Game Scoop! 824: Silksong Kept You Waiting, Huh?

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23:02Justin Davis:Includes up to 20 gigs hotspot. Capable device required. Availability, speed, and coverage varies. See MintMobile.com. Tomorrow morning is knocking. Stock your fridge now. How about a creamy mocha frappuccino drink? Or a sweet vanilla? Smooth caramel, maybe. Or a white chocolate mocha. Whichever you choose, delicious coffee awaits. Find Starbucks frappuccino drinks wherever you buy your groceries. I have been playing everybody's golf hotshots, though. which I'm, you know, we're big fans of that series and arcade golf games in general here on the show. Not my Hot Shots. The last one, the last Everybody's Golf was 2017.

23:37Justin Davis:So it's been eight years. It's been a minute. Eight years. Yeah, I know. It's crazy. So my first impressions are I'm a little disappointed. It's the gameplay is solid. I can report that. It's the solid Hot Shots Golf gameplay. And they've de-emphasized the sort of online play that Everybody's Golf was all about. So it just feels like classic me just playing arcade Hot Shots Golf by myself. But the whole package just feels cheap. It just feels like a budget title. It is a budget title. It's 40 bucks. I just think it's kind of ugly and it lacks personality. There's like animals that will walk across the courses like a squirrel or a rabbit.

24:13Justin Davis:They're so low poly. They look like they could be from the original Hot Shots Golf. This is such a bummer. Like the same thing happened to Harvest Moon, right? Where Marvelous obviously went and continued the spirit of Harvest Moon under a different name in the West. And so then Natsume brings in a new developer. The same thing happens here, right? Like the original games were great because it was the Mario Golf developer. It was Camelot, right? Really creative team. And I never thought I would be into a golf game. And they brought me in with this series. I'm like, this is just super fun. It's a bummer.

24:50This is what happens when you switch developers. And like, you know, I'm curious if we'll ever get a Metal Gear game again. Metal Gear? Metal Gear? So you're saying... Sam, you're getting old, man.

25:00Peer Schneider:Is it one of those things where, like, is it like pizza, or even if it's, like, not that good, it's still pretty good?

25:05Justin Davis:It's, you know, like I said, the gameplay is solid, and they have some fun, like, wacky golf modes. Like, there's one where, basically, there are hidden... Wacky golf? There are hidden landmines, and if your ball just lands on one, there's an explosion, and then it sends your ball falling somewhere. Okay. There's a mode where you can play, and you get these tickets that will alter the game. So like it'll turn the entire course into concrete. So your ball will just like keep bouncing and bouncing. It's like that stuff's fun. That's good. Yeah, that stuff. And I think it's interesting. My six-year-old is really into it.

25:34Peer Schneider:Yeah.

25:35Justin Davis:He likes playing it. Justin, was this game entirely made by humans?

25:39Peer Schneider:This game does have, so on Steam, you're required to have a little disclosure if your game has use of generative AI in it. And yeah, there was generative AI used on, I think some of the grass and tree textures in this game. So they caught some negative flack for that in their Steam description.

25:55Justin Davis:Hold up. Taya, who are we missing? There's a black box on the screen. I think this is the overlay AI got sent in when Justin talked about AI. They dropped it. Oh, there we are. We're all back. Okay, we're back. So it did the grass have extra fingers? Is that how people figured this out? Yeah, the grass has extra fingers. It shouldn't have any fingers. Extra fingers, huh? So what you're saying is the grass has extra fingers, huh? So Kingo plays a lot of games. He has no problem with 3D games. and controlling the camera and stuff, but it took him a while to wrap his head around the three-button press.

26:25Justin Davis:Press the button. Just to hit the ball. Press it again. Yeah, he did it again. Nope. Oh, yeah. He started going, and then it... Are you saying that, Justin, that that's like a... It's just funny that that's become just like how you play golf in video games?

26:36Peer Schneider:I said it on the show, and I say it with love as someone that loves Mario Golf and loves Hot Shots Golf is like, I think it's time for golf games to evolve beyond the tap, tap, tap, tap. No, it's so funny. It's like somebody at one point decided the mechanic for a lot of sports games, right? Like if you remember back in the days, the track and field Konami games where you're hitting buttons as fast as possible. That's your little feet going, right? And like in this one, they decided a swing is you starting and then waiting for the character to swing and then hitting it again. Do you swing play?

27:06Peer Schneider:And I like that gameplay, but it's like it doesn't – it's a little rhythm, a little timing minigame that you'll play a thousand times. But it is not closer to golf than pulling the stick back and letting go at the right point, right? So it's pretty funny. It's definitely like it's funny going back to like PS2 era games before certain control schemes have been standardized of like now if I'm playing an FPS, like click in the stick and I'm going to sprint. Like stuff just gets standardized. Like the grenade is always on R2, maybe L2. It's like back then it's like what grenades on square? Like none of this makes any sense.

27:38I know. In Donkey Kong they moved the jump button and everybody was upset, you know? yep yep yeah i had to change that off the bat i mean i always compare it to when we all played an assassin's creed game and then red dead 2 came out and we all punched our horses in the face because the ride the horse button was swing swing your fist yeah for me go into a town punch

27:55Peer Schneider:everybody's horse it was uh for me that was which are banned from that town witcher 3 and metal gear solid 5 had the punch button switch and i kept punching my horse and i think metal gear

28:05Justin Davis:yeah always with the horses it's wild that mario odyssey uh breath of the wild tears of the kingdom and Donkey Kong Bonanza all have different buttons for jump. I know, they went the whole clock. It's all logic, though. It's so great. They've got a reason for it. Oh, yeah. I got used to it on Bonanza. I switched back to the default setup for Donkey Kong Bonanza because I'm like, okay, I get it now. Because in the beginning, all I wanted to do was jump and punch something in the air, and that's easier when you have those buttons on top of each other. And then later on, I'm like, oh, I get it. You need to be able to quickly dig navigate with these buttons.

28:38That's a term. Look it up. It's called dig navigate. Dig navigate.

28:44Justin Davis:Well, speaking of Nintendo and Donkey Kong Bonanza, I like the story this week. The headline is, Nintendo has no real need for new franchises, veteran says, and can just pick whatever existing series fits new gameplay. So speaking of Bloomberg, programmer Ken Watanabe, probably not that Ken Watanabe, said Nintendo doesn't really fuss over which of its big franchises a fun new gameplay mechanic might end up in. And with so many existing series to choose from, there's little need to come up with more. So quote, quote, new franchises haven't come out simply because there's no real need to make them, Watanabe said.

29:14Justin Davis:When Nintendo wants to do something new, it's basically about the gameplay mechanics first, about creating a new way to play.

29:19Peer Schneider:That's so funny. That means there's obviously some cursed Nintendo prototype will never see of all the Mario characters' arms stretching way out. Yes, yes. And at some point they said, no, no, no. No, no, no. I was actually thinking about that. Like, you know, I think you guys talked about Box Boy and Box, Box, Box Boy. Yeah. Like the Formula One simulators, Box, Box. and I always felt like that was one franchise where instead of doing black and white graphics with squares they could have used Kirby or Mario or someone and it would now be a successful franchise that people would remember and talk about by the way nobody remembers Pushmo you're wrong everybody likes Pushmo Pushmo is good I've never played go down the street and talk to five kids five kids will say I don't know what the hell Pushmo is or Stretchmo or like Squishmo not gonna go talk to able to extend that to every child on earth hey kid you ever heard of push mo come here you know what a stretch mo is you can't say that on second thought okay i've seen this nintendo philosophy in action because they've made four three versions of lemmings now one with kirby one with mark little mario's and then pikmin yeah what's the one with kirby they made a kirby one that was like 100 Kirby's on screen for 3DS.

30:36Peer Schneider:Is that Robobot? Robobot? I want to play Lemmings Kirby. Kerbings? I do think, I mean, that's fine. So if they just pull a franchise off the shelf and like match the gameplay to it, that's fine. But then please give us F-Zero. I know. Give it back to us. Give me Advance Wars. No, I think everybody would be mad. Remember when they turned Metroid into like a shooter, a first-person multiplayer shooter? The baby. Don't do it. That was other. You're thinking of Federation Force. that was yeah that was they turned it into ninja guy i do they gave a nintendo gave i can't remember if it was an a lot of asks or gdc talk a long time ago where they were responding to like some criticism of like all you do is make mario and zeldo over and over again and then they pushed back on that and said you know because they because they have these beloved franchises that are evergreen that actually gives them more freedom not less to innovate from like a gameplay standpoint so like and i do i do actually give them some credit for that like you think about All the way back to Super Mario 64, that gameplay, that's a puzzle exploration game.

31:36Peer Schneider:It's completely different than any other platform. With a hub and puzzle rooms. Diddy Kong Racing, by the way, is that game for racing games. That's why Rare was inspired by that. There's dozens and dozens of examples of innovation. You guys talked about when you went through the most popular game franchises, you talked about Kirby, and Kirby is so many games. Like Canvas Curse is unlike any other Kirby game. And like Nintendo did that with Yoshi at one point. And sometimes it's the gameplay design follows the console that it's on, right? And so for the longest time, Zelda games became point and click games, right?

32:13Like on your touchscreen devices, it's like go here, Link, and then hit this, right? It was the same formula, completely different controls. I'm glad we're back to button controls. but I kind of dig that they just sort of changed their franchises.

32:28Justin Davis:Yeah, so if we apply this philosophy to recent Nintendo games, the Mario Odyssey team has an idea for a 3D platformer where the entire levels are destructible, and there's this dig mechanic, and then they say, well, that doesn't really make a lot of sense for Mario, but it makes a lot of sense for Donkey Kong. Yeah, but they flipped that Wario coin, and we got the wrong side. It could have been a Wario game. It was a Wario game, yes. Yeah, you're right. It was also hard to die in it, except for the last bosses. And like both games have lots of butt jokes in them in any way. So Wario would have been even better.

32:59Like there's a lot of butts in Donkey Kong. Could have been Garnley. Speaking of Hard to Dark,

33:04Peer Schneider:I dug more to the final boss than the rest of the game combined. Easily. Yeah. Donkey Kong.

33:09Justin Davis:Yep. I also wonder why when Donkey Kong's in any of his bonanza modes, you can see his butt. But not when he's not, even if he's not wearing any clothes as Donkey Kong, his butt is covered with fur. but his butt is exposed in all of his bonanza it's weird that you noticed that I never noticed it is funny I think there's like some kind of do Japanese monkeys have exposed butts yes that's right and they go in the hot springs and they get really red butts oh that's right that's when they have that in a lot of like pop cultural things you see the red butt monkeys and Nintendo always liked monkey butts if you go to remember like Twilight Princess the monkey always hits his own butt when he's taunting you.

33:56Yeah. No there's definitely like an animal butt thing with Nintendo. Well that's a culture that grew up adjacent to this one type of goofy monkey. You just see it in so much stuff and like I don't think we have a lot of context for that in America. Like the monkeys and apes that we refer to are just kind of different.

34:11Peer Schneider:I also think maybe so Donkey Kong is always wearing pants but in its bonanza form maybe he's not. Maybe that's what's going on here. Well because like the Hulk He can be naked without pants.

34:22Justin Davis:Just like a McDonald's. Pants are optional. So I don't know why the bonanza burns all the fur off his butt. I'm still so creeped by the freaking built-in bananas in their hair and stuff.

34:33Peer Schneider:And why are they all DJs? It's a strange game. It's a really big...

34:38Justin Davis:And the zebras are all surf bros.

34:41Peer Schneider:They just always say bros.

34:43Justin Davis:It's so good. Another detail. I don't think we ever discussed about this game. I think it's funny. Pauline does not know his name is Donkey Kong. Oh, DK. She calls him DK because that's on his tie. She has no idea his name is Donkey Kong. Because he can't talk. Maybe his name isn't Donkey Kong. I mean, now that we have some distance from it, we don't have any more explanation for how Cranky Kong is also Donkey Kong from 1981's Donkey Kong. But Pauline is younger in this game. I think Nintendo are very careful with their timelines and their story crafting. As a big Zelda fan, I can tell you that.

35:21Peer Schneider:So first of all, do not bother getting into Donkey Kong lore because that way madness lies. Don't do it. But I will say that they did a clever thing. So this seems to be a prequel to Mario Odyssey and then Pauline seems to grow up and be mayor. But they had to do, it's not a retcon. They were clever because Pauline has a line in Mario Odyssey where she talks about how she was kidnapped by a monkey when she was a kid. And when Mario Odyssey came out, That seemed to be a reference to the original Donkey Kong.

35:49Justin Davis:Yeah.

35:50Peer Schneider:But now they made the villain of Bonanza a monkey so that that line still kind of works with her and DK being allies instead of him kidnapping her. But there is the scene in Super Mario Odyssey in which she is adult Pauline and singing and she's at the top of the tower and that's referencing Donkey Kong. Right. Right. Yeah. But that's what's weird is that, again, we can talk about this now, skip ahead 30 seconds, but you do go to New Donk City in this. And so you do have that established part of the connection to Odysseys. Yeah. It's completely insane. It's like the lore is so funny. The lore is just broken.

36:32I don't think they care. It's like Alien Earth now, right? I think there are creators who just sort of start over and go like, eh, don't worry about it.

36:41Peer Schneider:But like the New Donk City in DK, in Bonanza, has like, you know, advertisements for like, you know, lanky Kongs, whatever, like auto shop. I'm like, none of this makes sense. Like, how does this all fit together? They're all legends. They don't. Yeah. Like, this one is the one your grandma told you. Was so good.

37:01Justin Davis:Yeah. I was a little, I didn't really know how I felt about Alien Earth because I thought it was like interesting sci-fi, but just didn't, it's not much of an alien show. it seemed however episode five is really good episode five is alien like the way he remembers like in space but what i like about it is that they've it's an alien movie after they've established characters for five episodes yeah so you have a lot more like understanding of why people are acting the way they're acting and it's really interesting and it kind of explains the backstory of a character who is like really inexplicably evil yeah yeah you know it's just it's so cool also love i mean look this is supposed to be a prequel right like about like a year from now where we are in the story you know uh ripley and the gang are setting off to on their mining vessel right like it's it's before that uh that that event in the timeline they want to get one of those wimp aliens that always loses but but i mean the thing we don't know about the show is like Obviously, there is the xenomorph on Earth now, but are they going to flash she thingy, everybody, like in Men in Black, where nobody actually knows this except for the people running the corporations?

38:11Or is it going to be like, is everybody going to know the Aelion? Does everybody know this little octopus exists? I hadn't heard the term Aelion. That's pretty good. Oh, it's so cool. No, and I do like the story about the artificial humans because that was something, obviously, with the original Alien, with Bishop, with Prometheus. You've got artificial humans in all of them. This one introduces a cyborg who is a human with, you know, fancy arm. And then it has the artificial human. But from like 70 years ago. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Like they were like earlier models of, I mean, they're not models because they started to speed.

38:43They're not the milk filled ones. Are they still filled with milk? That's what I was saying. They're not the milk filled models yet. No, but those exist concurrently. It's just a really interesting like set of sci-fi things. And I just like the name the boy genius too. Well, yeah. Yeah. Boy Cavalier. Yeah. Yeah.

39:00Justin Davis:I really like Timothy Elephant in this and I think he's so annoyed by all the children it's just it's a brilliant casting because he's known for playing like folksy sheriffs you know down to earth people but now he's playing like a literal robot who just what motivation do any of the androids in any of the alien movies ever have to just do stuff for their stupid human bosses I don't understand that I hope they explain that they can't help it they got that little that little bolt built in like C-3PO they can't help it but I I do like, so I think some people have issues with this story because it isn't clear cut alien, like people trapped in a spaceship.

39:35It's not really about a xenomorph. And it's what they did, though. They created this really cool monster story. It's more like a video game where like in the beginning they show you five monsters. And then like there's like this plant keeps hanging in the background. You know the plant is going to do something really nasty, but they're not showing you. It's like the end of the Simpsons episode with the little guy that hasn't fought yet. He's like, I want to see what the little guy is going to do. Let's check off this plant. Yeah. and then the next episode is called the fly you're like oh i forgot about the fly there's also the fly yeah that's great yeah well yeah and like don't you want to see what that mission was like where these people went to five planets and got the most dangerous animal this is also my thing

40:10Justin Davis:in the original alien i i always thought no human had ever encountered an alien species until then we thought yeah it wasn't and i think internet analysis was pretending like they didn't no way anything yeah yeah but it wasn't actually said i'm just saying like the the discovery of alien life would change everything yeah it would change everything but the people on the show who have all these aliens they don't really seem too fussed about it they're all just like oh we have these we just found a bunch of aliens okay whoa that's an alien we just yeah we just found a bunch of aliens everything everything is now different for the human species but uh but remember like Apple may have found a UFO many, many years ago, and there was an iPhone, and we will just never know, right?

40:53Like, the point here is the government is now privately owned. It's five different corporations, and they all know stuff that they're not going to tell everybody. They're not going to tell even the androids this stuff, right? And so the people on the mining vessel may not have known that aliens exist until they find the space jockey skeleton elephant man in that seat, you know? Yeah, I just, whatever. It's fine. I love it. There are some plot holes. I like the Eileen. It's still fun.

41:21Justin Davis:I like the Eileen a lot, but Joe, our producer, pointed out. It's a very human-like eyeball. It's on a planet where a lot of creatures have human-like eyeballs. No, it can split and rearrange. It's just an ocular thing that can adapt to any type of mammalian eye. It comes from a planet of cyclopsies. That's why now they actually have to hunt in pairs. I think we need for this Christmas, instead of those logs burning videos, we just need sheep staring videos. That was so cool when it got up on its hind legs. Ten hours of sheep stares. Yeah, that was a good moment. Ten hours sheep stares. And then it goes apologetically like, oh, four legs.

42:01Yeah, that's so good when it stands up for a little bit. It's like, oh.

42:09All right.

42:10Justin Davis:Good stuff. Let's check in with the listeners. Hey, listeners. Hey, listeners. Listeners, remember you can always reach us at the email address gamescoop at igin.com just like Oh no. Slick, Damon. The build up, the wind up. Big Tony style. Big Tony style. I see. Big Tony style writes in to say, I'm excited to jump into Gears Reloaded. The original was the very first game I played on a flat screen, HDTV at my friend's house during college. At the time, my mind was blown at the leap in graphical fidelity and what HD gaming could be. It's probably the last time I was surprised at how good a game can look and feel.

42:44Justin Davis:It's a feeling I usually got with the release of every new console generation dating back to my first console, the Sega Master System. While games seemingly do just about everything I could ever want, when was the last time the Goose Camp counselors were truly surprised at something a game could do or show you? Great question. That's a really good one. My mind immediately goes to the pivotal moments in my gaming career as a player as well as a journalist was always like, you know, Mario 64, where you finally got to explore in 3D. It was like, oh my God, what if games are actually like that, but look realistic and here we are.

43:19I will say there were a couple of moments, like one was VR. The first time trying out a VR demo, I think it was like Valkyrie. And then there was that game from Team Soho. Remember that one where you're sitting in a chair and this dude walks around you. And like, for the first time you feel this actual presence of a digital character in front of you. And he's smoking and your mind almost fills in the gaps, right? where you go like, do I smell smoke? No, I don't smell smoke. Those were really cool moments. More recently, I will say The Last of Us 2, because that game animates things where other games cut to black.

43:54A lot of games, you sit down at a campfire, then they go to black, and then it's the next morning or something. This game will animate everything. I think the thing they picked apart was always a kiss sequence where the two character models connect and it looks realistic. Nothing's flickering and stuff, But like, I just had, this game just sort of blew my mind with the quality of the animation and the lengths they went to to make all the things work. Yeah, I remember like the upgrading your weapons always looked really good. Yeah, it's just everything. It seems like most game developers will just not have the time to do this, right?

44:33Like they really got to spend time with this game, but it's obviously tremendously talented animators. and it's just like nothing clips you know it's so good yeah that's what what's the saying of like

44:43Peer Schneider:you know what gamers are impressed by is like you know the vista and the mountain and the forest and what game developers are impressed by they're like i can't believe that they just took that weapon and like put it on their back and like attach it to themselves it's not clipping through their hair famously the the electrical lines and last of us too were like that yeah or even just like developers were like how did they do this they can carry around electrical line it stretches and bends around everything and then you plug it in like they could people can believe that the

45:09Justin Davis:snow being knocked off the top of that bus yeah like this game still looks really really good and then i'd say tears of the kingdom is i think for everyone there might be a different moment where you go that's possible like i glued like lots of trees together and made this really long pole to create across the gap i'm like for a moment it took me out of the game because i'm like yeah programming that seems impossible like wouldn't you at one point as a programmer say only four of those please and i have like 20 or something right like the things you can do that seem impossible um in in that game that's what i saw i mean i saw people making giant like

45:46Peer Schneider:orbital launch vessels that are like lasering down like linels and like meanwhile i'm over here like gluing a sword to my sword and that's the best thing i can manage kojima is always good at that sort of stuff too where you try something and you go like no way did they think of it and they're like oh my god they thought of it and they're melting ice cubes in metal gear 2 melting ice was mind-blowing so you're saying old ones yeah so what you're saying is um a few old ones and one new one and one of my new ones is actually vista mountain related like justin's saying because i think the weather uh systems in assassin's creed uh from this year were unbelievable and there were times where I was there while the clouds rolled in on mountains below me like on top of a mountain and the sun is setting and everything's ray tracing and looking incredible and it's just never been a game that looks like that and I'm hoping there's more because I've never seen anything like that it's so cool when it's a game system that is so flexible that it can create a moment of art or beauty versus somebody like backstage something and everything is in the right place because the developer placed it there like the games that truly impress are the ones where you think you're having a unique moment and then you you glimpse something right like you you see something that you didn't think was possible yeah so then my older ones i have two gamecube uh just i think that was the graphical realism generation that was a big leap then and um one was the the and i know perry you'll remember this well but one was seeing your face reflected in metroid prime oh totally awesome that was cool and i've said this so many times i know this is boring to hear it again but metroid prime was the last time that nintendo made like a cutting edge graphical game that everybody's like does this look better than half-life 2 which came out the same you know like it was like a discussion like what's the best looking game on the planet and nintendo made it so that was cool um and then right after that i remember resi will 4 being this kind of moment where it just felt so next gen and everything but i just remember this dumb moment where i was looking at like i was like i had some friends over and we look at the candle in it and it was just like this candle flame looked like unbelievably well thought out and realistic and casting light and we're like what is happening here like who who spent this time i'm i'm glad you brought up resident evil because despite the older games being being sort of like feeling very mechanical and limited there were moments in that series with remake where an enemy could walk through a door and at a time we had only played games where enemies existed in one room and when you exit you're safe and in this game this game broke that wall and they don't just walk through the door like swings open and they're like swish and then resident evil 4 they actually come after you and thank you for the footage over um that's tayo oh tayo sorry uh where they actually follow you up through a window out

48:44Justin Davis:on the roof and I'm like you're not allowed to do that that's illegal yeah yep yep Justin how about

48:50Peer Schneider:you yeah I mean I don't know that this is the last time but in terms of like uh interacting with a game like the thing that I'm experiencing in the video game felt really new and different and unique was factorial was game pass on the 3ds yeah okay not game pass street pass street pass street pass like you know I would get street passes on the bus on my way into IGN and then And you would get them and they would give you puzzle pieces or give you things in the different StreetPass games. And that just felt very cool and social and unique and kind of special. And I don't know. Game Pass was just super neat.

49:26Peer Schneider:I bought all the Game Pass games and they kept coming out with more. And the way that they were designed of each StreetPass game would give you a different bonus or a different thing for streetpassing people around the world. And that was really addictive and cool. The human element of that is so fascinating because you'd walk around and you get like, you know, noise from Brazil. You're like, what? There was a Brazilian here? Well, and like there was this, I mean, it's a little bit kind of creepy slightly, except I'm an adult. So like it was fine. But like, you know, you would see their me's and like, they'd be like, oh, hello.

49:58Peer Schneider:Like, you know, nice to visit you. And then I'm thinking back to the people that I saw on this, like on the street. I'm like, who did I pass that? Like we street passed each other. That was really cool. no one's gonna remember this but me there is a game on the original DS I don't know if you're gonna remember it too called Treasure World I think and it was so far ahead of its time where you could I don't know how it was doing that because that game didn't have GPS in it but you could take your DS your original DS out into the real world and I think what it was doing was picking up wifi signals and based off the number of Wi-Fi signals that it picked up, it would try to do like, it would know where you went and where you visited.

50:44Peer Schneider:So it was doing like a pseudo street pass and pseudo 3DS system way, way ahead of its time. And you would go out into the real world and it would pick up Wi-Fi signals out in the real world. And then you would earn little treasures and items. And so that also, that game always captured my imagination. It wasn't very good, but it was such an interesting idea. Yeah. Very cool. I don't remember that at all. Yeah. Nobody does but me. Scribblenauts blew people's minds on the DS. Remember that? It really did.

51:16Justin Davis:Yeah. We couldn't believe it because it just knew every word. How does it know every word? It's so many. I just remembered things like Manticore and Cyclops and some people just come up with fantasy things and it would just pop one in. Yep. That was really cool. I was hired at IGN in 2006 in April. and so one of the first things I did was go to E3 and I always think about two games that I saw closed door, behind closed door demos for at E3 2006 it was Bioshock and Mass Effect and I just remember sitting in there and like seeing the water running down the walls and Bioshock looking absolutely realistic oh that's so cool, not affecting the gameplay but just really you know sort of setting the mood and then in Mass Effect having these close ups of these alien faces and their eyes moving realistically and just you know you can see like pores and sweat on their skin I was just like, part of it was like, I'm new to IGN.

52:00Justin Davis:I can't believe it. I have my dream job. I'm sitting behind closed doors, demos at E3, seeing these amazing looking games. How is this my life?

52:08Peer Schneider:Yeah. I know, but those games also, they were clearly not aping Hollywood movies, right? They impressed you by showing you something very, very different. Like, I mean, the world of Bioshock, it is. Well, there was a lot of lens flare in Mass Effect, to be fair. We also, I mean, Mass Effect back then, that early, like this giant 80-hour RPG and all of it's voiced and the voice acting's all like pretty good even that was like a pretty big deal like voice acting was usually reserved for like smaller games where like there's gonna be 10 cut scenes in the game and that's all the voice and invent it mass effect invented a sound effect that was then used in every hollywood trailer for years namely which is like that was the reapers no i think it was it was first mass effect it was the reapers and then it happened in inception in every trailer since.

52:53Yeah, true. In Bioshock, there was also kind of a promise of you can approach the situation these different ways in that demo. Where it was like, well, the little sister is just kind of there. And then the big daddy's like protecting her. And, you know, you can either avoid it or you can, and then they're just like, and then you go right in. The guy's like hand gets chopped off or something. And it's like, the game didn't really feel that way in the end, but that demo was incredible.

53:19Peer Schneider:The sandboxy opportunity for player expression of like set traps for the big daddy or go in guns blazing and stuff like that was a big deal back then. And before that. They should make Bioshock games still. Or Mass Effect games. Well, there'll be a TV show. Nobody makes video games anymore. Which one's getting a TV show? Bioshock. Oh, no. No, I think it'll be good.

53:40Justin Davis:I think it's a good team. Okay. Okay, okay. Starting to run. Short on time. This is Jesse, who we heard from last episode, who gave us a list of the most famous games from Canada. Oh, I see. And he included Factorio on that list. Oh, no. What happened? That's not a Canadian game. I think it's Polish? Check. Check. Okay. Well, Jesse writes back, said, I just listened to the latest show. I'm sorry to say that I foolishly put my faith in chat GPT. That's where I got the info that Factorio was a Canadian-developed game. The chat even links the statement to Wikipedia, which clearly states the game was developed and published by Czech studio Wubei Software.

54:20I love the hallucination of the source. That's great.

54:24Justin Davis:Thanks for consistently creating the only video game podcast. I consistently listen. Guys, I'm starting to think we can't just take everything AI says. Oh, weird.

54:32Peer Schneider:What? That's so strange.

54:36Justin Davis:Okay. Man, I have so many extracurricular activities I wanted to get through because I've done so much in the past week, but we are running short on time. I saw Matrix at Cosm LA. I was very jealous to see your pictures. Which is like our sphere. It's this giant curved screen. And it's not just a giant matrix. It actually has the usual aspect ratio, but they've created all this new content that sort of like extends beyond the screen. And it's every single moment of the movie. And it's not cheesy. It's all super well done. It was amazing. It's so cool. If you're in LA, I highly recommend that. I also saw Oasis.

55:11Justin Davis:That's different. At the Rose Bowl on their live 25 tour. And they were amazing. There were some other IGN people there.

55:18Peer Schneider:Also, Zach Ryan was there, I think.

55:19Justin Davis:Well, I mean, yeah. Yeah, I had some friends there. Did you? Even Paul McCartney was there. Yeah, Paul McCartney was there. And Leonardo DiCaprio and stuff. Leonardo DiCaprio was there. Salma Hayek was there. There's also a premier movie. Did they recognize you? Yeah, yeah, I did. Oh, D-Man. D-Man. Yeah, D-Man. Yeah. and I watched K-pop demon hunters. Oh, well, and now that's, and you love it. Those, that soundtrack is all that my family listens to now. Okay. We're just a K-pop demon.

55:45Peer Schneider:I'm convinced that anybody that's kind of looking down their nose at that hasn't actually watched it. Like forget, forget sort of it being a tween sensation. Yeah. Like it's just a good movie.

55:54Justin Davis:Yeah. It is a good movie. I don't think for me, it's not on the level of like the spider verse movies, but it's totally,

55:58Peer Schneider:it's got that vibe of like, it punches above its weight with like really interesting characters. And just, I like it a lot. Yeah.

56:05Justin Davis:I liked it. Our kids are obsessed with it. Also, my son, you know, my two big things in life are basically video games and music. My son loves video games, but has never expressed much interest in music. But he sure loves the soundtrack to this, and he sings along with it. So, like, anything that gets my son interested in music, okay in my book. That's awesome. Right now, get up to 15 % off select storage solutions. Put heavy-duty HDX totes to good use, protecting what's important to you. The solid, impact-resistant design prevents cracking. and the clear base and sides make items easy to find even when the totes are stacked.

56:38Justin Davis:Find select shelving and tote storage up to 15 % off at the Home Depot to organize every room in your home from your garage to your attic. Visit homedepot.com, how doers get more done. This episode is supported by FX's The Shards, a seductive drama from executive producer Ryan Murphy. Set in 1980s Los Angeles, the series follows a group of glamorous, deeply entangled high school seniors drawn into a life of wealth, beauty, parties, and excess. At its center is Brett, whose reality begins to unravel when the arrival of a new student coincides with a series of mysterious murders. FX's The Shards premieres August 5th on FX and Hulu.

57:22Hear that? That's now Crispy and McCrispy Strips meeting creamy Caesar sauce. Sounds extra crispy. Caesar sauce at McDonald's for a limited time.

57:35Justin Davis:Ba-da-ba-ba-ba.

57:43Justin Davis:Okay, and that brings us to Video Game 20 Questions. Our suggestion this week comes from Michael in San Bruno, California. Michael says, I've been listening to the podcast since 2006. but not since episode one. So safe to say I'm a bit of a game scoop boomer. Same, Michael. If I ever could revive my old iPod video from the time, there's probably a scoop MP3 file sitting on there somewhere. Wow. I was always thinking about sending in Elder Scrolls 4 Oblivion as a 20 question submission, but the remake this year killed that ever being a potentially tricky one. So he sent in another one and he has another anecdote, but his anecdote would be a big hint.

58:18Justin Davis:So I'm going to save the anecdote in case you guys are in trouble. Okay. All right. So with that, let the questioning begin. Oh, I remember loading GameScoop before I worked at IGN on my iPod video. Oh, nice. Was this game made in Australia? Just kidding. No, no. Was this game made in Europe, America, or Australia? No. Okay.

58:42Peer Schneider:Was this game made in the 70s, 80s, or 90s? No. It's a Japanese game made in the 2000s. Probably. Maybe Chinese. Or Chinese. Or Korean. Or Korean. Yeah. No, because he's old school. Yeah. China didn't exist back then. Well. Chad, you told me. Did this game come out at the start of its existence on a laser-based disc medium?

59:08Justin Davis:Yes. Wait, what? At the beginning of the start? Yeah, because the things get ported all the time, so you have to do all these qualifications now. Okay. Basically, was it originally released on a disc? Yes. Yeah, because if you say anything else, it's like, well, it came to Switch on a card. But it wasn't in the 90s, so it can't be PlayStation 1 and Saturn.

59:31Peer Schneider:Not a PS1 or Saturn game. Okay. It could be a PlayStation 1 game. It didn't come out in the 90s. I guess it could be late PS1. Can I do a genre question just because of the country that it's made in? Yeah, but you have to ask three genres. Is it a role-playing game? Of a sort. of a sort is it played in the first person no that's fine it's Japan it can't be well but there was Kingsfield oh there's one game thank you thank you Justin is it a first person but we did eliminate Kingsfield well and I was thinking RPG of a short a sort I was thinking about Souls-like and then that made me think of Kingsfield fair enough

1:00:16okay

1:00:16Justin Davis:you also know it's not a modern Resident Evil, right? Is this game have multiplayer as a focus? No. It's not an MMO RPG.

1:00:30Did we ask, was this a platform exclusive when it launched?

1:00:35Peer Schneider:Yes. That's a good question. Was it exclusive to, oh, I don't know what console to ask, the PS4?

1:00:43Justin Davis:No.

1:00:45Peer Schneider:Was it a Sony exclusive? No. Like not a PlayStation exclusive. Okay. I'm glad you did that, Sam, before we did the PS3 and PS4. Let's go start going through all the PSs. Well, it can't be an Xbox game because none of them were made in Japan except for like Blue Dragon or something. So probably. Was it a Nintendo exclusive? Yeah, that leaves us with what may be a GameCube or Wii or Wii U exclusive. That makes it really easy.

1:01:06Justin Davis:He said GameCube or Wii or Wii U. Was it a Nintendo exclusive? At launch, this was a Nintendo exclusive. That's 10.

1:01:12Peer Schneider:This makes such an easy thing. Yeah, that does make it easier. Was it developed or published by Nintendo? No. Xena because then it would never cease to be a Nintendo exclusive except for one Lego game yeah you're right Fire Emblem is developed by Nintendo yes we should get the console was it exclusive to the GameCube no so Japanese made Wii or Wii U exclusive not made by Nintendo it's an RPG of a sort maybe it is Xenoblade Chronicles why can't it be switch or switch 2 well because because it came out on a disc uh optical but it's but it's still a nintendo exclusive it's still yeah so xenoblade chronicles for they bought monolith and we yeah yeah okay yeah you can't bring that one to any that's also not an rpg of a sort that's just an rpg you said nintendo published right no not nintendo not Nintendo Publish.

1:02:12Peer Schneider:So Wii or Wii U exclusive, made in Japan, but not Nintendo made. Well, then you get into like the sort of think of Capcoms, Okamis, and Monster Hunters and stuff like that, right? Yep. Could be a Mon Hun. Yeah. And Monster Hunter is sort of an RPG. Yeah. Okami is really an action adventure, though. That was on PS2 first. Which one? it was on was it on ps2 first and then we yes yeah okay yeah yeah you're right and then there was the box art it's come up twice that's right twice in a row now it wasn't me who put that um okay man you're breaking our brains again so let's think there's it was a rough time for uh nintendo owners to be playing rpg like games what was the one what was it what if it's like little king's story or something like that it could be a little king's story it what was the last that is so obscure though the last story was that a the the final fantasy creator what mistwalker made like a big triple a rpg was this wasn't that blue i think the square enix question is a good thing oh there was also the crystal chronicles type stuff final fantasy crystal chronicles crystal chronicles was gamecube originally but then there was a sequel and Dragon Quest so is this a Square Enix game?

1:03:36no what the heck? okay that cuts out a lot how many questions are we done? you asked 13 questions we're doing alright we got another 13 then so what else do we got? we got like Natsume and I don't know I would say you've got your Atlas? to me it sounds like Capcom Atlas Namco like in that camp is this a Capcom?

1:04:01Peer Schneider:Capcom. Is it a Capcom, Atlus, or Namco game? No. Oh my god, no. Okay. This is awesome. That's good. That's better than getting the yes, because then you have to ask for one question. So there's Sega. You know, Sega became third party in that era. Monolith?

1:04:19Peer Schneider:Monolith is owned by Nintendo. That would be published by them. Wii. I'm assuming it's a Wii game, because no games came out on the Wii U. Maybe it's Sega. What would it be for Sega? it'd be cool if it was GameCube Sega did Super Monkey Ball and that came to other platforms later yeah it could be a Fantasy Star but it's not an RPG, Fantasy Star Online was on the Dreamcast first I don't think that existed on Wii and you also asked about multiplayer and the answer was no so that eliminated MMORPGs is this game set in a fantasy universe like you know high fantasy see does it have elves or dwarves or that kind of stuff no tolkien characters no and that's 15 so

1:05:06Justin Davis:i'm gonna i'm gonna read you an anecdote this is your hint this is michael uh from san bruno says i enjoyed hearing from pear on a recent episode would love to have hear more of him on the podcast it made me reminisce on when i used to listen to week in review with pear matt casamacina and mark bosan back in the day so because of that my suggestion is zach and wikis yeah i mean

1:05:28Peer Schneider:except it's not a Capcom game. Oh yeah, it wasn't a Capcom game. It wasn't an RPG. No, but that's all Matt always talked about. Yeah, games great. We can review, there were some games like Geist that wasn't from Japan. Yeah, you guys really championed that one. Who made Little King's Story? I think that that's a pretty good guess. There was like... I thought that was Square. I don't think so. There's some weird games. Umbrella Chronicles, remember that one? But what did Atlus make at the time? Or Sega? Well, we eliminated Atlus. Yeah, you said Atlas. We said, I forget the three already. Namco, Atlas, and...

1:06:06And Sega.

1:06:07Peer Schneider:No. Capcom. Capcom. Capcom. Yeah. Like the three big Japanese studios. And we eliminated Square Enix. So Natsume, what if it's a Harvest Moon? Yeah, Natsume or Konami was obviously still kicking around. Nobody is passionate for that era of Harvest Moons. Did Konami do anything? Konami, well there were a couple of games, I think you guys did Elibits on 20 questions at one point yeah we did that's also not an RPG man the Wii era, I totally blocked everything out, thank you for doing this game oh what if it's a retro game like there's just one they never, they cancelled anything else no no I mean like retro style RPG but those aren't mainly, I was thinking about downloadable ones.

1:06:55That all happened later, like Octopath Traveler, all that sort of stuff came later. No, they did After Years. Huh? After Years was on Wii. But that's not... Not Square Unix. Okay, we need to get to the publisher, at least, on this one. Does this game have any... Should we ask about sequels, or if it's part of a series? Yeah. Which one? Series one, maybe, is better?

1:07:16Justin Davis:Yes. Is this game part of a series? Is this game... Sorry. No, it's not part of a series.

1:07:22Peer Schneider:I like Little King's Story I can't remember who made it do you remember that game? no I remember that name I don't remember who published it and I'm going to know like I own the game they did make kind of like a pseudo sequel didn't they? but you know it was a different thing yeah I think there was a 3DS version of it yeah and then there was remember there was like you know my time as a dark lord and my time as a king like I don't remember who made those to the little town builders

1:07:54Peer Schneider:was that more of a sim type game uh those were little king story was almost sort of like a pikmin like where like you rolled around as a king and then you had some little minions that you could sort of there was an era of games where people like there isn't that probably that an rpg would be a stretch but that's why he said rpg of a sort but isn't if isn't fantasy eliminating that yeah oh man that was probably a fantasy game all right let's get to the publisher let's do another triplet of Japanese Konami Konami, Sega and Natsume is it a Konami, Sega or Natsume game? I'm not American actually

1:08:32Justin Davis:is it Konami, Sega or Natsume? no there's no other companies Damon well let's just remember that just because a game is made in Japan doesn't mean the publisher is from Japan and also there are publishers that are no longer with us oh man

1:08:46Peer Schneider:who went out of business that's so sad that is sad yeah hudson hudson's gone oh well that's true they did the bombermans it's probably a hudson game oh my man rpg the bomberman rpg bomberman heroes bomberman hero no what was it you have two questions and a guess oh man i thought we were doing great guys you gotta ask like obscure old crap like goemon then i'll get it yeah not you It sounds like obscure old crap like Goemon. I was not paying attention when I was on the Wii. Is it a Goemon game on the Wii? No, there's nothing. There was one on DS. Is it helpful to know if the game has Waggle featured prominently?

1:09:30Peer Schneider:Yeah, that's all of them. Oh, this is so tough, Damon. Some of our other ones are like realistic graphics or did it get reviewed well? That's not going to get unstuck. I bet you reviewed this game oh what about do you play as a human we didn't do that one we've got the hat standby what about if we've mentioned anything in the game or the series or anything adjacent to it although I'm sure we haven't ask it ask which whether we mentioned it have we mentioned this game no you've gotten nowhere close oh wow what is this I think we got stuck We didn't veer hard enough right when we found out it wasn't fantasy.

1:10:16Peer Schneider:Because I'm only just picturing fantasy games. I'm not. But I don't know what other studios are there that are no longer there. Tecmo is still there. Oh, what about Clover? Clover. Is that what it's called? And we didn't mention Okami, though. Oh, no, that's Capcom, though. Yeah. And they had Beautiful Joe and stuff that's not an RPG. What about Mad World? Oh, my God. that's Platinum. They were Platinum games. But what Damon was saying is that it could be like Ubisoft published it. So none of this really matters because we're thinking about devs. Well, who published Mad World? It was not. I don't know.

1:10:55Peer Schneider:I think Nintendo might have published it. Really, it was too gross, though. Yeah. It was very violent. But I'm thinking about other Platinum game stuff from that. Oh, yeah. What's for the little hero, guys? What's the... Wonderful 101. Mighty 101. Wonderful 101. Wonderful 101. one is that an RPG though was that a Wii U game that's a that is it's funny that that's a different little game with lots of little guys running around yeah I like games with lots of little

1:11:20Justin Davis:guys running yeah that's a great genre yep yeah let's just ask was it made by Platinum Games

1:11:26Peer Schneider:no all right so you're either close I also like games where you're a little guy running around

1:11:31Justin Davis:that's my favorite kind of yeah that's a good genre all right should I reveal yeah this game this was released for the Wii in 2009 it was ported to the Playstation Vita in 2013, those are the only two platforms it was ever released for it's an action RPG made by Vanillaware and published by Ignition

1:11:51Peer Schneider:it's not Odin Sphere it's the other one the one with the giant knockers that one was Dragon's Crown

1:12:00Justin Davis:but that's Vanillaware right this one's Muramasa, the Demon Blade. Oh my God. The Demon Blade. Okay. Yeah, I wouldn't have guessed this. But it's from that time that you would have been on Week in Review. And Mark Bozan reviewed this for us. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think he gave it a nine. Yeah. And I was looking forward to this game because of the art style and stuff. And then I don't think I ever played it. That's why it's not in my brain. Yeah. Did you guys ever play this?

1:12:29Peer Schneider:I don't think so. You could have gotten this, Sam? Damon is like, I have. Yeah. I was about to ask about the Odin Sphere developer but then I thought that was Atlus for some reason our publisher I really wouldn't have guessed this in a hundred tries look at how gorgeous this is

1:12:43Justin Davis:they should bring this to Switch it's trapped on the Wii and the Vita 2 all of these old games are coming back eventually everything finds its way to THQ what was it called? Project Cross Zone?

1:12:56Peer Schneider:it was like a multi-character RPG on the 3DS That was a Capcom turn-based strategy game, right? I've wanted to do a feature. I've talked about it on Scoop before. The best games that are trapped on old consoles that never got ported or updated or re-released. That is good.

1:13:12Justin Davis:I think in particular, you could do one that's just WiiWare games. Like good WiiWare games that have never been taken anywhere else.

1:13:18Peer Schneider:World of Goo launched as a WiiWare game.

1:13:20Justin Davis:Yeah, it's true. Before it came to anything else. There's some pretty high-profile games that are stuck on old consoles. I mentioned Diddy Kong Racing. How crazy is that? That has not been seen since. So nuts. Also, I believe Sega published Mad World. Oh, right. Sega picked it up. Jeez. That's right. What a weird time. Yeah. Muramasa, the Demon Blade. Nicely attempt. Thank you for the suggestion, Michael in San Bruno, California. Viewers, listeners, if you have your own suggestions for video game 20 questions, email them to me at the email address gamescoop at IGN.com. Before I let you go, put on your suit and tie and charge up your Mega Buster because Phoenix Wright and Mega Man have joined forces for Humble's latest games bundle.

1:14:01Justin Davis:Act out the exciting courtroom drama at the heart of Ace Attorney compilations, The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles and Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney Trilogy. Try out all the best Mega Man games with Mega Man Legacy Collection, Mega Man X Legacy Collection and Mega Man Battle Network Legacy Collection Volume 1. A wealth of great games are at your fingertips for the price of your choice. In all purchases, support Breakthrough T1D. It's a$254 value. This bundle is available now through September 23rd over at Humble. And that's going to do it for this edition of... No, that's how I end next-gen console watch.

1:14:31Justin Davis:That's all the scoops we have for you this week is how this one ends. Thank you, Sam. Thank you, Pear. And thank you, Justin. Thank you to Tayo working behind the scenes to make this episode possible. My name is Damon. Zaijin Game Scoop and we're out.

1:15:01Justin Davis:This episode of Game Scoop was produced by myself, Damon Hatfield, and Tayo Oyekin. Technical direction was handled by Tayo Oyekin. Technical production is by Mariah Franzen and Amir Rakib. Audio engineering is by Amir Rakib, and post-production editing is by me, Damon Hatfield. Graphic design is by Nicole Kageman. Game Scoop is an IGN production and part of the Geek Media Network.

1:15:40Muramasa.

1:15:41Justin Davis:Muramasa the Demon Blade. I think we asked good questions though. Yeah. I thought it was a good process. Like who would have ever guessed that? A game just has no legacy because it never had sequels. The company's gone. And nobody would ever ask. But Vanillaware is still very much. Vanillaware is around. But nobody would ask, was it published by Ignition? no

1:16:01Peer Schneider:that was like the bargain big company you know is that not a fantasy game it's like

1:16:06Justin Davis:like Japanese mythology Japanese not Tolkien high fantasy

1:16:09Peer Schneider:it doesn't have elves and shit no it has Tengu yeah Ignition is a US publisher what's up was Ignition a US publisher

1:16:18Justin Davis:or maybe even European I don't know I'd have to look it up