WE'RE BACK! - EP 83

[00:00:18] Speaker A: G'day and welcome to Oceanic Gaming radio. It's episode 83, season three. [00:00:27] Speaker B: The third year of us doing this tackles that. Really? [00:00:34] Speaker A: That's three, yeah. [00:00:35] Speaker C: 82 episodes. Pretty sure. [00:00:37] Speaker B: Something like that. 83, 80. [00:00:41] Speaker A: Yeah, I just said it 2 seconds ago. [00:00:43] Speaker C: Well, for some reason. Oh, yeah, I can see it now. I've got 282s. [00:00:47] Speaker A: Yep, that's my 82 squared. But, yeah. Pretty exciting, mate. Pretty cool. But yeah. We're back. Welcome back. Thanks for being here. We appreciate it. Sorry that we took a big old break, but, you know, it's the holidays, so. Come on, give us a break, will you? But, yeah, we're back. It's episode 83. It is the 15th of the first. 2024 January. Great start to the year. Anyways, my name is Captain Perth. Alongside me is me good old mate grizzly gaming 86. How you going, mate? How was your. Just weekend, your holidays, your New Year's, Christmas. [00:01:26] Speaker C: So much to unpack. I'm good, Cap. Actually. I'm really good, mate. I'm feeling 1000 million bucks before I jump into my holidays and things. I just quickly wanted to show off. I have got Cap, my scuffed OGR merch in my hand. You've got it as well. Hang on, let me put mine up. [00:01:52] Speaker A: Look how fucking bad that is. [00:01:56] Speaker C: I put it on my head. My wife was like, that hat is terrible. She reckons it's really small for my head. It is quite small. Do we get the kids sizes, Cap, or what? Is that? [00:02:06] Speaker B: What happened? [00:02:07] Speaker A: I don't know. [00:02:07] Speaker C: Big heads. [00:02:08] Speaker A: We got the australian. Not australian friendly size, but yeah, it's not a good hat. I think after taxes and all the rest of it was like 50 australian dollars and delivery or something ridiculous. Because your brother was like, I'm going to get one old noodle cookie. And then he was like, wait a second, $50? I was like, for the quality. Not worth it. [00:02:37] Speaker C: No, absolutely not. But I will say it is limited edition, one time only. [00:02:42] Speaker B: So before we blow up. [00:02:44] Speaker C: This could triple in value easily, Cap. [00:02:48] Speaker A: Yeah. In fact. And I think we're going to get to it later, but I think this might be the year. I think this might be Ogre's year. I think we've been ticking along nicely over time. And I think realistically, things are only going to grow, but I think things might exponentially grow. [00:03:05] Speaker C: Patreon numbers are the highest we've ever had, Cap. [00:03:08] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:03:09] Speaker C: Look at just. [00:03:10] Speaker A: They haven't dropped. [00:03:11] Speaker C: They haven't dropped. That's a good sign. [00:03:15] Speaker A: Anyways. [00:03:16] Speaker B: Well, yeah. [00:03:17] Speaker A: Grizz, give me a bit of a rundown. [00:03:20] Speaker C: I had a fantastic Christmas time, Cap. [00:03:22] Speaker B: I took two weeks off work. [00:03:24] Speaker C: Some of the highlights over my Christmas time, mate, were I took my kids to this water park in Belle divers. [00:03:30] Speaker B: With all these, like, had all these. [00:03:32] Speaker C: Inflatables and stuff and going down big slides and jumping. [00:03:36] Speaker B: That was a lot of fun. [00:03:37] Speaker C: Lots of beach, lots of late night playing video games. I went to my brother's house for a land party with my kids and we all played custom games in Fortnite. [00:03:48] Speaker B: And I'll tell you what, cap, that. [00:03:50] Speaker C: Game is amazing for that because you can cross play between Switch, you can cross play between console and pc. [00:03:56] Speaker B: So between everyone, my brothers and all. [00:04:00] Speaker C: Of our kids were all able to jump on custom games and have a good old laugh. [00:04:05] Speaker A: That would have been great. [00:04:07] Speaker C: It was wicked. [00:04:07] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:04:08] Speaker C: Kids are all getting a bit older now, so they're kind of enjoying that kind of stuff. [00:04:11] Speaker B: I tell you what, Mikey and Kurtie's kids are pretty good at Fortnite, eh? [00:04:16] Speaker C: Like, they've got really. [00:04:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:04:20] Speaker A: Give an old Uncle Grizzler a run from his. [00:04:22] Speaker C: Oh, big time, mate, big time. What else, Kat? I've bought a secondhand drum kit from marketplace and I'm restoring it. So I've been slowly chipping away at like, I think it's an early 2000. [00:04:40] Speaker B: Tama swing star, which is like an entry level tama drum kit, but all. [00:04:46] Speaker C: The hardware was rusted on it and. [00:04:48] Speaker B: The shells are wrapped in this really faded blue wrap. [00:04:54] Speaker C: So I've pulled all the wrap off it, I've taken all the steel bits off them and I've soaked it all and I've polished it all up and it looks brand new. [00:05:01] Speaker B: And I've bought a new wrap, which. [00:05:05] Speaker C: Basically, you got to adhes it to the drum shell, but I've bought champagne sparkle, mate. So it's going to be this sparkly under lights, like kind of gold. Kind of gold, actually. You would have seen them. And I posted in the group around a few different finishes. [00:05:19] Speaker B: Well, the one that you guys voted. [00:05:21] Speaker C: On was no longer available, so I couldn't get that. So I kind of something else. Yeah, I wanted to get this second best. Yeah, second best. But no, lots of things happen, Cap. [00:05:31] Speaker B: So far, 2024 is pretty good for me, mate. I've started the year continuing my fitness journey. I've never really stopped for the last. [00:05:41] Speaker C: Year, which I'm pretty proud of myself for that. [00:05:43] Speaker A: So, continuing in the gym, I guess. [00:05:45] Speaker C: One big change for me, Cap, is I have started calorie counting and watching what I'm putting into my body to try to lose some of the body fat that sits below. They've got the muscle hiding below the body. [00:05:58] Speaker B: Hell yeah. [00:05:59] Speaker C: I want to get that summer beach body out, mate, and strip some of the weight around the outside of me. What about you, Cap? How's your holiday? In your break, mate? What did you get up to anything, mate? [00:06:12] Speaker A: It was amazing on every freaking level. It was so good. We had two weeks off as well, so we took off from Christmas and Ted's daycare was still in full swing, so he was handled every day that they were open, obviously minus public holidays. And me and Mia just did a lot of stuff that we haven't been able to do in the last year and a bit, basically we went and watched movies and saw like the new studio Ghibli movie, which is fucking excellent, by the way. We went and had expensive. [00:06:46] Speaker C: Sorry, I want to interrupt you there real quick. I have recently watched all of the old ones, things like Howes Castle and moving Castle. Yeah, moving Castle and spirited away. And the other one that has totoro in it, what's that called? [00:07:02] Speaker A: My neighbor Totoro. [00:07:04] Speaker B: My neighbor totoro. [00:07:05] Speaker C: So I didn't know there was a new one. When's this new one? [00:07:10] Speaker A: It's been out for last few months. It's called. God, why can't I think of the fucking name? The boy and the heron. Really good. Really good. It's incredibly vivid and the animation is incredible. There's a few scenes in there. [00:07:28] Speaker B: The other ones that are kind of cool. [00:07:33] Speaker A: Yeah, they've kind of got that, like, I don't know, gritty Disney movie kind of thing going on. [00:07:41] Speaker C: Obviously japanese, big time morals and stuff in there. I think there's a lot of deep meaning that's behind those. [00:07:47] Speaker A: Oh, dude, absolutely. [00:07:49] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:07:50] Speaker A: And even a few tear jerking moments as well. It's a really well put together movie and I think it's interesting to see how they kind of blend the events from the current day in history and blend those in with these almost fairy tale style narratives that are very, well unfamiliar, basically from western kind of stories and our classic asop fables and stuff like that. But yeah, the new movie is great. Definitely highly recommend watching it. Really good value. And I think if your kids are a bit older, they'll really enjoy it as well. [00:08:33] Speaker C: I was thinking that spirited away might be a good one to watch with my girls. I reckon my two young ones be. [00:08:39] Speaker A: Interested in spirited away is great. [00:08:41] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:08:41] Speaker A: I think you want to be a little bit older where you're not getting scared by little sort of things. Little bloody ferrets running around and stuff. Great movies, but yeah. So we watched that in the cinema and that was really nice. I mean, we haven't been in the cinema since well before Ted was born, so that was really nice. And then we had a bunch of really expensive dinners and lunches because it was Mia's birthday around that time, so we kind of just had a bit of like a very lavish couple of weeks. And what else did we do? We did a couple's massage. [00:09:15] Speaker B: That was great. [00:09:17] Speaker A: Really nice, very lovely. And did a couple of escape rooms. Those were really fun as well. Yeah, just kind of really opened her up in terms of just like. Yeah, just really indulged. And now we're kind of in the kind of weight loss bandwagon back into work. I've got like a major project that's wrapping up end of this month, so. [00:09:44] Speaker B: It'S going to be pretty big. [00:09:45] Speaker A: And then also I'm calorie counting as well, which has been great. So even like last night I made a curry and then I got the calorie counted, every single thing I put in that curry sauce and then figured out how much calories would be in a 250 mil cup Scoop. [00:10:12] Speaker C: What are you giving yourself per day? [00:10:14] Speaker B: Calories? [00:10:16] Speaker A: Well, I think it was 2300 would be like if I want to lose weight, essentially. So I'm kind of trying to come underneath that and aim for about two to 2.1. [00:10:31] Speaker C: I'm a bit shorter than you, obviously, so I think it calculates differently for me based on height and stuff. But mine's 2000 and weight. And weight, so mine's 2000 to be in deficit. [00:10:42] Speaker B: And dude, I tell you what, you do feel it. [00:10:46] Speaker C: It takes a couple of days, but if you say deficit for those few days and it's just like, oh man, I'm so hungry, dude. [00:10:54] Speaker A: Today at work it was rough as guts and I was like, oh, man, you just got to keep going. But tell you what's been really good, a soda stream at work, I've been pumping a shitload of soda water and that seems to help a little bit. [00:11:05] Speaker C: Yeah, soda water. [00:11:07] Speaker A: I think it just like a bit of air in your guts. I don't know. Does this next thing to food, green. [00:11:13] Speaker C: Tea is a good one as well. There's zero calories. That's not a bad because you've got to sip on it. [00:11:20] Speaker A: There's always little hacks and stuff. If you want a bit of a splurge in the weekend, you can have a bacon and egg mcMuffin meal. And that's just under 500 calories with a regular coffee. It's little things like that, mate. You just got to be thoughtful about the decisions you make. But, yeah, getting there, mate. And then we had a really good Chrissy. It was Ted's second Christmas, but probably one of the first ones where he's actually kind of. Well, I mean, it is literally the first one where he's kind of been a bit more present and been able. [00:11:51] Speaker C: To kind of get open the presents, mate. Like, actually excited around what's in. [00:11:58] Speaker A: You know? I think he enjoyed tearing the paper off more than the presents inside, to be honest. But as a family, we all got a pair of crocs, so it was the merry crocmas. And then we bought a bunch of jibbets. And, yeah, it was fucking good. It was a good holiday season. [00:12:16] Speaker C: What is a gibbit, cap? What is a jibbet? [00:12:20] Speaker A: It's like these little things you can plug into the holes in the crop. [00:12:25] Speaker C: Little stud things. [00:12:27] Speaker B: Okay. [00:12:27] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:12:28] Speaker A: And so I bought a bunch of anime ones. So I've got anime jibbets from the latest jujitsu Kaisen anime. And I bought these ones that look mushrooms and fish and all kinds of random shit. It's really cool. And I bought this fast food one, and it looks like someone's dropped a fucking Macca's french fry on McRock. And there's bits of popcorn chicken as well. It's so good. But, yeah, so, anyways, it was a really good two weeks, but I was quite ready to come back to work, I think. Got a lot of really cool projects we're working on at the moment and just nice to dive back in. So, yeah, it was really good. [00:13:16] Speaker C: Hey, Cap, one thing neither of us mentioned that were highlights of our break. [00:13:20] Speaker B: Which is sad, but we played some. [00:13:23] Speaker C: Bloodborne together, and I got really pissed. We got really pissed. [00:13:27] Speaker B: It was great, dude. [00:13:28] Speaker A: Yeah, immensely pissed. Yeah, it was great. Crank blew the dust off the old bloodborne board game and got our asses relatively, not horrifically. I think we did really well. We basically played one of the campaigns. Yeah, well, the campaigns are broken into three chapters, and we got into the second chapter and basically carked it on the final boss, which it is brutally unforgiving. And in the main base game, there's four different campaigns, and we randomly chose one. And we happened to choose, according to the forums, the most difficult one. One of the sub quests that you need to complete to sort of progress the storyline and finish is you've got. [00:14:16] Speaker B: To essentially, use your currency that you. [00:14:21] Speaker A: Use to upgrade your character to progress that quest, which is completely fucked because you need that currency to progress your character, which is really important, would you believe, especially in a finite amount of time with a board game. So anyways, it's a really fun game. I mean, if you're a board gameist and you're looking for something interesting and campaign based, that's a cracker, and you like a bit of born of blood, but, yeah, mate. Yeah, it was fucking excellent. We definitely smashed a few cocktails. We were having Bloody espresso martinis and having bloody mojito, raspberry smashes and all kinds of stuff. [00:15:01] Speaker C: The cocktails were excellent, weren't they? Bloody, yeah. [00:15:04] Speaker A: Well, I mean, you basically completely bartended, which was much appreciated. [00:15:09] Speaker C: Yeah, I love that stuff, man. [00:15:11] Speaker B: I love making cocktails. [00:15:13] Speaker A: Oh, man, I love drinking them. Speaking of cocktails, I've decided that one of my New year's resolutions is going. [00:15:20] Speaker B: To be the year of no beer. [00:15:22] Speaker C: Wow, the year of no beer. So what, you're just drinking cocktails now? [00:15:27] Speaker B: Yeah, basically. [00:15:27] Speaker A: No, I'm going to go for, like, seltzers and shit like that. But, yeah, I'm just going to basically hardline and go no beer. Because you can get low calorie beer, but they're just not fun. I'm sorry, but they're just fucking average. They got no flavor and they just suck. Versus you can have a pretty tasty seltzer. [00:15:49] Speaker B: So I thought, you know what? [00:15:52] Speaker A: I'm not going to be able to give up alcohol for a year because I just can't and I enjoy it too much and I don't want to either. Not in the frame of mind where I feel like I want to do that, but I feel like I should give up the beer because there's a lot of hidden shit in beer. [00:16:10] Speaker C: Hugely. Imagine if you have two beers. That blows almost your whole daily calories out the window, capo, doesn't it? [00:16:18] Speaker A: Oh, dude. Yeah, it's actually insane. Like an IPA, which is my vice. It's just horrifically calorific. Pretty crazy, but yeah. Anyways, you got anything else you want to tell the class about grizz before we get stuck in today? [00:16:35] Speaker C: No, mate, I think I've covered everything already. So let's do it. [00:16:39] Speaker B: Let's bloody hit it. [00:16:40] Speaker A: How wonderful, mate. How delightful. Well, yeah, firstly, as mentioned before, we're back, baby. So appreciate you being here. We go live every Monday night, australian western standard time of 07:00 p.m., and, yeah, you can jump in the chat and have a bit of a chat with everyone else. That's sort of cruising and viewing live. Otherwise, we're available on all of your favorite podcasting platforms. Just look up oceanic gaming radio and plug it in, and you will get a response from that particular service showing you one of the best podcasts on the planet. [00:17:18] Speaker B: Now, what we would appreciate if you. [00:17:20] Speaker A: Do go ahead and do that is. [00:17:22] Speaker B: Please rate that particular podcast. [00:17:25] Speaker A: It'd be really helpful to us. Just as long as it's a five star review, nothing less. Unless the review platform gives you the opportunity to do more stars, then just max that bad boy out, basically. So use your brain. You know how this works now. Yeah. Also, I just want to say a big thank you to our wonderful Patreons. They are the legends that come out every month and keep plugging money into this thing that we've built with our own two hands. And, yeah, we appreciate you guys immensely. If you'd like to become a patron, you can go to ogrshow and follow the cues. And you too can be one of the following people that pay x dollars per month. I couldn't even tell you how much they pay. I don't even know what the tiers are, but I know that they exist now. They are the following people. Sukai, Moosey, caging, run Sergeant Paul Lee, GD, Jay Libs, Brendan Dan, fantastic strops and slatos. Who's in the channel today chatting live. [00:18:30] Speaker C: Absolute legends, cap. [00:18:31] Speaker B: Absolute legends. Bloody rippers. [00:18:35] Speaker A: Now, Grizz, not a huge episode because I just kind of wanted to get into the new year. Talk about us, talk about the year, talk about gaming. [00:18:48] Speaker C: Just settle into the show, mate. [00:18:50] Speaker B: Just slide in. [00:18:53] Speaker A: It's your first week back. You don't want to be bloody moving mountains or anything. You don't want to kind of just cruise back in. So we got a few bits and pieces that we'll have a bit of a chat about. So, yeah, let's fucking jump in on. [00:19:09] Speaker B: Okay. [00:19:09] Speaker A: Apparently my stingers aren't working, Bruce. Probably should have checked that before we went live. [00:19:15] Speaker B: I could hear that, dude. [00:19:17] Speaker C: In fact, I heard it twice. Yeah, it was that good. [00:19:20] Speaker B: Cool. [00:19:20] Speaker A: Because I pressed it twice. I don't think it's coming through on my headphones. That's all right, though. Don't worry about it. [00:19:28] Speaker B: Cool. [00:19:29] Speaker A: All right. So, yeah, anyways, look, Grizz, last year we had a bit of a chat about gaming. New year's resolutions. Yes. And so I kind of wanted to do that again because I actually stuck to my resolution. Last year and it felt fucking good. [00:19:50] Speaker C: Hey, cap, out of curiosity, do you. [00:19:51] Speaker B: Remember what resolutions I made, mate? I'm pretty sure I did not meet. [00:19:54] Speaker C: My resolutions, but again, I can't remember them. [00:19:57] Speaker A: I couldn't tell you what yours were, mate, but my resolution last year was to finish more games, basically, not just buy and start games and never finish them. And I think my rough rate of completion was about 60%, which is up from about like, you'd be lucky if it was 10% the year before. I reckon. Even managed to knock out Boulder's gate towards the end of last year, which was pretty cool. [00:20:28] Speaker B: I've definitely noticed you working harder to finish games, cap, because I felt like. [00:20:34] Speaker C: That there was a period of time there, especially like in the early days of OGR where I would just see you on steam playing a new fucking game every time I look on there. But I don't know, is it because you have limited time having a child that you're more focused with your gaming time? Or is it a conscious effort you made to achieve that or what do you think? [00:21:00] Speaker A: I think there's a few things going on. Firstly, well, I'm medicated for ADHD, which I think helps a lot. So I don't kind of have the squirrel syndrome of as soon as something comes into my periphery I'm kind of on a gone. [00:21:14] Speaker B: But. [00:21:19] Speaker A: I think because I have less time, I'm a bit more picky with how I spread that time out. And I think ultimately it kind of comes down to. I was thinking the other day, I was like, oh, I kind of feel like a new game. And I was like. But also I don't really know if I want a new thing at the moment. And so I started up yakuza like a dragon a little while ago, so I'll just keep playing that and it's been fucking great. And I think there's more of me realizing that I just need to kind of maybe push through a little to kind of get into moments with video games where I'm like, okay, cool, we're back on the kind of the fun train, you know what I mean? Because you do have dips and stuff in story and gameplay and everything when it comes to a game. But yeah, it's a hard one to quantify for me, Grizz. But I definitely think overall I'm finding. [00:22:18] Speaker B: It easier to stick to those. [00:22:20] Speaker C: I also think you making a conscious effort last year to go right, here's something that's happening. I'm not finishing games, so I'm going to try to finish games this year. I actually reckon that that really helps when you've realized that you're doing something. [00:22:34] Speaker B: And then you try to retrospectively go. [00:22:37] Speaker C: And fix that moving forward, which you've done that. It's pretty fucking cool, man. [00:22:41] Speaker B: Well done. [00:22:42] Speaker C: Yeah, congratulations. [00:22:43] Speaker A: I mean, ultimately, I'm not going to finish a game that I'm not enjoying. And I have just stopped games last year that I just went, well, I just can't see myself finishing this, or I think I've enjoyed the game loop up into this moment and maybe I can't really see myself kind of. For example, a game like Dave the diver. [00:23:03] Speaker B: I felt like I couldn't just keep. [00:23:05] Speaker A: Going in that loop, if you know what I mean, because it's a very condensed game loop. I know that sounds weird, but I really enjoyed that game. But I kind of got my money out of it within the first, say, ten to 15 hours. And after that I was kind of. [00:23:23] Speaker B: Like, I don't know if I want. [00:23:25] Speaker A: To just keep doing this over and over again more so, because I was like, well, I could keep doing this over and over again. I'm still having fun and I'm enjoying it, but then I can also go and finish boulders gate. I can go and do something else that I think I'm going to get more kind of bang for enjoyment buck for myself. [00:23:41] Speaker C: Absolutely. [00:23:41] Speaker A: You know what I mean? And I mean, again, I have a finite amount of time these days. [00:23:47] Speaker B: So. [00:23:47] Speaker C: Look, Cap, I don't want to interrupt you here, but I feel like you're kind of reflecting a bit on your gaming in 2023. And I've made some general reflections around. [00:23:56] Speaker B: My habits this year as well, that. [00:23:58] Speaker C: Maybe it's a good time to share with you now. 2023. [00:24:02] Speaker B: Cap, I actually really struggled with video gaming, and I think that's because my life priorities changed quite a lot of bit in that year. [00:24:11] Speaker C: I started prioritizing my music and my. [00:24:13] Speaker B: Job, probably more than I have ever before. [00:24:16] Speaker C: And unfortunately, it meant that my free. [00:24:18] Speaker B: Time, I was trying to spread it. [00:24:20] Speaker C: Too thin and I found myself that it actually affected my gaming habits a lot. [00:24:24] Speaker B: Where I was getting to this mindset. [00:24:27] Speaker C: Where I didn't want to set myself into this big, long term aaa or. [00:24:31] Speaker B: A large game like God of War. [00:24:34] Speaker C: Ragnarok, which I've got sitting there on the back burner, I haven't played even things like, what's that other souls like that came out. [00:24:41] Speaker A: Cat, you're thinking of Lords of the Fallen. [00:24:48] Speaker C: Lords of the Fallen, yeah. I would get home from a day at work or even on the weekend. If I play a gig on a Friday night and I've got the Saturday night free, and I'd be pretty tired. [00:24:56] Speaker B: And I'd be like, you know what? [00:24:57] Speaker C: I'd rather play something mindless that I don't have to think too hard about story or whatever else. And I'll sit there and play like. [00:25:04] Speaker B: Magic, the gathering, online arena, or binding. [00:25:07] Speaker C: Of Isaac or anything else. So I don't know. [00:25:09] Speaker B: I kind of found that I'm not. [00:25:12] Speaker C: Overly happy with the way that I really want to play these games because I really enjoy them when I sit down and do. But I just feel like I haven't made the space in my social life. [00:25:24] Speaker B: And I guess my personal life at. [00:25:28] Speaker C: The moment to be able to do that and just enjoy it. So my reflection is that I haven't. [00:25:34] Speaker B: Enabled myself to have kind of the. [00:25:36] Speaker C: Gaming that I want to have right now in the life balance piece, but as a general reflection for 23. [00:25:43] Speaker B: So something to try to fix in. [00:25:45] Speaker C: The next one and maybe kind of create some content as well around that cap. [00:25:50] Speaker A: I can kind of feel that as well. Dude, I think like an outsider looking in on your life, your work has become more required, more of you over time. And I can see why that would have the kind of effect. Some days you get home and the thought of having to turn on your Playstation or something and then get your controller out and do all the rest of it, even just the thought of doing that can be tiring. And you're already tired of that stage. So I can completely empathize with that because I kind of think interstitially between these games that I did finish, there was a lot of periods of time where I just did not feel like gaming at all, which is fairly new for me. And I think a lot of that is also getting, well for me, getting a lot of enjoyment out of my work. And I'm not seeking dopamine, the dopamine after work because I'm enjoying my job a lot. And so I don't feel like I need to fill that gap in my life with a lot of gaming, which is really interesting because I think my whole life I've done that in a lot of ways, you know what I mean? But not to say that I don't want a video game or anything like that, I still really enjoy the media and I still really enjoy seeing what is being done. For example, I'm playing Yukuza like a dragon at the moment. And that came out a couple of years ago or whatever. And that game is fucking awesome, man. [00:27:14] Speaker C: It's just good. Is it so well put together? I don't think I did a very good job of playing stuff this year, and I actually found just to run the podcast and be able to talk about video games. [00:27:27] Speaker B: I found myself researching stuff quite a. [00:27:30] Speaker C: Lot of the time rather than actually playing these games that I really wanted to play. That's simply because I just didn't have the time or even the drive to want to go and play those. So it's interesting looking back at it now, retrospectively, after 2023 has happened and kind of where I'm at now. And I do have a hit list. [00:27:48] Speaker B: Of stuff that I want to play because I'm keen to play it and just got to find the time and. [00:27:55] Speaker C: Kind of slot it in there. [00:27:56] Speaker B: But the list goes like this, cap. The things that I want to get around got of War Ragnarok. [00:28:01] Speaker C: Because I finished the 2018, mate, and it was honestly, I finished that game and I was like, wow, that was such a good experience. The storytelling was amazing. So I've got that on PS five, ready to go. [00:28:10] Speaker A: So you finished the first God of War. [00:28:16] Speaker C: I didn't 100% it or anything. [00:28:18] Speaker A: No, but that's perfect. I mean, man, I've got to say, like, God of War Ragnarok. It was funny because I don't know if you remember my initial feelings on that game. I was like, man, this game is just the fucking same thing. But then it became such a nice, wonderful experience with how they redelivered that same experience again. But then the story is fucking, dude. [00:28:41] Speaker C: Really well put together. Still think about the 2018 story that was told through that climb up top of the hill at the end and lots of emotion. [00:28:50] Speaker B: Yeah, very cool. [00:28:51] Speaker C: And you know what? Did you play that when you were. [00:28:54] Speaker B: A parent, Kat, or were you? [00:28:56] Speaker A: No, but I reckon I really do think there are moments in Ragnarok where certain it wasn't even, like, some of the more sad or relationship things, just the small interstitial things that really made me think about my relationship with Ted and I think just making you realize, like, man, how would I feel if that happened? Or, like, you know, it definitely amplifies things. You know what mean? Like, it really does amplify things. It's a really interesting dynamic for when you have that relationship. I mean, obviously, my relationship is a little bit different because Ted, he doesn't have a bow and arrow. He doesn't fucking talk. [00:29:45] Speaker B: Well. [00:29:46] Speaker C: I reckon having children definitely switches something. [00:29:48] Speaker B: In the brain chemistry that it allows. [00:29:52] Speaker C: You to empathize situations, even if they're. [00:29:56] Speaker B: Fictitious to put you, and if you. [00:30:00] Speaker C: Were to have a child in that situation. So you kind of feel those feelings more in your head as they're occurring. But yeah, God of War 2018, big time. [00:30:10] Speaker B: I had a lot of those feelings. [00:30:11] Speaker C: Throughout that gameplay, more of like how. [00:30:14] Speaker B: He was a father figure the whole. [00:30:17] Speaker C: Way through in their relationship and how. [00:30:19] Speaker B: That is just very well done. [00:30:22] Speaker A: I think you see the decisions that he has to make and the reactions that he has to some of the things that Atreus does, and they're quite understandable on a lot of levels. You know what I mean? And I mean, even trace's reaction to a lot of things his dad does, they're all super relatable. Yeah, exactly. It's totally understandable. But yeah, you see that love for one another and you know what that feels like. And it's interesting, it being regurgitated and then you're having to consume that. But yes, sorry, I feel like we've kind of got a little track here. [00:31:02] Speaker C: But that's on my list. Other things are, cap, I want to beat honor mode belt as gate three. I want to do that. I actually haven't even beaten it yet, dude. But I wanted to get to that later because we've all been on holidays. I'm playing co op. We're right at the end, but just got to find. [00:31:15] Speaker A: Can I ask how far through your current playthrough you are? [00:31:17] Speaker C: Like, look, non, we're in the final act and we've been dicking around in. [00:31:21] Speaker B: It for maybe like seven or 8 hours now. We went down to what I think. [00:31:28] Speaker C: Was the final area and there's a. [00:31:30] Speaker B: Bridge that you got across that starts basically a fight. [00:31:34] Speaker C: You got a certain amount of time to kill this one enemy before something happens. I don't know. We're in the area, the end area, I'm pretty sure, or somewhere around there, but there's still some big decisions to make. Everyone's trying to kind of pull us in different directions. We don't quite know what we're going to do with it yet. Look, I'm sorry, because I know that you wanted to discuss the final act. [00:31:59] Speaker B: And bits and pieces, but yeah, we're. [00:32:01] Speaker C: Not quite there yet, but we're not far away. [00:32:04] Speaker A: Yeah, well, I'm excited for when you guys manage to knock that out because I'd love to have a bit of a bouldersgate post mortem because we're well overdue for it. [00:32:16] Speaker B: It's so good. [00:32:17] Speaker A: The finish for, and I won't say anything about what happens or anything. But I went pretty full completionist, so I did pretty much every side quest and anything I thought I could potentially do explored every area because I just realistically, I was like, I'm never going to play this game again. I'm not going to have time to play this again. Even a multiplayer playthrough, I'm probably just not going to play it multiplayer because when the fuck do I have time to jump on multiplayer realistically? I don't. I was like, oh man, it'd be nice to have a multiplayer playthrough. It's a very romantic thing because it's like, liam not going to have time to do a multiplayer play through, you idiot. Enjoy this game now for what it is. So I just thought, you know what? Okay, I'm going to do some funky things in it, but I have a rough idea of how I want to progress through the game and how I want to be interpreted as one of the heroes. And so I kind of stuck to that and it was really fun. Anyways, we'll have a post mortem battle later, but yeah, continue on, my friend. [00:33:18] Speaker C: No, what else I got to say? So the honor mode belt is gate three. [00:33:23] Speaker B: Get that done. [00:33:24] Speaker C: I want to give new releases that. [00:33:26] Speaker B: Interest me this year more attention, cap. [00:33:28] Speaker C: The attention they deserve, because there's a. [00:33:29] Speaker B: Couple of indies that have come out. [00:33:31] Speaker C: Like dredge and other ones that I just kind of let go thinking that I was going to play them later down a track and look, just didn't. [00:33:40] Speaker B: Find time or anything else. I've got to get those little bits. [00:33:45] Speaker C: And beautiful nuggets now. We will get there because we're going to be talking about our top tier list for 2024 coming up. [00:33:52] Speaker B: But one of those new releases that. [00:33:54] Speaker C: Is coming out this year that I'm very excited about is Hades, too. So I'll play that. But I guess just going back to. [00:34:01] Speaker B: My reflections, cat, which was essentially I. [00:34:04] Speaker C: Found myself in a space where I almost didn't really feel like jumping into a full commitment in a video game. The only real one that I've delivered this year is Battlesgate three, which I haven't even finished yet, but that's the only one that I've really put the time in to finish that. So 2024, I've got this list of stuff that I want to play. This is stuff that I want to do. And I think I would like to. [00:34:25] Speaker B: Try to stick to that and actually. [00:34:28] Speaker C: Get some proper gaming down and bit of enjoyment. [00:34:31] Speaker B: And you know what? Put aside some time to do that amongst my other things that I've got going on. [00:34:40] Speaker C: It's essentially where I'm at, mate. [00:34:43] Speaker A: Yeah, man, I love it. Yeah. I think ultimately I want to kind of match my resolution from last year. I do want to finish more games and maybe be a bit more thoughtful about where I'm putting my time in video games because I don't know, I think I did a pretty good job of it last year, but I think I could maybe be a bit more realistic about the way I approach my ideas of what time I might have and maybe just kind of be a bit more realistic with myself. [00:35:12] Speaker B: But I think one thing I want. [00:35:13] Speaker A: To really do this year, Grizz, is game more with Mia. And whether that's through a board game medium or like, I want to do more of that with Mia because we actually started playing Mario Wonder and that was really fun, but something came up and we haven't played it since. And obviously me isn't a big gamer, so, like, jumping back in blind would be a bit rough for her. Whereas I have that latent gamer muscle memory to how to play with a controller. It would be a bit of a. [00:35:47] Speaker C: Nightmare holding run and jumping with the bottom of your. [00:35:53] Speaker A: It's just interesting watching someone who has no inkling to basic things that you just take for granted as a gamer. Like approach, like pressing two buttons at the same time. That's literally something you can do. [00:36:07] Speaker C: Watching had to be Fortnite is the. [00:36:11] Speaker B: Funniest fucking thing ever. [00:36:13] Speaker C: She plays on controller, on a laptop because I've been playing with her sometimes do duos and things. Like she just has no awareness of anything around her. [00:36:22] Speaker B: She'll be like, I'll kill someone. [00:36:24] Speaker C: And she'll walk over to their loot and be looking at the floor for like 10 seconds trying to figure out what she wants to grab while I'm fighting the other guy who's the duo partner from the team, and she's just like, oh, I got sniped. [00:36:40] Speaker A: Yeah, I feel like a lot of that stuff just comes from just doing it over and over again, though, right? Again, it's that latent game of muscle memory, and it goes beyond just interacting with a controller. It's just like interfacing with a video game and knowing what your objective is different, but yeah, so I think that's going to be a big one for me as well. In all honesty, there's a couple of board games I don't know. People at home might have heard of some of these games, but we bought one called Azule which is pretty cool. It's like this patch, it's not patchwork. It's like you're building this wall of tiles and you're trying to place the tiles on the wall in certain combinations and get points and stuff, and. [00:37:25] Speaker B: You. [00:37:25] Speaker A: Work against one another to kind of be the best tiler and just kind of little fun games like that. Because they're not hyper expensive, but they're just kind of fun. [00:37:36] Speaker B: Sounds good. [00:37:37] Speaker A: So that's my big gaming New Year's resolution. But to think in my break over the last two weeks, I was like, okay, before the new year bowler's gate gets finished. And I did not finish it before the new year. I think I finished it on fifth. [00:37:53] Speaker C: Or close enough, mate. [00:37:54] Speaker B: Close enough. [00:37:55] Speaker C: Cap, are you going to have the. [00:37:57] Speaker B: Time this year to play through a whole playthrough of Elden Ring and the DLC? [00:38:05] Speaker A: That's a really good question, grizz. And actually, because this is the. I mean, realistically, and maybe we'll quickly talk about this whilst we're in the middle of know, there's rumblings that maybe the DLC might even be coming out as early as February, which I don't know if I believe. [00:38:24] Speaker C: Very high in the sky, isn't it? Have you read those articles? [00:38:28] Speaker A: I did have a bit of a squizz. And I mean, hey, you never know. Often the way that these shit comes out is through accidental leaks of shit. So you never really know. And there was recently, I think there was an Elden Ring PlayStation controller or something that was found on EB games or something like that, and it had a release date for a certain time. They sound cool, by the way. [00:38:52] Speaker C: There was a millennia one. And. [00:38:58] Speaker A: You would imagine that given that Elden Ring's been out for a while, they probably wouldn't be bringing out new peripherals for a game that's been out for a while, maybe doesn't have the same draw. It probably would need to be co released with something, perhaps a DLC, but who knows? So we'll find out. Yeah, I mean, ultimately I do really want to play that game again. I think next play through, I'm just going to give myself a bit of a fucking leg up and just go for a broken magic build, honestly, and have a bit of fun with it. But yeah, I definitely want to do the DLC. The big issue I've got, Grizz, is traditionally souls games have very. Just archaic, weird ways to access DLC. That sometimes it takes people a while to figure out how the hell you even get in them. [00:39:50] Speaker C: Sometimes you don't get into the DLC till way later into the game. [00:39:55] Speaker A: Right. Late game, yeah. And so it's going to be like, okay, I start a new Elden ring playthrough. Do I just do my playthrough? And that's the other thing, is my playthrough currently is on a PS five, but I kind of want to play on my pc now. So it's hard, man. I don't know. I think realistically, maybe I should just slowly play to mid game and just leave a character at mid game and. [00:40:28] Speaker C: Then, yeah, maybe it's worth starting to play now. Maybe I should do that as well. [00:40:31] Speaker B: That's a good idea. [00:40:32] Speaker C: I actually don't own it on my pc either. And I've lent special to a friend. [00:40:38] Speaker A: I've done the exact same thing. I've literally lent the PS five to my. [00:40:42] Speaker C: Are we the same person, Cap, or what? [00:40:44] Speaker A: I think we're literally the same human being. But I did buy Elden ring last sale when it was on special because I thought, well, this game doesn't go on special very often, so, fuck, I'll buy it now before the DLC comes out and grab a copy. So, yeah, I don't know. [00:41:00] Speaker B: We'll see what happens, mate. [00:41:01] Speaker A: But actually that's a pretty good gaming. New Year's resolution is get an Elden ring character prepped for mid year. Well, whenever it comes out, we'll say, but, yeah, so, yeah, that's my New Year's resolutions. And alongside all those resolutions, Grizz, I think I'm in a pretty good mindset to hopefully lose some weight as well this year and just bundle it all together, you know what I mean? [00:41:28] Speaker C: Always hard as a brand new dad. Because I reckon the biggest thing with losing weight is sleep. [00:41:33] Speaker B: Regular, good quality sleep. Because if you're tired, you feel like shit, you almost feel hungover, you want. [00:41:41] Speaker C: To eat shit, it's hard to get motivated to exercise. I believe you, Cap, because I know that you've got Ted sleeping pretty sorted now. [00:41:51] Speaker A: Yeah, for now. Touch wood touches literally every piece of wood in this room. But, yeah, I don't really have an excuse now, so at the moment. If that changes, we'll see. But, yeah, so I don't know, the double whammy, mate. Exercise and a bit of gaming in there. So I'll tell you what, though, a gengar is like, I want to keep finding some more gems for the steam deck. You know, just some things just. I don't have to play them on my pc. All the like. For example, playing again, going back to the yakuza. Like a dragon, it runs great on the steam deck. And it's a fairly new gen game or next gen game. It's like the turn based kind of style of the Yakuza games, but it runs really well. I mean, I've got it on probably medium, and it's running like butter. Like, really good. [00:42:44] Speaker B: Nice. [00:42:45] Speaker A: Yeah. So, yeah, we'll see how it goes. [00:42:48] Speaker B: Now, grizz, our next little chapter in. [00:42:53] Speaker A: Our, what do we call the quest log. We want to talk about games we're looking forward to this year, mate. What do you got, mate? What's on your list? What's coming up hot? [00:43:02] Speaker C: I've got a few here, mate. I think the biggest one for me is Hades two. So this is coming, apparently, Q two, 2024 by supergiant. And there will be an early access through Epic store. I would imagine most people would know Hades two, but if you don't, Hades one came out in 2020, and it's. [00:43:24] Speaker B: Touted as a rogue, like, dungeon crawler, kind of like a top down view. And it's very heavily inspired by greek. [00:43:35] Speaker C: Mythology, particularly the underworld. So you kind of play as Hades son, Zagreus, and you work your way through. And I guess the reason why I really like this game, Cap, is I'm. [00:43:44] Speaker B: A big fan of rogue lights. [00:43:47] Speaker C: I really just enjoy that concept of. [00:43:49] Speaker B: The game being very hard, and you. [00:43:52] Speaker C: Have to learn through failure, but each time you fail, you get slightly stronger. So your next run is potentially you can get further. I just quite like that gameplay loop. Now, what we know about Hades two, Cap, so far, we know that you're playing as Zagreus's sister, called Melano, who's the princess of Hell. And it seems to be a pretty. [00:44:14] Speaker B: Similar kind of thing where you're working. [00:44:18] Speaker C: Your way through the depths of hell. [00:44:20] Speaker B: While also embarking on a assassination mission, kind of. [00:44:28] Speaker C: We don't know much more in the story than that, but I think super giant did a really good job of Hades one. So actually, this is probably the one that I'm most excited for, for 2024. So Q two coming? [00:44:40] Speaker B: Q two? Yeah. [00:44:41] Speaker A: Grizz, remind me if I'm wrong, or maybe you can update me, but I was under the impression that Zagrius was obviously working to get out of hell, and then it kind of seems like the opposite is happening like this. I can't remember what you said her name is, but she's trying to get into hell. [00:45:00] Speaker C: Melano. Yeah, maybe she is. Yeah, maybe she's going down to try to kill. [00:45:05] Speaker B: Well, that would make sense. Kill Hades in the depths of hell. Maybe you're working. [00:45:10] Speaker A: Maybe she fights Zagreus or some shit. [00:45:12] Speaker B: Fuck, that'd be cool. Who knows? Yeah. [00:45:14] Speaker A: I mean, a Zagreus battle would be pretty fucking dope. [00:45:17] Speaker C: Because that would make sense, cap, because. [00:45:19] Speaker B: Zagrius's mum lives on the surface. [00:45:22] Speaker C: And so each time you get a successful run, you would be up on the surface and you see your mum, and then you get into the real world and you die, and you come back down into the depths of hell. Maybe this is your sister from the surface world who's working away from the. [00:45:37] Speaker B: Top down, which is. [00:45:38] Speaker A: Is Zagreus's mother supposed to be a. [00:45:41] Speaker B: Particular deity or something? [00:45:43] Speaker C: Or just so. But I cannot remember off the top of my head, potentially. Maybe a quick Google on that one. [00:45:48] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm going to. Oh, yeah, Persephone. [00:45:52] Speaker C: Yeah, that sounds. [00:45:57] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:45:58] Speaker A: Okay. Oh, yes. He finds purpose when he discovers the existence of his true mother, long lost Persephone. [00:46:05] Speaker B: I think. [00:46:06] Speaker A: What was Persephone's big deal? I think she was like goddess of harvest and hell. [00:46:15] Speaker B: There you go. [00:46:16] Speaker C: Very exciting. Great soundtrack, great fucking game. [00:46:20] Speaker B: I know that mine are going to. [00:46:21] Speaker C: Be quite different to yours, Cat. Why don't you pick your top one then as your next, and we'll maybe take turns. [00:46:27] Speaker A: I mean, look, in all honesty, my toppest of the top, I think, is going to be Final Fantasy seven rebirth. I'm so fucking excited for that. I loved the remake, and I think. [00:46:41] Speaker B: Just taking it into an open world. [00:46:45] Speaker A: I think is going to be just awesome. I think there was a bit of a leak of the map size the other day or yesterday or something like that. Grizz, and you flicked me a cheeky little, what do you call, uh, a link for that. And it just got me so excited about it because I tell you what, one thing I've been really craving recently, again, with my change in gaming habits, is rpgs, but specifically good. Normally, I just consume any new game or whatever, but I've really had a hankering for a good JRPG or any kind of rpg with a good open world, but more so turn based kind of combat. I know that the rebirth isn't going to have that traditional JRPG combat, but I think just the application of what they did with the more recent remake and the quality that I think came out of that and the voice acting and just like, the graphics, and I'm really looking forward to that going one step further and just kind of just having a bit of a nostalgia trip through. [00:47:55] Speaker C: Can you tell me how this fits in, cap? The rebirth, as opposed to the Final Fantasy seven remakes? What are we looking at here as this game? [00:48:05] Speaker A: I think the whole idea is going to be that they break the original game into three main sort of narrative points. [00:48:15] Speaker C: Right. [00:48:15] Speaker A: So you've got kind of the first part, which is up to when they kind of blow up the thing together. And then the next one is when they go out into the eastern continent, which I think it's not called miggar. I think Miggar is the entire continent. But there's an eastern continent where they go and do a bunch of shit, and then they have a big face off with Sephiroth there, and some shit comes out about cloud and their kind of background. And then they go after that to the opposite side of the continent, the western side, and then they do a bunch of shit there. So I think they've had the first get to know the characters in the main city, and then they're going to the east side, and then they'll go to the west side afterwards, and that's where they're breaking up. But the thing is, with the remakes. [00:49:04] Speaker B: It'S obviously the entire plot of Final. [00:49:08] Speaker A: Fantasy Vi, but ultimately, there's some little artistic flares happening here and there, and you're having characters that presumably were supposed to be dead are coming back to life and different ways that could potentially, the story might unravel, I guess, moving forward. So it's a dedicated remake in the sense that it's supposed to evoke the nostalgia, but sort of take things in a little bit of a different direction, which is really cool. But, yeah, also looks really good. The rebirth looks really cool. [00:49:44] Speaker B: Really good. [00:49:45] Speaker A: Yeah. I mean, presumably going to be a bit of chocobo writing. [00:49:50] Speaker B: Big open world. Okay. Yeah. There you go, Cap. [00:49:55] Speaker C: Next one for me. And I know this isn't a new. [00:49:57] Speaker B: Game, mate, but actually, before we progress. [00:50:00] Speaker C: Yes. [00:50:01] Speaker A: That comes out on the 29th of. [00:50:03] Speaker B: Feb, by the way. [00:50:04] Speaker C: Oh, dang. Not far away. [00:50:06] Speaker A: Yeah, sorry. And hades two. I don't think there's an actual release date for Hades, too. I think that's a TBA early access. [00:50:14] Speaker C: I've got Q 224, but maybe that's the early access, potentially. [00:50:18] Speaker A: I think it's the early access. [00:50:20] Speaker B: Yeah. Hey, it could be cool. Now, Cap, we can't ignore this, even. [00:50:25] Speaker C: Though the game's already out, but the. [00:50:26] Speaker B: Olden ring DLC, it's coming out this year. [00:50:29] Speaker A: Yes, but I mean, from what we from. And again, it's all hearsay and whatever else. But from what people have said about the vague size of the DLC, and there's been rumors that the approach to the DLC is kind of like a shadow world of the game, right. And so theoretically, it could be pretty freaking massive. [00:50:55] Speaker C: God, imagine if it's the whole map, dude. [00:50:58] Speaker A: Dude, it would be wild. I mean, it would be cool if they did something like that. And maybe you don't need to play the base game. You can kind of just go into the DLC or something like that. That would be really rad. [00:51:09] Speaker C: You know, there's going to be some fucking random entry spot somewhere in the world. It's probably that. Who's the blood guy that you fight? That egg that's sitting there. That's real weird. [00:51:20] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:51:20] Speaker A: You probably need to go and get a seed off some fucking random bloke. It's got a 20% drop chance, and then you go and give the seed to some tree somewhere that you didn't know existed and suddenly is there. And then the tree grows and then you walk into the tree, and then. [00:51:37] Speaker C: I don't know, that happens, but, you know, that'd be amazing. [00:51:40] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:51:40] Speaker A: You're here to hear first. Yeah, the DLC will be great. Another one for me, Grizz. Maybe my second most excited for Dragons Dogma two looks real good. Real tasty. [00:51:56] Speaker C: Is that online or. [00:52:01] Speaker A: It is a single player rpg, I believe. Yeah. But it's kind of got that black desert online kind of visual style, I guess, and it feels a little bit like, kind of a little bit clunky, but it's also got the kind of shadow of the colossus, climb beasts and attack them and that kind of stuff going on. A bit of magic, obviously, the kind of western medieval kind of setting with magic, but it just looks really good. There was something about dragons Dogma one that really drew me in. I just never really felt like I wanted to finish it because I kind of got to the boat a bit too late, and it's not aged particularly wonderfully. So it's not a particularly fun game to really get stuck into, but I'm really looking forward to a fresh take on that. And it just looks really good. I think the story looks really fun. They kind of exploring some new races and stuff in that game and like a beast kind of race of people. And I think just the approach to the gargantuan combat and stuff looks really fun. I think that's going to be really good. Yeah, it's kind of got that monster hunter esque sort of thing going on, but I kind of really like what they call the system. It's like our pawn system. Pawn. And they're kind of the guys that help you out, and you can kind of choose which pawns you want to come jump into and level them up a little bit. Yeah. So that looks really fun. So I'm really looking forward to Dragons Dogma that is on March 22. [00:53:32] Speaker B: Okay, dude. [00:53:33] Speaker C: A lot of good games coming out. Q. One, one that I wanted to keep an eye on, Cap, is Rise of. [00:53:38] Speaker B: Ronan, which is Rise of Ronan, coming out March 2022. [00:53:42] Speaker C: And I'll read this to you, because you're going to like this. If you loved ghosts of Toshima. Yeah. It is a summer aesthetic, deep sword play, then you're probably going to love Rise of Ronan. So it is set in the mid, late 18 hundreds, and you basically use your trusty sword. It actually looks a lot like Ghost of Sashima, but probably a little bit more polished than that, I'd say cap. [00:54:08] Speaker B: And maybe a little bit more realistic. [00:54:10] Speaker C: In the combat with bits and pieces. [00:54:14] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:54:14] Speaker C: I think this is something maybe potentially to keep on the back burner, although. [00:54:17] Speaker B: I haven't heard cap. [00:54:18] Speaker C: Team ninja, have they done stuff before? [00:54:21] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. [00:54:22] Speaker A: Team ninja. Oh, God. Sorry. I think I'll tell you exactly what they've done, because it's not coming to mind. They've done neo. They've also done fallen dynasty. They've done. They certainly kind of pretty well versed. They're well versed in, I guess, that setting as well, you know what I mean? And manipulating that for video gaming. But tell you what, man, I think from memory, when the Rise of Ronan game was announced, I think it was announced at a PlayStation State of play or something like that. And it kind of was giving me the cross between Assassin's creed and Ghost of Tsushima, just with the traversal stuff and just the way you can kind of do maybe some. A bit more unhinged sneaking and stuff like that and flying across rooftops and stuff, whereas Ghost of Sashim was kind of a little bit more to the ground, I guess, but looks really good and kind of got this interesting thing going on with. I don't know who you play as, but just looking at the website, looks like there's also going to be, like, western characters that know, kind of influencing what's going on in Japan at the time and stuff like that. I think it's going to be really cool. I love this approach to a lot of japanese historical settings at the moment. Because it's a fucking great setting. I love this time period and stuff. [00:55:58] Speaker B: It's so fucking cool. [00:56:01] Speaker A: All right, now, greasely gaming. My next one that I'm super fucking keen on is fucking Warhammer 40K space marine two. [00:56:11] Speaker C: I did not see this. [00:56:14] Speaker A: That is coming out September 9. Now, I've kind of slowly been getting into the 40K universe's setting, and I've been reading books and stuff. And actually, I kind of took a bit of a break on literature for a while, but the last couple of months, I've been getting stuck back into reading books. I've been reading the Uriel Ventress chronicles at the moment, which follows an ultramarine captain from the fourth company. And it's a really good, I guess, just book to wrap your head around who the space marines are, what their motives are, kind of, I guess their kind of typecast, classic kind of paladin approach to just tackling problems and stuff. But yeah, you might have watched some YouTube footage of space marine too. And I think the approach to horde combat in that game just looks honestly insane. [00:57:23] Speaker C: Just pretty good. [00:57:25] Speaker A: Oh, man. It's just wildlife. I haven't got anything on hand, but you're kind of in these sprawling, beautiful, but also quite grim landscapes, and then you can kind of see these waves of tyranids just kind of running as massive swarms, and it looks unbelievable. So I'm really excited just to give that a crack. I'm not a huge space marine kind of guy. I much prefer the Inquisitors and the kind of subvertitive kind of parts of 40k less. So the kind of army style stuff, but I think just this whole thing looks insanely freaking cool. And also the main character is an ultramarine. Kind of like the book I'm reading. Sounds pretty fucking cool as well. [00:58:19] Speaker C: What's the gameplay, mechanic cap? [00:58:20] Speaker B: What is it? [00:58:21] Speaker C: Is it like a horde? [00:58:22] Speaker A: Is it similar to third person over the shoulder shooter and you're running around with your bolt sort of gun, and if you can think of what a classic kind of 40k space marine looks like, you're that guy running around. The graphics look nuts, really nice, and he's kind of got hack and slashy kind of combat, like, dark souls esque. You're kind of reacting to shit happening in front of you, I guess parrying kind of blows and stuff. But I think there's a lot of. They want to make you feel like a space marine because space marines are supposed to be these pinnacle soldiers that are just, like, unkillable. [00:59:08] Speaker C: You know what I mean like saw blades and blaster pistols in their big. [00:59:13] Speaker A: Exactly. [00:59:13] Speaker C: Yeah. I guess what stands out to me. [00:59:17] Speaker B: Here is graphically and gameplay wise is they've really leveraged hard on the pure. [00:59:24] Speaker C: Hordes of those tyranids coming in. They almost look like they're overwhelming. [00:59:30] Speaker A: The density is nuts. Like really dense swarms of things running at you. And it's bonkers. I don't know, because this game isn't developed, I don't think, by fat shark or anything. And they're known for vermin Tide and. What was the other one? Dark tide or whatever it's called, but it's kind of got that similar kind of. [00:59:53] Speaker B: I don't know. [00:59:54] Speaker A: When you see a horde of things running in those games, like, it feels like, oh, shit, that's a horde of enemies coming at me. [01:00:00] Speaker C: A lot of blokes. [01:00:00] Speaker A: This game is like that on steroids. So pretty rad. But yeah, that's my next game, Grizz. That comes out on the. What day was that? The 9 September. So I've got a bit of a wait for that one. But I can wait. I can wait. [01:00:16] Speaker B: Cap, I'm going to duck to indie games. [01:00:19] Speaker C: One that we talked about last year that we. I think it was off the back of the devolve, a digital showcase. But the placky squire comes out this year. [01:00:30] Speaker A: Oh, hell yeah, dude. Nice. [01:00:32] Speaker C: Which is. You may remember us talking about it, but it's essentially a stylized animated. But it's kind of set like you're playing on the pages of a storybook, essentially. [01:00:48] Speaker B: And as you turn the pages, you'll. [01:00:51] Speaker C: Be doing different things and then your perspective will change into three D. And. [01:00:55] Speaker B: Then you're all of a sudden almost. [01:00:57] Speaker C: Like a Super Mario Odyssey style platformer. Just looked very creative. It almost reminded me a little bit. [01:01:04] Speaker B: Cap, of how well done it takes. [01:01:07] Speaker C: Two was with many different game mechanics to build that game into what it is. [01:01:12] Speaker B: But. [01:01:15] Speaker C: Anything to add on this, Cap, it just looks like a really great platform. A platformer to look out for from a retro. [01:01:22] Speaker A: Yeah, I just think the kind of visual style is really freaking cool. Like you're going between this 2d kind of almost like Legend of Zelda style top down thing going on, but then with elements of links awakening, kind of side scrolling stuff happening as well. But then suddenly characters jumping out into the world in this toy kind of story esque world and doing stuff in there, but then moving back in between elements of the world to do 2d stuff. It's really well done and I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on that game as well because I'm just a sucker for Zelda likes, basically, especially this kind of quality. And devolver digital could shit on a plate, not eat it. In all honesty, it's true. [01:02:23] Speaker B: They're pretty good. Yeah, give it to me. [01:02:26] Speaker C: What do you got next, Cap? What do you got next, Matt? [01:02:29] Speaker A: Well, look, I think next for me is probably going to be there's this game coming out and it's been on my radar for a while called. I don't remember how you pronounce this properly, but the thormaterge, it is an isometric, story driven rpg, akin to something like Boulder's gate. Now the difference is it's set in 20th century century Warsaw, which is kind of fucking rad. And there's like all these weird things going on with. There's basically like weird disturbances. It's got like a lovecraftian kind of element going on, but then it's kind of like sub. Not quite victorian era, but kind of like round about that time. 19 five. So not really victorian, but it's kind of like oldie timey. And yeah, you're in this kind of russian sardom kind of thing going on, and there's all these weird groups of people that are kind of amalgamating as they did around that time, but then you've also got all this weird kind of, what do you call, like ghosts and unearthly entities happening and people being hosts to these beings and stuff. But that's all kind of wrapped up. [01:03:51] Speaker B: In this. [01:03:54] Speaker A: Bolt'S gaiteian kind of RPG. So that kind of classic top down, kind of CRPG, isometric kind of thing going on. So I think that one looks really good. It'll be interesting to see, obviously, in a world post Boulders gate. [01:04:14] Speaker B: Exactly. [01:04:14] Speaker A: Because a lot of people are going to be immediately likening this game or comparing it to Boulders Gate, given it's in the same genre. But if they can do a reasonable job at, I guess, just character development. And I think if the combat, again, that's going to be term based, if the combat is fun, if they can give you something a bit different to work with, I think it's going to be really work in their favor. And already the setting is really fucking cool. So see how it looks. [01:04:46] Speaker B: Okay. [01:04:46] Speaker A: See what happens. [01:04:47] Speaker C: Sounds good, capo. [01:04:48] Speaker B: Sounds good. [01:04:49] Speaker A: That's the 20th of Feb, by the way. [01:04:50] Speaker C: Sorry, 20th of Feb. Due to everything at the start of the year. I haven't got anything else on my list, Cap, but one that popped up in the preshow was Prince of Persia apparently is looking pretty amazing. [01:05:01] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:05:01] Speaker C: Is that released yet? Is that out? [01:05:03] Speaker A: That is out now, I believe. Side scrolling kind of deal. [01:05:10] Speaker B: Kind of got like a. I'm going. [01:05:11] Speaker A: To use this incorrectly, but. Well, I guess it's almost got like a God. Why can't I think of the game? What's that counterstrike style game made by league legends people. [01:05:26] Speaker C: Counterstrike or you mean is it a mobile you're talking about? [01:05:29] Speaker B: No, it's like an FPS but Valorant. [01:05:35] Speaker A: I think the art style is kind of valorant adjacent, but I think it seems to be reviewing really well and getting a lot of spotlight. So it'll be interesting to see. I need to give it a crack. It looks really good. Definitely looks like something I could spend time on because I used to love those old Prince Persia games. [01:05:56] Speaker C: It's much more of a 2d side. [01:06:00] Speaker B: Scroll up kind of game, isn't it? [01:06:01] Speaker C: Father looks? [01:06:02] Speaker A: Yeah. But yeah, it seems to be copping a fair bit of praise, which, let's be honest, Ubisoft can do with a bit of that. [01:06:10] Speaker C: Very true. [01:06:11] Speaker A: Recent times. All right, Grizz. Well, look, I've got like a bit of a list going on here, so I might just run through some of the other ones that I've got. So I really want to give the Persona three reload a crack. That's a remake of Persona three done in the new kind of Persona five engine. If you know it, you know it. Same kind of style game. But I think the content is a little bit grittier from memory. So I haven't played it before number three, but I'm really keen to get stuck into that. So it looks really good. Black myth Wukong I remember seeing being a little bit unimpressed by some of the more recent trailers, but I'm still pretty keen to see what that looks like on release. And I remember some of the combat and animations looking really weirdly stiff and stuff from some of the more recent gameplay trailers. But if they can kind of iron out all that shit and hopefully it was kind of like a preview, early build kind of style situation, maybe we'll see what happens. But yeah, so that looks really good as well. [01:07:18] Speaker B: Avowed, which kind of looks like, I. [01:07:22] Speaker A: Guess like a much more vibrant Skyrim but slightly more cartoony. And it's by obsidian, I believe, who they've done plenty of other games, including the outer worlds and these guys worked on bloody what do you call, I can't think of the word fallout. Once upon a time, fallout for Vegas stuff like that. So it's going to be interesting to see what these guys do with Avowed. Definitely kind of just looks like they kind of wanted to kind of. It's on a Skyrim clone, but it's the classic kind of first person. You can see your two arms and those two hands are doing like magic and stuff of that kind of rpg. But yeah, it's going to be interesting to see what the quality of that game is like because I didn't really get too turned on by the outer worlds, more recent Outer Worlds game. So I don't know, be interesting to see what they can do with this world and see how it feels. I don't know if I like the colorfulness of it and the whimsicalness of it for something a little bit more gritty, but yeah, I'm interested to see. [01:08:39] Speaker B: How that turns out as well as all that. [01:08:43] Speaker A: Grizz also paper Mario, the thousand year door remaster. Really keen to give that a crack. And just some lesser known ones. Grizz, on the 18th of this month. So in a few days, a game called Pal World is coming out. Have you heard about this one? [01:09:02] Speaker B: What's it called? Pal world. [01:09:05] Speaker A: Pal P-A-L. World. One word. [01:09:08] Speaker C: Pal world. No, I haven't. [01:09:10] Speaker B: Okay. [01:09:10] Speaker A: People are calling it Pokemon with guns now. I don't know if I like the look of it or I just like the look of just the fact that it just looks bizarre. But yeah, the kind of art style is very Pokemon esque, but kind of like real world blended with Pokemon World. But then also your character has like an AK 47, so looks insanely bizarre. The other game I'm looking forward to is the next Yakuza, like a dragon game, which is the term based ones. It's called infinite wealth. That comes out the 26 January hell divers two. I'm interested to see what the quality of that game is like that's that kind of top down. Well, it was a top down shooter. It's now going to be a cooperative, kind of first person, third person experience, kind of alien horde kind of stuff going on. An indie game called Pacific Drive Grizzly gaming 86. It's called they coining the genre a road like. And the idea of it is you're in this car and you're trying to. [01:10:23] Speaker B: Get between points on a map and. [01:10:26] Speaker A: You'Re avoiding these weird environmental anomalies like big tornadoes and stuff like that. And yeah, that looks really cool. Check it out if you haven't seen it and it sounds interesting. Also, the new Star Wars Outlaws game I'm kind of, again, not super impressed by the more recent gameplay videos we had because the combat looked really boring and stiff, but just generally interested to see what Ubisoft can do with the. [01:10:53] Speaker B: Star wars franchise and Final one, Grizz. [01:10:58] Speaker A: Destiny two, the final shape. [01:11:00] Speaker C: You're excited for that cap or what? [01:11:02] Speaker A: I don't know if I'm excited for it. I think I'm excited because technically this is supposed to be the last big content drop for Destiny two before the next stage of Destiny. [01:11:14] Speaker C: Basically destiny three. [01:11:16] Speaker A: Interested to see what happens. So apparently I'm not up to date with my Destiny law, but the whole idea is that you're going inside the. [01:11:23] Speaker B: Traveler, which is the big, oh shit, big sphere. [01:11:28] Speaker A: Like, we're finally going in there. [01:11:29] Speaker C: Didn't the traveler die in early Destiny days? [01:11:33] Speaker A: Died, came back, almost died. Yeah, everything in between. But we're going in there, Grizz. [01:11:40] Speaker C: We're going in there. [01:11:41] Speaker A: I don't know if I'm going to play it. We'll see again. I mean, I literally said earlier in the show, do I really have time for multiplayer games? Not really, but we'll see what happens. Deaf see is one of those games where it's very difficult to shell out money for that game when I find that they're just kind of regurgitating the same kind of content over and over again, just with a slightly different lick of law paint. So we'll see what happens. But yeah, there you go, Grizz. [01:12:10] Speaker B: That is one more thing from me. [01:12:13] Speaker C: There's one game that we haven't spoken about. [01:12:16] Speaker B: We don't have a release date on it yet. [01:12:18] Speaker C: Could it be 2024 and it is Silk song? Do you think there's potential that we may see Silk song this year? [01:12:25] Speaker A: Hey, do you think I would be surprised if it didn't come out this year, in all honesty, because it's been a long time. I think ultimately the devs team Cherry made a shitload of money off Hollow. [01:12:39] Speaker B: Knight one, and they're probably not in. [01:12:40] Speaker A: A big rush because I know they're running on a fairly small team and they're quite happy to keep it that way, which my hat goes off to those guys, because I think that's the best way to run a video games industry. [01:12:53] Speaker B: But I would be surprised if we. [01:12:56] Speaker A: Didn'T see it this year. I think we'll probably get it towards. [01:12:59] Speaker B: The end of the year. [01:13:01] Speaker A: The fact that we haven't gotten a release date yet. Yeah, I think if anything, it's going to be towards the end of the year. [01:13:07] Speaker B: Okay, cool. [01:13:09] Speaker C: Well, there you go. [01:13:10] Speaker A: Hope so. Because I could really do with a bit more Hollow Knight. That game is freaking exceptional. [01:13:15] Speaker C: Also will be amazing on the steam. [01:13:17] Speaker B: Deck, Cap, I'd imagine. [01:13:19] Speaker A: Oh, yeah, good point. Actually, I didn't think about that until you just mentioned it. Yeah, I mean, literally perfect Steam deck. Yeah. Very keen for that, mate, ultimately, but, yeah. [01:13:30] Speaker B: Cool. [01:13:30] Speaker A: All right, Grizz. Well, look, one thing we wanted to kind of touch on quickly, and, I mean, it's not a huge one, but I think just recently, and this happened kind of towards the end of December. So we've got a bit of news cleanup to get through, but we've kind of had all this. Well, I guess Epic's been taking. They took bloody Apple to court, they took bloody Google to court. And the whole thing was kind of monopolization and basically Epic games painting themselves as the dark horse or the underdog of downtrodden. Like, these guys own these marketplaces and we can't make a buck off of things and yada, yada, yada. Anyways, it seems like recently Epic Games has basically had pretty strict rules around sort of adult content and stuff in their marketplaces. But in more recent times, the ESRB. So this is the entertainment, I think, standards, rating board or something like that. They have since applied the adults only rating to games that use things like blockchain and gambling and stuff like that, which I think is very important on many levels. Now, the issue is, since this has happened, and again, just want to repaint Epic Games as, oh, wow, is us really tough to make a crust out here. We're the good guys. These guys suck. Since they've basically changed their own sort. [01:15:18] Speaker B: Of adult content to exclude blockchain and. [01:15:24] Speaker A: Gambling games so that they can continue to show those on their store within their own parameters. But ever since, this has all changed. So not a huge one, Grizz. [01:15:36] Speaker B: But just to get this clear cut. [01:15:39] Speaker C: They exclude games with an adult rating on their store, but they've given blockchain. [01:15:45] Speaker B: A free pass basically from that. Yeah. [01:15:49] Speaker A: So they can continue to be distributed on that store. Now, I'm sure that there's probably some degree of. [01:15:56] Speaker B: Look, unfortunately. [01:16:00] Speaker A: We already had these games on our marketplace and we've probably taken people's money to some degree. And maybe there was kind of. Sort of an element of that. But yeah, I think it's just kind of generally disappointing because blockchain is just kind of, when it's interrogated in video games, people can have their opinions about it as much as they want, but when it comes to my video games, I just prefer it not to be there because it is fucking hot garbage. And I think the approach to development generally focuses on the implementation of the blockchain, not the game being any good. [01:16:36] Speaker B: Absolutely fucking NFT game shithouse garbage. [01:16:43] Speaker C: Until they retrospectively take a good game. [01:16:46] Speaker B: Like Dota or something and then start making all the items NFTs I just. [01:16:51] Speaker C: Can'T see. [01:16:53] Speaker A: Even tried, they've kind of tried to slowly do that with certain ips, but I think gamers are just generally pretty resistant to this style of monetization and just approach to currency, I guess. So it's not really worked out for them. But yeah, I kind of just wanted to highlight this one because, I don't know, I've never really thought Epic Games was the good guy or anything in these more recent law things. But I just think the most hilarious thing is them appending their own policy on adult only games to ensure that they can still continue selling these shit games. I'd imagine they get some percentage of revenue. [01:17:41] Speaker C: Does that mean that kids can sell these games in the Epic store? Does that mean that they're open? [01:17:47] Speaker A: I'm not too sure how it works. When you set your age and stuff, you probably have to be like, are you over 18? [01:17:55] Speaker B: Or whatever? [01:17:56] Speaker A: But yeah, who fucking knows? I probably opened up the Epics game store once last year, I reckon Max. And that's even with them offering free games all the time. I just kept forgetting to go in there and get. Yeah, anyways, me bloody guy. All right, Grizz, now what have you been playing recently, mate? [01:18:18] Speaker B: What's new? [01:18:18] Speaker C: Look, my brain's been stopping me from focusing on one video game, Cap. So we're playing many video games at the moment. I actually downloaded Sea of Stars, started playing that on my pc and then. [01:18:33] Speaker B: In bed on the Steam deck. Initial thoughts, Cap. [01:18:37] Speaker C: I actually struggled to get invested in the story. Early is one thing that I had and also found. Look, I liked the combat mechanics, I liked having skill shots. But I do also think that after a while and you doing a number. [01:18:53] Speaker B: Of combats with that, it almost takes. [01:18:55] Speaker C: Too long if you're successful to keep doing those mechanics. So look, I think what I need here, there's positives, man. [01:19:04] Speaker B: The art style is beautiful and it's so well animated soundtrack seems to be. [01:19:09] Speaker C: Great and I'm sure as I work my way through the game I'll find myself more invested in the story. But for now, I've just kind of put that down. I think I'll pick it back up when I start doing some travel for work and I find myself on an aeroplane for 3 hours and jump back in on the steam deck and play through that. [01:19:28] Speaker B: So there's that. [01:19:29] Speaker C: I've also been playing a shit ton of binding of Isaac. And I didn't mention this, but I've. [01:19:35] Speaker A: Actually done that for a while. [01:19:36] Speaker C: I have. [01:19:37] Speaker A: Yeah. [01:19:37] Speaker C: I've got something like 200 hours in it now, cap. But I'm aiming to get what's called dead God, which is all the unlocks in the game. [01:19:47] Speaker B: Which. [01:19:48] Speaker A: Wow. [01:19:49] Speaker C: According to some people if you're a decent player, it's like 500 hours worth of gameplay to try to get all the unlocks. [01:19:56] Speaker A: Jesus Christ. [01:19:57] Speaker C: I'll slowly tick away at that. But yeah, really good progress. And I just really enjoy that game. Like, I started unlocking a lot of the late game characters now. [01:20:05] Speaker B: So some. [01:20:06] Speaker C: But we've actually playing that on stream. [01:20:08] Speaker B: I had three streams before the end. [01:20:09] Speaker C: Of the year and one in the new year. [01:20:12] Speaker B: All Isaac streams. And yeah. Just really enjoyed it. Hell yeah, man. [01:20:19] Speaker C: I've started about a week ago the. [01:20:23] Speaker B: Honor mode playthrough of battles gate three. So I'm still in the first act. Just kind of waiting till I can finish. [01:20:30] Speaker A: How's it feeling? Like in the honor mode. [01:20:36] Speaker B: I haven't. [01:20:37] Speaker C: Really felt any difference yet. Because I haven't felt like I needed to save scum anything. Because I already know most of the dialogue options that I'm going for. So it's not like a first play. But I imagine when I get to some of the bosses because I know. [01:20:51] Speaker B: That the boss mechanics have changed, they. [01:20:54] Speaker C: Get other abilities and legendary resistances and stuff like that. So I don't reckon I'm far enough into it to feel it yet. [01:21:02] Speaker B: But yeah, I have heard of people. [01:21:06] Speaker C: Ripping their runs and just if people don't know if your party wipes, that's that on a run. [01:21:12] Speaker B: Gone. It's gone. [01:21:13] Speaker C: You got to start again. [01:21:14] Speaker A: Brown bread. And it can happen. You got to be really careful and know what encounters you're going into. And having a bit of think about even just shit like resistances and how I can maybe not cheese, but use those resistances to improve your ods, I guess. [01:21:33] Speaker C: Definitely going to. I'm actually going to completely respect. I've had a bit of a think about how I want to build my party out. [01:21:40] Speaker B: Right. [01:21:40] Speaker C: I'm actually going to completely respect some of the characters and take them along with me. That's one thing I didn't realize. [01:21:46] Speaker A: Give me a rundown of your party. [01:21:47] Speaker B: Well, so I'm playing a druid, an. [01:21:50] Speaker C: Orc druid, and the whole reason behind. [01:21:52] Speaker B: That is you get two shapeshifts per short rest. [01:21:59] Speaker C: And if I get down to very little health and I shape shift into. [01:22:04] Speaker B: A bear, I automatically get the health for that animal. [01:22:09] Speaker C: So it basically gives you super survivability. You can build into it with Tavern Brawler as well. So you're dealing a lot of damage. So basically I'm just going to be permanent shapeshifters as long as I can, and swapping between those for survivability. The rest of them, cap, I don't really know. I think I'm going to play like. [01:22:27] Speaker B: A paladin as well. [01:22:28] Speaker C: I just got to really think about. [01:22:31] Speaker B: Having people that are survivable and providing utility as well. So what do you reckon, mate? [01:22:39] Speaker C: What do you reckon of the broken ones that you've played so far? [01:22:44] Speaker A: Well, I think that a mage is just generally really fucking good because they do have survivor ability with things like mage armor and shield and the spell. [01:22:58] Speaker C: Dude, spirit guardian just broken. So I picked that up on Shadowhawk. Is that cleric? [01:23:04] Speaker A: That's the cleric spell, isn't it? Yeah. I think a lot of what honor mode for you is going to be. You making the most of damage weaknesses in enemies and mages can really make. [01:23:24] Speaker B: That work because they have so many. [01:23:26] Speaker A: Different elemental type spells which they can use to leverage that. [01:23:30] Speaker C: So I think that might help a lot. [01:23:32] Speaker B: But, yeah, I'm not too. I. [01:23:34] Speaker A: Do you know what? I found that in my playthrough, karlak, built as a half barbarian, Paladin was out of control. [01:23:42] Speaker C: Apparently Carlak made some insane combat with her, a really good barb monk, for the same reason, because apparently she gets through her. What are those things that she can do? She gets bonuses to unarmed combat through using those somehow. [01:24:01] Speaker A: Oh, I didn't know that. Okay. Yeah. And so obviously, being a monk, full unarmed combat. [01:24:07] Speaker C: Yeah. [01:24:08] Speaker B: Punch. [01:24:08] Speaker A: That's kind of rad. [01:24:09] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:24:11] Speaker A: I had combat where the rest of my party died, and she was just like soloing like seven enemies, and it. [01:24:18] Speaker C: Was like, paladin's a monster. Kind of why I want to have one. Maybe that's what it is. Barbarian. Maybe barbarian and Paladin would be nuts, dude. [01:24:26] Speaker A: Yeah, it was ridiculous. [01:24:27] Speaker C: You get like lay on hands and all that kind of. You get a lot of utility, healing utility. The smites are so much damage, dude, what the fuck? Smites? Oh, dude. I know. [01:24:37] Speaker B: Mental. Yeah, there's insane. [01:24:39] Speaker A: It's insane. But yeah. So that's all I can really recommend what I'll do. [01:24:45] Speaker C: I'm going to write it all down. I'll send it through to you, see what you think. I'm going to go because I want to cheese it. And the whole thing of this is if you beat battles gate three in honor mode without ripping your party, you get a set of golden dice to play in the game, which I think is pretty cool. [01:24:59] Speaker B: I like that. [01:25:00] Speaker A: That's pretty rad. [01:25:01] Speaker B: I like that a lot. [01:25:02] Speaker A: Yeah, that's freaking rad. [01:25:04] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:25:04] Speaker A: Nice one, mate. Love it. Well, look, I've been playing, not an awful lot, but I have been playing a bit of yakuza, like a dragon since I finished boulders gate three a couple of weeks ago. And that's been a really surprising, joyful game. I mean, it's just a little bit wacky. Like the characters are. It's not really GTA, but it's kind. [01:25:32] Speaker B: Of like. [01:25:35] Speaker A: It'S a yakuza game. It's so weird. It's its own brand of just slightly wacky but real world. But then there's all this weird shit going on in the game and you're like, okay, suddenly apparently everyone's changing form for some reason. And then, I don't know, it's just really bizarre. But I love how they've turned the kind of more traditional kind of yakuza gameplay being that hack and kind of beat them up kind of combat and distilled that into a more kind of classic JRPG, almost like Persona term based fight kind of system. And then all the people that you're meeting, one of the guys is like an old detective. Your main character is like a yakuza guy. Literally. One of my other guys is like a homeless dude. And then there's also just like someone else I get along the way, but it's just bizarre. Like the jobs, I guess, that are in the game and they even reference like dragon Quest and stuff. And the main character is like, I want to be hero like the guy in Dragon Quest. And it's like. It's just really cool. And I'm listening to it in Japanese and I just love the entire thing. [01:26:49] Speaker C: Is there romance in that game, cap? Is there romantic? [01:26:52] Speaker A: Not so far. The whole thing is kind of like a revenge tale so far. It's actually a shitload of cutscene and dialogue, which I've been playing a lot in bed. So it's been a really good kind of thing to put into that kind of 08:00 to 09:00 window where I'm kind of just cruising along. I kind of just want to play something before I kind of maybe read or drift off to sleep, whatever. [01:27:17] Speaker B: So it's been really good. [01:27:19] Speaker A: Some of the minigames are just bizarre. Like one of them is like riding around on a trolley cart, like picking up cans to sell at the can place. [01:27:30] Speaker B: But it's funny because they take the. [01:27:35] Speaker A: Traditional approach of rpgs and kind of morph it into the real world. You pretty much go into dungeons and stuff. Which one of the ones was going into the sewer to kind of sneak into this yakuza hideout. And it was kind of like very dungeony, you know what I mean? It was just really weird. But I love it. It's great. So I've been really enjoying that and not really playing an awful lot else. I'm just trying to think what else was on my radar recently. [01:28:05] Speaker B: But. [01:28:08] Speaker A: I haven't really got anything off the top of my head this month. I've got nothing major on my list to play the next yakuza. Like a dragon game comes out end of this month, which I'm not going to have time to kind of finish this before that. But the next big release for me is going to be probably Final Fantasy seven, end of next month maybe. Hey, yeah, we'll bloody see. But yeah, see. Bloody game, mate. All right, Grizz, let's jump into the old bloody rapid fire, rapid fire, shall we? Love it. I don't know how long this sound bite is going for because I can't hear it in my ears. [01:28:51] Speaker C: Perfect, mate. [01:28:52] Speaker B: Nailed it. [01:28:53] Speaker A: Excellent. [01:28:54] Speaker B: All right, cool. So, Grizz, e three confirmed. 100% dead. Fully cooked. Yeah. [01:29:05] Speaker C: Tell me what happened. Why is it dead? [01:29:08] Speaker B: What's going on? [01:29:10] Speaker A: Well, the ESA, which is the body that kind of puts out e three, they have come out and just basically confirmed. Yes, the event is completely dead now. And yeah, they tried to come back last couple of years and didn't quite work out for them. A lot of people citing that video game companies these days just don't see, I guess, the return on investment for this particular event. Like when they can just go and put their own on and get as many eyes on it via online presentations and mean, realistically, we've known that EA's been dying. It's kind of been its final death throws for a long time, but it. [01:30:01] Speaker B: Has been fully confirmed by the ESA. [01:30:06] Speaker C: See if I can get so e three for those in the chat that I know. It's like a convention in person convention. [01:30:14] Speaker B: That was running for years and it. [01:30:16] Speaker A: Was town since the. [01:30:20] Speaker C: That's where they announced the biggest consoles, didn't they, Cap? [01:30:24] Speaker A: Yeah, it used to be. I mean, some of the biggest consoles of all time, like your PS two s and some of your biggest gaming announcements of all time were at this particular convention. [01:30:38] Speaker C: It's interesting because we kind of covered it. It's almost been over the life of this podcast, Cap. Over the last three years, we saw. [01:30:45] Speaker B: Covid hit and we saw a lot of different developers use digital platforms in different ways. [01:30:52] Speaker C: We saw like the Nintendo, what do they call them? [01:30:56] Speaker A: Treehouse. [01:30:57] Speaker C: Yeah, and lots of different things that kind of came out of it. And those were typically kind of covered under e three's banner, but they just didn't move with the timescap. They still tried to hold some of these events in person events and then had to keep canceling them because Covid was hitting and it was just like, not. [01:31:15] Speaker B: Wasn't all around. [01:31:16] Speaker C: It wasn't very well managed, I feel. [01:31:18] Speaker B: And, yeah, it's done. [01:31:20] Speaker A: Yeah, it's fully cooked, so there you go. All right, mate. [01:31:24] Speaker C: Now, Cap, Naughty Dog has reveals development of their live service multiplayer last of Us game has been canceled. So there is a bit of a blog post on the Naughty Dog website, which was in December about this, but essentially what it comes down to is, as they were developing this game, they realized how much resources it would require. [01:31:47] Speaker B: To keep the lights on on a. [01:31:51] Speaker C: Live service online last of us, and it would literally take their whole resources. [01:31:57] Speaker B: To keep this thing going. [01:31:58] Speaker C: So they've made the decision to not do that anymore, which is. [01:32:02] Speaker B: I don't know. [01:32:02] Speaker C: Were you looking forward to that? I actually didn't know this was the. [01:32:04] Speaker B: Thing, but there you go. [01:32:07] Speaker A: Look, I knew it was a thing. I don't think we knew what it was going to be. And I think the original last of Us game had a multiplayer component, and it was fine. It wasn't bad or anything, but I think people were kind of just expecting it to be that again. And I don't know how exciting that was going to be. I think for me, like a live service last of us game, I'd want to be like, in an MMO kind of style thing, almost like, I guess. [01:32:39] Speaker B: What the division is, but just done. [01:32:41] Speaker A: Properly, if you know what I mean. Yeah, essentially what it is. [01:32:46] Speaker C: Post apocalyptic kind of survival kind of game. [01:32:50] Speaker A: Yeah, that's the kind of game I would want from the last of us live service game. I want something along that line, but I just don't know how they would execute it. And I reckon what's probably happened is they were worried that maybe the game wasn't kind of hitting the same. I don't know just what they expect from that IP and whether the quality of game was going to be there. And they had a massive win with the tv show as well and maybe they didn't want to muddy the water too much. So I know Sony's been putting a lot of eggs in the live service. [01:33:30] Speaker B: Basket, but yeah, seems like they were. [01:33:34] Speaker A: Happy enough to kind of give this one the fleet. I don't know if Sony bankrolls this. [01:33:37] Speaker B: One or whatever, but yeah, there you go. [01:33:40] Speaker C: Done. [01:33:40] Speaker A: All right, Grizz, Amazon is cutting 500 jobs at Twitch. Yeah, it's quite a lot. [01:33:52] Speaker C: I don't know how many employees are at Twitch. Is that a significant portion or what? [01:33:57] Speaker A: No, I think it's a pretty significant. [01:34:00] Speaker B: Amount of human beings at Twitch and. [01:34:05] Speaker A: I think 500 is a reasonable chunk. But yeah, I don't know. I don't know. Twitch is just so bizarre in so many ways. And I think the CEO came out and said that this company is just not even profitable. God knows what their finances look like. But it's interesting. I don't really know. Twitch is the home of influence. This is where influence, the whole idea of influence I think, really kind of grew. [01:34:45] Speaker B: And over time, this is why I. [01:34:46] Speaker A: Think realistically, while we have influences, it's. [01:34:50] Speaker C: Actually amazing cap, to say they're not profitable. [01:34:52] Speaker B: And I understand you look at, I. [01:34:56] Speaker C: Mean, there's a lot of ongoing talk around revenue split and streamers. [01:35:01] Speaker B: It basically being pretty much not viable. [01:35:04] Speaker C: For you to be a Twitch streamer unless you're in the upper 0.3% of people on the platform. And then you look at something like kick, which can offer a 90% split. [01:35:15] Speaker B: On subscription revenue and other bits and pieces. And what that just comes down to. [01:35:21] Speaker C: Is overheads of a company, right? Like if Twitch is getting rid of 500 employees here, but you've got to pay them off the money they're making from twitch. [01:35:30] Speaker B: So it's kind of like, well, I don't know. [01:35:33] Speaker C: So there's somewhere something needs to give. If they're not making money and they're not paying creators, something's going to break somewhere. [01:35:42] Speaker A: Look, apparently, according to the CEO, I think his last name is Clancy or something, but he reckons that Twitch hasn't been profitable for nine years, which is, wow, wild. And I think what's even more wild about it is the fact that Amazon decided to purchase them if they hadn't been profitable for nine, just maybe they saw it as a reasonable investment in the live streaming space and all that. Kind of shit. [01:36:13] Speaker C: When we hear that a company is not profitable, do you reckon that is actual real? Are they like fudging the numbers? That just seems weird to me. [01:36:24] Speaker B: I don't know. [01:36:25] Speaker A: I have no idea. But I mean, this is apparently what the deal is. But yeah. Bit rough, it seems like. Also this news coming out was also the first instance of some of the employees at Twitch finding out that people were being laid off to the point where they actually didn't. Like they have internally, they haven't told people who's being laid off, so they just know that 500 jobs are going. [01:36:50] Speaker B: Which is kind of fucked overall. There you go, Cap. [01:36:57] Speaker C: A bunch of documents were leaked after insomniac games was hacked. And the leaked documents indicated that the studio has an exclusive license on most X Men games for the next three years, meaning that Xbox is not allowed X Men games or X Men related games until 2036. [01:37:18] Speaker B: It's a long time. [01:37:20] Speaker A: It's a fucking long time, dude. And you know what's fucking crazy is know, obviously it's a Marvel property and sure that's going to go anywhere. But going back to the whole AKB buyout thing from Microsoft and Sony crying poor and know we don't have anything cry. But then this shit comes out that they've got exclusivity rights over X Men games for this. Like, this is fucking wild, dude. Companies know they really do just suck. But, yeah, there you go. All right, Grizz. Recently, the GTA five six, sorry, trailer and shit, or release date had leaked and that was done by a hacking group called, I think they're called lapsis or some shit like that. Anyways, the leader of that group has recently been suspended to life in hospital prison. [01:38:18] Speaker C: Wait, in hospital prison? What is hospital prison? [01:38:21] Speaker A: I think it's like. I don't know how to word sensitive sleep, but like asylum basically level shit shit, right? Okay, yeah. Apologies if that wasn't the correct word, but my tribe. But yeah, anyways, so there you go. [01:38:39] Speaker B: Okay, so, cap, this is interesting news, I guess. [01:38:44] Speaker C: No real surprises to us, but Bobby. [01:38:47] Speaker B: Kotdick leaves AKB and after he's left, lots of information has slowly trickled out, confirming that he's a giant asshole. [01:38:56] Speaker C: We can see a tweet here from Andy Belford saying, breaking my science to share a fact. When we planned Overwatch two's stream launch, my team dwarned months in advance that. [01:39:06] Speaker B: We'Re going to be review bombed. [01:39:08] Speaker C: We begged for more information, more details and more resources helped us with the anticipated influx. [01:39:14] Speaker B: All flatly denied. [01:39:17] Speaker A: Yeah, it goes further on to say because they knew that the Overwatch two was going to be completely knackered on review platforms. And so obviously they wanted some degree of moderation to help with that because it's their jobs, right? But basically that entire request for moderation and help in that space was completely flat out declined by no other than Bobby Kotick because he's a complete fucking toss. But yeah, he's just basically the whole idea of making shit decisions and then just letting the underlings kind of deal with the shit decisions you make. Just seems like that was kind of his modus operandi. That was the entire life of Bobby at AKB. And yeah, well, thank fuck he's gone. But will he be replaced by someone equally as shit? [01:40:16] Speaker B: Who knows? Who knows? [01:40:19] Speaker C: It's unfortunate those kind of people that are willing to throw those others under the bus within the company, generally managers that are successful because just worried about profits. [01:40:31] Speaker B: Capo. [01:40:32] Speaker A: Yeah, it sucks. All right, Grizz. Now more recently, well, not more recently, this was a little while ago, but Xbox put out some, basically just some AI generated art that was promoting indie games. But the art that they put out was fucking garbage. [01:40:54] Speaker B: Like really bad. And on top of that, you're also. [01:41:00] Speaker A: Using AI generated art to promote an industry or indie games in general, that is supposed to be kind of highlighting and celebrating small indie developers producing things, not mass scale AI generated cost saving initiatives like generating some marketing images. So it's a bit of a shame that they use it for this. Some people got very shitty about it, which fair enough. I think ultimately, honestly, you kind of see the images that they used and the faces are fucking warped. And it's just really people building the. [01:41:49] Speaker B: Words, the letters id at. [01:41:56] Speaker A: Well, id, which I think is something to do with them. [01:41:58] Speaker C: Yeah, I can see. [01:42:02] Speaker A: The building id at Xbox in the snow, but when you zoom in on the characters, their faces are just fucked. Okay, you guys clearly generate faces are all fucked. [01:42:13] Speaker C: Yeah, it's really. [01:42:19] Speaker A: A little bit insensitive or whatever, but there you fucking go. [01:42:24] Speaker B: Interesting cap. [01:42:26] Speaker C: Sony patents a system to enable live difficulty adjustments as you play the game. So what does this look like on paper, cap? Is it? [01:42:36] Speaker B: Having actually looked at this, I don't know. Do you know what I kind of think about this quiz and I'm like. [01:42:44] Speaker A: Does this not already exist? [01:42:47] Speaker C: I wonder if it's more of you not physically toggling a difficulty slider, but. [01:42:51] Speaker A: Say, well, I think that's the idea, right? Is it's like a gradient kind of difficulty system where if you're doing really well, then maybe we'll throw shit at you. [01:43:01] Speaker C: I can just imagine you're playing something when you're real pissed, and then the next time you jump on to play it, and you're, like, fucking. Just blitzing through the content. [01:43:10] Speaker A: Well, yeah, it'd be interesting to see how reactive it is, for example. But imagine if bloodborne, for example, had a fucking difficulty slider system like this. [01:43:20] Speaker C: Okay, so this is what it says here. So environments that use graceful algorithms to. [01:43:25] Speaker B: Assess how a user is playing and. [01:43:27] Speaker C: Dealing with certain mechanics, elements, and circumstances. It will then adjust the difficulty by making those elements harder or easier to handle to encourage the player to stay engaged for longer, avoiding frustration or a feeling that the game is just too easy. You know what? This actually pisses me off already. [01:43:44] Speaker A: Yeah. And you know what? One reason me off, Grizz, is because I feel like a lot of these algorithms will just change the numbers to require more hits, or you have less health, or your gun does less damage, which isn't fun. Difficulty. [01:44:01] Speaker C: The other thing is, cap, if they. [01:44:03] Speaker B: Make a game impossible to be challenging, then you may as well be fucking watching a movie. I don't know. [01:44:12] Speaker C: I feel like. Well, for me, I know that I'm different and everyone's different, but I enjoy overcoming an obstacle in a game through it being difficult. I don't want the game to hand. [01:44:21] Speaker B: Me out free little trinkets or be nice to me. [01:44:26] Speaker A: Ultimately, I'd prefer it not to be there, because, like you said, at least, I don't know. It's kind of nice knowing that everyone's. [01:44:32] Speaker B: On the same playing field and you're. [01:44:35] Speaker A: Trying to overcome the similar things that other people. Because then you discuss with your mates. [01:44:38] Speaker B: You go, oh, how did you defeat that boss? [01:44:41] Speaker A: What did you do? And it's like, oh, have you tried this? And you're like, oh, shit. Yeah, okay. I'm sure that will still be possible, but when it comes to difficulty, I think difficulty is such a weird one. [01:44:51] Speaker B: And I think broad strokes of the brush are better. [01:44:55] Speaker A: But, man, fuck, what would I know? Who fucking knows? But, yeah, there you go. Well, Grizz, that's the fucking rapid fires. And that is the first episode of 2024. [01:45:09] Speaker B: Bloody good job, mate. [01:45:10] Speaker C: We did it, mate. [01:45:11] Speaker A: Wonderful. [01:45:12] Speaker B: Good to get back on the sound waves, mate. [01:45:14] Speaker A: Bloody excellent. [01:45:15] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:45:16] Speaker A: Good to be back in the saddle. [01:45:18] Speaker C: Back, baby. [01:45:21] Speaker A: We're back in a big way. Look, as always, just want to say thanks to all the wonderful listeners out there. If you could do us a favor. And if you're listening to it post via podcast, give us a bit of a review, maybe tell someone about us, regardless of how you're listening to this. Yeah, just let your mates know if you think they might like a little grassroots Aussie bloody banter games podcast. [01:45:44] Speaker B: Yeah, we'd love to have them again. [01:45:46] Speaker A: Always. We're live Mondays 07:00 p.m. AWsT on Twitch. Tvoceanicgamingradioceanicgamingradio all of our links to shit, our discord channel, our Twitter, everything that's on OGR show. You can go over there and find a link to all our social media stuff, including our Twitch link. If you want to become a OGR. [01:46:13] Speaker B: Show as well, you too can be. [01:46:16] Speaker A: Giving us money to put towards Grizz's terrible TikTok obsession. That's something we need to do the new year, get some more of those cranking. But yeah, other than that, we'll see you guys again next week. [01:46:32] Speaker B: Thanks for being here. [01:46:33] Speaker A: Appreciate you and bloody look after yourself. Peace out. It's.