The Besties - The Besties Podcast XIV

Episode Date: June 1, 2012

The Besties square off on Ghost Recon, Dragon's Dogma and Resistance: Burning Skies.The Commish returns to dole out more Besties justice. This week we've got three big games, but a special nod to a fourth game, Slingshot Racing, which offers up single-touch iOS racing enjoyment with grappling hooks. Plus we're introduced to Special Boy, Justin's ward. 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 hug anybody who wants it, yeah. I'm kind of a slutty. You're going to get sick. I'm already sick. You're going to get hug-beeties. Hug-beeties. You're going to get embraceria. This is gross.

When you're sliding in the home and then you hug a guy. Embraceria. Can this not be the intro audio? Oops. Oops. Oops. My name is Justin McElroy, and I know the best game of the week. My name is Griffin McElroy, and I know the best game of the week. My name is Griffin McElroy. Justin just sold you a lie, because I clearly know the best game of the week.

My name is Christopher Plant. You can call me the Mish. What? The Mish. Like, the Mish. My name is Russ Frustick, and I'm not the Mish, I the mish uh my name is russ frustic and i'm not the mish i guess yeah yeah you're the mish yeah yeah hey we don't want people to think that chris plant is the commish just just part and parcel because of i don't know because he's the smallest

right now um it's because he brought two bad games in a row. I did not bring a bad game this week. It's true. His game is not terrible this week. Is he still going to pitch it? I think he can still let the people know about the game, even though it's pretty clear that it's not going to win against all the other games. I don't think the commissioner's game can win.

You're getting crazy. Hey, everybody, this is the besties. It's a game of the year podcast that lasts all year long uh much like king of the hill we compare the newest games all right man i'm gonna get propane then pit them it's like the tv pit them against each other in mortal combat or injustice gods among us uh piggy it's pretty good and also it is a show about king of the hill and favorite popper that's not bad about that's the neighbor as bobby doing a jewish comedian okay uh so uh chris play as the commissioner you are course, ineligible because you'll be choosing our best game.

So maybe you should decide who gets to pitch first. I will. And before I decide, I'm just going to put this out there. For people who like iOS games, Slingshot Racing is 99 cents. It is a one-button button racing game i thoroughly recommend it it is a fine wine amongst the the swill that you can play on ios right now so when did it when did it come out came out like last last week it was last okay all my favorite wines are a week old because they're still like you know they haven't fermented yet they're basically just like smooshed grapes at that point smoosh i do want to say something about uh slingshot racing because i actually like this

game too so you remember that scene i think it was in batman 2 or maybe batman 1 that one of the michael keaton ones where he's driving through uh gotham and he needs to take a turn really hard and he like shoots the grappling hook out onto the pole and he spins around the pole. You guys remember that scene? Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So that's basically the concept of slingshot racing.

So you're like constantly doing that around. Instead of having to turn the wheel, you just like use your momentum to whip yourself around corners. Yeah. You don't have the ability to control the gas or even your wheel. You just kind of slingshot around corners. Do you guys remember that scene? Do you guys remember that scene? Do you guys remember that scene from,

I think it was Batman and Robin where, uh, uh, Uma Thurman was there and she just hit everybody with all of her pheromones. Yeah. And, uh,

and, and Batman and Robin were both bidding on her like a piece of meat. And then Batman won because he, he, he, because he had a Batman credit card in his utility belt. And he because he had a batman credit card in his utility belt and he said something about never leave home without it you guys remember that and you could like see his nipples yeah fuck what a terrible movie i know it was the worst

it was the worst so uh so you guys i i was actually thinking that maybe this week uh mr justin could go first oh my god yes uh my game of the week is dragon's dogma um i have played it for shit i don't know probably 15 i love it uh i think it is it is an action rpg uh created by capcom it is i would say it is clearly sort of a japanese response to somewhere between skyrim and monster hunter not a japanese response to monster hunter that would be an echo chamber but uh it is a an open world uh action rpg uh where you play the arisen which is a uh a person who has had their heart stolen by a dragon literally like ripped out of his chest like a really charming yeah thario of a dragon. Yeah, just like all you. You guys boned in his secret den,

and he promised he'd call. He never did. But anyway, he has a heart stolen by a dragon. Like a Lothario of a dragon. Okay, good. Now let's not do that again. But he comes back to life to try to take vengeance. He is aided in his quest by a pawn.

And pawns are basically slaves. I thought they were just like really small shrimp. No, no, no. You're thinking of prawn. That's a common mistake. No, pawns are basically, I think, from another dimension, sort of. But they have no will of their own. They wait for someone to tell them what to do.

And when the arisen comes, that's you again, they, they fall all over themselves to serve you. So you create a class for yourself and a class for your pawn. And one of the cool things about the pawn system is that other people can check out your pawn. Basically they can borrow it.

It doesn't take them away from your game. It's just another, your pawn travels to their land. Your pawn helps the people, and the people can send them back with some gifts or a note about their appearance or fighting capabilities or whatever. I, for instance, have a beautiful little mage child named special boy and he what what yes you enslaved a child i enslaved a no i enslaved a beautiful

towel-headed uh child named special boy who thinks i am just a cat's pajamas uh and people check out special boy and then send him back with gifts. You can't just put that sentence out. It's that they borrow Special Boy and use him. Don't get dirty. What I have with Special Boy is, well, special. So,

the action is, no exaggeration, great. I mean, it feels really good. So much, so, so, so much better than Skyrim. You mean the actual combat? It's all presented in third person. Yeah, everything's super responsive. There's tons of different styles.

It's fully mappable. Like, if you want to – you have three abilities that you can map to the face buttons for each weapon. So, like, if you have daggers equipped, you have three different dagger abilities, and you have a profession where you grow in the profession and you learn those abilities. Sort of like a job system from, like, Final Fantasy, where you learn abilities in a specific job, and then you can always change careers and learn and grow in that job, but you keep all the abilities. So it gives you a lot of freedom about how you want to play. If you get bored halfway through and you decide you want to be a mage or a hybrid class or whatever, they make it really easy for you to do so. The only thing that I don't like about it is that it in many ways makes a lot of decisions that

don't seem particularly player friendly for instance it's a giant open world and there's not really a fast travel system per se at all now there is a you can get these items that are very expensive that will let you port back

to the main city and you can actually create other locales you can port to with those stones but it's not a renewable resource and it costs a lot now this is very bad in one way because it's like oh god but it makes journeys into a big deal so like when you get to a place you're like i don't i did not know if i was going to make it or not i thought i was going to was going to die. And it makes it really rewarding and immersive. But it's not for everybody. And I end up cursing it as much as I like it. But anyway, that's Dragon's Dogma.

I've found it really, really, really enjoyable. And like I said, draws me in. The connections that you make with the world sort of because of its uh quirks i guess you could say or at least in part because of its quirks um it really works for me so i really i really enjoy it but it's probably not for everybody okay i got a few questions hit me with your best first what is the dogma of the dragons do you actually learn it i don't think you get too deep into their into there's not the story is not uh it's barely there like you just gotta get your heart back that's all uh and crazy things happen and don't really pay off there don't there doesn't seem to be a lot of

thought given to the story um so i can't answer your question with any alacrity he's actually he's devoutly religious isn't he he's like he's uh he is a hasidic jew yeah but but uh but that is his that but he's very personal about he's very private about it got it got it uh the heart is it a metaphorical heart or is it oh no dog rips your heart out your chest. And it's actually pretty funny because it lets you make your hero like physically however you want to. So mine's a pretty close representation to me. He's kind of a junkster

and the dragon like plucks his heart out of his chest and there's this like chubby guy laying in the sand with a hole and he picks up a sword. It's like, what are you doing, beefus? What do you think you're gonna do with that look at you you you look like ed grimley's fat brother and you're gonna make a run at this dragon and try to fight him like it's it's pretty it but it is awesome because i made him the most agile class you can have so it's got these awesome boss fights where oh that's the other thing I forgot to tell you there are big monsters

griffins, cyclops what? griffons, cyclops cyclops and you can use the right trigger to grapple any of them so if you jump and

press right trigger behind one of those things you'll just grab onto their back. Very Shadow of the Colossus, but much more dynamic. So you can, like, climb all over them. So you're climbing on the back of the Cyclops and plunging a dagger into his eye while he, you know, wildly tries to knock you out of it. And those boss fights can happen basically at any point. They'll just fly out of the sky and try to murder you. But it's not scaled, right?

Because, like, you could just turn the corner. Oh, no, it's not scaled at all. Nothing in this game is scaled. So every once in a while, you'll run into, like, anything. It could be, like, a wolf. And you'll shoot it with an arrow, and you'll realize, like, oh, I've shot him ten times, and his health hasn't decreased at all. I am going to die. But it's not punishing in the way that, like, Dark Souls is.

You can save at any time. It's just kind of frustrating because you'll think, oh, I'm going to do this quest. And you walk all the way there. And then you realize, like, oh, there is no. I have nothing that is going to help me here. I am not ready for this at all. One thing that I wanted to ask you. to help me here. I am not ready for this at all. One thing that I

wanted to ask you, so I've seen video of it, and there's this weird use of text boxes where your compatriots are talking and it fills up half the screen. Yes. I recommend you turn that off first thing.

Oh, you can turn that off? Oh, totally. The interface is kind of cluttered initially. It even has buttons that tell you what your buttons do in any given context. I recommend turning that off and turning off the pawn dialogue. Your pawns are still a little chatty, but you can sit them. This is great. You can sit them down in something called the knowledge chair in all the pubs and stuff. So you sit across. I'm'm sitting across special boy in the knowledge

chair and he's like so i've been talking a lot how's that working for you and you're like no special boy don't talk so much it's like i'm sorry dad i'll let you i didn't say that sorry sorry sir arisen i let you down i'll talk talk a little less. It's like, I've been healing myself and you. Do you want me to just focus on you? It's like, yeah, special boy, I do. You just keep dad alive and we'll worry about you later. All right, Arisen. You're the boss.

That's the knowledge chair. Can I borrow special boy if I get the game? Will you loan him out? You can borrow special boy. I want to play special boy. Okay. Anybody can borrow special boy that wants to uh he is he is a level 20 i think he's level 30 wizard now so you can just take him with you can you start with like a level 30s pawn and like like right at

the beginning of the game you can if you, this is the way I understand it. If you go into this other dimension to recruit pawns. Basically like the Ghostbusters, like where Slimer lives? Yes, that's exactly like that. And when you go in, it's pre-populated with a bunch of pawns that are of your level. But also any of your friends that are playing uh it their pawns are there uh and they don't have to be level appropriate like i've been playing with patrick klepek's wizard oi has been actually been following me the whole time because he's like level 40 and has some dope

spells and it it can i i mean in one way it, oh yeah, this guy made it a lot easier. But on the other hand, the game doesn't scale whatsoever. So it's not really like, it doesn't feel like I'm cheating because the game doesn't care what level I am. So maybe I, you know, it just feels like you're trying to even the odds a little bit. And it never feels like they are overpowering you what's also kind of cool is once your pawn goes on a quest uh they will have they gain knowledge of the quest so like if oi has already been on a quest with patrick when i'm on the quest i can talk to oi and he will have insight for me like he'll know the best ways of getting there and he'll know what enemies are weak to and he'll know and he'll just like he'll he'll volunteer that information uh which is

really cool it'd be great if he was more patronizing like oh you sure you want to go down that way when patrick did this mission he used fire but i guess i guess different water will be different strokes for different folks, I suppose. So, Justin, that sounds like a really good game. Like, unless you have a seafood allergy, I think people will probably want to play it. Oh, my God. Stop. Russ. Try it out.

One more try, eh? Get one more spin. I mean, I think it sounds like the best video game that Kevin Smith has directed yet. What? Oh, Dogma. That was a Dogma joke. That was a Dogma. Oh, sorry, guys.

So, Russ, you want to go? Can we put Chris Plant in the knowledge chair? Chris Plant, stop talking so much. Would you like that I make bad jokes less? Am I going next? Yeah, tell me about your game okay so i'm i'm bringing um ghost recon future soldier uh to the mix so here's the thing about future soldier i haven't actually played a single moment of single player interestingly enough which is surprising because

i really like single player games but based on what i've heard from everyone i'm gonna play it eventually but based on what i've heard the reason to get this game is not for the single-player, it's for the multiplayer. So I'm going to speak to the multiplayer. The way the multiplayer is structured, it's a third-person shooter, you know, in the style of like the past few Ghost Recon games. The difference here is that it's, and this sounds a little dull, but the whole multiplayer is based around intel. So the idea is you're playing and you see an enemy guy right in front of you. You can shoot him and kill him and get points, experience points, and level up, stuff like that. But if you shoot him with like a stun gun, you can stun him and

he goes to the ground and then you can hack him while he's on the ground and after he's been hacked uh the locations of every other member of his team get revealed for like a short period of time so that's like one way of getting intel and it helps your whole team and you get points anytime one of your team members kills someone using the intel that you got another way to do intel is like you're flying around flying around in a UAV, and you're, like, spotting guys for people. There's a few different ways to do it. So the idea is it sort of blends, you know, the, like, Call of Duty, like, Twitch-based shooting mechanics

with people that like to play more tactically. Because you don't really need, like, reflexes to, like, fly the the UV around and help people. But you're still tremendously helpful and the game is still rewarding you a lot. Mode-wise, they've got a few modes. Traditional bomb the base stuff and deathmatch and stuff like that. But there's also a mode where once you complete one objective, it randomly picks the next objective. So that's sort of the mode that everyone's been gravitating towards because it keeps things fresh and interesting um yeah i don't know i would i would uh give a lot of props to the

creativity they put into this game it's it doesn't feel like any other multiplayer shooter i've played uh very creative game design at work and it's fun it's a good multiplayer cooperative uh shooter now i i liked advanced warfighter a lot when it came out years ago is there anything remotely similar to grow in here yeah well advanced warfighter had some of these intel moments yeah i i don't think in multi i didn't play a ton of the multiplayer, but I'm not sure if the multiplayer had it. Definitely in single player, there were moments where you had to control the UAV and mark guys. And I always found that kind of tedious in single player. But in multiplayer here, they made it much more fluid and interesting.

And it's a lot easier to do to mark guys is it my problem with with ghost recon games has always been my worry that to be i'm not crazy about tactical um how how much of this is tactics based versus just straight action based yeah from the multiplayer side what's good about the multiplayer is that you can play it either way like if you just want to be a soldier and go like you know heavy machine gun whatever and just shoot people you can do that but if you want to go like there are definitely people that prefer the more tactical route you can be the guy that's marking guys and like doing all the intel stuff so it's really i mean it's your preference a few things give me more pleasure than when somebody's trying to play it all tactically and you know flying around their

their their special helicopter and looking down at their game boy and i run up to them and i i shoot them with a shotgun and yell something about sports in their face and call them a nerd you can do that and pull their pants down that's an option for me there's a pants pantsing option you can yeah when you hit the b button after you kill someone you pull their pants down you just get right in their dead face and you yell sports uh there was a one other thing i want to mention is that the game uh strongly recommends cover in sort of like a nod to like realistic combat so you'll actually earn more experience points if you kill guys from cover really like yeah um and there's also some moves in the game that like like if you're pressed into cover it'll show you like a marker in front of you at another cover

point and if you hit hold a you'll do this like super fast sprint to that next cover point so you're sort i mean it feels like you're using like real world military tactics which i know a heck of a lot about given that i've no i've never done anything real world military wise i did go paintballing once though and it felt like paintball yeah you got shot in the face i did russ still has has tremors at night because of paintball yeah he has post has post-paintball stress. Post-paintball stress. Do you want to sum it all up for us, Russ?

Is there any, hold on, real quick, is there any co-op? There is, actually. Oh, yeah? Yeah, there is. There is. So you can play the single player, which I haven't played, in co-op. I can't really discuss that. But there's also a horde-style co-op mode.

I forget what they call it. But it's basically like you with four other people, you know, fighting against a crapload of AI people, waves of AI people. So you can use those same tactics in multiplayer. That sounds cool. I've never had a more engaging or addictive multiplayer shooter experience than Rainbow Six Vegas and Vegas 2's Terrorist Hunt mode. And every time I hear a Tom Clancy multiplayer game,

I always have my fingers crossed. I think if you liked the Terrorist Hunt stuff in Rainbow Six, I think you'd really like this stuff here. Because it feels like a more fleshed out... No shit, that endorsement, I'll go pick that game up. There you go. Unless you're pulling my up. There you go. Unless you're pulling my leg.

No, no, I never found Terrorist Hunt all that much fun because I thought it was sort of random where the guys showed up. Yeah, that's what's so awesome about it. But here, I don't know, I feel like there's more thought in how you take on a situation. There's more teamwork involved because you're marking enemies as they're coming in and stuff like that. Hey, do you know why they're called Ghost Recon? Yeah.

Why? Because they're dead and they're ghosts. What? Oh my God, I always suspected. Yeah. That's why you can't be like perma-killed because you're already dead. Exactly.

So basically the story goes, you were a soldier in vietnam got it and you travel to vietnam because there was some sort of like he wasn't really a terrorist he was like a cult leader and you go to like shut him down but he's like no you should join me but you need to make the ultimate sacrifice so he takes a knife and he stabs you in the leg but you end up bleeding out anyway because he hits the artery and then you die so you die in vietnam and then you wake up and you're still in vietnam but you can take a plane back but it has to be a ghost plane and then you take the ghost plane back and then they're like okay we need a new squad made

up of only ghosts and you're like okay i guess i should do it no one else is gonna do it it was amazing how coherent your story was when you were ripping off francis ford coppola and then how it immediately fell apart after apocalypse now ended yeah and then it became soul plane it became soul plane and ghost ship and the perfect mashup uh great well that was that was not enlightening whatsoever. Well, the rest of it was. Let's take a break to talk about something fun that was going on this week in the life of us. What did anyone do for the holiday weekend? Oh, I've got to.

Oh, God. I don't know if I should share this. Are you going to talk about your poops? Should I? No, I'd rather you didn't. Okay, we don't have to. We're voting. No, that's fine.

About the poops? Yeah, I don't want to hear about poops. Okay, so never mind. You don't have to hear. I had some stomach probs this weekend. Cool. That's a fine... We won't share it.

That's a fine short story. Like, it's over. It's over. I drank enough shandy to fill a child's swimming pool. Enough what? Shandy? fill a child's swimming pool. Enough what? Shandy. What is Shandy? Oh, Russ.

What? It's only the best summertime drink ever invented. It's a beer with lemonade flavor. Oh, right. You'd mentioned this many, many weeks ago. Like old-time lemonade? You just crack open a little packet of old-time? I don't think you can alchemize it

quite quite that easily it's it's lemonade and beer it's not like one part lemonade one part beer it's like beer infused with the good good spirit of lemonade does it taste like bud light lime no god no no although bl lime's okay that can refresh you on a hot summer i can't swim without some sort of lime infused beverage and i can't hammock without my shandy right i have the best life do you guys know i had the best life ever where do you get your shandies griffin like what kind of shandies are you i got the hgp i tell you lining kugel is probably my fave shandy but uh shock top doesn't okay shandy oh these are branded shandies yeah they're brandy shandies oh i thought you were making your own now you can make your own

of course yeah but i mean i could i could you know i could make my own pizza too but there's a little caesars across the street and they always have them so is it all shock top shandy or is it like a specific kind of shock i think shock top Shock Top, I think they specialize in fruit and cheese wheat beers. Yeah. Yeah. The core Shock Top, I believe, is an orange flavored experience. Hey, are you guys looking forward to E3? Oh my God, the triple.

Will we have a show next week? Yeah, we will. Yeah, we'll have a show. We're not going to spoil it. Yeah, we're going to have so much free show we're not gonna spoil yeah we're gonna have so much free time it's gonna be a great show are we gonna do another video i think there will be video i think if the people want them that's what they want we'll give it i don't know like nobody watched our first video about this i feel like people hated it uh lots of people liked it if you've never seen it i would recommend you go to

tube tubes.com and search search for besties video to watch about packs and you'll find it yeah it's probably not the best search but no i mean that's pretty close that'll get you halfway maybe maybe maybe the listeners could petition for a video with a hashtag. You know any good hashtags? I got one, like, give me my besties video now, shot at E3. I can't wait anymore. Gotta have this video in and on my eyes and ears. Please give it.

Besties, 2012. Jeeves, besties. Kony. Games. Jeeves. Besties. Coney. Games. Yeah. Bieber. No, we'll definitely shoot some stuff, do some video content, maybe record another episode, an audio show for you to enjoy.

We're going to be busy. The triple, guys. If you guys are in town, if you're in L.A., come hang out with us at our party. We're having a party on Sunday night. Where at? At, I believe, 7 PT. It's at the Broadway Bar? Yep. That's the name of it.

It's at 7 PM PT? It's 7 to question mark. Except 11. We're going to have work. We have work in the morning on Monday. Yeah, we got to work. Yeah, I got to be. Oh, jeez.

I didn't even think about that. I got to be up at like 6 in the morning to on monday so yeah we gotta work yeah i gotta be oh geez i didn't even think about that i gotta be like six in the morning to cover the microsoft press conference yeah i thought you guys would get to meet fun justin but instead you're gonna meet uh darting away from conversations because he can't handle them with people just that he doesn't know very well justin baby there's a switch up after max funcon there's a switch inside of justin that can only be flipped by the by the subtle hand of a vodka gimlet yeah alcohol's been a social lubricant can we before we move on can we all name our the game we're most looking forward to seeing

yeah we did a feature on this we did a feature we wrote this down this would be the audio version of mine so i'm gonna say it first metro okay i Okay. I'm gonna say... Wait, that doesn't match. Chris Plant, you picked Super Mario Wii U. Yeah, because I couldn't pick Metro because Justin already picked it. Here's mine then in that case. Dishonored. Oh, okay. Dishonored? Yeah.

Dishonored him. A dishwasher with the power to teleport. Dish one red. Actually, that's dishwasher. Oh, yeah. Yeah, Dishonored. Actually, that's dishwasher. Oh, yeah. Yeah, dishonored. I think that looks really cool. Little Big Planet Vita. Sorry, guys.

It looks amazing. Tomb Raider. Very excited about Tomb Raider. You already saw it, though. Yeah, but that's why I'm excited, because I saw it, and it looked awesome. You saw everything. I didn't see everything. Yeah, you did.

So, Griffin, what did you bring for us this week? Speaking of the Vita, I brought Resistance Burning Skies. It's a new shooter. How is that? I mean, you can read my review, and I'm assuming you all did, so I can't sit here and pretend that it is the best game ever released. It has its strengths and it has its weaknesses, but some of its strengths no video game has ever done before.

So I'll start with that. It is a first-person shooter on a handheld console that works perfectly to that effect. The dual sticks, like no other handheld console, I guess you have the dongle attachment for the 3ds now but um as far as i know it's the first first person shooter on a handheld console with two sticks and triggers and all that stuff and and it like all of the fundamentals of moving and covering and shooting and aiming like they all work superbly um and if anything else like

it feels, you know, it's kind of messed up to say it's a great proof of concept that a first person shooter can work on the Vita, but it does fill that role really well. And I'm, I'm really looking forward to, I'm hoping other developers will play it and say, okay,

this is possible. This is something that can happen. And then make better games because there's a lot of bad stuff in it too like the campaign is is pretty rough um it apes a lot of elements of other shooters only not really as well i don't want to give any spoilers but there's a scene in the game that is basically taken directly from a gears of war War game. Zombie Wife? Can you edit that out? But yes, that's what I want.

Really? Is that it? I guessed that. I was hoping that you write it a giant monster. You do do that also. I can't believe I guessed it, though. That's horrible. Yeah, that's what happens.

Please edit that out, though. And yeah, there's a few balance issues. There's eight guns in the game and the guns in the resistance the resistance franchise are like the best pretty much always resistance three is probably the the best example of that do they bring over the experience stuff where you can level up the guns using them well here's the thing uh so each gun has an alt fire that you set off with the touchscreen in different ways. No, it's actually, it works pretty well.

Like the bullseye that you use to lock on, you just tap on your target and then it locks on. Like that works really well. And some of the stuff, it's just sort of like an obstacle that you have to take your hand off the screen to like set off this super powerful shot. So it's sort of like a balance and uh you can upgrade the weapons with these uh things called gray tech that you find they're like little cubes that you can find on each level uh they are not hard to find though they're they're just like you go into a room with two exits and one leads to gray tech and one leads to the it's not like you're not solving puzzles or anything like that the big bummer is if you miss one and you go on to the next level there's

no chapter select option you have to beat the game and then play it again a new game plus it's wow it's puzzling um and like there's some other stuff too like the there's two mini bosses that you have to fight just ad nauseum over and over and over again and the pattern of like you know duck and cover and then shoot and shoot heads like that really never changes throughout the throughout the game but i didn't think it got especially stale because the the game is only six chapters long and each one takes about an hour to be um it's it's functional but it's not it's not uh it's not great but the multiplayer is actually pretty fun uh it's not working right now unfortunately um but when i was playing good good pick well i mean it's it's just i think their

server has probably exploded from from the pressure of the 10 people who are trying to play um from all those vita owners yeah well before launch though when i was playing it it was perfect i think what were you playing with oh there's a multiplayer session yeah yeah um and like i played for like three or four hours like without getting disconnected there was no lag you can use the vita's party system which i don't know any other thing has used to create a party and then jump into party matchmaking. And chat? Yeah, you can chat in the party thing. Voice chat? Yeah.

Damn, I need a Vita. I know, dog. I didn't know it could do it either. But yeah, that all functions really, really well in the multiplayer. It's super limited. There's not many levels, and there's only deathmatch, team deathmatch, and a survival mode,

which is reminiscent of Halo's zombie mode. But they're fun, like, fast-paced, run-and-gun. Is it experience-based? Multiplayer. Yeah, it's experience-based. So you're unlocking stuff, and the upgrades that you find in the game, you unlock in the multiplayer,

and then you build three loadouts with you know a weapon and a grenade type and two upgrades for that weapon um that you can switch between at will during the match um i had a lot i had a lot of fun with it how many people do you think will be playing multiplayer in a week i mean i don't know i don't know especially if they don't get their their servers back online i would say probably zero which is a shame because um it's it's definitely the stronger half of the game but i don't know it's it's hard for me not to be swooned by the novelty of i'm playing a first person shooter that feels great on a handheld console but not only that i'm playing like a compelling fully featured multiplayer

first person shooter like if they put call of duty on this thing with all that functionality and like all of the stuff that you expect from the console version like i could see it doing really well uh so yeah that's resistance it's it's got some neat stuff it's got some it's got some rough stuff um if you're a fan of the franchise or you're really curious of what a shooter is like on the Vita, you should pick it up. Otherwise, I would say probably wait for a price cut because there's probably not much there to justify for it. Can you bring it to E3 so I can just borrow it from you? It's digital, so no. Oh.

Just pull out your hard card. Okay, I'll pull out my hard card just slide it into mine gross i'll just port it over slide it into special boys oh stop it sorry come on that won't happen won't happen i feel like i i feel like i tore my own game down so much that you guys don't really yeah yeah we don't even know if i think consider it slingshot was really good and we didn't bring it well slingshot racing a groundbreaking synergy of hardware and software that's never been seen before in no but it's a lot of fun and it only costs 99 cents it's also pretty creative from a racing perspective yeah and as multiplayer

like it's the only fun one touch racing game i can think of um besides like a stock car or when that stock car slot car racing you know yeah those are games yeah this was 1950 i totally agree with you wow wow burn so i know the two games I'm not bringing to the end. Okay, let's go over this real quick. You know, I don't think that we can give Resistance a chance in the final two. Because you really tore it down. I think that's fair. It does sound interesting. I have a copy of it.

I'm going to boot it up. I'm going to try out that multiplayer. We'll give it a week. I'll give it a week oh i'll give it yeah i'll give it some time i mean the good thing is at least something interesting is coming out on the vita people give the vita so much crap but there there's a lot of interesting stuff out on it already and i think coming out this summer i think the vita is fucking dope yeah i like a lot of people give it shit but i can't remember the last time. It's great hardware. I mean, after these two games, the next big game being Gravity...

Oh, my gosh. Whatever. Gravity Rush. After these two games come out, it's sort of pretty quiet on the Vita. That's what people keep saying. That's not true. That's not entirely true. Yeah, that's not true at all.

Okay, apart from Little Big Planet Vita, which I know you're excited about, what other big retail... The Call of Duty game that's going to come out in the fall. So that's four months away, five months away? I mean, the Sony press conference is in four days. I'm just saying it's weird that we don't know more about what they're planning. I don't know what. People attack the system.

They have tons of good games out there right now. Yeah, but launch lineup? Well, let's be honest. Between launch and Resistance, it's been a dry spell. Three or four great games on it, maybe. Since then? No, I mean since launch. What are they?

I mean, nothing. Oh, this guy. Okay, seriously. I haven't bought anything since launch, so I want to know what I'm missing out on. Your monster game that you like, the alien game? Right. I'm not saying that. That was at launch.

Right. No, that's what I'm saying. No, including the launch. It's like four games. You can't say the good stuff has been coming out because nothing has been coming out. I'm saying that the launch lineup was super good. Yeah. I mean, the hardware is so tight that once they start making good games on it, I think it's going to be great.

I mean, the 3DS, you can say the same fucking thing about that. The 3DS had a horrible first year. It had the worst launch lineup of any game console I've ever heard. I'm not disagreeing. I mean, yeah, the Vita had a good launch. I'm just saying that it falls out of mindshare when you don't have any games

released for months. I don't think that will matter if when Call of duty comes out in november and it works if that happens mind share goes way up here's the other thing i honestly i know you disagree with me but i don't think huge hardcore call of duty people are going to want to play that game on a portable oh yeah i totally disagree just because you look at madden portable players and it's such a huge market. Like, I think there's a market for it.

But that's not the point of this podcast, yo. Let's talk about the final two games. Okay. Dragon's Dogma and Ghost Recon blah, blah, blah, blah. Future Soldier. Future Soldier. Do you want me to give the synopsis again? No, I don't.

I don't at all. Because you said there were ghosts in it, and I looked it up on Wikipedia, and there aren't. I was trying to make it more interesting. Suddenly much less interested. Each of you give me your best short hard sell. What is the most fantastic reason that this should be the best game, not even of the week, but of the year? It's over. Dragon's Dogma has a

really innovative system for online connectivity. It has upwards of 60 to 70 to 80 hours of gameplay. It has a huge, beautiful open world, world a fun soundtrack and it is one of the closer

approximations of what the western audience wants that has come out of japan and we need to support efforts like that is there anything magical about it because we used to have games that were like solving world peace connecting with their dead i mean nothing i've thought about dog i've learned to look i mean it's taught me to love a small boy who's basically nothing but ones and zeros it's taught me to love special boy i don't think that there's anything wrong i think that that is something pretty special you're saying in the future if if the robot revolution comes and we're all up against the wall, the Cybermancers will look through the archives and find your special relationship with Special Boy. Who is it?

I assume. He is an AI construct. Well, I assume Special Boy's AI construct will be imported into one of the mechs. So, like, one will be about to shoot me and then the mech will be like. And he might have compassion. The mech will be like the mech will be like this one is named special boy protect the arisen and he'll like scoop me up in his arms take me away probably probably something like that how about you russ his love is real but he is not gonna do for you ghost recon captain benjamin willard lies on his bed in a hot sweltering summer day

we can sweat drips down off his face are you reading the script from apocalypse now as he looks into the mirror and smashes it with a fist blood drips down his hands as he wonders why why i've gotten pretty good at sensing when Russ is about to say some dumb shit. I can feel it. Like my knee starts to ache. Like it's an oncoming storm. How many games let you play as Benjamin Willard

from Power Clubs now as a ghost? Okay, well, that's a lie. That's false. That's made up. Chris, I want my ruling. I want my rightful award i i really cannot believe this because i did not come into this thinking dragon's dogma had a chance even the number two spot but he sold it well you you sold it well i dragon's dogma is our best game of the week

uh i actually as somebody who's played both of them i would have a hard time is our best game of the week? I actually, as somebody who has played both of them, I would have a hard time selling it over Max Payne 3. I think Max Payne 3 is a lot more thrilling and solid all around. Can I ask you a question?

Ask me. You can, in addition to grappling large enemies, you can also pick up and chuck your teammates, right? That's accurate. I can pick up special boy. Can you pick up special boy and throw him at an enemy fastball special style? Fastball special boy.

Yeah, but nothing fun happens. It would be like throwing a big stupid bag of jello at him. Like he's just a special boy. He just flies. I mean, he just thunks against them doesn't really do any good can you throw him like off a mountain like a special special sacrifice you could actually when your characters die you you can tap them on the shoulder and bring them back to half life but that's something but the other pawns can't do that. But what they can do is pick the person up. So a lot of times you'll see somebody die,

and then one of the other pawns will go and pick them up and then walk over and drop their corpse in front of you. Like, what did I do? Do the thing. Do the thing you do. Special boy down. It's like when your dog brings in a dead baby rabbit or a dead special boy exactly but but but the it the pathing's not really great so it doesn't necessarily know if it's close to you or not so even if you are standing next to the corpse and the other pawn is standing there

the pawn will pick up the corpse and drop it in front of you. That's adorable. It is. It's fantastic. But anyway. It sounds funnier than Max Payne 3. It is. It is. It's not as funny as Game of Thrones, which I also played and beat this week. I was gonna bring just because it's got a character in it named Dale Tomato. But I decided against it. Max Payne 3 remains

the champion of the besties for now. For now. But it will have some serious competition next week. Oh, yeah. Hey, Chris Plant, maybe don't bring garbage next time. I'm bringing a great game next week, you guys. I want to be a commish one of these weeks. You can because I'm bringing a great game.

I'm bringing the best game of the week next week. I know what you're bringing. God, I can't wait for it. Yeah. It's so good. It's so good. It's so good. So, thank you, friends, for tuning in once again. Make sure to visit us on our website.

It's theverge.com forward slash gaming. It won't be like that forever. You can also go to polygon.com and sign up for our mailing list and follow us on Twitter at Polygon. Like us on Facebook. It's forward slash Polygon. Subscribe on YouTube. YouTube Twitter at Polygon. Like us on Facebook. It's forward slash Polygon. Subscribe on YouTube. YouTube forward slash Polygon.

And make sure to come to our party if you're in the LA area. Sunday, June 3rd at 7pm at the Broadway Bar. Come on by. We'll have some drinks and games and stuff. And make sure you tune in next Friday for another episode of the besties

and should the world's best friends pick the world's best games besties