Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - Biomutant & Knockout City Reviews - Kinda Funny Gamescast Ep. 75

Episode Date: May 26, 2021

SnowBikeMike joins us to review Biomutant and Knockout City. Time Stamps - 00:00:00 - Start 00:02:40 - Sonic Predictions 00:05:45 - Horizon Forbidden West 00:16:15 - Biomutant 00:46:18 - Ads 00:51:58 - Greg’s Poll 00:54:33 - Knockout City Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome back to the Kind of Funny Games cast. As always, I'm Tim Geddes, joined by one of the coolest dudes in video games, Greg Miller. Don't tell my wife, but I have so far eaten four cookies today and I'm ready for this podcast and I got a little bit of coffee left over. The cookie monster with his little coffee. Of course, we have the nitro rifle, Andy Cortez. Ready to Mountain Dew, Rise and Grind right here. There it is. There it is. That's my gamer boy. Roll over. Let me scratch that belly. Come on.

We have the two face of video games blessing at a-oh-ye. I got my water. I'm ready to water and slaughter. Water and slaughter. Pour it on the ground, fill it with bourbon. Oh, my God. And of course, joining us is the Hightman himself, Snow Bike, Mike. Since everybody's else doing it, I'm refueling, rehydrating, and replenishing with Gatorade.

The only way you know how I appreciate that. There's no Gatorade in there. This is the kind of funny games cast. Every week we get together to talk about video games and all the things that we love about them. You can watch it on YouTube.com slash Kind of Funny Games or Roosterteeth.com. If you want to get it as a podcast, search your favorite podcast service for Kind of Funny Games cast and we'll be right there for you. If you want to get the show ad free, if you want to watch it live as it's being recorded, if you want the exclusive post show, Patreon.com slash Kind of Funny Games is where you want to go. Just like our Patreon producers, Omega Buster, Tyler Ross, Delany, Twiland.

joining Julian the gluten-free gamer, James Hastings, Casey Andrew, Elliot, and Tom Bach have all done. We appreciate all of you so very, very much. Today we're brought to you by ExpressVPN, Credit Karma Money, and Dr. Squatch. But I'll tell you all about that later. Boys, it's crazy.

I feel like we're at the dawn of video games at this point. We are weeks away from E3. Games are starting to come out left and right. We're getting all the nice little like the double A and less out of the way here before the 2. AAA monsoon torrential downpour begins.

It's a monsoon. Do you ever think of that when Robin Williams says that in Jumanji? Good movie. That reminds me of that scene where it's just like a little water never hurt anybody

and he's like yeah, but a lot could kill you. Yeah. I was like, holy shit. Water's never been more scary than this. But bless,

we are days away from as of recording this today, we know that on Thursday there will be a Sonic the Hedgehog press conference thing of some sort. I want to hear your final predictions going into it. What do you think we're getting?

I think we're going to get the announcement of Sonic colors coming to probably switch, I imagine, because there was that leaked thing that we got earlier on. I hope we get a new big Sonic game announcement. I would want it to be a 3D Sonic, but like a good 3D Sonic. And like if we're doing like the Gatorade get hype moments right, like I think a GetHip 1 would be Sonic Adventure 3. I would be insane. That would be insane, and I think part of them might do it, right? Like, when you think about what's a good next move for Sonic, you know, after coming off of a bunch of, a bunch of games that seem like they're trying to start something new, right?

Like, Sonic Boom. Sonic the Lost Worlds. Sonic Forces. Like, all of these different things didn't hit. Sonic Adventure 3 would be the thing that I think would get people excited in a way for Sonic again. Either that or a Sonic Mania 2, which would be like the dopest thing, but also I'm just not hopeful that that's. in the slate. But I'll be excited if that was.

Like that would be the most type announcement. But my prediction is that we would get a tease. We'll get a tease at a new 3D Sonic. And then also Sonic colors and maybe some other Sonic games are coming to switch and other platforms. Do you think we see a teaser or trailer for Sonic the Hedgehog the movie too? No. I don't know if this is the right place for it.

Really? Yeah. No. Like, do you reveal a new movie trailer at like just a random? We show a scene. Yeah. show a teaser. Schwarzenham

or eating ice cream like, this ice cream's great. And then Knuckles is like, is it? I have a carrot. Like, oh, no. We'll see you in theaters. 2021.

We're back. Tim, what do you think? Aside from even like movie stuff, what game stuff are you expecting also? I think we'll get a tease of the movie of some sort. It might not be substantial. It might just be, you know,

some CG something or other. But I think we'll see that. I think the Sonic Colors thing is fairly an easy bet. Might get hype. dream would be Sonic Mania 2 but I'm definitely not expecting that but I think Sonic Adventure 3 would be the most overall exciting moment

of holy crap they're actually doing it but Andy what do you call me? Like here's the one thing that piss me off about Discord dude when you right click on somebody's face to like raise or lower the volume that menu doesn't go away unless you click somewhere else so I click off of it and click

into blessings thing and somehow start calling in a private chat you're like let's take this to a private room the funny thing is like the cat got Andy going if you're watching it right you like you saw Andy leave and then you probably saw my face go like what the fuck because I saw Andy's I saw the thing go Andy's calling you right now and part of me was like do I answer do I answer the call it's like he has something to say and he's like

there are Andy in the call isn't me don't answer it Moving on from Sonic a little bit to Bless and Greg, you guys didn't get the time to do a PSI love you after the announcement of this state of play situation. What are you guys expecting for what we're getting on Thursday with the Horizon State of Play? Blessing.

I mean, obviously, we're going to get gameplay finally. I think that's the big thing we've been waiting for for a long time. I think the big question is, do we finally get a date? Do they actually put a stamp on it? Do they give us a month? Do they continue to double down? on 2021. And I'm scared to make the prediction because them doing the state of play makes me think,

yeah, they're going to double down. They're going to say summer or fall 2021. But another part of me is like, don't hope, just let it happen. You know, don't hope. Just wait for it, see what they say and get hype after. Greg, where are you at? Yeah, it's a similar place where, you know, of course, we did one of those classic PSI Love UXOXO things on Monday afternoon, right, where we talked at length about the next

seven years of PlayStation 5. But also, yeah, you know, is Deathloop the big game for PlayStation? Is it the big exclusive for the fall? And it was that question of, well, it's this or Horizon, but is Horizon really coming out this year? And it was this whole idea of like, well, you're on this run up to Ratchet and Clank. So clearly let Ratchet and Clank speak until it's out, then start talking about it. I thought there'd be a state of play maybe end of June July coming out to talk about this. But putting it here, like, yeah, we're going to see it.

We're going to get to start knowing more about this game. And I would, the fact they're putting it here and talking about it makes me think they are going to confirm that yeah it is still this year and they are still coming this way and there was a great you know there was a couple great different questions uh on games daily today laying it really out of like you know how you know we look at uh last of us and ghost last year for playstation and how those state of plays you know just gave it the windows between all right cool like here's where the game's going to come a few months later a few weeks later a few months later uh and like there there was a writer dan who wrote in who was putting that all on the board here

trying to say that you know this he makes it think that horizon's coming sooner than we think it is because I think we all keep jumping to fall fall but what if it was a July is this guy was trying to pay what if it is in August what if it is early September which I think are all pretty likely but it'll it's either going to be I think they say nothing about the release date in the state of play or they will I think announce that it's coming further I can see I can see any permutation of this where it is they don't say anything about release date and you know then there's some blog post that still mentions 2021 I can see at them actually you know saying 2022 like hey this is where we're at

and the game looks great but we do need more time to cook on it yet to show you something to get you excited for it but then also be like we're going for spring next year but any of that is it's just all over the place I don't know I don't know what they if they gave us a date in July or August does that do anything for you in terms of God of War

do you think that means that God of War may come out sooner than we think no God of War is not this year at all I nothing changed that because I would say there's no way Horizon Horizon Forbidden West comes out in July But if they prove me wrong, who knows what fucking drug they're doing over there. It won't be July. It won't be July.

Shift everything back six months to a year. If they're going to do it this year, it's going to be September. And if they're not going to do September, it will be next year. I feel September is the right horizon time that they'd be aiming for. And I feel like we're going to get that date this week because of the timing of all this. And I know that what the whole industry is doing at once doesn't necessarily mean that the other people need to listen. And release dates are kind of set to a certain extent with best intentions from the developers and publishers. And what other people do doesn't necessarily affect them.

But I do think Sony planting their foot down on a date with Horizon this like early before E3, at least gives them everyone else some time to maneuver their dates if that they were to not want to be trampled by Horizon. You know what I mean? So I think that like that, if September was their goal, I think July and August might be a little too soon for it. but I wouldn't be surprised with the September date, the fact that they're showing 15 minutes of gameplay at this thing. Yeah. The sooner that you get it out,

the more you get to avoid Zelda rough for the while too is a big thing, right? Because that game's over their horizon too, no pun intended. That game is going to come out, right? And it could be this while, it could be next year. And both of them are, like, it seems like both of them are kind of waiting to, you know, state there. This is when we're coming out, obviously because they're being worked on.

And they probably don't even know. but that is a reality that could have come to fruition that those games come out in the same month again. Also, like, you know, we're getting 15 minutes of gameplay. We saw, what was it, 30 minutes to an hour of CyroPunk 27 and 2018. So, like, I do feel like this gameplay, Tim, is definitely more trustworthy, right, of that this is just some super polished vertical slice of the video game.

But, yeah, when it comes to, like, yeah, they're showing his gameplay, I don't really take that as a sign that it's coming sooner than maybe later. And the other thing to take away from it, too, is remember when last of us had its state of play, last of us part two. State of play, here's a release date. And then what was it? Like a week and a half later, they pushed it? Yeah, just got even them coming out and doing this.

And it could be what you're saying, right? Of like, let's get ahead of E3. Let's kind of own the conversation with not only ratchet dropping right at E3, but what people will be looking forward and getting to all these conversations about what's happening for the rest of the year. And then after E3 in July, push it. You know what I mean? I can easily see that too. What I want to know is what...

I'm still convinced that God of War, Ragnarok is not going to be a full game. I'm still convinced it's going to be more of a Miles Morales or Lost Legacy type situation. I feel like you would have said that by now. I mean, where would they have said it? Yeah, they haven't said anything about it, right? That's the thing. Like, I feel like you would have followed up with a blog post or something that... A lot of it posted on YouTube about it.

If you return and come out and now say that it is like, hey, this is a skilled back God of War instead of it being like however long God of War, 25 hours, it's going to be a 8 to 10 hours. experience, I feel like you are, unless it is coming out this year. That's what I'm saying, though. If it's coming out this year, then maybe that's a thing that people understand more. But if it's not, then it's like, oh, man. Again, my argument against that is that the whole buildup for the ending of the God of War

2018 is all about leading into Ragnarok, which tells us that like that's like the sequel that they want to to be about. For God of War Ragnarok to be more of a Miles Morales, just doesn't make sense to me for like a God of War, quote unquote, two to kind of. after that. Like, they're building up to Raggers. Especially hyping it up that much. Yeah, exactly.

Like, it doesn't make sense for it to be a Miles Morales level game where Miles Morales wasn't the full sequel. It's not like Miles followed up on like the post-credit stuff in, uh, Spider-Man one and stuff like that. So it's just like, Tim, if you're right, I'll go to your house and watch a movie with you. Oh, shit. I mean, it's a lot.

I'll drive too. I won't open it here. Whoa. No shit. See, what I want to know regarding Horizon is, is there a unique game play? look like is this just hey here's more horizon zero dawn and it's beautiful and it's the the world you know and the mechanics you know or is there like is there a twist is there like it's going to be a doom or uncharted i think they're going to add either some sort of zip line cool do-hicky thing you know like

you know you know you go from doom to doom eternal they add um oh gosh what did it what did they add do me to doom eternal platforming right yeah a lot more the platforming type stuff and then when we go to Uncharted, we add the rope or whatever, and that's sort of a big addition, and that changes the way the game is played. I think they add some sort of traversal mechanic. I don't know what. Maybe, how about a jetpack? You get a cool jetpack.

Oh, my God. Greg, what do you get that? I mean, the big thing breaks off part of a machine and then straps it to her back. Yeah. For Horizon, it's something they already teased when they were doing it. I don't know how many people picked up on it or, like, had a real conversations, but somebody wrote into one of the shows about it of like they've already shown the swimming stuff, which is new, right?

So you figure you now open up the entire new biome, underwater of what kind of robot dinosaurs you're going to get and what's going to be down there you know megaladons the meggram but we don't be Jason Statham we got to find a cooler way to swim I don't want to be swimming slow mo like she was in that trailer I need like

a jetpack underwater type stuff we need to make that we need to make moving up there feel as good yeah dash and Perry down there down there down oh yeah I mean I mean I feel like this is this is an out there idea right but like what if there is

multiplayer? Like, what if there is, like, a co-op mechanic? Because that's the thing that's been talked about. I was a rumor for a long time. Yeah, and rumored. And then I think the rumors were were shut down. But coming off of Ghost or Seema and Ghostsetsima Legends and what they were able to do, right? Like, legends came out of nowhere. And what if it is like, hey, by the way, you can play co-op? You know, what if that's a thing? So, last question I have about this PlayStation thing for you guys. So they said 20 minutes for this. They also said that there's going to be a, like, multi-hour countdown. Starting a 9 a.m. A countdown you've never seen before.

Yeah, so that starts at 9 a.m. But then the actual thing starts at 2 p.m. And if they start 20 minutes and 15 minutes of it is Horizon, that leaves five minutes. Do we expect that just to be a, oh, hey, Ratchets come in. Here's an update on an indie game, maybe. Or is there a chance that we get a major announcement with this being potentially Sony Z3 placement? Finally, we get Haiti for the PS5. Everyone's puzzled.

Well, it's that thing of like them, yeah, during the state of play, we will debut the Horizon Forbidden West gameplay reveal. In this 20 minute exclusive segment, you'll be seeing about 14 minutes of brand new in-game action. See, for me, I read it as in this 20-minute exclusive segment, you'll be seeing 14 minutes of, I think it's going to be 20 minutes on Horizon Forbidden West. I think they're calling out the fact that there's a grand total

of 14 minutes of brand new in-game action. Maybe the rest of it is people at guerrilla just talking. Yeah, talking heads, well, you know, whatever explanations they're doing it and stuff like that. Cool. but I also don't think that it eliminates the chance that you could have something tacked on before after we get into Horizon let's talk you know

the disembod in our chat in our live chat which you can join by going to Patreon.com so that's kind of funny games brings up a good point of maybe a Zero Dawn like remaster like maybe like we get a little tidbit of like a update like a PS5 update or something like that. Oh yeah that's really good yeah this already came to PC right Horizon

yeah zero Don I can't it's that went from being a rumor for so long I can never keep up so yeah you can have a PlayStation 5 full on. Bels and whistles, everything happened. The port could use some work, though. Let me just throw that out there. Yeah? Just throw that out that little tidbit. Thank you. Thank you. I'm catching it. I'm catching. You're putting out there. No problem.

Speaking of the work, though, Snowbike Mike's been putting in the work in a game I like to call, and many other people like to call Biomuton. I have been putting in the work right there. I am 16 plus hours into Biomuton. I have beaten the story and moved on to New Game Plus. And I have full on. Gotcha. game. Oh yeah. It has it got me and I have a lot of thoughts and we're going to definitely break those down and talk about it

but the grand story of this is I started off slogging through the game and really hating it and probably at about hour three it really breaks open and allows you to go explore and do a lot of what the game wants you to do and that is when the open world

bug bit me and I just kind of hit the zone out button and just had fun running around and exploring this world. So I know a couple of you guys here joining me today have played it. And I can't wait to hear what your thoughts are. But I guess I'll give the quick rundown of it. Of course, this is Biomuton. We've been talking about this game for way too long. I played it back at E3, 2019. And it's cool to finally have it out from Experiment 101. People have been on social media saying that it was created by 20 people. So the team of 20 have put

a lot of work into this big open world game. It's set in a post-apocalyptic world. It's a third-person open world action RPG and uh there's a lot of systems in here there's a lot going on in this video game that i like that i love and that i don't like so you know i can go really in depth on it if you guys want you guys are feel free to ask me questions or tell me what your experiences were but uh sorry with this no like mike you say we've been talking about it for way too long i feel like biomuton is a game that it just came out of nowhere earlier last week maybe where people suddenly were talking about biomew. I don't remember.

What is biomew? What is the elevator pitch on this game? See, I think what caught people's eye, Greg, a long time ago, if you saw it back then, was that cute, almost rocket raccoon looking fury. I lost him. Do you hear him? I hear. Looking, uh, or yeah, I'm talking to you, Greg Miller.

I'm talking to you. You cut out completely on my end. I'm sorry. I think everybody cut out. I think a lot of people caught onto it back when they first saw it a long time ago because it did look like a rocket. raccoon, hack and slash type combo-based game. And I think a lot of people saw that and they were like,

ooh, that's eye-catching, right? I think that was what we talked about biomuton. It's eye-catching with a pretty good-looking open world. It has these creatures and main character where you're like, wow, like that's cool, that's different, almost like Horizon, right? When you first saw Horizon, you're like robot dinosaurs. Now you got me talking. This one has really cool mutated animals throughout this open world that caught people's eye.

And I think the big drop-off was knowing that it got pushed so long. And then, yeah, Greg, now, I mean, Tim asked it, what, two episodes, maybe three episodes ago on Gamescast of like, hey, this game is coming out. I was like, well, finally. And also, where did this come from? And I think it's just in that T.HQ Nordic, like, stable where it's like, okay, we've got a lot of games. Let's get these things out here eventually. And so it was their time. I think Greg was kind of confused of where it came from because this has been a game that's been at a lot of events, Greg.

like something that people have been demoing for three, four years now. It was that name that I can recognize the name. But like when you like I would have, it's just so generic at this point that I, before we're seeing it obviously now. But like I just, I had no like I remember biomuton at all when then all of a sudden everybody's talking about it coming up. I'm similar to where Mike is and what Mike's talking about in terms of it was, it was revealed.

I remember, I remember being super into the trailer being like, yo, I got to play this game. And then it was just stretched out so long that I had kind of lost hide for it to the point where a few weeks ago when we did that whole what's coming out over the next year games cast when we got to Bion I think both me and Mike were like, yeah, like is this for real even coming out? Because it just feels like it's been so long.

It's like it's just hard to believe. And it was to the point too where there was a different game, Mutant Year Zero, that had, it's kind of a similar style to it that I thought was Boundemian that came out. And so like that came out and I remember Bion being brought up again. And I was like, hey, did that, like, is that not out? Did it not come out?

but Mike mentioning THQ Nordic I feel like it's such a relevant thing when it comes to what this game is and how we talk about this game because THQ Nordic still I guess not relevant not relatively new anymore because they've been around for a while but it doesn't feel like they put out a bunch of releases Nordic

yeah like well is that thick Nordic THQ oh yeah yeah Thick Nordic yeah and so like this biome mutant for me when I started it I've only played like the first hour or so of it immediately struck me as a THQ game in the way that it's double A and weird and quirky and also low quality in a lot of ways. When I first started it, you are, you're, uh, presented with like the character screen where you make your character and you do all your

stats and all that stuff and you can create like a very unique little rodent thing. And that's what that's actually what I want to ask Mike about since you, you've beaten the game. What, like, what is your take on the character build system and how much that, that, that actually, that actually affects how you play. Like, when you build your character in the beginning of the game, did you end up really playing that build or did it end up being a thing

where it was like, oh, yeah, I can build my character in any way, but this didn't really matter as much. So on the character builder side, I got a lot of thoughts here, blessing, and I'll answer your question right off the bat of, yeah, it gives you about five,

and then there's also a pre-order race that you can get as well if you pre-order it that we did not have. But, like, it gives you five different races, we'll call it first, that really heavily impact what your character's strengths are, whether it be the telekineship abilities, whether it be dual wielding weapons, whether it be shooting guns, and then it also affects their look,

right? And so a lot of that plays a factor into what you choose look-wise for me. I noticed blessing at the end of the game, it did not matter what I chose there, right? No matter what you're going to be able to do abilities, no matter what class you pick, you're going to be able to hack and slash away. You're going to be able to use a gun. So it's not like that really is a big factor. So there's also resistance, which I noticed, like, it doesn't matter on the resistance. Enemies have small powers that are going to be in your resistant field.

But in all honestly, you're going to shake that off and just keep playing no matter what. I think it just comes down to the look for me, blessing. And so that was a big issue for me is four out of the five are just real mutated, ugly-looking rodents. And then one of them is as close as you can get to the cover arts, right? And I think that's where everybody wanted it was like, I want to be that cover art guy because he looks dope. there's only like a small chance that you will even make it close to that guy because after that you go into your class and then for those four classes they also change how big you are how small you are how lanky you are and it all mutates differently and i really was disappointed in the

character creator and i did not like any of that but at the end of the day no it didn't affect me at all if i picked the ranger as opposed to the telekinesis guy or if i picked the generic Commando, it all felt the same at the end. Yeah, I ended up restarting the game again because I didn't like what I had chose, what I had chosen initially. And what I noticed, like, I think it's a really cool creative way to have a character creator. Again, what Mike is saying is the character changes its look completely.

And when you think of, Greg, you know, like in Madden or NBA 2K, where they have the circle with the five stats around it and like up, my. be scoring and the top right might be, you know, assist or whatever. Yeah, you can kind of move that, yeah, that Star Chart or whatever. And that's the way this works, where at the top is like health and then it's power, which is like your melee attacks and then maybe intellect for your magic abilities or whatever the hell. And you can kind of move this circle.

You can be a jack of all trades and kind of keep the circle in the middle. And your character will kind of look the way that it is after you choose a five races. Here it is. Look at that. Look at Bear with the B-roll. And then. but the more that you drag it towards one end or the other, the character,

maybe if you move it towards intellect, the higher into, like the head will grow a lot bigger and your body will shrink. And it's really interesting. Like, these are all the races right there. And again, the only one that I liked that I thought was cute enough

was an intellect build. I didn't go for it because I was like, well, I don't want to be a magic guy. I want to be a melee type player. And then I was like, you know what? After a couple hours,

this shit doesn't matter. I'm going to restart. I want to be cute. So I did restart and I went for the cuter of the race that does have a high intellect. And like Blessing was asking, I don't think it really matters a whole lot. You get a couple of extra bonus points, but it isn't the end-all be-all that your character is going to suck at melee. No, you can just level that up anyway and it won't matter. But character creator are pretty robust, I would say, when it comes to not only the overall shape of the enemy,

but then you can change the color of there's all sorts of different. Like maybe you have like a white mark on your face and you can change that to a blue mark. But then you could move the slider and there'll be two black marks on your face and you can change it. Like there's a lot of different options in variety. And I think that's super badass. But yeah, like Michael was mentioning, you do get into the gameplay and you realize, ah, this should doesn't really matter. I should have just made the dude how I wanted them to look. And then you just level up anyway.

And then who cares what your starter class is? Because you're probably going to change it midway through when you find better. weapons and modify a bunch of weapons and guns and armor and things of that nature. Yeah. And you're also going to wear full gear the whole time. So don't be afraid to like put on any color you want or mismatch the guy. Like you're going to wear so much gear over him. It's like any RPG you play.

Yeah. When you play Elder Scrolls, how much do you really see your character? Very, very lightly. There's never a scene where you actually like see his face that much either. There's not much cut scenes with his face in it. So in all honesty, like you're going to wear gear over your guy. so you don't have to go crazy because I remember I made mine yellow and blue

and immediately an hour in I was like damn I shouldn't have made him yellow and blue but I was committed anyways You're making your guy look cool for about 45 minutes of gameplay I'm about 10 hours in I think I've given up on it I think it does combat really well at first I was very iffy on the combat

I thought it felt a little too floaty but once you get into the rhythm of it and the perry mechanic I love obviously got a good dash mechanic A good dash. It's got to have that dash for you. You can combo together gunshots and then melee. I started off with a dual-wield mic with the dual-wield daggers.

And then immediately you find a cooler weapon and you're no longer dual-wielding. You're one-arming, or two-handing a bigger weapon for slower attacks. This game does so many different things. And I think it does them all kind of above average. And some of them not so great. I think everybody's score so far, Tim, of like six and a half to seven. is perfect because this game does like a lot and I think it's a little too overly ambitious and I wish they cut down like 30% of the systems they're trying to implement and really focus on maybe just combat and maybe just the the weapon modification because that stuff is really cool and robust and it feels you know meaningful but Mike how do you feel about the upgrade system because when I keep leveling up and unlock the little dog tag like upgrade points or whatever I look at all the skills to unlock and all of them all the moves that you want to unlock are already unlocked yeah and

there was there wasn't a whole lot to to unlock from there on out and if i say unlock one more time jesus christ but yeah how do you feel about the way the upgrading works because i thought it was like wait what am i actually trying to upgrade most like 80% of this is already done yeah so i agree with that i actually the upgrade system was kind of blest right because when you look at it you start off with what are you going to put the extra 10 points in your stats, strength, health, you know, charisma or whatever. And you just move past that. And then when you go to the dog tags part, like you talked about, you'll go down each

weapon and there's two upgrades for each of them, right? One combo, another combo with reins. And then vice versa every single time. And so once you level up and max out each one of the weapons you actually use, then you get into the general, Andy. And, like, the only things after that is, like, upgrade your charisma for easier bartering or upgrade your movement speed, upgrade the ability to, to get more loot. And so it felt kind of pointless on that. But after that, you get into the next set,

which is your good and bad choices and the powers that you get from that. And you also get the radiation powers. So that's where I thought it really shined because now you get to look at these cool powers that you can play on. And I regret because what I chose was all good play through. And you get points. But like the biggest one was 16 points. And I didn't unlock that until about 12 hours in. and so I held on to these points where I could have spent them at four, six, and eight, and had these cool telekinetic powers that I wish I could have shown off like the freeze and or the bubble. And I waited till the end to get the lightning bolts and the lightning bolts were totally lackluster.

And it really soured my mood because I waited so long to get the cool, you know, side powers is what they call them. And I never used any of them the whole game until the end. And so I really encourage people like, when you get those radiation buffs, spend them on the small ones, right? Don't go for the turtle fell at 16. Spend them on the small ones because you get to have an extra level to the combat, like Andy said, right?

You're going to be hacking and slashing. You're going to be shooting. You're going to parry and dodge. And then the next level to that is adding in these cool abilities that if you're somebody like me who waited till the best stuff at the end, you're going to miss out on the fun because you could bubble up. You can put little mushrooms down that send people flying or yourself flying. You can jump up and over things.

And it was like, man, I really missed out on having fun with that extra layer of combat. And that's all through the upgrade system. Now you've got to keep an eye on. So what about it was fun then? Because you're talking about like you missed out on the fun there. Like what made you play all the way through it and then turn the corner and then want to do new new game plus? Because yeah, it seems like what Metacritic 68 on it right now?

Yeah, yep. So I think what it really comes down to and we'll have the discussion at the very end of it was this hit that open world just kind of zone out gameplay for me. right? And what it was as well is, the world is beautiful. And the creatures are very cool, right? And the creatures show up periodically. But every now and then you'll be riding your mount through this cool looking world, whether it be in the red rocks, whether it be in a swamp, whether it be up in the frozen zone, and you'll turn a corner. And all of a sudden, this big enemy will jump out. And each one of is so unique and different looking, right? You'll fight a giant rat or you'll fight this giant cat that's dressed as a bumblebee. There's this weird alligator thing out there. You ain't no bumblebee.

And I'm telling you, every single time you came by those, you're like, wow, these are really cool and different looking. I think that's kind of the hook of the game. It's like, hey, look at this weird, like mutated animal, and that's what you're fighting. Of course, when you really roll it back, there's four big bosses called the World Eaters. And those are currently eating the roots of the living tree that you're protecting the world tree. And so you have four big bosses similar to a breath of the wild situation where you've got to go find them and kill them. And then on top of that, you also have an arch rival. And so there's so much going on of, go over to the kill this world eater.

Let's rinse and repeat the missions, right? You got to get this transport vehicle that will take you to the world eater. But before that, you got to get it gas. And then after that, you got to get a distraction animals. And the only way to distract it is these little tiny creatures that you catch. Oh, you did all that? Okay, now you can go over there and fight them. And so each world eater is actually unique and pretty cool.

They're very similar fight style, very similar. of settings where you fight them, but each one was very cool. The first one's super electric. The next one you fight out there is in the middle of a mountain range. The third one is underwater. So those are cool and I liked that. And also man, there's so much going on here, guys.

I can tell you, there's a lot going on. Because not on top of that, there's still the tribe system that we didn't even get into. There's six warring tribes that you have to bring together or destroy. And so you choose right off the bat, the good side or the bad side. And what happened to me was, is you took down

two of the warring tribes out of the five or six that there are. And actually they came to me and was like, hey, here's the deal. The other tribes see that. And they're really pleased that you brought us all together. Would you like to bring them all together now? Or would you like to continue your conquest and battle them? And I chose, in my mind, wrong. Because I chose, yeah, bring them all together, which means all of those missions,

all of that is just completely gone. It's done. You've united them all. So that means every single time you do with three things, a lot of combat. And I didn't get the weapons, Andy. So each one of those tribes has a special weapon at the end of them, right? And so because I didn't fight their tribe leader, I didn't get their weapon at the end, which I was really mad about because some guy had num chucks out there that I can get the try or play as.

So that was a big downfall. But you'll see in a lot of reviews, the word rinse and repeat, the same thing repeated over and over again. That's what these missions are. And there's not really a fun way to go about it, right? Like you think of the different ones that use outposts like Far Cry, right? where it's like, hey, you got to take down this outpost, but do it however you want, Greg, right? You can go shoot out a bear and let him come into the cage.

You can let the whole place on fire. You can stealth snipe. You can drive in with the car and kill everybody. On these, you have to go through this very linear mission, right? You're the butt on the front door. You fight the first guards, the second guards. You get to the final champion. And every single one is like that.

So there's not really much freedom in this giant open world game to create your own narrative and create your own story. So it just feels repetitive. over and over again. And that's where I got into like, you zone out, right? This is one of those games. You get lost in the world and you just go from one side quest to the next side quest. Go do this.

Go do that. And they have cool little moments, but I mean, it's going to be very repetitive for most. And that's how a lot of these. When it came to the tribes, I was like, oh, I'm going to infiltrate this one area, right? Because they won't let me go through the front door. I'm going to find a way to sneak in. And there was a hole in the geometry of this big base, this big encampment. and I found like a way to kind of jump up on this roof and kind of get and I jumped in

boop cuts me out throws me out to the beginning of it like they kicked me out as if I was like oh so you're not going to let me do this okay I have to go like the boring route very specific way right every time yeah like I wanted I wanted to infiltrate from you know within and try to take everybody out so that was kind of a bummer a couple of other bummers I immediately muted the narrator good Lord that's that's the promo if like if this is a game that you are going to want to get into, mute that fucker because it's... Mute the narrator. And I don't think he's bad.

It's the way it's implemented. The way everything works, I wish everything just worked like Hollow Night, where the animals, if you're not going to have fully voice acting, full voice acting, you're going to give all the animals this sort of gibberish. You walk up and they're like, bing, blym, don't bing, don't do it. And that's fine. Just give me subtitles. But the way it happens is you walk into an animal, they talk in their gibberish for about a second and a half to two seconds. and then the narrator pops in

she says that so-and-so is but coming for you blah blah blah what you might want to do and I'm just like I got a mute you do it feels very like storybooky in a weird way and it just like it does it also

it's way too much yeah and it also I don't think fits the tone of the like I I agree like I don't the direction they gave him he did a great job but like I don't think it fits with the tone of the rest of the game

so I just I like an experiencing it where it's just like the game is just translating through subtitles to when they're doing their cute little noises. I think the biggest problem with it is that, again, this game has a lot of stuff going on in it. And the narrator has to explain all of these systems. And when your game has this many things happening in it, the narrator is just, he never shuts the fuck up.

Like, he's just always going because when there's always. Much stuff in this game. There's always a new thing to explain to the player. And it does sort of, you know, make you kind of overwhelmed because, God damn, how am I going to remember? I'm catching these fucking critters now. What do they do? There's so many things happening in this game, and I wish they just focused on the combat

and the open-worldness of it, I think, is fine. I enjoy that loop of taking out enemies, taken out of NPCs, going to enemy encampments, but making it, you know, just make it a little bit more interesting. The thing that really bummed me out was fighting the first boss, Mike, where you can't enter certain enemies down below because it might be,

be too cold and you'll suffer from hypoxia damage. And in order to survive down there, you get in a big sort of mech robot that you kind of walk around in. And that's how you traverse from in those sort of, it's either it's too cold down there or it's radiated or whatever. Either way, your robot will protect you. The thing that sucks, though, is that I finally traverse through all that in my mech suit. And it's definitely not as fun moving or fighting in that.

thing as it is just fighting as your character. Like you're not doing crazy cool combos, you're kind of just shooting the cannon guns and you're jumping and melee attacking. So that makes the combat and traversal immediately less interesting as it would be if you were just your character. But then I arrive at the

world boss, the world either of the first one, and I have to fight him in the mecsuit. And it is the most least interesting fight I've ever had in my life. The most least that's a, you know, doesn't work that way, Greg. Doesn't work that way. It was fine. Just go, just power through your podcast. shooting the motherfucker with this mex suit

and it's not fun and I want it to be more interesting and then at the very end he eats you and you're inside of him and you got to kind of like slash at his heart and then he dies and it was like fuck that was so lame

like I really wanted to just be my character I don't want to be this stupid robot anymore and maybe I could have gotten out of this dude and he doesn't want to be in the mex suit this is a it's unbelievable Tim it's unbelievable I got bad news for you Andy because the next three ones, you're going to be on top of a different kind of suit every single time. Oof.

And that's what I'm saying. The second one, you ride a horse. The third one you're in a submarine. The fourth one, I forget. But you will not leave that kind of fight. It's frustrating because, like, why are, am I harping on, you know, how I play the game with combat normally? Why am I concentrating on that so much? Why am I learning how to do combos?

Why am I unlocking sigh powers and these cool abilities if the world boss fights? are just going to be getting the fucking robot and do the gimmicky thing. And so that's pretty disappointing. Yeah, I think this game, again, just lower down the scope. We need to, let's tighten this shit up. And we could have something really, really good here, I think.

The one question I have is when we first saw the game, I think all of us were excited by the character design and just like how cute and cool it looked at the same time. Yeah. And, you know, you guys talk about it, create a character. You're kind of limited and really only one of the options gets you how you want to look. What about the supporting cast?

And, you know, Andy, we're doing Pixar and review right now. And, like, the cast of characters is, like, the most important thing about those movies to give it the charm. And this looks like it has that charm. Does the rest of the cast kind of back that up? I don't think so. Oh, okay. I don't think so far. I mean, they just, they talk in gibberish.

And I'm just annoyed by reading the subtitles that are what the narrator is saying, but he's muted. so the subtitles are never what the character is saying and they don't pop up immediately and so I'm just kind of annoyed with everybody honestly like it's almost like this there's you feel a lack of personality because it's not like you're getting like the dialogue directly from them and like drawing out

like how each of them act you're getting it from a different perspective of a voice who doesn't belong in this world so it's a very weird disconnect with like how character and plot is being delivered to you it's yeah Yeah, like in Hollow Night, it's gibberish, but I'm reading what they're saying. And some of it's funny.

Sometimes it's really neat, and you're getting this cool backstory and maybe the type of warrior that they are in this universe. But in this, yeah, the subtitle is, you're reading word for word. They think that you are a danger to them. And that's like you're reading it as the narrator. You're not getting what they're saying directly to you. So, I mean, I think the characters look unique and cool. And there may have been a really good chance to have those personalities. but other than just kind of talking

in different voices like that's all it is. It's adorable when they do it. There's one that I think was like literally spoken kind of like Elvitt and like you have like a little flashback to when you're a little

and like there's this like rocker dude and he like talks like that and it's like a little cute things like that but yeah I totally agree with Andy of like just Oh he's out of date. He's that guy out of date. Yeah. That's it.

Yeah. The real games are crazy. He's like really young. Yeah. When you don't play them, you haven't seen it. You hear people talk about it. And you're just like, where the fuck did Elvis get involved? Yeah.

Yeah. He's like one of the animals that you're like raised with. He's got like a rockabilly vibe. Yeah, he's got a rockabilly vibes. And he like, that's like his little like jibirous stuff like goes to the tune of like rockabilly stuff, which is little things like that are every once in a while kind of funny. A similar question from the chat.

Madeline was asking about how's the story is an. interesting. I'll start off if we want to move over to here. It's just that while I think the world is really like unique and interesting, I think the actual plot and story is very Breath of the Wild, Ray and the Last Dragon kind of set up and plot that we've seen kind of over and over again. And I don't know if, if y'all agree on that or what. Yeah, it's, it's not, it's, it's, it isn't driving me to keep playing. I wanted to keep playing just because of the comments. combat and I had fun playing it. Uh-oh, there goes Mike. His internet may have shut on. Who's Mike fucking calling now? Why are they getting another call? It's Mike's, Mike may have, uh, whenever Mike exits a war zone match, sometimes the internet

cuts out, and maybe this is a new thing. Maybe things that he's playing a war zone. I don't know if you guys realize this. Mike's been frozen for a while. I haven't stared at him. He just had the same expression. And I was like, hmm, he seems like he's had the same reaction to a lot of these statements than I realized.

Gotcha. Gotcha. Um, yeah, I don't know, Baird, I think it's, I don't think it's anything awful, right? I think it's a decent story that is good enough for this world, right? It doesn't need to be anything wild. It's, there's a tree of life, and these world eaters are trying to get to it, and you got to do the thing, do the thing.

Yeah, whatever. It's nothing, like, super, I wouldn't say it's straight up bad, but it's just, it's nothing, like, super inspired and, like, other similar stories that have, like, similar plot set up, uh, and, uh, just a narrative, I think have done it, uh, a little better. And so, yeah, it's not, it's definitely, again, I just wish they implemented the narrative better. I wish they found a better way to tell this story as opposed to this narrator, which I want the,

I wish the game was a bit more obtuse in a way. Have you all heard of this game called Hyperlight Drifter? Oh my God! Hyperlight Drifter has a, I mean, it's just, it's just a special feeling world. And you don't get a whole lot of hints as to what happening, but you might talk to people and they may tell you stuff. I wish it was more along that vibe

as opposed to take five steps and this is the world of blah blah blah blah he's not going to want to see that and actually it's an English guy this is the world of blah blah blah blah do that voice Greg Oi governor

Oi governor this is the world of blah blah blah Yeah that's exactly what it is Anyway kind of disappointing Yeah does it sound like a good game It's not a bad game though That's the thing it's like It's one of those things where you are

frustrated that it could be great. You can see what could, yeah, you can see the great. The game is gorgeous. I think exploring is fun. You find a lot of sort of broken down, ruined neighborhoods or landscapes that you go and you find cool loot. And that loot, you can then, you know, you might find a cool helmet or whatever. But then you have that add-on that makes that helmet more powerful because it gives you

more armor. And you see all these little add-ons happening. in real time and you see these modifications happening and it's dope like customizing guns is really really cool you might have like a blade that is electric and you can add a better handle

to it if you found maybe the handle to a katana but maybe that katana handle isn't as powerful as that one hammer handle that you found earlier so you add that on and it all just adds up and I think the modification stuff is super deep and really good

honestly but it's it I think it's just the the story and the characters and a lot of things like that are just kind of holding me back I don't I don't want to be writing in this machine and then fighting bosses in the in that machine I want to traverses myself fast travel's great they let you find a lot of fast travel spots you find posts and you piss on it you take a little pee pee and you actually PESP

you do see a splash of yellow urine fall on the ground and that's like you're marking that and you can then fast travel to all these spots and it's great and it's convenient and we love when games make stuff convenient like that but yeah it's just uh it's just missing well no it's not missing anything it just has too much it's it's missing executing on many of the things yeah before we keep talking though let me tell you about our sponsors this episode is brought to you by dr squatch real talk the soap or body wash you're using it's no good okay it's packed with harsh chemicals, synthetic detergions, and it's brutal on your skin. If you're ready to stop your

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you know, I'd rather play a game where a small dev studio does too many things rather than like a boring, bloated AAA game. And I agree with that to an extent, but I'd rather, like, again, I just think it's too overly ambitious. Cut down some of the systems out of here and I think you'd have a really, really damn good 8 out of 10 as opposed to like a 6-ish, 6 out of 6 and a half. And even though this is an experimental kind of like indie small studio game, like it does in a lot of ways the different parts that come together feel like a bloated

triple a game in some aspects and it's uh yeah i i i agree with you on that aspect uh andy mute the narrator mute the narrator mute the narrator mute the fucking narrator oh my gosh but i the last thing i will say is like even though i'm definitely down on it like a lot of other reviewers i do think there will probably be a a very hardcore audience uh like this uh for this game kind of like a Immortals, Phoenix Rising, or I call that game one of the most generic games I've ever played, but a lot of people really love that game. I think a lot of people will like, like, reviewed better than this game. That's true. I think people will still like Biomeaton. I do think there's heart in it, too. Even with like how low I am on the game, I do think

there is heart there that we can, you can see in between the cracks of all the, all of the different things that are happening in this game. Mike, do you have any closing thoughts on this? Yeah, this is a solid 6-2-7. It's a good game. It has a lot going on. There's a lot of negatives, a lot of positives in it. And if you can catch this game on sale between the window of $20 to $40,

then I would recommend it. At $60 right now, and for what I just played, I would not recommend anybody checking that out. So if you can catch this game on sale and you're really interested in an open world with some really cool characters, pretty basic combat and skills things going on, pretty basic story as well, then I would get this,

but as of right now, it's skip it at full price. Before we move on to talk about Knockout City, Greg, you put up a tweet that I want to know the context of. Explain yourself. Today, as we record this, it is, of course, Tuesday, May 25th, 2021.

Today, I'm kind of funny games daily. We were talking about Sonic's 30th anniversary. the upcoming event that we were going. It was me and Gary Witte with number one Sonic fan, Blessing Eddie O'E Jr. there. And at some point, Blessing floated that, of course, Sonic is more popular than Zelda.

And I forget how we got there. Sonic the Hedgehog is a more popular IP than the legend of Zelda, which Gary Witta wanted to go to the mat and argue about. And I was like, no, what are you talking about? Sonic the Hedgehog is more popular. Like, I was there to back up Gary.

He was not in this alone in this battle. But it's a ridiculous. statement to say the legend. Yeah, but like you had never came down an actual good conclusion. Like, the thing that kept getting brought up was that like the Zelda games are better. And I'm like, yeah.

That's not what I'm arguing. Like, that's what Gary, but like, your argument was that like Sonic is more of a household name like Zelda isn't a household name. Like I just said not at all. You just said more of a household name indicating that yes, Zelda is a household name.

Yeah. I believe it is. But yeah, Sonic is more popular. It's the circular argument. And it's like, I'm making a very clear statement that Sonic is more popular than Zelda. Not that Zelda isn't popular. Not that Zelda isn't a household name. You're looking at me who I'm also a very big Zelda fan as a reminder.

I love Zelda. Sonic is more popular. As much as you hate Miles Morales. Breath of the wild, literally my favorite game of all time. Sonic is more popular. The Sonic cartoons make it more popular. The pole is a travesty. The pole is a travesty.

Right now, 69% of people are saying Legend to Zelda. Look, Barrett, the poll makes sense. You're trying to tell me that you think the question, what's the more popular IP? The answer is the legend of Zelda over Sonic the Headchalk? Yes. In absolutely no world. Sonic the Headchalk has had a cartoon for every generation since it came out.

There's been like six or seven of them that are popular. Here's what this discussion is. If they were popular, there wouldn't be seven of them. like they wouldn't have to keep rebooting it, you know? Yeah, just like Spider-Man. Just like the Spider-Man cartoons. We're doing the planets, what planet is more popular discussion. It's like, look, I don't give a fuck that Mercury has rivers of steel.

That's a cool fact. It's not a popular planet. Mars is a popular planet. That's what we're doing here. It's a household name. How many movies talk about Mars, you know? Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ.

Let's talk about Knockout City. Craig Miller, I want to take you up the bench. Go for it. Knock me out. Hold on. I got to tell my wife, I'm okay. I am okay. It was about Sonic.

It was Sonic the Hedgehog. No, you just got to put it. It was Sonic the Hedgehog. Jen's like, oh my God, what the fuck? Are you okay? You can't scream like that and then go quiet. Knockout City, ladies and gentlemen. What a fucking game.

Are you kidding here right now? You want to talk about something. Knockout City, of course, was a preview we sent the old snowbike mic to months and months and months ago. I remember listening to him, I talked to Gary and Paris about it on the Xcast, and it seemed like, okay, cool,

a dodge ball, third person, dodge ball game, whatever. And then, of course, it was announced that it was going to be on GamePass, and then, of course,

it was announced that it was going to be the, uh, knockout cities, brawl party, a house block party, where for the first, you know, whatever,

10 days, it was going to be completely free on all platforms that you play. Of course, this is cross progression. This is cross play. It seemed like, man,

EA who has all this money, obviously, throwing it around in the right ways of giving this game out for people to actually jump in. It wasn't in any way locked behind anything, no progress gating, nothing like that. And we jumped in on launch day and I have not been able to put it down since we started in. Like, it is so much fun.

It's just a great time I'm having out there. And it's all of us playing together. But it's also, you know, when it's not me, Barrett, Mike, blessing, Andy out there throwing some balls, as the kids say. Yeah. I am playing solo and I am jumping. jumping into things and I am running around and doing it and just having fun with it.

Blessing. Am I wrong? It's a terrible game. It's a really, really fun game. I'm surprised by how it's one of those ones where like over the weekend, over the last week, there were people tweeting about like,

oh, knockout city is so good. Oh man, I can't believe how much fun it was. And I'll read those and I'll go, sure. Uh-huh. We'll see about that. And I played it and I was like,

oh, no, this is actually like a really fun game. And the more I play it, the more fun I have with it. You know, Tim, described it to you earlier is like it feels like an EA sports big game it has that kind of energy to it where you know it's not about like it like it's not about the sport of it it's not about like it's

it's it's a dodgeball game but it's it's it's about fun at the end of the day right it's about having fun and they've really nailed down like the how to simplify it the most they can but then add just a bunch of fun elements onto it you know it has like the like the whole the whole bit of it's like you play in an open arena and you try to hit your opponents with balls you you just usually have two health bars. And so like if, yeah, like two health points, I should say. Two hearts. And then if you get hit twice, you get knocked out is the whole thing.

But with that, not only is the, are these stages littered with just regular dodge balls, but they're also special balls. And so you'll have the triple ball, which basically means that there's three balls and ones. Multi ball. Yeah, the multi ball. Yeah, the multi ball. Yeah, the multi ball. You know, fuck a bomb ball.

Dude, it's the worst thing in the game. They need to take it out. The bomb ball is the worst one. I'm also not a big fan of the cage ball. I get really annoyed when you get hit I love grief and people with the cage ball

like trapping them in and then throwing them off the map it's so fun Yeah there's moments too when you get them in the middle the map of the cage ball I'm like crap and I got to find another ball

or hit him into something yeah I mean I think blessing nails it of like what works for it is you know it's this you know multiplayer only game and you know

you can play one v one but you know multiplayer only and going out there with the team and it's so simple an idea that and I

like what I described what I've been described what I've been describing it as when I talk to people about it, right? It's like, it gives me, it reminds me a lot of calling all cars from PlayStation 3 where that was a game that when it dropped down PlayStation 3. It was one of the first multiplayer games that was around for PlayStation 3 that I was into. And I remember playing it and doing it and learning the maps and learning the points and learning the points and learning like where I wanted to take special things.

And at a glimpse, both this and Knockout City and Calling All Cars, right, but transitioning back to call it city, I think looks. so simple, get the ball, throw it into somebody, be done with it. But then it is about learning the meta of it. It is about, you know, getting into a, understanding how your mechanics work and how you feel in it of, you know, pegging somebody with the ball and then popping up in the air to get it back from them or, you know, checking somebody so you can run it, you can check them when they have the ball. They fly away. The ball goes straight up. So if you can jump up and then be aiming in the right spot, they peg them with it right away, you're on it. And even, you know,

after multiple nights and days of playing it. And again, having a great time with it and putting a lot of hours on it. You know, jumping in with Mike and Andy, what, two nights ago? And it was that thing where Mike had been playing all day too but with different people. And we got in there and it was all of a sudden

about calling passes and getting that extra bonus there. And then the fact that like, because as you volley the ball against other people, right? You throw it, they catch it, they throw it back at you. The intensity of the ball starts going up. And so as long as you don't get hit and you're following it back and forth, you're going to see the speed at which you throw

increase increase increase increase but with the pass there's a little thing of like okay cool if you pass you you jump a few levels meaning that people aren't expecting it when you throw it so if you're target there's a whole bunch of stuff to it that I think it looks to be that whole simple to get into difficult to master where you get in and there are so many different elements and so many

you can obviously throw straight on but then there is the curveball there is the overarching lob and stuff like that like you start really mixing in mechanics and styles that's where it starts getting really intense when you have these games and when it's clicking, when you are in that kind of game, and you're having that moment and just getting the dodge ball hitting somebody. It's so sad.

It's so satisfying, too, and it's funny because it mirrors the actual sound of a dodgeball hitting somebody, but in this game it gives you that feedback. Like, you just got to kill on Call of Duty, which is the craziest thing ever. And I think another thing this game does well, too, is the fact that it never feels unfair, at least for me playing. I've never felt how I felt when I jump into a game of Apex, and I immediately get killed in the first 20 seconds. And I'm like, damn it, man, they keep getting the best of me.

me. It being a standard of 3V3, there have been plenty of times where I've been by myself because my teammates just got Merked and so they're reviving or they're responding and it's me versus three people. And I still feel, even though I'm outnumbered, even though I'm probably going to get murked in that moment, I still feel like I have a chance and it is still fun going about that. Like it's still fun having that one V3 challenge and at least trying and sometimes getting the best of them and that is the most satisfying feeling. And I tweeted about this. the other day that I don't think we would be talking about this

if it launched like a lot of games launched where you're running into server issues games are getting canceled. Now granted it's not perfect right no not at all. We have had load times are a bit long and I think yeah it's it reminds me of something that is bare again to the calling O'Car's analogy where it's like there's

you're playing the game but then you come out and like there's only so many maps there needs to be more maps I think there needs to be more gear and differences there but it is just like menus in the way they deliver information i think it's kind of bland at times sorry i'd be back to you no it's all good yeah the i mean i think just the way that vallon and e3 velan how do you pronounce it um i think it's val i think just the way that the game is built and the way online full cross play and full cross progression works and it to feel this good where a lot of people are playing it because it's free right now and you i think you can play for at least two or three

more days or whatever it is with the block party um But the fact that it works so good and feels as good as it does with as many moving parts as there are. Again, the first day that we played, I'm on PC. Mike is on Xbox. Greg's on PS5. Nick was on PS5. Tomor Hussein was on PC as well. We're playing on all sorts of different platforms.

And it feels great and responsive. And you're not really running into a whole lot of hitching and things of that nature. Again, it's not perfect. I know some people, you know, when I mentioned that the other day, we're like, oh, I've had a game hitch on me before. Like, all right, cool. But we're talking like Outwriters type first week status. We're talking the fact that I can't even fucking play an NBA 2K game and not feel like I'm playing on a three, you know, second delay or whatever. This game feels fantastic.

And I just really want to shout that out and just like congratulate them because it's so hard to do that when you have this many eyes and this many users trying to get in at these moments. It's just kind of like the ideal launch where it seems to be running insanely smooth and it's so much fun. And again, the cross-progression stuff is fantastic because if I want to hop off from my PC and play on my console on TV, I can easily do that. And all of my gear will switch over. So just shout out to them for making this game work well. I just feel like every launch nowadays we're used to the bullshit. We're used to Greg wanting to play Division 2 on launch day. And there's always like, well, servers are down.

Let's switch over to something else. And that's just kind of like what we're used to nowadays. And the fact that it's pretty also. Exactly, I was going to say. I think that is such a one of the reasons there's a swell of goodwill. Because I think if it was that, hey, here's this game, buy it or whatever, a whole bunch of people could say if I, you know, if I wasn't getting it off of, because yeah, I downloaded it off for the free trial, I didn't get like review code early.

And so it was this idea of like if everybody was saying, oh man, I'm having a great time with Knockout City. Not everybody. But even if it wasn't on GamePats, I guess. Like if somebody's saying they're having a good time with Naga City I don't know if I would be motivated to actually put dollars down for it Because I'm like oh cool multiplayer game not really my thing I like dodgeball fine but I don't know Like this one does seem fun

It's the same idea I don't know that's the stupidest thing because I said that the game is really fun I forget where I was going I think I was spinning my wheels to get to the point that Yeah I'm with the argument that like even when we get fucking wrecked Like Barry and I had like two or three games back to back the other night where we were god mode Yeah We were just destroying people 10 to 1 And then the game was like, oh, okay, cool, here's the team

It's way better than you. And they kicked this shit out of us. And it was that thing of like, fuck. Like, back to what we're talking about, like, it's not, I'm not losing because of the game. It is very much like shit. I hit, you know, I hit the, the Perry button to grab the ball. I'm not reading things right.

Exactly. They're thinking 3D chess and I'm still thinking 2D. They're running as a squad, exactly. So I can block one of them, but I can't block them all. But it's never, like, I appreciate that. I like that. I want to get better at the game. I'm in, I'm taking something.

even from the losses. And I feel the game is, you know, being generous with XP on that level, too. Like once, I thought it took, they get to forever date to, like, level 10 of XP, but then once you cross that threshold,

all the contracts, which are like, you know, the dailies and stuff like that, they started really clocking into where, you know, I'm like, you're getting a thousand XP for, like, each contract and stuff.

Yeah. Yeah, it's around there where you start, like, really completing everything. And it's, yeah, I'm already at, like, level 30 or something like that. And,

well, we started playing this game on Friday. so yeah I've been putting so much time into it but yeah that like I tweeted out that same night Greg where it's like you know we had some matches where we're God mode and then some matches where we got our teeth knocked out and like I was never not having fun yeah I can't compliment enough to how much how involved the game is when you're playing it like I feel I feel like my brain is going at the same rate is going when I'm playing a fighting game when I'm playing the game where it is you know running around dodging around all right you has a ball okay there's an opponent there

they throw it immediately I throw it right back okay their opponents over there okay I got to kind of step. Like my brain is going a million miles per hour in a way that makes the game feel like it is like I am playing a fighting game. It's a dance. In the moment. Like I'm not going to have the adrenaline. It is a dance. And like that's the thing to talk about it, right? Of like, the fact that I think you are so involved with it and so in the moment of those times where I'm sprinting down at the end of me, you know, I got a lock on them.

I curved the ball around the wall and then dashed backwards because I just remember I ran past a ball, right? Or I go in there and the plane goes awry. And I remember there was a ball over there and I dash that or I try to dash into somebody. I try to get around a piece of cover so they can't hit me with the ball. Or I, you know, in the one with all the pipes, I run and try to get sucked up. get out of there before he's getting emotional he's getting emotional he's getting well I'm getting shocked up I get I get emotional too Greg that's a good Andy Andy a lot of what you're saying reminds me of how you used to talk about arms for that like

brief moment of time like how comparable is it to to arms in the sense of like always having to know your environment and all that stuff oh my gosh I mean this is so much better than wow okay than that yeah for sure I mean again I liked arms for maybe three or four days I think this is something that is going to stick with us in the way that Predator stuck with us for that amount of time where every once in a while there will be the squad up request in our Slack channel. I think it's such an easy thing to mention

whenever it comes to any games like this that aren't the heavy hitters that aren't Warzone or Fortnite or Apex. Whenever we talk about games like this, it's always, yeah, how long will this last? How long will we be playing for? That's such an easy thing to go for, for discussion. But I think this will be something that sticks around in a much more meaningful way than, you know, a crucible or... Like, I don't know if this is going to reach it, but I could see it possibly getting into Fall Guys potential in terms of, like, how fun it is.

And like, you know, like wanting to go back to it, being around friends being like, all right, we want to play something together. What's out there? Hey, dude, like, knockout city is still fun. Let's just jump into Knockout City because it has that same level. At the most fun I was having with Fall Guys, right now is the amount of fun I'm having with Knockout City. And you're not getting shit on by just, you're not getting headshot at every two seconds. It's not a, it's not like when everybody's into Valorant and then you start playing really good players. Like, I fucking hate this shit.

You know, like, you have the capability to catch that ball and to throw it right back at him and hit them and outsmart people. I think, you know, Blessing I already mentioned that, but just the ease of use or the ease of, of never feeling like you're out of a fight always, I think it's super important for players that aren't hardcore. How many times have we had those matches? Yeah, where it looks like it should, you know, they get up 8-5, they get up 8-4, they get up 9-4. You know what I mean?

Somehow you struggle back. And sometimes, yeah, you still lose, but we lose, you know, 10 to 8, where it was like, man, we were in that and you felt it. For me, with the longevity of it, I do wonder as well, not that that's a negativity, right, or a negative thing, because if you have a week with this game that, again, If you just played for the 10 days of block party, you had a great time.

You had a great time with a free game. I don't see that happening. But I do think it's interesting that I can see with us in particular and friend groups in particular that, okay, cool. You know, we've already moved on to other things we need to review. Or you at home are moving out of something that you want to play biomuton, so you put this down for a little bit. When you come back, maybe the world at large has gotten so good that you're like,

oh, man, I am getting my head kicked in every time. But I go back to that stream we did with it on Friday, right, during the charity thing, where it was instead of just, us as a team of three going out. It was six of us just playing each other and hot swapping between it and how much fun that was. That was the spectrum of some of us had been playing for hours that day and then we brought Nick in sight unseen and made him play it.

And he had fun at the same time. That was Kevin yesterday. Yeah, right? Does Kevin like it? Because I'm sick of him like, oh, let's play Fortnite instead. I'm like, no, no. Fuck I'm playing Knockout City. I think he's coming around to it.

But I could have sworn it was going to be his game. but I think he's still, because last night, the slack popped off and he was like, or we could play Fortnite. It was one of those things. I feel like I predicted that since like we got into it when he was away and he wasn't there for that initial thing. Like I knew, I was like, man, this does seem like a game he should be really into, but because he wasn't here, he's going to be like, man, let's play some Fortnite.

I will say, though, for anybody wondering, because there was some people saying, do you play on keyboard mouse on PC? I play keyboard mouse on PC and it feels fantastic. So if you're thinking you have to use a controller, I don't think you have to. I think it can be played on either, whatever you feel more comfortable with. But I got this sensitivity dialed up to a million

and I'm just whipping 360s. Because the thing is, Tim, like, you're running around, the borders of your screen turn red. If there's nobody in front of you, they're behind you. Yeah. Immediately just 180, look around. You hear the ball kind of coming on your way. Catch that shit.

Fucking whip it right back at him. If you whip it right back at him, it's even faster. Do the pump fake? Get him to go. The pump fake is the best. You are fucked, son. Yeah. I turned into a toxic gamer when I pull off the pump fake.

Like, I started saying words to my, like, I'm not on my phone. I started saying words to myself, where I'm like, I shouldn't be saying this. You dumb bitch. You can't be a fucking little bitch ass. Good Lord. To end the show, Mike, you've been real quiet. I want to hear your thoughts on Knockout City real quick to send us home. You know, I'm a little bit different than everybody, but I'm really happy to hear the excitement

and the fun that everyone's having. And that's a big credit to EA and Valin Studios, who went above and beyond with the game pass deal, with this block party for 10 days, allowing everyone to try it. And you're hearing the excitement. And what this team did is unlike many others. And this is what we're looking forward to in the multiplayer world

from this point forward here in 2021 and onward is full cross-play, cross-progression, private lobbies. And this team hit all of that. And that's what we're talking about when we look at multiplayer games and what you need to succeed in this day and age. We just talked about it two weeks ago. Hood Outlaws and Legends. Gone.

That game died on contact. And now you look at this game and everybody's very excited because they got to get their free demo in. They got to try it with their friends no matter what console there is. And this game will fit into a good multiplayer rood decks no matter how long it goes for because of the crossplay and the custom lobbies. Like Greg said, even if you jump in three months from now, six months from now and people are kicking your teeth in, you can always play with your friends. And so for me, this is a pretty basic multiplayer game that will come and go within the 10-day period for me and my squad. But it will always be in the roller decks of the predator hunting grounds, as Andy says of, if you guys want to jump into this, I'll play it.

But we won't be talking about this in my circle after Monday when the block party is over. I'm excited. Yeah, that's the thing about it where I agree with Mike. I don't know what longevity is throw that out, but it is a basic multiplayer game. We're all in it because it is so much fun. but what is their cadence of new map, new mode, new ball, whatever it's going to be that actually makes it feel like, okay, cool. Like they just drop a league play today,

and I know they have a couple different modes on there. That's all awesome, but like, yeah, do we have to get our assigned group together? You know what I mean? Like, how are we shaking it up and keeping it going? Bring in the MCU. Bring in D.C. Oh, shit. Well, I don't, I'm sure.

I'm looking at this ready to buy this thing. And it'd be like, oh, he's got money. Let's put some of those. Bring in the characters from the hit movie Dodgewell. Yeah. Also true. And the characters from the movie, Balls of Fury. Yeah.

It will be very interesting to see what this team does in the coming weeks and months to keep this fresh. You know, you bring up new maps and new balls, but that might not be enough. So it will be coming down to game modes and what you can do. But it will be exciting to see. And Andy, you asked, you know, you brought up how good this game feels. When I was behind closed doors with it, they brought up that they built out their own neck code for this game. I was trying to look it up in the background. I believe it's called like the Viper Engine or something that they built.

But they worked really hard to ensure that you have very low latency and everything works seamlessly across all these different platforms. And they nailed it for sure. When you play it, it feels good no matter where you're at. So, you know, really big props to them. I immediately thought of playing Outrider solo, it feeling fantastic. A duo joins, kind of spotty. A third joins, oh my gosh, this is like unplayable right now.

I'm getting so many frame drops across the board, which is why I beat that game solo, because it just felt better to play solo. And I know it's hard to do that. Like, it takes money and it takes a lot of time to do that. You can take the easier way out and, you know, rent out servers or whatever the hell it is that you have to do as an engineer. But I'm glad that they went this route because it's definitely worth it.

And I think had they not, we'd be talking about, yeah, the game's fun, but it's a performance mess, you know. Well, this has been the kind of funny games cast, No bike, Mike. Thank you very much for joining us. Next week, we will return with our E3 predictions. It's going down. So excited. Can't wait for that.

But right now, if you're at patreon.com slash kind of funny game supporter, you get to watch the post show. We're about to do. Blessing, what do you got for us this week? Unfortunately, I don't have anything. Oh, shit. Okay, cool. Well, we're going to have a good old time of this post show coming up with stuff from my knockins.

Until then. I love you. Bye.