Video Gamers Podcast - TWIG: Bad Reviews, Bogus Pros, and the Steam Machine Leak – Gaming Podcast

Episode Date: January 13, 2026

Gaming hosts Josh, Ryan, and Ace are back with TWIG (This Week in Gaming) to break down a wild week of news and nonsense. We dig into Code Violet launching to brutal reviews, unpack a bizarre story of a woman allegedly faking an esports career, and react to Steam Machine price leaks that have the internet buzzing. What do these headlines mean for the future of video games, consumer trust, and the industry at large? Plus, we hit even more rapid-fire stories shaking up the space, from surprise announcements to ongoing controversies, all while keeping an eye on how these moments shape the video games we play and talk about. It’s a fast, opinionated TWIG episode packed with takes, laughs, and exactly the kind of gaming chaos you tune in for on the Video Gamers Podcast.   Thanks to our MYTHIC Supporters: Redletter, Disratory, Ol’ Jake, Gaius, Jigglepuf, Phelps and NorwegianGreaser, and Dettmarp   Thanks to our Legendary Supporters: HypnoticPyro, PeopleWonder, Bobby S.   Connect with the show: Support us on Patreon: ⁠patreon.com/videogamerspod⁠ Join our Gaming Community: https://discord.gg/SKQvqrbT 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

Greetings, Kindred gamers, and welcome to the Video Gamers podcast. We got one of the worst showcases we've seen in a long time, but it did come with some interesting games we'll be talking about, and some of them look pretty freaking awesome. But before we get to the games, e-sports, controversies, and steam machine pricing, some introductions are in order. I am your host, Josh, and joining me,

unlike code violet his review score is trending upwards it's Ryan everybody likes me no they're gonna like me maybe just trending upwards soon maybe yeah someday until you get review bombed

I'm sure for something that's that's very likely to happen yeah and joining us he wanted to hoard all the cool games to himself in the indie episode and not share any of them with the rest of us, but it's okay because Ryan and I are basically Robin Hood,

stealing from the rich and privileged to share them with the world because that's the kind of guys we are, and we would never try to keep them to ourselves. But if you want to know who would, it's Ace. I like how this implies I was just gatekeeping them and I wasn't going to put them in another episode by themselves. It's like, yeah, such as mom. Ace did say, guys, I've got the indie show ready to go and had like every game from the New Game Plus showcase in there. And then I was like, A, it's like, we'd kind of like to be able to talk about a few of these. And then he finally was like, okay, well, just pull out the ones you want, you know.

And then I was like, okay, well, we should talk about these few. And then he was like, fine. I heard the sigh. I heard the sigh. He's like, but I wanted to talk about X the Killer. And I was like, you will. You'll get to. It's just on the main show.

It's not fair. I found it. I should go to put it where I want it. I know that thing. It's coming out. Ace, you thought we were like, you know, Ace is like, yeah, Ace just proved our point. That was my game. That was my game.

Exactly. Exactly. So here we are, Ryan and I doing the good work. Just making sure we're sharing these games with the world. We're here for the people. You know, not saving them for the indie episode. I'm not going to tell you all when there's a new showcase to watch now. You know what?

We knew about also, Ace. Okay. If we're going to talk about this, this was the worst. showcase ever, dude. Oh my gosh. I get excited for like for game showcases, right? New trailers, new game announcements, new whatever, new information, right? New game reveals.

This showcase was torture, dude. But I mean, there was there was like, there was so much gameplay, you know, that we could see, right? We got to see like all the all the gameplay, right? Oh, man. Oh, no. I wish. No. I wish.

For anybody that had to sit through the New Game Plus showcase, we are sorry. Archadolich. I watched probably like 30 minutes of this. And then I noped out. I was like, I can't do it, guys. Professional or not? Like, look, I love everybody out there for listening to this podcast and being part of our community and all that. But like, love has a limit, man.

And that limit was watching more than 30 minutes of this new game plus showcase. And I was like, just going to wait for somebody to summarize it. And then we'll just go for. from there, man. We'll look over that summary, for sure. Oh, man. Well, guys, we got a lot to talk about. There were some actually pretty cool games.

We teased what might be one of the craziest e-sports controversies I think I have seen. And we have rumors of the steam machine pricing, guys. But it may not actually be good news there. But before we get into all that, guys, we got another new supporter to thank. So a huge thank you. to the one and only Richard Simpson who signed up for rare status to support the show.

Richard, you're the mayor. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. It's always fun when it comes through in euros as well because it's like,

I did see that. What is the, let me do the calculations here. Like, oh, okay, okay. What is this loonies? What are we going on there? Yeah, so thank you. And remember,

if you enjoy this podcast, you too can sign up to support the show over on Patreon. There's a link in our episode description. it helps us keep doing this. After five years, guys, five years we've been doing this.

We have scratched and clawed our way to the near top of the charts, you know, and we're still fighting, man. Until we sit atop the peak of gaming podcast Nirvana, we won't stop until then. I thought you don't like climbing. I don't think you like climbing. Okay, until you guys hoist me to the top of this. We're going to zip line him up.

Just don't run out of stamina, Ryan. We got to keep going. We all know that's what Sherpas are for, okay? All right. None of these people are making it to the top of Everest by themselves, guys. All right? It's all the Sherpas at this point. Let's do it, Josh.

All right. Well, this podcast will be looking for a new co-host soon. Ryan died on the mountain. Yeah, so. All right. Man, I don't. like all right we're just going to get the crazy story

out of the way first guys because then we'll get to the game talk but look look I could not believe my eyes when I was reading this story okay so this story a woman faked

her entire esports career without ever playing a video game is like the title to this guys so apparently an e-sports competitor that goes by the handle Tokyo Girl has somehow gotten into the esports scene and plays these games and stuff like that.

I'll be honest, I've never heard of this game. I've heard of it, but I don't know anything about it. But apparently, she applied to and got accepted by an e-sports team. She's a member of Thailand's national team. Okay, so this isn't like some random like college person. This is a member of Thailand's national e-sports team that was competing in the 2025 Southeast Asian games playing a game called Arena of Valor. When people started to notice something seemed a little off and they kind of started looking at her and her hand movements weren't really relaying what was happening on the screen. But there she is.

in this official esports competition, just faking it as much as she can. The catcher to this whole story is this girl basically was Discord streaming somebody else playing the game and making it look like she was the one that was playing it.

And somehow never got discovered until she was in the arena in an sports competition. until they finally caught her like, who does this? She's like, man.

Do you think it's like a Disney channel movie where they overact how they're like, oh yeah. Oh, they're just slinging that controller around. Oh, my God. Okay, Ace was reenacting this, but this is 100% every gamer, like, representation in a movie where it's like, guys, we're not just flinging the controller, smashing buttons.

Every representation of a gamer in media is some like person sprawled up in a game in gear just like bang just going ham yeah just going ham on the controller and it's like that's not hold on I've seen Ace play rivals that's pretty accurate

I've heard A's play rivals you can hear them buttons clicking we all have that one really loud clicker friend I think that might actually be me I'm pretty aggressive on the mask that is you 100% because I'm on a controller or 99% of the time anyway.

I can't pick on A's for this. So guys, this is bonkers, man. So this fallout happens. I'll be, I'll be honest. I don't even really care about the fallout. She had to issue an apology. She got kicked off the team. The guy that was actually the one playing the games for her had to issue an

apology. And like, like, would you, like, okay, I can see a world where maybe I pretend to do something that I'm not. Like, I could, like, the sneaking into. to a concert, right? Put on a high-vis vest, grab a clipboard, pretend like you work there, walk into a concert. Okay, I can see myself doing that, right? I'm not condoning it, but I'm just saying I can at least fathom, pretending that you were an e-sports player? Can you, like, what was she thinking when they said, hey, you were invited to this in-person

live competition? Like, you think she would be like, uh, I got a family thing that day. Sorry, you know. But you just go and go like, I guess I'm just going to keep pretending. That's, this is the Mrs. Doubtfire. It's gone too far. You know, it's just like this is, it reaches the end where you have to like, you have. And the thing is like, I mean, she's, if you look her up, she's a pretty girl. And like, she could have just streamed and not been that good and probably made a good career of just playing online on Twitch.

But to do what she did, like that, that makes it a whole other. level of just weirdness. It's such a weird thing to do. It just seems like so much more work than just, you know, doing, maybe just trying and practicing and getting better. Yeah, why didn't you have him coach you? Yeah, exactly. He knows what he's doing.

So have him coach you how to play the game. The crazy part about this, guys, is that she got invited to the national team without ever having to participate in a formal tryout because normally if you're joining an e-sports team, they want to see that you're good. Right? You go in person and you do that. And like, because of her online reputation, they just invited her to the team and said, hey, and she was like, okay. Just like, whatever. Anyway, I mean, dude, these crazy stories, man, we got to share them sometimes. Like, like, I mean, on the one hand, I'm kind of like, kudos for like giving it a shot. But on the other hand, I'm like, did you really think this was going to happen? Like, the way that you thought it out?

You got to figure out when it's like, this is the limit. Like, okay, I can't take, I can't push this that far, but I can sit comfortably here. Like, no, I'm going to decline. You know, I'll respectfully decline. I'm going to keep doing my thing over here. Jeez. My goodness, man. My goodness.

All right. Well, let's get into a wamp, womp, womp story. Tise this in the intro. Code Violet, guys. This was the Dino Crisis, dinosaur. I don't know, like Resident Evil-ish style. game where you know you are going up against these dinosaurs we talked about this because there were three dinosaur games that were coming out i remember us talking about and at the time we kind of went

code violet looks like it might have something going for it well this is our first big bomb of the year guys code violet came out and look i don't you know we don't we don't try to troll igon round these parts but you know most gamers out there know how they feel about ig n seven out of ten i gn gave it a seven out. No, they did not. They gave it a four out of ten and said this game straight up bad. Oh no. When IGN gives you a four out of ten that there is something drastically wrong with this game. If you want to just see what a bad game looks like, just watch the, watch the review on this. Watch the trailers on it. It's just, guys, how do you release a game in this state, dude? It looks, to me, it looks like one of those games that like Peter Piper Pizza or like a, uh, yes, like a, like a, a, like a, a, like a, a, like a, a,

A restaurant. That's in the corner. And you can go in the play it. And like the dinosaurs, you shoot them and it's just like, it flashes. They don't respond. But it just flashes on them. And like that's the shot marker. And then that's about it.

That's all you get. But you paid a quarter and your little six year old is happy. You know, that's what this game looks like. Oh. Yeah. It definitely looks like one of those kind of games. I feel bad for people that bought this game, man. Like it's not, it's not like, you know, we try not to be too harsh with games.

but if it deserves it, it deserves it. And this game deserves it, man. Like everything about this is like, how did you release this game in this state? Like, this looks like it's an alpha that somebody sort of developed and then went, you think people will buy it guys? Like, let's just release it and see what happens, man.

Oh, the dinosaurs should respond to being shot? Yeah, no, they don't respond to being shot. Oh, okay. Also, hit registration is just a spurt of blood. There's no actual impact or anything. It's just blood squirting on the screen. And render distance is a myth because it never renders. It is awful looking.

Yeah, it never renders. The dynos don't react to being shot. Anyway, so stay away from Code Violet, guys. That's the takeaway on this one is just don't, you know, don't, don't. Enjoy the first PS exclusive of the year. Yeah, so I just, I don't know who's in charge of saying, hey, this game isn't ready, guys. Like, maybe we should keep working. Because I do think the idea is sound.

Like, I could see this type of game actually. being really good, but this one ain't it. And somebody should have told them, hey, we probably shouldn't release this right now. But they did. And now it's failed. All right. And then one more story. Then we'll get into the games after our break.

So, guys, the Steam Machine price, right? This is the big thing. We got the Steam Machine announcement. We got the Steam Controller announcement. We got the Steam Frame announcement. Everybody wants to know what's the Steam machine going to cost. What's the Steam Machine going to cost? there was some website in another country that accidentally posted a listing for the steam machine

and they listed a price for it and of course the internet did what the internet does and they said oh well based on this information and conversion rates and stuff like that it looks like the steam machine now steam machine comes in two versions it comes in a 512 gigabyte version and it comes in a two terabyte version um $800 for the 512 gigabyte one and 900 for the 2 terabyte one. Now, I know there's probably a couple people out there that have seen the, this story, and they're going to go, wait a minute, it's more expensive in the story. That's because the company or the website that they listed it on charges a 17% markup or something like that,

which would not apply to the actual retail price. So that's why we're looking at it. Because it was even worse. It was actually like 9, I think like 980 and then like 1,060 or something like that. But then they went, oh, well, this is including that 17. percent markup. So, you know, I, again, this is rumor. This is not concrete. So just everybody out there understand this is not a confirmed pricing for the steam machine. But there is people that think that this might be accurate based on this listing and some other information. Here's the

problem. Like, would you pay $800 for what the steam machine is? Or would you just try to build a PC at that point? And so you'd be better off building a PC. at 900. At 900, you are in like low to mid-tier PCs. Right. Yeah. I mean, and you get way more out of it. It's, to me, it's, okay, so this is the hard thing, and I just went to

like adjust a hat because of how, like, frustrated I am. Let me get deep on these. I just, to me, it just doesn't make sense why, like, anyone who's going to buy a steam machine, obviously probably has a computer. That's why they're buying a steam machine. So they have, and

accessible unit in their living room or somewhere else. To me, I see so much value in that. To be able to sit on my couch and do some couch gaming, but Steam games, like, there's a value there for me. But when I get a 512 gig system at 800 bucks with what, what is my, what is my processor look like? What is my graphics card going to be? Like, is it upgradable? Like, what are, What are we looking at here? And I'm already almost spending $1,000. Like, to me, that seems I could build a unit that would be my living room unit that I could go and play for the same price. And it would probably be, you know, 50% better.

So, like, I just don't see the draw here for that price value based on what they're offering. Like, we're going to have to see exactly what it's going to be. but man, I don't know. I'm just, I feel weird about it. Here's my problem with this is, and I'm going to disagree with you, Ryan, on one thing. I think that the steam machine is actually geared for people that don't have a PC. So all of the console, you know,

our console brothers and sisters out there that say, hey, I have a PS5, I have an Xbox. I'd like to buy a PC, but they're phenomenally expensive to build and to get into, and it's intimidating if you try to build one and all that stuff. But people want access to PC games and they want access to the Steam library and all that, I actually think the Steam machine is geared towards those people

because somebody that has a PC. Yeah, I guess so, yeah. Maybe they're not just looking to spend that much money to be able to sit on their couch, but I think that this opens up PC gaming to the console market and for people that don't actually have a PC. So, you know, we do know some of the specs of the Steam machine. It falls squarely in between the Xbox series S and the PS5

as far as like comparisons for like power, right? So, I mean, PS5 can play a heck of a lot of games, guys. Like, that's no slouch. You're playing out of war. You're playing cyberpunk. You're playing Red Dead. You're going to be playing GTA6 on it. So it's like, it's no slouch of a gaming system.

And so if the steam machine comes out and it can do what the PS5 can do, great. The problem is, is like the PS5 is what? I think they just raised the prices like 700 right now, something like that. I feel like the price is higher than it's ever been for some reason. but my concern is that if you price people out of it, you're not going to get, you're not going to sell it, man. People are just going to buy a prebuilt that is an entry level prebuilt that's going to

play the entry level games and then they're into the PC ecosystem and then you can upgrade from there. You know, and I think, Ryan, you said it where once you're in the PC industry or no, actually, A.S., you were talking about building it, where it's like once you build a PC as daunting as that is, you can then make incremental upgrades. That's the beauty of a PC is, oh, I need more RAM, I'll just buy some RAM. Oh, I'm out of space. I'll just buy another hard drive and pop it in there and there you're good to go.

The steam machine's not going to be like that, guys. No, you can't do that with that. And I think it's priced at just the point where it misses both markets of people who, I agree, who, you know, they don't have a PC and they want to play PC games. Maybe they'll just go jump to a PC. But people who do have a PC and have massive steam libraries aren't going to pay that just to play it. to be able to play on their couch. They build another PC.

Like, yeah. I mean, it misses the mark for me. We don't know that this is, in fact, the price. But just going down this rumor milling and following this thread, this is disappointing to me. I personally think for the steam machine to be a household name and to sell a gillian units, which I would love to see. I literally think it needs to be comparable to like the PS5.

Like if you're going to get into that market, you have to be there because the only other thing you can say is what we offer you access to you know a huge library of games which does have value but i don't know that that's going to be enough to get people to drop eight hundred dollars on on this thing and that you then now still have to buy games for at the same time so i don't know we'll see i hope steam and valve are smart and i hope they go yeah let's price this thing competitive we'll take a little bit of a hit if we need to and let's make it to where people can actually afford like he needs more money too like he's got he's got he I'll say this. 30 million dollar yacht. I mean, I agree, but you've got to, and we, you know, we troll Nintendo all the time for how anti-consumer we feel like they are. At least Gabe Newell is still on the side of gamers. Dude, no, he is. Honestly, like, you've got to give, I know the dude's a billionaire and, you know, how people feel about that and all that.

But at least he is still on the side of gamers. He's running a good company. He's paying his employees really, really well. So it's like, you know, he's a gamer. You know, Gabe, say what you want, but at least he's still with us. Whereas I feel like we've lost Nintendo. And a PS5 is around 500 bucks, but the PS5 Pro is 750. The Pro, okay, that's what I'm thinking.

The pro is the 750. So I don't know how comparable it is to the pro. Put the steam machine close to the pro, but in between the two. Like, price it at like $675, maybe $700. And I think you're good, dude. If you want the extra storage, you pay a little bit more. But then that makes sense. But I don't know.

But things, they always price them just a little bit too much. And you're like, come on, man. But enough people buy it. Yeah. All right. Listen, we're going to take a quick break and then we got some games to talk about a few of these. We've got some updated information on. A few of these are new. And all of these that we're about to talk look freaking awesome. So we've paired down this list for all of you out there. And we'll be right back to talk about them. All right, guys, we're back. Let's talk. Some of the highlights from the new games plus showcase. And I don't mean the ending of the show. I mean some of the better games that they showed off to us. um what look ace actually made like a master list of this so if you want ace's master list from this the showcase you can come to the discord server and ask him

I'm sure he's happy to provide that we let you know but we kind of picked out the games that we thought looked really really good that looked interesting and are the ones that should be on your radar as well so guys let's just start off with the expanse um osiris reborn and here's the thing when we talked about our most anticipated games on our episode, there was actually, because we read all the comments, y'all, somebody said, no love for the expanse. And I kind of went, I forgot about that game, dude.

Like, legitimately, I forgot about this. Guys, the expanse of Cyrus Reborn looks freaking great, dude. You want to talk about a modern-day Mass-Effect-looking game? Like, this is literally Mass-Effect, but, like, updated to current tech and graphics, man. What did you guys think about this one? gave me that very mass effect dead space feel. Yes. But like futuristic world, it was super cool, beautiful graphics.

Yeah. It's, I, it's, it's something about like having, having that, you know, I don't know, it's, it's so hard because with the futuristic worlds and having the space thing, like, it's hard to, to really make it feel real and to make it feel like you're kind of in that world. And I'm just so excited for a game to really hit that. Um, the, uh, uh, Starfield didn't do it for me. You know, like, uh, a couple others haven't as well. So I'm really looking for that futuristic kind of, again, like you said, throwback, like style, like, kind of space game that, that makes me feel like I'm in space, you know.

Yeah. I really like the enemy design does that. Like the guys with their crystals popping out of their masks. Like, dude, I really like that. I think this game looks fantastic. And honestly, I don't know that I would have drafted. it in our anticipated games, but this game, this game is up there as far as like production value and like this could be a really, really well developed game. So check it out.

The expanse Osiris reborn. My ace, I think you nailed it. My number one takeaway on this was this is Mass Effect, but it looks like it's done right. And I do get a little bit of that dead space vibe too because I think they're going to have a decent story and kind of atmosphere that goes along with it. So this one is one to keep an eye out for because I am excited for this. Maybe it's not as good as it looks, but if it is as good as it looks,

fingers crossed. We get a good space game for once. Yep. All right. So this is a game that we talked about way back in the day, dude. Way back in the day. And that is a game called beautiful,

well, I don't know which one Ryan's thinking of. I'm talking about beautiful light. Yeah, I'm so stoked for a beautiful light, dude. Just making sure. because there's a couple of other games that we're all having for. So Beautiful Light is a PVEVP extraction shooter. Well, those sound like all the rage right now, right? This game's been in development for like four years now.

And we actually know the developers for this game. You know, they had kind of reached out to us. We had reached out to them. They had come into our Discord server. We were in their Discord server. They actually invited us to playtest their game very early on. And unfortunately, just due to work and stuff like that, we miss the playtest. And then they've just had their heads down in development.

Beautiful light looks incredible to me, dude. It is basically six squads of three people. You all drop into this world. You are looking for this anomaly. There is PVP if you come across another squad. You know, you can light them up if you want to. You don't have to, but you can. Everybody is looking for this anomaly, which of all things is actually a

chocolate chip cookie. I don't know if they'll change that in the final release, but for now, it was a chocolate chip cookie, which was funny. If you get the anomaly and you find it, the world starts to go berserk. There are all kinds of enemies, enemy and enemy types. When you have the anomaly and you're trying to extract with it, those enemies get real mad at you now and they're freaky. They're like, kind of like shadowy half in our world, half not in our world thing. The atmosphere in this game's incredible. The graphics are incredible. The gunplay is incredible. Like everything that I have seen about beautiful light tells me this is absolutely going to rival marathon, escape from Tarkov, and maybe dare I say, Ark Raiders, because

this game actually looks that good, guys. What do you guys think on this one? You left out one genre this game is also, which is an asymmetric because you can take the role of these monsters and hunt down all the players. That's so much, dude. That's sweet. That's like prey. I love that so much, dude. So that's if... So I was watching the stuff. So if you die, you're able to take the form of the monster and then you can go and you can attack everybody else. Yeah, you can just say, true all of you.

I hate all of you. I know why more games don't do this. And I know that, like, asymmetrical games are its own genre, you know, like dead by daylight, you know, in Friday the 13th and any of these games. but the ability to let players control like an in-game entity and then just have fun is the most awesome thing ever because when you're dead, you don't want to just sit there and watch your squad. You know what I mean?

Like, oh, I'm dead. I died. Okay, guys, like I'm cheering you on. But really, I'm just, you know, checking, you know, social media or something. To be able to be a monster and then see people and be like, they don't know I'm a monster. Like, I love this in games. I wish more games did it.

But beautiful light. I've been following this development for a very long time. From the time that they were little to the time that they got funding because people went, yo, you guys are on to something here. This game actually looks really, really good. They've shared this entire development process. They've been very open about it with all of their gamers and their community. Absolutely.

Make sure you wish list beautiful light because I'm telling you this game is going to be good. And it's needed in this genre, especially like, like I said, with the recent hit. of our graders and the likely flop of marathon, beautiful light, might just do it, man. So everything about this game just screams polished to me, which I love to see. Agreed. All right, guys, the one I might actually be most excited for. Now, we don't have a lot of info on this, and we brought this up. I forget where we saw our first preview on this one.

It was maybe Gamescom or one of these big showcases they showed off. The Cube does not give info. The Cube does not give info. So the cube, bro, this takes place in the Atomic Heart universe, which I like. Atomic Heart, the game was a little, it wasn't bad, it wasn't phenomenal. It had some really good moments. It had some really like fever dream bonkers moments, which I loved. But like, you can tell the developers are onto something with Atomic Heart, okay?

They ran out of time in the initial game. Everybody knows it, but it still wound up being a pretty decent game. Now they've had the time that they want to. develop not only this universe that they're in, but then also two games, because we've got Atomic Heart 2 that is in development, but now we have this game called The Cube. How would you even describe this, man?

Apart from, like, you know, crazy, sexy ballerina robots that are very prominently featured in all these trailers. Of course they are. How would you explain this to somebody? Oh, man. Where do you even start with the Cube? I don't know, but, like, I know we, didn't we, we talked about this like a year ago.

did. It was like, even less then. It was, I mean, it was a long time. We knew less and it was like, this looks so amazing. We don't know much more now, but I just, it's, it's just such a weird, like, it doesn't it keeps shifting and the world keeps shifting? Yeah. As the cube spins and the cube turns and you keep getting in different worlds and environments. And it's just, there's, um, like you said, ballerinas.

So. Yep. Well, one thing about the world of atomic heart is it's. incredibly impressive and well, like, done. So seeing more come from that world. It's lore is there. It's vibe is there. Like you very much feel like you're in this futuristic, like 60s tech thing.

I don't know. It's a really cool blending of all of that. So for people that don't know, the cube is an, it's a RPG shooter that is going to have like online multiplayer. The cube shifts over time. So it's like, I think, I don't know if this is like a battle reality. Like that's probably the closest thing to to kind of equate it to, but I don't think it's actually about a Royal. Yeah, is the issue.

They haven't said any of the marketing. They're calling it a multiplayer RPG shooter. So maybe this is not PVP at all and it's co-op PVEE a la let's say Outriders, a la remnant. Like, I'm in for that. I'm all in for that. Yeah. You know, but the cube is always shifting. You're going, you're getting different landscapes and depending on where it shifts, now you're in a hostile environment.

you know, it looks amazing to me. This might be one of my favorite trailers that I've seen in a while just because of how bonkers it is and how stylized this game looks. It gets me so hyped, guys, so hyped, man. And I don't even know what to expect from this game. Don't even know what to expect, but it looks great. And I'm excited.

Guys, I don't know. I just, I feel like it's weird because of the way, the way the trailer is and the, like, the POV and the stuff, like, it just gives me like half-life vibes. too. Like, I don't know. It just, it feels like it's something that's going to be really good. And I pray that it's, it's going to be that way. And we're not just going to be let down. Knowing what I know about Atomic Heart and the gunplay and stuff like that, I think it's actually going to be really good, dude. Like, that is, you know, I think that they have learned what they

needed to, uh, and they're taking that to the next level. I cannot wait to see more about this game. This is very, very high on my hype meter, man. Like, because I just, I think it's going to be awesome. All right. One last one, guys. We covered this one. We got excited about this one. We got a more in-depth look at the gameplay and the game on this one. And it is a game called X-A-Killer. E-X-E-Killer. I know because that's how the person who made the game said it. So X-A-Killer, this is your cyberpunk Western, like, bounty hunter game. I guess that's the best way to describe it. I love everything I see about this game. I said this when we first covered it. I get very strong deus X vibes out of this one, which is an all time favorite of mine. You know,

you get that. You get some cyberpunk out of this. And you also get like a bounty hunter game at the same time. Like my goodness, this game is shooting for the moon. Yeah, you play as like a corporate bounty hunter who takes on these contracts from your boss and then you just take off in your hover into the wastelands and like everything you need is in that car to track down your you know your hit and you're like this is just so freaking cool. I love. Fallout vibes with the characters and the interactions and the dialogue and like very heavy fallout influences very heavy deuce X influences with a little bit of like cyberpunk slash

night city almost at certain parts like this game is doing everything right in my opinion. I mean, who was it that was saying they wished I had a really good bounty hunter game. Was that you Ryan? That was me. I was Ryan. I've always, bounty hunters are always my type of game.

I, the original on like PS2 or something, like the old bounty hunter game and then, and then even in Red Dead, I just talked with Jiggle on, on Red Dead Redemption 2. Like bounty hunter stuff is like my go-to. And I just love it for whatever reason.

You see the target. You go and you find them and whatever happens happens and like then you go to get the next one. Like to me that is like the perfect gameplay loop and I absolutely love it. So to have it in like such a cool, amazing world that this looks like it's going to be. I'm I'm so stoked for this game. I remember it's one thing that's so cool about this and I'm going to riff for a minute. One thing that's so cool about this podcast is that we can see these things like years before. and we forget about them

and then things pop up and the showcases pop up and we see trailers and new things come to fruition and stuff and then you're like oh yeah I remember that and you get so excited for it and this is one of those like I remember seeing this like

a long time ago and here we are now and it looks so crisp and so clean and it totally has that fallout vibe which I love but it's like bounty hunter version so I'm I am so excited for this one You can lockpick, you can do all these kind of crazy things. Like, yeah, to me, this is, this is like, I'm very, very excited for this one.

And I hope, I hope it's good. I do too. I hope it's come such a long way from what we saw last time, honestly. I know. And they showed off a lot more of the RPG elements in this one. Yeah. Which I thought was really cool. Like the car, because it's like, is the car just a loading screen or is it actually like a car?

You actually do get to drive the car around and kind of, explore and stuff like that. So yeah, Ace, I got to give you kudos on this one because you found this. And I've been keeping my eye on it, man, because I knew there was something here. And they proved me right. They proved me right. Dude, I forgot about it. Like, thank you for bringing it back up, because I, I, I, I've totally forgot about it. And I'm so stoked for this one. Have you guys ever seen someone put a silencer on a revolver? No, not a revolver. I know. Yeah. I've never seen. I've I've never seen that before. That was hilarious.

Yeah, this game has it all. It very much looks the part. You know, it doesn't, it's got good graphics. It's got voice acting. I mean, all these things that we say, hey, this looks for. So Ex-Killer needs to be on your wish list, guys. We are all three of us hyped for this one. We got another glimpse at more gameplay, and it only got me more hyped after that,

which is a very good sign. Slated to release. We don't have a release date, but a slated to release in 2026, releasing for PlayStation station 5 Xbox S and X and PC. So this is one. We are deep diving that one. Yeah. Yeah, I think all three of us are automatically in on this one too.

So all right, listen, we're at a time. That's going to do it for this episode, everybody. We didn't get to talk about PubG's blind spot. This is the Rainbow Sixth Siege in a top down PubG like a format. If you like Rainbow Sixth Siege, this looks like it would be right up your alley. that early access is launching February 5th. We didn't get to talk about that one, but I'm sure we'll have some more news

as it gets closer to the early access release date on that one also. So listen, if you are not part of our Discord server, you are missing out. We say it every single episode. We have people join every single day. And people always go, wow, this place is awesome. All right.

It's like universally. This is just a truth at this point. Come be part of the best gaming community on the planet. There's a link in the episode. description. We have people that jump in and start chatting right away. We have lurkers that hang out and just watch the chat for a really long time before chiming in. Everybody is welcome. There is no toxicity. There is no getting mad at people for their opinion on a game. And if that sounds like your kind of people, then we want you to be a part of it as well. And it's free to join. Just click the link and you're

in and you're in gaming nirvana with the rest of us there also. If you want to be like our good friend, Richard that is supporting the show. You can do that. There's a link in the episode description. Super easy to sign up. It takes like three minutes of your time. You can sign up for as little as $5. You can cancel it any time.

You get a shout on on the show and a bunch of other perks. We try to make it worth your while. But we need your support to continue to do this. So if you like this podcast and you enjoy this podcast, then show a little love and help support us. That's it for this one, everybody. Until next time, happy gaming. See ya.

Peace out.