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Episode 65 - Callahan's Crosstime Saloon
0 Playsin 5 hours
Ok, let's address the spider in the room: We could not find a way to play the Naked Gun game BUT we do come to you this week with stories of black jelly beans aand Roses dumping a scooter. Also, Matt is playing Hollow Knight: Silksong and has a lot to say about it.
Then, Matt recently got to play a PushingUpRoses favorite, Callahan's Crosstime Saloon! Some come on a journey with us and Jake Stonebender through time and space and a cozy little bar while we SAVE THE UNIVERSE!
Games Mentioned:
- Hollow Knight: Silksong
- Blasphemous
- Unbound: Worlds Apart
- Lone Fungus
- Bo: Path of the Teal Lotus
- Nine Sols
- Rosewater
- Callahan's Crosstime Saloon
- Jezzball
- The Journeyman Project
- The Naked Gun: I.C.U.P.
Email us! mattandroses@gmail.com
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Transcript
Quirky Fennel and Licorice Stories
00:00:00
Speaker
there can be sometimes there's bowls of fennel up by the cash register and instead of grabbing like a mint you grab some fennel and chuck it in your mouth i would do that it's got kind of a licorice thing going on yeah it's my favorite thing have i told you this have i told you i love black licorice Oh, no, you have not.
00:00:19
Speaker
Oh, I didn't tell you the story. What? Okay. There's a story about you loving black licorice. Yes. Okay. Tell me. It's kind of boring, but here's what happened. So at Christmas one year, my partner gave me some black jelly beans because they're my ah they're they're black licorice flavored and they're my absolute favorite. Do you not like that? Do you not like black jelly beans?
00:00:42
Speaker
ah No, not at all. and Oh, shit. Okay. Well, listen, i like I don't like jelly beans. I only like black jelly beans. And being the good partner that he is he's like, well, I'm just going to get you a bag of black jelly beans.
00:00:56
Speaker
And, you know, this was over Christmas. We were at ah his place in Virginia. I'm not even at home. I ate the whole bag of black jelly beans.
00:01:08
Speaker
Before our flight and the day of, I'm like, i don't, I don't feel good. And I just don't know why. i just don't know why my stomach hurts.
00:01:18
Speaker
Oh my God. And my partner's like, I don't, I don't know what's going on. And then later I'm like, i ate the whole bag. is it it like Is it like ah every now and then? Because I'm a huge fan of gummy bears.
00:01:34
Speaker
Gummy candy of all time all kinds. And sometimes people will get me like a giant bag of gummy bears. And they're you know like that they're they're being sweet. of Or they think they are. But I'm just going to sit there and eat nonstop gummy bears. Yep.
00:01:50
Speaker
And I'm going to be and I'm going to know my stomach is going to start hurting. oh yeah. Before I stop eating the gummy bears, meaning going to keep going. Yeah.
00:02:00
Speaker
yeah I know. going to feel it in my stomach and I'm going to keep going. It's a real problem. it's just It's just a shameful thing and it's so shameful that I had to lie about it.
00:02:12
Speaker
I feel like I just don't know. Here's the thing that i always wanted to ask people who eat black jelly beans. When you get those... There must be non-Harry Potter branded ones, right? Oh, yeah. It's like jelly beans has been around for a long time. No, no, no, no. Not that. the um Those things, the birdie bots every flavor beans where it's like it is a random assortment of jelly beans and some of them are flavored like horrible jelly Ew, I hate that concept. ah you don't You've never had them?
00:02:46
Speaker
No. Because I always wondered if somebody who's into black jelly beans, if they just go ahead and eat them by the handful. Ew. If liking black jelly beans means you just like jelly beans and you do not care about the flavor whatsoever.
00:03:04
Speaker
That would be awful. Imagine you're enjoying a handful of black jelly beans and you like bite into one flavor like barf or hot dog or something. That would be terrible. Well, here's my question. How could you tell?
00:03:18
Speaker
Because black jelly beans taste and and the other ones do not taste good. ah You're saying, though, if you have a handful of assorted...
00:03:30
Speaker
The hot dog flavor that I'm making up is just going blend. No, no. I think you're going to taste it. I'm saying that people with who like jet black jelly beans must have no taste buds.
Podcast Introduction and Hostess Snack Cakes
00:04:02
Speaker
Hey everybody, welcome to Save Your Game. I am your host, Matt Aukamp, and with me is your host. Your hostess with the mostest.
00:04:18
Speaker
Hostess with the hostess snack cakes, huh? Oh shit, I wish. I wish too. You got really sad there for a second. You're just like, yeah, me too. Yeah, now i can't even introduce you because I'm thinking about eating that really gross processed filling in the middle of a Hostess snack cake. disgusting. Oh, God. It's so good. This is Pushing the Broses.
00:04:41
Speaker
Hey, everyone. What's up? Welcome back our little gaming corner of the internet. It's so fake buttery and and- It's gross. It's so good and horrible.
00:04:55
Speaker
I don't, I think I don't like it actually. And oh man, that really dry cake. It's off. No. Are you thinking of the, of the cupcakes of the, with the, i'm I'm thinking of the chocolate cupcakes. Yeah.
00:05:09
Speaker
Yeah. Those are fucking terrible. I, yeah I didn't like them as a kid and I don't like them now. Yeah. They suck so bad. They're so good. yeah How are you doing roses? Hey, guess what I did the other day?
00:05:23
Speaker
Um, let's see. Did you tightrope walk between two skyscrapers in Chicago? I did, but that wasn't the problem. that would That went okay, actually. it was very, I got a good audience, good got a good reception. I was fine.
00:05:40
Speaker
And then afterwards, I dumped a scooter. ah got into a scooter crash. Yeah.
Electric Scooter Mishap in Chicago
00:05:47
Speaker
tell what Tell me what happened. I'm not really certain, but so. i lost You lost about five minutes. I died for a second. No, i um I really wanted to go to the zoo, but I didn't want to drive there. Yeah.
00:06:05
Speaker
So like, why not take and when I say scooter, I mean, like an electric scooter. I do not mean a moped or a Vespa. ah Yeah, it's just an ah electric scooter, like the Divi scooters, and they're all over the city. You can rent them. They're they're great for transit.
00:06:22
Speaker
And so like I rented one. And Matt, I was almost there. were you rented Had you rented one before? Yeah. Yeah. No, this is not new. Like I have i have ah ridden scooters before.
00:06:35
Speaker
okay And um I was almost there. I was so close to my destination. And there was this weird incline in the street. kind of looked like an incline where it just looked like ah ah a ramp. It wasn't a speed bump. It actually looked like it would work fine.
00:06:54
Speaker
Okay. And I hit that thing so fucking hard. And because I have no survival skills, I tried to protect the scooter instead of myself.
00:07:07
Speaker
So I'm like holding on to the scooter. The scooter's dragging me. Yeah. And then i it flings me into a curve, like my face. My face hit the curve.
00:07:19
Speaker
And it's it's healing really nicely. but like I was upset at that crash. And i hit my I hit my hand. My hand's all scraped up. There's a huge bruise on my... I mean, I'm lucky I didn't hit my teeth or something. like That would have been terrible.
00:07:39
Speaker
so now i'm i'm now everybody at home, you can picture your Pushing of Roses riding a motor scooter down the streets of Chicago. the The elation on her face, because she's almost there.
00:07:54
Speaker
I'm so close. I'm so close. She's so She's made it. She's thinking about what... I don't know where you were going, but I assume... The Lincoln Park Zoo. Okay. You're thinking about the animals. I am. Your face is lighting up. You're like, I'm almost there. There's like a new little lion cub.
00:08:10
Speaker
The sun starts shining behind you. starts... You're... face starts twinkling like an instagram filter the birds are singing and then just face plant right before finish line all your rings going out everywhere you've seen the pic it's it's bloody it's yeah quite the scuff holy cow well And then I couldn't even go anymore.
00:08:41
Speaker
i couldn't even go see the new lion cub. ah This is a zoo where they do a lot of conservation, a lot of, ah um not survival, what's the word? Rescue type stuff. And I was so excited because I love animals and I love little lion cubs. And now I'm all bloody ah the side of the road in Chicago And I just had to cab. I said to go home.
00:09:07
Speaker
I said to cab home. You're going there and it's playing the travel music and it's like, go and do the zoo. And then, and then almost there.
00:09:22
Speaker
Thud wump. You're crying. You're dragging your scooter to wherever the pickup spot is. And then a car comes and picks you up and drives you back.
00:09:39
Speaker
Oh, God. you can assume I didn't play any games. Oh, and prior to that, stepped barefoot into some glass in my apartment and didn't notice.
00:09:50
Speaker
But that was for fun. That was just my normal thing. Yeah. I don't know how I did it. So I was throwing. I was doing some wheel throwing. I was making a candlestick at the time. And I'm like, oh, my foot hurts.
00:10:02
Speaker
But it's fine. i got to finish candlestick. Throwing means making pottery. Yeah, throwing on the wheel. It's called throwing. And yeah, ah just look up the ghost scene, the the wheel, the pottery ghost scene. That's what I was doing. And my foot was hurting. And I'm like, i it's fine. With a basket behind you holding both arms.
00:10:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:10:24
Speaker
licking the clay because she's unhinged and like so later so i and then later i find that i'm actually bloodying up the apartment dude there's blood all over my tarp in the art room how did i not see that but now people come in to your house and you're like oh that was an art critic i invited over it's a you should see the other guy type of a situation yeah yeah So that that's me. That's what happened to me. I stepped in some fucking glass and then dumped a scooter on Lakeshore Drive.
00:10:59
Speaker
Great. Wonderful. I didn't play any games.
Deep Dive into Hollow Knight: Silksong
00:11:04
Speaker
Yeah, I had a rough time too. um I got pretty far into Silksong and then I died and then I couldn't get back to my spa and then I lost my um ah rosary beads.
00:11:22
Speaker
Rosary beads? Rosary beads that you get. so So in game, you didn't just lose some random rosary beads. Yeah, lost rosary beads. So I had it pretty tough too. Well, now you can't pray.
00:11:34
Speaker
You have to have that. I don't know. honestly don't know why it's Rosary Beads. It does seem a little, it does seem little, maybe, maybe the lore of the game eventually like explains it, but yeah, I don't know exactly why it's Rosary Beads. And this is in a world after, okay, here's one of the things. All right.
00:11:55
Speaker
Do you want to hear about Hollow Knight Silksong? Sure. Okay. So I've been playing Hollow Knight Silksong. It just came out as, as we're recording, it just came out yesterday. I'm about five hours in. um It's great.
00:12:07
Speaker
Just a quick overview. It's great. It feels a lot like Hollow Knight, but a little more um ah graceful. Yeah. Yeah. so You can look at Hornet, the character you're playing. And if you've played Hollow Knight, you saw Hornet move in the original game because she was a boss.
00:12:26
Speaker
Yeah. That's how Hornet moves in this game. So the fights are based a little bit um less around, you know, you might have thought Hollow Knight himself. that I don't think that character had a name. The Hollow Knight. The Hollow Knight. You might have thought battling was based around dexterity in that game, but he He almost seems blocky compared to the way you move as Hornet. you're
00:13:00
Speaker
You're jumping around. You're moving at angles. you're um a lot of the bosses are more like sword fighters than bruisers. So...
00:13:13
Speaker
it's it's it's a lot It's a lot more delicate, a lot more graceful. There's a lot of environmental traps in this game in a way there wasn't in the first Hollow Knight, which I think also lends to this idea of you're supposed to be light on your feet the entire time. um The skill set that they're looking from you isn't quite the same.
00:13:35
Speaker
Right. and it's a lot more musical ah the game two there's a lot singing there's a lot of bells there's a lot of chimes the world that you inhabit is is kind of a musical world it less hypnotic like i'm just kind of going through the screencasts and it looks very fluid and and magical Absolutely. And Hollow Knight was fluid. But again, compared to Silksong, Hollow Knight feels... Hollow Knight's a little blocky.
00:14:02
Speaker
um Right. Silksong's just so fluid, so graceful, so... You feel almost less like you're fighting enemies are more like you're dancing around the screen.
00:14:13
Speaker
Ooh, that's very artistic. I like that. it's a very It's very it's very good and That all to say, it's mostly just more Hollow Knight, which is all we wanted from this game, right? It's been a while, right? Like been several years?
00:14:28
Speaker
I think it was 2018 when they announced. Yeah, when did original Hollow Knight come out? I think it was 2018 when they announced that Silksong was no longer going to be a DLC, but instead was going to be its own game.
00:14:45
Speaker
Right. And then they have been pretty tight-lipped ever since then. And then about two weeks ago, they're like, it's coming out in two weeks. Yeah. It looks like Hollow Knight came out in 2017.
00:14:57
Speaker
Yes, and then I think they announced there would be a DLC called Silksong based around Hornet. And then I think somewhere in 2018, they were like, actually, ah we made too much DLC. It's going to be a whole game.
00:15:11
Speaker
I mean, that's a good thing, right? like i would rather Personally, I would rather have another game versus DLC. Absolutely, and Hollow Knight was a ah If you don't know, it's a Metroidvania that set the stage for the current... Like, all the Metroidvanias that have happened since it.
00:15:30
Speaker
ah Which is where where the rosary beads are going to come back into the discussion. um Because so many... It's a, okay, it's a Metroidvania that introduced souls-like mechanics and really precise platforming and um and just really interesting, really thoughtful level design and really interesting um settings and characters.
00:15:59
Speaker
I also um love a Hornet's design a lot more than Hollow Knight. i like Hollow Knight a lot, but yeah. There's something fluid and very like, I don't, i just, I'm really drawn to that design. I really like it.
00:16:13
Speaker
I find Hollow Knight to be just so iconic. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But Silksong, but Hornet. keep I keep wanting to call her Silksong.
00:16:25
Speaker
Makes sense. um But Hornet is, i think she works in a similar way, right? Like she's got the red, these she's got the flowing red cape. She's got a slightly longer needle and the slightly longer like head tines. I like her head. I like her little horns. Yeah.
00:16:42
Speaker
Right. You get used to her very quickly. No matter how much Hollow Knight you've played, you get used to looking at Hornet very, very quickly. And I think, yeah, I think she will become as iconic. And I think this game will be as iconic. So like what I was going to say, Hollow Knight was a perfect game.
00:17:01
Speaker
So when they announced they're making a sequel, you really don't want them to innovate that much. You really just want more Hollow Knight. Right. And this game delivers you that, but tweaks it enough that you feel like a whole new sense of discovery and mystery, like you're beginning...
00:17:24
Speaker
You know how at the beginning of most Metroid games, they know they're giving you the same game. so And you're still Metroid. So they have to come up with some reason at the very beginning as to why she gets stripped naked and loses all of her powers and all her suit upgrades. And then you're going around collecting all of them again. like so So ridiculous.
00:17:48
Speaker
Hollow Knight Silksong avoids this by having you be a different character and that character being enough like Hollow Knight that it feels familiar, but different enough that you still feel like you're discovering an entirely new way of playing.
00:18:03
Speaker
Familiar but different. That's that's how describes so much of this game. and um And it's funny because Hollow Knight was so influential. Yeah.
00:18:13
Speaker
And there were so many really impressive Metroidvanias that came out after it, right? Like um games like like Blasphemous, for example, by people who made The Last Door.
00:18:28
Speaker
Oh, ah, one of my favorites. that game Blasphemous and a lot of the post- Hollow Knight Metroidvanias have had a very Hollow Knight-like feel.
00:18:42
Speaker
um And again, Blasphemous being one of them that has this religious, like pseudo-Christian cultish feel.
00:18:54
Speaker
Sure. And one of the things you collect is rosary beads. And it makes a lot of sense thematically in Blasphemous, right? Right, yeah. But it does't does not in Silksong.
00:19:05
Speaker
Yeah, and in Silksong, I'm collecting rosary beads and I don't really know why. There's there's an... i'm not Again, I'm only five hours in and there is a religious pilgrimage thing to the game, but you're also a bunch of bugs.
00:19:19
Speaker
Blasphemous is about Christianity, right? like Right, right. And I guess the difference is in Hollow Knight, in Silksong, rosary beads are like a currency, where yeah in Blasphemous, they are the charms that you equip to yourself to give you, you know, extra powers.
00:19:40
Speaker
Anyway, the last thing I'll say about Hollow Knight is it's just so striking, right? That after Hollow Knight came out, like even just looking here at my Steam library, there's games that follow its format in some way or another, like Unbound Worlds Apart,
00:20:03
Speaker
There's Ultros, Tales of Iron, um Lone Fungus. Lone Fungus? Yeah, it's a really, it's ah it's a precise platforming.
00:20:16
Speaker
it looks cute! ah Where you're a little mushroom and it's mostly mostly about bouncing around. And the the platforming in that game and if you're trying to get, if you're trying to 100% it, even at some points if you're not, is so difficult.
00:20:33
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. and and then And then those two games that came out, what was it last year? Bow Path of the Teal Lotus. And what was the other one that was just like it? Nine Souls. They're not exactly. not familiar with that. They're not actually just alike, but they have enough similarities that they're easy to confuse.
00:20:50
Speaker
And they came out right next to each other. You're both a little white cat guy going through this Unique, like, Asiatic. Oh, I remember Night Souls. Mythological. I looked up. Yeah, I recognize the character design.
00:21:06
Speaker
Yeah. So all these games owe this debt to Hollow Knight. Like, it's if there's so many games that are trying to do what Hollow Knight did. And since it's been so long, you start to feel like.
00:21:20
Speaker
you know what Hollow Knight feels like and these and these people have nailed it, right? Yeah. Because you've played all these games for the past eight years and you haven't played Hollow Knight for the past eight years.
00:21:31
Speaker
Right. And then you pick up Silksong and it feels like a different genre. it's The art is so polished. The world is so interesting. the combat the movement is so smooth yeah that you're like oh fuck yeah no these like these guys team cherry are experts at this for a reason hollow knight was that influential for a reason yeah uh have you played did you play the original hollow knight i did not are you a metroidvania person at all
00:22:09
Speaker
Yeah, sometimes. it I mean, one of my first loves were side-scrolling games yeah i think i'm and platformers. i think I'm pretty good at them. But also, um i as i get older and my OCD goes wild, I do have trouble with like anything that's side-scrolling and platforming. I don't know why.
00:22:31
Speaker
because Because of the completionist element of it? I think so. Yeah, I think so. You're just like, sometimes in games like that, you can get a little paralyzed. Like you yeah move forward and you're like, well, wait, what secrets did I miss? And then you just go right backwards and you start exploring every inch of the map.
00:22:51
Speaker
Yeah. and it's it's It's a problem I've had in video games for a while. Like, if there's a grinding aspect, I'll just do it over and over. Even if I don't have to, I'll do it. Even in, like, a game like k Chrono Trigger, where you don't have to grind, I'm just going to do like we're in Or in Stardew, where I'm, like, making the perfect things, and, like, it's a problem.
00:23:15
Speaker
I would suggest, though, if if you like Metroidvania, I mean, Hollow Knight is... probably the best one ever made um i would put it above super metroid big words i would yeah i i would say hollow knight is maybe the best i'd put it above animal well even i think hollow knight is the best metroidvania ever made and hollow knight silk song is on track to potentially become the second best. Nice.
00:23:49
Speaker
um or or I go play it. Or, you know, right up alongside the original. So that's Hollow Knight's Silksong. You guys are listening to a video game podcast ah in the beginning of September 2025. You knew.
00:24:01
Speaker
You knew. Even though we're an adventure game podcast, you can't listen to a single video game podcast without them talking about Silksong. That's true. Yeah, that's true.
00:24:12
Speaker
We weren't going to be the exception, folks. Sorry. I mean, I also think that adventure gamers are still gamers. You know what I mean? If you like adventure games, which is more of a niche thing anyway, you probably like a ton of other adventure games like I do, you know?
00:24:28
Speaker
Absolutely. But if you're also a big video game fan and you hey platforming games or Metroidvanias or Holo...
00:24:39
Speaker
If you like both of those things and don't like Hollow Knight, you must... There's something wrong with There's something deeply, deeply wrong with you. But if you don't like side-scrolling games or if you don't like Metroidvanias, fine. That's fine.
00:24:51
Speaker
is That's just preference. um But if you are that and it is the beginning of September 2025, must... must be so frustrated that you can't turn on a single one of your favorite video game podcasts and get away from this fucking game.
00:25:07
Speaker
But hey, yeah it's great. that The only reason is because it's very good, actually. Yeah, of course. I mean, like nobody would be talking about it if it was just another you know flash in the pan.
00:25:21
Speaker
But I mean, we're going to be talking about a very traditional point and click game. So y'all can deal. Yeah, you can you can you can hang on for just a few minutes. wella yeah Or 20 minutes. I think I rambled for 20 minutes about this. Oh, I also had to tell people about my scooter incident. so It's going to be a fucked up year trying to pick a game of the year.
00:25:42
Speaker
i already know mine. blueprints was this year and citizen sleeper 2 was this year now hollow night silksong jesus christ mine's gonna be the drifter i'm just putting it out oh and the drifter it's just i was just so enamored so enamored old skies oh yeah old skies of course Also, so and I don't want to talk too much about this because I want us to talk um more in depth about it, but I am very far into Rosewater.
00:26:12
Speaker
That's awesome. And it took me a minute for it to read took a minute to really get its hooks in me, but it really got its hooks in me. And I'll say every part of the game's good, but the middle section of this game is so fucking fantastic.
00:26:28
Speaker
Oh, good. I'm so glad. That's what you want. That's what you want from a narrative ah heavy kind of point and click, you know Yes. um And it does have that moment after that middle section that we were talking about before.
00:26:42
Speaker
I think maybe two episodes ago where it's like you get to a new area and things open up and suddenly you have a whole map to explore and it can feel a little overwhelming and it can kind of make you shut the game back off.
00:26:53
Speaker
I'd be like, okay, I don't know if I'm ready for this. it It has a little bit of that after the middle section, but that again, that middle section was so unbelievably good that I, you know, there's no way I'm not making it through that game.
00:27:07
Speaker
Yeah. So anyway, Hollow Knight Silksong. It's really great. Rosewater, we'll talk about and an upcoming episode. Roses. Yes. Neither of those are exactly why we're here, are they?
00:27:21
Speaker
they They are not. No. you trap You lured me into a room, trapped me in a box. Whoa, wait, what? ah Dropped in old Windows 98 computer, IBM computer in front of me.
00:27:38
Speaker
ah The only thing on it was Callahan's Crosstime Saloon. And you were like, you are not leaving this room till you finish it. I didn't even put MS Paint on it, guys. I deleted that shit. So Matt wouldn't get distracted. Jezball was gone.
00:27:50
Speaker
Jezball was gone. That those screens, that that Pipe Dream screensaver. No, nothing. Just Callahan's Crosstime Saloon. But we'll see if I manage to escape the room before I finish the game.
00:28:04
Speaker
After some Silky Songarino. Oh, still can sound.
00:28:33
Speaker
everyone, welcome back to Save Your Game. i am one of your hosts, Pushing Up Roses, and with me as always, Matt Aukamp. Hi Matt, welcome back. Hey. Hello. Hey.
Introducing Callahan's Crosstime Saloon
00:28:45
Speaker
Are you excited? i am excited. I'm excited to talk about this game. This game was better than I expected it to be i knew it was a lot knew it would I knew it would be. All right, so you locked me in that room.
00:28:56
Speaker
Yes. I spent the first six hours playing the game. Mm-hmm. And then I got so had to go to the bathroom. Oh, no. I got so had to go to the bathroom.
00:29:08
Speaker
So then I spent the next two hours trying to escape the room. And I eventually did. So I didn't finish. ah just full disclaimer, everybody. i am basically on ah right before the last chapter of this game.
00:29:21
Speaker
Yeah. And to be to be quite frank with you, Matt, that last chapter is more of like, let's tie up these loose ends. like the the right You played the the best parts of this game to where you could talk about it, hands down.
00:29:36
Speaker
Right, because that's what I was thinking, because this game is a series of short stories. Yes, yes. More than it is a single cohesive narrative. Yeah.
00:29:47
Speaker
There's things that tie them together, but mostly just jokes. but Just a lot of ones. that They don't... the As far as I could tell, maybe you have a different perspective on this, but as far as I could tell, the each little section didn't tie together, not only narratively, but didn't tie together even thematically. They seem to be no entirely different themes, genres, and stories.
00:30:14
Speaker
That's correct. and And this game is based on a series of books by Spider Robinson, the Callahan's Cross Time books. And that makes sense when you know the books because they are based on those characters and the ah and the plights of those characters. Really, the only thing that's tying them together is the saloon, is the Cheers-like...
00:30:36
Speaker
ah The Cheers-like bar where a bunch of like motley people meet. ah And we should say, this is ah ah sci-fi adjacent.
00:30:47
Speaker
ah So in this in this bar, in Callahan's Cross Time Saloon, You're playing a human. We are playing a human. We are playing a person. Yeah, we're playing a human named Jake Stonebender.
00:30:58
Speaker
But the patrons of the bar, are they range anywhere from vampires to aliens to ah talking dogs. so Yeah, and it's a little hard to tell.
00:31:11
Speaker
you get some background as how as to how Jake Stonebender got to this. And i want in a minute, I want you to explain, number one,
00:31:22
Speaker
how you originally discovered this game and what this game sort of means to you. And number two, and want you to give people the like overarching premise. Sure. But what i what I was trying to say is there seems to be something either metaphorical or supernatural about even being in this bar.
00:31:44
Speaker
Right. Yes. I agree with that. you... ostensibly seem to be on earth in a real place and a real human being. But what I think it would be, i don't think it would be out of line to question that on some level.
00:32:02
Speaker
Yeah, I agree. And say like, well, you know, could be, or it could be something a little more supernatural. Yeah. I think that's extremely fair.
00:32:15
Speaker
to to gauge and i think they kind of they kind of touch on that um but yeah i i actually would you like me to to go over the my my brief little history with it yes please found this game on home of the underdogs
00:32:34
Speaker
don't say i found a download for it and ah when I was a teenager and I played it without the sound. It didn't have the voice acting on this particular download. interesting. Cause the voice acting is such a big part of this game. It is a big part of it. So I grew up with not having that. So I had my own little, you know, thoughts on who sounded like what.
00:33:02
Speaker
Um, And yeah, i found it you know I found it after my dad passed away and I was sad just all the time and yeah struggling. And I just really remember sitting down with this game and just loving it and finding like really genuine comfort and humor in this game. This is one of the funniest games I have ever played. It is so funny.
00:33:26
Speaker
This game is legitimately funny. Like laugh out loud funny. yeah You will laugh... You will laugh not nonstop, but anytime you want to laugh, just look around the room at different stuff.
00:33:39
Speaker
Yeah. andre like If you want to laugh, just do something. after you know Every third thing you do will get a genuine, actual, out loud laugh from you. Yeah.
00:33:50
Speaker
I have a Let's Play on it, and there there is a part where I am just dying laughing. because And it's it's the part where I said, hey, have you done this thing yet? You need to do this thing. It's very funny. I didn't get around to doing it because I didn't... ah because you You told me that right after I passed that section.
00:34:11
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's it's very, very funny and very cozy. and And like Matt said, there's not really...
00:34:22
Speaker
It's cohesive and it's not, right? So you're you're playing Jake Stonebender. You're kind of this folk the folk musician, hipster guy with a beard. He's kind of dry, little cynical.
00:34:34
Speaker
And you meet up with these patrons. He's very 70s, even though I think this game is supposed to take place in the ninety s I think it is, but I i want to say that the books themselves might be ah little bit older.
00:34:47
Speaker
Yeah. Maybe, yeah, maybe this is, maybe this does place take place a little. I don't know. ah Yeah, maybe I don't. Yeah, I think that's just jake ah Jake's aesthetic, though. He's kind of you know kind of ah a little bit of a folk song, hippie type person.
00:35:02
Speaker
um And he is a regular at this bar called Callahan's Crosstime Saloon, which is a very almost magical bar where patrons of all species meet up. And when people when people meet up at this bar, it's like they...
00:35:20
Speaker
kind of forget their problems for a little while, and they're just kind of in this space with good friends. and good It's very Cheers. You know what I mean? It's got a Cheers vibe to it where you you know all the regulars, and all the regulars know each other. um But like you said, the regulars here are...
00:35:40
Speaker
Some people. Some people, yeah, yeah. But a vampire. Yes. A talking dog. Aliens. Aliens. a what A robot from the future, I think, is the one guy.
00:35:54
Speaker
Is he from the future? He's a robot, though, right? I don't. Could you? I'm not. Could you? He's a very tall guy. I don't remember his name. Oh, I know. I'm pretty sure that is an alien.
00:36:07
Speaker
Oh, he's just an alien. Yeah. I think he might have maybe some mechanics in him, but I'm pretty sure he's an alien. I'm pretty sure. um um'm not i I'm not like but I'm like Right.
00:36:23
Speaker
But yeah, a lot of the people in this bar aren't, you know, people. There's like a witch with her like little pet imps.
00:36:34
Speaker
It's really cute, honestly. And it's it's way more cozy than you can even imagine. i tried to take one wouldn't let me. You tried to... big So that's the thing about this game is the verb system is you it's a a single click, but when you click on something, ah like as you mouse over the screen...
00:36:57
Speaker
um I'll get a little bit more into the mechanics later, but as you mouse over the screen, um you sort of see everything is named. anytime Anything you mouse over, it'll tell you down at the bottom what it is.
00:37:10
Speaker
And if you click on it, you get a series of verbs specific to that item. Yes. And um almost all of them are jokes. Yes. Almost all of them.
00:37:20
Speaker
Very few of them aren't jokes. And... They're all worth trying out because they're always, they're almost always, they're almost always funny. Yes. Agreed. Anytime you come to a door that you, that is like, it's a video game, right? So you know, oh, this door is going to be locked. And my main goal for the next year,
00:37:41
Speaker
you know, five to 20 minutes, depending on how good I am at puzzles, is going to be trying to get this door open. Right. You click on, if you if you click on that door, it'll be a giant list of verbs.
00:37:53
Speaker
And there's writing for each one of the options, but it'll be like, jiggle, talk to, knock on, push, knock over, phase through. I know exactly what you're talking about. Take off hinges.
00:38:07
Speaker
and It'll just be a list of, ridiculous verbs specifically referencing the door at piotr's piotr's door um it's jimmy jimmy it jimmy the door jimmy there well the exact same thing happens when you're rescuing the talking dog and you get to the main door of the complex he's being held so it It does come up a couple times.
00:38:35
Speaker
um Oh, and when you find that dog and you are locked in a room too. Like anytime you come up against a door that is obviously going to be locked. Yeah.
00:38:48
Speaker
Because it would, you know, ruin ruin the game if it didn't. um If it wasn't, they do this joke and every time it's funny.
00:38:58
Speaker
Every time. Yeah, yeah. ah Okay, so all right. All right. So continue with the premise of this game. So there's this this bar people meet in it. And how does the story start?
00:39:13
Speaker
So it's really interesting. ah You get to this cozy bar. and It is very, very cozy. Like I said, it's it's it's it's a... Despite there being a lot of weird-looking patrons there, this is a bar that you would want to, like, cozy up to and get a pint or something.
00:39:30
Speaker
So everybody in this bar knows each other very well. Like, everyone is friends and... Or are friends. And... um And that really adds to that coziness for sure. Yeah, it really does.
00:39:42
Speaker
It's nice, right? Even the even like the NPC, the little side characters that you don't have ah that you don't have a story with, has a little bit of a story regardless. like they They have a little bit of a description. And these are all characters from the books too, and they're fairly accurate.
00:39:59
Speaker
So I think that was interesting. Generally, the only characters you can have an actual dialogue with and that are voiced are characters that are important to ah puzzle or the story.
00:40:12
Speaker
Yeah. But there's a ton of other characters in the game, and most of them you can look at, and there'll be, like, a text. There'll be either interactions that are entirely in text um or...
00:40:29
Speaker
observations that are entirely in text but it gives you so much about each of them yeah there's so much writing in this game like it is it's unbelievable how much writing went into this game Yeah, it's it's really good. And ah it does seem like this bar is certainly a place where if you've had a struggle you know in your past, or even if you're struggling presently, this is where you want to go to to be around other people.
00:40:59
Speaker
yeah um And the way it kind of starts you out is one of the patrons is like not there. He's always there, but he's not there today. And his name is Piotr, and he is a vampire.
00:41:11
Speaker
and basically you are given the task. We as Jake Stonebender are given the task of going to Piotr's, going to his house, be like, Hey, what's up? Where are you? And this, of course, like leads to a crazy journey, right? Because it always does.
00:41:28
Speaker
um And so I should say this is kind of how the game is set up, though. So that is your first goal. And when you figure that out, when you figure out where Piotr is and you do this this little adventure, you always end up back at the bar to reconvene. And then somebody else has a problem.
00:41:45
Speaker
And then you go on another adventure. So, yes. All right. I did Piotr second. Is it not always the first quest to do this chocolate? Oh, no, it's not. It's not.
00:41:59
Speaker
It's not. Actually, I was going to say that. um you but two You have one of two choices for that. And I, because I've always played it a certain way. I've always, yeah, I've always done Piotr first, but you don't have You can do the chocolate first. Yeah, you can do the chocolate first.
00:42:16
Speaker
And then I believe I always do Piotr first. Okay, so, all right, there are, let me let let me count real quick. There are five quests. There are five short stories. Well, and then the ending one.
00:42:30
Speaker
Right. And so I guess it's, I know the last three you can do in any order. Because I did, after Zorto, walk through just a little bit. And the walkthrough had them in a way different order than I did them.
00:42:47
Speaker
So the the last three you can do in any order. The first two you can also do in any order, but they're grouped like that? Yeah. is that Is that what I'm understanding?
00:42:58
Speaker
The last three? Like the first two. Like, okay, you can do... To start, you can either save the chocolate or find Piotr. yeah Yeah, and you have to do both of them. You have to, but you can decide to do... I always do Piotr first. It sounds like you did the chocolate first. Yeah, but until you do both of those...
00:43:17
Speaker
you can't deactivate squish a satellite rescue Ralph or find Alfie's cure. Is that So you have to do the first two first.
00:43:28
Speaker
You do have to do those first. The other three you can do in any order. That's correct. Yeah. Correct. So interesting. Okay. Okay. Yeah, you do have to start with. And and honestly, those are good starters, I think.
00:43:42
Speaker
um This is interesting. This also actually gives me that. So you most of these quests, you come back to the bar without any of the inventory from.
Game Structure and Quests in Callahan's
00:43:53
Speaker
Except for you do come back with inventory from the chocolate quest.
00:43:59
Speaker
Yes, yes. You come back with the chocolate. Yeah. And you can you come back with the chocolate and you come back with, I think, two other things. And you can use those... You use those inventory in the other quests.
00:44:12
Speaker
Yes. Yes. But... you don't use, I was wondering why you don't use any of that inventory in the Piotr quest. And it's because it doesn't, it, you didn't necessarily do that one. relax yeah There you go. Yeah. This might answer some questions for you That that does answer some questions.
00:44:31
Speaker
Yeah. I thought you had to do the, well, okay. Do you, what the other thing, I, I think we, we can keep talking about the Piotr quest, but the other thing that I,
00:44:43
Speaker
wanted to set up is the framing device for this whole game. Yes. Yes. Before you even meet Jake Stonebender, you are, you're just a bunch of abstract shapes in outer space. You're just watching a bunch of abstract shapes in outer space and you find that basically your universe has been canceled.
00:45:04
Speaker
Yeah. It's going to be shut down. They're going to shut down. It's at risk of being shut down for being problematic, essentially. Yeah. And so one of these concepts, Parabolus, has to discover a way to prove that our universe is worth existing.
00:45:24
Speaker
Right. So at the, at this bar, you're going to find this kind of bearded, bearded guy who and no one's ever seen before. And he's kind of like, you know, observing, he's kind of just quietly observing everything that's going on. And he's there the entire time you do all these quests. And these, these are quests in which you help the patrons.
00:45:46
Speaker
So you're, you are showing essentially the humanity, you know, of the earth and that you are good people. And he was the first first guy I talked to and he's the only one with bad voice acting and I think that's on purpose. I think it is on purpose. So that because he's supposed to be like personality-less, everyone else has amazing voice acting. So I wrote down in my notes, bad voice acting and then crossed it out.
00:46:11
Speaker
Because it's like, no, this actually is voice acting is really great. it's just that one guy. and then when I figured out what he was there for, I was like, oh, I also think that's maybe intentional.
00:46:23
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. ah do you would Do you want to briefly kind of talk about the nature of these quests that you do? Yeah, so do you want to keep telling, do you want to finish sort of like I don't think we should reveal the ending of these quests, but maybe we should touch on each of them in turn. And do you want to start with a little more about Piotr?
00:46:44
Speaker
Yeah, because that honestly, I refuse to start with the chocolate one because this is one of those cozy games that this is how the story goes to me yeah in my head. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I always i always start with trying to find Piotr, who is a vampire, and he is missing. And so we we go to his house, and there's a moving van out there.
00:47:04
Speaker
and we're like, oh, no. What the heck is going on? And this is so funny. We like squish ourselves into a crate and travel to what is essentially Romania.
00:47:19
Speaker
Yeah. call Yeah. Yeah. We travel. They call it Romania. Yeah. Yeah. To find out where heck Piotr has gone to, only to find that he is lovesick.
00:47:31
Speaker
And was, yeah, was essentially following this woman that he had another vampire who he had fallen in love with. But something is wrong with this lady vampire. She seems to be under someone's spell.
00:47:45
Speaker
And that's our that's our little adventure quest is we have to help Piotr figure out why the object of his affection is acting bizarre. yeah And it is it is like my favorite quest. And maybe that's why I always start...
00:47:59
Speaker
with it. I love the gothiness. Obviously, I love the gothiness of it all. It's very funny. ah there's ah There's a Starbucks parody called Star Bucharest.
00:48:10
Speaker
um I love going in there. There's also a puzzle in which you need to put on a pair of wax lips. There is.
00:48:21
Speaker
It's very funny. But you can put on the pair of wax lips You can buy the pair of wax lips pretty early on in this quest and you can put on the pair of wax lips immediately. And then you're just going and it it changes your portrait in the game. Because, okay, this game is first person um and your portrait is in the lower left hand corner.
00:48:45
Speaker
Yeah. um Right below your inventory and the like status bar that'll tell you what the name of whatever it is you're looking at. Yeah. It'll be like window, floor, ah vampire lady. Yeah. um And honestly, this is not my, this traditionally has not been my favorite perspective for adventure games, but I love it here.
00:49:09
Speaker
i I really like it. It's not open world. It's almost like, it's so book-like, right? It's like so story-like. You kind of, you get a panorama view of your of the setting that you can side scroll to flip around.
00:49:25
Speaker
That is the thing that I find difficult about this game. It is hard to, you kind of hold your cursor on either, hold your cursor to the right or to the left and an arrow pops up and your character slowly turns around. Right, yeah. um And so, and there's there's parts of the game where it depends on you there's a part where you're in a space station and and you have to constantly flip around 180 degrees over and over and over. Yeah, I know what talking about. And yeah the only way to move forward is to first turn around 180 degrees and look behind you.
00:50:02
Speaker
yeah So it is so slow and so frustrating and so awkward. um And sometimes navigating is tough in and of itself. It is hard to know.
00:50:14
Speaker
Sometimes it can be hard to know if you're at a dead end. Or if there's another place for you to go until you yeah your cursor goes over the exact right spot and you see it turn into an arrow.
00:50:25
Speaker
So in some ways, this game can be very frustrating in its UI. But I do think first person really works for this game.
First-Person Perspective and Storytelling
00:50:37
Speaker
I do too. I would say I love it artistically and um like narratively, but maybe mechanically it could have used a little bit more polishing. And I do think if, i I don't think this would be solved by a fully sort of open world perspective. Like if you could just turn around at any location and walk anywhere, like a lot of times the perspective at which you're looking at things is part of what makes the puzzle either hard or or solvable.
00:51:07
Speaker
right And so if you could miss that by walking around freely, I think it would hurt this game. So I don't know how you would update it for a modern experience. but that's how it's And it is a lot smoother than, say, um the Journeyman Project. But I only played the first Journeyman Project. This was a lot less clunky than that.
00:51:31
Speaker
Right. yeah so Yes. Yes. If you played those games, you kind of know what this is like. And also it's better. Yeah. And in part, the aesthetic is truly part of the game. It really does give it that storytelling book-like feel to me, which I think makes sense since it is based on the books.
00:51:52
Speaker
ah It's so... adventure-y in the most like definitive way, I can say it. Not just in genre, but like you're just going on these little You're going on a bunch adventures.
00:52:06
Speaker
Yeah, you're going on adventures. You're helping your friends, you know? i think... And you're just a normal guy becoming, I guess, kind of like a hero. And so okay so that one...
00:52:19
Speaker
Piotr is sort of like horror monster movie. You know, you're in, yeah, an Eastern European town. you you youre You're at a castle for a while. You meet an old gypsy woman and talk about curses. She's so funny.
00:52:34
Speaker
hi's really good. she's She's like very old and wise. And she's wearing these smiley face earrings that crack me up. um and You meet vampires and stuff like it's, it's, and there's some monster movie knowledge that you need to have to solve one of the puzzles. yeah yeah It's very, yeah, it's very horror-like. And then this chocolate puzzle.
00:52:55
Speaker
Oh my God. It's one of my favorites. So funny. You help, you know officer Josie, who is a time traveling cop. Yep. She's a time cop. Yep.
00:53:06
Speaker
You help her to, on a mission, To stop a corporation, a pencil corporation, from destroying a part of the rainforest where a very specific cocoa bean grows and stopping that...
00:53:21
Speaker
stopping them from destroying this grove of trees and thus saving this special chocolate forever. And this is a thing that has already happened, that you're going back in time. Yes. Right? Yeah, you're going back in time right before it happens to try to convince the corporation to save these chocolate trees.
00:53:43
Speaker
And this is very adventure-y. Very. You start out on a city street and then you're trying to Bluff your way through some corporate shenanigans. Which just cracks me up. did you Did you pester the guy that was waiting for an interview?
00:54:01
Speaker
a little bit. I didn't realize. I pestered him until he left. Oh, he did. leave he No, he only left when I got an interview before did. Oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I didn't know you could pester him until he left.
00:54:13
Speaker
That's very funny. I don't know if he but I pestered the shit out of that guy. I just thought it was so funny. so So then you end up on like a yeah prop, up ah like a twin prop airplane and ah overthrowing the airplane. And then you end up in the jungle and you end up in a temple. and like, it's it's just an adventure story. like So you go from this like horror story.
00:54:44
Speaker
this horror monster movie story to this adventure story. And then Indiana Jones, I would say it's got a setting vibe. Yeah. Yeah. ah Okay. So what, which the next one you want to tell them about?
00:54:56
Speaker
What is the next one I i usually do? Probably the the alien ship one, which I don't... It's not my favorite. It was my least favorite. Okay, that's totally fair. um It could be that maybe I'm not the biggest on alien stories, or it could be that I i just wasn't as into...
00:55:15
Speaker
the puzzles or the story. I guess also, up until this point, these quests have been pretty character heavy. It seems like you're always, when you go on these journeys, you're with another character.
00:55:30
Speaker
think you're with one of the aliens for this one. No, you're with a a You're with a former bomb squad. Right, that Noah. You're with Noah. Yes, Noah. It's like a grizzled old former bomb squad guy with a yeah cowboy hat.
00:55:47
Speaker
But like on the ship itself, it's just not... it's really just not the same vibe as the other settings. The other settings are so lush and, and pretty. And now we just get, we, you know, you go from that to, by the way, making your own chocolate, which I think is one of the coolest puzzles. I had such a good time making chocolate.
00:56:10
Speaker
You go from that to being on this more sterile spaceship where there is no, there's no humans on this spaceship. There's a robot. Yeah. ah do you want to you want to say what the premise of this one is?
00:56:23
Speaker
So this one, if I remember, this is the one i remember the least of because I think I don't like it that much. But as far as I recall, you are saving one of the friends like motherships, right? You're like saving the ship. Is that? No, you're saving the earth. Okay. So ah ah saving the earth I'll tell you, I'll tell them this one and you can tell them the next one. So this one, this extraterrestrial race has And you end up ah fighting their mothership.
00:56:52
Speaker
This extraterrestrial race has created set up a satellite around Earth because knowing that you have created ah nuclear technology and the ability to travel in space, but thinking that you are not mature enough for it, they've been firing that that you're your violent tendencies are going to cause you to destroy yourself.
00:57:16
Speaker
ah with these technologies. So they have been firing a testosterone suppressant onto the earth for several years. Right. Yes. and Yes. Of course. You and this alien both determine that despite all the terrible things that testosterone does to our planet, that the fact that nobody knows that this is happening is removing their free will. And so you are going to go up to the satellite and destroy it.
00:57:43
Speaker
Right. And allowing people to have testosterone again. It's funny. At one point, your companion does get hit with a full blast of testosterone. And he just hulks out and bursts through his clothes with muscles.
00:57:56
Speaker
It's very funny. It does not last, sadly enough for him. It does not. It's true. It's not a lasting effect. ah But... or This mission is all ah almost all aboard the aboard a shuttle and then aboard the satellite itself. yeah And so almost everything is alien. And so you're just trying to figure out a bunch of buttons and machines that you have very little context for. There's even a puzzle in this one where there's a machine that's just called a like what's...
00:58:27
Speaker
have what's it or something like yeah yep in the it's called a something or other few of them are named that like yes yeah yeah yeah and they're all jokes except for one which for some reason you have to put your gloves in and then it'll duplicate them and there's no there's just no hint as to why that would occur It's a frustrating one, for sure. yeah That's why i like kind of I didn't even remember the premise until you told me just now. and I'm like, oh yeah, the testosterone and and Noah.
00:58:59
Speaker
Some of these solutions are absolutely crazy. There's ah there's ah one in the monster one where you have to fix a jukebox. And ye you have to just intuit that if you put it on the dumbwaiter, the dumbwaiter will raise it up above the bar Yes.
00:59:20
Speaker
And allow it to be struck by lightning like Frankenstein and it'll come down it but There's no hint. There's no clue for that. it's I feel like I got that puzzle and I don't know how I got it. Maybe there was something.
00:59:32
Speaker
may Maybe. Yeah, maybe. I don't know. there was As far as I could tell, there was absolutely nothing for duplicating the gloves. Like, it's just... you're interacting with things that you feel like are part of the background.
00:59:45
Speaker
And there's so much to interact with that is useless. Right. And just there as a, as set dressing or a joke that you wouldn't really have any reason to think this thing in the background was useful.
01:00:02
Speaker
Yeah. Um, So even the time, time honored tradition in a point and click of using every inventory item on everything, it would take you hours and hours and hours and hours.
01:00:15
Speaker
Yeah. So not feasible, but anyway, so that's that one, that quest is a sci-fi quest. So again, now we've gone from adventure or horror to adventure to sci-fi and And you yeah again you're just getting this tour of genres. What's the next one you generally play?
01:00:37
Speaker
So, yeah, I really like this mission. This mission is really interesting. um One of our friends comes in with a thing on his head, a little machine on his head. His name is Alfie with like a hyphen. Yeah.
01:00:52
Speaker
And he took a drug from the future. I know, it's wild. He took a drug from the future called biotracine. And this drug makes you ah understand what people are saying about you.
01:01:07
Speaker
ah You could read people's minds, essentially. um And that's a problem. Imagine you can't live that way. In fact, he is in such distress at hearing everyone all the time that we basically sedate him. We slip him a vicky.
01:01:23
Speaker
He wants you to kill him. if you that You have morphine and if you hand him the morphine first before like you know watering it down yeah by putting it in a drink, he's just like...
01:01:39
Speaker
He's about to chug it all. And you're like, I don't know how to save you without killing you. And he's like, that's fine. Oh, my God. Yeah. I mean, yeah, it's that intense, right? Imagine knowing everyone's thoughts.
01:01:50
Speaker
Yeah. You know, all the time. And so we travel into the future, which is very... ah downtrodden this this look the future looks a little bleak uh in this particular world yeah so yeah again if you're tracking the genres this is very dystopian yes dystopian dystopian fiction is i what i would think that's the genre that you're you're experiencing here Yeah, I really like it. um It's an interesting take on dystopian future. And it's it's wild. Like in this future, everybody is on biotracine.
01:02:28
Speaker
Everybody. And, you know, some people kind of, they kind of lose their mind and go downhill. Other people just kind of ignore it because they're used to it. um Some people use it for their advantage. Like there's a a secretary you meet that...
01:02:43
Speaker
clearly takes what people say about her to to heart, and she uses that to you know be a bubbly a bubbly, attractive secretary. um There's so many good things about this chapter. There's so many funny things about this chapter. ah You have to join like a criminals like club.
01:03:04
Speaker
i don't know how to describe It's not a criminals club, but it's like... you They call it the Organization The organization, yeah. Yeah, and it's it you have to prove yourself worthy, and then they let you join the organization. Yeah.
01:03:17
Speaker
And like you have to like harass somebody, but also you have to like have permission to harass somebody. I really like this tattoo. You get a tattoo. It's super... I think that's very fun.
01:03:30
Speaker
And this... This story gets a little deeper. This story is probably one of the more serious stories, ah which is important because, you know, you can't can't keep getting pounded with humor and brightness.
01:03:43
Speaker
ah You have to have a little bit of but of dark so you can even see the light, right? Right. So this kind of gets a little personal for Jake because he needs to find the ah the antidote.
01:03:54
Speaker
There isn't one as far as people know, but in this quest, you end up finding the doctor who created Voyatresine. And you agree kind of to do a very serious experiment in order to get this antidote.
01:04:11
Speaker
And it's sad. Background about why why Jake ended up in Callahan's Crosstime Saloon. And it is really sad and it is really affecting. And I think what's interesting about it, what was interesting about it to me was that it In this incredibly silly game, it hits.
01:04:35
Speaker
It hits. Yeah. It's really sad. Yeah. It's really, really sad and and very serious. And it's it's good. I really like this chapter yeah a whole lot. That said, I'll talk about the next quest, which is saving a talking dog.
01:04:51
Speaker
Yeah.
01:04:54
Speaker
No, did you have more to say about that quest? little bit of a break ah of seriousness because now we got to go back and save a talking dog. like Yeah, did you have more to say about the Alfie quest? About the Voyager scene.
01:05:07
Speaker
I just, for add no, I just really enjoyed There's just a lot yeah that I really enjoyed about this. And I don't want to say too much because I actually want people to play some of this game. And we'll talk about that before.
01:05:20
Speaker
Okay, we have one more quest and then we'll talk about ah the actual logistics of trying to play this game yeah um in 2025.
01:05:30
Speaker
But ah the final quest, not the final quest, there is a final quest. We're not going to talk about it. It yeah is the quest that ties everything together.
01:05:43
Speaker
yeah um This is the last like friendship quest where a friend is in trouble and we've got to help him out. And the thing that's in trouble is you have you have a friend.
01:05:53
Speaker
He um is... and he He can't speak. I don't know what the term is for that. And when I was growing up, it was mute. I don't think we call... pet I don't think that's what we use now. I'm not sure. But yeah, no, he is unable to speak. He's unable to speak and he writes stuff down. they Yeah. ah So all the dialogue... And it's not really played for laughs except for at some points where... he'll write something and you'll be like, he'll write like the brand name of something. And it's like five words long. And he's like, you could have just said chips or whatever.
01:06:30
Speaker
I didn't need to know. Like that's, that's this extent of joke. yeah No, they're not joking about the character. The characters are endearing. You're supposed to connect with them. For a game in the mid nineties, early nineties, even.
01:06:44
Speaker
that's I was impressed that they didn't use him as a punchline. Use his inability to speak, his disability as a punchline. i I thought that was really cool. Anyway, yeah he he arrives and his best friend, a talking dog, and has been kidnapped.
01:07:01
Speaker
Dog nap. Dog nap. So this is, and this is the last, again, tracking genres. This is sort of like a spy thriller genre of story. Yes, yes, yes, very much.
01:07:14
Speaker
You drive up to this facility. You're basically breaking into a secret government facility trying to liberate this dog. And the story, this story isn't that much more complicated than that.
01:07:26
Speaker
It is just you using a series of tools and your smarts to locate this dog who's being interrogated by some government men and then break him out and then break out his friend.
01:07:42
Speaker
Yeah. who or as somebody
01:07:46
Speaker
He ends up knowing, but he doesn't know he knows. He knows there's another dog trapped here. Right. and that's it. That's that whole mission. is that Yeah, that's the whole mission. Just like a spy thriller, it is as simple as, I gotta break into this. I gotta do one last job. You gotta break into here, and you gotta save the guy, and then you... Yes.
01:08:09
Speaker
You know, where you run into some trouble, and then you escape. Like, it's really... That one was one of my favorites. I think because of how straightforward it was and also how great that talking dog is.
01:08:20
Speaker
Love the talking dog who is a German shepherd. um Love him. i like the character you're with. ah Yeah. No, it's it's it's great fun. the only Really the only, won't call it level quest that was lower was the alien.
01:08:37
Speaker
Agreed. And it's the same thing as Sanitarium, right? Sanitarium has way more chapters to it, but you're not going to like all of them. You're going to really love some of them, but you're going to really dislike some of them too.
01:08:50
Speaker
There's moments in this game that I didn't love, but the yeah the only chapter that I was legitimately frustrated by was the ah spaceship. yeah spaceship And there's other stuff in this game. there's a lot of there's There's a lot of inventory puzzles. There's a lot of dialogue puzzles. Oh, yeah. Super dialogue heavy.
01:09:14
Speaker
Oh, yeah. And... There's a lot of word puzzles, which is really interesting. The game starts off on a word puzzle, and it's sort of setting you up for the fact that this can be part of this game.
01:09:27
Speaker
um I don't know how to describe this besides you are using... They give you a series of words, and you're looking for synonyms of those words the that...
01:09:41
Speaker
when the sounds of those synonyms are put together, they make one concept, like a name or an object, or they make up an answer to them. I love those. oh my God. I love those puzzles. There's only two instances of those, but I like them a lot.
01:09:59
Speaker
They do require very specific knowledge of specific culture in specific time periods, though. Yes, it does. And i don't I don't want to give it away because finding out what the theme is is difficult. But you have to know.
01:10:14
Speaker
I don't even know how to. Okay, you know what I'm just going to say em both. And if you want these spoilers, you can listen um because you come across a puzzle like this twice. And again, it's it's very specific. And I'm just going to tell you the theme and yeah because it can be very, very frustrating if you don't know the theme. Yeah, that's true.
01:10:33
Speaker
And I caught the theme from the walkthroughs without catching the answers. Oh, okay. I'll just say the first one is classic rock bands. which is like my favorite. I was so stoked because that's just up my street like so hard.
01:10:48
Speaker
Love it. they The second one is classic, not horror movie, just monster movie actors. Yes. Very tough. Yes. Very tough. That one was so hard. I did.
01:11:02
Speaker
I had to look at the walkthrough for some of those answers. i So yeah i the the last two I had to look at a walkthrough for. The rest I had to open up a Google search page for classic monster. mo After I got the first one, which was not hard.
01:11:20
Speaker
Right. Yes. I had to look up a wiki page or not a wiki page, a Google page for, uh, in case somebody fast forwarded for that specific thing. and Yeah.
01:11:31
Speaker
And then just see if I could match things up with that. Yeah. I got definitely got several of them because I'm also a horror person. So, yeah but yeah, some of them are really tough, really hard.
01:11:44
Speaker
Okay. I think honestly that this is one of the best point and clicks I've ever played. Yeah. Yes, it has problems. It has slow parts. It has frustrating puzzles like every other adventure game. But I feel the way you feel about Toonstruck is the way I feel about Callahan's. It's up there.
01:12:00
Speaker
And it is so funny and so clever and so cozy. And I hope one day that it's more accessible ah to play. Yeah. yeah So I loved it. And i'm I'm really excited to play the final bit of it ah literally literally i have like a half hour left i think like even that honestly it goes it goes it concludes pretty quickly but i i really loved it i'm really glad that you locked me in that room forced me to play this game i'm going um it was really really enjoyable a super funny game the problem the biggest problem with callahan's cross time saloon is you really can't play it right now yeah it is not commercially available anywhere
01:12:43
Speaker
It is not playable on ScumVM because none of the ah
Accessibility Challenges of Older Games
01:12:47
Speaker
legend. So it's it was made by ah Legend Entertainment. Yeah. um In 1997. And none of the Legend Entertainment. ah The Legend Entertainment had its own or engine, its own ah proprietary engine.
01:13:01
Speaker
And it is apparently incredibly complicated. And very few people have been people have had trouble recreating it. So it's not. You can't play it on ScumVM if you own the game. and um Which, again, you can't buy it anywhere.
01:13:16
Speaker
So you either have to own it or dot, dot, dot. And you need to play it on DOSBox or an old PC. Those are the only options, a virtual PC or an old PC.
01:13:31
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. It's it's tough. um This is one of the only instances where I'm like, yeah, just download it. Just pirate it. and Because you can't, otherwise you cannot play it. yeah There is not a way, it's not available. And it's not on archive.org. Like it isn't any of the places that you would normally go to play. At least I couldn't find an archive.org.
01:13:51
Speaker
Any of the places you would normally go to play classic games. It's not on GOG. It's not on Steam. It's not on ScumVM. It's not on, I'm repeating myself. But yeah.
01:14:02
Speaker
It's that's really frustrating as people who like kind of classic games and talk about classic retro games on the show all the time. The concept of game preservation really important to us and that this game was just allowed to float off into space and die.
01:14:23
Speaker
Is a real shame. mean, even the space bar. got a modern but but like accessible. I can play that one. yeah Got re-released in a way that you can play on modern PCs. Like the, it's, it's criminal that this game is unplayable right now Yeah, I agree. I can't believe it's been, that i mean, I did my review several years ago now and it's still not a, I just can't believe that. It's wild.
01:14:48
Speaker
It's wild. Speaking of unplayable, we have to address the spider, the spider, the spider in the room. The spider in the room. I was looking at the wiki and I saw Spider Robinson's name and I just said spider instead of elephant. Yeah. yeah i I couldn't even think of the fucking it We have to address the spider in the room, Roses. Okay. We could not play the Naked Gun ICUP.
01:15:18
Speaker
We could not play it. It legitimately is not available. It is an Android game that has been taken off the Android Marketplace. And required server connectivity.
01:15:30
Speaker
Yeah. Even though it was just a point and click. There's no reason you need to be online for it. But it requires it. So even if you download like a APK, there's no server to connect to.
01:15:41
Speaker
you can't play it. Right. It's unplayable. Sorry. Sorry, everyone. Sorry, guys. Not that we would have played it because Roses was too busy smashing her face on crumbs for fun. was too busy dumping a scooter on Lakeshore Drive. And I was busy playing Silk Song.
01:15:58
Speaker
So we just wanted to update you guys. Yeah, we won't be playing. it's It was a real bummer to find that out, but we won't we won't be playing the Naked Gun ICUP.
01:16:10
Speaker
Stop saying that. Stop it. Stop saying what, ICUP? Yes. I'm just spelling the word ICUP. Jesus, ICUP. but You know, that word. you ever, when people say to that as a kid, when they're like, spell eye cup.
01:16:24
Speaker
Oh yeah. and it's like, why? That's not a word. i know. Kids are fucking stupid. Why am I going to do that? Why am I, why would I do that? You're trying to get me to say something yucky because that's not a word. And if it was, you would know how to spell it.
01:16:44
Speaker
Kids are stupid. Kids are dumb. So, to yeah, in conclusion, kids are stupid. And what do we want to tell people before we go, Roses? I would really love to say something.
01:16:58
Speaker
Because it's important to me. and Because I feel it in my my little goth heart. We gotta do the goodbyes first. No, I wanna say it! Fine, I'll do the goodbye. Even though you're... You're... Walking all over me. I knew what you were gearing up to. And we gotta do it. I was so ready for it!
01:17:17
Speaker
I know. It's in my little heart. Okay, bye. You jumped the friggin' gun here! I'm sorry I didn't say goodbye. ah so i sorry, everyone. but ah If you would like, if you'd like to reach out to us, please email us at mattandroses at gmail.com. Or if you want to talk to us or just me, because I'm on Instagram all the time, follow our page at, I almost said, for I almost said mine.
01:17:43
Speaker
almost said my own Instagram. Follow PushingUpRoses on Instagram. Do it. Follow me, but also follow Save Your Game Podcast on Instagram, where we post updates. We post when we actually put up the podcast.
01:17:54
Speaker
Yes.
Closing Thoughts and Listener Engagement
01:17:55
Speaker
yeah Matt, do you have any closing thoughts? um Yeah. Rate and review. Email us at mattandroses at gmail.com. Again, I don't know. and uh, unless we, unless another plan falls through and we need a filler, we probably won't be doing a Q and a for a while, but you can still send us questions and comments and Hey, send us some compliments. We love those. We love praise. We've gotten a lot of emails recently of new listeners who, uh, who found the show and I'm good. And Hey, we really appreciate, uh,
01:18:31
Speaker
hearing that so thank you so much for emailing in and someone sent us ah that a target in Minnesota has Sobe send it to me I said remember I said I'd pay for shipping I'm gonna do it what do we're doing it alright that's there's only one other thing that I want to say I'm stealing it from you go on
01:19:02
Speaker
it's Now I feel bad, but I do not- just do it. It's too late. have to. I thought it was going to be silly and fun. Instead, now I just i feel bad, but podcast is art. Well, I agree with you.
01:19:16
Speaker
Thank you. Bye. Because- Oh. Oh, you had more to say? Oh, sorry. Okay. I was just going to say art is supper, which you've just proven. Yeah.