Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - How Do You Follow Up Game of the Year? - Kinda Funny Gamescast

Episode Date: November 10, 2025

Go to http://shadyrays.com and use code FUNNY for 35% off polarized sunglasses. Exclusive $20-off Carver Mat at https://on.auraframes.com/AURA20 Promo Code AURA20 Thank you for the support! Run of Show - - Start - Housekeeping - TOPIC OF THE SHOW: TWO VIDEO GAME REVIEWS FOR YA! - Goodnight Universe Review - Greg’s Score - Rue Valley Review - Madeline‘s Score and general thoughts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode's brought to you by ORAFrames and Shady Rays, but we'll tell you about that later. Yo, what's up? Welcome to Kind of Funny Games cast for Monday, November 10th, 2025. I want your host, Blessing. Eddie O'A Jr., joining me is The Legend, Greg Miller. Hello, Blessing. How are you? I'm doing well, Greg. How are you doing? Good. This is like my ninth ice coffee of the day. Oh, God, no. We're also joined by the one and only, Madeline Stanley.

Madeline, thank you so much for joining us. Hello. Love for being here. Happy to be back. Happy to have to have you. almost didn't make it though. I know. I was stuck in Vegas until 2 a.m. last night due to all the shutdowns. The crowd in the airport literally applauded the flight attendants because they were about to time out. The pilots were about to time out, but we made it. We made it.

Oh, my God. I'm glad you made it because we're reviewing two different games on this episode, starting off with Good Night Universe. And then Madeline, of course, you're here because you're going to review the one and only Rue Valley. so we're not going to waste any time. We're going to get right. Unless you have something. No, I love wasting time.

One time I was there where the pilot and the flight attendants were about to time out, but that was like the third thing that had gone wrong. It's like we had this very surly crowd at LAX or whatever. And when they got back up, they're like, all right, here's the latest problem. Because it was mechanical. It was this, whatever. And then it was like, all right. Now the team's about to time out.

So if they don't get here in the next and this old man, like literally looks like he's about to die, like stood up out of his wheelchair shaking. and just goes, you're lying to us. And the guys are, I'm not lying to you, sir. This is what's happening. So, wait, what leads to a timeout? Because I'm not familiar with this. You can only have so much legally and obviously for all the different rights and then just your own mindset.

Pilots and flight attendants can only be on the clock so long. Otherwise, it's like, well, I've been on for 28 hours. Yeah, exactly. You don't want to, you know. You know, that's fair. That's how you end up with flight. Denzel Washington movie, never forget. So then, is it a thing where the entire plane needs to deboard or is it just like we got to wait for

new. Yeah, well, I forget what it is, Madeline. You might be more up. The timeout is takeoff for them getting on the thing. Yeah. So I believe the timeout is takeoff. So we had the instance where the actual flight attendants and the pilots are on different timers. So we lost our first set of flight attendants because they timed out. We got pilots. And then our second set of flight attendants came late enough that the pilots were about to time out. But they boarded us so quickly that we were able to make it. But yeah, we almost. hit the point where they were, if we didn't load fast enough and get in the air, the pilots would have to debord the plane and leave, and then we would all be stuck in Vegas. But we didn't we didn't, so that's good. Nice. In Vegas, like the worst, I don't know, when I fly United,

Vegas is the worst airport to be stuck at. Oh, really? It's just a sad terminal. A bunch of slot machines at the end, but it's not even fun ones, it sucks. I got a trip coming up to, like, spend Thanksgiving with family. And like, this government shut down, fucking horrible, open end soon. But also, part of me is like, let's make it to Thanksgiving. And maybe

cancel my flight. They voted away. all the things they were fighting for last night to make sure that doesn't happen. Oh, damn. Well, enough about that. Remember, this is Kind of Funny Gamescast. Each and every weekday, we get together and talk about the biggest reviews, previews, and topics in video games live on YouTube, Twitch and on podcast services around the globe.

If you love what we do, support us with the Kind of Funny membership on Patreon, YouTube, Spotify, and Apple Podcasts to get all of our shows ad free, watch us record them live and get a daily exclusive show. For a chance to be a part of the show, some of your thoughts and opinions as YouTube Superchats, we go. Some housekeeping for you. We're an 11-person business all about live talk shows. So KHGD right before this covered PlayStation State of Play predictions for tomorrow show. And then after this, Joey's streaming cinema simulator 2025, which should be pretty fun. If you're a kind of funny member, today's Gregway is 15 minutes reviewing Frankenstein and talking about one of Greg's

happy places. I'm scared about what that is. Thank you to our Patreon producers, Carl Jacobs, Omega Buster and Delaney The Somme Twining. For now, let's start with topic of the show. Tots, dots, dots, dots, dots, dots, dots. Like I mentioned, two video game reviews for you.

We're going to start off with Good Night Universe. The follow-up to what game, Greg? Before your eyes, of course. I saw somebody in the chat go, wait, did they change the topic? As you know, as much as we try and fucking try to make the masses

care about indie games. It's incredibly hard. So rather than put Goodnight Universe comma Rue Valley reviews in the title and have people go, I don't know what those games are. I don't want to do it. We titled this one,

how do you follow up game of the year? Because, of course, before your eyes was one of my games of the year. I got to it late. Of course, it launched where this one got a lot of a claim,

obviously, as you controlled it with your webcam by blinking and moving your eyes. I came to it when it came to PlayStation VR2. The story goes, of course, inside of my headset when I came off and then Nick was like, what the hell is wrong with you? But it went on to be something I've talked about at length on many a show here.

So the fact that a nice dream was following it up with Good Night Universe, obviously very high on my anticipated games list. Yes. And yeah, I'm excited to host this one because, of course, before your eyes is one that I played around that same time as you because we reviewed it, I believe on PSLW. We did. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.

So excited to hear about that. And then, of course, Roo Valley is a game heavily inspired by Disco Elysium. And so very excited to hear Madeline talk about that. that's a game of love as well too. But of course, Good Night Universe, developed by Nice Dream. Those are the folks

who made the BAFTA Award winning before your eyes. Published by Skybound, Out Tomorrow. Greg. Lots of games out tomorrow. A whole lot of games. I was prepping tomorrow's games cast.

Like, these are coming out tomorrow too. Dude, we were just talking about this game where wins meet. Yes. This comes out later in the week. I know.

Like, it's a crazy week for video games. I know. So, Greg. Yes. Where do you want to start with this one? Good Night Universe? Yeah.

I think we start with the fact that I'm very disappointed. You know, before your eyes is in such rare air that I knew it would be hard for Good Night Universe to chase. But on the other side of it, having rolled credits, my steam clock says four and a half hours. I think some of that was it sitting on idle. So I'd say four hours or whatever. You know, you crack open that kind of funny review scale, right? One to ten. I'd say I would give this a 5.5 mediocre.

And I know there's no Metacritic yet. Reviews are leaking here and they are not leaking. They're coming in here and there. Other people are way higher on it. And I just struggle to see how or why. Interesting. This is not a bad game. Obviously mediocre does not mean bad on our scale.

We like to explore our scale. For me, this one, when I finished it and I was like, okay. And then I mulled on it and I moved on it. I eventually came back to what I think is the Achilles heel of any game. It's just flat. And I don't know who I would recommend this to. That's the struggle. We come on these shows and we do this

and I can sit here and bend over backwards most times for games that I like or don't like and be like, well, if even it didn't connect with me, but I could see it working for so-and-so or this, that, the other, blah, blah, blah. I mean, the pros of Goodnight Universe, excellent voice acting. Really, really great stuff.

You know, I love the visuals of it. But outside of that, I don't feel like I'm doing anything interesting in the game moment to moment. I don't feel the overall narrative, which I will not spoil. Is that interesting either? Do we read the Steam description? No, I can read it if you want. I'll toss it in.

You are Isaac, a six-month-old baby developing mysterious psychic powers. What you want most is to be loved and accepted by your family, but a secretive tech corporation wants you for their own. That's all that's out there. That's all you see here. And the game goes about its way and tells you a narrative framed with that. I think at no point was I on the edge of my seat about what was going to happen when I think the big picture finally starts to get revealed. I thought it was pretty much like, oh, so it's going to do da-da-da.

And it did, oh, do-da-da-da-da. Like, there's nothing in this game that I'm like, you got to play it because, oh, you did this. I did not have the emotional connection whatsoever that I had in before your eyes, again, sobbing in my headset. But I didn't even have it in the sense of, man, I want to see what happens next. Like I'm saying, it's four hours to beat. These were a long four hours. Like I felt those four hours, which I hate. And again, I'm not trying to shit on the game.

It's just not up to the standards I think they had before. It did not work for me. And I don't know who I'd recommend it to. And what's fascinating about it is, of course, before your eyes, as I've already said, is a game you could have played with controls, but it was encouraged and made waves initially because you played it with your eyes. You camera tracked your eyes. You could blink.

You could do this. You could advance time to do that. That is in this game as well, kind of. I made the choice at the onset to do my playthrough of this game entirely with a controller to not use the eye tracking stuff, which might sound radical in why that's what this game's all about. At launch, it only works on PC, the eye tracking. Nintendo Switch 2 will get camera tracking later. Xbox and PlayStation, no.

So if you're a console game and you're jumping in this, you don't have the eye tracking. Even with the webcam attached? Even with the PS5? Yeah, yeah. Wow. Okay. They're not. It's not in PlayStation 5 according to all the official notes. I played on PC. So I did a PC play-through all the way through.

At no point would I say my complaints about the game and my drawbacks of the game are the controls. It's not like, oh, it's so clunky. Oh, it's this, that, the other. It's that there was a one section of the game where it was like, oh, all of a sudden you're trying to be a video game where I'm failing things and having to restart checkpoints. I'm like, I didn't love that, but I don't, that wasn't a controller problem. However I did this morning before I came in here, I was like, you know, I do want to try it, though. I booted up the Razor Blade 16 out there, went off the eye tracking there. And I was shocked to find that it's not even,

oh, your eyes control the entire game. Your eyes blink and can do things with the screen. You have the psychic powers, right? But you still need to move the mouse to move your perspective. And it has head tracking and face tracking for like if you want to smile or frown for when the baby needs to smile or frown. But like, it's bizarre to me that I'm moving the mouse to move my head when I, why am I not just moving my head in real life? It's like that actually makes me more angry that they even did this in return.

it's like such a weird one of like for me personally I would have rather seen them move away from all this eye tracking stuff because I feel like they found success and a lot of acclaim right Basta award winning a game that I love so much even though I don't think the eye tracking is what I loved about before your eyes but it was a big part of this makes it a special experience now we're here and I play this game and I'm like I feel like they were like we got to do the eye stuff again

and they kind of shoehorned in especially now that I'm finding out I got to use a mouse even if I wanted to use it. So it's a weird mixed bag that I step away and I'm just like oh man this is a miss for me I want to bring in a review from game spots Mark Delaney who yeah on the opposite side of you gave it a nine out of ten and this is

what he says given how strange this game gets compared to its predecessor I expect many will experience it in a similar way to how I did thinking you know what you're getting into to a significant extent getting something quite different before it ends back where you'd expect with a bittersweet emotional blow that shifts

everything you know or sorry everything you thought you knew good night universe enjoy similar tricks to the team's previous award winner, but it takes bigger risks along the way, all before an emotionally messy, loving gut punch of a finale. Life is far from perfect. Everyone would agree, yet it's an exploring that obvious fact that this team has achieved something so memorable once again. Nice Dream Games' Good Night Universe is both mechanically simple and emotionally complex. Presented as a story about a baby, it's more accurate to say it's about the time we spend on earth with whom we spend it and what we leave behind when our time is up, which is a good jumping off

point for, I guess, my follow-up question to everything that you talked about, right? Because it seemed like your main point there was, you know, what is the thing that's making me recommend this game to people? What's like the X factor here that's bringing people in? And for their previous game, I felt like it was the emotional base that it had, right? Like, you talk about crying in the headset. Like, it's, I think it's impossible to play before your eyes only and not feel its story, right? Not feel the things that the characters are going through, not feel like the way that it's telling that story. It is to jump in if people don't know, right? Before your eyes, the whole thing is you, the game starts in, you are dead. You are on, I believe, the river sticks or something to that

metaphor, right? As you're being, a ferryman is taking you along and he basically interviews you about your life. So you relive these moments throughout your life, controlling it with your eyes. Yes. That's how you choose to play. And so for us, before your eyes only, the emotional beats really hit. Did the emotional beats for this game hit for you at all? No. Oh, that's, again, like, I was talking to somebody before this. They're just like, this is what I love about video game criticism, art in general. Yeah. Is that we can sit here, two people play a game and walk away with wildly different things.

Because no, like, it just, he's talking about this, you know, the twists and the turns and it's expect, but it doesn't. It comes back. Like, by the end of it, I, I'm not trying to be mean. I thought this was so hackneyed. I'm just like, oh, as soon as they gave the thing. And like, there's like the telltale things of like, not telltale. capital T, telltale games, but telltale like, all right, you're going to go do this thing, but then there's this choice. And it's like, all right, well, clearly you want me to choose this,

which will then to lead to inevitably this. And all that happens. Like, I feel like, once they show their hand on a mystery of like, how does a baby have psychic abilities? I was like, all right. I don't, I'm not, no, this does. It just, I was, I never became emotionally invested in this story. Madeline, are you, go for it. Oh, go ahead. Blessing. No, go. I was going to do. I was going to do. Yeah. Is there a choice or are there different branching narratives? Or I'm curious about what you meant by like, it brings you this choice and what it, it wanted you to kind of pick one thing. I couldn't get into without spoilers. I don't. It's one of those where I, in my mind, because I didn't do it and I didn't reload because I just, I just don't care.

It was like, clearly they want you to go this way for the narrative. And I imagine if you don't, then it's one of the, you know, how it is where you do the thing. and then it's like something happens and credits and there's more if you went the right way, right? Do you think this would hit different for you if you played it in VR? Like let's say they had the VR version that they had for Before Your Eyes that we got to experience?

I doubt it because again, I would be annoyed, I think, in the degree of how much of this is Isaac the baby looking around, but I have to still use the controller, I guess, to then go and then click and then snap, you know what I mean? So is that different from Before Your Eyes? Because I feel like before your eyes was white,

we're just like looking around in the headset and blinking, and that was the entirety of our. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so, like, would that not work in Goodnight Universe or is it a different? Well, again, what I'm saying is why, so you're saying they do it the way that, okay, I'm taking the controls as they exist now and you're giving, again, no. I want to throw the controls conversation out.

The controls don't matter to me. I think it's weird that I have to use a mouse and also to move my character's head when they can see me moving my real head. That's my hang up right now with that, which is a moot point because I did not play the game that way. I don't want that to become the hill I'm dying on. would me being in VR do more for it? No.

Again, like this was, I'd love to, I don't think, I don't think enough of us are ever going to play due to spoiler cast. Maybe I'll do a Greg where I rant a little bit more about it one day. But it is that idea like, towards the end of the game, they give you a narration, I'll say, of something else. And I was like, oh, this is interesting. And I'm using interesting mechanics here where I'm using, for me, the mouse cursor, but I could see using your eyes to go through and like decipher like symbols or texts. So we're like, yeah, scribbles, I guess would be the way to put it, right? And I was like, oh, this is fun and it's narrating thing. Like this, I wish was the game.

It's like, it's not a control issue and it's not a perspective issue. I think being in there, I would still be like, all right, what are we doing? Why are we doing this? Madeline, did you check out before your eyes only slash, do you have interest in checking out a goodnight universe? I haven't played before your eyes. I've heard so many people recommend it. It's just something I don't really get into VR very often. anymore.

So, but that is when I am interested in. And I was curious hearing Greg's thoughts on this as there are options to play it outside of VR. So I haven't, yeah, I haven't played either. I'm, I don't know where I'm at now with, with Greg's opinion on it. If it would make more sense to just play before your eyes or maybe check this one out. Just play before your eyes. And that goes back to it where it's like, I struggle to recommend this game.

Because I think the twists inside of before your eyes hit way harder. and are way stronger. And I think even this is where, again, I don't want to spoil before your eyes or stuff. Like what you bring to your personal baggage of all this, maybe that has something to do with it. But I also don't think, I am still the target market for Good Night Universe. Because Mark's review for GameSpot starts with,

I'm a dad. And he's talking about watching his kids grow up and like, you know, the things I struggle with as a father and think about too. So it's like, I'm still very much here. As I look at this baby Isaac, I'm like, I remember all of this. It's not like, I'm not connected to the, I shouldn't be connected to the subject material. Gotcha.

Also, I keep calling it before your eyes only. Or I keep like having to stop myself from calling you that because there's an album that I love called for your eyes only. Sure, sure. So I keep conflating them. So Greg, for you is somebody who's a fan of the studio's work, right? But like this latest thing didn't do it for you. Or do you want to see the studio go beyond this? Do you think?

Beyond. Beyond. Great question. And I want to make sure if this ever makes it back to them, still a big fan. Still, I love people taking swings. Again, I hope. I hope always. when I don't like a game that I'm odd men out.

I hope everybody else says it's nine out of ten. It's at game awards. It's this, that, the other. What I want, I'd like to see Nice Dream Do is throw away the, and this is hard to say, because I'm not in the room. Again, I feel like they were like, we need the mechanic. We need the eye mechanic. You need to control that way.

I think that if they, with the cast they brought together, it was up there too. I had to print it out, right? Lewis Pullman from Thunderbolts is in this, like Top Gun Maverick, Carrie Kenny Silver from Reno 911 Like they have so much Talent inside the game and the VEO is Really really good. I'd love to see them Just go and make a narrative video game

That is just built around we're playing With controller or mouse and keyboard and we're telling you a story And we're doing it. I feel like that's clearly What they want to do. They probably Want to surprise and delight like Nintendo And I think the eye mechanic did that But I feel like it was shoehorned in here and it doesn't work The exact same way because it just is a weird

thing of like I'm doing I'm moving I'm clicking on things and using, I guess, my psychic abilities with my eyes, but I still need to use the mouse to grab onto things and pull myself up as a baby or whatever. I'd rather see them just do a narrative venture. I'd also like to see the time come down. I think it's possible

that if this was a two hour long I'm playing a movie experience, maybe I would have enjoyed it more. But again, I felt all four of these hours. Of course, Super Chats, write in. If you have any questions about before your eyes, or Good Night Universe. I'll answer before your eyes, or Rue Valley coming up.

Let us know. We have one superchats, I'll have one super chat in from Joshy G who says hey Madeline Thanks a much Josh for Josh Yeah I don't know It's one of those where it's always hard when it's like this And especially when it's a game you can't spoil Yeah and a game that I think is simple Right in terms of mechanically right

Like it is very much like you are using These psychic abilities to move things around To do that but even in a lot of experiences You know it's canned right Like one of the early on experiences I saw another review mentioned So I feel a little bit more Not that it's like spoiler you know what I mean But like your dad's really

you a story he leaves the room you hear him and the mom kind of not arguing but like talking about how much there is to do so okay as the baby like i'm gonna clean up the room so you you know look around the out room your blocks maybe it was blocks or not don't quote me on it maybe his laundry you know you focus on it you close your eyes as the character the baby right and you can hear your telepathic and then there's like a ding and they drop like you know put together in a nice little pile or whatever like that's what you're doing inside of this game throughout pulling yourself up. There's a great new narration again. I guess it's Lewis Pullman who must be the baby who's narrating their adventure or whatever. Really well done. It's got pieces that make it should make it

work. I just don't think the narrative is interesting and I don't think the narrative is presented in a way that's engaging and pulls you in. So to I was going to I was going to ask is the actual psychic ability mechanic fun? Like it looked like in the little trailer you're like maybe psychically moving your dog as a baby like playing with it or something like that is is using the psychic powers fun or it's just kind of what moves the story along no it is not fun another damning i think indictment of it right where it's like you are doing canned things again this is a small team small game so it is like at one point i need to scare somebody so it's like all right there's you look around the room you find the thing you can do you move it you close your eyes to levitate it or whatever it is and it's like boom

it's done okay that person's scared and moved around i'm not i wasn't i i i if you were if we tightened all this up and we just made it into something there you go thank you right if we tightened it all up and did all stuff there could be something cool here but like just you're just doing stuff to move the narrative that again is a narrative that i'm not like oh man i gotta see how this turns out to pull it back to the title of this episode right how do you follow up on game of the year yeah did this game have a prayer like i know this is even with what it is seems like it's really undershooting what your expectations were was there a world where we could have gotten a before your eyes follow up that would have met the expectations of, oh man, I love this game.

This was one of my games of the year, have something else that hit that well for you? I don't know. It's a great question. And I think it wades into a fascinating conversation of what, I was talking to somebody recently. And they were like, oh, I want to make a video game. Me and my friends want to make a video game. And I was like, cool, what's the idea? And like, oh, we don't have one yet. Like, you know what I mean? But we think that would be, and I'm like,

oh, like, I'm stupid, as everyone knows, but I don't know how to reverse engineer that. Yeah. Where it's like, for me, it seems like you,

somebody has to come in like, I want to make a video game, and this is the thing. I have a vision. I need a person. I need this and I need that and da-da. And you pull it together and you build that. And so I am ignorant as well on what,

uh, the lead up to before your eyes was and how that all came together. But I do think that like, I imagine someone was super passionate about that. and maybe it had gestated with them for a while to get it there. And I'm not saying nobody was passionate about Goodnight Universe. And again, I'm not, hopefully am odd man out and everybody loves it.

But it is, I wonder how much that gets into it of like, you had that, you know, breakout sensation you wanted to do. And now you want to make another game. So, well,

what's the other idea and how do we do that and how do we figure that out? And then to come to the question, right, in some way the jigs up, right, where it is like, okay, cool, we're going to go do this,

but you're not going to catch people off guard with the mechanic anymore. right, because that was quaint and totally new at the time. And now people know to expect that and that they're going to get something like that out of it. Same thing I would imagine you get into a little bit of an M. Night Shyamalan territory where you go to an M. Night Shyamalan film, you expect a twist at the end, right? Same thing here where it's like, I expect to cry. I expect if I'm playing this kind of game, I'm expecting them to come from my heart, tug on my heartstrings, destroy me in some way.

And so again, maybe that is, this is apparently, you know, it got Mark. maybe look at other people too the same way but it didn't get me yeah it's it's really fun looking at the reviews right because i um just did a google search where the gamer uh com they gave it already lost i think it's a five out of five oh yeah they gave it a 4.5 out of five um and then i have another website here uh checkpoint gaming there are very few reviews but all the ones are binding checkpoint game here gave it a nine out of ten and then the xbox hub as well gave it a nine out of ten and so It's a very fascinating conversation because I'm as somebody who also really love

before your eyes, I'm so interested to jump into this to see if I follow where you're at or if I follow where some of these guys are at because I have some of the same fears based on what you're talking about where we've been having conversations on KFG lately about studios finding their thing, right? What is their thing? When you see an insomnia game, you know what

insomnia game is, right? When I think of Blue Point, I think of remakes or whatever. And I feel like this studio kind of has that thing where it is, we make games or you blink. It's kind of a very funny thing to have because it's just a mechanic. But I feel like there's a crossroads there as far as, all right, we had before your eyes, which used that mechanic to such a great effect.

And to your point, somebody probably had a vision there that might have been gestating and like really hit gold with that original game. But even for me, I think about like, oh, so you're going to do the blinking thing again. I for me, I for myself get worried, right? Of like, all right, do you have the same level of vision? Are you going to be able to capitalize off of this? And when I read a lot of these reviews, I'm like, oh, okay, like, We might have something here, even though I'm looking at checkpoint gaming here,

and the only negative they give is that the blinking mechanic might alienate certain players. But like, for the most part, I think it's really neat that they have a gimmick married with, I guess, the vision of narrative games that have an emotional base to them. Like, I think there is something special there, but it is also so specific that I worry about something that hit me as a surprise of before your eyes. You know, can you do that again with Good Night Universe and your feet? future games. I'm very fascinated to see. Well, I'd love, it's always so tough. There's so many games coming out.

I know how many games we're playing for review right now. I'd love you to kick the tires on it one day and have a conversation about it with me. Like off, or, you know, a spoiler cast, what I'm driving at. Yeah, yeah. It's just a great way. Because, yeah, I'd love to talk about what, I'm just like, well, wasn't this telegraphed here? And, like, why is this? And, like, as soon as this gets introduced, did you not see where we're going to end up here?

Like, you got to do one of those videos where, like, you're the guy, sitting at the table in the middle and then like all the other reviewers are around the edges and you're like in like good night universe and then like all them have to run up to then debate you oh yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah oh my god my nightmare you know what i mean turn into a debate me bro yeah but just the way for video game review i'm always i'm always like oh man i just want to be with everybody else why do i have to be the one i either don't like it or like it too much i don't know what's going out of my life all right madeline we're going to get you off the bench because I want to hear all about Roo Valley.

But before you talk about that, I want to talk to you about patreon.com slash kind of funny and YouTube.com slash kind of funny games where you can get the kind of funny membership, which allows you to get shows ad-free. Speaking of ads, let us tell you about our sponsors. This episode is brought to you by AuraFraim. ORAFraims are the one gift that never get old.

It's the perfect gift to bring your loved ones closer and share memories every single day. No lie, ORAFraim's are undeniably the best gift I have ever given. Families, friends, partners, everyone loves being able to have beautiful frames showing off their loved ones and all of their favorite memories. Orra Frames are incredibly smart and easy to use, allowing you to upload unlimited photos and videos directly from your phone to the frame. Plus, you can order the frame online and preload it with photos and videos using the ORA app, so it's all ready to go right out of the box when you gift it to somebody.

Named number one by wirecutter, you can save on the perfect gift by visitingoraframes.com. For a limited time, listeners can get $20 off their best-selling Carver matte frame with the code, Aura20. That's A-U-R-A-Frams.com promo code, Aura 20. Support the show by mentioning us at checkout. Terms and conditions apply. This episode is brought to you by Shady Rays. Let's Talk Gifts. Not the kind that get tossed in a drawer, but the kind that actually get used.

and appreciated. The holidays are coming up fast, and Shady Ray's sunglasses are an easy win. You don't even need to think about it. I'm doing the work for you. Every pair is polarized, durable and lightweight. They've got a ton of great-looking, high-performance styles that hold up no matter what you throw at them,

and the price way less than you would expect for the quality. And here's what sets them apart. If you lose or break your shades, Shady Rays has your back with their lost and broken protection. No hassle, just a solid guarantee. So whether you're picking up a pair for someone on your list or grabbing one for yourself, Shady Rays makes gifting simple. Quality built looks great and actually worth it.

Start your holiday gifting early and head to ShadyRays.com and use code funny for 35% off polarized sunglasses. Try for yourself the shades rated five stars by over 300,000 people. ShadyRays.com, use code funny. And we're back. With review number two, Roo Valley. It's a game being developed by a Motion Spark Studio, also out tomorrow, published by Alcat Games, which I had to look a little bit into because I hadn't seen any work from a Motion Spark Studio. Like, I couldn't even find details about...

No one knows who these people are. Yeah, it was like one of those ones where I was like, okay, are these formerly Disco-Easian people? Like, what's the story here? I couldn't find much in my little bit of Googling. However, Alcat games, that name sounded very familiar. I'm like, I know who they are. Went to their website. And, of course, they've done multiple CRPGs, including multiple Warhammer 40K games.

They did Warhammer 40K Rogue Trader. They also did some Pathfinder games as well, including Pathfinder, Wrath of the Righteous. They did Pathfinder, Kingmaker, and more. And now they're on the publishing games train, right? Like, they were doing that as development. But now it seems like they're publishing CRPGs specifically, which, again, we're always talking about people having a thing or companies having a thing. Yeah, your identity, right?

Yeah, it seems like their identity here is in CRPG. So I'm very fascinated about this one because when we saw the trailer to Roo Valley, it immediately jumped out at me as somebody who really, really fucks with Disco Elysium. I love that game. If you don't know Disco Elysium, that is a top-down CRPG-style game where you're playing as a detective who is very drunk and hungover in the game. The game involves a lot of reading, or if you have the director's cut, a lot of narration, which is nice. But you're getting into a psyche and doing all these.

these different things. And Rue Valley seems to have a lot of similarities in terms of how it presents, except it has a bit more of a comic book slant to it. But you don't need to hear me talk about it because I'm not even played the game. Madeline Stanley has played the game. Madeline, what did you think of Rue Valley? Yeah. So definitely I came upon this game and Steam Nex Fest over the summer.

Nice. And I think Blessing and I, we have a similar love for Disco Elysium. Also, this game has a time loop mechanic, all up. Forgotten City, which we both love. Oh, nice. So I was like, okay, two of these things that I really love together, I'm also love a mystery, so all of those things together. Overall, just getting to my overall thoughts, I did really like this game.

It didn't quite hit it out of the park for me as far as like a disco alesium, which really blew me away. I think Greg and I are having similar things where sort of the predecessor or the inspiration kind of hit a lot harder than this one. I do think I'm a little bit higher on this. I would probably, I'm like waffling between a seven or seven and a half out of 10 for Rue Valley. I think it has a lot of good bones. There's a lot of things I really like about it.

And then there's a few things where I feel like just didn't quite hit the mark as far as hitting that, yeah, that greatness of the things like Forgotten City or Disco Elysium. I never quite hit those highs. But I still really enjoyed the story, the art style, the all of the narration. the voice acting is really strong. There's just a few little things that I would tweak moving forward. Kevin, if you could rewind the trailer where it was introducing the character, there was like a few seconds back right there. Yeah.

So you're playing as Eugene Harrow. The screen here has like, you know, a lot of personality traits of this character. Madeline, what's like the story premise? What's like, where are you starting off as as Eugene Harrow? Yeah, totally. So you play Eugene. And honestly, Rue Valley is a, is an RPG about a man going to therapy.

And you are going to therapy in the middle of the desert. They're kind of vague about why you're there. Just your therapist is like, I need you to be in isolation in this desert. You're going to therapy. And after your first therapy session, you go through all of checking into your hotel and everything. And then at 847 exactly, there's a giant explosion in the sky far off into the desert. and once that explosion reaches you, your time resets back to the very end at 8 p.m.

at your end of your therapy session. So you start reliving this 47 minutes for the rest of the game in this loop. And the interesting thing, you know, you kind of showed those traits. The RPG nature is actually you choosing your character traits. It's not like skills-based. It's more how you emotionally interact

with the world. So some of the things you can be is like dramatic. You can be paranoid. You can be outgoing. And so you put your points in kind of to give yourself the personality. And then that's what unlocks different conversational trees, different interactions with the people that are in the town. So for instance, something that I really enjoyed is that I made my person like me. So I was very dramatic and emotional. And during my first therapy session, there's an option where he's like, how are you feeling? And you can say it's fine or I'm horrible or something else like that. But because I'm dramatic, I was locked out of being able to like play it off cool and say I'm

fine. I had to go in with like a very emotional overwrought response, which I think is a really fun mechanic to kind of bring those different aspects into it. This might be the most I've been sold on a seven out of ten review. Yeah, so tell me what, so like what, what brings it down? Because, yeah, everything you're saying, I'm like, damn, I got three other things to play, but I want to play this too now. I know.

And here's the thing. It's like, I feel like maybe 7.5 is where when, when Greg and I were chatting right as I finished, I was like a little bit lower on it. And then as I've been collecting my thoughts and writing, I'm like, okay, I'm coming up a little bit more as it's, as the narrative is sticking with me, I think the big knock. for me on this, like the con that kind of puts me down, is that it took me about 11 hours to play through this. And I don't know if it should be that long. And obviously, time loops are tricky, right? Because you're redoing the same thing over and over again. And, you know, we talk about Forgotten

City, for instance, they did a really good job of never making you do the same thing over and over again. You talk to the guy at the beginning and he kind of does all of the things that you've already done in the other loops. And there is a lot of tedium, I think, that comes with a looping narrative. Same conversations and stuff like that. Mm-hmm. I got it. And I do think they do a good job of letting you not have to redo a lot of things, but I think

like thematically, because this game is a lot about depression and mental health and kind of the never-ending loop of that and how do you get out of that and how do you get out of that and How do you make different choices? How do you interact with the people around you when you're experiencing like a poor mental health? And I think it's thematic, but it's not always fun, right? Where there's a certain section where I'm doing something over and over because I'm trying to get a certain outcome. And while it thematically makes sense, I'm like, okay, I get it. Like we can move on to something else.

I'm getting what you're saying. And I do think if this was a closer to like an eight hour experience, I would, I would probably be almost like a full point higher on it. I think I just got a little bit tedious towards the middle end. Is there a gameplay function to the time loop? I feel like most time loop games I play. You mentioned the Forgotten City or I'll even bring in a game like

At Our Wiles. Usually there's a puzzle I'm solving. Usually there's like a, oh, okay, I got to remember this because now I know that this guy will be here at this time. So I'm going to go to him first and do all this shit, right? Like is the time loop there to serve mainly like the story and repetition that? you're talking about or is there like a grand puzzle?

No, so there definitely is a puzzle aspect. And I think that's, that's where the fun of the gameplay comes through. There's kind of two different main gameplay or, or things that you're interacting with, right? So you have the actual puzzle mechanic of why, what is this explosion and how do I get out of this time loop? Like, I don't want to be stuck in this same 47 minutes every day.

So there is that sort of, detective narrative where you're like going to talk to all the people in the town like what do you know about the scientist base that's off to the side of the city is there something going on what's every how does everyone relate to each other and then there's also sort of the emotional narrative of like getting better and and getting escaping your own sort of depression a hole that you're in and making yourself feel better so you kind of are simultaneously doing both of those things and I think they kind of of serve the same purposes, which is really nice. But yeah, you have this sort of mind map and you can set intentions.

And so at any given point, you can kind of decide which order you want to do things. You have a certain amount of points that you can spend to like set your intention to do something. So one of the first things you can do is, um, you see like a camera and you're like, maybe this isn't real and I'm like on the Truman show. I'm not really in a loop. So you can set your attention to like go down. that avenue and see if that's what is going on. And that will bring you to other things.

And you get to choose kind of which direction you're wanting to go. And then, yeah, the loop comes into play where you're like, okay, I learned that so-and-so. Is that this location at this time? But if I don't go there as soon as the loop starts, I can't make it there in time because I only have 47 minutes to get to this location. So if for some reason maybe you talk to a couple people earlier in the day, you don't have enough time to make it to that person before they start doing something that you can't interrupt them. So there is a lot of puzzle based as far as like what to do when, which missions you kind of

want to do first. And then, yeah, where to find people and where to interact with them. I'm so fascinated about that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. This sounds awesome. Is there VO or is it all reading? So it's primarily VO. So all of the people you interact with have Vio, you have your own sort of monologue, which is not voiced, but primarily everything is viewed. Okay, okay. So for you, Madeline, as somebody who's a big fan of Disco Elysium, are there things that you feel like this game could have learned more from Disco Elysium or even other time loop games that exist?

Yeah, I think, and I think, too, this is where expectations play a lot into this, because I think I went into this thinking it was a little bit more Disco Elysium. and where I was going to have a little bit more impact on that my personality traits were going to have a little bit more impact on the story when in fact like it is a it is a one single narrative there's no branching or or choices or anything like you do get different dialogue options depending on those personality traits I gave you like the example I said before so you can say certain things to certain people and you're locked out of saying things to other people because of your personality traits um but they do have a sort of skill check thing, like the dice roll in a disco elysium that it exists, but I ran into it so infrequently. And I failed every single skill check that I ever encountered. I hate that. So I do feel like that mechanic was like a little underbaked or maybe the way I built my

character was broken or something. But I wanted more of that. I love that dice mechanic of like wanting to do something, seeing if you kind of have the right skills to do it and then seeing if you pass or fail. Whereas like in this, in Rue Valley, I didn't really have that thrill of of passing those skill checks because I

failed every single one and also they came up so infrequently that I wasn't really seeing them that often. I want to bring in a couple of super chats. Only special features writes in and says, Madeline Stanley is the best. And then the Portland Kevin writes in and says, hi, Madeline. So I ask for questions. This is why we don't put indie games in the title.

If y'all want to keep writing in to just say hi to Madeline, and you know, feel free. Manila, can you talk to me about the, like, I guess the setting of Rue Valley, specifically, like, I want to hear more about, like, the surrounding characters of the world, but then also is it explorable? Like, how, like, what's, how big is the world? Like, even in comparison to something like Disco Elysium, that's like, you know, not the biggest world, but still, you know, there's exploration to be done there.

Yeah, there definitely is exploration. I would say there's, I think, five or six sort of zones that you can travel. between. So you have like a little car that you can or you can walk you can walk or take a car to different areas. So there's like a little loading screen where you're driving your car and you can get to different areas. It is a little bit smaller than disco Elysium for sure. But there is a lot of explorable things. And I think this is a game that definitely benefits from looking at everything. Right. Like I I'm nosy as part of the reason I love detective games because I'm always like, let me ask you a bunch of questions. Let me look at all your stuff. I want to figure out how to get into

this person's hotel room. So the game definitely benefits from having that sort of mentality of wanting to look at everything, click on everything, see what's going on. And yeah, you benefit a lot. I want to say something that the world itself is really beautiful. I touched on it briefly before. I think this is a really gorgeous looking game. I love the comic book slash hand-drawn art style. There is a section of the game where it's just rained and it's nighttime. And like the reflection of the lights drawn into the ground is just like really, really stunning. I think it is so beautiful looking. And it has obviously a lot of comic book inspiration.

But it's just a really unique looking game. And I really just enjoyed being in the world. All of the characters are very interesting to talk to. everyone kind of has their own flavor. The VO is really good. I think the voice acting is really strong. So you have a good time kind of just getting into these different people, their lives,

why they're here, how they're connected to each other. That definitely like the nosy part of me is like, okay, so you're this person's brother and what's going on with that? But yeah, all of it's beautiful that like that's still right there. You can just see like the little neon on the ground.

It's just really beautiful. Madeline, question for me as I get more and more excited about this. as we talk about it. Is it, is the game doing a good job of keeping all the information that you're gathering? Or is this like, I need a notebook to write people's connections. I would say it does a really good job. I think it's, uh, it's actually the sort of perfect system in my opinion.

You have this mind map. That's where all your intentions are. You will select the one that you're kind of interested in at the moment. And then it kind of gives you a. general thing to go off of. So it might be like, go talk to this person or go to this person's room, something like that. And then if you want even more of a detailed description of like what you should be doing, you can kind of hover over it.

And it will give you an even more like nitty gritty prompt of like what to do next. And then every character also has their own space in the mind map. So everything you learn about them gets written under their card. So as you learn about this girl who's on the screen right now, you, you, you, you, you, you know, oh, she likes comic books. Like that will be filled in. Oh, she works at the front desk. That will get filled in as you learn those different aspects about her.

My other question, as I can see, you get more excited. I've seen a lot of mousing on it. Did you play it with a controller or the steam deck or anything like that? Does that work or is it strictly mouse? So I did both. Yeah, you can do mouse and keyboard. You can do controller. I think it is, it seems more optimized for mouse and keyboard personally.

But the controller is fine. I did disco Elysium on a controller as well. It is Steam Deck compatible as far as I've seen. However, people did complain about how small the type is. So I don't know if they've put in an option to make the font bigger. It is that tiny, like, comic book font that's, like, very little and might be difficult to read for Steam Deck users. I got a few more superchats in. Uncle Memphis writes in and says, hey, Madeline.

Greg Miller writes in and says, Madeline's the best. Last Geek writes in it says, hi, everyone. What's your favorite color? I'd say red Red is my favorite color Although I've been Actually you know what I've been thinking about

Changing up my favorite color Oh my God Because maroon is a color That's like That's one that That was both my middle school colors When I lived in Nigeria And then also my high school colors

And I also really like The maroon as a color So maybe that Or even Veridian I'm gonna throw a veridian out there Do you guys want to answer? I like royal blue This question comes up a lot

Ben loves dark blue So he's always checking to see If I still like Superman blue I like Superman blue I like Superman blue Nice Nice. This might surprise you, but my favorite color is purple. Oh.

And then Veroom Dex writes and it says, Hi, Mad, that's my friend right there, the goat. Hello. Here's what I need. Greg. Yes. I need you to play this game and enjoy it and then pick up Disco Elysium afterwards. Oh, man, Disco Elysium. It's such a good fucking game.

I tried. Oh, it's so good. I tried. I don't know if I came back since the VO. Yeah, I don't know if I came back since the VO. The VO helps. Okay. Because this is really well.

So much. so much. Really well viewed. How long is disco leasing? Oh, probably closer to 20-ish hours. See, this one sounds, I loved the movie Palm Springs. Oh, yeah. Right? So it's like this sounds like that idea and I'm like, oh, okay, I like that.

And the comic book art, the comic book text, like everything, everything about this game, I'm like, yeah, but I just don't know because it's redacted. Now we got a good night universe, then tomorrow I got redacted, then I got another redacted and another redacted and another redacted. So there's a lot going

on to where I would get to Roo Valley, but I want to get to Rue Valley. I mean, what if I tell you that there's a lot of good reviews out there? You know what I mean? Like, of course, Madeline is it's given a 7 slash 7.5 out of 10. I forget if you settled on a number. Do you say 7.5? I think I think I want to say 7.5. Okay, co, cool. And yeah, I'm seeing like a lot of, I guess similar reviews here, right? There's a, the gamer.com meg over here gave it a, a, that gamer got a, we got to figure out the U.X here. Four out of five, because that's the one copy and paste it in the thing. Four out of five.

I went to the actual website. I gave you the information. And then console creatures on their review gave it an eight out of ten. And so everybody's saying good to great here. Yeah. It's not, I don't think it's a quality issue. I think it's just a time issue.

Yeah. Because I'm playing something right now. Yeah. I definitely, if you guys have time, recommend, I do think you would both enjoy it. I do think it's just the length that really kind of pushes it over the edge. Yeah. as far as like i think it would be a much easier sell to be like oh seven eight hours really interesting

story um really beautiful great voice acting like you're like yeah i'm good to go but since it is hitting like the 11 12 hour range i think that is kind of it gets a little i can see it sagging a little bit um i will say i don't know what the price of the game is i tried to find it so i'm not sure what it will end up costing but i definitely like seven out seven out seven point five out of ten is still i still do recommend it especially if you like a time loop if you like um being a detective just finding out things small town slice of life you're saying all the words that i like like that's the crazy thing is like with every single adjective used to describe this game i'm like damn this is a me game like i think both me and gregg probably should check out this game

um i can't find the price but on steam there is a demo uh if you want to download it and check it out for yourself if you're watching or listening um i don't this is a fantastic review about Mitch says it's $30. Yeah, great job, metal. Oh, yeah. Thank you. I do want to say, too, like to, I feel like I didn't talk a lot about like the mental health aspect.

I do think that's like a really interesting component and one of the reasons that the story really works. You do like go to therapy a bunch of times through your loop and sometimes you leave before you really get to do the therapy and sometimes you do it. And like, because I made my character have a lot of similar traits as me. some of the times I would go through therapy and the things that he was saying to me really hit home

there was one time where I actually teared up because I was like, damn, you got me, man, you got me. Hell yeah, that's what I want. Yes. I clear my schedule. Madeline, thank you so much for joining us on this episode and sharing the gospel

of Rue Valley. You're welcome. And Greg, thank you for, I don't know if I'd say sharing the gospel, but talking about Good Night Universe. 20 bucks, by the way, for Good Night Universe. I didn't say that when I was doing. Physical is 20 or 30 bucks. Again, lots of games coming out and so stay tuned to the kind of funny games cast.

Here, let's talk about. More reviews tomorrow. More reviews tomorrow. We're talking about a lot of video games this week on gamescast. Ain't that kind of funny in general. So stay tuned. More reviews Wednesday too. Really?

Wednesday we're doing the dispatch thing. Oh, yeah. So we're doing games cast late so we can play through it and do a review in a little spoiler. I played episodes five to six over the weekend. Oh, what a game. Oh, what a game. You know what I mean? here's the thing

this is what I'll say and this is like maybe a preview to the episode 7 and 8 review before we get there if this game keeps it up

it will be my favorite telltale game that's not made by telltale but you get what I mean it's my favorite one of these possibly right I think it's competing

I think it's what was your favorite before this either walking dead or tails in the borderlands okay actually you know what

probably walking dead because I would say so far this is overtaking tails in the borderlands for me okay I don't I'm not gonna say

it's hitting walking dead level yet but it's knocking on the door oh man i was gonna say walking dead for me season one is so high up there and i love what we're doing in dispatch and again i love the emotional beats they're hitting the fucking whenever they play a song and they let the game go you're like oh my god so fucking riding is so good uh to close out let me read a few more super chats here uh zane mc boss writes and it says dispatch is so good i love it so much same and then deliney twining says hi madeline also love the hair cup bless thank you so much i appreciate it of course this has been the kind of funny games cast.

Oh, before I go, Madeline, where can people find you? Yeah, you can find me everywhere at Matt Exposure. I stream on Twitch, usually on Wednesdays and Sundays. You can find me there at Mad Exposure, but also on Instagram, TikTok, the blue sky, MadExposure everywhere. There you go. Each and every weekday, we get together and talk about the biggest reviews, previews, and topics in video games live on YouTube, Twitch and on podcast services around the globe.

If you love what we do, please support us with the kind of funny membership on Patreon or YouTube to get all of our shows ad-free, watch us record them live, and get a daily exclusive show. Can catch today's KHD on YouTube or podcast services and know then until next time, it's been our pleasure to serve you.