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Mario and the Incredible Rescue - Part 2 ft. HotCyder!
6 Plays1 year ago
Yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaahhhhhhhhhh we are finishing up MAH rio and the Incredible Rescue! Here we gooooo!
Catch up with James's work at: https://www.youtube.com/@hotcyder
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Book Synopsis
Mario and Luigi are Enjoying a peaceful afternoon when Toad makes a chilling announcement: Bowser has kidnapped Princess Peach! Several strange, ghostlike beings overcame the Princess's guards and took her back to Bowser's Keep.
As the three friends travel into the Mushroom Kingdom, they learn that Bowser used an old book of spells to create the ghosts. As long as the ghosts guard Bowser's Keep, Mario and Luigi cannot pass. To break the spell, Mario and Luigi must search for six special mushrooms. Once all six mushrooms have been gathered, the friends can break the spell.
Mario, Luigi, and Toad better move fast. They have to travel to the Kero Sewers, Tadpole Pond, Forest Maze, Yo'ster Isle, Moleville, and Booster Pass. Can they collect the mushrooms in time to save the princess? -via the Video Game Library
Recommended
Transcript
Arrival on Yoster Island
00:00:00
Speaker
Yoshi saves the day, chapter 6.
00:00:01
Speaker
Yoshi saves the day, chapter 6.
00:00:04
Speaker
They get to another pipe which will take them to Yoster Island and nothing happens.
00:00:10
Speaker
They get there, fine.
00:00:13
Speaker
They meet with some Yoshis, they're all doing pretty well.
00:00:16
Speaker
The Yoshis all speak in perfect English.
00:00:19
Speaker
Oh, no, they don't.
00:00:20
Speaker
Oh, no, I get confused.
00:00:21
Speaker
Mario called out to a green dinosaur.
00:00:23
Speaker
Yoshi, it's me, Mario.
00:00:25
Speaker
Yoshi turned and smiled happily.
00:00:26
Speaker
The little dinosaur bound.
00:00:27
Speaker
Okay, so no, the Yoshis don't talk.
00:00:29
Speaker
The Yoshis is a moat.
00:00:32
Speaker
There we go.
00:00:32
Speaker
I got a bit confused there.
00:00:34
Speaker
They're like dogs, mostly.
00:00:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:00:37
Speaker
Um...
00:00:38
Speaker
So Mario takes the Yoshi and not the Yoshi.
00:00:43
Speaker
This is clearly Yoshi.
00:00:45
Speaker
This is a Yoshi.
00:00:46
Speaker
This is this is Yoshi.
00:00:48
Speaker
Before we determined that Yoshi was a seat.
00:00:51
Speaker
It was part of a species, a greater species of Yoshis that are all called Yoshi.
00:00:59
Speaker
Yeah.
00:01:02
Speaker
So he takes the slash a Yoshi and leaves Luigi and Toad behind.
00:01:08
Speaker
And they're like, we're going to go get the mushroom.
Battles and Clues
00:01:09
Speaker
And they go up to the top of the hill and they find the blue mushroom.
00:01:12
Speaker
But just then, Lakitu's attack.
00:01:18
Speaker
And they got the spiny balls are flying down.
00:01:23
Speaker
And Mario, I guess you got the hammer from one of the Hammer Brothers, starts using the hammer as if he's back in Donkey Kong days and just breaking.
00:01:33
Speaker
Yeah, he's breaking those balls.
00:01:37
Speaker
He's a ball breaker.
00:01:38
Speaker
And then Yoshi jumps up in the air and he eats the clouds that the Lak-2s are using and they fall out of the sky.
00:01:49
Speaker
So that's clever.
00:01:50
Speaker
It's a clever way to deal with that.
00:01:53
Speaker
Exactly.
00:01:54
Speaker
They have got air advantage.
00:01:56
Speaker
So as long as you eliminate that, that's all you need to do.
00:02:00
Speaker
That's all you need to do.
00:02:01
Speaker
They get back down and talk to Toad and Luigi, and they see the next clue, and the next clue is mine.
00:02:11
Speaker
And they're like, the next clue is yours.
00:02:15
Speaker
No, it's mine.
00:02:17
Speaker
Whose clue is it?
00:02:18
Speaker
What?
00:02:19
Speaker
Who's on first?
00:02:22
Speaker
I don't know who's on third.
00:02:24
Speaker
Ah.
00:02:25
Speaker
Um.
00:02:26
Speaker
So Mario said they would never find the next mushroom until the next chapter.
00:02:32
Speaker
Well, it's good because the next chapter is called The End.
00:02:34
Speaker
So we've done it, folks.
00:02:35
Speaker
We've done it.
00:02:36
Speaker
We've reached the end of the episode.
00:02:38
Speaker
Even though this is a 46-page book, this is only page 20 or so.
00:02:43
Speaker
So pretty good, you know, all things considered.
00:02:45
Speaker
Pretty good.
00:02:46
Speaker
It's pretty efficient to get to the end of the book.
00:02:49
Speaker
Yeah, nice typing.
00:02:50
Speaker
The rest of the book just must be a bunch of, you know, zipper lighter adverts and X-ray glasses sent off about your arm.
00:02:58
Speaker
Right in for this.
00:03:01
Speaker
Solve this clue and get an entry into winning these Nintendo systems.
00:03:09
Speaker
There's the rest of it.
00:03:11
Speaker
It's just all misconnections.
00:03:12
Speaker
LAUGHTER
00:03:14
Speaker
You were reading a copy of Mario and the Magic Maze.
00:03:21
Speaker
I was on the other side of the library in Pittsburgh.
00:03:23
Speaker
Please email.
00:03:29
Speaker
The year 1997.
00:03:30
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:03:32
Speaker
This was published in 2006, but all of the messages are from 1997.
00:03:37
Speaker
Yeah, they're all misconnections from 1997.
00:03:43
Speaker
I think that you were the Archbishop Desmond Tutu I was here with the UN as well Please get back in contact with me
00:03:54
Speaker
So it's the end.
00:03:56
Speaker
It's the end of the book.
00:03:58
Speaker
Yoshi.
00:03:58
Speaker
But oh wait.
00:03:59
Speaker
Yoshi figures out the clue.
00:04:01
Speaker
Yes.
00:04:02
Speaker
Yoshi figures out the clue.
00:04:03
Speaker
And he points down at the ground.
00:04:05
Speaker
And Mario is like.
00:04:06
Speaker
It's underground.
00:04:07
Speaker
It's a mine.
00:04:08
Speaker
Not mine.
00:04:09
Speaker
It's a mine.
00:04:11
Speaker
Not mine.
00:04:13
Speaker
The mines are right here in Moleville.
00:04:16
Speaker
So they go to the mines and on their way to the mines, they run into a chain chop.
00:04:22
Speaker
And this guy is he's a feisty boy.
00:04:26
Speaker
Mario realizes, though, that he's not angry at them.
00:04:31
Speaker
He's angry at his situation.
00:04:33
Speaker
And he jumps on the back of the chain chomp.
00:04:36
Speaker
He speaks to the inner baby chain chomp inside the chain chomp, the puppy chomp, and practices his animal husbandry.
00:04:49
Speaker
And he unchains the chain chomp.
00:04:51
Speaker
And everybody's freaked out.
00:04:53
Speaker
Like, what's going to happen here?
00:04:55
Speaker
And then the chain chomp calms down and just rolls away.
00:05:01
Speaker
Yeah, he's done.
00:05:01
Speaker
He's like, I'm alright.
00:05:02
Speaker
I'm just gonna chill.
00:05:03
Speaker
I'm alright now.
00:05:06
Speaker
Thank you.
00:05:06
Speaker
How are you?
00:05:07
Speaker
And then they continue on to the mine.
00:05:11
Speaker
Do you know what the story is for why the Chain Chomp exists as a character in Mario?
00:05:17
Speaker
No.
00:05:17
Speaker
Is it like half of a bullet bill or something?
00:05:21
Speaker
No.
00:05:21
Speaker
So it's either Miyamoto or it's Suzuka who had this story, but it was like when they were a kid walking home from school, one of their neighbors had just a big-ass dog that was like incredibly aggressive.
00:05:34
Speaker
So the dog would like run full power at the kid and then the chain would yank it back.
00:05:40
Speaker
Like it was just on a short enough leaf that it would never like kind of attack.
00:05:44
Speaker
I'm rather than thinking, like, oh god, that dog's being kept in bad conditions.
00:05:48
Speaker
Just, like, 30, 20-odd years after the fact they went, that'd be a good Mario.
00:05:53
Speaker
Let's write him in.
00:05:55
Speaker
It's the same thing with the ghost.
00:05:57
Speaker
Well, finally, after the ghosts are in this book, so boos from Mario are based on Takashi Tezuka's wife, who...
00:06:04
Speaker
When they met her in person, she was like a quiet, incredibly shy, timid woman.
00:06:09
Speaker
And then behind closed doors was like abusive.
00:06:14
Speaker
Well, whenever he went late, she'd ring in and be like, what the fuck are you?
00:06:17
Speaker
Get home immediately.
00:06:20
Speaker
this would be really aggressive too and then rather than yeah being like oh wow you know maybe there's something going on you know when you found me it was just like that's funny as fuck we're putting that mario that's hilarious yeah we're putting those in as ghosts that's funny as fuck she's an enemy now in my in my mario game
00:06:39
Speaker
Yeah, we turn your wife into a, not just a single character, but a multitude of ghosts and Mario.
00:06:47
Speaker
What was that short film?
00:06:48
Speaker
Do you remember, ever see that short film where it was about like a young George Lucas walking around like the campus of Stanford or whatever and everything he sees is like...
Character Origins and Interruptions
00:07:00
Speaker
Inspire Star Wars.
00:07:02
Speaker
Yeah, something that would inspire Star Wars or Indiana Jones or something like that.
00:07:06
Speaker
And I just imagine that for Miyamoto and everything he sees is going into Super Mario Brothers.
00:07:16
Speaker
I mean, that is what he was like.
00:07:19
Speaker
Flying through rings in Star Fox was based on a New Year's tradition where you go to Japanese temples and you walk...
00:07:27
Speaker
Like, the pathways have these, like, kind of gates overhead, and he was like, huh, what if I was a plane doing this?
00:07:33
Speaker
That might be a fun game.
00:07:35
Speaker
Kind of thing.
00:07:36
Speaker
That might be a fun video game.
00:07:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:39
Speaker
When he was a kid, he went cave exploring, and, you know, he found fun caves, and then the internet historian ripped that off for his video, but we can't talk about that.
00:07:49
Speaker
He got that out of it.
00:07:54
Speaker
I'm now plagiarizing H-bomb guy.
00:07:57
Speaker
Oh, boy.
00:07:59
Speaker
Plagiarism, huh?
00:08:00
Speaker
All right.
00:08:01
Speaker
Love it.
00:08:02
Speaker
We love it.
00:08:03
Speaker
We love your folks, don't we?
00:08:03
Speaker
Yoshi yips questioningly in Luxembourg.
00:08:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:07
Speaker
There's some ghosts.
00:08:09
Speaker
They continue on, and they get into... They find the mine, and they get into a mine cart, and they ride that mine cart on down, and they find Mushroom No.
00:08:18
Speaker
5.
00:08:18
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:22
Speaker
And another clue.
00:08:23
Speaker
And another clue.
00:08:25
Speaker
And it's just the clue is this is an actual like, oh, this is a neat clue.
00:08:31
Speaker
So it's numbers.
00:08:33
Speaker
And then under it, it says one to 26.
00:08:36
Speaker
And they figure, well, what's 26 number?
00:08:40
Speaker
What's 26 long?
00:08:42
Speaker
And that's that's letters letters in the alphabet.
00:08:46
Speaker
So I figured it's just like a number replacement thingy.
00:08:49
Speaker
And it's booster pass is where they got to go.
00:08:56
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:58
Speaker
But on the way, they get attacked by Koopa paratroopers.
00:09:03
Speaker
Oh, no.
00:09:04
Speaker
Oh, no.
00:09:04
Speaker
And the pouch gets knocked out of Mario's hand.
00:09:07
Speaker
Oh, double-o now.
00:09:09
Speaker
Down into a ravine.
00:09:12
Speaker
Which brings us to Chapter 8, which is probably your favorite chapter.
00:09:16
Speaker
Yeah, so this is why you asked me on this episode, right?
00:09:20
Speaker
Yeah, clearly.
00:09:21
Speaker
This is why I asked you on the episode.
00:09:23
Speaker
Chapter 8, watch out for Wario.
00:09:27
Speaker
Now, this is why I said I don't think she played that far into Mario RPG, because Wario is not in.
00:09:34
Speaker
Booster Past is.
00:09:35
Speaker
There is a character called Booster who looks a bit like Wario, but Wario himself is not in Mario RPG.
00:09:41
Speaker
Would Super Mario RPG have been...
00:09:44
Speaker
like a much better game with Wario in it.
00:09:49
Speaker
Yes, clearly.
00:09:50
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:09:52
Speaker
This is a reference to another SNES game, though, which when we get to it, I'll mention more.
00:09:56
Speaker
But yeah, they lose the mushrooms, but then they get the mushrooms back, so it's not too bad.
00:10:03
Speaker
It's not too bad.
00:10:04
Speaker
They lower Todd.
00:10:05
Speaker
Todd.
00:10:06
Speaker
Toad.
00:10:07
Speaker
They lower Todd's from Breaking Bad's.
00:10:10
Speaker
It's good.
00:10:12
Speaker
They're towed down into the ravine where the mushrooms fell and he gets them.
00:10:20
Speaker
And they continue along and then a bucket falls on Mario's head.
00:10:24
Speaker
Yes.
00:10:27
Speaker
And Mario's like, that can only mean one thing.
00:10:29
Speaker
My sworn arch enemy.
00:10:33
Speaker
So, do you know why he drops a bucket on his head?
00:10:36
Speaker
I don't.
00:10:38
Speaker
No.
00:10:38
Speaker
So this is a reference to a video game that no one has ever played.
00:10:43
Speaker
From 1995 called Mario.
00:10:44
Speaker
Which I'm sure you've played, though.
00:10:46
Speaker
Oh, of course I have.
00:10:47
Speaker
Mario and Wario.
00:10:49
Speaker
Not Mario vs. Wario.
00:10:50
Speaker
Mario and Wario for the SNES.
00:10:53
Speaker
One of the first games that Game Freak made for Nintendo.
00:10:57
Speaker
Before Pokemon, this was something that was contracted out to them.
00:11:01
Speaker
It is basically Nintendo's version.
00:11:04
Speaker
It's like Nintendo saw the success of Lemmings and said...
00:11:08
Speaker
Oh yeah, we can fart one of these out.
00:11:10
Speaker
We can do that.
00:11:11
Speaker
Yeah, fuck.
00:11:11
Speaker
We'll fucking sleepwalk through this easy, which is ironic considering that it is a game which is about...
00:11:18
Speaker
Wario in his pitiful bi-flame drops buckets on the heads of Nintendo characters and then they just start walking forward and then you as a fairy have to use your magic wand to fill in blocks to basically make platforms and get them to the end of the level essentially.
00:11:36
Speaker
It's a cute idea.
00:11:37
Speaker
It is also like the most ambient video game.
00:11:40
Speaker
It is so like low stakes.
00:11:44
Speaker
Right.
00:11:44
Speaker
Very much so.
00:11:46
Speaker
But, yeah, obviously Tracy West here is like, oh, I can't take everything from Mario RPG.
00:11:50
Speaker
What else have I got on my SNES?
00:11:52
Speaker
Oh, for some reason I have Mario.
00:11:54
Speaker
Oh, yeah, and that was another thing as well.
00:11:55
Speaker
Um...
00:11:56
Speaker
One of the other games that supported the SNES mouse, apart from Mario Paint, was for some reason Mario and Wario, which was, again, because it was like Lemmings, I guess.
00:12:07
Speaker
Yeah, because you're
Game Development Insights
00:12:08
Speaker
kind of using it.
00:12:08
Speaker
Yeah, you need to kind of click around and stuff.
00:12:10
Speaker
Yeah.
00:12:12
Speaker
That's interesting.
00:12:13
Speaker
Yeah, it is a kind of, it's sort of a, like I said, just kind of as an outlier in sort of Nintendo's kind of games.
00:12:20
Speaker
And again, it's like one of the first Game Freed games.
00:12:22
Speaker
It is interesting, but it is also like,
00:12:25
Speaker
Not as good as Lemmings.
00:12:27
Speaker
Right.
00:12:28
Speaker
It's yeah.
00:12:29
Speaker
And that does sound like because like Lemmings was not.
00:12:36
Speaker
that interesting ultimately it was a game i the only time i ever played lemmings was if i was in um like a computer class sure yeah and it's like the teacher's like uh yeah you have a free day today and all the macs were loaded up with lemmings for some reason so you could just like kind of just sit there and fuck about with lemmings and
00:13:01
Speaker
That's funny that you say that because I think Lemmings is one of the first computer games I played and it's literally because when I was a kid I had like an old fashioned Macintosh like I had my dad's hand me down and one of the only few video games that would run on it
00:13:14
Speaker
was Lemmings, because I think DMA was just like, oh, let's put this on every particular device that we can, which includes the Mac, which doesn't have any games on it.
00:13:25
Speaker
And so, yeah.
00:13:26
Speaker
Right.
00:13:27
Speaker
Christmas Lemmings, I think, came out like the year I was born.
00:13:30
Speaker
And so, I mean, I'm not saying that I came out and played Lemmings immediately, but... Right.
00:13:36
Speaker
It was one of the first games I played.
00:13:38
Speaker
And you know who made Lemmings?
00:13:42
Speaker
Yeah, Rockstar North.
00:13:44
Speaker
Rockstar North.
00:13:45
Speaker
DMA Design, which eventually became Rockstar North.
00:13:50
Speaker
Famously as well, they did make a game for Nintendo, which was UniRacers, and then it got pulled off shelves because Pixar were like, hey, that guy looks like our fucking unicycle character.
00:14:04
Speaker
We're going to sue you for every dollar you owe.
00:14:10
Speaker
Amazing.
00:14:12
Speaker
Yeah, so lemmings.
00:14:15
Speaker
Also, speaking of things that were victimized by Walt Disney, lemmings, which do not actually run off cliffs.
00:14:23
Speaker
They were...
00:14:24
Speaker
just pushed off cliffs for a... They were chased off by Walt.
00:14:28
Speaker
Walt was the guy he was doing.
00:14:29
Speaker
Walt was the one who was doing it.
00:14:31
Speaker
He was blowing cigarette smoke in their little faces.
00:14:36
Speaker
If you look closely, you can see Roy Disney in the background just saying, ah, Walt, what are you doing?
00:14:41
Speaker
And Walt's like, it's for the picture, Roy.
00:14:44
Speaker
Get them furry fucks down.
00:14:47
Speaker
Well, he didn't sound like it.
00:14:50
Speaker
He was a hayseed, wasn't he?
00:14:52
Speaker
He was from Kentucky, right?
00:14:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:14:56
Speaker
I just imagine, though, he sounded like exactly what you said when the cameras weren't rolling.
00:15:01
Speaker
Like, ah!
00:15:03
Speaker
I'm chomping on this cigar.
00:15:04
Speaker
I'm a fucking Morrie guy.
00:15:09
Speaker
Pizza.
00:15:10
Speaker
Pizza.
00:15:11
Speaker
Speaking of pizza, Wario.
00:15:14
Speaker
Give it up, Mario.
00:15:15
Speaker
Mario called down.
00:15:16
Speaker
Bowser's gonna give me a lot of money if I bring you to him.
00:15:19
Speaker
You might as well just surrender.
00:15:21
Speaker
So again, Wario, very good characterization.
00:15:24
Speaker
He's not really evil, he's just in it for the pack.
00:15:27
Speaker
He's in it as a mercenary in this story.
00:15:32
Speaker
Doesn't care about the politics, doesn't get involved.
00:15:36
Speaker
They solve the Wario conundrum, though, by... Like throwing the bucket on his head?
00:15:41
Speaker
Yeah, Mario grabs a bucket and with Yoshi jumps higher than the plane because it's a low-flying plane.
00:15:52
Speaker
He's crop dusting, and he drops the bucket on Wario's head, and Wario loses control of the plane and disappears over the horizon.
00:16:02
Speaker
He Michael Jordans him.
00:16:04
Speaker
He slam dunks the... Slam dunks that bucket right on his head.
00:16:08
Speaker
And then they grab the final mushroom and a bright light fills the ravine and...
00:16:16
Speaker
leading to chapter nine where they fast travel to Bowser keep because yeah, don't worry about it.
00:16:22
Speaker
Don't worry about it.
00:16:24
Speaker
Which is part.
00:16:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:16:25
Speaker
Even, even like Tracy's like, Oh, don't worry.
00:16:27
Speaker
We're nearly done.
00:16:27
Speaker
No more puzzles as well.
00:16:29
Speaker
What that's like.
00:16:29
Speaker
Those are done now.
00:16:31
Speaker
We're done.
00:16:31
Speaker
26.
00:16:31
Speaker
That was a bit too much for you.
00:16:33
Speaker
So don't worry.
00:16:34
Speaker
We're not doing those again.
00:16:35
Speaker
We're, we're in a real Scooby doo of a chapter, chapter nine.
00:16:38
Speaker
Good, good, good, good, good.
00:16:39
Speaker
Ghosts.
00:16:40
Speaker
Um,
00:16:42
Speaker
And they're at Bowser keep and they are, are wow.
00:16:47
Speaker
They're, they're, they're woozy and all that.
00:16:50
Speaker
And then they're like, ah, we're here.
00:16:52
Speaker
And then they run up to the gate and then the ghosts attack them and steal the pouch.
00:17:00
Speaker
And they're tossing it around.
00:17:03
Speaker
And then Luigi overcomes this fear of ghosts and gets the pouch back.
00:17:08
Speaker
At one point, Yoshi tries eating a ghost.
00:17:11
Speaker
There's a moment earlier where Yoshi's like trying to figure out what a ghost might taste like.
00:17:17
Speaker
um then mario kind of reads like he's like oh yeah i don't know what they taste like yoshi and then yoshi tries to eat it later and can't so never any payoff to that but they said never any payoff to that um
00:17:35
Speaker
Yoshi eats it and then for his first words he starts summoning Cthulhu and his eyes roll back
Supernatural Encounters and Humor
00:17:45
Speaker
into his head.
00:17:45
Speaker
I thought he played that Romhack.
00:17:49
Speaker
It's not good.
00:17:50
Speaker
It's not good.
00:17:50
Speaker
He stares right into the camera and then there's a bunch of jump scares.
00:17:54
Speaker
Oh shit.
00:17:54
Speaker
His eyes start bleeding somehow.
00:17:56
Speaker
His eyes start bleeding.
00:17:57
Speaker
And it looks really realistic.
00:18:00
Speaker
And then Sonic.exe shows up.
00:18:04
Speaker
And then I get the game cartridge from my best friend Billy, despite the fact that he's now a 40-year-old man, he still calls himself Billy.
00:18:11
Speaker
He's Billy, my best friend.
00:18:13
Speaker
It was his cartridge.
00:18:17
Speaker
Billy's cartridge.
00:18:19
Speaker
I do like the fact as well, it's like just laughing about just Mario saying normal sentences.
00:18:25
Speaker
Luigi's just like...
00:18:26
Speaker
Mario the Ghost!
00:18:28
Speaker
And then Mario just goes, you gotta do it, Luigi.
00:18:37
Speaker
You have to do it.
00:18:38
Speaker
You must try.
00:18:40
Speaker
You gotta try.
00:18:41
Speaker
You have to do it, Luigi, says Mario.
00:18:44
Speaker
In his... In his... Jon Hamm ass voice.
00:18:50
Speaker
Yeah, when's Jon Hamm playing... When's Jon Hamm playing live-action Mario?
00:18:55
Speaker
Mario.
00:18:58
Speaker
Oh my god.
00:19:01
Speaker
Mario gets into the elevator with Mario and Mario's just like, I feel bad for you, Mario.
00:19:07
Speaker
And Mario responds, I don't think about you at all.
00:19:17
Speaker
Imagine a piece of pasta.
00:19:24
Speaker
uh we gotta get the series ends with him on a commune coming up with the super mario brothers theme coming coming
00:19:32
Speaker
Oh, no, coming up with the fucking rap from the Super Mario Super Show.
00:19:36
Speaker
There we go.
00:19:37
Speaker
That's it.
00:19:39
Speaker
Captain Lou dances, too.
00:19:41
Speaker
Captain Lou Albano, yeah, appears in his visions on the commune.
00:19:48
Speaker
So Luigi gets the pouch back.
00:19:50
Speaker
He overcomes his fear, and he gets the pouch back, and he gives it back to Mario, and Mario's got to line the mushrooms up in just the right order.
00:19:59
Speaker
And then he's got to say the spell.
00:20:00
Speaker
But he can't do it if the ghosts are all over him.
00:20:03
Speaker
So Luigi did his bit, right?
00:20:07
Speaker
Now somebody else has to get over their fear of ghosts.
00:20:10
Speaker
And that's Todd.
00:20:11
Speaker
Todd Howard has to get over his fear of ghosts.
00:20:14
Speaker
Todd Howard.
00:20:15
Speaker
Todd Howard has a small toad voice.
00:20:21
Speaker
You see that mountain?
00:20:23
Speaker
You can climb it.
00:20:25
Speaker
Ha ha ha ha ha.
00:20:30
Speaker
It's our first new franchise in 30 years.
00:20:33
Speaker
Cool.
00:20:35
Speaker
Thank you, Toad.
00:20:37
Speaker
Thank you, Toad Howard.
00:20:38
Speaker
Thank you, Toad Howard.
00:20:42
Speaker
So, Toad... When did you make this game for a not-some-ice computers?
00:20:46
Speaker
No, we just made a game for new computers.
00:20:50
Speaker
Ha ha ha!
00:20:51
Speaker
Ha ha ha!
00:20:56
Speaker
I don't know, I'm just now imagining Todd Howard in the big stupid mushroom hat and just wearing nothing but white linen Iranian pants and just a blue waistcoat with nothing else.
00:21:12
Speaker
But it's still Todd Howard.
00:21:14
Speaker
It's still Todd Howard.
00:21:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:18
Speaker
Oh, no.
00:21:19
Speaker
So Toad gets getting tossed around by the ghosts.
00:21:25
Speaker
Only by the ghosts.
00:21:27
Speaker
Just getting really manhandled.
00:21:30
Speaker
Mario casts a spell, which is eeny, meeny, miny, moe.
00:21:35
Speaker
Send the ghosts where bad boos go.
00:21:37
Speaker
And yippity, bippity, the ghosts are...
00:21:42
Speaker
banished.
00:21:43
Speaker
Yeah, they're blown by the color of the rainbow and they all go, aye.
00:21:47
Speaker
Aye.
00:21:50
Speaker
The thing is, the ghosts, what we isn't revealed is that the ghosts were actually just regular folk who hadn't finished their earthly duties, but Mario actually casts them into hell, even though not all of them were destined for hell.
00:22:07
Speaker
So...
00:22:09
Speaker
They're all unbaptized babies.
00:22:11
Speaker
They're all unbaptized babies.
00:22:15
Speaker
And then we get to the Pope himself.
00:22:17
Speaker
Chapter 10, Big Bad Bowser, he's here, because even though the ghosts have been defeated, there's still Bowser to go.
00:22:25
Speaker
Pope Bowser, they hear Princess Peach, and she is upstairs, and
00:22:33
Speaker
in the ceiling, in a cage that hung from the ceiling.
00:22:36
Speaker
Back in the Super Mario RPG.
00:22:39
Speaker
Metal cage in the ceiling.
00:22:41
Speaker
Super Mario RPG right there.
00:22:42
Speaker
The only bit of Super Mario RPG I have played, by the way.
00:22:46
Speaker
Well, here's the thing.
00:22:47
Speaker
Not to be internet pedant here, but Super Mario RPG right at the beginning, she is tied up in a rope being held by the ceiling, but they are fighting on metal chandeliers.
00:22:58
Speaker
However... Oh, that's right.
00:23:00
Speaker
Mario Brothers All-Stars, the remake of Super Mario Brothers 1, she is in a big-ass cage.
00:23:07
Speaker
There we go.
00:23:09
Speaker
So, yeah, there we go.
00:23:09
Speaker
So, it always comes back to an SNES game somehow.
00:23:14
Speaker
At some point.
00:23:16
Speaker
I think, you know what's wild is I think a lot of people forget that Nintendo remade the original Mario games in, like, the early 90s.
00:23:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:27
Speaker
Like,
00:23:28
Speaker
long before remakes were a thing, they remade with the, it was like the SNES, it was the Super Mario World artwork they used to remake them, right?
00:23:40
Speaker
Yeah, well, kind of level of rendering.
00:23:42
Speaker
Like, it doesn't quite look like Super Mario World, but it is like that level of rendering.
00:23:46
Speaker
So, yeah, they remade one, USA, and three, and then they also did Lost Levels, the Japanese version.
00:23:54
Speaker
Then, obviously, in Japan, they flipped that around, and USA was the one that they got.
00:23:58
Speaker
Right.
00:24:00
Speaker
Yeah, like, I always find that period really weird, because they also remade all the Mega Man games on like Mega Drive, being like, hey, you probably didn't have an NES, so check all these out, Bozo.
00:24:09
Speaker
Right, oh yeah, that's right.
00:24:11
Speaker
Because Capcom is like, yeah, fuck it, we're not beholden to Nintendo anymore.
00:24:18
Speaker
But even weirder than that, Super Castlevania 4 is, all intents and purposes, a remake of Castlevania 1 as well.
00:24:26
Speaker
So people were remaking stuff pretty... Basically, after the NES, they were like, okay, full-on the remake, Sue.
00:24:35
Speaker
Let's bring it in, folks.
00:24:37
Speaker
Let's roll them in, boys.
00:24:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:24:42
Speaker
Yeah, because Super Metroid is...
00:24:46
Speaker
So, that was my theory, was that Super Metroid and A Link to the Past are, like, in my head, Nintendo being like, oh, if we were to remake, if we were to make the NES games, like, again for the first time, what would we do differently?
00:24:58
Speaker
How would we do it again?
00:25:00
Speaker
Yeah, and like, in Super Metroid's case, it makes sense, it's like, oh, well, I'd add a map, because, like,
00:25:05
Speaker
no one's going to be able to you know we didn't put like a paper one in so it made it confusing so let's put one in the game and you know it's even like the same planet that you go to but they flesh it out a little bit more as well and then layer with like link to the past it's like oh let's do top down again and let's like if we made it again what if it had nicer graphics and then they decided oh let's add a plot to it and let's actually make it like a prequel sequel to the original one as well
00:25:29
Speaker
So, yeah, I think they were just on that tip of... And, like, Super Mario World itself isn't that different from Super Mario... But even Super Mario Bros.
00:25:37
Speaker
3, as a concept, is like, if we could remake one again, how would we do it kind of thing?
00:25:43
Speaker
So, yeah, Nintendo are very, like, iterative with, like, how they want to... Yeah, they're not... It's not like they're...
00:25:49
Speaker
They don't really... I mean, it's not like they care a whole lot about story, clearly.
00:25:54
Speaker
No.
00:25:55
Speaker
Continuity ain't that thing.
00:25:56
Speaker
Maybe not... Yeah, yeah.
00:25:57
Speaker
Not story, but continuity between games.
00:26:00
Speaker
Like...
00:26:01
Speaker
To them, canon is more of like a who the fuck cares type of situation.
00:26:06
Speaker
It's my favorite thing with the Zelda timeline that based like after Skyward saw people like, you need to tell us what the timeline is.
00:26:12
Speaker
And I went, OK, fine.
00:26:13
Speaker
And he was like, OK, here's the timeline.
00:26:16
Speaker
If Ocarina of Time, you say there's an adult.
00:26:19
Speaker
The timeline is choose your own adventure.
00:26:21
Speaker
Bullshit.
00:26:23
Speaker
So the timeline is already stupid because it's like, OK, here's the timeline that
00:26:27
Speaker
from the future of Ocarina of Time where he's an adult, and then here's the timeline from when he was a child.
00:26:32
Speaker
Okay, that's fine.
00:26:33
Speaker
Okay, and then here's another timeline that if you had died in Ocarina of Time, here's this new timeline, and it's like, hold on, this isn't XCOM, what the fuck are you doing?
00:26:43
Speaker
Like, that ain't...
00:26:44
Speaker
And then when they got to Breath of the Wild, they said, fuck the timeline.
00:26:48
Speaker
Yeah, this ain't got nothing to do with the timeline.
00:26:50
Speaker
This is something new.
00:26:51
Speaker
This is something brand spanking new.
00:26:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:54
Speaker
Not many companies.
00:26:56
Speaker
So two companies have the balls to say that the bad ending is canon.
00:27:01
Speaker
And that's Nintendo and Firaxis.
00:27:05
Speaker
with xcom 2 where they said yeah nobody beat xcom 1 so we're gonna say the canon ending was you didn't be xcom 1 the canon ending is you lost you gave up uh the canon ending is is that um uh marvel's midnight sons didn't sell as much as we wanted it to so canon ending with that is everybody lost
00:27:26
Speaker
Everybody lost.
00:27:28
Speaker
I lost.
00:27:29
Speaker
I lost personally a lot.
00:27:32
Speaker
And obviously Jake Solomon lost.
00:27:37
Speaker
Well, he's off in another company now, isn't he?
00:27:39
Speaker
Or has he retired from getting... I don't know.
00:27:41
Speaker
I feel like he's too young to retire.
00:27:43
Speaker
He's... Oh, yeah.
00:27:44
Speaker
I mean, it's early 40s, I think.
00:27:47
Speaker
Yeah, Sid Meier is still going.
00:27:48
Speaker
So Jake Salman's got to.
00:27:51
Speaker
I mean, Sid Meier is like Miyamoto.
00:27:53
Speaker
Like he won't leave.
00:27:54
Speaker
Like he'll just die at the job.
00:27:56
Speaker
He will just die sitting in his office chair.
00:28:01
Speaker
more than that so have you heard about oh we will get about in a second don't you worry folks but you know um how they design chimera well apparently so it's um phyrexis when they prototype new games like sid mea built this thing in the 80s that he calls like the sandbox where it's like whenever they want to try a mechanic out he will just quickly write it in this bit of software and
00:28:25
Speaker
And it all, like, give them a bunch of data and a bunch of demonstrations of how it worked.
00:28:28
Speaker
And that's how they did Chimera Squad, was, like, they weren't sure if the mixed-up turn order would work.
00:28:34
Speaker
When XCOM, he was like, oh, Giz is, like, 10 minutes, and I'll write it up.
00:28:38
Speaker
And, like, literally had a working prototype working on it.
00:28:41
Speaker
And they were like, oh, yeah, like, all of Firaxis's games from Civ 1 have used me as sandbox for, like, prototyping.
00:28:49
Speaker
And it's like...
00:28:51
Speaker
So yeah, I just imagine that the day that he dies, they'll find him in the office, but he has written himself into his own sandbox.
00:28:59
Speaker
He's going to live forever in the sandbox, like Johnny Depp in Transcendence.
00:29:04
Speaker
He's the guy, and apparently he's the guy that anytime they're developing a game, aside from the sandbox thing, they just sit down with him, and they're like, what do you think of this?
00:29:13
Speaker
And he's like...
00:29:15
Speaker
he's just like gives the thumb he's like i like he's like so he gives the thumbs up or thumbs down he's like no that's dumb uh do this the player players like this better like he somehow has this like instinctual idea of what might work over other things because it's not like he's not doing the he doesn't do the day-to-day stuff for the civ games oh no i obviously i imagine it's like miyamosa where he's like create a fellow where it's just like they keep him employed as kind of like a
00:29:43
Speaker
Do you think he does that for like all the other 2K games?
00:29:46
Speaker
Like they go to him and it's like, all right, we're doing 2K, NBA 2K 2020 like four.
00:29:51
Speaker
I would be interested.
00:29:52
Speaker
They have to hope he gives him the thumbs up.
00:29:55
Speaker
I would actually kind of be interested seeing who Sid Meier meets in like a regular day.
00:30:01
Speaker
Like who's calling him seeking his advice?
00:30:04
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:06
Speaker
Same thing for Miyamoto.
00:30:08
Speaker
Like, do people just go for advice?
00:30:11
Speaker
Miyamoto's an interesting one, because he's obviously, he's been developing the theme park for the past, like, four years, but now that that's done, it's like, what's the next thing?
00:30:19
Speaker
And apparently he works on Pikmin 4, and it's like, yeah, but what does that...
00:30:23
Speaker
Like, what does work on mean?
00:30:25
Speaker
Like, was he... Because I can't imagine he was doing the modeling or, like, doing the programming or anything, but I imagine he might have been looking at the design docs and being like, yay or nay on stuff like that.
00:30:34
Speaker
Yeah, just, like, breaks out the... Like, they give him a draft of the design doc, he breaks out a red pen, like, makes his notes and then throws it back to them.
00:30:43
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:30:45
Speaker
More Iochi.
00:30:47
Speaker
Even more Iochi.
00:30:48
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:52
Speaker
So we're in chapter 10, I believe.
00:30:54
Speaker
Yeah, we got the cage.
00:30:58
Speaker
But Bowser is able to keep them pinned down with suppressing fire.
00:31:02
Speaker
Speaking of XCOM.
00:31:04
Speaker
Yes.
00:31:07
Speaker
Bowser activated kill zone.
00:31:09
Speaker
Don't go into his line of fire.
00:31:14
Speaker
And then Toad says something about it being hopeless.
00:31:17
Speaker
And that reminds Mario about the envelope.
00:31:20
Speaker
Hey, now, we got a callback here.
00:31:24
Speaker
And Mario opens up the envelope, and basically the note inside tells Mario that each of the mushrooms also casts a spell when thrown.
00:31:35
Speaker
So one by one they take turns throwing the mushrooms at Bowser and like the black one is like a smoke bomb and then the green one... The red one does firebombs.
00:31:45
Speaker
It's kind of very Mario Kart-y.
00:31:47
Speaker
Like they all turn into sort of like classic Mario weapons which is...
00:31:51
Speaker
And basically that's just from a password pass.
00:31:53
Speaker
It's just like, stop.
00:31:55
Speaker
This is annoying.
00:31:57
Speaker
Stop doing it.
00:31:57
Speaker
I was just like, please stop.
00:31:59
Speaker
Ah, I don't like this.
00:32:01
Speaker
I'm not a fan of this.
00:32:03
Speaker
One of them's a giant, just like a giant bouncy ball that hits him in the face.
00:32:07
Speaker
Yeah, and I was trying to figure out what that was a reference to.
00:32:10
Speaker
I know that in Mario Brothers 3, some of the Koopalins are just like...
00:32:15
Speaker
what do they call it like in the circus like on a gymnast when they balance on a ball it's sort of like that kind of like a sort of a trapeze thing so i wondered if it was a reference to that but yeah just like the the the koopa kids doing their little thing yeah and i mean it could also just be chasey west being my foot uh ball why did i write six
00:32:41
Speaker
Why is it the six mushrooms?
00:32:43
Speaker
Why couldn't it be three mushrooms?
00:32:45
Speaker
Why wasn't it just one mushroom?
00:32:47
Speaker
Mario and the... Here we go, Scholastic.
00:32:49
Speaker
I've written this pamphlet for you.
00:32:51
Speaker
Mario and the quest for the one mushroom.
00:32:54
Speaker
Mario and the special, super special mushroom.
00:32:57
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:59
Speaker
So the fireball mushroom, which is the last one, knocks Bowser out of a window.
00:33:04
Speaker
Yeah, it does.
00:33:07
Speaker
They rescue the princess, and then Mario grabs the book of spells for Cronus's wife.
00:33:15
Speaker
And I don't think Bowser will need this anymore.
00:33:21
Speaker
And somewhere in a deep, mysterious forest, the sorceress smiled back.
00:33:26
Speaker
The end.
00:33:28
Speaker
No more writing.
00:33:29
Speaker
The
The Mysterious Forest Conclusion
00:33:31
Speaker
end.
00:33:31
Speaker
Hard end.
00:33:31
Speaker
I nearly sent you a message about this, because I did the PDF conversion, and I was like, oh, did this cut it off?
00:33:38
Speaker
Why did it just end here?
00:33:40
Speaker
So then I had a look at the EPUB, and I was like, oh, no, it just ends.
00:33:45
Speaker
Yeah, and then I had a look, and it was like, yeah.
00:33:47
Speaker
That's just where it ends.
00:33:49
Speaker
It just ends on, like, gunshot fade to black of Somewhere Deep in the Mysterious Forest, The Sorcerer's Smile Back, Bummed, Cut to Black, Linkin Park, Doesn't Really Matter, Executive Producer Credit.
00:34:06
Speaker
Directed by Michael Bay.
00:34:08
Speaker
I've come so far.
00:34:09
Speaker
And in the end, it doesn't really matter.
00:34:14
Speaker
James, what did you think of the book overall?
00:34:17
Speaker
I thought it was okay.
00:34:18
Speaker
We did kind of gloss over it a little bit, but I will say, compared to when I was here last time and I read the Bionic Commando book, the main criticism I had the Commando book was that basically it was very kind of like...
00:34:31
Speaker
kids clancy in regards to they were trying to describe like a lot of action scenes of and then he did this and then he did this and then he did and right just over and over this does have action scenes in it but they do try and like it's very dialogue heavy and they do try and make it quite cutesy there isn't a lot of like
00:34:50
Speaker
actual combat in it.
00:34:51
Speaker
Like, with the... The paratrooper thing was, like, he jumped on the paratrooper and he lost his wings.
00:34:56
Speaker
Then he jumped again and he turned into a shell.
00:34:59
Speaker
And then he jumped again and, watch, he was gone.
00:35:01
Speaker
So... All very kind of friendly kids' writing.
00:35:04
Speaker
And again, like, it borrows a lot from Mario RPG, which is, like, the most kind of character-filled and story-focused of that.
00:35:12
Speaker
I do like the puzzle element, even though they give away all the answers, like, immediately, which is a shame.
00:35:18
Speaker
Right.
00:35:19
Speaker
But other than that, I haven't really got a lot of complaints about a book which I think was probably aimed at ten year olds for Mario.
00:35:28
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:29
Speaker
I am annoyed I didn't get my stickers though.
00:35:35
Speaker
That's the thing that has lasted with this.
00:35:38
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:40
Speaker
That's a bummer.
00:35:41
Speaker
I thought it was fine.
00:35:42
Speaker
I thought it was fine.
00:35:44
Speaker
I was just I was comparing it to in my head.
00:35:47
Speaker
So my daughter just read Charlotte's Web for school.
00:35:51
Speaker
Yes.
00:35:52
Speaker
And she's 10.
00:35:53
Speaker
So I was like, all right, well, Charlotte's Web is a book with pretty complex themes and, you know, all that stuff.
00:36:01
Speaker
It's a kid's book, but, you know, yeah.
00:36:03
Speaker
And I was like thinking about that in comparison to this.
00:36:06
Speaker
And I was like, all right, so what age is this for?
00:36:09
Speaker
Is it for 10 or is it for younger?
00:36:11
Speaker
I don't know.
00:36:12
Speaker
And then I got distracted and didn't really follow up on that thought.
00:36:15
Speaker
But, um, I, it's not like something I could, I wouldn't give it to my daughter.
00:36:21
Speaker
Uh, no, this is a bit, yeah.
00:36:23
Speaker
So maybe 10 is a bit, I think you would have to even be a bit younger.
00:36:26
Speaker
Seven, eight.
00:36:27
Speaker
This is like seven, eight, I think.
00:36:29
Speaker
Um, probably.
00:36:34
Speaker
So, yeah, it's fine.
00:36:35
Speaker
I think it does a good job of, like, not being very repetitive.
00:36:39
Speaker
Like, in terms of beats.
00:36:41
Speaker
A lot of variety.
00:36:42
Speaker
There's variety in locations and pulls in a lot of Mario stuff.
00:36:47
Speaker
And the only weird thing I'll say about it is that it's Mario talks...
00:36:54
Speaker
A lot.
00:36:55
Speaker
A lot.
00:36:55
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:56
Speaker
Like an unnerving amount.
00:36:59
Speaker
Even with the Chris Pratt Mario Brothers movie in the back of my mind, it still feels like an unnerving amount of dialogue from Mario.
00:37:09
Speaker
Yeah, and even then, Toad and Luigi, the way that they're written, they are goofy, kind of like, as you'd imagine, psychic characters would be, and you would kind of need that level of aim.
00:37:18
Speaker
But the fact that they made Mario kind of the level-headed one, again, that kind of dialogue doesn't feel right coming out of it as well.
00:37:25
Speaker
Again, not to brag too much on a book which is written for literal children.
00:37:30
Speaker
literal children literal children that hasn't listen that hasn't stopped us before um that's true i was gonna say so like assuming this is like the bedrock for like the youngest possible person this was written for what's it what's like the book that you've or what's something that you've written for this podcast which is like probably aimed at like the oldest person possible
00:37:53
Speaker
Okay, so something we've written, we've read for this podcast that is like in terms of reading level, like... Yeah, comprehension or just like the subject matter.
00:38:07
Speaker
Probably the Far Cry novelization that we read.
00:38:10
Speaker
Interesting.
00:38:12
Speaker
Because the author is very, stylistically, the author was very Cormac McCarthy.
00:38:19
Speaker
Huh, yeah.
00:38:22
Speaker
And the subject matter has to do with like, it's based on Far Cry 5, which has a lot to do, like one of the guys has like extremists and stuff, extremists and like cutting people's flesh off and nailing it to a wall.
00:38:37
Speaker
There's some really, really heavy stuff in that book.
00:38:40
Speaker
So.
00:38:41
Speaker
I'd probably say the Far Cry novelization is... Fair enough.
00:38:45
Speaker
And you would say that the level of reading comprehension for that as well is a little bit more kind of like... Yeah, it's definitely aimed at adults.
00:38:54
Speaker
And then Joseph Seed said this.
00:38:56
Speaker
And then Joseph Seed did this kind of thing.
00:39:00
Speaker
And then he cut off the skin on the woman's forehead and nailed it to the wall.
00:39:05
Speaker
Praise be the seed or whatever.
00:39:11
Speaker
I barely remember Far Cry 5.
00:39:12
Speaker
Yeah.
00:39:15
Speaker
considering the fun I got out of Far Cry 5 I was like well if I just if it was just the story with none of the gameplay in it it's like oh god yeah imagine like David Cage version of Far Cry 5 is just the story straight up uncut story very little gameplay see now I'm imagining that there probably is a novelization of Heavy Rain out there
00:39:38
Speaker
She may have to end up doing on the pod.
00:39:41
Speaker
Heavy.
00:39:42
Speaker
You're looking at it.
00:39:49
Speaker
No, there's a book called Heavy Rain, but it doesn't look like it's about... The Oregon Killer.
00:39:57
Speaker
Yeah, no, there's several books titled Heavy Rain.
00:40:01
Speaker
Doesn't look like it's from the David Cage Heavy Rain.
00:40:10
Speaker
You dodged a bullet there.
00:40:11
Speaker
Dodged a bullet there.
00:40:13
Speaker
David Cage novelization?
00:40:20
Speaker
uh okay um now it doesn't seem to come up i'll i'll dig into it i'll dig into it just in case yeah yeah so i guess at this point in the show i always ask phil one question um and that question is what are you playing um
00:40:44
Speaker
Oh boy, well, I have been playing two games recently, if I'm allowed to quickly go into them.
00:40:51
Speaker
It's been funny, actually, because obviously we're recording this and it's towards the end of the year and it's like... All the kind of the big goat-y stuff has kind of come out now and I've got... Well, apart from Baldur's Gate 3, which I think my plan is sometime next year to make a start on that, just because I can't imagine a ton of stuff is coming out, so I will be...
00:41:09
Speaker
Yeah, 2024 seems a little droughty so far from what I've seen.
00:41:14
Speaker
It's a bit of drought.
00:41:16
Speaker
Like I know that Like a Dragon Infinite Wealth is out like right at the beginning of February, but I haven't gotten to any of the users yet.
00:41:26
Speaker
Seems like a good backlog year.
00:41:29
Speaker
oh yeah so boulders go for anything will be part of that but two games i've been playing at the moment one which is on mobile one which is on my pc uh the mobile game i've been playing is sonic dream team which is a uh ios exclusive but it's interesting because obviously some of the hedgehog game came out
00:41:46
Speaker
A couple of months ago, Sonic Superstars, which was like a... Technically, it's 2D presentation, but it's 3D rendering, but it's done in the style of Mania.
00:41:56
Speaker
I didn't like it massively based on what I had played, but... Sonic Dream Team feels like... Oh, this feels like another step in making a Sonic game, as in like...
00:42:07
Speaker
It's a little bit of forward kind of running and kind of obstacle course stuff, but then you have these little open areas, and it's a little bit more like... Almost kind of Tony Hawk-y in a weird way.
00:42:17
Speaker
Okay.
00:42:17
Speaker
Like, it's a lot more about kind of using the environment to build up speed and get, like, little trinkets and stuff.
00:42:23
Speaker
Like, every level kind of has, like... It's like Mario 64.
00:42:26
Speaker
Like, every level has six objectives to complete, and it's like...
00:42:29
Speaker
beat it in this amount of time or this amount of trinkets and stuff.
00:42:34
Speaker
It's very cute.
00:42:34
Speaker
It does make my phone run very hot though.
00:42:38
Speaker
So if you're going to play it, I would suggest having a more up to date Apple device.
00:42:43
Speaker
I think this will probably work.
00:42:44
Speaker
It works on iPad.
00:42:45
Speaker
It works on Apple TV, basically anything that supports Apple Arcade.
00:42:49
Speaker
The other game that I have been playing is one that I kickstarted a few years ago and it's finally come out.
00:42:55
Speaker
It is a RPG called Knuckle Sandwich.
00:42:58
Speaker
Have you heard of this?
00:42:59
Speaker
I have not.
00:43:01
Speaker
Okay.
00:43:02
Speaker
So Knuckle Sandwich is an interesting one.
00:43:03
Speaker
So the reason that I backed it and what I've been quite enjoying about it is that it is like a... So like if Baldur's Gate 3 is like a throwback to old PC CPRPGs and like obviously Bills and Larians work on stuff, this is very much a throwback to GBA stuff.
00:43:20
Speaker
So like Mother 3 and like Mario & Luigi Superstar Saga.
00:43:24
Speaker
So there was kind of like...
00:43:26
Speaker
A little bit more streamlined kind of overworld stuff, but also like the combat is very active.
00:43:32
Speaker
So like if you're like, you don't just like press a menu item and then like the attack plays out.
00:43:38
Speaker
Like they also expect you to do like a little mini game like to, you know, time it with the jump or whatever.
00:43:47
Speaker
But, uh, old Knuckle Samu's goes a step further in that all of these interactions are done in the style of WarioWare micro games.
00:43:57
Speaker
So, like, there's an attack which is called, like, Beatdown, and, like, it brings up a little window and it's like, Beatdown!
00:44:03
Speaker
Here's the inputs, go, go, go!
00:44:05
Speaker
And then you have to, like, mash your buttons and it plays this little animation to do that.
00:44:09
Speaker
Or there's one where it's, like,
00:44:11
Speaker
defend yourself and it's like you have to do like a ddr style thing so like basically there's like all these little micro games for like each little different thing but then the game itself is in the plot i haven't quite dug into yet but the presentation's really good it flip-flops between like this really like on point gba sprite rendering but then sometimes it does like ds style 3d where it's like low poly and very kind of um
00:44:36
Speaker
texture driven but then it does like Game Boy Color stuff when it's doing like flashes to the past.
00:44:42
Speaker
It's really interesting and all made by a single guy called Andrew Brophy.
00:44:46
Speaker
He did the like the graphics, the music, the like the programming and stuff like that.
00:44:52
Speaker
And yeah, I would say so far has been worth it was worth the wait.
00:44:57
Speaker
I'm slowly working through it at the moment.
00:45:00
Speaker
Interesting.
00:45:00
Speaker
Yes, being pretty good.
00:45:02
Speaker
What about you?
00:45:03
Speaker
What have you been playing?
00:45:05
Speaker
Let's see.
00:45:06
Speaker
I have been playing.
00:45:10
Speaker
The big thing I've been playing is Warhammer 40K Rogue Traitor, which is it's a lot of fun.
00:45:22
Speaker
It's also I mean, I Baldur's Gate three basically was like, oh, yeah, fuck.
00:45:26
Speaker
I do like CRPGs, don't I?
00:45:31
Speaker
It reminded me of that.
00:45:32
Speaker
So I got Rogue Trader and it's very much, if you're coming to it from Baldur's Gate 3, like don't expect the polish that's in Baldur's Gate 3 to be in Rogue Trader.
00:45:44
Speaker
Sure, yeah.
00:45:46
Speaker
Like Baldur's Gate 3, literally every line in the entire goddamn game is voice acted.
00:45:51
Speaker
Oh, God, right.
00:45:55
Speaker
So what do you do in Rogue Trader then?
00:45:57
Speaker
What's it?
00:45:57
Speaker
So like, what do you do in the 40k universe?
00:46:01
Speaker
So.
00:46:01
Speaker
So yeah, you're playing as a character who, when you start the game, is the heir to a house.
00:46:10
Speaker
You're just informed that you're the heir to a house called the Von Valencia's house, which is that house owns a trade warrant, which in the 40K universe, from what I understand, basically gives...
00:46:27
Speaker
It gives you the title of rogue trader and it lets you have almost full autonomy outside of the Imperium of Man's government.
00:46:39
Speaker
So like...
00:46:41
Speaker
It takes place in a section called the Kronos Expanse, which is basically set, which is like far outside of like the settled area of space.
00:46:50
Speaker
And it's like, all right, these rogue traders, they're the first ones out there.
00:46:54
Speaker
And it's kind of like the wild west, basically for Warhammer 40k.
00:46:59
Speaker
There isn't, don't expect a lot of support from the Imperium out there.
00:47:06
Speaker
So yeah, it's,
00:47:08
Speaker
There's like a tutorial mission where and you go through all the command, how to play and all that stuff.
00:47:18
Speaker
All the major gameplay elements, which include there's the combat portion and then there's like the portion where making decisions in dialogue options kind of takes you down one of three paths.
00:47:32
Speaker
which are iconoclastic, dogmatic, and heretical.
00:47:36
Speaker
Obviously, in heretical sense, that's usually not a safe way to go in the 40K universe, but you can if you want to.
00:47:48
Speaker
And yeah, after this opening segment, you are now in control of the ship, your character,
00:47:58
Speaker
And you have to go around and just start rebuilding the ship after it was attacked.
00:48:03
Speaker
And I just got to the end of towards the end, I think, of the first chapter of the game, which is still basically just like introducing all the systems in it.
00:48:13
Speaker
And I put about like 10 hours into the game.
00:48:17
Speaker
And that's including me restarting it because with CRPGs,
00:48:22
Speaker
inevitably I start the game with one build, play around for like a few hours and then go and restart it.
00:48:31
Speaker
Yeah.
00:48:33
Speaker
I'm like, yeah, I feel like something else.
00:48:36
Speaker
So, but yeah, it's a lot of fun.
00:48:40
Speaker
Yeah.
00:48:41
Speaker
It's very, reminds me a bit of Fallout.
00:48:46
Speaker
And it almost makes me think like,
00:48:49
Speaker
when I see these new CRPGs, I'm like, God damn it, Bethesda, you could, we could have a Fallout.
00:48:56
Speaker
We could have a classic CRPG Fallout.
00:48:58
Speaker
You know, it's not like it has to be
00:49:01
Speaker
It doesn't have to be first person.
00:49:03
Speaker
It doesn't have to be first person.
00:49:05
Speaker
Just give us that.
00:49:08
Speaker
It also uses cover mechanics, kind of like XCOM, half cover and full cover, which is neat.
00:49:17
Speaker
The whole system is kind of tough to... I haven't totally gotten it yet because it's different than...
00:49:26
Speaker
any other system I've played.
00:49:30
Speaker
But I'm slowly getting there.
00:49:32
Speaker
I mean, it's still based on dice rolls behind the scenes.
00:49:34
Speaker
It's still based on dice rolls.
00:49:37
Speaker
But the calculation of it is, it's whatever Games Workshop does.
00:49:42
Speaker
Sure.
00:49:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:45
Speaker
But that's it.
00:49:45
Speaker
That's the big one I've been playing.
00:49:48
Speaker
Otherwise, on my Steam Deck, sometimes at night, I've been playing Stasis Bone Totem.
00:49:56
Speaker
I've never heard of that.
00:49:58
Speaker
So years ago, not that long ago, a few years ago, I'd say 2015 or 16, there was a game called Stasis, which was a point and click horror game.
00:50:08
Speaker
It's like isometric point and click, and you're just kind of like going around.
00:50:12
Speaker
It's spooky and all that.
00:50:14
Speaker
And it's...
00:50:16
Speaker
It was very difficult because... It was one of those games where if you solve the puzzle wrong, your character... It's not like you get another chance.
00:50:26
Speaker
Your character just fucking dies.
00:50:29
Speaker
Like, oh, you put the wrong thing in the thing.
00:50:31
Speaker
The thing exploded.
00:50:32
Speaker
Your character...
00:50:33
Speaker
got something on them and they melted into a puddle.
00:50:36
Speaker
Stuff like that.
00:50:37
Speaker
Stasis bone totem, they've kind of learned a little bit that that's a little bit frustrating.
00:50:42
Speaker
So the first time I solved the puzzle wrong and my character died, instead of like starting me back at the last save, it just started me back right there and unlocked a like...
00:50:54
Speaker
You found the first death or something like that.
00:50:57
Speaker
Oh, interesting.
00:50:59
Speaker
It's like, just keep playing.
00:51:01
Speaker
Keep going.
00:51:02
Speaker
You have seen that death scene once.
00:51:04
Speaker
It won't happen.
00:51:05
Speaker
And even if you solve it wrong again, it doesn't play the death scene again.
00:51:10
Speaker
You can just keep playing.
00:51:11
Speaker
It just turns off.
00:51:13
Speaker
the death for that puzzle once you experience it the first time.
00:51:19
Speaker
So yeah, it's an interesting little game.
00:51:23
Speaker
I haven't gotten too far into it, but it's a lot of fun so far.
00:51:28
Speaker
Well, please.
00:51:30
Speaker
Yeah.
00:51:30
Speaker
So James, why don't you go ahead and plug where people can find you?
00:51:35
Speaker
Yeah, sure.
00:51:36
Speaker
You can probably still find me at this point over on xbrackets, formerly Twitter, at HotSider.
00:51:44
Speaker
I'm still making videos at the moment as well.
00:51:46
Speaker
I'm hoping to have, because we're recording this around Christmas time.
00:51:51
Speaker
I am working on two things at the moment, which I do not think will be going out either before or even after.
00:51:56
Speaker
These might come in right in January.
00:51:58
Speaker
So that...
00:51:59
Speaker
Yeah, I'm always happy to come back here as well.
00:52:23
Speaker
Yeah, and we're always glad to have you.
00:52:26
Speaker
As for us, you can find PixletPod on X, on Twixtre and Instagram and all the other platforms.
00:52:36
Speaker
Blue Sky, wherever.
00:52:38
Speaker
You can find us on just search at pixel at pod.
00:52:41
Speaker
You can find us there.
00:52:43
Speaker
If you get a pixel at pod.com, you'll just be redirected right over to our Patreon page.
00:52:47
Speaker
You can go to patreon.com slash pixel at pod.
00:52:49
Speaker
If you really, really love us, you can throw some money.
00:52:52
Speaker
We have three tiers, $1, $5 and $10, $10 gets you a shout out at the end of the episode.
00:52:58
Speaker
And we have more people to shout out now.
00:53:04
Speaker
Actually, let me look up because this is the first time I'm shouting out these additional folks.
00:53:10
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, here we go.
00:53:13
Speaker
Audience.
00:53:15
Speaker
Who do we got?
00:53:17
Speaker
We got, we got, all right, so our traditional friendly friends
00:53:25
Speaker
You've been shouted out forever.
00:53:27
Speaker
Thank you so much, friendly friend.
00:53:29
Speaker
We also have Jesus Loves You.
00:53:33
Speaker
Lord, I hope he does.
00:53:35
Speaker
And Ruthless Mutter, thank you so much for being our Geek Scholars, throwing us $10 a month.
00:53:43
Speaker
We truly, truly appreciate it.
00:53:47
Speaker
Until next time, thank you so much for listening, everybody, and have a good evening.
00:53:59
Speaker
Bye.