Video Gamers Podcast - [Force a Friend] Time to get Deep - Video Games Podcast

Episode Date: August 28, 2023

Video games hosts Ryan, Paul and Josh are pumped to be bringing you our first Force a Friend episode. Ever wish you could make your friends play a certain video game? Would you use this power for good or evil? Well in Force a Friend we get to do exactly that. One host gets to pick a video game that the other host MUST play for 2 weeks. We break down the game, the pick and more in this awesome episode!  Thanks to our LEGENDARY Supporters: Redletter and Gaius214 Connect with the show: Support us on Patreon: patreon.com/videogamerspod Join our Gaming Discord: https://discord.gg/Dsx2rgEEbz Follow us on Instagram: instagram.com//videogamerspod Follow us on Twitter: twitter.com/videogamerspod Subscribe to us on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCU12YOMnAQwqFZEdfXv9c3Q   Visit us on the web: https://videogamerspod.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Visit BetterHelp.com today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com. Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Video Gamers Podcast, where we break down all things gaming, like first impressions on new releases, deepives gaming news and tournaments like figuring out who the best gaming dad of all time is i am your host paul and i am here with my two fellow gamers in crime first up he is the gaming guru it's josh oh no okay Was that an age reference or was that a skill reference, Paul? Skill reference.

I just figured you need some kind of nickname. I don't know if it's going to stick. I like it. Gaming Guru is what came to mind. I mean, I am old. I am wise. It's a game. Paul's probably secretly going, it's just because he's old.

But he's messaging Ryan right now saying, dude, I really just mean he's old. He's messaging ryan right now saying dude i really just mean he's old he's not really good but don't tell him do you prefer jazzy josh or the gaming guru now we're getting something dj dj jazzy josh there i'm kind of for it all right that's not bad all right and then moving on we also have our very own wheat thin warrior it's ryan yes i love wheat thins not only do you love wheat thins ryan but famously when i was 21 and you were 17 uh you ate my whole box of wheat thins when you spent the night at my house i was not mad i was just disappointed that I wouldn't be able to get any Wheat Thins. And today you left six boxes of Wheat Thins on my

front door all these years later. So yeah, I guess I came out on top in the end. That's Wheat Thins with compound interest, Paul. Yeah. It's a lot of compound interest. That was a lot of interest on the Wheat Thins, but hopefully... It's almost 20 years. 20 years of interest in Wheat Thins. It's a lot of compound interest. That was a lot of interest on the Wheat Thins, but hopefully... It's almost 20 years. 20 years of interest in Wheat Thins. It's a long time coming.

Very nice. All right. Well, for our listeners out there, just so you all know, you can find us on socials at Video Gamers Pod. You can also support our show on Patreon and get sick perks. You can check it all out at MultiplayerSquad.com. Okay, so this is our very first pre-dive episode in our new format. Had a little bit of a soft reboot of how we do our show around here. I'm very excited for this.

For anyone out there who does not yet know about the format with our pre-dives, Josh, can you tell the people a little bit about what they can expect today? Oh, guys, I'm so excited for this. So what is going to happen? We've all had it, right? We've all had that friend where it's like, we love a video game and we just want a friend to play that video game. Maybe it's not their cup of tea. Maybe it's not the style of game that we know they love, but we go, you know what? If you just play this, you'd love it. Or maybe we've got a friend where you've been trolling me for a really long time, calling me a guru and meaning it because I'm old, you know, and not good at games. And then I go, you know what?

I'm going to make you play this game I heard about because I think you're going to hate this and I want to laugh at you the whole time. Or maybe it's a game that, you know, I want somebody else to test the waters and go, hey, I don't really want to put my time in on this. So, Paul, you play and tell me what you think and let me know if it's worth picking up. Like, this is the format that we're going with. So, we are calling it Force a Friend. And the way that this is going to work is on every one of these episodes, which there is going to be a lot of these moving forward, one host is going to get to pick a game of their choosing without any influence from the other hosts. And they're going to then decide which host they want to play

that game. And we will rotate through this. Um, but this is going to happen moving forward. I am super stoked for these episodes because I think it's going to be a lot of fun. I think the reactions are going to be real. I know that there are games that I have been dying to get Paul and Ryan to try. And this is my chance. And I know the same with those guys. So I'm very, very excited about this. I love the idea of it. And I think it's going to be a lot of fun for the listeners.

Yeah. So whether it's me or Ryan, we're gonna have two weeks to play it we're gonna come back record our full deep dive on it and the third host can choose to play it or not totally up to them now ryan now that you've been here with us for a little while do you trust josh's judgment or are you are you a little bit nervous of what he might pick or are you excited i absolutely do not trust his judgment i i know it is going to be probably something ridiculous or something i won't like or i don't know but we're gonna we're gonna see it's gonna be probably amazing and then uh the recap's gonna be equally as amazing now i i have

to ask you guys because this is the first one like this, and I'm so hyped right now, but I'm not on the other end of things, man. Are you guys nervous? It could be Paul. It could be Ryan. Neither one of you know who's getting picked number one, and you have zero clue what the game is on top of that. So what are you are you feeling boys bring bring me the pain yeah bring it on okay ryan's up for it i kind of like it because i don't have to worry about coming up with the next game to play there's always a little bit of like guys do we all want to play this do we want to skip it well this other game comes out in two weeks is that too similar it just takes all the thought process out of it you get to do all the thinking for me,

Josh. That does make me a little nervous, but I am also ultimately excited. You just get to take control of the reins and I'm just here for the ride. I'm strapped into the roller coaster. I'm going wherever it leads me. Anytime that I get to be in charge, you guys should both be afraid. That's probably a fair rule moving forward. Be very afraid. So for our listeners out there, if you do sign up on Patreon, there is an option to go legendary and hijack a host, which is where you get to choose what game one of us has to play. And then the other two hosts may or may not pick it up as well. So as a reminder for our Patreon perks, there's some really great ones there like under legendary status. So that's also going to be really fun as our listeners every once in a while are going to get to come in here and do that thinking for us as well. Just to clarify that for people, it's my turn to pick.

I'm picking a game. I already have it in mind. I'm picking Ryan or Paul. I already have that in mind too, even though they don't know it. If you want to sit in my place and say, Josh, I know it's your turn to pick, but I'm picking the game and I'm picking the host. That's where you can go legendary over on our Patreon. You get to hijack a host and force one of the other hosts to play the game of your choosing at that point. That is going to be so much fun. We've done something similar in the past, but it's a little more personal now.

And I love that about that, like that option because now people can say, I think Ryan would love this game and I'm, I'm hijacking Paul and making Ryan play, you know, whatever this game is. And then you get to hear about it two weeks later. So that's the beauty of this format is we're going to come back in two weeks and we're going to, we're going to review everything about that game, what the hosts thought, what their thinking

was and all that. It's going to be a ton of fun. All right. This is the moment. This is exciting. I feel like we're at the Oscars and we're about to hear the best picture. All right, Josh, don't tell us who has to play it yet. What game are you choosing for our first deep dive? Oh, the game. All right. I will start off by saying this is a game that we have never done a review on. Oh, we have talked about it on the show. It is a game that I personally love.

And I think in all honesty, as much as my desire would be to troll one of you guys, I actually really am genuinely curious about what you think about this game. So the game is subnautica. I just talked about that not too long ago. Um, this game is well known by a lot of people, but it is a, like I said, this game is near and dear to me. And I know that Paul has dabbled in it a little bit, never finished it. That is correct. And it's the kind of game that begs to be finished. It does. But Ryan has never played Subnautica.

Ryan, I'm picking you, baby. I want you to experience Subnautica the way that I experienced it. This game caught me completely off guard. I picked it up on a whim because I remember hearing the name and seeing some good reception for it. I picked it up. I started playing it.

And man, it hit me like a ton of bricks how much I was enjoying this game. Now I will say that I caught a little snippet from Ryan the other day that really sealed the deal on this one because we were talking about Subnautica and I mentioned that Subnautica can actually be a little scary. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And Ryan went, oh no. And that just sealed the deal for me, Ryan, because I cannot wait for you to experience this game. And some of the scares, it is not a horror game by any means,

but there are times when you are going to get freaked out by this. And I want to hear about those times so bad. Oh, here we go. Paul knows personally jump scares scares what they do to me so josh and i we know all about subnautica because we've played it i i assume you haven't even watched any footage so just at this point what's your understanding of this game what do you think you've been signed up for um a game that has jump scares and i mean i quickly googled it and i see a guy in uh like a snorkel suit or a scuba suit so underwater i would assume by the subnautica name as well

so lots of underwater lots of underwater assumption so i have uh no idea. I have a feeling that if you guys both played it, it'll probably be cool. But I'm also very interested in this scare part. So now that Josh has said that, I'll also be looking out for it every turn or every cave or whatever the heck this game entails. So this should be interesting. So Ryan, you legitimately have no experience with zero nautica you've heard the name before because we've talked about it a little bit but you've not i mean you're going into this game completely blind at this point yep i love it oh you can also play it in vr fyi yeah i don't know if you want to you can play it vr you could but

i don't want to do i want you to i just want you playing but you can play it VR. You could, but I don't want you to. I do have an Oculus 2. I just want you playing the game and enjoying it for what it is. I'll jump out the window. Now, Ryan, you have played a lot of Dave the Diver lately, so I feel like you've been priming for more underwater adventures. Dude, if I find that katana, I'll slash some sharks up. I'm like, come on, bring it on. I don't think you run any sushi restaurants in Subnautica from my recollection. Oh, man.

I mean, you do eat a lot of fish. So no lie, this is actually a funny segue because you mentioned it, Paul. But Ryan, you have been playing Dave the Diver. Imagine Dave the Diver, but in first person. Ooh. Okay. So that is a fair assumption or comparison. Now, the games are vastly different overall,

but I think if you can at least in your mind picture playing Dave the Diver in first person, you will at least understand a snippet of what Subnautica is. No. Fewer guns. you will at least understand a snippet of what subnautica is no i mean fewer guns just just recently i you know i was in uh i was in san diego and we were we were snorkeling and so just that alone you can see the way the ocean shifts and moves back and forth of the tide oh man the first person in a game that maybe potentially has jump scares uh that that may get me i'm uh i'm excited are you excited okay that was my next question is what is what is the feeling ryan is it is it excitement is it like oh man like this doesn't sound like my kind of game um you don't have a choice because

you have to play it at this point but like you know be honest what is the thing well he can quit well i guess you always have a choice but i want to say in the beginning they you know be honest what is the thing well he can quit well i guess you always have a choice but i want to say in the beginning obviously you know first number one all overall pick ryan here that's true that's one way to look at it that's the most important part obviously take it as a compliment yeah take it as a compliment absolutely uh but i yeah no i'm Absolutely. But I, yeah, no, I'm, I'm excited. I, I think, I don't know. I love, I love games that suck you in and like get you immersed into the world.

And then typically the ones that have the jump scares are the ones that do it. And I'm very susceptible to that. So as Paul knows with resident evil, so, uh, yeah, I'm, I'm,

I'm excited, man. It's going to be good. I, I'm, I'm excited, man. It's going to be good. I love the ocean. I love anything that it probably entails. So this, this should be good one. This is going to be a really interesting one.

All right, well, we're going to take our short break and we'll be right back with more video gamers podcast. All right. Continuing our pre dive here. The game is subnautica. forced friend is ryan he's gonna have to play it here for the first time i i'm gonna say it i'm gonna reinstall subnautica

i'm not promising to beat it but i will dabble in it and i will see if i can get past the point that got me stuck last time so i i don't remember what I was looking for. There was some material. I know what I could not find it. I wasted about an hour of time, couldn't find it and just quit the game. I was enjoying it, but I didn't get very far, only a couple hours, but I'll dabble in it for sure. And if it sucks me in, maybe I'll try to do a full playthrough with you, Ryan. So I think that'll be a lot of fun. Oh, I would love that. I've always, Paul, I seriously considered you for this because I know that you've played it before and I think that'll be a lot of fun. Oh, I would love that. I've always, Paul, I seriously considered you for this because I know that you've played it before.

And I know that you got stuck at one part. And I get that. Everybody gets stuck at that one part. You were looking for the final piece of the Cyclops, which is a vehicle that you get. And it's hard to find that final piece. You do a lot of searching around for it. The game really takes off after that. I don't want to spoil things for Ryan, even though this

game's been out for five years now. But since he's going into it brand new, I don't want to spoil that stuff. But I'd be very curious, Paul, what your thoughts are if you do. And I know there's no obligation there, but if you do dabble back in it and make it past that point, kind of where it goes for you as well. Sure. Now, Josh, I think you have a description of the game ready. Hit us with it. I do have a description for anybody that's like Ryan that has never played Subnautica. Again, this is a pretty well-known game, at least in title. But here's the game description. So Subnautica is an underwater adventure game set on an alien ocean planet, a massive open world full of wonder and peril

await you. You have crash landed on an alien ocean world, and the only way to go is down. Subnautica's oceans range from sun-drenched, shallow coral reefs to treacherous deep sea trenches, lava fields, and bioluminescent underwater rivers. Manage your oxygen supply as you explore kelp forests, plateaus, reefs, and winding cave systems. The water teems with life, some of it helpful, much of it harmful. After crash landing in your life pod, the clock is ticking to find water, food, and to develop the equipment you need to explore collect resources from the ocean around you craft diving gear lights habitat modules and submersibles

venture deeper and further to find rare resources allowing you to craft more advanced items so there is a synopsis of subnautica straight from the developers themselves okay now josh is there anything that you need to tell Ryan to help prep him for this game? Anything he should know? Any helpful tips? What does he need? My body is ready. Just enjoy the game. I'm going to actually give you a fun fact on one thing that actually the developers approached the development of this game with, because this game doesn't have quests. Like you, you progress at your own pace. Um, and I'll get to that here in a minute, but my biggest tip would be, don't think that you've seen everything that this game has to offer

because you like when you get to a certain level, because when you do, you haven't even begun to scratch the surface. And again, it's an ocean game. You're going to get to a point where you go, oh, cool. I made it to the bottom of the ocean. No, no, you have not. It's a little bit like when Todd Howard, who runs, gosh, what's their name? Bethesda.

Starfield Studio. Bethesda studio thank you like how he makes reference to how games always have a stepping out moment whether it's like stepping out of the vault in fallout or whatever it might be and you realize like how much this world has to offer there's a little bit of that in in terms with subnautica where the world is going to be maybe a little bit bigger than you initially realize yeah it's going to blow your mind. Honestly, there's going to be parts where you just go, what? And then, you know, just this is a survival exploration game.

And I don't know if you've really dabbled in that genre a whole lot, Ryan. So I said it before. Subnautica is the game that got me to realize that I love this genre. Now, not every game in the genre is a banger. The Forest is one that just didn't land it for paul and myself um but subnautica is really the the game that was the turning point for me in that regard yeah okay i'm i'm excited i mean you guys i i like that you have both played it and you both have some knowledge on it and i am completely dark on the whole thing so i think this will be cool because you get a hundred percent fresh perspective on how i took it and how i played it and i don't know maybe we'll get some audio and jump scares

oh i do want you to play this on camera and that would be amazing But that would also take up your entire hard drive. Probably just recording you. Very true. Now, whenever we do these deep dives, whoever gets to choose the game is also going to come with some fun facts. So, Josh, I think you've got some stuff to tell us. I do. So some fun facts about Subnautica is the developer, Unknown Worlds Entertainment, actually almost went bankrupt several times during the development of Subnautica, which breaks my heart a little bit to think about

because it's like, I know how I feel about this game. And to think that it almost never happened is kind of crazy. But it was only because of the streamer and YouTuber Jacksepticeye, who is very, very popular. He picked it up and he started playing the game on his channel and it blew up in popularity so much so that Unknown Worlds Entertainment actually credits them being able to finish development of the game to Jacksepticeye for him picking it up and playing it and making it popular. They sent him a personal thank you letter, which you can go and look up on YouTube if you want to see this. But I thought that was so cool that him picking this game up and playing it and making it known to people is actually what let this game get finished.

And then just enjoyed by millions and millions of people around the world really does show the power that like twitch streamers and youtube yeah yeah the whole let's play movement that's pretty crazy i i i wonder if they've put anything in the game in his honor it'd be interesting if there was like a there are actually sunken statue or something with this there actually are some portraits like paintings that you can get to outfit your base uh because this game does have base building as well um that you can get that are some of the youtubers that picked it up and helped launch it into popularity and kind of got them out of that development right yeah so they definitely acknowledge that another fun little quick fact here um the aurora which is the crash ship that you will see right away in this game so that's not a spoiler but the aurora was originally a 2d picture that was on the horizon and it was just meant to give

some depth to the horizon. People were never meant to actually go look at it. It was just supposed to be, you know, kind of like a planet up in the sky or something. And so many players during the early access for this game kept trying to go over to swim over and explore the Aurora that the devs eventually added it to the game as an explorable place. So that also kind of tells you if you see something, maybe go check it out. See what it is. I don't want to spoil things, but this is relatively early on. Is this where you start to experience radiation yes as you get near it okay gotcha gotcha okay so this game does have a lot of progression where

you can't go to certain places until you get certain things that allow you to go there as well um and that the aurora is one of them so um and rust has trained me well to stay away from the the geiger meter yes or whatever it's called. All right. So this fun fact is the one that I was actually talking about. The game lacks a traditional mission or quest structure that's usually found in video games. This was a deliberate choice. The devs stated, with intrinsic rewards, people are encouraged to do just the activities for their own merit. People would be motivated to do these if there is merit in them,

but if they could not get over the learning period, they would get to the point where they internalize that activity as pleasurable and on its own, they would continue to do it. So basically what they're saying now, this is, I know that sounded a little goofy, but the developers are not English, uh, you know, speakers by, by nature. So basically what they're saying is there's no quest system. There is no mission system. The things that you do in Subnautica, you do because you need to do them and you want to do them. And the game starts off very well. Now, obviously, it gives you some survival elements.

Hey, you need to eat or you're going to starve. You need fresh water. You're on an ocean planet. Where do you get fresh water at? Right? So they do these things, but they designed it in a way that in doing them, there is just natural reward in it. And I actually love the fact that a game like this gives you no quests, no missions, and just says, here's a planet. Go explore it and check it out.

Yeah, it's almost like as if you were dropped off on an alien planet and you just had to start looking around what am i gonna do and that's that's exactly how it works in subnautica yep and then just a real quick one uh subnautica won the golden joystick pc game of the year in 2018 now we know a couple other good games that came out in 2018 um and the fan favorite indie game of the year so this game was uh actually fairly well awarded uh when it first came out and that was up against the likes of god of war and red dead redemption 2 as well okay so ryan now that you have a better idea of the game any follow-up questions anything you want to know about subnautica before jumping into it um man i don't know i i'm i'm excited the way you guys have described it i think it's gonna be something that may sit well for me um i love exploration i love

to just go and you know i love skyrim i love you know all these games that you can just go off and and find all these little kind of nooks and crannies and areas so uh not really if if josh do you want to just tell me where the jump scares are so i can mark them and then not get scared no no you'll okay you won't know when they're coming don't worry actually you will know when they're coming because this i will say this subnautica has an excellent soundtrack and excellent sound design. And that's going to tell you everything you need to know. So just pay attention.

Play it with headphones. Pay attention to what you hear. Duly noted. Headphones are a must. Yeah. Yeah. And I think it's roughly a 30-hour game. That's what it says on howlongtobeat.com.

So yeah, not a terribly long long game but also not terribly short and i think at this point here we're going to read a couple community reviews and then we'll kind of wrap things up i was going to say i want to i really want to get ryan hyped because i know he's kind of i i get it he's like man i don't know what to expect on this and i i don't know so let me let me read some reviews ryan and then we'll get into what the actual review score is. Maybe we'll even guess the score and see if we can't play a little game. All right. So I've pulled three reviews.

The first one, at one moment, it's a nice cute game where I explore alien marine life, enjoying the beautiful sights, playing with little fishes and building my underwater home sweet home. Oops, I've run out of crafting material. Better make a quick run in my brand new submarine now i'm in a survival horror game in the darkest deepest depths of the ocean being

chased by a giant sea monster straight out of a lovecraftian horror my submarine is on fire i'm running out of oxygen and the game decided to drop the sickest beat while i'm experiencing 12 ways to die 10 out of 10 recommend don't play it for a story. Play it for the experience. Oh, man. I think that's a very well-written review. That's exactly what it is. This review is so spot on for me, man.

If you're trying to get me hyped, that got me hyped. Well, good. For sure. All right, this next one. I cannot put into words how experiencing Subnautica for the first time felt.

You are on an alien planet and you get to explore it. See all the types of plants and fish. It was amazing. This curiosity guiding you to danger without you even realizing it and then getting eaten by a massive reaper was terrifying. The moment when you realize that this planet is not safe and when you start to fear it is when you also realize that you won't be able to progress without exploring further being forced to go places where you know danger

lurks filled me with such dread not only the planet itself interested me but the story behind it also was unexpected to say the least no spoilers but witnessing a certain ship made me rethink what exactly i was playing absolutely amazing okay okay all right and then this last one i'm getting a little hyped this last one one of the best games i've ever played and probably the best open world survival crafting game that's ever been made it's high praise i i love this do not disagree with that review uh in all honesty all right guys so i wanted to get i picked obviously i cherry picked some good reviews on this one um but just as a last little hype machine let's let's guess the steam score on this one

this one's way up there i think it's like 96 96%. That's my guess. Paul says 96, Ryan. Ryan, who knows nothing about this game, how it was received. Yeah, Ryan, pick a score. Yeah, what's your educated guess, buddy? 92. 92. Paul, you hit the nail on the head. You are really good at this, by the way.

This is 96% overwhelmingly positive out of 217 000 reviews wow so when a quarter of a million people take the time to actually review a game and then it comes out as a 96 on steam you know there's something to be said for the game itself yep i remember buying it almost the same time as dos 2 because i remember both games were overwhelmingly positive and i was like if 200 000 people love it this much there's got to be something to it yeah yep all right well i'm very excited i i i don't i i really don't know if ryan's gonna love this game or just think it's fine i think it's gonna fall somewhere on that spectrum i don't think he's gonna hate it but i don't know. I'm very curious to hear if we're making guesses.

I think Ryan's going to love it. I think, I think right now he's going, I'm not going to like this. Josh picked this and I know he's hyped for it. I'll play it cause I have to, but I think it's going to be okay. I think that would be like my thinking as well. And that was kind of my thinking when I went into it but i think i think we're gonna come back in two weeks and i think ryan's gonna be like dude that was awesome i hope i have the same reaction because i'm gonna finally get to get hopefully past the spot where i got stuck last time yeah so i'm also speaking from a place of ignorance because i only played the first few hours of this game. Yep.

All right. Well, any closing thoughts, any questions, anything else we need to cover on this pre-dive? I'm ready. I am ready. And just to point out,

we will be back in two weeks to, to follow up on this. We will do an entire episode on subnautica to see what Ryan's thoughts are. We'll dive into the game a little bit more. We'll do a full breakdown on it and everything else. So, you know, if you want to see the follow-up for this one, it's in two weeks. Yeah, make sure to come back for that. And also we each have our own individual leaderboards now.

And so anytime that we cover a new game after a deep dive, we will all individually place it on our leaderboard if we have played it. So you'll be able to hear not just ryan's thoughts but also uh my thoughts as i jump back into subnautica and then i think probably all three of us will end up placing it on our leaderboard and i think that's going to be an absolute ton of fun uh so that'll be in two weeks in the meantime check out all of our other episodes make sure to hit the follow button so none of those skip past you and make sure to to hit up MultiplayerSquad.com where you can support the show and also hijack a host if you go legendary. Also, make sure to check out

our new Flashback Friday episodes that are going to be coming out. We're going to have so many episodes releasing during the week. We're really excited. A lot of fun stuff for you all to listen to. We just want to make sure you don't miss it. All right. Well, we'll be back for an episode on Thursday for This Week in Gaming. And until then, happy gaming everyone. See ya! Enjoy those Reapers, Ryan.

Oh no. Bye everybody. you