Triple Click - Triple Click Picks: The Games You Should Play (2026 Edition)

Episode Date: August 27, 2026

The Triple Click gang convenes for a long-awaited update on the Triple Click Picks — our list of games we highly recommend — with some surprising new additions and removals. One More Thing: Kirk: Mean Streets (1973) Maddy: Ludwig (Britbox) Jason: Time to Burn (Ellery Lloyd) LINKS: Triple Click Picks Update History Help support this show and unlock bonus content! Become a member 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

Every so often, the hosts of Triple Click get together to decide which 10 games are the greatest of them all. Which games get to be a triple click pick. Welcome to Triple Click where we bring the picks to you. This week, after three long years, we're finally updating Triple Click picks, and we have got a lot of games to consider adding to the list. Which games will make the cut, and which games will go? Stick around to find out. I'm Kirk Hamilton.

I'm Maddie Myers. And I'm Jason Shire. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello. Hello, hello. Hello. Hello, my friends. Did I tell you guys that I'm going to Japan in like three weeks? You didn't? I guess you did because we've been scheduling around it. And I think I knew you were traveling and I think maybe I do you were going to Japan. But anyways, that's very exciting. And listeners didn't know that. It's very exciting. Because the reason I bring it up is because I've never actually been to Japan, which is kind of crazy because I've been covering the video game industry for many, many years and have written and have loved Japanese. games for many years, but I've never had an excuse to go to Japan. And so now I'm going. What's the excuse? It's a few things, various projects, secret projects, and Tokyo Game Show is that week. And yeah, it'll be fun. But if anyone out there wants to send me some tips of places I should go, I'm going to be staying in Shibuya in Tokyo. And if anyone gives me, want to give me tips, wants to give me tips for navigating Tokyo or for what to do and see

and eat there. Please, uh, please do let me know. I think because you play persona five, you should be fine on the metro. You should be fine getting around. And you should be fine on like schedule orientation and just how long it's going to take you to do each activity. You'll know all the best places, right, to where to get a burger. Yeah. Where to do some batting at the batting cases. Shibuya crossing is in persona five. That's like the kind of like the time square of Tokyo and it's pretty uh it plays a pretty prevalent role in persona five so you see it a lot so yeah i think of it as being in the world ends with you because that game is primarily set in shibuya like on the swear right you kind of walk around there a lot in that game sounds about right

i'm going to be uh killing demons on the bottom screen while i'm walking around chibuia you have to split your brain into well we are a listener supported show and that means that our listeners make it possible for us to occasionally take trips around the world for cool projects. And if you want to support our show, you can become a maximum fund member at maximum fund.org slash join. And we super appreciate everybody who supports our show and supports the creation of Triple Click. It's the only way we make any money on this show that we spend so much time making and are having such a good time creating. And yeah, if you sign up, you get a bunch of bonus episodes. so many bonus episodes over the years. There's a huge treasure trove. I've actually enjoyed seeing

a few different people on the triple-click Discord mention that they finally became a member. One person I think was gifted a membership and another person just signed up, I think, after a long period of taking a break and they have been just binging all of the bonus episodes and having a good time and that is very cool to see. And also a nice reminder that you could buy a membership as a gift for somebody if you wanted. Even if you're already a member, if you want to support the show a little bit more, and you know somebody who might like all the bonus episodes, you can buy them a membership as a gift. And then they can listen to us talk about all kinds of things like Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey and a spoiler cast on Resident Evil Requiem. And starting last fall, The Sopranos.

We've been talking about the TV show The Sopranos. We have supersized episodes about that television show, which we have been rewatching. and we will be releasing the third one of those, which is going to cover seasons four and five, I think, in a couple of weeks, right at the end of August. That'll be our next bonus episode. And then in the fall, we've got all kinds of fun stuff planned as well. So lots of bonus stuff,

and you can support our show at maximum fund.org slash join. All right. So we have been answering a lot of questions, listener questions on the show lately. We've been doing a lot of mailbags. And one question that we have not answered, but one that has come in many times is, when the heck are you going to update triple-click picks?

Because we haven't updated the triple-click picks in a while. Now, in fact, it's been so long that I think I should probably explain what triple-click picks are, because there may be people who started listening to this show and aren't even aware that triple-click picks exists. There may be. Maybe, maybe some people since September of 2023. Yeah, we may as well say just how long it's been. It's been three years.

It has essentially been like half the length of this show's existence since we updated triple-click picks. So when we started the show, we had this idea of wouldn't it be cool if there was just a list of 10 games that were the games that we unequivocally recommend? Ten games that the three of us all love that we would just be your go-to. If you just are getting into video games or you just are looking for something new to play, look at that list, anything on there is going to be good. And if you're kind of like this show and you feel like you kind of understand our tastes, you're going to get a game that all. three of us like. And also those 10 games kind of represent triple click in a way. Like they're a good frame of reference for listening to our show because we talk about them a lot because they're all games that we really like. We have updated the list a few times and each time we add a game, we have to

remove a game. And there is a helpful sort of paste bin that a listener has maintained that has the whole change log. And I should say up top, if you hear these 10 games that we're about to list and think, oh, but I want more, you could actually play any of the games in any version. of triple-click picks and you'll be getting good games. So we'll link to that, that complete sort of update history of the triple-click picks in the show notes. So you can follow along. But today, we are going to make an update to the list of triple-click picks, to the list of 10 games that we think you should play.

And there are a lot of contenders because it has been three years since we updated the triple-click picks list. So I am looking at the list. We've all got it right here. Jason Schreier, how about you read, the current list of triple-click picks. Sure. The current list in order of name length, Kirk Hamilton's specialty.

Very important order. Yes. Number one, Eldon Ring. Number two, Outer Wilds. Number three, disco-elisium. Number four, hollow night. Number five, Metroid Dread. Number six, Baldersgate three.

Number seven, Marvel's Midnight Sun. sons. Number eight, return of the Oberdin. Number nine, the case of the golden idol. Number 10, the legend of Zelda, tears of the kingdom. What a list. That's a strong list. Can we just say, this list is so great that I feel like we can understand perhaps why we wouldn't have updated it in a while. I mean, I know we're going to make some changes today. I thought you're going to say, this list is so great that we shouldn't change it. I honestly, there wasn't part of me that read this list and was like, I really like all these games still. I really like these. We're going to change it though. It is possible that we'll discuss and debate and we'll wind up not changing that list.

I don't think it's very likely. I just wanted to compliment our past selves. We got great taste. It's a bangor list. Bangers over bangers. For people who aren't familiar with the process, Kirk, do you want to walk everybody through kind of how we handle this? Yeah, we're going to go through a list of contenders and we're going to then sort of look at the list and it's basically a balancing act between what stays and what goes and I think generally, you know, each of us thinks of the list differently, but I would say that generally we try to think of the list holistically and not get too caught up on, okay, this for that, even though we do kind of tend to make trades, like one immersive sim for another immersive sim, one side scrolling game for another one. Like we do

kind of do one-to-one trades. We don't always, sometimes it's just like, you know, the list with this game on it would just sort of feel better than the list with this game on it. So it's a little bit of an arcane process. Yeah, I do think that we try to have a variety of genres here, because I think part of the idea is that if you are not a big fan of, I don't know, big, meaty role-playing games, you should still be able to find other games that you would appeal to you on here. Right. I think that's the holistic view of the list. We don't want to just have a big list of, yeah, big long role-playing games or a big list of, you know, puzzle games. It's going to be, it's to have some variety, and we try to maintain that variety with the switches that we make.

So now let's get into contenders. So the first list of contenders is a list of tested contenders, according to science, or at least I'm saying this is somewhat scientific, in that most of the games on this list were on at least two of our top 10 lists for the year that they came out, our top 10 individual favorite games of the year lists. There's a couple there that we decided to just talk about. Like, I think cyberpunk may have actually only been on my list. So, you know, there's a couple there that don't qualify for that. But pretty much these are like games that at least two of us picked as favorite games of the year. So Maddie, how about you run down this list of tested contenders? This is the first list of contenders.

Okay. So these are cyberpunk 2077, Octopath Traveler 2, Blue Prince, Holo Night Silk Song, Metaphor Re Fantasio, Balitro, Animal Well, Rise of the Golden Idol, Alan Wake 2, Super Mario Wonder, Final Fantasy 7 remake and rebirth are both on here. And or. And or, well, I think we'll have to decide. And Astrobot is the final entry on this list of contenders. Yes. A lot of contenders.

So then there is also a list of 2026 games, games from this year, that we should at least mention. I think we tend to avoid games that just came out and kind of put a pin in those. That's one reason that we're bringing up Cyberpunk 2077 now because the last time that we talked about this, the Phantom Liberty expansion had just come out. That game had just hit 2.0, which is kind of 1.0.

You know, it had hit its kind of finished state. And so it was a fantastic game, especially, I think, in my opinion. But it was so fresh that, you know, we were updating it at the same time that was coming out. So some of these 2026 games might not make the list, but we might as well mention them. Jason, how about you run down this list of 2026 games

that we should at least mention. 007 First Light, Pokemon Pocopia, Fields of Mysteria, Mina the Hollowar, titanium court, esoteric ab, Mugenics,

Resident Evil Requiem, and Dispatch is not a 2026 game. It is not. Well, I put it on. I'll add to the other bonus category of slightly older games that still came out since 2020.

Maddie's, there's a list here that just says Maddie's bonus list. Yeah, now it has dispatch on it. Okay. You want to just tell us what these are, Maddie? Sure. These are just other games that don't fit in any other previous categories.

And they are dispatch. A hundred line last defense academy. Prince of Persia of the Lost Crown. Control. I know it's old, but I just put it on here anyway. Tactical breach wizards. An Eldon Ring shadow of the erd tree, which I would argue is a game. I know it's a DLC, but it's a game.

Yeah, let's clear this up to start with with Shadow of the Earth Tree. I think that Shadow of the Art Tree is just included under the banner of, under the Aegis of Eldon Ring. I am totally fine with that. The same as Phantom Liberty is just a part of cyberpunk 2077. I think we can just knock that out right now. Yeah. Great. One decision made, done.

Okay. So I guess because Maddie, you got to do a little bonus list. I will just say there are two games that I would argue to put. on the list, but that neither of you has played and that I just don't think will make it that I want to acknowledge. One of them is Kingdom Come Deliverance, too, which just really is like, I'm still playing that game. I'm playing it right now. It's such a great game. And I really do think it deserves a spot. And the other is Cairn, which I've mentioned before is my favorite game of the year, a really amazing accomplishment and something that is just amazing and would fit really well on our list,

but neither of you have played it. So I want to mention those two games and we'll maybe come back to them in six years when we update this. I've played some kingdom come too for what that's right. That's true. Yeah, but you played like the beginning hour or something. It's like a few hours. Okay, but I mean it's- Maybe not enough to make a firm argument for it to be on the list. Yeah, I just can't imagine us having a substantive argument or discussion about the game because like I've played a hundred hours of that game and I have probably a hundred left. Like it's just a different experience when you've played that much. And I am okay with us not not submitting it. Okay. So should we make some. pitches because I have a couple of pitches that I can make for like this for that. That's how we've

Okay, you want to just do a this for that swap. You don't want to try and get rid of stuff. This, this, when we started doing this, it was kind of like in the lineage of the best that we would do, the best list that we do at Kataku. And the process was always like my pitches, this replaces that. And then we look at how that list would kind of the shape of it. And we decide, okay, yeah, that's a good swap. That feels right. Yeah, I think that'll be a better, like more time, just more efficient than trying to knock games off the contenders list. That'll take a lot longer. So go for it.

What have you got? So my first swap is my first proposal is going to be blueprints. And I think blueprints, I think there are a couple that we could do away with on this list that maybe like in maybe I don't know have kind of like have run their purpose, run their course on this list. My proposal is going to be blueprints, uh, replacing, uh, disco elysium. Okay. I'm going to write that down.

It's not what I would have expected you to say it replaces. So, Maddie, what would you have expected or what do you think that blueprints could replace? Because I agree, Jason, that blueprints should probably be on this list. I agree. I think all three of us... Yeah, I mean, I think blueprints, I would argue it's the best game of the decade. Like, it's one of my favorite games of all time. It's a game of the decade. Like, it's an incredible...

And I've been, like, re-experiencing it both through having my wife play it and watching her and also having Russ Freshick played and talk to me about it. his progress every single day. And I'm just constantly reminded about how incredible an experience it is. Yeah, it's not really even a debate. I think it has to be on our list. Like all three of us are obsessed with it. Yeah. It has to be on the list. I agree. And heading into this, I thought that was one of the most obvious choices other than perhaps Silk Song, but we'll get to that later. For now, we're talking about Prince. I think that, unfortunately, much as I love this game, Marvel's Midnight Sons has run its course.

And I realize that I'm proposing a swap of a completely different genre of game here by suggesting blueprints replace it. But. Yeah, I'm fine with that. I think that's a weak entry too at this point. I think it's one of the weakest links of the list, much as I, it may be a great game. I also think we might have other ones that could swap in there too. I was just proposing disco because that to me feels like it's maybe run its course on this list. I think the thing about disco is I think a bunch of other games like it have come out and I think in some ways not to diminish the quality of that game, but have kind of made it feel less essential. Because these days if someone was like, should I play disco a lesium, I would be like, I don't know, this game just came out called Esoteric Ev. That's really cool.

And I'm not arguing that Esoteric Eb should be a triple click pick necessarily. It's just that disco feels less like a singular experience that everyone must play these days. So let's just say for now that we know Blueprints is going on, and we can talk about what it replaces in a little bit. And I, for what it's worth, agree with you about, I agree with both of you about Midnight Suns and Disco Elysium. They're both great games. I do just feel like, especially with Disco, yeah, there have been other games like it. And actually, let's talk about Esotericab. Does Esotericab deserve a spot on our list?

Is it a one-for-one swap for disco? I don't know that it's a one-for-one swap. I liked it very much, but I'm not sure it's essential enough to merit a placement on the picks. I don't know if it gets the crown. Yeah, I'm with you there. I don't think it's essential. Actually, I have another proposal that's a little bit more left fields in terms of genre, but I think Bellatro has to be on here.

And to me, Bellatro and Blue Prince for disco and Marvel's Midnight Suns feels like good moves. I don't know, yeah, Balotro, Balotro, that's a tricky one. It's really great. I've played it a million hours. We always wound up playing it on stream. We're all obsessed with it. It's also just kind of a game about, like, the math number going up. I mean, it's an amazing game, but I'm not totally sure if it's a triple-click pick.

I could be convinced. Okay. You don't think it's got enough depth to it? It's not bad. It's like, I'm ambivalent. It's not that I think it shouldn't be on there. It's great, obviously. I really am still obsessed with it and still play up pretty regularly.

So it's a contender. I'll put it under the going on contender. I'm just a little less convinced. Maddie, what's your take on Balitra? No, I really know what you mean. And I almost, for lack of a better comparison, it's kind of like putting a cheeseburger on a list of really fine foods, where it's like, well, yeah, a cheeseburger is wonderful.

But it's got a kind of quality to it that just, doesn't quite fit the rest of the list. And I'm like, well, am I being biased against Bolletro just because it has a sort of light sensation of like just it's not a deep game. It's not a really long story game. I'd be hard pressed to write any essay about its symbolism or what it means to society, whereas I might easily do that with any of these other games. Volatro is more of a time waster game than any of the others on our list. Yeah, it's just what a time waster game. It's like, you know, not a cheeseburger, but it's a bag of jalapeno kettle chips, which is just... Which you're obsessed with.

Yes, exactly. Just like Bolotro. And I'll open the bag. But you wouldn't put it on your top 10 list of foods. Right. I would open the bag and every time I will just eat the entire bag if you don't take it away from me. And I can't even fault... And maybe you feel a little sick.

And like, I wouldn't fault the artistry. Like, it is an exceptional combination of flavors that the people at kettle chips have come up with. Just like... This is good. No, I agree. an exceptional combination of elements. Chips is a perfect analogy for what Bolletro is bringing to the table. And I too love chips very much.

But also very similarly have been known to eat an entire bag and feel a little ill. And also have been known to play a little too much Bolletro and feel a little bit like maybe I wished I had spent that time doing something different, playing something. All right. I put a little question mark by it. Let's move on. So I guess one game to throw out there is Cyberpunk 2077. since we said we were going to revisit it. There is no, you know, the Witcher 3 isn't on our list.

Used to be. I don't think it ever was. No, it was. It was. I thought it was of one of our very first. No, I'm looking at our. Is this a false memory on my part? Maybe we just talked about it extensively.

Well, I'm looking at the, the paceman history and it's not on there. I believe you. And that's, I think, partly because, you know, Jason, you've played some of it. But really, I mean, I'm the only Witcher Sicko here. And all of us played Balders Gate 3, which is a similarly dead. role-playing game, even if it's a very different game mechanically in a lot of ways. And I guess to throw cyberpunk out there or to finally put it to bed, I would be happy putting it on this list. I think that it's really good.

It's a tricky one to recommend, like, as a replacement for Baldersgate 3. I would never suggest that. They're very different games, though. I mean, cyberpunk is not an immersive sim, but it is a first-person sort of open-world city game. It's just, like, wildly different from Baldur's Gate. And also, CD Project's approach to storytelling and, like, branching narrative is very different from Larian's approach in Baldur's Gate 3. I think it's great. And Phantom Liberty is just, like, truly great.

It's similar to some of those Witcher DLCs. It's just some of the best interactive storytelling going. It's such a great story. But I guess what are the two of you think? Because I can't even remember if I any of you finished Phantom Liberty or have really engaged with this game that deeply? No, this is a tough one for me because I haven't. played that much of it. It just never got its, it's hooks into me for whatever reason. I enjoy what I played, but like, I don't know, something about it just didn't grab me. Yeah, I, it's tough. I,

I feel like this is one of those classic things where intellectually, I have a lot of respect for what it's doing. I enjoy a lot of it, but I would never put it on my list of favorites, even though I think post-Fantom Liberty, it's a way stronger game. And if I were talking to somebody who liked a sci-fi epic of that kind. I would absolutely recommend it to them. But for the triple-click picks, it's like, I don't know. It's an edge case, though. I was really considering it heading into this conversation because I do think it's a way,

way stronger game now than it was the last time we had this conversation. And I also think it's a much stronger contender than some of the other games on this very long contenders list that maybe we won't even bother saying the names up again as we go through this conversation. It's definitely up there. The question I would ask yourself, okay, Maddie, ask yourself this question as kind of a thought exercise. If someone, just a random person, whether it's like a family member or like someone at a bar who you just met was like, oh, you're a games expert. What are some games you would recommend? Would cyberpunk be in your top 10 of games that you would recommend to just this complete stranger out of the blue?

I mean, probably not, especially if we're going to make it more specific and say, I love RPGs, I love story, I would be more likely to still say Baldersgate 3 for somebody like that. I think Baldersgate 3 has a very comfortable position on this list still. Cool. And I think, yeah, I think with that kind of game, especially with a game that's a hundred hour role-playing game that's all based on story and branching decisions and choices you make and yada, yada, yada, cutscenes, it feels like two on here makes it a little too heavy. Makes a little too much of that? I don't necessarily.

Yeah, that's fine. I think the thing that decides it for me is just that the two of you never really dug into it. And this list is going to represent all three of us. So, like, it's, you know, that kind of does it right there. Yeah, like, okay, yes. I mean, it's kind of to you, what Octopath Traveler, too, is to me,

where I would say that's one of the finest JRP's ever made, and I would totally see it on the list, but neither of you really played much of it. So it's hard to argue it's a triple-clay. Right, and it's similar in that I loved what I played and was like, dang, I could see this being a great game and then just didn't make time for it. And it's kind of similar.

All right, well, let's get into another pretty strong contender and one that raises some interesting questions, which is Hollow Night's Silk Song. I think it's pretty likely that this goes on. And the first question I want to throw out is, what do we do about this? Because Hollow Night is currently on the list. How do we want to think about this?

God, I mean, honestly, I would tell people play both of those. And in fact, I would say maybe Silk Song replaces Metroid Dread, and maybe we keep both of them on there. I mean, I don't think that's actually a wild argument. And I came into this thinking that Metrooddred would probably come off of this list, in part because Silk Song exists. And I already think it's pretty flattering to Dread that both Hollow Night and Metro Dredd are on here. Like, even in its original iteration, I think some of that was some recency bias with Metroid Dread.

But I also think in terms of the triple click canon when I evaluate this. list and what do we refer to a lot. I see that as part of the value of the list in addition to what do you recommend to a new friend who's asking you for advice on what to play. And I would probably recommend Metro Dred to that person. But when I overlap that with what is the triple click canon and what do we actually talk about a lot, it's going to be Hollow Night and Hollow Night Silk Song. Having both of them on there, I personally prefer Silk Song. I've made no secret of that. So to me, that swap is totally fair to make. I think it's a stronger game.

But I also can see the argument for keeping both. I got to say, after I finished Silk Song earlier in September of last year, I immediately jumped into a replaying all of Hollow Night. And my goodness, I mean, it's still astounding. It's still phenomenal. And the two of them almost, they compliment each other really well because they feel so different to play that you never really get sick of the formula, no matter how much you're playing, both of them.

Okay, but here's another counterpoint. We have Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom on here, and I would say that game and Breath of the Wild have a similar relationship. And we don't have both on here. Actually, one of the arguments we made, I remember making this argument and having this conversation, was that Tears of the Kingdom,

because of all the travel, all the extra ways it added to get around the world and also to fight enemies, to me, it kind of, it superseded Breath of the Wild. because it felt much better to play. And it was hard to imagine going back to Breath of the Wild once you had gotten all those powers like ascend and fuse and an ultra hand.

I mean, I still really enjoyed going back to Breath of the Wild regardless. So even though I understand the argument, I also still think Breath of the Wild has its charms. And Hollow Night similarly to me feels slower, not always a bad thing, doesn't have all the characterization that Hornet has. She's such a beloved character to me now that that's a really waiting Silk Song in its favor to me. And so to me, they have kind of like a similar comparison point.

But yeah, I mean, I remember when we made that argument. What do you think, Kirk? Yeah, I have a few different thoughts, I guess. One big difference is that Hollow Night is quite a bit easier than Silk Song, and Silk Song is very, very difficult. And that's always my hesitation with recommending it to people is that that game is hard as nails, and it gets particularly difficult in the back half, where Hollow Night has its most moments of difficulty, but it is baby town frolics compared to Slok Song.

Like going back and playing Hollow Night after playing Slok Song, it's just a much, much more straightforward game and the encounters just are not as difficult. It's just not even close. So that's kind of an interesting one with the recommendation, because I would definitely recommend people play Hollow Night first if they're, you know, thinking, oh, I'm starting to get into these games or I know I have a lot of friends whose kids are getting old enough to play these kind of more difficult games and they want to get into some of these, you know, more advanced side scrollers, they always start with Hollow Night.

I say, start with Hollow Night. You know, that's always my advice. And yet, Silk Song, I agree, is, I mean, it's more game than Hollow Night. And it is just, if not an improvement, it's just like an elaboration upon Hollow Night in so many different respects. The world, the story, the design, the, you know, crafting your build and just the way that it feels to play it. It's such a masterpiece and an incredible accomplishment that it does feel like it should be our list. So I'm really a little bit torn. My only other thought is also, I think having Hollow Night and Silk Song on this list is kind of a lot. That's 20% of the list then is these

very difficult side-scrolling Metroidvania is made by like the same two people. I don't, I don't feel bad great about having two of them. I also, I'm fine with us taking Metroid dread off, but I think part of why it made sense to have it on there, despite it also being a somewhat difficult side-scroller is that it does have a really different feel from Hollow Night or Silk Song for that matter. It just feels different to play and has different mechanics and obviously made by a different team. So it felt like it had enough variation, whereas just literally having two Hollow Night games on the list. It would also be the first time we've done that, right? Like we have never had two games in the same franchise. All right. Here, I have a proposal.

I have a proposal. I think this is clean. I think we can take Hollow Night off and put Silk Song on. I think that anybody who's coming to this list like totally babe in the woods fresh can look at the history and understand that like Hollow Night was the first one that it's still really good and it was on this list for six years. Yeah. And it's like it's an emeritus. Like it doesn't lose its pick status. Right.

It's still like a pick in a way. And so song is a masterpiece and it's the newest one and it's, you know, like I think that should be on there. So I think maybe we could just do it one for one swap actually. What are you thinking, Jason? Okay. Yeah, that's fine with me. I think for balance.

I think for balance's sake, which, again, looking at this holistically. So, yeah, I mean, let's look at some other contenders. Do you guys want to make some other proposals of like games you think should be on there? I have a couple more suggestions, but I'll let you guys go. Yeah, I'd love to hear whatever you got. Go for it. Okay. I mean, I was going to say, I would love to talk about animal well.

That's a game that I think all of us thought was pretty special. I could totally see that fitting on here. I think the only downside of that game is that a lot of the end game stuff is kind of, you need like a group of people to be working together to do it. It's kind of some of it is kind of irrelevant today. But there's so much of the kind of first two phases, the first stage, getting the first credits, and then collecting the eggs, that you could just kind of call it after that, after getting all 64 eggs and still have a tremendous time.

And yeah, I mean, that game is pretty special. I don't know. What do you guys think? What do you think, Maddie? Yeah, I liked Animal Well a lot. And I do like the idea of having a game that is a side scroller and sort of pays homage to games of that ilk and the specific pixel art style that it has. We don't really have another game that has that flavor. And so I like including it artistically.

Oh, I didn't propose a swap, but maybe that's what takes Metro. dreads spot. Yeah, I think also spiritually there's there's something to that that makes sense to me. It's a little Metroid. Yeah, you get your items. The items allow you to pass things. And you know, what I think is really clever, it kind of, it really evolves the, the Metroid formula in a way that I haven't really seen before in the sense that every item in the game has multiple functions, some of them hidden and some of them really clever in a way that most Metravenia's don't do. In most Metrovenia games, your item is your item. And this, it's like, while your Frisbee, you can use it to fling it to things, or you could friggin' write on it if you learn that.

And the feeling of learning that you could write on it is pretty cool. Yeah. I'm not opposed to putting animal well on the list. That's an unexpected one, but it does kind of fit. We're looking at, I'm just going to add it here. And I do feel like Metroid Dread, that's a great game, like really, a really great game. But also, I haven't thought about it in a long time. and when I see it on the list, it's a little like Marvel's Midnight Suns.

Actually, I think about Marvel's Midnight Suns a lot. Especially with that Star Wars game coming out. I've been thinking like, man, I loved Midnight Sun. So it was like the best game of that year. And I can't wait for the Star Wars one. But at the same time, with Metroid dread, it is a little like, okay, that's a great game. But it isn't like Hollow Night where I still think about Hollow Night every day, like a few times. Just ambiently, it's just kind of always on my mind.

Thinking about Hornet. It's Kirk is like that meme in bed where it's like his wife flying next to him saying, what do you think he's thinking about other women? And he's just got hordid and his thought bubble. Yeah, the thing is, I will say that like I don't think about animal well all the time either. That's not like top of mind for me. That's the thing about a Metroidbanian. Hold on this list is in 10 games we think about all the time.

It's 10 games that we would holistically recommend to people. Yeah, I know. I mean, using that as just one rubric of just sort of like, did this game make a big enough impression on me that it's like, it's like still something I think about and reference and it kind of isn't. Well, what is another game that you think about? Let's talk about a couple of more, like serious contenders and then we can figure out exactly what this is. Yeah, a few more contenders. All right. So one thing that comes to mind is actually dispatch. Should we think about dispatch? Let's talk about it. Let's talk it through. Dispatch was really cool. It was really good. I

loved it. And it made my games of the game of the year list. I think Jason, it made yours as well. Yep, definitely. Yeah, it didn't make mine. And yet I am the person who brought it to the table today, which I think is part of why I brought it was because I was like, well, I know this wasn't on my list. But this is actually a game I've thought about a lot since I played it. I'm not going to amend my game of the year list. That's not how game of the year lists work. But I think that it did something really interesting.

And I, yeah, I don't think about it every day like I do Hornet. But I have thought about it a lot since playing it. And I think that it was good. I think it's a good game. I don't know. I don't have anything else deep to say that doesn't spoil the story of the game that I think is actually really worth experiencing. And that's part of why I, that's part of the value that I think it offers is like feeling like a TV show where your choices actually impact how the TV show plays out. And that experience is pretty special.

Jason, what do you think about dispatch? Yeah, I don't know. I'm of two minds. Yes, it was one of my favorite games of last year. Yes, it's a fantastic game. But I think if I were recommending it to someone, there would be a little bit of a caveat, which is that like the management, the actual gameplay of it can be a little bit of a drag. And you can get to moments where you're just like, I wish this was over so I could just see more story. At least for me, that's how I felt playing it. And the hacking mini games are kind of like whatever. So that makes it a little bit tougher of a cell. Um, I also, yeah, I don't know. Um, there are they also, I, I remember we talked a little bit about this, but like I wasn't 100% thrilled with like choices leading into certain, like outcomes of choices in some ways. I don't know. I feel like when there's a sequel to dispatch, I feel like they're going to knock it out of the park and that feels like when, uh, the game will get on this list. Yeah, I kind of feel that way too. I'm like, I, I feel like the sequel is going to be so great because they've figured out how to do it and what was special about it. And I'm really excited to see where

they take those characters and what they do next. So maybe this is something we revisited a future time. Yeah, I'm not super assault on it. Yeah, I think that as much as I think of the three of us, I liked the dispatching gameplay the most and found it to be pretty characterful and fun. Yeah, I agree. I really like it as a contender for the list just because it's so different. And it really fits in this cool place where you put it on the TV and you play with a group of people and it's like watching a really good show. But also considering what it's up against, you know, if we're not putting cyberpunk on there or Octopath Traveler, too.

Cyberpunk could make a late game play for the list. I mean, we'll see what happens. Yeah. Okay, can I just say, okay, two things I would say. One is, I think Big Walk will make this list. I think it might be too soon, but I think Big Walk is going to make this list. I thought about Big Walk heading into this list. We still got to unlock the monorail.

Yeah. we got to play more. Once we get the monorail, it's going to be over. It's going to be over for all these games. It'll just be one thing. Can I make another pitch? Can I make another pitch? Yeah, go.

Meena the Hollower. Yeah. What would, uh, maybe. I'm, I'm open to it even though I like go back and forth and I found the difficulty to be a little off-putting and even after modifying. Yeah. Okay. So I guess the thing that would be my biggest roadblock is that you have to warn people just

like with some of these other games. I've been mentioning when you can't just unreserved reservedly, like you can't just be like this without reservations, no hesitations, you got to play this. With Mina, it's kind of like you have to be willing to get through a really difficult first couple of hours. That said, the game is so special and meticulously designed and feel so good to play and look so good and sounds so good. It's hard to argue that it's not a complete package.

But yeah, that difficulty spike at the beginning does make it a tough sell for me too. what do you think maddie yeah i'm in the same boat i i feel like the way that they organized the accessibility settings is itself so overwhelming for some people that it can be a downside it is not how i felt but i've heard that enough from friends who've played the game that they thought parts of it were hard and they wanted to figure out how to make it more playable but because there are so many things in meena that you can change it actually ends up being difficult to tell how to make it fun for you, even though I actually believe that there are ways to make me a fun for maybe not every person in the world,

but a lot of people, because of all of those settings, I just also think it can be really hard to figure out how to make those settings work for you. And that that is also a design challenge that they've described facing in making the game and designing all the items on top of all those accessibility settings. Yeah, I think I kind of don't think it quite makes it. Just because it's a little bit more of a niche game. Like the art style as well, I know a lot of people don't like how it looks. And I'll admit that it's not like my chosen art style.

Like I came around on it. Like I really warmed to how it looks. But it is a little bit flat and sort of, I don't know. know that particular style of video game, just like it didn't really grab me, and it wasn't until I played it a bit that I really came around on it. And it is pretty hard. And yeah, well, I like the difficulty options and really found a way to play the game that I really like. I had also seen that feedback, Maddie, that actually all the options are like overwhelming and people just wind up in their head about like, do I have the game set right? Am I playing it the best way? Am I having fun? Is this

too hard? Is it too easy? And that that winds up kind of throwing people off. And like, it's really great, but I don't know for the, you know, for the like show-wide pick for one of the 10 games you must play, I think it's maybe a little bit too particular. Hmm. Any other contenders for you guys? Otherwise, we can kind of go through what we've got here. And so I'm curious. We've got the case of the Golden Idol on this list. Do we want to sub in rise of the Golden Idol as just a swapparoo? Yeah, Jason, you're the most familiar with these. What do you think? No, I don't think so. I think cases where I would recommend people start.

And I think case is stronger as a whole. I think Rise, I think, is fantastic. I love that game too. But Case, I think, is better. Okay. Okay, asked and answered. I don't even, I don't even entirely disagree. I was kind of torn on it, but I think you said it well.

That's true. Thinking it through, they're all doing the same thing. And so you might as well start at the beginning. It isn't really like a Hollow Night to Silk Song thing where the sequel expands and explodes like so many of the ideas and moves in all these new directions. It really is almost like one huge game. You could just play a case and then rise. And if you play a case and like it, presumably, you'll just be like, oh, sick, there's a whole other one with a bunch more puzzles. Exactly. With references to the first and so on and so forth. By the same token,

Obra Den's still on here. We don't really have another game like it to replace it. But like Disco Alisium, this is maybe this is an older game. I mean, it's one of the oldest games. I don't know. oldest game on the list? Yeah, I don't know though. I mean, yeah, but I don't think, unlike Disco Elysium, I mean, it's not about games. Come on, people. Make a better game than this. No, no, no, no.

That's not what I'm saying. No, that's not what I was saying. I mean, I know I said that disco didn't feel singular anymore. In fact, I would say Overton did get other games like it. There are a lot of games that are like Oberden, but Overton still feels singular. And it still feels like the game that I would say you must, you absolutely must play this game. I would say Golden Idol is kind of an iteration of the Oberden formula. And there are a bunch of,

of others. I just played another detective game that was kind of like followed similar. There are a lot of games that involve just kind of like doing a logic puzzle and figuring out who did something that are just kind of in that mold. So I would say the games have come out like it. It's just that nothing has lived up to it in any way. I feel the same way about Outer Wilds for what it's worth. I just there's, I can never. Yeah, I was like, I have no interest in removing Outer Wilds. I can't imagine taking it off. It's still the baby best video game I've ever played. It's singular experience, yeah. Yeah, it's truly singular.

And, I mean, Echoes of the Eye has come out at some point, the expansion. Amazing. And again, like with these other games, I consider that part of it and Echoes of the Eye is amazing. We did a whole beans cast about it. But, you know, it's just like, that game will be on the list maybe forever. And that's just, that's fine. I actually look forward to the day a game comes out that's so good. It makes me actually think maybe I would want to put this on instead of outer while.

It's because it hasn't happened yet. Yeah. I want to throw one more thing to the two of you. that I feel we should at least mention because it is a development since 2023. And that is, I think we have become a little more enamored in general of Resident Evil. And it kind of started with the Resident Evil 2 remake. I almost put Resident Evil 2 remake on my list. And then there's been the Resident Evil 4 remake, and there's been Resident Evil Requiem.

And like, all of these games are fantastic. I've really fallen in love with them. But I feel like as a show also, we've really gotten into them. And thinking about all of them, I would say, would we want to consider Resident Evil 2 remake as one of these 10 games? I mean, I think there's a strong argument for that. I think it's a very influential game and that that has been part of why we've talked about it so much. It's a really good example of remaking a game and making it both completely different in terms of how it actually plays out and improving on it, while also making it totally stand alone.

You don't need to have played any other Resident Evil's to enjoy it. I really like it. It's scary in the right ways. So, yeah, I'm very open to including this. I certainly think of our going on maybes. I'd sooner put that on than Ballotro, for example. Jason. I'm not really convinced just because I think that Resident Evil 2,

two big weaknesses that that game has. One is that if you want to see the whole story, you have to play from both sides, and it's so repetitive to play both sides because whichever side you didn't do, you're doing a lot of the same stuff you already did. Two is that I think that game loses a lot of steam after you leave the police station

and becomes a little bit more grindy and just kind of following this more linear path and just was way less interesting to me. If there was a Resident Evil game that was all the equivalent of the police station, stuff in RA2, then I would be totally on board for it. But to me, I don't know if any of those Resident Evil games I played, I feel like I would just kind of unreservedly recommend to people. That would be the volley I would send back to you, which is that I don't disagree with any of that.

And in our discussions of Requiem, we did say many times, you know, this is a lot like Resident Evil too, but it doesn't make the same mistake specifically with the replaying. And you kind of just play it one time, but you still get the variety and stuff. I don't know, Requiem. But it also has some weaker parts, like when Leon and Raccoon City gets a little repetitive, gets a little monotonous, I would say. I don't know. It doesn't feel to me like the same caliber as these other games.

Yeah, that's fine. Throwing it out there because I think we've become more and more Resident Evil pilled over the years. Maybe Code Veronica will nail it. They just haven't quite released the right one yet, but at some point, right. It might. I think at some point I could see a Resident Evil game being the one that makes it onto this list, only because those games, I think, do kind of like check all the boxes for all three of us. Well, okay.

This is another way for me to bring up control again, which also an old game hasn't been on the list before, Resident Evil inspired, just incredible aesthetic in this game. And since it came out, it has accessibility, easy mode stuff in it that wasn't there at launch. and I know that was something about the game that, at least for me, made it harder to recommend. And now I'm far more likely to recommend control to people in my life who want something that's like a really interesting science fiction shooter experience. So I hereby present it to the panel. Yeah, it's an interesting one. Like, I don't, I'm not sure that I wouldn't put control on the list maybe over Animal Well.

I don't know. It's different, but it's kind of a Metroid type game. It is, yeah. It's cool. It's just that it's like getting a sequel right now. That's kind of neither here nor there, but it's about to have a sequel. Yeah, and it's like, why not Alan Wake 2? You know? Like I... I think I would recommend control over Alan Wake 2 as much as I absolutely love Alan Wake 2. That's a more particular experience. The survival horror part of it, the action isn't quite as fluid, where control is really fun. By the time you're flying around and like destroying the levels and just like fighting huge rooms of dudes and the world, like the story, the setting, it's just so... kind of evocative and addictive. I found myself, I just kept wanting to play that game

just because I loved each new weird area that I'd find and each new thing I learned. So I think control over Allen Wake, too, that's an easier one for me to make as a recommendation. But I don't know. Jason, what do you think about control? I loved control. I don't remember enough of it to be like,

I would recommend this wholeheartedly at this point. It's seven years old. A sequel's about to come out, which I do think is here or there. I do think that's an important part of this because we could be playing that a month later and be like, holy crap, this is so good. This should be on the list. I don't know. Is there a statute of limitations on this?

Did we ever decide if there's like a cutoff date? No, we could put Ocarina of Time on right now. I feel like we definitely wanted it to be more modern games than classic. I don't know. To me, it feels a little weird to be like, we're just kind of randomly add this seven-year-old game. Like, why not other games from 2019? Why not, I don't know, Persona 5, why not like Mario Odyssey? Like, I just don't know.

I just don't know. I mean, I think part of it is like, well, what are the games that we talk about a lot? And I do feel like we talk about remedy games a lot, but that doesn't necessarily justify this. There's a little bit of a feeling of writing a wrong. Like persona 5, to your example, Jason, has been on the list. Like we had persona 5 role on the list and then it got replaced. Did we debate control in 2020 when we first made the list? I think I'm sure that we did. I think I probably argued for it back then, and I'm just bringing it back, and I've forgotten that I already did this, and the listeners are yelling at their...

It was quite a long time ago, so I think that's understandable. Well, all right, so currently we've got a kind of four-for-four going. We have Blueprints, Boletro, Hollow Night, Slick Song, and Animal Well going on. Hollow Night, Marvel's Midnight Suns, Disco Elysium, and Metroid Dread coming off. But we don't feel strongly about Balotro. I'm the only one who is really pushing for it. You guys kind of disagree. So maybe something else should go in that spot.

Well, here's the question. Well, we haven't brought up tactical breach wizards yet. That was one of my other wild cards. I mean, I would wholeheartedly argue for that to be on the list because that's like one of the best games I played in the last few years. I absolutely adore it. Many. I mean, are you fighting for it also? I think it has a similar energy to like a disco elysium, which is coming off where it like is doing interesting things with narrative.

I know it's a different genre. I would say, I mean, it's not really like, I would say mechanically, it's much more midnight suns and that it's a turn-based, isometric strategy game. Yeah, which is also coming off. Yeah, which is coming off. I think that would be like a clean, a clean swap. And I love that game. Narratively, it's not like disco elisium, though. Like, it's, you know, it's really funny and very well written, but it's not like this incredibly elaborate narrative experience where you're choosing, making all these choices and building a character the way you are in that game.

And I don't know. It's tricky because taking Disco Elysium off definitely removes like a huge serving of narrative from the list. Well, hold on. Let's put a pin in Tactical Breach Wizards because, Maddie, you suggested it, but, well, actually, let's not put a pin in it yet. Mandy, you suggested the name, but you didn't say, like, you're fighting for, are you fighting for it as hard as Kirk is or you just brought it up just to discuss? I would sooner put Tactical Breachers on than Balitro. I, that's personally where I would put it. To respond to that specifically, let's put a pin in tactical breach wizards.

We don't have to add blacho. What we could do is add blueprints, homoanid silk song, animal well, and then keep one of the ones we said it. Like, we could keep discolysm. If we, if you guys feel like, yeah, we don't have to get rid of that. I was just making it as a suggestion, like that's still a phenomenal game. I was making it as a suggestion to remove just because it doesn't feel as singular as it once did, could still very well be on there. Could we could talk about keeping on midnight suns or hollinate or metro jet?

Like any of those could stay on. If your argument is just that like tactical breach wizards, you'd rather put that than Bellacho. I don't think that's a strong enough argument. Then again, Kirk is very much pro tactical breach wizards. If you also feel the same way, then that's another conversation entirely. I don't think anyone likes tactical breach wizards as much as Kirk Hamilton does, maybe including like the people that made it.

So I can't compete with him there. I do love it quite a bit. And I think it has a strong case. But it also has that case where I'm like, I haven't thought about it since I played it. It's not really in the triple click canon in the sense that I don't know that we talk about it a lot. I'm not sure I'd recommend it in a conversation with somebody that I just met. It's unusual. It's sort of iterating upon ideas in game.

I don't know. It's in a weird category in my mind, but I do love the game. Yeah, I definitely wouldn't wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone as much as I enjoyed that game. To me, it's too niche of a genre and too specific, and you really need

to have kind of tactics brain to be able to really enjoy it, especially later on once more things open up and you really have to make smarter decisions rather than the kind of, I feel like the earlier stages of that game, it's a little more puzzly where there's like a clear solution that you can just kind of follow through.

But then it gets more tactical. Yeah, I mean, I don't think that's... Okay. I don't think it makes it. That tells me that it does not go on, which is fine. I will just continue to love it in private. So can I'm, I'm going to make a proposal. So how would this list look?

I'm going to, I just want to read this and just picture this in your brains. Eldon Ring, Outer Wilds, Blueprints, Animal Well, Disco Elysium, Baldur's Gate 3, Hollow Night Silk Song, Return of the Oberdin, The Case of the Golden Idol, Legend of Zelda, Tears of the Kingdom. So basically, we would add Animal Well, Blueprints, and Silk Song, and we would remove Hollow Night, Midnight Suns, Metroid Dred. So we would keep Disco Elysium. How does that feel to you guys? That works for me. I think the one pick that we're adding, that is like a game that it just doesn't inspire great passion.

in me is Animal Well, but I totally acknowledge that game's brilliance. It's really amazing. And think it's a nice swap for Metroid Dread in some ways. Like, I really, I find that very, very tidy, actually. Can I throw something out there? What if instead of Animal Well, we keep Holonite? I knew you were going to say that. And I almost said it at the same time as you. I think the list is stronger with Animal Well instead of Holland. I think I'd rather have Animal Well there. It's a little bit metagaming, but I think that just having Hollow Night and Silk Song on there is basically just sacrificing one slot on the list because I think like taking holiday off like this gives us the opportunity to recommend one more worthy game so I would rather have animal well

okay so then the other question is if you guys look at like or think about other contenders is there anything you think should go on here whether in replacement of animal well or replacement of something else or are you happy with this current state of this list all right so kingdom come deliverance too no I'll I'll do I'll do one last one here. I don't, I don't know that I'm going to win this argument, but I will say, instead of recommending Metroid dread to people or a Hollow Night game, what I actually tend to recommend is Prince of Persia the Lost Crown, just as a Metroidvania game that includes so many things that make that genre easier for people to parse. It is not as creative as animal well

in terms of its item selection, but it is just a joy to to play. It's so polished. It's accessible not according to what people mean when they use the word to describe settings, but what I mean when I'm talking about people who don't play that many games and are like, I just want to try a Metroidvania and see if I like it. Prince of Persia the Lost Crown comes up a lot for me in terms of just everyone will like this kind of a game. I think it's very strong as just a Metroidvania recommendation. And it's, it's one that I return to a lot in my personal life recommending games to people. Yeah, that art style. It's not even the art style. Hey, I think it's hard to compare it to animal well. This is part of why I'm like, I don't think this is going to win.

I think it's good. It's, I think that's like, it's a really solid recommendation in exactly the way you're describing because it really is like, it's not just well made. It's exceptionally well made. It's just that there are two Metroid-style 2D games on here, and they're both really special, Silk Song and Animal Well. Or they're special in a different way. Yeah, they're each special in their own way. You know, the exceptional Ubisoft down the middle game, I just think it doesn't quite make it,

given that we're already celebrating the kind of slightly more special and unique games. So I think Animal Well and Silk Song are stronger. This is making me feel pretty confident about our Animal Well Pick. actually. I feel like it's really stood up to scrutiny in a lot of ways. I have another out of field, out of left field contender pitch. Go. Instead of Animal Well. Mm-hmm. The Final Fantasy Tactics remaster. This would be between the two of you because I liked that.

I don't know if I can go with you down this, Jason. It's so fiddly by the end. I was doing so much fiddling. Actually thinking about even listening to the two of you talk about it. It's so wildly complex and sort of unforgiving. And like I loved doing that, but there were a lot of times where like my wife was watching something on TV and I was just messing with my guys for hours. And I just don't think that many people have the brain chemistry to want to do that. You and I do, but it's just it's not a whole hard recommendation. You know what I'm saying? Fair enough.

All right. Well, that's a pretty good list here that I think. I think that we've maybe kind of done it. I mean, are you two feeling good about Animal? Because I pitched it. I'm very happy with Animal well. I'm happy with this. I'm going to make sure there's no reservations here. Okay.

Yeah. No, yeah, I'm not speaking abstractly here. I think it's a good list. I think it works for me. You want to read it before we break? I will. Before I read it, I will say that, you know, we mentioned a bunch of contenders at the beginning.

We didn't get into all of them. I think some of them we just kind of didn't because it didn't really seem like there was an argument. Those were all great games. But the ones that we wound up really putting forward are the three are the ones that we three feel there's a couple that i think down the road like i think if metaphor refontasio gets like a royal edition like it's equivalent and it's got a bunch of new stuff and like the pacing and some things change about it or it's like streamlined and i think that could

be a strong contender but right now i don't know if i would fight for it that hard yeah it's possible and i wouldn't fight for it and also i think that this uh fire emblem fortunes weave is going to wind up being the game that i kind of wished metaphor repentazio had been or least i'm hopeful Okay. Okay. And then we might wind up just arguing for that instead. But we'll see. Yeah, I also, I think, man, meugenics, I think is a special game, but like the aesthetic and the potty humor makes it that I absolutely cannot like, unreservedly recommend it. Yeah, and I think we could kind of go through all of them and make kind of similar. Yeah, I won't. I won't keep going. Yeah, okay. Right, right. But yeah, that's just to kind of mention those since we did mention them at the beginning.

Yeah, let me read the list. Here is the new as of some. September 26th list of the 10 triple-click picks, the 10 games we think you should play. In name-length order. Number one, Eldon Ring. Number two, outer wilds. Number three, blueprints. Number four, animal well. Number five, disco-elisium.

Number six, Balders Gate three. Number seven, Hollow Night Silk Song. Number eight, return of the Oberidim. Number nine, the Case of the Golden Idol. And number ten, the legend of Zelda. Tears of the Kingdom. Congratulations to all of the new entrance. Strong list.

Notable that none of these have one word. No games with one word titles in this list. Well, I'm waiting for the two of you to play Cairn. Just saying, you can play that game. It's really, really good. Before the end of the year, I will do my best to play it. Hey, I mean, dispatch, we talked about it for a minute. Could have been dispatch, but didn't make it.

It had a shot. All right, well, that was a great debate, and I think we made some great picks. Let's take a break. then we will be back for one more thing. Hi, I'm Justin McElroy, and I host Sawbones with my wife, Sydney. I'm here with Max Fun member of the month. Amanda Adams, thank you so much for being a supporter, and thank you for being our member of the month.

Woo-hoo! You're so welcome. How long have you been listening to Sawbones, Amanda? It's been probably a good 10 years. I very much enjoy Dr. Sidney and everything she does, and it's wonderful to be able to support it. Let me ask you about the most important moment in your life when you just, decided to become a maximum support.

Honestly, I am just proud I can support the people who make me hours and hours of content every week. I feel honored to do it. Amanda Adams, thank you so much. I really appreciate your support. Congratulations on your whole month. Thank you so much. It has been a good month already. Support the shows you love, including this one. Check the show notes for a link or go to maximum fun.org slash join. Hi everybody, it's Ellen Weatherford. And Christian Weatherford.

People say not to judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. But we can judge a snake by its ability to fly or a spider by its ability to dive. Or a dung beetle by its ability to navigate with the starlight of the Milky Way galaxy. On just the zoo of us, we rate our favorite animals out of ten in the categories of physical effectiveness, behavioral ingenuity, and of course, aesthetics. Guest experts like biologists, eat, Ecologists, musicians, comedians, and more join us to share their unique insights into the animal kingdom. Listen with the whole family on maximum fun.org or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back for one more thing. Maddie Myers take us away.

Sure. So we still have our seven-day free trial of Britbox and we have been taking advantage of it, people. We are watching all the BBC shows we can. Getting as much out of the box as we can. I just, I would have said for the record, we were recording this episode a little bit early, in case you're wondering about the time dilation here. How does seven days possibly work for Maddie? Well, I would have still recommended this anyway. I just would have, I wouldn't, I would have used past tense. I would have been like our trial expired. But this is another television show that the BBC created that we adored very, very different vibe than the other Bennett sister, which I talked about last week. This show is called Ludwig. It's a different, it is a comedy.

but it is a murder mystery series that stars David Mitchell, who's a British comedian that I know from the famous sketch in which he plays a Nazi who says, Are We the Baddies? Oh, he's, Are We the Baddies? That's David Mitchell. And that is the main thing that I know him from. I believe that that is a sketch from The Mitchell and Webb look,

which is like the name of a comedy series that I haven't seen every episode of. Anyway, he's very funny. And on this show, Ludwig, he plays twins, twin brothers, except one of the twin brothers has been missing for several days. And that missing brother is a police detective. And the twin that David Mitchell plays, who is not a police detective, is a very reclusive, socially awkward, introverted puzzle designer. So he and his brother have very similar skill sets, except that one of the. them is extremely introverted. And so the wife of the missing brother gets in touch with him and is like,

I think there's a conspiracy involved in my husband's disappearance. And I need you to pretend to be him for a day and just go to the office and get some files so that we can try to look into what happened to him. And because this is also a comedy show, as soon as he gets the office, he gets roped in to going along and solving a mystery and his unique puzzle capabilities lead to him being extremely masterful and very funny at solving this murder mystery in the first episode. And as unrealistic as that sounds, you just kind of have to go with it. He just gets swept up into the police station and has to start solving all of these murder mysteries and does so in his own unique puzzle master way that is extremely satisfying and funny to watch,

but also needs to try to keep up appearances of being his brother, who is a very different person than he is. And just, we found this so charming. We love a murder mystery and we love puzzles. And this show really blends both of those things and also just really takes advantage of David Mitchell's ability to be, like, awkward humor guy. I feel like that's kind of what he's been,

cutting his teeth on for his entire career. And he's excellent at it. And there is some fun mystery. So yeah, I recommend it. It's called Ludwig. There's only six episodes because this is a BBC show. So it's really short. And in theory, you could watch it all six of them while waiting out a seven-day free trial of Ripbox, which is, of course, precisely what we've done.

So yeah. Nice. That's my rank. It sounds good. When I hear David Mitchell, I think of the author, the author of Cloud Atlas. Oh, sure. Yeah. This is a different one.

I guess a fairly common name. Yeah, two kind of common names. Two first names. Yeah, true. That sounds like a fun show. Jason, tell us your one more thing. Yeah, I read a book called Time to Burn by Ellery Lloyd. And this book has a phenomenal premise, which is that a tech company has figured out how to make a time machine and send people back in time.

And of course, because it's a tech company, there may or may not be nefarious things going on there. But what happened was, in the premise of this book, is that so this company figured out how to do it, but it's very heavily regulated because the only way that the government was going to allow this to happen was to say, okay, you have to follow by this, this, this and this. This is a fictional world where the government actually functions and can issue regulations and keep tech companies under control. And so they can only do specific things with this time machine, and they can only send people back to a very specific time and a very specific place. It's all set in London. And what they can do is send people back to World War II era London bombing to watch the city get bombed by the Nazis, and then they go back

into the present after that, and they're not allowed to change anything, and so on and so forth, because changing things could, of course, have repercussions. As for the story of this book, well, we open up in that during, on one of these tours where some rich people have got paid to go back in time to World War II, and then they go back. But one of them stayed. behind and is stuck in the past. And as time goes on, we learn why this person got stuck in the past, whether or not it was intentional and a whole lot more. And so our main character is this documentarian who has been brought in by the tech

company to kind of witness and make a documentary about the Wonder Kid founder and all the great things he's doing with his time time. travel technology. And she happens to start this on the day that this massive crazy incident happens that they lost someone back in time. And so she starts filming and they allow her to keep filming and keep working with them. And she watches the story unravel. And the story just goes from there. The kind of the inciting incident is that she realizes that the person who's been stuck in time, who's like stuck in time, stuck in the past, is someone that she knows. and also someone who is not who she says she is.

And then it goes into, it gets into some interesting mysteries and twists and turns along the way. I really enjoyed this book, mostly for the premise, which is very fun to explore, but it's got some fun stuff in it. Also, a little bit of ridiculous stuff,

and I don't mean ridiculous in terms of the actual plot, but ridiculous in terms of just how things are kind of contrived by the end of it. But still, I really enjoyed it, really enjoyed that the way it all comes together, the way the characters' backstories fit together, and the way that it sends up tech executives, because tech executives need to be sent up these days. Once again, it's called Time to Burn by Ellary Lloyd. Really enjoyed it. I recommend it. Cool book. Nice. I'll check it out. That does sound good. I love a time travel story. Yeah, me too. Even ridiculous ones.

Yeah. Well, my one more thing is a mood. that I watched last week with my friend Sam, my movie buddy, Sam, who we also do the thing where we roll the dice and pick a year and whatever, the D100 picks. We watched the best picture nominees from that year. So we have watched a lot of movies together, and we decided to watch a movie called Mean Streets, the Martin Scorsese movie from 1973. Part of that is because on the Blank Check movie podcast, they are beginning a much Ballyhooed Martin Scorsese miniseries, which is very exciting for that podcast. That is a great movie podcast. And also they focus on directors. And they kind of wait sometimes with some of the really big ones.

Like they've done Spielberg, but it's a huge commitment, right? And also, it's just going to be a lot to do someone like Martin Scorsese. But they're finally doing Scorsese, which is exciting. I have not listened to their episode yet, but their Main Street's episode is actually, I think, I think it's out this week, and I'm looking forward to listening to it. I'll probably listen to it sometime this week. And I figured the two of you would also be excited to hear about this movie, because, of course, we have watched Scorsese movies.

We did a Beans cast on Casino, The Wolf of Wall Street, and Goodfellas. And I think the two of you have not seen Mean Streets. Is that right? No, I have not. Should we? I hope that you'll both watch it. It's great. Okay.

I really recommend it. It's a very cool movie. This is a very early period in Martin Scorsese's career. He had made a couple of features, and I haven't seen them, like Boxcar Bertha, and there's one other. I'm forgetting the name. I think they're okay, but he was kind of still figuring out his thing. And Mean Streets is fascinating, because you can tell this as a young, you know, visionary. But it is remarkably fleshed out.

It really feels a lot like Goodfellas. It feels like a first run at a lot of the ideas that he then fleshed out in Goodfellas and then kind of flipped on their heads and sort of re, you know, reimagined in Casino and then kind of just keeps flipping around and turning over and playing with. So this is a movie starring Harvey Keitel is the main character, though it also features a young Robert De Niro as the kind of antagonist, like the secondary character who winds up sort of dominating the whole film, a character named Johnny Boy. And the plot is basically Harvey Keitel is a young man who is connected and kind of works in organized crime in New York City.

His uncle is like a very established Italian mobster who kind of goes back to the earlier era. You know, this is kind of the early 1970s in New York. And his father is Italian and kind of goes back to the older, whatever version of organized crime. And then Harvey Keitel's character has like a group of, other men who are around his age, like late 20s, early 30s, all of whom are these basically like aimless, low-level, just troublemakers. They all just seem to kind of be around trying to take advantage of people, scamming tourists, just trying to get money.

But none of them are running like a really elaborate racket or super involved in organized crime. One of their friends is a lone shark. Like that's about as high up as any of them get. But because Harvey Kytel's character has this uncle who is like a big, big kind of made guy, you know, is kind of connected. He has like a sort of a status that's a little above or outside of everybody else because of that. So all the other people are kind of like Matthew Bevelaqua. Yeah. Whereas he's more like Christopher Lutessonji.

It's a little, it's interesting. Yeah. And yet he is not like Christopher in that he is a kind of a more upright guy. He's Catholic and West Reyes Catholic and is like dealing with the guilt of what he knows he does and sort of his Catholic upbringing, obviously another big Scorsese theme. And that's in the background a lot, but you can tell in his character that he wants to be an upright guy. And Kitell is great in this, actually. I haven't seen Kitell as a leading man. He looks so young in this. He's like 30 or something. He looks like a little baby. And I picture him as Winston Wolf from Pulp Pictures. Because that was like the first time I ever saw. But even that was 30 years ago. So now he was. Is he alive? Is he alive? I think so. Yeah. And that was 20 years after this. So, you know, he was more like 50 in that movie. He was a middle-aged kind of weathered guy. Where in this, he's much younger. He is still alive and he is 87. Wow.

Wow. Good for Harvey Keitel. So he's great. And De Niro is remarkable. Like he is, he looks like almost a different person at times. He's so young. And yet you can see the De Niro that we got to know, even in later Scorsese films like taxi driver and enraging Bull, just like a few years later.

Is taxi driver after Mean Streets? Yes. I think six, yeah, those are like five or six years after. Okay. And that's when Scorsese had kind of found. I'm forgetting the name of the cinematographer, but he'd found a few more of his regular collaborators. And De Niro had had more time to kind of grow, to become physically larger and just kind of to discover his, like, physical self on screen. It's pretty scary and taxi driver.

This version of De Niro is this, he's this very skinny, like, kind of like, almost punk. He has a sort of a punk energy. And he's, Johnny Boy, the character is this, like, absolute, like, wild troublemaker who's just, he has debts all over town. and he's like the doomed friend of Harvey Keitel where like everyone is kind of always telling him, dude, you've got to cut this guy loose, he owes money to all these people, he's going to put you in a position

where you're vouching for him and he screws you over. He's drunk all the time. He's reckless like he is going to get himself hurt or killed, and yet he's also so charismatic in the way that De Niro plays him. He's this undeniable guy that you kind of like keep him around.

And so that's the kind of central relationship in the movie, though it explores a lot of other things as well. And you can see Scorsese and his cinematography. Who is a cinematographer on this film? Kent Wakeford, who I'm not super familiar with. But this is that kind of early, like, young Hollywood, like there's this kind of new Hollywood style of filmmaking that's taking over. And this film was like one of the kind of the landmark films in that school. And there are these scenes. It's so fun. They get in this fight in a pool hall at one point, and the camera is just running around behind one guy as he's fighting.

You get a lot of those big, long, exciting sequences that Scorsese likes to set up where there's no cut and the camera is moving through all this choreography with everyone in the room. There's a lot of really ambitious stuff. There's a car chase that's incredibly scary and intense, and they're working with a budget. It's not a crazy budget, but a budget, but also just a lot of ingenuity and creativity. And if you're at all into filmmaking, this movie will just totally light you up. Like it was just so fun. Sam and I were just sitting there being like, look at this. Oh, look at that. Look at this. The whole movie. And then the performances are so much fun. It has this, you know, stagey kind of old-fashioned quality to it. But it's also very naturalistic. And it's shot in New York. And it's just, you're just looking at these vistas of just kind of trashy, 1973 New York. It's so distinct looking, you know, the seven-up branding that is everywhere because there was just seven-up stuff around the city. All of the stuff they shot was just on the streets of the city.

And so you really get that feel for that, like, gritty 70s, New York that is a very particular period in time. So this is a cool movie. I really recommend it. Sam recommended it, or he, it was his idea to watch it. And I'm really glad because I wouldn't have thought to watch it. I would have, I don't know, there are plenty of other Scorsese movies I haven't seen that I would go to first. But actually going back to the beginning is really cool. And I think the two of you would love it.

And at some point, we'll have to talk about it in the context of the Sopranos, too. because I think that, well, for starters, it features a young David Praval, the actor who played Richie Apreal. He came on screen and I was like, wait, I know that guy. And he's just so much younger, but it's Richie Apreo, which is just fun. But also, like, thematically, we've talked about this some when we talk about the Sopranos. I think that Scorsese is in an interesting place where if you go back to the Godfather, as the characters on the Sopranos so often do, the Godfather is that Coppola type of filmmaking is so much more the 1950s, the earlier generation. of, you know, of mafia, of gangster guy.

And then Goodfellas is so the movie about the generational divide and how it all fell apart when the new generation took over. And this movie is also kind of about that because he has this uncle who seems like very much this more refined old-fashioned gangster, but he and his friends are just a disaster. And I guess it's also interesting just thinking of it as a movie that was made and is set during the Vietnam War when so many men, young men, these guys age were overseas in Vietnam fighting.

And these guys are in America, not fighting, and just like absolutely going to seed and ruining the community for everyone around them, which is something that I just thought was interesting, like considering the time period for the movie. Anyways, there's a million thoughts from me about Mean Streets, a very cool movie that I hope some people go out and watch and that I hope the two of you go and watch because you would both, I think, really get a lot out of it. Yeah, I think I would. I think Taxi Driver was one more thing for me a while back, if I'm remembering right, and

It was very cool. I really like going back and watching these movies that I missed because I either wasn't alive or didn't come up for me in film class in college or whatever it may be. They can be really illustrative. Yeah, I think you'd really like it a lot. And yeah, that's our episode. We did it. We updated triple-click picks. Everyone can stop emailing us further.

You're welcome. Maybe we'll do it in less than three years. We should try to do it like every September or something. No promises. No, definitely no. We would never make a promise. We know better than to make promises, but we can try. We can promise to try.

How about that? That's a good one, yeah. All right, well, I will see the two of you next week. See you next week. 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 Maximumfund.org slash join. Email us at triple click at Maximumfund.org and find links to our merch store and our Discord server in the show notes.

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