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Episode 7

S1 E7 · Detroit Gamesters

6 Plays1 month ago

Split Fiction Impressions, Wheel of time and Severance, Ubisoft, and Nintendo Switch 2 Reveal

Transcript

00:00:00

Shameer Mehdikhan

Oh, wait. Hey, everyone. It's Arjun and Shamir, and the Detroit Gamesters are back for a very yeah interesting and special episode. You know, there's been a lot going on, and a pretty big announcement today, the Nintendo Switch 2 Direct.

00:00:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

But there's a couple of things we definitely want to talk about before we get to that. So how excited are you, Shamir? Pretty excited. I know we talked about, you know, we've been trying to do like a two-week flow for these podcasts, which gives us, an you know, a decent amount of time to play up on stuff.

00:00:29

Shameer Mehdikhan

since this is in our full first time, a full-time job. And also, you know, for some interesting news to happen. And I really wanted to do this last week after the switch one, you know, kind of real and showcase, but you had convinced me to wait an extra week. And honestly, I do think it was kind of worth it because we, you know, a lot of, lot of big developments, a lot of, a lot of hype, but, you know, first we wanted to catch you up on, you know, what we've been up to and some of the things we've been playing and watching.

00:00:55

Shameer Mehdikhan

And then from there, we're we're hoping to really just dedicate a lot of time to Nintendo because I'm kind of feeling like a fanboy today. am too. But I guess we'll start off with what we're playing and we actually just got into Split Fiction.

00:01:07

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. So we've been sitting on it for a while and then we finally tried to actually play and then it was kind of a pain ah logging in because of the EA account and everything. Worst experience I've ever had. If you've ever had a Xbox or PlayStation or platform linked to a disabled or deleted account,

00:01:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

It recognizes but doesn't allow to log in to play using the front pass. So it was one the worst experiences I've ever had. But I will say... EA customer support, it was on point. They knew exactly what I was talking about, and I didn't i barely had to explain anything. well You know, they're probably getting a ton of that, like right now, because it's such a niche thing, and there's ah probably a bunch of people who are trying to use spread passes right now. 100%. They're like, it what the hell? Yeah, it's such a unique game to like offer that, and now it's cross-platform. Someone from an Xbox can play with someone on a PlayStation, vice versa, so it's no longer tied to the online ecosystems dedicated to the platforms.

00:01:58

Shameer Mehdikhan

So yeah, it's just interesting. So like ah we got through there, started playing and we're about what, three hours in? What do you yeah i think so far? Yeah, think we've beat two levels. I think we're on mission three and I kind of looked a lot, you know, kind of looked ahead and I think there's like,

00:02:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

eight missions total. So we're not, we're halfway. We're maybe have a quarter of way through. So it's about, it's about a 12 hour game at the pace we're going. think it's interesting because in the two levels we played, we had some side stories.

00:02:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

Um, and for those that don't know what the game is about, it's about two, two writers that write both sci-fi and fantasy, stories within the game but their ideas are being stolen by some corporation and then you get sucked into some virtual reality where your stories are actually like real and played out, and it's about surviving these environments through the stories.

00:02:46

Shameer Mehdikhan

So it's ah it's interesting. It's, you know, based on obviously the developer and Joseph Farris, he said he's named the two women after his daughter, so I found that somewhat interesting. Doesn't do a whole lot for me, but you know yeah interesting to pick two women as the protagonist you know that's not um common right yeah and it's like not necessarily a dei i think it's you know i remember watching that interview he had and someone asked him about like yeah he's like what are you guys talking about i'm like the father the two daughters like he's like what he's like and i quit like he said what the fuck are you talking about this is the funniest video yeah i guess with me i i really have mixed feelings about split fiction i mean i'll be honest i'm kind of biased because i just don't really like

00:03:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

super cocky dudes and i feel like that guy is just on another level after it takes two i mean it takes two was good but it's like bro like cool your jets you know uh but no i mean the guy is super talented you know he really is um but i guess with me i really like old school kosh co-op games and it's been a while since i've really been able to play that um so i have Probably Battletoads was the last one because I tried it Takes Two and I played it with the wife and we were not able to beat it. She tried really hard and I got kind of frustrated, you know, kind of waiting on things. And yeah, we couldn't beat it.

00:04:06

Shameer Mehdikhan

We got maybe like halfway through and had a lot of fun, but I don't know. I guess I just expected more out of It Takes Two and I don't know if that was unfair of me. But I, sorry, not in takes two, out of Split Fiction, I really had high expectations.

00:04:19

Shameer Mehdikhan

And in some ways I feel like I've been let down. um So I guess I'll start with the good, you know, the graphics aren't absolutely amazing, but they get the job done, you know? And I think, um you know, everything feels smooth. It feels vibrant. The art style and, you know, the different settings are so well-imagined.

00:04:37

Shameer Mehdikhan

And some of them are really unique um that to me, even if it was in the biggest like graphical powerhouse, um You know, it's it's a really solid looking game. So I think on that front, i I'm pretty happy with it. I don't have major complaints.

00:04:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

It could look sharper, you know, like I think some of the models and things like that. But I remember when we were playing that cyberpunk level and you got to really see the draw distance and everything. I'm like, all right. you know things going on You know, I feel like the art style kind of makes up for, you know, maybe it's not the most cutting edge graphics. Yeah. Like the first thing they definitely did again while trying to make this from a technical standpoint, they knew they were going sacrifice somewhere.

00:05:12

Shameer Mehdikhan

And that was the models, like the way the game looks. So they sacrificed that for a gameplay and creativity and just a unique experience, which I understand. I think this game hasn't captivated me as from the beginning, like It Takes Two and Battletoads has. like Especially Battletoads, which I still remember us playing together. And Battletoads was probably the most like fun couch co-op experience I've had in...

00:05:36

Shameer Mehdikhan

years and i think that's one of the most underrated games well that game was balanced in the sense that aesthetically looked good too but it was much shorter it was maybe only like a six hour game or a four hour game but like that game we were frustrated with but it was a fun type of frustration and it felt like old school like arcade games because of course i had to crank it up to hard mode and oh my god it was hard yeah and so i remember that stupid galaga level Oh, oh my God. That was one of the hardest things. Or the level where we're the bikes and we kept hitting the wall. Oh my God. like that and And it was hilarious. Like I thought the humor was great. You know, the, the gameplay was pretty varied and there was definitely some crazy difficulty spikes, which i can understand. You can say that's a knock, but like an old arcade game, like, you know, it's, yeah they're, and they're not meant to hold your hand. It's supposed to be hard. And with split fiction, we haven't had that difficulty spike yet. we couldn't pick a difficulty and

00:06:27

Shameer Mehdikhan

right now it just feels like we're plotting through just for the sake of the story and that the level that we did play kind of overstated its welcome so we kept feeling like hey like these side scores that we're playing those are fun and unique but they last maybe 10 minutes maybe five at most and and then we would get frustrated because we we got to like maybe two different parts of the cyberpunk-esque level like what do we do and it sometimes it isn't clear i kind of feel more passive when i'm playing it because i don't I think what I'm missing is there doesn't seem to be a lot of tension in the game, both from a gameplay perspective and also from a plot perspective. right Because, you know i'm kind of slightly spoilers, but, you know you know, the premise, and you can see this in any review or YouTube video about the game, is, you know, there's these two writers and essentially someone's trying to steal all the ideas with the machine.

00:07:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

But like, ah why should I care? Like, what's the tension? I think like with any story, when you're you really want to get the audience engaged, you want to know what the stakes are. And what's the worst case scenario if I as the gamer do nothing? Are their lives in danger? Not necessarily because you think if they just sit around doing nothing, eventually they will be pulled out of the glitch. Yeah, and you know the way they said it at the beginning of the story again, spoilers, but the one lady, the one protagonist says, I'm just trying to get published.

00:07:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

So what's the worst case if you don't get published? Really nothing. You just have it. My heart will be broken. Sure. But like when it, it takes two, it was about a mother and father trying to reconcile their differences. she they If they don't, then it's over. It's over.

00:07:58

Shameer Mehdikhan

So like, you don't really have as much to lose. You don't have as much tension. Like this needs to be done. now and also like where's the danger like it's a simulation well if you're afraid if you're in pain and there's no it's ah it's a dream basically and and with it takes to there's more of that emotional tool where again and for those that are in relationships or have been or with a family member whatever There's always going to be ups and downs in any type of relationship or a friendship.

00:08:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

And it's about how you navigate that. So again, it hits hard for a lot of people that probably played the game, which is why it probably sold like 20 million units. Now this game, I think they already announced either two to 3 million people played it or two to 3 million units were sold. I can't remember what was pretty solid it is i just saw it for the first month. And that's another success for the studio. I just don't know it's going to sell as well or will have the legs.

00:08:44

Shameer Mehdikhan

And again, Maybe this game changes over time as we play it because this got high rates. It has a 90 or 91. Yeah, pretty much everyone everyone was saying that this is the best work that they've made. So, you know, I guess I have to wait and see. But, you know, and I think from like a writing perspective, like I won't go too much in the nitty gritty of my story. But, you know, my first book that I was I've been trying to make happen for a long time. One of the major struggles I've had and I've gotten a lot of feedback on is, you know, technically a large part of the story takes place in a simulation. Right.

00:09:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

And so it's hard to make the reader feel engaged because they're like, well, what's going to happen? It's not like they're actually going to die, you know? And so I think that's one thing that kind of slows things down for me.

00:09:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

And from the gameplay perspective, there's, I mean, if you die, there's no big deal. Right. So because of that, like, even if things get hectic, um you know When you're playing, if you die, you literally respond in two seconds if you just press the Y button. Well, I can give them a little pass for that because again, this is a game. But from the grand, you take a higher viewpoint of this, and like said, the story, and that's like I have higher expectations of the narrative because of the prior game yeah already. So that's not a precedent for me. So I would expect them to push the boundaries in the narrative aspect as well. And maybe it still does. well and

00:10:01

Shameer Mehdikhan

And, you know, i don't want to be overly hard on them because, you know, I do think the banter between the two characters is really well done. You know, or when they're talking back and forth, it really does feel like two like people and not video game characters. And that's a very hard thing to get, right?

00:10:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. So that's why I say it's like a mixed bag, you know, because, you know, for me, story and characters are really important. And yeah, I'm not feeling the tension and the stakes. Banter is really good. The characters are sure pretty fleshed out. So I'm enjoying that.

00:10:28

Shameer Mehdikhan

Gameplay perspective, it is fun. It's varied. And really, there's some set piece moments that are just so creative and fun that, you know, even I was taken aback, you know, like, yeah but like you know, some of the motorcycle levels, I was like, ah, this is really fun. sure But then, you know, for me, like, if you think about it, like,

00:10:44

Shameer Mehdikhan

what if like every time you died, like after a certain amount, it took you longer and longer respond each time? They could have been unique and creative about that. And I think like, you know, when we were playing, there was a part where, again, spoilers, you're on ah a motorcycle, you're trying to deactivate a bomb, you have a phone, you got to,

00:11:00

Shameer Mehdikhan

unlock your phone, you're getting a phone call, you have to go this CAPTCHA authentication process. And honestly, to me, this was more cringe than it was funny or like, actually thought it was funny. I thought it was cringe. Like that one wasn't like that good. Like I thought the tension was going to be there, but the tension, like the story wasn't there for me to say, Oh my God, I'm trying to get to it. And then like,

00:11:18

Shameer Mehdikhan

like the way the scene ends, it doesn't really matter how fast you got through everything. like ah Because the thing is, like if you actually had to get through everything fast enough and that's how you succeed and move on with the scene, it'd be one thing, but if I did nothing, it seems like it would be a similar result. Yeah, because they get to the I got near the end where i had to accept the terms and the conditions and the privacy and all that.

00:11:39

Shameer Mehdikhan

I do some of that, almost hit X up, and it goes, oh, the motorcycle blew up, but guess what? You still survived, you just fell down. And it's like, okay, like what was the point? Like that or there was no point to that then. So yeah, yeah.

00:11:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

I get what you mean. So I think those are some of the things that have kind of dragged down the experience, but you know, definitely going to, we're going to play the whole thing. Yeah, we'll play. we And for me right now, like as much as I'm like getting, being hard on the game, like I give an eight out of 10.

00:12:04

Shameer Mehdikhan

So I was just about to say, man, you just beat me to the punch. What I'm playing isn't a nine out of a 10 right now. Like I did. I'm just be honest with again. This is a persuasive. And if this is already one quarter of the game, I don't think and additional three quarters going to convince me otherwise.

00:12:17

Shameer Mehdikhan

An eight out of 10 is not bad. You know, it's just like when you are being led to believe something is going to be a nine for you and it's more of an eight, then you're just going to like, okay, like let's cool the jets. Yeah. And I guess the last thing I was going to say about the game, the platforming is like pretty fun, but,

00:12:32

Shameer Mehdikhan

And I really didn't expect to love this game as much as I did. i loved Astro Bot. And after I got done playing Astro Bot and seeing that creativity and just seeing how well the platforming worked and how varied it was, I kind of lost a little bit of the allure of ah for this game.

00:12:48

Shameer Mehdikhan

I feel like if I played Split Fiction before I played Astro Bot, I would probably review it higher. yeah But after that, I'm just kind of like, okay, one of the main things Split Fiction has going forward is how each encounter is so very... I'll give you that. Astro Bot, man, the the level design is so good and all the different like, you know, built backpacks you can get. Like, oh man I'll give you that. This game, Split Fiction, is technically a platformer as well. And so if you compare the two purely based on platforming mechanics, like Astro Bot like wins out by a far shot. like I mean, I'd give Astro Bot a nine and you know, I was hated. I was mad hating on that game. I agree.

00:13:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

So, Yeah, that's all I got on Split Fiction for now. Yeah, and I guess ah other things, you know, I actually started to get back into Assassin's Creed, so I got Mirage. It was really cheap. I got a disc replay for like $14.

00:13:34

Shameer Mehdikhan

fourteen bucks So I was like, all right, I'll load this up. And maybe it's, again, one of those things where I just went into the experience not really expecting much, but I've been pleasantly surprised, to be honest.

00:13:47

Shameer Mehdikhan

um You know, it doesn't look anything crazy fantastic, you know, graphics are serviceable gameplay so far has been serviceable, but it really does feel like Assassin's Creed and not necessarily, you know, a big, you know, bulky RPG. And I kind of liked that, you know, I miss the old Assassin's Creed games.

00:14:06

Shameer Mehdikhan

So I'm probably going to play it a little bit more dip in here and there. um i don't think it's gotten the hooks in me yet. So I don't know if I'll be able to play it full through, but um big picture,

00:14:18

Shameer Mehdikhan

I know Shadows came out, and that was kind of high on my list of things to play, but I think I'm going to wait, honestly. I feel like with as much going on, I don't want to spend $70 on the game.

00:14:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

I don't either. like It's funny. like You were just talking about Mirage, and it's like, I thought i thought for sure this Assassin's Creed was going to be the one that got the the really good review scores. It was going to very, not just sound and technical, but like, oh, they finally pushed the game to its limit, and this ended up scoring slightly worse than mirage yeah it got like the eighty or eighty one <unk>ly better they knowro square that well i thought it did or one hour was maybe val hu i thought it was Mirage.

00:14:58

Shameer Mehdikhan

So again, this was like, what what most reviews said from what I read was, hey, it's just Assassin's Creed with a little more refinement. And the story is like, it's just another nice story to see. And that's like, I don't want to pay 70 just to be like, I don't want to say it's mediocre because it's not mediocre, right? By standards, based on what people are saying. An 8 out of 10 game is a solid game. Yeah.

00:15:18

Shameer Mehdikhan

you know For me, like I just have a lot of other things I'm really excited for. like This is just a busy month in April, so I'm okay with kind of putting it on the back burner, but if I didn't have as much stuff on my plate, like I would totally play it.

00:15:30

Shameer Mehdikhan

Because the the setting itself is so enticing to me. Again, like and for you played Ghost of Tsushima, know it wasn't your favorite game, but you liked it, but like this specific setting you can be a ninja or a samurai and just i mean honestly i i mean well i'll have to see but i think i might like assassin's creed shadows more than yeah i'm sure you will because even though i love the setting and the characters like i really wasn't feeling the combat and i really am digging the fact that there's two different characters and kind of out two different play styles and ghost kind of did the same thing but i really didn't feel the need to switch up my play styles unless the game forced me to. So the problem with Ghost was that you literally had a unique play style just to beat a unique anime. That didn't make sense either. that You could have just had one play style just fought. I just felt like I just had to kind of follow what the game wanted me to do. And then when I did that, like I didn't really feel that creative or you know? yeah um i mean, again, I mean,

00:16:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

It sounds like we're mad hating, but these are all 8s out 10s to me. Which is I'm saying I'll get it. I will eventually get this one out of all of them. But for me, like yeah I'm going to wait until I can get it for like $50. That's what I'm looking at. but you know i guess I expected this game to review really badly. I felt like there was so much negative attention going into the game. All the YouTubers were hating.

00:16:46

Shameer Mehdikhan

And you know, that kind of creates that like cognitive distortion, like that negative bias. You just anticipated to be terrible. So I, I honestly was expecting like open credit of like 72. I was shocked when it was close to an 80. It's funny you say this because I think if they released this last fall when they intended to initially, this would have got a 72.

00:17:03

Shameer Mehdikhan

I think these extra six months of polish probably help just to, just to say this was a good functioning game and if you've not compared to Star Wars Outlaws, I've now been seeing a ton of forums where people are saying, hey, this is actually deep down underneath all the bullshit performance issues. This is a good game.

00:17:20

Shameer Mehdikhan

So I think people are also, like you said, that bias. had Great, take the extra month or a couple months to polish, I'm glad they did it. Yeah, I feel like this is what's happening to a lot of games because games, at least I'm not a developer, but this is what I hear when I watch YouTube videos, is that games really come together late, you know, like near the end.

00:17:40

Shameer Mehdikhan

like in the last couple months or last year. But now I feel like with how complicated graphics and physics and everything has become, ah really what used to seem like, oh, it's going to take six months to polish is more like a year, you know?

00:17:54

Shameer Mehdikhan

and so it's it's yeah And so it's just really hard to give a realistic timeline because you think, oh, I can just polish in the last two, three months. Yeah, that's no longer. can't, you know, because really you should be anticipating like nine months to a year of polish, which is crazy because that means your game should be pretty much...

00:18:10

Shameer Mehdikhan

really well playable a year before they wanted to be released. Think about like Nintendo when they released Tears of the Kingdom. they said They admitted they had the game in a year prior. They took a full 12 months to polish the game.

00:18:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

And that that was a big game. And like that's insane to me. That boggles my mind that they didn't even talk about release dates until two to three months in advance. But I think... like i think both studios and developers and publishers should really kind of start changing the way they view things. Like look at movies, right? We hear about, oh, this movie, they're shooting it and then they get done shooting it. And how long does it take until that movie actually comes out?

00:18:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

Like they'll shoot it. and they'll they'll be It's like, okay, you shot it in like two months. Now we have to wait two two and a half years for the release. like right i Guys, I just hate to come out. This is side tangent, but goddamn Matt Reeves and fucking Batman. Yeah. Or Spider-Man, the new animated one. They just announced 2027. Why? It's a CGI movie. I'm sure they were kind of why they don't say it a cgi movie but this is my point like yeah i mean i'm sure there were kind of a lot of rewrites and a lot of sure, screw ups and stuff like that. I, I still think the movie will deliver, but my point being is like really the, I feel like it used to be that when the game is in a pretty good playable state, then it's just bug fixes. But now I almost see it like more like a Hollywood movie. Like, okay, you've just shot it. That's it

00:19:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

Right. Like now the editing start and really the movie comes together on the cutting floor. Right. And same thing now with video games. So, But, you know, and I guess that brings us into talking about Ubisoft in large, because I was not expecting that Tencent, like $1.5 billion is pouring in.

00:19:52

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. so you know, there was rumors in the last several months about Ubisoft potentially trying to have some sort of buyout by Tencent specifically, because they had already invested in them and and then prior.

00:20:03

Shameer Mehdikhan

And so what ultimately what happened was Ubisoft spun off a separate subsidiary and they decided to take three of their most important ipss which were Far Cry, Assassin's Creed, and Rainbow Six.

00:20:14

Shameer Mehdikhan

And Tencent bought a 25% stake in that. And they want to use this collaborative or collaborative partnership to market their three biggest games.

00:20:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

and it's interesting to me because they listed there was like a list of like ten to fifteen other ips they didn't include it I wonder if they're all of a sudden going to start selling those off. Yeah, was surprised about some of the things they didn't include. Like, what was it? Like, Division, Watch Dogs. Rayman.

00:20:39

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. um What's the stealth game that everyone loves? Splinter Cell. Yeah. Like, honestly, shocking. It's really big stuff in... I mean, I don't know I feel about it like I'm actually happy that Ubisoft isn't dead and buried, you know even though a lot of people want them dead and buried, because these are pretty good IPs. Even if you're hating now, like a lot of the people were hating, there was a time when you loved Ubisoft, right? And you had a great time playing those games, so I don't want them to go away.

00:21:03

Shameer Mehdikhan

It's just, they grew and they became bloated. yeah i think they really need to change how they make games, because these 40, 50 hour loaded games are just not coming. But that's the thing. The three IP that they decided to not save, but like take over to this venture are all open world games now. Like Far Cry is now a open world game. And it's always, it has been for a while, but like Far Cry 7 was a large game. From what I'm hearing, the rumor is the next one's going to be just as big or bigger.

00:21:30

Shameer Mehdikhan

So to me, they're going to keep having this problem where they have to have a focused development team or ah multiple teams in multiple regions and if fails oh guess over shutting down like this studio this studio this studio So it just doesn't, their model doesn't seem to work well and maybe they should scale back a little bit some of these games, make a traditional linear game, make a 10 hour game. That's why I like the idea of Assassin's Creed Mirage, but like I kind of get the sense that Prince of Persia was one of the things they wanted to test out to see how successful that model is.

00:21:57

Shameer Mehdikhan

And I don't know, I feel like it probably didn't sell as well it was. Yeah, it commercial plot. you know It got great reviews. I started playing it like it's a solid game. it's kind just It didn't seem to crash you know catch the type of traction they were looking for. yeah And so now I think they're also kind of wary of drawing out those $40, $50 video game experiments right that are smaller in scope. Well, the game went on sale literally months later, which was insane to me.

00:22:24

Shameer Mehdikhan

I bought the game for like $25. I think people just didn't want that genre right then. Because you have Metroid, you have... Castlevania, you have all these other games that out. I don't think people were expecting this type of Prince of Persia game.

00:22:37

Shameer Mehdikhan

They wanted a core Prince of Persia game to come back to the roots. They announced the remake a year prior. then And by the by the way, by developers in India, ultimately they said, never mind, we're taking this back because it doesn't look good and the reception was bad.

00:22:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

And so people wanted just either a yeah pure remake or a new entry in the series. So This is great to do the spin-offs, but you only do it when your brand is healthy. So those are supplemental key. Those aren't supposed to be your core. Like this 2D platform wasn't meant to be their next Yeah, if you think about it, only people who really remember Splinter Cell are old, you know, they they have kids, you know. Exactly. And so like what's really going to...

00:23:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

drag them back in to play you know funny that you you mentioned that though they're literally making an animated series now for splinter cell and i wonder if they're going cancel it now i mean you never know like if if anime really does it well it can honestly revitalize a franchise like look at cyberpunk yeah that was a definitely and if if the prince of persia anime is fire then people are going to be really clamoring for video games so So, but yeah, you know, I know Microsoft doesn't have unlimited pockets and I know right now it's kind of a strange time for them, you know, with the share-ups and all those things, but I was surprised. i was like, man, you couldn't pay $2 billion dollars to get those three franchises in Game Pass all the time. Oh my God. but Like you would think Microsoft would be salivating at the idea of having every

00:24:04

Shameer Mehdikhan

Assassin's Creed along with every Call of Duty on day one. And again, Far Cry, Far Cry. It speaks to a very big sector of their core audience.

00:24:17

Shameer Mehdikhan

Oh yeah, Xbox gamers love shooters. yeah Yeah, so I feel like they should have, and if they don't, obviously they they can still get in that's only twenty five percent state to tencent i don't think they will but they snatch up the other ib trip For sure.

00:24:29

Shameer Mehdikhan

Why not pick up some of those other smaller ones that throw them out? You know, look, I get it. Like if it's a 25% stake, then you do the math. this Do they want to spend, you know, $6 billion? Okay. okay I kind of get it. You know, think about what you got for Bethesda, right?

00:24:43

Shameer Mehdikhan

Spending as much as they spent 8 billion or something like that. So I get the money, but like, you know, couldn't you find a way to make a deal to make them all day one game pass without owning them? Yeah.

00:24:55

Shameer Mehdikhan

You know? um I don't know. I'm just, I mean, it's not that I'm, it's always nice to have more games on Game Pass, but I'm happy enough with what I have that I don't need Microsoft to do that.

00:25:07

Shameer Mehdikhan

I'm just surprised they didn't because, you know, it seems that they like swooping in when a company is getting a lot of bad PR, right? What they did with Bethesda and Activision. So it seemed like, hey, if Ubisoft is in that exact right moment for you to you know they they sneak in. They do it because they know that's when they're worth the least. Because they're undervalued. Undervalued at that point.

00:25:31

Shameer Mehdikhan

And they go, look, we know this isn't going to get any much worse. They'll take the PR hit, you know, and they say, hey, we're coming in as heroes. That's all we're doing. We don't need to do anything. yeah like that's

00:25:44

Shameer Mehdikhan

survive like i said there're these are great games i don't give a fuck about i'll be honest with the yerbo family they've abused their power for so long but at this point all that matters is two things stop if you're going to simplify your development process stop hiring a bunch of people then to fire them a year or two later stop doing that scale down slightly and then get a better development pipeline And then the second thing, just save the IP that people want. So I do think they should really focus on Splinter Cell.

00:26:10

Shameer Mehdikhan

I think that's ah and a mature game. Like if you look at Death Stranding or Metal Gear, right? Like those have been successful coming back. And I see Splinter Cell in that genre. They kind of time it right because there is a desire for that type of spy game. right which I know we're going to talk about later, but like Project 07, right? And then you have Hitman. Look at how good Hitman's been doing. look at the you know Look at how people are getting hyped up for Perfect Dark.

00:26:34

Shameer Mehdikhan

Even Cyberpunk, where they had more of that spy feel, like that was hype. So really, that is a part of the video game industry that's being neglected. Yeah, it's neglected. you know, Splinter Cell now would be fire, but if you release it right after like Perfect Art in Project 07, then people will kind of be like, eh, I can't get enough Spy games. So, you know, they should really be getting on the ball now. Well, the last core Splinter Cell game they released, which I think was 360, which was called, I think, Blacklist. Blacklist, yeah, I That was really, want to revolutionary, but I remember people talking about because of the core stealth mechanics they introduced in the game. They're all

00:27:08

Shameer Mehdikhan

Oh my God, this was so good. Cause around the time Metal Gear came out just before. So everyone was like, Oh, we have something on the 360. we have something on the PS3. Like that was so big. If they had just, you know, kept kept on it, they could have potentially, I mean, I'm not saying.

00:27:24

Shameer Mehdikhan

It's that easy to replicate Metal Gear Solid. But even if you had half the success of Metal Gear Solid, oh my God, you would be happy. The crazy thing is they announced they were remaking Splinter Solid. Like, was it three years ago now, four years ago?

00:27:36

Shameer Mehdikhan

We haven't heard anything since. And i feel like they scrapped it or they had probably... And I know Microsoft, you know, if Microsoft's going to swoop in at any point, I would have expected them to really salivate over it. Assassin's Creed, but really I think I could see him make a play for Splinter Cell because Splinter Cell has enough brand recognition when it comes to Xbox, like with Chaos Theory and things like that, yeah um that, you know, it seems like a good fit, you know, and I feel like it would really help the repertoire of Game Pass and they could, and if it fails, you know, at least it goes into Game Pass so you can kind of cushion, you know, the loss financially. So,

00:28:08

Shameer Mehdikhan

you know I could totally see Microsoft trying to make a play for that. ah Well, so again, the rumors, and I think this is probably true, is that Ubisoft has already been talking Microsoft. So there was like a protest or supposed to be a protest by a company ah representing a lot of the smaller shareholders and of Ubisoft because they weren't notified that Ubisoft had been talking to I think it was, want to say Warner Brothers and Microsoft already.

00:28:32

Shameer Mehdikhan

And obviously then they announced the deal with Tencent slightly after. So Microsoft had already been in talks with them the last several months. The question is, why didn't they come to an agreement? No idea. I mean, it must have been a money thing. Yeah, it must have been a money thing. So maybe they thought they were worth less than they really were.

00:28:46

Shameer Mehdikhan

there's a Or they didn't want the partnership with, again, Guillermo because there have been other like allegations. bet you I bet you that was it. I bet you they didn't want Guillermo. all yeah think microsoft just wanted you know they just want to take over yeah because if you think about it like they're opening themselves up to liability as well right because like then they don't have full control yeah which is why when they took activision they the deal made with bobby kochak is like as soon as you take couple months you're out you can't do this and you know i know microsoft gets a lot of flack but overall like i'm pretty happy with the direction like bethesda and activision has gone into and

00:29:21

Shameer Mehdikhan

A lot of the flack we give Microsoft for, you know, those companies, I feel like they're based off of decisions that were a long time coming, you know, like Redfall, like, come on, you know, like,

00:29:32

Shameer Mehdikhan

How did no one notice at any point in their development, you know, where this thing was going? You know, that there should have been an inter... some Somebody... A gate. Doing something. There should have been a gated process, but that one's like, they knew, they just kept it under, like, the carpet or the radar, and they're just like, we're going to fleece our customers for now. And if Starfield, you know, I think an 85 game is still solid. You know, Starfield was great to me, you know, didn't live up to the hypes of the rest of them, but that's a no, but it's still solid.

00:30:02

Shameer Mehdikhan

And can't really say that's Microsoft's fault. I think Doom looks fire. you know look i'm really good I think that looks amazing. Kudos to greenlighting that project for them because that was after they were acquired. Indiana Jones.

00:30:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

Indiana Jones. That looks great. that And that was, you know I thought that was a pretty good game. So really, I think the only misstep when it comes to Bethesda has been Kind of it's a been a little weird about what's platform exclusive and not, but it seems like that's pretty much going to be resolved and everything is just going to go everywhere. yeah And then the next thing is going to be, well, HiFi Rush. and And I mean, I still hold that against Microsoft.

00:30:39

Shameer Mehdikhan

That sucked. That hurt. But i guess it just really, people didn't love it that much, you know? And I think I was reading somewhere about how well, like, those ports sold.

00:30:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

And, oh, God, I think CFD sold like crazy on the PS5. Crazy. And I want to say like. Hi-Fi Rush, they were reportedly saying it's only $150,000 or something. That's a hit, wow. Yeah, so I mean, it sucks. Yeah, again, it's maybe it's not a marketing thing, maybe it is, but that game, there's just not an appetite for that specific game, and that's okay.

00:31:08

Shameer Mehdikhan

like We can live with that. I enjoyed it for what it was. I'm glad they got a chance. It was a small group that worked on it. But I think Microsoft has done good enough that had they taken over any of these IPs, I would have been hopeful that something good would have came out of their leadership with that.

00:31:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, and and the thing is, I know they closed down studios in Bethesda, but, you know, it's kind of the name of the game when it comes to the industry. You know, like, I give Microsoft a B overall when it comes to Bethesda. You know, there's things I'm unhappy about, but I was pretty satisfied with Starfield with the and Indiana Jones, and I'm super hyped for Doom. So that's good enough.

00:31:47

Shameer Mehdikhan

And with Activision Blizzard, I mean, I'm happy that now we're actually getting other things, like Tony Hawk, though I'm sure... That's a long time coming, but you know they haven't really screwed up anything that bad yet.

00:32:00

Shameer Mehdikhan

So I guess we'll wait and see. Now, other things to talk about. Do you want to go straight into the switch or something else on your mind? Before we do that, you want to, there's a couple of shows we've been watching, which we really just want to talk about really quickly. And then to, then we'll hit the big news. don don So I guess I'll start with what I've been watching yeah wheel of time. So I'm not entirely caught up. I've only seen the first four episodes and I think on episode five, soon to be six.

00:32:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

um But man, like... Cancel the show, end it? No. It's horrible. It's bad as Lord the Rings rings a bar. No, it's way better. think I think was telling my cousin, because I told him, like, I'm watching and really enjoying you was like, dude, what's wrong with you? Like, this game... Like, I started watching the first season, and it wasn't great.

00:32:43

Shameer Mehdikhan

And was like, honestly, like... even if you say the first season was a six and the second season was a seven, even though I would rate the second season higher than the seven, this is a solid eight. And so like, this is what I like seeing like really season after season, the show was getting better.

00:32:58

Shameer Mehdikhan

Like the people, like the writers, you know, the actors, they're noticing the things that weren't fitting and they're addressing them and it's just working. The biggest problem with Wheel of Time is the the books are just way too big, you know? And so when things feel rushed,

00:33:14

Shameer Mehdikhan

I look you know online like, hey, like what did everyone think about this? And it's usually because they're trying to condense a whole book into like six episodes. yeah And it's the book's are like a thousand pages. Which to me, the writing I see on the wall is they won't adapt all the books.

00:33:29

Shameer Mehdikhan

And instead... this will be like a i just my gut feeling will be like a six season and show and they'll condense all 12 i don't know what they're going do i mean i in this season they're doing some things out of order like if i'm remembering there's like like see you know book three and book four they're kind of doing that a little out of order um but it's 12 books that are a thousand pages i'm telling you this is gonna be like a six season show and they will have a conclusive i think that will be somewhat different from the books but they'll be like hey we like we did as best as we could because it's not feasible you don't just pilot a show like that based off a 12 book series and be like oh i think this would be popular to keep mean i feel like what they're hoping for is you know by the time it gets into season three or season four people going to love it so much that they're just going to spread the news like hot fire and then because with game of thrones i remember i was you know watching it in season one in season two and no one knew what it was and i was like guys this is good this is good and then finally like season three and then people are like

00:34:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

Okay, well, if my buddy is saying it's a good show, even if it's four seasons in, like I'll invest. you know and But then, I mean, Game of Thrones, really, that show need to be nine or ten seasons.

00:34:37

Shameer Mehdikhan

So i can I don't know if they would do six. I feel like they're shooting for eight. I feel like they're shooting for eight or nine. And they'll see how successful they are. And if they're successful, maybe they'll stretch it out. But 12 seasons is insane. That's like, if you do even one a year, that's 12 years. And if you don't, that's...

00:34:54

Shameer Mehdikhan

I think it's taking him like two years do a season. Dude, that's like 20 years, man. Yeah. Well, first of all, the actors will renegotiate their deals. They won't stay long unless they get paid more money. And B. They'll look so different by the time you're at the end of the show. Yeah. Well, that and then the other thing is that like.

00:35:12

Shameer Mehdikhan

What is this? So you said 12 bucks. Yeah, I just, oh yeah, the other thing is it's Amazon. So the production is probably already high. They're probably wasting a ton of money. yeah I don't know how much they're spending, but man, this game, this show looks amazing.

00:35:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

Well, that that's what I'm saying. It's the same problem with Rings of Power. They know they're losing money on it, but Jeff Bezos, because he's loves Lord of the Rings so much he doesn't care so he's like I'm gonna let this go into a tell the whole story which if he's also involved with Rings of Power it's probably the same thing fine we'll go eight seasons or ten seasons because we have money to burn like who cares so that's the only good thing going for it is that we might get a complete story only for the fact that yeah I mean I would really hate the fact if we got like five six seasons in and they wanted to do more and then they just they just pulled the plug because and for big shows like this like you you really have to build on yourself you know and like

00:35:58

Shameer Mehdikhan

It's going to make a big difference if the showrunners are like, okay, do have six seasons to this or eight or ten? Yeah, of course. You try to plan a level ahead. But they still go season by season. So, like, when this season ends, they're going to go... They never know.

00:36:10

Shameer Mehdikhan

Well, no. what I mean, like, when when the season ends, it's like, go are we going get another one? don't Well, they what they do is they go back to the writing room and they start to write a lot of what the next season should be. So they don't, could they have things planned for several seasons ahead of time? A little bit.

00:36:24

Shameer Mehdikhan

But then they take it one season at a time and they flesh it out. So they don't even, they don't even care about season five, six and seven or eight right now. They're just like, once we get to the end of season three, we'll get back to the writer's room to write season four.

00:36:34

Shameer Mehdikhan

And then they write their cliffhangers. So I just think. Look, you have to also remember Amazon has jack shit. So this is only one... This is one thing for I don't know. They are doing... They've gotten better shows. I don't know. Jack Reacher.

00:36:47

Shameer Mehdikhan

People love Jack Reacher. I've never watched it, but people love Jack Reacher. um You've got to watch Invincible, dude. Yeah, Invincible. Yeah, I think if you watched Invincible, your opinion on Amazon would change. Look, Invincible, Jack Reacher, and Wheel Time is not enough to... Like, I think Apple TV is better.

00:37:05

Shameer Mehdikhan

In my opinion, I think they have more shows. I mean... that are higher quality, good storytelling. I think if you're looking objectively, then yeah, Apple TV would be better. I like i like Amazon Prime better, and that's probably because don't like severance.

00:37:19

Shameer Mehdikhan

And that's the biggest show there, and I'm never going to finish it. So that's like a huge, you know, to me, that's like a huge draw for the service. I love Ted Lasso. You know, I loved... um Shrinking. Those are like my favorite shows.

00:37:34

Shameer Mehdikhan

Silo. Silo's pretty good, but don't I'm going to watch the second season. And Foundation is good too, but I like Wheel of Time way more. so But yeah, so I think I'm going to watch it. It's on my list next. Dude, watch. You're going to watch Invincible, and then you're going be like, man, love Prime Video. Prime Video's the best.

00:37:54

Shameer Mehdikhan

So yeah, anything else about Wheel Time? uh i guess the one thing that's kind of surprised me and maybe for people who have actually read the books um i didn't realize how dark it was like my wife sometimes is like oh my god what are you watching because when it's bloody it's really really bloody and gory and there is a lot of death and some of the evil entities are it's almost like horror level like oh my god these are like some creepy ass people like

00:38:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

what is going on? So that's that, I did not expect that. Like, i i thought it would be more lighthearted. Like, You know, I think Lord the Rings, even though there's dark elements like Sauron and the Lords and stuff like that. one's scary. You know, the thing is it's it's lighthearted because of Frodo and, you know, the dwarves and the Kormatari and like that. So it's kind of like that balance. but Well, they have the ancient evils and like rings of power when they go in the woods.

00:38:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

But even that is like, yeah like you know, but man, like mealtime gets dark. So you saw the second season, right? No, I need to start watching. Oh, man. Okay.

00:39:00

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. Catch up. Catch up when we'll talk. Okay. Is that what anything else? No, no. I mean, i am looking forward to the rest of the season. Okay. yeah'm I'm hoping I can start season two in a couple months here and finish it by summer so I can finish season three by the end of the summer something. But, you know, I'm just always, I'm always haphazardly jumping between different shows on different platforms.

00:39:21

Shameer Mehdikhan

So it all just depends on my mood. Just have a drink and convince yourself you're watching Severance. You know, play the the background music and then you'll fly through the show. Yeah, that's true. I actually flew through Severance.

00:39:32

Shameer Mehdikhan

um So yeah, I just wanted to quickly talk about Severance 2. Obviously, for those that don't know, Severance Season 2 just ended on basically a cliffhanger as well. Interesting season. i really love Season 1 only because it kind of...

00:39:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

came out of the blue for me. And then it caught, it captivated me more. So when I came to season two, I had, my hopes were like really high, but it started off slow. Um, so I'm just trying to, you know, level South with everyone here.

00:39:57

Shameer Mehdikhan

the biggest takeaway to, uh, to me specifically, i want to talk about some spoilers here too, is that we finally understand what the severance procedure is, who invented it. We get a better understanding of miss Casey, the therapist that we meet in season one and what drives, um,

00:40:14

Shameer Mehdikhan

I-mark and O-mark's motivations for like why they're doing what they're doing, whether it's in South, like when the seventh building or outside of their personal life. So that finally picked up in the second half of the season. So it did take a while to get there.

00:40:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

So pacing was uneven overall though, I think the reveal of it was anticlimactic a little bit. Like it was like, it wasn't super simple, but it was also like, okay, like i was, I was expecting grander things and maybe there still will be some of that in the later seasons, but the climax, I felt like we hit the climax.

00:40:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

um So overall performance on the last episode was really good. And then there was the episode, I think episode seven, where we get the backstory of Mark's wife specifically, that was well shot. One of the best,

00:40:57

Shameer Mehdikhan

choreographed and the cinematography was like top-notch that i've ever seen in any show like on on god for real for real who are you bro so so that was good too but overall i'd have to give maybe the season like an eight but every season that ended like every episode that it always had me wanting more every week so the the way they ended every up episode on cliffhanger perfect um so i think overall i'm excited for season three they did confirm there's a season three coming and i'm not going to talk too much about the show because again for those that haven't seen it just go watch it for yourself it's hard for me to explain it because there really is like an interesting vibe that you get from just watching and experiencing it because it's the way the show is filmed and the way the characters in interact so I just don't really want to talk about too much because me explaining it objectively doesn't give a good i idea and um

00:41:46

Shameer Mehdikhan

You know, and to why I... It's just kind of a unique thing. It's unique thing. You've got to check it out. I mean, for me, like i think I recommended the show. or No, I think you recommended this to me, and then I watched and was like, yeah, dude, do you should watch it.

00:41:57

Shameer Mehdikhan

um You know, I had some concerns with the first season, but overall, was pretty happy with it, you know? um But at the same time, like after the first season was done, and maybe this is just a me thing, but I don't know. like i I was expecting a lot from the beginning of season two because the first season ended in a really interesting place.

00:42:21

Shameer Mehdikhan

And after the pacing just felt so slow in the like the beginning of the second season, I was like, i I personally don't like that kind of show where it's like, all right, you know, it's going to be an eight hour you know like season because there's multiple episodes. So you know, just, you know, feed me little morsels throughout to keep me placated until I finally get a reveal. And I'm just like, it just feels kind of exhausting to me that it's like now season three is going to come.

00:42:47

Shameer Mehdikhan

You built up the hype at the end of season two. And now I know the beginning of season three is not going to feel like a roller coaster. It's going to be really slow again. It's going to be a slow burn. It's like, okay, now I have to wait, you know, until finally things get interesting again.

00:43:01

Shameer Mehdikhan

And, and for me, like, i think that's one of the challenges in a TV show, right? Because if every season is going to follow that same arc that a movie has, right? Well, like the beginning, it's slowly building up, then you hit your climax and you hit a resolution.

00:43:16

Shameer Mehdikhan

Like it's, it's one thing if it's a movie, but if every season follows that, you know, it's like, like, okay, this is the most off the wall example, but, and I don't know why, but I'll never forget this moment. Okay. Okay.

00:43:29

Shameer Mehdikhan

entourage. All right. I still haven't finished that. You got me started. So I love that show. That was one of favorite shows of all time. And I remember I was like a lot younger when I saw it. And, um, I, at this point, I have to say, it was spoilers. If you're going to watch it, you're going to it by now.

00:43:44

Shameer Mehdikhan

Um, but, um, I remember like the whole thing is why, you know, he's an actor and you know, they're always trying to make money and then they overspend their money and then they're kind of screwed and stuff like that. So I remember I was like, okay, by the end of the season, like there's all been all this tension, all this funny stuff happened, like things worked out with his Aquaman movie or whatever.

00:44:01

Shameer Mehdikhan

And then it's like, okay, like finally they've grown, they've learned. And the next season starts and it's like, well now we have to create some artificial problems because we tidy things up too much. And now it's like,

00:44:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

really I'm following the same plot arc as the last season repeated again. i mean, it was a funny show, so I didn't care, you know, but it's like, it's like this artificial thing that like story writers do when they're writing TV shows, you know?

00:44:28

Shameer Mehdikhan

Which is just, and books kind of do this too if you think about it. like I was just remember reading like you know the second Hunger Games book and I couldn't finish it because for me the beginning of the second Hunger Games book just really dragged.

00:44:42

Shameer Mehdikhan

i was like, I've already done this whole arc and now it's like I have to repeat the arc again. right But who knows? you know Sometimes when you get too much of something good it just becomes draining. But I mean, I'll you know i'll agree with you. like The writing when it comes to acting and stuff like that and the characters, like they do a phenomenal yeah job. Especially because they're playing every character's like twoities so you have to switch on and And they're not similar.

00:45:05

Shameer Mehdikhan

you know They really do a good job of portraying. And the way they sell it is based off of their acting, right? Because if they didn't you know show the nuances, we wouldn't really know. Yeah, we wouldn't know. We wouldn't care. so So yeah, I mean, it's a good show. I just i guess I just, it's not for me. It's fair.

00:45:20

Shameer Mehdikhan

That's fair. Again, I felt the same way about Rings of Power. love season one, but I just didn't. Season two didn't resonate long. It took me forever to finish that. So I understand that. There's one other show we really want to talk about really quickly too. So Solo Leveling, for those that don't know, that's an anime. It's based off a manhwa, a Korean anime, or a Korean comic. And I think we've talked about this in the past, but season two just finished.

00:45:41

Shameer Mehdikhan

It's the most liked anime now in Crunchyroll, ahead of One Piece and JJK. Honestly, that's insane. Season two was so good. Like... this this is insane stuff for some context season one originally when it came out two years ago was supposed to be 25 episodes they decided to split it into two cowards and instead of releasing them back to back they did season one of 12 episodes and they took a year and a half break and they beefed up the animations because they realized so many people loved season one and not in a oh my god this is the best animated they just noticed that the the popularity was there so they decided to put more effort in season two and

00:46:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

my god, did it pay off. Like every episode was a banger. And pacing was really fast is what I noticed here. So almost every three episodes covered an arc, which was utterly insane how fast this season blew by and how much info it covered in the light novel and the manhwa.

00:46:32

Shameer Mehdikhan

But overall, it it worked well because again, I think we've said this in the past, this show really is like a turn your brain off type of anime. it's It's a very simple kind concept. you're just leveling up and you're youre working towards a specific goal and like it doesn't have to be complex like jgk where people were like oh my god and then the shadows came then made my asshole no jutsu. And then of course I was going to beat this guy because of physics and gravity. It was like, no, it's not that like, it's like fucking not that at all. So I like animations were top notch.

00:47:02

Shameer Mehdikhan

The acting was great. The voice acting was like just up there. And then the. i yeah I don't know. I think it it was like so good that like they did the same thing that Severance did, the cliffhangers.

00:47:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

They always ended it on a crazy note. And as soon as it would like get to a really high like ending, boom, you you hit the ending song and they did it on purpose, like for every single episode. So honestly, that they knocked out of the park. There hasn't been a confirmation of season. three I could see this series going to four or five seasons, but yeah, I was just super excited, man. I think they did a great job, and this is honestly one of my favorite series time. I mean, I don't think I've heard anyone say anything bad about solo leveling.

00:47:39

Shameer Mehdikhan

um I don't know. Again, I feel like this is just a me thing. I'm not trying to be a big hater today, but I just can't get into Shonen anymore. Like, the older I've gotten, like, I feel like I got through Naruto, I got through, like, Bleach, Dreadmozzy, like, that filled that need for me, that niche, and, like,

00:47:57

Shameer Mehdikhan

At this point, like anytime I watch a Shonen, I'm just like, all right, well, this is this is the leveling up part. This is the kicking ass part, you know? And I'm just like, I've just been, I've seen it so much. Yeah, you're burnt out. I'm burnt out, you know? I think if I give myself enough time, you know, then I'll be like, oh no, I really want a Shonen. But like, even... like the old, like the old enemies, they're, they're still bringing them out. You know, like one piece is still going on. Bleach has their, own their new season, you know, like they're remaking one piece, even though one piece hasn't finished.

00:48:27

Shameer Mehdikhan

So like, at the same time, like, I guess I have a less of a desire to even experience new shonen because the shonen I grew up with are still kind of a thing, you know? Yeah. Yeah. It's still a thing. I mean, you know, I swapped back and forth cause I haven't seen a good balance for an anime. Like I would say the last anime that I thought had a good balance was like nine years ago. That was my hero academia. But then that story slowly for me fell off a cliff because they didn't end it like in a good spot. Yeah. i gave up on that show. and I'll never forget when, and my cousin always makes fun of me and tells me to get back into it, but it was the gentle villain.

00:49:02

Shameer Mehdikhan

Oh god, that was the worst. That was the worst arc. As soon as got there, i was like, I can't. And everyone has told me to just skip that arc, but I'm just like, god I just can't. yeah And and it's it's not motivating enough to be like, well, like and again, don't get wrong, the show is good.

00:49:20

Shameer Mehdikhan

But that was the less balanced anime con. So either we find anime that super complex, like an Attack on Titan for something else or you get which italian times five Don't don't get me wrong. That's like up there for me too. Like I'll remember that show or you gotta get simple tropish anime, like a soul of an or an art or a bleach. Even bleach is a simple story to me. Like it's great and greatly animated at coming back the way it was. I mean, a lot these shows are a bad guy yeah power up with friendship and trading and beat them. That's it. That's most of the shows. So yeah, I'm trying to think back to the last great anime I really talked a lot about. I mean, Attack on Titan for me, though that's what it was.

00:50:00

Shameer Mehdikhan

I think it was probably Vinland Saga Season 2 for me. I don't know if there's been anything else recent that I really like. I think it's been a little while since Cybersunk. Pluto. Pluto was great, yeah. Pluto was friggin' There was nuance to that. You know, I'm happy you brought it up because I feel like I sound like a hater a lot, you know, but Pluto was friggin' fantastic. Yeah. That was a great one. That was the last one. So sorry, that's like a year and a half ago, but besides... But yeah,

00:50:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

ah like we were talking about with animes, it's either the shounen or those like really deep shows that like really make you think, you know, and... And I feel like I get burned out on the Shonen after while, but, like, those deep shows that are kind of gems, know... Once in a while. You know, I still want to find one, and I want to watch Because we don't get enough of it. So I'm okay with, like, everything. And kind of haven't liked, you know, how a lot of anime in general have... I know, like, a lot of the new shows i'm i'm seeing, I'm just like, what's going on? You know, like, I know...

00:50:55

Shameer Mehdikhan

Well, like like, so another show that was really great, like, eight, nine years ago, it's called ReZero. And it is a great anime, but now they're finally on season three. It's been so many years, and it's just the same thing now, over and over again. like, this started off like such a great concept, and it can't deliver. And it's just like, man, like, you cannot find something consistent. Yeah, I remember, like, and maybe I'll get flagged for this, but, like, my cousin loves S.H.I.E.L.D. Hero, and I just, I couldn't get into S.H.I.E.L.D. I couldn't get into S.H.I.E.L.D. Hero. He loves S.H.I.E.L.D. Hero.

00:51:22

Shameer Mehdikhan

And I know I've seen a few episodes in there, I was like, yeah, it's good it's just like i don't have the desire to finish the show like i'll watch a show here and there with him and i'll be like yeah this this is good this is funny like you know so yeah again pluto for me i sorry i gotta put that up at the top too it's pluto and attack yeah and i gotta say like netflix has kind of been showing up you know like There's a couple of new animes that Netflix is getting in the next month or two. I think one's called Moonrise.

00:51:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

So looks like it's ah it looks like an original anime. And then they're um making an anime based off a manga from like 30 years ago. i forgot what it's called. I was just looking it up and that looks good too. So it's like, okay, Netflix, you're trying to get really into that space and carve out your own niche there and say this is exclusive now to Netflix.

00:52:06

Shameer Mehdikhan

So we'll see. Yeah, they really doubled down on anime. Like I remember a while back when I first started seeing animes pop up, and I think I like first saw Naruto pop up. was like, oh, thank God. You know, I don't have to use these shitty websites anymore. Like it's actually going mainstream. And now you see, man, micro,

00:52:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

Netflix is really investing a lot into anime, right? And don't they even have like a whole like day? Like Geek Day? Yeah, yeah. And then they just like go ham on this stuff and show it off. But I feel like in the Geek or whatever, they just, they show off a bunch of Netflix.

00:52:39

Shameer Mehdikhan

So it's even live action stuff and everything. But um there's a new Mobile Suit Gundam anime coming out next month. So it's their next... didn't know I love me and my Gundam. But just to put this out there, I know Shemira isn't a misogynist or anything, but the main character again is a woman.

00:52:53

Shameer Mehdikhan

I'm fine with... Okay. Okay. I didn't hate the Witch of Mercury because she was a woman. I hated the Witch of Mercury because the show was not good. I'm just putting it out there prefacing it because it's not a coincidence that the woman, the man who was a woman, you hated the show. No, I'm just kidding. That was just the Witch of Mercury thing.

00:53:11

Shameer Mehdikhan

So we'll see how that looks. In my defense, I will you know say something that shows I'm not a misogynist, but also is a very unpopular opinion. I like Last of Us 2 over Last of Us 1.

00:53:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

that's because the maker its like guy' kidding okay fair enough That's a good point. So yeah, that's all I have on on the show. So I guess we can now deep dive into the big stuff. So we'll talk about the Nintendo Switch 1 Direct that came out a week prior to the Switch 2. God, I feel like it's kind of hard to remember what happened. Because it was ass, let's just be honest. Well, I actually liked it better than you did. And I think that's because I had really low expectations.

00:53:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

And... I was just happy to see more Pokemon and Metroid. I was too. i likell I'll start with this. So there was only three or four things that interested me in the Switch 1 Direct. So first of all, the first thing they showed, Dragon Quest 1 and 2 HD 2D remake.

00:54:03

Shameer Mehdikhan

Super excited for that. The Dragon Quest 3 HD 2D remake just came out on the Switch, sold really well, like 5 million units. looks great i played a little bit of it already. Now I've already heard from some of my friends that by the end of it, it's still grindy, very grindy, but they have a lot of quality of life improvements that can make it zoom by really fast.

00:54:21

Shameer Mehdikhan

I personally think just seeing this now, and they're doing the same with one and two is that dude, square Enix needs to go back to like final fantasy six and five and do the HD2D remakes, man. Like it's honestly nuts. And I also look at this from a post. Yeah. It's selling well. And also it's greatly like it just fits well on a portable system. a But B, I think Pokemon should do the same thing. Like, again, when I said scope creep, Pokemon's being too large and their developers are clearly not competent to make open world games.

00:54:51

Shameer Mehdikhan

Go back to the HD 2D style. Just give me, even if it's a spinoff game, and just want that style looks so beautiful so yeah i'm excited about drag requestst one too And then they showed up Marvel comic or Cosmic Invasion. Yeah, yeah. Wasn't that from the people who made TNT? Yeah, which I played. That was good.

00:55:09

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, and I played a TMNT game a year ago on Xbox. Phenomenal game. was very short. We played it together. Did we play it together? Yes. Okay, I played it twice then. You forgot. Sorry, I played it with another set of friends and I beat with them. Oh, the betrayal. And then I beat it with you too.

00:55:24

Shameer Mehdikhan

So it was a great game and I think they're the the right people to do it because... from a did they great music for the TMNT game bringing back this old style was good it graphically it looked well and performed well so this actually looks good too because using the Marvel license I'm like dude you had Venom you had Spider-Man you had what else like who else was in the oh Wolverine yeah that's gonna be hype man people love that stuff I mean people love Marvel vs. Capcom yeah and like uh To this day, you know, whenever me and, you know, Juby try to play any arcade games, the one she's always down to play is Marvel vs. Capcom.

00:56:01

Shameer Mehdikhan

That's surprising. I'm surprised she really likes Yeah, she really likes that one because I think it's like the character recognition and like the characters feel varied enough and she's just going to spam all the buttons. She always has a good time. It's funny you say that because my nephew does this and I have the game now and he just spams the button he can actually beat you just spamming literally like about And then um two other things. So again, they showed off some additional gameplay of Pokemon Legends Zah, which i was kind of surprised they did that because they we just had a Pokemon Direct.

00:56:28

Shameer Mehdikhan

Again, it looks more interesting, I think, in this trailer than the previous one. I am a little excited for it, but what I'm starting to notice, and I saw some breakdown videos on YouTube, and i think people did a great job, is, man, the textures look so flat on the buildings. Like, this is supposed to be reminiscent of Paris, and people found the exact place in Paris, right near the Eiffel Tower where this is like taken from, in Luminos City.

00:56:48

Shameer Mehdikhan

And goddammit, like, the buildings are horribly flat, and I'm just like, fuck, like, I can't. You gotta to play on the Switch too then, right? Yeah, I know. And then and then they showed Metroid Prime 4, and they revealed that Samus is gonna have psychic powers this game, which I was, like, shocked. I felt like the reveal of that was... Felt flat. Felt flat, you know?

00:57:06

Shameer Mehdikhan

I actually really like the Metroid Prime 4 trailer and the gameplay overall. I actually think it is a graphic, like, it's a step up graphically from the remastered. version And I was surprised to see they were able to get more juice out of the original Switch, you know, because I really thought Metroport Remastered was like as good as it got. yeah um So that was good. I thought the gameplay felt so much more fluid than Remastered. I couldn't beat Remastered because i felt like it was a little clunky, but that that looked good to me.

00:57:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

oh But just the way the narrator was talking about the powers, like, oh, it's such a big deal, I can open a You can doors and move. Oh my god. It's can't anyone with a hand open doors? And I'm so surprised because Nintendo does such a great job marketing and with their trailers.

00:57:51

Shameer Mehdikhan

was like, did this is just... That's definitely a retro thing. Like, the developers themselves definitely put that together and I was like, eh. Like, if they just showed the gameplay and didn't have that voiceover in that moment, it would have been better. if It was just, ah like, the juxtaposition of the two. It was so dumb.

00:58:06

Shameer Mehdikhan

And yeah having played Metro games, like, I know it's it's going to be a nice ability and they're going to really use the crap out of it and it's going to really make you scratch your head. So I don't...

00:58:17

Shameer Mehdikhan

I'm not scared the game won't be dead. And I'm not scared it's going to be a weird addition. It's just like the way they talked about it. You can open doors and move i objects. I can do that with my current set of hands and fear right now. I'm just shaking your head. was like, God. was literally like, yeah, can't say I was just go up there and grab the thing and move it. It was gone.

00:58:37

Shameer Mehdikhan

So I honestly within this. Oh, and there's one other big game that was announced that i didn't give a fuck about, but Tamodachi apparently is coming back. People love Tamodachi. That game is going to sell like hotcakes. Yeah. Think about Animal Crossing, how much that's going to sell.

00:58:52

Shameer Mehdikhan

So hey I was like, oh my God. but like I think for me, the reason why the the reveal last week still seemed pretty good I had no expectations and for literally the end of a generation and such a long generation. They felt some bangers. After you fired that much.

00:59:10

Shameer Mehdikhan

And let's say the Switch 2 was not coming out this year. if all you got this year was Pokemon Z and A to a and then Metroid, people would still say this is a good year for this year.

00:59:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

And it's their last year after, what this is their eighth year something crazy like that? like I gotta give it up. like That's a marathon, man. That's tough. you know, I was just impressed.

00:59:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

And so I'm, I'm already going to scoop those two up. So then going into the switch to reveal, I'm like, well, I'm already happy with what Nintendo is outputting this year. So anything else I get, it's going to be icing on the cake. And for me, like in high, like,

00:59:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

My hype has cooled down a little bit for the Nintendo Direct that happened earlier today because I was kind of disappointed by some stuff that maybe I hyped myself up too much like Oblivion or like you know a new Super Mario Odyssey 2 or something like that.

01:00:06

Shameer Mehdikhan

But man, they there was a lot of unexpected things for Yeah, like let's start right there because you said Super Mario Odyssey. They announced Donkey Kong Bonanza, which looks interesting because to me, the trailer looks so eerily reminiscent of the Mario Odyssey trailer that was revealed eight years ago.

01:00:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

I just, I'm putting my guess out there. I think it's the same team that- I think they- havent enough They haven't confirmed that it's same team. They always wait until the day or month before. i think it's the same team. Yeah, it looks the same. To me, I'm actually really happy Nintendo did that because i feel like Donkey Kong hasn't gotten a lot of love. And I think we were talking about this.

01:00:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

And I'm happy that they're trying to juice that up. And I think it's great timing because Super Mario Bros. the movie just came out. Donkey Kong was in it. You got a lot more recognition. Universal isn't there. Universal. They're trying to make a whole Donkey Kong thing. So I think that was one. And, you know, Donkey Kong has not been out of the limelight completely because he's been a big part of Super Smash.

01:01:06

Shameer Mehdikhan

Right. So. And I think now is time for that kind of renaissance and resurgence and I think it's going to sell really well. oh yeah And it doesn't have to compete with the Mario Odyssey, right? So it just gets its own time to shine. And if it's going to be as polished as a Mario Odyssey game, yeah like um that's you know really going to help it sell well. And then the the best thing to me is it's still a platformer like Mario, right? But it's different enough that it's not going to feel repetitive. That's the thing. So if you saw the abilities that look different up there, like I can, so he like, you know how Mario had Cappy or whatever, and I was like, he's got like a ah diamond, like a gem on his shoulder talking to him. So it's like very similar.

01:01:43

Shameer Mehdikhan

Now I think this does a couple of things. One is it doesn't put the burden on them to reinvent the wheel. So every time a new Mario game comes out, you have to constantly reinvent the wheel. have to find some new like mechanism. Yeah, it's, there's a lot of pressure right to outdo yourself even if they had eight years.

01:01:58

Shameer Mehdikhan

And I think they can start now baseline with this and they can build on it. And I wouldn't be surprised with this one. They say, oh, we do want a sequel. We'll give that to you five years and you don't have to wait another generation. So would be okay if they do Bonanza and then Bonanza 2 something. Yeah. And I wonder if like, I think it's the same. I don't even know what the studio names are for Nintendo. They're all wacky. They don't make any sense to me, but the studio that made Odyssey, like,

01:02:19

Shameer Mehdikhan

I would hope they could grow great enough that they can have multiple things cooking at the same time. Yeah, that would be nice. Right? And that would, oh man, we'd be eating good. Yeah. And then, so the other thing is, you know, my favorite one of my favorite childhood video games is Donkey Kong 64, which was like, it's not an open world, but it's like you hop from like, I think like almost like island island and it was a full story like narrative and they even had multiplayer in it so this was again eerily reminiscent of that now will there be a good story in this game probably not like odyssey didn't have a phenomenal story all needed a great story yeah but and and uh donkey hong 64 did have a good story but at the same time like i said the gameplay to me is always king so if they can just do a good job of making this game game

01:03:02

Shameer Mehdikhan

it again, it innovates on pre-existing stuff, but at the same time it gives like a fresh take on their on their style of games, then yeah, I'm happy. And I'm i'm pleasantly surprised July 17th. I wish it was there at launch. or So with that said, I know there's so much to talk about, it's kind of dizzying, but I think maybe we can start with what stole the show for you?

01:03:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

Like out of everything you saw, what was it that was like, man, this is the best moment of the show. Okay. That's a, that's a great question. Um, I actually think to be honest, it was the Donkey Kong bonanza for me.

01:03:35

Shameer Mehdikhan

And like, I was shocked that they announced Kirby Air Riders as well, only because you' you're getting a Mario Kart game. I looked up Kirby Air Ride, which came out, I think, on I don't know if it was n sixty four or GameCube back in the day.

01:03:48

Shameer Mehdikhan

And that's also like a racing game. And it kind of looks the same? and kind of looks the same. And it's like, I'm not shocked that they said Sakurai, because Sakurai is creating it, the guy who developed Super Smash. Which I think is insane.

01:03:59

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. But it's clear that they're saying, you pick whatever you want, and we're not going to say no, because that's coming out on twenty this year, too. So you have two redundant now racing games. So I was, like, shocked they let him that. he must be doing something different.

01:04:12

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. He has to be taking it in a different direction. I would think. Or else, like, there's no way Nintendo will release them both in the series. That's what I'm saying. It's weird. And, like, think about this again. The last Super Smash game sold 45 million units. Oh, my God.

01:04:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

you expect that this

01:04:27

Shameer Mehdikhan

gonna think it's actually mainstream does anyone know how much money nintendo is just sitting on and sell secret vaults somewhere these guys get paid really well oh my god that's insane yeah so i i would say donkang bonanza for me was the the the wow so so my wow was the game from from software you know, that blew my mind. i was like, oh my god, exclusive from software.

01:04:57

Shameer Mehdikhan

We got Bloodborne 2, essentially, let's go. And by far and away, I was so hyped about it. And then now that hype has been died down because I realize it's a multiplayer game. Yeah, no, I'm good. I'm good. and So I don't know, maybe if it looks really insanely good, you know, I'll get it. But do I really want to get Nintendo Switch online when have game pass ultimate just so i can play that and oh man that sucked because i was so hyped for it so i guess we'll see i mean i think it's gonna sell like hotcakes because obviously like from software has been crazy successful and for good reason yeah and i'm sure aldenering night rain is gonna be crazy popular but yeah i think like okay so when they first announced it and i'm looking at the game i'm like wow can't believe this and then it says you know it's exclusive to switch i'm like there's no way like how do they have multiple development teams really yeah

01:05:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

doing like all these games you got the Night Reign you got obviously Elden Ring with there's a DLC just that just came out prior and then this I was like there's no way ah this makes sense you had a small team doing a multiplayer only component and you could and I think it's kind of far out you know because if Night Reign is coming out this year and honestly why is that not coming out on Switch 2 yeah like that should be a Switch 2 right and it seems to me and this was really the thing that blew my mind like I really want to know the teraflops and you know the yeah processing power of the Switch 2 because

01:06:20

Shameer Mehdikhan

Man, it seems like every game that's come out on the PS5 and Xbox silent bomb can run on the Switch. yeah And if that's the case, like and if Elden Ring is coming out, and I would assume it's the same thing.

01:06:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

i don't know if Tarnished Edition is different, but yeah, Night Ring should be able to run on it. And so then why would you not release it and make more money? And then if that's the case, like, wouldn't you want to release this this new game like two years from now? Yeah, that's what I would think. So I think a lot of these third-party developers got the dev kits pretty late.

01:06:51

Shameer Mehdikhan

And so I think the first thing from software looked at was like, what can we do at the start where the hype is highest to maximize profit. And I think it makes more sense to get Elden Ring first because everyone already loves the game, yeah right?

01:07:03

Shameer Mehdikhan

And if you can, I think people would probably buy that more than a new IP that's all we established. So I think they were smart to say, let's do Elden Ring first. Just in my opinion. Well, no, I agree with you, but I think that's the reason why I believe that game is far off.

01:07:19

Shameer Mehdikhan

You know, because I don't think it makes sense to put them back to So think to delayed? I think Elden Ring Night Raid is going to come out on Switch 2. Before this? Yeah, I mean, why would you not? But they said this game's coming in 2026.

01:07:30

Shameer Mehdikhan

Oh, they did say that? Yeah. man. Maybe late 2026. Maybe. Maybe not even comes up with like in between. I would imagine like a late 2026, early 2027, because I feel like after two years, gamers forget.

01:07:41

Shameer Mehdikhan

yes so Yeah, I mean, I could see that. so it end up doing the I don't know if the Elden Ring game is going have the DLC. I don't even know they're releasing the DLC, the Shadow Orchery. So, yeah, that's true, because just a Tarnished Edition, so I have no idea what that means. But, um yeah, so I guess, you know...

01:07:58

Shameer Mehdikhan

Originally, that was the thing that I liked the most and it blew my mind. And now after like that's been kind of cooled down, I'm kind of debating between honestly hearing that Cyberpunk can run on that game, right?

01:08:12

Shameer Mehdikhan

um It runs really well on Steam Deck. Yeah, so I think that was like one of the things that really blew my mind. um i really was amazed that when it's docked, you can actually get 4K, even it's 30. Yeah, I was shocked.

01:08:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

Oh, so wait, we were talking about, I thought you were talking about games. Okay, go ahead. Those are the things that really shocked me. Yeah, I mean, I was talking about... Game-wise, I don't know if anything really blew me away. Like, I'm probably Donkey Kong, you know, like you said.

01:08:37

Shameer Mehdikhan

Because the game I'm the most hyped for, you know, it's Pokemon and Metro, you know. And so because of that, like... Yeah, so I think for me, if we're going to talk about everything, like what had me the most hyped, so let's just start there.

01:08:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, I was shocked that if you dock it, it looks like it's upwards. you're getting a fan inside the dock itself you can support four k one twenty fps but just shocking um Again, they didn't talk about upscaling at all in the trailer. and I mean, it's probably a game that's like 2D, you know, but thes just the fact that they're aligned out as an option means that it must be substantially more powerful. Well, they and the fact that, okay, they're also having Switch to enhanced editions of Switch 1 games. And the one that they showed specifically was Metroid. They go on handheld mode, you can get 60fps HDR docked,

01:09:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

or seven twenty p hundred and twenty fb four when doc 4K 60 FPS or 120. ten adp one twenty Yeah, that's ah that's really good. That's crazy, dude. It's like, wow. So, I mean, to me, that's a huge upgrade.

01:09:36

Shameer Mehdikhan

Like, what world am I living in? and i think for me, what really just like... Pinch me....blew my mind is we might actually now be in a place where ah Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo, like,

01:09:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

they can all have games released at the same time on all their platforms because they have ah relative similarity in terms of power. So parity. So I think for the next three years now you're going to get games released on all three platforms but as soon as we hit the next, generation for PlayStation, Xbox, game over again. Oh, yeah. So you've got a small three-year window, I personally believe, where everything now comes out on all three.

01:10:12

Shameer Mehdikhan

But as soon as we jump again, Nintendo's like Which is kind of annoying that like now like Nintendo is always halfway. Yeah. That's why I was kind of like, oh, man, if Microsoft goes to the next generation next year too, you know? But it's it's always I feel like it's always going to be like Nintendo on its own and Microsoft and Sony. 100%.

01:10:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

And then another thing I was pleasantly surprised is they're now, you can't use micro SD cards, but you have to use micro SD express, which means they're using a faster, more proprietary ah memory, um, uh, protocol on the switch, which means faster load times.

01:10:47

Shameer Mehdikhan

And one of the games that, uh, is going to take advantage of that is the enhanced version of breath of the wild. yeah past They showed it off. I think we had talked about it like, um, ah maybe our last podcast or the one before then. And I thought it was just such a stupid idea. And like now actually don't think it's a stupid idea.

01:11:03

Shameer Mehdikhan

You know, I actually think it's a pretty smart idea. It's because both of them are just, you know, you know, basically, you know elevated versions of what you would do on the switch. And then you could just pay for like an upgrade pass. Like, and you know, I got to give it up to Nintendo. Like I feel like Microsoft and Sony have kind of struggled at times with the transition between one generation and the other.

01:11:24

Shameer Mehdikhan

But Nintendo kind of did it really well because they showed, hey, here are the games that you love. They're still going to work. Here are the games you love. Okay, you have to you know buy this to get an upgraded version. And you know here's the games that just came out.

01:11:38

Shameer Mehdikhan

You don't have to buy them all over again, right? You just have to pay for the upgrade if you want it. And here are the games that are clearly on both. And we're also giving you games that are just exclusive to Switch 2. So they had something to cover everything. Yeah, and don't get me wrong. That Donkey Kong game, that could be a Switch 1 game. Yeah, I think so.

01:11:56

Shameer Mehdikhan

But they need a reason for people to buy it. And I think them keeping Metroid and Pokemon on Switch 1 and Donkey Kong on Switch 2, that's the perfect Metroid. so like that let' second again the the memory protocol being faster Great, I love that.

01:12:10

Shameer Mehdikhan

Them showing off the example. And then GameCube NSO, like for them to announce that for Switch 2, that, hey, you're getting now a GameCube controller dedicated control we're bringing that back which is gonna be a harder idea by the way but that wireless and then um the like here's where i'm disap one of the first three games coming to GameCube and NSO fucking Wind Waker. It's like that game was fucking remastered on the Wii U. All you gotta do is port that over.

01:12:32

Shameer Mehdikhan

You get a better version rather than an emulated version. Like why? yeah but But then you get F-Zero for the GameCube and then the third game was Soul Calibur 2 which those two... Soul Calibur love playing. But don't you... but you have to have a Nintendo Switch Online membership, right? Online plus the expansion pass which is expensive.

01:12:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

So again and what i hate about nintendo is why can't i buy that game separately and just emulate it on the nickel and dime you they find you they find their way to nickel speaking of which i think that was the most shocking news of the day for me was how expensive everything has got i wonder if tariffs have anything to do it and do with it i don't know but uh 450 i mean i'm still gonna buy it i think it's still gonna sound like hotcakes but man I did not x expect $450. I thought for sure it was a done deal at $399. I thought so too. And I like i thought there was a possibility $450. I was just like, would they really want to do that to their consumer base? And they seem to be willing.

01:13:28

Shameer Mehdikhan

Hype is at an all-time high. and Now, what I can say is if you get the $500 bundle, you're saving $30 by getting the Mario Kart bundle. Which is the one I'm going to buy. Okay. I'm going to get the $500 one. So I'm not. I'm going for the $450.

01:13:39

Shameer Mehdikhan

What does piss me off though for sure is that like they released a lot of the pricing models now for a lot of their games. It's all over the place. Some games are $80 like Mario Kart Tour. Some games are $70.

01:13:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

And then there's some third party games that were $60. And I'm like, I i don't understand this. I mean, it's insane that they're going up to $80. you know The fact that they're breaking that boundary and it's Nintendo that's breaking the boundary because I don't think there's been any regularly priced Xbox or PlayStation game that has been $80.

01:14:09

Shameer Mehdikhan

Because it's only been deluxe editions. I truly believe GTA 6 will be $90 or $100. yeah i mean now I never thought it would be $90 or $100. And after I saw Mario at $80, I was like, oh my god, why would they not charge $90 for that? well here's Here's where I'm confused.

01:14:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

Two first-party mario cart eighty right Donkey Kong 70 and I'm like why why would they make Donkey Kong 70 the only thing I can think of is again it's not a case by case basis to go Mario Kart it's also going to be a live service game we're going to support it just like we did at Mario Kart 8 we are inherently giving you way more of this package because Bonanza is just a one time play yeah you're done after a couple of years yeah I wonder if that's how they're to try and make that a thing but to me I think they look at the numbers and they have their calculations. Like, if we have Donkey Kong at 70 versus 80, you know, we're going to sell this many units, you know, and we might going to lose on this many units.

01:15:03

Shameer Mehdikhan

But Mario Kart, if it's 60, 70, 80, everyone's going to buy it. And if they're bundling it, then people who are price conscious will just get the bundle and they'll just get it for 50. And that's another win for them.

01:15:17

Shameer Mehdikhan

because now they don't have to worry about people reselling it, right? Because they're getting the straight 50, right? Digital. So it's just kind of a win all around. I mean, it kind of sucks because I feel like it sets a bad precedent. It really does. But it is what it is because Mario Kart sells so much. It's insane. like and Everyone buys Mario Kart.

01:15:36

Shameer Mehdikhan

i just Right now, I'm in a spot in my life where I want to collect as many physical games as I can and I get the convenience and i know I'm going to swapped the card out opt in but

01:15:48

Shameer Mehdikhan

physical version of Mario Kart. But you're not gonna sell it, right? Yeah, i'm not gonna sell it. I used to sell all my shit in the past. I haven't been doing that lately. I've been buying a lot of physical copies for Switch. I've been going back, like, I bought it now. I just recently bought a physical copy of Mario Kart 8 because I sold mine a long time ago.

01:16:02

Shameer Mehdikhan

I bought a physical copy of Smash and, like, two other Mario games that didn't have. So, I'm just, now I'm in that mood where I'm gonna keep them forever. i just It's inconvenient for me to constantly say take this physical copy the game, put it in and put it in, put it in, put it in, but it is what it is. And then the other thing, I just want to talk about Mario Kart a little bit. So that's releasing day and date on launch on June 5th with the system. To the surprise of no one. to the surprise of no one Interesting that they're basically making it like Forza Horizon. Yeah, I saw that and I was cracking up. I was like, this is Forza Horizon, Mario? But i have

01:16:34

Shameer Mehdikhan

i was dispointed and i wasn't like i like that they're doing that but what's the incentive to just free yeah like if I'm not collecting shit or upgrading my cards, which do there will be upgrade aspects, but like there's not that much. And I really felt like if they had added a single player story based mission kind type of mode, that i would have made more sense than just free roam. Yeah, I'm really curious what they're scheming.

01:16:55

Shameer Mehdikhan

I really didn't understand what they were getting at either. So I know they're going to have a direct, you know, what is that? Soon, too.

01:17:04

Shameer Mehdikhan

um But yeah, at least, again, i i want to say that it's just Nintendo's marketing. Yeah. Because the clip it the clip that they showed of the free room just seemed quite nice. really did. I'm like, what am I?

01:17:17

Shameer Mehdikhan

I'm cool. I can visit all the the maps. But dude, I can just so select a screen a map on a screen and say, give me to this. And one of the new things was you can keep driving from one course to another. Yeah. So there was, okay, there's a mode called knockout mode.

01:17:32

Shameer Mehdikhan

If you keep, like, if you're always in like, the top eight or something you'll keep moving on to the next course and that will be more than four courses. Well maybe after rewatching video could have sworn they said something else after you're done with the race you drive to the next course. Yeah then they said that as well and again didn't make sense to me. was little confused I was like like am I physically getting off the track and then driving to the next course? Yeah that's what they made it like. Why would I want to drive from one stadium to another? Yeah. like dad that That just seems kind of odd. Again they're trying to make it like an open world-esque like you just everything's connected so it's like okay fine this is a big map

01:18:04

Shameer Mehdikhan

i get that but I just don't care about that. like and extra Dude, i have to spend an extra three minutes now getting to the next course. Yeah, i'm really I'm really curious what they're doing because that seems like the first major change in the Mario Kart game in a long time. you know and they They had to do something to change it up. Yeah, that's been for sure. It's been essentially the same formula for a very long time. yeah Yeah, it's formulae, but I was hoping that they would have went like the double dash route and reintroduced the two people per kart again, but I guess we're not getting that.

01:18:31

Shameer Mehdikhan

Oh, which which one was that? That was the GameCube one. Oh, man. That was amazing. Because you could swap on the fly. And when you paired up with certain people, like, there was, like, I don't know if there was not bonuses, but it was just, like, a unique driving styles.

01:18:43

Shameer Mehdikhan

And then the other thing is, I'll be honest with I'm not getting the game because of the free roam. It's, like, a cool thing, but it's a side thing that i'll probably never touch. The maps are always so good that I'm, like, I can competitively drive for, like, and play this game for, like, a year. And then I'm, like, it tempers me on. I'm, like, okay, no more.

01:18:58

Shameer Mehdikhan

But the maps I know will be good. yeah And then I hope that, oh, and 24 players online. So I'm like, okay, it makes it more competitive. I think for me, I've kind of gone over Mario Kart. Like I played it a lot, you know, when I was in school. And, you know, now I just kind of don't have that same allure for it, you know?

01:19:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

We don't get enough people together to want to it. Exactly, yeah. And like if I was going get into something like that, like, you I'd rather play like a Super Smash, you know? yeah um But for me, you know, if it's $50 bundled in, then I'll get it, you know?

01:19:29

Shameer Mehdikhan

that's That's what kind of drew me in. I was like, yeah it's 450 versus 500 and I get the whole game. I might as well get it. yeah because yeah it is like Right now, I don't actually have Mario Kart 8. I did not buy it because I had the Wii U version and I refused to buy the Mario Kart 8.

01:19:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

oh so it will be nice that if someone that comes over and they want to play then i can't you know yeah for me i'm like yeah you know i feel like it's it's almost it almost feels like an a essential yeah it's the same like you have to have it you can't not have it regardless of how much you play um so another thing to talk about is you know pre-orders open up april 9th i thought for sure they would have dropped the pre-orders right after that yeah today i even stopped by game stop just before going to work i'm like hey you guys do prayers like no we're waiting a week i'm like damn yeah Yeah, do do we know if they have any trade-in bonuses? They did. GameStop just announced that if you trade your Switch 1 towards it, you get 175. not bad. not bad.

01:20:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

so but and What about the OLED? For the OLED. If you trade the older ones, it's like less. It's like 100 and 125 for the older ones. Oh, man. and You have the OLED, so... I have both. have the OLED and the old one.

01:20:35

Shameer Mehdikhan

Okay. You can trade in at least the old get at least like a hundred or hundred. I wonder I can stack them both. Yeah. You might, that way you'll have to check. Yeah. I was actually considering keeping one because, i yeah, because they said the whole thing about, um, you, you can do like the game share or whatever, and then you can use like an old Nintendo switch as like a screen. And I was like, well, that could be kind of cool right if I really needed to, you know?

01:20:59

Shameer Mehdikhan

Um, cause like if I'm playing Pokemon and, you know In order for you to play with me, all you have to do is use my Switch and use the same game. And if someone uses the TV, you don't have to worry about that. like That's kind of cool. Yeah, it reminds me of like what other system did that years ago where the game sharing thing?

01:21:14

Shameer Mehdikhan

It wasn't Nintendo, it was the DS, right? I specifically remember us being on our in high school. on the bus someone had mario kart for the ds and like hey how can we play this and i think it was anthony and he goes it's game share she's like i can you don't have to have a copy of this game i'll just share it with you you did not realize that and we did we're on the bus and they i'm like wow i'm playing mario kart 7 with them and i'm like don't own this game it was crazy that's nice yeah so they brought that the fact that they brought that back pretty insane to me i and i want to see how that works out but man this is like the way nintendo was just kind of clever you know because

01:21:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

If they're making it so the old Switch is not 100% obsolete, but there's a ton of reasons to upgrade, yeah like you're kind of getting the best of both worlds. Because ideally, what you want is for people to have both.

01:21:59

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, well, they're making you invest in their ecosystem. The problem with like Xbox was when they jumped from Xbox One and 360 to the series, it almost made made sense to not own those older consoles anymore. I mean, this is the same way about PlayStation. What's the...

01:22:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, what's the point of the PS4? Like, the only use you'll get is if you need a Blu-ray player. Yeah, and it' at that point, people don't care, right? So you stream most of your stuff now. Some other the things to talk like, some of the hardware. So, A, the cartridges will now be red. Interesting decision to make red cartridges, but okay. And the the box art ah bread as well i i don't say like that i like how the current ones are translucent.

01:22:38

Shameer Mehdikhan

The other thing is you're going to have 256 gigabytes of storage. So that's more than the current switch, which is 32. And now they're announcing something called game key cards.

01:22:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

So certain games that cannot fit on a switch to cartridge, which is still the same as the switch one in terms of capacity, 32 gigs, you basically have to download the whole game online, even though it's a physical cartridge. So for example, one of the games that was announced i think was street fighters sex that's coming you put it in your switch to the game is not on at all it authenticates online through their back office through their pki once it authenticates to your local switch to then you download the whole game online and i'm like dude that's so dumb you know i mean but how do you get around it you know because if you're if you're trying to get if you're basically getting the same games that xbox and sony are getting those games are like 80 90 gigs like

01:23:30

Shameer Mehdikhan

How are you going to get Call of Duty on one of Unless the technology gets so advanced, you can get like 256 gigabytes or 100 gigabytes or whatever on one of those things. Or you just have games that don't look that good.

01:23:43

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yes, I would have liked to know how much a 128 gig cartridge would have cost them compared to their normal. 32 gig? Because if they're really, let's say it was just a couple dollar difference. It's like, man, you skimmed this out. you You're charging 450 for console rather than 400.

01:23:57

Shameer Mehdikhan

And if maybe it was only a couple dollars difference to upgrade the capacity of the Switch cartridge, it's like, come on, man. I don't know. I don't know. isn't there a world where, like, you could have both? Like, couldn't you have some cartridges that are 32? Yes. And then some that are plus? And it's...

01:24:12

Shameer Mehdikhan

a cost that the developer has to eat up, right? And then you get like a 120 gigabyte like yeah thing and you can even make it a different color if want. Or pass it on to the consumer. So let's say your game is 100 gigs, right? Like for example, let's say Death Stranding comes to Switch 2. 100 gigs.

01:24:27

Shameer Mehdikhan

Oh, we'll use the bigger capacity cartridge, but guess what? We'll pass the cost on to the consumer. We're going to charge 80 bucks for it instead of 70. Screw that, i don't want to pretend like someone. But still, know what I'm saying? I know, I know. Like, why why do i have to go through this bullshit?

01:24:39

Shameer Mehdikhan

I mean, I will say that's one of the things I low-key liked about the Switch, you know, and I feel like that was an underrated feature. Yeah. you know, if you haven't touched your Switch in a long time and you need to play, you can just plug it in and, you know, and then it'll tell you, okay, you need to update and you'll be like, screw that, start software anywhere and you're playing. You're playing. You didn't need to connect to the internet and B, sometimes playing a game off the cartridge was faster than having the the game downloaded. See, that's how I got through so many of my Switch games because I would just carry it along with me if I was on a vacation somewhere and then I would just pull it out and be like, right, time to play and then I could just get started. You know, and now if I have to like,

01:25:17

Shameer Mehdikhan

download and update everything else and I'm not gonna play the games. Yeah, I'm not gonna play. And now, especially want to play third party game like Cyberpunk, you're gonna have to download 100 plus gigabytes of data per. Yeah, what happens when Call of Duty comes Fuck that, not playing Call of Duty on this, but fuck that. Because wait, how big is the, it is 256? 256, it won't even be enough. Well, if you, yeah, that's what I'm thinking because if it's 256, then how much actual data space? You have like 200 and how big is Call of Duty now? 400 now, it's 400. Dude, was legitimately at Andrew's house a month ago.

01:25:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

He had 400 gigabytes dedicated to Call of Duty. like god I couldn't believe it. i was like, this is utterly insane. So the other thing that they're doing to combat combat piracy, because Switch 1 was so bad in terms of piracy and emulation on the PC, is they are now doing what Xbox is doing. And I think even PlayStation does this, but they're authenticating once in the lifetime of the game with their back office and their PKI.

01:26:08

Shameer Mehdikhan

So basically now when you ins search insert any Switch cartridge, you have to connect to the internet first. If you forget to do that, and let's say you go to Cancun and you try plug, forgot thank to connect to internet, you won't be able to play. Well, that's annoying.

01:26:20

Shameer Mehdikhan

So, that is annoying, but is their way of combating piracy? It is what it is, you know? Yeah, so... You know, the person who hates piracy the most in the world is Nintendo. Yeah, they'll sue you to the ground, so... Which I think is kind of funny, because honestly, I feel like low-key Pokemon got a big fan base of all of those emulators and all the ROM hacks, but whatever. Absolutely. They made the games better of the time. Yeah, and I remember, like...

01:26:46

Shameer Mehdikhan

Not me, but people I know who played on their PCs. And their mobile phones. They get to play at a faster speed and then reload instantly. So I've heard it's been great experience. Rewrite the Atari. I would never do such a thing myself.

01:27:01

Shameer Mehdikhan

What? but And then what do you... and So I'm curious, like, the fact that they finally introduced game chat, like, this was a little shock to me because, first of all, it looked fucking horrible in the trailer.

01:27:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

Whenever you share your game with someone else, it looks like a trash. It was literally lagging so bad. But fine, now you can buy a camera. I think the fact that, like, you actually have, like, good audio game chat and an easy way to access it is a massive improvement.

01:27:27

Shameer Mehdikhan

But again, the the video chat, like, you want to make sure what you're showing is not laggy, you know? um Limited in scope 2 to only friends, it seems like.

01:27:38

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. I guess with me, it was a mixed bag. Like, I kind of get the flack, you know, people were were saying because, oh, you know, the video chat, you know, looks kind of choppy, and then when you do the game share and stuff like that.

01:27:51

Shameer Mehdikhan

But I like the way that Nintendo finds a way of making the features of the console, like, feel more than just a console, but like feel more integrated to you and like the people you're playing with.

01:28:05

Shameer Mehdikhan

And this is kind of the thing. you know like Ever since, really, since the beginning of the day, like Game Boy, like a key part of that was you know how portable it was, and then you play Pokemon with other people.

01:28:18

Shameer Mehdikhan

And then GameCube, play Super Smash all in the same room. Wii, now we're doing Wii Sports. And then they started really evolving. They did motion controls. And then from there with the switch, you know, they're really doing gyro and they're doing like separate handhelds and tabletop and all this stuff.

01:28:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

And it's interesting now they're adding in a new dimension, right? When it comes to like, well, how does your voice integrate into the game? How does a video camera integrate your face into the game? So it's like, they're trying to like still create like be creative and like find new like systems that like their developers can play with.

01:28:52

Shameer Mehdikhan

Like for instance, like, I think the whole Mario party thing where the people's heads pop up, like that's not for me. You know, I don't think it makes a big difference, but it's so unique. Like I have to give it to them. We're like,

01:29:05

Shameer Mehdikhan

Wow, like that is a unique use of this feature. Yeah, so I was just about to bring that up. like The one game that they're going show off at the Treehouse live tomorrow and Thursday, which I'm surprised they're bringing back Treehouse because that used to be an E3 thing, by the way, is Super Mario Party Jamboree. So it's the latest Super Mario Party game that came out, and they're enhancing it with all these new um game chat features and game share features and camera features.

01:29:28

Shameer Mehdikhan

Now this isn't super unique to Nintendo because, i don't know if you know this, and you've probably have seen it before, at our local Dave & Buster's, they introduced two to three Mario Kart kiosks where you can drive. And they have a camera there that when you drive, they take a picture of your face and if they put it on your character.

01:29:44

Shameer Mehdikhan

So they've already experimented with this in arcades. So it's funny that they're now integrating that in their actual console ecosystem. But it's just interesting how like even features like your voice and they're like trying to use like your voice to kind of impact the gameplay and like the puzzles and things like that. i was like, man, like somehow they find a way of like making something that's really niche, but also plays into their game and fits into it, you know? And even like the whole mouse thing, you know, yeah as a butuse you know the mouse thing, like,

01:30:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

When I heard Lenovo was doing that, I was like, okay, this is kind of silly. You know, like, what's really the point of this? But Nintendo, like, finds a way to show you that, like, no, this can actually be used for gameplay purposes, you know?

01:30:28

Shameer Mehdikhan

And, like, for me, for instance, like, I didn't really think that basketball-ish game was, like, that. I wasn't into it. the the where they got entities look like they're disabled and playing basketball. Like, I wasn't, like, super into it, but I was like, that's creative.

01:30:43

Shameer Mehdikhan

That's really a creative Crippled people playing basketball? Yeah. I mean, just A, yes, that, but B, also like, who would think that, oh, we have these mice, you know, let's make a game that's like Rocket. That makes you like Jordan. You're crippled.

01:31:01

Shameer Mehdikhan

I already can stop. so But, um like like, that's such a unique, like, use, like, you know, I'm man, I gotta give it up to them. And then, Okay, now you can use it for Civ. Okay, that's kind of cool. can use for Metroid.

01:31:16

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. You know, point and click. So, I mean, I used to never play Halo and Gears on PC, but, like, the fact that you can basically play Metroid like that, a granted, you're going to need a table. wonder what that's going be like. It might be actually pretty good. They showed, like, a five-second but you're going to need the things you're need a tablehelm front you you're going to use sit somewhere those if you're If it's not convenient, then okay, I'm to play. mean Out of all of them, I think the feature that I, when I saw it, I was like, oh yeah, this is actually like a better use of this.

01:31:44

Shameer Mehdikhan

And it was super small. You know that, it's kind of, what was the name of the game where you have to pay for it, but basically shows you how to use the Switch. Yeah. one two switch no it's in the switch oh yeah yeah the thing um they had they had a little clip where they were basically yeah showing you how to golf yeah then you know the guy was like pulling it back and then you know shooting it and it was like way more precise and i was like oh man that's a really good use of that tech yeah yeah yeah i what you're talking about because uh i don't know i think it's really silly it's a welcome tour welcome yeah i think it's really silly you have to pay for that yeah that's that's that's

01:32:21

Shameer Mehdikhan

that's absolutely whatever but yeah that because that's a When the PlayStation 5 came out, you got asked her about demo or thing for free. includ Yeah, that included, yeah. And it kind of showed you the features of the PlayStation. So they were like, here's the rumble, here's the the microphone, and how do you use that, and et cetera, et cetera. And the gyro or whatever. So I don't know. that's It's weird that we have to pay for this one. I don't think anyone's going buy that. Yeah, who knows?

01:32:43

Shameer Mehdikhan

yeah I guess other things, I was kind of surprised that the Switch 2 weighs the same as the Switch. Yeah. Oh, doesn't. Yeah. The dimensions are relatively similar, but I think there's some differences in the dimensions.

01:32:54

Shameer Mehdikhan

Like it might be like a little taller or something like that. But yeah, I think it's both like 0.88 kilograms or something like that. But battery life, I'm i'm still disappointed. And it it it's says 2.5 to 6 hours. It's going to basically be like the first one. Yeah, it's just like, man. and i get And they downgraded the screen. It's no longer OLED.

01:33:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, now it's an LCD again. But it's larger though. 7.9 compared to 6.2 originally. point two original like So again, they'll go through like Nintendo. I was just thinking about this because I just bought an old 2DS recently. Dude, like it's so crazy to me how Nintendo goes, we make a console and then we make 500 iterations. Oh yeah.

01:33:29

Shameer Mehdikhan

There's totally going to be a Nintendo Switch 2 OLED. Yeah, there'll be ah all that there'll be another Lite. I wouldn't be surprised if they make other versions that they didn't have from like the Switch and the prior generation. like And then they make multiple colors and variants of it. And I like that. I like that they go balls out on that because to me, it just, there's that allure again. Like, and it reminds me of the X-Rex lab thing where can create different controllers.

01:33:52

Shameer Mehdikhan

I love that you can do that. I'll pay you the 200 because if this makes me feel like better and happier playing my game. Yeah, I mean, it's kind of unique, you know? It's unique, you know? So i like that. makes you feel like you have something that's unique.

01:34:04

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. So, and then they add they announced some new hardware and accessories. So again, the camera was one thing. I don't think I'm going to buy it. I'll be honest with you. I don't really care. I'm not going to get the camera. I mean, I can see the use cases they have for it, but I'm good. Like, I remember the days of Kinect and PS Move and all that. It failed.

01:34:25

Shameer Mehdikhan

and then Why could you have just integrated a camera into the Switch? Yeah, I just don't understand that. That's not expensive. It's not. Yeah, they're price-grousing. And then they announced that a new Pro Controller, which I was surprised because this one on the back has two um of those trigger buttons yeah on the sides, kind of like how a lot of the Pro Controller's utilization... Yeah, it's kind of a halfway step towards the Elite. Yeah, it's like a halfway to Elite. So i'm I'm happy about that.

01:34:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

They announced a charging grip, and then... The dock itself, because it has a fan now in it and whatnot, and it can upscale to 4K, it's $110 you want a new dock. Oh my god, that's huge. Which is a lot. Wow. And so just want to go quickly over the third-party games that were announced.

01:35:05

Shameer Mehdikhan

Again, the one other thing we didn't touch on specifically was... all two Kirby games. They're enhancing Kirby and the Forgotten Land, which you know what? That actually is a really well-received game, so I'm gonna buy that, but it's coming now with a new expansion, so I'm gonna buy for this fish too.

01:35:19

Shameer Mehdikhan

The other one was Kirby Air Ride, so or Air Riders, that's what Sakurai is now working on, we talked about earlier. So be well it remains to be seen how the game will be, but the third party games that I'm kind of excited for...

01:35:31

Shameer Mehdikhan

ah Final Fantasy. Final Fantasy 7. I can't believe that it's showing up on Switch 2 before the Xbox. Like that, that's the craziest. Oh my god, this is, this is so petty.

01:35:43

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, it's petty, but it's like, look, they found a way to bring it to the Steam Deck and I'll be honest with you, saw videos it doesn't run really but the fact that it can you know they're gonna then bring remake or uh rebirth yeah they'll have the whole trilogy there before xbox i'm telling you the thing is i think nintendo switch 2 is gonna sell like crazy so i understand that there's gonna be a good user base and it'll probably sell well but at the same time wouldn't it take more work to go from ps5 to switch to the ps5 to xbox like and you you've developed it on the pc did you not like how hard and it's on the pc now

01:36:20

Shameer Mehdikhan

It doesn't even make sense. How hard is it to just put it to the X-Men? I feel like you put press three buttons and it's there and you make yourself like a couple million dollars. And it's so old. like and you know I will say this is the type of stuff that turned me off from Sony. like I'll never forget when Sony purposely had Call of Duty and they like did a you one year like exlusive exclusivity for like the zombies mode or one of those modes. And I was like, why? You're winning.

01:36:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

Like, why does it matter? You know? It's a petty thing. It's a petty thing. It's like you're just depriving people from joy. Like, who in the world is going to now say, I'm going to buy an Xbox instead of a PlayStation because Final Fantasy VII Remake has came out on the Xbox. Literally, nobody is going to do that.

01:37:11

Shameer Mehdikhan

Are you stopping? So the thing is, a couple of other games announced. So we finally got to see Silksong Hollow Knight. That game hasn't been shown in a long time, like years, and they confirmed a 2025 release date.

01:37:24

Shameer Mehdikhan

Utterly shocked because the first game was so good, well received, critically acclaimed, like pre commercially did well. I love how they gave it like three seconds. Yeah, and they literally gave it... It was like in a sizzle reel. And everyone's like, oh my god, it's a lot... Because people thought the game was cancelled.

01:37:37

Shameer Mehdikhan

We're getting Star Wars Outlaws. I'm kind of shocked that they're deciding to port that first rather than an Assassin's Creed game, personally. But again, Ubisoft has acknowledged that at the beginning of every Nintendo generation that they've supported, their games have sold phenomenally well.

01:37:51

Shameer Mehdikhan

And I think they want to make their money back on a licensed game like that. So that just makes sense. Yeah, I imagine... um Assassin's Creed Shadow will probably sell well, whether it's this year or next year on the Switch.

01:38:04

Shameer Mehdikhan

But i feel like if there's not a ton of games out for the Switch 2 and you just picked one up, you know, then, yeah. People will see that in stores and they'll be like, oh, like, I'll get that for my game. Yeah, honestly, it seems like a pretty good fit, you know, because... Star Wars, like... Yeah, you can try target, like, a younger audience, too. they'll play that game, I think.

01:38:21

Shameer Mehdikhan

um So I was surprised a new update to Daemon X Machina, so it's called Titanic Scion. Yeah, I was so confused at what that game was because I thought it was Mecha Break. And I was like, why does this look so good? it looks so good, didn't it? Yeah, because and I was like, ah how have I never heard of this game before? So I remember when the first one came out for Switch, and again, I think this is the same game it's just theyre adding like and don' want to say it's an expansion it's just like a i don't know if it's a new gamer i'm confused but what i what i can say is when the first one came out for switch gameplay looked great but it looked like a prototype like a here's our first idea of the game and this version of it the gameplay like it looks like more action more story and it looked like like ah the gundam game i've wanted for my entire life so i think i'm like legit i think i'm gonna finally get that game um project dose 007 which again they've already announced in the past but no release date yeah how long has it been since they announced

01:39:10

Shameer Mehdikhan

like two years over You have to assume they started well before then too. So no release date. hit Hitman World of Assassination Signature Edition. I've never played the new Hitman games.

01:39:21

Shameer Mehdikhan

I don't know if I'm going try it now. kind of up in the air. not really for me. I mean, they were on a Game Pass for a while and I didn't bother downloading them. Fortnite, which has already kind of been on the Switch. so i Yakuza Zero Director's Club being supported at the launch.

01:39:38

Shameer Mehdikhan

Kind of surprised, but I wish they did a different Yakuza game, like Pirates, the new Pirates one that just came out. I don't care about these older ones, but I understand they're they're like one of the best ones in the series and in the franchise. Tony Hawk's Pro Skaters 3 and 4.

01:39:51

Shameer Mehdikhan

Pretty cool for to come out. Utterly shocked. They're supporting Borderlands 4 at launch with the Switch 2. Yeah, that's huge. That's huge. Yeah, I think I'm going to get out on the Switch 2. I was going to get on console first because I'm like, okay.

01:40:02

Shameer Mehdikhan

Is there going to be cross-system play? there Yeah, there there should be. so Yeah, so if that's the case, then really doesn't matter. You just get it on there. And I loved playing it on my ROG Alliance Borderlands 3. And now, don't get me wrong, I told myself earlier, I'm like, okay, I'll get Borderlands for now on the console. It'll look beautiful on there.

01:40:18

Shameer Mehdikhan

i just want to see fidelity-wise. But honestly, I'm playing a part it. So are we thinking that the Switch 2 is more powerful than the ROG Ally? Yeah, I think it is. Because honestly, it seems like it is. Look, I won't say more powerful because depending on which version of the ROG like you get more the one i have the z one extreme has 24 gigs of RAM, which this only has 12, right?

01:40:41

Shameer Mehdikhan

But then this has a customized SoC with an NVIDIA GPU, and that has an AMD chipset with the, what was it? Yeah, this is the Zen 1. Yeah, with the Zen 1.

01:40:56

Shameer Mehdikhan

So like, it's Apple's orange orange comparison, so it's like, Because the thing is, like some of these games that they're mentioning, I'm like, whoa, like they're really confidently mentioning these games. And I can't imagine...

01:41:09

Shameer Mehdikhan

Nintendo being okay with a game that pushes the system so hard that it only plays for 40 minutes. Yeah, like you they wouldn't want. And I feel like that's something, like one of the problems with like the Windows handhelds. Like maybe the Windows os is just eating up the performance and eating up the battery life. So that's why, even if like spec wise, it's on par, it's just running way better. Well, so that's the funny thing. So whenever I played Borderlands on the ROG, I play at the highest frame rate with the high and like highest performance mode. I barely get it. potentially two hours of gameplay with borderlands for i'll take it that's better than what i was getting ready yeah and then and i well i would connect my battery pack to the rog when i played borderlands as well but if i didn't the one hour it was frustrating because i'd be in the middle of a battle i'm like i can't say this because the other thing the other problem about rog you can't save a game in the middle of gameplay because you lose bunch of data on window i'll be able to yeah can just easily easily resume i need to pause and resume

01:42:08

Shameer Mehdikhan

I do wonder what the Microsoft ROG is going to be like later this year. yeah Especially if it supports the resume feature, suspend and resume. I feel like if they're putting their stamp on it, they really have to clean up with it.

01:42:23

Shameer Mehdikhan

Again, if you put that out and the Switch still has a better UI, simpler, cleaner, and and you can still suspend and resume and has decent battery life. more people would go with this. Of course, yeah. I mean, the only thing that that would have going for it would be, oh you can play Game Pass on it.

01:42:38

Shameer Mehdikhan

That's it. The price is going to be crazy high. Yeah, it'll be like $900. Man, I was looking at these handhelds. They're $800, $900 nowadays. That's insane, right? And so if Microsoft is putting their brand name on it, I'm like, um Are we talking close to $1,000? Like, yeah what?

01:42:52

Shameer Mehdikhan

How expensive is this going to be? I'm not going to be paying anymore because I think Nintendo is going get more third-party support than they've ever gotten with this going forward. And I think maybe RNG might not be my preferred way to play anymore. I think it's going to be the Switch 2 now.

01:43:06

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. um so That's crazy to me that it's going be having that much third-party support. Like, when's the last time Nintendo was getting third-party support like this? Never. Never. GameCube? Even then GameCube didn't. I would say yes, GameCube.

01:43:19

Shameer Mehdikhan

I feel like GameCube was the last time that PS2, Xbox, yeah. yeah and It did. relatively simple It similar. It would get the same games PS2 and Xbox got, but you have to put into perspective that the GameCube only sold 20 million. Yeah, they sell long.

01:43:35

Shameer Mehdikhan

It wasn't worth our time because we made Jack Shedown's console. um Bravely Default is coming, which I don't really care about, but... Split Fiction. Split Fiction? Oh, wow. Split Fiction is coming out there, yeah.

01:43:47

Shameer Mehdikhan

Wow. That's what mean. Pretty much brand new games that have come out this year are all coming out. Hogwarts Legacy. So it's already out on the Switch, but it runs like garbage. um But, you know, so there was a rumor that Hogwarts Legacy was getting a definitive version with an expansion, and it looks like it's been canceled internally by Warner Brothers, but at least they're enhancing it now for the Switch 2.

01:44:07

Shameer Mehdikhan

Street Fighter VI, which has pleasantly surprised, Final Fantasy, we already mentioned, Cyberpunk 2777 Ultimate Edition, which comes with the expansion. Yeah, that's going to be great. that one i'm But I'm curious to know how that runs. look If that game can run handheld 30 fps happy. That's the thing. I actually ran it on my RJ Ally. Not the X from my RJ Ally. It ran fine, but I mean I didn't get a great casualty life. you know but but What resolution could you run that?

01:44:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

don't even remember. It was, you know, all I know is there was... Was it... on I don't think I had frame generation, but I had like the DLSS. It was like cranked up quite a bit. So um yeah, it was kind of blurry.

01:44:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

And it was a little choppy. I'm scared a little bit. I feel like the best I'll get out of it is like 720p 60 frames per second on this, but it's still portable. I'd be totally fine with that, but that makes me wonder that if there's some really good AI stuff going on with the NVIDIA chips, you know?

01:45:05

Shameer Mehdikhan

<unk> I guess this is kind of related, but there's been a lot of flack, you know, for you know the 5080 and 5090 like you know the uh laptop uh gpus and yeah i really love dave tootie and uh i was watching his video about it and i totally agree with him he's like guys like what do you expect you know like we want laptops that are portable that work well we don't want these massive laptops and how much performance have we really improved like got it you know raw performance like

01:45:36

Shameer Mehdikhan

you can't get laptops you want to use that oaks she also play games you want to play without having some sort of tech like this, like AI tech. And I 100% agree. Like, you know, I can totally get why people are annoyed at the 5090 desktop version, not having as much raw performance and juice as they wanted and really leaning it heavy into like a multifame generation, but on a laptop,

01:46:00

Shameer Mehdikhan

Do you know what kind of ridiculous stuff I had to use, do you remember like when i had the Surface Pro 4 and i had like a fan connected to like blow on the back of my Surface just so I can get like three, like four more frames per second so I could go from 26 to 30. Yeah, so when we had that conversation a while ago about like using upscaling and frame generation as a crutch pray for a dedicated PC, it shouldn't be, but for a laptop or a mobile like this, I'm absolutely fine. That'd be amazing and the thing is I am not expecting to be the best gamer on those systems.

01:46:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

you know So if my input lag instead of like 4 or 10 or is 50, fine, because I shouldn't be able to play this game on this device. And it's convenience.

01:46:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

That's those what I said. So for a laptop and handheld, you're playing it for convenience, not because it's looking like like amazing. So I'm playing probably on my handheld because a i want to either lay in bed or I'm traveling.

01:46:56

Shameer Mehdikhan

Or I'm taking my laptop with me while traveling. I'm like, hey, I'm paying this at a resort or a ah a family's house. So I'm paying the convenience over, you know. So that's what really makes me wonder if if like the secret juice is the fact that they have some good AI. Yeah, I think. Because, you know, it wasn't PS5 also going to go into similar, you know, aren't they trying to use AI or something? They are right To super resolution. PS5 Pro.

01:47:18

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. So, and I think it's going to be built into all the consoles in the next generation from the get-go so you already see it's built into the switch now i' pre p s six and xbox will whatever series whatever it's called we'll all have it built in at the start of the generation yeah and i guess like to me what i can understand as a downside is okay it increases input lag and it creates artifacts and things like that and that's why we're unhappy with it but if we're using cpa a c like cpu cores to create a simulated space for us to work and play what difference is it if it's a cpu that's running a simulation or in

01:48:00

Shameer Mehdikhan

you know APU or an NPU is they're called and it's making ah fake frames sure because it's all fake. yeah It's literally a video game. It's all generated content. I think the PC market is fucked. I think it needs to be completely reset because expectations for people ah you said moo's law right eventually you get to a point where you're not getting exponential growth so people kept saying hey every generation of a gpu came out we kept we keep expecting it to look more and more realistic a game that comes out says oh it should look so good and the biggest concern that people have had this is why i got mixed reviews on steam was monster hunter like oh my god you've been using a 50 series there's so many artifacts in this it's like guys it doesn't matter anymore like it legitimately you can't get those like monumental changes yeah anymore it's just you know

01:48:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

I mean, we're talking like two, three, four nanometer. It doesn't, it's so small, you know? And, and so, I mean, I kind of do have to blame the video a little bit yeah because I feel like, look, that's it. Right. Because we should, if you sell people on, you're going to get crazy, you know, performance. And then you use that as a tactic to really sell your cars for an insane price when you're overly, overly so evaluated, at such a crazy stock valuation, you know?

01:49:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

it's going to leave a bitter taste in everyone's mouth because like the expectation should be, Hey guys, like yeah we really should be expecting like 10 or 20% improve, not 50 or a hundred.

01:49:24

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. And, and if you are willing to trade, right. Um, some artifacts and some input lag, then you can get better performance.

01:49:35

Shameer Mehdikhan

But, and that's the other problem is I think Nvidia is also tied now and they, they cause their own mess in the sense that they can no longer market it as a cheaper product. Cause if they do, people automatically assume that it's not as good as the prior generation of products.

01:49:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

So imagine if the 50 series was cheaper than the 4,000 series, or I'm like, then what's the point of buying this? I'm just going stay the 4,000 series, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Yeah. yeah And so cause they want to get everyone in the upgrade cycle because they, it's like the Apple tax, you know, it's like, you want to find a way to make everyone feel like what they have is obsolete. Yeah. Well, think about it. it's It's the same thing you just said with your bed. Like, Hey, you said, I want to get a better bed. I'm going to spend more because I'm assuming quality is going to better and you do and it. is But then sometimes it's still a hit or miss and you're like, Oh, ah like I'm going buy the cheaper bed. Yeah. So it's just, it happens to be that way with, with products. but i agree i think the pc market needs to be reized

01:50:28

Shameer Mehdikhan

EA Sports FC, which we've gotten in the past on the Switch, but they did it for like one or two years and then they stopped. I think these will be more consistent and prevalent on the Switch too. yeah I think that's why like Valve, I feel like Valve gets PC like no one else. And that's why Valve like...

01:50:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

Steam Deck was a good bet. It was a good bet. And I know it hasn't sold like crazy, but it really is kind of showing where there is a lot of room to grow yeah in the PC market. Well, think about it this way. Again, maybe Nintendo would have did this on their own. Maybe not. What if they didn't have the competition from Steam?

01:51:02

Shameer Mehdikhan

And now that Microsoft and Sony are heavily investing in maybe they we we wouldn't get a console that could output 4K or 120 MPIs. That's... you know Definitely the 120. I was so surprised when saw that. was like, when has Nintendo cared about 120 frames per second? I was like, that is totally a response to all the Windows games. Well, if they had said I'd say, okay, sure.

01:51:27

Shameer Mehdikhan

But I was at 120. Now, they what they didn't announce was VRR. I hope the hell to God that there's VR we can get 40 FPS games. But the fact that they didn't say that now, yeah absolutely would have they totally yeah a little i'm a little concerned there. But they keep saying enhanced games. so they say enhanced i looked at their descriptions for some of the games like Pokemon Z8 and Metroid. They go, they keep saying enhanced performance and resolution, but they're not pointing out exactly what that means.

01:51:51

Shameer Mehdikhan

Maybe it is variable. I don't know. But if if it's not variable, then fine. Lock me at a solid 30 or a solid 60. That's all I care about. You know, just, dude, okay, so they already announced a list of games that are getting free updates for enhanced versions. So Link's Awakening and Echoes of Wisdom which both are notoriously horrible on the Switch. Like when you play handheld, dude, you drop so many frames. Like it gets into the 20s, the 15s. I think you even complained about it before the Link's Awakening.

01:52:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

So they're getting free updates. I hope they lock them in at least at a 30, solid 30. So that's really all I have for the Switch too. I think it was a great like overall like way to introduce things. i think If you had to grade it, what would you say? I can give a solid eight out of 10.

01:52:31

Shameer Mehdikhan

An hour was the perfect length in my opinion. They had the one more thing at the end. You're getting the treehouse demos in the next two days. You're then getting a Mario Kart Direct in two weeks. And then you're going to probably get more directs probably in May or June for the Bonanza the bonanza game. yeah So I think I'll give it Anacent. I think an Anacent is pretty fair.

01:52:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

i think because they had to kind of do divide and conquer and some of those stuff was already revealed you know that kind of took away from it you know some of the can you imagine if we had metroid and pokemon you know being announced for the first time i was like really getting gameplay for the first time in this then oh my god that would easily be attacked you know yeah everyone's mind would be blown away um walking out of this i was thinking instantly this is going to be a nine you know but now that i've had more time to think about it like you know, I kind of tempered my expectations a little bit and brought it down to B because

01:53:24

Shameer Mehdikhan

hearing about how expensive these games are getting, really, like, that's ridiculous. Yeah, that's ridiculous. So I think that kind of, like, slowed things down a bit for me. There's a report right now floating around. i don't know how accurate it is, but they're saying some games might even be 90. Yeah, that's insane.

01:53:38

Shameer Mehdikhan

So when I heard about how expensive the games are going to be, I was like, man, how expensive is every going to be everything going to be? And Nintendo was already charging so much, you know, because their games never go on sale. All their accessories are super expensive.

01:53:50

Shameer Mehdikhan

They already make so much money. And Now everything has gone easy one and a half times more expensive. So that was kind of disappointing. you know i i am kind of disappointed on the new FromSoftware game because I've got to be single player. But i i that's just me personally. i It's going to be an amazing game. People are going to love it. FromSoftware has honestly never missed. so But for me, that's why it brought it down for like an eight-year-old.

01:54:13

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, i agree with that. I think the pricing is so all over the place. like I like that they announced Switch to Enhanced Games. We'll probably get a good amount of support going forward. it It looks like Scarlet and Violet will be getting an update as well. They didn't say really what that update entails, but it seems like they're getting a performance mode update. It say when.

01:54:30

Shameer Mehdikhan

The other problem that I have, again, is they're setting, again, a precedent. So I bet you two k looked at this and said, oh, games are 80, maybe 90. We're selling GTA 6 for 100. I just have a oh, if it's a popular IP and brand that people care about, we can get it with anything.

01:54:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

I totally agree with you. I think before this, I would have probably bet money that Grand Theft Auto will not be 90 bucks. And I remember watching like YouTube like videos and clips of people were speculating. I was like, this is a stupid conversation. This is clickbait.

01:55:05

Shameer Mehdikhan

Why would it ever be 90 or 100 dollars? And now that I'm hearing about Mario Kart being 80, I'm like, oh my god. Yeah, I like it. like and again I don't know what games are going to be 90 going forward, but if the reports are accurate, it's going to be on a case-by-case basis. And you know who's going to jump on this afterwards?

01:55:22

Shameer Mehdikhan

Sony. Yeah, Sony will too. Sony is absolutely going to make like the next God of war or like you know Last of Us or Intergalactic. They're totally going to upcharge them. Yeah, they will.

01:55:33

Shameer Mehdikhan

And again, I'm not saying they're skimping on us, but 450 for the Switch too. like just It still blows my mind. And I wonder as well if, you know, because of the Windows gaming handhelds, that also made Nintendo feel like they could get away with it because the ROG LiX is what? And if that's what the competition is costing, it's literally a fraction of the cost. It nothing.

01:56:02

Shameer Mehdikhan

And so I think, you know I wonder if Nintendo would have made it less powerful, less featured like console for a little bit cheaper. And then when they saw what the rest of you know the gaming landscape was like, they were like, okay, let's kind of make a more pro device and let's start selling at a premium. Well, like, okay, was the juice really worth the squeeze? So they say 120 FPS.

01:56:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

Again, the only way that makes sense to me is if they support VRR. If they don't, what big AAA game is going to take advantage of it? It's not going to be in the AAA games. It's going to be like the indie games, stuff. So then the question becomes is if they cut that out and they had a four k sixty fps screen could they have saved korea we have saved ten dollars could we have savedd twenty dollars Yeah, I don't know.

01:56:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

that's so That's my point. So if, again, if it comes out later that VR supported, okay, different story. and Then um this is well worth the money. I'll pay the extra 50 because we'll get great performing games.

01:56:56

Shameer Mehdikhan

But if not, then it's like, what could you have cut out of this to have made me say 50 bucks? you know Yeah. I guess with us, you know because we're older and we have like you know good jobs, We're going get it. you know It's not going to matter. But for other people, especially in this economy, like and especially looking at myself when i was a high schooler, stinks.

01:57:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

I would have never been able to afford it. You know, I felt like when we were in high school, yeah, we were broke. But like if you worked, you grinded, you got a job, like you could, you saved your money you got as gifts. You could eventually get more than one console.

01:57:29

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah. You know, and just takes a while now it's tough. Like unless your parents are going buy it for you, like, you know, and you're younger, like how are you going to get a PS5 Pro and a Switch? I mean, most of the people I know, like my aunts and uncles that have kids that are young, like let's say between the age of five and 10, they don't buy their kids. consol so most of them just play on their tablets now for free there's like Roblox and like Fortnite, they're all free to play.

01:57:51

Shameer Mehdikhan

So they they're like, okay, you can play on your iPad. We already bought you the iPad for school. So just play it on this. I have been hearing that iPad gaming has been blowing up. Yeah. mike Dude, my nephew, he's only six. He knows how to use the internet completely on his iPad. And I'm like, bro this, you should not know how to use your iPad this way. This is scaring me.

01:58:08

Shameer Mehdikhan

know And it's like, you know, and I never thought about that because, you know, six sounds like such a young age to like, well, have a console, but, Man, we had PS1 when I was five. Yeah, yeah. I'm pretty sure.

01:58:21

Shameer Mehdikhan

and then... And look how fucked up you turned out to be. I know, right? Thank God I started gaming early. Yeah, and then I got a... I got Halo 1, and I want to say I got the Xbox when I was in, like, the fourth grade. Third or fourth grade. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's crazy because for us, it doesn't seem like a big deal, but when I now look at it, I'm like, I don't want to... If I had a kid, I'm like, you're not touching games until you're 20. Yeah.

01:58:46

Shameer Mehdikhan

You know? Yeah. I'm pretty sure. yeah Cause third grade. It's brain rot. I'll be like, it's brain rot. Yeah. and and And Halo came out in 2001. So dude, I really think I was eight.

01:58:59

Shameer Mehdikhan

and got a mature rated game and i was playing halo and i was terrified by the flood which is funny because your parents had to buy the maturity game obviously for did they not realize that anyways that's not the point the point is do you not understand why your parents probably said hey games are brain rot don't play games when you're younger oh yeah i i look i don't even have kids and i'm already saying to my nephew and niece no i'm not letting them touch videos so when they come to my house now i It's only to last so long because, you know...

01:59:30

Shameer Mehdikhan

as they grow older, yeah they know you're gonna wanna share your hobbies with But we're slowly trying to get them into things like Pokemon cards and stuff. But the the bigger point is that when they come to my house, I specifically do not love to play video games just yet, because I just don't feel like they're ready, they're at that point.

01:59:45

Shameer Mehdikhan

And I know I shouldn't be making that decision, but like, because my first video game- Hypocrite! I know, that's true. But my first video game was ah when I was five as well. It was the Super Genesis, yeah.

01:59:57

Shameer Mehdikhan

yeah uh sega genesis and it was sonic and so again i was like fine you know i yeah i think in our generation we started early man i i want to say like i would hang out with like all my cousins and they would all be playing tekken and i wanted to play tekken and i was so upset that i was bad at tekken yeah and i felt bad i was like why do i suck why can't i play tekken It was 5. Why would I be able to beat them at Tekken? And my first mature rated game was Mortal Kombat 2 on the Sega, and I was only like 6.

02:00:30

Shameer Mehdikhan

say and i'm like i shouldn be playing this there's Women wearing skimpy clothes. I should not be watching this. Okay, it was a little blockier back then, right? Nowadays. it wasn't even blocky because the way they created the game was they took st still images of the characters. So Mortal Kombat was different back in the day. You look like an actual, like you know, you've seen like how it looked back then.

02:00:52

Shameer Mehdikhan

You're going to have to describe it to me. What's that website? It starts with a But yeah, so like even then I would watch Mortal Kombat and i'm like, Like, why am I playing this?

02:01:04

Shameer Mehdikhan

So, yeah, I just feel like this generation is a slightly different in the sense that if people are already off-put by buying something this expensive, I'd rather at least it be a Nintendo console because you have family-friendly games more prevalent on there.

02:01:19

Shameer Mehdikhan

So that's my point. I think Nintendo should have went with $400, even with the tariffs looming. And i know all of this is kind of coming up recently. And maybe this already accounts for it. But if Nintendo raises it another $50, let's say six months to a year, I would be utterly pissed. Didn't Japan just hit with 25%? Yeah. I mean, what's that going look like?

02:01:38

Shameer Mehdikhan

God, I don't know. but Dude, oh, this is where I heard the $90 from. So in Europe, one of the Nintendo first party games is 90 euros. People are complaining about already. Oh, God.

02:01:49

Shameer Mehdikhan

And so it begins. Yeah. So we're lucky in the US it's not hitting 90, but I think it was either Mario Kart for them or one other game. I don't remember which one. Well, it was going to happen eventually, but man, it sucks.

02:02:01

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, it sucks. So that's what it is. So all right. Well, I think that pretty much covers everything we wanted to chat about. ye sorry Alright, well, I guess we'll catch everyone around and you know hopefully we'll learn even more about the Switch as time goes on.

02:02:15

Shameer Mehdikhan

And if any of you got lucky enough to go to the event at the end of this week to play Switch 2 Games Live in new York or Cali, please give me your ticket if you can. Otherwise, have fun. How do you know that was a thing?

02:02:26

Shameer Mehdikhan

Yeah, i entered for an event. and girl I would have flew to New York to play it. It was at the Nintendo store. That's what happens when you start gaming at 5. Yeah, literally. You get addicted.

02:02:37

Shameer Mehdikhan

All right. All right. See you guys.