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Episode 2 - Switch Pro news & Microsoft plans to ruin Discord
7 Plays4 years ago
Originally recorded live on twitch on 3-23-2021 @ twitch.tv/addtoparty
The boys discuss Microsoft's rumored bid on Discord, the leaked specs of the Switch Pro, Sony closing the PS3, PSP, and PsVita stores and buying Evo. Also recaps of the Magic Legends Beta & last week's Square Enix Presents
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Transcript
Introduction and Nostalgia
00:00:00
Speaker
you
00:00:14
Speaker
To add to party a friendship simulator masquerading as a do show. I'm your host James Hartwell joined by this Charles and Andy You're like Madonna right it's it's a single name Yeah, well in real life you have like three names so
00:00:38
Speaker
like three. Yeah, sometimes one. Well, it has it flows, right? Mm hmm. You also you have you have your gamer ID, right? You have your your your Christian name. You have you have your handles, your aim handles, your ICU numbers. I'm dating myself.
00:01:03
Speaker
That was my real one. Yeah. Aim and like ICQ. MSN messenger. That was my accident. Me three. What about you? What was your, what was your chat platform of choice back in the day? My score was AIM. You were AIM? Okay. Did you, did you have any particularly good away messages? I remembered away messages.
00:01:29
Speaker
You had to have a lot of them too, Andy. You had like a couple depending on what your mood was. Technically, we had dial-up. I couldn't really go away because I'm taking up the phone line. But sometimes I'd go away to make people think that I didn't have dial-up. But really, I was just still on the computer and I disappeared.
00:01:55
Speaker
I don't remember what I wrote, but I remember, sorry, we called it AIM. AIM was the place you could talk to people you couldn't talk to at school, right? I talked to popular people and attractive people, and they were all on AIM, but they don't even look at you at school.
00:02:20
Speaker
it was bizarre but maybe because etiquette wasn't established yet on the internet yeah well i mean i i think uh spectacular has a good call which is american all-american rejects lyrics i i was more of a yellow card man myself you know you see you were the edge cut you right i had to
00:02:42
Speaker
It was crawling. It was a paper cut. You know, you put those lyrics in there. Oh, man. Well, well, you know what? All those social media platforms lasted the test of time, especially when big corporations bought them.
Discord's Valuation and Future
00:02:55
Speaker
You know what social media platform will will stand the test of time when a big corporation buys them? Discord. Oh, see, this is what I don't understand. And you know what? Oh, cool. God.
00:03:12
Speaker
This goes back to it was Microsoft that bought Discord. No, no, they want to. So let's. So Andy, as always, remember, there is an audio portion of this podcast. So let me let me just throw that out there by saying Microsoft reports came out today that Microsoft is in talks to buy Discord for over 10 billion dollars, which should also be interesting based on our discussion last time about sending Max purchase being seven point five million dollars.
00:03:40
Speaker
Right, and Star Wars being 4 billion. Discord is more than Star Wars. Microsoft also notably owns Skype and Teams, which if you use instead of Slack, I'm really sad for you.
00:03:56
Speaker
Yeah. And now Skype is for old people. That means Discord is going to be for old people in like five years. Everybody's going to talk over TikTok. Like it's all going to be on a different platform that we don't understand. But well, they didn't buy it. But here's the thing. Here's the thing. Here's the thing. Ten billion dollars. Star Wars, four billion. Marvel, four billion. Worth more than all of that.
00:04:24
Speaker
I think I was reading into this and they only made 300 million last year. I need to be fact checked on that number, but I know they weren't profitable. Discord has not been profitable, but they need more money than Star Wars.
00:04:39
Speaker
Well, Andy, you can't you can't buy what is essentially. Well, I guess you can because Microsoft's about to do it. But essentially you have the premier gaming voice community platform. Right. This is like I and it sounds very.
00:04:59
Speaker
reactionary to say it, but it's like buying Facebook before it became Facebook. You know, you have a platform of highly energized young people, you know, the young people using it. And Microsoft has a chance to just take all that. Also, also imagine how sweet it is if they just integrate Discord into fucking Xbox Live parties instead. And it's just pretty cool. Yeah, that would be incredible. I didn't think of that, but that's pretty good. Yeah. But how are they going to monetize it?
00:05:29
Speaker
I mean, how do they monetize game pass, right? It just, you know, you pay Microsoft 10 bucks a month and it comes with it. Oh, we got to pay for discord. I mean, they just bundle it with everything else. Like it could be another thing.
Discord's Role and Microsoft Speculations
00:05:44
Speaker
Like the thing about discord is as it stands over the past like two years, it
00:05:50
Speaker
It's literally like you create a community on Reddit and you create a community on discord and discord is the one that you do for like actual live events in real time. Yeah. Yeah. I've been dragging my heels on making a discord for us just because I think there's no fucking reason, but I do need to. You know, listen, I don't know, but it's evaluated at more than 10 billion and it doesn't make money.
00:06:17
Speaker
I want to know the math. I want to see the spreadsheet that they put the number into and then just project wildly all over the screen. I have no idea how we get here. Also, reminder, it says over 10 million. That's any number from 10 billion to 100 billion, Andy. I don't get it.
00:06:43
Speaker
the people who made discord that's wonderful for you i hope everyone on the team gets a cut you know i hope they're all wildly successful and happy from this but there's a problem when someone has 10 billion sitting around i well i don't i don't get it i don't understand how you monetize it i don't understand how you look five years down the road you know
00:07:03
Speaker
necessarily monetize it in the traditional way. You just harvest data, right? People are playing these kinds of games. They're spending this amount of hours in it. Well, that's data they can use to determine what games they develop and sell. People are in communities talking about this kind of thing. You know, there are plenty of Discord communities have nothing to do with video games, right? You have artists have them. Yeah, but then everybody's going to say, this is China. And then they'll
00:07:29
Speaker
leave discord well they're not gonna leave discord it's too big i mean i mean i i almost kind of feel like discord's becoming new tumblr if i had to like put it really yeah why i feel like i feel like most people went from tumblr to discord communities
00:07:48
Speaker
Now, when we say Tumblr, my mind goes to people in middle school or high school just becoming socially aware of social justice issues and then just going wild.
00:08:05
Speaker
Buckwild. Furry's yiffing everywhere. Oh, right, yeah, because they find their own communities, right? And then just all the fanfiction, all the slashing. That's what you're supposed to do when you're young. Experiment, explore, have fun.
00:08:20
Speaker
Everyone needs to know about my erotic Destiel fanfiction, all right? And I supported 100%, but I don't know. So that's why I'm curious. Is Discord now where all the middle schoolers go to write fanfic? Well, don't make it so like one-to-one. Yeah. But yeah, this is where they go to write fanfic. I mean, if anything, there's probably a Discord where people share their fanfics they created.
00:08:49
Speaker
There are definitely discords where people role play. Yeah, this is kind of the spot now. Is there a convention for you? Is there a discord time? Well, you know. Actually, I think there is a discord convention. I think I saw something.
00:09:06
Speaker
I mean, I mean, it also was it people of the of the adult entertainments have discord where they they sell chats and pictures and things like that. I say no nothing about it.
00:09:21
Speaker
No, we don't know. Absolutely. So private messages. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Andy, Andy, I want you to want you to look up on Snapchat. Well, they do. Andy, you got to diversify. And I want you to look up G.F.E. Oh. And you find out what that means on Urban Dictionary. It's going to unlock a whole new world for you.
00:09:49
Speaker
Yeah, it's a good faith estimate. No, that's not what it is. Although they do provide estimates on how much it will cost. Yeah. Just as much as WAP means a... Oh, okay.
00:10:06
Speaker
Yeah. Okay, so we're talking about all these uses of Discord, but about all these companies that seemingly want to buy Discord.
Potential Discord Buyers
00:10:16
Speaker
There's only so many that can compete with Microsoft on buying this, right? Yeah, who else could buy Discord? Sony does not have $10 billion to throw around for Discord. Apple could.
00:10:29
Speaker
Yeah. I would, I would think like Apple could probably do something because I think the article you mentioned is more than one, like it's not the only company that has tried to divide discord. Yeah. It's the, they're in the running, right? And we're not clear who the other companies would be, but was it, you wouldn't need to count hands and links to, uh, yeah. Amazon. Oh, there's a little roulette wheel.
00:10:52
Speaker
And it includes Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Twitter, Twitter. That's actually very interesting in Apple. Yeah. Yeah. I could definitely see Amazon just gobbling that up to Google. I don't think would buy it. There are two committed to doing things their own way. Twitter would be interesting. Sort of like, you know, this is your followers and then you could suddenly create a discord community with that from that or jump into a call from that.
00:11:19
Speaker
Got to be harassment. I. Yeah, I don't know how I feel about that. Also, as an aside, Twitter said they're going to be giving tweet decks some love soon. And I went, please, God, no, it's the only way to use Twitter of desktop. Please don't ruin it. But we will find out who is buying discord. I don't have the money to buy discord. No, but you know what? I do have money to buy. Yeah.
Nintendo Switch Updates
00:11:46
Speaker
A Switch Pro, which is actually gonna probably come this year, despite everything Nintendo says. Oh! Here, make that bigger. No. Read the article. It's in your nose.
00:12:00
Speaker
I want to see the stand. It's open the show notes, you monster. So yes, Bloomberg has Bloomberg has some leaked notes that a new switch should be coming this year with a seven inch 720p OLED screen equipped with DLSS, a better CPU, more RAM and launching with a bunch of brand new games. And they're sourcing multiple people familiar with the matter, according to them. And they're also picturing probably like a four hundred dollar price tag.
00:12:30
Speaker
Um interesting things about this just to get out of the way Keeping the 720p screen. Um, I know a lot of people have balked at that But at seven inches, it's basically the same thing. It's looking at like a 1080p screen at 55 inches So it's it's about pixel density, right? So it's it's the same it's fine
00:12:48
Speaker
DLSS is actually the big deal. And so DLSS is the thing that's on new GeForce cards, the 30 series and I think the 20 series too, although it might have like step one of DLSS. But basically it's an AI generated system that takes low res images, sharpens them and upscales them so that you can get higher quality at lower performance cost.
00:13:16
Speaker
And it's actually very interesting and one of the reasons that I went for a Nvidia 30 series. So this could really kind of help switches kind of power problem, basically using AI, using the AI to help. I think games look pretty good on it anyways. You're wrong. But that's fair. I mean, are we surprised? Are we not surprised? Why do we need it?
00:13:44
Speaker
First of all, shame on you. I don't know if I can continue this podcast with the amount of vomit that's in my mouth. What am I going to do with it?
00:13:57
Speaker
Well, you're going to play Monster Hunter Rise, which comes out on Friday. Oh, no. That's for you guys. That's for you kids. I can't play it. No, I mean, like your Breath of the Wild 2, whenever Metroid Prime 4 comes out, Splatoon 3, Bayonetta 3. Andy, I know you're interested in that one. I love freaking Bayonetta. I mean, I'm a hypocrite when I say this, because I bought a PS4 Pro.
00:14:27
Speaker
I wanted it to look nice on my 4K TV and some of those games were gorgeous. But I don't go to the Switch for that. That's not what the Switch is for. But imagine, Andy, if you could play Final Fantasy VII Remake on your Switch and it looks almost as good as it does on the PS5. I don't want to. Fake fan. I've said it before and I'll say it again.
00:14:50
Speaker
I don't use the Switch in handheld mode. What do you use the Switch for? The games that come out on Switch, Nintendo games.
Handheld vs Docked Debate
00:14:59
Speaker
Charles, how do you feel about this as I abandon it? Do you guys both use handheld mode? I use handheld mode.
00:15:07
Speaker
To be honest with you, the Switch is purely a mobile gaming platform. A handheld gaming platform. I actually feel weird sitting down to play the Switch on my TV sometimes. Wait, what? Yeah. Agreed. Charles and I are the same person, though. So it's not necessarily fair, Andy. I don't know. OK. OK, here. No, no, no. Explain this to me, OK? The biggest problem with handhelds is because my arms get tired.
00:15:36
Speaker
Or when you lay on your side, your glasses like press against your face. So that's not good. I wouldn't know about that. I have 2010 vision. Like I don't know how to use a handheld comfortably for a long time. Charles, you're functionally blind. How do you how do you do it? Well, do you sit upright? That's it. So either if I lie down, you move around every once in a while. Oh, is it tired? Roll over onto your stomach. Is it tiring still?
00:16:06
Speaker
Maybe I'll sit up, whatever. Here's the thing, when I play on handheld, hell fucking just sit down and don't move. I fidget around. It's like when I read a book. I don't just stay in the same position the entire time. I move around. Reading books are tough too.
00:16:27
Speaker
I just don't think I know what's up. And you're concerned about your forearm and bicep strength that you're tiring from reading books. It's uncomfortable. I mean, you're reading a book, so you're straining your hands, keeping the book open. Really? And then you try to put it above your head, but it's like not the right light. And it's like a little bit too dark. Charles, it's been a while since I've seen Andy has he withered away into a.
00:16:55
Speaker
I'm sorry James. This is actually the fun secret. That's it. Andy was always like this.
00:17:05
Speaker
laughing but but here's the thing too though like a book yes i can do that the switch is big the 3ds was little my gameboy was little my psp was little like it was it was easier but still uncomfortable and it was the only way i could play it mostly i know i could hook up but whatever the switch is just i'm i'm amazed i'm amazed so you know that so you know what nintendo is telling you you know what miyamoto song is telling you right
00:17:34
Speaker
I don't, I can't. Or I can't. It comes with a kickstand. If you really want, you can place it like two feet in front of you. And I'll just play it on my TV, which is bullshit. Yeah, I was going to say the aftermarket, the aftermarket has solved these problems mostly. There's all sorts of contraptions and devices you can slide it into to hold it for you.
00:17:59
Speaker
Oh, you know what? Not to belabor it too much, though. I will say I do play the switch handheld for Celeste. Yeah, I did play it for Celeste. I can't play Celeste for very long, mainly because my arms get tired. Do your arms get tired or do your hands get tired?
00:18:17
Speaker
I honestly I don't remember I just know I get tired as an entity as a person I find my hands cramp up from those joy con buttons that's why I switched to the Hori controllers and it's been much better since I did it yeah I don't know I just don't like holding it
00:18:33
Speaker
I don't like holding it above my head. I can't lay on my side because my glasses get messed up. I don't like laying on my stomach. It's just really inconvenient way to play games. I can imagine. I mean, I can't, but it's fine.
00:18:49
Speaker
So here's the thing, then. I will concede and allow this to exist. A magnanimous of you. You're not going to get it, though, considering how every electronic has sold in the past year unless I do my job again for all of you guys and hunt down those licks.
00:19:10
Speaker
I need to cheat my way in. Yeah. I found we found those backdoor Amazon links. I love it. But the thing I want and I want to be clear here. I don't feel like I need to get one as soon as it gets there either. If they release Breath of the Wild 2 with it.
00:19:29
Speaker
Yeah, I do. I mean, that's the thing. It has to do something. It has to be like combined with something that I really would want to see on that screen. I mean, they're saying multiple new games to come with it. I mean, a Metroid Prime trilogy is a possibility. Definitely Breath of the Wild 2. Definitely most of the Zelda remakes in general, right? Not that they necessarily need the Switch Pro for that, but hey, it's like.
00:19:54
Speaker
You know, it's a great opportunity to give me a new console and also just go buck wild on it. Yeah. It is fun to get something new. And it's a, are they calling it new switch? We don't know that yet. I'm sure they'll announce it sometime in the summer. I don't know why. Super Nintendo Switches where my heart is too. Oh, that's lovely. If they make the buttons look like the, or they have like the different colors. Oh, I know. Right.
00:20:21
Speaker
I then I have to buy it. Then I don't have a choice. Just just remember that last month or two months ago, they said they had no plans releasing a new switch anytime soon. Yeah, that was a pretty silly thing to say. I was trying to dumb. Who said that? Did Miyamoto say that? Well, Miyamoto is not. He's not the head of Nintendo. He's Nintendo. He's Mr. Nintendo. He is Mr. Nintendo. If you saw the announcement for Super Mario Land Park in Osaka, he was basically Mr. Nintendo running around.
00:20:53
Speaker
Actually, wait, I don't think it was Doug Bowser. Anyway, well, let's talk about, we talked about the new, let's talk about the old Sony's going to be closing down the PS3, Vita and PSP stores permanently in a few months.
Sony's Digital Store Closures
00:21:09
Speaker
You know, I thought about this a long time ago. Okay. I had a thought.
00:21:14
Speaker
They did an HD re-release of Space Jammer 5 Part 2. And I remember when it released and I was so pumped because I didn't understand why they would spend a second HD remastering it, but they did. And it was wonderful and it was on PS3. So I remember I bought it, I downloaded it, and my next thought was, when is the PS3 store going to close? And I'll never be able to download it again.
00:21:40
Speaker
So right now, on my PS3, when I had to have the solder reflowed, I got it back to the one game I downloaded with Space Semifide Part 2. And that's like the only digital game that sits on the hard drive in case the store goes down. And now it is. And now it is. And Andy was right a couple of years ago. Did either of you own a Vita or a PSP?
00:22:07
Speaker
I own both. You and Greg Miller must be best friends. I appreciated every time Greg Miller was championing the PSP and PS Vita. I played good games on them. But here's the thing. Well, and then now it becomes the greater argument of we don't own our games, right?
00:22:29
Speaker
Well, you don't own them. You do own them. You own a license to use them. Right. Better fucking download it otherwise. Right. I spent $15 on Space Shuttle Five Part Two HD remaster, and it's going to be gone. I'll never be able to get it again. What happens when I put in all and I was thinking of playing El Shaddai. If I pop in El Shaddai and it goes to update it, how am I going to download up?
00:22:56
Speaker
Want to say they're actually re-releasing El Shaddai on the Switch this year? I think they are actually. That's what made me think. I bought El Shaddai years ago and I was like, oh, I need to play that. It was a it was a weird game. Yeah. I think Indian religion based God of War. I think so. And it wasn't very good. So I think it was fine.
00:23:20
Speaker
And maybe it's not platinum good, which makes everything else bad, right? So maybe that's why. But I heard it was super weird, so I was like, cool, I'll pick it up. I mean, Andy, kudos to you, though, for really getting to the core of this issue, which is games preservation. And in this digital age, how do we do it? Because
00:23:39
Speaker
Really, when you think about PS3 games, which still do not have backwards compatibility with any other platform other than the PS3 and PS. I think you can play Vita games on the PS4 PSP. I'm not so sure about we are. We are in a world now where we have these digital storefronts going away and are limiting access to games. Yeah. Yeah. That's why I do prefer buying physical still.
00:24:05
Speaker
And I understand that. I just can't. Right. It's a question about like space and everything else that with the amount of media and content that keeps coming out that people want to interact with and enjoy,
00:24:23
Speaker
it does take up space and you know not everybody has enough space for all this stuff they collect or end up getting it and like the and go ahead i was like didn't the vita and the psp have some crazy ridiculous prep didn't you have to buy like umd discs or some shit
00:24:39
Speaker
The PSP was UMDs. Vita, I think it was a card. I forget. It was a little card. I don't know if they still called a magic gate or whatever, but there's just a little card. But I like having the stuff on the shelves, but the problem is I still like to collect physical even now, but every game disk is like stamped with a broken game.
00:25:05
Speaker
We don't get like it's hard to even preserve with physical anymore because the copy that shift is not right there's always that day one whatever.
00:25:17
Speaker
Lost and I don't know. Now there is a difference between just the store and then the update servers, but or maybe not. I don't know their infrastructure, but I would consider them separate in terms of you can't let me buy the game, but can I still update it if I can't update my PS3 games? That's not cool.
00:25:36
Speaker
I think the updates will still hold on. Let's see what the article says. That's not cool. I think you can still update them. You just won't be able to purchase any new news. That's going to be weird. I mean, here's I get why they would close it down, right? Eventually, it's just a thing that like, you know, ends up costing more than it's putting in. Yeah. And, you know, it's all just goodwill at that point, like when they
00:26:02
Speaker
eventually closed out the Demon's Soul servers before the remake. And they were just like, well, you know, it's kind of the same situation here.
00:26:13
Speaker
And I get it, but that's why I do appreciate those third party groups that are just about digital preservation. The ones that like converted to emulators or like just straight up just have like digital versions of everything. They just move it over. Losing it is weird, I will say. The thought of something like that was there and suddenly you just can't have it anymore.
00:26:42
Speaker
is strange, but then again that's no strange in any other piece of media that's ever existed. One of the things that Interesting came up with in terms of dating an archivist is that this conversation came up and she and I had a conversation about digital media storage and archiving those and
00:27:01
Speaker
Apparently there was a ruling that if a service is no longer available that you can host code that is not yours in a museum for preservation purposes. So any game like this they could actually create playable versions of it and this includes like MMOs and things like that they amended the law I think.
00:27:21
Speaker
I think it was 2015. But just basically to help preserve these kinds of things. And I think it's interesting, too. Because I kind of shot fires like, what about those ROM sites? I'm like, well, they're not museums, are they? And I went, no, you're right.
00:27:39
Speaker
Um, but yeah, so she was right for the record, uh, spectacular. Yeah. Uh, there is a, yeah, there, there is a digital rights, um, preservation act that was passed by the U S U S library of Congress allows this to preserve those kinds of things. But.
00:27:57
Speaker
That being said, the narrow of it is focused and you have to be a licensed museum to be able to do these things without getting all sorts of trouble. How much does it cost to become a licensed museum? I don't know. That's a national endowment of the arts these days.
00:28:16
Speaker
So it's it's it's yeah, I don't know it's some of those things of you know gaming has starting to advance in age to the point where things are disappearing now and It's almost kind of sad. Yeah, and this is the first time for Sony right? Yeah. Yeah, that's true
00:28:33
Speaker
And now their backwards compatibility missing kind of bites them. Yeah, I would say I think the PS3 and the PS3 and the PSP were the first digital storefronts, I want to say. I think it didn't come to 360 until after the PS3. Really? I'm not sure about that. I don't know. I can't say.
00:28:56
Speaker
Luckily a lot of PS3 games, or at least the ones I bought, I think most of them were stable on the disc. PS4? Absolutely not. Those PS4 games that ship are garbage. Everything's broken. It's just like one line of command, download from server. Yeah, it's literally all garbage. This is like a realization that I'm not liking, right?
00:29:27
Speaker
Doesn't shipping a disc mean anything? When a game goes gold, doesn't that mean anything anymore? Again, right? This is the growing pains of us, our generation, where we grew up at the start of our digital age and now. We also get to see the beginnings of how digital technology ages away as well.
00:29:54
Speaker
Oh, and this is where all the PC gamers are going to be like, Oh, I can play games from 10 years ago. Yeah, that's it. I mean, to be fair, they put a lot of work into that, especially with like DOS games and things like that, because there was a real I mean, even some of those DOS games don't run great to on like DOS box and stuff like that. So there was a lot of kludgy code written in it to get to get a lot of those games working. This is really sad.
00:30:23
Speaker
It is, but Andy. I'm like genuinely sad. Andy, Sony looks to the future. Oh. And you know what the future is? I don't.
Sony Buys Evo Tournament
00:30:32
Speaker
Fighting games! You know, I actually, not actively, but I like to watch Evo every year.
00:30:42
Speaker
Yeah. Again, again, and the audio experience Evo has been purchased by Evo, the fighting game tournament community. Most like I mean, I think it's safe to say the most popular one has been purchased by Sony Interactive. So they are now wholly owned by them, which that should be interesting.
00:31:05
Speaker
they were always the biggest sponsor right like they had to play on playstation consoles and did their credit yeah i thought so oh and that's why good no good oh i only meant to say because i thought they sponsored it and so they had to play on it and that's why the the systems were so big in the community and people played on playstation was for evo
00:31:27
Speaker
I'm going off of things. I read a long time ago. I might be wrong, but I know several as Tony was already heavily invested anyone So it kind of makes sense that they buy it Because they were already the staple at least of playing on a console. Um, I just don't know my first my my first thought goes to is how they're gonna make money back at
00:31:52
Speaker
Like if, like, again, it's one of those things too, where you're creating this like association, right? Where if you go, oh, if you want to get good in fighting games, you're going to be playing it on a PlayStation, right? That's one of the thoughts that it kind of wants you to evoke, especially if Sony owns it. Because it's a tournament, right? And if they're saying, hey, when you run this tournament, everyone played with PlayStations,
00:32:19
Speaker
Guess what you have to buy if you want to become really good at the community. I had actually thought they were already there, but you know, buying makes sense. But not all is good news with this corporate sponsorship of a fan community, as it always is.
00:32:37
Speaker
You know what? That's right. It was it wasn't it wasn't bought out or corporate or whatever before it'd be like if it'd be like if Microsoft bought SGD Q or a GD Q basically, but But what did we learn last week?
00:33:03
Speaker
allegedly but everyone in the community allegedly is a predator that's a predator and on the on the on the fighting field andy there we go with their sick combos and air juggles
00:33:16
Speaker
I have frames, you know, you know, input lag, rollback netcode. Oh, yeah, that's right. The rollback netcode. I mean, but that's actually so a very interesting part of it is. So what does this mean for smash at Evo? I don't think they care. Do they, Andy? Do they?
00:33:37
Speaker
Listen, we're all friends now. Are we? Snake was snake was in Smash. I know it's not Sony owned, but if Snake was in Smash, OK, Smash can be a name one wholly owned Sony character that's in Smash right now. Go. The answer is. People say when Microsoft bought Zeni Mac Studios, they weren't going to let.
00:34:04
Speaker
Their games be played on PlayStation later after contractual obligations. Hmm. I mean, it will be actually even more interesting is, you know, I'm sure there are people who are used to playing on their fight sticks and that's fine. But and that's not a problem. What about people are used to playing on Xbox controllers and whatever? Yeah, it's like you fucking get good at playing on a PS4 controller now if you want to play.
00:34:30
Speaker
Get on that dual sense. We're gonna use that swipe. No, that is fair though. I'm assuming they'll let them. If Sony didn't, it would be bad, bad news. I mean, Sony has a history of not giving a shit about what anyone thinks. I actually, I don't think anyone likes the Smash community anyways, so that wouldn't matter. The Smash community likes the Smash community.
00:34:53
Speaker
and they can go whatever but uh i'm sorry i thought you were a pro smash player there andy are not are you kidding me no listen i i the smash people still like melee
00:35:09
Speaker
and melees we've moved on right we've moved on from melee leave it in the past guys um but the whole the whole thing i meant to mention was i was trying to think is there an exclusive on like 360 or something or pc that they would still allow played there i could see there being an issue if they prevented that smash i don't think they care about pc yeah there's an article they mentioned some things could still be played on pc
00:35:35
Speaker
Okay. And that's fine. I don't see Sony caring about that, but who cares about Smash. They're also moving to online, which again, as we talked about fighting games and online netcode.
00:35:46
Speaker
Oh, that's all the best, isn't it? I think those moving. It's not moving exclusively. Well, at least for this year, I think they're going. Oh, that makes sense. Like, how is the fun of evil that it is in person? Yeah. Yeah, I think what is it? They'll be playing Tekken 7 Street Fighter 5 Mortal Kombat 11 and Arc Systems Works Guilty Gear Strive. Oh, OK.
00:36:11
Speaker
No, no Dragon Ball Z, which I noticed Fighter Z. Just on the main stage or I guess it's on stages. I think this is it. I think this is all. Yeah. Well, if you recall, right, there was last summer they had to cancel Evo a because of Covid B because of the thing you allegedly make mates like. And then also see because of Nintendo pulling Smash out because of B.
00:36:39
Speaker
Oh, I forgot about that. So, yeah, it's I don't know. It wasn't a weird transitional point. I think Sony will help them get through that. But I don't I don't know if it's ever going to be the same. I don't think it would be the same. Like that's that's the thing, right? Evo did pride itself in being not owned by anybody. It was a thing that sprung up from its own community and was like all about the community itself.
00:37:07
Speaker
And if now they're officially under another company, it's gonna be real interesting. But like here's the thing, sometimes it's different times and people are, a lot of companies are in interesting situations. This might, you know, you could probably have done worse. I could only think. Well, speaking of people doing worse, Charles, tell us about magic legends.
Magic Legends Critique
00:37:37
Speaker
So here's the thing about Magic Legends. Magic Legends is Wizards of the Coast's attempt to create a Diablo-like game, but in the Magic the Gathering card game IP slash franchise. And let me tell you the good points. When the game is running correctly, the animations look good and
00:38:04
Speaker
abilities look fun. That being said, today, as the start of its open beta that you sign up for, it had the most stuttering animations I've ever seen. Like, like all these pro gamers that played all their other games with like ultra high settings and like less than like at like 60 FPS and everything.
00:38:28
Speaker
This game had to be run on medium and lower just to have some semblance of smoothness. One person was in the character creation screen and their character is like idle animation was stuttering. I was like, what are you doing? I should have waited a little bit more. Yeah.
00:38:51
Speaker
I'll be honest with you. They certainly created a Diablo clone or anything else. And my only problem with it is it seems like it's just not baked. There's still some things that need to be polished. Some of this gameplay, while it's fun to fight monsters, some of the tasks and quests are so tedious.
00:39:15
Speaker
Like this one, that one on screen right now is almost like a King of the Hill type, like defend the control point type thing. But they made the map so large, and sometimes when they spawn these things back to back, they're really far away. So you're just running for a few minutes before you get into the game. It's just like, what are you doing? So there's a lot of stuff, not only the technical stuff of like,
00:39:44
Speaker
none of these stuttering and hard intensive requirements on a graphics card. It shouldn't be that much worse than any other game. When you're looking at the trailer, it does not look any more pretty than Diablo 3. Yeah, right, exactly. And I was just like, they certainly made that. And I was like, but if you were to do anything else, this one is, they still has
00:40:12
Speaker
So micro, it has microtransactions. It's kind of designed to do that. But like an ARPG. Yeah. I didn't. I didn't take a look at what some of the options were, but it does have it. And is it for gear? I don't know. I didn't see. That's what ruined Diablo three for like two years. Well, it was a real money action, real money auction house. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah.
00:40:40
Speaker
Yeah, I will say the voice acting also is not the best. Is it worse than Elena? Oh, only a little bit worse. So Arena, their thing is the voice acting is like a sentence, right? Yeah. These people are throwing speeches around. So it's a longer torture. I'm blah, blah, blah. Ho, ho. If you're not here to kill me, we should have a different conversation.
00:41:10
Speaker
It's like, oh, it was raining. Whatever. It's like, anyhow, again, it's an open beta. Things that they can fix are probably clean up the animations and whatever that performance problems can be. It'll be interesting to see it come out, because to be honest with you, if this is a game that's fun, somebody will see you play this and go, oh, cool. Have you seen Path of Exile?
00:41:39
Speaker
Or, you know, if you like this game, you might like Diablo 3, or maybe even Diablo 4 if that ever comes out. Or Diablo 2, resurrected. Yeah, exactly. There's all these other options that are already more established and aren't this far back.
00:41:58
Speaker
It's just one of those weird problems where you're trying to get into a space that you're like, it's like, it's not an established space for your franchise and you're just kind of hoping it's going to be super successful. I don't know. I feel like them pivoting into being in a MOBA would be a better, I don't even, not even necessarily just making their own MOBA, but licensing their, their heroes to another MOBA.
00:42:20
Speaker
I mean, that can be a thing. That's probably even better. I agree. Just to just get that cross marketing. I did. I did remember seeing a thing not too recently, which was someone complaining about how all the art in magic now has become horny. Everyone looks great. Like back in the day, it used to be decaying corpses and everything like that. But now everyone's beautiful.
00:42:46
Speaker
I, you know, it is that is slightly different topic, but I will say there was a discussion about how there was a move away from physical media for art. And like, there's a larger, more proportionate there, there's a much larger percentage of digital art that was done for magic cards in recent years, and it was like other traditional media. But I don't think it's actually that big of a disparity, really. But
00:43:16
Speaker
To be honest, I think there was some interesting art direction for certain sets that were doing it. There are some well-known artists that don't have that type of style. That's very popular among people. Are you people? Not in the way other people will say. Some of these other people are very
00:43:42
Speaker
It would be as if they were the second coming of Jesus is how they act about some of these artists. That's fair.
00:43:54
Speaker
Well, speaking of the second coming of Jesus. Oh, it wasn't announced that the most recent Square Enix presents.
Square Enix's Copyright Struggles
00:44:03
Speaker
So last Thursday Square Enix had their own little presentation thing, which by the way, if you watched it on any Twitch channel was hilarious because Square Enix sent out notes to all their like partners to say mute your streams during this time so you don't get copyright strikes because we put licensed music.
00:44:23
Speaker
Oh, so I want to say 40 to 50 to maybe even 60 percent. It's somewhere in between that 40 to 60 range of the stream was just muted because they are using lysis music in their trailers and they weren't like sure because it was not very specific. It was like should be around this time. But they did announce a couple of things. They showed out Reiner's.
00:44:51
Speaker
All I could think was who wants this when I was watching Outriders? Someone it's made by the gear, though. Yeah, it is. Oh, it'll probably be good, but it just looks so dingy and sad. Laura Croft, Croft Manor will be coming to Fortnite. I assume Laura Croft will also be coming at some point afterwards. Let's go ahead. I'm a little bit sad about that one, like, you know,
00:45:21
Speaker
coming off of the whole Pokemon anniversary and Mario anniversary, and then going 25th anniversary of Tomb Raider, she gets to show up on Fortnite. Oh yeah, I was almost in.
00:45:35
Speaker
I love Tomb Raider and as I was watching and I was waiting for an announcement of the next one, they did say that more is coming this year because what they said was very disappointing. The trilogy is all of them are excellent and it's like 20 bucks right now. I never played three. How was three? Three? Unpopular opinion.
00:46:00
Speaker
three, I think might be my favorite. Really? Yes, because it's more for me, it was more puzzle focused. And that's what I like about Tomb Raider is I like environmental puzzles. I really like I really liked one. Two didn't get me. Two is the the golden child of it. Everybody loves two. And two was fantastic. But then the story got done. They all get done. That's Tomb Raider. But I I highly recommend it. It's I it's more puzzle focused and I really liked it.
00:46:30
Speaker
but no new cheerleader so hopefully there's another one because they did an excellent job with the reboot i really want another one remember crystal dynamics is making Avengers true that's true and it was a different team that made the third one that's why everybody was like what's this one it's not crystal
00:46:49
Speaker
I don't know who it was, but they did a great job. Shut up. Just Cause also coming as a mobile game because that's what everybody wanted. Also, Hitman Sniper Assassins coming as a mobile game. That's where you basically as a prone sniper and you blow people's heads off and Hitman. It's cool. I don't know. People like it in Europe, apparently is what I. I thought Square ditched Hitman. They did, but I think they still own the license to Sniper Assassins.
00:47:16
Speaker
Oh, OK, that's not what makes sense, because I thought they were even like good guys square and gave a license. They did, but I think they still own that IP. Sure. And then they had some other things that not super interesting, but Black Panthers coming to Avengers this year, they showed a roadmap for Avengers, the PS5 and Xbox S and X versions of Avengers also came out with an archaic way to transfer your save from PS4 to PS5, Charles.
00:47:46
Speaker
if you ever feel like doing that? Listen, I barely progressed enough to justify taking the effort. I will just start the game from the beginning.
00:47:57
Speaker
Fair. Play it again. I would I would wait. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, they gave out a roadmap. It's not particularly interesting. Avengers is just I like it. It was a fun time. The single player campaign is excellent. I think it's actually probably going to be a lot better now playing on the PS5 because really performance issues was my main complaint about it. That and the stupid ability that
00:48:21
Speaker
You can replay it and you can play it with front. It was Monster Hunter ask for an online game. You couldn't play it. Balan Wonderland got a new trailer. I don't have the time to explain Balan Wonderland to you guys. I keep wanting to like that game, but it just looks so bad. It's.
00:48:40
Speaker
Man, Ballon Wonderland is a game in which you should really take some time and see where that sits with you as a person. I wanted to be like this tricky fever dream, but it just looks like a budget kid game. Yeah. Andy, if you didn't play the demo, every face button is jump. X is jump, A is jump, B is jump. No way. Excuse me. Cross, circle. There you go. That's what it is. Yep.
00:49:11
Speaker
But anyway, and then they announced the new Life is Strange game and a remastered collection of the first two. Good. I know you two are hardcore Life is Strange fans, so I'm just going to mute my mic and roll away. So first off, Asian protagonist, I was like, I'm in. I got this. I was like, are they stereotype? Nope. Oh, great. Perfect. Even better. Keep going.
00:49:38
Speaker
Almost there. All right. It's just it's in a small town, too. Yeah. It's just like an accepting small town. Oh, just 2000. What is it? Twenty one. Yeah, that's it. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah. They said it around 2021.
00:49:55
Speaker
I mean, I will say the interesting part about this one is that it's going to be the full game and not split up into episodes. Yeah. Yeah. I think everyone's basically moving away from episodic comments. They're like, that was a neat idea. Let's never do it again. I mean, I will say the Life is Strange 2 definitely suffered from its episodic nature. They lost a lot of steam. There was like a large gap between one of the episodes. I think it might've been like three and four.
00:50:25
Speaker
Yeah, at some point in the middle it like took a like Alex a little bit extra long time and then people just kind of lost Yeah Good I think episodic gameplay exposed this idea that while it's it's great. Well, we'll get a little charger more
00:50:43
Speaker
over time, but what it requires is you to hit your commitment deadlines exactly and have no delays, which frankly, I can think of about two game developers that never have delays. Do you remember the service it was originally with? Oh, I'm trying to remember the salmon. I think it started with salmon max. It was on like a subscription game service and they started doing episodic games.
00:51:11
Speaker
I remember I was really mad. What's that? The painting arcade games? That the indie ones they made were also doing episodic. Yeah, I remember it was a big thing. I don't remember what that service was called. Yeah, me either. You two keep talking, I'll look it up.
00:51:29
Speaker
I'm so curious, but anyways, I still think I'm not too poo-poo on episodic. I think it's kind of fun to finish something and wait for the next one. It gives like time for conversation and processing. I've noticed, at least I feel like with some, I'm not going to stay across the board, but I've noticed with some things that are like, that I watch episode to episode and over the course of like a month or two or even years,
00:51:55
Speaker
I will actually remember the character names. I will like process the story better. I'll become more invested. Whereas if I did something right away, it literally just passes through me. It is just gone. So it helps me digest better. So I don't mind episodic, but it might just be done. It might be gone. I think that structure is done.
00:52:19
Speaker
Well, I mean, the structure, the thing about it too, it's also kind of this thing where when you do episodic content, it does require you to split up your story structure in a different way. That's right. It becomes this thing where basically the game is a mini series of story arcs that kind of gets semi resolved within each structure.
00:52:46
Speaker
And like I you ended up beating life is strange too, right? Or you started it but didn't I started it. I did not finish it. I need to go back and finish. I think one of the problems with life is strange too. I mean, one, they they never made the secondary the site. You're a partner character redeemable in any way. It was just it was just it was just a handful the entire time. And you know, yeah.
00:53:14
Speaker
But it had to create all these super tense moments in every episode that's kind of like, oh, what happened? And then it started getting kind of boring, because one of their themes was like, hey, racism is real. And one of the things they did, and I'm sure it must have been very hard, and not being sarcastic about it, but they're like, how do we create this tension in the story?
00:53:43
Speaker
I know they're going to deal with a very extreme racist part. And I was just like, but if you play it all as a whole, you're like, I wonder who's the racist character in this section. That guy in there is just like, oh, well, all right, that's the super racist person. Which if you did one continuous story, you could kind of be like, there's a theme about racism here without it being like,
00:54:11
Speaker
feeling like as if it was kind of thrown into your face. I love it too much. That's fair. And so yeah, it's, it's probably for the good then that it's being phased out. And you know what, I hope it does good things for the new life. I'm sure it will. Um, and it's life is strange three, right? They're not even Minson and so it's not life is strange three and it's life is strange. True colors.
00:54:33
Speaker
Oh, is it not three? I think maybe they just have like it's a main line or something. Yeah, it's they said it's a main line game. OK. But yeah, so I have to say also amusingly with all that what I told you about copyright and licensed music during the life is strange true colors trailer. The protagonist sings creep by reading it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Are we safe?
00:54:59
Speaker
I'm a loser. Nope. Yeah, they have a whole separate person for the singing voice. Who's a lady I enjoy listening to? Oh, yeah, I never heard of her before. Her voice was great. She was wonderful.
00:55:20
Speaker
And and just to close this out, they announced Project Athias real name, which is for spoken, which seems to be kind of a third person action RPG games featuring my new favorite line. That's a motherfucking dragon.
00:55:38
Speaker
oh my god i was just gonna say there is this very the way she says it is very cringe i mean you're very sad i don't think it's cringe it seems like i thought it was very cringe like it there wasn't like a hit to it in at least the way that i think is right um but it could be good
00:55:56
Speaker
It looks beautiful, is what I would say. It looks beautiful. Yeah, it looks so good. Also, by having a name, it already is ahead of Project Triangle Strategy. That's true. Project Triangle Strategy TM working title, parentheses. Yeah, it looks, you know, Four Spoken looks really good. And I was just like, I want to play it.
00:56:21
Speaker
Luminous productions. Didn't Square have an engine called the Luminous Engine? Square did have a thing called the Luminous Engine. Yeah. I also thought the demo looked familiar. Like it was like set in a desert area. Well, I mean, they announced it as Project Alpha, like class E3, I think. Oh. Let's see. Luminous productions made Final Fantasy 15. There you go. Oh, well, there you go. I thought 15 was made using the Unreal Engine.
00:56:51
Speaker
Well, they might have. But they're, yeah, interesting. No, I think this is the, wait, no, no, no, hold on. The aliens use proprietary luminous engine. No, I think, yeah, I think this is, yeah, I think they use the luminous engine for Final Fantasy 15. I could be wrong, I could not be. But we're at an hour. Yeah. So, I would say, what are we planning? I think it's a luminous engine, you were right.
00:57:18
Speaker
Aha. There you go, Andy. I am number one games reporter. I was thinking of Kingdom Hearts, I think. That's right. You are thinking of Kingdom Hearts. Faked fan. So I I don't think what I've been playing has changed much, but I know what I will be playing. And Charles, you two Monster Hunter rise this weekend. Yeah, I'm willing to give it a shot. All right. Then we will hunt those monsters. And then, Andy, you can continue letting the switch tire you out.
00:57:48
Speaker
this art though I I can't be the only one where it's just like expressly inconvenient this has been add to party a friendship simulator masquerading as a new show I'm your host James Hartwell and I've been joined by Charles just sorry I was drinking in handy episode two in the books good job