Castle Super Beast - CSB329: Don't Tattoo Me I'll Cum

Episode Date: July 15, 2025

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["Sailor Moon Theme"] My favorite part about last week is how absolutely nothing happened. That was so... So I want to give you show credit, like public show credit. I think you tweaked the format super good for guests. Thank you. You did a really good job. Thank you, thank you.

That is the guest format debut. Yeah, do you wanna talk about stuff that happened this week? The date says it happened last week week but it really happened this week? I just threw the big stuff that was sitting there from two weeks ago in and it's just a pile. And there's more than enough to get into quite frankly. Our cup runneth over so you know. There's some topics that I think I'll have to put

till perhaps maybe next week, because it's been pretty busy regardless. For example, I have not seen Superman yet. Have you seen Superman? Okay, I'll talk about that when I go see it. I don't even know when I'm gonna have time to go see it. But you do have to see it, because it's Superman and that's content for you. Yeah, but I can just wait for it to hit the fucking Netflix, man.

Yeah, but right now. I haven't like screamed to go out into a theater for like since before Corona. But everyone wants to see you come back on camera and be like, oh no, I liked it. I am literally looking at an edit of Dr. Manhattan on the moon going. It's October 22nd, 2013. And I'm listening to Pat rant about Superman on the super best friend cast. It's March 29th, 2016, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Do the bit. And people are like, we need a bigger meme template because it just keeps like factoring today. I didn't see the movie. It's not long enough.

Yeah, yeah. I've heard good things. I've heard good things. I've ironically heard really good things. I've heard great things and I want to go investigate those things. And I also saw a line that was, it feels like something that would be used in other places, but you know in this context it was The his superpowers are the least interesting thing about him, and I'm like yeah, okay. That's what I like to hear I don't I've that I don't know if that's been used elsewhere and other superhero movies

But I'm definitely like most interesting thing about Superman is Lex Luthor. I Mean a good Lex a good Lex can be incredibly compelling. I'm having people crawl out of the walls to tell me, yo Pat, you're going to love this Lex Luthor. I'm like, no. How petty can we get? How fucking petty? We need the most, the most pet. I want a Lex Luthor that would create a restaurant called Superman's and staff it with bad chefs Just to hurt his brand image

Yeah I just think that like as the world itself gets more pathetic and pettier our Fiction needs to move the needle that much further You know you need you need to shock us with things that go beyond what is actually happening in real life. So I need to get back to satire being outlandish satirical perhaps if our satire can be satirical you maybe Yeah. Oh boy. Well, on to car. We had Yeah, I, I had a week, some stuff was going on. I'll

jump in and say that I have finally finished my little tattoo project. I saw, it looks really good. Thank you, thank you. I was, you know, obviously over the course of months, people have been seeing my arm fill up with shit and have been like, what's going on there? And I'm like, I'll talk about it when it's done. And now it's done. And it took quite a while over the course of this year

to go find somebody that I trusted for the project and to get all these ideas in place and coordinate them in a way that made sense. But yeah, I'm very happy with like what happened and the result there. The finishing touches in particular, I had a, so big shout outs to Fabio, a tattooer. Fabio is from France and I've been working with him for most of this year on a lot of the designs and things. Some of the stuff that came in over the last month was Caddo as well, was just a tattooer that was here for literally like three weeks. And I just kind of went like, OK, let's do what we can in that time.

And he did the shivers on one side and the vagabond panels on the opposite side. And yeah, an incredible job with that. And then Fabio took care of just the circuit board, the third strike, the Neo Geo circuit board, the patterns of just the overall geometric stuff. And then he did a Legend of the Galactic Heroes stuff as well. That was just like, it's just a big excuse so that you're never too far from a panel or a picture.

So you can go, hey, hey, what? I'm showing off my arm. Oh, what's that? What's that? I'm reaching for that over there. Well, let me tell you. What's that? Yeah. Yeah. You know, there's a? What's that on my body? Reaching for that over there. Well, let me tell you. Oh, what's that? Yeah, yeah.

You know, there's, I've wanted- Oh, you see. I've wanted tattoos for a long time. It certainly helps when you're putting up your boxing guard if you can have a little cool little thing going, or whatever, but no, I do, it's been a long time. I've wanted to just have a fucking cool inked up vibe.

It's been, and I'm like, okay, cool, got that done. And I was definitely like, I want to get that done before she gets here. I kind of want to take care of that side quest for me before other major responsibilities arrive. So that was a part of it too. And you know, there was a, I think I kind of described this a little bit in the past, but like after doing a big, massively meaningful thing

on my back, it's kind of like, okay, and now we can let the bullshit gates open a little bit and just put some fun stuff in there that, you know. Let's just put some weeb shit all over here. It's all meaningful to me, and I can sit and talk somebody's ear off if they were interested in what the things are about and why I like them,

but the fact that they're based in fiction automatically puts them a couple tiers down from something based in reality that was the more important first piece I did, you know. But yeah, that shit's cool. That's dope. Now to work on how to grab the shirt and yank it off in one fell swoop, you know? Well, the trick to that is really you just have to not give a shit about the shirt at all. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And you need to pre-cut it. Yeah.

The problem is also, well, OK, pre-cutting the shirt and pulling it off in one fell swoop can be practiced. What cannot be practiced is the sense of shame as you blob and as your gut makes a noise. Oh, as everything just expands. As your gut makes a noise and lands into place as it settles. You never see Kiryu having his gut settle.

I'm just thinking of you going to the beach and doing the move and some 10-year-old looks at your tits and goes yo that Recoils, what the fuck is happening there? Yeah, you know that it's it's Back sure thing. No problem. I am NOT getting thug life on my stomach You know, I I do I did say I've said many times the secret is Rick Ross He just got huge and tatted so hard all over his big body that it doesn't even matter.

It's just an art piece, you know? I can't see nothing but a walk in canvas. Yeah, yeah, so, yeah, it's, and you know, we've known, I've known, we've all known forever. If you've been big for a long time, like I have, you know that like the true secret Is to not give a fuck right and you learn the hard way because you know at some point when you're Younger and like you you're like, okay

How what are the how can I approach this pool in a way? Where you don't want to be shirt kid in the pool, right? That's horrible. Don't do that You know, but if you find be shirt kid in the pool right that's horrible. Don't do that You know that if you find out short kid in the yeah short kid Sure kid, but it was for a different reason and the reason was this this fucking horrible anti-melanin skin, okay? Okay, yeah, I might take 40 minutes to fucking Yeah, lather my whole self up so falls off in 10 seconds. Yep understandable For the most part shirt kid in the pool is like, no, we all know what you're doing there.

And it's a rough look. And if you do it, and then if you do it once, you kind of realize how it's like, oh no, that makes it look worse. Don't do that, okay, fine. So then you become Shirt Kid up until the last second before I jump in the pool, right? Like shirt is coming off as I'm in midair.

Right? You finally- Luckily the refraction in the water will distract. I mean, listen, it's rough out here. You know, the shave is brutal. It's not good. Learning to let go and not give a fuck is quite difficult. And the person who's just ultimately like,

yeah, it's there, who cares? Fuck it, that's my body is living life and enjoying it. But it takes a while to get there. You know? I brought this up with Reggie before on other recordings, but it's just like, I heard a bit with a comedian that was like, you know the big guy, untuck your shirt move, where you like,

pulling your shirt out move? That thing, like when you're fat, you do that so often that you could be crossing the street and see a child about to get hit by a car and you will pull on your shirt before you save the child. It's like, it's crazy, you know? So knowing how bad that is, it takes work to get used to being like nah, fuck it, but it's brutal.

But now you've got cool tattoos all over. Yeah. Just put the camera behind me, not in front and we'll be fine. Anyway, that project is done for the moment. I have other fun ideas that I'd like to do in other places, but I'm gonna let that settle for a little bit I Have some fun Potentially more painful spots I could target but we'll get there when when when the idea strikes You learn a lot about about meditation and pain though, I'll tell you what you really do get to know yourself Oh just disassociate. Just go to your trauma zone and unfocus your eyes and just leave

your body and then just come back later. Yep, that works. I can confirm that works. Getting porked up, getting all hot and bothered, just putting yourself in some good old memories, hitting the Rolodex, that can work too. Whatever can distract you, I swear to God. Even a... What? I am literally, there's that one point where my body, there's that one point where my body's in so much pain that I'm like think of the best moments

You've had in your life, and I'm literally thinking of great memories of fun times that have happened And I'm like trying to get anywhere away from my mind to not feel the pain and that actually helped Does that make sense? You talking about fucking dating back to your goon memories while getting a fucking tattoo? I'm talking about thinking about good times that have happened to literally try to get your brain going elsewhere when you're feeling the pain at its worst. Yes, thinking of sex, that's literally what I'm talking about.

Well, this is why is this what is I'm just this is a really awkward scenario I'm dead serious like you're you're you're whatever you can and at that point There's a point where that stops working too, right? There's a point where like you're just kind of, especially when your body's at maximum tired, right? I'm just being real. And there- You're just saying what everybody else is too scared to say. I'm just saying I'm being honest, right?

You thinking of like disassociating whatever like your fucking memories are. I had that, right? I had that. I had this. And at one point, and then at certain points you kind of just do thinking of nothing, right? You do the just actual meditation, just breathing, thinking about your breath. And when you think about your breath, you kind of notice that inhaling actually makes it hurt more than exhaling for some reason, you know? There's just little, little, little things like that that you get to kind of, and then you can

interface with pain in a way where you can go, it feels like you can go under it or over it, it's a hard to describe thing. But anyway, the point is that I even at one point kind of relaxed myself into like falling asleep while I was getting inked. And it was like, that was nice. Cause I was like, oh, this is great. I mean, I have a really nice endorphin like spot going here.

And I kind of was like, okay, I can almost like nod off and lean into it. And I did. And I was like, okay, awesome. And then I had a little sleep twitch and the artist was like, whoa. And I was like, fuck, nothing happened is okay. But I was like, shit. is okay, but I was like shit

You mean a hypnagogic jerk. I like you know you do you ever get like while you're sleeping falling asleep one Yeah, no, maybe but just sometimes when I'm falling asleep or yeah, not in my mid-sleep, but like falling asleep Are you a little huh that yeah, that's called a hypnagogic jerk, okay? It's it's your your fucking your Your your body misfiring, your nervous system. Probably because you're getting fucking stabbed. And it like, the artist was like, yo,

and I was like, oh shit, okay, don't use that technique. It's good, but if that happens, that's very bad. So and then yeah, you know, I just, all these different ways of dealing with it. I would definitely say the tier list is just, at the least effective is, yeah, just focusing on breath. And then gooning is like third place. I'd put second at trauma memory.

Yeah, just leave. Trauma memory is very, very strong. And if for any reason it's connected to what you're feeling, great. You're above the situation. You're in a different location entirely. Yeah, and then first, of course is like if you can zone out to the point of passing out But there's the risk of the jerk. You know I have a I have a fifth Solution to this

Which is what would happen to me if I sat down to get a tattoo? Where he would put the needle in and I'll go ow that hurts fuck this. I'm a pussy bye Would put the needle in and I'll go ow that hurts fuck this I'm a pussy bye There is that there is that that is that's true, too What the fuck was I thinking? The the what is nice though is that like the ouchy parts are mainly the you know thinner areas so the pit of your of your elbow and like the back part and stuff but like the the meat the meat is fine you barely feel the meat when it's getting you know drawn on so anyway that was that was some of it and yeah I I want to just give big credit and shout out to, again, that is Fabio at Fabiotattoos

on Instagram. Huge, huge, awesome job done by him. CaddoTattooer as well. And Phil Dragash, the artist that helped me with a lot of the composition putting this together. Phil also helped me with putting lot of the composition, putting this together. Phil also helped me with putting together the art of my sister for the back piece. So I've just grown to trust him with putting together

a lot of stuff that's on my body at this point, and he's been incredible for that. So huge thanks to him as well. Yeah, ever since doing thumbnails back in the day for the old channel, I was just like, okay, your shit is sick. Let's go. Let's do it buddy um Beyond that, uh, I got to play a couple games Uh last week as well before we had um

Kali on that I didn't get into because we didn't have as much time for it But one of them was dead as disco Dead as disco. I think I saw you play. Yep because we didn't have as much time for it. But one of them was Dead As Disco. Dead As Disco. I think I saw you playing that very briefly. Yep, yep. This is a, this is Woolly Core. It is a rhythm-based, amazingly stylish game. And the direct comparison point is Arkham Combat.

Oh no. On the music, on the beat, to the rhythm. And I fucking loved it. It is, a lot of the aesthetic is like kind of pseudo-coded as well. Some of the characters and some of the vibe feels pseudo-51-ish. It's super, super cool.

It's only a demo that's out for now. So you can just do the tutorial, you can do like one. Oh wow, that's super, super cool. It's only a demo that's out for now. So you can just do the tutorial. You can do like one. Oh wow, that really is Arkham Combat. Holy shit. Mm-hmm. And the preview for what the full game is gonna look like is, I'm super on board.

But the most important feature in this demo is the ability to load in your own music, set the BPM, and fight to it. That's a cool idea. It's great. Definitely worth a quick, you know, peak, you know, half an hour or so of content in the game in the demo right now. But the proof of concept is extremely powerful between hard soft moves, counters, dodges, light attacks, heavy attacks, couple special moves.

You know, you just, you get a flow that gets going and dodging ranged attacks from a distance and kind of moving the way in close to them. So that's Sifu rhythm, you know? But obviously like Sifu, you're just going for maximum like style and efficiency, you know Arkham You have the parts where? Whoa, whoa, whoa, what what's going on? What nothing?

Well, what happened nothing I'm just laughing, okay Yeah, it's it's super good and I would say too as well that the fact that it's on the music and on the rhythm where you're waiting for that to act on it and of course, the first time around with Arkham not realizing that hitting the wrong buttons in between the prompts and the whole, my whole, my whole arc, my whole Arkham struggle, you know, of, of not quite understanding what the combat was there. Yeah. In this case, I think with the music and everything like that, I'm like, okay, no, I, I 100% get this from the jump and it makes a ton of sense. the The the the end I loaded up

Six black heaven guns from the guilty-gear soundtrack and just kind of that vibe was was immaculate What every game that I've ever played that it's like put your own music in right? I always have this like fucking massive hole in my gut where you're like, okay I'm gonna pick like a song I like but maybe it's not like I don't know the most common or has a simple BPN I'm I always like worried that I'm gonna put it in is like oh cool the song that I picked Plays like shit it it yeah playing audiosurf all that Yeah, it might it might The game is dead as disco. It might happen, but fortunately,

because you can load things on, you just pick another song, I guess. Get the right BPM going and see what fits. Not everything will, but there's a couple of moments in Six Black Heaven Guns where as you're getting to the breakdown, dun, dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun, and you're hitting and kicking and punching on the beat with every part, it feels amazing, you know?

I'm super excited for the final product on this. And yeah, I guess the only other thing I'd say is like, when we played it, some of the music was so good But it was covering real music like there's an amazing cover of uh, she's a maniac You know and I was like, oh no, please don't let this get flagged Please be streamer safe and I think it was in the end But I don't know if everyone's gonna put in the amount of work that uh, hi-fi rush did To make sure that the amazing soundtrack that you play, Stream Safe, is also as good, you know?

Supposedly, Tony Hawk 3 and 4 just came out with a full soundtrack for Streamer Mode. Wow, okay, yes, yes, yes, yes. That being said, even, like, one of the things that's really frustrating to me is it'll say, Streamer Mode, and so look, we have a bunch of non copyright songs I'm like yeah but that didn't stop some fake Russian persona company for claiming all of them anyway yeah yeah or whoever a different youtuber who just got to the cutscene first I think my brain is ruined in the sense that even if I'm playing offline for myself and I hear something really really licensed I'm gonna have a panic reaction first

Like I've been playing Death Stranding and the the flags copyrighted music on Twitch so often Twitch no longer auto publishes my VODs Like fucking stop it and I'm like no, I'm not gonna fucking stop it I'm gonna put it up on YouTube where Sony is gonna eat the fucking profits off the ads that run on it yeah like fucking just leave just leave me a version up on an upload somewhere that isn't muted that's all I need at this point yeah I don't know if the if the James Stephanie Sterling tech of putting so many conflicting flagged things into the video that none of them can be claimed still works. Well, no, it'll still claim them and Sterling was never able to get revenue. But the point

is that they're all fighting each other so that nobody gets the revenue. I believe, right? But sometimes things go into the auto split even before they go into the like denial I mean shit even for things that are currently sponsored or I'm like you sponsored me. What why are we fighting? It's really funny It's really funny because I've been uploading the death stranding parts like within like 10 minutes of the streams finishing like like immediately like Here's here's the part. Here's the part is the part and like the other night I finished it like two in the morning And I saw a fucking skeet at me at like four in the morning going why aren't the vods up?

And I'm like are you fucking serious? serious motherfucker Fucking go to bed Holy shit, yeah, it's different I'm I'm Taking the the extra steps to like cut this up into episodes and and you know Separate it so that are my voice is separate from the game means hey whatever

I can put clown fart music to replace whatever gets claimed if need be yeah, you know clown fart music to replace whatever gets claimed, if need be. Yeah. You know? Anyways, though, Dead As Disco was really, really cool. I highly recommend everyone check that out. Art is also immediately on fire. Character designs are fantastic.

The other thing I played was, did I talk about Might Rea? I feel like I did talk about Might Rea. OK, OK, yeah. That was really, that was good. And then yeah, Mecha Break, of course. We did the sponsored streams for that, but I like how that game is, just yeah, I like how it's shaping up and how it's turning out.

I like how there's a good original, like yeah, just online Zoe vibe thing a good original like yeah, just online Zoe vibe thing that you can jump into and I I Would like to see Them cross the line and get in some like guest robots? Absolutely not. I think it would be cool. I violently disagree with you. I think it would be cool. But here why I'm saying it like this.

Because there is a point where you open up the floodgates and oh no. It just gets taken over and it becomes the new Super Robot Wars style thing. You know? But I, Skins, yes. Like, put Romboral's special goof on Welkin. That's fine, that's fine. Yeah, yeah, Skins is fine. But not like Bespoke Robots.

I think that would be a fucking terrible idea. Skins is totally fine. I just kind of have that little thing. It's just that like, oh, the things I love doing cool shit is there. And I'm kind of like, yeah, you know, you can get enough customization going on these robots to make them look like the things you want to look like anyway. You can get pretty fucked. You can get very close with that panther, but it would just be fun to have some to hear, you know, Camina yelling from the cockpit

while I'm unleashing Panther's drill. I'm super torn on that because on the one hand, I think that yes, that is cool. And on the other hand, I look at something like Dead by Daylight, which has become totally dominated by guest characters. Licensed skins, yeah. become like totally dominated by licensed characters. Yeah. I don't, and that's, this is why I'm, this is why I'm not so fully yelling about go do it. That's why I'm like, I can understand how it can go too far and just become about this, you know, when it's like this month tune in for the specific Gundam series of things and

you know, they're limited and it's now, yeah, it's all about the guest content as opposed to the original content you know especially if it's a new game and these robots are by some of the designers of these legendary series right Xenoblade. I feel like you're halfway there already. Yeah no the the the the designers here are like famous for these incredible famous these incredible robot designs we love anyway. So the originals are amazing and absolutely deserve that spotlight in their flowers as well. I don't want any of that taken away.

It's just, yeah, little fun cosmetic skins would definitely. And you know what too? Let's be real, it turns heads. You know if you do get your fucking your goof color or if you get your you know, if you even just the the Whatever the whatever the the I don't know if you I guess you could talk to Licensing to get like the the plane. I forgot the jet one but like Takara Transformers licensing, you know, or something like you can know you're thinking of Falcon and it's like that is Starscream. That's what I'm saying is you can literally publish published Japanese Transformers content,

you know, and like you could you could reach out and get one one or two of those little cosmetic skins going if you wanted to, you know. Anyway, it could be fun. I was really, really impressed, and I mean really impressed with the full release of Mecha Break, where I put some time in all three modes and all three of them were fully unique, excellent modes. Like Team Deathmatch and Objective were both really good. And that weird-ass Smash Mac mode is so much better and more interesting than I was expecting, considering it's the extraction game type that is now going to be everywhere and suck ass.

This is a really, really good extraction game type. Yeah, it looks like from last year, they figured out the 6v6. They got that balanced and going, and they kind of went, okay, they figured out the 6v6, they got that balanced and going and they kind of went, okay, let's do the 3v3. And then they just spent a bunch of time on this other thing and that kind of replaces your single player in a way. They also didn't, there's a little bit of that demo where you could walk around the ship and I don't know how much that's going to be, but they did hint at a shooting gallery

where you could aim and just manually Like, you know do pilot based activities That makes me think if you're just watching your your little dude jump in the robot you want to talk about fucking cosmetics You get every single pilot from every single series to just be the one to talk about cosmetics jump in the fucking robot Single series to just be the one to talk about cosmetics jump in the fucking robot Creating a lady character versus creating a man character in that game. Oh, oh you mean You mean which plug suit girl you can set up as an Ava alternate Character versus like the cosmetics on the dudes are so bad

They don't like if you put the hat on it overwrites your fucking hair and your facial hair into a default Why are you making a man idiot? Obviously, this is for the jiggle Talked about this and I was like maybe it's just me but like I'm not I'm not like desperate to goon while I'm playing my robot game. Yeah, well that's you. I guess it is me. I wanna play with my robot toy. I mean, it's just- I don't wanna have to move my controller to get around my fucking throbbing erection when I'm trying to win in mashmacks from the dawn of time when the major Kusanagi was

straddling that tachy coma ass up There were robots and there was booty and people had feelings about those things Okay, just so you know Yeah, no it is it, it is not even funny how much they clearly don't give a shit if you're not making a girl character. It's dancing on that line.

It's dancing on it. Like the defaults are existing Evangelion characters, which is the funniest. Yeah, and you also, and then also you see the special outfit you put on is essentially like, it's a like, ZAFT, not a ZAFT uniform, it's like a Federation, Earth Federation, you know, white uniform with the beret on the side and everything. And you're kind of just like, yeah, they also know that you, the next thing you want to

look like is part of the space army. You know, you want to be in your space military thing. And I imagine more of those types of abilities and outfits. All the plug suit colors and stuff are there. Second is you get those. And then third, you can get some of that kind of like, I kind of like the Macross pilot look, where you look kind of like Air Force.

You've got some of the straps and a bit more of a retro style helmet. Yeah, I could see a lot of fun with the dress up on that but the the priorities are have never been more clear. If you offered me a button that just said delete all pilots I would just hit it I don't give a shit. I'm here for robots man. Just throw a fucking AI bucket. The only reason they're pilots in that game is for secondary customization sales. Mmhmm. Mmhmm. That's it.

Mmhmm. And you know, I spent some time, I took a look, I was like, yeah, I'm gonna stare at this person as they get into the robot, and every time they do a little taunt, you know, they do a little, haha, I killed you, thing, you're like, yeah, it's part of the cosmetic, so whatever, you know it's never gonna be like Titanfall again you know where like the two things matter because you're they're a part of you and you're seeing them all the time you know yeah also the custom the custom characters aren't as interesting as bespoke characters if you could if you're picking like but I would

rather have a bespoke character for every robot so I Think that's cool, too. Yes, I actually if you make it and you can customize that yes Yes, if you buy a hundred percent if you have a character designed for that is the pilot of the welkin You know yeah, that would be really cool. I would love that too And they do do that. It's just it costs $50. Oh I didn't I didn't see that. There's like there's bespoke pilots with bespoke skins for the certain robots There's one for Falcon and it's like 50 bucks. Okay, okay

Because I'm thinking of like tech romancer where it's like here comes wise duck It's the big American military suit and there's three army dudes inside like yeah army you know and then there's your your you know Koji Kabuto analog who's jumping around in his like super robot as well with spiky hair and he's full of burning hot vigor you know and I'm kind of yeah, I could see the fun of like having a set character that you love that's a part of this too. Not to mention, I don't, I mean, just the ability to like, it's crazy I'd imagine, but aesthetics are thing moments where you could have the pilot like hop out and taunt,

you know, as part of the gameplay would be fucking sick besides the wind pose. Anyways, fun stuff with Mecha Break. And yeah, I played a card game that was pretty fun. And it was one of those ones where there's a board game this like board game bars that we have and one of them is Randolph's is pretty sick. You can go and sit down have some drinks. I've talked about it from time to time. And I found that like, when I go there, oftentimes I walk away going like, oh shit, I think I want to Amazon.

I think I just want to buy that one. And in this case, I got one. It's called Red Flags. Really fun. No, not Yu-Gi-Oh! I talked about Yu-Gi-Oh! We got in there. Vanquish Souls is cool.

But this time around, I'm talking about just a actual card game as in just normal, you know, whatever, sitting around having a beer antics. Red Flags is a really fun game. It's following the Cards Against Humanity formula that is basically two funny things putting them together, you know. It's funny because like Apples to App apples should really get the credit for that. That was the first game I ever saw that did it. But they just weren't raunchy. Or as the cards against humanity was. Yeah, let me just confirm is anyone going to the door?

Okay. Hold on. Sorry. Oh no doors. Good. Okey-dokey. Nope. Nope.

Doors answered. Nevermind. We're good. And in this case, yeah, it's like. Okie dokie. No, no, door's answered. Never mind. We're good. And in this case... Yeah, it's like, look, I invented this game and then someone else came along, it's like, what if I invented the same game, but instead said, Oh no, I shit out a lot of cum. I win. Yeah. Or you know, you just make rent. Just exactly. You just add cards talking about taints and Rush Limbaugh's shitty soft body and all of a sudden billion

dollars, you know? That was the problem. And furthermore, games are coming out now that are clean, but then they add the raunchy add-on DLC pack, you know, where you go get the extra cards that are, ooh, naughty. It was a great idea. And in this case, what you're basically doing is one person is trying to date the other people around the table, and you have to picture your best qualities so you have a bunch of cards that are green flags essentially, the good things about you and you get handed a bunch of things that are, some are tame, you got your patience, reliable, you can be courteous, and then there's stuff that's like, I got a card that says

I'm a famous writer or it says I'm blind to all your faults, you know? There are cards that are said that say you can, I believe you're the most attractive person in the world or I'm a pilot or I know all the words to your favorite theme songs. And that's a really strong one to have on the green card side. You're like, damn, that's cool. I'm a pilot is a red flag, dude. If I. And those guys are disgusting sluts. That's a terrible flag.

If you're attracted to pilots, it could be a green flag for you. Yeah, I mean, there's also green flags in the list that say, like, I'm a CEO and I'm like, OK, fuck that. That's it. That's it. So whatever whatever it's oh, there's a red flag. Yeah. Well, that's what I'm saying, right? Oh, you mean a sociopath, right? Yes I gotcha. No you you eat you need orphans Oh, yeah a mecha pilot. How about that, right? Oh, they got damaged. They got mental brain damage. I Like I think when we were playing...

Sorry, there's pilots in the chat. They feel targeted. Well, fuck. Punchmobile we were playing got a card that was like a female professional wrestler. And I was like, that's awesome, right? But then while you're pitching, the people next to you, their job is to then go, okay, hold on a minute though, before you say you might date this person,

have you considered that while they are reliable, and while they do believe you're the most attractive person in the world, they also can only eat out of someone else's hand. Right? Oh, that's... Oh, I hate it so much more than I thought I would when you said it. Oh. And you've got it now.

Oh, I hate it. As the person who just got that red card slapped on top of them, you've got to continue selling yourself. And you've got to pitch why that's not so bad. You know? Um, sure, I'm a famous writer, and I know all the words to your favorite theme songs. Sure.

But what if I refuse to cover my face while I'm sneezing you would you would you take that date so this is it's bad the people talk about yeah right Yeah, I got the ick off this, bro. Right. Someone slaps that card down and you go, Fuck! Right? Um, and the red flags, they range, you know, there's those ones, there's one that was like, a red flag is like, live streams your first date. Right?

Immediately. Or, and then there's the ones that's just like, is a literal serial killer? And you're just like, yeah, right, it says CEO, I know, got it. You know? But you have to then, and so it's your job to, as the person who doesn't know

what red flag is gonna get slapped on you, to be like, hey, hey, listen, all right. Sometimes it feels good to sneeze out violently in everyone's face out loud to not suppress it. That's a good thing. You should try it sometimes. Let's go out. I don't know.

God gave me that sneeze for a reason. Yeah't even I can't even devils advocate it I don't even know how to pretend that's a remotely acceptable, but you find a way to pitch it. You know oh, yeah No, you can pitch it. It's really easy You just in vacant invent a fake story Where you covered your sneeze, but it wasn't as effective and then so you got like beat up and you have trauma over it. Now unless you don't cover your nose you have a panic attack and shit yourself. Okay okay.

Well no that's actually another card you know so yeah. Gentle hands. Yeah you're thinking of like every time you nut you shit your pants you know. That's bad that's a bad one. That's not good. That's a really, that's, ooh, that's quite poor. That is, you know? That is lifestyle altering.

Yeah, yeah, you know? You gotta, you got, there is logistics that need to be figured out. And, and. You need to get a, you need to get a bag for that. You need to get a bag for that. You need to get security in the form of more than just a bag, my friend. No, no, I mean like a fucking intestinal bag. Oh, well, I was... No, you see, I was just thinking a diaper that had...

No. Yeah, no, a diaper with perhaps some... No, it's yeah, no a diaper with perhaps some snow. It's not good. No, it's but I don't Unless unless you're planning to nut directly into the diaper. It's not gonna work No, but that's the boy you're gonna cut a hole in the front of the diaper That's what that's the problem is that's why I'm saying like I fucking hate this podcast. No, no my god This is like the worst one in a long. It's not it's not good. It's not good. It's not good I think I think a diaper is bad. I think you'd have to figure out a way to

Facilitate the front Hey hollow live listeners, how you doing welcome to Castle superbeast I'm just saying that before listen a colostomy bag requires like massive like body alterations And a diaper is a is sucks, but if you can figure out the front And a diaper is a it sucks, but if you can figure out the front Then you can you can improvise the rest you know and you also you got to be with someone that loves you that Really loves you yeah, and is true love true love for Veil. You know they've got to be down with all of the rest Yeah, no

or of the rest, you know? Or, or, you literally just don't pick that person for that round and you pick someone else, you know? You just go, and for that reason, sharks, I'm out. You know, like it's done. I believe that some of those red flags are completely unwinnable, you know? Yeah, it's kind of a search in the list of like, okay, what red flag can I actually deal with yeah like genuinely yeah?

No, like there's there was nuclear flags that we kind of were just like if you were that we were holding on to We're just like okay if I need you to not win this round because you're getting close in points I need to just drop the card that says yeah, you've got all these good traits But you are literally six years old and it's just like yeah you're out. Scoop fold fold the cards you know I need you to not win and save you in this yeah it was it was um. And then you put that card down you look around the table and you just give me the eyeball Yeah, mm-hmm. That's an instant disqualifier, right?

Eyes bugging. No, listen, Red Flags was fun. And yeah, I got a copy, because I was like, yeah, that's a fun time to just, and it's also quick to understand, you know? You just kind of open it, throw everybody a bunch of cards, and then throw a bad one, and they go, oh no, and you get how to play right away.

So anyway, that's pretty much that. So yeah, tune into Woolly Versus on Twitch for nothing. That's crazy. But tune into Woolly Versus on YouTube, where Expedition 33 continues, as well as some of the research sponsored streams are going to be published as soon as we get the approval to do so. And yeah, I'm going to be doing life in the meantime.

That's what's up. Very, very important life stuff. What's going on? I'm going back over myself and like pretty much I played two things this week. One of which is I dove a little bit deeper into Uma Musumei, the horse girl racing game. So Paige streamed it and said Uma Musumei, like I don't know if she was joking or her accent came out, but ever since she did I literally can't stop thinking About um, I'm oh, Sam. I all right like some fucking appellate man fucking horse girl like me

Yeah, did did you graduate some horses? No, man, so I was talking to so you get to find out who in your in your circle Is horribly addicted to horse race gambling And for me, it's like a lot of people I know like a lot And you also discover just how fast Foxcade will respond to a DM if you put your horse code in it. Yeah Really fast Shane is fucking in there. Really fast.

Oh shit. Yeah. Yeah. He's on the meta. But as I've gone through it, it's a pretty enjoyable, charming roguelike. And the variability in the actual horsey racing thing, even if you're just watching it, is pretty exciting. The other thing is that, man, they are doing a really, really bad job incentivizing me to buy anything, which I really like. Because you're getting a lot of good stuff. Well, they're, they're, so, well, I don't know know, is Persona 5X's story on the docket this week?

No, I didn't catch anything. Okay, so Persona 5X and Uma Musumei came out nearly day and date, right, in America, and they're both on accelerated schedules because they're way behind the Chinese or Japanese releases. Yes. Right. Yes. So the umemusume thing is they got to catch up like four years.

So like when you go to career mode, they're like, career mode will give you double rewards for like 200 more days. Okay. And every single fucking day, the login bonuses have exploded and There's overlapping fucking bad and basically they're just yeah, are you throwing shit out? Are you getting that rune terra thing where you're like, oh, I don't even need to do anything Yeah, I've actually saved all of my horse girl carrots because I rerolled like a psychopath until I got super Creek off the one free voucher. Okay. But that's not important. Okay. But basically I've got like 14,000 carrots

just sitting there. So the basic deal is that they're like, if they're on an accelerated schedule, they're also accelerating the free rewards. Right? Which makes sense, because if banners are coming out faster, then you need more resources to get through them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Persona 5X was made by a Chinese company, and then Atlas is handling the rollout in America and Japan, and their solution to their solution to running the gacha at an accelerated pace is that Sega and atlas have

Slashed the free rewards by how fast they have Increased the pace compared to the previous release Yeah, so like that's the resources that people on the Chinese. Oh, that just feels bad for no reason. That's so like the Persona 3 collaboration is coming even earlier than it showed on the schedule. And people on the subreddit are like, I'm a free to play player. And under the game's normal schedule, I would have had like years to build

up to the P3 collab and now I think I'm going to have to spend money in order to get any of the things that I want and it's causing the game to just get fucking shit on. I'm just very bad. There's a part of me that's going, I can't believe that we're comparing the rollout for FOMO based gacha systems when they're like, the whole, yeah, I hate the whole idea, but if you're gonna be like cool about it, at least not have, at least don't make it so that the direct earlier version someone else has somewhere else is getting more and you can look and go what the fuck? Why are we not why are you following me even harder on the Chinese on FOMO based gaming?

Yeah, and like the the fucking the Chinese dev had to come out and be like that's not us That's atlas stop complaining to us, please which is dire. That's dire shit publishers decision Cuz I got just runs these games into the ground over and over and over and over with this shit They just they're too stingy. The other thing that I've been learning about playing the umamu Samai And talking to Fox Kaden mom who is very smart and very helpful Is that there's like almost no FOMA in the horse game? is that there's like almost no FOMO in the horse game. Because all limited banner characters just get dumped

into the pool when their banner is over. Oh, and they get- They don't go away, they just get dumped into the pool. They're obtainable. Same thing with the cards. Do their percentages change? Yeah, they get the base percentage. Okay.

And then the other thing is that the events always roll back I'll also Like the special week event that happened in the first three weeks. Okay, I'm gonna come back in like a couple months um Does endless do that? I okay, so nobody dumps their limited banner characters into the pool oh I hmm. I thought that Zen-less had a way. No, no, no, no. Okay, well, shit. Oh, Nikkei does it.

Nikkei does it, okay, okay. Oh, you know why? It's because of Cygames. Ah, okay. But the other thing, and this is the fun part, is that, so you know in fucking Hank Genshin or whatever, you roll 90 times and you're guaranteed at least a pity. No, but sure.

Okay, you roll 90 times. We've had this conversation before. Yeah, I've seen that in other games. Yes, I've seen it in Zandler's. I've seen it in Tekken even. Yeah, I know what you're talking about. And the pity is a 50-50 between the banner character and any other character of that thing. And if

you fail the banner character pity, then the next time you get a pity, it'll guaranteed be the banner character. So this leads to people going like, well, I know so-and-so is coming up in X amount of months. This means I need to build up 180 rolls to absolutely guarantee the character I want. Which can be a lot. That's like a year of currency. That can be like a lot. I'm flashing back to this conversation in Zen-less as well, actually. And then in the Uma Musume, the pity is if you fucking roll 200 times, they just give you a voucher to pick whoever

you want. But if you roll 199 times and don't, at the end of the banner they just turn all those resources into shop items and just let you buy things from the shop and it doesn't roll over. So nothing will ever go away. But. But if you absolutely motherfucking must have this horsey. Never back down.

Get ready to save up for 200. Keep going, don't stop. Which is 30K carats. It'll pay off if you never stop. Yeah, okay, I see. I will say that for however deep you're going Just always remember that you You can take solace

Until we show up and then you're you're talking about how the anime seasons are going Because that's the ultimate catch-up right like once you've done all there is to do You can dive into that umemusume anime. Well, there's there's definitely way to so the that's the ultimate catch-up right like once you've done all there is to do you can dive into that umemusume anime. Well there's there's definitely way too so the I'm playing this game on the toilet that's where the horse racing game lives it lives during my shits which I think is appropriate because horses there's way too much to do in this fucking game there's way too much like the idea of like oh when I've burned out all the fucking content, it's like, no.

I haven't even won the fucking, I haven't even beaten Haru's campaign. And I shouldn't have picked her first, apparently, because she's apparently the hardest of the base characters to win. But I think it's a little more subtle than that. I think it's more direct. I think it's like, hey, I want to see a little bit more special week. Where can I do that? Oh, here she is. Let's tune into the show and see what's going on. Let's hang out with our girls.

Don, man, there's a lot of dialogue in those campaigns. Okay. There's a crazy amount of fucking dialogue. We'll see. No, the real question is I want to see where that animated GIF is from, where Vodka is racing so hard that the entire character is just a smear that's like 10 feet long. Oh, are they doing the the Sakuga Speedline like new blorb melts? Absolutely. It was like because it's a race. It's it, cause it's a race, it's, it's fucking, um, it's a, what's it called? It's stock car racing, but with animals, right? It's a fucking oval. So when you animise

it, you gotta put your speed lines in your sparks and your smears and shit. I would love to see, um, well, yeah, matriculated was it the, uh, the Aon flux, like, uh, matrix running style, but just with the Uma Musume girls, just like muscles flexing, out running, out running the art itself. That being said, Wooly, if I want to watch that anime, it's not because I need more of these characters is because like, I want to see how dramatic you could possibly make running in a circle. Oh, you can make that very dramatic, I'm sure.

I watched, dude, I watched Days of Thunder a million years ago, and I couldn't figure out why I was supposed to be excited about any of the things that were happening. He's rubbing on me, he's rubbing on me. Yeah, fucking so what? Race your car. Yeah. Okay. You got days of thunder, but then on the other side of the spectrum, you've got red line and the speed racer movie. Yeah, that's true. But those are not stock car races or horsey races. They're they have tracks.

Yeah. I, I, I mean, it's, it's, it's the emotional push of the, of the, what the characters, you know, able to think and do as they're running and when they're deciding to unleash it all, even if it's a straight line or a curve or whatever the case is. Were you a part of the Donovan Bailey versus Michael Johnson like mania with Canada versus the US years ago in the Olympics. Nah. Okay. Because that was a big thing in my house and in my neighborhood and you'd be surprised.

You'd be surprised how it's just like, yeah, we're just running in a straight line, but that shit's exciting. Or Usain Bolt with the flex and all that stuff. Anyways, it was a time. What was the second? I remember Donovan Bailey, but I don't remember. So Michael Johnson was the American record holder for the relay, and he was part of the relay run.

And Donovan Bailey was the fastest man in the world at the time, and he beat the record for the 100. And so the idea was that if you take Michael Johnson's record for the full 400 meter relay and divide it by four, technically his numbers are faster than Donovan's 100. That's not how that works. That's not how that works. But that's what they were saying at the time that's so stupid it was crazy Right that is not Now you're there now you're let me now congratulations. I brought you there immediately

We were losing our minds. This is like 20 years ago, and it was insane and America was like nah But if you divide it in four though If that's how the cope was not have him run the hundred meters and just saw and just so eventually Because of all that shit and chirping. They're like fine One v1 on the track let's go and they were like were like, what, how far are we going to run? And they're like, oh, can we do it at a hundred? Because that's what this has started over. And they're like, no, no, because our guys used to the longer thing and it needs to now

be that. And then they're like, but you started this whole thing talking about dividing by four. So why not? You know? And so it went back and forth. And I think they eventually settled on 200. I think they just settled on They settled on 150. Oh, so 150. Okay. Yeah, they there you go. Right. Which we really won after Johnson allegedly injured his hamstrings.

So you watch the there's a whole build up a whole big spectacle. Everyone's there. They get on the starting line, the thing the gun fires and Donovan takes the fuck off and like It's that start that has like the sparks on it. It's such an insanely, you know and Immediate the lead is so immediate that Michael Johnson just goes. I'm a leg I pulled up I pulled up, you know, and he's like you and they go and he goes down and he's like yeah I know pulled up pulled a muscle. You know whatever and then dot of it It's just like he grabs the mic afterwards and just calls him a coward or whatever. He's like you're a chicken He didn't pull up. He said he track had had fucking lore

Diving oh, yeah, he don't know he don't he took he took a dive right away cuz he could he didn't get this the boost start He took a dive immediately and then dot of it was like get the fuck out of here, bro You know and then he knows that was it says I'm watching it right It's so funny this pulled a hand string shit is not like yeah He all my leg I pulled up instant he passed I pulled up. I pulled up guys. It was yeah Fuck this is the most embarrassing cope I've ever holy I've said fucking crazy. I'm so glad I brought you here all these years later. This was it. It was nuts I also if you wanted to make it fair you'd run a hundred meter

You'd run a 200 meter then you'd run a 200 meter, then you'd run 150 meter as a tiebreaker. You know, after... Bim bam, done. And this is also leaving out the night before, Michael Johnson was on, he was on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and he was yapping. He was talking all that shit. You know, dude was going off and just like whatever and and and Jay Leno

I believe at the time introduced him as the fastest man in the world. You know and you're like if you divided by four Well, I mean listen So upsetting so stupid guys viewers listeners. I love you guys, but it's so tiring So stupid guys viewers listeners. I love you guys, but it's so tiring I'm the fastest man in the world. I'm the best fighter in the world. I'm the world heavyweight champion of the United States Like Yeah, yeah Even down to sports entertainment is the world heavyweight wrestling champion of the WWE. Like really? It's like a roster of like 99% American.

Dude, I, you know, I love me. Um, a good old evil grand finals. And even then when they put on the evil thing, world championships and I'm like, if you can make it to Las Vegas, you know, come on. It's, it's the biggest event. The only way to make that fair, fair, fair would be to have like multiple events and then feed the winners of those into a all expenses paid trip to the final location. Top paid finals. Yes. And so that's what these like events like, you know, Tekken World Tour and Capcom Cup end up being is like, okay, make your points internationally and then we send you to the final location. Because yeah, if you can't make it to Vegas, then you can't get to the World Finals.

That's not the World Finals, man. Anyway, but yeah, that whole wave is talking about it, right? Is always been just like, okay, the World Series, right? You know, it's it's the World Series. Dude, so I don't follow baseball, and I don't play baseball. I would fucking kill to see the World Series just include Japanese. Japanese players. I would kill.

Right, right? Yeah. Because I'll tell you, I think Japan loves it more now. I think they love it more now. I don't think that's a question. I think that's confirmed. Yeah, no. At this. And you know what? Of course, if we're going to do America versus Japan on this,

I would like all of Central America to make their own teams also. I mean, the fact that they're sending scouts out to Japan to get your Japanese players to come back this way. And then same thing for China and basketball as well And you know what I mean? Like it's it's quite clear that no, no, no, there is a globe here But yeah baseball in particular with Japan is like I would I would love to see that Indeed Shohei Otani is who I was thinking of. So what uh... What else? No, I was going to say like what is your, who's your, what's the word for Oshi for your

umma? Oh, it's Haru Urarara. Okay, okay, she tries her best. Urarara, whatever her fucking name is. Fail horse. Okay, okay. You see- Fail horse that got so much specialty fancy grass Because everyone's supporting her now.

The donation website went down. That's amazing. Everyone's giving her all the grass in her retirement. And you know what? That horse hates pickles, and I hate pickles too. Okay, but I think it's a coin flip. I could have seen you going either way on that. I could have seen you also being like,

nah, losing means you shouldn't have tried That fail horse deserves nothing for failing the whole time you know like nah man She's a precious cinnamon bun the horse to the horse is adorable the bit the bit could have gone either way But I do love the idea of the real horse just getting tons of grass not knowing why in in the most Unshocking twist of all my wife's oh she horse is gold ship ah Which one was gold ship let me see oh the crazy one yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah the yeah the nut Biting biting people's hats off and shit

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm Unshocking drop kicker that umamu some is pretty good I'm gonna I'm gonna use all my my carrots on trying to get Kitas on black and if I don't get it I'm gonna go. Okay, I mean, I Mean now that I've gotten Rudolph, I'm like, Yeah, you gotta, yeah. I mean, what's next, you know? So here's the thing, when I re-rolled it,

and when I re-rolled my horsies so I could get Super Creek the card. Hey man. No, sorry, I made a joke for, It's real goo goo babies hours. I made a joke for absolutely no one. Anyways, go on. Oh, sorry. I just I made a joke for a real Google. Sorry. I made a joke for absolutely no one anyways go go on. I hate that. Like did you make the joke for no one and you looked at the chat and you're like oh shit it was for no you didn't even hear it. We're moving on. It's fine. Oh I didn't actually roll any horsies. I only have the five starter horsies. Oh.

Okay. Someone can get those cards first and then we'll see. Okay. It's really, really strange how disincentivized rolling on a horse in that gacha game is. It's fucking weird. Why? Because a horse, the change of any particular horse is what race they're good at and their

personality during their story mode. Whereas the cards are the actual gameplay altering mechanics. Oh, the support cards. Yeah. Yeah, okay. And so since all the horses just feed into the gigantic pool of horsies and you don't know if you like them before you get them, like you pull for the cards you want and then with your leftover shit you go, ah, roll on a horse.

Okay okay. I also want to see the part that Shane was talking about with like some people can be good at racing but bad at performing. I wanna know what that means. I don't know what that means. That's really interesting. How's the Kojumbo Gumbo? I have passed.

So it has an incredibly similar, okay, before we even start, have you played Death Stranding 2 at all? I didn't crack it and open yet, no. Great, okay. Just that helps me with where to go with this. I have hit the turning point. The game has the exact same exact same. Sorry, pause.

We are talking about Death Stranding 2. Yeah, Death Stranding 2. We let in with... Oh, we didn't say it! I said some stupid shit. I said it when I asked you to say it. Yeah, yeah,ing 2. We let in with- Oh, we didn't say it. No, I said some stupid shit. I said it when I asked you to say it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, all right.

Yes. Talking about the package simulator, Death Stranding 2. The game has the identical structure as the first game, like normal area, plains, rockier mountain, rockier mountain, mountain mountain mountain Right as a progression so I'm on I'm out mountain zone now And I have had a character literally look me in Sam's face and go you are 75% done Oh, yeah, okay, waking up the network. Okay, okay, so I'm pretty I'm I'm I'm trucking right and I'm I'm I'm trucking right and I've been thinking a lot about how I'm enjoying the game and how I feel about it and this is the least interesting game Kojima has ever made. Least by far like not even close.

You're throwing. I would say it's not. I would not say it's the worst game he's ever made, because I actually really strongly dislike Metal Gear Solid 4. Okay. You're throwing in... Metal Gear Solid 4 is super interesting! You're throwing in Metal Gear originals and... Oh, absolutely.

I just played those! Yeah, that's why I'm saying that. And Boktai? I haven't played Boktai. Okay. But Boktai's weird And Boktai? I haven't played Boktai. Okay. But Boktai's weird. Boktai's super weird. The main thing that I'm dealing with is that...

It's a safe sequel? Obviously, this is personal opinion. Like, a huge amount of Death Stranding's gameplay loop was carried by the level of confusion and... huge amount of Death Stranding's gameplay loop was carried by the level of confusion and obtuseness and strangeness of its setting, right? So I think about the Death Stranding trailer where you see the five figures off in the sky. And just that feeling of like, what the fuck is that?

And like learning about BTs and learning about void outs and repatriates and shit like that It can't do that again. No because you already played Death Stranding. Yes Nothing in Death Stranding 2 can even approach Being as weird or interesting as even the same thing was in Death Stranding 1 the first Death Stranding 1 it was brand new Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah, okay as a result a lot of the stuff in this game feels really safe And on top of that some of the stuff feels so safe as to almost be parody The Luca Baba to boopy sections where you fight the soldiers Are literally just three or four more cliff levels.

Like they're exactly the same. And the way that you get flashbacks to Luca's stuff while you hook in the BB pod, it's Luca instead of Cliff. Like it's- They're not twisting- Sorry, Neil instead of Cliff. They're not twisting it in any obvious ways yet.

Like it's exactly the same. Okay, okay, okay. It's exactly the same and it's kind of weird. The other thing is that, so it's one of the, this was a really interesting situation where I was talking to a couple of people and I was describing how I don't like how easy it is to drive everywhere. You can just drive, you can skyrim your way up a mountain with a truck. Once you get the roads clear?

Once you, once you. No, no, just right away. Oh. And the truck is a lot, a lot easier to maneuver as well. Like you can't, you can just drive through a bunch of rivers with them. is a lot easier to maneuver as well. You can just drive through a bunch of rivers with them. I was doing back and forth with people and the consensus seems to be that trucks and trikes and movement is just easier and more powerful. But part of that is because I already played through Death Stranding 1 and so I know how to use ladders, I know how to use the trucks, I know how to use the climbing ropes I know how to you know all of these parts of the gameplay loop I already know right and so what the game is supposed to put towards me is like new types of challenges that

Test that or different types, right? It's the same challenges with stronger tools Okay, okay, okay. It's like even easier. I gotta climb a mountain, but all of my tools are stronger and I have a bunch of new tools that are even stronger than the old ones. And you've already gotten proficient at the old way. And I'm already good at Death Stranding 1. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And as a result, I end up falling into this really, really weird trap where you chart out your route or you chart out, I'm going to go fight the mules or whatever. And then you go, okay, what tools am I going to bring with me? And I have tons of different tools.

I have a bunch of different climbing things. I have a cargo launcher. I have tons of different tools. I have a bunch of different climbing things. I have a cargo launcher. I have multiple vehicles. I have a third specialty vehicle, which is super weird, which I won't talk about. And on almost every single thing, I bring the generalized loadout of like the machine gun, two blood grenades, a stun bomb, some blood packs, one climbing rope, one ladder, and my fists. And the most effective way to fight human enemies

in this game is to sprint at them and drop kick them. It will knock out every human enemy in the game is to sprint at them and drop kick them. It will knock out every human enemy in the game in a single hit. Let's go. And it's like, yeah, yeah. Before even grabbing your other weapons. So like, yeah, we've been given like 10 times as many ways to solve the same problems. But the first things you get to solve those problems are the best things to solve those problems. Okay. It's really, really weird. So I kind of, I have a theory I want to posit

because I feel like when we go play, when we play Guess with Kojima, the expectation is typically that we're gonna get baffling narratives, but the gameplay will be recognizable, right? And in this case, could it be that like, almost in a way like, you can go baffling with the narrative, and there's a lot of different ways you can try to confuse people, but the setting has already been established for how weird it is and what's going on. If you are no longer using Konami's money, but your own studios, that your sequel decisions need to be a certain way.

Safer. Right? You need to make money for Koji Pro to be able to do this for years. And that might in turn, you know, influence how nutty we're going to get. I don't know per se, but I would expect like. I would expect that, like, yeah, there's some some element of Kojima wanting to keep you on your toes. Even that interview the other day from Woodkid being about like, yeah, he said it was too safe in the play tests, you know?

So I don't know what the hell that was talking about because one of the big things is environmental effects, right? So now rivers can flood and brush fires can happen and avalanches and rock slides can happen and there's also earthquakes, right? And you're supposed to be able to, there's like a weather system to see if these are likely to happen and you get alerts for earthquakes. They don't matter at all. Oh yeah, okay, weather.

They don't matter at all. I've encountered avalanches and rock slides, which I moved to the left and stood next to the wall and they missed me. I did a brush fire that I just walked through and you can drive through the flames apparently. The sandstorm happens all the time and you just plot your course on your map and just drive through the sandstorm.

And river flooding, all of the vehicles can just roll right through a flooded river. And it's just like... It's not enough of an obstacle. And I'm getting tons of cool toys and I'm really, really enjoying building up the larger infrastructure. But I'm enjoying that because I just like to see it all... I'm building my fucking model train set. If I had to say what the core of it is, is vehicles are too strong and you get them right away.

You get them in the first 10% of the game. And they remain excellent for the whole game. I drove up the side of the mountain on a trike. Okay. Is perhaps, I was going to say, is the geography changing in a way this time around that it The side of the mountain on a trike Okay is Perhaps I was gonna say like maybe is the geography changing in a way this time around that is like presenting new challenges No Okay

In fact the geography has changed in a way that has removed old challenges If I if I could like put my thumb into the game and turn something off and make a single design change, you get the zipline like 25% into the game. You get the zipline super, super, super early. In Death Stranding 1, zipline was one of the dead last upgrades you got. It was almost all the way at the end. And so it caused a really fucking weird situation where I'm climbing through the mountains and doing my mountain stuff on foot because I actually have to. And I unlock the network. And then they go, actually go over the mountain to the other side, because that's right, that kind of thing.

actually go over the mountain to the other side, because that's right, that kind of thing. You're flip-flopping. One that I ended up doing is climbing to the absolute tip-top of the mountain and lining it up to the edge of the network and putting it down in advance, so I could actually link it up to the place I was just at and Then when I do unlock that part of the network

I only have to place like two more back up the mountain and now I've already ziplined the whole area and now I've like Automated the trip to this location and so I'm actually only taking the trip to new spots once I'm never even taking the trip back. Okay, okay. You're just going through, yeah, once entirely, okay. Like, I am not even done with the mountain section and I have almost totally ziplined it up to completion. And I'm like, part of this is design, but most of it is that I still know how to do this

from Death Stranding 1. Okay. And, and And like I was expecting with all of these environmental things on the larger map and stuff like that that I would be dealing with more complicated delivery routes or more obstacles or whatever. This feels in terms of difficulty this feels like the first game and the second and the first game would be the second game In terms of because you have less today. It's harder. Yeah. Yeah, the challenge is increased. Mm-hmm Okay, and this is also like, you know with no without the deterioration as much you said there was like roads to or whatever Right, like yeah

I've built I built a road at the very the very first road in the game and it's been deteriorating over time over 55 hours It's gone from 100% to 60%. So I'm really not fucking worried about it. So, I mean, this has been a discussion for years in video games, but like, sequels do have this thing, right? Like, there's the- Absolutely.

That the, how do you raise the challenge, not present the exact same thing, keep it exciting, even though a lot of the surprise is gone, and, but you also want to you know you there's a there's a gulf between again flame lurker and consort Radon you know that we have to that we have to close here the other thing is that like the story is better told and worse. Hmm. The story is cleaner, quicker, more present,

more consistent, more understandable, and much less interesting. Because it's not an explosion in constant confusion and where you're learning about what the fuck the world of The Death Stranding is like. It's an endless barrage of character vignettes that are all very interesting. But it's like, it's the same structure as before, even down to like the way you get Heartman.

Is like the same, you go through the same scene with Heartman when you run into Heartman. Okay. So the world- Because they have to re-explain that he's Heartman. The world is already explained, so now we're just spending time on the specific character, stories and arcs that they're going through. The beats.

Also Higgs is like the worst character ever. Good worst or bad worst? No. Bad. Bad. Or bad worst no Like like he will probably rotate around to being so bad I love him But right now he is the worst He is so dumb and stupid I'm not not sold by what you're saying

He I'm not not sold by what you're saying He feels like Troy Baker trying to get another shot at Kai Leng Don't invoke Kai Leng, bro. Yeah, I'll invoke it. That's that's low Kojima's above Kai Leng That's brutal that's fucking brutal So, Kojima's above Kai Lang. That's brutal. That's fucking brutal. The other thing, and I will not name, you know what, hold on, let's just, let's just turn that off.

Okay. To Emoto, just in case. Okay, okay. I will not name the character. Okay. I have encountered the stupidest, like, I don't mean like badly written, I mean the objectively dumbest character Kojima has ever written, ever, by multiple orders of magnitude. In which, like, I have learned this character's backstory and it has made me hate them in a way that every time they talk from now on,

all I can go is, you're stupid. You're a stupid person. Okay. You are the dumbest motherfucker that has ever lived. Okay. Because it's everything is your fault type of thing? Yes. Yeah, okay, okay. All right, all right. No, you're like, you are an thing? Yes. Yeah, okay, okay. All right, all right.

No, you are an objectively dumb person. Okay, okay. In a way that ruins your life. Okay, okay. And it's crazy. Okay. It's fucking bananas. I cannot think of one that is dumber, ever.

I mean I'm racing, but okay. Yeah. Like just bad dumb decision, man as it were So I'm I'm nearly to the end so I'm gonna keep trucking I have to see where this is going It's just it's a super. It's a super safe sequel to the super weird not safe game. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And that is very disappointing. Huh.

I mean, do you literally just reinvent the wheel and the world for Death Stranding 2? Well, here's the thing. Maybe you just go to a different place entirely. you don't do a sequel right? Maybe you make a brand new game That's just not the thing but also you're like there as there's always that like hit the credits and see what happens, right? There's always that little absolutely I It's It's just this thing where I it's it's just this thing where

One cojumbo was like I can't wait to spread my wings and do weird stuff. I'm like, oh Death Stranding. That's super weird What are you gonna do for Death Stranding 2 the same thing? Again, the Death Stranding 1 and Death Stranding 2 are way more similar than any two Metal Gear games Death Stranding 2 are way more similar than any two Metal Gear games. Okay. Yeah, I getcha. I getcha. And he has remade those Metal Gear games into each other over and over and over. Death Stranding is more Death Stranding 1 than it is anything else. There's also something to be said for the team is familiar with the flow and can do the thing they've done better this time around in a more time efficient way as well for a studio.

But I thought that something like OD, for example, the new project, I thought that that was going to be Kojima's, Koji Pro's way of going about games is gonna be like big Hollywood original entries, self-contained to them, to each one. So yeah, even announcing the sequel and kind of being like, we're going to build up a franchise here was not what I expected. So I also, I spoke to two friends of mine who both are insane.

And after beating Death Stranding 2, both went, hey, I'm going to go through the director's cut of one again right now. And both came away going, oh, yeah, no, DS1 is significantly better. Hmm. And I was like, I can't believe you two are so fucking crazy that you went for it just to know. But then again, I can respect that. It's it's safer. Interesting. It's so safe. Interesting. Okay. Okay. Okay. And that's what's going on with me this week. Oh my god this week. I have so much fucking going on Let's see I need to go look at my own schedule on my own on my own broadcast thing to even tell you what's going on over

At twitch.tv slash Pat stares at today's the podcast tomorrow I'll be watching a streamer contest show called next brought brought to you by Progressive as a sponsored hashtag, sponsored watch party. Then there's Death Stranding, then there's a sponsored look at Fretless and Donkey Kong is coming out, then more Death Stranding and then TennoCon on Saturday. Ah, the latest with Warframe. Yeah, so basically I was talking up Rebecca Ford.

And Soulframe. She's an amazing, wonderful cinnamon bun lady. And I was like, Reb, you're doing a great job. You should feel good. And she was like, oh yeah, thank you, that's great. How's the baby? And we did that back and forth. And then she was like, oh, TennoCon's gonna be really good.

I'm like, okay. I believe her okay That's it Was Was soul frame like was there was there more going on with that There is gonna be a soul frame thing on more going on with that? There is gonna be a Soul Frame thing on... there is gonna be a Soul Frame thing on at TennoCon. It's a part of it, okay. But it's not gonna be the the Tenno Live which is the part that I'm gonna be tuning in for. Alright.

So with that, let's... Also I played the alpha of Soul Frame. That shit's far away. Far away. Okay. Yeah, I'm recalling last time that yeah, I'm remembering it wasn't super an exciting conversation when you brought it up last time. Yeah. Oh, there's a lot of Steve in that game. And if you know, you know, and if you don't, you

don't. The main thing is like, man, the the hatred towards vacuum continues. Very, very weird, very intense hatred of vacuum. I don't know what Steve's deal is. I hear the deep cuts and... Okay, you know what we're gonna do is fuck it. You don't have to, you don't have to. There could be a documentary written on the skill vacuum in Warframe and all it is is

That the radius that stuff gets sucked into your character in Warframe is too small. Oh Yes, yes, yes, it'd be like five feet. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah And so then eventually a mod called vacuum came out and the mod basically you could attach it to like a certain type of little Sidekick and it would increase that to like 30 meters so became the single most popular mod the game had ever used and by the way by the way when I say mod I mean into inside the game item not a not a modification of the game I mean like the items you equip are called mods and Warframe okay okay and then there was basically a back and forth for like fucking 10 years as to whether or

not vacuum should be universal and then oh okay you can have vacuum on these types of carriers and then you get vacuum and blah blah blah blah blah and then it finally in 2024 they buffed it to universal right? And then I played Soul Frame and Soul Frames like walk over to items and pick them up with a button and I'm like Steve you're crazy Okay, like you're so mad about fucking vacuum now. Yeah that you there's no back extra steps actually Okay, I. It's Scott, ah, whatever.

I can't talk about it from the context of this type of game. I just know that when I'm playing a platformer like Gungeon or Isaac, or any one of those kind of simple 2D games, the idea of having a stat or so that increases your vacuuming range, I hate that it's not automatically just massive to begin with. I don't like-

I mean, you've played Vampire Survivors, right? Exactly, right? But I'm like- Attract Orb? Yes. I was playing Vampire Survivors, I was like, Attract Orb is the single best upgrade in entire game and every single person chat was like yes Absolutely, it absolutely is but like

it's a feeling of There's a few know there's a feeling of like getting a really good power of like I didn't have this but now I have it And then there's a feeling of I deserve this. Why did you take it from me? And I'm opinion that items should always just suck up, but that's that's what I'm saying Every single game souls souls come from the blue from the other side of that map and get into your body You're right. No matter how far away I feel like you have taken away my ability to get everything that is rightfully mine and making me earn that back slowly Doesn't feel good. It's like god damn it. Hurry up

Extra super crazy in warframe because whenever you hit an enemy they just explode Yeah, to a million. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and you like there's there's warframes that like will just generate a death field around them that's like 50 meters long. And it's like, okay, well, I need vacuum so that I can pick up anything, man. Yes. Okay. Maximum vacuum should be the way the game works, except that when I say the game, the feeling in games in general, I want that maximum vacuum feeling, except if I'm opening a box with a thing in it. Sure. Then make a,

I got the cool thing, you know? But that's the distinction. Open a box or vacuum for free, and anything less is actually a bad feeling you're giving me the player. Yeah, all right, there we go, we solved that. Okay, quick break and we will. Yeah, I gotta piss, man.

Oh, damn. BRB. Hey, let me ask you, if I, hey, would it distract you from the pain if you were sitting there getting tattooed and you were just full to bursting with piss and you're like, oh fuck, I gotta piss so bad, would that distract you, do you think?

I mean, only if that excites you, I suppose. I don't know. Okay. Don't tattoo me, I'll come. Or piss. All right, let's take a quick word from our sponsors Love you sponsors This week the podcast is sponsored by

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Nothing happened. Nothing happened. And if anything did happen, I suggest that you use AI to reduce the emotional and cognitive load that comes with nothing happening. I've got your emotional and cognitive load right here, motherfucker. Oh boy, you know, I think it's kind of like, if we charge up a story about layoffs for long enough,

the number gets bigger and bigger. It's kind of like a spirit bomb. If we just hold our hands up and hold our hands up for enough weeks in a row, the number will get bigger and bigger until we finally drop it and it will be incomprehensible. Not to mention, it's not just the layoff story, it's all the cloud makeup that gets applied as it lands. Microsoft, as of two weeks ago, laid off 9,000 people coming from the Xbox business. But hey, that's 10% of King, that's 3% of the company of Microsoft. But Phil Spencer says that the gaming business has never looked stronger.

And this is a difficult choices. We have some blah, blah, blah, blah. Sure. But let's not forget. That's the shot. But let's not forget the chaser, shot, but let's not forget the Chaser, which is that they also had a record performance in 2024. Yeah, they did. Delivering $245 billion in annual revenue,

up 16% year over year, and over 109 billion in operating income, which is up 24%. You don't say Look at that Business is booming things are Growing and they'll never stop growing There's a multiple pieces of follow-up to this the first of which is this was alongside

an order from on high, which is like, stop not using AI in your work. AI is now mandatory for your work. Correct. You have to use it. We told, so that story we covered two weeks ago, in which we discussed the, you know, the mandated, you will be followed by a robot. Oh yeah, we'll get there.

We'll get there. You just, he just posted a photo at me. You will be followed by a little R2-D2 and that will, don't worry about it. You must use the robot, you must use the AI and feed it exactly what your tasks are every day. And, uh, it'll be fine. Shut the fuck up.

It's mandatory. Um, so, so you're, you're, you're, yeah. So a shot chaser. And then I guess what would this be your lime and salt lick? Well, the, the, the middle of the shot is also like the MMO that they canceled. That was like seven years in development that Phil Spencer liked so much that every time he played it, other people would have to be like, dude, we have a meeting. He's like, oh man, what a great game.

Oh. Just canceled that. Loved it that much, huh? Yeah. Just killed that. That's sick. Seven years of dev on an MMO apparently was wrapping up and they're like, nah, kill it. Cool, cool, cool, cool, cool cool cool cool cool cool cool cool

The Zenimax people are like you have stood there was a story today where the quote is you have stolen our future. Yeah I was talking to people over at Zenimax during the layoffs Like I mean like simultaneous to the layoffs and It was I have been locked out of my slack account. I don't know if I have a job. No one on my floor knows if they're fired. Let me just back it up a second because we read through these things and there's not oftentimes an underlining moment per se. But we'll tell a story like, hey, 60 people got laid off here,

30 people got laid off there, 300 people got laid off over here at this big company. The number I said at this beginning of the story was 9,000. That is what? 900 indie teams? 90 gigantic teams. It's incomprehensible. You wanna count how many projects that, like what the fuck?

Yeah, no, no, you know, but whatever. Money's, money's, money's, money's got, line go up. That's good, that's good. I have a feeling we're really building up to a really big line go down. Mm, mm, mm. Because you don't sell anything. So so what feeling we're really building up to a really big line go down hmm You can't make any money well well listen listen what matters what matters most right is The advice that came from Matt Turnbull the executive producer at Xbox Game Studio publishing this is a Cru time, right?

It's very, very important to make sure that when a big downturn like this occurs, you want everybody to land and feel comfortable and the most human piece of advice you can give came. And I quote, these are really challenging times and if you're navigating a layoff or even quietly preparing for one, you're not alone and you don't have to go it alone. I know these types of tools engender strong feelings in people, but I'd be remiss in not trying to offer the best advice I can under the circumstances. I've been experimenting with ways to use LLMAI tools like ChatGPT or Copilot to help reduce

the emotional and cognitive load that comes with job loss. Here are some prompt ideas and use cases that might help you if you're feeling overwhelmed. Career planning prompts. Act as a career coach. I've been laid off from a role in the gaming industry. Help me build a 30 day plan to regroup, research new roles and start applying without burning out.

What kind of game industry jobs could I pivot to with experience in production, narrative, live ops, et cetera? Resume and LinkedIn help. Here's my current resume. Help me give me three tailored versions, one for AAA, one for platform publishing roles, or for startup small studio leadership. Rewrite this in bullet points to highlight impact and metrics. Draft a new

LinkedIn About Me section that focuses on my leadership style, shipped titles, and vision for game development. Networking and outreach. You write a warm message about reaching out to somebody at a studio, about a job posting, or sending old coworkers a message to let them know I'm exploring new opportunities. And of course, emotional clarity and confidence. I'm struggling with imposter syndrome after being laid off. AI, can you help me reframe this experience in a way that reminds me what I'm good at?

No AI tool is a replacement for your voice or your lived experience But at a time when mental energy is scarce these tools can help get you unstuck faster calmer and with more clarity If this helps feel free to share with others in your network, stay kind, stay smart, and stay connected. Okay, so we should just get the elephant out of the room right now. He did not write that. He told the wrong person. I didn't even think about the part where the thing itself... It's very clear I didn't even think about that part I didn't even think about that part clearly clear because

despite its terrible content it's like it's formulaic the bullet point list points bold using lots of dashes, so let's just start there. Let's just start there. Sure. Right? Sure. Second of all, it really goes to show how little that this the C-suite cares about you is that they're delegating even like using delegate this to like your secretary or your

receptionist or something, right? Um, have and then you'd sign it But let's keep let's keep going sure sure sure yeah On top of that it's so disconnected like the c-suite is so disconnected from the realities of humanity That the idea of talking to your family co-workers or loved ones for emotional support does not even apply It never even occurs anywhere in the fucking terminal LinkedIn brain CEO. Why don't I just talk to, I don't know, all of my also fired co-workers and we can get together a labor solution. Oh, we know?

Terminal LinkedIn fucking brain doesn't even occur to speak to a human being at any part of this process, never mind why the process is occurring to begin with. Also, and this is slightly outside the video games wheelhouse and more into the social media landscape, like public health thing, but it is my opinion as me that anyone who is offering an AI chatbot to you, if you are in a tumultuous time in your life, if you are depressed, if you are suffering from any form of mental illness or medical issue or just a general bad time, anyone who is offering that to you as a solution is doing you concrete physical harm because these LLMs tend to just repeat whatever you like to hear

or feed into them. And there have been like a dozen cases of people getting delusions of grandeur or exacerbating depressive episodes or schizophrenic tendencies and leading to people's deaths. And not just the people using the machine, I mean other people's deaths as well when the AI pushes them towards the messiah complex that was hiding in there. Like it is a legitimate public health danger and anyone offering that to you is attempting to harm you. I would call Matt Turnbull ghoulish but that word implies that he used to be human at some

point. That's true. So that would be a misnomer, if anything. This is the single most out of touch thing I have ever seen in my entire career. Oh, I don't know. I bet I could pull one out in like a couple seconds, but it's a bit outside of our purview.

Yeah, I mean, okay, okay. Well, I would, okay. Well, okay, no, hold on, hold on. Because to be fair- How much could a banana cost, Michael? Five dollars? Because like the only other place my brain goes is to the sexual criminal activity

of farting bosses at Ubisoft. Like, I don't know what, you know, strapping you to a chair and farting in your face is not like that's all. We're at another level of just like, yeah, you're my slave. You're not my employee. I'm like, you know, without getting into a judge banging a gavel in front of you, just the level of you're not a person here anymore. You don't know where you work. Did you ever go to high school with anybody who was like wildly out of touch with the reality of everyone else and they're in The world did you ever get like run into like some white girl who would ask you where your family goes skiing? during the summer I

Mean no, but No, I you know when you hear run into a couple and I'm just like, motherfucker, I got no money. What are you talking about? Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. No, I, you know, when you hear the word summering for the first time. We went to Lake Meacham in the US because my grandparents are out there, like. Yeah. Well, first of all, like, they're not going to your high school. And if they are, then like something went wrong. No, I'm talking about when we went to Saja.

Ah, yes, yes, yes. That's when I started to encounter those people. True, true, true. That's when you come down from the mountain to fraternize with the lowborn. Yeah. Oh, you guys have to take public transit? Oh, I just have my dad drive me from Westmount. It's like a five minute trip.

What, in your BMW? Yeah, Yeah, okay cool sick. That's awesome Wow that must be all getting up early must be tough for you bitch fuck you I mean not only do I remember those people but more so those people were over there I remember the person who was trying to get in with those people as badly as he could It was so gross. Oh, yo, yo, like like my skin peeled. It just the fucking hangers on heels off of my body.

I start molting. Yeah, so so I don't really know what more you do here, you know, but um Literally and everybody joined the Union that's that's the answer That's the actual I mean that's not cuz Zenimax is in a weird place Where a lot of people who've had their projects cancelled and left with nothing can't be fired unilaterally because they're in the fucking Union So they're in this weird fuck ass limbo. God, I want to see the prompt so bad that's like, hey, I just fired nearly 10,000 people.

What do I say to seem like a good person? And then the AI was like, oh, you should give them some tips about using AI to help them feel better. And then my turnball was like, no, no, no, less compassionate. Dial it back. And then- then accidentally put some compassion in there cut out the part where it goes sure I can help you with that You know like just Wow, man, what like it like how many seconds total were spent before you pasted that?

God, yeah, we were watching like the US video game industry just completely kill itself. Mm-hmm. Like, it's crazy. Mm-hmm. I can't wait. Like, this is a Canadian podcast. It's not like super overt, right? But we both happen to live in Canada and have been for the whole time. So it's like, I can't wait until we're like reading like a fucking Kotaku or like fucking Forbes article about The video game industry is crashing and then in the footnote it goes well except for Europe and Canada and Japan and Brazil and China and Korea I mean here is to 9000 potential employees of small studios doing cool shit, possibly. Who knows?

I really, really hope that we start seeing, like that's so many people, that's so many projects, that's so, like it's incomprehensible. I really hope that we start seeing like shit picking up steam. Yeah, just the absolute out of touchness doesn't stop there, folks. It continues. Boosie. It's fucking crazy. Boos. It's crazy, dude. Don't you get it? Like, so, so check this out, right? If that dog wanted to join up and sign up to be part of the Xbox graphics department. Yes, yes.

Would you suggest that perhaps attracting people to said department should show off some artwork that people working in said department might generate themselves to perhaps? Yes. Yeah. Yes, I did. It's interesting because there was an ad put out amongst all this Microsoft shit that's

been going down that says Xbox graphics is hiring. There's a new development lead at its graphics department that's putting out a LinkedIn post for job opportunities. The ad advertising for people to join the team is generated using AI. And it is a... And it's obviously generated using AI. Like, it's a... there's a computer monitor with the fucking screen on the back of the fucking monitor. It's dead ass.

The person... there's an Xbox... It's one of the worst examples because not only is it shlop, but it's the person who generated it couldn't even bother looking at it once. Not even once. Negative fucks. Like I'm sure there's an insert the brand logo to make sure that it is, you know, not breaking any brand platform guidelines. So that Xbox logo was inserted correctly, but. It was likely added afterwards. But yes, yes, this is a graphic of a girl in a green shirt staring at a monitor and the back of the monitor

has the actual text and screen on it. Join. You know what? It's almost brilliant if you're kind of like, we don't know what we're doing We need help, please help us Right it's a cry for help more than anything I dude I don't know I add job security I Feel like if you're in Microsoft right now, or if you're in a company that's like super pushing

AI really really really hard and you're like a technical person or an artist or something like that you need to start thinking about getting out and finding something that is not doing this because we are going so AI is eventually gonna crash once it becomes obvious that they're just chasing like a fucking investment pile of shit that doesn't actually do anything. We're already seeing in a bunch of industries having to hire back people that AI was supposed to replace. There's a great article I was reading two days ago about there's a new cottage industry

of people who work on AI. So do you remember during COVID, there were a lot of places, particularly in the States, that cut nursing staff. They're like, ah, we're gonna save money. We don't need that many nurses. But then COVID happens and turns out you do need those nurses. So you hire back the same people as travel nurses at five times the cost because it's emergency hours, right? And there became an this large industry of travel nurses that are like, I'm making way more money than I ever did as a nurse because I'm on permanent emergency call

Right that is happening to AI now Where there is a cottage industry of people whose job it is to come in at like $200 an hour and Fix your shitty press release that the AI Sent out or fix the logo treatment or or the art that the AI shit out, and it's costing like 10 times more than it would to just have the guy do it. But regardless, when this thing eventually crashes, people that are in like Microsoft graphics department

are gonna have this fucking block of their fucking work history go, okay, did you do that or did the AI do it? Did you do the good parts? Or did the AI do the good parts? Did you do the shitty parts? How hard did you fight AI implementation at your job? Show me your work. Oh, you can't because it's under lock and key to a corporate NDA. So I'm just gonna have to, like it's fucking mess. Yeah, I think what we're kind of seeing is essentially the last couple of years have been, you know, companies slowly flirting with the idea

a little bit more and a little bit more, waiting for things to get a little bit better and so on. And of course, external pressure from investors to be like, hey, the trend, the hot word, it's going now. Why don't you hurry the fuck up, right? Get these people out of here. What are we doing? And I feel like, now, why don't you hurry the fuck up, right? Get these people out of here, what are we doing? And I feel like, yeah, this is, you know, every,

like a lot of these companies, again, for their own preservation have flirted, but like this is Microsoft taking the full plunge, you know, and going one to one, all humans out, those who are here feed the AI what your job is so that it can replace you. And then also just using it on the back end for this type of thing and for the message we just described and such.

They're diving hardest and fastest into this and they're also in the most trouble in this generation so they're the most desperate. So like, is just, are we just looking at the first flails of like them getting the fuck out of this entire corner of the industry? I don't know. I don't think there's ever gonna be another Xbox platform ever again.

I think they're gonna just add Game Pass support to different shit. Well, Pat, This is an Xbox I don't even have the energy for I don't even have the energy for I think that I think the inversion of power and the the the implementation of AI stuff is is particularly nuts because I want to quote the I'm pretty sure I'm pretty sure this was Chris Wolfhart talking about it, which is the goofiest thing about all of this

is that the single position most likely to be effectively replaced by AI decision-making is the C-suite, because the C-suite don't actually use any objective data in any of their decisions at all. It's all based off of vibes and personal philosophies that they've invented for themselves based off of nothing. So any objective criteria being added to these business decisions would be an improvement. But the Sele Dominoes don't know that yet.

Like a fucking Google search with Boolean would probably have better fucking results at picking winners and losers in the games industry. It's one of the weirdest things about people who follow games, like me and you being enthusiast content creators and people listening to this or watching this being enthusiast members of the hobby, is like, I could pick a random person in this chat and ask them if a game was going to bomb or succeed and I think they would have a better chance of getting it right than the head of Microsoft. Yeah, no, that's not course. That's not even, there's no question to that. Because you're talking about people

who also leave this industry and jump into, I don't know, literally any, business is just a concept. They can jump into fucking nail production. They can jump into post-packaging. It doesn't matter. I'm just a professional, sit on top of the business and spout words at it person.

So the idea that you're actually in touch with what you're making or the people that are pouring a lot of their energy and fucking soul into what they're making is insane. That's not, obviously you're looking for a bottom line profit maker, you know, that, again, investors, et cetera. It's the same conversation we've had forever. But that-

It is like to some degree, like more specifically the US, because in the US you could be sued for not providing your shareholders adequate value, which is not a fucking thing. Sure, but every single one of these C-suite members, like the day after they join said suite, then has to go get their Xbox controller or Switch or PlayStation for the first time and be like,

we're now a console family and look how we're excited we are to play a video game for the first time. You know, in the same way that you're like, oh, yeah If I'm now in in the C suite at Tupperware I've look at my whole family's using it now Like it's what are we talking about? These people have no investment in any of this shit long term They're the most transient shit. I mean a lot of them don't have investment in their own lives or families either But that's well, you know What they do have is fucking Points on the back end is what they have, you know?

So anyway, again, I don't want to let the second part of that story be ignored, which is that the numbers have gone up, you know? To those of you things are booming off stay mad and Organize Yeah, talk to each other about the nature of capital Sucks sucks though. That's that's the nature of capital also make cool indies and then make make make single and double a production about that and like that is the obvious like well I mean the big

company laid you off why don't you go make a new company and it's like the problem is it's like you need money you do to make this is of course of course live on every time this is absolutely a real, real issue, yes. And it's just the people that are, it's just the people that are the moneylenders, so to speak, in these situations, the scale and the groups need to be much smaller with people that are more in touch with the industry

that understand and care about what the fuck they're funding or making. Like, do you give a shit is is a mandatory question behind where that money is coming from. You know that's that's like. Oh, it's gone. Okay. No. Is it? No. Alright. Make a new indie game is tough because you need the money to live on. It makes me think of the people who worked in Rhode Island for that fuckhead baseball

man. Who the fuck was that? Curtis Schilling? Kurt Schilling, who got everyone to fucking roll double mortgages on fucking two properties. And then the company goes under and they're stuck in fucking Rhode Island with two mortgages. Like those people are fucked over 38 studio like fucked fucked and they made a sick combat juggle system that they burnt on his shit in the reckoning. I think the best piece of advice I've seen from game devs talking about this recently

is don't move to somewhere that you would need to sell your house. If things go. To get a new opportunity. Like don't. Don't. Physical relocation. Sell your house or buy a house upon the move to your new place because you're probably going to get laid off

in 24 months to 36 months. Start posting on French production forums for indie groups getting together. Put your SoundCloud shit out there. Get on SoundCloud. I mean, shit. Yeah. And, you know, in the meantime,

while that's happening, hey, how about a simple wrap up on this one? The ongoing story that is stop killing games. Okay, stop it. Stop it. Don't do it. Stop. Stop killing them. Are you about to kill a game? You look like you're about to put the game down. Hey! Hey! I don't think my criticisms are that strong of Death Stranding. Video games Europe lobby. I see you. You're about to kill a game. Stop it. Put it down. Unfortunately,

that lobby consists of everybody. Last I checked. Everybody. Everybody in Europe? I think we're talking everyone. Let me pull up the, yeah, video games Europe.eu. The lobby that's against stop killing games includes Activision Blizzard, Netflix, Microsoft, Sega, Roblox, Riot Games, Nianta, WB Xenomax, all of it, Square Enix, etc. So if I remember correctly, this was born out of Ubisoft taking the crew offline for like, and disabling like people who owned it from playing it for no reason, right? Yeah. Yeah. And so the story, it seems like it got like pretty complex, but overall Accursed Farms is the YouTuber behind this campaign

and basically has been pushing for a EU and for a UK specific parliamentary recognition of essentially just making sure that when a game gets purchased by the consumer, if the security feature on the game, if the game has a call home feature, that the developers should provide an easy way for them to keep playing if the call home feature or server gets switched off. So if there's any sort of thing where it has an offline mode and the game is going offline from live service,

but you've bought it, the game being taken away from you after you've spent your fucking money on it. Pretty simple concept. One of the things about it was that the crew had a fully functional single player mode that didn't require online authentication at all. Yeah.

But Ubisoft was like, nah, no more crew for anybody. And so we've talked a bunch about, I think, over the years, these games where people get them back online through You know whether it's a halo or Titanfall and they just get home servers going um Metal Gear Solid 3 subsistence like you know online mode yeah crazy shit Because yeah, that sucks if you've paid money for a thing and then they said fuck you and turn the servers off so The my understanding too though is that like some of the complication of getting this to be actually actionable is that in at least I think the UK proposition or so after a certain number

of signatures, it doesn't guarantee that action will be taken. It just means that people in parliament will discuss it. They're forced to acknowledge. It has to be heard. It's forced to be acknowledged and discussed openly. And in some cases, they just kind of go like, ah, we don't care about this or whatever. So that's unfortunately, I think, the downside of the nature of just getting signatures doesn't necessarily mean something actually will happen. Yeah, if it's going into the UK parliament,

you can only hope that it gets in on a sober day. Yeah. I think for the EU, it's a little bit different. And it seems like the latest news story there is that they got the vice president of the European parliament to back the campaign. So the quote was, a game once sold belongs to the customer. So cool.

That's promising. Again, this being turned from an idea into something actually actionable seems like a far way to go, but it would be cool if the thing that you paid your money for was not then taken away from you when the company said fuck you. I think the strangest thing about this being a news story by far is that this seems like such an obvious universally positive thing for literally everyone that you would have to be a crazy person to take any stance against this whatsoever. Like, if this went through and all that, like, who could it possibly harm at all? So, Video Games Europe, the lobby that has all the companies I mentioned, is one

person, certainly. There could be others. But for the lobby that large, their whole deal is basically, we don't want you to have to force extra potential costs, legal liabilities, and take away developer choice in the process of how they want to take the thing that the customer paid for away from them. Yeah I'm jorking it through my diaper. Yes. Well you figured it out. Yeah.

I just pulled it out over the top. Yes. No. Essentially the Video Games Europe argument is that the creator of the game reserves the right to perpetually fuck over the purchaser of the game and if you stop that from happening then you will that that takes that restricts the developers freedom to fuck over the player like the same kind of logic it was like it costs more to not dump it in the river. But it's faster. It's right there.

The river's right there. Yeah. So, Wully, there's something in content creation that's so funny, which is, there's always this attitude of like, well, I'm gonna be part of the game development sphere one day So I desperately want to make sure that I don't talk too much shit about this person or that person and speak too loudly about this or

Talk about any mechanics that would hurt my future sales on my thing in the future. It's a bit too late for that future sales on my thing in the future. It's a bit too late for that, Pat. It's been one of the most infuriating things, and we've run into like dozens of people like that. By doing this podcast here with me for the last 10- Oh, doors are closed! It's a bit too late! Oh, yeah, they're, oh man.

Listen, man- My opinions are mine alone. Look, the problem with the aforementioned diarrhea that I was just quoting is that, um... Okay, so, Europe is a different place from North America. And- Very true. And being a different place means that they have different attitudes towards things. They are potentially more willing to go, hey, fuck you.

When it comes to things like, you know, the fortnight dark patterns, for example. Yeah, we've also seen Australia get on top of bullshit. We've seen literally China be like, hey, if you're going to do Gacha, you've got to show the percentages because get the fuck outta here. Because of the children. Right, yeah, so different places have different attitudes towards that. Like you load up Horse Game

and every single time you click on it, it goes, hey, if you're a minor, fucking chill, maybe. The list of companies that I described that are part of the video games Europe Union is extensive and there is, I described that our part of the video games Europe Union is extensive and there is like negative chance that America could ever, could even fathom, could begin to think of a dream of a hope. This is the fun part where the Europe is a large enough

region with enough people in it that represents a large enough market share for this kind of consumer action, is that decisions made over there would in some way, even if not directly, affect us and our American buddies down south and people in Japan. Because specifically for this, for stop killing games, if you ascertain that the consumer has a legal right to a game, if they've purchased it and it has to stop phoning home, then that means that that version of the game has to be provided to Europeans, and there's nothing stopping non-Europeans from having that version of the game also.

Yeah. Well, the interesting trick here in a lot of these things is that if one significant enough market is forced to do something, then it becomes more cost effective to provide that everywhere on a single skew than to divvy it up. And so the hope is that if enough places are forcing this through, then places like America, it just becomes cost effective to not make a fuck over you for living their version of it. That's the hope. One of the reasons we have steam refunds is because Australia mandated refunds.

And Australia isn't that large of a country in population, but what it did cause My assumption is that steam was like well, we're gonna have to do a full refund program in Australia It's gonna look really fucking bad if we only offer that shit in Australia We're gonna look like the biggest motherfuckers in the world And I assume that is part of the reason why that refund like process rolled out to the rest of the world. Yeah. I just know that when you look at this list of companies that are against the idea and you see literally the 30 biggest video game companies in the world all there, it's

like I don't want to pay. Well, the power behind that is the shareholders. You know, nothing to fucking shake a stick at. I mean, that is a that is a an uphill battle. But hey, yeah, no, it would be nice. It would be nice if you didn't put the game down. Don't kill it. Stop it. It's just stop it. What an easy thing to get behind hmm what a crazy crazy easy way to

get by would it be would it be batshit crazy would it be batshit nuts to just just to swerve on that and find a reason oh my god you'd have to be fucking bananas, just a total buffoon. And yet. Somehow. Let's see how it goes. What else is going on over here? I think the... Um...

I don't know if you've seen it, probably not, but on the off chance that you haven't, I'm gonna just show you a picture. Um, they have announced a new Kamen Rider. Kamen Rider Zets. And... Just... just look at it. I just want you... Alright, I will look at it. Just look at it. I just want you to- All right, I will look at it.

Just look at it. Yo, that's cool! It's cool! No! Yeah, it's cool. I like it. I like it. All right?

That's really good, dude. That's a really good Kamen Rider design. That's it! I just want you to look at it. I just want you to look at it. Oh, I love it. Don't lose your dream. That is such a good Kamen Rider design. Misamero. Yeah. look at it. Oh, I love it. Don't lose your dream. That is such a good common rider design.

Mezamero, that's it. They announced the new one, and I just want you to look at him. Oh, that's super good, I love that. That's super slick, but also classic. It's the classic colors, and it's the belt over, the belt is a chest strap. The design is so sick, dude And you know what else is fun is that this is going to be premiering September 2025 in Japan

Oh cool, that's soon and America and Canada and Hong Kong and Korea and Thailand Taiwan Vietnam etc. It is going to be an international Kamen Rider premiere. Bro bro I'm gonna have my little baby watch Kamen Rider and learn that he kicks he kicks evil. Get the fuck in that's so cool. That's really cool. It's an international finally debut with the thing you know. They've been of course. There's been the the translation Efforts before but in terms of debuting a new series at the same time. They had the right. This is this is cool. Uh

Yeah, I just I just wanted you to look at just look at that boy. That's great God damn it. I think that's just super in the meantime Gav is hot. Beyond that, what else? There's a little bit of that. Remember, Inti Creates? They made Mega Man Zero, Mega Man Zero X Advent. Yeah, they're all right.

And then they made Gunvolt. Oh, all right. All right. They're making a new game. They announced it. Okay. It's called Majogami. And it looks pretty.

It looks kinda cool. I see lots of paper platform slashing things happening. It looks all right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you know what? Like, okay, I did not like Gunvolt. I enjoyed the previous games they made. I have room in my heart for Inti Creates to do what they do once again.

And let's see. Let's see how this goes. But I like the style of what we're seeing here with a witch doing lots of cool pretty casting textures and things flying all over the place. There's never been a problem with the feeling of an Inti Creates platformer. My issues have always been strictly mechanical. So I'm hoping for the best with this new game, Majogami, coming to Switch 2 and all

the rest. And beyond that, did you see Ken? I saw a screenshot of Ken. He looks dirty. So, Ken is coming to City of the Wolves and his beard is too pronounced. I that's my only thing I think the rest of his scrungy dirty ass Ken look is totally on point They got him looking as he should but the beard it should be more Faded and and scraggled. It's it's too

Colored in and loud, you know and and and scraggled. It's too colored in and loud, you know? And yeah, sure enough, just like that ending as predicted in the SF6 Terry story, Terry Bogard walks up and picks Ken up off the ground, you know, just sitting in the dirt,zing around and you can give some terry a look. That's basically like She took the kids terry We'll see how ken works with uh, no crouching medium kick Think about that, isn't that weird? It's really fucking strange. Yeah. They've done it in the other crossover things before a little bit, but he's got his Jinrai. He'll probably be fine. Cool. Shall we take a letter or two?

Before that, there was part of my week that I forgot to talk about. Let's go. Very shortly, but you might have noticed that I talked about streaming a lot this week, and Paige has also been streaming a lot more recently. I think she might be streaming later tonight as well as on Sunday. But part of that is because we have made the decision as a couple to quit Dungeons and Dragons in our current campaign. Ah, time has been reclaimed.

Time is back. Okay. Okay. The long and short of it, like the really, really simple, we really like the group that we're in, like now. And we like where it was going back and forth with some things Both of us being in the campaign is the problem because that means that there is a babysitter cost per D&D And the babysitter cost over a month

Way too high for something that I get excited sometimes being cancelled, okay, okay, right? Okay, okay Yeah, yeah fair It was one of those things where we talked about it on on our respective channels and we talked like oh, we have a really good babysitter that we really like and she's like $25 an hour and We talk like, oh, we have a really good babysitter that we really like and she's like $25 an hour. And people who don't have kids go, oh my god, that's crazy. And people who do have kids go, wow, that's really good actually.

Right? Can the child learn to roll a d20? No, man. Can't even give the child a d20. Can the child? The child will eat the d20. Can the child learn to not copy your character sheet? No, man. We're working on ABCs. Because I think I think you can you can get further

No, well alright but yeah, the long and short of it is like we're like, I like sometimes I'd be like, sometimes D&D would get canceled by one of the other people because it was like, you know, they got busier, they got work stuff. And me and Paige would go, oh, sick, one of us can stream or let's go out to dinner instead. Like, it's just like, for the thing that is representing like the number one cost of babysitter dollars In our household. Yeah for it to being a thing that I usually enjoy pretty much Yeah, instead of being the most fun thing we do all month. It's it just didn't yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it doesn't fucking work But you have now like had a tabletop experience.

Oh, absolutely. And granted, huge proportions of that experience were wildly stereotypical. Like crazily, insanely stereotypical. And we had lots of adventures in learning social dynamics with D&D people. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the basic reality is that I have some buddies of mine over at Discord that do D&D campaigns and I've put my hat in the ring for when they start a new campaign in six months to a year. But until that kid's going to school, me and Paige probably have to split.

If we play D&D, we probably just can't be in the same fucking campaign because it just kills time Yeah, no that's a very very disappointingly reasonable reason As opposed to you know the bit epilogue part four, you know Though the biggest thing for me like Paige is very bummed out about it because she was enjoying it, but she agrees with me that this is just probably for the best. My biggest bummer is that I was about to hit level five and I never got to cast fireball

on the party by accident. The big old, the big, by accident. I never, I never got to be like, how big is this room? And then go fuck it. I never I never got to be like how big is this room and then go fuck it. I don't care. Well, yeah, no, I it's tabletop and tabletop and is a is a fun thing in the right context and yeah, hopefully that can y'all can figure that out in a different way. And you know, I mean, there's there's DND but, but then there's stuff that's not D&D, you know, there's there's if you ever branched out into other things,

you could always find some fun stuff. You could you could you could jump in in a fucking robot, you know. So I mean, there's, there's all kinds of places you could go. Let's Yeah, that's that's what's going on with that. So the schedule is freed up. Once again, Let's take some a break because I think that dog is asking to go out do it. Okay. Let's take some letters. CastleSuperBeastBale at gmail.com is... That's where you would send your letter. Gabe says, hey Pat and Woolly, re-watching the Tekken 8 streams, realized just how many

games have you fighting your own dad in a cinematic boss battle? Press F to fight your dad in the rain. What's your favorite dad fight? This is a spoiler if it conversation potentially because some games are going to be like I have one that's like relatively recent. I got that is a I got one. Yeah. Well, I got two actually. Yeah, two good. What do you yeah, I think my two favorite are probably the owl from Sekiro Yeah, I know that's your dad. Yeah, um and fucking Hades

Yeah, Hades. That's your dad. Mm-hmm. I have to Fight your mom in Metal Gear Solid 3 mmm Not the same question, but that's that's a good answer too. That's the best fight your dad in Metal Gear Solid 2 Yeah, and fight your dad in Devil May Cry Yeah Yeah, I mean for sure fight your dad yeah in Metroid

It's the thing with the devil may cry it's like of course it's the best fight you're dead, but it's not the dad I want to fight We did that and it was lame We did that and it was lame, which was kind of funny actually. No, but you want the good version, you know? Just do it but make it good. Yeah, yeah, no, the owl was a really fun one and I remember putting it through the like grind motions to be like, okay, I have to learn this startup

to the startup of your animations. And in particular, the, I have to learn this startup to the startup of your animations and In particular the what was it? Yeah, he does the mccurry counter to you You know, which is awesome. Mm-hmm Oh Death Stranding One for the record Yeah thematically more than mechanically, but you know it was cool it's cool All right, let's take one over here from

That's movie about fighting your dad that was hot rod Okay, I can't do movies cuz no time we're gonna get us we're gonna be here forever Just want to say fighting your dad and hot rod is awesome What about bad Margera? God damn it I Hate Bam Margera. I know so much. I know I almost blew up a sponsored stream over how much I hated him Yeah, that's how much I hated him.

Yeah, that's about right. I almost said fuck it, I don't even care and went nuts, but I was like, mm. Jesus Christ, Bam. Getting crazy over here. All right, here's one. No name given, hey mom and dad. What are some games or hobbies you feel like No name given, hey mom and dad. What's up? I'm the mom. What are some games or hobbies you feel like you've fallen out of love with?

If you can't think of any, then give us a good kite story or else chat will call you a poser. Love your son, K, thanks, bye. Wow. Oh, that's really good. Wow. Well, for- My heart is broken when I think about FF14 and how I don't have any desire Wow. Oh, that's really good. Wow. Well, my heart is broken when I think about FF14 and how I don't have any desire to play

it at all. Can I just say for the record, sorry, that Punch Mom and I drove up to a open area on a windy day up north and flew that whale around. Oh, that's cool. And, you know, it wasn't a perfect windy day, but we did the best we could with the situation. Got some fun photos out of it, and that's for me, not for the internet. Go fuck yourself, I have a private life.

Please give to the internet. Wait, kite memories are private? Some of them, you know. Dude, okay, so yesterday, literally yesterday, at 5 p.m., I'm like, hey little man, you know. Dude, okay. So yesterday, literally yesterday at 5 p.m., I'm like, hey little man, you need to nap. You have not napped. And he goes, no. I go, no, we're gonna go upstairs, we're gonna go nap.

And he goes, okay. And then he asks for specific books. So I read him the specific books and I look at my perfect little guy, right? And he's like getting sleepy and I'm like, man, I'm gonna think back on this one. I'm an old man and I'm like man. I'm gonna think back on this on I'm an old man, and I'm gonna be like this was like Maybe one of the best moments of my life, and then he looks at me, and he slapped my tummy

I'm gonna admit it. Oh The sustained duration crucial yeah crucial to the bit oh man too bad And now it's really locked in now that memories forever that's great that's great the kids the kids are gonna be alright That's great. That's great. The kids the kids are gonna be alright Yeah, um in terms of hobbies. I have fallen out of love with see there's hobbies that drop off But not because I'm like turning against them per se time or Yeah, but there is one thing that I can say like it's Unfortunately just been long enough and life has changed in such a way that it's not a thing.

It's, I feel, this is going to hurt some people. I know, like if Mello- It's fighting games, isn't it? No, no, no, hey, no. The trick is to do it professionally so that you can never truly be divorced from the hobby. Yeah, that's true. Now I'm mad. I feel like I'm going to break some people's hearts like mellow if he hears this but

Seeking out new music is just something I have not done in Forever and I have been relying on People I know to just send me their tastes and I check and I fuck with the shit They send me but for me myself, it's been so long that it would count as an answer to this question. Yeah, no. So that that makes perfect sense. There's a real time expenditure to seeking it out yourself. But also that happens to a lot of guys our age, Willie. You turn on the oldies channel, you know, you know what?

This is good enough. This has got all the things I like on it. You just fucking said that's that's only a half joke oh yeah like you said no you settle into what you're comfortable with you know that's it that's it you know I mean shit um it's one thing when you're loading screen music is restricted to be video gamey because to be video game because it's YouTube safe but then once that comes off and all of Spotify is at your leisure and then I'm like I don't know

free Phoenix Wright turnabout Let's get some 33 soundtrack Yeah, five hours and then let's you know what and then right after that Let's just hit up new job ass and loop right back around to ace combat. You know that reminds me Piece of news that we didn't cover Did you see the ghost of Yotay fucking 20 minutes presentation? Oh, I thought that was happening later It did already happen Yeah, okay that happened. Yeah. Okay. Okay, there's a bunch of shit in there. Whatever, I'm gonna skip past all of it.

There's one thing specific to you for there. Kurosawa mode will now be, I think, higher contrast and more wind. So it looks more like Kurosawa. Actually black and white. They're also adding Miki mode, which is closer camera and more blood and mud. Takashi. And they are adding Watanabe mode, where the soundtrack will be replaced with a lo-fi samurai intro soundtrack.

Whoa! And it's called that specifically? It's called Watanabe mode. Oh my god, okay Kurosawa, Miki and Watanabe is a pretty fucking hard filter to that hot That's it might turn on the water that say I might actually do that. That's kind of incredible. We're going okay So one arc we shampoo Another arc we seven Seven Samurai.

Yeah, okay. Ooh, ooh. That's, do I even want to play the base game? You know? I hate these types of things. Like, who the fuck's gonna go through Resident Evil 5 with the fucking yellow filter, green, or whatever and then I look at this I go hmm. I actually I think I liked Watanabe's music better than than the ghost of the original score

I think that might just be a direct upgrade. This is a yeah This is a this is a strange proposition in which you're providing content That is for bonus playthrough that I might just make my default That's incredible and then you can play the bonus playthrough with the original score be like oh, that was cool. That was cool Yeah, it was alright, you know Nice, okay Yeah, there was Where yeah that that that was it was a half an hour presentation with some other stuff. Okay, I gotta check that out.

They showed a lot of shit in that. Mmm. There's a lot. Like when you do the samurai confrontation. Oh yeah. The dog will also join up with it So you're doing like like multiple opponents at once and the dog is also doing like the samurai draw but with dog mouth. Oh Man Tsushima was fun

Yeah, I'm down. I'm down. That's hot. All right. I gotta go watch that then We um Man Alright, I gotta go watch that then. We... Man. Yeah, I-uh-uh-uh-uh-uh-uh, we'll be back next week. Uhhh... Sorry, no, no, okay. Oh, did we run out of good emails? Uhhhh... After the one.

Here we go. Here we go. Here we go. It's on you, Max. Okay. Says, hey Pat and Woolly. What's up? Just finished Expedition 33 the other day and I had a blast with it, but I encountered balance issues that seemed to haunt a similar number of RPGs. The difficulty drop that comes when fighting the final boss versus the super boss. Absolutely. It's crazy. It's crazy. It's like the worst...

It's like that game's single glaring flaw is that the difficulty just starts to fly to pieces at about the 70% mark in both directions I later learned of a few things I could have done to solve that for e33 specifically But my question is more of a general problem for other RPGs that have this problem I feel like most people put the game down after reaching credits, so they'd want to do everything first before One game I can think of that massively has this issue is SMT5. One of the endings is locked behind beating a super boss before you even get to the last zone.

I mean, that's just sounds like it. That's SMT. That's ridiculous. The question for you guys is, what are some of the possible solutions a studio could do to prevent the ending fight from feeling lackluster? Or a cakewalk compared to something earlier make two instances of the final boss with different stats have a limit to your damage output Much love to both of your families From max. Thank you

Okay, so I Would like to hear your thoughts on this because I have I have been thinking about this a lot and I have a definitive Series of thoughts. Yeah ready to go. Um, I Mean I think about how obviously expedition 33 was an insane Experience with scaling and they had to patch the game to allow you to handle it and capping you and even that's like that is a genuine bad Problem you should we shouldn't have to be self capping on the fucking yeah self capping at nine nine nine nine or You know each the digit up from that is a solution, but it's not the most elegant ones as As much as I love expedition 33 and its gameplay

I think that they could have solved a lot of their gameplay issues and scaling problems if the multiplications on those stats were additive instead of multiplicative. Just calm it down a little bit. I think the game would be a lot more fun gameplay wise if the strongest your attack could go is like 250% above your base attack. Instead of Balotro.

Instead of a trillion. Yeah. Yeah. is like 250% above your base attack. Instead of Balotro. Instead of a trillion. Yeah. Or make a thing so that it's like you can do that multiplicative addition on spending three points to, you know, whatever, build up a super turn or something. But I get what you mean by that. Expedition 33 is such an odd specific duck though, with all its weird picto systems that let you over juice your offense and have zero defense,

which other RPGs are not gonna necessarily support. The thing is, is when I think about other games with the Super Boss thing, my reference points is limited to the games I've played, but when I think about like metaphor, for example, I had no problem with that, because while I was really, really strong by the end of that game, by beating the super boss, you're ready to just, you know, cakewalk

all the way through to the finale. It's crazy. I kind of am like, I like the idea that the super boss is good optional lore that adds to the story, but is that remains optional. It should, it shouldn't ever ever feel completely, completely mandatory, but it should supplement the story in a good way. I kinda, yeah, I don't know, I think like, the maybe you can implement something kind of how the,

sort of Souls game version of like, you're going to another place that has a specific scaling system for it You know in a way right like if you made that fight have something unique about How your power level were scaled that didn't apply to the rest of the game? So that could potentially solve it. I'm playing through the horizon DLC right now and Do you remember when I played horizon? I beat horizon Horizon I said my biggest complaint is that fights become solved Like yes, yes. Yeah has like sequence

So you can repeat you get to the DLC and you encounter what's called a scorched version of most enemies and the first thing They do is massively jack up all their elemental resistances. Okay Um, and so fighting them is actually much more difficult But also enemies that are scorched are almost always placed around these towers. And the towers do two things. They pulse out massive bursts of energy that heal all the enemies.

You have to not just beat them, but beat them fast. And the best armor set in the game for Horizon is the only game that has a halo shield, like a energy shield on it. And when the pulse hits you it turns it Off okay It fucks up the technology in the suit and turns off and it does a really good job of like balancing that out by like Having a in-universe reason to turn off one of your strongest abilities, but not one that's like player controlled

Just defensive and also juicing the stats of the other things for Expedition 33 I think you could fix that game like this by having a certain pick toe be split into two Sure the pick toe that unlocks the damage cap Yep Should have actually been part one and part two and it should have been unlocks the damage cap from 10k to 100k Yeah, and 100k to a million and then then when you beat the final boss You should get the second part of it,

which is fully unlocks the damage cap. Yep. And I think that the best game to ever do it is Star Ocean 2. Star Ocean 2 has the final dungeon, and then it has the super dungeon. If you put one, if you unlock and take a step into the super dungeon,

the final dungeon reorients itself to the assumption that you beat the Super Dungeon. Ooh, that's elegant. That's real nice. That's work. If the final boss is built for you hitting level 90, unless you walk into the Super Dungeon, and if you walk into the Super Dungeon,

the final boss reorients for you being a level 200 Go fuck yourself. You did it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Okay. I like that that takes work, but that's a real nice way to do that There's there's a problem though If you're Pat and you go to the super dungeon at 10 years old and go wow this looks really hard I'm leaving And then get to the final boss time strong yeah yeah yeah start the whole game over well or you go back to the Super Dungeon and then you just run around the first floor of it and then leave when you're you know strong enough, but yeah, that's true. That was that that feature was hidden

interesting Yeah, I also there's also stuff where It kind of challenges that turn the fight into like a puzzle as well as a boss fight so the second dragon in metaphor is like It's it has has the whole bit where like your HP drops to like one and you have to basically like fight around a low HP build and it becomes a more tactical fight than a just, you know, how much can I hit and how much can I heal, you know? Fights like that that kind of like are sort of like, I don't care what your level is,

you have to solve this unique problem, could also be interesting, but you can trivialize it once you learn it once and make it too much of a puzzle. So it's hard to balance that together. I like that one you mentioned though. Like right now, right this second, there is a essentially play order I could recommend for Expedition 33

that would be, in my amateur opinion, a fix to the game's scaling problems, which is you get the damage uncapped at the end of Act 2, and then the game mandates that you go to the Reacher and the flying manner as part of the main story and then sends you to the final boss area. I think the Reacher and the flying manner being optional is crazy in that game. Yeah, maybe the most important story content that has been optional in a game I have ever played.

Those are huge story beats that, yeah, I think, because I think the feeling of just kind of like, because it's essentially that act of when do you want to wrap this up? It's up to you, right? Scrape if you like scraping, but when you feel like you're done, ready and done, which a lot of people in some cases,

don't forget the persona problem, right? Don't forget the feeling of this is where we say farewell, but we've got five more months to hang out, you know? So letting somebody be like, I'm ready to walk through that door being up to you, I respect that choice for sure But yeah the the those two you mentioned. It's not even what comes to mind when I think optional I'm specifically thinking of Simon right I'm thinking of yeah like that if you if you be if you beat Simon

The fucking final boss of expedition 33 should fucking gain a thousand times final boss of expedition 33 should fucking gain a thousand times. Just not even the dungeon, just the fight. Yeah. Just give it. Yeah. No, yeah, no. It would be fine if it was just the fight. You did this. Well, here you go. You can do that now. You can do that with the manual settings, but there should be, they should put out a fucking difficulty mode. Don't call it. Okay. there's three difficulties modes, right? Right now there's casual, expeditioner, and expert, right? They should put out a fourth difficulty mode that introduces these changes and tweaks the

level scaling to be harder, and the difficulty mode should be called Expedition 60. With some new costumes, perhaps? Sure, add some new costumes. No, no you can't do that. But that's the joke. Alright. That'll do. Well dude you could do a bunch of them. There's the fucking one of the other Expeditions that doesn't have Pictos so it's just Mega Version that limits you to three Pictos. No Ill converter play it on expedition expedition or difficulty but no lumina converter mm-hmm mm-hmm okay okay there's one I have but I'm not gonna anyway we yeah I don't want to get into the details but yeah there's a there is a really potentially awesome game of the year edition version of that game.

You know, they have talked about it. They are good. They are working on updates and more content. There's no plans for new content. Okay, no plans at all. Okay, it is all upgrades and fixing what's there is features Balance yeah, etc the one game. That's actually allowed to make a game of the decade edition You're allowed if you want to do an expedition. We will allow it I would expect that the very next patch they put out will be have loadouts mm-hmm that you can say mm-hmm

Which will take that game from a low ten to a high ten? they put out will have loadouts. That you can save. Which will take that game from a low 10 to a high 10. Oh my god, dude. 10.1 to 10.9. I curse those menus. I curse them. Yeah. Loadouts and, I mean, well anyway, the favorite, with a loadout comes a favorite overhaul as well. You know with that whole thing

Alrighty, you don't even need you to give me three loadouts. Give me three That's it give me three fucking loadouts per character. I'm done. I know that's all I need I also it would be like the upgrade system, it's a much very minor, but like minor upgrade things for weapons, at a certain point, they're just junk, you know? Oh yeah. Which, you know, I mean, I guess you kind of run

into that issue in a lot. It would be nice to like convert 30 junk things into one Big stone or some some such you know it's it's time. It's all just time spent You know there's only so many slabs in that game, too. There's plenty, but there's only so many That's the thing is if I if you'd like to this weapon And then you got that one a little later And you didn't know that one was coming then you're like ah you committed and you know you put a ring on that weapon

So now you better fucking stick to that build if you don't want to if unless you're okay with sitting at your weapon level at 32 the whole game yeah I did I did you just you just settled for it there but it feels you know you know where I you know when I put my 33rd upgrade into those weapons the 10 feet in front of Simon yeah okay yeah yeah that's like listen okay I've made my decision I just need more juice. That is the place to do it. All right, everybody.

We'll see you next week. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.