Speaker 1: You were listening to episode sixty one of GameSpot After Dark.
Speaker 1: On this week's episode, we talk about Genschen impact, cyberpunk Crunch,
Speaker 1: and Peter Parker's face. Hello and welcome to episode sixty
Speaker 1: one of GameSpot After Dark. I'm your host Jake Decker,
Speaker 1: and joining me this week is Lucy James Hi to
Speaker 1: more Hussein, Hello that, and Jean Luke Sipeke.
Speaker 2: Hello.
Speaker 3: Hello.
Speaker 1: This is the first episode we've done in a while
Speaker 1: where we haven't had a guest, so this is just
Speaker 1: the core crew for the most part. Kelly's got another
Speaker 1: podcast after She's going to be on the on Jared
Speaker 1: Petties like, oh the one countdown, So she's taken a
Speaker 1: break this week to I don't know, save her podcasting voice.
Speaker 1: I guess you could say that to make sure to
Speaker 1: check that out. But anyway, this week, what have we
Speaker 1: all been playing? Did you want to start?
Speaker 4: Yeah? So, I I had a little meltdown in slack
Speaker 4: when I was trying to remember what I've actually done
Speaker 4: this week. I did play a bit of Mafia on
Speaker 4: Sunday morning. Forgot about that.
Speaker 5: What do you think I.
Speaker 4: Never played it originally? I was digging it, honestly, it's
Speaker 4: quite a chill game. I was very encouraged. You said
Speaker 4: last week that it was relatively short. I just enjoyed
Speaker 4: driving around basically. But the main thing that I've been
Speaker 4: enjoying this week is the Great British Bakeoff is back.
Speaker 4: I'm not calling it that shite American name that you
Speaker 4: have to call it because of Pillsbury or whatever. It
Speaker 4: is Great Britain.
Speaker 2: The American name.
Speaker 5: Yeah, what's the shite American name?
Speaker 4: The Great British Baking Show?
Speaker 5: Oh, you just said it.
Speaker 4: I know I just said it, But I won't refer
Speaker 4: to it when I in my in my review quote unquote,
Speaker 4: I won't be referring to it as a bakeoff. So this, like,
Speaker 4: I know, I think I've talked about it in the
Speaker 4: pot cast maybe last year, but like, Bakeoff is one
Speaker 4: of those wholesome shows that just instantly cheers me up,
Speaker 4: and I'm so glad they're all on Netflix here. I
Speaker 4: am one of those people who I'll watch Bakeoff, but
Speaker 4: I never get the urge to bake. I will just
Speaker 4: buy my baked goods. I don't need to go through
Speaker 4: all that stress about soaky bottoms and watching the oven
Speaker 4: don't need it, but we were watching it on Friday.
Speaker 4: There's a small group of us watching it, and it's
Speaker 4: just a very wholesome show. And usually you can tell
Speaker 4: who you're gonna hate immediately when you watch it, but
Speaker 4: this season is kind of magical because I didn't hate
Speaker 4: any of them. Also, in terms of like bake off,
Speaker 4: there was so much drama in the first episode someone
Speaker 4: accidentally knocked over someone else's plate of cakes just at
Speaker 4: the technical as well, and then the show stopper at
Speaker 4: the end, so that's like they get a brief, they
Speaker 4: get time to practice. It was maybe one of the
Speaker 4: weirdest briefs ever seen. It was make a cake of
Speaker 4: someone who you're inspired by, and if you go online
Speaker 4: and look at something they.
Speaker 6: Are specifically, it's a bust. It's a bust cake of them.
Speaker 4: I mean there was David Bowie just looked I don't know, sad,
Speaker 4: squashed like and the thing is as well, it's like
Speaker 4: very wholesome. Everyone's laughing and I'm not critiquing because I
Speaker 4: know for sure that I couldn't do it. David Bowie
Speaker 4: just looked so sad. I thought Freddie Mercury looked actually
Speaker 4: really good. Because he was way more stylized, or like
Speaker 4: most of them tried to do more realistic takes didn't
Speaker 4: really pan out. But I think my favorite one had
Speaker 4: to be Tomm de Along from Link on It two
Speaker 4: and it looked like you know that music video for
Speaker 4: Sledgehammer where he's all made of wax and it's all
Speaker 4: I'm moving around. It reminded me of that, and it
Speaker 4: was it's such a good show. I'm so glad at
Speaker 4: his back.
Speaker 6: That Tom DeLong cake is genuinely horrifying. It's ah, who
Speaker 6: would you make.
Speaker 2: A cake of? If you had what celebrity would you pick?
Speaker 1: The first thing that came to my mind was you
Speaker 1: know that Gerald busts where he's like playing.
Speaker 5: Gwent and it's just like that.
Speaker 1: That's probably what I do. It would look terrible, but
Speaker 1: that's the first thing that came to my mind.
Speaker 4: Ah, who would I make? Might make? I mean, I can't,
Speaker 4: I can't do David Bowie. Oh it annoyed me. I
Speaker 4: got like very push glasses up nose because they said, oh, yeah,
Speaker 4: we're making Ziggy Stardust. But actually it was a Laddin insane.
Speaker 7: Uh.
Speaker 4: The lightning bolt across his face so that one's already gone,
Speaker 4: but like you could do David Bowie and maybe his
Speaker 4: life on.
Speaker 3: Mars Labyrinth or Labyrinth all the Hair.
Speaker 4: No I would do Nikola Tesla from The Prestige, David
Speaker 4: Boy's greatest role Tesla. You can't do that accent for
Speaker 4: ship Kenny, but no. I mean, like Bacop's back is
Speaker 4: Fantastics on Netflix every Friday.
Speaker 5: M h nice.
Speaker 6: It's really fun enjoyable to watch the bit where the
Speaker 6: old cake knocking incident came. It was so good, like
Speaker 6: spoilers for it, but like it's a lady called Sura
Speaker 6: and she's like adjusting or she's trying to like shoe
Speaker 6: a fly away.
Speaker 2: From a case.
Speaker 4: She's already an early favorite by the way, because she
Speaker 4: walks her cat around like a dog.
Speaker 6: She like recoiled after like flicking this fly away and
Speaker 6: someone was walking up just behind her and like knocked
Speaker 6: the entire tree down, and then she was devastated. And
Speaker 6: then she went on to win that challenge. So everyone
Speaker 6: was like praising her and being like.
Speaker 7: You're so good, well, don this is amazing, and she's
Speaker 7: like she's like on the verge of tears because she's
Speaker 7: just like ruined someone else's but like they chilled and
Speaker 7: it was all nice after that.
Speaker 4: I mean, it's never gonna be bin gate because bin
Speaker 4: Gate had repercussions that went out into the media. It
Speaker 4: was literally front page news.
Speaker 6: You should explain bin gatepinate and I didn't get it.
Speaker 4: Okay, So bin gate they were making. Was it a
Speaker 4: baked Alaska? It was something with ice cream? Anyway, there
Speaker 4: was this one guy, Oh, and he had his ice
Speaker 4: cream in the freezer, but I think he'd put it
Speaker 4: in someone else's freezer. So the woman whose freezer he'd
Speaker 4: put it in took it out and just left it
Speaker 4: on the side. So obviously it all melted. But like
Speaker 4: he kind of went, why didn't you tell me? Like
Speaker 4: why would you just leave it on the side? Obviously
Speaker 4: kind of sabotage. But instead of him, you know, trying
Speaker 4: to work around it and explain to the judges, he
Speaker 4: just took it and just chucked it in the bin.
Speaker 4: And then it became bin gate because it was like
Speaker 4: did she do it on purpose? Avatage? Here? Was it
Speaker 4: actually a mistake? Her name was Diana And then she
Speaker 4: actually ended up leaving the competition a couple of weeks later,
Speaker 4: like she didn't get voted out. She left I think
Speaker 4: because of external pressures.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was a big thing.
Speaker 1: Sounds like a lot of drama in a show that
Speaker 1: doesn't have a lot of drama, right.
Speaker 2: And the other thing is the enjoy it.
Speaker 6: If you're watching it probably worth doing. Not that they
Speaker 6: need a shout out. If anyone doesn't need the shout out.
Speaker 6: It's the McElroy family. But they have a They have
Speaker 6: a companion podcast called Bacon, which is very good and
Speaker 6: it's back as well.
Speaker 5: Of course they have a podcast for it. They've got podcast.
Speaker 1: Travis.
Speaker 4: It's just Travis.
Speaker 2: It's not the Yeah, it's not the entire Yeah, it's
Speaker 2: not the entire.
Speaker 1: Still though, between the three of them, like every time
Speaker 1: I listened to my brother, my brother and me, there's
Speaker 1: ads for other their other fans only podcast.
Speaker 2: It's a dynasty.
Speaker 5: I know it, truly is.
Speaker 2: They're the rock a fellow of podcasts.
Speaker 8: I'd say, So it isn't today National Podcasting Day or something.
Speaker 8: I was seeing that on Twitter.
Speaker 4: It is.
Speaker 5: That's why we're doing it on a Wednesday.
Speaker 3: Oh of course, yes, I thought this, Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 5: Tomorrow. What have you been up to?
Speaker 6: So I've been playing a game called hades Haiti's Nuts,
Speaker 6: which is I know you guys talked about it last week,
Speaker 6: but phenomenal game, excellent, having a lot of fun with it.
Speaker 6: I think I'm doing pretty well at it, Like I
Speaker 6: haven't done that many runs, but I get really far
Speaker 6: each time.
Speaker 2: Like I was listening to another podcast I can't remember
Speaker 2: which one.
Speaker 6: It was like, and they were like, oh, yeah, if
Speaker 6: you get to like Elysium within like twenty runs, you're
Speaker 6: doing really well. I think I got to Elysium on
Speaker 6: like my third or four off run, and like, I
Speaker 6: think I got really lucky with my setup. I love
Speaker 6: the Shield because it's got that distant spam thing and
Speaker 6: if you like put like a Zeus's boon on it
Speaker 6: and it electrocutes everyone, and then you add a few
Speaker 6: other modifiers onto it, it's incredibly powerful. So I've been
Speaker 6: doing really lame tactics because it's fun to do that,
Speaker 6: like just using the kind of projectile part of the shield.
Speaker 6: The Captain America part of using it and keeping people
Speaker 6: at distance and crowd controlling and then getting in doing
Speaker 6: a few strikes and getting out very like Dark Souls
Speaker 6: style style of prey.
Speaker 2: And you're playing pretty much.
Speaker 6: Yeah, like Meg, I beat on my first try because
Speaker 6: of dark souls, Like I very quickly realize that you
Speaker 6: can get three strikes in before she charges her like
Speaker 6: void blade move that as it like it envelops the area.
Speaker 2: So I was like in.
Speaker 6: Three strikes out to two dashes and then it would
Speaker 6: take her when she started dashing. All I had to
Speaker 6: do was move one dash back and it would put
Speaker 6: me in perfect position to do like a dashing strike,
Speaker 6: which did extra damage. And like I just mopped the
Speaker 6: floor with her. Yeah, and I did the same with
Speaker 6: like the Love Life and Boss as well. I was
Speaker 6: just like these boss it feels kind of easy, which
Speaker 6: sounds like a weird flex, But I haven't really had
Speaker 6: any trouble with that game.
Speaker 5: I was gonna say.
Speaker 1: I think the great thing about Meg though, is that
Speaker 1: Meg is pretty easy. But I always mess up on
Speaker 1: her because I I just think like, oh, this is easy,
Speaker 1: and I get overconfident and I stop dodging correctly and
Speaker 1: then I die and I'm like, I just I just
Speaker 1: beat her, Well, why did I die again? And it's
Speaker 1: because the game is being like, yo, you still gotta
Speaker 1: respect this this boss just because just because it's easy
Speaker 1: doesn't mean you can't sleep on the job.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And like the the actual narrative stuff that the
Speaker 6: way it unfolds as you keep coming back, and even
Speaker 6: meg recognizing the way that you're you're coming back and
Speaker 6: if you change your loadouts you'll respond to it, and
Speaker 6: that kind of stuff. It's just a fantastically well created game.
Speaker 6: I mean, like people have been heaping praise upon it already,
Speaker 6: so I don't really have much to add in that way,
Speaker 6: but I think probably one of the biggest or the
Speaker 6: most exemplary ways to treat an early access experience I've
Speaker 6: ever seen, like that Dead Cells is one of them. Like,
Speaker 6: I feel like Dead Cells they did really good with that.
Speaker 6: They were very open and very clear about the things
Speaker 6: that we're doing. But it feels like Super Giant went
Speaker 6: one step further on it, and like they were super communicative.
Speaker 6: They had in game timers to make sure, you know,
Speaker 6: counting down to the next content update and that kind
Speaker 6: of business. And it's been really really interesting to see
Speaker 6: it come together and be as good as it is.
Speaker 6: You know, Danny did his no clip documentary kind of
Speaker 6: charting the process. So like, if you're enjoying it, it's
Speaker 6: worth checking that stuff out because it is really really fascinating.
Speaker 6: So just unsurprising that Super Giant has put out an
Speaker 6: absolute banger of a game.
Speaker 2: Again, you love to see it.
Speaker 6: So I played that, and then I checked out a
Speaker 6: game called Genshen Impact, which is a very strange for
Speaker 6: the weave.
Speaker 5: It is very long, it is it is.
Speaker 6: Intensely anime from the outset to the point where like
Speaker 6: it's it's the kind of anime that I'm not super into,
Speaker 6: like cute, cute, like lots of cute little characters, high
Speaker 6: pitched voice girls, and and like it's very much like
Speaker 6: I'm not into that as much.
Speaker 2: I find it quite greating after a while.
Speaker 6: But it's a fascinating game because it's like it's a
Speaker 6: mishmash of so many different games and it seems to work.
Speaker 6: It's free, first of all, on on most platforms PS four,
Speaker 6: I think it's on Xbox One, PC and mobile, and
Speaker 6: it's a fully realized open world JRPG that has like
Speaker 6: Gatcha mechanics that allow you to unlock new characters to
Speaker 6: add to your party. But it feels and looks a
Speaker 6: lot like Breath of the World in that you have
Speaker 6: this massive really vibrant world that you can explore at
Speaker 6: your own pace, and you've got a lot of climbing
Speaker 6: and that kind of stuff, and the RPG it he
Speaker 6: teaches you how to cook in the same way. And
Speaker 6: then on top of that, it feels like Dragon Quest
Speaker 6: where it's like the open kingdom that you can go
Speaker 6: and speak to and everyone's got like a little bit
Speaker 6: of character to them that you that you speak to. Like,
Speaker 6: I met this kid early on and I put like
Speaker 6: a couple of pictures of him up. His name's Timmy,
Speaker 6: and he was just like he was just standing on
Speaker 6: by the side of the road and he was like
Speaker 6: pigeons in front of him, and I ran towards him
Speaker 6: and the pigeons flew away, and he was like, hey,
Speaker 6: you made the pigeons fly away. And I was like, oh, sorry,
Speaker 6: my bad, I don't mean to do that, and he goes,
Speaker 6: it's fine, but sometimes I'm worry they'll never come back,
Speaker 6: just like daddy.
Speaker 1: And I was like, what, out of curiosity, how's the
Speaker 1: so you mentioned there are Gosha mechanics micro transaction.
Speaker 5: Have you had to do any of that?
Speaker 1: Because I noticed someone in the discord server was saying
Speaker 1: that they'd played a couple hours and hadn't seen any
Speaker 1: of that stuff.
Speaker 6: Like I the only reason I know it's there is
Speaker 6: because I had to look it up, and that is
Speaker 6: what I found. I've not actually encountered it any in
Speaker 6: any way yet. I'm like maybe three or four hours
Speaker 6: in because I've been I think you get to like
Speaker 6: the main first kingdom about two hours in or so
Speaker 6: less than maybe that, like an hour, but like I've
Speaker 6: been running around and just like exploring and figuring things out,
Speaker 6: but it's not shoved it in my face. The only
Speaker 6: way I realized that it's there is one I searched
Speaker 6: it to. I went on PlayStation Store and tried to
Speaker 6: see how it's monetizing the game, and this there's a
Speaker 6: currency that you can buy. But it hasn't prompted me
Speaker 6: to spend the money or anything like that. It's shown
Speaker 6: me like areas where clearly you could do it, Like
Speaker 6: it's like, hey, go to this screen. This is the
Speaker 6: outfit screen where you can change characters visual style. You know,
Speaker 6: there's like a character roster screen which is like really
Speaker 6: big and your character's like two characters right in the
Speaker 6: corner like really small icons say like oh, clearly it's
Speaker 6: going to fill this entire screen with loads of people,
Speaker 6: and you can like switch between characters on the fly.
Speaker 2: They're like map to the dpad.
Speaker 6: And the two characters I have is one is the
Speaker 6: main character I picked, is the boy, and he's kind
Speaker 6: of like link ish where he's got a sword and
Speaker 6: also has the ability to like do certain magic. And
Speaker 6: the other one like you tap right on the dpad
Speaker 6: and you become this archer girl who's also it's not
Speaker 6: like palette swaps.
Speaker 2: They're all part of the story.
Speaker 6: Like the archer girl is like the one works for
Speaker 6: like the the god in in the local kingdom, and
Speaker 6: like you can use her for distance attacks and that
Speaker 6: kind of stuff. And there's like a weird story on follow.
Speaker 6: So it feels like Dragon Quest. It feels like a
Speaker 6: breath of the world. It feels a bit final, fancy ish,
Speaker 6: and it's it also seems like a fully fledged thing,
Speaker 6: like not like a you know, a tone down in
Speaker 6: terms of like production value. It's got good music, it's
Speaker 6: got impressive, like cool visuals. It's trying to do a
Speaker 6: lot with it that the actual world mapp massive. I've
Speaker 6: not explored even a fraction of it. And there's loads
Speaker 6: of kingdoms and stuff like that. It seems like towns
Speaker 6: and people to talk to. Everyone has got something different
Speaker 6: to say, and you can also have conversations with a
Speaker 6: lot of them instead of just hairing a bit of
Speaker 6: dialogue and then moving on. So I don't know if
Speaker 6: it's going to be any good, but I'm just intrigued
Speaker 6: at this game that has kind of come out of nowhere.
Speaker 6: It is free, and it's like an amalgamation of various
Speaker 6: other good games but somehow still makes.
Speaker 2: It work for itself.
Speaker 6: It's like easy to play because it has literally costs
Speaker 6: you literally nothing, So I would recommend, like, if you're
Speaker 6: in the mood for an RPG j RPG, it's free,
Speaker 6: download it, play it. It's worth taking a punt at.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I haven't downloaded it.
Speaker 1: I don't know if I will, but I was like
Speaker 1: waiting on Twitter for people to be like, oh, it's
Speaker 1: actually like only two hours a game play and then
Speaker 1: you have to pay for this, you have to pay
Speaker 1: for that, or they're still developing parts of it. But
Speaker 1: I've actually been kind of intrigued because based on the conversation,
Speaker 1: it seems like that's not really the case.
Speaker 5: So at least like that.
Speaker 6: When I tweeted about it, I had like people were
Speaker 6: replying and saying like what game is this? And then
Speaker 6: other people would jump in and be like, oh, this
Speaker 6: is gains an impact, and a lot of people are like, yeah,
Speaker 6: I'm twenty five hours in and I haven't paid a
Speaker 6: single penny, and like it's not asking me to do that.
Speaker 6: So I really do wonder how they how they kind
Speaker 6: of made it work, and and I think they're trying
Speaker 6: to do that thing where it's like just make the
Speaker 6: thing compelling and hope that people like it enough to
Speaker 6: to kind of play it and and and spend money
Speaker 6: on it. I want to what is the name of
Speaker 6: the development team. It's got a really funny name. It's
Speaker 6: like it's going to annoy me now, but it's it's
Speaker 6: like Futuristic Game Developer Team or something like that.
Speaker 2: It's like, really, well.
Speaker 5: It sounds like a trick, Like it doesn't seem like.
Speaker 6: It's it looks like when you when you look at
Speaker 6: the actual developer and the name and everything, it looks
Speaker 6: like one of those RPGs that is advertised to.
Speaker 2: You on like Instagram ads. Yeah, like a scam.
Speaker 6: And then you start playing it and you're like, no,
Speaker 6: this is actually it's actually quite legit, and you know,
Speaker 6: not to talk about those games, but most of them
Speaker 6: do suck, but like this, this feels legit and it
Speaker 6: feels like really really cool and interesting. I definitely want
Speaker 6: to check out more of it. The deem the developers
Speaker 6: called me me hoyo mejo yo. Yeah, but they have
Speaker 6: got uh okay mejo yo, the Otaku Saved the World.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a company good for that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think that's I think that might be the
Speaker 6: publisher more than the developer.
Speaker 2: The developers got I'm gonna.
Speaker 6: Check me me ho yo because it connects to like
Speaker 6: a central server and it's like, hey, we're gonna we're
Speaker 6: gonna connect your person account to the central server because
Speaker 6: we want you to. It's got multiplayer and stuff as well.
Speaker 6: I've not actually tried it, but it's definitely got that.
Speaker 6: But like they are like a well known developer or so,
Speaker 6: they've got loads of like games. I think of the
Speaker 6: of the similar ILK, but I think they are the
Speaker 6: publisher because there's a certain other games that are listed
Speaker 6: under Otaku Saved the World as the company. So I
Speaker 6: think that's my favorite game developer Name of the Year,
Speaker 6: Saved the World.
Speaker 4: I just like the really boring ones like Blizzard team.
Speaker 2: Fo yeah R and D Unit one.
Speaker 8: Oh, what's the foul Fantasy seven sixteen name?
Speaker 3: It was something real?
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, it's like I forgot what was it called.
Speaker 2: It's gone.
Speaker 6: It's gone, but yeah, it's it's it's worth taking upon
Speaker 6: on like it's it's literally they're free, so you've got
Speaker 6: nothing to lose. I will say up front, it hits
Speaker 6: you with like extreme anime bullshit where like you are
Speaker 6: too cute sa the characters fighting an evil looking lady
Speaker 6: and she's like talking about humanity needs to change, and
Speaker 6: like my eyes glazed over almost instantly, and then like
Speaker 6: once it starts kicking off, I like snap back into it.
Speaker 2: And it was fun.
Speaker 6: It's got it's slightly rough around the edges, but it's fine.
Speaker 8: Creative Business Unit three, that's the one that's my favorite
Speaker 8: game developer.
Speaker 6: My ones are also like, excuse me, the ones where
Speaker 6: it's like the game is or the team is named
Speaker 6: after the game that they're known for, so you gotta
Speaker 6: go talk with studios Ninja Ninja and that kind of stuff,
Speaker 6: like very close to the I'd love it if rock
Speaker 6: Steady renamed like Team Batman or something like that.
Speaker 1: Or like the Coalition, right, like I guess it's not yeah,
Speaker 1: but still three industries.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's pretty good.
Speaker 1: I'm curious if the Coalition, like ever doesn't make a
Speaker 1: Gears game and then it's why are you?
Speaker 5: Name doesn't really fit anymore? But Jean Luke, what about you?
Speaker 8: I've also been playing Mencient Impact. I don't really much
Speaker 8: to add outside of what Tam said other than I'm
Speaker 8: intrigued so far. I also am pretty like wary of
Speaker 8: like I think the voice acting is kind of whatever,
Speaker 8: like the high pitched like stuff does not work for
Speaker 8: me at all. If my girlfriends into it though, so
Speaker 8: she's enjoying it, so I'm like, Okay.
Speaker 6: I changed the voice to Japanese because I was like
Speaker 6: it would be better at Japanese.
Speaker 2: It's way well, it's even it's like extreme, and I
Speaker 2: was like no.
Speaker 9: No, yesout to like oh my god, You're like, oh
Speaker 9: please relax, and then you have to like read at
Speaker 9: the same time, if you're not like super familiar with
Speaker 9: what they're saying, just stick with the English one.
Speaker 3: What about Chinese because it is a Chinese studio.
Speaker 2: I didn't. Yeah, I didn't try I didn't try that one.
Speaker 2: Maybe that's maybe that's it.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 8: I think the only thing I'm wary of is I
Speaker 8: combat's kind of not really doing it for me. It's
Speaker 8: like it's very so the combats like very elemental based,
Speaker 8: which is cool because the idea of you picking your
Speaker 8: different characters is that you're you know, like, oh, okay,
Speaker 8: these enemies have water, so I should switch to one
Speaker 8: of my characters that has lightning and then use lightning.
Speaker 3: Attacks, so like that's Pokemon.
Speaker 8: Yeah, and like that stuff feels good, like in terms
Speaker 8: of like like on paper, but something about the actual
Speaker 8: feel of the attacks doesn't really hit for me. Like
Speaker 8: they feel kind of stiff, and I feel like I'm
Speaker 8: just kind of wailing on them sometimes, Like I feel
Speaker 8: like enemies have like really large health bars. So I
Speaker 8: don't know how like satisfying I find the combat to feel.
Speaker 6: I kind of feel like you might develop as you
Speaker 6: get more characters, I think. So I think the lack
Speaker 6: of satisfy I agree with you. I don't think you're satisfying,
Speaker 6: but I think they might try and make up for
Speaker 6: it with like interesting mobs. It does that thing where
Speaker 6: the first thing you do is literally go into an
Speaker 6: encampment that looks like the first Barcobblian encampment from Breath
Speaker 6: of the World, and like it.
Speaker 2: Teaches you how to shoot fire.
Speaker 6: So I'm hoping once we get more characters, it's like
Speaker 6: switching between them and what they want.
Speaker 3: You to do totally, and they do.
Speaker 8: I did mess with that a little bit because there
Speaker 8: is like a screen where you can like see like
Speaker 8: what characters are available for the day, and they let
Speaker 8: you try them out in like a little combat challenge,
Speaker 8: so you do get to actually like see if you
Speaker 8: like that character before you you put down the money
Speaker 8: on them, which is pretty cool.
Speaker 1: Is there a way to unlock these characters without spending
Speaker 1: money like just a lot of grinding izers.
Speaker 3: I think so because because the.
Speaker 8: Currency you need, I believe you can get that currency
Speaker 8: on your own. Like I when I tried to buy
Speaker 8: I like to see how I would buy one. It
Speaker 8: made me go like three currencies deep where it's like, Okay,
Speaker 8: you don't have this one currency you can buy. You
Speaker 8: can get that currency for three hundred of these currencies,
Speaker 8: but you're one hundred and sixty shorts, so you'll need
Speaker 8: to then spend the real money currency to get that currency.
Speaker 8: I'm like, and I was like, Okay, well, I'm not
Speaker 8: gonna buy any of this right now, but it does
Speaker 8: seem like you can actually get characters through grinding the game.
Speaker 5: That's good.
Speaker 1: I will say, just developers, please give us two currencies
Speaker 1: tops one end game one micro transactions if there needs
Speaker 1: to be.
Speaker 5: We don't need anything more. For the love of God,
Speaker 5: please agreed.
Speaker 2: Agreed.
Speaker 8: So other than that, I I finished Tell Me Why,
Speaker 8: which I had played the first episode back last when
Speaker 8: I was on the podcast, I think two weeks ago
Speaker 8: or something like that. Right, I finished the other two episodes.
Speaker 8: I really enjoyed it. I highly recommend it if no
Speaker 8: one's had a chance to check it out. It's really good.
Speaker 3: I it didn't. It didn't. It was like I didn't quite.
Speaker 8: Get there to like this is my new favorite, like
Speaker 8: of like the dope nod like kind of like you
Speaker 8: know Telltale style games, Like it got really close. I
Speaker 8: think there were just like a couple about getting into
Speaker 8: like spoilers, I guess like there were a couple story
Speaker 8: beats that like didn't quite pan out the way I
Speaker 8: wanted to or like more like the the execution, like
Speaker 8: like you A lot of the games about like confronting
Speaker 8: characters about like stuff that's happened in the past, and
Speaker 8: like the way those confrontations happened didn't feel as satisfying
Speaker 8: to me.
Speaker 3: As they could have.
Speaker 8: But overall, I really really liked that game, and I
Speaker 8: think it's got some amazing characters. Shout out to my
Speaker 8: more my boy Michael, not r Michael, but Michael in
Speaker 8: the game. Michael, who's this wonderful, wonderful gay lad that
Speaker 8: you can you can share a nice ice fishing moment
Speaker 8: with And it's beautiful and I love it. So, uh,
Speaker 8: really really liked that game. I highly recommend it. I
Speaker 8: still don't hear enough people talk about it, so I
Speaker 8: want to do it justice and say, if that is
Speaker 8: your kind of game, you should check it out.
Speaker 5: It's free on game Pass. Well you know, it is
Speaker 5: free as it can be on game pass, right.
Speaker 3: It is on game Pass. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Oh, I forgot playing Rambo six Seach as well recently.
Speaker 6: Yeah, that is a funny experience. I'm playing on PC now,
Speaker 6: so oh, actually I can actually shoot stuff and kill it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, you're doing pretty well then, Okay.
Speaker 6: Yeah, my count strike muscles are kind of like limbering
Speaker 6: up again.
Speaker 2: It feels good.
Speaker 1: Speaking of the game test, though, it seems like you've
Speaker 1: been playing something else on game Pass to gen Luke.
Speaker 8: Oh, yeah, I started playing or the New Ri because
Speaker 8: I just like that one passed me by. I don't
Speaker 8: even remember when it came out. I feel like this
Speaker 8: year has been such a really man wow rating.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 5: I actually started playing it literally this week too.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 5: So it's weird that you put this down.
Speaker 1: I almost put it down, but I was, like, I
Speaker 1: haven't played enough of this game to talk much about it.
Speaker 8: But yeah, I've only put it in a couple hours,
Speaker 8: and so far it's very much like more Or from
Speaker 8: what I remember the first game. But like, I mean, god, damn,
Speaker 8: it is beautiful.
Speaker 3: Uh the music, So the music is so good.
Speaker 8: It feels so good, like like just like the fluidity
Speaker 8: of like movement of like you know, like doing your
Speaker 8: like double jumps and like bouncing back and forth, and
Speaker 8: like the combat. It all feels so phenomenal. Like even
Speaker 8: though right now where I'm at still is very much
Speaker 8: like just more Ory like more Ri's just like phenomenal.
Speaker 8: So I'm really enjoying it.
Speaker 3: So far the.
Speaker 1: First one, if I remember correctly, right, your combat was
Speaker 1: done through this little orb thing right that would fly
Speaker 1: around you. I think, so this one's got the sword.
Speaker 1: I forget what it's called, but that is a change
Speaker 1: that I like a lot, unless I'm thinking of a
Speaker 1: different game. But it just feels so much more tactile.
Speaker 1: I remember that really throwing me off when I played
Speaker 1: the first one.
Speaker 5: It just it didn't feel right.
Speaker 8: I think you're right, and this one, actually, I there
Speaker 8: are other weapons you can get that's really fun. So
Speaker 8: like I replaced my sword with like a giant hammer
Speaker 8: where it's just got this really long swing but you'll
Speaker 8: take out like half an enemy's health in one hit.
Speaker 8: And it's like really really satisfying to just like jump
Speaker 8: in the air and like time it perfectly and just
Speaker 8: hit this bug and they go like flying and then
Speaker 8: they'll hit like an environmental spike and it's like I
Speaker 8: want to buy all the other weapons now, like see
Speaker 8: how they mix it up, because it just like everything
Speaker 8: feels really good.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean I've only played a couple hours too, and
Speaker 1: I I'm super impressed with that. I'm bummed it missed it,
Speaker 1: like it kind of passed me by, but I remember
Speaker 1: not enjoying the first one all that much, so it
Speaker 1: wasn't really high on my list, and I think it
Speaker 1: was because of that combat thing. But to be fair,
Speaker 1: I only played a little bit of the first one.
Speaker 5: Maybe it does open up.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'm just you know, I was just stubborn and
Speaker 1: only saw the very beginning and didn't test anything out.
Speaker 1: But yeah, will this seems really good, Like I was
Speaker 1: saying earlier, the music is excellent too. But mostly what
Speaker 1: I've been doing is I'm playing Spalunkie too. I want
Speaker 1: to play Hades. I really want to play Hades, but
Speaker 1: I can't. I like, I start Hades, and I'm like, man,
Speaker 1: I kind of just want to do a Spelunky run.
Speaker 5: So I turn on Spelunkie.
Speaker 1: And do a couple runs that turn into you know,
Speaker 1: a couple dozen runs, and then next thing I know,
Speaker 1: I've been playing for hours and I need to stop.
Speaker 5: It's so good, it's so good.
Speaker 1: It's Yeah, I'm sure it seems like that's how most
Speaker 1: people are with Hades, and I'm sure i'd be that
Speaker 1: way too if if I don't know, I don't know
Speaker 1: why my brain decided Spelunky over Haites, but for some reason,
Speaker 1: that's what happened, and.
Speaker 5: That's like all I've been doing.
Speaker 1: I did get a chance to play Call of Duty
Speaker 1: season six, though I didn't play the multiplayer or I
Speaker 1: didn't play the like standard multiplayer. I only played what's
Speaker 1: it called war Zone And when they added those like
Speaker 1: they added basically a public.
Speaker 5: Transit system around the map. Yeah, which is pretty cool.
Speaker 1: I didn't get to spend much time down there because
Speaker 1: I died a.
Speaker 5: Lot, but I don't know it's still war Zone.
Speaker 1: I like that they're adding these I don't know. I
Speaker 1: don't know they're keeping the map fresh in cool ways.
Speaker 1: And I know, you know, if you play Fortnite, it's
Speaker 1: probably not that surprising to you, But as someone who
Speaker 1: completely missed Fortnite, didn't play it at all, and played
Speaker 1: a lot of PUBG to me, it still feels kind
Speaker 1: of novel to see the map evolving in all the
Speaker 1: ways it does. That being said, like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: it's still battle Royale. I can only do a couple
Speaker 1: of rounds and then I'm done because I'm Battle Royaled out.
Speaker 2: Mm hmm, oh yeah, no, I.
Speaker 4: Mean it wasn't I like a lot, but I have
Speaker 4: to be in a very specific frame of mind for it,
Speaker 4: because I'm not very and it can be super discouraging.
Speaker 4: So I don't know, give me a Watchman.
Speaker 5: Win I bring it to the next gen, right, that
Speaker 5: would be the one. Uh well, anyway, I.
Speaker 1: Think that that covers what we've been playing. So move
Speaker 1: on to the topics. All right, first big topic this.
Speaker 5: Week is cyberpunk Crunch, and no, that is not a serial. Unfortunately.
Speaker 3: I thought that joke and I was like, I'm going
Speaker 3: to say that stole it.
Speaker 1: I was gonna put it on like our social thumbnail,
Speaker 1: but I was like, I don't know if that's the
Speaker 1: best joke to make just on Twitter.
Speaker 5: I feel like people.
Speaker 4: Wouldn't give me eyepatch and hirate hat.
Speaker 3: There you go.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you've got to leave at least a day before
Speaker 2: you start making light of it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, but anyway.
Speaker 1: The story came from a Bloomberg article in CD project
Speaker 1: read enforces a six day work week leading up until launch.
Speaker 5: Lucy, do you want to read the quote?
Speaker 4: Yeah? So, Adam Badowski tweet out, these last six weeks
Speaker 4: are our final sprint on a project. We've all spent
Speaker 4: much of our lives on something we care for deeply.
Speaker 4: The majority of the team understands that push, especially in
Speaker 4: light of the fact that we've just sent the game
Speaker 4: to seart and every day brings us visibly closer to
Speaker 4: shipping a game we want to be proud of. This
Speaker 4: is one of the hardest decisions I've had to make,
Speaker 4: but everyone is well compensated for every hour they put in,
Speaker 4: and like in recent years, ten percent of the annual
Speaker 4: profit our company generates in twenty twenty will be split
Speaker 4: directly among the team. Ooh, I you know what, the
Speaker 4: first time Cyberpunk Moved, I was like, I don't think
Speaker 4: that game's coming this year. Like, honestly, I just it
Speaker 4: just feels like such a huge, ambitious game that I
Speaker 4: was genuinely, genuinely thought it would be pushed to next year.
Speaker 4: So I'm not saying that I could see this coming,
Speaker 4: but it's like, I don't know, you could kind of
Speaker 4: see it, But also like the challenges with working from
Speaker 4: home obviously, but it's not ideal and I'm while I'm
Speaker 4: glad the studio is compensating, like I don't know, the
Speaker 4: minetary compensation is not the same as your health and
Speaker 4: stress and all that stuff, and So that's the kind
Speaker 4: of stuff that I really would like to get more
Speaker 4: clarification on.
Speaker 6: Yeah, the thing is like the whole point, the thing
Speaker 6: that makes this a difficult conversation or the thing that
Speaker 6: makes this more of a if it regardless, any sort
Speaker 6: of crunch practice is news because people want to report
Speaker 6: it and people want to shine a light on it.
Speaker 6: But what makes this one extra, like sting, a little extra,
Speaker 6: is that they specifically took the time before to say
Speaker 6: that we're going to avoid this, and they made a
Speaker 6: big deal of saying that they're already working, they're already
Speaker 6: committing to the idea that they won't be crunched on
Speaker 6: this because they never addressed it back in the day.
Speaker 6: But the Witcher three was a project that they crunched
Speaker 6: on pretty hard to get it to where it needed
Speaker 6: to be, and the results of that are obvious one
Speaker 6: of the best games ever created. But in light of that,
Speaker 6: they did interviews I think it was Shreyer, and they said, like,
Speaker 6: when we're already committed to this not happening, we're going
Speaker 6: to make sure that it's you know, do we're going
Speaker 6: to you know, we're going to have that healthy work
Speaker 6: life balance and people aren't like in that crunch period.
Speaker 6: And then the time since, especially this year, they've started
Speaker 6: to they started to like ease off on that and
Speaker 6: started to talk about, you know, sometimes is unavoidable. I
Speaker 6: don't think it's the the idea. I think the idea
Speaker 6: of them saying we're going to pay everyone is fine.
Speaker 6: You know, that's required by Polish law, like labor laws
Speaker 6: in Poland require you to pay people for overtime. So
Speaker 6: it's not like they're doing anything major there. They're doing
Speaker 6: the baseline where they pay the people for working the
Speaker 6: extra time. I think the bigger issue is like it
Speaker 6: sets it sends the message that creating a game, or
Speaker 6: it perpetuates the idea that games cannot be created to
Speaker 6: completion without crunch. Because we have the studio who's making
Speaker 6: this huge game, it's said by all intentsive purposes that
Speaker 6: it's going to avoid crunch. And after having said that,
Speaker 6: it's still ended up in a period where there is crunch,
Speaker 6: and there has been according to reports for a sig
Speaker 6: a con period of time, like people have been crunching
Speaker 6: for a year, perhaps even longer. And the message that
Speaker 6: sends is to people is like you can't make a
Speaker 6: game without this crunch period, which isn't the case. There
Speaker 6: are people and there are developers that manage to do
Speaker 6: it without crunch, and perhaps the scale of the game
Speaker 6: is different, the demands on them are different. But I
Speaker 6: think this should be the reason why people are so
Speaker 6: up in arms and like very vocal about this being
Speaker 6: a negative thing. Is it needs to be driven into
Speaker 6: developers and publishers that they need to factor into their
Speaker 6: release dates and their kind of timelines, that the game
Speaker 6: needs to be made without resorting to this kind of culture,
Speaker 6: because you know, crunch isn't like, oh, we're going to
Speaker 6: make you work an extra day. It's a sustained lifestyle
Speaker 6: where you're forced to think and behave in ways that,
Speaker 6: over a prolonged period will degrade you, regardless of how
Speaker 6: much you're getting paid on a day to day basis
Speaker 6: for that work. I think that's the reason why people
Speaker 6: are upset about it. It's the idea that it's it feels,
Speaker 6: it's the it's the preposition that games being made in
Speaker 6: this way are impossible without that intense crunch period at
Speaker 6: the end, which I think shining a spotlight on it
Speaker 6: in this way and pointing out the hypocrisy of saying
Speaker 6: you're not going to do it and then doing it
Speaker 6: is a step in trying to resolve or at least
Speaker 6: get improve the situation around a little better. Again, like
Speaker 6: from the from the for their part, it seems like
Speaker 6: they have made an attempt at avoiding it and the
Speaker 6: game got delayed what twice, and so it's clear that
Speaker 6: they tried to make it, you know, make the game
Speaker 6: and get completed without resorting to it, and ultimately it
Speaker 6: ended up this way.
Speaker 2: But that's not that's not that's not a.
Speaker 6: Way to excuse it. You can't excuse it because of that.
Speaker 6: If your ambitions are to create the greatest game of
Speaker 6: all time, that it's like massive cyberpunk RPG, keep in
Speaker 6: mind that the people are still there making it and
Speaker 6: that you need to make sure that you're not killing
Speaker 6: them and burning them out.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, do you think that, you know, do
Speaker 1: you think part of this could be because of the
Speaker 1: coronavirus people are working from home? Like obviously that's going
Speaker 1: to make things a lot more difficult.
Speaker 5: Maybe they maybe.
Speaker 1: The reason they delayed it was to not have crunch,
Speaker 1: you know, But they're at this point where like they
Speaker 1: can't delay it again right, like like the like, I'd
Speaker 1: rather have them delay it than have the game out now,
Speaker 1: but fans would.
Speaker 5: Be up in arms.
Speaker 1: They'd be super mad because they've been waiting for this
Speaker 1: game for so long.
Speaker 5: It was supposed to.
Speaker 1: Come out, you know, way back in April, which to
Speaker 1: me sounds absurd now even thinking about it, right, like
Speaker 1: the fact that they thought they'd hit April seems kind
Speaker 1: of ridiculous. And even having played it, what back in.
Speaker 5: When did we play it some more June July?
Speaker 1: It was it was so buggy, Like I obviously very
Speaker 1: excited for that game, but I remember playing that and
Speaker 1: being like, oh, there is a lot of work that
Speaker 1: still needs to be done and I and I think
Speaker 1: they ended up delaying it. That was around the time
Speaker 1: they delayed it, which made sense because I was like, yeah,
Speaker 1: probably needs that extra time. Uh, but like I don't know, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's so tricky. It's a it's a bummer that they've
Speaker 1: they've done this though, because like you're saying, after they
Speaker 1: said that, hey, we aren't gonna do this, we are
Speaker 1: going to try our best to avoid this, and then
Speaker 1: ultimately it came down to them asking their people to work,
Speaker 1: you know, an extra day every week. I feel like
Speaker 1: that just sets a bad precedent and like empowers other
Speaker 1: studios who who also engage in that practice and don't
Speaker 1: live in places like Poland where they are required by
Speaker 1: law to pay people, you know, Like I yeah, it's
Speaker 1: just like they could have been that like shining example
Speaker 1: to the to the rest of the industry of like
Speaker 1: this is how you can do it, and like they
Speaker 1: unfortunately were not.
Speaker 3: Able to do that, and like that really sucks.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean it's difficult too, right because you hear
Speaker 1: about like you Besoft as of late apparently has been
Speaker 1: doing pretty well about not enforcing crunch on their workers,
Speaker 1: at least.
Speaker 5: Based on what I've heard.
Speaker 1: Uh, I was gonna say something spicy, you can say it.
Speaker 6: But myself has been doing other things that require exactly
Speaker 6: it's been doing.
Speaker 4: Some other thing doing for a change.
Speaker 1: But you know, they haven't been enforcing crunch this much,
Speaker 1: at least as far as we know. And a lot
Speaker 1: of their games do come out buggy and messy, and
Speaker 1: they just get like lambasted by the public and fans
Speaker 1: and whatnot because their games are buggy, and like you
Speaker 1: kind of have to sit back and think, like you know,
Speaker 1: maybe these games have issues. Maybe the issues arise because
Speaker 1: they're not crunching, they're they're they're staff members to get
Speaker 1: this done. But then you know, you've got CD, Project
Speaker 1: Red or rock Star for example. That's that gets praised
Speaker 1: for these like very polished. I don't know if i'd
Speaker 1: call the Witch are three very polished came out, But
Speaker 1: you know what I'm trying to say, games, Yeah, these
Speaker 1: huge games that are like polished as much as they
Speaker 1: can be in that situation. But it's like, Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's good, but to get there, there was most likely
Speaker 1: a lot of crunch involved.
Speaker 8: I feel like that that does create this weird like uh.
Speaker 3: Falsehood of like it.
Speaker 8: That's like the the binary add like way it can
Speaker 8: work is like either we crunch and the game comes
Speaker 8: out good, or we don't crunch it comes out buggy.
Speaker 8: And I feel like there just maybe needs to be
Speaker 8: like larger structural changes and the way games are like developed,
Speaker 8: or like the way games are are managed. Like I
Speaker 8: think there's just so many other and I'm not a
Speaker 8: game a developer, so don't I don't know the inner
Speaker 8: workings of games. I know every game.
Speaker 3: Developer does it differently.
Speaker 8: But I think like there there's there's definitely got to
Speaker 8: be like other things you can look at and the
Speaker 8: way these studios are developing games that can like you know,
Speaker 8: create a better working environment, but also not have your
Speaker 8: game be out in a buggy mess like, I don't
Speaker 8: think it needs to be this binary thing that I
Speaker 8: think some people kind of like think of it as agreed.
Speaker 5: Well.
Speaker 1: The next big thing, which also caused some, god, I
Speaker 1: don't know, some negative reactions was that Peter Parker's face
Speaker 1: looks different in this Spider Man PUS remaster, which is
Speaker 1: kind of a weird story. I've seen a lot of
Speaker 1: people be like you, oh, it's cause they're trying to
Speaker 1: make them look like Marvel's Spider Man or Disney's Marvel
Speaker 1: spider Man, not Sony's Spider Man from like the Andrew
Speaker 1: Garfield Spider Man.
Speaker 5: But I think it's just because they wanted to make
Speaker 5: something that looked more like Uri Loenthal, the voice actor.
Speaker 3: It's a it's a tech thing. So the way they
Speaker 3: explained it was.
Speaker 8: Basically too because of motion capture, you have to have
Speaker 8: your face model like somewhat like match the facial structure
Speaker 8: of whoever's doing the mocap so that they can like
Speaker 8: get better mocap. And I guess the new tech they've
Speaker 8: been introducing for like Miles Morales and the other Spider
Speaker 8: Man games, the old face model like just was not
Speaker 8: up to par with Uri Lowenthal's uh like mo caap.
Speaker 8: So it's just I guess it didn't work right, and
Speaker 8: so they were like, Yep, we got to kind of
Speaker 8: get a new face model that like matched your Lowenthal's
Speaker 8: bone structure better, essentially is what they were saying.
Speaker 1: But like, well, why change it in the PUS five
Speaker 1: version because it's the same game, right, They're not using
Speaker 1: new tech game maybe just to test it out. It
Speaker 1: just seems kind of strange.
Speaker 8: I mean, presumably he'll show up in Miles Morales and
Speaker 8: you'll probably have that new face, and maybe they wanted
Speaker 8: to like sink the two up and kind of.
Speaker 3: Like re establish the whole thing. I get it. It's
Speaker 3: I prefer the old Peter's face.
Speaker 8: I'm not gonna lie, but like I totally understand it
Speaker 8: from like a technical standpoint, like he just looks a
Speaker 8: little bit younger. I think it's the only thing I
Speaker 8: don't like about it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, Yeah, it's that a lot of the complaints have
Speaker 4: been Honestly, you couldn't pay me to care about this,
Speaker 4: Like it's a different face, and they talked about it,
Speaker 4: explained it.
Speaker 5: I just.
Speaker 4: I don't understand the uproar, and like maybe that's just
Speaker 4: me just kind of being I don't know, I think
Speaker 4: there's more important things in the world.
Speaker 5: Character.
Speaker 3: Yeah, let's talk about the puddles again.
Speaker 5: Or Sam Raimi Spider Man suit.
Speaker 4: I feel bad for like the guy who originally did
Speaker 4: the facial capture, but at the same time, he will
Speaker 4: have you know, he's still in that game, believe in
Speaker 4: the original version. This is just a different look at
Speaker 4: This is me really stretching to try and care about it.
Speaker 4: I'm sorry, I'm tired. I like, yeah, it's interesting, like
Speaker 4: to understand the reasoning behind it, and I think you're
Speaker 4: right that it's probably because he is going to be
Speaker 4: in Miles Morales and they just maybe they couldn't get
Speaker 4: the old actor, but like or they just decided to,
Speaker 4: you know, go with this new guy because of the
Speaker 4: similarities between him and Uri Good.
Speaker 6: I just wish that we lived in a world where,
Speaker 6: you know, us as a society were a little more
Speaker 6: prepared for our superheroes to have different faces in different versions.
Speaker 6: If only there was a way that we could have
Speaker 6: been prepared for that, if only, you know, it would
Speaker 6: have been like maybe if there was like movies where
Speaker 6: different Spider Man showed up and they had like different actors,
Speaker 6: and you know, they weren't always the same actor. Perhaps
Speaker 6: you know, Marvel made one and then you know Fox
Speaker 6: made one, or like Sony made one and they had
Speaker 6: to use different actors. If that was the case, then
Speaker 6: maybe it would be easier pill to swallow, to have
Speaker 6: a two different faces of Spider Man. But of course
Speaker 6: we don't live in that world.
Speaker 2: Grow up, everyone grow up.
Speaker 4: But I kind of if you're a type of person
Speaker 4: who gets so worked up over something like that that
Speaker 4: they harassed developers and all that shit, it's like, yeah,
Speaker 4: you need to have.
Speaker 8: Yeah, everyone will get used to it. Everyone will forget
Speaker 8: about it. They did the same thing with Infamous. They
Speaker 8: changed they changed Call's face in between one and two,
Speaker 8: and everyone was complaining about and blah blah blah, and
Speaker 8: after that game came out, no one cared.
Speaker 3: It's gonna be the same thing.
Speaker 6: To be clear, we're speaking to a specific type of
Speaker 6: person that is out there like outrage machining it up.
Speaker 6: Most people have been like I've seen a lot of
Speaker 6: people be like I don't really like the new face
Speaker 6: and then just move on, yeah, and express their opinions
Speaker 6: in a very reasonable way. But then you get some
Speaker 6: people who are like Pitchforks ready trying to like harass developers,
Speaker 6: and it's like, what you're talking about, man, Relax, You're
Speaker 6: getting a different face. Like how much he puts a
Speaker 6: mask over his face for ninety that game, that's this
Speaker 6: whole stick.
Speaker 3: They did that.
Speaker 8: They're gonna go back and like undo all that work, Like, no,
Speaker 8: what is it?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 4: I so Brian Intahar from Insomniac. First of all, it
Speaker 4: looks like Brian wrote something on his PC and then
Speaker 4: took a picture with his phone. Brian, we're gonna have
Speaker 4: some words about that. I don't know you. I think
Speaker 4: I met you once.
Speaker 3: But windows shift shift.
Speaker 4: But like some of these, some of these tweets, I'm sorry,
Speaker 4: but I find this explanation hard to believe when it's
Speaker 4: unmistakable and undeniable that Peter has not only been made
Speaker 4: to look several years younger, but in priority with parity, parity,
Speaker 4: parity with Tom Holland, whom I feel is the worst
Speaker 4: iteration of Spider yet. This is incredibly disappointing.
Speaker 3: It's just wrong.
Speaker 4: But also this this guy has like said, Oh, it's
Speaker 4: also disappointing because the PS four owners won't get this
Speaker 4: as a free upgrade, So it feels like maybe it's
Speaker 4: just like an extension of that.
Speaker 2: That's a very good point.
Speaker 6: Like it's a lot of there's a lot of ancillary
Speaker 6: things happening with that game that have built up frustrations,
Speaker 6: specifically around like upgrade, paid, upgrade, cross saves, that kind
Speaker 6: of stuff, And this just feels like a way, This
Speaker 6: feels like a simple thing to channel that rage out
Speaker 6: because there's a lot to unpack with all those other things.
Speaker 6: But like anime Avatar, Twitter users are out in force
Speaker 6: right now just giving people shit, And like the most
Speaker 6: annoying thing is this presumption that people have that they
Speaker 6: understand how game development works.
Speaker 3: Like, ah, that.
Speaker 6: Doesn't seem like it was. You know, it's easy to
Speaker 6: change it back, and it's like, shut up, you ain't
Speaker 6: got a clue what you're talking about.
Speaker 8: Somewhat related, John Linniman of Digital Foundry made a tweet
Speaker 8: he was just talking about how good the ratracing looks
Speaker 8: in like the screenshots they showed, and then like somebody
Speaker 8: responded to him being like, actually, that's not retracing, that's
Speaker 8: like SSA and you don't know what you're talking about.
Speaker 8: And I'm like, you're gonna tell the Digital Foundry guy
Speaker 8: that he doesn't know what he's talking about. Random guy
Speaker 8: on Twitter, Okay, Like, I mean I get the people who.
Speaker 4: Are kind of upset on behalf of the original actor.
Speaker 4: Has he said anything about it, like I didn't one
Speaker 4: of the outrage Like just I'm just looking to like
Speaker 4: the replies to Brian's tweet, and it's all just people
Speaker 4: being mad because they look he looks younger. And he
Speaker 4: didn't even.
Speaker 8: Do the mo cap. It was Yary who did the
Speaker 8: mo cap, so he would have just came in that
Speaker 8: one literally did the face for the face. It's like
Speaker 8: everyone get mad at Yeah, it's like he did it
Speaker 8: like years ago.
Speaker 3: He probably doesn't even remember. Who knows.
Speaker 4: The problem isn't change itself. It's the Peter now looks
Speaker 4: younger than Miles, which doesn't really work for the whole
Speaker 4: bin doing this for years going to be your mental
Speaker 4: our role he's filling in the story. I don't buy
Speaker 4: a baby face like that. Having been spidy for that long.
Speaker 2: What are you talking about?
Speaker 6: Oh my god, I've been reading Spider Man and watching
Speaker 6: Spider Man since I was a kid, And do you
Speaker 6: know how many times his face has changed over the years, And.
Speaker 2: I can't even count. Do you know how many times
Speaker 2: they upset me? Zero? Zero?
Speaker 3: Grow up? All right, Jake, let's move on from this.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we probably should. I one thing I will say
Speaker 1: is we weren't going to mention the debate, but after
Speaker 1: the debate last night, I have to tell you, when
Speaker 1: I saw people mad about Spider Man, I was like,
Speaker 1: this is literally the last thing I could possibly care
Speaker 1: about at this moment in time. Like that's a will
Speaker 1: say regarding the debate, but honestly, like, who gives a shit?
Speaker 4: Oh I'm sorry. I saw someone say I hope this
Speaker 4: change is like Sonic did. There's your fucking terrible precedent.
Speaker 2: That is not what I mean.
Speaker 4: Yeah, they changed Sonic for the Bear, but like.
Speaker 6: But like, gread up on what work went into doing that,
Speaker 6: because it was crunch, it was.
Speaker 4: Cross and then that whole studio got the whole studio
Speaker 4: got shut down, and like a. All those people go
Speaker 4: legoh so no.
Speaker 5: Anyway, let's move on to listener questions, shall we?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Go on then, all right, first question here is from
Speaker 1: Jeremy Biff on Discord. But if you've got any questions
Speaker 1: for us, you can email us at after Dark podcast
Speaker 1: at GameSpot dot com, or you can join a discord
Speaker 1: by dming one of us on Twitter and we'll get
Speaker 1: you right in there. There's a whole channel in there
Speaker 1: for you to ask your questions. We pull most of
Speaker 1: them right from there, and the first one is from
Speaker 1: Jeremy Biff on Discord. They say, Hey, I listened to
Speaker 1: all the episodes of the podcast.
Speaker 5: I listened to Oh man, what am I doing?
Speaker 4: My beers?
Speaker 3: Have you had Jake one?
Speaker 5: Very light beer?
Speaker 2: Sounds like you're biffinite.
Speaker 5: I'm biffinite.
Speaker 1: Hey, I listened to all the episodes of the podcast
Speaker 1: last week. What's your favorite alcohol and non alcoholic drink?
Speaker 1: Keep up the good work to more?
Speaker 5: Do you want to start?
Speaker 1: Because I imagine you're just gonna have a non alcoholic
Speaker 1: drink for us?
Speaker 2: I do. Yeah. I don't drink, so I'm a huge
Speaker 2: tea drinker.
Speaker 6: I have multiple cups of tea per day because I
Speaker 6: have the like elite tea addict combination of being English
Speaker 6: and Pakistani. So that's basically like those are our two
Speaker 6: national drinks. But in terms of other beverages, I really
Speaker 6: like ginger beer. It's my favorite drink that you have
Speaker 6: ginger ale here more than ginger beer. And that's a
Speaker 6: very different drink that I'm not into, but I will
Speaker 6: drink it if that's the only option, but ginger beer
Speaker 6: is probably my favorite one. There's also a drink I
Speaker 6: don't know if it's like worldwide, but Lucy will know
Speaker 6: it called Copperberg, which is actually an alcoholic drink, but
Speaker 6: they do a non alcoholic variety of it which is
Speaker 6: really really good. It's like different fruit blends that are
Speaker 6: like carbonated, and I have not found an equivalent here,
Speaker 6: like high end. You know how people take beer really
Speaker 6: seriously here with like craft beers. Copperberg felt like a
Speaker 6: cross of soft drink and there's no like alternative of
Speaker 6: it here as far as I've found.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's in the UK. It's a cider, the Kiwian
Speaker 4: lime one a's elip that's very good.
Speaker 2: Forest fruits was the one I always liked.
Speaker 1: I mean, for me, like, I guess if we're just
Speaker 1: starting with non alcoholic, like a nice glass of orange juice,
Speaker 1: like fresh squeezed orange juice.
Speaker 4: Is bits or no bits, sorry, pulp or no pulp?
Speaker 1: Pulp, Yeah, I gotta have pulp, fresh squeeze, gotta have pulp.
Speaker 4: I don't want to drink, you know.
Speaker 2: I mean, yeah, I've I've heard that people I have.
Speaker 6: I've heard people, you know, drinking pulp and and like
Speaker 6: making them throw up.
Speaker 2: But I don't think that's the case. I think that's
Speaker 2: pulp fiction.
Speaker 5: Oh my, well, that's what we're calling this episode.
Speaker 1: I mean, you can filter out the pulp, it's still
Speaker 1: gonna taste really good. But like fresh squeezed orange juice
Speaker 1: is is the word it's at like and it's crazy,
Speaker 1: how much better? Well, I guess it's not that crazy,
Speaker 1: But like the difference between fresh squeezed orange juice and
Speaker 1: just you know, store bought orange juice is a night
Speaker 1: and day like tropicana orange juice is disgusting.
Speaker 5: But fresh squeezed, that's it.
Speaker 3: That's the one.
Speaker 4: What's about what about alcoholic?
Speaker 5: I mean, I'll drink any beer, honestly, I.
Speaker 1: Have the off the one that you have the hat
Speaker 1: of Oh yeah, Topa Topa that's like a local brewery
Speaker 1: that's very good from my hometown, which I enjoy.
Speaker 4: We were trying to get sponsored by four point at one.
Speaker 1: Point, what is point is my favorite?
Speaker 5: In fact, I'm drinking four point right now.
Speaker 4: The sketchy look off to camera doesn't work when.
Speaker 2: No one can see it.
Speaker 1: It's fine, Yeah, if you're if you're into beer, this
Speaker 1: is a plug for one Dave Jewett on our team.
Speaker 6: He does like live streams on Twitch, which is part
Speaker 6: gaming stream and part beer stream. So if you're like, yeah,
Speaker 6: if you're looking to see like what different beers tastes
Speaker 6: like and get reviews, he's the man to go to
Speaker 6: find him at irregular Dave on Twitter.
Speaker 1: He finds some weird ones too. Like I tuned in
Speaker 1: he was like drinking a blueberry beer and yeah, It's
Speaker 1: like that sounds it sounds like something i'd want to taste.
Speaker 5: I don't know if i'd want it, but it sounds
Speaker 5: like something I want to taste.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm trying to think what mine would be. Hmm.
Speaker 4: I am always weak for a diet coke, but I
Speaker 4: do think the the diet Doctor Pepper is an elite drink.
Speaker 4: It's very very good in terms of alcoholic drink. I
Speaker 4: am a basic bitch and I love White Claw. I
Speaker 4: drink a lot of white Claw. Lime is my favorite.
Speaker 4: But I also enjoy like a nice and nice peanot,
Speaker 4: a nice red or actually any gin based cocktail that
Speaker 4: has like you cover in it. I'm a Suckerphone.
Speaker 6: You are a big DC person as well in the UK,
Speaker 6: but it seems like you shifted over to Diet Doctor Pepper.
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, because it was twenty five cents off. But
Speaker 4: DC's over here. Diet cokes tastes different.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've learned this very.
Speaker 4: Slowly, so not as big a fan over here.
Speaker 2: Oh there's a sorry.
Speaker 6: There's a brand in in the UK called Rubicon, and
Speaker 6: they do a mango flavored drink, a passionate food fruit
Speaker 6: flavored drink, and a light flavorite favored carbonated drink and
Speaker 6: they are s rank so good.
Speaker 4: A sorry. Before I was John in a testament to
Speaker 4: just how much I like White Claw and your Goldfarb
Speaker 4: friend of the show message to say some big personal news,
Speaker 4: and he got a different variety pack of White Claw
Speaker 4: and just said it's got some new flavors. I haven't tried.
Speaker 1: Yet, so I still never had a white claw. I
Speaker 1: feel like I should have it at some point.
Speaker 4: You should like it's it's totally fine and it gets
Speaker 4: gets you where you need to go.
Speaker 1: This isn't just like Lacroix with some alcohol, Like I
Speaker 1: like Lacroix a lot, so I'm sure i'd like it.
Speaker 1: One thing I forgot to shut out is uh ishbiki
Speaker 1: hubikie whiskey with like one solid ice cube.
Speaker 5: Just one ice.
Speaker 1: Cube is perfect, Like there's Japanese mate, Like Japanese whiskey
Speaker 1: is so good if you.
Speaker 8: Get your hands on that, like thirty thirty aged hibiki.
Speaker 1: Oh man, Yeah, Peter Peter soaked me up before. He's
Speaker 1: the person to talk to, Sean Luke, how about you?
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 8: For regular drinks, I would go with either some fresh lemonade.
Speaker 8: I love making homemade lemonade is uh because you can
Speaker 8: control the amount of because I feel like you get
Speaker 8: store lemonade and it's like it's never correct, like the
Speaker 8: amount of sweetness versus like you know, tartness you wants,
Speaker 8: like you can really control it when you make at home.
Speaker 3: It's really good.
Speaker 8: For beer, my favorite that comes to mind would probably
Speaker 8: be a double ipa called Hetty Topper, which is from
Speaker 8: my hometown.
Speaker 3: My hometown is like.
Speaker 8: Big On Craft Brewery, and back when I was in
Speaker 8: college that was like the best beer in the state
Speaker 8: at the time. I'm sure if I go back now,
Speaker 8: everyone will tell me I'm a scrub and like Hetty Toppers,
Speaker 8: like old hat and they're all drinking like Trile Triple
Speaker 8: Sunshine now.
Speaker 3: Or something like that. But Heady Topper, Hedy Topper is
Speaker 3: pretty good.
Speaker 5: Nice, all right? Next question here, Lucy, do you want
Speaker 5: to read this one from Carbon? Sure?
Speaker 4: So Carbon and the discord. I have a little bit
Speaker 4: of a dilemma. So currently I have a PS four
Speaker 4: Pro and a switch light with a messed up micro
Speaker 4: SD card reader, and I want to get a PC,
Speaker 4: but I also want and you switch. And also I
Speaker 4: have a lot of friends who have Xboxes, and I
Speaker 4: want to get an Xbox because of that. But I
Speaker 4: only have like thirteen hundred dollars. So should I put
Speaker 4: the money and get a PC or get a cheaper
Speaker 4: PC and get a series S or switch or get
Speaker 4: all three and get a cheaper PC and you switch
Speaker 4: and do the financing for xbox.
Speaker 2: Hmm, there's a lot going on there.
Speaker 1: There's a lot going so I should point out that
Speaker 1: I think in a follow up there was a whole
Speaker 1: conversation of people in discord giving them suggests or giving
Speaker 1: them suggestions and whatnot, and I think they may have.
Speaker 5: Fixed their their switch, SD card or something.
Speaker 3: Sorry, Okay, So.
Speaker 5: Yeah, there's a lot to follow here.
Speaker 1: There's even more to follow when you, you know, look
Speaker 1: at the whole conversation. But I figure we can just
Speaker 1: kind of like just go from that, like PC, Like
Speaker 1: with thirteen hundred dollars, what would you.
Speaker 8: Do if they're only worrying about the piece or about
Speaker 8: the Xbox for playing with friends, I would recommend getting
Speaker 8: the PC because a lot of games between PC and
Speaker 8: Xbox now have cross play.
Speaker 2: Yep.
Speaker 8: So assuming you're not like I guess, I don't know
Speaker 8: what games specifically are playing, but if it's definitely first party,
Speaker 8: they'll be set. And I would say at this point,
Speaker 8: most major things, it's like Call of Duty, war Zone
Speaker 8: that's all cross play. So I would say that I'd
Speaker 8: go PC over the Xbox.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean, like you can definitely do the financing
Speaker 4: for Xbox and then you would get the So hang,
Speaker 4: I'm trying to see what's the justification carbon for wanting
Speaker 4: to get a PC if everyone's on Xbox anyway, Like
Speaker 4: do you need PC for work or school or just
Speaker 4: like some PC games? That's a good point, Like I think,
Speaker 4: I mean, getting a PC is probably the safe bet
Speaker 4: because there's so much cross platform play. If you have
Speaker 4: game Pass Ultimate, then you're laughing.
Speaker 6: Here's the thing, though, I think the smart thing to
Speaker 6: do is it would be get a piece because you
Speaker 6: are in the Microsoft ecosystem then, and that's where and
Speaker 6: it's fully connected to most other xboxes. The issue you
Speaker 6: have is and like everyone can speak to this, but
Speaker 6: getting a cheaper PC might not be the right play here,
Speaker 6: even though it's smarter to do so. But it could
Speaker 6: mean that the shelf life on it is lower since
Speaker 6: you're buying lower powered parts. And if gaming on PC
Speaker 6: changes in a significant way, which is likely to do
Speaker 6: because that's what usually happens, you might find that your
Speaker 6: PC's kind of left behind very quick quickly. Whereas once
Speaker 6: you buy a console, there's very little going to change
Speaker 6: in that architecture over time.
Speaker 2: And also it's a closed.
Speaker 6: System, so there's less likely to be major kind of
Speaker 6: degradation or faults with it in that Microsoft or you
Speaker 6: know whatever platform holder or a retailer won't be able
Speaker 6: to take care of PCs have a way of constantly
Speaker 6: screwing up, and once you've purchased the parts and put
Speaker 6: it together, it's kind of on you to figure that
Speaker 6: stuff out.
Speaker 2: So like if it was if it was if.
Speaker 6: You were saying, I'm going to spend the money to
Speaker 6: get a thirty eight top of the range PC, then
Speaker 6: I would say do that because you're good for this
Speaker 6: generation then and like you can spread out upgrades a
Speaker 6: little more evenly. But if you're buying a mid to
Speaker 6: like low mid tier, then I would probably say get
Speaker 6: the console, maybe even splash out on a Series X,
Speaker 6: because then you're good for a while and you know
Speaker 6: that there's very little going to change in the hardware
Speaker 6: architecture and the world around it that will push you.
Speaker 2: Out of playing the games exactly the way you want
Speaker 2: to play them.
Speaker 5: That was pretty good. I don't have much money added that.
Speaker 1: I think, like kind of to Lucy's point is that
Speaker 1: it is I definitely consider too write if you're not
Speaker 1: going to use this just for games, Like if you
Speaker 1: have school or work and you need a PC, then
Speaker 1: obviously I would prioritize the PC.
Speaker 5: But yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think I like what Tomorrow was saying too about
Speaker 1: financing an Xbox Series X, because then you don't need
Speaker 1: your spending less, you don't need to worry about upgrading
Speaker 1: your PC, or you don't need to worry about all
Speaker 1: these issues that may come from a PC. So I'd
Speaker 1: say that's a good bet, especially if you've got friends
Speaker 1: there too. Like the big reason I play on Xbox
Speaker 1: is in PCs because I've got friends there. So you know,
Speaker 1: that's always my priority when it comes to buying these
Speaker 1: new consoles is where where are my friend's going to be?
Speaker 1: I'm my friends at but now I got friends on
Speaker 1: every platform.
Speaker 5: It doesn't matter.
Speaker 4: Look at you.
Speaker 2: I don't go, I don't go friends, family, all.
Speaker 5: Right, show me up anyway.
Speaker 1: That's been episode sixty one of GameSpot after Dark. Thank
Speaker 1: you all so much for joining me, and thank you
Speaker 1: for listening. If you've got any questions, you can email
Speaker 1: us at after Dark Podcasts at GameSpot dot com, or
Speaker 1: you can join our discord server by dming any one
Speaker 1: of us on Twitter and we'll get you right in there.
Speaker 1: There's a lot more that goes on in there than
Speaker 1: just questions.
Speaker 5: For the show. Lots of good conversations.
Speaker 2: Sounds like a vague threat about joining a cult.
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe that's what it is, but please reach out.
Speaker 1: We'd love to have you there and with that, where
Speaker 1: can people find you?
Speaker 4: Lucy, I'll be branding people with the initials GSA D
Speaker 4: the nexim rules in our discord Now I'm on Twitter
Speaker 4: at Lucy James Games. This week on Generation Next, we've
Speaker 4: got Michael Hyam who has an Xbox Series X, a
Speaker 4: real one, on the show, answering questions that will put
Speaker 4: to him. That we call that for last week. So
Speaker 4: if you had burning questions about the series X, I
Speaker 4: just want to get like another cool info dump and
Speaker 4: watch a man lick a console. Then that is up right?
Speaker 5: How you get clout the console?
Speaker 4: Hey, yeah, I love the fact that Xbox is Social
Speaker 4: media manager Josh Stein tweeted out, I can't believe I
Speaker 4: had to say this, but please don't lick your series.
Speaker 4: To be fair, it was the middle of the pandemic.
Speaker 4: But Michael did wipe it down before we did it,
Speaker 4: and I will wipe it down before he sends it back.
Speaker 5: Timorro how about you.
Speaker 6: You can find me serving flavor aid to all you
Speaker 6: find joiners of our discord.
Speaker 2: Nothing bad will happen after you drink it.
Speaker 4: Man, respect for using the correct powdered drink.
Speaker 2: Yep, yeap.
Speaker 1: Honestly, I'm thinking we should rebrand this Discord server, this whole.
Speaker 1: I think there's another avenue we can follow here.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and I'm on Twitter at timore h.
Speaker 8: How about you, Jean Luke, you can find me at
Speaker 8: john lei sip on Twitter. I don't have anything else
Speaker 8: going on, but yeah, go check out the discord server. Actually,
Speaker 8: we just updated the discord server. It's now a a
Speaker 8: community server, which I don't think actually will change anything
Speaker 8: on the users ends.
Speaker 3: I don't think they'll even notice.
Speaker 8: But that means we now have access to like cool
Speaker 8: extra tools that we can use to make the server better.
Speaker 3: So look forward to that soon.
Speaker 8: Oh and I'm I guess I'll probably talk about it
Speaker 8: in the coming weeks, but I am starting to plan
Speaker 8: for various events that come at the end of October
Speaker 8: beginning of November that we do every year, So look
Speaker 8: forward to that. That should be fun and exciting and
Speaker 8: not a total nightmare to plan remotely.
Speaker 1: That could be great, and you can find me at
Speaker 1: Jacob Deck and more cyberpunk stuff. Jess has a cyberpunk video,
Speaker 1: a lore video going up Saturday, all about the different
Speaker 1: districts in night City. The week after that, I'll be
Speaker 1: doing one on brain Dance, which is like the cyberpunk
Speaker 1: VR sort of deal, so keep a lookout for that.
Speaker 5: And those are the things that come to mind. Probably
Speaker 5: a bunch of reviews too.
Speaker 1: Star Wars, right, the Star Wars and Crash reviewer. Actually,
Speaker 1: the review may not be up yet because I think
Speaker 1: there's multiplayer that needs to be tested, but the Crash
Speaker 1: one should be up by now.
Speaker 3: There should be single player impressions, I believe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, single player impressions, yes. Anyway, yeah, Star Wars Crash
Speaker 1: check it out. We've got we've got impressions, reviews, all
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. But anyway, we'll see y'all next thing.
Speaker 3: Bye bye, right,