Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - 2023: The Best DLC Year Ever? - Kinda Funny Gamescast

Episode Date: December 20, 2023

We talk about how awesome DLC was this year and Bless gives his thoughts on awesome games he saw at Day of the Devs. - Start - Housekeeping - Tim’s Fortnite Journey - Is 2023 the Best Year for DLC? - Pokemon The Indigo Disk - Diablo IV and Keeping Up with Live Service Games - Bless’ Day w/ Day of the Devs Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What's up and welcome back to the final kind of funny games cast of 20. Of course, I am Tim Geddes. I'm joined by the new face of video games. Blessing Eddie O.e A junior. Good afternoon Tim. The Big Daddy himself, Greg Miller. Good afternoon, Tim. And the Nitro rifle, Andy Cortez.

Great afternoon, Tim. Andy, I don't think I've said a word to you all day. Well, that's not true. The last five minutes, we've been talking. Before that, I feel like we haven't talked. We've been in our zones. I've been in my zone. What are you working on?

What's you're going to goady stuff, man. Goody, baby. That gody stuff. It's looking real good. It's almost done. It's looking really, really damn good. Game of the year for Kind of Funny will be the second week of January. We will not be making any content.

I don't know why I said it like that. I'm just getting around Andy too long. For the next couple weeks as we celebrate the holidays. And the first week of January, we are going to come back here. And we're not making content. We're just going to work and plan and start getting things ready for our big kind of funny day stream on January 5th. 10 a.m. You could watch live.

on Twitch.tv slash kind of funny games and YouTube.com slash kind of funny games. We're going to do a fun stream all day, hang out, celebrate nine years of kind of funny, which is absolutely wild. And then the following week, we'll return with Gamescast

with our Game of the Year episode that we're very excited about. Everyone's been working really hard on it, and it is going to look phenomenal. So I'm very excited about that. Have you seen any of the stuff, Greg? Yeah, I glanced over Andy's shoulder here and there. I see what they're working on.

Good. Yeah. Damn good. And it looks real cool in the big. Yeah? This looks awesome. So yeah, everybody, get excited for all of that. But since this is the last kind of funny games cast,

I wanted to keep it a little bit chill. You know what I mean? As we enter into our holidays, we are taking a week off that kind of funny, which is a weird thing for us because it's like, all right, what are we going to do on our break? Are we just going to play more games?

Because that's what we do all the time. But let's always talks about, like, wanted a break from games, you know? But it's impossible to actually do that. You know what I did? Last night I played dead cells. You did? I did play the Castle.

No, I didn't interrupt to the Cassavania. No, I fell asleep. I got really tired. But I did get pretty, I was this coming back to Dead cells or starting Dead Cell? This is coming back to Dead Cell. So like I booted up the save. It was like,

I was like, how much have I played this game? And it was like, this is your 45th run? And I was like, oh, that's a lot of runs, isn't it? And so like I started playing and I got to the third like area, like the third map. I forget what is that's like when they start to let you choose

which one you want to go to? I forget. It was like the ramparts, I think. Yeah, I think I went to the ramparts. It was so hard for me, man. I'm so bad at Dead cells. I mean, coming back to it, I'm like, oh yeah, no, I'm still bad.

I'm lucky I have the upgrades, but like, yeah, no, I'm like, I want to get to the Castlevania stuff, but I'm scared. I'm not going to be good enough for the Cassavian stuff. I think you will. I feel like it's balanced pretty well to be. Did you play the Castlevania? Yeah. How was it?

I didn't know it's amazing. It is. Like, again, dead cells in Castlevania put together just makes so much sense. And especially when you think of the music and how hard do they go with it. Like, they do Castlevania justice. Like, I don't think I would be surprised if we ever get a Castlevania game in the future that's as good as the Dead Cells Castlevania thing is this year. It's just kind of the perfect

format. I mean, the same way. That was this year? Was it this year? Right? Wasn't it? I mean, yeah, it was early. I thought it was last year. I'm pretty sure it was February this year. Wow. It's been a wild year. Let me do the rigmaro real quick and I want to get right back to this. What's going on with your mouth? Y'all ever eat some food and then like hours later you find a little bit of it?

It doesn't matter a little surprise. How much time I give a cliff bar? If I eating with bar that day, I'll be talking on a show. And I'll be, I had a chicken cassidy earlier. Right now it's got a little cilantro. The Casabania DLC,

not only was it this year, it happened in March, March, 20, 23. I got it 10 out of 10 from IGN. Dude, I mean, I get it, man. I really get it.

Do I deserve a Coke? I think you do. Yeah! Yeah! Double Cokes, baby. We got to have like a discussion about, I think I was talking to you about this, about like, DLC this year.

That's what I want. Let me get through the rig. Then I want to get right back there. I love that. So, of course, this is the Kind of Funny Gamescast. We each every week, we get together to talk about video games and all the things that we love about them. You can get it on YouTube.com slash Kind of Funny Games or on Roosterteeth.com as a video. You could also get it as a podcast by searching your favorite podcast service for Kind of Funny Gamescast.

Thank you very much. Great. Jesus. I don't know if you deserve the Coke, actually. Or podcast services around the globe. You can also go above and beyond by going to patreon.com slash kind of funny. Thank you all so much for your support over there. It helps everything go, especially our Patreon producers, Jackson Hampton, and Delaney Twining.

If you're over on Patreon, you get the shows ad free. You get to watch live as we record them and a whole bunch of bonus content, including the kind of feudy that we're about to record right after this, which I'm really excited about. But yeah, enough. And also Epic Creator Code kind of funny. If you don't have bucks to toss our way, that's cool. When you're buying stuff on the Epic Game Store or in games like Rocket League or Fortnite, which I know a lot of people, a lot of people are buying stuff on Fortnite.

A lot of people. A lot of people. Are they named Tim Getty? They are. The other day, I was sitting at my desk and I look to the left and I see a group of four people trying to help Tim Geddies buy one Teeny Mutanty Turtles outfit. I have that video. I would need to edit that down.

You got it. It's like the physical manifestation of like, how many people does it take to screw in a light bulb? How many kind of funny members does it take to screw in a light bulb? It was how many kind of funny members to take to buy skin, a team, and T skin. More than you think. More than you would think. Today we're about to you by better help, but I'll get to that later. Let's start here with this Fortnite conversation, all right?

Because he's just scrubbed to, at least the, are you fucking kidding me? Well, wait, wait. When he gets to buy the V-Bucks, then the wheels click into place and goes, wait, so that means it's $5 a song? There was a very, I was immediately taken back to my best buy days when I'd have uncle and aunts ask me about iPhones and laptops. everything. And when Tim walked up to me, it was like, so

like these Ninja Turtle skins, will they ever go away? I was like, oh yeah, they go away for a long time. Like you need to get them and he's like, God, fuck. So as soon as it happened, right? Fortnite, been around for many years. Been around for Fortnite, some would say. And I played before. I've done

some less plays with you guys. I'm semi I understand it. I get it. Games fantastic. And I was like, all right, it's going to take a lot to really get me to jump in. I mean, they've had Optimus Prime in there. They've had like the cobra kai. They've done everything they possibly can to really really peak my interest, right?

But I've never been like, I gotta do it though. They've had M as well, you know what I mean? But I've never been like, I gotta jump in. I gotta jump in and I gotta go. Seeing the designs for these turtles, turtle designs very important to me. I either love or hate them. There's very rarely in between. And these are really good.

Really, really, really big fan of these ones. I need this Leo, especially jumping into Fortnite Festival, Fortnite, Rocket Racing, all I'm like, this is more of my speed when it comes to games. Really a big fan of the potential of what festival might one day become. And I'm like, I don't even understand like what I'm buying. I look at Fortnite and I feel like the oldest man on the planet. There are so many UI options that are just like, what the hell is going on here?

Everything has 10 different names. It looks like Netflix. It looks like Disney Plus. It really does. Yeah, and I'm sure it makes a lot of sense to a lot of people. Not to me, though, right? I tell Joey, I want the turtles. I want Leo specifically.

And she goes, cool. she slacks me she's like hey you have to get it by 4 p.m. And I thought she was fucking with me. Like I thought I was like there's no way that's like they just dropped this shit Like everyone's talking about this. There's no way that's how this works. So that's what I asked Andy later.

I was like hey so wait what's up with this? And he's like yeah no like they'll go away for a long time Like you gotta get him you gotta get him now. That's why I was worried about the invincible skins. I was terrified about losing my chance. So I was like all right I get it. Supply demand and whatnot. I understand all that exactly.

That's how they get you. And I'm like all right cool. well, let me try to figure this out. And I was like, can I just go to like fortnight.com, log in and buy it. No. Of course. That doesn't work. You need to play it on a system, which, I mean, God forbid you turn on the game.

Really, they're asking you that. You could have probably, can you not go to the Epic Game Store and buy it through that? Or is that weird with V bucks and whatnot? I think Tim's conundrum was, I'm at work. I don't have a console. I don't want to download this game. And then you saved them by saying, I got it on my console, log in. So that was my issue, is that we were, there was live shows.

And we all know it kind of funny. We can't download games while people are live or else it fucks up the internet. So I was like, ah, shit. And now that I have this ticking time bomb of 4 p.m.,

I'm just like, what am I going to do? By the way, downloading stuff on Wi-Fi is okay. Is it? Because, wait, okay, on Wi-Fi. Is it?

Oh, wow. Okay, okay. Yeah, whenever I need to download a game, I pop by unplug the... Unplug the Ether. Yeah, unplug the Ethernet. All right. How long is it?

Good to know? Real long. Yeah. Yeah, it's not great. T-T-T with the power of X-Cloud, though, you could have jumped right in. So that's the thing is, like, this is, it's awesome. And, like, it's so funny how not a problem this is, but simultaneously a problem it is, where I know that, ironically, Fortnite is the easiest thing to get into, because there's

10 bazillion ways. I could have just got it on my phone. I got to walked outside. Marks or Starbucks. Yeah, exactly. Like, there was, there was solutions. But I was working. I had things to do.

But then Greg was like, cool, just like log out of my PS5. That's a great solution. So then I pop in. And then, yeah, literally multiple people walking. me through this. And step by step, I just heard him go, how do I get V bucks? I'm familiar with the concept of V-Bucs. Like, I didn't fucking know. And I'm trying to look through these stores. There's just so many menus. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. There's so many venues. I'm like half the time I'm not using most of them, right? Like, I go through those men. I couldn't,

if you ask me what menus are like in the top tab of Fortnite right now, I know there's the main one where I can like party up with people. There's the fucking like seasonal like outfits that You can buy, like the store. The shop. Yeah, there's the Fortnite store. Don't forget Locker. Oh, yeah, the locker I put things on. Well, I think there's Battle Pass.

This recent 5.1 thing or 5.0, whatever, just dropped. You know, had a gigantic refresh of the way the menu looks. And there was a lot of people like, dude, this is, we were barely getting used to the last UI, you know. And a lot of it is the introduction of all these custom games and Fortnite editor and all that stuff where people were just making their own things. they want that stuff in front of your face. Come spend your whole life here.

So then I'm there and I'm like, I call found Leo. This looks accurate, I guess. And here's the past with all the turtles. I'm like, clearly I want that. But then there's the numbers. Start popping up. And I'm seeing these numbers and I'm like, that looks like a mighty, mighty big number

for what I'm trying to purchase right now. You had this great moment where you were like, wait, do I have to buy this back bling to the shell? I'm like, no, they have a shell. That was if you wanted to put a shell on, Eana Reeves or whatever. You were just gonna see turtle flesh on their back. The problem is the turtle shell back bling looks cooler than the turtles one.

Because it has like the bandana on it. It just looked tight. I was like, this one, this is what's up. But I was like, I'm just gonna fucking buy this shit. And that's when the moment happened.

And it hit me. Everyone is helping me out here. Andy starts filming me. And I was just so legitimately shocked blessing at the conversion rate between real money. and these V-bucks. What do you think of what? Because isn't it like 100 V-bucks for like a dollar? I'm pretty much.

Or is there like some kind of weird inflate? Yeah, I think it's like you spend $30 to get $35. Right now, a thousand V-bucks runs you $8.99, so $9. So basically. And then they do that shit. 9,000, like you do the weird-ass things where it's made up. This is all on Xbox, by the way, if it's different somewhere. 2800 V-Bucks is $22.99, but you get 12% extra.

5,000 V-bucks is $36. but you get 25% extra. And then 13,500 V bucks is $89.99 and you get 35% extra. So I buy these turtles. And after conversion. I buy these turtles. It was $38. Yeah.

I spent $38 U.S. goddamn dollars. Did you buy all the turtles or were you just buying the art turtles? You get the bundle. I got a sold. Oh, you got a bundle. Yeah, that's on you then. But here's the problem.

April O'Neill, not in the bundle. Yeah. And she looked cool. That pissed me off. And she looks awesome. So I had to. Yeah, I got them all as well. That's insane.

Even though I rarely play there. Tim, if I told you the number that I... Valerite and Wright allow you to look at how much you spent on their game. And in that whatever years of Valerant, that when that first came out right when the pandemic hit, it is like staggering, the amount that I've spent in that game. And I'll never forget when you were like freaking out about this. I was like, Mike, when the Valorant Finals happened,

and during the Valerant Finals, they released... this limited edition gun set you could buy. It's a commemorating the 2022, 2021, whatever the hell, Valorant Finals. And it's a gun that you'd buy because you're just buying guns. You're not buying character skins. It's all gun skins. And I think it costs like $70 or $80 for a limited edition gun.

And the gun gets brighter and shines more, the more you get kills. And Mike bought it. I was like, Mike, ain't no way that thing's ever going to light up. You're always dying. It's like, I'm gonna buy this. I'm never gonna see like the true potential of it. Like, dude, like, yeah, the thing is

whenever I've seen people talk about, you know, Fortnite and Overwatch skins, I always just like, I pray that you never ever discover Valorin or Counterstrike. Because Valorin is, it's a gun skin.

It's a gun. It's not your character. Your character's not gonna look like fucking Mufat. or maybe some other trademarked whatever. Like, it's just the gun that you're holding that. Sometimes the more you spend, the final kill will, like, have this cool animation or whatever,

but it's just the look of the gun. And I am just so ashamed of the amount that I've spent on something. It's like, hey, you know, $26, why not for that gun? And then it just adds up and adds up. When you unlock the Mufasa gun, though, like, what sound is it make when you shit? Scott, no! Yeah, I mean, this year has been eye-opening to me in many ways when it comes to the micro-transactions.

Like, get into Pokemon Go, worst decision for my wallet of all time. Marvel Snap, I was responsible. Oh, wow. I am responsible with it. Like, I buy the season pass once a month. I feel like that is absolutely worth the $10 a month for what the devs are working on, it being free to play, like, all that stuff. Totally think it's valid. I'm not having a great 10 bucks is not bad.

Pokemon Go is a goddamn rip-off. Like, every single, every single thing that they're selling, I'm like, you motherfucker. You know exactly what you're doing. What you're doing is making money and ripping me off. Okay? They got snake in there already? No, no, 35 days. Oh, 35 days.

I was like, wait, shit, I had to go. Put the shit up. Pause the show. I got to go find something. The Ninja Turtle's still very much featured. You could buy them. I don't know why Joey was like a used car salesman. Oh, man, turtles, I know what?

I hear they already packed their bag and started the car, but let me put in a call on my manager. But let me see if I can get this. But you gotta use code JNW. You gotta use creator code. Well, we did use the creator code kind of funny. Yeah, right? You know, that did, that did help us out there.

You can earn V-bucks just by playing the game, right? Correct. That's part of the- Have you heard anything about doing that? Like, what if I just play in fucking Pokemon Go? By putting Pokemon in goddamn gyms, get fucked. If you get to level 100 on the battle pass, that's enough to buy another battle pass is to keep it going.

You know what I mean? Use the thing that you're missing, bless. I don't want to, I don't want to actually play it. I just want to play it. I just want to play it. I just, I don't want to buy the turtles. What the fuck be the turtles?

Oh my God. I don't want to be a turtle. Moving on from the micro-transactions. I did want to get back to something here. Bless and I on Games Daily a couple days ago, we were talking about dead cells. We're talking about the Castlevania. And so I'm happy you're jumping back into at least the OG dead cells.

But the concept came up about DLC. Is 2023 easily the best year of DLC ever? Because like let's just top level. Let's just throw some things out there. Cyberpunk, Phantom Liberty. Yeah. Valhalla. Verizon,

Forbidden West. Forbidden West. Dead cells. We got the two Pokemon, Scarlet and Violet DLCs. I'm not saying all these are perfect. I don't know what the status is on the Pokemon. They're pretty good.

I mean, like they're as broken as Scarlet Val is. It came out. It came out last week. Yeah. And I'm enjoying it quite a bit. But I mean, I literally,

I uninstalled Pokemon yesterday to install dead cells. So now I'm like, damn, do I need to reinstallonle? Final Fantasy. 16? Fantasy 16, yeah. Echoes of the Fallen. Arenas.

Yeah. The house content. H-A-U-S for Dead Island, too. Episode 37 for DC Universe online or whatever. Just naming all those things. Some of those are like, I mean, in the case of like Phantom Liberty, like Game of the Year contenders. Mahala sounds like it is probably going to end up in some people's game of the year. Like, has that happened before?

Multiple. I know we've had The Witcher. I know that there's been examples of. great DLC, but this many? It just kind of goes to show how much of a banger of a year this is in total. Like, without even the DLC, just like

the idea that these developers can put out, quote unquote, downloadable content or expansions, because I know that I saw Radick, our homie from CD Project Red, reply to some people like, it's not a DLC, it's an expansion. I love that. I get it.

You still download the content. Sure. Sure, sure, sure, sure. And plus Blue, your mind yesterday with the expand alone expand i had never heard the word expand alone like that's some kogiba transferring type shit that i'd never heard of my life um yeah i i think that it it we could maybe be mistaken if we look back a couple years and we do see that you know maybe i don't know but then i think about like breath of the wild d lc wasn't like anything but like blew anybody away i'm somebody who i usually don't care about d lc and if they're all to give a few more shoutouts we got

the RE4 separate separate ways. Yeah, separate ways. And then also none of us played Zeno Blade, but Zeno Blade got the feature redeemed thing as well. And everybody loved that. And yeah, everybody loved that. Both of Res Evil's got a VR, right? Yeah. And I don't know if you count that as CLC, but I guess if you want to count that a CLC, that is

well. Did you fucking download it? Was it fucking free? I mean, it's not just a mode. It's not just a thing you click on. You turn on the VR. But one for me also is Hitman Freelancer mode, which is a thing that highly expanded that game. If you ask me, I say yes. Like I think for me at least, this is this year is the best year for DLC across the board just in terms of, I think it being a lot of

video games that are coming out this year that are incredible. But yeah, like, if I look at my top 10, like, there's a very strong chance that Val Halla makes to my top 10. There's a strong chance that a freelancer mode from Hitman mixed into my top 10. Was that this year? Yeah, that was like at the very beginning of this year. Yeah, like January, February. And then also like, it is a for sure chance that Cyrupunk, the Phantom Liberty DLC makes it into my, my, um, top. 10. And so like, tender.

It's a contender for me. And so it makes me excited that like, I think there are four, we mean you had this conversation actually earlier that like, I think the forms that DLC are taking, are becoming more varied and therefore getting more interesting where it is, oh, it isn't just here's four more hours of story, right? No, it's God of War going, here's a rogue light.

It's hitman going, here's a roguelight. Last of us going. Here's a roguel. But yeah, like, there's that. there is like, Saurapunk being like, hey, we're opening up a whole new part of the city

and then also giving you Idris Elba. It's Sefu giving you the challenge arenas and I think these devs finding more ways to give you more, I guess more interesting ways

to actually play the game as opposed to just, here's more, right? It's more thoughtful almost. But even when it is just here's more, I feel like that can be great too. Like, Barry, you're going to need to help me out

on this a little bit, but I want to shoot from the hip here and say that this year had the most Mario Kart DLC, like the most of the waves came out this year? Let me look into that. I don't think it's most, but a good chunk. But yeah, a good chunk, and it was great,

and it was the end of it. And like, it ended, like, Mario Kart deluxe ended in like an emotional way, which is very unexpected. Yeah, I saw according to game rant that they just put booster course packs, and I got to assume that those were multiple packs that were released.

2023 saw the long-weighted completion of the booster course set for Mario Kart 8. It was releasing six ways over the course of 2023 and 2022, which included 48 new courses, eight, a lot of courses. It literally doubled the game. Half of it came out in 22 and then the other half came out in 223. So that's still 24 courses over the course of this year. That is absolutely wild.

And again, they were good. Like not the best things ever, but like overall like, bear it. Like what? I mean, we got. uh, Yoshi's Island. Oh, yeah.

That was a great, which is like a fucking banger, uh, of a track. So, yeah. Some hits, some misses.

Yeah. Also shout out to Escape Academy. Yeah. I know not everybody's like on deck, like, you know, patiently waiting or, um,

you know, like the super waiting for the escape academy stuff. But when that stuff came out, you know, I played it. And we played, I think we did a preview of one of the ones, like the latest one at,

um, summer game fest. We beat the record, right? Every single time we set the record. Man, we can't be fucked with, unfequitable.

But yeah, like, those, that's a great DLC as well. And so, I hope this trend continues. Like, I,

again, coming from somebody who, historically, I've been more on the hater side of DLC, not literally hating, but more so just the thing of like,

I couldn't care less. Is it worth coming back to? Yeah, like, I don't want to come back to this game that I've already forgotten how to play and all this,

right? And like, you know, but I mean, horizon burning shores, I played that. And that is like, kind of the definition

of like, here's more. It was still great. Like, a four out of five or something like that like we both came out of being like that that was a great time like I really enjoyed that let alone yeah like the vast amounts of dLC we've gotten this year yeah I mean transitioning this conversation into a little uh my my thoughts on actually Pokemon the indigo disc here um yeah so this is the second

dLC pack for scarlet violet the first one came out a couple months ago and i talked about it then the first one was like a like four hour like mini little story it was like a summer vacation type thing where they go to this little village in Japan essentially and like there was like a small story about finding this like three legendary Pokemon pretty run-of-the-mill stuff you'd expect. It ended with the crazy like anime

like moments of like betrayal essentially and that's not spoilers it's just basic stuff. One of the Pokemon was cheating on the other Pokemon. Oh my God! But it ended like super hype in a way that like the story of the entire thing I was like I really don't care about this at all but it ended up being like I cannot wait for the next

one. Like I need to see what kind of like Scarlet Violet core where it's like you get to the end of it and you're like, oh snap. This is so much better than the rest of it, right? So this, it's been interesting playing through this. I'm very early. Like I'm only like maybe like four hours into this and it does feel a little

girthier. I feel like this one like just to be probably going to be like closer like the 15 hour mark maybe 10 to 15. And it's really awesome because it's so funny how it's just like a a very, very,

hey, here's just everything you actually want from Pokemon in a smaller form. Like, you're not getting the whole going out and gym battles and stuff, but there's a focus on battling here. And it's all like double battles, which is like the more official like VG competitive way to play Pokemon.

So it's actually kind of challenging and you actually need to have strategies and like do things that Andy Cortez hates. Like, yeah, use the defensive moves and tail-lip and stuff. I'm not trying to growl. Using what's black? I'm not getting damage.

I'm not using it. It's interesting because in double battles, like if you're, this example might not actually make sense. If you're on your team, you have a Gerados and a Jolteon. And my Jolteon uses discharge, which like shocks everybody. It also shocks Gatos.

So I'm hurting my own people. So you got to be like smart about how you use the like, the moves that kind of like affect everybody. And I'm just having a really good time like actually being chat. challenged by Pokemon battles. And then on top of that, it takes place in this underground terrarium where, like, the whole thing is in the dome,

like a decent dam type stuff. And all the walls are LED walls. Oh, that's awesome. It's like fake. Like that's in canon. Like that's the story of what's happening. I'm like, this is the most Tim bullshit ever. And it's a big circle that's like,

how'd you all afford this? You know, they were really two during the pandemic. like D walls around too. Start podcast. It's this big like circle that you're in and it's divided into four quadrants and each quadrant is a different biome. So it's like the frozen tundras and then the like more beachy areas and like the mountains. And it's cool because all of that's just like inherently is kind of cool.

The my hero arena is Barrett. I mean it is very similar to that stuff that Barrett was showing one time. But what I think is awesome about it is in addition to the cool battles, in addition to the cool just like ideas. for a location where it's smaller, but you still get a bunch of variation. Because in Scarlin Violet, there wasn't that much variation in a lot of the grounds you're going around. This one, I think,

just gives a little bit more. But what's cool about this is, since it's the DLC, they want you to kind of, like, go back and get just working-uckin. Get all your favorites from the previous generations that might not have been in the Scarlet and Violet. So all of the originals, or not original,

all the starters ever are in this. like every single generation of starters in this and you can just catch them. Pretty much every single legendary ever is in it. And they each have like their original music from their old games and stuff and you have to like chase them around Paldaya like the whole region from Scarlet and Violet.

And it's just presented in a way that's like really, really cool. And I'm having a great time. This kind of just feels like the ultimate Pokemon DLC and I'm just very impressed with the fact that they're just, they did it all. It's not much more I could ask for.

Is it as fun to go back to as it was playing when we first picked up the game? because that's always been a weird thing for me having played it at launch, having such a fun time with it despite its flaws, and putting it down since then. I always have the thought, especially with the DLCs coming out of like, if I go back to the game,

am I going to be like, what the fuck was I thinking? Or am I going to be able to get into these DLCs? So my problem is, I feel like if you could just jump into the second one, you'd be utterly obsessed. Yeah. I don't know,

jumping into the first one, I really think it's going to be like, what mood are you in? Because like, it feels like a little bit of a diet version and it's like a smaller simpler thing that might be just enough for you to be like this is the stuff I don't like about the game and like back out and you have to beat DLC one to play DLC 2 because DLC 2 is very much an end game content like it's very much like catch them all motherfuckers let's go um but yeah I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to you but like if you are like I'm kind of interested in getting to some Pokemon give the DLC a shot because it is good I'd give the first DLC probably like a three out of five I'm leaning towards four out of five on this second one. How's the decks looking?

My decks is looking pretty damn. Yeah. Pretty damn good. I have all of them in all 400 from Scarlet and Violet. I have all 200 something in the first DLC pack. And I have like, I want to say I have like 140 out of the 200 something in this one. So like I'm doing some damage. I really need to go back and clip out the night that here's the kingdom launches.

And there I am at home from work. I'm like ready to stream this. that's, man, this is going to be a blast. Everybody's popping up. So-and-so is playing Tears the King. So-and-so is playing. Everybody in their mom was playing Tuesdays the Kingdom. Tim Getty's just started Pokemon Violet.

I'm like, what are you doing, bro? It was a terror. I needed my samurai. But anyway, those are my thoughts on Indigo Discrete. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. This time of year can be a lot. I'm to figure out, am I getting a gift for this person? Am I not?

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That's right. What is it? I got re-obsessed with Diablo over the weekend. Oh, no. But it's just the way he delivers it. that's like I don't feel good about it. I feel great about it. I'm happy.

You know, I've been floating around since we got off of a review season, finally came to a halt there, of trying to catch up on stuff, playing things I missed, trying to double back to things. And then just having a general malaise to a degree of like, well,

what do I want to do? Like, blah, blah. And so I was thinking I wanted to go, I still want to get back to my real playthrough of Starfield. You know what I mean? I have that new game plus five, I believe,

where I finally have where I want to be, everything I want. to happen in this thing. The reality you choose. Exactly, exactly. But I don't want to get distracted from it and I don't want to get pushed off of it. So I'm thinking maybe, I don't know who knows when I'll actually get to it or whatever. But like this week and last week we had Jen sisters in town.

So like downstairs was occupied there or whatever. So I've been doing a lot of remote play, obviously, a lot of PlayStation Portal as usual. And I was I was getting geared up to do Starfield the other day. but then I'm going on the Diablo podcast, the day this posts. And I forget when that goes up publicly for everybody else, but from Pure Diablo. It's a Diablo podcast I started listening to when I was, you know, on the verge of release and super hyped about it and everything else.

And so I was like, well, I got to get in there and, you know, dust myself off and just check. I haven't checked out. They got the never winter stuff going on, one of their seasonal events, not, you know, the big, the big expansion sort of thing. No, no, no, no. Like a season type thing, right? Yeah, well, this is a seasonal event where it's like just running, like this, you know, some monsters or whatever

and it's super icy and cold or whatever. It's kind of like Christmas or whatever. It has its own rewards, and then there's the bigger season that, you know, season two is going on as well right now. Yeah, Andy. When Diablo 4 first launched, I felt like you were starting

multiple different playthings of multiple different classes and characters. No. What are you main, like, what's the one you've been sticking with now? Dude, this is the whole problem with you. Thank you very much for asking these questions. So we're on to season two right now

of Diablo, right? Because you remember, they launched the game and then I forget how many weeks, maybe even a month, they put out season one. And where this- Everybody was mad, right? Caught a lot of flack was the idea that Diablo 4 brought in a lot of new players, also had just come out, then launches a new season, and the new seasons require you to roll a new

character for it. You can't bring your eternal character in the seasonal realm. That was nuts. That was nuts. Right. So I'm in a weird spot with it where I fully intend to platinum Diablo 4 at some point. however it will not be soon and it's going to need to be a I am committed and I have hit up Fran and I have these nights off to have him

pull me and grind me and just you know power level me like grab me daddy and do all these different things because like you know like there's when you start getting up in the levels yeah blah blah blah as you all know this Diablo 4 has been the love affair of me and my wife of playing this game together and being super into it which was awesome at launch you know I had my rogue, she had her necromancer, right? Everything's fantastic. Oh, okay, can I just interrupt?

Yeah, because I, we need, we need Blizzard and Activision to have you and Jen Bid one of those little, like, mid-roll video things they play at, like, BlissCon, where it's like, hi, I'm Greg, and I'm Jean-Viev, and we played Diablo 4 together, and it's just a little cut to them, like, playing at night, like, when he gets... It's like, I'm playing and laughing, and then it's just one shot of, like, Ben rolling in his own shit. Take care of the backdust and crying And throwing himself How to reach

He's playing in the bathtub And there's like a toaster Like How quick Greg jumps to bed rolling In his own shame God damn Just saying, you know Let's have an accurate representation

Of course Anyways though So that is the fact of the matter Season one You know we rolled I rolled Lucy James Uh Jen rolled Moore Hussein. You know what I mean? Those were our characters on that seasonal realm.

And what we discovered pretty quick was, Jen was like, this fucking sucks. I want to be my necromancer. I'm committed to that character. There's still more to do there yet. But we struggled on with, finish the story. Season one. Season two dropped right. And it was like, I wanted to jump in and it's vampires. It started around Halloween. You know what I mean? Fuck yeah. I made Ria Ripley and I made Jen make Dominic Mysterio. So it would be super cute. And she did one night of it. And she's like, this is ruining my enjoyment of the game. I don't want to be Dominic Mysterio. It was like, this is ruining my,

and I was like, well, our eternal characters, the characters that aren't in the seasonal realm that are on the eternal realm, right, still exists and there's still so much fucking shit to do. Like, especially for me trying to grind out of platinum on it, and blah,

blah, and she's like, all right, fine, but then the fire just hasn't been there for her to go back to it. And so it's cooled off to the point of like, I was like, we divorced.

Head drop or head, head of, Remarry. No. So it really just stopped. And then this re-invigoration has been me running my seasonal character alone. And so I'm doing Ria Ripley right now. So I have my head wrap around the vampire content because you're picking up gear that has different stuff on it and, you know, limited time stuff that's going on to use vampire powers and all these other things.

How are you playing? Right now? Awesome. I'm playing on portal. There's a lot of different ways. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I've come back. I'm killing the game. Strictly on portal. except yesterday when I was at the office and I was playing on my PS5 at my desk, but otherwise just portaling it, which is such a dream come true. And this is one of the things where it's like, I miss my wife and I enjoy

I enjoyed our time together, but there is something incredibly freeing about playing a game that has been tethered to another person by yourself. So it is that idea of like, all of Jane. I'm a fucking, you know, every time I turn and I take off this wedding ring, go into the other room. I'm saying Rio Ripley,

ain't married, Jen. Uh, no, but it's the idea of like, you know, you, really nerding out my menus, really nerding out about gear, you know, what do I want to do right now and going off and grinding that thing again? So,

Frank, grinds me. That's always one of the worries with me playing a game that is that involved, playing co-op. It's like, oh, man,

I could be in this menu for three goddamn hours, but I don't want to hold that person back. So I'll just quickly kind of try to, you know, let me just skim through whatever these descriptions are. And like,

I can imagine how freeing that feels like, oh, I can really look at this build and maximize the hell out of it. Yeah, so it's been a lot of that and just playing on Portal going that way, grinding out on the vampire stuff, trying out this never winter stuff, looking in that season past. You know, we talked about micro transactions. And you don't need me to tell you everybody how fucking horrible the Diablo marketplace is and how goddamn expensive. They got a couple hot outfits in there, though, that I do sit there and go, do I want to drop $28 or whatever the fucking insane amount of money?

Diablo requires. Play good, bro. But I mean, it's another one I look good no matter what, you know what I mean? I already got a lot of great styles. Okay. But anyways, I was trying to convince Mike, we're going to do a stream on Friday, and I was like, let's do a hardcore run. Let's start that hardcore character I need to get going, you know?

I love it. He died so fast in her for his hard. Yeah, I know. It's been great. I'm happy to be there. You know, we had a conversation on PS I Love You last week. That was, you know, we went through our PlayStation stats, and one of the stats they tossed out this year for some reason.

What was the first game you played? You know what I mean? What did you play the first game this year? I would be shocked if it's not Diablo for me, if something comes around that, I'd be that ready to boot back up because right now I'm in there on the daily again,

getting in there, just beating the hell out of monsters. Are y'all playing any games daily? Like a game that has like a daily challenge type feature? No, I haven't really been on that grind since I was really into Destiny earlier in the year.

When in the lead-up to Lightfall, yeah, Lightfall is the name of that DLC. In the lead-up to Lightfall and then for the next like month or so, that was a all right what are the alias today let me finish these challenges i it's so funny because like i don't love streaming destiny because i'm just really really tough for me to kind of like just get around all of these different menus and understand i don't want to be sitting in menus

that either so i would just play a lot with like chris anchor or washbird and we try to that's when that's when snowmike mike was like no fuck you i'm gonna play with you all and we're like no we don't want you like you don't want to play this and he's like no i'm gonna do it we're like Why are you threatening us with your presence? Like, go away. That's, yeah, I'd say Destiny 2 was like the last time that I was, I had that objective at night. I got to go hop in, do a couple little rounds, go do whatever this thing.

Oh, the main, I get exotic loot from this little, if we run this dungeon or whatever. Yeah, the closest I've gotten is Street Fighter 6. And I'm not playing that daily. For me, it's like every few days where I'll get the craving to be like, oh, you know what, I want to hop into a match or two and then I'll play. But like that game does have systems. that are like almost like light battle paths, hey, come through and unlock all this stuff

and like have the daily objectives or the weekly objectives and stuff. But that stuff is so in the background in Street Fighter 6 that I never pay attention to it. At first I was excited about it when I first started playing that game back in June. But like very quickly, I was like, okay, well, I actually don't care about any of this stuff really. So I just play just to play. But I also have this thing with daily games that have dailies

where I get very anxious about the idea of playing something that's super long term. Like I booted up Warframe because during Game Awards, I got into a conversation with, a couple of people that were like, yo, Warfram is legit. Like, oh, man, it's one of the best playing action games can play yada yada.

And I got home and I was like, maybe I should try Warframe. Like the game always looked cool. And I used to play Warfam a bit back in the day before it actually officially released. Like when it was in beta on PC, I played quite a bit of it then. And I was like, well, let's see how it is 10 years later and I booted it up.

And I was like, ah, this just seems like a big time thing. Like, this just seems like a big commitment. And especially right now with everything else out. Yeah. And I don't know, I don't know if I'm ever going to have it in me to play a game that I know is going I got that dog in you. I don't have that dog in me. It's like a thousand hours to play this.

Like I don't have like I need to know that a game is going to end. Like I need, I think the longest game that I, that I have in me is probably a persona game. You know, like I'll put in 150 hours into a persona because I know eventually like it's going to end. Right. I'll put an 80 hours into a game like into a Balder's Gate 3, even though I've only put in like 30 hours. But like I'll put them out that amount of time into that type of game because I know what's going to end. If I know this game is endless, I almost lose all motivation. I love that feeling, though.

Like, I love the, I love the idea that I can walk away from Diablo and come back to it and fall right back into it. And I think that is a special game because it's more than likely, like, I always talk about DC Universe online where I want to play some DC Universe online. I jump in, what the fuck was I doing? What is the, what matters now? What's the meta? What do I need to grind? I think it's the kind of game to, like, because I think for me when the, if the game is, this is a numbers go up kind of game, I want to hit the point where I'm like, I'm all powerful, right? Like I'm at the level cap and I'm fucking killing shit right now.

And that's like a standard RPG. But I can have that for a competitive game. Like an Overwatch, I probably put in like 500 hours, right? Or a Street Fighter 6, I'm going to keep playing it. I'm going to probably put in hundreds of hours into that game. But I'm not playing it to have the numbers go up. I'm playing it so I can be better than other people. And that for me gives me like just a general sense of satisfaction.

Is it all about recontextualizing it for EdoBest? because I kind of feel the same about games in that way, but when I hop into Destiny 2, and it's going to sound extremely hypocritical because I never did the raid. But to me, I'm like, I want to get good enough to get to do the raid. And that's usually where I fall off right after that.

I usually don't keep on going back to, we never did the raid, and I blame Snowback Mike. And there's a lot of blame you being thrown around. You should blame Snowm? But like, is it maybe that in Warframe, there's that big, gigantic sort of endgameish, mission in whatever planet of Lana that he got to go do.

Like, and once you do that, you're like, okay, cool, that was 30, 40 hours that I spent doing that grinding. I did that final dungeon. I'll come back whenever the next big thing drops. Yeah. I think the tough thing for me is I would, I am such a, I need to be there to experience, like everything sort of person, right? Like, if I'm going to be into Destiny 2, what would have helped me if, was, would be if I stuck

around for like, whatever the first big expansion was. Because I played Destiny 2 at launch. I played a lot of hours. into it, right? I probably play like 80 hours between doing the raid and then also doing a lot of PVP. And then I didn't stick around to play the next big expansion. And I missed it. And like from there on, it was, there was never a prayer for me. Like, I think for me, if I'm playing that kind of game and I miss a big drop, it's so impossible for me to get back into it because I feel like I've already, like, I feel like I've already lost the experience there. Um, I will say, I think my one saving

grace with getting back into a game like that would be GTA online, like whatever GTA 6 comes back, because I'm so, like, Craig's phone is reflecting the brightest lights at my eye by now. Sorry. But yeah, like, I was such, like, I was so hooked into GT Online the first time, just because I love GT online that much.

And so I think when online comes out for six, I'm definitely going to be there every single day, like doing every single crime, right? It's a bit easier. Doing every single crime. That's a bit easier to digest, right? We're not talking about, like, oh, dude, nobody's using those armor sets anymore.

Nobody's using, exactly. Oh, you're still using that bow. No, dog. That was done in, like, season three. Like that doesn't happen in GTA, but in Destiny, it's very much that way where, hey,

that Gallaghorn rocket launcher that everybody wanted in whatever Destiny 1 or Destiny 2, it's back, but it's different now. What you're going to want to do is do that one mission, that exotic weapon mission,

it's like, it can be a lot to... Online for GTA, it had that in a very different way where it was more so, oh man, what businesses are you running right now? Because, like,

you know, people aren't doing the arcade shit anymore. Now it's all about the bunkers. What's the fuck is a bunker? And they're like, You gotta go out to the country, you gotta buy a big old bunker, and then you gotta like, fucking steal cars and shit. Always a meta.

And I'm like, what is going on in this? I've been gone for a year, and it's all different now. And I came back when they dropped Dr. Dre in the game. And then, like, I played that and I was out. Yeah, I want to say real quick, whenever a meta is discovered, that's usually when I would love to drop out of the game. Yeah. Like I...

Hey, we've taken all the fun out of it. You have to play it this way. This is... That's great. That's just what I want. Yeah, we every... Everybody, like, has, you know, come together with all their, you know, scientific degrees and they've gone, they've like been discussing this in PowerPoint presentations.

And this is, this is the mathematical best way to play it. And for about three or four days, I really enjoyed playing the finals. And then lately, I have not so much enjoyed the finals because everybody knows that you need that melee build. It's like, I just want to shoot. I don't want to be a dude like swinging like a big hammer at people. I just want to, I want to first versus shoot it. That feels good, right? And the finals was kind of that game for me, where I'm, I just want to shoot. I I still enjoy the gameplay of it and it is really cool in terms of destruction. The point of the finals, it's 3V3V3V3

and you go get the... You have to get the money out of that little bank that's being deposited, but all the other people are trying to get the same thing and then you have to take that money to go deposit it in another area. But while you're doing so, if that little thing that you're depositing into

is on like the third floor, the people on the bottom floor can like shoot out the floor that you're on and then you'll just cave through and the level of destruction is like it is not pre-canned in any way it is like so accurate and legit where like I've seen buildings that I would run through all the time just like toppling over

because all the floors are being broken in through it is so damn cool to see though like kind of like those I think of the Joseph Staten Halo 2 thing of like those 32nd to 30 second to 30 second moments that you just remember like those are, that's a gameplay moment that I'm experiencing right now. And it's

awesome to be in that. And then you see everybody who knows the meta and I'm already like kind of tired of it. And I think I'm just, I'm just too old for the shit. I just get really like, oh man, I really enjoyed the first five days when it was all experimentation. When everybody here

had never touched the game and we're just sort of let's just see what happens, right? Oh, you can use that. I guess that explodes that wall. Well, if we don't level those things up, then that's going to explode this whole gigantic thing. And now it's just kind of... That was the first time I saw somebody fly in Rocket League, where I was like, oh, it's over. Like, it's over. Like, I'm not going to be able to play this thing anymore because people are fucking flying. And like, I, that game was, like, I think you could take any quote unquote

casual game and like, eventually it'll have a meta. And the meta is going to like, you know, tear you out of it unless like you're, you're into it. And I think for me, like, I've been able to find my niche a little bit where I like in a, like, in a niche a little bit where I like in a, enjoy and I'm good enough at fighting games where like I can keep up. But even like I have my ceiling at right now in Street Fighter. It's the, um, fuck what rank am I? I think I'm, I'm platinum with Luke. So like, I'm stuck at platinum poppy.

Yeah. And I'm like, there's no, I'm, I'm losing and winning like a strong 50% of matches. And like no matter what I do, I keep landing in the same place. And I'm like, all right, cool. Like I just gotta be happy here. There's such a glorious part of multiplayer gaming where you're in the thick of it. Where you, you're not necessarily the best, you're not the worst, but you're competitive. You can do.

something, da-da, and then inevitably you take a weekend off and you come back and the cars are flying and everything day, you're like, fuck this stuff. I felt a lot of guilt this year whenever I get asked, when was last saying played at Overwatch? When was that played at Ballarat? And it's like, there's just been too many other things to play where

in past years, Warzone was the go-to. You fall back to it. Warzone was the, like, last year, Overwatch 2, I put in so many, as somebody who put in thousands of ours to Overwatch 1, Overwatch 2 drops, and I played this shit out of it. I miss Rainbow Six Siege

all the time. I don't know if you ever had in the Rainbow Six siege era, but like that was another one where I played enough of that game at like my skill level and then I started to see people actually play Rainbow Six

and I'm like, oh, what the fuck is the point? And then you move on. No, nobody uses that character. You got to use the whatever destruction thing. I got all, those discussions just like really kind of.

Snap the phone out of everything. Yeah, but like this year when it comes to multiplayer games, there have just been so many great single player experiences that I haven't gone back to any more.

multiplayer games. And I know I will in a much deader time, in a much more slow period of games being released, but it just really feels like every two weeks there has been something big getting released that I have to try out because I know it aligns with my interest.

It looks super up my alley. And I just, I always feel bad saying like, no, I haven't played Overwatch too. It's not because I don't like it. It's not because I don't like these multiplayer games. It's just always something that I want to try out. Maybe next year will be a bit slower. You can have your multiplayer games. Maybe.

Big maybe. Well, if we got really high-ranked in Suicide Squad. Yeah? Yeah. Master of the meta. I can't wait to see how that game plays for me. Like, you know what I mean? Is it either going to be something I fucking am all about,

or am I going to have one night with it and be like, fuck on an Arkham Knights, be like, see you. I think you're going to love it. I know you're hyped on. Gameplay-wise, at least. You know Greg. What do you think Greg's going to fall? I don't think he's going to like it.

Really? Yeah. I mean, it just doesn't really. really seem like it fits Greg's vibe because it is, I mean, it's a shooter and it does have those little hooks that you enjoy about like Diablo, but I don't, I don't know. I'm going to guess that Greg does not vibe with it. I'm going to guess that. Because Greg is not going to be able to not see what the potential was of them not doing that. You know, like, I think, I think the hardest, the people that will enjoy it the most are people like me who were not looking forward to

to a rock steady Batman game. You know, who are like, yeah, sure, if they don't really, oh, they're not making a suicide squad game, oh, it's a shooter, that sounds cool.

But people like Barrett and Greg, the hardcores, that want a Batman game from this studio, or just a single player experience from the studio, getting this is so wildly out from left field

that I don't think they're going to vibe with it. See, I think it's going to be... And that's natural. That makes sense. I think it's going to be the reverse where I think like the gameplay will be fine

and I think Andy Cortez is going to want more than fine out of it and you'll end up like falling off after a little bit and I think Greg may not bear but Greg is going to enjoy just being in the world and being like oh shit it's DC and forget the game takes place a metropolis or not but like it does yeah it's like these cameos

yeah and I think it's gonna be like a Marvel's Avengers type thing where even though the gameplay is mid there's going to be enough pulls to it that are like almost Diablo like where Greg's like oh just let me level up my a Harley sniper guy or yeah, Harley. Yeah,

my dead shot. My dead shot, yeah. I was going to say, Bumer Coanger. I was going to say Boomer Coanger from Mega Man. Great. Do you think this ends up?

Better or worse? Isn't even the right words to use. But like, compared to Avengers. Ah, I was going to say compared Gotham Nights. Better than Gotham Nights for sure. I think it does better than Gotham Nights.

Avengers, I would imagine, yes, it does. Again, a lot of people didn't understand NDAs when they got in that beta. and it seemed like the buzz was positive off of it. I've been, I, you know, I've avoided all the leaks and stuff for the story.

I don't want to know them. I don't want to see that stuff. And I think that's where the difference really is where if the cut scenes in the story are rock steady quality, I think you have a win already there. You know, Avengers was a, oh, yeah, single player was pretty good. You know, it wasn't like a ringing. Oh, man, this is amazing. It was more like, oh, this caught me off guard that I like this story.

I'm talking about general public, right? Yeah. And then the gameplay was like, all right. And the single player was like, okay, good, maybe. and then multiplayer people didn't like except sickos like me. I feel like this one is going to have the story section of it. And the gameplay looks interesting. Like it's colorful.

That's what Andy's always talking about, right? It gives you crackdown vibes. You're running. You're shooting. You're doing your thing. Like, I look at that and I'm still like,

I don't want to be any of those people, but I do want to know the story, but I also want to know the story of injustice too. You know what I mean? I didn't play injustice too because like I hate fighting games. The same question that Tim asked you, but like without riders, do you think this is going to hit harder than,

I think honestly, I think suicide squad is going to catch it off guard. We saw those. Yeah. We saw those that really bad state to play. We're like, what? And then they went to the drawing board. And I don't think they like changed the DNA of the game. But I think it's going to be more fun than we thought it was going to be based on some of that stuff.

Now when you say that, what does that metacritic look like? I'm going to say 76. And there's going to be a decent amount of eights and a lot of fives and sixes. I can agree with that. I'll say like 70. I'm going to say 80. Wow. I think you know,

I think you can do that. I think an eight for my gym. When I do think about Outriders, though, I wonder like, that game comes out this year. I don't have time for that. That's the tough thing about this game

coming out in February. Yeah. Greg's also going to be playing that Helldivers. I haven't been playing that Final Fances since I'm in Rebirth. And then also... You didn't seem confident about that one,

did you? I was like, I'm free... Yeah, having just beaten a lot of it does come down to not only release, but how packed the schedule is, but yeah,

when I just beat blasphemous two, everybody thinks I say the last of us too. Oh, having just beat blasphemous too, a lot of people have been saying, Andy, have you seen the last faith? You should check out the last faith. And because it's such a pact here,

I'm like, I've been told about the last faith a million times by this point, and I knew that it was coming out already before I was recommended, but it's, I'm making a metacritic call on that where I see that it's like 76s

and I'm like, there are other experiences I'd rather play than something that doesn't seem quite as good as what I just played in blasphemous too. If it was dead for the rest of the year, I would totally give it a shot, but I just don't really got time for that. To give you a bit of a window, right? Suicide Squad is February 2nd,

same day as persona 3 reloaded or reload. The week before that is like a dragon, infinite wealth on January 26th. Tekon 8 is January 26th as well. A week after that is Helldivers on February 8th. Prince George is before that. Yeah, yeah.

Prince Perj is January 18th. No, Roger is pumped up. Then Donkey Kong, Mario versus Donkey Kong is February 16th. Don't forget, Scull and Bones. February 16th. Played three days early if you pay X-10th. What was the one you said before? Mario versus Donkey Kong.

That's in February? Yeah. According to game, informer. And then Rebirth is the 20-9. Did you know Open Roads and Pacific Drive are the same day? February 22. second. This is a wild release month and a

random release day right there. The two game, two indie games about driving. All right, cool, let's go. Speaking to indie games. Yeah. Blessing. You were at Day of the Devs after game awards. I was at Day of the Devs.

Right. It was after. It was the day after. And so, yeah, game awards happened. Greg Miller said, I'm going to go home. And I said, I'm going to stay in L.A. Hang out of friends. But more importantly.

No, not more importantly. You didn't know what's happening when you booked that. More importantly. You booked it. You booked it. And then they were like, Oh, we're doing a day of the dev. More importantly, I wanted to cover the indie games that are in the, that are happening in the NISP.

I wanted to be the voice of the people and check out the games that are often underrepresented. And so I stayed and I went to a nice little media hour and I stayed for the full day of the Debs event. Yeah, I was at Day of the Debs from like noon all the way through like 8 p.m. It was great. Open bar. Yeah. I wonder what kept them around, ladies and gentlemen. For, well, it was tickets.

So as a media person, I got two tickets to you. Kojima and Phil Spencer wanted to have dinner with him. He's like, I got to cover these indie games. He's like, sorry, man, I got to go to Day of the Devs. I did get tickets from other people, though. I was like, yo, you got tickets. Let me get another drink. And I was, man, I was dehydrated about it.

I was tricking the whole day. But during that media hour and during the Day of the Deves proper, I got to check out a bunch of different games. I made a quick list here of six different games that I got to check out. I played only about half of them. But there's the other half that I saw, and I talked to the devs, and I wanted to highlight because these games look really cool. I want to start off with this game called Give Me the Toilet Paper. So I walk in a day of the devs

media hour. First person I see is Janet Garcia. I'm like, oh, Jana, what's up? And Janet's like, Oh, yeah, yeah, Jan is like, Jan is like, oh, the first game you should check out is over there. It's called Give Me the Toilet Paper. They'll explain it to you when you get there. And so I go there, there's nobody there explained it to me. But I see a piece of cardboard with a piece of toilet paper on it and a JoyCon shoved in. And I'm like, oh, that's peculiar. And I click, I take the other JoyCon I like, I like start it over, starts a demo over, and I like start from the beginning. And basically what you do in this video game

is you hold this piece of cardboard, you have the toilet paper with the joycon shoved in on the cardboard and you're rolling the toilet paper back and forth on the cardboard to control what's going on in the game. In the game, there is a dude who's sitting on the toilet that needs toilet paper. And you basically that there's a toilet paper roll

that's like above him at the top of a maze. So you need to navigate the maze to get through and then drop down to the guy. so he can get the toilet paper. The mobile game, where's the water? I need my water. Get me the water. Get me the toilet paper.

Something like that. Yeah. I don't know. Tim needs the water. He's having a stroke. A little alligator. He was there. Same idea.

Same concept. But yeah, but basically, like, I started playing it. And like, as you go, obviously, the levels get harder, right? And so there ends up being, like, these chainsaws that, like, you have to, like, fucking dodge and avoid to get to the end of the maze. And it, I mean, it's very gimmicky, but it's also, like, just a very fun and novel idea. And I had a pretty good time with it. And it was, like, one of those.

things where in a room full of games that are regular control games, having a fucking piece of cardboard with some toilet paper, that was also kind of duct tape so it wouldn't fall apart. I was like, oh shit, all right, this is a novel thing, but I kept thinking like, all right, cool, like, this is great for a demo at an event like this, but like, how are people supposed to play this at home, right? And that's the thing I kept thinking. And if you're a video watcher right now, Barrett's brought up footage of it. But yeah, I was like, how are people supposed to play this at home?

And I didn't like have a developer around me to ask. I like probably like 30 minutes later I finally came around and like saw one of the people that was working the demo who I believe was like was one of the Sharer bears um and I talked to him I was like hey so like

what's the deal how are people playing this at home like what's the vision for this thing and the guy looks at me and says everybody at home has toilet paper and I was like huh all right cool like cool that's cool I didn't I didn't think about that the fact that yeah like

at home they're like yeah find some cardboard get one of the toilet paper that you that you probably had. Everybody has Amazon boxes around their house. Yeah, like shove your toy con into your toilet paper and play the game.

I thought that was really funny. The way you said it. Like a drag off a cigarette, blew your face and walked away. Yeah. I was like, all right, cool,

I didn't think about it that way. But that was the very first game that I played. You really enlightened me. Yeah, I played it. And I was like, all right, cool, it's fun. It's a really cool idea.

Going down the list, right? Another game I played is this game called combo devils. So basically, this is one that I didn't actually get to play. This is one that I got to the station and they're dealing with like fixing bugs like live as it's happening right because it's a pre-release like a very pre-reliation of the game but i did get to talk to the devs so combo devils is this game coming from a small team uh they're called punkzilla they're a brand new team making this game uh it's i don't believe it has like a release date or release window or anything like that but the way they described it to me was to say it is a platform fighter so think like a smash type game but it has a lot of the trappings and pullings of like a hardcore fighting game. It has meters.

It has things like that to actually make it a bit more locked in and a bit more hardcore. It looks cool. Yeah. Really cool. And like the way they're talking about it, I was like, oh, I get exactly where you're going here because there's the, the dev off socket too was saying that they had people that worked on, I think Project M, which was one of the, um, Brawl remake that made it more like melee. Yeah, yeah, it was like a, like almost like a mod type situation for brawl that, yeah, made it play a bit more hardcore for that audience. Yeah, it made it a bit more melee like. people from that who worked on that are working on this and they were like yeah we want to make this a more hardcore thing and so the focus is on one-on-one fighting oh um those parrys that's hell of sick like the way it said parry with the style that's so cool uh it's more one-on-one focus even though they do have a four-player mode um they have a single player or not single player but they have a campaign mode that is a roguelite which is funny because i'm coming off of playing nicolodean all-star brawl too which also had a roguid mode um but this game has it and then

They're like, yeah, you can play the mode in a co-op. You can play it like two players. I forget if they said more, but actually, though it looks like here, you have more than two players here. Yeah, so you're going through, you're picking upgrades for your one. Space emissary, man. Yeah, and I love it.

Like I, after playing Nickelodeon all-star Browelty, I was like, yo, this is actually a really good idea. Like the idea of a smash style, roguelike game for a single player campaign. It gives you the fun of doing an arcade run, but also it gives you the variability of going back and having everyone feel different. And then also, yeah, you get to play with their friends.

And so there's a co-op element there to keep everybody involved. I thought that was really cool. And yeah, the more they talked about, the more I was like, yo, I can't wait for this. Again, it seems like a more hardcore take on Smash. That's being made by a group of indie devs. And so I thought that that was really cool.

Another one I played, this is another fighting game. Two strikes. This is one that I did get my hands on. I played a little bit of it with the one and only Khalif Adams who beat my ass in this game because he was playing before I did, before I got there. Cheater. He cheated.

Exactly. Got it. But what this game is, it's another 2D fighting game. The R style is really cool. It's basically like a black and white hand-drawn style fighting game. And the twist here is... Dude. Yeah, this looks really cool.

The twist here, though, is that you only have two strikes before you die. Right? Like, if you get hit twice, you're fucking done. And so it is you having to parry as you read the animation of your opponent. It is you having to like balance if you want to do a light strike or a hard strike. Because if you do a hard strike, then it's only one hit kill. But if you do a light strike, then you have to get two strikes in. And so if you have it to balance like, all right, do I think I can get like a hard strike in that's going to take me longer to initiate?

Or do I want to play it safe and try to like, you know, stab in, jab and do all that fun stuff. For a quick burst. Cool. Very cool. Yeah. For a quick burst of playing this with Khalif, I was like, oh, this is fucking rad. And I believe this game is, I'm on the Steam page. It's out in early access.

Demo right now. Yeah. So you can play that. You can download a demo if you want to try two strikes is what it's called. Really cool our style. Really cool idea for a game. game. The next one I got here is a game called Anton Blast. I didn't get my hands on this game. I only watched it for a little bit and immediately went, oh, this looks fucking cool.

If you watch the trailer, you'll immediately get what this game is going for, but the easiest way to describe it would be that to say that it's a Wario Land clone. But it's doing that with a really cool art style. It almost reminds you a little bit of what like Pizza Tower did this year. And this is me saying is somebody that didn't play Pizza Tower. I know nothing about it. Yeah, seeing gameplay footage where Pizza Tower is, you're going through these platforming levels and you're like blazing through and all this stuff, right? It has like this very exaggerated high energy art style. Anton Blast has a similar sort of thing, but it almost feels like it's even going more for like the Wario Land style gameplay. And it caught my eye just for the art style of it, right?

Like it brings me back to playing something on the Game Boy advanced, but even has like, I would say like a little bit more detail obviously because it's going to be on PC. But then also, yeah, like color to it, really cool, illustration to it. And it's one that I would say if you're a Warrior Land fan, keep an eye out for him. next one on my list is a game called Despolote Despolote this is one that's shown up before

it is a first person narrative game another one that has a really cool art style it's like shades of hue with this art style with like I think almost like a hand-drawn nature to it I watched somebody over their shoulder

play this game I couldn't get my hands on it because like every anytime I went back to the station somebody else is playing this game which made me jealous but also this one that I can't wait for because it takes, this is a game that takes place in Ecuador. The story that is trying to tell is basically the story of this community in Ecuador. During 2001, when, I forget if it's the World Cup is coming to Ecuador or if they're getting to participate in the World Cup.

But it's the story that's telling this community story around soccer and the community getting passionate about soccer. And it's a narrative game that has like first person soccer mechanics. And so like you're kicking around this soccer ball or you're doing all this fun stuff. And the way, like, I think for me, this one stuck out and this one hit because it reminds me of living in Nigeria for a couple years when I was a kid and like how important and how, how like all the kids that went to the born school that I went to were into soccer to the point where like we would make our own soccer games out of like rolling up balled up socks, right? Or we would play like one touch soccer with a fucking empty water bottle, right? like we were excited to play soccer by any means necessary. And it was just part of the community, right? And like it seems like this is the kind of story that this game is aiming to tell.

And it has to be very excited for when this thing comes out because I really want to check it out. The final game that I want to talk about is this game called How Not to Get Hit by a Self-Driving Car. Now, this is one that is less of like a home game, right? It's more of like, I think it's like a traveling around events sort of thing. I don't know if this was like a game jam type situation or maybe there's training an actual AI car. I don't know. But basically this was set up outside in this like big area. They have a camera that is pointed toward this area where your goal as a player is to get to the button at the end of this like course.

And you have to get there without this AI recognizing you as human. So. So right now, if you're watching the video version, this is footage that was taken by Janet Garcia of me playing the game. And again, like, the percentage on the screen you see, like, it has a camera pointed towards you. And like, if the camera starts to detect you as human, it'll like bump up the percentage of like, oh, yeah, like this is a human. And if it goes all the way, then you lose. Right. But if you make it a button, hit the button, then you win.

And the fun thing about it is that it is tracking your movement to like remember it. And like if at the after you do it, there's an option to save your data that it just collected. So it can use that data to train the train itself to see if it can catch future people. Okay. So you can dime out other human beings. Exactly. And so like if you do this one way, it'll save it.

Right. And then like if somebody else in the future does it that way, they'll be like, oh no, that's a human. Like we've trained on that data. So I need to stop. Nobody's going to be break dancing here. We got to break this down. So it ends with you break dancing.

Yes. What does it really start with you doing? I do, I'm not human. I'm crap. Have you seen, so I was doing like the featureama, um,

Zydeburg, like crap thing. And I was like, oh, maybe if I act like Zoidberg, you won't detect me. And then it started to detect me.

And I was like, okay, backup plan. Back a plan. I need a break dance. And so I go down and I fucking start. And I break. And guess what?

It couldn't tell that my breakdance and it was human. It was like, oh, this can't be a human. This is otherworldly. This moves are out of this world. And so it was able to detect me.

Barrett, I sent to assets, Andrew Renee on Instagram, put up a post about her trying to do it too. And she put up, I think, just stills, I forget. And I haven't looked at it

since I sent it to you. But it was that thing of like, I didn't like, scrolling through my feed last night, I think. And I was like, what? And I just like,

I don't have time. I don't know what. I don't know why. I'm not going to get to the bottom of this mystery. Yeah, but that was, it was a hit. Like everybody,

like everybody, like everybody that I saw there was like, yo, you've done the AI thing yet. And we're like, oh, no, it's like, oh, we got to go do this. And so I was there, I was down there with like a group of people. It was me, Janet, Michael Heim and like a group of the other folks. And like, we're all in a line to do it.

And we're all fucking excited to do this. So yeah, Andrew and I had the same idea of like the- Andrews, he's captioned it. At the day of the devs of the Game Awards event, I used all my toddler mom playtime skills to trick a self-driving computer AI and thinking I wasn't a human pedestrian. On my first try, I do not recommend trying this in actual streets with cars. Oh, yeah. So, yeah, I think the thing that I left out, right, is that like,

the thing is emulating. an AI car. And so the idea is like you're crossing a crosswalk and you're trying to get hit by a car. And if you get hit, then you win. If you don't, then it detected that you're human and you lose. So utterly amazing. We need we got to get in the studio. We got to do it in here somehow. Because I got to see what everybody here does. Someone's going to get hurt. Mike's going to blow a hammy. God. Well, thank you all for hanging out with us this year on the kind of funny games cast. We will return next year starting off with our game of the year. episode. I'm very, very, very excited for that. A lot of work's been put into it. Can't wait for you

all to see it. The 10th. Get ready. Get hyped. Until next time, I love you all. Goodbye.