Castle Super Beast - CSB369: FFXIV Liveleaks

Episode Date: April 22, 2026

Download MP3 | Watch Video Episode Full Timestamps: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vQeqqk6JE2eVnGPxZCTWCiYcitdRWoT-WY_s6lFxpxmngWF4qStd1nErIwUms_j_i1wkUzAzbh3EtlJ/pub Watch full episodes: https://www.youtube.com/@CastleSuperBeastArchive Pragmata: We Are Locked In For The Dadslop Era Sydney Sweeney's Gundam: What's a Polar Bear Doing In Arlington TX? Return of the FF14 Hourglass Segment Tank Your Game Dev Flops With Prestige (letter time) Soul Reaver 1 Spoilercast Let Rocket Money help you reach your financial goals faster. Join at http://RocketMoney.com/SUPERBEAST - Head to http://factormeals.com/castle50off and use code castle50off to get 50% off and free daily greens per box - Sign up for your 1$-per-month trial today at http://shopify.com/superbeast - Exclusive $25-off Carver Mat at https://on.auraframes.com/SUPERBEAST. Promo Code SUPERBEAST Docket: Devil May Cry: Season 2 | Official Trailer | Netflix Bayonetta creator Hideki Kamiya explains what actually happened in Bayonetta 3's ending The IGN review of Mouse PI For Hire Dragon Ball has the craziest dev cycles I've ever seen for AAA IP Daniel Casey (Co-Showrunner) shuts down rumors that Amazon's 'Mass Effect' is being rewritten for "non-gamer audiences" Netflix Live Action GUNDAM starring Sydney Sweeney and Noah Centineo Elden Ring movie cast

Hello, good afternoon, Willie. How are you? Sleep, regression. Sleep, sleep, sleep, regression, sleep, sleep, sleep, regression, sleep. You did it. You're doing it. You're fucking in it now, boy! Oh, yeah! It's fucked. Dude, I got, that's, you know what, what? Reminder, I went from being a scrub to hitting master rank with bison because of sleep regression. so we'll use this this baby as a stand-in so i was i had you know just it's fucking two a m and i got to fucking nowhere to be because this motherfucker just looking at me like ah all right scissors kicks yeah yeah i mean we're doing it we're keeping her in in the dark inner room and trying to you know minimize but boy oh boy does it just feel like it's like hey i know it's night time but

But it's not. The day continued. You just don't know it yet. Inside baby's head, it is still daytime. Everything continues as normal. And you and your weak fucking need for sleep is some bitch-made shit. You better fucking step it up because I'm bored down here. Like...

Okay. So at the same time, tiny tyrant person, you know, being anthropomorphized in this adult-speaking conversation, you, what are we talking? Ten months? Less, but... Okay, nine months? Okay. Yeah, yeah. Literally sleep like 14 hours a day.

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Like, like, literally, like, not exaggerate. Like, girl, you sleep in all day. So... Yeah, you can pick when the fuck you want to be awake. She's, she's not a big, she's not a big, uh, big sleeper. She's, she's a, she's a nap-napper. And she's taking her little...

My God was also not a big sleeper. Yeah, she's taking her little nap-naps. And, um, like, we can force and men manipulate to try to be like, no, we're going to crunch these five naps down into three, you know? And like we're kind of like stretching out wake windows. And there's moments where it's like, okay, eyes are being rubbed and starting to get tired. And we're like, not yet, kid. We're not finished yet.

Like an infant child can stay at 99% being almost asleep for an entire calendar day. I mean, the funniest thing is just watching, like, if I can replicate this, like, this is a rattle. And it's just like, it's like, I'm half asleep and dead and I'm just going. Yeah. And I'm not, my heart is not in it. My soul and my spirit is not in it. But I'm still trying to play because this is in my hand. And that's what I'm supposed to be doing right now.

I've got one for you because they, so my guy still does this. He hates like, so I'm not, he has asked to go to bed. twice in his entire life. He said, mommy, daddy, I want to go upstairs. Straight up. Okay. Go to bed. I'm like twice. Yeah.

About 30% of the time. Okay. Curious George. You know, Pete the cat, you know, whatever, whatever the book is, you know, some hugs and kisses with mama. Okay. Bam. Full song number. Full number.

Okay. All right. You're done. Okay, good. All right. We're snuggling. You're going. You're going. Okay. Quiet, deathly quiet for 40 minutes. What's a cow? Okay. And so here's my favorite part. That wakes up mom and dad who fell asleep waiting for him to fall asleep.

Right? And then, and then my... The real follow-up when he's like, you know, rubbing the eyes, when he really wants to go for it, you know what he does? Oh, the head, the hits, the hits. Straight up slapping his cheeks. Straight up slapping his cheeks and his forehead. Like, no, no, stay awake. And you're like, I can't believe this. It sucks.

It's like the, so the craziest part. And like, I see why the word regression is used because it literally is going. backwards in progress because like she was starting to get to a point where she would wake up when things are going fine and she would like not even start crying right away. I'd be looking at the monitor at like, you know, whatever, like two in the morning. And she would kind of go like, mm, she'd stir and then kind of wake up, look at her hands for a bit and then turn on her side and kind of like just go mm and go back out. And I was like, you're getting it.

Ooh, that's good. That's, that's what we do. Progress is getting made on sleeping through the night. Yeah, you change your position, get more comfortable, kind of look at your hand a little bit, do what you got to do, get your brain off of it, and then try to settle in. And we actually saw that, you know, and then somehow it just turns into go fuck everything, fuck all of this. And what, yeah, because, so we're just like doing like, hey, going to come down, try to do a hold till she drifts off and then transfer. And it fails naturally. And then every hour got to go back down.

And it's just kind of like... There were, I would say, probably 50 or 60 nights that I was like, fuck it. I don't even care. I'm just going to put him in my arm. You just got to go downstairs. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And just fucking watch TV and play games until Paige wakes the fuck up,

transfer him back over, sleep for two hours. two hours and then just go about my rest of the day as a scorched freak because getting up and down and up and down and up and down and bite and the trailing the transfer failure I only failed the transfer twice yeah yeah yeah yeah used to attempt to transfer third time I'm wasting my time I'm wasting the baby's time fuck it he's not going to transfer I do I do I do three transfers um the thing is is but like I don't count it if I like okay there's a botched transfer and then like a, you know what I mean? And then a failed transfer.

Like I, I do. Yeah. No. Uh, oh, oh, oh, oh. I did. So the one that got me the most, dude, it made me so mad and mad enough to scream, but it's two in the morning and it's in a dark room with your child. So it's your fault.

Don't, don't yell. You'll, you'll defeat the purpose. Of course. Is when I forgot. I would, I would transfer and he'd be perfect, perfect, perfect, perfect, perfect. And then I would slide my hands out. and then his feet would drop in his ankle. Bosh!

Idiot! You fool! You fool! You forgot the feet. You forgot the feet. Yeah. No. The transfer, that's the thing is, like, the trend, like, for anyone, like, you have to

understand, getting the baby from your arms down into the crib, like, softly enough that it doesn't wake them up. It, it is, there's such an art to this, and it's so delicate. And, um, in particular, getting it into, so what I do is I go a little bit, down head first because that's where the weight is and then you kind of unfold you unfold you know the the burrito um and then your head the thing is that you get your hand out you have your head kind of your hand stuck underneath and pulling the hand out you got to be careful about that because it kind of like that's friction that's noise that's where they feel it etc um but the boy yeah the botch

transfer is where exactly you do something that makes noise you know and then they're like it was my fault you completely woke them up with that and now you've you fucked up right I've uh A regular fail transfer is you got them down and you're walking away and then they're just like, no, I'm kind of still up though. You know? Yeah, so that I'll do, yeah, about three times until it's just like, fuck this. You got it. Fuck it. I have paperwork I can catch up on.

Contact naps and stuff are a part of it too that, you know, or just like waiting until she's like fully, fully asleep, you know. That dude got a lot of contact nap time. like a lot and it's just a it's a give up nap right it's just a complete like all right whatever whatever was was just like yeah fuck anything else this is how you do it just it's not worth fighting it at this point um but uh uh yeah it miss it yeah oh boy do yeah okay okay okay it's dude it's it's one of those things looking for a light at the end of the tunnel it's one of those things that when you're you're like, get me to that fucking toddler stage, well, they'll just go to sleep. But now I'm like, what if I do?

Oh, my God, your little be-be. Now, luckily I have this and the cat. Yeah, yeah. That just fulfill that role, like, exactly. It is, no, you see, it is, it is currently infinite crash outworks. But the things like, like, for example, I do, like I said, I do a nighttime ball. you know and right that's that's a that's a big deal and like it is one of those things where I like I want that to continue as long as possible and it is not going to I'm

aware of the fact that there is going to be a full unlike last night for example she just skipped it you know yeah but it is one that I'm like okay like if I can get that in there that's some that's that's a that's a nice that's a nice nightly moment that's a nice routine you know you never know what time is the last last time you're going to do something. I guess that's the thought. Right. But I don't want to hear that shit right now.

Right now. I didn't know what the last bottle was. Right? But then it came and went. And it was only, it was like a week later. By the time it was like, oh. We're full on to sippy cups now. The bottles are gone.

And again, I am, we're looking at the calendar and we're aware of the fact that like, okay at certain milestone certain things happen and at certain ages certain daycare things happen and stuff and you got to figure this stuff out but you know and there are little feelings like that like for example you know the the the snoo which uh we discussed on this show before the the the the rocking white noise kind of little bassinet you know super useful that's only for the first six months um yes and you will pay for it when that six months is over with what we are describing right now But me and Hage made this decision, and you and Punch Mom definitely made the same decision, which is, but that first six months is when I needed the help the most. You're buying time. You're investing in the future with dividends.

I am sewing now and must reap later. But I don't want to reap right now. It's hard right now. You are, you are fucking crow-countrying. You are reaching into the fucking future and ripping resources out, you know. but um but the idea of um the the the the the the whole like new setup thing is that like yeah after and at six months like her head is touching the top of it and her feet are touching the bottom it's it's just goofy to even continue trying to fit yeah um too big big baby so yeah we eventually it's like okay well that's pack this thing up and you know move it out of the room and downstairs

and then there's like a space there where that used to be a baby now and like you know punch mom's like, oh, you know, and we're like, oh, yeah, like, this part of the room, that was where she was. And, like, now time is past and she ain't there anymore. And that's a thing, you know, like, there's these moments. And, um, I know that those are going to start increasing and hitting. And you fuck, like literally, whatever, cats in the cradle, the entirety of every piece of media I've ever experienced about anything relating to this has been happening and hitting. Um, like at some point, guy's going to have to go sleep in his own room. And when that happens, the sleep we're going to get is going to be so good.

So this is. So good. Well, so, and this is where our paths branch, because we're already there. Right. Oh, you're already there? We're already there, but we're doing a different thing, right? Like, we went straight, we just, we went straight out of snoo into, you're in your room, you know? And it's, but of course, this is the thing where, um, when there is a regression, it's,

not a like turnover and let's solve this problem. It's a, here we go. Yeah. So that was, that was not, that was, well, our guy, that was just never going to happen. Waking up at night, needed mama, needed mama in one second. Not five seconds. Yeah. Not 10 seconds. Now, what we are, what I did learn as a result of our setup, though, is there's some tech. I mean, baby monitor, microphone, right? You make a little, hey, yeah, a little, bit of like hey you can hear my voice okay cool um you know throw it a little uh uh uh wheels on the bus coming out through the the microphone you know just to just to distract the like where where the fuck you at moments um yeah it does work and there's a there's a like a looking around for the it's like voice of god almost like a what yeah a little bit where where's that coming from but like

it does delay and calm the the the the the the the the the the fret down a little bit we We have too much self-aware. You know, almost a three-year-old toddler. So when we've tried to use that to get him to go back down to his nap, because, like, you know, nap's like an hour and a half, but he'll pop up after 40 minutes. He's too aware. So he'll be, you'll be like, I'll go back to sleep, honey. And he's like, where are you?

I want you here now. Wow. Literally, like, the concept of your, yeah. Okay. So, like, no, it's not. It's not enough. Not enough. Yeah.

fucking getting my voice into trying to hit miss rachel fucking pitches hi you can't no that is a it's it's not doable yes make decisions willie just you know i was scrolling through tic-tok and i hit rachel and she just looked at me and went hey you're doing a good job And I was like

Yeah Yeah Anyways There's your dad For the For the podcast Your weekly Um

Not exactly There was a bit There was a dad There was a dad moment That got clipped out And is making the rounds My little guy Do you know what he did?

Where is it? Where is it? Oh it's on it's on blue sky It's on the subreddit know where is the object that should be kept under glass and lock and key protection? Oh, it's in the trash, dude. It died. Oh, well, okay.

It's a, it was a dandelion. It's ephemeral. Yeah, I know. But you put it in a thing for a minute. All right. Well, you know. No, man. There's plenty of dandelions out there.

It's the thought. It is. Of course. But that's my point. That's my point. Exactly. Um, but yeah, my little guy was picking flowers for me and was hanging out, waiting outside the office going out, wait for dead.

I'm going to give him this flower. That's amazing. And I was like, oh, that's so sweet. Shut the fucking stream down. Everybody go away. Yeah. Urgent business is occurring. I also encountered the first example of the nightmare, which is hanging out in the kitchen two, three days ago.

And I was making a coffee. And he said, dad, don't make your coffee. And I went, why? You want when you make your coffee you go dad show and I don't want you to go dad show I want you to stay and hang out and I was like yeah that's right that's right I'm tell you no I mean look I don't know how well people caught it would have been when it occurred but like some of her first laughter started occurring just off mic and I was like shut the fucking stream down be right back Here's the worst part, right?

And I hit him with the shut the fuck up, be right back screen. We're so lucky. We're so lucky because our kids are like over there. They're right there. They're right there. They're like that way. Yeah. 40 feet from us or whatever it.

No. Right? And that's going to, as time goes on, that might become a problem. Right? Like, I am within air shot. Fuck your show, dad. All right. Come on.

We need to. Yes. But like, for example, like, my dad missed out on fucking most of it because he was at work. My dad worked six days a week and he left it 5.30 in the morning and he got home at 6 p.m. And something that I remember thinking about a lot was the fact that like there is the effect of like, oh shit, dad's coming home. You know, like big hug. Like, yeah, excitement, right? and I know that

every time I've seen stuff like that I've always felt like I'm like oh that's a that's a cool thing and that's wholesome it's wholesome and I know that like that's not the type of situation I have set up here but it's like no that's not true actually because you still do that you come in coming from where I record

coming from the studio down into the room you get the same effect you know or even just waking up in the morning after because doing the night chip you get the same effect of like hey, it's you. And I'm like, yeah. You know, so it doesn't matter if it's like working at home or not actually because

it's the point is, is that if you're not seeing them, you're still going to get that effect, period, you know? So that's cool. I'm glad that that is not something that's been robbed from this. But no, super lucky being with this with this. Very, very lucky. And again, a couple years' time. We'll see what's happening when. yeah, I'm getting my shit echoed back at me.

I don't need to her to, A, just reflect her any of the things happening up here. Back in our direction. You want to hear the ultimate? I came over here to set up, you know, turn a game on and get the settings right before I was going to stream later that day, right? And Paige was asleep. She was sleeping in because she had a rough night.

So I was like, all right, bud, you want to come over to me? You want to go to the office, set up dad show? we went, yeah, right? We come over to the office and he runs to this chair before I can get to it and climbs into it and goes, when's my show? Dad's show is Duda. And I'm like, I wanted to say fucking never, but I said, no, never. I want to talk into it and points to the, and was like grabbing the microphone.

I'm like, okay, okay, here you go. What do you got? And he says, you're on the bike, what's your beef? Pretty tricky. I don't know. See? Yeah. It's hard.

Nice, nice. Hot seat, let's go. All right, all right. It's tough to do. Interesting. That's one of my favorite things Paige did was things aren't hard. They're not too tough. They're just tricky.

So he'll be going to, like, put his shoes on and he'll have, like, a trouble because it's like a new pair of shoes. I'll like, Dad, can you help me? My shoes are being pretty tricky. Tricky. That's good. And I'm like, oh, that's so cute. That's good. So, hey, look, Dad Slop is a segment, but it is also a genre.

It is a genre now. And I am very invested in it because, yeah, shit is different and it's good. Um, it helps. Taking the internet by storm in a way that I wish everyone would just be quiet. Pragmat is out this week. Yeah. And I mean, to be perfectly honest, like the, uh, it helps when the, the dad slop, as I'm describing is also a very good game to play.

So, um, hold on. We were both sponsored to play Pragata last week and run TikTok ads for it. Hashtag sponsored. So these are, I would say, quite generously sponsored opinions. They are. However, I will say that the, I played the demo before that happened. I also did, yeah, and I like the demo. I was very, very much impressed by it there.

And the fact that they sent a fucking microwave to my house. It was a microwave? It, the fucking giant, there's the whole press kit thing. it's just insane. And like, I'm like, what is this? And it opens up and goes, Buh, fuck it. And it's like, it's this insane light and sound setup thing to just give you some keychains and some stickers.

I'm really glad I passed on that. It is the size of a microwave. You press a button on it. It lights up and goes, that's ridiculous. And then you get some markers and some key chains and some stickers and some stick. And it's cool little merch, but I'm like, this is insane. I feel like every time I have to have that discussion with somebody, like, oh, you want to

sign up for the event or the press kit? And I'm like, nah, just send me a code. Yeah. For me, it depends. No, I don't. I don't want it. For me, it depends on if I think I'm going to care, right? And in this case, I'm like, I like this is going to be cool.

I think I'm going to care. And like, for example, well, metaphor, right? That was worth it. There was some... Yeah, I got a box back there. Yeah, the metaphor one was super dope, right? I'm happy with that. Yeah, it was all right.

Yeah. I mean, the end state of the metaphor special edition press kit is it's literally just sitting behind me in this room in the corner. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, to be fair. To fill space. Yes. The, the, I got rid of the box and stuff after a point.

It's just a jacket. The Ghost of Sushima box has become a crate for, like, putting some pictures on and stuff. It's literally like next to my. TV as just a little like, yeah, we put a like little board on it and pictures and stuff. But in any case, some of those, this is one of those ones where

you're like, for what, for what comes in it, this is insane. Game itself. How, so yeah, did you do anything beyond that first two hours? No, I did not. I have a lot. I have a lot going on

and Pragata seems super hot. So I figured, you know what, it can keep a week or two. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. That being said, that first two hours was super solid. Yes. Including going through the demo area again? Yeah. It was completely different.

Yeah, I was going to say, you fought the boss in the demo, but the area leading up to it and everything around it was not at all the same. Yeah, it's the same like architecture, but you go through the rooms in a different order and fight different enemies. And the demo gives you an impression of what the bonfire sort of system is, but it's not that at all. the game at all. Yeah, and it's not, but it's not what you thought. Like, it's, it is a come back to a checkpoint, like, and, and heal up, but it's really a full-on return to base and do everything in your little hangout club space. Yeah, do the, do the little social events with Diana. Hangout with, yeah. And, and talk to Cabin, who's a freak and I hate. Ah, okay, Cabin, I was, I, I'm like, squinting at you, like, how do I know you're not connected to Edis?

There's nothing here that says you're not connected to the evil AI system that's destroying everything in this game that we're trying to kill. And then Cabin cracked a joke or two and his hat came on and he had a bingo system. And I was like, okay, Cabin, you're in. So I don't think Cabin's like nefarious. What I do think is that, I don't know, he's just a little unsettling. I just don't like it. I like how his face goes from Tate to, you know, so he goes from side. scrolling mode to fucking vert shooter.

And I did note I was like I was going through my menus and I heard Mega Man sound effects going off. Oh, I didn't hear that. Interesting. Like I turned and he was playing the prognata version of Mega Man on his own face. Oh shit. I got to see that. Okay. Because like I was looking at Diana. I'm like, this is a send up to rock and roll. Like it is roll in a blue bomber jacket. Yeah. I mean, you can you can put a you can put as much of that on. on the game as you want. And not to mention the fact that you're on, you're dealing with the moon,

you know. I'm on the moon. But, uh, what I do really like actually and was not expecting. Given the setting, given the system, given what it all is,

it's so simple. And like, so far, almost like light on, um, it's light on like some of the lore for now. It's light on, a lot of things. Oh yeah, the premise is like overwhelmingly simple. That intro sets it all up.

You're right. The AI, oopsie, there was a quake. And, and the most important detail in the background is there's a giant 3D printer. Yeah. That's it. 3D print anything. You can 3D print anything. And then there's these 3D printers that are human-sized that are all around the base printing out enemies. 3D printing human-sized robots that don't like you. You know? And you. You're like, okay, go. That's it. But, you know, you kind of just are like, okay, you meet Diana, you hang out. You establish a little fun relationship and chatting with her. She's a goober.

And she's- Diana's great. It's been a while since I played a game in which I'm like, whoever wrote this slash directed it has kids for sure Z's. I saw, because I saw there's a couple moments, one, where it's like she's walking. And it's like that, like, you've been walking for a little while now, but you don't quite have it down yet. And there's those steps of uncertainty where you're like, you're going to fall on your face any second now.

For me is when she goes, oh, Kitty and nearly kills herself launching into a death. Exactly. Like an infinite pit. A million percent. Right? Not to mention. And they're like, but Kitty. And like, I have legitimately gone through this identical scenario.

Not to mention, um, uh, Hugh being like, yeah, I don't like kids. And it's like, yeah, we'll see about that idiot. That's the perfect kind of got to have this. adorable kid on his bag, hacking and whatnot. Also, like, you're hanging out

with your crewman, like, Ken, and I forgot what the other one's name was. The guys who don't pull their masks up so you know they're going to die

in a second? The ones without faces, exactly. And, uh, you're like, Hugh is not a protagonist's name, but it's a dad name.

Yeah. And that's what's important here, right? There's a very, very clear energy to that, that is, that is, paternal.

And one of the big things that did it to was like when he was like he was holding her or something and she kind of did this at one point. Like from the side she kind of did like that like on his face and it was like one of those things where I was like that happens all the time. That's super real. Right?

She kind of just like... You're touching my face in a way that would be wildly like aggressive or weird if an adult did it. Ah but you're cute. You're just a baby. You're just a baby. I saw I saw And Death Stranding as well. Bibi did that and that thing with that.

And I was like, yeah, the face grab is super real. No, it is, it is cool to have that aspect to it. It feels a lot better that she's on your back behind you and not like in front, you know, even though it's a robot child, admittedly. There was a version of the game where she was like running around and it just caused like the player to accidentally shoot her like a hundred times. I mean, there's no tactical role to worry about, so you're not going to, like, bong every time. But, yeah, it does feel interesting to kind of like, I'm like, okay, this between this and the way I saw that intro to Death Stranding, too. None of that unease, you know. And then, but like, yeah, you have this and you have Donkey Kong and you've got Death Stranding, and you're just like, okay, we're in an era right now.

We're in an era of like Dad's Loll. Sins-Abe's legacy continues to Dicky or not. We will pay you to use Tinder. We will fucking pay you. Get out of the apps, kids. So one of the things of note, so first of all, I want to point out,

I've seen people say, Dad Space, this is the best, this is the best fake name for the game genre. I've seen, Solid, that's fun. Dad Space is A plus.

But I've seen like a fair amount of discussion and I felt it too where like we had the era of the sad dad the sad dad era like like emphasized by like Joel and Kratos and it

there's there's this weird like there's a type of guy out there who fantasizes about defending his family let's go hit it hit it yep yep I'll kill anyone to defend my boy I'd kill anybody who looked at my daughter

and say okay well would you pick them up from school and go to their soccer practice running through your head you're like what are you thinking about just hands over the over the wheat hiya hi yeah I'm right yeah of gladiator music

you know thinking about the Roman Empire specifically so that you can thrust at the enemy and like and those child in hand those games like particularly the last of us like plays directly into the family the the family revenge family protector like power fantasy um you read my mind on this go go donkey Kong and pragmata do not yes donkey Kong and pragmata are you and your buddy going on an adventure and I want to keep him safe but it's not about

oh get on like Hugh isn't going oh kill any robot that looks at that like no that's fucking weird right and and I'll even say instead he's like going get behind me get behind me I need to protect you and there's obviously those moments of like and then you kind of see like oh how's it going to handle something like oh they're being taken away or being threatened

right but something that is in the former category is going to make it all about that energy the like warrior revenge, LARP Dad Energy in a way. And there's a huge difference between how that feels, especially beforehand playing it as someone who didn't, you know, when you don't have a kid or anything like that.

I remember when I played Last of Us One, I didn't like Ellie at all. I thought Ellie was really annoying. Okay. And she pissed me off. Okay. Because I was in my 20s. Okay.

And I nicknamed Ellie Garbage. I do remember that. would refer to her only as garbage. Right. Right. But then I got to the last scene in the game and I was like yelling, I'm going to get you garbage. And then I went into the room and I just started shooting every doctor in there. Yes.

Going, you don't get to do this. Right. Right. Right. Yes. And then it was like, okay. So it was in there. Mm-hmm.

So I like. It was in there underneath. I really liked Ellie. Underneath all the annoyance. I didn't. I didn't have. I was fine with, you know, from the jump. I was like, okay, yeah, this energy works.

But, um, that's my garbage. That's mine. But there is something different. There is something different to the, like you said, like, yeah, it's the revenge fantasy and or the like, um, save them fantasy, you know. It's the, it's the mad max, lone warrior. Nothing to lose. Exactly.

Just going, right, right. Versus the one where it's like, actually do it now. here, they're here, take care of them now and, you know, while adventure is happening. I think the best summation of that attitude was like, would you kill somebody to save your family? Yeah, absolutely.

Would you suck a dick to save your family? All fours. Get the spit out. Just, I mean, and not only that, right? But think about the whole like, protagonists that are like good at

fighting and good at adventuring but bad at being parents you know your Joe Toro the ideas your your Josephs and your your Goku memes and it's like okay but what if like you had to really do a bunch of all the things you were doing all those adventures with the kid in your hand or like with you you know well don't ask Goku that

but that's you know like he's the work how does that change the entire adventure if you if if like Like, Gohan was there with Goku from fucking radits all the way through Namak. You know, there was no division in split up there. What if... And so, yeah, Pragata also has some of that where it's like, well, Diana can help you. She has to help you, in fact, because you're a team.

And it's like when I do dishes now, my dude, I don't have to bend down to get my dishes anymore, by the way. Oh, okay, okay. Okay. My little man goes in and the only thing I do is like, okay, steak knives. Dad takes all the steak knives out first because they're sharp, you know? But then I do that. And then he hands me every fork and every knife and every spoon. And then he gets distracted when he gets to the spoons because spoons make great drumsticks.

They do. They really do. But then he hands me every plate and every glass in that dishwasher. Nice. Okay. And it's like he's hacking a robot for me to shoot. You got a little opera. That's cool. Okay. So... Start them early. Start them real early. This kid puts his clothes in the washing machine. He does his dishes. He puts his dishes away in the sink. He helps his mom make muffins.

Oh, I mean, dude, when I said she, like, really responds to sound. Yeah. She's clapping like three months ahead of schedule. She's really, really ahead on that. Yeah. Before I forget, this is really important. because I know, I know your personality. Some milestones, they will be way ahead. Mm-hmm. And some, they will be way behind.

And unless they're like a year behind on those milestones, fucking don't worry about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All their skills are lopsided. There's no, like, normal child for their milestones. Yeah, except for, like, the really basic ones, like, you know, walking and talking and stuff like that. And some of it's just kind of random in the sense that, like,

you know um because yeah you we we talk about like tummy time and like how that strengthens the back and it's really good and everything and like she got really really good at it um and like now she's just like hating it and just doesn't want to do tummy time anymore and it's like oh i hate tummy time too yeah and like you know this is how like you can like and tummy time then leads to crawling you know but it's like she's kind of like like pulling back from that while also like getting more confident about like being more standing up and You know, and like having these and sitting down and balancing and things like that. So yeah, it's all like kind of swerving.

And ultimately it's kind of like, okay, I didn't care. I'm not caring about like that milestone as much as I'm going. I notice that she's old enough now to look around the room and want to get to stuff and is frustrated that she can't get to it yet. So I'm like, ah, I can see. My body isn't doing it. Well, how do I do it? Exactly. I'm like, I can see that you're getting frustrated at your limitation.

and you want to be able to move over there. So let's try to encourage that, you know. That's the speed at which it makes sense to go for me, you know? I'm going to hold up my hand. There's a comment that I just saw that I want to respond to because I think it's funny. Someone says, don't forget about the gifted child to burnt out adult pipeline. And someone says, has Pat ever talked about that? I would love to hear his thoughts.

Most of you weren't gifted. Your parents just gassed you the fuck up. Probably, yeah. Sorry. By the numbers. sure sure I mean I got I got the I got the records to prove it I literally skipped a grade yeah me too but so you know like I can't worry but yeah but yeah but yeah but yeah most most of you weren't gifted you you were just like normal and your parents like gassed you up and

didn't teach you to work hard you learned that you had to work hard one day and you were like oh this sucks And how were you rewarded? Were you rewarded by being told that, like, wow, you're so smart? Or were you told, like, that you worked hard? You worked really hard, yeah. Yeah. I was told, man, you're so smart.

You're smarter than the other kids. You're better. I'm like, oh, okay. Wait a second. I didn't just get 100 without trying this time. What happened? Does that mean I'm stupid? Yeah, exactly.

She's like, hey. So, um, Um, the, the take, the take is back to it now. Uh, you're running through. And I don't know if you got, um, uh, okay. So did you get to the area, the second area of, um, yeah. Okay. The New York area. Exactly. You get to the city, right? And shit opens up. You start to see like this wider zone. You start to see the environment in pragmatta that is from the trailer where you see them in the city. Because I was like, oh yeah, the first promotional material looked like in Times Square. And so you got to that sort of area and see what's going on. Something really cool about the passage of time in our era is that new things that can be used in fiction are very contemporary. Like if you've ever seen something 3D printed, then you might have seen how something looks when it goes wrong or when it's in the middle of printing and how fucked up and stringy. it gets. I think when I, I'm really glad I was able to get

to the New York section during the sponsored segment because the art style at the beginning of Pragata is pretty stock. It's sterile. You're in a space station. A lot of really good reflection work. Yeah. But like you're in a few fucking space suit and you're in

fucking space and there's robots. And it's clean space. It's not space that's been it's been abandoned for a long time. Yeah. But You get to that New York section, and the first thing you discover is the robots are starting to look deliberately non-standard. So I'll describe them. Yeah. But also, you get this Capcom team's opinion of what they think about AI generated slop, because you are walking through a 3D printed slop space where everything looks really pretty from a distance until you get closed. and everything's mashed together like shit.

I mean, and nothing's contiguous properly. You look through a window right before you get there and you see a taxi, a New York City yellow cab being 3D printed and you're like, what the fuck is that? You know, and then you see its application where it's just like, yeah,

this is a basic scanned vibe of what New York is, right? And the idea that, well, sure, because this data was probably just like, oh, I don't know, we sent in some Google cabs to do, Google Earth. And then they just took all that, uploaded it, and now we spat it out on the 3D printer and like filled in the blanks with what AI thinks. Some of the printings have also failed.

So you're seeing this really kind of interesting thing of like, yeah, it looks, you're just parts of the city that are breaking into the station underneath it. And you're just kind of printing out onto the space above. And you see where the errors occur. It looks like three, printing mistakes. That's a new thing. It's really interesting. That's a new thing that I've never seen in any fiction before because it's like this is this is now that we know about 3D printing that we could use that.

Right. There's a new medium and with a new medium comes new techniques, sounds and visuals and errors. And the way the stringy parts of the of the material kind of like rip into these fabricy like sinews, you know, is like, oh, fuck, that's someone. that's looking at when printing goes wrong and then you can use that to like give a kind of like horrory fucked up effect

especially like the areas where you're not supposed to go yet it's not just like a like oh it's like it's giving the same energy of like a crystal that says break this later in the game to get through yeah yeah but it's fucked up 3D printed you know see that 3D printed progression blocking bullshit because like

oh oh oh this is this is a larger scale of exploration than I was expecting and then I finished that section and it was like, you got 52% of the shit in this level. And I'm like, I've, what? Hmm. I didn't see enough room for 48% more level.

I found a couple of corners and areas that were tucked around that you can admit, you can miss running through it. Yeah. I found an invisible wall which made me want to shit. Because it's interesting how. Sorry, an illusory wall. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay, okay. Because, yeah, I get the impression that based on that opener area, that it's still, excuse me, it's still very, it's a linear game, you're going in a linear path, but like, there's moments where doors lead to doors lead to corners and those corners lead to pits that lead back up to the path you were on. And you can kind of like run in circles around these areas a little bit. And yeah, it opens up a little bit more so far in the second part. Gameplay wise, of course,

because we were you know we've been talking about like the setting and diana and stuff but like the core loop of just like it's third person shooting over the shoulder feels good uh you jump and shooting feels good the hacking also feels good jumping feels amazing jumping so one of the so this is one of those fun things where they they they had me ad copy um make sure to say it's by people who made devil make cry and reason evil like specifically the team right and like you opening credits you see John Takahuchi is a producer. John Takuchi is a monster producer. He just does like, he's produced like all the Resident Evil games like damn near everything

that's come out of Capcom. But then I'm like, well, where's the devil may cry stuff? And then I'm like, oh, enemy attacked me and I hit jump and Hugh jumped 15 feet straight up in the air with an invincibility frame on his startup. And I'm like, that's the devil may cry. I described it to Reggie as basically from the people who brought you Dante and Blanca's jump arc. Right?

That's so specific. Dante and Blanca have the same jump. It's really high, really fast. It doesn't go very far forward. And then they drop like a brick. And it gets you the fuck out of the situation and then drops you back down. And it's really tricky to deal with if you're, you know,

try to, if you're defending against it. But like, I really enjoy that into a hover. And then you boost with him forward. And it's like, it's just, it's nice. you know he's got a nice little little movement a thing going and then you jump and then you aim down the sights and that

some bitch starts floating in the air and you're like ah but also I was like okay I got a dodge or two dodges and then I you go to the upgrade thing and it's like you may upgrade from one dodge to two dodges and I'm like oh okay I guess that's the limit

of how crazy the game will go no because then I got like one level further and every single thing in the entire hook said, no, we unlock more levels of every single ability in the game. And there's way too many of them for you to buy. Hmm. So I didn't spend my... Which is something I haven't seen in a game in a long time. So I didn't spend my money on that, interestingly. I went a different way where I was like, I see they unlock, you get a special currency. And there's a whole big buildup for when you get that fucking super currency. Because... Oh, I didn't get that new currency. You pick up that, you open up the chest and it's like... You know, and you're like, yeah! And you get it, and it's like you now have access to dad dodge, dad time, you know, which is last second dodge into boom, right?

Or do the boss takedown QTE on regular enemies? On anybody? Yeah, it's, it's so you, there's too much that you don't have enough to buy all the upgrades, like not even close. Like I, you know, I finished two levels and I had enough. to get like one of the two of the cheaper upgrades I would have had to save up for any of the others right that's awesome that's awesome that I have to like really be like okay do I want dad time or critical hits on regular enemies because those are both really really really fucking good do you want to

spend your currency on just restocking your shotguns uh you know or do you want to put them towards like yeah any of the other, um, uh, stacks of upgrades or so. So like one of the things that I did, I'm like, oh, more mod slots. I will have as many, I will buy mod slots until I run out of like slots that I can equip because these, these upgrades are really powerful. They're really powerful and they're on all the time. Did you notice that when you got mod slots and mod upgrades that every time you saw a percentage that some bitch had two digits on it?

I did. every time you get a modification, it's minimum 10%. I talked about it. And I was like, but you know what else I noticed? You know what else? I was like, hey, I unlock the shotgun. Now the shotgun is available. Every time I want to leave the hub, I can start with a shotgun.

Somebody described it as Dark Souls One spells. Oh, preparing. You're leaving the bonfire with all you're going to have, and then you can find more out there. But that's what you're leaving with, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, okay, okay. But more than that, I unlocked that, and a little cutscene happened of like a locker opening up. And like the little thing of the, you know, the locker.

I'm like, where is that? Right? I'm like, looking around, like, where was that in the room? I'm like, oh, it's the set of like a hundred lockers next to the tunnel exit. Oh, okay. It's coming out of those in printing. And so, like, every single one of those. of those fucking things is a hack or an upgrade or a weapon or something significant.

Right. And it's a huge line on both sides. Okay. Okay. Every. Yeah, that's your. So you're like, oh, there's going to be some fucking guns in this game. And the thing is, is we're on a almost vanquish-like system of like you get four slots and

you can carry one of each category in each slot. So you're not going to quick switch into everything every way you want all the time. at once. No, you have your damage slot, you have your utility slot, and I didn't get the bottom. Yeah, whatever that's going to be, exactly. And then obviously there's your default gun, which we'll never leave.

So, basically, after you go through some of that New York section, so you get introduced, you get your shotgun, you get your net for locking things down, your next upgrade after that, you get a, basically a grenade

that replaces your net on the ground. So, like, just spread the enemy out, knocks them down, and then your shotgun replacement becomes sniper, right? Just laser, pierces through enemies, multiple in a row, blah, blah, blah, blah. It takes long time to charge it up, but it has its utility. Not long after that, you start seeing... So, I mean, here's the thing is, like, the game, as it's a Capcom game, has its moments where you're doing this running around and you're shooting and stuff, And then it goes, for this part, you're playing Resident Evil.

You're in a hallway and the enemies are coming at you and they're going go in your face and you don't have the room to dodge actually. And when you run out of bullets, you can reload, but you're reloading one bullet at a time. And it takes forever. And it takes forever. Yeah. Right. So I'm like, oh, you have a big guy and two small guys and some floaters around zapping at me in a tiny little hallway.

That's a, it's a problem. this is an R.E. moment in a not R.E. game. You know, so it can switch into that when it wants to, which I thought was really interesting. Not to mention, you need a little bit of room to, like, hack while things are coming at you from left and right and stuff. And then you start being like, okay, fuck this. Just go straight to the target. I can't be going through the extra relays, you know. Yeah, one of the things that I really liked was I just, I unlocked the, I forget what it's called, but the multi-target. HAL-MALTIHAC.

And it's like, I get three of these. Yes. And I'm like, this might as well be an incredibly good grenade in any other game. How? Hacking it and like, oh, I got this big fucking mess. I need it to stop. But don't, don't accidentally use it by just panicking and automatically running through the yellow object on your way to the green.

Giving yourself powerful hacks makes the hacking mini-game harder against normal enemies. because you have now put obstacles in your brain to avoid. It's really smart. It's really, really smart. And it feel, again, I can't say enough. After we talked about it before, it feels good to do the game inside the game. It doesn't feel bad.

I hate when it... Putting it on the deep head. Right. Feels good to do that. Now, there's a moment that occurs where the second category of flyers drops in and starts shooting missiles at you. Okay?

And so you fucking, you got to take some time time, shoot those missiles out of the air while the rest of the thing is coming, right? Um, the missiles, however, if you aim Diana at them, can be hacked. And that's cool. You then have Diana hack the missile and you return to send her that shit back to where it came from,

right? Awesome. But the moment that you hack it, this is, and this is like to lay this out, um, there's something that happened in my brain. And like, you know, I'm like, I can't, I'm not going to go too elaborate into it because sponsored stream, so I'm not going to bring up the other whatever properties and games, etc. You're playing the whole game and you're aiming at things and there's a grid and then you're

looking at nodes that are blue that you're trying to move through to get to a green one to activate the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, when the missile comes at you, you're looking at four rotational nodes. It's like, you know the elevator switches that rotate? Right, yeah, yeah. You're looking at that, and like, three of them are already blue, and one of them is orange, and you have to switch to turning that one into the correct location. And your brain goes from seeking out blue to needing to ignore all blue for that missile

hack moment, and I go, Icaruga, right? The moment you switch polarity in Icaruga, and your black dots are now hostile, and white dots are friendly and then you switch it back and then white dots are hostile and black dots are friendly and you're like that exact moment happened

when hacking and I was like I've I know this little tingle in my brain of needing to turn the colors that I was seeking out into colors to avoid right so that felt really cool as well in the middle of the fight you get these larger enemies

that's come out and they're moving they're like tightening they're basically like hey remember the creepy Titan effect like that's gonna be a part of this year. And they're a problem. And they represent things that should be dealt with until things that should be dealt with even more than those things start to show up. And now you have a list of priorities to go through. And basically where I took it to was after that first boss where you get a really awesome fight against the demo boss where you, it's like a metal gear and you're dashing

out of the way and hacking. And it gets her fucking, uh, uh, yeah, yeah, yeah, uh, whatever, rage of the dad Diana Trigger. Diana Trigger is what I was calling it. Her DT. Right? Yeah. Oh! Okay, DT.

Perfect. Yeah. So she pops her Diana Trigger and then you deal with the thing. So what comes up next is you get an exam room. You know, it is a series of waves, and there's a bunch of them, and there's things in there, and they come at you, and you need to prioritize immediately. And it's the first, like, Okay. Now, this is not the R-E little hallway section that we're doing. We're in a room and we're controlling a whored, a wave coming at you. And choosing what to ignore on the ground, what to pick up, when to switch to what. It's like I started to feel all of that as I was going through it. And like I died, I think twice and then came back through it the third time and just like I put down the sniper, picked up the shotgun, dealt with these things up front, take out the fly, etc. And then as you're just, and then as you're,

just prioritizing and then I saved up enough to deal with the big guy at the end and you're like this game when it's flowing and you're aiming and you're returning to sender and then oh my god it feels so good it feels fantastic man also I want to give the developers of the game

a little golf clap for two things about the naming conventions in Pragata first of all having this game come out on the moon like a week after a new moon mission. Good one.

Good time. Unintentional, but what a chisbit timing. Yeah, unrelated, but ooh, good one. But also calling Diana, Diana, that's

a plus. What's the bit? Diana's the goddess of the moon and childbirth. Okay, sure. Yeah, all right. That works. That's great. She's literally the moon baby god. moon child here's your moon baby um yeah i mean and it she's also the hunter okay i mean diana

can hunt um oh it's so it's aramis yeah okay like you yeah yeah yeah gotcha i mean they easily could have but also artemus yeah yeah yeah i i i just happened yeah i i i it could have easily been like a kid named luna or something but that that that's why you're going up to That's why the company is called Delphi. Because it's the Oracle. Cool, cool, cool. Okay, okay. Wasn't piece in that together.

What I was about to say just before that fuck was... Oh, yes. Something that I found that was initially tricky was like the fact that I'm like, oh, fuck, I'm out of bullets, and now I'm waiting to reload. and all this is taking time. And then I kind of realized in that last, like, phase, that challenge, whereas, like, the time where you run out of bullets is actually the time it takes to manage everything else happening on the screen.

So as those shots are coming back, you can look around, decide what to switch up to, hack anything that you need to hack right away, and position for the next re-engage moment after your bullets have, you know, reloaded. Now, Wully, I don't think you played calls. of duty modern warfare. No, I played advanced warfare. But if you had played call of duty modern warfare

and maybe advanced warfare, I didn't play that, I don't know if it's there. But Pragata agrees. Switching to your sidearm is faster than reloading. Yeah. Your default pistol reloads whether you have it in your

hand or not, which took me some getting used to. I hope you've got a side arm and that you're not empty. Right, yeah. Because you got to choose one to spend those shotgun bullets, which is another Resident Evil moment. Right?

How many do you start with? Four? That's enough for like one and a half. Encounters. Yeah. Straight up. Did you waste your shotgun on all the grunts? Well, too bad. No, no.

I had the shotgun. I fired it four times at the wall. Okay. that it hit zero instead of reloading. Uh-huh. And then killed myself on the next encounter to get the checkpoint reloaded and went, only for big boys. Furthermore, you start shooting at not the weak point on things and realizing you're an idiot

because there's glowing things you should be shooting at to make this encounter easier. And if you can line them up even better, you know? Yeah, no. Like, I did appreciate just like, Each subsequent enemy that got introduced became the new problem priority that you need to shift up the list. And it's like, you see that? Deal with that. Which is a little vanquish-like.

I mean, the most vanquished-like thing about this game is the suit of armor. Is the suit. Yeah, for sure. But there's a little bit of that, too, of just like, it's almost like in Vanquish when you're hearing, you're hearing, you know, and you're like, stop, where? What? Deal. You know?

Not to mention running up to the thing and QTEeing it and stuff too as well. Yeah. I say one of the things that I found very charming. I thought I was psychic at a moment in this game because I was, you know, in one of the first areas, you walk back to the tram to pick up a collectible and like two robots start coming out of the printers. And I'm shooting at one robot. And then I just dodged to the side. and the second robot that I forgot was there swung at air.

And I'm like, oh my God, how did I know how to do that? That's crazy. And chat had to tell me, Diana told you. I'm like, she did? I hadn't even noticed. But Diana, like, literally yells, watch out. Okay. And I just reacted without thinking.

And I'm like, awesome, awesome. Okay, I was, because I didn't notice that either. But something I was worried about often was, there one behind me? Because sometimes you're dealing with the thing in front and you're doing the hack. Yeah, she'll give you a heads up if something's readying up a swing. Okay. Okay. Because yeah, like there's, there's times where they are behind you and you're not always getting an audio queue if you're, especially if you're locked into the hack moment. And like I fail, you know the stompies, the big guys with the tummies

they stomp? I failed one of those and the next time they got ready. Dino's like, jump you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That I've been getting. And I'm like, oh, thanks. Oh, that's cute. 100%. Yeah. No. That's cute that you did that. Thank you. It was great.

It's great. I wish Ashley in R.A.4 had told me that somebody was sneaking up behind me. That would have been very, that would have been more useful than you hiding in a trash can, Ash. So something else that I happened to was an enemy I was in the middle of hacking. I was shooting and I hacked it and it died. And then I aimed at the next enemy. And then the hack line went to that enemy instead. so you don't lose the hack for killing the thing you're looking at

it applies to the next thing that you aim at and it and it and it and uh yeah and it just kind of like transfers over right it's like there's a moment I have to go back and look but I basically feel like I what I thought I saw happen was I was shooting and then it goes down and then um I the line that I completed the hack on I turned to the next thing and it went into that and then and then that thing created instead. I think that's what I saw happen in which case it's like, that's interesting because you have a transfer moment that's possible. No, I fucking...

Games just super solid. Yes. So solid, in fact, that I'm going to continue playing it. So... People have been at... You know what's a really positive sign for your sponsored stream when you're like, thanks, Capcom. All right, that's going to be enough pragmata for today.

And then every single day since you get a couple of compliments. When are you going to keep playing pragmata? When are you going to keep when? And the answer is for me is next week, because I have a very busy week this week that you should check out. Yeah. And to be fair, anytime the thing is brand new, you can expect that that's going to be the case. Yeah, this is going to keep. Have you heard about lunatic mode?

No. Nice name. Lunatic is the godhard equivalent. Okay. Um, it's harder. And they unlock more of the system for you at the very beginning of the game. Yes. Okay.

Like they just, they just open up the store like much, much earlier to be like, deal with the problem. You know what you're doing. You had to unlock this by beating the game. So what do you fucking want to use to go through hard mode? Great, great, great. Yeah, I'm, I'm envisioning really great hacks, really great items and mods. but like resources becoming the problem, you know?

Because that little pew-pew gun at the end of the day, you're going to need to rely a lot on that thing when you're out of your good shit, you know? I did find like you always kind of, you're running by them and you're like, okay, I remember this room had a couple things, but I ran empty in a few encounters and went, stop, go back and pick those up and then move forward,

you know, which again, RE, right? Yeah, no, it's like, listen, no, you can only hold four shotgun shells at a time, but I passed a shotgun power up in that room. Mm-hmm. I picked up... I should go and get it. I picked up a multi-hack, but I left a disarm on the grounds.

Oh, you gotta keep that, yeah. Let me go get it. I will say, going into that first boss fight, that... Somebody in my chat described it as a boss pond rather than a boss fountain. It is ridiculous. this. It is a giant circular room with like a dozen visible Unreal

tournament style weapon pickups just floating on the ground. Like it's, I fucking wonder what's going to happen. Yeah. But also get used to picking up things on the fly while the action continues. It's like this is what I have now. Yeah.

And also here's the boss is shooting a fucking circus of missiles at you. You can't really do much right now. Might as well take it the chance. to evade and go reload, you know, go pick up new shit. Plan. So there's going to be these breaks in the action where you got to like reassess and start up your next hacking plan.

You can put the hack node right before the final point and then choose to use it later. You know, if you change your attention to look back at something and then look back at the thing you were in the middle of hacking, it'll be where it was. Yeah. You know, so like that's, I can only imagine how this hacking is going to get inside. sane towards the you know i really like you know uh i had this happen a couple of times in which i had to cancel the hack i had to start it over and if you're pointing your gun at someone and you're hacking them you have to start the hack over like not fail it like i locked myself into a

corner okay um you have to hold the touchpad you have to hold it to cancel the hack uh and it's really awkward huh and that's definitely on purpose. Not failing, but stopping and starting it. Because you can't, you can't, like, you can't, you have to pick a thumb to fucking let off the fucking movement or aim. And it's like, no, you fucked it? Get ready to crab claw this shit.

Okay. I mean, I, yeah, I found myself getting cornered in a couple moments where I was like, I have nowhere to go and there's a big boy and a dude about to slash me. And I jump, float, dashed out kind of thing. and you know, I haven't found myself having to do that yet. But that's an interesting,

that's an interesting decision. Yeah, really fucking cool game so far, man. That is, and I also heard it's not very long, so, you know, we'll see. That's 20 to 25. Okay.

And then another, you know, 15, I guess if you want to hit lunatic mode, which is the length of all Capcom games. I don't know if you've noticed that. But like, if you're shooting a gun in a Capcom game, it will take you 20 to, 25 unless it's you know

a classic Resident Evil game then you don't blow through it in a single set down Is that also the the main campaign for Monster Hunter? Uh no. Before before the real mode starts? Yeah I would say so. And it's RE9 was that as well.

Okay. But RE9 and I assume Pragmat are built to like Now I'm gonna do it again. I'm just, I beat it, I'm just do it again right away. The only the other thing I'm kind of looking at that it's like happening is like your, you're spending those cabin tickets, cabin coins on, you know, I guess like model viewers and you're

filling up the room with gifts. So you're giving Diane and stuff. And I'm like, this is clearly a game where cosmetics can go far. And absolutely. You know, and they gave you a taste of that in the DLC and I was like kind of hope, not in the in the demo. And I was I was hoping we'd get some like right off the bat, you know, because I can see there's that like, hey, put her in a bunny outfit like like costume. or you can get Hugh to like have his suit be a little more halo looking, I think, or have little little cat ears on it or so. But I'm hoping we get some cool cosmetics

because, I mean, we already know the Mega Man one. Like they literally showed that in the Evil Fool's bit. It's a Mega Man. Cat armor, excuse me. Yeah, that game, that game is fucking great. And no, and yeah, Reggie walked away going, like, I'd love to see more of that. That was super fun to watch too.

It's great. Yeah. It's super good. Good. So I guess I'll take it from there. Take it away, Wully. Okay. Guy who works over at Wully versus. Correct. The, you know, okay, I wanted to bring this up to it. So just a little tag on from the conversation we had two weeks ago about River City girls and the endings.

Yeah, we're the only people who like that ending. So it turns out, so here's the thought, right? Because it turns out that like a, for a lot of folks that hated it, it was basically. based on they felt it came out of nowhere and it invalidated everything they did. It didn't come out of nowhere though. And it felt like there was kind of a bait and switch, right? It turns out there's some obscure, um, there's an obscure Coonio game where these characters existed. Yeah, there's a version of the game in which those girls are listed as their girlfriend. And then they got retconed out of existence.

Yeah, they got retconed out of existence, right? Therefore, making their, their, them and then the rivals have an act. actual like reason to exist and hate each other in this setting, which is a cool little detail. But I think for that type of ending to work where you're going everything you thought was one thing is actually a knot and it's kind of nuts. You're kind of nuts. As long as it's hinted at in interesting ways on the way there, I think that would be much better received than the idea of feeling like you just got the rug pulled, you know, because I love the idea of the idea of everything I'm hearing about that, but I think to give people to not receive it the way they did

based on the conversation we had, you got to like give something that you can look back and go, remember when this happened? Didn't you think that was a little bit weird and didn't you just kind of look past it? That might be something that kind of like, you know, plants a breadcrumb for you. Mm-hmm. And hold of my hand. So you didn't play River City Girls, right? I did. You did? Okay. Because but I did, I didn't do the secret ending. I just did, I did a main run, a one, a single run. The first thing that's your hint that the River City girls are not their girlfriends is that they

literally aren't. They're the wrong girls. From previous games. Those are not that's not Coonio and Riggi's fucking girlfriends. And the second one is every single villain in the game is like, who the fuck are you? Where is girl? Where are their girlfriends?

No, you're not. Who are you? Like the whole game builds up to it. Oh. Okay. Well, then never mind. Fuck that. Okay. No. Like the Yeah, okay Then they go Yeah, we are

And like, Oh, The villains are jerks Oh, No, That's all right, then that's exactly What I meant.

If there, I don't remember, but like, if that's what's been happening the whole time, then that's exactly it. Yeah, no,

so I'm like absolutely baffled by people not liking the ending because It was, it was built up to that. Okay. Yeah, yeah,

yeah, yeah, yeah, great. No, because that, that's how you make that, that shit work,

you know? I feel like, the because because basically reading the most charitable interpretation of that you go oh I remember how I felt at the end of fucking bayonetta three where the fuck did that come from

oh yeah no I know I know I know I know and we're gonna you know yeah turns out you were dumb and wrong it turns out that there's alternate realities being teased the whole time and like I mean the kind of work is there's serraza and everything and that's we'll get there there's not much to say it's just they did an interview

Camilla said that they hinted at the alternate realities in previous games. So there was signs like the moon being destroyed in Bay-O-1, but then it's back in two. So there's reasons to believe that, like, you were no longer looking at the same Bayo. What was the ending of Bay-O-2, Balder going back in time to do Bayo-1? Are you saying that Balder went back in time in Bay-O-2 to do Bay-O-1 in Bay-O-2? Why do you do that? You lie! No.

Also? I'm not even there. I take no issue with him saying that, like, this is what you. can go back to the old games and see a hints of that like uh there is an idea that alternate sure fine it doesn't make it good it's like no you just didn't understand it well you're explaining a bunch of shit that i had no complaints over at all i actually think like viola's like absolutely garbo fit at the end of the game is a bigger problem for your story than any of this multiverse shit i mean yeah i just you you showed us the future of the witches and my fit is

is trash. Fuck you. You leaned into the multiverse setup here and it wasn't that great. So it doesn't

even though there were hints at it in the past it doesn't make it better received unfortunately. It just it felt like shit.

So the main heroine of the season the series going forwards gameplay isn't finished so let's patch it fixed later because it sucks.

Um, a good one. Um, yeah, no, it, it is, it is like addressing like, an, it's addressing a gravy complaint as opposed to like the meat and potatoes of what everyone disliked, which is where, you see, this is how I made the gravy, bro. I'm complaining because your shit is overcooked. Yeah, well, um, because underneath that meat and potatoes is Shizzo Abe. Oh no, not again. How'd you get into my dinner? His ghost is so strong. The fact that that comes up, it's like, oh, fuck.

Anyways, the, the, the whole thing with, the whole thing with River City girls, like, yeah, if that was telegraphed, then that's exactly it. I have no, then no issues. That, that's it's hilarious. beyond that yeah no the only other thing was all right wrapped up Soul Reaver 1 hit the credits Woolly

yeah I want to I want to describe the event that occurred I was playing I think was it Pragano that I was doing at the time and someone came in chat like Wully just beat Soul River 1 and the very next

comment underneath it was somebody went already and it went Yes, that's the Soul Reaver 1 experience. You think you're building up to like the 80 or 70% mark? And then the game just goes over with a cut scene and a cliphanger. And you're like, I can't believe this. It really does, between that and, excuse me, everyone talking about cut content,

it really does feel like they ran out of time and money. I can tell you with absolute certainty, they ran out of time and money. Yep. right cut human era area that like it's not cut but it was meant to be more cut boss fight that is apparently

in the remaster hey did you know you remember when you got that fire soul raver did you think it was weird there was only the one element oh yeah okay but that's supposed to be like eight of those man to be fair though I

hit the credits with half of my spells not being there sure the glyphs were like all were you could have gone a little further and and to be honest most of them felt worthless like there was a really the fire one was great oh totally the others didn't fucking do anything really and that was that that is a that is a that is a uh a halo two ass scenario so i knew like one i knew the game was short but i also knew like okay cliffhanger shit coming the fuck up because of previous conversations and red I remember that conversation vividly.

I'm like, you're gonna do the second one. You're like, I don't know. I don't like to promise. And I'm like, this one ends with the fucking expectation that you're going to keep trucking because it just cuts the fucking page in half. And so, you know, while I was more or less like prepared for that, like, yeah, Reggie's just they're like pogging out. Like, what the fuck do you mean the credits are rolling?

You're like, welcome to the 1999 experience, you know? If you flip a coin enough times, will it land? on its edge credits. What? Uh, here's what I will say is finding out that like the, the, the, how, I said, how long did you have to wait in 1999? And the answer was two years. Right? So I'm like, okay, fine. That's fine. Yeah. Yes. And also, two years after 1998 time, that's like 13 years now. The speed at which, amazing shit was coming out back then.

That's an eternity, you know? But no, I'm like, all right. They did get to the second one within a reasonable time frame here. But guess what? Soul River 2 also. Ah!

Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. I can see, so here's the thing, is I was looking at the, as you're walking down that final stretch of the game, you're looking into the future, you know, you're looking to the past, and then you're seeing these scenes replaying and then you start looking into the future and I'm going are you showing me are you showing me the sequels right now are you setting up moments that you're going to have to come back

to you know Willie if you were playing legacy of Kane in 1999 and you're like oh my god this cliffhanger's crazy I can't believe it but like six months later they announced Soul Reaver 2 and it's out a year later in 2001. You're like, oh, okay, that's not. But then you finish Soul River 2. And the same fucking thing happens. You're like, oh, I can't believe it. Oh, when's the next one?

I can't wait when you think Defiance comes out. Oh, that, I guess that was a bit more of a stretch. When, when do you think? 2005? Three. Three. Okay, okay. So, like, each.

time it happened you're like oh can't believe oh it's there it is right right right okay the whole trilogy of games sorry a whole a whole tetrology of games like an eight year period because uh blood omen uh was um blood omen 95 96 96 yeah so 90 so in a nine four in a seven year span they released the tetralogy of games. And then Defiance does wrap it up, but then they, you know, they open it up for the future. And you're like, I wonder when the next one's going to be in about 18 months, right? And that's where I've lived for my entire adult life. And there we are.

Yeah. What I will say is knowing that looking at this with the lens of, you know, late 90s early aughts as the, you know, how you're supposed to to play it. It is it is really there's a lot there that is incredible for the time. The thing that I remember

the most though is the this is the ammunition that was used in the war of this versus Okorita of time. Ridiculous comparison. And that's an now and now I'm like that's insane. That you cannot.

The structure, I can see it. Like you like structurally it shares like I'm gonna go to a dungeon I'm gonna do a puzzle puzzle third yeah yeah yeah and it was mature and violent and had voice acting which

but like it's it's a it's a small game with a small scope and it and it does a couple things that are impressive but it's not like this mechanical masterclass that Okarina was like Okina is like you finish the dayku tree

and no Jabu Jabu's belly wraps up and then we end the gate roll credits there. You don't even get to adult, you know, in, in direct comparison here, I'd say. So, yeah, that, that feels silly. Not to mention that, like, there's no real other, like, you're not really going about and, like, talking to, there's no other, like, towns, villages, people, et cetera, whatever going on. You're doing the puzzle rooms.

You're killing the enemies. You're meeting your brothers. Templeman and Michael Bell are just going to monologue. They're doing it. It is funny, though, seeing this with the lens of the past in the chat next to us at the same time, because I'm appreciating it and like what it's doing and keeping in mind that like, yeah, I get voice acting at a premium back then. But at the same time, there aren't your childhood memories of this game are way longer and more in depth and have more plot going on than the reality.

of what we experienced, right? Like, for example, this is a really good example. I'm streaming and somebody goes, will they just beat the silent cathedral? And I'm like, I thought that was going to take them like multiple sections. Because when I was 50, yeah, yeah, yeah. It took me like eight hours. Yeah, yeah.

And I felt that. Oh, I was stupid. I felt that the whole time watching as we're going encapsulated in these big moments where, for example, walking into the final room with Kane, right? Folks are like, best monologue incoming. I was like, it was all right. I mean, it's fine. So the reason why it was the best monologue incoming is that your choices of monologues were

your solid one and nothing. And, and when you got this monologue, you were also on summer break in your friend's house with a sleepover and you just had pizza and you had some seven up and you're getting super hyped up for this sick final battle that's about to happen because you rented the game for the weekend. Right? So you're having all of that and I'm like, yeah, I'm not there right now. That's not where we are, but I can't fight that memory, you know? It's, it is, it is kind of like, yeah, this is, This is basically introducing these characters. And Kane really has like two moments.

One where you fight him. And then he kind of goes like, ah, I'm doing something with the Solar Reaver and disappears on you. And then the second time where he sets that up and talks about viewing the future. And Mobius gets introduced. And then he rage quits to the time stream, which is the funniest shit ever. Like, fuck Alt F4. I am jumping into the life stream and you will come find me.

It's hilarious shit. And then they're suddenly telling you that I hope you are excited for the timeline of the games to get super fucking confusing. Super confusing, man. Looking forward to it, you know. But this being said, keeping a lot of that in mind, I see the potential here for this to then tighten up something. of these mechanics, expand the whole, like, how to kill the enemies bit and, you know, maybe making this shadow realm a little more interesting with stuff. And then fucking pusing, pusing and thinking and turning and pushing and spinning and blocks.

And blocks. Because, oh boy, this is a puzzle game with 3D fighting graphics happening around the puzzles. Absolutely. as is a video game an IDOS video game at the time anytime I thought like there might be one moment there's the moment where you fight Dumas

and he gets up you pull the stakes out and you're like oh here we go it's a fight fight and it's like it is not it is a lead him to the furnace moment but his AI kept breaking so I had to like run back and kite him and it was actually a port showing

so Dumas rules like, Dumas is like a really good example of all the problems we're talking about in Soul River. The setup for Dumas as the biggest and healthiest of the vampire lieutenants whose enemy, whose children you've been fighting the whole game was so tough that he's the only one that the humans of the time were like, fuck that one.

And staked his shit to the wall. And they, but couldn't kill him. And he's so you have like, I have to, allow my enemy to like heal up so I can actually kill them cool idea very awesome setup I think

trick him to fall into the furnace I mean they like like he does do the ha ha ha laugh when you swing at him right so there but ultimately I think what's a little strange too is that like the only fights that are not puzzles in the game

are the cane fights but those aren't really fights either as much as they're like run up to him and get a swing. He's going to do a thing in the corner. Just do it fast. And it's like it's not about solving how he's going to zap you or what. It's just like, no, just get there faster, you know. No, you can feel how every single part of this game was built out of the old versions of Tomb Raider. Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, definitely brings that back.

And since Rosiel doesn't have a gun, how, like he doesn't, it's not a good bunch of ways to fight a bunch of these enemies. But around that, one of those last puzzles where you're pulling the one block to open the one door and the two block to open the two door and you're switching the sides with them and getting that, you know, I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah, we're tomb rating for sure. I still do think, though, that, like, again, the idea of how you'd kill enemies and have to take their souls and that whole thing is very unique for the time. And yeah, that's, that's very unlike any other thing. And that's the most unique bit it has going for it. Some of the platforming is dodgy, but like, it's fine. You have, I really only learned... I remember talking to somebody in their life, Legacy and Kane,

So we were so much better than Zelda because you actually have a jump in that game. Fuck off with that shit, dude. Zelda not having a jump actively made platforming work way better. Because I'm doing the thing that I only learned at the end, which is hold slow walk to approach an edge and you won't follow. off of it, right? And you, and I'm like, the problem I've been having was like walking to these edges and trying to get the high jump and floating down to get fucked over on just being able to grab the

ledge and moving up or whatever. Ah, the game's from 99. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, a jump button feels good in combat and in the ability to do with that. that running around the map is something that feels good in video games regardless. But getting used to it and getting used to the weirdness of like run to the edge and you'll jump off of it in Zelda was strange, but I ultimately got what they were going for and why, you know? I tell you what, though, legacy of Kane Defiance did genuinely change a lot.

You have a high time in that game. And air combos. Wow. Okay. They straight up were like, we played a bunch of DMC1. So, I mean, combat in this first one, as basic as it is, the little stinger input and sidestepping was interesting. I'm like, oh, you can backstep, you can dash in and slash, or you can swing around

them if you dodge when they're attacking, when they attack you, and get to the side. And that's more engaging than I thought, you know, while you're locked on. So they had like, yeah, like soft lock controls and strafing. That kind of worked out. Um, yeah, it was just, uh, you know, it was just all that and the puzzles and everything in the end. We're just like a, ultimately, I get what you're going for. I'm looking for, I want to see the, the step up from this. And yeah, maybe we can start to walk away from block pushing a little bit and get more towards the other interesting things with these games. And if you're going to keep block pushing, you can make the blocks go faster.

You know, you don't have to make them go cube by cube square by square one at one push at a time. So I'm looking at like Defiance footage and I can I can still see the fucking The rooms are still made out of the grid Mm-hmm. Okay, great The other thing too is a but Raziel has million stab with the Soul Reaver Okay So fuck it You also do feel like you're running through a giant cave for most of the game

Like rooms just connect to rooms in a way that like You're in one big complex as opposed to like Well don't you understand it? It's been so long that the earth has shifted and cities are gone and the landscape is barren. So, yeah, Nasgoth feels like you're in an ant colony. And that's a weird feeling, right? There's a couple moments where it opens up, but for the most part, the whole thing feels like you're running through an underground ant colony. Which, you know, like Metroid games have those moments, but there's ways to kind of like, oh, break it up a little bit in presentation, I suppose,

to feel more like, you know, you're traveling zone to zone. So I'm looking forward to see how they do that. It does help to shoot the blocks and push them faster that you get later on. But it's still pretty slow, you know. Anyways, the plan,

and I said it at the end there, was actually going to be hit credits, jump right over to two in that collection, and hit the start button. However, and that got people excited and I, but I gotta say, Pragmata has struck my interest. Pragmatas here.

So I want to play some of that because I really, really enjoyed it. So we're going to play some pragmata before we continue doing anything else. And in the meantime, Ace Attorney continues as the other LP we're playing right now. Yeah, that's over on Willie Versus. This week, I'm going to do some more of that. And then on

Saturday, I'm going to see if it's possible. I think we're going to do a strive 2.0 stream. I'm going to try to get a guest in, but I'm going to wait for confirmation. How about you? All right. So before I get into anything, I'm turning 40 years old tomorrow. So I'm having what Paige, Paige came up with this idea to call it the half-dead marathon. Because I am turning half-dead, and by the end of the day, I will also be half-dead. Okay. So that means that by 80, like Zaw-

I must die. Well, no, I think you just enter, like, unlife. Zombie mode. Oh, like Lichdom. Lichdom begins, yes. Lichdom's all right. Oh. People knock on it, but...

Well, the whole time with this cane thing, I was like, oh, so that's daddy. And then y'all are looking up to it. And it's like, no, no, no, that was Necro Daddy, actually. And then now he's necro-puzz daddy. it's a shame like very little in the legacy of cane series can live up to like all right cane you can solve the world and he's no don't want it well but now the well but now the implication is because i seen shit though and i'm like what you see cane staring in this fucking room of portals you've been looking at stuff what you see that made you choose to go so i'll tell you right now

the most interesting discussions between rossiel and kane is you don't know what i've seen and rossiel going you're fucking full of shit you didn't see shit you just didn't want to sacrifice yourself and then razziel goes uh uh rather uh cane goes nah you just didn't look long enough yeah and fuck you it's it's a great it's a great like clash of ideals because like i you don't don't know which of them is right until the dead last moment. I don't know what you saw, you know. But yes, tomorrow, April 22nd, 2026 at 10 a.m. Pacific. That's 1 p.m. Eastern. I'll be starting a long stream until 10 a.m. the next day. I'll be catching up on FF14 7.4. Then I'm going to do a full run of Symphony of the Night,

including the inverted castle. And then with the time we have left, I'm going to play a game I got on my birthday 25 years ago called Shining Force 2, which is the best. And I'm going to play that until I am tired. You got a speed run, this roll down the hill. Because you are now on the other side of the hill. Oh. It commences. And by trying to murder yourself.

Oh, come on. Live on stream. So the stream ends today for good reason. I concur with... Yeah, no, I have a hard out today because I've been... pages assessments. I have had nap times ordered by wife. That's that's good nap. That's good. mandatory nap. I can't

wait until it's literally like 3.34 o'clock in the morning Pacific and I'm playing Shining Force 2 and someone comes in and goes, is this an old fire emblem? And I just like, I've been streaming for 18 hours. I just lose it like I've never fucking lost it before. No, it's not like fire emblem. Shut up. At the stroke of midnight, like you're going to get like reboot like Enzo. Like the light's going to shine down and just pass over you.

and yeah actually nothing will change it'll just yeah nothing else slightly um aside from that i also played progmatah all caps all caps do not you capital p only how dare nope also make sure to have the hashtag pragmata in the title all caps again all caps from the creators weird ask honestly but hey, fuck it. Hey, you need to stop fucking around and do what it says and don't even do it as a bit. No, we can't.

Shut up. Shut up. Stop. No. You didn't respond to that text, man. I think the answer is yes. I think it is a yes a little bit. Well, that, I mean, that was literally

in the middle of said regression and freakouts that were happening in madness. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. However, not even as a bit. that one in the parlors um pragmat is cool

I also uh continued to play some kingdom hearts too uh of note so I I blew through Kingdom Hearts one in um

in eight days right that's the fastest like completion I ever did for anything considering it's our count right I am on track to

taking five times longer with Kingdom Hearts two There's a fraction joke somewhere in there that I don't feel like making it. Yeah. Oh, oh, King. Kingdom Hearts 39 over eight. I don't know. Anyway.

Hmm. Yeah. So. Welcome to the old age. To the old age. Welcome to the old age. That's right. So somebody in the YouTube chat was tracking it.

But could somebody in the chat right now hit? hit me with the death number. I think it's like 370 something. It's up there. I have never been more glad to waste the chat's time banging my head on bosses that I'm pretty sure I can't beat right now. Oh, you try to clear Sephiroth on camera? Oh, I did clear Sephiroth on camera. Oh, okay.

For one. In fact, there's a funny moment that you can only get in a Vod, right, when you're watching, like, the YouTube upload. Because there's a moment where I go, I got a text for my wife, I'm allowed to do one or two more tries of Sephraoth. But there's like three hours left of the stream. Okay, this is important. She went to bed, assuming I would. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. that was seen and regarded as the ultimate go fuck yourself level difficult thing at the time and I remember everyone talking about it I remember about the life bars going around of me just instantly dying in one second however with 2026 brain and time and with you have it's hard as fuck so but does he compare to dodging waterfall dance and you know yeah absolutely he's hard as fuck okay

Okay. Sephroth 1 and Kingdom Hearts 1 is hard as fuck. Post-Sold's game world. It's still... Oh, absolutely. Okay. Cool. He is like... What's a good comparison? Like playing through the entirety of Devil May Cry 1 and then the final boss is Virgil 3 from DMC 3.

As a jump. Okay, okay, okay. Like a full different games level of... of fuck you get good but I guess I'm just wondering if your reaction has been honed over time so that what once was Oh my reactions are probably a little slower But I'm a lot better at figuring out how to do it

But yeah no it's he's brutal shit And I mentioned absent silhouettes last time In Kingdom Hearts Sue where they just let you fight some of the organization members whenever the fuck you want D I think I'm near 400 deaths I would put like 95% no 99% of all deaths in my Kingdom Hearts 2 LP to me going yeah I bet I can get this boss now I don't have to come back later but you can just level up get stronger and come back and do it easier right but what if I could do it now okay okay it is a game though of course I could come back stronger yeah okay it is a game where you where that that is a thing um and in in in in in

one particular sundare case I had to come back like a while I thought Larksin 200 times and lost left came back stronger lost 50 more times

had to leave and came back stronger and then finally put it away how long were those attempts on stream each attempt was and I shit you not the first hundred maybe eight or nine seconds long like like when I say when I say this shit whooped my ass I'm I'm talking about from game over screen to back in the fight is 10 seconds seconds and the fight is lasting one second. Like dying to the first move.

So this was not my titling of this entire stream is dedicated to concert. This was like I died maybe a dozen times walking forward, which kills you. And then going, okay, don't do that. And then I got to see a move and it killed me. But then the next 10 attempts,

I learned how to block that move. And now I'm getting six seconds into the fight. But this is only happening because you're doing it under-leveled. Because I'm doing it way under-leveled. Because single strikes are killing me outright. Right. Okay. And then that three-hour session of just banging my head on it, I got to the second phase.

And then I'm looking at the second phase. And I felt something that I have not felt in a long time. which was the phrase, what do you even want from me here? You know when there's so much on the screen and there's so much damage that you can't even, like, what do you fucking want me to even do? Like, do you want me to do?

What the fuck? That's when I left. The expedition is cleared from the canvas. Yeah. That sentence. Well, see, no, no, no, no, I don't, I don't mean that. because that is what do you want me to do? Oh, you want me to be better. No, I'm talking about

I can't even see where you want me to stand. Okay. Like, there's so much here. So, I've been playing on Critical, which is the hardest, and,

man, that game's incredible. That game's just incredible. Kingdom Hearts 2 is absolutely incredible. It's a fucking incredible action game, and it's a great RPG. And constant, constant, constant charming slash funny moments with Sora, Donald, and Goofy. In particular, one, which is like a foible of translation, where they're reading out like a blackboard,

and there's something written on it in English, and they are like sounding out the letters because none of them can read. And in Japanese, it's still written in English, which explains why they're sounding out letters in English. But when it got translated, it's like, Donald, can you not fucking read? Isn't he a mage with a spell book? So the bit is meant to be they're in Japanese reading English. It's not supposed to be a bit.

It's supposed to be they're reading an English piece of text. And they're like, I speak Japanese. I don't understand this. But in English, it's like a single word. And they're going D. Oh And you're like, oh my God, man. Amazing.

It's really funny. They should have changed the texture on the wall to be a made-up language or Japanese and not just readable by the player. Going back to those boss difficulties, what is the, everything you're describing are all optional challenges. What is the level of the, the hardest mandatory thing? By comparison.

I'm pretty good at action games. The mandatory stuff hasn't really slowed me down at all. Okay. The gap between the easiest of the optionals and the final... So the mandatory stuff in Kingdom Hearts 1 didn't really slow me down at all either. I'd say it's a nice five or six, like, good action, good action game, you know? like it's not it's not free but like yeah you and i play this shit um but then when you get to the stuff that it's like hey do you want to fucking fight something because because i'm like the moment

you're describing i'm just thinking of like you know you get to you get to parts of uh silk song where you're like i can't move that fast and the game's like yeah you can yeah you can no yeah no there is a there is a chasm in between stuff that's that's optional and stuff that's not right And the stuff that's optional in two goes on and on and on and on and on. I think it has, it's got like 25 optional super bosses, which is enormous. Wow. That is like really legitimately ridiculous. And they're all fucked up like that.

So like the I was talking to chat and like the way that the playlist is going to go is like, like parts one through 30 are going to be like playing through kingdom hearts too and parts 31 through 60 is beating optional shit. Cool. Yeah, what an incredible game. What a fantastic stellar game. Me and Paige were going to watch more One Piece, but we fell asleep. four or five nights in a row putting the baby to sleep. Yeah.

Just like, okay, okay, we're gonna, we're gonna get them down and then we're gonna go downstairs and we're gonna watch one. Yep, yep. I mean, I, you know, like one, I'm, I can say that like you're struggling to figure that end of it out right now. And, um, Punch Mom has indicated an interest in potentially,

coming back to do some Delta room, you know, but gotta figure this shit out. Yeah. So. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's really funny because there was one night

when I'm like, all right, I think I think he's out. I think he's out. And I look over and he's looking back at me. And I'm like, God damn it, man. And he goes, hi. Yeah. And then from

the other side of the bed. I hear, all right, she's done. She's, she's cooked. She's out. And then I'm like, all right, I'm going to, I'm going to wait for him to fall asleep. And I'm going to go downstairs. I'm going to place, like, it's tomorrow. What happened? Do you ever, have you gotten the, like, it's dark, but like, whatever the, whatever source of light exists in any way, shape, or form? Like, she's craning to fucking stare at it.

No, I didn't do that, no. We have this thing where I'm like, I have to turn you away from the light, and you are, like, looking through my body at anything you can focus on, because, like, you just refuse to just let in the sleep, you know? Anyway. All right. So, let's see. I did, uh, I did some kingdom hearts.

I did some, uh, I did some pragmatta. Uh, I went and played some Rondo blood. And I was like, I could bang out Rondor blood in one stream. Fuck no I can't. Excuse me. That's Chi no Rondo. Shut up. I don't want to fucking do this.

I can't fucking tolerate this. Not doing it. Not fucking doing it. That's the fastest The bit has ever ended. I was ready. I was ready. As soon as you did this

at your hand, I knew, because you do that move every time. I'm so sick of it. Oh, my fucking God, dude. That is the fastest. I didn't even get to the... All right. All right.

I'll just... Next time, I'll just raise an eyebrow. I'll just... I'll just do this. Oh, my God. Oh, fuck that, good. Anyway, so I was like, yeah, I can beat Rondo Blood in 4 or 5. Fuck, no, I can't.

Oh, my God. That keeps so hard, dude. It's so good. It's everything good about old Castlevania games. and it is so hard. It's crazy. I don't, so I, I guess what? I don't know a ton about Castlevania,

but from what I have played, does anything or does anyone feel as insanely powered as you feel as Alucard at the end of Symphony? Oh, no. Rector, if you play Richter mode in Symphony of the Night, feels fucking busted. Julius in Julius mode. feels fucking busted, but in their own core game.

Okay. I mean, some of the, I mean, Soma and some of them, like the, the, the Metroid ones, yeah. Okay. He's not, he's not a, he's not a standout feeling of like, you are fucking unstoppable. Yeah. Okay. So the strongest Castlevania character, uh, in the action games by an order of magnitude is in Rondo of Blood and her name is Maria Renard.

and she can shoot a bird at you. And the bird has similar timing to the whip, but it hits on the way out and the way back, which makes it one million times better than the whip. She also has a double jump and a slide in that game that Richter doesn't have. So Maria is like baby mode. By comparison.

she she is super super super super super tough compared to richter also going through rondo of blood is really fun because like maria has her own subweapons like the cat from vampire survivors and the turtle from vampire survivors and the dragon from vampire survivors and then richter has the santa water from vampire survivors and the cross from vampire survivors and it's really I am had forgotten just how like one pixel off a lot of that vampire survivor shit was as long as the gameplay is different it doesn't fucking matter but yeah Rondo's great Rondo super

hey Bobo hey Bubba hey give me and last but not least I was approached for another sponsorship it was a big sponsored week I was approached by Wolfgang I'm sorry Wolfgang not Wolfgang

and Mirren out of Sweden and Romania to check out their game Dynastir which you can check out on Steam right now. It's on sale for the Steam medieval sale which is their independently made self-described Eurojank action-adventure game

self-described self-described every email I have about this game has the word Eurojank in it. Nice, okay, all right. And they basically said, hey, we're big fans of the show. The only one we want to sponsor to play the game is you.

You're the whole market. You're all the marketing. The word Eurojank says a lot. And I'm like, that's a lot of pressure. That's a lot. It's a very indie game. It's made by these two guys. I have a video up on it

Vaude up on the channel It is a it is a It is a It's a it's it's very much like a kind of Mix between like a dark souls and like a Kingsfield And like a like a gothic Where it's like everything Is unexplained

And also everything kills you Where's the camera? It's behind your back like a Dark Souls Okay And I played it for a little while and had the wonderful experience, again, no pressure of both of the developers being in chat, chit-chatting the whole time, including when I fell through the goddamn earth and died. And they're like adding it to the book list.

And then I'm like, at one point an NPC offered me like a mystery gift for my broken sword, which was my only weapon. so I traded it away and then couldn't attack and then one of the devs in the chat was like ha ha you fell for it now you have to find the currency to buy a new weapon without being able to fight anything oh we on some fear and hunger shit okay

yeah like laughing at me okay Jesus Christ all right and then I finally found one out in the world and bought a sword went to go fight a boss and that boss kicked my fucking ass a super interesting game very indie very Eurojank you can check it out now on Steam made by fans of the show

thanks for the spawn did you know you know how you know they're real fans of the show because the the email that came in was like oh man I really want you to take a look at this I've been watching you since you know what let's for our own old man sanity call it the apartment days okay okay got it all right all right

Just talking about the sponsorship stuff, but like, one of the things I just saw, I remember reading was like, do not say thanks for the spons. Thanks for, or thanks for the spawn. And I'm like, is this a real case that happened? Do people, have you ever heard anyone say shoutouts to whoever for the spawns? Anyway, whatever. Oh, that's cute. Patch notes Version 8.9.9.1, the Pat Patch.

Hey. Added auto exposure settings to make dark areas more readable. That's one of those things that comes up that I guess you only see it once it's on stream and it's through video compression. Game was really super dark when I played it. Yeah.

It is nice to have those, again, Hekita style like whatever you're just happening live on Twitch okay that's what's being addressed next cool reminds me of when I was playing a hat in time and I got some kind of fucked up sequence breaking nonsense

that they had to fix because I broke it in a highly public setting AGDQ where they're watching a I think it was double dragon and it was like oh god oh no oh Jesus Dinistere

Dinister Yeah One of the So they were They were super chatty And answer tons of questions And which was a dream Compared to most sponsored screens

Where there's nobody there to answer But we were talking about like They basically said Dynastere is a little hard to say And it's a little tough to market But it's the only fucking game named that Yeah And does not fall into

The Dawngate store not a slot machine. It's not a slot machine title. Everything else does. No. I was just praising Bridgeborn last week, and it's a great game, but it does fall on the slot machine. Bridge is not common, but still.

Bridge is not that bad. But Bourne means you're going to, that font in your brain is already kind of fading away, you know. Cool. I am being admonished by my tiny crippled dog that he's hungry, so I will have to be right back if you'll excuse me. BRB. Quick word from our sponsors.

Whom we love in all caps. All caps. Quick word from our spons. Oh, I get why that doesn't. Okay. Yeah. Must have been a thing. The only quick word for my spons is dood.

That is a word from the spons. This is true. Hey. This week, Castle Super Beast is brought to you by Rocket Money. That is your modern solution to the problem of forgetting about what you've subscribed to and where you're paying what every month and keeping track of your spending and all of that stuff that gets out of control. You can find yourself like I have looking at the weekly and monthly. Like sometimes it's not even monthly charges. There's weekly charges for certain services, certain apps, certain things.

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Talk just snooted into my entire face. Okay. Well, that's That's the end you want it coming out of, I suppose. I can't believe this has never happened in my life, but I got a dread farted on. And I was like, what the fuck? That's a new experience. That's a new experience. And only she can get away with it. Like, oh, that's, hmm.

I don't know what to do with this. Anyways, this podcast is also sports. sponsored by a factor. And you can 100% get yourself into a tizzy trying to solve your meal problems with, you know, preparing them, eating them, figuring out what to do. And even once you can get down to that step, you also need to want to make sure that you're eating healthy. And guess what? often I don't and it sucks. Yeah, so I have the problem where like, you know, it's 9 a.m. not hungry. 10 a.m. not hungry. 11 a.m. not hungry. And so on and so forth. Now it's 3 p.m.

Oh. That's a problem. I'm starving. That's a problem. I'm too hungry to, uh, I'm just going to start eating ingredients out of my pantry. Yeah. Don't do that. Don't do that. But I'm hungry now and I don't want to wait. Well, Factor has tons of meals to choose from built around your goals, whether it's overall nutrition, more protein, weight loss, GLP1 support, strength, or workout recovery. They got lots of options for you, and you're getting functional ingredients with each one. So lean proteins, colorful veggies, whole foods, healthy fats. Yeah, a Factor bans 175 plus ingredients, so no artificial colors or sweeteners, high fructose corn syrup, nothing like that. No refined seed oils, just nutrition-dense food, fresh, never frozen.

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Thank you, Factor. This podcast is brought to. you by Shopify, the best checkout on the internet. If you're trying to... Cha-ching. Trying to... Cha-ch-ch-ching! It's supposed to actually play a wave file there that goes to-ch-ching, but I rather my mouth,

cha-ching, you know? I'm just, I'm flashing back to, I remember, like, the last time I registered, my dad had, like, a register. That was, like, an old-school cash register that made that noise and everything. Cool, man. Then there... Anyway, whatever. I'm like, the, the, if I ever want to play a wave fall here, probably jump scare everybody with the volume being incorrect.

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of stores around when you browse these days. and that is, yeah, one of the reasons why it's one of the best converting checkouts on the planet. So super handy was very useful for setting up the podcast to T-shirt business pipeline. That being said, yeah, turn those what-offs into Cheching with Shopify today. Sign up for your $1 per month trial at Shopify.com slash superbeast. That's S-H-O-P-I-F-Y.com slash superbeast. Shopify.com slash superbeast. Thank you Shopify.

Thanks, Shopify. This one's for all the shippers. Lastly, and timely, you got Mother's Day coming up. And moms, they do a lot. They do a lot.

They do a lot. And considering... They gave birth to you! And considering the insane amount they do, the least you can do is make them happy and one really, really free and easy way to make him happy is with something. To be quiet. Yep.

Yep. Just shutting the hell up. Shutting the hell up is a really good gift to get your mom for Mother's Day. But also. Next to that, hey, look, here she is right now, actually. There we go. Okay. So yeah, perfect, perfect timing.

What I can say is my mom loved an aura frame. Mm, yes. It's a slam dunk. It is a frame that is a digital picture frame. You put it on your wall. You put it on a table anywhere on a mantle. And it cycles through all the photos that you decide to upload to it. and they sometimes you can get like little movies going you know you can have the kind of like

you can have a scrolling image the um i forgot what it's called but pictures that have a little movement with them you know it does those too parallax no not parallax it's like when you take a photo it takes a couple seconds of photo these days and um oh yeah yeah so that if an eyes closed you can correct it and things like that it has smart yeah it has those like little moving photos too uh they're great they look really cool and it's not a gif. It's a motion photo. Live image.

There we go. Yes. The live images are a nice little like captures a moment, a little sound, a little video of the, of the time and place. And you can get those popping up on the aura frame as well. And they look super cool when you walk by. And, you know, one of the things my mom loves, obviously, is I'm just uploading tons of baby photos. Like an absolute avalanche of baby photos is dropping her away on the, um, the Carver mat frame she's got. they, um, it's really convenient and easy to use the app and drop the pictures in. You can even send them to an email address to do it. It's super cool. Um, I also appreciate the fact that when the lights go out and when it's dark at night, it dims to reflect the brightness of the room and, and the day, time of day. It's not going to just kind of be like a really bright screen or like a tablet that just is there being, you know, a beacon in the middle of the night. Like it dims and then when no one's around and it's dark, it turns off. It turns off.

So I really, really, yeah, it is a freebie as far as like getting a good gift goes. I really got to get one of those because like I send my dad photos of the kid like three, four times a week. And he always goes, cool, looks handsome, whatever. And I know they're just sitting in his phone. Like my mom might not even see them. Yeah. It's cycling back through them that like you really get to see like, wow, holy crap. Look how different she is now.

you know, the passage of time and how that, that hair is coming in and stuff. So, um, yeah, I, I, I'm looking at the one we have down, downstairs even as well, I'm just kind of like, oh, man, like, look at her. There she is. It's, it's fun. It feels really good to just have that around every day. So be sure to, be sure to, like, get one, check them out. It's, it's a super dope gift. Um, and simple to use. So guaranteed your mom will not be confused and calling you up to try to figure it out and whatnot. I mean, in fact, you can, God, that's like, that was, That would be the worst, man. Yeah, you can put a welcome message on it, too.

You can plug it in and set it up and, you know, have it ready to go too. So that is the number one by wire cutter, gift by wire cutter. You can save on Gifts Mom's Love by visiting Oraframes.com. For a limited time, listeners can get $25 off their bestseller, bestselling Carver mat frame with the code Super Beast. So A-U-R-A-Frames.com, and the promo code is Superbeast. support the show by mentioning us a checkout as well. Terms and Conditions Apply.

Thank you, OroFraim's. Thanks, OroFraim's. Okay. What is going on this week? I have two remaining things to say. One is, I still got that birthday stream tomorrow at Twitch.tv.tv.tv slash Pat Stairsat and YouTube.com slash Pat Stairsat. It starts at 10 a.m. Pacific. It's going to go for a while.

Go to it. And the second thing I have to say is, Willie, get your hourglass. oh that one's too big all right I'll use my child's hourglass what topic are we entering here so the other thing

I can't see it the other thing that I did this week is I'm back into 14 yeah all right here we go long and short of it is that I have not played that game seriously

for about 18 months something like that okay like I've been out and I went back to the recent patch and I'm doing the newer patch tomorrow

but what's more interesting and they were good but what's more interesting to me than that is why I left this part to technically be news is that the keynote is on Friday and the keynote is when they're going to announce

the next expansion and all that. But of note is that the keynote is more than twice as long as it usually is. Ah. And we are now in interview season where there's implications and have statements about what's going to be incoming. Is this the live leak or live letter? What is it called?

No, no. It's the keynote. It's for fan fest. He comes out on the stage and gives a gigantic presentation. It's not the FF14 live leak. Yeah, that's different. That's highly different. Okay.

And usually those are an hour long. And they start with the trailer and they go, we're going to go here and whatever, right? This one is two hours plus. And the reason of why it is a special note and what has gotten me back in is because interviews in which YoseCP talking And the OshyP is one of those producers that, like, deliberately, like, undersells things.

Nothing is ever bombastic. Everything's always, please, have reasonable expectations. Sorry, hold on. Doorbell got to go. Can't stop that. All right. We are back. Willie, did you fake a doorbell to get out of this conversation?

I did not. And I turned this sideways as a side of good faith. Yeah, here we go, yeah. All right, we are resuming. All right. Anyway, the point being is that YoshiP has stated in, I'm using a tiny one. No, I know, but I'm just making sure that I switched it back to the right side and not to. Ah, whatever.

Okay. Yoshapia said that the upcoming changes are the largest that have had to the game since a Realm Reborn. The only difference is that this time they are not rebuilding. the client from scratch. But that is the level of systemic change to expect for the game going forward. And not just the

plot resetting, but system changes. Like, so an example he brought up was, there's a thing where if you do what's called an extreme trial, which is, you know, a boss fight against the famous summoner, right? You do it

with your bros. And, you know, it'll drop weapons and it also rarely drops mounts, right? But if you don't get lucky, it also gives you a token every time you beat it, right? And then you can cash in the token 10 for a weapon, 99 for a mount. And that's how it is. So that gets people running these things over and over and over, because if they're just really, really, really unlucky, you get up your tokens and you cash it in. And in response to that, he says, oh yeah, no, that system's going to be gone. That's going to be replaced with a completely different thing.

Okay. And goes on to say we have taken a very long look at every single system that currently exists in the game and whether or not it should be there and if it should, should we change it?

As well as in one of the interviews describing how the data center situation will be solved, which probably means that it's going to be like a matchmaking across every player. simultaneously instead of being siphoned off into different data centers.

Yeah. This is, this is like specifically, you know what this reminds me of? Uh-huh. The only other time I have ever seen this type of developer call their shot like this is when it's Suno came out and said, Devil May Cry 5 will exceed all of your expectations. Yeah. From a guy who's very quiet and doesn't brag. Do you got that second

Hourglass around? The big one? Yeah Yeah, I do All right Flip it over for a second All right No, no, keep the other one going

Keep the other one, okay Alright Or no, you can pause that one actually If you need to... Okay, all right, so what, yeah, we can pause that. It's just funny because this reminds me of when I was on stream with Bricky

and was blur playing to XKO And Say again Hourglass! I don't know, I'm giving you the big one here, too. I'm giving you the big one. I'm giving you your...

Oh, you gave me the big one. Okay, because we're going to just go off of your... Mortal Kombat. So I was playing to X-KO. And when we were doing, we were doing the Twitch Rivals. And, like, we were talking about some of the new stuff that was coming to the game. And he went, and I was like, oh, yeah, and there's a big, something that's a big deal. Is they announced DuoFinder is coming to the game.

Yeah, it's a big deal. Right? new fuses, new character, et cetera, all that stuff is great. But Duo Finder is going to be a thing where you just queue up and it's going to find you somebody to team up with. That's a great, that, right? Honestly, that's fun. Huge, huge, right? If you can play with some pros or some trash, you just got to make do?

Local duos and the ability to, right? So that's, that's great. And Bricky just went, uh, that's not a feature? That's not a feature. And I was like, fuck me. this is yeah this this revolutionary

awesome new announcement is like well no shit how is that not already a thing and you're like this is totally going through that and this is where we are this is how far back we are

yeah it's fucking stone age it's it's a PS3 game built on spaghetti code yeah so the dog so I haven't been paying attention the dawn trail um the dawn trail

what do you call it um patch cycle has been about cleaning up technical debt. It's like, hey, this system over here sucks shit. We're gonna clean it up. Old things that are

their holdovers that have not been addressed for years. Like one of the things that's going to happen in the patch that comes out in two weeks is they're going to make it so that if you make a full set of like a full outfit glamour, it's going to count as one item in your in your storage.

Okay. Right? Which means that people will be able to store like 10 times as many It didn't count as one before. No, it didn't. So one of the things people want out of a glamour system is the way Wow does it, which is anything you have ever put on your fucking character ever

stays in a big list that you can get to pick. FF14 system is super complicated and relies on you keeping the item and putting it into the fucking whatever. That's fucking, it's a mess. Right? So hearing that they are, so that what

was known like a year ago is that 8.0 will be the big combat overhaul where they're going to like look at and fuck with every job from scratch. But now they are talking about no, apparently it's the overhaul, overhaul where they are looking at everything and seeing what needs to stay. The video game. What needs to go? What needs to be changed into a different game. Okay. And you said a realm reborn levels of change. Yes. He said the only reason we wouldn't call it as big of a change is we are not rebuilding the client from scratch.

Okay. But like this is, this is really, really big, big talk from a guy who is always careful to manage reasonable expectations and go, maybe we'll get to it later. Maybe when we, you know, that kind of discussion for a live game. Well, and if the extra muted, like, reasonable take is actually underselling the level of change here, you kind of have to wonder then, like, why not rebrand at a certain level, right? Well, I have a sneaking suspicion that they're going to call the next expansion a Realm rejoined, which would be a play on a Realm Reborn, but also a thing. but yeah no

I expect so for people who play FF14 this means they have essentially said that the two minute meta is going to be destroyed which is great because every job in FF14

relies on a two minute timer and every single job is build your meter then spend your meter and like the identity between those has like kind of fallen away did that smiling old guy that got cooked? in the in the realm reborn reveal ever come back uh okay well i'm gonna go i'm gonna go with

yeah okay i'm gonna go with kind of kind of okay okay I just remember because when we were working at the fucking company and they had their people were testing it and they left their shit on idle. I just had a million screens of that old guy getting murked. And then Lewis Swah makes a minor. And it goes, mm-hmm, and fucking gets dragon balled out of existence. So I'm catching up because I want to be current for when they announced the thing, right? And the other statement that I actually really liked, which was they said that normally the live live.

The keynote is two hours. Normally the keynote is one hour, but they have five hours of shit they want to talk about. So they're actually going to split it into two at the North American one, two at the European one, and two at the Japanese one, which is way, way, way more than they ever talk about an expansion. They usually just give you the trailer and then go,

you're going to go to this location, and then they talk for half an hour about the new class. So you were out up until this point, right? scale systemic changes. You were out prior to this. I was out. And one of the reasons I was out, and like some of this is going to fly over your head, but like for people who know, I have been playing FF14 very strongly since April of 2015.

We are now coming up on April of 2026 with a year-long break. So I played it solid for 10 years. There is only so many weeks in a round. row, I can get 450 tomes before lockout. There is only so many EX trials I can do to get 99 fucking totems to get the fucking bird, dog, dragon, whatever. There is only so many times I can learn a two-minute rotation within the first week of playing the game in the expansion and run that rotation for a 23-minute. month period without any changes whatsoever. There's lots of little mechanical things that have been exactly the same since 2013.

That's too long. Meanwhile, skill issue says Dragon Ball Xenovirce 2 players as they pop off at the final DLC announcement for a game that's been running for, Probably just as long. I think 2016 was the launch of Xenovirs 2. Yeah. So, yeah, the long and short of it is I'm going to check out the live letter on Friday morning. And I am expecting big changes.

I have been told there are big changes coming. And I believe the person who said it. So if there are not big changes coming, get ready for me to be pissed the fuck off the following. Tuesday where I will rant and rave about how I got fucking hoodwinked. But ultimately, the changes are not what you needed. You just needed new interesting things to do. I do need certain changes. Okay, okay. Like I, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, it's literally been identical for, for, for, for, for, for. fucking 13 years. That's ridiculous.

The what's called the two minute meta and what's called homogenization. Yeah, what is that? Which is, so do you, okay, hourglass is out. Do you want me to tell you what the two minute meta is? Go for it. Okay. The long and short of it is that long time ago, a long, long time ago, Willie, classes got buffs that would apply to the rest of the party, right?

So Dregoon had one that would like up the critical rate. of other people in the party and by 10%, right? You know, a damage buff for everybody, and it would have a 90 second cool down, right? Simple. Bard would have one that was 60 seconds, dancer would have one that's two minutes, whatever. So everyone's rotation should last about that long?

So what happened was, is you had like 14 classes, and it turns out some classes have moves that line up more readily with each other. So, hey, turns out, I forget what the numbers were, but there was like a 90-second meta at one point where it's like, hey,

Bard and Machinist and Astrologin and this, they all line up. So they're the ones you want to take. So they went, okay. And over 10 years, they've said, well, we don't want Dark Knight or Warrior or Bard or Summoner to be left out.

So let's nudge their numbers over here, here. Now everyone's buffs are on a a two-minute timer. Okay. Which means every rotation is now built with the assumption that everyone's going to burst at one minute and 45 seconds to two minutes and 15 seconds. And all those buffs have to line up at the two-minute mark so that everyone's doing the most amount of damage when everybody's buffs are active.

Okay. And there's two problems with this. One, it makes every single fucking class feel exactly the same. because every class is on a rotation that lasts exactly 120 seconds. But two, it means that if anybody makes a mistake and is three seconds behind, the whole fucking system starts to come apart during the fight. And now no one's shit is lined up and it sucks. Oh, and there's no accounting for like a slight lag or something.

Because you can't make the cool down go faster. Gotcha. Okay. So everyone, so 20 minutes becomes the skill points. Rock solid. To pull out everything from. Yeah, okay. Right? They've designed fights around.

The fight's pretty normal and mechanics aren't too strict, but at one minute and 50 seconds into the fight, there's a really complicated math component that you have to run your burst while managing and stuff like that. It has been, the two-minute meta has been the two-minute meta for like six years. I see. And it has led to every tank feeling like variations on tank. it feels like every healer is variation on healer. You know, like, do you like...

Tussainty and used to be different. And now every tank is Coke. Do you want Diet Coke or Coke Zero or Crystal, you know? Right. So I am fully expecting the destruction of what's called the two-minute meta. I don't know how they're going to do it. Here's your new Overwatch hero. It's a fusion of all previous abilities from a bunch of different characters in it and together or whatever.

Hey, congrats. You want to play Tank? Every tank? is either Ryu, Ken, Akuma, or Sean. Sure, yeah. And hope that your tank isn't the Sean this cycle. So do you break that and not have the whole system be destroyed? Because the reasons why it exists do make sense.

They do. So there's a couple of ways you could break it. You could just not have party-wide buffs anymore outside of Bard and Dancer. Just like the only people who can buff the party are the, guys whose entire job is dedicated. Right? Class. That would just kill that shit right off the bat.

Class fantasy. I've heard this terminology before. So like the hero fantasy is not specific to MMO. No, no, no. I've heard this in shooters. I've heard this in other things as a game design term for like the hero fantasy, the thing fantasy. It works for fighters too. Yeah.

It's like what the idea of playing this character is supposed to feel like, right? the goal ultimately, yeah. It's the phrasing is... A really good example in 14 that I can explain because I play tank is that tanks want to feel fucking invincible. You want to be standing at the front and just fucking, oh, you can't get... Right? But now every tank has been built off what's called the like warrior template. So every tank has like a burst phase and they have like a one move that protects the party.

But all four tanks have one move that protects the party on a 90 second cool down. So now all four tanks. tanks feel the same, including Paladin, the one with the fucking shield. No, the one with the shield should be tougher, but do less damage because they have a fucking shield. The Paladin's fantasy is to be invincible. Can't have, right? Can't have Geef's SPD doing the same damage as other command grabs from other characters. No, it's Geese SPD. It's big. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. Anyway, so that's what that's why I'm getting back in. So, uh, you are either, you, I'm, I'm,

sorry, Willie. Next week, I will be using the big hourglass. I'm giving you the big one. Like you're... Yeah, I know. But I'll... But, you know, I'm on the honor system here. All right. I'm using it on myself so that you don't have to. Okay.

Um, well, if... So I'll either be thrilled or pissed as fuck. Hey. There's no in between. Uh, you know, if I were truly going hollow and dead faced and whatever else people say, I wouldn't have asked you about what the two minute meta was. So it's fine. But you can, even somebody who doesn't play, you can see how the two-minute meta kind of fucking sucks.

It's a, yeah, it's a sliding scale balancing problem where things, and this, I mean, this applies to all genres where like the standardized thing based on the meta that develops becomes what everyone has to adhere to. And now you've brought in a feeling of sameness that kills the fun of multiple characters. So just everything gets bland as a result, even though it didn't start that way. They chased short-term solutions. Because, like, you know, three expansions ago, they're like, damn it. Samurai doesn't fit in the two-minute meta. And Samurai's don't, you know, aren't, oh, so we'll make, we'll improve Samurai. And anyone.

Samurai fits in the two-minute meta. And anyone who gets released that doesn't fit into that gets ignored immediately, I assume. Like, just no one who's taking the game seriously is going to even look twice at that, right? So, yeah. Yeah. It's, so I, and the other thing, and this is more specific, there are people that have been playing FF 14 in its current state for 13 or 14 years. And everybody has the version of their class that was like the most fun to play. And none of them were the one that exists now. Okay. So like my favorite version of Dark Knight.

was the first one in 2015. That was 11 years ago. So there's a possibility that you can win back some people that have been fucking out for a long time if what they do now is good. Okay. And my last thing I'll say is I miss Bain on Scholar. That was more fun than anything they have now. I don't give a fuck. Bain on Scholar was so fucking long.

I feel like it's weird that these big changes didn't. line up with the story reset and it probably would have been a good time you know what man you know what yeah so yeah so let me tell you something let me tell you something dawn trail was pitched as the start of the new like a you know the new a plot it wasn't it was it was an intermission i'm on i finished patch 7.3 but i didn't see the final cutscene. The start of the new A plot is in the next cutscene. Like, it's literally... So it actually was a waste of time. Yeah, okay. But that is over a year into the expansion. It's a beach episode. It's filler.

16 years. So, like, you would have expected this level of bit and change to be with Dawn Trail, because that's when the graphics changed. But no, this was the internet. mission and the next one which will have all the mechanical changes is the start of the new a plot four years of filler Jesus Christ well so that so all so you probably don't get that so what happened was is and and Walker was the everything is wrapped up in a neat little bow perfect main campaign and then and walker 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.3 6.4 6.5 was a side story that had nothing to do with Don Trail.

And like, if you enjoyed it, you enjoyed it, but it didn't really, it wasn't the start of, it was not an off ramp to something new, right? Honestly, somebody in the chat says, it's not always says it's the Avengers end game problem. It actually is actually very similar to that. Where they built up to this perfect ending

and then they're like, well, what do we do now? And then they just kind of flail around with the Falcons. and in the Winter Soldier for fucking four years. But it also sounds like what people used to talk about with like, I guess, Burning Crusade and some of that like stuff that Wow went through. Well, yeah, no, wow. I also had that problem. You beat the Litch King and you're like, hey, guess what?

That was the fucking goal from day one. And so I thought like, you know, you would learn from the lesson of the previous all in one MMO platform, you know, that was that you took all the attention from. Like that was the lesson to learn specifically was whatever Wow did wrong. So what Wow did was every single time you killed a big bad, they said actually there was another big bad behind them. And that obviously can only go so many times before it's absurd. Okay. FF14, so I'm calling my shot because I don't know.

I am going to assume that the new A plot is basically going to be you didn't get everybody that could have been a problem. problem. Okay. There, there are, that you didn't kill everybody. Therefore, we will continue to have problems. Now, this timer is still going. However, there's another timer, and that's the page timer, which says we've got half, news, news, we've got half an hour left. I'm afraid of my wife. Let's go, let's go, let's go. All right. So, you know, I can hear you winding down there, I think, yeah. By the way, gentlemen, specifically. and and and gay ladies the mother's day also applies to the mother in your house

that counts it's not mother's day is it just for your mom it's for moms yeah who do people not is this what why is this obviously I've seen I've seen mistakes be made okay that's a that's a that's a fucking no duh

you know when we were at the hospital and all that pregnancy stuff was happening. I had this moment. I was like, oh, this looks hard. This looks pretty tough. Are you making an announcement to yourself, Pat? Was that an announcement for you? Was that a, you know, you're on an airplane in the sky,

the person complaining in the Luis C.K. bit. I was the one complaining it was me. Oh, no. Okay, all right. All right. Um well look we already talked about

uh bayonetta three's ending we talked to just stop Camia from can we just block Camia from talking I mean I feel like I feel like the uh

the I assume he's he's more relaxed now that he's out and about and doing his thing and he's got like Okami to work on yeah but um which I'm looking forward to uh yeah that'd be that'd be cool

Do you think it'll be Okami's 4, 5, and 6? Or just Okami? I imagine it'll be Okami 4, 4, 4, 5, and 6. Actually, Ok, Ocami 4 was Okie Den, so this will be Okie, 5, 6, and 7. Yeah, you're right. Devil May Cry Season 2 trailer. So, I am going to be strong, Woolly. I'm not going to hate watch this because I was looking at the picture on the subreddit,

and they are fucking up jackpot in the preview. you picture in the thumbnail. It is wrong. It is incorrect. Here's what I just watched it and I realized I'm like, you know, I'm a huge fan of Johnny Young Bosch and I love hearing him work in whatever. So I'm going to look forward to hearing his performance and that's it. And we'll see what happens.

The... I'm just a man though, so don't don't take. my word for it too strongly that I'm not going to hate watch it. I'm only I'm only a man. I'm not made of stone. I touched on it earlier, but Dragon Ball is fucking crazy man. Like, I just can't believe how resilient these game platforms have been because Xenovirce 3 has been announced, which is the age 1,000 thing that they teased some time ago, which just looks like a whole, like, you want to talk about a fantasy, like here's a whole like insert your Dragon Ball character into a, future timeline thing and go play as them in this world and do the thing.

But Xenovirce 2, which has been around since 2016, is like, I didn't hear no fucking bell. And of course, there's one piece of final DLC coming for that because that's been just consistently updating. And Dragon Ball Fighters is also getting one more character because they're like, don't forget us. Because Dragon Ball Fighters from 2018 is also still fucking getting updates. There are literally millions of people out there that will overhear any question and just scream out. Goku? Yes.

And there is a... Dude, I'm talking about where you want to go for lunch. Calm down. There is a video of an auditorium full of people losing their minds at Daima SSJ4 Goku being announced. And yeah,

he's also... Dude, Rufelmonger already got a fucking Tifa video out. Bro, you are crazy. It's the funny thing. But you can see the cracks are beginning to show, though. Because, um, you are,

Because people, if you look at some of the effects on Daimah Super Sayon 4, Goku, you can see stuff being reused from other characters. Some of the moves, some of the animations, some of the flips and effects of explosions are assets that were previously in the game. So, you know, you can see that it is still like, yeah, they're doing their thing and they're using what they already had. But this is also in a world where fans are adding Dio and fucking Yugi. Yeah, you never know. You don't know anything anymore. So that's what's going on. There was also the...

Oh, just I guess an update, but we talked about the Mass Effect rewrite occurring. And the showrunner, or the co-show runner, Daniel Casey, basically came out to dispel this news and say that the whole thing about Mass Effect being rewritten as a show for non-g gamers is not true or he doesn't know where it came from and at no point has that been said to him is the quote. Okay, that's great. Why is it taking so long? Oh, okay. So here's here's my opinion and this isn't fair. But when somebody goes, that's definitely not the reason. And people go, oh, so what's the reason then? I'm not going to tell you. Well, shut up. Oh.

I don't care. Was the, was the, was the, um, was the, um, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the genesis of this, of this rewrite rumor was because of the, how long it's taking. I don't know. Okay. Okay. If it's, if it's, if it's, if it's, if it's, if it's completely fake, then it's genesis was someone's ass. Yeah. Um, um, right, but, uh, yeah.

So, saw those street fighter rumors that they might not be real. So, you know, we'll, we'll, we'll, we'll. address that maybe when something a little more concrete drops or something else comes out to say. There's also- Nah, fuck it. Tifa's coming to Street Fighter 6. It's going to happen. Or I'm a dumbass. Whichever. Pick your poison. I mean, Tekken would fucking die another death, if so. I don't think that that list is real because Hagar's on there. And there's like, that's just a shitty pick.

It's also the bit that they run that they can never be in the same game with Geef. So, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, yeah, it sounds like a fake list. I'm not even, I wasn't even going to be, you know, whatever. What else do we all have lists of? We have the Eldon Ring movie cast, which I don't really recognize anyone on it, so don't have much to say about it. I recognize Nick Offerman as the mustache guy from all that stuff, Parks and Rec and Last of Us. Did I not notice his name on that list?

Let me look at that again. Oh, shit. Okay. Interesting. Oh, yeah, there he is. And I recognize Peter Serafinowick. Mm-hmm. Peter Serafinovix

voiced mild-mannered paint in Dark Souls 2. Ah, interesting. Which means Peter Serafinox will be playing patches. Cool. Just flat. Okay, that's dope.

I don't know what this should be or how this happens. It should be anything but about the tarnished. That's basically what I was going to... It should be anything. The only way I could... The story of Eldon Ring, the video game.

The only way I could see this, not the only way, but one of the most clear ways to make this kind of thing work as an Eldon Ring film project with how complex a Souls game is in general is to just pick a small, specific plot, subplot somewhere with someone, and just zoom in on that, while the game you know and the world you know happens in the background.

You know, do not do this massive, like, cinematic, retelling of the intro all the way up until the final moments, you know, in the Erd Tree. Like just... Okay, well, I'm looking at a picture of the lady playing Marika and she's not strung up long across. She's walking around with fruit behind her.

So it's not going to be the fucking game. Unless they do that because that's... Probably going to be about the shattering. Do that. Because there... But there is, like, you know, a exact ass way of looking at things going, no, it's got to be big and bombastic and it's got to deliver all the

crazy bells and whistles that everyone expects from what this game is. And we got to make it even bigger. Big, big, big, big, big, fit the whole thing in big. And then get Shadow of the Eritory in big. And you're just kind of like, it's a fucking single movie script, man. You know, like 4,000 locations in that game. Basically, what I can't think of, here's the thing, I realize, when I can't think of a, like, when I look at a franchise or an IP of some kind that I go, I don't know why this movie should exist. The only solution I can come up with for like, how to probably do that well is to do a dread, right? To just pick a location,

thing, go. Yep. Yeah. Just zoom in super far and make a dread situation happen and let the thing you know how you like and recognize happen in the background. That can work in almost anything. Just do Vike's story, man.

Um, uh, three fingers. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, may chaos take the world. Sure. Yeah, sure. And then he gives up.

Okay. More casting news. That's not the only one. The Netflix live action Gundam cast has been announced. Have you seen this? I saw it. Starring Sidney, yeah.

To which I read, and I read again. Of the, what is it, the Zeon Royal Family? She can play, what's her name? Um, not Garma. Um, Garma's the bitch. Killia? Lady, Lady, Lady Celia.

Yeah, you can. Yeah, yeah, you know, um, she can be Hamon Karn. She can be a lot of people. But one thing is for sure is I just look at her and I, I'm just like, yeah, I don't know if you've ever seen the bit, but like, what the fuck is a polar bear doing in Arlington, Texas? If you've ever seen that meme. And it's just like a, it's just a picture of a polar bear in Texas. And everyone's like, the fuck?

Like, why are you here? And I'm just like, I don't like, all right, I guess. Sure. So I'm going to say the same thing that I say every time. But this time it has a nice little meme to go along with it. Much like when we heard Akira was going to be made into a Hollywood movie. My body, soul, and brain all went, ugh. Yeah, it's just we need a star.

and Scarjo is unavailable. So. To this. Who else we got? I say, I genuinely don't believe Americans can make a Gundam movie that isn't just,

wow, cool robot. Like, I don't, like, I don't believe they can do it. It's going to be fucking wow, cool robot the movie.

Yeah, I, I, because I, I have not heard that, you know, uh, Tomino will be there in the room with a gun, right?

So if they're willing to, you know, wheel them in there and load a, load a pistol and have him pointed everybody. If Tomino was in the room with the American staff of Gundam with a gun, he would hold it and put it down on the table and go, I should not use this gun. and somebody from the staff would pick it up and go, wow, cool, gun. Oh, man. Yeah. All right. Well, whatever. G-Savier 2, here we go.

Here we go. I look forward to Sidney, Sweeney, in... A space suit outfit. It's going to be Sala, dude. Being, Hey, are they even going to try an Amaro thing? You think they're even? Yeah, they're going to, yeah.

They might, they might not. It's going to be Aaron Rogers. Like, if she, because if she's titular star character, star name, star power, etc. That makes me think, instead of going like, Sala is the main character of the story or anything, like they would have cast a big name for Amorone and a big name for Sharr. I'm expect, I think this is probably just a brand new, random, fucking. I fucking hope so.

You know. They won't even be brave enough to give the Gundam pilot severe autism and gender issues. You know what? If they say Camille Bedon coming in as the main character of the fucking Gundam movie, going to fight a bunch of cops for saying his name's a girl's name, and then freak out on a date because he's got autism. Fuck yeah, I'm in You're not gonna get that

You're not gonna get that No, no, no They'd never They'd never Not for net You should have seen my fucking face When he's on the date And he's like sorry

I'm awkward with girls Cause of the tism Netflix That was from the 70s Netflix would fucking never Um Yeah And then also on this list

Um The dude playing Ken In the street fighter movie is in it too as well. So too soon to say what that means, but... That was the 80s, whatever. The items old. It's old enough for me to have been dead.

Once again, polar bears in Arlington, Texas. Was I dead before I was born? I'm going... Okay. It's a question of language, because whatever the things that make up your... Even the sperm that begins to be you... No, no, I was a lot. I was just an egg.

The things that eventually, but those things have to come together, the materials that come together to make you. Yeah, but like, yeah, I was an egg. Well, but no, because that egg didn't always exist, right? At some point, the proteins. It existed for a while. It did, but at some point, it had the proteins and enzymes and everythings that come together to make it. Yeah, but life is contiguous. It's a whole.

So, well, so the thing is you come together to temporarily be a ship of Theseus, but then you eventually break apart and stop being that. but like the first thing that is pat at some point and the last thing that'll ever be pat like that already existed from the beginning and continues to the end. Oh, but I only came online as the pat that I am now like 10 minutes ago. Yeah, so then you've spent most of your existence being dead, but parts of you existed. Oh, no, that's common. I don't want to talk about it. The wood of Theseus continued to exist elsewhere and it is currently a ship for this brief moment in time, but then it'll...

Did you watch the second season of Fallout? No. Because there's a ghoul of Theseus thing going on in there. Interesting. Cool. Okay. Pieces and parts of others coming through. Yeah. Yeah. Nice. Okay. Yeah.

You asked the question. Yeah. I don't know. I shouldn't have asked that question. That's too hard. Yeah. If non-existence is death, then yeah. You start dead. You come alive and then you go back to being dead. Not me. Okay.

Simon and Sama so fucking stupid. Yeah, I've been thinking about that all week. Yeah, but the whole, like, wanting to be immortal thing is, like, aging poorly, because now you're joining the likes of fucking Peter Thiel and... Yeah, right. And that dude who... Or that... Or...

Who injects his kids blood into his body and... Or these shitheads that are like, can you believe I'm actually 30? I look exactly 17. And I'm like, you look like you are fucking a hard 30, and you're just wearing too much... Yeah. Yeah, so it was cute, you know, 10 years ago making the joke, ha ha, ha.

And now it's like, nah, there's people that are like vampiring their children to live forever. Don't do that. So all of a sudden, hey, how's that immortality bit looking? Your legacy's supposed to continue on through your children because your children are better than you. So, you know, it ain't, it ain't all that it was cracked up to be. Um, anyway, the only other thing I was going to, I was going to, I was going to get into there is wherever you go there you are

time is a flat circle hey let's talk about an IGN review oh who gives up the fuck okay I saw that bit with the people talking about mouse PI for hire and um it was uh pretty weird and and

just a strange way to go talking about this game being too full of cheese references and having you kill too many people and that not being real noir enough for noir and it's just a strange you know what

strange way to go about it 40 tomorrow I am I'm checking out of review discussions out of with one exception that God hand review is pretty fucking funny now to be fair, once again, not only are foundational bits

of this career built on review review and the silliness of the old IGN reviews, but also, we have not talked about anything like this in at least five years.

It's so tiring. It's always just the most neck, beard, mouth breathing fucking weirdos going, but I like that game! who gives a fuck? And there's like a culture element to what fucking

oh my God, who gives a shit? It's your toys. It's your toys. We're all just playing with this a toy podcast. Yeah, I like my toys a lot. Yeah. But like, holy fuck. Well, this is, okay,

you are currently feeling the exhaustion I feel around watching award shows and trailer shows and um the delay news and whatever something but what if there's a new toy what if a toy gets delayed I don't like it when toy gets a delay

I want the toy now cares just wait it's fine I could be dead tomorrow well then you won't get to play it no like I just my toys you know um

no there was a point I forget what it was but I would like I don't care about any review anymore because I don't trust anyone's opinion but mine. You know what I mean? Yes. And not like you tell me about a game and you say it's good and I'm like, fuck you.

No, no, no. But it's like, I haven't give a fuck about reviews of any kind of with that stuff for a very long time. But the reality of like, but I'm like, but it is true that this week when Pragato was getting a lot of good reviews and people started talking about that. I was like, oh, that's cool. Good to know. I like, you know. So you kind of. So you.

So finding emotion. So suddenly there's like, you. do put some weight on this thing that you weren't thinking about before or otherwise. And it's like, okay, I guess there's a thing here that is a, you know, a consensus. Also, every review that is on anything other than a five point scale is wrong. Five point scale is the best scale. Well, but now we get into the fucking should this be a, we're not doing it, but just the, the, should this be a critique of, um, of a media or should this be a buyer's guide, you know. I mean, considering everyone's broke now? Yeah, I think it should be a buyer's guy more than ever. I think it can be either,

but you should say it should be clear what you're going for from the outset. You know, because people come in looking for different things. So you don't, I imagine watch fucking Tim Rogers to find out whether or not you should buy the game he's reviewing. No, I don't watch Tim Rogers because he hasn't put out a video in like 10 years. Sure. But the point, even back then when you made articles before videos even existed. No, no, I watch or read Tim Rogers because I want to see a crazy person be crazy at me. Nothing about what he was doing had anything to do with whether or not you should purchase the product, you know?

Like you think I give a fuck about Tokomeky Memorial? Absolutely not. Let's sit down and get some popcorn. Tim's just going to go nuts at me. Insert coin, Katamari Damashi review a billion years ago. Do I want to buy this game? I don't know. But if you ever go to Japan...

I don't care. Tell me about it. You're invited to go spend the night on his couch. Um, I was better than other people who decided to actually watch only two pieces of the cyberpunk review. Do you remember that? When the cyberpunk review was six parts. Oh, and then you could choose to go around.

And he's like, only watch two. And then after you watch all six, he's like, I fucking lied. I, you were supposed to watch all six. Well, like, no. I knew it. Okay, but no, because, like, I, I can out hipster what, just said by saying I'm like I only I read his stuff back in the day I didn't really get into watching the videos that much later yeah you know I I mainly know I think you're better than me because

you can read like to be that I remember reading the insert coin articles and then the the six red coins and stuff like that oh by the way before I forget you know you got to go through your tic talks and manually disable AI remix on every single one manually I don't what so TikTok is implementing a new feature called AI Remix where people can go to any video that has the feature turned on and use AI to remix it and make people do whatever it wants. TikTok is not on my phone. I'll be okay. It's not on your phone.

It's not on. You don't have it? I do not. Do you have no TikTok anywhere? I do not have TikTok installed on my phone. I'm not on. We're fine. Doesn't CSB have a TikTok account? Yeah. Other folks are doing that and uploading to it. Okay. Tell them to turn off the AI. remix. Okay. All right. Um, what does that do? It will allow people to use AI to remix any video that doesn't have that feature turned off. And you're opt in automatically.

because... And you have to turn off every single video manually. There's no batch thing. So I had to spend like two hours the other night and just going through every single fucking video. Off, off, off, off. You know, I had a good conversation with my mom the other day and it felt like she did seem to understand because something I'd been telling her about in advance finally started

coming true, which was describing the fact that like, you're going to see this thing, this AI thing you've been hearing about is going to go from something you don't understand that is over here to something that it's going to be harder to. to avoid than it is. And you're going to know what it's doing, not doing, and you're going to get pissed off. And you're, and like, you're at first, now you're, you're currently confused how to opt in,

and then you're going to be confused about how to opt out. And, like, it's happening before our eyes. And, like, she kind of gets it, you know. Um, let's take some letters. All right, we got time for one letter. Go down to Castle Super Beastmail, gmail.com. That's Castle Superbeastmail at gmail.com. Um, all right.

Cog says, recently I saw a trailer for a game called Kieln by DoubleFlein, and it starts seemingly showing off a pottery building art tool as its main gimmick, then it shows pottery functions as armor for a PVP 3D platform or arena brawler, functionally, if Psychronauts was PVP. It got me thinking back on DoubleFind's catalog and wondering how they're still in business as a world where high-fire rush still cancels your studio. Besides brutal legend, I'm not sure if any of their games sold well, and if they've put out a game that has played as well or better than any others that other genres have attempted. My question is, are there any media companies that continue to survive purely off of pedigree,

inflated or undeserved, despite the actual output being awful? I legitimately don't understand how Double Fine continues to exist. Every single game they've ever put out was like a critical failure. And Brutal Legend is the... Sorry, not a critical failure, commercial failure. And Brutal Legend could have been... We could be up to Brutal Legend 5 by now if, It had been anything other than the world's shittiest RTS.

Wasn't everything after Brutal Legend crowdfunded? Not all of it. Some of it was like kind of indie thing. Because I thought broken age, Psychonauts and so on. I thought all of that was crowdfunded. You're forgetting the mech game they did. And there was another one. Big Chalice.

Okay. Because if they were crowdfunded, then that's the answer. Yeah. Also, Psychonauts 2 was not crowdfunded. You might think it's crowdfunded because they held a crowdfunding thing for it and took money on fig fig. But then they got bought out by Microsoft and then completely ran out of money. And then Microsoft had to bail them out to finish Psychonauts too.

Because much like Brutal Legend, not Burlis, Broken Age, they just can't plan for shit. When you're an industry name, you can definitely get like, You can go around and talk to people and get favors done and pull strings for sure. But I would say that a trail of lots of crowdfunding projects does indicate like this is the only way this place will stay open. And if any of those like, you know, in a lot of cases. I, my real, my bigger thing question here, my answer to this question is Quantic Dream, right? Quantic Dream is one where like they have these huge, like, like, I'm sure like Detroit was probably.

It sold well. It sold very well. Exactly. But in terms of just like, I guess the critical acclaim aspect of that, you know? I think the only one I can think of that is living on its pedigree alone is vanillaware. Every vanillaware game that has come out, it has been like, we have completely run out of money. So if this game doesn't do well, we are all going home with our shit in a bar. So I can't prove it.

And every time they say, we barely made enough to keep the doors on. I can't prove it, but I, in my heart, believe that vanillaware is not real. It is just George, when he wants to release a game, opens it back up and says vanillaware exists. And then when the game is out, he shuts it down again. And it goes back to not existing. Yeah, it's crazy. Every vanillaware game is like, we have completely run out of money. And hopefully it does well or else the company is going under.

And then it does just. just well enough to fund one more. I bet you it's just him and it completes ceases operations as soon as... Yeah, it's George and 10 monkeys with type rights. Every time, you know, and you just see the logo

and go, oh wow, game company. And it's like, nah, nah, like they've been gone and they came back. All righty. Happy pre-birthday. Don't die. I won't die. I promise. No, you can't. I promise.

People who die. Oh, no, no, no. No, no, no. No, that'll age badly when I'm dead.