Triple Click - Triple Play: Mass Effect

Episode Date: May 27, 2021

It's Mass Effect time! Maddy, Jason, and Kirk are all playing the remastered version of BioWare's sci-fi trilogy, and really, who needs an excuse to talk Mass Effect? The gang talks about what it's like to revisit Mass Effect all these years later, what has or hasn't aged well, and of course, who they'd all like to smooch.One More Thing:Kirk: Subnautica: Below ZeroMaddy: Little Fires EverywhereJason:  World’s End ClubLinks:Kirk’s now-mangled Kotaku post about the hidden music in Mass Effect 3: https://kotaku.com/mass-effect-3s-musical-secret-5895616Support 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

The humans, the Asari, the Turians and Silarians, the Krogan, the Quarians, the Hanar, the Volus, the Elkore, the Drel, the Betarians, and Vorchak. Welcome to Triple Click, where we get the Racknigh to you. We're talking about the new re-release of Mass Effect today, and we've got a lot of reapers to biotic implant. The Cerberus is in the veil and the relays and the citadles, so grab your Omni-Tool and let's Skillian Verge. I'm Kirk Hamilton. I'm Maddie. And I'm Jason Trier, and we are back once again. Yeah, we are.

For another podcast. Guys, guys, you want to hear something crazy? Always. This weekend, my wife Amanda and I went out to eat indoors for the first time in a year and, what, three months? A year and three months? That is crazy. And it was weird. We're sitting there like without mess on, nobody's wearing a mask.

Like, people are eating and enjoying themselves. It just felt like life was back to normal for a while. I had also got, I went to the gym that same day and nobody was wearing a mask there. It's just very, it's all very strange. It's all been very strange being in a while. this post-vaccinated world. Yes. Yes. I've had that feeling as well. All right. Well, we're a totally listener-supported show. We love you all for supporting us.

And you can find out more about supporting us at maximum fun.org slash join. Thanks to everybody who joined during Max Fun Drive 2021. And we have a little late Max Fun Drive bonus coming to you all this coming Monday at the end of the month. We already recorded this actually with the besties and my brother. my brother and me is Justin McElroy as a guest. We talked about Portal, did a whole portal beans cast, and it was super fun. That game is really, really, really fun to talk about. We all replayed it. That's also a really good game. But anyways, go to Maximumfund.org to join to become a member. And thanks so much to all of our members. And you know, speaking of

games from 2007. Great segue. Beautiful. Thank you. I'm proud of it. We're going to be talking about a game series that started in 2007 on this episode. And, geez, then it just kind of went from there. And then it really never ended, because Mass Effect never really ended, even though it kind of... They'll never stop Mass Effect. It was put on ice for a couple of years, but it has since been pulled out of cryogenic freezing. It was sent in one of those chambers, like an Andromeda, like on the ship.

Right, right, right. And then it woke up. So we're going to be talking about the Mass Effect legendary edition, the Mass Effect trilogy that was recently re-released by Electronic Arts, on this episode. It's going to be a triple play. And I'm driving this episode and I made some notes, but I feel like everybody has had so many opinions about Mass Effect over the years. I know the three of us all have. We've all been replaying it. I'm at least, I beat Mass Effect One already. I kind of just blasted through it on casual and got up to Mass Effect 2. I have so many thoughts. I just, I want to talk to you both about this series for like 10 hours, but we're going to make a single episode due, I suppose.

But yeah, I guess to start with how far are you both in this game and just, what are you thinking of it? Jason, you can go first since I always call on Maddie to go first. Jason. Oh, thank you. What a kind, what a kind little surprise.

Yeah, well, so I played all these games when they each came out and I really liked them. I've always liked Bauer games. I'm more of a fantasy guy than a sci-fi guy, so like Mass Effect

didn't resonate with me quite as much as like Baldur's Gate or even Dragon Age, but I always liked them. And replaying the first game, especially, it's easy to see why this series has resonated with so many people

because there's so much good stuff in there and so much stuff that's like aged super well. The writing and the setting and the way that it slowly introduces stuff to you, but also quickly it feels it's very well-paced in terms of like throwing proper nouns at you and throwing lore and terminology and you're even kind of introduced to the alien races in a gradual way so you can get to know like, oh, okay, this is a Krogan, this is a, these are the gath, et cetera, et cetera. And the names are all really good. Like you know, when you hear the word geth, you know, that's like evil robots. When you hear the word Krogan, you know, that's like a big lumbering something or another, right?

And yeah, it's aged really well, I think. I mean, the combat obviously is not great. I played, so I played with the first Mass Effect. I played up to, I got Liarra and then I'm up to Navaria. So not super far, a couple hours in. And then I skipped ahead to Mass Effect 2 just because I wanted to compare and contrast. and Mass Effect 2, you jump in and immediately it's like, whoa, the combat in this game is so much better and more modern feeling. With the first game, I picked the class where you're a distant shooter, a distant fighter, and so I've been using the sniper rifle.

And when you use the sniper rifle on enemies in the first game, like sometimes their health part doesn't even pop up because you're too far away from them. Which is funny because they've improved the sniper rifles significantly from how it was real bad when that game first came out. Yeah, I don't even remember. I don't remember how bad it was in the first game. But in general, it's a really good remaster. I'm playing on PC. It all runs really smoothly and looks good and sounds good. And most of everything is held up, except for the combat in ME1.

And then you start two, and it's like, man, this is so much better in so many ways. And so I kind of, I want to spend a little bit more time replaying too, because that is the game that I remember being like really the standout, the masterpiece in terms of like just the character development and the way that it's all set up and having Martin Sheen there to lecture you, Jed Bartlett's style about Cerberus. He's like, man, we have to, you see, both sides of this universe have some good ideas. And so, yeah, I mean, it's quite a series. It's quite a space opera, I will say.

Nice. Maddie, how are you finding it? I'm loving it. I'm about an hour away from the end. If I had just gone to bed a little later last night, I would have beaten Mass Effect One. and I thought about it, but I went to bed instead of that. That was wise. I played Mass Effect 1 in 2007, but I have kind of dreamlike memories of it. Like every now and then I'd be like, oh yeah, this part.

And then more proper nouns or whatever plot points would be thrown at me. And I'd be like, wow, I don't remember any of this at all. And I'm sure that will also happen with Mass Effect 2 and 3 when I get to them. Although at that point we're at least getting further in time. And the difference with those two games as well is that I reviewed those games. So I was still in college when the first Mass Effect came out. I was an intern at the Phoenix, but I wasn't reviewing games yet. So I just played Mass Effect one in a more casual way,

and so far as you play a game that you're not taking notes on to review. But I have much stronger memories of the second and third games. So in that way, it was kind of fun to replay it. And also, I feel like I'm a completely different person than I was. 14 years ago, and I don't feel the same way about all the characters. Not in a bad way. I still really enjoy the game. I just, there's certain parts of it that I'm just like, wow, this definitely hits me differently now than it did back then. Like, I used to think that Garris was the coolest character in the world, and he still is, like his voice actor, I don't know who it is, but he has

this real Jeremy Irons thing going on. And I romanced Garris the first time I played the game. This time I'm romancing Learra, because I'm trying to change it up. So, Garris is like an ex-cop. who's a loose canon and all of his anecdotes about that, I was just like, I don't know about this. Like, I'm playing this now. I'm like, I don't know if that's that cool, Garris. I don't know if maybe you should be torturing people you're interrogating. Maybe you shouldn't do that, buddy.

That seems kind of bad. I don't know. But like he's always in the right. He's always, like, that's kind of the thing about this series is that you are also superwoman. You are always in the right as well. I mean, we can talk about that more when, we describe what these games are actually about, but they're kind of like Star Trek, but if Captain

Picard were like a super cop who was in control of the entire galaxy and like could decide the fate of it and also made the right decisions every step of the way. Yeah, I want to get into the whole Star Trek of it all and like where this series fell in the sort of also in the evolution of Star Trek and in sci-fi on TV specifically because I think this series has a lot in common with sci-fi TV. We can get to that maybe. I guess I should recap for everybody. I mean, you play Commander Shepard.

You're this person who is essentially elevated to be a super cop. Like you don't have any rules. You become a specter in the first game. And then in each game you're either reinstated as a specter. You can actually tell them to screw off in the second game and just be a rogue badass. But you're always kind of the leader of an army

or an elite team that's trying to save everyone. while people won't listen to you about the true threat and you're trying to fight off these aliens called the Reapers and we're not going to do a whole lore explainer though I wrote a whole lore explainer for this game for Kataku back in the day and I do know I know my Elkhore from my Hanner but I agree with you Maddie that this game hits me differently now when I'm playing it and it also I also

you were mentioning how like where you were in your career when you played the first game so each of these three games Mass Effect 1, Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 They each came out at different points in my career with regard to video games in a way that really hit me as I was replaying Mass Effect One. Mass Effect One was 2007, which I've mentioned before is the year that I got back into video games. But I was still like teaching jazz at a high school and not working in video games at all. And I just totally played. I binge it in a weekend.

And I remember just being like, this is so cool that a game is like this, like that I get to play this like sci-fi movie video game. And then Mass Effect 2 was 2010, which was like right when I was getting into writing about games. I think I just started at Pace as the games editor. So it was shortly before I started at Katakou. The game that launched a billion blogs. Yeah, there was a lot to say about that game. And then in 2012, Mass Effect 3 is when I was already at Kataku. And I was like very aware then of that game.

And like the press buildup. I remember going to a preview event for that game 83. And then of course the like controversy after it came out and all these like sort of think pieces that were written about the ending. And then the subsequent way that by. where it changed it. So it's like each game is at a different point in my career. And now Legendary Edition is out and I'm like not a game journalist anymore and I can just sort of play through

all three of them which I'm really excited to do. So yeah, then I guess just really quickly for my part I started Mass Effect 1 and was like, oh maybe I'll just play a little bit of this, we'll see how it goes. And then immediately was like, oh my God, I'm going to play this entire game. A lot of that

sense memory for me is the music. Jack Wall and Sam Hewlett composed the music for the first game with some other composers as well. But that I'm going to go ahead and say that Mass Effect One has one of the top five greatest opening main menu themes of all time. It's called Vigil is the piece of music. And here's a fun fact for people listening that I will just tell people that I wrote a Kotaku Post about this. But this is a fun thing to listen for if you're playing this trilogy, in Mass Effect 3, when you're standing on the bridge of the Normandy, like in the main room, the engine vibrations, in the engine vibrations, you can hear the pitches of Vigil. playing out very subtly behind the vibration on the engine.

And I was sitting there playing this game and thought I was hallucinating when Mass Effect 3 came out. And then I was like, I am not hallucinating. I was like, it's there, that's it. And it was like those same chords. Bana, na, na, na, na, na. Like it moves through those notes. And I wrote about it. And then one of the composers, or someone at Biower confirmed it.

They were like, oh, my God, I'm so glad someone finally noticed this. Like, this is for real. Bing! Kirk from the future here, I went back and checked out that post. It was actually confirmed in the comments by Rob Blake, at the time was the audio lead for Mass Effect, he commented on the post to be like, hey, yeah, that was what it was. The post has been mangled by the ravages of time, but the audio and the video that I captured

is still there, so I'm actually going to play a clip of that, and I want you to listen for it, you just heard a vigil playing in the podcast, and now listen, you can just hear it kind of subtly nestling its way into the hum of the engines. It's so freaking cool. So like I said, it's subtle, but right now that F is playing, do, and you can hear it kind a resolve down to the E. You hear it? And now it goes down to that D.

It's subtle, but easier to hear when the game is paused. When you unpause it, it's still there. It's just harder to hear. Hear it still? See, I just wanted to share that because I think it's really cool. Blake said they hit a lot of stuff like that throughout Mass Effect 2 and 3. So keep your ears out if you're playing the games. All right, back to the show.

Bing! Well, of course, only Kirk Hamilton would notice it. I don't always notice things like that, but I was proud of myself for noticing that. And it is a fun thing to keep an ear out for. if the two of you play it. So the music was the thing that made me play it. And then, like, a few hours in, I was kind of like, wow, this game is pretty tedious a lot of the time,

like when you're really just playing it. And I kicked it down to casual difficulty after a couple hours. I did too. And then just blasted my way through it. It took me, like, less than 10 hours. That is the way to play. I'm going to actually suggest it is a good way to go. Because you can finish the game very quickly.

Like, it's funny. Like, when you're at Noveria, you're only a few main story missions from the end of the game. You can do a few side things, but it's really just like, Noveria, a couple other places, then Vermeier opens up, and that's like the big showdown. That's the big, yeah, yeah. Yeah, which will be, well, and we know some people are playing this game for the first time, so we're not going to get into super specifics.

There's no reason to. Yeah, we'll avoid spoilers. But this was, I mean, there's some, we should talk about that choice, because I think that choice, being really vague, this is a game that really promised. So, by where back of the day, I don't know how many people were following gaming news and following the gaming industry really close. back then, but Bioware was, um, back in the early 2000s to mid-2000s, Biware was really one of the only, if not the only company that was doing these big story-driven RPGs with choices that had

impact on the story. And that was kind of like an unprecedented thing back in the day. And we saw some of it. We saw like early bits and pieces of it with the Infinity Engine games back in the day on PC. And then more of it with Cotor. And then, um, really, Mass Effect was the first game that came out and was like, don't forget Jade Empire. We are not a podcast that erases Jade Empire. But Mass Effect One really like, like, gave you these choices that would really impact the story in a way that most games would not dare do because most games will not dare ask you to choose like who to sacrifice and like permanently lose from your party for the rest of the game, which is a choice in this game. I won't spoil all the details, but but that's a choice

in this game. And that was really mind-blowing back then. The other thing that this game really pioneer that I think is worth noting because it's kind of quaint to look back on now is the concept of a dialogue wheel where, A, it's a wheel, and so it's easy to kind of select options as opposed to just line after line after line, which is what most text-based RPGs like with dialogue, branching dialogue let you choose from. But also that the options you would choose from weren't actually what you said. They were just kind of the gist of what you said. And today, that's super common. You see that in a bazillion games. But Mass Effect, as far as I can remember, was the first game to really do this, certainly the first Bi-War game to do this. Before Mass Effect, you would choose the line of

dialogue, and then your character would say that. But because Mass Effect was like full production values, voice acting, they didn't want to have to like go through the tedium of you reading a line and then seeing it out loud. So instead you choose the gist of the line and then they read it outline, which is a brilliant, brilliant way to kind of solve that problem. And I think it's really cool, even today. Yeah, it's brilliant, though. It's also it can go wrong a lot of the time. I think there's been a lot of really interesting takes on, for example, Fallout 4, which tried to be the same thing and fail. So it does take good writing. Like, you need to have good synopsies, and usually mass effects are good. There's also just a nice little, for all the terrible UI in this game, which there is just so much,

especially in the first game, is just incredible, like how bad every interface element is. I think that the way that they implement, I guess this is just UX, not UI, but the way they implement the dialogue where you can pick what you're going to say next while the person this is. still talking and it's a little more like you're like pointing to lines in the script for the actor to say which then you know your shepherd will say the line like is usually in a natural flow of conversation that the loading sometimes gets in the way and there's like a weird pause but you know like that's the idea I think that's also like a cool implementation yeah yeah yeah it's uh the the to your point about the UI I was thinking so in the first game um the weapons are all just

like Avenger and Phoenix or whatever these weird generic names don't even get me started you can't Even in like in like the radial where you select weapons, you can't even see what they do. And when you're picking up new weapons, it's all just a big mess. And actually reminded me of a game that would come out a few years later called Dragon Age 2, where one of the my big bug bears of that game was that all of the equipment was like called things like ring. And you would just have to check it to see what it did. It was all just ring and necklace and stuff. And yeah.

Yeah, there's no good way to sort equipment, right? Like you just have to do it manually every single time. It's so annoying. completely ignore inventory, which is the actual way to play the game. Yeah, you just ignore it. Yeah, I think, Kirk, I think that's a good idea and maybe I'll go revisit it. I was enjoying playing starting too, but maybe I'll revisit one with on casual difficulty and enjoy more. It's still tedious, though, even with the casual difficulty, just because of the way that the game is designed. Yeah, the Mako driving is tedious. Like, yeah, there's, there's the Mako. I pronounce it,

Mako, but I guess I don't, I don't know how that that vehicle is pronounced. But it's a, it's the infamous vehicle in the game, the truck that you drive around on planet surfaces. I actually don't mind that so much, but I'm playing this game on PC the first time I'm around. I played it on Xbox. So that's already a big difference. And controlling the MAKO with WASD is fine for me, at least. I don't mind it. I more feel like the TDM comes into play with like just quests where you need to walk down a really long hallway and press one button and then walk all the way back to talk to one person about one thing and then walk to another location that's quite far away and do one thing there and then walk back. There's a lot of that in Mass Effect. So yes, it's just a half-baked

and tedious game, I have to say. And I think that actually all that tedium, which you just perfectly described, like almost every quest objective is like walk to the end of this room and press a button. Every side quest environment is identical. There's been much said about all of this. And also just the way that every story mission has an obligatory like corridor that you just drive the car down for like 10 minutes shooting at turrets. And it's just like, especially on, like, it's trivial on easy, but it makes it more clear just how kind of thin so much of the game is, which I think actually emphasizes how strong the strengths are.

Because this game made this huge impact the minute it came out. And everyone was like obsessed with all these characters in this story. And it was this huge hit. And, you know, it like paved the way for this really big budget amazing sequel. And it's purely just on the strength of like the story and the world. music. I think the music is like a huge, really like can't say enough about how much I think the music did to like cast the game spell. But it's all that stuff that when you really play the game, you're like, okay, this is BioWare. They kind of never made a console game like this before.

They clearly didn't know how to make a shooter. They didn't have people on staff who were good at shooters. They weren't good at like controller interfaces. The way that like the things that some buttons do and other buttons don't do on the controller are just totally demented when you're like doing when you're used to playing modern games. But then it's fine because the strengths are so good, and also the last act of Mass Effect One is just incredible. Like, I remember finishing it and then just playing it again. I was like, oh my gosh, like this is so much stronger than a lot of the rest of the game. Like once you get back to the Citadel and like the whole final stuff is going down, really, really cool.

And then, for me anyways, it was so worth playing through the game because I could make that jump into Mass Effect 2. And I was like, this is the whole reason I'm doing this, is I want to experience again the feeling that I had playing the first hour of Mass Effect 2. which one of the most exciting beginnings to a game, the beginning of that game is just like gangbusters. And it was so cool playing it and seeing what happens when you just have way more people, clearly way more money and time and resources. Everything about it is pumped up.

It's not just the combat. It's like the writing, the lighting, the graphics, the characters, the voice actors. You've got Martin Sheen and what's her name from Chuck? And then the guy Saul Tai from Battlestar Galactica and Carrie Ann Moss and like all these famous great actors and like it's just the way that it jacks itself up for mass effect too is amazing and i'm looking forward to playing mass effect too for like ever i'm going to do everything in that game i think

yeah and the combat is really so striking like you get in and it's like oh my god there's ammo now so you don't have to worry about your weapon's freaking overheating all the time which is such a pain in the ass um and like wow it actually feels like you're hitting the enemies and you're not just kind of like shooting shooting blobs and like watching a reticle whole kind of look weird. Yeah, it's definitely a Yeah, and there's like the wheel for your abilities, right? Instead of, I haven't even gotten to Mass Effect too yet, but I still remember that the controls

for controlling your special abilities are just significantly easier to use than in this version where it's like, you press shift and then you select something. Like, it's it's such a mess. Like you can only... I don't care because I loved it. Maddie, you should play with a controller on PC.

That's what I've been doing and it's way better. I mean, okay, but I'm enjoying the sniper rifle finally being good and just click So it's not better with a controller because with a controller you can still only hotkey one ability of this like huge weird wheel of abilities that you have. And like some of them is just an ability that makes your gun work. It's like you know the one it's like gun marksman or whatever? And it just makes your gun good for like five seconds. And so I'm always like having to pause the game.

What's Mass Effect 2, it's been interesting playing it right after Mass Effect 1 in a lot of ways. Like just so interesting. Like people could skip straight to Mass Effect 2 if they don't have time. Like, that would be fine, especially because they included the Genesis comic they did with Dark Horse, which is super cool. I loved that comic. I think it was only in the PlayStation 3 version of Mass Effect 2 at first. But now everyone can finally see it, and it's really good. And you can, like, make all the choices from Mass Effect 1 if you want.

But playing the game right afterward, it's like, it's interesting if you're interested in video games. Like, a thing they change is that you don't have cool downs on individual abilities. You just have one cool down. So, like, you'll use a biotic ability. And then you just have a cool down time. that's a few seconds. And that little thing around your reticle, it's like a ring that goes open. And then once it's closed, boom, you can do your ability again. So I'm playing Mass Effect 2. I switched classes to be a vanguard, which is the most fun class, I think, in Mass Effect 2, where your

special ability is that you do this charge, you like warp through the wall and just blast into people, and you do all this damage and knock them back. And then you have a shotgun and you can just shoot people. So it's like, it's a thing that would never, ever work in Mass Effect 1 at all, even though that class exists, they just completely changed it. And because of the way that abilities work, you can regularly just charge your way around the field and it's so fun. Like it's just, it's actually fun to play. Where in Mass Effect One, it's just totally bizarre. Like, the artificial intelligence in Mass Effect One, the way those enemies will just run at you. Like, what is going on? It's just so weird. Your teammates don't help you at all, I mean.

I thought that was the AI that I thought you were going to talk about is just the fact that you're going to have to carry them around. I was doing that mission where you have to try to not kill all of the villagers. There's like 16 villagers that you need to not kill. And I was on the last one and Rex just killed the villager. And I was like, dude, why? And so it's like 50 villagers survived. And I'm like, are you serious right now? Like, why did, why did I do this? But I still love the game. I should, I really can't complain. I mean, the thing, the thing about the game that I love so much that we can get to is like, it's the characters, it's deciding who you want to ally with. It's talking to people for like three hours about their feelings and their backstories and their parents or whatever nonsense they've got going on.

That is all worth it to me. It is a soap opera. It is Star Trek. But it's more like DS9 flavored than TNG flavored in a lot of ways. Yeah. So a striking thing especially about the first Mass Effect is how, especially playing it on casual, the combat is so clearly filler. Yes. Like I've said, like I already said, you know, like we've all said, it's not the strength of the game. Like it's not the thing that made people like the game. And I think these days, like this many years later, if one thing has changed, it's that more people are okay with the idea of a game where the whole game would just be, you know, you're a bit of a more of a Picard than you are a Commander Shepard. Like, you don't bring a gun to every situation. It's a lot more,

you know, going with Talley to, like, represent her in the trial, which is like the most Star Trek shit. You know how Picard is like always the guy who has to go be the, be the lawyer for whoever, like, or represent. Yeah, but that stuff is awesome. Yeah, it rules. And it's Yeah, and that's always the best stuff. Like, those are the most memorable moments. And, you know, I think there's more appetite for a game that wouldn't even need the combat, as good as the combat became in the later games, where you could just make a, like, Quantic Dream style or Telltale style version of this.

And it's actually kind of surprising that no one did. Like, one thing that sticks out to me this game, and I'm wondering if this is sticking out to the two of you, is the ambition of this series has actually not been matched in this specific way of, like, telling a three-part, like, TV, three-C-season. with like a massive series finale, like with that kind of storytelling ambition. There have been other ambitious games, but no one's tried that since. And I wonder what the two of you make of why that might be.

Well, what game publisher is going to commit to like a three-game deal before seeing how the first one even performance? I mean, it reminds me of Zeno Saga, which is this Japanese series of games that was made by Monolith before they started making Zeno Blade. But after Zeno Gears, which was a success. and the director of the game wanted it to be a six-part game, and he announced it as like a six-part epic saga, but like eventually it got to game two. And it was like, all right, we just have to end this with three. And he was not able to realize his dream, his vision,

because the games just didn't sell enough to justify a six-game saga. And I mean, that's what happens in game development. I mean, we've talked about game development's various woes. It's very difficult to say we're going to commit to 400 million dollars to make a trilogy, an epic trilogy. I suppose you don't have to commit, though. You can just kind of try it and make the first game and see if it's good and sort of build from there.

Sure, yeah. I feel like that's almost what Mass Effect One does. Like, obviously the game continues, but there's a version of that ending that I feel would work if they just changed a couple things. Like there's a version of it where you could have the story end at the end of Mass Effect One and have it be cohesive. And I feel like it's written that way in part because over the course of development, they were probably like, we might just have this be a one and done. But then

obviously the game was going well enough. Maybe they did enough playtesting that they were like, people are going to love this. They're going to love these wacky aliens. They're going to fall in love with them. They're going to want to hang out with them for two more games. And then they just made the ending more open ended. But it did feel kind of speculative to me. I feel like the only other comparable thing is Dragon Age, obviously, which is just another biower game. And when people describe missing bioware and the original bioware, like the preanth, them bioware. This is what they mean, I think, is the fantasy novel style of it's a series. You get to know many characters and a ton of lore about this world and you care about the world and saving it

because you're always saving the world in a video game, no? And that's what people miss. I mean, it's what I miss, which is why I'm still playing this video game, even though I think the saving the world stuff is pretty corny by 2021 storytelling standards. I'm still like, yeah, whatever. It rules to be a character who is awesome and everybody keeps talking about how awesome I am all the time because I am awesome. Right, yeah, Commander Shepard is pretty awesome. These days, I feel like most game developers

because the stakes are so high, so much higher than they were in 2007, the budgets are so much higher than they were back then. Development costs are higher. Everything's higher. Risks are higher. I think that there are fewer game developers who would be willing to put in budget for a game that is like eight playable characters,

but the player can only control three, and so the player will not actually get to experience, like the bulk of the story, or even just the big choice. Like, you will permanently lose the character, and we have to script and create scenes for, like, all the different permutations of ways that could happen. Because, like, all that shit is expensive.

And I just don't know that there's an appetite for it because the bar has been raised so high for, like, what publishers and gamers expect for graphical fidelity that, like, everything is just so much more expensive to do. And a mass effect today, they probably would have cut half of those choices from the final game because it was all just too expensive. Maybe, yeah. I think it kind of requires maybe rethinking what the game would look like.

I look at the fact that Netflix, for example, is very excited and interested in getting into making video games and imagine some not as ludicrously expensive as version. Like the one that we're imagining is the ultra-polished, you know, that looks like a modern version of this with all this stuff, like Anthem, you know, that kind of thing, like a massive, always on world with characters. Because that's what fans expect. It's worth knowing it. That's what the expectation is. Okay, but fans can expect one thing and someone

could give people something that they weren't expecting. That's really great. And I could see, like it feels so much, playing this game, feels so much like getting a box set for a show that I really love with, like, extended scenes. Like, the fact that all the DLC is included, there was so much DLC for Mass Effect 2 and now it's all just seamlessly into the game. Like, I met Kasumi on the Citadel,

and she's just right there. And you can do the layer of the shadow broker and like all these really cool stories and there's a couple of those in mass effect one that i did too the one where the asteroid is like heading toward new terra and those feel so much like episodes of a tv show and i remember even at the time being like this is all i want is like i don't want this main narrative to start to speed towards conclusion like it is a very sad moment for me in mass effect too when there's kind of a point of no return in the story like i just it stresses me out like i hate that like my favorite part of the game is when you're just doing side missions and like do it,

have an adventures and each one is like an hour, hour and a half long. Because it's like you're getting to the final season of your favorite show and it's like, oh no, it's so sad. Oh no, they're killing off my favorite characters.

Now this is that. Yeah, they're going to reveal all the twists that I don't like and some that I do and, you know, whatever. And I'm very curious how it's going to be playing Mass Effect 3

just because I only finished that game, I think once. I had mixed feelings about the ending, but didn't hate it. I'm definitely not a hater. But there's all this DLC to Mass Effect 3. Like there's Mass Effect 3, Omega, where you go back to Omega, and there's like a whole thing with ARIA, and like,

I never played, I never played any of it because it was so, yeah, me either. Right, it was so final. It was like, well, the game is over. I'm not going to go back now. I played Citadel. I reviewed Citadel for Kitaku, and Citadel is amazing. Like, having Citadel before the ending of the game, I would imagine that on its own would, like, really improve the just feeling of finality to the series.

But I'm planning on finishing it, and I'm kind of curious what that'll be like. and it just, it feels so much like watching a DVD box set of a TV show that I have to be like, this can't be the last time this happens. There's no other game series that's quite like this, and I want there to be more just because it's really cool. Well, so I'm curious, without spoiling too much, obviously there was a massive controversy over the ending, a Mass Effect 3. People, players felt like, a lot of players felt like it didn't give them any real choice or like their choices didn't matter in the end. Again, not getting into specifics here. But then, by where put out, was essentially a DLC, I think they called it the final cut or something like that,

that changed the ending. I assume that's the version in this game. It is. That is like a revised ending. I don't actually remember anything about what they change or how they changed it, but is it satisfying to people, do you think? I don't know. I mean, I don't know how, I can't speak for people.

It's, they add some more stuff, but it's not like they change the ending to be a different ending. Like, it's still functionally the same. They just add some stuff to it. So it's like more fleshed out. I watched it. I never actually played it. But I'll be curious to see it all in context. And like the same way that beginning Mass Effect 2 right after Mass Effect 1,

like there's the scene where you revisit the Normandy early on in Mass Effect 2, that having just been there in Mass Effect 1 was like much cooler than it having been a few years. Like all of that kind of stuff are characters that I remember. There's a great scene where Morden references Captain Kirahee, who's the Salarian commander on Vermeier. And he gives this speech that you both aren't there yet, but you'll probably remember, where he's like, we held the line. And he's like, before there was the silent step, there was the Armada.

And we held the line. We'll hold the line. And he gives the speech. It's a good speech. I have seen it. Yeah, I know what you're talking about. And Morton is like, oh, I loved working for Kiri. A little bit long-winded.

Love to give a good speech. We must hold the line. And I was like, I remember that guy. I was just there. It's amazing because it's like an unskippable cutscene. Like there are some cutscenes where you can kind of like tab through somebody's monologue, but that one is not one of the ones for you. No, they're like, we're getting this speech.

So there's a lot of stuff like that where just because I'm playing it all at once. I'm just appreciating it in a different way and I wonder how the final acts and the sort of ending will feel. Just having I'm going to pretty much just play through this game pretty consistently over the next month or whatever. Like I wonder what that'll be like. You're like screw Final Fantasy 6.

Are you two really not going to tell me who you romanced in these games? We've gone on so long and you're not coming clean. I told you to tell me. I've played them a lot of times. So I played It's funny, my, like, first times through Mass Effect are kind of a blur.

Like, I played Mass Effect One as a dude. It was, like, before everyone knew that Jennifer Hale's performance was so great as Femm-Shep. And now I, like, see her as the one true shepherd, basically. I feel so bad for Mark Mears sometimes. Totally good actor. He plays, like, a Vortcha in Mass Effect, too, and he's great, too.

He, like, does all their voices. He's, like, I feel like almost no actor has been as unfairly maligned as Mark Mier. And it's just because there's this other great performance. Well, you say that, but, like, The stat is like 80% of players are male Shepherds, so I don't know if he's like in the real world. Yeah, but come on, you know he knows about, he knows what people say. Yeah, I mean, a lot of people don't even know that Jennifer Hale is, is fantastic as the female shepherd.

But also, like, a lot of the voice acting is kind of wooden in Mass Effect One. Like, I know it improves as time goes on, but like, there were certainly some moments in there when I was like, no one is really bringing it in this scene. But I think that's partly because it was a game that was doing something so different. And there's so much dialogue that you have to deliver that, I don't know. I think it's a challenge. So I don't blame Mark Muir. I think he was trying his best.

No, I don't either. And I've heard he's very good. Then the final scenes actually in Mass Effect 3, the Shepard really has some stuff to work with. And I remember Jennifer Hale just kills me in like the final hours of Mass Effect 3. Like that's one of the reasons that I like the ending of the game is because she's so good. Like I really came to believe in my Commander Shepard as like this person. So I think of her as my main shepherd.

But I played as both, which has different romance options. I'd forgotten that in Mass Effect 1, you can only romance three characters. You can only romance Leara, Caden, or Ashley. And so if you're a female character, like each, basically it's totally strict and like Leara can romance male and female characters.

So it's basically like you get one option and then like Learra's for both. And like that, it's so limited compared to where this series went, which is also, I think, a reflection of how they were like, oh, people love this shit. Yeah, like, oh, people want to date Geras? First of all, what's wrong with all of them? But second of all, what isn't wrong with them?

Because Garris is perfect. I see it. Now that I've just met him in Mass Effect 2, Garris is hot. Even though I'm with you on him being like... Even though he's a bird alien. He's still... Right. And he's like got some fascistic tendencies.

A little bit. But no, he's got so much swagger. And yeah, his voice actor is great. So anyways, I think I've romanced Liar. I did Liarra again this time through... Just because, like, Kaden has never been my favorite. He's very handsome man. But, you know, Leara is like...

just much more of a important character in the run of the series. And then, I don't know. I was Thane all the way in Mass Effect 2 and then Mass Effect 3, which is an incredible story. I might do that again because I was thinking about Garris, because Garris is so cool. But then I was kind of like, you know, Garris, I'm not totally on board with you in a sort of similar way. So I wasn't sure. What about you, Jason? I don't remember.

I don't know. Maybe you were a single. I don't know if I even did. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know if I even did. I just have no memory of, but like romance, I've never really cared about romance in these games, unfortunately. I know I have nothing but respect for people who are. It was such a hot topic with, with this game, though.

I know, with all the bi-roar games, like, nothing but respect for people who do care, but like I just has never been for me the video game romance. I don't think I've ever enjoyed a video game romance, unfortunately. I've wanted to, but. I mean, valid. Yeah, I just doesn't. And you know what? It's the thing that, like, I remember trying to get.

a sex scene in Mass Effect 2. I might have actually, or one of them, maybe three, I might have actually had Shepard sleep with the Navigator, which you can do at one point, or like the receptionist or whatever it is. Yeah, which is questionable in Mass Effect too. Which is extremely questionable, but I remember thinking that the sex scenes themselves are so terrible that it just really took for you. Oh, they're awful. Very awkward. I mean, and I think that that always kind of made me wonder, like, why are people so into the romance? But I, again, I respect that people are into the characters and like the romance. I mean, I don't think they're into the sex scenes. I feel like they're into the romance for the same reason that people are into the story in the games.

Like just the idea of having a well-rounded character. Yes, yes, yes. That's not the point. The point is more that the sex scenes are so ridiculous that they kind of took me out of it. I know. They really are. You know, though, it's very interesting to look at how BioWare's developers and writers, directors, like, got better at just scenes of intimacy.

And I guess you could call them sex scenes. Sure. They're barely sex scenes because I always think about. about the Iron Bull sex scene in Dragon Age Inquisition, which is totally different team, but I'm sure a lot of people who learn lessons from Mass Effect, and like how they lean more into humor. Like that scene, just to kind of quickly recap it for people, it's like, Iron Bull is this big huge dude, and, you know, you can have, like, I think male and female characters

can, like, have this liaison with him, and he's great, Freddie Prince Jr. voices him, who's also actually in Mass Effect 3. And there's just this scene where, like, you're, like, post-Quital in the bed, and then people keep walking in to give you updates. And then when they walk in, they're like, oh, God, I didn't realize. And, like, but then soon, like, everyone is just in the room with you because they keep not leaving. And it's like, Iron Bull is just loving it. And you're both kind of, like, sitting there.

And people keep talking. And it's really, really funny. It's like an amazing scene. And it's also, like, intimate and cute. And, like, it's, like, great writing for the character. And it's like, that's kind of why it's a really good reward for someone who likes Iron Bull and would want to, like, you know, get a really fun scene with him. Yeah. Rather than, like, the reward being.

And now you get to see, like, his butt or whatever. whatever, which is sort of how it feels in Mass Effect 1. It's like, look, Leara's got a blue butt. Yeah, and you get to see her side boob or whatever. It's really silly, though, because the end of the sex scene, no matter who you sleep with, they wake up naked in bed and then you're just standing there fully clothed, like on the other side of the room, like, hey. Just like watching them sleep and you're like, hey, that was really good. It's like, oh, this is the most awkward thing I've ever seen in my life.

Yeah, I had fully closed sex with Leara who was completely naked. Yeah, that's how it works. I guess so, but, but to, I think, I think you had asked many, your favorite character. And I always, my favorite character was always Morden, which I think is also, he only comes in in Massivect 2, if I remember correctly. So, so I think that's another reason that I just didn't, like, Massifact 1 didn't resonate with me as much. I think Massifact 2 is really when I started, like, loving the cast and, like, really getting into it. I finished Massifact 1 when it came out, but, like, wasn't as into it as I got into it. They kind of, there's good writing in Mass Effect One.

The very beginning mission, I remember there's this line. It's when you're talking to, I think it's Caden, but it might be Seth Green to Joker. Joker. Also, one of my favorites, Joker. Yeah, he does a great job, voice acting that. Yes, Seth Green is excellent. Yeah, he's great. And he gets a lot more to do.

He's very, very good. There's a scene where they're talking about Captain Anderson. And someone just says, like, the guy's got so many medals that he could melt them all down and then make a statue of himself out of them. Like there's just a lot of like fun writing like that that was just kind of on a level above most other video games, which had been true of BioWare for a while. So there's this like crackle in the dialogue a lot. There's like inventive writing and just a lot of fun language, just in sort of day-to-day language. But the characters aren't really cracked until Mass Effect 2. And then in Mass Effect 2, it's fully like, okay, now we're going to like apply the same level of care to the characters.

And we're going to get, like, that's where all the iconic characters come from. and it's where the characters who were in the first game return and become iconic. Like Garris' turn basically in Mass Effect 2 is like, that's when he becomes an interesting character. I remember finding him so boring in Mass Effect 1 the first time I played him. And then Rex is, I guess, the exception.

But that's really just because he has a great voice actor and kind of... Yeah, that's just his personality also. Yeah, fun personality. It says, Shepard. I like Rex. I feel like he's interesting. But I always thought the Krogans were just an interesting

plot line in general just because it goes along with the whole idea of just the different alien species having different cultures and the culture clash. I mean, Talley's an interesting character to me for the same reason where it's like, oh, there's this being who's from a totally different world looks completely different from you and you get to learn more about her life and like what her situation is. And I mean, that is the fun part of the games to me. It's not just like, oh, yeah, you get to romance like aliens, but it's also like you get to know the aliens and be friends with people who are different from you, and that's the Star Trek-esque message. I mean, it's very corny.

I wouldn't necessarily say the game is, like, really teaching you a lot about bigotry, although I think when it first came out, I thought that. But by today's standards, I'm kind of like, oh, this is very heavy-handed. But it's still enjoyable at some level to be like, okay, yeah, all these different species are working together, and they're trying to get along despite how different they are and how their cultures have clashed or like they're at literal war with one another in other

star systems and they have to deal with that. Those are the draws. Yeah, the quarians are an interesting one because there are things about their society that I had forgotten, like that the Admiralty Board is able to overrule anything. But once they do, they have to resign,

which I just think is like an interesting idea. Yeah, there's a lot of stuff like that in the game. I think it's striking that the story of the quarians which is basically we created AI, and then they turned on us and destroyed us, and now we're in a rag-tag fleet, like, trying to survive, is essentially the story of Battlestar Galactica. And that, I think that, like, just to put it in the Star Trek timeline here at the end,

the way that Battlestar Galactica sort of flipped the script on Star Trek, and of course was created in show run by Ron Moore, who was like a next generation, like, and also, I think, one of the other shows. Anyways, he's like a Trek guy who then created Battlestar. Battlestar was way more like moral gray areas, torture, political commentary, like, you know, having to make sacrifices, people dying for real and all this stuff that Mass Effect was tapping into, rather than the sort of more utopian, you know, the ideas that the next generation had been tapping into a decade earlier. And it's interesting to look now at how shows like The Expans and even Star Trek Picard, they look like Mass Effect. Like they take a lot of the design, the like floating Holo LEDs, the look of the ships, Picard looked a lot like Mass Effect and felt like a mass effect game, like assembling a crew and stuff. It's just that it's also got some Star Trek to it.

And it's at its strongest when it's more trekky. Like looking at the way that sci-fi now is drawing from Mass Effect after Mass Effect was drawing from sci-fi at the time. It's a really interesting time capsule for that period, the sort of, I guess Obama years period of sci-fi, starting, you know, when they started making the game in 2004, like the late Bush era. and then up till today and sort of just to I like kind of pondering what a modern mass effect would look like because Andromeda ain't it But there's something there's more in that world like there's there's definitely room for a new one Well we're gonna get one we're gonna get a modern mass effect

Yeah hard to imagine some point it is hard to imagine maybe they'll go back in time to like the beginnings Like a prequel the first contact prequel right with the Turians like the Turian war maybe they'll just call it mass effects They'll call it the mass effect. Oh, man. The Mass Effect. Mass Effect Modern Warfare. Rise of the Mass Effect. Well, when they do that, we'll be back to talk about it more.

And we may wind up doing a beanscast here down the road on this trilogy because I think I'm going to finish the whole thing. And Maddie, I think you were saying you might too. That'd be a fun one. So stay tuned on that. But in the meantime, let's take a break. And we'll be back for one more thing. I'm Dallas Taylor, host of 20,000 Hertz, a podcast that reveals the stories behind

the world's most recognizable and interesting sounds. For instance, the startup sound for the original Xbox was made with five basic ingredients. So now I've got my palate. I've got sawtooth, I've got triangle, I've got white noise, I've got a thunder sound. I actually wrote a little bit of code to reverse it. So now I had a reversed thunder sound, and I had my Glock and spiel. And when you're recording monster sounds for Minecraft, it helps to have the flu. My throat was shot, and I was like, this is the perfect occasion to make zombie sounds.

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And we're back for one more thing. Jason, why don't you go first? Oh, man, okay. I really have to get into this one, so I hope you guys are ready. I've been playing a game called World's End Club, and this game has been out on Apple Arcade for a while, not in its complete form.

It ends on kind of a cliffhanger, but the complete game is released on Switch on May 28th. I've been playing an early code provided by the publisher. And this game is wild. Man, I don't even know how to feel about this game. both love it and hate it at the same time. So this game is directed, written directed by Kutaru Uchikoshi, who is the writer and director of 999 and Zero Escape and that whole series.

And it is, the creative director is Kazitaka Kudaka, who is the writer and director of the Dangan Rompah series. So you think a game by these two powerhouses would just be incredible, right? This is like the blind faith of Japanese visual novels. So this game starts off with this incredible concept. You are trapped, or familiar concept, I should say, but you are trapped in this underwater theme park with a group of kids, and each kid has a wristband on them, and that wristband says what another one of the kids has to do, like a task for them, like whatever is eat a marshmallow. And if that kid finds a wristband with his task on it, does a task, they get to escape and everyone else dies. So it's like a deaf game. Everyone is

trapped by this cute talking animal. And then half an hour into the game, they all break out and suddenly it becomes a road trip. Suddenly it becomes a platformer game instead of a visual novel. And it is the worst platformer game I've ever played in my life. Like, it is the least fun platform mechanics that I've ever, ever played. So it's a game about, like, a destroyed version of Japan, like a post-abocalyptic world. And there's a lot of, like, interesting sci-fi concepts and cool plot twists and stuff like that. There's stuff you'd expect from a game by the creators of Dangan Rompah and Zira.

escape, but it is also a terrible platformer. And so it is this game where, like, you are zipping between, like, action sequences and then story sequences, and the story sequences are really intriguing and interesting, despite a few, like, kind of Japanese cliche quirks, like, there's one kid who's fat or, like, chubby, and so his whole plot line is that he eats all the time, and is obsessed of the food. But, like, aside from that stuff, the story is really interesting and intriguing and explore some interesting themes. And then it's just constantly peppered with these platforming sections that are truly horrible. Each kid in the game gets a superpower and that superpower is reflected in the platforming sections.

And it is just like the most, oh my God, I can't even describe how bad it is. In addition to feeling like super clunky and horrible to control and just terrible in every way, it also like pauses every time you get to anything to tell you what to do. It's like they can't even trust you to figure things out. It'll like literally tell you what to do every step of the way. God is the worst. And so here's a little bit of an anecdote before I finish this off. So I'm near the end of the game.

I just got to this sequence that felt like the climax. And the way that it works is essentially as you go on this road trip, you make choices and the story branches based on those choices. And you'll see kind of this timeline that's like a stage select screen. And you see like, okay, I went up. Oh, okay, went down. But when you get to this climax at the end of the game, you actually have to go back and revisit all those choices

and play through the alternate paths, which means even more platforming and I was so excited to get to the end of the game and I thought this boss then I thought was the final boss and I'm like oh my god no more of this platforming and then it's like no go back

into all the alternate alternate paths sorry this is a Japanese video game the final boss is never the final boss Oh my god dude but it's like the other games that these guys have made don't have like terrible gameplay There was a dangan rapa game

that was like a first person shooter wasn't there Oh yeah but that was a spin-off and you didn't really have to play it The same idea though where it's like why are you trying to do this? But like puzzle solving in these games is usually really good. Like the puzzle solving and the zero escape games is mostly good. Puzzle solving in Angarapa is mostly good and that's mostly talking anyway. It's like a weird trial section that's pretty fun. But like these games are great. This game is not and I'm really

sad about it because like I would not recommend it to anyone because of the platforming. It's so bad that like I would just watch the cutscenes online if you're curious about the story. Like it's it's that the platform is that bad. It's funny that you played so much of it and you didn't like it. I'm just like so intrigued by the story that every single night I'm like thinking of the switch and like like angrily playing through it and I'm like so frustrated at myself for playing through it but like I'm just so but the story is good and like the plot the characters are really cool and interesting and there are a lot of good ones and I like so much about it that it makes it really frustrating how bad the bad parts are you know you guys have played games like that where where you're so into a part of it that it like it makes

you want to keep playing but also you get even more frustrated by the awful parts, then you worried if it was just like, okay, this is a bad game, I'm not going to play anymore. So instead, you have to sec up the bad. And it's really, really frustrating. And I hate it so much. But also, it's, it's fun. Nice. All right, Maddie, what's your one more thing? Sure. Mine is a TV show. It's a Hulu original series. It's eight episodes. It's called Little Fires Everywhere. And it is based on a book by Celeste Ing. And it stars Reese Witherspoon and Carrie Washington, which in and of itself should recommend the show,

They're both just powerhouses, chewing scenery together, bouncing off each other angrily. That should sell it to you. But I will provide more details. It's a thriller. The very opening for shots of the show are that Reese Witherspoon's beautiful suburban mansion is burning to the ground. And she's staring at it in shock. And then for the rest of the eight episodes, you're like, which character is going to

burn Reese's house down? Is it going to be Reese herself? And there's all these different thriller moments where you're like, well, this person would certainly be motivated to do it or, oh, well, what about this person? And then, but it takes you back in time to Carrie Washington being just this single mother on the run. Seems like she's homeless. Reese Witherspoon sort of takes pity on her and is like, oh, I'll rent you this apartment at like a reduced rate. And they have all these awkward, like, kind of racist conversations. And you're like, oh, well, I get why Carrie Washington might not like Reese Witherspoon. But then a series of

continuously absurd, increasingly absurd thriller events happen that I don't even know. know how to spoil because this show is so unpredictable and includes so many family dramatic twists that I don't know I don't know how to describe it but it ruled and it's about motherhood and grief and a bunch of other like unsettling themes but it's also just cool so yeah I recommend it it's good show yeah this is so it's only eight episodes and then it's over that's like the biggest I'm love it I'm gonna go watch it yeah I'm gonna watch it this weekend yeah I'm all about the new the new limited series trend little fires everywhere yeah I'm into it little fire is everywhere yeah I'm into Little fires everywhere.

Yeah, I've heard good things, but that's cool to hear. My one more thing is Subnotica Below Zero, which is a game that I have been playing, now that it's in 1.0, after completing Subnotica the first, which is just called Subnotica. Oh, you finished that? I didn't realize that you finished the whole game. Yeah, I played a lot of it. I really liked that game a lot. So I said at the time when I think it was one more thing, I was like, I'll talk about it more,

and then I did something else for my one more thing later. So I did finish Subnotica, and now I'm playing Below Zero, just because I really. really liked it. It's a great time to be discovering Subnotica and to really like it because there's two full games, one of which is a lot smaller. Below Zero is a lot smaller. Bing! Kirk from the future here, interrupting myself just to give the summary

that I for some reason didn't give during this one more thing. Subnotica is basically an underwater crafting game. I did talk about it just a few weeks ago, but just in case you didn't hear that episode. You swim around under the ocean, you craft stuff, you craft more stuff, you make a new truck, you get in the truck, you craft compartments for

the truck. It's crafting an exploration. and there's sort of a story that you uncover on this alien world where you're underwater. That's what Subnotica is. It's really cool, but okay, back to Past Kirk. Take it away. Bing! I do like Below Zero. They've changed some stuff from Subnotica that I don't love. This is a kind of a common opinion, but they've added more story. There's a voiced protagonist, which is not just not really my favorite, even though I get what they're trying to do.

And I also like how they've increased the diversity, basically. like, you know, just like there's like more specificity to it and it makes the game just feel better like it feels like more like it's real people like in a real place. Can you back up a second? Is this like, is this a totally new game or is it taking Subnotica and doing something different with it? Like how does this relate to the first game? So it's, it's just like Subnotica, but smaller. It was initially I believe planned to be a DLC and so it's just a person returning to the same planet as you went landed on in Subnotica where you swam around under water. So different story in the same setting.

Yes, and a lot of the same, yeah, like, Carrie, it's like a sequel, you know, it's, I mean, imagine it as a DLC that just got too big and they released it as a standard. Got it. Okay. And then they changed a bunch of stuff in the process. There's a lot of streamlining, which is good. Like, it's more user-friendly. You don't have to figure out what you're doing quite as much. There's just, like, little quality of life things that are really nice.

You get crafting and making stuff a lot faster, which is cool. But it's also, I don't know, there's something that I like about the shagginess of the original game, where you're just kind of playing, and it takes you a long time to even figure out that there is a story. But then there really is one, and it's this really neat process of exploration and discovery that goes on for this, over this huge amount of space and depth and, you know, over time, where this game is much more like, here's the narrative, you're looking for this person, your character is kind of talking a lot. Like there's places you find there's other actual characters in the game

who talk to you and stuff. Like it has a much more, you know, high budget feel, which makes sense because they made a lot of money from the first game. And they're working on a proper sequel that I would imagine is going to take a lot of these ideas and refine on them more. My main hope for the sequel is that they back off a little bit of the story, I like how they're adding more characters. It's certainly nice that it's presenting a more diverse view of world.

It's cool how they've streamlined things. I just think there could be more space for the player and a little more room for just not knowing what to do and sort of feeling lost and screwing around and experimenting. Like I don't want them to go so slick that the sequel is this like really, you know, smooth, frictionless experience because part of the joy of the game is just cruising around underwater and like finding stuff and feeling kind of lost and overwhelmed. overwhelmed, like that's a really big part of it, and that's a little less present in below zero,

even though it's still great, and especially having just played the first game, it's cool to play something a little different after playing the first game, and it's also cool knowing they're working on more, like, these games, they're cool. They're like really, really nice in a way that I wasn't expecting. Oh, man. Yeah, I've, Samadica is on my list. It's on my two-player list. They're pretty neat. And, you know, if you do only have a little bit of time and you just kind of want to see what it's about, you could do worse than playing below zero. It's shorter. It's like, more contained, it's more streamlined. So it's kind of like...

But is it hard to go back to the first one after like doing the streamlines up of the second one? I think you could do it. But there are definitely things where you'd be like, oh my God, you can't pin recipes in this. Like, this is so much harder. But I mean, you could. I think it's a more natural to go the other way.

But if you don't have that much time, yeah, there's, you know, it's not a bad idea to start, to start with below zero. How many hours did it take you to finish the first, some not okay? A 20-something problem maybe. Oh, okay. That's not terrible. Yeah, no, you could play it a lot more. Like it's a base building game.

you could build a crazy thing and like, there's a bunch of stuff I didn't see, but I did finish it. And it's really cool with a story and like the ending is really cool. It's worth finishing. The problem, I was thinking to myself,

how do these guys, like how do you both have time to like finish almost finish Mass Effect? Like how do you have time to play so much stuff like in Curst case, finished on On Onica. And then I realized, oh yeah,

I like every time I'm playing a game interrupted to go play StarCraft 2 for like an hour and then go back to it. I'm like, oh right, what could it be? What could the problem? I thought you were going to talk about your baby,

but it's StarCraft 2. that's calling out to you and being like, Jason, she'll take a nap, she'll take a nap for like three hours and I'll be like, all right, I'm going to get some gaming in. And then I wind up playing StarCraft 2 for an hour and a half. And I'm like, oh, well, it's completely understandable. It's still gaming. All right, well, that'll do it for this episode.

Stay tuned for the Beans cast that will be in the feed next week. And we'll be back next week with more Triple Click. I'll see both of you then. See ya. 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. Find us on Twitter at Triple ClickPod. 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.

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