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S7 E13: Up Late - Fortune and Glory, Kid
50 Plays1 month ago
Tom, Pete and Dan discuss the importance to both the movie and video game industry of indie developers. From taking risks the big studios won't, to inventing new game mechanics those same big studios then copy and milk the heck out of, your hosts catch up on everything indie!
Beers Reviewed This Episode:
- New England - Sanger - Heffeweizen - 5.8%
- Seeker - Chasing Summer - DIPA - 8.3%
- Hawkers - Four Seasons: Spring - Triply Hazy IPA - 10%
- Slow Lane - Hibernation - Baltic Porter - 9.5%
- Seeker - Amped Up - DIPA - 8%
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Transcript
Introduction and Return of Pixels and Pints
00:00:18
Speaker
Welcome back to Pixels and Pints. Up late, ah I'm Dan. I'm here tonight with a little under the weather, Tom. I'll power through, Captain. And a little under the weather, Pete.
00:00:31
Speaker
Howdy. Tonight we're doing one of our shorter, more focused ah episodes and we've been on a bit of a hiatus ah for somebody's wedding in ah another country. So we thought we'd decide to. Who the fuck was that idea? Decide to take a break while all that happened and we went overseas and shenanigans in Boston and got back and now we're we're getting back into the swings. Thankfully, it's a short one today because it's a warm Sunday afternoon and I'm sitting in a bit of a sweat box of a room too. So while we talk about what we're talking about tonight, we're going to be trying some beers. I'm assuming we've all got Aussie beers today.
Beer Tasting Begins
00:01:10
Speaker
I've got a New Zealand beer, but yes. Yep. So Australasian.
00:01:15
Speaker
Does New Zealand fall under Australasia or do they get the shits with that? Yeah, of course it does. No, no, no. Oceana, Australasia. Oceana. There we go. We'll get Oceana. And it's an Aussie beer anyway. It's just a New Zealand style Pilsner. We'll be trying some beers. Add some Deethal. Have either of you guys got yours poured already?
00:01:38
Speaker
No, boss man. Yes. Well, Pete, you can hit the ground running with that and then you can introduce the topic. I am ah forgot we're doing an up late, so I didn't pick ah a big AVV. That's okay. I'll i'll start with this. It's a palate cleanser. So right now I'm drinking New England Brewing Co's Sangha.
00:01:59
Speaker
sangga which is a heffa-faisan at 5.8%. Um, and it's pretty fucking lovely. I've got to say, I mean, it's, it's, it's got those, I was going to say noble hops, but it's just me talking at my ass, that Bavarian style yeast flavors and all those, those banana reesters through it. It's got a little bit of zing to it for heffa-faisan. Sorry, I missed you, sir. I heard you say heffa-faisan. Uh, New England Brewing Co. Oh, okay. Yep.
00:02:30
Speaker
Um, and it's Sangha. It's, I mean, it's got a, it's got two dots. I don't know what that's called. It's not a normal lot. The, the two dots above the A, but, um, but that's a normal amount. Okay. Um, yeah, it's, it's a fucking great heifers and perfect for a, for a hot or a warmish.
00:02:49
Speaker
Sunday afternoon. So relaxation beer. And lots of yeast, lots and lots of yeast, which is quite nice for for a difference. Spicy wheat beer. That's what I'm calling it. Nice. Spicy meatball. I'm going to give it a 4.25. Nice.
00:03:12
Speaker
Dan, are you? I got something a little bit different today. Well, not different in styles of beer or anything. It's, it's, I got, I got two little wee baby. Oh, I picked those up the other day. So Seeker Brewing down at Wollongong, Friends of Ours, ah they decided that doing smaller cans was going to be better for their sales out of the brewery itself. They've got a a big surfer local community where the bigger, higher strength ones and even their standard beers, even a 375ml can or 440s or 500s that they do some of their seasonals in, were far too big for their customer base because they want to grab one and just... because it'
00:04:00
Speaker
drink going not be little bit. Okay. No, we're just, it's just quantity wise. It's the army of midgets down. the i was i avoid where can't use that word midges weize ah So they decided to launch their beers or some of those. Oh, it's like a finger skateboards. Yeah. That's all good.
00:04:27
Speaker
um Two two fifty mil two fit little 250 mil cans. Yeah, that's cute. Two of these. these ah This is the Cali Dipper, the double IPA at 8.2%, 8.3%. And they just won the beer and brewer award for best beer launch for the launch of these these cans. So we've got a range of these in our call room because we sent our driver down there the other day to to drop something off or pick something up. I don't know. So we did a bit of a beer. Yeah. I missed out on one of them from the four. They did the, cause they did the, the four and the flight. I got that one, the double dry hopped. Yeah. I got a double dry. And then I think the other one was a triple IPA. And I missed that one.
00:05:13
Speaker
qua Quite odd qua hazy. Yeah. Yeah. ah so what's apple but I thought that was pushing for tonight. So I just thought I'd do the yeah the two doubles. It's Seeker Brewing. This one is called Chasing Summer. Chasing Summer. like And it's their Cali Dipper. And it's fantastic. As soon as I open the can, just a real dank American hot aroma. It's got a slight haze to it.
00:05:40
Speaker
ah but it's it's full of American resin and pine character. It's medium to low on the bitterness side, but super refreshing, really clean hop expression there, so it's a really great. I really enjoy this style of beer. Actually, I had ah had a ah a West Coast IPA from Squinters in Penrith the other day. And it was this, it was very similar to this. It was that borderline, the hop line of being too dank on on one side, ah but it was sitting right on that precipice of that really perfect hop level for that that pine and resin with that and ah American hop. So it's really good. I enjoy this.
00:06:30
Speaker
Nice. That's that's definitely a 475 for me. It's great. Yeah, right. ba And i like I like I do. I love the idea of these little cans and good on them for doing it. I do question the actual cost of doing these sort of things because I can't imagine it's fucking cheap. And if they if more people pick these up, it's great for me because I can get some for Louise. So she stopped stealing half my beer.
00:06:54
Speaker
She never, she never wants to drink a full one. I've got a, if I've got a fridge full of two fifties, they can go, well, there's your two fifties. Go for it. I'm going to have a full one. Yep. That makes a lot of sense. I believe. What do you got Tom?
00:07:10
Speaker
I am drinking a Hawker's from Melbourne. Good old Hawker's. It's all Mars in the other day. It's looking really well. um This is their part of their Four Seasons range they do. They do ah a ah one every season. so This is spring. ah Lovely can art. They used to be labeled cans. They're now printed. um but yeah They've always got some pretty cool pretty cool artwork that's generally like the last one I had was the um The winter was a triple black IPA and it had this ghoulish ghost coming out of the thing. It was very cool artwork. ah So it's a triple hazy IPA, 10%. It is, hold on, military helicopter going over. They finally found me. Anyway, gents, I'm out. How do you know it's military? It's the sniper hanging on the end of the rope ladder. There are several laser beams coming into the room right now and they're just slowly moving up.
00:08:04
Speaker
ah Yeah, look, it's a it's a juicy, juicy boy. um It is it but it's actually with all these they're always like around 10% triple something or other. um There's never any of that real alcohol burn that like knocks you out with some of these really big beers they managed to hide that quite well. um It's not ah how old was it? This was doesn't have a package date on it. But ah Best before the 23rd of August next year. So it's relatively relatively fresh. I imagine, I don't assume they put a year on it there. um But yeah, it's like it's not overly green. So like I'm not getting that ra massive hot burn as well on top of the like at any sort of alcohol burn. It's relatively smooth for a 10%er. They have used, I didn't read the back of the can, because it's a little difficult to ah to get that even in this light.
00:09:00
Speaker
um ah What have they got? yeah This is tiny, tiny writing on the back of this can as well. and they don't even tell you just hops and just malt wheat oh it's hops and yeast uh there we go they don't tell you what hops they've used um i imagine they are some of the classics it definitely tastes like it has some citra in there um i would probably hazard a guess there may be some mosaic as well um i'm getting some of those characteristics from beers we've had in the past um but it's really so that's a four and a half for me that's that's great i would
00:09:32
Speaker
I would not hesitate to pick up a second can of this for, uh, for, you know, watching something at home. That's, that's a nice movie beer. Just slowly sip on it over, over an hour and a half, two hours. Yeah. Very good. Well done. I need Pete's on mute and he's trying to talk. I need to retract my previous statement. This has just got New Zealand hops in it. Well, there we go. Rewaka amplified, which I imagine is, it must be like a cryo.
00:10:01
Speaker
Terpene. Uh, or a cryo- A lot for terpenes. Uh, and Nelson and HBC 586 experimental.
00:10:15
Speaker
Cool. Yes. We had a terpene event the other night and had to find all the buzzwords on the back of the can still right on, uh, right on the board. Super boost and hyper boost and, uh, amplified and phantasm and thiolized or whatever it is. Good.
00:10:30
Speaker
yeah Every buzzword under the sun, it felt like a marketing conference yeah by the end of it. and Anyway, they were delicious.
00:10:38
Speaker
What are we on, Pete? What are we on tonight?
Significance of Indie Games and Movies
00:10:40
Speaker
Crack. oh sir So the topic for the evening. um Just trying to put a bit of a positive spin on some of the massive fucking flops we've had this year. So um I wanted to talk about indie games and indie movies and and kind of the importance of the indie indie movement to us as consumers in both of those markets and to the industry as a whole, I think. I mean, they they they serve a really important function there as well.
00:11:09
Speaker
So that was my topic for our our Friday, well it's not Friday the 13th, it's our 13th episode and we're coming up to um Halloween. So that worked out quite quite nicely. So yes, that is the topic.
00:11:24
Speaker
Well, you can kick us off. yeah sunshine Let's fucking go. Well, I mean, but really at all if you if you look at look at some of the massive AAA titles that have flopped heavily in the last 12 months, 2024, so 10 months, there is a huge amount of money that that people have dumped into video games and movies that have just been steaming piles of shit.
00:11:50
Speaker
um Steaming piles of shit financially, i will I will preface. I think we should clarify that. Before I mention Outlaws. Well, yeah, because I completely disagree. Yeah. yeah that and that's and that's And that's okay. i'm just yeah um So, Senua's Saga Hellblade 2, I don't think any of us really played that, but some of the early video or some of the trailer stuff looked a little interesting. oh definitely I'll definitely be playing it. Dan was definitely, yeah because he played the first one, didn't you?
00:12:17
Speaker
yeah Not getting good reviews. um Star Wars Outlaws has a series of of critics complaining about it for various reasons. so Not to say it's and an irredeemable pile of shit, not at all. um but I definitely want to improve some things on it, don't get me wrong. Yeah, but it's certainly not the the success you would expect out of a AAA Star Wars title.
00:12:40
Speaker
I'm the borderlands movies another good example of a complete fucking flop skull and bones and then ah suicide squad kill the justice league. but And then just just the cherry on top is concord the game that lasted a month.
00:12:54
Speaker
Like, you know, and that's and that's just the ones that have gotten smashed. It's not just not to even start to mention just the cookie cutter shit that's coming out of Marvel Studios out of Star Wars production houses out of, you know, on the, on the video game front video games front, the like regular releases of the same shit in a slightly different rapper from Ubisoft. Like there's- Oh man, then the latest Call of Duty has got people in a fucking tizzy.
00:13:23
Speaker
Yeah, and and Assassin's Creed games are just getting worse and worse. It's just less and less interesting, engaging plot narrative and more and more of the same. So. Hmm.
00:13:36
Speaker
go down. And it's interesting on that side of it too. And I mean, I don't want to dump on Ubisoft for too long because we constantly dump on it and then we constantly dump on it in our chat too. So I think we can, we can cover this all. Poppy syndrome. Pretty, pretty, pretty quick. But the the comparisons between, and I know they're completely different i overall styles of game, but set in a similar world. But people have been doing water effects from AC4 that came out a generation ago ah on the PS4. Was it a launch title for PS4? Black Flag. yeah Black Fire. No, it was on both. It was on PS3 and PS4. It was on crossover title. So that there's comparisons on like
00:14:26
Speaker
the, the, some of the animation water effects and things like that from AC four black flag and skull and bones. And there's comparisons there going, Hey, you were doing this better 10 years ago. And then there's yeah been comparisons brought up about the facial animations on the characters out of outlaws and a whole bunch of other Ubisoft games. And they're like, you were doing this better 10 years ago. Like what the fuck is going on? You're putting more and more money into these games. And like.
00:14:55
Speaker
got skull modes it It took what, 10 years? Eight eight to 10 years in in ah production? Honestly, I'd forgotten about that game. I'd genuinely forgotten about the game until Pete said it. Star Citizen is another good example, although that that would classify as indie.
00:15:10
Speaker
yeah Well, yes, it is, but the amount of money that they've gotten out of it. I mean, where where do you. I guess that's the guy to say that's Indies, not, you know, untouchable, unfalable, like they're making mistakes as well. Yeah. like no And we'll reference for the topic yeah and and we'll we'll get into that. I think that's that's an important facet of the conversation. Sorry, Dan, we interrupted you. No, that was just kind of my, my thing is that not only are they not coming through on the gameplay for Skull and Bones and Outlaws and potentially Mirage, aid Assassin's Creed Mirage too. like It was meant to be a callback to the original games and it seems to only be that in a bit of ah an overall shell of a thing. It doesn't really call back to the the originals.
00:16:02
Speaker
and these things aren't being done as good as they were back then. I don't know what the call of duty, the most recent call of duty comments are. Six? I think it is. I think it's six, yeah. Black Ops 6. Black Ops 6. Yeah. There's something to be said here where Ubisoft a couple of years ago, they said, look, we're going to pump the brakes on this and just take a couple of years off between titles. And they did for like a year.
00:16:27
Speaker
And now they seem to have fallen into their exact same issues. And now they've just closed down the studio that did the smaller pinch of principles, side scroll ones, which I really want to play, but I don't want to give those fucks any more money. And I've said, I'm not going to. So I'm not going to, but yeah.
00:16:45
Speaker
Look, as someone who's like, as I just said to you guys before, as someone who's just done a year, essentially a year of Ubisoft games, because I've been going through the entire Assassin's Creed, because I never played them, and seeing the the the kind of the rise, and I would say up to about Black Flag, and then it just really started to fall off.
00:17:05
Speaker
And it was just it seemed to be one key thing about each game that fell off like. You know, I think back to unity and the the absolute like, well, the when it released, it was a glitchy fucking mess. But also, it's just like playing through that story, I got to the end of the story and I was like.
00:17:23
Speaker
but such an abrupt full stop I
Challenges in AAA Game Development
00:17:25
Speaker
expected another like, at least 10 hours of story gameplay in that getting to the conclusion of the main main story before I did all the cleanup. But then I would go to syndicate and I'm like, which is one of my favorite ones in the series so far. But they completely cocked up the brother sister element because they didn't They couldn't pick which one they wanted to focus on then they went well bugger this will just do entirely open world and you just get lost in sixty thousand things cuz yes i'm just about to start origins but haven't played odyssey like i know that's like. um But then i look back and i've just been playing the two thousand and eight prince of persia which was the cell shaded one.
00:18:02
Speaker
oh yeah yeah outside Yeah, and it's like, firstly, it just reminded me how much Nolan North voiced every single character. Because it's just Nathan Drake from Uncharted in a different skin. um And then, ah but the stories just it had just a little bit more, like, i so even though it was like a much older game, i I was a bit more connected to it. And I was just like,
00:18:27
Speaker
But it was suffering from that mid-2000s, every male lead character had to be like the quick-talking Spider-Man, smooth operator kind of thing. It suffered from that, but then the overall story, I was like, oh, this is interesting. like they've They've built up the bad guy enough, like the the evil they're trying to stop, and then like you start to care about the the characters, and the characters interact a bit better as the story goes on.
00:18:50
Speaker
but later Ubisoft games unity i can give it two shits about the main story in the main guy mainly probably because it was french but you know it's because they stop caring about the main plot absolutely yeah but it is it is that and then then just thinking about syndicate like. They couldn't get the dynamic between the brother and sister right it was either to one sided one way.
00:19:11
Speaker
Or then they just completely over corrected to make them friends again even though the next thing they're yelling at each other it just like it didn't work. wasn't It wasn't authentic sibling rivalry in any way it was just like.
00:19:23
Speaker
It was trying to make two polar opposite characters meld together and it just it was bad bad bad character writing. and But yeah. So I guess the sorry go down. No, just jumping in on the the that cell shaded Prince of Persia that falls into some tropes to that.
00:19:41
Speaker
Oh, yeah. That were definitely starting to come out around that time. And it's a egregious ah problem. It's a very hand holding game. It's a very linear game. And it's one of these ones that led into this era of and I mean my favorite game at the moment is not hand holding whatsoever, well actually two two games I'm playing at the moment are not hand holding whatsoever, but it was so hand holding. I don't think you can actually die in that. No, you can't. prince persian okay So even if you miss a wall jump or a run or something like that, there's something that happens within the world that it just, it just pulls you. The girl Ellica is ah
00:20:23
Speaker
will magically grab you and pull you back from any death no matter what. yeah but yeah you I've time done everything. have I have tried to kill myself in that game any number of ways and I cannot. like But one of the trophies is to only use that 100 times in the entire playthrough. So like there was a challenge element to that to like to use it the least.
00:20:42
Speaker
that by saying is Yeah. Okay. I mean, the controls were, it's been pretty janky. but yeah It's one of those things. ed it It literally, it is almost on rails. Like you can't lose any of the combat. Cause if you fuck up the quick time activity, she just pulls you back and you start the fight again. Like you do start from the beginning again. yeah So you get pulled back massive sections of gameplay. Like that's the kind of.
00:21:06
Speaker
the ah stick for the carrot kind of thing. But I 100% agree. it it It was definitely the start of that, like, no, no, no, we got you. It's like, I don't know, please, do let me die. um Yeah, me die bad yeah yeah in multiple, multiple ways, please. Thank you. Yeah. And I think that you see now the outcome with that with the rise of rogue lights and souls likes and things like that is like we we just ah as where people We got so i think developers got the shit and they were just developers as well got the shits with being like, oh, this game's too easy. It's like, oh, is it is it too easy here? This demon souls in your face. But I think it I think it raises a really good point. and And in thinking about why indie games and indie movies are important. That's one of the areas that I wrote down is that
00:21:57
Speaker
When you remove the expectations of having to churn out a new game every three months with the same fucking intellectual property title against it, or you're doing part of a cinematic universe that I would argue Marvel was doing a better job when they were doing annual or bi-annual releases once every two years. Then now, or over the last couple of years, and they have backed off, I think, but where they're doing a movie, then a TV series to bridge a gap, and then another movie, and another two TV series in parallel, and then another movie followed by another.
00:22:27
Speaker
It's just too much content and it just stifles creativity when you've got to just turn the wheel to print the money every three months because your shareholders are screaming. But if you look at something like Helldivers 2, which is an independent game,
00:22:43
Speaker
um God knows how long it was in development for i i actually didn't do the research i probably should have but. It was completely innovative it was different it didn't take itself seriously some of the game mechanics it's it's all iterative like most things are because there's no original thought but.
00:22:59
Speaker
it So you couldn't say that it's groundbreaking, but it certainly pulled together various pieces of a recipe in a new and interesting and fun way. And I guarantee fucking you that AAA studios are currently working on stealing those concepts and putting it behind a paywall. If not, they're already doing it. Yeah. Putting it behind a paywall and a fucking season pass and all the other bullshit trappings that AAA studios put on it.
00:23:24
Speaker
but good You look at what um i'll let you can finish that thought in a second but enjoy add this to your your comments here you look at what killed that guy like the the the corporate interruption with sony saying. Are you going to get billions of dollars we want in on the piece oh we want a piece of the pie yep.
00:23:45
Speaker
Yeah. So Helldivers was in development originally was meant to be three years. It took seven years, 11 months and 26 days. That's Helldivers 2? 2, yeah. Yeah, cool. And then you look at Larian Studios with BG3 that was in development for fucking five to seven years. um And it had like an early access beta for almost two years to to iron out the bugs.
00:24:06
Speaker
These are studios that take risks and put their dream of what they're trying to deliver before profit. Yeah, they're operating for a profit. Yeah, they want to see their their thing come to life. And certainly all the examples of bad indie TV. I mean, movies and and games are examples of what happens when those risks don't pay off, like Star Citizen. yeah but But I would argue that it's an that indie provides independent um made games and movies provide a really important function to us in terms of just keeping the appetite refreshed enough before going back into the next fucking Marvel cinematic masterpiece.
00:24:44
Speaker
Or um for the rest of the games, studios and and movie studios to look at these guys taking risks, putting vision in front of of um money and then stealing their ideas and trying to monetize them. And it's great to see that they still fuck them up. Concord is an example of a live studio site service game that flopped In in an era where hurl divers to is also a live service game without dollar values attached to them although you can spend money if you want to um and it was going gangbusters at the time the concord died is a quiet death. So it's not. The recipe it's that that you've it's it's gotta be something original and new and different.
00:25:27
Speaker
Yeah, and and and Concord just suffered from, um I think the best way to put it is a bit a bit of hubris. it It wanted to kind of dive into that that like MOBA setting, which is dominated by some of the older titles like Overwatch and that kind of stuff. And it wanted to try and reimagine Not even reinvent the wheel. that That's being a bit too nice to it. It was just like, it felt pretty deerruive that this is our version of it. Like give it a go. Like it's, it's, it's our Sony title. Like you should love it. Cause you know, we've made, we've made look Sony studios have been churning out some good games over, over recent years. And it's like, that's, I think what they were more, more backing on. And then it was just a complete and utter disaster. Like there's no other way to describe that. Like.
00:26:10
Speaker
They just cooked it. yeah So in dango in in everything that I've heard, the actual gameplay of Concord was perfectly fine. Apparently, it was the the overall, you paying a full full of the game, which is which is then a a live service game. The the overall visuals of it were a bit drab, like they picked a kind of a pastel color palette, which didn't really grab anybody's attention when- Because it's aimed at fucking pre-teens and teenagers like Overwatch and- Yeah, but they're a lot brighter and everything too. Yeah, that's what I mean. Yeah. You've got to market to the kids. That's why cornflakes have bright colors on the boxes. And the character design was lacking as well. They went to modern audience and didn't refine anything that actually had a lot of
00:27:04
Speaker
personality that would talk to the the the players that they wanted it to to play it. So it seems to be these couple of elements, even though the core gameplay seemed to be solid, it still failed because. I thought i thought a bit of the letdown was the in the gameplay was solid, but the promise of continual story development within the game, that was what was was was lacking.
00:27:28
Speaker
So like they, they, and because if you look at the trailer, the trailer really put it forward as like, there's going to be this story that goes along with what's happening. And like Overwatch has that because it has its own little like sub comic and web series and all this kind of stuff going on. But that's where like not enough was, was available at release. So there was no interest.
00:27:46
Speaker
Um, i think and that, that failed to draw people in. They were doing, they were, they had a lot planned. So they've got animated series planned. They had monthly story updates through, um, I don't know if it was comic books or, or just, uh, digital animation like episodes and stuff. yeah And they've got, they've got a full episode or all part of an episode in that, uh,
00:28:09
Speaker
the next level or whatever it is that's coming out on Amazon Prime. like they they yeah they would They were definitely leaning into that. um I haven't watched any of the Guardians Galaxy-esque cutscenes that they've released from it, but it screams Guardians there. That was the first trailer, yeah yeah. It might have just been too derivative overall, too. I mean, ah yeah not knowing somebody might have looked at and gone, oh, yeah, that's just the Guardians That's just a Guardians animation because it looks so similar to characters that could have been in that world that they've just canceled it off as compared to the other shooters that do all these other hero shooters that have very defined ah heroes and characters and a very defined look for them as well. So if I look for their overall game.
00:28:59
Speaker
so Bringing it back to the importance of the indie movement. how do you I mean, you you consume a lot more indie content than we do in movies, Dan. um You love a good horror flick. and And it seems to me like a lot of indie movies are horror. You had long legs. Talk to me. um Well, everything everywhere all at once is indie, but it's not obviously not a horror. But all the Jordan Peele movies are independent.
00:29:23
Speaker
I'd argue that Ex Machina is horror-ish, sci-fi horror, that's another independent. There was that upgrade, is it called? to Upgraded? that upgrade Upgrade, yeah. Fuck, that's a brilliant movie. Yeah, it's fantastic, yeah. so So is there a similar level of importance in indie movies folding back into mainstream titles, do you think? Because we can certainly see parallels in games that big studios steal ideas from indie game studios all the fucking time.
00:29:52
Speaker
Do you think they do something similar for movies? I think they do. I think the ones that really the indie movies that really stand out is the ones that they don't fall down in the third act. The ones the ones that don't fall into that. Oh, I'm halfway through the movie and I know what's going to happen in the end.
00:30:13
Speaker
kind of trope. The ones that go, I'm going to throw you curve balls all the way through, and I'm not going to end the movie the way you think it's going to end, are by far the best ones. The the other ones, the I think the outstanding side of the indie ones, they're cinematography, they're creative use of budget.
00:30:39
Speaker
Instead of using CGI, they use small real sets real life sets, ah things like that, that are a much more creative use of their lower budget.
00:30:52
Speaker
and They're the standout ones. There's, there's, I mean, there's a lot of trash out there as well. I mean, you look at yeah Winnie the Pooh movie that we watched a couple of months ago. um Like I said, they're not all going to go off without a huge trash. Exactly. Yeah. they But then they fall into this trap too, where they, these, these indie, and I mean, they all want to advance. I mean, you do a couple of indie movies and it used to be a couple of years ago, you do a couple of good indie movies and you get a Marvel movie.
00:31:21
Speaker
Yeah, and they might have been the the the early good ones. and I mean, it seems to me that some of these directors coming into these these Marvel and Star Wars movies now haven't even cut their teeth on good, successful indie movies first before there being given these opportunity to come into these big budget Marvel ones, whether they're they're speaking the right language or whether they're in the right circle of people, whatever it is, they've been giving these opportunities they're just not ready for. And they haven't cut their teeth on a smaller, lower budget to be creative on.
00:31:57
Speaker
ah and and and almost gotten a fan base in the the smaller side of things before they're thrown into these Marvel ones. And then they're trying to make their name when they're given a $250 million dollars movie and a successful, what do you call it, legacy character to do the next installment of and and things would fall down there.
00:32:23
Speaker
I know it's easy to say it from, I mean, look, we're armchair critics by definition, right? But yeah but but this I feel like there's something to be said, if you rewind to the people that made the movies that we grew up loving, those guys came out of film school essentially as indie filmmakers, like the George Lucas's and the James Cameron's, when they left and they started their career, they there was no money in Hollywood, like not that kind of money in Hollywood.
00:32:50
Speaker
And they had to be creative they had to have a vision in order to realize a film whether they had funding behind them or not. I had to invent shit on the fly to make the movie work when you spin it all the way forward to the start of the MCU in two thousand and five and the Russo brothers when they did the the captain america the that those movies i mean you look at those and there's. Is real creative before there was a formula i mean i know they.
00:33:18
Speaker
Set the cost for they invented the formula. yeah But it's just they're so boxed in now that they pull these indie guys in mid Marvel phase, I should say, or mid Marvel lifetime, I should say. They were pulling these indie directors in because they were making these fantastic ones and then they were hamstringing them once they.
00:33:40
Speaker
once they got, and fucking Warner Brothers is no better. I mean, they pulled the guy who did the original Suicide Squad in and then completely chopped his movie up with people who made movie trailers. But I think I think technology and so so in the middle of the the Marvel era and this ties back to the point in a kind of a tangential way around taking risk and um but about halfway through the Marvel era, they the previous got to a point where it no longer was a tool
Creative Storytelling in Film
00:34:09
Speaker
for directors to pre visualise what they were going to film.
00:34:13
Speaker
And it became the formula that they must follow to the micromillimeter to the millimeter in order to shot match with the 3D CGI because the budget's got to a point that complexity of 3D graphics got to a point.
00:34:29
Speaker
um And the importance of 3D graphics to storytelling go to a point where you had to do that in parallel to principal, principal filming, or else you would never finish the movie on time. And so it's no longer a, you know, you always see those, those, those photographs of people like George Lucas or um James Cameron, or I was just a guy that did um the science fiction movie we loved recently. He does a lot of found footage stuff. um He did monsters.
00:34:59
Speaker
I can't remember the director's name now. um But you always see photos of them looking through the lens of like an optic, not a full camera, but an optic to to see the shot. JJ Abrams walks into set for a fucking Marvel movie now and he can't do any of that because he can't choose what angles to shoot from or what lenses to use or all that creative decision making is gone. Yeah. And I think It's very easy to so to two I mean, you know, and again, Deadpool, Deadpool three Deadpool Wolverine was a massive success. But then it had something different that got away from it wasn't successful because of cinematography or 3D graphics or even stories. I mean, the the overall plot line for that movie is wasn't at all original. No. but it But that wasn't what any of us were expecting to go in for. We were going in to see, and I mean, get to gareth we was the direct afterwards yeah so you get You get to the point where Deadpool and spoilers here, Deadpool and Wolverine are in the wasteland and he's like, let's give the fucking audience what they, he literally says, let's give the audience what they fucking came here for. Yeah.
00:36:14
Speaker
Yeah. But it was successful for taking a different kind of risk. Yes. I think it got, Depel Wolverine got the nostalgia bug right. It's one of the few things recently that has got the nostalgia bug right. As opposed to people just beat or choose.
00:36:30
Speaker
Well, I haven't said it, but yeah, cause it was the, it was the perfect send off to the 20th century Fox Marvel movies. Like that's what it was. It was a, it was a love letter to that, but a ah ah well, like a a curated love letter rather than just let's just mash this shit in because we know fans are gonna love it. It was just like, no, these guys did genuinely care cause they'd been in it and around it from the beginning, like kind of thing. Um, so i yeah, I think that's where it won.
00:36:58
Speaker
Do you think we're, sorry to cut you off there, Tom. No, you're right. Do you think we're heading towards some kind of, a crash is the wrong word to use because you can't crash it we've been a trillion dollar company. We've been predicting this crash for a while though, as as ah as a fallout from the writer's strike. I don't think we're heading towards it either. I think it is a hero. Emotional. Yeah. Yeah, but we, we, we, you go back to our episodes from this time last week, we were like, next year's going to be just full of shit. No, but mike no, that's not the kind of crash I was talking about. what the The kind of crash I'm talking about is where these multi-billion dollar studios, both video games and movies are forced to come to terms with their formula for making money for their um their shareholders is no longer making money for their shareholders, because that's fundamentally what it's about. I just feel like these these companies have so much money that it actually takes a long time for them to feel it in their pocket where it hurts.
00:37:55
Speaker
So there there is a thing flying around the moment that Ubisoft is considering going private again. Yeah. Like the family wants to take it back. They want to, they want to get rid of because they just like killed our baby. Well, that's the thing. They're so sick of getting shat on. Like eventually you've got to have some self pride and just go cool. We've, this is not the legacy that we've fucked it. We've absolutely cooked it. Um, let's bring it back in house.
00:38:21
Speaker
and she said yeah There's the push from the other side, too, is to buy the family out, so which could be bought out by Tencent, which they don't want to deal with all this shit, too. So think whichever way it goes, if it goes private and they pull back from all this rubbish and they're not trying to deal with their shareholders, they release one game every five years that sells the same as Black Myth Wukong, 20 million copies in two months. Like if they do that, they're going to make a billion dollars every four years and yeah spend a quarter of that on game develop for your next one, but just don't lose your head. and and
00:39:01
Speaker
I don't know. i think yeah Sorry, Tom. I was just going to say, I think in terms of movie development, the movies that I've been really enjoying lately seem to be more actor passion projects. So a couple of the films I've watched recently. Anything by Nick Cage recently. But Nick Cage is the indie king, right?
00:39:19
Speaker
Yeah, but these these are like, um not well, some of them are Nic Cage level, some of them aren't, but like, um I don't know if you guys have watched Greedy People yet. i It's on my list though. It's really, we watched it, we watched it at Emma's house. It was a parent's place. It was fantastic. We also watched Wolf's, the Clooney go round pit and it was- Oh, I'm looking forward to that too. It was just,
00:39:42
Speaker
It felt like enjoyable cinema again. It was just, you know, it's those guys, you know, they had a fun, fun time making it. It's not completely over the top in terms of the after effects and all all the CGI that goes into it, but it was just like, you can tell the guys wanted to make that more than anything else they would have like had their agent sign them up for. I think that might be a good age of like pushing that in. Um, cause it's, uh, what's his name? Uh, Joseph of Gordon Levitt's in greedy people.
00:40:12
Speaker
And it was, it was great. You could, if does fall a bit into that kind of as Dan was saying before that indie trope, where you kind of can predict what's happening, yeah like ah about two thirds of the way through, but it still kept me on the edge of the seat until the end of it. Cause I was just like, this is enjoyable. Like you can see him imbibing the character and really getting into it. And I think that's just what we've really been missing from a lot of these big name actors recently. It's just, they're not.
00:40:38
Speaker
They're not really getting into the nuts and bolts of these characters because of whatever studio band, like they're not getting whole scripts or whatever. Like you talk about all the Marvel stuff and all that kind of stuff. Well, that's Tom Holland's fault. I blame him personally.
00:40:52
Speaker
I wish saw Jim Carrey had gone down the same path as Nick Cage, because I'd love to still see him in independent shit. Sorry, Dan. Jim Carrey's hilarious because he was like, I'm going to quit acting. And then they were like, do you want to make ah Sonic the Hedgehog and be the bad guy? And he's like, holy shit, you had me. and but he But he still turns up at red carpet events that he's not invited to just to fuck with everyone. yeah And some of the shit that he says while he's there.
00:41:15
Speaker
Anyway, sorry, Dan. No, no, no, no, it's it's fine. I think just going off what Tom was just saying there, it's ah getting these these actors to to really work on these passion projects. You guys are going to get really sick of me banging on about a penguin for about the next 12 months because but fuck me, it is so good. Like they are, there's eight one hour episodes. Like we're not getting eight 28-minute episodes where there's five minutes worth of credit at the end. They're one hour fucking episodes. And Colin Farrell and I'm really sorry. I don't know her name who plays Sophia Falcone in it. They
00:42:00
Speaker
absolutely nail their characters. And that's Colin Farrell is covered in prosthetics. He's top to bottom like he's he's in a fat suit. He's got half his face and he looks amazing. Three quarters of his head. I think the only thing that's actually his is his eyes, because it looks amazing in the Batman because it's the same prosthetics. So yeah, definitely. So Kristin, Kristin Malochi. Yeah, yeah. So she she's fantastic. Yeah, and is incredible. So she plays Sofia Falcon. And She absolutely loses herself in the character there. I don't want to spoil it because I don't think it it's one of those things that you could spoil really easily, but.
00:42:43
Speaker
There's so many episodes and her and the Penguin are the main characters. Like they, they ah they, they, they, they are, they play, ah play off each other. They're in the same Falcone family. Um, and Clancy Brown is probably into, he's about 50th DC Marvel character role because he plays Salvatore Moroni. Um, I'll be right back. And, and the good old clancy Brown. Yeah.
00:43:09
Speaker
they get lost in these characters. And you can see that they absolutely embody these characters, whether that's down to the writing, which is, again, excellent, the world building, which is excellent, the cinematography, which is excellent, and the directing, which is excellent. So you put these things in and it must be a perfect storm for these people who'd like to play make believe to absolutely lose themselves. You take out, it's like,
00:43:38
Speaker
I'll go back to what I know. So we we always say you can there's there's a 10% rule in brewing. You can fuck up a brew 10% and still make a really good beer.
00:43:51
Speaker
you start to you start to chew into that 10%. You start to make that 15-20% and you're going to make an average and then obviously the more you go down, you're going to make a bad or a very inferior product. So there's a 10% element there. And I'm sure that is applied across the board as well. And I mean, all these creative arts are sort of same, same, but different. So you take out that acting, directing, cinematography, world building and writing. You take out one of those elements and yeah, it's going to be a good show, not a great show. You start taking out more of those and the actors lose interest or they can't get into the character if they're not getting good direction. Or they're acting in front of a fucking screen covered with balls. If it's shitty sets, that's exactly what I was about to say. If it's shitty sets or if it's CGI, if it's something like that,
00:44:38
Speaker
These they're going to they're going to start to break themselves out of the world. I mean, these people want to play make believe for a living. Let them play make believe, set the world enough for them absolutely to do their job and play make believe. And you're going to get the best thing out of them. And the Penguin is hands down some of the best, not just comic book i didnt film. I know it's TV, but It's not just some of the best comic book film. It's some of the best film. Like this will chew it up at the Emmys. Like if it does not win for almost everything at Emmys, I'll be fucking blown away because I just don't think there's paid the ah judges enough. Well, that too, they end up saying the wrong thing or this is like whatever. But can I just say on on Dan's point there, if you want the perfect
00:45:32
Speaker
counterpoints of when a character is an actor is so into their character in the set and and everything that damage is talking about and when they're not and it's the same character. If you look at Gandalf, Ian McKellen. I've got him on my screen right now. Between all the rings and the Hobbit and when in the Hobbit he had a full breakdown because he could not act in front of a green screen. He has the shits. Some of the behind the scenes footage of him going. Chris Felice in the same, well Chris Felice obviously couldn't travel to New Zealand for it, but he he I'm trying to do it in front of a green screen in in the UK for them shooting in New Zealand and he was just like this is just absolute bullshit this is not what I and there's a great video like it's very sad but it's a great video to show this of just in like mid scene he fucks up and he's just like.
00:46:19
Speaker
Peter, I just can't fucking do this. I can't do it in front of this screen. I can't do it. And he just loses his shit. And like, because then you look back to all the all the behind the scenes footage of him in Lord of the Rings. He's the happiest he's ever been. He's living. I love i love that. he's yeah Was it him or or or um Christopher, who was Who was um arguing about the noise you make when you stab somebody? late chris crystal because he was he was You don't do ah you do, because it pushes the oxygen out of your lungs. There's no air left in the lungs. Because he was a special person. He said it he's just very, very, very quiet voice. Now, now, Peter, ah when your man gets stabbed in the back, it's not. so who Because all the air rushes out.
00:47:04
Speaker
but My favorite behind the scenes from the from the extended editions. Yeah, it's but it's a social game to your point, Dan. um Acting is is a social. Absolutely. It's about interacting with the other characters. It's about interacting with the the world around you and imagining yourself in it.
00:47:22
Speaker
as that character, and then we've technology is just stripped all back to a bunch of dudes in green fucking green Lycra. In front of green fucking backgrounds. It's OK. There's no art in it anymore. OK, so let me put a counterpoint to that. You look at Christopher Judge.
00:47:40
Speaker
voicing Kratos. He was in a warehouse with a fucking camera GoPro in his face in a black skin tight gray. I think it was gray with the black lines on it. You look at that in comparison, like I know it's a different mindset that they would have to get into that, but- I don't think it is anymore, man. And I've made that argument for a couple of years on this podcast. that That's the first time that behind the scenes on Got a Wall, and sorry ah to interrupt you, we'll get back to you in a sec.
00:48:12
Speaker
kind of into my thought but But I mean that I would argue that was the crossover point or around that point around ah the last of us and the the video acting all of the mocap acting for that. Those actors made those games successful for the same reason they would would make a movie about it successful.
00:48:30
Speaker
Good point. Yep. I would also argue on the back of that, that these guys are coming from a recording booth to now acting as the character. Yeah. Yeah. So in in a way they're enhancing their thing. Ian McKellen is kind of going in reverse. Yeah. Yeah. yeah and and And that's exactly the counterpoint, right? Yeah. Yeah.
00:48:48
Speaker
Yeah i think these days and i made the argument you got i think tom you you gave me a weird look at it's probably more the way that i phrased it but i think these days video game voice actors are as much real actors as anyone in hollywood because they're no longer in a sound booth.
00:49:02
Speaker
Unless you're doing a cartoon, for video games, they have a mocap suit on, they're in a room with the other characters. Their facial expressions are being mapped into the game. They have to be expressionful. They need to be emotional. It's not, it's no longer just about their voice carrying all of that, that gravitas. It's about their whole body. I didn't realise I gave you a weird look. I apologise, Peter. Maybe my stomach cramping up because of the orchestral. He's trying to shoot yourself. Not this episode, but like episodes.
00:49:31
Speaker
look good It was like a year ago, but but I think I so i think taking it back to the point of the importance of India. but but but but but um I think Indy represents a fallback position that continues to demonstrate to us as an audience and also to the industry that if you.
00:49:50
Speaker
I hate using quotes from Trump, but if you were to drain the political swamp that Hollywood has become, where it's about making money and about delivering a message instead of what it set out to do in the first place, although you might argue that Hollywood was always very fucking political, but it's lost its way. It's no longer about us. It's about what's in our pocket. That's all that
Acting in Video Games vs. Films
00:50:11
Speaker
matters. so I didn't give a fuck about the art of storytelling anymore. I think any of any of those industries now are just about chasing that billion dollar mark.
00:50:18
Speaker
But the Academy Awards has become a ah ah shit parody for the American voting system. Like, how much money can you, you know, can you can you poll the right people? Can you pay off the right people and you'll get a fucking Oscar?
00:50:33
Speaker
Hmm. Like it's anyway. Yeah. I mean, ah just to bang on about it again, I think the penguin is a very good counterpoint to that. I think they have chosen to tell a story within a world. There's lots of examples that are, that are successful within that mate, like within that, that mechanic. I just think, ah got a piece yeah.
00:50:57
Speaker
And your dog needs to pee too. No, no. Jasper's just woken up. Oh, that was Jasper. Yeah. Yeah. He's having a shake. Uh, yeah. No, I, I, I just think, I think the biggest problem with the, especially the film industry particular is what we mentioned before. Like.
00:51:15
Speaker
like I don't I personally don't really care what the box office take is for Deadpool and Wolverine if it's a good story. But yeah, obviously they they do and that's their that's their driving force now. And we could say the same about Ubisoft like so much of the we come back to outlaws like I really enjoyed playing the game but I completely agree with what people are saying in terms of it's a financial flop for them for how much they invest. And that's all it's become now it's just it's it's it's all it's only It's only good in, the in I think, a lot very general sense and the studio senses of it's only good if it's it's a good return on investment which like because they're not they're not willing to take those risks anymore, which which means we we miss out, which is when we go and watch that indie content and we're like, that's really cool.
00:52:06
Speaker
But also, we're probably a small group that would say, that's really cool if you tried to do that on ah on a mass. I think so ah some of the indie stuff that we consume, I think. Some of it, yeah. It definitely wouldn't work in in in a more mainstream thing. Yeah, that Goose Game. I think it was literally called the Goose Game. Untitled Goose Game. Fucking great. The one, Squirrel of the Gun. But Palworld was in too.
00:52:29
Speaker
yeah car simuli power watch simulator I don't know. I think it's the progression of capitalism is really what's driving it. And yet I would draw a good parallel. I'm just going to quickly talk about my proper beer in a second. But to segue into that. I got my next one to talk about as well. I actually think it's a good parallel in the beer industry, right? So you've got craft brewers.
00:52:55
Speaker
brewing passion projects, not because they're necessarily going to be a capitalist success, but because they represent something they want to put in market that they're proud of, and they go to, you know, beer awards and they they kind of push the the art forward, as opposed to the mass manufacturers who are just there to get you drunk in exchange for what's in your pocket.
00:53:15
Speaker
I think it's kind of similar. and and get get get you Get your tap contract sorted and have your 20 taps. Lock everyone else out. Yeah, exactly. So um my proper beer I'm drinking, a Slow Lane Brewing Bracket Brewing Colab. This is Hibernation, a 9.5% Baltic porter.
00:53:32
Speaker
Oh, nice. It is. Daddy, would you like some sausages? It's chocolatey and coffee. It's an absolutely phenomenal beer. And it has, I don't know if, um I don't know if yeast is part of the the program for a Baltic porter, but it's almost got just a slight yeast tang to it. but Can you correct me if I'm wrong, Dan? Isn't Baltic porter an ale made with lager yeast, technically?
00:54:01
Speaker
Well, they're they're I think they're all interchangeable, aren't they? Those those porters along those stars. I'll have to look up that one. Because porter generally falls in the ale category, but I thought i thought but baltics were used as laggies and that was their point of difference.
00:54:14
Speaker
Well, it certainly says on the back of the can. So Baltic Porter is a style that we have shared love for, combining big complex dark malt and chocolate flavors with the smoothness of a cold fermentation with lager yeast. And yeah, so it does have that kind of, it's using Nova lager. Molts are ale, caramel Munich three, carafe special three. Munich three? Cool.
00:54:36
Speaker
Break the budget. Cops, magnum, other grains, rolled oats. This is a flat five. It's fucking spectacular. And yeah, it is dark chocolate, lots of coffee from the like the dark malt backbone. um And just has just that. It's like a back palate.
00:54:55
Speaker
ah Zing's not the right word, but just a, you get that, just that note of yeast. Yeah. Not quite a zing, but a zest. That's right. It's on the, it's on the Z spectrum. It's one back. We love Z. Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to give that a flat five. So yeah, Tom, on the BJCP, um, yeah the generally larger yeast and then in brackets, cold fermented if using ale yeast as required when brewed in Russia. So to call it a Baltic porter with you can god within Russia. Still got it.
00:55:29
Speaker
That's a swish and a flick, baby. Yeah. Harry Potter one coming in. There's not too many Baltic porters out there so these days in this room. It's great. I think, um, theres enough the old feral brewing, uh, Boris was a Baltic porter, wasn't it?
00:55:45
Speaker
No, rush out no, no. Reckless, reckless, reckless, have reckless, have a Baltic portal. We had it on tap and slowly. I haven't done a few. I've had a few slow lane Baltics. Um, someone had another beer to share while you do that. I've got a ah message from work that I need to look at quickly. So I'm going to, I'm going to need like two, three minutes. Fuck work, Peter. Sign off today off. Don't need a bag of dicks. I wish I could.
00:56:14
Speaker
So I've got my next 250 mil Seeker. I'm going to lean closer to the camera these days. It sounds like a double beer up late episode by the sounds of things. So I'm going to have to go run and grab one. Mine are only 250. So I might have to do this more often. It is their Double Dry Hopped Dipper. It is most definitely a cloudy one.
00:56:40
Speaker
It has an eight percenter. It's ah I think it said it had Machuaker amplified. Yeah, Machuaker amplified VicSecret and another experimental HBC. I think it says 2029 on it, which I have no idea what that one is. ah And it's got a same same but different hot profile to it. It's got that real bold
00:57:05
Speaker
resin, hop oil character to it. And it's, once again, sitting on that precipice of going too far, but I haven't. I've stopped it right at that beautiful point. They've pulled it back just before the edge. Yeah, yeah they but they've pulled it back just before the edge, definitely. Both of those were like right it right on the right on the cusp of going going too far, but like whatever their hop ratios are, which I'd say these two were very, very similar.
00:57:32
Speaker
We're absolutely bang on so that's definitely another four seven five be like that's just absolutely fantastic I'll put that in the notes for P later. Oh good um um but I Think we're pretty close to wrapping up. I I will I will delay getting my second beer then in that case kissing I don't know if it has anything to add when he comes back I did just want to kind of cut back to the actor passion projects and I'd be very interested to hear your take on um So did you, have you ever, you've ended up watching monkey man? I did. Yeah. So what's wrong? Yeah. So did I, um, for me, it was just like, I enjoyed it, but I thought I'd enjoy it a lot more for what, what Dev Patel was doing. Um, and I think that might be an interesting point of like,
00:58:25
Speaker
It kind of leads into that, that, that point we've said about Snyder of like, when you're doing a bit too much in your one project, like do you, do I think for for, for us, like, do you think I can definitely see. If you're taking on acting and you're taking on directing and probably some, I'm sure he put on some other type of production role as well in that. When, when do you need someone to come in and say,
00:58:51
Speaker
I know this is your thing, and I know this is your thing, but let us let us come and help you. like When is it too late to accept that help? like do you think that if like i would I would love to see more actor passion projects in terms of like in movies coming out, and you start to and this is the perfect time for that writer's strike, you know that that kind of delayed lull that we're we're definitely in right now for these projects to appear and be released.
00:59:18
Speaker
But where do you, where, where should we cut kind of, I guess, where do you want to cut the line and be like, cool, act in it, direct it or write it, like pick a lane buddy, kind of that kind of thing. Like. Yeah. I guess, I guess ah from my point of view, there's probably multiple aspects of that. There's.
00:59:38
Speaker
Is there anybody around them that will tell them this? And I think Schneider is once again the poster child for this, but there's probably no one around him that will call him out on something. they They'd be afraid of their job. They would be afraid of their their they future aspects to do either more things with him or more things just in Hollywood in general that wouldn't tell him to pull back on XYZ.
01:00:03
Speaker
um I think and for the for the actor side of it, if they're going into the the writing, directing, producing, whatever side of it. I mean i think that might almost be a perfect storm for something great to come out in the end because they've got, they probably have the money.
01:00:24
Speaker
And they if they if they approached the studio and said, hey, I'm going to foot the bill for half of this, but I want 50% or whatever of the revenue that it brings in down the track. I mean, they go to they're going to be pulling out all the stops and they might listen to more people as they go along. um On the side of Monkey Man, ah I really enjoyed it. I thought it was really good. I thought it took a weird political stance three quarters of the way through when it didn't need to go that route. ah It was kind of interjected in there where, yeah, it was alluded to in some um
01:01:05
Speaker
some news broadcast earlier on in the movie, but then it sort of like went whole hog on this, this, this political modern day political talk within the movie, which it didn't need to, which then distracted from just being a Indian John Wick where it could have gone there. Uh, this is monkey man, monkey man. yeah So, so Pete, you were just off. I was just saying, um, with, with the rise of like, oh, rise, I say rise.
01:01:33
Speaker
a current kind of influx of, um, act of passion projects. Like, yeah is there a case of them going too far and doing, doing the Snyder and they're writing, they're producing, they're directing and acting. And, and we're using monkey man as like an example of that. Cause like, I, I enjoyed it, but I think we love dev Patel, but it's ah it's one of those things I think.
01:01:56
Speaker
he was, there was too much involved. He overreached, in my opinion, overall on that. And that's not in a case of overreach. and And when do you, when do you say to them like, yes, this is your passion project, but let us let someone else come in and help. Yeah. And I think like on that too, going back to something that I said earlier on, that was a really good movie until the third act.
01:02:24
Speaker
And i I guess I classified my agree the third act, with which is the the final fight. that's I guess that's where I would call the third act, where it was... When he so assaults the hotel, he comes back... Yeah, where he assaults the hotel. yeah yeah yeah so I thought that was 100% tropey and completely predictable from there on out, and it could have taken an opportunity there to take a bit of a left turn once it got halfway through that act. I thought the fact that it's called Monkey Man,
01:02:56
Speaker
He got the fucking monkey mask and started to fight like a monkey just before he sold at the hotel. Sorry, spoilers here again. He takes the monkey mask off after fighting in the street fight, bleaches it, puts it on for 30 fucking seconds, and then takes it off for the entire rest of the movie. It's called fucking monkey man fight three quarters of the final act with your goddamn fucking monkey mask on. I was, I was waiting for some sort of tie-in to the Journey to the West story or, I mean, it alluded to super-stitial themes throughout and never got there. The Monkey God. The Monkey God in China and India are quite different, but yeah. Sure.
01:03:39
Speaker
But they they're compatible enough that that's what that essentially, what drove some of that story. but Because i've I've seen it told from both sides of that that fence, if you like. yeah The Silk Road fence. um Yeah, I don't know. I think, you look, Nick Cage has done some trashy movies too, right? In terms of passion projects. But at least he's putting himself out there and taking risks. And I think,
01:04:03
Speaker
like the way that I was describing cinematographers of old where they would come up in a low budget world, out of film school, have to pump out a few. I mean, fucking Kevin Smith started the same way, right? his Clerks was a no budget. I think it was a Canadian film project. Was it Canadian? but Might have been American. um But that was a passion project. That was just him and a bunch of mates fucking around with a black and white camera because they couldn't afford anything better. Yeah.
01:04:29
Speaker
So I think I think actor passion projects where they they kind of drive with their energy rather than with their money and and they don't necessarily make every creative decision, but they're given enough rope to to make creative decisions goes back to that. I mean, my my film school just fucking riffing off other dudes around me.
01:04:52
Speaker
I think Kevin Smith did that in the right way because he obviously he succeeds as a director, but his characters are not main. They're background. Silent Bob is ah is' ah a side character at best. like and I think that's, that's you know whether it's humble enough or whatever you want to call it, but that's that's kind of where I think when you're when you're saying you're directing the film and then you're the main main actor,
01:05:22
Speaker
you can't, like you can't be the main director of the film and be the main actor. Cause what you're going to watch is watching the hen house. Exactly. Which is where Snyder got to, right? Yeah. So so I think that's where like where Kevin Smith really succeeded was that he was like kind of self-aware enough to be like, cool. Yeah. Oh, I'll, I'll write. I'll direct us. I'll be in it, but I'll just be off to the, off to the left. Like, you know, smoking J's doing whatever I need to do.
01:05:50
Speaker
Is there, I was, I was, I was going to go, I think we, I think the director should be pushing this more than the actors, but ah I think that's a whole nother rabbit hole that's too long, but I want to propose a question about games to go back to the indie side of things. Can you guys think of any.
01:06:09
Speaker
indie games that used certain mechanics or anything that then were adopted by the mainstream. I know there's probably a lot that we can't think of off the top of our head. PUBG pretty much spawned every battle royale. That's probably the biggest one, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, Minecraft, you could argue probably spawned Fortnite. If you look at Minecraft plus PUBG, you get Fortnite. I'd say PUBG is Fortnite more than Minecraft, yeah.
01:06:36
Speaker
Yeah, but that old blocky, you know, it's not all about the graphics, because the original Fortnite was pretty blocky. It was low res by. Cartoony bits. I wouldn't say cell shader, but yeah. No, not not to the Overwatch level. um So that's that's an example. um Minecraft in the sense of the the building element of of Fortnite like the building literally forts but pub pub G in the sense of the the shrinking map the the hundred players down to one like that kind of thing which is now definitely influenced Call of Duty like that's just all it it seems to be now it's that zombies and maybe a small campaign like yeah
01:07:16
Speaker
Yeah. don't even get this is This is the big thing that's pissing off a bunch of people at the moment is the the latest Call of Duty Black Ops 6. If you buy the PS5 version, it's listed as a DLC of Modern Warfare 2. It's not listed as its own game. What the fuck? So, you know, it's pissing off trophy hunters, which is where I've seen it, because you don't get a platform for it. Does it force you to buy the original game as well if you don't already own it?
01:07:44
Speaker
Otherwise you have to, if you buy the PS4 version. which obviously you can play on your best buy. There's some yep fuckery going on there. Fuckery, yep. i mean to assume with So I finally bought yeah yeah yeah so i finally bought um Space Marine 2 and gave that a bit of a crack and I will be investing. You turned on your PlayStation? I know, last night. It's a modern miracle. um And ah they the the the additions of that game are offensively expensive. So I think the base game was $110.
01:08:17
Speaker
Yeah. For $159.95 you get the season pass plus the game and some DLC. And I think the top of the range- Outlaws was about the same. It was about $160 for with season pass. And the top of the range pack was $179.95. Like, and all you get is some fucking skins and shit on top of- What? Almost $200. Yeah. You don't even get a collector's edition or anything. No. Statue in the back. Yeah.
01:08:44
Speaker
Now, whereas the first game, I got the collector's edition of Space Marine One and it came with a collector's edition tin and a bunch. Didn't come with a statue, unfortunately, but it came with a bunch of shit, like physical, tangible shit. Yeah. Still got tin somewhere, but yeah, no, I just found that offensively expensive. That's bad for a digital. yeah For what amounts to like a single camp, single player campaign that's going to take seven or eight hours to finish?
01:09:09
Speaker
So you could draw the line in the sand and say, you are buying eight hours of content for 180 bucks, which is not a great exchange in video game terms when you've got 100 hour plus games. meaning a term ah i may be Maybe that's wrong. Maybe that's wrong. Is that in any media terms? I just think it's like, i I got an email today that the Disney plus subscription for the year is going up. to It's 180. It's gone up 40 bucks or whatever. Sorry. Disney plus.
01:09:38
Speaker
Yeah, it's going to be 180 bucks. I'll be canceling that shit. um that's fine thatll I'll give you a login. I was supposed to cancel it fucking last year, but I they go i know you definitely can't. No, no, we won't share passwords at all. It's illegal. Or it's against the, it's against the EULA. It's morally wrong. Yeah. But like in terms of that, so that's, that's a year subscription of however much content I want to consume on that that platform is, is that the same as eight hours worth of gameplay? Yeah.
01:10:08
Speaker
Well, fuck that's not the rabbit hole I've just opened. I'm sorry. I just threw dynamite down. I don't think you can draw parallels to, to I mean. um you know No, you're probably right. But if you compare that to something like, um um my dad, I can't remember what the number was. I threw it at you guys. 250 hours or something, yeah. But that was, I just, what he said was,
01:10:29
Speaker
I just added another 250 hours over the last couple of months. That's not his total play time. And that's a game that he bought on Steam for like 30 bucks. And there's hundreds and hundreds of hours in that game that he's still enjoying it. And a lot of it's absent because it's the sort of game where you set up a factory and you set up train lines and you have to just let it run and manufacture shit and move goods. But still, I mean, he spent hundreds of hours of in-game time playing it.
01:10:59
Speaker
40 bucks for an indie title sorry my cat sneezing on and if you heard that i did yeah fucking random um Yeah, I think we probably round out this topic. I just think I think the original point in my head for what it's worth was I think indie content is super important to the AAA industry to remind them of what good can look like when you still take risks, when you are more focused on delivering a ah consumer product and and pleasing your your customers rather than meeting expectations of shareholders, and when you take your time.
01:11:39
Speaker
I think the big thing for me is if you're developing new content and you're a bigger studio, you like Dan was saying, you need to listen to all all parts. You can't cut out like more than that 10%. You need to listen to your production guys. You need to listen to your actors. You need to listen to the sound guys, that yeah the the composers, the whoever, the writers, directors, obviously, but like you need to listen to all parts. i think and and We've said this so many times. like i've I feel like- The whole industry is hubris.
01:12:09
Speaker
Will not be particular i feel like we can sound ad nauseam that vga the biggest pitfall that we've seen specially with. Like comic book movies or just be the franchise movies is.
01:12:23
Speaker
Yeah, Tom Holland did leak a bunch of spoilers, but it's just like now they just don't give actors the full script and they can't they can't do the full work. I think it's unconscionable that you can you can have an industry where the main people executing your vision have no idea what your vision is. And I would also argue that Tom Holland accidentally revealing some of those spoilers made. It's not the only one. Mark Ruffalo did a bunch of others. made both the actor and the character and the movie that the character was in more likeable because it was so Peter Parker to do something silly like that accidentally and you could tell it was genuine every time. Yeah, I think just excited about what he's doing. Yeah, I think it did more good than harm to those projects and their response was just over the top.
01:13:13
Speaker
Yeah, but a hundred percent. I think like if you're not doing what what Dan was saying, if if you're not, it's a great rule, that 10% rule. If you're not abiding by that, like, and you're not including every facet of your thing in equal parts, it's going to crumble. Like that's, yeah that's, that that's, that's applicable to across so many ah slather of industries. Like, absolutely. Yeah. Any last words, Dan? Yeah. Just from like my point of view too. I mean, Indy's so important for.
01:13:43
Speaker
the, like my Friday night gaming group, like we have tried a couple of mainstream titles and they almost get dropped instantly. So we we we bought ah Ubisoft um Ghost Recon Wildlands. Ghost Recon Wildlands. We bought that ages ago because it it went on special for like six bucks or something like that. So we played it.
01:14:10
Speaker
And we hit a game breaking glitch on the fourth, third or fourth main story mission within this ah massive group AAA story. And we couldn't get around it. And, and we were already after two sessions, kind of like, oh yeah, this is a bit generic and boring. But then we hit this break game breaking glitch where we could not progress because an NPC that was meant to talk, we were meant to talk to her in a bungalow, then she was meant to get in a helicopter and go with us to a point, would not and get in a helicopter. We tried. I wouldn't get in a helicopter with a bunch of random fucks I meet in a bungalow. Just quietly. You kidding me? That's the first thing I'd be bringing. I'd be brought into the helicopter being like, I'm getting the fuck out of here.
01:14:58
Speaker
Or it was a car or something, I don't know, I can't remember what it was, but week the the NPC finished the dialogue. Can we just focus on you and you your three mates in a bundle? Meeting some random chick of one a kidnapper in a helicopter. Hey, she was the fixer, all right. ah And it we we tried everything everything we do. So many things going through my head right now. We tried the actress to the bishop.
01:15:24
Speaker
Little, legitimate ways of fixing the bug. ah We tried, like, did you do not game breaking ways of like, yeah, we tried everything. It's one of the classic, classic thing of, uh, of Ubisoft games. If someone does a movie, shoot them and then they go.
01:15:40
Speaker
yeah No, no, we tried. There was, you could push the character and we tried yeah pushing her all the way over to the vehicle she was meant to get. it stay yeah and it just just She just wouldn't, would you it just wouldn't, that script just would not activate.
01:15:57
Speaker
So we we gave up and there's there's been, I think there's been one or two others. Why wouldn't you? Why would you, why would you go put more time back into trying? Yeah,
Preference for Indie Games
01:16:06
Speaker
exactly. Exactly. and There was only one or two other triple AAA aa a titled games that we'd actually played. And every other time we all play, we always play indie games, whether it's early release stuff or four For release in any games and we play them and we we still a couple of weeks ago We still we went back to the first indie game we'd ever played together back in 2000 We have played together in this run of us playing online on Fridays
01:16:35
Speaker
We went back to the game because we were playing another one and we're like, well, yeah, this is this is a good game, but it's not as good as this game. And and ah halfway through the night, I'm like, why the fuck are we playing this when we all keep saying it's not as good as this? Let's just go and play this.
01:16:51
Speaker
What was the old game? Because you talked about that not too long ago, didn't you? Pulsar. Pulsar. It's that like do the Star Trek. yeah andbo yeah It was the first one we played. It cost us all of about 25 bucks ah from this indie developer. They they've finished their updates on it. But we compare all of our co-op gameplay in all these indie games we play to how that game was a true co-op game. You cannot finish it without yeah your team working together.
01:17:20
Speaker
I'd be really interested to see what it's like playing co-op with people I know in SM2, Space Marine 2. Because you can play the main campaign co-op. You'd crack the shits with me so quickly it wouldn't be funny. it did it i wouldnoy I would annoy the ever loving shit out of you and I would probably do it on purpose. I think I'd i'd record most of it because i'm I'm sure there's hilarity that's just that would be unlocked. But it would remind me of, I kind of get flashbacks to Armia 2.
01:17:50
Speaker
Cuz you- Man, they were good games. Those first-person shooter, visceral, fast-paced, they're just the tomfoolery. yeah and And you've all got roles in Space Marine 2, so you're not all just tactical marines. Like some of you can be you can be heavy gunner, you can be a sniper, you can be tactical marine. There's actually quite a lot of depth to the multiplayer as far as I can tell.
01:18:14
Speaker
I think that's, yeah, that's, I definitely want to play space marine too. It could be the one we finally recorded. I think that looks, it looks, I think it's inviting enough for the, like, it's so inviting for you obviously as a, as a diehard fan. It's inviting enough for me as just a casual.
01:18:30
Speaker
Like I kind of enjoy seeing gameplay clips of it. yeah It's got a lot of doing. Yeah, we could find some time I would ah just I'd use a chainsaw sword. Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, yeah, 100%. And two out of three of us can record PS5 footage in real time. So we can I can cut that together as real time flip between the two screens. along Yeah, along the audio track over the top.
01:18:54
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. I think that'd be a lot of fun, especially drunk.
Potential of AA Games
01:18:57
Speaker
But see, I think that falls into, and I know we're running over time and we've lost things and we haven't even spoken about double A games. And I mean, Blacksmith, the Space Marine 2, the one I've gone back to now after Blacksmith. I'm seeing i' sitting sitting on my desk, ready to go. the cash she Double AA games. I mean, I think the AA games are the the space now where They can take that, they've got a bigger budget. They can take the innovative ah aspect of the the Indies, implements it there, but still have a marketing budget and an exposure level of the or close to the AAA guys and and deliver something fantastic. And I think Vanishes is a good good point of view, but Space Marine and Wukong are the same.
01:19:47
Speaker
I think Hogwarts Legacy would be a AA title. it did Because Keyhole Games or whatever they're called, Portkey Games? Portkey Games, but it was it was funded by WB.
01:19:59
Speaker
Obviously. apparently Yeah. You'd be, you'd be walking the tight line there, but yeah, like it ah it would almost fall in a tight line with a bunch of them. If you go really deep into it with most of those indie films, you'd be like, who's actually finding six degrees or seven of Kevin Bacon. Yeah, yeah exactly. Yeah. Yeah. 60 moves of Kevin Spacey.
01:20:19
Speaker
Which is ironic because it's six degrees warmer anyway, carry on. I think, I think the AA space is a different conversation. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, so I think it's something we, well, I know you, you've definitely have Dan, but something definitely I need to, uh, after this year of the year of Ubisoft, I'm calling it. I will definitely, I want to find some more of those AA games and get stuck into them and just like.
01:20:42
Speaker
ah I've played a few obviously in my time and just like that of just they kind they half like, they're half under the radar, half not. Like enough people play them, but they're not like getting the press that that that obviously they probably deserve. um that That's probably where I'm looking to take my gaming next year is to just find these golden gems. Yeah. Cause I needed something that didn't make me almost break, not break it out of frustration, break it out of gripping my controller like Wukong did.
Gaming Experience and Spoilers
01:21:12
Speaker
So as soon as I finished Wukong, I jumped straight back into the Sinking City, which I had never finished. And it's such a slower place game. And it's full of jank. It is jank central for absolutely everything, movement and facial animations and like combat. It's just jank, jank, jank. But the world, the voice acting keeps you engaged. And you look past that jank.
01:21:40
Speaker
to to just play some video games when you're growing up. Well, that's every video game. I think that's a kind of what we probably attach to, too, is that we can look past that jank that it doesn't need to be fully triple A polished, which triple A polish is gone. Like it that doesn't exist. Triple AAA polish for me now indicates stay offline and don't have the entire game spoiled and then wait a month.
01:22:09
Speaker
like and And that's why I think I had such a good interaction with outlaws was because I waited a month there are enough patches that I didn't have the same experience I had with Jedi survivor where there was some pretty ground like game breaking moments in that because I was, but that was, that was also on me for like not being smart enough to be like, well, cool. I'm just going to unsubscribe from these certain pages that I know just fucking ruin games for me and stories of games that I want to do naturally. Yeah.
01:22:34
Speaker
Um, but yeah, absolutely. I want to, I want to get more into that, that double a, uh, sex space. And we have talked about doing a, um, an indie indie games, kind of not so much an episode, but I've got a few in my, in my library on my PS five that I've just picked up through place as much for sales. Um, that I'm keen to like, I've still got to play Trek to Yomi. Um, I picked up this other game, which just looks.
01:22:59
Speaker
It reminds me of old school God of Wars. It's called Werewolf the Apocalypse. And it's it looks so top level, dumb, but fun. I just can't wait to tear per people up as this giant werewolf. um sounds I played like frankly played like a little bit of it, and it was just like, oh, this is stupid. This is great. I'm going to enjoy this. But like I'm sure I'll get into it, and I'll be like, oh, no, this is a great game of plantar mechanic. but it's just Does it need that more polish or does it just need, you know, some extra dollars in the bank so these guys can polish it? Like, do you need a bigger studio to come in and polish it? I guess that's the ah question that comes off
Humorous Conclusion
01:23:33
Speaker
that. Yeah. Cool. Um, I think that's it for the episode. I think so too. I don't know. so I think Dan's frozen. I think we've lost Dan. Yeah. Yeah. Um, he's still recording on his end. Um, well,
01:23:50
Speaker
I'm sure he'll come back in a sec. Bye Dan. Bye, Lieutenant Dan.