Speaker 1: You're listening to episode seventy seven of Game Spot after Dark.
Speaker 1: On this week's episode, we talk about hit Man three
Speaker 1: and all of the resident Evil announcements. Hello and welcome
Speaker 1: to episode seventy seven of Game Spot after Dark. Joining
Speaker 1: me this week is Callie Plaguey Hello, Tomorrow's saying.
Speaker 2: Hi, and Jean Luke Sydke Hello.
Speaker 3: Hello.
Speaker 2: It is kind of a busy week this week.
Speaker 1: There's the first big release of twenty twenty, and we
Speaker 1: plan on talking about that quite a bit. But before
Speaker 1: we do that, we're going to talk about what we've
Speaker 1: been playing a little bit. CALLI do you want to start?
Speaker 4: Sure? In addition to continuing Personify Royal, in which I'm
Speaker 4: about I'm a little over eighty hours into that now,
Speaker 4: I've been playing more Animal Crossing. My biggest thing lately
Speaker 4: is that I am about to complete my catalog, so
Speaker 4: I will have crafted every item in the game, collected
Speaker 4: every single item in the game.
Speaker 5: Goddamn.
Speaker 4: I have literally two more items left. One of them
Speaker 4: is just something I'll get from next time Gulivar visits,
Speaker 4: and then I need to craft the Aquarius Urn. It
Speaker 4: just switched to Aquarius season yesterday and I still need
Speaker 4: the golden shovel, but that's not catalogical, so it doesn't count.
Speaker 4: And I'm very eagerly awaiting news about the update that
Speaker 4: was promised. There's supposed to be a late January update.
Speaker 4: If I am not mistaken, it's beginning to look a
Speaker 4: lot like late January. So I would really like to
Speaker 4: know when we are getting fest of All, which is
Speaker 4: the holiday that was teased. So you know, I'm just
Speaker 4: keeping up. I'm staying on the beat, looking out decorating
Speaker 4: my island.
Speaker 1: What do you think this is like late a late
Speaker 1: part of a month. Do you think it's the twenties onward?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I would say like the third and fourth week
Speaker 4: is like later in the month.
Speaker 6: So I split, like most months are what thirty days?
Speaker 6: So I split it from fifteenth onward.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's late for me. Two halfsh okay for me.
Speaker 2: I could see that too.
Speaker 5: Ten and then you got twenties and then you got
Speaker 5: the thirties, So like, no, zero's than the tents. I
Speaker 5: don't know how numbers work, you know what I mean?
Speaker 5: Every ten every ten days? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely like the older I get, the shorter months
Speaker 1: feel and the sooner the late part of the month
Speaker 1: seems to come like it feels like it was just
Speaker 1: January second the other day. Now it's the twentieth. So
Speaker 1: you know, anyway, Timorro, what have you been up to?
Speaker 6: I have been doing the same thing that I was
Speaker 6: doing last week, which is playing Sekio. I'm still like,
Speaker 6: I've got one trophy left till I can platinum it,
Speaker 6: and I'm like, I'm getting most of the way there.
Speaker 6: I think I'm going to get to the point where
Speaker 6: I make a decision soon. Whoever, I want to get
Speaker 6: all the skills a scale, all the skills and I so,
Speaker 6: how did you do it? Uh?
Speaker 2: There was a path I found.
Speaker 1: On like New Game plus plus or something that you
Speaker 1: could run over and over again that would get you
Speaker 1: a lot of experience.
Speaker 2: I can show you after the podcasts. But that's what
Speaker 2: I did.
Speaker 1: What really screwed me over, though, was that I invested
Speaker 1: in the mask. And if you invest in the mask,
Speaker 1: that like that costs a lot. I think, like, I
Speaker 1: don't remember the math, but basically I remember that because
Speaker 1: I did that, I had to like grind an insane
Speaker 1: amount more because of that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so I have got a root, So I'm getting
Speaker 6: getting there. But it's just I've got a lot of
Speaker 6: points to get through. And yesterday I was thinking about
Speaker 6: it and I was like, you know, what would have
Speaker 6: been good for this if Xbox Snap was still a thing,
Speaker 6: that would have been so good work. I just like
Speaker 6: have this on the side or like I don't know
Speaker 6: why PlayStation doesn't have it as well, like have like
Speaker 6: Netflix on the side and I could just run it.
Speaker 6: At one point, I experimented with playing Securo on my
Speaker 6: iPad using remote play, and I spoke last week about
Speaker 6: Xbox remote play, which worked almost flawlessly, like it was
Speaker 6: I was playing Yakuza on my phone using my Xbox
Speaker 6: controller and it was great. Yesterday I loaded up Securo
Speaker 6: on my iPad using a dual Shock four controller and
Speaker 6: it worked. But the PlayStation, like the networking system, it
Speaker 6: really struggled with it. Like it kept telling me my
Speaker 6: battery was low on my controller when it wasn't, and
Speaker 6: it kept like changing video qualities and there was a
Speaker 6: little bit of latency input delay.
Speaker 3: So like now I've just ordered.
Speaker 6: A very large iPad stand, so like it's literally it goes.
Speaker 6: It's like it's like a it's like a light stand.
Speaker 6: So I put it on the floor and then there's
Speaker 6: like an arm that stretches all the way up, and
Speaker 6: I put the iPad in front of me. So basically,
Speaker 6: I'm gonna sit on my couch with an iPad hovering
Speaker 6: in front of me and then the TV in the background,
Speaker 6: and I'm just gonna watch stuff on my iPad and
Speaker 6: I'm going to play Secura on the background and where
Speaker 6: is my life anymore?
Speaker 5: But then you could put somebody on the iPad and
Speaker 5: then it could be like you a friend next to
Speaker 5: you because it's very tall.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah, exactly, That's what I'm saying. That's a good idea.
Speaker 6: So I invested in that and and get that. So
Speaker 6: I still I'm not one hundred percent sure whether I
Speaker 6: want to get that platinum. I'm just working towards it.
Speaker 6: But you know, like I said last week, like having
Speaker 6: one platinum is more of a statement than having two.
Speaker 3: But I don't know.
Speaker 6: I'm also kind of like I just want to kind
Speaker 6: of do the thing and say I completely secret to
Speaker 6: it its entirety. And I completed it on Saturday twice,
Speaker 6: like I played it through twice, which was wild, Like
Speaker 6: I was like, let me just see how many times
Speaker 6: I can complete this game in a row, and I
Speaker 6: just went through twice.
Speaker 4: I was like, damn, I even process that when you
Speaker 4: first said it, Oh my god.
Speaker 6: But yeah, I was just like destroying bosses left friend center.
Speaker 5: Have you ever thought about speed running the game?
Speaker 6: I have thought about it, and then I'm like, it
Speaker 6: stresses me out, like because you screw up one thing
Speaker 6: and you're like done. And there's just enough variables in
Speaker 6: secul where sometimes something will change and I and most
Speaker 6: good speed runners will know, Oh, I know exactly how
Speaker 6: this has changed, and I've got a strategy for compensating
Speaker 6: for that change. Whereas if I do it, I'm just like,
Speaker 6: fuck my life, why is this different now?
Speaker 1: I don't know if I tried to speed run, but
Speaker 1: I was streaming it a bit, and I found that
Speaker 1: game very hard to stream because I was I don't know,
Speaker 1: I was under It felt like I was under a
Speaker 1: lot of pressure to do well in front of people,
Speaker 1: and I don't know. That just didn't work because I
Speaker 1: needed to focus on the game itself. But it was fun,
Speaker 1: Like getting the bosses and just crushing them was yeah, satisfying.
Speaker 6: I reached where in my second play through I wasn't
Speaker 6: really listening to it either, like I had turned the
Speaker 6: audio off and I had a podcast on, so I
Speaker 6: was just listening to like Chop or trap House and
Speaker 6: like various other podcasts and just like playing the game through.
Speaker 6: So like I can. I think I can do it
Speaker 6: on a stream where I don't pay too much attention.
Speaker 6: But I just don't second as one of those games
Speaker 6: where if you start streaming it, people just pay attention
Speaker 6: to your performance in a way that's kind of annoying.
Speaker 6: Like I am blessing streaming it currently and I jump
Speaker 6: in there and I make a point of never being
Speaker 6: like you need to hit it this way to try
Speaker 6: and do this and telling him how to play. But
Speaker 6: you do get a lot of people that I've seen
Speaker 6: in other people streams, being like, you're not playing this properly.
Speaker 6: You need to time, you're like this and you need
Speaker 6: to go here. I'm just like, no, it's already a
Speaker 6: stressful game and with high demand execution demand, stop stressing
Speaker 6: people out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So I don't know.
Speaker 6: I've reached a point where Sekura is relaxing for me now,
Speaker 6: which is a strange place to be.
Speaker 2: I get that though.
Speaker 1: I remember returning to that game a lot just because
Speaker 1: of the environments and that, I don't know, it's just
Speaker 1: meditative once you get past that hump of the difficulty.
Speaker 1: But anyway, the big game this week is hit Man three.
Speaker 1: Jean Luke and I have been playing it. But do
Speaker 1: you want to start with your overall thoughts on Hitman?
Speaker 1: Now you Hitman Hitman.
Speaker 3: Hitman, Hitman, and.
Speaker 1: That's the title of the episode. But you previewed it
Speaker 1: a couple months ago, not even a couple months ago,
Speaker 1: like a couple of weeks ago.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so yeah, what are your thoughts.
Speaker 5: It's fantastic. I mean, I it's it's hard to like
Speaker 5: divorce Hitman three from like the rest of it because,
Speaker 5: like on face value, it's just, oh, it's like more
Speaker 5: of hit Man like one and two. It doesn't necessarily
Speaker 5: add anything new mechanically from two. I would say it's
Speaker 5: very similar. So if you're going into that, you you
Speaker 5: might be disappointed, But like for me, it's just like
Speaker 5: it is a it's more of like a continuation of
Speaker 5: like the same game that's now complete, is what it
Speaker 5: feels like, which is like for the reinforced by the
Speaker 5: fact that you can bring all those levels into hit
Speaker 5: Man three. So when you load up the game, and
Speaker 5: if you have everything, you're presented with this menu of
Speaker 5: just like twenty something hit Man levels with like each
Speaker 5: one has like sixty plus challenges and all this stuff,
Speaker 5: and you're like, it's just the amount of hit Man
Speaker 5: available to you is like it's so good. Like I
Speaker 5: already I haven't started yet, but I want to go
Speaker 5: back and like replay all the earlier levels and do
Speaker 5: them all again, because I there's just something about like
Speaker 5: the the clockwork nature of hit Man and the way
Speaker 5: you can like just mess with those little like dioramas
Speaker 5: of people doing their routines and you're, you know, throwing
Speaker 5: a wrench in it. Like it's so satisfying. It's I
Speaker 5: would say, like hit Man three on it so so
Speaker 5: hit Man three on its sowing very good. Like the
Speaker 5: levels are, the levels they've added are fantastic. I feel
Speaker 5: like we've talked very extensively about the first one, which
Speaker 5: is like Dubui, and the second one, which is a
Speaker 5: murder mystery I talked previously, but even the other levels
Speaker 5: after that, like the the third level is you're in
Speaker 5: Germany and you're in a like an abandoned nuclear facility
Speaker 5: that's been turned into like a nightclub, and it's just
Speaker 5: the bet. Like you go inside and it's just this
Speaker 5: like just blaring music and like strobe lights happening, and
Speaker 5: you're in this massive crowd and just like the atmosphere
Speaker 5: of the level is so fantastic. It's also a very
Speaker 5: unique level in that you have five different people you
Speaker 5: have to kill, but you don't know where they are,
Speaker 5: so you have to like find their routes and learn them.
Speaker 5: And they they can catch you no matter what disguise
Speaker 5: you're in, but they won't catch you if you're hiding
Speaker 5: in the crowd. So that's where you have to use
Speaker 5: like the giant crowd of the the club to like
Speaker 5: mask yourself. And there's a great kill where you like
Speaker 5: pretend to be the j and you like.
Speaker 2: I did that one. You can kill two of them
Speaker 2: too by that, and it's so cool.
Speaker 5: It's so cool. You have to like there you find
Speaker 5: a thing that says, like, hey man, if you're a
Speaker 5: DJ and you want to do like the big finish,
Speaker 5: like you got to tell the tech team before because
Speaker 5: it might go horribly wrong, So you have to like
Speaker 5: you know, grab a wrench and like you mess with
Speaker 5: like the the fuse and then you go in there
Speaker 5: and you like hype up the crowd and they're all
Speaker 5: like yeah, and then you're just like all right, I'm
Speaker 5: gonna drop the base and then it like kills two guys.
Speaker 4: It's incredible.
Speaker 5: It's just so good. I mean, they're they're they're humor
Speaker 5: in the in is like always been like so on point,
Speaker 5: Like they do such a good job of of like
Speaker 5: adding levity to what is like a very serious thing,
Speaker 5: like you're murdering people, although you're murdering rich people who
Speaker 5: are assholes, so it's it's fine. Can I say that
Speaker 5: on a podcast?
Speaker 1: Just to add to that, I was gonna say that
Speaker 1: the the levels are so good. I actually went back
Speaker 1: and played some of the older hit Man levels and
Speaker 1: they're all really good.
Speaker 2: But you can just see the you can just see.
Speaker 1: That io Interactive has mastered this formula in these new levels,
Speaker 1: because all of them feel so perfect. You know, perfect's
Speaker 1: like a weird word, but for what they're going for,
Speaker 1: it seems like these levels just utilize everything that they've
Speaker 1: learned up to this point, and it's just like a remarkable,
Speaker 1: i don't know, like suite of levels. Particularly there's one
Speaker 1: in Shanghai. That was just visually incredible and was just
Speaker 1: a ton of fun in the way you explore that level,
Speaker 1: the way you see different sides of that level, and
Speaker 1: the way the level just expands in so many kind
Speaker 1: of unpredictable ways, Like there's an entire underground facility that
Speaker 1: you don't see until you hit a certain point in
Speaker 1: the level and you're like, oh, wow, I've only seen
Speaker 1: I've only scratched this surface. And they do that constantly.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'm super impressed by it, Like I had
Speaker 1: so much fun.
Speaker 2: I think these collection of levels are definitely my favorite
Speaker 2: that they've done.
Speaker 5: I would agree absolutely, Yeah like that, Yeah, like what
Speaker 5: I said earlier about how like maybe like mechanically it
Speaker 5: doesn't involve much, You're one hundred percent right Like there
Speaker 5: it is like the peak of their level design prowess
Speaker 5: and and sort of like their masterful like subtle storytelling techniques,
Speaker 5: Like I think they get really creative with some of
Speaker 5: the the story stuff you do, uh where you get
Speaker 5: to you know, we talked about the murder mystery where
Speaker 5: where I redid the murder mystery this morning and I
Speaker 5: realized there's like multiple conclusions to the murder mystery, including
Speaker 5: one where you like find just the right evidence to
Speaker 5: make it be like, no, actually the guy did commit
Speaker 5: suicide even though he really didn't, and you like get
Speaker 5: the target to out of like cause she feels like
Speaker 5: she's responsible for his death, Like she then commits suicide
Speaker 5: herself out of grief, and that's how you finish it,
Speaker 5: which is like super dark. But I was like, I
Speaker 5: don't even know you could do that, Like it is
Speaker 5: they they just go so above and beyond with this game,
Speaker 5: and I really think, like, you know, like taken as
Speaker 5: a whole, it's like, this is maybe my favorite one
Speaker 5: of my favorite games ever made, like as a as
Speaker 5: a I'm pulling the Return of the King, you know,
Speaker 5: like situation where it's like it deserves the game of
Speaker 5: the year for what it is as a whole thing.
Speaker 5: Like when you take the hit Man World of Assassination
Speaker 5: trilogy as one massive package. It is insane and how
Speaker 5: good it is.
Speaker 4: Yeah, hearing you guys talk about it and then reading
Speaker 4: Phil's review has really made me want to play. It
Speaker 4: was just one of those games like this happens to
Speaker 4: be all the time where something will just like seem
Speaker 4: really dude, bro on the outside, so I don't pick
Speaker 4: it up. And hit Man was one of those I
Speaker 4: just I had heard. I remember people talking about it
Speaker 4: with the last installment, but and I was intrigued then,
Speaker 4: but like now, I'm fully sold. The Murder Mystery thing
Speaker 4: really did a lot of heavy lifting in that regard.
Speaker 4: Uh So I'm definitely really excited to play it.
Speaker 2: I need to.
Speaker 4: There's a lot of games I need to go back
Speaker 4: and play because the marketing was so dude browie, but
Speaker 4: the game wasn't. And I not that the hit Man
Speaker 4: market It's just you know, it's one of those things,
Speaker 4: just no, it seems like it's not for me, if
Speaker 4: that makes sense. Like I feel that way about Alan
Speaker 4: Wake too, where I was like, this is just some
Speaker 4: guy's name and I just never gave it a second butt.
Speaker 4: And I totally need to play Alan Wake too, So.
Speaker 3: Yeah, probably.
Speaker 6: I remember when I when the first one was announced,
Speaker 6: the first chapter in the war I was Fascination Trilogy,
Speaker 6: and I did a preview for it, and I remember
Speaker 6: writing my preview like I described that that game that
Speaker 6: franchise as like a like an old elaborate clock, like
Speaker 6: a grandfather clock, with like loads of gears and belts
Speaker 6: and that kind of thing, and your job is to
Speaker 6: just figure out which gear to jam your screw driver
Speaker 6: into to see what happens, and like, that's that's what
Speaker 6: that entire franchise is about now. And I think Kelly,
Speaker 6: you will absolutely have a fantastic time doing that because
Speaker 6: you start playing and you jam it in and you're like, oh,
Speaker 6: there's these other gears over here that carried on turning,
Speaker 6: and then you're like, oh, I didn't realize that this
Speaker 6: Grandfather clock was set up so that this one gear
Speaker 6: if you break it, it has various other fallback systems,
Speaker 6: and you get to see what happens every time you
Speaker 6: poke at a different corner of like logic and AI
Speaker 6: and kind of game design and kind of routines and
Speaker 6: that kind of stuff. It's just really fascinating. It's one
Speaker 6: of those games that is good to just like go
Speaker 6: into and just spend an afternoon just poking at it
Speaker 6: to figure out how it works.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think too if it like the story
Speaker 1: by itself isn't all that interesting. Like I think the
Speaker 1: third game or the final section of this ties up
Speaker 1: some loose ends in some interesting ways, but it's not
Speaker 1: really the main draw.
Speaker 2: Like I, if you've ever played.
Speaker 1: This Hitman trilogy and you can get all three, like,
Speaker 1: don't play them in order play the ones that look interesting,
Speaker 1: do you? Well, maybe play like the tutorial and first
Speaker 1: level because they're a little smaller scale and you can
Speaker 1: kind of understand what's going on.
Speaker 2: But then honestly, I just hop around.
Speaker 1: And play what looks interesting to you, because like, well,
Speaker 1: I think all the levels are pretty good. There are
Speaker 1: some that I think will stand out a lot more
Speaker 1: to other people, like, for instance, Kelli, the the murder
Speaker 1: mystery is probably more interesting to you than maybe like
Speaker 1: a bank robbery one which they added, which is also
Speaker 1: very good. So like, I don't know, Like the stories
Speaker 1: they tell on those levels are so interesting and it's
Speaker 1: cool how they interact with how you can kill people.
Speaker 5: There was they speaking of like small stories. There's this
Speaker 5: amazing little moment in the third mission, no a fourth mission,
Speaker 5: the China one, where I needed to like tail a guy.
Speaker 5: I was tailing this homeless man, and so I like
Speaker 5: went over and I like blended in at this this
Speaker 5: little like walkway, and there's a woman there and she
Speaker 5: just starts talking to me. To forty seven about how
Speaker 5: she's like waiting for this friend of hers in the rain,
Speaker 5: and how she's mad that her friend isn't there, and
Speaker 5: then they he basically like hit forty seven starts talking
Speaker 5: to her about like, oh, like why are you waiting
Speaker 5: for your friend? And and it turns into this thing
Speaker 5: where like he basically like she feels upset about her friend,
Speaker 5: and then he kind of is like consoling her and
Speaker 5: kind of makes her think of her friend's perspective. Forty
Speaker 5: seven basically turns into like a weird therapist for a
Speaker 5: hot second where he's like talking to this woman and
Speaker 5: the whole time, I'm like, is this gonna help me
Speaker 5: murder somebody? Because like usually when they have stuff like that,
Speaker 5: it's like they're trying to to set up like a murder.
Speaker 5: I don't think it relates to anything, because it just
Speaker 5: it was this full conversation where like forty seven just
Speaker 5: like helped this woman and was like being a normal
Speaker 5: person for a minute. And I don't know why that
Speaker 5: like really stuck with me of like like they just
Speaker 5: felt more free to to like get really weird with
Speaker 5: it in this one in a way that like the
Speaker 5: other ones have it, and that moment is just like okay,
Speaker 5: like you're doing something interesting here.
Speaker 6: This is actually a secret ending where it pulls back
Speaker 6: and it's age on forty seven sitting on a couch
Speaker 6: in front of two kids, and he goes and that, kids,
Speaker 6: is how I met your mother.
Speaker 1: The last time you did something like this, someone tweeted
Speaker 1: at us being like, did you guys really just spoil Cyberpunk?
Speaker 2: I was like, oh, it was a joke.
Speaker 1: One other thing I will say, kind of to your point, though, John,
Speaker 1: there is that I did find when I was playing it.
Speaker 2: There were a lot of kills or.
Speaker 1: Assassinations that that I didn't follow, like a mission in
Speaker 1: tel track, And of course I can.
Speaker 2: All the other ones.
Speaker 1: You could do that too, Like basically, you'll walk up
Speaker 1: to certain characters or events and the game will like
Speaker 1: subtly sometimes not so subtly, hint you or give you
Speaker 1: hints on how you can kill it. Like it'll be like, oh, man,
Speaker 1: the camera guy didn't show up. We're supposed to interview
Speaker 1: the guy you're supposed to kill, and then you get
Speaker 1: like a thing and it's like like, forty seven, the
Speaker 1: cameraman looks a lot like you. Maybe you should find
Speaker 1: the cameraman and take his clothes or whatever and become
Speaker 1: the new cameraman. But this game has that as well,
Speaker 1: But it feels like there's a lot of like quote
Speaker 1: unquote scripted kills that the game doesn't really point you towards.
Speaker 1: And I think that DJ one is kind of one
Speaker 1: of them. Like it does show up an intel, but
Speaker 1: it doesn't give you like at least I didn't get
Speaker 1: like the insight goal or whatever, which I thought was
Speaker 1: super interesting. I feel like they kind of found a
Speaker 1: balance between how much handholding they should do, because I
Speaker 1: think when I played the first World of Assassination mission
Speaker 1: like Sapienza, I felt that it was a little too
Speaker 1: handhole compared to some of the older ones, which which
Speaker 1: was okay, but like there's.
Speaker 2: A little too much of the.
Speaker 1: Game just being like you should check this out and
Speaker 1: this and these later levels do that too. But I
Speaker 1: really appreciate how they kind of just give you the
Speaker 1: setup and just let you run with it.
Speaker 5: Something I really recommend you do when you play is
Speaker 5: so you can they have like the little story missions
Speaker 5: which are like kind of the more scripted ones, and
Speaker 5: you can the if you set it to default. I
Speaker 5: believe it'll it'll just kind of tell you exactly what
Speaker 5: to do. And I would say that's if you're someone
Speaker 5: who's trying to learn the game, that's maybe a good
Speaker 5: way because it kind of basically like teaches you, like,
Speaker 5: here's like how these certain things work. But then afterwards
Speaker 5: you can go and you can set it to minimal,
Speaker 5: which just kind of gives you like a basic idea
Speaker 5: of what you're supposed to do, but doesn't tell you
Speaker 5: where to go, or you could turn it off completely.
Speaker 5: And I highly recommend after you get a feel for it,
Speaker 5: like switching to minimal, because for me, I think the
Speaker 5: game is at its best when you're not just following
Speaker 5: a direction and you're like the first time you play
Speaker 5: a Hitman game or a hit Man level, I just
Speaker 5: spent an hour just like walking around. I don't even
Speaker 5: do anything because you're just like taking in everything and
Speaker 5: you're really like planning.
Speaker 2: Out seeing where you can go.
Speaker 1: Can't go go finding screwdrivers because you're gonna need one
Speaker 1: of those sooner or later.
Speaker 5: Taking up screwdrivers.
Speaker 1: I spent an hour looking for a screwdriver on one
Speaker 1: of the on the Germany level, I could not find
Speaker 1: when he's driving me crazy.
Speaker 6: But I've been I've been thinking real hard about writing
Speaker 6: a feature slash making a video essay about how hit
Speaker 6: Man is all about using white privilege for good and
Speaker 6: if you think about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah about it.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, I'm thinking like Age of forty seven, like
Speaker 6: looks like various people, like very generic white man, looks.
Speaker 3: Like video game protagonists, like video game protagonist.
Speaker 5: He's able to get in anywhere.
Speaker 6: We just can get all he does. He acts like
Speaker 6: he belongs and people because he is a white person
Speaker 6: and he's he knows, and he's he's got confidence. They
Speaker 6: don't need to question it. They don't apply scrutiny to him.
Speaker 6: They just let him be and he uses that ability.
Speaker 6: He uses his his understanding of the innate biases of
Speaker 6: the world towards white people to get into places to murder.
Speaker 2: And then he gets please write this.
Speaker 5: They do. I really do think they do a great
Speaker 5: job like justifying that. Like there's a mission at the
Speaker 5: end of Hitman two where you're at like the secret
Speaker 5: like covert Illuminati party and they're all like talking about
Speaker 5: how like, oh, we know climate change is real, but
Speaker 5: we're all rich so it doesn't matter. And I'm like
Speaker 5: all these people are up for murder now like that.
Speaker 1: Like I think even the game like calls Agent forty
Speaker 1: seven's murders like the string of one percent murders at
Speaker 1: one point, and I'm like, that's what they are, no regrets.
Speaker 6: There's a title hit Man. Hit Man is a franchise
Speaker 6: about using white privilege to murder the one percent.
Speaker 3: Very clickable.
Speaker 1: Uh anyway, any closing remarks on hit Man, I feel
Speaker 1: like Hitman.
Speaker 2: Sorry, Hitman.
Speaker 5: It's very good. It's if you've never played a hit Man,
Speaker 5: I highly recommend it. I have seen some people talk
Speaker 5: about how like they had trouble getting into it or
Speaker 5: or it bounce off them. I really recommend giving another try.
Speaker 5: I do think it's a game that you kind of
Speaker 5: need to I don't know, like go in the right
Speaker 5: mindset or let me take it slow, take it slow.
Speaker 5: I think if, like I said, if you just try
Speaker 5: and go in it and you're like, oh, just follow
Speaker 5: all this story stuff, like you'll have an okay time.
Speaker 5: But I don't think that's really like that's not where
Speaker 5: the game is at its best. It's really about like
Speaker 5: taking it slow, feeling things out, be afraid to be messy.
Speaker 5: Like some of my favorite because I'm usually like a
Speaker 5: perfectionist where I'll like quick save and quick load and
Speaker 5: like I want to do the perfect kill and know
Speaker 5: never getting caught, and those are fun, but honestly, some
Speaker 5: of the best Funds runs is where you challenge yourself
Speaker 5: not to save at all and you just like roll
Speaker 5: with it and then you're like, ah, that guy found me.
Speaker 5: I have to quickly knock him out with the fire
Speaker 5: extinguisher and this disguises but so I have to completely
Speaker 5: change my plan and I that that game is all
Speaker 5: about just like creativity, and yeah, it's like I said,
Speaker 5: I think I think it's as a whole package. It's
Speaker 5: maybe one of my favorite games ever made.
Speaker 1: Or or do the do the thing where you have
Speaker 1: someone else pick the murder weapon, I have to try
Speaker 1: to kill the person with the murder tried to stream
Speaker 1: that giant bombs hit miss so good.
Speaker 5: I'm like, I'm always like I want to do that,
Speaker 5: but you can't because I'd be just stealing their thing.
Speaker 5: But it's such a good idea.
Speaker 2: Anyway.
Speaker 1: The other big thing this week is the Resident Evil
Speaker 1: stream two more ye're are Resident Evil Expert?
Speaker 2: What'd you make of it?
Speaker 1: Very exciting actually, first, why don't you give the listeners
Speaker 1: a breakdown of everything that happened.
Speaker 6: Okay, So the stream was probably about twenty minutes long,
Speaker 6: I think, and obviously a big year for Resident Evil
Speaker 6: since it is the twenty fifth anniversary of the franchise,
Speaker 6: so they're kind of celebrating that. Not a lot of
Speaker 6: celebration happening in the stream, well, not a lot of like, hey,
Speaker 6: we've got this amazing new experience for you to check
Speaker 6: out for the twenty fifth anniversary. But what we did
Speaker 6: get was a decent amount of a decent look at
Speaker 6: Resident Evil Village or Resident Evil eight. So it kind
Speaker 6: of opened with this trailer that showed off if you
Speaker 6: were if you're a Resident Evil fan, like you can
Speaker 6: pick out some really interesting things in there. But like,
Speaker 6: in terms of how it pertains to Resident Evil eight, specifically,
Speaker 6: it confirms that Ethan is obviously we know Ethan's back,
Speaker 6: but he's going to this village and specifically this castle
Speaker 6: in this village to rescue his kidnapped daughter. We get
Speaker 6: to see like the bit I think it's shortly after
Speaker 6: the previous trailer where you know it ends the previous trail.
Speaker 6: One of the previous Trailers ends with Ethan being like, Chris,
Speaker 6: why are you here? And it seems like Chris is
Speaker 6: naughty boy this time. And then we saw a little
Speaker 6: bit more of that where there seems to be some
Speaker 6: sort of soldier handing over a child to Chris Redfield
Speaker 6: and then Chris kind of looks at Ethan and then
Speaker 6: we assume that that's the kid who's gonna who is
Speaker 6: Ethan's child and has been kidnapped. The other thing we
Speaker 6: get a good look at is a tall vampire lady
Speaker 6: who has become internet sensation, rightly so, because she's tall,
Speaker 6: she's hot, and she seems to be a vampire lady.
Speaker 1: Is actually tall or is it just the perspective of No.
Speaker 6: She's very tall based on what I've seen what we
Speaker 6: saw there, like she seems to be above other people.
Speaker 6: So I've written a piece about the tall vampire lady
Speaker 6: specifically just to break down who she is and what
Speaker 6: the deal is so you can.
Speaker 3: Read about her. But effectively, the castle is hers.
Speaker 6: There's some sort of hidden power mother, a mother figure
Speaker 6: that she talks to on the phone, and there's a
Speaker 6: ritual or a kind of thing meant to happen. Ethan
Speaker 6: has become a problem, and the mother has the hot
Speaker 6: tall mother has hot daughters who are just around. This
Speaker 6: is like this game has been designed to make Twitter
Speaker 6: as thirsty as possible. They are evil daughters running around
Speaker 6: doing weird shit. They turn into like flies, and you know,
Speaker 6: the vampires usually turn into bats, but these these ladies
Speaker 6: seem to turn into flies, which makes me think, do.
Speaker 5: You think the doves were looking at like everyone thirst
Speaker 5: and over hades and they were like, oh, just you waits.
Speaker 6: I think they were looking at people first thing over
Speaker 6: mister X and being like, if they will get thirsty
Speaker 6: over this, but if we made an attractive time forget that.
Speaker 4: We were like, we're going to target the monsterfuckers with this one.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and they really went in So you get some
Speaker 6: of that and you get from there they move into U.
Speaker 3: So there's a trailer there, story trailer.
Speaker 6: There's lots to unpack there, and you can find that
Speaker 6: on the on the kind of on our website. We've
Speaker 6: got some stories about that. Beyond that, they announced that
Speaker 6: Resident Evil Village is coming to PS four and Xbox One,
Speaker 6: as well as PS five, Xbox Series, sn X and PC,
Speaker 6: which is interesting. So there's been some rumors about that stuff,
Speaker 6: and there's been some product listings that indicated that, but
Speaker 6: they confirm that it's coming day and date. The PS
Speaker 6: four version can be upgraded to the PS five version
Speaker 6: digital version if you purchase that. Xbox One has smart delivery,
Speaker 6: so sweet. The game is going to be out on
Speaker 6: May seventh, which is relatively soon.
Speaker 5: No, was not expecting that. I really assumed it was
Speaker 5: going to be much later, so much later, like yeah,
Speaker 5: if even this year, Like I don't know, Like my
Speaker 5: head is like, oh, Resideval Village, that's like us away.
Speaker 6: It's weird because like the trailers seem to reinforce that,
Speaker 6: because you watch the early trailers and it's all like
Speaker 6: it looks vaguely Resident Evil fourish, right, and then the
Speaker 6: trailers that were shown during the showcase are way more
Speaker 6: like Resident Evil oneish, where it's like the Spencer Mansion
Speaker 6: Vibe mixed with Resident Evil seven. So either they have
Speaker 6: like a very very big game going. They talked about
Speaker 6: it the PS five version having no load times, so
Speaker 6: I'm imagining like a really big expansive area, or they
Speaker 6: do a hard pivot at one point where it's like
Speaker 6: we're through the Resident Evil four section feel and now
Speaker 6: we're pivoting into Resident Evil kind of but in the castle, yeah,
Speaker 6: like the Castle fail uea or even like because there's
Speaker 6: a bit where they showed like the foyer or the
Speaker 6: main room area of the castle and it just looks
Speaker 6: like the Spencer mansion and you're like, that makes perfect sense.
Speaker 3: So yeah, it's you know.
Speaker 6: It's it feels like a very big game, and it
Speaker 6: feels like it's really far away, but it isn't beyond that.
Speaker 6: They announced a bunch of PreO ad editions. We've got
Speaker 6: a story up about that, and then they shot off gameplay,
Speaker 6: so Pete Fabiano kind of narrated the entire thing. The
Speaker 6: key takeaways are still first person perspective, first person and
Speaker 6: shooting is important part of it, but is very considered
Speaker 6: and deliberate. As Resident Evil games tend to be. New
Speaker 6: thing this time is there's a lot more emphasis on
Speaker 6: being defensive and blocking. So enemies in the actual trailer
Speaker 6: and enemy kind of grabs you and Ethan puts his
Speaker 6: hand up and blocks it, but then he kind of
Speaker 6: counters with a punch that knocks the enemy back and
Speaker 6: then follows up with this kick that delivers like mad
Speaker 6: damage so that's something that's way more important, which is
Speaker 6: going to be interesting how they balance that, because you know,
Speaker 6: when you lose all your AMMO and you have nothing
Speaker 6: to fight back against, that's kind of like the tension
Speaker 6: in becoming defensive. You start have to thinking about maneuverability
Speaker 6: and your environment. But if you can just like parry everything,
Speaker 6: I imagine you still take some damage from blocking, but
Speaker 6: it will be interesting to see how they.
Speaker 3: Balance that stuff out.
Speaker 6: The other big thing is, like they talked about, you know,
Speaker 6: enemies will have different styles of kind of attacking that
Speaker 6: you need to figure out. And we got like a
Speaker 6: look at one massive enemy who was like this giant.
Speaker 6: When I saw him, like my first the first thing
Speaker 6: that popped into my head was you know the hot
Speaker 6: fas great big bushy beard, Like it's that quote because
Speaker 6: he's got a massive thing, and he's got a hammer
Speaker 6: and he just swings his hammer. He doesn't care about
Speaker 6: any other enemies in the area. So we will like
Speaker 6: take out other enemies to try and get to you.
Speaker 6: Residial five, yes, very reson Evil five and a bit
Speaker 6: like I don't know it kind of I mean, like
Speaker 6: who knows how much we'll see of it, but it
Speaker 6: kind of had that same kind of like oh shit
Speaker 6: moment when you know a chainsaw guy from Resident Evil
Speaker 6: four A players and you're like, I've got to throw
Speaker 6: all my traditional my plan out of the window and
Speaker 6: just get away as quickly as possible.
Speaker 3: So it has that kind of vibe.
Speaker 6: They also showed up the Merchant sadly not the what
Speaker 6: are you buying? He's not back, He is still not there.
Speaker 6: This is a lad that they call the Duke. He's
Speaker 6: a he's a very big boy, which is good, nice
Speaker 6: big body type, and he kind of like appears out
Speaker 6: the back of a carriage and he's like, oh Ethan,
Speaker 6: and Ethan's like, how do you know who I am?
Speaker 6: And he's like anyone who's anyone knows the likes of you.
Speaker 6: So Ethan a little bit worrying, Like Ethan seems to
Speaker 6: have become this legendary figure, which I'm a little concerned about.
Speaker 6: And the tall Lady also remarks on the phone that
Speaker 6: like she she can't stop him for some reason. So
Speaker 6: I'm a little worried that Ethan's becoming an action hero.
Speaker 3: But who knows. Classic, Yeah, that's the thing. I don't
Speaker 3: want it to end.
Speaker 6: With like ethan punching like a load bearing wall on
Speaker 6: the side of a castle to bring it down, and
Speaker 6: like who knows. But yeah, so the duke is there.
Speaker 6: He appears in different places like the merchant would, but
Speaker 6: it's always a different scenario. Merchant was always just kind
Speaker 6: of like standing there with his back pack ready to
Speaker 6: what you're buying you. But like in this one, they
Speaker 6: show the duke come out of the back of a
Speaker 6: carriage and then later on you see him just kind
Speaker 6: of like sprawled out on a bed and he's like
Speaker 6: eating something. He's he seems very unhealthy, but he's willing
Speaker 6: to sell your stuff. Another gameplay thing that they introduced
Speaker 6: is the management system from Ari four is back, So yeah,
Speaker 6: tetris things in a briefcase. And they've also laid on
Speaker 6: top crafting, so you can craft items now, whether that's
Speaker 6: ammo or health items that that's a pretty big deal.
Speaker 5: And then they three had three hand crafting system.
Speaker 6: Yeah exactly, and then they kind of hit the other
Speaker 6: things where quick hits were like they've put more like
Speaker 6: destroyable objects in the environment because they know people really
Speaker 6: enjoyed stabbing boxes with their knives, so they've just like
Speaker 6: loads of.
Speaker 3: Stuff now that you can stab.
Speaker 6: And then they said, you know, there's gonna be environmental traps,
Speaker 6: there's gonna be lots of puzzles, so the kind of
Speaker 6: staples of Resident Evil will be re presented as well,
Speaker 6: and then from there they moved on to announcing the
Speaker 6: Resident Evil five demo is available immediately.
Speaker 2: So you mean village.
Speaker 3: Uh so why.
Speaker 6: Do I keep saying five PS fives one earlier?
Speaker 3: Well?
Speaker 6: Yeah, Resident Evil eight demo is available on PS five exclusively.
Speaker 3: It's uh, it's.
Speaker 6: Not a traditional demo. It's kind of like what they
Speaker 6: did with Rezie seven, where it doesn't it's it's called
Speaker 6: the Maiden you play or Maiden you play as a
Speaker 6: character who they're referring to as the Maiden. It's not Ethan,
Speaker 6: and you just basically have to escape this prison area.
Speaker 6: There's no combat, there's no defensive blocking stuff, so there
Speaker 6: probably won't be any like major set piece moments. They're
Speaker 6: kind of pitching it as we just want people to
Speaker 6: get a feel for the game, so you get to
Speaker 6: see what it looks like and what it sounds like
Speaker 6: and how it feels a bit more so, it's kind
Speaker 6: of like a mood piece, is what I kind of
Speaker 6: took away from it.
Speaker 5: It's very much how the RESONU seven demo work. Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 5: And I'm curious if they update it, which is what
Speaker 5: they did the seven to one. Like as the game
Speaker 5: we're closer, they at new stuff to it.
Speaker 6: They could do that they talked about, So this one
Speaker 6: is PS five exclusive, but they talked about having another
Speaker 6: demo available later which will be available on all platforms,
Speaker 6: so it won't be PS five exclusive.
Speaker 3: And then they announced our e versus or are everse
Speaker 3: Reverse Resident Evil, which is a multiplayer mode or multiplayer
Speaker 3: experience that comes that anyone who purchased Resident Evil Village gets,
Speaker 3: But the way they worded it seemed like they were
Speaker 3: going to release it separately as well.
Speaker 6: This is one of the things that they said they're
Speaker 6: celebrating the twenty fifth anniversary with. And it basically looks
Speaker 6: like Deathmatch, but it had like Clear in it. It had
Speaker 6: Leon on It in it, it had Jack Baker in it,
Speaker 6: it had Nemesis in it. It's basically like Smash Brothers Deathmatch.
Speaker 2: Multiplayer mode. Did I get with Resident Evil? Three? I
Speaker 2: Resistance Resistance Resistance was.
Speaker 6: The one, like it seems like they're doing another on
Speaker 6: that style thing, Like it looks a little faster, it
Speaker 6: looks a little more arcady. And when you like kill
Speaker 6: an enemy, you come back as a zombie or when
Speaker 6: you kill another player you come back as a zombie.
Speaker 6: At one point, like Nemesis shows up and is like
Speaker 6: tearing around tyrants in there, like the the key r
Speaker 6: has got eight to loong in it. It just feels
Speaker 6: like they're doing another I think the visual style they
Speaker 6: had like a slight cell shading look to it. I
Speaker 6: don't know, I don't know what they're doing with it.
Speaker 6: Hunky is in it as well. This is what they
Speaker 6: do with their multiplayer experiences.
Speaker 5: What you this is the other side of Residievil that
Speaker 5: everyone always forgets is they're always trying like really weird
Speaker 5: multiplayer stuff that never pans out. You had like Resistance
Speaker 5: for three, which is like interesting but maybe didn't have
Speaker 5: enough really there to keep me going. And then you
Speaker 5: had like was it Operation Raccoon City. Yeah was the one,
Speaker 5: and like that was around like five ere right or yeah,
Speaker 5: there's I don't know if that was the one where
Speaker 5: they also try to do like an esports thing. There
Speaker 5: was one where they had like the announcement trailer was
Speaker 5: like it had like Esport announceris.
Speaker 3: And that might have been Racoon City.
Speaker 5: I think it was like the worst thing I've ever
Speaker 5: seen in my life. It was terrible.
Speaker 3: I don't know why they're so intent on doing multiplayer
Speaker 3: for Resident Evil.
Speaker 5: Like they just got to go back to Mercenaries.
Speaker 3: Just go to mer.
Speaker 5: Mercenaries is good, but also Sink, which is like actual
Speaker 5: it's just co op Resident Evil.
Speaker 6: Like that, because because Mercenaries is basically like it's got
Speaker 6: the formula for a called zombie style thing in there,
Speaker 6: you can make that work. And even if you just
Speaker 6: did the time attack style thing with leader boards.
Speaker 3: Like that works.
Speaker 6: But they keep trying to make like these big experiences,
Speaker 6: and I don't know, it feels like it feels like
Speaker 6: busy work for a team, Like what do we give
Speaker 6: this team to do? And they're like, you can make
Speaker 6: a multiplayer thing.
Speaker 5: One day, we'll get it.
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, one day, They'll day, one day we'll have
Speaker 1: a great Residu Evil multiplayer.
Speaker 2: Hey maybe it's.
Speaker 3: Village maybe yeah.
Speaker 5: I mean, I'm surprised they haven't tried Battle Royale yet.
Speaker 6: I know, like that's the perfect thing, right, Like the
Speaker 6: zombie Horde coming in so cale and you know, yeah, like.
Speaker 1: Small scale maybe like a small smaller map with like
Speaker 1: eight people or something.
Speaker 3: Like that, and you pick an iconic location to always
Speaker 3: be like.
Speaker 5: Oh, you're dropping in a Raccoon city.
Speaker 6: Or like, you know, the circle is closing, where's the
Speaker 6: closing It's going to close on our CPD, or it's
Speaker 6: oh ship, it's going towards the Spencer mansion.
Speaker 3: It's going to an umbrella lab.
Speaker 5: And you're going to go fifty minutes, you know.
Speaker 6: Or like the government are like new and doing like
Speaker 6: rain fire to get people to you know, get into
Speaker 6: a tiger. It's it's doable. I don't know why they
Speaker 6: don't do it though. It's weird anyways, So that's happening.
Speaker 6: It's it's free to anyone who purchases Village, so I imagine
Speaker 6: it's going to be available separately as well, but who knows.
Speaker 6: And then after that, Resident Evil is crossing over with
Speaker 6: hit video game The Division two.
Speaker 5: I was not what.
Speaker 6: In a very limited for a very long a time.
Speaker 6: You can basically get iconic outfits and items for the
Speaker 6: original Residuevil trilogy in the Division two just like, yeah,
Speaker 6: anyone anyone who logs into that event, or get the
Speaker 6: Leon's Rped outfit and then you can see like there's
Speaker 6: a star's clothing stuff there, and then you can get
Speaker 6: the hunk outfit as well if you want to look
Speaker 6: like a gas masked soldier with red eyes.
Speaker 5: I don't know about you, guys. The last thing I
Speaker 5: want to do is play a game where I'm in
Speaker 5: a war torn DC city. I want to do in
Speaker 5: the year twenty twenty.
Speaker 6: One during a pandemic that's spread by touch and money
Speaker 6: and weird shit like that.
Speaker 3: Absolutely not, absolutely no.
Speaker 5: You got to know everyone at you.
Speaker 3: Fuck, how could we have done this.
Speaker 1: I remember going to an event for the Division two
Speaker 1: DLC and it was right under eve of all this stuff,
Speaker 1: and I was like, it's not the one.
Speaker 2: They knew it. We all knew it.
Speaker 5: We were like, well and then out, so I got
Speaker 5: worse they got yep. No, al right.
Speaker 6: So the final Resident Evil announcement was related to Resident
Speaker 6: Evil Infinite Darkness, which was that Netflix CG movie that's coming.
Speaker 6: Literally the least amount to say they had was on this.
Speaker 6: They announced it last year. So in this they said
Speaker 6: it focuses on Leon and Clear, which we knew because
Speaker 6: the picture had Leon and Clear in it, and then
Speaker 6: they said it's set after Resident Evil four, which I
Speaker 6: guess is.
Speaker 3: Kind of relatively new news.
Speaker 6: And then they pointed out that Leon is wearing a suit,
Speaker 6: and that was it.
Speaker 3: Yon story is wearing a suit.
Speaker 1: The big question I have, are you guys surprised that
Speaker 1: we didn't see a Resinue belfour remake.
Speaker 6: I feel like I'm surprised. I'm not surprised we didn't
Speaker 6: see it. I'm still I still believe it's happening. But
Speaker 6: I think we're at a cadence where they release a
Speaker 6: Resident Evil mainline entry and then they release a remake
Speaker 6: or announce a remake. Yeah, it was like once Resident
Speaker 6: Evil Village has had its time for will be announced.
Speaker 1: And they've been hitting it yearly too for a while now, right,
Speaker 1: like I think they did they did seven, they did two,
Speaker 1: they did three. Now they're doing Village the following year,
Speaker 1: and I imagine a remake right would follow.
Speaker 6: Yeah, we're very quickly closing on the Operation Raccoon City remake.
Speaker 5: Oh no, I'm so curious how a remake of four
Speaker 5: will go, because it already feels like eight is just
Speaker 5: taking like so many elements from four in particular, it's
Speaker 5: actually feels like it's taking elements from like a lot
Speaker 5: of residuevils, but specifically four, which is like, why do
Speaker 5: you need to make a I know why they need
Speaker 5: to make a remake of four because it's one of
Speaker 5: the best games of all time and you know, a
Speaker 5: lot of money money, But yeah, one.
Speaker 6: They've but the thing is like they've been introducing things
Speaker 6: from four into the remakes and other games a lot,
Speaker 6: so I imagine like it feels like they the game
Speaker 6: that has they've used to update other game games in
Speaker 6: that franchise. They kind of need to go.
Speaker 3: The other way.
Speaker 5: Now you need to go back and update that on
Speaker 5: that one kind of makes sense. Fixed camera angles and
Speaker 5: oh if they went back they just said, like what
Speaker 5: if what if the remake of four was like they
Speaker 5: went back to that original pitch where it's like fixed
Speaker 5: camera angles and Leon's gonna match it and there's like
Speaker 5: a ghost with them. It was like a sheer scissors
Speaker 5: or something that was basically clock Tower. What if they
Speaker 5: just did that? What if they just screw it, We're
Speaker 5: gonna make the original version of four that got canceled.
Speaker 2: They'd have some very mad gamers on their hands. I
Speaker 2: bet I would love that.
Speaker 5: I think the gamers would be I don't know. I
Speaker 5: feel like it's not more mad about.
Speaker 3: I think the game is are gonna be mad regardless.
Speaker 5: Yeah, that's true.
Speaker 6: Never make never make any decision based on whether the
Speaker 6: game is will get mad or not, because they will
Speaker 6: get mad and they won't get mad, and you'll never
Speaker 6: understand either.
Speaker 1: All right, well, let's move on to the questions for
Speaker 1: this week. All right, and we are back with listener questions.
Speaker 1: If you have a question for us, you can email
Speaker 1: us at after Dark Podcast at gamesbout dot com, or
Speaker 1: you can join our Discord server by dming myself or
Speaker 1: It's more or Jean Luke and we will get you
Speaker 1: right in there. All the questions this week are from discord.
Speaker 1: The first one we have is from Jacob McCourt. How
Speaker 1: do y'all feel about New Year's resolutions? Do you use
Speaker 1: that new year to reset personally, professionally or think that
Speaker 1: the New Year's isn't the best time.
Speaker 2: For that.
Speaker 6: Ordinarily like I would, but like this, yere, I'm like,
Speaker 6: just just don't die, man, Just don't please.
Speaker 5: Feel like I've been trying to get out of the
Speaker 5: mindset because I feel like I have a bad habit
Speaker 5: of being like, ah, I'll just wait until this specific moment,
Speaker 5: like that's the right time to do something different, and
Speaker 5: then I just like never do it. So I feel
Speaker 5: like I just need to get out of the mindset
Speaker 5: and be like if I want to just change, I
Speaker 5: should just start doing it. I don't know that's me though,
Speaker 5: that's like a personal problem I have.
Speaker 6: I think the important thing is like it's good, but
Speaker 6: one thing that you know everyone is trying to drum
Speaker 6: into each other's and their own heads, is like, don't
Speaker 6: be too harsh on yourself right now. Like everyone feels
Speaker 6: compelled to make the most of time and in the
Speaker 6: best of situations in the world, but right now, like
Speaker 6: you're more restricted in the things that you can do
Speaker 6: to make your life different and change than ever. It's
Speaker 6: good to want to please do try and you know, personally, professionally,
Speaker 6: but like, don't beat yourself up about it because it's
Speaker 6: not easy right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's kind of how I'm looking at it.
Speaker 1: Like I don't really have New Year's resolutions. I don't
Speaker 1: think I really ever have like written things down I've
Speaker 1: wanted to do, but this year, I am trying to
Speaker 1: do more things that interest me, I guess, which sounds
Speaker 1: very broad, but it's more of just a way to
Speaker 1: kind of stay sane as we head into you two
Speaker 1: of this pandemic, and like, you know, things are kind
Speaker 1: of looking up with the vaccine starting to get some footing.
Speaker 1: But but you know, like like when that trickles down
Speaker 1: to most people, I have no idea when that is.
Speaker 1: I'm not super well informed though, so maybe maybe I
Speaker 1: could know if I if I did some research. But
Speaker 1: but I think just generally speaking, is like just to
Speaker 1: figure out things to do. Like I've been trying to
Speaker 1: write more like short films, and I'm you know, just
Speaker 1: finding hobbies that i can kind of double down on
Speaker 1: a little bit, but not trying to push myself.
Speaker 2: Not like I'm going to write.
Speaker 1: A novel or anything like that, just kind of doing
Speaker 1: things that I think would be fun.
Speaker 5: Hundred percent.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I've never been big on New Year's resolutions, just
Speaker 4: because I've never ever stuck to any of them. I
Speaker 4: have kind of the same thing as John Luke, where
Speaker 4: like I've fallen into the trap of like, oh, I'll
Speaker 4: do all these things I want to do once I
Speaker 4: get over this particular hurdle, and so I don't like
Speaker 4: making an arbitrary day that turning point for myself. So
Speaker 4: I mean, I was just kind of in the I've
Speaker 4: been in the process of, you know, trying to like
Speaker 4: spend my free time in ways that I enjoy more
Speaker 4: rather than just like scrolling on social media. And yeah,
Speaker 4: I don't know. It's also weird because we work really
Speaker 4: really hard from like September through December, and so January
Speaker 4: is just kind of like healing month for us. I
Speaker 4: feel like I'm just recovering from all of the work
Speaker 4: and like just everything. I'm still I'm just like catching
Speaker 4: up with myself, Like catching my breath is kind of
Speaker 4: how I feel. And I've been in the industry long
Speaker 4: enough that it's felt like that for a while. So yeah,
Speaker 4: I just don't think about New Years resolutions anymore. I
Speaker 4: make jokes about them, though, yeah, like like I'll be
Speaker 4: like my news resolution is to eat less cheese.
Speaker 5: But but she's Great's good.
Speaker 6: I do want to, like I've been thinking about like
Speaker 6: I am writing more just personally, and it's been enjoyable.
Speaker 6: But I think I need to make a habit of it,
Speaker 6: and because I'll do it every now and then where
Speaker 6: I'll like I'll have the inspiration to write something random
Speaker 6: and it's like two or three paragraphs, and then I'll
Speaker 6: delete it a week later. So I think I want
Speaker 6: to get to a point where I'm like writing something
Speaker 6: start to finish and just having it available, whether it's
Speaker 6: like I thought. I've written like comic book style scripts,
Speaker 6: I've written video game style scripts. I've written like short
Speaker 6: stories and episodes of like TV shows and stuff like
Speaker 6: that and always ended up being like, Okay, that's out
Speaker 6: my system. Delete, And I think I want to commit
Speaker 6: to something a bit.
Speaker 5: So that's why I get a physical thing. I bought
Speaker 5: a bullet journal and some some gel pants. I'm very excited.
Speaker 5: I just want to do the same thing nice, yeah,
Speaker 5: some color. You can't erase it, like you're stuck with
Speaker 5: whatever you write, so I'm sure it'll like you read
Speaker 5: it and it'll be grammatically terrible, but thankfully it's just
Speaker 5: for me. So I'm kind of doing the same thing
Speaker 5: whereight like I just want to like write more for
Speaker 5: myself and get things out on a page.
Speaker 1: A friend of mine wrote a script and he sent
Speaker 1: it to me a couple of days ago. He emailed
Speaker 1: it to me and I was reading it and I
Speaker 1: was like trying to leave notes, and I was like, man,
Speaker 1: I hate leaving notes on a computer. So I printed
Speaker 1: all like sixty pages of it out, wrote down all
Speaker 1: the notes, put it in an envelope, and sent it
Speaker 1: to him.
Speaker 2: And it was like the coolest thing in the world,
Speaker 2: because it's.
Speaker 1: Like, I've literally the last time I've sent anything like
Speaker 1: stale mail has been God. I have no idea, like
Speaker 1: years and years and years and years, but it just
Speaker 1: felt so refreshing to just like grab the red ink
Speaker 1: and just like all right, time to leave some notes
Speaker 1: and slight it in those like big folders.
Speaker 5: Like you're an old school publisher who just exactly sends
Speaker 5: someone back their man.
Speaker 1: I messaged him and I was like, I'm just going
Speaker 1: to mail it to and he's like, wait, really, and
Speaker 1: I was like, yeah, I'm just going to do it.
Speaker 2: I'm just going to do that. That seems kind of
Speaker 2: fun to do. And he's like, all right, well.
Speaker 5: I guess I'll check the mail then get these next
Speaker 5: couple of days.
Speaker 3: I used to do that.
Speaker 4: I used to print out my essays and and then
Speaker 4: like my rough draft, and then I would physically hand
Speaker 4: edit them and then I would type retype them up again.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like it's easier to get your thoughts out.
Speaker 1: I feel like in two like I'm used to leaving
Speaker 1: notes on Google Docs, which has a good way of
Speaker 1: leaving notes. He just sent me a PDF that was
Speaker 1: done in like final draft or something. I'm not going
Speaker 1: to open this with Acrobat and figure out how to
Speaker 1: leave notes that make sense when I just print this
Speaker 1: up and write. And also like my parents had a printer,
Speaker 1: which he's been a very long time anyway, Next question, Kelly,
Speaker 1: do you want to read this one? Ryan Cooper? Sure?
Speaker 4: What games do y'all feel had the most impact on
Speaker 4: your lives? Maybe not your favorite games or even the
Speaker 4: most fun, but perhaps the most memorable. For example, I
Speaker 4: would probably have to put Where the Water Tastes Like
Speaker 4: Wine and Outer Wilds on my list, the first because
Speaker 4: it was the first game I covered as a games writer.
Speaker 4: In the latter because it helped me with the depression
Speaker 4: and grief of my father's death. Oh well, thank you
Speaker 4: for being open and honest with us, Ryan, that's yes, Yeah.
Speaker 2: You should.
Speaker 1: Also you should share some of your writing in the
Speaker 1: in the discord channel. I forget what it's called the
Speaker 1: self promo or whatever.
Speaker 3: We should we should create a creative writing discord. Yeah yeah,
Speaker 3: maybe just.
Speaker 6: Put like just for people to read, no judgment, just
Speaker 6: like it. What do you think about it? You know,
Speaker 6: no critis no criticism, constructive criticism. It's not just showing people.
Speaker 7: But yeah, yeah, mine's mind's blackbone, obviously obviously because I yeah,
Speaker 7: it's finding.
Speaker 6: Finding comfort in a place like I was actually on
Speaker 6: our community member for Gibar's podcast recently and he asked
Speaker 6: a very similar question, and I'm kind of reusing material here,
Speaker 6: but like, there's something really special to me about feeling
Speaker 6: comfortable in a place that's designed to make you feel
Speaker 6: uncomfortable and designed to be hostile towards you, and designed
Speaker 6: to be murderous and otherworldly and confusing. Because if you
Speaker 6: feel like, if you're familiar with enough, I've reached a
Speaker 6: point of familiarity where where nothing in that game makes
Speaker 6: me feel like I can't overcome it anymore. And sometimes
Speaker 6: you just need a reminder that something that's terrifying and
Speaker 6: feels overwhelming can be surmounted, just if you try and
Speaker 6: give it some time and effort. So that's why I
Speaker 6: like Bloodborne is a place I like to go to
Speaker 6: when I feel a bit lost and feel a bit
Speaker 6: you know, I need like a little more focus, because
Speaker 6: you get within seconds you're present with a challenge. Your
Speaker 6: brain goes, this is hard, and then you realize I
Speaker 6: can do this, I know how to do this, and
Speaker 6: then you do it, and then you have that, you
Speaker 6: have that satisfaction of really in a microcosm overcoming a challenge,
Speaker 6: and then you can extrapolate that if you're the kind
Speaker 6: of person to into real world and be like, forget
Speaker 6: do it here, I could do it in other places.
Speaker 6: And second Girls the same for that. Docils are the
Speaker 6: same for that. All or from game FROMS games are
Speaker 6: like that. So yeah, I'd pick those.
Speaker 1: I would probably go with Tales of Symphonia maybe because
Speaker 1: I played a lot of that with a friend growing up,
Speaker 1: like we just play every weekend, and I don't know,
Speaker 1: like just those experiences I still remember to this day
Speaker 1: really well, and it's why I like that game in
Speaker 1: that series so much. I think if I played any
Speaker 1: of those games now, I'd be like, yeah, it's not
Speaker 1: for me, but but it stuck with me because of
Speaker 1: those memories, and I think it did have quite the
Speaker 1: impact on me growing up. I think more recently, though,
Speaker 1: it would probably be The Witcher three. It was like
Speaker 1: a weird when that game came out, Like I was
Speaker 1: like had just finished had just finished a junior college
Speaker 1: and was had just started the internship at GameSpot, and
Speaker 1: like it was just kind of figuring out what I
Speaker 1: was going to do and how to handle school. And
Speaker 1: I ended up playing a lot of The Witcher three.
Speaker 1: So that game, it's the reason why it's one of
Speaker 1: my favorites. But I think just the memories I have
Speaker 1: associated with that game are why it always comes to mind.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I would say that, like so far, Person of
Speaker 4: Five is actually probably going to become one of those
Speaker 4: games for me. There's a lot of like messages in
Speaker 4: that game that I wish I had received earlier in
Speaker 4: my life, Like I wish that game had come out
Speaker 4: when I was like sixteen. So I'm not done with
Speaker 4: it yet, but I'm feeling that way about that game.
Speaker 4: And then I don't know, I've always felt a lot
Speaker 4: of affection for Gone Home. I think Gone Home just
Speaker 4: kind of marked a turning point in like where I
Speaker 4: was at with covering video games. I had like just
Speaker 4: started flirting with the idea of working in games media,
Speaker 4: and there was a lot of conversation about that game,
Speaker 4: and it just it had something that I had never
Speaker 4: seen before. So that game is still really special.
Speaker 1: To me.
Speaker 4: In a way that's kind of hard to explain, but yeah.
Speaker 5: Well, going off with Kelly said, my one of my
Speaker 5: games is Percent of Four, which did come out when
Speaker 5: I was sixteen. So I think one of the reasons
Speaker 5: that game hit so hard for me is because I
Speaker 5: was the same age as the party members, the protagonists
Speaker 5: of that game when it came out, So you know,
Speaker 5: that game versus I think Percent of Five is like
Speaker 5: a little more about society where Persona four is a
Speaker 5: little more personal and about like the personal struggles of
Speaker 5: each character. And because they're high schooler students like that
Speaker 5: hit me really hard, like I saw a lot of
Speaker 5: my own personal struggles that those characters were going through
Speaker 5: in myself. Because of that, that game really really stuck
Speaker 5: with me. And even though I look back on that
Speaker 5: game and I'm like, whoa boy, it's got some really
Speaker 5: problematic shit in it still means a lot to me.
Speaker 5: Despite all that like that that game is very special
Speaker 5: to me. The other would actually be Knights the Oald
Speaker 5: Republic two, which I played before Knights Scaled Republic one.
Speaker 5: I never played Knights of the Republic one. I played two,
Speaker 5: and that was probably the first, like because I never
Speaker 5: owned consoles growing up. I only had a PC, but
Speaker 5: I didn't really played that many PC games outside like
Speaker 5: the SIMS, so one of my I mostly played like
Speaker 5: game Boy, Like one of my first major games was Pokemon.
Speaker 5: But Nightsoul Republic too, like really opened up, uh like
Speaker 5: what games could do in terms of like writing and
Speaker 5: just like storytelling and characters for me, Like that game
Speaker 5: really sticks with me. Like I feel like that game,
Speaker 5: uh influenced my love for like role playing games and
Speaker 5: by Aware and like that led to me loving games
Speaker 5: like Master Effect and and Fallout and uh so I
Speaker 5: feel like that game. It's probably like hugely influential on
Speaker 5: my like personal taste in games.
Speaker 2: That game is also why I still like Star Wars.
Speaker 1: It really is, and it was like for that game,
Speaker 1: I probably wouldn't care much at all to this day.
Speaker 5: It's maybe one of the still one of the best
Speaker 5: Star Wars stories ever written. Are not even though it's
Speaker 5: not canon anymore, like, who cares?
Speaker 2: I think it kind of is, isn't it? Didn't they
Speaker 2: like read?
Speaker 3: I don't know, that's.
Speaker 5: Kind of I think they've heart the Mandalorian Warser canon
Speaker 5: and I think Revin is canon. I don't know. Whatever.
Speaker 6: It's fine, Kathleen Kennedy, You're never gonna meet her, Okay,
Speaker 6: it is Kathleen Kennedy, isn't it It is?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 6: Yeah, so like and the way I say it is,
Speaker 6: I decide what's canon unless Kathleen Kennedy personally tells me
Speaker 6: what is.
Speaker 3: Cannon shows up.
Speaker 6: If he wants to tell me what isn't isn't canon,
Speaker 6: she can comes out in my face.
Speaker 5: I trust Dave Filoni to just eventually be like, script,
Speaker 5: we're gonna just redo the entire We're gonna retell the
Speaker 5: entirety of Kotor and animated form or whatever, like just.
Speaker 1: Remake of it by words, maybe Toxic eight do remake
Speaker 1: and then tell Canad again because it's back anyway.
Speaker 5: I'm back for that, I know.
Speaker 2: Anyway.
Speaker 1: That's been Episode seventy seven, Game Spot after Dark. Thank
Speaker 1: you all so much for joining Jean Luke. Where can
Speaker 1: people find you? And what are you up to this week?
Speaker 5: You can find me at John excepting on Twitter, I
Speaker 5: don't really post there that much because I've been actually
Speaker 5: try to. I guess one of my New Year's resolutions
Speaker 5: is trying to not be on Twitter, which has actually
Speaker 5: worked out very well. I highly recommend it. Don't be
Speaker 5: on Twitter.
Speaker 2: U lead it off your phone.
Speaker 1: That's like an easy hack because then you're only checking
Speaker 1: on desktop exactly.
Speaker 5: That's what I do. It kind of works. But I
Speaker 5: have up so already there should be a video up
Speaker 5: about I did a like twenty things we want from
Speaker 5: the next generation consoles, which is just like my list
Speaker 5: of like they should add this, or they should fix that,
Speaker 5: they should add more backwards compatibility to the PS five
Speaker 5: even though they probably won't, but like, you know, made
Speaker 5: a video like that, and then also hopefully there should
Speaker 5: be a video either by the time this is up
Speaker 5: er shortly after where I'm gonna like deep dive into
Speaker 5: the Resident Evil Village demo and like point out cool
Speaker 5: little things in it that maybe you missed, so check
Speaker 5: that out.
Speaker 2: Cool in Cally.
Speaker 4: You can find me on Twitter at ikey dog Go
Speaker 4: I n k y d O j I KKO This
Speaker 4: week I was on IBM's review crew talking about Cyberpunk
Speaker 4: twenty seventy seven, so I guess check that out, and
Speaker 4: then you know, as always working on GameSpot reviews, there's
Speaker 4: been a lot. There's really not a lot going on
Speaker 4: in January so far except a hit Man. There's a
Speaker 4: couple of things, but yes, it's not a super exciting
Speaker 4: time for me, just kind of doing like behind the
Speaker 4: scenes stuff.
Speaker 2: And tomore.
Speaker 6: I'm on Twitter at tomorrow, h you can find me there.
Speaker 6: I have been helping a lot with the hip Man
Speaker 6: guide stuff, so if you need any hit Man related guidance,
Speaker 6: you can hit up GameSpot. We've got mission walkthroughs, we've
Speaker 6: got assassination guys, we've got general tips as well. Beyond that,
Speaker 6: I wrote a bunch of the news stories for Resident
Speaker 6: Evil Village, so if you want to get more information
Speaker 6: on that, you can find that as well. I'm streaming
Speaker 6: every now and then on Twitch, so I'll probably start
Speaker 6: doing that a bit more. That's kind of my New
Speaker 6: Year's resolution is to stop sitting in my bedroom playing
Speaker 6: games like in solitary confinement and maybe play and online
Speaker 6: and chat to people and commune with other people.
Speaker 3: And have fun. So I'm gonna try to do that,
Speaker 3: you know. I'm just add to more h on Twitch.
Speaker 1: On that cool and you can find me at jacob
Speaker 1: Deck And I think the big thing this week is
Speaker 1: the Cyberpunk spoiler Chat, which probably won't be up to
Speaker 1: this weekend, but yeah, we're finally going to do a
Speaker 1: Cyberpunk spoiler chat with Kellie Lucy and myself digging into
Speaker 1: that game. Please watch it, and please leave the thumbs
Speaker 1: up and be nice in the comments to outweigh the
Speaker 1: people who will be mean just for being mean because
Speaker 1: it's cyberpunk and they're mad and all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 3: Gamers are angry regardless.
Speaker 1: Gamers are always mad. You can't you can't do anything
Speaker 1: about it. But anyway, we'll see y'all next week