Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - Grading PlayStation's 2024 - Kinda Funny Gamescast

Episode Date: November 15, 2024

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Starting point is 00:00:06 What's up everybody? Welcome to the kind of funny games cast for Friday, November 15th, 2024. I'm one of your host, Greg Miller, alongside Forbes 30 under 30, AKA New York Game Awards nominated. A.K.A. PlayStation Poppy. Blessing Eddie O. Ye, Jr. I like the sweater you got on. Thank you. A new run of merch from Mill Valley Pasta. It's a rib cage with a pasta heart, which is quite, disgusting. I did not notice. Very disgusting. I did not notice the pasta hard. They got a buddy. Tony over there, a friend of the show,
Starting point is 00:00:42 obviously, he does a bunch of stuff. It helps us out. A bunch of crazy merch all the time. You know, you think a pasta shop you wouldn't think it's going to have a bunch of crazy merch, but he's got a bunch of crazy merch. I mean, I was at an ice cream shop last night that was Tony about on the last store, or on the last show. What drunk are you right now? I'm so tired.
Starting point is 00:00:59 Went in, looked at the right. They had like shirts that had popped up and we're like, oh, man, should we get some shirts? And then the guy overheard is talking. He was like, listen, holidays. around the corner. We got some holiday merch coming up. So yeah, I'm holding off, but I'm going to get the middle of the fucking holiday shirt with the milk shake on. What ice cream did you, I mean, go to? Mitchels? Where are you going to?
Starting point is 00:01:14 Yes, Mitchell's. Yeah, those Mitchells. Yeah, good stuff, good stuff. Really good stuff. A Bay Area staple. Mitchells or whatever. Hi, Barrett. I just wanted, there's another ice cream spot, bless. By right. Because Mitchells is a place that has, like,
Starting point is 00:01:30 the wheel where you can spin it, right? And get like a random ice cream flavor. I believe so, yeah. They didn't have when I was there last night, but I think last time I was there, they had that wheel. Okay. If I remember correctly. Okay, okay, okay. That's always a fun thing to do.
Starting point is 00:01:43 Hell yeah. Indeed. Of course, it's a very special, kind of funny games cast. It's just me. It's just blessing. It is. Cole's on the ground, my dog. He's not sitting in the bed we made for him.
Starting point is 00:01:53 He's just sitting directly underneath me on the linoleum. What do you think is up with him right now? Because I feel like he is either comforted, comforted by your presence, or he's scared of the video wall. Because I saw him looking at the video wall in a way. Yeah, where I was, I was like, are you scared of that? I think he's comforted by the presence.
Starting point is 00:02:09 He probably wants back in my lap, which he really doesn't. Because we did that last show, and he immediately wanted back down. He's just not a part of that. You can see him. Look at that. You can see the chat house popping up there. Lank is right there for him. I know, it's so close, right?
Starting point is 00:02:21 Like, just do it, Cole. He's stuck in this one spot. Maybe he wants to, like, kind of feel like the hard cold floor, you know? He was big chilling on the couch. I know. Nick sent me a photo. I'm just sitting all alone on the couch looking at Nick. On the couch.
Starting point is 00:02:34 He made himself at home. He's doing the damn thing. Good job, Cole. You should know. We're going to do something here, of course. Very special. The year's winding down, and it's time to start grading these hardware manufacturers. All right? And we thought, you know, we were always the number one console manufacturer podcast in this place. I don't hear about your X-Cast thing.
Starting point is 00:02:54 I don't want to hear about Tim and his dreams of a Nintendo podcast, all right? I want that to you want to be on it. You're going to be on the episode of grading Nintendo, so get ready for that. I've not picked up my switch this year. I don't think so. But I've been playing Pokemon, though. My phone. grade. Yeah, okay, that counts. I'll grade that. Yeah, that's Nintendo. So you and I are going to go through
Starting point is 00:03:09 in grade PlayStation's 2024, and then in the coming weeks, of course, you'll see the X-Cast crew return to grade the Xbox and Tim scraped together somebody who cares about Nintendo. Somebody. I don't know who that's going to be. He won't have a cool dog. I'll tell you that. I can get a dog. For now, I'll remind you, of course,
Starting point is 00:03:25 this is the kind of funny games cast. Each and every weekday, we run you through the biggest topics in the video game world, whether they be reviews, previews, or just things we need to talk about. If you like that, of course, be part of the show as we're live. YouTube.com slash kind of funny games. You can super chat.
Starting point is 00:03:41 You can leave your reviews for this here PlayStation in 2024. Lots to talk about. So I'm interested to see where you put on the kind of funny review scale. Of course, if you're watching later, remember you could have been watching live. YouTube.com slash kind of funny games. Twitch.com. slash Kind of Funny Games podcast services around the globe. No matter where you get this show, please consider picking up a Kind of Funny membership.
Starting point is 00:04:03 $10 on Patreon.com.com slash Kind of Funny Games or YouTube.com slash Kind of Funny Games. Keeps the lights and mics on. And of course, gets you all of our content ad-free. The ability to watch live as we record the afternoon podcast, like a dynamite. Kind of funny podcast we did last night. That was a lot of fun. Dynamite. I like that as an adjo for it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But just even the thumbnail of you and Nick touching fingers. I know, that was a good one.
Starting point is 00:04:24 What's not the like? You know what? You gotta put me and Nick together more. I think we're going to. Good. Because I can't stand them. I want to get away. Go in there and do alien isolation with them today.
Starting point is 00:04:32 All right, do whatever you want. And then, of course, you could get a daily dose of me in a series we call Gregway each and every day if you're a member. If you're not, please like, subscribe, sharing all the free platforms and enjoy the advertisements. Of course, some housekeeping for you. Our limited merch drop is still happening. The visual triangle is upon us, and you can go to kindoffunny.com slash store to pick up the cool. hoodie, the cool hat, see the CRT effect, ask if Roger's head's too big.
Starting point is 00:04:59 I don't think it is, but apparently it's been a conversation. You don't think Roger's head is too big? For his body, he thinks it's too big. I don't agree. I think Roger looks awesome. I mean, I think he looks great, but like, let's be real here. Look at that. God damn it, butts. He's like a piece of shit. You ever play James Bond
Starting point is 00:05:14 like the Golden Eye and you turn on the mode? Yeah, yeah. You know the mode I'm talking about. I know the mode. I know the mode. It's just, it's the lens of the camera that's making it. And the best part is, Rogers expression is almost as if he knows. He knows that we're having this conversation. He's like, he's like,
Starting point is 00:05:30 his expression is done with this, please? I just fucking wake, awoke and bokes, you know? I woke and bokes. It's Friday, everybody. It's Friday. Kind of funny.com slash store to pick up the merch. When it's gone, it's gone. Of course, you already got that there is going to be
Starting point is 00:05:47 another Xbox console. We talked about on Kind of Funny Games Daily, and we called Legendary Video Game Designer David Breivik to answer our questions, of course. Nothing like calling the man who made Diablo who invented it just to be like, hey, tell me about how the inner workings of being a studio head and a publisher relationship works. And after this, Nick is, of course, streaming alien isolation. You can watch live on Twitch.tv.tv.com slash kind of funny games. YouTube.com slash kind of funny games. Of course, later on YouTube as well. If you're kind of funny member, like I said, you're going to get a great way this afternoon after blessing and I eat pizza.
Starting point is 00:06:17 If you're a Patreon producer like Carl Jacobs and Delaney Twining, thank you for your service. And then of course, we're brought to you by Sonic at Top Golf, Marvel Snap, and Shady Rays. But I'll tell you about that later. For now, let's begin the show with what is and forever will be topic of the show. I'm going to order the pizza during the show that way, right, when we come off the show. Oh, no, num, num, you know what I mean? 2024 is almost in the books. Ladies, gentlemen, and NBs.
Starting point is 00:06:50 I can't believe it. It is, of course, November 15th, which normally would mean you're halfway through the month. But in November, you got Thanksgiving. That means pretty much the month's over. Is that how you view it? Yeah. I get it. I mean, because we have a normal week next week, and then it's Thanksgiving week.
Starting point is 00:07:04 Yeah. So you got a couple days there, and we all know those are in real days. So yeah. And then you come back and one of those days. You get one normal, you get that one weird week of December where it's like, it's not Thanksgiving and it's not game awards. So we're here. And then it's game awards.
Starting point is 00:07:17 And then it's one more where it's not Christmas, but we're here. And then we're wrong. I think the real thing is that it's just, over for PlayStation this year, right? Like, there's no way PlayStation games left. That is true in terms of a lot of different things.
Starting point is 00:07:27 You still have the 30th anniversary. PlayStation Pro is going to be shipping and all the merch is coming out. And to be fair, last year they did release God of War Vahala as a surprise in December. So who knows? Oh. What if we get?
Starting point is 00:07:38 Returnal Vahala. Something cool at Game Awards? I would like that, actually. That's very, that's very tempting. Maybe some Astrobot stuff, you think? Oh, yeah. You speed run challenge or something like that? Can I propose?
Starting point is 00:07:49 Whatever you're about to do, I don't know if I can because now because I'm about to produce in a way where I'm like maybe this is a meeting discussion and not an on-air discussion we're all friends here, we're all fair.
Starting point is 00:07:58 Can we bring back the game awards predictions where it is we each bring five things like five unique things because lately with the predictions it's like there's a list of things where all right what's Capcom doing
Starting point is 00:08:09 what's PlayStation new what a Xbox wasn't what was Activision like I miss like that's a great Tim impression thank you I miss like creating five bullet points
Starting point is 00:08:20 of ridiculous I think Rockstar is going to show off GTA 6 and it's going to star Vanessa Hudgens and, you know, Zach Airfront's going to be a side character. I think there's a common ground where we could do both. You know what I mean? Where if we're doing, we're trying to go through and do the thing with everybody. And we also started doing, we had, uh, damn, I'm so sorry. Kind of funny, best friends had made a graphic we were using as well that were asking questions
Starting point is 00:08:42 that were more specific than what's Capcom. We do do that as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There was a thing we were using those like template. Because now I'm like, coming off. I said we know the Game Awards for all. their worth. Oh yeah. Coming off of God War of a Hollow last year, I'm like, man, I'm, I got to figure
Starting point is 00:08:54 out, like, what is the prediction of what's that going to be this? I mean, I got to do myself. Nailed Jordan Peel. Nailed Kajima. Yeah, that's a good, tough one. What do I do? I got to, I got to, I got to get deep in the Duffy to come up with something. I just got, you know, call one of your industry buddies again, just to have them leak what's happening this year. I would never do that.
Starting point is 00:09:10 I would never do that. I would never do that. I think we could do it, like, where we start off with the specific five predictions plus, and then whatever we don't naturally talk about in y'all's, like, specific predictions, like, Tim has the list of things of like, oh, we didn't talk about this. Do we think anything from so-and-so company is going to bring anything? Because I just miss it.
Starting point is 00:09:28 Yeah, I miss like being in my Duffy. And I like, you know, I know. You haven't been in it for a while, you know. I'm not. I was, Roger told me this week that I've been on fire since the election. And I don't know what that means. Rodg's like, you've been on one. And I'm like, listen, I don't know, man.
Starting point is 00:09:45 I got to stay happy somehow. I feel the content you've been, you've been on for a long time this year. Thank you. You know what I mean? I think you've been, I want to say like anything specific has happened. You just had a good vibe with everybody for a long time.
Starting point is 00:09:57 Thank you. No problem. I told you this in your meeting. Barrett, I tell you ever so often, you're doing great work. I love the way the interplay you have. Whenever it's a Roger Bless episode
Starting point is 00:10:06 and Barrett's on the ones and twos, I'm always happy with that. It's almost like we used to do a show together that we don't do anymore for some reason. Yeah. Well, I mean, because we wanted to fold into the other shows and we folded in like this.
Starting point is 00:10:15 You know? It also gives us less work to do, which is nice. It was a once a month's show. I miss doing it. Put it's on kind of funny podcast more. Okay. You're all in the fucking weekly meeting.
Starting point is 00:10:26 It's so easy to say. We'll do the thing. All right, there you go. You're done. This is such a long meeting. I don't want to be like even. Even us doing this where we're grading PlayStation, right? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:10:34 I put out the thing on all the different social media on blue sky. And Paris is like, so that means we're doing an Xcast one. And I'm like, oh, that's a great idea. Yeah, you are. And then I put it in Slack. It's like, I would have done a Nintendo. And I'm like, look at this. We're making content.
Starting point is 00:10:46 That's how we do it here. But for now, let's double back. Of course, we used to do a show called PSI Love You XOXO. What we talk about PlayStation each and every week with Janet Garcia often. She wasn't there the whole time, but she was there a big part of the time. We love you, Janet. How are you doing? Then we killed it.
Starting point is 00:11:01 We were like, no more Janet. We don't want to deal with her. And then it was we're going to do games cast each and every day. And we started doing the PlayStation stuff there, yada, yada, yada. You see the PlayStation background here. So we haven't checked in on a specific, hey, let's just talk about PlayStation outside of a games daily here or there. And so to look back now to jumping here with 2024 behind. us. We need to decide
Starting point is 00:11:21 what we would give this year on the kind of funny review scale. Question. Yeah. And I might be off. Did we do the rigmarole? Like, are we in the topic of the show already? Yeah. Okay. Go for it. You're so focused on getting a pizza. You're so focused. And I appreciate it. I miss a whole segment of this show. We did. We all said tots together. Listen, it's Friday. We did the, we did the, we said the ends. Yeah, we did.
Starting point is 00:11:44 Yeah. Ton and Tats. My dad. Tons. I tuned everything out. If you, like, I love, what we do is very special, right? Because we look like we're ESPN, but then we're just a bunch of morons hanging out with us and you, the kind of funny best friends. I'll give you the real deal, too, of like, when we were getting ready for games daily and Barrett was doing the dog cam, and we were over it, and it was like, oh, yeah, I'm like, that's so great, that's so cool.
Starting point is 00:12:07 I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it. And I made sure I didn't bring up anything on my screen. Yeah. And then when the show started, like, I, when it went to the thing, I put up, I threw my text messages back up. that I quickly cut away from the camera. I sent Jen, I think a photo of yeah, Cole on set.
Starting point is 00:12:21 And then when we came live, you're like, what's? And immediately went to that shot and I was like, I was totally zoned out for the first two minutes. I'm like, let's look at every text message thread.
Starting point is 00:12:31 I'm like, okay, if people really want to care of that, Jen and me are discussing of her eating the salmon or if it's gone bad, we're okay. You know what I mean? We're okay.
Starting point is 00:12:38 I did need to ask you about that. Nah, you're fine. I mean, I knew it too, and I saw it. It's whatever, but like, I would stop to the first big deal.
Starting point is 00:12:45 Yeah, We're new pepperoni. But not, I'll do it during the ad. Not that 900 pepperonies. I'll make sure. That's the thing is, I look at the app.
Starting point is 00:12:51 I love Joey and I love Kevin. I don't know how they've ever confused this. Where they're like, we need to click pepperoni three times. Well, now this is why I'm waiting for the ad before I do this because like trying to do this while talking,
Starting point is 00:13:02 I'm going to fuck something up. Fair enough. We're just going to get pepperoni and no pizza. I just want pepperoni. Deadhead says, so has the salmon gone bad? We need to know. I don't know.
Starting point is 00:13:10 Jen was going on a hike this morning. And so that's when we are having this conversation via Syria on the car ride. So I'll get back to you, okay? Yeah. Eventually, here's what I'll do just for you, Deadhead. I will forget your name, of course.
Starting point is 00:13:19 But at some point today, I will put out, probably that tonight, a little fish emoji, and then a thumbs up or a thumbs down. I'll put it on all three of my social platforms. Also put it on your Instagram, what do they call the Instagram thing? Instagram stories.
Starting point is 00:13:31 Oh, my little thing? Yeah. Mike has an update for you on there, by the way. No shit, did he do it? He did. So yesterday on Gamescast, I was saying, you know, I need updates on what's happening in Vegas.
Starting point is 00:13:43 And I said, Make sure you use a little thing. And he says, this is for Greg. He did it. You know what I mean? What a nice guy. I love you. There we go.
Starting point is 00:13:52 So is it like, are you going to always be posted on three platforms? Or is it like a battle of which one do you end up black in the most? And then you go to that one. Man, it's a great question. This was yesterday's Gregway to a degree. Uh-huh. And it's right now feeling it out. Like, I feel all social media for me right now with how much time I have to devote to social media.
Starting point is 00:14:09 My whole Gregway was about like, I'm not the same social media person I was in 2009, 2010, right? And so for me, the main thing of using it is, hey, look at the cool thing we did at work today. Look at the cool thing. So it's like while I'm using it for advertising, what we've done, I feel like I'll just do everything until we're like, well,
Starting point is 00:14:26 this one, like threads does not seem like it's worth. I gave up on threads. Threads I do because I like being able to share that to the story on Instagram. Oh, I think making a story on Instagram is so fucking clunky. Threads is like, threads for me is like the Skype during a pandemic
Starting point is 00:14:40 where it's like, how'd you drop the ball on this? Yeah. Instagram should have had this as a slam. dunk everybody's already on Instagram you can transfer over and like have it all be the same people you're following all this shit but the algorithm is so bad this is my conversation and the thing yesterday of course was just like uh you know instagram i jumped out early or threads jumped out to whatever it was like 35000 and since like day one and not maybe not day one but you know what
Starting point is 00:15:02 mean like since launch i've gone to like 37 meanwhile like blue sky like i finally started using last week and it's like just going and it's not 30,000 yet but it's like oh if if everybody's coming here, then yeah, I'll be here or whatever. Anyways, I digress. PlayStation. Let's talk about 2024. It makes sense because I posted on all three. You did it.
Starting point is 00:15:20 You tied it in. I love it. Blessing, how do you want to tackle it? Because I've gone through enlisted month by month, the biggest things I could think of. Chat, please keep me honest as we go. If I miss something big, you think needs to be put there, I want to know. I want to be a big part of it. But we could just start at the top of, like, even before you delve into it.
Starting point is 00:15:37 What is your interpretation of PlayStation's 2024 since we stopped doing a weekly PlayStation show in 2024? Um, very rocky, I'll say. Like, I think there, there have been some highs. I think we started off very high with both Final Faces and Rebirth and Hell Iris too. Yeah. I think those were two very big Ws on the PlayStation exclusive side.
Starting point is 00:15:56 Um, I think you then hop to, I think a rocky to, I'll see a slow descent, actually. Because after those first two titles, it was Rise of the Ronan and Stellar Blade. Two games that were not bad by any means. I think Rise the Ronan, for me was fine. I know you liked it a lot more than I did. Yeah, I liked it more than you did. Yeah. Over time, this has become like, Greg thinks it's like one of his top ten.
Starting point is 00:16:18 I'm like, well, I just fucking liked killing things. Yeah. What was that? But then you get to Stellar Blade, which I did like a lot. But also it's like, for me, Stella Blade's not like a high tier, top tier PlayStation title. For me, it's an action game that gave me my fix out of what I like out of an action game, but it's not one that's going to stick with me necessarily.
Starting point is 00:16:34 I'm not like at the edge of my seat waiting for Stellar Blade 2 or whatever, unless they give me a way better story. Yeah. So, like, you know, you start off with that real big high of hell divers, too. in Final Fantasy he started to descend a little bit with Rives their own and install a blade
Starting point is 00:16:48 but you're still in the play you're still in the positive you're still in the blue then I think you get to the PlayStation I think it was a state of player I forget what the thing or maybe it wasn't even any of those
Starting point is 00:16:57 you get to the Concord like trailer and whatever where they did the deep dive play in the state of it yeah or you get the extended cut scene and get all that stuff and everybody's like
Starting point is 00:17:06 eh not really doing it for me like nobody people aren't really feeling it me and Andy are in I think Snowy Mac are like oh it looks decent but like, you know, it's not... In May they did that. Yeah, in May they did that.
Starting point is 00:17:16 But then you also get the announcement of Astrobot, right, which we're all excited for. And like, I think that was one of those presentations where we're like, okay, the rest of the year might not be 2023 or 22 in terms of a god of war, Ragnarok or Spider-Man 2. But you got some things.
Starting point is 00:17:31 You get to Concord. And I think Concord was a major low in terms of what they're setting up with the PlayStation Live Service stuff, right? Especially in contrast to what they did with Heldivirs to get into Concord, nobody caring about it,
Starting point is 00:17:42 it getting shut down seven days later, I think it was a big, like, boom, dip. You got Astrobot in there, great. Like, people love Astrobot, right? This is doing awesome. But I think there has been this turbulence in the second half of the year where it's been the tug of war
Starting point is 00:17:56 between an Astrobat type thing, but then Concord and then also the PlayStation 5 Pro, which I'm not going to, I'm not going to say it's like a failure by any means, right? I'm sure it's something. I'm sure he's doing fine. But it's not, I don't think it has been as as exciting for the audience. Not being exciting for the audience is the interesting thing.
Starting point is 00:18:11 I think coming into this when we put it on the calendar and then started talking about it and then even on the drive to work today where I was running through, I think I started with like, it's been a mid-year, it's been a mediocre year, it's been a, it's been a fine, but like when I laid it all out on the thing, it's a very interesting story to go by the bullet points. Okay. Of games and Metacritics, because I feel like there are games, there are this stuff. And not to mention, you know, PlayStation has won the hearts and minds campaign to some degree, right? of like you're playing your games on PlayStation
Starting point is 00:18:41 so even third party games you're enjoying and I'm painting broad brush here but the third party games that are coming out that people are enjoying you're playing on PlayStation so it feels like a PlayStation game to some degree and so we're not ignoring that but just looking at what the PlayStation was this year. I missed a big one too with Black Myth Cool Kong right and also Lego
Starting point is 00:18:57 Horizon I guess but BlackMoodoo Kong is definitely part of the PlayStation story this year. I got confused about that because you know it wasn't one of my games obviously Black Macu KluCon but I saw it listed with an Xbox thing so is it out on it's that was just PlayStation? I thought it was just PlayStation and PC, but correct me, Chad, if I'm wrong. Because I, that's, I've seen something about it.
Starting point is 00:19:13 I was like, oh, okay, hold on. I'm pretty sure that's just PlayStation. No. No? Oh, no, you are right. You're right. The whole thing, or yeah, I'm right. The whole thing is that people thought it was coming to Xbox,
Starting point is 00:19:23 but then I think the Xbox release date got the, like, I guess either delayed or just never came out on Xbox, but it's still going to at some point, I'm pretty sure. I'm dropping into August then so I can keep track. This is the kind of information I need. Thank you very much. People are saying, well, Panda in chat says it did not. come out because of tech issues.
Starting point is 00:19:41 Somebody said Xbox version is delayed. I think there was some rumors and speculation that PlayStation paid extra money to get exclusivity. That might have been like a whole Twitter thing of people just trying to make console wars out of something. So again, I'm thinking, okay, it's mid, it's mediocre, it's
Starting point is 00:19:57 somewhere in there as I'm driving in and then laying it all out, it's such an interesting take of the games are there to some degree, and again, it's not a last of us. It's not a ghost. It's not like maybe the big AAA single player thing you want, but they're there. And then it's this weird mix mashup of bad news of layoffs and bungee and this, that, the other, right? So the way I have it month by month goes like this.
Starting point is 00:20:17 January, there's the state of play, or a state of play that we've talked about. This is the one that had Silent Hill. It was a big deal for us talking about it there. It was an exciting way to start it. But it was, you know, again, what is a state of play going to be? Or yeah, what is the state of play going to be? They had the Dave the Diver thing, Death Stranding 2. More stuff for Hell Divers, but again, we didn't really know what we were getting in there, right? So, exciting enough, right? But then February, the eighth Helldivers 2 launches. Metacritic
Starting point is 00:20:43 today is 82. You know, the Wikipedia points out, became PlayStation's fastest selling title of all times, surpassing 12 million units within 12 weeks of its release, as well as Sony's most successful Windows title. I think, you know,
Starting point is 00:20:58 there's always a recency bias to some degree because I think when this was happening, we talked throughout February and March, right, how insane it was that this little game from Arrowhead, a sequel to a game I love nine years ago was doing these kind of numbers, right? And I kept joking that it was so crazy to have a game
Starting point is 00:21:18 I cared about be popular, because usually I'm the guy who likes some double A trash that nobody else does. And I'm just like, I'm a good time with Avengers. The fact that this took over, we did like, I want to say two weeks where we were streaming every day. And I was like blowing off meetings to stream for four or five hours
Starting point is 00:21:33 in the afternoon to play this thing because I loved it so much and still do love it. I think it's an interesting one of, that breakout success and that energy, I feel like is the usual case of the extraordinary becoming ordinary. We're now, you're like, oh, helldivers. They had a great year.
Starting point is 00:21:52 Helldivers was a great game. You know, blah, blah, blah. And it's like, we can't look past 12 million units in 12 weeks. You know what I mean? It all worked. And of course, there's so much that comes after the fact, right, of PlayStation shooting themselves, not only in the foot in the fucking head of like,
Starting point is 00:22:05 now we want you to sign in with PSN, everybody losing their mind and uninstalling. and it doesn't work in countries anymore and this, and then of course, the meta and people buffing and debuffing and yetta, yeah, yeah, but like, what a fucking way to start the year. I mean, it's almost, it's not comparable to Fortnite,
Starting point is 00:22:19 but like it is almost a Fortnite-esque story of a game that came out was on nobody to a few people's radar, right? Like Hell Divers 1 was a, you know, it was a specific community, it was a specific audience that was going forward. I mean, this was on my radar, but not to be this. And Hellers 2 had, like, mainstream success, right? And like, again, not Fortnite levels because Fortnite's a once-in-a-lifetime type thing,
Starting point is 00:22:39 but similar arc as far as comes out, we know about it, like, oh yeah, let's play some hell divers. And then, like, everybody's playing hell divers too, right? The steam concurrence are going crazy, all these things. Gary Wood is still playing hill divers too. Yeah. Outrageous, you know what I mean?
Starting point is 00:22:52 But of course, we can't get out of, you can't have good news with PlayStation this year and not have bad news, right? On the 27th, I'll read from Wesley at IGN's report. Sony has announced a significant round of layoffs affecting around 900 staff or about 8% of its global PlayStation workforce. The layoffs affected a number of PlayStation Studios
Starting point is 00:23:09 including Insomniac, Noddy Dog, Gorilla, Fire Sprite, and most significantly, PlayStation's London Studio. Alongside the layoffs, a number of in-development games are canceled, Sony said. In a blog post, outgoing Sony Interactive Entertainment Boss, Jim Ryan issued an update on what he called, quote, a difficult day at our company. We've made the extremely hard decision to announce our plan to commence a reduction of our overall headcount globally by about 8% or 900 people.
Starting point is 00:23:36 Employees across the globe, including our studios, are impacted. That was the 27th. Quickly followed up on the 29th by Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth. A Metacritic of 92. Let's go. Dude, there have been so many layoffs in the last couple of years that, yeah, like, even as you're reading through this one, I'm like, oh, yeah, like, that was February.
Starting point is 00:23:55 Like, you know, you kind of had to unearth that out of my brain a little bit. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, like, that's definitely a big one when you want to talk about the story of PlayStation this year. I think it was later in the year where we got even more, right, about like with bungee included and all this stuff, right? Yeah, yeah, we'll get there. That's coming.
Starting point is 00:24:08 Don't worry about that. But if you want to talk about Final Fanes and Seven Rebirth, that's one that I think is interesting as far as, I think that game is excellent. I think that game is fucking fantastic. It is high up in my game of the year list. But I always am so fascinated with Square Inix in the way they view their own titles
Starting point is 00:24:22 and what they wanted to do in sales because it didn't feel as celebrated by Square Inix as you would think for a game of that caliber. And granted, again, it's Square Inix. And so I feel like most, if not all of their AAA releases, it's always a, it comes out. the audience is like, yeah, this is fucking awesome and swear it's like, underperformed.
Starting point is 00:24:41 Not good enough. This is not doing what we wanted to do. I'm like, what the fuck did you want it to do? But I think this is definitely Final Faces and 7 rebirth with the whole recency like, you know, kind of thing that you're talking about with Hellinibers too. I'll put in a similar place of, at least for me, coming off of Final Faces and Rebirth
Starting point is 00:24:59 fresh off of it, I remember just being so blown away. You guys were so in love with her, right? I still, when I think about it and I think in detail of, you know, character dynamics, character relationships, certain moments of the game, right? Like things that they do with Red 13, like all this stuff,
Starting point is 00:25:15 I think back to it so fondly. And I know if you're a Final Fantasy person, especially Final Fantasy seven person, I'm sure you have that same thing. Yeah. I'm sure we'll talk about it a lot more in this episode, let alone into the game of the year conversations
Starting point is 00:25:27 we'll be having. But yeah, another one that I, when I initially started doing this, granted I'm not the Final Fantasy guy. I forgot it was even out, which is ridiculous because I played it two days ago
Starting point is 00:25:36 in the office when I was like, I gotta put some time into this for game of the year. And I was like, oh, right, that was this year. Like, again, recency bias on where we're actually at with anything. It feels so long ago. Doesn't it? Yeah. It's crazy.
Starting point is 00:25:47 Biden was running for president when this. Yeah. Remember Queen's Blood Bliss? Oh, man. So that was a moment yesterday when I was playing around with the PS5 Pro. And, yeah, I booted up Final Fantasy 7 just to, like, see what it actually, like, felt like, in motion. And I, like, my save had just. just come off of like doing a queen's blood battle and I think it was the final queen's blood
Starting point is 00:26:11 battle so there is no queen's blood left to play and I was like damn I just want to I feel like I just want queen's blood blood I'm gonna make a strong statement I'm probably wrong when I say this but I'm gonna say it anyway I feel like this year is the best year for video game card games or one of the best years for video game card games it's definitely but Gwen people are gonna be so mad at you I mean yeah sure but like you're gonna go fuck shit but then I remember that I'm a Gwen person But also, what was the game that you really like? That's all like fucking weird and creepy and shit. Inscription?
Starting point is 00:26:38 Yes, inscription. There's that. Yeah, but I'm talking about Blotro. I'm talking about Blotro coming out this year. I'm talking about Pokemon TCG coming out this year. Like, there's been some good-ass card games coming out this year. Don't forget Magic the Gathering had the Ghostbuster time. That's true.
Starting point is 00:26:52 Yeah, they did have the Ghostbuster time. And Queen's Blood, release it on its own. If you really want to make that money bag, Square Enix. And don't forget, Subok. Sub-Bach says unique technique. That is a great one. Sabak was fun. I'm just kidding.
Starting point is 00:27:03 anyone. I don't even know. Maybe it was the best part of that game. Who knows? But I, then, Solopsis says inscription was not this year. I don't think we meant to imply that was this year. No, I just meant of like, thinking of other years as top tiered card game years. But if we do the Smilis again this year, I got to write, we got to write this down. Best card game.
Starting point is 00:27:20 Yes. I like that. Write it down. You writing it down? Yeah. Okay, good. Moving out of February, we move into March. The one I have here is March 22nd, Rise of the Ronan. A Metacritic of 76 on this one. which I thought seemed high before it's like the way we talk about it around here
Starting point is 00:27:37 wherever he's like oh man only Greg like that piece of shit I was like yeah 76 is high considering jumping ahead a little bit April has Stellar Blade right on the 26th and Stellar Blade has a metacringer of 81 yeah I thought like that sounds right for Stellar Blade I thought I mean right is all objective whatever just for my personal assessment I guess I would put
Starting point is 00:27:55 Stellar Blade above Rives the Ronin just in terms of quality Oh no for sure I just didn't I was saying in 81 for Stella Blade that sounds right I thought there'd be a bigger gap of like 71 for Rise of the Run. I see. There were definitely a crowd there that was into Rise the Ronan. I think the thing that held it back a little bit was, I don't think, I think of Rise the Ronan was a like multi-platform release.
Starting point is 00:28:18 I could see it having a bit more further to it. For me, this didn't have like the stuff to make people care about it as like an exclusive. Sure. I think Rise the Ronan, if you're somebody who's played the Koi Tecomo games before, which I'm somebody who's done, right? Like, Wollong Fallen Dynasty just came out last year and he played this. Oh, this is like Wallong Fallen Dynasty, but it's open world.
Starting point is 00:28:35 But then that also comes with, in my opinion, some of the jankiness of open world games. Sure. Or like if you're an Assassin's Creed person, this might speak to you a bit better. But I like Rolong Fallen Dynasty mainly just for the combat, right? Everything else around it was not necessarily for me. Them expanding this into, oh, Rise of the Ronan, you're exploring, you're doing side quests, you're doing this. I got quite a few hours into it and was just like, I'm good. I thought this was going to be the one, but it just wasn't hitting for.
Starting point is 00:29:02 for me on that level. But enough people did like it, though. I think it does enough things for those open world fans. Back to me in Rise of the Ronin, right, where I was higher on it than the you and Andy. I figured if anybody else was on that review with us. But I was high on it as a podcast game, right? Yeah. I think looking at that right there and remembering what I liked about it, I'm like, damn,
Starting point is 00:29:22 I should do that tonight. Like it's one of those like, oh man, that'd be fun. Put that on portal, put some wrestling on TV and go that. Because yesterday I was playing WW2K24 on the TV and I was watching NXT on my phone. I was like, this is all, this is all busted. But Jen was already asleep, I didn't want to go upstairs and get the portal. You know what I mean. You know what you mean.
Starting point is 00:29:38 Yeah, you know. Yeah. Yeah, Rise the Ronan. Again, this, I think, Rise of the Ronan seems like a good tone setter for what PlayStation's year was. It's like, it's a solid thing you can enjoy. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:29:49 Yeah, you know what I mean? Like, I don't know. And we're talking about the overall scale. Do you think when PlayStation does like these third party PlayStation Studios deals, right? Of like, we're going to, you know, pay for whatever, we're going to have you be exclusive. We're going to do all this. And we're going to push.
Starting point is 00:30:02 you like. Stellar Wade coming up April 26 being another example of that. Do you think we should get more Rise of the Ronans or do you think Rise of the Rona was below the bar for what you expect out of a PlayStation's TV? I think it's below the bar. Okay. Yeah. I think I think you nail it when you're like if this was a third party thing
Starting point is 00:30:18 or a multi-platform thing, it would have made more sense. Yes. Because I think that even though you didn't go as far with it as I'm about to like third party you can expect okay cool, it's watered down a bit because it's trying to be on everything. Yes. Whereas this one, you're making a PlayStation game. Why is it having the PlayStation Studios
Starting point is 00:30:34 brand into it makes me immediately go, oh, it's going to be another ghost of Tsushima where it's going to be something with that level of quality, which I think is going to be an interesting conversation now that we're about to get into Stellar Blade, because Stellar Blade, I think is like right at the line of like, I think this is maybe the lowest quality you can get while still
Starting point is 00:30:50 being good enough for me to be like, okay, no, I can see the PlayStation Studios thing here. You can see the stuff here. Yeah, people might disagree with that. I'm curious on what chat thinks about that because I think there's something about Stellar Blade as far as like how how you, how kind of unique it is, and I think a bit fresh it is, but also just how good the combat is.
Starting point is 00:31:06 And like, there's a vibe to Stuller Blade that I think works. Linky Dragoon says, Rebirth was also questionable for a PlayStation 5 only game, though. No. I questionable how.
Starting point is 00:31:17 They had a bunch of different modes. I remember that was a big problem in terms of visual fidelity and this, that, the other. The thing I'll say to that is, rebirth was in PlayStation Studios, right? No, yeah. Rebirth is just a square index game
Starting point is 00:31:28 that is exclusive to PlayStation, which I know is confusing. It doesn't make sense of all that. But, It's also FinalFa. It looked terrible. People are shouting off. That's what they're probably on.
Starting point is 00:31:35 Yeah, it didn't look great at launch. Let's be real. Yeah, but, you know, visuals aren't everything. Yeah. So I tell you in all the time. It was gonna like that. It's also way too bloated, you know. I mean, you're right.
Starting point is 00:31:45 You're not wrong about that. Which I think also leads into maybe why it doesn't look as good as maybe as even remake. I don't think it looked that bad, though. Not with the pro. He's their own. The, the versatility mode on pro. I was like, damn. All right, I see it. So, April 26th, the Stellar Blade, Metacrick of 81, Wikipedia reporting.
Starting point is 00:32:11 By June, the game had sold over 1 million units. A Windows version is scheduled for release in 2025. Good game. Very good game. And I think, again, I think it is an example of the direction you should go when you're talking about, and a direction might be the wrong word. I think the quality that you should bring when you're talking about PlayStation Studios, right? Of like, all right, this is something that I think your audience likes, right? People like action games, especially the harder action games that feel.
Starting point is 00:32:33 like they're akin to almost like a soulsy type thing. There's a vibe here that I think a lot of people, people like some weird things when it came to Stellar Blade. Like there were some conversations that we had to have during the review that were like, yeah, what the fuck is happening as far as like some of the messaging in here? And then also, just a weird thing attached to a bit of the sexuality of this game that I think put quite a few people off. Like there have been conversations I've had with people are friends where I'm trying
Starting point is 00:32:57 to recommend Stellar Blade and they're like, oh, is that the game that's all horny? And I was like, yeah. But it's fun. It's fun. It has style and it's, you know, there's good things about it. But I think it would have been less of a thing people thought about if people on the internet weren't fucking gross and weird about it. Yes.
Starting point is 00:33:15 You know? That's the, and that was the tougher thing is that a community of shitty people on the internet, I think, lashed on to Stellar Blade to be their savior. And that's not something the dev asked for. That's not something that, like, this game is, in my opinion, I don't think they're setting out to do that with this game. But it just turned into like a weird lightning rod for that stuff. But I also think that's...
Starting point is 00:33:34 For the culture war. From the culture war stuff. But I think that's also something that's... I need these titties out. Loud and proud. That's something that I also think is secluded to the internet to certain degree. Sure.
Starting point is 00:33:43 Except your friends. We don't need to know that you're horny. We just don't. We don't fucking care. That's my secret, Barrett. Uh, May. We roll over to May. And, uh, yeah, this is where the Concord State of Play happens.
Starting point is 00:33:56 Mm-hmm. Which is immediately... The canary in the coal line, confirmation of everything you're worried about. wait, this doesn't, this isn't good. This doesn't seem like it's going to find an audience. This is weird, right? Yeah, the whole, I think Concord
Starting point is 00:34:10 definitely was like, you know, you're having trying to think of a good metaphor, and this might be a weird metaphor, but like, you're having a good cup of coffee. And then somebody comes in and they just, you know, squeeze some flavoring in there. They're like, oh, what's that? And they're like, oh, it's Andy Cortez. He's like, oh, some pickle juice.
Starting point is 00:34:25 He's twang. He's like, oh, here's some twang for your coffee. And you're like, I don't know if I like that in my coffee. Yeah. And he's like, trust me, though. Like, you know, you like a lot of flavor, right? And it's like, I sure, I guess. Then you drink the coffee and you're like, oh, nope, what I expected.
Starting point is 00:34:38 This is not what I would. Yep, yep, yep. And so Canary in the coal mine for trouble ahead. And then if that isn't enough, I mean, it's funny to lay it all out as bullet points, right? This is also the month that London studio closes. Oh. You know, Wesley over at IGN, who reported on the first round of layoffs earlier in the show, now coming back here. PlayStation London Studio has issued a heartfelt goodbye after the closure of the veteran developer
Starting point is 00:35:00 amid significant cuts across Sony's gaming business. In February, Sony announced a significant round of layoffs affecting around 900 staff or 8% of its global PlayStation workforce. The layoffs impact a number of PlayStation Studios, including insomniac, Noddy Dog, gorilla, and fire sprite, but PlayStation's London Studio is hit hardest with a notice of closure. Now the official PlayStation London Studio X-slash Twitter account has issued a statement thanking players for their support. For over 20 years, London Studio has been home to some exceptionally talented and wonderful
Starting point is 00:35:30 people in the games industry. As we close the doors and all go forward to new adventures, we wanted to say heartfelt thank you to all our past and present. I'm sorry. No, that's right. To all our past and present players and colleagues who have supported us over the years. We've had one wild
Starting point is 00:35:46 and wonderful journey. Waving emoji, blue heart emoji. Yeah, this is a tough one, right? Like, London Studio is, they were working on that like fantasy co-op, like one of the live service service titles coming up for PlayStation.
Starting point is 00:36:02 They were coming off of, Blood and Truth, I think, was their most recent thing. Yeah, the VR one year. VR. Great game. Great, like, one of my favorite PlayStation VR games. And I think this is one of the ones where the PlayStation Live Service push has, like,
Starting point is 00:36:17 put them into a weird spot of, okay, well, now we're having these layoffs and we have to look at who, like, we have to look at studio closures, like we got to look at who we're going to do. And London Studio just feels like, it seemed like they're in an unfortunate spot of man, you were caught into,
Starting point is 00:36:31 you were caught in a couple of different visions of PlayStation. You're caught up in the VR vision and you're caught up in the live service vision. Two visions which I don't think I've paid off. That PlayStation has closing their eyes to. Yes, exactly. PlayStation at this point, it's like oh no, that is not what the vision needs
Starting point is 00:36:47 to be. Like we need to get back to like the console like, you know, the premium games, the games that we know and love, right? The God Wars, the Returnals, the Watt Ratchets, those types of games. I think London Studio was just caught in an unfortunate spot. And this goes, I think, to the conversation we're having on KFGD about the business of these corporations and, like, you know, I would love to have a
Starting point is 00:37:09 discussion with somebody who maybe was higher up at London Studio as far as like, so was it PlayStation that was like you need to make a VR thing and you may make a life service thing? And like, they're totally to blame for this because that fucking sucks. Or was it the fact that like, was it a, you know, hey, everybody had to say in this and we thought we could make money for the organization by making a VR game or making a video. Live service. Fill that hole in. Either way, it sucks, right? Like, I think they're, you know better than me, right? What London Studio was doing before, even Blood and Truth. Oh, getaway. Get away. Come on. Remember that? Hell, yeah. Like, I think there, obviously there's
Starting point is 00:37:42 talent at that studio. There's, I think, visions that maybe could have been more for, like, the main portfolio of PlayStation, like the regular console titles, that you could have put them in. And I'm sure they could have made something good, but it sucks to see them caught up in, again, these two weird visions of PlayStation. Yeah, you know, again, we, it got mentioned at the top of this, but he's already gone by this point. Again, Jim Ryan leaving officially. He had already stepped down, obviously, but no longer being in charge, right, and seeing Herman step up to co-CEO, but be the games guy, right? And like, again, what are these two different visions? I think it's all very connected of like Jim Ryan and that team
Starting point is 00:38:15 pushing for live services and then it not working out and Herman coming in. And I, in my hope, grabbing the wheel to drive it towards games like Horizon, games like Killzone, PlayStation IP, right? Like, let's make things that matter to the PlayStation Gamer. Do you think there's anything to read into as far as London Studio being the studio to get the closure, but like what, the year prior, I think it was that like Haven Studio got acquired and like they've not even made anything, right? But like, oh, they still get to operate and do their thing and work on their live service thing. But London Studio goes, like, is there, is that just, is there anything to look into as far as that? Like, is it that Haven's thing seems maybe far,
Starting point is 00:38:52 better far along than what London Studios thing was? So this is an interesting one again where I, I think it's important to call out we don't know anything, right? So like my navel gazing, my crystal ball reading here would be the idea that what you're pointing out, London hasn't announced to whatever this new game is but they're live service, but they're VR, but these
Starting point is 00:39:11 are two things we don't really see a future in right right now, right. They announced, like a trailer or anything, but they had... They did, they did concept art. It was like a dragon agee, or not drag, it was like a dragon medieval. Yeah, fantasy in London, like co-op game. Fuck, right, right, ride, ride, ride, right. Yeah. My thought there, was like, I think you get
Starting point is 00:39:29 down to brass tacks and line items and I imagine that London was a bigger studio. I would imagine it was a more expensive studio. I would imagine that yeah, their game wasn't as far along and like so you see what's happening where they're going and what their talents are and what they could do next for you
Starting point is 00:39:45 and I think that's why you probably do it. Maybe it's also that yeah, like to all those points, Haven is a studio that was built from the ground up for this live service thing, right? So if London is transitioning from, you know, being the getaway folks, all right, now you made a VR game. Now we're having you make a live studio or a life service thing maybe yeah it is that awkwardness of you haven't built a team for these things yeah i've got this team over here that like is
Starting point is 00:40:06 again built from the ground up like everybody else kind of has their thing and you're just in an awkward place of these making these very different types of games and to swing it back to the business and the dollars and sense of it right like and i'm talking out of school to quite some degree here but haven is a studio that's being run out of canada canada is well known for tax credits for video games. So I'd imagine you're looking at what London costs versus what Haven costs and if Haven's a smaller team working on a game that's further along
Starting point is 00:40:33 and you're getting a break from the government to do it, it's not nearly as much money invested. Could be wrong. None of that could be correct at all, but I would imagine that, yeah. And again, do we ever see Fair Games? You know what I mean? Do we just get the announcement that Haven's closed as well? None of that will surprise me. None of that would surprise me, I should say,
Starting point is 00:40:51 when it comes around. We have made it to June and that's halfway through the year everybody but that means we're halfway through our show if you didn't know this is the kind of funny games cast each and every weekday we come to you with the biggest topics and video games if you like that pick up a kind of funny membership on youtube.com slash kind of funny games or patreon.com slash kind of funny of course you get all of our shows ad free the ability to watch the afternoon podcast live is recording them and you get a daily dose of me in a podcast slash video we call Greg way but for now you're not using your membership benefits and blessings got to order a pizza so here's a word from our sponsor this episode this episode
Starting point is 00:41:25 This episode is brought to you by Sonic the Hedgehog at Top Golf. Y'all, when you take one good thing and you take another good thing and you mash them together, that is when magic happens. Kind of Funny loves Sonic the Headchog. Kind of Funny loves Top Golf. So you know Kind of Funny is hyped for Sonic the Headchog and friends to arrive at Topgolf at Super Sonic Speed on Friday, November 15th, with the launch of the new Top Golf game, Sonic the Headchog. Exclusively available for play at Top Golf venues across the United States.
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Starting point is 00:44:32 300,000 people. Shadirayrase.com code kind of funny. Oh, that's scary. Pizza's order. Could have got me. Pizza's order. Yeah, okay. Yeah. We're getting some pepperoni. Hell yeah. Just one dose. One dose of pepperoni. I imagine, like, if, here's the thing, I don't understand how they messed it up before just based on a, like my ordering process. So if it does come with a mound of pepperoni, I need joining the tutorial because there's no way.
Starting point is 00:45:00 There's no way I couldn't mess this up. Someone in chat wanted this. Should I put up a poll of will there be another pepperoni mishap? Yeah, put up a poll. I'm joining back in here. Okay, good. Right in June.
Starting point is 00:45:14 Yeah, no, I did this. The chat over there said, Salty Express says Greg also skipped over Last of Us factions getting scrapped. But that happened in December, 2023. Yeah. So go fuck yourself. You did skip over last was remastered, right? Last was part two in the no, the, the, the, the, rogue light mode.
Starting point is 00:45:30 Is that this year? That was January. That was not January. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe it was last year. No, it sounds right, maybe. Right, because it was like the month after God of War. God of War Vahalo was last.
Starting point is 00:45:42 Yeah. Yeah. I'm not going to put up a poll. I'm going to put up a prediction on Twitch so y'all can bet points. Oh, I like that. Yeah. Yeah, I like that a lot. Anyways, June then rolls around, and it's just SGF is what I have here.
Starting point is 00:45:57 Gotcha. It much, anything PlayStation has it? No, right. I mean, I have here, if you go to your document, I have the blog post that they did from SGF, just talking about the games that were shown there, but it was like, here are games we saw that are coming to PlayStation. So it wasn't like, they had a big PlayStation. There wasn't a first party thing at the SGF. I don't think so.
Starting point is 00:46:20 There has to have been. What did it during Jeff's thing? Was it Horizon Lego adventures? It might have been Horizon Lego. No, I thought that happened way later. Didn't it happen way later? No, Horizon was during the summer stuff. I don't recall.
Starting point is 00:46:32 CJ splits on saying Horizon Lego. I think Horizon Lego was Jeff. Okay. Hold on. I'm trying to sneeze. Was he also Horizon Zero remastered? Somebody still wasn't an Astrobat. Astrobat was during the PlayStation's state of play, I think.
Starting point is 00:46:45 See, now I'm doubting myself. That is right. That's right. That was the state of play. I remember we were, because that seemed like it all but leaked. Right. Horizon was SGF. Say butt leaked. Is that what you said?
Starting point is 00:46:54 That all butt leaks. I was like, I did not say butt leak. No, I got a butt leak over here. I was like Greg's losing it. Cole's wandering through the office, butt leak and everyone. So then, yeah, okay, SGF happening. Congratulations. We have Horizon, Lego Horizon there and us. We did it.
Starting point is 00:47:11 Bander S then points out the final shape was June. Okay, so I did skip that. Destiny, the final shape, June. Cool. Cool. I mean, it's on there for what happened in PlayStation's year, right? So I'll put it in there. destiny. It's just, like,
Starting point is 00:47:24 I understand that it is a PlayStation thing. I just don't think about it that way. Yeah. Yeah, because it's everywhere, you know. Still, it's,
Starting point is 00:47:30 you know, putting money in PlayStation's pocket. Like, that's not one that, like, moves the needle for me on the grading scale, is what I'll say.
Starting point is 00:47:37 But it happened. Now, Beast comes in with something else. How can there be too much pepperoni? If it is too much for your soft-ass palate, take some off and eat it, like, eat it with the crust,
Starting point is 00:47:46 like a grown-ass adult. Listen, I won't lie. There would have been a time in recent, history that I would agree with you, Beast, and then this pizza showed up. Yeah. And think about how the pepperoni on a normal pizza saturates the crust in a box.
Starting point is 00:48:01 Imagine that quadrupled just like, disgusted. Like, you could scrape it off, but it was still, you touched it. It was just like, I don't think it's, I think the problem is when we say too much pepperoni, people think that it's like, oh, it's like extra extra pepperoni. It's like, no, there are four orders, four helping. You cannot see the cheese on this piece. Like, you open the box and you go, there's a problem. Like that's how much pepperoni was...
Starting point is 00:48:23 Again, it's to grease bath. Yes. Also, beasts, don't judge us. Go back to your mangoes. Ah, good one. July, what I have here is on the 31st, a big old round of layoffs at Bungy. We go to Pete Parsons at Bungy,
Starting point is 00:48:36 who put up the blog. Due to rising costs of development and industry shifts as well as enduring economic conditions, it has become clear that we need to make substantial changes to our cost structure and focused development efforts entirely on destiny and marathon. That means, beginning today,
Starting point is 00:48:53 220 of our roles will be eliminated, representing roughly 17% of our studios' workforce. Pete goes on, goes on, goes on, then we join it back here. First, we are deepening our integration with Sony Interactive Entertainment, working to integrate 155 of our roles, roughly 12% and SIEE for the next few quarters.
Starting point is 00:49:13 SIE has worked tirelessly with us to identify roles for as many people as possible, enabling us together to save a great deal of talent that would otherwise have been affected by the reduction in force. Second, we are working with PlayStation Studios leadership to spin out one of our incubation projects, an action game set in a brand new science fantasy universe to form a new studio within PlayStation Studios
Starting point is 00:49:35 to continue its promising development. So it's wild how much this puts it into perspective, like the amount of layoffs, even just within PlayStation. Sure. Like if we did a, I don't know if this is a games cast episode because I don't know what the conversation would be, but maybe it's a video that maybe another channel makes, I don't know, but like a,
Starting point is 00:49:51 Video that is just, hey, let's read out all of the layoffs that have happened this year, right? All in one go. I think that could put things really into perspective of how bad things have gotten as far as, like, what's happening to the workforce of video games and, like, how much money has gone away, right? How much money there's not going around right now as far as being able to develop and keep people employed and also green light stuff and also all the bad shit that comes with capitalism. I think in that video, you also include the bonuses and raises that people at the top. get around the same time as those layoffs are happening. And maybe in the case of Bungee, you add the amount of cars that Pete Parsons has definitely like bid for.
Starting point is 00:50:32 How much of a big will raise Cassette and Adela? Oh, 30 million. God damn. Yeah. Back at, I had this bookmark thinking it was going to be updated throughout the year. But apparently Zach over Kataku just stopped at one point. He sells a job, right? I don't know.
Starting point is 00:50:48 Kataku went through layoffs too. There's like six people left at Kotaku. I don't remember reading anything. This was a great article about tracking how many layoffs there were in 2024. As of March 29, 2024, at least 8,843 people have been or will be laid off this year. That was March. Yeah. So shit sucks.
Starting point is 00:51:09 I remember the conversation around this one being about, oh man, God, time flies, because it's been a minute. it was there was something around bungee misrepresenting like themselves to PlayStation when they sold to PlayStation that was the rumor right yeah um either way no matter what happened right of course
Starting point is 00:51:31 this sucks i think when talking about the studio thing that was part that was a part of the story that i completely forgot right where they end here with um we were working with PlayStation Studios leadership to spin out our one of our incubation projects in action game set in a new science fantasy universe i think sounds interesting but I think more so the story here for me is
Starting point is 00:51:50 what bungee was versus what bungee is now because when you're talking about what bungee was right bungee you're putting them up there as like I think one of the best to do multiplayer live service that kind of thing right you did halo you did destiny you've had iconic fucking um you know for sure games drop in that realm that have defined so much so to see this happen to them where you've cut this much of your workforce and, you know, I think be in a place where it's hard for me to foresee Bungee continuing to be what Bungee has been. I think that's for me, like, the biggest bummer of all this. I think they're a studio that has been so worthwhile in that I would love to see,
Starting point is 00:52:28 be able to innovate and, like, push things forward the way they have. But this is like a, just a sucky place to be in as far as them probably not being able to do that anymore. In a super chat, Street Shadow has a nice take. I like this. If we don't count the final shape as a success, then we can't count bungee layoffs in Sony's year. For what it's worth, I count both, they say. So I appreciate that. So yeah.
Starting point is 00:52:47 We're getting over. We're counting the success of final shape as well. When we were talking about the final shape, I forgot that technically Sony owned Sponchy. So that was, yeah. Yeah. Gotcha. Jumping back then, August 23rd sees Concord launch, everybody. And we all know how this one's going to go.
Starting point is 00:53:06 But there's Concord. I didn't, for some reason didn't grab the Medicaid. Also, people in chat, are like, was it a success when you're talking about final shape? Hard to say, I mean, right? I mean, like, people loved it, right? Did they? I thought so. I thought all the Destiny nuts were into it.
Starting point is 00:53:19 Maybe they didn't. I thought it was like more shaky. I thought like, shaky how. I got, I thought the conversation on Destiny right now is like, it reviewed very well. I don't know if it got the same amount of people in as previous DLCs have or expansion.
Starting point is 00:53:34 Yeah, I was talking about, like critically. Not, temperature-wise with Destiny's audience. Okay. I thought it was a success, no? Maybe I'm thinking about like post... Maybe I'm thinking about like a conversation after the layoffs. Because I think maybe after that there was like a slowing down of destiny in a way
Starting point is 00:53:51 where it feels like it's kind of done except for smaller updates. Which maybe was always the expectation. Is he calling Fran? Who do you think? No. He's calling some destiny person. Jerica, Hannah, it's Greg Miller. You're live on Gamescast.
Starting point is 00:54:01 How are you? Great. How are you? I'm great. You're a frequent contributor here. You're kind of funny. We love that you've branched off. You're my go-to for destiny information, okay?
Starting point is 00:54:12 Oh, okay. I need you to tell me, was Destiny the final shape a success or not? Was that, is that a good thing for PlayStation's year or a bad thing? A great thing. Great. Yes, it was a success. Okay. For sure.
Starting point is 00:54:26 That's with you as a player. Do you know, did they ever talk about numbers? Did it bring people back? Anything like that? You know, I don't really know. I mean, it brought me back for months, though that's a good sign. Like consistently. All right.
Starting point is 00:54:37 Great. That's all we need. Thank you. Yeah, you're welcome. All right. Bye. Everybody follow JK.K. Games podcast. We love Jericho.
Starting point is 00:54:45 There you go. Anyways, Metacritic on Concord, 62. Damn. I didn't see that coming. I didn't see that coming either. I thought it did better than that for most people. Not like, you know, I'd be curious to read in the reviews,
Starting point is 00:54:59 because I'm sure for a live service game, I wonder how many of those reviews were, oh, we're going to take the two weeks or whatever, and we're not going to review this day one. We're going to review this over time. And then they take it off the store, and they're like, oh, well, one out of ten, I guess. Like, I wonder if there are any of those scenarios.
Starting point is 00:55:12 I really would have, yeah, I thought that would have been higher. I mean, I know I don't know wrong. Because the message we've always said, no, granted, we liked it. Not me, I don't play it, but like kind of funny. Kind of funny. You liked and Andy liked it. I think like, I think kind of funny probably was what, like sevens across the board? Yeah, that sounds about right. Concord.
Starting point is 00:55:31 Six Axis gave it an 80. Game rant 70, push square 70. What did I gene? IGN gave it a 70, twin fin and a 70. That's what I would expect. But maybe it was just that, like, I don't think anybody was giving that game. game more than a seven. So maybe it was that it got a lot of sevens and then quite a few
Starting point is 00:55:46 people probably gave it like fours or fives. Yeah, yeah, down here, but it's like Eurogamer Portugal gave it a 40. Shinobu makes a good point. Only PlayStation biased outlets like Concord. Fair enough. Yeah. That's accurate. Yeah. Everybody's a real fair. Snowback Mike, biggest PlayStation man. That was
Starting point is 00:56:02 the 23rd and then the 30th was Blacksmith Wu Kong, 81, on Metacritic. Yeah. Another success, and that was another juggerna in terms of sales, right? That was another one where we report on the sales on games daily of like oh it's doing these outrageous numbers so huge success for PlayStation on that huge success i wonder what that means for the future as far as this PlayStation keep getting like that exclusive launch for a blackmith games right do they go after that for blackmouth too
Starting point is 00:56:26 or is it a case where whatever back room dealings that may or may not have happened with it don't make it sound both very like insidious and like fucking hamilton the community made a science cities. The room. But I do want to be in the room where it happens. But it's still coming to, like, I don't know. The community made it seem. Like, give me proof.
Starting point is 00:56:47 Give me a fucking source. The community made it seem like this was, yeah. Some, like, in a dark room and, like, the elusive man was there. Like, all this stuff would happen. This was happening in, like, a parking lot, like, in a basement parking lot. Someone smoked a cigarette. People were invoking, like, the leaked court documents and stuff of, like, and, like, regulations around, oh, you have to make it clear.
Starting point is 00:57:07 There's an exclusive, like, all that. People were invoking a lot of that stuff. So with all that said, right, I think this launching as an exclusive for PlayStation, I do think it's big for PlayStation regardless of reasoning. Even if it is, oh, we just technically couldn't make it work on the Series S or whatever it is. I think this launching as a PlayStation exclusive big, because I would say this is one of the biggest games of the year.
Starting point is 00:57:28 And like when you talk about, I know this is not a PlayStation Studios thing, obviously, but when you talk about the quality of a PlayStation exclusive, I think this is one of those games that brought, something. Wasn't my like biggest cup of tea like black myth Wu Kong I bounced off of after around I think like 10 hours or so. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:57:47 Oh, what was the song that we had was Blackmouth, Wukong, combat bed? No, it's just not great. I'm not great. I think of hate people like gave us for that when they weren't even listening to what we were saying. And like that's kind of where I stand I stand with Andy on that of we should have gone to
Starting point is 00:58:02 protest that. I was, I'm still ready. Let's go. The hotel workers still protesting. Let's go. That would be such a good video. but I stand with that Hey guys, we're a video game channel We just like to chant Can we join? Yeah.
Starting point is 00:58:13 Like Black Milled Woo Kong was a game That I, as I played it, I was like, man, production value on this insane, great ass cutscenes. A lot of really cool things are doing visually. But man, do I not care for some of the combat? Like, it's fine. It's not bad, but it just wasn't great to me.
Starting point is 00:58:28 And I think quite a few people felt that way, but I think also a lot of people are like, it's really cool to play a game of this amount of production that has a lot of cool shit going on, right? I think that's, oftentimes that's enough for people. And so I'll count this as a W on the PlayStation side. For sure. And it's on the game release side.
Starting point is 00:58:45 Yeah, yeah, I think so, too. We move into September. Two weeks after launch on September 6th, Concord is shut down with all sold copies being refunded. Oof. Just like, not only a fucking miss, but a colossal failure. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:59:00 Right? Like a legendary failure. And then just a backtracking on fucking vision. Like, outrageous. like what a crazy thing for PlayStation. Yeah. And I mean like not to just bite down and power through and let it go. And like I don't.
Starting point is 00:59:15 It's one of those things again when this happened and we all talk about everybody's like, well yeah, you could see the writing. It's like, well, yeah, you could see the writing. But how many times does this happen? Even when you see the riding on the wall. That a first party is like we're doing this. We're closing everything in. Like I know we've not, I don't know if we ever got accurate sales for Concord.
Starting point is 00:59:31 I think it's just been people reporting on like what could be the sales. but I think even when you see the writing on the wall, I don't, it seems like this did so bad on such a level that's like, oh, you can never see it be doing this bad. Like, I think most of us were like, yeah, this is going to fail. Like leading up to it, I definitely was like, yeah, this is not going to be a success. But it seems like this is a success unlike being able to dig into yet.
Starting point is 00:59:54 Like, I think there's still going to be stories that come out of Concord about how badly you did. It was just such a traditional, like you look at it like, okay, yeah, this sucks and nobody wants this. So you get it out. limp along, you pivot to free to play. Like, we've seen so many games try to save themselves. I, like, I, like, I, uh, message you because the other day, I think Arcadia Getten announced that they're going, they're going free to play in 2025. And I messaged you all's like, man, Arcadia Getton is about to get free to play.
Starting point is 01:00:20 Like, how could Concord not get there? Yeah. Concord got a week and a half, bro. Like, like, like, so many other games have been able to at least limp their way. Not that Arcade Againin is limping. I don't know what the numbers are. I mean, like, yeah, no, you know, no disrespect to Ilphonic in Arcade Againin, but like when's the last time you heard anyone talk about
Starting point is 01:00:36 our thing to get it. That's my point to it, right? Of man, Concord at the very least had the... Don't forget, foam stars is still going too. There's so many games that are still going. Concord had the backing of PlayStation. Concord had years of development. I would have thought, and this is why I stood by my pizza bet, is I would have thought
Starting point is 01:00:52 that at the very least, maybe you'll make an attempt. Maybe you try. And for the fact that for the story to go so quickly of, oh, we're taking this down, studio gets closed, which we'll get to in a second. we're not there quickly yeah September we're still in September that's October it's such a wow this must have done bad on a level
Starting point is 01:01:11 that again we I don't think we understand it yet yeah I think the stories that will continue to come out of that are going to be in crazy the dog's shaking so I'm like well if you get in the covers you know what I mean but then he's like I don't want to be I want to be it might not be a cold shake but I know I know I know but still it's not the most not the most usually that level
Starting point is 01:01:30 of anxious but we'll see also I yeah he's just living his life I'm getting the photos from Nick and then I'm getting messages from Cool Greg yeah cool Greg slacks me goes our male lady loves Cole so Cole's just living his life out there greeting people the door doing his thing yeah you gotta love it out there gotta love it oh let's move on to September on the sixth I'm sorry Concord shut down then also on the sixth astrobot launches
Starting point is 01:01:53 Metacritic 94 it's sold 1.5 million units by November if I'm visualizing this year of PlayStation as like a fight. Like if PlayStation, let's say PlayStation's a boxer, right? Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think you know, Concord being shut down after two weeks after its launch is like the haymaker that it gets where you realize and you learn that they could bleed and you're like, oh man,
Starting point is 01:02:13 that was a big, that was a big blow. And then like Astrobot is them like, like turning right back around and trying to give an uppercut to like really stay in the fight here. Yeah, what a wild day. This is. Astrobot coming out being an immediate game of the year contender and I think an immediate darling for so many people.
Starting point is 01:02:30 Yeah, good for them. great success here. Great critical success. I'm still in a place where I wonder what PlayStation thinks about its sales of Astrobot. I don't know if Astrobot's doing
Starting point is 01:02:43 what PlayStation wants it to do. But I feel like you had to have realistic expectations, right? For PlayStation? Yeah, they're not square. They're not square, you're right. But also,
Starting point is 01:02:54 1.5 million... I'm just saying this probably did not have the budget of other games. Yeah, 100%. You're right. You know? But I think it had the marketing budget,
Starting point is 01:03:03 did not have the development cycle of other games of recent years. Yeah, it's a quicker game, right? Still expensive, though. Still expensive. But again, like... Is this still one of the most polished platformers I've ever played? And I know it sounds crazy because we're talking about video games and... Mar-Morri!
Starting point is 01:03:17 I just don't think platforms are as popular as they once were. And so I think you enter into this knowing what you're doing. And I think you're also... If you're PlayStation, who is movies and toys and merch... Like, I think you enter into this knowing that this is a... investment in making a character people are going to buy plushies of and people are going to buy t-shirts of and
Starting point is 01:03:39 we're going to be able to theoretically you assume you continue to put out like basically what toys that are Nathan Drake and toys that are cold but they're astrobots and stuff like that like I feel like there's an investment here of making this a mascot I hope they're smart about it and yeah and understand
Starting point is 01:03:55 that I just get to worry that not that like I don't think the studio is going to shot done or anything I think 1.5 million is like a great number for for asteroid It's probably what I would expect for Astrobot. But yeah, I just hope that they don't see that number and go, oh, let's push this a little bit less. Like let's like maybe not, you know,
Starting point is 01:04:13 put as much marketing behind this next time or like not do the plushy thing or whatever it is. Like I think you should still throw a lot of effort behind Astrobat. Ben loves playing Astrobot and he loves his Astrobot plushy. He keeps it in his crib. Yeah. You brought it back for him. Thank you. October.
Starting point is 01:04:28 Oh, that was the one I brought? Yeah. The one from Japan. October. the fourth brought us the Until Dawn remake. 69 and Metacritic. Nice.
Starting point is 01:04:38 Yeah, a game littered with problems that people weren't necessarily asking for and somehow wasn't the whole build to this I was like, I don't know. Do we need Until Dawn back
Starting point is 01:04:48 and then like why wouldn't we just make a new one and I don't know. It's been really weird year and now that we're here I'm like man there's just a lot of odd like all right cool
Starting point is 01:04:55 like yeah until Dawn remake that is pretty buggy. Yeah. But you got to have it out there so when they make the movie when the movie comes out you can go play the game and we're gonna get to Horizon Lego and like we already
Starting point is 01:05:04 talked about Concord just a well a lot of this has been like maybe the weirdest PlayStation there's Whiplash right? Since like the PS3 era September 6th Whiplash on Concord Firewall yeah Concord shutting down and then Astrobot right and then October right the fourth is the Until Dawn remake of 69
Starting point is 01:05:20 then the 8th is Silent Hill 2 Metacritic of 86 a game that everyone fucking loved this game we're like oh wow which is like not surprising because it's Silent Hill 2 but also surprising because those trailers didn't do justice to how much this game hit for people. I was like fuck me I should have played this during the
Starting point is 01:05:36 review period right like it was one that I that wasn't on my radar because I just assumed based on looking to those trailers that it wasn't gonna be what people wanted and now I'm like damn I should play this for before you know we get to game of the year stuff so good for them good for them October 29th Sony announces the closure of
Starting point is 01:05:52 Firewalk Studios in the permanent halting of the games development damn you know what I mean? Yeah I mean I mean I was on the wall. You knew what was going to happen. But sure.
Starting point is 01:06:02 Like, come on. But also, yeah, like, to have this studio closure, have the London studio closure earlier in the year, it brings into the conversation like, all right, let's see what happens with the fire. Sprite. A little bit. No, no, Haven Studios. That's what I'm thinking. I was like F word, fair games, fire. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:06:25 Of course, 29th also saw the closure of neon koi, which all gets lost in there. of course the mobile stuff they were doing. And then the 31st brings you Horizon Zero Dawn remastered a Metacritic of 85. Cool, I guess. That's the thing where like some of these wins are, yeah, are like, all right, but like, cool, now you have Horizon on the shelf. So when people want to buy a PS5, they can buy the entire Horizon thing with the PS5 branding. It's like, I get it.
Starting point is 01:06:47 But it's not exciting for a PlayStation gamer, I feel. Yeah. IMO. On November 7th, the PlayStation 5 Pro launches. We've talked to this to death. The reviews aren't glowing. They're not horrible, but it's very much that. basically every review is
Starting point is 01:07:01 I wouldn't recommend it, but it does look nicer. Yeah. If you're getting your first PlayStation, might as well or not if you want to save money. Yeah. Okay, good. And then Lego Horizon Adventures on the 14th, a Metacritic of 71,
Starting point is 01:07:13 which I think is a miss for this. You think it's a miss? For critical acclaim, yeah. You know what I agree. As beloved as the Lego games were, for as simple or childlike as they were, you would think that coming in and making a new one in Horizon,
Starting point is 01:07:29 of the past and apply it to this, even though different developers, but again, I feel like the template of what a Lego game should or shouldn't be is pretty established. I think it's, I think it's a miss, but I think it's one of those ones that is so like forgettable and under the radar that like, is anybody really thinking about like, even if you're a Horizon fan, like how much were even paying attention to Lego Horizon Reap, or, yeah, Lego Horizon Adventures, right? This is one I almost put in the bucket of the rock climbing VR game for Horizon where like, it's not like this is Horizon's first midgame. And I'm not even talking about the mainline.
Starting point is 01:08:01 Janet Garcia punches through the wall. For the record, I think the mainline Horizon games are great. But like, you know, I think Horizon is just that franchise where you can have like side stuff that doesn't hit. And like, I don't think it does anything to like. I think it's more just a mess in terms of when we're talking about the year is that this should have been a super simple. Hey, here's a game that's a critic, a medic critic of 80.
Starting point is 01:08:23 People really dig it. It's fun for all. You can play it on Switch. It's a PlayStation. game on Switch. I guess I just wasn't expecting it to do all that. Like I read 71 on the Metacritic, I'm like, yeah, that's about what I expect. Maybe I expect it as 75
Starting point is 01:08:35 at least, but... See, I think it goes back to, for me again, where similar to Rise of Ronan, where you're like, oh, this is a PlayStation Lego game. This should be better than the Lego games that have come before. Yeah. Oh, it's somehow worse. Oh, that makes sense. That's it. I did miss chat called me out. Thank you for
Starting point is 01:08:53 keeping me honest. Ghost of Yote being announced for September September During September Yeah Yes I'm sorry Yes
Starting point is 01:09:01 Right in September It was announced So I've been going Month by month And doing this thing Which is super exciting So do we grade now Do we do
Starting point is 01:09:08 It's such an up and down Hot and cold Whiplash year That to put it on the scale It's hard Bear can we see the review scale Please So we're doing the 1 through 10 review scale
Starting point is 01:09:17 I thought so yeah That's what we review things on Right 10 being a masterpiece One being Golm I think This might come off As harsh but I am thinking about the standard
Starting point is 01:09:30 that PlayStation is set, right? Like, I think I'm going maybe six or six point five. I'm somewhere there. I might commit to a six though. I'm, no BS, I was flat six.
Starting point is 01:09:41 Yeah. I think it's okay. Like, it's one of those where it's like, there's stuff to love, there's stuff to like, there's stuff to love in here. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:09:48 But then there's just so many things like, oh, that sucks, that sucks, that sucks. And then there is no, all of this plus uncharted five or some god of war or whatever. big game we're playing this year, Spider-Man 3. Like, what was the, what would we say is the big game?
Starting point is 01:10:01 Like, I guess Final Fan 7 Rebirth. Yeah. But also, like, you know, that's a third party thing. It's going to come to the platforms. Yeah, yeah, yeah. To me personally, again, a PlayStation fan, Final Fantasy revert doesn't feel like, oh, man, that was a PlayStation exclusive.
Starting point is 01:10:13 Or the God of War. You know, or the Ratchet, right? So, yeah, I think you're missing out on, like, the big Fall title or the big PlayStation Studios proper title. You do have highlights, and I think the thing is, I think the highlights exist outside of the, outside of PlayStation organization, right? It is Final Fantasy.
Starting point is 01:10:29 It is Black Myth Wu Kong. I think it's even things like Stellar Blade that come through and are the highlights of the year. Oh, I guess Astrobot would be the big PlayStation Studios highlight. But again, you look at the chat and there's so many people in chat, or there was one for sure in chat that was just like,
Starting point is 01:10:45 respect Astrobot, but I don't like platformers. And it's like, I guess you can say it to any game, but I feel like, if you are a PlayStation person and you've bought PlayStation's, like, God, if we're uncharted ghosts, like, these are games that are like, that's a PlayStation narrative exclusive. That's why you're buying the system that feels like the PlayStation game.
Starting point is 01:11:03 I mean, it might be, I think it will be hypocritical from me as somebody who over the years, I'm always like, PlayStation makes the same games, right? PlayStation makes a third person action narrative where you're a father taking care of a son or you're a mother or your father taking your parents in some capacity. They always make those games. And we get the big game of this year being a really wonderful platformer that is wondrous and has polished and all these things. save your children.
Starting point is 01:11:28 And, well, I guess you are saving your children. What do you think about? And I'm sitting here like, oh man, can be a third person, an action narrative. But like, it's not even that I want that. I think it's more so that I don't think, I think Astrobot has the stuff as a game. I think it's a wonderful game, one of the best of the year.
Starting point is 01:11:42 I don't think it has the stuff to carry PlayStation's year, right? I think you need Astrobat plus Aspirate a Man or Astrobat plus a Ghost of Yote or plus a desperate, like, I think it's so light. You talked earlier about it, right, in terms of like, yeah, we're grading it, but we're also grading it against what PlayStation
Starting point is 01:11:59 years have been in the past. Yeah. And that's a big part of it, where there's just what's the big headline? Not even like Blockbuster game. What was the big blockbuster announcement news? This was an okay year. There was a lot to like you. But it's not, I don't think, I'm not looking back
Starting point is 01:12:15 being like, man, 2024. You remember that year for PlayStation? No. And that's the thing is, yeah, I think there were highlights. I think it's also counterbalanced by the low lights of this year when you're talking about how big some of these layouts were, how big of a failure of Concord was. And then, yeah, when you're talking about the other releases that, you know, felt mixed to like, you know, when you talk about Lego Horizons, when you talk about Until Dawn remaster,
Starting point is 01:12:35 when you talk about, like, Last Was 2 Remaster was, I think, a great remaster, but it was also the one that everybody complained about because nobody wanted the Last Was 2 remaster. So just a weird balancing of the good and bad of PlayStation that I think nests it out at a 6. Like, if there was no Concord failure, if, like, you removed those things, I could see it being a 7 or an 8. But, yeah, like, I didn't see. Seven, sure. Yeah. That's a fine.
Starting point is 01:12:57 Yeah, it was good year. This is too much weirdness this year. Of course, I asked you to Superchat in with your reviews, and we got quite a few here. Volk Dasher, Superchat and said, 8 out of 10, great. Five PlayStation 5 exclusives are on my game of the year list. Four are in my top five.
Starting point is 01:13:13 An exclusive will likely win game of the year. PlayStation did what every manufacturer should do, made their console the best place to play all the games on in 2024. Five PlayStation games. It's like the goddamn Ridler wrote in. Yeah. I'm like, what are the games? Held Ivers 2.
Starting point is 01:13:29 All my fucking thing is like five are in my top 10, four are my top 5 an exclusive could win. So yeah, Final Fantasy. Astrobot. Astrobot Haldivis 2. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:13:41 Black Myth? Oh, black myth. Yeah, yeah. It must have been a big Lego fan. Street Shadow, Super Chadden, said, I give us PlayStation a 7 or 8 for 3, for the year. Concord knocks it down a point
Starting point is 01:13:56 because three, Jesus Christ, Concord knocks it down a point, but three to four of the top game of the year games are only on PlayStation for consoles. Astrobot for Game of the Year. Oh, yeah.
Starting point is 01:14:08 Stinal Hill, probably the other one. Ah, I mean, people did like Black Myth. I can see Black Myth. Yeah, but I think we're still missing
Starting point is 01:14:13 a fifth game there, so. Well, he said four are in his top five. Oh, I was trying to figure out the top 10. Oh, five, okay, I see you're saying. Yeah. Fucking Redlin. Scoopy 5 became a member and said,
Starting point is 01:14:24 I feel like the pro gets more hate than deserved. it's like the edge controller or portal an expensive item for those that want the deluxe experience but not necessary for most that's fair yeah I think it's just when we're talking about what it's going to do that's when you get into like what it do it's for me this is my personal feelings
Starting point is 01:14:43 like I'll never recommend it yeah but like I'm not I'm not critiquing anybody who's like no I really care about this like this level of fidelity for sure do you do you do you uh and then the final super chat comes from street shadow if we don't count the final I already did this one The final shape is success.
Starting point is 01:14:58 We can't do that. Now blessing. Greg, we talked about 2024. We agree it's a 6 out of 10. We're correct. Nobody else's opinion matters. Talk to me about the future. Oh, I didn't even know
Starting point is 01:15:09 we're going to do this. I would have thought we were too late in this episode. I figure this is a nice ending point. I don't think we have to even discuss. We can do a quick discussion on to wrap the show up. Get out of here. Have a pizza pizza. Yeah, I'm not going to read that.
Starting point is 01:15:18 Not too much pepperoni. There was an article that went up, I believe about a week ago. The one I'm looking at is from Andy Robinson at VGC. who I think this is one of those like NPD like you know financial call articles where he's talking about PS5 and Sony talking about their financial results the name of the article is that PS5 hits 65 million as Sony says it to expect a mix of single player in service games there are kind of three big points to the article I think starting off right talking about how well or talking about the current numbers of the
Starting point is 01:15:51 PS5 so the company has shipped about 3.8 million PS5 consoles during the last three month period that is down 29% compared to where we're at last year during the same period, but we have a lifetime of 65.5 million. If you're comparing that to where PS4 was, it's a little bit behind, right? So 67.5 million is where the PS4 was around the same time in his life cycle, but it's not far off, right? That's a couple million off there. So that's like kind of the first point of it.
Starting point is 01:16:18 Getting into the business, we then talk a little bit about the live service stuff and how Sony has had this push for live service and they comment on it. I'll read this verbatim. They say, commenting specifically on his PlayStation Studios business, Sony has acknowledged a mixed year for its live service ambitions. While Hell Divers 2 has been a big hit, Sony has experienced significant teething problems with its push into the live service games market,
Starting point is 01:16:40 including canceling Alaska's multiplayer game and pulling Concord from sale just after two weeks. The company said it would share what it learned from both Hell Divers and Concord across his business, and in the medium term, they'll focus on a mix of single player and live service games. They say they intend to build on an optimum title portfolio during current mid-range playing period
Starting point is 01:16:57 that combines single-player games, which are their strength. And then they talk about like, kind of, they talk about leaning into like using the IP that they have, right? The higher predictability becoming hits due to their proven IP is how they put it. But it seems like they're learning. It seems like they're trying to figure it. It seems like they're learning.
Starting point is 01:17:15 That's hope they wrote that. They've like seen the response to Concord. Obviously they've seen the response to Hell Divers too and they're trying to act accordingly. And it seems like also a solution to that is going to be them leading into the IP. that they already own. Which is what we want, right? Yeah.
Starting point is 01:17:28 I hope they're not discouraged completely from new IP because they do think, of course. New IP breathes life, right? Of course. Love getting a returnal. You know, love getting those. But I think, I think,
Starting point is 01:17:37 looking at your IP and going, how do we utilize this to the best potential is what you should do. That sounds so capitalistic and so, like, marketing, but I always look at Nintendo because I love how Nintendo operates. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:17:48 Where you get... You love that alarmo. You love the alarmo, right? But even more so, I love how Mario has different, franchises within Mario, and it's all a delight. Mario Kart is basically a different franchise than the 3D Mario games, which is different from Mario Party.
Starting point is 01:18:03 And all of them have their different sales, like, you know, what they bring to Nintendo as far as how well they do. And I think you can look at your portfolio and try to figure out, like, yo, your PlayStation, you have so many different IP, not just like the ones we talk about as far as Ghost Horizon, Spider-Man, God of War, Uncharted, Last Plus, even though I just listed six different IP, which is a lot that I have that amount of success.
Starting point is 01:18:28 But even if you look in your history, you have things like Sly. You know, you have things like, I was going to say crash, they don't have crash, fuck. But you have plenty of like those Japan studio IPs that you've not touched forever.
Starting point is 01:18:39 You have fucking blood-borne. Do something. Do something. You have a bucket of IP that people are begging you to use. Use them. Use them. We had one final super chat roll through. it is sticks at short, or maybe it's sticks at short, or maybe, you know, just, come on.
Starting point is 01:18:59 10 out of 10 for Greg's mug and bless his shirt. We didn't mean to coordinate with skate, but we are excited about skate. Yeah, I didn't even notice that. God, when do we get that skate game? Are we still excited about it? Early access? Yeah. Are you not?
Starting point is 01:19:13 Definitely less so knowing what it is. Oh, like a persistent, like world, like live service, playing with a bunch of people kind of I'm down for that, honestly. Yeah, me too. That's where the future's at. Come joyous, spirit. The future fucking sucks. The screen you're looking at it's an Xbox right now.
Starting point is 01:19:30 Do that. Ladies and gentlemen and NB, that's Kind of Funnies review of PlayStation's 2024. Like I said, we're kicking off a trio of these over the next few weeks. It will stretch on through December because of holidays and reviews and everything else.
Starting point is 01:19:45 But be looking for the X-cast, reviewing Xbox, up next. And then, of course, yeah, Nintendo. Come on, get out of here. 10 out 10. Oh, Zalba. Ooh, Zalda. We got the Princess Peach game this year.
Starting point is 01:19:58 Yeah, we've got a lot to talk about it as far as... There is going to be a lot to talk about. You can hear us talk about it each and every day because Kind of Funny is all about live talk shows. At 10 a.m. we start with Kind of Funny Games Daily and the nerdy news need to know about. Then at 11 a.m. it's the Kind of Funny Games cast with the biggest topics in games. Then it's a video game stream for your amusement. Today, it's Nick playing more alien isolation. Of course, you can watch us live every day.
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