My Brother, My Brother And Me - FEED DROP - The Besties Play Animal Crossing: New Horizons!

Episode Date: April 1, 2020

This isn't an episode of MBMBaM, but hey! Every living human being on Earth is talking about this game, so we decided to toss our Besties discussion here on the MBMBaM feed! (Don't fret -- this isn't taking the place of a MBMBaM; it's back Monday!)The Besties is a gaming podcast featuring Justin, Griffin, and Polygon co-founders Chris Plante and Russ Frushtick. We've been doing the show for a while, but only recently relaunched as a Spotify Original! You can follow the show for free at Besties.fan.

Oh, hey, this is Justin McElroy, and I'm Griffin McElroy. We've never done a feed drop before. I guess technically the McElroy brothers will be in trolls to the first episode of that adventure zone. Technically, we've actually done quite a few feed drops. If you think about it, intentional, intentional feed drops. But this is this is a horse of a different color because we're talking about the besties. And this. Yes.

This is a video game podcast we make with our friends, Rush, Rushdick and Chris Plant. It is a Spotify exclusive, which means it's only over there. For you to listen to. But we did sneak this episode across because it's about Animal Crossing. And everybody's talking about it. And we wanted to share this show that we're very proud of with you. So we thought this would be a good one to do it with. If it's not your thing, you know, we'll be back next Monday with another.

This isn't taking the place of them a bin van. This is just a little something extra because Animal Crossing is virtually all we can think about. So I wanted to put our thoughts, our thoughts out there. If you like it, you can find it on Spotify. You don't need a paid membership or anything. You can follow them, listen for free over there. And we're on Twitter at the besties pod.

Yep. So that's the show. It's the besties. Here it comes for you. We hope you dig it and we'll hope you check out more. And we'll be back Monday with a new Mbem Bam. So hold, hold your horses. Partner, this got weird.

Okay. So I want to get, I want to get this. We're going to have a lot of new listeners for cause this is the Animal Crossing. It's going to be a big show. So I was thinking we should sort of in the cold open here. We don't normally address the audience. It's kind of just like a fun time for friends. And I hate to violate that sacred thing, but I think we should like all sort of

introduce ourselves and like who we are. So like I'm Justin and I'm kind of the, the, would you guys, you guys are about to all say bad boy at the same time, but all the bad, I'm kind of the bad boy. Griffin, you can't find me not on my skateboard. So it kind of sounds like a bad boy way. Well, it does kind of sound like that, huh? And that's sort of a thing that me and Justin have going on as a friction of who's the baddest boy.

Every episode, Chris and Russ will vote on who they think the baddest boy is. And the other one. It's tight. Usually it's pretty tight. It's tight. And the loser has to wear a big baby bonnet and suck their thumb the whole time. Chris, what's your thing? Oh, I'm, I'm the one who does the solo album, but doesn't find success, but

shows up at like state fairs for the next 20 years. And you're like, wait, what band was he in? Oh, yeah. Yeah, they were pretty good. Chris is, Chris is Dustin Timberlake. I'm the one that makes it all happen to be perfectly honest. Like I know you all think you are making it happen. It's all coming from me.

So it's too, too bad boys, a failure and the puppeteer. Is it, can I switch to the sexy one? You just put on gunner glasses. No, you can't. You can never use that adjective ever again, Justin. I want to be the short, the short. My mouth can't form the word. The gutters, they're blocking blue light and my ability to say sexy.

Oh my God, you look like gamer Bono. My name is Justin McElroy and I know the best game of the pandemic. My name is Griffin McElroy and I am a turnip man. My name is Christopher Plant and I live on Sweet Boy Island. My name is Russ Froschick and I should have cleared my throat before I said that. Hello and welcome to the Besties where we discuss the latest and greatest in video gaming entertainment.

It is a video game book club is a game of the year show that goes all year long. And this week we're going to talk about Animal Crossing. Now the New Horizons. Here's my thesis statement. I made no small amount of noise about not being as excited about Animal Crossing as everybody else was. You got to take those gunners off.

I can't. I was going to take it. Well, I was about to take off in a dramatic moment, but now I'll just take them off in the course of action. Just be careful with the strain. The eye strain is deadly. It's already having a migraine. So thank you Griffin.

So I wasn't very excited about Animal Crossing New Horizon. And that was a few weeks ago. And now I think it may be the most like in a sense important video game to ever be released in the history of humanity. Correct. Yes. This is not an exaggeration. No.

I'm literally, I literally think this could end up being the most important game. And important is a very loaded term. Obviously I'm not talking about in the course of like video game development, right? It's not going to change the world the way like a Wolfenstein or like the Beatles Rock Band, for example, or the Beatles Rock Band.

You absolutely. Mr. Mosquito like that. We're talking about the big milestone irritating stick. No, but this game is going to save lives. Literally again, save lives. Animal Crossing New Horizons is the most important video game possibly in the history of humanity. And I would like to talk with you about it now.

That's all I have to say about it. I like catching bugs, whatever, but that's that's kind of that where I wanted to leave from. Yeah, I think it's worth just like the the the thing that Animal Crossing provides and we're going to talk a lot about the game today, but the thing it provides is a quasi facsimile of going outside, which you for a lot of people cannot do right now.

Yeah, it's pretty nice and control. Oh, yeah, you know what I mean? Like we're in a we're in a moment now where I think people have the least amount of control they've ever had over their general situation, and this is a game that lets you control nearly everything in the world to to make it the world that you want it to in a way that like for a lot of people is impossible right now.

And I think that that the balm of the the sensation of being in a world that was pleasant and under my control is was unlike anything I have experienced like the relief I felt just getting in I have no comparison for. Plant, do you want to like just like do a quick rundown of like what this game even is for people that aren't familiar with Animal Crossing for the four people listening who don't know the long history of Animal Crossing is you move to a city

in this case you move to an island you get a new house and a mortgage the mortgage is generously provided to you with zero interest. You pay it off whenever you want as you pay it off you grow that house you do things like decorating the house in this game you can decorate the entire island effectively doing these things and cleaning makes you more money which allows you to get more stuff to decorate the island in the house

it's very very very simple it's basically chores the video game. Oh my God. It is but that's so no I think I think that's very I think that is part of what Justin is talking about and why it's so fulfilling because all the things that you do in this game are things you do in real life but without any reward in this game I mean that's not true in this game you pick weeds you

get paid for it and I know but you're you're fish and ocean fish and you're cutting trees like it's a day dude. Yeah but I mean you know why I'm not going to cut down trees because if I cut down trees in the real world I probably get hurt and I get nothing for it but a cut down tree I cut down trees here. I did some great landscaping it was doable without like serious harm to myself or my friends or family you would to make a

table would you that I could make you know a video game console out of wood because like apparently that's how you make video game consoles. So that's that's the basics new horizons I as I've been looking forward to this game for the better part of a decade and I was a little bit worried about some of the things like I was not sure how the crafting system was going to play out that is like a new major focus in this installment that's never

been in the games before the you know the island aesthetic I was a little bit worried about sort of coloring the game in a way that I was not going to be a huge fan of I know islands well no it's just you know islands is a sometime food you know what I mean I'm a I'm a landlubber yeah I am blown away like every day that I play this game how just smart the things that they have added a new horizons is like the the crafting system the sort of extra effort that you have to put in to get

people to move to your to get new villagers to move to your island having to like not only build the houses but kind of furnish them using the crafting system like the the crafting stuff I think specifically you could talk on and on and on about about how just sort of intelligently it the the rest of the game has kind of been designed around it in a way that I find really really satisfying yeah I mean it to boil it down like now granted you now have to like go out and

collect wood and rocks and various other things like make the things that you want you know you have the recipes for but by introducing this crafting system it basically removes this mechanic which was totally random previously which was I'm going to show up in the store and hope they have the thing that I really want right maybe I need like a wooden book case that and I and I have all the other wooden stuff and now I could either make it myself if I know the recipe or I can rely

on other people that have the recipe with multiplayer so it like really puts a lot more control I think in players hands whereas previously it was RNG which I think that core mechanic that core idea of removing a lot of the randomness is the whole like main thesis of what they were trying to design for with this game and it ties into not only the crafting but also just like island creation how you set up everything like you really are given like every tool imaginable to make this

game your own. Yeah I think what's surprising to me about the game is it is the culmination of a whole bunch of animal crossing games I didn't like like it was a happy home designer. I think that's all come on no one. No but these are important like happy home designer really just focused on all of like the design stuff without the actual I would say pleasure and cycle of animal crossing there was the mobile game that allowed you to do more decoration outdoors sure but the game itself

was not great and now it feels like in hindsight. Oh well I didn't like either of those games that experimentation fed into this game which now is the core animal crossing loop but with just an incredible amount of design features and now the entire island is yours to decorate so you can make it a theme park or you can make it really a mall you can make it whatever you want one question though for Hoops because Griffin said island life is a some time food now when I think of Justin

McAvoy the first thing I think is that's a man who likes a nice trip to Margaritaville. Yeah I love that island life I did build myself a beach house right there on on the beach that real estate wasn't taken out by anyone I want to go ahead and move there move my beautiful daughter next door she lives in a tent she won't go catch any bugs my daughter lives in a shameful tent and I'm next door beautiful beautiful mansion but daddy leaves her gifts daddy got her a hamster

today left that outside her house got her a fun ring toss game that's been a really cool aspect of this is like because connection is at a premium right now in our species being able to like share things with people visit people virtually like go to people's island is like weirdly profound in a way that I don't want to over analyze but is like is nice to go to someone's island and be like just look around and see their stuff and just to speak the design aspects and I know

that this is again part of that culmination but like the ability to download designs that people have created and put them up that is when I decided that I would care about design I've never cared about like decor in an animal crossing before I just throw my shit wherever and like what you know but as soon as I found that someone had recreated a vintage Epcot shirt teaser that I could download I was like okay I care very much because I can make a reasonable Simulcra

you come into my bedroom I got pictures of the Magic Kingdom I got a Twin Peaks poster up that somebody made I got wallpaper from the Haunted Mansion is fantastic the process to do it is unbelievably draconian and just absolute madness I was trying here's how bad it was you need three devices to do it and I was literally trying to like figure out a way to get my switch onto the internet so I could like through your back door so I could download the thing because my daughter

was using the computer and I needed to take a picture with my phone to put it back on QR code it's wild it's wild they have made it for what it's worth a lot easier once you get to a point later in the game with the there's a store that unlocks that makes it a lot easier to share designs for what it's worth but oh that's not it's good to know it is weird it's a weird animal crossing thing that yeah there's a lot of like hey good news you've upgraded and now we've removed

our own bullshit there's a there's a tool ring that you get for 800 miles which is like a sort of side currency in the game and it lets you press up on the d-pad and get to a tool wheel that makes it much easier to select your tools it's wild that you it's like a thing that you get and it is equally wild that I was so stoked to pay money to unlock this UI thing that should have been in there so that was that was pretty wild combining two of your points he said a human connection

at a premium and also a typical Nintendo bullshit how much do you think we would be complaining about the online issues with this game if it were any other time on the planet yeah because having to wait for people to join your island Griffin can you explain how online works let's explain let's explain how online works I have right before the game came out I put my switch code up on my my Facebook page because I'm mostly just like buds with actual like people I know there

and so I got a bunch of new sort of switch friends of people that I know and just kind of know and so I was like yeah hell yeah let's go and got Animal Crossing New Horizons went to the airport turned it on I was like let's party baby and then I went into the in-game friend list and it was empty because before you can have somebody in your in-game friend list you have to have played with them so just to really reiterate that there's no way of sending messages to people

from switch to switch right there's no way to switch you know user interface doesn't have a send message to switch friends thing so I could text Justin hey idiot open your gate so I can come over I could fly to Justin's Island and then we could then we would have ourselves on our in-game friends list or we can register each other as best friends and if you register somebody as best friends you can see whenever they come online and you can send messages to them

at any time in the game right now once you can dig up shit on their island things and you can be very smooth there you assumed that you could just fly to his Island yes he happens to be checking his in-game phone at the moment we decide to fly to his Island if you're talking to anybody even yeah just the process of even if the gate is open and I'm ready to fly you have to like okay you have to walk to the airport which okay I have to walk to the airport when I want to fly

somewhere there and there's a dodo there who's like hey what's up this is like every one of these is a menu with slow talking right hey what's going on I thought I'd fly somewhere okay you want to fly to Harves Island you want to fly to a friend's Island or just some random place a friend's Island okay do you want to do that locally or do you want to do that online okay online okay if you want to go online I have to put the on the Internet is that okay what have you been

doing why have you not been you should be hooking me into the Internet all the I'm already on the Internet what do you mean is a sheet is really all they need like you could bang all these questions out in one go but for whatever reason Nintendo loves to just like are you okay is this okay if I do this little thing and and the thing is you're up against a timer because if your friend switches just like lying there so you go over to their partner's Island and sell some

fucking turnips the time the time the clock is ticking okay I have to get over there and this dot is like do you want like a cushy middle seat or kind of like an aisle on the fake plane or do you give a shit about this like teleport me so we should contentionalize this we're not going to go into detail on like how turnips work because it's very complicated suffice it to say all three of the other people on the show visited my wife's Island yesterday because her turnip

price is very good so I shared this code and plant 45 minutes after I shared the code plant DMs me is like I can't get in I'm like my dog you need to be on top of it there's no like leaving the switch passive that is not an option you really are on the clock the second the code goes in and if you don't jump in you're totally I need a pager I was just just for animals thing yes I joined a rush of people going to rush his wife's Island yeah it was the name of it there was a bunch

of people and what made it bad as she was standing there I've met her once in real life but I had to do this like slow walk past I did not know the protocol of like hey I'm just here to sell turnips you've got a wild price but hey this is such a cool Island I'm not going to take a lot of time to stop and look around right now but now we're pals so I'll definitely be back whenever this really funny that she definitely wasn't looking at the screen it was just sitting on the couch so everyone's

having I know that made it worse because she was just standing still like well hey Justin this weird hey a friend a visit from a friend before that I went to fresh his Island and just completely fleeced it of every apple I could find so I could finally pay off my mortgage and then I walked over into the airport and fresh is just waiting there like passing the judgment so I like look at my inventory and the only thing I have as a gift is called the mama bear which is a six foot

tall teddy bear with floral print on it and I think that's great at its feet I thought about wild power plays you can go to your friend's Island shake their tree take their fruit that's that's delightful and irritating I have no idea the etiquette by the way unlike every island has like one of five different fruits so if you try to sell your local fruit at a different Island you get better money for it or if you take someone's foreign fruit back to your Island and grow it then

you can sell it on your Island for a pretty penny so it makes sense to get people's fruit and then grow it on your Island I don't know what the protocol is for taking things I do know that it is bad form to Animal Crossing makes it possible to eat a fruit get super strong for a second and just dig up a whole tree and put it in your pocket that I'm sure is that is not accepted fairly certain I think that the coolest thing about the multiplayer and this goes back to like this this this

moment this like strange comfort zeitgeist that we are all in with this game right now I am I'm like switch friends with a lot of people who I don't know like all that well like other games industry people and like other folks I follow on Twitter but that I'm not like I'm not actual real life I've never met in real life and one of this like sort of bad things about the online in this game is like if you want to go to a friend's Island you go to the dodo and say hey I want to go to friends

Island and then if somebody has their gates open it'll say like okay well it looks like Fern Gill is open that's the name of the island not the name of an actual friend it's like you have to know what your friends Island is named if you want to fly to the right Island or like some nights when I don't really have much else to do I will just go to the airport and see what's open and fly there and it'll be one of these people that I don't actually know very well and we are all play like we

are both playing Animal Crossing we're both playing it for the same reason and we are both sort of going through the same like shit right now and both sort of escaping that shit with with the same sort of game and it is this like really profound like rainbow connection thing that is at a scale I had 20 people online playing this game last night I had 20 friends like 20 switch friends all playing Animal Crossing and I have never seen a game launch like that in my life like I've never

seen a game launch with that many people I know that many like online friends all doing the same thing for the for the same reason and it is it has been genuinely like helpful for my like mental well-being during all this it is also it's worth noting that this thing is going to be a mammoth mammoth hit some of the some of the early information coming out today is that Animal Crossing is going to do 2.5 million units in Japan alone in its first three days which makes it the

biggest switch game ever right surpassing like the Zelda and Zelda and Pokemon and smash and all I mean like everything bigger yes but yeah smash like all of it bigger than all of it and that's that's in Japan alone 2.5 million copies like yeah it's going to be I mean I know people are just buying switches just because they heard about this and they need an outlet I just I want to mention so it's recording this on March 25th I started playing on February 28th because I was

reviewing it for Polygon so I got a code early which we've discussed in the podcast Griffin was very upset about it and it should be noted that like there's an element when you start playing this game when you are wake up and you're like oh I'm excited to see what the next day has for me maybe a new villager shows up maybe you upgraded a building maybe there's a museum whatever so I'm almost for a full 30 days at this point into the game and every single one of those 30

days ice have still maintained that excitement now granted it's not always hey I'm gonna get a new building a lot of the major major upgrades happen in the first let's say 2 weeks of the game but even after that I'm excited like oh my fruit is coming in today I'm gonna harvest it and get a bunch of money oh I've been trying to like move my rocks around so every so I can get all the rocks and like a little clump I wonder where the new rock is I'm collecting fossils every

day like it literally has this element of here's a little like drip feed excitement moment for you each day and it's not a lot like you know argument the argument is basically maybe there's an hour's worth of gameplay a day that hasn't stopped me from playing six hours or whatever it well you know let's talk about actually the other day told me they looked at my profile and it said 140 hours I was like I had no idea I if someone were to ask me I would have said

maybe 50 maybe yeah well and it just like every single day becomes like this is the thing and it's it's like a release it's like a total I'm removed from reality release which I realized can be a little unhealthy but you know what it's kind of what's healthy is your great wall of bugs that you have built Russ tell me about the wall of bugs rush or so so last night I tweeted a video about a wall of bugs now for some of you might know that there's a vendor that

occasionally shows up in your town that buys bugs at a 20% premium there are bugs in the game that are worth a whole bunch of money but I also ran out of storage space in my house so I was like maybe I'll just stack them on the beach until the guy shows up you couldn't do that in previous Animal Crossing games because you couldn't put furniture out so now I just have 46 containers of the same Emperor butterfly just chilling on a long wall of bugs and I'm just

waiting for this guy to show up and it's only growing last night I collected 38 tarantulas on a random not island that I visited they're getting added to the wall of bugs it's just going to be all the bugs from now on imagine going to Russ's Island like hey welcome we got a lot of cool trees and over here is my wall of bugs you want to produce it I should mention I work with someone who is definitely deathly afraid of spiders and I have a deep-seated fear that she's going

to show up one day and not tell me and walk over there and have a total fucking meltdown yeah yeah it's wild is anybody having heavy final final thoughts I have one more question that's specifically for Griffin because I don't know how music works I'd like to know how music works the music in this game is is a cure for me it brings me so much joy and I don't know how it works because it should be repetitive like it's not like some you know massive collection music it's

kind of the same thing over and over and over again it's a massive collection of music they have new I mean if it's like other animal crossing games I haven't really dove in but the the most recent couple animal crossing games there's new themes for every hour yeah and then variations on those themes based on the weather so like there's a rainy 5pm theme right you have to actually I should mention you have to unlock that that's something that comes along like a little

later yeah of course so the music that you're hearing right now plant is something that will get more complex as you play okay well it reminds me of like those low-fi chill study haul YouTube videos yeah like a monastic chant where it's just repeating the same thing over and over and that like lulls me into a state of tranquility and I'm I'm curious one how how does this get made the only other comparison I could think of as tiny wings on iOS where I like that I don't remember that

game but like I could just listen to that tune forever and it would bring me well I mean to be to do like a more sort of mainstream example of that like the Minecraft music is yeah that too like the extreme of just like extremely extremely thematic listenable music to underscore like a you know simulation based experience like that it's obviously two different sort of musical schools that they are composing from but it is I think the same the same idea and serving the

same purpose yeah it's music to work to essentially and and I should mention if you're a fan but you are also working at this time there's a Chrome app that you can install called Animal Crossing music that actually will play different hourly music depending on the day and weather in your life yeah present which is spectacular I am going to be curious I'm not curiosity is not the right word I feel pretty confident and this goes back to like Justin's thesis that you know a

year from now five years from now like we're going to look back on Animal Crossing New Horizons with a like a feeling about it that I don't know okay I'll speak personally I will look back at New Horizons with a feeling that like I don't know that I have about any other game and I've been playing games my whole life and I'm certainly nostalgic about a lot of them and a lot of them have filled like important needs in my life or like you know important social needs in my life especially

once like online games became a thing but everybody is doing that with New Horizons and I genuinely do think it's going to be a very sort of special game in the pantheon of all games ever made just because of what is what it is doing for us right now it is bizarre yeah so we're going to take a break and then we'll be right back with even more great content on our show there is a lot you can capture in your of your day to day existence in Animal Crossing but there's some parts

of your day to day life that aren't modeled and I wanted to talk to you guys about what what bits of your life do you wish you could include in in your Animal Crossing experience I think my biggest problem with Animal Crossing New Horizons isn't the online multiplayer hurdles isn't the fact that the tools break after you use them half of one time it's that there's really just one bag of medicine and you get hit by a wasp in your eyeball every time the wasps are like we

know we know which eyeball we like that one and we're going to get it and then you have to go eat a bag of medicine which isn't like Timmy and Tommy aren't licensed pharmacists so we can start there and you can also make it yourself with a wasp's nest and 10 clumps of weeds that I guess you just to quamp down in a mortar and pestle and then eat that instead like the hair of the dog situation is it yeah it's a yeah so I think it would be nice to just like get some more kinds of medicine

in there like say I eat a particularly spicy peach and then I do need to get some emotium from the store and maybe that can maybe that can be like 10 clumps of weeds and a spicy peach and then that will fix my my stomach issues or if I'm feeling kind of you know anxious or depressed 10 clumps of weeds and I don't know a plan or something and then you know I make a little I make some Animal Crossing Zoloft or something like that that would be a welcome addition Griffin what is

wrong with it's a it's a panacea right that's what they call these medicines that cure literally everything on the planet yeah and it seems like they Timmy and Tommy have found this because I found a very depressed villager and who was like I'm feeling kind of out of it you have any medicine and bam medicine did the trick I have not found a moment in Animal Crossing where medicine has not done the trick it's generic medicine sure but it's it's it's working man it did that

villager have a wasp sting on their own well then that was irresponsible. Practitioning that you worked out okay all right Justin what would you want in the game from your day to day life I just want to be able to use the bathroom you can here's the problem I have though today I walked into the nooks cranny the store and they had a large standing toilet and I was like wait the toilet is standing or is supposed to use it while standing now it's like a big like floor floor length urinal

got it okay you know what I mean and I was I looked at it was like absolutely I would that is hilarious I want to put one in the middle of my house that's too good so I bought it I took it home and realized like I can't use the bathroom in this game what is this in the context of my experience does it make sense to set up a bathroom in a game I would love to have a bathroom does it make sense to set up a bathroom in a game where you can't use the bathroom no great news right

great news Justin you can use the bathroom in this game how do you guys not know about this no Russ you don't know about this this is not a game for a month and I still don't know okay so here's the thing day one I eat a bunch of fruit and get so strong that I break all the rocks on my island which sucks because now like I can't get the iron nuggets and valuable resources I'm saying like man this is kind of a bummer I wish there was a way instead of going around and digging up trees

to like get rid of my my fruit power shut and then it has come out that if you sit on a toilet with fruit meter it will go away the fruit meter will slowly deplete and then it says well that's well that's all there is to that well done with that so you can poop your fruit power out so Justin your wish is granted next one great moving on this is the best game ever I I want to own or not own take care of a puppy like I do in real life I love my dog but the problem that I realize is the

animals are the people that's an island of Dr. Moreau type of yeah so like what would I do if I had a puppy would they be like you have captured one of us to let him leave your house yeah that's I I I've not thought about that I have from balloon drops I have a little kitty corner in my room where I have a cat tower and a litter box one of these days a cat villager is going to come into my house and be like yo I love this corner but I like what you've done here do you have that

and not a cat I mean yeah I don't have a cat there's no little you're an so you're just an absolute like you got a grip it sounds like what's that for like I don't know I haven't tried to dump my cherry power in the litter box yet I don't know if that's a possibility it also sort of begs the question about the fish like you can catch 80 different kinds of fish and then place them in a tank that is exactly the size of the fish like maybe they have an inch on either side right so if these

fish are sentient and on the same level maybe they have like an undersea version of your animal crossing village it's a goofy Pluto scenario right like we have to imagine that's how this world works that there are Goofy is in the Pluto's that the goofy is the sentient dog Pluto is the like right but what is the dividing line like how do you make that like are they chosen from childhood to become like I think I know society right like fish are just entirely different there's

animals and then there are fish and bugs I considered this philosophical question on a stream and decided that it's thick legs if you have thick if you have thick legs you get to be you get to wear shirts and live in houses like the rest of us and be large if you have no legs or skinny weird segmented legs I'm sorry but here's a small box you can live in or this big dope museum those are your options. I know Chris Plante and Griffin want to take care of sweet little animals all I

want to do is fend off animals that keep encroaching now in my real life I've talked a little bit in the past I have a pigeon problem on my balcony now right now my balcony is a true respite from the horrors of having to be stuck inside so I really want to be out on my balcony the pigeons know that and they internalize it and they camp out and all I want to do with an animal crossing is create a similar level of defenses to ensure that no such critters like centipedes and

shit like that that I don't want anywhere near my house have no chance of approaching it has not happened yet I've tried building walls they cut through the walls I've tried I found some iron bars they cut through that there's nothing I can do you've already stumbled on the answer what the bug wall bug wall you create a bug wall as a warning if both it both is a you know it a barrier but also a signal if you come past the bug wall you get put into the bug wall absolutely off my

you will go into this wall no question genius I love it you guys been playing anything else of course not no I mean yeah I'm feeling the same I I couldn't even finish Griffin did I get to tell you about murder by no Amanda turn me on to it on on the joco cruise but I was very fascinated by it but I did not dip in we talked about it last week when Griffin was we did talk about last week but I'll catch you up it's a it's a pit cross I never mind it's a pit cross murder I started

playing this game called near automata I mean I think a few of us have been a few of us have been playing Half-Life Alex which yeah we're I think we're going to talk about it next week yes next week episode if people are excited about that I'm very excited to try it I haven't tried oh and an Ori will of the West I finally got past that that first hour which is a real pain as I wind about last week and I apologize for being a real whiny baby who has played oh I guess you guys I

I was not on the doom episode last week did you do an extended Ori bit not a little bit about how the beginning is a little rough but then it's really good he doesn't like emotions I really liked it I mean I I think I've played about the same amount I streamed about like an hour and a half of it or so and I'm into it I feel like it it starts off with kind of a bang in a way that I'm a fan of I did not realize they re-released Saints Row four on switch last week yeah I think

the port is terrible no um I mean have you tried it no I've not tried it if it's on the level of Saints Row three like Saints Row three for switch wasn't like amazing but it was totally playable and I like Saints Row four a lot more than I like Saints Row three um I think Personas out next week yeah we won't be buying that too much reading it's very good do you have a good it's very good oh dang oh beans is there anything else I feel like there's like infinite things but but

you know we'll we'll be diving into these over the next few weeks and months there's there's yeah it's extremely busy right now in the world of video games yeah it's just yeah good do we have time to do some reader yeah we can sneak in some reader for their ask people for their thoughts uh I would say it's like it's so looking over the emails we got a ton of them about Animal Crossing and it's just like very positive it's like an outpouring of flow I'll give you a couple Kate said my

sibling I had a very troubled childhood but playing Animal Crossing on GameCube was a crucial escape for us getting to build a kind colorful and overall charming community together provided a comfort we didn't have otherwise so it's fitting this new Animal Crossing ended our lives at the time we desperately needed it just as before that's from Kate Anna said A and C and H has been the absolute highlight of the past few weeks for me yesterday I visited my boyfriend we've all

been quarantined separately for a week and his 11 year old son got really into watching me play AC so he brought the game for himself and my boyfriend son just visited my island for the first time and he was so proud of his custom design for his little shirt he made so my friends complimented him on it and it was just so pure and sweet uh we're gonna be locking down completely soon so I won't be able to see my boyfriend or son for a while but we can still visit each other's islands and I

can show my love for them by giving them apples and other presents this is from at Lars on Twitter I pretended to be sick for a week to get off school just so I could make sure that frobert the frog wouldn't leave me I sent him so many love letters it was heartbroken that I he didn't recognize me in another town um that was Sprocket is in two of my friend's towns he was my og villager and every time I see sprocket he's like oh hi I'm sprocket I'm like I grab him by

the face each time I'm like sprocket I know it's me sprocket it's like a metaverse situation it's terrifying uh from at bite shark yum I got the ladder in New Horizons before my brother so when I went to visit his weed-free town I climbed up to the second level which still had weeds and picked him a bunch of them then replanted them right in front of his house happened by and proceeded to hit me with an axe that's very funny I will admit I did uh take the opportunity to

visit a lot of newbie towns take my ladder climb up uh to the upper level and steal any fossils that were up on the upper levels that newbies couldn't actually access even that's pretty great yeah abby emailed about and it's I mainly want to read it to write us to talk about like one of the best parts of the game the museum is obviously gorgeous and I adore everything about it but what is up with the part of the fossil exhibit with all the animal silhouettes and then

just a blank space that shines a light on you oh yeah I can talk to that I actually wrote a little story about that um so the museum specifically the fossil part of the museum and Animal Crossing the new one is all about evolution so it you walk into this uh first opening room and there's like a single cell on the ground effectively and from that cell are lines and if you follow the lines you can actually see the progression of species as they evolve through time

so eventually when you get to the final room there's like a giant sabertooth tiger skeleton and above that there's a line leading up to a normal like cat silhouette showing that this is the final evolution of cats essentially and the blank space right below it is a human skull because you evolved from this uh early human skull uh and you're supposed to stand there and a light shines on you I just want to correct you Russ you said the final evolution cats you mean the

current evolution of cats that's we all know like year 30,000 cats too is gonna be off the for the final evolution are you telling me there's a chance I will at one point dig my beautiful cartoon shovel on the ground and come up with a fucking human skull uh it's actually a australopithecus I believe so it's like a caveman situation but yes got it fantastic but he did have dreams and hopes and wishes and was capable of love I wonder what I wonder what happened to

oh wait I've just been bitten by 35 different spiders so I bet I know uh sorry I I'm checking the notes and uh quick fact check the final evolution of cats is meowth meowth oh okay good good clear that I mean technically version is the final evolution of meowth so nice Chris nice joke maybe think about it next time before you make a joke well I cried reading an email about animal crossing so we're pretty much done um thank you for listening to our program we would

ask you to uh uh uh make sure to follow us on uh Spotify yeah we should mention this is only on Spotify for the people that might be listening for the first time we're only on Spotify that's a good point so yeah that's it's only on Spotify yeah pop over to Spotify and just click follow on the besties and you'll listen for free yeah plant you wanted to say something oh I was gonna say that you could follow us on twitter at the besties pod if you want updates on new stuff uh there's a

newsletter it's the pinned tweet at the top of our twitter profile so thank you for listening if this is your first time listening we hope you will continue to join us not every episode is quite this uh reflective and uh be sure to join us again next time for the besties because shouldn't the world's best friends pick the world's best games the besties is a Spotify original podcast in association with Vox media the show is edited by Jalati Carter and our theme song is by

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