Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - Indiana Jones and the Great Circle Review - Kinda Funny Gamescast

Episode Date: December 6, 2024

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Starting point is 00:00:08 What's up and welcome back to the Kind of Funny Games cast for Thursday, December 5th, 2024. Of course, I'm your host, Tim Gettys. I'm joined today by the Big Daddy himself, Greg Miller. Hello, Timothy. And joining us, it's the best voice in the business. Paris, Lily. What's up, Tim? Always good. Always good to have you, Paris. I'm excited for this crew. I'm excited for the energy that we might bring today as we review Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. Yeah, there is.
Starting point is 00:00:37 He's right there behind you. You'll love that. It's been a long time coming, but we're finally about to give our thoughts on machine games latest. We're doing that because this is the kind of funny games cast each and every weekday. We get together to talk about the biggest
Starting point is 00:00:51 reviews, previews, and topics in video games live on YouTube, Twitch, and 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 you get a daily exclusive show.
Starting point is 00:01:07 that we like to call Gregway. Greg, what did the Gregway's been recently? I reviewed yesterday, they're always a banger with me, all right? First off, today, Snowmike Mike did it. So that's a big one for you, all right, you know, it's going to be crazy.
Starting point is 00:01:18 Yesterday I reviewed Superman, the documentary about Christopher Reeve. You got that going. There's always a fun Benny story in there from that, some video game takes. You know, you got it. I'm reviewing things. I'm talking magic.
Starting point is 00:01:28 I'm having fun over there. And what's cool, if you're a kind of funny member, you can watch the old Gregways as well. You, right now it's the beginning of the month. You went in, you became a kind of funny member. you have literally nine years of content to catch up on. Go for it, everybody.
Starting point is 00:01:39 Nine years of Greg Miller. For a chance to be part of this show, though, no, we can't do it. You can't super chat because we're technically not lies right now. This is a YouTube premiere. Why is that, Greg? Just off the top of your head. They have what I would call a little bit of an funky wonky donkey embargo for this one, of a 4 p.m. Pacific time embargo for Indy.
Starting point is 00:01:59 So usually we say, oh, we'll wait for the games cast, but we want the games cast to be timely and be the most important thing. indie reviews a big deal. So today we're like, you know what? We will pre-record the games cast. We will load it for 4 p.m. We will pop there. Of course, this is the global launch of it in early access as well. December 9th is the official release date, but Xbox does early access. And then of course, depending on where you are in the world, your time zone, even if we're waiting for December 9th, it'd be December 8th in America and so on and so forth. Yeah, yeah. So that's why we're here right now on YouTube.com slash kind of funny games as a premiere. But still,
Starting point is 00:02:33 leave your questions and comments. I'm sure the chat's going to have a great time answering for you. They got to talk on Friday, there's got to be some kind of kind of funny games daily, you know, follow up, right? Exactly. It doesn't really have to. I'm not here either. So I can't, I can't do an FAQ. So actually doesn't make sense. Put him into the back eventually. Go watch Gregway. Yeah. Put him into that chat into those comments and I'll respond there. Remember, we are an 11 person business all about live talk shows. Today you already got, I'm sure, an amazing episode of Kind of Funny Games Daily. And then a stream. There was Mike and blessed looking for love in an FMV game.
Starting point is 00:03:06 Another stream that I'm sure was an absolute classic here. Oh yeah, yeah. You know how it's got to be. And then if you're a kind of funny, remember you're getting today's. Greg way like Greg was saying, it's snow bike Mike. Yeah, Mike.
Starting point is 00:03:15 What's you going to talk about? We'll have to wait and see, but I'm sure it's going to be good. How short is short shorts? He doesn't got short shorts. He's wearing shorts right now. Okay, actually, I'm seeing a lot of thigh. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:03:25 It's good. It's good. Thank you to our Patreon producer. Do you like that he's like Batman? It's like if there's a Xcast set, if there's a green thing, He's just over there in the darkness watching. He's there. He's there.
Starting point is 00:03:35 Thank you to our Patreon producers Delaney Twining and Carl Jacobs. Today we're brought to you by Shady Raisin or Frames, but we'll tell you about that later. For now, let's start with the topic of the show. Tots, Tots, Tots, Tots, Tats, Tats. It's Indiana Jones and the Great Circle developer, Machine Games, publisher, Bethesda. Release date is technically December 9th,
Starting point is 00:03:57 but like Greg was saying, early access is going right now. So that's why we're here with this weird 4 p.m. Pacific embargo. Greg, we have you here. We have Paris here. Mike's just over there listening. Why is that? I think Mike just really likes us. He likes us and he likes video game talks. I think Mike came over and watched
Starting point is 00:04:14 me play Indiana Jones in the Great Circle for a good 45 minutes and so I think he might just want to know how it all shakes out. Yeah, yeah. And you're the only one that got the code. Correct. Yeah, Paris had a code too, obviously. But for kind of funny locals, yeah, we're only one code we shared here at the office. So that that's why it's the cast. Mr. Uncharted
Starting point is 00:04:30 is right now. And And then, and then Paris, of course, you've played it as well. Before we get into your actual thoughts on the game, I do want a little bit of history from the two of you of your history with both Indiana Jones as a franchise, but then also your history with machine games. Oh, okay. Interesting one, yeah. So Paris, and also I want to know, did you beat the game?
Starting point is 00:04:51 Let's start there. Paris. I have not, because we got code kind of late, and it was over the holiday and had family. so I had to kind of power through here during the week. I will finish it. By the time people watch this, I'll be completely done with it, but I had played enough that I feel pretty confident to discuss the game.
Starting point is 00:05:10 I always love getting into the inside baseball of that. Yes, terrible turnaround on this review code. Of course, we're kind of funny. We talk about games in a very different way, I think, than most. Delivered on Friday after Thanksgiving, we are recording the Wednesday following that. So five days, you know what I mean? Maybe if we would have been able to do this at 4 p.m. live,
Starting point is 00:05:28 a sixth day, but still, for a game that has this much going on, pretty shitty embargo for that. But have you beat it, Greg? I have beaten it. Yes. Yeah. 14 hours later, I have rolled credits on The Great Circle. Cool, cool, cool. All right, so Paris.
Starting point is 00:05:41 Indiana Jones. How big a fan are you? Huge. I'm a huge Indiana Jones fan. I literally grew up with Indiana Jones. Raiders of the Lost Ark is one of my favorite movies ever. I have fond memories of, you know, short round. No, Dr. Jones, you know, the whole Templars.
Starting point is 00:05:58 of Doom and Last Crusade was fantastic. Not a fan of the last two movies, though. Kingdom of the Crystal Skull and... Knowledge was their treasure. Yeah. So I come into this basically being a huge fan of the original trilogy, so to speak, but I think the last two movies didn't land where they should. But yeah, I'm, you know, and even the series, the young Indiana Jones stuff, I was a fan of as
Starting point is 00:06:25 well. So, yeah, I'm, I would consider myself a huge fan of Indiana Jones. Greg Miller, what about you and Indy? This is a great question, Timothy, and I had a very big realization playing the game. I enjoy Indiana Jones, full stop. I enjoy watching the movies when they're on and I'll stop and look or whatever, but I would never say I'm a huge fan or a big fan or anything like that. In playing it, I had this really, like, look in the mirror moment of like, oh, the way I feel about Indiana Jones is how you guys always describe how a normal person feels about Ghostbusters. Where it's like, oh, this is, oh, people really, I'm glad everybody enjoys this.
Starting point is 00:06:59 I mean, I enjoy Indiana Jones, but I've never been like, bro, I need to dress as him, I need a whip, I need to do this, I need more, I need more, you know, I've never been that guy for Indiana Jones. I enjoy what I get and move on with my life kind of thing. It's like I was described Jen with Ghostbusters where, you know, eight years ago to Jen, Ghostbusters was a movie she saw once and was had fine feelings about, never thought her life would be defined by it later on. Good Lord.
Starting point is 00:07:25 She'd be unable to escape the No Ghost logo. Exactly. And then we'll that switch over to Machine Games then, Greg. Sure. What's your history fandom of the Wolfenstein Games? My fandom of the Wolfensstein games, I would always say, is non-existent. I've never disliked them, but a first-person shooter, that's a shooter, shooter, shooter, is never been my jam, right? I want a narrative.
Starting point is 00:07:47 I want characters. You've known this. I think people who know me know this quite well. So I have played the Wolfenstein games. for sure beat new order and then it gets hazy on how much I ever did because it strikes me a lot as the same thing with Call of Duty.
Starting point is 00:08:01 Dude, this campaign sounds awesome. I'm going to jump in and I jump in and eventually I'm like, all right, I'm just, I don't like this moment to moment gameplay. So as a huge fan of, you know, uncharted, the pulp action genre, right, that has sprung out of the DNA of Indiana Jones. I was very excited to finally enter into a game
Starting point is 00:08:20 from machine games where I was like from the ground floor, is something that's up my alley. Yeah. It's interesting because I'd say the machine games, Wolfenstein games, are a bit more narrative. They are. They are. They are more shootery. Blascovitz and the Nazi thing and they were fighting giant mecca robots and stuff.
Starting point is 00:08:35 It's just never, like that's just not my cup of tea terms of a narrative, right? Gotcha. Paris, what about you? I'm a fan of machine games as well as far as the Wolfenstein games go. Youngblood was disappointing of them, but first one and then Wolfensine 2 and what was
Starting point is 00:08:53 Was it Old Blood, right? That was kind of like a little DLC thing they had as well. Yeah, I love those. I thought they were great, but Youngblood did not land for me at all, which, and we'll obviously get into this now with Indiana Jones. I was very curious to see how they were going to follow that up.
Starting point is 00:09:11 And here we are. And here we are. Let's get into it. I want the thoughts on the new new on Indiana Jones in the Great Circle. Greg Miller, kick us off. What would you give Indiana Jones in the Great Circle on the Kind of Funny Scale.
Starting point is 00:09:25 On the Kind of Funny scale, I think Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is a 6.5. I think it is an okay video game. I think it's very close to being good. I also think it's very close to being mediocre. The problem I have, which I'm sure I will monologue about many times in this,
Starting point is 00:09:41 and hopefully monologue many times about the things they do right, because there is a lot they do right here. But what I think you see, or at least through my eyes, in my very subjective review, is two things getting mashed together. and you could almost visualize being in the machine games office whiteboard up there and be like,
Starting point is 00:09:59 what is Indiana Jones? It's Harrison Ford. It's the hat. It's the whip. It's adventures. It's temples. It's puzzles. It's this.
Starting point is 00:10:05 Yes. Yes. But that's the movie. What about what is an Indiana Jones video game? And I think they made some choices there that really detract from making this the definitive, oh my God, this is an amazing game. I think the open zone, because it's not open world, but open zone. nature of it is a detriment to it. I think they want you to explore and they give you very few
Starting point is 00:10:29 things to glom onto. I think that they just fail to make exploration fun in this game. I think the game struggles to be intuitive. And I think that's a whole bunch of them piling on video game systems that don't need to be here in terms of, hey, let's have upgrades, hey, let's have currencies, hey, let's have, like, they missed the mark on these and that holds back the entire experience. Wow, that well said. Paris, with your, how many hours have you put into the game? I mean, I think I'm probably 12-ish. Okay, great.
Starting point is 00:11:01 So that's why I know I'm pretty close to being done with it. I'll knock it out tonight. But yeah, about 12 hours, I'm very close to the end of it. So like I said, I had played the vast majority of the game to be fairly confident to give a score here. And ironically enough, I'm listening to Greg. And in my head, I had a lot of these same thoughts. thoughts as I was playing the game. Score wise, I'm probably going to be a little higher and I'm going to say a seven,
Starting point is 00:11:28 but it's the nostalgia of I'm an Indiana Jones fan. That gets it up to a seven. So I struggled a lot with this, like my thoughts about how I was going to present this, because I feel that if you take this as a proper sequel to Raiders of the Lost Arc, fan effingtastic as far as a story goes. This should have been an animated movie, honestly, more so than the game. because of everything that Greg's talking about, they made a mistake with the open zones.
Starting point is 00:11:57 I think this should have been a more linear game because I quickly realized once you got to the Vatican, because I did the preview, so only played like a little snippet of the Vatican during the preview. But now playing it full on, I realize, man, I'm backtracking a lot in this. This is not necessarily fun. I understand what they were trying to do
Starting point is 00:12:20 is from a discovery exploration standpoint because, you know, you go off the beaten path a little bit, you find these secrets, you can kind of get the points, you get the books, you can upgrade indie, stuff like that. I get all of that. It got monotonous, honestly. It really did. I mean, I would get to, you know, something's a puzzle or whatever, and none of the puzzles felt overly challenging, like I was beating my head against the wall. But, you know, I'd have to think a little bit. I'd have to go through my notes to figure, oh, okay, now I see what I need to do and you would solve it. The combat just did not land. It unfortunately, it did not. And that was my work. If you go back and watch the preview when we talked about it then, I was a little concerned then
Starting point is 00:13:00 about the melee and getting into the combat. And it never, even as I upgraded indie, it never advanced to where I was hoping it would be. And again, I bring in the machine games DNA as a first person shooter, you know, single player experience. They didn't do that. I think the best way I can describe this is they tried to be a jack of all trades, but they're a master of none, because there's stealth elements in this, but you didn't really land it. There's melee in it, but you didn't really land it. There's gunplay in it, but you didn't really land it. You know what I mean? The puzzles is probably the strongest gameplay element that they have in here, but they're, they're not enough to carry the game, so to speak, right? Yeah. Positives. The voice acting in this
Starting point is 00:13:49 is fantastic. I mean, again, Troy Baker is Indiana Jones. Troy crush is this. As somebody who knows Troy so well and would consider him a personal friend, right? The way that I'm playing and being like, oh, right, this is Troy. Like, I'm lost in the fact that this is Troy. He's doing such a good job. Being Indiana Jones. Not being Harrison Ford, being Indiana Jones. I think that's incredibly impressive, let alone the cast he's surrounded by, whether it be our big bad villain, right, the late great Tony Todd, who I think they don't do enough with, but he's there, you know, giving you a compelling, interesting what's this character and then gina his a companion there who's out throughout the game
Starting point is 00:14:22 but but to see that's the thing that's why i even said before if this was just an animated indiana jones story it's great they look they nail what makes indiana jones indiana jones the music again the the the characters the voice the comedy everything that is in here they nail that part of it it's that moment to moment gameplay that it they're just wasn't enough here to tie it all together. Because I even said this during the preview, if you walk into this thinking this is uncharted, you're going to be sorely disappointed. But even if you're thinking this is like a Tomb Raider or something that is a full on stealth action game, you're going to be disappointed, unfortunately. And I was really hoping they were going to at least
Starting point is 00:15:07 nail that part of it. Like, I feel like I am Indiana Jones and I'm going on this global adventure. From a story standpoint, yes, from a gameplay standpoint, Like I said, those open zones hold it back. It really does. I think this would have played a lot better if it was just linear, in my personal opinion. I want to stick on story for just one sec. Fine. Because we've got a lot of gameplay stuff to get to.
Starting point is 00:15:30 But stick it on story because Paris is definitely saying it's a highlight. And as an indie fan, he's like the story's hidden for me. This is exactly what I wanted. Greg, you everything you just said about not, you respect indie and respect the stories. Do you think that this is a good story and do you think it's a good Indiana Jones story? I think it's a good story. I think it's a good Indiana Jones story. The problem is, but I'll stick with the story, I swear,
Starting point is 00:15:52 because I do enjoy it, is that they put so much on the wreck. They put so much on the skeleton they've made that when I played the Vatican, and that's the first open zone you get to, right? And again, open world, it's, you can do whatever you want, right? But there's, like, it's just a giant zone
Starting point is 00:16:08 you can work within, right? I did the thing of, I'm Greg Miller. This is how I play the game. I'm doing everything. It's that, you know, moment of like, Indy's like, all right, I should go do this thing. But before then, I got a wrap up. And I'm like, I got you, Indy.
Starting point is 00:16:21 And I go and I'm like, okay, cool, I've done all the main side quests. Like, there's discoveries and stuff like that. But like, the side quests are done. I've done everything, right? And then I went off. When I went to do that, I got back on to the main Great Circle storyline. And it was like, wait, what's happening? Okay.
Starting point is 00:16:36 And it was like, oh, you know what's happening. There's so much video game bloat put to this of side missions and things to go do. You're taking me so far off the golden path that I'm having trouble getting back. on to it. And so what I did was, and I think I had the conversation with you, actually, of that after that first night or when I came in and was talking about this, I'm like, in the next section, I'm just golden pathing it because I'm very perplexed because the side missions reference the main bad guy. So it makes it seem, or the main bad guy for the Vatican, making it seem like their main mission. So can I do it without doing that and da da da and da and
Starting point is 00:17:09 and it sure is shit, you can. You can't. You can just golden path this and do this. The side missions they've created are going to tie back into. of the main path of explaining why this villain in this area has done this or what he's done, which is very cool in theory, but I think in practice gets you so far removed that once I got to the Golden Path and just committed to it, I think it takes a long, I went around the whole, everybody, everybody asked me how this game is immediately, right? So I'm giving everybody updates here and there or whatever. And I think it was day two that I finished in the office and went home and had a section that cooked that literally was like this is what i'm talking about this is
Starting point is 00:17:46 this is great and what what was this section not without saying it paris i know you'll know oh shockingly it was back to back levels that were linear that weren't go do all this stuff it was we're going to rope you through this thing and do this thing and that's happening and you're falling and then bam this is happening you've seen it in trailers but i don't need to spoil what's going on right and i was like that was awesome and so then to get back to the minute that was like the jump start i needed for the main quest to keep you keep going and just golden path, golden path and gold path. And by the end, when we get to where we're going, I think it was like one of those,
Starting point is 00:18:17 okay, cool. I like how this wrapped around and did this. Earlier on, I would have told you, I don't know who's who or what's what or that. Like to get to it, I was like, you know what, this is a good, I like this is an Indiana Jones story. And the traditional these, these fucking Nazis out there trying to find their supernatural things to, you know, win the war. I was like, okay, I like where we got.
Starting point is 00:18:35 And I liked how this developed in the very end. But again, the game gets in the way of itself, which sucks. Paris, any thoughts on story to wrap up that section? I mean, he said the one part that I was going to bring up. There is a part there where it's more linear. And then like, yeah, this totally makes sense. You know, from a story standpoint, it is ironically enough the side stories that kind of hold it back because they seem to be all over the place.
Starting point is 00:19:01 But then they reference this and do you really need to do it? No, you don't. But yeah, you could do it because it'll help you upgrade indie. Okay, I guess I'll do it. But it's, it takes away from the main story, which I think is pretty good because it is classic Indiana Jones. There's, there's Nazis, there's mysteries, there's all that. You have your your sidekick characters, things like that. There's the comedy elements to it that all work.
Starting point is 00:19:27 They totally work. I think anyone that plays this for the story that is an Indiana Jones fan is going to really like it. I really do. I am concerned, because I had an offline conversation. yesterday about this too, where I was like, my main concern is going to be people that are not big fans of Indiana Jones or are brand new to Indiana Jones. I don't know if the gameplay, again, I know we're not talking story, but I don't know if all the other stuff is going to distract you away from a main story that I feel is pretty good. All right. Let's jump over then to gameplay.
Starting point is 00:20:01 That's a big question or not even a big topic. Yeah. What do you think is the most important aspect to gameplay to talk about here. Is it the combat? Is it the traversal, the puzzles? I think in terms of what holds it back, you get into traversal and you get into combat.
Starting point is 00:20:20 Yeah. And I think that's where it really shines through. I think I, again, echo everything we're saying about story and characters. And the game is gorgeous. We haven't mentioned that. The soundtrack is awesome.
Starting point is 00:20:31 You have that. But it is this, these stagnant moments of staleness. that break this thing down and make you go, I don't, this is where it all starts to unravel, right? I felt this much that I made clips to try to demonstrate at least where it is. And these are going to be clips we show and you're going to go,
Starting point is 00:20:50 well, that's how you played it, Gregor, that's how I did it. Right, this is my review and this is how I did it. And I feel like this is how the game pushed me to do it. But this is my thing. And why would I ever do this otherwise to try to, whatever? Kevin, can we start with fighting, the combat one I put up or whatever? the clip you're about to see is a stealth takedown inside of Indiana Jones in the Great Circle, which is how I did everything, because the enemies in this game are dumb.
Starting point is 00:21:15 The AI is bad. The combat is also, I would say, bad. So as you see, I have a sledgehammer here. I'm moving into the section. This is one of the side missions. I need to go to go. I need to go. You come around the corner.
Starting point is 00:21:28 There's going to be a guy at the end here. I'll pause real quick if you can't, Keff. Real quick, note for everybody here. I have a bug here that is now just permanent in my game where my companion, as you will hear, will scream, oh God, over and over again. There's some other, oh, that was too close and oh, God, over and over again.
Starting point is 00:21:45 It will interrupt me talking to other characters. I have reloaded. I have not only, oh, this is bad. I quit out, came back in, redid the thing. Save still has it. I reset the save, because they give you three checkpoints within your save, reset the save, went back, called her, she's, pilots your boat when you're not there,
Starting point is 00:22:05 call her on the boat, same thing. So my game is permanently bugged, at least for the moment, where she will scream, oh God, and that was too close throughout. Meaning, and this not, doesn't matter. That's why she's screaming, oh, God. Anyways, though, let it play, Kev. You see here, this, this is a guard, staring inside of this hole, inside of this fucking hole.
Starting point is 00:22:23 Hey, watching the hole. Just watching the hole, which is not his thing. And so what do I do? I come over here, I hit the button, ream back, boom, hit him in the thing, cave in his skull with this thing, right? Triple H style A triple H tile sledgehammer, right? That is
Starting point is 00:22:37 the gameplay that I did throughout the entire game. Like it is, there are, there's melee fisticuffs in this game, right? You only have to do it, I feel you only have to do it in boss fights or when you're found out,
Starting point is 00:22:51 which we can jump to another clip if you want in a second where I'll tease you. You'll see a thing, but it's only because I screwed something up, right? And then I had to do it or whatever. So I'm stealthing
Starting point is 00:23:02 everybody this way, which, again, the game is dumb, because I'm always having a weapon, right? So I will come around a corner, and even if I see the things start filling in, if they know where I am, I'll do the room check of like, okay, well, there's you and one other guy. If I take you out before you can scream or whatever, no big deal. And I run over there and club them to death with the thing, pick up their club, club the other guy, right? And again, the AI is so bad that you can do this in our studio on this side of the room with Mike over there, and Mike won't understand that I've just done that.
Starting point is 00:23:29 So I'm able to do that part of it, right? So that is combat 101 and for me where it starts and stops. And then the game has all these different pamphlets of, okay. Now you've found this pamphlet and if you want to invest your indie coins, which you're getting from discovering with your camera, you take photos, it gives you like sets of like 40 indie coins. They don't call me Indy coins. Exploration tokens.
Starting point is 00:23:53 I don't know what they are. I was really excited. But they give you these coins that when you get these plantlets, you can go and do it. And guess what? Now you can reload your revolver faster. You can repair your revolver faster. You can reload your double things.
Starting point is 00:24:08 You can have a stronger grapple so it's harder to break out. And I'm literally getting these things going, I haven't done this once in the game. I picked up... You don't need to. I picked up repair kit after repair kit, not understanding what this was for. Finally, in the final section of the game,
Starting point is 00:24:24 I was using my revolver and it jammed. I need a repair kit. I was like, oh, that's what that's for. It's like you're getting all these video. game ass video game tropes that you just don't need to do in this game. So real quick, for me picking these tokens up 40 at a time, right?
Starting point is 00:24:38 At the end of the game right now, I bought everything I've ever gotten, think for it, because why not? At the end of the game right now, I still have 4,800 tokens ready to spend on anything I get. And it's just like, what? What are you talking about? So I want to jump from there, because there's a lot of interesting stuff there.
Starting point is 00:24:54 Paris, like, is there anything that you disagree with with what Greg's saying? And is there anything that you're like wholeheartedly? You're right. And his main theme of what he said, the AI is dumb. I mean, there's just no other way to say it. So much so that it becomes disappointing. So I remember early on in the Vatican. And again, you talk about bugs.
Starting point is 00:25:11 Like I had a bug too. I had to scroll back checkpoints to clear it. And it was no spoilers. But to get in the fountain, it wouldn't let me go in. I was like, I was losing my effing mind. I couldn't figure it out. But anyways, so because I knew, I was like, all right, I got to go back. I was just purposely trying to die.
Starting point is 00:25:29 I just went on rampage mode and I was fighting everybody and shooting people and all that. And people would just stand there and look around. And then they would call a couple of people over and it wouldn't matter. So there was no reactions to anything that I was doing regardless. So it was like you realize this, you're in a game. You're in a game where there's no repercussions to what matters. And see, that's such a problem and a detriment to it is that this is such a great. Indiana Jones performance cast story idea that the fact that all this video game shit gets in
Starting point is 00:26:05 the way of it to make you go, oh, this is just a game, it's horrible. And it's not only bugs, it's design issues, right? One of the things you can unlock off the pamphlet is Lucky Hat. If Indy gets knocked down and he's in his indie outfit because you wear disguises, you can look around and grab your hat and then you get a second win to go at it. Super cool. Very cool on paper. And so Kevin's about to show you, I swung in here, fell by accident because of of course, we'll get back to how unintuitive so many of the systems are, but I swung and fell here, and I was like
Starting point is 00:26:35 I'll fight my way out. Let it play, Kevin. So I'm here, all, cool. I don't never fight, I'm like, okay, I'll punch the show of this guy. He's a gun. I'm down. Okay, that sucks. Oh, wait, because this is, I think, second time I've ever had this pop up maybe. I'm like, oh, right, I have the hat thing. Grab the hat. The two guys walk
Starting point is 00:26:51 away from Indiana Jones who just resurrected from the dead, and he puts on his hat, turns around, I'm ready for them to fight me. They stand there. Like fucking robots with your like what? Why? I just blow this. Oh my God, Greg.
Starting point is 00:27:04 Oh my God. I just blow this Boy Scouts brain out, right? And it's like, so much more violent than I expect. It's one of those like, okay, that's, that sucks. I don't like that. Another thing that sucks, Kevin, if you want to show running with a lemon. This is like, again, exploration, the open. Hold on, hold on, hold on.
Starting point is 00:27:21 Hold on. I want to see this running with a lemon and I want you to explain it. But I want you to do that, Greg. After a word from our sponsors. Isn't it funny how the people we love the most are often the hardest to shop for? Luckily, there's one gift that everyone on your list is sure to enjoy an Aura Digital Picture Frame. Aura Frames make it incredibly easy to share unlimited photos and videos directly from your phone to the frame. When you give an Aura Frame as a gift, you can personalize it and preload it with a thoughtful message and photos using the Aura app,
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Starting point is 00:29:40 cliffhanger here. Maybe the greatest cliffhanger of our time. Greg Miller talked about running with a lemon. What's going on? So don't start it yet, Kev. I think we've talked about combat. We've talked about AI and how neither are great, right? The other big part I have for a game that has these open zones, these worlds to go explore, is that the exploration just isn't fun, and I think and or rewarding, but that can be eye of the holder kind of thing. I think with a clip we're about to see, kind of is a great picture of all of that. So, Kevin, if you want to start, I was walking through the deserts of Gaza. No, no, the Giza, right?
Starting point is 00:30:17 And as you see, I forgot that I was my first time out and about in the open zone. And the Nazis like, oh, there he is. I'm like, oh, I start running. But I was hurt, so I started to heal. And I was like, oh, no. And then pause it right here, Kev. You can't see it because of us being on screen, but there's a stamina meter hidden underneath there.
Starting point is 00:30:32 Because again, in what I would refer to as, we need dumb video game shit in this video game. They're like, we will give Indiana Jones stamina. Which for running, okay, I guess that makes sense. But I don't think you run enough in this game where we really need to worry about that. Then they have it for climbing. Okay, so you're climbing and it starts to get dark.
Starting point is 00:30:51 But if you stop climbing and just hang on the ledge, the stamina fills back in, And you're really never being chased in a way that that's a, like, it's a system that seems to just be there to be there. And one of the reasons I would assume it's there to be there is because if you eat fruit, you can buff your stamina. So I'm walking through, Giza. I am spotted by the Nazis. I take off running because I don't want to fight them because I don't enjoy fighting them. I start to run out of stamina so I eat a piece of fruit and then it switches over to the next piece of fruit, which is this lemon, where I just then continue to,
Starting point is 00:31:25 to just book it to the objective. So please play, Kev. You see me just running. Just Nazis are screaming at me. They're running. They know where I am. We're talking about how I don't like to fight him, so I don't want to do the fight because of the combat.
Starting point is 00:31:37 Then we talk about AI. These guys see me. I'm red. They know I'm bad. I fall in the hole. And you're not in disguise. And they just erase it. They're like, fine, you're here.
Starting point is 00:31:45 You're going to talk to the, you're going to talk to your character and move on the story. And again, that's not fun exploration. That's not fun traversal. That's not fun combat. That's world breaking. feel in terms of I'm eating this lemon.
Starting point is 00:31:58 I eat a lemon. The almond on the lemon is you get punched off the street. Punched by this other Nazi that I then ran past and did. It's like, again, you could say, well, Greg, you're choosing to play that way. You're choosing to break it and run. Sure, I am, but why not just have it be that? You're giving me a, cut the game down from 14 hours to seven hours and have it be nonstop action.
Starting point is 00:32:19 When I was complaining about this in the office, one of the things Nick pointed out is a joke was like, yes, you know, well, how would they have a blueprint? It's not like the Indiana Jones movies are well-paced When in reality, obviously the original trilogy is so, it's like one of the things those movies are lauded for, right? And the fact that they missed the mark this way, To the point again of how unfun exploration is, Kevin, can you show my final clip of boating?
Starting point is 00:32:41 In one of the areas, it is all water, so you need to boat everywhere. And the boating is so boring. And to compare... Pause it. This is again the bug. She's going to scream, oh God. That was too close.
Starting point is 00:32:55 over and over again. So go ahead. Sorry. This is just me trying to get to the next objective. And it's like, what the hell? Like, think of God of war
Starting point is 00:33:04 in that boat and Mimir telling you stories and all this stuff. Occasionally, Gina here will engage with Indy about a conversation about what's going on or where you're going.
Starting point is 00:33:14 But instead I'm doing this and I don't know, you know, I'm using the Xbox built-in thing, so I'm just doing it a minute. You can bring up your paper map and you have to look at it and then you've got to put it down
Starting point is 00:33:23 and then you go. And they're, are fast travel points inside of the open zones, but they're signposts. So you actually have to physically get to the signposts and then choose the sign you want to go to, which annoyed the shit out of me so many times for as much backtracking as Paris already pointed out.
Starting point is 00:33:40 In the preview, I would say in the preview, two of my highlight, I had three highlights that I want to talk to you by here. One of them was, I like the signs. I thought that that was cool. I thought that was a nice, like, in-world way to kind of, a very Indiana Jones way to be able to fast travel.
Starting point is 00:33:56 Yeah. I liked that the map actually, you could pull it up and see where you are, move around as you are moving in the 3D space. Yeah. I'll say my third thing for later
Starting point is 00:34:05 because these two are a bit more connected. In a longer experience, you didn't like that way. Paris, you had your hand raised there. Yeah, I had my hand raised because the map actually annoyed
Starting point is 00:34:14 the shit out of him after a while. Because, again, navigation isn't intuitive. Yep. Like, I noticed in your gameplay, like you constantly had the question mark thing up I had to pull the map up to for that to be highlighted to see so I'm constantly pulling the
Starting point is 00:34:30 map up when I needed directions on where where to go because you're constantly backtracking through these open zones and again I this is why I keep saying this would have played out a lot better as a linear adventure than them trying to make it semi open world because it just it just became boring let's jump let's pull off a thread out of that right you notice that I had my objective on screen at all times. One of the things they're pushing with this Indiana Jones game, of course, is customize it to your heart's content, but they want it to be an exploration.
Starting point is 00:35:00 They want you to kind of have those discovery modes. So stuff on screen is very limited when you start, or depending on what you picked. I picked the middle of the road for adventure and combat. They wanted to be cinematic like the movies. Normal difficulty, right? And what I found was that it wasn't making me feel more like Indiana Jones, because when I stop and I think of any of the open world games you love, right?
Starting point is 00:35:22 It is that you're running and you can go left, you can go right, you can climb over that thing, you go under that thing. You can get where you need to go. Whereas Indiana Jones felt like I turned a corner, oh, it's a fucking dead end. I'm in the boat. There's a, there's a tree here. Turn it around slowly. Get back. So it became really quickly when I'm like, all right, I know the question marks over that way.
Starting point is 00:35:41 I'm going to go, oh, fuck. Well, hold on. Where? How do I, you know what? I'm looking at the map, pulling the map up. I feel like I'm a lost tourist in, in Italy, right? So I was like, I'm going to go in and turn that question mark on and just have. that on and I customized it to have that right.
Starting point is 00:35:54 This goes back to how I think unintuitive this game is to its detriment. Again, you know, video games, when you got these people who want to hate video games, oh, the leg's painted yellow, that things blah, blah, you know what I mean? They're calling these things out that are that way for a
Starting point is 00:36:10 reason, right? So you're not frustrated playing it. The amount of times I'd be in a room, Paris, and I'm like, I don't know what the fuck you want me to do. Go into the menu, go to accessibility, turn on the highlights. Highlight what's interactable. I don't know where you want me to go. I have things pointed down.
Starting point is 00:36:25 I'm in a room. There's spikes coming down in a trap. The woman I'm with is like, oh my God, blah, and then she'll go, that wall, it looks fragile. And it's, again, the same AI. So it's just this crouched character saying that no pointing, no question mark, even with the highlights on, no highlight going up. I died like three or four times in this thing being like, all right, well, I'm going to run to where she is. Only four walls. Then get in front of her.
Starting point is 00:36:52 No, it's like, it was a much bigger room than that. Grab the thing. And I know what a breakable wall looks like in this game. I just could not find it. And it would happen with, oh, yeah, there's a handle here. And there's one over there. And so I'm like, oh, shit. Well, and the other one, it was across the room, run across the room.
Starting point is 00:37:06 This isn't it. Oh, it's right there eventually. It's like there were so many things that get in the way of this feeling like I'm Indiana Jones. It makes me feel like I'm an idiot. You know what I mean? If I had to go to Antonio's office one more goddamn time, I was going to lose my mind. Not to mention, and again, I'm trying to not spoil anything,
Starting point is 00:37:24 but there's another puzzle earlier, earlier on, where you have to get these beacons of light. I don't want to spoil it. But anyways, the point is there was clearly a thing where you have to use the whip. I'm like, okay. But again, it wasn't intuitive on what to do next because I know what the objective is,
Starting point is 00:37:43 but I'm sitting there just scanning the room trying to figure out what's next to do. And it was like, I don't want you to hold my hand, but at least make the level design more intuitive for people to figure it out. I mean, obviously, I eventually figured it out, but it just, it didn't make sense to me. And even during the preview, when I had a chance to talk to someone from machine games, I was pointing that out with something that happened in Giza as well.
Starting point is 00:38:05 I think I said this in the preview where I needed something to complete it, but the game let me get to this point without it. So I'm sitting there banging my head against a wall, not understanding why I can't progress in the game. And there's a, I just think there's multiple examples of that, you know, as I played. I have so many more written down that are that, where it's again, like, all right, cool, uh, there are all these scorpions. Gina's going to use light to scare the scorpions off.
Starting point is 00:38:34 She says as much the light is pointed to this one thing where the scorpions are. I hop to it. The scorpions start stinging me. And then I, it, the light moves a little bit. And I'm like, all right, hop back off. That's not. Hop back in. That's not what she wants.
Starting point is 00:38:47 Run over here. Run over there. Uh, okay. then finally I'm like, okay, wait, climb on this thing that doesn't look like I should climb on it, jump. All right, I'm on the wall. Great. Crawl on the wall. Now there's a piece blocking the next handhold. Okay, I do the 360 turn and look, I don't see anything.
Starting point is 00:39:03 Drop, follow my death. Okay, come back in. Maybe I'm missing. Follow my death. Finally, like, I come off. I'm like, that can't be right. Run around, do stuff. No, come back, get over there, and finally get the camera in the right position that it actually
Starting point is 00:39:16 queued the grapple for the whip. And what it reminded me of so many times, again, being the uncharted fan, it really reminded me of every time we'd get a new uncharted and you would go, oh, man, they fixed something from before. And really, you are playing uncharted one here for machine games of, hey, this is a, there's lots of cool things here, but there's so many little annoyances that games like this have overcome because they've had so many shots at it and they've done so many things with it. And you just don't get that here. You're getting those little mini frustrations. Again, we are bagging on this. I feel like a lot. I'm saying it's an
Starting point is 00:39:47 okay game. When I was playing Indiana Jones, I was usually enjoying it enough. But it was that thing of every time I turned it off, I was never like, I gotta get back to Indiana Jones. I can't wait to see what happens next. I can't wait to do this thing. And after rolling credits, like, again, incredible turnaround time here, right? It was like, well, I'd love to do more side stuff, but then I jumped into the side stuff today. And I have a not game breaking bug, but a game annoying is shit bug of Gita yelling, that was close. Oh God. I'd ever, like, interrupting conversations. I was doing the side mission, right? And Gina, the character starts talking to the guy who needs our help.
Starting point is 00:40:21 And she's like, what do you? Oh, God! And it just cuts the dialogue then. And that's it. The dialogue is over. I don't know what they're trying to like, all right. You know what it is, Greg? It's your point about there's a bunch of little annoyances in here.
Starting point is 00:40:34 And like you said it's 6.5. I'd say it's a 7. But it's those little annoyances that hold it back from being that 8.59 type of game. Sure. Because you can, there's so much there with the care. Again, like we talk about, the character, story, the IP of what this is, this should be a lot better than what it is. And that's the frustrating thing because a lot of these nitpicks that we have right now, these are things
Starting point is 00:40:55 that have been solved in video games a decade ago. So why are we doing this here in 2024 with this game, with the studio, with a Bethesda game, with the IP of Indiana Jones. That's frustrating to me because I was saying to someone offline that if this wasn't, if Indiana Jones was out of this, if this was Chicago Jones. You're not playing this game. I'm just being honest about it. You're playing it because it's Indiana Jones because of the legacy,
Starting point is 00:41:24 the nostalgia of it. If this was no name character and you dropped them into the same game with the same story, you would be so annoyed, you would not play it, unfortunately. Wow.
Starting point is 00:41:35 It's one of those, I'm trying to Google it and get it because I'm so old. I don't remember it, right? What was it, you know, Bethesda famously around Skyrim,
Starting point is 00:41:45 right? Yeah, no, it was to talk about like what every X minutes there should be something interesting when you're out there doing the open world. I'm butchering this. You know what I mean? And I feel like for Todd Howard in this to be a Bethesda game, but Todd Howard would be, or published a game, and Todd Howard to be executive director on it, I feel like that was something that got tossed aside as something that should happen if you're going to have these open zones. It should be interesting. I should want to engage in combat every chance I get because I'm being rewarded. Something's happening.
Starting point is 00:42:13 It's going to be good. I understand that you can toss me my opinion out when I say it but you know how much I enjoy Starfield for what it is when I'm playing Starfield and I'm running from point A to point B especially in shattered space there were so many things that pulled my attention oh that's interesting I want to go do that oh there's combat here
Starting point is 00:42:31 of course I'll fight this thing because I'm going to loot the guy to get something that'll make the next battle easier maybe it's just XP yet yet that doesn't exist here right and again Starfield is one of those of I'm going to go right I'm going to go left I'm going to go over I'm going to go wonder, I'm going to get to the objective I need to. It's off on that horizon. I'm going to find it. Whereas Indiana Jones really does feel like,
Starting point is 00:42:50 fuck, what do you want me to do to get to the, shit, okay, do this thing, blah, blah, blah. So the last thing that I enjoyed quite a bit about my time with the preview was how cool it felt and authentically Indiana Jones it felt that there was weapons everywhere and anything could be a weapon. Where you walk into a room and there's a wine bottle, there's a hammer, there's a shovel, there's whatever.
Starting point is 00:43:08 You can pick it up and hit people with it. And it felt in my very limited time playing. I was like, oh, there's way more than I expect. expected here. How does that play out in the full experience? Paris? I think it's overdone, honestly. I think sure, you can pick up the wine bottle, the random shovel, a toothbrush or whatever, and you hit the guy over the head. But that again goes into the gameplay aspect of it. Like, I feel like you can just cheese it.
Starting point is 00:43:34 And a lot of that played into that, I just pick it, I'll just sneak up behind him. He's not going to turn around. I'll just hit him and boom, boom. And then the big thing of, oh, hide bodies. Why? I'm just, just going to knock out the guy who the same AI that goes back and forth, I'll wait for his ass, knock him out soon and I don't have to worry this. And then to say over and over again, hide bodies, but not have it like metal gear for, I mean, fucking metal gear solid we're talking of being able to put them in a locker or something. Like, no, we mean high bodies just out of sight. Like walking behind a truck and drop off. You wouldn't, you would have expected when a body gets found
Starting point is 00:44:07 and the other, because an alarm does go off, right? They quote unquote get alerted. You're going to just spawn in enemies, right? So you're screwed. So it's going to encourage you to want to actually hide the bodies to be more stealthy stuff like that. That never happens. It, sure, a couple characters get annoyed for a minute. You could run off, come back, and they're right back to their normal routine. It just reminds me so much of, and this is a stretch, but it reminds me so much of Jurassic Park the movie, right? When the dinosaurs realize the fence isn't electrified. When I did it at first, I moved a body and I put it away to, and then I got caught the first time hours in and then I was like wait
Starting point is 00:44:42 you're not there's nobody's dynamically moving this guy's always sitting on the cop this one guy always walks into the door and walks out so just gung gunk all right don't need to pick any of you up because I'm just knocking every human being out as I go which then made the weapons feel slap sticky
Starting point is 00:44:59 and I think again take away from what Indiana Jones is then of course there's like I'm just in so I am in such a I'm going to knock the shit out of everybody thing there's this great moment where I came up the stairs there's a soldier who's just finishing his cycle and I'm like, I can get him and I run over to hit him and he turns
Starting point is 00:45:16 and I was in a disguise as a clergyman he turns and goes, oh hi father and I was like, hello. I'm like, hello, I'll put the bottom. It's like, and I think that might actually be the time where I was like, oh, cool, I'm in a safe spot, no big deal. And I dropped the bottom and I was like,
Starting point is 00:45:32 well, there's a zip line down to the next thing. Like, are they going to care? And I zipline down and it set off the alert. So again, rather than fight these guys, just ran, ran, ran, ran, ran, ran, ran. Eventually got killed like right before the objective,
Starting point is 00:45:44 but guess what? It gave me a save point well beyond where I was, so I just picked back up, no alert, did my thing as a priest. So this game has guns. Yeah. How often did you guys use the guns
Starting point is 00:45:55 and did you enjoy it? I believe, if you don't mind me taking the first one, Paris. I probably had three instances, maybe two instances of using the revolver as an actual pistol and shooting. You saw one there in the clip. I think there was one. boss fight where I was like
Starting point is 00:46:12 you could shoot I think it might have been turned off in the other ones and then I picked up a machine gun once and it shot and it wasn't I didn't like it so I used it as a melee weapon and did that then there's a section in there where you have to shoot like in a boat or whatever but no gun play is not a thing I did in this game whatsoever
Starting point is 00:46:28 so again when it's like here's a painful to do whatever your guns I'm like I don't I don't do that why would I care Paris he nailed it I mean that's literally it I think I had two encounters where I was using revolver It's so funny you said that about the machine gun because I remember, and I think this, again, I don't want to spoil it.
Starting point is 00:46:45 But when you, one of the first times that you'll get it, I was using it. And I was like, hey, this actually works better as melee because I just sneak up behind him and hit him in the back of the head and the gun doesn't break right away. I don't alert everybody. I can just use it as a club. All right, great. I'll do that. All right, Greg, here's the challenge for you.
Starting point is 00:47:03 From a gameplay perspective, was there something you like? Yes, and I'm glad you did that. Again, I know we're bagging on it is event session for a game. that this is always the hardest kind of game. You can see it. You can see, I'm telling you, I can see where this game could have at least been good, let alone great.
Starting point is 00:47:18 You know what I mean? I feel like there's just designed decisions that weren't good. You need to give a shout out, I think, to puzzle design. I think the puzzles are well done here. They are enjoyable. You know, I felt,
Starting point is 00:47:28 to Paris's point, like, they're never, fuck, I am stumped and I'm going to be here for hours figuring this out. Sometimes they are incredibly brain dead of, oh, there's a lockbox here. And then I think I did this in front of Mike.
Starting point is 00:47:41 Oh, there's a lock box here. Like, well, I just walk from into the other room. Oh, there's the piece of paper. The combo is X, Y, and Z. There's a few of those, but there are a few that are like, there was one code breaking section that I was like, I put in the wheels and I got the thing and I looked and I had two set. I was like, oh, man, like, am I going to have to take notes actually to figure this out?
Starting point is 00:47:58 And I was like, oh, wait, hold on. And I did take notes. And I did the thing. I was like, that's great. And there's a few, like, you know, statue puzzles of this and that and figuring it out. And then cranking giant wheels and moving light and using these keys that spin things and it's like, man, this is fun and this feels like Indiana Jones. Again, like if they could have just half the game, we're dropping you in, you go through, you actually fight rather
Starting point is 00:48:20 than 50 enemies you could possibly engage with, that's probably too many. 25 you could actually engage with. We will give you seven that are really well thought out through this, you know, bunker you're going through whatever and you have to figure out different things to do it. Like, that's a way better idea than what they did here, which I feel is just a watered down thing. But puzzles are really good. You know, there is that exploratory. of like, oh, this is fun, this is cool. Again, I don't find the exploration to be rewarding as much. You know, you can go off the beaten path and find this relic
Starting point is 00:48:47 and it's like, cool, I found a relic and you put it away. Okay, and then there's, you know, I think one of the things I complimented Dragon Age so much on was like, you want me to go right, I'm going to go left, and inevitably there's a treasure chest, there's a piece of armor, there's something cool down there. So many times in Indy, oh, you want me to go that way? I'll go, ah, it's a dead end. There's just a, I went down this thing and there's a blown out wall, nothing here,
Starting point is 00:49:06 maybe another melee weapon to pick up, but nothing. that made me go, oh, cool. And even the notes and stuff like that, you're picking up so many recipes. It's like, okay, like, it's quirky a few times, but then you put it in here like, well, why do I want to pick any of this up? It gives me the exploration books or whatever to upgrade indie when I get the thing, I guess, but no. Paris, any thoughts on that the puzzles expanded on what you were saying earlier? Yeah, I mean, the puzzles is the highlight of the game. And I know we've been kind of, you know, more negative Nancy, you know, in this description, but they felt really.
Starting point is 00:49:39 rewarding once you solved a puzzle. I was like, I like this. To your point about going off the beaten path, you know, there was, like you said, there was dead ends and things, but there were sometimes where, oh, a secret. You find this thing. It's like, oh, I am glad that I went off the beaten path and I found this thing. There just wasn't enough of those moments, unfortunately. It's like, again, when I compare this to the movies to, and again, you're trying to, and I think what you said about Nick is probably spot on. There's probably to play it out better as a seven or eight hour experience where maybe I'm not having so many combat moments in the game and you can make them a little more challenging, but fewer, if that makes sense, right, to where it feels more rewarding
Starting point is 00:50:20 that you're doing it. Be Indiana Jones, be that archaeologists and you're solving these riddles and these mysteries and things along the way to get to your ultimate objective, I think, would have worked a lot better. But when you had those moments, they were great. There was just too much of that filler stuff in between getting to those moments. I think it's the best way to explain it. I really, really with what I'm about to say, I want to stick on what this game is, not on what it could have been otherwise. But in the switch between first to third person when it comes to the main gameplay
Starting point is 00:50:57 being first person and when you're on ropes or things like that, it goes to third, would you describe that integration is seamless? It's fine. It never bothered me personally. Yeah, when I was playing it, I want to say it was Barrett, but it might have been Mike watched it. And I was like, honestly playing it, it was never jarring. The most jarring thing for me would be that when you quit out of the game and reload it,
Starting point is 00:51:22 like the main menu will be indie standing there and it'll say continue or your options or whatever. And it's Indy standing there. You're looking at his back or whatever. And it like literally is like where you left off. And so you click it and it'll do this thing where Indies then takes and puts his hat on and then you pop in as indie. And every time it got,
Starting point is 00:51:39 in the beginning, it got me where I'd hit start. I'm like, oh, Ryan, I'm gonna fucking his first person. You know what I mean? I was like, ah,
Starting point is 00:51:45 I got you. And I really wish it wasn't. Like, again, not to get into what it is or what it isn't. Like, I don't think the, I think it's Indiana Jones. You paid for Harrison Ford's likeness,
Starting point is 00:51:56 right? Like, I'd much rather see Indy the entire time and feel like I'm watching the movie than feel like I'm him. And again, when it's indie running around with a fucking lemon in his right hand,
Starting point is 00:52:06 chomping on it while some Nazi kicks him in the head. Like I don't, this doesn't feel like Indiana Jones, which is so heartbreaking because there are the moments when you are like, damn, this feels like Indiana Jones. Like I think, I forget which reveal it was, whatever, maybe a developer showcase, you tell me, where we saw the snow stuff with them on the boat, remember, and there's the grenade and snowing and the Nazi monologues and all that. Yeah, exactly. Like, I remember watching it and be like, I don't know.
Starting point is 00:52:32 That's a section where I'm like, this is hitting. This is hitting really well for how we got here. what we did the performance right before that. Right before it, there was a moment where I was like, okay, I see y'all acting. You're doing something here. I like that. But then we're back to chomping on fucking bread, so I have more health.
Starting point is 00:52:48 Paris, did you like it being first person? Yeah, like I said, I was fine with it being first person. That never took me out of the moment. Like, man, this would have been better if it was, you know, over the shoulder kind of gameplay. I don't think that was the problem at all. I just think they needed more.
Starting point is 00:53:06 or there needed to be the gameplay was too simplified when it came to the combat stuff and i don't think that was because it's in first person i played plenty of first person games where where it was fine so no no issue there well wrapping this up uh do you have any final thoughts on indiana jones in the great circle i i do if i get if i could see one thing because because again i realize as we're talking it just seems like you're like why are you even giving this a seven it sounds like you didn't like it. I'm liking the game. I just, it is what it is. I just see something there that could have been more. And it is Indiana Jones. Again, I cannot praise Troy Baker enough. If I ever get a chance to meet him, it's probably the first thing I'm going to say is like, dude, you literally own this
Starting point is 00:53:54 role. You're Indiana Jones now. I think the puzzles were a lot of fun. I had a great time with that. again, some of you already mentioned it, Greg. I wish there was more Tony Todd in the game. And obviously, RIP with him, but I think he was good. There's great performances in this game as an Indiana Jones adventure. It's fantastic. They nailed that. Machine games nailed Indiana Jones.
Starting point is 00:54:21 There's no complaint here with that. It is the video gamey stuff of it that I have a complaint about whereas I thought it could have been better. And that's just unfortunate. So that's why I landed on seven. Yeah, I think that's, you know, the final thoughts on this right are disappointment. And not that it is a terrible game. It's this, that it's the fact that I feel like they were close.
Starting point is 00:54:44 You can see there's so many, there's so many things they did right, but then they did so much, I feel wrong in terms of making this a video game, video game, which again, isn't bad. It isn't horrible. It just takes away from this end product that I think could have been something really special, getting to be Indiana Jones, play an Indiana Jones movie. But then when it is this, I'm boating around. Like that, I think that's the most interesting thing. I like the puzzles. I like the side stories and again, how they connect to the main thread. But to get to those side stories, to get to those side missions is such a chore and is so not enjoyable. I won't turn
Starting point is 00:55:22 Indiana Jones back on. Now that we're done, now that we're reviewed, it's an uninstall and I move on, which sucks. Because I'd much rather it be, first off, I had two weeks with the game and I did everything or I finished it for a review. That's great. And now I can't wait to go back. But today, loading it up and I'm like, let's go do some side missions.
Starting point is 00:55:39 You know, one of my other reviewer friends said, cool stuff was happening over here. And I thought this one sounded cool when I heard it. I'm going to go do that. I jump in to go do it and I get this bug of Gina saying, oh no, that was close.
Starting point is 00:55:51 Oh, God. That sucks. And I can't fix that. And then even if I could, getting in the boat, you know what I mean? Too few and far. in between.
Starting point is 00:56:01 This is, it's over for me, which sucks. Well, everybody, that is Paris and Greg's thoughts on Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.
Starting point is 00:56:09 Let us know if you are still hyped for this, if you are an indie fan yourself, and anything else you want to talk about here. I'm kind of funny. Thank you so much for hanging out with us for this review and for all of our other reviews. Until next time,
Starting point is 00:56:25 I love you all. Goodbye. It's gang gang, gang. Ha!

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