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Tex Avery Under a Bugs Bunny Moon (Tex Murphy: Under a Killing Moon - Part 1)
328 Plays25 days ago
We've had bad luck with FMV to Book games. Is this one better?
(No.)
https://nogamesforgenocide.com
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Transcript
00:00:00
Speaker
I don't think it's good idea. No, probably not. Probably not. um Yeah, so that's that's going to be a couple weekends from now.
00:00:12
Speaker
um You know what else is a ladder? What's that? Hey there, everybody. Welcome back to Pixel It. My name is Kevin. With me as always is Phil. On today's show, we're doing Tex Murphy under a killing moon.
00:00:30
Speaker
right. We got... We're doing some... The one you've clamoring for. The one you've been clamoring for. Tex Murphy under a killing moon. ah Yeah.
00:00:42
Speaker
So, Tex Murphy. Okay. What is Tex Murphy? What is a Tex Murphy? What is a Tex Murphy?
00:00:53
Speaker
it's It's a video game series. And I don't, I've never played them. I've never, ah i i could have watched a Let's Play, didn't do that. I'm just basing all of my interpretations of it based on the the picture on Wikipedia of...
00:01:11
Speaker
Tex Murphy holding a stupendously fake looking gun. It is. It is just ah is like I can I can feel the rubber texture of that fake firearm. It looks like a toy desert eagle like from this. Yeah, it's a toy desert eagle. It has no moving parts. I can see that nothing is moving is going to move on that gun.
00:01:35
Speaker
In fact, there is no trigger. There is just the the hole where the trigger would be. Oh, ah yeah oh my God, you're absolutely right. it's For those of you who look this up, it his finger, his trigger finger is so far down and the trigger in the trigger guard that the gun in the picture should just be going off continually yeah based on that. That's hilarious.
00:02:03
Speaker
Yeah. ah So video game series, it's designed by a gentleman named ah Chris Jones, who also plays Tex Murphy ah on the on the game. And what do I mean by that? Well, Tex Murphy, they were FMV-ish.
00:02:23
Speaker
Yeah. um They mostly were known for FMV, but I don't think they started that way. Well, they were 1989. I'm looking up means the first game was called Mean Streets.
00:02:37
Speaker
Uh, came out in 1989 and it looks like from what I could tell, they actually had like, like stills, uh, It used digitized stills of ah of actors. You know what I mean?
00:02:52
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Mean Streets video game. Hold on. I'm just clicking through
00:03:10
Speaker
Yeah, basically basically that. is it was it was those It was those low, really low fidelity ah videoate like digitized stills where it's like three three colors, just enough contrast you can see.
00:03:28
Speaker
um And then eventually it goes into full motion video. Yeah. But yeah, so they're they're all over the map too in terms of what they are supposed to be. ah According to the Wikipedia...
00:03:44
Speaker
ah hey god they were like They're like side scrolling action and there's flight work flight simulator and and then there's in the second one, there's point and click and so on and so forth. So the first book of the Tex Murphy series is actually the third game of the Tex Murphy series.
00:04:04
Speaker
called under a killing moon and that's what we are going to be looking at in today's episode uh yes so fun fact designed by chris jones played by chris jones first release 1989's mean streets and latest release 2014's tesla effect a tex murphy adventure
00:04:28
Speaker
So
00:04:31
Speaker
there you go. There's Tex Murphy adventure within the 15 years. there's a text-murphy adventure within the last fifteen years Yeah, yeah. And actually, there are books even more recent than that ah because they will not let Tex die. At least Tex Murphy die but ah we will discuss whether he should die, whether he should be ah in the marsh, but we'll get to that. But we'll get to that, yeah.
00:05:01
Speaker
Phil, who wrote this this book, which is not...
00:05:09
Speaker
Great. Not great. This was written by Aaron Connors. This is another guy one of... The guy who wrote the games, wrote the book. Yes. He started... Well, hit the first two he didn't write. He started with Under a Killing Moon.
00:05:21
Speaker
Okay. So he was involved, and that was the first big one. it was like it had It was like millions of dollars in budget. It took them forever to make. It was a very big deal. um And he he wrote that one. ah He...
00:05:37
Speaker
has since been a creative designer and writer for different games. But you get the impression that Tex Murphy is absolutely ah the biggest thing for him. Like that's his claim to fame. He loves this. He loves this franchise. And we know because not only has he written novelizations of all of the ah games that he helped with right up until Tesla Effect. He has also written books for ah games that never existed.
00:06:15
Speaker
Tex Murphy and the Romanov Enigma. Great title. Great title. um Great title. And ah let's see, there was a Tex Murphy ah interactive, they call it an interactive adventure. It is, it is, it's ah they've tied. They've, if you look at the cover art, um, what is it called? It's called Tex Murphy and the steakhouse stakeout and interactive adventure. And when you look at the, the cover, it's, it's very clearly going for the old fashioned choose your own adventure novels. Um, and, and it says here it was published. It was published last year. Uh, and it says here that it's 451 pages long.
00:06:56
Speaker
um And the cover says 70 possible outcomes, one perfect ending. ah So here's the thing. I can't help but be genuinely intrigued, despite.
00:07:09
Speaker
what we're going to get into here. Yes. i yeah I'm very curious. And i I do want to eventually do a choose your own adventure on this show. I just don't know how we would do it.
00:07:22
Speaker
i think i think what we have to do is stream it and leave our decisions up to the audience or something That's true. Yeah. I think that that would that's something I've always been thinking about. That's the only way it could work.
00:07:35
Speaker
Yeah, that's the best way to go about it. um Yeah. So that's mostly what he's done. ah If you go to his website, he's been the lead designer and or producer 14 video games, including most of this shit. He did a ah casual game called Murder Island.
00:07:54
Speaker
um Sure. He worked on it he worked on a ah Sean White snowboarding at Ubisoft Montreal. Okay. lot of three cards to midnight.
00:08:06
Speaker
A lot of stuff that I'm not familiar with. I love this. He's got his personal stuff section here at the bottom.
00:08:18
Speaker
He leaves in Salt Lake City. What kind of movies he likes. ah He and Chris Jones are in a a band called Endless Summer, which is a Beatles Beach Boys cover band.
00:08:31
Speaker
Yeah.
00:08:33
Speaker
I mean, come on, reads a lot of Jack Reacher. Sure. Sherlock Holmes. I don't believe you. um Like all kinds of interesting stuff. He seems like a character. And if you look at his picture, he's got a jaw that could cut steak.
00:08:50
Speaker
a
00:08:53
Speaker
You know, you talked to like you mentioned earlier, like Chris Jones playing Tex Murphy. It's almost like it's a vanity project for him. Sure. I'm i'm shocked and amazed that this guy, he he does pop up in these games, but he plays like really minor characters. But he does have that smolder face. Like he looks like he looks like he was born to play Captain in America.
00:09:16
Speaker
Uh, Jesus. I'm just, i looked at ah him up just now. he looks like he would have been cast by Tommy Wiseau in, the room had some point. Absolutely. looks like that dude. Yes. Yes. Um,
00:09:31
Speaker
Now this book and its sequel came out ah like a couple of years after the original um game.
00:09:43
Speaker
I don't know if it, if I don't, I have no idea if it got any traction or anything, but after the Tesla effect ah came out, he started re-releasing them with like, yeah kind of like he, I guess he rewrote some of them and, and re-released them.
00:09:59
Speaker
I think, I think these are self published. I'm trying to find a publisher and it's not happening. um But yeah, he's got six.
00:10:11
Speaker
He's got six of these books, not including the interactive adventure. So that makes it seven. And the first thing you notice when you look at the cover of these is if you know anything about Tex Avery, the cover art is taking itself way too goddamn seriously.
00:10:29
Speaker
Yeah. ah it's it's It's just all of them, except for the very last one, except for the choose your own adventure one, all of them have this kind of like you know, ah but I don't even know what you call it, kind semi-transparent, noir-looking dude with a fedora in the background and some sort of sci-fi gadgetry. And for and it just, it but when you realize what you're getting- It doesn't fit the story.
00:10:56
Speaker
No. um It looks like it would it would be more at home on as like the cover of like a knockoff Expanse novel. Yeah. Sure. Absolutely. Like if you were reading and one of the the Expanse ah the books, and which, by the way, the Expanse has noir stuff in it early on, and it's probably better than than this.
00:11:25
Speaker
I'll say that. And side note, I just saw this this wild conspiracy theory. Okay, so ja so The Expanse is written by two authors that use a single pen name, James S.A. Corey, right? okay One of those guys used to be George R.R. Martin's writing assistant.
00:11:49
Speaker
What? Oh, that's weird. George R.R. Martin, I don't believe, has published a new Game of Thrones book since this guy left to start his own thing, writing The Expanse.
00:12:04
Speaker
Oh, I see where we're going here. Okay. Not saying this guy wrote Game of Thrones, but I am saying he might have been the George R.R. Martin whisperer like... Hey, George, you got your pages done. You know what I mean? may Maybe. Maybe. He might have been his muse. Who knows?
00:12:22
Speaker
Something very romantic And since then, him and his writing partner have cranked out, like, there's like nine novels in in the Expanse universe and a television show that came and went.
00:12:34
Speaker
But, you know. That is funny. I get a kick out. i You know, We're never going to get those novels. ah yeah i And I accept that. um But the fact of the matter is, is the level of of ah complaining, you know, bleeding into conspiracy that it that the whole thing has that whole direction is hilarious. And I yeah i appreciate it.
00:13:02
Speaker
I really Yeah. Yeah. um And this isn't even like a conspiracy. This is just like necessarily this is just like, oh, the guy that used to keep him in like focused yeah is not working with him anymore.
00:13:18
Speaker
and now he's he's had he's unable to do it. He wrote a goddamn FromSoft video game before writing the next Game of Thrones book.
00:13:29
Speaker
a That's... That's crazy. That's crazy. Like, he's just he's just trying to piss off the fans at this point. He's just going, ah, fuck you. I don't care.
00:13:42
Speaker
I think he did wrote a blog post saying as much. Really? And and if you are... I think at this point... Oh, no, go ahead. At this point, I just I think at this point, if I were in his shoes, because most people are are just they are, in fact, treating it as just like, a come on, man, we really want to read these books. We really want to read them, especially now that the TV series is over. And that was such a bust.
00:14:09
Speaker
um ah but But there are a lot of supposed fans who are vicious little monsters on the internet. And if I were in his position, there is a part of me that would not even burn it all down.
00:14:23
Speaker
Just let it rot. You know like ah like a house in the woods that's slowly getting reconsumed by vines and plants. yeah just Just let it become the old shuttered house that people tell rumors about and no one actually goes into.
00:14:41
Speaker
Nobody goes into except for Baba Yaga. Exactly. Exactly. An old Russian witch has made her home in this place. And that is it. And the building is growing chicken legs.
00:14:54
Speaker
Yes. Well, I mean, that's just that's a natural progression. Yeah, that's like the Pokemon evolution of of rundown houses out in the woods. is thats Oh, yeah. yeah it's after Yeah, that's the way you want to go about it.
00:15:08
Speaker
Yeah. ah ghost Ghost type. Yeah. Am doing that right? Yeah, I think you're don't doing that right. ah the pokemons if you want to find out more about our opinions on pokemon go to patreon.com slash pixelate pod we currently have zero posts about pokemon but if you would to have more than zero posts about pokemon then yeah ah be consider becoming a patron of of the arts and of the saints uh us being the saints in this case
00:15:41
Speaker
ah we are your We are your saints and that's what patron and saint means, right? ah Yes. Patreon.com slash PixelitPod. Free $1, $5, and $10. $10 gets your name shouted out in the episode. To that end, I want to thank Ed You Are Hiding, Song 85, Jesus Loved You, Kyle Seaman, Ruthless Mudder, Middle of Things, Sigma Sal, Sanguine, Flatulence, Shia Lude, Chet Beaks, Dummy Thick, and Friendly Friend. Thank you so much for being a friend. Patreon.com slash PixelitPod.
00:16:12
Speaker
Do it today. So, body in the marsh? Body in the marsh. Marsh that body. Yeah, I'm back.
00:16:23
Speaker
When I tell you to dump a body in the marsh, you dump them in the marsh. My God. Okay. ah Tex Murphy under a killing moon.
00:16:37
Speaker
We start with a prologue. It is an introduction to Tex Murphy and the futuristic world 2042. off future of 2042. ah we are a future of twenty forty two And there was World War III and nukes dropped basically. And it's it's similar to Fallout really, except there's still cities and stuff.
00:16:57
Speaker
ah Basically, it's created a new class of people. You've got regular people that they call norms and you've got mutants. And these are people who have been affected negatively or just affected negatively or not. ah Yeah. a The radiation and that sort of thing.
00:17:14
Speaker
ah And it's become kind of the new sticking point for, for certain undesirables. And we'll get into that later. um I've called him Tex Avery on accident about 50 times since we first started talking about this. And there's no reason to think that it won't keep happening ah throughout every single one of these episodes. In fact, and, and and just just to start off right. ah Like Tex Murphy, right.
00:17:44
Speaker
i So here's the thing. They're going for the the hard-boiled detective story, the Raymond Chandler era, they're the they're those movies like Maltese Falcon. Maltese Falcon is literally referenced and as for as well as a few other movies.
00:18:05
Speaker
Tex Murphy is just not... a name I associate with this type of story, right? No.
00:18:17
Speaker
Tex. Tex? Tex. you don't x you don't you don't have the i none of these guys are murphy tex murphy way to texas and way to irish way two texas way to murphy i think we way to murphy way way to texas way to murphy come on guys what are we doing here tex murphy it's like they went it's like they went with the first name they came up with and just said let's fuck it we'll do it live ah
00:18:49
Speaker
Yeah. Fuck it. We'll do it live. So it's going to be a text. It's going to be, in fact, it's to the point that literally right before I i signed on this evening, ah I had to change the title in my notes on my phone from Tex Avery under a killing moon to Tex Murphy under a killing moon. Sure. Yeah.
00:19:09
Speaker
So that's just going to keep happening. ah do a shot every single time i get it wrong and you'll be dead ah by the end of this episode. I guarantee it. Okay. So we cut to chapter one.
00:19:24
Speaker
A hungover text is approached in his office by the colonel, ah who's it's like his former mentor. He used to work with him as ah when they were they were detectives. He worked with him and for him. It's kind of unclear. Apparently, at one point early in his career, he sold him out.
00:19:44
Speaker
That's not... we haven't yet gotten to what exactly it is he did or said. We just know that he, he ah reported him to the ethics department basically. And the guy lost his badge for six months or something ah relatively inconsequential. i I don't know, but it it really pissed off the Colonel apparently. And he hasn't spoken to Tex in 15 years. So yeah,
00:20:08
Speaker
ah so he but he He just shows up. ah It isn't clear why he shows up. He just shows up after 15 years. No.
00:20:20
Speaker
Just to tell him he looks like shit ah and to kind of bury the hatchet. Kind of. Yeah. Clean up your Basically, he's telling him, like, you know,
00:20:31
Speaker
you know
00:20:34
Speaker
Yeah, it's it's it's a very you're better than this kind of thing. And I'm not sure. And after after reading a third of this book so far, I'm not sure ah that that's correct. I think i don't think text is better than this. ah So, yeah, they have kind of ah an estranged father son bit. They yell at each other, ah let loose a little bit. And and the colonel fucking leaves. Yeah.
00:20:58
Speaker
Chapter two, it's a few days later Tex is in Mexico City with a new case. This is the thing that that confused me a little bit, though, yeah was that ah it goes prologue. Milk chapter one.
00:21:13
Speaker
Yeah. Chapter two. Yeah. It's like it's like elevators that go 11, 12, 14. Yeah.
00:21:24
Speaker
it Well, it goes, I think, I think Connors thought he was writing this in a clever way. ah We jump forward and backward in time. oh Well, there you are. Okay. You just, be okay. Okay.
00:21:39
Speaker
We jump forward and backwards in time a lot and it's not well ah explained. Right. It's not, it's not well ah set up. ah And yeah. So in chapter two, it's like a few days later. We're in Mexico city with a new case that as the reader, you know, nothing about. Okay.
00:21:59
Speaker
ah Right. And he's not being very, he's being very coy, but not in a like, Oh, I need to find out what's happening. It's just confusing. Yeah. We know that he was hired to steal back some sort of family heirloom from a guy named Eddie Ching, which the less said about name. I was like, I was like, I gotta, I gotta look this name up because is this a real name? And like, it could be, could be, but I don't think this guy knew.
00:22:28
Speaker
No. Eddie Ching of Mexico city. Eddie Ching of Mexico city. Yeah. Um, well, We focus a whole hell of a lot, and this is going to be a running thing here in this book. We focus a whole hell of a lot on details that do not matter. Do not matter. Like his brand of cigarettes. Like his brand of cigarettes. Right. Llamas. Llamas. By the way, just one of the dumbest lines in ah written history
00:22:59
Speaker
I assumed llamas in Mexico were like white cows in India, but I hadn't seen a single one, animal or cigarette since I arrived. That's, yeah.
00:23:10
Speaker
You know where llamas are from are not from Mexico. Right. the the I was like, that doesn't sound right. I'm going to look this up because that doesn't sound right. and mean Where llamas from, they're from the from the Andes yeah in South America, which Mexico is not in.
00:23:27
Speaker
No, no. This is the beginning of ah a little game I like to call weaponized ignorance. Yeah. where he's at a certain point and you pointed this out earlier today at a certain point it catches up with te ah that he's kind of an idiot um so dumb and he's and he and he starts to kind of own being an idiot but it's really unconvincing. And I'm, and I'm, I believe that it might be that Aaron Connors just wanted to write these things. And like, in retrospect, had no idea what he was talking about. So he's like, well, we'll just make ticks.
00:24:08
Speaker
Avery, Tex Murphy, a fucking, uh, uh, That's one. ah Well, just make him an idiot. that and he's that out That's charming, right? It is not. ah Not charming at all. In fact, ah there's ah there's a moment pretty right around this time where Tex Merfavory references Sauron.
00:24:33
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Which like, nope, this this character would not have watched Lord of the Rings. No, no. Especially when we find out that we find out later he's he's like, I'm not a literary guy at all. He talks a lot about how he doesn't read.
00:24:50
Speaker
He talks a lot about how he doesn't read. And we're like, yeah. Nah. and And I'm saying, yeah, he refers to Flannery connor flannery O'Connor as some guy named Flannery O'Connor. Yeah. And it's like, and I'm supposed to believe that you can make an obscure Lord of the Ring reference. Like, come on, man.
00:25:08
Speaker
good No. um But yes, ah during our time in Mexico City, ah everything is racist. Yeah. I do not say that in a reactive reactionary kind of way. It's just fucking racist.
00:25:23
Speaker
yeah you can And you can you can basically see the yellow light filter over everything. like like Pure Mexico filter going on. That's exactly it.
00:25:35
Speaker
There's a moment and i I just highlighted all these things and I have to talk about them. Absolutely. There's a moment where he's on. ah He's like, I was on the flight down to Mexico and it only reinforced my fear of native Mexican food by including translations for such phrases as what species of meat is that?
00:25:53
Speaker
And no lettuce for God's sake. As I waited for the elevator, I could feel my digestive juices deciding that my stomach was not only edible, but nutritious and delicious. Fear of Mexican food written by a white guy in Utah. Clearly, ah this is the most Salt Lake City white man that ever it like or there there there have to be Mexican people that live in Salt Lake City. Right.
00:26:22
Speaker
Oh, sure. Well, um maybe not, actually. I don't know. This takes place in San Francisco. This takes place in San Francisco. I just ah attribute ah a lot of this to like maybe some weird Mormon stuff that I'm not sure about.
00:26:38
Speaker
ah Tim, as our resident former Mormon. Yes. ah Can you get back to us on that? Now that's interesting. I hadn't thought about that because we're going to, and we're going again, we're going to get into this. the The way he talks about things that Mormons are not allowed to have does sometimes feel like a person who has never been drunk describing being drunk, ah that kind of thing. Okay. That's interesting. All right. all right. Yeah.
00:27:05
Speaker
i don't know if they're Mormon or not. it's They're just from, they're white guys from Salt Lake City. Yeah, it's, it's, yeah, it, there's a reason you don't typically, you have your druthers, you don't move to, to Salt Lake city, you know, for the food, uh, if, if you could go anywhere that you wanted to. So yeah. Right. Um, yeah.
00:27:29
Speaker
ah Chapter three, Tex is now breaking into the apartment of one Eddie Ching of Mexico City, ah who we do not see and will never see as far as I've read so far. We just hear his name and not in a Kaiser Sose kind of way. It's just some off stage character.
00:27:50
Speaker
Just some guy that he's breaking into the apartment of to steal some shit. Just some guy. ah We get some half-assed futuristic yucks with laser blades. He has a laser blade.
00:28:02
Speaker
We never get that described. It doesn't. It doesn't. It's not like, is this a lightsaber? It's just the supplies that he has. He just offhandedly mentions a laser blade. and then And then that he bought the laser blade from Radioactive Shack.
00:28:18
Speaker
up up Yuck, yuck, yuck. um And I'm honestly at this point wondering why this goddamn series is even set in the future. um Yeah, it's it's going to come up a lot.
00:28:31
Speaker
ah There is no Internet. And don't get me wrong. When this game came out, I think it was 94. I was, yeah. So it would have been pre-internet, at least in the way that we know it, in the ubiquitousness that is. Yeah, mean, you had your AOLs and your things like that. You had your mostly walled garden-ish internet was still the experience for most folks, prodigy and AOL and that kind of stuff. Yeah, yeah. So anyway, it's just –
00:29:03
Speaker
it I haven't run into a single thing except for the mutant thing, uh, that requires this to be set in the future. And and admittedly, the mutant thing will be pretty, uh, a pretty major part of it.
00:29:16
Speaker
Um, he literally cuts open a hole in one of the walls. Like he, he breaks into Ching's next door neighbor's apartment, cuts a wall in that guy's, uh, cuts a hole in that guy's wall and breaks into Ching's apartment that way.
00:29:34
Speaker
Um, At this point, yeah, he finds what he calls a treasure chamber. um and And we are just knee deep in an attempt at the hard boiled detective type.
00:29:46
Speaker
ah ah the The similes and you know the the kind of wry wit and the back and forth and everything. And and I've got it. i'm i'm I'm sure Aaron Connors is a perfectly nice person, but random ray ah Raymond Chandler. He ain't.
00:30:02
Speaker
He is definitely not Raymond Chandler. No. Chapter four, he steals this statuette, ah Indiana Jones style sets off an alarm. And by the way, chapter three was the Flannery O'Connor stuff. Oh, yeah. Yeah. yeah And ah he talks about how ah his reading material had always fallen somewhere between Spider-Man comics and the back of a cereal box.
00:30:27
Speaker
ah And he had never read. he He only had read one of the books for whom the bell tolls. Well, actually, he had seen the movie with Gary Cooper in and Ingrid Bergman.
00:30:38
Speaker
First, yeah one of the earliest ah times of him being weird about women in the book. Oh, boy. But not the end. Angry Bergman. Now that was a woman. Oh, boy. Dames like that had disappeared around the time two tops and tie-dye became fashionable.
00:30:56
Speaker
Like, this is the year 2040. What the fuck do you know, Tex? This has got, I mean, honestly, when this was first released, it wasn't really a thing, but this stinks of incel culture. This is so incel. This is proto incel.
00:31:13
Speaker
Right. Nonsense. does everything but call her a femoid. ah It's bad. Calls her Dame. Yes, that's true. Well, I don't mind Dame, but I'm but i'm a white guy. It really depends on the tone and the context. Yeah. Dame Edna versus dames like that. you know Yeah. yeah They got gams up to the clouds. They got legs all the way up to the ears. Yeah. So he's hunted by guards. He manages to escape the apartment complex and immediately starts driving to cross the border into Texas.
00:31:50
Speaker
ah Chapter five, Tex is back in Texas for some reason. He's back in the States. um He describes his first good cigarette ah with an ecstasy that can only be written by someone who doesn't smoke.
00:32:04
Speaker
i but We get like three pages of this guy talking about finally getting his own brand of cigarette ah back again and like how good it is. And it goes on and on. And I am a former smoker. I will have gone six years without a smoke this summer. And I still, to this day, every now and then will go,
00:32:32
Speaker
fuck, I'd kill for a cigarette right now. That would be real good right now. And I and i and i take that information and I crumple it up into a bowl and i throw it away. ah Like all the non-smokers, you know, and and or ex-smokers.
00:32:44
Speaker
And this is too much. just it is i'm like Come on, man it like It feels like a 14-year-old describing a tit for the first time. like it's It's basically the 40-year-old virgin scene.
00:33:00
Speaker
Yes. It feels like a but bag of sand. Like, what are you talking about? All right. Another thing, and this is this will come up a shit ton. He is the worst hard-boiled detective of all time.
00:33:12
Speaker
What a panty waste. Like, this guy is like, I can't take those Mexican cigarettes. Like, fucking... Sam Spade over there would be like, yeah, give him to me. i'll take i'll I'll have four packs right now. he doesn't give a shit. ah Yeah, yeah. the say Like the other, the hard-boiled detective, our hard-boiled detectives would have just chewed.
00:33:33
Speaker
did They just wadded up ah like any cigarette they found and chewed it. Yeah, yeah. Like, I don't have a lighter, so I'm just going to turn this into dip. Right. Right. it's there's there's ah Have you ever read A Day in the Life of Ivan Dinizovich?
00:33:52
Speaker
No, I haven't. it's I think it's Stolz, Stolz, Nietzsche. I don't know how you say his name, but ah one of the main things I remember from reading it ah was it's because it's in a gulag. It's in a labor camp. And um this one guy keeps going and he starts, he collects everyone's cigarette butts and he ah opens them up and he pours the tobacco ah onto fresh rolling paper. And he basically makes a Frankenstein's monster of all these,
00:34:22
Speaker
you know, stubbed out butts and they, and they, and they're like, dude you're going to get fucking mouth herpes like that. Like that it's, it's, it's this thing that he does, but it's, it's, it's how he, how he is frugal, I guess and with his cigarettes.
00:34:36
Speaker
That is the kind of shit a smoker does like that kind of shit. Like that's 100% believable. ah but This, this ecstasy is, is,
00:34:47
Speaker
It's it's it's killing me. Yeah. um Yeah. Under a killing moon. and He ah he also ah they also talk about the the fucking grilled cheese. And he wants to talk about food forever.
00:35:02
Speaker
he wants it on a He wants a nice medium cheddar on his grilled cheese. ah Extra thick. um And then he he talks about the the girl, the ah waitress, LaDonna.
00:35:15
Speaker
ah As I watched her work, I noticed how with some shock how shapely her legs were. Of course, they were doing miraculous things with leggings these days. But those gams looked legit.
00:35:26
Speaker
They were certainly her most attractive feature. The area between her hips and shoulders could have belonged to a Texas A&M middle linebacker. And the towering beehive hairdo atop her head made full third of her total height.
00:35:39
Speaker
um So, yeah, example number two of Tex being really, really sexist, misogynist, weird about women. Yeah, starting to get an idea of why his wife left him.
00:35:53
Speaker
Oh, by yeah get we have him by the way, he my way he's ah he's a recent divorcee. Tell me another one. Go on. ah Yeah. Yeah. And the food he bitches about diner food ah before describing this this this, you know, very particular little grilled cheese that he wants.
00:36:13
Speaker
And i i I just I've never. ah believed in a hard-boiled detective less. It's so stupid. i um So this chapter ends up being almost entirely useless until the very end.
00:36:31
Speaker
there's nothing that happens is so in so much of this book ah is so much of this book, nothing happens. um So we, we get right to the very end and we learned that ah the Colonel probably had helped him out by paying his tab in the past. um Right.
00:36:49
Speaker
And, and he also kind of reflects on the notion that this Countess Rainier case ah was more trouble than it's worth. ah And I'm not sure if that's foreshadowing or anti-shadowing. I don't know what it is because we've hopped forward in time.
00:37:07
Speaker
And now we're chapter six. We're hopping back in time. We get a random flashback of him getting the gig with Countess Rainier. ah So, we We started in the present. We move forward.
00:37:21
Speaker
Now we're in the past. We went back and it's it's so unclear. It's so sloppy. he Yeah. He spent. So chapter five, he spends it talking about food and cigarettes. And then it's like, right, now let's talk about why I'm really here.
00:37:35
Speaker
Right. Right. Yeah. Let's now let's get down to the important stuff. Now that you're hungry. Right. yeah Exactly. ah Now that I've got you salivating with my, my a plus descriptions of food.
00:37:48
Speaker
ah This is what happens in this a lot. And it's, and it, it's so disorienting. ah I know for a fact that at this point I would have put down the book if not for this show. So yeah you're welcome. Connors.
00:38:03
Speaker
Yeah. So yeah, this chapter, we get a flashback. He gets the gig from Countess Renier, who basically gives him seven days to find this statuette that she says is is worth a shit ton of money. And it's very sentimental to her. And she doesn't ah she doesn't ah ah think that he'll actually be able to do it, but she'll pay him a shit ton of cash if he does. ah So now now he's got, that's the statuette that he got. So whoop-de-shit.
00:38:31
Speaker
um Chapter seven. Oh, here's the other great thing. Chapter seven. Tex wakes up in a hospital because he was mugged and smashed over the head with something heavy off camera.
00:38:48
Speaker
Sure would be fun to have like a fight scene or even ah a brief smart ass description of being attacked from behind. No, we just find out. We just find out that he, that he got mugged when he wakes up in the hospital.
00:39:02
Speaker
Right. Okay. ah Statuette is gone. That was a peak Dennis Miller okay that you that you had. okay Okay. Okay.
00:39:12
Speaker
Yeah, i i I learned a lot from Dennis Miller right up until I decided I didn't need to learn any more from Dennis Miller. ah This book is actually basically written by Dennis Miller. little bit.
00:39:24
Speaker
God. Like if Dennis Miller was really only obsessed with like 1940s movies. Yeah. and ah And Raymond Chandler, but didn't absorb any of the aesthetic or meaning of them.
00:39:40
Speaker
So it's like ah this is like a combination of it's like a melding of Dennis Miller and Joe Rogan. Yes. Okay. Okay. Yeah. That's the end the episode, by the way. My favorite description of Joe Rogan is something you said once where ah Joe Rogan ah is a man who could stand ah in front of ah on on the beach of knowledge.
00:40:05
Speaker
i being being being Having the waves of knowledge knowledge wash over him and he would come out dry. ah I did say that. Thank you. Thank you for reminding me of that.
00:40:19
Speaker
I can be a pretty good writer when I want to be. Hey, hey you can write when he wants to. and i wants to ah Yeah, this that's what this is. It's it's complete it's it's Dennis Miller with about 16th of the reference points.
00:40:37
Speaker
um And the ones that they do have, ah they're still not entirely sure on. Sure. um So the statue, it's gone. He watches ah TV ah while he's recovering. It's a news clip about a bombing in l L.A., a civil rights organization called Capricorn was bombed ah by basically a bunch of eugenicists. ah They are anti-mutant.
00:41:03
Speaker
And ah Capricorn is basically described as like an international version of the ACLU. And yeah they're they're trying to protect the rights of mutants and all that stuff. Which is like the literal most interesting thing about this book. Yeah. ah word I mean, hopefully we get more on it, but it's like, that was like, he spends like a half a page talking about that and be like, but now about that grilled cheese. Right. It's it's it's kind of hilarious because it's shockingly timely. Of course, something like that, I'm sure that works for just about every generation. Just about any time. We're like, oh, the eugenicists are coming back. Yeah. Oh, there they are. Oh, is it spring already? ah Yeah. oh man. I always know it's time to get my taxes paid for the second quarter when the eugenicists are out and about.
00:41:55
Speaker
um Yeah. this is a This is stupid writing, though, because we... Oh, yeah. And the eugenics people, they call it the crusade. Of course.
00:42:08
Speaker
I love when my book ah tells me shit instead of showing me. ah Yeah. And that's what this whole chapter is. ah we could have had We could have had moments where he's walking the streets on his way to a place or something, and we have graffiti described. Or he sees a mugging take place between right or or like a hate crime or something like that. But instead, we get it from him ah recovering from a head wound in a hospital watching TV. The most boring goddamn way we could get it. It's the the like I always say for you kids learning out and learning how to write. ah Tell them what you're going to tell them.
00:42:47
Speaker
Tell them. Tell them. Tell them, tell them what you told them. Tell them again what you're going to tell them. Yep. And then... Tell them. Yeah. just Just a little dot of telling them at the end because that's what really seals it, I find. That's what really seals it.
00:43:03
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. that's the That's the seal. That's the varnish after after everything. It really locks it in. ah So when he's finally released from the hospital, he heads back to the countess's house and finds it abandoned and realizes he's been set up.
00:43:19
Speaker
ah So chapter eight. Bum, bum, bum. Yeah. I mean, well, that is, that is, if, if I had the strength for that, that's absolutely where the bop up bow would be. Yeah.
00:43:31
Speaker
ah Chapter eight. ah We spend three pages going through Texas mail. Yeah. And and on background information on his landlord, ah all things that I'm sure will be relevant later on. Yeah.
00:43:49
Speaker
And also the the girl, the the newsstand girl across the street. Yep. Yep. Yep. Chelsea Bando. Yep. Yeah. Chelsea with three E's.
00:44:02
Speaker
With three E's. Yep. And ah ah we get we hear that... Tex, she wears a perfume that causes primal urges to stir within Tex, like a den of bears in early spring.
00:44:16
Speaker
And we find out that Tex, it's been a long time for him since he'd performed the forbidden dance of love. But that was the only reason Chelsea made my toes curl. The forbidden dance of love.
00:44:32
Speaker
Tex, I'm begging you just jerk off. like just Just drain the cyst, man. like Get some of the evil out and and and and return to being a human being. like i just I just imagine him having some clarity and be like, oh, man.
00:44:52
Speaker
Oh, I'm a private detective.
00:44:56
Speaker
Oh, right. Right. Wow. I have been terrible to women. ah Oh, God. text it's It's bad. He has... When that post-nut clarity hits. that he He has the it the fucking mentality and attitude towards sex of ah of like a 13 year old, uh, who's seen like a playboy once. Uh, it's bad again. and I went, and we find out that his wife was cheating on him and that's why they got a divorce. But honestly, I'm still on her side here.
00:45:29
Speaker
Um, ah In the mail, in this pile of mail, we go through bills. We go through everything that's useless. um And he does get an ah an anonymous clue, some sort of code on a blue index card.
00:45:43
Speaker
ah He heads back to the countess's house again. ah Like he he, for those of you keeping score, he went to the countess's house, found it abandoned, left, went to check his mail,
00:45:58
Speaker
Then went back ah to investigate again. ye So he's a real good detective. um Really good. Really good. ah He finds cigarette butts that he can't identify. And so he goes to a tobacconist, to a tobacco store. And he and. Tobacconologist. Tobacconologist. Yeah. Yeah.
00:46:21
Speaker
ah He and the owner have a random conversation about detective fashion that I'm sure will be relevant later on. Well, he does talk about how handsome Don Amici was. Oh, yeah. Yeah, sure. And for those of you who are wondering, ah yeah, Don Amici of Trading Places.
00:46:42
Speaker
um
00:46:45
Speaker
it Fucking book. um the The cigarettes are French. Uh, Tex randomly remembers the name Lowell Percival, uh, from a list that he saw when he was robbing Eddie Ching, uh, and goes to find him.
00:47:03
Speaker
Uh, okay. Uh, yeah. The book's just leading us by the nose here. Uh, chapter nine, he goes to this corporate office that apparently Percival owns and operates. Um,
00:47:15
Speaker
He meets in what is possibly the most repellent scene in this book. He meets the little sister of an ex-girlfriend of his.
00:47:28
Speaker
ah We got we get a you got your braces off. which is replied to with a, in case you didn't notice, I'm all grown up now.
00:47:39
Speaker
And I think someone needs to type Tex Murphy's name into the Epstein file search engine and get me a Pepto Bismol because I'm going to be sick. it's Oh, I, uh, and to, for, for Texas response, just so the readers know after she says I'm all grown up, Tex goes,
00:48:01
Speaker
Oh, I'd noticed all right. She was wearing a black blazer over charcoal-colored top that fit her like a coat of paint. Her complexion was flawless, and she'd grown into her features nicely. Long, wavy brown hair lay silkily over her shoulders.
00:48:18
Speaker
Elena didn't help things when she leaned forward and lowered her voice. Silkily? She breasted boobily. She breasted boobily. And the thing is, I think she's like meant to be 18. Yeah. Because he talks about like he dated her sister like six years ago and describes her as like this gawky little kid. So I think if I'm being if i'm being very generous, I'm going to go ahead and give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that she is of legal age now. Yeah.
00:48:53
Speaker
Nope. And it's not it's not okay. to I will give to to Texas credit. ah he was he He is a little weirded out. He deals with some mixed emotions, but then he very quickly resolves to handle all that with booze.
00:49:08
Speaker
Yeah, he's like, he he he really puts up a fight for like a good 30 seconds, 30 seconds longer than I thought he would. Yes, yes, exactly. And for all 30 of those seconds, I had ah the tiniest firefly of respect for the man. ah So that's our hero. He can't get an appointment with Percival ah because he's a corporate stool ah stool stooge. And of course he can't. He didn't even think to call and get an appointment or anything like that. ah So instead he decides to go to a piano bar with ah with Elena, ah the girl.
00:49:48
Speaker
um they're flirting. It's gross. ah It's really weird, uncomfortable. um And then she, a couple of mutants ah enter the place and she basically calls them their version of the N-word.
00:50:03
Speaker
ah Yeah, it's like it's like he's fine with the age gap slash that she was the younger, that he knew her when she was a kid. just like... ah ne he's just like he He gets upset. He draws the line.
00:50:20
Speaker
He's like he draws the line at racism, which I guess if you're going to draw the line anywhere. Which great. That's great. Great. glad bret Chalk one up for Tex.
00:50:31
Speaker
I just think that maybe if he was a he he probably shouldn't have been in the position in the first place. Right. But there it is. Yeah. Chapter 10, Tex heads, he heads to his friend Louie's diner, ah where we get three pages, three pages about their chili, which I'm sure will be relevant at some point later.
00:51:01
Speaker
Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
00:51:06
Speaker
I would like to think that he's just like, cop he's just like, he was doing some some some copywriting for like a Zagat's Guide or something like that.
00:51:18
Speaker
And just like, hey, ah we're going to write this book. And he's like, well, I got all this this unpublished work for... for the local chi chili place and the grilled cheese emporium. That couldn't possibly fit into this book. No, put it in, and put it in, and put it in. a Put it in, and put it in. We got to pat out the pages. we're one When I read that he edited the original manuscript and added more to it ah for this release, ah I was like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, I see that.
00:51:56
Speaker
I see that right now. You added a bunch of shit. It's never good news when a writer adds. ah What you want is subtrat subtraction. Like I could see there's like the original manuscript and there was like, there's just like pages of like struck through like yeah stuff. And it's like, oh yeah, let's just add all that back in. Yeah. 100. Let's just undo that.
00:52:20
Speaker
um Control Z, control Z, and we're dead. Control Z for four years, and we're in. ah Louis complains about the crusade that's going on and encourages Tex to ask the very blonde, the very boobily Chelsea out.
00:52:37
Speaker
um which this is yeah yeah I know we've met Chelsea before, but this is like the fourth or fifth woman that he has lazily you know talk ah thought about sex with. yeah in in in like At this point, 60 pages.
00:52:56
Speaker
yeah It's kind of breakneck speed. ah it's Again, he's got... he's got all of the willpower and discernment of a child with a $50 gift card and a Toys R Us. It's absolutely ridiculous. um I want that. I want that. I want that.
00:53:16
Speaker
um So the three of them do sit down and they try to work out the anonymous code that techs got. um And they start to get some ideas, VIN numbers. I know that's a, I know it's VIN, VI numbers. Let's do it that way. ah ah Phone numbers, all that stuff. um And, and, so and like, we almost get into some actual ah ah detective deduction, but don't worry because Don't panic.
00:53:48
Speaker
Don't worry. Deus Ex Machina is here ah ah to save the day because he gets so he gets a call from an old cop friend of his who says that the colonel has gone missing and Tex is suspect number one.
00:54:05
Speaker
Oh, boy. we almost boy We almost had some detective work there, Kevin. I started to panic. I started to panic. My breath got short. I was whoo.
00:54:17
Speaker
Boy, howdy. The thrill of a near miss. Yeah. Oh, God. It feels so good when you miss it like that. yeah Chapter 11. Tex goes to the colonel's apartment, ah which is, of course, swarming with cops that he wants to avoid because he knows they're looking for him. He sets off an alarm at a nearby store by destroying its window.
00:54:40
Speaker
and setting off the, ah the alarm. And he sneaks past him. He finds the same kind of cigarette butts, the French cigarettes that he had found before. And then he finds a secret camera and a secret entrance into the closet where he finds the secret footage disc and sneaks it out ah secretly in the empty case of a, a Oh, what's his name? Um,
00:55:08
Speaker
Edmunds Fitzgerald, Gordon Lightfoot. ah Gordon Lightfoot. Which I'm sure, here's the thing. this ah i haven't I haven't watched through the whole thing. i I played this game a million years ago, so I didn't remember a lot of it. um Right. I have been watching some walkthroughs of it and some long plays. um And I haven't gotten, I'm sure that that was important in the game to like protect it or something. Or you like lock yourself out or something like that. You you lose because you ruin it. ah We don't need it in the book. We really don't.
00:55:43
Speaker
um he tries to so He tries to sneak out and he's caught ah by a policeman. ah Chapter 12, he's thrown in a drunk tank ah where he immediately complains about needing a smoke.
00:55:56
Speaker
ah Jesus Christ. ah Charles Bukowski didn't smoke as much as this guy. He has two going at once. It's like it's one in the mouth, one in the fingers. Exactly. Yeah. Just went up the ass. but but Yeah. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. That's the good one. That's that's where the good stuff comes from. ah he's He he's sits in the drunk tank for half an hour and then he's taken to the commissioner who wants to interrogate him.
00:56:24
Speaker
Now, now, now. little writer's tip.
00:56:30
Speaker
You can just go straight to the commissioner in your story. Yeah, I know. i know. Let's say from experience and leave it at that, that if you're going to have something like this happen, you're going to start in, in, in some kind of holding area, maybe a drunk tank. maybe And then eventually when they get to you,
00:56:56
Speaker
they'll they'll come get you. Right. In your fiction book, and this is really fun. This is super fun. You can just cut that out. You can do anything you want.
00:57:07
Speaker
You can do anything. We don't have to go through the minutia. We've got, we've got crusaders trying to kill mutants in this book. Like, I think. Why are we wasting time on like, I'm sitting with the, I'm sitting with these crazy characters in the drunk tank.
00:57:25
Speaker
and they're not that crazy. Like we get, he gets, he gets like one awkward conversation with, with, ah with a couple of the jailbirds who claim that they've been in the drunk tank for weeks. And that's not a thing.
00:57:39
Speaker
At that point, they will put you in with gen pop. At that point you will, they will move you into a cell. ah You're not going to be in the drunk tank for weeks. ah Once again, let's not talk about how I know that. And so he's, he gets, he's, He finally goes in and he gets interrogated by the commissioner and he cuts a deal to avoid B and E charges. um And basically it's check out the Gordon Lightfoot CD in my, in my shit.
00:58:06
Speaker
ah And, uh, And throw on the the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald. Yeah, exactly. Just really think about you know the implications, yeah man, of of the Great Lakes and all that. Of cruel and evil lake. Of that cruel and evil lake. So...
00:58:27
Speaker
Yeah, they watch this secret video, this footage, and they see the colonel getting jumped by a couple of strangers. um ah One of whom, the who's like the the main interrogator, who is the first a person ah whose race is overtly mentioned. Well, not even fully overtly. ah He's just shade of brown.
00:58:50
Speaker
a suspect shade of brown ah you know He says he might be Arab. Is that what he says? Yeah. He says it like he might be Middle Eastern or something like that. Oh, I got to hold on. I got to, I got to find this. Yeah. It's and it like they describe his outlandish mustache and yeah, it's the first time anybody is anybody's skin tone outside of like her complexions. Perfect is mentioned.
00:59:19
Speaker
His skin was dark. He looked like he might be Middle Eastern, though he could have been wearing makeup and a false mustache for all I knew. Like, OK, he's like, this guy could be Middle Eastern or it could be a guy doing brown face.
00:59:33
Speaker
I don't know. This guy could be Middle Eastern or he might be a chimpanzee in a trench coat. I'm not sure. there are lot I'm just asking questions. ah it's It's bad. So ah the colonel is getting interrogated um and he's like, he's clearly talking real loud so that the camera will pick it up. But the guy, the the Middle Eastern guy ah is always talking way too soft for the camera to hear.
01:00:03
Speaker
right And ah when it's clear that the colonel isn't going to give him anything, ah you know they drug him and drag him out. End of chapter 12 and end of the first third of this book. Kevin, yeah what do you think, sir?
01:00:22
Speaker
ah
01:00:25
Speaker
I'm actually actively wondering how this book is rated 4.29 out of
01:00:34
Speaker
I don't know, man. ah That's crazy. There are all of his books seem to be very highly rated suspiciously.
01:00:47
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And this one's the lowest one 4.29. The rest of them are 4.4, 4.5. Yeah.
01:00:54
Speaker
yeah Why are there no one star ratings? 11 people are currently reading it. I don't believe that 105 people want to read it. I also don't believe that.
01:01:05
Speaker
Don't believe that readers also enjoyed 2001, space. hide see No, they didn't. No, they didn't. ah They didn't. They didn't. ah We got one.
01:01:15
Speaker
No, we've got three, two star reviews.
01:01:20
Speaker
Uh,
01:01:23
Speaker
Yeah, this is bad. This is bad. Yeah, it's like, i don't i don't get it. it's And it's somehow it's rated better than Shadows of the Empire ah by, oh, look, Steve Perry. There's our old friend. Yeah. Our friend Steve Perry. Yeah. You click long enough, you're going to get one of the parries. Yeah. Honestly, yeah. when you Writer for hire sheet. You go far enough, you'll find a parry.
01:01:53
Speaker
See, and this is the difference. 517 people are currently reading Shadows of the Empire, and nearly 7,000 of them want to read it. And that's how you know it's got 19,000 ratings versus yeah twenty three No, sorry, 166. No, this is not good. i don't think that it is good.
01:02:15
Speaker
I think it is bad. um The character is reprehensible, which is okay. Maybe the game, the character is also kind of like that in the game and you're just adapting it. But the thing is, there is absolutely nothing...
01:02:36
Speaker
intriguing about his point of view or anything he's doing or the plot. No. So like ah ah ah American Psycho, right? ah You have Patrick Bateman.
01:02:53
Speaker
ah Awful. yeah awful person, human being, still an intriguing character to read, right? great Misogynistic, massive, murdering piece of shit.
01:03:05
Speaker
Racist too. yeah Yet... ah yet, Brad Easton Ellis manages to make it an interesting book to read and an even, I would say, probably even better movie than it is a book. i I'd agree. I'd agree on that. It's one of those rare instances where the movie is just much better. Yeah, the movie, yeah. ah But this is just like...
01:03:35
Speaker
Uh, fucking... It's boring. ah The character is not intriguing in anything that he likes or does. He's a hard-boiled detective in that he cosplays as one. Yeah, and they and they kind of overtly say that.
01:03:54
Speaker
They say that, but it's not like... He's like, ah, he cosplays as one and we're all in on the joke. It's like just acknowledging that he does and there's no ramifications in character or plot for that. Maybe that'll come up later. I don't know. I doubt it given that he's still doing it and the future stories.
01:04:19
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. Um,
01:04:26
Speaker
i I would rate it a a grilled cheese out of 10. Actually, that's too high of a rating. I like grilled cheese. I like grilled cheese. Grilled cheese would go grilled cheese and a cream of tomato soup right about now. I'd rather have that.
01:04:43
Speaker
I'd rather have that i'd rather than this book. Yeah. That'd just like, just like the and you you dip the grilled cheese in the, yeah in the tomato soup. Oh baby. Now you're talking. Now you're talking. Yeah. This is bad.
01:05:01
Speaker
Yeah, I agree. And I think a huge part of it, and I don't know what the motivation is because he wrote both. Um, as most FMV games were slash are by necessity, ah they're very silly. There's a very over the top quality to them. Um,
01:05:22
Speaker
FMV games, especially in the eighties and nineties, I don't even know if they were in the eighties and the nineties. Anyway, earliest FMV games were basically a video game version of a community theater production of a play that somebody in the neighborhood wrote.
01:05:36
Speaker
yeah Um, they're silly. They're over the top. And that's part of the appeal. That's part of what is so enjoyable about them. Um, Watching Tex Murphy under a killing moons long play of the actual game is is kind of enjoyable because it has a lot of the tropes that you come to expect from these kinds of games. It doesn't take itself terribly seriously. Yeah.
01:06:02
Speaker
and And that's not to suggest that this book takes itself all that seriously. It doesn't. But something about the lightheartedness is gone.
01:06:13
Speaker
Yeah. yeah You know, it's like Tex Avery goes from being. Oh, take a shot. Oh, God. Yeah. Oh, fuck. Yep. Yep.
01:06:24
Speaker
Hold on. Yeah. Yeah. he goes from being this kind of silly, poorly acted, uh, cartoon character of a detective.
01:06:39
Speaker
Um, to a creep. Like he's an actual sex pest. Like he is a yeah creepy guy. yeah So it's not great.
01:06:50
Speaker
It's not great. Something was really lost in translation ah because honestly, and I haven't, I haven't played the whole game fully and I haven't read the whole book fully, but so far, ah the book has almost fuck all to do with the game.
01:07:09
Speaker
There are, there are some overlaps, ah but it's, it's a very, like we've seen a lot with these things to be fair. ah There's a lot missing. There's a lot of weird changes. Mexico city for one thing.
01:07:25
Speaker
Yeah. It feels very much like the, the seventh guest novelization. Yes. Yes. If I'm being honest, very appropriate, very appropriate. Um, Yeah.
01:07:36
Speaker
Yeah. Well, Kevin. Yeah. now that Now that we've gotten that out of the way. ah What are you tech savering? Shit. I mean, shit.
01:07:50
Speaker
What are you playing? yeah Oh, playing. All right. So what have I been playing? Yeah. I have been playing Resident Evil er Requiem ah or Re9wiem.
01:08:07
Speaker
If you turn the Q in Requiem into a nine as they do. they Did they do that? ah Yes. like They're really living for that for that ah shtick, aren't they? Wow. They do. they They live for the shtick, and I'm here for it. I beat it um over the weekend.
01:08:28
Speaker
it It is Resident Evil game in all the good ways and all the bad ways. Okay. And i I love it. Let's be clear. I love the game.
01:08:39
Speaker
ah It's probably... I'll say like it's my seventh favorite current Resident Evil game. But when you look at the list, the list is pretty stacked. You know, it's yeah because we're talking about the Resident Evil 2 remake, which I consider to be one of the most perfect games like ever made. Right. Yeah. You got the Resident Evil 4 remake. You got ah you got.
01:09:03
Speaker
ah the resident evil seven or resident evil biohazard ah you got resident evil one remake and then i would probably put this and then village and then under that would be the three remake and then currently unrated just because i know remakes are going to be coming eventually is zero code veronica five and six i'm just kind of like yeah They're still in the old canon, so to speak. So they just kind of I'm leaving those out for now. Yeah, that makes um makes sense. but all the But I like all those games, you know?
01:09:40
Speaker
So it's ah it's it's funny when I say that. It's like, oh, it's like the sixth best one. But i all ah of a bunch of games that are rated like 8, 9 out 10.
01:09:52
Speaker
eight nine out of ten Yeah. it is a It is a very consistently, well, now that now that five and six are in the past, it it has it is come back to being a very consistently ah good series. Yeah.
01:10:08
Speaker
Yeah. Since they've done the two, three, four remakes and Village ah and Biohazard Village and Requiem. Six games. They've released six games since six.
01:10:19
Speaker
ah So, and they've all been pretty solid. um Yeah, so you play ah a big bulk of the game as a new character named Grace Ashcroft. She is the daughter of Alyssa Ashcroft, who was one of the, I think, the main character in the Resident Evil Outbreak games.
01:10:40
Speaker
Um, and, uh, Grace is now an FBI agent and she's been tasked with doing analysis on a crime scene where a dead body was found that seems to be, ah related to, crime scene.
01:10:59
Speaker
they're all raccoon city survivors so people who lived through the raccoon city incident these are these there's like this is like the fifth person that they've found recently that has died um and they've died of like some it seems to be some sort of bio uh weapon type thing um So that's ah it's that's kind of like the hook is is Grace is investigating this and she gets kidnapped ah at the same time that Leon doing his job as ah working in the bioweapons, anti-bioweapons agency for the government.
01:11:38
Speaker
is investigating this stuff and he sees her being kidnapped. And that's kind of how like the whole game kind of introduces Grace and Leon being in it simultaneously. It does. It's like two games in one, whereas Grace's gameplay, all of her scenes are classic Resident Evil.
01:11:59
Speaker
you got no You got no ammo, basically. Healing items are limited. ah You got to puzzle your way out of things. You got to avoid zombies.
01:12:09
Speaker
And Leon on the other side is, is action hero. oh Yeah. um So they you know they're blending that that that sort of thing up on more of a a parallel ah as opposed to like a special mode that you unlock at the end or something. Even there yeah even there their UIs look differently, right?
01:12:30
Speaker
So like Grace, you you can't see her health, right? She just has the little the like heart monitor thing in the pause menu. Leon has like a little heads up display with his health and how much ammo he has left and all that stuff.
01:12:49
Speaker
um So it's like it's it's interesting how they they really have a ah parallel ah thinking in terms of this is this type of gameplay and this is this type of gameplay.
01:13:03
Speaker
um And they do it pretty well. i said on ah in a Discord that it's like they didn't try to like blend the two.
01:13:14
Speaker
It's like two meals, right? You have two meals and it's not like you went to a restaurant where they tried to deconstruct and blend them together. no they just served you two nicely plated meals side by side. Huh.
01:13:28
Speaker
And they're their own thing. Yeah. And you take a little bit of this and a little bit of that. But they're not they're not touching. ah Right. And they kind of complement each other, but it's not. Yeah.
01:13:41
Speaker
yeah So the first half of the game or a little over half of the game is Grace, is primarily Grace. And then the last half or so is Leon, which is very ah reminiscent of like the way Code Veronica was structured.
01:13:56
Speaker
where it was like Claire and then, and then Chris, uh, for the last, like, i don't know, uh, two fifths of the game or something like that.
01:14:08
Speaker
Um, It's really fun. There's only one segment where I was like, that this is kind of a drag. um But, ah you know, spoilers, it all ends up in a secret lab underground.
01:14:21
Speaker
What? It's a Resident Evil game that ends up in a secret lab. that you You're kidding me. You're joshing me. Tell me there's a great big mansion. yeah Well, you say that, but ah there is. um What?
01:14:39
Speaker
It's just been converted into a hospital. Oh, okay. There you go. Oh, that's fresh. Good. There we go. Glad they're making a fresh spin on things. I say this like I'm criticizing. I don't give a shit. That sounds great. That's awesome. That sounds great. That sounds perfect for like Resident Evil. Yeah. Give me the I've been telling of people like um like, yeah, it's it's your it's our zombie little zop soap opera zombie game like there. Somebody was saying, oh, I feel like they're trying to wrap up the story. and be Like there's no wrap up. There's no wrap up the story. This isn't no, there's no end.
01:15:16
Speaker
Let's be honest. Come on. This is yeah. This is days of our lives with with biological weapons. going This is going. They are going to keep making these games long after we are dead. Like this is not going anywhere.
01:15:31
Speaker
Don't worry about them wrapping up the story. There's no end to Resident Evil. There's no wrap. And that's the the like you you can you need stuff like that. You need like I want my Resident Evil.
01:15:44
Speaker
no I want it every two to three years and I want it cheesy. You know, yeah I want it with a mild cheddar.
01:15:57
Speaker
And I want it served to me by someone who has got great legs, but otherwise looks like a Limebaker. That's right. And I want it with my llama cigarettes on the side.
01:16:09
Speaker
umma An extra thick black coffee. ah He asked for the coffee to be extra thick. And I was like, what?
01:16:20
Speaker
You got it. And she just like pours a little envelope of gelatin into it.
01:16:27
Speaker
Anything you say, sweetheart. was like, just going add some protein powder to this, baby. Yeah, you'll be fine. Yeah, so Resident Evil Requiem, I just recommended it on Steam.
01:16:40
Speaker
ah And my review is Requiem has some high highs and low lows if I'm being straight with you, but overall it's tremendous Resident Evil experience. Find someone who loves you like Umbrella likes a secret lab.
01:16:56
Speaker
There you go. Yep. There it is. ah So, Phil, ah knowing that it was like NexFest last week. Yeah, yeah. ah What are you playing? Well, I'm glad you asked. I played several games, a lot of demos, as as you correctly pointed out. I want to start high with the best one that I played, and that's Vampire Crawlers.
01:17:23
Speaker
um this is a dungeon crawler by the makers of Vampire Survivors. It is in the same world. It has a lot of the same elements. It's roguelike. um But again, it goes with the classic dungeon crawl, first person, grid-based kind of thing.
01:17:45
Speaker
Almost enough that I actually am worried that it might... be too esoteric or old, ah old head of a ah genre for it to do as well as it should, because this game is marvelous. It is, it, it, it does everything right in the same way that vampire survivors did, where it's got all the right levels of unlocking stuff, all the right levels of that roguelike feeling of trying a new run, trying new things, evolving your weapons. Um,
01:18:19
Speaker
just in a somewhat different format and it's wonderful. And I, I, I played, I think I played the demo for three hours before it finally kicked me off. us So but I'm, I'm really pumped for it to be released this year. i'm I was really pumped when I found out that it's coming out on switch. Cause that's going, it's going to be my permanent switch game yeah for probably the rest of the year. Yeah.
01:18:46
Speaker
It's excellent. Play the demo. It's so damn good. ah they they They kind of captured lightning in a bottle again. ah and and basically by just not fucking with what works and just, you know, changing certain aspects of it, changing the gameplay loop, changing um a lot of that.
01:19:08
Speaker
ah Just... the gameplay basically. Right, right, right. The aesthetic and the, the, the, it's all there. It's all there. And you'll be, it does a little fan servicey stuff there. And I was delighted. ah It just great, great, great goddamn demo.
01:19:26
Speaker
ah I cannot wait for this game to come out. And I can't wait for it to be four bucks or some goddamn thing. And for me to pump 120 hours into it in the first week. Yep. Yep.
01:19:37
Speaker
Um, From there, I played a game called Final Sentence. This is an interesting one. Final Sentence might be the first ever ah game of its type. It is a Battle Royale.
01:19:56
Speaker
Oh, oh i saw ah I saw a Northern Lion play the demo, a demo for this last year. Oh, like okay. Yeah, I just played it.
01:20:09
Speaker
yeah This is... Nuts. I, ah I really loved it. I thought it, I think it's a clever idea. I think it's a lot of fun. Um, and it's tense in all the right ways and it's simple, which is, which is fantastic.
01:20:27
Speaker
Um, I think the only problem I can think of is I don't know how they're going to get people to keep playing it.
01:20:39
Speaker
um Because it doesn't have the customization and the unlocks and all that stuff, at least not yet, that you could get from...
01:20:51
Speaker
Fortnite or any, you know, PUBG or any other number kind of games, it you can you go up in levels and unlock certain things. But as far as I can tell right now, that's it. It's not really...
01:21:06
Speaker
you As far as I can tell right now, you're not unlocking outfits for your character. Right. Customization. I'm sure they will do something like that. um But that's that's the only thing standing in the way of this being a game that I would play a lot. yeah I like typing games. um And I think this is this is a very good example of taking ah a popular genre, the Battle Royale game, and really giving it a fun spin.
01:21:34
Speaker
right I think it's very clever. I think it's really neat. Yeah, i I remember when I saw him play that, I was like, this is this is, this game might have ah the proverbial sauce Yes. Yeah. it it it it could It could have some serious legs. It really could. um After that, I play the demo for The Dark Rites of Arkham.
01:21:58
Speaker
Kevin, this game's for you. Okay. This is, it's out. It was released at the beginning of the month, February. um It is a classic LucasArts style point and click.
01:22:13
Speaker
Complete with screenshots right now. Yeah. The, the, the pixelated style, the smart ass, uh, uh, uh, dialogue, the puzzles. Um, but it's HP Lovecraft, uh, style stuff.
01:22:28
Speaker
Um, The demo is short, but very good. It gets it gets you right into it. um And honestly, based on the demo, it's a pretty terrific balance of the strange lightheartedness of these styles of games and the very serious you know cosmic horror of a Lovecraftian piece.
01:22:51
Speaker
um it's very good it's very very good the demo is and uh i think 15 bucks uh sounds about right i don't know how long it is let me see if anyone says how long it is um 15 bucks little man but that put that shit in my in my hand uh i'm seeing like a lot of 10s 12 hour play times that sounds about right Oh me, oh me, oh.
01:23:17
Speaker
um ah It's done by postmodern adventures who also did an English haunting and nightmare frames. I'm not familiar with either of these, but I'll have to look into it. Yeah. um Good stuff. They're also the same style.
01:23:34
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. I was playing it the entire time, just sitting there going, oh, Kevin's going to want to play this. This is this is very good. it's cause You know what? it's It's very much the... um the The style is it's LucasArts, but specifically the Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade um style.
01:23:59
Speaker
it's it's it's Yeah, it's not just a good example of that genre. It's a good example of a very specific piece of that genre. yeah It's pretty cool.
01:24:11
Speaker
um I really enjoyed it. I think that's what I'm going to have to come to later. Yeah. I finished Valkyria Chronicles. ah I pumped about 31 hours in that thing.
01:24:25
Speaker
ah Good game. Damn good game. Anyone who likes you know your Shining Forces and you know your anime strategy war games like that, ah it's a terrific game to have on your Switch.
01:24:38
Speaker
You're just dicking around and you can... play a battle here and there. It's, I had a blast. Uh, the second and third ones were only released for the PSP and or, uh, exclusively in Japan. So they're kind of hard to get. Uh, but Valkyria Chronicles four is available and I also have that one. So eventually at some you're just going to, you're just going to skip from one to four.
01:25:01
Speaker
yeah kind of it's i i i got a feeling that i'm not gonna miss much uh like read a wiki of the story and yeah think i'll i was barely paying attention to the story anyway so i'm really not all that worried um and i so just started playing uh sinking city um which that was another one we were talking about getting the ah getting the old backlog down a bit. Right.
01:25:32
Speaker
But it's I wasn't sure what to expect. I got it like dirt cheap. It was like on some kind of like even right now it's literally eight bucks. on yeah steam And I think I got it on on switch for like half of that. I think I got it for less than $5. Right. um And it's got that good kind of double a bugginess and that sort of thing that that premium jank.
01:25:58
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, exactly. um I'm surprised at how much I'm enjoying it. it has a It has a high bar of entry in the sense that there's a lot of shit you got to learn how to do kind of early on. Right. um but when you get there, ah it's it's it's really entertaining and fun. And there's ah a huge cartography kind of aspect of it. You've got a map and you've got to you've just got to mark up the map. You've got to there's a barrier here and there's this here and there's that there.
01:26:30
Speaker
ah And it does a really good job with the Lovecraftian cosmic horror the ah stuff While also admittedly falling into a lot of the traps of Lovecraft in games. There's a lot of, there's not a huge focus on combat, but more than i i thought was necessary for this kind of game. It's a detective game and and it's and the detective shit is great.
01:26:55
Speaker
um But then all of a sudden I'm shooting these random spider monsters and stuff that are like straight out of the thing. And that's like, ah, it's, it weakens it a little bit, but yeah, still not half bad for five bucks. So cool.
01:27:13
Speaker
Yeah. That's been me. That's it. Awesome. Awesome. ah Well, thank you all ah for listening. You know where to find us on social media, Pixlet Pod. We're everywhere on all handles, on all platforms. We're that handle.
01:27:29
Speaker
um And go to our Patreon, like our YouTube, subscribe to our YouTube, comment on our YouTube. Comment on our tax returns.
01:27:40
Speaker
Please. ah Please. We need the comments on your help on the tax return. My comment section on my tax return is looking a little empty this year. It's real bad. I knew it was going to be bad when I had a literal guest book at the bottom of it. I was like, what is this? You know, what is this? 98. think this is bullshit.
01:27:59
Speaker
oh Web ring. the Turns out it was my tax return from 1998. I'm going to jail, Kevin. It's going to be hard to make this show, but I think we'll be able to pull it off.