Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode 84 - The Dark Rites of Arkham
1 Playsin 5 hours
There are two Matts on this show! But only for a second, then one Matt turns back into PushingUpRoses. We talk about a ridiculous YouTuber-inspired creationist movie, Improvised Shakespeare, and trying to manifest a meet-cute.
But, settle in folks, because the bulk of this episode is a break-down and basically gush-fest about the new(ish) adventure from Postmodern Games, The Dark Rites of Arkham. And now, we're both huge HP Lovecraft fans. Sorry...
Games Discussed:
- Mina the Hollower
- Shovel Knight
- Banjo Kazooey
- Hollow Knight: Silksong
- Nightmare Frames
- An English Haunting
- The Dark Rites of Arkham
- Dreams in the Witch House
- Darkside Detective
- Call of the Sea
- Call of the Elder Gods
- Shadow of the Comet
- Chronicle of Innsmouth
- The Terrible Old Man
- Dredge
Email us! mattandroses@gmail.com
Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/fPv7hRgTeV
Follow us on Instagram: instagram.com/saveyourgamepodcast
Recommended
Transcript
Debate and Reality Rewritten
00:00:00
Speaker
I've i've been watching sam' been watching some YouTube explainers lately. Are you you also watching my videos or what's going on here? So this guy about a year ago, invited some dude onto his channel to debate him about creationism.
00:00:19
Speaker
He invited this creationist on who was like, who who apparently emailed him first and was like, I want to debate you. Because this guy is apparently this weirdo who makes his own movies. Uh-huh. goes by the name of Gramps and makes and stars in and directs his own movies and like like Gramps goes to college and then it's like Gramps is in college and hes like he like he's like talking to a biology teacher and he comes up with such a good argument in his biology class that the teacher ah gives up on science, becomes religious and marries him. Right? like
00:00:56
Speaker
That's the sort of movies this guy makes. yeah So apparently, so I think it was it two years ago because it took him two years to make this movie. So he just released this movie about him being invited onto a YouTube channel to debate somebody about creationism. And like going on and owning the other guy in the debate.
00:01:15
Speaker
Yeah. Like rewriting what happened in real life. And it goes it's it goes, it's worse than that because The plot of the movie is like, he's like this humble guy and he's like, I tried my best, but he just caught me. He just got me into a corner. And then his super hot daughter who had been running into this YouTuber, ah like at coffee shops and stuff turned out to like discovered who he was. And she was like, I'll talk to him. And then it's in, it's about, it's another like hour of this hot woman,
00:01:49
Speaker
slowly teaching this guy that he's wrong about science and he stops being an atheist and he becomes religious and then marries the guy's daughter so this fucking his name is for the the the youtuber is forest valkai so he does this okay it's it's it's three level three or it's three hours Three hours? A three hour YouTube explainer about, like, this guy made a movie about me. Basically, I debated him once because he asked me to debate him. And then he spent two years making a movie where I lose an argument to him and then marry his daughter.
00:02:36
Speaker
ah Thank you for that. I need to seek that out because that sounds amazing. Doesn't it? Yeah, it's I highly recommend watching. and Again, it's a three-hour YouTube video ah by Forrest Valkyrie, and it's so good. it's so It's so compelling. Every moment of it, I'm just like... Because it...
00:03:00
Speaker
All right. It's the way that's when somebody breaks down a bad movie and that is funny and fascinating, right? Yes. Yeah. But... it's got this other level of like, and this is the event that he's talking about. This is the thing that I actually said, and this is what he makes the character based on me say. yeah this is This is like, he's like showing um screenshots of emails with the guy and he's showing clips from their interview and it's it from their debate. And it's so, it's so funny.
00:03:37
Speaker
That's amazing. I mean, there's
Hosts Introduction and Humorous Exchanges
00:03:39
Speaker
there's passive aggression and then there's like this, which I'm not even sure what to to call that, making a movie about a thing you had and then like changing it. Is he trying to be like, hey, look, you could have had my hot daughter if you had just changed all of your morals. Well, he does mention, um Forrest mentions in the video that this guy's estranged from his own daughter.
00:04:03
Speaker
So like the levels of... self-fantasy going on like he's a guy who has a good relationship with like he's imagining a world in which he has a good relationship with his daughter wins an argument with a youtuber and then the youtuber becomes his son-in-law oh my god he's having a crisis we should call someone right it's so bizarre like Now, there must be an interesting discussion topic here. Like, oh, well, who would you... But it's it's hard to even think in those terms, right? Like, it's hard to even imagine, like, well, what would you do if somebody made a... I guess the the question is this.
00:04:50
Speaker
Like, have you ever... I think this has happened to all of us Have you ever had a bad conversation and then thought about it for weeks or months, maybe even years? Yes. Afterwards and been like, oh, I should have said this. Yep. Oh, absolutely. All the time.
00:05:05
Speaker
Now, can you imagine making... Making a movie out of those thoughts? Writing, casting, directing, editing for two years a movie about that thought.
00:05:22
Speaker
This is going to be my next like book or short story. It's going to be called I Should Have Said This. Yeah. And that's what it's going to be about. It's going to be about a movie about. Yeah. That's the way to do it. it's It's every conversation that you did wrong. Like you sit down. You remember every conversation that you had that was bad.
00:05:41
Speaker
And you string them into a narrative where you're just walking through the world just owning everybody back-to back to back to back. You're the most, it's you can call the movie the cleverest girl in the world. It's just you walking around fucking destroying everybody you've ever had a bad interaction with.
00:06:05
Speaker
I mean, i already do that on the daily, so this would even better for me. Than just a documentary of your life, I guess.
The Art of Improvised Plays and Personal Anecdotes
00:06:12
Speaker
It's just a documentary.
00:06:32
Speaker
Hey, everybody, and welcome to Save Your Game. i am one of your hosts, Matt Aucamp. i with I am also Matt Aucamp. Oh. Hi. Huh. Okay. Vegetables are yucky.
00:06:47
Speaker
Okay. No, I don't. I like vegetables. i just don't eat them very often. I'm just kidding. I'm pushing up roses. Hi. Oh, God damn. I got so confused. I was sitting here scrambling through my notes like, I don't have anything to talk to Matt all camp about. I guess he's played all the games that I've played. and no, that was the twist of this podcast episode is that I am also Matt.
00:07:15
Speaker
Wow. I know. Scary. How are you doing? Pushing up roses. I'm fine. oh
00:07:25
Speaker
I'm salty, actually, but that's OK, because it it fuels me to have better conversations about video games. I like to talk about video games. Well, this is really interesting. this I have an observation. So usually when we finish a game that we're going to be talking about, we often talk a little bit more about it just like via text. like
Zoo Experiences and Amusing Tangents
00:07:48
Speaker
We'll have like ah another conversation. We didn't do that this time. We finished the game.
00:07:53
Speaker
Without telling each other like our thoughts. I think that's interesting. Because you finished the game, what, like yesterday? And I finished. Yeah, a couple days ago. Oh, a couple days ago. I finished the game, but we haven't talked much this week. And I finished the game today. Yeah. um So we haven't, we haven't. told Yeah. So we we don't know each other's thoughts about this game. Which is weird because I'm you.
00:08:16
Speaker
And you would think I would know your thoughts. All right. We're going to do this the whole episode. This is the whole bit. I'm fucking funny. So what?
00:08:27
Speaker
Okay. Before we get into that. ah Before we get into the what this episode is about, what else have you been enjoying lately?
00:08:39
Speaker
I saw ah show last week. Okay. Yeah, about a week ago. i shot i saw Improvised Shakespeare Iowa Theater, which is a really long-running, extremely popular company, the Improvised Shakespeare Company. They also perform in Denver, but Chicago is kind of like their team town. like They have a team here that plays every week.
00:09:02
Speaker
I heard really good things about it, and I just wanted to see – wanted to be impressed by something. Yeah. And I fucking was. i could not believe that a full blown Shakespearean story was just improvised in that kind of speech with no stuttering, nobody tripping over yeah themselves, nothing. It was so it it was funny, obviously, because it's meant to be, you know, parody. It's meant to be funny and kind of goofy. But i like I can't explain to you like how impressed I was. I don't even know.
00:09:35
Speaker
i would not be able to do that. I would not be able to improvise in like this Shakespearean speech. I would have to be like so hyper-focused on what I'm doing. Yeah, it was just it was so good. It was so good. Also, after the show, i tripped on a stair.
00:09:52
Speaker
and just ate it, man, just ate Pavement. I have such a huge bruise on my- did you get up and you were like, forsooth the stare. Forsooth. The stare which- It just betrayed me. generally which which Which often meant to convey a human from one space to another hath hath bounded backwards, conveying me to the spot I was before, only with force.
00:10:21
Speaker
It was obscured and cloudiness. Nay, I could not see. yeah no, it was bad. i crashed really hard. And the server's like, oh my God, are you okay? And I'm like, yeah, I'm fine. I'm fine. But I was not fine. I was bruised the fuck up. And I didn't even have any good mute like meat cutes.
00:10:39
Speaker
Like a hot guy didn't come see if I was okay. Yeah, you didn't fall into the arms of some hot person. No, I just fell on the floor. Like, oh my God, you could have been hurt you could have been so hurt.
00:10:50
Speaker
Hi, I'm Brad. and then And then waves his hair out of his face and he's like, he's like, man, I'm glad I was here to catch you. my Yeah, my name's Brad. name's Brad.
00:11:02
Speaker
Here, you've been through you've been through a lot today. why don't i Why don't I get you a drink and sit yeah I'll wrap you in my coat and sit you down on this chair. In this 85 degree Chicago weather, please take my coat.
00:11:18
Speaker
but You see, I'm from a small town in Nebraska, and i we're all I'm so used to being cool. We always wear coats. I'm from Coat Town. And, oh, my God, you are. So, oh, man, he, you are. yeah you're the protagonist. No, he he' is the protagonist. I don't know how these work. I'm the big city girl.
00:11:38
Speaker
You're the big city girl. He's the small town boy. And so he, you're going to keep tripping all the way into the country. Yeah. where everyone wears coats all the time. And then he teaches you the value of coats while at the same time you guys fall in love. Yeah, totally. that The funny thing is like I'm kind of I'm like kind of like coiling up at the thought of that. That would not work on me even a little bit. I think what would work on me is just like not not negging because negging is mean, but like banter.
00:12:10
Speaker
That would work like a little bit of poking fun at me because I fell like too much coddling. and I'll be like, what what is happening? No, I don't want your coat. No, get away. I'm fine you You fall, smack your face on the ground. You get up. You're bleeding. You're crying because it hurts so bad. And you're like, I might need help. And some guy's like, you fucking idiot. And you're like, I love you. fucking freak. And you're like, I love you.
00:12:33
Speaker
love you. historically, have gone for some pretty mean men. So yes, that would probably work it. That would work. That would work. But it's okay. it's it's i'm I'm a little nervous. I'm going back to that theater tonight and I know that stare is there.
00:12:53
Speaker
What if it remembers you? I know. It's like, ah i have to remember, it's dark in the theater. There is one stair, just one, just one stair that goes up one. What is the point of that? hey is this What is this?
00:13:05
Speaker
But yeah I think you're thinking about this all wrong. Okay. Because if, what are the chances? So you're saying this is a rare circumstance where a person slips on a stair and doesn't have a meet cute.
00:13:21
Speaker
So, what's the chance that it happens twice in a row? I'm not falling again, man. It was bad. saying, if you go fall again, be fine.
00:13:35
Speaker
Almost definitely you're going to have a meet you Or a broken nose. If you just keep going ah i keep going back to the theater every night.
00:13:47
Speaker
and fall over that' sort That same server is there and he's like, oh my God, she fell again. I was at a party um like six months ago or something, and there was this person who just walked straight into a glass door. oh that sucks. Oh, and no. And just, like, just so loud, just like, thunk, thunk, thunk, and then fall fell backwards. And it was, like, it it was it was so jarring that it wasn't even, like, funny for people. Everyone just like, oh, my God. No, I would i would not let – I would be all like, oh, my God, are you okay? That's really painful.
00:14:25
Speaker
And – this what i what I was talking to somebody about it later, and it turned out that this was a person who had very wasn't close to the hosts and had very recently broken up with somebody who was very close to the hosts. Okay. um This person ended up staying at the party like very, very late, like was clearly trying to be like,
00:14:56
Speaker
oh Oh, hey, me and you were the last two people here, right? Oh, boy. With this girl. Yeah. um But... I learned this because ah one of the hosts and this girl were like commented on it and they were like, do you think they did it on purpose? Yeah. I was like, what?
00:15:15
Speaker
and and She was like, yeah, i I do think that. Oh, my god They're that kind of person. And it was probably because, yeah, it was like it was probably to get her attention.
00:15:29
Speaker
That's awful. And I was like, that is the craziest thing because that is so unappealing. It is very unappealing. Yeah. Is it like, is it more appealing and like cute that I fell on accident?
00:15:43
Speaker
Like would that, would that get attraction? I fell on accident. So you just, again, just keep going back every night and keep falling. That server is going to fucking hate me by the end.
00:16:00
Speaker
I just don't know why she keeps falling. They're going to have to put like orange cones around that one stair. So Improvised Shakespeare was good. So good. So good. If you're in Chicago or they also play out of Denver, they might play out of like one more. Oh, they they have a touring company. So they hit up. Yeah. They've been to Philly. And and yeah um a lot of impro there's a lot of some of the better improv theaters have shows, have periodic shows like this. It's not the same company, but, you know, Philly Improv Theater had an Improvised Shakespeare show for a while. Right.
00:16:36
Speaker
This is like, this is the improvised shakepeare this is the improvised Shakespeare company that has, that is like the, of it's weird to say official one. Yeah, I know. Shakespeare founded this. Hey, when, he says, says. it doth be hilarious? When I die, i need you all to lampoon my work in improvised fashion. Go forth and yes and.
00:17:05
Speaker
That's great. No, it's I highly recommend it. if it you've So you've seen it. if it's gone Have you seen it if it's gone through Philly? I haven't seen it. Okay. Well, we should see it when it goes through Philly.
00:17:16
Speaker
I don't know why I'll be in Philly at the exact same time as that. I probably won't be, but. Yeah, you've never been to Philly before, so why would you suddenly be in Philly? Yeah, not likely. No, I've been to Philly. I've been to Philadelphia. You have?
00:17:30
Speaker
Yeah. What'd you do there? For a Hall & Oates concert. Oh, yeah, that that those do happen in Philly a lot. They do. They like Pennsylvania. Well, they were they're from Philly.
00:17:41
Speaker
<unk> Yeah, they are from Philly. So I i saw them in Philly. and I took a detour to like Hershey Park on that same trip. It smelled really good. It smelled so good. that's the That's the number one thing about Hershey Park. Well, they have a cool wooden roller coaster, the Comet. Yeah, and I went on that. It smells very good.
00:17:58
Speaker
It ah smells so good. I went to the the zoo. It was fine. Remember we had that conversation about like the best zoos and like I was salty that Chicago wasn't on it. Weird. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
00:18:09
Speaker
but We have a zoo in the city. Philadelphia Zoo is great. we have a do Yeah, Philadelphia Zoo is in the city. Whatever. Well, also, speaking of places that me and you have to be, ah we did get an email that, um do you remember sometime last year?
Fan Meetups and Elaborate Travel Plans
00:18:35
Speaker
Oh, boy. We said we would do a fan meetup at the Wisconsin State Fair in 2026. We said that? Yeah. Oh, no. When did we say that? Oh, God. Well, I guess we're going to the Wisconsin State Fair. Which is apparently in august Yes, it is. I went last year. it's coming up.
00:18:57
Speaker
Yeah, I went last year. can be at this. i don't know if you can be at this, but can be there. I think you also said there would be a fan meetup at the Mushroom Festival in Kennett Square. Where is that? What what state is that?
00:19:09
Speaker
and It's near me. It's near me, Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. um I mean, that's probably more fair. You were just in Chicago. Honestly, you visited me more than I have visited you, so like i could...
00:19:21
Speaker
go to this I like mushrooms. Mushroom festival this year. Mushroom festival is in September this year. Is that a weird thing to have a meet and greet at? Yeah. Both of them are weird things to have meet and greets at. I don't know. I think mushrooms are a little more weird and niche. Well, no. mu The mushroom festival is like a huge town wide.
00:19:42
Speaker
ah festival I do like mushrooms. With food stands and bands and attractions. and It's like a fair. You can also tour. Yeah, you can also tour. ah Usually there's like mushroom grow houses that you can tour.
00:19:54
Speaker
Like that they they move ah sort of in miniature. They move a bunch of like mushroom grow things to like a tent in the in the town so you can see what they're like.
00:20:06
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. So either Wisconsin State Fair or Mushroom Festival or neither because we do what we want. We didn't sign a contract. you You're not paying us.
00:20:20
Speaker
I would be down for doing something like that? will probably go to the Mushroom Festival anyway. Yeah, and I'm also going to the Wisconsin State Fair anyway. So, like, here's what we'll do. Okay, I got it. Here's what I'm going to do. right, maps.google.com. Exton PA to Wisconsin State Fair. it's even worse than Chicago.
00:20:43
Speaker
to Wisconsin State Fair on South 84th Street, It's like in Allison. Is that the name of it? Alley? Mallison?
00:20:56
Speaker
oh West Alice, which is west alice yes which is yeah just basically Milwaukee. That's 12 hours away! i was just going to say, I'm like, that's way too far. That's big drive!
00:21:09
Speaker
You know that that's worse than Chicago. like come on, my dude. But like here's the thing here's the thing. Here is the thing, right? so It's super cheap to go from East Coast to O'Hare, right? I have a new job that I get hella tips at.
00:21:25
Speaker
I could fly you down to the state fair. what if i go up what if What if I drove up through ah new York? Okay. And then through Ontario. Okay.
00:21:38
Speaker
And then across into Michigan. And then I take a boat from Uh-huh. hu To Milwaukee. How is that better than what I just posited? Yeah, we'll do it. You posited it. you said' instead So here's me. I'll fly you out. It's real easy. And then here's you. I'll take a boat. Cross the seas to get to a state fair. And go through two border crossings.
00:22:09
Speaker
Like bitching about 12 hour drives you're willing to go across a lake. I'd be able to see Niagara Falls if I did that. Oh, good. Great. And and and at Lake Erie. I've seen Lake Erie, but I'd get to see it again. And Lake Huron.
00:22:27
Speaker
Yeah. I could see the Great Lakes. Just those two. You could Lake Michigan. because then also see Lake Michigan. Did you take – were you on Lake Shore Drive for any reason? Yeah, I did see Lake Michigan. Love Lake Shore Drive. Love driving that. All right, well – And I've seen Lake Ontario. I've seen some Great Lakes. I'll see some more. Matt seen stuff.
00:22:46
Speaker
Yeah. i would i would I would think about that. you want know what about that what I've played?
Exploring 'Mina the Hollower'
00:22:56
Speaker
If you're going to bring up a subject, you have to focus on it, Matt. We'll talk. where Guys, we will we will talk. We will convene about this supposed meetup. And if not, I'll just go to the Mushroom Fest anyway and eat some fucking mushrooms. I love fairs.
00:23:11
Speaker
love festivals. Anyway, what have you been enjoying? Are you playing games? Are you watching Shakespeare? I've been watching Sopranos, but I'm not ready to talk about that yet because I'm i'm still pretty early on. And I i think I want to finish whole season before I want to talk. I start talking to everybody about Sopranos. But, um you know, i've been I've been playing the fuck out of Mina the Hollower, dude. I know. You were supposed to be playing the game we're talking about today. And i did. But i played I've been playing the fuck out Mina the Hollower. It's so good. um
00:23:44
Speaker
it So one thing I do want to take back that I said in the last episode that I talked about this was i said, you know, as similar to other Zelda likes, um there is some areas are blocked by not having the right items. That I've learned is not true.
00:24:07
Speaker
um Pretty much. There are some secrets that are blocked by not having items, but even those secrets are... um accessible through a bunch of different ways.
00:24:21
Speaker
So like, yeah if you don't have any of the right items, okay, there's places you can't get to. um But usually you'll have at least one of the right items if you think about it well enough. Because again, so this, Mina the Hollower, just to go back, it's um and sort of like NES,
00:24:44
Speaker
style graphics it's by the people who made Shovel Knight sort of any NES style graphics you are a mouse um her main mechanic is that she can burrow underground for short periods of time it so cute that functions as your dodge um you can burrow under objects and lift them up. You can burrow under obstacles. You can also, also coming out of a burrow, you jump a little further so you can use it to you know, to these like super jumps. Um,
00:25:15
Speaker
ah But also you have a a main weapon and a sidearm. And your sidearms do all sorts of crazy shit. Like one of your sidearms is like a bike with a big spike on the end of it. And like, so you can use it as a weapon to just like barrel into people. Or you can, since you're going so fast, it can make you jump even further.
00:25:34
Speaker
if you need to yeah If you need to cross a bigger gap. Or like there's an umbrella that can help you cross big gaps. Not quite as big as the bike, but... um So a lot of your sidearms will help you find secrets. And there are secrets fucking everywhere in this game, which is one of the things that's so addictive about it. Yeah. um Pretty much. Yeah.
00:26:00
Speaker
I mean, just pretty much everywhere you go, every screen, every screen that you can be on has a secret hidden in it. Yeah. And. i I love that. it is It's just... you just want to You just never want to stop playing because you're like, oh, I just thought of something else. Or, oh, I just saw something else out of the corner of my eye. going to check that out. um i've I'm about... I'm 14 hours into the game. Holy shit. Now, so... I didn't realize it was going to be that long. I think it's about a 20, 25 hour game, maybe, if you're looking for all the secrets. Could be longer. Might be as much as 40. I don't know. But um it's...
00:26:40
Speaker
You know, i've visited a bunch of, there's a bunch of different lands which serve as like different biomes, right? And you're traveling from land to land trying to restore all the generators in this town that you once upon a time built, you designed and built, and they've all shut down for some mysterious reason. And the mayor of the town is asking you to go restore all the generators. So yeah.
00:27:07
Speaker
um
00:27:09
Speaker
I have restored, I think, four of them, and I've been through the swamps, I've been through the crypts. Now I'm in the body of ah ah a dead serpent. Nice. um Oh, there was like a farm sort of area. There was a lava area. This game, it has all this sort of like biomes that you...
00:27:32
Speaker
have seen in other games, but it's just, they're just done so well. and This, this team just does everything so well. That's awesome. I'll say my criticisms of it at this point um are, I think my main criticism is it's, it's hard to find your way around.
00:27:53
Speaker
and There's not hard like hard to navigate. Yes. Yes. There's not a reliable map. um There's a, there's a big world map. But that doesn't help you very much. Yeah, yeah, i know. That would be rough on me.
00:28:07
Speaker
It doesn't do a great job of sort of pointing you in the right direction. Like, okay, after I finish the... Sort of, it seems like many people will intuitively know to go to the crypts first.
00:28:25
Speaker
But... So I do i ah honestly, usually i'm I'm good at picking this sort of stuff up. I don't know how they led me there. I just, I i was playing and playing the Crips and then I started listening to all the podcasts that came out last week about Mina the Hollower. Because every video game podcast was talking about this game. And...
00:28:48
Speaker
everybody was saying like, yeah, ah I started at the Crips or yeah the most logical place to start is the Crips. And like, usually i can tell how a game designer has led me in a direction. I cannot tell you how Mina the Hollower has led me in a direction. yeah And it it may be leading me to these other places, but usually I'm bouncing around for 20 minutes. Oftentimes I quit the game. The times that I quit the game,
00:29:14
Speaker
that I close it and go do other stuff is when I've just finished an area and restored a generator. And I'm like, I'm a little overwhelmed by how much there's stuff there is to do back in the hub town. And i have no idea where the next, or even how to find the next area that I am supposed to
00:29:42
Speaker
Let me ask you a question. Do you feel that way? Because I'm like, I'm i'm looking at the very charming trailer right now. These graphics are so lovely. they're Yeah, they really remind me of almost any NES Zelda style. Yes. Do you feel that way? Did you feel that way navigationally about the Zelda games? Did you feel like I do not know where I'm going? Because I find that I was. And I just wonder if it's more of an aesthetic design choice where these maybe these maps and settings are just inherently a little harder. to navigate following this style i i think very well could i had trouble i've had trouble navigating some of the top down zeldas i yeah same um link's awakening and um what's the what's the the the big famous one ocarina that's not no no no pre-ocarina um uh a link to the past
00:30:35
Speaker
Link to the Past and Link's Awakening, I had yeah trouble navigating. Same, yep. And i had trouble navigating the Link's Awakening remake. Did you? Oh, okay. Interesting. one for The one that came out on the Switch. Yeah, I thought that was pretty cute. I thought it was cute too, but I had trouble navigating, like knowing where to go next. But then there's other Zelda top downs that I had no trouble navigating. I had no trouble navigating um Link Between Worlds at all.
00:31:03
Speaker
I always knew where to go next. And it didn't feel like ah a sacrifice of my... you know, freedom or ability, like my my deduction ability, right? um Yeah. and the cartoony one, um that was for the Game Boy Advanced, where you shrink down. Minish Cap.
00:31:27
Speaker
i Yeah, I didn't play any of the handhelds. Absolutely no trouble navigating Minish Cap, so. Yeah. So I would say maybe this is a design choice, but I'm not sure that it's a great one. Yeah, I mean, if you're having trouble navigating it, it will be hell for me. Like I can follow a map, like Ocarina of Time, had a map, nailed it. ah Breath of the Wild, huge setting, right? Had a map, nailed it. Like i need i need to have a guidance or I'm, it's kind of like that that issue I had with ah the Winterboro
00:32:03
Speaker
Okay. Remember, I'm like, this game is yeah so hard to navigate. I just, I feel like I'm just kind of bumbling into places and I'm not really sure how I'm being guided. Yeah, that's kind of, what that's also about a mouse, which is interesting. Maybe the world of mice is just ah It's hard being a mouse. The world, you're so little and the world's so big i tell I say that to my guinea pig all the time. that's cute. So,
00:32:31
Speaker
The other thing, my other sort of criticism about it that i think i've I think I've gotten to a place where I've overcome it now, but it was a barrier at the beginning.
00:32:43
Speaker
and I talked about this on the last episode is the sort of verticality of it. Hey, you ever notice how game reviewers love to use the word verticality? And like, oh there's so many buzzwords. Cognitive dissonance is one of them.
00:32:57
Speaker
yeah From a gameplay perspective. It's so polished. polished is you know Is it polished? so but the ver but there But there is... It is a very difficult thing to get used to. is a At first I thought it was super clever.
00:33:14
Speaker
oh like that there It's a top-down game, but it's a very... vertically oriented game. You're burrowing, you're jumping, there's things that fly over you. You have to manage the arc of certain weapons. yeah um
00:33:31
Speaker
That at first I thought was really cool. Then i was like, I don't know that my brain is ever gonna get this. This is so difficult. yeah um And then i think I think I'm at a place where I do get it, but it's still, any time,
00:33:48
Speaker
that I'm having trouble with the difficulty of this game. And it is a difficult game. Anytime I'm having trouble with the difficulty, it's generally because of that verticality. um I am right now fighting a boss.
00:34:00
Speaker
I'm, it's like a, it's like I'm inside a big creature and I'm fighting its brain. and That sounds very Zelda to me. You're yeah inside a creature fighting things. Yeah. sounds very Zelda.
00:34:15
Speaker
It is very Zelda. And, The problem, the biggest problem I'm having is it this brain jumps around and slams itself down on you. Oh, I hate that. it's a very vertical boss. Yeah. And I'm having so much trouble, like, either I can dodge it or attack it.
00:34:33
Speaker
I am having so much trouble doing both um because your brain just has to move in so many directions. And again, from from a top-down perspective, it's really difficult to...
00:34:48
Speaker
to um to parse. yeah Yeah, I get it. And i've this is I haven't had much trouble... Like, again, it's a difficult game. I've died a lot, but I have not...
00:35:03
Speaker
I've not considered myself stuck at any point yet. Besides again, like, I don't know where to go next, but in terms of difficulty, I haven't been like, oh, this is a wall that I'm having trouble getting through. see Even the bosses, like I've, I've had a fairly easy time with the bosses until I got to this brain boss. And I think I've fought him seven, eight times now and died every single time. I'm having, I'm having a lot of trouble with it. um And so i Overall, I absolutely love this game. Yeah, i think it looks great. I think it is really great.
00:35:38
Speaker
um it is It is definitely going to be up there in my games of the year. um But it's... There are... If you play it, just know that there are some challenges that
00:35:57
Speaker
I think are intentional, but may...
00:36:03
Speaker
b a they may be a barrier to entry for people, right? Sure. It might be too frustrating trying to find your way around for you to love this game. It might be too frustrating.
00:36:15
Speaker
like the your Some people's brains might not be able to adjust to the verticality of a top-down game, which... It doesn't make them bad at video games. It's just like, this is a weird thing oh yeah to do. It's an experiment by Yacht Club Games. And I think it like any experimental things, like any experimental piece of art, it's not going to work for everybody.
00:36:39
Speaker
Yeah, no, I'm very good at platforming games and like side scrolling games. I was playing fricking Mario Party the other day and one of the CPUs like got into a duel with me and it it was like a jumping challenge. You have to like jump over this thing. You're like positioned on a clock, a clock. ah What are those called? Hand. And ah you have to like jump over stuff, right? Right. I'm jumping with this CPU. I think I got it because like it's CPU on Mario Party. It's stupid.
00:37:08
Speaker
ah But because it was like vertically like that, because it was like top down vertical. Yeah. The depth of which like the jump looked weird to me. i I lost all 300 coins. to fucking Daisy Mario Party because I couldn't jump right because of the because of the angle. I just could not... My brain couldn't understand Yeah, and i this this game is built around... Yeah, imagine if in Zelda games there was... ah You had to occasionally jump over things and duck under things and you had to... And, I mean, again, it's more than that. You jump...
00:37:51
Speaker
And you burrow. Sometimes you're yeah under the ground. and these things, like anything, like jumping, throwing things has an arc. Jumping over stuff has a has a um has ah a timing to it. Burrowing has a delay. so it's...
00:38:12
Speaker
I think it's a really interesting mechanic, but unlike, unlike Shovel Knight, right. Where your main mechanic was the, the thing they were playing with most was this like downward slash and you could bounce, you could kind of pogo around like Scrooge McDuck from the DuckTales game. Yeah. um That I think is a mechanic that anybody with a little bit of practice is going to get and master and love, yeah you know, uh,
00:38:43
Speaker
Easy to learn, difficult to master. I think Mina the Hollower, this burrowing, this vertical, the the top-down verticality mechanic is difficult to learn.
00:38:59
Speaker
very difficult to master. So there are some people who just, it's not going to work for. um if If a demo is still available of this game. So I i think this game fucking rules. and Do you If a demo is still available for this game, i would actually suggest people try and play the demo first.
00:39:20
Speaker
um Just to see if the gameplay is something that they... can and want to hang with yeah um and if and if it's intriguing to you at all just go ahead and buy the game at that point because it's fucking great it's it's better it's even better than you think it's gonna be but um And you know I love a game where you find so many secrets. I i know. There's just so many secrets, and I love discovering secrets, and they're so fun. All right, wait. Did you discover 999 in Breath of the Wild? No, I gave up after you got the amount that gets you the Master Sword. Is there an upgrade after the Master Sword? don't think so.
00:40:08
Speaker
Okay, then once you get the amount that gives you the Master Sword, I was like, it is not worth looking around this entire map. i still kind of i If I came across them, I liked finding them, but i yeah, i wasn't seek those are secrets I don't really care about. That said, um i did find... hold it on.
00:40:31
Speaker
If you don't find Koroks, they just die where they are. did find 880 power moons in Super Mario Odyssey. Nice. I think I did too. I think I did too. Because i love i love the Mario games and I'm like desperately craving another one.
00:40:49
Speaker
Games with secrets and collections, and etc like I get so, so into them. And i get so i get i get I get a little obsessive and I just keep playing them. I mean, that's why i love him one of the reasons I love Metroidvanias so much, right? There's yeah just so much to do for a completionist.
Gaming Tendencies and Preferences
00:41:05
Speaker
I did like i do Banjo-Kazooie completionist. I find every single fucking thing. Mario 64, everything. Every coin, every star or ring. Yeah, coins, coins.
00:41:16
Speaker
Speaking of that, I ah got to the, I got to the, I don't know if it's a secret. I was going to say secret act three of Hollow Knight Silksong.
00:41:29
Speaker
Oh. There is a, on your path to the true ending, there is an act three, but you can, Some playthroughs of the game, you'll just get acts one and two.
00:41:42
Speaker
yeah and There's like an extra quest you have to do before you fight the final boss. If you do that quest, you get act three. If you don't do that quest, the game just ends. So i I didn't do the quest. The game ended. And I was like, hey, I'd heard there was an act three here. And then I went back and started looking all around and I was like, oh, there's another quest here. And I did it. So I'm i'm in act three of Silksong.
00:42:04
Speaker
Man, another game that just starts hard and gets harder. We are not talking about Silksong again. i must i must insist that we stop.
Introducing 'The Dark Rites of Arkham'
00:42:15
Speaker
So anyway, Mina the Hollower. um There's another game i've been playing, but I think I will wait to talk about it because I only have i have something very brief to say about it. But I think I will mention it after we talk about what we are here to discuss today, which is.
00:42:36
Speaker
Zelda. No, we're we're talking about ah The Dark Rites of Arkham. The Dark Rites. Latest game by Postmodern Adventures. The Dark Rites of Honor. ah Honor? Oh, man, want to play that game. yeah The Dark Rites of Arkham, yeah, by Postmodern Adventures. So why don't we play some, here's what we'll do.
00:42:56
Speaker
Oh, boy. This is what we're doing. From now on, we're going to play royalty-free, public, not even royalty-free, public domain music. We're going to play music from, like, 1910. That was recorded on wax cylinders. Yeah.
00:43:11
Speaker
Nailed it. that's what we're doing from now on. So why don't we play some boogie woogie. The early 1900s and then come back and talk about the Dark Rites of Arkham.
00:43:42
Speaker
Hey everyone, welcome back to Save Your Game. I am Pushing Up Roses, one of your enigmatic hosts. And with me as always, Matt Allcamp.
00:43:53
Speaker
Hey Matt! Oh!
00:44:02
Speaker
as one of your enigmatic hosts and with me as always mad all ca hey back oh oh Hi. Oh, hi. Sorry. I didn't mean to shouldn' mean to frighten you. Yeah, I yeah forgot that you were all here with me in my house. Yeah, we're all here.
00:44:17
Speaker
ah We came straight from the Wisconsin State Fair and now we're at Matt's house. So what's up? um i know I played a cool game. It's called The Dark Rites of Arkham. I played that game too. Do you remember this guy?
00:44:31
Speaker
Postmodern Adventures? ah You know I do. ah They made a game called Nightmare Frames back in 2022 that we loved. it was about, it was like a horror game that took place in the 1980s of Hollywood about loved it cults and murder and ah the production of horror films. It like went around like the premise of like a haunted film from like, man, i loved Nightmare Frames. It is one of my favorite modern, modern style adventure games. Loved it. Loved it. Then 2024, Postmodern Adventures released a game called an English Haunting, which was, it took place in 1907 England. Yeah. The,
00:45:16
Speaker
nineteen oh seven england yeah the ah the paranormal craze, the psychic yeah spiritualism craze in England. Uh, and you were solving a mystery amidst,
00:45:35
Speaker
amidst that that craze and you ended up ah teaming up with arthur conan doyle and stuff it was weird yep um it was a good game we didn't like it as much as nightmare frames but yeah but it was a good game it is a very good game yeah i i enjoy i got i definitely got immersed and i i enjoyed it and now in 2026 they have
00:45:56
Speaker
they had released a game called The Dark Rites of Arkham, which is a a collage of concepts and characters and storylines from the HP Lovecraft Cthulhu mythos. Mm-hmm.
00:46:17
Speaker
Just all slammed together and you play a and detective. Actually, you play two detectives. Yes. Who are in the midst of trying to solve a very mysterious paranormal seeming murder. Yeah, it it gave me kind of the it gave me like the voodoo murder vibes from Gabriel Knight. That's not what it is, but the way it was like set up with like there was like a pentagram on the ground and like candles and it it looked at first like sacrificial. And there are sacrificial things in Lovecraftian lore, but that's kind of the vibe it it gave me. There's sacrificial things in this game. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. ah it But it it doesn't quite stay on the Gabriel Knight lane. i think it just kind of starts that way and has some some similar mechanics. But yeah, there's a ah very strange looking murder slash death and we are put on that case.
Lovecraftian Elements and Narrative Depth
00:47:12
Speaker
And that is that is how the game starts. This game starts fucking strong. Yeah. Where you're you're a detective. you are you're You're actually investigating a blackmail case.
00:47:23
Speaker
Yeah. ah With some just like random drug dealers who managed to...
00:47:32
Speaker
blackmail the mayor with a yeah with a incriminating photo and while you're investigating that you just sort of stumble in to a very gruesome murder um there's a man in the middle of a weird set of symbols on the ground and his head is just gone yeah but it looks like it's like blown off it looks like it exploded And next to a large burn mark on the wall, there is a severed hand that does not belong to this man. Yeah. And the room was, and as a locked room.
00:48:12
Speaker
Mystery though, there is, the room was in was totally locked from the inside. No one seemingly came in or out. So the question is,
00:48:23
Speaker
What the fuck happened here? And it very, very quickly, this, the detective Jack. Foster. Recognizes this doesn't just seem a cult. This is a cult. Yeah, like he gets that, it's that eerie feeling that people get in Lovecraftian stories. Like they just feel like something's wrong, you know? Yes. Yeah.
00:48:47
Speaker
He goes through, so we can, I think we can, because this is all the very beginning of the game. Yeah, he he lost a partner um in a way that he doesn't quite remember.
00:48:59
Speaker
Right. or He doesn't remember all of. um And from the very beginning of the game, it's like, you're The police chief is like, number one, I have to set you up with a partner. I don't want you working alone because of what happened right last time when your partner died and still none of us really know how that happened. Right. So people kind of blame him.
00:49:18
Speaker
And second of all, you have to go to a psychiatrist. Yeah. and you do and you sort of realize that there was something paranormal about what happened to your partner as well. Yeah.
00:49:31
Speaker
And I have thoughts on that scene because there are, i while I did truly, really enjoy this game and not even just in the game, it actually inspired me to look up things in the Lovecraft lore. So I did get quite a lot of enjoyment and like,
00:49:48
Speaker
immersive stuff out of it. I do think that some of these scenes are abrupt. well We'll talk about it, but like, yeah, I feel like, oh, okay. They're just telling me that instead of showing me it happened, they're telling me it happened. okay But I mean, whatever. this is These are minor critiques. For an entire ass game, you know? And i think I think that does happen a lot because a lot of this game is just... like Every Lovecraft story is kind of wrapped into this game in some way. so Yeah, yeah.
00:50:22
Speaker
So sometimes a person will just be like, oh yeah, this person was haunted by a ghost and... like ah went crazy and killed their dad. That's not a Lovecraft story, but just like I just mean to say sometimes somebody will just tell you this whole that you're like, holy shit, there's got to be so much more there. Right.
00:50:43
Speaker
And there is. They're referencing Lovecraft story. um So we should say And then i want to talk just like overview before like before we get into like story. This does take place in the fictional town of the fictional city of Arkham, Massachusetts in 1933. It's kind of like a cross between old New York and Boston. yeah um And it since's it's got a noir, a hard-boiled noir type of ah a thing with the detective. Yeah.
00:51:12
Speaker
Yes, this is the this is a city on the fictional Miskatonic River um where a lot of H.P. Lovecraft's stories took place. And it's also where the Miskatonic University is, which we spent time in in Dreams in the Witch House. they found out and I found some of the overlap so interesting.
00:51:34
Speaker
The Witch House is in this game! Yeah, the Witch House is in this game too. And the the Keziah Mason, the witch, like... Yeah, i found I found that so interesting. Yeah, Walter Gilman. That was so interesting to me to see that overlap and the different portrayal that they gave Dreams in the Witch House. Yeah.
00:51:55
Speaker
Yeah, it was interesting. I can see why now, like, if you're a Lovecraft fan and you know. So, like, I know about Dreams in the Witch House because we played that game and I like that game. So when I saw references, like, direct references to it in another Lovecraft game, I got pretty delighted. So I can see why, like, Lovecraft games would delight fans. You know, they want to see these references and this lore. Yeah, and yeah. Yeah, it was it was it was neat. like I kind of, I enjoyed that I knew about it already.
00:52:25
Speaker
And that made me feel smart. Same. and i've i've read I've read a a chunk of Lovecraft before. And so there there was a lot that I did know.
00:52:39
Speaker
Yeah. Or at least not if I didn't know i recognized. who And that was amazing. Like, and I kept basically every time i would, somebody would reference a character or an event or a place, I would write it down And then I'd go look, oh, what story was this from? Yeah. Yeah. um Herbert West, the reanimator from the story Herbert West Reanimator is in this game. You know, um they tell the story of the music of Eric Zan in this game.
00:53:11
Speaker
You meet a character from Innsmouth. Yeah. Like in the shadow over Innsmouth. Yeah. That's the that's the story i I know the most about. Yeah. yeah um And they also reference the Dunwich horror. Like they reference so, so much. um And again, like you you meet Keziah Mason in the and you go and you visit the witch house. You go into Walter Gilman's room, which and you we are very familiar with. And go to a portal too. Yeah. You even go to the planet that you go to in um in the the Dreams in the Witch House game by ah who made that game?
00:53:48
Speaker
I will look it up real quick Yeah, look it up. ah i thought What I found really interesting is that ah The Dreams in the Witch House, which is a short story by Lovecraft, wasn't really received very well. People didn't like it. Critics didn't like it, which I think is so interesting because it translated into like an adventure game so well. Like it was just so ah it was just so interesting to play it as a game. So it's it's funny that people are like, yeah, this isn't very good. ah It kind of sucked.
00:54:16
Speaker
Adam Brain Games. Oh, yeah. Adam Brain. Yep. We did a um and we did an an episode about that. Once yeah upon a time, you can go look it up. But we we both loved that game. Yeah, I had a great time with that game. and And we talked when we were doing that episode about the problems with Lovecraft.
00:54:40
Speaker
Yes. And one of the the lighter problems Lovecraft is that it's overdone. Sure, sure. um So that can be a little frustrating. But then there's something like this where like, sure, yes, this is also like more Lovecraftian stories, but it's almost like it's so deep into it, it didn't bother me. It didn't bother me. No, I felt that it was actually really well done.
00:55:08
Speaker
i was like, okay, okay. This is enjoyable to me. The other problem with Lovecraft is he, and there's a lot written about this, and there's a lot written about the way that his views started to change towards the end of his
Critique of Game Narratives and Designs
00:55:27
Speaker
life. Yeah. um And how some of his political views were incompatible with the social views I'm about to mention. And so many people are like, well, he, he was, a you know, he was,
00:55:41
Speaker
had every sign of being on the path to getting over that. But yeah throughout his life, he was very racist. And a lot of his stories involve this sort of crypto racism.
00:55:54
Speaker
Right. For example, there are a lot of stories, a lot of Lovecraft stories about a educated white man traveling to some foreign place, meeting the natives who worship a foreign god and often look monstrous. Yeah, yeah.
00:56:19
Speaker
And in some stories like the Dunwich Horror or the Shadow of Erinsmouth, the white people mate with those people and it creates a terrifying sub society of, ah of sub humans. Right.
00:56:34
Speaker
um And like as a concept on its own, i kind of like that. That is kind of scary to have just this weird, it's kind of like they're mutants, but you wouldn't say like, you wouldn't say that the X-Men are, are a racist idea. Correct. No, the X-Men are very explicitly the opposite of that. But the X-Men um are people born sort of randomly with this extra gene and then yeah discriminated against for it. That's true.
00:57:04
Speaker
The way Lovecraft writes this is very much like, oh, it almost seems to be a parable against... interbreeding between races. I totally get that. I think if he were not racist throughout his life, this concept would be better because I totally like the idea of weird fish people. but um And it ah it also plays on the fear of the the foreigner, right? Yeah.
00:57:35
Speaker
And of foreign beliefs and... Yeah, so there again, a lot of ink has been spilled over this. One thing that I like about this game is in as oblique of a way as Lovecraft was racist, this game obliquely sort of addresses that racism.
00:57:54
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, it does. There is a character from Innsmouth. who is sort of like a, one of these sort of subhuman types of people. And he talks about how, you know, like our artifacts were stolen from us. The whole reason that the police blew up our city is just because we looked different. If I looked like you, you wouldn't, but people wouldn't be treating me the way they are. And, um,
00:58:28
Speaker
and I think, and there's there's some other little minor things here and there that I'm not even sure was intentionally the game developers trying to address the racism of hp Lovecraft. I think it it might just be a person writing from a modern perspective and recognizing how how it would really be.
00:58:58
Speaker
Yeah. um But anyway, I appreciate, I guess i'm all that to say, we understand the problem and the problematic nature of HP Lovecraft stories and HP Lovecraft as a human.
00:59:12
Speaker
And I found it refreshing that this game addressed this. that yeah yeah I did too I did too and it did it really well and it wasn't uh it wasn't egregious if that makes any sense I don't think any of the Lovecraft references were egregious they really kind of just uh flowed really nicely i guess into the game because it was it's the world It's the yeah. That these people lived in, right? It's not just a reference. This is the world that they're living in, yeah. Right, which is why this wasn't annoying, right? Because it is, if you lived in a world where there was a guy who had to continuously play his violin or he would be taken over by ghosts, or if you lived in a world where somebody actually brought humans back from the dead with a serum, right?
01:00:08
Speaker
These would be huge stories. Yeah. That there would be remnants of all around you. Yeah. And that's how this game treats it. Like...
01:00:22
Speaker
Like if you go to a museum, you're going to see evidence of these things. if you write If you hang out in academic circles, you're going to find people who are obsessed with these things. If you go to a jail, you're going to find somebody who engaged in one of, who was who was a former ah protagonist of a H.P. Lovecraft story, right?
01:00:46
Speaker
um Yeah, yeah. So yeah, so what what are your big thoughts about this game? So my my biggest thoughts are... i really enjoyed it. i really did. i liked all the storytelling. i do think...
01:00:59
Speaker
It didn't grab me like Nightmare Frames did. and I'm wondering why that is. I think they did ditch some of the design elements from Nightmare Frames that gave it more of a personality. So if you remember, that was their first game and they had little like character portraits and that's how the dialogue worked. I really liked those. I really thought i really felt it gave the characters a sense of...
01:01:21
Speaker
identity and likability and the changing facial expressions. And not that you can't do that with pixel art. You can. We've talked about it with like the Drifter being able to express emotion with just a few pixels. But i just didn't quite feel the same way about this game as I did Nightmare Frames. I just think Nightmare Frames had more of a very distinct personality and like vision that they were going for. So this didn't grip me. ah but I still loved it, but this didn't grip me like nightmare frames. And I think maybe some of it is. um
01:01:53
Speaker
Yeah, some of the scenes. OK, so you know that you have to see a psychiatrist in this game. And she's doing regression therapy. So she's putting us into a hypnosis to try to figure out what happened in our past. Like why? What what happened? We need to shed some light on this.
01:02:13
Speaker
And so we do that. And the and the way they do it is is very much in line with how postmodern games does their games is they put you in a flashback and now you're playing that flashback. It's very adventure-y, don't you think? Like you play in flashbacks, you go to different places. It's very...
01:02:28
Speaker
Even though it seems like low fantasy, it's it's pretty grand adventure where you're where you're just traveling a lot.
Puzzle Design and Memorable Game Moments
01:02:34
Speaker
They call back much later in the game in a very impactful and crazy sort of way.
01:02:43
Speaker
But yeah, youre so you're so you you do this flashback. You're in your dream. You're playing your dream. Always a fun time. Mm-hmm. And you're only seeing the dream. And then you wake up and you're back in the office.
01:02:56
Speaker
And the segue was way – the segue was just the doctor saying, like, I saw it. I saw everything. I saw everything you saw. And now I understand. And we felt that danger, me and your partner. We felt that danger in the room. I'm like, this is very abrupt. Like, I i don't know. There's something about it. Like you wanted it to, you wanted the, you wanted there to be more story beats that would have, in order to convince yeah the psychiatrist and the partner of what happened. How did they see it? Why did they see it? Why was it? Why did they feel it? Yeah. Overly convenient mechanism. Correct. Like, well, we got to we got to wake him back up and they need to believe him. So we're just going to tell the audience that, oh, well, they believed him.
01:03:42
Speaker
I also felt that the ending was that same style of abrupt. It's like, oh, well, I i won. guess. The ending was so abrupt. It was so abrupt. yeah The ending is basically like...
01:03:54
Speaker
Oh, I'll just click on this. Oh, that did it. Okay, well, then I'll click on that. Oh, that did it again. Okay, then I'll click on that. Oh, the game's over. It's very abrupt. it It had all the decorat decoration of one of those LucasArts boss fights.
01:04:10
Speaker
Yeah, um But it wasn't. It was and that like there there was no puzzle to solve. at the No, no. You just needed to end the game. And like part of me is like, that's fine. I just spent hours doing some some interesting puzzles and getting through narratives. So part of me is like, that's fine if it wants to end abruptly. But part of me was like, huh.
01:04:30
Speaker
I feel like nothing is explained. There was no there was no emotional denouement there. yeah there was There was, I mean, in ah in essence, the end of the game is, it addresses some of the big issues that both of the main characters have have, that have haunted both the main characters, but you almost wish there was more of like a difficult decision somebody had to make or a struggle that occurred. Yeah, I think I texted you one thing while I was playing, and that was that the energy wasn't gripping me the way that Nightmare Frames did. And I think it's exactly what you're saying. There's something... and maybe because this is Lovecraftian, I'm not personally like emotionally involved with these characters. like I was in Nightmare Frames. I just... Yeah, I don't know. There was just some there' was a different energy about it. i
01:05:23
Speaker
You know, so I had trouble... connecting with this game front like there's that opening scene that is very kinetic and really um shocking and interesting and then it takes you to the police station right and it's just clear oh here's a bunch of locations that open up and there's going to be puzzles at and between these locations you can kind of like see the structure yeah um as As happens with a lot of point and click games, right? Absolutely. that's That's the point where I said, hey, this reminds me of Gabriel Knight. When that map opens and there's there's overlay of like these city sounds and like you're going places and and and there's a police station, you're detective. I'm like, oh, that's very, it went really hard. It started really hard. hard
01:06:17
Speaker
And now we're kind of already in that slower pace, like inventory object yeah puzzle phase. And that's that's where my enthusiasm ah did slow for a minute. sure um Because I yeah i agree, this that that really slowed down the momentum of the game. And we've we've talked about this um a bunch of times, right? About sometimes when that map opens up and you can just kind of see this lattice work of puzzles in front of you.
01:06:50
Speaker
and characters to talk to and inventory items when when that happens you kind of like it can feel tiring it can yeah and that usually that happens to me though when i've spent like a long time in my setting and then i go somewhere else completely right so this one felt tiring kind of pretty early on yeah but as i found as i So I sort of forced myself to start exploring the different locations because I knew we had this coming up. And it was really... It didn't... Very quickly, I found myself back on
01:07:31
Speaker
that trajectory. I found myself compelled. I think there's a point fairly early on where you realize what you're looking for um r Three witches.
01:07:46
Speaker
Yes. um it is It is somebody's professional opinion that what the key to finding out what happened is talking to at least one witch in the town, and there are three witches left in the town. And, yeah you know, it's it's a well-structured point-and-click game, so, like, the witch who has the most information...
01:08:10
Speaker
there are two obstacles blocking her and you get a solution to each obstacle by talking to the the previous two witches. yeah So it's just a really good puzzle tree. I'll say that it has a really good puzzle tree and I felt good doing these puzzles. I liked it.
01:08:29
Speaker
Yes, it definitely has that the dominoes. You knock down the dominoes. Like, oh, I got this, so now I can do this, so I can do this, so I can do this, right? Yeah. Definitely has that feeling to it. And at the same time, um some of these puzzle trees happen without, like, you have to pay really close attention to notice that one sequence was dependent, that it led you in a sequence. Yes, yeah. um Because it's really good Again, after that first moment, once you've started exploring all the different locations, it's really good at leading you to... Like, making the thing that you would need to do next to not run into a dead end the most intriguing thing.
01:09:16
Speaker
And so, you know, i very naturally did all the witch, like interrogated, found the three witches in the order the game meant for me to. Yeah, so did i and while I was talking to, you know, while I was interrogating the last witches when I was like, oh, okay, if I had gone here earlier, they would have said, ah i we can't get through this. Correct, yes. We can't solve this puzzle. We'll need to come back.
01:09:47
Speaker
Correct, yeah, yeah. Which, again, Just it really, really good puzzle design. really Just this is this thing that constantly there's so much that impresses me.
01:10:00
Speaker
Also, there's a loose crank. There is a loose crank. So happy. So fucking happy. I Matt, Matt, let's get best friends forever. Loose crank tattoos. This game.
01:10:17
Speaker
was talking directly to us at certain points it felt like when when you found a loose crank and then oh happy you visited the dream the witch house yeah was like they're talking to us definitely they are right like i'm so happy we have raved about both of this guy's games and for those two things to be in such close proximity to each other it's like and Let me just say that the loose crank that you found sound could have been anything. It was like specifically made a loose crank for a reason. You know what i mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. like ah where are you where you find it and how you find it
01:10:56
Speaker
Why? Why is it a loose crank? Right, right. Yeah, yeah, it's just like, yes, it could have been a lever, it could have been a button, it could have been a key, it could have been, it could have been anything. Into just the context of that part, it could have been a weapon, it could have been wrench, you know what mean? Like, why is it a crank? Literally, could have a crystal, like it could have been anything.
01:11:21
Speaker
that is That is really fun. And it maybe might have made more sense for it to have been like an artifact or something. yeah But, oh man, also what it reveals, what the Loose Crank reveals is one of so cool yeah one of the coolest concepts and spookiest things in the game. Yes, I agree. think this is fair to say because i don't think, it's not a surprise what's behind that. They they talk about openly. um It opens a curtain and shows a picture that different people see different things in the picture and it
01:11:58
Speaker
it drives people. it It gives people emotional reactions. So it like it caused one person to start attacking everybody in the museum when they saw it. It causes the person you're standing with when you reveal it to just stare in wonderment at it. Like hypnotized. So like everybody. I'm glad that happened. Cause like, what if we opened it? He just fucking killed us yeah they We both had guns. It's like, oh good. He just gets hypnotized. Excellent. Yeah. You play as two. If we haven't been clear, you play as two cops.
01:12:33
Speaker
Yeah. ah Harvey Whitman is our is our sidekick. And he's introduced pretty, like, very early on. Like, a suit basically, as soon as we're back at the police station after you find the strange murder, you get paired up with this, quote, odd duck. And he's a fucking dork. I loved him by the end. I did, too. I love him. This is something that they did really well, is they slowly made you like this guy. um Because by the at the beginning, he's such a fucking dork. Like, it is during the very end of Prohibition. Yeah. um
01:13:05
Speaker
And he is. Every time he sees any mention of alcohol, he's like, we have to arrest them. He's a bit of a square Jack is not. Yes. Somebody at some point we find somebody has pot and he's like, we have to take this down to the precinct. Oh, I remember. It's the guy who's living in the witch house. He has like It's the living in the witch house. He has jar And Jack's like, dude, he sees a witch every night. Let him have some pot.
01:13:34
Speaker
I think it's cool. i also think it's cool how the witch house looks a little like the witch house. I do too. um I do too. The bed, the desk, the... The woman who owns the bed. Yes. The door on the right-hand side and the portal on the left-hand side. yeah i don't know if this person played...
01:13:56
Speaker
Dreams in the Witch House, but it's just it's just cool. It is really cool. that That's the thing I think I like the most about this game is the it's not scary by any means. I wouldn't call it a scary game. I would call it more in the line of like a thriller, you know, a mystery thriller. which are only sometimes scary. But the thing I like the most about it are this this weird, spooky environment yeah it gives us, the witch house and the portal. And that and of course, we got to go to a cult.
01:14:25
Speaker
We have to go to ah you know see a cult. That's one of my favorite things. I love it when there's a cult. We get to investigate a cult. Now that is the only place in the game that I got legitimately stuck. And it is a, this is, this is, I think a design fail, um, where you have to find two ingredients for a ceremony to yeah components. Um,
01:14:51
Speaker
And one of them, most of the locations you get at the cult, because there's a lot of small maps. Yeah. You have the big city map, and then there's certain times like you're at the docks and you get a small map of docks. And now you're in this forest investigating a cult, and that's its own map. Its own map, yes. So um one of the locations on the, most of the locations on the map,
01:15:12
Speaker
ah you get by talking to characters or walking into a room and overhearing a character or like things that you would just naturally do in this...
01:15:24
Speaker
instance the only way you get this map location is by clicking on both of the places where the items for the ritual would go now you've already talked to the woman standing there about the ritual and about the items and she didn't say oh this is where the one is Right.
01:15:45
Speaker
That's true. and and maybe that's because I was thinking about how did we both we both got stuck there. That is the place we both got stuck. and And what's really frustrating to me is that I was intent on really looking at everything and really reading the descriptions. And I was doing that. And that was so frustrating. The one time I didn't do it, yeah did. I got stuck. and Yeah, I think it's because the woman talks to us first. And so we're not led to click on the on the space that we're supposed to click on. And when I think it's something like when you click on the left tray, he just says, oh, that's where the mask goes. Right. So you assume that when you click on the right tray, he'll say, oh, that's where the crown goes. But he question, So like, oh, it's not, there's nothing interesting about clicking on the tray this tray. guess so. there won't be anything interesting about clicking on the other tray. And-
01:16:34
Speaker
Instead, when you click on the other tray, she says, he says, what was it that goes here again? And she's like, oh, the crown. It's usually put together by flowers in this specific meadow. And it's somebody's, they're doing it now. And then the meadow opens up and you can go there. and i I'm just so frustrated with myself though, because even if this was a game flaw, i was I was so intentional about like clicking on things that were available to look at, to interact with. And that was the one time I didn't do it. i Yeah.
01:17:04
Speaker
You know, i think I think the same thing for me, right? Like i got I got a lot of the achievements and most of the achievements are just about clicking on... or Or just that. they' it's just They're just there to show that you clicked on everything. Yeah, just being observant and interacting with the game. And then at the time, we did not do that. And like yeah, we had reasons for it. perhaps Perhaps if we hadn't talked to the woman first, perhaps if the other Trey gave us like a similar reaction. I don't know. I don't know what happened there. I think i think it's i think this is a a failure of design. yeah um i was going everywhere to see if I missed. Because it's happened. I have missed locations before. I didn't see a path or I didn't notice that there was an arrow. was just dragging my cursor across every screen systematically. couldn't figure Where am I not?
01:17:58
Speaker
talking to every character a second time. drag I was doing the thing where you drag your inventory items over everything. Like maybe maybe it's just some weird interaction. No, yeah, but you just had to click on a tray. we talked um Yeah, we just, we weren't finding it. i want to say one of my favorite things in this entire game is there is a, it's called like the Museum of the Unusual, I think. Oh, you know, I loved that shit. It was so cool. It was, um you you go to a museum,
01:18:26
Speaker
And you get lead ah led through by like a ah ah caretaker who you go through like individual rooms and each room is based around a theme. And each one is like it it is just a series of... I don't even know if references is the right word. just yeah Yeah, I know. i don't Direct interactions with...
01:18:50
Speaker
Lovecraft stories. So, you know, it it'll it basically just gives you summaries of different Lovecraft stories. And I think this is why, i think this scene is why I've seen ah this game compared to Dark Side Detective. Hmm. is because this is a very Dark Side Detective ah scene it is in the game. It yeah.
01:19:11
Speaker
I don't think the rest of the game is like Dark Side Detective all. I don't. at all In fact, I didn't even really clock that until you just said it. Yes. Yeah. um But you are, yeah, you're just going from room to room looking at different exhibits in the museum. And one of them, my favorite one, besides the...
01:19:31
Speaker
a picture that yeah gives people different reactions. My favorite one is there's a room with three different characters, protagonists of yeah Lovecraft stories. I love that room.
01:19:43
Speaker
One of them is Herbert West Reanimator from the that's from the so you know story, Herbert West Reanimator. The other one is Eric Zan, who is like an animatronic statue And there is this... The sound effects in this game are fucking off the hook. They're good. Yeah, they're so good. The music's good, too. All the sound is sound design's very good.
01:20:05
Speaker
Well, that's what i wasm saying earlier. This guy... i'll get back to it in a second. Let me finish this point, and then I'm going to tell you what impresses me so much about postmodern games. um He is...
01:20:17
Speaker
You know, his bow will go across his cello and then you will hear just this robotic like snap and click, click, click, click click click click click yeah click click click click just like you're looking at an animatronic thing. and it And they look so spooky. These guys look so haunted and they're like, they have these like lights coming down on them. Yeah. what i Postmodern games
Creators and Development of Postmodern Games
01:20:40
Speaker
impresses me so much. They seem to release a game every two years. Yeah.
01:20:44
Speaker
They make all their games in Adventure Game Studio. Yeah. They do this just phenomenal amount of pixel art and some of the best pixel art I've ever seen.
01:20:56
Speaker
Yeah, it's really good. It's really good. It's really detailed. It's really um it is it it It is detailed while at the same time completely fitting the tone of the story that they're telling. yeah And the lighting effects are amazing.
01:21:17
Speaker
Every game has such good music and such good sound effects. I know. And they're all bigger than you think they're going to be. And they're so compelling. I am deeply, deeply impressed with this guy and his work. Yeah, I am too. I mean, like I said, Nightmare Frames is one of my favorite. God, I obsess over it. That's one of the... if that guy is listening, if the devs are listening, that's the, one of the only games I went to got every achievement for that proves that I like, and for reference, I only got seven achievements in this game.
01:21:50
Speaker
I don't know how he does it. His, his name is Jose Maria Melendez. Um, he does the writing, the art and the code and, um, He does design with ah somebody named Victor Martinez. um The music is composed by Matthias ah J. Almeido.
01:22:08
Speaker
um And he gets some animation help from Emilio Elmerion. and I don't know if I'm pronouncing these correctly. um But ah it's mostly a a single guy. And...
01:22:27
Speaker
He's just so good. He's really good, yeah. Jack Allen seems to do all their English oh the yeah yeah localization, which is fun. i I hope Postmodern Games just keeps making games forever.
01:22:42
Speaker
I do too. It's also a great balance of narration and puzzle design. Yes. There's never a point where I'm like, oh there's too much talking. Right.
01:22:53
Speaker
No, it's, and there are points where there's quite a lot of talking. Like you'll have like a little scene, right? Actually, did. Close of characters. Now that I'm thinking about it, we did think that a little bit about an English haunting. There were some moments where it was like, oh, this is a little much. Yeah. Very few and very far between.
01:23:11
Speaker
Yeah, and I think that's why I actually put this game above an English haunting. Right. I actually prefer in order nightmare frames, this game, and then an English haunting. That's kind of where I would rank them.
01:23:23
Speaker
I agree, but I think that they are both like that they are all three just top notch point and click. Yeah, they are. They are really good. I will say that what you described with the museum is basically one big like meta reference. And you know that I hate that. I i hate that like so much. But it didn't seem to come across that way.
01:23:44
Speaker
yeah For some reason, this is one of the only instances where this is a reference. well This is a nod. Yeah. Because again, it's the world you're in right? Yeah, because it's the world you're in. It is the world you're in, and it just feels like this is building out the world. And you can tell how these things are tied into the other parts of your story and your world and the puzzles that you're trying to solve.
01:24:04
Speaker
Yeah. Are you confused about – because I went in and I'm trying to learn about Lovecraft lore and, like, the Outer Gods – I guess sometimes I get confused on like the hierarchy of the gods and what, like, what, what are, what are they? Like, I recently learned that Cthulhu is like a lower tier God and the God that we're kind of following in this game, which is like Yogg. Yogg-Shoggoth?
01:24:35
Speaker
Yogg-Shoggoth? Sothoth. Sothoth. I, I, well ah who who made these names a psycho h i mean he was i mean yes absolutely yeah as so he was a he was a he was yes a racist also a racist made these names there's also um i don't think this is spoilery because the these characters are in the trailer but ah aside from like i'm not quite sure i understand the intentions of these outer gods or what the intention of even even calling them to the world is. There's also like men in black characters, which I guess is pretty common oh yeah for HP Lovecraft. It got me thinking, like, did did he, is that where the concept of men in black come from? I guess in this game though, I was a little confused about what their role was in the big picture and who they were trying to help. And it seemed like they were trying to help us, but then they kept saying they were neutral.
01:25:30
Speaker
i don't know. It almost feels as if they were completely superfluous, right? Like they did yeah they didn't add to the story. And i that was actually probably the one game design choice I didn't like. there's That did seem like a reference to me. there That more seemed like a nod instead of a this is the world.
01:25:49
Speaker
the There's a point where you are exploring an area and you're going to be completely stuck. there's no way to progress.
01:26:01
Speaker
So you just will naturally say, all right, well, I guess I'll leave and I'll check out someplace else. And one of these characters will run into you and say, here's the item you need and leave. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, that is true. And then you're like, well, okay, fuck. Right? Like that didn't feel, that doesn't feel earned. That doesn't feel. Right.
01:26:19
Speaker
That was the only moment where I was, that was the only thing in the game where it, the design sort of, felt I don't know frustrating is the word, but a little a little disappointing. Yeah, and I feel like that definitely coincides with me saying like, oh, in that in that dream sequence we had, it feels like they just needed to progress the story. So here you go This happened.
01:26:43
Speaker
And now we know what's going on. The same thing when the character gives you that item. It's like, oh, I guess that. Okay. um did How did you feel about? we do come across a reanimator character.
01:26:57
Speaker
i I cracked up. Herbert West the reanimator? No, the other one. The one who was trying to copy him. Oh, okay. Yes, yes. So i I thought that was hilarious, actually. That whole weird... the way I'll just say this. The way you defeat this guy made me laugh. Maybe it shouldn't. Maybe it's too disturbing, but it made me laugh. Oh, right. Yes, yes, it is. Yes, it is very funny. And the the way you solve the puzzle of his henchmen is so funny. It's pretty funny. Yeah, it's pretty funny. um pretty funny Oh, I do want to say it something. There's one other thing I want to say. Okay. And I'll tell you about the other game I i was just playing before we right before we hopped on this call. The the Lovecraftian Monsters and Gods.
Lovecraftian Horror and Psychological Preferences
01:27:42
Speaker
I don't find them scary at all. I don't either. don't either. I wonder. Just like the weird fleshy monsters with a bunch of eyes and a bunch of tentacles and hands. Yeah. Like, they never do it. They never scare me. Which is interesting. They never shrink me out. They never. Yeah. In the world, people are hella fearful of the, you know, when you see one, you lose your mind. You know, it's this idea like, these are gods and like things that we cannot comprehend.
01:28:12
Speaker
And so it drives people mad. So to not feel... i agree with you. I didn't feel... Maybe we're desensitized to these. Maybe that is where Lovecraft gets a little weary on us, is we do not find this surprising or yeah scary anymore, you know? and Okay, here's the place... All right, that's a good point. here's Here's the places that I feel frustrated with the over-prevalence of Lovecraft. is Number one, I think you're right. of One of them...
01:28:41
Speaker
is that when you see Lovecraftian monsters, I don't find them scary. I'd rather just not see the monster than see these things and then be like, oh. ah Yeah, yeah. um Number two i The other place that I get weary of it is having to, when there is a trope of a person um being overwhelmed by the their insignificance in the universe and the structure of the unknown surrounding them, right?
01:29:18
Speaker
And that that driving them mad. Or that being the horror. I think that's cool. Yeah, I do. but i get ah But I think I get weary of having to call that Lovecraftian all the time. Sure. And i get I get weary of tangible, supernatural monsters. Okay, yes, yes. Some of the scariest things I found in nightre Nightmare Frames were more human. It was murder. It was missing you know psychological. it was more psychological than that. But that's not what Lovecraft is. He has cosmic horror. So there's going to be gods and monsters and things that look insane. And maybe that was scary once upon a time. It's just not right now. And I like it.
01:29:58
Speaker
And i yeah, and I like the I like the psychological stuff conceptually. I like it when it appears in a book. I just I think as a reviewer, I get sick of having to reference Lovecraft. when I talk about those stories. And that's that's not the that's probably not the writer's faults. That's fair.
01:30:15
Speaker
But, ah all right.
Sequels and Continuations in Lovecraftian Games
01:30:17
Speaker
So the other game I played was another Lovecraft-inspired game. Really? um And i'm in the I'm in the middle of it. It is... So ah in 2020, there was a game published by Raw Fury called Call of the Sea. Yeah.
01:30:36
Speaker
Okay, okay. Yeah, I've heard of that. um And it was a first-person, almost Myst-style game where you are a woman who travels to an island searching for... her her husband vanished on a expedition to cure her illness. And you are sort of following his expedition and figuring out these sort of ancient technologies then that are
01:31:14
Speaker
yeah On this trail. And again, it's a little more miss. It's it's a little like a little walking simul simulator simulator in which there's like the story is told diegetically and through these notes and things and so and you know set pieces that you stumble upon yeah in the world.
01:31:34
Speaker
And it's a little mist-like where you're, again, trying to solve. You're trying to understand. The puzzles are you understanding a machine that you would have no reference for.
01:31:47
Speaker
um Or a mechanism or something like that. And then it's a little escape roomy, like the sort of those sort of puzzles. yeah Where it's like, oh, I found this symbol over here. What if I put it ah in this symbol?
01:32:01
Speaker
thing over here oh it opened a box and now the thing in the box I can go put in the wall over here and that you know opened a tunnel whatever right so this year that those same developers the same publisher released a game called Call of the Elder Gods oh Oh, nice. didn't know that. Which is the sequel to Call of the Sea.
01:32:26
Speaker
it Out of the Blue Games is the developer, the publisher. Actually, it's a new publisher. It's Kweli, not Raw Fury. That's interesting. That is interesting. So you play a young girl who is being sort of called by, i guess, the elder gods. Oh, geez. What you have in your... So, all right.
01:32:53
Speaker
There's two protagonists. One is the husband of that woman back from his expedition. um And he's dealing with the trauma of what happened to his wife in...
01:33:06
Speaker
her expedition in the first game. um and probably And seemingly some leftover chthonic influence, right? ah And she was researching at Miskatonic University. She was studying there.
01:33:24
Speaker
And she had a period of several months of amnesia. And when she woke up, She had spent those entire few months researching the this island and the statues and that expedition.
01:33:45
Speaker
And so she reaches out to this professor to be like, hey, somehow something about you and the stuff you know is important to me. And I don't know how because I i had amnesia.
01:33:55
Speaker
i can't remember that whole that several months of my life. Yeah. Yeah. um And so you guys ah go together to this island.
01:34:08
Speaker
That's about where I'm at. Okay. So far, it's good. I think it it feels a little more escape room-y than Call of the Sea and a little less mist-y than Call of the Sea. And so that's slightly disappointing.
01:34:26
Speaker
But I think it's a really cool premise for a sequel. yeah And the first one was based on a story that wasn't really referenced.
01:34:37
Speaker
What we just play? like The Dark Rites of Arkham. Yeah, wasn it wasn't really referenced in Dark Rites of Arkham. It was inspired by the shadow out of time. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
01:34:49
Speaker
But this game is entirely seems to be entirely new. Cool. there There also isn't a game that take, least I don't think, that takes from The Color Out of Space, which is a very trippy and interesting movie with Nicolas Cage.
01:35:04
Speaker
Okay. have you seen Have you seen it? No. Yeah. a Color Out of Space. ah It's from 2019. I think I watched it like just as the pandemic kind of was happening. Yeah.
01:35:16
Speaker
um yeah Yeah, so like I've watched it not long after it came out, and it was trippy. ah I could see why maybe nobody wants to make a game out of that, to be honest. But I liked it. It was fine.
01:35:30
Speaker
I recommend it. There's some other... We should play some more of these. Now now that I'm back... it seems like this happens. When I play a game that is so that is not just you know obliquely referencing Lovecraft, but is directly...
01:35:46
Speaker
interpreting Lovecraft or directly um what's what's the word directly based on a Lovecraft work I'm like oh I want to read so much more Lovecraft we should play a Shadow of the Comet which is a point and click adventure a game from 93 and that is based on um it's just based on the Cthulhu mythos Okay, so it's not based on a specific story. I don't think so. I think it has elements of things. It's also known for its very strange like portrait art where like there's randomly one of the characters is Jack Nicholson.
01:36:23
Speaker
It just is. That's who it is. He's not Jack Nicholson in the game, but he looks like Jack Nicholson. Interesting. Yeah. So there is also a point in click game from 2017 called Chronicle of Innsmouth.
01:36:37
Speaker
Okay. Okay. um might be worth playing um the developer did do a sequel um based on the mountains of madness that got kind of cool very poor reviews um but also i don't know who knows who knows yeah you never know there's also the the quite famous you know now famous xbox game call cthulhu dark owners of the earth which maybe had one of the most frightening sequences sequences I've ever played. I was so fucking scared and stressed out. Oh, really? bad Yeah. um
01:37:12
Speaker
I played a very short. And we played dreams in the witch house. Yeah. And the Dunwich horror is supposedly still in development by the person that by the guy who did dreams in the witch house. Right. um But.
01:37:27
Speaker
ah I played a very, very short game based on what's it called? The Terrible Old Man? The Very Old Man? The Terrible Old Man, which is a Lovecraft short story. That was pretty good.
01:37:39
Speaker
it was It was cute. It was cute it you know cute? It was one of those games that's like... somebody's just messing around with um sure adventure game studio. And it's like it's like, oh yeah, this is fine. This is this this is nothing to write home about, but yeah yeah it's cute. Anyway.
01:37:59
Speaker
Oh, it's fine. The Terrible Old Man is Cloak and Dagger Games. Did you know that? Is it like their first? It's 2019, so it's not, I wouldn't say it's that old, but yeah, this is, it's got to be one of their, it's before Hobbs Barrow. Definitely before Hobbs Barrow, before.
01:38:18
Speaker
oh around the time of Sumatra Hand of Fate. Yeah. I mean. oh after Sumatra Hand of Fate. Yeah. They hadn't quite gotten to. Yeah. I mean, they made better games than it before it. But this was this this is a free game and is very short. It wasn't.
01:38:37
Speaker
it It seemed like it was made during like a game jam. it seemed like a very It seemed like maybe it was thrown together a little bit. but sure
01:38:48
Speaker
And while we're on the topic of, like, Lovecraftian games, I also very much enjoy Dredge. i I finished the fuck out of that game. It does... The the only problem with Dredge is it's going to get old.
01:39:00
Speaker
Like, the the fear... The things that scare you right away, you're going to get so used to them, like, pretty quickly. But, man, I loved i just loved being on a boat, you know? Sometimes you just got to be on a boat. Sometimes you just got to be on a boat. Well...
01:39:14
Speaker
so
01:39:17
Speaker
Folks, I think we've hit the wrap up. What do you think? Yeah, I think we
Closing Thoughts and Humorous Envisioning
01:39:24
Speaker
have. I think I've said what I what i needed to say. Well, thank you guys so much for listening to ah this episode of Save Your Game.
01:39:33
Speaker
If you want more of us, you can find us on Instagram at SaviorGamePodcast. Yes. um You can check out our Discord, which is in the show notes. You can find us over on YouTube, which is, i mean, it's just this show. um But like, subscribe, leave comments, share, do all that stuff. And you can always email us at mattandroses at gmail.com.
01:39:59
Speaker
Yeah. Tell us tell us a story. um You just released a new video, right? ah It will be hopefully released. ah It is currently copyright struck. But by the time this comes out, I believe it will be public. Yeah, it should be public by the time. So go check Pushing Out Rose's YouTube channel. and She's got a she'll have a she having many rose she't have a new Murder, She Wrote video up there. And those are always fun. Wouldn't it be great if there was a Lovecraftian Murder, She Wrote episode?
01:40:28
Speaker
but You're like, no, Sarah, no. What would it be about? How do you imagine it? ah yeah i I mean, the Cabot Cove is a seaport. It's like a town with a C. And could just come and, you know, just take over. Somebody somebody rose into the town.
01:40:47
Speaker
because There's got to be a murder. Okay. yeah So yeah somebody rose rose into the town. um And they are talking about how they, while they were out at sea, they visited an island that's not on any maps and ah ah heard a strange voice.
01:41:06
Speaker
And then that person turns up dead the next day. But you see the murder in Murder, She Wrote, don't you? Yeah. It's not a mystery to the viewer? Oh, it is. It is a mystery. It's a whodunit. So okay you do see like, you see what the murder is. So you'll find a guy and he'll be like he'll just be like dead, you know, so this guy is dead. And it'll happen off screen. And then maybe they'll touch they'll show maybe a little bit more of it in the recap at the end.
01:41:32
Speaker
So what the murder is, is this is somebody who worships the gods who live on that island and killed the man to keep the secret. And Jessica Fletcher has to figure figure all this out. Yeah, but she doesn't go to the island. Like, she can't, because that's not what that show's about. so So they just leave the whole, they leave the whole Lovecraftian horror mystery of it completely untouched. It's just, she solves the murder and that's it. And that's it. And the viewers are like, wait, what the fuck? An island full of gods? What?
01:42:08
Speaker
And then the next episode comes and it's just like, Oh, a guy got in argument with his wife. Yeah, exactly. So one savory guy that nobody likes got murdered. What happened? what Wait, what was that whole thing about an island with what?
01:42:24
Speaker
What? Sea gods? What? Amazing. Sorry, sorry for that tangent. I know we're trying to wrap up, but I just had that vision. Look, sometimes you have to express yourself because we are on a podcast and you know what?
01:42:41
Speaker
Podcast is art. And art is supper.