Video Gamers Podcast - [Game Court] - Josh vs Ryan: The Friendslop Showdown – Gaming Podcast

Episode Date: July 30, 2026

Gaming hosts Josh, Ryan and Ace are back with GAME COURT, where Josh and Ryan go head-to-head over one of the hottest debates in gaming: are "Friendslop" games actually great, or are they ruining video games? Ace takes the bench as both sides make their case, bringing laughs, arguments, and plenty of chaos. If you love gaming debates and passionate discussions about video games, this is one courtroom battle you won't want to miss from the Video Gamers Podcast. Gaming has never been this contentious!   Thanks to our MYTHIC Supporters: Redletter, Disratory, Ol’ Jake, Gaius, Jigglepuf, Phelps, Bobby S, NorwegianGreaser, Dettmarp and NightWizard63   Thanks to our Legendary Supporters: Milkman, Drewsky, Jigglepuf and BadGam3rDad   Connect with the show: Support us on Patreon: ⁠patreon.com/videogamerspod⁠ Join our Gaming Community: https://discord.gg/h2cHKAvSmu 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

Hello, honorable gamers, and welcome to the video gamers podcast, GameCourt. Friends Slop is a new genre and success stories like Peek and Mecha Chameleon are known to the world. But with them have come a slew of copycats, uninspired money grabs, and some truly lazy attempts at making games. They're fun for sure, but are they good for gamers and the industry? Well, on today's episode, we're making arguments for, and against friend slop games to see who wins and who flops. Before the proceedings start, some introductions are in order. I am your host, Josh, and joining me, he's my mortal enemy on this episode.

He's absent-minded, perpetually late, a Lou Goblin to his core, and he's got a big nose. It's Ryan. Objection. On all counts. Objection. overruled I'm not always late I'm not always late

that's that's it that's it overrules you have a big nose to know nothing else he was like the one thing is I'm not always late guys oh man

all right well I did say we were enemies Ryan so and joining us he's the greatest host to ever join the podcast his indie knowledge knows no bounds

his tasting games is impeccable, and he has the best food takes of anyone I know. Plus, he's just an all-around handsome fellow with a great personality. It's Ace. I'm trying to butter up the judge, are we? You're darn right at you. Is it working? Is it working, Ace?

Will you tell me that GTA 5 is an overrated game? No, because it's a really good game. Oh, okay. He won't go that far. It's a really good game. It's a really good game. You'll see. You'll see, Ace.

also so stupid because GTA 5 is horrible. I just wanted the, I just wanted the sound clip, Ryan. Yeah, it's such a bad game. It's such a bad game. There you go. Oh, yeah, there we go. I'll say it. Look at this idiotous suit, trashing GTA 5.

Oh, man. Yeah. Well, welcome in everybody. Hey, it has been a long time since we have gone to GameCourt. We love doing these episodes. But, you know, sometimes we have to be passionate about the topic at hand. And it just so happens that Ryan and I may have gotten into a fight recently over Friend Slop.

And this happened naturally, like most of our arguments do, where Ryan loves Friend Slop. And I went, no, Friend Slop is stupid. And then an argument ensued. And then we both went, oh, Game Court. And we were like, yeah, it's time for GameCourt. So we are bringing the argument before you. We are going to present our cases as to why I think Friend Slop is stupid. we're going to why I think it's bad for gamers and the video game industry.

Ryan is going to argue why he is for it and thinks that these games are great and belong as the newest genre in the gaming industry as well. And Ace is the honorable judge that is presiding over this episode to attempt to keep Ryan and I in line and civil with each other. Oh, we'll try. Well, we'll try our very, very best. And we'll ultimately, and we'll ultimately decide who wins their. case here in game court. So, Ace, as the presiding judge, I'm going to hand things over to you at this point. I am going to wait to defend my side of things, but I will pass the reins to you for the remainder of this episode. All right.

I am your honorable judge, Ace, here for the people versus friend Slop to decide today if Friendslop deserves to call itself a genre or if it is a massive internet scam. Ryan, would you like to give us an opening statement as the defendant? Oh, man. Um, no. No, he would not. Can I say, can I just say no? To the prosecution.

I was not ready for that. To the prosecution, go ahead and give us your opening statement. Wait, am I the prosecution? I don't know which one's which. Oh. Am I defyter? You're the hater. Yeah, I am the hater.

Okay, so I guess I'm the prosecutor. You're the prosecutor. He's the defendant. Yeah, okay. Yeah, prosecute me. Prosecute me, daddy. You're the people and he's, you're the people. and he's friend slop.

Prosecute me. You're good. Okay. All right. So here, listen, and I'm winging this because I didn't, I didn't write up an opening statement because I didn't know. I had one, but I didn't realize it was going to come there. Okay.

So we're not in real court. Okay. No, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm ready with my points and my facts. I just didn't know that I had to have like an opening statement written. But that's fine. One minute. I'm a seat of the pants kind of guy. Just in one minute, tell this court why or why not friend slop should be considered a genre.

a genre? Oh no, I'm arguing why I think friend Slop is stupid and not good for the gaming industry. Okay, well, explain why it's not. Explain why. So I mean, in effect, shouldn't be like a thing, a genre. All right. So here's my issue with Friend Slop. Number one, to me, Friend Slop incentivizes lazy, formulaic, like, low effort development. These games are the lowest common denominator for video games that you can possibly develop.

Like we have seen it time and time again. There is nothing in these games, mechanics or otherwise that is innovative or fun. They rely on the fact that only you and your friends are what make these games fun. You cannot enjoy a friend-stop game as a solo gamer. Like they, like it is absolutely geared towards, hey, we are giving you a playground or a sandbox so that you can make whatever fun you want. That's not like that's not a good game. That is simply saying, hey, if you have a fun friend group, guess what? You'll have fun hanging out together.

Yeah, of course. Hanging out with your friends is always fun. But we're talking video games, okay? Friend Slop games function as disposable throwaway products, all right? And that is not good for the video game industry in any sense of a long-term health for the video game industry. All right? There's no franchises. There's no memorable characters.

there's no memorable worlds. There's no memories at all other than laughing with your buddies. And again, that's not the games doing it. It's the fact that they're just giving you the ability to hang out together. And you can do that in so many better ways in gaming. They reinforce short attention spans.

You know, we hear about the doom scrolling and the short form content because people can't think for more than 15 seconds at a time now. And Friend Slop is the natural evolution of that to where it's like, I can't put 20 hours into a video game anymore. If I can't play this game and throw it away in three hours, then I'm not interested.

And that's bad for the video game industry as well. And like I already mentioned, they are formulated on the fact that it is only through external factors that these games are enjoyable. They are not enjoyable solo. They are only enjoyable with your friend group, which by nature alienates other gamers that don't have friends to play with

and then feel left out because they're not caught up in the current fad of whatever friend slop game is breaking the internet at the moment. All right. Defense. How was that? That was pretty bad, honestly. I mean, I just winged that, dude, so I don't, you know.

Okay, so here's the thing. People hear the term friend slop and immediately think it's some low... Slop. Yeah, some low effort throwaway game. I think it's completely looked at the wrong way. I think these games aren't trying to be the next Eldon Ring, the next Redid Redemption 2. Their goal is simply to get a group of friends together and create moments that you'll be laughing about and thinking about for years to come. Honestly, it's one of my favorite moments is a lot of the times that we've played these games together.

We've created memories. We've played these games. and we will think about them for decades, decades over and over and over. It's not emotional cutscene. It's not from some chaos or some cinematic masterpiece. It's from playing ridiculous scenarios with my friends. And it's something that I think that these games are designed to do and it allows the player or the playee to,

create what they want to do, create the memories that they're looking for, and they're not designed, they're not predestined, and that's what makes a friend, that's what makes a friend Slop game what it is. So you don't feel that Friends Slop games are disposable in any way, as the prosecution has said. It is not to be said that they're not disposable, but disposable does not mean it lacks value.

I believe that there is value within these things. Just because the disposable camera is disposable, does that not make those images less valuable? What's the last time he used to dispose of the landfills with disposable cameras when you could be? Yeah. When's the last time you used? They're so great. Hold on. Hold on.

Yeah. Hold on. What, what judge goes, yeah, well, what about, you know, what a point of order, point of order. Court, can I get, we want a replacement judge here. This is, all right, all right. I want to pose a question to Ryan. Okay. All right.

All right. Lay on me. This is how we try to prove our points on these. To me, there's, you know, some of the greatest memories in gaming are the gaming moments. And we've covered many of those on this show. You know, we do drafts all the time with gaming characters and gaming worlds and gaming weapons and these things that we remember, right? Because they stand out.

The only thing, and you kind of hinted it. this, the only thing that ever stands out in a friend Slop game is a funny moment of laughter because something comical happened. It's slapstick comedy at best. And I'm not saying that slapstick comedy isn't funny because Lord knows, I think Jackass is one of the funniest movies ever made. Like, you know, everybody's got a different sense of humor. But like, you know, our brains all get tickled in a different way. But my point is with Friend Slop games, there is zero, zero memorable about any of them other than the laugh, laugh inducing moments that they allow you to have.

And that goes back to my point that there's nothing special about these games at all other than giving people a means to come together. If the three of us were hanging out in voice chat and just chilling and vibing together, we would laugh. We do that all the time. I mean, our pre-shows and recordings and all this stuff. Like, you know, so there's nothing special about a friend slop game that creates those moments. There's no memorabilness.

There's no franchises that happen. There's no characters that arise from these. They are, they're just garbage, dude. They're garbage that multiple people can consume together to give them an excuse to hang out. And my whole point is that people can do that playing much better games and having much more memorable moments together than you could have in a friend slap game. Okay, well, I will answer your question with the question, counsel. You can't do that. There's no question with questions.

There's no takesie-backsees. Well, I identify as a woman, so I'm going to answer your question with a question, because that's what they like to do. Sir, councilman, let me know what you think about, do you have a memorable time of us playing lethal company? Yeah, sure. Okay. Do you have a memorable time of us playing Mecca Chameleon?

The community night because we had a large group of people. Absolutely. Do you have a memorable time of us playing Dig, Dig, Die? It's a bad memory, sure. It's bad because it's not a good game. It's not a good game. And it wasn't fun. All Friends Slops that you just get to be with your friends doesn't make a game.

It doesn't make an experience. And that shows that there's a lot of these that are not good. And that's okay. But the ones that are create a memory and experience in a world that you will remember forever. They make something that is an experience. And there's a lot of them that don't. But the ones that do really hold true and they set in stone what they're meant to be. They are meant to be an experience.

They're meant to be a good time. They are not 60, 50, $40 games. They're $5.99 at best. Like, there are cheap games meant to have a really, really, really good time with your friends. You have five, six hours, and then you move on to the next one. So the thought that any game at all is just garbage is just factually untrue because there's a whole heck of a lot of them that we've had a good time. I'm playing. And there's a lot that aren't very good. So. Okay. First of all, Judge, I would like to object to lethal company being considered friend

slop because I do not think that lethal company fits the definition of true friend slop. All right. Let me go to the books here. Judge, I would also like to object to because lethal company is going to be the one example that Ryan continues to try to use because it is the there's a no, I have a bunch more. Like that's, I mean, lethal company is great, but like, yeah, no, I have a bunch more. According to our AI overlords, lethal company is widely considered a prime example of the friend slop micros. Dang it. Dang it!

All right. That's fine. That's fine. Okay, Ryan, you wanted to point out experiences. You wanted to say, hey, we had fun playing mecha chameleon. We had fun playing lethal company. We had fun playing whatever, right? But like, I would argue that we had more fun playing Night Rain.

We had more fun playing Remnant 2. We had more fun playing endless dungeon. We have more fun playing Overwatch. We have more fun playing any other number of video games out there that actually lend themselves to better and longer experiences than a friend slop game where the only fun is slapstick comedy. The only fun from those games is the lowest common denominator. There is no boss fight to overcome to work together. There is no hard, difficult puzzle or quest to overcome or any of those things.

The fun comes from, oh, look, Josh fell off the cliff in peak. Or, oh, look, what's the new one that they're trying to make? They're trying to make the new friend Slop game with the passenger jet, right? What's that one? The plane one. It looks stupid. Like, this is what is the tipping scale for me is because I started seeing all of these reels and things on social media. for this stupid playing game.

And you know why the playing game looks fun to people? Because you can grab somebody and throw them out the door. Oh, oh, that's so entertaining, guys. Like, how fun is that to just troll your buddy? And it's like, again, it's not a game that is good. It is not healthy for the industry to have these things. When the only draw is the fact that you get to troll your friends. I am a troll.

I love trolling my friends. But I like doing it in an actual video game that is going to stand the test of time and actually wind up returning more value for my money than a friend slop game would. I get the low price of friend slop being the biggest draw to that. But let me ask you something. If you can get a dollar cheeseburger from McDonald's,

it's going to be trash. It doesn't mean it's good. It is the lowest common denominator of something that you can possibly put in your body without poisoning yourself. It doesn't mean it's good. It doesn't mean you should go around eating dollar cheeseburgers all the time. In fact, you shouldn't because bad things. are going to happen when you do that.

And it's the exact same thing with Friends Slop. Sure, I paid $5 and I got three hours worth of entertainment out of it. You know what? I've gotten way more out of. I have thousands of hours in Overwatch. I paid at the time, I paid $40 for Overwatch. I have gotten way more entertainment value out of a $40 game over thousands of hours than I did for paying $5 for a three hour game.

So the dollar to entertainment value conversion doesn't actually hold up for the most part. And that's one of the biggest things that people say about Friends Slop. Oh, they're only five bucks. What's your objection? You cannot use a free to play game, especially a AAA title. It wasn't free to play. It was $40. Overwatch was $40 when it came out.

It's as of now it is a free to play. So we're using current metrics. You cannot use that with an entity such as Blizzard to, you know, substantiate your argument. Why? Yep. you can't use. Yeah. Modern Overwatch is a free.

I can't use that. Modern Overwatch and rivals are free games. Okay. NightRane. We all paid for NightRain. We got so much entertainment value and memories and enjoyment out of night rain than we did out of any of these friend slot games. So, so I'm going to ask you a question, uh, councilman. Uh, if you're hammered drunk and you're headed home and there's a jack in the box staring you in the face and you got four tacos and a junior baking cheeseburger looking at you, are you going to drive it? Are you going to driving home, are you going to not get it?

You got Uber. Number one, don't you can drive. He's got an Uber. Number two, thank you. Thank you for proving my point that the only time that it makes sense is if you are out of your faculties. It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. If you were out of your faculties to go, hey, I'm making bad decisions right now.

There's a point for them. I'm making bad decisions because I drank too much and now a friend slop game sounds great. You're not. You're not looking for a AAA game when you were playing these games. You're not looking for Christmas. You're not looking for excellence. You're not looking for something that is going to wow you or blow your socks off. That's not the purpose of these games.

These games are meant to have fun, enjoy it for five, 10, 15, whatever hours that may be. All games are meant to have fun. That's not anything special. All games are developed so gamers can have fun. That doesn't make friendslop special. But what is the value to fun? What is the value to fun ratio? If you pay $7 for a game,

Peak was abysmal. I had zero value to Pete. Peak was abysmal to you. Peek was abysmal to you. There's a lot of people on this server and listening to this show that loved that game and thought it was great. I thought it was a really good game. It wasn't my favorite. It's not something that I would be drawn to.

But for $10, $15, $20, it's far away. I'm going to give you a point that you absolutely are trying to make. I am not arguing that friend Slop games cannot be fun. all video games are made to be fun and can friend slop be fun absolutely they can be fun do you know why they're fun because it's your friends that make them fun if you're playing peak solo

what does that matter? It absolutely matters so all multiplayer games don't matter all multiplayer games are just invalid but I'm saying that friend slop is predicated on the fact that the only way that you can have fun in a friend slop game is if you have friends to play with

all right so Fortnite counterstrike everybody playing bots is just It's, that's what that was good. No, because those are competitive games. Oh, you brought up competitive games. I'm going to have to ask for some evidence here on games that you can only play by, with friends. Yeah, every friend Slop game. Name a friend Slop game that is fun solo.

Give me an example of one. Name a friend Slop game that is fun as a solo experience. I am a masochist, so I've played, I've actually played a good bit of lethal company solo. Actually in the morning. Oh, my God. You are a masochicist. I am a masochist. The whole point, and I made this in my opening statement, is that these games only thrive or only even survive under the pretense that you have a friend group to play them with.

If you were playing Peak or RV there yet or any of these other games, repo, headliners, any of these games, and I'll tell you what, we can even get into the fact how they just get copied into oblivion at this point because there's no innovation whatsoever in this genre. you know what I mean. If you are trying to play those with strangers, it is not a good experience. Josh, do you have fun playing Overwatch solo? You like to solo cue? Do you like to solo cue one of your favorite games of all time?

A game that you have hundreds and hundreds of hours? Yes, I absolutely. I absolutely do. And you're trying to use Overwatch because it's a team-based game. I'm using it because it's a team-based game that we all have fun at together, but you don't solo-cue it. You don't play on your own. You play with your daughter or with us.

Like, you don't play on your own. And you've said a million times over. But Overwatch is a friend slop game. So if I can't use Overwatch as a comparison for a free to play game versus a friend slop game, then you can't use Overwatch as a comparison for a friend slop game when it suits your benefit. Judge, can you rain this guy in? So objection, Your Honor. Can you rein this guy in?

Objection, Your Honor. No. The bottom line is that, is that you can't sit here and you can't say that these games, aren't okay because you have to play with a friend. When all you do in all of these games, these hero shooters and anything else, you're not playing them solo. You don't

solo. You can absolutely play them solo and have them work. You cannot play in friend slop games solo. You personally have told me a million times how horrible Overwatch is if you solo queue. If we're going by personal takes on this, then that's a different story. I'm arguing as the industry as a whole and you can absolutely play Fortnite solo. You can absolutely

play Marvel rival solo or Overwatch solo and have a very good time. You cannot play Peak solo and think that Peak is a good video game or that lethal company, which is the greatest of the bunch. It's not designed for that. Or headliners or repo is a good game solo. That's not what it's designed to be. You can't sit there.

But that's my point. You can't use that as your argument. It is literally not designed to be a game to be a game. It is only a hangout with something to distract the people that are hanging out together. Look at this. basketball game. It's not football. Can you believe it? Can you believe it? What are we doing here? Like, that's what you're doing. This is not, this is not what it's designed to be. Those games are designed to be played with your friends. They're designed to be trash. And they're

right. No, they're absolutely, they're designed to be trashed. But they're priced accordingly. We will have order in the court. Prosecutor, I'm going to ask, have to ask you to, you know, set us up for an ad break here so we can come right back. All right. Ryan's wrong and we're going to take an ad break for everybody to think about why. We'll be right back. All right. Court is back in session. Defense,

continue with whatever points you were making. I'm not putting an ad break there at all. Ryan's like, I'm not putting nothing there, man. Nobody's hearing any ads. Okay, can I make another point? Go ahead. Since I'm the prosecution, I'd like to ask you another point.

I would like to hear, I would like to hear more nonsense that you have. have to say absolutely late on me. Well, you have said many times on this podcast that innovation in gaming is paramount. And whenever anybody copies the same formula over and over and over and over and over and over again, that that's bad. Yes. So how do you reconcile the fact that with friend Slop games, they are literally just copying the same formula over and over and over again? And if you need some examples, because you're going to be with which ones. I will need no examples. I need no evidence. Leathlethal company headliners, repo, content warning

are literally the exact same game. Everybody just copies everybody in the exact same fashion. Janky mechanics, reaching a daily quota. What was the game that we just played where we had to have a quota every day? Oh,

the mound. Omen of Cthulhu. That's not even a friend slop game. Thank goodness. But it borrows. We're starting to see them borrowing from friend slop now. It is It is infecting the industry already because a game that's not even a friend slop game is going, oh, well, we have to have this daily quota because that's what friend slop does.

There's zero innovation in friend slop beginning to why? Because they can't innovate. Because the only point of friend slop is to have a community hang out with a distraction for the people to do. And that's a problem? So how do you how do you defend the lack of innovation when you yourself have repeatedly stated that a lack of innovation is detrimental to the gaming industry. And yet you are supporting the thing that is stifling innovation more than anything else right now. Josh, did you, let me ask you some questions here.

Did you have fun when we played a lethal company? Fun is not what is on trial. It's a yes or no. Yes. Yes. You've deflected the question. Did you have fun when we played Highliners or Headliners? The judge is saying something to you, right?

Defense, you have deflected the question. I need you to answer the question of the prosecution. Yeah, you're making a straw man. What was the question? The question is how do you respond to the fact that Friend Slop is stifling innovation in the gaming industry because they just copy the same tired mechanics. That's a personal opinion. Look at open world games. Look at action RPGs.

Look at turn-based combat. Are you saying that you don't think that it's stifling? I need evidence in proof of contrary from either of you that they are either copying or that they are. I gave my evidence. I gave four different games right off the way. are not just a I'm not saying that they're not all the same. That's the genre.

Just like every other genre is equally within a threshold of similarity. You're taking a blanket thing like an open world, which is a setting for a game, and you're trying to say that the exact same game mechanics out of the games that I listed are the same as to a

turn-based combat game. What is different? You parry, you parry, the abilities, the skill trees, what the characters do, the timing if they have active stuff like Expedition 33 does. You're trying to lump a genre into a very small window, which I am targeting a small window saying that they are copying the exact same mechanics in the exact same formula.

And you're trying to say, well, that's a genre. I'm saying these games literally, literally are the exact same game with a different title. Like the mechanics, the jank, the daily quotas, the moving things, the finding stuff and trying to extract with it is literally, the same across the board. Literally the same. There's zero innovation involved there at all. And then you're trying to broaden that to being,

oh, well, it's a genre. And yet I harken back to, um, again, yes or no answers. Josh, did you have fun with headliners? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

I already agree that. What is on trial is that is these games that we've played. So you, you had fun with Leitha Company. You had fun with headliners. Did you have fun with, uh, with,

mound. You even brought that up. That wasn't a, that wasn't a friend slop game. But, but you said it was taking aspects of it. I have fun with almost every video game imaginable. So we all play these games together. We all play them whether they're so similar. I would like to object because video games being fun is not what's on trial here. Okay. There's no, there's no argument for me that friend slop games can be fun. Hanging out with your friends is always fun. Playing video games is always fun. So what are you arguing, councilman? Literally that what I said in the opening statement of what this game court is predicated on. That friend Slop games are garbage.

They're not good for the industry. They stifle innovation. They help to, not enhance, but reinforce short attention spans in this pandemic we have of doom scrolling and short form content because people can't hold a thought

for more than five minutes at a time. And we're just reinforcing that with throwaway trash games. They're bad for the industry. So you're saying that the games that you had fun on, that were highly affordable, that were of quality make that didn't have a lot of bugs that you enjoyed are now bad for the industry. Not a lot of bugs. Did you have you played these friend Slop games?

I'm, uh, no of them. Not all of them. Bro. Jury? This man has no idea what he's talking about. If he said these games don't have bugs. They are the least developed games in the world. Of course they are.

They're not meant. Can you give me an example council of? a game with a bug when you remember. Mecca chameleon. We just played it. 20 people. We had a group of 20 plus people that were ridden with bugs in this game, dude. Absolutely. Sorry, defense.

I also just played Assassin's Creed and that was riddled with bugs. True. It's almost like video games have bugs. It's almost like they have bugs. So then one costs... It was a moot point. One cost one eighth of the other. That wasn't my point. Just for the record, it wasn't the point I was trying. The issue is that you're,

You're claiming that there's just like some onslaught of all these games and there's so many. And how are people going to deal with that? Let me give you the numbers. Would you say that indies are a plague to gaming industry? No, what does that have to do with friends? And I know at the risk of my judge. I just want, I just want to say that in 20204, there was a total of 18,825 indie games submitted. making Steam's biggest year ever in 2020.

Friendslop games are not, while they may fall under indie developers, Friends Slop games are not considered indie like the same as an indie game because they are the lowest common denominator of game that is made. So trying to say that Friendslop represents all indie is absolutely wrong

because we're talking about a genre. So you're trying to make the argument that Metroidvanias are bad because lots of Metroidvanias are made in the indie industry. And that is not the argument here. No, no, the argument here is that just because a lot of games have been, have been developed and made and put into there, like, you have to look at what's coming

out of it. They're the quote unquote friend slop games, which I hate that name, by the way, because there's a lot of really good ones that we have a lot of good memories. You can blame the peak developers for coining that one. Yeah, it's the peak developers to that. But there's a lot of really fun. enjoyable experiences that you can have for a super, super price where you finish that day or that gameplay and you say, that was worth it? How many games do you play where you say, dang, that was

worth it? Like, where do you go and you do that? And it's like $8 and you're like, man, that was a good deal. That was fun. So being cheap makes them good. It doesn't matter. Is that your argument? No, whether it's expensive or cheap or none of it. That's your argument is you're saying that because they're $5 that that just automatically makes it good. They're priced according to what they offer. So you can't see here. Was Dig Dig Dig Die worth $5? We didn't pay a dollar for it.

So that's why. Is it worth $5? No, God, no. It wasn't worth it. They couldn't pay me to play that again. Okay. So then that doesn't mean just because it's cheap. Like I just said, there's 18,000 other indie games that just came out that you wouldn't take two seconds to look at.

You can't sit here and say based on the like the metrics of like the biggest games and and say, well, these aren't this. These aren't that. Let me ask you a question. Okay. Go ahead. And this is to your point that you're trying to make. So I'm going to answer. I'm going to ask you a question. I like, I keep saying the point I'm trying to make. I like, I noticed that. Because it's a terrible point. You keep saying. Yeah. Uh huh. Do you think would you recommend to indie developers that they try and focus on making a friend Slop game? If an indie developer came to you and said, Ryan, you're the host of the video gamers podcast.

I value your opinion. I respect what you guys do. I respect your knowledge. Should I make a friend slop game? 10,000%. Take two people, spend six months. So that's a yes? Yes, a thousand percent.

Oh, so you hate indie developers. No, no. Spend six months, make whatever. It doesn't matter what it is. If it's a time that you can sell it for $7 to 3 million people, and everybody has a cool night or a cool week. weekend experience, then that's what all you're trying to do. You are providing a service that services those few days. And I think both parties get value out of that. You get the value of

your experience. You experience it with your friends. You have the memories. You have the clips, you know, especially a lot of streamers. What are the most streams games? They're, they're streaming this stuff like crazy for a good reason because it creates, it generates good organic experiences with your friends and then it's cheap and so the monetary value exchange is more than you get with these AAA titles or anything else. So that's

why I think these Friends Lobb games are far and away of very, very good value and then they shouldn't be you know disposed of like some people. So a chef that's fresh out of culinary school you you think should go to McDonald's and work at McDonald's because it's the easiest cheapest thing to make. What? I'm just saying

You just said that you think in any of it. You would recommend that an indie developer try to make a friend Slop game, which is the lowest common denominator. No, it's not go work at McDonald's. Go make your own McDonald's. Go make your own burger shop and sell it wherever. But you can't make your own burger shop. No, they can, though.

This is where they can. That's the thing is that they can make their own burger shop here. They can make a game and they can go make hundreds of millions of dollars or tens of millions of dollars, you know, and cash out. It's already tough. It is already tough as an indie developer to get your game discovered in the industry. To recommend to an indie developer that they try to make a friend slop game,

which will absolutely just get lost in the mass of indie. Can't win if you don't play. You can't win if you don't play, brother. Mechicamillion made $75 to $90 million. Yeah, I'm not arguing that they can be financially viable. So don't try? Is that what you're saying? Don't try.

So, okay, so you think that let's, let's just take peek and mech a chameleon. Okay. And I'll even give you lethal company, even though I don't still don't think that it qualifies the definition. Why? Because it was too good. Because it was too good. So let's just take those three games.

You have three examples. Okay. RV there yet, I think was probably mildly successful. Yeah, that was good. So four games. Can you name any others? I'll give you, I'll give you content warning because that was mildly popular. And I'll give you repo.

Okay. Can you think, I'm asking you, can you think of any other games that we should throw into this list of successful friend slap games. What's the one where you go around and try to find the murderer? Among us? Among us. No, that's a deception. No, that's a friendship.

That's friend slop. No, that's friend slop. No. Well, let's go to the AI overlords. All right, well, while the judge looks at stuff, I'm going to just give you five games, the five most prominent games. Five games out of 10,000? That's not a good hit rate, man.

I just told you there were. There's 18,000 indie games. So five games out of 18,000 that were successful in this genre because this genre is slop. It is the lowest of the low. It is the price accordingly. That's the thing. It's price accordingly. What's the only thing that makes them popular, Ryan, is it's when you can get social media reels for it.

The only thing that makes these games popular is the shareability. Wait, wait, what is this? Is this among us? Sorry, Judge, judge ruling among us. Among us is widely considered by internet culture and gaming media to be the pioneer and ultimate blueprint for the FriendsLop. I disagree with that. Boom. I disagree with that. Why?

Because it was successful, just like you wanted to get rid of lethal company. So any of these ones that do well, then you're like, well, hold on. I was asking you for for numbers, dude. You couldn't give me any others. The numbers are six games. So six games out of the indie, like, okay, so let me ask you this. Since you're such a proponent of these Friends Slop games getting developed, now I can't use Solub. last as an example because you haven't played Celeste.

But like, I can name so many incredible indie titles that are memorable, have memorable characters, have furthered the industry, have, have innovated, uh, Hollow Knights, Celeste, Expedition 33. I mean, you could go on and on and on about how indie games have succeeded, but yet you are saying that you support the lowest, the trash, the, the garbage games because they're cheap. and maybe there's some fun to be had. But again, there's no memories from the game itself. Everybody knows Hollow Night.

Everybody knows Silk Song. Everybody knows Expedition 33. Everybody knows Celeste. Ace, name me 20 indie games that are memorable. We'll talk to our judge like that. Mix tape. Mix tape. Dispatch.

I mean, again, any number of games that have memories tied to them. There are obvious ones there. You jump to some interesting ones when there were some obvious ones there, but I'll have it. Yeah, but you get my point. You know what I mean? Is that, again, there's so many memories built on these games when they're developed with love and passion and they're developed to provide joy and entertainment to people when they're not garbage on a garbage can lid because it's cheap. Oh, guys, if you give me $5, guess what?

You get to laugh a little bit for three hours before you throw this to the side. What's wrong with that? That's the question is what's wrong with that. Why? That's what's wrong with it. But why? Why is that bad for the industry? I've been listening to a word I have said?

Why is paying a minimal amount of money and having a good time for a few hours bad for the industry? Would you like my opening statement again? Okay. How about we just do this? That is you're a fool. Since Ryan can't understand any of the points that I'm making, I'm going to try to. Make a point that makes sense. I'll talk slow for Ryan.

Yeah. Okay. Here. I'm going to say, okay, my closing statement is that friend slop is. is bad for the industry and they're bad for gamers because they incentivize lazy, formulaic, low effort development. They're bad for the industry. Okay.

They're rushed out in weeks or months by small teams that are just chasing trends or prior releases that were successful, which stifles any sort of innovation in the industry at all. They have low production values because, you know, why, Why should we put any effort into these if we're just trying to make a quick buck? And it doesn't matter what the game is because the game is really just disguised as a hangout for people. They're throwaway products that harm the long-term health of the gaming industry because there's no such thing as a franchise. There's no characters that are memorable. There's no memorable worlds.

There's no memories at all other than laughter that is made because once again, they're just disguised as hangouts for people. They reinforce short attention spans and shallow engagement, which is bad for humans in general and gamers in general. The gameplay loops are deliberately dumped down and simple. They're low stakes. They're session-based. You don't even get like permanent progression or anything with these games. There's nothing to strive for in these games other than, ha-ha, I threw Ryan off a cliff. Wasn't that funny?

Ha-ha-ha-ha. Okay. They create dependency on external factors or exclude gamers. Again, you have to have friends to play these with. If I don't have friends, guess what? I'm left out of Mecca Chameleon. And now I'm watching everybody on the internet playing Mecha Chameleon. And I'm home depressed in my room because I don't have friends to play with because

friend slop makes me feel bad because I don't have any game or friends to play with. You can fix that by joining our Discord server, by the way. Yeah. And they devalue the craft and the artistic expression of the industry as a whole. You kept wanting to reference indie games. none of these games have a good art style. They don't have good music. They don't have memorable mechanics.

They're garbage. They're garbage in every sense of the word garbage, which is why the gaming industry themselves labeled them slop. This wasn't gamers that did this. It was the industry that did this. I rest my case, Your Honor. All right. Defense, do you have any closing statement?

They're fun, Your Honor. They're fun and they're cheap, Your Honor. I first want to address the fact that councilman Josh has invited people to come join our Discord to come hang out to get friends to play games

to play the games that he's telling us not to play first of all No I didn't say that Second of all, sir, your time is done I would like to say that for these horrible horrible games that don't have an impact on the industry that aren't doing well

among us exploded to nearly 500 million monthly players at its peak in 2020. He didn't even know Amongus counted. And now he's got stats on Among Us already. 500 million. You know, what you need to think is, what has that brought to the world of gaming?

You say it's a bad thing. No, you bring more people, you bring more eyes, you bring more value, you bring more dollars, and that develops better games. Legal Company has sold an estimated 16 to 18 million copies on Steam alone. Okay, it's 10 bucks. You can go and you can play this game and you can have fun and if it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out. You're not paying $70.

You're not paying this absorbent price for a thing that you don't know if you're going to like or not. It is giving you the ability to try something out, play something with friends or family, ride the wave. Who cares if it's, I know it's old man, get off my lawn. I know your age is showing here and we're not going to address. that in today's service. This is what his defense is. But, you know, the,

he's scrambling, it's not, it's not, yeah, yeah, uh, your honor. Order of the court over there. Order in the court. Yeah, order in the court.

The defense finishes his closing statement. The defense tried to insult me to make a point. It's, well, if age insults you, then that's on you, sir. Uh,

I just want to let it be known that these games are here for a reason. They are appropriately priced as such. They are fun. They are enjoyable. And they are what they are. Friends Slop games, if you want to call them that, are Friends Slop Games. They are a good time.

You spend eight to ten hours or more, depending on the game, with your friends. You have a fantastic night. You have a fantastic weekend. And then you move on to the next one. And why would that ever be a bad thing? Why would that ever be frowned upon or looked down upon? Maybe you get somebody into gaming that otherwise wouldn't have. Maybe somebody who doesn't like to play these types of games or any sort of type of game gets into it and says, wow, maybe let me check something else out.

Let me look at what else there is. There's no reason to think that this is a bane on the existence of gaming or gamers other than people who are trying to gatekeep and stronghold what they believe to be pure gaming. I am against the pure gamers. Pure gamers are the worst to come through in the gaming world. and I hope that we can hashtag pure gamers against it. What the heck is a pure gamer? Yeah, it's you guys. It's you guys.

Your Honor, objection. He's trying to create like a meme word or something now. Like, I completely lost the point of this. Yeah, sustained. I lost the point of pure gamers. Pure gamers. Yeah, get out of here, you pure gamers. Purest gamers, I think, is what you're going for there.

But I have heard both arguments, and I do want to bring up some points that were left out that I feel are somewhat interesting. Yeah, Ryan. You left some points out, Ryan. Josh is an idiot. These games are very low barrier to entry. These are games for people who don't play games. Like, is what you brought up near the very end of the argument. You said prosecution that they are not memorable.

They don't have memorable characters and worlds. I would disagree. There are cosplays. There are our crossovers. There are all sorts of things featuring these characters. And there are things like that. But that's not we're here to argue today. We're here to argue friend slop, if it's bad for the gaming industry, if it is a poison, if it is not what we want.

And in this argument between the people versus friend slop, I am going to have to rule in favor of the people today. Yes. As I do feel that the genre has become oversaturated with low effort slop that drowns out true creatives and developers who are selling games for sims, other prices with more content and more to offer, quite frankly. From the indie man himself. Coming from 18,000 indie games like this over, over saturated. Eat it, Ryan. Judge, judge, give here.

Open it. Yeah, get me through the screen, buddy boy. I'll have you held a contempt of court, son. We will be voting on Ryan's punishments in a future episode. Wait, he doesn't have his headphones on. I don't know he's getting punished. I would say we'll be voting in the legendary lounge on a punishment for Ryan in the future. So everyone please stay tuned for that.

Yeah. But I do believe they do have a place or they had a place at some point. But at this point, things have gone too far where we've gotten no ingenuity with them. We've got no kind of interesting thing. Like the next game in the French Slab genre that people looking forward is called grain rot. Grain rot. That looks freaking sweet. Yeah, I saw this one.

Oh, my gosh. It looks sweet. No, we pay $7. It's the same as repo. Don't forget. Don't forget about the stupid airplane one, Ace. Yeah, that I sent you and it looks fun. You got the gnome one.

Why do you guys hate fun? Why do you guys hate fun? I don't hate fun. Nobody hates fun. But here's what happens every time we buy a friend slot game. We play at one session. Yes. And then we're done.

Yes. And then I never get to touch a set game again. Congratulations. You spent $8 and you had an awesome time. Oh, my God. That's so horrible. That time could have been better. spent supporting an indie dev and their actual game that is a better multiplayer experience. If the indie devs solo experience, no, if the indie game was that good, then they would sell that good.

Like, that's just what it is. All right. I will be handing control of the podcast back over to the prosecution. Gorilla Court. Kangaroo Court, whatever it is. What the, what the, I don't know. All I know is the right person one on this episode. Okay, listen, listen, just because the episode is coming to an end, we want to know what you think.

Like legitimately, this is a fun discussion. It's a fun debate. If you think Ryan's right, leave a comment saying that Ryan is right. I will say nobody is questioning the fact that these games are cheap and that they cannot be fun. Nobody's questioning that. It's just whether or not you think that this friend slop trend is good for the gaming industry on a long-term basis or not. Is it good for gamers? Is it good for the industry?

That's what we want to know from you. And we also want to know who you think won. So if you think Ryan won and was Robbins. Leave a comment. Oh, which are three? Oh, another open world. Oh, gross. Gross.

Oh, no. Then leave a comment. Oh, Skyro. Oh, no. An open world. Gross. There's too many of them. So Ryan will understand that he made a terrible argument.

You guys are toads. I quit. I'm never practicing law again. Ever again. There are too many open worlds, but that's another story. Yeah, that's true too. That could be a whole other game court. All right.

Listen, everybody. We hope you had fun on this episode. Leave us a comment. Let us know what you think. think about friend slop games in the industry as a whole. Ryan, we got to get out of here before Ryan hangs himself with his tie. Remember to follow the podcast. Sign up on Patreon.

Support the show. We need your support to keep doing this year over year. There's a link in the episode description for everything. And listen, if you're a gamer and you don't have people to play games with, come join our community. It's the best gaming community on the planet. We will make sure that you get some awesome gamers to hang out with and play games with. There's a link in the episode description for that.

as your victor and reigning game court champion i will sign us off by saying until next time happy gaming he was muted we didn't hear any of that wasn't muted i just he wasn't i just wanted to mess of you guys oh okay i'll see you all in the retrial peace out