0:00

A gift's cringe. I

0:03

have been told that gifts are all a piece more.

0:06

I have been told that they are actually. I have

0:08

heard that. I have. I'm like, I

0:10

think there's like there's good gifts or there's bad gifts,

0:12

though, because a lot of gifts can be cringe because

0:14

they're like, we've seen that gift many times now. It's

0:17

time to get some more gifts than

0:19

just office gifts. But they're not making any lives.

0:21

There's only so many times I can see stiffs.

0:23

They are cringe. Yeah, that's the thing. So I

0:25

feel like short answer, no. But

0:28

long answer often. Yes, that's

0:30

my sense. Listen, if Discord is still going

0:32

to have it like integrated, I'm just still

0:34

going to send people gifts in my, you

0:37

know, in my inner circle. But the thing

0:39

is, is that Discord now has I

0:41

think Discord is moving on from gifts

0:43

to sound boards, which are way funnier

0:46

because sometimes. We're talking about the Arnold Schwarzenegger one

0:48

back in the day. That was my first. Yes. Who

0:52

is your daddy and what does he do? You

0:54

can have that in Discord for now. Sometimes

0:59

I'll be on a Discord call with someone and they'll

1:01

tell a joke and I'll do the polite golf clap

1:04

like, OK, and it's a sound. Is

1:06

it actually a sound? You can put your own

1:08

sounds in too. Oh, I see.

1:10

OK, Tam

1:13

obviously put in the snake eater theme.

1:15

We've got a bunch of stuff in

1:17

there. So I feel like gifts

1:20

are out. Sound boards in. I

1:24

don't feel qualified to make that call. I feel

1:26

like I'm over an age bracket where I'm allowed

1:29

to decide what is in and what is out.

1:31

So I'll leave that to you guys. That's fine.

1:33

That was very grandpa. I'm also I'm also not

1:35

on TikTok. So I feel like I'm well and

1:38

truly disconnected from. You're also twice our age. And

1:42

I'm 38. That's right.

1:45

Well, that makes me fucking

1:47

what? 70,

1:50

70 year old Ralph right here, ladies and gentlemen. That's

1:57

it. Hi, everyone, and

1:59

welcome. to an episode of old

2:02

friends. Well,

2:05

we whine about the internet. And

2:08

these kids in that video game. That's

2:10

right. And they got no attention

2:12

span anymore. I mean, seriously, I don't

2:14

have attention span anymore, but I've got enough attention

2:16

span. I talked to you fine folks about some

2:18

video games. I'm Lucy. And of course,

2:20

every week we've got Ralph. I

2:24

love how he just waved. For audio listeners, he

2:26

waved. That's right. No, I need to click down. I need

2:28

to do this. Google,

2:30

yeah, Google me. The mic

2:32

doesn't care. It doesn't care. Right.

2:34

It doesn't care. Fair enough. And Jake, how are you?

2:38

I'm, uh, I have bangs now. Yeah.

2:40

You look fantastic with your bangs. Thank you. I'm

2:42

letting my hair down. Enough of like the fricking,

2:44

the big thing I do with the blow dryer

2:46

and everything. I'm just, I'm letting

2:49

down. I'm relaxing. Ralph,

2:51

you were away earlier and Ralph was like, Lucy,

2:53

your hair is much curlier today. And I noticed

2:55

that your hair is also much curlier today. Curly

2:57

gang. Curly gang, rise up. I

3:00

had to use curly cream for it though. Uh,

3:02

but anyway, hi everyone. Welcome to the episode of Friends

3:05

for Second. Uh,

3:07

it's been a busy couple of weeks for video

3:09

games. It's a packed one. We are, we are

3:11

friends per second. We got like a rotating chair

3:14

this week. Cause there's so much stuff

3:16

that has happened. We got three friends

3:18

in this episode. We have. We do. We've

3:21

got, uh, cause we're going to be talking about

3:23

suicide. No, that's all we're talking about. Xbox

3:26

cause that's a whole thing. Uh,

3:28

and we're lucky to be joined by, uh, by

3:31

Parr, lucky to be joined. Um,

3:34

Parris is joining us. Let's rephrase that. Uh,

3:37

he's joining us for that. And, um, that was a

3:39

really good chat we've already prerecorded. Um, and then we

3:41

have Greg Miller who joins us for a chat about

3:43

Suicide Squad. And then we also, uh, spoke

3:46

to the co-founder of Keen Games. Uh,

3:48

his name is Anthony. Damn

3:51

it. It's a Greek name. I can't remember it now. Damn it.

3:53

I was so proud of myself. Like pronounced it correctly. We did

3:55

the interview. That's right. Um, anyway, Anthony,

3:57

and he is the, the lead. like

4:00

creative lead on Enshrouded. We had a really

4:03

great chat with him. So yeah, it's a

4:05

pretty stacked show reflecting a

4:07

pretty stacked week in the world

4:09

of video games. Cause it's

4:11

all Fortnite really. It's like dude we're over two weeks. So,

4:14

um, so yeah, did you guys,

4:16

have you guys been doing anything else other than

4:18

consuming video games this past two weeks? No

4:20

dude, it's been, no, I

4:22

genuinely like, I drove up to, I'll talk about it

4:24

in show and tell, but I went for an evening

4:27

away with my friends. Like we drove up to Sacramento,

4:29

we went to see a musical and then I came

4:31

straight back and I played Suicide Squad for two

4:33

straight days. Yeah, it

4:36

is like that, isn't it? It is like, well, that's what,

4:38

we're in February now. And we always knew

4:40

this was coming. We looked at the release schedule and like,

4:42

yeah, it's pretty wild in February. And sure enough, it's very

4:44

wild in February. And um,

4:47

yeah, but I am so far, I'm keeping

4:49

up, you know, it's

4:51

been okay. I mean, I had a really nice

4:53

break during January and so I came back feeling

4:55

very recharged and there was

4:57

a bit of a lull period towards the back end of January.

5:00

And so now it's like hitting the road and push hard for

5:02

a month or a month and a bit, maybe

5:04

end of March, it kind of gets a

5:06

bit wild again with like Ronin and Dogma

5:08

and what have you. But um,

5:10

I'm excited man. February is always fun

5:12

these days. It's a lot, but it's

5:14

fun. Yeah. I mean, like

5:17

we've got convention season also kicking off

5:19

as well. So Jake, I booked my PAX

5:21

stuff today. So I will be coming to

5:23

bother you. GDC,

5:25

I'm at Tice next week, which

5:28

I'm very excited about. But, and also, you know, thank

5:30

God for the Steam Deck

5:34

and the Rogue Ally. Greatest console

5:36

ever made. I mean, a Stu's

5:38

Rog, get out of here. And outside

5:40

Talon or Clog, get out of here.

5:43

To be fair, the Rog is a good machine. No, it is. It's

5:46

a great machine. I have a

5:48

Steam Deck supremacy. Yeah, I tried. Look,

5:50

I got the, this, I haven't, I don't know

5:53

if I'm sure. The Lenovo Legion, the Legion go.

5:55

Which one's that? That's the, it's the G.

6:00

Giant one. It's like good Listen,

6:03

I have a massive head mind you like

6:05

my head is huge Yes, and it's

6:08

a bigger than me, you know to the point

6:10

where I'm like I don't like using this very

6:12

much and the whole detachable but hand thing is

6:14

not great Yeah, I don't know man. It's so

6:16

heavy is like look there is a place for

6:19

like a really big screen and that's nice and

6:21

all But I don't know man. I'm

6:23

always just going back to my steam that steam deck

6:25

is just the pinnacle. I love it. It's incredible It's

6:27

perfect. So yeah, hashtag

6:30

not sponsored Hashtag

6:32

not for valve don't do any sponsorships. Okay

6:36

So that they don't need to they're like listen, we

6:38

have the market corner we don't need you people But

6:41

yes, I'm just I'm just chill on the steam deck for free.

6:43

I'll do that in time How

6:46

do I how do I graciously? How do I elegantly

6:48

move us on? I don't like that

6:51

Just like this exactly. You're nailing it. You're

6:53

crushing it speaking of Con

6:56

Yeah, it's just rock ally. They have a might they

6:59

have a partnership with Microsoft Microsoft Nails

7:02

it obviously a lot of

7:04

stuff is happening right now with regard

7:06

to Xbox potentially moving into a multi-platform

7:09

Strategy we thought it's

7:12

only fair We should get one

7:14

of our good friends and Xbox expert Paris Lily

7:16

from game and tag radio and the kind of

7:18

funny X-cast on to talk about it. I mentioned

7:21

it. We've already recorded this chat I mentioned

7:23

there we're recording this on Tuesday Stuff's

7:26

probably gonna go bananas in between now and the

7:28

episode going up So if we say anything that

7:30

gets proven otherwise Then you can't yell at us

7:32

because we warned you but we had a really

7:34

good chat about what this could mean for the

7:36

future Of Xbox and the reaction So

7:39

far which has been wild Quiet

7:48

quiet week for Xbox news

7:50

not much happening not much.

7:52

Pretty small So mention

7:55

it obviously we joined but Paris. Thank you so much

7:57

for having us for being now. I'm gonna read you

7:59

all this Yeah, thanks for having us.

8:01

I know, I can't help myself to introduce

8:03

myself. You know what, I think I'll just

8:05

be rolling. It's

8:09

fine. Cousin Greg hosting a

8:11

Friends by the Secret podcast. I mean, hey, to

8:13

be fair, Phil's tweet was very much like, we're

8:15

here for you. We're

8:20

listening. That's right. That's right.

8:23

So if you have been not

8:25

really paying attention to gaming news,

8:27

and for context we are recording this

8:30

on Tuesday, God knows

8:32

what's going to happen between now and the episode going

8:34

up. We have just come

8:36

out of the weekend where, let's

8:39

just say Xbox has kind of broken the

8:41

internet a little bit. So the Verge posted

8:44

an article that suggested that the upcoming machine

8:46

games, Indiana Jones game would be coming to

8:48

PlayStation, a short period

8:50

of exclusivity on Xbox, and then coming to

8:53

PlayStation, multiple other reports. So there was that

8:55

date of mine on Hi-Fi Rush. If

8:57

you didn't see this, that they found stuff

9:00

in the game that there would be t-shirts that I

9:02

would wear. And one of them was like, surprise

9:05

drop. And the other one is, I'm here too

9:07

or something, you know, like in the Switch.

9:09

It's actually really cool. By the way, I like them.

9:11

They're actually mine. I really do. They're

9:14

cute, especially like the surprise drop one in

9:16

PlayStation and Switch colors. And

9:19

then another website, Xbox era, reported

9:21

that Starfield is going to be

9:23

coming to PlayStation after the next

9:26

big update. Fair

9:28

to say, people started freaking out.

9:31

Phil Spencer tweeted, we're listening and we hear you.

9:33

We've been planning a business update event for next

9:35

week where we look forward to sharing more details

9:37

about with you about our vision for the future

9:39

of Xbox. Stay tuned. So

9:43

basically, yeah, people freaking out that Xbox

9:45

might be moving towards a multi-platform strategy.

9:47

Well, don't forget because you

9:49

missed one actually. Oh, I did? Yeah,

9:52

because Jeff Grubb, the man himself. Jeff

9:55

Grubb. Who? What?

9:58

He is reporting. Gears of War is

10:01

also under consideration. I mean, he seems very

10:03

confident about that. So like that is a

10:05

big one. It's like, it doesn't get

10:07

any more Xbox than Gears of War. I mean,

10:09

Starfield is a bit of a Johnny come lately.

10:11

Halo. You know, we're

10:13

like, yeah, I mean, Halo, obviously, sure. But you're

10:15

right. But like, it's in terms of core

10:18

brands, it's basically like just Halo

10:20

and Gears of War that are

10:22

just inseparable from that brand, you

10:25

know. And the idea that they would end

10:27

up on other platforms is pretty wild. So like

10:29

I said, just so we don't get

10:31

burned in case something comes up, we're

10:34

recording this on Tuesday. If

10:36

stuff happens that we don't mention here, that is

10:38

why we're sorry. But I

10:40

mean, let's let's get

10:43

initial thoughts, guys. What do you

10:45

think about Xbox first party games

10:47

coming to other platforms? Paris, I'm

10:49

going to go. I'm going to go to you first, mate. Yeah,

10:52

for me, it's not a surprise

10:54

when the initial rumors came out

10:56

about things like Hi-Fi Rush or

10:58

Starfield, I commented at the

11:00

time saying, hey, I get

11:03

it. These aren't the games that are going to

11:05

get you to go buy an Xbox. Right. So

11:08

they already have shown in the

11:10

past with things like Minecraft Dungeons or

11:12

Ori that they're willing to put games

11:14

on other platforms. But it's to

11:16

the point of these, the Jeff Grubs of the

11:18

world and the Tom Warrens of the world when

11:20

they started saying things like Gears of

11:23

War and Halo potentially

11:25

going. That raises an

11:27

eyebrow because I think Halo

11:29

is your flagship. There is no Xbox

11:31

without Halo. So if Halo were to

11:33

now start showing up on your competitor's

11:35

platform, I think you start losing some

11:38

of your identity as being

11:40

Xbox. So I can just to

11:42

just to interrupt you, there's no I haven't heard

11:44

any rumors that Halo is under consideration. Master Chief

11:46

Collection. That's what I saw. Really?

11:49

Okay, who's reporting that? It's been so many. I

11:51

can't even keep track. Okay. But even

11:53

with these gears. Let's just go with that one. some

12:00

of your identity because these are your flagship

12:02

titles, these are a reason that you would

12:04

want to go jump into an X-Mux ecosystem.

12:07

So excuse me, that's

12:09

where it started raising the alarms of

12:11

all right, what are they doing?

12:14

Are they going full third party? Are they

12:16

going to start making stop making hardware things

12:18

like that? So it just raises a bunch

12:20

of questions. But I think even the phrasing

12:23

that we're seeing sticking with gears like grub

12:25

saying it's under consideration. It would

12:27

not shock me at all that internally

12:30

they're talking about it but are

12:32

they actually going to execute something

12:34

like that? Excuse me, that

12:36

would be surprising to me. I could see

12:38

the scenario again that

12:41

your Xbox game studio games

12:44

stay in the Xbox

12:46

ecosystem. Bethesda and Activision, you continue to

12:49

treat them as basically third party publishers

12:51

but obviously you own them now and

12:53

you get the revenue from them. So

12:57

my opinion on all this has been

12:59

let's just wait until they

13:01

officially say something. I think when you had

13:04

so many media sites starting to talk about

13:06

this over the weekend, Phil Spencer had to

13:08

acknowledge it. So that's why we saw the

13:10

tweet that we did but I

13:12

would rather wait till next week

13:15

and they actually officially say what they're

13:17

going to do because plans change all

13:19

the time. They could literally be deciding

13:21

what to do until the very last

13:23

minute versus what we've obviously seen here

13:25

over the past few days. People thinking

13:27

everything's going. I personally don't think that's

13:29

the case but we'll see next week.

13:32

Yeah, I'm curious to see what a what

13:34

did he call it? A business update event?

13:36

What that actually looks like? What does that

13:39

mean? Is there going to be a nice

13:41

live stream presentation where Sarah Bond comes out

13:43

and says, hey gamers, we're putting

13:45

Starfield on PS5. Like I don't know

13:47

what is actually going on. A business

13:49

update event has the same corporate

13:52

speak to me as company

13:54

update. Yeah, I saw

13:57

these Reddit threads that it feels

13:59

like it's feels like I'm about to get

14:01

laid off as an Xbox fan. I mean, don't

14:03

forget, like we're coming off the heels of 1900

14:05

people, leaving, like getting laid

14:11

off and losing their jobs from the Xbox

14:13

org. One team in particular

14:15

that was hit is the physical game

14:18

side of things. You

14:21

got to wonder if

14:23

this wasn't all part of some measures

14:26

to get more money. Like, you know, if physical

14:28

is not doing that well and judging

14:31

by the amount of sales that I've heard from

14:33

friends of mine and like publishing and dev and how

14:36

what the split is between physical

14:38

on Xbox and PlayStation, then yeah, that

14:40

kind of, I don't

14:42

know, hedging their bets in other places. It sounds

14:44

like. Yeah,

14:47

I mean, yeah, like it's in it because obviously

14:49

we don't know, of course, we don't know what's going

14:51

to happen, right? But it's almost inevitable that some Xbox

14:53

stuff is going to make us because we already kind

14:55

of know about like, what do you call

14:57

it with high-fi rush? It's already kind of been rated. And

14:59

I think see if these might have also been rated other

15:01

territories as well, like by rating sports or whatever. So that's

15:04

almost certain. There's also the other

15:06

stuff where it's like, it's highly likely that Xbox is

15:08

thinking about this, because if they're going to do a

15:10

business update, they're not doing a business update just to

15:12

announce they're bringing high-fi rush to the switch. I'm sorry,

15:14

but that's not happening, you know? So

15:17

it's like, OK, we're going that direction. Certainly

15:19

some of their portfolio is going to be available

15:22

on other platforms. Paris,

15:24

you made the point like, you know, maybe they keep

15:26

some of their other stuff and they keep it exclusive,

15:29

but it almost becomes a case of like, well, what's

15:32

the point at that point? Like, you

15:34

know, like what if you really only keep

15:36

in Halo and Gears of War? Like, I'm

15:39

sorry, but those brands, those things, they're essential

15:41

to the Xbox brand, but they don't have

15:43

the same cash and pool that they once

15:45

did as exclusives, right? I

15:47

think, you know, Starfield at this point

15:50

seems like has more like Elder Scrolls. OK, for

15:52

example, Elder Scrolls 6, that's got

15:55

a lot more pool than Halo does at this point, for sure.

15:57

As much as I love Halo, that's just a fact, you know?

16:00

It's almost like if you're going

16:02

to go that path of putting most of your

16:04

stuff on multi-platform, why

16:07

wouldn't you just go the whole way? You

16:09

know what I mean? And maybe, and I

16:11

mean, my suspicion is probably something akin to

16:14

like, they'll do Xbox first, you know, and

16:16

they'll say, you know, play all

16:18

the best games on Xbox through game pass, play them

16:20

first here, et cetera, et cetera. But,

16:24

um, sorry, I've got to, someone's knocking at my

16:26

door. You guys keep going. Keep going. I

16:28

got to get it. I mean, to that

16:30

point about Xbox first, I could see that

16:32

as a strategy, but then that only really

16:34

benefits, you know, we are very privileged

16:36

in that we have all of the consoles, right? And

16:38

it's like, if I wanted to play the new

16:41

gears, it's finally coming out. And

16:43

I have an Xbox. It's like, great, I can play

16:45

it six months to a year early because I have

16:47

that console, but I purchased, if I was only a

16:49

PlayStation player, would I purchase a new console for new

16:51

gears if I knew it was eventually coming? I

16:55

would. No. And I think

16:57

that's, that's part of the point why it's going to

16:59

be interesting to see what the strategy is going to

17:01

be. Because if I, if

17:03

I already own a PlayStation and you're just

17:05

telling me I need to wait a certain period

17:07

of time and those games will eventually come

17:09

to the PlayStation, why would I

17:12

go buy an Xbox? I would continue

17:14

to keep a PlayStation, play all the

17:16

PlayStation games, and then play the Xbox

17:18

games when they show up on my

17:20

platform, or if I don't own a

17:22

PlayStation or an Xbox right now and

17:24

I'm looking to get a console, I'm

17:26

probably going to go get a PlayStation because

17:28

I only need one console

17:30

at that point. I don't need multiple consoles.

17:32

So whatever the strategy

17:34

is going to be, the kind of halfway

17:37

in, halfway out, Xbox first, I

17:39

don't know, they're going to need to do some great

17:42

messaging around that because I think a lot of people

17:44

are just going to see, well, even

17:46

if you're going to continue to make, make hardware, I

17:49

don't need your hardware. I'll just get

17:51

the competition. I

17:53

mean, that's like, that's another question

17:55

where looking at

17:58

people's tweets from the weekend. The

18:00

immediate freak out is they are

18:02

leaving the console hardware space.

18:06

I personally don't believe that for a second. I don't

18:08

think so either. I think, I mean,

18:10

obviously they sell them, they sell them at a loss,

18:12

but it is part of their broader ecosystem. Game

18:14

Pass brings in a ton of money. They also

18:17

have peripherals, like controllers and stuff. All of that

18:19

does bring money. I can't see

18:21

them at least in the short term, let's

18:23

say 10 years. And maybe I'll be wrong. Maybe

18:26

someone will clip this and it'll bite me in the ass.

18:28

I can't see Xbox leaving the console space immediately.

18:32

But it's almost like, what is the point

18:34

of an Xbox console without exclusive Xbox games?

18:36

What is the point of any console without

18:38

exclusive games? It's like an existential question about

18:40

the nature of this business model. And

18:42

it's your point as well, Paris, which is like,

18:45

if I can get all of the games on

18:47

a PlayStation, but I just need to wait a

18:50

bit longer, then I'm going to do that. Like,

18:52

it just makes sense. Like, you

18:54

know, yeah, you can have a hardware agnostic Xbox.

18:56

You know what it's called? It's called a PC.

18:58

Exactly. I mean, like they already exist. And

19:01

so the idea of a console is

19:03

it's a thing that plays a lot

19:06

of games, but in particular, it plays very specific

19:08

games that you can only play on that thing.

19:10

I mean, that's not the technical definition of a

19:12

console, but I'm saying in terms of how we

19:15

how we understand that what the business model is.

19:17

And so, yeah, if you abandon that pillar, it's

19:19

kind of like what's

19:21

what's left on that side of the fence on the

19:23

hardware side. And that's the thing. It's not even just the

19:25

hardware side. It's because are we going

19:27

to see Game Pass on PlayStation? No, are you

19:30

going to see Game Pass? You're going to see Game Pass

19:32

on Xbox and PC. And

19:36

so those are the places where they have the

19:39

hold on the hardware market, at least, especially because,

19:41

you know, there is not a

19:43

PlayStation model that is as cheap as the

19:45

Series S, you know, for

19:48

those gamers who don't necessarily want to go both feet in,

19:50

but want to still be able to play games, who

19:54

don't want to have to spend thousands on a

19:56

PC. I still think I could see them. over

20:00

time eventually walking away from consoles just

20:02

because I think they have kind

20:04

of done things differently they thought about things a

20:06

little bit differently game pass is an

20:08

interesting thing I mean as news talky people

20:10

we've been talking about it for years just

20:13

because it's different it's unconventional to the other

20:15

things the other platform and software people do

20:17

so I just

20:19

I if there was like a that with

20:22

of them leaving the console space I was

20:24

like oh it makes sense in

20:26

my brain only from the fact that they've kind

20:28

of approached things differently for a while now and

20:31

you know with them talking

20:33

about how Phil Spencer

20:35

acknowledging that they are like third place

20:37

in the console war type thing I

20:40

do feel like there is going to be a point where they do

20:43

start radically shifting their thinking they've they've

20:45

already done it before in so many

20:47

other ways I don't think it's

20:49

gonna happen like right away but you know if

20:52

if we're breaking it down by generations if this

20:54

is the last like physical Xbox generation I

20:56

wouldn't you know if

20:59

I came through a time machine and told myself that I

21:01

wouldn't like not believe it I mean that's

21:03

the thing it's like the the secret

21:05

sauce thing that we're not really talking about

21:07

I guess fifth thing you include PC is

21:09

like the cloud if that's

21:11

the future of Xbox is like they

21:14

leave the hardware space completely like you've

21:16

already seen it Samsung TVs now you

21:18

can just attach your controller to your

21:20

phone and you can run things on

21:22

xCloud they leave the hardware space

21:24

altogether they still run things like

21:27

the accessibility controller the Elite controller regular

21:29

Xbox controller but you can play everywhere

21:31

like I could play all that stuff on my Mac just

21:34

streaming I could absolutely see that

21:36

route and you know given that what is it

21:39

the most the biggest money-making thing

21:41

that Windows has Microsoft

21:43

has is you the

21:45

cloud computing tech put game paths

21:47

on Apple Vision Pro do it there there

21:50

are dozens of us it's already

21:52

on mid quest 3 headsets it's on mid quest

21:54

3 headset right now yeah I mean yeah I

21:59

mean Apple People actually will do that because

22:01

just recently they have changed their rules and

22:04

they now allow dedicated apps

22:06

on the App Store for streaming platforms

22:08

including GeForce Now and Xcloud. So yes,

22:10

absolutely. It will appear on the Vision

22:12

Pro for sure. So yeah, I don't

22:15

know. It's really

22:17

nerve-wracking. I'll tell you what I'm thinking

22:19

about as well. I feel like if

22:22

Microsoft, and I know we're all talking about hypotheticals here,

22:24

we don't know. We don't know. We're

22:26

just talking. We're just talking. We're just

22:29

asking questions. Yeah, hypothetically, Microsoft does become

22:31

a third-party focused publisher

22:35

who also has a little bit of hardware stuff

22:37

going on. They try and maintain their platforms across

22:39

Xcloud and Game Pass and all this other stuff.

22:42

But they're a third-party business. How

22:45

does that affect the kind of games

22:47

that they want to make? Because third-party

22:49

games, a lot of the

22:51

time, the first-party system sellers

22:53

that we buy are typically

22:55

single-player focused, very big,

22:57

bit AAA games that

22:59

are just swinging for the fences. You know what

23:02

I mean? Because they're like, this game

23:04

needs to rock so that people want to buy the

23:06

console to play this game. Third-party

23:09

games, a lot of the time, not all

23:11

the time, but a lot of the time,

23:13

especially from bigger entities, they're focused on live

23:15

services. They're focused on microtransactions. You know what

23:18

I mean? And if Microsoft

23:20

becomes an entity that is focused

23:22

on third-party publishing, I think

23:25

it's going to be less focused on box

23:27

sales and more focused on long-tail

23:29

live service revenue. And I

23:32

wonder if they're going to have the

23:34

same commitment to making these weird little

23:36

psychonauts, too. And Hellblade,

23:39

is that publisher who's a third-party focused

23:41

publisher backing those bets at this point?

23:44

I don't know about that, man. I

23:47

would probably guess not. If

23:49

this is a dollars and cents business decision, I

23:51

don't imagine Psychonauts made a lot of money for

23:53

Xbox or Hifi Rush, for that matter. So

23:56

I think it really,

23:58

that's what I worry about with all this. If

24:00

this happens, sure, you can, Halo

24:02

will still exist and Halo kind of went with

24:04

the free to play stuff, whatever, probably bad example.

24:06

But I don't know. I just, I

24:09

wonder if they'll walk away from that commitment of

24:11

saying we are going to make fantastic system selling

24:13

games. That

24:15

goes against what their messaging has

24:17

been over X amount of years,

24:19

right? But talking about bringing these

24:21

quality experiences, this is why they

24:23

were doing certain acquisitions that they

24:25

did like Double Fine, like

24:27

you bring up FICO and us to as an example,

24:29

I don't think Double Fine is ever meant

24:31

to deliver a game that's going to sell

24:34

20 million copies, but it's going to

24:36

give you something that's critically acclaimed, something that

24:38

you can hold up high and talk about.

24:40

My, my thing when I think about this

24:42

is it would seem to

24:45

me, and again, I'm not clearly not smart enough to

24:47

be in these rooms to make these decisions, but it

24:49

would seem to me that they would want to keep

24:51

a hand on the wheel when it, when it comes

24:53

to hardware so they can kind of dictate what,

24:56

what hardware is doing. So if there's

24:58

certain innovations and things that they want

25:00

to be able to do with their games, but,

25:02

but to Lucy's point, maybe it's, maybe it's cloud.

25:05

I don't know. Maybe it's cloud and AI that

25:07

that's a direction that they're going to go to

25:09

continue to deliver certain innovations on games.

25:12

But, but to your point, I

25:14

mean, if they were to just go completely

25:17

third party, they are now at the mercy

25:19

of whatever Nintendo is going to do, whatever

25:21

PlayStation is going to do from a hardware

25:23

standpoint, and that is going to dictate what

25:25

their games are going to look like moving

25:27

forward. So they kind of got to answer

25:29

these questions. Maybe they'll start answering them somewhat

25:32

next week. I would

25:34

hope knock on wood, that they would

25:36

actually be up to doing some, some

25:38

interviews so people can ask these questions

25:40

and try and get some definitive answers

25:42

and clarity on that. But what

25:45

I've seen over the past 48, 72 hours is that concern

25:47

that the games that

25:50

we thought we were going to be getting

25:53

from X-Box, you know, with all these acquisitions

25:55

and the things that they've already announced, like

25:57

a clockwork revolution, the South and Midnight. are

26:00

you going to continue to have that commitment

26:02

towards those versus just being another Sega? Because

26:04

I mean, that's kind of the word around

26:06

the campfire. Yeah. I'm just going to be

26:08

Sega and not make hardware anymore and just

26:10

make third party games. And

26:13

I wanted to ask you because I mean,

26:15

you're quite juiced into the Xbox community and

26:18

it's it's like it's a thing, the Xbox

26:20

community. Yeah. It's a thing, right? And

26:23

I wanted to get because I was also listening

26:25

in on a Twitter spaces that you were in.

26:27

I saw it. I logged on

26:29

Twitter. And there was a lot said in

26:31

that man. It was a lot said. So

26:34

but I think it was a very it

26:36

was fascinating to listen to because it was

26:38

very raw reactions from very

26:40

rusted on hardcore Xbox fans who you know, Xbox

26:42

is a big part of their personal identity. You

26:45

know what I mean? In terms of the brands

26:47

they built, the games they played, the friends they've

26:49

made, whatever else. So I want to maybe just

26:51

get your view on like what

26:53

was that reaction that you are seeing

26:56

across the community. Panic. You know how

26:58

you panic. It's panic. And

27:00

it's funny you say like I'll go into

27:02

those community spaces. I think I get myself

27:04

in trouble doing that sometimes. But I try

27:06

to go in there and at least provide

27:08

a perspective that maybe they're not having like,

27:10

hey, here's what I think is going on.

27:13

But a lot of what I've been

27:15

seeing over the weekend with people from

27:17

the community is, again, it comes back

27:19

to that brand loyalty. Like I am a

27:22

fan of Xbox. Are you losing the identity

27:24

of everything that I liked about Xbox? Right.

27:27

Do I have to now go get a

27:29

PlayStation? Am I no longer going to have,

27:32

you know, an Xbox console under my television?

27:34

Is Game Pass going away? Like am I

27:36

still going to have achievements now for my

27:38

games? Are you just

27:40

stripping all that out and you're just going

27:43

to simply make games moving forward? So this

27:47

is why, and I know I kind of

27:49

DMed you this a little bit before we

27:51

started, that I was saying part of the

27:53

problem with Xbox, and it has been for

27:55

a very long time, has been their communication

27:57

and their messaging. They've always been very reactive.

28:00

to bad news instead of getting

28:02

in front of it and kind

28:04

of dictating what the message is

28:06

going to be like again these

28:08

rumors have really been floating around

28:10

since December and here

28:12

we are in February now and really the

28:14

only reason that we're seeing a response to

28:16

it is because It got

28:18

to the level of a Tom Warren or a Jeff grub

28:22

Actually starting to report these things now

28:24

versus hey, let's get out in front

28:26

of it. Yes. We are gonna make some business changes

28:28

Yes, we are gonna talk about it Just be

28:30

patient if they would have come out ahead of this

28:32

and said that maybe we don't see all these float

28:35

of leaks That have come out

28:37

and who knows how many of them are

28:39

true or not But the community is taking

28:41

every last rumor that's been said as a

28:43

100% fact that it's happening And

28:46

that's part of the problem. It's interesting though. Yeah,

28:48

I think part of it is Really

28:52

fascinating because it's like Xbox fans as soon as they

28:54

get a whiff of the rumors. They're like, oh, this

28:56

is it Yeah, what does that say

28:58

about the state of? everything

29:01

with their communication in the past and just how

29:03

they have been performing that fans are quick to

29:05

hear what rumor and Go with it and almost

29:07

a lot of I've heard a lot of Xbox

29:09

fans now talking tough on like hey Xbox does

29:12

have to step it up they do have to

29:14

change their message messaging and stuff like that, so

29:17

to me like I see a lot of the reaction as You

29:21

know a direct response to how

29:23

things have been going like it Was almost like

29:25

something that was coming to a head anyway, even

29:27

if there weren't rumors and reports

29:29

and and then there's the whole other side Of

29:31

it where like I know like

29:33

people talk about how some Xbox fans get

29:35

like toxic and crazy about it but You

29:38

know from the perspective of like if you're just a

29:40

customer and you bought One console

29:42

and you've bought one console for so long

29:45

you have invested in that ecosystem You do have

29:47

a game library on that system. You do have

29:51

Like Paris you mentioned before like achievements if you've

29:53

been building achievements in the since the Xbox 360

29:55

era Which

29:57

I have like does it that is like a lot

29:59

to? digest over the course of

30:02

a long weekend. Definitely.

30:04

Well I think one, sorry I didn't mean to cut you off. Sorry,

30:07

we're all podcasters, I talk too much.

30:09

But one other aspect of that that

30:12

I've heard a lot is the digital

30:14

library, is digital preservation. Like, are my,

30:17

the ecosystem that I've invested in with

30:19

all these digital games, if you're gonna

30:21

stop making hardware, is that gonna translate

30:24

over to whatever the next platform's going

30:26

to be? Am I going to be

30:28

able to keep these games and clearly

30:30

Xbox is headed towards an old digital

30:32

future. So I think the community

30:35

wants to hear some reassurances when it comes to

30:37

that as well. And I do too. I want

30:39

to make sure that all the digital games that

30:41

I have that I'm not stuck

30:44

just having them on a series S or an

30:46

X, whatever the next thing's going to be, they're

30:48

gonna follow me wherever I go. Yeah,

30:52

I mean I think it's also coming back to what

30:54

Jake said, like this whole thing kind of coming

30:57

to a head after a while based upon sales

31:00

and based upon, you know,

31:03

market share and the third place thing and

31:05

whatever. I don't know, if it

31:07

is true, it also feels a little bit sad in

31:09

a way because it's like Xbox

31:13

started this generation so strong. Right?

31:16

I mean, every foot correct, Phil's strategy

31:18

was I think a great strategy where

31:21

they were investing in, you know, they

31:24

were buying up studios because they wanted to make really

31:26

great games. And they were also committed to play anywhere

31:28

like PC Parity and X Cloud. And I think that's

31:30

cool. And I liked that. And they

31:32

had, you know, a really strong console. They didn't

31:35

compromise at all on hardware capabilities. And they had

31:37

the series S as an entry point to get

31:39

you into the ecosystem and off you go. And

31:41

that had its downsides as well in terms of,

31:43

you know, maybe acting as a bit of a

31:45

throttle in terms of game development that's been well-documented

31:47

across specific games, not a lot, but a few.

31:50

But overall, I looked at Xbox and thought,

31:52

man, hell yeah, this is

31:54

it right now. This is what else

31:56

would you want? Nothing, right? And

31:58

it almost feels like. But

32:01

if that didn't work, and now we're at the

32:03

point where Xbox is like, it didn't work, guys,

32:05

we're still third place. And we've

32:07

got to make this. It just, that's a

32:09

bit sad. It makes me, yeah, I'd be

32:11

disappointed for Xbox to have

32:14

not found more success with that strategy because I

32:16

do think it was a good strategy. And

32:18

I do ultimately think as well that it would be the

32:20

end of Phil Spencer's leadership or at least, you know, he

32:24

was always, it was very clear that Sarah Bond is

32:26

being positioned as the heir apparent. It was clear that

32:28

she would be moving up at some point anyway, but

32:30

it does make sense that if Microsoft or Xbox are

32:33

going to pursue a whole new strategy, they would also

32:35

have some new leadership, you know? And

32:37

it would make me very sad to see

32:39

Phil leave the gig because I personally really

32:42

like Phil Spencer. I mean, obviously all leaders

32:44

have their pros and cons and whatever, the

32:46

corporate level. But I think he's

32:48

been a very good ambassador for Xbox and a

32:51

good leader of that business. And it would be a bit

32:53

of a shame to see him move on. I think as

32:55

well the amount of course correction. Oh, sorry, go

32:57

ahead. Sorry, no, go ahead. No, I was going

32:59

to say like to your point about

33:01

how they came into this generation after

33:04

the sheer amount of course correction they

33:06

had to do and damage correction

33:08

they had to do from the Xbox

33:10

One, the the the metric years

33:13

because totally think about just how

33:15

far behind they were lagging to

33:18

the PS4. And some

33:20

of that was exclusive. Some of that was price

33:22

point. Some of that was the weird,

33:25

not that's the thing. It wasn't even if

33:27

you think about it now, the amount

33:29

that they invested in TV multimedia all

33:31

in one experiences and like that's why

33:34

everything is now everything needs to be but

33:36

they were a little

33:38

too far ahead. And then yeah, coming

33:40

into this generation, I think you're right.

33:42

I think the way that they were positioning themselves

33:45

and I think the way that they've

33:49

I think the way they've communicated with

33:51

fans this generation around being more personable,

33:53

having Phil kind of being

33:55

the relate not reliable but you know, like the face

33:57

like the guy who is though more

34:00

relatable than Jim Ryan. I mean,

34:02

he's still funny and most- I'm not gonna guess

34:04

Jim, but I mean like, you know, it's a

34:06

fact. You know, having someone who is a

34:08

gamer and he'll tweet out that he's playing vampires or

34:10

whatever, but I think all of that

34:13

is very clever and... I

34:15

don't want to say the word calculated, but I think I

34:17

am just saying the word calculated. At the end of the

34:19

day, it is a business decision. It is very much how

34:21

Taylor Swift operates and not to compare, but like-

34:24

Are you saying bad things about Tay-Tay right now? You better watch

34:26

yourself, okay? I think she's

34:28

just very clever and calculated in how she has

34:30

a public image and how she chooses to engage

34:32

with her fans. And I think one of the

34:34

things that she did- and this is a very

34:36

long-winded analogy, but I think Xbox has also done

34:38

it- whereas like that

34:41

relatability, that promise of maybe she'll interact with

34:43

you, maybe she'll do something. I think Xbox

34:45

has done something very, very similar in how they

34:47

communicate with their fan base and how they are

34:49

always listening, you know, like they have the creator

34:51

dinners and stuff that, you know, we've all

34:53

been invited to. We have like creative and

34:55

press, we'll actually get FaceTime with Phil Spencer.

34:57

Like, Sony doesn't do that.

35:00

Yeah, Sony and Nintendo do not operate that way.

35:03

So, I mean, Nintendo doesn't even know that anyone

35:05

outside that is headquartered in this, they just don't

35:07

understand that concept, you know what I mean? So,

35:09

yeah, no, I think you're absolutely right. And like,

35:12

and Taylor used to have album listening parties at

35:14

her house where she'd have fans come around and

35:16

see- There we go. This

35:18

is a thumbnail. It's a picture of Taylor Swift next

35:20

to Phil Spencer. It would be like the Taylor Swift

35:22

effect. That actually was

35:25

clickable. I like that. So, you

35:27

see what I mean? It is part of a

35:29

thing where it's like, yes, it's personable, and

35:32

yes, they of course corrected in a brilliant way

35:34

based on where they were from last generation. But

35:37

the same day, the same thing even, it

35:39

is a business. Yeah, for

35:41

sure. I think a

35:43

lot of people, especially given

35:45

the reaction online, are forgetting

35:47

that. Or at least not forgetting that,

35:50

but definitely not considering that when they

35:52

are getting so upset. And like,

35:54

you are well within your eyes to be upset about something. I

35:57

think it's fantastic to be a fan of something, be so

35:59

passionate about things. But when you are,

36:01

I mean, already seen it, like, one

36:03

of my friends has been getting death threats just because they

36:05

work at Xbox. And that is so bizarre.

36:08

Like, if you are sending death threats to people

36:10

because a game might come out on a different

36:12

platform than the one that you own, dude. That's

36:15

very weird. Pack it up. I

36:19

wanted to ask you guys something because one thing

36:21

that Phil Spencer said during your kind

36:23

of funny interview, by the way, Paris, by the

36:25

way, amazing interview. You guys absolutely crushed that one.

36:27

Thank you. He

36:30

said, and I'm paraphrasing. Sorry for contacting

36:32

him on the one after Redfall, right?

36:34

After Redfall. That's right. And

36:37

that was when Phil was, he was very

36:39

down and he was very open and more open

36:41

than I think we've ever seen any video game

36:43

boss ever in any

36:46

recorded media. And

36:49

he basically said, this is where he said, like, are we

36:51

with third place and whatever else? And he also said something

36:53

along the lines of, you

36:56

know, people just say, if we just

36:58

release great games, it will turn

37:00

things around. And I'm paraphrasing, but it was something

37:02

to that effect. And he kind of he

37:04

basically was trying to say he wasn't saying great

37:06

games don't matter, but he was saying that all

37:10

of the systemic restrictions

37:12

that are currently imposed by their

37:15

third place position means

37:17

that if they just release good games, it's

37:19

not enough to move the needle. And I

37:21

wanted to ask you guys what you thought

37:23

about that in this context. Do

37:26

you agree with him? I reckon I obviously

37:28

remember that interview very well. And

37:31

I know what you're talking about in that context because

37:33

he also added in there. It wouldn't matter if Starfield

37:35

was an 11 out of 10 when he was talking

37:37

about that. But the point that

37:39

he was making was they lost the

37:42

last generation, which was the start of

37:44

the digital ecosystem. And it's going to

37:46

be very hard for them. Just releasing

37:48

great games is not going to be

37:50

enough to get someone to basically abandon

37:52

all their digital games that they have

37:54

over here and now jump over here

37:56

and basically start all over because you

37:58

have great games. But I will

38:00

add in this part, which kind of goes back to something

38:02

you were saying before, that

38:05

would be the sad part of all

38:07

of this if this

38:09

completely disrupts. Because you could see

38:11

Xbox building up to this point from

38:13

2016 to where they are now

38:15

as far as infrastructure, adding all these

38:17

services, the game path, all the

38:19

things that they were doing, and that

38:22

missing piece, which both Phil

38:24

and Matt Booty had been talking about in

38:26

the last couple of years is the content,

38:28

the games, where even in

38:30

that interview, he mentioned he was like, we're so

38:32

close, I can see it. And

38:35

the phrase both of them have repeated is we want

38:37

to get to the point where we have

38:39

a major release every quarter. And

38:42

even from this dev direct, you can see, wow,

38:44

we're actually getting to that point now and then

38:47

obviously 2025 and beyond. Here

38:49

we go. We're actually getting the

38:51

games. Everyone's complaining about getting games. You're

38:53

getting games. It

38:56

sounds like even that's not enough. They can't

38:58

just rely on having great games. But

39:04

this is what I really I was trying to I was

39:06

trying to prodding at right. Like have there been any really

39:10

great system selling level games

39:12

on Xbox this generation? Starfield

39:15

is probably the closest. And

39:19

that is a real stretch from a variety

39:21

of perspectives. Obviously, it's sold a lot for

39:23

sure. But I think the critical

39:25

reception to that it's no Skyrim.

39:27

White Simulator for Dads maybe? Obviously

39:31

Forza rules the category now in

39:33

terms of but it's its own

39:35

niche thing. Yeah,

39:39

I mean, I think and obviously there were

39:41

no system sellers during the Xbox One era.

39:44

I mean, they just they just weren't full stop. Right.

39:46

So we're talking to one and a half console generations.

39:49

And I do not want to pretend

39:51

as though there are no good Xbox games

39:53

because I love, you know, like Hi-Fi Rush.

39:55

Incredible. Psycho Nauts 2. Incredible. And I like

39:57

and I'm not even a racing guy. I

40:01

enjoyed the Halo campaign didn't love it right so I

40:03

don't want to create this false narrative like xbox games

40:05

is shit but what I am asking is Has

40:09

there been a God of War on and that's

40:11

the point what has been it? That's gonna

40:13

get you to go totally gotta go get

40:15

an Xbox to play this that's and I

40:18

think And I just I really

40:20

I think about what Phil said that time and I

40:22

like and I think about the Nintendo switch where you're

40:24

coming off the back of the Wii U which sold like 13

40:27

million units and everyone Absolute

40:31

catastrophe for Nintendo by every metric

40:33

right and then they just announced

40:35

this week that the switch has sold 132

40:38

million units and they've sold 1.2 billion games

40:42

You know what I mean? And it's like look

40:44

at that turn around look at what you've done there

40:46

and what was the basis of that? Was it because

40:48

they made a handheld console? I mean, yeah sure

40:50

obviously that would have helped don't get me

40:52

wrong But you know the

40:54

games that you could get on that

40:56

platform were extraordinary and they sold Zelda

41:00

has sold just just tears of the kingdom 21

41:03

million copies, you know what I mean? I thought price

41:06

and it's like and it is it Hogwarts legacy

41:08

just edged it out as the top selling game

41:10

for 2023 But Hogwarts

41:12

legacy is available on every platform Zelda

41:15

is on one, you know what I mean? And I

41:17

really think about How

41:20

different it might have been if Xbox has managed

41:22

to pump out one

41:24

two three truly system selling

41:26

games that You

41:28

just have to have to have an Xbox to

41:30

play or it's on PC or whatever, but it

41:32

just it's that prestige factor It's the sell

41:35

through on hardware It's all of that and you

41:37

haven't had that for a long time

41:39

with Xbox and I think That

41:41

more than anything else is probably why they're in

41:43

this position where they need to make it It's

41:45

like to be different to stand out in the

41:47

market. They invested in like Paris said

41:49

from 2016 all this Foundational

41:52

platform building and ways to be competitive

41:54

different ways to access games more options

41:56

and stuff like that But it's it's

42:00

me, it's like they built

42:02

the tracks. But the

42:04

train still, we're

42:07

still waiting for some of that train. Yeah, we're

42:09

getting some shipments through like, you know, like a

42:11

freight train, but like, we're waiting for real commuter

42:13

trains to come through. And by that, I mean,

42:16

games, a bunch of games, because

42:20

I do think that that's the

42:22

bottom line here. Like in terms of

42:24

it is interest conversation, you know, which

42:26

keeps a lot of things alive. It's

42:30

games. And it's not

42:32

toxic to say that either. I think as well so

42:34

much of the conversation becomes like, well, it's you're ignoring

42:36

Xboxes. And it's not, it's not. It's like, as

42:39

I said, we all all of us have enjoyed various

42:41

Xbox games when they drop on it's usually on my

42:43

game of the year list. Just saying totally, you know

42:45

what I mean? And so it's like, it's, it's there.

42:48

But it's not that extra little

42:50

step where it's like the Spiderman 2018,

42:53

for example, and you got a war and it's just your

42:56

naughty dog stuff like just that level of

42:58

so with that, I'm curious to see with

43:01

this big business event thing, how much

43:03

of an actual pivot there is going

43:05

to be like, I

43:08

don't know. I also don't know. I

43:10

also I also wonder if the conversation is going to

43:12

change because yes, Sony has had all of those, you

43:15

know, the God of Wars, the Spiderman, etc, etc. We're in for

43:18

a quiet year for Sony. I mean,

43:20

we've got what we've got Final

43:24

Fantasy seven rebirth. Then

43:27

what? Which is third party party,

43:29

but only on PlayStation. But then you know,

43:31

I mean, we don't maybe ghost is ghost

43:33

of Sushima two possibly this year. I

43:35

don't know. That's a that's

43:38

possible. I think if there's some they've been working on it,

43:40

and they're going to reveal it at summer games and then

43:42

ship it in October or something. That's possible. But

43:44

they haven't, there's not been no rumblings to

43:46

suggest that. And there's nothing else that we

43:48

know that the major studios are working on

43:51

anytime soon. Like we definitely know in some

43:53

the X roadmap. Sadly, we

43:55

know it's on the

43:57

X roadmap. It would have been factions this year,

43:59

but That's been canceled. Um,

44:02

yeah, there isn't anything at least immediately in

44:04

the pipeline that's big for

44:06

Sony, but Xbox has kind of come out and kind

44:09

of put a flag in the ground for 2024 and for

44:11

2025. So I'm interested

44:13

to see, but also I think the timing

44:15

and how all of this is coming out

44:18

has soured the community in such a

44:20

way that I don't think I've ever

44:23

seen before, like, and I wonder if that's

44:25

going to really scupper how, I

44:27

don't, I don't think it'll like completely impact sales. I

44:29

don't think, you know, Indiana Jones is going to come

44:31

out and no one buys it or about whatever, but

44:34

I think it's really interesting to see, especially I've,

44:36

you know, we just sit and look and talk

44:39

about this stuff all day long. It's interesting.

44:42

It's wild. I never would have thought this would have

44:44

happened or come out the way that it did because

44:46

I agree Paris. I think that messaging

44:48

has been very, very reactive, but I think with

44:50

something like this, they would have been working so

44:53

hard to get it right. And now

44:55

all of that wind has been knocked out of

44:57

their sails and they are scrambling. Do

45:00

you guys reckon it was a tactical leak from

45:02

inside that, you know, someone disagreeing with the strategy?

45:04

Oh, I saw. That's the theory. I don't know

45:06

if it's true or not. No one has any

45:08

question. I saw, I think each from Wirecutter, it's

45:10

only polygon tweet that and I was like, that

45:13

is some, what do you call it? Succession.

45:16

Just a little shit right there, man. That's

45:18

right. I've had a wild gun theory. Gone.

45:22

It's, it's Bob Iger or somebody like

45:24

that. He just makes up and he's

45:26

like, wait, Indiana Jones, it's just on

45:28

Xbox? Wait a minute. Give me the

45:30

phone. And then. Right. He

45:32

calls, he calls Jez Corden. So

45:36

yeah, no, I, yeah,

45:38

I think that, but to what you

45:40

said Lucy, just the level of anger

45:42

that I've seen from the Xbox community,

45:44

I've never seen anything quite like it.

45:46

I've seen them be disappointed before for

45:48

sure. But like they're

45:50

really pissed off now. And I've

45:53

never seen that unanimity, that uniformity

45:55

of opinion like that before

45:57

from the Xbox community. So yeah,

45:59

whatever. ever feel says better be

46:02

good. Stay tuned. Any closing

46:04

comments from anyone? I

46:11

think the only thing I want to acknowledge too is

46:14

we're in our news world bubble

46:16

and we see the Xbox

46:18

fans and how they're reacting but the

46:21

one missing ingredient for me always is casual

46:24

audiences, all the other people out there that

46:26

own Xboxes and just play Warzone on it

46:28

or they just play Halo or they just

46:30

play, how are

46:32

they going to be affected going forward? I

46:34

think honestly, Microsoft Xbox right now is in

46:37

war rooms talking about how they're going to

46:39

talk about their business strategy but I think

46:41

there's a whole other layer beyond us that

46:43

they are always thinking about that they have

46:46

to think about a huge customer base. So

46:48

I don't know, I just wanted to

46:50

throw that out there. That's something I think is always not really

46:52

talked about enough. I

46:54

agree. I also think often on

46:56

the retail level because I

46:58

came up through like Eevee Games or

47:00

GameStop as you guys call it and

47:04

I think when I started this console generation, I

47:06

was very much like if

47:08

I was on the shop floor still and a customer came and

47:10

said to me, what should I buy? I'm like, there's

47:14

pros and cons but I would probably buy an Xbox.

47:17

I would probably buy an

47:19

Xbox because Game Pass is so

47:21

compelling and the console hardware is

47:23

really strong and you've also

47:25

got this cheaper option if you want to go in with

47:27

just the series S and I think there was a whole

47:29

thing there that I was like, and I

47:32

said there's also a lot of very promising

47:34

games there or at least they're on the

47:36

way. I could sort of point to that.

47:38

Now halfway through this generation, if this is

47:40

true, if someone came up to me like,

47:42

should I buy an Xbox? I'm like, I

47:44

don't know about this, maybe buy

47:46

a PlayStation and then just wait a bit longer

47:49

and then get the games. I don't know. So

47:51

I just think on the retail level, I think

47:53

retail still matters. I really do. I think most

47:55

people still buy their console at a shop and

47:57

I think they don't know what they're, like, they

47:59

buy their as gifts or whatever they take advice

48:01

from people on the shop floor. And I

48:03

do think I do think in those terms as

48:05

well about how it how it changes the message. So

48:07

yeah, yeah, they'll be fine when Grand Theft Auto six

48:09

comes out. Yeah, all of

48:12

this is getting my next box to play Grand Theft

48:14

Auto or something. You

48:16

reckon they'll think that doesn't feel like I

48:18

was buying PlayStation. Yeah, that's right. It

48:21

does. It does happen. And like in terms

48:23

of like video game stores, I feel like

48:25

I hear it. I feel like I hear,

48:28

you know, clerks behind the counter be like, well,

48:30

PlayStation. And I'm like, you're a little biased, sir.

48:32

You shouldn't say that. Yeah, it's

48:34

a reality. Yeah,

48:36

for sure. Well, Paris, thank

48:38

you so much for joining us. No, no,

48:40

thank you. Again, I'm a fan. So I'm super

48:43

excited to be here. And I thank you so

48:45

much for having me come on. Of

48:47

course. Anytime. We'll definitely have you back. Yeah.

48:50

We will be right back again with someone. You

48:52

might know Paris one, Greg Miller. We're

48:55

going to have it's a spicy week, boys, because

48:57

we got to talk about Suicide Squad. So

48:59

we're back after a message from this week's

49:02

sponsor. Peter

49:08

Butter and Jelly, Burton Nanny,

49:10

a blockbuster movie and a

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favourite podcast, The Fall of Civilisations

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and Recon everyday earbuds. That

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was a hard pivot loop from the other content

49:23

of that one. OK, a very hard pivot. I

49:25

like it. Big fan of this podcast. And

49:27

they have been working on this ancient

49:29

Egyptian episode for like eight months.

49:32

And it came out yesterday. And I'm so happy.

49:34

And I've been listening to it. It's four hours

49:36

long. I'm having the best time. But

49:38

anyway, are you listening to it on

49:40

your Recon Wireless earbuds, Lucy? I am.

49:43

I'm listening to it when I'm out and about on the

49:45

go. So this episode is obviously brought to

49:47

you by Recon Everyday Earbuds. You've heard us

49:49

talk about them before. I mean, where

49:52

do we even begin? Like we all use them all the time.

49:54

I was Like, yes, like Jake's got them right there.

49:56

I'll go to Always Strap. Like

50:00

a little holsters are you open up

50:03

a jacket and it's like us you

50:05

know the main he pop out the

50:07

about I tell you One thing they

50:09

are really great for like really long

50:11

podcast because they they have a hours

50:14

of playtime with an enormous battery life

50:16

yet so I always will. Lucille was

50:18

depressing such as. A

50:21

civil just behind could fool twice

50:23

before one set of Ray Bans

50:25

rat race on he was run

50:27

out as person Francisco Air and

50:29

lawyer. Me up the up for. Yeah. We've we've heard

50:31

one of those I the God. Tens of

50:34

thousands of five star reviews. I'm not only

50:36

do they have a really great and long

50:38

amount of play time and battery life, but

50:40

it's also nice. Profile looks down profiles you

50:42

can tap into Paul's which is great to

50:44

the movies will come about and I'm in

50:46

a big say in me so than I

50:48

am things and from the road and stuff

50:51

though. there's also an awareness mode. I

50:54

used all the features you really expects you

50:56

have here are wireless charging is really nice

50:58

or the pair of nice and easy with

51:00

bluetooth you're good to go. You can take

51:02

calls it has a microphone they they check

51:04

all the proper boxes plus they do so

51:06

at a fracture the cost of premium other

51:08

premium he about similiar really off a hell

51:10

of a teapot and the qualities to fantastic

51:12

arm and so i see own a few

51:15

pairs discuss of as I won't buy some

51:17

muscle ones so i have like one pair

51:19

my gym bag but i use my one

51:21

pet coal miner and my house cause them

51:23

I don't. Ever accidently go to the gym

51:25

without everybody cause. I. Buy Sigma. Oh

51:27

I don't have a a bunch of the gym today.

51:29

Guess I'll turn around and go home. I'm not going

51:31

to assume that he about says if I have to

51:33

listen to Jim music no thank you Very much so

51:35

that people while I'm thing as a list things. You

51:39

know that soon as like I've never been one. So

51:42

annoying where people do it as well. Again at

51:44

you're exerting yourself a com and just relax. but

51:46

like most assists in office and don't shoot him

51:48

out with re com. Know Yeah,

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thank you again to Raycon for sponsoring this

52:05

episode. Hello,

52:12

Greg Miller. Did you and Paris Lilly deliberately

52:14

wear the same shirt because you're both on

52:16

this week's episode? We have sat here

52:19

troubleshooting for 10 minutes. You didn't

52:21

think to mention that. You

52:24

didn't think to mention we were both in

52:26

the X-Cash shirt? No. Hang on.

52:28

Actually, what I realized as well, and we

52:30

can keep rolling, is we didn't intro Greg

52:32

in the last bit because we would have

52:34

come straight back from a message from the

52:36

sponsor. So we should actually properly intro Greg.

52:38

Nah, it's fine. No, I'm kidding. Good

52:42

one, right, Lucy. Good

52:45

job by Greg Miller from Kind of Funny.

52:47

Hi, mate. Hey, how are

52:49

you? I'm doing well. It's been like

52:51

two weeks since I saw you. I know. Too

52:53

long, Lucy. I'm with you too. I'll see

52:56

you next week. But we thought we're

52:58

going to be talking about Suicide Squad. Who better

53:00

to get on than DC

53:02

Superfan himself? You've written for

53:04

DC. That's true. Have

53:06

you really? Is that a true story? I didn't know

53:09

that. Yeah, me and Gary Witte did a Joker story

53:11

in the 80th anniversary. I did not know that. That

53:13

is actually quite sick. It was. It was very, very

53:15

cool. Definitely one of those, you know, how is this

53:18

my life moment? And especially because Gary did all the

53:20

work. I really just won lunch where I pitched ideas

53:22

and then he wrote the whole thing. It was great.

53:24

Fantastic. Living the dream. I'm not

53:26

going to take the achievement away from you. You are

53:29

a published DC author. Oh yeah, I got the byline.

53:31

It's done. The

53:33

biggest Superman fan that I know.

53:35

Thank you. I appreciate that. Which

53:37

is truly. And so yeah, so

53:40

Suicide Squad, Kill the Justice League is finally

53:42

out, guys. I always feel it. Is this

53:44

just going to be a dumb fest? I

53:46

don't want it to be a dumb fest because there is, I, in

53:49

the words of Kyle Bosman, the

53:51

thing that is like the thing that has stuck with me

53:53

forever and ever that Kyle said years ago in an episode

53:56

of the final Bosman is a naught out, even a naught

53:58

out of 10 games still has value. I'm

54:00

not saying Suicide Squad isn't all I'm telling, but it is very much

54:02

like a... A one out of ten? Sorry,

54:04

is that like American? No.

54:06

No! Hero. Hero.

54:10

Hero. That is not American. It's

54:12

kind of taught me to try and be a

54:14

little bit more positive because I think there are

54:16

moments with Suicide Squad and we'll definitely get into

54:18

the stuff that didn't work about that

54:21

game. But there were moments, and there's a lot of stuff

54:23

that didn't work in that game, I know. But there were

54:25

moments that I was genuinely enjoying myself very much in the

54:27

flow state as I was playing. And,

54:30

you know, despite the UI

54:32

desperately trying to stop me from

54:35

being in that flow state. Can you blind you?

54:37

Give you permanent eye damage? I

54:39

had to stop the Superman boss fight because it genuinely gave

54:42

me a headache, and I've never had to

54:44

do that outside of a game. That fight was so annoying! Anyway,

54:47

we'll get into that I'm sure. Yeah,

54:49

no, but I totally agree with you. And

54:51

I think most reviews that are treating it

54:53

fairly have been very willing to call out

54:56

its numerous redeeming qualities, for sure.

54:58

You know, I think anyone

55:00

who engages this product in good faith

55:03

cannot but celebrate the production value, which

55:05

is like off the charts.

55:07

It looks incredible. It has some issues running

55:09

on high-end PCs, whatever. That's a rule. Hey!

55:12

That's a new game. Here we go. We're not

55:14

going to do that again. It's a primarily PC-based

55:16

community here on the ShillUp channel, I think. So

55:19

watch yourself, Greg, okay? It's very dangerous territory for

55:21

you. Well, they're too busy rebooting and getting their

55:23

EXEs working right now to come here. So

55:27

it runs pretty well. Some

55:29

issues aside, it looks extraordinary.

55:32

The facial stuff is wild. Gorgeous. Some

55:35

of the best up there with Naughty Dog and Guardians

55:37

of the Galaxy. Voice work,

55:40

top tier as well. There are

55:42

no bad performances. The metropolis they built, I am

55:44

in love with. It's very pretty. It's really

55:46

cool. Totally, totally, totally.

55:49

And so I think there's a lot of things that you can

55:51

really hang your hat on for this game. And that's

55:54

setting aside other things that

55:56

are more subjective, as in everyone agrees that

55:58

it looks fantastic. When we

56:00

come to how it plays and all other stuff, people

56:02

have different opinions. But I do believe that there was

56:04

pretty broad consensus that there are quite a few things

56:06

that are really great about this game. Yeah,

56:10

that's fair. Yeah, but the

56:12

problem is all those things get tossed

56:14

into then becoming just bittersweet. Yeah. Right.

56:16

Like I'm right there with you, Jacob,

56:18

like, man, does it feel

56:21

awesome to be in this metropolis, to

56:23

be in a metropolis built by Rocksteady

56:25

to have this beauty. Like, when

56:27

you get to walk in the Daily Planet

56:29

and like I'm playing his Deadshot and he

56:31

makes a reference to Steve Lombardi and Ron

56:33

Troop's desk there and you go into Clark's

56:35

office and he's got the Monpoc. It's like,

56:38

oh, this is so awesome. And when

56:41

you're in the Batman

56:43

Museum, right, and they're filling in the gaps, they're

56:45

just telling you the Arkham story, let alone then.

56:47

And also, here's how we got to where you

56:49

are right now. So you understand why the game

56:51

is taking place, what

56:53

you think, please. It's like, yes,

56:55

this is it. Rocksteady, do this.

56:57

This is amazing. But then that

57:00

makes up the two to three percent that

57:02

isn't just fighting purple guys on rooftops. And

57:04

it's like that. Then you're out there and

57:06

you're like, oh, man, this so

57:08

is it. And not only is

57:11

this not what I want, this just isn't enjoyable.

57:13

Yeah. Yeah. The drop

57:15

off after what you've described there with like visiting the

57:17

Daily Planet, I think after that, I think the game

57:20

kind of just totally goes off a cliff. It's like

57:22

it has these moments in the setup where you visit

57:24

the Hall of Justice and you do the Batman experience

57:26

and you visit the Daily Planet and all this stuff.

57:28

And it's just like, wow, man. Yeah, cool. Absolutely. This

57:30

is this is totally on track. But

57:33

then I don't know what happens after that. It's

57:35

just they just completely. Well, I know I sort

57:37

of have a suspicion, which is that you actually

57:39

have a playable game after that. And then the

57:41

playable game is the part of this that's absolutely

57:43

awful. And so that's why it all

57:45

just sort of falls in a heap. So,

57:47

yeah, it's it's it's brutal. I think the moment

57:50

for me where because I was

57:52

definitely women positive on it, starting out in terms

57:54

of gameplay, even actually, no, I wasn't because I

57:56

didn't like traversal. It took me a while to

57:58

get used to it. I'm really contradicting myself

58:01

with everything. But the moment it really went downhill

58:03

for me was

58:05

the first escort mission with

58:08

the truck with Lex. And I

58:10

just went, oh my god,

58:12

are we doing this in 2024? And then you

58:14

will do it

58:16

again. And you're doing that again, like, oh, my

58:21

God, you to a place where

58:23

cars don't even exist. And then

58:25

they'll still make you escort a

58:28

car. I was like, I'm going.

58:30

It's such a I

58:33

think messy is the word for it.

58:35

And I spent so long. I know

58:37

that I shouldn't spend a long time

58:39

crafting anything on Twitter anymore. What because

58:41

of what that platform has become. But I

58:43

was so I spent so long thinking about

58:46

how I would even package

58:48

up my thoughts about this game,

58:50

because every single moment it felt like it was

58:52

dragging me in a different direction. And sometimes I

58:54

would go along with it and I'd be fine

58:56

with it. I

58:59

would actively look forward to cut scenes because

59:01

of the stuff we talked about. Right not playing it.

59:03

Yeah, the animation. Like, I think,

59:06

yes, the story did

59:08

not hold strong all the way through. And I think,

59:10

Ralph, in your video, you really know why I'm not

59:12

going to dig into that if you want

59:14

to talk about it. But I think the thing that I really

59:16

enjoyed is like, despite not being a big fan of the Suicide

59:18

Squad in terms of its characters, I

59:21

knew what every one of those characters kind of was. And I

59:23

knew kind of how they would react to things. And I think

59:25

they reacted to things appropriately,

59:27

except for some moments where they kind of went

59:29

off. But like, I love the way that they

59:32

were reacting to things. And I love the way

59:34

that they would react to each other and play

59:36

off each other. And that was the stuff I

59:38

was really excited for. I loved the jokes. I

59:40

think humor in video games is very, very difficult

59:42

to do. I had multiple out loud moments like

59:44

when Boomerang says my massive

59:46

and disappointingly male audience. I

59:49

felt that so deeply, man. As

59:53

a person with a video games YouTube channel,

59:55

I felt that so deeply. What

1:00:00

happened there? Why am I doing this again? Why

1:00:03

the hell is Penguin here? What's he bring into this?

1:00:06

Why is poison ivy a child? W-w-w-what's

1:00:08

what? Why? Why is that?

1:00:10

What happened? Just, yeah. It's

1:00:12

just so weird. And then when you get into, and

1:00:16

actually, I mean, Ralph and Greg, I want to ask

1:00:18

you this question because I take

1:00:20

it on how much you enjoy kind of live

1:00:22

action, live action, live service games, but you know,

1:00:24

like Ralph, obviously you started off doing division stuff.

1:00:26

Greg, I lived with you in the division two

1:00:28

came out. And that was a lot of division.

1:00:31

Yeah. And, and Avengers and whatever. I'm

1:00:33

like, obviously, Destiny as well. Uh,

1:00:37

my brain doesn't work like that. I

1:00:39

see those things. I see purple guns. I see whatever. And I'm

1:00:41

like, Oh no, this isn't for me. What

1:00:44

was it that was so bad

1:00:46

about what Suicide Squad did in terms of live

1:00:49

service games that immediately turned you guys off

1:00:51

as people who I know really enjoy that

1:00:53

genre? That's a great question. Yeah. Uh,

1:00:56

I mean, I'll start for me, right? It

1:00:58

was the fact that none of the loot

1:01:00

mattered. You like, you know, division,

1:01:02

I think reigns loot on you. Avengers definitely reigned

1:01:04

loot on you. And so there was the, Oh,

1:01:07

well, maybe I want to make a build to

1:01:09

fight this type of enemy. Okay. I'm doing this.

1:01:11

I need to go to that. Oh, I've been

1:01:13

investing in this and maybe I'd use the, you

1:01:15

know, special currency to make it better. But I

1:01:17

know that I just got this other thing and

1:01:19

it's a, you know, elite drop or whatever, blah,

1:01:21

blah, blah. Like Suicide Squad. I

1:01:23

just did not feel that in any way, shape

1:01:26

or form missions. And you get two things you

1:01:28

say, okay, this is better stats. You slap it

1:01:30

on. And I wasn't attached to anything because I

1:01:32

kept getting assault rifles. I'm usually an assault rifle

1:01:34

guy. So I'm getting an assault rifle and the

1:01:37

fact that none of them were special, even at

1:01:39

the end of the game, like one of the

1:01:41

final missions I did drops a bizarre assault rifle.

1:01:43

And I'm like, Oh wow. Is this, or is

1:01:45

this where we're really going to get into making

1:01:47

these guns feel special? No, the, you know, active

1:01:50

reload on this just goes backwards instead of forwards.

1:01:52

I'm like, Oh, that's stupid. I didn't

1:01:54

even notice that. I code critiqued in my review about it.

1:01:56

And somebody in the chat pointed that out. I was like,

1:01:58

Oh, that's what they did with it. That's what

1:02:00

they mean this special and not just feel like an

1:02:03

AR. I finished the game with the

1:02:05

pre-order guns Right see yeah,

1:02:07

the pre-order guns are ridiculously overpowered. It's so stupid

1:02:09

when games do that They're like we're gonna sell

1:02:11

you a gun that breaks the entire loot system

1:02:13

during your campaign And it's like also they make

1:02:16

things flash on screen when you're starting the game.

1:02:18

You're like, I don't know what's happening Why are

1:02:20

there skulls everywhere? Yeah, and 777 everywhere Yeah,

1:02:27

I think it was the grenade it was a Read

1:02:30

and I was like see I I

1:02:33

am I actually disagree with what you said

1:02:35

Craig about the loot not mandatory mattering because

1:02:37

I do think it does and I think

1:02:39

one of the things I kind of liked

1:02:41

about or at least respected about the Game

1:02:43

is that the itemization is

1:02:45

there. I think there are some modifiers that kick

1:02:47

in at the back end That

1:02:49

open up different play styles and I've definitely

1:02:52

seen certain build the foot focus on certain

1:02:54

things propped up exclusively by Itemization well the

1:02:56

talent trees help as well, right but

1:02:59

similar to your point Even

1:03:01

though you can do that. It doesn't

1:03:04

actually to me feel Impactful

1:03:06

or satisfying to build those things, right?

1:03:08

So yeah, you've got stats and you've

1:03:11

got modifiers But I for me personally

1:03:13

because the core combat is so bad

1:03:16

It's so repetitive because the guns themselves

1:03:18

don't have any unique feel to them

1:03:21

Because there's only one type of enemy that you fight

1:03:23

in the entire time I don't

1:03:25

actually care if I now have

1:03:28

an exclusively grenade focus build versus a sniper

1:03:30

build that spreads afflictions versus another

1:03:32

build that crazes enemies because it just all

1:03:34

feels the same to play regardless I think

1:03:36

human legs get your shields. Okay. Yeah, I've

1:03:38

done that so I can shoot this guy

1:03:40

in the head I okay. Okay. So it's

1:03:42

a car mission. Oh, no, the car mission

1:03:44

still has me going up and fighting guys

1:03:47

behind their purple shields Yes.

1:03:49

Yeah, so those parts of

1:03:51

it really broke for me and I think as well

1:03:53

and I'm sure you would experience This as well Greg.

1:03:55

It's like we've played so many of these games and

1:03:58

you would think Like, video games

1:04:01

are a medium that

1:04:03

evolves, and there's ideation and improvement over

1:04:05

time, right? Not in every aspect, but

1:04:07

certainly in many, many. It

1:04:10

just feels like with this genre, it's

1:04:12

the same fucking mistakes every single

1:04:14

release. Like we really did get

1:04:16

a very shitty 10-hour

1:04:18

long campaign and a non-existent

1:04:21

endgame with three missions. No word of a lie.

1:04:23

Three missions that you repeat over and over again.

1:04:25

It's like, how are we still doing this 14

1:04:28

years after Borderlands came out? Like what's up with

1:04:30

that? That was the thing for me coming home

1:04:32

and talking to Jen about it, my wife and

1:04:34

running her through it and explaining it. I'm like,

1:04:36

stop me when you've heard this before. All right?

1:04:38

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Middling campaign, that's going to

1:04:40

be fine, but it's not. Then you

1:04:42

get in this endgame, but there's not this one. I'm

1:04:44

describing Avengers again, right? Like how

1:04:47

did they not figure this out

1:04:49

and stop this from happening? And

1:04:51

I think, you know, another big part of it for me was

1:04:54

the fact that like we talked about Metropolis being beautiful

1:04:56

and having these cool things and da, da, da. It

1:04:59

is such a bore to traverse. Like

1:05:02

they go out of their way to give

1:05:04

you these heroes and make up stories and

1:05:06

okay, well he's using the speed force and

1:05:08

you've got a jet pack and Harley's got

1:05:10

the, but like none of these

1:05:12

are a blast. None of these are a lot

1:05:14

of fun. And even they're dropping you where you

1:05:16

can only fast travel to the hall of justice,

1:05:18

but it's down in the, you know, the bottom

1:05:21

right corner. So it's not even helpful. It's not

1:05:23

central. You see, you can travel there, but you still got

1:05:25

to go all the way over there. So

1:05:27

you're just going and flying and

1:05:29

gliding and whatever. And you're passing

1:05:32

boring enemy that's popping in in front of

1:05:34

your eyes after a boring enemy, not

1:05:36

engaging with them. And it was just like, wow,

1:05:38

like this feels so sterile. And even though there's

1:05:41

things in it, it feels empty. You know, I

1:05:43

kept comparing it to the division two, which I

1:05:45

adore. And it was the fact that, you know,

1:05:47

division two, you leave the base of operations and

1:05:49

you're right in the thick of it. And so

1:05:51

do you want to engage, you want to stealth

1:05:53

around you, are you going to go for that

1:05:55

cash over there? This your hot drop over there or

1:05:57

something else is happening that's organic in that minute. Oh

1:06:00

man, and your boots on the ground, so you have

1:06:02

to route yourself through where you want to go and

1:06:04

pick and choose. Whereas this was like,

1:06:06

okay, I am not being adequately

1:06:08

rewarded, I feel, for anything I do. The

1:06:11

combat is not engaging and not fun. The way I

1:06:13

found Avengers combat to be fun. So it was up

1:06:16

into the sky, go that way to the main

1:06:18

objective. And at that point, it's like, well, why

1:06:20

am I not playing a linear superhero game? A

1:06:22

just linear first person, I'm sorry, single player mission

1:06:24

that I'm just going through and doing over and

1:06:26

over again. And when you're not playing with your

1:06:28

friends and you're still being insulted by getting, oh

1:06:30

man, deadshot was the number one hero in the

1:06:33

slow mo thing. I'm like, stop, like, stop. Like,

1:06:35

who do you not think people would play this

1:06:37

alone? Like, come on. Yeah. And

1:06:39

I think as well, like to your point about Avengers, it's such

1:06:41

an interesting parallel. Because I think a

1:06:43

lot of people are, oh, how

1:06:46

could you score this lower than the Avengers?

1:06:48

That's ridiculous, right? I'm like, not really. I

1:06:50

don't think because Avengers for all

1:06:52

its problems and it had a lot of course, the

1:06:54

core combat of that game was excellent.

1:06:56

Like the core character kits were actually based on

1:06:58

the heroes that they were based on, which is

1:07:00

a novel idea. Oh wow, we're following it. And

1:07:04

then after that, you actually had some very

1:07:06

smartly designed combat systems that had a lot

1:07:08

of legs and that I really think

1:07:11

could have seen that if

1:07:14

Square Enix had managed and Crystal Dynamics had managed to

1:07:16

build out that game properly, I reckon

1:07:18

that game could have had a future. I really do

1:07:20

believe that, you know, and I said as much in

1:07:22

my initial review of it and I'm like, look, this

1:07:25

sucks right now, but it's got some good things that

1:07:27

give it a good future and I'm looking forward to

1:07:29

that future, that never materialized. But with this, I'm like,

1:07:31

no, the core gameplay is bad and I do not

1:07:33

see how this lives as a live service. Like I

1:07:35

just, I can't see how this has to go. Almost

1:07:39

the opposite of Avengers, right? Where like, you

1:07:41

know, you get to the end game here

1:07:43

for Suicide Squad and it's like, are we

1:07:45

spoiling stuff or not? Well, does anybody care?

1:07:48

What are we doing? I mean, let's like not do, because I'm

1:07:50

sure there's a lot of drops. There's a

1:07:52

whole many things we gotta do. And like, we already know

1:07:54

that there's the Joker, Al squirrels, and they're probably gonna be

1:07:56

more elseworlds like that. Here in these

1:07:58

characters, we're promising and hinting at. one's already

1:08:00

kind of leaked because of an audio bug.

1:08:02

And it's like, okay. And it's like, yeah,

1:08:05

okay. Like I deleted it off my PlayStation, right?

1:08:07

Like I, the Joker, I don't, I don't, I'm

1:08:09

not gonna wanna come back and play this. Whereas

1:08:11

Avengers was, I would have gladly come back and

1:08:13

played, but they just couldn't get it together. Hawkeye,

1:08:15

who was supposed to be the next, Arcade Bishop

1:08:17

was supposed to be, you know, month two, what,

1:08:21

five months later or whatever it was. And then it

1:08:23

was like that drip feed every, like, you know, by

1:08:25

the time we got to Warford Wakanda, it was like,

1:08:28

okay, you blew this, you know

1:08:30

what I mean? But here they're promising that stuff, but

1:08:32

I don't like your combat. I don't wanna come back.

1:08:34

And again, to your point, Ralph, like everyone

1:08:37

in Suicide Squad feels the same.

1:08:39

It doesn't, like, why is it

1:08:41

that Boomerang, Captain Boomerang should

1:08:43

be using his Boomerangs, right? Like this isn't,

1:08:45

is this an outrageous thought that he shouldn't

1:08:48

just use that for traversal? King Shark should

1:08:50

be a melee shark that's really screwing stuff

1:08:52

up. Of course, Deadshot should feel like the

1:08:54

assassin. It hardly should be this crazy close

1:08:56

quarters that I'm using melee combat, like to

1:08:59

stop and go, we're gonna

1:09:02

make all of them gunners. And yeah,

1:09:04

you will, you know, King Shark will have the Gatling gun

1:09:06

and, you know, he'll have the assassin. And like, of course

1:09:08

you could swap those out and give them all whatever you

1:09:10

want. It's like, again, back to the Avengers comparison. It's the

1:09:12

idea that like, at least everybody felt different.

1:09:15

When I was playing Avengers, I loved being cap and

1:09:17

punching the shield back and doing all this stuff. And

1:09:19

like, I see my friends, and my friend Sean run

1:09:21

around and be Thor, and I'm like, man, Thor looks

1:09:23

great. And you know, Goldfarb was always gonna be Kamala.

1:09:25

And I was like, oh man, like, there's a synergy

1:09:27

here where it's just, this is just dump the bullets

1:09:29

into them, be done with it. I, you know, there

1:09:31

really isn't a strategy. Back to

1:09:33

what we're talking about to compliment Avengers. When

1:09:35

you would run into bosses and the end

1:09:38

game stuff they did had, which was for

1:09:40

you in far between, there was like, oh,

1:09:42

well, how do you engage this? What are

1:09:44

you doing? How are we doing that? You

1:09:46

think of a destiny raid, right? What is

1:09:48

it here? Well, use the counter shot to

1:09:50

knock their health bar exposed to these enemies,

1:09:52

and then just dump bullets into them. Let's

1:09:54

take some of the coolest concepts from the

1:09:56

Arkham games, apply them to Batman, and make

1:09:58

them the most boring. interaction. I

1:10:00

like when I finished the Batman fight, I

1:10:02

was furious, not because of the story, not

1:10:04

because of what happened, just because of how

1:10:06

bad that fight was. Every fight is either,

1:10:09

hey, you're in a 360 degree arena where everybody's running

1:10:11

around fighting a big guy, or you're in a half

1:10:14

circle arena fighting a big guy. It's like, come on,

1:10:16

like this is all you could think of with these

1:10:18

people. And the Batman fight as long as it was

1:10:20

so disappointing because visually,

1:10:25

it's the coolest one. I'm not going to

1:10:27

spoil it if you decide to get that. Visually, it

1:10:29

looks really cool. And then it just boils down to you

1:10:32

doing the same thing you do

1:10:34

in every fight, Pinky. You just

1:10:37

point your gun at him and shoot him. And

1:10:40

then you jump, like when the thing comes across.

1:10:42

I know

1:10:44

we've been talking a lot, we've been talking

1:10:46

a lot, Jake, and I wanted to hear your story because

1:10:49

you're very, you know, you're very into the lore and the

1:10:51

story and the story. So I wanted to hear like your

1:10:53

take on the on the story side of things. Like, were

1:10:55

there any things that really clicked

1:10:58

with you on the story front? Or was that also

1:11:00

just something that you didn't love? Positives

1:11:03

for the story were some fun DC

1:11:05

fan moments, some stuff I don't want

1:11:07

to spoil, but some characters showing up,

1:11:10

new takes on characters, rock studies takes on

1:11:12

characters. Some of them just ended up being

1:11:14

glorified vendors, but I like that they pop up.

1:11:18

And the initial sighting of Batman that was

1:11:20

shown in teaser in the initial trailer, like

1:11:22

that's not spoiling anything. But that initial reveal

1:11:24

of Batman, I think felt very inspired. And

1:11:26

it felt like yes, rock steady, like acknowledging,

1:11:28

you know, yeah, we made we made this,

1:11:30

but now we're doing this. And it felt,

1:11:32

it felt kind of cool. But

1:11:35

it's I feel like the game starts strong, like

1:11:37

presentation, cut scenes and like, you're like, okay, this

1:11:40

is this is pretty cool in the first hour

1:11:42

or so. But as it goes along, and once

1:11:44

you get to the first boss battle, and it

1:11:46

just kind of boils down to shoot

1:11:48

him with a gun with everybody. It's like,

1:11:51

how do we kill Green Lantern? I don't know.

1:11:53

He's powered by will, right? Well, shoot him with

1:11:55

a gun enough, and he'll lose his will. Okay, I

1:11:57

mean, it's true

1:12:00

in real life as well, so why not there? Good,

1:12:02

you know what? The first hour is

1:12:05

good except for the first 10 minutes. I

1:12:07

think tutorial-wise, that was... It was

1:12:09

like an extra tutorial. Pretty shocking. It was

1:12:11

the one where you take control of every

1:12:14

single character and you go through the same

1:12:16

area. Yeah, yeah, yeah. This is how we

1:12:18

all got to this one point. I'm like...

1:12:20

And I was playing that and I was like, am

1:12:22

I taking crazy pills here? There is no way you

1:12:24

could have just done an intro mission in

1:12:27

any different kind of way at all. Yeah, so,

1:12:29

so, so. And you know, it's an interesting game

1:12:32

because I know some people are like, oh, this

1:12:34

isn't what we really wanted from

1:12:36

Rocksteady. Make another Arkham game or why

1:12:38

didn't you make a Superman game? But

1:12:40

I think the elevator pitch for this

1:12:42

game somewhere is really cool. If you

1:12:44

sat me down and you were like,

1:12:46

yeah, it's a Suicide Squad game. Okay,

1:12:48

yeah. The Justice League

1:12:50

is controlled by Brainiac. Okay, cool. They

1:12:53

got all the bad guys got all the good

1:12:55

guys weapons and they're just like flying around and,

1:12:57

you know, blast and shit. I'm like, okay, cool.

1:12:59

And you get to kill Batman. Yes.

1:13:02

Awesome. But it just, I feel

1:13:04

like it didn't make good on

1:13:06

any of the anything

1:13:09

it really set up. So it's the same thing,

1:13:11

the same problem with me. And I'm sorry if

1:13:13

you watch my videos and I'm repeating myself, but

1:13:16

Gotham Knights, the

1:13:18

whole building for that was we're going to

1:13:20

kill Batman and we're going to tell a

1:13:22

story of what it's like for the Bat

1:13:24

family to get up and learn to fight

1:13:27

and live without Batman. Awesome

1:13:29

idea. Love it. Hear for it. Didn't

1:13:31

do anything with it. Then here, Suicide Squad

1:13:34

killed the Justice League. It's like, kill the

1:13:36

Justice League is huge, man. That is a

1:13:38

huge concept. That can be a ton of

1:13:40

fun. There's so much you can do with

1:13:43

it. And they didn't really commit to that

1:13:45

either. It's hard to like talk around without

1:13:47

spoiling things, but it's like the

1:13:50

big part of the game, the game is

1:13:52

structured around taking out all the suicide, all

1:13:54

the Justice League members, but

1:13:56

they're all very unsatisfying

1:13:58

mechanically. from a

1:14:00

boss fight standpoint, but also story wise. Story

1:14:03

wise, I didn't get any impact from gunning

1:14:06

down any of these suckers. And

1:14:08

that- They didn't even have like death monologues.

1:14:10

Yeah. They just keeled over. And you're just

1:14:13

like, really? You couldn't even give them a

1:14:15

few lines? This is where I feel like

1:14:17

something's lost in translation because for

1:14:19

me, it felt like they didn't commit to the bit. It

1:14:22

wasn't like, ha ha, we're edgy and we killed

1:14:24

them. It doesn't really do anything cool. It

1:14:27

doesn't do anything like a

1:14:29

poetic, climactic, you know, a

1:14:31

speech. It doesn't do anything epic, except for like a couple

1:14:33

of little bits here and there. It just feels like it

1:14:35

didn't know tonally or story

1:14:38

wise what it even wanted to do

1:14:40

with these characters, with the Kill the Justice

1:14:42

League concept. And that's the whole thing. But

1:14:45

I think Ralph, you said it in your review where you were like, the

1:14:48

one emotional moment is when the Lesu of Truth

1:14:50

has been used on Flash and he says, you

1:14:52

have to kill us, Diana. There's

1:14:55

no, even if you killed him, why aren't

1:14:57

they saying like, oh, you did the right

1:14:59

thing? Like something to incentivize you to keep

1:15:01

going. Or even breadcrumb

1:15:04

away to, you know, go

1:15:07

get the next one. Like here's something I learned about

1:15:09

Brainiac. Story wise, it would have been, I don't know,

1:15:13

every time I finished a boss fight, I was like, oh,

1:15:15

thank God that's over. Because they are

1:15:17

just, they are a miserable accumulation

1:15:19

of everything I didn't like about the

1:15:21

gameplay. Greg,

1:15:23

obviously you've got your team over there, kind of funny,

1:15:26

or a lot of them would have played it. Has

1:15:28

anyone on the team taken to it? Have you had

1:15:30

conversations with anyone that being like, you know what, I

1:15:32

really like this. This is working for me. Absolutely not.

1:15:35

I think Andy came around the most from when

1:15:37

we played it on launch day, early access launch.

1:15:39

And then he went home and played it by

1:15:41

himself to get better fidelity and be able to

1:15:43

live there. He came back a little bit more

1:15:45

like, okay, the shooting is kind of delivering what

1:15:47

I thought it was going to do. And that's

1:15:50

cool, but nobody's made time for it. They've all

1:15:52

moved on to better games. And it was funny even

1:15:54

for me where, you know, I rolled credits, I think on

1:15:57

Wednesday night, then moved into another review

1:15:59

on Thursday. And so then I was like, oh

1:16:01

I need this on Friday They were like, oh you gotta

1:16:03

come on games daily, right and talk about it Oh, right

1:16:05

like I'd wrap that game up and never thought about it

1:16:07

again, you know, and I even coming on today I was

1:16:10

driving like alright I think it back in that headspace of

1:16:12

like let's get mad about it What let's talk about like

1:16:14

everything this game did wrong and what admit, you know what

1:16:16

I mean? And like again, what a bummer

1:16:18

it is Like it's just such a bummer

1:16:20

as an Arkham fan as a rock steady

1:16:23

fan as a live service fan I've enjoyed

1:16:25

so much since my videos have gone live

1:16:27

about it my podcast and stuff people coming

1:16:29

back Quote tweeting like and

1:16:32

this in this but you like Avengers

1:16:34

right Greg and I'm like, yes I

1:16:36

like the most men superhero game of

1:16:38

all time I can find that much

1:16:40

enjoyment in mid games and I can't

1:16:42

find it in this like I am

1:16:44

the DC guy I've like I have

1:16:47

what is it over 900 hours in

1:16:49

DC Universe online? I should be like

1:16:51

yo this game ain't great, but I'm in it I'm in

1:16:53

it for everything and I'm doing it as soon as I

1:16:55

was like What is the endgame gonna be and I got

1:16:57

the taste and I was like cool. No One

1:17:04

thing to strap out the endgame thread though It'll

1:17:06

be fascinating if they commit to it and do

1:17:08

everything and it has a real roadmap and thing

1:17:10

if When there is the

1:17:12

complete edition and maybe there are Seven

1:17:14

new mission types that don't feel like it is

1:17:17

right now where it's like open up the toolbox

1:17:19

Which one are you gonna get a B or

1:17:21

C for your mission objective? Like if there is

1:17:23

a through M version of that, maybe it is

1:17:26

so glaring but by then I mean, come on

1:17:28

Whatever good will you have will be gone? I

1:17:31

think it's so fascinating to see the reviews

1:17:34

for this one because Like obviously

1:17:37

the reviews are almost universally negative

1:17:39

or mid, right? You know, I

1:17:41

think the most generous 3

1:17:43

Metacritic I think And

1:17:46

whatever else yeah, however you're saying

1:17:48

like on Steam It's like 84% very

1:17:50

positive and I'm really surprised

1:17:52

by that number because I I

1:17:55

don't know It's it's it's on

1:17:57

you like usually when you get this kind

1:17:59

of uniformity of opinion about how a

1:18:01

game is, it's sort of reflected on the

1:18:03

Steam score, you know, but there's just this

1:18:05

massive gap with the way that everyone's talking.

1:18:08

Do you think this is like a bit of

1:18:10

a beat up from critics and we're kind of

1:18:12

just out of touch and you know,

1:18:14

this game is actually really popping off for people and

1:18:16

we're just not feeling it in the

1:18:18

right way or what do you think is going on

1:18:21

there? What explains that gap? It's absolutely not popping off.

1:18:23

You can look at the Steam concurrent. Yeah, I'm looking

1:18:25

at them right now. I'm not trying

1:18:27

to drag it into the street and beat it. I think

1:18:29

what you're usually, if this is the same

1:18:31

thing we all see when we do this, right?

1:18:33

And Lucy, I know you know it from GameSpot

1:18:35

so well. I know it from IGN where you

1:18:37

have that early access, you're able to get in

1:18:39

there, da da da da, so the people who

1:18:41

want to believe are there saying, no, no, no,

1:18:43

you're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong, blah, blah, blah,

1:18:45

blah, blah. And even though we all got our

1:18:47

hands on this one at the same time, I still

1:18:49

think there's a lot of that where it was, you know,

1:18:52

the comments I see where people are mad at me not

1:18:54

liking it. It's always,

1:18:57

yeah, okay, fine. It's middle of the road,

1:18:59

but I'm having fun with it. It's like,

1:19:02

yeah, you're allowed to have fun with whatever you want

1:19:04

to. I have fun with bad games all the time,

1:19:06

but it's like we still have to sit here and

1:19:09

put a score on it and talk about what it

1:19:11

is and how it stacks up. And like, there's that

1:19:13

disconnect, I think, between trying

1:19:15

to be critical of something and loving it

1:19:17

and just loving something. And so I think

1:19:19

there is this audience that is just stoked

1:19:21

to be in that DC universe, is stoked

1:19:24

to support Rocksteady, is stoked to have something

1:19:26

to grind on and chase and shoot.

1:19:28

And so they are like, well, yeah, but

1:19:30

every game repeats its mechanics. Every game only

1:19:33

has so many mission types. And I'm like,

1:19:35

well, yeah, every game is all having a

1:19:37

game, whoo, but this one is so

1:19:40

glaringly dull, I think. You know what

1:19:42

I mean? Where it's like,

1:19:44

there's just, I think there's people wanting

1:19:46

to believe something that they're enjoying. Again,

1:19:49

like I'm talking as an Avengers fan. And Avengers,

1:19:51

I was on the subreddit every day checking in

1:19:53

and seeing what people were saying. Every

1:19:55

game wasn't a 10 out of 10. But

1:19:57

like, I'm there enjoying it. And so yeah, I was still buying.

1:20:00

skins are doing this thing or enjoying this thing to

1:20:02

a certain degree. Those

1:20:04

people are definitely out there. I've definitely spoken to

1:20:06

them. Those people that are like, yeah, no, but

1:20:08

like, I like, I like this world. This is

1:20:10

cool. Or like, I've got a lot of like,

1:20:12

stop complaining. I'm doing end game with my friends

1:20:14

and it's awesome. And yeah, cool. You

1:20:17

didn't know what to expect from this. And you're trying

1:20:19

to make it into an art. I'm like, I'm not

1:20:21

doing either of those things. I just wanted more and

1:20:23

I'm not enjoying what I have. I also think too

1:20:26

with Steam reviews, uh, you know, I, I

1:20:29

was into the game for the first hour or two. I was

1:20:32

like, all right, cool. Where's this going to

1:20:34

go? I'm enjoying the cut scenes, the gameplay. All

1:20:36

right. I can't wait for there to be more

1:20:38

enemy types and maybe more

1:20:40

maps and mission time. And then it's

1:20:42

just after that, it starts to fizzle

1:20:44

out. Yeah.

1:20:47

It's, um, it's a shame. Obviously I think, I

1:20:49

think the biggest, the biggest shame

1:20:51

with all this is, you know, this is what Rocksteady made. You

1:20:53

know, this is what they worked on for nine years. It's

1:20:56

frustrating to see that this genre has

1:20:58

claimed another studio like this, you know,

1:21:01

it's like these fucking games, live service,

1:21:03

looters or whatever. They just, they

1:21:05

just, they're merciless. They just, they fell

1:21:07

whichever studio dares tackle them. And you know, Rocksteady's

1:21:09

the latest casualty of that. And it's a bummer.

1:21:11

And we're going to have to wait a really

1:21:13

long time for our next Rocksteady game. Cause they're

1:21:15

going to have to support this for at least

1:21:17

two years because there's all the promise stuff and

1:21:19

then whatever else and whatever. Uh,

1:21:21

and then they got to work on something else. And you

1:21:24

know, it's probably, I don't know

1:21:26

who knows what they make next. I mean, do they

1:21:28

make the live service Harry Potter game after this? I

1:21:32

mean, yeah, Harry Potter probably is the license that

1:21:34

will get shopped around because look at the sales

1:21:37

for Hogwarts legacy. I do hope that

1:21:39

Warner brothers see

1:21:41

that, Hey, a single

1:21:43

player game got those numbers. You don't

1:21:45

have to shoehorn the live service shit

1:21:47

into everything. Come on Wonder Woman game. Let's

1:21:49

go. Yeah, I think that

1:21:51

is absolutely not the lesson that executives would

1:21:54

take from the sales of Harry Potter.

1:21:56

They would not say we sold on. lot

1:22:00

of copies, they would say we sold a lot of

1:22:02

copies, but it could have had live service. We could

1:22:04

have had one country and got together. We would have

1:22:06

made even more money. So that's...

1:22:10

That's right. What

1:22:12

are we, some kind of magician squad? Yeah, I

1:22:14

think that's the thing. You know,

1:22:16

live service continues to be a mirage in the

1:22:18

desert that so many people stomp to their deaths

1:22:20

chasing. And by the time you realize, oh my

1:22:23

God, this isn't water, it's sand, you're too far

1:22:25

gone. You know, you talk about the nine years

1:22:27

that between this and Arkham Knight, right? You're

1:22:30

talking about a different industry. You're talking about all

1:22:32

these different things. And I think, you know, what

1:22:34

I brought up on one of the shows talking

1:22:36

about Suicide Squad was the idea that, you know,

1:22:38

we look at Fortnite and the Battle Pass and

1:22:40

the success and every IP and yada, yada, yada.

1:22:42

And it's that thing where it's like, we all

1:22:44

remember when Fortnite launched as a completely different game

1:22:46

and was failing. And they're like, hey, we love

1:22:48

PUBG. So we're trying this battle royale thing. And

1:22:51

it's not like, oh, I'm going to get off, but it

1:22:53

was week after week, month after month, season after season to

1:22:55

get where it is now. And now you have so many

1:22:57

people jumping in, wanting to be Fortnite now without wanting to

1:22:59

do the work, lay the foundation, actually find

1:23:01

what their audience wants and hold in on

1:23:03

it. So instead of coming out with half

1:23:05

pay promises saying this is clearly what you

1:23:07

want, right? And no, it's not, let alone

1:23:09

the fact that the industry's moved so far

1:23:12

from that when you set off to make

1:23:14

that kind of game. It's a heartbreaker because

1:23:16

again, you know, even if you

1:23:18

wanted to leave it Suicide Squad, Kill the Justice

1:23:20

League, that's fine. And that would have been better, I think, as

1:23:22

a single player. But I look here and I'm like, the

1:23:24

fact that they just, you know, looked at Arkham Knight's ending

1:23:26

and were like, well, how can we do this? All right,

1:23:28

here's like the one scene at the end or not even

1:23:31

seen at the end. Here's the one scene in the Batman

1:23:33

experience of him shaking Superman's hand to explain what happened here,

1:23:35

right? It's like I would have

1:23:37

much rather have you undone all the work you did

1:23:39

there and the beautiful ending you had to have it

1:23:41

be Batman, Kill the Justice League. And it was that,

1:23:43

you know, we pick up and the Justice League's been

1:23:45

brainwashed and Batman's the only man standing and how is

1:23:47

he going to stop this and what's he going to

1:23:50

do and what is the turmoil between it, right? Like

1:23:52

that would have been a smarter move than what

1:23:54

they did here, I think. Yeah. Sure.

1:23:58

Yeah, I've even found myself fantasizing about like, what if it was just a It

1:24:00

was just a Justice League game where you're

1:24:02

just doing crime stuff and it's actual Batman

1:24:04

out there and he's taunting you the whole

1:24:06

time. Because that was like an interesting and

1:24:08

kind of redeeming thing for the game for

1:24:10

me. It was very creative was that they

1:24:13

committed to having Conroy

1:24:15

essentially be the radio chatter, you

1:24:17

know, where in Arkham

1:24:19

Knight and stuff, it was always like you'd hear criminals being

1:24:21

like, when's the bet? Could you show up? Now

1:24:24

it's just Conroy just like hamming it up.

1:24:26

Did you ever find him in the open

1:24:29

world? I saw a video of it. I

1:24:31

never saw him. It's so cool. That was like the

1:24:33

one moment where I'm like, damn, yes, hell yeah. Like

1:24:36

he's literally just standing there staring at you. You're like

1:24:38

shooting all these purple guys. You're like, it's fucking whatever.

1:24:40

And then you just kind of stand there for a

1:24:42

second and you kind of look up and you're like,

1:24:44

what the fuck is that? Oh my god. Batman

1:24:46

watching, he's like, damn, they dropped the rare level

1:24:48

SMGs. Yeah,

1:24:52

like even the Nemesis system, but the

1:24:54

Nemesis is always Batman,

1:24:56

you know? Like he would

1:24:58

reference shit that you've done. I mean, like his

1:25:01

boss battle could have just been reverse. Mr.

1:25:03

Freeze. Yeah, Mr. Freeze. One of

1:25:05

the best, one of the best boss battles in

1:25:07

I would go on to argue up all time

1:25:10

and in terms of creative, in terms of forcing

1:25:12

you to use every single thing that you've learned

1:25:14

to outsmart your opponent. Yeah, it

1:25:16

was nothing like that. And that's what

1:25:18

it's heartbreaking about. Like when you are in the Batman experience

1:25:20

and I walked up on the first thing like, what is

1:25:22

on the floor? And it was the bat gel and it

1:25:25

exploded and blew me back. I was like, that's awesome. Yeah.

1:25:27

And now I'm going to see the other side of what

1:25:30

it's like to use these gadgets on criminals. And then of

1:25:32

course that's wasted. I've never been so hyped to see an

1:25:34

open vent shaft that is human sized. Yeah.

1:25:37

Yeah. It wasn't easy. Oh man.

1:25:40

Yeah. What could have been? What could

1:25:42

have been? Well, thanks Greg. Thanks for

1:25:44

having me. Of course. Yeah. We'll

1:25:47

get you back in a little bit. Really great to see you. Thank

1:25:54

you again to Greg for joining us

1:25:56

for that Suicide Squad chat. I

1:25:58

think that we all are in sorts. bit now? I

1:26:01

was so excited to uninstall it. I know that sounds really brutal

1:26:04

but sometimes you just, you just, it's just sometimes there's a, there

1:26:06

are games on your hard drive and you're like and you're just

1:26:08

so relieved when you get to click the uninstall button because you're

1:26:10

like I don't have to play anymore. But also what I said

1:26:12

at the back end of my review is that

1:26:15

like I'm glad I don't have to watch

1:26:17

that game anymore because the visual noise, I've

1:26:19

never felt that before, I've never once experienced

1:26:21

a game where I like I don't want

1:26:23

to watch this anymore but I, this was

1:26:26

that and so as brutal as

1:26:28

it sounds I was very glad to see

1:26:30

it removed from my device. I

1:26:32

will, I think I will be the person who goes back and

1:26:34

I just want to, I'm interested to see what they do with

1:26:36

Joker because I'm a

1:26:39

glutton for punishment I guess but I'm interested.

1:26:41

He was kind of whack but there was

1:26:43

another leaked character that I think was pretty

1:26:45

cool. I want to see how he plays.

1:26:47

Can you text me that because I don't want to spoil

1:26:49

it in case people don't know who it is but

1:26:51

I want to know because Greg mentioned it too. Yeah.

1:26:55

But anyway let's move on to a user

1:26:57

question. If you have a question for us

1:27:00

hit us up at contact at friends for

1:27:02

second.com and we can read it

1:27:04

out on the show. So this one is from Daniel

1:27:06

Vadejo. Hello folks, love

1:27:09

the podcast, it is the perfect trifecta of

1:27:11

gaming personalities. My name is Dani and

1:27:14

I am or maybe more like once was

1:27:16

a very avid gamer who used to get

1:27:18

so much excitement and joy from new game

1:27:20

announcements and releases. Over the

1:27:22

last couple of years after many disappointing

1:27:25

releases, you'll see why I picked this

1:27:27

question, whether it

1:27:29

be from technical problems or lackluster

1:27:31

gameplay mechanics or cash grab microtransaction

1:27:33

mechanics, Dani names some

1:27:35

games here but I will keep them

1:27:37

out of our mouths just in case.

1:27:41

I have been, I've felt burned by

1:27:43

so many releases in the past few

1:27:45

years. It's really destroyed my will and

1:27:47

want to try new games despite also

1:27:49

playing some fantastic ones. How do you

1:27:51

deal with feeling burned out on games

1:27:54

and disappointing releases? I

1:27:57

have a formula for this. I've answered this

1:27:59

question before. somewhat. Tap

1:28:01

out as someone who

1:28:03

it's me saying like don't don't visit my

1:28:05

place of business, but like detach

1:28:08

a little bit from the gaming news world. I'll

1:28:11

be a little less plugged in for a while and

1:28:13

just naturally stumble into

1:28:15

whatever it may be. One

1:28:18

game, one random game, one game

1:28:20

on your backlog or even go

1:28:22

back and replay

1:28:24

a couple of those games that you talked about

1:28:26

loving from you know like the 2000s or so.

1:28:30

That makes a big difference. Just a

1:28:32

little unplugging, little playing some nostalgia and

1:28:35

really just seeking out. Yeah,

1:28:39

cutting through the noise is basically what

1:28:41

I'm trying to say because we make a

1:28:43

lot of it, but ultimately it still comes down to you and

1:28:47

sometimes you'll feel better not knowing about

1:28:49

something going into it and not having

1:28:51

any preconceived notions or clouded anything and

1:28:54

that can that can be worth it. That

1:28:56

can help it. Sometimes it's just one of

1:28:58

those games where you go back online and

1:29:00

you go wait what? Everybody hated that? Well,

1:29:02

I like it. So that helps.

1:29:05

That's power in my opinion. I agree.

1:29:08

I think some of the best advice that

1:29:10

I heard is if you're enjoying a game,

1:29:12

never visit its subreddit. And I guess that

1:29:17

could also be extended into never look up the

1:29:19

reviews and never try and track the discourse because

1:29:21

if you're enjoying something, that is what matters. But

1:29:24

simultaneously, if you're not enjoying something, like

1:29:26

don't stew too much in that. Don't

1:29:28

go out seeking tons of confirmation bias.

1:29:31

Don't look at tons of negative reviews

1:29:33

that also hate the same thing that

1:29:35

you hate because it's just going to

1:29:37

get you like in a shitty spiral. And I say that as

1:29:39

someone who makes video game reviews for a living, you know what I

1:29:41

mean? And it's my job to watch

1:29:44

reviews. You know, I watch other people's reviews as well

1:29:46

because they show me different perspectives and there's some reviewers

1:29:48

I really love to watch because I love their insight.

1:29:50

And, you know, sometimes if you're just

1:29:52

watching too many negative reviews on something, yeah, you do

1:29:55

feel even more burned out than if you just played

1:29:57

a bad game and moved on, you know. So,

1:30:00

yeah, but I guess the other thing as well is

1:30:02

that I personally have never

1:30:04

actually felt that feeling of like, Oh,

1:30:06

that game really sucked. Now I'm kind of burned out on

1:30:09

video games. I've never felt that because for

1:30:12

me, there's just so many all the

1:30:14

time. And I'm like, I, if one

1:30:16

sucks, I'm like, that's a bummer. And

1:30:18

I'm disappointed that that one game sucked,

1:30:20

but it never dampens my enthusiasm for

1:30:22

everything else. And I just go

1:30:24

and play something else and I move on to the next

1:30:26

thing, you know? So don't, don't, don't dwell on the stuff

1:30:28

that sucks. Go and find the stuff that doesn't. And

1:30:31

I think as well, there's like really good subreddits that you

1:30:33

can find, like patient gamers, for example, is a really good

1:30:35

one slash our patient gamers, because they

1:30:37

play games well

1:30:40

after they've been released. They're totally

1:30:42

separate from the discourse zeitgeist. And

1:30:45

they're really interesting, good, insightful

1:30:47

commentary and conversation about what a video

1:30:49

game is. And, you know, a

1:30:52

lot of people will say, Hey, I finally played Bioshock for

1:30:54

the first time. Here's my impressions. I loved it. Wow.

1:30:57

It's cool to see someone play Bioshock for the first

1:30:59

time and just put up an honest review without trying

1:31:01

to make some think piece video

1:31:03

on YouTube that's designed to get a million

1:31:06

views. It's just a genuine reaction to a

1:31:08

great game. And then if you might

1:31:10

want to go and boot up Bioshock for yourself, either for

1:31:12

the first time or play it again. And I think that's

1:31:14

pretty good for the soul. So yeah, yeah,

1:31:16

I think my advice would also

1:31:18

be kind of a mashup of what you, the two

1:31:21

of you just said, whereas don't feel

1:31:23

pressured to play something or do something

1:31:25

that you don't enjoy. I

1:31:27

grew up being a people pleaser and I

1:31:29

would do a bunch of stuff just to

1:31:31

make other people happy. And I realized

1:31:33

that would translate into me doing things

1:31:36

that weren't making me happy just because I felt like

1:31:38

I needed to do them because I spent the money

1:31:40

on buying a game where I felt like I had

1:31:42

to finish it. Reality,

1:31:44

I'm an adult. I'm an adult. I

1:31:46

don't like a game. I can take it back or

1:31:48

I can just stop playing it. And I can, I

1:31:51

think as well as you get older. Oh

1:31:53

my God, I just said as you get older. There we

1:31:55

go. There we go. Old

1:31:58

friends. I couldn't over here. You

1:32:00

cannot realize that your time is precious and there's not any

1:32:03

point wasting it on things that are not giving

1:32:05

you joy And so I

1:32:07

think what is it? Rikondo, she had it.

1:32:09

Exactly! Spark that joy! People got mad at

1:32:11

her, but she was right. She was right.

1:32:14

Yeah, but the way she folds underwear is fucking annoying.

1:32:16

It's so annoying. In

1:32:19

my drawer, I open up my drawer and I'm like,

1:32:21

why are they like this, Amanda? She's

1:32:23

like, what's that? But I think it's because

1:32:25

it's a lucky chain. She's

1:32:29

a lucky woman. My

1:32:32

husband's a lucky department. My husband's complaining about

1:32:34

how his underwear is folded. She really, she

1:32:36

scored big. No, actually I fold it most of

1:32:38

the time now because I didn't like it. Nah, you say that. It's

1:32:41

a damage control. But no, I think

1:32:43

there's a lot to be said about finding

1:32:46

new ways to enjoy things that you already like.

1:32:48

I think that, I've never heard of that

1:32:50

subreddit, that sounds great. What I love is speedruns.

1:32:55

Oh, wow. It is such a fun,

1:32:57

I wouldn't call it a hobby of

1:32:59

mine. Watching speedrunning is not a hobby,

1:33:01

but it's something I really love. I

1:33:03

talked about GDQ on the last episode, but I've

1:33:06

just been watching. So there's

1:33:08

a blindfolded Elden Ring run now. I've

1:33:11

seen that, it's so scary. There's a run.

1:33:14

There's a guy called Bushy who just does runs

1:33:16

where it's like, can I do, can I beat Elden

1:33:18

Ring upside down? Can I beat Elden Ring at

1:33:21

minus level 79? Like all my

1:33:23

attributes are zero. And I just

1:33:25

think it's so cool that people can take an

1:33:29

amphibious, like,

1:33:32

oh, there's amphibious something.

1:33:34

I don't know, there's a guy who does

1:33:36

it like this in The Sims and Sim City and stuff

1:33:38

too. I think it's so cool to find different ways to

1:33:40

enjoy a game by not playing it

1:33:42

as you are supposed to. I love that

1:33:45

stuff. Did you see the Baldur's Gate

1:33:47

sex speedrunning? No, not yet. Oh

1:33:50

my god. There's

1:33:52

a two minute record baby with Laezel.

1:33:54

Two minutes, that's a fart. From the

1:33:56

time you boot up the game to the moment you bare

1:33:59

Laezel, two minutes. So they

1:34:01

got this all new category. The

1:34:03

only other thing I would add is a

1:34:05

little corny, but it helps me is go

1:34:07

to if you have the

1:34:15

opportunity and not everybody has this privilege,

1:34:18

but go to a local video game

1:34:20

store or go to a Barcade or

1:34:22

whatever and kind of immerse yourself in

1:34:25

or even a convention, you know, a

1:34:28

retro gaming convention, immerse yourself in

1:34:31

the joy of other people. It

1:34:33

sounds weird, but even if you're an intro, just

1:34:36

like breathing some of that

1:34:38

air, that stinky air, but breathing some of that

1:34:40

air can make a difference or go to a

1:34:42

local game store if you have one, a mom

1:34:44

and pop type store, talk to the guy behind

1:34:46

the counter, like that

1:34:48

makes you kind of realize like why you were

1:34:51

playing and loving this stuff in the first place.

1:34:54

Totally agree. I agree. Well,

1:34:57

thank you again for your question. Next

1:34:59

up, we got an interview with Anthony from

1:35:01

the Entrada team. But

1:35:08

I wanted to make a joke about the Greek names.

1:35:12

You can do that. I can do that right now.

1:35:14

I still make a joke about Greek names. Okay. We're

1:35:17

rolling. It's Christa Larkis, right? Yes, it is. Okay.

1:35:20

Right. Nice. Okay. Well,

1:35:23

I have like a lot of Greeks in my life. So

1:35:25

that's why I feel very confident when I'm presented with a

1:35:27

Greek name. I'm like, I know how to pronounce that. I'm

1:35:29

feeling good today. Anthony Christa

1:35:32

Larkis, thank you so much

1:35:34

for being here today. We

1:35:38

are certain that you are just like ridiculously

1:35:40

busy right now. You've had a gigantic

1:35:42

launch, first of all, right off the top.

1:35:45

Congratulations. That is huge.

1:35:47

Thanks. We'll talk about the specifics of the

1:35:49

numbers or whatever a bit later on. But yeah, we really do appreciate

1:35:51

you making the time in what I'm sure is

1:35:53

a pretty full on period. But

1:35:56

yeah, we wanted to start right at the beginning

1:35:58

with you personally, maybe because you know, obviously. actually,

1:36:00

Keen Games and yourself, most people

1:36:02

will not be familiar with you or your studio. So

1:36:04

we kind of just wanted to hear like, who

1:36:07

are you and how did it happen? You came to

1:36:09

work at Keen Games and all that sort of stuff.

1:36:11

So yeah, tell us about yourself. Yeah,

1:36:15

I'm Anthony. Well, I'm also the co-founder

1:36:17

of Keen Games. So that's how I

1:36:19

came to the company. I'm

1:36:22

personally making games since I would

1:36:25

say the early 90s as a

1:36:27

job, which was a bit of

1:36:29

beauty back then, coming from Germany.

1:36:33

And there's not much of a games development

1:36:35

industry in Germany. At least in that period

1:36:37

of time, it was specified as a group

1:36:39

for the US because of that. So

1:36:43

yeah, we started our own studio.

1:36:45

Basically, Keen Games, the second one we

1:36:47

had before we had neon studios, which

1:36:49

we sold to a publisher. Things

1:36:53

went wrong, unfortunately. So we had to start again.

1:36:56

But here we are. So we

1:36:58

mainly focused on console games. We

1:37:00

started Keen and worked on a

1:37:03

lot of work for

1:37:05

higher projects. So we did games based

1:37:07

on existing IPs. So that's

1:37:09

also a reason why we as a developer

1:37:12

got like, not the main thing

1:37:14

to feature in those kind of projects. So

1:37:17

we worked with Ubisoft in the economy on various

1:37:19

kinds of projects and lots of different genres as

1:37:21

well. But

1:37:23

in the last game we did

1:37:25

before, I tried it. It's called

1:37:27

Podlites. And

1:37:29

then it was already in a similar space.

1:37:32

It was also having sandbox

1:37:34

elements and things like this.

1:37:36

So something like a

1:37:39

combination of Minecraft and Zelda-ish elements,

1:37:42

but mainly in the pits. So

1:37:46

now I'm responsible for

1:37:49

creative direction for this game, which

1:37:52

basically we tried to take

1:37:55

the learning we had from Podlites and

1:37:57

tried to make a better game.

1:38:01

So far it looked like we found

1:38:04

an audience for that, which is great. So

1:38:08

yeah, I'm mainly responsible for the design side

1:38:10

of things, but there's obviously a full team

1:38:13

of other people involved in the design of

1:38:15

the project and all

1:38:17

the different areas of development. So

1:38:19

I'm doing this for quite a

1:38:21

while, but fortunately we went back

1:38:24

to creating original IP nodes. I

1:38:27

was in short, for example. Yeah,

1:38:29

right. Speaking of creative IP with

1:38:31

Enshrouded, what was the first kernel

1:38:34

of an idea? Like how did it all start? Was it

1:38:36

from the start you guys were like, let's just make a

1:38:39

massive game with all this stuff? Or was there one thing

1:38:41

you wanted to do really well? What was it? Yeah,

1:38:44

to be honest, the idea for

1:38:46