Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to side Quest. This is our weekly
video game show here at geek First. I'm your host,
Del mustn up with me the mana lost Travis Snell.
How are you doing tonight, my friend?
Speaker 2: Pretty good for the most part. You know, it's Monday,
is a kickoff. I think we're talking about this last
week of a really great week here at Geekers. We've
got some good topics today and lots of fun casts,
so it's a it's a good time, you know. March
is here. We're getting Clarks here officially. What's what's officially
spring again? It's that's an April.
Speaker 1: Right, Oh man, it must be now.
Speaker 2: You think so.
Speaker 1: I think so does spring because winter must be December, January,
February right.
Speaker 2: Uh, it's yes, it's March twentieth. So we are in
the last few days here of winter.
Speaker 1: Okay, there, you go home and do the clothes here. Yeah,
but yeah, it's gonna be a spicy way. We got
Daredevil kicking off here in just one day's time, twenty
four hours. Twenty four hours, yeah, because it's six pm
I song right.
Speaker 2: Like, by the time people are listening, it'll be hours away,
so it's not.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so go check that out. And then in today's episode,
we have a good mix of stuff here. We've got
some of the games we've been playing, maybe just a
couple quick highlights there, and then a little bit of
news fable little up update there, and then the big one,
of course is WB Games closed three studios, So we're
gonna talk about all the ramifications of what all that means,
and uh, yeah, that's pretty much it for this episode.
Oh and then a quick draft checking I want to
do as well, because there's actually been a couple updates
on that front already, even though we just did that
like three weeks ago, four weeks ago or something like that.
But of course we've had some games releasing now. Other
than that, hit up the Patreon you get episodes early
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Speaker 2: Know, once during a newscast, Yeah, we should We probably
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that is not our prices we charge like there's a
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Speaker 2: Just hit subscribe here on video like wherever you know
there's Yeah, we appreciate if you're listening, you know, we
we we've come a long way to have this amount
of people still listening to us come ten years, you know, so.
Speaker 1: Coming up on ten years. Yeah, you can also leave
review that helps, especially once getting side quest speed because
that's a separate thing from the geek for speed at times.
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely give us a five star review to bounce out.
We got a one star review recently because kirkle.
Speaker 1: Who was it complaining about this time?
Speaker 2: Kirkland Kirklin. It was I think this is first time
ever and it was like a god, like, why tell
this whole story before review? It was for a September
five review when he told the whole rigamarole of why
he was reviewing. So I guess someone just really wanted
a September five review for the click on one of.
Speaker 1: The twelve people who wanted a September five review.
Speaker 2: This isn't good. So yeah, one star, which I think
is history because I think we used to joke that
Kirkle had never gone any ning reviews. So I've not
told him that yet, but I don't want to tell
him really because that was he'll probably we want.
Speaker 1: Him to do more solo cast. Yeah, so we don't.
We don't need to bring that up.
Speaker 2: That was a great story too, of how I was
so confident.
Speaker 1: With I was thrilled from starting to finish.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like and like, just I don't know, skip
ahead a couple of minutes you'll get to the review.
So yeah, bounce that out. Someone gives someone give kirkle
on a five star four September fifth through vie ers
five for five, you know, five.
Speaker 1: For five, that's the one.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Uh, Travis, let's start out by taking a quick look
at our draft because if we keep talking about again.
Speaker 2: There's like three minutes in my god, what happened.
Speaker 1: To keep talking off topic? We might get another one
star review, so we better get moving on with the
show here. But yeah, for the draft chickens. So there
are now three games that have released. Uh so, so
kirklmselves nothing released, so he's still sitting there at zero
goose egg. But Taylor is jumped into third place here
with the release of Like a Dragon Pirate Yakuza in
Hawaii with a review of seventy nine. Oh review score
seventy nine. I think, once again, these things can always change.
They can always ebb a little bit, especially with the
newer things, but that one's probably pretty solid at this point.
But seventy nine. It's not an eighty, but it's not
at sixty.
Speaker 2: I feel like that's why I said, is not because
that's not bad. There's we've all had worse scores. But
I feel like when he pitched, he's like, oh, all
these games are usually in like the eighties, so I
think pretty good. So like you, like you said, could
go up, but could also go down a couple not
just but so, yeah, that's not bad. That's that's no
South Park, you know.
Speaker 1: It's no South Park. No, But that was his second pick,
by the way second, so his second round pick, so
pretty high, pretty high there. Your second round pick also
came out, and that is a little game by the
name of a vowed just in the eighties. So you
got one more point over at Taylor there for a
second place.
Speaker 2: I'm happy with that because lower than I thought. Lower
than I I thought too. I did pick that with
a hope that it was going to be more of
a breakout. But at the same time, when I did
pick it, I did say there was that room for
you never know, new ip, and everyone's like, oh, big disappointment.
So at the end of the day, to me, it
was a more of a gamble pick for number two.
But I'm happy with the eighty. Wished for more, but
could be worse, so thumbs up. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And then my first round pick, my very first game
that I pick on the draft is now oh, which
is Monster Hunter Wild's sitting at a juicy ninety. So
that's really good. What can I say? I know how
to pick them. I either pick them and they get delayed,
or I pick a good one. That's my that's my
mo O in this, and I went wow. I thankfully
went for a nice early game this year, So sitting
pretty in first place right now. We'll see how long
that lasts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's good. Well it's heating up. But luckily no
one had the game we're going to talk about later.
Speaker 1: So yeah, exactly that. I was kind of surprised to
see that when I looked back at the list today,
but I.
Speaker 2: Thought for sure, because I will, we'll wait, we'll wait
till we get there. But I right away to win
to my phone. Was surprised.
Speaker 1: Mm hmm, yeah definitely. But let me let's get into
the games we've been playing. I'll start here following off
your pick that you got there for eighty points. Avowed.
You know, did a long, long discussion on that last
week with Taylor. But that's really the only thing I've
been playing this week. It's the only thing I want
to play. I did boot up like Sniper Elite for
like five minutes anyone, and I was like, you know what,
I just want to play more Vowed. I just want
more Vowed. I need things to talk about on the
side quest, but I just want to play more Vowed.
So it's it's really hooked me in here. I'm in
the second area now and the game just continues to
be great. It's exactly what I want. It's so fun.
The world building is fantastic. I'm just getting lost in
the little details of just walking around these places, looking
around the details, talking all these random characters, reading notes,
and just getting super invested in the world. And then
it's just once again, the highlight is the combat. I
think the combat is super duper fun in this game.
So I just wanted to share one anecdote, which is
this is early on in the game. I have a
bounty to go take out this like group of bandits,
and they're kind of hold out and not really a mountain,
but it's like at the top of a hill, kind
of built like a little spire around this little outcropping
of rocks sort of thing. So I circle around. One
door is kind of locked. There's maybe a couple of
air sketchy parkour areas I could go, but I just
find another way to kind of sneak through in the base.
I go up top kind of scouted there. There's a
bunch of guys everywhere. There's even like a couple creatures
and stuff. It's a little overwhelming. First, I sneak into
a building, do a couple of nice stealth kills, take
a couple of guys off the out of the equation right,
and then I go back outside. I'm like, there's no
way I can stell through this. There's too many guys here.
As soon as I tack one of them, they're all
gonna get alerted. So that's exactly what happens. Me and
my companions. We just get into this huge fight with
all these guys. There's like four or five guys. A
couple of them are running at me with their sword
and shield, A couple of them were in the back
with just bow and arrow just chip damage. And then
they also have somehow recruited like multiple bears, so there's
like two or three bears coming at me too. The
first time I did this fight died. Had to reload
my save and try again because I just got absolutely wrecked.
But it was such a fun fight. Just like the
way it was set up. There's kind of this one
ramp down a slight little cliff, and so I was
kind of continue tighting up there. I'd run up to
the off the cliff, then I would jump off because
then it's like a little bit harder for them to
get to me. I'd be trying to stun guys. I'm
throwing grenades, I'm healing like crazy, but I'm running on
health potions. I try to dart to the back to
get the archers out of there so that they can
stop hitting me before these guys chase me again, trying
to freeze people in their tracks. Super Kadock's super fun.
And then eventually my companions eventually they die. They tank
a lot for me, but eventually they go down. It's
just until the fight ends and then they get back up.
But it gets to this point where, okay, it's just me.
There's like three of our enemies left. IM getting arged
by a bear and some other guy with a sword.
I'm just backing up with my little wand shooting little darts.
I backed up enough that I accidentally fell off the cliff,
like the hill, the base they were on the top,
this little mountain. I just fell off this cliff, fell
down like pretty far. I didn't die on fall damage, thankfully,
but I was like, shit, I gotta get back in there.
My companions are up there. I want I don't want
this fight to get like reset. You know sometimes in
a game if you leave there and come back. The
enemies like their health three sets, so I'm like, I
gotta get back in there. So I dart back around
in the same place I come up, and you want.
That ended up being the perfect strategy because now they're
way over here on the other side of the base,
and now I have like a nice law range away
from them, and I've kind of recooped my Mana or
my Stam and all this, and so then it was
like easy pickings as so I got to do that
more often, just jump off of a cliff to get
away from the enemies and reset the position because they
kind of lose me. So it ended up working perfectly,
and I finally beat that mission, got my bounty, collected
all their fingers or whatever it was, and then when
it got my bounty. So just the combat is so
intense or so much to it, it's it's so great.
I just I can't praise this game enough. I'm just
in love with it. Better than eighty for me.
Speaker 2: If I was to reviewed, I was gonna say, yeah,
it sounds like it. I was gonna say, your tactic
there of just falling off the you know, taking a
little damage.
Speaker 1: My quote unquote tactic tactic.
Speaker 2: I feel like that's the tactic like Wolverine should use
in future fights or concert he hasn't, right because you
just you just fall off. That's what sounds like. You're
doing the Wolverine tactic where you're sacrificing your body but
you know you're fine, you get back up your companion's
aka the X Men are still fighting a good fight.
Well you've diverted attentions. So no, that's cool.
Speaker 1: Yeah, really, yes, a really great time. And yeah, like
I said, that is all I've been playing. So I'll
probably this will probably be like a weekly checking game
for me until I beat it. And I'm taking my
time with it. I'm not exploring every last corner of
the maps, but I'm I'm taking my time with it,
trying to see all that has to offer. So that's
what I've been up to. Thrown over to you. What
have you been playing recently?
Speaker 2: Well, like, I guess three things one just quickly, because
I've been because football season ended, I was playing a
lot of Madden. I played I think my last Man
game for maybe till the stream because GM mode is
out on Friday till I'm I'm very annoyed because we
Luckily the boys moved the Mickey seventeen review to the Friday,
but that means I gotta see because I have my
daughter's dance recital. It's Pirate themed this year for.
Speaker 1: Gwenna Liiraycuse or just just pirates.
Speaker 2: All the Japanese mob and you know everything like that.
But uh no, So I got to see Mickey seventeen
at nine point thirty and the game comes out of nine,
so I'm gonna enjoy making some team. But the whole
time I've been win and I'm gonna wait for a
future side quest when you ask me what I've been playing.
But yesterday or last I don't know how that works.
At midnight yesterday the embargo released for the GM mode stuff,
and it was like features I've been wanting for a
while happened.
Speaker 1: Because also the reviews aren't out though, because I looked at.
Speaker 2: That that's the fourth I think that it's coming up,
so it might be tomorrow at some point. But yeah,
so that's coming out soon. Because they did like a
Creator Day on the weekend where a bunch of YouTubers
played and everything, but they when they what happened was
when they showed that trailer. They announced online mode, and
I'm very excited because, like like I said, we're here
cheap plug too. March sixteenth, Me, David s Bubbs, We're
doing a GM mode. We're probably gonna go for five
or six hours. We're gonna try and finish a season. Yeah,
we're gonna try and finish a season until someone has
a heart out. But yeah, it's us in a GM mode.
We're playing a whole season. I'm so ready I've created.
I don't want to show the picture right now, but
s Pubs and David should be worried. I have a bible.
Right now, it's blanked out so they can't see what's
in there. But I have a Bible. You can see
the words. There are words there.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be honest, I can't see anything.
Speaker 2: But look there's a lot there. Because I show that
to intimidate them. But I've been working on a GMO
Bible for me, so when I start up, I know, like, hey,
what I'm doing. Like it's not like at home we're
gonna sit around on lounge rounds. Like, no, I got
two sharks after you.
Speaker 1: Think they'll be in curveball. New mechanics that threw you off.
I guess if you've read the embargo, you kind of
know what to expect a little bit around.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so there's multiples where like there's something coming up
now where every five weeks there's an event where you pit.
So let's say it's just I'll just make it easy.
It's just me and s Bubs. Let's say, and he's
raw and he's smacked down. There's a show where there's
gonna be two matches where I pick a superstar and
he picks a superstar, and the winner gets ten thousand
fans and they also get like a special power card
that you can only get at these events. So yeah,
so one power card that you could win was like
drain someone's supercar on the other roster to zero, stamina
to zero and that's like that's like that's an injury
right away for five seven weeks. So this is a
big deal.
Speaker 1: You could pop it on someone right as they come
back from injury. I guess right, you could do whatever there, Yeah,
you could do it.
Speaker 2: We wanted their situations where you might because me and
David s Sbub's are gonna be do a threesome where
we might have to team together so there's all this
stuff where it's more competitive. But the good thing is,
or I guess what's fun is you can't counterpick because
you both pick a wrestler, but you don't get to
know who you picked until the match happens. It's it's
just a lock screen. So like if he were to
pick someone that's a bit more higher rate, let's say
they've got like a ninety six rating, and be like, Okay,
I gotta make sure someone of equivalent is going up there, right,
because I have stamina people that maybe they're low and
I don't want to play them. But if s Bubs
is playing someone at ninety percent rating, like their their stats,
like how good they are, I gotta have someone equivalent.
But I don't know that because it's it's hidden, because
then I'm gonna feel bad if s Bubs like plays
like a really shitty wrestler and I play a great wrestler,
and sure I get the win, but the stamina. And
they've said these these versus matches, they're gonna like drain
your stamina, so your superstar is gonna get really hurt.
But it's like money fans everything like that.
Speaker 1: So that you think that will like over incentivize, like
like keeping your strong this guy only for that, Like
is that how big that benefit is that you would
like not use them other than those fights every five weeks.
Speaker 2: I have a strategy that I'm not willing to talk
about until I hold your secret because I know s
Bubs might listen, so I don't. But I have a
I think I have a strategy that David Sbubs would
have never ever thought of. I got it written down.
I'm very excited. But yeah, so there's tons of like
planning out now. And what my point was that early
when the first game Trick came out, they just announced
online and that was really it. So I kind of thought, Okay,
first time ever they're doing online. That's only the feature
we're probably gonna get. There's not gonna be much fine tuning.
But the thing that they added was you've seen the game,
there's so many wrestlers. The problem that I always had
was the match card was limited to four matches, and
like it kept your roster really small. But they've changed
it to five matches and it doesn't sound that big.
But like before, I'd say, like you could probably play
with a limit of like sixteen wrestlers. Now you can
play with like twenty four to twenty eight, and for
me that's huge because there's so many people on there.
It's like I don't want to just limited to my
twelve sixteen guys. So a feature that I've been asking
for since they brought it back like four years ago,
was finally at it because the old games had that
in the two thousands. So that's what I was always like,
the games from two thousand and seven could do five matches,
why can't we? And now they can't. So that's why
I played. I finished my man run, I lost in
the playoffs. I was really disappointed there on my franchise mode.
I won the super Bowl, lost in the playoffs, won
the super Bowl, lost in the playoffs. So I got
a very mixed record right now, and it was like
it was like a I it was my bad. I
like screwed up. I had some really bad plays and
I just uh, I think I over or underestimated the
CPU and I made a lot of mistakes and I
was pretty salty. But so I finished that and then yeah,
in the future Tub because I played a little bit,
but just a couple hours, I wanted to play more
but I just didn't have time.
Speaker 1: But yeah, yeah, wait until you've done the game and
then we can dive in.
Speaker 2: Oh I am done it.
Speaker 1: Oh oh, just going back for the bonus stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm going back the boon stuff because I told
you there's that like all like all says, there's that
wall with the there's a certain you collect and then
you put out the war. Yeah I want to. I
want to complete that wall. But oh yeah, I bet
I beat the game many pre I loved it. Probably
beat the game. Probably would have been my game of the
year last year, to be honest, So we'll say that
for another time because I had tons of fun with that.
But uh so, yeah, it'll just be GMI layout. Right now?
Is GM mode on wake? And then is what is it?
Probably Lord of the Rings? What is it Shadow War?
Because all the Monolith and Nemesis talk and now that
I know Wonder One's not happening, it's like, Okay, I'm
gonna play this. It's kind of like I'm waiting for
Kotar remake to be canceled so I can go back
and play Kotar because I don't want to play it
over and then the remake happened. But yeah, so the
only thing I've been doing as I'm doing this started
while I was off. I tease it last time, but
I've like semi been playing Minecraft, but more with Gwen.
This is like a huge blind spot where I feel
like two of the biggest games of the i'd say
the past. I don't know when they started with Minecraft's twenty.
Speaker 1: Years old now, right like twenty eleven.
Speaker 2: Okay, so I'll play it safe. Of the last ten years,
school I don't know came around the last ten years.
Like two of the biggest name games ever Fortnite never touched,
never downloaded, never played at all. So yeah, I have
no idea. And Minecraft's a.
Speaker 1: Bad video game show host played for it.
Speaker 2: And Minecraft's another one that I never and it was
never like, oh that doesn't interest me because I like
buildings like just I guess it probably came out a
time where I was playing just more specific games and
maybe I didn't have the time to do like oh,
I could get lost, like I could see why elementary
school and middle school kids like I could imagine had
that game for spring break or summer break of like oh,
I just spend days building my Ute's me yeah, there
you go, right, And that's where I think it came
out war and I was like in high school. So
this was a game that Gwen wanted to play because
like a bunch of kids her age talk about her
cousins about So I'm like, okay, yeah, this seems like
a good one. But it was like the blind leading
the blind, because like, I know, you build, but like
I don't know how any of this works, like, and
we're not doing the there's like the survival moment then
just the build mode. We're just doing the build mode
right now. Even her, she was like, I just want
to build stuff, And I think that's probably a good
way like to start off.
Speaker 1: And you can at least you can play survival and
like turn off the monsters if you want. Okay, it's
like you at least get a little bit more of
the actual gameplay, but without the threats, okay, like falling
in LoVa or something.
Speaker 2: I guess, Okay, So that's that's good to know. So
maybe we'll transition there because she's played a little bit,
so maybe I'll ask her and say she wants to
turn the monster off. But I think so far she's
having a good time and yeah, it's it's been fun.
It sucks the first week, her first two weeks, she
worked hard in a place and it's in like the
whole world map and we still found it again. I
don't know where she went. I left her for a
little bit, made dinner and it's just off in the ether.
There's I'm hoping one time. But now we've specifically picked
a spot, like okay, pick a spot with a big
landmark and it's like this higher U boat or something
has like treasure, and then like off to the side,
it's like, okay, don't go too far from this boat.
We know where your stuff is. And yeah, it's lots
of fun. The music's great in the score a couple
of times of let the girls listen to it is
like the there's the ambience they got on YouTube. So
it's like Minecraft music with rains. It's like that's it.
That's like a nice calming game that's much better than
some like the Paul Patrols or like some of the
iPad games. It's like, this is very nice, and it's
been cool to see the things she creates and what
she's doing stuff. So like I've been playing like tangentially
and she wants me, like to build my own place.
I haven't yet because I just feel like I feel
like I lost this skill a long time ago, like
the builder. It's like I feel like at one point
in my life, I used to be able to draw,
and I can't draw to save my life anymore. That's
why I hate whenever we do one of those games
on jack Box and forces the draw. That's always like,
I don't want to play because everyone just knows what
my drawing is. They just know because I've shitty writing
and my drawing some like, and at one point I
have drawings when I was a kid, I was like,
who is this kid? Like I must have took a
soccer ball to the head or something. But yeah, no,
it's been fun just watching or build everything out. It's
been fun exploring that. And I don't think it's made
to the point where it's like, oh, I want to
play on my own, but I think I'm soon enough
gonna build my own property when she's kind of done
her stuff there, but uh, yeah, she's uh, she's having
a good time and it's been fun to There's certain
things like just learning where I couldn't remember we accidentally
put some water in our house and we took out
the water, but wouldn't get rid of the fish, so
we're just stuck with his fish. So we had to
like tear down the whole house and start over and
everything like that. So I think this is like another
good It's like, it's funny to compare this in Smash Bros.
But in different routes are like good things to kind
of learn on, Like they're not like like obviously tons
of kids play it, but I feel like it is
a good like things of moving the camera around that's
still things that they haven't played in many games. This
is like a mini version of like you're kind of
getting that idea of hey, your eyes are connected to
your thumb and this stick right here, you know where.
Like I said before, I'm excited to get to it.
But when we played, I think it was about a
year and a half ago, tried Star Wars Lego. It
was just that part was just too advanced for them.
So this is like a good like mini step and no,
if it's been fun, it's a great game. I'm like,
I guess I'm not surprised. I guess I'm just surprised,
like how big it's gone and because I do really
enjoy it. But I also played the survival thing stuff,
and like I said, I do see why kids like
during a spring break or summer would just because every
week she asked, like, and I play. We kind of
have a role. We kind of let them do it
like once in a long stent eventually too, but we
also just don't want them to like just completely do
that right now. So but uh no, it's been a
it's been a fun time so far and been enjoying.
It's just like nice to kind of scratch off the
lists I said, just stuff like music. Didn't even know
what that sound like, Like I couldn't say like couldn't
don't know with the menu, like I'm just learning what
the creeper is and everything like that. Yeah, she hasn't
asked about the movie yet, so my fingers crossed. Or
she does and we just see it at home. She
wants the in theaters. I'll take her, but uh, I'm
sure she might, uh friends might talk about him. We'll see.
But yeah, that's been my little venture. It's been a
great set of menus. I love. I love that it's
like the art style is you could I'm sure you
get update and make it a look attle fancy, but
I love the retro feel a.
Speaker 1: Bit like a million art packs and things like that.
Speaker 2: You know. Yeah, Like I'll say, no, it came out
O nine, but even and O nine, like things didn't
look like that, right, Like we were far more advanced
than that, So I like the aesthetic they picked. And
uh no, I I kind of get it, not that
I'm surprised, but like I I do get it, and
uh yeah, but that's been.
Speaker 1: About it, so yeah, I mean I think that to
speaking on like how it got as big as it did,
I mean it was big early even before it was
officially released, right like because it was like in alpha.
That's when I first started playing it just gotta saw
a couple of YouTubers talking about it and then following
it through beta and then eventually like it's full reason.
I think it's really when it got to the more
multiplayer online server element of it. I think that's when
it kind of elevated it to a next level. All
that stuff was not even like natively in the game.
At first. It was like you had down all these
weird apps and things like that to play online. But
now it's like super easy to get in there, and
I don't know if I forget if that needs a
subscription for something to do the realms and whatnot, but
I think that's kind of where things explode, where there's
huge servers and people do mini games and things like that,
and that's where kind of it has like that Fortnite
element too. It's like Roadblocks or Fortnite in the exact
same way. But then yeah, for someone like me, if
I ever go back to it, I'm not gonna do
that stuff. I just go back and boot up a
new world and like, you know, play for a couple
weeks kind of thing. But yeah, I'm glad that you've
played it, because it is It's one of those games
that like hasn't I haven't really talked about on in
the side Quest era because I just haven't really played
it recently, but like it will forever be. I think
in my top ten all time favorite games it is.
It is just one of the best. And I can
still like vividly remember my first base that I built
back in you know, whenever it was twenty ten or
something like that, and like early high school for me,
and I can still vividly picture so many different houses
or servers or things like that that I went on.
And then I remember at one point me with my friend,
we would just download like Mystery and like puzzle maps
and things like that. So people like create like pre
made like little video games essentially within the world of Minecraft,
using like signs and Redstone technology and all this crazy stuff,
and then we just drop in here and like play
these like minigames that people had created in there. So
like that's where it really is just like infinite and
you can find, yeah, your fun in it in whatever
way you want.
Speaker 2: Well, And that's the cool thing from the outside is
to when I'm watching Gwenville to see like what she
wants to build and just whether it's color site like,
it's like a little like window into her mind of like, Okay,
what is she what does she wanted? Why is it
this house here? Why does it look like that? Why?
So that's been a fun thing from the outside because
it's been more so me helping orlist. I haven't built
the thing yet, I will, I've told her soon. I
have to build like some piece of produit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, let's let's talk that through. Like what
could you do? You could do like a brick a
classic brickhouse. You could do like in the side of
a cave. You could do like a Hobbit hole. You
could do a cave in the ground. You could do
like a floating glass base. You could do a castle
with a moat, like castle esque, classic castle wall kind
of something like that.
Speaker 2: I think that's like, obviously I'm not gonna get to
have seen It's wild those things people do with like
Hogwarts or Middle Earth's. Like when I showed when a
couple of things on YouTube and she said, oh, yeah,
we'll have to do I'm like, well, no, that's a
that's like a you gotta have many years left before
you get there. But yeah, I think of cast so
I I it's not gonna really fit with Gwen's aesthetic.
I feel like she has like a like a like
a future suburban thing going on right now.
Speaker 1: Wait wait wait, keep going uh future suburban.
Speaker 2: Because I feel like it's kind of like if you
think about suburbans r where it's all like the houses
and they're all together. So I feel like all the bottoms,
the doors, the inside, it's all like regular housing, but
the roofs are always funky, they're always bright blue, they're
bright pink, so it looks like it it's like we're
on the way to Blade Runner where it's like slowly
it's like every the bottom, like the roof is the
blade Runner science place inside. Everything else is fine. It
looks like it's a regular bed, but the top of
all her buildings have like there she I guess just
views that a roof has to be like a very
bright color and a very like it's not just a
regular like, oh, it's a block. It's like sometimes like
it's those translucent ones where it's like there's like a
pink one where it's like, I don't know, kind of
looks glassy like and I'm not sure if they're all
the same color whatnot. But that's the biggest thing that
there's kind of like a mix of all the houses
look generally normal except for the top half, and those
look like something you wouldn't see.
Speaker 1: So I feel like a castle would fit in perfectly there.
Maybe you just touch it up with a little bit
of bonus color on the top.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I might need to. I like that idea too,
of like that's some I imagine in video games stories
that's never been done, like a sci fi medieval maybe
there's a reason. But could you imagine that where you
think about medieval times, think about it like it's a
reverse where like where we are now and then like
the apocalypse happens, but we still have some tech because
like people do, like you think about that. Dum oh god.
What's that new noned dog game called Intergalactic right where
it's like old stuff but it's in the future, but
it's like old like oh it's old stereo, it's emp
three player. I don't think anyone's ever done anything like
that where it's like medieval stuff but there's like a
sci fi like tinge to it. I know it sounds
like an anti like like a double negative thing, but
maybe there's something there.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I just think of fantasy games that have
like machinery, but that would be just like kind of
basic steam basic things. Yeah, Like Marlin's got a bit
of that, avowed kind of has a little bit of that.
So I think that's it done. But this was not
a good excuse to bring your cloud.
Speaker 2: I meant like more almost a final fantasy a little
bit it right, where there's like a mix of like yeah, definitely.
Speaker 1: So yeah it's fair. Yeah, So I think it's it's
been done, but you guys could be you could create
your own new art style with a worldly Minecraft. So
that's very cool. Yeah, I'm glad that you're finally not
that's a good one. Knock off the backlog a little bit,
I mean, and it's one that you can never I mean,
technically there's a way to roll credits now, but like
it's a game you can never complete or be done with.
So like, even if you just jumped in for a
few hours, you have now kind of experienced a little
bit of what makes that game so special.
Speaker 2: Mm hmm, yeah, time, what are you.
Speaker 1: Gonna hit off net? Is it Fortnite? Roadblocks? What's the
next like big obvious game that you've never played?
Speaker 2: You feel like, so you put roadblocks? You put there as.
Speaker 1: Well, But I feel like because you have kids, like
maybe that would make it a bit more.
Speaker 2: Well that's what I was gonna say, because yeah, I know,
I didn't know about it really until I think I've probably.
Speaker 1: Heard the name, but I didn't really know what it's
like Minecraft two pretty much from what I understand because.
Speaker 2: Her cousins play it, and I think we like bought
them a couple gift cards and stuff, So I feel
like that would be the next one. We don't foresee Fortnite, Like,
I think Gwen's far off from that. I just really
I never have interests other than like I appreciate and
I respect the hustle that they do we do, and
I respect when you see like the loading screens and
all the skins and characters they've acquired. It's like, Okay,
that's very cool, but it's nothing that I want to
get into right now. So that'd probably be the one
if Fortnite maybe down the road. But I don't even
think Gwen's like had an interest, like, oh, I know
kids or age play them, but she's never brought that
up once. It's like something she's won to play if
she doesn't sure, but if if it doesn't come up,
then probably not for a while.
Speaker 1: So yeah, now keep her on Smash Bros. You know,
we don't even more Fortnite players in the world were
Smash players.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we got to go back and unlo lock that.
We did a couple more. We haven't bought the newmar apart,
but we did some Mario Party Superstars as well, so
there's been kind of a different rotation going on. So
right on.
Speaker 1: Uh, that was great. That was all the games right
that you had on yours, all.
Speaker 2: The games for now. Yeah, like I said, just been
checking some things off and I'm saving up. I've not
been dis anticipated for a game and quite a while,
maybe since Stranding. To be honest, I'd really have to
think about it. But like it's just they it's and
it's specifically just Travis stuff because it's the features I
wanted and they put back in.
Speaker 1: Well, it's the best kind when it's so specific too.
Speaker 2: And yeah, like the YouTube comments for the embargo or
brutal because they did this thing for GM mode where
because I've said this before, for the next GM, I
told these guys and I think I told on the newscast.
What I want to do for Extra Life, at least
for a one hour block, is I have Dylan Kirkland
Taylor play around the GM mode. But I'm gonna make
it all like created people, so like Master Chief Mario,
I gotta see if I can find Spoonky. I just
want to be like random people. Like I just saw
today someone on two K twenty five is playing with
Daredevil and Wilson Fisk and they recreate the ending of
stare double season three when he beats them up. So
I want to I want to download, like because you
can download one hundred characters, I'm gonna download like one
hundred night just like random characters. I want to see
you guys play.
Speaker 1: With the pool from Night swim in there all that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'll get supposed to make that one. But the
thing is what happened is and I get it, probably
for legal stuff, but for the online mode, they said
that you can't use custom rosters. For me, I'm completely fine.
There's like I think it's like close to three hundred
wrestlers in the main game, but that's been the biggest
thing all days. Everyone's like, oh, this is so lame,
no custom rosters. What are they doing. We finally get
online line and it's shit. It's like we just like
last year was all they didn't announce online and everyone
was pissed, and then this year like, hey, you can
play online. You just can't use like wrestlers from other
companies or like Black Panther, And I was like, oh,
this is dumb. I want It's like like just bankers
can't be choosers. So I'm just happy, Like he said,
like the same thing I supposed to day. It's like, yeah,
like we just got online. Like it's and that kind
of for me. I said to Amily, that's a fun
thing because online with the Boys, I can play like
the It gives me a reason to still be excited
to play by myself because now when I'm not playing
online the Boys, that's when I can do my custom
rosters and restlers from other companies are weird things, so
like it kind of gives me a reason. I get
why people might be upset, but I'm you know, the
stuff that I wanted. So I feel like there's more
people negative on it, but I'm happy. So maybe I'm
screwed for those reviews. I don't know, but I think
the the critics will be fine. So let's see next week.
Speaker 1: Sounds good. I'm excited to hear. I'm excited to watch
that stream and excited to uh yeah, just hear about
the game in general once you played some more of it.
So that'll be at some point on a future side quest.
But for now, let's take a quick ad break. We'll
be right back. We are back, and Xbox made an
announcement this week, along with a short little video that
Fable has been officially kicked, just like a chicken out
to the year twenty twenty six, no month or date
or anything like that. But I think, like, yeah, it's funny,
like none of us put this game on our draft,
and I think partially that was probably because, like, who
knows this game is made by a playground. They make
a bunch of fours of games. What are they doing
making fable like question marks there? But I think for me,
I just was kind of unsure if it was gonna
release this year, and I just had what felt like
more solid picks. But anyway, it has been officially kicked
and we got like a new trailer. It's like a
little gameplayed demo trailer. I don't really know what you
want to call. It's pretty small. It sless that I've
meant it long. Mostly shows some combat and then like
a little bit of walking around with the character. I
don't know, what do you think of this about of
footage that we got here.
Speaker 2: I'm bringing up again to see because I watched it.
I watched it the day of the actual delay, so
I it was bad Podcaster didn't watch it again right now,
But I I'm I don't know, I'm very pessimistic with
this game. It's not just because I got delayed again,
but this has been in the cooker for quite a
like when did we get this announced?
Speaker 1: It might have been annound quite a while ago. But
I think for me, the timelines felt pretty reasonable because
they last game they did it was for the Horizon, right,
which was like twenty twenty one or something like that,
So it's like not that old, Like the development time
kind of makes sense, even with the twenty twenty sixth.
Speaker 2: Day, I guess, because I get I think the problem
was though, when they did the first official announcement, they
didn't tell us who was working on it, right, it was.
Speaker 1: Just like they did I'm pretty sure.
Speaker 2: Oh did they like the trailer and everything like that,
Like so let me go back. I'm gonna go back
a couple like the.
Speaker 1: One at the Frog, that first initial thing. Yeah, so yeah,
Forest and Horizon came out in November twenty twenty one,
so to me, like this timeline seems to make a
lot of sense. And even with like that six year
or I guess five years. Okay, so if it does come.
Speaker 2: On next trailer, so I imagine they'd have a logo at
the end of it with the team, right, let's see.
Speaker 1: So it just said I think Fable came up very
like it was the last drop, like that it was
actually Fable, and probably Playground games came up earlier.
Speaker 2: That's okay, right, be a Xbox let's see, and then
we have yeah, no, you're right, playground games, I guess.
And this was back four years ago, which does I
guess it just feels longer, But even then, I guess.
I guess it's just because it was.
Speaker 1: I mean, for games, that is a pretty long amount
of time too, from announcement to release. Dy obviously the
same is way longer, like I'll just roll six now
is like three thousand years, I think. But you know,
this is longer than a lot of games get.
Speaker 2: And hey, we just had a game that was also
announced four years ago, completely be gone to smithereens, right,
So I think this game, as I'm rewatching the footage now,
I don't think it looks anything too special. So that's
why pull up, because I feel like I've forgotten about it.
It feels like at times it's like it's a light,
like I don't want to say it's like witch or light,
but there's times where it feels like that, and that
to me is not a good thing. I'm not a
person that's a big fan of the Fable franchise, so
don't have much to go off on if this looks
just like an update version of that or what it is.
It didn't do anything for me where it's like I
was looking more forward to it. I felt like they
just want to put something out there that was, Okay,
we're doing this delay, but show us. But I just
feel like this I don't know, I don't have I
will never draft this game, is what I'm saying. And
I think that's that's why when you're talking about because
I thought the same thing when it got delayed, I
pulled up right when oh, somebody wants to have had it?
I feel like I thought, Taylor, But I feel like
I recall that when we were talking about it, we
all just still had that like trepidation about it. And
for me, it's not even the date, it's just how
the game's actually gonna go. And yea, the Elfige was fine,
But like I said, I just think it was like
something to say shiate people that were it was delayed
into that whole year. So I'm not surprised because we've
still heard very little of this, But I feel like
this is gonna be like Fall next year if it
does come out, and I don't have high hopes, like
I'm I'm in the I don't know why. Maybe I'm
being cynical, but I'm thinking seventies, like the cap here
like in the seventies. Like, I don't know, there's no
way it's an eighty. I just I don't know. And then,
because you know better than me with Playground, do they
have any experience making this type of game or is
this like a because it's it happens like kill Zone, right,
Gorilla did that and they did Horizon, so it can't happen.
But that also is like another situation, right I Oh,
it's not a proven route that we've been down before, right.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I mean it's they've been. All of the
studio's ever done is for as a Horizon. Now, you
could really go deep and look at like the creative
leaders and the games they worked on before Playground was
a thing. Because Playground's only been around since I guess
twenty twelve is what I'm seeing here, So not that
super old. But obviously those people were working you know,
other games before, so that would require a deeper dive,
but it is definitely uncharted territory for them, and like
it seems like a it seems like a much bigger
jump than we saw, like that Horizon xample always comes up,
but even that is like okay, first a third person
but still like an action game, different setting, but like
there's a lot of similarities. But going from racing open
world game to like fantasy RPG, very writing focus, like
it feels like quite a major leap. Yeah, I mean
I I've since the beginning of this, like I like
the trailers they've done where they really set the tone.
I think they seem like they're getting the humor right
and the characterization and that sort of stuff, which is
a very important part of what Fable is for me.
Uh But yeah, my question has always been more of
the gameplay side of things. Are they gonna be able
to pull it off? We'll see, And yeah, this was
not a very reassuring trailer for me. Like it like
a lot of the clips they show were very basic,
just like slowly walking through admittedly very very beautiful place
and then like the little bit of combat we got
just looked really really stiff, and you know, it says
they're at the bottom of the screen the whole way
through in big bold letters, like pre alpha footage or
something like that. Right, so it's it's early like usually
these things. It's like that footage is probably months old
now anyway. But and then you know, maybe the game's
not even in alph and maybe it's in like beta
or I don't know what the heck it works at
a big studio like that, but the game could be
a lot further along as it's just footage that they
were able to show, I guess, And so yeah, we'll
have to remains to be seen. And obviously I'm not
gonna judge it based off this. This just kind of
seems like, Okay, they wanted to sweeten the bad news
with a little bit of honey on top, and so
they're like, here, give give the fans something here. And
like the two things that I glommed onto or I
guess three things is like they showed a balvarine, which
is like an iconic Fable animal, like the big wolverine thing.
It's much bigger and looks pretty scary the ones in
Fable and are like very lanky, kind of things, and
so these has a different new tone to them. Kicking
the chickens that's a classic Fable thing as well. You
can always just vault these chickens across like a field goal.
And then like the little noll enemies, like the little
mini guys with the that are kind of going crazy.
So you know, showing some classic Fable stuff in there,
just to reassure you, Yeah, remains to be seen what's
going on with the game play, because it does look
a little stiff. And then I think the other thing
for me it is even more so important than that,
is like when we're walking through the world, like that
city that they showed that shot, like cool, beautiful looking city,
but it's like a little mute. It's not as like
colorful and zany as I want from Fable. And Fables
always had this art style that's like kind of very
exaggerated things that are like bulky and silly and cartoony,
or at least it started that way, and then I
think as the series has gone on, it's actually veered
a little bit away from that. But that's kind of
my heart and soul. Like I've mentioned this many times before,
but like diehard super fan of Fable one, one with
fair games of all time, barely played Fable two, never
played Fable three. Like it's just one of those series
that it's like, yeah, I'm excited for this, but I
haven't even played the whole series. I can go back
and play new Fable experiences right now. So I'm kind
of a fake fan, you know. I'm just I'm just
a diehard for the original and so of course those
are the things I'm nostalgic for and I want. And
like I said, they are nailing it with certain parts,
but then other parts kind of missing the mark. But
I'm kind of okay with this too, Like I'm kind
of okay to see a new iteration of Fable. Of
course it's gonna be different. And like Line Ahead is
such an iconic studio in terms of the kind of
games they made, and they're not around anymore, and I'm
kind of down to give a shot to playground here
to make something different and new, and the pressure on
their shoulders is freaking huge. But I think if it
doesn't pay off, then go make a four of the game.
It will be very successful. So that's where I'm like
a little bit more okay with it, where like it
feels like any time the studios taking a risk right
now feels like, okay, is the studio just gonna get
a game canceled and then closed and then all these
people lose their jobs. I don't feel like that's gonna
be the case here, even though Xbox and Microsoft have
done a shit ton of layoffs already. But I'm okay
to for them to take a little bit of risk here,
and I think it'll be okay even if it's not
like a perfect game. So yeah, I don't think this
really worried me necessarily, but it unfortunately didn't get me
a whole lot more hyped either, which I don't really
think once again, was the purpose. I think they just
wanted a little bit of a gift on the doorstep
on the way out right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And like you're toe of the buildings, that's where
I kind of had those Witcher vibes, because Witcher is
not they have outlandish stuff. But then the city's landscapes
they look very much this is realistic medieval fantasy right
where I, like you said it fail. All I've heard
is it's more like fantasy book sort of way, not
that type of fantasy where its supposed to be a
bit more outlandish, so it just felt more. I think
my thing was like I said, it just didn't stand out.
It not didn't look bad per se. It just didn't
look like, oh man, this is something very new happening
to me. It's I've always made the comparison of both
times where when God of War came back, it stood
out looks something different, and I always thought whatever the
last Halo was, I thought they were gonna do the
same thing. And it was just I felt like everyone was, Oh,
it's just kind of more Halo, right, and this kind
of I can't compare because it's not more. I haven't
played Fable, but this just looks more like other action
RPGs of the last five years and like that are
fantasy real. It didn't look like anything where it's like,
oh it came back, And I get why people really
like this because it has this this this like to me,
it's something like in ten years from now, let's say
they do dest Rainting two, they don't do anything more
than they do Destranding three, you would feel that world
in the imagery and like the visuals go, okay, this
is very specific, but it's almost like if they just
go like, Okay, well we gotta make it more like
this unless Kajima get to Da da da. So yeah, no,
it's uh and again we'll see it's probably far way
off and maybe the actual full all takes is one
more good trailer and like a full look and then
people are really excited and good to go.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, my guess said this point would be then,
because they've been on three years in a row now
of doing the Xbox Developer Direct in late January, which
is like, here's a super duper deep dive on like
four or five of our games that are coming out
this year, and so my guess now would be that
next January we'll definitely get a Fable one there, even
if the game doesn't come out till fall, like still like,
do that big deep dive, give us like fifteen twenty
minutes of going in depth on everything, we'll see a
lot more. But I don't think we will see any
more Fable this year. So I guess that's why I
want to bring it up today, because I don't think
we're gonna be talking about it for like probably another
twelve months.
Speaker 2: Pretty much still can because it's at the very end
anything at Game Awards.
Speaker 1: Man. I guess maybe if if the game actually is
coming out like early, like if it's coming out in
like April or May of next year, maybe that's where
they would do that. But I just feel like Xbox
has so many games in the oven right now that
there's a lot of other things that could easily go
in that game ward spot if they want it. But
I yeah, I kind of inclined to agree with you, just
like Fall of the Year, I don't I don't know
when they game's traditionally released, and I don't think Xbox
really cares when the legacy games released at this point,
like you know, in terms of trying to like, oh,
every November kind of thing like Bethesa usually does. But
uh yeah, I don't know. I think that would also
just be a good hype cycle build up. Do the
developer direct in the summer thing, have another big showcase
really promote the hell out of Fable because that one
could be a huge seller for them. Yeah, and I
don't know, maybe part of the delay is to get
it onto PlayStation day one. Who knows, we don't know
what's going on with the world Xbox, so that could
be part of it too and once again get that
marketing cycle built up. Bam, that game could be it
could be a really big deal. So I mean, if
it's hopefully it's good too, that has.
Speaker 2: To be important part. Yeah, that has to be the
second part of that thing. Yeah. No, I was just
wonder game Wards is because if they were confidence coming
out next year, then obviously you would miss that, right,
There's always Summer Games Fest, but I definitely feel like
Summer Games or Game Awards is the a show that
to me does better, just has more of the hype.
I feel like people Summer Games that's like, oh okay,
Like we've had many years where that's kind of fine.
Even Game Wards. I fel like the years that you
may thought it was lesser than it still feels like
the big one. So that's why I feel it's kind
of like, well, if you don't do it now, you
could maybe never do it. Right, So I could see
maybe a a teaser of some sort, even if they
do those win Olds classic like a teaser and they
kind of allude to see more at a direct in
the future or whatnot, like they've done that too. So yeah,
I think it'll be there if they're confident it's out
next year just because it's a big platform.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, Okay, there you go. There's fable for
the day and moving on to our final topic of
the day. But it is a big whopper of one.
Last week, WB Games announced the closure of three studios
WB Games San Diego, which was founded in twenty nineteen
and I don't think has released a game. I don't
know if they were a support studio. I could not
find any information on what the heck the studio was,
but anyway, it got closed down. Player First Games, who
were the developer of multi Versus, and then Monolith who
have made I mean games since the nineties, but most
notably kind of game became most popular in the last
ten years. With the remind me of the name of
these two freaking Lord of the Rings games. I always
forget what they're.
Speaker 2: Called, Shadow of Moor and Shadow of War.
Speaker 1: Okay, it's not that hard. I don't know why I
can't remember it, but I can't.
Speaker 2: Shadow of War is a generic title, and they might
actually be Middle Earth shadow of like it might be
the long Yeah, I.
Speaker 1: Think that is what it is. Yeah yeah, And so yeah,
of course with Monolith, like the big thing is, as
you alluded to earlier, they announced, uh they were working
on a Wonder one game several years ago now at
this point, and so that game has of course canceled.
The studio is closed down, and see you later. I guess, so,
I guess just quick because the Monolith that's the big thing.
But let's quickly talk about the other two. I mean, Sandy,
I don't think I the best really have anything to
say about that. It's hard to feel too emotionally charged
about that one. We don't even really know what's going
on with it. And then Player First Games. Unfortunately, this
is like not surprising at all. That game just had multiverses.
That has had like just one of the dumbest launches ever, right,
It like kind of sort of launched and then it
launched it again a little bit a few months later,
and then they took it offline, and then they launched
it again every time had some issues involved with it,
you know, micro transactions, with the as weird annoying structure.
It's annoying because I really like what the core of
this game is. I think taking platform fighter, making it
like multiplayer focused, teams, focused, cool move sets, great character roster,
but just the release schedule of it was absolutely abysmal.
And how much of that is the executives, the suits,
the people up top versus like the studio, We'll never
really know the full details on that. I'm sure it's
a mixture of both, but probably more of like the
people up top wanted to make as much money as
they can off this game. You know, when this game
got announced it was getting its final season. I think
that was like last month or two months ago or
something like. This is not really a surprise and end, unfortunately,
but as even looked at, like I guess they technically,
when this studio first started working on Multiverses, they weren't
owned by w B, and then WB acquired them and
then shut them down. So it's a weird order of events,
and I wonder why it happened to be that way,
But you have to wonder what that studio would have
been able to accomplish if they would have been able
to stay open even if they were independent without the acquisition,
So who knows what would have happened there, But yeah,
what are your thoughts? And I don't think you've talked
about Multiverses kind of getting its final update and kind
of being not canceled, like you can still play it,
I guess, but you just not like online is going
to be disabled at some point. What were your thoughts
on the kind of funeral for that game.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just because I can't remember if we talked
about the last time I was on before I left
or after. We talked about multiverses, because also we talked
about it on the stream and how you couldn't even
just local play. It was you could, but it's a
big pain and stuff. So yeah, that's one of the
more mishandled ones, and I think it's just like something
we've seen in the past few years more. Unfortunately, unless
you are a top five studio or you're backed by
a Sony and Microsoft in a big like I mean
back like literally, it just says Sony right like it's
a Sony first party Xbox. If your game doesn't perform
to whatever levels they have it at or whatever on
the chart, they say you gotta get to x Y
and Z it just your studio's gone.
Speaker 1: And people, well, even if you do have Sony or
Microsoft back in you, that doesn't even seem to matter
these days either, And they're closest studios left, right, and center,
and they're firing people from Naughty Dog and all these
big studios right.
Speaker 2: Well, that's like big ones where it's like a it's
a Sony partner with a Kajima, Like they don't own
the studio, but they're putting it out like that's at
least even if Destrang two bombs, it's like, well, Kajima
Studios is safe, right, or Productions whatever safe, And it's
just yeah, it's a crappy situation. And yeah, I think
it's one of those things where it was kind of
writing on the wall once it just fumbled that hype.
I think it had hype for a while. It wasn't
like an all Star World's Greatest Game of All Time
or anything, but I think it was fun. I think
it had some buzz like we've thought about before. I
think there is room for a Smash competitor somewhere. I
think PlayStation just has to just dust off their knees
from all starts and just say we're gonna do it,
We're gonna commit to it. And I don't think they
will though. I think there's just too much fear there right,
and I think.
Speaker 1: I would be scared for whatever studio had to make
that in terms of if they would stay open after
they release it. That's just the sad state of things
right now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's the thing. So yeah, no, it's a
shame that's the way it went. But it wasn't a
that's unfortunately, it wasn't a surprise that the Model one
is obviously more surprising, but this was I feel like
the writing was on the wall for kind of, if
not the year, the past six months. So and we
talked about many times in the discord, which you know
you can join we have many channels there, but yeah,
bummer that it didn't work out, so.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then moving on to Monolith here. So there
there's a lot going along with this one. There's a
lot of layers we could tackle it. Trevis. I know
that you are sometimes a listener of kind of Fundy
did you buy Chancey their discussion with Jason Tryer from
Oh yeah, of course.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I listened to all that, all that stuff because
it was there's certain times where obviously this is not
the exact same situation, but even like Concord last year,
like I let's do a bunch of podcasts because that's
always what excites me other than when we talk about
stuff as fans. The next thing is just the business aspect,
right of, like, Okay, how did all these dominoes fall?
How do you again? Because it just hard to rack by.
Speaker 1: GM mode in you you want to.
Speaker 2: Absolutely and it's just like, man, this game's been cooking
for four years and it's just gone. It's fascinating from
a fan point of view. It's fascinating from like I
feel so bad for the people that have been working
on this in the resume, they just have like a
blank spot spot now for years. It's just won these things.
And for me, it's this is fascinating because the Concord
one was fascinating because place He's like, big thing, this
is like, this is studio that gave us Arkham asylum.
This is like or like not exactly, but I mean
Warner Brothers in general, like that company was at the
forefront of Superhero game evolution and where they are now.
So yeah, but I did listen to the Shryer thing,
so mm.
Speaker 1: Hmm, yeah, I mean, I you know, I don't want
to just repeat point for point what he says there
because he's gonna be able to explain that stuff a
lot better. He knows the names of all these people
that are involved. I can kind of remember some of them,
but like I don't know, I don't know all those details.
So definitely go check that out. Not that they need
us small little podcasts compared to them to shout out
their thing. But it was a really great episode. It
was really it was really enlightening. And yeah, I mean
it's funny like when Jason Schreyer starts talking about your
your game or your studio, you know, you know you're
in trouble, and so yeah, it was. It was really
interesting to hear kind of the inner workings of what
happened a Monolith. But I think for me, like the
big maybe one of the big takeaways is that just
like wow, over the years since the release of those
Lord of the Rings games, just like all the top
level talent, the leaders of the studio, all those people
that kind of you'd say maybe the most responsible for
like those games being what they are, have just been
like leaving one after another, leaving forming their own studios,
grabbing other people from Monolith on their way out. And
so it's one of those things with I feel like
when we talk about movies, we can easily be like, oh, yeah,
this is the writer, this is the director. Obviously there's
a million other people that are involved in the movie.
But we can be like, Okay, I can see the
people that are involved in the creative thing of this.
But with games, it's it becomes a lot more tricky.
Sometimes when we're talking about certain studios we're talking about like, oh,
even what we just had, like Playground, Oh, they made
fours of the Horizon and now they're making this, But
it's like a lot of the leadership that made those
furs the game is actually left like recently in between
this fable things. So it's like even that studio is
not quite the same as what we're so we're already
comparing to this thing that doesn't quite exist anymore. And
that's just the nature of how huge these development teams are.
People are leaving constantly, new people are joining, people are
coming back, people are you know, leaving again, all this
crazy stuff. But it gets a point where it's like, Okay, well,
I don't know, is the monolith that existed last week?
Is that even the same thing right other than the name,
Like what else makes it that same studio that made it?
That thing it's really just comes down to the people
that make these games, and it just seems like overwhelmingly
a lot of those really really people in the big
important positions, the most important positions, weren't really there anyway.
So it's like, I don't even know who are the
people that are making this Wonder Woman game. It's just
like a new team kind of to some extent, right well, and.
Speaker 2: It's to the not to take us off track, but
it's like the similar extent to Rock Study, where it's like, Okay,
the rumors they're making a soul sing Batman game, right
like what I put into it for years that okay.
Speaker 1: Squad another Jason Tryer reveals, so yeah, that's probably legit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but it's the same thing of like those guys
that shepherd that franchise are they're not there anymore, you know,
like they left Rock Steady. Like even by the time
the person Paul Dana who was from the animatesers who
wrote the first two games that were more critically acclaimed,
he already left for the third. So it's like the
same thing for this, like you're not gonna have oh,
this guy who's been writing Batman for twenties, maybe they will,
maybe they'll find somebody, But I mean, like same thing
when you think, like okay, Rock Study Batman, that has
to be something different and you just have to kind
of go with the laurels of the past. But yeah,
I think it's just like a anytime a situation where
a studio closes that you have some if you love
a game and that's studio closes, I think that's that
sucks a lot more. That hurts a bit more because
it sticks to me because it just things like man,
it's never You're never gonna see Monolith again. Like and
even then I didn't love the game. I have many
like or just mini memories of it. But even like
condemned those games they did back in the day because
those are like horror games. I remember seeing the cars.
Now this looks like Saw and that's how I got
into them. But like Lord of the Rings, those are
I know, we'll talk about the system after, but the world.
I love Lord of the Rings and I think they
did great stuff. Some of the story stuff is all right,
but it felt like they captured the spirit of what
Lord of the Rings was. And I'll never forget where
I was when that Nemesis system hit and it was like,
such a man. That's one of those gaming moments where
you'll remember forever, because I think when I played it,
I might have heard about it leading up to because
I was still online looking at the game spots ign.
But you don't know until you really feel it. And
how many games have we played where it's like we
got this new system or feature and it does this,
and then when you play it's like, well, not really
like it kind of is that that would be the
perfect version of it, right, But that was great. So
it's just it's just kind of a bummer. And we
talked about last time, right, of all the games they pitched,
and then we learned this in this report though they
even before they pitched like the Flash and Constant game,
that they wanted to do their own IP and w W.
I was like, nah, like you're not gonna do that.
So it's it's really unfortunate when then again just mishandling
of even then when everythink about those those games I
think were other than I totally forgot in the podcast
era that second Mortor game had those loop boxes controversial
completely forgot because by the time I got they got
rid of that all. But once I got rid of that,
like pretty well received games and this to go to nothing,
and even with Wonder Women, I thought that was a
perfect fit. I really liked that idea that Shreyer leaked
of the reverse Deem. It's the system I was working
for that game of instead of killing people in the
coming back, you're gonna befriending them. And that would be
like building because it already was like that way in
Lord of the Rings where you'd kill a guy and
you could make them your captain. There, lieutenant, you could
build an army, but wonder one that might not make
sense by okay, I'm gonna take a bunch of DC
villains and make my captains and whatnot. But finding a
way to make it like the reverse of that, and
that people remember you for doing good deed, It's like
that's something cool. How many superhero games do we do
the side missions and whatnot? I think there'd be some
really cool If you see a burning building, there's someone
you gotta go save, and you know, maybe you don't
go save and they just die or whatever, right, but
if you go save them, other than just like I
appreciate you saving my life and they give you like
some XP tokens, like imagine that. Like two hours later,
it's like, oh, you bump into Sally May and she
has this, so she wants to fight, Like I think, oh,
that was again really cool. But unfortunately that didn't happen,
and they and then it sounded like they were just
gonna make it a god of worgan, which makes sense,
but like, you have this great system, it's only unique
to you, you should use it. So just it was
it wasn't surprising because it's funny two weeks ago when
last time I was on Sycust, we talked about the
issues they were having, so it wasn't a big surprise
that okay got closed. But still it's still disappointing because
I feel like when we talked about that Wonder Woman revealed,
we were all at least somewhat intrigued because it's like, oh,
that seems like a good fit model if a Wonder Woman,
let's see what can happen. And uh now a lot
of that team apparently is working on that Black Panther
game at EA or whatnot.
Speaker 1: But like you gotta slow down, okay, you're you gotta
give me a chance to jump. So many, so many
things you've covered now. We got to get through this
one a time. Yeah, I mean, I guess I'll jump
back to the Nemesis system thing. Uh we can. We
can finish talking about that a little bit. I because
I think I'm kind of the opposite you. I think
I'm I think it was a really weird choice to
not continue with what they had built there in terms
of the villain side of it, just because to me,
that was always the great why that game had, Like
the Pitch alone was great because it was a wonder
Woman game. With the Nemesis system, that's all you need,
just because DC and Marvel and all these things just
have such a depth of villains and characters and that's
where you could like have the big ones and maybe
you'd everyone smelled bumping a Lex Luth. They're probably not,
but like you know, you have your smaller, like freak
like villains too, and I just think that would be
such a great system to combine with that stuff. And
obviously with all this compook stuff, these villains never die.
They always get locked up, they go away, they could
be you know, or in the Mortal games you'd get
like mutilated and they come back later with like a
new prosthetic leg or something like that. And I think
that system just made so much sense. But I also
do think from the other side of it's like, you know,
it's cool potentially that monolith. Rather than just like, Okay,
we're just gonna make the same game over and over
again with a different skin, they are like looking at like, Okay,
how can we take this really cool unique system that
we made and then for some reason patented it because
that's annoying to sell, But like, how can we turn
that on its head and like adjusted a bit but
put it in a new way. And I think the
idea of having that with allies to some extent is
a cool idea, but I think it works. It would
work a lot better if it was like a combined
system where you still have that that nemesism with the villains,
but then maybe there's some way where you can like
your teammates will come and go, and I think that
would be really cool. There's a lot of games where
like companions or team members like could die permanently, and
then there's a lot of games where, like avowed, for example,
no matter what you do, your companions are never gonna die.
As far as I can tell from a few hours
in the game. I think very few games deal with
the idea of like someone joining your party and then
leaving your party, and then joining your party again, just
based on like choices you make. It's like, if you
make a bad decision, they leave your party. Usually that's
permanent and you can never undo that kind of thing.
So I think the idea of like a more active
ally system, I don't know how it would have worked
in the game. Maybe you have like a team of
two buddies that are with you at all time and
you're kind of picking and choosing. I think it could
have been really cool. But yeah, I think the idea
of like moving away from the nemesystems for the enemies
seems like a real whiff. But I think maybe that
could be because of what you were saying there, that
like turning into maybe more of a linear experience with
smaller maps compared to what those mortor games were. Maybe
that system just doesn't make as much sense. But then
I also think, like that sounds like a not very
compelling game, like a linear game, or the core mechanic
is that your allies are like leaving and joining based
on your choices. And stuff like, Okay, that seems kind
of the by the numbers.
Speaker 2: I wonder though, I would have liked this scene because
that's one of the things I liked about Shadow of
War was the building your army and when you would
go invade other camps and stuff, and it would be
still spin on that. But I think I wonder if
that would have worked, like I said, better with good people,
and they would have made a spin on that where
you are actively building armies of people and if they die,
like what does that do for your roster or does
everyone go? Is there a lutet there? So? But I
do get your points there. So, but like I said
in the reverse, I agree with you where it's just
cool that they didn't want to just do the same
thing over reskinned.
Speaker 1: But yeah, but yeah, I mean another thing was too,
Like I guess the game kind of completely restart development
at some point. Obviously this happens when like leaders change around,
and you know, it's like one of those things I
talk about, like Okay, maybe that that monolith is gone,
but it's like that doesn't mean that the new people
who take over those positions can't be better or just
as good, right, Like you know those new people that
fill those positions, maybe they were from the studio before,
maybe they brought in other people. I think it could
be cool to see like how those collaborations work. But
it sounds like even when the game was announced when
we got that teaser, that it was just fiction at
that point, like there wasn't even a game at all,
Like they just announced that they're working on it essentially,
But yeah, it was. It was as real as Elder
Scroll six was when that when that teaser was shown
off too, right, it was just like pretty much announcement
of what they're working on. But that was already years
after the last Mordor game, So just like years of
things churning, people leaving, I don't know, things getting green lit,
not getting green lit, and just kind of messing around, which, yeah,
when you have a really a big team and an
expensive area, like that's just bleeding money at that point.
So obviously this is just kind of a rough thing
all around. And I'm sure the team members are not
too thrilled, as you mentioned, to just have like this
kind of big empty bucket on their on their resume
of just like what have they been doing? Well? Not
really their fault but just like, unfortunately nothing for like
this almost ten year time span for some of these people.
It's really just really sad overall. But yeah, I think
we can go to that Black Panther thing you're talking
about the two because I didn't realize this when we
talked about that Black Panther game announcement, we said like, oh,
it's EA making this thing. But yeah, I think that
is some interesting context that I didn't really realize is
that that studio is kind of created by a lot
of the people from Monolith who left Monolith. You know,
starts out with a couple of big big wigs at
the top, the big leadership people, and they bring over
other I don't know, people in smaller and more specific roles, right,
And so I don't know, what do you think about that? Like,
do you think that the Black Panther game world utilize
the Nemesis system in a way that is not like
infringing on the patent. But we'll still take some of
those ideas and roll with them.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would love for them to achieve something like
that where they can't be sued or get in trouble.
I'm gonna say no, just because I think with games
right now. They don't want to risk. They just want
to be successful, and they don't want somewhere Oh you
get a successful Black Black Panther game and then oh boom,
big lawsuit hit on there, and then there's this issue
in that issue. I think they were going to play
it safe. I think luckily with like the map size
of the Moral Games, I feel like I can already
see that we're like, okay, I can see the reverse
of you know, the very dour like lots of grays
and greens for Lord of the Rings, where it's like
the very bright version of that with Willkanda. So I
think the layout and the missions and kind of how
they use side quests and stuff, I think they'll do
that well. So I can see the line there. But yeah,
I don't think they'll do anything to that level. And
I hope that it does just still come out because
we have that, we got Iron Man, we got the Office.
I think that whatever Captain America Black Panther game, I
think that's a go and gonna happen.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think it's more single player like linear sort
of situation, probably not gonna be anything too crazy structurally.
Speaker 2: I hope the Panther will happen. So at least it's
it's good to know that, hey, people that have made
some great stuff are working on it. So that's that's
never bad thing. That doesn't guarantee a great game, but
that at least is somewhat exciting.
Speaker 1: So it's not like the people got snapped or anything.
These these these workers still exist, they just moved elsewhere. Yeah,
And then I guess with that too, Like the patent
side of things with the emsis system, well, I forget,
it's like until twenty thirty five or thirty six or
something like that. Yeah, when that's locked away till. But
I know that, like there has been other examples of
studios doing things similar to it, and I you know,
all these patents are always super duper specific, or at
least they usually are like super duper specific, and so
there's ways you can skirt around it, or they're super vague,
and then you can like get away with doing a
similar system because it's so vague that you can kind
of slip through the cracks a little bit too. So
I don't know, we'll have to see. I think just
a lot of people probably just don't even want to
mess with it though, right, they just don't want to
take that risk, and that would I guess maybe depend on, like,
I don't know, if you're a studio that's owned by
Xbox or something like, maybe Xbox will just not allow
it or green light something like that. If you're a
smaller team, maybe you're taking a bigger risk because you
don't have like the big Xbox lawyers. But now you
don't have like the overhead you say, you can't try
these things out. So I don't know. We'll see what
happens with it, but I don't know. Do do you think,
like other studios that WB are gonna take advantage of
this or is this patent just go to sit idly
used until it's up and then maybe we get an
influx of games that try it out if it doesn't
get renewed.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because like, to me, what the only thing would be?
I feel the only thing really gonna be on there
played for a while as Batman, and I guess you
could like.
Speaker 1: Do you think Hogwarts would do it?
Speaker 2: Hogwarts forgot about Hogwarts?
Speaker 1: Batman's an interesting poll though, again I guess that would
be because those games are all well, I guess they
did get kind of open worldly right, So maybe they're, oh.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they definitely did. The only thing is you're not
hopefully killing people as Batman, so that's a little bit.
But I guess you can just arrest them back.
Speaker 1: That's the idea, right, So you're killing these orcs. But
then it's like, oh, I'm back, I didn't actually die, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah I guess so, so yeah, yeah, I don't think
either one. I think Hogwarts is gonna not want to
take massive swings with that type of stuff. I think
they're gonna want to keep the game play pretty similar
ad locations, if anything, add to it more Harry Potter
stuff that is, like we talked about Quidditch or other stuff,
because I do feel like Harry Potter has a more
mainstream fan base for the buyers of that game.
Speaker 1: So I don't think they Now I'm picturing just a
Nemesis system with only Quidditch, like if they did Quidditch Champions,
but with where you like hit someone with a quaffle
or whatever and then they get like break their leg
and then they come back next season they're like, oh,
I've got a vengeance. They're gonna take you down, Ron Weasley.
Speaker 2: And then even with Batman, it's like, I guess you
could do the nemesisiystem that could work. I don't think
you can do that portion for Shadow of War where
it's like you recruit and make an army, because I
don't see Batman working with a bunch of thugs to
like take down the Joker, Like that doesn't make much sense.
So I guess you could see the reverse if they
would have done the save people thing, but it sounded
like Monola or the people Warner Bros. Whoever made the
decision didn't want to go forward with that, right, So
I feel like that's kind of like a dead version.
So no, I think it's something we're not gonna see,
And I guess my hope is that they just forget
to PAD in twenty and thirty six. Again, I don't
doubt they will. I'm sure they'll have somebody.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, ready to go, But if they haven't
done anything with it, I feel like that would probably
worse than their case to be able to renew it, right,
I don't know how, yeah, me assuming as like a
regular citizen doesn't know anything, but I feel like if
you're not using it, then I don't know why a
court would. But I also a lot of these courts
don't know shit about video games, so they just approve
random patent like Nintendo has all sorts of random patents
like this too, for very innocuous things.
Speaker 2: Right. They even bs and lie and make like another
game announce of like oh, we're doing Superman, and then
when they go to the court, so yeah, we're making
it's gonna have the Nemesis System. We're excited. It's in
process right now, same thing as Wonder Woman. It's like
it was being used, but until it got closed, we
didn't know about the switch of the Nemesis system and
we also didn't know got dropped. So this whole time,
most of us were hyped because it's like, oh, man,
Wonder Woman used the Nemesis System. That sounds great, but really,
when we got the game. Let's say we did get
the game, it would have not had any of that,
so that would have felt very odd when they announced
like those press releases. And that was a selling point
to me because like, sure, I definitely can see the
pitch of just Wonder Woman via God of War, right,
that works like sure, but like the nemesisism, I think
gave it like a little extra juice to be like, Okay,
this is something that will get me in the door
that maybe other video games won't have or even got
a War because you could just look at Wonder Woman.
If it's lack luster, you go, eh, I'll just play
God a War again, or I'll buy you know, a
different one that's on sale. But yeah, it sounds like
we wouldn't have even got that if the game did code.
Speaker 1: So yeah, yeah, and then the last last point for
me is like when I first heard this news, my
immediately thought was like, did no one want to buy
Monolith and like own them for themselves like an Xbox
or a Sony, Like is that not a way out
of this? And so yeah, really great context from Shreyer
in that interview once again kind of breaking it down
of like one, just like, Okay, this is a big studio,
there's a lot of people, and it's in a very
expensive city. So just like for anyone to buy it
like that is a huge expense to take on. On
top of that, it's like if you are too continue,
if they're to continue doing things they were like making
a DC game or using an Emesis system, all those
things would have like licensing fees on top of them
if they're not owned by WB anymore. But then also
it's like, yeah, you'd be buying a Monolith that doesn't
include a lot of those key figureheads. Once again, that
I was mentioning that like make made the studio what
it was for some amount of time, So like with
that all that context, it's like, oh, yeah, I guess
it is a lot less of a desirable by it's
really expensive, it's a big risk, and then like what
do you get out of it, Like it's just kind
of remains to be seen. It's kind of like a fret.
It's like almost like a new studio at that point.
So I can see why that wasn't you know, There's
always a chance that happens, like when Xbox closed people
who made HIGHI Rush Tango and then like they got
bought by Crafton or Kafting or whatever that company is called.
Like I don't know, I think it was like a
month later or something like that. So it could happen.
Monolith could come back, I guess, But once again, so
much has changed that who knows what what would happen
if they had even happened. And then once again, it's
not like they would just still have the Wonder Woman
IP sitting in their studio like all WB owns all
that stuff. So some good context there, because that was
my first thought was like no one wanted this really.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, and I think that's probably why I imagine
they wanted to make their own original IP, because then
that would have been something to fall back on, right, Like,
let's say, even if the Nemesis system was in that, right,
if they go to warm reds, oh, we're doing this game,
You'll be a part of it. You could build some
sort of franch hopefully, right if it's a hit, some
sort of franchise, some sort of name. So even if
you get bought, it's like, hey, we don't you know,
we don't have wonder when we don't have Lord of
the Rings, but we do have this, and we could
make something similar to this and do this. But now
it is just not That is a problem with Warner
brother games in general, because they talked about in the
kind of funny thing I remember a couple of years ago,
we talked about this of like them trying to sell
but like it's a weird sit twitch because like they're
trying to sell, but it's in like some weird, like
still licensing agreement because they're not selling, Like, okay, they're
not sitting me and Dylan down saying we want to
sell Warner Brothers games and when we do that, you
get Batman, you get the Ninja Turtles, you get Mortal Kombat,
you get all this stuff. Right, It's like, no, it's
some weird selling. We're same thing where you're getting a
bunch of studo as workers which could be talented, but
you're not getting Batman. You're not getting you know, Gotham
Knights or Harry Potter. That would be the selling point
of almost like a Marvel right of Hey, Marvel for
Spider Man owns everything except for those film rights. Sony
has that right. So imagine if Warner Brothers said, hey,
we're making a huge deal where we're gonna keep the comics,
we're gonna keep the TV shows, we're gonna keep the movies,
but with anything DC video games now, which I would
not want this, but like now Xbox owns it, now,
PlayStation owns it, right, so that I could see that
people being interested of Oh man, they're selling all the
Warner brother eyp for us to get, but they're not.
It's like this weird type of deal where it's just
you know, studios people and there's no original IP. So
even if you had one original IP, you could justify
if it's a big title, but it's yeah, it's it's
it's a weird situation. I I don't know, because obviously
Batman games do sell pretty well. Like the last Arkham
Night I think it was like somewhere in the twenty
twenty five million, a pretty good haul, and like nowadays
like they're gonna be looking for that. I do assume
it will sell well. But at the same time, like
we almost said with the Fable, I think it has
to still be a great game, you know, because I
think if you'll get your mainstream people, but if it
if we're travels it is a like a massive step
down from the Arkham series. I think that will kind
of sink it. And we've seen many games Obviously Batman's
a big title, but still we've seen many Superhowl games
not do well lately, so I don't think it's a guarantee.
And then if that doesn't happen, then I think one
of those games in general is just kind of they're
just kind of done. Maybe they'll do the Marvel route. Well,
they'll just start licensing their games out, like you know,
you make a game, you make a game, you pitch us.
That's what I could see the future, because yeah, I
don't think a Batman game being hit as a is
a guarantee. I think it's likely, but it's still it's
not promised.
Speaker 1: You know, where do you think this success level of
Hogwarts legacy sequel will be?
Speaker 2: That's kind of tough because I just I think we've
talked about this before. Where what do you do with Hogwarts?
And like I said, I made a pitch where it's okay,
maybe you find like a secret cave that's like a
you know, oh, here's a secret part of the school
that was shut down and everything, but it's like again,
you're adding on to that's not the nostalgia. I do
agree with many kind of critics because they talked about
the kind of funny and I listened to sacred symbols
and other places too, where it's just like that Hogwarts
might have been, like I won't say a one off.
I'm not saying the sequel would not be successful, but
that I think scratched the itch for a lot of people.
I think there's a lot of people like Emily who
bought the like we bought the game, she played it,
she's still never been it. And I also don't think
she would feel like, oh, I need to buy the sequel.
She would just finish this one, or even she was done.
I think she would just go, ah, like I can
just play that, you know, like I think everyone That's
the one thing where I think from certain aspects of
the game, it was so great, like the customization of
your wizard, picking your house, seeing the floor, like everything.
People been wanting a Harry Potter game to be in
a mainstream way. It was so like, other than Quiddache,
what more can you really do? It's different with Spider Man.
Spider Man we talked about New York. What do you
do with New York? K. You make it a little
bit bigger, but still you can add you make it
snowy exactly, so maybe yeah, maybe make it more snowy
Hogwarts like, but I do agree that I don't think
it's gonna I don't say bomb, but it's not gonna
be the mover. It was that going on because I
also don't think people were like, oh, I loved this
game and guess what the story was something special. It's like, no,
the story thing was serviceable for the world, right, so yeah,
like even everything, like you could do like a Voda cadabra,
Like they didn't even hold anything back up. But hey,
this time you could be a dark wizard and do this,
Like I guess maybe that's the only route you could
go is try to make it more RPG. But at
the same time, does that sell the people that buy
two games a year, that bought call dude and Harry Potter.
If I say, hey, this time you got more RPG options,
It's like, oh cool, Like I don't think so. I
don't for that crowd. I think they just want like
his Quidditch in there? Hey is Hagrid in there?
Speaker 1: Yeah, which the Quidditch thing is funny because like obviously
that game Quidditch Champions did not do well, but obviously
people would more prefer to play it just via Hogwarts.
I can say that has everything else with it too,
the all in one sort of experience. So yeah, we'll
see what happens there. I'm kind of in I guess
my my only maybe counter argument and be like, what
is it really say that in relation to the TV show.
How good is the TV show? Are people loving and
hyped on the TV show? Is that bringing in new
younger fans of Harry Potter who then want to play
like the new Hotter game that probably runs really well
on the Switch to Well, probably won't, but maybe it'll
run better than Harrod's. I can say one does on
the Switch one, and like, I don't know, maybe that's
how it could find it's it's matching its success. But
I think with let's say that that doesn't happen. Let's
say it doesn't line up that way. I mean, when
of that show is already it's get casting right now,
I guess, so I'm guessing it'll be out. It should
be out around the same time as the game, So
I think right now.
Speaker 2: The current date is twenty twenty seven.
Speaker 1: I think, yeah, yeah, And I don't know, I've probably
along with that show, they'll probably put some of the
movies back in theaters. So maybe you like get a
resurgence of Harry Potter fandom. We'll see. So yeah, but
I'm kind of agree with you. I think as a
default state, I would say it's I don't know, maybe
gonna be like eighty percent as successful as that first one,
but then these other factors could really boost it up again.
Or I don't know what the other selling factors really
are because as you mentioned, like to go to an
extra cave in Hogwarts, like, yeah, you're right, Like what
else can they really do other than just like straight
up putting it in the same like yeah, bringing your
Hagrids and your other like beloved characters, which they very
well could do, like they were even just sprinkling a
bit more of them in there. So yeah, well we'll
have to see what happens there. But any other thoughts
on all this WB games stuff right now?
Speaker 2: Uh? No, Like I said, it's just overall pretty crappy
because I think it's like I know there's some biased
with myself, but if you were to make a list
of the twenty five most influential games, I do think
Arkham Asylum would be on there because not only for
the superhero genre, like we talked both Mad Max and
you look at Lord of the Rings. There's many games
that that inspired, right, and I think that that kind
of started this wave of success takeout Mortal Kombat, but
this wave of wins with that, and then obviously you
had a Shoutout of Mortar, and then Mortal Kombat was
still doing its thing. The Injustice games did pretty well,
and it just kind of weird where for a while
it felt like Warner Brothers was really building towards maybe
something I won't say special, but something of note that
like when this podcast started, arkham Knight was coming out
in Shadow of War and also, yeah, they had that
loot box controversy. But I would have not thought like, oh,
we're like this is the start of the end. I
would have thought, Okay, there's some road bumps, but like
there's still gonna be a bigger studio as it goes along.
It felt like we had everything figure out, and even
to Hogwarts right like that's a massive win for them.
The difference is now Hogwarts doesn't feel like Hogwarts almost
felt like it could have been like, oh, Batman hamming
off the baton to Harry Potter like you're the next one.
But it really just feels like a diamond in the rough.
Where you had Suicide Squad, you have the Mamas News,
you have Gotham Nights, like all these kind of disappointments
or letdowns, and Hogwarts is the thing that stands out
so I think in an alternate universe there is Warner Brothers.
Much We're all still killing it. Mama's still killing it.
Rock said he's put out a game that's not like
a Again, we talked to about the whole like you know,
Gorilla and play games like their playground. It's like the
same thing of that. It's just where I get it.
We've talked about this. I've said this before. I'm excited
for like who makes the live service documentary or something
like that YouTube series, because like, how do you go
from that influential to me superhero franchise two? Okay, we
got to make the live for service and even then
Suicide Squad, I've had a promise to make time. Why
was that not Justice League? I get it because they
couldn't have guns, But just like the Suicide Squad, like
that's not like I know, it's had two movies, but
people still have not really like it. That didn't hit
the mainstream like Guardians Galaxy did. Right, even if you
had Joke or Harley Quinn didn't matter. That's not a
franchise that people refer back to. So again, many of
these problems are from the suits and the higher up
and we gotta do this, and they're looking at scoreboards
and check sheets and all this stuff. But that's what
is more of a bummer, cause again, it's just it's
stuff that like we talked about on the when we
did Weekly Geek last week where we talked about how
oh Daredevil's around and got canceled, and now Marvel's kind
of like, oh, we're going back that We're where are
we with rock SETI we did Batman, massive success, we
could do different studios, all this stuff. Everything starts to
go away and what are we doing? Ah, We're gonna
do Batman again. And it's just like and I'm again,
I love Batman, but I have, you know, two ten
ten Batman games for me and then two other ones
that I really enjoyed, and it.
Speaker 1: Won't release until at least twenty thirty.
Speaker 2: Exactly right, And it's like, what's the landscape then, does it?
I'm sure we'll get released, but I think that's the
thing as it's funny just coming on a lot of
like landmarks in the ten year and that's where looking
back to when the podcast started, now it's just like
a sad thing, and there's many sad things in gaming
right now for this one particular, because I really liked
a lot of the franchises they were working with right now,
right so I would like to say, like, I hope
they can turn it around. You still got Harry Pottery,
got Batman. But do they just stick to that now
and they go, ah, this is this is where our
bread and butter is, and let's not do anything else.
Let's never do a Superman game, or let's do it
when it's too late. You know. That's the thing where
I don't know, it's it's a disappointing situation, but we
can't go on and see what happens.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there was a statement and I forget it was
an article I read on Polygon. I forget if it
was like an investor call thing or where it was.
But they're talking about how they're just really going to
double down on like all we're doing is like Hogwarts stuff,
DC stuff, Mortal Kombat and Game of Thrones. Those are
like the only four things to do. And obviously the
bucket of DC that's a big bucket. That means I
could be a Superman game, but it probably won't. Probably
it probably just means Batman. But yeah, like it sounds
like they're really don't expect anything revolutionary in terms of
like new IP or anything or anything very daring. I
think we'll get like a very safe WB for a
long time until like they start working on that revenue
again and it's more consistent, I guess.
Speaker 2: And I'm with people that when they say DC they
just mean Batman because they just closed down a studio
making a DC game, and you know, if you were
to look at them.
Speaker 1: And then another one just bombed supremely last.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and if you look at the pantheon heroes, I'm
not saying one of women's as big as Batman Superman,
but for the people they got, like she's top five,
I'd say for who you could make a game for, right,
Like even then myself who loves Joker, when they're like
what Monolith was, like you could make a flash game
or a Joking and it's like, unless you're making something
really cool, low key, like a Telltale game like something
like that, like that would fit Joker to me, something
like that, But like you're telling me you're gonna make
a game the size of Shadow War based on the Joker.
It's like Jokers tied of that mass fagure character. That
sounds like a terrible, terrible decision. So it's why I
wonder when that sounds a great idea to at least try.
But now they've got with that, so again they let's
oh yeah, we're focusing on DC, but we just killed
the DC game that's been on the work for four years.
It's like, all right, so we'll see.
Speaker 1: Hopefully next week. On side quest, we have some good news,
fun news to share, because this stuff always it always
sucks to just hear that hundreds of more more game
developers are without work in a landscape that is, you know,
doesn't have a ton of jobs for them to go
get in the absence of this one that they already had,
so remains to be seen. Hopefully WB Games can turn
things around, and not for the execs, but just for
the team, just for the people, the hard working game
developers out there. Our hearts are with you. Thank you
everyone for listening, Thank you Travis for joining me. Very good,
heated discussion that we had here today, and we will
be back again next time. Bye bye.