Triple Click - A Beginner's Guide to Video Games

Episode Date: October 14, 2021

What's a video game? Let's explain! On this very special episode of Triple Click, produced as part of Maximum Fun's Block Party, hosts Kirk Hamilton, Jason Schreier, and Maddy Myers give you a beginner's guide to gaming: the good, the bad, and the pixelated. First, a few definitions of what a "video game" actually is. Then, some recommendations for games you should play if you're just getting started. And finally, our regular bonus segment, One More Thing.SIX GAMES FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE NEW TO VIDEO GAMESAnimal Crossing: New Horizons, Picross, Breath of the Wild, Return of the Obra Dinn, 80 Days, INSIDEOne More Thing: Kirk: WildermythMaddy: Back 4 BloodJason: Switch OLEDLinks:Cameron Kunzelman’s review of Wildermyth: https://www.polygon.com/reviews/22638600/wildermyth-review-pc-proc-gen-worldwalker-games-strategy-mac-linuxSupport Triple Click: http://maximumfun.org/joinJoin the Triple Click Discord: http://discord.gg/tripleclickpodTriple Click Ethics Policy: https://maximumfun.org/triple-click-ethics-policy/ Happy MaxFunDrive! Right now is the best time to start a membership to support your favorite shows. Learn more and join at https://maximumfun.org/jointripleclick 🚀  SUPPORT TRIPLE CLICK:Join Maximum Fun | Buy TC Merch💬 JOIN THE TRIPLE CLICK DISCORD🎮 Triple Click Ethics Policy📱 SOCIALS | @tripleclickpodInstagram | YouTube | TikTok | Twitch

I'm Maddie Myers. I'm Jason Schreyer. And I'm Kirk Hamilton. And if you've stopped by our spot at the blog party, well, grab a controller because we're glad you're here. Welcome to Triple Click, where we bring the games to you. Welcome to Triple Click, where we bring the games to you. Welcome to Triple Click, where we bring the games to you.

All of you, whether you've listened to the show from the start or this is your very first episode, let's get into it. Hello, and welcome to Triple Click's maximum fun block party episode, which is kind of like a regular episode of Triple Click. Only it's for maximum fun block party, which you probably know about, and maybe you don't know about. Maybe you're just a triple-click listener and you're like, block party, what's happening? This is just the video game podcast that I listen to every week. Or maybe you are a new person who's visiting this show because of Block Party, because that is the idea.

Block Party is going on this week, the week of October 11th. The idea, I guess, is to treat all of Maximum Fun, the whole network like it is a big block party with a bunch of separate houses and each house has its own theme. And we all walk out into the street. Exactly. Shake hands with each other and somebody brings hot dogs and somebody brings pasta salad, etc. Definitely. There's like there's good social distancing going on if you've had any block parties in your neighborhood. Of course. We're all wearing masks and we're there with like a CRT TV and like Super Smash Brothers and some lawn chairs and we're inviting you to come play with us. Actually we're playing we're playing Tetris because it's a block party. That's true. We are.

We're playing competitive Tetris. You do. Though I guess you can, do you smash blocks and smash. No, I guess you just smash blocks in Martin. Anyways, we're the video game nerds here, and we're welcoming all comers. So maybe you're an old friend of the show and you're hanging out at our house because you know us and you're a regular listener. But maybe you're a newcomer, and this episode is also for you. So this episode is going to welcome any new folks to triple click and hopefully convince you to listen to our show because we like our show.

and we think that maybe you will as well. And I should say that this is happening network-wide. That's the whole idea behind Maximum Fun Block Party. So every other Maximum Fun Show is also doing what we're doing. They're doing an episode that doubles as an introduction for new listeners. So it works on two levels. If there are other Max Fun shows that you've maybe been curious about, this is a great time to go and check them out.

And if there's anyone you know that you think might like Triple Click, but doesn't already listen, this is a great episode to send them to try out. And we do appreciate people spreading the word about Triple Click. that is really the only way that we grow our audience. So that's the theme of this episode. It's going to be cool for anyone who's a regular listener. This isn't like something that... It's so cool.

You shouldn't worry about it. Get hyped. The cues, you have to say it's going to be cool at the beginning of something. And then everybody knows it's going to be cool. So Kirk, what's this episode about? Well, this episode is going to be a beginner's guide to video games. And before we get into that, I actually feel like we should introduce ourselves so that people know who the heck we are.

because we do say our names at the beginning of every episode, but we don't actually say who we are because we sort of assume that most of our listeners know who we are, but if you're new, you probably don't. You're like, who are these three people? Why should anyone care what they think about video games? So I thought it would be fun if we each introduced one another. So I'm going to introduce Maddie Myers.

Maddie Myers is the senior games editor at the extremely popular video game website, Polygon.com. She's a co-host of the X-Men podcast, The Mutant Ages, and she is a synth pop musician. She plays keyboard and she sings beautifully. She has albums of her stuff out. Oh, boy. She is also a noted Metroid expert.

So that was one sentence. Then the second sentence is, she is based in Boston. She's been writing about video games for more than a decade, and she knows a lot about a lot of different types of games, but she has a particularly large expertise in competitive games, tournaments, and fighting games, which I think is really cool because I don't know much about that.

So that's Maddie Myers. It's true. I had a past where I was a very into street fighter, and it's still kind of the present. A troubled pass. A troubled secret pass of playing street fighting. I am the beast from Brazil and I will somersault into your face. That would be Blanca from Street Fighter.

Anyway, I'm going to introduce not Blanca, but my co-host, Jason Trier, who is an author of two books about the video game industry as well as a video game reporter at Bloomberg, and he mostly covers crunch, which is a method of working in the video game industry that basically means too much work, too many hours. So when you hear us talk about crunch, that's what we're referring to.

But Jason writes a lot of other silly articles about Final Fantasy. We met, all three of us met because we all worked together at Kotaku, which is a different video game website. But who cares about that? None of us work there anymore. Now Jason's at Bloomberg. Killing it, getting aggregated over at Polygon.com by some of my reporters when he gets a good scoop.

Thank you for that intro, Maddie. And of course, last, but certainly not least. I mean, maybe. Well, maybe. I would say, it's a three-way tie for most. It's a three-way tie for least. He's the tallest, so I feel like that's true. He is the tallest.

Well, I mean, it's not much of a comparison. No, not at all. We're both very short. Yeah. The musician turned journalist, turn musician again, Kirk Hamilton, who, was once a music school teacher who's had an eclectic array of jobs over the years

was once a music school teacher. Top music was once a journalist for kataku.com, a video game website, and is now a full-time podcaster and freelance musician. He is the host of strong songs, which is a phenomenal podcast, analyzing

musicians and music. It's a different song every week. Sometimes it's multiple songs. Sometimes it's multiple questions. And it has a Patreon. If you want to support it, but you should go check it out, strong songs. And he is also the editor and co-hosts of Triple Click, which is what you are listening to right now. And in fact, Kirk often uses his editing wizardry to manipulate the show and to make himself seem smarter than the rest of us. And I'm sure he'll Bing in right here. Right. As I'm saying this, I'm sure he'll edit himself

in saying something prescient and smart and making the rest of us look bad. So that's Kirk Hamilton. Wow. Bing. Okay, it's Future Kirk here, and I'm editing the show, and I feel like my hand was forced by Jason, but I just want to say that when I bing my way into the show, it's always to make a correction. When I bing my way into my own segments, like when I'm talking, it's always to point out that I was wrong about something. It is not to make myself sound smarter than everyone else. It is, in fact, to point out the many ways in which I don't always know what I'm talking about. So, just wanted to get that on the record there and clarify that. Back to the show. bing

All right So that's the three of us That's why you should care Or maybe maybe not care Maybe that's why you just Turn the podcast off You're turning it off right now Wow

Kataku Oh don't Oh I forgot to mention Kirk is also a pro gamer Who only died seven times While beating the difficult game Returnal this year That's true

That is that is But he wasn't a dick about it He just kind of tossed it off casually Which which almost is being a dick about it To just be casually Like I only did So that's us. That's who we are. And we're going to tell you about video games on this episode. I think this will be a fun conversation, even for people who are not beginners at video games, because playing video games means that you kind of spend a lot of time explaining them to people who don't play them, especially people in 80 older generations, people at family members and people at other parties or even just... Or people in your own generation who are like, I haven't been playing video games since middle school. You're still playing.

playing those? Why? And that's always a fun conversation. You love it when somebody says that to you. You just think, yes, finally. Or your editors and colleagues at a news at a news. Right. Right. Or busy, like, breaking pandemic related news and asking you about, what's this Ace Attorney game that I keep seeing you talk about in Slack? Why do you keep trying to write about lawyers, visual novels about lawyers? So we spent a lot of time explaining games. And it's sort of a fun thing to do. And even if you don't actively play video games, I know there are a lot of people out there who are very interested in them, who have seen headlines, you know, increasing headlines at the New York Times and Bloomberg and elsewhere about video games. I just saw a Switch OLED headline in the New York Times. It was like, should you buy the Switch O-L-ED version?

Well, should you? Finally, let's get into it. But it's a valid question because one of the most popular game consoles ever. I think that was a wire cutter article. Yeah, maybe it was. But still, you know, you see this kind of stuff all over the place and maybe people want to know about it. So I thought it would be fun to just come up with some like thesis sentences that are just sort of broad statements about what video games are that we can then discuss a little bit each of those and sort of use them as a way to explain what video games are to people. So, Maddie, I think you're doing the first one.

Let us have it. That's right. So one way to think about video games is there something that you can do. with other people. It says something fun here, but I would argue that's not always the case. Sometimes it's something competitive and deeply petty that you do with other people. And a lot of times. And sometimes it's something monotonous that you do with other people. Of course. Yeah. You don't want to just sit around eating cheese and crackers when you could be

fighting for your life in a virtual world or with some cards or in a jackbox game. I don't know how to quantify jackbox if you have never heard of jackbox and you're a new listener. You should Google it, check it out. There's some good stuff on there. Anyway, you can play games online or off, although these days in the pandemic times, most people are playing them online. These days, what I've been doing with my friends

is booting up a voice call and then all of us play separate video games and we talk to each other about the games. And if we do it in Discord, we can stream the games to one another and be like, I just got to this part. Let me show it to you virtually. And that's a wonderful way

to experience a non-multiplayer game that's still social. But of course, you can also play multiplayer game. You can play on a public Minecraft game or make your own Minecraft server or perhaps, you know, some kids who do that or some kids who make Roblox games and share it with their friends. Or maybe, you know, people who play World of Warcraft or other MMOs like Destiny. Or maybe you just don't know about any of this, but you kind of like triple click and you would like to socialize more with other gamers. If that's the case for you, I would say you should check out the triple click Discord because they have. have like a little video game book club where they all socialize together and play the same

games. And it's pretty cool. Yeah, that's a, I've thought a lot about the sort of the friends you make along the way thing. We talked about Diablo the video game last week and how the real loot was the friends you made along the way. And I've thought a lot about my time playing destiny. But also the real loot was that gold that dropped. The real loot was the, the loot. Right. I mean, well, to me, the real loot was the friends I made along the way. But to Jason, it was the loot that he got from those bosses that he'd be. with a collection of total strangers. But you know, everyone's different.

Everyone is different. But I've thought a lot about the friends that I've made along the way, and that is very true. My group of sort of guys I used to play with, some of whom are still games journalists, some of whom are no longer games journalists, or at least primarily games journalists.

Dog walkers. Some of them work for amazing dog rescue organizations. And these are people that I spent so many hours with. Like, more hours were spent with this group of people, including Jason, who was also one of my destiny buddies, for this period of time, I guess, from like 2014 to 2016 or 2017, maybe, when we finally kind of got burned out on that game. But that group persists, and there is still this, like, energy around these people. And they've made a Minecraft server that I can't remember if I've talked about this on the show. I don't think so.

It is one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. And it's this, like, collaborative, creative effort that just has nothing in common. with the idea of a multiplayer video game, as I'm sure many people have it. So if you make a Minecraft server, right, you make like a whole world that might be infinite. I think there might be a limit. You have to define a limit somehow,

but it's really big. You also have to pay for it. You're paying for server space in order to create such a thing. Yeah, go on. And so they've created, I mean, it started out, I think it was purely just in survival mode, so it's just like a procedurally generated Minecraft world.

And they've gone on to develop it into what, One of the most incredible, like, digital creations I've ever seen. There are multiple amusement parks with, like, full working rides. At one point, Mike, our friend who actually now works for the dog rescue organization and used to work at a game spot, he made an escape room, like a series of escape rooms that I played through with some other people. And it was like doing a destiny raid, but he had designed it. And he's not a game designer, but it was amazing. Well, it sounds like he is.

Yeah, I mean, I guess he is. and that's kind of, that's what's so remarkable about it, is just going in and seeing these different realms that are assigned to different people. It's this like online space that they've all built. It's one of the most amazing things I've ever seen, and it would be something that I would show to anybody, even someone who's never played video games,

or doesn't even really know what Minecraft is, aside from it being something that kids are really into and just being like, this could be anything. This could be, in this case, something that keeps you sane during the first year of the pandemic, and allows you to have something that you're legitimately proud of, that you can show people that's like really impressive and really cool. Yeah.

I think that the online game and the kind of to get at this description that Maddie is using to, that video games are just this thing to do with other people. I think an online game, even to people who haven't played games before, can be such a useful substitute for the phone and such a more engaging way to catch up with your friends. I know a lot of people, especially younger folks, aren't big fans of the phone for various reasons. And I think that can be a really good entry point for people who don't know games super well

or are interested in games, but don't even know where to start is to get a couple of friends together and be like, hey, let's jump into this game. Let's try this out. Let's go check out destiny and form a squad and see what happens. Let's all check out, I don't know, Final Fantasy 14, if you want to get pretty hardcore,

or if you want to go a little more casual, let's go check out Fortnite together. Let's go play Smash Brothers together. Don't recommend Splatoon because a group of friends and I tried to get into that. And you can't even team up as a party together. The online capabilities of the game are so terrible. But there are a lot of games out there

that I think are worth just calling up your friends and being like, hey, let's bond over some gaming sashes. Yeah, definitely. And I feel like a lot of people these days will just watch each other play games. Like I know people are very familiar with the idea of a let's play, but the kind of discord that I described where my friends, maybe one of us will be playing a game and the others will either just be watching or will be playing their own more low impact game is an experience. I happen to really enjoy and strongly recommend to people. Like that's definitely how I got into Dark Souls, which is a notoriously difficult game, is that I was playing it. And then I had a few friends watching me play it.

And when I got stuck or I just was bored because I was like running back to the same boss over and over again and just learning attack patterns, I had people to talk to and cheer me on a little bit. And that just adds something really nice. It's like having friends on the couch sharing and the experience with you. And like maybe they're also reading a book a little bit or like playing the jeweled on their phone. But like they're there with you and they're hanging out and enjoying the game as well. Yeah, there's really something to that. I mean, whenever you describe playing games in that way, Maddie, it makes me want to do

even though I never really have. Like I never just stream on Discord to a few people, even though that seems like it would be really great. And it's nice that you're all doing different things because then what you have in common is the conversation, and the conversation winds up being the focus. Where I do find sometimes, and Jason Toy, you were talking about, I also have a group of guys that I play tabletop games with. We used to meet at a bar, but now we play with tabletop simulator, which is basically a virtual tabletop system that lets you simulate any table top.

So it's not really a video game, it's a tabletop game. But we don't actually do that much casual talking because the games we're playing, we're playing a game called Gloomhaven right now that's very involved. And we spend all of our time pretty much just figuring out what to do next and like how to solve this current combat puzzle or whatever. And Destiny could be the same way with raids where it's like, you need to really focus and you know, there's not like, it's like hard and you're really trying to talk through and coordinate your strategies.

I really like the idea of just everyone's playing whatever, like maybe. just like a really low impact game. Like a person could just be playing Animal Crossing or something and talking about what Tom Nook has got in, you know, or what is, I guess, what his kids have in the store that day. And like just whatever. And then you just talk about movies and TV. So that does seem like a really nice thing to do.

One day I'm going to find a way to do that. All right, well, let's keep moving. The next thing, the video games are, this is this one I'm going to read. It is, video games are a fascinating and constantly evolving modern art form. Very high-minded. We do talk a lot about video games as art on this show. I think we are all three in some way or another art critics

and think about games as art. And that is a really fun thing to do, or at least that was always what drew me to writing about video games. Like, that's the reason I got into it and stopped teaching jazz band at a high school and started writing about video games. And then games stopped being art until you left. Right, and then exactly.

Actually, though, they achieved their... artistic potential completely. Thanks to you. I could just walk away. Right. Red Dead Red Dead Redemption 2 came out. Right. And then you were like, goodbye.

My work here is... I should have picked a different game because some people could think I was being serious. I did really like that game. I don't think that it is the pinnacle of video game artistic. Well, it is the last game that you reviewed. You should clarify that. That is true. It is the last game I reviewed.

So maybe that was the game that convinced you that all of your work was pointless. I mean, we'll let the listener decide. which it is, because it can only be one of those two things. It was a good one to go out on just because it was such a big and challenging thing with so much going on. And I think that a lot of the games that we talk about on this show are that way, like The Last of Us 2 comes to mind. Well, Final Fantasy 7 remake is another example. Also another big one. But like games that are really big and ambitious and like trying to tell stories and, you know, do new things with this interactive medium.

Because I always tell people when I'm at parties, actually I don't always do this because I don't really. do this anymore. I think that maybe it's too intense. But what I used to say when I would describe why I thought video games were so cool, because people would ask this question. Well, you were like teaching, you were doing music, you had a whole thing, why did you switch over? And I would say, well, because video games are so fascinating. It's so interesting to be trying to understand and follow an art form that's in the phase that video games are in, compared with other types of art, other media. And I would always talk about how movies, used to be the artistic super medium,

which I don't know if that's a real term. And I think it sounds too intense and I don't use it anymore, but I used to say this, and I'm sharing this on the show. But I would say, like, the reason that movies were seen as so exciting is because they combined so many other forms of media

into one new super medium. And so you had music and composing and you had acting and performance, and you had, like, lighting and costuming and set design and also cinematography and, like, camera work and all of these things that a director would then pull together into this one thing that went above and beyond in a certain way each of those other forms of art. And it's not to say movies are better than music, that's not true, but they do use it.

And I think that video games are the new kind of super medium, because they take all of those things that movies do, and they also add this interactive element to it. Oh, I thought you were going to say they also add microtransactions. They also have clever new ways to monetize our time. they're interactive and they're interactive between, like they're shared in a way, because you do them together. And some of the most amazing games are things that you do together like we just talked about. And that's totally wild.

Like every year there's a new video game that comes out that does something that we've never seen before. Or like we're talking about and being like, this is just a new thing. No one's ever thought of this before, which is really cool, I think, just to be talking about an art form that does that. Yeah. I thought you were going to say it was a super ultra plus medium. I really expected the Kirk Hamilton-esque taxonomy to be the button on the end of that monologue. I mean, it was a great monologue. But I just think if you go back to a party, maybe that could be worked in as just your explanation for why you would even consider covering video games on your pit podcast triple click.

Yeah, that's not dissimilar from the answer that I say, although, of course, the conversation has to progress onward from the person being like, really, you play video games? you, that's so unusual. And then the person being hard pressed to explain why they're saying that to me specifically. But once we get past that part of it, once you get past the blatant sexism, then we can have an actual conversation where I'm like, well, it's actually just that video games happen to be super cool to think about during a time when they've only been around for a few decades. And all the conversations are new in a good and a bad way. We're still defining terms about how we would even describe different forms of interactivity, and we're only a few years hence from arguing about ludonarrative dissonance and whether or not it's socially acceptable for games critics

to use pretentious terms like that or not. And when I say pretentious, I, of course, I mean wonderful and useful terms. I've used it to. And that's fun to me. I like having those kinds of debates about games and what they even are. Like the topic of this episode is fun to me to even try to consider the different layers of how we consider what games are. I do think that there's something to be said since this is an episode about the beginning beginner's guide to video games. And I'm sure there's some people out there listening who are like, man, these games sound like great art forms, but like I can't get into them. I don't know how to use two joysticks. I don't even know where to start with this controller. Oh, do I really

have to go out and buy a $500 PS5? So a little bit later in the episode, we'll talk a little bit more about like games that are more accessible for for newcomers. But, um, but I do think that's kind of the, one of the downsides to this, to your definition here, Kirk, is that like, even as games are getting more fascinating and evolving more and more every year, I think they can still be impenetrable if you're not following them, the, the games industry, if you're not familiar with games, um, at least a lot of them can. There are some that are better than others and welcoming new players. But, um, because of that interactivity element, the game is just inherently more difficult to get into than the movie, which I think might, it's like it's got the double-edged sword of the super medium here.

And I think that's another interesting part of this whole equation. Yeah, I think that's totally true. It just requires more, like a difficult text is very different in the context of an actual book, like war and peace or something. That can be a difficult text just because it's complex. There's a lot to keep track of. There's a lot of layers to the metaphors. But a difficult text in terms of video games can be something like Maddie mentioned Dark Souls

and notoriously difficult, but also beautiful and rewarding and amazingly designed games that once you learn its language, you can really get a lot out of. But, I mean, it's not a game that we're going to recommend at the end here when we recommend games for newcomers, just because it can be so off-puttingly difficult, especially if you're not already a little bit read in on the language of video games, which is such an interesting part of this specific art form. is that, you know, the more familiar you are with it, the more you get out of it, which is, I guess, true of every type of art.

But in this case, it really matters a lot just because you can't actually even see the whole thing, right? I mean, this has been said in a million different ways, but it would be like if they gave you a test on music theory, like two minutes into the new Lil Nasak song, and they were like, okay, so what chord was that just played and you're like, I don't know. And they're like, sorry, you can't hear the rest of the song. You got to go learn that that was a minor major seven chord. and then we'll unlock the next two minutes. Like, it's just such a fundamentally different experience.

I would more compare it to the way that all media does have different layers of difficulty. I mean, I know it's not like media gate keeps you in that way, but I feel like it can in terms of your understanding. Like, I would say The Little Mermaid is perhaps like an easy mode version of something. It is the bejeweled. There's certainly deeper messages, as there are in Bajouled, a game I love, that you can find. And Disney's The Little Mermaid. But it's not like, you know, Brazil.

a fairly complex movie that I hated when I was a teenager, but as an adult can recognize actually has some pretty interesting themes that I simply didn't comprehend at the time. And I feel like video games are not the same as that because as you say, they gatekeep you, but it is also true that different forms of art have different levels of literacy that you can bring to the table. And in that sense, I don't really think they're that different from other art forms. And in that, you know, in that sort of vein, you can listen to triple click and you can become more literate in video games. And I do think that welcoming more people in, it's like an important part of helping people, you know, just enjoy video games more. I think that triple click Discord is actually

a really great community for that reason is there's a lot of people there who are like, I don't know, I don't play many games like this, but I'm going to give it a shot. And then people are very, like, helpful and welcoming. And that community can be helpful for reading people in and getting them that literacy. All right. Let's keep going. Next one is all you, Jason. video games are an $180 billion entertainment industry with some serious problems. I'll keep this short because I don't want to get too depressing here, but something that people should know if they're entering this equation.

But I've only ever heard good things about video games and gamers ever. You had have seen a couple headlines here and there. To Kirk's point earlier about the video game industry being very young and nascent, it's kind of in its one way to put it, is that it's the games industry as a whole is in its silent film stages if you're like looking at the Hollywood as a Hollywood is a parallel there movies is a parallel there and as a result of the games industry being so young it is going through many many growing pains the games industry is constantly dealing with labor exploitation and sexism and racism and other abuses a lot of just

unpaid overtime and cultural issues that we've seen tackled quite a bit volatility and burnout and just lots of layoffs and income inequality where the CEOs are the biggest game companies are making insane amounts of money while the developers at the very bottom are not are making making pennies. So yeah, there's a lot of baggage that comes to the AAA industry with the AAA is kind of a term for the big budget games industry lingo there. And so somebody to be aware of if you're going to get into games, if you're going to play big games, you should know that some of them might not have been made in the, most ethical of ways.

Yeah, it's a downer, but it's also, it's like reflective of a larger conversation that's going on. Like, it's nice that we have our little corner of the world to talk about, but it does feel sometimes like our little corner of the world is just, you know, like a fractal of the world. Like, it's just a lot of these problems, right, are tech industry problems that then manifest in video games, but then again, they have their own unique things too, like crunch thing that Maddie referenced earlier, that Jason, you've raised.

written a lot about. You've done a lot of reporting, a lot of great scoops on studios that embraced super intense crunch, naughty dog comes to mind who they make really celebrated games, and they crunch brutally hard. People work so hard and, like, totally burnout and, you know, hurt their families and their relationships and their health to finish these games that are undoubtedly great and cool when they're finished, but there's always this question of, like, did it need that cost? And in video games, it's really a kind of unique thing. It's like, or specific to video games, because people are so excited to be making video games. And for all the like artistic reasons I just laid out, if you're an artist and you want to make this new and exciting type of art,

it is understandable that you'd be drawn in and be like really excited about making, you know, this new thing that no one's ever done before. Look what we're going to do together. We're going to totally break these barriers and like make something brand new that'll stand forever as this revolutionary thing. it's just going to require us to work, you know, 5,000 hours a week and never see our families for three years and, like, to actually then finish the game and we made all these compromises and it's like, it's pretty cool, but I don't know. And then you look back on it with regret. And I think that's happening more and more as the games industry gets older and older, there are kind of more people talking about that stuff and looking back and being like, it wasn't worth it, man. Like, we shipped a great game. But in the end, you know, whatever, my marriage fell apart or whatever else it might have been, it wasn't worth the, the costs, and it is nice to see more people sharing that perspective. Yeah, the couple of things there that make games unique, because overtime, excessive overtime, is pretty common in a lot of industries. Podcasting.

We saw a big controversy earlier this year with Goldman Sachs and those crazy hours that they're going through. I think the two things that make games different are that, one, unless you are a lead at one of a very few companies like Naughty Dog, really, you are not getting paid what you're worth for that kind of money. You're not getting paid like along the lines of a banker or doctor or someone else who works for crazy hours. And two, and this is the most important one, it's kind of, or to one, a corollary to one is that sometimes you're not paid for overtime at all because you're on salary and you're just like maybe you'll get a month off at the end of the game,

but it's nothing. But two, and this is the most unique one is that it's all hid under the guise of passion and like people are really like the passion that people have for making games is really exploited because you're put in this position as a game developer where it's like, oh, man, I really want this game to be great, really want my favorite feature to get in. So I want to put in all these extra hours because I really care. And sometimes it can take a while and it's not until much later, years later where you're like, oh man, I was really exploited, maybe subconsciously, but still it was exploitation there. And it's all done under the name of passion. Yeah. And also unions are not common in the video games industry. Yes. We talk about a lot as compared to film and

TV where, of course, unions aren't perfect. There's still layoffs after every project. It's common to be shuffled around and be treated like a contractor, essentially. But the video game industry is like that, but with no protections, no one that you can sort of turn to and not a ton of solidarity. But the other thing that I think is pretty easy for people to understand, even if they don't work in games, is just the sort of mythologizing of a specific genius in the tech industry and also the way we do that in the arts as well.

and how those two forms of putting an otter on a pedestal get combined for the worse in video games because it's like you really have the fantasy of like the Steve Jobs type who just comes in and points at something and is like an iPad should be the same size as a manila envelope and everyone is like oh my God how did he come up with that? You have that side of the sort of design ethos and then the other side you also have like the Alfred Hitchcock of it all like the abusive person where we look at their art and we're like, oh, it's all worth it because, you know, he made these incredible films. You have both of those combined into one horrible specimen in the video games industry. I will not name names, but there are certainly some people who come to mind that would fit that paradigm. And that is also something I say to people when

they ask me why I cover this industry, is just that it's combining two terrible things that I would like to take down two pedestals that I'd like to see demolished in one go. Yeah, it's true. They're so complicated, too. Video games are just like extremely complicated to make and something I think we're being better about. I mean, I always, it's very hard to be as good about this as possible, but to just recognize the other people who are involved in making any one thing and to never attribute something as complicated as a video game to one person or even, you know, 50 people, which that's when it really gets hard is how do you even talk about the creative decision making of a 150-person team, even though that is what's required to understand some of the decisions that are made in games,

which can be challenging, but it is something we try to do here. All right, well, let's keep going. Maddie, you've got this next one. Sure. So video games are also one of the most popular spectator sports in the world. So I touched on this a little bit with a fun thing to do with other people. there are wonderful competitive video games out there that people play with one another on the internet and other people watch them do that. And this is just the same to me in my heart as watching great athletes, great chess players, great golfers, whatever, people who are great at darts in your local bar. It's fun to watch somebody who's really freaking good at something.

It just is. And also, it usually inspires you, or me at least, to improve a little bit at playing the game in your own time. And perhaps my favorite example of this is always going to be fighting games, like watching Evo every year and seeing the finals of Street Fighter and Super Smash Brothers and so many other wonderful games is just a delight. And I enjoy it every single time. It's just it's like a classic one v one. It's like a boxing match. There's personalities. There's long-term rivalries between certain players who've known each other for years and competed in the same games over and over and that's just really fun. Like, it just, it just owns.

And it's just a whole other part to games, which in my eyes are a sport as much as they are in art form, at least when it comes to competitive games. Definitely. I think a lot about fighting games in particular because anyone can watch them. They're so watchable because it's just a fight between two. Like, you can just figure out basically what's going, oh, that guy's kicking the other guy in the head a bunch of times

and his health bar just went away. So, like, that seems bad for the other guy. where it can be really hard to watch some games. It's hard to watch Overwatch, right? Like to watch competitive Overwatch. But if you've played some Overwatch, it gets easier pretty quickly, and then it becomes really fun.

So if you're going to start watching games, maybe don't start with Overwatch or something like really complicated first-person shooter, just because first-person games in particular can be hard to spectate unless they have really robust spectator tools, which I know Overwatch kind of has, but I feel like they're not really there yet,

just because any given match of that game, is like operating on, you know, three different layers of the Z-axis, and there's people flying through the air and, like, underground and invisible. But my memories are mainly of, since as I mentioned, I played a lot of Destiny 2. I've never been good at competitive first-person shooters, but I really loved watching some Destiny streamers who were, you know, they were all like kids. They were probably like 21 at the time or something.

And they would just play Trials of Osiris, which was this competitive tournament that I guess is still in Destiny 2 every weekend. and I would just watch them play rather than play it myself because I found it so stressful to go up against really good players and to just get rocked all the time. But watching amazing players play, it really is that feeling of watching a great basketball player and thinking, oh, okay, I could do that. Yeah, I could do that. And then you get out there and you're like, oh, I suck at basketball.

But it's that same feeling of, like, they're just so good. Their situational awareness is, like, so amazing. They, like, just are always in the right place at the right time. It's this feeling of almost like watching someone, not. cheat, but like be psychically good at the game. And it's just very satisfying if you've played even a little bit of the same game. One of my favorite things every single year, one of my favorite kind of video game subcultures is an event called Games Done Quick, which is one of the most entertaining things on Twitch. And essentially, it's a week-long marathon where these people

called speed runners compete to play games as fast as possible, which often means breaking them and finding glitches in them and finding shortcuts in them. And it is so cool. It's this incredible energy at this event every single year. It happens twice a year. And they just like find new ways of beating all these classic games and all these new games. And it is just super cool. And just again, speaks to this idea that like this industry and this, this culture is still in this, it's still so nascent and it's still so young that like people are still just finding new subcultures that are being created every single year. And it's just been cool to discover and watch. And it's just super fun. Hype, as they call it. Very hype, as the kids would say. It ties in with the sort of games

as technology part of this, which they are art. They are a sport. But they're also just pieces of technology that people like to take apart. And it's like watching someone rewire a computer or like take apart a car engine and rebuild it, watching someone dismantle an old JRP or A game like, I don't know, Bloodboren is one that I really like watching speed runs of, where they'll find, well, if you like roll at this one fence, you know, actually the game will kind of glitch out if you do it enough times and you can go flying over it. Breath of the Wild, which I believe is going to come up later, the most recent mainline Legend of Zelda game,

is one of the most incredible games for this kind of thing because it has all of these systems built into it. You know, a whole complicated physics system and all of this stuff that's simulated in the game, watching people actually use the rules of the game mostly, and then some glitches, but they're kind of treating it more as an object, right? It's like it is the rules of the game, it is all in the game, but there's just this different approach to it, I think, that Speedrunners take, that treats the game more like this thing to be picked apart and sort of examined and put back together in the most interesting ways,

and that is a very fun thing to watch. So before we go to one more thing, we are going to list six games for all of you newcomers out there, all of you beginners who are looking for a guide, six games that we think would be great for people who are new to video games. Maddie, why don't you go first? Sure. So I have Animal Crossing New Horizons as my first pick, which to me seems like the most obvious possible pick. I'm sure people have heard of it at this point, but it is a game in which you land on an island with a bunch of other anthropomorphic animals. You are a human that's never explained or address. Everything is absolutely adorable. You start out

in a little tent where you're sleeping in a sleeping bag, and then eventually you collect resources and build a house of your very own. And you can make that house super big and awesome and build a garden and travel to other islands and also visit your friends in the game. If they also play the game, you can go to their islands and see how they did. You can celebrate Halloween and collect candy from your friends in the game. It is freaking adorable. And my girlfriend didn't really play video games a ton.

She played a bunch of phone games before we started dating. And then during the pandemic, I bought her Nintendo Switch, which is what you would need to play this on. and Animal Crossing because she loved the Animal Crossing phone game. And I was like, I bet she's going to love this other version of the game that has way more stuff in it, way more garden to tend. And she does. And now she's super into it and plays a ton of other games that I won't list here. But I think it was a really good entry point for her into gaming. And the other pick I'm going to say is a classic puzzle game.

I almost put Tetris here because I love Tetris. But I put Picross because it's on almost every plastic. You can imagine, like if you don't want to buy a console or get some complicated PC game, you probably could still get pickross on whatever you have. And if you like a bejeweled, if you like a puzzle game, you know, boggle, whatever, scrabble, you'll probably dig it. It's got some Sudoku vibes. It's not that expensive.

And it's just fun. And I know a lot of like quote unquote hardcore gamers who are very into all the pickross games that are on the Nintendo Switch. It is wildly popular. I am. I've played so much pickross. Yeah, so you get it. I feel like it is also a good entry point into more complicated puzzle games like Baba is you, perhaps.

Like Picross 3D. Yes, or Picross 3D. Yeah. So those are my fix. Nice. Jason, what are you, too? Okay. First of all, the Legend is Zelda Breath of the Wild.

Most people listening have probably heard of this game because it just kind of dominated everything for a long time. It's one of the best games ever made. It's a game that's best described as an action and adventure exploration game where everything you try to do, the game will just say yes to you. If you want to chop down a tree and then push the log to a river and use that as a raft, then by all means, be my guess. It's a really phenomenal game that you should just go and play and really passes the partner tests that we always talk about in terms of like, would your partner who isn't

into games. Introducing your poor partner who's so tired of hearing. about video games. Exactly. It's just like, will they tolerate it? It's just steps away from becoming an addict. Yeah, my wife played through the whole thing twice, which is once more than I played through it.

Yeah, and she barely plays video games. The other game on my list is Return of the Obra Dinn, which maybe some people have not heard of. But this is a game about, it's a story game. It's basically, it's set on a ship where everybody is dead, and it is in the 1700, 1600, something like that. And essentially your job is to go around and figure out why each person died, how they died. And what happened on this ship?

Were there supernatural events that led to these dooms? Were they all killing each other? What happened here? And the way that the story unfolds and the way that you solve this puzzle really feels like a giant, like, logic grid, like one of those logic puzzles that you might have. where it's like person A has a red hat and is sitting next to the person with a with a with a with a B on their head or whatever it is. And so like that that's how the whole game unfolds. It's really cool. It's really easy to play because there's no like shooting or running or any sort

of like action gameplay that you need to like get the hang of. So anyone could pick it up and and play it. And it's just really good. Highly recommend it. It's an amazing game. All right. Well, my two are the first one is a game called 80 Days, which is an interesting. interactive fiction sort of story that is available on just about everything. I know it's on phones and on tablets and it's also on computers. This game is so cool and I think really speaks to the sort of interactive storytelling potential of video games. And it's the kind of thing that anyone can get into because it's just a great story. And it's your story.

You are the sort of valet for the guy who's trying to go around the world in 80 days and you're on this race to try to get around the world. but the whole thing is really told through texts. So you just are reading this wonderfully written game. The lead writer is a writer named Meg Janth, who we know a little bit. She came on our previous podcast that we made, but she's really cool, a great writer. And just the whole thing, the way that it's written,

this whole evocation of a kind of, I think it said in like the 1920s, like 30s maybe, and it's this kind of steampunk alternate version of our world. And it really just unfolds organically. you learn about this world in so many cool ways. You'll just go and meet someone at one of your ports of call and have a little adventure and learn about them. And then you're off to the next place.

And it's just a wonderful, wonderful game that I think... My mom enjoyed it quite a bit. Yeah. Honestly, anybody would get into you. My second one is a game that I just picked. There were a lot that I could have chosen here, but I actually think this would be kind of a cool one. If you want to get into games, and this one has a little bit of action in it,

but it really speaks to just some of the more abstract artistic potential of video games. This is a game called Inside. And it's made by a studio called Play Dead. It's from like three or four years ago. Oh, I thought it was made by Bo Burn. Yes, it is a 90-minute Netflix special that's just music made in a single version. There is a game in that special. There is a Twitch stream in that special.

And it's called inside. And I feel like that this isn't that. I think there's even a reference. I think that maybe the first thing you do is like press X to wake up. And I think that you also do that in Inside. I think he deliberately made a reference. Anyways, you may have seen this reference on Bo Burnham's wildly popular Netflix special inside. But no, this is a very very.

very, very strange game that's sort of horrifying and funny and weird and defies description in a lot of ways. It does require some coordination. It's a side-scrolling sort of puzzle platformer, but it's not all of the puzzles, or at least as well as I remember them, there may be a few that are sort of tough, but they're largely logical. And there's a lot of just sort of, well, I need to get past this thing. If the light shines on me, they kill me. So, like, I'll have to avoid the light. And you just can kind of follow your understanding of the world and get through it.

And it's just a totally enrapturing, amazing experience. It's not very long. It's really, really cool. And I think, you know, if you're up for that kind of a thing, if you're not maybe so new to games if you want to try something in that vein, inside is a really cool one. All right, so those are six games that you can try.

If you're a newcomer, we will put them down in the show notes. And of course, there's a million more that we talk about on the show all the time. Speaking of which, let's take a break, and then we'll be back for one more thing. I'm Lisa Hannah-Walt. And I'm Emily Heller. Nine years ago, we started a podcast to try and learn something new every episode. Things have gone a little off the rails since then. Tune in to hear about.

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Hosted by us to Horny. Adults. Hang out with us as we try and fail to retain any knowledge at all. Every other week on Maximum Fun. A man goes to the doctor and says that he's depressed and that life seems cruel. The doctor says, ah, the treatment is simple. The great clown, Pagliacci, is in town tonight. Go and see him, and you will surely feel better.

The man bursts into tears and says, But doctor, I am Pagliacci. Ah, okay, says the doctor, in which case, try listening to the Beef and Dairy Network podcast. The Beef and Dairy Network podcast is a multi-award winning comedy podcast, and you can find it at maximum fun.org or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back for one more thing. Jason, why don't you go first? Okay, my one more thing this week is the new Nintendo Switch, the Switch, O-L-E-D.

Wow, should we get it? The New York Times was wondering. That was the question we said we would answer. I'm really sweating here. Should we get it? Which, first of all, so, okay, so this thing is, it is not a Switch Pro. It is a new switch that has a beautiful new LLD screen. So really only different if you're playing it in handheld mode.

Does it make much of a difference on Doc? It also has a couple of other new cool features. Not capable of playing 4K, despite apparently people are doing like these gut, like, tear-down. and finding that like it has all these capabilities for 4K. Like the doc has the capabilities for 4K. So it seems pretty clear that some shenanigans have. It's almost like maybe your publications reporting is going to be borne out at some point. Well, it seems almost like there's a chip shortage that might have affected their plans.

But so full disclosure, I got mine from Nintendo. Nintendo sent me one along with Metroid, which I've been playing on it. And so I've been trying to answer the question in part. for for to help you out kirk um is this thing worth buying if you just have a regular switch is it an upgrade that is really worth the 350 dollars or whatever it is and i don't know it's a tough question to answer i will say though um here i have mine here it first of well it looks really good it looks terrible for an audio format jason but i just want to show you guys something and listeners listeners will be able to hear this okay well i guess you can't really hear it but sort of anyway

You guys see this. This is the new kickstand. This is pretty nice. As you can see, it takes up the entire back of the switch rather than just like a little flimsy nub thing. And it works really well. It's really good. So if you're the type of player who's like been using a kickstand a lot or wants to use

a kickstand a lot and like you take off the joycons and like sit at your desk or whatever, really, really good for that. So I do want to know who are these maniacs who use the kickstand on their switch all the time. I can answer this because. Airplane riders. My girlfriend, Dina, is a huge fan of watching a television show on the big screen while doing Animal Crossing chores that are not very interesting to watch or other chores in her many Stardue Valley-esque farming games

that, again, are not interesting to watch, with her switch propped up on the coffee table and joy confines in hand. And so if that is you and you have some switch games that you're playing and you just need to get some chores done in there and you'd much rather watch a television show while you're doing it, now you can do that. Yeah. It feels a little bit different, feels a little bit sleeker than the old switch, and the screen is really, I mean, it's been blowing me away. Like, I moved all my games to it and I've been just experimenting with a bunch of different games and it looks gorgeous.

So if you're the type of person who like only plays in handheld mode, it might feel like a new console to you. I mean, it's worth looking into it at least, like looking how it compares. If you play in dock mode, then this is not even a question. Like, don't bother. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's cool that the screen is great, and I feel like when they inevitably do release the one that can do 4K and has a more powerful CPU,

that it will also have the screen, and then I'll probably buy that one. Yeah, I think it might be worth waiting. Yeah, that's the main reason. And I think that's why Nintendo has so vehemently denied all of Bloomberg's reporting about the 4K is because they know that nobody's going to buy this thing if you're just waiting for the inevitable Switch Pro whenever that comes.

But we don't know. So you might be waiting a while. Again, I can't sit here and be like, well, I got a free one, but you should go spend $350 on it because I don't know. It's impossible we're going to answer that question. But I will say, I expected it to be more of an incremental upgrade, but it looks really good. It's like something that I can't imagine going back after using this thing for a week or so now. I don't think I'll be going back to my old switch. But like, is it really worth spending that much money just for a screen upgrade? I don't know. Your mileage may vary. But, but, but, but, but. But it's good. It's a great piece of hardware from what I've seen so far. And apparently the new joycons, they've like tweaked a little bit. So maybe they won't drift as much. Who knows? Supposedly. Yeah, we'll see. Jury's out on that one. Maddie, what is your one more thing? Okay. So I know we're going to talk about Metroid dread next week. And obviously I played a ton of that. But I figured I would wait and I would just talk about back four blood. I'm emphasizing the four because it's the digit four to indicate how many people. should play this cooperative zombie shooter together for people. Four people need to play it together. So I've only played this for an hour with a couple coworkers today.

As opposed to their last game, Evolve, which had a V for five. Yeah. The V was for Verses, if you recall. I actually had an amazing logo where it was like the big E and the... No, but the logo was like one versus four. Yeah, it was like split up. It did have five people in it as well. It was a double meaning on that V.

I see, yes. The Roman numeral five and also versus. Anyway, back for blood is a spiritual successor to a different video game called Left for Dead, which also has the digit four in the title, which is also a zombie shooter with four people in it, and which many people may remember as something that they played a heck of a lot of with three of their friends in, I don't know, six to ten years ago whenever that came out. I refuse to look it up. Back for Blood is more the same.

It's not quite as funny writing. wise as Leffredaed. I've seen a lot of people talking about that. I agree so far, even though I haven't played it much. But the thing that's fun about it is that it introduces this card system that reminds me a little bit of Hades Boone system, where you pick what card modifiers you want to have for each distinct run. And also the AI director, which much like Leffordead had an AI director, this sort of like movie director fixture in the game who decides when the zombies are going to come hunt you down. So two does Back for Blood have that. But They're more like the gods in Hades, where they, this director can decide which cards it wants

to throw at you that will challenge you moment to moment. And that is fun and adds a different layer to it that feels a little bit more like you're playing a competitive card game on top of this classic Left for Dead shooting zombies either in the head or in the glowing red spots, depending on what kind of zombie they are. And it's pretty fun. I mean, it just, just playing it with a couple people. the AI was terrible, so the fourth person, quote unquote, was just abysmal at the game. But playing it with a couple people was really, really fun today.

And I was like, oh, yeah, Left for Dead, that was a great game. That was really fun. So I recommend it. Oh, and also it's on Xbox GamePass, which for the newcomer listening is basically Netflix for games as far as subscription services go. So, like, it's pretty good bang for your buck. If you already have GamePass, you may as well install it and give it a shot. Do you think that in Microsoft HQ, they just have a counter that says Netflix for games

and anytime anyone in the media calls Game Pass Xbox for games like it goes ding ding ding ding and like they all like some confetti comes out. I know I'm sorry I even said it. But it's what it is. It's very different from Netflix. Like I don't, we don't need to get into it here. It's really

not Netflix for games but I'm just it is the elevator pitch that Microsoft has said to so many people over and over. No it's to their credit that they've made something that fits that description. Yeah that game sounds really fun. A very old friend of mine just got it and texted me and so we're probably going to play together, and I'm excited.

All right, well, I'll go last. My one more thing is a game called Wildermith that, holy crap, I think we're going to be talking about this one more in the future. This is a role-playing game for, I believe it's just on PC. It might be on consoles, but I think it's just on PC. And it's this, gosh, it's like a tactics game that is really about procedural narration and, like, narrative generation. It's a storytelling engine that has some of the most fascinating narrative stuff going on of any game I've played since like Disco Elysium or something.

So I've only played a couple of hours of this game and I can already tell what it's doing. And I've read a wonderful review by Cameron Kundselman, noted Stephen King expert and occasional video game critic who reviewed it for Polygon and we'll link that in the show notes. Never heard of it, but okay. It's an okay website. His review was the reason that I was like, okay, I need to play this because I trust. his taste in games, and he was like, this is like one of the best games I've played in a really long time. And I'm with him so far. It's really, really cool. So let me just explain what it is really quick. Basically, it's a party-based role-playing game where you, you know, you have a party of young people, or they start out young, and it's like an archer and a melee, you know,

assault warrior and a mage. And you are adventuring through this kingdom, and you're kind of on your quest, and you know, that sounds like a video game. It's a video game. And it sort of, there's a world map, and then the world map, like, time passes in the world map, so you can assign different tasks, like, secure this town, or for this river, or, like, build a staircase across these mountains so that you can travel to this new area and scout the new area. Each thing takes time, and time is always passing, and your characters are actually growing older. And so that starts to hint at, like, the actual narrative stuff that's going on to this game,

that is much, much more interesting than the moment-to-moment gameplay. though the moment-to-moment gameplay is also good. So you get into fights in this game too. There are monsters that you fight. It plays out in a kind of grid-based tactics game, so it's turn-based, and you're sort of assigning movements, so your warrior will move up and defend,

and then your mage, the coolest thing so far is that the mages, the way that magic works is, like, you cast a spell on any of the objects in the game, so like a tree or a vine or a rock, and then each object in the game has its own unique thing you can do with it. Like, you can make the rock explode,

all over the people who are standing right next to it. So there's a lot of sort of using the environment with your mages, which is really cool. It's a good combat system. It's been really fun so far. But the heart of the game is in the story stuff. So it procedurally generates these stories that are actually handwritten, and there's even a little credit.

Like the story will have the writer's name. It'll say by so-and-so up at the top when you're playing through some scenario or sequence. And it starts to feel very quickly like you're actually playing a tabletop role-playing game like Dungeons and Dragons with an actual dungeon master who's telling you this story. All of your characters are procedurally generated. They all have a unique look based on some kind of basic templates. There's, I think, a lot of mods for this game so you can make things much, much more complicated. But I'm not playing it modded.

And you'll just wind up in these really cool, really well-written scenarios over and over and over again. Where, like, I don't know, I have two characters in my party who I have to decide on their relationship really early on, and I made them rivals. so they don't like one another. And they're like a mage and an archer, and then there's a third character, and the archer and the third character are really good friends, and he's always kind of complaining about the mage.

And they have these just sort of vignettes that play out between sequences in the game where they'll have a conversation, and you kind of decide how it's going to go. And the whole thing is really beautifully written and interesting. It's just never what you're expecting. It's like really about the characters themselves and their worldview and how they think about what's going on.

And I gather that the more you play this game, your characters get older and older, and soon they're like having kids and they're retiring, and they're going to just like live lives in this kingdom. And it really feels like this epic sort of narrative saga that unfolds over many, many hours as you play the game and becomes just sort of as elaborate as you want it to be. I already have this, like, really interesting narrative connection with all of my characters, just because they're all so distinct. And I never feel stressed about the decisions I'm making for them.

Or like, I never feel like the way I feel in some role-playing game. games where it's like, what are you going to do? Are you going to be good? Or you're going to be evil? Because it's kind of this whole cast of characters. And I'm just choosing like, well, how is this person going to react to that? Or like, what choices this person going to make? I just had my fighter was hearing a weird voice from the trees. And so everybody else goes ahead. This is after a battle in the forest. And she stays behind and there's this voice coming from a tree. And there's like a shiny object under the tree. And it's like, what do you do? And I'm like, well, she's going to pick it up. Because I could have just walked away. She picks it up. And now she's like possessed or

something. So there's like, I don't know, something has taken her over. And because the game is so procedural and uses the same kind of templates for everything, I get the sense that there's just a huge variety of things that can happen. And it's all in kind of the choices that I make and the ways that I've chosen for them to interact with one another. So I really feel like I've scratched the surface of this game and it's already so captivating and interesting and just not like anything I've played. It really feels like the first time I've played a computer role-playing. game that feels like a hybrid between that and a D&D game. And I'll say that it's the closest thing that I felt to this.

There are two games that I'm going to invoke here, and I don't do it lightly. One is Divinity Original Sin 2, and the other is Disco Elysium. They're both very different games from this. This game uses procedural generation. It's like not as flashy visually as either of those games. It's really got its own thing. But it feels as striking to me narratively what they're doing, like the feeling of this, this narrative engine that these developers have come up with is as exciting, at least in these early hours.

And then based on Cameron's review, it kind of holds up. So I'm really excited to play more. I hope the two of you will play it. Maybe we'll talk about it in the future of the show. We'll see. But that's Wildermith. It's a really cool game so far. I'm digging it. And we'll probably talk about it more in the future. Yeah. I'm interested to see how procedurally generated narrative could be as good and evocative as you just described. I'm very curious to see how that It is interesting. And playing it, it's clear. It's that there's so much of it is handwritten stuff. You know, it's like there's a lot of really great, great writing happening. It's not like Madlibs. It's just the procedural part is more in just how the pieces fit together.

And it gives you this feeling of a unique thing. But the specific stories and the vignettes and the asides and the character dialogue, those are all written and presented in this very charming and very authored way. So it's a cool, it's a cool hybrid. But yeah, you'll have to play it and and let me know what you think. Cool. Cool. I will. All right. Well, if you're a beginner to triple-click, we hope that you've decided to stick with us. And if you're a beginner to video games, we hope that you dug this episode and that you're going to go try out some of the games that we recommend them. Be a gamer. Do it. Become a gamer. Join us. Become one of us. Don't do it. Don't ever call yourself a gamer. You don't have to call yourself a gamer. I'm so

sorry I said that. Please please don't leave. That is not required. Until then, I will see you gamers next week. See ya, gamers. Bye. Triple Click is produced by Jason Schreier, Maddie Myers, and me, Kirk Hamilton. I edit and mix the show and also wrote our theme music. Our show art is by

Tom DJ. Some of the games and products we talked about on this episode may have been sent to us for free for review consideration. You can find a link to our ethics policy in the show notes. Triple Click is a proud member of the Maximum Fun Podcast Network, and if you like our show, we hope you'll consider supporting us by becoming a member at maximumfun.org

slash join. Find us on Twitter at triple click pod. Send email the triple click at maximum fun.org and find a link to our discord in the show notes. Thanks for listening. See you next time. Maximum fun.org. Comedy and culture. Artist owned, audience supported.