Get Played - Outer Space Games with Zane Carney

Episode Date: November 10, 2025

Zane Carney returns to the show to talk about being a contestant on The Voice of Romania, playing video games while on tour with Foster the People and Joe Jonas, and to talk about games set in outer space! Check out our brand new merch at kinshipgoods.com/getplayed Follow us on social media @getplayedpod Music by Ben Prunty benpruntymusic.com Art by Duck Brigade duckbrigade.com For ad-free main feed episodes, our complete back catalogue including How Did This Get Played? and our Premium DLC episodes and our exclusive show Get Anime'd where we're currently watching Serial Experiments Lain go to patreon.com/getplayed Join us on our Discord server here: https://discord.gg/getplayed Wanna leave us a voicemail? Call 616-2-PLAYED (616-275-2933) or write us an email at [e-mail] Advertise on Get Played via Gumball.fm All of our links can be found at linktree.com/getplayedpodSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This is a headgum podcast. Guys, guys, thanks for joining me out here. I know it was a big pain to get us all out into outer space to record the episode, but I think it's going to pay off because, you know, the famous phrase, in space nobody can hear you scream. Yeah. I just thought we could try it out. We're here to screen.

Just like test the levels. I know that like sometimes we peek on the microphone and Ranchester then, you know, do a lot of editing to the... I actually, you know, for somebody who's worked in this industry as long as I have, I don't know what the works on. I expect you to know. I get to be honest, I'm really nauseated. I was just not prepared for the zero Gs. I am so angry right now. Use it.

That's great. What are you talking about? Do you have any idea how much training I had to endure, that centrifugal force machine, all the blood tests I had to do? Yeah. The hours and hours and hours it took to get into outer space. And you're telling me that we came up here so that we would scream to see if it's silent? Just let's not forget, I did say at the beginning of this, I know it was a big pain.

So you kind of can't be mad at me. Man, I had to lie to several governments. Like, this was not something that you could just do at the drop of a hat. Like, I had to get access to a rocket, which was a rocket that initially the American government wasn't going to allow me. I had to do a favor for a billionaire that I never want to do again. I just suck a dick to get into space. You didn't have to say. I had to suck a dick to get into space, man.

We all put together on it. Man, I suck the dick to get here Look, I mean, no offense We all had to do that Well, I was just gonna say, I mean And I'm stifling vomiting here Because I'm just not used to this sensation Had you and got to for some

Well, well, here's the thing I didn't have to go there any of this rigamarole I had training, what are you talking about? What are you talking about? What am I talking about? You kind of thought it was besides feeling sick I remember you saying that you thought it was kind of easy Yeah, I just walked up and you know, white guy with a crew cut,

they're like, hey, you got the right stuff. Yeah, you got the right stuff. Maybe an astronaut. Yeah. Didn't have to jump through any hoops. Of course, they're very upset with me participating in this at all. But I just wanted to give you guys just an example of what it's going to sound like if one of us were to scream. Okay, okay, okay, here I go.

Here's my, and I'm screaming, okay? Yeah. Tell me if you can hear it. Okay. Are you going to scream? No, I'm doing. I'm doing it. I've been screaming this whole time. Let me just...

Matt, you're having a laugh. This is a wind-up. You are screaming right now or you aren't screaming? My voice heard so much for screaming. You're poindedly, you're acting like you're screaming, you're not. I'll just, I'll show you how it's on. This is how you scream in space. Okay.

It working, it's working. You're both, you both, I can't hear either of you when you're screaming. And that's insane. whole exercise. I think part of what's going wrong about this experiment is technically we are inside of the tube itself. We're still inside the shuttle.

If we want to see what it's like to scream in space, one of us has to go out. You know what? I'll do it. Okay, get out there. I'll go outside. You're going to get out of the tube. Let's see if you guys can hear me scream in space.

Yeah, great. Let's trap yourself in and I'll open up the air lock. Yeah, she had the most draining. Oh my God. Heather, if you can scream, scream. She really went flying. Holy shit Oh my God

Heather Heather If you're listening to this message Then I died in space I pre-recorded this will So that everyone would know What it was that I wanted to be queved to my family Now

I'm certain that it's gotten out That I sucked a dick to get it So if I died in space Then I sucked a dick so I could die in space. Anyway, I leave my house and my stuff to my wife. If you're hearing this, I watched Heather die in space. And I know that a lot was made about the dick sucking that occurred in both who it was to and who did it. But let me just say, I had to do that too.

and they still wouldn't let me out of the ship and I didn't get to die my life sucks if you're hearing this you've heard Heather's message and also Matt's message referencing Heather's farewell message

and you've reached my voicemail leave a message I'll hit you back We travel unfathomable distances and hear unrealistic sound effects as we discuss all things space games this week on Get Played. Welcome to Get Played, your one-stop show for good games, bad games, and every game in between. It's time to get played. I'm your host, World's First Trillionaire, Heather Ann Campbell, along with my fellow host, Tiger Weiger. That's me, Tiger Weiger. I'm here with our third host, Mr. Games, Matt Apodaca. Hello, everyone. Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the premier video game podcast where this week we're talking about outer fucking space.

Yeah, yeah. Get on it. Get on it. Get with it. Get with it. Get ready. Get ready. They say in space, no one can hear you podcast.

Man. And it's true. We got to get there soon. How are you guys doing? I feel like a series of things. A world series of things. Matt? Well, well, well, well. Okay, all right. That was really, really good. I ate the mic for that. My boys won. Matt is wearing an L.A. Dodgers hat. This is the championship hat from last year.

It's now gone back to back. To be replaced with the new one that is currently on its way to me. Wow. And... You go fitted or a snapback? This one's a snapback, but I did go fitted for the new one that's coming. How did you measure your head? What I did was I... Well, okay, so actually, If you'll recall, when I got married last year, I did have a fitted black and white Dodgers hat that I put on. I remember. It was very like L.A. sort of themed wedding in a sense. So I was like, I got to toss on a fitted, you know, hat to match my tuxedo. And I went to, like, the Dodgers store at the Citadel.

For those of you who don't live in Los Angeles, the Citadel is a sort of giant outlet and non-outlet mall, shaped like a cast. And during Christmas time, they dress up the entire thing to look like one big gift-wrapped package. Yes. And again, because our topic is outer space games, you might have heard of the Citadel and been picturing the Hub City in Massifax. That's right. But that's not what we're referring to. I was not there. I was not running around with Shepard and the gang.

So get that out of your head. I was not there. It is also, no matter the time of year, the worst place to be on planet Earth. It fucking sucks there so bad. But it was like I, my family lives on the other side of the Citadel and I live on one side of the Citadel. So we had stopped in on, you know, our way back from visiting them. I was like, oh, I'll get a fitted cap here. You're talking about it like it's the Berlin Wall.

Look, and it's like, it's actually really dangerous for me to go across and visit them from the other side of the Citadel. It's actually not safe for me to do this. I've been begging Mr. Gorbachev to tear it down. Guys, do you know, I have, I went to Berlin in 2018. Okay. First and only time I've ever been to Berlin and purchased a piece of Berlin Wall from the Berlin Wall store. Wow. Which is on the grounds of where the Berlin Wall used to be, and I have it up on my bookshelf.

I don't care anything about the Berlin Wall, but having a fucking chunk of it on my bookshelf feels pretty cool. It's going to really sad. How much it cost? It was like $9. Was it packaged? Yeah. Okay. It's in a, like a plexiglass, like a folded plexiglass chunk that's like a book, if you imagine

like a book like this. Yes, yeah. And the Berlin Wall piece is wedged in between the plastic. And so it's like got its own little display that also says Berlin Wall. Is it like a chunk that was like knocked out of the wall or is it like kind of a symmetrical sort of brick? A chunk. Okay. It's like a like almost a triangle.

Yeah. piece. Yeah. I love it. That's cool. It's going to be really sad. One day, everybody that bought a piece should go in to see if they could put it back together.

It's going to be really sad when that store has to close because they've run out of pieces to sell. Well, they will. Yeah, they will eventually run out. Although it was a pretty big wall. Yeah. Yeah. Famously really big.

It was a bit of an issue. Interest may wane over time as people forget, you know, about its significance. Well, hopefully they don't forget. Yeah. And they go and they make a trip to go buy a piece. so they can always remember it. I was saying that, well, obviously, my Dodgers won. That was huge for me.

Yeah. Grats, buddy. There's a lot. Thank you so much. What a moment for the city of Los Angeles. My voice was very bad for two days because I was screaming. Very exciting. What a gut punch if we have any Toronto Blue J fan listeners.

What an absolute gut punch. What a tough loss. I called off the airstrikes. It was okay. Everyone in Toronto's doing great. It was like an interesting, like those two last two games were so exciting to watch, game six and seven of this World Series. And I feel like a lot of people who sort of know sports better than me.

I've been hearing people be like, those are like two of the best baseball games they watched this year and like maybe ever. They were so exciting and so fun because there were so many improbabilities that occurred. Yeah. I've never seen a ball get stuck, and I'm sure probably happens more. It probably happens more than you would assume. but I had never seen it before. So that was very interesting to see.

For people who didn't see it, a ball was hitting a late ending and it got wedged underneath the outfield wall. Yeah. So it was basically effectively dead if the outfielers choose not to touch it, which they did, which they opted not to do. And so what that does is that it takes it out of play. And it makes it so that the base,

the hitter advances to second base. Yes. And it was like that was like a consequential moment in that. game because it could have a really improbable thing if you could watch a hundred baseball games and not see happen just truly astounding and then there was just like very like you know it really matters like foot placement is so important like it can be just like a like just the smallest amount of space on a base as long as you're like still there uh when they're sliding in you're out and it was just like it was just thrilling baseball really really loved it um the place that i watched it

had a tv that was flickering on and off during uh what i would called Crucial Moments. Oh, man. And this bar advertised that they were going to be showing the game, and I was about to door dash them a $150 TV to make sure this didn't happen again. I was fucking furious at these people. But I spilled my Coke Zero before we started. Okay.

It was a big debacle. I walked in like a big shot for some reason. And then when I spilled... You did? I was kind of talking tough when I walked in. Okay. Maybe you didn't notice it because that's kind of how I always am, but I spit it. and then I immediately called for Rochelle to help me because I was, face it,

we're all lost without her. And I cleaned it up myself. It didn't make anybody clean it for me. And I did do a really good job. As the spills guy on the podcast, I got one thing to say, stay out of my territory. Oh, shit.

Fucking does the ice bucket challenge on himself right now. We should acknowledge the Grand Theft Auto 6 delay, but we've already delayed the insurance. introduction of our guest about enough. Too much. Let me, let's get him in here.

A musician from Evan and Zane. He's also played with Foster the People and Joe Jonas. Zane Karnie is back. Hi, Zane. What's up, guys? How you doing? Hell yeah.

Well, thanks so much for being here. Are you, like, I, we've talked about your gaming tastes a lot. Are you a grand theft auto guy at all? Does the Grand Theft Auto 6 delay affect you in any way? It does not affect me. I have not played a grand theft auto game ever in my life. Ever in your life?

Wow. That's wild. That's, I, that's, that's, that's, I can't, I'm, I'm stuck. Sorry, Mom. Or you're welcome, Mom. I know, because I don't think she would have wanted me to play when it came out, I think. And then I just kept not playing it, and I'm so obsessed

with JRP's and, like, slower, turn-based type experiences that I just didn't get into it. Yeah, I think knowing your taste, I don't think you'd be, the Grand Theft Auto games would really appeal to you anyway. It makes a lot of sense, because you're a really good boy. I barely even curse. No, I curse a lot. It's bad. I'm working on it. But, yeah,

I don't know. I haven't played them. But I had a friend who had music in it, and it was a big deal for him. help, like, launch his, didn't help launch him, he's big now, but he had a song in Granthus Auto 4 or 5, and he was like,

whoa, it's on the radio in the car there, so I kept an eye on it, but the closest thing to a game like that I've played would be maybe like Spider-Man. I only say that because of,

like, you do different things that they tell you to do and you run around, and I like that kind of gameplay, but I haven't done Grand Theth Auto. Grand The Thetthano is kind of like Spider-Man, if you could kill anybody you want it.

I know. I know. I didn't even get into face, which kind of had that element of like, do you want to be good or bad? Yeah, yeah. It was recommended by a friend. I didn't play that. But Grant The Auto 6, I did see the Unreal Engine.

Is it 5 they're on now? The thing is, like, the Matrix, they showed that little preview? Yeah. Is Granthus Auto 6 using that engine? I don't know. I'm not sure. I thought Rockstar was using their own bespoke engine, but it could be wrong. I actually should know this.

Well, regardless, it looks amazing. I've seen, like, gameplay and, you know, the... Yeah, it's really impressive. So, my guess is if it's been delayed to... winter or fall 2026 then technically it's coming out spring 2027 but they can't announce that yes it's this is now I think the

third delay yeah the third major delay it's it's now delayed to a point where it was supposed to come out a year after the first delay so it is I I each delay that comes I become less interested in it if I'm being honest and I love those games I think they're really really fun I'm particularly interested in this entry

because I think the world is so different than it was when the last entry was new. So I wonder how the sort of sensibility of the game will shift or lean in. It could go either way, honestly. At this very important inflection point right now, I can only assume that they're delaying it so they could course correct a previous correction.

They're pointedly delaying it until after the 2026 midterm election. Yeah, yeah. Wow. But I get less interested in the game each delay because I'm just like, I don't know. I just can't see myself really being like, but I also talked about this recently. I'm just like less excited about things in general now, I think. Well, yeah, that just happens. Yeah.

I mean, I think like I'm just using it more of like a marker for advancing time at this point. Yeah. I wish Rockstar would make a medieval game a la Red Dead Red Dead redemption, but with the same, like, gameplay style where you could just be a night running around. Like a more casual kind of kingdom come deliverance. Yeah, yeah, not first person, third person, riding your horse, visiting castles, doing missions, side quest, yeah, with no magic. But it's just like a, like, it'd just be a re-skinned Red Dead where you can like hunt

and like, like, you have to like convert peasants and stuff. Would be awesome. I kind of wanted them to do, I would like them to do their version of cyberpunk. I would like them to do a future world because I just think I just like that aesthetic a lot but I... You're going to love today's episode then, buddy. Oh, yeah.

I just remember what we're doing. Grand Theft Auto 6 as the previous Grand Theft Auto entries have used and Red Devre redemption 2 is using Rockstar Advanced Game Engine or Rage, a proprietary game engine developed internally by Rockstar. It's a good engine. I got to say, the games that they made with that engine are all really good. Yeah. Only one engine allows you to scramble and cook eggs in real time.

Right, right. And that's Rockstar's Rage Engine. Have you ever wanted to look through a menu page by page? Yeah. That's Rockstar. Would you like to play a very slow game of actual poker? Rockstar. Rockstar.

Have you ever wanted to look at gravy? and see different textures in the gravy? Rockstar! The most impressive thing that the engine has actually done is that horses' balls shrink when it get cold. Real? In the game, they do that. Yeah?

They do it. It's not just like one thing. It's like that you can see the horse's balls, which, you know, of course, you're going to look. Yeah. And then... That's where you've got to shoot it. Maybe that is where we're at, though, graphically,

because the fidelity's gotten so good. It's more about, is it true to life? The ball shrink. Then you go somewhere cold, they shrink. Not mine. I'm a real strong type. Mine don't do that. You go someplace hot, the balls get long.

Wow. That's amazing. Toss them over your shoulder. Okay, real talk. Has anyone else realized that gift-giving season is already here? If you haven't even started your list, yet, don't panic. Meundies has your back and your butt. That's where the butthole is. Meandies is making it ridiculously easy to win the holidays this year, whether you're shopping

for a partner, bestie, or just treating yourself. Their holiday and match me collections make it simple to give a gift that actually fits, literally and emotionally. Big component of gift giving. Meundis is the go-to for unbelievably soft underwear and loungeware made from ultramodal. That's fancy speak for cloud level comfort. And with matching sets in fun, festive prints, you'll be the most coordinated couple or family on the couch. We're talking over 30 million pairs sold, 90,000 five-star reviews and a problem-free philosophy that means if you don't love your first pair, it's on them.

Plus, they're sustainably made so your holiday giving can feel good and do good. From cozy joggers to festive onesies, cheeky undies, to cuddle-worthy brawlets, there's a cut, color, and vibe for everyone on your list. Their match-me line lets couples and friend duos, you know, friends who are duos. Coordinate their loungeware game, while the holiday collection brings that seasonal joy to your softest layers. And here's the best part. Right now you can get up to 50% off. Yeah, half off.

That's a holiday miracle. if we've ever heard one. You know what? Everybody wears underwear. And a lot of people wear stuff to sleep in. MeUndies sent us their stuff and it is soft. It's comfortable. It's cozy.

It's good. I liked it. I wish we got more of it. Knock out all your holiday gifting needs today with me undies. To get exclusive holiday deals up to 50% off, go to meundies.com slash get played. and enter promo code Get Played.

That's meondies.com slash get played. promo code get played for up to 50% off. Hey buddy, most holiday gifts end up in a drawer or the back of your closet or accidentally left

at your cousin's house. Not this one. Mint Mobile is offering unlimited premium wireless for $15 a month. That's their best deal of the year aka the only holiday gift you'll actually use

every single day. Mint Mobile's best deal of the year is happening right now. Get a three, six, or 12-month unlimited plan for $15 a month. All Mint plans come with high-speed data and unlimited talk and text on the nation's largest 5G network. You can bring your current phone and number over to Mint. No contracts and no nonsense. You know, Mint Mobile's wireless service is great, and you should look at how much you might be saving with Mint Mobile versus your old provider.

get them socks. Get them premium wireless for $15 a month. Shop mint unlimited plans at mintmobile.com slash get played. That's mintmobile.com slash get played. Limited time offer. Up front payment of $45 for three months, $90 for six months, or $180 for 12 months plan required, $15 a month equivalent. Taxes and fees extra. Initial plan term only. Greater than 35 gigabyte may slow down when network is busy. Capable device required. Availability, speed, and coverage varies. See mintmobile.com. I've got a question for all the gamers out there. Are you seriously going to miss out on Alienware's biggest gaming sale of the year? I mean, these are Black Friday prices we're talking about.

So it's not just another sale, you dummy? I took a look, and this is some pretty big bang for your buck. You know, it's Alienware with some of the most advanced engineering out there with systems at the top of reviewers list. And what about a gift for yourself? gift yourself. A new Alienware 16 Aurora gaming laptop. I mean, this thing's got performance at the absolute next level with Intel Core processors. And even better, you can get it during Black Friday, starting at, listen to this, starting at, are you ready, listen to what I'm going to say, starting, are you prepped, starting at $899.99.99. Plus, you can save on all kinds of

displays and accessories like the Alienware 324KQD OLED gaming monitor for ultimate visual fidelity. These really are incredible deals on PCs with otherworldly performance. So I'd visit alienware.com slash deals soon and grab what you can before their biggest sale of the year goes dark. Zane, we have a lot of video games stuff to discuss, but I did want to bring up that you are a contestant on the voice of Romania. I am. That is true. How did this happen?

Man, well, my girlfriend's from Romania, and during the Foster of the People tour this year, she's like, hey, it's so random, but like they're looking for singers for this show. Would you ever do this? I was like, whoa, maybe, I don't know. And then she's like, let me just reach out to them, reach out to the producers, see if, you know, They're interested in having an American on the show And they were very excited

Like yeah An American would be great We'd love to have an American out here And the foster people That's fucking right It's insane, I know But the foster people European run ended on June

No, I'm sorry July 19th In Barcelona And this started on July 20th in Romania So I was like I'll just fly there And we'll see what happens And I was there for a few days And they they liked me

And that was nice And then I kept singing And now I'm currently a contestant I'm in round two right now round two airs soon or it already aired I guess and we'll see how I do because I know you primarily as a guitarist

but you got some pipes too I do sing check it out oh yeah just kidding I honestly that was pretty good my career my earnings have come from being a guitar player or like a producer or songwriter but in my old band

with my brother Carney I sang background vocals and wrote songs with him in the band and then when our band broke up I played with John Mayer And during that time, he didn't, John didn't know I was a singer. My brother knew it, but, you know, not many people did.

And during that mayor run, I was like, I'm going to really, like, branch out as a solo artist. So I started releasing music back then, and I would play at Hotel Cafe in L.A. or Trubador or El Ray and do solo shows. But the solo career as a singer hasn't yet gotten to the place I would like it to get to. Right.

So that's another reason I thought I'd do it. Like, this is a fun opportunity to let people know I'm for a real singer. Do you speak any of your Romanian, and how has the Romanian audience received you thus far? Much you mess. I'm gonnae vore best flint romana. Whoa, okay. I'll take that as a no.

No. I tried to say that during the show, but I ate shit, saying it. Because I learned it the night before. But that meant, like, thanks for letting me speak in English. I'm still working on my Romanian. Yeah.

But I can say, like, 200 words, but they're not, they don't work together. I did do a lingo for a while. So, like, chai is tea, and lopta is milk, and much mesque, much meh for the most, much misd, different ways of saying thank you. But I, I, yeah,

I don't speak it well enough to, like, fully conjugate sentences. And when I was watching the episode with my brother at his wedding last week, he, like, got really drunk in New Orleans. I was like, check out my episode on episode two on Voice of Romania. He was like, can you translate what they're saying? I got, like, four words. I like, that was good. Partibine, very good, you know.

But I remembered what they translated in my ear. They give you an earpiece. So I can translate what they're saying. And they were very sweet to me. And my celebrity judge is like the cold play of her. Mania. Wow. His name's Tudor Kilila.

And he's awesome, very sweet, very supportive. And we'll see how I do this year. Maybe I'll, I don't know. I don't know. But the audience will find out. Yeah, that's crazy. You'd be really crazy if, like, later we find out that you're called, like, the crown of the voice of Romania.

There is a chance. I'm still doing it. How many vampires are on the judge board? Seven. Seven. Yes. And they're only four. It's strange.

Yeah. Yeah, no, Romania is, you're right, known for the Transylvanian region, you know, the Count Dracula and Vlad the Impaler lore. There's a whole, you know, vampiric thing over there. But yeah, there's a lot of the culture that's really deep. What made me do that show versus doing the American version, because I was asked to do the American

version for five seasons. I was like, I don't want to do that. It was during a time when I thought maybe I had a better chance as a solo artist. I was like, yeah, I don't need this. But, you know, I'm 40. Now I'm like, yeah, let's do some shows. Let me out there. But please, someone help me. So I decided to do the show. But the real reason is,

My girlfriend showed me last season's winning performance and it was in like seven four for a piece of the song and they were doing this really strange scale that's sort of a cousin of the Romanian minor scale and they had a spoken word poet who is like a Romania's great theater actor speaking during the performance This is this is crazy. This is like the sort of stuff in college I got into like heavy jazz weird scales Esoteric avant-garde stuff and I was like that's the winning performance. She's like yeah, this girl won this year. I'm like that's cool Wow Wow. That is not what I've seen, no offense to the American voice, but like it's more pop forward. And this felt like I could maybe do guitar solos. So the producers are like, we want you to do guitar solos every single performance. We want you to sing whatever you want. You know, if you feel like doing a song in 7-4, like we would support that. Yeah. So I feel like this is more of my speed. For our non-musical audience, 7-4, so like the music is in a time signature. The most common is 4-4 or sometimes 3-4. And that's basically like 99% of music. will be in those two times. Exactly, yeah.

So 7-4 is really unusual. 7-4 is unusual. Trinkle-trinkle little star will be in 4-4. The meter for that, it was in a box of four beats per bar. Whereas a song in 7-4, it was like, 1, 2, 3, 3, 6, 7-1. Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. It's like a slightly different, disjointed rhythm.

You did that on the show. That was pretty good. That was pretty good. But so, yeah, they let me do a bunch of fun stuff. and we'll see how I do but I was gaming when I was out there I was playing Donkey Kong Bonanza non-stop during that

I 100%ed it during those things because it was a very stressful process learning new songs every week they gave me 40 songs one week to learn and they picked the one like the day before and I was like wow why did I get so many songs so the stress release valve was like trying to get all 700 and whatever bananas

which I did and it was great unlike you I know you're more of a completionist and I am as well I haven't fully finished that game That last little thing once you've... Is it like spoiler alert? No, go boy, it's fine. Are we a spoiler country?

You guys don't do that, spoiler? We do have spoiler country, but I think we're fine with Donkey Kong. Well, long story short, there was like an extra thing after King Kroll and I went and I haven't beaten that yet, but I need to do that. Sorry, I did spoil that. Maybe you can... No, it's okay. Because I was surprised when he came up in the game.

I was like, he's in this? No way. That was amazing. I was also surprised, but then I was also like, why was I surprised? I know. Why wouldn't he be? Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. Did you, like, so overall, a positive assessment of Donkey Kong bananas, I assume.

Oh, I loved it. Yeah, I wouldn't, I was similar to you guys. I know in a previous episode talking about games of the year. Like, I don't know if it's the game of the year, but it was one of my more enjoyable gaming experiences this year. Top five for me personally. I want to come back to that, but before we do that, Matt spilled a Coke Zero earlier. You recently had the first Coke Zero of your life. Yeah, three days ago on a flight back from New Orleans. Three days ago.

Yeah. What provoked this? That is happening. Because the internet is always right about information and facts. So I saw some guy, and I've been scared about, like, Aspartame and, like, I want to be healthy and all that. And it turns out it's way healthier to drink this stuff than it is to drink full sugar. Sure. Like, they have done studies after studies after studies.

I was like, it is? So the woman on the flight on the Delta flight, you know, represent Delta. Am I right, guys? Anyway, she was like, hey. I'm allegiance to a different airplane. I cannot, Zane, I cannot co-sign that. I'm happy for you. I'm not doing that.

I do like the Delta Sky Club. I will say, though, Delta 1. Have we done it? I'm sorry, I'm not trying to, I just, I did. This is a whole thing. I have an a extra grind here, which is just like the, the Delta Sky Club was like, hey, this is the nice place where you can lounge before the, you do your flight. Now they have another lounge that's a different level.

And they make you pay for it. That's an upgrade on top of that. So now the Delta Sky Club is like the shitty lounge for plebeians. And then if you're a, you know, if you're true elite, you get to go. in the Delta One lounge, but that's going to cost you an arm in leg. I wasn't familiar with Delta One, and now that I know that there's a place where I can comfortably sit, I'll happily join. I know, I know.

But no, but all that is to say, the stewardess is like, yeah, would you like to try like a Coke zero? I'm like, I've heard about it. I'll try it. It's fantastic. It's better than regular Coke, maybe, for me? I can't believe I'm saying this. It's replaced regular Coke for me simply from the sugar standpoint, but I think we all

couldn't agree. The healthiest version would to not drink it at all. Would be water, yeah. Just to drink like a glass of water or something. But if I didn't have this, what would I have? I used to drink six RC coales a day. Wow. Amazing.

Full sugar. Amazing. Was that like in high school or was that like it? That was like in my 20s. Amazing. But I also had an insane metabolism. I was running a ton. But I had like, I was just like, looking back on it, that was like 1,200 calories of sugar every day.

You'd open all six and just open your mouth and dump all six into your mouth. If you want a real, I think the best of the. zero's is Dr. Pepper Zero. Like, Dr. Pepper Zero tastes indistinguishable from regular Dr. That's good. Zero soda. Yeah, that is good. I need to get into that. Wow.

Welcome to Zero. Well, thank you so much. Metroid Zero something. Okay. There you go. That's your mission. That is good. Godzilla minus zero. Yeah. Announce this week.

Oh, wow. Yeah. Oh, Octopath Traveler Zero. Oh, okay. I'm so excited. I'm 90 hours into Octopath Traveler 2 right now. I still haven't beaten it. Wow. I haven't gotten all the EX skills. There's like two EX skills, special ones. I've gotten eight of them, not all 16.

I love games like that. I'm obsessed. I love completing them. Ay, y'oy. What was your, you were talking about this a second ago, the games of this year, 2025. What else have you been playing that is really gripped you? Well, on the tour, the Foster People tour,

we did like a whole American run, then we did a South American run, then we did a European run, and I was like the video game dealer on all three of those. Wow. So I'd bring my Xbox Series X and then the Switch one before the two had come out. and Mark Isam and I

Pretty much 100% of Doom Eternal And I love that game I got so into it I asked him I was like apologizing When we got back into town for a month I'm like guys I think I need to finish it

I know we're at 90% But like Mark's like finish it's fine I'm like If you guys want to come over But we really We were up till 4 a.m. In New Orleans And then in other cities

Just like yeah fully playing that game And Mark was the best at that game Then I played it at home And then I 100% it myself And I got really good at that Wow. Love that game.

Yeah. Great. Yeah. So that was one that I love this year, but that's not from this year. I don't think. No, no, no, yeah.

And then Dark Ages, I didn't even start. I downloaded it, but I haven't played yet. But it's such a different game. It's like they called a bullet hell, quote-unquote game, which is so different than Doom Maternal.

So I'd be into more doom maternal type stuff personally than the Bullet Health vibe. But, yeah, what else have I played this year? It's been more sparse. Other than D.K. Bonanza and Mario Kart World, it's good.

I don't know. It's good. It's good. Yeah, it's fine. I don't... I like it better. No. I like it.

It looks better. The sales for eight, the last one, have, like, skyrocketed in the last, post-Switch 2 launch I was reading. Yeah. I've been buying eight, like, gangbusters. Yeah, and I watched a lot of that guy Shortcat. He makes, like, videos on. He's, like, a Mario Kart 8 deluxe streamer,

who's now, like, a, you know, nine or world streamer. Yeah. And he talks about the different mechanics and how, you know, certain things were lost and certain skills. or they don't transfer. But I did 100% it so I could get the game ready for Mark Isam and Aaron

and Micah from the band and I was like, yeah, now I have all the characters so they can play them but it was just such a tedious process I'm locking the characters. Yeah, it's a bummer. I did not enjoy that. And then we didn't end up playing it

because then the tour ended up like five days later because it took so freaking long to unlock them. So I'm not happy. I have grives with Mario Kart World. And I will see what I'm most excited about now that I'm back in town because the handheld experience with the Switch to is,

great. It's a little heavier, but most of my playing was on a tour bus this year. Now that I'm back at home for the rest of the year, I am excited about finally finishing Tears of the Kingdom as the Switch 2 version. So the FPS thing. And then I also haven't finished, I mean, when I was a kid, I finished it, but Link's Awakening. It was, for me,

unplayable in its original form. Like, dipping down to 18, 20 frames a second. I was like, I can't do this. Now it's smooth 60. I can actually play that game. I'm an FPS snob, it turns out. I get very disturbed when it's when it drops that much. No, it's reasonable.

Yeah, so. There's nothing wrong with liking the thing. Yeah, I like, I like smooth. Wanting it to be good, I think it's like, fine. I'd rather have, I've talked to friends about this. Like, if the iPad is janky and not working, it's like pencil and paper worked. Like, I just want it to work. Yeah.

I'm not angry at technology because I'm some modern snob of like, everything should be great and amazing, you know, electronically. It's like, well, if it doesn't work, I don't want it. I just like something to work. That's me in every public restroom with hand-powered, um. Oh. Uh, me, like, why doesn't it fucking work? I can't piss.

Amazing. It used to be able to do this. It was fine. And now I won't make piss anymore. Uh, no, like, you know, like, you go to, like, a sink or, like, a, you know, towel dispenser or soap dispenser and you can't fucking get. Oh, I've got, I think it's motion sensors. Like, these things used to have handles or buttons or something. Right.

What the, why? Right. Give me tactility. Yeah. Yeah. You know, Zoe Kravitz had, had one of those subway take videos, which, she made a good point. just like Bluetooth only works 40% of the time. It doesn't really work.

Like if you're like trying to vibe out and have a nice date night and you need to connect your Bluetooth to the headset but it's on the car and it doesn't really work. Put it back in the oven. It's not fully cooked yet. Yes, I'm like, I feel that way with having to wave my hand.

Yeah. Yeah, I relate. Okay. So 60 FPS. One of the things I learned about Bluetooth is that you need to have a visual connection to the object roughly. Oh, okay.

Or maybe it's sound. It works on a wavelength. that it shouldn't work on. It has to bounce literally. Yeah, there's something about Bluetooth where I read it. And I'm re and I'm paraphrasing it incorrectly. But it was like, when I learned how Bluetooth worked, I was like, what the fuck is this?

This is what we decided? It's like, it's like string between two cans technology. Amazing. Yeah. You mentioned Mario Card. We've previously talked about your Mario Tennis obsession. Are you still playing Mario Tennis at all? I'm excited about it.

the new Mario Tennis for Switch 2. Okay, okay. That looks good, and I'm particularly very excited for baby mode. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's like a thing you get turned into babies. Yeah. It looks fun. I'm excited about that.

There's also another Mario Tennis coming to the Switch 2 this winter, which is Virtual Boy Mario Tennis, will finally be released. Wow. What are you holding your face? You know who I am. You know what the show is. I know, but you're so not excited about it? I just, I just, like, it must be just interesting to be the one person that's excited about something.

Two people. I'm excited. No, because like the Macs, the circuit board stuff you do, like we have a lot of overlap, the Sega stuff, the retro era. I happen to be on a very similar wavelength. I am very excited about virtual boy stuff. I bought a virtual boy as a kid. I got like neck problems from it and it hurt my eyes, but I'm still excited. Yeah.

To finally be able to, yeah, play it. I wish they would do something with it, though, like, I'd be curious to have them colorize it or something. Because, I mean, it'll be playable, but I'd be curious. Well, you can, on the emulators now you can color it. Like, if you have a 3D. You can download the Virtual Boy Amulator, play the games in 3D, and also add color. Amazing. Really? Okay. I need to jailbreak my 3DS.

Yes. That's what I'm hearing of this. Okay. It is ferociously nice. Okay. And as always, it is the easiest thing to do in the world to jailbreak a 3DS. It's like almost they want you to do it kind of. It is, it'll take you 20 minutes. Well, to this day, I still play my 3DS. I brought it here in studio, but I was playing Luigi's Mansion on Halloween on a double-decker bus tour in New Orleans. Oh, cool. And I took a Rayband meta video of me doing it to be like, this happened. I did this. And I still prefer like I'm playing Shovel Night again on the 3DS just because I love that.

I love the 3DAS experience. I really do. So now that I know the virtual voice possible, I legitimately tonight I'm going to jailbreak it. Hell yeah. That's amazing. Zane, do you have the new Gen 3 meta glasses or just the Gen 2s? I have the ones. I actually took a video at an FTP gig, which I have not put any of these videos up, but I have the craziest videos on my meta glasses from like 75,000

people at like Lollapalooza and I'm like playing keyboard then having a guitar tech hand me a guitar and I'm playing like why haven't I put these up yet I need to put them up so point is I did that during the tour meaning Gen 3 had not come out yet and then I bought the new not new I lost a pair and I bought whatever generation that was four days before they announced gen 3 but I bought them in Canada while we were on tour I'm like I can't return these yeah but I have the I think they're older they're like you know just the last generation um I was thinking about booking an appointment to because you can't the craziest thing about the minute the new bet metaglasses is that you cannot purchase them unless you take a 20 minute demo like you can't just walk into like the

ray band store and buy them yeah you have to book an appointment in order to buy the fucking glasses got you and i was like that's fascinating because what what did they possibly do in 20 minutes that's going to either convince or unconvinced some dummy like me who's come in to be like i want to screen in my eyeballs. I bet you they maybe get like people who are just like, oh yeah, that'll be interesting and then just like can't figure out how they fucking work. Right, because it's a wristband. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I keep accidentally taking video of me jacking myself off. I can't. Oopsie. In fairness, I don't have those, I have just the regular ones to take videos. They're just sunglasses. Okay. Yeah. But I did see that announcement.

That was crazy. Yep. But yeah, so I love the 3DS experience. And there's that one game that came out for Virtual Boy, because weren't there only like 19 games or 21 or something? A very small library. Sub-30. Yeah, so great.

But there was one game where, like, you're on a walking playing thing and you drop down. I forget the name of it. People are going to, whatever, on this video or whatever. The other virtual boy person is going to be so upset. Yeah. No, I'm here. I'm excited. I love that stuff.

Yeah. It's good stuff. Yeah. Zane, my final question for you, and actually I'll be for everybody. It's a question we ask every week on the podcast. What do you play in? What are you playing? be the resident even merchant and i'm here with my friends and our guests to ask what they're playing

and you know what i've liked listening to the conversation as it's been happening i felt really relaxed i think you guys should record this show oh no we we've been recording this whole time this is yeah this is the you've been on i'd say probably hundreds of episodes at this point at least at least dozens if not hundreds you're you're a fixture of a podcast that is recorded every week and released to an audience of thousands of people when did that start uh this is i mean this podcast is i don't remember when you originally when you originally joined us but we've been doing this for the the the podcast in general has been going since 2019 i don't see any tape recorder fun fact the first episode actually they recorded in uh at the end of 2018 isn't that wild what is what what what what what what what no what did you say i said that we recorded the first episode in 2018 of what of this show this this podcast this show this show that you're saying

it is scripted but don't tell don't tell anyone that's her little secret i was saying no because i was i was reading my lines and this is actually part of my lines no right right well it's really interesting you know i'll have to look i'll look it up online Don't worry. Toss us a sub. What? Toss us a sub. Of what? Subscribe to the podcast.

It's difficult to know what you mean, though, because you could have been talking about meatball. Yeah, I thought you were talking about a sandwich. My ass at Jersey Mikes. Toss me a sub. You got a wiger. I fucking jump for it like a dolphin. I think this is great. It's great to know it.

I think, hey, if you're out there, this is the Jet Blade podcast. Okay. If you're out there is critical. Matt upidaka, what are you playing? Thank you so much. You're welcome. Thank you, R.M. I'm basically at like the last thing in Pokemon Legends, Z.A.

And I'm excited to finish it. I will say since last week, I have been having a bit more fun with it. I do think that the loop is a little bit tiresome, but I've grown attached to my team. You know, I like the characters. I do think that the story is kind of just blah, but it's gotten more interesting at the end, I think. So I think overall, I will have had fun with it, but I don't think it was like, it's not a banger.

It's just kind of like not what I was looking for. Was it Archaeus that was the most recent Pokemon banger for you? I think so. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's just tough because... You know, I feel like I sound, you know, like I only like the old stuff. But like I liked all the way through the 3DS stuff.

And then like the Switch, I kind of think in the same way that like people make the argument that Sonic should have never made the jump to 3D. I kind of think Pokemon's same thing, actually. I think that we would have all, nobody would be mad if Pokemon had just stayed the way it was, just in like a sort of, you know, top-down 2D, sprite-based game.

Because imagine it in the Octopath Traveler style. Totally. That'd be really fun. This new stuff, these new guys, the way they look. You know what, actually the Pokemon models are not that bad. The models are actually pretty good. And you can have a bunch, you know, you can have them walking around with you

and their movements and their attack moves actually look pretty good. But I'm just not like super stoked on it. There's DLC coming out for it pretty soon that costs $30. $30. And I'm just like this is not, this needs to come out a year from now

for me to be interested in it because the fact that it's coming out weeks after the game just means that they just didn't put it in the game on purpose. Right. And I'm like that's that fucking sucks. but you know I probably will play it at some point

I'm just not very interested in it the thing that I actually am excited to talk about sort of will probably crest with what you're probably going to be talking about Heather okay oh I do want to really quick I played through the entirety of inside again what provoked that I was a guest on my buddy Connor McCabe's podcast

actually he has a show called Call Me By Your Game where they do episodes where they talk about like they did like what they do a co-op episode where they had a bunch of people on to discuss one game, and this is on their Patreon, Super NPC Radio. And I was just like, he had asked me to do it.

I had played it enough times in my life where I could have spoken about it forever. Yeah. And I was like, oh, you know what? It's just like three and a half hours. I'll just like do it in two sittings, and that's basically exactly what I did. Some of it just truly muscle memory.

It's just like some of those puzzles are so, just like stuck in my brain. It's truly so fun to replay a game you love. yeah and I don't do it enough even knowing that sensation is so satisfied it was such a joy it was really wonderful and I just I love the you know I won't spoil it but I love getting to the end of that game so much yes because even knowing that it's coming it's just like it's just very delicious it's very uh it's just a really fun time to get uh you know to get through and it's like yeah very short game so I did that but but you know you're you're sort of the fortnight captain

You're like the You cover the Fortnite beat And you know We've talked in the past We've all sort of danced with it a little bit And there's been you know Collabs here and there That have been of interest to all of us

In some degree But it has not ever really Fully got us in there Yeah yeah This new season is the Simpsons And you know what I might just be John Wick Because yeah

I'm thinking I'm back Woo The Simpsons got me, you know, I didn't get the John Wick skin, but I've been playing. But it is a great game when you can be John Wick executing Marge Simpson. Yes. So I have been playing this new season and I've now, you know, I got the, you know, I've got the Bart bundle. I've been playing around as Bart. I've unlocked Marge at this point.

I think I'm level 11 right now. So I'm on my way to unlocking evil Marge or which Marge. And you have, correct me, if I'm wrong, two Simpsons tattoos? Just the one. Oh, okay. Just the one, which is the moth, the incomplete mother tattoo. Right. And it...

Why did I think you have rat, you had Rat Boy on yourself? You know, because I had a Rat Boy t-shirt that I was rocking for a little bit. That's what it was, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I actually missed that T-shirt. I think about that T-shirt a lot. I'm like, where did that t-shirt go? Maybe commemorate it with a tattoo.

Maybe I should get a tattoo of Rat Boy. I certainly have stupider. tattooed. Don't say that about the key blade. No, I was not talking about the key blade. You can't see it, Zane. I have a ghost holding a slice of pizza. Amazing.

But, you know, is it a stupid tattoo stupid or is it a fun time that you had one time? It's usually the latter. The new season of Fortnite's fucking great. It's really fun. I love Springfield. Yep. And I have, like, it's not really set up the way I know Springfield, but I feel like when I'm in areas of Springfield

that I am sort of familiar with. I'm like, oh, yeah, this is, I'm kind of there. It's, and I love Simpsons video games and there hasn't been a Simpsons video game in a long time. So you can, like the, like the, the play space, you're getting, like, where you can see like a Lard Ladd Donuts, a Krusty Lou Studios.

It's all the, you know, the Springfield Elementary. It's all kind of there. Yeah, not everything. Not every landmark, but like, you get, you know, there's a Krusty Burger, there's a Quiky Mart. There's the, you know, the power plants there and stuff. Burns Manor. Um, Homer's neighbor's neighbor.

hood is there with all the appropriate houses. I don't think the elementary school is in the game because, you know. Oh, right. That would be bad. Yeah, you probably don't want that happening. Yeah, it's probably too expensive to put it in. Too expensive. But there's, you know, City Hall and

like all of the all of the POIs. Like, I have a very cursory knowledge of the Simpsons. Yeah. But I also am like, oh, wow, I kind of know this. Yeah. Yeah. I love playing as Marge because the characters don't really blink

that much so like these in particular the Simpsons characters like have like pretty big eyes so they're just kind of like do they have a skin for Bart that's what was that NES game or like where it's like a mutant thing bar versus the space mutants we talked about that in our old format accidentally outer space I didn't even think of that

amazing. This guy's got space on the freaking brain that was an accident wait but did they have that skin because that would make sense no he's got like they because everybody's hipbox has to be the same which I think they should change I think it's kind of like it's more fair. It would kind of be more fun if everybody had slightly different hip boxes. It'd be here to see what the meta was if you had like, you know, like you got like Kenny from South Park and he was actually as small as he is and, you know, like, relative to Godzilla or whatever.

The truth is that like the really intense hardcore online community has determined that there are slightly different hit boxes. And there's certainly skins that you can play as that blend into the environment a lot more than other. skins they're like superhero skins um they suck uh what i found in this season because it is all cell shaded is that if you are a cell shaded character you blend in far more into the environment than if you're one of like the three dimensional rendered characters yeah i'm remembering something i wanted to ask you yes uh because maybe i just am a fortnight ignorant and i don't know because there are tasks there are quests that you can do yeah but it's a battle royale game so the you know people are like out if they if you get seen trying to complete quests people are

like trying to kill you still yes i think there should be an etiquette where you see me breaking stuff i have to break 50 things at the crusty burger or something nope you come and kill me i got to now come i got to do it again yeah maybe yeah like lay off for a second lay off for a second give me a fucking break absolutely not i just think it's rude or there should be a mode that's like free play well i mean there are there are there are versions of the game where like you can go on there are versions I think

where you can just do quests like the Save the World mode I think is what it is but I think the fun of the game is I'm just trying to pick up this fucking garbage while people are hitting me with a car or shooting me in the head

freaking Hatsune Miko fucking sniked me Wow But the hitboxes are not different than how does Marge's hair work? Is she, they shrink her down to the hipbox or her hair is not shootable? Her hair isn't shootable. Yeah, okay. Yeah, no damage to the hair. But that's kind of reflected in the Simpsons canon. We've seen her hair. Like, just her entire hair get it, get chopped off and

then reattached with a stick. Also, hair doesn't hurt if you, yeah, she doesn't have nerve endings. Yeah, uh, Zane, I don't know how to tell you this. No. Hair doesn't hurt. Why have I been keeping my hair short the past few years? What are you doing? You know, they should put in the The Simpsons Fortnite, they should put in a Mod Flander's skin so you can kill her repeatedly in front of Ned. Oh. Keep tormenting him. You got to watch The Simpsons. There's so many good ones.

Okay. Ranch, you played a little bit of this new Fortnite season, yes? Yeah. It's fun. I kind of like how it looks more than regular Fortnite. Wow. Are you using any of the Simpsons skins? No.

What's your skin currently? Still Eminem? It's not Eminem anymore. It is just a generic anime girl. Got it. I didn't, I have the Otani skin, but I purposely moved off of it because I didn't want to put a fucking target on my back. I don't want anyone to be mad at me this week.

Like, extra. Wow. I actually did buy the Otani skin. Yeah, it's so good. There's like, it's him and his daughter uniform, and then there's one where it's samurai Otani. Wow. I'm, I'm so fucking dumb when I was briefly playing Fortnite.

I bought the Yannis skin and then just never used it. I just wanted to have it. It's like, he's cool. It is fun to have. Yeah, it's fun to have. Yeah. Heather, what are you playing? Well, I have been playing The Simpsons Fortnite.

I find this season to be a far more granular position-based game. There's a lot less mobility than in previous seasons. And I think of a tighter, as of right now, as of record, a tighter weapons set. No snipers. It just feels like a more grindy game than previous seasons of Fortnite which have felt a little bit more liberated. This is a game currently where if you don't have position

you can get wiped out very rapidly and not really have any means of recouping those losses. So I've been playing that. I've also been playing Ghost of Yote. I want to know how you guys would feel about me showing a clip to you guys. I would love to see a clip. You would love to see a clip.

Now, I don't think we should play. I think we should edit out the part where you know you sit through three minutes of a clip. Okay. Yeah. I don't know if I got three minutes for being honest. I'm like interested in seeing the clip but like three minutes is kind of like it's almost a movie. Kind of kind of pushing it.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'll do. I'll commit three minutes to it. I'll do it but I just kind of like is it really is it full three? It is a full three and you'll love it. Okay. If I get a text I might check my phone. That's fine. Okay. I might have to get up and go to the bathroom. I actually have to pee

I'm so sorry but I genuinely also want to watch this so I'm torn and what to do. No, go pee. Here's what we'll do. We'll watch this clip and then we'll come back and we'll talk about it.

Ba-ba-da-da-da-da-ba-ba-ba-ba-da-da-da-da-a. The countdown is on. Holiday shopping season is officially here. Uncommon good. Takes the stress out of gifting with thousands of unique high-quality fines you won't see anywhere else. Don't wait. The most meaningful gifts get scooped up fast, and now is the perfect time to cross names off your list. Uncommon Goods looks for products that are high-quality, unique, and often handmade or made in the U.S. Many are crafted by independent artists and small businesses, making every gift feel meaningful and truly one-of-a-kind.

Guys, I won't lie. targeted by a clock on Instagram for years. Every month, I'm getting an ad for this clock. What's the clock? It's like a clock that tells the time by using quotes from books. It's called the author's clock. And the clock, instead of a, like a screen that shows the time, it shows the full paragraph with the time bolded in the paragraph. So you get like every minute of the day, you get a new quote from a book. We, as part of the way this advertising works, is we got to get something off Uncommon Goods, and I got that clock, and it is so good, so easy to choose. Uncommon Goods also has stuff for everyone.

I mean, that clock is for me, but from moms and dads to kids and teens, book lovers, me, history buffs, also me. Diehard football fans, not me. To Foodies, Mixologists, and avid gardeners, you'll find thousands of new gift ideas that you won't find anywhere else. When you shop at Uncommon Goods, you're supporting artists and small, independent businesses. Many of their handcrafted products are made in small batches, so shop now before they sell out this holiday season. And with every purchase you make it on Common Goods, they give back $1 to a non-profit partner of your choice. They've donated $3.1 million to date. So don't wait. Cross those names off your list before the rush. To get 15% off your

next gift, go to Uncomcom. Get Played. That's Uncommodeds.com. slash get played for 15% off. Uncommon goods. We're all out of the ordinary. Hey guys, I've talked about this on the show before. I use NordVPN and now we're doing ads for it. So I feel like I am specifically qualified to talk about using NordVPN. Look, there are stores you can only shop at if you have a Japanese address or a Japanese like IP address. And if you want to get these goods, these Gundam goods, The only way you can access the website in order to buy the item is to go through a proxy service or a VPN like NordVPN. It's not the only thing you can do with NordVPN, though. You can watch TV shows and films which aren't available in your region by switching your virtual location to a country which is showing the event. You can protect your private data like bank details, passwords, and online identity.

NordVPN can switch your virtual location, allowing you to save money by purchasing flights, hotels, and subscriptions from other countries at a cheaper price. Protecting your data whilst traveling and using public Wi-Fi, NordVPN protects you wherever you are in the world. It can be on your computer, on your phone, on a computer phone. NordVPN's threat protection feature protects you from viruses, malicious malware, and fishing sites. It's the fastest VPN in the world.

It's premium cybersecurity for the price of a cup of coffee per month. I do it. I use it. I use it all the time. And man, I get cool t-shirts. To get the best discount off your NordVPN plan, go to NordvPN.com slash get played. Our link will also give you four extra months on the two-year plan. There's no risk with Nord's 30-day money-back guarantee.

The link is in the podcast episode description box. I should do this. Why haven't I taken advantage of our own offer? I'm so dumb. Cold mornings, holiday plans. This is when I just want my wardrobe to be simple, stuff that looks sharp, feels good, and things all actually wear. For me, that's Quince. And the bonus,

Quince, pieces, make great gifts, too. This season's lineup is simple, but smart and easy with Quince. $50-dollar Mongolian cashmere sweaters that feel like an everyday luxury and wool coats that are equal parts stylish and durable. Their denim nails the fit and everyday comfort all at a fraction of what you'd expect to pay. By partnering directly with ethical factories and top artisans, Quince cuts out the middleman to deliver premium quality to half the cost of other

high-end brands. so you can give luxury quality pieces without the luxury price tag. Me, I got a couple of quince pieces. I got myself one of them Mongolian cashmere sweaters. It's a crew neck. And let me tell you, really comfortable and looks pretty flattering too. Got a nice compliment for my wife. Pretty cool.

Doesn't happen every day. In fact, I'd say it rarely happens. Also got myself a nice shirt. It's kind of a shirt jacket hybrid. It's actually a suede over shirt. And it is really, really comfortable. and again a flattering fit. And Quince has gifting covered beyond clothing too

if you need anything for home, bath, kitchen, or travel. Give and get timeless holiday staples that last this season with Quince. Go to quince.com slash get played for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E dot com slash get played. Free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com slash get played.

All right. So as I've spoken about on the show previously, I have created my own difficulty level where I cannot take more than two hits at this point from anybody on screen. Any character, whether they are the weakest character or the strongest character, if I get hit twice, I'm dead. Yeah. Most characters can kill me in one hit. Weakest characters have to take two. In return, I can kill everybody else in one to two hits, except for bosses. The game has become a management of space and resources at top speed.

This clip that I'm going to show you starts with a couple versions of me dying. So you get a sense of how rapidly it can happen. But then I finally conquer an area that took me more than an hour of... I've also set it up so that parries don't exist. Only perfect parries exist. Wow. So anyway, here is a clip that will cut out of the actual podcast. and I'll never actually release online

of me fighting against the spider. Oh shit, hell yeah. This is a fight where you fight the boss while also fighting an army of people at the same time. I'm watching this like I'm watching a movie and I'm enjoying it the same amount.

You're so good at this that it almost seems like they don't know how to play. Like they're not getting a chance to hit you because you're sniping in right before they can Whoa. Is that the boss? Yeah. Okay, got it.

Oh. You're killing them in such a way that, like, if I got killed like that, I'd be like, I deserve them. Oh, dude. There was my final perfect parry. Wow. Jeez. It took me an hour of losing that fight to finally get that fight. Wow.

And it felt like I had achieved something real in my life. Yeah. Congratulations. Thank you very much. It's a fun way to play. Yeah. So for our, you know, we had a little bit of a time gap there, but we all just witnessed what I would describe as three minutes of mastery.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That was really, really rad to watch. It was really good. Just seeing you wreck like a whole bunch of underlings and then take out the big heavy. It was like watching the attract mode. Like, you know, this guy's fucking good. You're like, you must be so, like, mentally or like brain-wise healthy because how do you do that? Like, my brain is slowed down.

I can't. It's crazy. Well, with this game specifically early in that when I, when I was like, I'm chasing this feeling, this feeling of like riding on a razor thin line the entire time. I also beat for our audience, Takeso, who's the, like, the optional boss. I beat him in this mode that I have invented where with him one hit killed me. And also, I'm now in an area where everybody can shoot guns. And anybody can shoot me from anywhere in the map and kill me. So anytime I hear somebody loading their gun, I have to run and dodge without knowing what I'm dodging.

Oh, my God. It is the most thrilling experience that I've had in games except for Fortnite in so long. but every what you saw though is again an hour of me being like son of a bitch and like

you like turned it into like ninja guidance style because like one hit it kills you and one hit yeah it's so so fucking fun but yeah I'm I've now unlocked all of the shrines my entire growth map is completely unlocked

nice I I've unlocked I think all the areas because the map guy quit. Like, yeah, I got a message that was like, there are no more maps. Whoa. And it wasn't like I was talking to him,

it was somewhere else. He don't got no more maps for you. And I think I might, I must be in the end game now because I'm not like, there's only, I've only killed three of the Yote 6, but I would have to assume

that the final three are in rapid succession right after one another. Sure, yeah. But yeah, that was, that felt like, I did something that I did something in my life. Did you ever get into Super Smash Brothers? No.

Whenever I play that game, I play as Little Mac because I suck at that game and I can just like do the taps and I don't do Perrys, I don't do blocks, but you were using all buttons, it seemed, on the controller versus I'll tap A and run away. You could play professionally probably, smash. I don't like the floatiness of Smash, but I did used to play Street Fighter all the time. Oh, did you play Street Fighter 6? Very, very briefly. I got really into that for like six months.

Yeah, yeah. Who was your main? Dalsham. Okay. And I was really pretty good with them. I frustrated some people because in Street Fighter 6 when the game starts, you can move your face, you know, and do little goofy things. And I'd play the same people and they do faces that I think if I understood the language

of the game meant like you're an a-hole and I hate you. I was a little bit cheap, but I was really into that game. And now it's on Switch 2, so I should get it. But my best friend and I bought the game and played the game and play together a bunch and I'm like it's on the Xbox already I don't really feel like buying a second time. Yeah Yeah. But I did love that game. Yeah. Zane, what are you playing?

Ooh, I am playing Octopath Traveler 2 right now. I'm uh, there's a lot of branch story lines in that game. So like, I forget what they're called. I think cross paths. Like some of my characters have like their level 31 story, but then there's a cross path story with two characters that are level 15. I should probably take care of those first.

And I've already put 90 hours in that game. A handsome amount of that. that was like, I pressed pause and left, you know, and so it's probably more like 60 hours. But, so I want to beat that before Octopath Traveler Zero comes out. I want to finish Metroid Prime Mastered before, is it Beyond? Is that they're called? Yeah.

Before Beyond? I want to finish that. I played Luigi's Mansion, Dark Moon, on the 3DS for a hot second on Halloween. Yeah. Because why not, man, I'm in New Orleans on Halloween, dressed like David S. Pumpkins. That was my character. Dash actually Dash Anderson was the one who was like Are you David has pumpkins?

I guess so So shout out of Dash Yeah But I know so I've been playing that I guess I kind of want to beat that Although I know they released Luigi's Mansion 2 quote unquote On the day before Halloween I think on Switch

Nintendo Switch online That's right yeah But like I have it on 3DS And I prefer the 3D experience So I'll play it there Even though it's lower res What else am I properly playing? I don't know

Space theme episode. I didn't play a lot of these games, but I did watch gameplay of different games from, like, more the retro era that we'll talk about. You've given a pretty comprehensive list of stuff you've been playing. Yeah. I don't feel like you had for more. You know what? Did you do good, Dad? It doesn't seem like you're playing enough games, actually. The truth

is, I don't play as many games. No, actually, I always say that. It's not true. I play too much, man. I always pretend like I'm not playing as much as, like, watching videos, watching Wolfden videos, watching like, you know, Spawnwave videos, I was watching RGT 40, 85, whatever his name is. I watched a lot of retro gaming and handheld videos online.

But I actually did, you know, 100% of Doom Maternal this year. And I am, like, about to be Doctor Path Traveler, too. So there are a handful of games. I have 700 bananas. I got all seven, exactly. So I guess I did play a lot of games this year. I'm allowed to be in this room. That's right.

That's my fear that I'm like, I'm not really gaming enough. No. But I guess I have your quota this year, bud. Dispose of your imposter syndrome. There you go. That's what it is. Comes for us all. Why do I not have that when it comes?

to jazz guitar, but I have that when it comes to gaming. What is that psychologically? Well, I think that there's like a gatekeepiness to gaming. Oh, sure. Oh, you're not a real gamer. Whereas I feel like in my limited exposure to the music world, yeah, there are still gatekeeping guys, but mostly it's like, oh, wow, how's it going? Like, you know, there's like a, like a please come into this arena and share your stuff

and I'll show you what I have. and there's, of course, always going to be jerks and assholes and show-offy type guys, but it feels more, like, broadly inclusive, if that makes sense? Also, everyone's looking to, like, co-write and collaborate, so there is more of what you're saying. And in the jazz space, most people think of it as a very snooty, esoteric thing.

But if you can hang and play a gig, people are very welcoming. Unfortunately, they can be rude if they feel like you can't hang. It's very athletic in that way. But once you're part of the community, which I'm lucky to be part of, it's like, let's hang, let's go shit, let's go jam. Yeah. Yeah, when it comes to gaming, I'm like, you guys are talking Fortnite. I'm going, I've never played Fortnite.

I've not once played it. And the season, the way you're describing, and I'm like, I've never played a game with seasons. And Grant the thought I was six, I'm like, oh, I'm out of touch. But with the stuff I'm into, I am very obsessively in touch. Yeah, you're very, and you got some stuff too that you're playing chunky ones. You're not playing. Right, that's true. That's true.

And that's maybe the one area where, at least from listening to the podcast and loving it so much, I do feel like I relate to you, Heather, with like the retro stuff and the Apple Mac series stuff. But we do deviate because. you can get into like the more hardcore fast-paced stuff, I tend to go very slow-paced tech space. I think gaming is, I mean, like, I don't play call of duty. And there are people who are like, well, if you don't play call of duty, you're not like gaming.

Like, you know, like there's always going to be a type of person who uses their hobby as their identity. Right. And thus they have to protect it because any attack on their hobby is an attack on who they think they are. So like, I think that's part of why gaming, becomes like this, this gatekeeping arena is because so many people have become

the thing that they like instead of becoming themselves and then liking a thing. Yeah, totally. Speaking of, Wiger, what are you playing? Heather, thank you so much for asking. Yeah, it's funny that we're having this conversation because what I've been going through lately is like, do I still like video games?

You know, you ever have those, I feel like what happens with any hobby and maybe you've had those moments as a musician where you're just kind of like, you know what I mean? And, like, I kind of have those, it's just, it's just the, the, I've had this happen with video games before. I've had those moments of exasperation where I'm kind of like, like, what am I doing here? You know, am I, am I liking this? Do I understand too much what this is doing to my brain and my body, you know, to really extract joy from it anymore?

And then sometimes I go away from it. And what's happened to the past, I've gone away from it, and then I've come back to it. The thing is having a podcast about video games, it's like, it's a little bit harder. to take a full sort of breather from this thing that is, once you monetize your hobby, you kind of got a, it's a little bit compulsory to indulge in it. Let's do a Star Wars podcast for six episodes. Just get to take a fucking break.

Well, let me say this. I decided to play some Deep Rock Galactic Survivor, which was a game that I played a lot of an early access and I played some more when the 1.0 release came out back in September. And just, I was hanging with our buddy, John Gabris, the best guest in podcasting. He's put a lot of hours in this game. I was like, you know what?

I should go back to that and spend some more time with this space game. It's everywhere. Which is an auto shooter vampire survivor like set in the Deep Rock Galactic universe. Now, I've never played Deep Rock Galactic, the OG game. This is my whole familiarity with the IP, but I do like it. It's maybe a little quippy for me, but I still think it's a lot of fun. It's a cool, colorful, joyful aesthetic and sensibility. And so I just was like, this game is pure gameplay, and I'm just going to see what this does to me.

And I did vacillate a bit between a flow state and existential angst, but I overall had a nice time with my, with the hours I put into Deep Rock Galactic Survivor this past week. I'm going to keep going with it. I've discussed this game before on the podcast, and I may have even put it on my best of list last year as an early access game or a couple years ago. But basically what distinguishes it primarily from vampire survivor and other of these games is that it has terrain mining. So you have like, you're not just have these endless mobs of baddies that are pursuing you all with their own attack patterns and some of them are spewing projectiles and some are our giant bosses and what have you. But you also have a way to kite them to, you know, effectively erect defensive. walls against them. It's a much more active bit of movement

other than just like, you know, moving in different directions. You actually can, like, I kind of channel them into certain avenues and get them clustered where you need them to both defend yourself and ensure the maximum

impact from your particular loadout. And it also just gives it a bit more depth beyond just hyper-optimizing said loadout, which is like kind of one of the thing one of the issues with Survivor likes is that a lot of times it's just like, okay, I figured out the best synergies, I figured out the best abilities, I figured out what I'm going to prioritize when I have that rogulike element of being able to choose what my next upgrade is going to be. And so I'm just going to target everything towards that. And I kind of feel like I can always push myself toward a win state. I will say some of the secondary objectives do start to feel a little bit samey, but I think that's okay because it's just like a nice evolution of this. pretty straightforward but also like really innovative a new subgenre that's come about in the past few years and yeah i just i just really really enjoy this game i just think

it's it's it's super fun and kind of what we were talking about matt um with uh with ball pit which is uh the ex is unspoken uh it is it's just like it's just the the purest form of a video game. You know what I mean? It's kind of just like, like, it's effectively and hey, I talked about another game that was like this, it's effectively a glorified slot machine, you know, like, like, it's so simple in terms of

just, you know, the incremental progress you're making and it's like one step up from a clicker, from a true idle game. But I, but it's like it's like the sweet spot for me right now and I just think it's a, it's a

really, really nifty design. It is really great. I played it a little bit in early access, too. I haven't revisited in 1.0. I don't get back into it. This is the other thing. This is another dumb dog brain thing for me. I got it because I already had it on Steam,

but I was like, it's on Game Pass, whatever. I'm paying like 50 bucks a month for Game Pass where the fuck it is now. Paying the absurd amount that it costs for a subscription, which is what that we knew this was happening. We knew that it was like, like, that it was going to go from the best value in gaming to something where we're all taken on the chin. What are you going to do? uh that's capitalism anyway so i got the uh i just got it off of game pass because for some

reason again dog dumb dog brain game pass achievements feel more tangible to me than steam achievements so i was like okay well i can knock all these out while i'm playing this game i was gonna i'm gonna you know whatever i felt like a fresh save anyway so uh but yeah that's that's what i'm playing it's a it's a great one yeah but you kind of touched on it already nick uh that game kind of takes place in outer space let's talk outer space let's talk outer space games. Zane, part of the impetus for this is you have a music video for is anybody else out here

your song that's set in space? Yes, I wrote this song a couple years ago, and I had this image of like an astronaut in space floating by himself, and then maybe some more stuff happens in the video. I was like, let me write a song based on that experience in my mind, and this really sad song came

about, which I released last year the weekend we played Austin City Limits when I was playing with Foster People. So I released it, and I was like, oh, I'll get this music video done and it's been a year. I haven't released it yet because I haven't finished yet because it was much harder to make than I thought because it's in outer space and I had to fly out there. Yeah, you had to get out there. It's really hard to get out there. No, I just, yeah, we had a few ways of trying to make it happen with like CG and then with a video and then it's filming

in a place and it got very expensive and we're almost done. One of the beautiful things of doing the voice of Romania is I met an amazing CG artist, amazing video guy out there. So he's helped Let me finish it. Thank God. And we're getting there. But I don't know if the video's going to come out in two weeks, in a month, in two months, but it will be, I think, before the year ends. So, yeah, I was texting Matt. He's like, what's going on in your life? I'm like, this weird video. He was like, let's do an outer space episode? Yeah, yeah. Which is awesome because a lot of my favorite games actually, at least one of them took place out there in space. I was going to ask you, in general, do you like outer space as just like an idea, as a concept? I'm obsessed with astrophysics. When I was like a kid, my dad used to, I'd like take sure. showers. I was like, you know, four years old. And he's like, oh, well, keep, you know, keep you

safe. So let me, like, read you some books while you're in there. So he'd sit, like, on the closed toilet. Sounds very strange. Anyway, he would sit there and go, like, yeah, this is this book by this guy, Stephen Hawking, let's talk about it. So we'd talk about, you know, the brief history of time. Is that right? Yeah. And then he's like, this guy, Carl Sagan, we should talk about Cosmos. And from a very young age, he was, like, philosophizing about physics and astrophysics in particular. And then I became a big fan of Bill Nye and then near the Grass Tyson and then see I'm really really into space stuff and I'm hoping one day that intersects somehow with music there's a brilliant pianist named Dan Tepper

who my girlfriend's friends with and uh he did a whole thing on the vibration of jupiter and then he made a song that was in that vibration in that key whoa yeah he's he's a he's a PhD in astrophysics and a jazz piano player he's a genius do you have a favorite space thing it could be like a planet it could be like a a concept. I talked to Dash about this a lot. We talk about PBS space-time videos. There was one video I saw maybe a year ago, and it was about if we were to get to interstellar travel,

how fast would we have to go, and what's possible? And basically, like, how close can we get to the speed of light? And what would the challenges be if we were at 0.9C or 0.95C or, you know, close to C, which is, you know, the speed of light. And it turns out, like, there are way more challenges if you can go that fast. Like one little molecule could hit and go through your brain and, like, you know, destroy the ship just because you're traveling so fast. Yeah, right. One piece of dust.

The holdover maneuver. Really? From. You said the holdover maneuver. I think you're talking about the holdover maneuver from the Last Jedi. But I said it bad. And now everyone's thinking about Paul Giammati. We're thinking about with a prosthetic eye.

A good movie. But no, you mean holdo. The Holdo maneuver. Holdo maneuver. He had an extravert because of maneuver. Is it a thing? I don't know Star Wars One of it. Is this a thing where he has to watch out for a piece of dust?

Well, Laura Dern does this basically suicide mission where she helps everybody escape by taking her ship into hyperspace through a Star Destroyer. Yeah. And it is really cool and it's done really effectively, but some people, depending on who you ask, don't like it. I do think there was an opportunity to give it to Admiral Ackbar because he kind of gets into ignoble death

but I think it being the Holdo maneuver is cool I do like it conceptually in the movie I don't like in episode nine No no we can't I don't like a rise of Skywalk We're talking out of space We're talking out of space We're talking out of space so we can

This is on this is on topic Rise Skywalker They're like they're like like Holdo maneuver Oh that's a million to one shot like that's like they dismiss it like that instead of like you got to come up with a better justification yeah here's like it's like it violates like the code like like just maybe give me an ethical argument or something like that we're not gonna sack with our ships are too too

valuable to sacrifice or you know we can't sacrifice crew members or something yeah even if somebody was just like what are we gonna do fucking crash all our ships into each other all the time it's crazy they've got more ships than us yeah they got exigal with apparently this unlimited a group of shipbuilders Zane if you want to go pee again you totally can They could have done it just by saying The calculations required

To enter hyperspace In a way in which you don't Immediately disappear in front of the ships Is an almost incalculable problem Yes There you go. Because in theory when you go in a hyperspace All of the shit around you disappear

Yes right right right So, like, they could have justified it by saying that she was a mathematical genius and nobody's been able to do that calculation before or since. They just didn't give a shit. Or it's because they were writing the movie as a camera was rolling apparently. You know who does give a shit right now is the legacy of Vader comics are doing everything in their power to connect episode eight to episode nine. Wow. Charles Sol, I think is his name. is doing this run

where he's basically following Kylo Ren's character growth after 8 to make 9 make sense and so much cool shit is happening in that comic series that I'm like

fuck wasn't this the fucking movie God damn it Right yeah right But yes what you were saying about About the light speed That's fascinating Yeah how do you solve that And also they want part of the video

That's amazing I forget his name But he's like an Australian astrophysicist He's like well even getting to the speed of We could use nuclear propellants, and we could keep using them, but then you might get nuclear poisoning. So you need to have a certain amount of water between you and the nuclear propellant. Wow. And then if you get there, then the dust will destroy you.

And then there are so many other challenges of, like, you know, food and shelter. I don't know. There's a bunch. Star Trek does it where it's not propellant, but they're warping space around the ship. Like so that the stuff can't hit you, which is why it's called warp drive. Got it. They're creating like a distortion. That's cool.

In space. Got it. Kind of like the way that, like, you know, gravity distorts space. Yes. Yeah, that's kind of the do-s solve as well. They're kind of folding space. Okay. Also, my suit has all my piss and shit in it.

Amen, brother. Now we're talking. I think that's one of my favorite space things. Just like the rules that you just got to come up with, like, just like, so you don't have to piss or shit. Yes. Well, you're talking about the, the Fremen still suits. Yeah, yeah.

Well, they don't talk about the processing urine and feces and the, the Neville New movies, but they do touch on that. It's in the books and the David Lynch film. It's pretty nasty to me. Matt, you're on the record as saying space is better than old. You stand by that. You know, it's interesting because a few years ago I did say this, and I meant like basically like at the time I think I was comparing like outer space to like the old west or something.

Sure. Like those two places, obviously it's so different from each other. but I've at that time thought one to be superior I think I have since then changed my stance on this and said that the ocean is the best of ocean is different than space and old and ocean is actually supreme to me I feel like I can't in good conscience

be a space guy like I think space is the best now because like all the worst guys out earth are like we gotta get to fucking space That's a whole thing, right? But I am interested in it. I think it is interesting. And like, it is a cool place.

I like that. Nobody can hear you scream because, you know, if I'm up there, I'm going to be doing that. Yeah. Get me to put me back down, I'm going to be saying. I would actually want somebody to hear me. Yeah. I want help. Get me out of here.

But right now, I think it's the ocean for me, if I'm being honest. I like the ocean because it's just so they know less about it than they do space. I know. It's very serious. And it's here. Yeah. It's staggering. Well, let's talk about some games.

I mean, like, Zane, you mentioned one of your favorite games is a space game. What is it? It's a little bit obscure, but Bucky O'Hare for the N.S. Okay. Remember that game? There's a cartoon. I have a very special memory with that game because we went out for my brothers. I'm a younger brother.

We went out for Reeves' birthday. I think he was seven. Fern Goley came out, whatever year of that was. Huge. Yeah. And we went out for his birthday, and I was. the younger brother. Huge, huge, huge.

Actually, famously, very little. Yeah, right, right. The impact. The impact. Huge. We don't have Avatar without it. Amen. Good point.

So we, yeah, we went out to see that, and I wasn't really invited to the party because I was like the five-year-old brother. And then we got back to the house and Reve's the best. I love, I just got back from his wedding. We were like so close. We were in a band together.

We were like so, so, so close. But back then when you're five and seven, it's like, you know, he's forging his own identity. Yeah. He was like, I don't want to say it at the party, you know? I was like, oh man, come on. Let me eat some of the ice cream from your truck thing.

And I was watching far away at his birthday party while he played Bucky O'Hare. And I was like, I can beat this. I can do this. And they were struggling on one of the levels. And someone said, doesn't your younger brother play games a lot? I was like, I'll play that level. And I came in. I became the coolest kid of that party.

Hell yes. 100% of that game with their, you know, help, sort of. But I did most of it. And he was like, that's right, that's my brother. So now I was the cool, like, secret weapon. Wow. So that was a good memory. And I, and like, and also, I think the,

Gentilly brothers, they created the power glove and we have a power glove that's from them they gave it to us. Whoa! And I'm pretty sure they created Bucky O'Hare too or they were involved in the show somehow. So like that game, it's at outer space. You go to different planets. It's very Star Fox-esque. Each planet uses a different character.

They have different powers. I'm like, that's my kind of game. And I love the NES area because I discovered gaming as a three-year-old beating ducktails without like the man. I was just like all about that game. Woo-oo. Yeah, exactly. Woo. And so yeah, Buckio-Hare is one of the like it sticks out as a space game

that I loved. How did you end up getting a power glove from the creators? So my dad wrote, my dad was a pretty well-to-do jingle writer in the 80s in New York City. So he wrote, anything goes with Play-Doh, that little jingle. He wrote that little jingle. Wow. And then he wrote, hands across America,

hands across Atlanta, I love. He wrote that song, he worked with Michael Bolton. He was very involved. And I think he may have written the music for, what was the Stretch Armstrong? I think he wrote the music for that commercial and the Gentility brothers created Stretch Armstrong and they created the power glove. He was like, yeah, I'm friends with them. I write for them. They're like, here's this toy for your NES. You can use it. So I have that power glove from them, which is pretty cool. That's awesome. That was sort of not a useful tool for the NES, but it's cool to have. It is cool. It was fun in the movie. They had an interesting niche, it seemed like, they're like, what's good, like, they had that, stretch Armstrong. Let's get fucking freaky with it.

The power glove was very cool and didn't work. That's the whole thing. But it was, but it was, but it was, awesome. It was like a cool thing that it took concept was cool. Yeah, it was in the wizard. It seemed like it could turn in the car, but it didn't really. No. But I wonder where those guys are. I should reach out to them. But yeah, so that was there, that was the Bucky O'Hare thing. But there was another game that

was like, I think to this day still a top five game of all time for me, which was Beyond Good and Evil. Okay, yeah. I know if you guys, everyone's been talking about Beyond Good and Evil too for like 20 years, 15 years. But that was like a full tilt, like the Pokemon snap sort of mechanic mixed with

insane story that was genuinely amazing mixed with like weird characters like that pig guy and then combat was great and just yeah I love that game and that that's another top five that's another space game I love it truly is a top five game of all time for me yeah

all Star Wars games take place in space all Gundam games take place in space but you don't think of them as space games you think of space games as Halo the outer worlds like games where space is forward instead of like, you know, lightsaber forward or giant robot forward.

Right. And so it's when we were talking about this episode, I was like, oh, no, I don't know if I like any space games. But the truth is so many, so many games are space games. They're just not necessarily about traveling from planet to planet. Yeah, yeah. Like, I mean, because like in the more recent Star Wars games, like the Jedi games or even in outlaws, there's traversal.

I think that sort of separates it from, like, you know, like some like pedant could be like Red Dead Redemption 2 is a space game because it takes place on a planet. And it's like, yes, and then, you know, my hands clasp around this person's neck. Yeah, amazing. You know, choke myself out for saying it. But, you know, I think the thing that really separates a game that gives it the qualification of it being a space game is that if you leave the planet at all and go somewhere else, that

counts. So for me, I'm thinking of like a ratchet and clank. Ratchet and clank is great space games because not only are they're just aliens everywhere, you're often traveling to different planets and they all have different biomes. I think that's like, that's kind of a funny planet rule.

Biomes? Just like, yeah, like this planet is like, the whole planet is forest. It's just this. Or like, oh, this is the ice planet. Like the desert one. And like You know. It's weird because we live on a planet where all those things are. Where it has all of it.

And we're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. But other planets are just volcano. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This planet, Cantobite is casino. You're like, great. That's kind of cool. And that's why I brought Beyond Good and Evil, too, because it takes place on a different planet. I'm like, well, this is an outer space.

Yeah. Existing on that. Yeah, totally. It counts. I think so, too. Gummy ship. Is that a space game? It's kind of tough to think about.

So we're talking about Kingdom Hearts here. So, like, you travel through the different worlds. the different Disney worlds via a gummy ship. And I just like can't, I actually don't know what that, that space that you're in is. Well, aren't there stars going past? There are stars,

but I don't know if it's outer space. Because if you think about this, the Pirates of the Caribbean planet, and are they planets? They're called worlds, right? I would almost think of them as pocket dimensions rather than planets because like, if you think too much,

then you're like, okay, toy story is on Earth, presumably. I guess then you would be in, it's all too complicated. I think the amount of actual outer space games where it's kind of inarguable and unambiguous is vast enough where we can focus on those. Because I think, yeah,

if we start asking like, like, you know, is Madden a space game? We're going to be here all day. Yeah. But a one I will shout out because this is a big one and we've already mentioned it,

but Mass Effect. I mean, like the Mass Effect franchise I got really into with the remaster and I just, Just like, for me, a big part of a space game feeling satisfying is that feeling of like, I'm in space, but I'm also going to different worlds, to distant worlds. I'm exploring alien biomes.

And particularly with Mass Effect, too, they really hit on that feeling of like, you're on the Normandy, you've got your ship that has its crew, that is kind of like an environment in of itself. It really feels like you're traveling from world to world. and it really feels like you know you're harvesting resources from different planets and then when you go to a different world it is a relatively confined play space

it doesn't have that sort of feeling of like and look I've never played No Man Sky my understanding is that No Man Sky has gotten to a place where it's like rad and really well refined now you know this is the game that's been iterated upon and improved upon with its updates and I know that people love that game but the complaints about No Man Sky

and its early going was that the in the 1.0 version was that there were a lot of like sort of empty sort of feeling spaces. And I think that does happen sometimes with procedurally generated worlds as they just kind of feel like, okay, this is kind of a vast wasteland. Whereas with mass effect, it's got these, you know, much more curated, more confined levels that get the feeling of like I'm in an alien biome. I'm in, I'm, I'm on some alien sort of civilization. but I'm also

you know just not exploring this again a planet-sized a planet-sized biome but yeah I really love the Mass Effect games I still have not played them which is insane because I'm so into RPGs and I love space and I was talking to a friend about it today

like I need to like finally dive into those games especially now that they're remasters I think the remaster absolutely is like it's all super playable and they feel like contemporary games I honestly think one's a little clunky because part of the what one has is it has like a lot of these levels where you have a um this land tank i forget the name of the craft that that lands this that lands on planets and that is the sort of thing where it's it's it's a little bit

cumbersome to pilot uh they they dispensed on that it they dispensed that in and two and so i think if you just started with mass effect too honestly that might be the yeah i should do that more refined version i want to shout out a game that i've shouted out on this uh podcast before as one of my favorite space games, which is Star Wars squadrons, specifically in virtual reality. If you have the VR helmet, there is a sense of depth and scale when you're in space that feels truly like if you fell out of the windshield or cockpit of your ship, you would fall forever. And having that sense of height and depth in all directions while also flying around and shooting stuff in space, so fucking good. Sick. I love that game.

I need to get a VR situation. My friend just lent me his PlayStation VR, my friend Patrick. And I have squadrons. I might have to do it. But I'm afraid that if I fall, I will fall. Dude, it is so good. I'm scared, actually. It is so good.

Like, you look down in the, you're in the cockpit. And you look at the cockpit and it's like, holy shit, I'm in Star Wars. And it's not like when you're doing Vader Immortal or any of the other Star Wars. Wars experiences because those are still somewhat like removed and cinematic in some way. Yeah. This is just you're in a, you're in a bomber or a ship. Do you think I can get Hans famous dice? Yeah, Hans's dice might be up there.

You might be able to grab them. Maybe toss them and see what I get. Hopefully not snake eyes. That's the other thing with Rise of Skywalker. Where are the dice? That's kind of my least favorite thing. if I had to make a list where are the dice is number one

I'd like to see them at least dangling from someone's neck Billy D. Williams shows up could have reference the dice Yeah he could say something like Anybody see those dice I miss Han and his dice I miss Han in his dice

Wow I got a shout out a couple of games that got me into space games You know I always like I love science fiction and space and science in general as a kid as did you Zane But for me specifically

from an interactive standpoint one of the big ones and this is like a huge franchise that endures that we already touched on but Metroid was just like again just like

the feeling of being in a space suit and exploring this alien world the Metroid games and from the first one that was like kind of the first time I ever played a 2D game like a platformer that felt like it was like an open world game

like obviously the progenitor of the whole Metroidvania genre but like I just like I honestly couldn't even wrap my head around what was happening. It was like I can go back, like I can just explore this whole space just in 2D where I'm so used to just like scrolling from left to right because that's how platformers used to be structured way back in the day.

Or used to be that limited. And another game that I'll shout out is a master of Orion. Now this is a they, this became something of a franchise. But this is very much in the 4X sort of. of turn-based strategy genre, these 4X space games. But Master of Orion was the first one that got me into it. Later, Sidmeier's Alpha Centauri, I spent some more time on. But I've never really gotten to the more contemporary franchises like Stellaris or Galactic civilizations. But Master of Ryan back in the day, really, really gripped me. Basically, you pick some sort of some

species, some largely alien species, and then you're just setting up a like a civilization game except you're you're conquering various planets when you're taking territory you know you can take over an alien civilizations planet um there's all sorts of uh you know elements of like researching not just like you know it's in the civilization games you're researching like the wheel and the printing press historical technologies here you have like future technologies that you're uh like plasma rays and shit um and that's really satisfying really yeah yeah yeah so it's it's really um i i i i i i i i That game, I, like, I just, like, got me thinking about space in a different sort of way. So those are two franchises that, or two individual games that I think of as standing out in my memory. Cool. Matt, how about yourself? Has anyone messed with Destiny ever? No, not me.

My friend, my friend orchestrates all the music for me. Really? Oh, cool. Because when I bought my, when I bought my PlayStation 4, it came with Destiny, and I, like, had money for the PlayStation 4, but, like, no games. So like I or it came with a choice It came with like NBA 2K You know whatever year it was when I bought it Uh 2013 or something

Yeah And it came with either that Destiny and or Plants versus Zombies And I was like I guess I'm going to pick Destiny I don't really know what this is or whatever And to this day I have well first of all I have no memories Of it really

But to this day when you look at like my most played on PlayStation, it is still in the top with hundreds of hours. That's wild. Wow. More than 100 I think less than 300. Somewhere in there, it's like I played it so much and I could not tell you a single thing about it and like I don't know what it was. I think like maybe it was like a similar like

I must have played it and then like paused it and like left and came back you know, right, 300 hours later or something. Right. I was jamming out to the music. Yeah,

the music, I do remember like that like being great and like I liked the, um, the gun play was really satisfying to me. I liked that, but like couldn't tell you a single thing

about the story or if, uh, if there are notable characters at all. Um, but it's, it's a franchise that I would like to know more about actually because I feel like people are like destiny too. It's like so fucking good and fun.

But I haven't, I haven't, with it beyond those hundreds of hours as I played it before. I was recently thinking specifically of all the time I put into Diablo 3. Yeah. Not 2, which is my favorite in which I played

the most of, and not 4, which I played more recently and really enjoyed, but 3, which got refined with an update and got to be a lot more playable, but started off from kind of a weird form. Yeah. Half-bake sort of form. And I was

just thinking about, like, yeah, how how little i remember about that yeah like i was just like man i spent a lot of my life playing diablo three and it's like not even the primary diablo in my memory yeah i mean i wish that they're like that these companies or like that us as a society were not so um interested in time spent with things because like now everything has to show you like Nintendo just like put out they just put out a store app, which is like a separate, uh, they have four apps that all do different things, but they just put out like a sort of like e-shop app. And with that, you have your purchase history of every game that you own in your library. And so like right now you can get in this

app and it'll tell you how much time you spent with as far back as 3DS games. So I was going through this and looking through all this. And this is how I learned that I bought Hollow Night like a year after it came out, but then it sat in my backlog for seven years until I played it this year um but i was going through it and like this like i knew that i had uh when animal crossing came out that i was playing that for a work shift yes a day basically uh but i learned that i had a 10 hour day in tears of the kingdom two years ago wow that i just like don't remember doing i just kind of sat you know uh you know had a day night cycle happened behind me while i was playing tears of the kingdom um but it's it's just a fascinating it's just a fascinating it's just

It's just a weird part of this hobby that I kind of wish went away. Yeah, I want to toggle that shit off. I don't need to know that. Especially when I look at my Mario Tennis Aces, that 1600 hours later or something insane like that. I could have, I could be a real tennis player. You do stuff like that and then like, in the same way that, like, I used to love playing, you know, we talked about guitar here in the past.

Right. That time spent, I could have like actually learned to play an instrument probably. I could be on, or I could be on freaking, the voice. of Romania. Yes, you could. That'll fuck you up. And I definitely have those thought patterns a lot. And it's really unhealthy because the time was going to pass regardless.

And also people back in the day would like play cards or bridge. It's like that's part of being human. I think it's playing. And it's about time that you enjoyed it too. Like I enjoyed the time that I had doing the other thing. You know, I probably like I've tried to learn how to play an instrument. And I wish I, it's one of those things where you kind of just wish you were good at something like immediately. Yeah.

It's like, you know, when you're an adult trying to learn something, it's hard. Like me trying to learn Romanian, not good? Here's the thing, you're doing pretty good at a desk. I can say that at one sentence fast. Destiny, a big one for me. Weirdly, I got very into Among Us. Oh, nice. Sure.

When one of us was new, weirdly, everybody was very into it. But, like, you know, if you get blasted out because you got, you know, people thought you were suss, remember that? Oh, yeah, I do. We were first calling you people's suss because you're, you know, you seem to a little suss If you got identified as suss And you got sent out into space And you were actually not the imposter

They're just been floating into space And everyone would feel bad Very much a space game Yeah, you're absolutely right Yeah I just downloaded this app that you just talked about It's horrifying I don't play a lot of Nintendo games

No, you don't I'm not a Nintendo main I have three games over 100 hours two of the three are Breath of the Wild on different platforms Amazing Wow Disco Elysium is in my

in my top ten But yeah I'm not Don't look at it It's a lot of We fit you Only got a one minute It's very granular actually though too I watched the legend of Zelda

Ocarina of Time 3 E3 video for longer than I played. Wow. We Fit You. Wow. That doesn't make me sense. Oh, no, this is the We Fit You Info app. Oh, yeah.

You're like, you want to get this. Halo, obviously, you mentioned it earlier. Yeah, sure. I've only played some of the first Halo, which is getting now a, like a full remake of the campaign. I mentioned it before, but playing through the, the entire Halo 1 campaign with my friend, one of my favorite gaming memories. Same.

But I did a soul. Oh, that's amazing. You get that, no, that was, we were never a PlayStation household. We went straight from Nintendo and Sega, straight to Xbox. And I played a cameo, which was actually a great platform. Oh, yeah. I liked it a lot into Halo. And that was like a big moment.

That was a great game. That surprise, is it spoiler alert 30 years later? But, you know, like, when you discover it's, you're sort of fighting these. What are they called again? The flood? Thank you, yeah, when the flood comes up. And that's, you know, who you were fighting in the end. That was the actual enemy.

That was a big moment. I loved Halo, the campaign. I'd play the remake. I can't wait to play the remake, and it's interesting that I'll probably be playing it on a PlayStation. Like, that's really crazy. But I also, I've talked about, I've evangelized this Halo entry, I think, enough. But Halo Reach, one of my favorite. Great.

It's like maybe the only FPS game that I've loved. I loved it so much. It's so good. You love the gameplay or you love the actual story? I thought the story was fucking great. I thought the gameplay was really great. More so than, you know, it's also like not, I think that one came out for 360 or something. So it was not as janky to me as the original one.

I just didn't have any nostalgia for that. So like it looking old and bad was not like charming to me. Yeah, right. But Reach, not that it looks brand new or anything, Reach just like looked old enough where I was like, I can do this and this is fine. And it's awesome. It's really great. Also, you don't play as Master's Chief.

I played, I played Halo 2 for a significant portion of time. Yeah. On the 360 with, you know, had a squad back then and we would get on and we would play for like five or six hours of a day of just like constant loops of the game. And it was an extremely positive experience. Yeah. But it also was in the window of time where the unfiltered Xbox. edge lord lobbies where you would hear the worst shit you'd ever heard

I don't know if those are still that's still the case but at the time it was I think it's gone past the lobbies and it's in all of culture now but it used to be that you would you know you get in these lobbies and you would just hear people be like the worst people ever yeah and now I feel like when I play like the fortnight chat like proximity chat you don't hear that language as much. I mean, you'll still sometimes hear it, but it was just like this window where people were like, oh, I've got a phone

and I can call everybody on Earth and the only thing I can think of to say is the F word. Yeah, or worse. And now, yeah, it's less like that. Nobody has anything to prove, at least in my personal anecdotal experience on Fortnite. Now they're not trying to prove anything.

They'll just say it. Yeah. I just say it because this is a thing I said. Yeah, I was so, I, Halo 2, I would stay up till 5 or 6 a.m. My brother would put on the headset for me and make fart noises into it. And we were old enough to where we shouldn't have done that, but that's what we did. That's pretty good. Hey, I like it now. It was, yeah, yeah. But there are some other games that I have to shout out a couple space games, one of them being Gallagher. Oh, yeah. So, uh, yeah, because I have a Gallaguer

Pac-Man machine in my house and I read out. Is it the cocktail machine or is the, it's the fake wooden panel looking arcade one-up machine? These are, I have like five arcade one-up machines in my patio now. I got Pac-Man Gallagher. My brother bought me Centipede slash asteroids for my birthday last year, which is very nice. Asteroids, also outer space. That's right. And then I have NBA jam Street Fighter 2 Turbo and then

a Simpsons cabinet that's been modded to have 184 player beat-em-up games. Nice. Amazing. It's a great setup. And I read online somewhere like if you can get about a million points in Gallagher, you're pretty good and there's enough lag on my home system because it's an emulator to where I can't get past like 200, maybe

250,000 points. And then for my birthday this year, I went out with, yeah, my family and friends, and I played in a real Gallagher machine, like an actual, and I got like to 400,000. Like, I took a video of it. I was like, it actually matters. Like, the latency in a game like that really matters.

Yeah. So that's a space game that I love. And I got obsessed with, like, the routing of you don't want to shoot the yellow and blue fly-looking guys until they come down because you get more points. And when there's two fly yellow and blue guys blocking the big guy at top,

You want to wait until they're coming down to shoot them. Then you want to get your ships stolen, so you can get two ships. So I'm really into the strats for that game, so I had to bring that up. But there are a couple others, which is Maelstrom, which is an old Mac game. It was sort of like asteroid, but much nicer graphically. And I played that so much on my Power Book, Fortune 100 CS in the 90s when I was a child actor. Whoop, what's up? I got no trauma.

I'm good. Don't need therapy. But I played that game a lot. That's an outer space game. And then another game that's memorable for me emotionally. And there's a few others on here, Star Fox, Vector Man, you know, Star Fox. I know that, dude. Space Ace comes to mind, too, because of Eva Anderson.

Oh, sure. I played that on Eva and Dash's CDI when I was a kid, and then Dash brought the CDI to my house and beat it. But that was, like, you know, big memory. Space Ace was, if people remember, a Dragon's Lair, which we've talked about in the podcast, but it was a, it was a laser disc game that was like this fully animated thing with minimal interactivity. But in the era when games look like Gallagher in the arcade, you had this thing that looked like a cartoon where if you pressed the stick in a cardinal direction

at certain points, it would branch off the path and you'd either succeed or fail. It felt like this revelation. Yeah, God bless Don Bluth. Yeah. I think it was in. But the last game that really feels meaningful because I have like 15 more on here is my brother

and I played out of this world. Okay. I mean this game that I always pulled up on. No way, really? Yeah. I was just about to talk about it. Amazing. Okay, sorry, I stole it from you. No, no, no. Let's talk about it.

So I have a memory, because my brother never really got into video games, and when we were kids. I have, like, child actor money, so I'd buy laptops for family members. Like, you can go to college with this computer. And for my brother and sister, I'd always buy them video games that they would not play. Because it's just not a hobby they were into. Yeah. So I got Reeve, a red Game Boy with a Red Game Boy camera. My sister, Paris, a yellow game boy with a yellow Game Boy camera.

And they're like, eh, this is fun for half a day. But I was, like, obsess, of course. And out of this world is one of the only games my brother was like, let's finish. try to beat this. So we didn't beat it because it sort of had a space ace Dragon's Larian thing

of like sort of time-based Sure. Like each screen has its own like challenge that puzzle to solve kind of but Reeve love the graphics and the vibe.

So I'm like whatever game he's down to play like this is my hobby we're going to be hanging out we're going to play this game even though I'd rather be playing Zelda Link of the past with him

which we also did beat but um yeah out of this world was like we actually connected we played that game together and that was a good memory personally and I love the artwork I love the design.

Heather, just just because it was mentioned earlier, like, would it be semi-accurate to describe out of this world as kind of like an early progenitor of like inside? It's the same sort of like kind of idea. Yeah, yeah, it's similar ask. It's, it was, also it was an indie game.

I mean, it's created and designed by, what was his name, Eric? Eric something, Eric, oh God, Eric, Chahi, is that Chahee? Chahee. And, yeah, it came out for PC initially and then was ported to Super Nintendo and eventually like Genesis

at Sega CD. This was a game also similarly for me that has a family memory attached, which is that my parents, you know, bought it from me. And it was a game where we got it, I got it over Christmas

and they were like sitting down with me every night on the couch to pitch different things I could try on each individual screen to be able to get through it. And me and my parents beat out of this world together. Wow. Which was so like it's like one of those, you know, hallmark style like irreplaceable core memories. Yeah. And they still talk about it and I still have my copy of the game. But yeah, it also, it looked like nothing else on the superintend. Totally, yeah. It was cinematic.

There were cutscenes. Yep. And those cutscenes involved full body animation on a fucking Super Nintendo. You were like, what? How was this magic trick achieved? Yeah. And the way we found out about it was walking through a mall where it was playing on a screen at the proto game stop, which was called Babbage's.

And yeah, I don't know. Wow. I have a memory with my mom involving gaming that's so much. much stupider than that. That's so beautiful with her. Memory I have, it's hilarious. I was playing that Disney, it was like Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck. It was for Sega Illusion or Castle of Illusion

or something. Yeah, Castle of Illusion. I think yeah. And my mom was, it was so sweet of her. She was trying to connect with me. She's like, Zane loves video games. And at that time, I was I think part of the reason I was obsessed with video games is I was acting on a TV show so you don't get as much kid time. So I would bring my Sega Nomad

to set and play NHL 97 or Garfield or some Sega game Vector Man That was like how I was staying a kid While doing adults acting type things And so my mom's like you know he's away on set Like I'm gonna like learn how to play a game And impress him and it'll be great

So she's playing this Mickey's game Oh my gosh And I come home and I'm like look I've been playing it And all I noticed was like there were stars around his head Which is an animation I had not discovered yet Because I hadn't been hit that much by enemies I was like that's possible She's like I don't is that good?

Yeah Oh mom oh god It's amazing but it's very sweet memory but she wasn't you know didn't beat the game we lost so badly that Mickey got stars I've told this memory

on the podcast before but I remember waking up in the middle of night one time of my mom sitting in front of the TV like the kid in poltergeist playing Tomb Raider just being like what the fuck

like this is like my mom's cool this is crazy and like just going back to sleep and then like confirmed that memory like years afterward did I remember you like playing that and she's like yeah

like I don't think she beat it but she, like, got, like, decently into it. Wow. But it has not really touched a game since. She's watched a full play-through of PT, though. Oh. I sent that to her because she likes horror, and I thought she would think it was interesting.

Good God. She did like it. Wow. She did. I think it was cool. Nick stepped out of the room for a second, but I do want to point out, I think we have to talk about what I think is, like,

the number one space video game of all time. Okay, okay, here it is. 3D pinball for Windows. Space Cadet, the pack-in pinball game that came with Windows computers. We were all thinking that he said it. Look, somebody had to be brave and bring it up.

This is, I think, it's possible the game that the most people have ever played. More than Mind Sweeper? Maybe, uh, yeah, mine sweeper up there probably for sure. Tetris certainly. I'm realizing right now, you said this game,

I was not a Windows house, I was Max, so I had not heard of this. until just now. Oh, wow. Okay. And I'm realizing, my response was like insane maybe

because this is like a played game by people. Oh, yeah. It's like a pinball game. I feel like it was like, you know, Windows sort of had these like packing things like Windows 95 of course came with the Buddy Holly

a Weezer of music video. And in this pinball game, I don't know if this was on Windows 95. It might have been on 90s, maybe Windows 97, 98, but it was. Windows C.E. Maybe Windows C.E. Um, but it was, it's just a very standard pinball game, but the layout is like a, you know, there's like a classic UFO like flying saucer thing and it's in space. And I think, uh, gosh, if I, if I had, if I had had, had what we have now with the technology of it telling you how many hours you've played, I think it would like get, it would have gotten to the end where it couldn't display a bigger number. I played that game so fucking much as a kid because like it was free. I did love. I did love.

I love pinball games. I also loved pool games as a kid. Oh, sure, just like figuring out like the physics of that and stuff. What was that developer? It has like a D in it and there's like silver. It's a circle. Oh, God. It's a developer that was really famous in the Sega Genesis era, but they developed a pool game that I was obsessed with. And I think, didn't Sonic have a great pinball game? Oh, Pokemon had a great pinball game. Pokemon is really, really fun. I've played it on my analog pocket actually. Yeah, it's great. Yeah. I think bully has a pool. bully like the modern rock star game yeah yeah I think there's a I think you can play pool in in in in like the in the dormitories or something oh dude how did I not bring this up yet this sort of involves that not really but on this tour I did I went to the best video game museum I've ever been to my entire life in Zagreb Croatia so shout out to any listeners in Zagreb whoa we'll see you there it was amazing yeah have you been to a proper video game museum before I have not Heather has.

Yeah, I went to one in the Netherlands that was staggering. Like multiple rooms, multiple floors, you know, games both organized by kind of cabinet that they were played on, era that they came out in. But then also in order to give you sort of the emblematic experience of what the game environment would have been, they had like a fully built 1970s computer room. a fully built 1980s living room so that you could play an NES in the context in which it was being played at the time. Amazing. This is similar in Zagreb and then there was one in Berlin I went to too

but man I want to go to video game museums more often. It was like that that's really what I'm into gaming for is the history of it the preservation of it. I love of course I love Octopath Travert like you said if Pokemon was back to that doing HD 2D I would be all in I can't wait for the upcoming game that's like a Zelda

like that the Octopath developers making. Oh, yes. Give what that's called. I don't remember what it's called either. It's like a long, long title. The Adventure of Da-da-da-da-da. But I'm definitely going to be playing that.

So going to a video game museum is like, that's, I would go to one every month if I have one in my city. Nick, I just brought up. Yeah. I think what I was what I called them Ultimate Space Game. Yeah. Which is 3D pinball for Windows Space Cadet. And everyone in here thought I was insane.

I didn't say anything. Heather thought I was insane. Yeah, I was a Mac household, so I didn't know that was a thing, so I was confused. No, yeah, I mean, there were, I was, I was less into it, but I am aware of its existence. Less into it. No, I'm just like, I was like, I was more of a Minesweeper kid. Okay, so this is what Heather said. I said, I think it's the game that the most people on Earth have played, and Heather goes more than Minesweeper, and I was immediately like, oh, damn, you're probably right, yeah.

We're still in it. Okay, I left. You left, I said you were left, it's fine. I'm back. yeah i'm thinking i'm back i didn't go number two i think that's people's assumption is going to be that i left to go no you weren't gone that long okay also you you picked up dinner that's what yeah i went to get dinner that's what it was like dinner was delivered and nick stepped out to you know give the man a hug yeah nick said i gotta go make my own dinner and went number two

it's not what happened don't anyone saying that i wanted to shout out a couple of a couple more games real quick. One, I'll mention because if we don't mention it, I feel like people will be like, hey, didn't mention, this is a space game, you should have mentioned it? And sorry, I apologize. Can I guess what it is? Yes. Based on that. Mario Galaxy? It's not Mario Galaxy, although that's a good thing. Honestly, insane and hasn't

come up. Yeah. I was going to, no, the game I was going to talk about it was outer wilds, as opposed to the outer worlds. Now, look, I put about 12 hours into outer wilds. Everyone was telling me it was a masterpiece, and I was playing, and I was like, I can really appreciate this game design. But, it just didn't get its hooks in me. And I, I know I should go back and finish it. And I know it's one of those things that if you finally, you know, when you, if you see it through to the end and you don't use guides, as everyone says, then it feels like a magic trick. You experience the prestige. But I, but I just never, I couldn't, I just wasn't as into it enough to, to, to persist. Uh, which is probably means I, I suffer it as a result because I didn't get to have this transcendent gaming experience that a lot of people have had. But out. But out.

Wilds, a game that I've played, but that I unfortunately did not connect with, as I imagine some of our audience has. Another game I was going to shout out is by... Can I do a funny version now of what the guess is? Do you pretend I'm funny like you guys? A boy in his blob? Pretty good. He's an alien.

He feeds jelly beans. Sorry, see, you guys are the funnier ones. Continue, I'm done. I liked it. I was going to shout out FTL, which is a rogue like that I put a lot of hours into. and I just like it's so you're managed you're basically managing a ship you're basically like it's it's it's it's it's a very much like like a Star Trek sort of of sim where you've got his crew that you're managing you're exploring a front a space frontier and you're seeing how far you can survive until you get to the end and you're trying to take out the capital ship and it's really really satisfying to finish a run but it's also like fun to fail runs too because it's just like always there they're different events that happen and that are unexpectedly beneficial or detrimental and, you know, just the decisions that you have to make, both in terms of which of the various solar systems you're going to explore,

and then also, you know, which route you're going to take to most efficiently get to your destination while also maximizing the number of resources but not being too greedy is really, really satisfying. So I love FTL of subspace games Who also made Into the Breach which I also love I'm a big fan of all of their output But yeah FTL a big one for me I need to play that game I was talking to a friend about that That's one that would be right at my alley

Yeah There's so many space games There's so many space games That there's not enough time to get to them all There's not enough space Now that's what I should have said That's really good Fuck

God damn it I wasn't ever in the ballpark of going to say it, so I actually am, like, not upset that I didn't say it. I understand why you're upset. Yeah, you were right there. It was like a word away.

Yeah, yeah. This is sort of we were talking about the word series earlier. So, I mean, there's something to that too. I'm like, you kind of said it. Yeah. When we say time, we mean space. Oh, boy, that's a charitable reading,

but it's really not what I was trying to say at all. It should be, the point should be driven home. You fucked up so bad. Wow. Humiliating and in front of our guest. Shouldn't have to go number two. Should we do a segment real quick? Let's do a segment.

Okay, guys, I've prepared a little bit of a different type of pixel chart for us. This is our segment pixel chart. So as a musician, I figured this might be an interesting thing, Zane. I've collected here some. video game music and soundtracks that have appeared on the billboard charts and we're just going to see if we can guess where they where they landed on the charts obviously there's very different charts uh so i'll i'll give you guys just some information about like uh what it is and what chart it charted on and we can just like see where where they landed and uh i'm confused

so we're guessing a like a number that it got to yeah a number okay we're it peaked at basically peak placement i'm going to put my phone in this in landscape mode here uh so I can see the whole thing. Matt has gone 90. I've gone just like Verizon foretold. That's right. People may not remember the defunct a streaming service Go 90 exclusive to Verizon mobile devices.

Yeah, because my phone previously was this way. Yes, you were holding it in portrait mode and you turned it into landscape mode, so that's what they would say, Go 90 to watch the Verizon Go 90 content. Yes. I had a Go 90 series, isn't that wild? What was it about?

You don't have to get into it. E-sports. Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah. And then they did with Jason Ritter. Oh, cool. I don't think you can watch it anymore.

Man, that sounds like I would have loved that. Me and Maddie Smith did it. Annie Maxwell directed some episodes for us. Yeah, did like eight episodes. Cool. Can you imagine trying to explain to your, to an older person, what Go 90 meant? I can't like explain to my family what this is. Okay, so this first release is called Video Games Live, the album.

and this is a concert album of video game music of various games, some of which are Kingdom Hearts, Warcraft 3, Tetris, God of War, and this placed on the Billboard Classical Crossovers album chart. Oh, okay, got it. I was wondering how that could have charted. Got it. That makes sense. Now, I don't know much about the charts,

but I feel like this is going to be popular enough to hit number one. It is not number one. Okay. It's actually, maybe this is like a bad exercise. Because I'm like, we're just guessing numbers. I'll just tell you. I'm going to say it, I'm going to say it reached 43. Maybe I shouldn't answer until everyone has answered.

It's not one though. Not one, not 43? I didn't say, I didn't say, yeah. No, no, okay. Is this like Price's Right Rules where I win if I... I think it has to be, otherwise, this is a waste of everybody's time. So, zero? I'm sorry, I would say, seven.

Pretty good guess. Zane's the closest. Really? Oh. Wow. Peak placement was number 10 on the Billboard classical crossover albums. There's just a few more Okay

Interestingly Halo 2 original soundtrack New Music Volume 1 charted on the billboard Top 200 Yeah that makes sense Because this is 2005-ish right 2004 yeah

It was the first video game soundtrack To enter the The US albums chart Where did it Where did it peak? And it was the top 500 Top 200 Wow

So that means that that melody whatever that melody was, that was good enough to make it that's crazy. Yeah. Okay, sorry, I love that soundtrack, but still. Really, yeah, really, very, very popular game. I'm going to say it was at 114.

114 from WIGs. Okay. I'm going to guess I'm going to guess like 187. Oh, fuck, that's so close to where I was going. I have to go with 172. That's what my initial guess was. Okay. Zane takes it again. It debuted at 185.

Wow. And it peaked at 162. By the way, fun fact, like, I don't know. I'm not good at this part of music. I'm only good at music theory and, like, playing the instrument. I know nothing about the industry. Also, there's nothing to be good at, because this is not really a game. But, like, I don't follow the charts.

Like, I got made fun of on a lot of tours for not knowing good music that's popular. I think this is, I know weird stuff. I know weird bad stuff. I think this, as a segment is just, hey, isn't this kind of interesting information? Yeah, I like it. I'm having fun. Okay. Selected tunes from Cuphead charted on the Billboard Jazz Albums chart. Interesting. Because they have that barbershop quartet vibe.

Yeah, sure. Yeah. Where did it place? Where did it peak? Um, okay. It was, it was just jazz? Billboard Jazz Albums chart. What's challenging about this is the Halo One, the reason why it mattered to me that it was 2004 is people still bought items back then. Whereas these charts now are how many streams did you get? And that counts as a, purchase if it's enough thousands of streams yes so it's tricky so it means like did this get memeable did people put it on their ticot so that could inflate something so i think youtube counts also right so cuphead on the jazz charts i having been in the jazz space for a while i think

this is pretty high because there are there might be released by chick korea that goes right to number one or by stanley clark or goes number one uh i feel like this could be like three yeah that's what Because, you know, you got a contemporary artist like a Kamasi Washington or a Christian McBride, but you've also got, yes, the entire catalog of like a Miles Davis record for some reason is all the way up there. That's true. If they do a re-release or remaster. Yeah. So I, so like it's like it's hard to gauge, but I think you're right that it probably is pretty high.

You went with what number? I said three. You said three. I'll go a little lower. I'll say number 12. And I'll say 30. Zane gets it again and this actually has

the Guinness World Record for first video game soundtrack to ever hit number one on a U.S. Billboard chart. It hit number one. Wow. It stayed there. Look, it's a great soundtrack. Yeah, it is. Also, part of my analysis for that is I released a jazz record

in 2021 called Alter Ego, very, like, snobby, jazzy, whatever stuff. And like, it did way better on, like, Spotify than anything I've ever done because it was in jazz. So the competition was, it was, It was like, to do great in the jazz space, my girlfriend's is super jazz snob, way more so than I am. And her favorite artist, she's like, oh, this guy, Thomas Fujiwar is like the drummer of New York and has nine monthly listeners.

But he's the dude. That was like, I was like, this would jump above. I feel like 20 years ago, this is like an old reference, but like I think Sting put out like a classical album or something and it was like huge. And I remember being a kid and being like, who even cares is like old music? And then I'm thinking about it was like, oh, it's like probably like the only one of these that like came out. Like, and he, like, he won a bunch of, like, awards in, like, the, I don't know why I was paying so much attention to sting. Oh, yeah, dude. When I was a kid.

Because of that cool music video where you rotoscoped and you, like, stopped in midair and in the garden. And I was, like, just admiring his fuck style, of course. There you go. Tontra. Well. Okay. The Halo 4 original soundtrack has also charted on the Billboard top 200. Halo 4?

Halo 4. Okay, so that's 2010? 2012. Well, okay. where did it where did it Crest 72

72 from Heather I'm gonna go Zane's gonna go 193 193 from Zane Number 4 Heather actually takes this one It placed number 50

Wow I did it Wow I guessed the number I guessed the number Good job Heather And finally Clear Obscure

Expedition 33 soundtrack It's in it's on the billboard classical albums and classical albums crossover charts two charts where did it place before we guess I'm realizing I'm shocked that

Final Fantasy is not been part of this because those scores are insane and they're so classical and genius pieces of art but I don't know this game so this would be hard for me to guess this was a 2025 release that you may have missed because you were touring

but I think as fan of JRP's you'd love this game what's it called Player Obscure Expedition 33 Honestly this question Is it sort of like Tales of Vesparius shell-shaded graphics or is it vintage HD2D or is it? It's more like modern sort of like regular like it's more like regular. Final Fantasy remake? Is it more like that?

Yeah, more like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it has like a French sensibility and I was just about to point out some of the characters can wear bandanas around their neck. I do that a lot. In fact, in every episode so far on Voce de Romania, which is how you say the voice of Romanian-Romanian, I'm wearing goddamn scars around my neck. There you're going to love this. One of my best friend's wedding is, like, a decade ago, I hadn't seen his father in 10 years, and he

walked to me, he's like, Zane, you're still doing those scars and shit? And I am, but now they're on my neck. You have to download this game immediately. It's French-type stuff, and it's RPG, I'm bottom down, it's tonight. Okay, great, fantastic. Amazing, you're not going to bed.

Amazing. I think you're really like the combat system, too. It's very engaging. Does it have a turn? Okay, but is it, because I love Final Fantasy, 13's combat system where it is turn base but there's also like you better you better act quickly there's like some time to action in the turn base yeah um I'm gonna guess 15 I have no idea

15 from Zane yeah specifically the classical chart billboard classical albums and classical crossover number six number six 23 why is it going to take this one but Zane's going to be our winner oh right it placed number one on both charts wow geez this game it's kind of sweeping the It's sweeping the nation. Everybody loves this game. This year, 2025? Yes. Oh, I kind of hear that.

It's kind of a banger. It's crazy. You're in Romania. I was very stressed out over there. And I'll be back there maybe soon. Great. Hell yeah. That's the segment.

Wow. And that says we get played. Our producers, Rochelle Chen, Ranch, Yard underscore, underscore Sard. Gistream and Ranch? Took a little break, but I'll be back to Silent Hill, F eventually. Hell yeah.

Awesome. Check that out over at Twitch. TV slash yard underscore underscore Sard. Our music is by Ben Prunty. Ben Prunty Music.com Our artist by Duck Brigade Design, duck brigade.com. Get played merge at kinshipgoods.com

and get animator. Sister show is over on Patreon. Matt, what are we watching this week? It's present day, present time, and we are watching serial experiments lane. Wow.

Let's fucking go. Let's go. Classic show, patreon.com slash get played. An esteemed guest, Sane Carney. Thank you so much for joining us. Anything you would like to plug.

Thank you so much for having me. I'm going to get back onto Twitch streaming for the rest of the year. should be back by the time this episode airs at Twitch.tv slash Zane Carney. Oh, awesome. Some music stuff, maybe a little bit of gaming, but probably mostly music nerding out. Yeah, you've done music theory of video games in the past on your channel. It's just really, really cool. Exactly. I'll start with that and then maybe play some Octopath Traveler when it comes out. I don't know. We'll see. There you go. And I'm going to say something that I hope you

don't hear on the voice of Romania. Zane, you got played. Oh, no. Except if they did say it to you there, it'd be kind of cool. It'd be cool. It'd be cool for For us, at least. Wow. You've got to play. Vampires, vampires. Perfect. Perfection.

That was a HeadGum podcast. What's going on? It's Lamarne Morris. And Hannah Simone. And we host The Mess Around, a New Girl rewatch podcast now on HeadGum. Now, here's the thing. Every single week, we chat about an episode of New Girl.

And we really get into it. Like, we get up in there. We get up in there. You know, we reminisce about our times on set. We share behind the scenes tea, we react to re-watching episodes that we haven't seen in years. We talk about how Jake Johnson is dog. That's not true. We talk about so many memories we have of working with the biggest stars on the planet.

I'm talking Prince, Taylor Swift, Olivia Rodriguez. We're just two BFFs having a good old time, okay? Sometimes we even talk to other co-stars like Zoe Day Chanel, Jake Johnson, Max Greenfield, and Damon Wayne's Jr., and your dad. We talk to your dad on this show as well. Make sure you subscribe to the mess around wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes drop every single Tuesday.