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Gavlan Wheel? Gavlan Deal!
15 Plays6 months ago
Join Dave and Jake as they talk about capitalism in video games, Lorn's Lure, S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2, and our recommended game deals for the Steam autumn sale in this week's episode!
Intro:
- Heavy Weapon (PSN) - Main Menu
Outro:
- Honor of Kings - Revelation
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Transcript
Clothing Choices for Cold Weather
00:00:40
Speaker
going, everyone? Welcome to another episode of Soapstone. My name is Jake and I am joined by my co-host is always Dave. How's it going into today, Dave? It's going so cold. How are you? Are you warm? Are you inside? I am. mean I've never I've always assumed, but I've never asked. Are you inside? Yeah, ah it would be very funny if this was just like a set that only had these two walls. But otherwise, I'm just exposed to the elements.
00:01:08
Speaker
um But I am inside. I am in my basement. I'm wearing my shacket, which is ah not a word I came up with because I would have picked a less disgusting sounding one. But it is a shirt jacket that I bought from Sam's Club. So how is that not a jacket? It's like it's like fluffy and it where you wear it like a shirt. It's kind of like a.
00:01:31
Speaker
Yo, yo, um, can you get me one of those and I will pay you back because like I'm starting to shop for, or if you can just recommend a brand new, like starting to shop for warmer clothes, because I realized I'm going out there with like with the wind, basically paper thin stuff or just layers upon layers of things that don't really break the wind and don't insulate very well.
00:01:56
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. It is nice for that. It's kind of like, it's, it's definitely down from a coat, like a full winter coat or something, but it is, it is pretty warm. And I, they it's called a shirt jacket, a shacket, but I wear a shirt under it because without that, it feels like it would be wrong. So.
00:02:14
Speaker
Yeah, I don't want that fuzzy material, which from a distance, um my head just goes, oh, fleece. Yeah, it's basically a fleece like thing. I wouldn't want that touching my skin directly because I I'm a human. I sweat. Yeah. And it'll gross immediately. It will accelerate that if it's just on skin, it just heats up and what are you going to do? But ah but yeah.
00:02:38
Speaker
Warm here in my basement, got my slippers, we already talked about that in a previous episode, go back to listen to that one. um And I'm indoors, so got it all checked off. I don't know, my slippers are in. Oh no. Imagine them on my feet. but Never gonna make it, never gonna make it the full hour.
00:02:57
Speaker
Gonna turn into a popsicle. um I don't know how to transition from that to the next topic.
Holiday-themed Gaming
00:03:04
Speaker
The holidays are among us. we are among the Among Us holiday patches recently came out and you can play uh five new exciting roles such as pilgrim way of turkey okay i thought you were going for the um the town of salem reference that was the other kind of hidden role game are you familiar with that one Oh, yeah yeah, it's like you get to like you got like your priest and the constable and the werewolf or whatever and It was more in detail more in depth than among us the idea of them just randomly dropping five rolls to among us which currently has Two wrong one of them is a foster and the other one is crewmate is very funny They're like, yeah, now you're the ship's cook and you have nothing to do with the investigation I
00:03:54
Speaker
Did you cook? Yes. Here are my souffles. Well, it can't be that. Yeah. Right. Or and they mess up the recipe and you're like, I think they actually are the imposter. Someone was given a incorrect ingredient. Uh-huh. Just like a whoopee cushion on a plate. You know, like that's not correct. Yeah. I needed to. Maybe I'll do that today for dinner. Um,
Thanksgiving Meals and Social Norms
00:04:21
Speaker
to have an actual quote unquote holiday meal. There is a sandwich shop, um the Primo's chain, and they have a Thanksgiving hoagie, which is going to be structured probably the same way as Wawa's Gobbler. I was going to ask, but I imagine just with better ingredients.
00:04:42
Speaker
better piece Better pizza. papaja yeah amen yeah um I am curious, because I mean, Primo's products generally are a lot better, I would say. I would say a hot take, a Primo's hoagie is probably better than a Wawa hoagie in most cases.
00:05:00
Speaker
What do you specialize in, this one thing? What do you specialize in? Gas. Gasoline has actually been our thing for a long time. and also will have Anytime you don't have gasoline on the hoagie, that's a good day. That's a good day. at all Oh, so you get yours without gas. Classic Northwest. well No gas, all breaks. One person's like, what about the ethanol free gas on my stuff? Shut up. But now you have to let me how that and you'll have to let me know how that is and whether it is basically the gobbler or not, because I don't even, in my head, I don't even think of them as stocking the ingredients that would go on a Thanksgiving gobbler type thing. like They don't have cranberry sauce or stuffing or gravy or anything like that.
00:05:51
Speaker
Well, I mean, I imagine that they could get it for that promotion. Yeah. Like I assume they're already doing a hot Turkey sandwich somewhere in there. And the other stuff, maybe they just have like a, like a little frozen pre-made pouch of like Thanksgiving extremities. Right. And you just kind of put all that soup on something like, there you go. You're done.
00:06:13
Speaker
Uh-huh. It would be funny if they just took like us, another business's leftovers, like Thanksgiving food. It's like, yep. And we'll just throw this on sandwiches. American's lead anything. While the market nearby is like running over with like a little pail of mashed potatoes. Uh-huh, exactly. I got you. Sourced by local grandmas.
00:06:33
Speaker
But how about ah your holidays and Thanksgiving? I hope you ate better than the thing that I did not even eat. Yeah, we had we had the traditional spread. So ah moist turkey, not dry turkey. That came up several times. So that's the reason I'm. It's the story. It's had a reputation. ahha Yeah.
00:06:53
Speaker
um Cranberries, mashed potatoes, gravy, all that jazz. um And then there were two cheesecakes, ah which I had one slice of one cheesecake um and an apple pie, which I didn't have any of because of the aforementioned slice of cheesecake. If I would have stuck around for longer through the day, ah there would have been danger of that. That was pretty good. I like that.
00:07:19
Speaker
You've been sitting there and you've already had your dessert. There's still some food around. Maybe even they're starting to put it away you're like and you go up with like a small plate and you cut off a little something and you're like, it's Thanksgiving. Yeah. Yeah. And it also is like, I'm one of those people where with, if I'm offered food in this kind of social setting, it kind of feels wrong to not overindulge to like be the recipient of food and that sort of.
00:07:48
Speaker
I guess stereotype's not the right word, but there's something about being a guest and being like, oh, if you're offered dessert, you eat dessert. If you're offered food, you eat food.
Holiday Conversations and Game Recommendations
00:07:59
Speaker
Yeah. You don't want to spit on somebody's hospitality. Exactly. You want to be a gracious guest.
00:08:04
Speaker
Yeah. You don't show up for Thanksgiving dinner, like eat two green beans and then be like, Oh, I ate before I came. yeah stuff that wawa I five sticks of beef jerky on the way over here. So I'm just, I'm good. Thanks. No, but it was nice. We talked also, uh, the, there wasn't that much in politics. We talked, uh, home prices though, with, uh, some of the other ah similarly aged children.
00:08:33
Speaker
I guess they're not making not children at this point. yeah Housing laws are different in this state. No, I mean, when i move to pencil for the backstory, for the people, without Doxie and anyone, when I moved to Pennsylvania and married my wife, she has a very large family, a lot of siblings. um and I've been here long enough that they've pretty much like grown up into you know college age or like they're done with school or whatever.
00:09:02
Speaker
And, um, those conversations, like now I can talk to them about the boring adult stuff where it's just like, Oh, you know, interest rates, you know, it's just, yeah. Um, and things like that. So ah some of them were like looking at houses and things like that. And we got into that whole, that whole spiel, which may or may not be topical for a video game podcast used to say, but, um, it was, it was fun. It was good to catch up with people.
00:09:31
Speaker
It could be in something like The Sims maybe. Yeah. I mean, we talked about The Sims too. um Very briefly. Well, you you did say your wife was there. Yeah. um There was actually, that was my one regret is at one point someone asked for video game recommendations and I was like, Oh, what kind of games are you interested in? But then like the topic drifted to somewhere else and I never, I never got to recommend anything. So.
00:09:57
Speaker
You're going to go to hell for that one, Jake. It does feel unfulfilled, um for sure. I mean, is this somebody who you can reach out to? so Probably. Probably. I'm sorry. Literal direct member of the family. I'll catch them next Thanksgiving. ahha Yeah, we'll see we'll see what happened. You asked me one year ago, hear my recommendations for 2024 and also 2025. Give you extra information.
00:10:25
Speaker
um But video games, some of us play those.
Vampire Survivors DLC Discussion
00:10:34
Speaker
I don't know who would do it, but if it was me, I would have been playing more of the vampire survivors DLC for Castlevania because it's huge. I'm told told it's very big.
00:10:49
Speaker
you're not you're saying You're not claiming it yourself that it's very large, but other people have- Well, I've seen some YouTube videos of people playing it, on unlocking characters, different parts of the map and stuff, and a bunch of new songs. I mean, I was going to i was trying to make a penis joke.
00:11:05
Speaker
um But that's why too i would yeah we're talking about video games and you're like throwing this crass business in here. Uh huh. Now that's, that's on brand, but you are enjoying it so far. Still got that. Uh, they haven't, they haven't sold out with the Castlevania. Doesn't feel like Konami's rub their stink all over it. Well, no. Um, which, I mean, that could easily happen. Um,
00:11:35
Speaker
And I get a chance to play their other one ah with guns, which I think was based off of Contra. But they have a lot of references to different Castlevania media. Right. I'm basically taking what a Mike said verbatim. Yeah. He's not here to defend him. No, he's got to.
00:11:55
Speaker
um But it was cool to see certain characters and things that they do. ah Some of them I mainly recognize from the show, the Netflix anime, because I did not really grow up playing the Castlevania games. right um But they have lots of characters across.
00:12:13
Speaker
lots of Castlevania. Nice. It's been cool. Like they definitely put effort into it. Yeah. Yeah. And I was, I'm kind of, I'm kind of misleading with the whole Konami stink. Cause like, I think, I think it's fair that the vampire survivor devs probably just got the ability to license certain characters. And then they're like, do whatever you want. We're not going to help you at all. That's how I assume this went down.
00:12:39
Speaker
And then it was on the vampire survivor devs to like fill in all the actual content. I suspect that's the case. And they're good at that. Like we've talked about it a lot. This is one of those games that keeps coming up. um It's a really good game. Yeah, it's stupidly entertaining for how simple it looks. Yeah. But.
00:13:03
Speaker
I was playing last night was a little bit toasty, which I think helped for me to kind of zone in on the experience. But I had the headphones on. I had the music going, which is
Game Comparisons and Industry Critique
00:13:14
Speaker
one of the many tracks ah tied to Castlevania. Right. It could have been a vampire killer for all I remember, but.
00:13:22
Speaker
And I had my build going and I was just watching myself collect gems, murder things, trying dodge some enemies because my build wasn't complete. I don't know, I was just getting into it. And it's nice to just do a run because at max it'll be half an hour and then I can go do whatever responsibilities I was neglecting.
00:13:46
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, no, I do appreciate that and that is I've been playing Robo quest again go back listen to our episode excellent game, but I will say that is The pacing difference vampire survivors is very easy to kind of just like do a run and then Stop in Robo quest. I'm always like I mean like I could gather more resources There's another thing I could do some more wrenches or whatever it feels a little bit harder to put down but it also has a very high intensity. And so you're listening to this upbeat music constantly. And, you know, you're running through shooting all these things and depending on your class, you know, it might be high APM or actions per minute and like the
00:14:32
Speaker
Downside to that is once I'm done with a session of RoboQuest, I'm like, I'm exhausted. It feels like it's kind of like beating me down almost if you go too long. We play for four hours. We keep mentally taxing because you do constantly have to consider your movements options.
00:14:51
Speaker
as far as, oh, I'm going to hold control in for like the super jump, which is a part of a slide, which I did. yeah And because I got that one upgrade that shoots rocket or grenades out of my knees when I slide o fucking cost 12 bullshit. I'll never get it. yeah I also don't slide. But yeah, there's a lot going on and you're planning to.
00:15:09
Speaker
Both hit everything there and dodge everything there Yeah, it's a lot of cognitive load with fewer lows and stuff like that where vampire survivors will occasionally give you a little bit of a break um Or it pauses you during or pauses during selections I guess RoboQuest does have the inter combat areas where you could call that a a break in quotes but Anyways, the point I was trying to make is if you play that four hours, you're good. You're good. There's no more, uh, RoboQuest for a little bit, but, um, it is fun. And I'm glad I'm, I am especially glad that, uh, vampire survivors is continuing to see success because nothing for the best for, uh, for that team. Yeah. It's, it's always cool to see somebody put something out that is good. Uh, you can see the effort those put into it.
00:16:02
Speaker
Like we were just recently talking about Baldur's Gate 3 before we started recording. That's a great example of that with Larian. And they've continued to do stuff for it. And they don't need to. Yeah. Whereas like a lot of big studios make an unfinished product, sell it, and then like scrap the team and move on to the next thing. Yeah. Do you have issues? We don't give a shit. Are our servers having issues? That's fine. We can discontinue the game in six months. Yeah. Yeah, I don't know.
00:16:32
Speaker
I don't know exactly what the the money proposition comes into it. Like maybe you do make more money if your game development process is essentially slash and burn, like the rainforest style approach to game development. You're just like, oh, how how do we just mine any sort of inspiration or interest or anything from these people and throw them away? But I will say as a consumer of video games,
00:17:02
Speaker
It's so much nicer to play the games that have heart that were supported that you could tell that people wanted to make as opposed to like, you know, some basement somewhere, a sweat shop for video game development. Um, or people that are saying is a lot of, um, mobile games or things that are like, Oh, it's kind of looks like everything else. Those are those games.
00:17:28
Speaker
Yeah, that's true. Yeah. I guess like I get the games need to make money, but part of me, maybe it's the romantic is like, I think.
00:17:41
Speaker
That's not, that's not enough. That's not just the type of game that I want to play is the one that was optimized to extract the most money from me. I'd rather play something that's fun and is interesting and maybe it's a new experience or it has some mechanics I haven't seen or it's just really, really good for something that I have seen before.
00:18:00
Speaker
You know, ex-employer within a genre. That's what I'm trying to say. That's super rare. But, um, yeah, I mean Baldur's Gate, right? It is kind of weird how like video games are this one super capitalist medium, like movies. Yeah. They get, you know, box office sales. Um,
00:18:22
Speaker
books get their sales but there's not like book dlc yeah like once you've done the purchase you have everything and i don want to like redo the whole conversation of like um game ownership and all that but like it's a complete package at the time that you get it hopefully yeah epilogue what happened to chapter 17 george r r martin take notes
00:18:51
Speaker
Yeah. With video games, like they're big. Oh, we added on some stuff for like, Hey, I'm just imagining the book version of like cosmetics. It kind of go back, goes back and like edits all the plays. It was like describing the character and it's like, they were wearing a red spandex suit. Yeah.
00:19:12
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, games run the gamut of whether they're completed at launch or not these days. Um, but regardless, it's like, yeah, I don't know. It's, it's tough. I, I get that it's tough and people need to make money, but hopefully that's not the only reason you're doing it. I guess that's what I'm trying to say. If it's just to make money, then you can kind of tell at the end of the day. Um,
00:19:42
Speaker
Speaking of money though, no there's a, actually I'm going to, I'll, I'll save the steam sales for later. We can judge some of the games that are there. Um, is there anything else that you've been playing recently this month or previous month as a release date?
Game Recommendations and Trailers
00:19:58
Speaker
Uh, let me check my by month category. I mean, my most recent thing has been checking out Lauren's lure, which I continually hate to say and enunciate for. It's a two word tongue twister.
00:20:12
Speaker
Yeah. ah But it was mentioned in a video by Polygon and they were talking about some stuff as far as like level design and speed running and like, I've never heard of this game.
00:20:25
Speaker
um But basically, it feels like 3D Celeste, but completely different tone. Right. It is very much you and exploring and using the mechanics they've given you to be like, you figure this shit out. Gotcha. And it's kind of cool to be like, how the hell did I get over here without dying? Can I do it again if I need to? So is it very climbing oriented or combat or I mean, I'd say there's a good degree of.
00:20:56
Speaker
climbing, platforming, jumping puzzles. It's basically like, hey, I need to find something over in this direction. But you're like, how do I get over there? And then you need to be like, oh, I have this much stamina. Maybe I can jump over here, climb. Maybe I can wall run for part of it. Yeah. It's kind of like free running plus climbing sort of style. Yes. I'm imagining that once I beat the game, they're like, hey, do you want to be able to go back through but have access to your full kit now? I'll be like,
00:21:23
Speaker
Oh God. Yes. Uh-huh. Cause some of my like level clear times have been like an hour and a half plus. Right. And I'm like, man, I'm shit at this. I mean, I don't, I don't know how long the levels are. if If it's something where it shows you a leaderboard at the end, then an hour and a half does seem like a little bit long. Yeah. It's been just very cool on the exploration side of things. Gotcha. I think that's kind of like the key selling point.
00:21:51
Speaker
That does sound neat. I know you meant. Oh, sorry, you're going to go ahead. I was going to say, if this sounds interesting to you or anybody else, I do recommend just watching the Polygon video ah because I think they do some good coverage of what that game is and how it plays, ah maybe more so than a trailer might.
00:22:10
Speaker
right i mean i i definitely appreciate that i think trailers i don't know what i get from trailers these days i don't i'm trying to think of the last time i watched a trailer and i'm like yep that was Exactly what the game was like, you know, how many stars did they give it though? How many stars that IGN? Uh-huh. I don't know we can find out gaming former. What's your opinion on this? IGN Doesn't look like IGN even reviewed it so perfect score
00:22:43
Speaker
Get rekt. Yeah, I think this has been out for a little bit. Yeah, it's definitely it's definitely in the indie space. Right. Like this isn't something like major, major game ah critics may not even have reviews up for this. It's kind of hit or miss with indies. Right. Yeah. This is very much like a solo developer type thing. Yeah.
00:23:12
Speaker
It does look very atmospheric though, like these kind of retro graphics. It kind of reminds me graphically of like quake. That's kind of what they're going for. yeah Um, but might stream some for you at some point. Yeah, that can be cool. Cause I'm looking at these screenshots and I also see like a lot of fog and that might be the one thing that would have been harder to render back then for quake, but, um,
00:23:38
Speaker
there was a point in games where it's like we can't do fog at all and then we're using fog but just to cover the fact that we haven't loaded in assets yet and now we're getting back to like okay this is just because it's supposed to look retro yeah i'm glad that some things are going back to low poly style because i think i think we've talked about a couple times as far as graphically like beyond a certain point, it's not going to look better. Yeah. And a lot of times I'm not going for specific look in games.
Stalker 2: Bugs and Development Challenges
00:24:15
Speaker
Like, obviously, I appreciate that stuff as far as design for Elden Ring, um the way they do lighting, the way the level is laid out, et cetera. Gorgeous.
00:24:25
Speaker
um But if you're focusing on something like, Hey, this is just like for exploration and mechanics. Yeah. You don't really need to spend a lot of time on assets for the world or the background or making sure you can see your character's hands and. Right. Yeah. No, I, I agree a hundred percent. Um, the game that I've been playing most recently, and I want, I wish that they had made the graphics worse actually is stock or two. Um, and.
00:24:58
Speaker
i my my One of those is because of performance issues. um I'm using a mod right now that makes it like a little bit better, and I have a pretty good like PC, so it's it's running okay for me, but there have also been a couple patches I didn't play as soon as the game came out. um But I also know that other people have had really really really bad times with it And I'm just like whenever I see depth of field motion blur chromatic aberration, whatever I'm like
00:25:29
Speaker
I don't care about any of these. In fact, motion blur, I'll turn it off at any game that tries to turn it on. It's the worst, but like for 95% of people playing this stuff, who goes in and changes the setting? Cause they know what something specifically is. Yeah. Or who would be playing coffee like, Oh, it's definitely missing this thing. Yeah. Yeah.
00:25:54
Speaker
Yeah, and it's like, they also just, they they they'll pick a preset for consoles, right? Where it's like, oh, okay, well, you're gonna have motion blur or you won't, right? um You don't have that kind of range of adjustment that PC has access to. um But yeah, in any case, if they would have focused more on the gameplay and spent a lot less time on the graphics,
00:26:17
Speaker
I would be all for that. We're done. I'm done, I should say. I can't speak for other people, but I'm done chasing that graphics rabbit forever into the future. um like I would rather people spend half of the time on gameplay.
00:26:36
Speaker
compared to other graphics. It's I think really the the key part of it unless you're solely going for atmospheric. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, there are there are some times where I'm like, OK, that's a cool graphical thing. But I mean, I would give those up for gameplay like in a heartbeat.
00:26:56
Speaker
um I want to describe Stalker um because nobody plays this series but me. Please do. I'm going to look up a an example of what we were describing a moment ago.
00:27:07
Speaker
Yeah, so Stalker is um it's a fictional, it's a first-person shooter survival, not crafting, just survival kind of scavenging type game that takes place in an alternate ah universe basically where the Chernobyl explosion, um reactor meltdown,
00:27:28
Speaker
Um, was either caused by or caused or somehow related to a whole bunch of wacky shenanigans going on is the TLDR. It's all based off of a Eastern European book called roadside picnic. It was at least inspired by it. Um, and the TLDR is you go out into the waste, essentially, um, the people who adventure there are called stalkers.
00:27:52
Speaker
Which is kind of funny um And they search for anomalies which are basically like magic doodads that give you some benefits or um something like that um Artifacts within the anomalies and the anomalies try to kill people they're like There little hidden spots where if you walk over it, it'll like erupt in flames, or maybe there's a little aberration in the air, but if you touch that, it'll pull you in and then explode, or you know all these other things to kill people. I think from the book, the one that stood out to me, I didn't read the book, but I heard of this, was one where if you like walk into the anomaly, it's basically
00:28:34
Speaker
another dimension where time doesn't pass and like so you'll just be there for hundreds of years before like your corpse just falls out for other people to see and it's like Eastern European terror stuff. ah um But the game doesn't do that because that's just an instant game over one.
00:28:54
Speaker
um ah But the whole point is to go around looting basically weapons maintaining your weapons getting ammo getting supplies progressing completing quests and um Yeah, it's it's a fun little sandbox experience um So when you say sandbox would you say it's like a Skyrim or Well, more not crazy open world, but like, yeah, there is not a set direct line path you have to go on. Yeah. I mean, there's a main story and the main story will open up new areas and stuff like that. So eventually you have to do the main story, but if you want to just go off and explore, you're free to do that as well. Um, go off king yeah. And they have like a lot of, um,
00:29:44
Speaker
They have a lot of scenarios you can find yourself in where it's like you have decisions to make. You're like, do I want to screw this person over just to get their stuff? um Like it's completely viable in this game.
00:29:56
Speaker
to have the binary choice of like, I got an artifact. These two people want it. They're offering me different rewards. I will, and they're in different areas or whatever. And you're like, I will turn it in at this this quest guy. And he gave me a custom rifle, like a unique rifle. You couldn't otherwise get in the game. And you're like, excellent. I will now kill that person, take the thing back, now have both things and go turn it into the other guy for the other reward. Like the game lets you do that.
00:30:25
Speaker
um your own morality, it's just a role-playing game in that respect, right? And sometimes they'll comment on it and other times they won't, but um you kind of just play the game however you want.
00:30:40
Speaker
Okay, so it's it sounds pretty open as far as how you want to approach it. Yes, and the areas are very open also. like it's it's the There were three games prior to this one. um ah Stalker, Shadow of Chernobyl, Stalker, Clear Sky, Stalker, Heart of Pripyat, Call of Pripyat.
00:31:00
Speaker
um And this is Stalker 2, which again, don't do that. yeah This is the ah the legacy of Cain problem all over again. Just two numbers. Nobody's gonna judge you. You don't need to make... or have it be like stalker two enter the oblivion stalker three and then give it a different name exactly yeah stay in stay in your lane basically find a way and commit to it um but it has been enjoyable i have had some bugs i've had quests where like either a quest i am stuck in my inventory
00:31:40
Speaker
Or I completed a quest, but then I was like, can I just take this item back? I just like took it back from the container and it added the quest back to my quest log. And now it's just stuck there forever um because I haven't completed it now. um But apparently, and this is my fear because it's on game pass. That's where I'm playing it. I actually was going to specifically not play it until some months had passed past and there was a bunch of patches and stuff.
00:32:09
Speaker
But I was like, it's on game pass, we'll give it a shot. um Apparently, near the midgame mark or the midpoint in the game, everything gets way, way worse and way, way buggier. And a lot of people literally can't proceed. They have to like turn on no clip in PC mode and use console, or on PC, and then like use console commands and all this other stuff. And I'm like, uh-oh. Do you remember that thing we were just talking about?
00:32:39
Speaker
Yeah, it's That's pretty bad like I know um Blank it on the name beyond good and evil ah The pc port has an issue where it can get like or I think it did consistently get softlocked. Um Yeah, that was one issue out of It sounds like a shit ton here. Yes. Yeah. um And there are they the mitigating circumstances circumstance in this is it's um it's developed by GSC game world, which is a Ukrainian video game developer. They were like ba they were founded in Kiev like 29 years ago. um And right now they're in Prague for reasons. Right. So like.
00:33:29
Speaker
On one hand, I want to be i want to acknowledge that like your home being bombed might impact your game development cycle a little bit. um Just a little bit, you know? But also, the game's not finished. It released in this not finished state, right? Where so much is still broken.
00:33:54
Speaker
They kind of have done, maybe not to the same extent, but similar releases in the past with the other Stalker games. So it's not even like it's a one-off and they could have just gone to early access. Like this is a 1.0 release and people would have had so much more of an appetite to accept that the game was going to continue to see development if it was in early access.
00:34:18
Speaker
Yeah, if if you just have a blanket, it's not done yet. Okay, whatever issues are currently there, we will assume will not be there in the future. right But if you say it's done, I'm handed in my homework, ah we're going to grade it as it is.
00:34:35
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. And I i want to wait. right I want to wait till the game's done. But they've signaled that it's it's out of the oven. you know it's It's on the plate. It's delivered to the table. There's nothing there's nothing here. For the people going into it, the the start of the game, even with some of the bugs and the stuff you'll encounter, it feels really polished compared to the latter half of the game, apparently. And that's misleading.
00:35:00
Speaker
right Because it's like there's no one that's gonna still be in the refund Window by the time that they start seeing some of the rough stuff the game has um And like stalker the series is one of my favorite bad game series Like they're they're fun for me to play. It's literally The moment to moment gameplay is like crap. There's a group of enemies. They started shooting at me Can I even take this fight?
00:35:30
Speaker
and get anything out of this or will I be wasting ammo and health and supplies conversely if you sneak up and you like stealth kill all of these enemies with like headshots or something you're like I just I'm up so much like I've got so many so many more supplies to take back and sell and it just it feels so good to play and it always has in those moments When someone's not T posing and helicoptering into the sky or like the doors refuse to open or the quest doesn't start or it doesn't stop, you know, like. They got to fix it. They got to fix it. It sounds like it's just kneecapping immersion. It does. And it really, really can, because which is a shame because otherwise the game it's got good bones. If you're going to play like ah an EP cheapy.
00:36:24
Speaker
multiplayer game with friends and it is buggy. OK, I didn't spend any money on it. We can enjoy the flaws together. Mm hmm. Oh, ha ha. Isn't it funny that this happened?
00:36:35
Speaker
um But this doesn't need people to do that in actual. This is a full price game, right? Like. I don't think it's 70. I think, I think again, I'm playing it on game pass. So, um, for me, it was kind of included, but, um, I think it's like 50, 60 bucks. Jesus. Yeah. It's insane that this is a trying to be sold as a complete product. And like, there have been other games that have fallen under this same category, but.
00:37:08
Speaker
as somebody who's 16 element on stuff you got a QA you got a QA you got a QM yeah work for you locally once okay it doesn't mean it's gonna work all the time everywhere you got a test for other scenarios too and if they had to be I know I already mentioned this once, but if they had to be in a position where they were out of money, right? It was like, we gotta, we need more money to really get this game whipped into the shape that it needs to be. um Tell people that, and then release it to early access. A bunch of people will buy it. You'll have that influx. Game reviewers won't, you know, nuke your score because it has all of these issues. more like flame reviewers. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that was the other issue is the games reviews were kind of decent, actually, like pretty good, I guess, coming from critical reviews because reviewers were releasing their reviews after playing through the first half of the game. And then it gets real rough. Yeah. That almost seems. It's dishonest. Intentional. It seems intentional. Yeah. So.
00:38:24
Speaker
Don't do it that way. with the Do better. Stock or two, piece of shit, right? If you have any takeaway. I mean, i would I would either wait to play it or play it on Game Pass. I cannot in good conscience recommend anyone actually buy this game.
00:38:41
Speaker
um So yeah, that's another little game pass perk because Again, if you find out that something is a flop like that after you spent the money, okay, you're fucked it's gone. Yeah um And it shouldn't even be a thing Like if you were to again buy a movie or a book or anything else It's literally has to be a complete thing. You they wouldn't give you half a coffee somewhere. Yeah
00:39:11
Speaker
Or like half ah a Danish. Right. Or whatever. Man, I want to go to Panera. I want a Danish and one of those now illegal lemonades.
00:39:22
Speaker
Yeah. The, the boost or whatever it is, the caffeine infused stuff. Yeah. Um, but I do hope that at some point, hopefully within a year, my recommendation for the game can be different. It's going to fall out of game pass right before before the final patch or whatever. Um, but again, you know, hoping for the best outcome.
Game Sales and Recommendations
00:39:46
Speaker
For the people who are listening pretty close to when this came out, um Steam is doing their autumn sale. And there are a lot of games in the autumn sale. I don't know if you have the window up right now, Dave, but I want to mention some of these that I personally recommend. Dishonored 2 for $2.99.
00:40:10
Speaker
is no money. That's almost them just adding it to your library. Yeah, I played Dishonored 1, liked it. I don't remember if I played Dishonored 2. Yeah. I played everything except one of the DLCs. I think it was the Butcher of Dunwall or something like that, where he plays Doubt. But I did play Dishonored 1, Dishonored 2, and Dishonored Death of the Outsider. And great series.
00:40:41
Speaker
I really, really like Dishonored 2 in particular. I think it's a, it's a high point for the series. Um, so big recommend for that. Uh, is there anything else, anything on this list that jumps out to you as something you're saying people should snap up?
00:40:58
Speaker
I'm imagining Jake right now. Just, it's like a crack of dawn. He shows up at the, at the baseball field. He, uh, he parks his car. He opens the minivan trunk, gets out a bunch of these little like T-ball stands. He lines them all up yeah and he puts a little T-ball on top of each one. Undertales on here. There he goes. And he's like, Dave, take this and go.
00:41:24
Speaker
Undertale is here for 250. This is always working on a lot of sales. I definitely think it's worth if you're coming in completely blind and you don't know what Undertale is and you've stayed kind of away from it.
00:41:39
Speaker
Uh, it's just a very simple RPG where you can choose to fight enemies or you can choose to not fight enemies and deal with them another way. Yeah. The the tagline was like a game with monsters where you don't have to kill anyone. I think that was the actual tagline for the game, but it's again, a very simple game initially, um, made by one person.
00:42:06
Speaker
But it really has a lot of heart in it. The music's great. The characters are fun. The writing's very good and witty and serious at points. um But it's one of the few games that has evoked emotion from me. So it's good. It's really good. It's really good. um it's i can't like I can't hear Undertale music and not get a little bit emotional even to this day. So that tells you something.
00:42:35
Speaker
um I've got a couple others. I can't say that they have the same impact as Undertale. Deep Rock Galactic is great fun co-op. Oh, that's way better than Undertale. Rocking stones, dude. Getting drunk with my boys. With dwarves. Just under 10 bucks, probably 10 bucks with tax. Great four player co-op game if you've got some lads or lassies to play with. Or just normal people. Do you want to give a very quick synopsis of what that is? Sure.
00:43:08
Speaker
Oh, you want me to, oh, my synopsis, yeah. ah You play as four dwarves. You embark and try to dig to get minerals. um You fight ant-like aliens and some other threats. The game has a whole bunch of different game modes now beyond just normal um like, uh, dig missions, um, including like wave defense. There's meta progression for getting better gear or customizing your characters. You can drink. Um, also the, the dwarves have classes. Yes. Yes. That's important to note. Yeah. You've got like the driller, the scout, the engineer, and like the heavy weapons guy, I think, um, who has a different name, but that's pretty much what they are.
00:43:55
Speaker
But no it's I don't know. I like stuff like that where it's. It's not rogue like, but it is kind of just like, hey, we can pick up and play for a little bit and stop whenever. Exactly. yeah Very engaging game gameplay loop. Mm hmm.
00:44:10
Speaker
And if you're the digger, ah when shit hits the fan you need to go, you can tunnel a direct line to whatever solution, you know? It's very funny. And it's like, hopefully you don't run across something terrible and hopefully you move fast enough that the aliens don't pour in behind you and massacre everyone. There's there's so many things going wrong in the game is both the threat and the enjoyment sometimes. um It's one of those.
00:44:37
Speaker
Yeah, and also like when you are the digger and you're given C4 and other explosives, it's impossible not to grieve somebody sometimes. yeah Yeah. And again, it's part of the fun. Yeah. Excellent game. Really recommend it. um I'm pretty sure they still have like a free Battle Pass-like model. um And it's very, very generous. It's one of the it's one of the technical live service games that They really don't squeeze you for money at all. um um And I don't think I've ever spent anything other than the base price on the game. But if you do, they deserve it. um Anything else on this list? Jump out to you. I mean, Half-Life 2 I feel is worth mentioning because it's a classic and it's here for two bucks.
00:45:24
Speaker
Yeah, it used to be, I think it used to be free. It was free for the 20 year anniversary. So you just missed that. But, um, two bucks. Yeah. If you haven't played half life, then you're on a PC. Um,
00:45:39
Speaker
um
00:45:42
Speaker
Uh, people know about red red redemption. I don't need to mention that. And it's not that inexpensive. Balachros on this list, not a big discount. Um, but it's down to 12 bucks, 75 cents. Uh, some people think this is going to be the game of the year. I've never played it. I know it's a indie title. It's.
00:46:01
Speaker
has cards and everybody who's played it, who I've talked to has really enjoyed it. It's it's incredibly well made. I do recommend it. um If you have anything else on your plate, you don't have to pick it up for sure, but it's a poker roguelike.
00:46:17
Speaker
where you are basically cheating essentially to get better hands and trying to continually rack up a higher score. um And that's the game. That's mostly it is you're just like, okay, what if I played eight You're like, what are you talking about? But that is this game. So, uh, it is, it is really fun and it's very addictive. I don't know if it'll win game of the year or not, but that's a different discussion. How do you feel about Hades too? Would you pick it up now or wait? I would sell 10% off 10% off. I mean, you could wait for a bigger sale if you're not in a rush. Um, but again, at launch,
00:47:03
Speaker
even an early launch because the game is not at a complete state. It is leaps and bounds above so many other games. It is very smooth, very polished. It was good. Yeah. Yeah. This is the one i'm I'm kind of waiting a little bit on it. I'm waiting for it to have a couple more patches and be a little bit or a little bit more off.
00:47:27
Speaker
Um, but, uh, I absolutely already know it's worth it. So, um, I'm, I'm missing the train by waiting and it's not even at 1.0 yet. So, but that's fine. Like, I think there are people who do just pick it up when it is at its full 1.0. I mean, you shouldn't be playing the game just later. Yeah, exactly. Um, Hellblade too. 35% off.
00:47:55
Speaker
ah This was on game pass when I played it. I'm not sure if it's currently still on game pass, but it is very visually enticing, um engaging story, but it feels different than Senua one, um because Senua one, I think had a better story.
00:48:23
Speaker
And Hellblade two feels kind of short. Gotcha. I don't know. It doesn't feel like it should be a full price game, ah but really it is a gorgeous game. Yeah. I'm looking, it is still on game pass. Um, it does seem pretty short. Is that seven hours?
00:48:49
Speaker
Is that how long it took you to beat it? But thank yeah um but yeah, still in Game Pass was added in in May, so it'll probably stick around until sometime next year. um
00:49:01
Speaker
Doesn't sound like a resounding recommendation, though. A little unfortunate. It it falls under of like the Harry Potter stuff for me, where it's I've seen the other movies, so I feel kind of obligated. like I should probably see the next one. Right. You're invested. For the continuation of the story. You have skin in the game. Yeah. That's kind of what it felt like to me.
00:49:19
Speaker
Um, cause I really did enjoy the first one so much. Yeah. I think that's fair. That's fair. So maybe wait for a larger sale or just play it on game pass. If you have that, um, not to sound like a broken record, but some of these titles, they're a lot easier to try out. If you're not super invested in them, if you can try instead of buy, um,
00:49:43
Speaker
I heard good things wires on here as well. Yeah. Plucky squire. I was going to ask, uh, 25% off 22 50 pass super the better and the cheaper, the better. Um, I did enjoy it. It was fun. It is creative at times. Uh, I don't feel like it goes as far as it could. Right.
00:50:06
Speaker
Because I like the idea of the game. um I think they could expand on it a lot if they do future titles.
Game Pricing Strategies and Sales
00:50:16
Speaker
But it is a, I'd say, a cute, loose RPG with a lot of puzzle solving. That's fair, yeah. It has a very, very clean arc direction. like I like the look of this game, for sure.
00:50:32
Speaker
um
00:50:35
Speaker
No, it's really like fun toys come to life type of design. Right. Which I'm always a fan of ah very smooth and polished in the lighting. But yeah, it is not going to be Elden Ring difficulty.
00:50:51
Speaker
No. I mean, if you went into it expecting that, then I don't know where you're getting your information from. But I feel like I could give this to an old, slightly older relative, maybe like my parent generation, and I feel like they'd be okay. I mean, and that's fine. That's good, right? We need gems like that. Yeah. But very accessible, I should say. I've heard of this one. Sons of the Forest, 45% off. Piece of shit, gang. 1650.
00:51:20
Speaker
Uh, pay no money for this game. Pay no money. I think it's worth 16. I'd pay 16.50 for it. You wouldn't in retrospect, I mean, we already had our episode on it as far as why, but it felt very much like a better forest one as far as the things you could do in it. Yeah. But. Infinitely weak story. Yep. Um.
00:51:50
Speaker
I felt like they spent more time on the multiple vehicles they give you than anything else in the game. Yeah. There's, listen to our episode for all the critiques, but as you continue to poke holes in this, the ah value prop, the value is draining out of the bag that was supposed to hold the money bag. Um, David's poked holes in, um, I guess, I guess it's not a hard of recommendation, even at 16 50.
00:52:18
Speaker
It's fun for the base building. I think if you went into it just with a group of friends and you're like, we just want a rust light sort of experience where there's more mechanics for building things out of wood and then defending the base. um I think that's fine, but I agree. As soon as you start to talk about anything beyond that, the caves, the story, all of that, you're like, ah, it doesn't really add anything to it.
00:52:45
Speaker
So, uh, it's a whatever a middle thumb is, not neither a thumb. It's just a, it's a, it's just a fist basically held in front of you. No thumbs up, no thumbs down. It's an unrequited fist bump. That's a nice score for the game. The person's like, do I get executed or what's going on? Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Um.
00:53:08
Speaker
Here's one I haven't picked up, but I would consider Like A Dragon Infinite Wealth already 50% off. That game didn't come out that long ago. I think. Pretty sure. No, it's fairly recent. 50% actually is almost, it's almost enough of a discount that I'm like, what went wrong, all right? um I don't expect to see that until like a year elapses from release. I mean, I've only played Came out one like a dragon game. Yeah, ah but I did enjoy what time I spent with it. Mm-hmm Again, our thoughts on these are like throughout episodes But 50% off obviously really good Discount persona the three reload. Yeah again. I've never played persona games also on game pass Okay, nice So game pass for two games in this list already ah at least
00:54:04
Speaker
ah But for friends, I know who have played it, they said they did a good job of it. um But yeah. Yeah, I mean, I like Persona. um And I think this one, what's the what's the total sale price coming down from? So it's 30 bucks, or no, I'm looking at euros. Right now it's 35 bucks. I think it'll get lower. I would wait for it maybe to get a little bit lower or otherwise play on Game Pass, because this is basically a ah remake. um But I mean, if you're an Atlas fan, you already you've already played this game. that were like I don't know who we're talking to when it comes to the Persona games, right?
00:54:44
Speaker
Um, but yeah, that's fair. Um, yeah, some of the years other games, like I haven't played them personally, but I've heard good things. Silent Hill two, um, still pretty expensive. So I don't really want to recommend anything like over 50 bucks. Cause that doesn't really sound like a discount to be honest, even if it's 20% off or 30% off or whatever, it's like, uh, you can just wait. It'll go cheaper. Be a patient gamer.
00:55:12
Speaker
In my mind, um, new release games are still 50 bucks. Yeah. I see one for 70. I'm like, you can fuck off. Uh-huh. I mean, 70. Yeah. I know that 60 has been more standard. 70 has been introduced here and there. Some people push it. Yeah. I think, um, Square Enix, I believe, and maybe starfield could be wrong on that last one, but Square Enix definitely likes to place their games at 70. Um,
00:55:40
Speaker
And yeah, that just means I wait longer basically before I pick them up. Um, we already mentioned it. This is, uh, it's not a massive discount, but Baldur's Gate is under 50. That's 40, 48 bucks. Um, absolutely worth it. That's game. it's It was game of the year. So yeah, like we talk about it a lot. Um, and a whole bunch of other stuff here.
00:56:06
Speaker
That, uh, you can, you can look up, uh, look up on your own time. Actually, I do want to mention Phantom Liberty cyberpunk 2077. Excellent DLC on sale for 24 bucks. And it is an expansion saying it's DLC is not really giving it the credit it deserves. So would you say it's like another game or is like another?
00:56:31
Speaker
Campaign it's an entirely different area um So it is like it's a side branch off of the campaign that introduces like three to four potential endings for the game um It is a good chunk of content um And it doesn't reuse, you know, it reuses almost nothing from the base game I think there are some side quests that take you back to a like night city proper, but otherwise the entirety of the DLC takes place in dog town, which is like a, it's a Coliseum south of night city. That's been basically like locked down by their local pellet paramilitary force. And, uh, it's great. Um, it's very much in the vein of everything that made cyberpunk 2.0, the redemption for what the game came out like. Um,
00:57:24
Speaker
And they use all of those good vibes and energy and good ideas and continued on to make Phantom Liberty. It's one of my favorite expansions. Okay. I might need to actually go back and give that a peek. Cause I haven't touched it since around when it initially came out. Yeah.
00:57:45
Speaker
He has some really good characters too, which I can't talk about without spoiling anything. So I won't. Damn. So that's my that's my last recommend. Is there anything else on this list that really really stood out for you or would be something maybe you'd be interested in trying, either from like a new game or so something on sale that came out? No. I'm a stubborn old man. sorry Because like these things I've known about, but like they didn't tickle my interest.
00:58:14
Speaker
Like I didn't hop in on pal world hell divers to metaphor. Silent Hill two, just because it's not my thing. I don't say I wouldn't necessarily enjoy them if I play them, but it doesn't lure me in.
Strong Recommendations and Listener Engagement
00:58:29
Speaker
All right. Then I'm going to, I'm going to steal your, your recommend and split it into two loop hero $3.75.
00:58:39
Speaker
It's a good game. It's not my, it's not the best game. It was enjoyable. I like a lot some things about it. Hollow Knight, $7.50. If you don't have this in your library, you're incorrect. Yeah, this is one of those.
00:58:55
Speaker
I mean, for me, a classic. I have to say that for like games I have tattoos of and like, well, I mean, it's pretty good. live ah um But yeah, Hollow Knight still think is one of the best platformers. The only way I can think of it would be close would be Celeste. Yeah. um And they're kind of focusing on different aspects. yeah Celeste is more like a puzzle game. Hollow Knight's more like a ah combat game.
00:59:22
Speaker
Yeah, it's always like very tight movement, and like there can be some difficult platforming, but it's not to the level of Celeste endgame. With certain, certain very specific exceptions, they do not demand super precise platforming. But then there are the exceptions. Hollow Knight, such a good game. um It is my favorite platformer, Bar None. ah Yeah, buy that. If you already have a copy, buy buy another copy.
00:59:52
Speaker
For a friend. Who doesn't have it? It's the only way we're getting Silksong. We gotta, we gotta, we gotta commit. Gotta continue to funnel money into them. Hollow Knight Silksong is my star citizen. Allow me to pre-order Silksong characters on the website for a thousand dollars each. Also, it's always tempting to do jokes like these because it's so easy, but like,
01:00:18
Speaker
Oh, I'm exactly like Silksong. Never coming out. ah Yeah. A lot of good stuff though. um So if there's any of those peak your interest, definitely take a look. um Other people also have, you know, sales compilations. um Black Friday, pretty mid deals across the board for me. On the gaming front though, if you're catching up on some of these, great time to do so. Quit your job um and buy these video games and play them.
01:00:48
Speaker
so Yeah. Uh, get some stuff on the cheap if you'd like, or you can wait for another sale. Honestly. Uh, these sales happen semi regularly, like every couple of months. yep Um, so don't beat yourself up. If you don't pick something up now, cause it's on a good price because it will happen again. And this one that we're describing, all of those sales, those are on steam. They go through December 4th. Um,
01:01:15
Speaker
well, through the morning of December 4th. So really ending December 3rd is your safe bet. So really for the early podcast listeners or... Like Dave said, bookmark them. A lot of them will be on sale for the ah the Christmas sale or New Year's sale. um So, good stuff though. ah If we didn't talk about one of the games that you are really excited for, her you're like, why did you not mention that there's a sale on this game? Or you should play this game even if it was full price. Let us know what that game is. Send that in, soapstonepodcastatgmail.com. Or you could mention it on Facebook
01:01:54
Speaker
will only delete the particularly salacious entries facebook dot.com slash soapstone podcast and as always we'll see you in the next one get the fuck out of here
01:02:59
Speaker
and