Kinda Funny Gamescast: Video Game Podcast - Octopath Traveler and Captain Toad Review Impressions - Kinda Funny Gamescast Ep. 178

Episode Date: July 16, 2018

The boys talk about their time with Octopath Traveler, Captain Toad, Bomb Chicken, Fortnite, and more.(Released first to http://www.Patreon.com/KindaFunnyGames Supporters on 07.13.17) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What's up guys? Welcome to the first ever episode 178 of the kind of funny games cast. As always, I'm Tim Geddes. He's joined by one of the coolest dudes in video games, Greg Miller. I'm going to best travel! You're playing right now. You're in a boss fight. I'm up against Ophelia's boss here. How are you feeling?

I got him down. I got three of his five vulnerabilities exposed right now and I'm just bop, pop, pop, pop, you got that spinning thing going on. Yeah, he's not ready to fight me right now. He's like, what's going on? That's how it happens. Yeah. And of course, once again, joining us.

Good, Petty. Hi, glad to be here. Well, thank you. We got the cool great clap for that one. Cool, Greg on the boards, on the ones and twos, as they say. Yeah. Thank you. Kevin setting up for a stream, we're doing Monday. Very excited about all of that. Ladies and gentlemen, this is the Kind of Funny Games cast each and every week right here on YouTube.com slash kind of funny games.

You get to talk about video games, all the things that we love about them. This has been quite the week in video. What a week for videos. Lots of games coming out on today, actually, as a recording, Thursday, July 12th is when a lot of them are actually coming out review embargoes going up. Usually it doesn't line up with our games cast schedule. This is actually very nice that we can talk

about the games instead of just being like, oh, I'm playing something like. I'm doing something. You can't let you know what I'm doing. Maybe I'm kind of funny game too. If you want to support us, you get the show early by going to patreon.com slash kind of funny games. You can watch it live for just one dollar. Just $1 a month allows you to watch four episodes in that

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Do they do podcasts? All the exclusive ones. Oh, the cool, Greg effect. The cool, Greg effect. Yeah, yeah. Oh, man. Let's just get right into it, though.

Oh, Patreon producer Tom Bach. Patreon producer Eric Heights, the men, the myths, the legends. Both of them are fantastic people that helped this show happen. Let's talk about it, great. Okay.

Octopath Traveler. It's here! Finally. The review embargo up today. People ready to download it tomorrow as of our recording. Obviously, everybody freaking out. and everybody freaking out about the reviews today as well.

I've been playing it. Yep. I like it. You know what I mean? It's what we talked about last time I was on the games cast. Of course, I wasn't here last week. Thanks for taking over, boys.

But, you know, Jared, you talked to me about it. I asked you the question basically of like I, it takes a very particular JRP for, that I can get into, I should say, actually. It's a very particular JRP that I can get into. And you talked about this and what you liked from the demo. And obviously, I've heard everyone in the audience loving it. We've seen it, obviously, at a million directs where I look at them. Like, that game looks great.

I just don't know if it'll be for me. And, you know, you laid it out and I was like, if I have no nostalgia for an S&S Final Fantasy or something like that, right, or any kind of JRP in that in that time frame, is it going to be something I'd like? And you said, I think so. And so, yeah, I had it downloaded ready and on the flight back from Canada last week. Yeah, last week I started it. And it was that thing.

I had a six-hour flight. Okay. And so I was like, I'm just going to play this on the flight. And so started in And I'm coming in Pretty much completely blind Outside of the demos we've seen But you haven't played the demos

Correct Yeah I meant demos we've seen On like Nintendo directs Yeah yeah You did not play the demo You did not play the prologue And I didn't do the whole thing of like You know I knew obviously eight paths

Eight different characters They all have their own little stories Your own little reasons for it And starting off not I didn't know research You know what I didn't know I didn't know any of the characters I'm going through who they all are

And what like the gist of their stories are And what like the gist of their stories is. And I was like, all right, this Primrose story seems super interesting. And so if you're not, if you, like everybody has their own different stories and setups. Primrose's setup, right, is that she, as a child, saw her dad murdered by three dudes that each had a crow tattoo somewhere on their body. And then she, you know, was like lost at it. But her life's goal and mission now is to take down these fucking three guys that killed her dad. And so eventually she finds out that, you know, one keeps coming to this like, basically, they don't say this. It's a dancing club, dancer's

A dance hall. With private shows and like, it's a whorehouse, right? And so she's like, I'm gonna fucking become a dancer. I'm gonna become a stripper or a whore whatever you want to put in there. And work in these horrible conditions

for this horrible, creepy fucking man that probably... Who looks like such a that guy? Oh, he's totally... He's like, you come back for me for my private shows. How do you do that with a figure this small? But you look at him, you're like, yes,

that is a rapist. That is what a creepy old rapist looks like. Yeah. And so like, Stop jumping into that like immediately. I'm like, wow, that's some dead of fuckingcation to catching your dad's killers that you're going to go be. And we'll just say dancer at this point.

But again, the subtext of everything here is that it's a full service. I mean, it's more than subtext. They're pretty straight up. He calls her a horror at the end. It's pretty early. I'm thinking of like the conclusion of their thing. Because this was the same storyline that I started with in the demo. Oh, really?

And now that I'm redoing it, like I'm most interested in her. So I started as that one. again so I'm pretty fresh you know as hell this is the guy uh hell ganesh right uh he's yelling at her that naughty mouth of year belongs to me put it where it belongs and if you please me to my satisfaction dot danta who do you think you're speaking to you horror you know what i'm laying it all out i'm like she she calls him master and all this stuff what i what i appreciate like the like dancing like the i dream a genie like my belly's exposed very like uh you see through outfits i love that all of the dancers are all in the same outfit i love that all of the dancers are all in the same

but like she's in red and then her friends in blue and then the rest of them are just all green. It's like, you guys are NPCs. Yeah, you don't matter. I think that's very evocative of old RPGs. That's a place where they're deliberately hopping back because you do have things like you have the dance scene in a couple of other games

where you're going to see situations that are supposed to be considered tawdry or broth alike and you'll see those dancers kind of in the background. But even earlier, like pixel art era. Before that, you're going to see a lot of that. So what drew you to that? The idea of a revenge story.

It sounded like the most, adult, not in the winky sense, but like the most mature storyline there of like, wow, what for a character, the dedication to have that, right? Of like, all right, cool, I'm going to go on deep undercover into this seedy lifestyle and be treated as a sub by my master and a slave by my master. See, that's interesting because I went with the scholar storyline and this is pretty much about a guy whose boss doesn't like him and lost a book. And I actually have been like, I can connect to this.

But I'm appreciative. Yes. I've lost a book. I've lost a book and my boss doesn't like me. Exactly. No, I've popped into that situation. I like when RPGs,

like Octopath Traveler, give you these, everything kind of feels like a side quest in a way, but it all comes together and feels like a sum of more than its parts. Yeah, yeah. Speaking of two, which I've evoked many times, it's really good at that.

It doesn't feel like you're saving the world. It feels like you're saving your life. It feels like you're dealing with your issue. Octopath Traveler leans really heavily into that. Yeah. People talk about whether, you know, why wasn't this a Final Fantasy game? I think there are two reasons for that. One, because Final Fantasy games traditionally are about a big elemental evil you have to destroy.

Second, I think that Square Inix realized that it might be time to, you know, if you have an Octopath Traveller and it takes off and it's really good, then you can have a two and a three. Sure. And an Octabath Traveler, Guy Dan, and Octabath Traveler Monsters. And you know, and you can start a new IP, and they managed to do that. And it looks like successfully. Yeah. Reviews are positive right now. I think the most damning, in quotes, when I've seen, right? It's Jason Chires, which is basically like, it's pretty, what you see is what you get, easy to get into.

It's not that engaging, but he liked it still, right? And that's the boilerplate version of a very long, lengthy, good review from Jason. I don't think that's necessarily wrong. Like, you know what I mean? Like, Primrose, oh my God, I'm so into. And then when I finished chapter one of her story, and it's like, cool, there's a chapter, there's more chapters of her story, obviously, but you should get everybody else first. I'm 10 hours into the game right now.

I should actually stop because I don't want to fuck on my game clock. I'm 10 hours in right now, right? Walking around getting all the other characters and joining all them. And what I'm finding is what you're talking about. I'm like, I'm running into some of these people. I'm like, all right, cool. My dad got killed and I've been having to fuck my master for a while. It really sucks that you just want to be an apothecary to everyone.

Yeah, you want to be a world famous apothecary. And you're clearly in love with your best friend who's, okay, whatever. It's interesting because I'm right there with you where the primro story line. And like it's the most interesting one to me that I've seen. And like, because I did start, I played the other demo. I forgot the other dude's name. But like months ago when I played through his first chapter. And then when I started playing now, I started to someone else.

Yeah. And I was like, yeah, I want to go back to Primrose. Yeah. And it's funny because I'm seeing online a lot of people do not like her story. Really? Or just like, oh, it's so top level and so just like trite and like the same story I've seen a million times. And I totally agree.

But it's like there's something about it. Yeah. I'm here for this. I like this. And even though it's like pretty predictable when it comes to the dialogue and stuff, I love, I mean, this game to me is kind of the sum of its parts of aesthetics.

And I love that it sounds as good as it looks. I love that it's like actual orchestration. And the voiceover is perfect to me where it's like just the right level of cheese. It's fitting what it was trying to be. Exactly. It's fitting what's trying to be. And I love how much VO is in it.

And I love how you can skip it. and it's pretty quick. And so it's like, it kind of allows you to play the game and experience it how you want to, which is great because I feel like all the parts that I would play old games back in the day and be like, I wish this had VEO. Like even for something like Final Fantasy 10,

it had a lot of VEO, but a lot of stuff didn't. I feel like in this game, everything that should have it, even if it's not in a cut scene, does. Otherwise it does the kind of Fire Emblem style like, oh.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I love that. I love the fact that I can get just as much stories I want, that there's a ton of story going on. And not just story being told to the dialogue. But story being told through immersive storytelling, through the world that I'm in, looking around and seeing this place obviously has reasons for the way that it's shaped the way it is. The reason that this is happening. The reason this pathway or this building is here or this person is standing here. Those things all make sense. But I hate when games are so chatty and there's no way out of it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And this one gives me exactly the amount of exposure I prefer. Just hold B right. And the little thing fills in. You can skip everything. And it was like, I'm only using that like the one time I died and came back and I had to listen to the boss again. I was like, all right, well, fuck, skip all this. But it is that it's, what I like about it

and what's interesting about it is, okay, maybe I don't connect with every story. You're not even connected as in the right word. Maybe there's not as engaging as I think how deep primroses is in terms of like, wow, there's a lot of weight to this, right? What I do like about it is that it kind of has a Justice League vibe to me, to it or any ensemble performance where I, like, when, all right, we did primroses, right?

And then when I went to, and the names of skipping me right now too, but then when I went to basically the girl who's Aloy she's got the bow and arrow and she's in like the tribal thing and they're talking like Norse mythology they're talking very like Thor right it was like oh fuck this is kind of like I can see it all coming together of it being the Avengers where everybody I'm playing everybody's intro movie to get them together to go do what we're gonna do like oh I love Spider-Man which is Primrose in this case yeah it's like why the fuck would I ever want to watch a doctor Strange movie yeah yeah when you do give it the shot you're like yeah oh this totally

works I also love how there's a kind of a mix between gravity and goofiness. Sure. And that's something Japanese games have always done sometimes with more success than others. I think it works pretty well here. You can have something that's completely wacky right next to something that's completely melodramatic and they both work. You go back to, you were talking about Final Fantasy 7 earlier. This is a great example of that, you know, arith to eyes, like just murdered, butchered, speared right in front of you.

And then you're like, you drop her into the wire. And then immediately it's time to go snowboarding and fall down the mountain. And it's just like ha ha ha. And those things are right next to each other. This game has that spirit to it. And sometimes it's a little jarring. But for some reason, there's so much darn charm. It still works.

But the way they do it, right? I feel like I can go from Primrose's like Batman, dark and gritty story to, yeah, Alf on the, you know, Apothecary or whatever, right? And it really just is like, man, an apothecary came through once and was really cool. And again, I'm clearly in love with you, my best friend, also apothecary. but I'm sure this game won't ever address that because of, it's very Japanese. But like, all, cool. But it's like the way, since they all are compartmentalized, it is, I'm interested to see when we are assembled and we do move on to see what it is the interactions between them if there are any of how guys.

Yeah, no, definitely. I cannot wait to play more of it. The one thing that I kind of have an issue with is the boss fights can be kind of challenging, which is good. But when you lose, I feel like there's way too much dialogue before boss fights. Well, even then, though, it's like, it's little quality of life things where I'm just like, ah, like I remember like Kingdom Hearts 1 had this huge issue where there'd be these crazy long cutscenes before boss fights and you couldn't skip them. And they address that in future games, which is great. I just hate that now when there's a game that's kind of styled after games even before that. Yeah. Where it's like now there's, it's cut scenes and dialogue where it is all just text base and you it's there should just be a you obviously saw this. You died. Yeah.

Start at the boss fight. And let's touch out a couple of other things that may be obvious to us, but that we kind of skipped over in the discussion. By the way, it's beautiful. Lord, it's gorgeous. It's ridiculously accessible as JRP's go. It does not take long to figure out how to play this game and to get a handle in the combat.

The combat is just deep enough to be engaging, but not so deep that it feels overwhelming. For me, so it's term-based combat, which I'm sure most of you, but I'm going to explain to this to a lot of people, I'm sure, for the first time, who don't play J-R-Pegs. For me, you're talking about quality of life things.

And again, I, you know, in terms of my video game pedigree or whatever, JRP's a very shallow pool, mainly made up by persona games, right? For me, I love the system they're using here in the way that the vulnerabilities, once I discover them for the character, are chronicled beneath them on the bar. And when you use the vulnerabilities, you'll see a shield next to them, right? Which is how many times they're shielded. If you use enough, if it says five and use five of their vulnerabilities, turn over turn, you get a break where they're sitting there with the things over their head where they

won't attack you. Quality of life-wise, for me, persona has this. And again, I can only compare it to persona really, right? In terms of I put hundreds of hours into persona games. Persona has that where you scan the character, you know their weaknesses. But for me, the problem always was, all right, cool. If I'm not like playing it day after day after hour, after minute after minute, I'd forget like, oh, wait, what are, what's there?

And you have to go into a little, you have to go into a menu to find out what's, there's a call up a button, you know, to get that report. And I always hated that. I always wish I could just see it. So to see it at a glance here, especially for a game that, you know, I did five hours of on the plane or whatever, six hours of the plane, then put down, then woke up the next day, played for another hour, then took a couple days off and came, you know what I mean? Like, I haven't found the problem I have with a lot of JRP's of like getting dropped back

into a dungeon and be like, wait, fuck, what? How does this work? It had to be that way to work on Switch. Exactly. Exactly. They seem to have really understood that. Yeah. And we had somebody right into games daily this morning and talking about, hey, will this ever be on

PS4? I don't know, but this was a game that was obviously designed with this, to be a portable experience. I think about, you ever play Crisis Core? I mean, you know, that's a game that was made to be on PSP. Yeah. And it's, it takes advantage of the fact that you can play in little chunks, a little three to five minute bits. And this one definitely, while it's a very long game, can be broken up in almost any way. Yeah, totally. And remain engaging. And I like how they do that with the chapters with each character. Like, not only having so many different characters, but being able to break up and continue along the storyline you're going with or jump around and kind of go through.

I like that and it is very conducive to handheld play. And it's awesome. And going off what you're talking about with the brake modes and stuff and being able to see the vulnerability, I totally agree because it's like usually in RPGs, some character will learn the ability to scan and figure out. But I like that this, that is the battle system for this. It is totally working around this brake mechanic

and it's satisfying as hell. Yeah. I don't know what I'm going to do this year because we've got this, which I haven't played nearly as much of as I want to. And then we got Dragon Quest 11 coming, which is another turn-based 6 trillion-hour JRP that's going to be excellent.

Now, that's not portable though, right? No, that's not yet. It will be on Switch, but it's coming out first on PS4 and PC. And those are the two places you'll be able to play in the beginning. And I honestly will probably play at both places because Drag Quartz is my jam. But I'm looking forward to both of these because they are from a similar kind of DNA,

even though they are not going to be identical experiences. Dragon Quest, if you can believe it, is even more accessible in general than something like Archopath Traveler. It really is just designed so that anyone can play and enjoy it. And I like that about it. But I feel like that anybody that owns a Switch and has ever even thought about a JRP, this is a great place to hop in. It's such a great DNA lineage. It's a little bit of Lunar in there and a little bit of Final Fantasy in there. I love the way that they're making things easy to go back to and make me want to go back to, right?

Because, again, so I was playing on the plane. I'm going to play all five hours of this flight or whatever because we had the tail. We were going fast in them. We're six hours. We're going to, you know, do this. And it was that first thing where, all right, cool. I'm having fun this first hour, but also luminous is on here. And four hours of luminous sounds really.

And I was like, no, fucking keep going. You know what I mean? And it did that thing where I got through Primrose's story, get the next character. And then you learn it like, you know, Primrose's ability. Right. It says she can, like, charm somebody to come along and then summon them in battle and whatever. But then to get the next thing and realize that every character has a path ability. That like all of a sudden it was, oh, like, if somebody,

he's blocking a door, I've got this guy or the Aloid character, right, they can bring out a beast that can attack them and knock them out so I can get through it. And it was like, oh, fuck. When I started, I got a few of those and it was like, okay, let's go all the way back to town one. Oh, I can steal from people now. Let's steal from everybody we can and get all stuff. And that's cool that that stuff

affects both the overworld and the battle system. And I just love that, man. I feel like they really paid attention to, obviously it's in the name of the Octopath Traveler. Like, sure. The characters matter a lot. But I love that it's thought of not just for one side of the game play.

I'd love to sit down with the developers and ask them this question. There's Ultima and Wizardry, a two series that very heavily influenced early Japanese RPG development, especially like turn-based console RPGs. And Ultima 4, which is one of the most influential RPGs in America and Japan in all of history, is about eight very distinctive characters that all have special abilities scattered around a world. And depending on how you answer a quiz at the beginning of the game, literally a personality quiz.

That's awesome. You play as one of them. to go find the other seven and they join you and become your party and everybody has this unique thing they bring to it. I really do wonder if that's where they started with the idea for Octopath Traveler. I'd like to find out. Yeah. In terms of complaints, I guess, just not problems even, but like, you know, things, right? I do feel like what the people were saying about Primrose, even what I'm talking about. It is very surface level, right, where I'm so engaged with her that other people I am a little bit like, all right, Ophelia, like, all right, you know what

mean like I'd rather just focus on one when I when I again not knowing anything other than it's beautiful and everybody says I'm gonna love it jumping in I thought it was gonna be like oh man do you have to play eight eight playthroughs of this game to really get what it's about you know what I mean so to jump in and be like as soon as chapter one finished for her be like all all all right cool find everybody else before you go on really like oh okay so I am getting everybody's experience all right that's interesting uh my only my only real criticism of it in terms of things is the I don't like the map at all I find myself like when it's like cool like I clearly have to go find the next town over here

to get Ophelia or whatever. It's like all right that looks up or whatever and then I'm like kind of wandering around and granted you have to find the signpost that then go up like that and it's just like I feel like there should have been a better way to do this and not that I'm at I'm rarely avoiding battles it's random battles obviously as you go through the map world

it is that annoyance of like all right cool I'm going I went the wrong way double back oh fuck something found me all right cool I got to fight you right now I don't know what I mean yeah I love the dungeon designs though yeah like for all the dungeon that I've played like I just love the look of them and I love how they're laid out. And it does the thing that RPGs do best when you know you're enjoying it is when you see that treasure

chest. Oh yeah. And on the side of you're like, how the fuck that get there? That's way out of my way. I'm gonna get it. I'm gonna fucking good. That is the most square inix thing. Yeah.

Like to have that chest, this poking in it. That goes all the way back again like Dragon Quest one. Have you ever played the original Dragon Quest? You know, again, deep in the history of this company. I just love this. You have the castle that you start in and there's like one, like one, pile of water, one little river, and on the other side is the end of the game. Like sitting like three squares away on the map is the bad guy's castle.

And you start right next to it, but there's a river between you and it. And the entire game is a journey around to that thing. But from the very first moment, you can see that. They are so good at that. They've been doing this at the 1980s, and they still manage to find ways to dangle that in front of your eyes. I think more than anything else, that's why people hated Final Fantasy 13 was because it didn't feel that way. You never felt like there was a big world you were getting to. way that you're just going down the entire time.

15 nails that. And this, and I do think a lot of it's just where the camera is, gives you so many opportunities to do that. And I think we've forgotten that it's not just about pixel art style. When you pull a camera out, you can do things in a game you cannot do when you're close in. And Octopath Travel illustrates it. And that's the thing of like, yeah, especially have you played Ophelia's stuff?

Like, you know, hers is in this like giant church or whatever, like that's ornate and has all the, you know, the flame of the traveler or whatever the hell it's called in the front or the back. Like when I got it and it was like, all right, cool. And they let me free roaming for the first time. I was like, all right, cool. And I'm going into rooms expecting there to be a character or a treasure chest. There isn't. And it's just like, wow, you built this room just to make it seem alive and cool. And then like to walk up to the priest or the clergyman at the front and then go behind him to the flame and have like the wall kind of come in and fade away. I was like, oh, here's, oh, this is, okay, there's a chest there. But it's like,

you made a very detailed level here just to make it seem real and alive. I love the choices they make on when to have it be pixel art and when to have it be more like cinematic lighting and like when these real flames versus like pixel flames it's just like it just makes the world so freaking cool yeah and like I love that they made a game that like backs up that quality of style yeah right because I feel like it'd be super easy for them to just put something out that looks cool but sure this is some more than that I think it might be the most artistically interesting I think it is the most artistically interesting square enix games since final fantasy tactics it does really need things with art.

And I haven't seen them take a risk in that direction this extreme in a long time. I think it really pays off. This is a game that deserves to succeed. Yeah, and I think it's going to. I mean, obviously, IGN gave about a 9-2. Like, I mean, it seems like it obviously. Seth Bacy, shut up. Exactly.

Hypes been there for it. And I think it's deservedly so. And what's fun for me and interesting for me again, after everything we're talking about here, is the fact that I feel like when I inevitably do fall away. Because it was the thing of, all right, cool. It was very much my plan original. for Fortnite, right? Where I was like, I'll play it on the switch

when we're doing stuff and then leave it alone. Where, all right, we landed and I'm finally home. I'm finally at the TV. I'm going to sit down and play the Life is Strange time and Captain Underpants.

We can never remember the fucking name of it. I've been dying for more Fortnite. I'm going to play Fortnite and wake up that morning and be like, fuck, I'm going to put Project Octopath on the giant team. I've been playing it in handheld the entire time. Now I'm going to plug it in and go

and just sit there and play it and have Jen be like, this voice acting is terrible. And I'm like, well, no, not every town sounds like this town. They're talking like Thor for. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. No, there are several things.

It's not perfect. I mean, there's some goofy voice acting. There's some pacing occasionally. It does, I mean, it's a weird one where I feel like it doesn't go full JRP, which where for me it would get too close to the sun and I'd be like out. But it does definitely get up there where I'm like, I know these tropes. I know what this is. The way they're talking.

You know what I mean? Like, it does do. It doesn't feel like paris. I think that's the key for me. It's in the safe spot between being JRP and Western enough, where it's like I can, I'm enjoying my ride here. But you're right, it doesn't feel like self-parody. That's an excellent way to put it to them. It very well could have.

And the reviews are all pretty much glowing. Jason Shire's is the exception that's kind of getting torn apart. And the thing is, if you read his review, it's not bad. Pretty much the point he's making is, hey, people expected this to be Final Fantasy 6-2? It's not. Yeah, it's good. And it's just like that, if that is the worst. trigger you got for this game.

I think it's looking pretty good. Yeah. Now, I haven't been able to put as much time into Octopath Traveler as I wanted to. Sure. Because I've been distracted by one of my old friends. It's Captain Toad. Captain Toad Treasure Tracker. Okay.

Oh my God. I love this fucking game. I loved it on Wii U. Love the hell out of it. But man, playing through it again. It's one of those type of games that even if you played it before, at this point is years ago. came on what, 2013?

2014, I don't remember. It's been long enough that I don't remember all of the things, so I'll get stuck, and I keep having that aha moment of just like, oh, this is what I need to do. And then I'm like, I remember what I remember, like, figured this out the first time. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like seeing an old friend, but what I like about it is it's undeniably better on Switch than it was on Wii U. Oh, expound.

So one of my biggest issues with the Wii U that at the time I was fine with because it's all I knew, is the camera you had to use the gyro shit for with the game pad on the Wii to be able to rotate it and so it's a rotate the kind of world. And I mean, I even remember then wanting to be able to use the right stick. But it didn't ruin the experience for me because it was such a fun novel thing. Like I never expected them to take that fun mini game from Mario 3D world and put it into its own game. But they did. And I was so just enthralled by that. But now being able to just use the right stick like a normal person. Not be on a plane like this.

It makes it so much more satisfying and just like you can kind of just do what you want, what your brain wants to do. It just happens instead of having to think about struggling with the controls. And like that should not be something of a hero game, you know, it's complimented for. But like here it is. An awesome game is now even better. Yeah.

The touchscreen stuff is still there. Good. And what about when you're playing on a TV? So that's the thing is I was like, I can switch back and forth. I'd say I was about halfway here, halfway there. And on the TV, there's no touchscreen, obviously, but you can use your JoyCon or Pro Controller or whatever controller you're using as kind of a Wii remote type thing.

Ah, so you're just pointing. So you just pointing. It's a little weird. I don't recommend playing Captain Toad on the TV. I think it's way more at home in handheld mode because the moment that you need, like the cursors always. always on the screen. Yeah. And it's,

if there's like, if there's different shapes or whatever platforms you need to click on to make rise or fall, um, the thing blocking you is kind of distracting. And I think the worst thing is because the joy cons don't have the,

the, the Wii sensor bar and all that stuff. It just doesn't ever feel quite as good. Precisely. The we, when it had the motion plus. The original Wii moat still good, but it had some issues.

Um, this kind of like, Sometimes I need to hold it in a weird angle to get it going where I want. And I was like, I don't really like it. Just feels like it's not as polished in that part as you want. Exactly. But yeah, in handheld mode, man, I'm all about it. It is a little weird and the switch is a little heavy to be playing, moving the camera around with the right stick,

then having to let go to touch it. Holding it with one hand and also using touchscreen stuff can get a little weird. But when I was just laying in bed, putting it on my lap, like then it was super intuitive and super awesome. So for best friends that have never played Captain Toad, what's the hook? So if you've never played Captain Toad, I ask you, have you played any of the Go games? I ask you this, sir. The Go games on mobile and PSP and PSP and, or PSIDA and, um, did they ever come to Switch? No.

And then on Vito, whatever. So Laura Croft. They're on PlayStation though, too, I mean. And PS4. And Hit Man Go. It's essentially like mini board games where there's specific paths you have to go down. Things are happening and every turn you do something like enemies will move and it's it's straight up just a puzzle game You have to figure out how to get through it all

There's just a star at the end you have to get to and that's how you beat the level But that's not really where the fun is the fun is there's extra challenges on top of it of Do it in three moves do it in six moves Yeah avoid getting the the shy guys alerted and like play it super stealth or kill all the shy guys before you murder the shag guys yeah And then there's In every level, there's three things you need to collect and if you get them all. Like, there's like normal mobile game rules where it's like you can three star the level, but then there's usually like one more challenge.

This has that, the one more challenge, one more challenge on top of that. And now this version, I don't think this was in the Wii version. This must be new because it's based on Odyssey. It's like little pixel toads are hidden in every level. And so you need to find them like just straight up wears Waldo style. And they'll be hidden in really interesting places. So it is just kind of looking at the full level and then kind of using the camera to explore

the full level and the nukes and crannies of it. But it's actually fun, unlike that horrible hospital game we talked about last week. Well, yes. What was that disease hidden object? Yeah, way better than disease hidden object. It is fun and then you just tap on the toad and then you get the toad seal of approval

in your little book. A lot of that noise and it's actually that noise in 8-bit Oh, nice No way, is that Yeah, or is it where he's like I'm Toad? No, it's that

Okay, I can do that It's when he's I can do that No, it's Mario 2 advanced Toad Like the where he's just like Like, I'm egg! You know, that whole thing Oh, I just, I can't, I like Toad

He's always been My favorite of the four to play in games Really? Until he started talking Hit him, my girl Peach And then I hate, Toadstool Oh no, I like, I like Peach I like Princess Toadstool

But Toad's great. Pick up those coins faster, get more lives, got that short jump. It's playing on hard mode, essentially. Oh, I think he's great. I appreciate it. No, I'm all about to tow. But Captain Toad draws from our lineage.

There was a time when puzzle games didn't mean blocks falling down from the sky. You know, pre-1989, you had things like Lolo, for example, and then right out for that games like Chuman Fu or things like Kekul Cubicle and Pengo. And they were all about controlling a board and trying to make things happen and how things interacted there, almost through Goldberg or Berkish in a way. Captain Toad evokes that. Very much so. And the inspiration for Captain Toad and originally the mini game from Super Mario 3D World was the idea of those little miniature Japanese gardens, like whatever Nick has out there with the...

Yeah, the little Zen garden type stuff. It's like that was the inspiration. When you see it, every level, it's kind of this little microcosm of things going on. And I love that the game introduces new mechanics constantly and then we'll just take them away and you don't see him for another 10 levels. but then they introduce it again with this next thing that you learned. And it never feels like, ah, this is like playing through a game and then the final boss is totally different than everything else. You're constantly expecting to learn something new

and like to see the same type of structure in a totally different way. And I think it's super satisfying. And I love it. And I'm taking my time going through wanting to get three stars or whatever, like through every single level. In this version, I didn't get to the new stuff yet, the Mario Odyssey levels that they added. because that's like at the end of the game.

And those bonus levels replace the bonus levels that the Wii version had that was the original mini game in a 3D world. That's fine. Those won't be missed. Yeah, there's a lot of content here. And I'm having a great time going through it. The Where's Waldo thing where you just have to find a little toad.

It's really cool to me because one of my favorite things about playing through Odyssey is the Mario franchise is one of my favorite franchise of all time. I can't tell you the nooks and crannies of Sunshine's levels or Galaxy's levels the way that I can. Mario 64's levels. There's just something about how they were set up and where they hit all the secrets

and how they designed the challenges of like the six different stars and revisiting the same level over and over and over where it's just I wanted to be intimately familiar with everything that level had to offer. Mario Odyssey did that for me in a way that I'd never expected I'd see again in a Mario game. where every single level, I wanted to know where every moon was, where every single thing, every character to talk to because they had something worth giving me. And having to look at the, even the Captain Toad levels, as small as they are in a different way to find where the pixel is, it's satisfying.

And it's just like, especially when you do all the challenges back to back in one level before moving on to the next one. It's just cool because, so I should have said this earlier, the find pixel Toad challenge. is separate from going through. You can't do it in the same run that you're doing the rest of the stuff. Oh, okay, okay. Hop back in and do it. So it's like you need to do everything

you have to play every level twice. And normally I hate that type of shit. Like I like being able to just complete it. That's another reason I loved Odyssey like more than 64 in some ways because 64 there was a lot of stars. Once you got them, you were set back or all the stars.

But I love playing through the level and then immediately having to play through it again to find tow. and being so familiar with like the mechanics of well if I push this up that goes down and all that It makes it really Fun to kind of be like oh I know where I think he is like like knowing how they they design this game He's probably in here and guess what Nintendo's way smarter than me they know I thought that so it's not that It's always just a blind search. I love that's one of the best feelings in video games though

I mean I mean why why we enjoy open world gaming is largely a matter of coming around That corner and finding or looking at it I'll bet you there is something there. And I mean, one of my favorite memories of Breath of the Wild is climbing this immense mountain just because I saw an immense mountain. And it's before I had a lot of stamina. But I found a way to do it. And I climb and I climb and I climb and I am up over the world and I get to the top.

And there's just this single curve blade samurai sword sticking into the summit up there, stuck into the ground like I found nowhere else in the world. And I climb up and pull it out of the ground and look out over the vista of all of Hyrule. I'm like, I did it. Yeah. Being able to do that in a game is localized as Captain Toad, that's really great design. That's impressive and rare. So you're really impressing me here.

I can not wait to see this. I'm all about it. And I'll be honest, I don't think that every level's toads are hidden in the most ingenious places. Like there are something like, all right, well, you were lazy on that one. But I'd say more often than not, I'm surprised by the amount of thought put into the game. And how much fun I'm having replaying. And it feels fresh. It feels like I'm doing it for the first time.

I like the mental image now. Just some guys like Bob wants to go home at 2 in the morning. Yeah, he's like, just fucking put him on the tree. Let's go all. Done. Oh, man. Are you guys looking forward to playing Captain Toad at all? I am.

Yeah, big time. Have you played before? We had done demos and stuff. We're at IGN for it where I was like I was on, I don't think let's plays, but I think I did it at like Comic Cons and stuff like that. And I was always like, this is awesome. And then it came to Wii and I was like, I hate my Wii and I refuse to play it. So when it got announced here, I was totally like, yeah, 100% I mean.

But now it's on there and it's like, I see it on my, my, for lack of better term, cross media bar. I see it there and it's like, well, Octopath, well, Fortnite. Captain Toad, your time will come. Your time will come. It's a game I'll devour portably. Piece by piece, puzzle by puzzle, train ride by train ride. This is made for Switch for me. So, yay.

Captain Toad for Smash Bros. Let's do it, man. Let's get him in there. Don't let him jump, though. Find ways around that. Oh, that'd be amazing if you couldn't jump. I think they're going to do it. Oh, that'd be great if you couldn't jump.

I'm so mad Mega Man can duck. That's true. Greg. Yeah, Fortnite season 5. Just dropped this morning, and boy, have we been playing it. How much did we get excited for this? Nick Scarpino came into work at 9.02 a.m. The stream for it with us.

Andy, can we get you on the Cap Cam for this one? Andy's getting on the Cap Cam. Andy's getting on the Capcom. Hey, it's Sandy. I got a sexy song for him. He's eating a chip instead of talk. Yeah, so we were super excited for Fortnite season 3. obviously all the teases, the real world stuff, worlds collide.

It wasn't so much, I think, any of us were excited for, oh man, worlds collide, the axe, all that shit is just like, man, new Fortnite content. I can't wait to see how the map changes. I can't see what they add. I was thinking more of like, I can't wait for the costumes they were going to put in there. But to wake up today and get a new battle pass, which is great enough, but then to see the golf carts that are there now and have it be, we were doing the stream and it's me driving with, you know, Kev, Nick, and Andy there, and we're just like going over all these hills.

It's, there's golf carts now? Yeah. There was shopping carts before, right? Right, but those were like, they were cheap. No,

they were put in and then taken out and then put back in because it was like, oh, wait, it was like a day or two where something didn't work right, here you go again. But that was very much like,

you're pushing a car with your friend in it, you're getting a little bit of momentum where this is now, hey, it's like, yeah, exactly, what PubG's always had on them

is the vehicles and everything else and now, hey, you have vehicles here. Yeah, it felt like Christmas morning, really. Yeah, that's what you kept saying, yeah.

I could not wake, I could not wake up and update the switch so much so that like at 2 a.m. I'm still on Twitter and I start seeing all these drops. Let me turn on my switch. Get the update. Yeah. And yeah, I woke up and the, they have a really clever way of not creating a whole new area to play in, right? Like it's still the same island. But the way that they change certain areas.

now a desert biome, which used to be Moistymeyer. The bottom right side, which used to be a swamp is essentially now. Just a big desert. Yeah. Anarchy Acres is gone. Now it's just a pool and country club kind of thing. Is a golf cart.

It's a golf course. Yeah. Which is really cool. And on top of a mountain, I forgot when we were flying, there is a big Viking ship that has, you know, worlds collided. Has power been displaced from through these little whirl ribs?

Is Power Man 5,000 playing at all? No. Are you ready for a world? There are porno rips in the world that if you run into them, they drop you from really high up. Random? Yeah, I was going to say, I don't know if they're random. Like we've seen them in our game and Kevin ran through. Or no, then some kids were running through and they were all popping up in the same place.

So I don't know if that's every time. I don't know if it's random with a map, but once you figure out on a map as you're done. So I might utilize them for traversal when you know. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think so. But the golf car is really fun. They did fix a crucial bug, which is known as not a bug, but it's sort of a...

Cheezing. People cheez the system, and it's called the double-pump shotgun move where... Good old double pump. You love a good double pump. It takes wild to fire off a second shot with the pump shotgun. So what people do is they equip two of them. You fire one, you switch to the next weapon, you shoot the other one. It's like back in Halo 2 with the...

That's what he was talking about. Yeah. The same thing I brought up, yeah. So they fixed that, which is... Awesome. Now you have to wait a certain amount of time before you can shoot a shotgun shell from another shotgun that you own, which is just the best. I'm so glad they fixed that. Yeah. So the changes they made to the map, is there a method to the madness in terms of like the story or like does it make sense at all? Or did they just kind of take the, hey, these are the sections people don't really like. Let's try to make them better.

I see both of it really. I what I'm assuming is they looked at areas that they can improve on. And, just figure it out interesting ways to sort of bring in new biomes and new sort of environments. Yeah, I think the worlds collide and the cracks and the way they're using like spatial separation and like things being teleported in and out. I think that's what their explanation is storywise. And I think yeah, but behind the hood I'd have to, or under the hood I should say, I think it's just like, I know it's just my own, but like we never

ever dropped it moisty. Like we always stayed away because there wasn't much over there. So I'm sure it was like. you walk really slow through there. So I'm sure Epic sees all that data of like what's not being used appropriately. Shit. No one's dropping there. Like a Fortnite heat map. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, to see where you're going to put you somewhere else. The other question I got for you is that you played a lot of Halo back in the day. And it's like when new maps came out, that was super exciting. But it's like you always still wanted to be able to go back and play older maps. And it's exciting when they read skin things and bring them back in Halo 3 and all that. Do you think people,

now that we're kind of in this new era of, first person shooter or whatever shooter design and this battle royale stuff do you think people are going to miss the old map or do you think that this is where we're at now where it's like hey this is an ever evolving

like game and like we're not going to miss the old map I see people missing the old map there was a there was on the Fortnite battle royal subred last night there was a video a guy made of he went to every location and his character

and waved goodbye to it just in case it was going to be gone and I mean granted that's being, you know, I'm sure he's being cheesy with it and goofy, but it's like, I'm sure that, yeah, people are going to, like, today when Andy's like, let's drop it, what, what's an, Andy acres called now? What is it called? Golf course, something, or whatever. Lucky links, lucky links. Yeah, yeah, it doesn't matter, but it was like, wait, what? And I was like, oh, fuck, I dropped it anarchy all the time. Like, that was where I dropped the most to go into that back house and get through the roof and come, you know what I mean? And like,

so I don't like miss it, but in a season or two when, whatever, for whatever reason, they flip it back and anarchy's there and greasy grove changes or something like okay. I think it's the same thing where people gravitate and still play, there was that big outcry when they took away the original vanilla wow servers. I feel like that's

sort of that thing where people will prefer the old one just for nostalgia yeah, but no, it's just I don't know, I think Epic's doing the incredible job of finding a new way to keep it refreshing. Yeah. And I think this season five dropping seems to be the biggest the game has been and just Obviously it's a huge game up right and in the public sort of the public knowledge of this game is that it is like

Everybody's playing and everybody's addicted to it But I think this felt like Halo 2 came out Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, like Destiny or Destiny 2 was coming out like this felt like a huge event and Yeah, it's been great so far how much of that do you think is due to it now being on switch now being everywhere and how much do you think it's just due to Fortnite is I think it's just due to fortnight is I think I think it's just a public knowledge. I don't think it's necessarily Switch. I think it's people finally coming around and giving in

and then realizing, oh, season 5 is dropping. What is season 5? It seems like a big deal. People won't shut up about it. What is it? And they see all these skins. They see all these leaks. Yeah.

It's almost like chicken and egg, I think, with a Switch thing. Where I don't think Switch is like the reason it's at fever pitch, but then I also do think it is, if that makes sense, where I feel like for you in particular, right, like, the fucking Nick Kevin and me today, Joey on Twitter. Like, you know, I don't know if Switch, if Switch hadn't happened, I don't think I'd be playing it right now. I don't think we'd care as much.

I don't think we'd be talking about it right now necessarily. I'm not sure we'd be talking about it. I've talked about this before, but I really do believe that more than anything else, the fact that this game is free and resonates with kids. Of course. Yeah, I'm definitely not trying to say that. Oh, no, no. I wasn't trying to implicate it or to indicate that you did.

Thanks, cool, Greg. Sorry. I just think that when we're talking about that cultural event to season five, some of it may just be that if you're going to have anything to talk about at the lunch table with the other eight-year-olds for the next month, then you download season five. Because if you don't, you're not part of what's going on anymore. And since it's free, and since you either own a phone or a PS4 or a switch or a PC, somewhere in your household, you're playing it. And maybe more than anything people like us can do, that's what's really moving it. I haven't seen a game like this resonate with kids since Minecraft.

And this one's designed to, instead of them sit and talk about their big. build or their little private servers, this is about a hundred of them playing at once. I think it's inescapable. If I was a kid right now, there'd be no way I didn't play Fortnite. If I didn't like Fortnite, I would pretend to like Fortnite. Totally. Totally.

You'd have to pretend to like Fortnite right now. It feels like Halo back in the day. Yeah. It was just the thing that everybody did. And then eventually Paul Buckey became that. But this is, I'm getting that same vibe from where you can't avoid it. It's crazy.

I really do wonder what, the ceiling is for it. Like, you know what I mean? How much, where does the hype and excitement and energy run out on it? But like I think, when's the Facebook going to come to kill the Myspace? Yeah,

exactly. It's just, it's, you know, such a perfect timing for them on so many ways. So just like, I think the way Switch did prime a lot of gamers out there and get it back into a lot of people's hands

or into people's hands and then have it drop here, you know, whatever it was 30 days after Switch, give or take. I like the analogy Tim used there, but the question there was PubG the MIS. I think PubG was the Zanga.

Okay, so the Zanga. Like, that was just the, hey, social media is a thing. But then it took MySpace to come and be like, no, but really, though. But then Facebook happened. What song played on your MySpace page when you started it? My own shit, dude. Your own stuff? No kidding.

Hell yeah. Where do we find those Tim Hades original? What's up? And my boot and my boot from my shoe. Speaking of HALO, I've been playing a lot of HALA. Yeah? Back in that? It's great.

It's so much fun. Like, I, I felt out just because, you know, whatever Halo. you know, I don't know what else they can show me. But it feels so goddamn good to play. It's like riding the bike again, Craig. Yeah? They have this awesome mode called Super Fiesta mode. Super Fiesta.

You're been there since day one, but this is all new to me. I'm everybody's probably like, you fucking idiot, Andy. Yeah, so Super Fiesta is just like, it's 4V4 or no, 5 v5. I don't want. But you just spawn with a random weapon. And there's like 48,000 fucking weapons in this goddamn weapon.

They have like, they have like, the new battle rifle, the Halo 2 battle rifle. Oh really? New pistol, the Halo 1 pistol, later, it's everything. And you just sort of, and there's so many maps too, where you're either playing a new map or you're playing an HD version remake of Hang'em High or rat race from the earlier Halo games. But then you'll play a new map that's like, oh, this is kind of like midship, and then they'll straight up have you play Ascension or like an old Halo 2 map. That's awesome.

It's insane and really fun and, uh, and they also do this. thing where similar to what game I'm thinking of? I can't even the game. Stubbs the zombie. No, they have a seasonal sort of content where it's like for three weeks out of time. Oh, like, I guess like Fortnite where it's like they have 50 v. 50 mode

or whatever. Halo will do like, hey, we have a Halo 3 playlist mode and it's all BRs. It's all battle records. Or they'll do shoddy snipes mode for a couple weeks. And then once that's done, they'll move on to

whatever the fuck, rockets only. You know, like, you have all these sort of cool ways to kind of bring you back and kind of get you interested in the game. When it comes to Super Fiesta mode, is it the randomness that draws you in? Yeah, because the thing about Super Fiesta is generally, me and my brother and my friends aren't as good as people playing.

Okay. But Super Fiesta, you can spawn with a rocket a whole bunch. Okay. And feel and sort of have that advantage. Or you, you know, you follow the sniper and it's game over for the other team. Hell yeah, dude. Do you play Smash Brothers with items on?

No, but if I want to have fun, I'll do Pokemon only. You're halfway there. You're almost there. Smash Brothers with items on is a super fiesta of Smash Bros. It's fun. It's fun, yeah. It's a lot of fun. Have you played with Finning in at all?

Halo 5? He plays like every night. Really? Yeah. That man loves him. You should hit him up. Yeah. I'll be so bad, though.

He'll help you. He's supposedly really good. I don't trust him ever, but. I heard of him. A viable rumor that he has Master Chief's helmet tattooed on his right buttock. I can confirm that as not sure. I believe it. You've been looking at this?

Kevin. It's your time. Big Kevin! Another game came out on Switch on this beautiful Thursday, July 12th. Bomb chicken. Don't come out? Or is it an embargo? I'm 90.

Cool. Yeah. I'm just double checking. I'm just making sure. Because I remember that the three Switch games are coming on. the same day. July 12th. Okay.

Okay. Oh, if it's out, then it's out. Sure. I just, I don't remember reading it on games daily today. Get on that shock mic. I'm on it. Go ahead and sit down.

What's up? So what we can't talk about for sure is bomb chicken is a game. Hold off on any in-depth coverage until July 12th. Launch on July 12th. Bomb chicken. Yeah. A game that Kevin and I play at GBC. Yeah.

During the Nindy's event. Yeah. Really enjoy the demos. A lot of fun. Puzzle platformer where you're this fucking chicken. You're just going through. Yep. And then it's like it's just

you move with the analog or d-pad and then it's one button. One button. Any button you hit. Any button. It lays a bomb. If you let the bomb explode, Metroid rules,

you kind of bounce around with it. Ooh, fine. You can like stack the bombs so you can have up to... What do you mean the Metroid rule? If it, the bomb things, it bounces you? No, it doesn't.

Okay. You've been playing more than I. It's like an egg where you, like, you lay an egg and you're now on top of it. So if you immediately drop six, like you've put yourself higher and then you can, run to the platform that you want to get to, but you got to get away from them because they

will explode and kill you. Another thing you can do is like lay a bunch of, you know, drop a bunch of bombs, go to the left and kick it and like that'll shoot it off to whatever side you kick it to. So it's not like explosion man where you're being propelled by your own explosions. It's the opposite of what I say. Yeah. So we were super all about it. Super all about it. I could not wait to get my hands on it.

It looks like a Kevin-ass game where it's like a lot of environment puzzles. He's a GoPro. Yeah. And? It's more of a platformer than I thought it would be. And I got to tell you, I got these dumb fucking useless fat fingers that just won't do what I want them to. So I played it for a solid like two, maybe even four hours. I was trying my hardest to get into it, but I couldn't.

Some about it, like, I'm not enjoying it nearly as much they did with the short demo that we did where I was like, oh, this is awesome. You know, actually, I don't know if I even played the demo. I think I just watched you. And I was like, oh, I want to do that. But yeah, it's too much of a platformer for me. Yeah, see, I'm a platformer guy. Puzzles I'm down with, but I'm definitely on the platform side. The puzzles are all very simple.

Like, you're not using your noggin as much as I'd want to. So it's all about the hand-eye coordination. Exactly. The puzzles that I encountered were more like, okay, throw the bombs to break the rock because there's little cracked squares where you're like, all right. So you can push bombs on them, hit them, and now you're, you got to time it so that like this saw that's like rotating around that you can jump over it and as it does another loop go through the hole and I'm just I'm terrible at like platforming.

This sounds like my jam. That sounds like my jam right here. Yeah, I think you might like you. You should try. You should try. I play this. So that's the things. Do you still recommend it to people to give it a shot?

Not if you like the kind of games that I, you know, like the kind of puzzle games that I'm always pushing for. I played two to four hours of it I don't know that I'll play it again So yeah What's a good comparison for a puzzle game That you'd hope that would be like Kevin Just to give me an idea

The kind of game I think about that I mean I don't know like Death Squared Where it's like Or like snake pass where it's like All right the controls might be tricky But once you get the hang of it It is about like trying to figure out How do I swing this, you move this character

In a certain way where I can get into this part Death Squared is a good one It is very similar to like If you combine death square with almost Celeste I would say but a way simpler Celeste

Yeah I like that idea a lot Because I kind of like a shriveled Raisin where that part of my brain is Where you're supposed to solve puzzles So this may be a very good game for me Actually Captain Joe You want to play a little bit of right now

Bring it over What bring it over here right now? No I'm not good at talking and play At the same time We take you, Kev And we play And we'd be talking Next game

There's two games here They're going to talk about Back to Back to Back Old games That we just fucking should have been playing a lot more of. Number one. Oh yeah. Rocket League. Sure. Of course.

So, full disclosure, we're obviously teaming up with Cionics. They hired us to come host their Rocket League third birthday party down at Peco Park. If you're in San Diego for Comic Con, it's Thursday. 3 to 9 p.m. It's free. Open to the public. You should come hang out. It's kind of funny. It's

Xavier Woods. It's a whole bunch of cool people doing cool things. Thursday, July 19th? Correct. Oh, that's a birthday. Oh. Bring her down. San Diego. Love! this time of year. So yeah, obviously we're doing the thing. So we did a party mode

that's up on patreon.com slash kind of funny games right now and that was like part of the deal, right? I'm like, we're doing this, we're going to do all this stuff. Well,

it's not part of the deal. We were fucking love that game. Yeah, and it would be like, why don't we play it for? And that's the thing about it. I put it on the list because we did the party mode and it was that thing of like,

fuck, we played, we remember a long, long, long, long time ago. We did a, a Twitch let's play of Rocket League three months or so before it came out. It was me, Colin, Dunham, Doug Perry.

You guys came in. Nick and Tim, you played with us and stuff. And we had such a great time. And that was really the one that said it for me of like, I fucking love Rocket League. I can't wait to play more Rocket League. And the story goes that Rocket League came out. And it was that PlayStation Plus game.

We were at an event, came back. I downloaded it and started playing online. And everybody was so much better than me. So I was just getting curb stomped left and right. And I was like, all right, boat passing me out. This isn't a game for me anymore. And of course, you know, at IGN, we covered all the DLC and stuff. I remember when they put the Batman v. Superman cars and the fact they've never stopped.

The game's been a runaway success. I don't need to recap any of that. So it sounds stupid for us to be like, man, what a great game. But it was when I think we rode off as it will never be good at. And when it came to Switch, I made, I was like, man, basically what is happening with us in Fortnite now and what will happen with Smash. And like, this is awesome. We should all get it. And we should play it at the, you know, at the end.

end of the days and stuff and yada yada yada and we got codes and we downloaded and i didn't touch it until we were getting ready warmed up for that where i needed to play and get my wits about me again team fat flags in rocket league of course go get it um and so yeah we did all the sponsored stuff but it was i wanted to talk about it here not as not part of the sponsorship because you know obviously we tell you uh just like holy shit god damn we need to play more of that game yeah because it was so much fucking fun watching y'all play that party mode that you were screening at the day i don't think i've ever seen you all have more fun i i i you were just you were giddy. It's that thing of, I think

to jump online in Rocket League is similar to jump online in Fortnite of, not know what you're doing. You're going to get clowned out and it's going to be a pain in the butt, right? But to sit down with your friends who are all equal footing for the most part, right? You know, Andy could not figure out how to fucking jump and twirl. Like, I'm telling him over and over again.

Yeah. That was such a great time in seeing us all figured out and seeing it go from me and Nick winning that first match to you. Dominating me. To you and Andy coming with, you figured it out. It clicked for me and I'm like, oh, I can fucking do this. You know, we did the one party mode and then it was, it's the rare occasion where we did the one party mode. And at the end, Kevin was like, oh, fuck.

There's no audio on the video. The video is corrupted. And I'm not going to know for two hours. We spent an hour making the party mode. And it was so fun and so good. And then the video got corrupted. We were like, fuck, it was a busy day. We had to play it again.

Well, we did something in between it, right? Didn't we do another podcast or something? We did an MCU and review. Right. In between. XCU interview. Yeah. And then we came back to do party mode again.

And then it was like, fuck, we have to do it again. And it was like, we were tired. as hell, but it was also like, so what happened was, we went there like, we have to re-record it. So we recorded again and maybe 10 minutes in, Kevin's like, hey, I fixed the corruption. We're good. We don't need to keep going. And we all caught him. We're all kind of.

Yeah, well, let's just do it. We'll just keep going. And it's just like, it's the same thing of Fortnite really, where I can just see where I could totally lose myself to that game. Where it was, as soon as it was done, like, yeah, you know, I was driving the Delorean. I had my team fat flag. not on the Delorean because you can't do that. But it was that thing of like, fuck, I never bought the Batmobile.

I should go buy the bat. I'm like, wait, am I, what is my real commitment to Rocket League going forward? Is this going to be a thing we play as an office? Because if so, then fuck yes. Let's go get everything. Rocket League is an arcade game. We live in an age where very few new arcade games are made and even fewer are ever featured. Fundamentally, that's a four-player multiplayer multiplayer arcade game.

It's the kind of thing that in a parallel universe is standing at some mall in 1994 with four-linked cabinets. some people are playing it. You can understand what you're supposed to do in seconds and the controls are as simple as you can possibly possibly imagine and yet you can play it for as some people do thousands of hours.

That is a rare beautiful thing in gaming and the fact that you found a way to get over that hump, that barrier of entry you've talked about. That's extraordinary. I love Rocket League. I'm not a good at it. I love it.

Exactly. What was fascinating about us playing it is you can see in the party mode where it's learning to walk where I'm not using the follow ball cam, not that I'm saying, I'm better than you guys, you know,

clearly that was better thing where I'm like, I'm going back in the field, playing the ball, moving up on it, jumping as the ball descends, and I go to what would be, and I go underneath it.

And it's like, oh man, once I get the timing down on that one, but it wasn't, it was like, you watch that thing and it is a bunch of this,

you know what I do it on scores even where I didn't think I was going to get it. And it's like, man, it's all just a second off. And you can see where you can narrow those gaps and fucking start nailing it. And even besides things like that, because like that, I feel like none of us actually got ever even hit that point. Like I would say like the, the walk analogy is good, but it's like I feel like we're still. Oh, we're still totally crawling. We're crawling. But it's like learning the, not even just the kind of momentum and physics of how you move, but also just the different things you can do. Like, all right, I could hit the ball or I could just jam into Nick and blow him up. Yeah. To stop him from going. It's like, it's that type of strategy where I'm like, this is really freaking cool. And also that one. And also that one. emergent idiocity because even failure can be fun in Rocket League when you have something like Andy blocking his own shot for example and stuff like that that's

extraordinary yeah and yes it's dumb and you get mad at yourself but at the same time you're like that was my fault this is a skill based game I didn't get screwed there I screwed myself yeah that means I can get better yeah exactly exactly so the next game it's a weird one to be bringing up on this show super smash brothers for the 3d yes that's right there's that's where it gets weird Jude, why? So I had to go to L.A. last week to do an interview for IGN. And I got a chance to meet Yuji Hori, which was awesome.

And I'll be writing about that later for IGN. But in the course of that trip, I reached from my switch, and I said, no. And I grabbed my 3DS. And I stuck Super Smash Brothers in it and took it along with me. Now, which 3DS are you playing on? Okay, I was playing on a 3DS XL, my big pink XL. Not a new one. Not a new.

So you don't even have a nub. I don't even have the nub. up. So yeah, I know. And that's actually what was, it had been a long time since I had played that and sitting there trying to do the Smashes with the Circle Pad. And I was delighted to discover

that it was way better. I'd always enjoyed it. But I was delighted to discover that I slipped right back in. And it had been a long time since I played. I did not get to play Smash Brothers at E3 this year. I was in a point in time. So I never got to touch it. And I was like, I cannot wait for this game.

But I was grabbed by how well implemented it was, even with those limited controls. And really what it did was just wet my appetite. I wanted to take my switch with me, but I couldn't play Smash Brothers on it. And that's what I found myself thinking the whole time. It was like, this is great. They did so well within these limitations. I cannot wait for this wonder. Can we just fast forward the next few months?

I've said it a million times. But Sakurai is definitely my favorite game director of all time. The love and care that he puts into his games is just on a totally different level. And the fact that Smash Bros. 3DS exists is a testament to that. I'm sure there was meetings in Nintendo that were like, you know what? We can't just put it out on Wii. That will not do enough. Me being the type of person I am, I looked up sales numbers for Super Smash Bros.

Wii U and 3DS last night, just so I had an idea. And total, we're looking at about, it's going to hit 15 million by the end of the year. The 3DS version still is selling about 80K units. Oh wow. Like consistently, like every month or whatever. And when you break that down, I think that 10 million of them were 3DS sales and the rest was Wii U, which was still a crazy attach rate for... For Wii U, yeah.

Systems were sold. And there was a reset out of a thread about how many copies is Smash ultimately going to sell on Switch. And it's like, it is kind of crazy because the last number was adding two together. But when you look at Smash, each iteration of the game has sold a lot of more than the last. And the thread was brought up was like, is this going to sell 25 million units? Which has previously been reserved for Mario Kart type numbers.

Yeah, I think it will in the long run. I think we're looking at several years from now. But I think it will. I definitely think that it will. This is going to be a game that launches the second wave of Switch ownership, I think. This is going to be a much app game. Let's go PC2 and Evie.

But I think people that own one are going to own the other. Not entirely invariably, but I think you're going to have like 70% overlap between those two groups of people. Is it going to be games that people just have to have them when they experience them? I was also really impressed looking at that. It had been a wall since I picked it up by it.

Nintendo just must have the best engineers on the planet Earth. That game shouldn't exist. There should be smoke coming out of my 3BES to make that thing function. No ice climbers. Yeah. I think about like Mario Card 8 and how great it looked on Wii and how it looked in many ways better

than most PS4 and Xbox 1 games that were coming out contemporaneously. with it. And now I look at this on my 3DS and I'm like, I can't wait to see how perfect. This is going to be when they're the power of a switch behind it. I never really loved the look of the 3DS match, but I agree with what you're saying because like adding the black outline to the characters. It's like that is a perfect example of them understanding they can't just have the exact same game on the 3DS small screen and like the look the 3DS has. And also just changing the levels and having it be like again,

And going back to Sackrad just being so extra with everything. Like, I love how the 3DS levels were different for the most part than the Wii U levels. And they were based on handheld games instead of being based on console games. And just like little things like that are just like so awesome. I do say, I do believe that the game would, the Wii U version would have been better if the 3DS one didn't exist. But I don't think that it would have sold as much. And we wouldn't be where we're at now getting Smash Ultimate with all the characters. I don't think there's a universe where they didn't make the 3DS one because.

because they had such an install base at that point around the 3DS when they did it. I think the decision was made earlier than the Wii use failure, that they looked already just when we are going to do this on both platforms. You also had wonderful things like the fact that I could just pick up a 3DS at IGN one day

when there was a five-player game of Smash going on and suddenly it was a six-player game of Smash because I could literally use the thing as a controller. That was a weird feature. It was weird. It was rad. It worked great. It was great. It was there. You're in. I mean, you want to play an eight-player game of Smash. You got some 3DSs laying around at The biggest problem, when you said this earlier, but smash is just not made for the control scheme of the 3DS.

And even the new 3DS, like that little weird C-stick nub thing, like, it's still not good. I can deliver a smash with it, though. Yeah, that thing is like the 3DS game, I've played that for countless hours. I probably put 50 hours into the 3DS match, let alone the Wii you won. And it's like, man, no one, the Ultimates coming. I can't fucking wait, baby. Let's go. You got three more games here.

Yeah. This is the Jared Petty Mobile Game section. Jared Benny. Mobile games. What the fuck is Polesl Slide story. Yeah, all right. So I need to start

sending these to you a few days before so you guys can play so I'm not just preaching about these games. So I'll be quick. It's a Kerosoft game, Keterosoft. Yeah, you know the Keterosoft. Game Dev story.

Exactly, game best story. And I've talked about some of the other stuff on here. Is it pool side or pool slide? Pull slide story. Am I running a water park in this? You are? Downloading now. Yeah, that's it.

Are you fucking kidding me right now? It's Karasoft. It's five bucks. It's a pre-estest. Download knowing that purchases you get the whole game right off build a waterpark That's the game it's kerosoft so it's a perfect I was gonna say you need to know no Sirens are on our end by the way so our sirens not yours we'll wait for those to go by here and then continue but yeah Kerosoft makes Sim type games that it's like hey here's a budget here's some visitors and lay out a little park

Oh my god it's adorable it's so good they're colorful they're simple they're wonderful and they do it better than anybody support this kind of game folks it's a quality game for $5 and it doesn't beg you for any money I'm bad at supporting Kairosoff because you always bring on stuff and I like I loved loved love loved game dev story inputs it's probably my most

that's a bold thing to say I guess probably my well no it's one of my most played mobile games of all time like in terms of a phone game you know what I mean? It's so good and so yeah the fact that I haven't picked up every game since then is kind of embarrassing to me and it shows that I am man without character dungeon village is really good if you haven't I don't put that right there like see

this what I'm talking about where it's like game dev yeah dungeon man pools yeah yeah right I was doing my pool slide story sure I'm all about that water and it's great you put like the snow cone stand up and that was the image I saw right of like you have a food court running I'm like yeah and that's all there is to that one and that's actually all I was going to talk about it perfectly well you got it you just got him a sale so good jams since tim's gone I'm going to move down to the next one here my next one's atomic bomber this is another premium game it's a dollar okay it's a 99 cent game no in that purchases So Atomic Bomber looks like it was drawn in like worse than MS paint.

Okay. And down to the thumbnail, which is just absolutely awful. Oh, what do you got? Oh, you got the music going on? Cool's last door, everybody. It's so much fun. Carosoft games are, they're so delightful. It's like they come from some magical fairyland heaven.

So adorable, yeah, that's great. We just started talking about Atomic Bomber. Okay, atomic bomber. Yeah, which- Give me the pitch. It's absolutely fugly. It's 99 cents. Oh, is this the one you were showing me? Yeah.

Jesus Christ. It's a premium download. And I was talking earlier about arcade games. It's an arcade game. Yeah. It's similar to an old DOS game called Barron that used to find on like really old DOS computers. But you're a bomber. You're flying around.

You're blowing stuff up on a map. That's it. You're fast. It is perfect touch controls. Ridiculously good. Touch control. Very responsive. Games take a few minutes.

It's just fun. It looks ugly as all. And it is so thoughtful. Colorblind is all hell has no idea of color theory. But you can see everything. Like everything is very clear. You can see what you're supposed to shoot at.

You can see what you're supposed to do. You're blowing stuff up on the ground. It's shooting back. You're picking up power up super fast. You get more, you get ridiculously powerful really fast. But the game rams up difficulty really fast. You're dropping atomic bombs

and cluster bombs and dodging under missiles. And there's this cool system where guys are shooting down from the ground at you and you can see the missile arcing towards you. But you can see the line from the radar station. And so you have to, they're faster than you, but just slightly, so you're going to destroy the radar station before the missile gets to you while you're avoiding tank fire. But watching out for MIGs swiping down while dropping 17 bombs and two nukes at the same time. And it's great. It also has a little A10 like DLC mode built in that's free where you're running around just shooting guns at things.

It is a great time wasteer. Desert golf is desert golfing. Pardon me. Not desert golf. That's a different game. Desert golfing is an odyssey. Mm-hmm. this is a great way to spend three minutes. Cool. And just pick up. I can't recommend that enough for being like stuck at a bus stop. It's just a great little game, perfect for phones.

And then finally, angular velocity. Angular velocity I just started. It's by the same guy that made Atomic Bomber. That's how I found it. It's just as ugly. It's a game about a soccer ball with a built-in grappling hook. Okay. You tilt the phone to cause the ball to roll.

where the other, you tap the screen to fire your grappling hook, and you try to get to the goal. Okay. It's great. Again, it's a dollar. It's no in-app purchases. And it's another wonderful, creative, ugly video game. Yeah. And everyone on Earth should own this and atomic bomber.

Well, check it out, guys. The Jared Petty's seal of approval. Yeah. And speaking to mobile games, it's time, ladies and gentlemen. This week, it's time. Oh, look on a laptop. Oh, you want to go grab that? We've been doing this little game, the general.

Jared Petty came up with called Mobile Game or Bullshit. Did you guys do it last week without me? We did. How'd I go? Kevin beat the shit out of me. Wow. I'm yet to win this. I want to get a piece of paper as always.

This week or last week, no, let me take a couple steps back. This all started with Mobile Game or Bullshit. Then last week we did Mobile Game or Silicon Valley startup. This week we are doing Mobile Game or Erotic Novel on Amazon. That's right. That's the game. And I cannot wait for this. erotic novel on

and let's give a shout out to Justin Dean who wrote our theme song for mobile gamer bullshit. Hold on, let me make sure you a theme song. Well, remember I sang it on episode one and then Justin Dean actually made it into a real song. Okay, we It's one of those things where I, when I podcast

I forget Justin Dean is one of us. Oh, thank you Justin Dean. Justin Dean at Jangleboy underscore. Yeah? How did it sound on your end? Because we want to, we want to play it every time. I feel like giving you guys more work of playing something seems stressful.

But playing... Huh? It was gritty? Well, I think we got Kevin it. If we give them... He'd be good. Okay, cool. We might even be... You know, if we could find some animation, it could become a graphic. Let's not get ahead of ourselves, right? The name bars barely come up as is, and they're 70% of the time, they're

right, I guess. 30% wrong. Hold on, sorry. So, last time, the victor... First game, first game, you were perfect. You have not yet missed a question on this. Second time around. Yeah, you defeat. Yeah, you lost to Kevin. So you don't want a game here yet, Tim.

I hope some of the best friends... We probably need a scoreboard. I mean, otherwise, these episodes are going to be lost to history. Yeah, I'm sure someone out there will figure it out. Started on the subred. Maybe start on the subred to keep a scoreboard for mobile gamer bullshit. All right, I got so excited by this one. I was having so much fun with this topic, with this theme of mobile game or erotic Amazon novel.

Erotic Novel on Amazon. That I actually, we're doing it. We're stretching it to seven here today. Wow. I've also, we added this last week, Greg. There are descriptions for every game. Oh, wow. Now, these games are either from, these descriptions are either from their real description on the app store.

Okay. Or I've made them up. Okay. All right. Of course, yeah. If it's erotic novel, you had to make it up. All right. So here's the first one.

Is it love drogo vampire? Is it love drogo vampire? Is that an erotic novel on Amazon? or is it a mobile game. Do I get the description first or I get it after? The description is, you may even be able to tame his destructive character and discover in him a passionate lover.

What's the theme here? All right, so who's going first? I'm going to say erotic novel. You say erotic novel on Amazon. Greg Miller? Fuck. So when we're saying erotic novel, are these like Amazon submissions included

or is it has to be published and it comes into? These are like things that you can buy on the Kindle store or buy on Amazon. They might be print published. They might be Kindle directs. But they're erotic fiction that you can purchase on Amazon. Can I hear that game description one more time? Is it love, Drogo Vampire?

You may even be able to tame his destructive character and discover in him a passionate lover. I'm going to say it's erotic as well. Erotic novel. Okay, erotic novel for both of you. Are we going to the end this time? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, remember we come back then. Number two.

Number two. Mone with Bigfoot mega collection. Mone with Bigfoot mega collection. All five episodes of the Mone with Bigfoot interactive novel series now available together plus exclusive sensual Sasquatch D.L.C. Fuck. I'm saying that's erotic novel. Fuck.

See, here's the thing. I also think it's an erotic novel because, is the mega collection makes it sound like a game, so I feel like you're trying to play me. Yeah. And I feel like they wouldn't say DLC in the description. So are you saying erotic? So I'm going erotic.

So you guys are both voting erotic. That was my thing. And this is going to sound like the most fucking classist shit you've ever heard for video game players. Do mobile games have DLC? And like, it would this game have DLC? That's, I guess, the bigger question. Obviously there's deals. Animal Crossing has stuff.

You know what I mean? But all right, cool. All right. All right. All right. There we go. Number three. Burn and rubber crash and burn.

The most explosive game on Earth is now available on mobile. You're so good at this, Jared. You're so good. Because this sounds like it has to be a video game, which makes me think it's an erotic fucking novel and I'm going erotic. You're going erotic? I'm going erotic novel. Oh, got erotic novel.

I'm going game. Greg Miller says game. It's more a game Number four Hot or shot Hot or shot It's a free game That will unwind the party

participants and make the party Really hot It's a game I'm gonna go erotic Greg Miller says erotic Yeah game Tim Getty says games It's a fucking game man

Number five Southern hospitality Oh here we go The Southern bells of Spector Manor need the touch of a good detective to strip away the mystery. Game. Tim Getty says game. Greg Miller.

I say erotic. He says erotic. Number six. The stable girl, colon, bred by a stallion. Fucking goddamn. Help. This is definitely, oh, go for it. Here's the description.

Help Madeline rescue horse. from a corral. And by the way, it's not spelled corral, it's spelled coral. C-O-R-A-L. Okay. Help Madeline rescue horse from a coral. The stable girl, colon, bred by a stallion. Description, help Madeline rescue horse from a coral.

My God. Greg Miller, what do you say first? I think it's a game. Greg says game. I'm going to say ironic because the coral thing, you... Wouldn't have told us that if you didn't make it up.

Because that would give away. That's a good point. It's those, it was the terrible sentence structure before the core. I was like, that's the absolute score description. That's an extra description. Final one.

Final one. Number seven. Ready? Yep. Taken by the Minotaur. Description, Antigone has been kidnapped. Taken by the Minotaur. Video game.

Tim Gettys is video game. Miller? Erotic. He says erotic. All right folks for playing at home that's seven. We went seven today. A little extra a little extra on there. Well you know what I'm going erotic. No no no you locked it in you locked it you locked it in sir. Damn it. I mean really bad. The Antigone anything threw it off. Doesn't matter go. Are you sure? Yeah yeah yeah I'm going to allow it. It's been locked. It's been locked. You got to lock. All right. All right. That's what he says. Okay. You had your chance. Number one. Is it love. Oh, there's a song again. I just, I just want to have it

prepped to end there. Okay, okay. Is it love, Drogo vampire? Yeah. Totally a mobile game. Ah!

And we both said erotic fiction. Yeah, yeah. Totally a mobile game. Absolutely. It is a sensually themed mobile game where you can meet

and perhaps seduce a vampire. That is the real description. It's from the description. You may even be able to tame his destructive character and discover in him a passionate lover. This game, by the way, does have

DLC because it occasionally rolls out new television style episodes for you to interact with. It's a spiritual successor to Mom's got a date with a vampire. There we go. Number two, Mone with Bigfoot mega collection

is in fact an erotic novel. Hell yeah. It's a collection of nine nine different works of erotica including several parts of the famous Mone with Bigfoot.

series of Are you guys aware of like the fantasy erotica on Amazon? Yes. No further questions. Okay. All right. There's a whole world of like really kind of out there Amazon erotica.

And the Bigfoot books are apparently very, very big in this world. Man. So Mone with Bigfoot. Number three. Burn and rubber. Crash and burn. That's a game. That's a mobile game.

That's a mobile game. Greg Miller rushes that to an early lead. It is in fact a racing game. Boo. Yeah. So right now, we score for the folks back home. Greg has two points. Tim has one.

Big has two. Tim has one. Number four, hot or shot? Is the free game that unwind the party participant to make the party really hot. That's a point for Tim. All right. It's a point for Tim. So we're tied up at two, two, three to go.

Number five. Southern hospitality, the southern bells of Spectre Manor need the touch of a good detective to strip away the mystery. That is absolutely erotica. That is not a video game. Greg Miller back and lead, three to two.

Yeah, my fake description was not good enough there. Number six, the stable girl, colon, bred by a stallion, help Madeline rescue horse from a coral, is erotica. Fuck. Oh, wait. You got that.

You got it. You got it. That means you made up the description. I did make up the description. I knew it. Yep. I'm worried I'm going to stop giving these descriptions. I think I'm giving more clues away.

I just don't say something like coral like that because it was my thing too where I was like, ah, fuck. It was trying to make it go either way. That's it. I guess it worked. Fuck it. Keep doing the description. It's great.

Don't worry. Okay. Here we go. Number seven. And you guys did different guesses. This is going to win. This is the question. I thought it might be a tie here.

I thought it might be a tie. I had a tie breaker. Taken by the fucking Minotar. Taken by the Minotaur Amazon Erotica Yeah The champion remains Tim Getty's O for three

There you go Four points And guess what I'm having it Okay, you play that song again I don't do anything Well there we go What did you say after mobile

Gamer bullshit? I don't know Ladies and gentlemen This has been The Kind of Funny Gamescast Thank you very much for joining us. What will we do next week on mobile game or?

You'll have to come back to find out. Until then, I love you.