But it's just
all these and Nate's obviously really uncomfortable but doesn't know
how to ask people like why are you a horse?
Speaker 2: That's just kind of how it is.
Speaker 3: Yeah, just like it's fine. So uh yeah, So it's
that's that's like the story, that's the aesthetics of it.
I find that funny. I like the cut scenes. I
like the story, I like the place that goes, and
the gameplay obviously is infuriating. I was trying to like
evaluate it. I'm like, I'm gonna meet this game on
its terms. It's gonna be frustrating. It's gonna frustrate me.
What does that look like? The thing I think that
I would give this game a lot of credit it's
it's a lot more accessible than something like Getting Over It,
because there are often hard paths and easy paths, and
especially early on in the game, it's very clear what
your destination is and you can see, like, if you're
really good at this game, you could try to go
up this other path really fast, and now I'm like
excited to see people speed run this game. But you
can also take the long hiking path that's other more
reasonable elevation, and you'll probably you'll get there slower, but
you'll get there and it'll be fine. And there's a
lot of instances of this. And when you get in
the later game, the thing that's frustrating is it is
not nearly as clear where you're supposed to go. Oh
so on multiple times I was trying to do these
like very difficult climbing challenges and in the review discord,
it was only eventually I went back in and found
out there was like alternate paths for a lot of
them that aren't clearly markeding you have to explore for.
But again, it's a game where you're climbing up a
mountain this whole time. If you mess up a step
and you fall, you could set yourself back a really
long time, and depending on whether or not you're like
good enough to climb back up immediately again. Like there
were times I fell way back down and then I
fell down again and I was like set back like
two hours because I was doing this. So it's hard
to have an open world structure where you're punished for exploring,
because then how are you ever going to find the
qote unquote easier paths or the challenges or whatever. You
just have to be really determined.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is a game that makes you realize you
take traversial mechanics and basically all games for granted. Because
there was one moment where I was I saw like
a weird shiny thing up onto like a stack of rocks,
and I was like, oh, I'm gonna go over there,
And I spent like a good fifteen minutes trying to
get up there in I just could not do it,
and then was like, Oh, I'm just gonna go towards
like the main path and I'll come back later. But
then as soon as I thought that, I was like, oh,
if I come back down here, that's gonna be a
whole lot of work because of how hard it is
the move here. Of like in most games, you're just like, yeah,
I'll just come back later, no problem, But here it's
like that's like a real like, am I actually gonna
come back here? Like I want to put myself through that?
So maybe I just won't. Maybe I'll just just leave
it beet whatever that is up there. It's shiny and glowy.
Maybe I'll just never know what that is because of
the amount of work I know it will take to
go back there at this point.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's a part in the game later on where
there's a big green, metal spiral staircase that just goes
straight up a cliff face, but then there's also a
path you could walk on the cliff face, And one
of the people is there talking in Nate and he's like,
I bet you could never climb up this.
Speaker 2: It seems pretty difficult. You've got to be a man.
And he's like, no, I'm a man. I can do it.
I'll climb back up and it'll be fine. You're like, no,
I don't think you could. I think you're gonna take
the stairs.
Speaker 3: He's like no, And he's like, if you take the stairs,
you're gonna have to call me lord and you're gonna
have to refer to me as Lord from now on.
And he's like, well, it's fine because I won't even
need to. And I, as a player, I'm like, I'm
not I'm not even gonna entertain this long clip wak.
Speaker 2: Up the stairs. Yeah, and I did, and.
Speaker 3: Then I had to call him lord for the rest
of the game, which is very funny. But yeah, it's
it's mainly that thing where like, uh, I like that
it lets you kind of choose your own difficulty level
and it's always gonna be frustrating, but you get to
be in control of it to some extent. But I
don't like when it loses you stop being able to
tell that you can go do other things. And yeah,
I it's It would be a fun game to stream,
it'd be a fun game to watch someone play because
it is so punishing, and we did stream it earlier
this week.
Speaker 2: It was a great clip where Alex freaked out and
accidentally closed the stream. It's hilarious, it's so funny. Yeah,
uh and uh yeah.
Speaker 3: But it's it's a thing of like it's there's a
lot of you know, and I think it was designed
like that. It's a hard game to put a score on, right,
because it's like, I hate it.
Speaker 2: I didn't like it.
Speaker 3: I didn't think I would like it, And there's people
that will be interested in this sort of thing, but
it's definitely not for everyone. In our game and former
like numbers, what the review's scores say, six is what
I gave it. I gave a six out of ten.
Six is limited appeal, which I think is fair to
say for this game. It's like, I would not recommend
this to most people. If you know what kind of
game it is. I don't think you need to read
my review necessarily because you'll you'll know that this is
the type of thing I'm interested in. But for other
people that are like, is this like a fun, casual
game I can pick up? Or is this something my
kid could play? Because he's been watching the stream play,
he's like, no, do not bad idea man, not just
for the nudity and everything. But it's a challenging it's
a tough one.
Speaker 2: Charles. I like, I admire you for reviewing it at
the way you did, because it is like it's that thing.
It's like there was artistic contention here that is interesting.
They're trying to say something and by all accounts, like
even beyond your reception, like it seems like they were
effective in it. But it's like that doesn't necessarily equal
like fun to play video game, you know, and it's
like it's like, well, where's how do you how do
you sort of apply a score to that is tough? Yeah,
but I think you did a great job.
Speaker 1: Yeah. It's kind of like maybe more so a silent hill,
Like it seems like when I was looking at reactions,
we're kind of all over the place, like I've.
Speaker 2: Seen people.
Speaker 1: Of the Year and yeah, it's one of the best
characters and it's like oh wow, and then you know
your review just saying like no, this is fresh.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Talking to Jeff mark Yafava, former game former editor
over at mind Max, he's on that side where he's like,
this might be my game of the year, like he
finished it, and it's like he was not obligate. He
was not writing a review, he was not trying to
hit a deadline, you know, but he Yeah, some people
really love it for what it is. It's it's interesting.
I don't think I'm going to play it. I like,
I just I just like if I can't even like
get like make time for Hollow Night, I can't imagine
a world where I'd be able to make time for bases. Yeah,
but I like the idea and I like the humor.
It does look it is very funny.
Speaker 3: Yeah, in terms of like the we were talking about
incentive and like being rewarded for stuff in games. The
rewards in this game are usually cut scenes, which I
do like, but especially late in the game, it's like
it's just not it's not worthing. Marcus mentioned hats. There
are collectible hats that you can get if you do
like these little challenges. I got a cool froggy bucket
hat that I was proud of. But the way the
hats work is if you trip and you fall down
hard enough, your hat falls off and you got to
go pick your hat up. So if you're trying really
hard to get a specific hat and you fall on
a big fall, you might have to go even farther
down to go find your hat, pick it up, and
then bring it back with you. Very punishing game comedically.
Speaker 2: So and.
Speaker 3: I think I posted on Blue Sky afterwards, I was like,
I am glad this game exists. I think it's a
fun idea, but I did not have fun playing it,
and it would be crazy for me to give a
good review to a game that I hated playing.
Speaker 1: So I'm giving you this sense that's fair. I'm in
the camp. I do want to keep going with it.
I want to see how far I can get. I
would like to finish it, like I just I like
the writing into humor. So far, it's very few games
are funny. This one has been so far. But yeah,
I like hearing your description of the later game. Stuff
does give me pause.
Speaker 3: Hey, I can I can also help you be like
if you're like, hey, where do I even go here?
I can be like, this is the this is the
thing you do not have to do. There is a
the hardest climb in the game that I spent genuinely
five hours on. I just spent I was just watching
I'd arrow on on Netflix. In the background, just just
grinding away at this point, trying to hit the embargo,
taking me forever. And then later went in the review
thing and they're like, oh, you can actually take this
other path, and then the end of the game is
right there. Like I was so close the whole time,
but I was doing this one climb that I thought
was like the big finale and it was like unnecessary.
Actually yah, yeah, so yeah, baby steps.
Speaker 1: Yeah out now all right, last game we'll talk about
is a Hotel Barcelona, a action side scrolling roguelike made
by Sweary, best known as the creator of Deadly Premonition
and Suit of fifty one of Grasshopper, best known for
No More Heroes. And you got a new game coming
out next year called Romeo is a dead Man.
Speaker 2: I believe it's called I was gonna say Romeo must Die,
but that's like a Jetly movie, isn't it.
Speaker 1: I legit had to stop myself because Romeo must die.
I always think in that movie when I hear about
the suitor game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, anyway, this is what I've been curious about because
I'm always speaking of games that aren't necessarily fun to play,
but are like super fascinating. Sweary is like the king
of that. Like, you know, like I have a lot
of fondness for Sweary in particular.
Speaker 1: Well, what if I told you, Kyle that this game
is very fascinating but not particularly fun.
Speaker 3: What from Sweary and Suita, You've really got two types
of games on this episode of the podcast.
Speaker 2: The best games of the year and then the frustrated games.
We like, thinking of ballot but not in practice.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean this one, honestly, I've I've never played
Deadly Premonition, but I know, I know of its reputation.
I did play a little bit of the Good Life,
which is that weird like oh yeah life that one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you can like change into a cat you're like
a journalist.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, And I bounced off that one pretty quick.
But like I would say, like of all of Sweary's games,
this is probably the most sort of like mainstream friendly
because it's a two D action roguelike, so they're like, oh, yeah,
I'm on board for that. But also I think that
because of that, this may be the most egregious of
his games, because it's like when you say too D
action roguelike, I have certain expectation of like, oh, the
combat's gonna be really good, and like when you watch
the trailers, it's like fast paced, like you're like air
juggling people, You're like slicing them up and stuff. You're like,
oh man, this is one hundred percent my jam And
the combat in this game is just.
Speaker 2: It's bad.
Speaker 1: So uh so premise. You play as a US marshal
named Justine who arrives at the Hotel Hotel Barcelona. She
is on a mission to hunt down some some serial
killers that it might have taken over, but also she
is possessed by an ancient titan named doctor Carnival, who
is this very like murderous, like just this just like
potentially evil entity, but we don't know yet. But they
need each other and and doctor Carnival is looking for
a the person that runs the hotel, who is a
witch that has bound him like he like he is
trapped because of this witch and he's like, hey, the
only way for me to be free is if we
kill this lady. Justine is like very timid and very
shy in comparison, so they kind of like they kind
of like complimented, where she's very unsure about everything and
she doesn't really maybe know if she should trust this thing,
but also she needs it, and so he's always kind
of like pushing you to like no, no, no, you
need to go murder all these people. That's totally fine.
There's nothing longer murder you humans are too soft. So
you're in You're in this hotel, and a hotel kind
of serves your hub in between these, uh these roguelike
runs where you're meeting all these other characters, like a hunter,
you're meeting the concierge.
Speaker 2: Each of them more or less.
Speaker 1: Serves as like different shops, like you can buy new weapons,
because like you're pretty much wielding a mix of a
melee weapons and different firearms, like you start with like
this this dual wielding like a sword and like sickle
or knife or whatever, like a short like a short
two short stabby weapons. Basically it changes in a handgun,
but you can eventually unlock like an axe, which is
a lot slower. And then maybe the most creative weapon,
which sucks because it's not particularly enjoyable, are these bus
songs that she can strap to her hand that are
like motorized, so you're literally just like throwing, like spinning buzzsaws,
like just swinging them at people. I wish that was
more fun than it actually.
Speaker 2: Is, so it just stuck fun as it sounds.
Speaker 1: It's yeah, because it looks and sounds pretty cool, but
it's like, ooh, this doesn't feel great. And then you're
just going on runs throughout different areas around the hotel grounds,
like the first areas like in this lake that's very
it's very much like almost a parody of Camp Crystal
Lake from Friday to thirteenth, or like like a little
kind of remember what the second one was because I
only ran through it once and beat it. It's like
like a little shack or somewhere, but basically you're running
through and trying to get to a boss at the end,
and kind of like Ruglizz like Haites, there's different doors
that you're going through and to get to the next section,
but every door grants like a different sort of perk,
like some of them replenish your health, some of them
make you attack faster, some of them give you movement boost,
and you can choose. As a two D game, they're
like scattered all over parts of the levels, so you
can kind of decide how long you want to stay
at a level to seek out the door that has
the perk that you want in that moment, or like
if you find the first door that has what you need,
you can end a level like immediately. But even if
you stay in a level for the duration, you're not
there for long because everything is on a timer like
between like a minute and two minutes, depending on the level.
So it's kind of it's very much a game that's
like you get in and go like kill these guys.
You're jumping around trying to find the other doors or
just find like collect the kind of like upgrade materials
that enemies drop, which are like bones and ears and
other gross stuff. And the other interesting thing is that
you're building up as you kill enemies. Their blood is
splattering everywhere and are everywhere, and as blood splatters on you,
you build up this like meter that when it's full,
you get this big special attack that is tied to
your weapon of choice. But the problem, and I actually
think thematically that's pretty cool, and the way the game
plays with that is that there's different weather in the levels.
Like at the start of a level, it does a
little roulette saying like this is these are conditions for
this this run. So it's nighttime and it's rainy, and
when you get wet, it washes off the blood that
you've accumulated and it makes that meter go down. So
a lot of the challenge is trying to stay dry
and keep all the blood that has splattered on you
interest so that you have yeah, so that you have
access to this this big special attack at some point,
especially you want to save it for like the bosses.
But the combat just doesn't feel good, Like I'm I'm
a big stylish action like I'm an action guy, like
I love stylish action games, and like the worst thing
you can do is like have the combat feel sluggish
and just like it doesn't feel particularly weighty and there
just isn't the feedback behind it, Like it doesn't it
just doesn't feel smooth, like like going to to Haites two,
Like you were talking about how having the sort of
like bounce between baby Steps and Haighties two charles, like
having to play a not fun roguelike action roguelike when
Hades two is sitting right there as probably the epit
of me of action ro like roguelikes is it's been
eating at me just I know, but or maybe the
more closer parallel of something like Dead Cells, which is
also like a two D side scrolling action role like
which I think the combat in that game is incredible. Yeah,
and it's it's and like with that in mind and
playing this, it's like, you know, you can do all
these things. You can unlock like more combos, Like there's
a skill tree. We can kind of like add more
to your repertoire, Like you can do like a block
and a perry, But the block and parry don't feel
good and for some reason, like the perry is like
blocking and hitting a different button and instead of just
doing a time block, which would make it less work,
Like it's like if I have to block and then
hit a different button, I'm just never gonna use the
perry because that just isn't quick enough.
Speaker 3: For what a person you're creating a new One of
the most intuitive button presses in all of video game
is the block and then you can time it perfect
into perry. Existed for decades. One of the things that
people try to change them like why would you change that?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, why would you make it's more complicated? Yeah yeah,
and that doesn't it doesn't even feel like that great
when you execute anyway, you got like a dash and
an air dash that don't feel super great, and you
have to upgrade it multiple times for the meanything because
the distance on the dash isn't super great and all
the upgrades for it are like you can dash farther,
and it's like, I wish that was just from the
start so that it felt like useful. Because the boss
battles in this game, the two or three that I've killed,
are kind of nightmares on the normal difficulty, where they
the attack priority is so cheap and be like the
way that they can just hit you out of a
dodge or in some cases because the dodge initially is
so short and they're such big characters that you got
to be like right up on to actually dodge through
them without accidentally just landing inside of their hip box
and taking damage. And then also the most egregious thing
is that they can just stunlock you into oblivion. Like
if you get knocked in the ground and they follow
up with an attack and she doesn't get up quick enough,
then you'll just like take like three hits in succession
and she goes down pretty quick and normal to the
point where right now I've dropped it to easy, which
easy doesn't as far as you can tell. It doesn't
really change the difficulty of the enemies. It just gives
you more retries because when you fail, unless you find
these special like retry tickets, you start the run from
the beginning. You go back to the hotel, which is
where you can, you know, do your upgrades and spin
your currency, because when you start a new run, all
the currency you have left over gets reset to zeros
that are like try to unlock as many things as
you can see you don't waste it.
Speaker 2: So but at least oneasy they kind.
Speaker 1: Of give you three retries so you can stay in
the stage where they hapened to go back to the beginning.
So I've been playing through that, especially since I've played
enough of a comba to be like, this isn't fun.
I just want to see the story stuff, which has
been more interesting than the combat, like sort of the
the mystery of like who is this witch? Like why
does the Titan want to? Like like what did he
do to get trapped? Like who was actually the bad
guy here? And then also like Justine's backstory gradually being
unfolded like they do the Haites thing. Every time you
go back to the hotel, you know, you talk to
your NBC's and they have new things to say, and
the story kind of progresses from there. Like that stuff
I'm I'm a little bit more interested in. And even
if the there's some really weird and dumb stuff in
the ways that it's like some of it's like fun
and some of it's just like why Like the opening
cut scene, you meet a guy doesn't expoil it because
he's gone like immediately, but you meet like a you're
like driving a car and you've got a hitchhiker like
this lady who is just like really promiscuous, And then
in a passenger seat is this soldier that was a
Niche gonna do the job that you wind up doing.
And he's basically a more extreme version of PC principle
from South Park, where he's like threatening to shoot everyone
in the car for saying anything he perceived as being
like like a knock against diversity or like or something. Yeah,
it's it's weird, and like the dialogue is so blatant
about it, but like yes, you know, he's like, you know,
we live in an age of diversity, and so like
you know, you saying this. I don't even remember what
she said, but it was something we're like, you're you're
mad about mad, Like how would she imply that she
was being like bigoted it anyway? From that statement? But
like I don't know, there's like weird stuff about like
some of the commentary about certain things where I'm like, uh, okay,
but like I said, he's gone pretty quick. Yeah it's
it's I guess it's a Swarry and a Suit of
fifty one game of like yeah, thematically and like narratively,
there's some interesting things here, but like I dread starting
another run off. Yeah, like even with even unlocking new
things to make it easier for like, okay, I got
new combos or I got more helps someone die as quickly,
But I'm not like looking forward to going through these
levels and like I just want to im to the bar,
like I just want to get through it, see just
see the story stuff and just get through these boss
bosses like it's just yeah, it's it's not it's just
not fun Yeah funny.
Speaker 3: There's a breathlessness to your description of this game that
I find very relatable, where you're like the whole reason
I did all this stuff is to talk about it,
and I can finally finally explain all that I've been
suffering in silence for so long, and now I could
explain this weird.
Speaker 2: Guy in the car just that I had to just
have in my head by myself for all this time. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but yeah, you know, like I said, it's a
It's out tomorrow at the time of recording, on the
twenty six. Yeah, Hotel Barcelona. Everyone. It's uh, it's a
it's a game.
Speaker 2: It's a game. I mean, that's it's sweary, man. That's
about you could. That's like the headline for every review
of a sweary games. It's a game. It's it's got,
it's got a stop, it's got stuff. Great, we'll give it.
We'll give it that in a in a in a
very more Souda kind of way.
Speaker 1: Honestly, if we're gonna like pin it on someone, it's
got it's got a very Suda style that you're always
kind of like, at the very least you sort.
Speaker 2: Of like can respect and appreciate.
Speaker 1: Yeah cool, Yeah, awesome. Well, I think we'll just wrap
out the podcast here this week. Thank you guys so
much for watching. Once again, if you want to support
Game Informer and go to gaminformer dot com slash subscribe
and get yourself a magazine subscription ten issues of year.
We got the Outer Worlds two digital issue A launching
next week on September thirtieth, with the physical issue hitting
mailboxes in early October. If you want to follow us
on social media, you can find me on Blue Sky
at Marcus Stewart seven. Charles, you're at Chuck Duck three
sixty five. Yes, did I get it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, every day of the year, I'm throwing waterfowl.
Speaker 1: Ducks, and Kyle you were at Kyle M. Hilliard on
social platforms. In terms of like stuff on the website,
be sure to tune in Every Friday, We've got our
ongoing Resident Evil Outbreak super replay Charles and myself working
our way through the entirety of Resident Evil Outbreak ahead
of Residentevil Requiem in February. And every Wednesday. We have
also our Wednesday streams. We're doing that again. Like we
mentioned earlier, Alex van Agen and Eric van Allen stream
Baby Steps this week. But yeah, our Wednesday streams are
kind of just geared towards highlighting more recent games. Usually
around two pm Central every Wednesday, so check those out.
And yeah, guys, that's a show. Thank you for watching,
and we'll see you next week. By everyone,