Game Scoop! 845: What Was the Point?

10:14Justin Davis:Right now, get up to 60 % off your Babbel subscription at babbel.com forward slash gamescoop. Get up to 60 % off at babbel.com forward slash gamescoop. Spelled B-A-B-B-E-L dot com forward slash gamescoop. Rules and restrictions apply. I don't know about you, but I like keeping my money. Unfortunately, traditional big wireless carriers also seem to like keeping our money. After years of overpaying for wireless, IGN's Seth Macy finally got fed up with crazy high wireless bills, bogus fees, and free perks that actually cost more in the long run, and switched to Mint Mobile. Isn't that right, Seth?

10:46Justin Davis:That is right, Damon. The longest part of the process, I'm thinking is going to be staying on hold with my current provider, trying to break up with them. I mostly use it to just scroll on social media and click things that I like anyway. So why am I paying like several hundred dollars a month to do that? Stop paying way too much for wireless just because that's how it's always been. Mint exists purely to fix that. Mint Mobile is here to rescue you with premium wireless plans starting at 15 bucks a month. All plans come with high speed data and unlimited talk and text delivered on the nation's largest 5G network.

11:20Justin Davis:Bring your own phone and number, activate with eSIM in minutes, and start saving immediately. No long-term contracts, no hassle. Ditch overpriced wireless and get three months of premium wireless service from Mint Mobile for$15 a month. If I were in the market for a new wireless plan, I'd be looking at Mint Mobile. If you like your money, Mint Mobile is for you. Shop plans at mintmobile.com slash gamescoop. That's mintmobile.com slash gamescoop. Upfront payment of$45 for a three-month, five-gigabyte plan required, equivalent to$15 a month. New customer offer for first three months only, then full price plan options available.

11:53Justin Davis:Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details.

12:00Justin Davis:All right, let's check in with the listeners. Hey, listeners. Listeners, remember, you can always reach us at the email address gamescoop at IGN.com, just like Andy from Montreal did.

12:10Mark Medina:Big Andy style.

12:11Justin Davis:Andy says, I want to start by saying how much I love your show. I'm eager every week to watch the new episode. I wanted to add a little something in regards to what you guys said about long development cycles. We often lament how long it takes to make a video game, or at least a Western studio to make a AAA video game these years. And he says, as a veteran in the film and game industry, I believe he's an animator, a very long development cycle can be quite detrimental to the livelihood of the devs themselves. Here's an example. You start a project, work on it for 45 years, and then for X reason, you get fired or you move or whatever, you leave the company, you have to find a new job, none of what you did in the last half decade, can be shown legally in your portfolio.

12:49Justin Davis:Oh, I never considered that. Brutal. None of your can be shown online until the project has come out. That leaves you in a very tough spot. You kind of have to be working on personal projects on the side to keep your portfolio up to date. And that's a lot of work. It's doable if you're single and have no responsibility, but add one or two kids in the mix and a ton of responsibilities, the task becomes a huge hurdle to overcome. Yeah, that's just another reason why they need to sort it out and get these long development cycles under control.

13:15Sam Claiborn:and then obviously like just it's just bad for your soul like like let's say the project's canceled right it's like well that's you know it's sad anytime you work on something and it doesn't see the light of day but if you worked on it for a half half decade it's like you know we're not on our on this earth long enough for like that much of your work to like not come to

13:35Daemon Hatfield:fruition yeah yeah i never i never felt old until todd howard told me that fallout 5 will come out one day after XXXX. I was like, oh my gosh. I'm going to be like 50 when this game comes out. Todd Howard told you that, Mark? He was speaking to you? No. Yeah, you should write our news team. He told me through an article.

13:57Sam Claiborn:They're texting. Look, you just have to wire on these Apple gift cards, and then everything's going to go fine.

14:02Daemon Hatfield:Him and Peter Schneider, I just am draining my bank account.

14:06Mark Medina:If you really were on this cycle, like say you were working on GTA, but not Red Dead, then like you worked on a game for 10 years and then a game for 10 years like you got like three more of those in your life's lifetime before you retire not before you die before you retire right it's like you know i was doing the cat math recently i was like well you know i have a one-year-old cat like if my cat lives for 20 years like i might have one more cat after that

14:34Daemon Hatfield:a man has a leopard gecko that she got on her 18th birthday and we're almost 40.

14:39Mark Medina:wow that's crazy

14:41Daemon Hatfield:crazy he's still there he's still chilling he's about to be the oldest leopard gecko to ever live that's so cool is that true I don't know I don't know if that's true but he's he's getting up there I think the longest ones ever lived is like 26 I don't know I never mind the comment section tell

14:57Sam Claiborn:me I'm wrong what was the stat like I see now I don't know who this quote comes from but there was a news story going around this week about how some Japanese youth it was like a study have less affinity for you know dragon quest and final fantasy and these franchises that kids grew up with and really loved and it's because their entire youth is going by without a release coming out in that series like if you're taking five or six or seven years to come out with something you're not hitting these kids yeah you know frequently enough for them to sort of care about

15:27Mark Medina:about the thing you make oh please do that for kingdom hearts yeah i mean we we all love grand

15:32Daemon Hatfield:Theft Auto because we got three Grand Theft Auto games on one platform and it's like I understand that like that can't happen anymore people expect Grand Theft Auto to be this like insanely good thing but it's like still they made fans of us and the to add to that that theory that they don't

15:49Mark Medina:need to be good games because there hasn't been a good Sonic game since I was 11 and people still

15:54Sam Claiborn:play those games Sonic Mania that one was all right but yeah otherwise the takeaway is I hope

16:02Daemon Hatfield:Sam's cat lives long enough to play Fallout 5.

16:05Mark Medina:Yeah, and the takeaway for everybody out there listening is that I thought Sonic was really good when I was a kid. The panel didn't. I thought it was good.

16:15Sam Claiborn:We're all just catching strays over here from Sam for no reason at all.

16:20Mark Medina:Okay, they weren't strays. They were adoptees of your positions 10 years ago.

16:27Justin Davis:I bet you that video is still getting in your comments. I haven't looked at it recently. I bet people are still angrily commenting on that video.

16:35Mark Medina:You know, we get a person every once in a while. It's like, I'm listening to Game Scoop from the start, you know, and then somehow they made a comment on this one, but they're going to get to the episode with the Sonic was never good episode. And then they'll understand all of this.

16:47Sam Claiborn:The people I love, I love all of them.

16:48Mark Medina:I never said.

16:49Sam Claiborn:Yeah. I like all of our fans and I'm glad you're here, but the, but the going back, like it's, this is a news show. I don't understand what people get by going back to the old episodes. Well, the retro pieces are still retro. It's not like going back to watch Mad Men, right? Like that's a very different thing.

17:06Justin Davis:Do you think 100 % of our discussions are discussing something timely from that week?

17:11Daemon Hatfield:I will say, before I worked at IGN, I worked at a warehouse, and I would listen to old GameScoop episodes. Thank you, Mark.

17:19Sam Claiborn:Damon, we've been doing this long enough now. Like we flipped through, you know, whatever, the 1996 issue of EGM. So two things are going to happen. One, we are going to run out of old magazines to flip through because they stopped making them. but two we can somehow i don't know like we can use the way back machine to flip through ign

17:37Justin Davis:from you know 20 or 30 years i love i love looking at early 2000s uh the greatest thing is website

17:43Mark Medina:looks it looks better that's it looks great and it loads just as fast as it did back then

17:50Justin Davis:yeah true um all right we're getting into the weeds andy had one other anecdote here it's

17:56Mark Medina:Did you have a plan for this episode? Yeah.

17:59Justin Davis:Andy says, I'm currently playing Avowed and Grounded 2. I really enjoy these two games. I think Obsidian is among the top studios of the last decade. It's really disappointing how the corporations estimate value in a title.

18:11Daemon Hatfield:Avowed is great. I'm playing it on PS5, and I think it works very, very good. I like the game a lot.

18:17Justin Davis:Andy, you should also check out The Outer Worlds 2. I enjoy that game quite a bit. Okay, this is Daniel. Daniel says, since Baldur's Gate 3 has been the topic of conversation recently, I thought I would bring this to your attention. Recently, Larian made it known that they would have loved for Baldur's Gate 3 to come to Switch 2, but the decision wasn't theirs to make. Seems to be a Wizards of the Coast call from what I can tell. As someone who just got the Switch 2 for Christmas and has put over 300 hours into Divinity Original Sin 2 on the OG Switch, I'm quite disappointed. I'm a 35-year-old dad of four kids and I play in handheld mode 99 % of the time.

18:51Justin Davis:because of this, I'm seriously considering a Steam Deck to start my Baldur's Gate 3 journey. You'll love it. Which brings me to my question. Has there ever been a game announcement or release that caused you to go out and purchase another console just to play it? I remember being 15 years old at a friend's house when I got my first look at The Elder Scrolls IV Oblivion in a Game Informer magazine. I had never seen anything quite like it and decided to save up and purchase an Xbox 360 just to play it. To this day, Oblivion will always have a special place in my heart, and few games have delivered the way that one did.

19:19Justin Davis:The first true HD experience, in my opinion. we'd love to hear what uh from all you guys are the best and are truly the only gaming podcast

19:26Daemon Hatfield:around yeah uh i didn't have the money to buy it because i was like a young adult at the time but i borrowed a friend's ps3 just to play last of us like i i didn't have ps3 like i borrowed it played last of us gave back because i was like i can't not play this video game i don't know if

19:45Mark Medina:i've ever bought a console specifically for a game were you like a like just a massive diehard sony i have to play everything sony makes fan is that why you wanted to put no i didn't even have

19:54Daemon Hatfield:ps3 i was a 360 kid i love sad dads i just i okay so here's actually what happened so i thought that last of us was the elliot page game and i was i i you know that's when juno came out and stuff and i was like i want to play that and then uh i was wrong but i but i also love beyond two souls so what's um so i really wanted to play it i thought i played uncharted or anything

20:22Sam Claiborn:i thought i was the only person that liked beyond two souls i also liked that game oh that game's

20:26Daemon Hatfield:great uh my wife's alarm clock is still uh willem defoe's theme song from that game to this day

20:32Sam Claiborn:i hear it every morning i mean we now because of my work and because video games are my primary hobby it's like i'm a day one guy it's been a long time since i've not had any of the new consoles day one but back when i was you know buying them myself and had less income like it was a great feeling it was never like a one game came out now i have to buy you know an og xbox or whatever it is but like if you would wait two or three years to buy a console and usually you know they only get more expensive now but back in the day they'd be like 200 bucks cheaper and there'd be a bunch of cheap games and the game companies used to release like the budget lines of games like it was the best and like i i have a vivid memory of getting i got the super nintendo in 1996 because the ps1 was already out and so it's like oh i got the console for like 80 bucks and got a bunch of games for like 10 bucks and you have this whole library of like games that like back then the console wars were like such a thing that like there's a genesis kid i had to pretend like i didn't want those snes games but secret secretly i really did and then i was able to get them all at once it was it was that was a great summer i mean i was an idiot like i got nintendo power and

21:41Mark Medina:you just get everything that nintendo power you know looks good right so it's like that's how you did your selection but you know i ended up with a virtual boy somehow so something was hyping me on it now but my obviously like the biggest stories that i have are are culturally like in line with the world like sonic the hedgehog like i got a genesis for sonic the hedgehog i didn't get it for anything else. Like it was before Sonic, like that was the biggest thing in the world. And everybody was saying the Super Nintendo was for babies. And I was like, Yeah, that makes sense to me that this really this really rings true.

22:13Mark Medina:But then a year or two later, I was like, Well, I really like playing Super Mario World at my friend's houses and Mortal Kombat looks a little better than the Super Nintendo. Definitely want one I want to play off zero on the Super Nintendo I think was the sale for that. And then I I didn't play a lot during the early 64 PS one years. And And then, you know, I had played Mario 64 a lot at a friend's house. It was great. It was so fun. But then when Ocarina of Time came out, it's like, I needed Nintendo 64. That was like the last time I really remember being like, this game sold me on the system.

22:42Sam Claiborn:Yeah. You hit like a critical mass of like, maybe I can just pretend like Mario 64 doesn't exist. But then Zelda comes out. Now there's a gold knight comes out. Oh no.

22:52Daemon Hatfield:I gotta have it. Beetle adventure racing. Beetle adventure racing is dope, man. You can spin. I've always only because it's now been brought up twice on this episode. I'm always curious because I was like six when this was probably happening. But like nowadays, console wars are very silly, right? The Xbox Series X and PS5 are essentially identical and have 99 % of the same library. But I'm always wondering what leg did people have to stand on to say Sega was better than Super Nintendo?

23:22Mark Medina:First of all, if you're going to ask a question, you can write us at gamescoop at IGN.com.

23:26Sam Claiborn:just like the proper channels mark yeah seriously the thing is the thing is mark when we were 11 years old you have to understand that the sega genesis had blast processes sure yes of course

23:40Daemon Hatfield:but like the super nintendo library is still one of the best video libraries of all time yeah that's

23:46Mark Medina:kind of a i think that's that that came out of this early game journalism speak like that super Nintendo's library is great, but there's a lot of great libraries. The NES has an incredible library. It's like there's there's notice you're not bringing up Sega Genesis.

24:01Daemon Hatfield:You're just putting it against the Genesis.

24:05Sam Claiborn:Back in the day, the Genesis kind of bodied the Super Nintendo for a long, long time. It wasn't until like as that generation wound down with the benefit of hindsight, like that. People were like, OK, maybe the NES was pretty dope.

24:17Mark Medina:Specifically because it had the good sports games. Yep. And that meant everything. It meant everything. And then it had blood and Mortal Kombat.

24:25Justin Davis:Yeah, they had blood and Mortal Kombat. Yeah, yeah. And they had this edgy hedgehog mascot that was much, much faster than this, you know, kind of by comparison, methodical Super Mario World, right? That's a much slower exploration game.

24:39Daemon Hatfield:Anybody that knows anything should know that Mario World is far better than any Sonic. No, it was seen as kitty.

24:45Mark Medina:And it came out with F-Zero at launch in Pilotwings. And people didn't play those as much. and then there's just nothing for a while then there's like a punch out and metroid and those had trouble like getting audiences like it was not you know what you think it wasn't until donkey gone country that people were like oh my god this is incredible and like it's it's you know going to compete backwards and like credit to nintendo for putting chips in their games and then getting to

25:09Sam Claiborn:do crazy things because that there is a few like the the super nintendo library like in games they They are better, but they are not cooler for 12-year-olds. There's exceptions. Star Fox was cool, but the games weren't as cool.

25:24Mark Medina:Yeah, and then Final Fantasy, now we're like, oh, I had Final Fantasy 4 or 2 and 3 at the time. Nobody cared. Nobody played those games.

25:32Daemon Hatfield:Oh, funny, because those are regarded as some of the best Final Fantasies of all time still. Some of the best games of all time. Same with Link to the Past and Earthbound.

25:42Mark Medina:Nobody played Earthbound. They didn't sell any copies there and then chrono trigger barely caught on mario rpg had a lot of it was at the end of its cycle like these are when you look back at a library wins they're not wins at the time

25:55Justin Davis:yeah it's all because of thomas klinsky and the sega of america marketing team how are they going to get people to buy the sega genesis they capitalize on the fact that gamers who were eight when they got their nes were now yes 12 and they could say oh now Now you're more of a grown-ass gamer. You don't need to play the baby games. You've outgrown Nintendo. Now you need the more grown-up games.

26:21Daemon Hatfield:Genesis does what Nintendo... Yeah, I specifically remember the whole broken-down car and that's Mario Kart kind of deal. Commercials and stuff.

26:31Mark Medina:So then you get to the end of that console generation and Genesis added a CD drive and a 32X add-on. It sure did. And a Sonic and Knuckles cartridge. Whereas Nintendo was like, no, we're going to hold out and do these like really expensive chip additions to our games and they 100 % won out that point like by the time the 32x was out like they would have trouble selling saturns as their next in console because everybody's like no i just bought two iterations and they felt exactly the same

26:57Justin Davis:yeah and that was all um sega japan's fault and then they killed it with dreamcast yep i mean yeah with with game library yeah but not at the time like it was It was too late, though. They could not stand up to the marketing power of PlayStation or Nintendo.

27:17Mark Medina:Night trap!

27:34Mark Medina:Yes, online shopping is quite literally at our fingertips, but that doesn't mean it's always simple to buy. Whether it's trying to remember one of a million different logins so you can actually place your order, or getting almost all the way through checkout before realizing your card is nowhere near you, there are many hiccups that can get between you and placing that order. Which is why it's such a relief when you see that purple pay button that has all of your information saved, making checkout as simple as a tap of your screen. That iconic purple shop pay button is why Shopify has the best converting checkout on the planet, meaning less carts going abandoned and more sales going to you.

28:13Mark Medina:Shopify is the commerce platform behind millions of businesses around the world and 10 % of all e-commerce in the US, from household names like Thrive Cosmetics, Gymshark, and Allbirds to brands just getting started. And they're not just great at converting sales. If people haven't heard about your brand yet, Shopify can help you find your customers with easy-to-run email and social media campaigns. and they have world-class expertise in everything from managing inventory to international shipping to processing returns and beyond. Tackle all of those important tasks from one place, making your life easier and your business operations smoother.

28:51Mark Medina:See less carts go abandoned and more sales go with Shopify and their shop pay button. Sign up for your$1 per month trial today at shopify.com slash realm. Go to shopify.com slash realm. That's shopify.com slash realm. When you want your spring break to feel like and your kid's pool day to feel like and your hotel bed to feel like and room service to feel like because at Hilton, hospitality feels like Your cabana's ready. Would you like fresh towels? It matters where you stay. Book now at Hilton.com. Hilton, for this day.

29:41Justin Davis:All right, this is Jeff in Austin, Texas. Says, hi, Omega Cops. While perusing IGN recently, I came across an article for one of the most Damon-ass Damon games I've ever seen, Hunt Down Overtime. The gorgeous pixel art, the roguelike structure, the gore and classic side-scrolling action. I'm immediately all in on this game, day one, and Damon, I wanted to bring it to yours and everyone in Scoop Nation's attention in case you missed this announcement. Rest assured, Jeff in Austin, Texas, I'm well aware of Huntdown Overtime because the original Huntdown is a very Dame-y ass video game. I love Huntdown.

30:13Justin Davis:I was just, after I got this email, I revisited it last night. It's great. So in case anyone doesn't know, Huntdown is a 2020 run and gun game developed by Easy Trigger, which is a Swedish developer owned by Embracer now. And it perfectly nails that scuzzy 80s synthwave aesthetic terminator robocop it's got voice acting it's got pixelated blood splatter lots of little details and set pieces and then gameplay wise it's contra or metal slug or rolling thunder if you remember that namco game so yeah um hunt down is great and then hunt down overtime is a prequel i think actually that's now a roguelike or roguelite and the tag the tagline says every strategic upgrade strips away more flesh and builds a cybernetic fighter one chrome limb at a time.

30:58Justin Davis:Hell yeah. The description talks about biomes and stuff. So actually, I think it's going to play like Dead Cells, which would be great. Bring it on.

31:09Sam Claiborn:So this art looks super rad. I didn't even know that they made a sequel. Did you say this is out or it's coming out?

31:16Justin Davis:Early access sometime this year.

31:18Sam Claiborn:I think that the name Hunt Down Overtime, you could take those four Hunt Down Overtime and rearrange them in any order and you would make a game title that was probably pretty dope and worked. Time hunt over down. Yeah.

31:33Daemon Hatfield:I just like to imagine that the first game takes eight hours to beat and so now it's, you know, now we're in overtime.

31:38Mark Medina:So now we just say biomes all the time. That's the thing. We've been saying biomes,

31:42Daemon Hatfield:yeah. It's like, oh, the background's different, you're in a new biome.

31:46Justin Davis:There's grass here. What did Nick call it last week? Search action games? That was calling Metroidvanias. Yeah, but that's different than

31:55Mark Medina:dead cells style biomes though right well that's more like the rogue legacy where you're like i'm gonna go upwards and it's the attic i'm gonna go to the right and it's the garden yeah but i think

32:05Justin Davis:metro so metroid a metroid game like super metroid yeah we could say those are all different biomes

32:12Mark Medina:right well that's what that's that's like just using that term like the word is but i feel like it's been become a game term to imply that there's some kind of rogue attude to it but maybe i'm I'm thinking about it wrong.

32:24Sam Claiborn:The most, I think about biomes in the context of Minecraft and like other kind of like crafty open games of like, you know, going to different biomes or they're adding new biomes.

32:34Mark Medina:And it's different than a level because, you know, you don't complete it and that's right.

32:38Justin Davis:Well, speaking of all this stuff, our next email comes from Matt Jones, overlord of the super fans. He says, Dear Damien and the Scoops, per this search action discussion in last week's episode.

32:48Sam Claiborn:Hold on, wait a second. What? You're just going to, You're just going to breeze right by Damien the Scoops? The coolest band name ever? That's us, right? We're Damien the Scoops.

33:01Mark Medina:That's great.

33:02Justin Davis:No notes. Per the search action discussion in last week's episode, I propose that when it can't be called Metroidvania, it should be called Exploraction Games. Exploraction Games. That's good. So with God of War, Son of Sparta released, and me recently finally playing Prince of Persia, The Lost Crown, because it came to Game Pass, I started thinking about other older franchises out there that could make for great exploration games. Here are some franchises that I came up with. That was Matt talking. So Mega Man says, I read up that there may have been attempts at this in the past, but how has Mega Man not had a bunch of games in this genre?

33:34Justin Davis:Each robot master has its own biome, their own power. You get their powers, use them to unlock new biomes, finally arrive at Wily's Castle to use all the newfound powers to beat the boss. This seems like a no-brainer. I agree. I agree. Let's get Capcom on that.

33:46Sam Claiborn:That is a good idea.

33:47Justin Davis:Contra, this one would probably be more Metroid-esque as opposed to Castlevania, but why not have Bill and Lance fight through different areas to get to the vile Red Falcon's lair? All the guns they normally get in the original game, fire, laser spread, etc., can be unlocked after beating certain areas or bosses. Then those guns can be used to unlock new areas. Yep, that sounds good too. We'll put Konami on that one. And then Sonic the Hedgehog, he says, okay, I'll admit this is more to get a Sonic Mania pun, or I'm sorry, Sonicvania pun with Sonic Mania, but Sonic usually goes from zone to zone, collecting Chaos Emeralds along the way.

34:16Justin Davis:There could be an interconnected world where Sonic needs to get Chaos Emeralds to unlock new zones, fight Robotnik at the end. With his time traveling in Sonic CD, you could even put a rewind ability in one of these Emeralds. Plenty of opportunities. So what are the franchises the Scoop crew thinks could use an entry in the explore action genre?

34:33Daemon Hatfield:This sounds like my nightmare because I don't like Metroidvanias. Because you're too old for them, right? I'm way too old for Metroidvanias. And so this idea of turning all of our games into Metroidvanias, I'm way too elderly for that one.

34:47Mark Medina:What if we didn't call them Explore Action, call them Action Plorers? Would you be more interested in that?

34:55Sam Claiborn:Why is there this video game? So even roguelikes are named by, you know, Rogue, right? That's where they come from. And then obviously Metroidvanias and Souls-likes. It's like movies, like Mission Impossible isn't a Bond-like. like other I feel like other genres except there have been several

35:13Justin Davis:there are John Wick likes now yeah oh

35:16Daemon Hatfield:I didn't know that oh yeah is it John Wick just like kind of a spinoff of like the Matrix though like not a spinoff but I mean like the fighting style he fights kind of the same

35:28Justin Davis:this like one man unkillable one person unkillable thing like it's um Keanu

35:36Mark Medina:One Keanu.

35:37Justin Davis:Bob Odenkirk, they made two Nobody movies. And then there's the Sisu one with the World War II era dude. He's just, the Nazis can't kill him. He's impossible to kill.

35:46Mark Medina:Isn't that what the Kingsman? Kingsman? That's more like James Bond-like.

35:51Sam Claiborn:Although those predate John Wick.

35:53Justin Davis:James Bond-like, yeah.

35:55Sam Claiborn:They, you know, so anyway, to answer the original question, in Mario Maker 2, there's this whole sub-genre of Mario levels that I liked that are Metroid-like. There are these kind of puzzle box levels where you're stuck in a room and you need to do a specific thing and go a specific way to get a Fire Flower. And then you use the Fire Flower to get into the next space. That's like Mario vs.

36:14Mark Medina:Donkey Kong a little bit.

36:15Sam Claiborn:Yeah, and then there are these little Metroid-like semi-linear puzzles of figure out where to go and what power-up you need to break out of this space. And I enjoy those. And I would play either an open-world 3D Mario or a Metroidvania-like 2D Mario. Hmm.

36:34Mark Medina:Yeah, there's other ways to reshuffle these levels or biomes. Biome Commando, which we only talk about on this show now, it has biome in the name. If you remember, that has a map screen. You can go back to previous levels and do things with things in them. It has a map screen. It handles and so does Mario World. We can use a little bit more of that type of game, I think. Like, they don't need to be, you know, corridor-based connected areas. Like, it is kind of cool to revisit things with more weapons and do stuff like that way, but then to have, like, a cool other way to shuffle up those levels.

37:09Justin Davis:Biomic Commando. Biomic Commando. I can see one perfectly. Think of a game like Prince of Persia, The Lost Crown, but it's Tomb Raider. It's 2D Tomb Raider Metroidvania. Lara is very acrobatic. She's going to be jumping around, flipping around in, like, a platformer Metroidvania game. I can see it. Let's let's let's put Crystal Dynamics on that one.

37:33Mark Medina:What's the Dung Beetle pinball game? Oh, man. Yoku's Island Express. Think about a game like Yoku's Island Express. But yeah, just just like that. Just another one of those.

37:44Justin Davis:What did that developer go on to do? Which one? Yoku's Island Express? Yeah, yeah. Who was that? So this is by Villa Gorilla.

37:56Mark Medina:I bet even Mark would like that, Metroidvania.

38:00Daemon Hatfield:I think Devs react for it, but I don't remember if I played it much.

38:04Mark Medina:I don't know. It's a good one. Okay.

38:07Justin Davis:This is Ron in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Just wanted to shout out and say, y 'all have been a lifesaver since having to return to the office full-time back in February this year. GameScoop helps make at least one of those commutes bearable. Writing in to let Justin know that after playing nearly every Metroid and Castlevania over the years, I finally dipped my toes into Super Metroid, and it doesn't disappoint in the least. Game is a blast. Playing this back in 94 must have been incredible. No wonder Justin loves it so much. I also can't get enough of that perfect sound the bombs make.

38:37Sam Claiborn:The bombs do make a really good sound. Yeah, I mean, Super Metroid, you know, it is like modern Metroidvanias have more interesting movement options, and you can mantle up on ledges and stuff like that. Like, Super Metroid's my favorite game of all time, But it is getting old enough now that if you didn't play it when it was new, certain stuff about how Samus moves and how you flow through the game, I could see sort of frustrating gamers that have a more modern sensibility. But something that the game absolutely gets right, that it still outclasses many games released now more than 30 years later, is in its atmosphere and its vibes.

39:13Sam Claiborn:And that this alien planet that you're exploring, you know, feels like when you're in the wrecked alien spaceship. It's like it makes sense how these areas fit together as you go deeper and deeper into the planet. It's more hellish and there's, you know, lava everywhere. and like the way that those biomes are laid out is kind of like has a logic behind it and there's there's a there's a wordless story being told with the way that samus is sort of like you know pursuing her goals in a way that a lot of other metroidvanias aren't quite as thoughtful about

39:44Justin Davis:their environmental design i would say yeah absolutely succeeds on vibes it's crazy that like this is it was a nintendo made game back then that had a totally different feel from anything else Nintendo had ever made at the time. Right from the title screen, it's like, whoa, this is a very different sort of mood piece from Nintendo. Dead scientists.

40:06Sam Claiborn:Yeah, I've shared before that, like, you know, when I played Super Metroid, I was playing it on an old crappy CRT, and I did not know those were dead scientists. I just, I didn't, I couldn't see them on the title screen clearly enough. And then I played it, you know, later on a more modern television. It was like, oh.

40:22Daemon Hatfield:I don't know what you're referring to. I need it. It's on the title screen?

40:26Sam Claiborn:The title screen of the game is a scene where a Metroid is broken out and there's dead scientists strewn around the room in pixel art. Oh, yeah. Poor little guys.

40:38Mark Medina:The energy sucked out of them.

40:41Justin Davis:Yeah, that's what you see right there. Very, very, very cool game. We're talking a lot about Metroidvanias and old games this episode, and that's okay.

40:56Mark Medina:This episode is brought to you by Redfin. You're listening to a podcast, which means you're probably multitasking, maybe even scrolling home listings on Redfin, saving homes without expecting to get them. But Redfin isn't just built for endless browsing. It's built to help you find and own a home. With agents who close twice as many deals, when you find the one, you've got a real shot at getting it. Get started at redfin.com. Own the dream.

41:24Justin Davis:This is Talon in Alaska Talon points out that he's 28 And says my brother-in-law gifted me a handheld Emulator for Christmas I need some recommendations from my favorite oldies Hold up, are we the oldies? Are we his favorite oldies?

41:38Sam Claiborn:That can't be right

41:41Mark Medina:We're the Damies Or no, we're the Scoopies You're the Damon No, we're the Scoops

41:46Justin Davis:Damon and the Scoops Mark is too old for Metroidvanias though That part is true Way too elderly for that one Alan says, I'd love to hear some personal recommendations for the NES, Super Nintendo, Game Boy, and Nintendo 64. I've already saved buying a Commando. Not to worry. I just finished Super Mario RPG for the first time. I'm lining up to play Super Metroid, Link to the Past, and Star Fox 64, three of my all-timers. There you go. Yeah, it's okay.

42:12Sam Claiborn:Just random suggestions? I mean, here's my... Make it thoughtful. Well, and here's my kind of hot take about the N64 generation is I think Diddy Kong Racing is better than Mario Kart 64. Yes. And I also, I don't know that I'm going to say it's better, but I replayed both Mario 64 and Banjo-Kazooie recently. And I think, I'm like, ooh, Banjo might be better than Mario 64. No. I mean, I would have never have said that until this most recent replay.

42:42Mark Medina:I mean, I can see the take. I'm just like, I didn't think that you would ever say that.

42:47Daemon Hatfield:I didn't think anybody would ever say that, but here we are. It's the world I live in now.

42:52Sam Claiborn:once you get to that click clock woods man there's a there's a mod of donkey kong 64 that um lets you swap characters on the fly so you don't need to go back to the character swap pads it fixes everything legitimately like it honest to god makes that it makes that game go up to two points on like a top 10 review scale because the way that the game worked before is you would see a collectible that only one character could collect and like a that's already really shitty and bad but like b they did it on purpose where you would need to be one character to unlock a door and then in that door would be another character's collectible and so then you would have to go back and switch and come back and so being able to swap on the fly in the modded version is um it makes that game actually really good man i remember going through the things tooth

43:39Daemon Hatfield:yeah that's a hard one this is a great game yeah thank you great yeah very very great game

43:45Justin Davis:playable on Xbox too. Listen, on NES, I would recommend Shadowgate, which I talk about quite often, one of my favorite games of all time. And I realize it's not going to be for everyone. It's a point-and-click adventure, but it's a game where you, it's an 8-bit Nintendo game where you explore a creepy castle in first person and the music is fantastic and has a great personality and sense of humor. So I just, it's just like a really, really cool piece that stands out for being unique and original on the NES. There are two other games that are like this from the same developer, but Shadowgate is way better than Uninvited or Deja Vu.

44:19Justin Davis:So I'd love to hear someone who's 20 years younger than me what they think about Shadowgate. Go ahead.

44:27Mark Medina:Well, there's a bunch of series on the NES that are pretty good overall. The Adventure Island starting with 2 is really good. And then Mega Man starting with 2 is extremely good. So don't miss those. They're also really good with save states, which is nice. but um yeah generally things made by nintendo are worth revisiting so like if you go and just like look up all the games that nintendo made like check out what they made for their like black box releases early on like balloon fight and clue cool and stuff like that because there's elements of nintendo games that have maintained throughout their entire existence that even go back before the nintendo that just are part of their toys and stuff like that and it's just fun to delve into for that reason so i recommend that and then there's a bunch of licensed games that are fun to just look at just to be like, what, they made a game based on this?

45:14Mark Medina:Damon and I used to love like putting on like the Predator in the office or like, you know, any movie that they made a game for, like check it out. It's funny.

45:22Sam Claiborn:It's usually pretty cool. Like there's eight bit versions of, you know, the Jaws theme song and the Gremlins theme song and all that stuff in the NES games.

45:30Daemon Hatfield:Gremlins 2 is pretty good. That's a pretty good game. Yeah, it is. It's also a home improvement Super Nintendo game. That game's pretty awesome.

45:37Mark Medina:Yeah, the dinosaurs.

45:39Daemon Hatfield:It's really rare. There's Full House Tournament Fighter. I would always recommend the Castlevania games, specifically three and four. Very, very good games. But I also think one holds up as still one of the best side-scrollers ever. Yeah. Castlevania is an easy win and very playable on those handheld, smaller screens.

46:01Justin Davis:What the heck game is this? What are we looking at here?

46:04Mark Medina:It's Home Improvement. There it is.

46:07Daemon Hatfield:You're on a set. Tim the Toolman Taylor.

46:09Mark Medina:You're on a set. that's a dinosaur like Tomb Raider reset. And so you're fighting through with your staple gun. Smart.

46:16Justin Davis:This is a fast paced game. Or Heidi.

46:18Mark Medina:It's a rare game.

46:20Justin Davis:On Game Boy, I would recommend Donkey Kong 94.

46:24Mark Medina:That's the one.

46:25Justin Davis:That's it's it's it's so good. Oh, cool.

46:27Mark Medina:Game was a little rough to revisit. Myths and Monsters, the Kid Icarus game is kind of neat. Hmm. I never played that one.

46:35Sam Claiborn:That's a good one, too.

46:36Daemon Hatfield:I have a weird take, but this is probably just because of nostalgia. but I actually prefer Game Boy's Link's Awakening versus the Switch version because I just remember each screen in Link's Awakening and that you know the you know it's like the screen scrolls and you're like yep I know what screen this is I remember playing Link's Awakening on Switch and not having that same type of like I didn't like it as much right because the screen moves with you so it's like you don't have that like I remember this screen it's like because you know when we're kids we play these games over and over and over um so that i i would always suggest to go back

47:12Sam Claiborn:and try this game out i love it i mean zelda oracle of seasons oracle of ages are two i was gonna say underrated i i don't know they're pretty appropriate yeah two of the two of the best

47:23Daemon Hatfield:games yeah i think i've never played minish cap but i think a lot of people like minish cap as

47:29Sam Claiborn:well yeah i i replayed half of that game over christmas break and i forgot how the much the cap is like a real asshole he's just very snarky was minish cap also capcom yeah it's just crazy that capcom has made three zelda games okay all of that brings us to video game 20 questions but

47:52Justin Davis:maybe justin needs to excuse himself or you want to hang around for five minutes

47:56Sam Claiborn:i gotta go because i have a band concert um it's not not for me for one of my children Okay, good luck, gentlemen. Mark, you're going to hard carry, right? Oh, yeah.

48:07Justin Davis:Pack it up. I got this. Make a good face to leave us on to Justin and Godspeed. Okay. Wait, wait. No, he's not frozen. When's he going to freeze? You have to disconnect. There you go.

48:20Justin Davis:Very excited to be here.

48:24Daemon Hatfield:Oh, I love it.

48:40Justin Davis:Our suggestion this week comes from Ash, who says, Hello, Damon, Sam, Justin, and whoever else is lucky enough to be on the best podcast in the world this week. My name is Ash. I'm a 42-year-old father of two young boys, ages 6 and 9, from Whitehorse, Yukon, which is right beside Alaska. And I'm a lifelong gamer. I've been listening to your show for over 10 years now. thought it was finally time to write in. Recently in the last year or so, my oldest son has been listening to the show with me and his absolute favorite thing is Video Game 20 Questions. So much so that he constantly comes up with games to make me play Video Game 20 Questions with him.

49:13Justin Davis:Amazing. My suggestion this week is redacted for redacted because it is the game that I've redacted more than any other game. And with that, let the question begin.

49:24Daemon Hatfield:I hope it's, I'm wondering if it's repurchased. i i had to put a tab over justin's face i can't i can't do it sorry can you read the redacted

49:36Mark Medina:part one more time no oh man i mean you just want to hear it as it was it's just oh yeah redacted that was got redacted yeah my suggestion this week is redacted for redacted because it is the game that i've redacted more than any other game and i think it's repurchased oh yeah yeah

49:54Daemon Hatfield:Could be. Oh, so it's probably Skyrim. It's the only game you can repurchase that many times.

50:01Mark Medina:Did this come out after 2010? Nope.

50:04Daemon Hatfield:Not Skyrim. Okay, let's see. Not after 2010.

50:10Mark Medina:Did this come out this century? Yes.

50:14Daemon Hatfield:So between 2000 and 2010. Okay. Was this game exclusive to one platform? Yes.

50:22Mark Medina:Was it a Nintendo platform? No. Sony

50:26Justin Davis:yes that's five

50:28Daemon Hatfield:okay so we are in the PS2 PS3 era did this start its life as a PS3 game? no PS2 okay is this game first party? no

50:41Mark Medina:it could be PSP or Vita true that did this start its life as a PS2 game?

50:49Daemon Hatfield:yes alright not first party

50:56Daemon Hatfield:alrighty Japan question? yeah yeah was this game developed in Japan? no well that rolls out a lot yeah yeah especially the exclusives yeah like Final Fantasies Kingdom Hearts all that stuff

51:12Mark Medina:and it wasn't published by Sony is that right?

51:15Daemon Hatfield:right yeah

51:17Mark Medina:interesting yeah um

51:21Daemon Hatfield:um thinking Grand Theft Autos stuff like that let's see did this game have more than one game in the series on PS2 yes that is 10 oh

51:41Mark Medina:that's interesting does this series have a game that's yet to come out that's been announced

51:49Daemon Hatfield:no not gta no not gta well they weren't exclusive i mean they were but briefly they were yeah

51:56Mark Medina:is this game still only on sony platforms um

52:04Justin Davis:this game is still only on sony this game interesting okay so it's a game that's part

52:12Daemon Hatfield:of a series that eventually probably went everywhere. But multiple of the same series were on the PS2.

52:20Mark Medina:Who would have developed a game like that? This is confusing.

52:25Daemon Hatfield:Yeah. I'm thinking like Tony Hawk, but I think Tony Hawk was everywhere. I think it was like even on 64.

52:30Mark Medina:Yeah, if there was like one that was just for PS or something. I mean, sports is kind of likely here.

52:36Daemon Hatfield:Yeah, yeah. Is this game like sports adjacent? Yes. It could also be racing, Need for Speed, stuff like that. Yeah.

52:47Mark Medina:Is this a game that you ride something around on four wheels? No. Oh. It's not racing or skating. Yeah. That's great. Hmm. What? What? Maybe it's not wheels at all. Maybe it's snowboarding or skiing or. Yeah. Oof. This is interesting. Yeah. Is there a... Do you... Is there any sort of vehicle, whether powered or unpowered, that the humans move around on in this game? No. That's 15. Okay. Okay. So at 15, we've determined that it's not a drivey, racy, extreme sporty game of that, Neil. But it could be just a regular-ass sport game.

53:42Daemon Hatfield:Mm-hmm.

53:46Daemon Hatfield:I did say sport adjacent, but I mean, I don't know what else I would mean if it's not a sports game.

53:51Mark Medina:Is this a game about a, oh, maybe it's like a wacky golf game. Although those are always Japanese though.

53:59Daemon Hatfield:Yeah. Like everybody's golf and what's that series from? Hot Shots Golf.

54:05Mark Medina:Is this based on a non, I'll just do it the other way. Is this based on a team sport? No. Hmm. A couple more questions. Three more questions. I should narrow it down some.

54:20Daemon Hatfield:Not that I think Damon would choose Madden 04, but still.

54:29Daemon Hatfield:Yeah, boy.

54:32Mark Medina:What do you do when you're not, you know, when you're doing something sporty, but you're not playing a team sport or riding around by yourself on something?

54:42Daemon Hatfield:Yeah. It's PS2, so this is before PlayStation Move. What's up, Damon?

54:50Justin Davis:The question that Sam asked was, is there a vehicle powered or unpowered that used something around? Oh, yeah, yeah.

54:57Mark Medina:So it could still be skiing or snowboarding. Maybe it's a snowboarding game. Yeah.

55:03Daemon Hatfield:Were the SSX games, were those PS2 games?

55:07Mark Medina:I don't know. Yeah, me neither. Well, I know that 1080 was the 64 exclusive right right yeah is this a snow sport game yes yeah i don't think i like i don't think i can get this i mean it could be if it's a series was around though maybe you can

55:26Daemon Hatfield:help with that but like i can only think of like ssx tricky but like i don't know like is that the first one and is that one ps2 exclusive that's still not that wasn't a 64 series i don't know 1080 I thought 1080 was yeah okay hmm I feel like we gotta do the cheating question no I mean that

55:49Mark Medina:won't really help us with this I don't think well I mean I guess it would yeah I guess you're the

55:52Daemon Hatfield:cheating question is have we mentioned the game in the past one minute no have we mentioned it at all yes we have okay I guess it's SSX tricky could be or just SSX yeah it's just called SSX it could be

56:12Mark Medina:I don't know how to narrow that down

56:14Justin Davis:don't you? how many questions do we have left? one question

56:18Mark Medina:is this game tricky?

56:21Justin Davis:is that what you want us to ask? it's a very a question you ask very often that would solve this whole situation for you oh is this the first

56:33Mark Medina:in the series?

56:34Justin Davis:yes

56:35Mark Medina:is this SSX?

56:36Daemon Hatfield:SSX yes we got there yay I can't believe it. I'll be honest. I thought I didn't know. Oh, God, Justin's back. I didn't know if Tricky was the first one in the game.

56:48Mark Medina:I vaguely remember that being a modifier.

56:52Justin Davis:Got it. SSX, it was a launch title for PS2, and it never came to any other platform. It's still just a PS2 game.

56:58Mark Medina:It looks like it has a good frame rate.

57:00Daemon Hatfield:Yeah, it looks great. So what was the redacted thing without all the redacts?

57:05Justin Davis:My suggestion is SSX Snowboarding for PS2 because it is the game that I've started over from the beginning more than any other game. And he has an exploration. My not so fun reason for starting it from the beginning so many times is not because I love the game that much, but out of necessity, because when I bought my PS2 on day one from my local game store, they only had SSX available and no memory cards. So every day I would come home from school, start the game over and try to get a little further than the last time for over a month until I was finally able to get a memory card and end my groundhog day like suffering.

57:36Mark Medina:Yeah.

57:37Daemon Hatfield:you would get really good at it that yeah he kills that first stage i i was the same with like final honesty 10 like i would get to like when when san attacks the ship and then i would just like pause it and pray that nobody turned it off or anything great and because i didn't have a memory card because like you know we just didn't know that is the meanest thing well thanks

57:58Justin Davis:ash and and the kid that's a good one really really good one yep uh yeah i think tricky is the second one and that came to other platforms but this game is just a playstation maybe even gamecube i think that one i think so too yeah i think it came to all three um this looks great who developed it it's ea they developed it and published it yeah yeah wow crazy it looks like a japanese game for some reason but yeah it's cool but ea montreal though so if you had asked if it was uh made in right right right right uh let's see who is this good good olympics olympics

58:32Mark Medina:uh, pick too. I've been watching the, I watched downhill. I don't think it's called downhill. It's called like freestyle snowboarding women's the other day. And it was like incredible. Like the builds they make for those are incredible.

58:43Justin Davis:I used to love the Olympics so much and always watch the Olympics. But now like my like TV viewing habits have changed so much. We just don't have ever have like the TV on. And I just know I think about it to go seek it out.

58:55Mark Medina:I have to change everything to do that. Yeah.

58:57Justin Davis:I just, I, I, it's been,

58:59Mark Medina:but we've been putting on like the gold zone or the best of, or wherever they are. Yeah. Like on Friday nights when we're like getting ready to go somewhere or something. It's been fun. I've been enjoying it. Plus it's in Italy. Everything they show between things. I'm like, why am I not there?

59:12Justin Davis:Usually I love the Olympics. It'll be here very soon. A couple of years. Crazy. Ash says, thanks for all the great insight into gaming and all the fantastic weekly entertainment you provide. I look forward to your show every week. P.S. Get excited for season two of Paradise next week. Now that's how you do it. Believe it. It's been a little over a year and season two is here. that's how you do it

59:33Daemon Hatfield:House of the Dragon like yeah seriously

59:35Mark Medina:I remember the characters and the situations and what happened

59:38Daemon Hatfield:yeah I know it's like I don't need to like when Severance season 2 came out and went back and watched season 1 I don't have to do that for Paradise I'm good yep ready to just watch season 2 let's go

59:48Justin Davis:that'll be really good so thank you for the suggestion viewers listeners if you have your own suggestions for video game 20 questions oh my god Jobert email them to me at the address gamescoop at ign.com and that is all the scoops that we have for you this week except for an important message it is humble bundles 15th birthday and everyone is invited celebrate 15 years of connecting fans and gamers with good causes with the humble 15 time capsule bundle featuring games from the very first humble indie bundles right now you can score Odd Sparks, An Automation Adventure, Kill Night, Inbound, Bionic Bay, Mark of the Deep, Lugaro HD, Samoros 2, Osmos, and And Yet It Moves.

1:00:32Justin Davis:This all supports Child's Play, an organization that donates toys and games to children's hospitals worldwide. Head to HumbleBundle.com through March 11th to start playing today. Thank you, Sam. Thank you, Mark. Thank you, Justin's giant face. Thank you to Jobert and everyone working behind this episode to make this episode possible. My name is Damon. This is IGN GameSoup. And this weekend, I'm going to play Redacted.

1:01:23Thank you.

1:01:52Thank you.

1:02:25Thank you.

1:02:57Thank you.

1:03:27Thank you.

1:03:53Thank you.

1:04:25Thank you.

1:05:00so

1:05:08Sam Claiborn:damon did you watch the slay the spire trailer no oh man we should do a live reacts a game I saw it.

1:05:19Justin Davis:Very good. I think what March 5th is early access date. Well,

1:05:23Sam Claiborn:the big, I don't even, I mean, I guess it's not really, you're not super spoiler sensitive. The big feature that they showed is that it has four player co-op.

1:05:31Justin Davis:Ooh. Well, I don't want to do that, but that's interesting.

1:05:36Daemon Hatfield:I mean, I had the same reaction. I was like, that's sick. I'm never going to do that,

1:05:40Sam Claiborn:but that's sick. It shows like four hands, like four cartoon hands, like picking, you know, in the between mission events that happen. What choice do you want to pick and stuff like that. It looks cool. It says it has co-op specific cards.