Transcript
Speaker: Hey there, everybody.
Speaker: Welcome back to Pixel It.
Speaker: On today's episode, we're starting a brand new book series, Far Cry Absolution by Urban Waite.
Speaker: Urban Waite.
Speaker: No way.
Speaker: There's no way his parents gave him that name.
Speaker: Or her parents.
Speaker: That name is too cool.
Speaker: That is not a, that is not a name that somebody, uh, came up with when they were 15 years old and they were like, I'm going to go by urban weight.
Speaker: I'm going to go by Clive.
Speaker: True story.
Speaker: I remember you remember when you were a kid and you were getting your school pictures done and, uh,
Speaker: often it was done by some guy who was really good with the kids.
Speaker: And so he would like give everyone, everyone got a different nickname or something like that as they came down the way.
Speaker: Well, he called me Clive and I therefore decided that that must be the coolest alternate name that I can have.
Speaker: Because I'm so damn cool.
Speaker: Because I'm cool.
Speaker: I'm cool like Clive.
Speaker: Clive is cool.
Speaker: I'm Clive.
Speaker: Therefore, I am cool.
Speaker: That's just math.
Speaker: There's the math.
Speaker: So, boom.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Boom.
Speaker: But yeah.
Speaker: Or try absolution, baby.
Speaker: Far Cry Absolution.
Speaker: Now, we decided on this book, I think, before our first episode even aired.
Speaker: I think we had already picked it out.
Speaker: So it's been a long time in the making to get to Far Cry Absolution.
Speaker: And today we're going to cover the prologue and the first chapter, I believe, we had decided.
Speaker: Because the book is written in like four mega chapters.
Speaker: It's a prologue, four chapters, and an epilogue.
Speaker: It's not a crazy long book, but it's not a short one either.
Speaker: It's just over 300 pages.
Speaker: And Mr. Waite went ahead, and it's also, I don't know if you can see this, it's a very long, narrow book for some reason.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, I can't figure that out.
Speaker: Man, we are opening up all kinds of shit with this video.
Speaker: I could feel it.
Speaker: This is going to work.
Speaker: It is.
Speaker: It is tall and leggy.
Speaker: That's the kind of book that it is.
Speaker: So, yes.
Speaker: In the prologue, we have the sheriff, who I assume is supposed to be the same sheriff from the game, Sheriff Whitehorse.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: There's no name assigned to him.
Speaker: I think he's just referred to as the sheriff.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Right?
Speaker: I don't think they gave him the name.
Speaker: And we have our main character, and it's a bad sign that I already forgot her name.
Speaker: It's too-naked.
Speaker: It's Mary May.
Speaker: Mary May.
Speaker: I was thinking Maggie May.
Speaker: Well, I mean, it's Maggie Mae.
Speaker: Maggie Mae.
Speaker: That's good.
Speaker: That's a good one, too.
Speaker: No, Mary Mae.
Speaker: She is talking to the sheriff.
Speaker: Because her daddy's died, her mama has died recently, and her brother is in a cult.
Speaker: And really, that is just the trifecta of... And who can't relate with that?
Speaker: Already, super relatable content.
Speaker: I think we've all been there.
Speaker: We've all been there.
Speaker: So yeah, and everything, like her father's death, at very least, is...
Speaker: It's just mysterious circumstances.
Speaker: I don't think they go into it with her mother too much, but at least with the father.
Speaker: She's like trying to... basically she's trying to talk the sheriff into doing something.
Speaker: You know, that classic action movie.
Speaker: We gotta do something with those Eden's Gate boys.
Speaker: It's a cult that has basically taken over their town.
Speaker: And he points out, he says that, you know, they're in this huge place full of every kind of person.
Speaker: You know, he says, we've got preppers, you know, like, because they're in Montana.
Speaker: So, yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker: We got preppers, we got cowboys, we got libertarian anarchists.
Speaker: We've got, you know, farmers.
Speaker: I think it's funny.
Speaker: It's like he has he lists all these things and he kind of uses all of the most like the pejorative terms for each group, it feels like.
Speaker: And then at the end, he says and Democrats.
Speaker: Hold on, I've got it.
Speaker: I've got it right here.
Speaker: We got preppers.
Speaker: We got doomsday freaks.
Speaker: We got whole families of folks living in shacks up in the hills.
Speaker: No power, no water.
Speaker: Grandma and the great grandkids sleep in three to a bunk while mommy and daddy make more.
Speaker: We got gun nuts.
Speaker: We got bunkers and compounds.
Speaker: We got free thinkers, anarchists, nihilists, Democrats, and God knows what else, but I'm telling you.
Speaker: what i saw up there at eden's gate the conviction they have the goddamn power they gave to the words of the father it was infectious it got damn near under my skin and they're believers you know every one of them and that's not to say a bad thing about them or to question their faith but i tell you it scared me more than anything i have yet to see this life and there's not a thing i can do about that because you know what it's perfectly legal i gotta say
Speaker: It's like the most, the most neoliberal reaction to the, I gotta tell you what's going on up there scares the fuck out of me.
Speaker: Makes me shit.
Speaker: But it's their religious freedom.
Speaker: They're fine.
Speaker: It just scares the shit out of me.
Speaker: They're eating babies, but you know, religious freedom.
Speaker: We gotta, we gotta make sure that they remain untouched.
Speaker: That baby probably, you know, probably desired to be eaten because that's the true believer baby.
Speaker: The true believer baby desires to be drawn and quartered and put into four vials.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And then, and then spread to the, to the four Lords.
Speaker: And then there's, there's the big lady and, and there's a giant weird fetus underground.
Speaker: And, uh,
Speaker: Resident Evil Village was actually taking place in Montana.
Speaker: Resident Evil Village.
Speaker: Game of the Year 2021.
Speaker: Probably, actually.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: It's up there.
Speaker: So the prologue is basically two scenes.
Speaker: The first scene is her complaining to the sheriff.
Speaker: The sheriff is like...
Speaker: It's bad, but it's legal.
Speaker: And then we have the introduction of the guy who is basically, if you played Far Cry 5.
Speaker: Now, Far Cry, you can play in any order you want.
Speaker: But the way the game is kind of funnels you for a beginner, it's like,
Speaker: take this guy first and you are introduced to basically who is the guy who's the first boss of the game yeah um and is basically the big bad of the book john seed yeah and and before we go any further this is a prequel
Speaker: Yes, it is a prequel to Far Cry 5.
Speaker: played and he's like the televangelist of the family.
Speaker: He's like this new age, up with people, the power of positive thinking kind of hippy dippy guy.
Speaker: He seems kind of silly and stupid at first.
Speaker: He doesn't seem dangerous.
Speaker: Yeah, he's he seems a little he's not like the paramilitary guy, Jacob.
Speaker: He's not creepy like the father, Joseph, who is actually the middle brother.
Speaker: But we'll unpack that later.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: He's he's like he's he's got this positivity type of thing.
Speaker: Like, yes, you can do it, too.
Speaker: You know?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's a it's a very.
Speaker: You know.
Speaker: oh, what is it?
Speaker: The bakers.
Speaker: You know, it's a very, you know, televangelist, like, if only you would just, you know, you can do it and you've got God on your side and if only you would give me all of your money and free will, then you would... You can be saved too if you give me your money.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: And there's got to be something, and maybe this is like an idea for you in the future to write a play unpacking the idea that
Speaker: The Protestant Reformation and the schism from the Roman Catholic Church started because of tithes, and now a lot of Protestantism is about giving preachers all your money.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: It is not to get it off on a side tangent here, but for those of you who don't know, Kevin and I met in grad school in the film department and true story.
Speaker: I went to the professor that we both met under no names, but I
Speaker: And I, I brought a, um, it was for a pilot class.
Speaker: He wrote for Bill Cosby.
Speaker: Let's say that.
Speaker: And let's just point that out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And so I brought him, we were, it was a pilot class.
Speaker: I brought him my pilot idea, which was about a televangelist and, and faith healer kind of guy.
Speaker: And, uh, basically about him keeping the grift alive, that sort of thing.
Speaker: Uh, and he, uh,
Speaker: First off, he's a pretty pious man.
Speaker: I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that that is not the reason that he told me to just forget about this idea and move on to another one.
Speaker: But that is what he said.
Speaker: He told me, he said, you know, this isn't going to get no one's going to pick this up.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: You know, this this kind of thing in America, especially.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: And and actually,
Speaker: He has a point, but I really wanted to write it.
Speaker: But based on that information, I decided not to even bother writing it.
Speaker: And then years later, the mighty gemstones, is that what it was called?
Speaker: The...
Speaker: I think I know what you're talking about.
Speaker: I don't know if that was the name.
Speaker: It might have been the name.
Speaker: It's a, it's a movie of the movie, something like that.
Speaker: The mighty something.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And it's a TV show about a group of televangelists and that whole thing.
Speaker: And it's, and there was another one, another TV show that came out that is under similar,
Speaker: about similar circumstances.
Speaker: The point is, the point I'm trying to say is if there are any budding creatives or writers out there or anything like that, just fucking write it.
Speaker: Just do it.
Speaker: Just do it.
Speaker: Just write it anyway.
Speaker: Just do it anyway.
Speaker: Even if you... Even if your old white professor says no.
Speaker: Especially if your old white professor says no.
Speaker: It means you're barking up the right tree.
Speaker: Yeah, it was also a central plot in, what was it?
Speaker: The, oh shit, Matlock?
Speaker: No, was it Matlock?
Speaker: Matlock?
Speaker: No, it was one of those shows and they did a version for, on HBO, that was like the origin.
Speaker: You're talking about Perry Mason?
Speaker: Perry Mason, there we go.
Speaker: Perry Mason?
Speaker: Very different shows.
Speaker: Perry Mason, Matlock, Columbo, they all...
Speaker: They're all the same.
Speaker: They're all bleh.
Speaker: They merge together.
Speaker: They're all cops, right?
Speaker: They're all cops.
Speaker: Well, you know, they're all lawyers.
Speaker: That just made me so happy.
Speaker: They all work... They all are officers of the law.
Speaker: ADAD.
Speaker: ADAD.
Speaker: All detectives are bastards.
Speaker: ADAD.
Speaker: Anyway, Perry Mason.
Speaker: Perry Mason.
Speaker: The Perry Mason HBO series, which is set before he becomes a lawyer and is a cop.
Speaker: Ah, ah, um, or a private investigator.
Speaker: Uh, anyway, it doesn't matter.
Speaker: There's a story.
Speaker: There's basically that there's like a, there's a evangelist, uh, grift in 19, uh,
Speaker: 30s Los Angeles or something like that which is actually ironically where a lot of these things were born where it was was the first half of the century in Los Angeles yeah yeah and and I am not for the record saying that I would have written a better script or better pilot or anything than what has come out but I would much rather have written the thing and see someone else do the idea and we go oh man god damn it blah blah blah then to me to me go oh right I had an idea for that
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, and I look off into the middle distance and cry once once.
Speaker: So we're halfway through the prologue.
Speaker: We're on page like seven.
Speaker: Well, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: So yeah.
Speaker: So Mary May is trying to leave and she is stopped by John Seed.
Speaker: Mary Mason that bums me out.
Speaker: John Seed.
Speaker: John Seed.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They, whoever, the, the, the person who created the names, the writer who created the names for this game,
Speaker: They knew what they were doing.
Speaker: They must have.
Speaker: Yeah, there's a lot.
Speaker: It might have also been a play on like apple seed.
Speaker: Oh, sure.
Speaker: American traditions.
Speaker: American tradition and all that and all that stuff.
Speaker: I could totally see that.
Speaker: But seed is a word that's one of those words that's.
Speaker: It's like lover.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Kind of a bummer of a word.
Speaker: Moist seed.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: See, I'm moist.
Speaker: I'm kind of I'm kind of desensitized to by now.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But I might have to censor that I actually said moist seed.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's that's offensive.
Speaker: That's not safe work.
Speaker: It's upsetting.
Speaker: So.
Speaker: So John Seed stops her basically, and he threatens her basically all in out.
Speaker: It's really clear that Edensgate's got a really tight hold on this town.
Speaker: He's got this posse of guys with what might be rifles or assault rifles in the distance.
Speaker: She's trying to drive up the hill to get to the HQ of this Edensgate so she can get her fucking brother.
Speaker: And and he's basically threatening her saying, you know, he's up there.
Speaker: He's fine.
Speaker: You know, don't don't don't stick your nose where it don't belong.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And yeah, she she just she just runs basically.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: She just guns her engine and she's like, I'm going to go find my brother.
Speaker: And more or less, there's a bit of a.
Speaker: It's it's like a it's like a it's not necessarily a chase sequence, just kind of like a I'm going right.
Speaker: And then she crashes her car.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Then she flips the car and it doesn't.
Speaker: And it says it says it literally I have in my notes.
Speaker: She hits.
Speaker: something.
Speaker: And that's because that's all they gave us.
Speaker: They're like, like whatever was she hit flips the car.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So fine.
Speaker: And then we get part one and we get the, the classic, you know, you can see this as a movie.
Speaker: You totally see it.
Speaker: Like, this is our opening moment.
Speaker: The car flips in the dark.
Speaker: You, you, you hear the, the, the, you know, tinkle of glass and the clicking of an engine exhaust floating to the air.
Speaker: And then it fades down and you see,
Speaker: one week before you know it's hilarious though because i i listened to it on audible and you know what's missing on audible and suddenly makes this first chapter make more sense the one week before is never said oh no shit that makes a difference that's kind of a big oversight on their part yeah
Speaker: It just says the bear was big, more grizzly down out of Canada.
Speaker: Thunder had woke.
Speaker: And here's the thing.
Speaker: Um, it, I don't, it, it's, it's a big oversight.
Speaker: I kind of put it together anyway.
Speaker: It didn't matter, but, um,
Speaker: What I love about this first chapter is that 50% of it is just talking about the nature of Montana.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: There is, it is not plot at all.
Speaker: It is literally pure character and setting.
Speaker: This guy is getting his Cormac McCarthy on.
Speaker: Oh god yes.
Speaker: In a big, big damn way.
Speaker: This guy put down No Country for Old Man, The Road, and Blood Meridian, and then was like, we're gonna write something rugged!
Speaker: They hired him for this Far Cry book.
Speaker: And he's like, all right, so what's Far Cry game about?
Speaker: It's like, well, you know, you parachute and you headshot people and it's like jet ski off of ramps.
Speaker: And you have a and in this one, you're going to have a cougar that that will kill people for you.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And and he's like, got it.
Speaker: So and then he's like, Anton Chigurh.
Speaker: where is it where's this one set where's this one set and they're like Montana and something in him goes Montana and just goes I know what I'm gonna write and so it starts out with
Speaker: And I'll do it in the voice of the narrator.
Speaker: Please, I insist that you do.
Speaker: The bear was a big boar grizzly down out of Canada.
Speaker: Thunder had woken Will Boyd, and he had come out into the night and looked to the north, where the silhouette of the northern Rockies stood like dark centuries amid the lighter gray of cloud and moon.
Speaker: The storm was somewhere to the north.
Speaker: He had felt it building all through the day as he worked, the air growing thick in that damp, heavy feel that built with it.
Speaker: Erased in a second as the rain came down and the sky lit and cracked open like shattered lake ice soon subsumed by the pool of water it had grown from.
Speaker: Oh, my God, that's a lot of.
Speaker: And then Johnny Cash, God's going to cut you down, just starts playing in the background.
Speaker: God.
Speaker: Yeah, that's right.
Speaker: But you're right.
Speaker: This is, I think more so than anything we've read on this show.
Speaker: This one has aspirations of being downright literary at times.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: This game, this book is like, this is the book that is, that is yearning and pulling at the shackles of the game that it comes from.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: and it's hilarious because i'm a i am a huge far cry fan i have played all of them i've finished all of them at least twice uh right at least since they rebooted i did i i haven't much patience for one and two just because they're very different games but when they kind of rebooted them with three um i played all of those games and they're like
Speaker: standalone DLC, Far Cry Primal, all of that shit.
Speaker: I've played them all through at least twice each.
Speaker: Including the Far Cry 5 sequel?
Speaker: Yeah, in the future.
Speaker: The Twins.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Oh yeah, I've played them all.
Speaker: And they're all really satisfying to me.
Speaker: Someone, I think, described the game series as like Grand Theft Auto in paradise, because they're always in these far-flung, beautiful areas.
Speaker: And I always thought of them as like a first person shooter through the eyes of Hunter Thompson.
Speaker: They're kind of drug addled and yes.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And they're so close.
Speaker: The writers of these games, it's frustrating to me because I just played.
Speaker: They're fucking satisfying, man.
Speaker: Oh, sure.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Just so good.
Speaker: But the writers frustrate me because they're so close to something really actually kind of poignant at times.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And I think they know it.
Speaker: And, but they're just, at least so far, the writers are not big of mind enough to get it onto the other side of it, or the producers have stopped them or something like that.
Speaker: And I think,
Speaker: And I think that's something to be said for and for those of you familiar with the Far Cry series, it is created by Ubisoft, which is a French video game company that has been in the news quite a bit over the past six months or so.
Speaker: Yeah, they got problems.
Speaker: For their toxic work environment.
Speaker: You know, you have sexual harassment.
Speaker: You have general harassment.
Speaker: You have all sorts of issues coming out where the higher-ups were taking advantage of their employees.
Speaker: And I just wanted to state that.
Speaker: Obviously, we don't condone the issues.
Speaker: We don't condone this company or their actions or what have you.
Speaker: And I think part of it is you have a company like Ubisoft, which in prior years has stated that Assassin's Creed, that Far Cry, even this this specific Far Cry are not political.
Speaker: Oh, sure.
Speaker: And I thought them they're so full of shit.
Speaker: They're so full of shit.
Speaker: And I think the problem is you have these writers.
Speaker: You have you probably have writers that are hamstrung and I'm not speaking with any inside knowledge, but I'm assuming you have writers that are hamstrung from some sort of.
Speaker: directive from above that like you can get this close to the line but you you can't go any further and you can tell when you play far cry 5 that it is this close to the line to saying something about um religious religious extremism right white terrorism things like that
Speaker: but never quite actually gets there.
Speaker: Never, never actually crosses the finish line.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's like, it's running.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They really do believe in the whole go woke, go broke kind of idea that if they, if they take sides on anything, they're going to lose all this money and blah, blah, blah.
Speaker: And it's like, man, your confirmation or denial of,
Speaker: You know, whether or not you, the creators, see this as a doesn't change shit.
Speaker: Like you're still out in the middle of Montana fighting white religious extremists.
Speaker: Yeah, it doesn't change anything.
Speaker: Basically, what we're saying is we know about the stink that's surrounding this stuff and on top of that.
Speaker: But it does color what we're talking about with the book here.
Speaker: And because I think you're right, I think the most likely scenario is absolutely, as you said,
Speaker: the writers are hamstrung somehow.
Speaker: I think Urban Weight here, because it was a book and they figured most people wouldn't read the book.
Speaker: He's a little less so.
Speaker: He got away with a little more.
Speaker: My guess is that they were like, the editor kind of glanced at it and went, okay, great, fine.
Speaker: Nothing blatant.
Speaker: That's fine.
Speaker: Yeah, as long as it's in the subtext.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Can our fanbase read?
Speaker: Oh, they can.
Speaker: Oh, well.
Speaker: That's a little different then.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So right off the bat though, yeah, we've got this, a tapestry.
Speaker: The dude like, sets the stage beautifully.
Speaker: It is a tapestry.
Speaker: Really, really well.
Speaker: um yeah and and so we're dealing with will boyd here who is a hunter and a trapper who's worked we know that he's worked the area for about a dozen years or so um he's talking about a grizzly that has gotten loose somehow out in the area come in from canada uh and i did and i did not know a male bear is called a boar
Speaker: Yeah, I didn't know that either.
Speaker: I was like, isn't that a pig?
Speaker: And like, I guess it's a man.
Speaker: But I tell you what, when I when I read the words boar grizzly, I came out with a new D&D monster.
Speaker: Ah, the pig bear.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: Yeah, he's basically hunting the land looking for this bear, and he traps and hunts and basically gives all of it to Eden's Gate.
Speaker: You get the impression that he's heavily in debt to them for one reason or the other.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And he's out there...
Speaker: hunting rabbits and he finds the bear in question and it's on the other side of a stream it's checking him out and basically because of the stream and that sort of thing it's not interested in him and he's not really doesn't seem to be interested in killing it in fact he gives it one of the rabbits he tosses a rabbit at it to basically be like alright you take this I'm gonna go the other way
Speaker: Pretty much.
Speaker: And so it's like a lot of heavy stuff about this bear and you're 25 pages in and you're like, is this a video game novel?
Speaker: What the fuck is going on?
Speaker: What is the point about this bear?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then you get to page 25.
Speaker: And it says here that the bear basically, he gets away from the bear and he's checking out the woods.
Speaker: He doesn't see him anywhere.
Speaker: And it says he dropped the rifle from his shoulder and stood looking over the forest and hills, the mountain farther on.
Speaker: He said to himself, just because you don't see him don't mean he's not out there.
Speaker: Ah, a clue.
Speaker: We've got our first bit of religious symbolism.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: And a bear.
Speaker: And a bear.
Speaker: Worship bear god.
Speaker: Sometimes you get the bear.
Speaker: Sometimes the bear gets you.
Speaker: Bear gets you.
Speaker: So, and this is about when we get introduced to...
Speaker: My character that I absolutely love to hate in this book, he is he is somehow a bigger piece of shit than than even John Seed.
Speaker: And that is that is saying something.
Speaker: Oh, you're introduced to Lonnie.
Speaker: What a dick.
Speaker: It's just this.
Speaker: He's like, he's basically the way after he's described, he's just like this skinny, wiry dude, somewhat muscular.
Speaker: You know what?
Speaker: He's basically he's basically Brad Pitt in Snatch.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Picture Brad Pitt and snatch.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like country hayseed version of that.
Speaker: He's every skinny slash vaguely muscular guy you knew in college who refused to wear anything but a dirty white t-shirt.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: With a big Adam's apple.
Speaker: And you, you know, you just, you loved him, but you also just,
Speaker: You also just wanted to punch him in that Adam's apple.
Speaker: It was just like sticking out so far.
Speaker: You just wanted to see what would happen if you just punched him right there.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I think I feel like it's like it's like the glowing dot on a Mega Man boss.
Speaker: And you hit him with the with, you know, the the the Shadow Man shuriken there and just.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: just blows him up.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then the Dr. Wily fight music starts.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: I would play Mega Man.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So later on, we get, we find Will, he's basically, he's giving up a bunch of his, the game and stuff that he has hunted and tracked over to, yeah, Eden's Gate and Lonnie's taking it.
Speaker: And Lonnie just threatens him like over and over again in this chapter.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Like, yeah, Lonnie is Lonnie is basically like, he's like, hey, you remember all the stuff the church did for you?
Speaker: You know, he's he's basically like, like, you know, we you you've done a lot for for us, but the church has still done more for you.
Speaker: Like, like, you're the debt's not it.
Speaker: It like kind of hints that the debt isn't paid, all that kind of stuff.
Speaker: And basically, yeah.
Speaker: So they're having this discussion.
Speaker: Oh, I gotta go find our dog outside.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Oh God.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Hi everyone, this is Phil the Conquistador.
Speaker: While Kevin's gone, I want to tell you that I'm the genius behind all of this.
Speaker: This is all me.
Speaker: I have done everything.
Speaker: I came up with the idea I edit every single episode.
Speaker: I wrote most of the books that we are reading.
Speaker: And I developed the technology necessary for us to record ourselves through video and audio, in fact.
Speaker: So I think we should all take a moment, celebrate me.
Speaker: Please make sure to send Steam gift cards and cupcakes my way.
Speaker: You can find me at Twitter at El Conquistadorc.
Speaker: Moving on.
Speaker: It was the new puppy.
Speaker: She was, well, April let her out into the backyard.
Speaker: But she's like this little thing.
Speaker: I showed you the picture, right?
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: She's a little thing, like four pounds.
Speaker: And she lets her out in the backyard to go potty.
Speaker: And then she goes, she poops, she pees.
Speaker: And then April goes to pick her up to bring her back inside.
Speaker: And the dog's just
Speaker: Now it's doing zoomies out in the back.
Speaker: So April's like, can you just please like, so we had to do like a two person tag team like maneuver to, Oh yeah.
Speaker: That's to get this dog back into the house.
Speaker: I'd say the older I get and the more friends I know with kids and that sort of thing who are married, it's like that's the main purpose of a marriage.
Speaker: You know, like, okay, we gotta make sure.
Speaker: Yeah, you just need extra hands.
Speaker: I mean, yeah, that's pretty much it.
Speaker: Pretty much it.
Speaker: So yeah, let me see.
Speaker: We were talking about Lonnie.
Speaker: Talking about Lonnie, that piece of shit.
Speaker: I think right off the bat you realize you're dealing with a total dickweed here, because he's looking at all the food, the game that Will's brought him, and he asks him about the deer.
Speaker: He brought him a deer, and he says, what are you going to do with the head?
Speaker: and will says i don't know he's probably gonna you know he's gonna put it on the wall yeah yeah put it on the wall and lonnie's like sure the father probably really liked that it sure would be a nice gift together yeah you're not giving that to the father you're putting that over your bed
Speaker: Next to your Van Halen poster.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And your beer can collection.
Speaker: So it's funny is because like, so like Will is being like the, the big, the bigger person he's doing his job.
Speaker: He's like, you know, it's going to take me a few hours.
Speaker: I gotta, I gotta, I gotta skin the deer.
Speaker: I gotta like drain the blood and I gotta, I gotta separate the muscle groups, cut out all the sinew, get it ready.
Speaker: And Lonnie's like, just skin it and throw it into the truck with the head.
Speaker: It's like, okay, it's such a dick.
Speaker: Like right off the bat.
Speaker: Like not even, not even over anything particularly important.
Speaker: Yeah, no, it's just the deer.
Speaker: Asshole.
Speaker: And Lonnie has, but Lonnie has a special job for Will.
Speaker: Oh, yes.
Speaker: He has a special job.
Speaker: So, so basically, and this is, this is more or less,
Speaker: the inciting incident, I guess, of the book.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: If you want to put it in film phrases, this is kind of like, this is kind of what kicks off.
Speaker: If the story is really about Will, Will Byers, is that, that's his name, right?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Bill Boyd.
Speaker: Boyd.
Speaker: Will Boyd.
Speaker: Will Boyd.
Speaker: If the story is about Will Boyd's, it's really Will Boyd's journey, right?
Speaker: Is this book.
Speaker: this job that Lonnie gives him is more or less what kicks off that journey of introspection that Will goes on through the course of the book.
Speaker: And basically what Lonnie wants is for Will to hunt down and kill the grizzly that has come down from Canada.
Speaker: And Will has been interested in this grizzly, of course, as we've seen, but he also points out, like, he respects the grizzly,
Speaker: But he also points out to Lonnie like, hey, it's illegal for us to kill it.
Speaker: It's protected.
Speaker: We can't go kill grizzlies.
Speaker: And Lonnie's like, well, we can do whatever we want on church lands.
Speaker: And they kind of can.
Speaker: He's kind of right.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They are kind of making the laws themselves, you know?
Speaker: Yeah, they're in charge here, man.
Speaker: So, yeah, he basically... And then Will tells him a story about when he was in Vietnam, because he's a vet, about them hunting this man-eating tiger that was slowly killing off
Speaker: one after the other like all these just members of his his platoon right now and it's it's a good damn story uh hold on there's actually there's a movie i was thinking about um that um oh what was the name of that movie
Speaker: I think Val Kilmer was in it.
Speaker: Hold on.
Speaker: Hold on.
Speaker: Hold on.
Speaker: Hold on.
Speaker: I'm telling the listeners to hold on.
Speaker: Hold on, listeners.
Speaker: Hold on, listeners.
Speaker: Put your yap in.
Speaker: Have some respect.
Speaker: It was in the 90s, I think.
Speaker: Yeah, I think it was in the 90s.
Speaker: The Ghost in the Darkness.
Speaker: Oh, there we go.
Speaker: A bridge engineer and an experienced old hunter begin a hunt for two lions after they start attacking local construction workers.
Speaker: Oh, that sounds fun, actually.
Speaker: That sounds like a computer.
Speaker: And that is starring Michael Douglas and Val Kilmer.
Speaker: That's a great combo.
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: I'm intrigued.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: So, but basically, yeah, he tells Lonnie the story about this tiger, which is hunting and killing parts of, like, members of
Speaker: his platoon or anyone who tries to hunt the tiger gets, ends up getting killed.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And he tells them this whole story about what they decided to do about the tiger.
Speaker: And they build this pit and this trap and all that stuff.
Speaker: And that the tiger doesn't fall for it and ends up killing more people.
Speaker: And ends up killing the people who built the tiger trap.
Speaker: Crazy smart animal.
Speaker: And Lonnie is waiting for... Because Lonnie, you can tell, is one of these assholes who's like, he expects people just to do whatever hell he is, he says.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker: And so he's telling them this story.
Speaker: And at this point he says, and you killed it.
Speaker: No, Will said, how do you kill something you can't see?
Speaker: Lonnie finished his cigarette and flicked it away towards the fire pit.
Speaker: You think this bear is supernatural?
Speaker: You think this bear is some heavenly retribution?
Speaker: The father would love that.
Speaker: That would be scripture to the man.
Speaker: No, Will said, I'm saying I don't know a goddamn thing.
Speaker: I'm saying I can't help you, which is probably, well, it's certainly untrue.
Speaker: Yeah, he's absolutely the guy that they want to talk.
Speaker: He's absolutely pretty much the only person who would probably know how to handle a grizzly.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: But that doesn't mean he wants to do it like he doesn't want to do it at all.
Speaker: What ends up happening is.
Speaker: He tells Lonnie this story and we kind of fast forward to it's probably like the next day or so.
Speaker: And Lonnie has had a crew of people dig a pit with spikes, basically as Will described in the story over in the woods.
Speaker: And Will has trapped it with these beaver beaver carcasses.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And they have this discussion about if you tie off a certain gland in the beaver, it ends up smelling like artificial vanilla or something like that.
Speaker: And I and I looked that up.
Speaker: That is absolutely real.
Speaker: That is.
Speaker: And I'm not surprised with the level of detail that Urban Weight has put into this book.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's called, I think, castoreum.
Speaker: It is a gland found in the asshole of beavers.
Speaker: And it smells like vanilla and humans love it.
Speaker: And if you see, if you have vanilla scented or flavored something and it says, and it doesn't say imitation vanilla and it doesn't say vanilla ingredients, it says natural flavorings.
Speaker: You're probably eating something from a beaver's asshole gland.
Speaker: This is an absolutely real thing.
Speaker: Your imitation vanilla is beaver ass.
Speaker: beaver ass you know and look some of us love eating ass even when it's not vanilla flavored but that's a step i think that's a that's a bridge too far my friend a bridge too far that's a bridge too far a beaver too far god damn it oh boy so the trap works um not exactly kind of the trap works in that the trap activates
Speaker: What they end up killing with the trap is not the boar grizzly that they wanted.
Speaker: They wanted to kill.
Speaker: It was it was a it was a mama bear.
Speaker: It was a mama grizzly.
Speaker: And it basically he says, now I know why the boar was coming down to look for food because his mate is pregnant.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: Or or at least they have a baby.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And yeah, yeah, it's yeah.
Speaker: It kind of gets gets dark and mixed in with all this around the same time.
Speaker: They're talking about the cattle ranchers who used to live on the property.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: The the the Kershaw's their cattle ranchers out there and they're just kind of disappeared.
Speaker: Gone is the word that they use.
Speaker: And it's creepy how nonspecific that Lonnie gets about where they are.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: He says they've been repurposed.
Speaker: Repurposed, which is like... And that's certainly not Stalin talk.
Speaker: That's not... Yeah, that's definitely not a version of disappeared by...
Speaker: good god yeah that is creepy as um and uh but the bear has been there uh they're they're all their cattle are gone and ronnie you know and lonnie says the most of them they had like taken and eaten uh at eden's gate uh but yeah the bear apparently they're blaming on blaming losing some cattle on the bear
Speaker: Well, it's funny, though, because, like, it's such a weird moment.
Speaker: It's almost surreal in that Lonnie's like, well, we got to kill this bear because it ate the cattle.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: There's almost there's like no cattle left.
Speaker: And the cattle that the only cattle
Speaker: the rest of the cattle weren't killed by the bear.
Speaker: It was just like one cow.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But this bear is now a problem because it killed like the last cow or something like that.
Speaker: It's honestly really good writing in the sense of allegory.
Speaker: It's just like, oh no, it doesn't, the bear doesn't really stand to hurt us in any way.
Speaker: Just fuck him.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Cause we're the ones in charge here.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: and that's it um and and we do get a moment uh before he wakes up in the morning and finds that the trap has worked which i folks i i had i had to make a note here it it mentions not in any specific way but it says here it basically says that he's miss he misses his daughter and his wife they are gone for some reason um uh they imply that he used to be a heavy drinker so maybe they left him because of that now he's just kind of sad
Speaker: uh and he falls asleep at the kershaw's house and uh ends up finding a nightgown in the place and smells it and um and uh and like holds it against him and just and it's and it's really it's just really really sad he's he's um he's so lonely and and yeah he's
Speaker: He's very lonely.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And he also has a moment during the night in which he witnesses John doing some baptizing.
Speaker: And I did not know that non-consensual baptisms were a thing.
Speaker: Evidently they are.
Speaker: They are definitely in Eden's Gate.
Speaker: Now the game kind of expands upon this because I believe the non-consensual baptizing is also done under the effects of the bliss.
Speaker: Bliss kind of makes a lot of the things that Eden's Gate is able to do make sense.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Because it's a semi, it's a hallucinogen that has some like mind control properties.
Speaker: And I gotta be honest with you, one of my main problems with the way they handle the storyline in the video game of Far Cry 5 was the bliss.
Speaker: Because the whole explanation basically is like, oh, all these people weren't brainwashed, um...
Speaker: you know, well, they were brainwashed, but it was because of this drug, you know, it's like, no man, people do horrifying murder shit all the time because they're, you know, because their worst selves are appealed to by people like this every day.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And also once you introduce the idea that these people are under the influence of some sort of drug that has been forced upon them, the game becomes a lot sketchier in terms of like, oh yeah, feel free to kill the cultists.
Speaker: Right, right.
Speaker: It gives you permission.
Speaker: It's like killing zombies in a video game.
Speaker: They used to be people, but they're not anymore, so blow them all up.
Speaker: Yeah, it's really interesting.
Speaker: So Will wakes up in the Kershaw's house to this kind of light barking sound outside of the house.
Speaker: And that's when, as you pointed out, he finds this mother bear dead in the bottom of their tiger trap.
Speaker: And he realizes that the mother bear is, that the cub is the barking that he's hearing.
Speaker: So the mother bear is dead and has left this cub without a mom.
Speaker: And I am so sad.
Speaker: I was like, he's, Will, Will points out, he's like, the cub was probably circling around the pit, barking at the, at the corpse of his mother, trying to get her to come out, and then ran off.
Speaker: It was so sad.
Speaker: It was so sad.
Speaker: It was so sad, like you're like, oh my gosh.
Speaker: Motherfucker.
Speaker: Oh, it's so sad.
Speaker: Yeah, because that's exactly what it was.
Speaker: And so he starts searching for the cup because obviously he feels responsible.
Speaker: He feels bad.
Speaker: He feels bad.
Speaker: He's hoping that and at this point.
Speaker: As a person who's played Far Cry 5, I'm hoping
Speaker: that this is the bear companion that you'll eventually get in the game, whose name is Cheeseburger.
Speaker: Cheeseburger.
Speaker: And I love it.
Speaker: I would live and die for Cheeseburger the Bear.
Speaker: He's like Flipkup, I will die, I will die for Cheeseburger the Bear.
Speaker: I just love him so much.
Speaker: That's great.
Speaker: And at this point, I wrote this in my notes,
Speaker: book, if you kill this cub, I will never forgive you.
Speaker: Just like,
Speaker: I was just, I was like immediately, it took less than half a page for him to be.
Speaker: I love this cub.
Speaker: I love this cub.
Speaker: Please.
Speaker: I can't deal with this.
Speaker: I can't deal.
Speaker: So he's, he's, he's searching for the bear.
Speaker: He finds it is a little cub and he feeds one of the beaver.
Speaker: He takes one of the beavers that they use to attract the bear and feeds it to the cub and the cup starts following around.
Speaker: And the cub becomes his best friend.
Speaker: His best friends.
Speaker: Best friends forever.
Speaker: Will and the bear.
Speaker: Will and the cub.
Speaker: Fridays and Fox.
Speaker: Yes, exactly.
Speaker: It's a sitcom at this point.
Speaker: Yeah, and the next day... For brave, shining moments.
Speaker: They give you some light and happiness.
Speaker: Urban Weight is like...
Speaker: You know, even Cormac McCarthy has like a lighthearted moment occasionally.
Speaker: I'm going to give that to you now and then I'm going to take it away.
Speaker: Steal it away from you.
Speaker: Like Anton Chigurh with...
Speaker: With a compression gun to your forehead.
Speaker: That's just, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Cause the next day he wakes up with the bear and the bear and him go hunting together.
Speaker: He like goes and checks his traps for the rabbits and stuff in the woods and, and, and the bears with him.
Speaker: And you're like, yay adventures.
Speaker: This is the far cry I signed up for.
Speaker: I love animal companions in, in far cry five.
Speaker: It's so good.
Speaker: Um, and, uh, and then, uh,
Speaker: someone shoots at the bear.
Speaker: He assumes at first they're shooting at him.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Like, who's going to shoot at a bear cub?
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: But then it becomes clear that someone's shooting at the bear.
Speaker: And he pulls a John Lithgow, Harry and the Hendersons, you know, I don't want you anymore.
Speaker: Like, he doesn't say anything.
Speaker: He's white fanging.
Speaker: He's white fanging the bear.
Speaker: Yeah, that's a far more literary and respectable reference.
Speaker: And fuck you a little bit.
Speaker: Damn it.
Speaker: So, yeah.
Speaker: So he shoots at the bear.
Speaker: Like, he shoots at the bear's foot and shoots over its head.
Speaker: And finally, the bear, like, it just, it just, the bear gives him, like, one last look of betrayal because he just lost his mother.
Speaker: And I can't fucking take it.
Speaker: I was like, no.
Speaker: And the presumably cheeseburgery bear runs off.
Speaker: It's runs off in the woods.
Speaker: And guess who is holding the, who is shooting at it in the first place.
Speaker: Just guess.
Speaker: Just fucking Lonnie.
Speaker: Lonnie.
Speaker: Lonnie.
Speaker: And for fun, we brought in John seed as well.
Speaker: Yeah, for fun.
Speaker: For funsies.
Speaker: Two biggest dipshits in Hope County.
Speaker: Oh my god.
Speaker: Yeah, so they basically saw what was going on, but they don't really lay into him too thick about it, because they have a new job for him now.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: And they want him to hunt the most dangerous game.
Speaker: A girl.
Speaker: A girl.
Speaker: Is that, is that, that's probably a girl who has just been in a car accident.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Girl gets into a car and they, and they need him to help them hunt her down.
Speaker: And suddenly the prologue and the first chapter are nice and tied together.
Speaker: They tie together.
Speaker: Hmm.
Speaker: circles back around circles back around it's beautiful um so basically the bear now that we've talked about it it's like the grizzly bear represents anyone who stands against eden's gate exactly yeah it's basically like this is this is how anyone who stands against eden's gate is going to get and it doesn't matter what what trespass like it in in the nature of life the circle of life scheme of things this is a relatively minor trespass
Speaker: This is just a bear killing one of the last cows that a farm that is out of commission has.
Speaker: Doesn't even have anyone to work the fucking ranch.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But just because it did it, it was enough.
Speaker: Yeah, it was it was it was basically the bears thumbing its nose at them and they can't have that.
Speaker: And it's from a bear.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: And it circles back around to the conversation John Seed and Mary May had where Mary May is talking about how
Speaker: Like you wanted me to you want me to stop selling alcohol at the bar.
Speaker: And John's like, yeah.
Speaker: And she is like, well, how do you expect me to keep the bar open?
Speaker: And he goes, I don't.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Like, right.
Speaker: He's very clear about his intention.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's not.
Speaker: He's not.
Speaker: We're not being clever here.
Speaker: This isn't a riddle.
Speaker: They're very your front business to shut down.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: They are taking over.
Speaker: It's a hell of a first chapter in this book.
Speaker: Admittedly, it's a first chapter that goes on for 64 pages.
Speaker: It's the first chapter that's 64 pages and half of which is, is basically nature documentary.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And here's the thing we've, I'm, I'm, I'm here for it, man.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I'm digging it so far.
Speaker: Like, uh, it's just, uh, it's, it's, um, just well-written.
Speaker: It's got, it takes itself seriously, but not, uh,
Speaker: in that self-important bullshit kind of way that you would totally understand seeing in like an adaptation of a video game.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: You know, you can kind of see like them go, you know, I'm going to make something special out of this.
Speaker: I'm going to make a piece of art out of this.
Speaker: And it just disappearing up the author's asshole.
Speaker: But yeah, pretty good stuff.
Speaker: It's like, like it could go a couple of different ways.
Speaker: The worst possible way is like the Mario Brothers movie.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Um, and, but yeah, urban, urban weight, I think did a pretty tremendous job.
Speaker: Um, I would say it almost deserves not now.
Speaker: And I say, say deserves not to, not to put down far cry five.
Speaker: It almost deserves to not be a far cry book.
Speaker: Like, like this could have had been totally something else.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And just could have been some, something like Cormac McCarthy light.
Speaker: Um,
Speaker: um, book about a man, uh, a man and a woman, um, like a woman trying to find her brother and a man struggling against the, um, the, the, this church, but now has become a cult.
Speaker: in the time that he's been a member of it struggling against like you know and his own personal like that's that's some deep stuff right oh absolutely um and it and far cry five never quite it never gets half as deep as some of the implications and and and that's what it is that's how they designed it you know there's
Speaker: There's a part of you that's just kind of like, well, that's probably fine.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: But yeah, no, he he he offered.
Speaker: A little more something there's this there's there's definite total mismatch between the two big time, big time to read this.
Speaker: I have not.
Speaker: I want to.
Speaker: I have not started playing Far Cry 5 again a third time, too.
Speaker: Because I've got other games to play, but I know that I will play that game and 100% it, and just because I have to, because I fucking love that franchise.
Speaker: But yeah, I can imagine that playing the game while listening to this on an audiobook,
Speaker: Um, yeah, it would be a weird tonal shift.
Speaker: That would be very interesting.
Speaker: This is more like a novel that would have belonged with, uh, red dead redemption to door.
Speaker: Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker: As opposed to far cry.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Um, because red dead redemption two has the, um, has the, the far car five is beautiful.
Speaker: Don't get me wrong.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: Red Dead Redemption 2 really leans on the aesthetic and the sweeping landscapes.
Speaker: You're not in a car.
Speaker: You're in a horse.
Speaker: You're you're you're walking through this countryside.
Speaker: It really leans on that on that vibe.
Speaker: Whereas Far Cry 5 is like, oh, wingsuit.
Speaker: Right, right.
Speaker: Far Cry 5 will get you to those moments every now and then.
Speaker: Sure.
Speaker: But then it just jumps right back into the insanity of it.
Speaker: In fact, Far Cry 3 got a lot of flack for that, like the tone problems.
Speaker: They wanted to talk about really serious
Speaker: deep and dark off-limit stuff there, but they also wanted to have you hang gliding through the tropical wilderness, blowing up things and stuff like that.
Speaker: It's where I recall, I'm sure it was from another game, but that was the first time I ever heard of the term ludonarrative dissonance.
Speaker: with smart cry 3 and as much as i love that game yeah i can't deny that it's there yeah i believe the first time i heard it was that phrase was uh had to do with uncharted um because you're playing a guy who is like going through tombs and and trying to like get these treasures or what have you and at the same time he's killing thousands of people yes like like there there would be
Speaker: Some sort of like not not thousands, but there's a lot.
Speaker: There's actually an achievement.
Speaker: I believe there is an achievement in one of the uncharted games called ludonarrative dissonance when your account hits over a thousand kills or something like that.
Speaker: And for those of you who are listening who don't know what we're talking about, ludonarrative dissonance is basically when when your actions in a game, for example, don't match up.
Speaker: with the tone when you're told like the tomb raider uh by by uh crystal uh dynamics they had it was a similar problem i had with that where
Speaker: in between action scenes in the game, your character is very naive and very sweet and not a murderer and takes life very seriously.
Speaker: Uh, and, uh, and then in the actual gameplay itself, you're, you are straight up murdering the fuck out of dozens upon dozens of people.
Speaker: Compare that to something like the hit man series, which it is like the story and the gameplay actually kind of work together.
Speaker: And in fact, in Hitman, you're not even like you're not incentivized to kill anybody beside aside from the targets that you were assigned.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And that's that's part of it is like just is.
Speaker: So it's it's funny that like a game like Hitman where you play a killer, you can end up killing fewer people than Nathan Drake or Lara Croft, who are not killers.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Very distinctly not killers.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And that's basically the beginner's version of what is Lunar narrative.
Speaker: There's a whole thing.
Speaker: There's probably some YouTube videos on it.
Speaker: Yeah, go check it out.
Speaker: So that was the prologue of the first chapter of Far Cry Absolution.
Speaker: I'm looking forward to the rest of this book.
Speaker: So we'll take chapter two next time.
Speaker: And until then, you guys can follow us on Twitter at PixelitPod.
Speaker: We have a Discord now.
Speaker: I will pin that to the top of the Twitter.
Speaker: You can join the Discord.
Speaker: Find other people who are interested in the PixelitPodcast.
Speaker: And remember to give us a five star review on Apple iTunes or follow us on your favorite podcast app.
Speaker: It really helps us out.
Speaker: It helps people find us.
Speaker: It helps people.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: No, you know, it just it helps the algorithm put us near the top, which, let's face it, it's where we belong.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: That'll do it for tonight's episode.
Speaker: Thank you, everybody.
Speaker: Bye.
