Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to side Quest. This is our weekly
video game show here at geek Verse. I'm your host,
Dylan Wilson. I have with me today to review Star
Wars Outlaws, the two biggest Star Wars fans that I
personally know. First up, the Dank Ferrick Taylor Field. How
are you doing, my friend?
Speaker 2: Doing good?
Speaker 3: I am happy to be here to talk Star Wars
with you and Travis.
Speaker 1: Yes, there is the clown Prince of Scoundrels. Travis. How
is it going at my friend?
Speaker 4: It's pretty good. It's been a busy, long weekend, but
I got as much time as possible without Laws, so
I'm excited to compare notes and talk about it.
Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yeah. As as you mentioned, this is Star Wars
Outlaws here. We have no other topics. We're all in
on Star Wars Outlaws tonight. I don't think I have
not beaten the game personally. I don't think I would
be surprised if you guys have rolled credits on it. Taylor,
I don't know. You're giving me a little smirk over there.
Speaker 2: No, okay, no, no, no, it's like, oh my god.
Speaker 1: I mean apparently the main story is not too long.
If you just kind of rush through it. But anyway,
we will kind of we're gonna start a very spoiler light.
We'll get more spoilery as things go along, but as
I just mentioned, we haven't beaten the game or the
main story at least at this point. So that's kind
of what to expect for today's episode, and we're just
gonna get right into it. Taylor Fields staring with you,
how much have you played? Roughly hours or well, maybe
I'll hold off on these spoiler stuff roughly hours and
what do you think of Star Wars Outlaws so far? Uh?
Speaker 3: I could not pinpoint how many hours I have played,
but I'm glad that we got to actually have it
a few days early, which we'll talk more about that
because that was fucking horrendous how they allowed us to
access it early.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I guess to break that down, essentially,
if you got like the premium edition of the game,
then you can play it a couple days early. However,
if you subscribe to you'd be self Play or Plus
or what the hell is called, and play the game
through there, you get access to that version of the game,
the premium edition, so you can have days early even
if you didn't pay any more money than like the
twenty dollars monthly fee of Ubi stuff. So yeah, it
was it was confusing, and I definitely threw you guys
off maybe a little bit there, because it's like, oh,
I don't think it's out until.
Speaker 4: There costs me a day, costs me a whole day, Travis.
Speaker 2: Gift fighting me on it was on your side. I
got the email. I'm like I was saying it.
Speaker 4: And I agreed with Dylan because like that would make
sense for the Ultimate Edition. But like, I'm used to.
Speaker 1: The game pass model where they like that's how they're
kind of getting their money. Is like you subscribed the
game pass to get to the game, but then you're
gonna pay, you know, for that extra edition content. That's
where you get the bonus stuff. So I'm surprised that
they dump all that in there for uh, for these games.
I wonder if they do that all the time, or
if Star Wars as an exception they want people to
get in there early. I'm not sure, but anyway, it
was kind of a weird situation.
Speaker 4: It was a weird scenario, and even the download situation,
the fact that it's not in the app that you
search into terrible app, terrible app all the way around. Weird.
Speaker 2: Yeah, almost as bad as Crave.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I don't know how many hours I've sunk
into the game, but I've been playing as much as
I can. And it's funny because like it'll be late
at night when I'm playing, and I'll play for like
an hour, it's like okay, at like fifteen minute power
and App and then like, okay, we're in for another
two hours, and like just trying to like get into
it and do as much as I can. But I'm
happy actually with where I've gone. I feel like I
actually made a pretty good dent in the story, and
I made a pretty good dent in the overall exploration. Now,
the first is not as non spoilers, the first planet
you start on after you beat basically.
Speaker 2: Like the prologue.
Speaker 3: I was really taken aback by how much you could
do on this planet, and so most of my time
was heavily invested on that planet. But once I finished,
kind of like for the most part of the main
story on there, obviously there's a lot of side stuff
to do. The next planet I hit, I was much
more streamlined, and it felt like it was it's a
lot more contained. It's not as open as that first
planet was, which I'm kind of thankful for because I
was able to complete everything main story wise related on
that second planet and then move to the next planet.
So I've done I've done a lot of the side
missions on the first planet. The second planet, I did
a bunch just to boost my reputation with the crime
syndicate there. But there's there's a few things that I
kind of dislike and a few things that I think, ma'am,
I don't want to have to wive out a guide
or a YouTube video, but fuck, I don't know what
I'm supposed to do in this situation. I had to
pull out a few videos and it was truly I
don't know, just kinda do I just say underwhelming? Maybe
underwhelming is the proper word for that, just like this
is where this thing is to allow me to progress further.
And I thought, that's really really unfortunate. Even in the prologue,
I thought, I don't know what I'm supposed to be
doing right now, Like there's no proper kind of direction
or guidance, and that's.
Speaker 2: A big con for me.
Speaker 3: And ultimately, like we'll talk more and more about it
just but in closing here for my initial thoughts, I
feel like the movement coming from a company that has
a big hand in Assassin's Creed titles, which are amazing games.
When it comes to movement, this game's movement, when it
comes to the climbing and the maneuvering really really bothers me.
It feels very blocky, I guess is the word. It's
not smooth, as you know. I'm looking at this new
Assassin's Creed Shadows game with the park Or mechanics and
it looks fucking smooth. This game, this is not smooth.
They should have been.
Speaker 2: She is not an ETS CEO, that is for sure.
Speaker 1: So okay, Travis, how about you? Do you have an
estimate of hours or I guess I like Taylor's metric there,
like there's that one kind of the main planet, the
first planet, and then it kind of opens up and
you can go to three separate planets. So I don't
know how far in the game are you roughly and
what are you thinking so far?
Speaker 4: I'm still in my first planet, I think, because for
the not the first time doing this more lately, but
I've I've I've done like a good ounce of side quests,
random stuff, and the main quests. I feel like I
think I could be somewhere in the ten to fifteen
hour mark, but not in the sense of because I
think the campaign is supposed to be like eighteen to twenty.
You could beat that, but I haven't really because I
think so far as like as I guess, it's a
con I don't think the stories anything to write a
home about right now, but I think that's part of
the game. I like it that when I'm doing the
side quest and law of the jobs or the reputation banners,
which we'll talk about, I feel like I'm kind of
creating my own story in a sense. So I think
it's pretty paint by numbers. The best way I described
this because I was talking to Kirkland about the game.
He thought, I like hated it. But for me, and
maybe this is I'm what I can say is I'm
heavily enjoying it. I like going in there. It's like
what you're talking about a couple of weeks ago with
mad Max or just last week. It was like just
the rotation of like I like going in there doing
a couple jobs, doing side quests, doing one main mission
and then I'm kind of done. I think it is
like Hogwarts Legacy, where there's times where I think it
was I did like a long play through and at
the end, I was like, I'm just like done, Like
I'm not even tired. I'm like, I'm done playing this
game right now, you know. So that's where I'd say
we're I'm having tons of fun with it, but it's
also like, oh, I can't put this down. It's like, okay,
for me, this has been good and like good like
three to four hour blocks and then I'm kind of
I've had my fill with it. But it's like the
best movie version of a game ever, like those straight
to movie games that they would make to like, oh,
we know Captain America's coming out, so here's a Captain
America game. I think it's like that. And this sounds
like a disrespectful thing. I don't mean it to be,
but I think the gameplay and some of the features
had that where it's very basic. It's just very okay,
check box, here you go. I think there's some things
about the skill track kind of like but then they
it's still skill tree. It's just the way I like
that they kind of parse it out to but I
think overall's kind of a basic game with the open
world agenda put on it, but it's kind of the
best version of that. I'm kind of surprised. I'm excited
to get to their planets. I feel like, even just
with this one planet, there's enough to do. It has
that classic Ubisoft Even then I was playing, I'm like, Okay,
you get this cool little menu, which I like of
how you can keep all the missions, and I love,
absolutely love, because that's one of my cons. I've been
playing well not o god, what is it Starfield again?
And the missions a side quest. It's all just a
big mess on there, right. I love the menu system here,
so it's like, oh, I'll do this job and this job.
But then, as you would think a Ubisoft game five
eight hours in, that builds up very quickly, and that
starts to become okay, this is a bit too much.
I think that's why I've almost slowed down, because I'm
trying to make it that that doesn't become egregious right now.
But I'm having a good time. I like the character
of k I like the small little you know, changes
you can do, attire gun stuff like that, So I think,
and the other thing is to say, like we're paying this,
We're all playing this as like a fifteen to twenty
dollars game. So I think it'd be a lot different
if I spend one hundred dollars on this, and maybe
I would come in more critically.
Speaker 1: I'd pay twenty. I don't know where you're where, you're
fifteen dollars.
Speaker 4: I think it's fifteen Americans, so I think I keep
I've seen the ads of that. But then with US
it's the conversions twenty. So that's what I'm saying for
American listeners, Yeah, fifteen US twenty. Don't know what you're
doing in the UK with your pounds over there. But
so for like twenty bucks, I'm having a great time.
This is like one of the best twenty dollars games
I've played in my life. If it was a full
price I could understand that. I could definitely wait. I
think it's like the Legacy too, I will say as
well for Hogwarts Legacy. I think this game does a
great job of capturing the feel of Star Wars when
you walk into a cantina, when you're seeing the speed
racers go, when you see the storm Troopers, even the music.
It's not perfect, but there's sometimes where it just feels
like that. There's one mission, a minor spoiler where you
had to like invade an empire base. I'm like, all
this feels like ripped out of the movies, corners, everything,
so it has that or I think that helps too.
If the game didn't feel like Star Wars, then if
it didn't feel like Stars and it was basic, why
am I playing? This is not nothing, but this is
like a great like bonus like simulator, and I actually
am really enjoying because I know some people are like, oh,
the first open world Star Wars game, you don't get
to be a je I like that. I like being
the scoundrel we'll talk about. But I love the reputation system.
I think that's very cool. And it's like, actually, how
I can plan my jobs down and go, oh, I'll
do this one first because if I get my meeter
up here, this will make this job easier. So I
feel like with each play through I learned little tricks
and even the traversing's really easy. That speeder drives nicely.
Just talk about the starfield where that's awful. I feel
I get to every place really quick, and even if
you don't fast travel, it doesn't feel like it takes
that long. So no, I'm having a really fun time this.
I don't think it's game of the year. I don't
think it's ever gonna be my Top five Star Wars games,
top five Games of the Deck, or anything like that.
But so far, you just give a thumbs up and say, hey,
if you're a Star Wars fan, I think there's something
for you to like here, but it's not gonna blow
the hinges off your door.
Speaker 1: Nice. Well, I I think I'm in a very similar
spot to you, Travis, if not even hotter on this game,
which is surprise. I can't think of the last time
or anytime ever where I on the podcast have been
like the hottest on a Star Wars thing. I am
in love with this game. So far, I'm having a
absolutely great time. I'm probably about fifteen hours in. I've
I've had a busy weekend, but I'm still just like
any free minute I'm like I want to put even
I just had like twenty minutes before we're starting here,
Like I want twenty more minutes with this game because
I'm just I just can't put it down. I'm in
a similar I guess as Taylor like in terms of
the how far along I am. I'm finished that first,
not finish that. There's a million side quests still there.
But I did a bunch of side quests there because
a lot of them had like really good rewards, or
I was interested in them or once, as you mentioned,
like get those meters up and wanted to try and
go for some bigger rewards. And I got a culture
the vault. The Vault, Yeah, got five k credits.
Speaker 4: Five K. I've been swimming. I know nothing there's been
I've been. Oh you need some help. Yeah, here I
have fifty credits. You know, like I've been swimming. Did
you do the Vault yet? Taylor? No, no, No, you
should go back to that first plan. Yeah, that first planet. Though.
You gotta get three key cards. It's worth it. Get
that those credits. Oh yeah, good stuff.
Speaker 3: Are those like the crime syndicate faults that each one
has or something?
Speaker 1: I think I think every syndicate probably has one, and
then at least the first two on the first planet,
like they each have. Yeah, three key cards spread across
the open world there, so you just have to go
go pick those up and then head back there, which
is easier if you're a friend of that syndicate to
just walk in through most of the doors at least.
But yeah, no, I'm really really enjoying the games. Yeah.
I finished that first planet for the most part, and
then I went and I pretty I just finished all
the quests on the second planet that I went to,
like the main story quests, which I was surprised about
that it went really quick. I think there was like
two missions maybe like one TI didn't you I went
to Tattooine. Actually, oh you.
Speaker 2: Did Tattooin, Okay.
Speaker 3: I did Kijimi as my second, and that was literally
two story missions.
Speaker 4: So they both sound like they just have two stories.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what I'm guessing. The third one does two,
so maybe that's the structure. I don't know if there's
is there more than four planets, do you guys? Or
I guess five of you kunt the intro area, I
don't know.
Speaker 4: I think it was just the three not cutting the intro.
I think it was just the three.
Speaker 1: Okay, Yeah, so that that sounds part for the course,
and as like, I'm sure there's them the side quest
to do there as well, but I was surprised how
quickly the main quest went on that second planet.
Speaker 4: Five.
Speaker 1: Okay, So I don't know if they count that prologue
situation as being a planet. Probably not. You can't fly
there again as far as I've seen. I guess you
would maybe go back there for the final quest or something.
Maybe it's something like that, but either way, Yeah, so
I'm kind of kind of blasted through it in that way.
I think I'm probably gonna do with like maybe three
or four more quests on the second planet before I
move on to the next one, just the ones that
really upgrade my character. But I it's funny, I'm the
exact opposite of you said Taylor in terms of the
game feel, because over the years, I've been trying to
play some Assassin's Creed games, jumping into Origins, and uh,
I'm trying to think just anyone thing that's like been
on game Pass. I guess Origins wasn't on game Pass,
but I've picked up a couple of these random games,
and like, I don't I just don't love the feel
of like an Assassin's Creed game, And maybe I gotta
play the right one or really sit with it long,
but I just found like the complete opposite of this.
That's why I was so surprised, because I'm so low
on Star Wars hype right now. I'm generally so not
even just our Assassin's screen, but like any Ubi Soft thing,
I just don't like the feel of their games typically,
So that's why I'm so surprised that I'm really enjoying
this and even something like the Speeder. At first, I
was like, oh, man, this thing controls like shit. But
it's like, oh, I got a couple upgrades on it
and now controls really well, which I think is a
really nice thing. Most games, you know, they make everything
feel really good at first, but I like this game
kind of makes you feel really underpowered and really bad
at your job, like you're a really bad at lot first,
and then you kind of at least I felt like
I was, and then you kind of ratcheted up as well.
And then I also feel like this game had some
of the best like settings options I've seen for games,
because almost every game these days, or at least like
big Triple A ones, has like really intense accessibility options,
which are great, and I like looking through at what
is available there but most of those things aren't really
for me. But in this game, I mentioned to you
guys early on that, yeah, you can turn off those
annoying black bars that that kind of shrink the screen resolution.
So did that immediately. You can get really customed with
the difficulty. So I turned up like the enemy difficulty
to the maximum because I wanted them to be. I
wanted the stealth challenges to be a little bit harder,
but I don't really want to have like no HP.
So you can really like fen dangle the difficulty exactly
how you want it to be challenging. You you can
like turn off some of the yellow of like all
the things that you can climb on, which really bothers me.
In games, everything's just like past plastered with like bright
yellow paint some of it. There is still a lot
of yellow stuff in the game, but you can at
least like turn it down somewhat. There's a lot of
really great customization, so I felt like any cons I
was having in those first few hours, I could go
in the settings option and fix the issue I had
with the game, which was really cool. So obviously, like
the default settings weren't perfect for me, but they had
so many things in there that I could customize it.
Putting autosprint on all the time, that was a must.
Speaker 4: I didn't know you could do that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's really great. You just constantly run in full
speed and if you just touch the stick a bit,
you can still like walk slowly so you can control it.
And I know, Travis, you you were saying you didn't
really like the one of the lock picking things, right,
so you.
Speaker 4: Just like maybe it fantastic. Yeah, you literally just go
in there, you click right trigger twice down and it's unlocked,
like okay, good. Because I did not like the mechanic
for their minigame. I just thought it was like annoying
and not fun to play, like because there's so much
of it in some levels, it's like this is just
not It's not like with again Starfield. I love that
lock Picking. I love that. Now this was just okay,
let's move long with the slicing. I like because it's
just like a quick, fun little puzzle thing. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's great that you can customize that kind
of stuff. If you're just not into it, you can
just kind of opt out of it. So I think
that's that's all really cool. So yeah, I'm really really
enjoying this game. I think the really my favorite part
of it is just like and it is with like
Ghost of the Dream any of these kind of open
world games where there's just camps all over the map,
enemy cams, and just like stealth and through them, finding
different ways to get through them. Using Nix, I think
is a really great addition. I really like what he
does for the character move set they're and then yeah,
just like that extra layer of okay, are you are
you on? Are you like in good standing with this faction?
And that'll allow you to go through more doors but
maybe not all of them still, And then as you
upgrade that tier more and more you get like more
and more doors you can go through. So it just
changes these these puzzles and these stealth challenges and like
really interesting kind of immersive dynamic ways, which I think
is cool. And yeah, like any Imperial base that I've
I've tried to go through, like those are so much fun.
I just absolutely love those. I think some of the
quest designs are really good too. There's really fun stuff
you're having to do. It's not quite as just like
follow the line on the ground to figure things out,
which to your point, Taylor, I've had to put pull
up to YouTube videos to find out what I was
doing wrong in a certain situation. So I'm with you
on that, but I think for the most part, I'll
take that a couple of youtubes at the cost of
like the game not just like telling me exactly what
to do all the time where you have to like
actually search an area and it's not just like, oh,
search an area, but like we're actually gonna show you
exactly where the thing is that you have going to get.
So I think there's a lot of really good stuff
like that. And then Travis, I completely you agree with
you on the On the story, I think they will
raw stories is pretty lame. The characters in this game,
almost across the board are very uninteresting. But like the
element of being a friends or enemies with these different
factions and the push and pull of that, I think
that's where the more interesting stories are coming from. And
it's a very personal thing and it's very gameplay focused
and like you know, reacting to the kind of gameplay
choices you're taking. So h that for me, like that's
a better story than I would prefer them. Just like
a I don't know, a single player linear thing. Anyway,
It's it's really really nice. So I definitely have some
cons along the way. Uh, just there's a lot of
like little things in this game that are annoying or
a little bit janky, But for the most part, I
am I'm just really really enjoying this game. So I'm
excited to just keep playing more of it, and uh,
I don't know, we'll see, We'll see how I feel
by the by the end of it, because I think
some of these mechanics maybe have don't have as much
depth as hoping for. But I'm enjoying it way more
than I ever expected. So that's uh, that's really good.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 1: I think I think where I want to jump first
is just talking about the scoundrelness out of this game,
the outlawness of it. Travis, you mentioned really enjoying that. Taylor,
how about you as as the star as a Star
Wars super fan, how do you feel like this game
is doing it like that power fantasy of being an outlaw,
being a scoundrel. Do you think it's it's kind of
fitting with the mechanics, is it Is it pulling it
off for you in that way?
Speaker 3: For me as a Star Wars fan, scoundrels have always
been at the bottom of the list. I put, you know,
bounty hunters, Jedi sith, you know those.
Speaker 4: Are those are the politicians who put the politicians.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, oh yeah yeah. But I think the game
does a great job at allowing you to play that
role of a scoundrel with the factions to try to
make a name for yourself the big job to get
you out of this line of work for good. I
think it's really really fun. And I think that the character,
because I didn't really speak much on the story, the
character is interesting enough.
Speaker 4: I like that.
Speaker 3: I'm a sucker for a good droid character, and I
like what's his name?
Speaker 2: And ND five super cool.
Speaker 3: He's a separatist assassin droid that's been reprogrammed that.
Speaker 2: I really like that.
Speaker 3: I think that's that's a lot of fun. So his
character's cool. I don't know if you guys have gotten
to him yet. I guess actually you would have Dylne
because yeah, I won't say that because Travis, I don't
think you've gotten to him yet.
Speaker 4: I know who he is, but he's not going to him.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, so super cool character.
Speaker 3: But yeah, having this kind of connection to the syndicates.
I think that it's it's a lot of fun. I
think it's a good stepping stone. If we get a
sequel to this.
Speaker 2: Game or whatever they do next.
Speaker 3: That's where I get really really excited to see where
they take this kind of ranking system amongst these syndicates.
Speaker 2: And kind of amplify it.
Speaker 3: I felt disappointed in the fact that once I hit
maximum like reputation with a syndicate, I got all the
rewards and there wasn't really anything else really pulling me
in or kind of keeping me there. So you just
jump to the next syndicate to maximize your reputation with them.
Rep with a syndicate right now with Crimson Down and
the Ashiga. So I did it with twice two of them,
and it did not take long at all.
Speaker 4: I was gonna say that would be a con for me,
because I so I love that, and I I guess
I do agree with you. It'd be great if there
was more to it as far as with the maximize it.
But for me, it was just okay. I remember I
had a couple bad jobs with the Pikes. I was like, okay,
I really got to focus on the Pikes, and I
did like two jobs and I was back to like
good standing, and I wish that maybe was a little
difficulty sure in the time, like oh good, I'm with
the Pikes, but it does just feel like you accept
a couple job contracts and you can fix that right away.
And I felt like I maybe I was wrong. At
the beginning the game. It felt like they were trying
to say like the more you did for one would
hurt the other. That happened sometimes, but even if there
was like a mission where Okay, I took a Pike
contract and it was to go to Crimson down and
a trace like put a track or there, right, that
was unbeknownst to them. Now I didn't get caught, so
it was fine, but I still thought, oh, because I
put a track or my reputation would don go down.
But it didn't. So I do like the aspect of okay,
if you don't get caught, but I wish that maybe
that those bars were less, like it was not so
powerful or there was more push and pulled out. Okay,
every Pike contract you take, it's gonna hurt the other
two to three, right or vice versas, So you really
have to pick because I thought you would have to go, Okay,
you can maybe have like pour to good relationships with somebody,
but you can never you can only have the perfect
relationship with one. And I don't know if I like
that you could have them with all of them, because
that seems like, well, that's kind of what anti the
game pitch if like, oh, every decision matters, and I
like to a point it stops.
Speaker 3: So I like my hand being forced. So let's say,
for example, I was doing a mission for Crimson Dawn
and the guy, the contact I was working with, he
interrupts me, and as I'm nearing completion of this mission
and he gives me like a choice here, like okay,
my decision will either benefit Crimson Dawn and boost my
rating or it'll benefit the Pikes and lower my rating
with Crimson down.
Speaker 2: And it's basically I can kill this guy or I
can work with him.
Speaker 3: And I like that dynamic because like, Okay, now my
head has forced mid mission where I thought I was
gonna boost my repewation with one syndicate, I can boost
it or I can turn my back on them. So
those kind of things are nice and I like that,
and it's happened actually quite a few times. But aside
from that, it is nice that some of the missions
you do for the syndicates, it shows you, Okay, this
will be a little bit of a boost, higher boost
or like a maximum boost, but that that is unfortunate
that it's just it's so I found it quick to
do and the benefits to stick with that high reputation.
Like once I explore their their hideouts, there's not really
much else to do. And like the stores, you buy
the stuff from the stores. Money has not been in
like a problem. It's fricking everywhere. I would have liked
it if it was a little bit difficult. But I
buy everything I need in the stores when I can
at the maximum reputation, and then I carry on and
then there's no there's nothing pulled me back to those
those stores that incentive.
Speaker 1: So I'm so surprised that you were able to max
out to syndicates at this point, Travis. Have you maxim
on note as well?
Speaker 4: No, but down is like it's getting close, like it
I was working on Don the most because you know
Kira fan and then Pikes are good and the huts
I just haven't I haven't pissed them off or made
them good because I've been the first planet. There's just
not much huts. I know there's the fourth one, but
Don is very close because I was just doing a
lot of contracts with Don just because I would plan
it out of okay, look at them and they just
happened to all be in a similar area and they're
all Dons. Like, hey, I guess I'm taking these three
contracts cause it's like a big bang boom. So I
did find it goes same as a pike. At one
point I was I was in a bad relationship. But
it took me a couple of contracts and maybe one
bigger story thing and I was back to being good
with pikes. And I was like, oh, I thought this
was gonna be when I got to bead, like oh man,
this sucks, like this is really gonna hurt me for
a while. But it took All you have to do
is just really focus on somebody. So yeah, I'm close
with Don to being to the tippy top.
Speaker 3: One of the things that I think might have helped
me kind of get my reputation up was instead of
working directly with I think her name is Danka the Montcalamarian.
Speaker 2: There are certain like.
Speaker 3: Other characters like Droys and stuff that give you independent contracts,
and those contracts give you really high boosts with your
reputation for certain crime syndicates. So I did a few
of those that might have been where I.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just so interesting to hear how you guys
have had a totally different experience with that system than
I have, where I feel like for all of them,
I've been like threading that needle back and forth. I'm
like staying near the fifty. I've really I've gone against
the Pikes, like any I always throw them under the bus,
so that yeah, I don't know what it is about them,
So they've dropped really low in my books. So I
feel like it's probably not likely at this point unless like,
like once again, I could just spend the hours and
go grind just contract and every contract get that number up.
But I don't really want to do that, I kind
of because I want to live with my consequences to
some extent. But even with a Crimson Dawn, you know,
like I'm siding with them over the Pikes. But then again,
it's like I also maybe I'll pick up a contract
if it's worth a lot. That has me going into
the Crimson Dawn base to steal something, and you know what,
naturally I fuck up every once in a while, I
get and then I have to fight them, and I'm
losing some rep here there. So I feel like for
Crimson Don, I initially sided with them after the initial quest,
and then a couple fuck ups later dropped into the
negative again, and then I fought like just I had
to do a couple of quests to really get back
to just good again so I could go back in
their base to do something else there, and then with
the huts once again, up and down, up and down.
I've been positive negative. I haven't seen the fourth I
haven't met the fourth faction yet at this point. So
for me, the system is working like perfectly where it's
making these really fun stories of going back and forth.
I haven't found it very quick at all, even Crimson Don,
who I've really never taken a quest against them. It's
just because I've like fucked up and accidentally killed someone
and got spotted for it is even that it's like
it's still in the good category. I haven't even progressed
to the second bar of there's like three tiers, right,
three positive and negative tiers for like each one that
you can have there. So yeah, I wonder why that is.
Maybe I'm just fucking up a lot more and getting caught.
Maybe maybe that's what it is. I'm not exactly sure,
but I like too. Like one thing I thought was
pretty cool is there's different like intel that you'll get
as like a collectible and you can just sell it.
But depending on which merchants you sell it to, if
it's a merchant that's kind of working with the Pike
syndicate Crimson down, that'll also like build you up some favor.
So when I was getting really low on the Pikes
for a bit, I did a little bit of that
just to kind of get my rep up a little
bit so I wasn't getting punished as hard. So I
think that's a pretty cool mechanic. And then I just
like the variety that adds, and I feel like that
would open up a lot of doors for replayability. Not
that this is the kind of game I'd want to replay.
I would just keep doing the same, you know, save
file until I've done everything. Yeah, but I just feel like, yeah,
like different bases each I think it's really impressive that
each based each enemy based on this game is designed
that it is like a little place you can just
go hang out and talk to people, buy from merchants,
you know, buy get some upgrids for your speeder, that
kind of thing. But then there's like these layers of
like Okay, this room, this building you can't go in
until you're higher tier. Then once you're higher you can
get in there. But then there's always like these extra
layers that you can or enter. And I think that's
really really cool and really impressive that each base is
kind of designed that way. And obviously I'm still my
first play through, so maybe if I played it again,
maybe I wouldn't feel that way if I really analyzed it,
But right now it's feeling like really cool. Even Crimson Down,
who I'm close with, there's like certain doors I can't
get through. It makes makes like screwing them over a
little bit harder.
Speaker 4: I was gonna ask say, as you're the top with
Crimson Down, do you remember on that first planet there's
that station that you gotta do sneak by like every time,
like you haven't done the vault, but it's one where
you can walk in and then it's like a little
kind of platform. Yeah, a little circle the yeah, and
there's like a fan Does that eventually go away? Or
is that always a restricted area? Uh?
Speaker 3: When I was maximum reputation with Crimson Don and the
Four Syndicate, I could go into the areas, but there
was always still that this is a restricted area.
Speaker 4: Part I swear I've had to that's there's one con
for me. And maybe it's just because I spent on
the Station to Las side quest or that Plan side quest,
but four separate times had to have been like, oh,
in the Intel, you got a sneak in this area
and that stupid plot on the Crimson Dawn. And it
was also because my fault was there. So again, there's
stuff that I've wanted to do. But that's one thing
I'd say, is I wish there was maybe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's a tool tip that says it does that.
So I'm kind of surprised that there is. That there
must still be tears to some extent, but yeah, no,
I assume that area would eventually be a place you
could just walk in for.
Speaker 4: You, So I wish there was maybe other mini areas
of if it wasn't a restrict area, it was always
the exact same Crimson on because even Crimson on that planet,
there's another area on the planet that's just like a
Crimson Dawn area. So I wish it was like maybe
it bounced back and forth, because that's one time I found, Okay,
I'm a little sick of going to this place, and
that's when I got back to the main quest, like
I'm gonna stop this. But that's one thing of mine
where there's maybe sometimes some locations if you do a
few quests back to back that aren't the main story,
could get repetitive, and it's all luck of the draw, right.
It's the same thing like Dyling you're talking about with
the syndicate stuff. It's probably just because you guys have
done more main story with me, where like Tayo, some
of those contracts, if you get some big swing ones
right away, you just like boosts it very fast. So
but restricted area annoying for me, you know, go away.
Speaker 1: I think it's really cool that the like stealing from
your faction or even like killing your knocking out people
from your faction, as long as it doesn't become public info,
you don't get caught, that that doesn't affect your rep
at all. I think that's really great. There's so many games,
even favorites of mine, like Bethesda Games are really bad
about that, where if you do anything to a faction member,
it's like immediately global information that everyone on the planet knows,
and then you get screwed over for it's like, ah, man,
no one saw me do this doesn't make any sense
that this information we get around. Even in the case
where you can go in a room, maybe I'm trying
to take out one guy, but I get caught by
someone else, and so there's like three or four Crimson
Dawn people all looking at me, and I take all
of them out. If I take all of them out
before and alarm goes off or before they tell more people,
then even that doesn't lower my rep because it wasn't
like public information beyond that one room. So I think
that's really cool that it works that way. And yeah,
I'm stealing all the time from Crimson Dawn, but trying
to find that like right spot of like trying to hide,
trying to maybe sneak in rooms I'm not allowed and
even though I'm close with this faction, and I think
like maybe I'm doing that too much, and that's why
my rep is dropping a lot because even the huts,
I was like going through this base because I had
a couple pieces of equipment. I was trying to get
there multiple times getting caught, and then I just I
just ran out there. I didn't want to kill everyone,
but just ran out of there. Kind of reset the
stealth puzzle a little bit. I'm not doing any saves gumming,
so I'm living with my consequences here and I really
really enjoy that part of it. I love just stealing
from my faction without it being just public info. That's
really cool.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I've stolen a lot from the kitchens and the
Crimson on there. I just walked by, take that food.
But no, I agree with you. I like that because
it's that for me is more of the scoundrel thing too,
because it makes you feel a bit more like, oh yeah,
I'm pulling one over on these guys. Where if you
did that and you always got punished, then it's like okay.
Then it's then it just feels like, well, I'm Team's
Crimson down now, like I they are my people. It's
like I still feel like there are my people, but
if there's like some coil as I need, Yeah, I'll
take that and go sell them for a couple of bucks. Like,
I think that adds to the Okay, I am a
good person because clearly they I think they said a
couple times in marketing, K is for sure a good person.
They are on the light side, like they they are
doing some stealing things, but they're always like okay in
the story, if there's something really bad, they're gonna go
with the light side. But I like in those instances
the same thing. I'm like, Yeah, if I gotta knock
out a Crimson down person, that's what I gotta do.
So I think that adds to my playthrough of enjoying
it again, maybe more so not in the main mission
on the side, because yeah, I can just still be
and it feels more scummy that way. I can have
the best relationship with Crimson Dawn, but I'm still like
screwing them over on the side. So that's why I
like that. Okay, big decisions, Kay's good guy, but little stuff.
I need some money to get by. So I enjoyed
that factor. What you brought up that you don't get caught.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I feel like non enough games let you
double cross against factions like you sign up with them,
you do their quests, and that's it. That's the game
right there. So I really like the push and.
Speaker 2: Pull in terms of getting caught.
Speaker 3: I'm curious how far you've pushed the wanted factor with
the Empire, because when the Death Stroopers come out, man,
it's fucking game.
Speaker 4: I haven't yet that I want to. I think I
got to because how many layers is there?
Speaker 3: Ten?
Speaker 2: Is it?
Speaker 1: What is like?
Speaker 4: It looks like, it looks like Okay, then I've got
into I think maybe three quarters. I got to when
they showed up with a whole shuttle and then they
started to come out and that was like, oh ship,
but got the Walkers? No, I haven't got the Walkers. Luckily,
I just get to a tower and I bought my
wanted off. But I think I will. I should have
done that for this one. But the Death Troopers, that's uh,
how can you even kill them?
Speaker 3: They I've tried so like I hit a base and
this is when I was dealing with the Slicer lady
and she just fucks off and leaves your mine and
it's like, okay.
Speaker 2: The whole Yeah, the whole base.
Speaker 3: Is on alert and I had to fight my way
out of that and that was mission. That was crazy
and it was a lot of fun, but getting out
and then my wonder level getting maxed after I left
the base a little bit, then you have the shuttle
lands nearby and the death Stoopers come out and these guys,
I don't think I did any damage, and I was
throwing grenades and everything, and they would one shot from
them to me would take half of my health down.
They were so freaking tough. I didn't get close to them.
I was just trying to fight them from a distance.
But I'm going to try and go back and see
if i can actually fight them, because I've almost finished
maxing out my gun upgrades and two of the tiers
and they okay now with this and some extra back
to health, because that's another nice thing too. You can
actually wear certain items for your character that give you benefits,
but you can change the appearance if he likes how
some of the other things look, which is kind of nice. Exactly. Yeah,
so that's a nice benefit. But I want to go
back and try and fight them. I haven't even bothered
with an atst because those things are just freaking They're big,
and even though you get like your eyon blaster and
stuff like that. I just don't think it's gonna be
enough to take one of those things down yet.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I've not really been too successful in a
large scale battle like that. It's just so hard, like
being limited with a pistol, and you can pick up
weapons off the ground, but you can't have them on
you actively, so you can't just have like a AR
or grenade launcher ready to go. And I find like
the throwing grenades is very awkward or you gonna like
hold the D pad.
Speaker 4: It's not great.
Speaker 1: And then right, I like, maybe that's something I should
look in the settings for it and see if there's
like a better way to do it, just because it's
a it's a it's a little awkward. But no, I
don't think I've gotten super high. I think I've maybe
got like three or four. I found like I barely
did anything, and I like it jacked that wanted level
up like hardcore. It's very different than GTA, where GT
feels like a very step thing, step based thing that's
kind of linearly building up the more damage you do,
or they feel like this you just as soon as
you get caught, you already have quite a few dials
on that ring tapped out there, and then yeah, like
the story moments where you're like forced into being wanted,
I feel like those on's I've been on like the
higher tiers, but I guess just on my own chaos,
I haven't and I find that it's it's really hard
to get rid of that wanted level. Like Travis you
mentioned you can go and like off the bounty. I
think there's like certain machines you can like hack into
and like remove.
Speaker 4: Your Yeah, you just find an imperial tower and you
get in there, and it's like that, I guess.
Speaker 1: I just like in the middle of a want it's
like it's hard for me to know where any of
those things are. I don't know like the maps well
enough perhaps.
Speaker 4: But because that is like a little like world breaking,
where Okay, what I'll do is, let's say I'm halfway one,
whatever people are after me. I found an imperial tower.
The imperial people will be after me. But the second
I go in there, get into the tower and pay
it off, they're like, oh, well he's gone, you know,
or she's gone, and that's it. So it's literally they
saw me running there, their guns ready, and if you
paid off. So I do that because it's like, hey,
get them off my back. But I wish it maybe
was not that easy. Even it was okay, I know
in GTA the Joco you high behind a trash can,
but even then, like something like that, I do that
necessity and for time. But it is and maybe in
the future I'll stop doing that, but it is something. Okay,
it should at least be. The people of the tower
still go, okay, why is this girl just hanging out
in our our thing? You know?
Speaker 3: So and you can just out run them too. Half
the time I'm on my speeder bike. I just go
and they're like, oh, we've called the search off. It's
like okay, good yeah.
Speaker 1: Wow. Once again, it sounds like way easier for you
guys than has been for me to I am on
the highest difficulty for enemies. So I don't know if
that's part of it, potentially, but could be.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: The reason I did that is I just found a
weird like. I found like some of the stealth like
I was never like the action stuff. I found always
a little bit difficult just because of the limitations of
your character in terms of being like an action hero.
But for me, it was like the stealth stuff was
a bit too easy. And I really like the levels,
but I was just finding that it was a bit
too easy to sneak around people, like people would be
like looking at me and like I wouldn't be getting caught.
And so that's when I went and turned that up,
because I think even on like the normal difficulty, I
don't think I had never at least noticed an enemy
like spotting like a friend's body on the ground, Like
they just walk by bodies. But once I turned the
difficulty up, they started like if they see a body
on the ground, they like whole certain the whole area.
They'll call for backup even sometimes to come try and
find whoever did that. So I really enjoyed that, and
I even like turned it down one because it was
a bit too hard, and then I got some more
upgrades from my character and then turned it back up
to the max difficulty. So I'd recommend trying that because
it might give you guys a bit more of a
challenge with some of these things and make them a
bit more intense. Because I found, like, yeah, anytime I've
been wanted, it's been it's been a pretty treacherous situation,
and then yeah, making the stealth a little bit harder.
I think is is definitely a good thing. It was
maybe a touch too easy for me on the standard
difficulty there. But what do you guys think of the
stealth stuff in general? I guess Taylor as the Assassin's
Creed expert, I'm sure this shares a ton of similarities
with the Assassin's Creed kind of stealth system. But what
do you what do you think of that?
Speaker 2: It does?
Speaker 3: Like I like the smoke bombs. I like being able
to like slice into different things where you can deactivate
turrets and lockdoors if and stuff like that. That's not
of fun, but yeah, it's I feel like at at
the end of the day, it does get kind of
repetitive just because you're just you're crouched, you're dodging camera
and then just go up and you just like bop
a guy.
Speaker 2: And then the sun blaster is nice.
Speaker 4: That's a lot of fun, especially though, like I like
the I love doing the fast talking. Have they come
up and you do the oh, I don't know what
I'm doing, then that's it's like, Okay, that's fun.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And so I'm glad that they give you kind
of like a brief bit of time that you can
really kind of disarm and disable them before anyone starts
firing their blaster and it goes to a full.
Speaker 2: On alert and then a battle.
Speaker 3: But yeah, I know, it's it's it's okay, I'm I'm
content with it. Nicks is a lot of fun to
use in these situations as well, because you can distract
and you can kind of sneak in behind.
Speaker 2: So he's he's cool.
Speaker 3: He's sabotages too, which is a lot of fun.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just got that upgrade for the for the
alarm traps. Yeah, the alarms you can set a trap
on them, which is really nice.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I like how he's part of the kind
of like the assassination uh anime animated or what would
you call it? Just a sequence where you go up
and it's like a cinematic is what it is. Where
you just go up and you're executing them and like
next we'll just grab the gun out of their hand,
like grab their arm and pull them down and you
just punched.
Speaker 2: Them in the face. It's some it's just cool.
Speaker 1: Listen Neat, Yeah, absolutely, how would we take our first
break here? And after after that we'll get back into it.
But just a couple of quick things. Did you know
that Patreon is a great way to support us what
we do here. You get episodes early, you get episodes
ad free. We have all sorts of retrospectives that go
up there. If you join it the highest. Here, you
can request that we do a review for any movie
or game. We haven't said no to anyone yet, so
we know we keep doing them, So please give us
some wacky suggestions and we'll see what where our limits are.
But you can also join our discord. You can leave
a review to help the show. What's what's going on
in the Star Wars world? Is there anything? What's coming
up next?
Speaker 5: Because Act Light ended, Skeleton grew in December, so we
will well, Kirkland and Taylor will be reviewing that and
then and or sometime next year, so we'll be around
for all that jazz and hopefully a movie soon.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, if anyone's listening to this and they are
a new listener, we have a ship ton of Star
Wars content. We have episode review for every single one
of the live action shows that have happened. You guys,
did some of the animated shows as well. Every movie
we have a review for or a retrospective for reviews
for the both both Jedi Survivor Jedi Star Wars Jedi
games like Fall Jedi Survivor, right.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it's a Jedi game.
Speaker 1: The Jedi have reviews for those. Yeah, we have a
review for Lego Star Wars from a couple of years ago,
so we got you covered on the Star Wars front,
and even even some books you guys have done too, right,
so even even breaking out of the the visual world
in that way, so very very cool stuff. Any other
shout outs from you guys on what's hitting the feeds
or anything. Juice Juice this week?
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, that you got. We're back with Rings of
Power every week for the next few weeks and Agatha
and Penguins soon, and I think it's about in for patrons.
I just dropped that episode of the Originals, which was
a very fun one, so go check that out and
then it's a far out but next month we're recording
them all right, But next month starts the Fantastic Four retro,
So if you're waiting to jump on Patreon, that's a
good time because I think those f four retros are
gonna cause some I think they're gonna be some fun
reviews because they're not the best movies. And I think
that's usually the our best times. We're like, oh, what
happened here? You know, so good stuff happening.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so there you go. There, that's what's going on,
and we're gonna throw to a quick ad break and
then we'll be right back. Okay, we are back. We're
talking about stealth trumps. What do you think about the
stealth A's my fellow fellow ghost of Sashima ahead. I
don't know, not that we need to compare them, but
what do you think about this?
Speaker 4: That's gonna say. It's not that Ghost is like peak like, man,
this is great. I think with Taylor where it gets
really repetitive. This sounds like a dumb thing to say.
But without Nix, I would maybe put like, put this
on a failing grade. Now you can't, cause we put
it in the game. That's the way. But it's just
like it because Nix is around all the time, whenther
you're non stuff, so that helps, and they build a
lot of things around him, so that is great, and
that's an added thing and that makes it a little fresh,
but I think that is especially if you get I think,
too many missions in a row. There is a lot
of stealth missions and at the area is not that
exciting area. It's just okay, I gotta can get into
another camp where it's lots of grass and lots of rocks,
so it's not ghosts. It's not like Batman Arkham. So
for me, it's like I would say, I don't even
want to say above average, but I guess I could
say above average because like the Knicks stuff puts it
in there. But it's fine. I think that is one
of those things where if I do too much, okay,
I need a break from this game. I think it's
better in the main game levels like that Empire. It
sounds like we've all played that level because you had
to update the speeder when it was a main game
one that was great because it's all they you know,
plan it out. Not that they haven't planned it, but
if it's just hey, go to the space and sneak in.
There's five different points, which is fun because you could
pick your path. But I do think the ones that
are very designed, like the main Quest, where it's you
gotta do specific thing, you gotta go on a walk,
gotta go through this vent. I like those ones better
because I feel like, Okay, this is some stealth like
like it feels high intensity when you got to hit
this vehicle and you press the A button and you
got to walk alongside and not script like that's like, Okay,
this is a great set piece right here. So main
quest stuff, I think it works. The side quest. I
think they could have maybe trimmed a law of those
out and left most of the I'm not saying take
them all out, but most the self stuff for the
main game. But then again, maybe if people did the
streamlining and the main game they go it's just nothing
but stealth. So it's good enough, and it is weird.
I've felt that complaint too, where you never really know
where their eyes are, not in a good way. I
feel like there's sometimes where I walk right by them,
they see nothing, and I have here's a good example
of I don't know what the barma is for taking
someone out and alerting them. I've had it where it
felt like they were five feet away and I take
out their friend and they look and go ahead and
the alarms go off, and I've done it and they
don't move a muscle, so I feel like there's no
consistency there with something like hang uh the hang Man
game and hit Man game. I usually know, Okay, this
is the radius I'm working with here. That's like a
great selfie, right, This is like if I know they're
looking this direction, they probably can't see me where this
game it's kind of been a little iffy, so, you know,
enjoyed it, but not not anything I saw up there
with those top kind of three or four I've mentioned.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I mean definitely comparing this to hit Man,
which is like the masterclass and stuff design and like
you as the player have all the information to make
the right decision and then obviously sometimes things go awry,
but for the most part, like you kind of know
what to expect. I think that I definitely agree with that.
There has been some weird times where I don't understand
exactly what the distance is, but that's real where I
just use nicks to distract and try and separate those
those characters farther away from each other to make it
a bit more a bit more obvious. But yeah, I
think where I'm liking it is just the the freedom
of it I suppose I feel like I need one
of these levels areas that we've talked about, with the
exception of like the main even some of the main
quest has like very linear sections. Obviously it's very set
PC as you mentioned, but other other ones, and also
just the side missions or random camps you go to.
I feel like there's really no set one path, like
there's three or four maybe ways in there's all sorts
of different ways you could go. You could take out
all the enemies, you could just try and sneak past them.
But I think for me, what happens most of the
time is it starts with a stell sequence and at
some point I'll get caught and turned into a full
blown battle, which I think is really great design. I
always loved. That's like my ideal way to play Dishonored
is everything's going perfectly until it doesn't, and then I
just got to live with the consequences to see if
I can salvage the situation. And in this game, that
feels even more punishing because of the faction side of it.
It's like, ah, I fucked up, and now I'm dropping
back in my my thing, as I mentioned earlier. So
I think that's it's all working really well for me,
and I don't know. I'm just like in the stell mechanics,
I like the zapper, the stun gun that you have,
the other weapons you have. I think Nick's and all
the different tools that he has are really fun and engaging.
I haven't used these smoke bomb a bunch yet. The
one time I did use it, I was trying to,
like it was in a very highly public area and
there was a door that I had to hike through.
I'm like, I don't see a single possible way to
do this, with the exception of just like dropping a
smoke bomb, and maybe those will work. But the smoke
bomb seemed to be really loud and it alerted everyone
who was around me, and then they all came gunning
for me. So I still have to get used to
how the smoke bomb works. I think it's more of
like you get caught, you drop it, and then you
can like escape easier. I feel like that's maybe more
it rather than like dropping a smoke bomb to try
and stealthily sneakily do something. But yeah, I don't know,
I'm really enjoying it. And then we've talked about the
combat a little bit. I like the variety of the guns.
I maybe wish you could have some of these weapons
with you at different times rather than just like them
being pickups. I like the idea of them having a
limited AMMO, so you're kind of in almost like a
John Wicki and sort of way just like picking up
a weapon, like firing three shots from it, dropping it,
moving too the next thing. I really like that element
of it. I really I like that this game has
like active reload. I think that adds some franticness to
the uh to the combat situations. You know, there's explosive
barrels everywhere in this game. You have have your homie
Nicks fighting alongside you sometimes. So I'm really liking the combat.
I think it's it's a lot of fun so far.
I'm curious what it will be like to fight some
of these bigger battles or bigger enemies, as you mentioned, Taylor,
like some of these big what are the at eighties
the two feet things that that ats ts yeah, ats
t's yeah, Like I have not fought one of those yet,
and I'm very scared for when I have to. Whereas
I feel like when I got to those in Jedi Survivor.
I was like, that was gonna be fucking easy. I
got them, But in this like, I don't I don't
even know how I'm gonna kill him yet, and that's
kind of an exciting thought. So I'm curious what other
kind of enemies are gonna pop out there. I think
maybe one one definitely big critique on the combat is
like there's creatures and animals in this game, and they
just like, I don't know, that feels like it was
an afterthought that was put in like a couple months prior,
where the combat is very simple, and like they also
don't have like they're not proper physics objects. I don't
know if you've ever slamed into any animal full speed
with your speeder, but they don't move an inch and
you just fly off your speeder. If ike across the
it's like hitting a tree in GTA with a car,
where trees are for whatever reason, just like just immortal unstoppable. Yeah,
So I don't know. For the most part, I'm enjoying
the combat. I'm hoping that the more upgrades I get them,
that's what keeps it engaging when I get deeper into
the game, because right now, it's it's pretty basic, but
it is kind of like the last ditch effort. If
my stealth didn't go correctly, then it's that's when it's popping.
Speaker 3: Up, you say, getting flung off the scooter or speeder
I have. There's there's a few times where I've been
flung off of it and I land, but I fall
halfway through the map and I can't move properly. There's
been times where I'm trying to go through doors in
certain rooms but a random computer players and PCs are
just setting there and you can't you can't get in,
So I got a reload so that they've they don't
appear there. I've had a bunch of like characters duplicating,
like ND five has appeared in like two.
Speaker 2: Of them at the same time.
Speaker 3: There's there's a lot of problems with this game.
Speaker 4: Luckily not have any of that glitches. Really, I've had
like maybe it like like uh, frame rate drop, a
little look a little like sloggy that I have never had,
because I've seen people have that where they're like they
get off their bike and that just like shoots them across.
Like I've seen what you're talking about, but I have
so far luckily not had any Have.
Speaker 2: You seen the t the teeth pose.
Speaker 3: I've seen a lot of guys doing that to get
off their speeder bike and they're gliding tee poles like around.
Speaker 1: A lot of cus and that was it. Like it's
it's really it's been pretty bugless for me. Yeah, other
than like I've had a couple of situations where I
was trying to stealth knock some guy out and then
I think I was like a bit too far away,
so I just like punched him. But like that's not
really like user error, I think. So, yeah, I have
not had a very buggy time, so whither than like,
I think maybe the speeder at first was really buggy
for me, and then when I got it upgraded, it
was like working better. So maybe it's just like intentional
that it was very janky, but especially when you get
like the jump, but it helps a lot to just
get over certain situations. But no, it's too bad that
you're having a glitchy your time with it. How about
this though, Tay, how about how about space combat? Because
I know you love space combat? How are you feeling
about that in this game?
Speaker 2: Everything space related?
Speaker 3: Like, I don't mind it but it was it's a
little underwhelming. I was kind of thinking it's gonna be
something better, Like I thought I'd be taken off and
flying from the planet up, but it might as well,
like it might as well just be like the same
as Starfield. I hope people were making those comparisons, like, oh, well,
you can just fly off from the planet, but it's
the same thing, Like it shows you your schematics, and
I felt like that was deceiving because it shows you
your navigation, like your your controls and stuff whatnot as
you're taking off and flying up. But there's no reason
for that. It's just one long cut scene that you
can skip basically, uh, and then you appear in space.
The fighting in the space combat it is fun. But
Star Wars Battlefront, like squadrons are not gonna count. But
stars batt Front that space combat. That's I love it.
It's it's way better and I feel like this could
have been it's similar, but it's just kind of boring.
I would love it if there was a little bit
more you could do with the ship, but it's it's
it's it's not.
Speaker 2: The main thing. I get it.
Speaker 3: Your main focus of this game or the main trajectory
is just being on the planets and being a scoundrel
in the space combat. It's just kind of second to that,
which I totally understand. But there are some things that
just is exploration that I do enjoy. When I went
to Kajimi, that was fricking fantastic because I felt like
it was from the Solo movie. Going to Kessel because
there's like these beacons and you're going through a nebula.
So with the beacons highlight where you fly through, and
when you drift out into the nebula, you can't see shit,
but there's big ice chunks moving you gotta like dodge.
Speaker 2: It's super cool.
Speaker 3: So I love being able to fly around the outside
of the planets. When I pulled up to another planet
there is just a huge cartel battle with capital ships
going on. I was like, holy fuck, this is crazy.
Speaker 2: So that was neat.
Speaker 3: But just finding random states and debris you can blast
off or blast open, take the loot whatnot, that's pretty cool.
Helping random frigates is pretty fun. So there's a lot
of neat things that I really do appreciate. But I
find I'm not racing to get into space, even though
like I've upgraded my ship a little bit, it's still
still can get pretty overwhelming pretty fast.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I'll say it fly if I like the
feeling better than Starfield, which we talk about many times,
where that's just very clunky. I still have never played Squadrons. Well,
I guess I think I played Squadrons one string a
stream or something. I think we busted out or something.
I remember my hands on it. I'm waiting to play
one of these space games where the spaceship just feels like, Man,
I want to be in space whole time. I think
I agree with something Steraa said, and I think that
goes back to what I was talking about earlier with
the feeling of the game. I think being in space,
the surroundings, the layout that's great. The actual look of it.
It feels like Star Wars. I like what Taya said,
where Okay, you look off the distance and there's just
you can see, oh god, a star destroyer. Right, It's
just there and there's stuff going out like I like.
It has its almost sections. I like being in space.
I guess I should say any of the movement, I
don't necessarily love the fighting in space. Maybe I don't
have my ship really upgraded at all. So that's one
thing I'll say, that's my least thing. So I think,
actually know, I got like I think, like a shield
on there, but even just the I feel like, I
know it sounds dumb, but I think even combat the
ships are just like they're too small. The enemy ships
that you're fighting against sometimes like I know they're far
away and they got a tracking someone, but just sometimes
it just feels like you're just shooting against rock. So
I just feel like even if it's a little unrealistic
to make that size, but and I get what they're
kind of trying to do. They're trying to make. I
think the space combat be very fast, but I would
like it if your ship was slowed down and they
were slowed down so you could have a more cinematic feel.
So I think again kind of like the actually know,
I wouldn't say that. I would say it's subpar the action,
but the actual being in space I don't mind. I
like traveling. Like the speed of the ship where the
like I said, the you know, the stealth, I think
it's above average and eventually bore. The fighting in space,
it's not anything that I'm I haven't had one those
experiences where I'm like, man, I love this. It's kind
of like, oh, I have to do this and get
through it. Maybe it'll change, but yeah, it's it's not
great still, and I'm waiting for one game to really
crack that out of this new generation. Maybe I'd have
to try Squadrons out again, Taylor and see what it's like.
Speaker 3: But Squadrons is like, it's really in depth with what
they did.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's why I don't count it.
Speaker 3: I just in terms of space combat, like you said,
it like traveling in here is nice, but the combat
is just it's brutal.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I can't really think of a game where I
like this space combat. I like, I think I like
star Fields more, but I don't like star Fields at all.
So just just how little I like what's going on here.
I've also like pretty much opted out of doing any
of that so far. Like there was you know, a
main question or too that took me out to space
where I had to do some of that, but otherwise
I haven't really explored up there. I haven't done many
contracts out in space out that I did one because
I wanted to get an upgrade for one of my things,
but otherwise I'm not spending any time out there, so
it's not something I've done much. I know, I have
a side quest right now to get it an additional
gun holstered on my ship, so maybe that'll make it
more interesting, but I don't. I'm just not really interested
in doing that stuff. I think I'm just really enjoying
the detail of the planet so far. Like I like
the size of these open worlds, because it's like, how
are they gonna make four open world planets? Like in
this game? That's gonna be insane. It's like, Okay, the
open worlds are not overwhelming. You can kind of cruise
from one side to the other on one of these
maps in like I don't know, ten minutes or less
or something. So I'm really like, in just exploring the locations,
I found that the first planet is way more interesting
than Tattooing that I went to next, And in fact,
I actually I feel like just in general, like the
quest design and stuff, like the first area is so
much more engaging than that second part. Was still having
a good time, of course, but maybe I just picked incorrectly.
But Taylor, would you say, was that the same for
you or did you like the Kajimi like about as
much as you did to Shot. I think it's the
name of that planet, right, just like in general for
gameplay and exploring and stuff.
Speaker 2: I love the detail of Kajimi.
Speaker 3: I feel like I'm literally right and Rise of Skywalker
and that planet minus the first order, Like the attention
to detail is really really cool, really enjoying it. But
it is significantly smaller Shot to Shana, I think is what, yeah,
what it is?
Speaker 2: Uh massive?
Speaker 3: It is huge, and I'm kind of thinking that maybe
this is the biggest planet out of all of them
in terms of exploration with how small Kajimi is. You're
only in the city as far as I know. You
don't go outside into like the really the world or
anything like that.
Speaker 2: You're only in one.
Speaker 3: Massive city hub and maybe I just haven't found it yet,
but there's there's nothing really showing me I could explore
and go out of the city.
Speaker 1: So you're not just in your speeder at all on
that planet then at all?
Speaker 4: Wow, which I feel like And really it's I'm up
two minds because I even said that Ty your last
time when we're filming. I feel like you could have
just had it onto Shaw and it just be fine,
like you just like there's one planet, there's enough there
would work. But at the same time, when then by
previewing and I checked it on the five planets, the
fifth one did include the the opening can't I can't
go buy? Yeah yeah, So it's like, Okay, it's kind
of a cheap's really four So I think it's kind
of a misrepresentation, like there's four planets when really it's
like I feel like there's really you do go to
four planets, sure, but there's one planet where it's like
this is a big you can do a whole bunch,
Like it feels like an actual planet. You feel like
you can venture so much, where the other ones are
just kind of slices of life. So I get that
they're not wrong in saying it's four planets, but it
does from what you guys both are saying, it feels
like they're just kind of a slice of life per se.
Where the first planet that is or the second planet
that's a full that's a that's a game right there
on that one.
Speaker 1: You know, Tattooine, like you definitely go outside of uh
MASI is the Cantina or is that the name of.
Speaker 4: The ten, yeah, Mazzi, Yeah, it's Cantina.
Speaker 3: Right, Massizley is the name of the spaceport.
Speaker 1: That's the town, right, Yeah. And then yeah, the canteen
is called just it's some guy's name, some guy's name Cantina,
and I forget what the guy's name is.
Speaker 4: But is there not just a moss Isley Cantina or
is it the canteen in moss Isley?
Speaker 3: I think cantina in moss Isley, yeah, which is like
that's still yeah, moss Isley town, but.
Speaker 1: No, I mean yeah, on tattooing, like there are a
couple of different little town areas, little settlements there are,
Like it is pretty expansive. I don't know if it's
as big as to Shota. I can't tell yet, but
it's pretty big, Like it seems like it's almost as big.
So maybe Kajmi is just an exception because of what's
going on with that planet. And I guess none of
us have been to a Kiva yet or Taylor, have
you flown there yet?
Speaker 3: Or just I went to Tweed next after Cool, So that's.
Speaker 1: Kind of the unknown right now. I wonder how big
that one is. But uh, let's see where do we
want to go next? I think maybe talk more about
some of these RPG mechanics. This is something that I'm
a little bit disappointed but also liking enough, which is
I remember before the game came out, I thought it
was really cool that the different skills and things that
you're upgrading for your character are kind of contextualized by
being there's these different experts across the world that you're
gonna be finding as you're going to these different locations,
and then these experts and maybe there's like a slicing expert.
This person knows all about hacking, this person knows all
about the speed, or this person's like a combat person.
And you meet these people and once you've met them,
then they go into your thing and they're like kind
of teaching you these skills. Is how it's contextualized. And
so you're going around, you're getting pretty much you're either
completing tasks or you know, just getting equipment, and then
you get like the upgrades to those things. I think
it's a way cooler in concept, and it sounded better
before the game came out, and it's truly just a
skill tree that has different people's pictures there instead, so
I was hoping there was a bit more to it,
like maybe it would be pretty tedious if you actually
do back those people once you did the prerequisites and
then then they would teach you that new skill and
you could do it. So I can understand why, but
at least like maybe even have like a call with them,
like the three, like they have your calm, right, so
maybe that you could talk to them and they could.
I don't have some line of dialogue. It just felt
like a little bit half baked. But I think it
makes sense and that it's like, Okay, there's certain parts
of the skill tree that are just gonna lock when
you discover this person. So Taylor, you've probably discovered someone
on Ajami that I don't have yet. But I've already
got these two skill trees on lock because I've been
in tattooing. So I think like maybe the order of
it is interesting, unless they just kind of like fake
it and whatever. Like the second planet you go to,
like maybe it has those experts there.
Speaker 3: I've got four experts so far, and I've maxed out.
I think I'm one, uh one, I've maxed out with
one person and then the other three. I think I'm
one off from completing all of them.
Speaker 1: Okay, yeah, I've maxed out one and then the other ones.
I still have one or two things to get and
then two more people I've discovered on tattooing. I think
I still have to actually meet them, Like I haven't
actually unlocked that, but I've like it's it's obscure. It's
popped up on the screen, but it's not quite unobscured yet,
like I can't click on it yet. So I'm guessing
one of them is like a question I'm literally doing
right now is to go find this person. So yeah,
I think it's it's a decent system, but ultimately it's
kind of just more of the same. But I like
for some of these it is collecting resources, like to
get a better smoke bomb, you have to get the
certain materials. That makes sense. But for other ones, it's
one of them was just like do separate seven different
actions with Nicks, And I really like that One's okay,
I'm gonna get to of think I'm to do it
distract I gotta go for fine alarm. And for the
last couple ones, I'm like, oh, what else have I
not done with them? And it makes you wonder what
other things you can do, and one of them was
really cute, is like make Nick's happy in four different ways,
and I was like, that's great. I love that that
gives you like a peg on your skill tree rather
than having like an exp thing. I think that works
well because I'm not incentivized when I'm going to these
bases to kill every single person, because there's really no
bonus for doing that other than like maybe some people
have some collectibly good grab off them. But for the
most part, it's like, once I've got my objective, I'm
out of there because I'm not gonna get any more
XP or progress for killing every single person. So I
think that just fits the theming of the game pretty well.
And then as as Taylor mentioned, is there armor you're
a different armor that you can upgrade. You're upgrading your ships,
beat your gun of course, So to me, there's like
enough there, there's enough carrots on the stick to get
me going of these different directions unlock some new stuff,
and yeah, definitely like still few, Uh, I don't know
types of upgrades to unlock that. I'm really curious how
there's gonna affect my gun or affect my character. So
I'm liking this is some enough. I just maybe wanted
it to. I thought it was gonna be a little
bit better or a little bit more story focused than
it actually ended up being.
Speaker 4: Two things. One before you get into that, is there
an armor on the first planet, because I'm not bumped
into them at all to update your health and everything
like that, Like this is like find like an armor.
Speaker 1: There's people that sell armor. I don't know if there's
a guy who's only armor, but is there because like
I felt, they were probably three or four different people
I've bumped into.
Speaker 4: It made it sound like it was a specific because
I've had before it's like, oh, you gotta buy this
apart from a scavenger. And then I pulled the many
It's like, oh, well here's a scavenger right here. But
I think I've not found a specific armor or yet
of that can get my health up because I've had
that for a while. I'd like to get it up
a little bit.
Speaker 1: So two ways you get your help up is through
like the skill tree, yea like on one of those things.
Speaker 4: And now it's like, go, I did that, and it's like,
go see someone to update this.
Speaker 1: I don't know the exact situation you're talking about. But
if only bought armor from people.
Speaker 4: Off the look, because I have all that, Like it's
like the corn sweeve or whatever it is like that. Yeah, yeah,
So I don't know. Maybe I just I feel like
maybe I've just not talked to the right vendors. I
guess I'll have to do a quick YouTube or somewhere
I look around because I feel like everyone I keep
talking to is selling the maybe the same.
Speaker 1: Parts, because are you Are you negative on any faction
right now in terms of your reputation?
Speaker 4: No, my go everywhere.
Speaker 1: So they're gonna say, maybe that was what it was.
Is like a pike vendor that had this thing.
Speaker 4: Yeah, maybe I'll go take a look into it. But yeah,
I agree with you, Dylan. It's like it's pretty much
just a skill tree. But I guess it's okay. Would
you want to do a skill tree or this fun
little way with the characters linked to it. I kind
of like that. I like the idea of Okay, the
bartender gives you, like the fast talking everything like that.
So it's nothing that I agree with. Either could have
been something great and same thing that we could have
if you want to be in depth if you would
have told, like, picked the type of scoundrel you're gonna be,
and maybe that would be more punishing, especially or even
I would have liked it as far as let's say
you could only get to a certain relationship with one
of the crime syndicates, and maybe they only offer like, hey, hey,
there's a couple other perks you can get, but you
can only be really like perfect good with this one.
And then if you really want that, you might go, oh, man,
I have a poor relationship with the Pikes right now,
but I'd really like that skill, so let's get up there.
But then in counter that, you know, exits ones from another.
So I think it's kind of what we've tubbled in
so many RPG games where it's like it'd be great
to have some sort of cutoff if you can't do this,
But I do understand where that's just kind of the
way games are today. So I like it as far
as it's a fun little gimmick that Okay, these are
you know, slicings tied to a slice or more the
mechanical stuff, right, ye have speedsters tied to them, So
joy it. For the for the most.
Speaker 1: Part, you tailor any any bonus things that you've discovered
on your times a Kami interesting.
Speaker 2: Oh no, not necessarily.
Speaker 3: Is mostly where I was focusing just on the story,
the main story missions. There are vaults there too, but
I've gotten some key cards, but I haven't just been
actively pursuing.
Speaker 1: It's not been an issue for you then, like, I
guess it's not.
Speaker 4: That's true.
Speaker 3: No, yeah, it's I I'll get to that point after
this point, because with the abilities and whatnot, it's just
been finding certain things because like doing the actions, I
usually knock those off quickly and then it's just for me.
It's a matter of, oh, I need to find like
this durasteal whatever with this other item specifically, and then
you find that and then I can do the unlock.
I don't like how when you get it you have
to actually go into your abilities and actually hit a
button to hit unlock. This should be just be automatic.
I feel like, but I get it. You're probably getting
the the items and maybe you don't want to use
those items on that specific unlock, which does make sense
in retrospect, but sometimes like oh I forgot to go
in and unlock this ability. That's annoying, but not a
not a deal breaker or anything like that. So I
was gonna say though, when it comes to making credits,
I like doing the different mini games, the Fatherier Racing.
I love that it's rigged because usually find your data pads.
It's like, oh, bet on the one that weighs the most,
but on the one that's the tallest or whatnot. It's like, okay,
do that and then you win because it's all rigged.
Doing the memory following Icon game, that's a lot of fun.
You can get a good payout with that. But Subac
is where I love the Sabbac Like it took me
one game to figure it out, but I'm on a
wind streak I haven't lost, and to me it's it's
so much fun. I like the rules, I like the setup,
the system, and just kind of like playing. I don't
you can cheat in it, but I don't like to cheat.
Speaker 4: Like to I think can beat them without it. Yeah,
I feel like I feel like the game gives you enough.
When someone discards a card and they're discarding two, so
you go, Okay, they're looking for a one, so they
probably like either you're hoping that they just have like
the what's that card call? When can shape shift into
another one. Remember it's like it's the three symbols and
then well yeah, so it's like you either know they
have that or one. But if they're like discarding fours
to five, it's okay. I think I got the I
got this guy, so I haven't found the need to cheat.
The only card that was messing me up was for
why I kept missing it. Because you have those kind
of whatever power cards where it's like, oh, you know,
retrieve two credits or skip a turn or whatever it
may be. It's one that one guy kept using and
it was making that that morphine card to six, but
I kept missing it. So every time I probably sin
it's like oh six, I'm like, I didn't even roll,
why does it give me a six? But then I
just realized, okay, on my and it's so funny'm my
next play through, I just sat out all because every
time I did it, I lost three times because I
was not reading is prompt that he was playing this card,
So like, okay, for the first round, first game, I'm
just gonna sit out. He didn't even play the card,
and then he just lost all his chips and he
was out. So it's like I don't know if that's
a random thing or whatnot, but it's been fun to
play the block when like I make Star Wars fan,
but I can fully admit, like I've never played the
bac in real life. I've never been like, what are
the rules of the bok. It's like, oh, this is
a cool game. That is how Han Solo want to
shipp in Star Wars, right, And that's where it's like,
it's it's pretty much Star Wars' version of a poker
or like a you know, a it's like reverse blackjack
as high yeah black Yeah, it's just you're kind of
getting twenty one bitton reverse you want to lower and
noever you want pairs and it's a bluffy game, right
because then they that's why I don't feel like you
need to cheat, because like, sure you could look at
their cards and see, but you still need to have
a hand that can beat them. There's not like a
poker where you can bet a bunch and so I'm like, oh,
I'm gonna fold because I don't know, there's not that
everyone has to reveal their hand at the end, so
he's still just got to play for the best hand.
But it's been a fun time.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I haven't jumped into that yet. In that
race thing that you mentioned, Taylor, is that like, is
there races you can do and then also betting on
races or there are those?
Speaker 2: No, you're not doing the races.
Speaker 3: It's just like holograms, right, like, yeah, these alien horses.
Speaker 1: I've seen a couple of quests pops up pop ups,
but I haven't actually done one of them yet. You
haven't played to balk myself. I did play one of
the arcade games just to try it out, you know it.
It was fine, not something I'd really do again unless
there was maybe like some reason to do it for
an unlock of certain kind. But yeah, I like that.
There's a lot of stuff I'm excited to get into
some bock. I don't know why I haven't done it yet.
I guess I'm just trying to like progress the story
somewhat before this episode. So maybe now that I'm less
pushed to do that, I might go snow cards.
Speaker 4: Snow Gwent, though I'll say that snow Gwent Gwent's still
the peak video game card game inside a game, so
just saying.
Speaker 1: Nothing, Well, matchup one one thing too. I wanted to
say on the RPG side of things that I kind
of just discovered now is that there are armor sets.
So if you have you know, like the whatever it is,
like the satchel, the pan, it's in the jacket for
a certain armor, like the name of it, that each
you know, each one might give you like a stealth bonus,
but then when you have all three of them together,
then you'll get an even greater bonus because you're wearing
the full set. So I really like that that's in
there too, kind of incentivizing trying to collect these sets.
So that's pretty neat. We talked about the the lock
Picking mini game. I like it. I like a little
rhythm game. I think what I like about it the
most is that it's just very quick. Even if you're
getting crushed by it, it's still like, is pretty fast
to just mash through it. But like still, it also
happens in real time, so sometimes there's a situation where
someone is patrolling an area and you know that, Okay,
I can't mess this up, like I need to get
this on the first try or too, and that adds
a lot of intensity. So I'm like in the mini game.
I also the hacking mini game I think I'm like
finally just getting bored of it after doing it like
maybe twenty times, or I'm.
Speaker 4: Like, it's pretty easy.
Speaker 1: It's it's just it's just like playing Mastermind. Yeah, but
it's it's a little little basic for my like and
even like the highest difficulty.
Speaker 4: Before four and then you just figure it out, you know,
because I is there like a I've had this too,
where it's like you don't get them and then you
get to that final one. Is there some sort of
alarm that goes off to something because I feel like
it goes off and then I eventually just get.
Speaker 3: The right one, and then you are limited on how
many times you can do it. But that's where the
slicing subroutines come in, because you can add certain incentives
or yea perks.
Speaker 4: Right, So yeah, I've seen I have one now where
has lines to certain ones.
Speaker 1: The one time I got like where I there was
no way like it would be a random shot guess
on the last line, I just like exited out and
try and started it again, and then I like it,
I started from scratch, So I don't know, I don't
I'm guessing to an activating alarm. I think that would
be good if it did something like that, but really
even just back out and activated again without losing anything.
So that's what I would That's what I would advise,
random little thing. The fall damage in this game is
absolutely brutal. Arker can out fall at.
Speaker 4: All, which makes sense. I kind of like, right, they're
like a normal human who's not like a Jedi or
a trained soldier where they're just like, you know, so
I kind of like that.
Speaker 1: So and then my last notes, you're all kind of
like story related things. Do you guys have any other
like gameplay things or systems, RPG combat still things that
we didn't mention?
Speaker 3: No, I think I'm just I'm story at this point too.
Speaker 1: Okay, how about we take our last break. I don't
know how much we'll talk about the story, but we'll
take one more break and we'll be right back. Okay,
we are back. So obviously we none of us have
beat the game, and me and Taylor went different routes afterwards,
so we you know, I don't want to spoil anything
for him. I don't want him to spoil anything for me,
and we don't want to spoil anything for Travis, who's
a little further behind. Us there.
Speaker 4: I'm still digging the first plan. I'm just saying out, you.
Speaker 1: Know, I love it, though I spent a lot of
time there, a lot of time there too. What do
you guys think of Kves as a Star Wars protagonist?
For me, I feel like she's like part of the barrel.
I am not a big fan of Kves. I. I
like the idea that she's not an evil person. I
like that what they're doing there. You your your scoulenge,
you're an out while you're not a evil villain. I
get it. But I think she's I still think she's
way too nice and like a bit too goofy for me.
I wish she had a bit of a harder edge
to her. I don't really vibe with her humor in
like these life or desk situations. Is she's just like
cracking one liners and not in like a fun, smart
alec sort of way, just like kind of like an
annoying teenager sort of way. So I'm I'm really not
like in this character a whole lot, which is too bad.
Speaker 4: I'm with you on the harder edge part, that's about it.
But I think because I'm just having a good time
with the game, and I think if the game was
more story based and she was like this, oh, it's
really led me down. But because I feel like the
story is very just kind of there to propel you forward,
and it's just you're just some random criminal and she's
not really criminal. That's why, of course i'd like the
more hard edge thing. But like I like the voice actress,
I like her reflection she does there, so for me
in the world where I'm just okay, I'm kind of
making some story up, I'm kind of fine. Just this
very it's a very pour yourself into the character type
of character, to my opinion, because I don't think there's much.
It's just kind of what do you want in your world? Like, well,
I want an adventure? It's like, well is that it
like like a scountered to me would be like I
want to be rich, I want to be powerful, stuff
like that, But she feels like she is. They definitely
again when they say oh, well, yeah, scoundrel, it's you know,
these dangerous people and you know they're the most like
smart Alci of the universe. It just feels like she's
just a regular person that's doing things in the Star
World world, right, and just that's in the story, so
uh yeah, there's nothing and I'm not too far into it,
but it just feels like it is a just a
okay character you can just kind of put your own
thoughts into, but not even that money, because they still
give you enough to know, Okay, she's not gonna go
that far. I think the humor I'm fine with right now.
But uh yeah, she's just she's fine as a video
game vessel, I would say, So.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess I was just expecting that they're since
we're hanging out with the criminals the dark underworld of
Star Wars, that would be it wouldn't be as bright
and colorful and cheery. So maybe that's what's catching me off.
Like even like the criminals and stuff, I'm I feel
like they're not really like even job of hanging out
with him a little bit and he's like pretty chill.
He's a pretty chill dude, which is not what I
would expect.
Speaker 4: Or chill right now, you know, And it's like it's
not to be like disrespectful, because I'm sure Taylor would
push back on this. I'm not playing them all, but
I just feel like that's kind of like a UBI
soft trope where the main character I've never invested in,
like the Assassin's Creed games. I never was like, it's
the Assassin, but like Etsy was pretty dull in that
first game whatever his name was, Adrian whatever, and Watchdogs
like he was very dull. I think there's another Ubi
Soft game, Like didn't they do the Division? Do they
do Division games or no? Yeah, they were dull. Like
I just feel like all their I guess that's maybe
why if this was like, oh, rock Steady Stars, but
k I'm expecting some stuff here. But I think ub
Soft and even the Assassins, I feel like they have
their own lineage and history where you can bring a
lot to that character depending on X, Y and Z
where the time, I think us off is just we
need someone that you can play with, like you just
a guide you around. So maybe that's why two didn't
hurt me as bad because it's the Ubisoft game.
Speaker 3: So I am not, like I said, I'm not big
on the scoundrels, and so her character like she just
feels like when the if you watch Solo and Kiara
is like you're the good guy, and so it is
like youah, no, I'm not That's what Kia is Kia
is just all scoundrels are good guys, right, And there's
a lot of story dynamics here where she basically makes
the the good guy choice, And of course I'm kind
of eating in that decision making as well. But she
just naturally is even dialogue like, oh, you know these
crimes in the Kiss, they just take over and they
they have no care for the little guy. It's the
smaller people that pay the price.
Speaker 2: So yeah, it's just who she is as a character.
Speaker 3: I've been heavily drawn into other characters and ubisoff games
than I am this character, namely at CEO. But I'm
gonna keep I'm gonna see where this goes. I'm gonna
keep seeing it. Like I like ND five, he's a
funny droid to pair up with her as as a character,
but yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, fair enough. I also random, I feel like the
lip syncing is just atrocious in this game, Like there
are no lines of dialogue that are lining up, so
maybe that's hurting the investment a little bit. Like the
performance feels fine, but when like the lip syncing is
so bad, it's hard for me to buy into some
of these sequences, especially like the character models don't look amazing.
I think the environments and like, whoever are designing these
sets and just designing the houses and putting all the
trinkets around that urt team absolutely crushing it. But I
feel like some of the character models and faces and
that all ties in with the lip syncing two is
not ideal. It's not great.
Speaker 4: The first conversation she had the bartender, I feel like
all the bartender's lines did not match one single bit,
and I was like, ooh, I agree with you. Where
some of that the characters, some of this game feels
like last Gen to me, and last one's still looks good, right,
but I just feel like in what we've gone now,
like it even feels like maybe higher end like three
sixty pis or like the top tier games, but it
just feels like at times like this is not the
best looking game. But yeah, the world, the environments of
those settings look very good.
Speaker 1: So and then what else there's uh, there's I've had
a couple of flashback sequences or some backstory with characters
Mom Rico, and that's both of them are very short,
like you're just kind of getting a quick snippet, so
curious to see what we do with that, but that's
not really doing too much for me yet.
Speaker 4: And it's making her more like sympathetic too, like oh,
we'll shoot a mom that she probably lost, right, Like, yeah,
it's showing how she became that, but I don't think
it's gonna be anything too deep.
Speaker 1: But she also see it, like the first time she
talks about her, she seems pretty unaffected by it. She's like, yeah,
she's not really around, but like not in a way
that she was bummed out, and like she just shared
that openly with someone. I mean, she's a very open person,
like any person she talks to, she's like, Hey, I'm Kvez,
that's my name, that is who I am. Identify me, Like,
here's my SIN number, Like she's out, you're just dropping information.
So I don't know, I feel like that part of
it too, feels like man, I want to be even
more stealthy. And as you mentioned, Taylor, like you at
some points have choices in this game, but you never
really have dialogue options. You can choose like which way
you want to go on a quest who pretty much
which faction you want to screw over, or if you
want to help this person or not, And most of
the time, I'm not because this one person was like,
oh my my, my partner went missing, and it was
it just felt like a setup and like there was
no reason for me to help this person. I'm like,
you know, I'm gonna, like, I don't care about this person.
I'm not gonna help the little guy. Like I'm not
a terrible person. But I'm also not just dropping everything
to help random people in the street. And I feel
like I'm kind of doing that so far. Like anytime
someone has like a regular video game like side quest
that is just this nothing quest of go get this
thing for me, or go find this person for me,
I'm like, no, I'm not doing any of that. It
doesn't fit with who this character should be, even if
this character does play every line like in a very
positive way. Any other characters that are sending out Taylor.
You mentioned the ND five. I believe it's his name,
but I guess I don't really want to spoil it,
like character things, so I don't really want to bring
too much up here. But there isn't really anyone who's
done anything for me yet, villain wise, kind of ally wise,
there's no one that's really working for me. I like
the factions in terms of the setup for them, and
maybe those like the quest Givers, but even then, like
there's not like tons of dynamic with them. But in
terms of like the main story stuff, I'm not too
intrigued by anyone.
Speaker 3: There's a character that will they play a heavier part
in the story, but it's not spoilers. Their name is
ank N Kajimi, and I fucking love this character. She's
absolutely hilarious and yeah, just just a very fun character
to interact with. There's I don't know if I should
say because I don't want to spoil it, but there's
someone who is interesting on Kajimi as well to deal with,
and I wasn't I knew to look out for this interaction,
but I wasn't expecting it at this point in the game.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I think maybe the one thing I do like,
I mean, not a big fan of these characters, but
what I do like is that everyone else in this
world is double crossing you, just like you're double crossing
everyone else. I think like no one really has each
other's back in this world. There might be a couple
exceptions to that, but even then, there's other people that
I'm teaming up with and there's always someone in the
back of my head of like, Okay, when is this
person going to screw me over any chance I get,
I'm just gonna break away from them, like I don't
want to trust this person. So I think that dynamic
of it is working pretty well. But any other story
notes from utres.
Speaker 4: No, Unfortunately I said that's not been the driving factor.
I think maybe that would have been something where when
I talk about because I think Hogwart Legacy, if we
kind of have that too with a story, I would
say the Legacy story was better than this. There was
a time where like we're just not really loving this.
I think that's where, with the game play being a
bit more simpler, if the story was driving me, i'd be, oh,
I'll really want to get to that next mission. But
there's so many times they give me the main quest
it just feels like a side quest where it's like
I have no pull other than I know, hey, to progress,
I gotta do this one. There's usually times where it's
like I'd rather maybe just do like the sort of
bounty hunter thing of like getting contracts and going out right.
So that's where I probably will try to streamline it
a bit more now because there's just things I want
to do after what you guys have said, and you know,
go to other planets and everything. Maybe we'll try and
go to a different one. But uh yeah, no, it's
just been it's just again kind of guiding you along.
Not gonna win any game awards for best Story of
the Year or you know whatever they call that. So yeah,
which is unfortunate. But at the same time, again for me,
I've I never got that from Ubisoft Games, and I've
also paid twenty bucks for this game, so it's not
like a oh man, my height was you know, I
was really looking for Last of Us call the you know,
even Jedi fallen over to me, that's a single player game.
They got a I guess they still got an actress
to play this character. But the actor they got for
Jedi is a more of note actor, right, So right away,
I go, Okay, I'm expecting X, Y and Z from
the Jedi games were this. I wasn't really expecting that level.
Speaker 3: Sorry to Interjectravis, So have you lined things up timeline
wise like with Crimson Dawn and where this game takes
place in the story.
Speaker 4: I feel like didn't they?
Speaker 3: Is it?
Speaker 4: After the first Death Stars blown up.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so this is between Empire strikes Back, which are
the Jedi. But if you remember, Darth Maul is dead
at this point, but we still have Crimson Dawn popping off.
I just thought that was interesting.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well and you're as still alive, right, she was
there and everything like that, so I yuess she just
took over from him.
Speaker 2: Yes, yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah. There's a couple other familiar characters that pop up
in in Tattooine that I've seen so far. So Luke, yeah,
Luke's there is there.
Speaker 3: Apparently the blaster shots there from when Grido and Han
Solo were in the cantina. You can see the booth
and didn't see the damage on the wall.
Speaker 1: It's fun detail, very rundown canteen. I can't even patch
the walls, come on. Yeah. I think my last note
here is is that the the opening sequence Canto Bite,
I thought it was really good, Like it was a
pretty extended sequence. It's very linear and he was teaching
you the mechanics. But I thought visually looked great. It
you know, it's acting in as the tutorial area, but
I really enjoyed it. I thought it was a really
fun set of set pieces there and got me pretty
invested in it right away, So shout out to that.
I like the exploring the town a little bit too, So,
uh yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Think that was cool.
Speaker 3: I think that it's it's nice that these games are
able to pay tribute to that era of Star Wars
and kind of let us look more into it, like
can't bite exploring it was cool. Like I said earlier,
I loved the detail that they've invested in that, like
this snowy planet a lot of fun, just kind of
like checking around, you jog my memory on something. Have
either of you guys found the higher public cruiser on
the first planet to shine?
Speaker 2: So it's not much was.
Speaker 1: That like the destroyed kind of situation?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's part of the main story. I'm pretty sure
that question.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So there's these dialogue things in there, like data pads
where it's super cool because just the idea that they
put a higher public ship in there got me really excited.
And then you have this guy talking like, oh, I
got to go to the bridge of this cruiser like
I'm just an engineer.
Speaker 2: I can't wait.
Speaker 3: And there's talk that we're gonna go to Starlight Beacon
soon I'm thinking, oh, that's just a cool little thing
that they added in there, and then it shows another
data pad where the guys like our ship is under
attack by an I have fleet. They just came out
of nowhere, like, oh, we're engines are down, like I
don't know if we're gonna make it. Those kind of things.
I really really like that, So I'm hoping helping other
people kind of find those little easter eggs just.
Speaker 4: Make me sad about that Star Wars Eclips game.
Speaker 1: Now, yes, anything else that we haven't mentioned here, guys, No,
even with.
Speaker 4: My critiques, I'm still excited to get it in and play.
Like I said, I think it's a fun game that
I recommend everybody that is a Star Wars fan. And
then hey, luckily even Dylan so far, like not the
bigges Stars fan, he's enjoying it. So that's why i'd
say recommend that. Yeah, doing the UEI play thing again
if it's one of those things where we have a
big backlog and it's like, oh, I get this this.
I don't know if you don't love Stars if you
need to get there. But I've had a good time
and I'm looking forward to seeing where it all kind
of all goes and what you're kind of everything you
have at the end. But no, I'm just having a
fun time of venturing in the world of Star Wars
right now.
Speaker 1: Oh, I was gonna ask the the fourth Planet's what's
it called? It's called starts with an a Akiva? Yeah,
where is that? Is that from any of the movies
or something? Where is that?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 4: A jungle world with numerous droid factories, So I don't
think so. No.
Speaker 1: Okay, so that's like a new location that they made
for this.
Speaker 4: Or it could be something from like an animated book
or something like that, but nothing that I think like, oh, yeah,
this is where Hansol and Laying made love or something
like that.
Speaker 1: I think it's a good mix to pick some some favorites,
maybe a more low key spot like a kami and
then yeah, just make up one and the droid factory.
That's cool because I've seen like droids. I feel like
I've seen a handful of them, but not a lot.
So I'd actually like to see more of that because
even like in combat, like any droid I've bought is
so freaking tanky that like, I don't know, they would
just make for an interesting like switch up on the
dynamic there. So hopefully that's integrated into that planet. That'd
be cool to check some out.
Speaker 3: It's neat how you can't just knock out a droid,
but I do like that. That's where it comes into
switch into like your eye on blaster, right. Yeah, and
you guys have the sorry.
Speaker 1: What emes if you use the stun blast on like
a droid.
Speaker 4: I don't think.
Speaker 3: I don't think it worked for me when I did it.
Have you guys used the like explosive shot thing? Yeah, yeah,
see using that on rocks. I did not know that
was a thing until like you just you've messed around
a little bit, but I wish I like had some
It's like, oh, you can use this on certain objects
in your environment to cause a reaction, just something to
nudget instead of just like blind firing all over the
bloody place trying to see what would happen.
Speaker 2: But I digress.
Speaker 1: Yeah, funny once again, Like I feel like me and
you almost play different games to some extent because for me,
I'd like seen multiple spots in the game where I'm like, oh,
that looks like a breakable wall. I guarantee you I'm
gonna get some sort of explosive, Like I threw a
grenade at it because I thought it was it was
something I could blow up, and then it didn't work.
I was like, oh, I swear I'm gonna get something
at some point. And then there was a quest I
had later that was like, oh, this requires the gun
blast thing whatever to progress the quest. So I was like, Okay,
it's something I'm gonna unlock. Then I even went there,
and then I saw that crack on the wall and
I was like, oh, I can't.
Speaker 4: I was wondering, man, because I threw Nate, I haven't
got that. Yeah, I was throwing an e because I
was like, man, Star Fox Adventures taught me about walls
that look like this, and I was shooting everything. I
even meant. Gwen was with me or trying to figure
out like I guess, I guess not. I guess it's
just a designing way. So that's good to know that, Okay,
there's something coming later that I can do that because
I got to double back to a pike syndicate walls
like there's something behind.
Speaker 1: There, so yeah, that's so funny that. Yeah, And then
and then like after I did that, got the got
the quest for it, and then as soon as I
did that, they the ND five. He gave me like
two spots I could go like test it out and
practice it too. So I don't know that's funny for
me like that. That was like a very unintuitive, very
well laid out. But I guess just an open world
game like this where you can do things in different orders,
that's just gonna happen. Did you you get you got
that on Kajmi, I'm guessing, Taylor, Or did you just
get it now when you got to Tattooin.
Speaker 3: No, I got it before when I was on Kajimi.
Speaker 1: Okay, so they I guess they whatever like second planet
you go to, I'm guessing they like have a way
that you can go through it. So maybe like Tattooine
was set up for it was a bit better than
the Kajimi route or something. I'm not sure, but interesting. Noneless, Travis,
where are you going next? What's your next planet you're.
Speaker 4: Gonna hit up? I want to go to Kajimi because
it is something from the sequels, aren't see that much.
I love Tatowein, but we've been there a lot. But
I might have to just go to that other planet
if that is option.
Speaker 1: The whatever that's called, you can.
Speaker 4: I might go there just in case the next amount
of a side quest and something we haven't all progressed
or anything, so might go there. And plus and I
can tell you guys, hey, this plant might suck, like,
don't rush to it, you know, but uh yeah, probably there.
I think I will work on that now because I've
had a good time. But I got a lot of credits,
my reputation's good, a lot of places, I've opened up
some vaults, so I think I'll probably work on I
don't even remember what main quest right now. I think
I'm like updating my speeder or something like that. And
that's something where sometimes the uh the goal of you
hit up the d pat shows you. I think sometimes
that's a little mess up too, because I've seen times
where it makes it looks like it's above you, but
really it's a guy that's like.
Speaker 1: The map in this game is atrocious in the towns
or even though I think is pretty I like that
it has all the icons for all the quests, even
if you even selected the quest, but other than that,
not a good map.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I guess I show that I didn't get it
into specifics when I'm doing non overall or the overalls.
I really like the like the quest bar where it's
like your main quest, your jobs, your side quest ventures,
and I love that you used.
Speaker 1: To but once I'm now that I'm used to it,
and it like even breaks out by planet too. Yeah,
getting used to it now.
Speaker 4: Oh I love that so much when it will literally
say you know that the orbit of it whatever, because
they say in Starfield sometimes paint. I love that you
can collapse the you know the tree and everything like that.
So I think that's well put together, the actual menu
of the missions and the job. So I appreciate that
because there's something it's just like Okay, just got this
job and where is it? But I feel like even
the icons they use on the side of like okay,
handshake that makes sense, that's a contrary Like there's just
things that I think that was clever and that's been
a good way of streamline it for me.
Speaker 1: So yeah, definitely. Yeah, So stay tuned because I'm next
week I'll probably be talking about this game more, maybe
for one of you guys are on, I forget who's
on next week talk about it. But I'm sure this
one will be Kirkling all right. I'm sure we'll be
updating our thoughts on this game as we play it.
For well, I have I have a you know, three
weeks to play it before i my Ubisoft things runs out.
I'm not not gonna resubscribe for a second month of this,
but I'm gonna try to play a bunch this month,
is my plan, get my twenty bucks worth, and then
I'll probably resubscribe when Assassin's Creed comes out, so who knows,
maybe I'll even play some more Outlaws at that at
that time.
Speaker 3: Pandora, you know, Pandora quame.
Speaker 1: I'm putting on my list here, Taylor is playing Pandora.
It's on my list. We'll talk about it next time.
Taylor's on Side Quest. Thank you everyone for listening. This
is a fun episode. If you are playing the game,
let us know what you think. I'm curious what the
other people out there are thinking of this game. And yeah,
we'll see you again next time. Bye bye,