Guardians of The Galaxy, Deus Ex Studio in Trouble - Kinda Funny Games Daily 12.03.25

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1:53Solo Leveling Arise Overdrive, the fast-paced action RPG based on the popular solo leveling franchise, has just been released. Head on over to Steam to begin Sungjinu's epic journey to become Shadow Monarch today. Today's stories include Eidos Montreal lays off staff, Kojima is giving a keynote at GDC, and Saudi Arabia will own 93 % of EA. We'll have all this and more because this is Kinda Funny Games Daily.

2:31yo what's up welcome to kind of funny games daily for wednesday december 3rd 2025 one of your hosts blessing at aia jr joining me is the lacroix poppy tim mo boy gettys it's been one of them ones bless yeah you know what i mean yeah it's just it's just crazy it's one of those it's been one of those mornings where as i've been building kfgd i was like oh no here we go it's got worse and worse it's a lot of a lot of bad news it's just like why what are we doing here yeah at least kojima's doing something cool i guess a keynote yeah right with your super chats that's what i need yeah give us something to talk about here stuff to talk about even but there was a a a positive negative discussion i do want to have real quick okay and it's something that happens often in our field of work but i feel like there are certain certain like lightning rod tentpole moments when certain games come out from certain publishers that just cause people to go insane and like maybe it's just because i reviewed metroid prime 4 yesterday that my entire life's algorithm has just been the most insane people with the most insane thoughts left right and I don't understand.

3:42Like, I don't understand how people can not get that everyone has a different opinion. And like, I didn't see a single Metroid Prime 4 review yesterday. Not a single one. And I read a ton of them. I watched a ton of videos. I didn't see a single one that I was like, they're off base. Yeah. Whether it was high, whether it was low, I think the numbers just drive people insane. And it's like Eurogamer gave it a three out of five. VGC gave it a three out of five. But then people are calling that a 60 out of 100, which feels so different. You know? Giant Bomb gave it 100 out of 100. No, they didn't.

4:17They gave it a 5 out of 5. Hey, that's perfect. It's a perfect video game. No, it's not. It's a 10 out of 100. On their scale. It's a million out of – they gave it a million out of a million. Tim, are you saying we should abolish numbers and math? Because I'm with you. I'll be behind that. Just blow it all up. You know what I mean? Just blow it all up. It's just funny, man. There's just always – there has to be conversation on conversation. And look, we're literally having the conversation here. I get it. We're part of it. But I just think that there's a due diligence to playing a game and like putting your opinion into a way that people can understand how you feel about the thing that all the people that reviewed the game yesterday did.

4:53And like an 8 out of 10 is a great score. Oh, dude, it was fun. It was so fun. Like watching chat as like Logan gave it an 8 out of 10. You gave it a 9 out of 10. Two very close, like closest you can be without being the same score. And we would have swore Logan hated the game. Exactly. And it's crazy, too, because it's like, I get it. Like, I understand that a Metroid Prime game getting an eight is a big deal. And it's like the difference between an eight and a nine there for a Metroid Prime game is sizable. Like, and it's something we're talking about. That's what we did. We talked about it, right?

5:25And it's just so funny. And, you know, overall, I feel like people have been pretty cool about our review. But seemingly every other review out there, like, the crazies are out. The crazies are on the internet. The crazies are always out, though. I know. I noticed this with, like, every review, where I'm like, man, where are people on? If you're watching a review, here's my thing. Here's what I'll say. You don't have to watch reviews, guys. You don't have to care about reviews. If you don't like, like, hearing other people's opinion or hearing numbers or whatever, you don't even need to look at Metacritic.

5:55You don't need to care what anybody else thinks about a video game but yourself. The thing that, like, really confuses me is I understand people wanting to listen to this because they're excited for these games. or they're interested in these games whatever it is i love this shit like i just said i probably listened to three hours worth of metroid prime 4 reviews yesterday like i and i beat i myself played it but i was interested in hearing other people's thoughts like there is so much value and entertainment in the content people are making there but the amount of people that legitimately think that game journalists and media are trying to tank the metacritic score well here's the thing right you give it an eight out of ten and then people are going to lose their jobs that's the critics fault you know what i mean that's all on fucking logan it's just or whoever it's just it's it's so tim there are a lot of fantasy critic teams on the line like how could you that's true how could you fantasy critic it's a net positive you know what i mean like it's a net positive here but also it has made me i think it works yeah and it's like i don't know if it's net positive it's a fun thing but it is i think there is a warped framework people now have with uh with fantasy but also that was before fantasy critic like people always fair but i think it's i think it emboldens it a little bit emboldens me because here's the thing you're gonna tell me that to a t actually no i didn't have to a t on my thing because that was greg's i got that in a different league you're gonna tell me that wander stop was in a 90 the wonder stop we gotta be real about what we're giving games on the scores all right you play wonders up no i don't give a fuck about one or stop but i had it on my thing i had it on my fantasy critic and so guys we gotta be better but this is the bullshit that you're spouting right now at least it's coming from somewhere with like an end goal yeah you know what i mean you are trying to win a game i'm trying to win a meta game that ultimately i don't care about that much people do care about video game reviews and all this shit way too much and like i get it i care about conversation i care about art i care about opinions like i'm i understand a certain side of it where you want to be in the discussion about like what a game that is coming out that you care about is doing but at the end of the day there's got to be a line where it's like it can't care that deeply it's it man it's i remember when jeff gerstman gave legend of zelda twilight princess an 8.8 at game spot and it felt this way it felt the way of whoa not even a nine like a new the zelda game that we've been waiting for this is the one after wind waker this is the one that when the trailer dropped we all fucking cried and it's just an 8.8 you know what i mean and it's like this review entirely backed that up yeah and it's like then you look at other reviews that other people are higher some people were lower whatever it is but game spot giving that game at that time that score threw people into a tizzy but it's like yeah but that great power great responsibility all that stuff it's just like y 'all need to understand and i'm not talking to y 'all like you get what i'm saying yeah people just need to think through from point a to point z with the whole thing and it reminds me too of the game awards like there's so much game awards conversation going on it's like anybody that's thinking that jeff keely is picking the freaking nominees nobody but grow up people only believe that is conspiracy theory but but that's the thing though yeah is so many people bless do No, but we've lost that war.

9:16You can't speak sense into a masses that is senseless. It is pluribus out there. They're fucking hive mind. My favorite from last year, a newer one I saw when we were reacting to the Game Awards, were some people coming in and being like, why are they acting and pretending they know all of the winners already and shit? It's like, no, that's not how that works, man. That's simply not how that works. And it just, it concerns me because there are people that I would say I respect in the industry that I see on social media saying that Death Stranding 2 is there because Jeff loves. Oh, yeah. And I'm like, oh, yeah, you you're putting that out there.

9:54Like you might be being sarcastic or something, but it doesn't read that way. And I don't think it is that. And that's very concerning to me. Oh, yeah. Listen, there's a deeper conversation we'd have about like how that feeds in into this fucking Internet, like Internet obsession, I guess. Right. Like people are just too online and they believe things that they read that are just like coming from places of trying to deceive people. And people believe shit because we're too online. Let's go outside. Let's touch grass. And let's also not care that much about people's opinions on things. Because like if I came to Tim and I was like, hey, Tim, how do you feel about Fairly Odd Parents?

10:28And Tim was like, you know, I think it's great. Not amazing. I'm not going to be like, fuck you, Tim. You fucking what agenda do you have? Like, no, it's like I came to you for your opinion. y 'all are doing the same thing when you watch reviews when you read reviews give cut people some slack that's the that's the moral of the story cut people some slack because we got a heavy kfc so let's get into it remember this is kind of funny games daily each and every week day we run you through the nerdy how do you feel about fairly out parents i loved it okay good you're safe the nerdy news you need to know about live on youtube twitch and on podcast services around the globe if you love what we do support us with the kind of funny membership on patreon on youtube spotify and apple podcast to get all of our shows ad free watch us record them live and get a daily exclusive show for a chance to be a part of the show some of your thoughts and opinions as youtube super chats as we go housekeeping for you we're an 11 person business all about live talk shows so today after kfgd you're gonna get games cast that's a lie you're gonna get in review before games cast that's kind of a lie you're getting a screencast it's it's interesting so like because here's obviously we have kind of funny in review where we rank review and recap different movie franchises but then there's just a lot of times where it's like it's we're just talking about movies and tv stuff but like we have screencasts but it's all on the in review feed it gets a little messy we're talking about movies we're talking about our most anticipated 2026 movies and i'm very excited because we got some bangers bangers coming up next year fingers crossed when are we getting the avengers movie next year no shot you guess what else we get do find a man brand new day no and dune no way dune 3 oh that's exciting yeah man and the odyssey Stay tuned for screencasts.

12:03This isn't going to happen because I keep making promises to myself that I'll never keep. But I want to make next year. I want to try to make next year the year where I watch a lot more movies. Not just new movies. I want to watch old movies. No, I like that for you. I just want to watch fucking movies. You know what could guarantee that, Bless? Because I know there's an in-review a lot of people have been asking for that I think you should be on. It's called Shrek in Review. Oh, dude. Shrek in Review. If you ever do that. And that new Shrek movie, Tim. It's coming. Is that next year? No. It got delayed.

12:30No. god bless i promise you when the time comes we will do shrek and review they just keep pushing this thing listen shrek and review that's calling my name i love you there's gonna be a fight for who's on shrek and review that's hilarious dude i need to be on shrek i fucking love shrek as a kid um oh i also wanted to shout out um of course we announced this yesterday i want to reiterate it today the inaugural kind of funny games daily awards is happening kind of funny games daily is literally nothing without the hard work of an entire industry so we're going to celebrate the people who make the news each and every day nominate your favorite sites authors and stories at kind of funny.com slash awards so we can show some love before the end of the year that's kind of funny.com slash awards and so like we mentioned uh after kfg is in review slash games the slash screencast uh which is our most anticipated movies of 2026 after that is gamescast which is our octopath traveler zero review then the stream is elden ring night rain getting ready for the dlc if you're a kind of funny member today's greg ways about the relief of finally being able to talk about an embargoed video game thank you to our patreon producers carl jacobs omega buster and delaney the psalm twining for now let's begin with what is and forever will be the roper report it's time for some news we have six stories today a baker's dozen starting with our number one uh this is a report from game developer embracer owned idos montreal lays off staff this is from diego arguello deus x and marvel's guardians of the galaxy developer idos montreal is reportedly laying off staff for the second time this year According to a report by Insider Gaming published yesterday, the Embracer-owned studio has laid off at least a dozen employees.

14:21Quote, I was hit by the recent Eidos layoffs, so I'm looking for a new design leadership role and would appreciate your support, reads a LinkedIn post from one impacted employee. Quote, Eidos Montreal got served with one of those Mondays. We had to part ways with some incredible talent due to gestures at everything, said a current worker at the studio last week before listing and vouching for 12 employees. neither idos montreal nor embracer has acknowledged the reported job cuts publicly back in april this year the developer laid off 75 workers the reason being that one of its mandates had come to an end at the time the studio also added that the cuts weren't a reflection of the dedication or skills of its staff according to sources speaking to insider gamer or insider gaming most projects at the studio have reportedly been canceled now it seems to focus for idos Montreal to keep on supporting Microsoft and Xbox on games like Grounded 2 and Fable.

15:18Well, there's also another internal project that started development in 2019, which sources say has no way of recouping its current costs, continues the report. Once those projects are finalized, additional staff reductions are already forecasted, said the sources to Insider Gaming. It never ends. And it just sucks that it just becomes the same story over and over. and it just becomes a gesture at everything. And it's like, man, what is the everything? And we could look at it and we're like, it's a bunch of shareholders and it's a bunch of people that are looking at just numbers and names on the spreadsheet.

15:52They're not thinking about the names, right? How do we make number go up? It is by cutting people out. And we're just cutting and cutting and cutting and really at a certain point. And I feel like we're there already. What's left? Like how many teams are even left? When we're talking about the Eidos Montreal's a couple of weeks ago, Crystal Dynamics, Like we're talking about these big studios that are so key and important to the industry. And they are slowly disappearing. Like at what point is Idos Montreal just completely gone? Right now it's support. Idos Montreal is going to be support. Which like, I know that doesn't mean it's completely gone.

16:27But in my heart already like that means it's completely gone. I mean we think of like how many times have we told the story of the Activision situations with their teams. where they had so many dozens it felt like of talented teams making different projects and then all of a sudden call of duty becomes a hit and it just becomes call of duty map makers over and over and over and we lost so much talent in original ideas and i mean even non-original ideas just non call of duty ideas right yeah and now you see this it's happening here too and it's like you look at crystal dynamics and it's like are we ever going to see this tomb raider game it's been years and it's like you look at big layoffs yeah i just did and it's like crazy to think about it where that list of games that we were kind of looking forward to the wonder woman iron man james bond uh tomb raider and i mean black panther was one of black cancer right of all the ones i just named half of them are canceled yeah right and like it seems like james bond is actually going to come out yep that's semi-surprising to me but yeah i mean i then i think that one is even less surprising just because that's a studio that's not owned by a bigger conglomerate right like they uh not that square enix is known for shutting all this shit down but i feel like when we're getting into these conversations it's a lot of these studios that are owned by publishers or owned by bigger corporations that are looking at that bottom line and looking at these teams and teams like the amount of teams they own and go okay well we have some games are successful we have some games that are moderately successful and like at a certain point success doesn't even matter anymore yeah let's cut shit right like we got to figure out how to make that line continually go up because because we're a big company we have big expectations for where we need money to go yeah and that that continues to happen and here we are looking at this deus ex oh man don't get me started those games love deus ex those games are loved yeah those games did well those games sold well they reviewed well they are talked about with reverence if a new one was announced people would be excited as many people as a call of duty no yeah not even close how could you expect that yeah what i mean and like maybe call of duty might be too big of a thing to bring up it's like well then what are we talking about here i mean their previous game being guardians of the galaxy which i loved a game that a lot of people really liked obviously like the best game in the world no but like a game that i don't think anybody would be like this game's trash you know what i mean like either it was okay or good or great like i feel like people rotating that and at the very least i think if they made a guardians of the galaxy 2 they could have really made it shine and made it an even better game that would have done better as far as numbers and all that stuff but i remind me i don't know i don't remember clearly but i feel like it probably underperformed probably yeah also it came out at the worst time imaginable and following up avengers the game which like yeah baggage to all of it that was that was also the era where every western release square nx had always they always said this didn't hit our expectations so and that all that started the whole like what are your expectations for video games avengers though is like a really good one to point out in the story of guardians of the galaxy because like i think if avengers wasn't as bad as it was i think guardians would have had a lot more hype going adventures was crystal dynamics yeah like there's just so many factors there like wow you fucked up the avengers brand for video games and crystal dynamics hot off of three banger tomb raiders to some extent banger right yeah yeah and guardians of the galaxy is such an interesting one where it's like i truly feel like it is one of the games that i would put down as like a hidden gem you know it is one of those games that like i don't know a single person that's played it in recent years that hasn't been like what the hell why didn't people love this game you know and that's so sad that like yeah we're never gonna get a guardians 2 and like that makes sense to some extent given where we're at with superheroes and video games and all of that but at the same time how did we get here and how do we get to the point that now the idos montreal is a support team helping out grounded too yeah no no shade to grounded too but i mean no shade to that because like there's been a lot of microsoft um their teams have been doing that a lot right as far as having support studios namely i believe crystal dynamics is doing the same thing with perfect dark which got canceled was yeah perfect dark that's another one of them right yeah and like i when that when that first started happening i could see a bit of that vision of okay cool like you got this big game that you're working on you have a studio that's available to help you out with this thing while they're doing their own individual you know projects and stuff yeah work together that's cool to see microsoft partnering with these i forget if there were square enix at the time or this is always like post square enix but seeing microsoft partner with these non-microsoft studios to make these games cool to see where we're at now where it's like i like fucking perfect dark isn't happening that then leads to layoffs at crystal dynamics we're at a place where we're getting layoffs at ados montreal which i like it's hard to pinpoint exactly where how we got here i don't want to just blame xbox or whatever because i'm sure there's many different factors here but yeah like it feels like it all kind of fell apart in a way that it shouldn't in a way that you hate to see i guess you really hate to see it yeah and the support studio conversation is very interesting because a couple days ago was it weeks ago time is crazy right now for me um nintendo acquired uh what was formerly their bandai namco kind of support studio which is now nintendo singapore and that really felt like a like lateral move like the numbers that it was sold for and stuff were not astronomically high and it really kind of just felt like uh oh nintendo just made this purchase to keep the team so that they can keep supporting the projects or else this was going to happen to bandai namco singapore yeah and like the writing was on the wall so nintendo had to come in and be like hey we're essentially purchasing this just to be able to make sure that the people that we have helping us aren't gone yeah they can continue to do that and that's a terrifying position for these support studios to be in that unless there is a company out there that sees the value and is like we need you you're not needed yeah tough shit man real tough um let's move on to story number two kojima is going to deliver gdc's first keynote in five years at the gdc festival of gaming as they're calling festival gaming fucking alphabet and glinda are there uh this comes directly from a press release gdc festival gaming is proud to announce that acclaimed creator and studio founder Hideo Kojima will headline the event with a keynote address reflecting on the bold leap to establish Kojima Productions 10 years ago titled restarting from zero a message to creators considering independence the keynote marks GDC's first in five years and signals the event's transformation into the GDC festival of gaming a global gathering for the full game making ecosystem returning to San Francisco March 9th through the 13th 2026 it's fucking cool man I I love keynotes.

23:39Yeah? You're a big keynote guy? Hell yeah, dude. Give people an opportunity to go up there and, like, talk about whatever the hell they want. You know what? I fuck with it, too, actually. I'd watch this. Great information. This might give us headlines for a week. Now, this is what I want, right? Do you think they're going to have Kojima up there with a host? Or do you think it's just going to be Kojima solo dolo? It'll be with a... It'll probably be, I mean, a translator at the very least. Oh, for sure. It's a translator. Yeah. Because, like, I'm... How do we get involved? Yeah. This is in San Francisco.

24:08And if not even in this, how do we get Kojima to stop by? I feel like that is if his schedule allows. Of course. I don't want to say a sure thing. But we got to get in there early. Yeah. Oh, I'm sure Greg's already in his DMs being incredibly annoying. Yeah. We got to find another person aside from Greg that has the connections. Hey. We need somebody who's like more. The man who changed his life. Refined. roger the case maker corny i feel like could be that new connect for us you know i like that we send roger yeah greg did uh it wasn't a actually i think it was a keynote for rtx sydney in 2017 greg did a one-on-one thing with kojima where he run that what you're talking about like he did it and it was great i know people watch this run that back with greg yeah or even if you don't want to go that far roger like barrett mentioned had a big impact on kojima's life i feel like we can't it's true it's true posts about caroline polocheck every other day yes i feel like we can get a roger segment and it could we could feed in into like the the kochima was this a message to creators considering independence restarting from zero i guess that doesn't have anything to do with that but you can look this in into like a creativity conversation where inspiration comes from i like it roger picorny you know he's my inspiration exactly and he's kojima's inspiration yeah just get him on stage for a second is all i'm saying i think that we're really thinking about this the wrong way what's been there done that roger already got the credit yeah we need to send our best we're not sending mike nick scarpino oh yes actually no we are said we should could you imagine what do you think nick would talk to kojima he would ask him a couple questions about metal gear solid 5 because i think that's a game that he actually played right yeah and then he talked about 80s movies but then it would transition to dune the game and then cyberpunk and then heat with sandra bullock heat with sandra i feel like there's something there as far as the matrix game that kojima never made yeah they're probably a very good conversation is nick into the matrix happy not be yeah yeah for sure for sure i mean he's that's not like his thing i associate more with paris than nick but oh yeah paris does love matrix um but yeah everyone like you should check this out it's like still really good uh the definitive interview with greg miller with hideo kojima wow it's on our youtube channel and this is uh from eight years ago in 2017 which was right before the switch came out and this was one of the first places in the world people could actually play the switch one and oh i remember i know where to glean this yeah i remember this video hold on i'm sending one more video to assets barrett because if y 'all don't know one of the greatest moments in kind of funny history was greg miller playing one two switch before it came out with the day of kojima and they wore little hats little cowboy hats what a life i didn't realize that's where this was was uh what was this pax this is rtx oh wait Oh, never mind.

27:15At first I thought there was a typo in the lower third, but just the F real quick looks like a J.

27:24So silly. Can you imagine doing this with Koji? I'd be shaking. I got him. That's right. He does the revolver Ocelot thing with the joy-con at one point.

27:39Wow. that's wonderful um yeah exciting very exciting stuff i hope they stream this broadcast this i would like to watch i assume they would this is their first one in five years yeah they probably will because they they stream the awards and they stream like the concert series they do yeah yeah they should i mean it's kojima they should stream this so um we're gonna hop into story number three but before we do want to tell you about patreon.com slash kind of funny and youtube.com slash kind of funny games where you can go and get the kind of funny membership which allows you to get shows ad free and speaking of ads let us tell you about our sponsors the wait is over solo leveling arise overdrive the action rpg based on the popular solo leveling franchise is now available on steam as i previously mentioned i'm a huge solo leveling fan and this game comes at the perfect time as everyone is patiently waiting for the next season of the anime but now i can dive into this world and feel what it's like to actually be sungjanoo as he continues to fight to become the strongest hunter and i can even join up to three friends for some co-op raids to defeat incredible bosses and see who really is the best if you don't know the story players will work their way up as sungjanoo an e-rank nobody that no one wants in their raiding party, clawing their way up to becoming the powerful Shadow Monarch.

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33:13We'll be right back. store for availability. This episode is brought to you by State Farm. You know those friends who support your preference for podcasts over music on road trips? That's the energy State Farm brings to insurance. With over 19 ,000 local agents, they help you find the coverage that fits your needs. So you can spend less time worrying about insurance and more time enjoying the ride. Download the State Farm app or go online at statefarm.com. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Honey, did you invite the Minions over? Well, you know how we talked about getting Wi-Fi from Xfinity?

33:48Yeah. I ordered it this morning. It was online in minutes. Then, they showed up. So they just came over to use the Wi-Fi? For what?

33:58Better not to know. Get online in minutes with same-day Wi-Fi from Xfinity. Plus, lock in your price for five years. And see Minions and Monsters only in theaters. Xfinity. Imagine that. Restrictions apply. Not available in all areas. Learn more at xfinity.com slash same day wi-fi and we're back and i was gonna open up super chats until i looked at my laptop and realized that i for some reason closed the tab with the super chats i'm opening it back up though we're gonna talk to you guys i want to have a fun conversation i want to have a back and forth with the audience like i'm back and forth here we go it's loading here we go i thought it'd be faster all right here we go um let's start from the bottom here Jeff Bull Jr.

34:37says off topic but any of you watching Pluribus good stuff I am watching Pluribus I fucking love that show yeah it's a really good show that I'm so fascinated to see how they keep this idea going for seasons of tv it's something that I would have thought that you do in like a movie like one and done kind of thing because it's so like weird and I think tough to build scenarios around but they're fun in ways yeah are you have you haven't watched it Yeah, and it's, I can't wait. I heard a million amazing things about it, but I just, man, stupid baby. Yeah. I'm already blaming everything on her, but it's true.

35:11It's causing so much chaos in my life. I haven't watched Pluribus with you. It'll be a good time. Peter Ropp writes in and says, horses has been removed by Epic Game Store and Humble Store. I am so interested in this saga. One's going to be the end result of this. Yeah, I'm not. It's been one that I've only seen in passing because we brought it up recently um when ign wrote an article about it not being included on steam and like that happening like at the release time i watched alana's video on it and it it sounds from her perspective sounds very concerning yeah um but to me there's just something weird of like now they're all like doing it after steam and especially like reb bringing up yesterday when the news came out she was like we were uh epic game store i think she's like we reviewed it on epic game like we had a code through epic game store and now they're banning it on there and it's yeah uh if you haven't yet you don't understand uh don't know what we're talking about i do recommend uh alana pierce's video on it i do have i can read this verge article and an unsettling indie game about horses keeps getting banned from stores uh this is from ash parish at the verge horses a first-person narrative horror game was banned from epic game store just hours before it was set to launch on december 2nd then a day after launch the humble store banned it as well the decision shocked the developers at santa ragione makers of the critically respected saturnalia as these storefronts were the homes they found for their game two years ago before it was preemptively banned from steam valve and epic says horses violates their sexual content policies humble hasn't yet said why it banned the game after hosting it for several hours post launch However, Santa Rageon claims neither Epic nor Valve has clearly explained what exactly in the game is objectionable and that these decisions have put the studio in peril of shutting down.

37:03The back and forth has catapulted horses from a little known prestige indie title to the next battleground in the fight between game storefronts, indie developers, content policies and creative expression. uh though all of the action kicked off late last month horse's story officially began two years ago in a lengthy faq the developers explained that in 2023 horses was rejected during steam's review process which we talked about um on a previous episode uh of kfc i'm gonna jump forward in the article to see if we can get past all that stuff um in november after santa ragion uh shared horse's release date and the reason why it wouldn't be sold on steam valve finally responded a statement to GameDeveloper.com read, quote, After our team played through the build and reviewed the content, we gave the developer feedback about why we couldn't ship the game on Steam, consistent with our onboarding rules and guidelines.

37:55A short while later, the developer asked us to reconsider the review and our internal content review team discussed that extensively and communicated to the developer our final decision that we were not going to ship the game on Steam, end quote. The studio says that the Steam ban put the company in financial peril as it completely erased our ability to find an external supporting publisher or partner to fund the rest of the game as no one in the industry considers an indie game that cannot be released on steam to be viable though the developer were the developers were able to continue work on horses uh through investments from friends unless the game's a hit they say the studio will shut down what are these horses doing i know that's what i'm trying to find uh So, yeah, the horses are actually people wearing horse masks that are completely naked.

38:42This was at GDC, wasn't it? Yeah, and it's, like, from what I understand, it's, like, it's kind of used as commentary, I think, on, like, labor and shit like that, from what I can parse out from it, not having played it myself. but it gets into some dark stuff. And I, but I think there's a fine line of trying to, um, for these companies trying to like protect, uh, their audiences from, I don't like gratuitous, like shit for, you know, just being like weird and like shitty for no reason versus what this game's trying to do, which is trying to make an adult, like kind of like piece of art having a conversation about society and i think yeah it just sucks that you know it's not these companies aren't letting that happen yeah so like to get back into some of the article that i think helps explain a little bit more as with steam epic didn't explain what in horses triggered the band the band only referring to the policy on inappropriate and hateful slash abusive content and the fact that games rated ao or adults only could not be distributed on epic game store um and then jumping forward paragraph santa ragion is very clear about the kind of content horses contains the lengthy content warning on the game's website lists physical violence psychological abuse gory imagery mutilation blood depictions of slavery physical and psychological torture domestic abuse sexual assault suicide and misogyny it also makes sense that out of an abundance of caution steam would ban the version of the game it saw with the father and daughter scene which i it's a long article so i don't i might have skipped over the father and daughter scene part maybe we'll get back there continuing on quote the scene is not sexual in any way but it is possible that the juxtaposition is what triggered the flag riva told ign but what makes less sense is the platform's refusal to reevaluate the game or at least explain its reasoning quote we believe steam intentionally keeps its policy opaque so it does not have to stand by clear rules and adjust decisions to whatever best serves the platform at any given moment okay there's a lot there yeah this is what i'll say is that i feel like games deserve to have the space to be art and express and have things to say and this is me still not understanding the exact full context but them like even reading the things that they express here right as far as the content warning shit obviously there's a bunch of fucked up shit in the game if they're expressing something that i think is i guess worthy art that is something that feels like you know it is speaking from a place of we have something to say and we're using these elements not just to show off like not just to be like a sexy game not just to be like a you know gratuitously fucked up thing if we're making art here then art should be able to exist on these platforms yeah it's complicated because there's an argument that the other sides aren't too right sure like just just having something to say makes it more valuable art than an art that is just like hey i like naked people sure i and i just feel like to me the big problem here is you got to be clear about what the what the reasoning is you know like if you're gonna have rules you gotta have rules and just tell them what what it is that made it that they're banned from the stores but then they're getting banned from all the other stores it's like well there's something there yeah but i wonder how much of this is coming off of um earlier in the year we had the discussions about like the fucking um payment processing companies cracking down on certain things and like that leading to possible censorship and all that stuff i don't know it's a whole big conversation that i think we're going to keep continue having um in the industry i just i just wanted to end in a place where it's agreeable i want art to exist in art to be able to feel like he can go there right and obviously to your point you know what where is the line as far as sex and sex being a thing where it is like this is purely for people to enjoy the sex of it or this is sex that's saying something right like that's a weird it's a weird line to make it is and who gets to make that decision yeah who gets to make that decision not me i'll tell you that yeah i don't know either i don't i don't want to be the person to make this decision um more super chats for you junior sherman 67 says tim do i get metroid dread or prime 4 man dread dread dread hey real talk metroid dread's awesome and like in the wake of me playing metroid prime 4 i i keep thinking about metroid dread i'm also thinking about metroid prime 4 i i think the answer is prime 4 i think that you should play prime four and i i think that if you're going to fall in love with it want to play more i think it's better to do prime four and then dread instead of the other way i think dread even just the timeline of the story of samus of where she is the prime series are more like prequels they're like kind of in between some of the earlier games dread's at the very end of the timeline um and i think that that is really showcased well in the game via her moveset and the way that the game kind of functions with a lot of the like the slide and the parry and all that stuff and just how fucking badass samus is samus has never been and probably will never be as badass as she was in dread she's so fucking cool she was really cool she's so fucking cool and she's cool in prime 4 but she's like literally maybe one fourth as cool as she isn't metroid dread um mr straight fire says blessings right i stand by the fact that playstation all-star battle royale is nine out of ten i've never i've never loved a 74 on meta as much revisit guys i love that the start of like oh yeah you know lessons right who cares about review opinions but also everybody revisit playstation all-stars battle royale i respect it i won't um let's see here gear brightson and says i went or oh friday went to one more time daft punk tribute dope cool i love that i'm slowly turning this into like a daft punk channel hell yeah with all these daft punk things i was listening to this morning good face to face man uh omglx says how long before we re-christian re-christen roger as rojima i hate that think about it let us know how i feel about it let us think in come and think about it nightlife 2025 says did roger quiet quit that's the big question that's the conversation we're having yeah i think we can get him back if we can you know get him in for this uh kojima thing you know yeah i think so too bander sn says get rid of scores and switch to beef carcass ratings bonanza is a prime prime four is a choice air riders is a select it won't be confusing at all i love it i love that i fucking love it uh claw master says since you're wanting some good since we are on a downer today just wanted to send you folks some sweet nasty love thank you so much nitro 3940 says if idos lives long enough to make a game what would you want i want deus deus x that's my answer give me another deus x i want guardians too um shadow slain says love the kf awards um odds of a sarah bond category for most headlines generated damn um i think that this is going to be and you correct me if i'm wrong because you and greg are the ones kind of leading this up but this is not snarky this is very celebratory very celebratory it's also like a very small thing right like it's going to be i think right now it's planned for the last kfg of the year and it is us just giving shout outs to the people that really work hard in this industry and so yeah this isn't gonna be that smiley's however you're

46:42let's see phil the trucker says take away your scores and just rate games good bad or greatest hits t pate says imagine if musicians were given bonuses for a higher pitchfork score that's what's happening with metacritic and games uh and it stifles unique art i 100 % agree i don't i don't like the idea of like bonuses based off of metacritic scores and also like people fucking losing their jobs because the game did too low on metacritic i don't think that's how it should work um shadow slain says all i'm saying is if every game i look forward to isn't a 10 out of 10 what's the point of journalism there you go um alex says what are you sipping on today tim happy one ice coffee it's always the same and then zeke speak says bless how's dnd tell us everything you fucking nerd um dnd was really fun i it was a little little bit tough because i'm jumping into a campaign that's already been going and so this is their i think third session maybe third or fourth session um it was fun creating my character i like showed up early so i could actually like fill out a character sheet i'm playing as a fire genasi named cole he's like a fire elemental tim oh okay it's like the genasi i don't know enough about bionicles just that they're cool man that's that is the saddest thing you've ever said to me Yeah, I feel like shout out to Bionicle, the golden mask in an alternate timeline would have been blessings.

48:05Your personality, man, like real talking up until this moment, I would have been convinced you had a Bionicle tattoo. No, I had I had a singular Bionicle and I hated building it. Honestly, I don't know why. Like they're just weird to put together. I was I hated it as a kid, honestly, but they seemed all right. Like when I see all right, when I saw a cool guy, when I see them on TV, when I saw them on TV as a kid, I was kind of like, it seems cool. well i was like all right they're doing too much a little bit but yeah they are they were doing bionicles were just we're just doing too much i think that was the big thing for me i've never been a lego technic guy the moment you get all crazy yeah but bionicles bionicles were getting crazy but they weren't cool but there was like you're getting a little bit too crazy for me um but yeah like you know joined up with the main crew and the dnd thing um and oh i got shot in the shoulder because basically the way they introduced me was like their crew was hanging out at a camp or whatever and then i was like kind of like a shadowy figure that was like hanging out behind a tree and somebody had rolled for perception or whatever and they didn't roll high enough so they saw me as a shadowy figure they didn't see like who i was started shooting at the tree dude fucking eric eric is not his name in the game his name in the game is cannonball cannonball yeah he's like a tough dwarf um cannonball saw me and was like he was like i want to shoot it and i was like oh shit you know because they don't know it's me i'm just sitting there like waiting to entrance and so they shoot me they fucking roll i believe a nat 20 and so their shot connects it hits me for 10 hp or whatever and so now i'm like well the dm's like all right introduce yourself or whatever like what do they see what's your name and i'm like they see me fucking bleeding out my shoulders what they see and so it wasn't a great introduction to the crew but i'm looking forward to the next session that's a fun that's a memorable introduction it is a memorable introduction those cannonball who are you um cole i'm cole so i'm the fire denasi so basically a fire elemental i named nicole because cole produces fire come on come on oh i thought i thought you named him after cole the dog because now that's just who i think your character looks like now is this cole no he's like think like look bear look up what a fire genasi looks like genasi genasi g-e-n-a-s-i i'll see with a g man yeah it wouldn't have started there you know what yeah i know you're right and it's cool the genasi genasi i don't know how to pronounce it but they all it's like avatar last airbender okay so imagine this tim but but a weird dog shape yeah dude they basically have different elements so you can be the water it's like the last airbender water fire earth whatever the fourth air wind whatever it is but yeah dnd was fun i look forward to the next one we ended on a on a really good cliffhanger so fucking rift opens in the sky hands coming out ripping the rift open it's a battle scene it's cool it's really fun it's a really good for you story number three saudi arabia will own 93 it's not funny it's a really sad it's serious story on what it's just a transition uh saudi arabia will own 93 percent of ea when the deal is done uh this is from ethan gotch at kotaku when the dust settles on the 55 billion dollar leveraged buyout of electronic arts saudi arabia will be its only true owner despite a consortium of investors being involved in the deal including president trump's son-in-law jared kushner the public investment fund will control 93 of the company according to filings with brazil's antitrust regulator as reported by the wall street journal this is the reverse of what you might usually expect for one of these deals where a sovereign wealth fund is one of the smaller players in a buyout led by a private equity the stakes of the other partners silver lake and affinity are set to be 5.5 and 1.1 respectively it's unclear what the point of their putting up money is at all other than to help grease the wheels of a foreign takeover.

51:50Both Silver Lake and Affinity already get some of their own investment funds from Saudi Arabia. According to the New York Times and others, Saudi Arabia's finances have grown increasingly shaky in recent years, with the Public Investment Fund pulling investments out of several other U.S. companies. Maybe that's why it's relying on$20 billion in loans to make the EA deal work. that high interest debt will need to be serviced either through big bets on ai revolutionizing game publishing or more likely big budget cuts and studio sell-offs yep it continues yep it does and here we go that last line there that high interest debt will need to be serviced either through big bets on ai revolutionizing game publishing or more likely big budget cuts and studio sell-offs yeah that that's the line we're gonna be telling about a lot the next couple years were you talking about we're gonna be talking about it a lot and honestly 10 years from now games industry gonna look a lot different also oh yeah i think as far as who's still around what people are doing like this is gonna have a big impact on ea and i hope like i mean i want to say i hope it doesn't but like there's just no way it won't there's just simply no way that this there's no good news here yeah there's just no good news here about any of the teams that he any of the projects at EA yeah it's very concerning store number four call of duty is underperforming in 2025 an analyst says citing burnout creative decisions and AI slop this is Eddie at GameSpot according to one analyst call of duty as a franchise is underperforming in 2025 due to a variety of factors Reese Elliott of Alinea Analytics said in an interview that some of the factors that he believes are contributing to call of duty's decline include community burnout questionable creative and business decisions by activision and microsoft and strong competition in terms of the competition elliott called out battlefield 6 in arc creators along with fortnite which recently had a popular simpsons season somebody outside just fucking i don't know what's going on out there oh it might just be ice um which recently it sounded like somebody fell over not not the bad one oh yeah ice cubes so he's using an ice machine is what i'm saying yeah which recently had a popular simpsons season and launched its positively received chapter seven well xbox dropped the ball on the wrong year as this year saw some of the most exciting shooter releases in years elliot told euro gamer attention is scarce elliot went on to say that players are becoming increasingly dissatisfied with call of duty's lack of innovation prior to black ops 7's release elliot said people would buy black ops 7 even if they complained about a lack of innovation because many people buy new call of duty games yearly as part of autopilot purchasing elliot also predicted that black ops 7 would outsell battlefield 6 but he made this prediction prior to the release of both games elliot also pointed out uh that call of duty's turn toward more fortnite like cosmetics and non-military character skins like beavis and butthead and nikki minaj i love that what a blunder that was just in the sense that beavis and butthead and Nicki Minaj will forever be like the second sentence when people are talking about Call of Duty yes like it's kind of like Mercedes-Benz in Mario Kart like there's just something so weird about it that like you're not ever gonna be able to get to shake that legitimately anytime I think about what Call of Duty is nowadays I pictured Nicki Minaj every single time I'm not joking um continuing on the article those things have uh has have alienated a significant portion of the fan base who prefer a more grounded military aesthetic for what it's for what it's worth black ops 7 does not feature the same kind of wacky and over-the-top skins that black ops 6 had in part because activision said it heard concerns that call of duty had strayed from its identity warzone however still has those kinds of skins for black ops 7 specifically elliot said the game's co-op campaign was a major point of criticism while the game's use of ai slop was a sore spot for some beyond all this beyond elliot said the marketing for black ops 7 was pretty abysmal and underwhelming while the game's formal reveal event at call of duty next was messy and did little to excite the community yeah there's a lot of shooters out there right yeah and it's it's crazy because battlefield 6 was the one that all the pre-release numbers we heard of the expectations were like Y 'all need to expect better because that's crazy.