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Papers Please and The Return of the Obra Dinn
463 Plays3 years ago
In this episode Adam takes Satsunami to the glorious republic of Arstotzka to check his passport and then afterwards looks into the mysterious disappearance of the Obra Dinn. Join us as we discuss these classics from creator Lucas Pope and how they have redefined the indie gaming genre as a whole.
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Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Milestone
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome to Chatsunami.
00:00:17
Speaker
Hello everyone, and welcome back to Chatsunami. My name is Adam, and joining me today, is he a traveller with a legitimate visa? Is he a revolutionary trying to format trouble? Is he the foreign girlfriend of a high-ranking government official with falsified papers? Or is he a terrifying monster from the depths of the sea? Let's check his documents and find out. Satsunami, welcome back. Glory to Astodska. And your papers please.
00:00:41
Speaker
I told you that in confidence. I mean, hi, everybody. Nice to be back. And indeed, yep, glory to Arstotzka, of course. Yes, you can invite me in now, Adam. Only if you can say glory to Arstotzka five times fast. Oh, yes.
00:00:56
Speaker
Okay. Do you really want to go there? Right. Go for it. I believe in you. Okay. Glory to Arstotzka. Glory to Arstotzka. Glory to Arstotzka. Glory to Arstotzka. And glory to Arstotzka. Arstotzka. Oh, no, you denied. I'll be back.
00:01:16
Speaker
How are you doing this fine day anyway? Not too bad, to be honest. Really hyped that we are, I think at this point, about 5 episodes away from the big 1-0-0, the big episode 100. So, really excited for that one. Oh my god, I feel like I say this every week, but where does the time go?
00:01:33
Speaker
I don't know. I think it goes into the back of the wardrobe and it's like, you know, when you go in to clean it out once every couple of years and you're like, oh my God, this is here. Oh, my Stairmaster. And the first 90 episodes of Chas, you know what I mean? You're going to be telling that to your grandkids in the future. God, I pity them. It's like Grandpa Savage. What are these? Gather round, children.
00:01:58
Speaker
is how you told a red panda he wasn't allowed into Arstotzka. Maybe by that point they'll have taken the podcast off us. It'll be a coup. Or will be the propaganda wing of Arstotzka. That's true, that's true. Who knows what the future holds? Who knows? I wonder if we'll get a letter from the Queen when we reach 100. Our podcast is at 100. I think the Queen's probably busy doing other things.
Lucas Pope Games Retrospective
00:02:22
Speaker
better be as long as they're be writing a letter I can't argue with those facts
00:02:30
Speaker
So some of you fine listeners have probably been able to discern from these sometimes insane ramblings in the beginning that in this episode, we're going to be conducting a retrospective of Papers, Please! and Return of the Obra Dinn. Both these games were created and developed by the solo indie developer, Lucas Pope. So Pope developed a kind of early interest in programming and game design from a young age. And after working at some of the bigger game studios, most notably Naughty Dog, where he worked on Uncharted 1 and 2, he decided to strike out on his own as an indie developer.
00:02:59
Speaker
After releasing several small experimental indie games, Pope vowed to his pregnant wife that he would develop one more solo game before going off to find a real job. This final project turned into Papers, Please! Released in 2013, this game was a critical and commercial success, selling more than 1.8 million copies in its first three years, and winning several awards, including the Seamus McNally Grand Prize at the Independent Games Festival.
00:03:22
Speaker
This success allowed Pope to immediately break his promise to his wife and to continue his work as a solo developer and to release his next game, Return of the Obra Dinn, in 2018. This too received high praise, winning awards at the Game Awards and the British Academy Game Awards, and again, the Seamus McNally Grand Prize. So Satsu, when did you first become aware of either Lucas Pope or Papers, Please or Return of the Obra Dinn?
00:03:45
Speaker
In all honesty, I think I got on to the Papers, Please train quite late. I remember hearing about it and I actually think our good friend Green Shield 95 was telling me about it because I remember I saw on his wishlist at one point and I was asking him, I was like, well, what is this game? And he said, oh, it's Papers, Please and he kind of explained the brief premise and I'd kind of heard of this game through the grapevine but
00:04:11
Speaker
again as you know it's one of these games that I heard of. I heard like a lot of high praise for it but in all honesty I just I never dived into it. I think it's one of those games as well that I bought it and put it on the backlog, left it beside To The Moon and what remains of Edith Finch and went yep
00:04:29
Speaker
I'll play them one day. And yeah, one day resulted in several years later. So to be honest, I had heard of the name like Lucas Pope floating around, but I wasn't really that knowledgeable until I started researching this topic. And can I just say, I was so shocked that for someone who has credited as an anti-developer, a work
00:04:50
Speaker
for such prestigious companies such as Naughty Dog. I couldn't believe when they said, oh, I worked for other companies. I thought, okay, what was it going to be? Is it going to be another indie company? It's like, oh, no, I worked on the Uncharted games with Naughty Dog. And I was like, oh, my God, I genuinely did not know that. So, yeah, that was a bit of a shock. But even for the return of the Obra Dinn, I had no idea about this game until you brought it up.
00:05:14
Speaker
I say thankfully but we'll get on to that but when you kind of gifted me the games and you said, or rather you gifted me the Return of Obra Dinn and you said, oh you should play Papers, Please and I went away, I did and yeah.
00:05:29
Speaker
life-changing. That's really all I can say but what about you Adam? Were you more knowledgeable about Lucas Pope and kind of a sphere of indie games? I would love to say yes but honestly no. When Papers Please first released I had no idea it was existence. I wasn't particularly into indie games in that kind of like early 2010s you know I was still very much a kind of AAA kind of mainstream gamer. It wasn't until and I have to credit Yatsy Croshaw on
00:05:58
Speaker
of Zero Punctuation fame, if you know that YouTube series. I have to credit him for bringing Lucas Pope and both these games to my attention. So I think either in 2017 or 2018, I'm sure I watched his review of Papers, Please. And that instantly caught my attention just from the way he described it. And I was like, well, I've never liked
00:06:15
Speaker
heard of a game like this. It sounds so unique. And then I saw his review of Obra Dinn not long after that. And I was like, wow, I really, I was really, really keen to play Obra Dinn. But Obra Dinn only first released on PC. So I was I wait till it came out on console the year after. So I played Papers, Please first. Actually, I'm still in this episode. Really, really enjoyed it. I think it's great. And then played Obra Dinn. Absolutely loved that as well.
00:06:36
Speaker
So again, like you, I kind of was, you actually probably knew of LucasBook before I did. I was far too mainstream and quote unquote cool to know about these about a solo indie developer at that point. I know I totally see what you mean because all of these indie games that I kind of now say, oh it's the best game ever, it's fantastic. They came out years ago and I was exactly in the same boat as you where I was like, oh it's an indie game, I don't know whether I'll enjoy it or not and
00:07:04
Speaker
I mean I really wish I had played it but see on the flip side and this is gonna make me sound old, really I'm not that old but it almost does feel though like these games are ones that you would appreciate when you were older as opposed to playing them if you were like a high school or college or you know university student. I don't think it would have the same impact necessarily, like what do you think about that?
00:07:29
Speaker
No, I mean, I totally agree. From my perspective, certainly, I don't think I would have stuck with something. I mean, I feel like I may have stuck with returning the Obra Dinn. Because I feel like it's kind of uniquely, let's say uniquely, but it's of intense interest to me. But certainly, I don't think some of my papers, please, I could have seen myself dropping that pretty quickly, you know, when I was younger. So I
00:07:48
Speaker
I agree. I think I came to it of a good age as well. So I mean, I guess you again, not everybody's different. So like maybe if you're more interested in gaming and stuff like a younger age, it might still appeal. But I do think you're right, generally. And I think as you're slightly older, it's probably a game. Certainly I think Papers, Please is probably a game that you would appreciate more.
00:08:05
Speaker
I mean these games do delve into very deep topics. Like for example with Papers Please, it is like a story about a document inspector essentially. You're regulating who comes into the Republic of Arstotzka. I hope it's a republic and I've not just now to myself as not been a fan of this game. I think it's a quote-unquote republic. Yeah, yeah, quote-unquote republic. A people democratic republic.
00:08:30
Speaker
Sorry, one second, my right panda lawyer is... Right, okay, okay. Now he's telling me to say glory to Arstotzka, so this episode gets released in Arstotzka, so that's okay. Emphasis on the red there. Yeah.
00:08:45
Speaker
But yeah, this delves into some very serious topics, you know, you have to decide. In fact, you know what, before I even go on, do you think it's time to jump into it? I think it's time to go. Time to get into our main discussion. So before we begin the episode proper, I'm being told here that my superior at Border Control wants to have a quick word with me. So let's take a quick ad break and we'll be right back.
00:09:08
Speaker
Welcome to Chatsunami, a variety podcast that talks about topics from gaming and films to streaming in general interest. Previously on Chatsunami, we discussed Game of the Decade, Deadly Premonition, the romantic thriller, Birdemic, and listen to us get all sappy as we discuss our top five Christmas films. If that sounds like your cup of tea, then you can find us an anchor, Spotify, YouTube, and opiate podcast apps. As always, stay safe, stay awesome, and most importantly, stay hydrated.
00:09:39
Speaker
We are Beer and Chill Podcast. Podcast where we review TV shows, games, movies and whatever else takes our fancy. So what are you waiting for? If you're a cool kid like us, you're gonna listen to the Beer and Chill Podcast. You can get anywhere from Spotify all the way to your grandmother's radio. My name is Jan. And I'm Craig Yisi. And we are Beer and Chill.
00:10:14
Speaker
Well, that was quite the tongue lashing. So before I'm sent off to the Gulag, let's talk about Papers, Please.
Exploring 'Papers, Please' Mechanics
00:10:20
Speaker
So, like, fear not, Satsu. I'm not going to put you on the spot here and make you summarise this game because, luckily for us, Lucas Pope has already done that. In his own words, in Papers, Please, you play a border inspector at a contentious checkpoint.
00:10:32
Speaker
People are coming into your booth and they want to get from one side to the other. You've got to check their documents and make sure everything's in order before you let them through. So, sounds pretty boring, right? Well, trust me, this game is anything but that. In this game, you take on the role of a border control officer
00:10:47
Speaker
in the fictional totalitarian Eastern Bloc-esque nation of Arstotzka, which has a tense and vacillating relationship with its neighbouring states. You must review the paperwork of each immigrant arriving into Arstotzka against an ever-growing stringent list of rules to see if each person is allowed to legally enter the country. You need to do well at your job to receive enough income to provide for your family, while you also have the opportunity to accept bribes and work with corrupt officials to earn more money or to join a counter-revolutionary faction working against the state.
00:11:16
Speaker
So Pope came up with the idea for this game while having to undertake a large amount of international travel when working on a previous gaming project. He became fascinated with the work of border inspectors and sought to try and translate this into a game. So what were your initial thoughts and then your kind of first impressions of playing Papers, Please!
00:11:37
Speaker
I feel that's the answer to a lot of questions. Yeah. Well, how to put this in the nicest way possible. For a game that is so... I don't want to say simplistic, because that's not fair on Lucas Pope as well, but for a game that has so many kind of relatively simplistic gameplay elements and things like that,
00:11:57
Speaker
I was just shocked at how emotional I was getting when I was playing through this because initially you know it says oh you check the document, if the document doesn't match this then do that and usually in games like this they focus more on that element if it makes sense like oh if you process something correctly then that's it throw it away you get more points yay glory to Arstotzka but in this game it's like
00:12:22
Speaker
your family and the lives of other families totally depend on your decisions. And I think that kind of narrative hook is the thing that I think everybody kind of appreciates in this game. I struggle to call it a game, I have to say. I really struggle, because on the one hand, obviously, it's got gameplay elements, it's got a system where you earn points and things, and by that I mean you earn our stock
00:12:48
Speaker
credits i don't i can't even remember what their currency is but at the same time it's like the decisions you're making it isn't even like you're having fun in a way like you're having fun because you kind of go in autopilot and you think right okay i'm checking this i'm checking that okay you've got the right documents glory to arstotzka you know you press this and then you're reading through the paper and things but on the
00:13:12
Speaker
That side, it can get really stressful. There's one particular moment, and this is something I messaged you about, I think, when it happened to me for the first time, but it was when this man comes through the checkpoint and then he turns round and he says something like, although he's got the right documents, he says, oh, my wife's coming next. She's not got the right documentation. He kind of asks you.
00:13:32
Speaker
can you let her through? So you have to make like a decision. You have to say, oh I'm gonna let this woman in because that's a husband and the stories check out and everything but our documents are totally wrong. So you either have to obey the word of the law. Have you ever seen Les Mis, Adam? I have indeed. This is gonna sound like a weird comparison but do you know the character of Inspector Javert? Yeah, Russell Crowe's finest acting performance. We don't talk about that, Petru, Adam.
00:13:58
Speaker
Wise, very wise. I don't think even he talks about it. I actually don't think he does, but anyway, sorry, that was an episode for another day. In, you know, we miss Inspector Gewehr, as the name suggests, he is a member of the French police force who looks at the law very kind of black and white, even though he's chasing a character who just stole a loaf of bread to save his sister's family. This character says, oh no, I don't care, you broke the law, and
00:14:25
Speaker
I know that's kind of a side tangent but that's the kind of mindset you have to decide between. Do you take a totally objective black and white outlook into this game? Do you say oh well maybe I'll let one or two through which the game will give you a warning and then start to punish you for getting things wrong and that piles on the stress? Or do you play it as like an objective video gamer where you're like oh it doesn't matter I want those sweet sweet XP points?
00:14:53
Speaker
Yeah sorry, I know that's kind of a ramble but genuinely that's how I felt. I felt really stressed at times and at one point, I don't know if you felt the same but I actually went on autopilot at one point where I was getting quite tired when I was playing it but I was just processing, processing and I got quite numb at one point you know like emotionally I was just like okay here we go, here we go, here we go. But did you ever get to that point
00:15:18
Speaker
I'll talk about the exact moment later, but going on autopilot was exactly what caused me the most amount of trouble in this game and brought me to ruin just by going straight onto autopilot. It was funny you just saying like, stressful as the very first word for like your impressions of this game. I guarantee if we like polled.
00:15:35
Speaker
a lot of players, that would probably be one of the most frequent words used to describe the experience of playing Papers, Please. I went into it. I kind of knew what the gameplay loop was, but again, kind of like you, I really did not expect to be as engaged and to be so, my stress levels to be so heightened and everything. And it was funny you mentioned mutual friend, Green Shield, because I believe, am I right in saying he stopped playing this game because he found it too stressful? I think you're right. Yeah. And I can see why.
00:16:00
Speaker
Yeah, it's a valid... I do think it's a great game, but I can totally understand that kind of outcome, because there's a lot of stress to be had here, particularly if you get absorbed into it. We'll look a little bit more in depth at the game mechanics. The central gameplay loop is you reviewing documents and transcripts, taking fingerprints, conducting body scans, all to decide whether a particular individual can legally enter the country of Arstotzka.
Moral Decisions in 'Papers, Please'
00:16:27
Speaker
You're awarded money for each person that you correctly process. Money is deducted from you. You say after your third processing failure. And then the money that you accumulate at the end is used to pay for food, heat and medicine for your family. And importantly, family members can die, as I'm sure people will find out in this game. So how accessible did you find this game? Did you find it quite easy to pick up the gameplay? Was it a challenge at all?
00:16:49
Speaker
Objectively, I did think it was easy once you got into the flow of it, but, and this is gonna sound very weird, but I felt as if this game was more like a job, if that makes sense. Like, have you ever been in a new job before and you have to kind of learn the ins and outs of what you're supposed to do? So it's like, the first couple of times you do something, you make mistakes, and you're like, oh damn, I've done this, and they're like, don't worry, you can try again and everything.
00:17:16
Speaker
I just want to put out a disclaimer, I've never worked for an Arch-Doskin ticket booth or anything like that, nothing that stressful, but do you know what I mean though Adam? It's like that kind of having to learn and pick up the skills, but see once you pick it up and you know what to look for, you just go and autopilot and you just kind of like write okay I'm checking out the name, checking out the gender, checking out the photos and things, which the photos I must admit did get a gig about me when you looked at the photo and then you
00:17:46
Speaker
today I mean you went nah
00:17:48
Speaker
just like nah but yeah i honestly felt as if it was at times it was like starting a new job but not in a bad way i just want to say that because you might think oh you're starting a new job it must be very laborious it must be very boring and everything but no genuinely it was again i don't want to say it was fun but there was a kind of hook there that made it addictive to kind of go through so yeah no i honestly i thought the gameplay itself was
00:18:18
Speaker
pretty good, I would say. Now let me rewind a bit, the only thing I would criticise this game for is there were some moments where it felt like there was too much going on. And I don't know, maybe that's just me, maybe that's just because I was getting stressed out, it turning away like a hungry family. But
00:18:35
Speaker
it did feel as if there was a lot to contend with so at the very beginning of the game you just have to check whether or not they've got a passport and if they've got an Arched Stottskin passport that's perfectly fine but everybody else needs like a travel permit I think in fact that's how I think it's like the first day you're not allowed to admit anyone who's not Arched Stottskin or if they aren't then they have to have like a special permit on the other days but then they start introducing other elements like
00:19:04
Speaker
having to do body scans to determine someone's gender. So like for example you'll get a very feminine looking person coming in and then it says on their passport like oh there a man and everything and you have to do like a full body scan to confirm and everything. It's a very invasive game though and I know that ties into the whole dystopian thing but it's like grilling people there and then trying to get into Arstotzka to be like who are you if you know what I mean? Like challenging them.
00:19:33
Speaker
And it's just an interesting experience, but sorry. I hope that answered the question there. No, I think I would completely agree with what you're saying. From a purely mechanical standpoint, this game is just played with the mouse. I think you can upgrade your border control booth to make things a bit easier. I think that's when some buttons on the keyboard start getting used. But for the most part, you can just play this with your mouse. So from that perspective, it's a really simple game to grapple with. But you're completely right in that
00:19:59
Speaker
There's a lot of different elements that get introduced into it, especially when you start taking fingerprints, body scans, when you start having to look for discrepancies. I think for me that the moment the stress really started to hit was I think when work permits were added, so people who are coming into the country to work need to then have three.
00:20:15
Speaker
sets of documents that you then need to review, make sure they're all legal, they're all valid, and then also make sure the information matches amongst them and from that point it just kind of escalates because you're eventually looking at diplomatic papers. I think there's also health. I remember later in the game there's health certificates and everything that start getting introduced and you're getting more and more stringent criteria. You need to be checking
00:20:38
Speaker
the contraband. I don't know if you got this far in the game as well, but eventually you get access to sniper rifles and tranquilizer guns that you need to use if people try to illegally run for the border and everything. But you need to find the key and smash open the case to get it out. So a lot of different elements get put in to really ramp up the tension.
00:20:54
Speaker
But so yeah, it's both a very simple, I suppose maybe like the ways maybe maybe like, I don't think it's exactly this, but like kind of, you know, simple to understand difficult to master is maybe the kind of way I would describe it. Just just as a kind of final point, like, have you ever played a game like this before? I mean, because I never played a game, unless I'm completely blank on one, but I've never played a game with this kind of gameplay loop of like, reviewing documents and things. But have you ever played anything like it?
00:21:19
Speaker
I honestly can't think of any off the top of my head either. It is definitely a unique game because can you imagine many games like this getting popular? Technically you get flight simulators, you get you know truck simulators, even goat simulator, but you know those are all things that have some kind of thing that you would think okay not my cup of tea but I can understand why people would be interested in it. But for this game it's like
00:21:45
Speaker
You're literally a ticket inspector or passport inspector. You're inspecting documents to decide the fate of all these people coming into the country and everything. It's quite surreal to think that Lucas Pope has created this small world
00:22:04
Speaker
do you know what really surprised me actually with just the whole idea of Paper Spleeze? It was just the fact that there were so many fans of this game. You know as I said it's like it's such a what should be on paper, ironically enough, a boring concept but it really isn't. It really hooks you in with the story, with the characters and again as you said with the more kind of complicated elements later on.
00:22:29
Speaker
And I think that's an excellent point to turn to the kind of story of this game. So this game has 20 different endings, depending on a lot of different actions that you take throughout the game. So in one, you can escape Arstotzka with your family. In some endings, you can stay in Arstotzka and remain a loyal employee of the state. You can also help a resistance movement who will contact you at different points and ask you to do certain tasks.
00:22:51
Speaker
Or you can end up in a labour camp, which I think is probably the most common ending that you can do. You can end up with very different reasons. So I'm really interested to hear this. So talk me through how your story unfolded in the game. What actions did you take, and what was the end of your story? We really couldn't go there. We are. This is the grilling of the...
00:23:11
Speaker
I swear I gave you my passport, what more do you want Adam? Only you've been able to say Glory to Arstotzka five times fast. Glory to Arstotzka there. It's like that guy that you meet. I could be butchering this name so apologies but it's like that Georgi Kostava I think his name is. You're the guy who gives you the documents that he's clearly drawn. He gives his handwritten passport.
00:23:33
Speaker
Oh, I love that character. Such a highlight. So in my playthrough, when you're playing this game, there's kind of cutaways like after every day and at the end of each day you get like money.
00:23:48
Speaker
depending on how your performance went and you can put it towards looking after your family. So it is quite a huge family. You know, you've got the mother, the children, you've got like uncles, aunts, mother-in-laws, things like that and you have to decide whether or not they live. I can't
00:24:05
Speaker
remember how far, I think I got maybe halfway through, I could be wrong but yeah, long story short my family died out and they fired me because apparently passport inspector in the glorious Republic of Erstotzka is a family profession as they told me. It reminds me of, do you remember in the Simpsons where, do you remember the episode where Milhouse's parents break up? I sleep in a race car, where do you sleep? Yeah.
00:24:31
Speaker
Exactly. I sleep in the Gulag. Oh. But that was that. You know the scene where Kirk goes to his job and he's like, well, I've so got my job at the cracker factory, and they fire him because he's a divorced parent, and his boss starts trying to say, you know, crackers are a family business. Maybe single people lead them. I don't know. I don't want to know. It's like, you know, maybe single people do check documents and passports. You know what? I don't want to know.
00:25:00
Speaker
it's like saying after all these years of loyalty, it's good buying, good luck. I don't recall saying good luck. But I did say glory to Archducka. So long story short, my family ended up dying in it. There were times where after that I realised that every day you could get away with one mistake. So I always used that mistake to pay
00:25:22
Speaker
certain people. So as I said before the guy who goes through and he says oh my wife's coming right behind me so please you know let her through. I let her through knowing that I wouldn't be docked any pay. There was another incident which I have to admit I felt really proud of where there was a guy or rather there was a woman
00:25:40
Speaker
who comes through. And this is where the deep themes come in, where she says that she's potentially going to be trafficked and she gives you the name of the guy. And I have to admit, the first time the guy popped up, I audibly gasped. I was like, you son of a bitch. And the guy, of course, is like, do I know you? Do you remember the scene I'm talking about?
00:26:02
Speaker
oh it's so grim but it was satisfying to put them behind bars and then the next day the papers talked about it saying this notorious trafficker was arrested in Arstotzka and everything I was like wow I actually made a difference and I get it it's a video game you know it's not real but you do get that sense of accomplishment of
00:26:21
Speaker
Oh, I actually helped someone today, and that's what I always use the kind of leniency in the system for, to kind of help as many people as I could. But at the same time, as you said, the pressure does come on where you have to feed your family and you get offered bribes and things by the guards. Technically they want you to arrest more people, so they get more money and then they give you a cut of the money. Basically, long story short from that, yeah, family dead, single people don't check passports apparently. Ending up in the labour camp or
00:26:51
Speaker
I think with your family that it is a very common experience for most people who play this. I did reach the end with most of my family alive, and I'll speak a bit about my reactions to one of the deaths, which shocked me at my reaction to it. So I kind of went into this game and I was like, right, I'm going to be a true family man. My family is my priority. So whatever else, I'm going to try and do as well as I can in my job to make enough money just so I can provide food and heat for my family medicine if they need it.
00:27:19
Speaker
or let me tell you, I don't know if you reached a bit where your son has a birthday, but oh my god. Scraping, I think I left the family without heat for several days so I could afford the birthday present for my son. And then when he really wrote me a thank you card and I put it up in my booth and then the inspector, my boss walks in and finds me for having an illegal drawing up. It was quite the gut punch. But basically my story ended when my boss showed up one morning
00:27:45
Speaker
So I got very near the end of the game. The game has like 31 days. It's like a full month's work. I think I got to day 26. My boss walked in the morning and said, oh, my girlfriend's coming in from a different country. Make sure to let her through. And I was like, yep, yep, will do. Of course I will. Instantly forgot that happened as I got into checking like people's diplomatic authorization, their work permits and everything.
00:28:06
Speaker
This character came up. I did not recognise the name at all. There was something wrong with the documents. I sent her back. I said, no, you know, you're not getting in. You're not getting in today. And then it reached the end. The boss walked in and said, I've had enough of you. And I got thrown into a labour camp for being too good at my job. So there you go. That was maybe my punishment for being too, trying to be too good at my job. So yeah, I ended up basically the same place as you. My family had to deal with the shame of me in a labour camp. So maybe if they were dead, it would have been better.
00:28:31
Speaker
But anywho, that's a life in Arstotzka for you. I'm actually just surprised you didn't give him like a passport or something, you know, for his birthday. Do you know what that's actually one ending is that if you, because I think to get out of the country, you need to get like foreign passports. So I think you have to like illegally detain people and take their passports, and then you you'll eventually use those to get your family out of the country. So yeah, there's there's a lot of interesting endings to it. You can be the kind of you can do that is that this stuff you can do to help the resistance as well.
00:28:59
Speaker
Well, I think they say they can help your family. There's also a fun one where I think if you take too many bribes and you have too much money, your neighbours will report on you and you'll get sent to the Labour account for corruption. So there's a whole kind of spectrum. I mean, many of them end up in the same kind of place, but there's a spectrum of different things, which is quite interesting and makes you kind of live with those consequences. So, I mean, you've kind of talked about some of the memorable moments that kind of stuck out for you. Is there any others that you kind of wanted to mention, any other kind of moments that really stuck out for you during your playthrough?
00:29:26
Speaker
actually one moment I have to admit that I was really proud of was, is it like an athlete that's trying to escape to our store? Yeah, yeah, yeah. A foreign athlete is, yeah, you see a headline, don't you? I was so proud of that when they recognized him because I read the article and I thought, oh, that's cool, you know, a wee bit of cheeky world building from Lucas Pope here. And then two seconds later, this guy comes in and I can't remember his name, but he comes in and they're just, I recognize the name. I thought,
00:29:53
Speaker
I just thought they'd look familiar. And then I'm imagining you don't mind, Specter, just like putting out his newspaper and going, okay, okay, glory to Erskowska. Oh my God, you're a murderer. I was just like bam, shutters down, got him arrested. I don't think I got a bonus for that though, unfortunately, but no, that was definitely the main highlight. The only other highlight I would say again was Georgie Gustavo.
00:30:19
Speaker
who was absolutely fantastic. Every time he popped up during the days, I just made my day in the game. I was just like, oh, get out of here, you lovable scamp. Yeah, was there any moments that particularly stood out to you? Well, I'm not going to pick highlights, I'm going to pick lowlights just for what I feel like they revealed about me and the revulsion I felt in myself. So there's one point in the game
00:30:39
Speaker
And I don't know actually if these moments happen all the time, or if they're slightly randomised, but there was a moment in the game, as I ended one day, that the game told me, I think it's like your brother's like, oh, your brother and his wife have died, will you adopt your niece, your young niece? And I was struggling to, I was like, I could barely afford food and heat for everybody, you know, in medicine, so I made quite a callous decision, I was like, no, I can't, I can't afford to do it.
00:31:03
Speaker
I made it quite quickly and quite callously and then I remember hitting no and then it would carry on. Just this single line of text came up and it's like, your niece disappears into a state orphanage. The decision just hit me there and I was like, wow, what did I just do? And I felt like an utterly crappy human being for the rest of my play for it after I'd stopped playing as well. And then the other one was when my uncle eventually died because I was prioritising giving food to my wife and my son. So I think I left it too long for him. He got sick. I couldn't afford medicine for him and he died.
00:31:32
Speaker
And then, to my eternal shame, one of the first emotions I felt was relief. In a way, I was like, oh, that's going to make things a bit easier now. And then I was like, wow. I am a terrible human being. It kind of, I don't know if anybody's ever seen the Seinfeld episode where George's fiance dies. And then the doctors, the first reaction he had almost looked like relief and joy. And I was like, wow. I'm as bad as George Costanza. So those were the moments that really stood out for me just in there of what I felt they revealed about me.
00:31:59
Speaker
I was going to say it could have been worse. You could have processed Penske and let him into our stocks, God. But the company's in terrible financial ruin. Actually, there is one more point when it is, but see the first time you see, and again, kind of spoil us here, but see when you see the terrorist attack for the first time. Yeah. That actually blew me away. Like, I genuinely didn't realize that was going to happen because, you know, it's like a kind of normal day, a process of people, you know,
00:32:30
Speaker
And then all of a sudden all you hear is the guy declaring glory to his own country before you see this pixel blow up in the corner of the screen and you're just like, what the hell is going on? And it turns out it's a terrorist attack from one of the neighbouring countries that they were at war with. And you think, oh my God, as you slowly put down your shutters and put up the clothes for the day sign, you're just like, yeah, not dealing with this today. It was just like quite an impactful scene, I have to say.
00:32:58
Speaker
I like as well because that's a good example of what I love about this game as well is how like the world kind of fleshes itself out through these sort of brief interactions that you get with visitors and that's a great example that one because the very next day you have to conduct a body scan on every person who's coming from that particular country where the terrorist is believed to have come from and then the day after that you then you then read the newspaper that that country has complained about it so they're like saying oh yeah diplomats arriving today so you're not allowed to do it anymore and make sure the diplomat gets through but
00:33:24
Speaker
just like the small details that came through of the world like I remember I remember one one character arriving from a neighboring country and I was like my character asked like what are you like what's your purpose here and she's like oh I'm just traveling through I hate this country like I'm here for hopefully only two days I hated it just funny little details like that
00:33:40
Speaker
And then I think as well, just you get a sense of like how this Arstotzkan regime looks like it's kind of its political views as well, in a way, particularly around transgender issues. As you mentioned before, you'll get people who arrive there who have like male or female on their passport, but they perhaps don't look
00:33:57
Speaker
classically like you would think a male or female and you're forced to interrogate them on this, you know, and you might end up having to turn them away or you're going to have to conduct a body scan and that complete like invasion of privacy. And so it's kind of interesting that it's not a detail that's like, it's not a headline talking about it all in the paper. It's just one of these details and you can just see this regime clearly just has no like, no respect, no interest in those types of issues. So that's one thing I really love about the game is just the way it kind of builds this world.
00:34:21
Speaker
Oh no, I totally agree. I think one of the testaments to this game though, and how well it's built up its popularity and its fanbase, is just the fact that so many people, whether it's cosplayers, content creators, even artists, they've all drawn and created art related to this game, and it's
00:34:44
Speaker
absolutely mind-blowing to see how much dedication there is. So, for example, there is—and I've been badgering you for ages to watch its apologies, Adam—but there is a 10-minute video on YouTube for Papers, Please, and it is quite famous, I think, within the community and things, but
00:35:02
Speaker
if you haven't seen it and you think oh I don't know whether I want to get into Papers, Please. I mean there's slight spoilers about what happens in the game but I would wholeheartedly recommend that you go and watch that to see what kind of game Papers, Please is. So the movie itself was directed by someone called Nikita Ordinski. Honestly they did a fantastic job
00:35:24
Speaker
with this film. The main actor who plays the inspector is called Igor Savochkin and unfortunately from what was written in the comments he actually passed away after the film. I don't know if he passed away like in the last year or so as of recording this episode but he
00:35:42
Speaker
he does just such a fantastic job with the way he has all those subtle facial movements and he's trapped in this dark and dingy office and everything and he has to process people, he has to make that decision, he's got a photo of his family on his desk and he kind of looks at them and then has to look at the person in front of him and there's that dilemma, does he prioritise the person in front of him who has this life, who has this
00:36:11
Speaker
individuality this freedom or does he do it for his family does he make sure that his family's got as you said enough to eat enough to sustain themselves for that cold winter it's honestly one of those games that on the surface you would not expect
00:36:26
Speaker
this level of dedication, and yet somehow people have created amazing things from this game. And even Lucas Pope, I actually think he gave his blessing for this film. There's actually a Making of video for this film, and they actually said that they contacted Lucas Pope and they didn't expect to hear back from him, and I think it was like two weeks later.
00:36:49
Speaker
after they said the email would apply and everything and said he was totally on board with it. So you can see he kind of cares about the community as well because I think, and correct me if I'm wrong Adam, but did he not have a competition or something where he asked people to submit names to include in the game?
00:37:08
Speaker
exactly right he did that he was actually very he was very open with the development of this because he kept a public blog while making the game and he was very kind of interactive with a lot of like a lot of gamers and I think some content creators and things while he was making the game and he released a couple of demos couple betas of it with some of the content in it which I think really helped to like you know build excitement for the game and then helped as well when it was released get its kind of name out there so yeah like it doesn't surprise me that you know he
00:37:32
Speaker
would give his blessing because he seemed very active with the kind of community and as you mentioned there was a big response to it as well from from cosplay and everything like that because i was just surprised at the amount of people that actually put their name i think it was like oh something like 30 000 or something like that
00:37:47
Speaker
remember if that was like the total number or the number of people they had to cut down from because they said things like you know joke names won't be included and it has to use eastern block sending names as opposed to you know Jim Smith can you imagine that everyone coming through it's like hello there I'm Jim Smith from United Federation nice to meet you sorry I just realised United Federation sounds a little bit like the one out of Sonic
00:38:13
Speaker
Oh my god. See, the rabbit hole goes deeper than we expected. Maybe we get to day 31, Shadow will show up, or Gerhard Robotnik. Wait, did you not watch the credits? I've got on it, I've now always skipped too early. Yeah, the post-credit scene, that's where he pops up.
00:38:28
Speaker
Anyway, terrible jokes aside, it is honestly just such a fantastic game, a fantastic experience and quite frankly, I'm blown away at how fantastic this developer is. Like how much love and attention they gave this game for something that seems on paper so simplistic and so, you know, straightforward. I completely concur with what you're saying there.
00:38:51
Speaker
I think, if you remember, I brought this game up a few episodes back when ourselves and Crazy C were discussing mature content in games. I brought this one up as I thought one of the best examples of tackling mature subject matter in a game
00:39:07
Speaker
And I think that is still for me like the greatest strength of this game is the fact that basically like you have to end up defining your own kind of moral code here and we've talked about that and like what you're gonna prioritize what you want to achieve here and the game will make you live with the consequences of your actions you know and in many ways there's like no there's nothing that you're really gonna do that doesn't have like at least some kind of consequence whether it's you know impacts the game or whether it's just something you're like wow just makes you think about it and
00:39:31
Speaker
And the games are game video games are very unique medium and have a unique ability to tell stories because of their interactive element, you know, something that movies and books and TV shows don't have. And just for me, like, I don't think this could ever work as like, I mean, we talked about the short length movie sounds amazing. I really do need to watch it.
00:39:49
Speaker
But I don't think if this, let's say Lucas Pope was like a film director or something, I just don't think this would have had the same impact that being a film or anything. I think the very interactivity of it is what makes it so impactful. And I think it really shows what video games can do, you know, and like how powerful a medium they can be. And, you know, in a day like I wouldn't say this is one of my favorite games of all time, but I do think it's probably I would rate it as one of the best because I just think it's such an incredible like achievement, especially for just one person to have done.
00:40:16
Speaker
So before we move on, do you have any kind of closing thoughts you want to say about Papers, Please? I would say if you haven't played this game, usually it's quite cheap on Steam. Usually they have sales going on during the summer or the kind of mid-season ones. I would say check it out or at the very least watch a Let's Play over it because it's an experience that, and I do think that it's a better experience if you actually play it,
00:40:39
Speaker
But it is one of those games that again, it seems simplistic, it seems kind of, I don't know, is it a good game, is it not? Really, go play it, throw yourself into it, you will be absolutely consumed by this world that Lucas Pope has made. And it's a very small world, ironically enough, although they talk about these worlds like the United Federation and
00:41:00
Speaker
other countries nearby. Of course you're processing documents from all these other countries, but at the end of the day you're just like one individual who is trapped in Arstotzka having to process these and seeing the world through this tiny booth and I can't understand
00:41:17
Speaker
how impactful this game is and I know maybe I'm a bit biased because I am getting into indie games a lot more recently so if you haven't played it definitely go check it out. You won't regret it but I wouldn't say you'll probably enjoy it but not for the reasons you know normally like it's a bad game or something. I mean because it's emotionally taxing you're gonna have to go through some difficult decisions and yeah go check it out essentially. I could not agree more with that.
00:41:43
Speaker
Well then, since your papers seem to be all in order, Mr Satsu, and you've also given me that bribe of credits, let's proceed to Pope's follow-up game, Return of the Obra Dinn.
Introducing 'Return of the Obra Dinn'
00:41:53
Speaker
So, Return of the Obra Dinn is set in 1807, and you play as an insurance inspector for the East India Company.
00:41:58
Speaker
So the Obra Dinn, a merchant ship that went missing five years previously, reappears near the English shore with no living soul on it. You're dispatched to the ship to uncover the fate of the crew and to reconstruct what occurred on the vessel. So initially Pope only planned to spend about six months making Obra Dinn. However, it kind of expanded exponentially. It turned into a four-year project and allegedly made him contemplate retirement upon its completion because it took quite the toll. So again, going back to you Satsu,
00:42:25
Speaker
reconstruct from me your initial thoughts going into this game and then kind of what your first impressions were once you got to grips with it. Well I just want to say first of all I had never heard of Obra Dinn until you brought it up.
00:42:37
Speaker
because you talked about playing Papers, Fleas and everything, and when we were coming up with ideas for this episode, you'd said, oh, why don't you try Obra down? And I was like, Obra what now? And yeah, I was like, okay, I'll try it. Graciously, you gifted me the game and I decided to go through it. I'm not gonna lie, I did not have a good experience, only at the very, very beginning when I loaded up the title screen and my computer was like not
00:43:04
Speaker
cooperating so that kind of initially I was like oh god it's gonna be one of these games but I feel as if that's more like an optimization issue with Steam maybe I don't know but yeah it was just a pain I couldn't move my mouse on my like desktop it was kind of fixed solely in the center because Obra Dinn was running in the background so technical issues aside because I can't slate that against the game itself that's just an optimization thing but
00:43:31
Speaker
When I first played it, I had no idea what to expect. And when I came into the game, I was like, huh, okay, this is a bit weird, quite an interesting story, quite an interesting art style. But when I came on the ship, I was like, well, this is a waste of time because there's nobody here. And of course you go in and the whole premise of the game is you are an insurance investigator. Yeah, yeah.
00:43:55
Speaker
and you use a magical pocket watch, not like Bernard's watch, which I have to admit would be quite funny if the two got mixed up. Poor Bernard, Jesus! Can you imagine that? It's like, okay, time to stop dying and get those sweeties. And then he sees like this rabbit getting tanned by a card or something.
00:44:13
Speaker
Wow, that would have made for a very different TV show. But yeah, sorry, my fanfiction aside there. Yeah, so you've got this magical pocket watch that kind of shows you like a snippet of time before someone dies, or rather kind of the final moments of how they died. And there's some really intense moments, mind you. But you know, at the very beginning, they show you like someone getting shot in the face, they show you someone getting cut down and everything, and you think, oh, good Lord, this is gonna be, this is gonna be quite intense.
00:44:40
Speaker
slight spoilers, you know, going into the story. But the turning point when I had a very much old shit moment was when I went into like the past of one of these skeletons and I thought, okay, we'll show them. Was it someone who stabbed him in the back? And then two seconds later I was met with like a giant tentacle cracking thing and I was like, sweet Jesus!
00:45:00
Speaker
This game is not what I expected at all and it just, it felt so satisfying. See when you figured out who the person was, how did they die, that kind of thing. So basically you have to do a Columbo and match the names on the roster against
00:45:17
Speaker
the bodies as it were and also specify who they were, what their rank was, how they died. One of the things that was quite interesting though when I was researching this episode and I think I told you before we started recording but apparently Lucas Pope had a real and very very severe issue with this game when it came to localization and it's something I never really thought of but in terms of language which I have to admit for someone who's into language learning I don't bring it up nearly as much as I probably should
00:45:47
Speaker
So in the game you have to see Captain William dies by getting shot or something like that. But some of the terminology that he was using for the English version doesn't necessarily translate well in other languages like for example Naft
00:46:03
Speaker
doesn't translate really with some other languages and things like that so we had to kind of find a way to try and adapt that for other localisations because you know like there's also slang there's the time period to take into consideration as well so we can just say they got shanked and dabbed on you know that wouldn't have made sense in 1807
00:46:25
Speaker
yeah it was quite interesting to see that was like one of the major stumbling blocks but it just shows again Lucas Pope's dedication to this game but yeah going into it I have to admit there were some frustrating moments you know where it was like
00:46:41
Speaker
you were pretty much just guessing who certain people were and I did find myself quite frustrated that I didn't know. Other people were this kind of obvious and I did feel quite clever when I would work it out. So for example, there's a particular scene where there's like an ongoing mutiny and someone yells for a medic and when you're walking through the scene
00:47:01
Speaker
you can see a guy with like the medical bag running and then you realise oh that must be the medic and then you scan them and everything and you put them into the book and I don't know like I felt really smart thinking oh I figured one out yeah but some of the other ones aren't as obvious and I know that's the point of the game but sometimes I was like maybe throw me a balloon or two like maybe that's insensitive to the crew of the Obra Dinn but yeah what was your experience
Detective Gameplay in 'Obra Dinn'
00:47:27
Speaker
though?
00:47:27
Speaker
So when I first heard about this game, I was like, this sounds right up my street. And I played it. And I'm happy to say it completely was like, I love this game. It's one of my favorite games of all time. I enjoy kind of deductive puzzle solving games. And I think this is one of the best.
00:47:44
Speaker
played so but like I couldn't again that's very much like it very much fits my works for my personality again but I could completely see if it's how it wouldn't maybe work for everybody it's that kind of thing you know it's difficult to imagine yourself not having the personality that you have and it working but it really really like chimed for me and I really loved it and so the main gameplay you've basically described the main
00:48:04
Speaker
You need to discover the names and fates of the 60 people who were on board the Overden as it set off. And you have that magical pocket watch, the Memento Mortem, which allows you to experience the final moment of a person's life. You also have a logbook.
00:48:19
Speaker
a crew roster and like a ship blueprint as well. And you need to kind of use those three documents plus kind of dialogue and contextual clues to work out, you know, everyone's identity and their fate because sometimes people, sometimes people are dying. Like you don't always find bodies to people. Sometimes you actually have to look in other memories. You have to look in people's memories to find out other people die. And basically how it works is the game will inform you when you've correctly deduced
00:48:43
Speaker
three persons identities and fates so you have to get a collection of three it won't it won't tell you if you just do like one at a time you have to it'll tell you when you've got three right as a way to kind of stop you from like an artificially stop you from just sort of brute forcing it in a way how accessible did you find this game at all did you find it like more of a struggle to get into this one than with papers please or was it slightly easier or
00:49:05
Speaker
I would say it's probably harder to get into this game because I mean in theory Papers, Please is an investigative game if you know what I mean? Like you're investigating the facts right before you, you're kind of figuring out is this person telling the truth? Is their story matching up with the documents they've given me and everything?
00:49:26
Speaker
For this one, you do get a kind of wider world, even if it's like on a boat. And I do think that's something that Pope does really well, you know, these kind of small environments to explore. Sometimes it would work, but sometimes it would feel as if...
00:49:41
Speaker
correct me if I'm wrong and maybe I just like misunderstood but there's some moments where it's like once you've explored a scene your hands start shaking and you have to press the pocket watch to guide you to like the next body or something sometimes that pops up sometimes it doesn't is that like a random thing like you've explored that and then it'll trigger that once you've explored that memory it's
00:50:29
Speaker
does it if someone else is dying at the same time.
00:50:34
Speaker
other. I won't say too much because I do think this is a game, if you're interested in it, it's really worth finding the sword out of yourself. But some people die in other locations, so there's not always a body to find. The memento and mortem guides you to that. It's sort of how that works. So it doesn't always work for every memory because not everybody's, some memory is only one person's dying.
00:50:52
Speaker
Oh right, okay, no that makes sense then. It's interesting because Lucas Pope himself thinks Papers, Please! is a more accessible game. He kind of talked as well because Papers, Please! is only used in the mouse. It's a lot easier for a lot of people to kind of grip around, well this one you are having to move around a 3D space. But it's interesting that he did kind of talk, he doesn't think it's as accessible so it's interesting that kind of it fits with what you're kind of saying in a way.
00:51:13
Speaker
I can totally say what it means though because and I was joking with you earlier about this where I actually found Papers Please on the Apple app store and I was like Jesus I did not know you could have dystopia in your iPad though.
00:51:29
Speaker
There you go, but like, that's the kind of game papers please is. You can have it on your tablet, you can have it on your computer, you can have it on... I don't know, did it come out for Xbox? It's not on any console as far as I know. No, is it not? No, that's what I thought. Am I even on the Vita I have a feeling maybe? But then again, I feel like it kind of works on a handheld, it's still like on a handheld format as you say.
00:51:47
Speaker
Yeah, it's like that kind of accessibility, isn't it? A lot of them laugh and that sort of thing is. I just had to look at Brainwave here. Can you imagine if it was on the DS or something like that? Oh wow, just like swiping around your 3DS. Little Timmy at Christmas just like, denied! Phew! Oh, little Timmy sure enjoying that game we got him for Christmas. Glory to Anstoska! Little Timmy grows up to join US border control.
00:52:12
Speaker
Nintendo took notes. The game's called Papers, Please and if you put it on sale on the Switch, give us a cut please. Anyway, my role-playing as a corrupt guard decides. Yeah, I totally see what he means. I do feel as if there is more of a steep learning curve for this game. Like, don't get me wrong, when I say a learning curve, I don't mean in the sense that it's a difficult game to pick up.
00:52:34
Speaker
Because the game itself is very standard. You play as an insurance investigator, you go down the ship, you say, oh boy, he died because of X reason or Y reason. And then that's it. That's the whole point of the game. But at the same time,
00:52:49
Speaker
There are a lot of moments that do, as you said, they feel quite ambiguous. And because the whole game's in kind of a shaded black and white environment, sometimes it's quite hard to make out what's going on. For example, the guy who gets blown up as he's fighting the Kraken.
00:53:05
Speaker
I have to admit, I did not really get that initially until I looked at the logs and what people were saying and things. I was like, okay, that's happened. And I think there is leeway. I could be wrong in that, but I think there is actually leeway for when you say, how did this person die? And as long as it's in parameters, then it says, you're technically right.
00:53:24
Speaker
Yeah, you're right. There are some features that can help you out. That's one of them. Also as well, most of the crew's faces will be blurred until you have enough information. So even if you've not maybe figured out at the minute, the game will let you know by unblurring their face that you have enough information there to work it out so you can maybe go back and look at different things.
00:53:43
Speaker
Also, the game gives you a difficulty rating as well for each person. So that kind of lets you know, you're like, all right, okay, maybe I just need to like, except I'm not going to find out who this person is right now because I just don't have enough. And then you can find out, but oh, look, I seem to be, this is a low difficulty rating. The face is unblurred. Again, I feel this is a very personal, very subjective thing and it kind of goes down to that.
00:54:00
Speaker
There's a lot of things you need to use here. So you do, you need to use those kinds of documents you get, but you also need to like look for a lot of clues and there's like very small details that can help you. Things like accents. I started to find very useful for like trying to identify people because you get told in the crew roster what everybody's nationality is. So that can help tattoos as well sometimes can.
00:54:18
Speaker
help, there's other kind of visual clues. One thing that I just found out today in researching this, there's apparently numbers on the hammocks in the ship that can be used to help. I'd never noticed that before, but if you can find those, that can really help you as well. And as well, alongside this, there are points you're going to have to use like some, you're going to have to make guesses and it's just trying to kind of rationally work things out. Like sometimes, for instance, there's a collection of Russian sailors and
00:54:42
Speaker
There maybe is enough clues. I think you can work out some of them. There's enough clues. But I think for some for some of the others, especially, I just kind of did it by a process of elimination type thing where I would just kind of change names and stuff. So you can do that as well. My biggest frustration with this game is nothing to do with the game itself. It's to do with how I played it first time around. I kind of started to brute force a few things. And I'm very annoyed at myself now because I realized I was like, oh, my God, I was doing things that I was like, oh, my God, that was a clue that I could have I could have worked that out if I'd spent more time.
00:55:10
Speaker
But again, it kind of comes down to that. And I can see that being frustrating for some people because, you know, it is the nature of it. It's not as hand-holding in a kind of way as other sort of like detective games. Do you have like just a matter of interest? Do you have like much interest in kind of detective games or like a lot of prior experience playing them or?
00:55:28
Speaker
It depends on the game, to be honest. I do like it in some games where they'll have, let's say, for example, you know, like if it's a shooter game, if it's an open-world game, if it's something like that. I do appreciate it sometimes when they kind of mix it up and they do have a kind of detective
00:55:47
Speaker
There's none I can think of off the top of my head just now, but it's that way that it's a way to kind of explore the world and allow you to get that satisfaction of being able to figure out, you know, the issues. Like, when you get to that realisation, you think, oh, that's who did X and Y. You know, a bit like, and again, I know I bring this up every time, but like, deadly premonition, because how many nights did we spend on that game just thinking, I think that's the killer. No, that's the killer.
00:56:15
Speaker
Oh that was fun, that was good fun. Yeah, a game like Deadly Premonition, let's go with Deadly Premonition, like I love that game for many different reasons but the main reason was of course being the fact that you could take the role of this eccentric FBI agent who went out there, ate dinner sandwiches and doesn't afraid of anything.
00:56:33
Speaker
Yes I know, outdated meme, but yeah it was just like so satisfying when you figured out certain things and I do like that kind of thing but the only issue is with the case of Obra Dinn it is like a very gripping mystery but if it's too overly complicated or there's like moments in
00:56:53
Speaker
like a mystery that just don't make sense then it kind of starts to push me away because I think well if I wasn't able to guess this based off the evidence then what's the point of the game or movie or whatever media but with Obra Dinn as I said for the most part it does give you logical conclusions like oh this guy got shot this guy got crushed this guy was a stool away etc
00:57:15
Speaker
but there are a handful about that where you just get really frustrated and I was kind of laughing in the background because I thought when you said about some of the people whose faces were blurred and you don't know who they were and everything and you have to kind of go back to investigate them I felt that exact frustration when I played this game because I was like really we're gonna have to go back and you know find out who Blurry McGee is over here and you know that's part of the game though that's part of
00:57:44
Speaker
exploring this mystery, what happened to the Obra Dinn, why did it return and so forth. So I definitely think it is an interesting concept, it's a nice change of pace because usually I'm used to games that they'll say go from point A to point B and
00:57:59
Speaker
have more of a linear story and don't get you to think as much and don't get me wrong those are fine every so often but when you get other games that ask you to think about the story I mean another example of course is the one you and I actually played recently to the moon which isn't
00:58:16
Speaker
inherently an investigative game, but at the same time you are going through the memories of like a dying man, you're figuring out in that game in particular why he wants to go to the moon by exploring his memories as well. The only difference is you don't see a big sea monster in that spoilers, but for Robred Inn you're doing a similar thing where you are going through the memories of these sailors, you're trying to find out who's who, what happened,
00:58:42
Speaker
So, yeah, no, I do like a bit of mystery every so often, but what about yourself? Are you the same or...? I really enjoy detective games. I've played a lot of the older kind of CSI. I've never watched CSI, but I've played a lot of the older CSI games. I've played some of the Sherlock Holmes games, things like Ellie Nowark and Murdered Soul Suspect. I played quite a few different kind of detective games. I really enjoy Her Story as well as another one. I really enjoy ones where you have to figure out a mystery and you have to use evidence and try and work things out.
00:59:10
Speaker
Obra Dinn for me is the best of those kind of deductive games. And there's a really, I'd recommend if people are interested in this, there's a really good video on YouTube from a channel called Game Maker's Toolkit, which is a fantastic series. If you're really interested in game design and things like that, really good series. But that channel has a really interesting video talking about Obra Dinn and sort of the way it works and what Obra Dinn does so well compared to other detective games.
00:59:33
Speaker
is that a lot of other detective games try to mirror as closely as they can the actual process of like what detectives do. The issue is games aren't at a stage, artificial intelligence isn't at a stage where we can do that. We can't ask, you know, you can't ask a character like a witness an infinite list of questions so the game kind of has to artificially push you in a direction so the game kind of can almost lead you by the hand in a way as much as it tries not to. Obra Dinn doesn't do that and by kind of
00:59:57
Speaker
taking this sort of otherworldly approach to it, which it doesn't mirror reality at all. It actually allows you to take complete charge of the investigation and it's all like you're the one driving it and making conclusions and deciding what you're going to use and everything. And that's why I love it. And I think it is just
01:00:13
Speaker
The way it does the mission, again, it's such a personal thing. I think this game maybe is such a subjective whether you like it or not. It really chimed for me. It really worked because of my personality, but I can totally see it just not working and not clicking for other people. One last thing I would say.
01:00:28
Speaker
before we move on as well. One thing I love is it reminds me so much of being a historian. Now, I'm not a historian myself. I do have a, as you may know, I do have an intense interest in history and I have done historical research before. And this game kind of reminds me of it because when you're kind of conducting historical research, a lot of the time the pieces are all there. You just need to kind of put them together. So you need to like review different documents and everything. And that's what this game is as well.
01:00:52
Speaker
The evidence is all there. The evidence is all there for you to work out. You just need to uncover it, put it together, see what fits, and then sometimes you're going to have to make a kind of logical jump to get an answer. It just reminds me so much of that and what I loved about doing historical research that again, it just really chimed
01:01:07
Speaker
me, so I do love this game, but I would recommend it. I would recommend it, but maybe with some hesitation, because again, it might just not be a thing. And if it's not anything, that's fair enough. No blame to be a portion there, that's just the way it is. But we won't go into it, we won't discuss it, because I do think the story is one thing that I think is best not being too discussed if you are interested in this game. I think it's really fun to uncover, but it just
01:01:29
Speaker
briefly kind of going over the story and everything. One thing that I really loved about the story was the kind of combination of the mundane with the supernatural. So we've talked about this like at one point a giant Kraken appears and is like ripping people apart and like throwing them overboard and everything. But other points you're finding people who basically die of tuberculosis, you know, other people who die when cargo falls on them. And I really like the kind of, you know, it's not just one thing or the other. What did you like find about the story? Were there things that you really liked about the story with other bits that you didn't like as much?
01:01:59
Speaker
It was interesting, as you said, to see those comparisons and contrasts, if that makes sense. As you said, there was the people who died of tuberculosis. There was people who died from mutinies, of course, which isn't very ideal when you're on a ship. But the worst one, of course, being the Kraken creature, which I'm not going to lie that completely threw me off guard. I was kind of like, wait, what is going on all of a sudden?
01:02:26
Speaker
Because I honestly went into this game having no knowledge whatsoever of this game, and then when that turned up I was like, oh, okay, it's gonna be one of those games now. I did like it though. I did feel as if it lit it up quite well, where you'd have like one moment where the crew were fighting like these horrible sea creatures, and then on the other half you would have this downtime, if that makes sense, you know, where they're talking with one another, they're joking, like there's one particular moment where
01:02:54
Speaker
they're down below and they're looking after like the livestock animals and one of the other crewmen teases the other one saying kind of if he's a midshipman but he says something like oh what's the matter he never grew up on the farm and i thought that was a nice touch it wasn't just complete exposition throughout the entire way it wasn't like oh never grew up on the farm charlie no but my great grandmother used to warn me she was an Aztec priestess and it's like okay yeah they're
01:03:22
Speaker
there's no Aztec priestesses in this by the way, I'm just saying like very facetiously it wasn't a 120% exposition, there were some real human moments and as I said it was satisfying when you got to explore like one memory and then you just said it's unknown death by I don't know cannibal to the face but then you would see that same person and another memory and then you would be able to link the two together to say oh that person called them Charlie and everything
01:03:49
Speaker
therefore they must be Charlie. You link it up and it connects you if you're right and you think oh that's fantastic.
Storytelling in 'Obra Dinn'
01:03:55
Speaker
So there is a reward in that kind of sense of satisfaction but in terms of the story I do think it's well done but am I right in saying it is quite fragmented so I can agree that like it's not maybe going to be for everyone.
01:04:09
Speaker
Yeah, you're not going to experience the story in chronological order. You're going to stumble across bodies that are out of sequence. The very first body you're going to come across, it takes place right at the end of the story. If you go into your logbook, it's divided into 10 chapters, I think.
01:04:24
Speaker
memory serves rightly that kind of detail different bits of the voyage so basically you start right at the end you know when there's very few people left on the ship and you kind of see what happened to the the last of them and then you know you'll jump around the different points from there so it is at a sequence
01:04:39
Speaker
Again, you're right. Some people might not like that nature, but I quite enjoyed it. I quite liked getting different bits and then in my head putting them together and then reviewing for the book and then seeing it, the story build up, but I can get if it's not for you. Did you have a feeling on the fragmentary out of sequence timeline?
01:04:58
Speaker
Personally, I think it worked. I can see why it would be frustrating to people because I do know of people who, even when they're watching the film and then as soon as a flashback pops up, they're completely lost and they're like, who is this character? What are they doing here? Why are they doing the XYZ? You know, that kind of thing, you think?
01:05:18
Speaker
oh god here we go but I do think that it does work in the context of the story because the fact is you're not, especially like for the character you play, you're not playing as a person who you know is gonna get the facts from point A to point Z. On the one hand as you said this game gives you total autonomy to explore the ship, to take it at your own pace, to
01:05:42
Speaker
identify these people, how they die, that kind of thing. But on the other hand, it is restricting you in this fragmented way. But I mean, it's like any mystery in real life. You know, if a detective goes to a crime scene, they're not gonna get all the facts right away, unless someone's left like a journal of like the whole process at the scene, which is very rare.
01:06:03
Speaker
but they're just gonna have to work backwards. You know, as you said, you start at the very end of the game and then work your way back, Benjamin Button style. It's just, it's interesting to see that. It is interesting to see a game that's kind of brave enough to implement something like that, because I'm sure it's been done before. In fact, though I tell why it has been done before, the only infamous example, I remember of it being done poorly, is David Cage's Beyond Two Souls.
01:06:30
Speaker
I'm sorry Adam, I'm sorry I had to bring this shame and disgust into this episode. You couldn't give it to yourself. Yeah, I couldn't go through the episodes and keep you happy with the fact that we're only going to discuss Obra Dinn, so I apologise. Well to me, the Shadow of the Hedgehog story came in a very fragmented... I don't know if it was, but it felt very out of sequence and fragmented. Like, granted I didn't get all like, what, 500 endings? There's no, it's like seven isn't there? I'm being facetious now, but...
01:06:58
Speaker
Oh no, there's 10. Oh, there's 10, no fair enough, there's 10. Half of Papers, Please is ending. Again, it felt fine, but I don't think that was, I think it was just because I only had done the experience, like, a portion of the game. So, yeah. Yeah, no, no, I totally agree. Although it is technically a linear story, I'm just gonna emphasise and leave that word on the table, technically. Just leave it there. Yeah, that was a game. Thank you for bringing that up as well, Adam. You're welcome.
01:07:23
Speaker
Again, I feel like if we're going to summarise this game, I feel like maybe more than Papers, Please, this is a very subjective experience. Again, I would recommend it, because I don't know. Perhaps it just won't jive with you. That's fine. If it doesn't, I can understand. Maybe you'll fall in love with it like I did. So again, who knows? Just go try it out. What have you got to lose? If you don't like it, you can always just put it in.
01:07:47
Speaker
I just want to emphasise that point because although I haven't given as positive a reception to this game, I don't mean to be negative because I'm not. I do think this is a very interesting game and it's got some really fascinating mechanics to it. Again, I think some bits are a bit annoying, but it's not the end of the world is what I'm saying. I do believe that this is a game that if you're looking for something different, if you're really into the detective genre of like this kind of mystery game,
01:08:16
Speaker
definitely go play this game. This is the beauty of indie games, it's the fact that you can get these kind of curated experiences where you can role play as a passport inspector or you can role play as a insurance investigator, both of which on paper just sound ridiculous, you know, it's like you're playing a very boring 9-to-5 kind of job. But Lucas Pope has done it in such a way that you are invested, you want to know more about the Obradon and again
01:08:45
Speaker
with papers please, you wanna know more about papers please, you wanna know about Arstotzka, you wanna know about what happened or rather what is even going on in these worlds. I would recommend it as well. I don't think again it's not everybody's cup of tea, it's one that I think a lot of people might
01:09:02
Speaker
try and kind of thing. I don't know, because it is drastically different. Like if you're going from Papers, Please all the way to Obra Dinn, both of them are like night and day. They're completely different games. And I do agree with what Pope was saying earlier that Papers, Please
01:09:17
Speaker
is maybe a bit more accessible. I will agree with that but at the end of the day Obra Dinn is just such a unique experience and I would say I would actually say that you'd be hard-pressed to find a game like Obra Dinn. You know you will get detective games and things like that in very similar concepts but to find a game like Obra Dinn is probably going to be very difficult but I've got a question for you Adam though before we move on.
01:09:42
Speaker
Would you say this is in your top 10 favourite games of all time? Definitely, definitely. It might not quite crack the top 5 but it's definitely in my top 10. I've only played this game twice. I recently replayed it earlier this year and I was a bit worried because Papers, Please at least has 20 different endings. You can do as much as you'll do the same things and meet a lot of the same people.
01:10:06
Speaker
you can like have a different experience playing it. You're not going to have like people's fates don't change in Obra Dinn like you know their names don't change. So I was a little bit, it was one of those things I was like oh god is this going to be even worse because it's this game I'm like I'm just I don't think I'll ever fully be able to enjoy it again as I did that first time but you know I left a couple years in between playing it again. I replayed it recently honestly I think I might have loved it more the second time around. There were some people who I just remember I just I couldn't expunge their memory from my mind so I instantly I was like right I remember who that person is.
01:10:36
Speaker
But there was a lot of characters because there's 60 people. So there was a lot of people I'd actually forgotten. So I was like, right, okay, let's, you know, this is, I can, I can go back to like square one and try and work out who these people are. And then it was just from, I really got to appreciate all these different little, the visual clues and the auditory clues. I remember one thing when I just heard somebody say a word and I was like,
01:10:53
Speaker
that sounds like a Scottish accent so I ran to the crew roster and I'm looking for it I'm like wait a minute here's right here's a Scottish person this looks like a you know I think it was a sailor's like this looks like a kind of ordinary sailor but like let's try this and then I find out right and it's fine I found this one the most fun experiences to play and again like I don't know some people probably share that opinion with me but I can see a lot of other people being like
01:11:12
Speaker
what you were doing, like how is this fun? It made me feel so smart and so clever and I got such enjoyment from working out who people were. If you get all the fates right at the end, like you can find out, it's like a missing chunk of the story that you won't get to unless you work everybody out correctly. It's important to say this game, you don't have to work out, the game can still end, you know, you don't have to find out all the fates correctly. The game still kind of gets a point where you can end it, you just won't find out the full story. But like, I really wanted to see exactly what happened on this and get kind of the big story beats.
01:11:42
Speaker
and I really love it for that. It's one of my favourite games of all time. I really want to go play it again, but I know I'm right. I need to at least leave some time in between, because it's eventually going to be a point where I'm pretty sure all these people's names will be burned into my memory. I have a limited number of playthroughs of this game, so I need to try and eke them out over the rest of my life, but I love this game. I really
Replayability and Game Experience
01:12:03
Speaker
do.
01:12:03
Speaker
It is one of those games I know you co-heartedly recommended to me about Edith Finch and you were like, oh you should play this game. It is absolutely fantastic, the narrative's amazing, but it has honestly been such a pleasure listening to how much you got from this game and how much you enjoyed it. But I do agree with you, I think that's one of the main issues of this game, that there isn't as much replayability for it.
01:12:27
Speaker
because the roster list is set to that group of 60, and as soon as you get every single person and you've guessed their feats and everything, that's it. You can't really go back. Yeah, you just can't go back without remembering what happened to the Obra Dinn. And it is like certain indie games where you do go through it, you kinda think.
01:12:47
Speaker
Oh I wish I could go back and play it for the first time again, there's certain games I wish I could do that. But Obra Dinn does seem like one of those very special experiences that you go through and you think wow this is an absolutely fantastic game so no thank you for like genuinely sharing that enjoyment in the episode.
01:13:04
Speaker
It's my pleasure and apologies for everybody listening for my my mad slowly there. It's just again It's just one of these games that chime so much for me I'm sure like you I know it says I mean you've had games like they've done that for you I'm sure people listening can think of games films books, whatever, you know Whatever thing is a piece of music is just absolutely click for you and it was just one of these things
01:13:24
Speaker
but again thank you for trying it and you know and I'm sorry it didn't quite have the same result for you but you know that's it that's you know what can you do that's life everybody has different reactions to things and there's nothing wrong with that at all. The one thing I would say just to kind of point out is and I think it's actually something that Yahtzee from Zero Punctuation actually pointed out where he said see when you play this game you should do it in like short bursts. Good point. Is that something you did when you first played this?
01:13:52
Speaker
Uh, no. I'll be honest, I played this in, like...
01:13:55
Speaker
I played it in, I think maybe two days, maybe two or three days at the most. He makes a good point. Maybe it's better to eke it out, but I don't know. I just found myself so gripped by it that I physically couldn't. I have no patience. I have no patience, so I was just like, I want to play more. There's no one to experience more, but I think it's a valid point. If you can do it, if you're really enjoying it and you can have that level of self-control, then it probably is a better way to approach it. You'll get more out of it. The experience will last longer, but I say, I have no self-control. I'm weak.
01:14:24
Speaker
I'm a weak spineless man who's meant for temptation so that was me. I think for me personally, because I went through it, you know, just in the kind of one sitting, it's a bit similar to how I felt with Papers, Please. Although I enjoyed that game as well, both of these games are very exhausting. See when you play them hour after hour and things like that, like I think.
01:14:44
Speaker
I spent a good couple of hours on my first playthrough for Papers, Please and I just got so exhausted by it. Again, it was a similar thing to you, I just could not stop. I just kept going and going and I was just making more mistakes as I went on and I thought, right, maybe it's time to stop this game soon because I'm getting tired. And it was the same with Obra Dinn, like I was still going through it and I kinda thought, hmm, maybe I should. I think I did take a break.
01:15:07
Speaker
at one point and again I'm not saying like Obra Dinn is a bad game, it's absolutely not, it's a fantastic experience. I would totally recommend it as well but I think that kind of contributed the frustration building and everything. Yeah and like the insurance inspector just coming out.
01:15:24
Speaker
and be like, what happened to the ship in the end? They all burned in a fire. Right, let's go. Just another day for the Art Stotzka insurance investigator. I was like, yeah, let's just go back to Art Stotzka and never speak of this again. Jokes aside, I actually did enjoy my experience with this game but I can understand why people wouldn't enjoy it and I would recommend that if you are going into this game and you do find yourself getting frustrated or tired
01:15:49
Speaker
Please do take a break, take a break to step back because literally you do have all the time in the world. In this game, you know, you can step back, say, okay, not gonna do this, I'm not gonna do that, I'm gonna just sit back.
01:16:02
Speaker
have a look and yeah just get my bearings and I think that is important to enjoying this game. It's like a fine wine. You don't need to worry about feeding your family in this game so as well it takes that pressure off at the very least. Well I hope not. I hope there wasn't a minigame we missed. I generally hope not to. I didn't want to leave the Obra Dinn. I was like I won't go back. Can you imagine the modding scene for this? It's like Obra Dinn but with the Papers Please family system. Oh my god. Geez. Give him my ideas.
01:16:31
Speaker
So as we approach, is there anything else you want to say about Return of the Obra Dinn before we kind of wrap up? I would just say go try it. It's a unique experience and honestly I don't think you'll regret it, genuinely. I do not think you'll regret laying this game. It does have a lot of praise and again if this isn't your cup of tea
01:16:48
Speaker
don't worry about it because it is like so drastically different from a lot of other games but I still think it does great. It seems very simplistic at times you know with just the one button click and then basically as you said before Adam it's a bit similar to Papers Please where you're using the keyboard to move granted but
01:17:07
Speaker
It is very much like a point and click adventure, a bit like, you know, the point and click adventures of old. And I think that's kind of what the appeal is to this game. It's the fact that it goes back to that kind of simplistic time, but it translates it into the modern era of gaming and it just shows you that these games or rather these type of games have a place in the modern landscape of gaming. Totally agree.
01:17:31
Speaker
It's on most systems now. I don't think there's many things it's not on. Maybe it's not onto mobile devices might be the only thing Obra Dinn's not on, but it's on most other systems. So, you know, there's only a chance to check it out. So, as I said, like, just to concur with what Satenami said there, give it a try. If it's not your thing, then so be it. You know, you put it down, you don't have to worry about it, but maybe it will be your thing. And there's not many other experiences you're going to find, not many other games you're going to find like Obra Dinn. So,
01:17:55
Speaker
Yeah, what have you got to lose? As we conclude now, I think I know your answer to this one, but I'll ask the question anyway. Do you prefer one game over the other here, as the one that really stood out to you? Nah, both of them were rubbish. Zero out of ten. Didn't expect that, did you? I didn't, that's true. Now give me my passport back. Detain, detain. Enjoy your full body scan though. Oh god.
01:18:17
Speaker
Oh boy, I hope he put the censorship on up because this is going to be a bad time. Yeah, it's probably expected, but I think I probably preferred Papers, Please purely just for the fact it was more accessible.
Narrative Preference and Future Games
01:18:30
Speaker
And I think as well, this is going to sound really weird, but I feel as if after playing games like Toon the Moon and Finding Paradise, you know, that kind of series of games and of course Edith Finch as well. I feel as if I'm becoming an emotional gamer, I've always wanted games with
01:18:45
Speaker
a very strong narrative core and sometimes games don't deliver on that like for example Halo, Call of Duty, I mean sometimes games like Red Dead Redemption come along and that has a similar vein but not to the extent that I felt when I played games like To The Moon, Edith Finch and so on. With Papers Please I felt as if I was more attached to the story and
01:19:07
Speaker
It doesn't necessarily mean that Papers, Please is a better game than Obra Dinn. I feel as if both have their merits and if you'll excuse me, I'll try and shift on this fence I'm sitting on. At the same time, I didn't feel as emotionally invested in Obra Dinn. I did want to know what happened. Don't get me wrong, my curiosity was peaked. I was like, what happened here? Why is there a jank cracking here? Why are these people
01:19:30
Speaker
causing immunity and so forth. I didn't get why things were happening. I was like, oh, I want to learn more. But in terms of the emotional core, definitely Papers, Please. For me anyway, it hit me stronger than Obra Dinn. And again, that's not to say that Obra Dinn's a bad game. It's not. But that's the reason why I would say that I preferred Papers, Please. It wasn't because of the gameplay. It wasn't because of anything like that. It was just more emotionally hitting to me.
01:19:55
Speaker
maybe it's just because you and I are historian buffs where you know we like these kind of or rather where we recognize these kind of settings and it's very much like a cold war era propaganda driven story and setting and things so I was kind of relating more to that because although Obra Dinn is a historical game I've not got much knowledge when it comes to like naval and nautical things like that and not as
01:20:24
Speaker
invested in that compared to this kind of period but yeah no that would be mine but i'm assuming you would be the opposite make some room on that fence because i'm coming up to join you with a with a very fence sitting answer oh wait wait wait wait wait wait where's your passport hey no i'm the passport i'm the border control officer here you're not gonna play mind games with me
01:20:44
Speaker
No, no, not in this fence. You're getting an extra year in the gulag for that. I claim this fence for the glorious nation of Arstotzka. Have you got a flag? Do you know I carry my Arstotzka flag with me? My son made it before he died from lack of food. God damn it. God damn those crafty Arstotzkas. Anyway, sorry. No, no, no. As I said, Oberlin is one of my favourite games of all time, but I do think Papers, Please, I would rate it as one of the best games I've ever played.
01:21:10
Speaker
Again, it's sort of that way. I differentiate best from favorite. Sometimes there's things I'm like, I love that, but I can objectively say it's not. I don't think it's the best thing ever made. But I really do think Papers, Please is one of the best games ever made, in my opinion, just because I think it shows a lot of what gaming can do as a medium and the real strengths of video games compared to other entertainment mediums. I just think it's exceptional. And I think it really engages you. And I completely agree.
01:21:36
Speaker
There's not really emotion to Obra Dinn. The kind of emotion I got was like a lation when I figured things out, but you're completely right. And the Papers, Please is a far more emotionally engaging story. That's like a real, a real strength of it. So again, I would differentiate it that Obra Dinn, I probably prefer Obra Dinn as like a favorite game. It's something I'd much rather play. And I had a lot more fun playing, but you know, if I'm looking at like gaming in like a higher kind of artistic terms, I think Papers, Please is the better game out of the two. So yeah, we'll both, we'll both set up on this. I feel like we're always in
01:22:06
Speaker
up sitting on the fence, but it's there for a reason. Sitting on is what I presume that reason is. As a final kind of thing, how interested are you now in any future games that Lucas Pope does? Would you be on the lookout for them now, or is it something that you feel like you would keep a lookout for anything else he does in the future? I would certainly be interested, because although I know it's not going to be Papers, Please 2 or Obra Dintu, I don't even know how Obra Dintu would work, it's back.
01:22:33
Speaker
But with zombies, you know, you'd be like, eh, Sean of the Oprah Den book it, I love it.
01:22:39
Speaker
Yeah, like I don't think he's the kind of person to do sequel games, a bit like David Cage, but it would be an insult to compare Lucasfilm to David Cage as a video game creator. I would be interested, 100%, I would be interested to see what he comes up with next, as opposed to like expecting more of the same, if that makes sense. I don't want Papers, Please to. Maybe if it was like remastered or refined or something, that would be different, but I wouldn't want Papers, Please to.
01:23:07
Speaker
I don't think he doesn't seem to have any interest in making sequels, and that's kind of part of the reason he left Naughty Dog was he said he had no interest in working on Chartered 3, which he knew was going to be the next thing, so he kind of had his fill of that, so I don't think he will. I like to say as well, sorry, I forgot to mention previously, but actually, Lucas Pope's favourite game is Paper, Please, so you're very much in line with him. He prefers it to Obra Dinn.
01:23:28
Speaker
But like, he's currently working, I think his next thing is he's working on a game called Midnight to Mars for that. Did you know that system called the Playdate? What's it called again? I don't know if you've heard about it or not. It's kind of, it's a handheld device. It's kind of built around this kind of crank operated thing. I can't really describe it, I don't know too much about it, but that's what he's most recently been working on.
01:23:48
Speaker
And I don't think the Playday Playmate, whatever it's called again, has been released yet. So we'll have to see what happens there. But I think he's looking at making a lot smaller experiences because Obra Dinn ballooned into this massive four-year project that really burned him out. I think he's looking at making much smaller games in the future. So I'm certainly very interested to see what he does next. I will keep a lookout for his name.
01:24:09
Speaker
But then even if he doesn't make anything else, like I think to have Papers, Please and Return of the Obra Dinn on your list of credits, I think is more than enough. You can rest very happy having done that in your game developing career. But I'm pleased to hear at least, I'm pleased to hear that you've kind of, you've even enjoyed what he's had to offer and see what the future holds for him. Oh, absolutely. Yeah.
01:24:28
Speaker
Well, with that then, well thank you everybody for listening and thank you so much for playing both these games, for dedicating time to them. I know they're very different to a lot of other things out there, but thank you so much for just diving into them and trying them out and then just relating your experiences here. Thank you so much. Yeah, no problem. Honestly, to borrow a phrase from you, it was an absolute pleasure playing these games. They were, I wouldn't say they were, as you said, they weren't fun games to play at times because of how stressful they could be, but
01:24:57
Speaker
not in a bad way, I think that's the sign of a good game that it does make you feel things because it's like there's one thing going through like a walking sim where you just press forward and then you get to the end and you're like all right okay what do I do next now but with Papers, Plays and Obra done it was nice to kind of expand my own kind of views on gaming and things so no thank you for introducing me to them and actually forcing me to play it from my backlog so yeah thank you.
01:25:23
Speaker
No worries, I'll give you your passport back and you'll be able to enter the glorious nation now. Now that you've shown your loyalty to our glorious leader, Lucas Pope, all hail. Yep, the glory to Lucas Pope and Astrophovska. Well, thank you everybody so much for listening and we'll catch you in the next episode. But until then, stay safe, stay awesome and most importantly, stay hydrated and glory to Astrophovska.