The Ringer-Verse - 'Halo: Campaign Evolved,' 'Splatoon Raiders,' and Steam Machine Reactions | Button Mash

Episode Date: July 24, 2026

As Master Chief said in 2001 and 2026: "I think we're just getting started." Ben brings on Matt James for a wide-ranging discussion of recent releases. First, inspired by Christopher Nolan's 'The Odyssey,' they examine why games aren't typically made, marketed, and analyzed through an auteurist lens like other media and whether that could ever change. Then they break down their experiences with two big-name shooters, original 'Halo' remake 'Halo: Campaign Evolved' and 'Splatoon Raiders,' before sharing their impressions of indie games 'Denshattack!,' 'The Incident at Galley House,' 'Zero Parades: For Dead Spies,' 'Esoteric Ebb,' and 'Tears of Metal,' as well as Netflix's new interactive experiment, 'Unhinged.' Finally, Steve Ahlman joins to describe his experience with Valve's Steam Machine so far.Intro (0:00)Directors discussion (3:27)'Halo: Campaign Evolved' (23:20)'Splatoon Raiders' (44:27)'Denshattack!' and indie game impressions (59:37)Steam Machine reactions (1:31:14:)Outro (1:49:51)Host: Ben LindberghGuests: Matt James and Steve AhlmanProducer: Devon RenaldoAdditional Production Support: Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

And welcome into The Ringerverse, your nexus feed for all things fandom. I am Ben Lindberg, senior editor at the Ringer, Button Mash host, and juror number four at New York County Criminal Court, where I've spent much of my week. The trial I'm on is still going, but we will have several verdicts on video games I've been playing when court is not in session for the past week or two. And not just games I've been playing, but also my first guest on the game. episode, I may be the only member of this jury who has his Switch 2 to play on lunch breaks, but that is only because I am not joined on the jury by Mr. Matt. Mattster Chief James. Hey, man. I mean, you know, I have multiple Chinese handhelds that I probably would have brought.

That's true. It would have been a little less cumbersome than the Switch 2. Switch 2 is too basic for you. Well, you are, as always, the Ringer deputy art lead. And we are green tea twins today. We didn't plan it. We're just so in sync because we've been playing co-op a lot lately. And so our rhythms are in cycle, our choice of beverage, though yours is cold and mine is hot.

I will have two segments and two guests today because like Gabe Newell, I can't count to three. And Gabe Newell will be relevant in the second segments because Steve Alman will be here. He is not joining us on this first segment because he's busy at Comic Con. But he has been a conspicuous consumer of late. He has obtained a steam machine, and I will be grilling him about his experience, his first couple weeks with the device. But we've got a lot of games to talk about before we get to that. We're going to lead with two big budget brand name, AAA titles, both shooters. And they are both games from franchises that are famed for their competitive multiplayer.

And these editions of those franchises, well, what if we took out the competitive multiplayer and made it single player and co-op only? It's a bold strategy, but we will see whether it worked for them. I speak, of course, of Halo, campaign evolved, and Splatoon Raiders, two very different types of shooters, but shooter contains multitudes. So you and I played Halo together and also apart. You have not yet played Splatoon Raiders. because we received one pre-release code from Nintendo.

So we will then move on to talk about another couple of indie games, one of which we both played and one of which only you played. So we will do a little show and tell. I'll tell you about Spiltoon Raiders. You will tell me about a game later. We'll also compare notes on a couple of games that we played independently, but same game, Dench Attack, with a exclamation point, Denja Attack.

We will talk about that. It is a train game, but also kind of Tony Hawk meets JetSet Radio Future. It's quite fun. We also will talk about Unhinged, which is a new Netflix narrative game. And you'll tell me about the incident at Galley House, murder mystery game. We might mention a couple other new games, too, tears of metal. We'll see. But before we get to all of that, a bit of banter.

I had a question for you. So I was reading an article in the Wall Street Journal, as one does. you know, I'm dressing in business casual. I'm commuting. I'm cosplaying as a real commuter as I go into my day job in the office, which is the court. And so I was reading the Wall Street Journal. And there is an article that says, Nolan's The Odyssey, about Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey, proves Hollywood's top directors are franchises now. And it's all about how people will go see movies because of the directors associated with them. And they can get big budgets. And there was some associated data. that said that according to rent track provided by Universal, 53% of the Odyssey attendees said the director was their number one reason for attending. And it struck me that this is not the way games are marketed and made and sold at all, where you have big movies and they are tied to the director, or in some cases, the actors, individuals, right?

That's a big part of the pitch for why should we make this movie and why should we go see it? And obviously, that's paying off for The Odyssey. It's tearing up the box office. It's been very warmly received. And I couldn't help but contrast that with video games. Are video games the least atorist form of artistic media, or at least as it relates to how are we going to get people to play this thing?

Let's tell them that it was made by one particular person. That is just not the way this medium works. You know, it's like Disclosure Day. It's Stephen Spielberg. Maybe that sells you on it. Doon 3, it's Denis, Il Nouve, or The Odyssey, it's Nolan. I think Grand Theft Auto 6, which is probably the biggest release any kind of media this year, most of the people who are anticipating that probably couldn't tell you one person who worked on it.

So why are games this way? That's a good question, Ben. I think there's obviously several reasons to that. One of them is that the development cycles on games have spun out. to be, you know, anywhere from six years to over a decade. So by the time you, you know, say, hey, I like this game. Who is the director? Okay, I'll watch out for the next thing.

You might be at another stage of your life before you can get a sense of that director's second work in that particular line. So that's definitely a big factor. I think also there are just so many people who work on games and so many people who have a huge impact on games that just kind of focusing on the director doesn't necessarily give you the full picture of what goes into a game. And you look at, you know, you'll have a hit game. Like let's take Disco Elysium, for example, a very popular indie game from a while back. that studio had a whole lot of drama and we can go into that later if you want.

But basically, you end up with fractured team, right? Like you end up with multiple projects following that game that claim to be from the makers of Disco Elysium, right? And it becomes hard to kind of track, well, who exactly was responsible for how great that was? Was it the director? Was it the writer? Was it, you know? And I just think more commonly, we just see that games are a greater team effort. Not to say that movies aren't, obviously.

Right, that's the thing. I mean, the whole tour theory, the idea, oh, it's the director puts their personal stamp on this thing. That's true to an extent, but there are still hundreds of people working to make a movie. But I think relative to games, and it depends what kind of game you're talking. talking about. But if we're talking about the video game equivalent of the Odyssey, just massive budget, you know, huge tent pole type AAA release, then it's really hard to associate with that with any one particular person because the Odyssey, you know, the screenplay is written by Nolan, the movie's directed by Nolan. Obviously, there's a ton of delegation that goes on and there's

so many important roles and cinematographers and, you know, you could list a casting directors just on and on and but it's still probably more a product of a singular vision. Yeah, and he's putting a team together, right? Right. Whereas in games, it's more common that you'll have a director work at a company and direct the next game that the company is putting out, rather than sort of like a solo director hopping onto the next project, right?

Right. No one calls his shots. Yeah. And if you don't want to release his movies in theaters, then he will go to a different studio. So, yeah, there's a little more autonomy there, a little more sway, at least when you reach his level. And I think maybe in the early days of gaming, I guess early on, companies did all they could to restrict the role of creators and avoid giving them credits. So they sometimes had to hide Easter eggs, right? Like there were no credits.

They had to put their name in a secret room or something because companies didn't want those people to be credited for their work because then they'd have to. to pay them, you know? That's right. The more things change, right? But I think back when there weren't as many games and there weren't as many people making games and the medium was still in such a formative stage that any given game could actually change the course of history, I think back then you tended to know the names of some people more than you do today. I mean, you know, people knew who made doom, right? Like you know Carmack, you know Romero. And there were even kids. cases where, speaking of Id, like you'd have American McGee presents Alice, right? American

McGee is Alice or Sid Meyers Pirates, which we talked about recently. Like there were some guys, and yes, they were at that point, mostly guys, when we were marketing them that way, where you could actually say, this was sort of the product of one person and this person was so influential that now we will be watching whatever they do. Yeah. And with like, you know, when you think of game director, Autor is the first name you tend to think of as Hadeo Kojima. Or at least that's where I, that's where my mind goes. And he sort of hopped into that rare gaming auteur as, as someone who was making games, like right when the technology started to feel cinematic, more cinematic with, you know,

the PlayStation and everything. I mean, he started before that, obviously. But that's when, you know, Metal Gear Solid sort of kicked. his career as an autore in games into overdrive. And so that was this confluence of like games are becoming more cinematic. And the dev cycles of these games are such that they are coming out, you know, not as quick as movies, but not that far behind. Whereas now that reality is just completely different. Yeah.

And maybe it's not a coincidence that he is such a big movie guy, right? Maybe that affected how he marketed himself or the sensibility that he applied to his games. It's cinematic, as you say. And there aren't that many equivalents. I mean, maybe you could point to Sam Lake, for instance. Remedy has that sort of distinctive sensibility, and he's kind of the front man for that studio and someone who's... His face is in the forefront, which is rare for a game director. Yeah, I guess in gaming, maybe more often you get executives, you get,

people who are promoting a brand or a console manufacturer who become kind of the faces of gaming more so than an individual creator. And also maybe it's just the studio is the equivalent. And of course, this applies to movies to some extent too. I mean, you might have say A24, which connotes some sort of sensibility or there's some kind of common element to A24 releases, or at least there has been in the past. And that's what you get in video games where Rockstar carries a ton of weight. But do people even know which Houser is working on a Rockstar game or who has left Rockstar? Probably not. The individual identity gets subsumed into the studio identity. And then it becomes kind of this ship of Theseus thing where it's like, well, it's the same studio, but is it the

same people? Because there's so much turnover. There's so many layoffs. There's so much instability that it's hard to know how much of that institutional memory actually lasts. But I guess that's what you get. And maybe at a place like Nintendo, which was so foundational, obviously you know Shigeramumoto, and maybe you know some other famous Nintendo creators just because they're associated with a certain franchise and Nintendo has such long tenures, typically,

that there are people who have been making games there for 40 years at this point. So that leads to a certain sort of fame. But that's quite uncommon. But I guess that's what you're thinking about. You know, you think about insomniac or you think about naughty dog. Maybe that is more associated with Neil Druckman, for instance, for various reasons. But you tend to think about the company that makes these things. It becomes kind of a collective effort for better or worse.

Yeah, absolutely. And I wonder whether this will change back to what it was earlier in gaming, what with the shift toward smaller teams, the indie takeover. Obviously, you have your India tours, you know. know, your Jonathan blows or whatever, again, for better or worse, but because you can make an indie game by yourself in some cases, or with a small team, or maybe, you know, someone who is leading, but also delegating and outsourcing, as we see indies maybe take up more and more oxygen, or we see people move away from, it's going to make, it's going to take seven years to make this

game and $300 million or whatever. Maybe we will go back toward that personal brand. being pretty important. It's funny though, like even when a new studio starts up and it's made from people who worked at a previous successful studio, usually at least publicly it's sold as this is from the makers of game X or game Y, right? Because that individual name doesn't necessarily penetrate. But maybe that will change.

Maybe we will move back towards, okay, this was made by, you know, like if you're looking forward to the follow-up to, let's say, Stardu Valley, right? Yeah. You probably know who made Stardu Valley, or at least the pseudonym. Eric Brun, concerned Dave. We're still waiting for the haunted chocolatier. Exactly. And we might be waiting for a while, but when, I'll say when, not if, that is released,

people will pick it up because it's from the maker of Stardu Valley. And people might actually know that name because he's pretty online. line so that helps too. But I guess part of it also is that there isn't as much, I guess, like generational memory or people lasting as long for various reasons. It could be that you get kind of captured by a franchise. So like people might know Cory Barlog, but then he just becomes the god of war guy, you know? And like if you're Nolan, you can make a trilogy of Batman movies, but you're not just the Batman guy because you can do that in a reasonable time. frame, whereas it might take as long to make a god of war game now as it did to make that

trilogy. And then you just sort of get stuck, especially because there's so much emphasis on known IP and franchises, as there is in movie making too. But because of the timelines you mentioned, you just kind of get stuck with that one series. And so maybe it's almost for the best that say, Kojima gets driven out from Konami and he's not just the middle of gear guy. He's also the Death Stranding guy or the Horror guy or whatever. or Jeff

Qie's friend, probably. Yeah, and, you know, also, some directors don't want that spotlight, right? They don't want to be Christopher Nolan. They just want to make their games, right? Like, I still have no idea what local thunk, the creator of Palatro, looks like, you know?

Like, it's not necessarily, like, a thing that game devs directors want to do being out in front like that. Yeah, and I guess there are other ways that you can sort of cycle out. You can burn out someone like, say, Cliff Blasinski or Clint Hawking, someone who had attained some reputation and then maybe just leaves the industry eventually, or maybe you become a tech titan. You know, you pivot from being a developer.

You're so successful at that, that suddenly you're buying a super yacht like Gabe Newell or Tim Sweeney, right? and now you're not actually making games so much as you're overseeing a massive studio. Or maybe the medium evolves so quickly, more so than movies, which, you know, longer history, more mature medium, gaming has changed so quickly and evolves so quickly that if you were great at making games 20 years ago, you're not necessarily now. Whereas if you were making movies 20 years ago, you might still be good at making movies. Yeah, right?

So I think that's a big part of it, too. It's just like the ground shifts under you. And so you almost need a new generation to take over with some guidance. Like you want the Nintendo model of we'll have the wise senior people who made this and then they will kind of take trainees under their wing and then you get the best of both worlds. But I think that's a big part of it too. Yeah. Also, game studios are super secretive.

So that probably doesn't help. You know, like they don't talk about what they're doing because it's all. proprietary or whatever. And so there's a little less visibility. You know, you're not making your game outside on a set somewhere. So it's not like set photos are leaking, right? Like it's all just kind of locked down on a server. So that's a big part of it. And games get canceled all the time. Games get canceled. There's not as much of a mainstream star making media apparatus either, right? Like gaming historically has been undercover, I think, by mainstream media. And apologies to Jeff Keeley, but the Game Awards aren't the Oscars, right?

So, and if you're a journalist. They're closer than they've ever been, though, I'll say. They are. And maybe in terms of, you know, the number of eyeballs tuned into those things, if you believe the streaming stats on this stuff. But it doesn't have the same historical weight and cachet. And, you know, people who aren't really big movie people and cinefiles still care about the Oscars in a way that if they're not gamers, they don't care about the Game Awards.

So there's a whole glossy industry. devoted to Hollywood. And that just doesn't really exist for gaming. And if you're saying, well, I want to highlight this new game, it's hard to profile a whole studio the way that you might just do a profile of Christopher Nolan, for instance, and maybe that oversimplifies things. But there's an obvious focal point for that work of art. You know, underneath the director, though, I think in terms of film structure,

When you get to, you know, big-time filmmakers like Nolan, the average person doesn't hear about the cinematographer, you know, or the editor or the AD or any of that. You know, the director really is such a figurehead in films. But below that figurehead of the director, it's not too dissimilar from games. Shout out, Hoyt van Hoitima. Yeah.

So I think we're hitting on something here. But gaming is unusual. And obviously, you could talk about. books, novels. That's going to be marketed as from the person who wrote this thing, at least until AI is writing every book. Or if it's musicians, right, there might be a secret songwriting team of 10 people who put together that thing. But if it's a pop star performing, you're going to know the pop star. Maybe you're going to know the people in a band or once you were. Right. So gaming, it does really require you to kind of put your identity aside for the good of the whole.

And I think there are good things about that. There are also bad things about that. Maybe it's led to crunch and bad working conditions and less unionization and all the rest of it over the years. But there is also something sort of pure about it. I guess it's just, hey, this is the product of many people coming together to share their very disparate skill sets. There are people who can program and they're artists and their writers and their game designers and level designers. And these are all such distinct skill sets. that, yeah, you might have a creative director,

but it's hard to say that one person did this. So I don't know if this is good or bad, but it's certainly distinctive. Another thing I think is that if you're not going to see the Odyssey for Christopher Nolan, maybe you're going to see it for Anne Hathaway or Matt Damon or Zendaya or Tom Holland or whoever, right? And if you're playing a game,

you probably don't know who the voice actors are. And that's the case. You know, there are a few sort of voice acting celebrities in the world of gaming where there have been, you know, you're Nolan Norths and Troy Baker whom we'll be talking about in a bit, or Jennifer Hale or Jennifer English

or others not named Jennifer, right? But it's not quite the same as with movies where people are right there on the screen. So in video games, often you're dealing with animated characters who are voiced or not voiced. It might just be taxed historically. Or maybe there's motion capture going on.

Maybe there's voice, but you're not actually seeing the people performing those things. So there's just still a little less star power or it's just not associated. You know, am I buying a game because of Troy Baker? Yeah. I might enjoy the game more if Troy Baker delivers a good performance, but I'm probably playing because it's Indiana Jones, right?

I didn't buy 007 first light because Lenny Kravitz was in it. I'll tell you that. Well, producer Devin Ronaldo probably did, but to reach their own. And you had to find another excuse to talk about Lenny Kravitz. and double a seven. I think although Lankravitz was a big part of the marketing for that game, more so than the character was of the actual game, which I think just goes to show, right?

You have a non-gaming celebrity in your gaming. Once that started happening, once you have Kevin Spacey and Call of Duty or whatever, not that he'd be front and center in a marketing campaign these days, but it became kind of like, oh, Hollywood actors are slumming it in video games. Ooh, this is new and exciting. They're gracing us with their presence.

but that industry just mince stars, or at least it used to, right? If you're going to see Digger, maybe you're going because it's a, in Euretoe movie, or maybe you're going because it's Tom Cruise. And there's just no perfect parallel with video games, I think. The main takeaway, though, is where's our Odyssey video game, you know? What's taken so long? We don't really have one, right? I mean...

Well, we don't know the plot of Grand Theft Auto 6 yet. It's true. They haven't actually shown gameplay. So who knows? Lots of Greek mythology influenced games. I don't know, Rise of the Argonauts, etc. But we don't really have a direct adaptation of The Odyssey. And maybe Nolan will kickstart that because Arkham Asylum came out four years after Batonin begins. So maybe we should pencil in an Odysseus game for 2030 or so. Sounds fun. Okay. You know what else sounds fun? Halo. Or maybe it does. It certainly did the first time you played. 25 years ago, if you were around as we were. But remake mania continues. It's hot remake summer.

And so hot on the heels of Star Fox and Black Flag Resynct, and in advance of the Ocarina of Time remake, we now have another rebuilt Stone Cold classic Halo campaign evolved out now for Xbox PC. And yes, Will Wonders Never Sees, PlayStation 5 from Halo Studios, based on Bunges original, of course, published by Xbox Game Studios, available via GamePass, crucially. So we've been playing this mostly together, a little bit apart,

but this is a very faithful remake of the original Halo Combat Evolves from 2001, which we played in our younger days. And it is a lot prettier now, and there is no competitive multiplayer. So it's the same campaign that you might remember from before And if you don't remember it from the original incarnation, you might remember it from subsequent incarnations because the original halo has come out in multiple forms, right? You could have been playing it in Halo Combat Evolved anniversary edition 15 years ago or maybe the Master Chief Collection in 2014. But here we are playing it one more time and telling people whether they should sign up to finish the fight or begin the fight, I guess, in this case again.

So what do you make of Hello Campaign Evolved? I definitely am enjoying it. We've had a lot of time to play a co-op together, which has been, I think, very fun. I think that, you know, this is a full remake. This is a lot of the previous attempts, you know, have been more remasters. And this really is a ground-up remake. Yeah, Unreal Engine. Yeah.

Yeah, it looks gorgeous, at least on my PC. You played on PlayStation. I did. it felt wrong. It felt like heresy. Steve and I got PS5, I think just for the thrill of it, I could have played it on any system,

but I just wanted to experience playing Halo on PS5 just for kicks. And I got to tell you, I mean, first of all, Steve and I, initially we had issues in the pre-release period getting in,

and it felt as if the gods were saying you are not allowed to play Halo on this hardware. But eventually, that got straightened out on the studio side, and we played it. And eventually, this feeling wore off, but it was weird to be holding a dual sense and controlling Master Chief. I mean, I don't typically think of the controller and the button mapping being integral to my

experience of a game necessarily, but I just have such muscle memory with Xbox controllers and Halo over the years that playing this with a PlayStation controller, it was just a weird sensation. Even playing with a modern controller of any kind would probably feel a little weird if you're playing Halo 1 because back when Halo came out, you remember they had the giant first Xbox controllers. I do remember because I could barely get my hands around it when I was, whatever I was, 14 or something. That thing was massive. Large controllers before they revised them, trunk them down. Yeah. Yeah, it was fun to be able to do crossplay and have me on PC and and you on PS5.

And that took a little bit to figure out because even though you were on PlayStation 5, you still needed to have an Xbox account. Yeah. And we, yeah, it's a little bit of a process, but it did work smoothly once we got it going. And I'm glad that we did, because I think that revisiting this game

as a single player experience, if you don't particularly have nostalgia for it, I think it is a completely serviceable, competent, good shooter. I think that in the 25 years since this game has come out, we've had a lot of innovations to the shooter genre. And I think you might, if you had no connection to Halo and you just put this up for the solo experience

as a modern younger gamer, you might not get the hype, I would assume. Yes. Yeah, it was trailblazing in many ways, and especially being on a console at the time. So that would be lost on a person who's playing this for the first time. Not that the game doesn't hold up, it does. But it did make me wonder just who is this for exactly, who is the target market? Is it for PlayStation players who just never owned an Xbox and never actually experienced this game? Is it for younger players who just weren't around when it came out?

And maybe they're put off by how it looks now. and is it for people like us who have played this game before, maybe multiple times before and played it to death back in the day? Is it for us to engage in our nostalgia and sign up for another tour duty? I guess it could be to some extent for all of those. It's just when it comes to the price, I said it was crucial that it's on Game Pass. Because if you have Game Pass, then fine, no extra cost to you.

You can just dive into this thing. If you don't, though, it's 50 bucks, right? And you can get the Master Chief Collection for 40, I think. And is the difference enough here to say it's a prettier version of the campaign without the multiplayer that was such a big part of the appeal and the package of this game? Is that worth that price? And I don't know that it would be given the other options out there if I had been down this road before.

Yeah, that's true. I will say it's a $50 game, but visually it looks like a $70 game. Oh yeah, it looks great. It really does look great. And I think that really added to my enjoyment of the game was just how much of a visual upgrade it was, how atmospheric the lighting is in all of these sections.

I think it really adds a lot. So, yeah, I wish the multiplayer was there, obviously. I think we all do. But I think that, you know, you mentioned, Who is this for? I think this might in some ways be for Microsoft in the sense that they want to, I'm sorry, Xbox, all caps,

in the sense that they want to sort of put Halo 1 out there in this beautiful new realized form as a sort of like palette cleanser, like a reset, right? If you don't know what Halo is, you know, we're going to put out a ton of Halo games in the future, hoping that they make a lot of money. let's just get that first one out there in a really playable form.

So no one feels like they're hopping in on Halo 8 and they need to catch up. And did I miss this or that? Right. So I think if they are going to do console exclusives now on Xbox for future Halo games, as I think you'd have to believe is the plan for them based on what they've said recently, not that they stick to what they say. but I think that they kind of need a halo that people can jump into at a starting point for all of what's to come.

Yeah, which I guess was sort of the plan with putting gears on PlayStation, but then they were like, wait a second, actually, we're not going to continue to do that now that we have introduced you to this franchise. But it's true. I do think that the omission of competitive multiplayer is pretty glaring.

I mean, it's tough to forgive that absence because that was such a big part of this thing. I'm having red versus blue flashbacks, and as you were playing, you were testing out all the functionality available in this game. You were doing some teabagging just to make sure that it was faithfully reproduced.

I just want to make sure it feels for how it should. You go up, go down, you go down. But if I can't go to hang them high and I can't go to blood gulch, it's just, it's odd. It feels like a missed opportunity. Because if this is launching right now, let's say it was $70 and not $50, and you had all of those original maps and you had online functionality that worked well, they would probably be kind of taking over all of the buzz of games and games media

for at least a couple weeks during like the busiest game release summer in history, right? Don't you think? Yeah, I think so. And it's sort of shades of Halo Infinite, a game I liked a lot that launched with a lot of features, but also without a lot. And, you know, like co-op. And then there wasn't enough content to sustain the multiplayer for a lot of people. And that felt like a lost opportunity too. And especially this, you're talking about a 25-year-old game and you've rebuilt it and you've redone all the assets.

Why not? Right. Like, is it a networking issue? Is it tough to get crossplay? you can play in Master Chief Collection. So it really does feel like a missed opportunity, and it makes it harder to recommend. And it makes it, even though it's a faithful remake in a lot of ways,

that's a pretty big, glaring departure from the original because that was such a huge part of the appeal of the game. And it's not a particularly long game. The campaign is pretty compact. And especially if you've played it before, you can just sort of sail through it, at least on a normal difficulty level. So it's not giving you a ton.

Now, there are some remixed levels. If you are interested in that, if you collect some skulls, you can control and kind of mix up the formats of some of the levels. And there is a short bonus campaign. It's three levels. We played it together. Probably best to play it after you finish the campaign, but it doesn't really matter.

It's actually a prequel. It's set before the Halo campaign. And I wouldn't recommend getting it just for that. It's a nice perk. It's relatively faithful. It relatively feels like original Halo. I would say that there is a fair amount of just kind of corridor shooter in the bonus levels, which was not super entertaining. But when you get to some of the bigger set pieces and the outdoor parts.

And I won't spoil, I guess, all the specifics, but there is a space combat. component, which surprised and delighted us. Yeah, I kind of wish there was more of that, actually. Yes. Yeah. So that was kind of cool. So, you know, it's something new and actually new, not just a very pretty polish and facelift of something old.

So, you know, it's worth playing if you're going to get the game, but I wouldn't say that it's essential or feels like it necessarily is an extension of the original Halo experience. Frankly, we were kind of confused about the plot. and the story and some of the writing was weird, like the amount of chief one-liners going on and just like, there's some forgettable sacrifices and sergeants who show up, and we will lament their loss forever,

but we didn't have much time to get attached to them emotionally. That's right. That's right. Yeah. I will say, though, that, you know, okay, so the extra missions are, kind of whatever, the bonus missions. They're making the game longer, which is good. Yes.

But at least with the main game, with the main campaign, I think they really did a great job of sussing out, how much do we need to change this versus how much do we keep the same, right? Yeah. Because it seems like they really didn't want to step in and change things unless they felt they absolutely needed to. And you and I just played through the library level together, which infamously is a bit of a slog in the original

in terms of game design, level design. It's just kind of the same thing over and over. And you know what? We didn't have a slog going through that level this time because it was completely overhauled in a way that visually was an homage to, the original, but played and flowed a lot better. It did.

And they've also sprinkled in some aspects from later games in the series, which I almost had to remind myself, oh, right, this wasn't in the original. This came in later. Plasma sword, right? Yeah, like you can wield alien weapons. There are some other weapons that show up that are from later editions of the series. And it makes sense that they're here. It doesn't break canon or anything.

Not that I'm up on my Halo Canon because I think Halo Combat Evolved was the last time I actually understood what was going on in a Halo game. After that, they lost me a little. But little aspects like that. Or you can hijack vehicles now, for instance, or you can sprint, which is something you couldn't do in the original. And I don't know that you need to necessarily all that often, but I don't mind having the capacity to do that. It's all these corridors that you're running down. I need to sprint. Yeah, and that's always the conversation.

Yeah, how faithful do you want to be? How much do you want to update it to bring it into line with what has become the norm? And now I think it would feel weird if there wasn't a sprint function. And so if, as you said, part of the appeal here, part of the goal is to get new people on board, then they're going to wonder, wait, why can I sprint? And maybe that will be off-putting. And I don't mind it. I'm not such a halo purist.

And unless you really want it to be. You don't, no. If you're a purist, you can walk the whole game. Yes, I think there's even an option to turn it off, but also you could just not press down the stick if you want to. Get more value for your money. Take it longer to get through the game. Yeah, unless you're such a Halo Purist that you resist or resent any tampering with the original, then I think the updates are mostly fine. I've seen some complaints about the aesthetics of certain art here. And this was when we first started getting screenshots and video, people, of course, were over-analyzing and saying, oh, this has lost some of essential great quality of the original art.

It looks fine to me. I mean, I don't want to, you know, get a great idea. Yeah, it looks, yeah, it's not only very high fidelity, but I think artistically, speaking, it looks great. So it is an accomplishment, really, to rebuild a game like this from the ground up, more or less, and have it feel like it used to feel. I mean, that floatiness, right, the Warthog driving, the gunplay, the bungee gunplay, which is so signature and distinctive,

this is a new team of people making this game, right? And so it could have felt alien in a way. It could have felt like some weird facsimile of the original halo. And it doesn't. It passes muster for me as someone who sank an untold number of hours into the original game. So that's a victory of sorts.

It feels weird to control the word hog in 2026. It does. Let me ask you a question though, Ben. At the end of the year, which remake do you think you are going to feel better about this or the Ocarina of Time remake? Man, I would guess that, I mean, we still know nothing about the Ocarena Remake, right? So I'm going to guess that that's also going to be very faithful and that I will probably

be less impressed by the modernization of that than I am. of this game. But I think they'll probably leave me with a similar impression, which is, boy, this is a great game. But this was a moment in my life that I don't know. It can never really represent what it did when I played it. And I'm glad that a younger generation can have that moment for the first time. But for me, it will always really conjure memories of that first time, more so than independent original memories. If you know what I mean? I mean, it's it's kind of, with Star Fox, with Halo, even to some extent with Resynct, there is a kind of melancholy that these remakes conjure, because when a great game like this is remade at a time when the franchise is sort of moribund, right? It's like Star Fox, it's inextricable from the fact that there hasn't been a new Star Fox and we're just remaking Star Fox over and over again. And even Resynct, you know, this was maybe the high watermark literally for the franchise. And I've like some recent games in that franchise as well.

But still, like the cadence in which they're coming out is not the same. Not that that's a bad thing necessarily. Like, you know, it reminds you of the magic. And then with Halo, you're thinking, well, we don't even know. Are they making a new Halo? Presumably, but we know nothing about it. They better. The whole studio is named after it.

Right. It's hard to branch out when your entire studio is named after. or game. Halo studios. Yeah, I bet they'll make some Halo next. I mean, there are Halo spinoffs, but yeah, it does limit you a little bit. But it reminds you of how great this was. And then you start thinking, well, how did they fumble that bag or how can they get back

to this? And it's been so long and it's, you know, studio changes and everything. But it does make you pine for those days and wish they could recapture that magic, not just by going back to that same well, but by giving us something new. that's equally good or close to being as good. And so there is a point at which it's like, well, are you out of ideas now that the best you can do is harken back to the Halcyon days? I don't think that applies to Ocarina really,

because Zelda's still thriving. We may not know what they're working on now, but obviously Zelda has been on a bit of a year. Right. So it's different when you're making bangers and you're making Breath of the Wild and Tears the Kingdom. And then you're also simultaneously remaking some things. that's a little bit different than when it feels like you're out of ideas,

or at least we don't know what your new ideas are. And so you're retracing old ground. And even if the old ground looks great, still, you want something else. You want something new. So I'm always left with that feeling these days. And hopefully it's not just a remake, but also a reset. Let's get back to the roots. Let's remember what worked.

Let's reseed the player pool and then build on that, start fresh with our new found audience and expertise. And I guess it's kind of related to what we were saying about the autores and the creators, because it's like, okay, you can reboot a film franchise, you can remake a movie. But that's a little bit different than when you just say, you know, it's like Halo landmark game. Do people really remember who made that game? They remember Bunchy made that game. Do you remember, say, director, co-founder Jason Jones? I mean, probably most people don't. You might remember composer Martin O'Donnell. which I'd rather not remember him these days, or Michael Salvatore who co-composed.

You remember the theme because the theme stayed with us, but that's interesting, right? It's like another medium inside gaming is music, and you might remember who made the music, and you might not even really remember who made the game except for the studio. And thus, another studio can come along a quarter century later and remake it. And it's not that weird, right? Like, it would be weird if you had some sort of director's cut of The Odyssey in 25 years, a shot-for-shot remake made by someone other than Christopher Nolan. And why would you have to, right? Because it's not like movies. You don't want a Snyder cut of The Odyssey?

Personally, no. I mean, the Snyder cut wasn't so bad compared to the originals, but that's another conversation. But I guess part of it is that, like, you need a remake because graphics got way better. and that's not necessarily the case for movies, right? And when you make a live action remake of an animated movie, that doesn't always go so great. See Moana, for instance, right? Yeah. So, you know, another thing, I guess, is when you are an atore,

when you create something, when you're like notch, when you're Marcus person and you make Minecraft, then you're unimaginably wealthy and you can kind of cash out and go away, I guess. Another person who maybe has seen better days in some respects. All right. So that is Halo. I want to tell you a little bit about Spletoon Raiders, which you have not yet played. Have you played any Spatoon? Do you have any Spatoon experience? I have some Splatoon experience. I've never finished a Splatoon game. I have not been fully grabbed by one. It's not a franchise that has won me over at any point. I don't dislike Splatoon. It just doesn't really do anything. for me so far. Well, Spiltoon, I would say it's kind of a core Nintendo franchise at this point.

But it's really the newest edition, even though Spiltoon goes back a decade or more at this point, the original came out for Wii U, not that everyone played it on Wii U in 2015. But that's saying something, I mean, being merely 11 years old for Nintendo where your flagship franchises go back 40 years. Yeah, but if you go into a Nintendo store, in 2026. Oh, yeah. There's, like, I don't know, like a quarter of the store.

It's like Splatoon stuff as you like frantically search to find like a Metroid mug somewhere in the depths of the store. Yeah, it's kind of the new Squid Kid on the block, but it has become a breakout hit in Japan. Certainly, it's bigger in Japan than it is in the West. I enjoy Splatoon. Part of it, I guess, is, you know, if you are not a big online. multi-player PVP person, then there hasn't been as much. Yeah. Right.

At this stage, at least, then there's not as much for Splatoon games to offer you until now, at least in theory, with Splatoon Raiders, which removes the PVP, makes it PVE, makes it single-player centric, though there is co-op, or at least there's a co-op capacity. This is a primarily single-player spinoff, and there has been a single-player. component to previous Splatoon games. And I've quite enjoyed the single-player experiences. Splatoon 3 in particular, there's been some good DLC. But those were typically pretty short and not necessarily designed for single-player.

They were kind of based around multiplayer. This is based around single-player, and it's really raid-based. So when I initially saw it, I wasn't totally sure what this was. Is this sort of like a rogue-like of some sort? Is there procedural generation going on here? It's not really that. It is, you know, you're playing as the mechanic, and there's a tie-in with the band from Spiltoon 3.

They're kind of fighting alongside you. There's a story, which I couldn't care less about. Yeah, I know. You need the motivation. Why am I painting? Why am I to spray painting and, you know, covering salmoneids in paint here? I need to know what my character's goal is. There is one, but I could not care less.

Like the lore, you know, there is. is actually weird and interesting Splatoon lore out there. But this game, it was all just, you know, miss me with that, really. Like, just let me get back to painting. And frankly, there was too much of it. There was too much dialogue. Some of it, actual cutscenes. Some of it texts, you know, people speaking to you in Splatoon language constantly.

Like, I was inundated with a lot of that. And really, it's a looter shooter. You know, you're trying to get treasure. and yes, you're also trying to like explore this area and escape and you're stranded and you have this base in the water that you're rebuilding and upgrading as you go and you get more powerful and your enemies get more powerful. You know, it's basically like Spiltoon meets borderlands or something along those lines. And there's a lot that I like about it because the core Splatoon gameplay is good. It's just it's satisfying to spray stuff with paint and to submerge

yourself in the paint and to swim around. And there are some real frantic firefights here. And there's a ton of customization of your character and your loadout. It really does become a game about builds and about build crafting and what weapon are you going to use. There's a lot of weapon variety. It's almost, you know, Borderlands-esque or kind of Ratchet and Clank-esque when it comes to that, there are, I think, eight main types of weapons and, you know, it really, you can customize it to your play style. And I'd encourage people to experiment with that because it's a very different game depending on what you do. You have these sort of gadgets and you can choose which gadget you want, sort of a special that you can deploy. And I went with this turret that sort of

eventually auto-deploys whenever I got into a fight and you can trick that out and it has its own abilities and skill tree, and you can upgrade your weapon, and you can equip various items that confer various abilities on you. And there's like a companion with you throughout the game. One of the people in the band is in this mech that you can also sort of use to jump on stuff and fights alongside you. And all this stuff is actually pretty important, like the tanks you choose and the gadgets you equip. It's a pretty different experience. So there's some replay value. in that sense. But it does become pretty monotonous at a certain point.

I was just going to say, this sounds great. Yeah, it sounds good so far. But the charm wears off. I think there are a couple problems. So one, that classic Nintendo charm, there's not as much of it here as I'm accustomed to. And actually, if you read the developer Q&A that Nintendo did, I think it sort of illuminates why.

So they redesigned this game visually and sonically as they went pretty drastically because one of the concerns with Spiltoon, I know this sounds silly if you've never played Spiltoon, but there's like a colonizer aspect to this franchise where it's like, why am I attacking the somnids and why am I stealing all their treasure? And are they bad? Am I just robbing stuff? You know, it's kind of like the revisiting Indiana Jones and wait, was he the baddie all along kind of conversation? There's a lot of that happening with Spiltoon. And evidently the first incarnation of this was very colorful and bouncy and upbeat and bright. You know, sounds like almost Super Mario Sunshine Islefino sort of aesthetic. And then they were like, wait, maybe we're making light of what we're doing to the Samadids here. And so they kind of made it darker and it doesn't pop off the screen.

And I feel like they lost a lot of the character. in the process. And it becomes kind of visually nondescript, I think. There are some impressive aspects. I like how the paint patterns are retained. So you have this big level and you're spraying paint everywhere. And it sort of stays there, kind of like in Donkey Kong Bonanza, where the stuff you destroy stays destroyed.

But the actual look of it, it just doesn't really stand out. It doesn't really have its own interesting visual identity. And I'd say that applies to the music, too, where I could imagine, and some people liking it in kind of a chill wave way, but it's oddly dissonant, and it felt like I was losing my sanity at certain points, and everything's kind of like atonal. I know that sounds sort of interesting,

but probably some people will be into it, but I actually found it actively unpleasant at times. So when you play Nintendo, like, you know. Yeah, you have a Nintendo game where you feel that way about the music. Yeah, there's a catchy theme when you're back at the base. But when you're in the levels, which I get, I mean, you're fighting stuff, so you want to make it seem kind of threatening. But I just, you want that warm embrace of, ah, I'm in a Nintendo designed family-friendly world.

And there are aspects of that, but a lot of it just kind of fell flat for me. The other thing is that it does become a bit tedious, at least in terms of the level design. So there are a few different level types. there's the standard raid where you just kind of drop into a location and you lay waste to it, basically. And, you know, it depends. Like some of them are just big environments and you're going from place to place spring stuff and others are a little more involved.

But basically that's it. And these are not like long involved raids. This is not like, you know, MMO World Warcraft kind of raid where you want to put a party together. You can put a party together. And it's maybe more fun that way. But, you know, you're in and out typically. in maybe five minutes in these things, if not less.

There are some challenge levels, which are kind of platformy, and maybe make you play with one weapon or one gadget and put you through your paces. And those are kind of fun, a little bit more like previous single-player spiltoon campaigns, which you actually, you know, there's more creativity to it. And then there are some just really frenetic times where you just drop into something and it's timed and you just have to collect a certain number of power orbs by killing stuff. basically. And those can be kind of fun. And again, they don't last that long. But these mission types repeat and repeat and the levels kind of look the same. And at a certain point, it's just I

lost my will to continue playing. Even though the minute-to-minute gameplay was still pretty fun. And even though it does become interesting when you can really upgrade your gear and think about it tactically. And it's challenging at times, too. In fact, there's some grinding and farming that you don't have to do, but it's strongly encouraged. When you finish a raid, you can go back and tackle a spicier version of it for new loot. But again, when the levels are repetitive to start and then you're repeating the repetitive levels, it's exponential. It's extra repetitive, even if the challenge is ramped up. So even though it did test me, it just at a certain point was like, I get it.

And maybe you could play for 15 hours or so to get through it the first time. And there's endgame stuff and there's more to it. But I didn't have a desire really to return to it. Does $50 seem expensive for this then? I think there's enough value there. Yeah, there's decent bank for your buck. It doesn't feel like it's a budget game in a more premium price package. I think there's enough there to justify it.

It's just... Is there enough to make it fun? And the bosses, there are some interesting bosses, but mostly they're kind of bullet spongy. It's just like they have health meters and you just have to wear them down. There's not much thinking that goes into it or much strategy or not even your typical Nintendo.

Hey, that glowing red spot, try hitting that three times. You know, it's not even that really. So I don't know. You know, there's like, it's not weird enough. Which is an odd thing to say about Spiltoon, which is a strange franchise and, you know, very stylish. Like, Nintendo, do you expect some some weirdness? Some of that Nintendo sauce, you know? Yeah.

And there's some strange lore if you want to dig into it, but I just, I did. And yeah. And weirdly, there's almost like a Pikmin-esque aspect to it where there will just be like silverware sticking out of the ground in various points. Again, it just felt like it lacked its own identity. And maybe it's because they were trying to pivot to this, to a more familiar genre and taking something that was weird and making it a bit more conventional and maybe making a play for more cross-cultural global appeal,

but it feels like it lost a little aspect in translation. So the reception has been pretty polarizing. And two of our regular guests, Joshua Rivera and Giovanni Colantonio, differed very strongly. Joshua didn't like it. Gio really liked it. And I read both of their reviews and I was nodding along with both of them,

which I guess makes me sort of a wishy-washy fence sitter or something. But what they liked, I liked and what Joshua didn't like, I also didn't like. So again, like I don't regret playing it, but I don't feel like this is the big breakout bid for greater popularity that Nintendo was aiming for. It's a shame. Because describing the game, it sounds like it should have been like my entry point into the Splatoon series.

But it seems like from what you're saying that it just doesn't quite have that sauce. So let me ask you, if you had a crisp $50 bill and you were walking into a store hell bent on walking out with one piece of physical media, would it be Hello Campaign Evolved or Splatoon Raiders? Man, boy, I'm glad to know that I still can get physical media. That's encouraging. But I think... Is it a game key on the Splatoon Raiders? Well, I got a game key because I was playing it pre-release. But yeah, so often it's a virtual game card rate.

But I think I would probably get Halo, I guess. And maybe your answer differs depending on how much hail you've played before. If you have not played Halo before, I would say, yes, play Halo. Halo. If you have played Halo to death and you're looking for something new, Splatoon is worth playing. And obviously it depends on what system you have. If you own a switch to and nothing else, then this is not actually a choice for you. But yeah, I mean, you know, both somewhat worth playing, but can't give a wholehearted, full-throated recommendation to each. They both, as we speak, have an 81 on Metacritic. And honestly, that feels about right. You know,

It's like good, but not great, maybe. And even after all these years, I still can't play Spiltoon with motion controls. I still have to, because there's an odd hybrid where you can kind of tilt the controller. Yeah. And I still, even after all these years, it depends on the game. But for something where I need the precision of shooting, I just still can't do motion controls. I had to disable that as I always do with Spiltoon, which I'm always thinking maybe this will be the one, when I can do it. And there are also some aspects of it that feel a little retrograde or something.

It's like you can have all these weapons and you can switch in menus and stuff and do your loadout before a mission, but you can only equip one weapon at a time. You can't cycle through them or you don't have a secondary. So that was a little odd too. And I still think the run speed or the squitting speed is too slow, even though you can upgrade that. And even though it incentivizes you to do the squid thing. It's still just, you know, traversing these levels. It's not quite as fun as it is to traverse say, Dinch Attack. There's a segue for you. There you go. Also, another thing that flummoxes me about Spiltoon and always has, it defies physics. And I know that that's an odd quibble with Spiltoon of all things. But it's weird. It's like you'd think, you know, there'd be

conservation of paint. Paint could be neither created nor lost. But what happens in Spiltoon is if your ink tank is empty or almost empty, you can spray your last little bit of ink on the ground. And then if you submerge yourself in that last little pool of ink, you can refill your entire tank with the dregs of your previous almost empty tank. And I've never totally understood. I know. Give me realism in my spilitude. I mean, Halo isn't much better. I mean, did you see the unrealistic speed in which I was dropping it low when we were playing? I did. Yeah. That's not. All right. Let's talk about a few indies to wrap things up here. Qualified recommendations for both Halo Campaign Evolt and Splatoon Raiders. Densh Attack, which is out for everything. PC, PS5, Xbox, Switch 2. This is from Indie Dev, I believe, Spanish. Indie Dev undercovers, published by Fireshine Games.

Boy, this game is a lot of fun. It is. And you know why we both like it, Ben, is because it is, doing so much work to harken back to the Dreamcast era that you and I love so much. We are Dreamcast Kids at Heart. You know, the Dreamcast PS2 era, and I know we were just sort of lamenting, are we just endlessly recycling games of that era? But when you shamelessly pander to our inner Dreamcast kids, you know what, it's going to work pretty well.

So, Denshetak is, boy, it's really hard even to describe, which I think is a good thing when it comes to Densh Attack. It's kind of part Tony Hawk, part Jet Set Radio Future, part Catamari Damasi, part sunset overdrive meets high-fi rush. I sound like I'm pitching some misbegotten movie in The Player or something. But it's just a mashup of all these games, but particularly JSRF and Katamari and games of that kind of early 2000s era, when it just felt like you could get weird and unorthodox. Not that games can't today, especially indie games, but it was super experimental.

And this is pretty experimental, too, even though it draws on that era of gaming. Basically, you're driving a train, but you can control a train that can leap off the track and grind on rails and do somersaults and all kind of kickflips and tricks. As you are driving this, there is a lot of totally unhinged lore in this game,

not the game unhinged. We'll get to that. in a second. But Degiatek has its own sort of universe. It's very anime style in its storytelling and in its cutscenes and interstitials. But basically, you are a ramen delivery driver in a eco-devastated climate-changed Japan where it's dystopian. And so the high rollers can live in domed cities controlled by a megacorp, which is. shady, of course, as Megacorps are. And they run these high-speed trains that, you know,

deliver stuff between the domes. It's kind of like the twisted metal TV series for anyone who's seen that. Except that, like, you're just also kind of recreationally driving your train and trying to race people and do tricks. And it is frantic and it is chaotic and it is colorful and it is glorious. Yeah, I have to agree. Absolutely. You'll play the first level or two

and be like, is that it? Is that what this game is? And the thing is, it will gradually, over the course of the next few levels, introduce more and more mechanics, new mechanics, constantly being introduced until you have a fairly complex game.

And it is at first kind of difficult to play because you don't really have a reference point for what this game is supposed to play like. If you play any Soulslike, there are certain assumptions that you can make, right? Like X's might attack and you might have a parry on a shoulder, but right, there's no preconceived notion

for how a train game in which you can do manuals platform should control, right? So it's kind of mind bending, and it continues to be mind. mind bending, but it feels great, it looks great. The soundtrack is incredible. The music in this game is fantastic. And just every element of this game feels so touched with care and with creativity.

And it's like kind of inspirational just playing this game, to be honest. Yeah, yeah. And it has kind of a crazy taxi vibe too. I know I'm just name-dropping other Dreamcast games, but it does feel faithful to that spirit. And I know what you're saying. I don't know whether this is a compliment or a complaint. I think it's mostly a compliment.

I never felt like I got good at this game necessarily. You know, because every time I mastered something or at least got close to figuring out what it was or feeling like I knew what I was doing, it would throw something out at you, something entirely new. And it's partly the tricks, right? So there is a trickionary, which you can access at all times that just gives you an on-screen, okay, here's what you press and here are the sequence of joystick movements.

And it encourages you to chain together different tricks because they get stale. If you have a go-to and you keep doing that same thing over and over, you will not get as many points for it. I did kind of button mash when it came to the tricks ultimately. Like, it can get pretty complicated. but I was always just kind of like moving the thumbstick every which way, hoping that I would trigger something, you know, but not knowing what I was doing. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, you just kind of like, because the tricks get stale,

you're just moving the joystick in all sorts of different ways back and forth. And to invoke another Sega franchise, you said, I think, at one point, that this feels like what Sonic is supposed to feel like, where it's, or like F0 or something where you're just going a little too fast. It's like hot racing. You know, you need Jedi reflexes for this. Yeah, it's very, the sense of speed is great in this.

And I really do feel like you could make a modern Sonic game that feels like this, that has this speed at like the bleeding edge that where you're struggling to keep up, but you're, you know, jumping between tracks and doing tricks and all while trying to keep in mind various objectives that are optional that you want to, you know, check off during your run. Like it's, it's very satisfying. Yeah.

It also made me think of neon white. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. In the sense that you have a level that will take you, you know, I don't know, one to three minutes or something. And the speed is blazing and you have to kind of be dialed in the whole time. and the art style is very engaging. Yeah. There's just a lot of people I could recommend this too. And for some people, it won't be their thing, I guess.

But I think even if it's not particularly your style of game, I think you'll be able to appreciate what they've done here is just really impressive. Beautiful, cell-shaded art. Yes, great music, true to the legacy of JSRF. And this is sort of the sweet spot where, okay, it's clearly inspired by a certain era of gaming, but it also feels like it is yes-ending that. It is doing something new and original and has its own distinct identity. So it's not just sort of a faithful remake of a previous kind of game.

It's taking the ethos of those games and applying it to something entirely new. And I mean, there are boss fights in this game that are wild. And it's like, how are there boss fights in a train platform? Well, there are. There are times where you're just like taking over a Ferris wheel, which felt very catamari-coded to me. And you know, you're just like running over broadcast towers or whatever. Like you never know what you're going to get.

And it's a fairly long game. I don't know, 10 to 15 hours maybe. And you're getting good bang for your buck because unlike the other games we've been talking about, this is what, 20 bucks, right? And it might even be cheaper depending on discounts. I was going to tell you, well, just wait for a Spiltoon Raiders discount. but it's Nintendo. So you might be waiting a while for a discount there, unfortunately.

But this is a budget-priced game that doesn't really feel like a budget-priced package. And it's just kind of bursting with vibrancy. So if you couldn't tell, we really like Tenshattack. Yeah, I recommend. Yes, strongly recommend. Okay, then tell me also briefly about a game that I have not had a chance to play yet. The incident at Galley House, which is made by Evil Trout and is out for the computer people. Windows, Linux, Mac.

Yeah. So, yes, it was made by Evil Trout, which I believe is a studio that made The Root Trees are Dead, which is a game that landed on, you know, our top games of the year list last year. And this is actually a remake. in a sense of a text-only game that came out last year called Type Help. Yeah. So they took this text-based game and they figured out a way to make it not text-based, basically. And they even fleshed it out a little bit more.

I did not play the original Type Help. But the incident at Galley House, you do not need to have played the original. the original. And I had a fantastic experience having no familiarity with the original. Granted, I am big on deduction and mystery games. But I think... This is a golden age or a golden idol for that kind of game. That's right. I love Golden Idol. I've played through every D.L.C. And anyway, the incident at Galley House, here's the structure of it. So you basically arrive, you see a character arrive at this house, he's got an invitation,

he was invited by someone to be at this house, and he walks in, and no one knows who he is. And you are viewing this scene as someone who has walked into the house and approached this machine, and the machine will sort of let you see past events that have happened within this house. And so the structure of it, is that you have to, in order to see a particular room

during a particular time frame, you have to be able to input into the machine, okay, this character and this character were in this room at this time. And if you input those things correctly, you will then be able to see the scene that happened in that room at that time with those characters. And based on the conversations that they're having,

you can then maybe suss out, oh, well, they were just talking about how they, this guy was just in this other room, he said, with this other woman. So now I'm going to go see if I can explore that past scene in this other room. And there's this interconnectedness between the timeline. And throughout it, the story that reveals itself is really fascinating and interesting. And for the first half of this game, you are utterly confused. And you're thinking, is this game poorly written?

did they even like why this doesn't make any sense and then I absolutely assure you that by the end of it it does make sense and it's really cool and it is a fantastic deduction game it would be a fun game to sit on the couch and play with a friend or significant other as you kind of piece everything together the interface is pretty great you know having the visual interface versus the text-based game. This might be a little bit easier than the text version, I'm assuming, but I would still say that there's a good amount of challenge in this. There's a hint system if you need it. But yeah, I just found this to be an absolute highlight. It's a game that I've been thinking about every day since I finished and we'll probably be talking about at the end of the year because I just had such a great time with this. Okay. I've got to play

because otherwise you will make me put in on our top 10, whether I've played it or not. So I have to be able to weigh in. So this will be up my wife, Sally, for sure. Yeah, yeah. She likes blueprints and everything, right? Yes, and she likes a good mystery game and a good point-and-click game. Speaking of which, the last game I want to cover in some depth here, is a game that Jesse and I did play last night, in fact, on the couch,

sitting next to each other. and we did our pointing and clicking. It's called Unhinged. And this is where I usually tell you what platform the game is for. Well, this one is for TV. It's for Netflix. This is an interactive narrative adventure made by Night School Studio, the makers of Oxen Free.

And it's a game that you can play via the games interface on Netflix in about the time that it takes to watch a half-hour episode of TV. which is roughly half an hour. And it's a gimmick game in the sense that you interact with it through your phone. So you're watching on the screen, but you've got your Netflix app on your phone, and you are using the phone to point a flashlight in game, and you're getting calls and texts in game, which are coming through your phone to simulate to add to the immersion.

and the idea is that this will be part of Netflix's bid for getting people to play games who would not normally play games. Now, they got me to play a Netflix game, which I do not normally do. So I guess mission accomplished on that score, I've used Netflix for more than 20 years since early in the physical disc days. And this is the first time I have actually dipped my toe into Netflix's gaming options. And they've had plenty of good games. And, you know, if you're a subscriber, you can get free stuff on there.

There's Grand Theft Auto. There's, like, you know, acclaimed games that you've heard of. You can get them for no extra charge. You can play them on mobile, et cetera. But they have adapted their strategy multiple times. And it's always really intriguing. And there's always a lot of press whenever they come out and say, here's what we're doing. But they've pivoted a bunch of times.

You know, they bought up a bunch of studios. And then, like everyone else who bought up a bunch of studios, they then divested them, sold them. close them layoffs, et cetera. And, you know, they were funding like, all right, we're doing AAA originals. And now they're kind of doing more family friendly games and casual games and appealing to people who maybe would not be self-described gamers and play mobile stuff. And lots of tie-ins to establish Netflix TV properties, which unhinged is not as of yet, though it sounds like it might be at some point. So it's sort of old school in a lot of respects, but new school in the interactivity to an extent

and also the medium. And it's always intriguing, right? Because Netflix has a ton of subscribers and a lot of money. And if they could get people into gaming and really seriously commit to gaming, well, that has the potential to alter the industry. And we're seeing the same thing with Amazon and Luna, even as Amazon is cutting back on a lot of games

and canceling games and downsizing studios or closing them, they're also offering Luna now through Prime Video and hoping to hook people with more AAA-type experiences. So can a streamer actually get into gaming in a real meaningful, lasting way? We will see. But is Unhinged that? Do you think that Unhinged will break the seal for anyone?

No. Okay, then. Sorry, Netflix. Yeah. So this game, Look, it is kind of cool that you can sit on your couch and have your phone become a controller and a controller that can adapt while you're playing, right? It's used as a flashlight one minute and then you are receiving calls and texts on it and scrolling through messages to learn some backstory. that element of it is cool,

like holding a phone while the protagonist is holding a phone and simulating that. There's some novelty value to that. There is some novelty value in that that I found interesting, but ultimately, from a gameplay standpoint, it kind of felt like

I was playing an FMV game on the Wii and one that, constantly wanted urgent input from you in a format that has particularly bad latency. Yeah, it's kind of quick time events, except nothing is very quick or responsive. And also, there's only one thing to click on your app, usually. Yeah. So, and I'll tell you, there's some good performances in it. Yes, speaking of Troy Baker.

Got to compliment another Cravitz, Zoe Cravitz, Did a great job. The voice work. Troy Baker is... Troy Baker. He's always good. And also, Stranger Things his own Sadie Sink.

That's right. Or Spider-Man's... Not her biggest role of this month, I guess, though. We do know the name of her character in this one, at least. It's Gene... No, it's Claire, actually. But, yeah, you know, they don't have a ton to work with here, but convincing enough. Yeah.

And, you know, you need competent performances in this kind of horror, scary. setting. And it makes sense for Netflix if they're going for a crossover audience. Okay, let's get some, again, import some stars from another medium from TV or movies, which is something we've seen with, you know, 12 minutes and other Anapurna games in the past. And by the way, the setup here, it's a dark and stormy night, basically. You are alone playing as the Cravitz character, a young woman, and you're in a scary building that's been abandoned because everyone is evacuated because the storm and someone is stocking you. But Claire, the Sadie Sink character, is your neighbor across the street and is sort of checking

in on you and watching from her window and calling and texting you. And, you know, it's sort of a slasher. You know, they're trying to capitalize on all the interest in horror, right? And so horror, thriller, slasher, sort of a choose-your-own-adventure, bander snatch style, but really actually pretty limited in terms of how much you can control the narrative. Yeah, and you know, I am someone who is fine playing games without a lot of gameplay.

You know, I love mixtape. I'm playing visual novels all the time. Like, I don't need the gameplay to be great for me to have a great time, but I felt like the gameplay really kind of got in the way here, and that I just didn't really see the value in it as a game or the value of it as a story. The one thing I would take away from this,

going back to talking about the interface of it, and holding your phone in your hand, and there's a moment in the game where the character takes a spill, and then all of a sudden it looks like your screen is cracked. And like, that's cool. Yeah. Cool, right? I think there is like a path for this kind of format that is that is not, you know, based on urgent inputs, but perhaps there is like a really cool game that you could make where you are simulating the phone or the protagonist and going through apps and, you know, learning things in this one app and opening a different app and playing around more with that phone.

interface as the game rather than what we have here. Yeah, yeah, there is like the found phone genre where you can do things like that. And it's not like night school doesn't understand video games. They know how to make games. And they've made some similar things in the past.

They've collaborated with Telltale on a Mr. Robot game about a decade ago and a never-finished Stranger Things game. And they made a tie-in game for Black Mirror season seven. I could imagine something like this working, There was that moment when Telltale was at its peak and we were thinking, oh, episodic, storytelling, TV style, gaming, this is going to be the new thing. And then Telltale just kind of crashed and burned and did the same thing over and over again with different properties. I could imagine this working. Like this isn't the specific version of it that feels like it's come to its full fruition. But as a proof of concept, as a kind of casual experience, gimmicky, but this will be fun for half an hour, especially if someone hasn't played games before.

It's not a bad introduction to that medium. And if they could build on this, you know, like I could imagine this being appealing. This particular, maybe this is just, you know, the icebreaker, basically, and they will perfect the format. Yeah. And, you know, I'm clearly not the target for this. I think the target for this is probably, as you said, they're probably trying to bring people into playing games on Netflix who might not. Yeah, a lot of party games. Like, we're all in the living room together.

Let's hook up our phones. This will be, you know, my wife did do one jump scare scream, even though she was bracing herself, not to. Yeah, and so, you know, if they're a horror fans who don't normally play games and they slip into this, like they, you know, they might enjoy it.

They might say, oh, that was a unique experience. And that's great, you know. We're here on a... She asked me, she was like, Did Jessica Clemens make you play this? Because every time she sees me playing a horror game, it's because the other Jess made me play it. But no, not this time.

I did it for the content. Anyway, you know, it's like, boy, gaming contains multitudes. We're a video game podcast, but we talk about all different genres. There are so many ways to play a video game. This is definitely a different way. And if they're able to channel this into something that is a bit more refined, I could see some potential here. But, you know, it won't take you long.

There's not a ton of replay value, unlike some of the other games we've been talking about. Even Densh Attack, for instance. Like, you can breeze through that game and you can get a bronze medal on each level, even if you feel like you don't know what you're doing. Usually you're good enough to keep progressing. But if you care, you can go back and you can get better medals and you can get all the special objectives and get your point totals higher. So you can play that or Spiltoon or Halo in a more hardcore way.

But this is more of a compact, probably single sitting experience. So do you want to quickly just say a word? I know you finally finished zero parades for Dead Spies, the successor to the aforementioned discolysm, which came up on the previous pod. You finished it just in time for a lot of the people who made it to be laid off, which is wonderful. That's gaming these days.

But that's how Windows and PS5 came out in May. And also, you dabbled in tiers of metal, a new steam sensation, which is essentially Scottish Dynasty Warriors, which, wow, what a pitch I'm in. Yeah. Also, did we talk about esoteric ebb at all on this show? Not really, because we hadn't played it at the time.

So, yeah, if you want to do a lightning round, just, yeah, quick, ring averse recommend style. Okay, capsules. So zero parades. I was really looking forward to this. Again, this is what I was talking about, the developer that made Disco Elysium,

that then fractured into all sorts, sorts of different devs at different places making from the people who brought you Disco Valisium. So this is the actual studio. And the drama behind there, like, some people claim they know who were the bad actors. I don't know any of that. I can't presume to know that. But what I can't tell you is I played the game.

And I think it's a really well-made game. And ultimately, I didn't like how it came together at the end. And I felt that it was a bit overlong, and I felt like some of the dialogue was overstuffed. But I think if you were a fan of Disco Elysium, I think it is worth a shot. I think you might like it more than I did, I suppose. But I didn't find the story or the characters as compelling. I didn't really like how it wrapped up. And yeah, so that's Sierra Parades for me.

I know we had Geo on and it was one of his favorite games so far this year. Yes. And Esoteric Eb, I think, also came up on that pod. This is from March RPG from Raw Fury, which is also Windows game. So you like this a lot, right? I loved Esoteric Eb. I played Zero Parades and Esoteric Ab back to back. And they're similar style games.

Obviously, Esoteric Eb is also. very inspired by Disco Elysium. But it has a big fantasy kind of tilt to it. And it's as a story, I thought it was really great. It has an awesome sense of humor. And, yeah, I would just recommend it to anyone who likes Disco Elysium-style games where you're not afraid to read a lot. And it has a lot to say about politics.

and it has a lot of choice-making that you can do, that kind of really impacts your build. And I just think that it is a really well-executed vision. We just talked about directors, right? And all-aurs, right? And this feels, to me, like, it fits within that conversation. This is a really strong, And this has worked on for a long time this game.

And I just think it succeeds at everything it's trying to do. I definitely recommend it. And finally, tell us about Tears of Metal, which is Muso meets Scotland. And this just came out this week, developed and published by PaperCult. Yeah, you can press a direction on the D-Pad to yell. And he will yell things like Scotland. and this game I have put about five hours into and it rules.

It's great. It's a roguelike. If anyone played Absalom that came out somewhat recently, you know, that was sort of a 2D sidescrolling beat him up. This is the Muso, the Dynasty Warriors, kind of roguelike. and I just think that we play so many

roguikes every year and you can kind of pretty quickly tell if it has the juice if the systems are balanced enough if the progression feels too easy or too hard or just right and by my assessment so far this has everything

dialed in extremely well You are, after each run, it feels satisfying to upgrade the things that you can upgrade. There's a good amount of customization in the several characters that you can play as. There are surprises to discover. There is just a whole lot here. And the combat itself, which is a trick, you know, it's not easy to make a Muso or Dynasty Warriors game that, like, consistently feels good and doesn't get boring. And I think that I'm not going to get bored of this.

All of the different weapons for each of the characters have different movesets that you can learn. And the enemies vary. They keep, you know, as you go forth in the game, you'll have to deploy kind of new strategies against them that might make you pivot to a different character or a move set than you are using. I just think that this is an early accent,

it feels really polished already from a gameplay perspective and from a flow perspective. And I can't wait to keep playing more of it. Very exciting. So many games, so little time. And we have completed our time for this first segment. Thanks very much, as always, Matt. Talk to you soon. For sure.

Thanks for having me. And with that, it's time to tag in Steve. This is a busy time for Valve hardware-related news. Steam Deck. purchases, which Matt and Steve have made, have apparently plummeted after the recent price hike. But the steam frame VR headset is coming soon. And of course, the steam machine has arrived reportedly about 12 to 15,000 steam machines are moving per week. That's not much. Supplies are limited. But Steve Allman is one of those lucky 12 to 15,000. Or is he lucky? We will find out.

You're not going to do Steve, the machine almond? Stay tuned, Matt. Stay tuned. Okay. All right. Turns out I'm pretty predictable. All right. All right. I am joined for a quick hit here by your friend and mine, Ringer, senior audio producer and midnight boy, Steve, the Steve machine.

Almond. Welcome. Yes. Hello, Ben. I come here with hat and hand having just spent a four-figure sum on my new gaming console. Yes. You've bought your way onto this episode. And I know you're not normally known.

as the Steve machine outside the bedroom. But it's an appropriate nickname today because you're going to give us a hands-on report on valves pricey but nifty new piece of hardware, the steam machine. So to recap, you entered the lottery last month. You got a golden ticket for the top of the line two-terabyte model, $1,350, not including controller.

Immediately, you start experiencing some, requires remorse. You start eyeing the secondary market before it even arrives. I say, Steve, if you decide you don't want it, maybe I'll take it off your hands. You say, I might take you up on that. Spoilers, I don't think you're going to take me up on that. I think I'm going to get my own Steve machine if I ever get one, because it seems like you have bonded to some extent. So tell us about your blissful, maybe first couple weeks with this piece of hardware. all right so to begin i will say that to answer to answer your questions yes i have i have greatly bonded with my new steam machine and to state the obvious am i a hypocrite for the opinions that

i might have shared a couple of podcasts prior about the pricing and the overall philosophical ideal of this uh console yes yes i am uh did i spend my own one it could be true it could maybe cost too much and you paid too much nonetheless. All of which are true. I spend my own money on this. This is not a company expense. I'm laying the groundwork for the... Exactly.

Thank you. I don't even know if we're cleared for that. Neither do I. I'm laying the groundwork here mainly for the Simone Biles-level mental gymnastics that I am giving myself to say that I really enjoy my steam machine. And to know that... I've been asked about this from a couple of my friends who are also adamant gamers and were curious about the Steam machine, if not immediately turned off by its price.

I'll start with the fact that with my impressions of having it. And it's to say that I am wildly impressed. I have a very large, fairly top of the line TV that I was able to get during like COVID that I was able to finance and I was able to have a, a lot of enjoyment out of. We don't need any disclaimers about all your super expensive hardware that you've compiled here. I'm wildly living outside of my means. That's really what

this podcast is for. It's a large TV. It's a fairly demanding TV and I just wanted to see if the steam machine could handle just what its mission statement was to be the console for the PC market that you can have in your living room. And I got to say

it delivers. It It really, really does. The amount of resolution that I think a PC gamer would want to expect is not there. You are not going to be getting 4K out of this machine for the amount of things that you bought and the amount of, I guess, performance expectations that you can reasonably set. Those things are true. However, for as big of a TV as I have and as long as long, of a Steam library is that I've had.

I've had the Steam Library since I was like 12 years old. So I've got a handful of games that I'm willing to try to put on TV here. Yeah. This thing performs very well. I assume it can run the ones you bought when you were 12 without issue. It absolutely can. If we couldn't run the orange box, I don't, I think I would absolutely be sending you the bill for this.

Yeah, that'd be a problem. And I probably would be sending it right back if that were the case. But you put your entire Steam Library basically to the, the test, you put this thing through its paces, because there is a equivalent to the steam deck verification system for this, the steam machine verification. But you basically did the Steve machine verification to double check. Frankly, as easy as a statement as it can be, if it works on your steam deck, it definitely works on your steam machine. And I wanted to put it through its paces for at least the most top of the line high end gigabits games that I could possibly

throw at it. I put in the Horizon Remastered. I put in Red Dead Red Dead Redemption 2. I put in all of the Resident Evils that I could throw at it and a handful of other ones that are fairly modern, fairly demanding and fairly recent blockbuster games.

And I wanted to throw it up at, I wanted to get a benchmark of like 60 frames a second, 1440p and does it look good on my TV? Is it easy enough to set up and does it run well? And you're going all digital. Foundry on us.

This is impressive. And 9.5 times out of 10, that is the case. And of the times that it wasn't, I just did a little bit of reconfiguring like you would in any PC game. If you are a PC gamer, you know exactly what that means. And it works. It works perfectly. So, yeah, I'm kind of beside myself.

So where's the thresholds? Where did you find that you were testing its limits, that you couldn't quite crank up the settings? there was a major thing when it came to physics and ray tracing. One of my favorite games that came out recently was Control, and that's a very like physics heavy, ray-traced heavy type of experience. And that's a very physically, very demanding game, and it's a lot of visual elements all thrown at once.

I unfortunately had to turn ray tracing off and had to dial some shadows and particle effects down. So no, it does not look. look as good as it possibly could if it were on a PC and if it were on like a high-end machine like I would have at my desk that I'm talking to you right now. But I can't say that my enjoyment would have been compromised for it. It still looks great. It feels great. And if you're fine with 60 frames a second on a big TV, that's perfectly fine. Tell me about the hardware. Tell me about the setup. Does it fulfill the promise of if you are a console gamer, but you're maybe PC curious and you just want to replicate a console experience, you want it to work out of

the box with a minimum of tinkering with settings, more or less bug and play. Does it live up to that ideal? I think that you would probably still not want to get this console because at the end of the day, this is still a PC. This is still a thing that is open platform. You can do anything that you want to it. You can install windows. You can wipe the entire thing and make it your own PC. You can install it as a desktop. It's really that open-ended. And if you want something that 1,000% out of the box completely works, you pretty much got it with this steam machine, but you're kind of leaving a lot on the table if you want to have a gaming experience that this game, that this game console can promise. A PS5 or PS5 Pro will absolutely do you completely fine. And I think the value that comes

from a Steam machine, again, I'm not going to begrudge you for not getting over this price, but if you have a Steam library or if you are at all engaged with the idea of, say, you have a steam deck and want to have a bit more of an upgraded experience and you're wanting to be building your Steam library and stuff like that. I have obviously had a very long, a long leg Steam library over many, many years. So the value was immediately built in. I just have all of my games ready to go. I think for anybody that wants to get into this,

I would recommend just building a PC because at the end of the day, that actually is kind of a bit more of a, I hate to sound like a purist, but a bit more of an organic experience when it comes to PC gaming, because console gaming is something that's supposed to be happening right out of the box

and it's ready for you. And pretty much, that is the case with the Steam Machine. But if you're ready to tinker with it, and if you're ready to even have a bit more of a hands-on with the games that you either already have or want to get to know better, the Steam machine is probably also for you. And in terms of aesthetics, build quality, form factor, obviously, it's cute, it's compact. You have spent some time with the Steam Controller, which has been on the market a little longer

and has been largely well received. So all of that passed with flying colors. It does. The Steam Controller is actually excellent. And I'm very, very surprised. They've come a long way since that first Steam Control. if you remember, like, it's just two circular track pads and a, a, a, a, a, a, it's a way, way better.

The build quality is around, I would say, akin to a switch pro controller, but a bit bigger. And the, the, like, thumb pads that are de facto mouse pads for both of your thumbs, both below the analog sticks, they're very tactile, very good, and infinitely programmable. You can still do everything that you want to tinker with a, Steam controller and that's quite honestly the better get here. Like if you can't get a Steam machine or if that's wildly out of your price range, I still very much recommend the Steam controller for your PC gaming needs because it's

really everything you could possibly want. The build quality for the machine itself also wildly impressive. It's quite small. It's very sleek, dead silent. I haven't heard any fans going at all when I was even for. throwing on, again, the most high-end demanding games that I could find. Wildly impressive. The face plates are very fun. I'm put on the orange box one, the brushed wood panel as well that comes with it is really, really nice. They're going to be making

more. There are going to be equal opportunities for people to make their own and sell their own. Again, this is, it's confounding because I am so happy with this. And I still can't open-endedly recommend this to everyone because of the fact that this is a very prohibitively priced machine. But if you'll permit me a bit more mental gymnastics, Valve has also said this itself, these things will only get worse. And this might be one of the last consoles I ever buy. Yeah.

The good news is it's only going to get worse from here. Wait, that's bad news. No, but that means things are better now than they will be in the future. It's true. A friend of the show, Jason Schreier, wrote a piece for Bloomberg last week, talked to a couple of the steam machine engineers. And one of them speaking about Ramageddon, the rampocalypse, the shortage of memory chips said, honestly, it's still getting worse. Just in case people are not aware, we were. What people are seeing on retail shelves right now from our observation is lagging what we're seeing from a bulk supply by at least three to six months. So all of these companies are testing the contention that what goes up must have. come down in terms of pricing because they're actually saying, wait, what if it just kept going up,

though? So this might not be the greatest deal ever today, but it might be a better deal now, assuming you can find one than it will be from now on. So I guess go get one now if you're ever going to because it'll cost you even more potentially pretty soon. Right. And when I think about this as a pre-built PC, which again, it is, I can't. speak to how good of a deal it is, but for those considering getting into PC gaming with the ease of a console experience, this really is quite a good bet for right now. It pains me to say it because I don't want to. I don't want to admit that this is one of the better options for people to have the open-ended experience that PC gaming offers. because of the fact that it's so prohibitive now. And it makes me sad. It definitely makes me weep for the future.

And yet, I am still wildly happy with my purchase. And you said right now, so tell me about the longevity and how long you think this thing will be viable to play new releases, demanding games, given the upgradeability or lack thereof. do you think that this thing is priced or built to last? So that's a kind of a mixed bag because that's also kind of reflective of what the console market

looks like right now and what the fidelity of games in general look like right now. The AAA studio space and the overall landscape of what it takes to make a game that looks that good and is that demanding on hardware that it needs to be

is kind of hitting a ceiling as well. And it's hitting that ceiling because these components and this market share for RAM and all these other components is starting to hit their ceiling as well. So does it matter if you have an ecosystem that is both highly conducive to indie developers

that maybe don't have the most shiny and high fidelity games out there? But the ease of which you can put a game up on Steam versus any other console platform is something to be considered. I don't think that as far as the longevity of the machine itself, I think that this is kind of fine.

It really is something that you can explore a breadth of games with forever because there's never going to not be a Steam option for you. There's going to be a game that is going to take the world, by storm, that doesn't look like PlayStation's Wolverine. That isn't GTA6. And until that day comes, that's probably fine because the industry is bleak already. And if a machine works as good as this, I still count it as a win. Okay.

So you are satisfied personally with your steam machine. It sounds like you will not be reselling it to me. But let's close here with a little buyer's guide, some service journalism. your verdict for whom this is for exactly, because you have one market of potential players who don't even need something this powerful or this pricey, and they could content themselves playing many thousands of games on Steam that would run on older, cheaper hardware. And then you have the people who need something even fancier and faster and more souped up than this who will not be satisfied with the steam machine.

So for those in the middle, and this might be moot in many cases because supplies are limited, they haven't been able to manufacture that many of these things because of the component shortage, plus there's price as a gating factor. But assuming you can afford one and assuming you can find one, who is this for and who is this not for? I say it's for the skydivers, for the skydivers that have yet to skydive. And by that, I mean, I have been skydiving and I loved it. But I never begrudge anybody for not wanting to skydive. but I will say to anybody that wants

that you have not and I have no desire to but that's the thing if you don't have no desire to live your life like by the grace of God but if I do have some desire

to play PC games on my living but if you do have some desire to play it and if it's within your means I do recommend it I can't not recommend it actually because I don't begrudge anybody for not getting over the fact that this thing is $1,500

at the highest end with a controller if that's not for you and if that doesn't possibly work for you, absolutely do not buy this. And if it is not, like, do not waste your money on something that you don't think you're going to absolutely love. And I was fortunate enough to, A, be able to afford it and be have the risk assessment of being able to not love this

and give it to somebody else, which would be you, Ben. But it's... Giz, quote unquote. Yes. For the price of $1,500. But again, if this works, and if you really do, like, objectively, like, put the internet rage aside and think about the things that you can do with this, look at what everybody else is doing with it in a positive way.

Getting over that price, it's still really great. So if you want it and you can get it, get it. Because you probably won't have another chance. Okay. Well, there is a steam machine market. And we didn't question that last time. We were questioning how big it was and lamenting the fact that it wouldn't be bigger because of the price that I think that still applies. Even if you're happy with your steam machine, would have been nice if conditions would have allowed for this to be priced more affordably so that this could actually change things on a wider scale.

At this price point, it's just bound to remain a fairly niche item, unfortunately. but if you are in that niche, as Steve is, then you have heard his verdict and his positive review. So thank you very much, Steve. Congratulations on your shiny new hardware and your massive TV and your enormous Steam library. Sounds wonderful to be Steve Allman, and it's always wonderful to talk to you too,

have fun at Comic Con. I'm about to submit my PayPal Pay and Four right now. Well, I'm glad there's something left in your account after you splurged. on the steve machine. Not after this. Not after this in Comic-Con, baby. No, uh.

Okay, that will do it for this episode. Thanks to Matt. Thanks to Steve. Thanks, as always to Devin Bernalto for producing this episode. And to Arduna Ramcapal for his senior podcast management. We have so many more games to discuss. If you're wondering why we didn't talk about Avatar Legends, the fighting game that's out this week, it's because we're covering it next week on Ringervverse Recommend.

So follow us over there because we will be. talking about Avatar-ung, the last airbender on RVR, and we will do double duty on Avatar and talk about the new fighting game. But you can't look anywhere without running right into a new IP-based fighter of some sort. We talked about Invincible Verses. DC just announced DC-K-O, a free-to-play mobile game, shades of multiverses, and next time on Button Mesh, we'll be talking about Marvel Token Fighting Souls. So everyone's got to get their brawler in. We might possibly talk about BigWalk and Beast of Reincarnation.

Plus, in honor of No Man Sky turning 10, you will have a discussion about the biggest post-release video game glowups of all time. In the meantime, you can contact ButtonMash at Ringervverse Gaming at gmail.com. As always, we thank you for listening. We'll be back for more ButtonMash soon. As Master Chief says to Cortana, I think we're just getting started. We are just finished. My day kicks off with a refreshing Celsius energy drink.

Pre-K drop off. Then straight to the gin. Back home to meal prep before heading to the fire station for my shift. When the three alarm comes in, I'm ready. Celsius. Live, fit, go. Grab a cold, refreshing Celsius energy drink at your local retailer, or locate now at celsius.ca. Enjoy Celsius responsibly.

Design for occasional energy boost, not as part of your daily diet. Please adhere to recommended serving limits. Thank you.