The Besties - Sword of the Sea is Like Journey on a Hoverboard

Episode Date: August 22, 2025

Sword of the Sea is the closest game yet to a Journey sequel. The new game from Giant Squid sends a silent, heroic character through a desert on a magical sword that fills the world with life-giving waters. It’s fun! It’s beautiful! It’s… sensual? In the back half, the Besties discuss the big news from Gamescom, including updates on Silksong and Bubsy 4D. Get the full list of games (and other stuff) discussed at www.besties.fan. Want more episodes? Join us at patreon.com/thebesties for three bonus episodes each month!

I am so excited to talk about sort of the C. It is, I think, kind of messed up to expect me or, frankly, any of us to have to talk about a game other than Bubsy 40. Like, it feels fucked up that the, I see the rundown of the show. I know that we're going to get to it later, but it seems weird to me to, like, suspend that conversation. Sure. Until we have talked about another game, which is great. It's a great game. Excited to talk about it.

Let me propose this. Here's the deal. As we all know, time is the fourth dimension. And so, in a way, we are actually talking about Bubsy 4D both now and later. That's cool. That's cool. I like that. I like that idea.

There's a missing piece here. People can't see it. But Justin's face right now, I would describe it as ecstasy. I would say, hey. Bliss. Bliss. Looking into the eyes of the divine. Yeah

No Never been No no Oh shit What's wrong I'm right I watched Song of the South

I was so confused I was so confused Oh my God Fuck You got that on 4K Bluer I do yet It's on myplex It's the only thing

On my plaques It's the only thing on my plaques My name is Justin Mcoran. I know the best game of the week. My name is Griffin McQuire. I know the best game of the week. It's Mubsy 40. My name is Christopher Thomas Plant and I know the best game in the week. My name is Russ Frusick. I know the best game of the week. Welcome to the besties. where we talk about the latest and greatest in home interactive entertainment.

It's a video game club, my friend, and just by listening, you have joined our illustrious ranks. Hello, what a pleasure it is to have you. This week, we're going to be talking about a little game I like to call Sword of the Sea. Chris Plant, what is that? Chris Plant, I don't care. We have more towels to sell. They're almost out. If you want a towel.

I love it. If you want a towel that says you dried instead of you died, like in Dark Souls font, now is the time to do it fill your stocking stuffers is that what people do yeah dude because who knows if you're going to be able to get one if you do with one of these towels that's going to fill up a lot of stocking yeah that's basically the whole stocking in one towel so you're good yeah also what is sort of the seat chris plan just journey but you're surfing on a sword perfect we'll talk about that right after this i can't believe there's more to say but so this is basically journey too right

Okay, okay, okay, okay. I want to pop in here and clarify. Yourself. Giant squid. Yes. No, somebody else. Giant squid makes this game, right? And I feel like they've been chasing the Journey 2 dream day one, right?

There are some people, I guess, involved who made Journey. And then Giant Squid forms. And then they make Absu, right? Remember that one? Yeah, and then they made the one that we didn't play as much with the birds. Yes. Yes. I think it was called Bird Party. I think it was called Bird Party 2.0.

Or the pathless, but it may have been Bird Party. Yes. They were like, no, no, no. What we're going to do this time is we're going to make a perfect game. And like, I just think they should have tried that from the beginning, but hey, take the time. Hey, listen. And that is, yes. I think that is how we get to what feels deeply like Journey 2, unofficial edition. Yeah, if you're familiar with the, it was that game company. right? It was the name of the dead.

Yes, the original. And they still make stuff. They made Sky, which is great. Yes, of course. It's all very contemplative, beautiful, I don't know how to categorize it. It's not quite an adventure game. It's an experience.

Yeah, I mean, it's interesting because it kind of, if you think about what you would normally get from a video game and you think about like different sliders, right, in terms of like the visual. inputs of the game and the like the challenge or the difficulty that you're getting and that sort of thing it's sort of like backing off of challenge it's reducing that I think so that you are never it wants to be I think it never wants to put you in a place where you're like doing the same thing over and over again it's very much not about frustration I think it's

but it's not like fully it's not so hands off that it like feels like a roller coaster there are moments where it is that but for the most part you are interacting with the thing, but it is propelling you forward at all times. You're not going to get stumped on a puzzle. This is the biggest difference. Are we talking about journey? Are we talking about sort of the sea right now? Which one are we talking about? We're talking about sort of C. I wanted to bring that up because this game does definitely slot into that archetype a lot. If you're familiar with that game company stuff, I think this has much bigger flower vibes in that you are going around a world. And instead of turning everything from ruined cityscapes into flowers,

now you're turning the desert into the ocean and you're doing it on a fucking hoverboard. That's true. You're turning things into things. So in that way, I do agree. It is like flower. I think the journey comparisons are unfair. This is wet flour. Also, it's kind of like burger time

because you're taking the parts of the burger and you're trying it into a burger. So you're taking things and you're making them into a different thing. So it's not unlike burger time. I didn't vibe with Absu a lot. And I also didn't play bird party. But this one, I think,

succeeds where a lot of those games kind of leave me a little bit cold in that it's also a kick-ass hoverboarding game it is also like uh it's like flower by way of SSX tricky yeah there's definitely a like you're the I think in comparison to a lot of these games that feel like you're kind of like proceeding through a three-dimensional painting this feels much more like a playground like a big expanse they want you to sort of zip through and like experience but not spend too much time in but you are like the tricks that you're doing and the sliding and the momentum it feels much more like kinetic like you're much more in touch with the the things that you are seeing around you're not just kind of like on rails I guess it feels right

you feels more connected and it also like I think when you're playing through games like journey and ab zoo exploration is not really I mean there's like little bit of it, a tiny bit of it, but largely speaking, you're, like, moving from area to area very quickly. And here what I found, like, and even in the first few areas, but this continues later on, if you go off the beaten path,

there are, like, extra things to find, whether it's the currency that you're finding, or I found, like, a fucking Tony Hawk's score challenge for doing, like, tricks. There's, like, genuinely side things. I wouldn't say there's a ton of them. There's not very, I only found one of those

Tony Hawk. I didn't, like, dive in. I think 100% to explore every nook and cranny of the map. I only found one of those Tony Hawk score challenge areas, but it did crack me up because it's so unexpected of the genre to have an area where it's like, fuck yeah, man, I chained together Olly kickflip into a Christ's air. If it sounds like we have not explained what the campaign or like the overarching goal of this game is,

it is because it's very thin in a great way in a way that I like, But it really is a go from point A to point B, and there are different areas where you have a locked door, where you're going to have to solve the slightest puzzles to get that door open and then continue to move from point A to point B. We're talking about all this like tricks and stuff, like Tony Hawk. There is a scorekeeper. It's in the pause menu. It doesn't show up on the main screen except for in very specific time. So like it is truly just a, we have given you the lightest amount of. an objective and then we just want you to feel good in the meantime. Puzzle isn't the word I would

even use to kind of describe it. It is like you're going to serve, you need to follow this chain, follow these subtle environmental clues to go to this place where you will press the interaction button after, you know, surfing over a bunch of rad sand waves to turn this area into water. And then some fish will appear. Sometimes you'll climb on the fish and you'll ride them around and there's a level where you're, now you're a shark. It's, uh, it's, it is, it's not brain teasers. It's not puzzles in this sort of reverse sense. Yeah, if you can guide a cat to its food bowl using a laser pointer, that's kind of

means that you're ready for this game. Yeah. Uh, it's cool too because the, the, the lack of story, it's almost like anti-narrative or anti-reel, like buildings and other structures like that are used in this game as geometry, but they're very clearly not meant to represent buildings that people are living in, right? It's a very abstract sort of idea. I mean, I got the impression that, like,

people lived in them at one time. Here's my read of the story. And again, it's very light. There is dialogue. You can find, like, tablets and things that kind of, like, give you poems about whatever the fuck happened. I didn't fully absorb it.

But my read of is, like, you play as this being who is basically revived by the last drop of water in the world or something, and you are trying to bring life back to this valley that has turned into a giant desert and to that end

you basically find these points around the world and create oceans and then the fish come back and then you're riding fucking dolphins and stuff and it's like turns into a paradise. It's a fantasia short. It's about as much story as you would find in a fantasia.

Sure. Which honestly is not far off. It's more story that was in Journey which had no language whatsoever and really just a few pictures. So it is interesting that they're slightly moving in that direction but I prefer it because it just

simplifies and directs what they're trying to do, which is, again, having this very cool feeling, experiential thing that isn't mired by, we're going to send you down dialogue please and shit like that. It's also, the thing that I really dug about this as compared to other games that, like, I think experiential, like, this is a genre at this one, right? Like, it's a small subgenre, but, like, there's other things like this. I think it's in other perspectives or whatever, but what I think is, uh, makes this work for me

is that I never feel like I am being forced to slow down and look at everything around me at a pace where it's being dictated to me, right? Like it's like, I feel like in a lot of games like this, it's like you have to slow down and really appreciate all of the work that we put into this art. Because we made all this art for you.

And this game will just let you freaking truck through the art in a way that feels, it feels magical. Like it doesn't feel, I feel like someone made it. It feels like, holy shit, this is all happening around me and I don't even need to slow down

to look at it because I know something else awesome is going to happen around the corner. And there are moments where like they will take control of the camera and like make sure you see the dope-ass thing, whether it's the giant tower

that you're going towards or the fucking dolphin, whatever, dolphin showing up. Whatever the dope thing is, they'll let you see it. I got so excited every time I saw that dolphin.

I knew I was in for a good time whenever that rascal showed up. Yeah. It's so, like, It's really, really sidesteps, and this is going to sound really dismissive, and I genuinely don't mean it that way, but I struggle with games, even at the height of the genre, even a journey where it feels like plotting. It feels like, oh, okay, I'm really having to work to get through this beautiful experience that they, and in this game, I mean, shit, man, you hit a point where you unlock like a boost button, and then you also learn how to dive, straight down into a ramp or a half pipe and it becomes like wipe out like you are going through it so i think i finished the game in a few hours uh and i even went around and collected some of this stuff because there is like a currency you can find that you spend to unlock abilities like

tricks or grabs or you know dives or completely optional uh not particularly uh you know game assisting abilities uh and i got through it real real fast and i never felt a moment of like boredom or frustration with the pacing of the game it yeah usually in these games they'll have the moment where it's like you've been sapped of your powers and you're gonna walk slowly for five minutes and then you're gonna feel really fucking good when they give them back to you and here you just basically start with the dope-ass powers right yeah something that probably bears mentioning because of the name of the game you're not actually like hitting much stuff there's not much hitting going on if it like from the name sort of the sea you

might expect it to be sort of... Yeah, there's no combat. Which maybe we should... I could have clarified up top, because it's... The sword is very prominent. As soon as you get the sword, dude, steps right on it. He's like, he's never seen a skateboard. It's like, this idiot's never seen a sword before.

Every time a big monster comes, this guy's looking at the sword, like, help me sword. It's like, uh, dude, you have a sword. Let's go wrink some bells. Let's go to the heroic Zelda and ask, ask that guy, like, what, you know, what a sword's for. He jams it into the ground a lot. There's a lot of jamming. That's out of frustration, like, because you can't figure out what to do with it.

And it's to make stuff. Put the business in them, man. And it's to make things wet. And when it's wet, when the ground is water, it goes faster, and that's really nice. Oh, yeah. That's very satisfying. It's fun that we focus so much on not the art and music. That feels so, I hate that.

It's pretty. I don't have any vocabulary. We can do it. I'm going to try it. It's so beautiful. Okay. So I'm going to give you... Watch a video of it.

Seriously. You should watch a video of it. But I'm going to paint a word picture to you. Why? This is good at it. This is our job. I love word pictures. You're skateboarding across a desert and you go up a giant dune and jump high into the air and do a kick-flip spin.

And when you land in the desert, instead of it just going fump, it leaves this ripple of sand around you. And then you zoom off and ride a fucking dolphin. It's really good. It also has a dynamic soundtrack like those, you know, the best of that game that as you like bring this world to life and as you, you know, fix the world, the music kind of swells and picks up and adds, you know, instruments. Can I just say I love an isolated flute. Oh, dude. I mean, give me an isolated flute. Any of those high-pitched woodwinds, I'm right back in third grade listening to Peter and the Wolf.

Boopoo Boop Boop Bo! Bo! Bo! Bo! Bo! Transport it. When Tori is here for you You know, you found a perfect match Is this a awesome? I guess, yeah. Did he do it? Yeah, yeah, you did? Yeah, I just need more. I isolated flutes, everybody.

It's all we need. It's all we need. The game is very pretty. The music is great. It all comes together for me because it is a sensual game. And not in a bounticabowal way. I mean, we did talk about a sort of word.

Then you feel really betrayed by you. It's a different word. What do you want? Sensory? Is that good? It depends what you're going for. It depends on. You can't say sensual, but I don't say sensual and then be like, not sensual, but wink.

Like, use a different word. I'm saying it just makes you feel something. It is being able to turn hot into cold, being able to like ring a bunch of bells, being able to do all the various spins and everything, it's all these little tiny good feeling things from other video games smashed into one place. And I would say it's sensual. Cool. I would say if I could attempt, because I kind of get what you're going for, because I was attempting to summarize this in my head while I was playing, but by getting narrative out of the way and making the game so obvious, which is to say, you are bringing back the sea. That's what you're always doing, right? You're bringing back the sea. You've got the sea. You're bringing it back to this area. By getting the game stuff out of the way, it's like communicating narrative through gameplay.

In a way that where it's like the actions that you are taking, because there's not a story, the actions that you're taking, I think are imbued with more meaning. Because it's the meaning that you're like laying on top of them. But there is a, I guess my point is there is a story. There is a story. When I get frustrated by, you know, RPGs that take 15 hours to get going and things like that. Like this is what I'm talking about. You can make someone, you know what? Perfect example.

We just played mafia last week. perfect example it took five hours of you slowly carrying wine for anything to happen here you can make people feel things in a very short amount of time i think the ori games are like an incredible example of this where they really get going very quickly that just requires like i think precision and careful editing and thought about what you're including versus not i'm not saying games don't need narrative and dialogue and of course a lot of games do do need that stuff, but you just need to be very selective about what you're doing and making sure those first few hours for people are an incredible experience and not just a preamble for

what is going to be an incredible experience. I think it's great. I was surprised by how sticky it was. Like I kept finding myself with time and instead of playing other stuff, I kept coming back to this one until I finished it. And it is, I think just the right length, just the right size and just a really well-craft. version of this. Sensual? Just the right length. Just the right.

Erotic. Seedy. Hey, can I do a box quote? Let me try a box quote from the besties. This sword of the sea is extremely sensual. This sort of the sea is extremely sensual. Yeah. Not too hard.

Not too soft. Not too long. Not too short. One star, Lisa, trail of wetness behind wherever it travels. this sort of the sea Let's get it wet

This summer 2022 John Romero is going to make you his bitch In sort of the sea Hey There's a lot of other stuff to talk about Including but not limited to Bubsy 4D Okay

Okay Gamescom's going on Should we just get into the heart of the matter are the only thing that people care about? Yeah. And it should be noted. Jeff looks great.

That's what I cared about. He had a great suit on. It should be noted, we are recording this a little bit early. So if you're like, why are they not talking about the huge Silk Song announcement that just happened yesterday?

It's because we're recording it before that announcement. And we asked Jason Schreier. Jason Schreier's like, I got the scoop. I got the skinny. We're like, give it. Give it up.

And he said it's the wait until next year. No, he didn't. He said that on him. uh yeah they showed silk song at the opening ceremony of gamescom uh by which i feel so bad for jeff keely by the way why i think i think it's okay what they showed of silk song was like of like 30 seconds of new gameplay footage there's a demo that is playable at gamescom that's that is the big sort of proof of life i feel like you know jeff king that he is of this industry and the power that he wields bad for sure wanted it so so flew

to Sydney or whatever the fuck they are in Australia he said let give me a pick I will go down to the game minds myself just let me do the announcement that it's live now I want to say the words please they showed up at their office one day and he was prostrate in front of their door with cups of coffee what can I do for your Australian gentleman to make this happen Jeff's outside again he's whipping himself with the cat of nonce house that's a British guy who works at the Australia yeah sure and all they gave him was 10 seconds of gameplay and they let him announce that the game was coming out in 2025 even though they had already announced that fact okay but it's also

playable in some way at gamescom and that is a that is a genuine escalation of evidence that this thing is I mean it's been playable before this not the first time it's been playful for what it's got can I ask can I ask guys seriously yeah as somebody who liked Silk Song and I like like Hollow Night not so I liked Hollenite and thought it was really good at this point Is it more of like a meme or does this just frustrate you? And people who are like actually looking forward to it a lot, I feel like this is, I would be so annoyed if I really, it has reached a sort of ironic level of, like, Hollow Night, I think is

can hang with the best Metroidvania ever made. Like it's, it is way, way, way, way up there, top three easy masterpiece. And I can't wait for Silk Song. But seven years, by the time I hit five years waiting on a game, it escalates to a point of I have to distance myself from it to be like, it's not real. I mean, there was an edge preview of it like three years ago, maybe four years ago. It's been in the works. I'm excited to see anything out of this fucking game, man. I think what's sad to me, assuming that it actually is coming out, which I assume the listeners know at this point, it will probably mean the death of the Silk Song subreddit, which has been. basically dedicated to faking

Silk Song news over the course of the last three or four years. Yeah. In increasingly dramatic ways. Most recently someone created a totally different subreddit that only had one post in it. The subreddit was called Indy Grames and the post was

Silk Song announced and then they retweeted it on the Silk Song subreddit as an effort to fool everyone. It's been just this escalating game of... That community is going to absolutely meltdown. I feel like when this game exists I don't know how we're happy for them

I feel I don't feel like this situation is their fault obviously like this is not who's the creators of the game right I don't know to what extent it's a little bit a little bit there's a messaging issue there's a messaging issue okay the Silk Song announcement is coming out after we the second I guess announcement is coming out after we record this podcast so hopefully by this point by the time people hear this will know when they

games coming out. I don't want to talk about Silk Song anymore. Scratch. What? Bubsy's back. Yeah, so that's how the trailer starts. It's so scary. Seriously? He yells at you like that. He yells, Bubsy's bad. No, the trailer starts with Bubsy, and he looks amazing, and he's looking at all his old games, and he's like, these fucking stink. But it's better now, and then you see Bubsy 4D. And it's a cool way for a beloved IP to reintroduce itself to the new generation. It's so crazy that this is

happening two months after the Gex trilogy was released on Steam. Like, what is happening right now? Well, I mean, it's all the same person, right? Yeah, is it? Wasn't the Gex trilogy also part of Digital Eclipse? Well, it's Gex. Gex made all these games. Oh, Gex made it. I'm sorry.

I don't know if you've seen the logo, but Gex makes the games confusing. I just liked it, Wade Rosen, the current CEO of Atari. And let me be clear. Gex trilogy, that was limited run games. There are other sickers in the world. You get really rich. You take over Atari and then you use all of that power and money to make Bubsy 4D. I just think that is, that's somebody living out their fantasy, living out their dream. I am nervous

and perhaps a little skeptical that this is going to transition cleanly from Bubsy being something we all can have a good laugh about to a beloved to hey I'm back and I'm in on the joke to meegovine 4D it's meta hey just like here

for your guys I'm just curious without looking it up how many bobsy games have there been are we counting like this is a trick question this is the fifth one are we okay so

3D there are three bobsy games but they're a mobile one that are slightly different and there's also the art unofficial bubsy games yes so like what are you

what are you counting i was talking about the official ones probably like six if you count the the portable ones is different from the plain ones yeah it's six the number is six which is fucking staggering to me that bubsy's been in that many games and now soon to be seven yeah um and i guess

like irony how far does this go Okay, so here's, I think this game for it to work has to actually be a fun game. Yeah, I mean, I would argue that's the case for all games. Yeah, well, I checked out, you can see the developer, I think their name is Pabras. They're on Steam, and they've made a number of games that are quite well-rated. I've not played any of these.

They're called Demon Turf, Slime, Sond, Planet Diver, but they have. That is a great game. It seems like these people know how to make a game. So they are trusting it with people who know how to make a game. Right. And you can't go wrong with Bubsy. Can we talk about the design? Like his actual look.

I mean, he's grown up. He's more mature. He's wearing a suit now. This is an adult's bubsy game for adults. This is like, yeah, second divorce bubsy. Yeah, now I have to look at it. It's bubsy adults only is the original working title. I have to watch the trailer to participate in the discussion.

This seems like such a betrayal, guys. I don't know. Yeah. Bubsy. I don't know. Atari's been doing interesting stuff. Speaking of Atari doing interesting stuff, did you see that Pac-Man Atari they did?

Yeah, I did. You see that? Which was good. Look that, just look up the Pac-Man Atari 2,600. They have a Pac-Man-themed Atari-2600 that has controllers in four different colorways that represent the ghosts and it's like

it's gorgeous I mean it is gorgeous but they're doing more I don't know Atari's doing interesting stuff like that they were in a weird place earlier where they were trying to do a hotel and bitcoins and stuff or whatever I don't know they're a little more interesting you could listen to a little show

called post games listen to an interview between me and the CEO and you'll find out that That hotel? Still happening, baby. But the hotel is still happening. What other big announcements do we? Oh, the Kirby Airwriters direct. Yeah, this wasn't really officially part of Gamescom, but they did spend 45 minutes of Sakurai talking about what Kirby Airwriters is.

And at one point, he's like, you know, people might be saying that this is like Mario Kart. And it kind of is, but they still let me do it. I could watch that dude talk about any game he's making fucking forever. There's a bit where he's talking about how great the original Kirby Airwriters was because it only used a single button for all the interactions. He was like, unfortunately, we've added a second button. It looks so fucking fun. I did not play the original at all,

and I know it's a game a lot of people have a lot of nostalgia for. But just the movement, like, it's not a cart racer necessarily. I mean, it has elements of it, but it seems more kinetic, like almost like a bayonet. had a take on Mario card. Yeah, it's more about, like, charging up and dashing, like, chaining together these, like, charged dashes and using special Kirby abilities and stuff. It looks like a fucking blast. I cannot wait for this one.

Hey, I haven't played the last few Call of Duty Black Ops games. Have they always been kind of completely fucking unhinged? Or is the trailer for Blackop 7? We played one, what was the one we played? What was it last year? That was quite good. Did we just play Blackop 6? Yeah, that came out last year.

Okay. So I'm not. They are wild, and y'all, there are a million reasons that you might not want to play a Call of Duty game over the last 20 years. But I can't believe these games exist. They have gone so far off the plot. Every mission now is just a different type of game. I don't know if that's what they're doing this time around. I mean, based on the trailer, it's like you get super jumps and the world looks like how it did at the end of inception.

You get hit with the fucking scarecrow gas, and you and your squad all of a sudden are, like, in Venezuela, but all the streets go straight up into the sky. It looks insane. I think they've rightly realized that from a design standpoint, you can't make a grounded call of duty game for every single mission and have it really keep it compelling. So they've figured out, as plans said, new ways to sort of refresh it. The last game we played had like a big open world mission, which was incredible, in addition to, like, fucking grappling hooks and shit. and this one seems to be going even more in that direction where you get fucking superpowers for some reason and eventually there's like an end game to the campaign

where it's like a PVE co-op centric experience that's like very involved actually this whole game can be played in co-op which is pretty cool I don't know if it's enough to get me back in the ecosystem but it's always fun to specifically Black Ops to see a trailer for Black Ops where it's like we're on dinosaurs and it's like what the fuck you are Cool.

It feels like the sort of game that, like, for people that don't give a shit about the militaristic stuff, like, it's designed for them. It almost feels like they should call it a different, like make it a different thing, call it a different, like, just call it mind wars or something like crazy. Well, but then the multiplayer is the militaristic stuff and the like free to play, whatever it is. The Battle Royale mode is like all the basic militaristic stuff. So you're getting everything in that package. It's how they've done Call Duty forever, basically. Yeah. Sorry, are we just going to ignore the fact that Griffin took him up.

With Mind Wars, for free. I thought it was really, really good. Is it right now? Milo Ventimilia in Mind Wars. Yeah, so the bad boyfriend from Gilmore Girls is the star of this game. Or the good boyfriend, this is us. Yeah. And I know how you look at him.

Yeah, it's crazy. How do you all feel about the new Batman game? You see this? Oh, the Lego Batman. Lego Batman, Legacy of the Dark. Night, which seems to be a combination of every Batman thing, like Batman TV

shows, the Batman movies. You got Nolan movies, you got Burton movies, you got the Reeves movie. But also looks kind of like it plays like a rock steady Batman. It does. Yeah, the combat looks like a rock steady game. It looks like what they're doing here

is what they did with the Star Wars Rise of the Skywalker Lego game. Just mushing is all in... Fucking all the hits. Listen, I'll just say this, okay, Lego. I don't think we need anybody else taking all of popular culture and smushed it into a big mooshy slurry. You know, we get it. Sure.

You know, I don't think we need to just moosh everything up into one big gloopy pile and slurp it down in Lego form. I don't think that's necessary. I mean, I could be honest, they were kind of doing that long before Disney was. Yeah, way, way, way, way, way. How many of those beauties are sitting on yourself right now, Russ? none is that right none the answer is none none is the answer none of those beauties

um i even kids get bored of those games every every game toer list alive has recommended a Lego game to anybody looking for games to play with their kids and then without fail after 15 minutes every count in the plan is like this is boring I don't I think Lego's the last one genuinely is like a genuinely great game

their hit rate is so bad I can't cannot get the kids to try them anymore because they are so fucking I think there was a time when they were pumping them out like every six months and at that point I agree with you and I think what they've focused on instead like it's been two years since that Star Wars game at least I don't know how they are now spending more time on them I think they would need to do something for me to like separate it a bit more because in my head that's like a big just a big glump that doesn't really like an oversaturation sort of situation I feel like the Lego fortnight stuff has been more successful at like

kind of capturing the well it's like a separate brand you know what I mean like yeah yeah for sure that Lego thing this is not the shit on all of Lego because that the Lego thing that Jeff shared with his last time that Jeff on one of his special parties

the one where you're a Lego brick and you're rolling around the co-op you know interacting yeah the co-op one that Lego adventure I think it's called like that like I can't remember the title maybe they do need Batman I did not, I was not paying

super close attention to the gamescom stuff as it was being announced and so I got a slack message from Russ in the middle of the day that just said Sekiro anime and it felt like a prank at first but no they're doing one up on Crunchyroll Sekirot anime adaptation of the plot of the game

and I'm one wanting to play Sekirot again thanks to that two excited for this anime. Three, wondering if this is any kind of fuel for the fire for the to finally come to me because I'm ready. I've been ready. Do you think that Activision can get that to happen?

Yeah. Yeah, no, I prayed really hard to the Lord. I said, give me more Sekiro, give me more Subtero, give me more Bubsy. And the Lord was like, you got it, man. What if it's kind of both? I just want to say, Griffin, what if it's both? What if it's both?

An anime and the game where when it gets to a hard part in the anime, they turn to you and they say, Griffin, please help with your. skills. I want you to take over in this scene and then you play... You fought this monkey man 60 times. Then you play the adventure. Yeah. Travis, Griffin, Travis in here. Griffin, listen, I'm saying you could play the adventure.

Like, you could play the anime. That sounds cool, man. Yeah. Okay, do you think they're going to render the poop? I think they'll render the poop for sure. I think you try to start episode 10. It's just called Sword Saint-Eachin and you try to start it and a prompt comes up on Netflix. I'll grudge your role.

It's like, nope. You're not fucking ready man you're not good enough watch the first nine episodes again again watch the first nine episodes a hundred thousand times and then you can come and watch the finale um yeah a weird batch a weird batch of stuff out of out of games com but this is sort of the nature of the decentralized uh news uh state of the gaming industry where everyone i feel like i don't know you don't get any huge fucking pressers anymore where it's like and here's uh here's the news else because that's controlled entirely by Nintendo or here's the new, you know, a PlayStation joint, because that's going to be on their state of plays.

It's just left press conferences in kind of a strange spot. There's some good stuff. There's some ghost of Yote stuff, but yeah, it's all. Yeah, they announced the D.L.C. for Ghost of Yote. When is that, is that game out soon? It's this fall. Yeah. Yeah.

Weird to announce DLC for a game that's not out. I agree. I mean, I'm excited. I'm excited for the game. Yeah. Okay, honorable mentions time. Anyone got anything they want to talk about? I, Justin kindly, gave me a handheld, the I Aeo Pocket Ace, which has really become

my off-court buddy over here. Your new off-court buddy. Where is the old off-court buddy that were used to do. So I have a, now I was adopting a sort of two-hand-held system where I would have one, for the big fancy stuff, and then I have the pocket micro classic for, you know, I just finished FF6 Game Boy Advance Audio Remaster Edition on that one. But this is more of a mid-sized guy.

This still fits in the old pocket, and it can run like fucking anything. I got Final Fantasy 12 up and run on it. I got Celeste up and running on it, and it's fun to have a little guy that I can take around. And I don't know, I just really, really, really like the form factor. I also bought one of the Retroids Second Screen Attachments that just came out because it's supposed to fit really nicely on the Ace. So the cool thing about the Ace that is kind of different at this price point for a lot of these higher-end Android consoles is that it is a three-by-two aspect ratio screen.

Yes. Which is not the best if you want to like play a bunch of like high-end stuff that. It's already in widescreen, but if you want to play anything that is at that, like, old school ratio, like, it's going to look a lot better. It's going to take up more of the real estate on the screen. And that's not super common in the vertical form factor to have this three by two screen. Yeah. It's kind of neat, neat place the A slides in. Hoops, hoops, hoops.

Can you tell people about your sneakerhead theory about these things? Yeah, I don't know. When you follow this space, it's like very iterative, right? it's a lot about like latest and greatest and what is the newest hottest thing to a point where like people joke about the one feature that is missing from this year's thing or this year this month's thing that'll be in the next month's thing but you can a lot of these are funded through indigogo it's kind of wild like if you look at when the pocket ace or the pocket pro a lot of these i neo products you do this amber nick does it sometimes i believe but they start on an indie crowdfunding

platform so like if you go to indigo go right now for i neo i andeo i think you're is doing one for a flip console, a clamshell, sort of DS form factor that they are... Which has really become the battlefront of this is where the war is right now, right? Who can make the best double-screen clamshell? Right. So you had the Retroid Flip 2, which is widely beloved. A lot of people like that thing. It's a really solid option.

But it does not have the bottom screen. And then you have Retroid releasing that second screen attachment that Griffin just mentioned. And then we've got the I&O Flip. DS that just like got announced I think this week and that is a started with like a crowdfunding campaign and then you can

see on the crowdfunding campaign like exactly how many people have like pre-ordered these things and it's like the INeo Pocket actually is the one the flip is the higher end windows based thing that is over a thousand dollars yeah that's a little much

that's a lot guys it's kind of wild and I just announced the Thor, which... They tease the Thor. They have not told us what the Thor will be yet, but yeah, it is... Just wild. It is wild. It is a wild space, but you can see how many people have crowdfunded each of these

things. It's crazy. Like, you can see the exact number of people that are purchasing each of these, and I have heard people, like, on some channels, like, kind of bragging about, like, being number two or number three or even number one, you know, in line. How do they have the time? between all the fucking to brag about that stuff. Russ Frustick.

Of all of the people. What are we doing right now? You are in the way. What are we doing right now? A glass house, you couldn't even dream of being in a glass house right. You wish you're in Wonder Woman's Invisible Jet. It's like nothing. Your house is made of candy floss and you're spraying the fucking hose all around.

So they raised a half million, $600,000 pretty much on the pocket. Pocket DS, which is the world's first dual screen Android handheld. And that one, they have, you can see, they have done, like, for example, at the early bird level, which is like 400 for your base model, that's the cheapest one, they have 54 of those have sold. Step up from that, 257. You can see exactly how many of each of these models have sold and how many are unclaimed, and it's kind of a wild way of doing.

business because it's like if the market's there people will just keep like releasing it and I guess from wild I guess from my perspective the games that I loved on both the 3DS and the DS which I guess this is these devices are designed for right of the ones that haven't been like re-released in some format so the examples being like the Castlevania those GBA and DS games right I think there's like 10 of those DS slash 3DS games that I like really would want to play which makes the justification kind of hard for me.

That's, can I say, that's crazy. It's a crazy. Personally speaking, that's crazy. The DS and 3DS is... Those libraries are... A lot of games on there. A lot of great games on there, but like... So, I think you have 10 you'd want to play is...

I feel like there's a lot of games that can't be adapted because of the dual screen format. Right. And this is, this is, uh... I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if one of these is going to become, like, my, I think the dream is always having, like, the one, the one true handheld that I can play everything on. And, like, this is, there's a suggestion of that. You really, if you look at this space, there are some consoles where, like, the best way to play it is still on original hardware, right? Right. The DS is like that. The Vita's like that. Three DS is like that. Certainly, certainly, oh, well, home consoles, forget about it. But yeah, like, even those old ones, that's still the best way playing it. And that sucks for that.

Well, they are. Oh, that's like well settled because nobody cares, right? It's like, but from a preservation perspective, a lot of these games, you will not be able to have this experience, like, without some sort of hardware that can emulate it, right? Like, even, like, in retro arc, you can do a, in the, like, MGBA emulator, you can do a amount of solar radiation that you are receiving. Oh, for Boktai. Yeah. For Boktai, right? So, like, that stuff can be emulated, but that's the level, like, to be able, but if you want to play Boktai, that's, those are your options. So, like, why are you wear, Warioware Twisted on the GBA with the motion sensor?

Like, there's weird edge cases that are, that are. My kids are obsessed with I Carly. They've watched every episode of I Carly, and the only Icarly games are on Nintendo DS. So I have to, like, go dig out my pink Nintendo DS, charge it up, go find the Icarly. Carly games. Yeah. And so it's like, I understand the edge case thing, but like, especially as like your kids get older, the ability to say like, hey, there's 30, 40, 50 games on this thing.

I got to show you because it's wild. There's a real value to that. Personally speaking, Henry is really wanting to play Ocarina of Time and I don't want him to play any version but the 3DS version because the game is not especially approachable to an eight-year-old. and it's in 64 fashion. What about Ship of Harkinen? What about Ship of Harkening?

Quick plug, actually, for Sword of the Sea. Again, I meant to mention this in the earlier discussion, but I played with Cooper, who is seven, and does not play almost nothing with, like, dual sticks, and she loved Sort of the Sea. She loved it. And it was just enough of a challenge to make her feel like she was leading the experience,

but, like, she really got it. Only thing that I thought was interesting, I thought you guys would think was interesting, she was over-manipulating the right stick because she's so used to Roblox where there is no third-person camera support, and you are completely manipulating the camera on the right thumbstick. And she was getting frustrated with the game because she was wanting to control, essentially, she was wanting to control the camera constantly. She was like fighting the game until I told her like, honey, in a good game, there's a camera, and they're trying to help you. have to do it all on your own, hon, the game will help. It'll work with you. I know you're used to having to fight Roblox tooth and nail to get any pleasure out of it. Right. I also wanted to shout out a show I've been watching on Netflix. Big shout out to David Weiner, my father-in-law for the recommendation. It's called Final Draft. It is a Japanese competition, reality, athleticism show

where like 30 retired athletes compete in physical 100 style athletic challenges. And it's really great because the, I don't know, it's an older base of competitors who all have quite a bit to prove, and most of which have reached the end of their careers, and this is sort of like their last way of using these skills to try and win a big prize pool, and that is a cool concept for a show.

My father-in-law sending that to me would be the most fucking loaded thing possible, you know what I mean? Think about it. There's a bunch of old dogs with one last fight left in them, just in case they got one less scrap in there in case you think they don't have it anymore, Griffin. It hits different from a David Weiner

than it does from a Tommy Smurl, but I can see the point. Not fighting for physical dominance as much, I understand. I played a game called Super Mario 64 on the Nintendo 64. Interesting. I played it because I owned that version that came out on Switch that they stopped selling for some reason.

I forget what they called it. But I was looking for games because I beat Mario Wonder with my son, more or less, sitting alongside me. And he was super, super into it. And I was looking for games that we could play next. And went there, and he loved it. He was incredibly into it, not afraid of the eel remarkably. Loved all the swimming. We ended up beating that.

And then I was like, what could I play next? And I tried booting up Odyssey, which is also in that game pack. It's Odyssey, Sunshine, which I skipped. because it's dog shit and then straight to Galaxy. Galaxy was way too overwhelming. Yeah, man. I think he was just like,

it was too much for him. It starts with the scary like Bowser fucking mortaring the Princess Peach's Castle and then suddenly you're in space and it's just there's a lot going on. He doesn't mean that metaphorically, kids. He means that literally.

Sorry. Yeah, it's a shame. And then so I jumped over to Yosh's Island, which he was into, but then now he just wants to keep going back to Mario Wonder, which I guess is not a failing. But not ideal is the fact that the only levels he wants to see are the Wiggler races.

Wigler, as we all know, is the Caterpillar that runs along and is very friendly. There are only two Wigler races in the entire game, and he just wants to replay those over and over again, and it's fucking boring as hell. So I just want to play Yoshi's Island with him because it rules. We said have kids be easy. Yeah, that's true. Chris? Yeah, I'm just going to use this as a chance to plug something related to that, which is, I guested on the ringer verse over at the ringer.

They have a game show called Buttonmash. And with Joshua Rivera and Maddie Myers and the host, Binlenburg, we picked the best Mario games of all time. And it's a really fun episode. I did research ahead of time. And let me tell you, I learned so much about Mario sewing games. Oh, yeah. So much.

They made two of them over a decade apart. And you can learn all about it. on that episode. Did you do every single Mario game or just like the core? It was a draft. So there were like categories. It was very ringer, very sports,

you know, focused. You know, we talked a lot about baseball. They do love sports. Although we do do a bracket as well. We know about sports. We know about sports.

That's true. Justin, you got anything besides your nerd ass handheld shit? No. No. I don't think. I want to hear about your nerd ass. No, no, no, no.

No, we've talked, we had a good segment about that. We did, we did. We've done our due diligence. Let me scoot away some of these things that I had within reach to, hold on. Just got to scoot away some of these handhelds that I had within reach to. This is actually a fun game. How many within reach right now? I've got, how long will you give me?

I've got two. I legitimately don't have any within reach of the studio because I need to a workspace. Because it's a workspace, right? All I have is my Marvel stickers. for when you guys do a good job. That's it. That's all I have with image. No stickers handed out today, I noticed.

What? No stickers today I noticed. It's been a while, Griff. Actually. He's stingy gentleman when it comes to stick out. It's got to mean something when he does it. That's the show, I think. I think we did it.

Point, you want to recap games we talked about? We talked about so much good stuff today. We talked about Sword of the Sea. But we also talked about Hollow Night Silk Song, Kirby Airwriters, Call of Duty, Black Op 7, Bubsy 4D, Lego Batman, Legacy of the Dark Night. And we talked about stuff that is in video games, too. We talked about Atari 2,600 Pac-Man edition,

the Sekaro anime, I and Eo Pocket Ace, TV shows like Final Draft, and then there was a bunch of retro Mario games thrown in there in Lego Voyagers. It was just a full, wonderful episode. Yeah, Lego Voyager is the name of that co-op game we were trying to remember. Lego Voyager, there we go.

All of the details, all of the links, and so much more are available to you at besties. And fan subscribe for free. Not to mention, there's a towel for sale. There is a great towel. We also have a Patreon. You can go to patreon.com slash the besties. You can buy a gift to the Patreon for a good buddy of yours if you have money left over after the towel. That's patreon.com slash the besties slash gift.

We have some new members to shout out. We have Kelly, we have Brian, we have Stephen, and we have NJ. Thank you for being members. We have a new episode of the rest of these coming at you on Tuesday. We're talking about Stick It to the Stickman, which will be a fun one. And we also have a game that we're talking about next week, which is hurdling a very cool game from the makers of FAR. It was called FAR. And from the publisher, Panic.

who you know for Untitled Goose game and Espelote This one is like Imagine babe But it's with like Babe or Babe pick in the city Which one?

No more baby More original babe Because it's about hurting Creatures Is it about hurting though Hurting Hurting, herding I don't want to hurt them

I want to hurt them Yeah The game is called Hurdling Which I think is that's what you are That's gonna do it for us For this week Until next time My name is Justin McRoy

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