The Game Awards, Terminator 2D: No Fate, Mail Bag | Noclip Crewcast

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All right.

Hello, gamers and non-gamers.

Welcome back to the No Club Crowcast.

This is episode 258.

This is the last current affairs podcast you'll be listening to from this crew, assuming nothing changes from now until the end of the year.

Danny O'Dwyer is still on vacation with his family.

If you were following him on Blue Sky, I'm going to blow up a spot.

He's currently in Paris.

He's after Expedition 33 won Game of the Year and Game of the Everything at the Keelys.

He decided to go visit them.

That's a joke.

I don't know what he's doing there.

I assume just vacation.

I hope he's having a good time, though.

Eating baguettes, smoking long cigarettes and wearing a beret.

You know who else likes smoking long cigarettes?

Jeremy Jane.

I don't.

I quit smoking a long time ago.

Right when we filmed the Witcher documentary.

I quit smoking when we went to Poland, which is a terrible idea.

Cause that's like the cigarette capital of the world.

It's like number three, at least it was, it was directly shoved in my face.

How many cigarettes I could have been smoking on that trip.

Well, good for you though.

That's like six years smoke-free.

Yeah.

I don't even think now I smell a cigarette.

I'm like, that smells disgusting to me.

So that's awesome.

I'm free.

Good for you, man.

Thank you.

Congratulations.

Thanks.

Frank Howley, you like blasting cigs.

I mean I like it in media because it incites.

The person is like cool, doesn't care about their health or dangerous.

So like as a symbolic gesture, cigarettes is cool.

But no, I've never ingested tobacco.

Smoking's not cool.

Yeah, i'm with you on the knowingly.

I've never smoked a cigarette on purpose, but i was asleep at a friend's house one time.

They were like we're gonna play gears of war downstairs and i'm like cool man.

I fell asleep on the bed and i wake up with a cigarette in my nose.

They put it in my.

That was their prank.

Yeah, that was their prank to wake me up.

That's what i'm saying.

What the fuck?

I didn't go to their house ever again.

You guys have never smoked like a blunt.

I mean no.

OK, I was just going to say jazz cigarettes, but not not fucking, not not big big nicotine or whatever.

Big tobacco sponsor.

Go for him.

Yeah.

Listen, Philip Morris.

If you're out there and you're looking for like a podcast, we'll smoke the whole two hours.

We'll just chain smoke like a right wing podcaster.

Depends on how much money.

I got a limit on that.

But you know who's not included in our Battle Pass holders list?

Philip Morris.

Who is in that list?

It would be so funny if that was the first name, last name of one of the Battle Pass holders.

Wait a second.

Philip Morris?

No, yeah.

But you know who does support us?

This great list of people, including everybody else at patreon.com slash noclip.

They support all the great work that we do.

They allow us to go on vacation sometimes and for us to enjoy the holiday season recording.

Great podcasts for you.

And that list of the tippy-top Battle Pass holders includes Lil Toast, Corey Lovepreet, Yutt like butt Tiny Tal, Dwayne the Rock Lobster, Anthony Thomas, Nico Passeteri, It's-a me a Ferrari-o.

Oh, doing so many Italian accents today.

Senator Armstrong, Redredge, Harry Flanagan, Joosh, Arno, Matt Pearson, James Brown, Mark Rojas.

Quote, Tucker Morgan, David McGarry, Goddison, Sven Hooster, Pez, John Akers, Uint Nate, Tim Robinson, Forrest Pruitt, Dark Insanities, Jonathan Kremen, Eric Hamilton Schneider, Christophe Fatui, Enox, Grizzly Mug, Cameron Ladd.

I like that one.

I dragged that out.

I dragged it all the way to the barn house, took it outside.

Zachary Snader, Alex Goucher, George Zerkotis, Jacob Godserve Entheogen, James Med Tohir, Tilyaev and Rice In.

Rice In what? rice in my pocket.

That's how I'd be paying for stuff, you know?

I'd be paying for stuff with rice that they'd be putting in my pocket.

Thank you so much to all of our Noclip patrons at the Battle Pass Holder tier.

You are the best, along with everyone else who supports all the work that we do.

We are at the end of the year here.

I'm so thankful to everyone who supports Noclip at patreoncom slash noclip and patreoncom slash noclip2.

It's been a fun year, first couple months here of putting stuff together with the crew.

It's like, work for me has been so isolated and like I work remotely from home.

So when I get the opportunity to hang out with people who actually like talking to and like genuinely enjoy having a conversation with and you know, getting paid is nice but like just getting to hang out with you guys and talk it's like 1 closer to being in a big office where we can sort of walk over to each other's computers and be like Hey, how do you feel about do you want to play mario 64 for an hour?

I don't know, that'd be fun.

Yeah, we're almost there.

Yeah, for sure.

I i couldn't agree more.

I i feel like the noclip 2 stuff has been a nice like unifying factor where noclip prime is sort of it still feels kind of siloed, even when it's very collaborative projects like the disco elysium at it.

That project was incredibly collaborative but it's still sort of like everyone is it you, it's like frank does the gameplay over here and then he like hands it off.

The collaboration is uh, is in sort of like the handoff that we're like working with each other's things.

Whereas no clip two, it feels like more of we're coming up with ideas together.

We're doing stuff together.

We're like thinking about what games to focus on.

We're communicating about what games to cover and, uh, and making shit together.

Um, and yeah, I have a lot of ideas for what to do with no clip two next year.

And, uh, I think it's going to be big.

I think it needs a.

It needs to be a place for us to unleash sort of like all of the creative passion we have for making videos and talking about games and covering games in interesting ways.

And yeah, I think, I think next year is going to be the year.

Absolutely.

I'm completely, I agree 100%.

I feel like this this year has been a good opportunity for us to sort of see what we're interested in doing.

And next year we're finally going to just, we're going to hit the, hit the ground running as soon as, everyone's back together and we can sort of pool our resources i think that'll be the time to uh to really start doing stuff that we're excited about not that we're not excited about doing all this stuff but you know things that are more more a little more creative a little more weird a little more of that avant-garde energy that we wanted to bring with noclip too so far it's been great for discovery but i want to start really hitting that drum of like here's weird stuff and here's how we do it weirdly you know so i got weird thoughts i got weird shit up here in my brain you know how messed up our brains are our brains are so messed up they're especially messed up after watching the game awards that's what my brain sounded like after i experienced three hours of commercials non-stop straight to the dome shout outs to jeff keely i take it back actually no shout outs to jeff keely down boy down you're not good enough for shout outs uh frank you did not watch the game awards because you have self-respect but jeremy you and i separately watched three hours of commercials advertisements and advertisements for the advertisements uh what did you think of the show give me a rating out of 10

I mean, I don't know.

I kind of always hate it.

You kind of have to a little bit.

That means you love it.

You can't love something.

You can't hate something if you don't love it.

I love video games.

I agree with that.

Have I told you this?

Have we talked about this before?

Have we talked about that before?

I love video games.

And it feels like the Game Awards is such a beat in the cultural rhythm of the year of video games that it's like, you know it's like i i have been to e3 a bunch e3 was something that i idolized and idealized as a child and then uh you go to whatever like five of them and all of a sudden it's like oh that's that place where i don't get enough sleep and i'm like hung over my shoulder hurts from carrying the tripod bag yeah yeah that's the place where my back hurts a lot um that's that's what growing up is is realizing that e3 is just back pain um and so yeah i don't know the game awards is like I don't particularly enjoy it.

Sometimes there are bits of it that I like, but I like to watch it because I like to see announcements.

I like to feel part of the, I don't know, it's like there's a different feel.

You could just get the experience of the Game Awards in 20 minutes after and that's fine.

You could just read like a GameSpot listicle of like 10 announcements that are cool.

But I like to be there when it pops, you know?

There's something about it, you know?

There is a level of hype where like, if you can get on a call with some homies and just laugh at it, that's really the only way you should watch the Game Awards.

Yes.

But when you can sit down and all three of you are going, Jack and Daxter.

No, no, it can't be Jack and Daxter.

It's Half-Life.

It couldn't be Half-Life.

Why don't they show it here?

Like everyone's trying to play who knows the most video game symbolism, trivia and like guess what it is before they do the trailer drop?

Um i, that is the only fun i find from the event.

Uh, and also seeing cool new video games, and obviously that's that's fun.

Um, but before they showed the new star wars they showed off like what is it the fate of the old republic, or something like that.

Um, before they showed that off, there was no setup.

Jeff didn't say you know a galaxy far, far away, or anything like that.

Long time ago I was like I bet this is star Wars and it cut.

And I was like, I fuck, I gift of Apollo, baby.

I call me Raven Simone.

I can see the future.

Um, so that was fun.

I agree with you on that, that like watching it, seeing new stuff, it was the fun of E3.

It was like, you never know what's going to be there.

And then when you see it, maybe it's exciting.

Usually it's not, sometimes it's a soul's like, and then you get bored.

And then sometimes they pop a trailer, like the divinity trailer.

That's got like gore and there's like people fucking and there's children nearby nearby.

It doesn't get banned from steam.

It seems like an odd thing to me, but I don't know.

I've, I've maybe I need to update what my understanding of the policies are.

So, uh, no, I, I don't know.

It's like, you're right.

It's fun to guess it.

And, uh, yeah, I don't know.

Occasionally, I would say every year, there's like one or two announcements that i'm like that's cool, i'm excited for that.

There's a couple things yeah, was there anything this year that stood out to you?

Well, i was about to go through everything.

I'm not doing, we're not litigating all the announcements.

You saw them or don't care.

By the time this airs it will be like a week old news, everyone's fucking old news.

Yeah uh, yeah.

Let me just rattle off a couple and talk about what's cool about them.

Um, they opened with the the free shepherd a dog video game which um, I was just excited because they mentioned Burlington Vermont, and I love, I love Vermont.

So it's a game that was made in Burlington, Vermont.

That's crazy.

Shout outs to Bernie Sanders State.

Shout out, Bernie, my boy.

Yeah, I would love if the Free Shepherd team wants to talk.

I'd love to pop up to Burlington.

I'll just drive out there and chill.

And Jesse can meet me halfway because it's like kind of halfway between.

You got it.

I'll cross the border just for you.

It's risky, but I'll do it.

Oh, yeah.

What else was there?

There was Bradley the Badger, that weird like meta game.

I don't know if that was cool.

No, it wasn't cool.

No, it had.

Like the dreams, you could interact with the world mechanic and like you could pick stuff up and explode it or make it bigger or duplicate it.

That was kind of a novel idea, but I don't know if I thought the rest of it was interesting.

No, it pissed me off.

Right.

Okay.

Whenever there's a show on, we always post in the Noclip Discord because our community are all watching it together.

And after Bradley the Badger trailer aired, I posted in the Noclip Discord and said allowing millennials into creative control positions in the video game industry is will do irreparable damage to the medium of video games.

Oh, burn.

Sick burn.

That's the only reason I want to mention that.

That was made from the creator of Mario Rabbids, by the way.

Yes, which Mario Rabbids is a great game.

Yeah, but it's to your point.

I feel like Rabbids are very millennial coded.

That's true.

Yeah, it's.

That game to me is good in spite of the Rabbids, I would say.

Oh, yeah, for sure.

You know what I mean?

It's like a good tactics game that doesn't need the Rabbids, but they're there.

It's like that's the only way Ubisoft would give them the money is if they could figure out how to make Mario and one of their properties go together.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's true.

Big, big Rabbids was funding that one.

Star Wars Fate of the Old Republic, I thought was cool just because I like the KOTOR games.

I never played the Old Republic MMO but, like i don't know man, there's a part of me that just love i fucking love star wars.

You know, like i, i hate it too.

If you really love star wars in 2025, you kind of hate star, you gotta love it to hate it.

It's just the truth yeah um, but i don't know any new star wars video game.

It's like it might, it might fucking be good.

You never know.

It could always pull up out of the nose dive and surprise you.

Um yeah divinity, i thought looked interesting.

It's just the cinematic.

Right, they didn't have gameplay, it was just a cinematic trailer.

Um yeah, this is a weird one because it's not a, it's not an original sin game.

Um, and i've never played like divine divinity or this sort of pre well, but they have said that the this is supposed to be more in line with the original sin games in terms of gameplay, like it's supposed to be turn-based and not action rpg, like divine divinity sort of was.

Um, so it's.

It's still what you would expect from the way they're talking about it, correct?

Yeah, i think it'll be more like a dungeons and dragons sort of like.

Uh, balder's gate 3 adjacency rpg.

But um, but divinity, original sin 2 is one of my favorite, all-time favorite, all-time rpgs.

So are you gonna stream this on geforce now as well?

Is that your point?

I did play the entirety of original sin 2 on geforce now on my macbook, because i didn't have a computer at the time.

Uh, so 150 hours of game that was on like a server farm in las vegas.

Um, So I liked it enough for that.

Uh, what else?

Coven of the chicken foot.

There was that like weird dark fantasy game with the old lady.

It was kind of like, uh, the last guardian meets, I don't know, studio Ghibli or something.

Yeah.

Name a movie, name a Ghibli movie.

It's like that.

Yeah.

This is Bruce Straley is involved in this as well.

Um, naughty dog head, right?

Yes.

For one that's not Druckmann.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

The, the half of the sort of like leading duo of the last of us, original last of us.

Um and uh.

I did not.

I don't really, i don't really fuck with uncharted.

I didn't like the last of us 2, last of us 1.

I did like uh and i feel like bruce straley was probably a big part of that.

So i um to me i.

I have no particular insight into the creation of the last of us, but i have always imagined him as sort of like a, like the heart, the beating heart of last of us that got removed uh, and was created, the sort of like big dissonance between last of us 1 and 2.

So i'll be curious to see what he's working on.

Uh ontos, spiritual successor to soma.

That looks fucking awesome.

I can't wait for that.

I i have not checked the credits or anything regarding that game.

It is so dishonored coded i have to assume someone from arcane, some art director or level designer or something, character model or i don't know, got involved because it looks so much like a dishonored game.

It's kind of bizarre how close it looks.

I didn't even clock that when i was watching it, but now that you say it, you're right.

It does have that sort of like uh grounded stylization or something.

Yeah.

It's a look to it.

Yeah.

Like a Norman Rockwell kind of thing going on.

Totally.

Um, yeah, there was order of the sinking star, which obviously, you know, mixed feelings.

I don't know.

I love a good circle bond.

Shame about the other parts.

There's been some interesting controversy with that.

Alan Hazelden, who I talked about in a previous podcast uh was uh making a bunch of posts on blue sky about his involvement and a bunch of other devs who made Sokoban style puzzle games who are including, whose games were like licensed and they were all paid.

Like this is all above board from my understanding of them admitting it.

Um, so their, their games have been licensed and included in some regard into this new project from John blow, but they've also come out and been like.

You know, you know politics, you know like they're like, but they're still being straightforward about it.

Like, this is our ideas are included here and we all signed off on them, so at the very least, it's above board.

Yeah yeah, i'm not even like.

My take isn't even like oh, we got to separate the art from the artist.

Like, just buy the new kanye album and enjoy it like.

That's not my take at all.

It's just like if, if this, if this game pulls off something close to what the witness pulled off, i would be interested to check it out, in spite of the sort of cultural context or like I don't know.

I think the cultural context makes stuff like that interesting, too.

Not in a way where you should support people because they have bad takes, but it's like If you play a game that is made by someone who has some pretty dogshit takes on how the world is, it is also how that's informed in the art.

Yeah yeah, exactly like.

I don't know, you never know.

Maybe there's like a character in this who's like i just i think the disease came from a lab.

I just have some interesting thoughts about women's brains and their capability.

Yeah yeah exactly yeah, like.

Maybe there's a guy in the game who's like i just think only men can program and it's like.

That's fucking weird.

I can't believe this is in a video game.

Damn, where's the mute button on that guy?

Yeah,

Yeah, exactly.

Uh, there was gang of dragon.

Yeah.

Yes.

Uh, of Yakuza fame.

Um, uh, this had the, the actor from, uh, training Busan and a bunch of other movies in it.

Uh, I, yeah, I don't know.

It's like, it's weird because it's so Yakuza coded, but it's, uh, It's not like a Kiryu character.

His character seems to function very similarly to Kiryu.

He's sort of soft-spoken and withdrawn and brave.

Speaks with his fists.

Yes, like badass, but... but in a different way.

So I'll be curious to see how that comes out.

Frank, did you see that trailer for Gang of Dragons?

Yeah, I love that it's straight up still Kabuki Cho.

Like the fact that it ends on the gate is like phenomenal.

So that I thought was an interesting touch is that sign isn't the Kamurocho.

That one's Kabuchiko's actual sign, right?

Like the kanji is correct for that.

I thought that was interesting of the goshi being like hey, I'm doing the same thing, but I'm fucking not doing the same thing.

Yeah, that was pretty cool.

Um i yeah, i think it'll be cool.

I mean, i fucking yakuza is great and negoshi was such a huge part of that and um, you know, despite the fact that yakuza games are, they're still making good yakuza games.

But it does feel like as someone, i'm a latecomer to it, so it's not even like a nostalgia take where i'm like oh, they used to make them different or whatever.

I, just for my personal tastes, i like the way yakuza used to be tonally a bit better.

Um, So I'll be curious to see, sort of like, how much of that DNA is Nogoshi and how much he carries with it, how much of that he carries with him into a new project or whatever.

You know what I mean?

Yeah.

How much it feels like the original.

Sorry.

Yeah.

It feels a lot closer to that original Yakuza tone.

Frank, you've been enjoying these newer ones.

I don't know if more or less than the old Yakuza.

How do you feel about this new project being closer to the originals?

The new one or Gang of Dragons.

I don't even think I watched the full trailer, but I skimmed it.

But I feel like they openly showed gun violence.

It seems super brutal and violent.

But then that other Yakuza century, that old school Sega's also working on a like back in time yakuza game that also, i think, seems super violent.

But this one's got way more gun violence and like there's guns in the other yakuza games, this one feels like it's really leaning into it.

So um, yeah again.

But i also like generally hate all the game awards stuff because there's never gameplay.

These games are so far out and i hate.

I don't like judging stuff just based on cinema, like this conversation's fine, but it's just like.

That's why i just so tune out.

Like these are all announcements, these are trailers like three years from now, when we can play it.

Then i'm interested.

But for me yeah, oh my god yeah, i'm excited for this, but i have no idea when the hell this will come out.

Yeah, luckily for um, because i agree with you, i hate to like see a cinematic and be like that looks like a good game, because it's like that would be fun.

It's like seeing a movie poster being like oh, that will be a great movie.

It's like how do you can't, you don't know that you haven't even seen the actors actors like an ip in it.

Man, it's gonna be good, and i saw a drawing of the logo, so it's gotta be good.

Uh, luckily for like um, for gang of dragon, there was some gameplay screenshots that dropped.

Uh, i saw people comparing it to uh, what is it?

Yakuza souls?

Because he had the machine gun right, it's like the gatling gun, uh.

So yeah, i don't know.

I'll be curious to see more though.

But um, but it was just cool.

I just, i just personally wanted to know what negoshi was cooking on, because it's like that, it's very, it's kind of like what uh, like when kojima went out on his own and you know, like the reveal of the of death stranding one, like what he was doing, it's like, even if you don't see a lot of gameplay of it, it's cool just to sort of have a, a bookmark in your mind of like, Oh yeah, fucking negotiates out there.

He's working on a project.

This is what it is.

If only Jeff Keighley liked the Yakuza series more, he would have, given that the Kojima treatment and like been like Hey, here's a huge set up of a game.

That's the most important thing ever made here.

Here's an eight minute trailer.

He didn't have to spend any money on it.

Yeah.

That's a shame for sure.

Is there anything else Jeremy, from the game awards?

Or on Yakuza on uh, either.

Let's see, i'm going through the rest of the list.

Don't force yourself to say anything.

No no no, there's.

I know you're excited for high guard.

I get it, i do.

I am working my way down the list in terms of like first to last announced at the show, so we are getting into the higher profile shit.

Uh, orbitals looks kind of cool, but i'm not.

Orbitals looks awesome.

I don't.

I don't have a nintendo switch too, and i'm not gonna buy one.

So just come on up.

I want to play duskbloods.

Okay, come on, we'll play.

Okay, i will.

My, my brother is uh getting a switch to for his children, so i will uh just become one of your brother's children.

It's fucking.

Hey, your uncle's here.

Anyway, i was gonna play dustbloods.

If you guys want to just hang out and watch me play this violent game on the internet they're like babies, so they would love it oh perfect Yeah, and then that's kind of it.

I was a little disappointed.

The end of the show is usually when it's like, okay, finally, we're on to the real shit now.

And the real shit was just kind of like Star Wars Galactic Racer.

Hey, stop talking shit, all right?

I liked the podcast.

This is pod racing.

I was going to say the podcast game.

I loved fucking Star Wars Podcaster, that game for the Nintendo 64.

Yeah.

That was a great game.

The Empire is always saying slurs on their podcast.

That's true.

What's that about?

Funny story about Star Wars Podracer.

I had that game on the N64 and for some reason I was holding the cartridge outside and I left it on the ground in the driveway and my mom backed over it with her Honda.

And it survived.

It's an N64 cartridge.

They're indestructible.

It still works.

It's like punctured though.

That's fine.

It looks like someone shot it with a bullet.

All right.

But it still works.

So shout out to...

Shout out to that guy who invented the video game cartridge.

There was Phantom Blade Zero, which I feel like is emblematic of my disillusionment with games in general.

Frank, you were excited for that, right?

Yeah, I played it at Summer Games Fest like two years... Last year?

Not this year, last year.

So it was just like... It was another Souls-like, but it felt really cool.

I love how it looks.

Yeah it's, i agree, i think shanghai, that's right.

I feel i have very mixed feelings about it because i was watching the trailer and i was like this looks exactly like a game that i would think is cool, but it was, i don't know why.

It just like it wasn't exciting me and i was.

I've been struggling to come up with like the words to articulate what it is that isn't exciting and i feel like it might be a great game, but the way in which they are presenting it feels to me like it's.

It's like everything that i think it looks cool about.

It is like referential to something that already exists.

It's like it's like a wuxia that i think that's how you pronounce it w-u-x-i-a.

Yeah, it's like reference to that film genre of martial arts and like to like chinese culture and to like souls games and kind of to like more actiony, like god of war stuff a little bit uh, but i just don't know what it is like for itself.

Does that make sense?

I haven't seen anything of it that i'm like oh wow, that is.

That's such a that is uniquely original.

Phantom blade zero.

Yes, like what makes it different from all these things that it's that it's referencing or influenced by um.

So i'm not sold on it yet.

I think it presents very well, i think it looks gorgeous and i think it looks like it'll play very well, but i need to know, i need to like what's the, what's the vision?

You know, like i, i want to know a little more about it.

I think yeah, apparently it is part of the rainblood series or a return to the origins of the rainblood series, which I guess is something that I've never heard of before.

I've never heard of this either.

Do you know what that is?

Yeah, no clue.

I don't think any of us do.

Apparently it's some.

I know there's a lot of games coming out of China that were like oh, that's a thing.

And they're like yeah, it's the most important game ever made, which is not.

It's just pure ignorance.

It's just like it never made its way to English and this part of the world.

So of course we haven't heard about it.

So it's been interesting to see that part of it.

But yeah, I'm curious what exactly, it looks great, Phantom Blade Zero.

And my understanding of it is like, It's a lot of everything is very reactive.

All the animations look great.

Like it looks it looks very cinematic and it's in a styling for the combat.

But yeah, you're right.

I need to see a little bit more.

Where's the sauce?

Also, correction on the developer.

They are from Beijing China, but they do have a motion capture studio that's in Shanghai, and they work with a team that works that's in Hong Kong.

So cool.

Um yeah, i agree with you.

I it's like i'm i'm looking at a picture of like one of the best looking hamburgers i've ever seen in my life and i'm like yeah, i would eat that.

Where's the sauce?

But like what?

What makes this hamburger different from all of the other hamburgers that are good?

Yeah, you know what i mean.

Um yeah, so anyway uh also, while we're talking about chinese games, i saw footage of where wins meet for the first time this week with, like fake his game, the free to play.

Like background of law and order, svus video game uh, And I was like this looks dumb.

And then I saw that you use Tai Chi to throw a bear.

And all of a sudden I was like, maybe this is kind of sick, actually.

Look, it seems dope as hell.

I want to play it.

It's also like 120 gigabytes.

Yeah, no, fuck that.

I'm not downloading it.

And I was also thinking about I want to make a, not really but if I had infinite time, money and I was immortal.

I would want to make an MMORPG that's free to play.

And you know how... Let me cook.

Hang on.

Don't dismiss this idea yet.

This is very funny.

I know, I know.

Coming out of the guy who fucking hates this shit.

But hear me out.

So games like this operate where it's like, oh, you pay like $5 and you get the hat.

You pay $10 and you get the jacket, right?

I want to make an MMORPG that's free to play.

And the only things you can purchase in it are like $100,000.

Okay.

And you're like, who would ever buy that?

Star Citizen?

Yeah, but like cooler.

Okay.

Wait, hold on.

Hold on a second.

Imagine like World of Warcraft, where there's like the Zeppelins and the deep run tram that people use for transport or whatever.

Imagine an MMORPG that has none of that.

But if you're like a rich person who has no purpose in life and you have too much money and you're playing this MMORPG, you can buy a Zeppelin.

Jeremy, you're just inventing NFTs.

No, no, because there is a functional purpose that you would fill.

Okay, let me sell you on it in one phrase.

Imagine you're playing this game and you're not one of these rich people who buys the zeppelin.

And then you're like in, you're in elwyn forest or whatever the fucking elwyn forest of this game is, and you see the zeppelin fly over.

It's like it's like seeing a cryptid.

You would like you go to school the next day.

You'd be like you guys aren't gonna believe it.

I saw the fucking zeppelin fly over, right?

So this fills two purposes for the rich person who has no purpose in their life, and they have too much money They.

What does every rich person want?

Right.

They want they want to be beloved to hunt for sport.

They want to hunt man.

Yeah, of course.

Yeah.

You buy a PVP license.

No, you like you would become a celebrity because you would be like, I'm the Zeppelin guy.

Right.

So you could buy social status that you cannot buy in the real world.

And then for everyone else who does not spend money.

They are having a rarefied experience of of witnessing the Zeppelin guy.

Jeremy, you're just inventing FOMO, but it's six figures instead of five dollars.

Yes, but I hate rich people and I love rarefied experiences in games.

You know what I mean?

It would be like if you could buy the privilege of being a Jedi in Star Wars Galaxies.

It's a terrible idea, but I like it.

I like the concept of you great Gatsby-ing a video game. yeah but as like it's like an act of aggression towards rich people you know what i mean like i'm tapping into their greatest insecurities to fund my game right but but you're like letting them buy popularity by having the special rare thing that like people look at at all yeah but there there will be like a uh after the game sells like a certain number of them everyone in game who doesn't have the hundred thousand dollars zeppelin will get a piece of mail in the in-game mail system that says like By the way, that guy fucking sucks.

You should redistribute the wealth and give them all like $10 a year for every $100,000 license.

Who gets the $10?

Every other player?

The players.

Yeah, why not?

No, I get the money.

Okay.

That is the only crucial element of the scheme.

I'm taking back your communist license, Jeremy.

The only thing that matters is that I get the money from the scheme, okay?

Do not get it twisted.

All right.

You're literally selling a bridge in a game.

That's awesome.

Yeah, yeah.

No, 100%.

Yeah.

That's great.

And that is my scam.

Okay.

All right.

I love the idea.

I can't wait to play that in 2035 on my PlayStation 6.

Check it out.

It's coming soon.

Bridge.

Salesman from Jeremy J.

Was there anything else from the event that stood out to you or that didn't stand out to you?

I forgot we were talking about the game.

I was happy to move on if you want to move on.

The only other thing is High Guard, which is a bunch of former Apex devs, Call of Duty devs, a bunch of incredibly prestigious Titanfall devs.

You can't say that and then show High Guard, i know i was disappointed.

Um yeah, i was.

Yeah, i don't know.

I don't know what there is to say other than i was disappointed.

As someone who loves titanfall and loves apex and has a real fondness for fps um, for that to be the capstone of the show that it's like.

And finally, the before we leave, one last thing, like the moment where fucking gordon freeman could walk out, like that's the level of stakes uh, and they bring out, like you know, smite characters on horseback.

It's like, I just, I was so, it was so anticlimactic to Frank's point.

I think it was largely a cinematic.

It's hard to tell these games as much as we dog them for being so sort of unoriginal seeming.

Some of them still have success.

Marvel rivals.

I don't know how much of its success is based on the brand, but it is still done well.

People like playing it.

It's fun.

There there's aspects to it that are enjoyable.

Overwatch two is seeing a sort of a comeback.

So there's a chance that it works out, but I totally agree that I was so deflated.

Like as soon as they were like, it's a first person, it's a hero shooter.

Put Mega Man back on the screen.

I love when I give me things that remind me of being 12, not remind me of being 30.

That sucks.

Um, so that wasn't yeah that wasn't a great thing to end on but i hope that team sees success i'm not gonna be like oh well enjoy your new game that's gonna suck not that i hope it's good yeah of course yeah i i just am not sold by what they showed of like uh you know horseback valorant for sure x well it's out in seven weeks so yeah that's crazy i guess we'll know i think that's why jeff was so excited about it it was like uh keely we're on the first name basis sorry My boy, Jeff.

My boy, Jeff.

Classic Canadian.

When he was really hyped on it.

I think it was because it's like you know we get to announce something new no one's ever heard of.

It's a big game with a lot of money behind it.

And it's out in seven weeks as opposed to you never know when it'll be out.

That's true.

That's a good point.

That's cool.

And also very funny, by the way, that the game is called... What's it called again?

I already forgot.

High Guard.

High Guard, which i mean, that's just, that's just overwatch right, high guard?

Oh shit, come on, oh shit yeah, and it does have an overwatch flavor to it.

Damn that's, that is a real damning revelation.

Come on, uh yeah.

Yeah, that does feel a little.

This is gonna sound incredibly derogatory, because it is and i don't mean to shit on the name of the game, but it does sound like you plugged overwatch into chat gpt and you're like what's like another, what's like another overwatch?

Um oh, i will say though that uh, Another sort of like similar caliber spin-off studio that has a lot of ex-Apex Titanfall Call of Duty devs, that is also working on something that is not announced yet is Gravity Well Games, who I have been eagerly following.

California, right?

I believe so, yeah.

I think they're probably based not far from where Respawn's at.

That makes sense.

So, you know, there are other horses in this race, is all I'll say.

FPS ain't dead yet.

That's right.

There's horses in Highguard.

Yeah, that's true.

There's many horses.

Yeah, the only other thing of note from the show and this is I'm throwing stones from outside the walled garden here because these are not games I really play or follow at all.

I was.

I wonder if you guys could give me insight on this.

I feel like io, who are?

You know, they do hitman and like, uh oh, here's the part of the podcast where jeremy hates lenny kravitz.

No, it's not even i hate lenny kravitz.

It's like why?

Why those games are beloved yeah, as games, and bond is beloved as like a franchise.

Why do they feel the need to go so hard on the celebrity bullshit?

I don't know.

I mean, they got eminem and yeah, they got lenny kravitz and they've got melina yojovich.

I don't know.

Yeah, like what the fuck is going on over there.

Why do they feel the need to like it?

To me it cheapens the entire thing as like a we believe in video games and instead, to me it communicates.

We don't believe in video games.

We need to like, communicate to, to normal people that this is like a media experience worth having.

It was a funny novelty when they did it really early on.

Like it wasn't the first one, like you killed John Malkovich or something like this.

Is that real?

Yeah, I think so.

Um, it was like weird crossovers where it was like a novelty thing of you get to kill a celebrity in a hit man game.

And like, it was almost like it was fun for the celebrity as much as it was for them to do it.

Um, so there was that aspect of it.

But yeah, I do kind of feel like I don't know.

At a certain point it's like not cute anymore.

Now it's just like, Do you not want to?

I don't know.

Whatever.

It's like it's marketing really at the end of the day, I guess.

Yeah.

I just think that like if if you're a villain, though, is stupid.

I don't I don't.

Yeah, it's dumb.

And he's not a good actor either.

Not really.

If Zoe Kravitz is good. if if the if your marketing is like a supplementary thing where it's like it should exist it's like a it's a necessary evil i'm not like some sort of idealist who's like you should make a game in a hermit shack in the woods and release it without telling anyone i mean that's what i'm doing yeah but i don't have a marketing budget or john malkovich yeah if if eminem wants to help me out fucking far be it for me to stop him yeah but uh but to to to have this incredibly like self-fueling high profile beloved video game franchise in hitman and this like beloved media franchise in in bond like bond is bond is its own celebrity marketing it's a fucking it's a james bond game and it's not like the first bond game that's ever been made goldeneye is one of the most influential games of ever you know what i mean so it's like there is precedent to just be like, it's a Bond video game and people will go nuts.

Even like normal people, like the people who I think would be like oh, MM's in this.

Maybe that's interesting.

Those people played GoldenEye growing up probably.

Like it's MM, like these are fucking, I don't think like Gen Z and Gen Alpha are like oh my God, it's fucking Marshall Mathers.

I think this is like millennials who are like come home from their marketing job and they're like i have time to play one game a year.

Oh, i'll do the one that has eminem in it, because remember when he was on top for a year and eight mile came out the same year as his hit album uh, when i back, when i enjoyed life um, and i think you could just as easily invoke golden eye and hit that same demographic without having to cheapen it by, like celebrity endorsement.

Yeah, it does also sort of feel like I don't know.

I don't want to write anything off with the team.

I'm sure they're still doing cool stuff.

I mean, they published Minds High, so they know what they're doing.

But they're, you know, they're working really hard to to make something that feels uniquely like their own James Bond story.

Like.

My assumption was the villain was going to be Blofeld or the villain was going to be Dr No or something.

Right.

But no, they were like, let's do our own thing.

Let's have our own character. they chose Lenny Kravitz for some reason.

I don't know what compelled them to do that.

Maybe he's a fake out, right?

Maybe there is a real bond villain that'll be included in there at some point.

Um, but whatever the case, it definitely, I didn't get excited about it.

Cause he's not a particularly exciting celebrity.

I mean, you know, his music's great and whatever.

What's the relevance of Lenny Kravitz?

Like.

Also, what's the relevance of like like Keanu Reeves and cyberpunk makes a little bit more sense.

Cause like hackers, he's a relatively popular, uh, action hero care, probably one of the most popular current, action hero actors.

So it makes a little bit more sense to have him in that game.

But Lenny Kravitz is like a musician.

He's not even an actor, yeah.

He's not even really an actor.

I understand that we now exist in the era where getting high profile actors to be like you know, Nogoshi had the fucking train to Busan guy.

I wasn't like, why is he doing that?

I understand it, because the level of fidelity of these games is such that, like you know, that's why fucking Kojima has, like every actor that goes on the criterion, closet comes and stands in front of the homo ludens statue with him.

Like I get it.

It's.

It makes sense for him because he utilizes their acting skills in a way that he is trying to push the medium in a direction where like, the fidelity of storytelling, is higher.

Yeah.

I understand that.

I'm not opposed to that.

And it's just nice to have Lea Seydoux tell you you're a good boy and you did a good job.

I mean, I would do anything for that.

Millions of dollars.

But I just feel like it's like, if you're going to have a celebrity name, be your villain, at least fucking get a Skarsgård, you know.

Just one of them.

There's like a hundred of them.

Yeah, I don't know why.

I don't know why.

Yeah, Mads Mikkelsen.

Yeah.

He was in a Bond movie.

Yeah, he was.

He was Bloveld, right?

Wasn't he in?

Oh, I don't know.

I haven't seen a Bond movie since Casino Royale.

Sorry.

I don't know.

Yeah, I hope it's good.

It looks good.

Yeah, the game looks cool.

I'm not shitting on the game itself.

I just think it's like.

No, but that aspect of it's embarrassing is maybe a stretch too far, but I certainly wasn't excited about it.

Lenny Kravitz.

Um, yeah, but there's some other stuff from the game awards.

That was, uh, interesting.

Uh, there was a control resident resonant.

Sorry.

We didn't even mention the new remedy control game, which looks like they're going devil may cry as opposed to going Alan wake E uh in their, in their direction.

So I'm very excited for that gameplay wise.

If it plays as good as it looks like it does, that'll be awesome.

I didn't really find the combat and control very fun.

Um, so I hope this feels better.

It looks like it'll feel better.

I like action games.

So that'll be cool uh, and i think uh, i think that's pretty much it for me.

Oh, ace combat 8 also.

Yeah, i wish i got into the ace combat series earlier.

Ace combat 7 kicks ass uh, and this one has more human being, like top gun maverick hanging out bits so cool, i'm excited for that.

I hope they have a beach scene where uh, all the, all the men get super super, super sweaty.

Can't wait hell yeah, can't wait.

That was the game awards where it was featuring andrew schultz.

Uh, don't google anything that he said or done in the last couple of years.

Give him a microphone.

Uh also, the street fighter thing.

I just want to say very funny, very dumb.

I don't know why they brought the whole cast out.

Frank, did you see any of that?

I know you didn't watch it, but like, did you see?

Okay, most of the cast of the street fighter movie was on stage.

They had a bunch of wrestlers.

They had a bunch of, uh, like, uh, Cody Rhodes was there.

And, um, I think Jason Momoa came out.

He's playing Blanca, which sure.

Why not give him long hair and let him do something funny.

He'll be on board.

Uh, but I just need you and everyone listening to go look up 50 cent Balrog in street fighter the movie.

Trust me.

You're not ready for his hairline.

I told you.

Oh my God.

That's a war crime.

I know that's relatively accurate, but don't put that on a real human being, you monsters.

That has made me more excited for this movie than anything else.

Also Cody Rhodes as Guile.

When you see pictures of him it looks, It feels like it should be an easy slam dunk, but it just looks so wrong.

Anyway, that's my thoughts on Street Fighter.

I'm sure it'll be a movie that you can watch in theaters or on HBO Max, if that's still a thing, or Netflix, depending on when the merger happens.

Anyway...

Let's move on from the Game Awards and talk about the only game that deserves an award.

The award being Best Movie Adaptation with Terminator 2D.

No fate.

Finally, Frank Howley, after multiple delays, they have released your real game of the year.

How are you feeling about Terminator?

Yeah, I'm so happy with Terminator 2D No Fate.

I remember like I was at the San Diego Zoo with a friend who came out of town from London and I was walking around with a group of friends and then I stopped in front of the panda exhibit and I was like holy shit guys, look at this.

I was like, guys, they're not pandas.

There was polar bears.

I was like, guys, look at this.

And I was floored at this Terminator 2 pixel art game, which is like why is this coming out 30 years later?

This should be launching on like Genesis and Super Nintendo.

And then we kept talking about the podcast.

I think like a year ago.

No, I don't know.

This is like six months ago.

It got announced but like i kept bringing it up like, oh my god, i'm so excited for this.

They're supposed to come out like september.

And then it got silk song and got pushed back.

I didn't, i didn't play silk song, i want to play the terminator game.

They got pushed to november.

I had it on my calendar and then jesse was like hey, did you see the release date?

What it got pushed to, like even after the game awards.

So this is that's why i didn't participate in the game awards.

I didn't even have a chance to play this game yet nominated um.

So terminator 2d no fate came out.

So yeah, this is by.

I'll pull up the Steam page the developers.

But Jesse called out the team that made this earlier 16-bit shooter called Xenocrisis, which I played on Game Pass forever ago, which was pretty solid.

And so Terminator 2D No Fate is God.

It's a very genius throwback game where you're playing as both like John Connor as a kid John, future John Connor you're playing as Sarah Connor and the T 1000.

And each, each level is essentially a recreation of like an action sequence from the movie.

There's also levels set before the movie.

Like, I think at one point someone asked John Connor, like, how did your mom end up in prison?

Oh, yeah, she went psycho and tried to blow up Cyberdyne.

You play that sequence.

So, like the first, like few levels of the game, is Sarah Connor heading to Cyberdyne to blow it up, and then she gets arrested and thrown in the mental hospital.

And then it cuts to Arnie waking up in front of the biker bar.

And I was like, oh my God, this whole sequence we played was like one line of dialogue in the movie and they made three levels on that.

So immediately it buys you into, like, oh, they –

This is like a rare game adaptation or a film adaptation where it's like, oh my God, they maximize, like the fan service.

Like it's not just like we have to rush it out in time.

Like historically with video game adaptations, they're always rushed out in time as a release date.

They're working on the games before the movie's even finished.

So they have no idea what the hell they're working with.

Terminator 2 has been out for like 30 plus years. who knows how long to be working this a year plus.

I have no idea, but it's, it's just maximizing dripping with like fan service and detail.

So every stage I was like there's that, there's this.

They licensed the original music from the game.

There's also a new chip to music.

That's great.

Bad to the bone is licensed.

And in this game, um in between the action sequences there's like just straight up shot for shot recreations done in like beautiful pixel art like it's it's like it's like snk level detail it's so like that is a compliment it's snk level pixel art which we don't get ever ever ever it's uh it it's it's it was such a thrill to play they only like downside but not for me because i don't there's not enough time in life to enjoy everything i have to keep going back to japan You can beat the entire game in like less than three hours.

I'm saying that in terms of to do one playthrough takes maybe 45 minutes.

There's three different endings to unlock.

There's a John Connor ending.

So there's the canon film ending.

You beat the game.

And then it's like, I don't know.

I choose your fate.

If you like go back and do play the level again, then it's branching paths.

And that's where it's cool because then they come up with new endings for the gate.

So like there's a Sarah Connor ending where like, I don't know, do spoilers, whatever.

Like uh, it's uh, it they're giving i don't know it's like, it's like i don't know you're getting new terminator 2 stuff.

I don't know why the world isn't screaming about this.

This is so exciting.

I don't care about avatar coming out.

I love james cameron.

I don't like avatar.

I love terminator and it's 90 of the time there's new terminator stuff.

It sucks.

No one cares.

This is good new terminator stuff.

So it was really fun to see like new terminator levels set within the canon of terminator 2 and it's awesome and um Yeah.

So I played through the game three times.

I played on easy difficulty.

There's more achievements for doing it on harder difficulties.

There's boss rush mode.

There's no continuums mode, whatever.

I don't know if I'll go back to it.

There's a few collectibles I might play again when there's trophy guides out, but for me, sitting there friday night it was the equivalent of going to theaters and seeing terminator 2 instead.

I was playing it and uh, smiling and laughing and having such a good time and popping in all the little details.

There's even the john connor um motorcycle sequence chase when they're leaving the glendale galleria And the and the truck chases John Connor and jumps off the freeway into the LA river.

And you're playing John Connor on a motorbike.

And then Arnie comes on his bike and then you're playing as Arnie and shooting the truck with a shotgun and explodes.

And the T 1000 liquid metal comes out in pixel art.

And it's just like, this is perfect.

This is thank you.

We just mentioned golden.

I that's another like phenomenal game adaptation.

So it's like, it's so rare.

We get a film to game adaptation.

That's incredible.

And this is it.

They, they, they, they knocked out of the park and, Like, yeah, make a Robocop.

Keep doing this.

I don't know if it's going to sell well.

I feel like there's such a micro target audience for this.

I don't, you know, like, I don't know.

But for me, I'm so delighted.

It's $30.

It was like an opening week discount.

I think 25 bucks in PlayStation Plus.

Take the money, developers.

You guys killed it.

It was awesome.

It was so, so cool.

So it was worth the wait.

I really, really like this game.

Yeah.

Developers Bitmap Bureau, by the way, was their name.

Yeah, they've done really good work.

Like Frank said, Xenocrust is in the past.

And I did watch, we recorded a quick look of this for Noclip 2, so you can check that out.

I watched Frank play a little bit of this.

It is insane as he is saying every bit as much of like well-made fans fan service to the top, like their reference.

I love this movie.

Probably not as much as Frank.

I don't know if it's possible for me to love anything as much as Frank loves the stuff that he loves, but like this to me is capturing everything about Terminator two.

That is fun.

It's not just the action sequences.

It's like little references to things.

It's Arnold Schwarzenegger's naked in the bar scene.

Cause of course he is.

That's how he is in the movie.

You don't see his little Arnie, but you do see enough of them.

Like everything is, is perfectly done.

There's references to the brands that are in the movie and like, little bits of of just character interactions that seemed sort of like nothing in the movie or like oh that's a good bit but like they they go in on it they're like here's the animation especially do it all in 2d and pixel art in the style that they've done it with the level of fidelity like i think i pointed out in the video there's uh there's a moment where frank was fighting someone in the bar we're not even fighting him yet the guy was getting ready to fight frank and he picked up a pool cue and just as animation, there was like a hundred frames of some of the best looking pixel that I've ever seen lit properly.

Like it all looks so fantastic.

Uh, and to your point Frank, it's nice to see a licensed game again.

That is playing pure fan service.

Cause like that sort of thing died out.

I feel like in the mid two thousands, late two thousands, where like fan service game or not fan service games, but like licensed games had to be.

It had to be either its own thing.

That was like special.

And like, I like that obviously, but there's a charm to doing a license thing.

So it was either.

That it was either like a high profile, big triple a.

It's a brand new property using the original idea, but we've written our own story.

Or it was a mobile game that was basically just fruit Ninja, but you were Batman um, and now i feel like everything's just like.

You know, you would just see the t1000 in uh, in fortnite, and that would be about it.

Which he is in fortnite, isn't he, i think?

Yeah, yeah.

And then even like mortal combat 11 and 1 both had separate t2 dlc.

So like yeah, they pop up and up, but it's been so long since we had like a like.

There was a terminator like first person shooter fallout type game that came out like five years ago.

That was actually like pretty solid.

It might be called terminator resistance um, that was good, but like, until then there's.

Then there's the original terminator 2 pinball game and then arcade game, which is what has the machine gun, and that got ported.

But then there's a million like bad spinoffs.

There's like terminator vs robocop, which is like a super, which i think also is a comic that frank miller wrote, but like there's like that's why i've been burned a million times by bad games.

So it's like i was nice to play this and it was like oh, it's surprisingly good.

Oh, this is all like, and I do want to go back and play the bad Terminator spinoff games now inspired by this.

But yeah it's, it's like weird to get a good license game.

And a lot of people have said the mummy D mastered is also.

That was another game that I don't know what studio made that, but they got some studio got hired to make the mummy D mastered because Tom Cruise had a mummy movie and universal was trying to rebrand the cinematic uh, monster universe.

So this game, the mummy demastered, came out.

I never played it but everyone was like this is a weirdly good licensed movie.

The soundtrack is fantastic.

Really, really good music for that game.

Yeah, you remember the start of the dark universe?

This is the start of the dark universe.

Fools, they got their morbius moment with that one.

Um, speaking of terminator games, i was just looking up here because i know there is that terminator survivors that we were talking about.

Uh, after we recorded the thing of like, now they have nakon, are developing and publishing their own.

It looks like multiplayer game in some capacity.

I can't really.

Everything looks the same now um, but last year there was a terminator rts.

I can't imagine a more anti-frank thing to say, but a terminator rts called terminator dark fate defiance what, oh my god.

Yeah, it's a real-time strategy, It's not just a game.

It's an adrenaline-fueled journey where your strategic prowess decides the fate of mankind against the machines.

Wait, why does this look good?

Right?

This actually looks like a good RTS game.

How have I never heard this?

Why does this look so good?

What the fuck?

I'm going to play this.

It's got positive reviews.

It's got really good reviews.

And it's on sale on Steam right now.

It's developed by the team that did Broken Arrow and I don't know how many of the same people, but Broken Arrow and I don't think it's published at least by them and the Starship Troopers game.

Yeah, Slytherin.

Yeah, rts underserved genre.

Very agree, i've we gotta bring it back?

There should be more.

Maybe you should do that.

Maybe your game, where people spend a hundred thousand dollars, should be on a tank that you can destroy.

All right, let me.

I'm glad you brought this back up because i need to fix.

I need to.

I unwrite the star citizen slander that was thrown at my skin.

I'm so sorry.

It is a scam.

That is true.

Okay.

But the reason it's different is because the ship that you buy with real money in Star Citizen, everyone has a ship.

Yours is just different.

In my scam, only the rich people have the rarefied thing.

So when you see it, you're not like, oh, that's like a thing but different.

You're like, that is the only thing.

Okay.

That is why my scam is different.

Okay, that's it.

We'll come back to it later when you've got a new multi-level marketing scheme.

We'll figure it out.

If I'm going to enter my PC Barnum heel era, I need to come correct, all right?

You got to go all out.

Make sure that you're at least being honest about your scam.

Yes.

I do appreciate that.

And I want to be respected for the level of craft that I put into my scams.

You're right.

I'll clap after you rip a million dollars out of 10 people.

Hey, there's a sucker born every minute and some of them have a million dollars.

And every time they get sucked out of $100,000, an angel gets its wings.

Amen.

You know, it's not a scam.

Terminator 2D, no fate.

Pick it up on Steam, Xbox, PlayStation, Switch.

I think so.

Yeah, I played it on PS5, but let me see what it's on.

And yeah for, like Frank said, 20 off right now you can get it for 25 smackaroonies usd.

Uh it's.

It looks like a ton of fun.

There's lots of good opportunities to replay.

You can see some of the, like frank said, see all the stuff played out a little bit differently, learn all the story stuff.

I imagine if it does well, they'll probably keep updating it too, adding new things.

I wouldn't be surprised.

Um, you know, no promises there.

They didn't tell us anything, but seems awesome nonetheless.

Um, congrats to them for getting out the door as well.

Like i said, it was delayed a bunch.

Uh pretty close to launch two times.

So uh, always nice to see that story end well and not negatively.

Are there any good Terminator movies after Terminator two?

Terminator three is okay.

I've not seen any of them after one and two.

Is, uh, is dark fate the newer one?

Is it Jen?

Yeah.

What's the one where they brought, they like made had one where it was like Sarah, like Linda Hamilton came back.

That's dark.

Is that dark?

I bought like a 4k Blu-ray of that for like $8 at book off once, but never watched it.

And I feel like that's one of like if I watched it with no expectations, I'd probably like Oh, that was cool.

But um yeah, i think i've only seen terminator 3 and then i think i've just forever checked out after that.

I don't think i saw the christian bale one.

I might, i don't know, i don't know.

But yeah, that one's genesis right salvation, the salvation.

Okay, what the hell's genesis is that a thing?

That's the one where they had uh, what the fuck, what's game of thrones lady?

And then there's like a korean actor in it too.

Oh yes yeah yeah yeah, amelia clark.

Uh terminator, salvation.

The music was done by danny elfman.

It's really that's how you know it's.

I'm picturing like yeah yeah, the t-1000 comes out.

Yeah yeah fucking simpsons, ass music, real bouncy terminator soundtrack.

It's term terminator one, one of the best films of the 80s.

Terminator two one of the best ones of all time.

So there's terminator three.

Then salvation genesis, dark fate.

There's also.

There was a show called the sarah connor chronicles which i never watched.

My mom watched that.

She's got the disease where she'll watch anything with terminator in it.

Uh, she said it was fine, she got through it.

I might.

Oh yeah, people in the comments, if you've seen the other terminator films, you know, let me know.

Yeah, but i don't know i, because part of me is like i like terminator so much i feel like i'd probably like dark fate, and then I don't know.

I could still skip salvation Genesis, but Genesis seems bad.

Funny.

I mean, Arnold's back and then what's her name?

Amelia Clark.

Yeah.

She can't be bad.

It's yeah.

And Lee Byung-hoon who was just in no other choice.

He's a great actor.

I don't know.

I got to see Terminator Genesis.

That seems crazy.

I mean, yeah.

Oh my God.

What do you think I should do?

Should I watch no other choice or should I watch Terminator dark fate first?

Yeah, that looks good.

Korean cinema can't go wrong while you can, but usually it's pretty good if it reaches the West.

There you go.

Terminator 2D, no fate.

Check it out on your platform of choice.

We do have a ton of emails this week, a true avalanche of emails in this snowy season if we're in the northern hemisphere.

But I do want to mention one more thing that I got a chance to play a little bit this week.

Everyone got a chance to play a little bit this week.

If you're watching the Game Awards, you saw that Pragmata, which now has a release date of April 24th of next year.

There's a demo that you can play on Steam, which is 10 minutes long, which is a great dance.

All you need.

That's all I needed because I'm very excited for that game now.

I think it is phenomenal.

Frank, you played some of this at Summer Games Fest where Summer Game Fest one game.

They only have one game and it was Pragmata with Danny.

And you had some thoughts on it.

You enjoyed it, yeah?

I loved it.

I was like, holy crap, it feels like a weird Xbox 360 game.

I was like, not shocked, because it's Capcom and I feel like for the last five plus years they've fumbled one generation but they've been great for a long.

They've been back at it forever.

And so, yeah, I was so stoked on it.

But yeah, I'm eager to hear your thoughts now that you played it.

Yeah, I thought it was great.

So this is a third person action game where like you're playing as what's his name?

Hugh Williams is the character's name.

Funniest possible name they could have given him.

He's like a space.

He works for a space company on the moon and he uh, he is working with an Android girl named Diana, or or Megan, from the Megan movie.

She looks exactly like that.

Uh, and the gameplay is, as I said, a third person shooter, but also it's like 50 third person shooter, 50 pipe dream hacking mini game where uh, Diana is capable of hacking these robots that you're fighting.

These like Android style characters, uh, Um, there's other things.

There's like a drone and like these other weird things that you fight.

It's got, it's very vanquish looking.

A lot of everything, a lot of the enemies and the armor design looks very much like they're, uh, like vanquish.

Is that Capcom also?

So vanquish.

I don't know if it was Capcom, but vanquish was uh, the shinji makami, the guy who did resident evil and everything.

He he, it was part of like the clover i don't know if it was that, but like it's platinum platinum, yeah.

So like everyone who worked at capcom made the awesome games, left and then made more capcom awesome type games.

So yeah, it's the same capcom dna is in vanquish yeah yeah, for sure.

And it's also, i guess, in in pragmata as well.

Uh, that was published by sega uh, vanquish.

But yeah pragmata, it has that visual style to it.

But the, the hacking that the diana can do is it's like, While you're looking at an enemy, you can pull up this.

It's like, it's like pipe dream, like a weird set of blocks next to the characters, like a grid that you can move this little energy block around and you're trying to hit all of these squares.

And it feels kind of like hokey at first.

Like the first time I did it, I was like, OK.

That's neat, I guess in theory, but then I?

Then I had to fight two enemies at once and my brain exploded.

I was like, okay, I get what they're going for here.

So you hack the enemies by sort of completing this very simple puzzle of like get the block, get your little snake.

Basically it's, it plays like snake, get your snake over to the green power thing.

And then, once it's there, you've revealed the enemy's weakness and you can hit it for massive damage.

And then you use these guns that Hugh has access to like basic.

You know your stuff pistols, shotgun but they call it something else.

You get like an AOE stun thing.

So you have like more time to hack or do all this sort of stuff.

It feels like.

At first I thought it was going to be a hard thing to juggle of, like dealing with the hacking and dealing with the shooting.

This is all from a 10 minute demo, by the way, of doing those two things at once.

But like they give you a lot of leeway, like a lot of leeway.

It's very it was very simple on the on the normal difficulty.

Not an insult.

I am excited to see how it grows over the rest of the game.

But I was I was surprised. how easy it felt like it's still a complex thing but it's not overly it's not overwhelming basically is what i'm getting at um so that was cool i think a lot of the setup that they've done of the sci-fi world is pretty interesting again just from that very quick start the visuals are very is it unfair to say look like death stranding even to some extent like the player character looks a bit like the mascot for koji pro so i don't think that's too far off um there's a lot of depth to that puzzle solving as well like there's a lot of things to consider like you can get these um like pickups that, it's so, this game is so strange, but like so normal at the same time.

The pickups that you find are squares that you can place in the grid.

You don't place them manually.

They're sort of randomly placed whenever you start doing a hack.

But if you cross over them, you can trigger like oh, this enemy will take more damage, or this multiple enemies around the enemy that you're hacking will also be hacked.

But sometimes you don't want to use it.

Sometimes you want to actually avoid the upgrade that you have and just get to the end without triggering it, because you have a limited number of uses.

So like there's some strategy there.

I'm just very excited to see how this whole thing plays out, because I love the idea of hacking on the fly.

Like Watch Dogs, Watch Dogs 2.

Watch Dogs 2 is probably one of my favorite games of all time.

Like I think that game is fantastic.

I love the hacking part of it.

If you just shoot in that game, it sucks.

But if you hack stuff all the time, it is a bizarrely enjoyable puzzle game from start to finish.

It is so good.

The way you like, hack drones, like if you try to break into or solve a mission without ever shooting a gun.

The game is a hundred times harder and a hundred times more interesting.

And this doesn't seem like it's quite on that open world level of like hacking the enemies is all you can do.

Like hacking does deal damage, but like the quick interactions that you do outside of combat, Diana can interact with locked doors and stuff and solve simple puzzles.

It's not like overly complex or anything, but I found it to be Like just there's.

There's this tangibility to it.

That felt really nice.

It was just you do a quick little button.

You press a hack.

I love hacking.

So I'm very excited for this.

Again, it's a 10 minute long demo.

You can check it out on Steam.

It feels more like a performance test than anything else.

But it's it's you get the idea right away.

And I could see me doing this for precisely six to eight hours, which is roughly how long I feel this game would be before we get really annoying.

And I'd probably play it again, too.

But I agree with you, Frank.

I think Capcom has been uh, just killing it with weird stuff for the last couple years, like they've also been doing the resident evil remakes and making their own new line resident evil games, which have been pretty well received.

But even like kunitsugami from what was that last year, two years ago?

Um, that was awesome and very strange.

Very like 2008.

No, very like 2004, 2005 capcom.

So it's nice to see them not only be successful with their big properties but also come back and, like make something that works in the strange range of like beautiful Joe style games, stuff like that.

It's nice to see it anyway.

Plus, plus.

You never get like.

At some point every beloved franchise was like a new idea.

You know like resident evil 1 wasn't.

They weren't like all right, let's make 20 of these after we do.

You know what i mean?

They just made a game.

So uh, who knows, maybe in 2050 a podcaster will be like.

I can't believe.

Pragmata 1 is like so rough compared to pragmata 7.

What were they doing?

They were still figuring out how to have the player do two things at once.

Idiots.

We can just do that now with our neural links.

The little girl in Pragmata is so, she's supposed to be an android, right?

Yeah.

She's so uncanny looking.

There's something about her and I couldn't place it and I finally figured out what it is.

She kind of looks like like a, like a like a tiktok or like a like a korean app on your phone that makes your camera make you look like a child.

She looks like an adult with a filter that makes you look like a child or something.

She does look like that.

You know the horror movie megan, right?

Yeah, is she a mithrigan?

She looks like mithrigan.

Uh, i've never seen that movie and i uh, i don't know much about pragmata other than that she's an android also.

They could have.

Just maybe the people that made the android were like we'll make her look uncanny also.

The uncanniness works because she's like, not a human person, but uh yeah, i couldn't place it until now it's.

It is definitely like she looks like a black desert online default character or something she just has.

Her features are too perfect, to be fair.

Also, where winds meet, there's a little girl companion in that game and her it's funny because a lot of the characters look like, you know, like triple a, like photo realism, and then she has like cartoon character dimensions to her face, like her eyes are, you know, like tiktok film.

They're giant and it's uh, it's very odd how there's sort of like this weird, like stylization that applies to child characters in these otherwise hyper photorealistic games.

It's a very weird contrast.

They're bringing moe to unreal engine 5.

They're finally doing it.

They have the technology to pull it off.

Um yeah, Pragmata.

I think it seems pretty interesting.

Uh, it's a, it's, I honestly, I'm very excited for it.

Although unfortunately it will be launching pretty close to after when my child is born.

So, uh, maybe I won't play that.

I'll be.

I'm probably going to be having ice soup for the next seven months of my life, while I pay for everything for this child.

So, uh, if anyone wants to know, don't buy me anything.

I don't need video games.

I need fewer video games.

If anything, come and take them from my house.

Uh yeah, i think it's like the way people talk about like like second amendment reform.

You're like, come and take them, come and get them over my dead body, over my dead body, you'll take pragmata for my shelf.

Yeah, can't wait for it.

Think it looks really, really cool and i'm excited to see in what other ways they deal with the hacking.

And also congratulations to mithrigan on her performance in a capcom game.

Good job branching out.

Those are all the games that we played this week, including the Game Awards.

Also, I want to mention, by the way, the Game Awards.

Shoutouts to patron and homie Kron.

Before the show started.

In their own moment of clairvoyance, they had guessed that Werner Herzog was going to show up at the Game Awards.

For the Mario movie voicing Yoshi.

Now, joke, clearly a joke.

How could you know Werner Herzog was going to show up at the Game Awards for a bit, especially when he was guessing a completely different thing?

Instead, Werner Herzog shows up for Warframe to advertise their new expansion, or like re-explaining what Warframe is to people.

You know, he did his classic Werner Herzog explanation voice.

It's pretty cool.

Anyway, avalanche of emails.

Let's get to that because we have a ton of them here and they all seem really great.

Frank, you want to take it away?

Yeah, thanks everyone who sent in emails.

Uh, please write to us.

Podcast at noclipvideo or on our patron channel for the podcast chat.

Once again, that's podcast at noclipvideo.

Chase from sacramento asks what is one game or system from the past that you wish you had a chance to document its development and or its release?

Could be a game or studio that was plagued with problems, or could be quite the opposite.

I'm curious what release would be most excited to cover if he had the means to do so at the time.

Earthbound.

I would love to be a fly on the wall for the development of Earthbound.

It was an incredibly troubled development.

And there's a very interesting story about how it was rescued.

And also Shigesato Itoi is the GOAT.

That's a pretty good pick.

That's a really good pick, actually.

That would be cinema.

Werner Herzog could have made it.

He could have.

You should never play this game.

It stinks.

Don't play it.

He would say don't play it because it's like too, it would shake you to your core.

You will never play a better game than Earthbound.

The boy eats a hamburger.

It changed my life forever.

I can't really think of anything, honestly, off the top of my head.

Everything that like I wanted a documentary on, no clip is made.

And now I just work for no clip.

So that's pretty cool.

Frank, what about you?

I guess Shenmue is like Yu Suzuki took his whole team to like the great wall of China.

Like.

That in itself is like.

Maybe I'm wrong on that, but I believe.

I believe they went to China for like trips.

There was like so many stories of like Yu Suzuki just kept taking his team to China.

And like I feel like that in itself is like an interesting thing to like have documented but like Shenmue for its time was like the first 100 million game.

And just like at the time, like my brain went to like Jet Set Raider, like the launch of the Dreamcast.

But like Shenmue itself is such a wild, ambitious project.

And now that whole team's evaporated, many of those people ended up working on Yakuza games and like Sonic, Sonic Team and stuff like that.

But it's like, man, yeah, the whole Shenmue saga, Shenmue one and two, and even like.

I don't know even the, not the demise of Dreamcast, but like they had to shift, they half released Shenmue 2 in Europe, I think, on Dreamcast and then shipped it in North America for Xbox.

But yeah, the Shenmue story.

Also Yu Suzuki is getting pretty old.

So like, oh my God, I don't know.

But yeah, I don't know.

Shenmue, I think for its time seems so ambitious.

The way they talked about it was like when we did the podcast on the Square Enix Final Fantasy movie, talking about all the computers and rendering they needed.

Like I can't imagine at the time, like how, like when I saw the trailer for Shenmue, I think I think my brother and I we got a magazine that had CDs.

This sounds so ancient.

Back in the day, they used to have video game magazines.

Oh, tell me more.

And in the magazine was a CD.

You put the CD in your computer.

What's a CD?

And then you could play trailers and stuff, so like, it's so archaic, whereas now i'm talking about, like dude, i saw the terminator trailer on my phone at the zoo so we popped in the cd in the computer and played the shenmue trailer and i remember thinking like oh, this is like lifelike, this is the most real.

And all it was was like gameplay footage of rio, like walking in a neighborhood.

I was like this is the graphics will never be better than this.

So to me, shenmue is like historic, historical.

It's such a crazy game and I'm like oh, I feel like no one even makes fun of it anymore.

No one's teasing.

No one cares about Shenmue.

What happened?

Shenmue 3 happened.

Yeah, well, come on.

Come on.

That's why I was holding my breath for Shenmue 4 at the Game Awards.

But no, I mean, like, yeah, there's so much.

I don't know.

Sega is having resurgence, but I feel like.

The Dreamcast era is when Sega was like at the peak of the world, and then just, you know the game, you know everything changed.

So it's like, yeah, I can never get enough Dreamcast stuff.

That's why truly people haven't seen it yet.

On Noclip 2 is the Jet Set Radio thing.

I got to make like a 10 minute documentary on Jet Set Radio.

The fact that I got to sit in for a QA and like heard, like glimpses of what the development life was like phenomenal.

So like, yeah, Jet Set Radio would be awesome too.

But Shenmue is like the biggest, most bizarre game ever that like kind of people don't talk about anymore.

Yeah, that would be very cool to go back in time and do that.

You know, you just remind me because you've been talking about all these great Japanese games.

Killer 7.

I would love, I wish, just because like that game is insane.

So much stuff going on.

I'd love to see at what point they were like, yeah, let's just do Power Rangers.

Just do it for like 30 minutes.

Why not?

People will love it.

Uh, team silent documentary i would love to just like fly on the wall about.

There's no way you could have made it because there's no way you could have known how crazy.

I mean, that's the case for all of these, but like that one in particular, it's a fly on the wall for that development process of you know.

One and two especially would have been crazy if there was like a 12 hour documentary that was silent hill, one through four and ended in tragedy.

It would be the best documentary about video games ever made.

That would be awesome.

A few of my answers to this question.

I cannot say

Some of them, because they're documentaries I want to make for Noclip.

One of them is a documentary I already made for Noclip that has not been released yet.

I know what you're talking about.

Like nine months ago.

Was it really that long ago?

It was right when I moved to Massachusetts, I delivered it.

And it's like 95 done, been a long year.

But also hey, release the jane cut.

It's the only cut.

Uh yeah, there there is a full ass noclip documentary that i think um, i think it will be, i think it'll be, i think people will like it.

It was one of my dream interviews and i got to do it and uh, hopefully it'll be out there sometime next year.

Fingers crossed.

I can't wait to see it.

All I've heard is good things from Jeremy.

He's been hyping himself up.

So if it doesn't meet the expectations, I'm not buying the 100000 boat.

I'm not doing it.

From the guy who made it and is the only guy who's seen it, it sounds good.

Yeah.

It'd be funny if you were like, yeah, it's fine.

Oh, I will say one.

This is a documentary I do actually want to make for Noclip, but I'll spoil it because it's pretty like low stakes.

I it's fine if if someone else makes this documentary, i won't cry about it.

Um, the uh, secret of evermore not secret of mana, but secret of evermore is uh, it's like an american jrpg.

It's an american made jrpg that squaresoft published.

Oh yeah, you were talking about this a long time.

It was like made up in like redmond, washington or some shit uh, and i loved it as a kid.

As a kid I was just like oh, this is like Secret of Mana, but different.

It's not as good, but I think it'd be interesting to do a documentary that was like the American JRPG.

The ARPG.

Wait, no, no.

Yeah, different.

There's a, this game has a dog that looks like a toaster and shoots laser beams.

As you travel through time, the dog turns into a different dog.

It's cool.

So when you're in like, make it happen.

You're in the Neolithic era.

It's like a big wolf hound.

Then you're in like ancient Egypt and it's like a, I don't know, a Sphinx.

The Sphinx is like not a dog, but something like that.

Whatever.

It's like an Anubis dog.

This sounds amazing.

Alan Weiss, balls in your court, brother.

Hit us up.

Noclip.video, send us an email.

Also George Sinfeld, which is almost George Seinfeld, which is a very funny ship name.

Next email, Frank.

Yeah, Koshimitsu wrote in.

I've often had friends over who don't really play games and see them struggle with games.

Sorry, let me rewind.

Koshimitsu wrote in and asked I've often had friends who sorry, I've often had friends over who don't really play games and seeing them struggle with things in games we were able to do without thinking like controlling the camera with the right stick while moving with the left stick.

What game would you recommend as a good onboarding experience for someone who isn't familiar with modern game controls?

Mooncat in UFO 50.

Oh, that's mean.

Yeah.

Actually they might take to it better because they don't have the free knowledge that you have to undo to learn.

They'll play that first and then they'll play Mario and be like, why does this feel like shit?

Yeah.

Sucks.

They wouldn't have to empty themselves of knowledge to refill.

They would be empty.

This is tough.

This is tough because there's like there's answers to it that are era dependent.

Like, if I said you wanted to play N64 PS1 era platforming games, just play Mario 64.

That will probably give you a rough understanding of how to move in that era.

But I don't know.

Play The Last of Us now if you want to play games released from like 2015 onward.

They all control and feel like that, that are, like, big budget games anyways.

Yeah, I would also recommend, like... um the tough thing is that you don't want to you don't want to be like like your 35 year old wife who's like yeah i'd love to try a video game and you're like here's a game that's made for babies i think it's at your level you love this sweetheart it's a it's a hard sell and it's also kind of demeaning um a lot i think it's like uh it takes two might be a good one yeah it takes two works great yeah something that's like co-op also if well that one is split co-op where it's like you're doing separate stuff but co-op where you can directly help them also would be cool because then you can seem cool because they're like this game's hard and you're like watch this yeah unfortunately that game has a lot of long sections where it's like a platforming puzzle or challenge and if you reach the end you just got to wait for the other person to make it yeah and it will start some fights i'm not speaking from experience um good good uh good good shout though frank is there anything that springs to mind for mario i don't know it's like what's like like my first thought was like something like persona where you're just picking choices but then there's like if you play persona on like easy they might get intimidated but that's like you're walking around having dialogue and you can kind of like i don't know like like i feel like anything that's like a jrp you're just making choices is kind of easy but then there can be complicated systems with that my other brain went to like just just throw them on super monkey ball even if it gets hard it legitimately is like you roll and you collect bananas and and maybe you jump but i feel like though I think this last one invented jumping but all the basic invented jumping added jumping a lot of super monkey ball is you see the thing and you just roll the ball and it's like a grab it feels like there's an instinctual like physics like totally I don't I feel like it's not too complicated Jeff Gerstmann's answer is like not for modern games he says like Jeff Gerstmann answers like this a while ago and he's like super like just the original Mario Brothers like you left right you jump that's like if you want to learn games but yeah what's the modern equivalent of that maybe yeah a Mario game would be good honestly DK Bonanza is is like such a that's why i like that game you can just mash in any direction you're making progress so like dude there's nothing more modern than that dk bonanza another game with a little girl on your back we've been a big year for japanese games with a little girl on your back crazy yeah predator badlands 2 doesn't also have uh l fanning on the predator's back what's going on with that i don't know behind every great man is a great woman i think that's the quote right michelle obama with obama she was a side character child um frank what's up i didn't know predator badlands released on vod a week ago i just haven't had a chance to see it so now i'm gonna download it and watch it sometime this week oh my god i'm so excited yes i've been dying to see this hell yeah okay cool sorry sorry jeremy you're gonna say something earlier i cut you off i'm not a minecraft guy and i've literally played minecraft for maybe 20 minutes total but i feel like minecraft might be a good one because it's sort of open-ended Minecraft is definitely a good idea just because it's like first person.

It's fairly straightforward in the amount of buttons you have to press.

And then also it sort of teaches you the mechanics and systems that are in basically every single video game.

Like every first person game you'll be able to play after that.

Yeah, basically.

Yeah.

Anything with crafting, anything with an inventory that you have to maneuver items around in.

Like there's tons of stuff you'll learn from playing.

That's a really good idea.

Yeah, diablo 2.

So wait, diablo 2, diablo 2 on.

Is there an easy mode in diablo 2?

Diablo 2 just play diablo 2.

Everyone should just play.

I haven't played it yet, but everyone else should.

Jesse look, i will only play it if you're there, because then what's the point?

I'm playing it for my own pleasure.

What i need you there?

I need there to be a video where we play diablo 2 from start to finish together and we record the entire thing.

I need that to exist.

Patreoncom slash noclip2.

Leave a comment.

If the people demand it.

Yeah.

We need you to vote on our behalf.

You're kind of like our legislators.

We're lobbying you.

$100,000.

We got it from people buying stuff in Jeremy's game.

I keep coming back to this bit because it's so funny.

I'm sorry.

It's very funny.

I love this game.

I'm glad you appreciate it.

I think it's so dumb that I love it.

It's so good.

Next email, Frick.

I did want to issue a correction.

Predator Bandlands is not on official VOD.

The thing I saw is hard-coded with Russian subtitles, which I speak Russian, so maybe that's all right.

But the VOD might be January or February.

So I was like, all right, I might wait.

I might wait.

You can watch it.

Yeah.

I'm already – so maybe it's okay for me.

But, yeah, I was like bummed.

I was like, oh, crap.

Whatever.

Anyways, Catherine wrote in.

What's the last time you played a game?

Sorry.

What's the last time you played a game that became one of your favorites ever?

Uh, I started playing, uh, Valhalla recently.

And sometimes the game just clicks with you immediately.

Huh?

Valhalla.

The, uh, visual VA one, one hall a. Okay.

Yeah.

For me it was this year, it was Needy Streamer Overload, Needy Streamer Overdose, which again is a weird technicality because, like that game technically came out in 2022.

I didn't know about it until this year.

My friend was like, yeah, I'm going to this thing in Akihabara.

I was like, what the hell is this?

And then now you see it, like even at PAX this year, they're demoing it.

And we did a quick look with Jeremy like- back in february, and the only reason i played it this was the year it came out on ps5.

And uh yeah, that's the game where you are the boyfriend of a, of a twitch streamer e-girl, and you have to manage like, her mental health.

She has to manage her twitch popularity, like it is just.

It is so like i've had a girlfriend who's a twitch streamer, i'm a twitch streamer and like there's so many lines of dialogue that echoes so true, like it is just such a and i also streamed it, which is like a double layers of meta irony.

But then the fact that it takes place in tokyo.

There's the, there's the jr subway line, you can go to all my favorite neighbor, like it is made for otakus.

And it was just like, oh my god, this game is perfect.

And there's like 20.

It's like near automata.

There's like 26 endings um so yeah, needy streamer overloads.

Like oh my god yeah, it's like one of my, I don't know.

It's, it's rare when a new thing enters your like cannon of like favorite stuff ever.

But for me, I'm like, Oh yeah, it scratches like cute anime stuff.

Uh, it's like satire.

It's also Tokyo.

It's, and it's like I was when I was streaming it, like people were upset at the game because it is so like cruel, but it's funny to me.

I don't know.

Like it's just like it's just a dark, mean, fun, fucked up game.

And I really like it.

And it's cute.

And like also there's like now you have generations of girls who are cosplaying it.

There's figures everywhere.

It's entered the like anime zeitgeist or whatever.

And yeah, I don't know.

So needy streamer overload was was phenomenal.

And that was a discovery this year.

I have heard a ton of people talking about that since you, you were ahead of the curve on this one.

It's I've seen people being very excited for it.

And I think the team's working on something new that got announced recently.

Um, so there's a lot of hype around that too.

So, so good shout.

Is that published by playism?

I feel like it is.

I think so.

And then there was also a weird fault where like, they're going to make an anime adaptation of it, but the original it's like I'm not disco Elysium style, but like I think the original creator it's like no longer in their hands.

So it's something, something like that.

But then the original they're i don't know again.

It's like discos now.

There's like three different teams are making new things based on it.

There's like a we covered it in the next fest demo.

There's like a rhythm game based on some of the same people but um yeah, i don't know, it's just uh, it's hard again.

Maybe that's worth doing a documentary on what the hell?

Where did this come from?

Hey, you're going back.

What's going right, you gotta do it.

Also published.

It looks like it's self-published by wss playground uh, and also by alliance arts.

So there you go.

Very cool, i can't see.

I can't wait for you to play whatever they got coming up next, because i know it'll be exciting.

Uh, for sure.

Uh jeremy, any anything for you that sticks out here.

There's only one thing i can think of it it's neon white, and i feel like i've been very vocal about that.

That was years ago, so no, that's a good answer.

Uh, for me it's ooh.

Ooh is like yeah, ooh is like an all-time golden age of nintendo level experience that came out this year.

Um i, uh.

I recorded a video on ooh last night.

Uh for uh.

I believe it's a patron thing.

It might be public at some point, but in it i make the uh, the crucifiable uh.

Take that.

Um, i played super metroid and ooh this year and it was better.

I think it was a not only is better, is a better metroidvania whoa uh, and i can substantiate that claim.

But this is, it's a longer uh, a longer sort of uh hypothesis.

Sounds like a video essay.

Yeah, it doesn't, it doesn't fit in the end of this podcast.

Could you say it in under five minutes?

Cause we have the money for that.

No.

All right.

Uh, yeah.

Neon white for me.

Uh uh, this year actually also sectory.

Uh, i went from excited for that game from the demo to this is a disease that i have now and i love playing it so much.

It makes me so happy.

I love play.

It's nice to have something i can go back to and there there's no requirement for me to sit down and pay attention, like obviously it's a game fully about paying attention and dodging bullets and everything, but like i don't have to prepare to like think about the words or think about it for work or whatever.

I can sit down and 15 to 30 minutes will go by and I will have fun the entire time.

My heartbeat will be higher than it should be in a healthy state.

My blood pressure will be through the roof, but at least I'm having fun, and that's all that matters.

Yeah, Sektori, great game.

Next email, Frank?

Yeah, Vegas Buffet wrote in, it's been almost 25 years since Magic the Gathering came out.

It's hard to fathom a Slay the Spire Bellatio world without Richard Garfield's pioneering design and card mechanics.

However, he directly led Valve's biggest bomb.

How does the crew see Richard Garfield's legacy in retrospect?

Valve's biggest bomb?

I think that's Artifact.

Artifact was he made like a card game and then that became notorious because on twitch people just streamed movies and the artifact channel um oh, it really like it was a game that like they like immediately they had like pay to win card mechanics and they immediately were like ah, this is gonna be free to play.

What like they like bailed on the project.

I think you'd still play artifact.

That's crazy.

I yeah, i've heard about this, but i didn't know it was.

Uh, it was the magic the gathering guy.

That's wild.

What a bummer.

Yeah, I lack familiarity with Artifact and with Magic the Gathering.

I have played a lot of like deck builders that were inspired by those things, but it is hard for me to assess their relationship to the source material.

Yeah, I wish I knew more about the guy to have a have a thought on this, at least in general.

But I mean Magic the Gathering.

How many card games are as popular as?

That is 25 years after the fact, right?

I mean, not a whole lot.

Pokemon has a card game, but that's not what people know Pokemon for.

They know it for the anime and the games.

Um, or like Yu-Gi-Oh.

People still play Yu-Gi-Oh, but like I don't know if you grew up playing Yu-Gi-Oh like I, did you try to watch it now?

It's, you need a PhD.

They're synchro summoning.

They got like extra spots on the board for stuff.

I don't know what's going on.

Pendulum summon.

I can't keep track of that.

Magic the Gathering though, uh, brand wise.

It's been really weird seeing them incorporate all of the Final Fantasies and Magic the Gathering now.

It's the Fortnite of card games.

Yep.

They've super exploded.

I had a lot of friends get into it recently.

But, funny enough, two of my friends who are into it both have huge salary jobs, so they can afford it.

One's a doctor, so it's just like they're always he's bragging, always.

Like i just got this 400 card, i'm like cool, i'm never gonna play this game, i'm never gonna play it.

But um, but even magic the gathering's been at like summer games fest.

I got like a free fall fantasy deck and like yeah it's, it's the kind of thing that seems interesting.

I like collecting cards, like i have wrestling cards and stuff like that.

So i do have random magic cards just because i like the art.

But like i am too dumb and impatient to learn board games or anything.

There is like i think of magic, the gathering version on steam or what my friend was trying to tell me, like you can play a virtual deck and stuff like that, but it's just like I don't know.

I, I, it's, I don't know.

I'm not opposed to it.

Cause I have so many friends who like go to events.

So there is a social.

I get the social aspect of it, but from my myself, the only thing like I remember in the nineties, like like a kid, like when I was in the first or second grade, was like, do you look at these cards?

Like, I like that like nineties, Tom McFarlane S dark fantasy.

Like I like that style.

But in terms of just playing it, I it's like so out like I don't even know the guy's name Richard Garfield.

Oh, I don't know.

But yeah, Magic Gathering has been a thing I'm not into, but I have lots of friends are.

But I just feel like I like I don't like math class.

I'm just going to skip.

I just not for me.

Yeah.

Yeah, card games to me have the same thing in my brain as puzzle games.

Where, to enjoy a card game, i need to be tricked into thinking it's not a card game.

I don't know why.

It's like i need i need someone to like feed me it while telling me it's something else.

Uh, so like slay, the spire works for me.

It tastes like chicken and it's like mushy peas, like just open up.

Yeah yeah, they blindfold me and they're like i'm gonna feed you some chicken.

I'm like oh, i like chicken.

That's how I feel about card games and puzzles.

For some reason,

I like them when I eat them, but I will not put them in my mouth.

That's fair.

I feel like Slay the Spire and maybe more specifically Slay the Spire.

I feel like every other card game that tries to build off of its, its framework ends up losing the part of it.

That is the thing that makes those two pieces go together for you.

It's like Slay the Spire.

Every round is a puzzle with the cards.

All the other ones are like, what if we took the puzzle part away?

What if it was like everything has stats, you just get enough upgrades and eventually it's like hey, now you don't have to worry about solving the puzzle with the cards that you get.

That part of it is fun.

Minimizing your damage, maximizing how much you deal or sorry, minimizing how much damage you take, maximizing how much you deal is like That's the challenge of playing Slay the Spire.

And I think like Magic the Gathering not that I've played much of it, but like when I was in elementary school no, high school, early high school there was a trip we went on.

There's this kid who was like super nerdy.

I don't know where he is.

I hope he's doing well.

He's probably like working at a Fortune 500 company and makes 100 times more money than I make.

But he was like, you guys want to play Magic the Gathering?

And I was the only person who didn't laugh at him, so he knows I'm chill.

And we would play Magic the Gathering and I was like I don't understand what I'm doing, but you are kicking my ass in one turn.

I didn't get to do anything.

I got to play no cards.

You're having fun.

That's the most important thing, is that you're having a good time.

Magic the Gathering is weird, man.

I do want to say one last thing about the card game.

That isn't a card game.

Puzzle game that isn't a puzzle game thing.

I think that a lot of this can be in the design outside of the micro level game experience.

I think that you can elevate these things purely through framing and context.

And I think that the example I would give is that, uh, ooh is a game that is like puzzle rooms.

Mostly.

Sometimes the puzzles expand beyond one room or whatever.

But um but, because it feels like a continuous platformer Metroidvania world, it doesn't feel like a puzzle game to me, or like slay the spire, because it's like there's a, it's like a roguelike, there's like a dungeon map that you're progressing through.

It doesn't feel like a card game to me, it feels like a roguelike.

Uh, so i think you can.

You can do a lot of the like removing the you know, it's like removing the fish smell from seafood and people are like oh, i like seafood, but i hate that fishy smell.

That's me with like card games.

I like card games where it like feels like the cards are integrated into some sort of larger experience and the cards are just sort of, you know, they're no more or less representative than like characters in a turn-based RPG where you're seeing the characters on screen and they move forward when they swing the sword.

It's all kind of just abstracted versions of what's happening in the game logic, but context matters a lot.

The context can elevate it.

Yeah, I think those versions of a puzzle game is what ends up being most appealing to people who don't normally play puzzle games.

It's like Lorelei and the Laser Eyes worked for a lot of people who don't normally play puzzle games.

Because it's like this is a weird French art movie that sometimes I have to do a little bit of math to progress in.

Or like do figure out what these symbols mean.

Or like aisles and see aisles of sea and sky.

One of the best Sokoban games I've ever played works because it feels like a Zelda game, like a normal traditional Zelda game without combat.

Instead of solving, or sorry, instead you are only solving block pushing puzzles and that stuff.

You don't think about it as Sokoban puzzles.

You just think I'm playing a Zelda game where I'm moving blocks around to like reach the result of whatever I'm doing.

So you're totally right.

I think the framework, is what makes it more appealing to people.

Cause there is I think you made a point about this before which stung me so deeply about like nobody just wants to just solve puzzle books.

Like, but for whatever reason, if you put a bunch of puzzle books around in a mansion and gave me a gun sometimes, now I'm having fun.

Yes.

If you rip every puzzle page out of the puzzle book and you put them in different rooms in the resident evil mansion, then that's a fucking cool video game.

But if you hand me the puzzle book, I'm like.

I just pulled this out of the magazine rack in your bathroom when I was taking a shit.

Right.

And there's not even a pencil.

How am I supposed to solve this with my shit?

There's not even a pencil in here.

Am I just going to read this?

This sucks.

I don't have any of the answers.

Yeah.

I like puzzle games though.

I like them.

They're fun.

One day I'll get you.

I'll find one and you'll love it.

I mean, you found many that I liked.

True.

But one that's just puzzles.

I'll make it and I won't even tell you.

And then you'll love it.

And I'll be like, this fucking sucks.

You'll be just crying.

I'll just throw myself out of a window.

I won't know what to do with myself anymore.

This didn't work, Jesse.

You're an idiot.

We got two more questions here, Frank.

Yeah.

Joshua asks do you think virtual reality game development will explode now that Steam is putting out a likely more affordable device?

No.

I would love for that to be the case, but there's no universe where VR pops off.

There are problems with making VR work that exist past the price of or the general interest in the games that are on it.

Half-Life Alyx is still the best VR game of all time, and it's, what, six years old now?

I'm sure there are other great games on the platform.

I've played at least a handful of decent games that aren't just like Beat Saber in VR.

I bought the Valve Index.

I played it for 200 hours when I got it originally.

I played a lot of cool stuff but for the most part The problem with the platform is space to use it properly.

Like if you're just sitting at your desk and playing a VR game in seated mode.

Yeah, you can play some cool experiences.

But for the most part, it's just like the screen is strapped to my eyeballs.

The price for entry on that, even if you get it really low, is still not going to work for most people.

The most fun you can have with VR is in a large space dedicated to playing the game.

How many people have a spare room just for playing one particular type of video games?

Like that's, that's a pretty hard thing to get ahold of.

That's on top of having a machine that can play it properly.

That's on top of paying for the games.

Like it's a whole nother platform that requires a different platform already.

It's why it hasn't popped off on PlayStation.

It's why Xbox doesn't have one.

Cause they know nobody has an Xbox to begin with.

Why the hell are we going to sell a VR headset that no one's going to buy?

There's too many barriers to it that I think price or performance is, or accessibility getting rid of the wires.

Like, I don't think any of that really solves the problem.

Most people who have meta quests, what are they playing?

Like ape tag or gorilla tag.

Like they don't, they're not buying $50 video games on that thing.

And that's what really there needs to be for that platform to reach that sort of quote unquote mainstream success.

I feel like is uh, that's what people think anyways, when they say that sort of thing, gorilla tag isn't enough.

That's not, that's not good enough, even though a ton of people are playing it.

But if you want those like big half-life Alex level experiences uh, they cost too much money for the amount of people that exist on the platform.

So it's all subsidized by either meta or, or Gabe Newell's yachts.

Like that's your options.

Yeah.

Agreed.

Too much friction.

I have.

I have a uh, a vibe that was no clips vibe that Danny let me hang on to.

Once he got the index, because he why would he use the five?

Uh, and, uh, I played Alyx, and I played a bunch of other games, and it was great.

And while I was playing them, I was like, oh my god, this is the future.

You're caught up in the fervor of it.

But as soon as you put it in a box, it just... it's never coming out of that box.

Yeah.

Like, do we really want to set all that up?

And yeah, not having to set it up does remove that barrier of like, if you could just pick it up and put it on and start playing with the inside out tracking and everything that does remove a barrier, but it still doesn't solve the problem of.

Well, now I got to move my furniture out of the way.

Now I got to make sure I'm not hitting the TV with my controller.

Like I, is my computer good enough to render this at 4k twice and then stream it to the fucking thing?

Cause it doesn't have any cables.

Like yeah, there's still, there's still barriers that i feel like uh, even if you get rid of the price one, the other ones are still too big for most people.

So yeah, much much in the way that.

Um, that like xbox live arcade and like the sort of expanded like indie games to new audiences and then indie games sort of like snowball on that.

And then, you know, steam is like a platform where just like normal, ostensibly like normal people who don't like see themselves as like oh, i play like obscure games.

We'll pick up indie games because they're just there.

Um, i think that vr is there's not a big enough audience because of the price friction, so there's not enough people making games for it.

So there's not enough experimentation, so there's not enough innovation to drive a robust ecosystem of games, so that there's not more people getting into it.

And yeah, it's just like there needs to be.

Even if you remove the towers from the equation, there's still like 700 pieces of friction.

Yeah.

I think VR will continue to be a fun novelty.

Like arcade places that just have VR or like have a VR booth in them.

Those are great.

That I could see continue to be a fun thing, but like I don't know if you could build a whole chunk of an industry around that,

Frank, have you done much VR?

Do you care much for that at all?

I got the PlayStation VR thing when it came out and I played it for like got less than a month probably, and then this is before i wore glasses, so it was like it would make me nauseous.

I didn't know.

I had like a astigmatism.

I thought about getting a psv what do you call it?

Ps5, vr?

But it's still expensive.

Maybe like five years from now, before ps6 comes out, i'll buy a secondhand clearance one i really want.

I still haven't played half-life alex, so i am interested in the uh valve box, whatever the hell it's gonna be, i forget whatever.

Um steam yeah, but i, but i um or the yeah, whatever.

The steam frame right yeah, steam frame, but like is half-life alex the only game i feel like in?

I know resident evil has vr adaptations.

There's like the luminous and red stuff, but it's like yeah, there's not enough software for for me to be interested.

So i don't know, i really want to get a cheap one one day, but I mean no, I was like maybe they have super cheap ones in Japan.

I don't know.

They do have surprisingly cheap VR headsets, old XR headsets you can still use in VR.

Like XR was their extended reality stuff.

So you could like still interface with the world, but have a screen on your face.

Cause that's fun.

But they have some version of those that you can use on your windows machine and still have the experience of using VR.

But even then it's like 150 bucks, 200 bucks for like a subpar experience.

And again, it's still, do you have a big enough room?

You know all those things that just get in the way of it.

Really cool if you can do it very, very cool if you can do it, but unfortunately most people can't.

So stick to your flat screen game in there, folks.

Ps5 is also too much money actually, i don't know.

Just play the, play your nintendo switch for as long as you can get some magic cards.

And have you ever played magic the gathering they have did?

They have resident evil, yet they don't.

They have spider-man though.

Right yeah, spider-man got added.

Yeah, now it's a real game, much like fortnite.

One more email frank.

Yeah uh, uh.

Riven asks what are your favorite enemy slash monster designs in games, slash movies?

Oh, that's a good question.

I feel like there's a lot of good horror monsters.

Yeah, resident evil always comes to mind, like the liquor is sick, nemesis is sick, the new guy in requiem I don't know what's going on there.

I love it.

It looks very cool.

Did you watch the trailer?

Did you see the trailer?

Did you see this?

Have you heard about this?

No?

Very cool.

I won't say anything then.

Go watch the trailer.

I think it's a cool design.

Silent Hill also has really great bosses and enemies and stuff.

I haven't played F, but... Well, actually, I played a little bit of F. I didn't like it very much.

But the characters and the enemies, really cool.

And there was that Silent Hill, the secret message or something?

Silent message?

I don't know.

Like a spinoff game they released for free on PlayStation.

And they had a boss or enemy design for that that was just phenomenal.

It's like flower drenched creature.

Very cool.

Very cool design.

My all time favorite video game monster design is Silent Hill, for the room has a like a crab walking baby monster.

And it's like fucking terrifying.

And it stands still.

You're like, is that what the fuck is that?

And then as soon as you get close enough, it's like it just starts like crab walking at you.

Very scary.

I really like those Cronenberg style creatures from basically anything.

Cronenberg has like my favorite.

I love the, the body horror stuff, like, uh, even adjacent stuff, right?

Like the thing is great.

Um, the fly, I love the, the fly in general.

I think that is such a gross looking movie.

Um and uh still wakes the deep that yeah, they had that game from a couple of years ago from the Chinese room, or it might've been last year from the Chinese room.

Um, very, very good monster design in that.

I got very creeped out by that one.

Yeah, I didn't particularly like that game, but I thought the the monster design was unbelievable.

Yeah, super creepy.

Frankie, I'm sure you've got a ton of horror monsters that you like.

Or non-horror.

You don't have to.

Yeah.

I mean, like, even looking at all the, like, I look to the room and there's, like, King Ghidorah.

Like, this was the year I dove into all the Godzilla stuff.

There's, is it Hedorah?

The like ooze monster that's just made of toxic sludge and that was released in the 70s to warn people that we shouldn't pollute.

That's awesome.

So, I don't know.

I love like.

Even now I keep watching the Sentai, all the Super Sentai shows, and every monster design is just insane.

But, like, yeah, the traditional, like, Showa era Godzilla monster design is, honestly uh what's baby godzilla mozilla manila is like the dopiest dumbest looking thing in the world and i love him manila is adorable oh my god look at him he's so smooth yeah manila is awesome i want to rub him he looks rubbable yeah godzilla all that era has really good yeah monsters mothra is is truly an underrated creature a giant moth yeah they actually are kind of scary even when they're small once you get real close up trying to think of anything else there's lots of great monsters out there but i mean like i like a lot of cute monster design like i i fucking like the cactuars in final fantasy are iconic oh that's so good and they're designed sort of like the you guys have talked honeywa right right yeah no yeah yeah it's like exactly like the statue yeah yeah and like some of them are not enemies but just like you know like moogles and chocobos and shit like that final fantasy and uh i like uh what was the i can't remember his fucking name the secret of mana guy uh moogle invented moogles and they're also in secret of mana so they transcend final fantasy yeah there are a lot of cute creatures like that as well i just off the head top it's just i can always think of games but i can't think of the things in them Yeah.

Specific monsters and stuff.

Yeah.

Especially names like, you know, the yellow thing from that one game.

Scary.

So creepy.

Oh, dude, there's a, there's an enemy in a resident evil village.

You got Jeremy.

You got to play that.

Frank, if you play village.

Yeah.

The basement.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

That thing.

Let me ask you a question.

Yeah.

If I did not really love seven, will I like eight?

Probably not.

I feel like eight is way more action focused.

Yeah.

Okay.

So probably not.

I, I am way, I'm a, I like like slow atmospheric horror.

It felt like resident evil seven was a move in the right direction for me.

And it still didn't really click with me.

So I don't know.

I don't know if I'm going to love village.

You probably wouldn't, but you should at least get to that part.

So you could see it.

It was very, I think it's like there it's like, there's four sections of the game.

So it's like, first is like the spooky mansion, the sisters and the big lady.

I think it's number two is like the unique, like there's no combat and i think that's the sequence you would like and then after that it's whatever, but like the for i like the month, the first one, but like there's the second sequence, that's just like you're exploring and it's like subverts.

It's really cool.

So you might take that sequence.

I will play it eventually.

I put off playing seven for a long time because i was afraid i wouldn't like it and i i admire a lot about it.

It just it dips into like i don't know i, it's like i don't know.

We don't have to get into it here someday.

This has been the shortest podcast we've recorded in a while.

If you want to kill 20 minutes no, because it's like it's not i don't know, it's not fun for me to be like hey, you know that thing that everyone loves.

Let me tell you i hate it.

Why i don't like it?

Because it's like i don't know i, i never want to be the guy who's like oh, i'm the only one who sees that it's actually not good, because that's not how i feel.

What are you?

You yeah, you only like moroccan gent or something like.

You know yeah, you famously love, hate everything beloved and love everything maligned.

Um, hipster you no, i fucking, i mean i, i respect the fuck out of it.

I think it's very cool.

I this is my one line on it.

That doesn't isn't like shitting on it.

I, there's a type of to me horror, kind of like bifurcated at some point and there's like there's like weird, like Ari Aster horror.

And to me that's like Silent Hill, even though it has schlock elements, and then like Resident Evil, sometimes feels like it's in both worlds.

Sometimes it feels like Silent Hill and sometimes it feels like a Saw movie and I I like it less when it's like a oh we're, you know, we're at the table and we're eating maggots.

To me it's like it's I'm easily it's, I guess I'm like easily grossed out, and it's like it doesn't scare me.

I'm just kind of like, eh, all right.

Yeah.

I mean I guess they eat maggots and they're like gross people, uh.

But i did really like the design of seven being so uh, focused and sort of like intimate and you're just like moving around the house and there's like it's not like a million zombies being thrown, although there are parts where i feel like there's a few two enemies being thrown at me, but uh, but largely i felt like the atmosphere was very concentrated and focused.

It was just a particular flavor of concentrated horror.

That didn't click for me, but it wasn't that i thought it was bad, i really.

I think it's really cool and like i admire them for taking um, you know beloved franchise that like resident evil 6 is so different from 7, and to see them steer it back in a direction that is legitimately like innovative and cool.

I was, i respect the fuck out of it.

Yeah fair, fair.

I uh gross bugs.

Yeah, it just didn't click for me.

It was a little too like um, like the intro of oh fuck, what's it called?

The evil within is kind of the same for me, where i was like oh wow, this seems like really cool.

This is like a resident evil spiritual successor.

And then they're like what if you were in like an asylum and there was like a guy who's like chopping people up and i'm like i don't, that's not scary to me, that's just like the evil within two is a lot better.

I'll play it eventually.

Yeah, all right, we'll put it on the list of stuff you'll play eventually.

Put it on the list of games.

I'll tell everyone i'll play it.

Oh, sometimes you get like three recommendations in a row from like random people.

And you'll be like, yeah, I'll check that out.

I'm like, he's fucking never going to play that.

He's never going to play that game.

It's like someone hands you a flyer and you're like, oh yeah, I'm going to check this out.

And then you walk around the corner and throw it in a trash can.

Now, sometimes i don't even like wait for them to walk away.

I'm like, oh yeah, cool man, all right, now i i do want to play the evil within two.

There's not enough.

I need like a hyperbaric time chamber to play all these games.

If i had infinite time, i would play every game, even if i hated it.

I feel like my steam library and everything else that i own video game wise is just like in this big mental closet labeled.

One day i'll get really sick, but not deathly so, and that's that.

I'm just waiting for that day to come.

I can't wait to be sick.

You know, be like so if i was so rich that it didn't matter that i would play a lot of these games, yeah.

But sometimes i'm playing a game and i'm like i need to like work on my game or like i need to like make dinner.

That's got to be a particular struggle.

Not the dinner part.

Everyone has to do that.

But like the playing video games and making video games is such a such a different like playing video games is fun.

But making video games is playing video games.

And also you can do whatever you want.

It's like a lucid dream version of making video or playing video.

It's like a lucid dream.

It is.

It's like you're you're making, you're playing a video game and you can just be like I want Abraham Lincoln here.

And then there you go.

Abraham Lincoln's there.

Sometimes it's the least fun thing ever, but usually it's like the most fun thing ever.

And when it sucks, it's just because you made the coolest thing ever yesterday and now you have to make it work properly.

Yeah, usually it sucks because it's like now I have to do UI stuff. yeah oh god oh don't get me started you're you're in unity right are you still yeah we don't have to program talk here we can do it's no yeah no i i still use unity uh usually when people ask me are you still at unity it's because they're about to tell me why unity is bad so i'm like i'm like in a defensive posture i saw you go like turtle into the shell mode there for a second like shut your goddamn mouth because it's usually followed by why haven't you switched to godot yet and it's like and your answer would be because i like using a programming language that's not python I just it's what I'm comfortable I don't know I just it's like I it's a tool that works for me you know what I mean yeah that's totally fair it's I you know I don't know I don't approve of them as a company but like it's just I like my tools yeah the UI stuff is I find frustrating though in unity oh yeah more than other more than Godot oh interesting yeah Godot's you like it's the same structure that you would use for the rest of making stuff in Godot so that the UI is basically just how you would make like characters or anything Oh, interesting.

Yeah.

So you hate fucking graphic raycasters?

Sorry?

Never mind.

There's a different type of raycasting for UI in Unity.

I thought that's what you were referring to.

Oh, no, no.

I don't know.

I just didn't like the way that everything's written in Unity's UI system.

Maybe it's changed since I tried it.

That was like six years ago.

So I don't know.

Whatever.

As long as you're having fun making games, it's all that matters.

Who cares?

As David Lynch so famously said.

Rest in peace.

I hope you're all having a lot of fun working on your little projects, or whatever the fuck he said.

That's right.

Rest in peace.

To the genius himself, David Lynch.

And that's the piece of this episode of the podcast.

My throat is killing me.

I've been talking to these two lovely people for many hours now.

I need to drink more water.

But...

We're only able to afford water because of you guys over at patreon.com slash noclip.

You give us all that lovely money that we can use in exchange for goods and services and all of the other stuff we do with our lives, including buying gifts for our loved ones this holiday season, which I hope you are also remembering to do, because when this podcast launches, you have roughly six days before Christmas and then a bunch of other holidays as well.

I do not know.

I apologize.

But I hope you are enjoying your holiday season.

Like I said, this is the last normal current events podcast that we'll be recording for the rest of the year.

We do have other stuff dropping in the next couple of weeks.

Again, assuming nothing changes between this recording and the next episode that you listen to.

So assuming everything goes this way, this is the last current affairs one you'll listen to.

We will have another one launching the week of Christmas and another week after that for New Year's.

The New Year's one will be us talking about all of the games we're excited for for the new year.

So hopefully you'll check that one out and learn about something that you didn't already know about.

I know everyone on the team has tons of great stuff, at least in the first half of the year that, like has a concrete ish launch date that we're all pretty excited for.

I'm excited to hear what the rest of the guys.

Have to say though, I know Frank, you've got a lot of cool things, even looking forward to, that I have never heard of, which is my favorite part of listening to you talk about your exciting Japanese video games, indie games, stuff like that.

And then Jeremy, I mean there's tons of indie stuff that you you know of that me, the guy who checks Steam every single day, has never seen before.

So that's what I love about this team is we all have such unique interests and we get to bring them to you, the audience here.

On the no clip crew cast.

So hopefully, uh, well you'll look forward to another, how many weeks are there in a year?

52 episodes of the no clip crew cast next year.

We'll be at episode 200 or 300, 300 before the year's out.

That'll be pretty exciting.

I can't wait to see what we do there.

We'll rank 300 video games.

And Jesse and I recorded a very, very ridiculous podcast earlier today.

Yes.

That is for patrons only.

Can we say what it is?

Are we allowed to say that?

Yeah, why not?

Well, you know what?

No, don't say what it is because I don't know.

I don't know.

We don't know.

But it's good.

It's good.

You'll like it.

It's a J-Boys takeover.

I think it is one of the best podcasts we've ever recorded in 268 episodes.

It's really good.

It's really fun.

So if you can check it out, Patreon.com.

It's a goodie.

We'll catch you next time.

We'll catch you next year.

See you next year.

Loser.

I haven't showered since last year.

You dorks.

Don't you love that stupid joke?

I don't know.

Whatever.

I'm so tired.

I'll see you guys next time.

I'll see you guys soon-ish, later in the week, but I'll see you listeners next year, in 2026, when things will be better.

All right.

Bye.

Hope Danny's doing well still.

Bye.

[Game Awards Reflections, Terminator 2D, and Future Industry Speculations]-[The Game Awards, Terminator 2D: No Fate, Mail Bag]

📋 Summary

The Noclip Crewcast: Year-End Reflections and Industry Musings

The Game Awards: A Cultural Rhythm

Terminator 2D: No Fate – A Masterclass in Fan Service

The "Rarefied Experience" Business Model

Pragmata and the Future of Capcom

Listener Q&A and Final Thoughts

🎯Key Sentences

📝Key Phrases

📖 Transcript

[Game Awards Reflections, Terminator 2D, and Future Industry Speculations]-[The Game Awards, Terminator 2D: No Fate, Mail Bag]

📋 Summary

The Noclip Crewcast: Year-End Reflections and Industry Musings

The Game Awards: A Cultural Rhythm

Terminator 2D: No Fate – A Masterclass in Fan Service

The "Rarefied Experience" Business Model

Pragmata and the Future of Capcom

Listener Q&A and Final Thoughts

Deep Learning with ListenLeap

🎯Key Sentences

📝Key Phrases

📖 Transcript

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