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Starfield is a *REDACTED* (Some spoilers at the halfway) - Add to Party Mini 09.12.23
4 Plays1 year ago
We have several episodes to release, so instead of making a 2 and half hour podcast, we broke them up into 3 parts.
This episode covers my thoughts on Starfield
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Starfield Overview
00:00:00
Speaker
you
00:00:14
Speaker
Welcome to Add to Party Mini, a friendship simulator masquerading as a tiny new show where we discuss a small story. There we go. And I'm your reasonably sized host, James Hartwell, and I've been joined by Charles. I'm joined by. Hmm. I said regular size. No, you are, buddy. Yeah, you are. Is this is this so we can clip and tick tock at James?
00:00:41
Speaker
Oh, you know, that would actually be really smart of me. But no, it's because we have to record so much podcast today. That's true. And I want but I do want us to talk about Starfield for a minute. Oh, oops. Sorry, I was just so excited. I hurt my ankle.
00:00:59
Speaker
Yes. So we're not going to have necessarily all the fun banter because we'll probably be recording for two and a half hours today, but this will be released out shortly in different chunks so that it'll be an easier listening experience. Um, and this
Starfield Reviews and Comparisons
00:01:13
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will be the star field experience and star field launched, uh, last week. Well.
00:01:19
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Almost two weeks ago, if you got the early access games. No, I didn't. I held. I held tight because I saw the open critic reviews came in at an eighty seven with eighty nine percent of critics recommending. That's pretty decent. Yeah. An early access decent, though. Christopher Livingston at PC Gamer says Starfield shares plenty of DNA with Skyrim and Fallout 4, but ultimately falls short of both.
00:01:47
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Leon Hurley at GamesRadarPlus says, with this kind of freedom, avoiding the main mission is the main mission. And Stephen Mills at Destructoid gives it a 10 out of 10. I wasn't sure if it could be done, but Bethesda has managed to raise the bar for sandbox games even higher. In the end, Starfield is a genre-defining epic open-world RPG
00:02:08
Speaker
with a beautifully immersive universe, a captivating story and fun and addicting gameplay the whole way. I'm so happy to have to have experienced Starfield organically without any spoilers and really hope to get to. And I really hope you get to as well. Well, you won't if you keep listening to this podcast, because I talk about spoilers, but I will very much warn you in probably about five minutes, I will talk about spoilers. So this is your warning.
00:02:33
Speaker
that to get for that play button if you don't want to be spoiled about Starfield. But yeah, we're going to talk about it spoiler free for a second, which is it wasn't the genre. This isn't game of the year. No, it's not game of the year. This is not going to make it game of the year, especially with the nominated James.
00:02:53
Speaker
Oh, and 100 percent will be nominated, but it's not getting, you know, with 2D Mario, with Baldur's Gate 3, with Spider-Man 2 coming out. Yeah, this is not this is not going to make it. It's this is not going to beat those things. And that's a shame because this it's almost the Horizon Zero Dawn problem of Horizon Zero Dawn keeps releasing the same year as a fucking Zelda game. Sure.
00:03:17
Speaker
Starfield happened to like, if this was the only game that came out, this not the only game, but, you know, like the only big temple game that really came out this fall, I think Starfield would really run away with it like any other year. But
Space Exploration in Starfield vs No Man's Sky
00:03:31
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we're drowning in like fantastic games right now. I've just crossed the 24 hour mark on it. I'm having a great time. I am nowhere near completing it, by the way. But I know things about it, which is how we will get into the spoilers later. But yeah, it's very divisive.
00:03:46
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Uh, yeah, people are very, they're like, you know what? It's just another Bethesda RPG. It's nothing special, but also at the same time, people do love Bethesda RPGs, right? So you have this weird divide between, you know, everyone was like expecting Bethesda to break the mold, but they didn't.
00:04:07
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And it's very much there. It's very much what you would expect from Bethesda, but in a space fantasy setting. I don't know. It's it's it's what it's actually also interesting is the turnaround to where people have now come back and been like, well, you know, no man's sky does all of this better.
00:04:27
Speaker
Ooh, right. All of it. No, not the story content. That's the. But I will say some people prefer the setting of No Man's Sky, comparatively to Starfield. Starfield takes place where seemingly there are no sentient aliens. There's alien life forms like, you know, animals and what have you. But there are no other like sentient alien races.
00:04:49
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at least that I've encountered. Not even like Star Trek aliens where everyone looks like a human? Nope, nope, it is humans only. And in No Man's Sky, obviously, there's basically no humans. You can't even play as a human if you want.
00:05:05
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I mean, you could quote unquote, but it's really more you're playing as kind of this amorphous creature that you can't see. So who knows? You could be one of the many alien races or you could just be something else. But yeah, it's it's just funny how no man's guy has just and we've talked about this a lot at this point, but no man's guys just sat in the background churning out update after update after update. And now people re update.
00:05:32
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Yeah. And and now everyone's like, yeah, no man's guys. Great. I always like no man's guy. I never. Oh, I always. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. I don't know. It's it's very is it's very telling, I think, about how a lot of people are just. And of course, you know, people are fanboys, but you're like, how dare you review this lowly? It's a 10 out of 10 game. And I'm like, it's not. I mean, at least for me, I have my problems with it where
00:06:01
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it, no man's sky does do it better in terms of, uh, solar travel, which is basically, and I know I've told you guys this before the podcast, everything is instanced to the solar body you're in. So if
Starfield's Quest and World Design
00:06:16
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you want to fly to a moon, there's a little cut scene. You're at a moon. If you want to fly to a planet, there's a little cut scene. You're at the planet in no man's sky. You could fly directly there.
00:06:25
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Technically in Starfield you can do that as well, but I think it takes you like nine to ten hours Now was this a is this named Todd Howard Todd Howard was this a Todd promise No, I mean he didn't he never said like
00:06:41
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You know, I mean, you can technically speaking go to every planet that you see. He just never said that you don't have to go through a cutscene. Sure. And I mean, you could argue to that no man's skies, like fast travel system, because you don't normal fly to planets and starfield. You kind of engage this booster thing. You don't go into a cutscene. You just start going really fast to get there. And you can crash into the planet if you don't turn it off, which is fun sometimes. But.
00:07:13
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You could say that's a loading screen if you really want to. That's really one of the things that bothers me about Starfield. I don't really feel like an immersive space experience in there because of that. I'm not flying around space, I'm just kind of flying around point to point and exploring things that way.
00:07:33
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I just completed my first faction quest. That took me probably about six to 10 hours, honestly. What does that mean? You know, like in Skyrim, you do like the mage guild or whatever. I've never played, but I will assume that's like a side thing. Yes, it is a side quest. It's like a major side quest, right? Where you join a group and they have a bunch of quests. And I did one and it was a great time. And I think that is actually where the game clicked for me.
00:08:02
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Um, something else too, I've noticed is starfield doesn't have that big Skyrim and fallout moment where I can fall out where you exit the vault and they're like, have fun. You don't really get that in starfield. Um, and I think that's, it's to its detriment because you kind of feel you have to make a decision to break away from the main storyline at a certain point. And it, it feels weird. It's not cyberpunk weird where it's like, you're going to die in two weeks. If you don't do the main storyline, it's more just like,
00:08:30
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It's more like I kind of want to I don't know when I'm through the tutorial to to start exploring things and be safe. You know what I mean? OK. Yeah. So it doesn't have that kind of clear delineator, which I think also hurts it. Right. That people don't get that immediate feeling of openness because the story kind of contains them for so long unless you decide to make a break from it.
00:08:59
Speaker
Well, what made you decide then? What gave you the key if they're not telling you to do? Oh, honestly, I was just like, I don't fucking want to explore. I was just like, I was just like, well, I mean, another thing, too, I will say is the companions in this game are OK. Like AI companions.
00:09:18
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Yeah, like, you know, you have your you have people who follow you around. Right. And it's like, oh, you know, Barrett will remember that or something like that. And it's like, are
Morality and Relationships in Starfield
00:09:26
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they is this mass effect level? Here's the thing. They're they are good characters. And I think most of them are not annoying. And I like it. But the problem is, and this is something people have also brought up, is that
00:09:40
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much like as it should be in a modern society, everyone's kind of lawful good. So they get real mad at you and you just start stealing shit because you would in a modern society, right? If you and I were out at a friend's house and you just started grabbing shit from the walls of it, what the fuck are you doing? Okay. Yeah. Doing that in game. I mean, yeah, it's a Bethesda game. That's what you do.
00:10:07
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You steal everything that's not nailed down to a wall. You take a bucket and put it over a character's head so you can't see you steal. This is the classic Bethesda trope. Wait, does that actually work? It worked in Skyrim. I don't know. I haven't tried it in Starfield in space.
00:10:23
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There are space buckets, I've seen them. Okay, alright. It doesn't feel bad stealing. I even feel bad stealing in games. Meh, screw. So yeah, there's a lack of kind of evil playthrough support. I've heard some people say if you go to certain faction quests you can get more evil companions too, but you know, it's...
00:10:45
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Even the more morally Malleable of like your default companion still is you know, they're at best. They are lawful neutral You know what I mean? Like it's
00:10:56
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It's it's it's kind of it's a change in pace and it makes sense for the setting. Like I said, because it's a modern world, you know, there are rules and laws and things like that. You're not a survivor in an apocalypse or you're in a medieval place where, you know, the strength is the rule. This is like, hey, we have laws and shit like, you know, we're all just trying to survive here, man. Why you got to do this to us?
00:11:19
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Now, James, even more important than side quests, stealing and freedom of choice, how much kissing is there? I haven't romanced anyone yet. I know you can get married. OK. Yeah. Listen, we love monogamy, or is it polygamy? I don't know. I don't I don't know if you can have polygamous relationships in this game yet.
00:11:43
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Lame. And like I said, I am
Multiverse and New Game Plus Features
00:11:46
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I am hours and upon hours away from completing the main story quest. But I will say there is a reason I do want to do it. And this is your cutoff for spoilers. Oh, no. So I'm going to give you a five seconds, four seconds, three seconds, two seconds, one seconds. I hope you paused because I'm going to say it. Andy, why it's a multiverse. What?
00:12:12
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Yeah, it's real fucking cool. No, this is cool. I feel like it's like a writing cheat. Or not. It gives you a bunch of different Batman's.
00:12:23
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That's true, you get a lot of fun, Batman. I guess what's wrong with the multiverse. So at the end of the game, and I don't know all the fine details of it because I only know the broad strokes, but the end of the game, you get an option to start your new game plus run basically by walking through this alien artifact. And once you do that,
00:12:44
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they the conceit of the game is that you're going into another dimension of the multiverse and you're restarting and you have all your you don't have your items right and your ships and all that's gone but you have your skills and everything you know but when you get to new game plus
00:13:00
Speaker
You start getting different answers because you've done all this before and you know certain things. So you can say things to people like, oh, I already know the answer to this or oh, you always say that and stuff like that. The game changes based on that. And not only that, you are not the only person traveling the multiverse.
00:13:21
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the game will change and there will be other characters that you know from your first run playthrough who are other multiverse dimensional travelers showing up in your new Game Plus runs. So your character will remember the choices you made. Yes, but no one else in that new dimension will.
00:13:42
Speaker
Can you run into yourself or do you? I don't think you can. There's no kissing yourself. I mean, you you possibly could. Right. I people have really not scratched the the full breadth of this yet of how deep this goes. Sure. Right. I will say, like, what are the things? So because I knew this, I was flying around the other day and a ship hailed me and it was like,
00:14:10
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Hey, how you doing? I just want to see how you're doing. I'm like, who are you in my the other dialogues? Like, who are you? What are you talking about? And it's like, oh, you know, don't worry about that. It's just that I see you're here. Oh, it's great that you're doing well. And and the voice of the character sounded like the companion that was with me. And I was like, because I knew this, I'm like, I bet that is another multiverse version of her. And she's just not telling me.
00:14:36
Speaker
If I didn't know that, I would just be like, this is weird. Why does she sound like my companion? Right. Yeah. But even in that first playthrough, there are still these kinds of interesting hints and things where it's like, no, you're already in it. Sure. And I frankly don't think I've ever seen a game do anything like this. And that is the thing that makes Starfield actually pretty revolutionary. And you can't tell anyone. No, you can't. Right.
00:15:04
Speaker
And you did a great job not telling anyone, James. I know. But I mean, but Andy, like I don't think this is going to change your mind about playing Starfield, but doesn't that make you just ever so much like doesn't it make your opinion of Starfield slightly better now by knowing that it's I guess. Yeah, it's it's interesting that they did it. Like, hmm, what's the feeling I have? I guess I'm it's I'm glad they tried, I guess, is what I'm looking for.
00:15:33
Speaker
I'm glad they tried something because the vibe I was getting was Skyrim in space and it wasn't all that much different. But I mean, if they're playing around with the new game plus formula, that's kind of cool. They have branching dialogue. Why not just add another tree? Good on them. That's yeah, exactly. And I mean, I will say, right.
00:15:55
Speaker
It doesn't it doesn't get buck wild in there as far as I'm aware, right? Like buildings are still in the same places and people people don't change like races or anything like that. Mods will 100 percent do that at some point. Oh, sure. Where things will probably get buck wild in the multiverse. And I'm looking forward to that. I mean, it also makes a very smooth way to add DLC. Right. Where it's like, hey, go in to the get hit a new new new game plus. And we'll when you get in there, all the DLC will be there, you know. Hmm.
00:16:25
Speaker
Yeah. And I mean, and yes, it's just such a crazy good idea and it's executed well and it's such a good reason to play Starfield. And I wish they could market with it because I think that would change so many people's opinion of the game. When does it? Well, I guess it hasn't been revealed to you and you're 20 some hours in. No, it's Andy. It doesn't get revealed. It is the last mission of the main quest that tells you about this. Oh, interesting. OK. Yes.
00:16:54
Speaker
So James, when we were talking about this and heard about it, we were anticipating that because the player that reveals this was on their fifth New Game Plus run. We were thinking that the main story must be fairly short if you're able to New Game Plus this much.
00:17:12
Speaker
Like, do you think that if you mainline the story of the game, you would actually be able to fly through it like that? So I don't know. I don't know if it changes in New Game Plus to be faster. I mean, right now.
00:17:27
Speaker
This isn't, I mean, we're in spoiler, but it sounds like you have to collect 24, 22 artifacts to do it. So that's a decent amount of artifacts to collect. So I can't, I mean, I guess if I just mainlined it and just fucking fast traveled everywhere, I could probably do it quickly, but it's still, I can't imagine taking less than like.
00:17:49
Speaker
three to six hours to do it, maybe if you're really going fast. So then what's it when you so I don't know how you progress the story. So you're saying like this artifact collection is the that's the main quest, the main quest. Yeah. OK. And then is it like so in theory, if there was like, you know, somebody that just knew where all these artifacts were.
00:18:13
Speaker
Yeah. Would they have to go through actual quest, like unlock a quest to get the artifact? Or could they just fly to each area where they know they are and just collect them all?
00:18:24
Speaker
I mean, at least right where I am, because I think I've collected about eight at this point. They are all tied to like companion introducing quests. So that's going to take a while. I don't know if necessarily later, like the last 15 or something, or it's just like, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, if I want to. The artifact is what eventually will be the thing that lets you go to the multiverse. So that's why it's the don't. That's why it's the gatekeeper, as it were.
00:18:53
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know. I mean, that and that is a very interesting point, too, that I struggle with this game, which is like, what a cool feature. But it also so far back to hide so far away. Right. Like there's going to be people who don't get the spoil and are going to spend like 100 fucking hours in this game. And then they're finally going to do it. And then I go, what the fuck? I could have been doing this the whole time.
00:19:18
Speaker
Yeah, like it's, it's tough. And I mean, like Charles said, we heard it from Greg Miller, did a one man, what hour podcast about this? Cause he, he, you know, he brushed through it for review. And I think he was on like new game plus three or four I've seen in the mod community save files from new game plus one through new game plus 10. I don't know if that's where it like ends in terms of new content, but at the very least I know people have like, you can get saves to throw you that far ahead if you want to.
00:19:50
Speaker
Yeah. I just want to know if you run into yourself. I don't know, Andy. I mean, that's honestly, I mean, you could. I'll tell you like one of the quests that come up is, so there's this group, your joint is called constellation. And you know, one of the early quests is all you go to their, their headquarters and you meet everyone, right?
00:20:11
Speaker
Um, one of the new game plus openings that Greg Miller ran into was he went into their headquarters and instead of like everyone being there, it was this one person who was like decked out. It was one of the, uh, the group's members like decked out in like fucking combat gear with like a bunch of mercenary surrounding us and nobody else there.
00:20:32
Speaker
And the conversation with her is like, I found you. I finally found you. You killed my father. And he's like, Oh, and you can go, Oh, no, no, no, no. That wasn't me. That was a different me. I didn't kill your father. Oh, yeah. So things
Mods and Replayability in Starfield
00:20:47
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can get interesting, you know?
00:20:49
Speaker
They could. You know, I was wondering how gimmicky it was, but it sounds like it adds something. I think like when you get to like those side quests, like the faction quest that I talked about, that's where it might get like a little push to the side where it's not as interesting. But I think certainly in some level of exploration and the main story quest is probably where you'll experience it most again before people with mods get in there and go crazy. Yeah. And you can't play it modded because you're on game pay.
00:21:17
Speaker
Oh, God, no, I bought it. I was like, oh, I found out about that. Yeah. If this is actually probably an important note, I wish I put this pre spoiler. Maybe I'll double back. But if you get the Xbox Game Pass version on PC, you can't install like the script extender, which if you've ever done Bethesda game modding is how a lot of the more complicated mods get installed. And this is due to permissions on
00:21:44
Speaker
the exe file and all that shit not to get too technical about it so if you want to get the full mod experience you will have to probably buy it from steam or somewhere else which i did i mean it'll get cheaper eventually um to buy i i was just like there are some flaws that are just real bad with this game including like
00:22:04
Speaker
Um, menus can take too long. The inventory system was awful. Guess what? It was awful in Skyrim and fallout. It's still awful in starfield. I don't know why they can't figure this out. They just assume the mod community will fix it and they do. Um, but I'm going to fix it in a week. Andy, I swear to God, it might as well have been like the day of.
00:22:26
Speaker
I know. So yeah, it's there are still some core Bethesda problems with this game. I still think it's a good game. Honestly, it's in the scheme of like Bethesda games. This is certainly going to rate higher than Fallout 4.
00:22:42
Speaker
Sure. I don't know if it's going to eclipse fall three. I think it could. But I don't know if it's going to hit kind of the the highs of of Skyrim, where it's like ubiquitous to gaming. You know what I mean? Which I mean, which is not a fair comparison. Skyrim is like light is like catching lightning in a bottle. Like they got so lucky with that. I don't think they'll ever necessarily get that lucky again.
00:23:08
Speaker
Um, but yeah, I mean, I, I would say if you have any passing interest in Bethesda RPGs in space stories, in multiverse stories, I think starfield is a fun play and I would highly recommend playing it, but go in with clear eyes of what you're getting. And would you recommend it without mods? I mean, there's certainly people playing it on console.
00:23:32
Speaker
Um, I guess it depends on how much shit you're willing to take. I, again, you can get it on game pass for 15 bucks. Right. If you don't have game pass or trials, like the trial used to be $2. I think they bumped that up now to be a little more, but, um, you can get PC game pass for, I think like eight 99 a month. So you could try it that way and see if you can live with how normal it is. And then
Technical Aspects and Conclusion
00:23:58
Speaker
if you can't know the mod communities there. So.
00:24:01
Speaker
There we go. Well, I'm glad it turned out well. It's no Baldur's Gate. But it's not. It's not. And that's a real shame. We already have Baldur's Gate, though. I know.
00:24:13
Speaker
Baldur's Gate's writing and everything is just so good, and it's... Was Bethesda ever good at... Let me try that again. Was Bethesda ever good at stories? Or is it just that like, I can go anywhere? I mean, there was being a story game is Fallout 3 New Vegas, which wasn't made by Obsidian. So, I don't know. I think they're...
00:24:36
Speaker
They are very good at creating a sandbox and creating stories in it to give you just enough push, I think is what they are good at. Has there been any fun bugs? I remember when Skyrim came out, everybody was like, oh, the bugs. I will actually say this. This is the most bug-free Bethesda game I've ever played.
00:24:54
Speaker
I don't think I've, I don't think I've had a crash. I don't think I've had, and this is, I've been running like 20 mods at this point. Um, I don't, I don't, I've never had a crash. I've never had like a stall. I had like one or two quest things where it's like, Oh, this person will talk to me and I had to reload my save. And then they talked to me just fine. So that happened. But honestly, that's pretty light for a, but that's the release. So Microsoft really whipped them into shape with that extra year of like cleaning up their bugs.
00:25:23
Speaker
I wonder what who's the guy who was disappointed in Starfield when they said they had a delay. What's his name again? Phil Spencer. That was Phil Spencer. Yeah, that's the head of Xbox. What he's thinking. I wonder if it was enough for him. I wonder if it met internal testing or whatever. I mean, I was I would think they would hope for a 90. And again, I think if you could tell people about the multiverse content, I think you could probably get over that hump, but you can't.
00:25:52
Speaker
And, and also it very depends on how much shit people are willing to put up with in terms of the UI technical level of Bethesda. I can mod it away, which not everyone can do, which is fair. So, well, good deal. Well, thanks for sharing your thoughts. Thank you, Andy. And this, I'm not doing it. Okay. And this has been a mini episode of add to party, a small friendship simulator.
00:26:21
Speaker
masquerading as a tiny game news show. I've been your, I've been your space faring host, James Hartwell, and I've been joined by Charles Jamot and I'm joined by Andy, uh, grounded and, um, content. I don't need to go into space. Is there anything in space I like? Oh, Zeno saga's in space. Dude, give me some robots on crosses. Then I'll play star field.
00:26:49
Speaker
Don't worry, the mods community will take care of that. You're saying there's going to be robot girls in heels? Let's go. I mean, Andy, if it's not already there, I would be shocked. Oh, thanks. Agreed. Bye. Bye bye. Bye.