Game Scoop! 847: PlayStation Takes Its Toys & Goes Home

11:19Mark Medina:He says, I'm going to eat this for lunch later.

11:23Sam Claiborn:It's just a double quarter pounder. It's all it is. Whist of Big Mac sauce.

11:28Mark Medina:You know, according to fractions, it's a half pounder.

11:31Sam Claiborn:I feel bad that Justin tried to keep it on the rails there. It's fine.

11:35Daemon Hatfield:I just, I like the, yeah, I like the, oh, all my best.

11:40Sam Claiborn:despite wow yeah what a good have you seen that picture of rfk on the plane with trump and they're all like they have all that mcdonald's and he just looks like he just looks miserable that's what this is invoking but this guy's actually trying to sell the product the thing is as soon as the camera

11:56Mark Medina:turns off i'm gonna eat the whole thing it's like even though this went viral for being unappetizing and sad it still made me want mcdonald's for the first time in 25 years I even thought about McDonald's till now. Yeah.

12:12Justin Davis:I also love his quote. And of course, the pickles.

12:17Mark Medina:Did you see that the box for it looks a lot like a Series X?

12:21Sam Claiborn:Oh, I didn't know.

12:22Justin Davis:I feel like you could add that anywhere you're listing things. Like the new Xbox will play Xbox games and PC games. And of course, the pickles. Okay, get back on track. So next Xbox plays PC games. There's a Steam machine that's going to sit under your TV and can play a bunch of Xbox games and a bunch of PlayStation games that have already been released. Whereas PlayStation, this was going to be our lead story today, is sort of walking back their strategy of bringing their games to PC after some period of exclusivity on PS5. They're returning to console exclusivity, at least for their single-player games, it seems.

13:00Justin Davis:So this comes from a report from Bloomberg. says while Sony will continue to release online games on PC, single player games will now remain console exclusive. This is a significant strategy shift. Bloomberg suggested poor recent sales of PlayStation games on PC and the risk to the PlayStation brand were to blame for the policy shift. And in case anyone has forgotten, they have actually put out a lot of games on PC in recent years. Just in the last few years, PlayStation has allowed PC gamers access to Spider-Man 1 and 2 and Miles Morales, Horizon Zero Dawn and Forbidden West, Returnal, Beyond Two Souls, Ghost of Tsushima, The Last of Us, Parts 1 and 2, Days Gone, God of War 2018 and Ragnarok, Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart, Sackboy, A Big Adventure, Uncharted, Legacy of Thieves Collection, Stellar Blade and Until Dawn.

13:48Justin Davis:So they've been doing this a lot. And if they're changing, Mark, what do you think would be causing the change of heart?

13:56Sam Claiborn:Well, I mean, the article says poor sales, right? Which is, you know of course like i think it's very short-sighted for them to put put games on pc and and be like okay we got you know however many sales you know five hundred thousand dollars a million dollars whatever that whatever the number is there there are much smarter bean counters looking and being like hey less people are buying the ps5 because they think that the games will just come to steam and so instead of chasing the short-term win we need to force people to buy our console because every game sold on their console they get a cut of right so it's like hurt you buy you buy horizon on steam and playstation gets 70 of that well gabe newell gets the other 30 percent so it's like they it's just much more beneficial for them to put have people in their

14:55Justin Davis:ecosystem but if someone buys rec resident evil reckon on pc playstation sees none of that whereas if they bought it on ps5 yeah they get 30 right the games were you know single player action

15:06Daemon Hatfield:adventure games and they were years and years and years old like you know buy this buy this game that is four years old you know full price we put it on a new platform like it's nice like it's nice if you're only a pc gamer and you have a high-end pc like it's great to have the option but like it's not like they shouldn't be all like surprised pikachu face when the games didn't sell very well like you know they were old like it was all old news by the time they released almost all of them

15:28Sam Claiborn:the the ports were also kind of famously bad well some of them like like like spiderman 2 last of us they they came out and they weren't great i think horizon was pretty good though

15:39Justin Davis:that's what i was gonna say so hell divers 2 was a huge it was a bigger hit on pc than right yeah

15:44Sam Claiborn:yeah which which in this scenario would have still went to pc because that's a live service

15:51Justin Davis:game they're saying life right right yeah yes yes yes yeah um and it was also day one it wasn't a port of a old game and i think the first single player games that the initial wave were big hits on steam i think it was horizon um zero dawn and god of war 2018 and even days gone was a surprisingly huge hit on steam but i think since then i think they've seen diminishing returns because like i I think the novelty of playing PlayStation games on your PC has worn off. Plus, you know, is the PC audience, you know, just waiting on Ratchet and Clank, Rift Apart? You know? Right, right. Probably not. So if they're not selling that many copies on Steam and they are devaluing the PlayStation brand because every time you put a game there, that's one game you don't have to buy a PS5 for.

16:36Justin Davis:Yeah, maybe it just looked in the long run, it made more sense to keep games exclusive.

16:40Daemon Hatfield:Putting games on Steam. I mean, Xbox can claim all they want, like, oh, we just want as many people playing our games as possible. But like, no, like putting all your games on PC is it's coming from a position of weakness in the console market. Right. That's the only reason you would do it. Like you would much, much rather be selling millions and millions of consoles and having everybody in your console ecosystem. Like it's really it's really not that much more complicated than that, in my opinion. Like PS5 is number one. And so they don't need to support the PC market. yeah it's a competitor to them right yeah I was gonna say the same thing like like even if it's

17:15Sam Claiborn:not a financial thing they let Xbox run the test on what this does for your brand and I don't care how much people love Xbox whatever we know that that brand is diminished given the fact that their games are everywhere right and so PlayStation might have looked at that and said that's our future if we keep going down this path yeah that people won't everyone will just get a computer they'll just get the steam deck and the xbox helix and they're going to play our games there we don't

17:43Justin Davis:want that we want them to buy a ps6 they can also look the other direction and find an example of someone uh enjoying phenomenal success without ever putting a single game on steam nintendo

17:57Mark Medina:so think of what a terrible week this is for uh pc exclusive fans i won't use the term so so this This week, they get, you know, God of War, Ragnarok, God of, you know, Last of Us taken away from them in the future. They won't have these games on their PC anymore. And they're totally getting cucked by Xbox, who's going to put all their friend slop exclusives and garlic-like crap clones that you can only play on Steam. You can only play those on Steam on a console. Can you believe it? Can you believe it? What a terrible week. Yeah.

18:30Justin Davis:What a terrible week to have a curse. What are the other PC exclusives these days?

18:34Mark Medina:Is Ark Great or is it a PC exclusive? I don't even know. I mean, it's...

18:39Daemon Hatfield:Play the Spire 2 is. Play the Spire 2, there you go.

18:42Sam Claiborn:Anything early access, like I just played Winrose all weekend and I'm like, man, I would love to sit on my couch and play this with a controller.

18:50Mark Medina:Do we even care that the Steam, that the Xbox can play Steam games?

18:53Daemon Hatfield:I mean, the PC exclusives are like, you know, the games with little guys running around. Like, you know, Paradox Games or Dwarf Fortress likes, as I call them.

19:02Mark Medina:Or what about the factorios? Yeah, exactly. Although it's that's on switch.

19:05Daemon Hatfield:All those nerd games where, you know, you just lord over your little minions with your keyboard and mouse. That's those are those are PC games.

19:13Justin Davis:Cocked by Helix. Yeah. Well, interesting times ahead. Yeah. What has been happening? We still have there are still no news coming out of the Capcom spotlight. Well.

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22:18Justin Davis:Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. Then let's talk about Resident Evil Requiem. Five million copies so far. We talked about this last week, so we're not going to dwell on it, but I'm still making my way through it. I'm in the, I've left the hospital and now I'm in that big open area with Leon. And I saw people in the Facebook group talking about how the first half of the game is like the best Resident Evil has ever been. And the last half of the game sucks. I don't know. And I know Sam was like saying this is not how he felt last week. And so far I've done that first big boss fight that a lot of people are talking about.

22:53Justin Davis:And so far I'm not, I'm not experienced. I'm still enjoying it so far. So we'll see. We'll see how it goes.

22:57Mark Medina:People that are saying that haven't played the game because the game literally goes back to that first part of the game two more times after the part that they don't like. Okay, cool.

23:05Sam Claiborn:I think you'll like it. I liked it. I do. You are coming up on the part that people say that they don't like, but I think it's fine. Okay.

23:14Mark Medina:And it's like two hours of kicking asses Leon and it's really fun.

23:18Justin Davis:Yeah. They bring back a character who I think it's from like Resident Evil Zero. Is that right, Sam? We don't need to name the character, but like, I didn't know who this was. I thought it was someone else. And then Sam was like, no, no, no, this is this other person. I didn't know who he was either.

23:32Mark Medina:It's like a lookalike villain. Yeah.

23:34Justin Davis:Yeah. Yeah.

23:35Mark Medina:Which is really confusing.

23:36Sam Claiborn:Yeah. Anyway. And has the same like powers and shit. Yeah. Yeah.

23:40Daemon Hatfield:Yeah. Resident Evil lore is someone that hasn't played a Resident Evil game in probably almost 20 years. The lore is just unbelievable. It's just like, here would be a fun project. A fun video would be like, is this a real or fake Resident Evil lore fact? And like, you would never be able to tell.

23:57Sam Claiborn:That's because the game used to be about zombies and it's not. I mean, there's still a lot of zombies in this. But there are a lot of zombies, but there's a lot of other things too.

24:06Justin Davis:And they call them zombies, which I always think is funny. I saw Leon had just had a line last night. Like, this place is crawling with zombies. Also, was Leon always this cool? Yeah. I feel like I've just realized this whole zeitgeist of -

24:20Mark Medina:Only in 4. In 2, he's a noob, remember? Right. So he's just learning the ropes and they're welcoming him to the police station. In 4, he's a badass though. He's saving the president's daughter. That's true. And then he - Bad dude style.

24:31Justin Davis:He takes her home by riding a jet ski across the Atlantic Ocean. Yeah.

24:34Sam Claiborn:Yeah.

24:35Justin Davis:He's just - I love Leon. He's so great. He's very cool. Is it the same actor from the RE4 remake? It is. It is. Yeah, that's cool. That's very cool. Okay, well, Justin, what have you been playing instead of Resident Evil Requiem?

24:47Daemon Hatfield:Well, I just started playing Pokemon Pocopia, and I love it. Even as someone, I'm not a big Pokemon guy. It's really cool so far. And, like, I like it even more. And, you know, these are very early impressions. I played it last night and a little bit this morning. And, you know, I knew I thought I would like it. It's like, oh, it's a Pokemon game that sort of crossed with Animal Crossing and crossed with Stardew Valley. So it's a little bit more of, like, a life sim. but i like it even more than i expected it to because what it actually secretly is is it's like it's a dragon quest builders like which i love dragon quest builders and it's much more like that

25:20Mark Medina:than animal crossing um you can see that game boy that's cool yeah it's super cool so it's a little

25:26Daemon Hatfield:bit like you know like a minecraft or a game you know you have some freedom to sort of you know create terrain or destroy terrain or sort of build things how you want but it's a lot more guided and directed. And what you're doing is you're trying to build these, there's these little puzzles to make a habitat for a Pokemon. And sometimes they give you a little clues of what the habitat is, like you have to put four pieces of tall grass next to a rock, or you have to put, you know, flowers next to a tree. And like, I'm in the early game. So they're like very kind of simple habitats, I'm assuming they get a little bit more complex later.

25:58Daemon Hatfield:And so sort of meeting those requirements for like, what do I need? And how do I want to build out my space? So the fact that you get to be creative and kind of build out your area how you want but but it's but it's still guided and directed is um i don't know it's like it it it's really compelling so far and it's not

26:18Mark Medina:annoying from the start either it's no it has a good first couple hours and i think that and like

26:23Daemon Hatfield:and i say this with uh with love and affection but like this is a checklist game right like just i love this yeah it gives you a laundry list of kind of chores to do like pick up these sticks and gather rocks and do this. But it's sort of the best example of that kind of game I've played in a long time, I would say, so far.

26:41Sam Claiborn:Dude, it's just so smart to be like your ditto and that's your explanation for why you can do everything.

26:49Mark Medina:It's great. Well, there's kind of sad lore behind that ditto and like, where are the humans? And like, what's going on is all really cool. I think it's funny to compare it to Dragon Quest Builders because I've never even heard of that game. And so now I have a great - They made two of them.

27:01Sam Claiborn:Yeah, there's two.

27:02Mark Medina:I have a great game to play after this, which is great. Because I'm loving it, and what I've taken away from it most of all is that... So you're doing... There's 200 or so habitats and 300 Pokémon. So there's a lot to figure out, and there's a lot of combos to do, and a lot to sort. While you're doing that, though, so far, every time you unlock a Pokémon, they do something useful, right? Yeah. It's crazy. Like, I'm really curious what the late game reasons for unlocking are and like what the complexity becomes. Super cool.

27:34Daemon Hatfield:I love that. Like, you know, I like games. This is a weird comparison to make, but it reminds me a little bit of a vampire survivors where like something weird unlocks something new. And then that thing unlocks something new. And then that thing unlocks something new. And like the connection, like the map of like, you know, I unlocked a Hitmonchan and that gave me this move and that let me do this and that let me unlock this. and that let me unlock this is like really complex and cool and like you know it feels like you're kind of peeling apart layers of an onion um i really i really like it and i feel like like i'm not a pokemon person i've actually never played any of the pokemon role-playing games so it's like you know i don't i know them as someone that's been in the video game space my entire life but like i feel like if i was a pokemon fanatic i'd be losing my mind over this game and so they are They are.

28:24Daemon Hatfield:They are. Even just someone who's like, you know, just as a fan of video games, like it totally works on that level too.

28:30Mark Medina:So I also like really respect Nintendo's like seal of quality that they actually use for games like this. They bring it out once in a while where, you know, you can see the lessons they learned from Animal Crossing. Like that menu that pops up like looks like Animal Crossing, right? Like there's things in this game and then there's like a sheen of Switch 2 graphics to it. Like things like I know it looks kiddy when you're watching it in a video picture in picture on GameScoop. But when you see it playing on your Switch 2, it looks great. It just looks really good. It's not supposed to. It's supposed to be functional, but it looks really good.

29:03Mark Medina:So I like that about it. And then there's also, why are you playing this game? To unlock Pokemon, to make more things, to clean stuff. There's actually a through-line good mystery, because I've loved Pokemon. I've played all the RPGs, except for maybe, I don't know, 2 out of 20 or something like that. Like I know really well. And it's always really boring to walk around and talk to NPCs. All they have to say is don't you like Pokemon Pokemon your best friends? You know, I have an item that for you, like, that's all that happens in them. And everybody's talking about friendship. There's this overall thing, like first game, you get the team rocket, they always have this kind of, you know, villain set that you're beating in gyms, all that stuff.

29:41Mark Medina:This has nothing to do with that. You're a ditto. And all the humans are gone. And it's a mystery. And that's cool. It's a cool setup, because you're kind of in an apocalypse. Like there's like, everything's just destroyed there's a destroyed pokemon center there's all these kanto region pokemon like the reason for being there is like it's just and like you as a ditto are imitating your trainer from the start and like all the pokemon are surprised about that it's just cool like it like that lore is like pretty good for pokemon it's not good for like humanity because it's really stupid but it's good for pokemon yeah that's the mystery dragonite flying that was that

30:17Sam Claiborn:was you because i saw the lapras and then he like he like turned it i don't know you have

30:23Mark Medina:for so far i can tell us pokemon follow you and because you're ditto when balbasaur shows you how to cut or grow grass then you just have that ability because you you can mimic the ability

30:34Daemon Hatfield:like right there the ditto just use scyther yeah you like the the again the early game impression is like i'm pretty invested in like the lore and storyline of like where is this all going so yeah

30:45Justin Davis:i'm into it nice well i'm not a pokemon guy either but kingo is so maybe this is something

30:51Daemon Hatfield:yeah there's a lot of together so yeah you would have to that's that was going to be my advice is like nintendo you know for how family friendly they are like modern nintendo games and i know this is developed by what koi tecmo i think um but anyway like there's a lot of reading is what i was gonna say um so you know just something to be aware of if you have little ones well a little

31:10Justin Davis:anecdote i could share that justin will appreciate is kingo's learning to read and he brings home books from school that are like meant for him to read to us and like the first time he reads you a book it's like you feel like it's complete wizardry like my son can read oh my god it's it's been really really cool to watch anyway i felt that about when they learned to talk too i was like what yeah several different several of those milestones

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33:46Justin Davis:Okay, let's talk about a game that's been in the news a lot this year, but we haven't really talked much about here. It's not the type of game most of us would play except for Mark, and that's High Guard, which was launched on January 26th, a day of Kings, and is being shut down March 12th. So 45 days. It's just yet the latest in a long line of live service failures that did not get much runway to try and succeed. This was, of course, announced at the Game Awards in December. It was the big finale for the show. And here we are, what? Two months later. Two months, yeah. and it's gone so you actually played this mark right i did yeah okay and we gave it a seven it's you know it's apparently a good game right i mean yeah go ahead games you mentioned runway right

34:33Sam Claiborn:and like having a chance to be successful games set that for themselves nobody told them this game needed to come out in january and the big criticism for the game was that i played it for one evening and i was i was i was done there was nothing else to do and then they quickly rushed out a 5v5 mode that didn't change anything it just made it where there could be more players um yeah i i i don't know this is a weird one because people seem to be blaming the players a little bit on this one you didn't give the game a chance and it's like nobody told you you had to come out in January with no content.

35:14Sam Claiborn:So, like, everybody gave the game a chance. The game had 150 ,000 people playing it on Steam. That was such a wild

35:21Mark Medina:day. Yeah, and then they had half of that

35:23Sam Claiborn:by the end of the day. By the end of the week, they had, you know, an eighth of that, and now they're in triple digit numbers. That is nobody's fault. We played it. It's kind of boring. So then we stopped playing it.

35:39Daemon Hatfield:These games are a little bit of a popularity contest, right? Of like, you know, you play it if other people are playing it. And if, and if, and if, if it doesn't, if it doesn't feel like it's going to sustain itself, then anyone, like maybe there's this millions of people that are kind of high guard curious, right? And they're like, well, why bother? Like even before, even before the announcement that it was shutting down and being canceled, like, do I want to, it's a risk to invest your time and effort and energy and money into a game. If it's not gonna, you know, if you don't have consumer confidence that that it's gonna stick around at last.

36:11Justin Davis:Here's the part that I just cannot wrap my head around. It's a new studio, Wildlight, former Respawn devs. They hired 60 people. They work on this game for four years. But then, if it's not a hit right out the gate, they have to shut the whole thing down. Like I said, they didn't have a runway of -

36:30Sam Claiborn:Hey guys, I don't know if you can hear me, but I can't hear anybody anymore. Oh, okay. Stop down. Gilbert, Mark has lost us.

36:43Mark Medina:I can hear him. Yep. I hear him fine.

36:49Justin Davis:Check, check, check.

36:50Mark Medina:Damon was just making a really good point, though.

36:54Daemon Hatfield:Rip. I just want to leave and go play Pocopia. I know.

37:01Justin Davis:Well, after this, we're going to Disneyland. Just Kim and I.

37:04Mark Medina:Oh, shit.

37:05Daemon Hatfield:Dang.

37:06Justin Davis:Disney After Dark. Is it a theme night? I don't think it is. I think it's just a Disney After Dark.

37:12Sam Claiborn:Hello? Okay, sorry about that. All of a sudden, my sound just completely went out. Okay.

37:25Sam Claiborn:Never had that happen.

37:32Justin Davis:Like, what business sense does it make to just spend all that time and all that money working on a game that has to be it has to be a hit right away or else i would think you you would when you plan your release as mark was saying you set it for a time when you have enough cash to give yourself a runway so that if things don't go smoothly right out the gate you can tinker with it you can listen to player feedback you could pivot but like what if you're you're gonna make a new restaurant you build the building you hire your whole staff you hire your chef you plan the menu you get an interior designer to design the thing and then if it's not a success in the first week ah shut it all down i just don't what in what world what sort of business plan is that yeah

38:12Daemon Hatfield:gee because this as sort of perverse and sad and wrong as the decision is it makes a little bit more sense at a big company at a big studio because then it's like well you know look let's cut our losses and and and you know like sony and concord yeah they'll do like a tax write-off

38:29Mark Medina:literally with it right they'll actually write it off as part of their losses that year yeah

38:33Daemon Hatfield:So they can literally write it off and that staff, they're like, well, we should just have them working on something else. But if you're, if this is your whole company and your whole business, what was the point? What was the point?

38:43Sam Claiborn:Well, I mean, it has to be a 10 cent thing, right? Because it was, it kind of came out that they were the ones funding it. So 10 cent is probably just doing what Sony's doing, which is like, all right, we're writing this off. You, you, are you guys gonna be able to turn this around? Probably not. All right. Then we're done.

38:58Mark Medina:It does give you a, um, it, like it does do a little bit to explain why so many things do in early access or do part of steam next best and then do a alpha then a beta and all the stuff instead of like this was an attempt at us as a as almost a stealth launch right like the surprise announcement it's out right away like it's an interesting experiment in that but it just shows you that there's an ecosystem to building why people would care about your game and unfortunately paying influencers to play your game a bunch right like doing all this stuff that gets in front of people It's really hard to do without that.

39:31Daemon Hatfield:That's exactly. And that's the Apex Legends model. And that's what these executives at this company. So it's like, you know, Apex Legends was surprise launched and they did exactly that. Paid a bunch of influencers to play their game and sort of sustain interest until there is enough of an ecosystem of kind of organic interest from fans that it could sustain itself. And like they tried to replicate that exact same thing with High Guard and the market has just moved now. It's a different, you know, you build and launch interest in your game in a different way. Yeah.

39:59Mark Medina:And speaking of the market moving, it's super risky to put out multiplayer games right now. If you thought two years ago that Marathon was going to come out after a game that everybody likes a lot, and it's going to have to go up against a game called Arc Creators, nobody would believe that. That just wouldn't even be part of the conversation. and these are just such risky things because the whole idea of these games is that you're going to make money off people for a long time this is big like you know kind of hangout platform that people are going to buy stuff in and and have as a live service forever and everything like that's like that's a lot to ask like if you're making a triple a you know single player game and you're like well we're just gonna have to sell a bunch of copies of that that's just a completely different model yeah and i don't know what's more risky but it does seem like right now that putting out these big multiplayer games is a little bit more risky because boy there's no community you don't you're not going to sell anything.

40:49Daemon Hatfield:I mean, I think that they're, I, I, I hope that these companies don't have illusions. Like they're not dummies. Right. I think that it, I think that it's, you know, 99 of them are going to fail. And then one of them is going to be Fortnite and make literally billions and billions and billions of dummies. Like, you know, and then it's like, Hmm, if you're a 10 cent, you're like, well, okay. Like maybe we should, we can roll the dice on that. Yeah. Yeah.

41:11Mark Medina:Well, like rolling the dice on these like kind of single player big experiences. I just don't know like it seems to me it's a better choice like I would like I would only be saying this if I hadn't known that like last year Mafia was this giant success for 2k right like was it yeah

41:26Justin Davis:yeah I don't know if it was a giant success

41:28Mark Medina:but I mean bigger than Mafia should have been right it was like you know one of their top sales like situations for last year yeah I think that like you know like there's we're seeing these big multiplayer companies get taken out of that game and put into you know making these multiplayer experiences and i just i just wonder if that's going to shift after the many many times we've seen this fail but maybe to justin's point like you just got to gamble on that one out of nine one out of a hundred there's go ahead i was

42:00Sam Claiborn:going to say there's there's also something weird about perspective when it comes to these games so you had overwatch right which is first person and and like people liked it people love that game for a really really long time but something that more of arrivals did different which was going into third person it allows them to make more money because it's worth it to buy the skins because then people get to actually see the skins that they're buying and it causes them to make more money right and so it's i'm thinking about the arc raiders marathon comparison right now arc raiders a lot of not only is it fun to play but a lot of the pursuits is to make your character look cool whereas marathon's first person yeah i don't care what my character looks like ever so i will never care about buying a skin or anything from that game so it makes me wonder you know the longevity for that and and that's why fortnight's so huge right every time a new skin comes out people buy it because they want to be grace from resident evil and actually see your character

42:57Daemon Hatfield:that's an interesting i mean in addition to the economics of like you know how the game makes its money there's there's a there's a game design like the fps like for what 20 years fps was like the dominant genre and obviously call of duty and battlefield are still some of the biggest things on earth but like you know but but like look fortnight's third person right it is not an fps so it's like there's been this kind of shift under our feet kind of in plain view but until you kind of say it out loud it's like you don't think about it as much of like maybe the era of like the dominant fps is just kind of like it's just maybe it's over people want to see they want to

43:33Sam Claiborn:see that but they bought well and like even like a game like cyberpunk six years later we made a video about cyberpunk like a month ago and all the comments are like but did they it was like and everything that's been added to the game that since launch and all the comments on that video are still did they make it where you could play it in third person now and i'm like i don't i wouldn't i wouldn't want that but like that makes me sad i feel like that's people that don't that don't get it no i know because i think cyberpunk is wonderful in first person i think games like skyrim and stuff like that in third person are not great and that's different there's a difference

44:06Daemon Hatfield:between an fps multiplayer shooter and a decision to be experiencing this world from a character's eyes and the storyline of the game takes place in that character's head and so it's important for you to sort of see out of that character's eyes and be immersed in the world so you know i don't let's leave cyberpunk out leave it alone yeah so so with high guard some people were saying it was

44:32Justin Davis:uh being the last big reveal at the game awards that doomed it from the start i don't know that didn't do any favors but you know it's a new studio that nobody knows a new ip they have to partner with someone to make the announcement otherwise they're just it's just this developer on twitter that nobody knows saying hey we have this new free-to-play game coming out and no one's going to pay any attention to it right i think you could

44:53Sam Claiborn:theorize all this stuff did Jeff Keighley kill the game I think at the end of the game at the end of the day if the game was good people would play it I think that's all it boils down to

45:07Daemon Hatfield:there's a lot of hindsight backseat driving in hindsight there's all these op-eds and think pieces around how that reveal doomed it and how weird it is that they revealed it at the game awards and never updated their social feeds again for weeks and weeks but damon i i think i agree if like you're an indie dev you're a small dev you know like reveal your game of the game awards yes or no like you know

45:34Sam Claiborn:who's who's not picking yes in that scenario there's also just been from the devs discourse about like yeah about it being written off from the start because of that announcement but like i i just don't buy it they had 180 000 people playing on day one people i think it was not

45:51Justin Davis:quite it was not quite 100 it was like 99 something regardless people tried their game they gave it a shot and they didn't like it blame it on whatever you want

46:04Mark Medina:so just to just to make sure that nobody thinks i'm crazy uh mafia outperformed sales uh i think it did we reported that at 800k in the first month that it was out but it's it seemed to have done 1.2 million or more after that. And then there was a, there's a call in which Strauss-Selig said, if you give consumers great narrative experience, it's a lot of fun, somewhat contained and at a fair price, then you can have a perfect result. So they were chalking it up to the cheaper price

46:30Daemon Hatfield:for that.

46:31Mark Medina:And then they said it out, outperformed the company's expectations and they compared it to a high point in their, in this article written by some site called GameSpot that said it was the high point of the take two earning call because of the GTA delay causing the company's stock price to plummet.

46:49Sam Claiborn:I'm sure, especially after Mafia 3, I'm sure that they were stoked with how well this game performed. Yeah. I also really like this game. I think it's great.

46:57Justin Davis:Me too. Great game. Still very good looking. But remember, Sam, Resident Evil did five million right out the gate.

47:03Mark Medina:Yeah, well, we can't all be Leon S. Kennedy. We certainly can't.

47:11Justin Davis:Okay, we've got breaking news out of the Capcom spotlight. Oh, no. What do we got? As is tradition, they held a contest for Capcom fans to design a boss for Mega Man. Oh, no. They've done this going all the way back to at least Mega Man 2. I don't know if they did it for the original Mega Man. So they had over 10 ,000 entries. Capcom picked the best 20, and then the community chose the six winners. But only one of these winners will actually be in the game. anyway here are the winners would you like to hear their names Cleanserman what? wait a minute I'm just putting this together Sweeperwoman wait hold on

47:57Justin Davis:Recycleman Cactusman that's gotta win I love Cactuar Juggleman and Valveman I can't believe there hasn't already been a Valveman

48:07Mark Medina:there's already been a guy that pumps his own head

48:10Sam Claiborn:I think Gabe Newell is Valve Man. Why did the first story have such a cleaning based theme? I thought that was going to be the whole theme. Japan's a very clean

48:22Mark Medina:country. You can walk around those streets. You can't even throw stuff away in a trash can.

48:27Sam Claiborn:That's Sweep Woman?

48:29Justin Davis:Sweeper Woman. Sweeper Woman. Got it.

48:31Mark Medina:That'd be the second woman after Splash Woman. I would agree with Sam.

48:34Justin Davis:I think Cactus Man sounds the best. That's Sweeper Woman. She's in the maid. She's a maid of it. Well, if there's a community vote, that's going to be the winner. She's got a vacuum.

48:43Daemon Hatfield:It's a bit sexist. Recycle Man. I think Cactus Man and Juggle Man.

48:51Sam Claiborn:That's just Captain Planet as a robot.

48:53Mark Medina:Okay. I could have done a better Cactus Man, but I'll take it.

48:57Sam Claiborn:That looks like a boss that would already exist.

49:00Mark Medina:It does.

49:01Daemon Hatfield:Yeah, exactly.

49:02Justin Davis:They also showed a gameplay overview trailer for Onimusha, but no release date, unfortunately.

49:09Sam Claiborn:That's just a character from arms. The juggle man. Oh, this one too. These are just arms characters. He's a fireman. He's a, oh.

49:19Mark Medina:Yeah. That's funny.

49:21Justin Davis:These are really cute. Yeah. Okay. I do like them. Cactus man has to win. Let's check in with the listeners. Hey, listeners. Listeners. Remember, you can always reach us at the email address, gamescoop at igin.com, just like Mason from Texas did, who says, with the shutdown of High Guard just announced, after it had only been live for a few months, I'm more ashamed than ever to say that I am a Games as a Service fan. Don't be ashamed of. So am I. But it's obvious for everyone to see.

49:46Sam Claiborn:Only Mark should be ashamed of. I don't want to. It is none of my business how much money I've spent on Marvel Rivals. I don't want to know. Don't tell me.

49:58Justin Davis:It's obvious for everyone to see that this business model isn't sustainable for anyone other than Epic, maybe Blizzard. I know there's lots to say about the art style, gameplay, monetization, et cetera, but what I would like to offer as a solution to the service games industry. And for your conversation consideration is this. Would games as a service games be more successful if they released with an end date in sight? Like if a game like Destiny released with a content roadmap for three years and then said that was the story they were telling, and after that they're moving on to a new game. Hold on, hold on, hold on.

50:26Mark Medina:We already solved this. The solution is see more butts. Okay? That's the solution. See more butts.

50:32Daemon Hatfield:I think that the, sorry, was the question done or was there more? Do you think gamers would respond to that? That's all. I think the problem is the exact opposite, is they want to believe that this is a treadmill that will last forever. The party will never stop. And all the time I'm investing and the loot I'm investing and the money I'm spending, it's the exact opposite of that. Of the moment there's an inkling that, hey, this MMO might be in trouble or this gotcha game might shut down or this live service game might not be around in a year or two, you've instantly destroyed your credibility and your ability to sort of keep, like I said, it's consumer confidence.

51:07Daemon Hatfield:They need to have some confidence that there's intrinsic value in the money of the skins and stuff they're putting into the game. And so I think if they knew that this was only going to be around a certain amount of time, then nobody would care. They want to believe in the fantasy that this is a forever game. I want to believe.

51:24Mark Medina:I'm going to take the opposite. I believe what Justin's saying. I agree with that. I'll just plead the other side. So the other side of this would be, it'd be really cool to do a countdown game where there's like a countdown to an apocalypse or something where you are actually like working that into your narrative. And at the end of it, somebody wins a million dollars.

51:43Daemon Hatfield:Yeah, that's a Peter Molyneux joint for sure. A Peter Molyneux game, 100%. It's like in five years, this game's going to shut down and the world's going to blow up and then something insane happens at the end of it. Nobody can ever play the game again. That's such a cool idea for a game.

51:58Mark Medina:What about if at the end of the game, your final character, they printed a little plastic model of it, and it's all the stuff you put into it, and all the things that you added to that character become a visual 3D printed model that you get at the end of the plaque or something.

52:12Justin Davis:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Here's what would happen. Mason from Texas, here's what would happen if Bungie announces Destiny 3, and they're like, we have a three-year roadmap, and then we're going to shut it down. if destiny 3 is successful by the time that end date comes around sony is gonna be like i don't think so yep i don't think so yep thanks to the power of friendship and all of your efforts

52:34Daemon Hatfield:combined great news everybody the world has been saved yeah the world's been saved another three

52:39Sam Claiborn:years yep now i i think humans are i think we we like collecting things right like the whole thing with the with the console generation between ps4 and xbox one is as phil spencer said we lost you know the worst generation to lose because everybody built up their digital libraries on playstation and you know i have my 25 or so platinum trophies over there if the ps6 and and project helix came out they were like no backwards compatible no you know trophies no nothing then then there would be quite the decision on which console you go for but right now like i'm a lifetime sony man because that's where all my games and stuff are and same with like rivals like i know my account's not worth anything but i'd like to know that in 10 years all of my work is still there and if you told me from the start that rivals is only going to last for three years then yeah i probably wouldn't

53:29Daemon Hatfield:spend it no modern modern video games are toil right and and they you know and it's work and it's checking off boxes and the idea of that all being quote unquote not like not for anything oh we made a lose wow

53:46Daemon Hatfield:it's like you know it's horrible for gamers to contemplate something like that it's all a grind

53:52Mark Medina:that's human existence though that's the human condition we're all grinding for nothing even our progenitors will all be dust one day

54:02Daemon Hatfield:we're all warm food in the end and you cannot take your Fortnite skins with you but I hope that my rivals You killed so many things with gold.

54:11Sam Claiborn:I hope they persist long after I'm gone. It's going to be part of my will.

54:16Mark Medina:Are you happy with this answer, Mason? Are you happy? What if we told you there's only going to be 1 ,500 episodes of Game Scoop? Would you be happy? Would you still watch?

54:27Sam Claiborn:Instead of...

54:36Justin Davis:Okay, well, instead of looking forward, Let's look back a little bit. This is Charlie Gadsden, our friend in San Diego. He says, last week in response to Justin, Mark mentioned he would go back and listen to old GameScoop episodes while working a warehouse job. I don't believe this is an uncommon practice. The ever loyal GameScoop fan sees the show like one of their favorite bands. It's always fun to go back and listen to their old stuff from time to time. Over the years, I've listened to the whole GameScoop catalog three or four times. The most recent happened a couple of years ago while grinding through the harder VR battles and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth.

55:08Justin Davis:I even took the time to write down some recurring segments, inside jokes, or overall themes the show had in the earlier days that have gone extinct. I plan on sharing these in full when the show officially hits the 20-year mark this summer. Wow. In the meantime, here's one for Scoop Nation. Damon used to confiscate everyone's phones before the show started as he demanded 100 % focus. As he should. It's this sort of dedication to the craft that has allowed the podcast to survive all, well, literally all other gaming podcasts have gone the way of the dinosaurs.

55:35Sam Claiborn:I hate clicking on podcasts and you just see everyone. They're just all on their computers. I hate that. Take my phone. I agree with that.

55:45Mark Medina:Damon, I don't. I'm only saying because I don't remember listening and hearing that. Was that a thing that you did?

55:51Daemon Hatfield:That must have been the very.

55:52Mark Medina:Because it was like a policy or something like that.

55:55Justin Davis:I think Greg probably just like annoyed me by looking at his phone one time.

55:59Sam Claiborn:I was just like, this is 100 % a great. I have a, I have a very distinct memory of Damon being like, do you really need to be on your phone right now? I was like, well, someone got in trouble.

56:11Mark Medina:I, I, the worst thing about that is that you were actually the person that suffers there because you had to touch everybody's phone and they took it into the bathroom with them just, just minutes before that.

56:21Sam Claiborn:Just get a basket, put your phone in the basket.

56:24Daemon Hatfield:I mean, do I was.

56:25Mark Medina:Basket of bleach for clean man.

56:27Daemon Hatfield:Finzer man. I'm glad this topic came up because I represented my opinion poorly, which is like I completely get and I respect. So first of all, we love all of our fans and thank you so much for going back and listening to old episodes. But the part that was a little bit baffling to me was people that go back to episode one and like, all right, back to one. And I'm going to relisten the whole thing.

56:47Mark Medina:Because they think they should start with your first episode is what you said. Time capsule.

56:51Daemon Hatfield:Like picking random things, episodes here and there and going back and like, you know, doing reruns. It's like, that totally makes sense to me and I respect it. But, you know, let's just run it back and do it again. That's the part that, like, man, I just it's it's it's amazing that there's people that that will, you know, give us that much of their time.

57:09Mark Medina:I'd like for someone to tell my wife that they've listened to me tell the same jokes more than she has and they enjoy it. You think you got it bad?

57:18Sam Claiborn:Try being a GameScoop fan.

57:24Justin Davis:OK, so that's settled.

57:25Mark Medina:And she's not going to listen to this episode, I'll tell you that much. Nope.

57:29Justin Davis:That's settled. Let's put that one to bed. So this is Nick from Wisconsin. In episode 845, Justin asked, what was the point of going back to listen to old episodes?

57:40Sam Claiborn:Justin, we want people to like our show. What are you losers doing?

57:47Justin Davis:Justin said, it didn't make sense. Damon countered that there's more than just news that is discussed, which is very true. I personally have gone back to listen to old episodes recently as I was looking for more things to listen to while I drive and I found it quite interesting to see how the show and hosts have evolved over the years. I originally started listening to GameScoop around 2016. I missed out on the early years. So when I went back, I started as far back as Apple Podcasts has available, which is July of 2010. Wow. It has been quite interesting to hear people like Damon from back then to see how much he's matured over the years.

58:15Justin Davis:I think it's true. Wow. It has also been fun to hear when people who are still at IGN join the podcast for weeks, such as I recently heard the first episode Sam was on, as well as a few with Brian Altano. There wasn't a first episode.

58:27Mark Medina:I was always there somewhere.

58:28Justin Davis:I believe there was also an episode I listened to recently where one Andrew Goldfarb wrote into the show as a listener. Also, I would argue that those old episodes actually had less topical news and more veered into games-flavored entertainment shows with things like knocking boots, frequent recurring discussions of bathroom etiquette, general partying, and also just general antics of Greg Miller. And even the video game news from then, I do find interesting because the PS3 and 360, they're blind spots for me since I only owned a Wii at that time. And that was more of a waning of my video game hobby during those years.

59:00Justin Davis:Anywho, thought I would throw out my thoughts on why us listeners find it interesting to go back to old episodes. Who is this? Keep up the great work and scoop. And that was Nick from Wisconsin. Well, Justin hates you.

59:12Mark Medina:I like how Nick from Wisconsin recounted that episode. It was like, and Damon, looking a little hurt, was hurt during stories. Well, I thought the episodes were pretty good.

59:22Daemon Hatfield:I just want to say again, I apologize. And it didn't look, this is an extemporaneous podcast where we're speaking off the dome. And I didn't represent my point very well on that episode. And I'm very glad that everyone and I do like, obviously, I'm good. Like, I do genuinely understand why people would go back. It's just that it's just the listening to hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of them. That's the part that, like, it just is misaligned.

59:49Sam Claiborn:Warehouse jobs are really, really boring.

59:53Mark Medina:I just want to be on the record in saying that I always thought that Damon was very mature.

59:58Justin Davis:Thank you.

59:59Mark Medina:Compared to the other chuckleheads I worked with at the time.

1:00:03Sam Claiborn:Spring is here, and there's a whole new way to chai at Starbucks that's made perfect for you. Choose your sweetness, dial it up, or keep things light. Add a touch of pistachio, a hint of strawberry or vanilla, or make it a spring classic with lavender. Because this season, there's endless ways to chai at Starbucks. Kayak gets my flight, hotel, and rental car right, so I can tune out travel advice that's just plain wrong. Bro, Skycoin, way better than points.

1:00:35Justin Davis:Never fly during a Scorpio full moon. Just tell the manager you'll sue. Instant room upgrade.

1:00:42Sam Claiborn:Stop taking bad travel advice. Start comparing hundreds of sites with Kayak and get your trip right.

1:00:48Justin Davis:Bad advice? You talking to me?

1:00:50Sam Claiborn:Kayak, got that right.

1:01:10Justin Davis:Okay, okay. That brings us to Video Game 20 Questions, and our suggestion this week comes from a John Peacock, who actually has an anecdote here. we'll find out his location at the end. Ashes required. I just listened to the most recent GamesCube episode and heard about your six-year-old son asking you to play Fortnite. Oh, yeah. As a fellow dad, I thought I'd share my experience. For a bit of a background, I'm 48 years old. Same. And though I played shooters pretty regularly back in the 360 generation, my current taste in games has a fair bit of overlap with yours, mostly retro, indie games, card games, strategy, tower defense, et cetera.

1:01:43Justin Davis:So when my son had just turned six, he came home from school in December of 2018, said, Dad, why won't you let me play Fortnite? To be clear, he had never asked me to play Fortnite. We had never even talked about the game before. I told him I knew very little about the game, but we could check it out together to see if it was appropriate. I was thrilled to find there was a split screen mode on the Xbox. So we downloaded it, turned off voice chat, muted the other players and jumped into a game. We had no idea what we were doing, but played a few rounds because he was enjoying himself. And I was enjoying hanging out with my son.

1:02:12Justin Davis:After a couple matches, we moved on to something else, but he let me know how much fun he had. So a couple of times a week, we'd play a few matches in split screen. Before long, we began to figure out the map, learned how to revive each other, started completing quests, et cetera. And soon we were both having a blast with our regular gameplay sessions. After about a month of this, my wife started to come hang out with us while we played. My son really wanted her to try, which she did. She's not much of a gamer, had never played a shooter, began to enjoy completing quests, reviving teammates, unlocking characters and dances, et cetera.

1:02:39Justin Davis:Before long, it evolved into my wife and me playing split screen on the Xbox while my son played in the same room on the Switch, all in the same cross-platform game lobby. playing family Fortnite matches every night after dinner. This went on for two to three years until eventually my son became more independent with greater interest in other games and the family play sessions became less and less frequent. But to this day, playing Fortnite with my son and wife are among some of my favorite family memories. And now as an annual tradition, when my family asks what I want to do on my birthday, I reply, order sushi and play some family Fortnite.

1:03:08Justin Davis:Once again, last month for my 40th birthday, we sat down and played a single round of Fortnite together after dinner and got a victory royale, the perfect ending to my day. I will also mention the various crossovers in the game like Marvel, Star Wars, etc. led to my son becoming interested in other cultures that I enjoy. Because of this, we started regularly reading comics together and watching movies with much greater frequency. And then years later, when Epic bought Harmonix and integrated their version of Rock Band into one of the Fortnite game modes, it helped expose my son to some of my favorite music as well as exposing me to some of my son's favorite new music.

1:03:37Justin Davis:So I have no idea if your experience with Fortnite will be as positive as it was for my family and me. But if you do give it a try with your son, I hope you both have as much fun as we did. nice end story

1:03:49Daemon Hatfield:that's amazing we've been kind of goofing on live service games a little bit this show but like definitely shows you know the power cross platform multiplayer no barrier to entry just download and play it's very sweet very wholesome

1:04:02Mark Medina:the quickest extracurricular thing I watched the light and magic season the second one yeah and there's an entire episode about the Jar Jar reaction which is like an amazing documentary to watch the internal team at Lucasfilm produce an episode about something about how people the back really critical are. Yeah, like that was it's incredible. Like just watch that. It's like kind of hard to watch.

1:04:25Justin Davis:Yeah, really, really good. Yeah, it's like kind of, you know, it's kind of a bummer watch, but also just super interesting.

1:04:31Mark Medina:And because it's about light and magic, George Lucas is like, you don't need to care about what people say about the character. All they're saying is that it looked realistic.

1:04:39Justin Davis:Yeah. And also, you know, if he really said that They say something like, you know, he said in 20 years, they're going to love it, which is true. It kind of happens.

1:04:46Mark Medina:So yeah, yeah, it's okay. Yeah, I thought it would happen more than it did, but it has happened. And then the other thing is that there's a new Lucas gift shop in San Francisco that just opened the Presidio to like no fanfare, but it's so cool. It's right by the Yoda fountain and they sell wine made just from the vines at Skywalker Ranch.

1:05:06Justin Davis:Oh, cool.

1:05:07Mark Medina:Just brought home a bottle of wine made at Skywalker Ranch. It's like, there's not a lot of vines there. It's really cool.

1:05:14Justin Davis:Anyway. Okay. John Peacock says, P.S. In 2024, I submitted a list of 20 question game suggestions on behalf of my son, Lowell, who is now 13. Jedi Survivor was selected, which the crew got in 20 questions. Wow. At the risk of being greedy, I will submit my favorite redacted that has never been on the show. Redacted. And as Sam and Justin will surely want to know, I'm from Milwaukee, Wisconsin. him. I've been listening to GameScoop since year one of the podcast.

1:05:40Mark Medina:Nice.

1:05:41Justin Davis:And with that, let the questioning begin.

1:05:43Mark Medina:Great show at X-Ray Arcade in Milwaukee this summer. It was really fun. I love that.

1:05:46Justin Davis:Milwaukee's a great city.

1:05:49Daemon Hatfield:We got good hints from that redacted, so I appreciate that. We also lost last

1:05:54Mark Medina:week, so we need to... Oh, rip.

1:05:56Daemon Hatfield:Okay. Okay. We'll be serious. Did this come out in the 70s, 80s, or 90s? Yes. Great.

1:06:02Mark Medina:Can you see your butt in this game? No.

1:06:06Daemon Hatfield:oh okay it's golden eye maybe it's golden eye yeah yeah but you can see your butt if you were screen sniping like your multiplayer opponent you don't you can't see your butt in starcraft that's true we don't know who you are in starcraft you're the commander um you're buttless okay did this game come out in the 90s no

1:06:28Sam Claiborn:wait you already asked that you said 70 80s and 90s yeah but he asked about the 90s specifically

1:06:33Mark Medina:because the answer was yes the 70s 80s or 90s oh it was oh okay

1:06:40Daemon Hatfield:okay let's see 70s but how many games can you not see your butt from the 70s and 80s

1:06:45Mark Medina:well if you're in a helicopter you can't see a vehicle could be spy hunter you don't see your button that i want to put that on a shirt could be spy hunter you don't see your button that

1:07:01Justin Davis:uh did this game come out on the nes yes sweet yes it was also an arcade game at some point yes

1:07:10Daemon Hatfield:it was that's five well it's by hunters alive yes uh are you are you most prime are you controlling a vehicle mostly in this game yes okay that's why that's why you can't see your butt could be cobra triangle is that in arcades blaster

1:07:32Mark Medina:that's the boat game right that's a cool one yeah blaster master was not in arcades

1:07:40Sam Claiborn:this is my blind era was this developed

1:07:44Justin Davis:in the United States

1:07:46Daemon Hatfield:was it developed in the United States no does this game take place in is this a sci-fi game no it's not a space you're not in a spaceship it's not life force or Gradius

1:08:03Mark Medina:we determined you are in a vehicle for most of the time

1:08:06Daemon Hatfield:probably like a plane is it a drivey car no it's not a car not a car not a spaceship could be Cobra could still be Cobra okay I mean is it an airplane yes and that's 10 B-17 bomber 1941, 1942 Capcom Is this a Capcom game? No But an airplane game Could be what Space Harrier You definitely see your butt in that Afterburner Not on NES No you're right I was thinking 80s That might have been 89 I don't know

1:08:46Mark Medina:Well maybe Afterburner was on the NES Maybe it got boarded

1:08:49Daemon Hatfield:I don't think Afterburner was on the NES was it? I don't know.

1:08:55Mark Medina:It could have been a black cartridge game eventually.

1:08:57Daemon Hatfield:Really? Isn't Afterburner made by Sega?

1:08:59Mark Medina:Yeah, but says Vindicators, or not Vindicators, sorry. There's a series of Sega games that made it onto the... What's the one called?

1:09:10Daemon Hatfield:That's an interesting bit of trivia there.

1:09:16Daemon Hatfield:Okay, NES and Arcade. Was this made by Sega? No. NES and

1:09:23Mark Medina:arcade airplane games time pilot i don't think that came to nes i would also call time pilot a sci-fi game i think yeah i don't think i i there i would know if there's an nes port is this is it'd be top down or side scrolling yeah that'd be helpful is this top down no So side scrolling and tailspin as a Capcom game

1:09:49Justin Davis:You may have just narrowed it down to exactly one game Yeah I was going to say

1:09:54Mark Medina:Yeah I think so

1:10:00Mark Medina:I think it could be like like a really well I'm trying to think of like it could be like a really early arcade game

1:10:11Daemon Hatfield:Side scrolling plane game plane game I don't know I don't have an NES mind palace the way that Sam does yeah well is this based on a license

1:10:25Mark Medina:no I thought maybe it'd be like a they'd ported some movie to that

1:10:33Daemon Hatfield:how many questions do we have you have five questions and a guess okay yeah so probably made in Japan

1:10:46Daemon Hatfield:it came out of arcades there wasn't a lot of side scrolling

1:10:51Mark Medina:shooter things there's that game Stinger but I think you're like a little spaceship in that right

1:10:56Daemon Hatfield:yeah I was thinking about Xevious until I found out it was side scrolling

1:11:02Mark Medina:Stinger is so cute is that Konami?

1:11:07Daemon Hatfield:I can't picture Stinger

1:11:09Mark Medina:you're like a little ship with like you can shoot and stuff but you have like for some reason like boxing gloves it's a good little cute series

1:11:20Justin Davis:alright five questions and a guess

1:11:22Daemon Hatfield:I know we're trying Damon I don't even know like I said I don't have a great NES I know a lot of NES games but not the whole library

1:11:34Mark Medina:I don't even know if it was developed in Japan but I presume it was I presume it was is this company still around yes that's 15 is it konami nope so capcom we already asked if it

1:11:50Daemon Hatfield:was capcom yeah we asked about capcom and sega but namco namco would be let's see let's think of the namco games i mean i like you know i can't think of any plane like dig dug pack fan yeah Rally X. Stupid. Mappy.

1:12:10Mark Medina:I mean, Nintendo. I was thinking about if there was a Nintendo game. Is it Pilotwings? Not Balloon Fight or... They actually have this... Okay, this is not the game, but they have a game called Sky Pilot or something like that that they made that didn't come to the NES.

1:12:29Daemon Hatfield:Yeah, maybe it is. maybe would Nintendo make a flying arcade game? Not that I, I mean, maybe. I don't know. Am I going to be mad if I can't recall what this is? I can't think of the Nintendo situation. Is it made by Nintendo or Namco? Yes. Two questions of the yes. Maybe regret phrasing that question that way.

1:13:03Mark Medina:I think it's a Namco game. I'm just having trouble figuring out what that is. Yeah.

1:13:10Mark Medina:I mean, I can't remember who made Time Pilot at this point. But that's not really side-scrolling. That's kind of like on a single screen, right?

1:13:20Daemon Hatfield:What else did Namco make? Yeah, I can only think of their early NES games. I don't know what they were up to.

1:13:29Justin Davis:in like the late 80s is namco is namco one question and a guess okay

1:13:46there's these games that are like i'm trying to think of even the names of them they're like

1:13:53Mark Medina:you know they're about like prop planes like red red baron is a is a

1:13:59Daemon Hatfield:Yeah, yeah, but it's not. Yeah.

1:14:05Mark Medina:And then there's like.

1:14:09Mark Medina:Yeah, I might not know what the game is because it's like so it was so unappealing.

1:14:18Mark Medina:It's probably a game about flying called like High Flyer or something, but I'm thinking it still could be like World War Two themed, you know, or World War One themed or bombing or strafing or something like that.

1:14:28Daemon Hatfield:They did Namco. They were all, like, they were Galaxian and Galaga and, you know, all those. What did they do that wasn't sci-fi? Because they were Zevious, too. That was Namco.

1:14:38Mark Medina:And side-scrolling, which is interesting, right? Yeah. Yeah. I don't know if we know this one.

1:14:46Justin Davis:All right. Time to land this thing. Yeah.

1:14:51Sam Claiborn:I'm out.

1:14:52Daemon Hatfield:I was never in. Is it? what were the is it like with the namco museum trying to picture games that were in that I don't even know if this game was in that yeah um yeah

1:15:08Mark Medina:I don't really know where to go do like I just I'm kind of curious if it was a world war two game but I don't think so all right yeah I don't know I don't know I give up

1:15:21Justin Davis:does everyone give up yeah Yeah, yeah. Well, you came very, very close. I believe this is a World War I game. Like I said, this is the only side-scrolling game where you fly an airplane that I can think of on the NES. And what's even more interesting is that the screen scrolls from right to left. What? It is Sky Kid. Sky Kid, yeah.

1:15:44Mark Medina:I was trying to think of that name because I could picture like there's these kind of generic-sounding games like that.

1:15:50Daemon Hatfield:This is weird going the other way.

1:15:52Mark Medina:why are you going this direction i don't like it it's a little bit like a prop plane you always have to pick up a bomb and then drop it on target i wouldn't have thought of this as a uh as a as

1:16:02Justin Davis:arcade game either i thought it was came out arcades in 86 came to the nes in 87 yeah i don't know this game looks goofy developed by some by namco and then published on the nes by sunsoft actually i just thought it was interesting this was his favorite nes game yeah it looks fun Sam, do you have a copy of this in your house? Absolutely.

1:16:23Mark Medina:This is a dollar bin game that everybody has.

1:16:25Justin Davis:The box art has a guy. Let's see if they show it. At the end, there's like... Anyway, the box art has a pilot, like a World War II fighter pilot. You're actually a bird, as you can see at the top of the screen. Oh, yeah, you sure are. You're actually like a bird man.

1:16:40Mark Medina:But the art in the United States was a man-man.

1:16:43Justin Davis:Yeah, but the arcade flyers showed birds. Yeah, that's really funny. The United States was ready for bird man. Some corrections. Cobra Triangle was a rare game just made for NES, not in arcades. And Afterburner came to NES alongside Alien Syndrome by... Alien Syndrome. That's what I was trying to think of. Tengen. Tengen published them on the NES. Yes.

1:17:03Daemon Hatfield:I did not know Afterburner was on the NES. I don't think I've ever seen the NES version of it. Yeah, it's a black cart Tengen.

1:17:10Justin Davis:Well, nicely attempt. Thank you for the suggestion, John Peacock. Viewers, listeners, if you have your own suggestions for Video Game 20 Questions, email them to me at the email address gamescoop at iGin.com and that is all the scoops that we have for you this week thank you Mark, thank you Sam, thank you Justin thank you to Jobert working behind the scenes to make this episode possible. My name is Damon this is iGin Gamescoop and of course there's the pickles

1:17:35Sam Claiborn:I've been waiting an hour to say that

1:17:39Justin Davis:I shook you in my dream as hard as I can stand When I stopped you fell away Pockets full of sand Waking up a world away Cutting through the air 7 ,000 miles to kill I'll see you when I'm there i've been modified i've been modified well i guess it was worth a try but i've been modified

1:18:32Sam Claiborn:which one's no time to die is that the most recent one like the okay have you seen it mark

1:18:38Justin Davis:yes i have um so james bond just gets blown up by a bunch of missiles that's how he goes out yeah

1:18:44Daemon Hatfield:yeah okay and like i thought because i i knew i knew that he died in it but i had i'd never seen it i've never watched it and so i thought that they'd like leave it slightly ambiguous and it's like no you see it you see him get blown to bits yeah yeah they so went out of their way to just make it completely like there's no wink like ah maybe it's like nah he dead i don't know i mean look i didn't i didn't love it but i liked it i thought i thought the bad guy lair was like really good like a really cool evil guy lair who's the back is that rami malek yeah okay i didn't know

1:19:22Sam Claiborn:skyfall is javier bardem right yeah yeah i like that one yeah i like skyfall it is funny it's

1:19:30Daemon Hatfield:like people really like the daniel craig bond era but in hindsight it's like there's five movies

1:19:35Sam Claiborn:you know two of them are very good casino royale and skyfall yeah yeah quantum of solace is quantum of solace is terrible terrible i definitely didn't see all five but i can't keep it straight

1:19:47Daemon Hatfield:yeah i mean what's the fifth one what am i what am i missing uh uh specter oh yeah specter see that's what i mean it's like people like people are like oh yeah i like the this era of bond but it's like yeah but like the batting average it's two out of five are good although i like no time to die but i like look i understand why people don't like it i like it because i think they leveled up the action and i think um i think james bond action had been kind of like outclassed by like john wick in movies like that for a long time and this one like the anadarmus uh uh action sequence in cuba i thought was like really well choreographed and there's a really good one where he's like fighting his way up the stairs that felt very modern at the end of the movie

1:20:31Sam Claiborn:so i don't know i liked it they just went too hard with casino royale too hard out the gate i do like that one i watched them they could never live up to it it's just too good i watched

1:20:43Daemon Hatfield:all five because they're all on netflix so i watched all five of them the last couple weeks quantum of solace is terrible it's like terrible it's actively bad is that the second one yeah that's yeah that's the second one first of all it's incredibly low like and i don't need every movie to be like the the world is gonna end but like it's incredibly low stakes like nothing that's happening in that movie matters it's like the bad guy's plan is just to steal water he's just trying to steal the water in Bolivia and that's it

1:21:12Sam Claiborn:yeah that one they pushed up the release date of Pragmata they did April 17th now I just like that they that card that they kept using for all their delays they got to use it for pushing it up now

1:21:25Daemon Hatfield:yeah we regret to inform you you can play our game earlier like I'm still not done ranting about Quantum of Solace like the bad guy is stupid and not intimidating he's like just a little dweeb Yep. And, you know, and, and, but the real sin is that it does. And granted, this is a, this is an artifact of when it came out, but it does that like shaky cam, like none of the action is comprehensible at all. It's all just, you know, cut the camera every second and it's all shaking everywhere. And I'm like, this sucks.

1:21:56Sam Claiborn:Yeah. That's the born movies. I've tried to go back and watch them because it's also Batman begins the same way. I just I love Matt Damon and the born. I love the original born identity. Yeah, when we were younger. And so but they're they're unwatchable.

1:22:14Daemon Hatfield:I never watched this for the last one, like the the one where they brought him back. I didn't ever see that one.

1:22:24Daemon Hatfield:So what is this guy doing? I haven't been watching.

1:22:27Mark Medina:He's showing off some sort of I can snatch things.

1:22:30Sam Claiborn:it's like he's trying to are they just is he trying to get them to just land no he's just trying to

1:22:36Mark Medina:snatch them really fast oh and he's trying to not not knock over the other okay that was

1:22:44Sam Claiborn:fast holy shit okay it's pretty fast

1:22:51Daemon Hatfield:I hadn't I hadn't oh he's pissed yeah get it together

1:22:58Sam Claiborn:bro this is this is your thing me sitting there with a full bag of doritos what a loser yeah it's

1:23:05Daemon Hatfield:me watching the olympics every time i'm like you suck i i like how you know when you sit down to

1:23:10Mark Medina:watch a video needed to explain to you say what's happening here jobert's description was he's very

1:23:15Daemon Hatfield:fast yep nothing more needs to be said joe joe you should have been on sega's marketing team

1:23:22Sam Claiborn:You fucking nailed it.

1:23:27Mark Medina:This is the kind of thing, though, where since you have never actually tried this, if you were to try this, you would probably be just as good as this guy. I don't know, man. He just thinks he's very fast.

1:23:37Daemon Hatfield:I don't know. It seemed pretty fast.

1:23:40Sam Claiborn:Well, I'm pretty slow. I can admit it. All right, that's squared away. Jesus. That's crazy fast. this might be the best one yet

1:23:54Mark Medina:it's very fast

1:23:57Justin Davis:it's better than the girls that are trying to inhale cockroaches

1:24:00Mark Medina:but maybe he'd be faster than them thanks I had just forgotten about that I missed that one

1:24:07Daemon Hatfield:oh yeah well don't look it up I won't

1:24:10Mark Medina:you should look it up actually you know what we all have to be on the same page with how bad and terrible it was to watch that

1:24:18Sam Claiborn:The last one I saw was the shopping carts one.

1:24:22Mark Medina:Imagine instead of pushing shopping carts, people were pushing cockroaches into your mouth.

1:24:27Daemon Hatfield:There's also an element of like, you know, when he puts them really close to frame like that, like it makes it look faster. There's like a perspective trick almost.

1:24:37Mark Medina:What about his weird little flinches before he does the attack? It's like, I see my cat do that.

1:24:43Daemon Hatfield:Yeah.

1:24:44Justin Davis:Justin, have you played Resident Evil yet? No, and I will not. Ah. But I have played Pocopia. Okay. I'll ask you about that. I did the spider battle last night. It was annoying, but it only took me one time. Oh, it's not freaky. It's freaky.

1:24:58Mark Medina:That's only yeah, that battle is not difficult. It's just it's almost QT. I mean, there's hard to get where you're on the building.

1:25:06Sam Claiborn:But yeah, I don't I don't remember having too much trouble with it.

1:25:09Mark Medina:But yeah, it's funny. It's funny how surprising the spider is. You gave me the right. You're really good at surprising you. but yeah it's also like popular right now because of how she lob like that spider is like I

1:25:22Sam Claiborn:can I can handle like Resident Evil 2 moving the dude's head and it's like jaw comes off but that's yeah

1:25:27Mark Medina:what who's in that's like one of that's

1:25:30Sam Claiborn:like one of the oh I know you could go to a skeleton it's like it appears his jaw is missing

1:25:37Mark Medina:the spider is also a reference to Resident Evil 2 right

1:25:40Justin Davis:well there were spiders but not a giant spider like that what do you mean They weren't that big and they just crawl around the sewers and they only take a shot or two from your shotgun.

1:25:51Mark Medina:Okay, but they're bigger than a dog.

1:25:53Justin Davis:Yes.

1:25:54Mark Medina:All right. Those are big spiders too.

1:25:57Daemon Hatfield:Yeah.

1:25:57Mark Medina:They did grow up by this game.

1:26:00Daemon Hatfield:What were the things in the lickers were in the original resident evil in the sewers? Yeah, those were in this game too. I hated those fuckers. Didn't the lickers start in Resident Evil 2? I don't think so. I think they're in, well, they're in remake. that's the last Resident Evil I played was Resident Evil remake

1:26:15Mark Medina:they're basically zombies that crawl around but they also are blind it's funny

1:26:20Justin Davis:if you're slow and quiet they won't know you're there

1:26:23Mark Medina:but this game places a strategically placed broken glass on the ground and it's very mean I wish I could talk about Crimson Desert this episode is brought to you by Athletic Brewing Company no matter how you do game day on the couch, in the crowd or manning the snack table athletic brewing fits right in with a full lineup of non-alcoholic beer styles you can enjoy bold flavors all game long no hangovers no buzz no subbing out for water in the second half stock the fridge for tip-off with a variety of non-alcoholic craft styles available at your local grocery store or online at athleticbrewing.com your beer fit for all times