Triple Click - The Best (And Worst) of Video Game April Fool's

Episode Date: April 1, 2021

Here's the only true thing you will read on the internet today: This episode is not a prank. Instead of trying to fool everyone, Maddy, Jason, and Kirk are going back in time to look at the history of video game April Fool's jokes: the good, the bad, and the very, very ugly. From fake Zelda movies to Assassin's Creed Kinect, there's a lot to laugh at this week.Correction 4/1/2021: We initially thought the Assassin's Creed Kinect joke video was made by Ubisoft, but it actually wasn't. That part of the conversation has been updated and edited for accuracy. Sorry about that!One More Thing:Kirk: Monster Hunter Rise, baybeeeeeMaddy: Incomparable by Brie and Nikki BellaJason: The Grace of Kings by Ken LiuLinks:Gamespot’s 2006 Wii ‘Joke’: https://www.gamespot.com/articles/april-fools-analyst-revolution-will-take-lead-in-2010/1100-6146958/The IGN Zelda Movie Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBCzkz3gHb8Assassin’s Creed for Kinect: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7NufHsmITjMThe Virgin America 2013 pre-flight safety song (sorry): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQQaNuqY-kU&ab_channel=top10commercialsSupport 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

Comedy is tragedy plus time, plus an expensive focus group, and also an overworked social media manager. Welcome to Triple Click, where we bring the games to you. This week we talk about pranks, goofs, and whether brands can be funny, because it's April 1st, so everyone's a comedian. Not us, though. We've never told a joke before, and we won't start now. I'm Maddie Myers. I'm Jason Shire. And I'm Kirk Hamilton, and hello. Hello.

Hello. Hello to both of you. Happy April. April 1st to everyone. It's just April 1st. That's just another regular day, April 1st. Nothing strange is happening. And speaking of not strange things that you could do on this day, just a super normal thing you could do is become a Max Fun member and get access to our bonus episodes. And you could do that by going to Maximumfund.org slash join. And you could find a whole backlog of us talking about spoilers for video games like Call of Duty. And what else have we?

talked about control. Help me out here. Final Fantasy 7. Plus, we talk about our personal lives. Yes, we do. We just talk about our video game canons and movie canons and TV cannons. Sometimes we talk about movies. We did a good one on time loop movies. There's a lot back there.

There's enough that I've forgotten some of them. There is so much good bonus triple click content up in there, I will say. But you got to be a max fun member. And it's only possible because of our supporters. It's true. It's true. But we're not going to talk about that today. We're going to talk about April Fool's.

Yes, we are. How we feel about it. Yeah. So I was just thinking you starting the episode by being like, nothing's happening today. Maybe think of last year's April Fool's, how during, it was just when the pandemic was starting and everyone just kind of collectively agreed like, oh, yeah, we're not going to do anything.

Well, almost everyone. Yeah. A lot of people. The pandemic is still happening. And I kind of still feel that way. Yeah. Yeah, that was a dicey year. And I did do an April Fool's joke last year.

And it was the result of some deliberation, but I'll talk about that maybe a little bit later. So I wanted to do a historical deep dive into April Fool's in the video game industry and on the internet in general. But before I get into all that history, I wanted to ask each of you, what do you think about April Fool's as a holiday? I guess I can go to you first, Kirk, because you did do an April Fool's joke last year. I did. Yeah, I had an episode of Strong Songs coming out on April 1st, and I was like, I'm going to do a joke because I wanted to, and I had planted it a long time before there was a pandemic. And then even when the pandemic came along, it still was like, I think it's a pretty good joke and wound up doing it. And I think it was pretty funny.

I have some thoughts about like what makes a good April Fool's joke, even though there's no set formula because it's really hard to do a good April Fool's going to say even though there's no such thing as a good April Fool's joke. There may not be. And I think that may be the conclusion that we come up with. Though I was pretty happy with how that joke went. Like almost everybody thought it was funny. A couple of people were like, oh man, this bummedia. I wanted a real episode, et cetera. Yeah, right.

And then they got a... So I have a couple of thoughts on that that are specific. But just broadly, what do I think of April Fool's? Man, I think I actually prefer the version of April Fool's that has been co-opted by corporate culture. and it's just become a kind of eye-rolling dumb thing that we're all just a little over that just is a little bit cringy and a little stupid. Two, the version of April Fool is where you actually, like, fully prank the people that you love and, like, really mislead them and tell them you have cancer or whatever. And then, like, I mean, that's extreme, but really like fake people out because as potent as that can be, I don't know, a whole holiday built around deception is a little bit dicey. I would agree.

Jason, what do you think? Well, so first of all, I will say that one of my favorite things in the world, one of my favorite pranks in the world that I've done to a few people was to, this is like 10, 15 years ago, was to post on get a couple of other people and myself post on a friend's Facebook wall. Oh my God, congratulations. Like, we're so happy for you. Like, you finally tied the knot and see what happens. That's fairly funny.

That's a funny thing. The darker version of that is RIP, and you got a few friends that, like, start posting RIP on someone's Facebook. That's a little bit less funny. I feel like both of these are abysmal jokes. But these are not, like, appropriate for April Fools, because if you do them on April Fools, it's all very obvious. It's only too obvious. True. But, um...

You got to do it when you're genuinely going to mess with people and make them feel weird and confused. You have to do it right. There's something to that. The true prank is better if you just do it on a random day. Like having a date designated for it is just sort of weak to begin. Totally. Yeah, that's true. Also, Maddie, I think that the RIP one is horrible.

Yes. But the engagement one, I think that is in good. I feel like it has the potential to go horribly wrong, depending on the person's situation. Depends on the person. Which is like, this is always the thing with pranks is like, what if the person's having a horrible day or the prank is somehow related to something you couldn't have possibly known about? Or their relationship is in serious trouble and you, yeah. You could never know, but I don't know. But no, we did. It was, it was too a specific person, one of my closest friends. He was single. And you knew it would be fine. It worked. Yeah. Yeah. I would only prank people who I knew, no, will not get mad at me for it. But anyway, we're going widely, way off track here. I think that's how this episode is going to go. Yeah, that's fine. April flows in general. So I'm actually with you, Kirk, in that I think it's a really stupid day for pranks. And like, I've seen all of the different sides of this. Like, people have tried to prank us at Kotaku as reporters.

and send us fake news, which is just silly in today's day and age. I've seen actual journalists, like, publish fake news and participate in April Fool's jokes to try to prank people. And it's all so dumb. But I really, really appreciate a meticulous, well-thought-out, big budget, high production value, April Fool's joke. That's clearly a joke, but done in a way that it just makes me say, wow, this is cool. And a few of the big corporations have done really good attempts at that over the years.

And we'll talk about someone you go through your history, Maddie, that you put together, Google, Blizzard. But the one that I want to highlight that you reminded me of today, Maddie, when you were putting together your list, was IGN's 2008 Zelda movie trailer, which is still incredible. I just rewatch it today. It is astounding. We'll put it in the show notes. It is like this amazing short film almost. It's a trailer for a movie based on Ocourine of Time. Isn't that amazing? In 2008, it was. I don't think that by 2021 standards, it's that great.

It just looks like a regular fan film. Some pretty good CGI in there, especially by 2008 standards. I have not seen anything like this to date. So yes, I think it's amazing. Despite your skepticism. Well, I guess I don't mean to be a hater. But I rewatched it and it just, it has a lot of the hallmarks of the video game fan film. Like, it shows the entire plot of the movie.

Just like a real Zelda trailer. But I don't think the goal, I think they made it pretty clear. Especially at the end, they put like, see you April 1st, 2008 or whatever. You say that, but it was not clear. Like, if you go back and read these comments from people, people absolutely thought that was real. And there are comments from people to this day on that video talking about how they are, angry still, that this was not a real movie and that the creators of this fan film didn't go on to cut the footage together into a real movie. And there are people still demanding that IGN and

Rainfall Films, which is the production company behind it, put together a film based on this, which is like, you what, why? Is that like YouTube comment anger or is that like real anger? I mean, yes, of course. But I think there is some veracity to it because I do think that 2008 was a different time for the internet. So when I was putting together this timeline, I was trying to find the first ever examples. I think the true first ever example of high profile April Fool's Jokes probably goes to Google. I'm sure there are earlier ones than that, but I'm talking about your big deal, Splashy April Fool's jokes by actual companies. Google's been doing them multiple ones pretty much every year since 2000. And the first examples I could find

in video games were 2004. In RuneScape and Gaia Online, they both had basically prank gifts that you could buy in the worlds of the game. This was early days for the internet where you could have a really small joke and just the idea of there being a gag gift in a video game was really funny and cool and would get shared a lot. It's not quite like how things would become in the mid-2000s where Blizzard would start getting in on it in 2006. But also in 2006, I wanted to highlight what is probably my favorite example of this entire list, which is a GameSpot article that was a joke prediction article saying that the Nintendo We would win the console wars and it includes quotes from fake analysts who make fun of each other for siding

with certain consoles and it describes the motion controls which were kind of known about at the time but when this article was written it was back when it was just called the Nintendo Revolution which was the the Wees code name at the time and so the joke was like of course the Nintendo console is going to be super low powered compared to the Xbox and PlayStation consoles like no one's going to care. It's not going to be anything. And it like describes the the TV remote shaped controller, like almost derisively. And it's, it just feels like a real article if you read it now. Like I was reading it. I was like, what's the joke here? Like, how could this have possibly been seen as a joke at the time? But if you scroll all the way back on the comments, like the very first comments on the

article, which are still there are all people mocking the article and being like, this will never happened, but then the most recent comments, which people can still leave to this day, or people being like, this entire article came true. And that trajectory of like the full almost 400 comments is, it's incredible. Yeah, that's amazing. I mean, this is a different time for video journalism. It was. I think like an April Fool's joke prediction is an extremely dangerous game to play for exactly that reason. It's that you, no matter what outlandish thing, you're like, it would be so funny that this impossible thing, if this impossible, possible thing happened. It'll never happen. But then you're, you're really tempting fate. And I think,

I don't know, I mean, I don't believe in fate, but at the same time, the kind of thing does happen. Well, sometimes they go over so well that, uh, that like game companies actually convert them into real thing. Oh, well, that's another thing, which is probably a good example to do next. So Blizzard also started doing April Foolstay Gags in 2006. And Jason, you seem a little more familiar with some of these than I am if you want to list any favorites. But the first one in 2006 was a joke character. The two-headed ogre that you needed to play with another person and it would randomly select a stranger who had to play the character with you, which is like absurd and ridiculous.

And like, why would you play a World of Warcraft character that had such a high barrier to entry? But they've been doing them pretty much every year. And I think some of them have actually become real. Bing, Kirk from the future here, just chime in to say that we had this kind of a back and forth that was a little bit confusing about the fact that Blizzard did in fact make a two-player, two-headed ogre that was a playable character in Heroes of the Storm. So that is an example of something that Blizzard did where they took an April Fool's joke and then they made it real. The whole conversation was a little bit unclear about that though, and it was just kind of confusing. And I couldn't edit it into a way that it made sense.

So instead, I'm just going to take the brute force approach and bing my way in here and tell you all that we did mention. and that you should know that because that's really funny and cool if they did that. Okay, so Jason's going to pick it up and talk about another example of Blizzard doing the same thing. Back to the show. Bing! So in 2002, Blizzard puts up this joke that is, it was at Warcraft 3 was about to come out and they were four races and they were like, hey, everybody, the fifth race to Warcraft

3 is the panda ring and it's a race of like Ninja Panda, Samurai Panda. and it was ridiculous at the time. And then they left a pandarin Easter egg inside of Warcraft 3. And then they turned Pandarin into an actual race within the Worldcraft universe. I remember people talking about that when that happened. There was an entire expansion called Mist of Pandaria and World of Warcraft that introduced everybody to the Pandarin lore. And now Pandarin are a real thing. So, yes, Blizzard has a long history of adding their April Fool's jokes into actual games.

So then in 2008, there's the Legend of Zelda movie that we already talked about so we can skip. over that. And then 2012, I feel like 2012 was when things were really kicking into high gear when it came to multiple brands getting in on April Fool's, but also fans getting in on April Fools and trying to prank people as well with a high profile video game concept. So the first example I have here is, as far as we know made by a fan and not made by Gabe Newell, but who could, who can truly say what happened here. So on April 1st in 2012, there was a fake Steam store a listing for Half Life 3, notoriously non-existent video game Half-Life 3. A lot of people thought they could actually pre-order the game, but it was actually redirecting

to a version of SteamPower.com that had two Ps at the beginning of Powerd. And it took people like a weirdly long time to figure out that this was fake and not like Valve playing a prank on them. This is like right when I started at Kitaku. I remember this. That's right. How did it go in the newsroom that day? I do not remember.

It was a long ago. But I do remember when it happened, and I remember seeing the URL and being like, wait, what, people are falling for this? Yeah. I do remember that, like, we didn't fall for it or anything like that. Yeah, I mean, my memory of being at Kotaku when I, just even when I first started, which was, I guess, a year before that was that every year before April 1st, there was a sort of site-wide memo saying everybody.

Yeah, I think we had like a Slack notification a week ahead of time or something that was like, don't trust any news that comes up. this week. If something seems too good to be true or just weird or doesn't pass the smell test, not that we're not skeptics all the time, but the last week before April 1st is a seriously weird time. Bing! Hi everybody, Kirk here from the future, the real future, the post-publication future. We made a mistake in this episode, and we all thought that the Assassin's Creed Connect video that we're about to talk about was put out by Ubisoft. It's a really, really funny video, but as it turns out, it was not put out by Ubisoft. So I've

trimmed a bit of this conversation when we were theorizing about Ubisoft's motives and making fun of the Connect because Ubisoft was not making fun of the connect so that doesn't really apply anymore. And it's also kind of, this sort of underlines one of the points that we were trying to make, which is that the brands themselves aren't funny. And this is one of the funniest April Fool's videos I've at least ever seen and it wasn't actually made by Ubisoft. So credit to the people who made it. It's really, really funny. Props to all of you. Anna, apologies for the error. The edited conversation carries on from here. Bing! But there were also some pretty cool like high profile, high budget April Fool's pranks that happened in 2012.

One of my favorite ones was Assassin's Creed for Connect. It's supposedly making a version of Assassin's Creed that you could play with motion controls. And I'm just sad this isn't real because I feel like 2012 Kirk Hamilton would have really enjoyed this video game. I don't know if I would have enjoyed it, but I would have definitely played it and written about it for Kotaku. This video is hilarious. We'll link this one in Show Notes too. I'm not sure if I watched this when it aired, but I watched it just today. and I was laughing out loud watching it

because I think that this is a very this is an example of a very good April Fool's joke for a few reasons. Do you want to describe the video a little bit? So in the video it starts and it's like Etsio talking and then it shows people like in one of those connect ads where it's like the camera view of the living room and it's this like Benetton ad perfectly diverse group of young people

like and one person's standing there. Yes, at like they're all you know like sort of blocked perfectly so you can see them each and they're all watching this one. musical theater set, yeah. It has that sort of anodized look, that Ubisoft look, and then one person is getting ready to play. And it starts, and it's like, they're doing dramatic Assassin's Creed motions. So, like, the woman is, like, going hand over hand, and then on the screen, Etsio is going

hand over hand. And then she's, like, one guy is, like, fighting. And it's like, Etsio's, like, fist fighting. And it matches up with his fighting. And it's like, you're like, okay, these are things you could do with the connect. And then it cuts to this woman, and she's just on the ground, huddled in a little ball. And then it cuts to the screen, and it's just like the, the, like, the, like, like, the, like, stack of hay and like SEO is just hiding in the hay.

There's a guy doing the leap of faith and like everyone around. Well it keeps escalating. And so then she's like jumping around and she jumps to the right and just like falls into her table and destroys it. Well, the best one is the loading screen. They show the loading screen and the woman is just running around during the loading screen. Oh, that's another really good one. Yes is like the loading sequence of Assassin's Creed where you can just run and she's running in

circles, which was a long love of mine is the Assassin's Creed loading screen. And then it shows the final. shot is this guy slow-mo doing a leap of faith. And like, it's just like, it shows the leap of faith in the game in that dramatic way that the trailers show it. And then it shows this guy in front of all his friends, like, fully jumping in a way where you know he's going to land hard and badly. And then he, of course, he lands off screen, but all of his friends are like, oh. Oh, my God. And it's the end of the ad. And it's just, that is a really funny ad. I think the final shot of the ad is actually a joke about the Wii moat, though, where they say it's

coming to the Wii controls as well. That might not be in the version of the video I showed you, but it was basically just like a generalized joke about the idea of using motion controls for a video game, which I think became like a fairly common joke for April Fool's day for these companies because it's like the idea of video games getting more and more immersive, whatever that even means. And the supposed appeal of that is just considered funny, I guess. I don't know.

So just something else that happened in 2012. So Google Maps, Google had already been doing a bunch of April Fool's pranks for years by this point. I think this is the first year that you could argue they made a game-like thing. And they did makeover for Google Maps where they worked with Square Unix and basically made an 8-bit for NES version of Google Maps, except it's like not real and you can't actually get it. And then in subsequent years, they did some other updates to Google Maps where they did a Pokemon version in 2014 and Miss Pack Maps in 2017. And I mostly just found this funny because it made me think about how of all the Google products, Google Maps, is perhaps the most game-like, in terms of things that you can add a video game skin to and be like, oh, yeah, there are weight points. Getting around the world is kind of game-like. I don't really feel like you can.

I mean, Google Earth and VR is maybe the best VR game. Yeah, yeah, it's a good one. So I don't know. I feel like Google might have been able to come up with some other better versions of. of a game that they could do, but Google Maps being a video game seems fun and lighthearted, as opposed to a prank. Well, the Pokemon one is funny because this was two years before Pokemon Go would come on and show the world that like, wait a minute, actually, Pokemon and sort of Google Maps,

but like in the real world essentially is, is pretty, pretty sensational. Yeah, but I would say, though, that these aren't fully pranks. It's almost like, like, I think it's fun, but I don't know that I would describe it as a prank or like trying to trick you into believing something. Like, I don't think there was anybody who was deeply angry that Pokemon was involved in Google Maps on that day. No, it's just a cool thing. Yeah.

So... I think that, like, the best way that a joke like this can work is that it starts straight and then it becomes ridiculous. The thing about the Assassin's Creed joke is that it starts out and they reveal to you that they're making Assassin's Creed for Connect. And you could kind of believe that it was real at first. Like the first, maybe 45 seconds of that video it looks real. If it weren't on April 1st, you'd be like, oh, okay, yeah, I guess Ubisoft is doing this.

And then it just gradually reveals itself to be a joke. I think that's a really great way to do a joke. There are ways you can structure these things that work well, and there are ways that you can do it. It's just like a ridiculous announcement right off the bat. And they all kind of start to feel the same. Like I was reading through a lot of these kataku posts where there's just so many of them that they start to feel the same because it's the same joke over and over again. where there needs to be some element of prankiness to it, some element of misdirection for the joke to work. You just need to quickly reveal to people that it's a joke and then do something creative with it

the way that the Assassin's Creed trailer, like then they're showing all these increasingly ridiculous uses for the game. Yeah, I'm going to skip ahead slightly to the PlayStation Flow ad from 2015 because I don't know if you watch this Kirk, but I think it's very similar to the Assassin's Creed Connect ad in the sense that it creates this mock version of like a PlayStation peripheral which PlayStation has plenty of peripherals, so that's sort of inherently mockable in and of itself

that there would be yet another one. And it's like you strap it on and you go swimming with it so that you can go swimming in a video game. And like it's VR goggles plus on-body peripherals, like motion sensors. So you're like swimming around a pool and like Joel's swimming around in The Last of Us

or whatever it may be. And that's completely absurd, but it's also not at the same time. Like, you can sort of imagine a version of that product that actually exists, but why on earth would it exist? And it combines the same type of humor that you're talking about with like starting with something that feels almost realistic where like you see the peripherals. They're doing the same style of introduction that they would do for a real video game peripheral. And you're like, okay, it seems kind of weird. But then they just get more and more hyperbolicly stupid over the course of the video.

But it's also corny because it's brands. I mean, this is, I feel like, where I slightly disagree with you, Kirk. Like, I have fun watching these, but I'm also always like, this is a little bit dumb at the same time. Yeah, don't get me wrong. No, no, no, no, no. I'm not saying that, like, brand April Fool's is cool and I like it. Not at all. Like, I totally find this whole thing, like cynical and exhausting.

Like, there are occasionally ones that I think are really funny. Like, the Assassin's Creed one is very funny. When I think that it's important, like, there's also an important distinction between just doing a joke on your friends and, you know, a big brand trying to do a joke where they really just want you to like them. Like joking the podcast feed of your independent podcast is one thing. Oh yeah. And like that is an example of something fine. I'm thinking about a joke.

There was a joke from a couple years ago where Anthem the game, the subreddit, they changed their header to just be the Division II. And they like changed their whole Reddit so that it just like it was the Division 2 Reddit. And that's really funny because you go to the Anthem subreddit and you're just like, wait a minute, you think you went to the wrong one just for a second. And then you have to just be like, wait, what? And then you get it.

And you're like, oh, right, because like Anthem is not very good and everyone's playing the Division 2 right now. And that was kind of the joke is they're being like, fuck this game. And it was the people who ran the subreddit who did it just as a joke. And that's funny because it's first off, it's like making fun of a game company. It's being done by people who play the games. And it's a good joke. Like, that's a really funny, clever misdirection that confuses you and makes you laugh.

It isn't just a big brand being like, and no. Like, whatever, we're launching a new game on the moon. Ha, ha, ha. And, like, yeah, like, but I don't think that that's cool. It's just that I, I think the thing I said at the very beginning about finding this preferable to the version of April Fool's where people are, like, legitimately, like, faking one another out and doing, like, hardcore pranks to another. That's kind of intense as well. Like, I guess what I really like are the middle ground things where it's just independent people making funny jokes on their own and usually making fun of video game companies and not trying to sell anything. Okay, but Counterpoint, I think some of the video game companies have done some good ones that aren't trying to sell anything.

For example, I think it was last year or two years ago, one of Blizzards was just that they added googly eyes to all the Overwatch characters. And just like you're playing Overwatch and everybody has Googly eyes. Like sometimes just like stupid tiny things can just like bring a little bit of joy to your life that day. There's an interesting distinction I think we're centering on, and that's that the jokes that are done in the game are definitely fun here. Like when it's a joke for your players, for the people who are using your product, that's fun. Like, that's actually a lot more fun than when it's just like we have an announcement on Twitter,

which feels a little just more generally like marketing, because it is marketing. It's like fake marketing, but that still kind of feels like real marketing. And you're like, okay, well, this is all marketing. Where that is a good point that if you're doing Googly eyes in the game that people are playing, that's just like a fun thing you're doing to delight your players. Like, that's great. Yeah.

I think it's also true, though, that by doing an April Fool's joke, no matter what company you are, you're inherently signaling, we're a fun company, we're a cool company. Like, we devoted some resources to this. So you are helping your company's brand by doing something like this. As long as the joke goes well, like that, you're also playing with fire at the same time because you can risk looking cringe to use the parlance of the times. You can risk looking like the stupidest company ever if you screw. it up and that

well that's why they all have focus groups and months of market research before so what do you guys think is worse april fools jokes from brands or brands trying to be cool on twitter they're both both are the same thing there's so much overlap yeah this vend diagrams well but but mattie uh brand's trying to be cool on twitter is 365 days a year that's a great point yeah that's true i keep seeing the twitter account for stakeums the brand stakeums and i blocked it on twitter because i don't want to see it anymore, but it's like very much like this edgy millennial brand trying to be super cool on Twitter and it just makes me sick every time I see it. And there have been all these articles

about how cool they are. Look, Stacom's has revolutionized tweets. Like same with like Arby's or whatever, like all these game brands. Are these fast food or whatever brands? Yeah. Well, Arby's is like all games on their Twitter feed. But yeah. Right. Yeah. That's its own whole thing where those are usually being run by like one young person on the social media team who happens to have a brilliance for social media who probably isn't getting paid enough for how much how much work they're generating and they're kind of just doing it all on their own which has a new that has a different layer of like exploitiveness to it compared to you know a bunch of people at ubsoft workshopping a big elaborate joke that they're all going to put on that's true that's a good

point that at least is like a large effort that happens once where the whole like let's just hire a young person and just let them loose on our Twitter feed and see if maybe they can become a viral sensation. It's just kind of a separate thing. Yeah. It can be hard to tell the difference, though, because I think some examples like Google partnering with all these game companies, like those are examples of partnerships between these really big brands, and we can sort of envision that as a huge undertaking by a whole bunch of people who decided to do this partnership and launched this fun gimmicky thing. But the Arby's social media account is also that same way, I believe.

Like, they're partnering with game companies to make, like, a monster hunter sculpture out of a burger wrapper and the other, you know, gimmicky things that they do on that account. So it's like this young person probably writing the social media tweets about it, but they're being told by their boss most likely, hey, we've got a monster hunter bit this week. So come up with some jokes about monster hunter because Capcom's paying us or whatever it is. And I don't know. That means that the work is actually invisible. Like you don't really know how many people.

people worked on something like this, but the point of it is that the end product looks really shiny and fun and approachable. And that's, I don't know, I'm a cynical person, so it's hard for me not to view it through that. I think there's something to this that, like, commerce is the death of comedy in a lot of ways. Like, when Jerry Seinfeld gets up on stage and just tells jokes about stuff, it's just Jerry Seinfeld telling jokes. I mean, I guess maybe you think he's funny, maybe you don't, but like, pick your comedian when Hannibal Burris gets. I'll pick someone who's more generally that everyone agrees is funny and tell us jokes.

You think it's funny? I think they're both funny. I do too. But Hannibal Burris gets on stage. Tell us jokes, he's a funny guy. But if Hannibal Burris gets on stage at like the Delta Airlines official comedy tour and then he's being paid by Delta and all of his jokes are like about airline food. Right. Well, so wait a minute. What's the deal?

Exactly. Airline. Classic Hannibal Burris jokes set up. What's the deal with? I think I would watch this, actually. What you just described sounds dystopic and maddening, but I actually would check it out. Or it's an in-flight Delta video.

Yeah. So, like, talk about Delta. I'm making sure. I feel like that might be an inflate. I mean, not Handwell-Barris, but somebody like that. Oh, yeah. In-flight videos have gotten will be able to. Yeah.

Does Delta have the one with the, like, really annoyingly catchy song? I can't remember how it goes now. I think Virgin is the one that does it. They have like memes and stuff. in-flight videos. They have memes in their thing. There's a song. It's like a whole music video where like a little baby comes out at one point and starts rap. It's the video about putting your seatbelt out and stuff like that. Yeah. And it's like an actually very catchy song. It's like, fuck how does it go? It's like, you can put in a clip here. It's got a gospel thing. Yeah,

I'm going to find a clip and I'm going to bing my way and we're going to, no, because it'll get stuck at everyone's head. Bing! I found it. It is indeed the Virgin America takeoff safety song. It's really stupidly catchy and I just don't think that I'm ready to subject you all to it. to complete the point I was making, you can imagine either of those, like that, those two comedy scenarios. And one is just a person trying to make you laugh.

And the other is a person trying to make you laugh and their reasons are just a little bit suspect to you. And that ruins the humor because there's just like a natural connection that happens with humor when it's just an honest thing between people. And it's the same on Twitter when someone's on Twitter just being funny because they're funny, like,

like, whoever runs that Twitter account, like they just like funny jokes. funny. Drill? Pretty good account. I don't know if you guys have heard of it. So then if pixelated boat tweeted like, you know, oh, the new far cry, hashtag far cry, hashtag ad, like looks whatever and made a joke, you'd be like, no, that's not funny. Right. So, you know, it's an important difference there. Yeah, I mean, what you're describing sounds like journalism too, where there's like a level of trust and baseline expectations and then, like,

it's very easy to ruin that with, within, or something like that. Yeah. Journalism and jokes, sort of similar to this. It is very similar. There's a level of integrity. Because journalism is. is a joke, am I right, folks? Well, it is when journalism sites do April Fool's jokes and fake needs. Yeah, yeah. If we've learned anything from this 2006

GameSpot story, it's that it's a cautionary tale and journalists should not be trying to tell jokes. Ever. The funny thing about that is like that was a time when like everybody was very into console wars, even gaming editors and they would all

wear their allegiances on their sleeves and they were like fans that, like, IGN was separated into like IGN Nintendo, IGN PlayStation, IGN Xbox. And it was very strange. It was like that, that if anything helped cultivate this toxic like console war mentality where all these people were just like, yeah, the Nintendo is doomed. Nintendo is failing again. Look at them going.

There was also very much like an element of gatekeeping to the whole Wii era because people were pissed that the Wii was trying to reach like non-hardcore gamers. And I think you saw a lot of that bleeding into like this article. and stuff like that. Oh, yeah. There was a lot of sexism, a lot of sexist jokes about the we at the time as well. But I mean, it's also true that like the legend of Zelda trailer we just talked about IGN put that up. And it's like kind of hard to imagine them doing something like that now. Yeah, I was going to say before. I think despite what, yes, definitely hard to imagine them doing it now. But I think at the time, I might be misremembering this, but I remember it being pretty clear. I remember when this, when that aired for the first time, because I was into gaming news at that point. I was in college. And I remember like, feeling like, oh, man, this is super cool. And, oh, this is, like, clearly like their April Fool's thing. It's not like them trying to prank people. I could be wrong. I could be misremembering this, but I remember really enjoying it as opposed to being pissed off. Yeah, although I think that's more just a sign of your natural skepticism, though, perhaps. I mean, I think different people approach

these types of things with a different lens. When you're a reporter, you're just skeptical of everything you see. Yeah, nothing is, nothing is real. There's never going to be a Zelda movie or show. That's never going to happen. It's cursed. It's really the creative April 1st is nothing is true and everything is true. It's so, God. It's so true. The thing about April 1st in today's day and age is that it's like, it's become even sillier and stupider because so much of the internet every day is trying to navigate what's true and what's fake and there's such a proliferation. As opposed to even five years ago, it was so much less like that. But these days, like five years ago, you'd go on the internet and there would be fake stuff, but it would usually be quarantined to like certain areas of the

internet where you can believe it, like 4chan, like everything on 4chan, you know is going to be fake. Or like Zionn or whatever. Yeah, yeah, fake, clearly fake places or you could, but 4chan in the sense that people were doing it in bad faith as opposed to trying to be satirical. But these days, you go on Twitter and like a guy is claiming that shrimp is in his cinnamon toast crunch and it's like, this is probably fake. and a lot of people will fool for it. Yeah, but like you never really know.

And yeah, you don't really know because this guy knows that he can go viral and get a ton of attention. And like there's a lot of like reward that you can get from crafting this fake story. And so it's like April Fool's is every fucking day on the internet. And we're all just trying to navigate and try to figure out what's real and what is it. Like everybody's telling these embellished stories and getting real legitimate attention rewards for it in the attention economy. me. And yeah, it's, it makes April Foolers just feel like a big wet fart. Wow, you've really brought me down here, Jason. Yeah. We're getting so existential on this episode. How am I supposed to transition to talking about dating sims, Jason? How am I supposed to

get to the final point on my list here? Well, no, that's a good idea to cheer us up. No, I, I'm not a pessimist in general, but I am a skeptic and I think it's like in a world of today, like today, I think you have to be very skeptical. No, I'm with you. I'm like you. Oh, no, I, of course, I hear you. And I agree. I do, even in making this outline, I did kind of feel like commerce and these big brands are actually making April Fool's less fun. I never thought April Fool's with that fun. I'm not a very good sport about pranks, but I'm willing to admit that certain kinds of pranks are pretty good. I think Rick Rowling is funny. For example, it's a harmless prank in my eyes. I also think that Rick Astley song is actually pretty fun to listen to. So I've always seen that prank is pretty harmless and fun. I might do a real episode about it one. Yeah, I was hoping Kirk would do a real strong to see. songs about it. Yeah. So like there, that's, that's a form of prank that I think is fine. But, but, but I do think it gets kind of weird when companies are using April Fool's to advertise themselves or their brand. Like, I can quickly mention Far Cry 3 Blood Dragons started out as an April Fool's seemingly trailer, but then turned out to be a real game that had its own release schedule

that was leaked in mid-April. People realized it was a real game. And I mean, that's a fun release strategy for a game, but it's also like, well, you also could have just released this as a game. Like, it's, it, they just took advantage of April Fool's in order to, to market this game. And that's fine. I do think that's a pretty fun subversion on the typical. It's not a prank, though, really. You can kind of, you can do it once. Yeah.

Like, you can do it once. And they did it once and it worked. Well, with a game like Far Cry through Blood Dragon, I think it's, exactly. Well, the game itself is as you're playing it, you're like, I can't believe this is real. Right. The whole time you were playing it, especially at that time. Do you want to explain what it? it is, Kirk, since you probably played it at the time.

I did. I did. Yeah, it's, I mean, this was when, so Far Cry 3 had come out and it sort of revitalized the series. Far Cry 2 is the divisive, beloved by some people with great taste, but, you know, not beloved by everyone game. Far Cry 3 had made the series really big, but it was before it was like, there were a lot of Far Cry games and there weren't these weird spinoffs. And then they announced this game Blood Dragon that just looks like this total, like, 80s, synth wave, like neon, purple and pink, like cyber, everything, ridiculous-looking, like, game

that's just set in, like, Tron meets, I don't know, Commando or some Schwarzenegger movie. It's 2007, but it's the future that was the premise of... Right, like the cutscenes are all in this really old-looking things. Yeah, all the writing is really tongue-in-cheek. This was before, it should be noted, Far Cry went into, like, aliens and weird shit. Like, this is when Far Cry was... Right, that's what I'm saying. Like, it was still a very a grounded series. I mean, Far Cry 3 has a lot of drug trip sequences and some weird stuff, but it's still a pretty grounded

series. And this game is ludicrous, and it is a very, very funny game. Like, it has its, you know, it has its issues, and I don't think I've finished it, but there are a lot of jokes, and it's a joke game. Like, it's one of those games that is constantly telling jokes and, like, playing jokes on you. It's got that kind of

Saints Row energy in some ways. Like, the whole tutorial, you have a robot in your head and your guy who's played by what's his name, Michael Bean from, like, Terminator, who is just so pissed off that this robot is making him do a tutorial, and you have to, like, jump, and he's like, oh, my God, I know how to jump, and it, like, keeps making you jump, and it glitches out, and he has to, like, do sections of the tutorial over and over again.

So there's, like, a whole... It's funny. It is funny. I remember, like, being, like, this is cute, and it doesn't feel like it should exist. And the fact that they announced it on April 1st, like, it totally seems like an April 1st, like an April Fool's joke, like a really elaborate one, but it definitely seemed like a joke. So the fact that it actually became a real game.

I'm with you, Jason. I think that it is funny, but you also, you only get to do that one time. Sure, yeah. It's not a bad time for them to have done it. Like, it worked. Yeah, totally. So I'll just make one final point at the end here, which is about dating sims. And so in 2015, I'm sure there are other examples.

I just picked a couple notable ones. Harmonix did a joke dating sim April first thing called Romance Central, which is kind of like a dating app meets Dance Central and their other music games. And then people kept kind of making them. joke over the years. And then I believe the most recent one is from 2020. It's the smite dating sim, dream deity, which is like a play on dream daddy, a real dating sim. And I remember the reaction to that one being pretty different, because I feel like in the past few years, the perception of dating sims has changed a lot. And people have stopped seeing them as a joke inherently. Like the idea that

somebody would play or be interested in a dating sim is like, oh, it would be so funny if our our hardcore game about men was also a dating sim and people found these men attractive. Like, wouldn't that be so funny? And it's not actually that funny to imagine something like that. And I remember the reactions to the smite dating sim being pretty different and a lot of people being like, oh, this dick doesn't really work anymore. And we kind of need to punch in different directions now that the games industry has changed over the past 20 years.

Yeah. Well, that's a good thing. It's good that the reactions have changed. Although I will say, I think that, like, it could work if it's a game that takes itself super seriously in the first place. Yes. Because then it's not, the joke isn't like, oh, dating sims are so silly. The date is, the joke is, this game is so silly that as a dating sim, it would clearly be preposterous. Right.

Big Years of War, dating sim would be funny on its face. It's all in how you tell the joke. Except that would also rule, though. I mean, like, I feel like the other issue is like, if your joke game should exist, Blood Dragon style, then maybe it's not a great. April Fool's joke because it should exist. But that's the problem with a lot of the jokes we mentioned. That's the problem with like a lot of Blizzard stuff is that it got too cool. And like it was too many things over the years that Blizzard has done.

And been like this is same with Google. Same with that like Miss Pac-Man on Google. That should exist. Yeah. Ms. Pac-Man on Google. Yeah. The joke works better when it's like the way that everyone would announce a battle royale. Like that's a funny joke.

I mean, it's a kind of a basic joke. But it's funny because it's like making fun of the trend of everybody releasing a battle real. where like that's it's not battle royals are the thing that are funny it's just like there are so many of them where the dating sim it's just so easy to lapse into like it's just funny because the whole idea of a dating sim is funny for reasons and like yeah yeah yeah yeah you've kind of gone into bad territory yeah well anyway it's important to remember that brands can never be funny and i think we can just leave it there for the day or your friends brands are not your friends people are funny

funny, individual people are creative and funny. Brands suck the joy out of everything. And that's that. And here I thought you wanted to end on a positive note. I can't. I can't do it. Let's take a break. And we'll be back with one more thing. Hey, it's John Moe. And look, these are challenging times for our mental and emotional health. I get it. That's why I'm so excited for my new podcast, Depresh Mode. We're tackling depression, anxiety, trauma, stress, the kinds of things that are just super common but don't get talked about nearly enough. Conversations that are illuminating, honest,

and sometimes pretty funny, with folks like Patton Oswald, Kelsey Dara, and Open Mike Eagle. I have this public-facing self, and then I have my emotional self that tends to stay hidden. It was about finding a way to communicate to somebody that, like, there's terrible shit going on back here. Plus psychiatrists, psychologists, and all kinds of folks. On Depress Mode, we're working together, learning, helping each other out.

We're a team. Join our team. Depresh Mode for maximum fun, wherever you get your podcasts. Hi, I'm Biz. And I'm Teresa. And we're the hosts of One Bad Mother, a podcast about parenting. Parenting is hard, and we have no advice. But we do see you doing it.

Hulk, if you like to do it. What was? Didn't we have a bumper sticker a while back that was like, Honk if you did it. That's what it was. I think it was honk if you're doing it. Why did we not ever make them? We did make them.

I think they're still in the Max Fun store. Honk, honk, you're doing it. Thanks, Viz. So are you. Each week we'll be here to remind you that you're doing a good job. You can find us on maximum fun.org. Hong Kong. Toot-toot.

And we are back for one more thing. What are you up to? I'm playing a video game. Cool. It's a little game called Monster Hunter Rise. I heard of it. And I really like it, a whole lot. And now I'm going to tell everybody about it.

Jason, you're playing this as well. You've played some. Yeah, I'm going to need to text you constantly asking for how, like, I have no idea how to play this game. But yes, it is, the barrier for entry is very, very high. So, okay, Monster Hunter Rise. So this is a game on Switch. I'm playing a version that I got from,

Capcom PR. I've had it for like about a week. I got like a day before it came out. So I haven't had a ton of time to play. People who reviewed it had it a lot longer. And it's a big commitment of a game. So you need to play a lot to really know what's going on. I'm not a monster hunter like super expert. I had played a little bit of I can't remember which one like three or something on the 3DS, maybe four ultimate. Then you play some worlds. I think you were into monster new world. Yes. So then I played a ton of world. World was the one that I played hundreds of hours of and got really into. I played it on PS4 and then again when it came out on PC a year later and played just like so much of it. I played a lot of Iceborne and liked that as well. Though I didn't finish. I've heard it's good. But I just sort of was like, okay, I don't have time. These games take a lot of time. They're just games where you go into the world and fight huge monsters. That's basically it. I mean, there's a really simple loop. Monster Hunter is what it's called and that's what you do. It does what it says on the tin. They're made by Capcom. It's a long running series. It's very, it's got a lot of cruffed.

It's got a lot of different ways of playing. It's a very complicated game with an extremely high skill ceiling. If you go on the Monster Hunter subreddit and look at videos of people playing, you will see some anime shit. It is amazing how good people are, and especially at rise because of some of the new things that they've added. I'm like mediocre at best. I just run in and kind of hit the monster in the face over and over again and then get out of the way. The combat kind of works like Dark Souls.

It has a bit of that sort of animation locked. You're fighting a big thing. you've got to be really careful. You have a stamina gauge and kind of have to... It's not like a beat-em-up, like Devil May Cry or something. It's much more strategic. But an important difference, there's no target lock. There's not, and the controls are pretty weird

because this was a long time where these games were only on mobile, so there was a while where there was no right thumbstick when you would play them, and then World kind of added full controls. And this game is a lot like World in a lot of ways, including the controls, but I think it could use a control update or overhaul. It could use some more custom options, I think. Yeah, you can't customize all the controls. It's like a weird menu where you can swap some of them.

It's very strange. You attack with what would be on an Xbox controller, the Y and B buttons, the up and the right hand buttons, which is just weird because I'm so used to doing it with X, and there's no way to make it so you can do it with X. And you can't use the shoulder buttons either like in a Souls game. That's a whole separate candleworms. So this game, I guess that kind of highlights a bigger thing about this game,

which is, I think, a pretty... pretty welcoming game, just like World was. It's a lot like World. It looks like World. There are some skins and enemies that just carry straight over from World. It really like has the same rhythm, all the same rules. There are some new elements, but it's, it's pretty similar. It's like a switch version of World. It's going to be on PC, I guess, next year, which is also kind of weird. So it's like going to be only on Switch and then it's going to come to PC a year later, which is, I guess, kind of what happened with World 2. But there's so much like stuff that's really specific and immobile that you have to get through and get your head around with this

series. Like there's so many systems. There's all this management stuff you can do with your buddy and your animals that go out with you and your gear. You know, like leveling up and getting better gear is this whole complicated progression system. Learning the like way that you fight and loading up the right gear to take with you into a fight is like really complicated and takes a lot of time. And it's just not easy to understand at first. You have to read a lot of guides. There's a lot of pop-up menus that are kind of constantly coming at you in the beginning and they don't do a great job of actually getting you into the game. You sort of just need to play like a lot, like 10 hours or something. Yeah, so you need to sell us on it because what you're describing all sounds awful.

I'm getting there. And there's a reason that this all is sort of worth getting through if you want to, like if you want to play the game. And that's that there's a lot of complexity to this game and it's very rigid in all of those ways. But because of that, it has like a very specific and very distinct way that it feels when you're playing it. And once you get your head around it, it gives you so many options. Like you have so much possibility for the way that you can do a fight. It's really dense. I mean, there's like all these different types of weapons. Each weapon is its own thing. Like there's melee weapons. There's ranged weapons. There's like a hunting horn that plays songs when you do different attacks with it that buff people. And it's also a multiplayer

game so you can play in parties with your friends. And like the more I play, the more I realize just how rich this game is. There's so much there. Despite the very simple core loop, if they simplified it, and it was like, just go fight the monsters, the combat's basically like demon souls. It's like, kind of just, you know, complicated-ish, but pretty simple. And then you just get better gear. It would just lose something. Like it, I can imagine that it's very hard for them to know what to shave off and what to simplify, only because they've been going at, they've been going at it for so long, they've got it really balanced and figured out to where, like, this huge, like, number of weapons all work really well. And if you can get,

over that initial hump, you can get really into the game. And the thing is, lots and lots of people have done that. And these games are really, really popular. And as a result, like, they don't really need to, like, welcome new people. Like, they're not trying to welcome new people in, really. Like, I think they're just trying to make games that lots of people want to play. They don't need to. It's sold four million copies Worldwide or something like that. Yeah, like World was, like, ludicrously popular. And I think a lot of people like me did get into it because you can, if you decide to. And I think everyone can see how much fun people are having to be This seems like it's worth getting into, which it totally is.

So I have a million more thoughts. Let me think. Oh, the most important thing about this game is that there are dogs in it now. Yes. Palamutes. And you can ride them. Yes. And you can ride.

So I have Appa, my golden retriever, in this game, and I'm running around with Apah, fighting huge monsters, and then I can ride her around like a horse. And that rules. There's a lot of stuff in this game that's much more mobile. You have these things called wirebugs that you can use. Kind of like it. There was a thing that was sort of. sort of added to Iceborne that felt similar, but it's like you can like bungee your way really

quickly up to an enemy and then, or if you get knocked down, you can like pull yourself out of danger and you can climb walls, you can like run up any wall, you can like go straight up any surface and just all the way to the top, which is just there's a level of verticality and movement in this game that's never been in, well, that hasn't been in a Monster Hunter game that I played that certainly wasn't in a world. And as a result, again, it like raises the skill ceiling a lot. You can get super good with that thing and watching videos of people playing. Like, there's just some amazing stuff that people are doing, like flipping around and flying through the air and like countering monsters, like right in the face as they do this huge attack. And it's like so

dramatic. And it is exciting. It makes me want to like get even better at the game. Even though I am just having fun being like moderately okay and just leveling up and kind of working toward high rank. And I know they're going to be adding stuff throughout the year. So I'm really, really liking it. It's awesome to be able to play it on Switch. Like taking it and just playing it on the couch even is like just really nice for this kind of game because there's a lot of repetition. You kind of just have to into that loop. And it's a really good game. So I'm sure I'll talk about it more for my one more thing just because I'm going to keep playing it. It's very good. But yeah, a definite endorsement from me so far. I'm having a great time. All right. Cool. I'll go next because mine's really

quick. So I was moving to a new apartment this week and I had no time to do really anything other than listen to audiobooks while I packed. Yeah. Congrats to me. A whole new host of background noises for Kirk to edit out in this place. It's coming here to real place. Anyway, I listen. to a bunch of really dumb books and like low stakes podcast because I was stressed out enough because I hate change. And one of the really stupid books I listened to was this book called Incomparable by Bree and Nikki Bella, who are two female wrestlers, the Bella twins. They wrote a book about their lives and they talked about the reality show that Dina and I got really obsessed with during quarantine, which is called Total Divas. And there's also a spinoff called Total Bellas.

These are very trashy shows about WWE drama. I love them and I loved this book. It's also a somewhat serious book. They do talk about some of the parts of their past that were pretty dire. They had an abusive father. They were on the other end of racism and sexism. When they were part of the WWE, they talk about all that stuff and overcoming those trials. But mostly it's just corny, feel-good girl power stuff that I really enjoyed listening to while I was packing.

So, yeah, that's me. Jason, how about you? Girl power. Okay, so I'm reading a book that Kirk is going to immediately purchase as soon as this podcast. I bought your cooking book from last week already. You're going to enjoy it. You will not regret buying that. It's gigantic.

It's so big. It's like, it's great, though, right? It's this huge brick. Yes, it is good. Anyways, go ahead. So last year, two years ago, something like that, our former colleague Joshua Rivera recommended. My current colleague. He works with me now. Again.

I recommended that I check out this book series called The Dandelion Dynasty. And it is an epic fantasy series by Ken Liu. The first book is called The Grace of Kings. And I recently started reading that. And the reason you recommended- Jason, is this going to be a huge fantasy series that I'm going to have to read because it's awesome? The reason that he recommended it to me is because it's a lot like Sweet Coden, the JRP series that I love, which is like this amazing political,

fantasy series. And I won't get into Sweet-Ekeren because I've done that many times in the past, but I will get into this book series because I just started it. I'm only like 200 pages into the grace of kings. And it is incredible. It's like, it does this amazing job of building this world. And it's very much like this Chinese-flavored fantasy world that's set on this big series of islands. And it's all about emperors and dynacies. The main plot is that there are these seven kind of tribes or factions on this island that have all been conquered by one of them and turned into this empire against many of their wills. So yeah, so the book,

when the book starts, there's this big rebellion and you meet all these, this amazing flavor of the, like, these cast of characters. The two main characters are these guys, one who's like the descendant of a wiped out tribe of warriors and he's like eight feet tall and has double-puped eyes and he seems wild. And then the other guy is this degenerate, drunkard, gambler, bandit dude who winds up, like, caught up in forces and is way smarter than he seems. Anyway, it's this amazing story that I'm watching unfold. Like I said, I'm still very early in it. But the way that it's told is so brilliant because what the author Ken Liu does is he just zips between all these different characters to kind of create the sense of the world. And we'll

tell these almost like biblical, fable-like stories about each one to give you like unravel their past. And they all just have these amazing backstories and fascinating like little mini stories within the larger plot. And it feels very much like very biblical, very mythological. I'm sure there's a lot of Chinese literature that that has inspired this. Because it's just awesome. I love it. And Kirk, you're going to love it too. I know you are. So the first book is called The Grace of Kings. I'm sure there are people out there who have read this. and seeing the entire thing, and I'm still very early, so don't go writing in with spoilers or anything, but I'm really, really enjoying it. Also, I will say that it's, it's, I think it's worth

supporting, if you're out there and if you're into fantasy books, and you've never heard of this one, you think it sounds interesting, I think if it's worth supporting Asian American authors, of whom Ken Liu is one, given the current climate in America and the recent rise of anti-Asian American violence. So that's just an added bonus. But you don't, buy the book because of that. By the book because it's awesome. And you happen to also be supporting a really good Asian American author. Whose other book, a book he translated, the three body problem was also recently recommended to me. So I got that too. But first the grace of kings I'm reading, which is really, really good. Go check it out. Cool. All right.

That has been another episode of this show. We played it straight the entire time. No jokes. No jokes on this show. Totally unfunny show. Triple Thick is known for not having humor. That's true. Yeah, that's what everyone, everyone's most joke-free podcast. Anyway, that's it. We'll see you all next week. Yep, see you next week. Bye.

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 show show. the Maximum Fun Podcast Network, and if you like our show, we hope you'll consider supporting us

by becoming a member at Maximumfund.org slash join. Find us on Twitter at triple clickpodge, send email the triple click at Maximumfund.org and find a link to our Discord in the show notes. Thanks for listening. See you next time. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artist owned. Audience. Audience supported.