Video Gamers Podcast - Blue Prince: All Hype or All-Timer? - Gaming Podcast

Episode Date: April 21, 2025

Gaming hosts Josh, Ryan and Ace are diving into their thoughts on gaming’s latest hype craze, Blue Prince. Is this truly one of the greatest video games of 2025, or is this a case of gaming hype gone too far? We break down exactly what this game is, why people are talking about it, whether it works and if it’s ACTUALLY as good as people say. This is one video game packed episode you don’t want to miss from the Video Gamers Podcast! Connect with the show: Support us on Patreon: patreon.com/videogamerspod Join our Gaming Community: https://discord.gg/Dsx2rgEEbz Follow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/videogamerspod/  Follow us on X: https://twitter.com/VideoGamersPod  Subscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@VideoGamersPod?sub_confirmation=1    Visit us on the web: https://videogamerspod.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Air Canada, nice travels. Intro Hello fellow gamers and welcome to the Video Gamers Podcast. Blueprints burst onto the gaming scene with some truly incredible hype. Game of the year, best puzzle game ever, best game someone has ever played. The reviews and hype reached a frenzied level, but are they true? Is this game equal to the likes of Portal 2, The Witness, and Outer Wilds?

Or was this an internet frenzy that didn't quite match the game itself? Well, we're about to find out because we've played it and we're here to let you know what we think. But first, some introductions are in order. I am your host Josh and joining me, he loves the title screen and the intro screen, but he's not sure what all the other fuss is about. It's Ryan. You know, being called out by Santar was not the best day for me. I'm like, oh, come on man How do you how you gonna call me out like that?

Just to be fair. I have put if not the same amount or more time than Josh into this game So same amount we are both sitting at 14 hours. So Ryan Ryan did absolutely Play this game an awful lot. yesterday. Mine was just in one day, is all. Ace is like, oh man, is it me? Am I the guy that didn't play this game? Yeah! Well, we're gonna find out, cause joining us, you'll find him asking chat GPT

how to tell which box is true and which is false. And he never knew dartboard math could be so hard. It's ace. I'll have you know, the only puzzle I could get right was the box puzzle. Thank you very much. It was the only one that every single time was like, oh, one of us tells nothing but truth. One of us tells nothing but lies.

Oh, man. Yeah. Yeah, I remember this. This was in the labyrinth, man, and I never knew quite how people figured that out. You know, it's like the two doors and it's like one door always tells the truth, one door is lies, and then she's like, what would that door say? And then she figures it out. And I'm like, I don't, I don't get this. Yeah. What I do know is I have a 33% chance of getting that stupid box puzzle right. So, oh, man, guys, we're going to be talking about blueprints. I mean, this this game came out of nowhere. Do you I mean, nowhere.

It burst onto the gaming scene with people saying this is one of the best games I have ever played. People saying this game ranks up there with the likes of some of the greats. There were people that said, dude, I don't know that I've ever played a game like this before. And when you hear that kind of talk as gamers, we kind of go like, what?

What? What are you talking about over there? And it just so happened that it fell into that perfect moment where at least I was very hungry for like a good puzzle game. And the fact that this game had rogue like elements and stuff like that to it made it sound very, very interesting. As we know, sometimes internet hype doesn't quite match what the game itself is.

And so we all said, you know what, let's play blueprints. Let's see what the hype is about. And then let's come talk about it because because I wanna know if this is all true, because if so, oh my goodness, you're talking some of my favorite puzzle games ever, and if it's not, then what the heck is wrong with all you people that are saying this is one of the best games I've ever played?

So we're gonna be breaking all that down, but we do have a little bit of housekeeping that we need to get to, and man, my favorite, if we're gonna to be breaking all that down, but we do have a little bit of housekeeping that we need to get to. And man, my favorite, if we're going to call it a chore, cause it's housekeeping, my favorite chore in the world is thanking new people for supporting this podcast. So a huge, huge thank you to Jagged Son and you meet in a Tavern for both signing up for rare status to help support this podcast.

Both of you rock. Jagged Sun comes in, makes an enshrouded server for everybody, because a lot of people on our server are playing enshrouded. You meet in a tavern. I love that name, because that is 100% a fan of Dungeons and Dragons. Yeah.

If I've ever known a D&D player in my life, that's one there. So thank you to both of you. And for anybody else that might be considering it, we only exist because of the support from our listeners. I don't know if people know this, but there's a pretty good bit of expenses that go into hosting a podcast, websites, the games that we cover and stuff like that.

So if you are so inclined to be a part of that, there is a link in the episode description that you can click that will take you right to that option. And you can be a hero amongst the world, like Jagged Son, You Meet in a Tavern, and many, many others. So, and then Ryan, we made a promise. We're catching up on these reviews. We have two more we're going to need and you've got one. I believe

that you're going to start us off with, right? I do. So this one is a five star review from Ben bunk and it's, uh, titled top tier podcasts. One of the best podcasts out there. I love the culture and discussion of all these games. I don't know why each of these guys have the best and most soothing voices. Thank you. Great podcast that is very entertaining. Always listening during work makes my day way better. Dude, that's what we're trying to do. That's the best of goal.

Like legitimately, like I mean, we just got done talking about, hey, people can support this podcast to help this keep going. But ultimately, we talk about video games because we love video games, and the hope is that somehow, some way, we can make your day just a little bit better. If you're driving to work right now,

listening to our super smooth voices on your radio or on your, you know, your AirPods. Smooth. Yeah. Smooth. You know, Video gamer part.

Are we making your day just a little bit better? Come on down. Is your commute just not quite as bad? Did you just forget about the last two miles? Well, then you should probably pay attention while you're driving. Okay. You're behind a car. Come on.

Oh man. All right. and then I've got one. This one comes in from a dear friend of mine, named aka Wallaby. Fantastic dude, one of the best humans I have ever met in my life. And so thank you aka Wallaby for leaving us a review. And it is titled, Best Gaming Podcast, and it says, Phenomenal pod for anyone who loves games.

The hosts are passionate, fun, and bring a great mix of news, deep dives, and discussions. Whether you're into retro classics or new releases, there's something here for everyone. The production quality is top notch. Two thumbs way up. Yeah. Yeah. That's six thumbs now guys.

Who would have thought, cause I know you said that uh, how uh, you know, our video game knowledge, but according to Instagram and Tiktok and stuff, we're just, we're just dumb old men. We have no clue what we're doing. You know, that's the beauty. We've never said, hey, we're experts. We're just people that have been playing games for,

you know, 40 plus years for me. Right? Yeah. That's the beauty we've never said hey, we're experts. We're just people that have been playing games for you know, 40 40 plus years for me Ryan for yourself That long and ace probably like I don't know 60 years for ace All right, well that's it for the housekeeping guys, let's talk about a blue prince I mean, I kind of already preface this with the hype and and what people were saying Well, that's it for the housekeeping guys. Let's talk about a Blueprints. I mean, I kind of already preface this with the hype

and what people were saying, but what I really like kind of doing this is I was the one that I think really kind of got rolled up in that hype, you know? And I think I was the one that reached out to you guys and I said, hey, I'm gonna pick this game up. I'm gonna play it. Should we talk about this?

Is anybody else interested in it? And then Ace and Ryan, you'm gonna pick this game up. I'm gonna play it. Should we talk about this? Is anybody else interested in it? And then Ace and Ryan, you guys both went like, yeah, yeah, I'll absolutely play it. And then both you clowns didn't play it for like four days while you guys were playing Marvel Rivals while I'm being a good video game podcast host and I'm cracking out on blueprints. And then I kind of went, hey guys,

like how's blueprints going? And you guys were like, we don't know, but rivals is going really well. And then I went like, are we covering this game or what? You know, and then to your credit, you both buckled down and you guys both played the game. Ryan, I don't know that I've seen a marathon session that like you had yesterday.

What a turnaround, right? It was impressive, but I will say from my point of view, it was pretty hilarious, because you kept sharing screenshots, and then you would post your run that you had in this game and how you made it close to what you thought was the antechamber. And then it was like, I was just laughing,

because it's like, well, I know things you don't know about this. So this is a good place to say, listen, we're gonna try to keep things spoiler free in the beginning of this episode so that we can kind of just talk about the game and give people, you know, an idea of what this game is. If we get into any kind of deep spoilers, we'll do that later. And we'll definitely warn people as well, because I think this is a game that you don't want to have parts of it spoiled for you, but we

will be talking about things like the different rooms that you don't want to have parts of it spoiled for you, but we will be talking about things like the different rooms that you can encounter, some of the puzzles you come across, nothing game changing discovery type stuff. So we'll try not to spoil anything like that, but just be aware by the nature of us talking about this, we're gonna have to talk about some of the mechanics of the game and things that you come across there too.

So what was y'all's hype level for this? I mean, this came out of nowhere. We didn't really have a chance to build up a ton of hype on this. So I just want to start off and Ace, I'm going to go to you because I feel like you are the most down out of the three of us on this game. And I just don't know if it's like,

do you not like puzzle games? I don't know. I think I like puzzle games because I like Portal 2 and I liked what I played of Outer Wilds, and then I just like, I think I just lose interest. I think it's just part of that short form, content brained part of me,

where I just get into it and it's not being- Youngins, yeah. Yeah, it's not being spoon fed to me. I need things in 45 second increments or I can't. I need that yellow paint, all right? Yeah. Oh no. Tell me where yellow paint. All right. Tell me where to go. So you were not, you were not excited for this then. Ace, is that fair to say? Not particularly. I was excited when I saw the graphics and what it all looked like

and like the cell shaded look and the 3d environments and it being a rogue-like where you decide what rooms go where that excited me. But once I found out it's just a walking sim puzzle game, I was just like, Oh man. So I, for me, I, um, my hype level was just whatever you were yelling at me the whole time like guys we gotta play this game it's gonna be so great look there's hype all over the place and so I was like okay it's got to be at least decent you know I am not a big puzzle game guy I like puzzles in games I love when I'm playing an action RPG or

something and I love the the puzzles that lead to something But I don't like just strictly hardcore puzzle games So I wasn't super hyped but I was interested to see why it was getting so much praise and so much acclaim Like this early in to the release. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. I was easily the most excited about this again I kind of already mentioned it so I won't rehash it a lot But I was definitely in the mood for a puzzle game at the time It had been a long time since I had played one. I I'm gonna admit it man I'm a sucker for hype like legitimately, you know, we always say we're gamers, right gamers

sometimes gamers get caught up in hype sometimes they get caught up in the the The downside of like this game came out and everybody's saying it sucks. And then I kind of go like, oh man, that really sucks. So yes, I admittedly am susceptible to that stuff. So when I start hearing people comparing this game to Outer Wilds, which is one of my favorite games and Portal 2 and The Witness, which I think is one of the best puzzle games ever made, my ears perk up like big time, you know.

And so I was definitely the most hyped out of the three of us on this. I dove in. I mean, the day this game released, I was I was rushing home to come play it. So you were on top of this one, man. You were absolutely like soon as it was there. We you know, we talk about it, but it's like, you know, Expedition 33 is coming up very soon, man, very soon. And it's like, do you know how sometimes

you're just in the mood for a certain kind of game? And I am so in the mood for a turn-based epic RPG right now that it's like, I can barely contain myself. And it just so happened that Blueprints hit right at that time where I was like, dude, I could really go for a puzzle game. Sometimes that's not the case. Ace, where you're like, dude, I don't want to freaking play this game, man.

Why do I gotta play this puzzle game right now? Like, this podcast is stupid, man. Why do I gotta do this? I thought I got to play fun games. Yeah. So, let's do our best, guys. I want this to be a group effort on this one because there's people out there that are saying

blueprints, it's a puzzle game. What the heck do you do? What is this game? How do you describe this game? Oh gosh, it's a little nightmare for me. So I was like, I ain't taking this on. We're all jumping in here. So like-

So the thing that I loved about this game as far as how to describe it is that it's not just a puzzle game. There is a story. There is a background. There is a goal. You know, you, you are, are, what is it? The nephew?

Is it the nephew? Yeah, you're the nephew. So you're the nephew of this, you know, wealthy estate and you are the heir to all of it. If you can find this secret room. So you have a goal, you have a, uh, something to strive for. And, and while you're doing that, you're going through this grid. There's like a grid that you have that you have to go through.

Nine by five grid. Yeah. Nine by five grids that can fit in this thing. And you open up all these rooms, you have to find that 46th. So as you go, different rooms have different pathways. They only have one door. They have two doors. Or some doors are blocked or locked or a million different things.

So to navigate through this kind of board, if you will, is pretty tricky. And it takes a lot of pre-planning and in the moment planning of oh I'll go back and get this I'll get that so there's there's so much that goes into this game it's hard to kind of tell in one kind of you know fell swoop but there's just there's a lot there yeah so the overarching goal of the game is to find this fabled room 46 find that room find this fabled room 46. Find that room, find the room 46. You know, your uncle says, hey, I'm giving you my estate. Now here's the thing, this estate changes every day, but your goal is to find room 46.

If you do, you inherit everything with this estate and all that comes with it. So that is your goal. Now the game starts you off in the foyer, this big entryway to this mansion. And then there are three doors in front of you that you can walk through, basically. And every time you pick a door in this game to open, you are faced with a choice of three rooms to draft. So you are picking the room that you want to be behind that doorway. And so, you know, in the beginning,

you just kind of go, cool, well, I'll pick this room because I don't know what anything is. Yeah. And then, so you get like two rows of choice. Yeah, parlor, billiard hall, closet, bedroom, kitchen, closet. Closet. Yeah, you know, yeah, you get that stupid closet.

Storage room, parlor, boudoir, all of a sudden you're like, oh wait, that's new. So, you know, the basic gameplay loop for this is open a door, pick a room, go into that room, look around, see if you can find things. Maybe there's a puzzle in that room. Maybe there's a clue. Maybe there's something very cryptic in that room

that you have no idea what it is. Maybe there's nothing in that room and you spend entirely too long looking around that room for something because you're like, well, the game is tricking me because why would they just give me an empty room? And then you're like, oh wait, this room actually is empty. There's nothing to do in it.

Yeah. And as you go through that room, there's probably a door at the end of that room, unless it's at that end that now leads to more rooms. so you draft one room from those and like you said Ryan you kind of start to fill in this 9x5 grid you find rooms that you haven't found before you find new rooms that you know oh I've never seen this room before so let me pick this one let me look around it oh this room obviously has a puzzle in it okay so let me try to solve this puzzle.

Or this room has a clue that I don't know what to do with, but I have a feeling this ties into that other room that I came across somewhere because they seem to be tied together in some way. And so, you know, this is where you start to get the little nibbles where you get the little nibbles where it's like, okay, now I am kind of seeing why I've come across this room and why I need to go back to that room now with this clue that I was given sort of thing.

So that's the general gameplay part of it. Now Ace, there are roguelike elements to this as well. And what are the rogue like elements to this? Well, the rogue like elements, like you said, is every time you, you know, end the day as it were. Yeah. Every time you had the day, the mansion resets and all the rooms you placed, they disappear and you just have the foyer consistently. That's what you'll always have the foyer and the three doors. And then you'll go there and you'll place the foyer consistently. That's what you do. You'll always have the foyer and the three doors,

and then you'll go there and you'll place the new floor plan every day and you'll see how far you can get. But also, not only do you have to, you know, place the rooms in a way that you can keep moving forward and connecting, you have to watch your steps, because if you run out of steps, the steps are the key here. Yeah. Then you have to start over. That's it.

You can't go any farther. You pass out. No matter what. Yeah, no matter what. No matter what you have. If you had all those keys. Doesn't matter if you were about to beat the game. All those keys, all those coins, all those gems.

Doesn't matter if you ran out of steps. Yep. Absolutely, man. Yeah. So let's expand on that a little bit, since we're talking about the gameplay portion because this is where this is a Frustrating part of the game, but it's also like a rewarding part of the game And it does bring some excitement with it as well

So ace you said the the main the main mechanic in this game is that every time you go through a doorway you expend a step Okay, so if you go into a room and turn around and walk right back out that doorway, you've just expended two steps. Yeah, there goes your steps again. Yeah. Exactly. So you have to be cautious about how much wandering around you do, and you have to understand that every time I go into this room, I am going to expend one of these steps. So that is one of the rogue-like mechanics. Run out of steps, your day is over, you respawn,

you start every single day right back in that main entrance way with three doors standing in front of you and nothing is in this mansion. So again, you don't know what you're going to find behind these doors. You might get different choices of rooms put in front of you and things like that. The other part of this game are the fact that some doors are locked. So you have to find keys to open these doors. And if you come across a locked door and you do not have a key, you are stuck.

You cannot open that door. Run over. If you have no other doors, you're stuck. Yep. And then you have certain rooms that are special rooms that require you to spend gems to have that room appear behind the door that you are trying to open. So if the game says, hey, this is a special room, it has three exits to this room, for instance, or it gives you an option of you can change the rooms

that show up in the other doorways as a perk of this room, but it costs you two gems to open this door and make this room appear. it costs you two gems to open this door and make this room appear. Two gems. Two whole gems. Oh, the gems. The gems. And so if you are out of gems,

you can open the door still and you can select one of the three options, but the chance that, you know, they always give you one option that does not require gems. The problem with this is, is that this drastically limits your draft choice in the rooms that you pick because a lot of rooms don't have exits. And so you can very much become trapped in a run because

you simply run out of doors to open at that point. Yeah, for sure. And, and when you open the door and it gives you those three selections, you're done. You have to pick one. Yeah, you can't back out. That's a very bad point. You can't back out and say, oh, I'm going to go get some gems or try to find some and then come back to this. You know, you are toast and that killed one of my best runs, you know, because I'm not having the gems or stuff prepared. So yeah, when you go to one, it's that's it. You're picking whatever you're able to pick in that moment. And that's, that's it.

Yeah. It, that is frustrating to a degree because you kind of go, well, if I just could find two gems and come back, then I could pick this room that I want or need, but you can't. So I want to talk about, I want to stay on this topic a little bit, because I'll be honest, this is, this is the point in the game where I found the most frustration, and I think a lot of people find the most frustration, and a lot of people that we have talked to, especially in our community and online, all seem to come across the same problem with this game, and that is kind of how these roguelike elements work. We have to take a quick break, but we're gonna come out and talk about that here

in just a second. To support sustainable food production, BHP is building one of the world's largest hot ash mines in Canada. Essential resources responsibly produced. It's happening now at BHP, a future resources company. All right, guys. All right, guys. All right, so we're talking blueprints.

We've kind of explained the basic gameplay loop on this, but we have to talk about some of the frustration that's involved here because I know I got very frustrated like about a third of the way into this game where you're drafting these rooms. And if you're lucky, a room has two other exits. That's if you're lucky. A lot of rooms, they're just a straight shot

and they have one other doorway. So if you say, hey, here's this room, there's one other door in it, you go to open that door and you're presented with three dead ends as your choices through that door. That path is closed to you at that point. And this happens a lot, dude. I can't tell you how many runs I experienced

where I had gems, I had keys. I just had nowhere to go. There were no doors for me to open at that point. The options were very limited several times for me. It's just like, all right, time to start a new run. I didn't get that far in the last one. I opened the first door, closet, open the next door, bedroom, open the next door. Yeah.

And then you're stuck. Another dead end. And I'm like, I just started. That's the thing with RNG comes into play so much is where, you know, you can get a good run with a couple good items to begin with, but then your path is always like, oh man, that's why I would always try to just get as far north and just straight up as I could in the beginning through the middle. So then I have options left or right and, and as many pathways to go around

and circle, cause there's others where I thought I was dead in the water. I was able to find a key and then I was able to get through this one side door that opened it all back up for me and I was able to get back up so there's definitely you have to be so strategic with how you pick every single spot and you have to have some foresight and planning on like okay well this will lead to this and this will give me these coins to in case I get this or that or you know different things like that so there's just so much that goes into picking each room you know with just your selection of three other than just what gems you're gonna spend or what you know

keys you're gonna have to use or half the time I picked a room because it had two exits even if I didn't want the room it was like well at least there's two doors in this room that I'm unlocking so at least I have two options to try to continue. So I found parts of this game to be supremely frustrating. And this is where the frustration came in. Dude, I've got gems, I've got keys, I ran out of doors. Okay, I have plenty of doors that I can unlock, but I'm out of keys now.

Okay, so I can't unlock these doors. There's no keys to be found. Run over. Oh, I've got keys and I've got rooms with doors in it. Oh, here's a fantastic choice, but I can't pick it because I'm out of gems now. And I can't pick the good room that has three other exits in it

or has something I need. Run over. Exactly. Dude, I went through freaking 20 runs, 20 days worth of runs where it was just like, it was the worst man. It was the no path to go anywhere. Freaking no keys anywhere. No gems to be found. If I had two, I didn't have the other one. If I had one, I didn't have the other two. And this is where I really started to go like, what the heck is going on, man? Like I'm not discovering anything. I've been through these same rooms 20 freaking times. I'm not discovering anything. Where are the puzzles? Where is the discoveries? Where is the exploration? It's just the same freaking rooms over and over and over again. And I can't get a good path through the stupid mansion to discover anything at this point.

And I really started to get frustrated by that. Did that hit you guys too? Oh, it hit me like a brick. I got so tired of walking through the same like four rooms. And then all the only puzzle I was getting was, you know, the box puzzle and the billiard room. And I don't understand the billiard room at all. Yeah.

Oh, don't worry. We'll talk about that here. Oh yeah. Like I got there, I was like, I don't know. Yeah. What about you, Ryan? Does this hit you the same way? I don't know if it hit me as bad because I just kind of,

I mean, maybe it was just cause I was in a zone and I was playing for 12 hours in one day and that I was I was just click click click click click go through if I get locked out if I don't find a path boom new day and I just start over again and not have as much of a care as dang it I'm wasting this day as Dang, this one didn't run out. Let's start again and start fresh and so I tried to build every run just as much as an easy path up. And then if I needed to come back to try to look for more materials and other things, I was able to do that.

But, um, I know what you guys are talking about about the same rooms and stuff, but it becomes like, when you play enough, like this room means this, this room means that, and it becomes an asset, you know, to you. And you can use that on each run. And it doesn't really, it's not a negative, but it may not be, you know, a positive as well. It was a negative for me. Yeah, very negative. And it's funny because a few people in our community, we were all just kind of sharing our thoughts.

And it was very funny to see other people be like, I'm stuck. I'm not accomplishing anything. This game is frustrating for me. I'm on day 17, and I feel like I've done the same loop seven times in a row now. And that was for me, I would say if I had to guess, I think there was probably a three hour stretch where I accomplished absolutely nothing. No discoveries, no new puzzles, no new findings,

just dumb run after dumb run after dumb run with bad RNG because I could not progress. Now, if you push through that, if you push through that frustration, the game changes in my opinion. Like it goes from being like, I don't understand the hype to this game to I think I'm starting to see why people are liking this game now, because once you start to figure things out a little bit and once you start to realize like, Oh, I absolutely need gems so that I

can get a good layout and like, Oh, this room will always give me two keys. So if I have a chance to draft this room, even if it's a dead end, I need those two keys if I'm gonna progress later. So I'm drafting this room. So I have keys now, I have gems now, and I'll just hope for the best for a good path like to appear through this sequence of rooms here.

So I wanna talk about, obviously we don't have time to cover every room, but I want to talk about some of the different room types in this game, because I think this kind of gives you a good look at like the heart of this game, like you're looking around these things you're exploring. There's two rooms that have puzzles in them that you will come across a hundred times. This is the parlor that gives you a three box puzzle where, you know, one of the boxes is always a lie. There is a statement on the lid of the box. It might be something as simple as this box is blue and it's sitting on a white box. You're like, well, I know that's false. One statement is always true.

One statement is always false. And based on those two statements, you have to try to figure out which box has these gems in it. If you pick the right box, you get a couple of gems, which are very important in this game. It starts off fairly easy. The then dude, then it just gets so weird and complicated after a while that I was just like, dude, screw this man. I'm just picking a box, dude. Like, did you guys do that?

The weirdest one for me was when two of them had statements on them. And then one of them was just completely blank. Yeah. Oh, I have one of those. What is that supposed to mean? Yup. That's, I honestly, I don't know what you guys were. I was probably, gosh, maybe 80% on these boxes. The one

thing that I hated, and this is just like a personal thing, is that when you get it wrong, like you didn't know which box had the gems. So then you don't know the answer. And I'm like, Yeah, no answer. I want to know what I got wrong. I want to know why I didn't get this right. Because, you know, it'll say the truth and the lie and stuff. And, and, uh, you look at it and I'm like, dad, this is the one. And then it's empty. And I'm like, wait a sec.

Well, which one was it? You know, there's two more boxes and it's like, deal with it, bro. And I'm like, all right, I'll just go keep going on my mission, you know? And it's so that was super frustrating with those boxes, just not knowing when you got it wrong, which one was the right one. Yeah. And then there is the billiard hall which with the dartboard. Yeah, you know, they showed this off in the trailer So this is not spoilery just like they showed the boxes off in the trailer But the billiard room has the start board that has colors overlapping the wedges on the dartboard and these colors

correspond to mathematic like like equations that you need to do. Bro. Yeah. Ace is dead already. He's like, so, you know, if it's green, it just means, hey, this, this number plus, right? And then if it's yellow, it means subtract.

If it's pink, it means multiply. If it's blue, it means divide. And it starts you off very simple. Very, very simple. Here's the catch. Every time you do this puzzle and every time you do the box puzzle, the game knows and it gets harder and harder and harder as you progress. Dude, after 50 runs at this game, I'm doing the square root of like nine

runs at this game, I'm doing the square root of like nine multiplied by the square root of or I'm sorry, by four squared minus a number times a number divided by another number. And I'm just going like, I think I know. And then I click it and then you get it wrong and it starts you over at the beginning. Now the puzzle stays the same for that run, but it's like, I'm doing freaking calculus here, man. That's the thing. It's, it's, it's, um, you get it. Like you get that square in the middle and you're like, all right, I'm doing square roots now. So then I'm like, okay, this by this and then, but the problem was I was thinking, all right, square root by square root. And then I, I, I three plus five is a five. And then wait, that's gotta be, and then, you know, you're like looking around.

It's like the, the math, mathematical meme. And then I then, well, and then finally I'm like, Oh, it's still on the inside. So I got to add these square roots after I calculated them. And I'm like, Oh, it's this number. And then you click and you're like, yeah. And then it opens up and so, and it gets progressively harder. I know that it goes to just like crazy levels, um, on a dart board, like, and that's one teeny little factor in this whole game. But every time you go in there, you get like keys or a security card or, you know, things like that. And so it's always very advantageous to try but it is also very

frustrating yeah yeah you need to solve these puzzles to get the keys and the gems that you need for playing this game but they really do get complicated after a while i will say that this is where i was a little bit like is this actually a puzzle game because these are like the only two puzzles that you keep coming across. And I thought that you would have something like this in almost every room, right? Where it's like, hey, there's-

See, that's where I was. I was like, are these the only things I'm gonna do is math and guess the box? Cause like, that's not a video game. What's in the box? What's in the box? I know what's in the box. I know what's in the box.

It's two gems. It never changes. Two gems. Well, the colors of the gems change. I want them. Not that that matters either. So, all right. So in talking about the rooms, yes, you're gonna run into these two puzzle rooms

time and time and time again. You are going to run into certain rooms very, very often. Now where the game really starts to dangle the carrot, at least in my case, was when you make it about halfway through these levels and you're getting further towards the top of this 9x5 grid board that you're on. And it shows you the antechamber square up at the very top row right in the middle.

This is your goal. You're trying to get there. And as you start to get further and it gives you ranks, right? So it's like each row that you were on as a rank. So when you start getting to like rank five or six, you start getting options for these new crazy rooms that you've never seen before. And you know, one of the things, and this is a tip for anybody is if you ever come across a new room, you've never seen before pick that room because there's,

you know, this is where the game progresses itself and you start to get clues and things for other parts of the house. Now, the other thing that you find is not only these unique rooms, but there are items in the game. You might get a metal detector that helps you find coins or keys that you might've missed in a room.

You get a magnifying glass, which is very important for solving some of the puzzles or the clues in this game. You can get a sledgehammer, which lets you break open locked boxes, so you don't have to use your keys for that. There's a whole slew of items and they all do something. Part of the game is finding these items and then finding the right room to use these items in. And this is where some of the permanent progression for the game comes in, whereas, or you solve

like some of these bigger puzzles. So for me, I found the magnifying glass and then in another room, I found a photo that I looked at and the magnifying glass popped up and I started looking around the photo and I saw this scribbled out area on the photo with the magnifying glass I could make out the letters that were underneath the photo at that point. That gave me a huge clue to a password or a code on a safe or something like that. Those were the eureka moments where I went, oh my gosh, like I know how to open this gate now because I, I had the magnifying glass and I looked at this photo and there it was. It's the combination to this gate that I'd never knew before.

So I beeline it to the gate, I unlock it. And then the game says, Hey, congratulations. You have opened the orchard. You are going to start every run with 10 extra steps every day. And that's when I went, okay, okay, here we go. Like I'm starting to make progress. At one point you get a higher allowance that gives you a couple of coins to start each day.

Ryan, you talked about you can unlock a certain thing that lets you start with a couple of gems each day. And this is where the permanent progression in the road, like elements kicks in. Did you find that rewarding? When I start a new day and I'd have two extra gems. Yeah. Yes.

Yeah. It's huge, right? It feels like plus the steps and everything else. It's weird because when I say it, it just doesn't, it doesn't sound important, but having two gems at the start of every single run, absolutely changes. Yeah. Big time, big time.

Cause these men trying to get to these certain rooms when you get to like, you know, the room that takes one or two, but it's very advantageous for you in that position, in that grid to use that room. If you don't have the gems, you know, you're kind of just beholden to whatever the other selections are. But if you have them, boom, then that gives you that bonus head start early on to give

you a boost to kind of the rest of that run. So having that early start, having those extra resources right off the bat every day, like makes such a big difference in this game, which I found to be kind of, kind of cool. Like I did like that part of it. It was very rewarding. You can also through gameplay and getting a certain room or just RNG again, you can find an upgrade disc,

which lets you modify some of the more popular or common rooms that you find to where now every time you have that option for the room you are guaranteed to get two keys or two gems out of that room and things like that so you there are permanent upgrades there as well one other thing on the permanent upgrades is if you get through a certain room and in an event or a puzzle or something like that, that will unlock like permanent shortcuts to a degree. Like at one point early on, you can unlock this gate. And once that gate is unlocked, you can go to this outside room that I went to every

single time to start every run because it unlocks certain things that modify the house and stuff like that. So there are permanent progression items. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Are you talking about the shed? Yeah. Dude, I unlocked the shed and I totally forgot about it. I'm not even kidding right now. I'm not even kidding. I got out through the garage and I unlocked the shed and I totally forgot I ever even unlocked it. I just did 15 days without the shed and I have unlocked it.

Ryan. Okay. The shed is one of the best things that you can do to help start a run. Oh my gosh, what am I doing? Like, so for instance, unlocking the shed gives you a choice of three rooms, just like every other door in the game, but they're unique rooms that are unique to the outside shed, which is like, hey,

there's these red rooms which have negative effects, so you can pick something that says the first three red rooms have no negative effect for you. You can pick one that's a trading post where you can actually, if you find a shovel, but you want to trade it for the sledgehammer, you can go there and trade it for that. They have all kinds of different options for you that you can then kind of affects your run. So I'm so mad right now. I am. And game and I totally really started every single run by be lining it to the side and picking a room. Yeah, I unlocked it. I got, I got out there and then I just never even thought about it. I just went onto my normal

runs. Oh my God. Like it's not part of the mansion. What do I need this for? What do I need this for? I didn't think about it. Oh man. So I don't want to get too bogged down in the weeds. There are a lot of very unique rooms. There are Ryan, you found a room that you shared. I was like, dude, I'm 14 hours into this game and I have never seen this room in my life. I thought you were trolling me to begin it to the beginning, you know, in the beginning of that, but yeah, no, I've been looking for that room because I needed it for something else. And I've been searching for it for 15 runs before I finally found it. I'm going to go back to the frustrating part again, because again, here is where I started to get frustrated.

I'm starting to understand what these rooms are. I'm starting to understand what rooms I need to find. I'm starting to understand that I need this item in this run to go to this room, okay? Like I need the magnifying glass so that I can go to the dark room so that I can look at these photos in the dark room. To do that, I go to the dark room so that I can look at these photos in the dark room to do that I

Need the circuit breaker room Yeah, so that I can turn the lights on in the dark room so that I can see these photos But to do that I have to have the magnifying glass or I'm not going to be able to do what I need to do So you're getting RNG three different times here You need this specific item that you don't find in every run. You need this specific room that you don't find in every run. And you need to find the circuit breaker room that you don't find in every run. And this is again, where I started to get very frustrated, right? I got frustrated when I was running out of gems and keys and getting trapped in a very small, bad draw of doors, right? And then you finally start

to kind of make permanent progression there. And then it's like, oh, right? And then you finally start to kind of make permanent progression there. And then it's like, oh, OK. But then you start to realize that you need RNG to really go your way as you're making your way through the kind of latter half of this game. And I got frustrated all over again. And I was like, this is stupid. I know what I need to do. I just can't freaking do it because the

numbers will not roll my way in this case. And again, I spent 12 to 15 runs trying to get this perfect combination of having the magnifying glass, getting the breaker room and getting the dark room so that I could actually figure something out, you know? And this just really started to kind of blow my mind where I was like, this isn't fair. It's not fair, man.

This is my main complaint with this game. It's just like, the RNG is just sometimes not in your favor at all. Like, I'll get there and I can only pick from red rooms or something like that. It was like, well, I'm walking through the gymnasium, I guess. And then I just have to walk back and forth between the gymnasium, which costs you two extra steps. Yeah. And all I can get is the closets.

So now I'm hitting dead ends or I'm getting, uh, the break room, breaker room, but I'm not getting anything to turn on or off. I'm not getting the garage. I'm not getting the dark room. I'm not getting anything. So now I just have the breaker room for no reason. Yeah.

The amount, the amount of times that I had like, uh, key cards and, uh, other rooms that I needed the, the secondary room to even make them kind of viable. Like it was just, it was almost every run. You had multiple things that you needed something else to use it. And then you just never could. And so that, that is a serious RNG thing that, that just, it just doesn't sometimes pan out and maybe sometimes you pick the wrong choice of a room that would have led to something else.

Who knows? It's still new in the game. We kind of don't know a ton of it, but man, that part is definitely, it is, it is frustrating when you're just trying to make these runs work and you're trying to get a couple good things but you Can't execute it because there's there's nowhere to go, you know can't do it It's did there was a run where I had the magnifying glass. I had the dark room and I needed to break a room and I made it almost to the very top like rank 9 up where the antechamber is and I could

not the very top like rank nine up where the ante chamber is and I could not find the freaking breaker room and it was like dude if I can just find this I can solve this and and I just was getting quite perturbed and then my next four runs guess what I get I get the dark room in the breaker room but I can't find a freaking magnifying glass anywhere I'm running out of steps like this is to all that to say that there will absolutely be some frustration in this game. It is it is how the game is built. And I have not talked to a single person that has not gotten frustrated over the

RNG aspects of this rogue, like of these rogue, like elements in this game. Now. I will say when I finally got the three, the perfect combo of three things that I needed, it unlocked a very like big discovery for me, which was one of these permanent progression type things where I'm like, I just figured out the combination to this thing and I can finally open it and I got a big permanent progression reward from it. And I went, okay, cool. That was awesome.

Like that was awesome. I'm still angry that it took me that long to work it out, you know, through no fault of my own, but at least it was very rewarding to finally go, okay, sweet, I've been trying to solve this puzzle for a while now, and then you finally do, and it's again, it gives you some big reveal or something like that. So. All right. I feel like I'm just not wired for these games man like I would walk into rooms is like I don't see anything I don't understand what I'm looking at what is this I have a very big problem where RNG affects my

skill in the game like I have this with like Hearthstone I've mentioned this before but I love Hearthstone because it's like I like card based games and strategy. But when I don't get a good draw after refreshing the Tavern like six times and it's just like not one of the creatures that I'm trying to do like pops up. That's just bad RNG. Yeah, now I suck because it's like I just got hit by bad RNG

that infuriates me dude. It really does suck because it's like, I just got hit by bad RNG. That infuriates me, dude. It really does. I hate it so much, man. So I don't want that to affect my game, but I'm a gambler. I'm like, yeah, this is perfect for you. You don't care. Okay. So, you know, we're running at a time quickly. I don't know how we're so far into this already. So, you know, the you you start to make these discoveries, you make your way to the ante chamber. The game is not over. I'm not going to spoil anything there. But you know, it was funny watching Ryan get very, very excited because he was like one way from the ante chamber. And then I just laughed to myself. And I was like, Oh, this is the RNG man, you know, um, you know, but this game does a good job of giving you that big reveal that, that nice sense of progression. When you finally do solve a puzzle, there are multiple things

and rooms that I've never came across ever again. Like, you know, there's a freezer room that had a note that was frozen in ice and some other stuff. And I was like, dude, what's in that note? It's really bugging me. I want to know, but apparently I have to thaw this room out and then come back to it later on. I never got that room offered to me ever again, ever again, dude. So it's like, there's just things where it's like, again, the RNG is going to come into play

and you're not going to find things. You know, I think this is the weird question to me because this is a puzzle game that has puzzles in it and you were trying to solve this goal of getting to room 46 and the game does throw these puzzles at you, but a lot of times they're just like, did you observe something the right way? You know, did you, did you think about using this item in that room? And if you do, maybe you'll figure something out. I kept waiting because the game even talks about this

in the very beginning where it says forge your own path. Maybe you'll realize that you don't need to be beholden to the world around you and all that. And I kept waiting for this like moment of revelation where I was like, guys, if I don't have to like, I can walk through the doors backwards, you know, maybe that's the key, right? Like I kept waiting for some kind of revelation,

like in the very, and I'll say this, in the very front entrance room that you start every game and the floor is very reflective. And at one point I went like, dude, I bet if I look in the reflection of the floor, I'll see something that I couldn't see in the game and that's gonna give something away, which would have been awesome,

except it doesn't do that. No, no, no, no. When I read that note, my first thought was, oh, the door in the front is unlocked. I'll just walk around the house. Maybe there's a back door. So there's a part of me that's like a little disappointed because this game could have gone

all of these different paths and it didn't. But at the same time, I found myself just wanting to do run after run after run and Even when I paused and I was getting frustrated, you know, it was like I want to go back to this game, dude I want to find out what the heck is in room 46. What's in that ante chamber? How do I get there? You know, I came across it in one run, but the doors were locked Well, how do I open the doors, you know that kind of thing? So there is there is enough mystery in this game That it really kept me driven to say I want to figure this stuff out

Now I get that people would get frustrated and just go forget this game, dude. It's not worth it It's not worth it, which is ace. I know is exactly what happened with you Well on top of just not not worth it, which is ace. I know is exactly what happened with you. Well, on top of just not being worth it, I also think I think I fell asleep like two out of the three times I tried to play this game. Oh, no, it is a chill tranquil game, dude. Like this is not action based. It is a it is a chill experience. That's for sure. So a little too chill for for my liking, I think.

There is a story in this game. It gives you history into your family and the estate and some of the things that your family has done in the past and you're kind of piecing together pieces of like your uncle and your other uncle and your mom and your childhood and stuff like that. You discover these things through letters that you can come across sometimes by solving a puzzle or a combination or something like that.

Your reward is a letter that kind of furthers the story along a little bit. I'll be honest, I didn't care about any of this. I don't know who this family is. I don't really care that the mom read the kid a book or something like that unless it was a clue to solve another puzzle. So these people that said like, blueprints tells one of the most gripping stories I've ever seen in a video game. Like I want to know what you're on

because it didn't pay that for me. I mean, there is a story there that you piece together, but again, the story for me was not the draw on this game. So, all right, so that's how this game plays. That's what you're looking at. If you decide to jump into blueprints, what worked for you and what didn't work for you in this game? Oh, let me start.

Oh brother, here we go. So what worked for me was of course, I really liked the graphics and the environment and I liked the start of the story where it seemed like we were getting somewhere pretty straightforward with the thinking and like whatnot. And then it just evolves into Dark Souls levels of lore reading and I'm just like, I do not want to do this. If the game had a narrator or something when you pick something up that like would start telling me about it, maybe I would have been more into it.

But you know, I liked aspects of it. What I don't like is a puzzle game where I am drafting my own path and it doesn't have all the answers. It's like you threw me into an escape room, but you left out the tools I need to escape. That's, I mean, that's a great analogy to be honest with you. Like I can't go anywhere and I can't do anything this time. Sorry, you had bad luck. You're not escaping. It makes you feel like an idiot because you're trying to go down the pathways It's like oh, no, you see you got this room, but it only goes in this L shape

So it goes into the wall. It doesn't go anywhere else, right? Those boarded off doors were like the bane of my existence You want to go this way? But you see the only thing you've got that could move you forward to the chapel and every time you walk into the chapel You're gonna lose money. And the money didn't even do anything. So I was like, whatever cares, man. I'll, I'll take the chapel every time. At least it gives you two other path pathways to go.

That's very true. You get two other doors. What about you, Ryan? But what didn't work for you on this? And then what did work for you? Um, man, what didn't work was it was hard sometimes just the RNG of, of gathering certain items or devices. Like there'd be times where I'd find, I'd find the shovel.

Like if I get the courtyard of the green, the green room or whatever, and there's always something there to get and you get a shovel and then I would never find any dirt to dig up and I'm like, any dirt to dig up. And I'm like, or I dig something up and be like, oh, there's nothing of use there. And I'm like, come on, you know? I saw the shovel once. Yeah. Once.

So really? So I got it a ton. I got that a ton. I got the metal detector and the lock picks more than I got the shovel. Yeah, that's probably true. It just, it's it's uh, I think There might be a little bit too much of the RNG But I don't know if that makes kind of the game what it is It makes it so difficult or if that just kind of is is just an extra thing There's you know, kind of makes everybody not like it

So I don't know that the RNG part of it that that takes away from your strategic like planning is frustrating. Um, having said that you always get a new run. So you can come back in and, and try again and see if you can line things up and get them to go the right way. And then they're all the more, uh, you know, exciting when you get it to line up and you get it to all the more, you know, exciting when you

get it to line up and you get it to work and you get that one item over here and then over there you need it, you know? And so those parts of it I did like, I did think it's cool that it did have a story. I am not a big puzzle game guy. I don't like to do things just to do them. I love to hike, but I love to hike when I'm going somewhere, not just to get to the top of the hill. I love to hike cause I'm going to go hunting over there

or going to that Creek, cause I'm gonna fish it or things like that. I love a purpose to something. So I wanna get my estate. I want to win this and get find this room so that I can, so I did like get my estate. I want to win this and find this room so that I can, so I did like the story aspect. It did draw me in, but I think the RNG stuff is taking away a little bit

from that from my perspective. My biggest complaint is the RNG in this game, 100%. I mean, it is frustrating. It is unfair at times. It will slow your progression in this game. I mean, there are other things I would have liked to have done, like figure out the freezer room, for instance. But I never got the freezer room ever again.

You know, it's so the RNG for me is the real, real kick in the pants in this game. The other thing, and I kind of touched on this, is like, I feel like there's just a lot of empty rooms in this game. The other thing, and I kind of touched on this is like, I feel like there's just a lot of empty rooms in this game and I feel like that's wasted opportunity. You know, there's a room that's called the spare room and you walk in and there's like a ladder, they're painting the room. There's some stuff in there and it's like, it would have been so cool if there was

some reveal later on in the game that went like you walked past this a hundred times and you didn't even realize it, you know, because that's kind of what outer wilds does, right? Like outer wilds rewards you with that, that like, did you didn't know you could do this. So okay. So hold on. Did you ever, did you ever go through the spare room with the treasure map? Uh, I got the treasure map, but it was not pointing to the spare room unless you're unless you have to have that as you walk Through the room as you walk through your your spare your treasure map will pop up and you can click it And it'll show you a spot where you can dig

So there is stuff specific to the grid the spot on the grid though Maybe maybe maybe that's what it is But I all I know is I went through that a couple times But here comes the RNG again because every time I went through that I never had a shovel And then every time I walk through it I see the treasure map pop up like on the side of the screen and I'm just Like oh, come on. I already know I don't have a shovel. Yeah. Yeah, so RNG ruins it for me I will say what I like about this game is it really just continues to draw you in. I mean, the fact that I'm willing to overcome all this RNG and frustration to continue playing

this game and to, to, you know, make progress and to get closer to unlocking room 46 and Hey, I never saw this room before. Let me check this out. I can combine items in this room. Well, that's kind of cool. But I never found two items that I could combine. Yeah. That kind of stuff. Ryan, the room you found, you found some reactor room. And I was like, I've never seen this room in my life, dude.

So I just, I feel like there's some wasted opportunity in this game as well to where it's like, I think they could have truly made this one of the absolute greats in the in the puzzle genre. And I feel like they whiffed just a little bit, you know, as far as things they could have done to really make you look back and go like, oh, my gosh, how did I not realize that? So, all right, we're running low on time, guys. Final thoughts on this game. I mean, if you rate it on a scale of one to 10, what your thoughts on this game are

and whether you would recommend people to pick it up. Ace, we're going to start with you. Yeah, of course we are. It's a six out of 10, I guess. It's not a bad game by any means. I just don't like it. I like a puzzle game that's been, you know, thoroughly thought out by someone. It's not randomly generated for me every time I go to do it.

Like Outer Wilds, Outer Wilds is a roguelike puzzle game, but you're what resets, not the entirety of what you were doing. You know where to go and what to do because you learned it last time here. You don't really learn anything from your previous runs. Unless you know, you just get lucky on the draw. I I'll disagree with you a little bit there. I think you do learn. I think you learn what's in a room. I think you learn, Hey, there's something in this room that I have to discover kind of thing. I mean,

I will say like even in the failed runs, I think you sometimes do learn something. It might not be what you want to learn. But then again, there are, I had 20 runs in a row where I learned absolutely nothing and I almost quit playing this game. I felt like I wasn't getting enough progression, I guess out of it. Even when I was getting these permanent progression rooms, I still wasn't getting enough to say, well, I was so close this time, maybe I'll make it. And then I'd get there like closet, closet, closet. All right.

Well, I'm just not over it. Like it's not a bad game. Bunk room, closet, closet. It's just not for me. What about you, Ryan? So, um, man, interesting enough, like I think it might be the highest on this game, uh, which is wild because I am not a puzzle game guy. I... when they're, hey, figure out these puzzles, go ahead. You know, it's just not for me. I don't like no sense of purpose or direction,

and just like, cool, you can solve this puzzle, you know, good for you. I do like that there was a little bit of a background, a little bit of a story, some sort of, you know, as you described Josh the Carrot, to guide you along. I think the setting, the music, the ambiance, like was good to keep you in that mode and that mindset. Again, the RNG is a little bit frustrating, but I think that was some of the magic of it that you couldn't get too comfortable. You always had to be on your toes to try to Make whatever run you had make the best of it make all those items that you found count Solve every puzzle because you never know if you miss that one. Dang. You don't have two gems You talked about the freezer room. I found the freezer room one time.

And you know when it was? When I unlocked the right door of room 46, I got all the way there. And then I went to go in, the last room I had to go into, go into the room 46. And lo and behold, two of the three rooms needed gems.

And what do I not have? I don't have any gems. And I have to select a room. The only other room, the freezer room. So then, and then there's no door in the freezer room. It's the freezer room. So I go in, it freezes my assets, cool beans. I'll at least I'll save this stuff to the next day. I decided to go walk around and look around. I find a furnace. I melt all my assets. So I lose it all anyway. So it was just a big wash. So yeah, there's a lot of ups and downs in this game. I think it was fantastic for a, I understand the hype.

It's a 92 on Metacritic right now for the Metascore. It's doing really well. I get why people love it. I get why people hate it. It's probably a lot higher than most puzzle games would ever be on mine, but I'm gonna give it something like a lot higher than, than most, uh, puzzle games would ever be on mine, but I'm going to give it something like a 8.3 ish. It's, it's up there for me, which I never ever would have thought of. I don't play games for 12 hours straight.

And yesterday I played this game for 12 hours straight. I wanted to solve it. And I got, I got one room away so many times. So, yeah, that's my take. Yeah. I, you know, it sounds like I've complained about this game a lot, but I want people to know what you're getting yourself into. Like, honestly, that is the thing, is this game will frustrate you. You know, just plain and simple. I think that's most puzzle games in general, though,

is like you're getting stuck on a puzzle that you can't figure out. The problem with this game is you're not getting stuck on a puzzle you can't figure out. You're getting stuck on the game mechanics. You're getting stuck on the rogue like elements. You're getting stuck on the RNG part of it. You are not getting stuck on this brain bending puzzle that you can't just quite wrap your head around, you know, kind of thing. And so that frustrates me more.

I like to think the witness, I think, is one of the best puzzle games ever made. And it gives you 50 different types of puzzles, you know, that kind of come at you in all directions and different ways of solving things. Whereas Blueprints does not. The frustration in this game simply lies in the game mechanics itself. I think it's a fantastic game. I am going to say that. I think this game is really top notch.

I loved the experience with it. I was enthralled with it, even in my frustration. I felt driven to keep trying to make these discoveries and figure out what's going on and make it to room 46 and that sort of stuff. I liked that they had some outside areas. I liked that I found things I'd never found in a run before. Sometimes they were a little disappointing because I was like, I don't even know what

this is for. I kind of know what I need to do now. So what is the how does this come into play and that kind of thing. But all the negative things aside, I think this game is great, dude. I am going to rate it like an 8.5. Legitimately, I think it's very enjoyable. I think it's very unique. I do not think that this is like the Mount Rushmore of puzzle games that I have heard a lot of people talk

about. It is a very good puzzle game. Like if you were in the mood for one, Blueprints will absolutely scratch that itch. I liked the roguelike elements to a degree. I think they probably could use some fine tuning. You don't need four different RNG elements in your game that all have to line up together. Two is probably fine, you know? So like there, there is that complaint, but overall Blueprints is a really, really strong puzzle game. It is memorable. It's beautiful in its own right. You just have to be willing to put up with the frustration of it. And we have seen a lot of people that are doing that and they're like, dude, I'm past the frustrating part.

This game's got its hooks in me. I'm loving it. I want to see what's at the end. And we've seen that from a lot of people. But again, just know what you're getting yourself into. So yeah, I would say our I'll go ahead. I would say I would say people should definitely just take you to his opinion on this game.

Cause I'm just not one of the people who's willing to put up with. But I think that's people. I mean, I have seen, I mean, to be fair ACE on social media, I've seen people say, dude, I saw the hype I bought in. I tried this game. I don't get it, man. This game is dumb, you know? And that's why we always try to explain what a game is like to people.

You know, we always give our opinion on it but at the same time we try to explain it because if you were somebody that is easily put off by Frustration and RNG this game may not be for you If you're willing to slog through it, then you probably will find the appeal of this game You know and there is obviously some kind of mass appeal because look at the review scores and things like that. There is some kind of magic to it. It is just for me, not that Outer Wilds, The Witness, Ante Chamber, Portal 2 type magic. They say no Portal 2 for me.

It's close-ish, you know what I mean? Like when people say recommend me a puzzle game, I'm going to name those other four or five games first before I mention Blueprints, but Blueprints is probably up there in like the top five or six for me. It's right there. It's like right there. It is right there.

Yeah, it's like right there. Yeah, exactly. So, all right, well, listen guys, that's gonna do it for this one. Check it out, it's on Game Pass. That's one of the nice things. I'm just counting down the days till Expedition 33. This episode comes out Monday. Expedition 33 comes out Thursday. You guys will not see me for probably four days. You're going to disappear for a while. We're all prepared. I've prepped everybody, man. I've prepped my family. I'm

prepping my friends. I'm prepping my job. I'm just like, dude, Josh doesn't exist for like three days after that. So let's hope that game lives up to the hype, man. Cause whoo. So, all right, listen, everybody, thank you for, for hanging out with us, talking blueprints. If you want to support the show, it means the world to us. It helps this podcast continue on. There's a link in the episode description that you can click to support the show. If you are not in our discord server and part of our community, it is the best gaming community on the planet. We have people joining every

single day. It is, I mean, I think we're close to, if not over a thousand gamers strong. We're almost there. Zero toxicity, zero judgmental people. I mean, just gamers that love talking games together. We do community nights, we play games together and have fun. I know there's people that are like, oh, that all sounds too good to be true. It's not, it actually does exist. Come join us, hang out, you'll see for yourself.

And last thing real quick, if you're listening on your podcast app, make sure you click that follow button, that plus button, whatever it is that just says, hey, I to follow the show and get their episodes the day that they release. It definitely helps out the show as well. So that's it for this one, everybody. Until next time, happy gaming. See ya. Peace out. Thanks for watching!