Transcript
neocharge: What's up everybody and welcome to Shapes of Gaming, the weekly conversational podcast all about video games that's unedited, unfiltered, and unhinged. I'm one of your hosts, Matt Stenson, NeoCharge on PSN, and joining me, as always, my brother in arms for episode number 46 we're on is the Retro Gaming Encyclopedia, Bob Harriman, Leon Lionheart, Lee on PSN.
neocharge: What's up, dude?
Leon Lionheartly: Dude, I am just sitting here staring at this beautifully colored beer right now, and I'm ready to yeah dive into it, dude.
neocharge: i mean
neocharge: Hell yeah, me too. And ah this is a Shapes of Gaming cast first. We have arrived at this podcast with the same exact beer. And thankfully, ah you turned me on to this beer. And we are both drinking Powder Run right now ah from Living the Dream Brewing Company in gorgeous Colorado.
neocharge: ah Speaking of Powder Run, man. The ski resorts are closing early this year, and I'm sad. Keystone is closing April 5th, and i i mean might be able to get up back up to Breck one time one more time, but I'm a little sad.
neocharge: It's been so high here. It was 80 degrees today.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, we broke a record at the high, a springtime record by like 10 degrees.
neocharge: Fucking crazy.
neocharge: Yeah. Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: So we've already got fucking wildfires going on. It's already hot as balls. I'm ready to just move to Alaska and in say, screw it.
neocharge: ne
neocharge: Yep. Yep. I mean, we're coming out of an ice age. You've got the climate change is happening. If if we have something to do with it, who knows? We're not getting into that, but I'm not a fucking scientist. I just play video games, drink beer, and that's what we're going to do here on the cast. How's life, man?
Leon Lionheartly: Not too bad. Other than that, you know, keeping keeping really busy lately. It seems like one day after another after another. ah Meanwhile, trying to play that evening time video game craze, and it's like, well, it's 830.
Leon Lionheartly: Do I have the energy?
neocharge: ah right? Dude, that's a struggle, right? When it's like you're, you're at dinner and yeah I don't know, you might be watching a show or something or on your phone and then it's like, ah, it's 730. Fuck. It's like a 30 minutes pass. Okay. It's like, ah it's fucking eight now.
neocharge: Ah, I only have three hours now. And then it's like nine. It's like, oh, am I, do I even start something if I have only two hour, or a two hour game session? And then you just end up fucking doing scrolling the rest of the night. Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: You know, that I found the gap. I don't doom scroll as much now because if you only have two hours left, I'll bust out the portal and play a couple of rounds of something.
neocharge: Oh, yeah, neither do I. Yeah.
neocharge: Yes. Yes. that's ah It's a good idea to have like a pick-up-and-play game for that reason. and That's why I'm really interested in the portal when OLED comes, because I you know i play my Switch every once in a while, but you know people give...
neocharge: i gamers so much shit. Like, why are you wasting so much time on video games? As they're fucking scrolling TikTok or Instagram or Facebook four hours a night. I'm like, at least I'm working out my brain, man. Did you know gamers, their average mindset? One, it de-ages you like 10 years. And two, you have the reflexes, that of a fighter jet pilot.
neocharge: And your cognitive skills and problem-solving skills and reaction time are all super, uh, enhanced. So
Leon Lionheartly: You know what I heard there? I have the reflexes of a cat and the speed of a mongoose.
neocharge: yeah the speed of of Tom Cruise.
Leon Lionheartly: There's a there's a yeah there's a timely reference for you folks. Fuck yeah.
neocharge: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. but Yeah. ah Gaming's awesome. We love it. I just got off Nino Queen. I actually just ah popped one of the one of the rarest trophies on the game.
neocharge: ah The alchemy trophy, where you have to ah basically alchemize 120 items.
Leon Lionheartly: Fuck yeah.
neocharge: And like the the early ones are easy, but I'll get into that when we talk about what we're playing. Life's been good. Haven't been snowboarding as much. That kind of sucks. Snowboarding is a little like my therapy.
neocharge: Might start building some Legos again. i have some old sets I want to put together and sell at some point. ah but other than that, we are off the heels of a fucking almost five-hour spoiler cast last night.
neocharge: ah That was very fun. We talked all about Resident Evil Requiem, and ah that is live right now. It went live today, meaning Thursday, because we're recording on Thursday evening. But it's live for you all now ah and this this Friday. so Surprise, you have two podcasts to listen to, one five-hour. If you played Requiem, go listen to it. It's awesome.
neocharge: ah We have some fun on it, and there's some good laughs, some jokes. And if if it's too long, to just just digest it throughout the week or whatever. And yeah. yeah So Requiem, incredible game, and we broke it open. We talked all about it, went like pretty much scene by scene, and we had three special guests, Alex Meese, Caleb Schiff, and Bo Ben. ah So we had a ton of fun, but ah we also just recorded for five hours, so we're going to do a quick one and done tonight, an in and out, as we like to say.
Leon Lionheartly: if you will
neocharge: Yeah, little in and out. so yeah, we're quick done Let's get into it, man. What we got on the news. Do we have any housekeeping? Not really. Join our Discord if you're not part of it.
Leon Lionheartly: and yeah but go join the community you'll find us at gypsygaming.com go check it out you'll see all of us there
neocharge: We have an awesome community. Yeah.
neocharge: Boom. And yeah, subscribe to the podcast. It's all free. We're not going to ask you for any money. Netflix just rose their prices and all. Everyone's rising their prices. We got free content coming at you.
neocharge: Completely free. And we're on the Discord. You can talk to us directly. You hear us on the podcast. You're like, oh, these guys seem cool. Let me reach out to them. Or, oh, these guys seem like assholes. I got something to say to them. Reach reach us reach out to us on the Discord. We're there and we respond. We're active in the community. So we got like 60 discord members now it's it's growing uh we're having fun over there so yeah uh thanks everyone for listening uh this has been episode 40 no i'm kidding
Leon Lionheartly: You got to go for a record of like world's shortest podcasts or something at one point.
neocharge: it
Leon Lionheartly: That's a joke. Maybe in April Fool's.
neocharge: one oh yeah that would be fun dude i'm let's do it let's fucking do it yeah i wonder what the world's shortest it's got to be like a second or something like
Leon Lionheartly: if
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, yeah.
neocharge: Thanks. Boom. Done. Or something. I don't know. Yeah, we'll look into that. Fun. we We like having fun here. Other than that, we've got a lot of news this week. We had an Xbox event today in the morning, and we're going to talk all about it.
neocharge: What do we got on the news, Bob?
Leon Lionheartly: Well, we've got one big event. We'll touch that last. gig who ah
neocharge: Mmm.
Leon Lionheartly: Save that one for later.
neocharge: Mmm.
Leon Lionheartly: um As you know, the big stuff that came out today.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: um But we had a couple of smaller items ah touch in. a little bit of rick ripple effects. Holy crap, I can't speak.
neocharge: The beer's hitting already, huh?
Leon Lionheartly: Oh, it's exhaustion and life is like...
neocharge: what We're both running on a lack of sleep. do Shit, when I posted the spoiler cast, I misspelled Requiem, and I was like, whoopsie.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah oh
neocharge: So yeah, we're running we're running on a lack of sleep, I'd say, because ah yeah, that was a long-ass podcast. And one of the people, we won't dox him here, but one of the people was 45 minutes late.
Leon Lionheartly: We'll let you take a guess who that is.
neocharge: We'll let you take, you'll you'll find out on the spoiler cast. So if you want to see who's not prompt, go listen to the spoiler cast. It's funny. We give them a lot of shit too. Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: Oh, all kinds of crap. be Beyond time, folks.
neocharge: Yes.
Leon Lionheartly: Anyways. ah Yeah, no, let's ah start off with ah this over here. um I found this from ah Insider Gaming, who is reporting from Epic's website directly.
Leon Lionheartly: Epic Games, um as you know, of the creators, makers, owners, and giant with Fortnite. um has announced they are laying off a thousand people at their organization um according to the news post uh from their website um tim sweeney the ceo said i'm sorry we're here again the downturn of fortnite engagement that started in 2025 means we're spending significantly more than we're making and we have to make major cuts to keep the company funded This layoff together with over $500 million of identified cost savings in contracting, marketing, and closing soon open roles puts us into a more stable place, end quote.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: So Fortnite, maybe on the dying or on the tail end of its live service map?
neocharge: Hmm. Good. But I don't like people losing jobs. And dude, they're doing, they have so many players. They've been so successful. They sell $20 skins. These companies, man, they just keep getting greedy and greedy and greedy. And people are becoming more and more expendable. Lives are getting ruined. And,
neocharge: basically people are just becoming profit margins. I mean, they always have been, but it's so glaringly obvious now in the gaming industry. Like every fucking news, every podcast, we have something about, oh, people are getting laid off. A thousand people? That's a lot, man.
neocharge: And... like They helped create this juggernaut, Fortnite. It's cancer on the industry, in my opinion, but it's still a big popular game ah that you know they're just losing their jobs over when they created this amazing... like I mean, they're they're making a shitload of money, so it's a successful title.
neocharge: And then they're like, oh well... ah People are falling off. No shit. you're I mean, live service games don't last forever. And even the biggest one, I'd say, Fortnite, Apex Legends, Minecraft, Fortnite is feeling the effects.
neocharge: Good. Not good that people are losing their jobs. that's not That's not good. But Epic has the option to keep these people and, you know, i just eat some...
neocharge: some loss, right? So I'm, I'm glad that people are getting off Fortnite, honestly, but I don't like that it has resulted in people losing their jobs because I played Fortnite.
neocharge: I played Fortnite battle Royale when it first released, I got second place and then I played again and I was like, this is boring. This is repetitive. And I don't like, I got second place like twice and I was like, not, ah not a fan.
neocharge: So I don't like this this model. I don't like free-to-play stuff in the predatory market of it. And $22 skins now. They're $22 skins. So, yeah, they rose it.
Leon Lionheartly: oh Really?
neocharge: They rose their prices. So, with I think we... Did we ah report on that?
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, we discussed the rising. i think we did, but I didn't realize that skin prices themselves also went up.
neocharge: Yeah.
neocharge: Well, the skin prices you buy with V-Bucks, and the V-Bucks price went up, I think, 10%.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Oh,
neocharge: So that means skin prices go up 10%, which is 22 bucks.
Leon Lionheartly: So they're doing like Nintendo used to do, which pissed me off. You couldn't buy an exact amount for the item. You bought a currency that came in certain chunks.
neocharge: No.
Leon Lionheartly: And if you had extra leftover, sucks to suck.
neocharge: Yes, yes.
Leon Lionheartly: I fucking hate that.
neocharge: Yeah, so they rose the price on their digital currency, and on the heels of that, they lay off people? What the fuck? like I never liked Fortnite because there's no there's no real progression other than cosmetic
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, that's fair.
neocharge: Right? There's no, like... I like a game like... i don't know, the game playing, Ni No Kuni. You gain a level and you gain power and you gain... i Like... You gain levels.
neocharge: And you hit enemies harder.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: In Fortnite, it's all just a... like a flat surface. Everyone is the same level. Everyone has, and you have to do that with a battle Royale, but then when you're in the game, you gain the stuff, but after you, you gain all of the levels and power or gear, it goes, it all goes away.
neocharge: And the only thing you keep throughout all the matches are cosmetic. I was just like, that's not, that's dumb. Not a fan.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, that is kind of weird. And then the new stuff, they I do know because it's been about a year since I last checked in, but the new stuff they add is usually ah temporary. And then it ends up doing this crossover thing where like they got Goku and it's like, oh I'll pick up a Kamehameha wave.
neocharge: All
Leon Lionheartly: And then that... event season is done and you never see the Kamehameha wave or whatever, right? um And they' they've been doing that.
neocharge: bre
Leon Lionheartly: and I've been noticing there, Tim. You guys are not only not only did you increase the currency costs because of quote-unquote inflation, you also decided to go ahead and sue Apple to try to ah basically nudge them out of their 30% cut for...
Leon Lionheartly: purchases on their store and and then you go ahead and you start doing the classic oh let's cross over with everybody you know next it's going to be bluey uh in in the fortnight bus or whatever um yeah you're asking for you're you're like trying to get more money and then you're cutting jobs it doesn't make sense i'm i feel really bad for these people and uh you know what maybe this is what arc raiders and marathon are here for is to pick those players up
neocharge: Yeah. Right.
Leon Lionheartly: and and really keep the live service community going. Because I'm not a live service guy proportion most for the most part, but we have to service those players in some shape or form.
neocharge: It's true. Yeah. And ah I hope so. I hope so. Like, the they are disrupting the industry. Marathon, Ark Raiders. Yeah.
neocharge: Get them in there. Marathon's very heavy on story. Reviews are coming out for ah from reputable sources. And it's getting like nines and and eights and nines. Like, And the score now is on 80 on OpenCritic. So, yeah, all of these games, there's there's a time economy, right?
neocharge: And all of these games are in our competing in the same time economy. okay Netflix is competing in the time economy. Everything's competing in the time economy. And...
neocharge: you You got to realize if you have a game that doesn't end, I play games like I would read books. I read the fucking book.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: I try and read the whole book and complete it. And then I close it and and and I reflect on it and I talk to my friends about it and I put it back on the shelf and I go to the next fucking book.
Leon Lionheartly: that's That's fair. i And you know what? Sometimes I agree with you almost wholeheartedly, um but we all have our guilty pleasure stuff. you know the Whether it's music or movies or TV or whatever, we have our guilty pleasure.
neocharge: Sure.
Leon Lionheartly: go Everybody knows my guilty pleasure is I've been playing league for fucking 12 years, right?
neocharge: yep
Leon Lionheartly: But I don't, I pay, played 200 hours last year compared to the 10,000 or 12,000 hours I put on my PlayStation 5.
neocharge: Right. yeah
Leon Lionheartly: It's a guilty pleasure. You go to it every now and then. But you think of people that play live service games and they put as much time into a live service game or more as we do on our PlayStation 5 alone.
Leon Lionheartly: And that's for one game.
neocharge: right
Leon Lionheartly: um That sucks the oxygen out of the rest of the industry.
neocharge: Yep. Yeah. And we're kind of a minority now because a lot of people play these live service games. they're very popular. I'm not saying Fortnite's a bad game. In fact, I said the opposite. I said it's a great success ah story, right? They're making a lot of money and there's a lot of players and they have a huge player count. Not my thing.
neocharge: I've never liked Fortnite. And when people start disliking Fortnite, I disliked Fortnite before it was cool. But I...
Leon Lionheartly: yeah i'm going to get that as a bumper sticker for you won't die ah sometime.
neocharge: I... Yeah, exactly. disliked Fortnite before. It was cool to dislike Fortnite. ah Yeah, it sucks, man These corporations are just getting greedy.
neocharge: And I just... they rose their prices and they're laying off people like, and there's probably ai involved or Ram costs or something. I don't know industry, but Hey, we're still getting good games. We got plenty of games to play. it really sucks that these people are losing their jobs though. So I wish them well, everyone that lost their job and was affected by this.
neocharge: I wish them well. And I hope they land on their feet. hope they're They were prepared for this, and I hope they find another good gig in the industry. ah Fuck I can't drop my mic because it's on an arm, but I would.
Leon Lionheartly: ah he dead And then he mic drops it. um How about this?
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah I know you would have. i saw it i Visually, I saw it in my head. Well, how about some good news? we yeah let's Let's flip it over a little bit for you.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: This one's actually a win a win for the gamers. um I picked this up through mp First here. um And they are reporting um that...
neocharge: Thank
Leon Lionheartly: a company um via being reported via D-listed games, ah the company being Nostra Games, um based out of Cyprus, had around 700 games on the PlayStation PSN. Well, we can't call it the PSN soon, but the PlayStation Store. um And they've all been removed, including several hundred more. So about 1,000 games of what you would call shovelware have finally been removed from the PlayStation Store. And Sony, more importantly, didn't give a reason.
neocharge: That's awesome. Do you know what I hate more than Fortnite?
neocharge: but Fucking shovelware. Oh my God. These games. So you can get a platinum in like 30 seconds. You literally launch the game. You hit the X button a couple times and you get the platinum.
neocharge: that You're literally buying platinums. So anytime I go on PSN and I find someone or I don't know, I see ah someone's trophy count or level, that doesn't mean shit.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: i go I go through and I'm like, all right, how many bullshit platinums you got? there are i I have two terms for these. we We are trophy hunters, right? We play the games we love. If we love the game enough, we want to play a little bit more of the meta game and go for the trophies, get the platinum, right?
neocharge: We are trophy hunters. These people are platinum poachers.
Leon Lionheartly: oh Oh, I like that.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: That's a good... Yeah, they're they're just farming it out. You're right. these Some of these games are just... in it takes that There's a metagame to to Platinum Trophies.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: it's it's it's you you You kind of flex on your friends. You say, hey, here I am um and all Granted, we understand not all Platinum Trophies are the same. I got ball pit in...
Leon Lionheartly: 40 hours. But 40 hours compared to 4 minutes, 4 seconds.
neocharge: Right.
Leon Lionheartly: um We're talking games literally where you purchase it for like $2 or $1 and then you open up the app and they're like, cool, here's a platinum trophy.
neocharge: Yeah.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: You're basically paying to get those trophies, which throws off the metagame.
neocharge: Exactly. You're paying for the thing you should have earned. so ah And this is usually made with AI. And sometimes they are rip-off games of actual other games.
neocharge: And it's deceiving to the consumer.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: So good on PlayStation. They used to have a big stance of, oh, no, everyone's welcome in the PSN. And we were getting slop after slop after slop. And I love to see this because it's it's really, it's just like a printing press, a copying machine, right? It's like jumping sushi, jumping taco. Like these games are like 99 cents. You literally buy them and to play it, you you hit X and the whatever it is, donut, taco, some sort of food item jumps.
neocharge: And, oh, you jump five times trophy, ten times trophy. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. You'll get the plat in like four minutes doing nothing. My name is Mayo. All kinds of shit out there. This is called Shovelware on PSN. I'm still calling PSN until PlayStation tells me otherwise. ah So I'm really happy to see this.
neocharge: i If you have these Platinums, I mean, why? I just don't understand it. Like if you're if you're pumping the number, i okay. But hey, man. quality over quantity.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, I'd even say farther is if you if you are on that train, I'd feel free to reach out. I'm more than happy to have a conversation because I'm curious. I'm a curious creature by nature.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: um I want to know some of the dirty details, the real underbelly of that stuff. ah
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: It's not for me, and I really do think it kind of messes with us normal people, if you will.
neocharge: It does. It does.
Leon Lionheartly: I don't want to say normal, but ah but yeah, definitely reach out.
neocharge: Ha ha!
Leon Lionheartly: I'm always happy to have a conversation about that. But yeah, I have one Shuffleware trophy, Matt.
neocharge: Okay.
Leon Lionheartly: And it's not that I purposely was...
neocharge: What is...
Leon Lionheartly: I don't even remember the name of the game. It's not I was purposely going for it. This was in the early era of PS4. So like right as things were getting ramped up and I was farting around on the PSN and I saw a game for like four bucks and it was it was specifically titled as an idle game.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Those are different because idle games take time. You literally launch for an app, you check in, you make some changes and then you go back, do whatever you do and you can come back.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: So it was going to be a long-term game.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: I played for like an hour, Got to the end and got a platinum and I was so pissed. I was like, I felt ripped off. I only paid like four bucks, but I got an hour's worth of entertainment and a trophy that I was like, that's not platinum worthy.
neocharge: Dang, yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: I was angry.
neocharge: Wow. Yeah. um I don't have any. i These have been around for a while. They started coming around like, I don't know, 15 years ago or something.
neocharge: They started really digging into the trophy metagame. ah But that wasn't your intent. You weren't like, ooh, this ah game here is super cheap. I could just get the platinum and I can have one more platinum in my collection.
neocharge: So it's all right. That you didn't know.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, but but to make it even worse, but the point is, is you're right, but you had to go looking for those games back then.
neocharge: And.
Leon Lionheartly: Now they flooded the PlayStation storefront so much that I can't trust the PlayStation Network ah homepage because it's either the most top most popular games in the country, which I don't play, sports, wrestling, things like ah but shooters, things like that, um competitive.
neocharge: Yeah.
neocharge: Yep. I'm
neocharge: all in gun.
Leon Lionheartly: to Yeah.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah. Ball and gun games, right? Or it's a bunch of shovelware stuff that I don't care about. And then the things I really want get filtered out. And that kind of sucks.
neocharge: Yeah, and it's ah masking the the true art, the the games that take you know some three to five years, have a development team team on them, and like our indie titles or something, and they'll get buried. like There's like a thousand games coming out every fucking week or some shit like that. so And it's just...
neocharge: there for the intent of paying to get a platinum. it's not It's not a story. It's not art. It's just not good. and i'm And I heard ah PSN Profiles has actually taken a stance against this as well.
neocharge: And they are not... Because PSN Profiles, you have like leaderboards and you have stat trackers, stuff like that. It basically breaks down the trophy hunting metagame to a very precise ah degree.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: So you can see like, oh, you this is the time you usually pop trophies in the day, or this is the day you usually game, or this is how many ah like platinums you have compared to how many games you've played and like all kinds of ranks and shit. But they are starting to excerpt these shovelware titles. So people that are on the leaderboards that are just getting these bullshit platinum trophies from these stupid 99 cent games, they're not going to matter anymore.
neocharge: So I think that's going to help with getting rid of these titles. Because if it doesn't matter in a... like if you're if If you're buying these games, you care about trophies.
neocharge: And if if they don't count on PSN Profile, you're usually on PSN Profiles if you care about trophies, if you care about the metagame, and if you care about your stats. And if they don't count, what's the point of buying them now?
neocharge: Fuck yes. I'm all for this.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: I hope p PlayStation cracks down as much as they can. ah This is a greedy, sloppy cash grab. And i i don't doubt that some of these games haven't even been touched by human hands and they're just getting um printed out by an AI somewhere.
neocharge: Like, So, yeah, good on them. Get these out of there. we There's so much great art, so many good games that many people take their time on and want to share, and they're getting buried by this bullshit.
Leon Lionheartly: They're getting absolutely covered, man.
neocharge: So, yeah. So, this is amazing news. And, yeah, if you if you do have any of the... ah The shovelware platinums, yeah, we' I'd like to talk to you. like to see where your head's at. Like, why? are you Are you just pumping that number next to your platinum trophy? Because, I mean, for me, like, I'll go into your list, and I'll be like, oh, yeah, none of these matter.
neocharge: okay
Leon Lionheartly: Well, then we'll see. And i yeah I would have so many questions because I i like i want to understand the the logic behind it.
neocharge: Right.
Leon Lionheartly: Like you're putting the money towards this. Like I'm a genuine curious creature. I vehemently disagree with the you doing that.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: But if you do, come talk to me. I'm a curious guy.
neocharge: Yeah, me too. I want to know, like, is it just for the number? It's certainly not for the love the game. So why? ah so why ah So yeah, hopefully this from PlayStation and PSN profiles reduces that behavior and gets and and just makes these devs not do that anymore. Just get them get them out of there. it's not It's not helping anyone except the people that are trying to pump their numbers.
neocharge: And it's not a good thing for gaming because it's burying good games that people worked hard on. So great news.
Leon Lionheartly: huh
neocharge: Love it.
Leon Lionheartly: Yep. um All right. Well, hey, unfortunately there, Matt, I do have to give us ah some bad news, my friend.
neocharge: That's okay.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah. um This one, yeah, it's back and forth.
neocharge: Back and forth.
Leon Lionheartly: We're coming from over at Video Games Chronicle, who is reporting per reset era um over there, that Dark Outlaw Games, ah the purchased and founded game studio ah from ah Jason Blundell, one of the most notoriously from Call of Duty Zombies, um is shutting down after being purchased in 2022.
neocharge: Oh,
neocharge: oh yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: The straight up studio closure, no going back. um Have a nice day. ah And as you know, Matt, this is another studio that Sony purchased, funneled money into them for a few years, and is now canceling and closing closing the studio specifically without ever actually releasing a game under the PlayStation banner.
neocharge: Yeah. Yeah. um Was it established under PlayStation Dark Outlaw or was it established and then PlayStation bought it?
Leon Lionheartly: and it was ah It was, I believe, i'll to I'll double check, but I'm pretty sure it was ah established under PlayStation because Blundell had another studio that was being ah funded and they they were not owned by Sony.
Leon Lionheartly: That got shut down and that project was canceled and then he came over to Sony and spun up Dark Outlaw.
neocharge: Yeah.
neocharge: So.
neocharge: yeah they Yeah, so I've never even seen a game from Dark Outlaw. I don't think they've released anything. Bluepoint released some stuff before Sony bought them, but like I don't even think Dark...
Leon Lionheartly: Exactly.
neocharge: I don't recall Dark Outlaw releasing anything, so wow. ah More people losing their jobs. More studios getting shut down. What the fuck?
neocharge: But Treyarch. Treyarch did Call Duty, right?
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah. Oh, and while you're looking at that, this does include, and I forgot to mention it, it kind of got overshadowed by the bigger part of the studio itself. um It includes 50 people, which also includes PlayStation's mobile development arm.
Leon Lionheartly: So their mobile game initiative ah took a hit.
neocharge: oh
Leon Lionheartly: Not a complete closure, but a shutdown from my understanding, but they got trimmed down very heavily.
neocharge: From a industry infrastructure perspective. Good. From a people losing jobs perspective. Unfortunate. So, ah yeah, no, we don't need mobile games. we don't We don't need mobile games. Although there was a game coming out that is specifically mobile. Oh, yeah. Pokemon Champions.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: was excited for that one. And it's a fucking basically live service pay subscription based mobile game that's on Switch as well. was like, oh, well, I'm not interested it in it in it anymore.
neocharge: But yeah, Dark Outlaw. I remember when they, I think they established this studio and then didn't do anything with them. And they haven't released shit. So...
neocharge: ah Man, who's who's next? I mean, Media Molecule, Bend if they don't bring out anything. um
Leon Lionheartly: um um fucking what's her name Haven Haven
neocharge: Firewalk? or Not Firewalk, Fire Sprite? Haven. Yeah, Haven.
neocharge: Man, what is ah what is that multiplayer game they're making?
Leon Lionheartly: ah would ah Gummies the gummy bears no that's Bungie I know we reported on it what was that
neocharge: No, that's Bungie. Yeah. What is it? Yeah. It was like had to do with money. We'll look that up. Haven Studio. Haven.
Leon Lionheartly: But anyway, so while you look at that, um mobile games are a good thing.
neocharge: a Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: You just got to remember to keep your monetization kind of down ah and not be aggressive.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: Like I have Bellatra on my phone for when I'm, you know, eating lunch at work or something. ah And I have no problem.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: I paid them 10 bucks. I know what I got. I got a full game ah for a good price. And it's a time killer.
neocharge: Yeah.
neocharge: Yeah, I'm just not into them. Fair games.
Leon Lionheartly: Fair games. That's it. Yes.
neocharge: Fair games.
Leon Lionheartly: Yes.
neocharge: We saw like a CG trailer three years ago or something. That game's DOA. That game is toast. i think I think Haven may be next, honestly.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, I think that's the next one, dude.
neocharge: like Yeah, because...
Leon Lionheartly: This is a pullback from the initiative.
neocharge: Good. I'm not, I'm PlayStation doesn't need, they have Bungie now. They, they were going to release like five or six live service games and see if one stuck. They literally said that because you can't have multiple live service games running at the, like you they cannibalize each other. Right? So good.
neocharge: Focus on your, what you're good at single player or is maybe even co-op narrative heavy, i triple marquee titles wolverine ceros interstellar intergalactic stuff like that you you were always good at that ps4 you excelled on that we got so many new ip give us some new ip from some of your uh top tier studios just maybe have one or two you got to have a one or two live service uh you know games as a service you got marathon you
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: um I don't know. you Man, they could have made a Twisted Metal like Destruction All-Stars. Instead of Destruction All-Stars, they could have made the Twisted Metal game that we all wanted.
neocharge: Think of a Twisted Metal Battle Royale. It just makes sense.
Leon Lionheartly: Oh, I would love that, dude.
neocharge: Me too.
Leon Lionheartly: imagine
neocharge: I would play it.
Leon Lionheartly: ah i mean And you can't tell me you couldn't do it with cars because fucking Rocket League is one of the biggest hits ah in the last couple of 10 years or whatever, right?
neocharge: Exactly.
neocharge: Right. Yeah. Yeah. I just, I don't like the games as a service mom, i'm not into it. Destiny released like a three player co-op, uh, somewhat live service game, but then they started really getting into the, like almost a subscription model.
neocharge: Uh, But yeah, PlayStation is so good at what they do, making narrative-driven, story-heavy titles. just Just focus on that. um Have one or two live service stuff. Don't go all in on live service because this is what happens.
neocharge: you You release Concord and then you fucking pull it like two weeks later.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: And you you canceled a God of War live service game. Thank God. Last of Us live service game that probably could have been good. And you kind of just started chasing the trend and chasing, honestly, the money.
neocharge: And it bit you in the ass. And you forgot your identity a little bit. We still got amazing games throughout that experimentation, if you will.
neocharge: Let's get back on track. let's Let's revert the focus back to what you're really good at. And that's like make four games a year from your first party studios that are just banger, amazing, 90 plus Metacritic, you know, Last of Us, Spider-Man, stuff like that.
Leon Lionheartly: Yep.
neocharge: like Focus on that. Just git stop putting all your eggs in this live service basket. You're you're failing. Marathon's a success. And keep that. Awesome.
neocharge: You acquired Bungie. Hopefully you get an ah ROI from that $3 billion dollar ah purchase. And let's let's get back on track and focus on maybe make a new IP.
neocharge: you know like We got so many new IPs from PS4, Horizon, Ghost, Like Death Stranding, second party, but Bloodborne.
Leon Lionheartly: Oh, dude.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: you Absolutely. you got You've got those. And that's what they're there for. Sony went too far. like Go for live service, but do it their third party. I know it sucks because that rug can be pulled out from underneath you at any time.
Leon Lionheartly: But Helldivers 2 is a fucking smash success.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: another Yes. Amazing. Amazing. And they kind of flubbed that a little bit with the PSN stuff. And an arrow head arrowhead yeah Arrowhead was like, Helldivers 3 isn't going to be through you guys.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: So exclusive at least.
Leon Lionheartly: What... what
neocharge: It'll be on PS5. But yeah, you have so many third party. You're you're making enough money, man. just Just keep it tight. Stop getting greedy.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, go back to go back to those parties like ah like you did with Arrowhead and be like, look, you own it or or whatever deal you got to do. And let the people that make live service, like that's what they're designed to do as an organization.
Leon Lionheartly: Just be like, yeah, go ahead.
neocharge: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: Stop trying to mill up a team from the scraps of people ah who made games, quite frankly. Some of them, it's been a while, 10 years, especially with development cycles, 10, 15 years,
neocharge: he
Leon Lionheartly: Let the new guys, let the new blood cook it. And then say, hey, just like the same way they got first party. Hey, you pitched us a game. We're going to help fund it. And then in return, later down the line, after you build that relationship, maybe you come on board as part of the PlayStation family. And then that gives you the umbrella.
neocharge: Exactly. They built relationships first and then bought. They did that that with Insomniac. And look how that worked out for them.
Leon Lionheartly: Hmm?
neocharge: Insomniac is one of their best, if not the best developer. Bright Naughty Dog, Sandy Santa Monica, Insomniac. ah And Insomniac's been making them banger titles.
neocharge: And that was their philosophy. Like when Xbox was just buying up studios left and right, how's that working out for them now?
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: PlayStation was like, no, we like to build the relationship. We like to work with the team for, you know, at least five, 10 years and then see if they're a good fit for the company. And then now they're just like, Oh, live service. So, uh,
neocharge: I think there was a change up in leadership. And this is what we're seeing. We're actually seeing the changes because when leadership changes, like Jim Ryan leaving, you don't really see it until about like six months to a year later.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: Well, we're there. And ah looks like he was trying to push all this live service stuff. Didn't work. Maybe Herman Hulse was part of it too. But now we're starting to see PlayStation maybe get back on the rails of what made them great. Know your fucking roots.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, but come on. Jim Ryan's been around long enough. at I mean, Herman Hulse has been around ah long enough at this point. like It takes a while to turn a company around, but after all, you see still have to do the fucking job, and there's no excuse to go this along with him at the helm and still be hitting fucking icebergs with the Titanic.
neocharge: the
neocharge: that's true that's true I wonder what the Horizon Hunters gatherers is I wonder how that's coming along we'll see
Leon Lionheartly: Oh. Hmm. Hmm. um And I'll tell you, Sony, I tell you, Sony, I would upgrade my premium membership if you went back to a constant, instead of doing games as a service, give me multiplayer attached to a game because I will pay for a tier or a subscription to do that.
neocharge: yeah Hey,
Leon Lionheartly: And so would a lot of other people. And then eventually the game kind of fizzles out. But by the time that community dies out, you've got the next one already in line because your development is five years, give or take for the next game.
neocharge: and they did that with Ghost.
Leon Lionheartly: Uh,
neocharge: And separate the fucking trophies. If you don't, I will find you.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah
neocharge: No. They did that with Ghost. Ghost has multiplayer now, and it has co-op, and I don't know if it's not PvP, but it's co-op, multiplayer, online, and a little separate trophy list, which list which is nice, because I got the... it's God, dude, the only reason i don't have a black flag, Assassin's Creed black flag, one of my favorite games of all time, only reason i don't have that platinum is because of the multiplayer trophies associated with the main list.
Leon Lionheartly: oh oh that sucks dude wait
neocharge: Yep. Yeah, and they're red ridiculous multiplayer trophies. Like another 40 hours of multiplayer to get one bronze. Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: what remind ah Remind me again, which one is this?
neocharge: Assassin's Creed 4 Black Flag. Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: Oh, for Black Flag specifically. Yep, yep.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: No, I see it because I'm looking at my trophy list and you can see it's not like 55% because I was like, I saw the the the ah the multiplayer and went, exit here, please.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: Yep.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: Yep. Uncharted, I think, did the same thing. Uncharted 3? 4. Uncharted 4 did some multiplayer trophies that I think I got, but they were not bad. Maybe an extra five hours of multiplayer, which is fine. But yeah, ah Dark Outlaw Games.
neocharge: Sorry. um That sucks that people lost their jobs, but you know.
Leon Lionheartly: See you on the next one.
neocharge: ah PlayStation sounds like they're tightening stuff up there. They got rid of a really good developer they shouldn't have, Bluepoint. and
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: But yeah, hate when studios close and people lose their jobs. But yeah, PlayStation looks like they're kind of tightening their focus on what they did best before. Like, man, PlayStation 4, they knocked it out of the park, dude.
neocharge: It's still... one of my favorite generations. I think they had more games and better games. I mean, PS5 is a pinnacle of technological advancement, and we got some banger titles. still more coming out this year. We just had an amazing title that flexed the PS5 Pro.
neocharge: ah But there's just, there's something about those new IPs that hit different. And PS4 holds a special place in my heart. So I'd love to see them i change course from this stupid games as a service push and 10 online gas games, free to play bullshit, and just come back to where you were.
neocharge: Narrative driven, single player, story heavy, maybe even co-op games.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: And top tier, like six months to fucking polish. And so, yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah I agree, man.
neocharge: More good news.
Leon Lionheartly: We're good. ah Well, I'll give you some good news. um
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: How about that? As we move on to our final object ah for this evening, yeah here's what I was thinking. I provided you a list. It's in the the chat for us. um I was thinking, okay, I'll set this up and kick it over to you.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: Give me what which your highlights are, a couple of highlight games, and then we can discuss those if i if I have it same on my list. And then just kind of like, all right, after that, I'll give you a couple of things because I'm pretty sure there's a couple of, there's like one game that It's not you, but it is me.
Leon Lionheartly: ah And then we'll kind of finish it out from there and wrap it up that way.
neocharge: Yeah.
neocharge: Yeah, definitely. ah I thought overall the show was pretty mid. It wasn't the Xbox.
Leon Lionheartly: Which show? i didn't I didn't say it was the Xbox yet. I didn't say anything.
neocharge: What?
Leon Lionheartly: I was just like, I sent you the list. I'll tell you when we cover it. And then we never actually said what event it was.
neocharge: Oh, yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: ah
neocharge: What are we talking about right now?
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, yeah. ah The Xbox developer direct that happened.
neocharge: no
Leon Lionheartly: and
neocharge: ah so Yes. direct or Xbox partner showcase.
Leon Lionheartly: partner showcase see fuck even i screwed it up god damn it but i but i'm running on like three hours of sleep folks i apologize profusely
neocharge: Oh, running out like three hours sleep.
neocharge: So the Xbox Partner Showcase aired today, 11 a.m. Mountain Time. And I like the format of this. It was just game announcement game announcement after game announcement. Then like a recap after about five titles. But... ah there was really nothing of note except two games that stood out to me and one that's already been announced. So ah let's talk about the one that's already been announced.
neocharge: Holy shit. And and know I'm excited. An Xbox event announced the PS5 release date of Hades 2.
Leon Lionheartly: It
neocharge: So holy shit, we're finally getting Hades 2. But goddammit, it releases like five days before Pragmata. Or three days before Pragmata.
Leon Lionheartly: ah Yeah, three days before Pragmata, and then there's something else right in between. um if i let You know what, folks? Let me tell you put it to you like this. MousePI for hire is on the 16th. Pragmata is the 17th.
Leon Lionheartly: ah And then, ah of course, we've got Hades 2 coming right there on the 13th as well. um Never mind, you know, Saros at the end of the month.
neocharge: I'm super excited for Saros. I can't wait. Playing at day one. i'll I'll probably finish Pragmata's story. And then, i don't know, depending on the trophy list, I'll try and platinum it if I like it. I think I'll love it. ah But then, like, Saros, I'm going to try and get everything done before Saros because I'm very excited for Saros. But here's the thing.
neocharge: Here's the thing.
Leon Lionheartly: Here's the thing.
neocharge: I might let Saros breathe a little bit because my returnal experience was not great because of a broken trophy. And it broke me out of the platinum and... It was bad.
neocharge: um But yeah, Hades 2 finally got a multi-platform release date. It was a timed exclusive for Switch 2. And this is about the six-month mark that we talked about. were like, I think it's a six-month exclusivity deal.
neocharge: Yep. Hades 2 coming April 14th this year. ah I am putting everything. I think I'm putting everything down for this game. I am super excited. I've been I almost even got it on Switch 2, but I was like, nope, it'll it's coming to the PS5.
Leon Lionheartly: Can I help you?
neocharge: I will play it on PS5 when it comes. And finally, it's coming announced April 14th. I'd say that's my announcement of the show. So and the ah you're excited for Hades, too. I know we played Hades here. We both love Hades and we've both been waiting for this game, right?
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, this has been a game that I was hoping it wouldn't drop in April because of the other IP around it. But we said six months, and this is almost six months to the date.
neocharge: Yup.
Leon Lionheartly: ah So fuck my life.
neocharge: Yup. That's funny. I know.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah
neocharge: That's funny. They're like, ah we're not selling enough on Switch 2 for the love of God. Release it on all the other platforms. Okay. that day we The day exclusivity is up. We're going to release it.
neocharge: And that's what happened. so
Leon Lionheartly: I wonder how Yacht Club is looking right now because you know they were probably eyeballing next month ah as a release date.
neocharge: Right?
Leon Lionheartly: So for ah Mina, of course, but dude, i it's going to be tough, but I'm going to have to multi-game.
neocharge: Man.
neocharge: Yeah, no, I won't. I might. I can do two max, and that's about it.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah That's what I'm saying.
neocharge: But...
Leon Lionheartly: i'm going to have to drop the live service stuff. for like Marathon is going to have to be put down for a while.
neocharge: Yep.
Leon Lionheartly: Everything else, because Hades 2 just royally screwed Spring's schedule.
neocharge: Yes. Yeah. April's fucked. I think we'll have podcast around like April being fucked. Maybe. Who knows? I don't know. The other game that stood out to me was called The Eternal Life of Goldman.
neocharge: And this it's like this old dude on a cane hopping around like DuckTales style.
Leon Lionheartly: Yes. Yes.
neocharge: ah Really cool art style. ah The trailer's online if you want to look it up. The Eternal Life of Goldman. Multi-platform coming to PS5. And this looks like it might be a Metroidvania. It's reeking of Metroidvania.
neocharge: But I think there's a demo out now I actually want to check out. And i want to see what this game's all about. And I'm excited to play it. I think I i would like this game. and the It was very gruesome.
neocharge: ah The animations were cool. It's this old dude hopping around on a cane like with these aliens and shit. i don't know. Just go watch the trailer. Looks very cool. Looks very cool.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, no, it it does. That was the other one of them that I caught. um I can't tell. it they david I think they announced it officially as ah or described it as an action platformer a la DuckTales Shovel Knight. But something about... I saw a map.
Leon Lionheartly: And I was like, you don't put a map in a 2D platformer. That's not something you do traditionally. So it screams Metroidvania. You're right. The art style is unique. It's kind of very um Gravity Falls, if you know if you've ever seen that show.
neocharge: ah No.
Leon Lionheartly: Okay, go check. It's a really cool um cartoon that came out. they Animated show, really. Kids love it.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: It's it's got a great cult following. It's really cool. Actually, really enjoyable. um But it's got that animation style to it. um And... There's something about that.
Leon Lionheartly: And then all of a sudden he brings out that cane and just starts like going viciously visceral against creatures that look like tentacle monsters and just ripping out their guts with a ah a cane.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: I was like, ooh, that's my kind of humor.
neocharge: Uh-huh. Exactly. So I'm not sure what exactly this game is. The Eternal Life of Goldman is a vibrant yet dark adventure that weaves together legends, fairy tales, and myths. It takes the genre at an unusual angle and... Fuck, I lost it.
neocharge: is a good game it looks like uh inspired by in the breathtaking platformer an adventure explore a vast hand-drawn archipelago archipelago i don't know arc archipelago inspired by ancient fables and depicted in classic frame-by-frame animation and defeat a mysterious deity So, yeah, I mean, it looks like Mario mixed with maybe it's a Metroidvania.
Leon Lionheartly: I don't know.
Leon Lionheartly: know
neocharge: It's got an overworld map. ah The animation is incredible. Art style is really cool. It just looks like a very unique game that stood out to me. So kind of reminds me of DuckTales and there's some cool boss fights and there's some just gruesome deaths, like just gruesome kill animations, which, oh, THQ Nordic.
neocharge: is doing this.
Leon Lionheartly: Ah, yep.
neocharge: Yeah. So weepy is the, uh, developer or we, yeah, weepy W E A P P Y weepy studio, uh, published by THQ Nordic. So yeah, I have my eye on this game and it, uh, yeah, release date coming soon.
neocharge: and I think there's a demo out now. Yes. Demo out now on most platforms, I believe. So yeah, I might check this out. Uh, i will I'm going to try in Platinum Ni No Kuni tonight. I'm one trophy away.
neocharge: ah So, yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Oh, come on, man. You got this.
neocharge: I know, I know.
Leon Lionheartly: 14th.
neocharge: we'll We'll talk about it. We'll talk about it. But, ah yeah, those those were the two standouts. The Boomer Shader looked cool. You're going to talk about that. But, so yeah, ah I lost my shit with Hades. i was like, are we going to get a PS5 release date at an Xbox show? Yes, we did.
neocharge: So, April April 14th for...
Leon Lionheartly: <unk> fourteenth
neocharge: April 14th for Hades 2. ah This game's sitting at a 95 on Open Critic. I'm a huge fan of Supergiant games. Big fan of Hades. ah Hades is one of my favorite roguelikes, one of my favorite Supergiant games, and they really don't miss. And I couldn't be more excited that we're getting Hades 2. So those were my two standouts.
neocharge: How about you?
Leon Lionheartly: yeah um Well, those two were the biggest ones ah for for me. I absolutely agree. um there are ah two There was definitely one that caught my attention. it's I know, well, rather there's two that are importance to me. One, we got a release date for Super Meat Boy three d i coming out March 31st.
Leon Lionheartly: Relevance for me, because not only am I interested in it, Super Meat Boy is an amazing game, ah but this is also on my draft list. So I thought I was done with the month of March.
neocharge: Yep.
Leon Lionheartly: Turns out I'm not. ah But the the other one,
neocharge: Yep. which The next episode, we're going to do State of the Draft with Caleb. So we're going to go over how Bob is killing it this this year.
Leon Lionheartly: I don't know what you're talking about.
neocharge: yeah
Leon Lionheartly: yeah ah I got to say, we'll we'll we'll get there. But when my last game jumped from here here to like here, I was like, oh, okay, never mind. I think I've got this stra a year.
Leon Lionheartly: um But absolutely. so The other one was Serious Sam, Chatterverse.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: um This has been rumored for a while. It's coming in 2026. Serious Sam is in... It is quite frankly a boomer shooter um from what when I originally was what 360 era um back in the day.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: ah It is a boomer shooter with over the top comedy and ah animation and ah just makes fun of the seriousness because there was this counter trend of seriousness and in shooters. So you had things like this and then you had Matt Hazard.
Leon Lionheartly: um If you remember that game that kind of were tongue in cheek, if you will. um And this one looks like four player ah co-op or online.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: um So I definitely am interested in hearing what this is or seeing more of this because they just said 2026. But you put a boomer shooter in front of me with potential online, not sweaty lobby, Call of Duty shooting stuff.
Leon Lionheartly: And I'm probably going to show up for a couple of rounds.
neocharge: Hell yeah. Yeah, this looked cool. ah well I'm not too into Boomer. I like Doom. ah But other than that, I think I liked ah what what was Shadow Warrior 3.
neocharge: Also another kind of pseudo-Boomer shooter in feudal Japan. Have you played Shadow Warrior 3? It's it's ah published by Devolver.
Leon Lionheartly: I know the name, but I never got a chance to play that.
neocharge: Yeah, that's kind of I would say that's ah that's definitely a boomer shooter that I think you'd like. ah Just go ahead and add that to your list of 10 games this month alone to play.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: Or next month alone to play.
Leon Lionheartly: Next. ah But yeah, no, I consider Super Meat Boy 3D at this point in April game, and it's like, well... ah wellll we'll get all into that next week at the state of the draft.
neocharge: Yes, April is becoming our new September 2025 sure. for sure
Leon Lionheartly: it It really is. um But no, i think I think that was about it. There was a couple other small items in there, but I got to see more. um I'm not sold yet. um Maybe yeah at some point.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: And then there, of course, there was a couple of Xbox exclusive games that I was like, I'm not even going to have a chance to play it.
neocharge: Right. Yeah. ah Stranger than Heaven got a small little teaser, and then they're like, oh, we're going to have the whole event on it. So it's like, this is an announcement of an announcement. Okay.
neocharge: So that game looks cool.
Leon Lionheartly: This was the pre-meeting for the meeting that they were going to have later to schedule the next release. ah Yeah.
neocharge: Right. But it was mainly third party. It was all third party. It was a partner showcase. No first party. More emphasis on the indie titles. There were some games as a service stuff in there. ah Could have been an email, honestly. And it could have been a blog post on PlayStation for Hades, too.
neocharge: So, but... You know, whatever. We got an event out of it. We had fun. We had a Discord channel, a voice channel that we were chilling in, and we had fun. So like I said, I love the structure of it. Just game after game after game. Recap, game, game, game, game. game Recap.
neocharge: That's cool. And the voiceover was so monotonous. It was like, check out this game. It was really cool, wasn't it? Releasing April And I'm like, what the fuck is this dude on? Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: du it it was It was so jarring because we watched so many Nintendo Directs and his and it's the exact opposite of it. you know like Join Kratos on an adventure.
Leon Lionheartly: It's like...
neocharge: Join Samus on Vuros.
neocharge: Where she has psychic abilities. I'm going to narrate this entire trailer for you.
Leon Lionheartly: it It sounded like Sadia's latest AI voice. he's like, here, fucking beta test this for me. but
neocharge: yeah Yeah, it did sound a little robotic, didn't it?
Leon Lionheartly: perfect
neocharge: But so yeah, overall, the show was mid.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, it did.
neocharge: I wasn't expecting a lot. Hades 2 was an incredible surprise that I did not even... I thought that was going to be Summer Game Fest. ah But yeah, other than that, show kind of mid.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah. It was very hot or cold. cold You end up with Hades 2 and then this that Bluey game or whatever where it looks like Bluey with Pokemon Snap.
neocharge: Right?
Leon Lionheartly: I'm like, something's not these are not on the same level.
neocharge: Right.
Leon Lionheartly: No disrespect, but they're two of these games are not equal.
neocharge: No.
neocharge: Yeah. Yeah. So if you want to check out the event, ah YouTube. um So it aired today and they have a recording of it. So go check it out and let us know what you're excited for in the list. Let us know if anything catches your ah eye.
neocharge: So you know what's been catching my eye, Bob? that Is that all the news?
Leon Lionheartly: ah My pillow?
neocharge: Is that your pillow?
Leon Lionheartly: yeah true
neocharge: My pillow? no Yes, your pillow has been catching my eye. ah We podcast and sleep together. It's not weird.
Leon Lionheartly: No.
neocharge: Because we we don't do nut to butt. We do back to back. So it's not weird, right? um Jesus.
Leon Lionheartly: No, no, it's it's okay because we have our own sleeping bags. It's when you get in my sleeping bag.
neocharge: Exactly. Right, right.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: That's true. Yeah. And you yeah you can't cuddle. No cuddle. Is that all the news?
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, that was all the news.
neocharge: Cool. Nino's been catching my eye. Nino Cooney. I finished it.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, buddy.
neocharge: Yep. Um, incredible story. Amazing, amazing story that has so many twists and turns. Uh, it's very familiar. If you know other stories, let's just say that I don't want to spoil anything. Cause if I reference things, uh, it might, uh,
neocharge: Spoil it. ah The art style is awesome. Studio Ghibli. I mean, you got... Dude, I unlocked the ability to go back and watch the cut scenes that are animated in Studio Ghibli.
neocharge: And I was like, oh, yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Uh-huh.
neocharge: So I might go back and watch that entire thing. kind of like ah I think it's like 40 minutes of cut scenes, like animated Studio Ghibli style. Yes. ah The characters are really cool. The villains are awesome.
neocharge: Protagonists, antagonists ah just make sense to the story. The world is so fun to explore. The monsters are so fun. The familiar is so fun to catch. that The music is is top tier. Amazing. ah Nine out of ten. The reason it doesn't get a ten out of is the design.
neocharge: The battle design. ah this This game is a a thing of its time, probably either five to ten years late. There are some interesting design choices in the combat that I can't fucking stand.
neocharge: So when you know your boss or your enemy does an AOE attack, like an ability, a named ability, it zooms in on them, and that's fine. you know Camera work, cool. But it fucking cancels out everything you're doing. So if you're healing and an enemy does an AOE attack, well, guess what? You're not healing anymore.
neocharge: And the magic takes a little, uh, while to cast. Or if you're like, dude, it takes so long to use a Phoenix down or feather or whatever the hell they call it in there to res someone.
neocharge: Sometimes it cancels that out.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: Uh, The impact isn't great in the the battle mechanics, but other than that, I just wanted to touch lightly on the stuff I didn't like, and that's just the battle design, but the battles themselves are super fun.
neocharge: Like 9.5 out of 10. 9.5 out of 10. Incredible game. I'm still having a blast with it. RNG needs some work. too, because i have been i have had to farm. I wouldn't say have to because i'm still i I like doing it. like But I was farming an item, and the enemy that drops the item is already a super rare in-game only spawn in this particular world. It's like gold enemy or whatever. right And that's already super rare to get. But then the steal... Yeah, you have someone that steals. I won't tell you who, but yeah, you steal in and a JRPG. Shocker.
Leon Lionheartly: Shocker, right?
neocharge: The item you so you can only get from his from him is like a 1% chance to steal. So then you have to do the ability that ah the individual can steal the rarest item. But to get that ability, a golden glim has to drop. And to get a golden glim to drop, you also have to do an RNG thing that you have to attack the enemy to get a nice, ah like a, I don't know, like a...
neocharge: a good attack. And then you have the chance to drop that glim. So not only do you have the chance to run into the enemy, you have the chance to drop the glim, but then like the, the item is super rare to steal.
neocharge: And I needed 10 of them.
Leon Lionheartly: You know, it's said bad when you have to do those hard RNGs, but then you got to do it multiple times.
neocharge: Yes.
Leon Lionheartly: It's so disheartening. I totally forgot about that trophy, um but I've got terrible memory.
neocharge: Yes.
neocharge: I got it though. I got it.
Leon Lionheartly: Damn.
neocharge: ah It was the alchemy trophy. You have to... ah And I like this because they didn't require you to catch every single familiar. It was about 90%. That's good. That's fine. And they didn't require you to alchemize every single item because that would be ridiculous. Because, I mean, this super rare item that's like a 0.5% drop rate, you need to alchemize everything. You probably need like 50 of them.
neocharge: So they asked you to alchemize about 91% of the total items.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
neocharge: So got that trophy. The only trophy I have left and the one I'm about to attempt after this podcast is it's called the Solaceum. And it's like a Colosseum and there's ranks.
Leon Lionheartly: hu
neocharge: So there's rank E to S. I'm on rank S. I'm on the last level. Rank E through B, there are three rounds. Rank A through S, there are four rounds.
neocharge: And... Holy shit. They get real cheap. And I'm telling you, they are spamming these AoE attacks left and right. So I guess I have to fight fire with fire and just spam AoE attacks. But then their DPS is insane. They're just melting my health. So might have to grind a little bit, but I am pretty determined. I think...
neocharge: I started getting a little exhausted with it, with the alchemy thing. I finally got that trophy, but the in-game grind that I have decided to do, the meta trophy hunt, it's it's getting a little annoying now.
neocharge: And I'm i'm i'm on...
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: like I'm on the last 1% of that fucking trophy grind, right? And I have literally one round of the entire Solaceum to do, but I do have to grind some levels to get to the level I need to be to comfortably... Because I can't even get past round two, and there's four rounds. So...
neocharge: It's really, really tough, really challenging. ah I'm still having fun. i'm yeah I was getting a little annoyed with RNG stuff. Thankfully, that's done. ah But sometimes the trophy will leave a sour taste in your mouth. I wouldn't say it's to that point. I still love this game. and it's if i If I were to choose my top five JRPGs and I could only choose one from one IP, this would easily be in top five, maybe even top three.
neocharge: well, top five, yeah, because you got Palm Fantasy VII, right?
Leon Lionheartly: That's
neocharge: Tales of Symphonia. But this is an incredible JRPG. I'm so glad that I finally played it. i had a blast with it. I think I've put like 95 hours into it the last two weeks.
Leon Lionheartly: hard hooks, man. that's got that that's hard hooks man
neocharge: Yeah, it hooked me. I couldn't get enough of this game. The in-game manual, like the Wizarding Companion, was such a unique twist. I haven't had that fun going into an in-game manual since Tunic.
neocharge: ah You you know gather the pages for the Wizarding Companion. You gather mini-stories. You have all of your you know weaknesses and all the item drops like when i was doing the alchemy stuff i would be like okay i need this item all right so where what is this item and where is it oh it's on this enemy okay you go to the enemy chapter all right this enemy drops it where's this enemy oh here all right i don't know where the fuck that is then you go to the location chapter and you're like oh that's where it is on the map so
neocharge: It was just so cool. I didn't look up anything until about, I don't know, 95% of the game. And i beat the game, rolled the credits. And then even then the end game stuff, I was like, I'm going to try and figure it out on my own. And I figured out a lot of the translation stuff, a lot of the riddles in the games. That was super fun.
neocharge: Overall, if you like JRPGs, if you like Pokemon, if you like, it's got some Harry Potter elements in there, and you like Studio Ghibli movies, this this game is for you, and it's incredible.
neocharge: I love it. And ah I hope to platinum it tonight and put it back on the shelf and say, thank you for this amazing experience. I'm done with you. and Put it back on the shelf. And then probably play ah tails of but or Tales of
Leon Lionheartly: Ooh.
neocharge: Because you're the one, right? Yes, yes. ah Talk about a character cast. I think Vesperia has the second best character cast in the Tales series. But the first best character cast cast in the Tales series is Tales of Berseria.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah. i would oh okay I would say so far out of what ah ah the games I have played, or the ones I have, should I say, i would i would agree with that. um I did... So even though i was still running on like...
Leon Lionheartly: Four hours of sleep. um I still said screw it and ah showed up to work late. Not to sleep, but because I was right before the final sprint of Bruggeria.
Leon Lionheartly: And I wanted to get this done um to finalize this.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Because I'm going to tell you right now, there's there's grind I'm willing to go for. But Bruggeria asks for a grind on a platinum that even I'm like, ah no, um I'm not doing that.
neocharge: Oh, I know.
neocharge: I know. I don't even have the platinum. So are you are you trying to hit a specific percentage? Like if I don't go for the platinum, and this is just because I'm insane and I am very analytical in the head, I'm like, all right, let me hit at least 75%. Let me just get to 75%. So do you have a specific percentage you're going through? or are you Are you putting it to bed?
Leon Lionheartly: I'm going to put it to bed.
neocharge: and
Leon Lionheartly: i do i go i play the game naturally to what I feel is comfortable completion.
neocharge: Gotcha.
neocharge: Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: um And then percentage be damned. I don't care. right like It is what it is. i'm not good I've accepted it.
neocharge: the percentage is The percentages for me is always an afterthought. right I'll play the game regardless. If I love it, I'll go for the trophy meta grind. And then if I'm like, i I'm just not having fun anymore and I don't want to do this, I'm like, let's get to at least 75% call it a day. So that's what I do.
Leon Lionheartly: No, that's fair. I could see that one. um But what can I say I haven't said about this? ah Let's see. Last time where I left my adventure party and reporting here, um I was near near the end, i getting close to it. And I figured I could probably put another couple hours into this and knock it out and put it on the shelf. um But something happened.
Leon Lionheartly: um And I started finding myself doing a lot of endgame... ah content and it was addicting.
neocharge: mm-hmm
Leon Lionheartly: So I ended up playing and doing that for another four to six hours before I finally finished it off.
neocharge: nice
Leon Lionheartly: um This game shines at the end.
Leon Lionheartly: Uh, that's, that's what I can say overall, the overall, that's where I think it sits strongest. Um, there, this, you get some story wrap ups that are awesome. You've got some good side questing that's coming included. You've got some optional areas you can do that are awesome. Uh, this game sings, but you cannot really get into that con. You can't get into that until you're like 90% of the way done with a story.
Leon Lionheartly: Um,
neocharge: Right. Have you fought the Giganto Monsters?
Leon Lionheartly: um No, but I do know about them. Yeah.
neocharge: Yeah. Yeah. You run into them like very early on in the game, and you're like, what's that thing?
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: That's cool. And you go up and you fight it, and you just get it wrecked. And you're like, well, that's an endgame thing.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, that's exactly it. Yeah. ah this This game, a overall, I think it's really, good like I said, this is a very solid game.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: um I think some of the quest lines, quite frankly, are like the main storyline is good and it finishes good and it's got an amazing cast like Rokuro. He's my, he's my man. I love, love him as a character.
neocharge: Heck yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: um
neocharge: He's the best.
Leon Lionheartly: he's the best. Uh, velvet is really, she's a really good character who goes through a lot of growth. Um, and I respect that and I appreciate that. Um, and it's, it's got a Seinfeldian kind of sitcom feeling between you take her and then you've got like the witch Maggie Lou, and she's telling all kinds of stupid, the pretending like she's got the ADHD up the, up the ass and it's, and it's great.
neocharge: Oh yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Um, the,
neocharge: It's funny.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, it's funny. um They tell some jokes. Just know some of those jokes are very Japanese. um ah If you don't know what I mean, um cultural differences, that's all I can say right now.
neocharge: Yep.
Leon Lionheartly: um But these side stories, man, this is where the game really shines are these side quests and side stories you're going on.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: um The Omega Elixir story, i I felt a tear. I was like, ooh.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: At the end, I was like, ooh, that one hit good.
neocharge: Yeah. Right.
Leon Lionheartly: um See, you know what I'm talking about. And... that that was That was where it shined. My biggest complaint, and this is the biggest flaw I have of this game, is if you had taken all of those and like dabbled more of the story parts in throughout the rest of the main quest line to make it feel like a natural progression and instead of dumping 10 on me at the end...
neocharge: Gotcha.
Leon Lionheartly: it would have been a chef's kiss. um But that's my preference because I want to do side quests right away.
neocharge: got
Leon Lionheartly: And there's usually two things, and this doesn't make a bad RPG, it just makes it annoyance, a minor annoyance, is you either starve me of side quests till the very end like Berseria, or you upload me with so many side quests like Cyberpunk 2077 that by the time I get to the second boss, I'm 40 levels ahead of him and one-shot him, and then it completely takes the experience from me.
Leon Lionheartly: ah This is why it's important to do those because I am the kind of guy that will do the side quests as much as I can. um And it would be really nice if I you know grew all with the side quests, but that's just a me design thing.
neocharge: Yeah, I gotcha.
Leon Lionheartly: ah But yeah, other than that, dude, there's is really good ah there's all there's some really interesting side quests. um There's one in particular.
Leon Lionheartly: Dude, i was you know I was pulling five times XP on this game. um I'm near the end.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: I'm level nine mid to or very low 90s, like 92 across the board. Go to do a side quest against this one thing. I'm expecting ah a balanced fight. um But then I look and I was like, why is he hitting so fucking hard?
neocharge: okay
Leon Lionheartly: And then I was like, oh, he's level 100.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: it was like a solid eight to 10 levels ahead of most of my party. And i I felt those.
neocharge: Dang.
Leon Lionheartly: I got it. I got through, but I felt those levels. I have really kicked my ass for a minute, man.
neocharge: Dang. Yeah. ah I encountered a essential super boss in Ni No Kuni as well. And ah I barely got through that thing. And I'm like level... It's ironic. I'm like level 94, 95, think, too.
neocharge: so Yeah, man. JRPGs are the best. They're the fucking best. And I'm doing something very rare.
Leon Lionheartly: and comfort food.
neocharge: Oh my God. They're amazing. I'm doing something very rare. I'm going from back to back JRPG. I'm going from JRPG to JRPG. Because I'm on a JRPG kick, I feel.
neocharge: I like them, man. like i Dude, I love the side quests in the Inokuni.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: there were They were cool. There were some that, at the end, I told you there was some Dragon Quest level fucking side quest padding. ah But other than that, yeah. I'm so glad you enjoyed Tales of Brigeria.
neocharge: it's ah It's a gem in the IP. So this is your second Tales you've played?
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, this is the second Tales. um And I knew didn't say it.
neocharge: Gotcha. It was right before our Rise.
Leon Lionheartly: It was. um And I know i don't I didn't say it before, but this is easily 8.5 game.
neocharge: Cool.
Leon Lionheartly: Do not understand the things I'm talking about as bad. 8.5, that's a solid game. This is a solid game. I really appreciate ah the recommendation.
neocharge: Yeah. Awesome.
Leon Lionheartly: It was a good one.
neocharge: Cool. Awesome. I'm glad you liked it. And yeah, it's it's one of my favorite Tails games. So I'm about to play a Tails game. I'm so super excited. Ni No Kuni has some Tails DNA in there. They're both published by Bandai bandai Namco.
neocharge: So I, ah yeah, this is playing Ni No Kuni has been like, I mean, I gotta give Tails some love. I got it. I got it. And i have, I got like halfway through the Vesperia remaster. i beat it on the 360. So I am like, yeah, finally got to get back to Vesperia. So yeah, man.
Leon Lionheartly: I don't blame you. I still got to figure out what I'm going do. oh I don't know.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: You'll see me online.
neocharge: Yeah, exactly. You just kind of play what you feel in the moment. ah we We do have some ah new deals that we made but at the the dinner table, if you will.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah
neocharge: we We got some tacos at a nice little restaurant here. But ah you, me, Alex went out. We listened to some of his new tracks, which, holy shit, they're fire. Check out his new album, X30.
neocharge: He is BA Select Start. Yeah. this This is a special album, dude. This is going to be fire. Listen to some tracks. It's awesome. Anyway, we were at dinner. ah I made a deal with Alex. I really wanted him to play Sunday. And I love this. I love these like deals. right it kind of It forces you to play a game you otherwise never would.
neocharge: And like this last one just opened my eyes.
Leon Lionheartly: Hmm?
neocharge: I'm like... I sometimes I just need forced into these things because Caleb, Bo, they all were like, dude, you got to play Nino Cooney. I'm telling you, this is like 10 fucking years ago. They're like, you got to play Nino Cooney. It's a it's a fucking mad ass game. It's like Pokemon at Studio Ghibli. And I was like, yeah I'm playing Pokemon. i don't really. And I was just like, oh, I look back and I'm like, you stupid motherfucker.
Leon Lionheartly: Hmm? Hmm?
neocharge: So thank you for essentially forcing my hand and and thank you pass Matt for finally taking that plunge. But anyway, i said, Alex, you got to play.
neocharge: God of War, Sons of Sparta. He's like, oh, that game sucks. I'm like, no, it doesn't. You're a Metroidvania fan. I wouldn't recommend it to you. But i was like, you're a Metroidvania, maybe for the pixel art.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: ah You're a Metroidvania fan. It's a good Metroidvania. You got to play it. And he's like, and I was like, I'll tell you what. And he's like, well, you got to play Mio. And I'm like, i already bought it. Mio memories in orbit.
neocharge: It's another Metroidvania, incredible art style. And I was like, yeah, i already bought it. I want to play it. And he's like, ah okay, well, I was like, well, okay, I'll play Mio if you play Suns Asparta.
neocharge: he's like, all right, cool deal. And so that was when we had, what was ah your guys's?
Leon Lionheartly: Oh, yeah, because he still hasn't finished Death Stranding 2. I knew i was going to have to take a i knew was going to come to this.
neocharge: That's a crime.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, that's a crime. and So I knew I was going to have to do another game for him. And we made a deal because he doesn't want to be the only one to not have the Platinum in our group, ah friends group for this game.
Leon Lionheartly: um I'm going to go ahead and... I already bought it. I already have a save file from back in the day. um I'm going to go ahead and plant Legend of Dragoon, that was released on the PlayStation Network a few years ago.
Leon Lionheartly: i Actually, about a year ago, and I think. Maybe two. um But...
neocharge: PSN? i got it on PS3 on the PSN.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah Well, there's a... It finally showed up in the the Classics catalog as part of like the premium subscription a while ago.
neocharge: i Oh, yeah. And I was wondering if I had to buy it again. And nope, your PS3, it translates over. And I was like, cool.
Leon Lionheartly: No shit, really.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: It was off the PSN store for a while, and it pissed...
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: I was angry.
neocharge: Yep. Yep. But I was like, okay, cool. it's just It just translated over. So, yeah. That's awesome, man.
Leon Lionheartly: That's all.
neocharge: You got to stream that.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, I definitely will be streaming that one. I think I remember where I left off at, but I'm not restarting. I'm going to just keep going because I beat this game many, many moons ago. It's an amazing RPG from the PS1 era. um come Come join because this is a special game and there's reason people keep screaming to remake this, please.
neocharge: Yeah. ah And ah the best studio that would have done it just got fucking axed, unfortunately.
Leon Lionheartly: I don't want to talk about it.
neocharge: So. Oh, me either. Too soon. Too soon. Yeah, dude. Going retro, playing some Legend of Dragoon. Uh, I think we both own the black label. i own a Japanese copy. Thanks to Alex. Love this game. Haven't played it in fucking decades. I've been waiting for the remake, honestly. ah but Claire Obscura was very heavily inspired by Legend of Dragoon. One of the inspirations and, uh,
neocharge: Yeah, I'm happy to see you getting back to it. I think the deadline is just this year. so you have time whenever you want to. Maybe in April. You don't have anything going in April, right? Going on in April.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, no, not not not ah not a damn game, right?
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: ah i'm forget but You know what I was thinking?
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: depending on i i want to save for though the the wave that is coming April, but I thought about looking at the DLC borderlands for 4.
neocharge: I'm down. I'm in. I shared that with you and I was like, dude, Cash is a bob-ass fucking class because he's a gunslinger ah slash kind of chaos build.
Leon Lionheartly: God damn it.
neocharge: like He rolls a d20 and depending on what he rolls is what happens. So it's like a mix between like the the stuff in Absalom and the gunslinger.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: From ah what? Remnant 2.
Leon Lionheartly: Yep. Yep. ah Come on, man. You ain't got to say that because that's a beautiful creature right there.
neocharge: is and it And this is how you do DLC. you now And it's paid DLC. i just I think it's like $12 a piece or something. $30 for like all four of them. or I don't know what it is. But I don't buy shit that I don't know what I'm buying. But Borderlands has notoriously had incredible DLC.
neocharge: Not Wonderlands, Borderlands. The main entries.
Leon Lionheartly: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: Borderlands 3 had a cool, handsome Jack one. They had a mansion one. And the guy comes back from the mansion. It's called did something of Mad Ellie. Damn it, I should look it up.
neocharge: ah But it a new character, new enemy types, new ah levels, new um environments.
neocharge: Like new shit, new guns, new abilities. This is how you do DLC.
neocharge: Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Oh, I'm looking now.
neocharge: What's it called?
Leon Lionheartly: and So it's Matt Ellie in the vault of the damned starting March 26th.
neocharge: Matt Ellie in the Vault of the Damned. o Yeah. So, um, right, right.
Leon Lionheartly: The day we're recording. So fuck.
neocharge: We should just, I mean we should dig back into borderlands when we can. I'd love to play more with you. and we still got some trophy cleanup to do on that game. So, and, uh,
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah. Yeah.
neocharge: the Another one just came out. Three trophies. I thought this was the the big expansion. Apparently, it's not. the ah Fuck, what's it called? It's the it's like a rock expansion.
neocharge: and it only
Leon Lionheartly: Oh yeah.
neocharge: yeah it only had three trophies. And i was like, oh, well, fuck. But this isn't it. This isn't the story expansion. this is That trophy list, I think, is a free update. And then the trophy... We're going to get an even new trophy list for Matt Ellie in the shadows of the damned. Whatever the fuck it's called.
Leon Lionheartly: oh
neocharge: So, yeah, the stone demon or something.
Leon Lionheartly: yeah Something like that. I'd have to go look it up. But I will say you've got my you have my attention then because it's been a it's been a little bit. Maybe they finally patched it up and made it look the game look better um because it was a little rough for a while there.
neocharge: Mm-hmm.
neocharge: Yeah, we had a blast with it, though. Dude, Vex is still my girl. I don't know if I'm going to change classes. I don't know if I... I probably won't try Cash, but he he's he looks cool. He's like a fucking gunslinger, grim reaper chaos build that you would love.
neocharge: So, yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, going to have to go check this out now.
neocharge: Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Let's see. Yeah. Storypack, Mad Ellie in the Vaults of the Damned. So, yeah. That comes out 26 this month. Wait.
neocharge: Today.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah.
neocharge: ah Yesterday, it came out. I wonder what it got rated.
Leon Lionheartly: So um i did it actually get Oh, yeah, it should get a.
neocharge: Hmm. Mm-hmm.
Leon Lionheartly: open critic, huh?
neocharge: Yeah. Mad Ellie review. we're We're giving it to you live here. ah Mad Ellie. Game facts. 80%.
Leon Lionheartly: Hmm.
neocharge: iran orleans I do borderlands DLC hits like we got an entire game spinoff from a borderlands to DLC tiny Tina's dragons keep and then we got an entire game off of that and then an entire IP off of that as well.
neocharge: So yeah, Matt Ellie vaults of the damned open critic. So yeah, this is the first of the Borderlands 4 DLC and it is sitting at, oh no, that's Borderlands 4, 82%. Yeah. Okay.
neocharge: ah
Leon Lionheartly: I don't know if it has a page yet. Oh, here we are.
neocharge: Yeah, okay yeah it it came out today and it's DLC, so it's going to take a little time.
Leon Lionheartly: ah Let's see, Metacritic maybe. Let's see. Now it doesn't have any reviews yet. so
neocharge: ah But I've read good things about it and it's adding a lot. And ah Borderlands DLC has notoriously been awesome, so.
Leon Lionheartly: Absolutely, man.
neocharge: There's some more news for you. ah Hot off the presses. Go check it out. And we have two spots.
Leon Lionheartly: Damn it, I might have to. Thank you.
neocharge: Yeah, we we have two spots. So if if if we have open spots and you want to play Borderlands 4 with us, hop in. Let us know on Discord. so orre But but if fuck if Crystal comes in, we have one spot.
Leon Lionheartly: we'll We'll see. Pocopia.
neocharge: Yeah. She's inundated on Pocopia. Yeah.
Leon Lionheartly: Fucking game of the year right here in this household, man. And I'm not even playing it.
neocharge: Oh, yeah? Dang.
Leon Lionheartly: yes
neocharge: what's her Do you know our hour count what her hour count is up to now?
Leon Lionheartly: No, I'd have to go ask her. um I know she's got like she's got a whole case now for this Switch 2 and she brings it with her when she goes to like Pokemon hunting and stuff.
neocharge: Nice.
Leon Lionheartly: so She's always fucking running it around with that Switch 2. Yeah.
neocharge: Okay. Heck yeah. The battery is still not great on the Switch 2, but it's better than the Switch 1. And ah I was pleasantly surprised with how long it lasted.
neocharge: Because, yeah, Switch 1's battery is bad. OLED was a little better, but yeah. So, cool. We got the news. We talked about the games we're playing.
neocharge: Let's get the hell out of here and play some more games.
Leon Lionheartly: Yeah, I think it's Borderlands. Fuck.
neocharge: Yeah? You gonna play some Borderlands?
Leon Lionheartly: I might be on that tonight. I'm going
neocharge: Tonight? Okay, well, as soon as I plat Nino Cooney, I'll be on. I'll i'll play with you.
Leon Lionheartly: to be playing some cash. I'm going to go play around with this new character and see what he's all about.
neocharge: ah
Leon Lionheartly: God damn, he looks good.
neocharge: I know. I know. I told I was like, this is a bob-ass class. You're going to love him. So... Yeah, I think it's like $12 for the DLC, which from what I saw, lot of cool new shit. So yeah, I'll try the Solaceum. don't know how long it's going to take. I'm going have to grind a little bit. But as soon as I platinum Ni No Kuni, which couple hours maybe... I'll hop them on with you. We'll play some Borderlands and we'll stream it.
neocharge: So check out the stream. But guess what? Ah, you missed it. It was yesterday. It was last night. Sorry. But we will play more. So twitch.tv forward slash shapes of gaming.
Leon Lionheartly: Peace.
neocharge: So yeah, thank you all so much for listening, being part of the community. We love you all. Keep on gaming. Keep the conversation going. Have a great evening, morning, rest your night, whatever whatever time it is for you.
