Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, Welcome to game As Mornings with Me Jeff Greb,
Speaker 1: your host from giant bomb dot com. Thank you for
Speaker 1: tuning in. In this episode, we're gonna be talking about
Speaker 1: the latest with GTA six and more big time game
Speaker 1: creators come out in defensive physical games. It's gonna be
Speaker 1: a good one because we have Rachel Kazer on the show. Rachel,
Speaker 1: how are you doing?
Speaker 2: Hi, Jeff, I have COVID. Oh no, I tested positive
Speaker 2: for COVID last week.
Speaker 3: How's how's it regardless? You sound all right? Are you recovering?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm on the I'm on the mend uh. For
Speaker 2: the most part, it's just it's just down to a
Speaker 2: little bitty bitty cough that right here that won't leave
Speaker 2: me alone. But last I was telling jan this last week,
Speaker 2: it was getting so bad that even Dean Takahashi was
Speaker 2: telling me to stop working and go take a rest.
Speaker 1: Okay, Then then then you know it's bad, like when
Speaker 1: he against like empathizing and he's like, oh no, all right.
Speaker 2: I thought it was just like a summer cold like
Speaker 2: I had. I just had a cough, and then I
Speaker 2: was having really bad headaches, and then the coffee was
Speaker 2: getting worse, and everyone's like, hey, can you take a
Speaker 2: COVID test? And I was like, I haven't taken a
Speaker 2: COVID test in like three years.
Speaker 1: So there's been COVID here in fifty years. Yeah, exactly, Yeah.
Speaker 2: But unfortunately I think I got it at the gym.
Speaker 2: Like not a flex literal or figurative, but everyone is
Speaker 2: according to the to my friend at the gym, everyone
Speaker 2: is coming back from summer trips, summer vacations, and they're
Speaker 2: bringing all the germs with them.
Speaker 3: Ah, that makes sense.
Speaker 1: Yeah, everyone wants to get back into the gym after
Speaker 1: gorgeon on vacation and then they're attacking you with that.
Speaker 1: So yeah, the COVID could still catch the kzer beam.
Speaker 1: That's the bad news. That's unfortunately.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's okay, just give me, just give me a
Speaker 2: week of bed rest and I've got it.
Speaker 1: I'm back on we uh oh okay, yes, you keep
Speaker 1: getting better. Glad to hear that you're already on the
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Speaker 1: As far as this show goes most weekdays, I Jeff Grubb,
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Speaker 1: Hello YouTube. All right, we have a lot to get into,
Speaker 1: so let's start the morning Mess with Grand Theft Auto
Speaker 1: six marketing may finally ramp back up in August.
Speaker 3: This is from Eddie McCoo at GameSpot.
Speaker 1: According to a reputable insider, new information about Rockstar's GTA
Speaker 1: six could arrive very soon. Nathan Hate, who has accurately
Speaker 1: reported unannounced details about upcoming games before, recently said he
Speaker 1: expects to see a fair bit of GTA six in August.
Speaker 1: He went on to push back against the narrative that
Speaker 1: just because Rockstar has not marketed GTA six much so
Speaker 1: far with just a few months to go before launch,
Speaker 1: that there is some cause for concern. They have a
Speaker 1: marketing plan and they are sticking to that. No reason
Speaker 1: for concern, he said, adding that the game is not
Speaker 1: delayed and we'll launch on time on November nineteenth. Let's
Speaker 1: let's pause there real quick, Rachel, Rachel, We're not like,
Speaker 1: is anyone still thinking this game might not come out?
Speaker 1: I guess there is always that possibility that there could
Speaker 1: be a delay. I've moved past that, I think after
Speaker 1: they started really going hard on the pre orders. The
Speaker 1: idea that they haven't shown us much more is not
Speaker 1: really registering with me on that front of like, oh,
Speaker 1: that means there could be a delay. To me, it's
Speaker 1: always they're just showing us what they think they have to.
Speaker 1: They don't have to show us anything else. And people
Speaker 1: are still going to buy this game in absolute droves, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they've already bought the game in absolute droves. And yeah,
Speaker 2: I kind of think maybe Take two is like investing, Like,
Speaker 2: I know, nothing is coming to mind at the moment,
Speaker 2: but I'm sure Take two has other ip that are
Speaker 2: going out in the meantime that I'm sure they want
Speaker 2: to invest in before GTA six comes along and blitzes
Speaker 2: the entire market the.
Speaker 3: Way, right, they have to keep that in mind as well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, so they want to make money. They want
Speaker 2: to make money for their their quarters before GTA six launches.
Speaker 2: So it wouldn't surprise me if they're investing what uh
Speaker 2: you know, what scraps they can in their other IP
Speaker 2: before GTA because they know they don't have to have
Speaker 2: a long tail on the GTA six marketing. They can
Speaker 2: just drop a trailer in the middle of August and
Speaker 2: everyone will eat it up.
Speaker 3: I'll eat it up.
Speaker 2: I'm not being hypocritical. I'll eat it up.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Is that your expectation We're going to get a trailer
Speaker 1: in August? Because that's what That's what this seems to
Speaker 1: imply to me.
Speaker 2: And yeah, that's that's what I've heard. And I don't
Speaker 2: have like insider as insider resources like like Nate the
Speaker 2: Hate does, I think, but I that's that's what I've heard,
Speaker 2: is that when they say summer they mean August.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I heard way back in like March and April, like, oh,
Speaker 1: things would start in July, and then the pre order
Speaker 1: started in very very late June, and then there was
Speaker 1: no there's been nothing else in July. So I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 1: what's did that? Did that just mean the pre order thing?
Speaker 1: Are you gonna get like a big TV marketing campaign?
Speaker 1: And to be fair, like they've explicitly said like they're
Speaker 1: going to spend less money on marketing on traditional over
Speaker 1: the air television and stuff like that. So this is
Speaker 1: probably gonna manifest in a slightly different way. I don't
Speaker 1: think that means we don't get a trailer, although they
Speaker 1: don't need one, Like I feel like they don't need one.
Speaker 1: They don't need to let people review this game. They
Speaker 1: don't need to do anything. I still think I still
Speaker 1: think they will. I think they'll probably let people do this.
Speaker 1: Think they will have another trailer.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think they will definitely have a I think
Speaker 2: I think they are probably maybe going to invest a
Speaker 2: little bit more in creators, like creator lead marketing before
Speaker 2: this comes out. That's just that's not based in any
Speaker 2: like knowledge I have. That's just a subposition. But I
Speaker 2: think Take two knows enough about the market and knows
Speaker 2: enough about what side their bread's buttered on that they're
Speaker 2: going to like, Okay, let's go after the big shots
Speaker 2: in the GTA community to you know, to get to
Speaker 2: get a little bit of like boots on the ground
Speaker 2: or knut boots in their grassroots publicity.
Speaker 1: Take two as kind of intimated previously that that the
Speaker 1: marketing campaign would begin in summer. You know, pre orders
Speaker 1: have been opened since June twenty fifth. It doesn't seem
Speaker 1: like it's been slow at all. It seems like people
Speaker 1: have been pre ordering this game in quite a huge
Speaker 1: amount of the game is eighty dollars.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so far, nothing to.
Speaker 1: Me indicates that there's any reason to expect this game
Speaker 1: won't be as big as everyone is expecting. Like it
Speaker 1: seems like everything is just kind of lining up that way. Now,
Speaker 1: we haven't seen anyone play this video game.
Speaker 3: We have not seen that yet. Do you think the
Speaker 3: next trailer is not legally Yeah, exactly right.
Speaker 1: Yes, we've seen some leaks and stuff, seen some like
Speaker 1: hacks actually, But like when that trailer, that first trailer
Speaker 1: does come out and or the first trailer, next trailer,
Speaker 1: when that next trailer does come out, will it be
Speaker 1: like a full on gameplay trailer or do they just continue.
Speaker 3: Kind of doing what they've been doing and like setting
Speaker 3: up the world?
Speaker 2: When did the I mean I think in this case,
Speaker 2: I think that they'll follow the playbook that they had
Speaker 2: for GTA five. I don't know when the GT five
Speaker 2: gameplay trailer came out. I know they I know they
Speaker 2: had one before the game launched in the early in
Speaker 2: the early marketing stage. I know they put out a
Speaker 2: gameplay trailer, but I don't remember if it was before
Speaker 2: or after they released a bunch of cinematic trailers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, probably, and then you know, and it's been god,
Speaker 1: how long since that game?
Speaker 3: What did they do? What did they do for?
Speaker 2: I played it? I first played it. I first played
Speaker 2: it on the Xbox three sixty that's how long.
Speaker 3: It's Yes, God, that's crazy, Oh my god.
Speaker 2: I think they I think for Red Dead Redemption two,
Speaker 2: they released a gameplay trailer I want to say, after
Speaker 2: they released like at least three cinematic trailers.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I think it was pretty late, and it was
Speaker 3: like in the in like the quarter before the.
Speaker 2: Sprinkle They sprinkle like bits of gameplay in the cinematic trailers,
Speaker 2: but not enough for it to be a you know,
Speaker 2: gameplay trailer.
Speaker 3: Mm hmm. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think they will have some gameplay, but I think
Speaker 1: it'll be limited. I think it'll be sort of a yes,
Speaker 1: interspersed between more world of setting stuff and like the
Speaker 1: the cut scenes, which I think they believe shows off
Speaker 1: best in in advertisements. And then and again, like what
Speaker 1: do they get out of letting people see more of
Speaker 1: this game? Because it's not like the people who are
Speaker 1: going to show up to buy this game on day one,
Speaker 1: they don't need to see anything. They were going to
Speaker 1: buy its sight unseen and then if there are people
Speaker 1: waiting on the sideline, well they were probably not going
Speaker 1: to get it day one, but once the game's out
Speaker 1: there and the hype is inescapable, then that could sort
Speaker 1: of carry it through. I bet, I bet that's what
Speaker 1: they're mostly thinking here, although who knows that next trailer
Speaker 1: could come out and be like seven minutes of nothing
Speaker 1: but gameplay.
Speaker 3: I could be completely wrong, but I.
Speaker 2: Mean it's I'm trying to get in the head of
Speaker 2: the marketing people here, like what would yeah, like, what
Speaker 2: do they need to do? Like what is the cadence
Speaker 2: that they need to do? And I think right now,
Speaker 2: because everyone is everyone is so just chomping at the
Speaker 2: bit for GTAs for more news on GTA six. And
Speaker 2: by the way, regarding the delay, I still occasionally see
Speaker 2: like these schmucks on TikTok saying something like, hey, GTA
Speaker 2: six has been delayed purely either because they're rage baiting
Speaker 2: and you know, courting views from you know, just people
Speaker 2: being like what GTA six is delayed, or because they
Speaker 2: are so pessimistic that they believe there's no shot that
Speaker 2: two will release the or that rock Star will release
Speaker 2: the game in twenty twenty six.
Speaker 1: That's that's fun. You always got to appreciate the people
Speaker 1: out there just running that hustle to ruin everyone else
Speaker 1: and just to say things that are absolutely not true.
Speaker 1: Will points out they always do the narrated trailer explaining systems,
Speaker 1: and I'm remembering that now for a dead Redemption two.
Speaker 1: So okay, I could very easily see that, like here's
Speaker 1: the new stuff. You know, maybe that comes out closer
Speaker 1: to launch or whatever, but yes, I guess I would
Speaker 1: expect that now when I kind of remember that's the
Speaker 1: way they've done it, and I'm curious to see what
Speaker 1: the new systems are going to be. I'm curious to see,
Speaker 1: like how they try to different differentiate this game, because
Speaker 1: right now it feels like bigger. It's bigger and more,
Speaker 1: And yeah, I mean, I think this is still the
Speaker 1: one game in one developed that when they say bigger
Speaker 1: and more, that is a back of the box bullet points.
Speaker 1: Still I think other ones it's like, yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: you guys are just gonna fill this more with more
Speaker 1: of the same crap.
Speaker 3: And maybe that's what's gonna happen here as well. But
Speaker 3: I still think.
Speaker 2: If you heard that from you be soft, you'd be like,
Speaker 2: ugh right, you hear it from Rockstar and you're like, oh,
Speaker 2: that sounds great.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just want to like see what that means
Speaker 1: for rock Stars. We know that they are going to
Speaker 1: not hold back on spending the required money to really
Speaker 1: fill that out. So yeah, hey, August, all right, we'll
Speaker 1: find out more about this game. I'm like halfway between
Speaker 1: getting excited and still being annoyed about like, ah, man,
Speaker 1: this game takes up so much of the oxygen in
Speaker 1: the room. But at this point we're close enough. November
Speaker 1: is not like some far off land. It's now something
Speaker 1: I can imagine in my head. All right, let's let's
Speaker 1: play this game, see what it's all about, and I'm
Speaker 1: gonna start getting pretty excited about it.
Speaker 2: I'm excited because it feels like there's a lot of
Speaker 2: nostalgia there for me personally. So yeah, like I said,
Speaker 2: I play GTAs five back on the Xbox three sixty
Speaker 2: and I remember I wasn't really allowed to play GTA
Speaker 2: until like four, and then I then I played that
Speaker 2: on I think one of my cousins with on one
Speaker 2: of their systems. So then so GTA five was kind
Speaker 2: of like my first big girl Grand Theft Auto. So yeah,
Speaker 2: I've definitely gi Yeah, there is some mystery there.
Speaker 1: I'm the nostalgia is definitely for me, like it's a
Speaker 1: whole other part of my life. And I've told the
Speaker 1: story before about like going to a friend's house and
Speaker 1: like not going basically like just living at this friend's
Speaker 1: house and they had Grand Theft Auto three and we'd
Speaker 1: always have people over every night. It's Ohio, there's like
Speaker 1: just a constant house party happening and just passing the
Speaker 1: controller back and forth and playing Grand Theft Auto three
Speaker 1: for for weeks at a time, and it's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that to me, I think that was a lot of power.
Speaker 1: A lot of people experienced that game, and that's how
Speaker 1: I still want to experience these games. I want to
Speaker 1: kind of sit down and have fun. And that's what's
Speaker 1: great about streaming now you can kind of have that
Speaker 1: same feeling.
Speaker 3: All right, So let's keep going here.
Speaker 1: Final Fantasy seven revel director says he's working on arranging
Speaker 1: some kind of physical edition, but can't confirm the details.
Speaker 1: This is from Chris Scullion at VGC, the director of
Speaker 1: Final Fantasy seven Revelation.
Speaker 3: The third Entry in.
Speaker 1: The Final Fantasy seven remake, says talks are in progress
Speaker 1: for a physical release of the game, he just can't
Speaker 1: provide details on what that would entail yet. While Sony
Speaker 1: has confirmed that it will stop making discs for new
Speaker 1: PlayStation games as of January twenty eighth, Rockstar's decision to
Speaker 1: release Grand Theft Out of Six as a code in
Speaker 1: a box has led to some wondering whether other major
Speaker 1: publishers will follow suit. Speaking at the Final Fantasy fourteen
Speaker 1: fan Festival in Berlin, Final Fantasy seven Revelation director n
Speaker 1: Aoki Hamagucci told games Radar he was working on securing
Speaker 1: a physical release of the game, but couldn't confirm exactly
Speaker 1: what that would entail. We're still having internal discussions on
Speaker 1: what at the exact SKEW product lineup is going to
Speaker 1: be for Revelation, so I can't say anything particularly definitive
Speaker 1: at this point in time, but I am working to
Speaker 1: make the arrangements to allow us to have some kind
Speaker 1: of physical edition. Hamakuchi explain that every company has its
Speaker 1: own terms regarding physical releases, and this is currently what's
Speaker 1: being discussed with platform holders. Obviously, say if you're talking
Speaker 1: to Nintendo there's considerations about the storage limits and on
Speaker 1: key cards and things like that, and then other platforms
Speaker 1: about how much you can put onto a disc. Each
Speaker 1: platform and first party have their own specific rules and
Speaker 1: regulations that we need to take into account. He does
Speaker 1: go on later in the interview to say it would
Speaker 1: be a shame if physical release is stopped, even though
Speaker 1: consumer trends suggest it maybe heading in that direction at
Speaker 1: some point. I do feel, as a developer and as
Speaker 1: a fan that the general trend is for things to
Speaker 1: shift away from physical towards downloadable games. That's obviously talking
Speaker 1: about the trend personally here at something like FanFest or
Speaker 1: community events for games that I've worked on. I really
Speaker 1: think that people bringing up things asking for autographs.
Speaker 3: I think that's lovely.
Speaker 1: I think it's a wonderful culture and it would be
Speaker 1: a shame to lose that. I want that to remain. Basically,
Speaker 1: he still wants to be able to sign the discs. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I okay, Yeah, we should have been expecting a physical
Speaker 1: edition of Final Fantasy seven Revelation.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, because it's coming out. It's coming out on
Speaker 2: twenty twenty seven, and they're not stopping releasing physical discs.
Speaker 2: Until twenty twenty eight.
Speaker 3: January twenty twenty eight, was it, Yes, ten.
Speaker 2: Twenty eight, that's what they said. So yeah, I mean
Speaker 2: that's not a surprise, I guess, but you.
Speaker 3: Would hope so, right.
Speaker 1: But I mean the fact that we're clarifying, I guess
Speaker 1: as a reminder of just where we're at with this
Speaker 1: still where it's like people I think people are expecting
Speaker 1: more of these companies to not just to be like well,
Speaker 1: PlayStation's stopping discs, but to be like rock Stars, not
Speaker 1: putting Grand Theft Auto six out on a disc.
Speaker 3: Who's the next company that is going to follow suit?
Speaker 1: And you know, I think there's still this wait and
Speaker 1: see for the people in the industry that maybe want
Speaker 1: things to go that way faster of like we kind
Speaker 1: of have to wait and see what this means for
Speaker 1: Grand Theft Auto six.
Speaker 3: It's probably not going to mean.
Speaker 1: Much they're but I think if you if you are,
Speaker 1: if you're not Take two and you're not Rockstar, are you,
Speaker 1: probably you're probably right to not even be considering this yet.
Speaker 3: And then there is this contingency.
Speaker 1: Of like people inside of these studios like Hamaguchi, who right,
Speaker 1: uh no, I really like this still and I'm making
Speaker 1: the efforts personally to make sure that we can have
Speaker 1: the best physical versions, or at least, you know, respectable
Speaker 1: phys physical versions of these games out on all platforms.
Speaker 1: But I think he does bring up an interesting point
Speaker 1: of like some of the headaches involved with trying to
Speaker 1: get a game like this out on physical media, of like, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not just all right, we were done with the game,
Speaker 1: print it onto disc and everyone can go home. It's like, okay,
Speaker 1: how much space do we have on the PlayStation version?
Speaker 1: All right, that's pretty good. The Xbox version is gonna
Speaker 1: have a little bit less space that disc. Can we
Speaker 1: actually fit the whole game on there? So what are
Speaker 1: we actually going to include? What are we gonna make downloadable?
Speaker 1: And then on the switch, if we do try to
Speaker 1: include some stuff on the physical card, you're still gonna
Speaker 1: have to download stuff, and then that's gonna cost us
Speaker 1: a ton of money to put it on this sixty
Speaker 1: four gigabyte card that is way more expensive than their disc.
Speaker 1: So then do we put it on the game key card?
Speaker 1: People are gonna still hate that and not want to
Speaker 1: buy that. But you know, we kind of explained before
Speaker 1: that it helps with our technology actually, so we want
Speaker 1: you to install the game. Anyhow, there's all of these
Speaker 1: headaches and hoops to walk through and sort of challenges
Speaker 1: to overcome, and you could see you can begin to
Speaker 1: see why these companies are like, let's get past this ship.
Speaker 3: We hate these discs.
Speaker 1: And it's like, yeah, I don't know, you kind of
Speaker 1: feel like every every business, every industry has stuff that
Speaker 1: causes headaches. Just deal with it because this is kind
Speaker 1: of still something that we need.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I think the way companies are kind
Speaker 2: of rationalizing it is that I think they're of the
Speaker 2: mindset that, you know, the people, even no matter how
Speaker 2: vocal gamers are about liking physical media, if they don't
Speaker 2: actually buy physical media, then they're then you know, talk
Speaker 2: is cheap. So I I and I can understand that
Speaker 2: from a business perspective, but I also understand it from
Speaker 2: the consumer perspective of well, if it's digital, then it
Speaker 2: I have no like owner ship over this item. I
Speaker 2: don't have any there. It can be taken away from
Speaker 2: me at any time, which is another like pain point
Speaker 2: for the consumer that we've talked about before. And yeah,
Speaker 2: I can I can see where there's a disconnect there,
Speaker 2: But I what I think is probably going to happen
Speaker 2: is that even if PlayStation doesn't put out a you know,
Speaker 2: a PlayStation that supports to physical media, somebody will, you know,
Speaker 2: if not Sony, then somebody will make a USB attachment,
Speaker 2: a USB disc drive attachment, and they'll start putting out
Speaker 2: like special edition discs that cost like seven hundred dollars
Speaker 2: or something and come with a bunch of like come
Speaker 2: with a statuet or something like in the good old days.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think, like I hope we can get to
Speaker 1: that point. That would be nice because I mean that
Speaker 1: stuff would still have to work with Sony's authentication and
Speaker 1: and DRM stuff, but it's like, okay, yeah, then then
Speaker 1: Sony just give the like work with limited run games
Speaker 1: and all these other companies that print stuff to like
Speaker 1: let them go out there and find a parttner that
Speaker 1: can produce the discs that can then be authenticated and
Speaker 1: just like make sure that they still have a pathway
Speaker 1: to do that, because the DRM is going to be
Speaker 1: the problem with that side of things. And if so,
Speaker 1: if Sony just says no or says this isn't worth
Speaker 1: our time, it won't happen at all. Which was like
Speaker 1: like I think it's the position that most people assume
Speaker 1: Sony is taking right now, because when they brought up
Speaker 1: getting rid of disks, there was no mention of and
Speaker 1: here's how your discs are going to work in the
Speaker 1: future that you already own.
Speaker 3: It's right, that is still a big question mark.
Speaker 1: And I think the fact that it's a big question
Speaker 1: mark most people assume the worst case scenario, and I
Speaker 1: think that's fair.
Speaker 2: So, yeah, that's completely fair. I totally understand that. That's why.
Speaker 2: That's why I was kind of thinking. And by the way,
Speaker 2: when I say a third party, I'm not suggesting somebody
Speaker 2: is going to do it like illegally or something like that.
Speaker 2: What I mean is that I think I think Sony
Speaker 2: would probably be especially okay with it if another company
Speaker 2: underwrote the costs.
Speaker 3: Yes, exactly, Yes, that that would have to be the case.
Speaker 1: So but whether or not they're going to like like,
Speaker 1: let people use.
Speaker 3: That DRM, that'll be the big question. So wait to see, right.
Speaker 3: Splatoon Raiders launches huge in Japan.
Speaker 1: Splatoon Raiders opened with an estimated four hundred and seventy
Speaker 1: four thousand, six hundred and eighty four copies sold, and
Speaker 1: that's just physical.
Speaker 3: In Japan alone.
Speaker 1: In its first week that ended July twenty six, it
Speaker 1: was by far the week's biggest release.
Speaker 3: We've kind of had this story a.
Speaker 1: Bunch of times now with these Nintendo these smaller Nintendo games,
Speaker 1: where it's like, hey, what are the big Nintendo games. Well,
Speaker 1: it turns out they were the friends we made along
Speaker 1: the way in Rhythm Heaven Groove and Tomodachi Life. And
Speaker 1: this so Splatoon Raiders at nearly five hundred thousand copies
Speaker 1: sold in a week, puts it right behind Rhythm Heaven Groove,
Speaker 1: which sold another around eighty thousand copies in a week.
Speaker 1: That's up to six hundred and seventy five thousand copies total. Again,
Speaker 1: this is all just physical and just Japan, and Tomodachi
Speaker 1: Life is now at one point five million lifetime, just
Speaker 1: physical and in Japan only. So yeah, very well done
Speaker 1: over there, Splatoon Raiders. Obviously, we know Splatoon hugely popular
Speaker 1: in Japan, you know worldwide it is it has this
Speaker 1: you know, grand appeal.
Speaker 3: And we also saw like a metacritic I think I
Speaker 3: talked about on the show yesterday. Rachel.
Speaker 1: You see this where it's in the top ten for
Speaker 1: the highest rated user score ever on Metacritic.
Speaker 3: I mean fans are showing us yeah.
Speaker 2: It's a good premise. I'm I mean when I see
Speaker 2: those numbers, all I'm like is yay, I'm happy for
Speaker 2: them because that's a that's that's just a that's a
Speaker 2: fun game to be to be, to be a good seller.
Speaker 2: I'm I feel like the market is proving it is
Speaker 2: proving that it has good taste there.
Speaker 3: Yep, absolutely, it's it is notable.
Speaker 1: It's like every it feels like every time one of
Speaker 1: these fifty dollars Nintendo games launch in the last several months,
Speaker 1: especially this summer, they are finding an audience in Japan,
Speaker 1: and that audience is buying around a half million physical
Speaker 1: copies in that first week. And then you compair of
Speaker 1: that to like that Piscatella a little factoid about the
Speaker 1: United States where it's like there's only like seven games
Speaker 1: that have sold more than one hundred thousand copies. I
Speaker 1: might be wrong about those specific numbers everybody, but it's
Speaker 1: something along those lines.
Speaker 3: This year.
Speaker 1: It's like, oh man, okay, is that just like Japan
Speaker 1: just into physical games?
Speaker 3: Morees?
Speaker 1: Are they just getting hit like more square in the
Speaker 1: target by the games that are launching on switch to
Speaker 1: in this moment does feel like it's a little bit
Speaker 1: of that.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think it's a little bit of both. Honestly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that when I look at this, it's like, oh,
Speaker 1: I don't think Nintendo is going to get rid of
Speaker 1: of a physical anytime soon. I think that they are
Speaker 1: happy to continue serving that audience. And they really, you know,
Speaker 1: the fact that they did not give into like going
Speaker 1: all crazy with free to play stuff when that was
Speaker 1: like a first first becoming a thing, and loot boxes
Speaker 1: and all this other stuff, and it's like, obviously Nintendo's
Speaker 1: not going to do that, And I don't think it
Speaker 1: was always obvious, but the fact that they have usually
Speaker 1: like avoided these trends and kept just doing stuff the
Speaker 1: Nintendo way do just kind of say to me they
Speaker 1: will keep doing that into the future, because I think
Speaker 1: they just like, whatever the rest of the noise that
Speaker 1: is happening in the industry is kind of has nothing
Speaker 1: to do with us. We're gonna just keep releasing games
Speaker 1: our way, and we have an audience, and that audience
Speaker 1: keeps showing up, and it feels like, if anything, that
Speaker 1: audience keeps growing, and now they're hitting like probably like
Speaker 1: multiple generations of people who are into Splatoon in Japan
Speaker 1: and and and then like globally we show up for
Speaker 1: these games as well, Right, Yeah, I think we do.
Speaker 2: I think I think Nintendo still like primarily targets a
Speaker 2: Japanese audience and everyone else just kind of falls in line.
Speaker 2: And I think that's that's that seems to be pretty smart. Yeah, work, Yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean they're not. They're not courting us, like as
Speaker 2: in you and me, the you know JOQ American gamer.
Speaker 1: Don't.
Speaker 2: They don't. They're not courting us. They know that, you know,
Speaker 2: we grew up with their products. We're gonna buy them,
Speaker 2: you know, regardless. So yeah, I don't, I don't. I
Speaker 2: think I don't think they are gonna have a problem
Speaker 2: with like, you know, the sales of physical media dropping off,
Speaker 2: because they they know what their audience wants and clearly
Speaker 2: clearly this is a strategy that's paying off for them.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they just get some breaking news about NVD GPU prices.
Speaker 1: We're gonna, uh, we're gonna take a break and when
Speaker 1: we come back, we'll hit that and the rest of
Speaker 1: the headlines. A bunch of fun stuff happening in this
Speaker 1: industry constantly. Uh, if you want to skip out on
Speaker 1: these ad messages, you can do so. We put up
Speaker 1: ad free versions of the show for premium users. Still
Speaker 1: go to giant bomb dot com slash join and you
Speaker 1: can get them there.
Speaker 3: We will be right back.
Speaker 2: Okay, we pull up the news.
Speaker 1: All right, we are back. It's Game mess Mornings. I'm
Speaker 1: Jeff Grubb. That's Rachel Kaserbeam Kaser. We are gonna keep
Speaker 1: going here with the headlines. As I mentioned before the break, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the hardware price crisis seems to continue to spread and
Speaker 1: grow in Nvidia is reportedly imposing another major price increase
Speaker 1: on the GPU and memory packages it sells to graphics
Speaker 1: cards manufacturers.
Speaker 3: So it's like, you know, they may.
Speaker 1: Make the chips and they send this off to I
Speaker 1: was gonna say EVGA, but I think they specifically stopped
Speaker 1: making GPUs because they saw this coming. Taiwan's Economic Daily
Speaker 1: News puts the increase at twenty to thirty percent, potentially
Speaker 1: making this in Vidia's third significant pricing adjustment of twenty
Speaker 1: twenty six.
Speaker 3: Nvidia has not announced that.
Speaker 1: Every g Force card's retail price will immediately rise by
Speaker 1: thirty percent, so the reported increase applies to the bundled
Speaker 1: GPU gets purchased by board partners such as as MSI
Speaker 1: and Gigabyte. So the expectation here should be that like
Speaker 1: those companies therefore will have to raise the prices on
Speaker 1: their own, separate.
Speaker 3: From what Nvidia is selling to them.
Speaker 1: We're pointing out that in Vidia is not the only
Speaker 1: one raising the price of chips in this moment. Qualcomm
Speaker 1: in firms double digit increases in beginning September first for
Speaker 1: its mobile chips, so across the board and every aspect. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, RAM and Storage are raising costs, and especially
Speaker 1: RAM when it comes to this stuff.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean we were already paying a lot.
Speaker 1: I think we saw several price increases already for GPUs,
Speaker 1: for computer components, for consoles, for everything, for handhelds, and
Speaker 1: I think we're like, we're not even like through those
Speaker 1: price increases yet. The new right, August first is when
Speaker 1: the price increase happens for like Xbox, I think, and
Speaker 1: and even like Switch.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's I think it was.
Speaker 2: I think it's August when the when the switch to pricing.
Speaker 1: I think it's August, right, So we haven't even those
Speaker 1: haven't even happened yet. And we're already getting signs that
Speaker 1: further price increases are coming, and so I think what
Speaker 1: by Yeah, I feel.
Speaker 2: Like I feel like August is when we're also going
Speaker 2: to get news about the Zelda remake.
Speaker 3: After the price goes up.
Speaker 1: I think I think you might be onto something where
Speaker 1: it's like they are holding some of that stuff back
Speaker 1: to like change the conversation back to the games you
Speaker 1: can't miss out on and ockerat of time.
Speaker 3: Obviously they think that is one of those.
Speaker 2: A grid of tinnery, That's what I was talking.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but by the way, I'm leaning over this way
Speaker 2: because it looks like the way the layout looks like
Speaker 2: on the on the stream, I look like I'm whispering
Speaker 2: in your ears.
Speaker 1: Yeah, perfect, I love that.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean I think we get more price increases in
Speaker 1: the first half of next year, like from all these
Speaker 1: like as the stuff trickles down, I think Sony, Microsoft,
Speaker 1: and Nintendo all raise their prices again.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Probably it wouldn't. It wouldn't surprise me. And it's
Speaker 2: it's it's it's becoming I I honestly kind of think
Speaker 2: that this is going to mean that the next generation
Speaker 2: of consoles is just going to be just gone. It's well,
Speaker 2: not a thing, they'll never come out, But I think
Speaker 2: they're generally going to be either they're going to have
Speaker 2: to radically rethink what they are and what they're capable of,
Speaker 2: or we're not going to get them into like twenty
Speaker 2: twenty nine. Yeah, that's kind of what I'm afraid of.
Speaker 2: And like we'll talk about I think this more in
Speaker 2: a minute when we talk about the Xbox stuff, because
Speaker 2: I have thoughts about everything that's been happening over at
Speaker 2: Microsoft and Xbox. But yeah, I mean, I think it's
Speaker 2: getting to the point now where I don't even know
Speaker 2: if we can sell, we can reasonably sell video game
Speaker 2: consoles as a luxury item. Like it's it's so far
Speaker 2: beyond luxury at this point. It's like buying a five
Speaker 2: thousand dollars perse It's like, what the what's the point
Speaker 2: of spending all that money on something that you know
Speaker 2: you're not something? So, you know, what's the point of
Speaker 2: spending that much on something so utilitarian? What could possibly
Speaker 2: drive the price up to that amount?
Speaker 1: Yeah, there was word like like I didn't see what
Speaker 1: it was. Like, I think there's a new version of
Speaker 1: the thirty fifty, the RTX thirty fifty that has four
Speaker 1: gigabytes of video memory, which is everyone's like, hey, we
Speaker 1: have I thought we moved past this, like everyone knows. Ye, wait,
Speaker 1: that's not nearly enough, not on this day and age, No,
Speaker 1: not at all. This is yeah, I think when we're
Speaker 1: kind of looking around and trying to figure out what
Speaker 1: happens next here other than price increases for the stuff
Speaker 1: that we already see on the store shelves, which does
Speaker 1: feel again inevitable after the ones that we're going through
Speaker 1: right in this moment. Yeah, when we start talking about
Speaker 1: what does next gen look like? I mean, I if
Speaker 1: I'm at one of these companies, I am trying to
Speaker 1: figure out a way to make it make the most
Speaker 1: sense possible. And I do think that means like if
Speaker 1: you're if you're Sony, which maybe is the most interesting
Speaker 1: one because they're the ones that have the most momentum
Speaker 1: while also having to deal with like high end fidelity,
Speaker 1: expensive hardware because they did not they've never really stepped
Speaker 1: away from that. They always have been on the cutting edge,
Speaker 1: with the exception of like the PS four, which was
Speaker 1: very successful for them. It's kind of maybe you should
Speaker 1: repeat that the PS four was a bunch of like
Speaker 1: crappy parts taking off the shelf, and then all right,
Speaker 1: PS five, we're back at it with an expensive SSD
Speaker 1: and all this stuff, and you know it's the PS
Speaker 1: fives way better.
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's give you an astrobot game just so we
Speaker 2: can show off all the internal hardware here exactly.
Speaker 1: And the PS five is is way better. But it's like, okay,
Speaker 1: well it's way better. It should be able to last
Speaker 1: longer than the PS four did, and the PS four
Speaker 1: law lasted a very long time. So if I'm Sony
Speaker 1: in this situation and I was already planning a handheld,
Speaker 1: maybe the PS six is mostly just the handheld, because
Speaker 1: then you can sort of scale the power to sort
Speaker 1: of be more in line with the PS five and
Speaker 1: kind of communicate to developers, to your teams, this is
Speaker 1: the amount of power we're going to have. Because we
Speaker 1: just in no way want to deprecate the PlayStation five.
Speaker 1: We need to keep that audience going because they are
Speaker 1: going to stick with that console far longer than they've
Speaker 1: ever stuck with the PlayStation before, because they just simply
Speaker 1: will not have the money to upgrade to a PS six.
Speaker 1: What we're going to charge for a home PS six
Speaker 1: and they seem to have that option, And.
Speaker 2: I would honestly call that a smart business move if
Speaker 2: I were if I were them, if I were in
Speaker 2: charge of Sony, That's probably what I would be seriously
Speaker 2: considering right about now, because I'm kind of afraid the
Speaker 2: AI bubble is not going to burst as fast as
Speaker 2: we're all maybe thinking it. We all maybe thought it
Speaker 2: would like this time last year. Even I think it's
Speaker 2: just going to keep growing and growing and growing, and
Speaker 2: then it's going to be a lot longer than we
Speaker 2: think before it bursts. And if that's the case, then
Speaker 2: these prices are only going to keep going up. Yeah,
Speaker 2: the video has no reason to not raise the prices
Speaker 2: at this point.
Speaker 1: Yes, right, I mean the competition for their compute power
Speaker 1: from the AI bubble is something that they won't ignore
Speaker 1: that they couldn't ignore it, but they wouldn't ignore it either.
Speaker 1: They're happy to choose that instead, and that means giving, Like,
Speaker 1: just giving some of the resources that you have to
Speaker 1: the video game industry is kind of a hassle at
Speaker 1: this point, so you've got to just charge them more
Speaker 1: to make it worth more your time.
Speaker 3: It sucks, it's.
Speaker 1: Awful, and it's a bubble, so it's like we're gonna
Speaker 1: like when it bursts and it all goes sideways. It's
Speaker 1: not like suddenly we get all that compute back, Like
Speaker 1: that stuff is just going to kind of like have
Speaker 1: to be transferred back to gaming. That's going to be
Speaker 1: a hassle as well. It'll take you years for the
Speaker 1: stuff to stabilize once we get to that point.
Speaker 2: And I'm happy that we've got things like the Steam
Speaker 2: Deck and god, I hope the Steam Machine soon. Pardon
Speaker 2: just because I mean the first people who were priced
Speaker 2: out of it were like the PC gamers who like
Speaker 2: building their own rakes. Yeah, yeah, I can't afford to
Speaker 2: do that now.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Right then the Steam Machine, which you know I've been
Speaker 1: using recently. It's been great, but I continue go like,
Speaker 1: this is so handy, so nice, and who do you
Speaker 1: recommend it to?
Speaker 3: How do you tell people that it's worth the price?
Speaker 3: It's it's just not But okay.
Speaker 1: The the other side of this is like, yeah, people
Speaker 1: point out, like can have one thousand dollars PS six
Speaker 1: handheld like compete in the market. That also feels dead
Speaker 1: on arrival, and I think I'm yeah, I don't maybe,
Speaker 1: but that's not really the point. The point is that
Speaker 1: they need to do everything they can to sort of
Speaker 1: flatten the curve of graphical fidelity increasing and they need
Speaker 1: to like make it clear to their teams that you
Speaker 1: should still be making games for the PS five first.
Speaker 1: And so, yeah, for a long time now, it's been
Speaker 1: like my idea here is I think there is a
Speaker 1: PS six. I think there's this PS six handout, and
Speaker 1: then I think there is a PS six light, which
Speaker 1: is just a reconfigured PlayStation five with some other small.
Speaker 3: Upgrades so that that could still be like the.
Speaker 1: Anchor console that holds the gaming production sort of down,
Speaker 1: so that no one feels like they have to have
Speaker 1: the biggest hardware or the biggest and best hardware to.
Speaker 3: Like get their game running.
Speaker 1: You need to make sure it's running on this stuff,
Speaker 1: because we are going to be supporting the PS five,
Speaker 1: and you can put that version on the PS five
Speaker 1: as well, with some reductions here and there, probably not many,
Speaker 1: because that maybe should just be your lead platform for
Speaker 1: the next seven years.
Speaker 3: Like the game the.
Speaker 1: Console is already pretty old, like it's sort of like
Speaker 1: a fifteen year.
Speaker 2: Life that god, I would hope, So but actually, I
Speaker 2: mean again, we're gonna talk about this more in a minute,
Speaker 2: because I know we got an Xbox story coming up.
Speaker 2: But I think, do you think that if that was
Speaker 2: the way they went, I mean, I traditional, like the
Speaker 2: major players are so high bound to this, like very
Speaker 2: I think kind of archaic way of releasing consoles. It's like, Okay,
Speaker 2: it's time for the PS five, now it's time for
Speaker 2: the PS six. It's like five point five maybe handheld
Speaker 2: five point five in between, Like I would you release
Speaker 2: the big like the big PS six first and then
Speaker 2: the handheld or the handheld and then the big PS
Speaker 2: six like hypothetically speaking, Yeah, I.
Speaker 3: Guess, I don't know. I think.
Speaker 1: I think they would probably try to bundle like package
Speaker 1: as much together like and presented as one line as
Speaker 1: possible so that they can give people the option. But
Speaker 1: I think it'll be very clear, like what PlayStation prefers
Speaker 1: you get by like the pricing and all that stuff.
Speaker 1: So I think like they will emphasize I think the handheld.
Speaker 1: I think that is like the biggest differentiating factor. Right
Speaker 1: The PS six was going to be a hard sell anyhow,
Speaker 1: because games already look fantastic and you don't have to, like,
Speaker 1: there's just not much holding them back anymore more in
Speaker 1: terms of being able to put it like the things
Speaker 1: that are holding back games, I always say, it's it's
Speaker 1: time and money. Now it's no longer the silicon side
Speaker 1: and side of these these pieces of hardware, and you
Speaker 1: know it's okay. Well at that point that means you
Speaker 1: get to the situation where you're spending two hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty three hundred million dollars on games like they are,
Speaker 1: I don't think they want to keep pushing in that direction.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I think they focus on the handheld because
Speaker 1: the handheld could be this thing where it's like, here
Speaker 1: is a new way to play the games you already
Speaker 1: love and doesn't look amazing, and we kind of know
Speaker 1: that there's.
Speaker 3: An untapped audience.
Speaker 1: That was like that is there, Like the way that
Speaker 1: the PlayStation Portal has sold clearly that there's that that
Speaker 1: audience is there. So I think I think PlayStation will
Speaker 1: emphasize the handheld.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think Portal was kind of a like like
Speaker 2: a like the first shot yeah on that as well.
Speaker 2: I think I think because it did so well, I
Speaker 2: think that is a handheld is more likely to be
Speaker 2: part of their lineup going forward.
Speaker 3: Yep. But yeah, I think like they will.
Speaker 1: Take what they've done with the PS five Pro and
Speaker 1: sort of sort of like parlay that into a steady
Speaker 1: transition into this next generation and kind of like, yeah,
Speaker 1: the PS five Pro should give them another seven or
Speaker 1: eight years of support. Here, it's just like most people
Speaker 1: when they buy one these PlayStations. Most people buy standard
Speaker 1: PlayStation four, most people buy standard PlayStation five, and then
Speaker 1: there's like a much smaller audience that has the Pro.
Speaker 1: But you know, that just means that they can maybe
Speaker 1: lower the price to the Pro or make it look
Speaker 1: a lower price by making the prices for PS six
Speaker 1: stuff that much more. And so if you're looking for
Speaker 1: the affordable option eventually that it might just be the
Speaker 1: PS five Pro, which I think we'll get rebranded into
Speaker 1: a PS six Light In many ways.
Speaker 2: That would make sense.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, all right, let's see here.
Speaker 1: Yeah you're saying we got that. Let's talk about Xbox
Speaker 1: audiences grew. Yeah, it's audience grew, but it's business did not.
Speaker 1: This is from Chris Scoian at VGC. Xbox CEO Asha
Speaker 1: Sharma says it expects to turn to growth by this time.
Speaker 1: Next year, and it's nice to want things. Microsoft posted
Speaker 1: its financial reports for the last quarter on Wednesday, stating
Speaker 1: that while the company as a whole was seeing continued
Speaker 1: growth with revenue and operating income both up eighteen percent,
Speaker 1: the Xbox division was instead seeing reduced revenues. According to
Speaker 1: its Q four fiscal year twenty twenty six results, which
Speaker 1: cover the period from April first to June thirtieth, twenty
Speaker 1: twenty six, Xbox content and services revenue declined ten percent
Speaker 1: compared to the same quarter the same Q four results
Speaker 1: from last year. Xbox hardware revenue also declined, according to Microsoft,
Speaker 1: with a thirteen percent drop compared to Q four fiscal
Speaker 1: year twenty twenty five. This has been a recurring situation
Speaker 1: for Xbox throughout the past financial year. Microsoft's Q three
Speaker 1: earnings report showed that Xbox Content and Services revenue was
Speaker 1: down five percent and that hardware revenue was down thirty
Speaker 1: three percent, and Q two earnings results also showed year
Speaker 1: on year decline of basically everything else. They they've kind
Speaker 1: of been and going down since Q like one of
Speaker 1: three years ago. It's been consistently down, you know, ten
Speaker 1: to thirty percent every quarter. During Microsoft's presentation, though Microsoft
Speaker 1: CEO Sati Nadella referred to Xbox declined, stating that the
Speaker 1: company was in the process of undertaking the reset mentioned
Speaker 1: by Sharma in the past. When it comes to Xbox,
Speaker 1: we are making the necessary decisions required across our content portfolio,
Speaker 1: platform and operations to reset the business for long term growth.
Speaker 1: We have the best ip in the industry and talented
Speaker 1: studios around the world, and believe we can bring these
Speaker 1: strengths together and expect to return the business to growth
Speaker 1: in fiscal twenty twenty seven. They don't. They don't really
Speaker 1: say what, like how they get to that point. I mean,
Speaker 1: I think they're implying that will grow because we'll have
Speaker 1: fewer people to pay because we're cutting a bunch of jobs,
Speaker 1: and we'll keep making the same amount of money, which
Speaker 1: is like, will you because it looks they're gonna make
Speaker 1: less money based on the trender on and the cost
Speaker 1: of the console and all this other stuff.
Speaker 3: What is the plan here.
Speaker 2: Jeff, That's what I'm kind of wondering. It's like why.
Speaker 2: I remember when they were doing the whole like talking
Speaker 2: about the reset, and Asha Sharma said something like, don't worry,
Speaker 2: We're still invested in Helix, our next gen console, and
Speaker 2: I'm like, part of my language, but I'm like, who
Speaker 2: gives a fuck about healing? Three thousand people are losing
Speaker 2: their jobs and why are you investing? And correct me
Speaker 2: if I'm wrong, But I feel like this is probably
Speaker 2: a studio that would probably benefit even more from going
Speaker 2: for the whole, Like, well, we're going to invest more
Speaker 2: in the series lineup, and in the meantime, here's a
Speaker 2: cool Xbox branded handheld that costs much less to make.
Speaker 1: Right if they could, like they could keep working on
Speaker 1: it seemed like they were working on that side of things.
Speaker 3: They had the Asus Roger ally that.
Speaker 1: They kind of did in partnership, and then there was
Speaker 1: always the word that they were working on their own
Speaker 1: to sort of go in conjunction with that, and then
Speaker 1: that got shelved or something.
Speaker 3: So yeah, yeah, what, like what is the plan over there?
Speaker 3: I don't know, I have no idea.
Speaker 2: I'm I mean, I don't I don't know what is
Speaker 2: going to happen. I understand some of the things. I understand,
Speaker 2: like studios going independent or getting bought out. That's the
Speaker 2: best case scenario in my mind. I mean, it sucks
Speaker 2: that double Fine still had to lay people off. I mean,
Speaker 2: I don't want any I wish nobody had to get
Speaker 2: lay laid off. But twenty three people getting laid off
Speaker 2: because the studio went independent versus three thousand people getting
Speaker 2: laid off because Xbox is resetting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, and it's like, you know, those those jobs,
Speaker 1: all those jobs were lost once when Xbox decided to
Speaker 1: stop paying them. The fact that they were saved at
Speaker 1: all by the student it's like, you know, it is flipped.
Speaker 1: It's like double Fine saved whatever jobs trolling them, Yes, exactly, yes,
Speaker 1: So it's it's frustrating. This two hundred million, Okay, I
Speaker 1: just don't get like why, like they gained two hundred
Speaker 1: million new users. I don't know what that is from.
Speaker 1: I've tried to figure out, like if they've d where
Speaker 1: these people are, where they're coming from.
Speaker 3: Are they.
Speaker 2: Report again, I don't know. Maybe yeah, I mean that's
Speaker 2: my first thought is they're talking about people who like
Speaker 2: maybe had like a free sign up to Xbox Game Pass.
Speaker 2: It's like, hey, have a free month of Xbox Game
Speaker 2: Pass on us, probably like King right and just never
Speaker 2: yeah yeah, yeah, King, King King and Mojang definitely the
Speaker 2: ones that Ashra Sharma is now personally overseeing because those
Speaker 2: are those are the favorite, those are the favorite children. Yep, understandably,
Speaker 2: so those are those are very successful children of course.
Speaker 2: So yeah, so I understand that. But that's yeah, I
Speaker 2: have no idea what she means by that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think chat is speculating that it's all just
Speaker 1: Twitter engagement, is what they're like, Like, it's just like
Speaker 1: putting a post on on Twitter and two hundred million
Speaker 1: new users of Xbox Twitter posts.
Speaker 3: Uh yeah, is that?
Speaker 2: I do think it was. I do think it was
Speaker 2: probably like a lot of the promotion for Xbox Game
Speaker 2: Pass probably attracted a lot of curious people, but I
Speaker 2: don't think stuck around.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yes, and it's not two hundred million.
Speaker 2: For just Xbox stuff like no, yeah, I really don't
Speaker 2: think so.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So uh okay, just just saying things, uh man, because
Speaker 1: co pilot told you so, right, that's almost certainly what
Speaker 1: happened here.
Speaker 3: Like always just pick a pick a number.
Speaker 1: Here's here's some data I found that shows there's two
Speaker 1: hundred million people that looked at whatever. And then she
Speaker 1: just wrote that down and said it uh to t Satsia, No,
Speaker 1: that was charma that said that.
Speaker 3: Okay, let's keep going here. EA CEO, which.
Speaker 1: Is a great way to start any sentence, got a
Speaker 1: huge pay increase while company laid off developers. This is
Speaker 1: from Blair Marnell at GameSpot And if that like sounds rough,
Speaker 1: don't worry. The specifics are worse when Saudi Arabia is
Speaker 1: leveraged buyout of Electronic Arts is finalized. Another great way
Speaker 1: to start a sentence. The newly private company won't have
Speaker 1: to release any financial documents to the public. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: EA's latest financial disclosure has revealed that CEO Andrew Wilson
Speaker 1: received a massive that this story actually good spells this
Speaker 1: or mimis states this a massive thirty million increasing his
Speaker 1: compensation this year. It's actually he got an increase of
Speaker 1: eight million. He was at thirty million, it went up
Speaker 1: to thirty eight million. A double checked on this, and
Speaker 1: he wasn't the only EA executive to reap the rewards.
Speaker 1: Per EA's report filed with the Security and Exchange Commission,
Speaker 1: Wilson's composition package in the previously be a rose by
Speaker 1: yeh eight million. That total includes bonus payments and stock options.
Speaker 1: The report also notes that Wilson's thirty eight million payout
Speaker 1: has a three hundred and five to one ratio to
Speaker 1: the average pay of an employee at EA.
Speaker 3: God damn it.
Speaker 1: Another eye opening fact and covered the report that the
Speaker 1: report notes that Wilson only flies on private planes rather
Speaker 1: than commercial airliners, including for personal use, and.
Speaker 3: EA has to pay for that.
Speaker 1: There's a list here of other executives that have their compensation.
Speaker 1: President of EA Entertainment, Laura meel It makes thirteen point
Speaker 1: seven million.
Speaker 3: Blah.
Speaker 1: Point is a lot of these people are getting big
Speaker 1: bonuses or big increases to their pay. And why why
Speaker 1: are they getting increases to their pay?
Speaker 3: Rachel?
Speaker 1: Okay, So they're getting it because a lot of their
Speaker 1: bonuses were tied to the performance of Battlefield, and that
Speaker 1: game had to meet certain measurements and if it did,
Speaker 1: these people would make more money. And then what happened
Speaker 1: to many people who worked on Battlefield at the exact
Speaker 1: same time this was happening.
Speaker 3: They got laid off. They are jobs.
Speaker 1: Got what I You don't have to make it look
Speaker 1: like a complete clown show. You don't have to make
Speaker 1: it look as terrible as possible. This is the thing
Speaker 1: that makes people hate.
Speaker 2: Yet oh to be so to be rich enough to
Speaker 2: not care about optics.
Speaker 1: Right exactly, Yes, And to be running into the arms
Speaker 1: of your private owner in Saudi Arabia because yeah, you're
Speaker 1: not gonna have to report this stuff anymore. And and yes,
Speaker 1: the optics really won't matter because now it's Saudi Arabia's problem.
Speaker 1: They're worried about their optics more than you are worried
Speaker 1: about yours. And you're gonna get your big pay day.
Speaker 1: Probably can invest and get out of there in a
Speaker 1: couple of years.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if, like EA CEO Andrew
Speaker 2: Wilson steps down. Is a story that we hear sometime
Speaker 2: in the next two.
Speaker 3: Years without a doubt, like yes, as soon as he can.
Speaker 1: Like the Yeah, the acquisition will almost certainly have some
Speaker 1: sort of language in there about a transition period about
Speaker 1: vesting those options, and then once that's up, it will
Speaker 1: be instantaneous, like a lot of it. You'll see a
Speaker 1: wave of these people leaving because why would they why
Speaker 1: would they stay?
Speaker 2: Well, and the whole the plane thing, by the way,
Speaker 2: I'm like, well, first of all, I don't understand, like
Speaker 2: where is he going that he needs a private jet
Speaker 2: to fly that much. And also, and why is he
Speaker 2: a paying for it? I mean you pay I mean,
Speaker 2: you pay somebody a salary like that. He can get
Speaker 2: his own goddamn plane.
Speaker 1: And he's like Australian, right, so he's probably flying back home,
Speaker 1: like visits the family or whatever.
Speaker 3: Maybe not, I don't know.
Speaker 2: Listen, I would also listen, I would also fly to
Speaker 2: all of the world's beautiful vacation spots as often as
Speaker 2: I could if I was paid that.
Speaker 3: Amount saying for it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I would not do so at the expense
Speaker 2: of everyone else's jobs.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And I know it's easy for me to say that,
Speaker 2: you know, because I'm you know, I'm a brokeye over here,
Speaker 2: but I'm not. You know, It's easy for me to
Speaker 2: say that because I'm not in that position. But I
Speaker 2: mean it's also it's also I can also say that
Speaker 2: this is morally repugnant to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly this, And yes, ver Textbable points out a
Speaker 1: lot this is a common practice for CEOs. It's part
Speaker 1: of their compensation package. Often, it's just very occasionally we
Speaker 1: get it illustrated in such a terrible way here where
Speaker 1: it's like, man, this is happening simultaneously with you getting
Speaker 1: paid more and you're cutting jobs, and the reason you
Speaker 1: got paid more is the people who whose jobs you
Speaker 1: cut they did a really good job. Like that's just
Speaker 1: what happened here. That's literally what happened. Holy shit, that sucks.
Speaker 2: Oh man, Could we also not like use that? Could
Speaker 2: that be? Like for everyone at EA?
Speaker 3: That would be?
Speaker 2: That would make me feel a little bit better about it, Like,
Speaker 2: you know, you.
Speaker 3: Got to everyone gets one day with it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you know it's like, hey, Andrew's not using
Speaker 2: this plane for a day. It's like, do somebody does
Speaker 2: somebody have to go visit their family over in Taiwan
Speaker 2: or something. Somebody jump in the plane.
Speaker 1: Let's go h Capcom says the likelihood of a Pragmata
Speaker 1: sequel is high. This is from Liam Dulan at Nintendo Life.
Speaker 1: It's still early days for Capcom's new IP, Pragmata, but
Speaker 1: it seems the future is bright after the title sold
Speaker 1: over two point five million units since launching in April.
Speaker 1: The team has already touched on the idea of a sequel,
Speaker 1: and now an update has been shared alongside the company's
Speaker 1: latest financial resorts results.
Speaker 3: Excuse me. As reported by Bloomberg.
Speaker 1: Capcom's corporate officer, Yoshi's Yoshi Kazu shima Uchi Shimuchi There
Speaker 1: we Go confirms the likelihood of a sequel is high.
Speaker 1: And I think everyone's kind of feeling that way because
Speaker 1: the game just sort of popped off immediately and everyone
Speaker 1: got it reviewed well and has been selling well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's a good it's a solid game. So
Speaker 2: I would finally some good news in this in this report,
Speaker 2: I would not be I would not be mad if
Speaker 2: Pragmata turned into a recurring IP. I think it there's
Speaker 2: a possibility it could be milked a little bit, you know,
Speaker 2: more than necessary. But right now, right now, this is
Speaker 2: an optimistic this is this is a this is a
Speaker 2: good report.
Speaker 1: Yes, and I think we can like sort of like
Speaker 1: trust a Capcom right now. They seem to have a
Speaker 1: good handle on like how to use their IP to
Speaker 1: best effect. All right, let's hit these last few stories
Speaker 1: here pretty quickly. Nexus Mods wants to uh once mod
Speaker 1: installation to become spotify easy.
Speaker 3: Uh if people have not used.
Speaker 1: Nexus mods, if you've seen people install like a million
Speaker 1: mods for Skyrim or something like that, you're like, some
Speaker 1: of these aren't on the bethes, the mod store thing,
Speaker 1: it's like, yeah, they're all they're getting them all from
Speaker 1: Nexus Mods. It's this huge repository for creators to upload
Speaker 1: their mods or for people to download them. And it
Speaker 1: already has this like I think it's called Vortex, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the Vork Vortex Mod Manager, which yes, and that helps
Speaker 1: like deal with a lot of times. As they point
Speaker 1: out here, Uh, mods have dependencies and and there's a setup, validation,
Speaker 1: conflict management, change deployment, version, maintenance, and Vortex does some
Speaker 1: of that.
Speaker 3: I think they're trying to get it to a point where.
Speaker 1: It's like yeah, but you still have to like see
Speaker 1: the back end a little bit and see like the
Speaker 1: file names or whatever, and that might scare some people.
Speaker 1: And they're trying to make it like hey, just a
Speaker 1: one button press now there is I have such like
Speaker 1: Steam Steam Mods does that, but yeah, Steam can't have
Speaker 1: all the copyrighted stuff that Nexus Mods can.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I feel like such a like such a like
Speaker 2: old like such an old fogie right now because I'm
Speaker 2: like I'm kind of in like you know, it's kind
Speaker 2: of like a MySpace versus Facebook kind of thing for
Speaker 2: me because I'm like, oh, back in my day. Back
Speaker 2: in my day, we installed all and then if we
Speaker 2: had conflict management, we just deleted mods until we figured
Speaker 2: out what the problem was.
Speaker 3: Uh huh exactly. Yeah, listen, were about.
Speaker 2: To go into our gameplay files, and we knew how
Speaker 2: to edit the mods so that they, you know, we
Speaker 2: knew how to you know, find the right file that
Speaker 2: was corrupting our save and we knew how to we
Speaker 2: you were putting video game all Yeah, we had to
Speaker 2: do it all by ourselves. Like I remembered my first
Speaker 2: sixty sky Rim mods and my first one hundred dragon
Speaker 2: Age mods. Dragon Age was what started me on modding.
Speaker 2: But yeah, I remember, like, you know, just loading up
Speaker 2: Skyrim with all of my mods for the first time
Speaker 2: and just having it be like moving at the speed
Speaker 2: of glaciers.
Speaker 3: Yep. Yeah, I.
Speaker 1: Don't think that makes you an old fogey. Mike Manatti
Speaker 1: is the mod old fogy who's just like that, doesn't
Speaker 1: that's not what the game company wants me to do.
Speaker 3: I don't want to. I don't want to do something
Speaker 3: that the.
Speaker 1: Corporation says is not okay, So you're you're in the
Speaker 1: clear here, all right.
Speaker 3: Last couple Mike called out, Oh well.
Speaker 1: Every Time Kroc two Kingdom of the Gobos remaster announced
Speaker 1: from This is from Salamono Kamatsu. Basically just they're doing
Speaker 1: what they did for Kroc one.
Speaker 3: For Kroc two.
Speaker 1: They will have the Kroc two Pedia, which features original
Speaker 1: design documentation, marketing and promotional material, animation tests, galleries of
Speaker 1: cut models, levels and objects, and interviews with the original developers
Speaker 1: and the remaster team.
Speaker 3: I'm into it.
Speaker 1: I think one is like a weird time capsule game
Speaker 1: that didn't hit with me at the time, and then
Speaker 1: going back to it, it's like, oh, this is weird,
Speaker 1: but they kind of add the direct controls to it,
Speaker 1: so it's oh, interesting, this is kind of what they
Speaker 1: would have done if they knew at the time.
Speaker 3: So I'll check it out. And then Thimbleweed Park two
Speaker 3: has been announced. Let's see here.
Speaker 1: Ron Gilbert is back, Gary Winnick is back, and they're
Speaker 1: targeting twenty twenty eight for this point and click sequel.
Speaker 3: So very cool.
Speaker 2: It's all right, sounds awesome to me. Both Both of
Speaker 2: those sound great to me exactly.
Speaker 3: The couple updates.
Speaker 1: Today's Zeno Blake Chronicles two Nintendo Switch To edition is
Speaker 1: fully out. Zena Blake Chronicles definitive edition for the first
Speaker 1: game is going to get its standalone and physical release
Speaker 1: today for tomorrow.
Speaker 3: Is there anything? Not much?
Speaker 1: Hoyo Versus Genshin Impact Version seven point zero ever Winter
Speaker 1: Without Mercy Special program airs from eight to nine pm
Speaker 1: Eastern Time, So all you Hoyo verse maniacs out there,
Speaker 1: I'll get into it.
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 1: That does it for the headlines. Let's start wrapping up
Speaker 1: the show. We have a poll question from yesterday. Let's
Speaker 1: go ahead and get the freshest results from here. Are
Speaker 1: you planning or are you playing? Excuse me Splatoon Raiders boo, yeah,
Speaker 1: which is yes or no?
Speaker 3: And I am playing it?
Speaker 1: Twenty five percent of people twenty six excuse me percent
Speaker 1: of responded said yes they are playing this game. Seventy
Speaker 1: four percent said no. It's a pretty decent result for
Speaker 1: this fifty dollars sort of spin off of Splatoon, and
Speaker 1: again we know how well it's doing in Japan.
Speaker 3: Right, Is this is this one you've checked out? I
Speaker 3: think you said you might have played it. I can't
Speaker 3: remember I played.
Speaker 2: Was it a demo that I played?
Speaker 3: Okay? Yes?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: Probably?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Was there there was a demo?
Speaker 3: Was there?
Speaker 2: I'm not tripping right.
Speaker 3: I think was there like a there might have been
Speaker 3: I'm not sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you might have played at a previewed event or
Speaker 1: something like that.
Speaker 3: There is I think that's what it was.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Splatoon Raiders is one that I'm getting more into.
Speaker 2: There was a demo. I just looked it up and
Speaker 2: I'm like, yep, it was definitely the demo.
Speaker 3: Excellent, Okay, very cool. Yep.
Speaker 1: Splatoon Raiders is one I'm gonna keep playing for sure.
Speaker 1: We have a new poll question, though, we'll get to
Speaker 1: it here in a second. Before we do that, Rachel,
Speaker 1: why don't you tell people where they can find you
Speaker 1: on the internet what you have going on all that
Speaker 1: good stuff.
Speaker 2: You can find my written work at gamespeed dot com
Speaker 2: and where I am currently. I've just put out my
Speaker 2: latest edition of boss Mode, which is my series of
Speaker 2: interviews with female leaders in the gaming, technology and entertainment industries.
Speaker 2: I just did an interview with Amanda Cruz from Bloomhouse Games,
Speaker 2: and before that, I did one with Felicia Day, who
Speaker 2: if you don't know, you're too young to be watching this.
Speaker 2: And you could also find me on TikTok, where I
Speaker 2: make funny videos about games. I just did one about
Speaker 2: how the Legend of Zelda Ocreative Time remake might be
Speaker 2: the only game that could reasonably compete with Grand theft
Speaker 2: Ato six, and I got some very interesting feedback on
Speaker 2: that one. And I also have an assignment for Giant Bomb.
Speaker 2: If you don't mind, I'm just gonna put this out there.
Speaker 2: You can DM me on pretty much any social media platform.
Speaker 2: It's just my name, Rachel Caser. And you can also
Speaker 2: find me on like TikTok, blue Sky Twitter if you
Speaker 2: still use Twitter. But I am trying to upgrade my
Speaker 2: whole setup here because my camera, microphone, headset, all of that,
Speaker 2: this is all pre pandemic stuff, like I have not
Speaker 2: like most of my disposable income has gone into other
Speaker 2: areas and aspects of my life and also just you know,
Speaker 2: necessities staying alive, putting food on the table. But I
Speaker 2: have enough now that I can actually start to like improve,
Speaker 2: Like I'm still using the same Logitech webcam that I've
Speaker 2: had since like twenty seventeen, so I think tenth anniversary
Speaker 2: coming up, it's time to upgrade. So if anybody has
Speaker 2: any ideas on good semi reasonably affordable cameras, microphones and
Speaker 2: all that, Jeff, this question for you as well and
Speaker 2: everybody else jis yeah, Gimi crew as well. Yeah, just
Speaker 2: drop me, drop me a message anywhere you can find
Speaker 2: me online. And you know I'm open to all recommendations.
Speaker 2: So that's your homework, Giant Bomb.
Speaker 3: Yeah, help her out.
Speaker 1: Please, everybody like give give some recommendations. Uh fantastic. All right,
Speaker 1: Well let's see here a new poll question. Have you
Speaker 1: ever used used Nexus mods? Yes or no? We'll get
Speaker 1: the results talk about it on the show tomorrow. Speaking
Speaker 1: of Giant Bomb, tomorrow's show will have the Bomb twelve,
Speaker 1: So go ahead and vote for the Bomb twelve. We'll
Speaker 1: get the full results there. See what games everyone's been playing.
Speaker 1: Later today, and by later today, I mean very quickly, right, Jam,
Speaker 1: we're gonna be doing Voicemail Dump Truck with guest star
Speaker 1: Mary Kish. Yeah, thank you, Jan.
Speaker 3: We are gonna that.
Speaker 2: Noise English Chan, Yes.
Speaker 3: Exactly.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: I understood that there's an episode of Sea Lab twenty
Speaker 1: twenty one where the characters like Face gets eaten by
Speaker 1: a monster and they have a prolonged conversation with them.
Speaker 3: That's what he sounded like.
Speaker 1: The guy that face, So yeah, tune in for that
Speaker 1: and we're gonna have UPF tomorrow. It's gonna be a
Speaker 1: lot of fun here on gihme Bomb, and then we're
Speaker 1: recording some extra stuff that will pop off here and there.
Speaker 1: Thank you everybody. We really appreciate it. Thank you Rachel
Speaker 1: for hanging out with me today and talking about video games.
Speaker 3: I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, needtime, Jeff, thank you for helping. Thank you for
Speaker 2: helping me like socialize what I'm feeling like, feeling like crap.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know you crushed it. Yeah, I'm glad. I'm
Speaker 1: glad that you're feeling better. I hope, we hope you
Speaker 1: get back to one hundred percent here real soon. And
Speaker 1: once again, thank you to everybody for watching and listening.
Speaker 1: You're the best audience in gaming. Until next time, have
Speaker 1: a good one, take care of yourself, and goodbye.