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Live Service Struggles with XinSpanish
48 Plays8 months ago
Tony is back in the Game Lounge and is joined by XinSpanish once again! This time, the two talk about their time at Twitch Con, The Nintendo Direct Partner Showcase, Xbox's Big Announcement, Representation of Culture within Video Games, and Where Live Service Gaming is going, as well as your bi-weekly gaming news updates and upcoming releases!
Follow Tony: https://twitter.com/tonysgamelounge
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YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TonysGameLounge
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Follow XinSpanish: https://twitter.com/XinSpanish
Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/xinspanish
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Join the Official Tony's Game Lounge Discord: https://discord.gg/xXyvjaCsXp
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Transcript
Introduction and Disclaimer
00:00:00
Speaker
Disclaimer, all views expressed on this podcast represent the host and his guest, and not the companies or agencies they are associated with.
Meeting at TwitchCon
00:00:21
Speaker
Hello, everybody, and welcome back to another episode of Tony's Game Lounge. I'm your host, as always, Tony 14. And joining me this week, we have a returning guest who I surprisingly got to meet at TwitchCon was not planned. I actually didn't know he was even going to be there until.
00:00:38
Speaker
We like we sigh saw tweets and I'm like, yo, holy moly. He's here. It's in Spanish Hello everybody, how we all doing today? Yeah, it was neat. It was fun. I would say this guy like I I went in for a hug immediately when I saw this guy and I got asked What kind of detergent do you use because your clothes smelled amazing that day?
Learning and Networking at TwitchCon
00:00:58
Speaker
Let's make my own mic
00:01:00
Speaker
What's the Canadian? It's not Tide, it's... Because we don't use Tide because my brother is allergic to something in Tide, so we never use Tide. I think it was like... I think it's Downy that we use. Oh, okay. You smelled fresh, is all I'm saying.
00:01:17
Speaker
That and I was smacked up with some deodorant because you don't want to be stinky at these events. Oh yeah, like those crowds. I will admit, one or two people there, I couldn't pinpoint who it was, but when you're in a crowd and you're smelling, people are going to notice.
Challenges of Streaming Consistency
00:01:32
Speaker
Oh god, yeah. How was your TwitchCon experience? What did you get to do and see at TwitchCon?
00:01:39
Speaker
Um, mostly I was there for like the panels and such, learning, you know, all the, all the, like, uh, I, I wouldn't know who worked easier. I went to do to the panels about like growing the channels and all that stuff. It was very, very informative. I would recommend it to anybody who wants to like grow their channels, learn what they want to learn, all that stuff.
00:01:56
Speaker
It's a good experience. It's a lot of fun. You meet a lot of people. You do a lot of what's what I'm looking for here. Networking. I didn't go to any of them, mostly because with where I'm at with Twitch, it's like, I know what I need to do with this. I need to get my consistency up because that's my big thing. I am not consistent with it. I understand that.
00:02:17
Speaker
And especially now, but as people, if you've been on my Twitch channel recently, I really have only been able to stream like every Friday and Saturday of the past like three
Hot Takes: Underrated Movie-Licensed Games
00:02:27
Speaker
months because of my actual job putting me on early, early mornings. So I've been very tired to say the least to try to do afternoon streams. And it's like, I just want to play games and then go sleep.
00:02:40
Speaker
So that's coming to a close come March. So seems we'll be back to a bit more of what they were before trying to get to a better consistency. So look forward to that on my side, at least. All right. The request for that. Yeah. But since you're back here, we do have a brand new opening segment before we get to our headline of the week. And that is hot takes where you give us your hottest video game take. Oh, I don't know, man. I don't know if I'm ready for this.
00:03:10
Speaker
Well, oh The internet's either gonna love you or hate you after this Okay, okay Okay, I gotta think of it a little bit, but I got it. Okay Movie licensed games are not that bad
00:03:27
Speaker
When I first got my Xbox 360, back in the day, I got the King Kong video game, and I absolutely loved it. The Peter Jackson King Kong game? Yes. Oh, wow. I loved it. Okay. Okay. I'm just throwing it out there. It was fine. It was good, even. I've played a little bit of it on my GameCube because I do have it on my shelf right beside me. You know, it's...
00:03:48
Speaker
And from what I played, granted, I didn't play a whole lot. Like I maybe encountered like maybe the first batch of enemies. I didn't play it for a long time. It's it wasn't awful from what I played, from what I remember. But again, I didn't play much of it.
00:04:02
Speaker
A little bit of a lukewarm take, I'll admit, but I'm not ready for the hostility yet. No, but no, it's a valid opinion. There are some gems from the movie licensed games. I mean, best example for me is the SpongeBob SquarePants movie game. That's a great game. Even now, granted, it was the SpongeBob SquarePants Battle for Bikini Bottom engine, and it was basically a sequel to Battle for Bikini Bottom in a sense, but it's still a really good game.
00:04:31
Speaker
It's really not- I'm not- I'm not living this to the movies either. A lot of licensed games are pretty dang good. I still remember as a kid, on my Sega Genesis, I had a Power Rangers, like, fighting game that I just- I played that every day and every night. It was so fun for me.
00:04:49
Speaker
It's just memory nostalgia. Nice. Love to see that.
Xbox's Game Exclusivity Strategy
00:04:54
Speaker
Well, with that, we can now move on to our headline of the week. And, oh, boy, stuff has happened. You might think, oh, he's going to talk about Nintendo Direct. Actually, no. We'll be tackling the Direct a little later. The headline of the week is Xbox's big business direct state of thing. They announced their big thing announcing, hey,
00:05:16
Speaker
Well, you know, we want gamers to game. So we are taking four games that used to be exclusives for us. We're making them no longer exclusive to Xbox, which is huge and kind of a nice thing. Now, granted, two of these games absolutely makes sense for them to not be just Xbox exclusives. It feels like you're going to say I know which ones you're going to say.
00:05:41
Speaker
And then two of one of them is very surprising that it's like oh, okay That's actually a big move for Xbox good for you and the other one. I take it or leave it So the one I'll say is taken or leave it is grounded okay, I was wrong
00:05:57
Speaker
Yeah grounded I'll say is to take it or leave it on that one being an exclusive that wouldn't be exclusive or not I feel like it's a good game like for multiplayer I You we had it on PC. I feel like that like that there is fine enough Grounded is coming to the switch and PlayStation all the games are going to be on PlayStation only two of them are gonna be on switch as it was shown in
00:06:21
Speaker
as they gave out more details and also the Nintendo Direct did cover that as well. The other one that's going to the Switch is Pentamint, which makes sense. I didn't know about this. It's like the only game on the list. I'm like, I have never heard of this game. So sure, but that's fine. And the other game that's I'm like, yeah, it makes sense for it to be on everything. It's not on the Switch, sadly. It's Hi-Fi Rush.
00:06:46
Speaker
Absolutely. Finally, I gave it to you last year, honestly. It was close. It was in my top 10. You're right. You're right. I'm sorry, because Baldur's Gate 3 was last year, so no. Yeah. I mean, I never played Baldur's Gate 3. If the topic comes up again for Baldur's Gate 3, I'll explain why, but regardless, hi-fi rush. I am tempted to go play that game on PlayStation again and maybe try to platinum it.
00:07:10
Speaker
So, like, I'm excited that Hi-Fi Rush is not just exclusive anymore. It gives me a reason to play the game again, because it is just a great game. Oh, it's so good. It is such a good game. And lastly, Sea of Thieves is the one that, that's the one that genuinely surprised me, specifically with Xbox and Rare's agreement that's like, oh, wow, holy shit, a Rare game that's going to be on PlayStation.
00:07:35
Speaker
That was never been heard of. That's huge, actually. So Sea of Thieves. And it makes sense, though, like especially. I mean, it kind of makes sense, but it's also like, wow.
00:07:47
Speaker
The better pirate I feel like they did this like hey, Stella bones comes out is out. It's not doing good Let's give them the good pirate game and so they are Much of see if these but I played a little bit with my my my brother actually and the very first island we ended up on somebody showed up store ship and left us there and
00:08:14
Speaker
Wow, that's hilarious. That's our experience with CSDs, and I am saying that as a good thing. That is a pirate game right there. That is pirate through and through. That is pirate through and through. But those are the four games that Xbox announced, and they're probably going to do more down the line from what I understand. They want to, like, they're still going to have their exclusives, but I feel like Xbox is going to maybe do what Nintendo does and make it a, with a, oh yeah, this is going to be a limited time console exclusive.
00:08:40
Speaker
Where it's like we get it first, but then you guys will get it right and then you know I guess it kind of tempers what the rumors works or remember the rumors were just like oh Xbox is gonna stop You know they're making consoles there you go third-party developer, and then it turns out it was just this
00:08:56
Speaker
Yeah, it's just it's just absolutely people are overreacting and they always do they always it's not surprising Xbox is still gonna make consoles even though like the series X and S Were have been like compared to the switch and the ps5 underperformed Just which everybody's underperforming so
00:09:18
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. But yeah, that's that was the headline of the week. The big thing about Xbox and maybe more will come through down the line. Who knows? We'll only have to wait and see. I'm just really happy to see a high five rush getting a bigger audience. Yes. Oh, I love that game. So if it of these four games, I would if you want to play one of them, if you if you're a PlayStation exclusive homey
00:09:41
Speaker
Go play Hi-Fi Rush. Just play Hi-Fi Rush. And it is one of the best things that the Evil Within developers fucking gave us. Evil Within, I can't remember the exact studio name off the top of my head. Tango Softworks. Tango Softworks. Yeah. They're the ones who did this. Go play Hi-Fi Rush. It is fantastic. It's great. It's so good. Go play it. Go play it.
00:10:11
Speaker
With that, we can now dive in to everything else that happened these past two weeks. Let's dive into the Week in Review. Recapping the major stories of video games and the world of TableTop, looking over recent releases and reports from the Game Lounge crew, it's the Week in Review. Starting off with some of the major games that came out. Banishers, Ghosts of New Eden released to a positively warm
00:10:40
Speaker
Uh what's reviews and everything like it's doing pretty well It's actually people a lot of people were like very much on the fence about this game, but it did pretty well, which is good uh, lisvanga the time shift warrior released which if you're into roguelikes Uh, this is a great roguelike for you two raider one through three remastered skull and bones
00:11:05
Speaker
Sang. Mario vs Donkey Kong released on the Switch, that remake. And Nightingale also entered Early Access, which I've been playing a little bit of Nightingale. It's fun. I know a lot of people who have been playing Nightingale. I haven't touched it myself, but I know a lot of people who are into it. It's fun. My friends described it. If you liked Valheim, you'll definitely like Nightingale.
00:11:27
Speaker
Yeah, that's what I see then from what I've seen. Yeah, it's very violent very very violent and I'm liking it like the fucking portal system is cool Yeah, you're thinking with portals house building seems pretty neat I haven't built my house yet. I've kind of just been just crafting shit and just exploring exploration is really Encouraged in this game and I love that. It's like super super sick and gorgeous and
00:11:56
Speaker
The big thing about the honest thing about Nightingale is if you have not updated your drivers at all, you will have to update your drivers to even play the game.
00:12:08
Speaker
So that is the only thing I was like, oh, interesting, but okay. And now I have, and now Final Fantasy XIV looks better than ever. So, you know what? It was not a mistake. It wasn't a mistake to update my drivers. I'm like, I probably needed to anyway, but like, okay. Cause it's been like what, four years since I've had my PC now. So I think that's a good time to update them finally.
00:12:32
Speaker
Just look it over the list. I'm amazed Skull and Bones did so bad. Not because I think it's a good game or anything. I'm not going to make that pretense. I'm just getting years in development with how many of those actually not done working on the game because Ubisoft, Ubisoft probably would have just canceled the game if they hadn't done it into an agreement with who was it, Singapore or something like that. I don't remember her funds. It's
00:13:00
Speaker
It's a game that should have just been canceled, scrapped, and probably worked on it from the ground up again. Maybe. It's just a concept. It made so much sense. Oh, Black Flag, but just the fun parts. Yeah. I wanted that, and then here we are. Here we are with...
00:13:22
Speaker
I think Ubisoft should just stick to being a Nintendo partner and just give us the next Mario Rabbids game. Because that seems to be the only good games they've put out in the past while.
00:13:36
Speaker
Okay. Okay. I forgot about the, I forgot they did the Prince of Persia game. I, I, I haven't played it. It's bait. I haven't really played a Prince of Persia game to begin with though. So it's like, I can't really, you know, put my five cents into that, that pot yet.
00:13:51
Speaker
Fair enough, but if you ever get a chance to play the OG Prince of Persia Sands of Time, I would recommend it. That is one of my Spanish high school games, you know? Into the news department, starting off with the biggest news to happen this week is the Nintendo Direct Partner Showcase, meaning no Nintendo titles were shown, just
00:14:11
Speaker
the partners of Nintendo, people putting games on Nintendo. Starting off, they showed off grounded, gave the release date of April 16th, so that's when you'll be able to play it on both Switch and PlayStation. Andrew Magnolia, Bloom in the Mist, which looks like a Metroidvania type game. I will get that too, yeah.
00:14:31
Speaker
That's the vibe I got from it. Arranger, a role-playing puzzle adventure. Interesting concepts for a game. It's a puzzle adventure game. Looks neat.
00:14:43
Speaker
Unicorn Overlord got another trailer and a release date of March 8th. The demo is out now as well for you to play. Monster Hunter Stories, the first one that was on the 3DS is getting remastered and voice acted because it didn't have voice acting in the original and put on the Switch, which makes sense because the second one is a Switch exclusive. That announcement surprised me.
00:15:03
Speaker
It's nice, but it makes sense because the second one's been on the Switch for how long now? As an exclusive, I'm pretty sure as well. And so having the first one on there too, it's just good. I like that. Good job, Capcom. Probably the biggest surprise that no one was expecting, Disney's epic Mickey rebrushed.
00:15:27
Speaker
Nobody expected it. Can I ask an honest question here? Did anybody ask for it? No, but I'm glad we're getting it. Fair enough. Epic Mickey is a great, just like, I feel like hidden gem on the Wii. Just because of like, it's so cool to see this game coming back for the Switch. And not just the Switch. This game is coming out for everything when it does release.
00:15:55
Speaker
It was just announced for the Nintendo Direct. It's coming out on everything. We don't know the exact release date yet, but in the trailer on a calendar, it said March 25th, so I feel like it might be out March 25th, or we'll see more on March 25th.
00:16:15
Speaker
We'll go more by that point for sure, so. Yeah. Then Shin Megami Tensei 5 Vengeance. This is essentially the definitive edition of Shin Megami Tensei 5. That releases on June 21st for everything. It's not going to be a Switch exclusive anymore. PlayStation, Xbox, PC, you'll be able to play it everywhere.
00:16:33
Speaker
Persona fans rejoice. Persona fans rejoice because this is the hard game. Like this is the game, this is the hard one. So rejoice or maybe don't rejoice. It depends on how you feel about the S&T games. And then in another surprise that I'm absolutely stoked for, Star Wars Battlefront Classic Collection. They did it! 64 player multiplayer maps.
00:17:00
Speaker
It's not a Switch exclusive, they just announced it at the Nintendo Direct. It's gonna be on everything, baby. Steam, PlayStation, Xbox, Switch, March 14th, the Classic Collection, both the original Star Wars Battlefront and Battlefront II games in a combo. Oh! With online multiplayer! Oh, baby! Oh!
00:17:24
Speaker
Like this and Epic Mickey made the direct. Those two games alone made this direct incredible. And the fact that they're both non-exclusives made it even better.
00:17:38
Speaker
We got another trailer for Stealth Park Snow Day, which comes out March 26. A trailer for Sword Art Online, Fractured to Daydream, because of course it's going to be another Sword Art Online game. Guns N' Breaker 4, and then another hype announcement. Super Monkey Ball, Banana Rumble. This is a Switch exclusive, however. That comes out June 25th, and this is a brand new Monkey Ball game. So I'm excited. I'll pick that up on the Switch and play it on the Switch. I love Monkey Ball. Monkey Ball's a lot of fun.
00:18:08
Speaker
It is a lot of fun. I'm a big yuck as a guy, so you always see monkey ball references, and it kind of gets to your brain a little bit like, oh, monkey ball, monkey ball, monkey ball. Exactly. And the fact that they had Kiryu in the last one as well. Oh, that's right. They put Kiryu in the ball.
00:18:25
Speaker
World of you two has a release date of May 23rd. We got another trailer for fantasy life. I the girl who steals time, which is now October 10th. I can't remember if I believe this deal was supposed to come out like early this year. So I think this is this was like, hey, we need more time. I think I don't fully know. But we've seen this game for a while. And I'm like, oh, it's now October 10th. Wasn't it like much earlier? But I can't remember. So that's more time in the oven is never a bad thing.
00:18:54
Speaker
True. And then we got a release date for another crab's treasure. This is the crab soul-like game. We've known about this game for a while now. But now it's got an official release date of April 25th, which is super awesome.
00:19:09
Speaker
And then we have a bunch of games that are out now, but before we get to that, Pepper Grinder was shown off and that has released it in March 28th. And then we got three games that are out right now. PENNY'S BIG BREAKAWAY! This is done by the people who gave you Sonic Mania. That fan team, that Sega commission for Sonic Mania.
00:19:27
Speaker
This is them. This is their next game. This is huge. Go play the game. If you like Sonic Mania, play Penny's Big Breakaway. This game looks incredible for both the casual and incredible for speedrunners. So if you're a speedrunner who wants to get into a new game, pick up Penny's Big Breakaway. This game looks incredible. I'll be playing it eventually because I still have two massive RPGs to play through.
00:19:56
Speaker
And then streamers have new content coming out because Suica game dot multiplayer DLC and down the line will be getting online multiplayer as well Which is paid DLC too. So it's like oh, okay, but then again the game is like two bucks. So like I
00:20:17
Speaker
download the game, download the DLC, I was probably like, if maybe 10 bucks, maybe 10 bucks. So speaking game, multiplayer DLC and pocket card jockey ride on, which what if we could buy the horse racing with solitaire?
00:20:36
Speaker
I have no response to that. I don't know how to respond to that. Yeah, no, that's basically that game. Then they had two announcements left. Five rare games, like Rare the Publisher, are coming to Nintendo Switch Online, including Battletoads and Killer Instinct. Oh, yeah. Killer Instinct, that's the one that made me happy.
00:20:54
Speaker
And last announcement, getting a sequel, the original, the Wii game Endless Ocean is getting a sequel with Endless Ocean Luminous, which releases May 2nd. But you will not be playing this game if you have psilocyphobia, because open water, diving, sharks, dinosaurs, darkness, all that stuff. Psilocyphobia. Go play Subnautica and tell me how you feel about it.
00:21:22
Speaker
And that was the Nintendo Direct. It was a solid Direct nonetheless, but Shin Megami fans might have gotten outshadowed as Elden Ring, Shadow of the Urntree DLC. The trailer finally dropped and a release date of June 21st as well. I'm picking my mic out of excitement here. And a $40 price tag.
00:21:45
Speaker
Worth it, worth it, worth it. People are gonna get regardless. People are already buying the collector's edition, which looks really neat. I'm not gonna lie. I've not bought the collector's editions, but I saw the statue and I was tempted. I didn't do it, but I was tempted.
00:21:59
Speaker
But yeah, they finally got it. The Eldering fans are super happy about it. I'm happy that you guys finally got it. So congrats for waiting so long for what looks to be a pretty good payout come June. And then Nintendo made Twitter angry that we started tweeting at Reggie because Mother 3 is coming to Nintendo Switch Online in Japan only.
00:22:29
Speaker
And the world is set ablaze, and Reggie's like, I can't do anything for you guys anymore. I don't work there. It's like, Reggie, why? Just go negotiate, please. You said you would bring it to America. But alas, but maybe it maybe it means that it'll come to America soon. Maybe. Who knows? One day. One day we'll get Mother 3.
00:22:57
Speaker
In Mod News, Larian Studios, they're working on a cross-platform plan for mod support in Baldur's Gate 3 to bring mods to the console versions of the games. Yeah, I hope that works out well, because mod support on PCs is not that great, so I hope that means they're going to work on that too. It's going to be for everything with the mod support, which is super nice to see that they're being supportive of their modding community.
00:23:23
Speaker
And the cross-platform, that's always a great thing. I always enjoy cross-platform for any game, because bigger audiences working together is only a net positive. Exactly. Project L, the League of Legends fighting game. Well, we now have its proper title. And it's weird. It's called 2XKO. I don't like it. No, I don't. I don't. Because it's always on top of the list whenever you're searching for fighting games. Oh, that's stupid.
00:23:54
Speaker
That's so stupid. I don't know if that's true. It's just a joke that's been going around. Oh, God. That's so stupid. I don't know. I don't know how I feel about it. There's some reference or I haven't played. I used to play League. I used to play a lot of League, but now I play other stuff. But I wonder if that's a reference to something. If it is, I don't like League. This game is Ick. But what is it, Ick? Peacemaker has made his way into Mortal Kombat 1.
00:24:21
Speaker
That was such a fun trailer to watch. That was such a fun trailer. Is that John Cena proper? The voice? It might be. I don't actually know. I don't know. I'll have to look it up. It sounded so much like him.
00:24:34
Speaker
I had to wonder. In some re-release news, Limited Run Games and Konami, they're re-releasing Ninja Five-O for the Switch and PlayStation. You can pre-order them between March 3rd and 10th to get a physical copy of this very old game to be able to play it again. Yeah, it should be fun. Without spending $700. At least. At least. In games that I thought were dead, but apparently not because they're making a spin-off game, Tem-Tem,
00:25:05
Speaker
Which you're like, huh, that sounds familiar. Well, this was the game that was good that the internet called. Oh, it's going to be the Pokemon killer. It's going to kill Pokemon. Whoa. But it then released and it flopped harder than a pancake because it wasn't good. That is getting a bullet having spit off called 10 times swarm. So it plays basically a vampire survivor with attempt to have skin on it.
00:25:32
Speaker
Well, they're pivoting, so they're at least trying to say their own franchise. I want this game to flop. Fuck temtem. But speaking of Pokemon, but peeking is peeking. Speaking of Pokemon, Pokemon presents February 27th. That's Pokemon Day as well. People are expecting Pokemon blocking white remakes. People are putting in their speculations for what we might see.
00:26:02
Speaker
I mean, I got my own. What do you think we're going to see? OK, OK, you have to bear with me a little bit here because when they put out the announcement trailer, there was music in the background. I recognize that music instantly. It was gym battle music from Pokemon Gold and Silver.
00:26:19
Speaker
What I'm hoping, what I'm praying for, and I doubt I'm gonna get anything for this. I doubt my faith is gonna be rewarded. But what I want is the next Pokemon Legends game, and I want it to be Johto region. That's what I want more than anything right now, as far as Pokemon's concerned. And when I heard that gym battle music, because I rec, Golden Silver's my favorite, so I recognize that music instantly. I was like, oh my god, tell me it's something with Golden Silver. Please tell me it's Golden Silver. And I gave myself hope, and that might be the wrong thing to do.
00:26:49
Speaker
I think, for me personally, I think at most, we may see my predictions. If we get anything gold and silver, it's either gonna be Legend's Johto or it's gonna be Let's Go. People are guessing what the Let's Go for Johto would be. It's either gonna be called Let's Go Johto or Let's Go Whooper and Let's Go Togepi.
00:27:11
Speaker
And I'm like, I feel like they'll just go with Johto because then you can just let you pick the starter normally. Just do whatever you want. And then just do that with it. I don't know how they would do the let's go for a Johto. Like with Pikachu and Eevee, it's fine because like, yeah, those are like your fourth and fifth starters, so it makes sense.
00:27:31
Speaker
Johto doesn't really have that like sure Wooper and Togepi are fan favorites, but it's like Compared to everything else and Black and white remakes I think it we pop is a good chance because people it's of the remakes remasters or like getting put up to a next-gen current it but the gen 5 is next and
00:27:57
Speaker
If anything regarding Gen 10, we might see the starters, or like an announcement saying like, yeah, it's in the works. We have the idea, don't worry. One thing that a lot of people are predicting is Pokemon games on Nintendo Switch Online. That would be cool. I think they might do that considering they put red, blue and yellow onto the 3DS. I feel like they would probably give us those ones for the Game Boy, baby golden silver for the Game Boy as well. Something.
00:28:26
Speaker
Who knows? That would be cool. Because if they did that, though, they would all they would need to make like, you would hope that they would make it like transferable into Pokemon home some way. That would be nice. I mean, even back in the day, when you do the what was it the time machine so you can transfer?
00:28:47
Speaker
yeah like so it's a whole ass thing it was like you had to you had to basically trade up from each game with the earliest being uh ruby sapphire because you ged one and two pokemon were locked on that hardware so ruby sapphire you would then trade up not trade up you would then
00:29:08
Speaker
Insert so it's a pal park into diamond pearl or Platinum and then you would use whatever black and white add to get them into black and white and Then you had to use Pokemon Bank to get them into either stay in the Pokemon Bank or to get them into gen 6 or 7 or Into home which would then get them into current games It was a process that is a process
00:29:37
Speaker
Interesting in Sonic news Sonic superstars. They released a shadow costume for Sonic Instead of just giving us shadow as a playable character in Sonic superstars People just want to skate around his shadow. Just give it to him. Yeah, give it to him The Borderlands movie got its first trailer Krieg looks good
00:29:57
Speaker
Krieg looks good, Claptrap looks good. I think Jack Black as Claptrap will probably be the best part of the movie with how he gave us Bowser. That is true. I think that's what we can trust. Despite Claptrap not being a liked character, I think we're gonna like Claptrap in the movie. I just hope it's not like the game where he kind of more received his welcome a little bit after a while.
00:30:17
Speaker
Well I think he's a main focus in this movie as well, so I think it's gonna be like that. In some mod news, modders for Persona 3 Reload are working on a fem C mod, so you can play as the female protagonist in the game, which is super cool. It's... Yeah, I'm surprised they didn't just have that in the base game. I mean, they had it in the...
00:30:38
Speaker
We were like, oh, are they going to put it as DLC? And then Atlas said, yeah, no, we're going to give you the answer as DLC, but we're not going to give you Pepsi. It's so big that they didn't do it. Big sash. In other mod news, the mega ambitious Fallout 4 mod, Fallout London, well, they have a release date set for April 23rd. And signing up for the project of who you'll be able to hear is a Starion voice actor, Neil Newborn.
00:31:03
Speaker
Game Awards winner, right there. Game Awards winner, vampire who people have, who people enjoy. He'll be lending his money. Take that how you want. And you're probably right to take it the way you're taking it. Oh boy.
00:31:24
Speaker
In DLC news, the Power Watch Simulator Warhammer 40k DLC that we've known about for a long while, has a release date of February 24th, 27th, February 27th. And lastly, the creator of Hello Neighbor is making a Home Alone inspired PVP heist game. You can sign up to test it on Steam right now. It's called RBO. Yeah, that one just looks really interesting, just on the concept alone.
00:31:50
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know. I would like to try it out now, but I'll let other people do it for me. People who know what to look for. Yeah. In the live series game news, starting off Final Fantasy 14 has huge crossover event news because the Final Fantasy 15 event returns on February 28th.
00:32:08
Speaker
This is a set of I believe two quests that you have to you can only do once you've completed The main story of a realm of born which is the first expansion and are at least level 50 that you can play these Quests and you'll be able to collect the Noctis Lucas Callum triple triad card the Noctis clam pieces and you can purchase the regalia the car and
00:32:34
Speaker
for 200,000 MGP, which is Vanderbilt Gold Saucer Points.
00:32:41
Speaker
which you can only get at the Gold Saucer. So do the fashion reports, because if you don't have that much MGP on you, do the fashion reports right now. Get them done. Because you'll only barely make it if you just do the fashion reports. You'll barely get enough. So work on your MGP and get the regalia. It's a great mount. And in Destiny 2 news, Bungie is ending its partnership with Prime Gaming.
00:33:09
Speaker
The 49th and final exotic package that you can get through the partnership is available until March 7th before all that stuff goes away forever. Take advantage. Take advantage of it. I was actually shocked to hear that. I thought that was a partnership that was, you know, at least going a little bit longer, but that was wrong. Yeah, it could have gone for one more, you know. At least. And they got 49?
00:33:32
Speaker
It just hurts. Yeah, you could have done 50 and then be like, okay, that's that's good enough. The entire collective like OCD world is balling up their fists right now.
00:33:44
Speaker
In TCG News for Pokรฉmon, Temporal Forces releases March 22nd, and Twilight Masquerade was announced and it releases May 24th. In Yu-Gi-Oh! Masternool updates, the Legend Anthology Acceleration Event has just ended, the Synchro Link Festival is on until the end of February 29th, and the Indomitable Pride Pack is out until March 8th before that gets swapped with something else.
00:34:11
Speaker
and in regular TCG sets. The Battle of Legend Chapter 1 box set is out now. The Legendary Dex II box set releases March 15th. The Speed Dual GX midterm destruction releases March 29th. The $399 Stainless Steel Egyptian God Cards release sometime between March 29th, April 26th. I think that's just for collectors. At $399, that's for collectors. Yeah, it's Stainless Steel Egyptian God Cards.
00:34:39
Speaker
399 bucks if you want them legacy of destruction on the 26th of April and the 25th anniversary rarity collection to on May 22nd imagine the gathering universes beyond the fallout releases March 8th outlaws of Thunder Junction on April 19th and universes beyond Assassin's Creed release in July. Those are all the release dates that we know about and in more Kana
00:35:05
Speaker
into the Inkland's releases on March 8th. And that is everything in the news this week. Any final thoughts on any of that, Zind? Not really much to say. Assassin's Creed, the Magic of the Gathering cards, those are available for pre-order now if you want to get on that right away.
00:35:25
Speaker
That's just the first thing that came to my mind when you mentioned it. Other than that, really, not much. Like, it is a packed, it was a packed week of news. It was. Well, it's two weeks. You got to remember, we're biweekly now. That's true. That's true. That's true. Two weeks of news. But we try to cover as much as we humanly can without dying. Sometimes it even calls for that. No, no, no, no, no.
00:35:50
Speaker
Well, I don't know. I don't know any necromancy spells, so I can't bring myself back to life. Moving ahead, it's time to go over what should be on your radar from February 26th to March 8th. From AAA titles, indie hits, hidden gems, and hot pieces of garbage, here are the games coming out that should be on your radar. And oh boy, do we got a lot. Starting off,
00:36:14
Speaker
Tuesday, 27th, Dice Folk comes to PC. Sheerin the Wanderer, the mystery of Serpent Coil Island comes to the Switch. Tyrant Oakheart comes to the PC, and Wrath, Aeon of Ruin comes to the PC as well. On the 28th, Brothers, A Tale of Two Sons remake comes to the PlayStation 5, Series X, and PC. Star Wars, Dark Forces remastered, and Pekka Minosa, a deadly hand release on everything, and Time Belters comes to the PC.
00:36:42
Speaker
On the 29th, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth makes its way to the PlayStation 5, and Welcome to Paradise goes to the PS5, Series X, and PC, and the 1st of March, Euphoria the Saga 2 goes to the PlayStation 5, Series X, Switch, and PC.
00:37:00
Speaker
On the 4th of March, Biomorph and the Thaumaturge release on the PC, on the 5th, Quilts and Cats of Calico, and Life by You release for PC, and the Outlast Trials, the 1.0 release, comes out on everything but the Switch, and classified France 44 comes with PS5, PC, and Series X.
00:37:19
Speaker
On the 6th, Hex Gambit Respawn comes out on everything. On the 7th, as Dusk Falls comes to PlayStation 4 and 5. The Pirate Queen, a forgotten legend, comes to the Quest 2 and 3 and PC. Taxi Life, a cab-driving simulator, comes to the PS5 series X and PC. And Potions, A Curious Tale, and Blade, Prince Academy, both released on the PC.
00:37:42
Speaker
On the 8th, the final day, Aca R comes to the PS5 and PlayStation VR2. Unicorn Overlord comes to the PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Switch, and Series X. WWE 2K24 comes out on everything but the Switch. Boar Blasters and Star Racer also release on the PC. That's everything. I feel so bad for Welcome to Paradise. I feel so bad, guys.
00:38:11
Speaker
I don't know who your publisher is, but they did not check their calendars. Final Fantasy Rebirth is right there. Come on. I mean, you got to release what you got to release. And I mean, that is going to be a massive game. I'll be playing it. I can tell you that much as to when I'll be playing it. I don't know.
00:38:31
Speaker
I don't know. Cause I still have the phase for soda free. Don't worry about it. And I just finished playing. So I've told this story a lot, but I'll tell it again because you know, I like to tell it. Uh, 2024 is the, the end of January and all the way through February is the worst time for me because I played like a dragon infinite wealth right at launch. Oh.
00:38:57
Speaker
And I played it through it. I finished it. I did all but like three trophies for the game, which is getting cost to get a level 70 and finishing the two dungeons getting to like the bottom floors of the final levels, which is like you have to be a high level to do anyway. So those are the only things I have to do.
00:39:22
Speaker
But I like, I'll come back to those later because I can, that way I have time to play persona, which is what I'm currently working on. I only have a week left before that seven comes out and I'm in September. I miss September in the game. I'm on September 3rd.
00:39:41
Speaker
And I started Persona 3 late. Like, I didn't play it day one. I even played it on day five when it was out. That's when I finished like a dragon. Jeez. And so when I'm done Persona 3, it's like, ah, as much as I'd love to play Petty's Big Breakaway, I can't. I gotta play Final Fantasy 7 because that game is gonna take forever as well. I've played three RPGs back to back to back to start off 2024.
00:40:10
Speaker
And not like some rush RPG that could get done in a couple of days. Now you're playing the big ones. Yeah. These are at least 70 plus hours. You say that and I just realized I put it in about 25 hours on Persona 3 myself already. I don't really do the hats. I'm like 40 hours in. And that's because I like every time I go to Tartarus, I do everything. Like I play every floor again. More than once I started from floor one at Tartarus.
00:40:39
Speaker
More than once I've started from floor one. It is a good game though. Yeah, it is a great game. With that though, it's now time for us to dive into what we're talking about this week in the Game Lounge. Conversations of past and future games, the state of the gaming industry, how big decisions affect gamers and anything else that's important to us. Here's what's going down this week in the Game Lounge.
00:41:04
Speaker
And to kick it off, our first topic of the day are live service games, and I guess their recent, well, the shit that's been happening in them. Yeah. When I brought it up with you before the show, and I use the word flopping, I think that was a bit of the wrong word to use, because flopping really hard, but we are starting to see the cracks in like the business model. Yeah.
00:41:32
Speaker
We really are. And I mean, a lot of them of recently, though, like you think of games that have been put on live service like of recently and they just haven't done as well. Yeah. A recent of recent of recently. Suicide Squad. Kill the Justice League. Yep. It's I think it was like I think the report said it's like it barely has a thousand concurrent players. She's a thousand.
00:41:56
Speaker
Yeah, I think WWE actually came out with a statement like, oh, they're underperforming and all this, and they're, it's bad enough to make a statement about it. Yeah, it's bad. It's really bad. It's also just not a great game. It's a very boring game with a shit story. That's the shit, because I really, really liked Rocksteady games. I like to... Rocksteady, yeah, it's a shame that Rocksteady did this, because they would have, if they didn't do this game, they would have had a really good track record. Or at least this game went a little bit better.
00:42:25
Speaker
If it was for the life service elements, I think it still would have been panned, but not as badly. People would just say like, oh, it's a little bit boring, but whatever. But with the life service elements, it just became a whole, whole thing. Yeah. Yeah. When we hear that now, I think it started, it started because of Redfall.
00:42:46
Speaker
Like, that's where it all started. Oh, Redfall. Is that where this conversation's going now? I think if you want to look back, I'm like, well, why do these live service games not do great? You got to look at Redfall. The game was rushed. It didn't do people. The game was rushed. Things were boring. Game was bad. Too many bugs. Yeah, you try to fix it, but it's like it's too late. And it gave the live service model a bad rep.
00:43:15
Speaker
Come Payday 3, which is I think the next big game after that. And they're like, oh hey guys, the game is online only as well. And that's another thing of like, why is it always online? Now granted, some games I think are fine to have that. Like Nightingale is one of those always online games. But the reason for that is,
00:43:38
Speaker
And we learned that yesterday when I was recording, on stream I was playing with the boys and I was taking to my friend Sir Wiggles' server, or world, and it's like, oh yeah, that world is now saved, that is now your world. The second you build your spawn point, that's now the world that you'll just respawn into. So you can now play with your friends any time, regardless on if they're online or not. Oh, that is me actually. So I'm like, okay, that's a good reason to be always online.
00:44:08
Speaker
Payday 3, considering how Payday 1 and 2 were, does not need to always be online. And I think they finally announced it recently that like, oh yeah, we don't need, we're uh, making offline servers finally. Took you long enough. So I can finally do a solo heist, Jesus. Yeah, it's like,
00:44:31
Speaker
Games that feel like they could be played single player like it's You don't need it and it's just you know, you don't need it and it's like well if I wanted to play this game solo I don't want to have to be online. It's just so stupid. It's it's so stupid that like they're thinking like that and
00:44:52
Speaker
Yeah, and then painting three in particular where, like I said, I played it day one. I just want to do some solo heist just to learn how to do the mechanics and such. I couldn't play because the servers are down. I couldn't do a solo heist with bots because the servers were down.
00:45:08
Speaker
Yeah, that's another day. Yeah, another ridiculous thing of always being online with these live service games is they the server limitations, which we've seen issues for for many games. Power World even experienced that, but they're day one. Now, granted, they were in early access.
00:45:31
Speaker
So they're like, they probably weren't expecting how many concurrent players they would have breaking records at that time. Oh yeah, Helldivers is currently experiencing that right now. And the scene is like, hey guys, as much as I'd love for you to play this game and get this game right now, just like
00:45:53
Speaker
I would highly recommend not getting the game right now because we are working shit out. And I respect to the honesty of them. Yeah. Because that's what we want to see. And like, I think Helldivers is like, I think the outlier in this because Helldivers is doing really fucking good. Yeah.
00:46:13
Speaker
There's some games that have a live service element to them that it works out really well. Deep Rock Galactic. They have a live service. They have battle passes and events and such. And it works out really well. But what do you do differently? One game works. You make a good game. You make it fun. I feel like that becomes the question. When did video games stop being fun though? Yes.
00:46:41
Speaker
The answer is they haven't. It's just devs. People have their tastes and a lot of people aren't appealing to the broad gamer. They're going very niche.
00:46:57
Speaker
Which granted, sometimes that works, sometimes it doesn't. But like, it's it's weird nowadays, I feel, especially with 2024. We're still early in the year and we don't know what trends are going to be hits. And I feel like when people looked at PowerWorld and they're like, oh, that was a hit. We need to make it like that now or like follow that model to make it work.
00:47:24
Speaker
Well, it's not, though. I feel like it's not. Well, that's why you got to appreciate games like Helldivers that they shake the whole thing up.
00:47:32
Speaker
Cause now everybody's going to be in a rush panic. Oh, we gotta be like, Oh no, we needed to do power world. No, no, no. Why don't we just do our own thing and see what happens? Exactly. That's why people like looking at these games that are also massively multiplayer and whatnot. And yet they're barely selling. And they're like, why are we selling? And then you'll look at the past three massive RPGs of which all sold over a million copies laughing at them.
00:48:02
Speaker
Which is very funny. Baldur's Gate 3. And also that, Baldur's Gate 3 shook up the entire industry. Single player, well it has co-op elements, but mostly single player, RPG, top down, Dungeons and Dragons. This is a formula that should not have worked on the broad sense, but everybody loves it. Everybody adores it.
00:48:21
Speaker
It was in early access for a really, really long time. So long to help work out as many kinks as they possibly could to the full release. And it fucking worked. Simple as that. Simple as that. It was a great, great thing. What games do you think shouldn't have this live service? Like shouldn't elements. Yeah.
00:48:46
Speaker
Well, again, any thing that's advertised as a single-player game? No, no, no, I don't... I mean, it's not life-sharing so much as the loot box element, but if you remember Shadow of War back in the day...
00:48:58
Speaker
I say it back a day, like, it was so long ago. Like, Lord of the Rings Shadow of War? Yeah, yeah. They had the loot box element for a single player game. That had a loot box? What the fuck? Yeah, you didn't know this? It had a loot box element. No, I never played the Shadow of War or Shadow of War games. I never played it. Oh, they're going to tell you a good game, so that's beside the point. No, the second one had a loot box element. That's like with real money or in-game money? Well, you know how it is. In-game money is real money.
00:49:26
Speaker
what the fuck yeah it was it was a for lack of a better way to say it was a shit show did they undo it or is it still like that I think they eventually just like not supported anymore like it's still there but it's not really there you know what I mean that's disgusting yeah it was it was it was not a good look for I mean this EA on top of everything so you know
00:49:49
Speaker
They give you one really good and then just make it, oh. Yeah. So for sure anything that has to go, and even like co-op elements. And here's the problem I have though. I don't mind like battle passes and all that on two conditions. One, make it earnable in like in-game currency. Like that's how a lot of warfare does it. And everybody's cool with it. Nobody hates that battle pass system.
00:50:16
Speaker
and to meet the rewards worth it. Oh my God, in a game like Suicide Squad, oh, we got you this new gun that does 0.3% more poison damage. Why do I care? Why do I care? I'm not going to grind that out. Like when it comes to like looter shooters anyway nowadays, I feel like if you don't take it directly from like the Borderlands or the Destiny model, it's not going to be great. It's not going to be good. It's not going to do good. Because they set a press like,
00:50:46
Speaker
Some genres have set a precedent for what makes this genre good. And if you don't make it almost to the T like that, just with whatever reskin you're using for it, it's not gonna go well.
00:51:01
Speaker
Exactly. And that's why you brought up Destiny. That's a really good one, because they have events and such. And they're really good. They're really fun. They're coming out with that Mass Effect one. That might actually bring me back. I haven't played Destiny 2 in years, but I might come back to it. Oh, yeah. I forgot that it's getting a Mass Effect crossover. I saw that, and I'm like, oh, that's cool. And I completely forgot about it.
00:51:18
Speaker
Yes, I'm a huge Mass Effect guy. Anybody who's watched my stream, I had that N7 banner in my background the whole time. I love Mass Effect, and that's something that could bring me back, because it's a good idea, good concept, a good crossover. How often do you see something like that in any other life service games? Not many.
00:51:36
Speaker
No, not many at all. I mean Overwatch, the problem is Overwatch is a whole different conversation, but when they do a crossover, they do a good one. They're gonna do Cowboy Bebop. That's awesome. Yeah, that's probably because the original creators of other probably are like, if you fuck this up, we're gonna mess you up. Do it right, Berga. Yeah, do it right or we'll Cowboy Bebop your ass.
00:52:02
Speaker
Fucking tank plays it's just you see the overwatch you see Blizzard collapse on itself It's spikes beagle just walks out smoking the cigarette See you later space cowboy exactly, but that's what'll happen if Blizzard fucks that up Which I don't think they will I think it should be okay. I mean Blizzard has their problems That's a whole different conversation for this one little instance come would be about crossover. I'm gonna trust them
00:52:36
Speaker
Yeah Yeah, we'll trust you we'll trust you But but yeah, it's If your game is advertised as mostly single-player with oh, yeah, there's multiplayer elements But because of said multiplayer elements we have to make it
00:52:50
Speaker
Online or a live service all that shit. It's just like oh, yeah Then do it. Do what halo did that and give us the campaign separately then because all nearly but That's a whole conversation because they they also have the life service, but they finally said if I like a better way to say it they gave up on that system and now they do it properly halo could I don't know how halo couldn't figure it out and
00:53:17
Speaker
They just couldn't figure it out. It is like, how? How are you this bad? That one pissed me off a lot. Yeah, they finally gave up on that, though, and they're just doing a whole different system that it's still battle passes, but it's better. Better. Sure. It killed it killed it killed him away from it.
00:53:45
Speaker
It did. I hate to say it, but it did. I actually gone back and played it. It's still a lot of fun mechanically sound, good fun game, but it's just I can understand why people didn't want to play anymore with that. You might as well. You might as well make Halo Infinite a free update for Master Chief Collection. I don't think I would just say that. Honestly, they just should. They should add Halo 5 to it first, though. So that way, you know, PC players can play Halo 5. I don't want to subject them to that.
00:54:14
Speaker
I mean, at least give us a chance. I don't hate PC players. I love PC players. I don't want them to suffer like that. Just give us the campaign so that way we can do at least another legendary campaign with four people. Why do you hate PC players so much to make them play Halo 5? I just want to play Halo 5. It's not too hard to ask. I never played it. I just want to play it so I can say, yeah, that was dog shit. Thanks. I want to be able to say it was bad.
00:54:40
Speaker
I just want to say I've played it. I didn't be done with it. That's all I want. Is that too much to ask for Xbox? Geez, Microsoft. Also Xbox while you're at it, put the original three Fable games like remaster and put them on PC or whatever. Even though you probably won't be able to because Lionsgate doesn't exist anymore.
00:55:05
Speaker
Just like just maybe like just like take it into your own hands and do them if you can like I think they still load the properties for him for fame Oh also while you're doing this whole hi-fi rush grounded deal while you have Sony's ear like one on PC, man Bloodborne on PC. I mean, that's a Sony thing. That's a Sony thing. It's like I don't know if Sony ever will they won't they won't I just call Microsoft you have their ear right now get a trade going and
00:55:34
Speaker
from softwood. We can never rush ground to see if they just give us blood porn. I don't know. Sony's a bit more. Sony's response said, oh, they're doing that? That's cool. We're not. We're not. They just locked the door. They just locked the door. And I feel like if they even tried with Nintendo, Nintendo would have said, go talk to our indie partners. What are you talking about us for? We've had this conversation. How many times, Mr. Phil Spencer? No.
00:56:04
Speaker
Come on, Phil. We know this. Yeah. Oh, boy. Anything else you really want to add about the live service games? Where do you see this going? Where do you see the future of live service games? Do you think that will actually start to slowly see a decline of them?
00:56:23
Speaker
We might, because this is exactly what happened with the loot box system. What I'm scared of is that something worse is going to come along. Because that's what it was. First it was the loot box system, everybody hated it. It was a dumb concept. And then came the battle pass system, the microtransactions. I have actually seen people reminiscing about the loot box system.
00:56:41
Speaker
That's where we're at right now with this. So that's my fear. That something else is going to come along and make it even worse. And I don't know. I don't know. I do think like with everything, it's going to end. It always does. Any any system ends. But I don't know what comes next. That's the hard part. What comes next is
00:57:04
Speaker
Weird online party sizes that's like super Inconvenient for everyone like oh, yeah, you can only play online with five people Not like only three wait wait what?
00:57:20
Speaker
Yeah, even the three people ones are, like, really weird. Even though it's, like, worked in the past for, like, some games, it's still a weird one when you see it's, like, only up to three. It's like, that's weird. That is weird. I can't remember what games have done that. There are some that I could name, but it's still, like, it's weird. It's just to say the least. I don't know why. It's just an arbitrary number, but I'm not in the dev room. I don't know what they're doing. I'm just worried. I just realized that, you know, what the next thing is, we're going to circle around. We're going to go back to the arcades. You want to play a game? Put it in a quarter.
00:57:50
Speaker
Pull that corner in your PC to play this game. Can I get my corner? Okay, I mean I could get my corner back. No, it gets evaporated. It gets zapped to our headquarters. We figured out teleportation. This is what we're using it for. Yeah, it travels through the Wi-Fi network. Back to us. Whatever. Bitcoin mining has become way ahead of that one. Yeah. So this is what the Bitcoin miners were up to.
00:58:20
Speaker
Ha! Those sons of bitches. Yeah, but those are my thoughts on life service games. I do think it's gonna end. I just don't know when, I don't know how, and I don't know what comes next. Hopefully it's something good. Hopefully it's something fun, but we're not gonna know until we get there. Yep, absolutely. Well with that, it's time for us to move on to our second topic of the day.
00:58:43
Speaker
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00:59:04
Speaker
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00:59:30
Speaker
And our second topic, I'm going to let Zinn start this off. It's cultures being represented in video games. Right. No, I brought this up the other day because of the Dead by Daylight, their new chapter. I'm not sure of what the one is. They call them chapters. Yeah.
00:59:49
Speaker
Yeah, the new one came out and it was ultimately called The Unknowns, this weird, skittery creature. But what I wanted to do is rewind it a little bit, because when it was first teased, a lot of people thought it was going to be a Till Dawn crossover.
01:00:03
Speaker
And a lot of Native Americans in particular, they had a concern because the monster in that one, and I apologize, I know it's apparently a big no-no, that's why I brought this up, but just for the sake of our non-Native audience who doesn't know, Wendigo, it's a big no-no. Even saying the name is a big no-no. So a lot of Native Americans were concerned, like, oh, are they just gonna ignore the taboos and such with this one as well as they did in Until Dawn?
01:00:32
Speaker
developers came out. We hear you. Don't worry about it. It has nothing to do with this. We're just gonna, we're gonna do our own thing. And everybody was cool with it. And the reason I was happy or like, I found it neat that the developers were willing to listen to actual representatives of the culture that would have been the basis of whatever they were doing. Mick Gordon, the composer, when he did the soundtrack for Killer Instinct 2013, the newer one,
01:00:58
Speaker
He actually approached the Native tribe. I forgot the name of the tribe themselves, but they were in Dakota. He approached them to help him make a song for one of the characters, Thunder. And if you listen to the song, he uses traditional instruments. He has some of the tribesmen doing chants in the background, all kinds of stuff. I just wanted to really meet when you do accurate portrayals of a culture you're trying to represent.
01:01:23
Speaker
And I'm not just limited to Native American, that's just what clicked in my mind. Anything that you see that uses even just foreign or other things, it's always really super cool to see. I know that with, I think the most recent example I can think of is Ghost of Tsushima.
01:01:43
Speaker
Yes, yes, yes, yes, like they I think they said I can't remember I remember sucker punch said that I sent out a team to Japan there to just like like survey the lands to get like that and I believe they talked to like
01:01:57
Speaker
I can't remember who they, what exactly they talked to, but it like to just figure out like history, the history of the samurai and all of that stuff to get it as like accurate as possible. Exactly. It's always really cool to see that because it says like, oh yeah, that should be a standard for like what we do when it's like you want to do something like that. Right. And it's also like a regional thing when you think about, um,
01:02:25
Speaker
Fallout games. Fallout 4 was in Boston. That is a very Bostonian game. There's a lot of references you don't get unless you're from the area. I had to learn about from, you know, videos on YouTube, like, oh, did you know this and this and this? Like the Fenway Park thing, that one, I think it was a green seat or a red seat? I don't remember. But that had significance, like actual cultural significance to the people of Boston. That's actually really neat. I didn't know that at the time. Yeah, I know. It's super cool to see that.
01:02:55
Speaker
Yeah, that's what I'm saying. When they put in the effort, that's all it is, just a little bit of effort. You get so much done and people get so happy. It's just something I wish you would see Des do a little bit more, because I mean, there's games like...
01:03:08
Speaker
I'm trying to think of one off the top of my head that just, nah man. Okay, until done, but they did the whole bad spirit thing. I'm trying not to say the word because I had no clue that that was like a whole thing at all. Now granted, I've been Canadian. I don't think it's...
01:03:26
Speaker
It might be ignorance about because I just don't know if it's like a bit of I don't think it's ever barely been a thing for the Canadian First Nation tribes But then again, I really don't know because that was never really in our textbooks of like, oh, yeah Don't say the big bad monster name
01:03:44
Speaker
Yeah, I didn't know that until very, very recently. It's ignorance on all ends. But again, that's why I appreciated the devs saying, reaching out and saying, hey, we hear you. Don't worry about it. It has nothing to do with that. But if we ever do approach that in the future, we don't know. It's not a hard concept. It's just like, don't be a douchebag. That's the short version. Don't be a dick about it. And if you make that mistake, apologize, fix it, move on.
01:04:11
Speaker
Yeah, it's not a hard concept. So here's a question. Do you think for the Until Dawn remake that's coming out, do you think that they've changed that? Or do you think it'll still be... Is it just an HD upscaling that Until Dawn is getting for its remake? I think it's just an HD upscaling, so I don't think they're gonna change anything. I think they're gonna leave it exactly as is.
01:04:36
Speaker
But who knows? I mean, maybe like if enough people speak up or they say something, maybe developers say like, I feel like if anything would change, it would be for the Until Dawn movie that we know is in development.
01:04:49
Speaker
So maybe they'll make a change for that. We'll see because this is like I'm not very well over. I do. I do study history in college. For those who don't know, I do have a history minor, but native history is not something I've ever touched. So this is all new to me as well. I'm learning so much just from listening, listening to people talk.
01:05:09
Speaker
It's the player's voices that the devs listen to. So it's like, oh, hey, like if there's something that's like, if you know that, if you see something that's like culturally inaccurate, like it never hurts to just, you know, send the devs like an email or a DM and be like, oh, hey, I'm blank and blank. If you, the thing here is kind of slightly inaccurate. Here's how you could easily fix it.
01:05:37
Speaker
Like just having your voice heard or like just setting it out like it one single voice could make all the difference Well, it's like in the best case scenario the devs listen The worst case scenario the devs don't listen because yeah, yeah As we said just don't be a douchebag. That's Yeah, just be a respectful human being at the end of the day and
01:06:05
Speaker
Yeah, I'm glad you brought it goes to Sushima because that is also a really, really good example of respectful to the source material. I don't know how to say it, but to be respectful to the culture. That's a really good example. I thought you brought that one up. I think RGG also recently did it with Hawaii with Infinite Wealth's release. Oh, yeah.
01:06:27
Speaker
I still haven't played it myself, so I don't know how well. I watched a video of like the local Hawaiian reacts to like a dragon infinite wealth and just them walking around Hawaii and it's like I had no clue. It's like ABC stores are basically there 7-11 in Hawaii. I'm like, oh wow, really? That's wild. That's a real thing? Yeah.
01:06:52
Speaker
But it's like, that's crazy. Um, but yeah, just, uh, there's moments like, uh, I've never played ghost wire Tokyo. I'd soon it's on my list. Okay. Well, it's not really spoilers. I'll just go ahead and say what's my piece on that. It's a Japanese game that takes place in Japan, but there's so many elements in there that you can tell it was made for a non-Japanese audience.
01:07:16
Speaker
oh okay because there's a lot of things like you pick up the side i was like oh uh this is not a thing but like oh chopsticks you pick up chopsticks and chopsticks there's like a little description oh used by the people in japan to eat food like no shit and not from japan yeah i would know that
01:07:32
Speaker
Yeah, chopsticks. These specific chopsticks are like you could have got it. Oh, yeah, they're the wooden chopsticks. You got to tear apart or be the the the other. What's the material? Is it plastic? Is it hard? I don't know what the material is. It might be plastic. Maybe it is. I don't know. I don't know materials. I'm not a material. I'm not a material girl, as they say. Step, step, step.
01:08:00
Speaker
Yeah. Is there anything else you really want to add on the topic? I really don't know where else to go from here. No, no, no. Like I said, the only thing that I would ask developers is to just listen. If you hear somebody say something, at least take into consideration. Do your research. Please do your research. I think that's the biggest thing at the end of the day. Do your research and get it accurate.
01:08:25
Speaker
as much as you can. I mean, don't be those guys that made that one game. I forgot what it was called. It feels like a Swedish studio that they made a game about the Spanish conquest of Mexico. And I'm of Mexican descent. So this one hits a little bit close to me. What? That's the first I've heard. What? I cannot remember what it was called. If I ever remember, I'll let you know. But it was supposed to be a native trying to survive the conquistad, the Spanish conquistad of Mexico. And
01:08:56
Speaker
They were European studios, so they were getting European voices about it. So they added an option where you play as a Spaniard subjugating the people. That's just like, you really don't know who your audience for this game was supposed to be, do you? No Mexican's ever gonna touch this game now. That was just like nowhere near culturally sensitive, I guess would be the word.
01:09:23
Speaker
I'm just going to say this, not to like, bombard the Swedes, but like, I don't know if you remember the remake that they made for KO, the kangaroo. I've never, I'll never get over the fact that Swedes tried to do an Australian accent. It did not work. It really didn't work and it made that game awful. I'm sorry.
01:09:50
Speaker
It was it just what you could have just like hired some Australians
01:09:57
Speaker
to do the voices, and I feel like it wasn't fine. It still was an awful game because of gameplay, but like the voice acting was not good at all. It just wasn't good. And it's not like it's like cult. I wouldn't say it's like that. That's like bad. Big of a cultural thing of that one. But like when you bring up the Swedes, it's just like, I'm reminded by that. And I'm like, yeah, they did that too.
01:10:23
Speaker
Okay, here it is, Ekumin Aztec. That's the name of the game. Huh. Yeah, I can say I've never heard of it. Yeah, that's the one. They got backlash because they want somebody defending the European conquest of the native peoples. Like, I don't even know. Hey, if history has told us anything, you don't do that.
01:10:50
Speaker
Don't defend who were clearly the bad guys. Yeah, sure, history happened. That shit happened. You don't make the game defending them. Let's just take a moment to say like, hmm, maybe killing all those people was a bad thing. Yeah, that's my piece on the subject. Developers, please listen. People who feel like they're affected by this, please speak up. You never know if developers are willing to listen unless you say something. Exactly. That's my piece on that.
01:11:16
Speaker
All right, and with that, it's time for we'll wrap things up and head on into the bonus level.
01:11:21
Speaker
Crazy lists, great deals, and recapping gaming history. It's all here in the bonus level. And to start things off, you of course have this week in gaming history from February 26th to March 8th. Here's what happened in the past. Major event-wise, on the 2nd of March 2006, Xbox launched the Xbox 360 in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Taiwan, and in 2005 on the 2nd, in Arkansas.
01:11:48
Speaker
Senator Sean Womack introduced a bill that would require shops that rent or sell M rated games to display them at the height of at least five feet from the floor. And in video game birthdays, we got some games turning ages as to what ages do the math yourself. In 1996, Pokemon Red and Green released on the 27th. Oh, God, I remember I was there.
01:12:17
Speaker
Pokemon Day. That's what the direct is. I got red and blue Christmas that very year. Well, this is red and green. This was the original. Oh, right. No, red and blue was like the next year. Yeah. 1998 Tech and three that came out on the 28th. Yes. 2005. Double Bay Cry 3 came out on the first 2009. Halo Wars came out on March 3rd. 2017. Breath of the Wild came out March 3rd. And 2001. March 5th. Conqueror's Bad Fur Day.
01:12:47
Speaker
I'm just realizing how old I am because I remember every single one of these. I remember clearly watching commercials for like Conker's Bad Fur Day when Red and Blue came out. I remember the trailers like on TV. Oh my God, I'm old. That's crazy. Moving on to the top five. Top five personas in Persona 3 reload. Ooh. Ooh. So far. What would you say your top five are?
01:13:14
Speaker
So far. Okay. Um, I'm, you know, cause I remember the name, but there's the one that you obviously work up to and they give you like right there at the very beginning. The first fight. Orpheus. Orpheus. Yes. But he turns into something else. Thanatos. Thanatos. Thank you. Thanatos. Number one. I figured love Thanatos. Um, I don't remember names. So you're going to have to forgive me on some of these, uh, curious. I love hers. Oh, oh, that's the Leia. Yes. Um,
01:13:44
Speaker
Hermes. Hermes is really cool. I do just design alone. I like Matador a lot and I really do like I forget the name of it. The ones like a weird vampire elf Sin lead or something like that.
Character Discussions and Game Preferences
01:13:59
Speaker
I can't remember names. Yeah. I think I know which one you're talking about. Yeah. And then Ouroboros is really cool too because I like all the snake heads and stuff. That's just cool looking to me.
01:14:10
Speaker
Yeah, Ouroboros is a good one. I like Mithras a lot. Yeah, Mithras is cool. And I think Mithras has like a Thurgi when you get another one. I can't remember which one it is. I think it's Siegfried. It might be higher than Siegfried though. That it has a Thurgi with.
01:14:30
Speaker
Looking forward to unlocking it, I just unlocked the King and I, which you get with Kingfrost and Blackfrost. I haven't used it. I haven't gotten Blackfrost yet. Yeah, Blackfrost was at 37. Yeah, 37, I think, is what you need to be to get Blackfrost. I will appreciate how theurgies work now, because in the original game, you had to have them in your party to use it. Yeah.
01:14:56
Speaker
And now it's just, did you lock him? All right, cool, go ahead. Yeah, yeah, that is very nice. Moving on from top five, head to head, two games enter, one game leaves. It's Persona 3 reload versus Persona 5 Royal. I have played Persona 5 and already...
01:15:12
Speaker
I mean, just the main guys right here. Jokers with Lupin, Zorro, the pirate one I forgot his name. Captain Kidd. Captain Kidd. This is all so good. Now I say this, I'll give you to Persona 5 already as a winner, but I do want to acknowledge that this is the later game of the series. They do have time to work on their designs, get everything together, come all together. They do have that luxury. I do acknowledge that advantage, but I do think Persona 5 had the better designs.
01:15:42
Speaker
Tony's game poll, moving on to our next segment. It's a poll that we have every season now going forward, where we ask one single question, and at the end of the season, we figure out what the top answer is of the season. Our question this season is, if Kingdom Hearts IV was to add a Disney Pixar world, what world would you add? Oh, I already know which one I would add, but I don't know how they would do it. And what game would that be? Or what world would that be? Sorry. Oh, Wally.
01:16:11
Speaker
Wally, oh, all right. That would be, I feel like they would put them on the ship and it would take place right when Wally gets on the ship in the movie wise. Well, I would think, I mean, we've already reached out that they could do two, quote, quote, levels for it. I was picturing like Earth level,
01:16:35
Speaker
with all the junk and stuff, and then the Heartless were like robots or something themselves, like jungle robots. That's what I was picturing. That would be cool too. That would be cool too. I just think that would be neat. Yeah, no, that definitely would.
Epic Games and Sales Rant
01:16:49
Speaker
Our deals of the week this week. Epic free games. Super Meat Boy Forever is free until February 29th.
01:16:58
Speaker
If you want a platformer that will make you rage Go get it and also there's a 2k publisher sale going on on steam We don't know. I don't know how long it's going to it may be over by the time you're listening to this Steam sales hey steam I'm gonna tell you this put some fucking dates on how long your sales are going till right please
01:17:18
Speaker
They do it for the winter sale and summer sale. For some, yeah, for some they do. And then there's others that they don't. Do it for all sales. Make it fucking mandatory. It's a pain enough to be like, oh, well, there's a sale going on here. Oh, it ends this weekend. Oh, there's a sale going on here. I don't know how long this is going on, so I don't know if I can even mention it. Give me dates so that way I can tell people how they can save money on their games.
Game of the Week and Recommendations
01:17:42
Speaker
Yeah. We're cheap and poor. Yeah, exactly.
01:17:46
Speaker
The achievement of the week is at Nightingale, the doctor is out, which is to complete the quest, gift for a gardener, and the game of the week... I mean, take a guess, it's Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. Was there even competition for that? I mean, Unicorn Overlord, if people, people are excited for Unicorn Overlord, there's some people excited for that. Yeah, there's people excited, but I mean, I'm sorry, but Final Fantasy VII, that is a zeitgeist. Yeah. That is the game for a lot of people.
01:18:14
Speaker
I don't know how many people said my favorite game ever because I was like six when I have a PlayStation and they gave me that copy and yada yada yada. I was just I like six more. I like six more. I am a hater. I will acknowledge this because my my girl Tara does get enough love. Fair enough. And lastly, our guest game recommendation, if there's one video game older news that you would recommend to the audience, what game would that be?
01:18:42
Speaker
Um, not that the remake is going to, well, it's been, they've been working on it. Uh, please don't play Silent Hill 2, the original one, if you can. I know it's hard. Not all of you have a PS2 and the PC version is kind of crap, but if you can figure out a way, I would definitely recommend playing Silent Hill 2 before the remake comes out, because that is just to me, at least the epitome of psychological horror games. And I'm scared that a lot of people are going to get their impressions from the remake. That's all I'm going to say.
01:19:08
Speaker
Fair enough. Well, with that, Zinn, that wraps up another episode here in the game lounge.
Social Media Handles and Conclusion
01:19:15
Speaker
Thank you, as always, for coming on today. Where can we find you? Thank you for having me. Where can we find you on the internet? On the internet. That's in Spanish on Twitter. I have an Instagram page if I don't use it. Of course, Twitch is my main thing, but anywhere else, just look for X in Spanish and you'll find me.
01:19:34
Speaker
Alrighty, and of course you can find me at Tony's Game Lounge everywhere. Tony's Game Lounge on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Twitch, and YouTube. We put out a brand new YouTube video last week. You can go check out, and of course go check out all the other previous episodes of the podcast. Be sure to like, share, and follow the podcast on whatever platform you're listening to this to. Zen, thank you again for coming on out today.
01:20:14
Speaker
Thanks for listening to this week's episode of Tony's Game Lounge. New episodes release every two weeks. Make sure to follow, like, and share the podcast on your streaming service and follow us on Instagram, YouTube, Twitch, and X.