KFGD’s 2000th Episode Celebration! - Kinda Funny Games Daily 10.06.25

29:23Quote, Microsoft's acquisition of Activision has been followed by significant price hikes and layoffs, harming both gamers and developers, Con wrote. As we've seen across sectors, increasing market consolidation and increasing prices also often go hand in hand. As dominant firms become too big to care, they can make things worse for their customers without having to worry about their consequences. Damn. We should have listened to the FTC, bless. We should have listened to the FTC. You know what I mean? I mean, Eminem had me all twisted about him for so long. So don't let me be. Yeah, I know, right?

29:54But maybe Eminem was wrong. I do want to call out that there's been a couple of people in the chat that have noted that Sarah Bond confirmed that Xbox Game Pass is profitable, but there was a caveat that they are not counting revenue lost from first-party game sales in that profitability. And that, to me, is a huge numbers not being reckoned, right? I would like to see those line items next to each other because I have a feeling they don't line up great. Andy, Mike, I know we're seeing a lot of super chats in here about Kind of Funny Games Daily 2000. Have we seen anybody signed off about Xbox?

30:33We have a couple here. One person who says, Andy, love the jacket. Thanks, dude. That's not about Xbox! We also have a super chat here from Thwarted Junk. who says, no, that's not a Games Daily one. Sorry, I got the wrong one right there. They're coming in real fast. There's a lot. We're at around 240, by the way. Oh, wow. Which is crazy pace right now. But they keep on refreshing and ruining the screen. I think YouTube's kind of breaking. We have ZOVGM with a$10 super chat. It says, I'm single with my prediction. Within three to four years, they'll leave the hardware market and launch a first-party-only streaming version of Game Pass for PS5 and Switch 2.

31:16Parentheses, no day ones. back catalog only yeah that wouldn't surprise me like maybe not that exact version of that but some iteration of that idea i think is inevitable and again i if i had to guess hardware wise what happens to xbox i think xbox uh this is probably the last generation that they actually have a console that is just an xbox that's not seen more as a pc and i think that we've seen so much evidence towards getting to the point now that the xbox brand is the cloud stuff and is game pass and is more PC-focused. And with that, I think that we already are seeing the handheld market with the Raj Ally X.

31:54I think the same thing's going to happen on the more desktop box side, whatever that looks like. I think they're going to partner with other OEMs. It might be Asus. It might be someone else. And I think that the Xbox Windows experience, the gaming experience, that is just what's going to be in a bunch of different things. And it's going to function more like Android. And I think that PlayStation's going to function more like Apple. And I think that's just kind of what's going to happen going forward i think that's where i'd like to pivot the conversation just a smidge is talking about going forward where i'm of the mind like we've talked about in this that yes even if x one day i think xbox gets out of hardware i i'm not crystal balling and soothsaying and blah blah i do think next generation they're still here with an xbox my question becomes this the rumor has always been or at least what we we kick around in this show and you see kicked around the internet right well the next xbox will be in line with what we're seeing from their partnership with ROG, what we're seeing with AMD, and it'll be a Xbox that can also boot PC games and have Steam and have, you know, the Riot Launcher and all that jazz on there.

32:52The Steam Deck. But a big boy. A big, big boy, right? My question becomes for the panel, and I'll start with you, Tim, as you're piercing eye contact with the second best baby blues. Do you think that that would be enough to change perception and get Xbox going in the right direction? Absolutely not. But I think at this point it's not about that they lost now it's just like how do they just make money and function and and how do they win as much as they can to themselves the console wars are over like we're here still talking about all this but like like they just are like no no and it's not a bad thing my intake wasn't about console wars it was more the fact of like i don't even think of it anymore as xbox trying to change their place in all this change goodwill oh where people are gonna be like oh man i do love x no no no it's i mean like we're talking about uh at best a sega situation but on a much, much, much, much, much grander scale, unlike we've ever seen.

33:42Microsoft, Microsoft, not Xbox, Microsoft owns the majority of game developers in the world at this point, right? They have control over more teams than any other publisher out there. And we're talking about teams of consequence. We're talking about Call of Duty, all 15 teams working on those games and working on nothing freaking else, right? Like that, I think is so, there's so much there that like the Xbox brand, I don't think can just go away because there is so much money being made and I think there's so much good happening still and that there is value there but yeah in terms of Xbox being like a dominant brand and like them saving face and like goodwill and all that stuff it's like no no no they're playing a different game now like they lost the game they were playing they need to figure out what game to play and unfortunately I think it's gonna be a game a lot of us go no don't play that game yeah stay away from me which sucks because like a few years ago I think a lot of us wrote mine of like oh damn they're playing a game that I want to see them win right like the what they're doing with game pass what they're doing with play anywhere what they're doing with cloud cloud right like this ecosystem uh driven approach i think there's so much potential in that because we talk about how console gaming and how um triple a prestige titles right when i'm looking at playstation how expensive those are to make and how like those numbers strike a little shiver down your spine when you think about like is this actually sustainable is this actually a moneymaker is this the thing that you can do long term i would have thought that the xbox approach which would have been the one where as we're going into the next generation of games, we're talking about Xbox being number one and we're not, right?

35:09Because a lot of that has toppled and that's from a lot of different reasoning, whether it be just the economy and whether it be investments in AI, whether it be the acquisition of Activision Blizzard, which put a lot of scrutiny on the Xbox team, right? Like it's coming from all different directions as far as the hits that Xbox is taking and I think why we're in this place that we're in. But man, I would have liked to see them actually pull them off in a different timeline. 100%. I do think it's important to note because as we've been having this conversation and it's sounding a little doom and gloom for Xbox, I was like, what were the last earnings reports numbers?

35:44And so I looked it up and over at gamesindustry.biz, it says that the headline is Xbox content and services revenue up 13 % year on year. Microsoft was the top publisher on Xbox and PlayStation in Q4 of 2025. Or not 2025, excuse me, that can't be right. of its fiscal year for 2025. Let me clarify that, which is the three months that ended on June 30th for anybody keeping score. That revenue was$76.4 billion with a net income of$27.2 billion. So they made$27 billion. Their next financial thing is the end of October. Very, very excited to see what they have. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, 100%. It's going to be very telling Cause yeah, you know, they're going to be there and they're going to be like, yeah, game pass is profitable and like money's up.

36:36But then it's like to Andrea's point earlier, it's like, that's not the whole story. And so I do think that the money is coming in now. And again, they're putting the money out for it to come in. They just, they acquired Activision for$69 billion, man. Like that's crazy. And yeah, they're just going to continue. The money is still coming in, but we got to just be real. Like, let's talk about the hardware side. Let's be real about the hardware side right now, no matter what's happening. The official price of the Series X is$650. It already wasn't selling. How many is it going to sell in the next year?

37:09The next year from today. How many units is that thing going to sell? It's not. I really am. When both Sony and Microsoft raised the console prices, I just thought it was, I was shocked. I was like, you guys can absorb like this tariff cost that people keep pointing to as a reason and like the rising cost of literally everything. But you guys should be absorbing that in order to maintain the audience. Like the idea that those that older technology is going up in costs is just it's unfathomable to me. I mean, I just get the vibe, though, that the people that really could make that decision, though, super high ups.

37:50They're the ones looking at me like, hey, you're y 'all's little experiment is pissing us off. you know what I mean? Like, no, no, no, no, no. We're not absorbing anything. We lost$300 million. We've been in court for a year and a half. We've been in court for a year and a half. Which is not nothing. It's wild to even say that it's a drop in the bucket for Microsoft. But when their quarterly revenue as a company is$27 billion, you feel like$300 billion is almost like a rounding error, and that's wild. That's insanity. I mean, this is back to the whole problem with where we are right now with corporate greed is that if any of these corporations were able to step up and eat the cost.

38:30Hey, and then have that be the message. We're not raising the price of it. We're even lowering it. And that means to our shareholders, we're going from a double digit profit to a single digit profit while we weather this storm and hopefully win goodwill and bring you back. We're lowering the price of Game Pass. We're not putting in the Fortnite thing. Sorry, Bless. I know you're excited about that. We're not giving you the Ubisoft classics. I know you were champing at the big get to. I wanted to play Child of Light. We're going to figure out a way right now and even put a time on it. For the next six months, we're committing to this.

38:59We want to get you in the door. We want you to be here. We understand times are tough right now. And I know that that's, in 2025, a crazy fucking thing to say. That's what I'm so mad about, though, because it's not that crazy. Companies used to do this all the time. This, like, really bad financial situation that the United States finds herself in, it's not the first time this has happened. I mean, the last really bad one where stegflation really impacted our day-to-day lives was like back in the 70s. But companies just have it in their mind now that they don't have to care about their consumer.

39:34And that sucks, man. It really just feels bad. A hundred percent. But small businesses everywhere are eating the cost that they didn't ask for, that they get no benefit for. And I see it all the time in like some of the companies that I've bought stuff from saying, hey, you know, we don't want to add like a$10 tariff fee. So we're either going to stop. I've seen people just stop selling. They've closed their shops while the tariff situation is ongoing. Or they said, hey, just so you know, if you want, you can add on the cost to help us as a small business. But we're not raising our prices. And it's so silly to me that these giant corporations who have the money are not even doing anything close to that.

40:14Andy, Mike, I want to pull in a super chat. can you see jpms and read me that one or is it all is it all foobar on your screen 2000 um i don't know which jpm you're talking oh yes i do see oh nice job i do see it from jpm says i was ready to buy the rog ally x but with all the xbox situation going on i'm not so sure anymore anyone else feeling the same way blessing where's your temperature and i know you were never like i can't wait for it but i mean like in terms of what you're seeing and what you would recommend here for jpm oh forgetting that i mean listen i'm a steam deck ride or die so you're asking the wrong person because i'm gonna be like yo get an oled get a steam deck oled i want a steam deck oled um but like i think those are valid feelings um like how much do you guys know how much is the rog ally x is a thousand jesus yeah g a band of people say and what's the official way we're supposed to say it i say rog because i talked to somebody who used to work at republic of gamers so technically you should say but rock sounds better yeah i was told we say rog because roger but i was told by somebody who used to work there that it is rog you say the letters like out that makes sense yeah okay i hear you but that's true uh gif and you know exactly i mean and then there's at at and at so i mean well that's made up stuff it's not to this person i would say look at the catalog that's coming up and ask yourself next year you're going to get a new Forza you're going to get a new Gears of War you're going to get a new Fable and theoretically you're going to get a Halo do those four games speak to you for$360 a year for Game Pass, right?

41:47Like, I think that's what the math is going to come down to and then also, yeah, of course, having a handheld which I can't... I think in today's gaming landscape I can't recommend enough having a PC gaming handheld like it is totally... Not to... I guess over say it, but like it really has revolutionized the way I play video games. It's changed the way I play games. It's such a nice thing to have a PC handheld. I actually play PC games. Yeah. Same. Me too. I was like a console diehard. I play way more PC games now than I did before I ever had my Steam Deck. That said, whether or not you should get an ROG LiX or something else, right?

42:23Like a Steam Deck. One terabyte Steam Deck OLED is 650. Yeah. See, that would be my... That is the superior choice. That would be my rec. At this particular moment. I assume the ROG LAX is probably, what, stronger? Yeah, it's significantly stronger. My take on this is wait a couple weeks for the reviews of the people that actually know what they're talking about reviewing this thing. Because the reality of this is the LAX is going to be amazing. It's going to be worth the money for the tech that's in it. Not worth it to everybody. Like, if you look at that and go, I'm not spending$1 ,000 on a handheld, no one's going to be mad at you.

42:53These are expensive. I feel like this conversation is PC gaming in a nutshell. You can spend a lot of money and have a really cool, fast, powerful rig, or you can spend a moderate amount of money and have a very serviceable machine that lets you play games and have a good time. The difference is that there needs to be kind of standardized, we are building for this machine, and that has happened with the Steam Deck. It's why Steam Deck is so successful, is the devs are tailoring the experience to make sure their games can play on that platform, and they have the verification system. It seems like Xbox has taken that very seriously, and they are also trying to do that on the Ally.

43:27So I am choosing to believe that it is going to work. I think that the biggest thing of going against the ally X is going to be if there's some crazy fatal flaw that reviewers catch, like, but I don't think there's going to be. And I think that that is going to be the, they're putting more into this. We already know that the rogue ally is awesome. Yeah. I love my ally. So it's like, it's, this is going to be a great product period. Is it something that you should buy over a steam deck? Not necessarily. I think that the Steam Deck is still going to be the one that the majority of developers are looking at and are like, we're going to design for this.

44:05So do you need the extra power? I don't know. The Steam Deck really does get the job done, right? Like, I think that for me, I own both a ROG ally and I own a Steam Deck. And my ROG ally just collects dust because my Steam Deck, to what Tim said, right? Put that shit over. What are you doing? You definitely don't need both. I keep meaning to bring it in because Kevin asked for it like a long time ago. but like if you want to let me know because right now yeah i'm gonna take my steam you can arm russell kevin but i think he wants an rog specifically but either way right like i look at both those things my steam deck just has there's the compatibility i've already set it up with all the alleged emulation stuff that i got going see i think that's the thing for me with the rog ally easy to use i like it more than the steam deck because it runs the native pc triple a games i'm trying to play better than my steam deck ran them with less hurdles and less protons and all this jazz the the um cumbersome nature and the hurdles i thought i would have to cross on the rog are the ones i actually had to do on steam deck which again we're like click this that doesn't work do this andy make it work that kind of thing whereas like the rog doesn't do that for me now i'm not doing price alleged i'm not doing alleged yes 100 i'm not doing the alleged emulation i'm not doing anything other than just trying to play games and i'm sure i adore my rog that reason so again for the xbox to this question wait for review since we're so close but i'm still hype for it with the idea of it launching into this xbox ecosystem not eating up as much memory hopefully running faster and better than what i already have and love yeah and i'm sure like the emulation stuff probably i imagine might even work better on the rog ally like i don't know what the comparison is there but i think for me with steam deck it comes down to how it kind of is the console the closest to a console experience you can have on a pc product right where i boot it up it's full screen steam mode and everything's just set up the way that i want it to be set up which I know on the Asus ROG Ally, I could probably get it there, but I already have it there with my steam.

45:50Fair enough. Yeah, totally. It's everything I need it to be. Also, does anybody want a donut? Later. I can pass these out. Not right. I feel like if I start eating a donut with that much frosting, it's just going to go everywhere. That's fair. Messy. Mike, Andy, you want a donut? Okay. Yes. Asus says, it's not that much better than your current ally, Greg. Sure, but it's got the grips, which I find more comfortable. And this has been an ongoing conversation I've said of like having the ROG Ally X right now for a year falling in love with that. That's a review one they sent us, obviously. If they were to take that away, I would throw the$1 ,000 at this new one.

46:25I also believe that it's going to be good. The new one is significantly better than the one you have, like significantly better. But the question there is, is the better going to be used correctly and optimized? And that is a big question. We will wait and see, and we'll keep you posted here on Kind of Funny Games because of your support. Let's get out of this Xbox business this and go to story number two. Details emerge on Xbox. Fuck. Number two. Details emerge on Xbox's canceled Uncharted rival. This is Project Ranger and Andy Robinson over at VGC. A new video has unearthed alleged details on the canceled Xbox exclusive Project Ranger, an uncharted style action adventure game once planned for Xbox One.

47:03Project Ranger is said to be the game famously teased via a 30 second trailer during Xbox's E3 2013 press conference and never seen again at the time the title was attached to black tusk studios which would later be renamed the coalition and take over stewardship of the gears of war franchise a new video by did you know gaming investigates the fate of the mysterious project revealing that it was to be xbox's answer to the sony's uncharted series quote in short the idea for this game was uncharted with spies says researcher liam robertson an action-packed third-person shooter where the player controlled secret agents on high octane espionage missions in various cities around the world end quote pre-production on ranger began in early 2012 it's claimed with the mission impossible movie cited as a strong influence on the project's direction the game would feature a single male protagonist who would use bond style gadgets to distract enemies and hack scenery the game was also planned to include connect functionality with players able to change their primary weapons fire mode or ask for tips from their handler by speaking to the censor thank God, that never happened.

48:08The E3 teaser, which was made using Unreal Engine, was reportedly based on a Shanghai mission planned for the game in which players would have to infiltrate an office building occupied by terrorists. Ultimately, Project Ranger's development was cut short after the opportunity arose for Microsoft to revive a classic series. In late 2013, Microsoft acquired Gears of War from Epic Games, and Black Tusk felt like it was good to take over the Blub series. In early 2014, the decision was made, officially, in a meeting with the studio's wider team, that ranger would be canceled in favor of a new gears of war shortly after the company was renamed the coalition blessing what could have been man i've i've asked for this before i've so badly wanted an uncharted style game but with a mission possible aesthetic and like that kind of spy espionage story with like big action set pieces i just want naughty dog to make mission impossible and not literally like i don't want them to like make another ip but like i want i don't want them to make a licensed IP like that, but I do want that style of game made with quality.

49:06I got my fingers crossed that this 007 game we got coming up is going to fulfill that for me because we don't have enough of these types of games coming out. Andrea, do you need a Mission Impossible game? I would play it. I think I see an Uncharted rival, and I say, well, they already have Indiana Jones, and that game did pretty well. It's not Spies. you know it's you know much more like an actual uncharted rival yeah for sure um but i think that this type of game would do well but right now this sounds like a two to four hundred million dollar idea to really execute it well and people aren't making those right now fair enough timothy you always love an uncharted style of course i do yeah i am i'm so old i just i remember this like i'm talking to mitch dyer about this like this is crazy yeah the black tusk studios that's nuts and yeah to see just where we're at with all of this it's like yeah this could have been awesome and i do think that there was a time that this could have hit um but we're so far from that time and yeah it's it's sad that uh i think that we're just going to get less of these type of things than than more so i would love to see it never think we will no perfect dark could have been the i was gonna say oops yeah i was gonna say reading this i'm like i get a lot of perfect dark so sad yeah yeah i just want i just want more of this genre it doesn't need to be the most triple a of triple a things i just want more spy espionage i want mine's eye i was gonna say more triple a than mine's eye you know what i mean like give me that sweet spot give me like i'll give it to you who bond i think bond will um i want uh haze light studios to give me one oh i feel like they they got the skill like they got the moment to moment like you know action set pieces and all that shit right like i think there's something the thing about mission impossible that i love is that mission impossible ups the ante like to an extent to where like you're you're on the edge of your seat right oh man this person needs to do this thing while being undercover while this other person's like trying to hack into the thing while this while like person number one oh man there's that'd be cool the guards are coming by like you need to now hurry up or do whatever like there's a level of tension and a level of like just cool shit happening i'm gonna turn off the cameras in 30 seconds you got to be ready to go yeah and like you know i think you should go work at hazelite hazelite hit me up you know were you a splinter cell fan you know i never got that through the wall like a goddamn kool-aid man it's interesting that you are really into the this genre but i would recommend you check out that franchise you know i did play a little bit of conviction i want to say and conviction yeah that i remember i remember liking that one a lot you know what it is it's the meliger solid fan in me as well we just haven't had a million solid in so long yeah this isn't very soon maybe that i mean that's probably uh remember everybody this is the 2000th episode of kind of funny games daily to celebrate we're trying to get 2000 youtube super chats over on youtube.com slash kind of funny games they don't have to be big dollar amounts we just want the overall number andy mike how are we doing how are we doing andy how are we doing i'm head down there's a lot of time for my life we are We really are.

52:18Roger last updated me at 1042. So that was 10 minutes ago. We are at 282 Super Chats. And I'm collecting them. Man. He's putting them all in a little bucket. Andy taught me how to take photos on the computer, man. It's crazy stuff. Yeah, yeah. He was copy-pasting every Super Chat. And I was like, oh, you should check out Snipping Tool. And he leaned over and he was like, how do I do that? Oh, my goodness. Yeah, man. We're fucking doing it, dude. Look at that. Can we get some quick hits? If you logged in, then you could break out the chat and just do it like they're all super. There's so many. So many.

52:52I have them open as well. What are you talking about? Really important one from Omar,$5 Superjack. It says, hi, Mike. Nice jacket. Thank you. $450 from Sears. Got it. You got a good compliment right there. We also had one from the homie, the legendary Radek from CD Projekt Red, who wanted to congratulate us on 2 ,000 episodes. I love that. Thank you, Radek. Always a pleasure. Let's move on to story number three. Funcom is closing Metal Hellsinger developer The Outsiders. This is Chris Kerr at Game Developer. Metal Hellsinger developer The Outsiders is being shuttered by parent company Funcom. The Outsiders founder and creative director David Goldfarb shared the news on Blue Sky.

53:34That's BS, Tim. And explained the decade-old studio will be closing its doors. The news comes days after Funcom confirmed it would be making layoffs just months after million-seller Dune Awakening became quote-unquote the biggest release in its history. Funcom didn't explain how many people will be impacted by the cuts, but we now know that one internal studio has been torched. The Outsiders is credited with working on Dune Awakening. It's unclear how many people will lose their jobs at the Stockholm studio as a result of the closure. Andrea, you're back, but the news never changes. There's a reason why I got out of news, Greg, and this story is exactly it.

54:10It's really sad. It's disappointing. We don't want to see people lose their jobs. We don't want to see creatives be cut off from their work. But what are we going to do? Yeah. I remember Metal Hellsinger. I didn't play it. Bless, was this a you or an Andy game? It was mostly Andy. That's a me game, man. Metal Hellsinger was so damn good. Can you give me the synopsis? This is the one to the beat where I'm running around shooting? Yes. Troy Baker is kind of your little side character who is always with you. And it is a rhythm first-person shooter game. and it was fantastic. It pretty much just plays like Doom, but different weapons act different ways and then you are always kind of like, you know, your crosshairs are in the middle and you want to hit those shots on the beat.

54:56And it is some of the most hype shit you've ever experienced. It's super cool. When you are waiting to hit that one shot when the beat drops after the next measure, it's really, really awesome. Some of the coolest, funnest boss fights I've experienced as well. And yeah, I think this is a magic or a massive tragedy because I think Metal Hell Singer was like number seven on my game of the year that year. It's one that I highly recommend to anybody who cares about first-person shooters, who cares about Doom, or who cares about Rhythm Games. Yeah, I remember, shout out, of course, the folks who made this, they came up to me at SGF and were like big kind of funny fans.

55:29They'd already heard Andy talk about it. They wanted to thank us for supporting the game. So it sucks to see them here, especially on the heels of Dune Awakening, quote unquote, biggest release of the year, Tim. Yep, wild. I mean, like what a major success Dune Awakening is. And it just sucks that we so often are pairing major success and win stories with these sad stories. And it's just like, God, we got to solve that problem somehow. And it seems like we're not getting closer to being able to do that. Like, yeah, Dune Awakening has been such a major win critically and financially for them. So this is definitely a bummer.

56:00And it it really just makes you kind of look and go like, what's going on? Yeah. Yeah. I echo everything you guys are talking about. and yeah like i you know dune awakening is one that seemingly maybe even more successful than was anticipated at least for my end right like dune awakening i was kind of looking forward to just because i was newly into dune from watching you know um what's the name of the actor um timothy oh yeah watching timothy chalamet no i thought you were doing some tom steamboat i was about to say tom holland i was like that's not the guy who's the right guy Tom Holland. But yeah, seeing Timothee Chalamet do his thing in the movie, I was like, oh, let's go.

56:38I want to live in this world. And yeah, Dune Awakening came out, and I played that stream with Mike, Andy, and Nick. And seeing what that game was doing, I'm like, damn, dude, that's crazy that this game seems really good. It lives in this universe and is authentic to this universe, and Nick Scarpino really likes it. Also, Gary Wooda really likes it, right? And it seems like it's really doing something out there. But you can get the olds. Yeah, exactly. They're able to get the old movie. Well, the old are the ones who like Dune, Greg. Hey, that's true. That is true. Yeah, that's not a bad point.

57:05I just loved it when Nick made a comment to Gary Whitta of, you should come play Dune with us. And then Nick wouldn't play Dune with Gary Whitta for the longest time. And now Gary Whitta is like the Dune overlord from what I understand. He's running like the biggest business in the world. He is the Nissan Al-Ghaib, yeah. Oh, yeah. Good work. Good use. I like that one. Tim, I got bad news for you. Number four. PlayStation quietly cancels the remaining PlayStation The Concert 2025 tour dates in U.S. This is Andy Robinson at VGC. PlayStation appears to have quietly canceled virtually all its remaining 2025 dates for its PlayStation The Concert events in the U.S.

57:42PlayStation The Concert is a live show featuring music from across PlayStation's 30-year history, notably including music composed from The Last of Us. Greg, I'm going to stop you real quick. Can you unplug and replug in your microphone? reload reload there you go uh music from the last of us horizon ghost of tsushima and god of war and more the tour kicked off in the uk earlier this year with shows taking place in multiple cities including london and glasgow glasgow glasgow glasgow i got through everything everybody calm down Andy, tell him to calm down. Glasgow. Glasgow? I love Glasgow. I love 2000 episodes of Nothing Chains.

58:24I love Greg trying to pronounce words. However, the tour's European run seemingly ran into trouble with several events reportedly cancelled in countries such as Poland, Sweden, Norway, Italy, and others planned for Germany. Budapest pushed back until the summer. Now it appears ticket buyers for the PlayStation the Concert's US dates are set for similar disappointment after social media users reported being notified of cancellations for planned 2025 events in Atlanta, Cleveland, Detroit, Charlotte, and more. According to Ticketmaster, previously announced 2025 dates for New York, Washington, D.C., Grand Rapids, Huntsville, Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia have all been canceled.

59:01Skip that one, City. Reading? Oh, reading, sorry. I didn't know if it was like a... Well, now for the record, that could be... Is it reading or is it reading? I was like, is that reading? This is what happens when an international person writes it. No one knows what reading we're talking about. And also nobody cares. Reading, Pennsylvania. Reading. Nobody knows. Back me up here. Reading? Reading? Yeah, it's Reading. I mean, I also just saw a town in New York that looks like Chile, but is Shilai. Whoa. Someone's talking with you. Yes, that's what I said. I go, that's a fake thing. It's a fake thing.

59:36That's not real. Apparently it is real. To your defense, Greg, I feel like Reading, no offense to Reading, you don't belong between That's what I'm saying. Andy Robinson looked at a list of dates and he's like, I guess this is a major city. One city's not here. San Francisco. San Francisco. My ticket. Not canceled yet. Okay. Tickets still available for the February 16th show, I think. Yeah. So I'm interested. I expect it will be canceled. I am bummed by that, obviously. Yeah. I already talked about my thoughts on the show before where I think the arrangements are amazing. i think that the production value is just being put in the wrong places with it um and so far i've been kind of like let down by uh how they set this up is like this is going to be the best video game concert production you've ever seen and it's simply not um and a big part of that was the reliance on pre-recorded audio so there are very limited amount of musicians on the stage and it's mainly just like piped in audio playing um certain instruments and vocals that like you should be performing this on stage right um so yeah the whole point of a concert yeah is to see musicians perform it is um and there are musicians and they are great again great arrangements and i i've watched this entire show on youtube already and it's good it's and i'm still excited to see it if it still happens but bummed to see this all happen it was definitely a huge investment for them um so yeah i this sucks to see and i i wonder why and it's probably because it's not selling Yeah, yeah.

1:01:05I want to talk about that, but I do want from the Super Chats, can you guys give me Sort By First Names comment on this? I sure can. That's the one I was going to read, Greg. I genuinely enjoyed PlayStation the concert in London earlier this year. I think that's a shame, says Sort By First Name. I think it's interesting, you know, going to see video game music, not for every video game fan, of course. But of course, Video Games Live went on for many a year going on and doing that. And I think it's interesting to have this PlayStation-centric thing when, and I know this is Little Apples and Orges, but stick with my reference, with PSX dead.

1:01:39Where PSX, I feel like when PSX were happening, that was like the pinnacle of PlayStation. We're a community. There's Podcast Beyond. There's all these others. There's games. There's things where we love Troy. And then they killed that. And I feel like PlayStation killed all their faces. And they're just this monolith of we are PlayStation, the brand. And that's like not something that's easy for people to be like, I fuck with this. I connect with this. In a world where I'm looking to belong, I belong to PlayStation anymore. So then to come out and do this, it's kind of like, yeah, I like the music in The Last of Us, but do I want to go see that in concert?

1:02:13Do I want to do something else in my time? Blah, blah, blah. What's the name of the dude that was in the commercials? Kevin? Kevin Butler. Kevin. And Marcus Sellers, right? Marcus for PSP, remember? Kevin Butler is who you're thinking of. I think we need another. We need a new Kevin Butler. Bring him back. I was going to say, we settled the lawsuit. Get Kevin Butler back on it. His lawsuit? Oh, yeah. You don't remember this? Mario Kart. Oh, dude, it was great. They used him as Kevin Butler on PlayStation forever. And then he didn't read his contract, I guess. And so he took a Firestone ad where he played Wii.

1:02:39Oh, you can't do that. And the internet fucking blew up. Oh, you can't do that. There was a lawsuit. That was the end of Kevin Butler. But it seems like the first cancellation. Yeah. Oh, man. The first cancellation. That's when the world learned the power. We really can do this? i don't know i think fandom of playstation's in an interesting spot it's yeah i feel like i don't and maybe this is this is probably very most likely my algorithm right like i feel like most the fandom i see on my timelines is xbox like i feel like i don't see i don't see playstation selling back their xboxes that's what my reddit feed has been dominated by people coming to the place honestly it's just people fighting like it's just the entire xbox like community is fighting on my timeline i don't see anybody from like nintendo playstation pc it's just chaos I think PlayStation as a brand has just dramatically changed how they're representing themselves in marketing and in community spaces.

1:03:32Like you said, they're just not there anymore. I think back to all of the events that PlayStation used to do that we as members of the media would go to, and they've scaled those back dramatically. And they are having much smaller events targeted around key AAAs, and they're not doing these long marketing cycles leading up to their AAAs. I remember when we got to Summer Game Fest, and I was really surprised that PlayStation wasn't going to be at Play Days, but they were doing this red carpet event for Death Stranding 2. And then I was like, wait a minute. Is Death Stranding 2 coming out really soon?

1:04:09It feels like I haven't heard anything or seen any media around that. And I think it just represents an overall shift in what they're doing with the brand. But I mean, they're still quietly putting out some of the best video games that are being made today. for modern consoles. And I am fully confident that their business is strong and doing well. It just, like you said, it doesn't have that community and camaraderie and that we all love playing games together on our PlayStation. I love talking about our PlayStation fandom. And I think that is a tragedy. I think it is sad that that community is not as strong as it once was.

1:04:42What are the Ghost of Yotei activations that are happening? You know what I mean? TGS, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah, you're right. There is the beer. The theater stuff, too. their Alamo Drafthouse where they're showing all those films that inspired the game. That's fair. But that feels like such a ritzy upscale like, ooh, you gotta go to Alamo Drafthouse and all that kind of stuff. It doesn't feel like a bringing community thing together. It feels like a, hey, film snobs. Yeah, bring back the truck. I want pop-ups. I want to go see a pop-up where I can go and I feel like I'm in the setting. You know what I mean?

1:05:19I want the grass. I want the hills. I want the Aurora Borealis in that one scene. Spoilers.

1:05:27There being a giant ghost of Yote activation will be big news. But it's our 2000s episode. I want some big super chats. Andy, Mike, what do you got for me? You ready to start going back and forth for some fun? It's finally our time. Of course, don't forget the super chat throughout this like Matt Piscitella did. On 2000. Congratulations, team. Jupiter with the happy 2000. And Spartan, 2842, says, thank you, KF, for all you do. I started my weight loss journey shortly after discovering Kind of Funny and used Kind of Funny Games daily to mark when I needed to get up and exercise. Here I am almost eight years later, 150 pounds down.

1:06:08Keep it up. Love you guys. Spartan, that's my guy right there. That's awesome. Quitter. We got Red Hudson saying, that opening montage got me hella emotional, kind of funny forever. 2 ,000 and then the rest of it got cut off because I don't know if Mike was using the snipping tool correctly. I'm learning. I'm learning. There's a lot. Yeah, there's a lot. A lot of stuff going on. RL Ramsey says, Congratulations, Kind of Funny, for 2 ,000 episodes of KFGD. Y 'all are a beacon of light each day, and I appreciate all that you do. Hashtag KF10. I like that we're kind of the GDQ. Oh, we get to read some of them?

1:06:40Yeah, I like that. We're like the GDQ, like the Asian desk. I love this. This is great. Imran is my bridge to coming over here, Then bless when he had a show with the late but great Gabe Petillo. That's frolicious. Thank you frolicious for your super chat as well. Nimble Trent writes in and says, Miles away is forever iconic. Congrats on 2000. I love Gary. I think about him all the time. Ed Ferrara,$10 super chat says, Been listening to you guys for the past year, and I can't thank you enough for making every day a little easier to get through. Congrats on 2K. I plan to be right here for the next 2000 episodes.

1:07:14Ed also says, by the way, Greg, did Jeff Jarrett tell you I sent my regards? If he didn't, then you're right. He's the biggest heel in the biz. He never mentioned you. John Van Pelt says, let's not forget co-CEO Tim Geddes is throwing a huge show to distract us from him releasing the Mexico files. Release the files, Tim. Go team orange. You'll never know what happened in Mexico. You'll never know what happened in Mexico. I'm getting dangerously close to bad things. You know what? Fine. Paul writes in and says, happy kind of funny games daily. 2K. I still remember the first episode. And we are also nearing the 400 super chat mark, by the way.

1:07:51We have a super chat here from Real Deal J. O 'Neill, which is a really, really good name. Says, congrats, KF, thanks for being part of our lives and killing it with the news daily. Hope you all reach 1 ,000 super chats. Here's to 2 ,000 more. Love you guys. On YouTube alone, there's nearly 4 ,000 people watching. So right now, I've just 2 ,000 of you gave a dollar on a super chat. We could do it. and crush it. Please do it. I think you guys missed the many super chats that said Andrea Rene, GOAT, KFGD host. There was a lot about Andrea Rene. I feel like you just need to read all of those. They said nice jacket.

1:08:26Arturo Sean Robo bartender Andrea is the best. Joe Furelli says this one is for Andrea. Like what, like, oh, like, like when your favorite aunt comes to visit. Aw. Yes, cool aunt Andy. Let's see, we have Techie Haas with a massive$100 super chat. Extremely generous saying, I just want to say I love you guys. Happy 2000. We have one from Sword by First Name who says, cupboards. Cupboards. He wrote it. You know what I mean? That's how he spelled it. There's no space, by the way. Don't come to me, chat. This is how Blessing spelled it. Shift blame happens so fast right there. Micah Fournier says, been here since episode one.

1:09:11I bought shirts for me and my girlfriend. Congrats on$2 ,000. That's right, kindoffunny.com slash store. Wow. All of the retro throwback merch and new stuff as well. Some cool merch. Caminelli writes in and says, let's get to 2K. Been supporting Greg since Podcast Beyond in 2009, and I don't plan on going anywhere. Here's to 2 ,000 more. A lot of$1 super chats coming in. I urged you all to try to make it happen, but Alex J. Sandoval coming through with$100. KFGD is a huge part of my routine, so much so that when I pick up my six-year-old nephew, he says, Tio, are you watching Kind of Funny Games Daily?

1:09:44Thank you all for enriching my love of games and helping me both lose, parentheses, Ubisoft, and gain, parentheses, Sony money with hashtag not financial advice. Eric Aspires says, shout out to Kind of Funny on behalf of my husband, Drew, who's been supporting Kind of Funny forever. It's his birthday this week, so please send Drew some love. Happy birthday, Drew. Happy birthday, Drew. Happy birthday. It was a great episode to bring the party and stuff I was planning. Nah, it's not. It's about us. You're right. This is about us this time. All right, we'll get to the birthday things. I want to bring in one from Thwarted Junk, who wrote in way earlier with$20 and says, started watching back in 2016, then fell off, came back in 2023, and haven't missed an episode since.

1:10:21I always thought Barrett was saying, epic game does it, instead of a baker's dozen, until Kevin said it. Love you guys. That's awesome. Yang Fam says, two weeks ago, I asked my girlfriend to marry me. She said yes. Birthday tax as well. KFG. Yeah, congrats. Happy birthday. Congrats, Yang Fam. Congratulations. BigFresh37 in the super chat says Floradora, sign of a very old Greg Miller fan, thank you very much and then I got one here for Scott for$50 on a super chat, congrats KF on 2000, y 'all literally in my ears, bidet on my life, I love all of you so much comma, we'll be here till end for real, for real, I love that it's hard sometimes to get it all in you know, but you got it there Ty says, I love you middle guy Thank you.

1:11:06I like that one. I was going to read that one. Thank you, Ty. One Shot Thrills writes in and says, Just started watching after the 10-year celebration, but I've enjoyed the show, becoming a part of my daily routine. Danielle Z with a$5 Super Chat. Thank you for your continued generosity. She says, Happy 2000. Love you all. Ed Egan Hart says, I saw myself at the Kind of Funny Live 3 footage in the intro. That's awesome. Very, very cool. Yeah, when is Kind of Funny Live coming back, guys? Got an announcement to make right now? No. Oh, I can't. That was a super chat. I asked everybody. I was hoping to mark down a little bit earlier.

1:11:39It kind of, you know, just went by. It's a matrix now. It's gone. We can't get in the kernels right now, Mike. But the question was asking, when's the next kind of funny live event? That's a great question. Yeah. When will the people get to see you and I live? I mean, I was hoping just you and Roger or something. Yeah, that's a great question. Tim.

1:12:01Well, these have been big super chats. And we still have a lot more show to go. But if I wanted something smaller, say the tiniest news I need to know about, where would I go, Andrea? Well, you'd go to our last story, the We News Channel, where we cover all the small news items you need to know about. Okay, I was wondering if we'd have it on the set. I should have known better. Number five, the We News. Sonic is partnering with the Olympics. We're back, baby. We're so back. We're so back. Thank you, Bear. This is the brand collaboration. No, no. No, no. Turn this off, man. I'm tired. Well, we're excited to announce our upcoming Olympic rings licensing collaboration with the International Olympic Committee celebrating the Olympic brand and Sonic the Hedgehog.

1:12:46Stay tuned for more info in 2026. Mario's pissed. You know what I mean? Nintendo's just like, get this kart racer out of here. You're trying to come for us? You're trying to come for the crown? We ain't going to race with you anymore. I know there's a meme about how I get so excited for Sonic things, but if we can all be real for a second and acknowledge that this shit looks ill as hell. I would buy these shirts. Let's be real. The merchandising team knocked that out of the park. I really like the snowboarding one. This is really good. Yeah, I'd buy that shirt. I'd buy that shirt for sure. Skate has reached 15 million players, Mike.

1:13:19Wow. Holy shit. Those are big numbers. Are we caveman-ing back in tomorrow for season one? Can't wait. Season one launches tomorrow, everybody. I'm stoked. From Gamatsu, the unannounced alien, fire Fireteam Elite 2 has been raided by the ESRB. Seems to be published by Daybreak Game Company this time. Mike, we enjoyed Fireteam Elite. Let's keep an eye out on that one. I like that. I don't know why I thought you meant raided like the FBI raids people. I was like, whoa. Really dangerous stuff right there. For PC gamers, Steam players are upset over another AAA game coming to PC and not running optimally.

1:13:53Over on Reddit, posts about a hotly anticipated title dominated our Steam with users such as Excel Lover. xl lover 420 stating it ran fine on consoles why is it like this another user a user kicked in the head by a donkey 69 posted i have an rtx 5080 and it melted on low settings when asked about a fix the ceo of the studio said we're slowly working on an update sadly a hot fix is so far away if i wanted something more immediate say what's coming to mom and grab shops today where would i go who wants the answer the official list of upcoming software across each and every platform as listed by Kind of Funny Games Daily Show hosts each and every weekday.

1:14:32Great job. There we go.

1:14:36Out Today, I do have a special segment for Out Today, since Out Today is a segment we previously used to do that's been replaced by We News, but I have a fun mini game showdown round. I'm going to have to angle my laptop away from Tim Geddes and the rest of the cast. He is a known cheater. Since it is showdown, I know that's a show a lot of people don't watch. I would like to point out I am the reigning champion. I led Team Blue to its third straight championship. And then I won the Nick Scarpino season. And then I am currently, I have two stars. Currently. Currently. Today we're playing the Out Today game.

1:15:12This is not worth a star, by the way. This is just a fun exhibition. This is just fun. This is exhibition. Yeah, fun exhibition. The rules are simple. I've compiled old Out Today segments of KHD, where we used to list every single game coming out in a given day. I've slid in one fake game among the list of games. I'm going to go around the table after each list Your job is to guess which of these games Is the fake game I've hidden in the list We've got just four rounds Each correct answer is ten points Contestants, are you ready? Yeah! I'm going to have to keep points by myself by the way So bear with me here The first one This is from June 20th, 2017 A.K.A.

1:15:46the second ever episode Of Kinda Funny Games Daily I got four games here One of them is fake Out today We got Chess Ultra for PS4 and VR Dead by Daylight for PS4 Next Machina for PS4 and PC and Lo-Fi Girl the Game for Switch Lo-Fi Girl the Game I'm locking it in Andrea what's your answer? Oh my gosh can you read them again? You got Chess Ultra, Dead by Daylight Next Machina and Lo-Fi Girl the Game I'm going to go with Next Machina Tim? Lo-Fi Girl The correct answer is Lo-Fi Girl the Game That is 10 points for Tim and Greg. I think it is. I just don't think it came out then. I don't think it's a real thing.

1:16:30Oh, yeah. Lo-Fi Girls are real. It was a Lo-Fi Girls game. Was there? Oh, I thought I made that up. Well, there you go. Didn't come out that day, though. Next round. This is from August 7th, 2018. Out today. Again, these are four games. You got Minecraft Story Mode Season 2 for Switch. Super Blackjack Battle 2 Turbo Edition. The Card Warriors for Switch. crossword defenders for ps4 and ps vita and poop slinger for ps4 which one of those is the fake game let's start off with tim i'm gonna go with the super card battle whatever the long one second one yeah andrea poop slinger that can't possibly be real greg miller minecraft season two there was no season two the correct answer crossword defenders none of you guys got season for real?

1:17:22Did Telltale go out of business by then? And there was a game called Poopslinger for PS4. And Lo-Fi Girl was also real. Oh, cool. It's a real game. When did it come out? I don't know. I just saw the Steam thing. She's not on trial here. It's you. Okay? Round three. This one is from October 29th, 2021. Out today, we got Mario Party Superstars for Switch. Holy Cow Milking Simulator for Switch. Ghosts and apples for Switch. And Adventure Time, the roguelike for Switch. Let's start off with Greg Miller. Ghosts and apples. Greg says ghosts and apples. Andrea. The cow one. Tim. Can you read the last three again?

1:18:05Holy cow milking simulator for Switch. Ghosts and apples for Switch. Adventure Time, the roguelike for Switch. Ghosts and apples. The correct answer. Adventure Time, the roguelike for Switch. I was about to say, I don't think Adventure Time ever had a roguelike. No, it did not. Though they did have an Adventure Time game, didn't they? Yes. A couple, yeah. And that brings us to our fourth and final round of Out Today, the game. This is from February 4th, 2022. Out Today, we got Cousins Quest for Steam. Frog Ball. Very popular game in Kansas. Usually ends with a cross-eyed baby.

1:18:46Got him, Andy! Wow. I fucking got him!

1:18:54Cousin's Quest for Steam. You got Frog Ball Rerolled for Switch, Math Gym for Switch, and Millie and Molly for Switch. Is it Math Gym or Math Gem? Math Gym. So G-Y-M. Like I'm going to pump iron at the gym. Exactly. Math Gym. Let's start with Tim. math gym tim says math gym andrea i mean all of these sound fake to me but that means they're probably all real um i'm gonna go with frog ball re-rolled greg i'm saying frog ball as well the correct answer cousin's quest damn it damn meaning uh that does bring us to the end of the game, meaning with 10 points each, Greg and Tim are the victors. Congratulations.

1:19:44Great. Congratulations, Tim. Yeah. Would you like to risk it all and do one more? Yeah. Okay. I can't be making a one. You have some kind of feuding bullshit in your little thing. What do you got for me? You know what? Just for that, I'm pulling up. I mean, I could pull up a random KFG notes that are in my drive. Can you make up a random game on the spot? Of course I can. Oh, okay. I'm letting Andrea do it. Okay. Just give me one second here to find an old... Yeah, give me a couple Super Chats while that happens. Ready? Yeah. You go first. Oh, shit. James Wood with a$2 Super Chat says congrats on 2K.

1:20:23Kind of funny. Can't wait to watch the next 2K. And then we have a 99 cent one, which is I think the easiest way that we're going to try to hit the 2000 goal. 99 cent one with no message. Just for Malloy. Just Malloy. John Alexander Miranda Ronan says, my favorite memory is Gary and Jared just talking for 40-plus minutes before even getting into the actual news. Here's to another 2 ,000-plus. We used to call it View Cancer. You know what I mean? Riyadh with a$5 Super Chat says, just started watching during the pandemic and have been here ever since. From a fellow Bay Area native, thank you for everything you do.

1:20:56See you all at 4 ,000. Brandon Mills wrote in and says, I can't stop crying. Love you all. Congrats on the day. A big emotional day today. Congratulations. congratulations five dollars superjack from diego says mike i need to know where does the final where does final fantasy x rank on your all-time list uh that's a great list uh you know top 100 you have to keep an eye out where is the list i don't know one day you know what i mean i'm playing digimon now oh hey can i give a shout out um greg i told you last week that i was going to a board game thing this weekend right yeah yeah um while i was there on saturday i was hanging out and one of the dudes there uh his name's patrick we're chatting and like video games came up because most people who go to that board game night they work in video games or whatever and he was like you do journalism right i'm like uh journalism you know it's more so like infotainment infotainment you know like i'm trying to like correct him a little bit and he's like he's like and i told him i was like i'm mainly a podcaster like i just talk about video games and he's like oh cool what's the name of the podcast i told him kind of funny and he like i saw his face change a second he was like wait a second kind of funny i listen to kind of funny and then he pulls out his phone shows me like an old ass episode of kind of funny games daily that he was listening to and he's like holy shit i recognize your voice this man who i've been playing board games with for maybe like a year has been listening to this podcast and just did not put it together that it was me that's i i don't even i don't even know how that happens well blessing is such a common name you know

1:22:24you couldn't possibly be the blessing so he was do you think he was just trolling you No, he was dead serious. Because I could see it in his face of like, oh. The wheels clicking. Yeah, because he was like, I recognize your voice now. Yeah, that's you. I was like, yes, dude. That's what you've been listening to. Hilarious. Just audio form. You just sound like Michael Cera. Exactly. Hey, man. Hey, man. So shout out, Patrick. Those always crack me up when you have a special occasion. Somebody rolls in, like, I've only listened. Nobody looks like how they thought they'd look. Interesting. Okay, I'm ready when you guys are.

1:22:53Let's do it. Okay, so this is from April 8th, 2019. Okay. Out today, Ghost 1.0 on PS4, Assault of the Robots on PC, Crisis Core Final Fantasy Remastered on PS4, Magic Farm 2 Fairylands on PC, Hotel Mogul Las Vegas on PC, 30 Days to Survive on PC, and Jungle Z on Switch. There's a lot of games. There's a lot of games. It was just the first notes I picked. I'm happy to read them again. Ghost 1.0 on PS4. Assault of the Robots on PC. Crisis Core Final Fantasy Remastered on PS4. Magic Farm 2 Fairylands on PC. Hotel Mogul Las Vegas on PC. 30 Days to Survive on PC. And Jungle Z on Switch.

1:23:52Blessing. Am I in this? Yeah. I'll say Jungle Z. If you win, then you give it to me. Okay. Give what to you? It's an exhibition. One more time. Ghost 1.0 on PS4. Assault of the Robots on PC. Crisis Core Final Fantasy Remastered on PS4. Magic Farm 2 Fairyland on PC. Hotel Mogul Las Vegas on PC. 30 Days to Survive. And Jungle Z on Switch. Lock him in. Hotel Mogul Las Vegas. I'm actually going to change mine to Final Fantasy Crisis Core I'm going to say Crisis Core as well Did it come to PlayStation 4? I don't think it came out You locked in your fucking name I don't think it came out that year Crisis Core came out when I was here Crisis Core is correct That was the made up one What was the year?

1:24:39I think that's 2021 It was later What was the year though? 2019 2019 was the year Was there a remaster? Actually I don't know I just literally Googled Square Enix games and then just picked one and put remastered on PS4. See, I made up all my games. I know. Because almost all of them are remastered on PS4. That's not a 50 % game. That's not a 50 % game. Sorry, by the way, for the record. No, it's not a star. This is just my trophy for winning the Kind of Funny Games Daily 2000 episode Game Showdown. Fair enough. Another thing to add to his intro. Yeah, and I'd love it if you could do that. Because, of course, this is the cinematic universe of Game Showdown.

1:25:15It ties it all together. And this gets people to go, oh, I've got to catch up. Now I gotta watch KGP Damn, as always Tim, you suck We have more to get to But before then, one super chat check-in Boys, how we doing? What's the number? Where we at? Roger hasn't updated me In about 20 minutes You guys are fucking useless You guys are fucking useless You know, you can just copy and paste them Into a spreadsheet, and then you can look at them Without them scrolling Let me tell you about yourself Spreadsheets They're all over We don't know how they work I don't know if we know how they work yet I've never figured it out I just taught Mike about the snipping tool How are you adults?

1:25:57They're not We should have sat y 'all down before this Blaster Goblin with a$2 super chat Says haven't missed an episode since I found kind of funny In 2018 40Viz writes Happy 2K There's also a super chat I've been looking for That I need, if you did it Retype it in And like, I'll Venmo you back. I've been looking for it for a long time. What did they say? But it was just saying one moment that I'll never forget on Kind of Funny is the studio going dark and hearing the music hit and Greg entering with your WWE bit. Like the music hits and just how visceral that makes us all feel like da-da-da, da-da-da.

1:26:36And then it's just like a very, very memorable moment for them that they'll never forget. They'll Venmo you back. Yeah, I'll Venmo you. Just make sure you type it in again. Octavio writes in one that's about me, Tim. Okay. Happy to contribute to the 2K. Also, make sure to watch the rich, poor Minecraft video that Mike recommended. It's absolute cinema, 10 out of 10. I still need to check it out because I have heard nothing but that. Ever since you saw, like, I didn't believe you, Mike, because, you know, you're you. But every single person is like, dude, Mike was right about this. $20 Super Chat.

1:27:06Thank you for your generosity. Mike Hemmon, who says, congratulations to you all. I used to think that Greg Miller was the most annoying part of Game Scoop and Knockin' Boots. and I still do. I added that. That's part of it. I was joking there. Then they said, but I followed his entire journey since and now adore him and love you all. Here's to 2 ,000 more. Thank you, Mike. It's growth. Wow. Kobe writes in and says, happy 2 ,000, y 'all. I've been listening since 2016 and one of my core memories with the channel is the Year of Dreams E3 reaction. Y 'all have been amazing and have influenced me so much.

1:27:41I now work in the games industry. Congratulations, Kobe. Very, very cool. That's beautiful. Welcome. DG Ruka with a$10 super chat says, I'm barely a year new to kind of funny, but y 'all have made me laugh and smile so much in such a short time. Congrats to 2K, and here's to the next 2K. Always shocked whenever anybody says, oh, I just started listening in the last year. That's crazy to me. Why? Why? Thank you. But it's always blows me up. Do you remember the kind of feudy where they were like, where do you get your gaming news? And none of us guessed ourselves. We were like number three. IG and GameSpot, kind of funny.

1:28:15We just didn't even think of ourselves that way. SlayJ with a$5 super chat says, 2 ,000 episodes already? Congratulations, guys. Let's get that Tiny Wado game made now. I know a guy. Yeah. Jed writes in. Shout out to all the hosts, especially Nick Scarpino. He's working really hard today. Oh, yeah. Remember me and Nick posted on April Fool's Day. I remember that. We just showed up and did our best. Well, speaking of that, I got one from Chad Allen here. He says, my favorite KG moment was Andy reporting live from outside of E3. A petition that you start saying, that you start saying Super Chat, like you said, Superman during Superman 2 in review.

1:28:52Andy maybe tried it the other day. I like that. I was kind of bummed out to see in the montage that my really, really bad flubbed cold open didn't make the montage. But that to me is like a moment that I'll never forget of just, today's, just like what a disaster to start off. I don't know why they asked me to host Mike. I like this one. I don't want you to miss it. Saul Super Chaston says, birthday tax for October 8th. Can I get a Gerido from Andy?

1:29:23We don't get those enough. Still got it. We love that. Trevor Starkey. Hello. With a name I haven't heard in many years. With a$20 Super Chaston says, love and miss you all. I echo the calls to bring back Kind of Funny Live. Congrats on 2 ,000 episodes. All the best to the whole team. Thank you, Trevor. Hope you're doing well, dude. Steve Saylor writes in and says, congrats on 2 ,000 episodes. KFGD literally changed my life in more ways than I can include in a Super Chat. Y 'all created something special. Love y 'all. Love you, Steve. Thank you, Steve. Love you, Steve. Manny Bagelway Sanchez,$10 Super Chat, says, my favorite Games Daily moment is on February 16, 2022.

1:30:01Andy and Bless helped announce my son to my family on my birthday. Still have the video. That's my birthday, too. What the fuck? They're the same birthday. I don't know you and Manny. That's cool. Birthday boys. and final super chat from now comes from oscar navarro congrats on 2k ps glad to see andrea i miss what's good games oh me too of course ladies and gentlemen and nbs we hope you'll never have to miss us and if you keep supporting us with a kind of funny membership you won't have to you can pick up a membership over on patreon.com slash kind of funny youtube.com slash kind of funny games apple spotify get all of our shows ad free get them uh you know with the greg stuff that you get to do the Greg ways, we call them, 15 to 20 minutes of me.

1:30:40And then, of course, just have a good time out there supporting somebody. Get good karma. But right now, you're not using your benefits. So here's a word from our sponsors. This episode's brought to you by Factor. Fall always feels like there's just so much going on, so much stuff to do, shorter days, busier routines, back to school. It's all just a lot. That's why so many of us here at Kind of Funny love Factor. Their chef-prepared, dietician-approved meals make it easy to stay on track and enjoy something comforting and delicious. no matter how hectic the season might get. On many occasions, Factor has completely saved both Greg and Jen when they needed it most.

1:31:17Choose for a wider selection of weekly meals, including premium seafood choices. We're talking salmon. We're talking shrimp at no extra cost. Eat smart at factormeals.com slash kindoffunny50off and use code kindoffunny50off to get 50 % off your first box, plus free breakfast for one year. That's code kindoffunny50off at factormeals.com for 50 % off your first box plus free breakfast for one year. Get delicious, ready-to-eat meals delivered with Factor. Offer only valid for new Factor customers with code and qualifying auto-renewing subscription purchase. And we're back. We're doing a little bathroom shimmy.

1:31:57Everyone's going to cycle out and go to the little pee-pee room. That's what they call it now, the pee-pee room. We've got to change that name. We'll get on it. We can't keep that. we're going to get some more super chats here. Alien 5000 says been listening since the days of Undertaker bursting through the wall and even named my son's middle name after Greg. Thanks for being the most consistent thing in my life. Thank you so much. It's crazy. How consistent the show has been. It is. Yeah. For 2000 episodes, it's been a daily video game news show. Yeah. That's tough. Something that I love about it is I love getting to do it with you so often.

1:32:28I love being here, being part of this is so special, but seeing that montage, the amount of memories over the last like what eight years yeah and seeing all of the different guest hosts that we've had like i would have never thought we had that many people and there was a couple uh guests that we had that like i didn't even remember doing an episode with isla from easy allies like and i'm like oh my god it's just crazy that like we do this so consistently and so often that you just kind of eventually it's just another thing we do but to see it kind of memorialized that way it's like oh my god we do something cool here oh yeah 1000 uh want to bring in from one from goldfish boy uh 1337 that's elite uh congrats team kf special shout out to blessing the only one who really who really cares about us audio listeners and to mike the goat here's the 8 000 more khd's one of my greatest highlights of the day listen i was an audio listener and so i gotta care about my audio listeners mr showtime says the one with isla was earlier this year no shut up no actually that is true that is true

1:33:37look man that's hilarious i don't know no calm says cam spend my second screen while gaming forever and i've been there through everything love and appreciate you guys thank you that's so awesome and i do think that's one of the coolest things is like you know we listen to gaming podcasts as well so it's like cool to know that we're that for other people yeah Right now, somebody's playing Hades 2 while listening to us. I know that for a fact because I've listened to so many podcasts while playing Hades 2. And if you're playing Hades 2 right now, lock in. Pick the right upgrades. Choose the right paths.

1:34:08Make sure you're using your cast. This is the run. This is the run. This is the run. I believe in you because you know what? Timmy, beat it over the weekend. We got a gamer here, everybody. Dude, yesterday, my friend Curran came by and we grabbed just some coffee together. And this couple had this little baby with them. uh and we had a dog so like the baby and dog were interacting so we ended up kind of talking to them a bit he overheard we were talking about expedition 33 yeah and the guy overheard that and he was like oh my god i need to interrupt like what a game like got super into it and he was like yeah my wife like just started and i was like oh that's awesome like we're talking about she's like yeah like i need to stop and get back to it though because i'm almost done with hades too and i'm like this is the greatest conversation i've ever accidentally got and he was like oh yeah like i I got to get to Hades after.

1:34:52He's like, I'm about to beat Silksong. And I'm like, let's go. Let's fucking go. You know, it was so funny because Curran's like, I can't believe that. Because he only played Expedition. And he's like, every game that Tim talks about, you guys are just bringing up. I'm like, this is great. He's like, I'm about to start Yoshi's Island.

1:35:10He busts out Pokemon Go. Do you need a bathroom? No, I'm fine. Okay, I'm going to go. Yeah. Oh, you're getting that donut too. Nice thinking. You know, these are like solid donuts. Like no hole? Yes, I'm very curious what kind of donut it is. Like there's no hole in the middle. It's almost like a fritter. You know what I mean? Yes. I am...

1:36:03I'm really concerned though that this very blue frosting is going to turn my mouth like fully blue. Good day for it. I mean, I'm wearing blue. The set is very blue. Very matchy-matchy. Good. it's a good donut uh reading some more super chats for you 40 viz uh i might have i've scrolled all the way back to the beginning because i don't want to forget y 'all 40 viz just says happy 2k shout out uh velocity entertainment says so dang long i've been watching it feels like forever even inspiring my own podcast thanks uh thanks for always being consistent hilarious and happy 2k octavio writes in and says happy to contribute to the 2k also uh make sure to watch the rich poor Minecraft video.

1:36:50Oh wait, I think we already read this one. Do you think they're not doing their job? They were doing their job. They're doing it. You're doing too well? Here are my teeth blue? A little bit. Ah, damn it. Yeah, a little bit. Not noticeable. Oh, no, maybe. On camera? Probably not noticeable. In person? Bear, give me the one. Digital zoom on my teeth.

1:37:14I don't see it. Okay. Maybe a little bit. That's just like gunk. That's that blue gunk you get in your teeth when you eat a blue donut. Andy! Andy!

1:37:29Oh Andy, come here Andy, I missed you.

1:37:37I laughed so many times this weekend thinking back to like, we have a lot of fun here. Like a genuine belly laugh for both of us when I came in when the tech wasn't working and I was like, they say kissing won't fix audio lag and you wouldn't be both busted up laughing so bad on that street. Only one way to find out. God disagree. Man, I've been playing a lot of Super Bonk or Mega Bonk. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I've been seeing that make the waves online. Holy shit. Too much Mega Bonk. I want to read one from Jenny, aka Send Nuggies. It says Okay, real chat. KHD helped me remember how much I love video games and introduced me to the communities around them.

1:38:11If I can take one thing away from taking in the news, it's how important it is to support the little guys with the heart emoji. Is that a winking? Thank you, Sen. Nuggies. Always a pleasure. Thank you, Sen. Nuggies. And then Jason Cohen says, Bless called me out. Playing Hades 2 right now while listening. Got four more achievements to 100 % on Steam Deck. Congrats, Kind of Funny, on 10 years and 2 ,000 episodes of KFGD. If you're playing Hades 2 right now, I want you to super chat in. We're going to get a lot of super chats. We're about to be rolling. We're hitting 2 ,000. If everybody did right now, we'd be done.

1:38:43Mike can go home. $2 super chat for a birthday tax from Mr. Peepee Poo Poo. Jesus. Fan for six years. Sure, why not? Shout out. I also don't know if we shouted this out in the beginning, but we have a lot more segments past the Roper Report. I know typically this would be the end of the show. We had a lot more show left, which we decided to get to. Oh, yeah. That's good because Cameron Kennedy writes in and says, first time watching, pretty good so far. Ah, Cameron. Hopefully give him a good show. And then watch the zoom in on Greg's mouth. Probably quickly. That's the content that this audience wants.

1:39:14You can get the news from anywhere, all right? Do you want to go listen to Jordan Midler? This fucking giant Shrek looking bald man? Or do you want this kind of content? Mike, open your mouth and put it on my mouth.

1:39:30Andy, open your mouth and put it on Mike's mouth.

1:39:37Let's move on to our next segment. It's a new segment for Games Daily 2000 called The Audience Picks the Biggest KFGD Stories. We asked the audience to write in with their picks for the biggest news stories in KFGD history. And we've narrowed it down to the top three and ranked them based on what you wrote in. Super chat question to keep them coming as we march towards 2000. Maybe Roger can give you all an update. You know, since you can't ask. He's yapping outside. I can tell you that. As of 1128. 20 minutes ago. 527. Okay. Wow. We're marching. We're marching. And they're starting to come in in droves.

1:40:14Thanks to all the people playing Hades 2 right now. Thank you so much for the Hades 2. I'm going to leave one as well. Blessing, I gave you the synopsis at the top here, but you want to give me a little bit more on this segment? I mean, you pretty much nailed it. We put up a poll probably like a few weeks ago, a month ago, for the audience to write in what they think are the biggest KHD stories. And so I looked into them kind of feudy style, and I've ranked them. And so I've narrowed down to top three, the top three biggest KHD stories. We're going to start for number three. Number three, GTA 6 trailer is leaked.

1:40:44This is from the December 5th, 2023 edition of Kind of Funny Games Daily. We're reading from Mariko, Tom, and Mark over at BBC News. The trailer for Grand Theft Auto 6 has leaked after going online. Has revealed after an online leak. A glimpse of the sixth game in the Grand Theft Auto series has finally been revealed after the trailer for the long-awaited blockbuster was leaked. Developer Rockstar pressed publish 15 hours before a heavily trailed release after a low-quality copy spread online. The 90-second teaser confirmed the game will be set in Miami-inspired Vice City and star female protagonist Lucia for the first time since the 1990s.

1:41:24But the waiting isn't over as the game isn't due to be released until 2025. What was it like? because i i think i was in la when this all happened so i ended up not being on the gta 6 trailer reaction what was the energy in the office when it fucking sucked bless it was the most erratic thing you've ever seen in your life it was like an i mentioned that day it felt like an episode of succession yep where like if you just had a handheld camera zooming on everybody it was tim on a call and he's like this isn't good this isn't good and then and he was like move that four we need that two hours it felt like an episode of tv it was fucking insane like we and roger getting on the graphics like it was we were all prepped all hands on deck we're gonna be here whatever it was 6 a.m 6 a.m we'll be in the office we're gonna go live we'll have the whole thing that's it and then wait a second i think it's leaked and then wait a second and then rock star themselves coming out and tweeting right our trailer has leaked so please watch the real thing on youtube dropping that 3 10 on december 4th oh my god it was pandemonium out it was pandemonium and it was crazy because the panic came from we were sponsored like this was a big thing that i sold and was very proud of selling because it was out of the ordinary of like hey this trailer dropping is going to be one of the biggest most viewed things we've ever done i'm pretty sure it was extra real i could be wrong there and i was convincing my guy i'm like you want to sponsor us for this and so we had the whole thing planned and then it was like uh-oh what do we do like do we wait for the official thing to drop or do we react to the leaked trailer that like had the freaking whatever like gambling it was like a crypto crypto whatever the hell it was like god what do we do and then yeah like the energy in the room was so crazy and then yeah the set looked beautiful us reacting to it i mean again it's still a huge deal the game's still not out like obviously next year hopefully uh we'll get grand theft auto 6 but like yeah i'll never forget that day i'll never forget that trailer everything about that was very special and definitely one of the biggest news stories ever and also just crazy that it happened yeah this thing we're all waiting for we know it was going to be such a big deal to leak we out with this weird meme coin shit on it or whatever like what the fuck and this is after right like wasn't the first footage of gta 6 leaked by or am i confusing when they're the game but like somebody's kid like they made a video and it went up or no i think there was there was snippets leaked like a like a year or two prior and then there was this constant jockeying of everybody doing predictions of every major showcase being like, ah, GTA 6 is finally coming.

1:43:55Oh, it's the next Summer Game Fest. It's the next Opening Night Live. It's the next Sony showcase. And it was like GTA 6. And I maintain Rockstar does not need anybody else to release a trailer. They have not done that in the past for like the first trailer. They're not going to do that. I never predicted it going out this way though. I think for people like us who've been covering Rockstar for as many years as we have, I think it all took us by surprise because they are like Fort Knox over there, right? I mean, they are locked down tight with their stuff because their IP is incredibly valuable.

1:44:30And it was just like, I think, such a bummer how it spilled out like this because, I mean, we're talking about thousands of people who have been working on this game for many years. And this was supposed to be like this big debut moment. And then you get these leaks and it just is always such a like a wah-wah. And obviously, like when we all saw the like official trailer, we were blown away and are rightly like very hyped to see more from this game. But it was. Yeah, I mean, it was a very, very big news day. Incredible. This is the highest profile video game leak of all time. I mean, it must be right.

1:45:03Like the trailer leaking hours before is one thing. But I mean, like the hack of GTA 6, I think, is definitely up there. Like, well, there's this. There's Insomniac. Right. which I guess if I'm using the word high profile, like GTA six is like the biggest gaming IP, but like the, but like, I think what you also want to distinguish between like a leak and like a data mine, right? For sure. Like some, like somebody intentionally going in and like stealing information versus like one person on a team being like, I want to show my friend this cool thing. And then that friend like tells another friend and now it's leaked.

1:45:38Cause like in terms of volume, there have been bigger video game leaks in terms of, yeah, like it's on me. Assassin's Creed. What was the Assassin's Creed? Every Assassin's Creed ever. Yes, pretty much. Pretty much every year. Always leads through products from Canada. When they got the entire marketing plan for Destiny. Years before then or whatever. Yeah. Tomb Raider on the train. The NVIDIA leak. Yeah, NVIDIA. Dude, real talk. The NVIDIA leak is something that was like, we're still referencing. Where's Final Fantasy IX? NVIDIA might be the biggest, I guess, in terms of how many different games it touches.

1:46:09That list had Kingdom Hearts 4 on it before the game was announced. And all those games ended up being real. It's crazy. Except for Fall of Fantasy IX. Which we're still waiting for. I mean, Walmart Canada. They always just be like it's done. What was the Smash one that everybody was up in arms about? The Grinch League. Never forget the Grinch League. Never forget it. For me, that's a classic episode of KFGD. Because I've never had somebody convince me so strongly like Tim did. Listening to that episode and me being like, damn. It was a great thumbnail I remember with the Grinch on it. I was like, man, the Grinch League is real.

1:46:41I believed it because of Tim. There's a super chat from Sid X who said, Greg, we'll have a teenager when GTA seven comes out. Hopefully not a 20 year old. You know what I mean? Like, I don't know. As long as GTA take, I wouldn't let's not hold our breath for Ben to be in his teens. As voted by you, the kind of funny audience, the second biggest story in our 2000 episodes, Greg Miller is banned from E3. This is June 27, 2019. They have my tweet up there. It's just as good morning. Hashtag I'm banned from E3. And it's a screenshot of the email. Hello. As part of the E3 terms and conditions for 2019, you had agreed to the following.

1:47:18The E3 badge is non-transferable and is the property of the ESA. E3 badge swapping and or sharing is strictly prohibited. Any attendee found using another attendee's badge will have the badge confiscated and will be removed from the premises. The E3 badge must be worn at all times. Security confiscated your badge after stopping someone who had your badge on and whose ID did not match. Every year, management reviews each person and the reason their badge was confiscated and decides on whether they'll be granted admission to the show. As a result of this violation, you've been placed on a banned attendee list for 2020.

1:47:54That's still so crazy. The explanation makes it worse because it indicates a human being reviewed your specific case and decided you, Greg Miller, were going to be banned. Good. I honestly think this must have been a publicity stunt. No, I wish that was true because like their response and handling was so poor, obviously from the jump here, but then from the follow up, like they couldn't have fucked up worse. And then when I called them on it, they were so like, so if you remember, because this happened on games, I think it was an episode you were on Andrea. Because I remember this and like, like I was like, not mad, but I was just gobsmacked by it.

1:48:35And the fact that they couldn't have picked a worse guy to say did this because I had the video footage from GameSpot of me on the stage ending E3. When the announcers were like, we're closing the doors in five minutes. You have to be off. And so like, I just sent them that video and I was like, hey, here's me on this. So there's no way I could have given my badge and had it confiscated. I was like, what I think happened is another fat man with a beard showed up and said they were Greg Miller and showed the very nice people who work the desk who are not video game people. They are convention center people.

1:49:09Where's your ID? I don't have it, but here's my Twitter profile. And they looked at a guy with glasses and a beard and an overbite and being overweight. And we're like, checks out. There's your badge. That guy got caught. And then everything went on fine. And when I sent them that long description, they sent back an email like, oh, man, listen, let's just solve this. You're on band. No big deal. Nobody. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. Admit you fucked up. Don't be like, oh, well, you know, no big deal. I'm like, no, no. I thought we talked about how you always throw your badge in the trash after the show because I keep all of my badges.

1:49:44I have a video on my TikTok of all of my badges. And you were like, maybe someone picked it up out of the trash. but you saying that you were on stage until the very end of the show, like that doesn't check out then. Yeah, that was the thing is I'd throw my badge in my hotel trash can. So it would have been like a maid went through it. But again, there'd be no show to go to. You'd be trying to get in while they're packing everything up at the tea. Again, this was in the montage video, but some context. The following year, Greg hosts E3. Yes. Just hilarious. Yes. Hilarious. Yes. It's so good. I don't want us stepping over the best part of this where Greg is tagging ESA, the European Space Agency.

1:50:25A common problem. Sorry, ESA. I'm at the ESA. As you can imagine, I'm in a fragile emotional state right now. Crazy that the European Space Agency outlived the, you know. Did they ever respond? Click on the other one down there where I apologized. Did ESA respond to my apology? I'll have to look into it. Well, if you click right there on June 27th. which ESA are we talking about? Oh, the space agency. Okay. Yeah. Again, these pay, these people paid me a lot of money to come. No, the European space agency did not give, they did not really apologize. That's it. I can't believe that you all like, I, so talk to me about how we wrote in to, was it like a, a multiple choice or did enough people write in?

1:51:10Greg is banned. Enough people wrote in. Yeah. Greg Miller is banned from me. I appreciate that. Thank you very much. Yeah. Cause that's something like, occasionally comes around in the old thought process. What a ridiculous thing. You have an overbite, huh? Yeah. I got the big buck teeth. They go over the front. Isn't that kind of an overbite? I never noticed that, Mike. Yeah, like him mentioning a guy with glasses in the mirror. Do the zoom in again. I'll show Andy on Andy. Oh, God.

1:51:40I feel like everybody has that. That's an overbite? Yeah, I feel like everybody's mouth looks like that. Yeah, slightly. That's how it's supposed to look. I don't know. Aren't your teeth supposed to come and touch each other? I don't know. I don't think it's like a dramatic overbite. Like Cole the wiener dog, he's got a big overbite. Oh, fucking Cole. Give me started. Gray Almeida with a$2 super shot says, Hopping into Hades 2 now. Hashtag Team Purple for life. Team Purple. Team Purple. We're going to win this year. One day you'll get a star. No big deal. And then your final. Number one. The story you thought was the biggest story that's happened in 2 ,000 episodes.

1:52:13Xbox acquires Activision. January 18th, 2022. The deal is announced on January 18, 2022. We're reading from the Xbox Wire, welcoming the incredible teams and legendary franchises of Activision Blizzard to Microsoft Gaming. Creators of Call of Duty, World of Warcraft, Candy Crush, Tony Hawk, Diablo, Overwatch, Spyro, Hearthstone, Guitar Hero, Crash Bandicoot, StarCraft, and more join Team Xbox. Until this transaction closes, Activision Blizzard and Microsoft Gaming will continue to operate independently. Once the deal is complete, the Activision Blizzard business will report to me as CEO of Microsoft Gaming.

1:52:48I assume this is Phil Spencer, right? Upon close, we will offer as many Activision Blizzard games as we can within Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass, both new titles and games from Activision Blizzard's incredible catalog. We also announced today that Game Pass now has more than 25 million subscribers. As always, we look forward to continuing to add more value and more great games to Game Pass. There's a follow-up then here. October 13th, 2023, the deal closes. Microsoft just bought Activision Blizzard for$69 billion. This is the one, the only, W-Y-P at IGN. That's Wesley Ian Poole, Tim. Yes, it is.

1:53:25It's official. Microsoft has bought Activision Blizzard for an incredible$69 billion. It's the biggest buyout in video game history, and in one fell swoop expands Xbox's first-party offering to encompass everything from Call of Duty to World of Warcraft. upon close we will offer as many activision blizzard games as we can with an xbox game pass and pc game pass how you think they're doing there you enjoyed playing transformers war for cybertron huh no not yet maybe one day one day they can they can their hands are tied you know licensing and technology is tough for the licenses that they don't wholly own that it is actually like quite complicated but yeah they could be doing a lot more than like a lot a lot like a lot like yes the most more yes correct that's one thing for sure uh and yeah this being the biggest story absolutely right i mean this was a story for over a year yeah it's like we we cover things all the time ad nauseum as you saw earlier with the layoffs and which just acquisitions as a whole but there's been other themes there's been the nfts is that what they are yeah the nft yeah thank god i almost we beat we beat him into the fucking ground we didn't need to worry about him anymore thank god uh yeah the nft stuff like there's always things that we like trends of games daily news stories but like xbox acquiring activision i think is the single most covered story you know like this thing like the amount of times that we covered this one event and the court cases and the fallout and the layoffs and the studio closure the leaks from court cases oh my gosh the documents that came out of the court case yeah when they were uploading they didn't even have to reveal it they were doing it they're like oh fuck we put up the wrong picture we forgot to redact my bad oops well now you know about the next doom game and a bunch of other games yeah and again you know to your point it's still ongoing we're still talking you know today's games daily was all about xbox and what happens in the future because of this and the 300 million dollars lost because of this like it's crazy to look here now and be able to look at the ripples and where we are now and how it's just continues to happen yeah in retrospect how do we feel about the way that we have covered it right between games daily and games cast i was streaming yesterday and there was somebody in chat that i was like oh yeah reddit's talking about how y 'all were wrong about the acquisition i was like i remember us being skeptical about the acquisition wrong about what it's such a juggernaut of a story and a deal like there's so many parts to be right or wrong yeah you know how it is whenever you say anything on any of these shows you can talk for 30 minutes but that one sentence that pisses somebody off is how you feel and i would think that if i'm remembering correctly it was a lot of like hey a lot of times video consolidation is bad but phil and the team over there are gamers and they try they have done a lot of gamer first decisions so hopefully that would carry over here but it was you know hopefully and as we've talked throughout this episode right like it isn't necessarily shaking out that way as now again i would say like you did tim from on high screws are being tightened like make fucking money off this why are we losing money yeah it all comes down to having a vision that you're able to see through and i think that the vision was clear yeah we'll just acquire the biggest third party that there is with literally the biggest ip and biggest games in the games industry and profit and for that all to line up everything had to go right and so few things went right so yeah with where right now it is definitely not a surprise and being able to cover this on the show like daily and update and things change and see how the the entire sector of Xbox, whether it's hardware or software, like ecosystems, all that stuff, like how that changes over time.

1:57:03It's very interesting. There has been so much shift with Xbox specifically. Yeah, they're just unruly. It's just unmanageable at this point, and we're seeing the repercussions of that. I like Big Five before it goes. I'll admit, I'll always remember Blessing saying, just let them buy it so we don't have to cover this anymore. I don't remember saying that, but I remember it. Again, it was like a throw away like oh my god i'm sick of talking about this like in the old days when andrea got so mad when we'd update pub g numbers she's like i get it it's still the biggest game stop it was just like the same story over and over again at least the xbox stuff had like interesting stuff that was getting revealed from like the court case it was like seasons of tv with xbox stuff where it's like okay it's new but it's the same kind of thing i also think like the scariest but also i think something that i really like about covering uh big news on khd uh the scariest thing is covering something that's so unprecedented where it is people expect us to get things right all the time right or maybe people expect us to be done most of the time but like long time fans do when microsoft buys activision blizzard there's only so much we can do to speculate and talk about what's going to happen and talk like that's something that's that's one of the biggest things to happen in video games period and so realistically we don't know what's going to happen right we don't know what this looks like five years down the line and i think for me when i look back at the ways we talk about things and the ways that we i think grow in our coverage and see new information come in and like take that and apply that to the way we talk about things i think we do a genuinely phenomenal job at it i think like the day-to-day coverage of khd which is something that we uniquely provide um to such like you know with such depth because we're doing an hour podcast every single day we get into the weeds in a way that i think few other people can and i'm for me i'll say i'm proud of us the way that we cover 100 no you should be blessed and obviously if people don't know we're talking about this episode how much work you put into it alongside roger obviously on the daily right your job is building games daily even when you're not on games daily you're building games daily and i think that's done so well to give the show a narrative backbone where we're able to reference stuff and you're able to put it together and as hosts come in and then have that okay cool i can just react rather than be worried about building it in the last five seconds before i get out here right like you're able to keep that going and i think you know we've all talked about it and had those our own little interactions but when you go to someone else's podcast or you bring someone from another podcast on here and like oh okay we talk about games in a different way than many people not everybody by any stretch of the imagination but i know we've gone and done guest appearances where it's like we're referencing and talking about the thing and i'm like oh whoa they weren't ready for that they weren't ready for that idea yeah and those are the three biggest news stories of 2000 episodes everybody are you guys surprised is there any story that you you feel because like my yeah the e3 when i never would have thought enough people would be unified to vote for the story that i thought was missing was um epic games versus apple um oh yeah because that was also on one of those stories that we just kept covering over and over and over and over again um and you know maybe we'll talk more about it uh later on but like how that kind of kicked off with epic pulling fortnight from the app store like from ios which was like what why why would you do that yeah i I don't think there's a story to center this one around, but I think the saga of the loot box stuff going on in, I think, 2018.

2:00:21Star Wars Battlefront 2 being, I think, the big one around it. I remember listening to KFG every single day, and it felt like there was always something new about loot boxes and them maybe being litigated or the people being up in arms about Star Wars and all that shit. That felt like such a big story at that time. One that I was surprised by, but maybe it was just too slow of a roll for people to think of it as one story was the death of E3 over those two years, right? Like that was such a big shift on how people consume like big information in the middle of the summer. So yeah, I was surprised that one didn't make it.

2:00:55Yeah, and I talked about it earlier today, but the Game Pass news, like that legitimately, we will see and are feeling now, but we'll forever see the ramifications of those decisions and how that changed the way people perceive the value of a video game. and as games themselves are going up to$70,$80, it's like, oh man, you can't put the genie back in the bottle. Yep. The same way that Napster and then iTunes completely changed the music industry and streaming services have changed the movie industry, Game Pass is changing the gaming industry and I don't think it's a good thing. Yep. I got really shocked to not see Snoop Dogg's Amazon Luna video game.

2:01:35Oh yeah. Well, the poll went up before that. Ah, that makes sense. It makes no sense. Andy, while we have you, why don't you give us an update? Of course, we're trying to get 2 ,000 super chats here in our 2 ,000th episode. They can be 99 cents. Don't worry about it. If all 4 ,000 of you did it right now, we'd be done. We could stop talking about it. We could send Andy home. Of course, though, Andy, how many have we had so far over on YouTube.com slash kindoffunnygames? Or you can super chat right now. Roger updated me 10 minutes ago with massive news. We hit 600. Huge. Thank you, everybody. We have a super chat here from somebody named Andy Cortez who says, next kfl uh should be june 30th 2026 to celebrate the fifth anniversary of amazon prime videos that tomorrow war tomorrow yeah never forget i love that we made a try there everybody go watch it andrea have you watched the tomorrow war yet i have not no i've been just watching k-pop demon hunters over and over and over again i know that well yes my child is in the same boat yeah yeah next year though tomorrow war you should get charlie on that i think she'd like it i got the a Google sheet open with all the form responses, asking people what the biggest KFG story is.

2:02:39And like, while it's dominated by Microsoft fighting Activision, there are a few people that write in and says, Tim PP do work, which got a chuckle out of me. Any other super chats you want to highlight? It is a big story. It's not as big as I wish it was. Ow! OmegaBuster asks, can we add a Snowback Mike PowerPoint to games daily once a week? A lot of work. Wait a minute. I was going to say, you know how to use PowerPoint, but not spreadsheets? That can't be. Well, I think you should watch one of his PowerPoints before we just say if he knows how to use it. Okay. $5 Super Chat here from Jordan Harrison.

2:03:16He says, congrats, Kind of Funny Crew. Thanks for all the work you put into 2000 episodes of KFGD. You all are the best. Heck, yeah. Michael McCarthy writes in and says, happy 2000 fans since 2020. Wow. Thanks, Michael. Microtransaction Chris, with a$2 Super Chat, asks, Mike, are we getting a marathon Pokemon ZA stream? Oh, that's a great question. No, but you will get Nick unleashed in Pokemon. We will release Nick into the world, no rules, and he will go have some fun. It'll be a great time. We decided we'll just let you play the game. It gets very stressful for him. It's not good for his cholesterol.

2:03:50Justin writes in and says Team Purple, Team Texas, Team PC, Team Whataburger. Man, come on. You're on the team. You're on the team. Welcome in. So many bad things. RSC Raptor Face with a$2 super chat says that interview with Greg and Camilla Luddington. Oh, okay. I remember that. Because this is an up a new reference. Oh, okay. Gotcha. So that wasn't a KFGD reference. Gotcha. $10 super chat from Jim Tacey says, been a fan of Greg and company since the IGN days. So grateful for everyone on KFGD. Got me through many days. Proud to be a part of this community. Jordan West writes in and says, here's$5 for cash for Mike's Italian toothpaste for the office after those blue donuts that's a good call i've switched it up from just the silver to the blue now

2:05:05Nice. trees for free, right? Check it out. Maybe that's what I'll do next time. That's not what he does, though. You have to ask at the front desk. The good ones are not in the room, but you can get like a razor, toothpaste, toothbrush. You can get that from the front desk at most hotels. She's putting me on. Thanks, Andrea. You're welcome. I'm here to help you. Be an adult. All we fucking love to do, of course, is call out Snowbike Mike, right? And like every stupid thing he's ever done. There was a classic, instant classic today where Mike, when Mike walked into the entry, he was here. Andrea, oh, I got so many questions.

2:05:39I want to talk to you so bad. Andrea goes, you have my number. Why did you ever text me? I was like, oh. Just Stonewall, Stonewall. Greg, I got one here I want to ask you about. This is another one from the forum. Somebody wrote in and says, when asking what the biggest story in KGD history is, PSX being canceled while KGD is live on air and Greg committing to a KF Games showcase immediately. Do you remember that? I do, of course. Yeah, that was a big deal for us. as you all know as I've said many a time kind of funny in general very influenced by professional wrestling so there's a lot of kayfabe what do you know what do you don't know I had known PSX wasn't happening and so there had been background and I by like maybe a week I don't know maybe a couple days that it wasn't gonna happen and so there have been back channeling with me and Tim of like this isn't happening and I have an idea that if it's not happening we should jump on this and do a December showcase for these indies that that was always the best part of PSX when I think of psx especially the first one in vegas right i remember so well running around and like that they were giving out those trade the playing cards with games on them and i remember talking to the team at drink box who were showing severed on vita and how they were just getting showered with love for their little vita game that nobody else would like really care about in a grand sense right and it was that idea of that if that platform for getting indie games to people was going away i wanted to try to step up and do it and now obviously there's so many amazing showcases that we limit ourselves to our mixed stuff usually at gdc and yeah yeah and then on top of that too it's like that time was so special because in the same way that now even we still think of that that summer game fest week you know like the all the different events that are happening around the same time and before it was even clearer with e3 but there was for a long stretch of time this like second energy of the year in december the first week of december we got psx and we got game awards And I feel like PSX was kind of a hit or miss in terms of the big giant announcements, but they often were there.

2:07:35Like when you think about Last of Us 2 being announced and like some major, major things that at PSX Uncharted before gameplay, like all that. But it was the indie game. So it was the like the smaller titles, I think, that specifically on the show floor. So, yeah, I was losing PSX was a bummer in a lot of ways. But I do think having that PlayStation and then Game Awards, I don't remember the order of it, but like that was so special. and awesome yeah yeah so yeah i was super happy to be able to do that and again it was one of those that like i i'm happy we had the runway because i would have had the same thought if it happened live but it would have been that like well fuck can we do that are we committed to doing that so it was a good moment it's cool i also remember one of my sort of memories that i it's always just sort of instilled in my brain is sitting by my computer while y 'all were on games daily and more and more news kept coming out about ea maybe or e3 maybe not happening because of covid oh yeah like oh yeah so many like all right this publisher is pulling out this public and it's like oh wow this thing's starting to kind of feel more real than we thought it was and that was like maybe i think a week later we were already working by home by then yeah because we were like let's you know let's take advantage of it let's go home a work or a week early yeah and then everybody was home after that we'll be back soon yeah covid's actually an interesting one for not popping up there and it's i think we've just blacked it out i think we're still in like the inertia of the trauma of it all because it started really with playstation pulling out of pax east yep that was like that was the story that kind of like was the first domino and i just like when i think back to that time personally i was just like i was just angry and sad and confused and like it can't be real this can't this can't be happening the game's daily threat i would give would be to gary because i remember every episode gary was on he's like this is gonna be bad like we was like such even when we weren't even putting into game news yet and then yeah for psx to happen i remember then yeah when i went and did uh uh in february i went into dice awards and i remember there being like at rehearsal being like all right well all these international people aren't coming and i was like why not because that oh okay yeah they're oh interesting that they're that worried about it and then it was playstation leaving pax east and then yeah the whole thing falling apart going back real quick to the number one story we have the Xbox acquires Activision.

2:09:48I'll never forget Gia waking me up. I was in bed. She wakes me up and she goes, you have to get online. Something's happening. Something's happening. She's like, I don't understand, but everyone's freaking out. I think this is important. And I look at it like, Xbox is acquiring Activision. What the fuck? It's time to move on to our next segment of this jam-packed Kind of Funny Games daily 2000th episode. it's called former kfgd host clip bless what are we getting into um well we just have we have a clip to watch a fun clip to watch so barrett go ahead and roll it what's up everybody and welcome to kind of funny games daily which is what i would be saying if i were hosting kfgd today but i'm mostly just here to say kfgd was a hell of a time calling you from the magical land of canada and reminiscing on Kind of Funny's history as we look forward to the 2 ,000th episode of this ridiculous endeavor.

2:10:47Hey, Kind of Funny. It's your boy, Danny O'Dwyer here. The Irish cream, as Greg often liked to call me. What's good, everybody? Andrea Rene here. Congrats, Kind of Funny, on 2 ,000 episodes of Games Daily. Anna Garcia here, a.k.a. Game Onesis, and I just want to say congratulations to 2 ,000 episodes. It's KFGD, holy cow, what an accomplishment. Hello, I'm Gary Wetter, and I've been asked to record a short message in recognition of Kind of Funny Games Daily's 2000th episode. I've been a fan of everything that Kind of Funny has done over the years, so to actually be invited to be a co-host on KFGD was quite the honor.

2:11:24I had no idea what I was doing. I was super nervous, but everyone on the team, they were just super welcoming. They made it very easy to be a part of this, and, you know, I've been forever grateful and thankful to just be a part of the Kind of Funny family. And since that first appearance, I've actually hosted Kind of Funny Games daily, you know, both remote and in studio. And thank you for the time that you gave me, the opportunity you gave me to spend hosting Kind of Funny Games daily. It was some of the best time I had with you guys and it really helped me kind of hone in on a lot of my presenting as well and helped me get through a tricky period of time where everyone's isolated.

2:12:03I felt more connected than ever to the kind of funny community. And I owe that all to you guys. So I really, really appreciate it. I was lucky enough to be paired up with the wonderful Andrea Rene for that whole period. And when I first started coming over, I don't know why, but I had it in my head that I was being brought in as like the sort of the color commentator. Like I was there to sort of keep the, you know, give my opinion and keep the conversation rolling and not necessarily be the person who would like research the show. and it took me a while to realize that I was basically turning up on the day.

2:12:38I'd drive over from Oakland to San Francisco, take the best part of 45 minutes to get there and on the way I'd be thinking about news stories and all that sort of stuff. But then when I'd get there, Andrea had obviously done all the work to put together this really well-researched and thought-out list of news stories to cover. and so I think in retrospect I don't think I was so busy with like no clip stuff and doing this and everything else in retrospect I go back and go I was just super lazy and Andrea was doing all of the work if you remember July 11th 2019 a very specific date did I just re-watch this episode to remind myself how funny it was I sure did it's called setting up a Nintendo Switch light lifestyle and if y 'all know what I'm talking about it's that famous whiteboard moment where Greg gets a whiteboard from Kevin to explain to me a listener question, a situation about having a switch light and a regular switch, one as a primary, one as a secondary, one in a dock permanently, and one that you take on the go.

2:13:42And there was just a component of the explanation missing, and I was just not getting it, and Kevin was losing his mind. Wait, so are you insinuating that you would put the switch light in the dock? No, why are you saying that? We as hosts and producers are putting together this show, but allowing space for those moments of hilarity or sincerity, whatever the moment calls for, to just come about naturally. And that's what makes Kind of Funny so special. I loved hosting Kind of Funny and having an opportunity to be a part of this community. I love some of the most memorable moments we've had. But as much as I love being behind the desk with Gary, making fun of printers or trying to annoy Greg, what I always really, really appreciated more than that was the stuff you never saw.

2:14:24The stuff in the back room of the office would just sit and banter and come up with ideas and laugh. Or the backstage at one of the events where Tim would walk up and give you that patented, giant, super Tim hug. These are the things that meant so much to me. Kind of Funny was the best job I ever had. And of course, like all luminaries, I took that job and then decided to leave to go work on Stadia. So, you know, great judgment on my part. Fifteen years ago, Kind of Funny was barely a glimmer in a young Greg Miller's eye. as he toiled thanklessly in the salt mines of IGN. Then I catapulted into global recognition by telling him to not touch my knee, giving him the confidence to strike out on his own.

2:15:02You're welcome, Greg. Kind of Funny has grown into a media empire that now straddles the video games industry like a colossus. And in that time, I've grown to become close personal friends with Greg, Tim, Nick, Blessing, and the other ones. Congratulations on 2 ,000 episodes. Here's to 2 ,000 more. And maybe, just maybe, I'll host again. here's to a thousand more episodes of kind of funny games daily love you guys have two thousand more episodes kfgd then a great run and congrats on two thousand episodes keep crushing it here's to another two thousand here's to another decade i miss you i love you here's to you anyway congratulations kind of funny on the 2000th episode of games daily you can probably stop now right you've made your point and we're back for a very special episode of kind of funny games daily as we celebrate our 2000th episode remember of course what we're trying to do today is get 2000 super chats uh of course to celebrate to ring in to honor this milestone they don't have to be big ones you can toss in a dollar one right now uh andy's over there mike is over there they'll read it mike's got a mike came out with a little thing of raspberries lunch because i have omega buster writing in on the super chats that said, man, this stream would be next level if we spent an hour watching Roger and Mike order lunch.

2:16:19We could put it up on the back. Let's get on this. Instead, we're welcoming to the main desk, of course, Andrea, who's been here all day with us, but the rogue one, Gary Whitta. Hello, Gary. It's been a minute. Great video out there. We'll talk about how you cut almost all of my best jokes after the show. You act like I didn't do it. On my own YouTube channel, I will be posting the full, unexpurgated, uncensored, free speech version. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You can try to kill me when you fucking want. My jokes are going to get out there. You're going off, Mike. People at home don't see where the crafty little edits were, but I fucking saw them.

2:16:57They don't, they don't. Who's going off, Mike? Gary. What? When you turn to the right, you're going off, Mike. I'm a human being. I move my head when I talk. You got to keep up with him, Kevin. It's amazing we don't work with Gary Moore. It's amazing we don't work with Gary Moore. I wonder what's grinding his gears. Sounds like a microphone problem more than a Gary problem. I think if you just move it back slightly, then you'll be able to turn your head a little bit more. All right. Well, you're much more pro than I am about being in front of the microphone. And the best hair in the business, Fran Mirabelle III.

2:17:26Welcome, boys. Honestly, such a hard act to follow. I was just going to leave. Like, I couldn't even make it to the hello. Yeah. Just kidding. How are you guys doing? Good. Yeah? Yeah, we were just talking about, like, building PCs and stuff. Nerding out? Yeah. Yeah. Of course you are. You can buy them now. Those handhelds. It's great. Yeah. Oh, yeah. You're big on PCs now. I hear anything. You know, it's a Vita 2 and I'm holding it. That's great. Don't say I didn't tell you so. Yeah. What do you got, Andrew? Oh, I was just going to mention that I saw Gary walking when we were talking about Dune Awakening.

2:17:57Yes. But he was still top secret. I've been revealed yet. Fair enough. What hadn't been revealed? You being here. Oh, I didn't realize it was a it was a secret. OK. We got to keep you. We got to keep you. You know what I mean? They just said guess. I mean, how could, well, I was going to say, how could you not have kind of funny's 2000th episode without me? But you do all kinds of fucking stuff without me. So I wouldn't have bad an eyelid either way. Let him know, Gary. What? You're the chief one of them. You cut him out of stuff all the time. Why would they cut up your video, Gary? That's fucked up.

2:18:26It's absolutely, I put a lot of work into that. They're going to cut you out of work. I put a lot of work into that. I fucking set up my Elgato teleprompter for that. Why are you not cutting to the picture in picture of Mike eating raspberries out of the container? Jesus. He's out there touching cameras. God damn. You didn't even wash him. Mike is a menace today. This is even worse than usual. I like this energy, Gary. I'm with you, big dog. Get ready. There's a lot of pent-up frustration. Get the Super Chats in for Gary. I'll read them. Did you wash those berries? Oh, yeah, sure. No. Come on.

2:18:56Mike. What do you think? Mike, raspberries are packed with fiber, so it should be careful. Well, that's probably good for me. It's good for you. Heal a little fiber. Okay. Jesus Christ, everybody. He doesn't want to be shitting his pants again. As we continue on our 2000 March year, yes, of course, get the Kind of Funny Games Daily 2000 shirt. Gary is wearing it. I saw people popping off. They didn't know that was happening because there's so much packed in this episode. Kindoffunny.com slash story. You can pick up your Kind of Funny Games Daily 2000 shirt and some throwbacks. I can still see the N64 box right now, Greg.

2:19:26I know what this is from. Yeah, you know. Ten of the Millennium vibes are very present. It was just such a great homage to one of the best wrestling games of all time. I'm happy we have it. Wrestling games, so good. I mean, this kind of aesthetic was very popular around the late 90s. Everything was 2000. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was like a big deal. Yeah, exactly. And speaking of the late 90s and the early 2000s, we have a special segment called KFGD 2000. In celebration of 2000 episodes, we're going to talk about the biggest news stories from every year since the year 2000 all the way up to 2017, when Kind of Funny Games Daily began.

2:20:00Also when I started in the industry. Well, that was one of the things. When we were doing the walkthrough in the audience, and we talked, and Blessing was like, I'll leave, and then Fran and Gary come out because the old heads will have some good things to say. If I can remember that far back. Damn, that hurts. I don't like that one bit. Before we start this, Greg, can we make a disclaimer since I already can read the comments in my mind coming in? Oh, you can read them on that big screen as well. I mean, like the people who watch it after the fact who aren't live. I feel like the people who are watching live are the kinder, nicer ones.

2:20:32Of course, they're the best friends. They're super chatting right now. This list was compiled by... Roger and Blessing, I don't know. Blessing, right? Roger and Blessing, I would say. Share the blame. Share the blame. Someone who was barely alive for half of this list. And I look at some of these stories and go, probably wouldn't have been my pick. Slow newsier. Slow newsier. What are you going to do? You know what I mean? Oh, God, here he comes. Gary got a shooting. Gary got a shooting out here. I like it. First of all, I was born in 1994. All right. This list starts at 2000. Yeah, you were six years old when this list started, blessing.

2:21:07Yeah, I remember this stuff happening. But that's why we have you guys on the panel. And this is also Super Chat territory. Super Chat time. Andy, what do we got for Super Chat? No, no, no, no. No, no, no, no. I'm saying if they don't agree with the year, you're super chatting with your own page. We were ready. This is a lot of work to go and pull all these stories. So, please see if we're doing that. I was going to say, most of the work was Wikipedia and a lot of other wikis. I did my research. I did study. I'm diligent. I'm loving Kevin trying to line up The perspective of the screen I see what he's doing I love it Kevin This is such a traditional thing of why Barrett had it a second ago picture in picture He didn't explain how it works Now I know He didn't explain how it works You go out there and ask Barrett He explained it I'm not Jesus I'm not in any way an audio video expert.

2:22:02I look at all the equipment that Kevin has in there and I just like, this looks like mission control. I have no idea what's going on, but I do suspect that the best time to change and fiddle with your video and audio settings is not when you are going live to air. There'd be no... I mean, maybe I'm wrong. You're not wrong, Gary. There's no better way to do it. It's kind of funny. It's the only way we know how to do it, some would say. All right, let's dive in then, all right? We're starting at the year 2000. Man, lay it on me. The PlayStation 2 is first released in Japan on March 4th, 2000 followed by North America on October 26th and Europe on November 24th.

2:22:33I remember it well. Transformative. I'll give you the whole snapshot they made you here. In other news Microsoft acquired Bungie and Nintendo sells its 100th millionth Game Boy slash Game Boy Color handheld game console. That doesn't surprise me. For animals. You remember the PlayStation 2? Yeah. Yes I do. A real system. You know what I mean? The highest selling console of all time. Didn't need a handle. didn't need tiny discs. Could play DVD movies, alright? Could play great games. So you're putting down GameCube. I am. I'm shitting on what you love, yes. What this brings me back to more than anything is this was the exact feeling and culture in the IGN offices which was every it was always, like we had the fanboy wars more than ever back then.

2:23:17It's amazing to see how they've transformed to today. But back then it was like, Nintendo's for babies, you don't need your little purse, which they referred to the GameCube as like the purse and all that stuff. Because it had the little handle on it. Yeah. Handle's dope. The handle was like so weird because I don't think they ever fully explained why it's on there. It's not that hard to carry without one, you know? Like you're going to take it over to your friend's place. But no, but for real, like the PlayStation coming out that year, I mean, that's the PlayStation 2 that is. Yeah. Insane. Yeah.

2:23:49That was like, at the time, I mean, it was just transformative is the first word I would think of. What about you guys? yeah i mean it's one of the most innovative iconic and important consoles ever created yeah i mean for me obviously i've talked about it a lot but like this was i feel the moment i became an adult gamer like this is the first console i ever i was gonna i'm like i'm going to buy this with my own money i at lunch ready to go it's not a christmas gift it's not a birthday gift uh you know i i worked the summer job soul crushingly at walmart and on my lunch breaks i I would go next door to Best Buy and buy DVDs and then read the DVDs.

2:24:26And it was the first DVD player our house ever had. So I'm buying Ghostbusters. That's right. It was the gateway to DVDs for a lot of people. Reading all these extras, mall rats. What am I going to? And I'd already watched some of these extras at my friend's house, but I was like, I'm going to do this here. And then, yeah, to go camp out at Meijer, which is a giant supermarket, Walmart-y kind of thing. Camp out in their electronics department for nine hours on my camping chair, reading my EGM cover to cover over and over again, and finally get that gorgeous blue box. Come home. It was just a plain blue box, remember?

2:24:55I like that. A lot of confidence in that design. Exactly. Bring it to college. You just be the coolest nerd there was. Gary, you're heavily into PC at this point, right? You're just addicted to this devil. No, I don't discriminate. I play everywhere. I go where the games are. I'm fortunate enough to have all the systems, including a decent PC. So I'll play. Sometimes a game comes out and it's on multiple platforms. You've got to figure out where would you be most. for ps2 were you well i would so in 2000 was my last year on uh as editor-in-chief of pc gamer that was the year that i left yeah i see from 96 to 2000 so yeah i the late 90s pc gaming is still i think one of the most fertile nostalgia gardens that you can if you if you like retro stuff and you like to think about the good old days of gaming for a certain generation of us that mid 90s PCs and those games are still brilliant.

2:25:51I love every... I don't want to go play them anymore. They look shit now. But at the time, they look pretty great. Did PS2 do anything for you? Did you pay for it? No, at that point, it was kind of stupid. I was... When I was there for a PC gamer, we had Next Generation magazine right next door and those were the console guys. We had this bullshit fake rivalry and we joke about consoles and stuff, but when Super Mario 64 came in, you better believe we were all over there going, what the shit? But, you know, it was really cool. But then they all came over when we had Half-Life 2. Yeah. Oh, no, the original Half-Life.

2:26:22So, yeah, I had a GameCube. I did have a PlayStation 2, but I didn't really play it very much. Yeah. I was a Dreamcast guy. Don't forget, the Dreamcast was barely a year old at that point. Dreamcast, we're coming up on you. Don't worry about it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that, to me, is still, that's where my love and affection is the Dreamcast. Fran, were you at IGN at launch of PlayStation 2? No, that was in March, you said? Yeah, yeah. So no, it wasn't. Well, no, October would have been a U.S. launch. U.S. launch. God, I guess I was. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which it washed out. Do you remember that? Because it's another jump of like.

2:26:55It was November 24th. Because remember when they used to launch the stuff like right at Black Friday? Well, no, North America was October 26th. Never forget. Oh, okay. October 26th, 2000, Andy. I got my PlayStation 2. October 26th, 2001. Rush the field when Mizzou beat Kansas. No big deal. Oh, wow. Got on the poster and everything. But in short, I guess I was there. That was like my third month there. And you know how it is starting at IGN. Yeah. It was so, like, such a blur. It was overwhelming. It was also in the middle of, like, the dot-com, you know, burst. Oh, my God. It was bad times. We're in AI burst now.

2:27:28Yeah. But, like, the offices were insane. It was like Wolf of Wall Street in there. I'm not kidding. Like, it was just, like, everybody was running around. Like, because the sales side was the other side. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Wolves of Wall Street. I thought you just meant, like, the debauchery that you guys would have been doing in your area. Well, if that was happening to not, I'm telling you, it was nuts back then. But that being said, it was such chaos. And I remember we moved offices too that somehow I'm like, I don't remember that moment. And I remember all the other console launches. I'm like, how did I not remember this?

2:27:57Well, it's a weird one even for me of being at IGN through so many pivotal moments. But like, I remember the console launches varying so drastically where I remember the Wii U, obviously. No one cared about it. And Charles went out on a run and then like ran by and saw like there was a line of four people just bought one on the hell. Wait, wait, wait. PlayStation 4, though, I remember we did that giant unboxing, Fran, where everybody got theirs delivered. So like suddenly there was like 29 Amazon packages of PlayStation 4s and we unboxed them on the launch room. Yeah. But of course, even like GameCube launched the next year, you know, I mean, granted, that's what I was covering.

2:28:30I guess that's probably what it is. Also, yeah. Like myopic on like GameCube, Nintendo, everything was like, that's all I was focused on. Yeah. Gary I cut you off where were you going to say something? Well I was going to say actually the point I was going to make was really going nowhere but I love a good console launch and I feel like you know as the market kind of contracts and console generations last longer they're becoming fewer and farther between which I guess is a shame but you know I mean now it's such a I would say impersonal private thing right as we go to okay well the PlayStation 5 is here and most people I think order it offline and you get it and it's a little bit better than your last one right and now we have the iterations with pros and stuff like that too, where it's like, oh, okay, I guess I'll get his new bells and whistles.

2:29:11I got to miss, I don't, I actually did stand in line for about three hours for a Switch 2, because it was apparent that they were going to be hard to find. And I really wanted a Switch 2. I was willing to go stand in line for about three hours at Best Buy. And it was fun. It was actually very well, it was like the least shit show line I've ever been involved in. But prior to, I used to do the midlight launches. The original Wii, I recall standing in line, me and Bill Roper, camped out overnight at the Marin Best Buy to get the Wii. And then I've done a couple of other launches as well, but I can't do that anymore.

2:29:43You don't miss that, do you? Oh, God, no. I'd much rather it come to my door. I hate that we're still... I'm going to go to this Amazon link, this link, they all fucking bork and break. How is that still fucking happening? Trying to get a switch to the dramatic... It's in the cart, it's gone, what the fuck? That part is I hate it. The fucking staples and all that shit. Just so much stupid stuff. I will say, I do miss the excitement of being surrounded by the community. Of course. But not at... Well, but like... Figuratively, but no, you don't actually want those people near. No, I don't actually...

2:30:18You don't want to be near other nerds. I can go online and get a sense of community. I don't actually want to be in the same space as these people. You know what it is, Gary? It's like the aura is broad enough. You can sense it, but you don't have to get close enough to smell them. So, yes. Well, yeah. I mean, That is the issue. Fortunately, most of these lines are in the open air. But I do miss it. Before we move on to 2001, I want to give a shout out to 8-Bit Louise with a$100 super chat. Thank you for all the last unforgettable moments. Here's for 2 ,000 more episodes. I love you all. And we're at 727 super chats.

2:30:49If you all super chatted with$1 right now, we'd be done. Is that the cheapest you can do a super chat? No, you can do 99 cents. Oh, yeah? Maybe you can do 1 cent. Try giving me a 4 ,000 1 cent. Leave it to Gary. There's no way. I think super chats are interesting. And do you, at what point, what's the rule? At what point do you have to read them out? We do whatever we want. People understand that. I know in some channels, if you paid$20 for a super chat, you would expect to have it read out, right? Well, yeah, so you got whiny little babies like kebabs. I've super chatted like four times, Greg.

2:31:20Shove it, kebabs. We're trying. Yeah, kebabs. Kebabs might be one of the most read people on KFGD. Exactly. Over all of the 2000 episodes. Exactly. So I feel like you've got your time, Kebabs. Thank you very much, Andrea. I'm heated. I'm tilted. Are you happy? We're going to 2001. There you go. That's a 99 cent super chat right there. I'll be legit though, Kebabs. I haven't seen your name. That's how crazy the support is right now. A lot of 99 cent and$1 coming in. We love shouting out, obviously, the diehards that have been here forever. But I have not even seen your name. I probably scrolled by it in a frenzy.

2:31:582001 the one they've listed here don't get mad at me is sega goes third party nintendo ties announced this is ign hardware player and giant publisher sega made the announcement today that everyone in the industry was expecting it to make the company in an official release said it plans to gradually remove itself from the industry as a hardware competitor and instead focus its efforts as a multi-platform third-party publisher specifically sega announced its support for Sony's PlayStation 2 and Nintendo's Game Boy Advance handheld. The firm also confirmed that in an effort to accelerate the transition from hardware manufacturer to third-party publisher, it would drop the price of its Dreamcast console to$99, effective February 4th, 2001.

2:32:40Incidentally, the same price that Nintendo 64 retails for now. In other news, three major video game systems were released in 2001, the GameCube and the Game Boy Advance by Nintendo, and the Xbox by Microsoft. fran bang sega going third party yeah you remember that day what's that oh i remember absolutely i remember that day it's funny i remember so much about the dreamcast too because i was so hyped about it um i'm sure hillary wouldn't shut up about it hillary of course would not shut up about it he wasn't um but hillary came later though right probably yeah but anyway it was i mean it was crazy because it it maybe was one of those first big moments of failure from a hardware vendor right they just like it almost right we had the sega channel dreamcast channel on ign and all that like you know in the same way imagine you have someone specializing in coverage here and it's like we're not doing that anymore actually i know you guys were talking about xbox earlier today so maybe yeah there's some parallels here but um anyway no i remember it being kind of crazy but then also immediately it was sort of like okay when are we getting the dreamcast ports on gamecube and xbox and playstation 2 and it by the way it was pretty freaking fast yeah yeah i mean i was of course a sega kid i saw ghostbusters on the sega master system did no research because i was kindergarten pre-kindergarten my mom and dad bought the game uncle mike i had down commodore 64 that was rough yeah well no the but the master system was the best version oh it was for the same game though right they had additions and things that actually was the good one anyways though then it was like well sega genesis came out sonic was cool there was an adapter to put into your genesis to play your master system stuff so suddenly backwards compatibility i didn't know i had a game library and i was there through the saturn and it was the saturn that salted the earth for me that when dreamcast came out and was awesome and i'd go to target i played crazy taxi after high school it was a thing of like i will not buy this piece of shit because of what you did to saturn was their xbox saturn was their xbox one yeah yeah exactly yeah alienated a lot of people and just that was it for me and so So this was a sad one to a degree of like, oh man, this is done for you.

2:34:45And I was like, they're never coming back. We don't have to get into it now. Maybe I'll just do it offline and go watch a YouTube video or something. But I don't really know what went wrong with the set. It's a perfectly capable machine. So what was wrong with it? Why didn't people like it? Timing, I think, was a big part of it. Like it was trapped between, right, the PlayStation and the PlayStation 2. And what year was it? Nintendo 64. Nintendo 64, of course. 999. Or no, that was Dreamcast, wasn't it? But it was like later, like when was it? Like 97 or 98? Well, if you remember, the big deal was...

2:35:17Dreamcast was 99, so it must have been a few years before that. 94 in Japan, 95. Okay, there you go. About five years is usually... It had a... Well, basically, the answer is probably PlayStation, right? PlayStation is the answer. It completely ate their lunch, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so that was two questions about the Dreamcast. Because I could talk about Dreamcast all day. I love it. I'll tell you what, my particular memory, one thing I always think of, of course I remember Crazy Taxi was like, I melted that disc. I fucking love that game. It's still so good today. But I remember the first time that a video game looked truly next gen to me, like whatever that means to you.

2:35:55The first time I was at an event, it was a Dreamcast event, and they had NFL 2K running on one of them. It was the very first 2K game. And it was on Dreamcast, and I remember from across the room going, is that on TV? And I went over and they went, oh shit, no, that's a game. and now you got to a point you look at like eafc and stuff like that on your nba 2k now yeah it's like you have to look watch for like five minutes to figure out if it's tv or a video game we've come that far but that was the first time i felt oh shit that's a real leap yeah like that looks really good i mean we talked about it in passing there but like sega was ahead of the curve for so long and possibly too far because i remember the sega channel which was you get the cartridge you plug it into your genesis and then you have the telephone line to your wall and you have this through your cable company a bunch of different sega games you could play like netflix like we talk about now with game pass then of course dreamcast being an online system and it was go you know play head to head and do dynasties with your friends and it's like yeah it's a shame i think had it not been coming off the back of the you know i got a lot of the ill will from the saturn and then the bad timing because less than a year later sony would come over and run it over with a truck with playstation 2 i think if if they'd just been lucky if the timing or whatever had been more fortuitous.

2:37:01I think Dreamcast on its own merits could have done very well. It was a good machine. People are still like, there's no fondness for the Saturn, right? But people still have a lot of fondness for Dreamcast. Michael, 2001 Xbox released, or Microsoft released the Xbox. Special to me. You were alive then? I was alive and kicking Fran. I was gaming all the time. You know, it's funny, we brought up PlayStation 2 and I could go right down the list of all the PlayStation 2 games that meant so much to me. And the same goes for Xbox, right? I think about Lynx back in the day. I loved a good golf game on the Xbox.

2:37:40Oh, that was the first one where you could all take your shots at the same time. That was on multiplayer. That was a huge deal. I was going to say Lynx the Time Sweeper. Oh, that's Blink. Very close. We had Voodoo Vince. We had Blinks, of course. We had Conker's Bad Fur Day live and reloaded. brought it back that was a big deal to me i just remember some of my good friends mentioning plasma grenades you throw these things and they stick on you i'm like what are they talking about and then finally got to see halo and ended up being one of the coolest gifts ever where i was addicted to halo going to my friend's house all the time playing in and then i was gonna go that summer vacation to go uh babysit my cousins in austin and i was like i'm gonna go earn money my my uncle and and are gonna pay me then i'm gonna come back and buy an xbox so i could play halo and my parents said, Andy, we surprised you with it.

2:38:27And they bought me one already, the clear green one. Oh, that was a special Halo edition right there. The best gift ever, dude. You got that big Duke controller. The introduction of the internet really was at the forefront then with Xbox Live. Everybody making their own XPC before that. Well, the LAN parties of Halo, I think, are one of the true iconic things of that era of gaming that I remember being in college and having everyone in the dorms and being like, oh, we're getting together to play Halo. And I was like, what's Halo? because I didn't actually play Halo until Reach. Even the split-screen co-op was still a big deal.

2:38:59Split-screen four-player playing Wizard on Halo 1, hang them high. That was some special times back. Playing one of you, one against my brother, and we would get a poster board. Oh, yeah, you have to isolate the two screens. I had a poster board to split the screen. We used to do that. We used to do that with DuneInquite. I would stand on top of the bed so I could see the top of my perspective, and he'd be underneath watching. That's hilarious. Yeah, I was going to say relevant to both of the things we just brought up. One, I don't know if you guys remember. I remember buying the Dreamcast being so excited, surprisingly, because of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater.

2:39:31Two, maybe? Or was it one? But I was like, it looks so freaking good and had the VGA output. That's how much of a visual nerd I was. But I was, like, stoked. And then I found out how bad the Dreamcast controller was. So bad. What are you talking about? Oh, I know. It wasn't that bad. I think I have to this day because of that freaking controller. But secondly, I was going to say, you nailed it, Andrea. The Xbox, I remember being so stoked because we hooked it up at our apartment, LAN. And I remember rushing home that night and plugging in LAN, not having giant PC setups. We're just all going to game together tonight.

2:40:05It was so exciting. To me, that was Xbox launch. So two things real quick. One thing, I actually liked the Dreamcast controller. I thought the VMU was actually very cool. VMU was cool, yeah. I never understood why the cable that connected to the console came out at the bottom of the controller. It made zero sense to me. Yeah. Because then it has to loop under the controller. Like, it's obvious it should go on the top. On the Xbox, I have a good story about, well, not really a good story, but a story. I reviewed the official, sorry, Halo, the first Halo, when it launched. After PC Gamer, I briefly was editor-in-chief of Next Generation.

2:40:40I nursed that magazine into its grave. It was already kind of moribund when I got there. and it was like just you know try and make try and make the patient comfortable kind of thing um so i uh and they said you know and halo and official official xbox magazine was launching they had the right to do the official xbox magazine and they asked me to go up there and do it because i guess i was a console man at that point i was on next gen um i was like you're sending the wrong guy like i'm a pc guy like i'm gonna like whatever they've done with the controller like to you know to map those you know i was one of those people you used to go over to next gen live yeah you can't play that on.

2:41:12You can't play those kind of games on a controller. You need a mouse and keyboard. Yep, yep, yep. I'm going to have a hard time with it. You're sending them on. They sent me up there and they set me up. They did the thing and went up to Redmond and they put you in a room with the system and stuff. Gave me the big Duke controller which I always liked. I don't even have big hands but I liked the Duke. I never had a problem with it. The black and white buttons over there. Yeah. It was a big ass. I felt like holding a big hamburger. I liked it. And so I sat down a little bit kind of on my arms folded like you can't do these kind of games on consoles.

2:41:40And like an hour later, after doing that first mission, I was like, oh shit, they cracked it. I'm sure other people will say that there have been twin stick, you know, first person shooters on PlayStation, whatever, that were good before that. But for me, Halo was the one that like really made it like mainstream. I think that's a generally accepted rule that Halo was the one that showed how it could be done. Yeah, I agree. I think it was really, really well. I wasn't missing the mouse after like an hour. And now I play all those games on a controller, even on PC. Shout out to Goldeneye for doing it first.

2:42:10Yes. Okay, yeah, but like, again. But, I'm not saying. Frequently overlooked. Because it still is a bonkers control scheme, whereas like Halo makes it inverted. But they did it first. Everything in the, I'm using the C button. The C button's working. But meaning. Yeah, and also, don't forget, that was still one stick. The two sticks, which is now the default, that Halo really pulled that. Halo's the one that does that. Someone's going to say like SOCOM or Killzone or one of these. But I tried all those, and none of them ever felt like they had that. nails this. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I'm just saying Golden was really close.

2:42:40I'm saying, I think, so Golden, I think, falls into the category Gary and I weren't throwing away. Like, other people did this and made it work and playable, but Halo's the one that everyone went and was like, oh shit, this is what it's supposed to be. Yeah, it was revolutionary. I mean, they, again, whether through luck or skill or whatever, I don't know, but they, probably the last time that a game launched with a console that was like a major system mover, right? Like, it was a reason to buy the console. And I still remember the first time he sat down with it, I was in that room. And you go, oh, this is so epic.

2:43:13And the music is so fucking good. And you land on the Halo for the first time and you see it like arcing up. And you go, oh, this is so fucking cool. Like, I remember having so many great moments in the first couple of hours of that game. Let's move on to 2002. Microsoft purchases Rare for$375 million. We just talked about$69 billion. You know, it's like you're crazy to come to these numbers. That was a good purchase in retrospect. For who? Well, yeah. For Microsoft, yeah, I think so. For Rare and their legacy, no. I think that that was such a, hey, we're going to bring you over here to make Xbox avatars.

2:43:47Remember, that was the big thing they had so many of them working on. Oh, my God. They had made so many. Like, that 64 generation is so defined by Rare. And then to come over here and go, oh, okay, this is what their legacy will be beyond that. We got Viva and Piñata out of it. We did. And Viva and Piñata was great. Where's another one? Well, there was another one. It's still to this. You know what I mean? Well, you don't think Sea of Thieves is... Sea of Thieves got there. I think it took that long. I should play Sea of Thieves, but I hear it's toxic. I hear there's a lot of toxic people in there.

2:44:16That's what I've heard. You're one of them if you go in there. Yeah, but you like getting a little toxic. No, you do, you motherfuckers. They've always had a griefing problem in that game. But there's modes you can play now, by the way, that you can just get together with friends and not worry about that. Viva Viñata. Viva Viñata, a little slip. Sea of Thieves is awesome. when they did the Pirates of the Caribbean stuff I jumped in there and Mike went and it was great but to your point when Mike wasn't on and I went and played by myself Gary yeah it sucked to be a bunch of you guys were playing and I thought like on paper this is the sort of thing that I should enjoy so I'm going to finally sit down and try it like after months of saying no and I tried to install it and for whatever reason there was like a problem on the install and it was already like on a knife edge you know what fuck it I'm not I said I would play it but I'm not going to go to any so I never played it so I may have missed out on the huge Sea of Thieves thing But back to the acquisition way back then, because Sea of Thieves was so far from that.

2:45:06But what I remember thinking at first was, dang, you know, Nintendo's going to lose all these great, you know, Banjo-Kazooie. Yeah, GoldenEye. Missing another key one in there. Mickey Speedway. No. Battletoads? Conker's Bad Fur Day. But they had tons of great stuff before. RC Pro and? Yeah, actually, that's right. You want to go all the way back? Yeah. And that was before they were even, like, working hand in hand. If you want to get really old school, because I'm a Brit, you remember, Br 'er used to be a company called Ultimate Play the Game. And they did mostly games for the Sinclair ZX Spectrum, because it was like a little company in the middle of nowhere in England.

2:45:44Ashby De La Zouche, Tim and Chris Stamper, who started Ultimate Play the Game. And during the 8-bit Spectrum days, they were like the developer. When Ultimate Br 'er game, everybody paid attention. It came in this beautiful packaging. There was nothing else like it. And they had a mystique around them. And then they became Rare. And I don't know, I kind of felt like something got lost even in that moment. Like, whatever that ultimate sheen that it had back in the 8-bit days. They did amazing stuff on Nintendo and some on Xbox as well. But I kind of feel like, I don't know, because I have a very long history going back with pre-Rare Rare.

2:46:17So I maybe judge them on a different metric. Conker's Bad Fur Day was what I was thinking of, obviously, otherwise. But anyway, they were crushing it. Anyway, my first reaction was like, oh, man, like, you know, a little bit of that competitiveness we talked about. I'm like, oh, we're going to lose this to the Xbox, you know, the X-Bots. But then, like, maybe I'm wrong, but I'm like, didn't they just didn't find their footing until when? Sea of Thieves? Like, so, like, what happened? I guess a lot of people left. I mean, we know the TimeSplitters gang, right? Yeah. Some ex-GoldenEye folks and people moved around, but they lost the Nintendo, like, kind of production.

2:46:52I think it was a feel that it was going to be, like, their Insomniac or their Naughty Dog, right? But it never really got to that. level but that was probably like a microsoft problem more than it was a rare problem of like they needed to retain a bunch of uh the right talent but also you know if you look at what rare did the best it was like they took mario and then they made it like awesome in its own way with banjo kazooie you know um and they were just very good at like doing stuff like that like taking nintendo's ideas frankly and then putting their spin on it they're super talented and if you ever if you looked at rare replay when it came out a while back but that all that museum creation stuff is actually really well done.

2:47:28And that, for people who are interested in, that actually does go back and include all the Ultimate stuff, like Saber Wolf and Night Lore and Attic Attack, like all those games that were like Rare before Rare is Rare. They're all in there. Rare Replay is really worth checking out. Yeah, shout out Rare's 40th anniversary this year, so congratulations to them. We still do love you. We'll move on. Good stuff. To 2003, Valve releases their game distribution software Steam out of beta. How'd that work out? Yeah, you want to talk about a game changer right there. I would fucking love to see their books.

2:47:57Do you know how much money they make? It's obscene. Every single game that is sold on Steam, they get a piece of it. It is mental. They're like, why are we bothering to make games anymore? We don't have to. That's why they stopped. They're like, we don't need to do this. I mean, then why do Nintendo and PlayStation do it? I mean, honestly, this is gonna sound like a crazy thing, but like, the video games industry, like the president of video games can come out tomorrow and say, you know what? I'm tired of listening to all your horse shit on the message boards. You fucking complain about everything.

2:48:21We're done. We're taking our ball and going home. No more video games. We're not making any more games. Have fun with the ones we've already made but there's no more honestly i'd be fine yeah oh my god would sustain me for the rest of my life yeah yeah 100 100 yep yeah steam what an incredible move brilliant remember that either is like i mean i do remember it coming out because in the beginning it wasn't it wasn't transformative i mean that took that was like a slow burn yeah get to where yeah they were because it was really like as a publishing platform you couldn't as a developer just like go without a relationship with one of the platforms and get your games published.

2:48:57I mean, the certification process alone was wildly different back then than it is today. I mean, they innovated a lot of stuff. There's a lot of stuff we take for granted today that we wouldn't have without Steam. Actually, yeah. I mean, Garrett, maybe you remember the specifics. Now I think more about it. It's like, oh, yeah, wait. So if I was just like playing Battlefield 1942, right, like I would normally go to the store and buy the discs, right, and install it. But you weren't downloading it then. That was, and that's what Steam was bringing to the table. Is that accurate? That it was like downloadable?

2:49:27Yeah, I mean, I think it was a huge step forward. For better or worse, some people would disagree. I really don't care about the physical side. You know, I live in a digital world now. I don't want to get a game out of a, where's that game? It's just, that was the game changer. But yeah, and we woke up one day, one day, like Andrea says, it crept up and he woke up one morning and like Steam just dominated everything everything and it became almost like you know ea and epic have tried to to set up their own stores none of those have really got any traction how often do you go to the origin or epic game store not unless you have to right because the game's exclusive or does a great job of trying to compete by giving away games all the time yeah yeah it's you know and obviously now not just a not just a storefront but like an os that runs games on on a pc handle better than windows Significantly better than Windows.

2:50:15The friend system is also very great. The way that they've integrated mods. I mean, Steam has done a really excellent job of updating their platform. Now, of course, they've had some missteps here and there, but it really is, I think, one of the top ten most modern games. We so take it for granted, but like Remote Play, Steam Link, all of that stuff that they brought in. I still use Steam Link all the time. It's great. Steam Deck is fantastic. maybe i don't know when that started but but yeah well that's a whole other shit show well it is i would have a lot to say but meaning that's what i wanted to point out because like there was no e shop there was no like i'm just gonna download you know metal gear salad yeah it didn't that's not how it worked but they were at 2003 yeah like i'm struggling to even remember that happening wow maybe it's because pc gamers have had steam you know there was a digital storefront in a serious way long before consoles got one now they all have one steam was really the first one yeah Maybe it's because PC gamers have lived with it for longer, but you don't hear really anyone on the PC side bemoaning the death of physical games.

2:51:18There are no physical games on PC. They're gone. Those big boxes with the... Remember when Tomb Raider came in the big pyramid box? They used to have a special section. All the boxes were wacky. Again, PC gaming in the 90s. They were huge. We were going to the PC game again library. It was the size of the warehouse from Raiders of the Lost Ark. And there was eight games in there because that's all you had room for. These boxes were ridiculous. What I remember about PC, maybe the 90s PC games, is how they were like a big cardboard box. It had like a foldable. You could open up like the front. But then it would have like a cellophane clear thing that showed the inside of the box.

2:51:52It's so ridiculous thinking back on all that. So it's interesting. There's a big conversation right now. I think digital is now the lion's share of it. But physical games are still very much a thing. And people on the console side are like, oh, they don't like the slippery slope. The way it's going, digital will dominate. Again, on the PC side, that war has been fought on one. That's been over for a long time. I can't remember the last time I saw a physical PC game. I just built a PC recently. The idea of putting a CD or a Blu-ray drive in that thing is like, what am I going to do with that? You can barely find decent external ones.

2:52:21Yeah, that's why I got a$50 Blu-ray drive. If I wanted to rip my DVDs, then I plugged that in. But the idea of a PC tower with a slot in it seems very quaint now. I don't think anyone's done that for probably a decade. No. but I mean so people are doom and gloom about the death of physical games well you don't have to like imagine the future we're living in it and you can see what it's like is it that bad I don't know again some people might think so but like I don't feel like I miss anything from not going to the shelf and getting a box off the shelf and putting a disc in a drive or in any case it's 18 fucking discs I am the biggest fucking digital guy like I love digital and I've wanted it forever however I understand the counter arguments Gary of like oh they're taking the game offline they're removing my license servers are being shut down.

2:53:06I don't know if we have the space in this episode to get into the very deep argument. I'm just trying to bring something. Digital ownership and licensing and all that, because that's a whole other thing. Not to mention, is PlayStation 6 going to be backwards compatible? You'd say yes, but maybe it won't be. Yeah, I love downloading stuff 95 % of the time. Like, it works fine, but I do, like, them being in control of that license and being able to be like, sorry, we never promised it was going to always work for you. Like, that is super shitty. Yeah, of course, of course. But I was thinking like PT, imagine that you bought a game at the time that came with a PT demo.

2:53:40Yeah. And like meaning the point is we should be able to play that PT demo whenever we want. I still have it on a hard drive. Don't delete that. You want me to get it back. Yeah. It's a great example where like that's what that causes. Franimal in 2004, the Nintendo DS launches as the first major console of the seventh generation. In other news, Nintendo officially announces its revolution, later named the Wii console. But before we hop into the year 2004, Fran Mirabella, I just want to shout out a massive milestone. Okay. 900. Whoa. So close to the 1 ,000 mark. And I want to shout out to Kebabs, who I was able to find one of the comments.

2:54:14You found one of Kebabs? I got one of Kebabs. Who said, my favorite moment is Snakes as the sponsor. Oh, that's good. That was fun. And then also one from AK.98 who said, birthday tax for my wife Riley. Game Showdown is one of our favorite things to watch together. Well, I'm happy to keep winning it for you. The baker's dozen is made from a baker's dozen. 13. That's what kebabs wrote. Missouri for some super chats. We'll get back to them. The DS launch. So did you say 2004, the DS launches as the first major console of the seventh generation? A clamshell. And then, yeah, Nintendo officially announces Revolution, later names it.

2:54:49And was that the announcement at Tokyo Game Show then? Because what's really interesting, both of those things, it's still crazy to me to even say. I mean, I was one of the first people to play both of those things. Revolution was one of them at Tokyo Game Show. That's what I remember. Okay. Like, Codename Revolution. They secretly, you know, brought us in this back room and were like.

2:55:36you know, or we could be a much different discussion seeing kind of like, it just was a trend and a fad. Where DS though, two screen gaming, there's absolutely something there. Yeah, man, that was so cool, yeah. I mean, I look back on it as it was a pretty huge year for Nintendo getting away from like trying to figure out how to compete with PlayStation 2. Yeah. And basically it's how we arrived at the Switch. I think it might also be, of course, absolutely. I think it might be also the beginning of Nintendo's kind of divergence from the track that everyone else is on, right? GameCube was competing with Xbox, PlayStation.

2:56:09Wii is the first one. I always think of Nintendo. I think Nintendo is interesting because Xbox and PlayStation, the games are pretty much exactly the same. They're the only ones doing anything different. And I think that's where it began. Because like you said, GameCube and 64 were basically just boxes that you put a cartridge or a disc in. It was the same thing. And there was some little innovations in the controllers and things like that. Game Boy in itself was a huge deal back in the day. But I think it was the first time, because the DS was a massive success, right? 3DS even more so. So the first time that, I think it was the first time that Nintendo demonstrated, perhaps even to themselves, that you could do something really wacky, like two screens, what's going on here?

2:56:43One's on a touchscreen, that's bizarre. No one ever thought of that. And it could still not just be like a niche gimmick, but like a massive success. And it was. And I think that probably drove them to the 3DS. And as you said, the Wii, the Wii U, and now the Switch. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, it's funny. If you look at the Wii U, and I think everybody gets this, you're like, this is such a failed combination of like wanting to be the Switch, but the tech and the price of the tech wasn't there. But they were also using the two-screen kind of DS method in console form. It was a failure in the sense of like...

2:57:13It was a lot of experimentation that was actually happening in consumer products. Because the Wii U was really interesting. Oh, you should hold that to when we actually talk about when it comes out. Because you know what was a massive success from 2004 that was missing from this? This is Half-Life 2 was released. Oh, dang. Okay. Nobody cares till the orange box. What a game. Orange box will care. Orange box. I wouldn't say nobody cares until the orange box. Half-Life 2 was crazy. And it continues to be crazy. Over the course of my career in writing video game news, I have probably done a hundred stories on Half-Life 2.

2:57:50And I started writing video game news, you know, probably eight years. No, not even. Like six years before, you know, or after the game came out. It was just like, it was just like, it just followed me persistently. It was just like so much Half-Life 2. It's still one of the only, I mean, there's a list, probably 20, 50 games. But it is one of the true S-tier legendary games of all time. There's no question. If I can bring it in to weave it into what we were talking about before with Steam, right? I pulled the PC gamers, the 19-year evolution of Steam, right? Of course, they go 2003, the beginning, talking about what it is and isn't.

2:58:26But then 2004, colon, we all install Steam for Half-Life 2. the release of half-life 2 is arguably the reason steam is what it is today that's interesting the game's dominance of the storefront reflects that valve valve didn't want you to forget to play the universally acclaimed shooter you had to sign up for steam even if you bought the box at a store it was a landmark moment in the transition from the old model of digital ownership right they took their mega game and they forced you to use their store and gave it that that launch to the new one where game licenses are tied to online accounts but yeah to andrea's point like we have more coming up here 2005 microsoft's xbox 360 sony's playstation 3 and nintendo's wii were officially unveiled during or just prior to e3 however only the xbox 360 was released in 2005 xbox 360 the greatest xbox generation ever and i still think one of the best consoles regardless of platform.

2:59:23I mean, it completely changed. I never had it. It completely changed online multiplayer. I mean, that console, what they were doing from a technological standpoint had not been done before. The way that you could get into parties and play with friends online and do chat. I mean, that was all brand new. You want to talk about things that ushered in innovation. The architecture was crazy. Yeah, it was huge. I think they tried a lot. I still remember to this day, fucking J.L.R. standing up there and talking about Velocity Girl's going to sell you her merch in the Xbox store and all that bullshit that never happened.

2:59:56But like, no, I mean, Xbox Live Arcade, you know, Xbox Live in itself, like all of that shit was, I mean, again, we take all this for granted now, but these are the systems that ushered all of that stuff in. Wait, when was PlayStation 3's launch comparatively? It was a year later. It was. So Xbox 360 was November of 2005 and then 2006 was PlayStation 3. Hey, you want to talk about launches? fucking Ridge Racer, giant enemy crab. Yeah, yeah. Massive damage, $599 US dollars. $599 US dollars. And what was the fireworks game? You know what I'm talking about? For PlayStation 3? Oh, I think so. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

3:00:34No, for 2, no, it was 2. What was the game where the fireworks went up? Oh, was that 2? What was it called? Fantabulous or something. Fantabulous. It was Fantabulous. Was that 2? Yeah, I liked Fantabulous better. But, yeah, like, going back to it, the Xbox being so freaking powerful Yeah. in that moment where we're at the tail end of the life cycle. It was the first HD console, right? First 720p console. Yeah, that's right. Oh, my God. Correct me. Well, Dreamcast, of course, but in terms of where we're going, the first Microsoft, Sony, or Nintendo one to be out of the box, I have an Ethernet port or an Internet port, whether it was Ethernet or it was an Ethernet 360 to start.

3:01:13Yeah, out of the box. Oh, and no, Xbox had it. I'm totally wrong. The big black Xbox had an Ethernet port, too. It did. A modem, yeah. I'm wrong about that. Which is actually kind of wild because, yeah, like on GameCube, you had to like plug it in and buy that set. Yeah, yeah. Same with PlayStation 2. You had to buy the adapter, put that in there. Screw it in the back. I remember... I don't think Xbox had it all. DVD and... So to combine it in 2006 here, of course, then you would see the release of the PlayStation 3, the release of the Wii. They put, as Andrea calls out, the Los Angeles Attorney's Office sues Rockstar Games to take two interactive over the hot coffee.

3:01:42That is not the lead story of that year. It's just not. Hot coffee. It was, I think, just in the way out hot coffee holy shit hey there's a sex mini game in gta that was out that got published that you have to do all these things to get but it was there in the file it's a fun little one i think as somebody who had to grow up in a household where leisure suit larry existed i was like okay this is dumb yeah cj just grinded up ladies in bed who cares let him have his freak you know it was scandalous though that's of course but it was also like yeah you hacked it or you know got into the files on a i mean it was just still got them pulled from shelves it's still got them that ao rating for a hot sec like it was a big deal on that front but i would argue yeah the launch of these consoles yes let alone again the success of the we how impossible it was to get the we for so fucking oh my god i'm actually glad i did that camp out because yeah you could not find one for like i want to say a year more than that yeah i remember i i you lined up my mom had come and played it at Thanksgiving and then I had to get another.

3:02:42I got mine in a line. Then I went and got hers in a line. And I remember me, Brudvig, and I think Jeff Haynes being at Saramonte for lunch one day. Or no, Jeff wasn't there. It was me, Brudvig, and somebody else. And Game... Clayton? Yeah, probably. GameStop got the new shipment of Weez. And immediately people were buying them. And I called... We called the office. Does anyone need them? Does anyone need them? And it was like in the office show. It's happening. Somebody had those Weez available. Get them right there. Interesting landmark for 2005. I was just thinking of because I was in Hollywood for the Wii launch and I had to work it.

3:03:132006 then, yeah. Oh, 2006. We're coming up to that. Well, no, we've combined them. We combined 2005-2006, yeah, yeah. But yeah, I had to work the launch, but it also made me think that 2005, that was the year that, well, where's PSP in this mix? But anyway, we started the - Fuck you, Gary. You shut your fucking face. I'll kill you. The video team officially started, right? And they said, hey, do you want to get off of IGN Insider and start the video team? But then from there on it, man, I had to work behind the camera at all these launch events. So I got to go to all the launch events, PlayStation included, but I was always like behind the camera.

3:03:43What a piece of shit. How many movies did you buy on UMD, Greg? Ghostbusters for sure. In my quest to own every version of Ghostbusters. Oh my God. Do you remember for me, it was I graduated college and was getting ready to start my first job and I had like, I think a week off in between. And so my gift to myself was I bought a PSP, Hot Shots Golf, Open T, Luminous and Ghostbusters on UMD. Luminous was good It had that good soundtrack Oh yeah Shake your body Shake your body That's what I shopped The PlayStation PSP launch And I used Luminous music I shouldn't have But I did To score the video That we did 2007 saw Bungie announced It split with Microsoft To become an independent studio In other news Just in TV A website designed Specifically for streaming Video games is launched Just one of the most Landmark pieces of news ever because it became this little site called twitch.tv.

3:04:38That's right. No big deal. Who was Justin? I don't know. What's Justin's last name? I don't know. Dot TV, I think. No. He streamed it. I mean, now I'm forgetting his last name. Do you think he's like sitting on an island in like Bermuda or something? No, he's got to be, right? I think he consults now is what it is. Okay. But that is crazy to think back because Twitch didn't come around until. I don't know when it became 2012. 2011 or 12, yeah. Something like that. But Justin TV, that was pretty huge back then. I mean, there was plenty of live streaming out there, but I think they were the first ones to really commercialize it.

3:05:14Right. Yeah. It just wasn't even understood. I remember when Rumble was just Adolf TV. You're not familiar? You're not on Rumble? I do not say Rumble, but I can't. That's where I get all my political news. I don't know where the joke is. I don't understand the joke. Gary, is this a news site? Rumble? Yeah. You're not familiar with Rumble? Rumble is like when you get banned from Twitch, you go to kick. When you get banned from kick, you go to Rumble. You can get banned from kick. You can't believe it or not. It is possible. Yes. Okay. Number, I'm sorry, 2008. The key story for 2008 was the increased competition between the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360.

3:05:55This is via NPD. Starting in January, the PlayStation 3 outsold the Xbox 360 by about 40 ,000 units. however microsoft said they misjudged demand and struggled to produce supply until late february for the entire year the playstation 3 outsold the 360 five out of the 12 months with two more months within 5k of each other however the 360 scored the pivotal holiday months in november and december overall the ps3 experienced substantial growth from 2007 the wii and nintendo ds were the top two sellers we still suffering from supply issues shifted record breaking units month after month. Do you think there was a point either in reality or just in perception?

3:06:34Because it feels like in retrospect, it kind of feels this way, that like where Xbox 360, because Xbox 360 was a terrific

3:06:44generation for Microsoft, right? Probably the best Xbox for its time. And then PlayStation 3 kind of stumbled a bit, right? Too expensive. They struggled with games. No games. Was there ever a point where it kind of felt like they were actually at parity do you think? Because obviously the narrative overall is like Sony's always been ahead and currently way ahead. But for that point it almost looked like they were kind of neck and neck for a bit. I don't know about the actual sales but I would say from a release date. PS3 ends up out selling 360 in the hand. The narrative was very favorable to Microsoft.

3:07:16I was going to say I think the bigger thing is that Xbox 360 won the mind share. Where you'd go to the airport and they're like take your console out of your bag and they showed a 360. And I know that's a goofy thing no but that's the kind of stuff it was the excitement of that of xbox live of a headset packed in of talking to your friends and friends listen blades like there was a juice there that even with ps3 catching up and surpassing in the end i don't think you were ever able to get out from behind that shadow and then the halos and all these other things that were happening maybe but we have to remember it i mean again it could be misremembering but uh japan market was something it was very like microsoft they've always struggled there yeah so like you might think that way here in the Western audience.

3:07:56And that's how we saw it. But it was like, oh, but the reality was everybody was just buying PlayStation 3 and Final Fantasy in Japan and Dragon Quest. Of course, yeah. The 360 was MTV. It was Elijah Wood. Like, it had this celebrity mindshare. You know, that's what I think of. And I think that that's why... Their marketing machine was in overdrive. Yeah, I think that's what we think of them as, like, dominating that. Yeah, no, the rock, yeah. But they did dominate that. Yeah, for sure. I mean, they absolutely did. They did, and again, they capitalized on the fact that Sony had kind of a dud generation with PS3.

3:08:27I mean, there are some memorable games up here, but I remember it not having a great launch lineup. It's the launch lineup that does them in. The end of the PS3 lifecycle was a banger, though. And honestly, that was the time to hit, right? They hit that, and then PlayStation 4 is the result of we fucked up these PlayStation 3 things, we're not going to fuck that up again. And that's when Xbox went, we're going to fuck this up royally with the Xbox One. And Microsoft finally hit its stride where it had some crazy good exclusives, right? Like... Years. Yeah, I was thinking Mass Effect as well. Mass Effect, yeah, I know, 100%.

3:08:58They had, like, a pretty damn good lineup that you're like, oh, yeah, I'm getting Xbox. And that's what it was taking me, again, back to, like, the console wars in the office. You must remember this, right? Oh, I'm well-versed the PS3 Xbox. I'm not misremembering. Well, because, again, I came from the Nintendo side. Me fucking Clements over there. Clements giving Folklore a nine. I'm talking about this Uncharted game. Yes. Hillary saying, shut the fuck up. we got Halo and Gears. Exactly. But like literally people would get in say like, yeah, let's just say Mass Effect. Bioshock as well. The Xbox editors would look over and like sort of snicker at the fellow editors of like, you wish you were playing this.

3:09:34And it was, it was just so competitive back then. They had achievements. Like there was stuff going on that was cool. Oh my God, The whole like Avatar customization from the 360 era was gold. I was so sad when they got rid of it. The Blades. Remember the Blades? The aesthetic was so good. PlayStation 3 was its own thing with the cell processor and Xbox was basically a low-end PC. Ken Kuderati. So, of course, every fucking PlayStation 3 port ran like shit. Something was wrong. The blacks didn't work. I may be mistaken here. I'm sorry someone will correct me, but I think it was also the first console that was able to do wireless gaming.

3:10:02It had that little Wi-Fi adapter you could plug in the back, the little dongle. Yeah, like the little guy. I remember that being a big thing. Which, Xbox? Xbox 360. 360, yeah. You plugged in that Wi-Fi dongle. That didn't come until later in the generation, though. Yeah, but they eventually got up to Wi-Fi N or whatever it was. If that was the speed Yeah, it's just amazing that there's no wires. It's like, oh my God, how is this thing working? 2009, Batman Arkham Asylum attains the Guinness World Record for most critically acclaimed superhero game ever. In other news, Demon's Souls spawned a whole new genre that would put From Software on the map for years to come.

3:10:37The Souls-like was born, which is 100 % true, but that's like a smoldering, that's a little flame. I don't think that's Bloodborne, right, is where we explode. No, I added that as like a nugget because I think some of us... Oh, you put it in. Yeah, that's why I put the AR in the parentheses. Wasn't Dark Souls where it exploded? But to me, the bigger story... I mean, obviously, Arkham Asylum... We'll talk about that in just a second. But I added the Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 kick-started Call of Duty's dominance as the biggest entertainment franchise in the world. Because from Modern Warfare 2 on, they've just been knocking down the NPD charts ever since.

3:11:14But I also relate that. Now it made me remember why I'm like, screw this i'm not playing xbox online like call of duty it was so toxic like it's just it's funny that that would last a day and how is it today i mean it's still pretty bad i'm just saying that xbox live it's funny don't you think it became pretty iconic around call of duty of being like super duper toxic i mean yeah i didn't want my mic i feel like that's like a it's still it still is yeah it hasn't changed easier to control now though can i can i tell you my uh my favorite Xbox 360 story of my time as an Xbox 360 gamer. There's actually, Leah, my wife's actually got footage of this that you'll never see.

3:11:52Just for us. You're going to tell us about it, but you won't show it? So we had the 360. I think Leah and I started dating in 2005, so it was when we were first going out. And we got a 360 and we got the Vision Cam. Remember the Vision Cam, the little camera that you plugged in? It was a shitty, maybe like 240p. it was bad. But again, it was like, oh wow, camera. It was like the size of a postage stamp. And now there's a camera built into literally everything you buy. And we just, again, take it for granted. But back then, this was the first time. So I had this little vision cam. And I had the little microphone thing.

3:12:27And what I would do is I'd get super stoned. This was before it was legal. So we had to go to Dolores Park and buy our stuff from the cookie man that would sell the cookies. And they were disgusting, right? Because it's like, ah, and you had to like wolf them down. Now you go to walk into the store and buy like fucking artisanal Belgian chocolate that will take you to another planet. But as a reminder, everyone at Kind of Funny does sign a dare pledge, Mike. We did sign a dare pledge. They know the drugs. Which means when you go to Vegas, you buy the weed, but you throw it away for some reason.

3:12:51Exactly. Especially Tylenol. Send any you don't want over to me. I would get super stoned on these disgusting cookies that we bought from the cookie man in Dolores Park. And then I got, I don't make me how I got it, but I got this hand puppet. It was a Jesus hand puppet, and it looked like a little Jesus. Also from Dolores Park. It was like a guy who had a sash and the hair and the beard. I guess it kind of, if you took the thing off, it just looked like a caveman, but you put this thing on, oh, it's Jesus. And so I would like hide under, I would like hide under the camera and like pop it, the thing for the camera and you saw the puppet.

3:13:20Gary, did you have one of those cookies before we started? I would go on and I would do the, hello, I am Jesus. I will bless your game with my Jesus powers. It was all very stupid. And, but people, don't forget, it's like two o 'clock in the morning. When I was playing Uno, stoned as fuck. Stoned as fuck. I'm telling you, Xbox 360, Uno, with the vision cam. Take all the penises out of it. And it was a brilliant experience. Yeah. I was cracking myself up. Speaking of brilliant experiences, 2010, PlayStation Move and Microsoft Connect both launched worldwide. Sorry, what launched? PlayStation Move and Microsoft Connect.

3:14:03Yeah. How long have you got? I still vividly remember that press conference with the Kinect and then showing all the games. It really seemed like magical technology, and the problem was it just did not work that way in people's houses. You cannot. Kudo. Yeah. Bam! When he did that with his foot and the whole thing waked out. You will never achieve success in innovation, the kind that Nintendo enjoys, by looking at what someone else has already done, in this case with the Nintendo Wii and the Wii controllers, as the Wiimotes and go, that's a good innovation. We should innovate like that as well.

3:14:40Yeah. And then basically copy it and come up with an inferior version like the Move again, fucking dead on arrival, right? They tried to resurrect it with PSVR. Maybe don't try to resurrect it with something else. It's also dead on arrival. And then the Kinect, which again, I've said it before, one of the worst, biggest boondoggles in the history of the video game industry. It fucking killed the Xbox One. They forced it into every box, jacking up the price. No one knew what it was. It didn't work. They lied and faked about how well it worked. Remember the Star Wars demo where the character fucking jumps before the guy on stage did because it was all scripted and fake?

3:15:12We all saw, it did not work. Hold on, I'm sorry, the Nitro Rifle has something to say. What's up, Ian McQuittan? Gary, what about my friend Milo? We're going to talk about a boy named Milo. Blessed Peter. I love him. I still love him so much. I remember the moment I knew it was dead. I went to a kid's birthday party and there was a bunch of kids and they had a Kinect there and they were trying to play one of the Kinect games, and after about five minutes, one of the kids said, can we just play something with a controller? I was like, that's it, it's over. Bad news bears. I remember trying to no disrespect to John, I remember trying to navigate the menus on Dance Central.

3:15:50You look like fucking Trump dancing, going like this. You look like an idiot. Why is it not doing anything? How is this easier than this? It's not. It's terrible. It's what happens when you try to copy someone else's innovation, but you don't fucking know how to innovate. So Kinect killed the Xbox One. It's a real shame. Xbox is still in a hole because of it. Phil Spencer rightly said, it was one of the smartest things I've heard. Yeah, the worst generation to lose because it's when people started building their digital libraries and getting into the, well, I'm in the ecosystem now. All my games are here.

3:16:17I can't move over there. They, fucking Don Matrick can never be pilloried enough. Nope. Because again, coming out of parity, 360 resurgent, PS3 in the mud. Yeah. And then they could have gone for the kill. and instead they chose to fucking kill themselves. And by the way, there was like the first version of Kinect, was that right? And then Xbox One had the... 2010, they launched that Kinect for the 360. We are getting a bit to 2013, Xbox One launches, but it's all part of the same conversation. I was just trying to remember. Honestly, if you want to make the Kinect and try to copy Nintendo, fine.

3:16:50Make it an accessory. But again, they were on the shelves at the same time, PS4 and Xbox One, and that thing was$100 more expensive for a thing that you didn't want or understand how to use. And if you even tried to use it, it didn't work. It just didn't work. He's definitely mad about 2013. I'll have more to say that. But the last comment I'd say there is there's a lot of history of companies having ideas that are good that don't work. That doesn't mean there weren't a few good ideas in there. It's the only thing I would say. And as we get, I don't think they should have done it then, but there was some earnest good thoughts in there.

3:17:24As we get to 2011, Greg, I want to shout out Michael Sosby, who super chatted six different times for$2 each saying$2 ,000 on the road to$2 ,000. Let's get to$2 ,000. We are inching closer and closer to $1 ,000. I believe we're about$16 away. But I also want to shout out Chris Rod with a$100 super chat. I'll tell you what I'll do. Gary's got something to say. Just for fun. Big money. You'll like this. I know. Because I'm in a good mood today, I will now treat everything I say for the rest of the show as a super chat. Every time, you write this done, Mike. Every time I say something, I'll give you$5 at the end.

3:18:03Wow. How long are these sentences going to be? I'm just going to keep my mouth shut. That was the last we heard from Gary. He will not be able to contain himself. I also want to thank Michael Major with a$50 Super Chat saying congrats. I've watched every single one of them. Here's to 2 ,000 more. So much love from everybody. We got Grim, Ian David, Larry, A lot of people aren't even leaving messages because they just are leaving like one dollar. Gary, you wouldn't believe this super chat. Phil wrote me and says, Mike, talk about LaBooBoo for 200 milliseconds. I'm telling you, fucking LaBooBoo.

3:18:40Wait, should I start a timer? I got this sweet LaBooBoo named Serenity. I love LaBooBoo, Gary. It's got a Call of Duty outfit, too. You would love this. Okay. I got you. Are you going to do it now? No, I tried to break Gary. I really want you to talk about LaBooBoo, though. Freaking LaBooBoo. 2011? The Nintendo 3DS launches. 2012, the Wii U launches. So we're in this primetime Nintendo stuff here. I remember the 3DS and being at that Nintendo press conference because that was getting to the end of when Nintendo was doing in-person press conferences because they stopped doing them long before everybody else did.

3:19:19I remember the presentation where they had the 3DS open and they were showing Zelda on it for the first time. you could see the difference between turning the slider on and turning the slider off and i it just like you didn't fully understand it and so we got to the show floor and you actually got to hold it and you're like whoa how are you doing this without glasses exactly the big takeaway it was really cool great console brand mr nintendo yeah i it was there's a perfect example of something that i was like i i did not like it overall but luigi's mansion i think it was maybe in particular i I remember being like, well, this is pretty neat.

3:19:57I turned mine off and left it off all the time. I hated that. Yeah, I just remember doing it and, first of all, being hard to find the spot. And then, actually, after a while, I was like, this is like hiring my eyes out. I also used a lot more of the battery. And that, too. And you're like, screw it. It's not worth it. It just wasn't worth it at all. Why are you doing this self-imposed bit? Are you guys watching Rumble right now? I'm seeing 3D without glasses for the first time with Trippie AF. That's Trippie AF, no doubt, no doubt. Open up that wallet, Gary. I also have a super chat here I wanted to read from Kevin Lindsay, just throwing back to 2008, who said, Mass Effect causes debates on Fox News over simulated alien sex.

3:20:34I remember that. I'm glad Fox News has really straightened themselves out and don't report on dumb bullshit anymore. And then Jackie Lohr with a$2 super chat says, bring back the Fat Five. I remember that. That's a good time. I do remember that. That was good. Meanwhile, the Wii U, that thing sucked. Yeah. Great games, terrible hardware. Yeah, the Wii U was bad. I'm willing to spend money on this one. Spend money. There's a whole segment about you talking after this, so we're only doing it here. That was next year, Wii U. Okay, got it. All right, well, I'll save it then. I want my money back. That didn't count.

3:21:02I want a refund. It's like Steam. YouTube can do that. That was 2012, Wii U launches. Oh, no, 20... Oh, I thought we were talking about 3DS in 2011. I put them together. I said 2011 was 3DS and 2012 was Wii U. He gave us a Nintendo sandwich on the one. And now I'm going to go to 2013. I don't want to say... Go. Go. I cut Gary off. I at least want to say that was one of the most horrible console launch last setup experience I ever had. I don't know why. Maybe it was just bad luck. But I just remember trying to get it set up and like downloading stuff or something. And it just like was awful. It took me like 90 minutes to two hours.

3:21:36It was terrible. And then my second thought was, how am I going to get this cable long enough to run to the bathroom? Why? You know, it's the only real way to play the Wii U. I feel like I forever wanted that. Do you guys remember that Zelda tech demo we got in the behind closed doors in the Nintendo booth for the Wii U? And that game just like never existed and never came out. It was like this gorgeous, beautiful Zelda game that was 3D. Was it not GameCube? Well, there was that for GameCube. But no, I'm talking about the Wii U tech demo that was only playable on the show floor at E3. We got to look this one up.

3:22:14I don't remember. I'll see if I can find it. There was a crazy Zelda tech demo that never came out for that? Yeah. And I just kept waiting for that game to come out, and it never did. I only think of the one before Wind Waker, yeah. But it wasn't based on just, like, a previous Zelda? Well, I think it was based on Twilight Princess. Yeah, maybe that's why. But it was, like, different. Yeah, well, because I think before Breath of the Wild, you know, at least on What's Good Games, we had speculated, Brittany and I, that maybe, oh, they were going to resurrect that tech demo, and that would be what the new Zelda was going to look like.

3:22:43but then we got Breath of the Wild, which was a very different kind of art style. Okay. Yeah, Wii U, what a failure. Great games, though. And I'm glad so many of you made it to Switch. The one thing I remember about... I mean, I remember many things about the Wii U, certainly not enjoying it very much, but I remember... And it's funny, because Nintendo's gone the exact opposite way now. Like, a lot of people will rightly praise the Switch 2 for, like, when you hold it in your hand, it feels like a really well-built piece of hardware, like, solid. It's got just enough heft to it. How did they learn what a hardware was?

3:23:11So, you know where I'm going. When you picked up that Wii U handheld, it just felt like a cheap, shiny piece of plastic. It had a creepy plastic. And it would drop the connection to the console like 10, 15 feet away. You had almost no leash on that thing. And it was just like the games were just not great, right? No, the games were great. I mean, some were. Well, the traditional Nintendo. Oh, this is the Zelda. Nintendo had its. What have you found? The tech demo for Wii U. Interesting. I'll show it to you. We can maybe bring it up Yeah can you just send it to assets Look up the Zelda HD experience Wii U thank you to chat for that I don't think he knows how to do that I don't think he knows how to do that Text it to me and I'll put it in assets Text it to Fran I mean text it to Greg I'll send it to you He's asking me to send him a clip that's fine I mean the clip that you're showing everyone on the damn set Bro do you want me to slack it to you right now Yes He doesn't know how he's on slack 2013 the playstation 4 and xbox one launch worldwide as well as the ouya another year of luigi it was the year of luigi we're about due for another one aren't we we might actually be already having it greg i blacked out for a second what did you say playstation 4 xbox one launch 2013 wow we already talked about getting a lot there we've talked about xbox one fucking every day Do you know what two launch games were?

3:24:42But which one? Either. I mean, Rezo Rise, Full of Rome. That Roman game. You guys remember that one? Son of Rome. Rezo Rise for PlayStation 4. Housemarque, Rezo Gun. Oh, God. Oh, Rezo Gun was so good. Look at him today. I loved Rezo Gun. Shadow, Killzone, Shadow Fall. Yeah, Killzone. What else did that? Oh, God. It's white. We're like, we don't care. We still don't care. We're done. This is actually, I got my Generations mix. I was going to say, remember when they fucking launched the HD DVD add-on for 360? Oh, yes. What a mess that was. But Xbox One, as I recall, I remember when they came out and did the whole presentation and ended up with people saying, where are the games?

3:25:23They haven't shown any games. Because they were pitching it more as... Xbox, Call of Duty, Call of Duty, TV, TV. Yeah, they were pitching it more as... Remember, it had the Ethernet, it had the cable. The all-in-one entertainment machine. That was the marketing. I feel like on paper, in theory, that seemed like a good idea. It's all just going to be one box. That's why they called it Xbox One. Like, whatever you do, whether you play games or watch TV or whatever, like, you just do it on this one box. And, like, that seems good, right? Who wants, like, 15 different boxes? But, like, again, it was primarily a console, a game console.

3:25:53That's what people over the course of, like, the previous generations had been conditioned to expect. And then they came out and talked about it as a thing that you watch TV on. Yep. And I think, you know, I don't think they ever really recovered. Remember when they absolutely crushed the Snap feature, though, and it's never been seen again? where you could play video games while watching something. That was cool. It was the coolest shit around. So, none of you probably remember this. I actually reviewed the Xbox One and did the video review and everything. I spent all this time. The amount Tim shares the fucking gif of you doing the hula dance.

3:26:24Oh, is that in there? Yeah. That was also reviewing Ubisoft's, oh, the Kinect Fitness game, which were actually decent. But anyway, I remember reviewing it, and yes, like Xbox Snap, when it heard you and worked was pretty. Oh, that's right. You said it. Yes. You'd be playing. You're like Xbox, snap HBO. I mean, you couldn't do that on HBO, but it would even connect it to your freaking cable. Like the idea was not terrible to screen. Like watching like sports while you play Call of Duty. That's a great idea. I'll give you a paper. I'll give you two more as well from that generation because Microsoft are the masters of coming up with great ideas and then like squandering them.

3:27:04One versus 100. fantastic you don't remember that yes and um what was the other thing that was cool fuck now i had two things why you think of it i also oh netflix viewing parties viewing party yeah remember 60 yep oh so good avatars would be down there well you had your little mystery science theater guys down at the bottom it was yeah that was so much fun so this goes back to what i was saying before it's like yet like connect overall was a failure there's still some good ideas in there. One of the ones that I like the best and it's on practically on our phones now, you know, we're used to like saying some basic commands, but like Xbox on was actually a great concept because I always remembered, but it just didn't work every time.

3:27:48But the idea of like walking in, throwing my bag down and being like Xbox on and the TV flipped on Xbox on and by the time I grabbed the controller, we're about ready to go, but it was like slow. It didn't always work, but it did. and it brings me to like why don't we actually have that today i use the shit out of it bring it back because i was so busy in art school working until five in the morning on projects and stuff it was constantly xbox switched to netflix xbox switched to tv and my tv was already set to adult swim at that time or whatever i just had rick and morty playing or whatever i used that connect all the time volume up volume down it was i was like the like the golden example of what they hoped everybody was like.

3:28:31There was a lot of grief in there. I remember all kinds of stories. Someone would be home playing Call of Duty and the roommate would come in and go, Xbox off! And just fuck with them. Classic. I don't know if you guys talked about it earlier. It's relevant to the news story about Xbox today. But I think get ready for some of this to come back with, hey, co-pilot. And so that's where people... I mean, you figure they stayed away from it because it killed them here. Well, this is why PlayStation wins this generation out the gate and never looks back. is that we're about games this is a machine for games games games games and xbox like we want to be the hub and they were like no yeah and it's that thing where you're never going to be able to compete with what echo is doing what series is doing these systems that are divine designed for that but now that's what's changing is that you've got you know chat gpt5 yeah and all of a sudden that is going to be your side cart on the next xbox and so when people think about the next Xbox consoles.

3:29:23That is why they're going to take hundreds of millions of dollars of hits on selling Call of Duties, because it's coming out of the AI fund because they know Copilot is going to be on the next Xbox. So anyway. We've all got a lot of thoughts about AI, mostly negative and rightly so. One thing that I was thinking, because I think Microsoft is supposed to be working on something like this, is a future where if I'm stuck on a level and can't figure out how to get out of a room and say, hey, Xbox, how do I get out of this room? And it will guide me. And it will say, oh, yeah, I see where you are. Turn left or whatever.

3:29:50but I think that is coming, and that will be super useful. Yeah, I've heard about it. That's why I got game cards on PlayStation. I want to hear a special segment with Gary. We need to get through the next four years. Hold on. Sorry, I'll shut up. 2014, a lot of big acquisitions happened. Amazon purchased the online video game streaming service Twitch for$970 million. Facebook acquired the virtual reality company and product Oculus. Microsoft also studios. I think it is. Microsoft Studios also acquired Minecraft developer Mojang for$2.5 billion. That to me was like a historic moment, that Minecraft story.

3:30:26I remember that number coming out and us all being like, that is an unfathomable amount of money. And yet still good value. I mean, a humongous value. I think we were all bending over backwards trying to figure out how is Microsoft going to make that money back, and here we are. I said Jack Black. You know, 10 years later, and they're like, ooh. Yeah, but then they blew it all on Activision. So I don't know. But I think, again, this is like one of those turning points of and i guess not 100 true right as we are talking about rare is it mojang i've been saying mojang it is mojang there was there was one xbox presentation where they came out and our friends at mojang and we all went oh fuck oh no anyways but i feel like that's such a turning point in terms of these giant acquisitions starting to happen yeah huge yeah uh 2015 uh sotoro iwata president and ceo of nintendo died at the age of 55 This is Kyle at Game Informer, Nintendo's president and CEO.

3:31:17Nintendo's president and CEO. I think Nintendo Direct host is probably what it's supposed to be. Oh, there it is. Iwata has passed away, unexpectedly passed away. Nintendo issued a brief notice on its website regarding Iwata's death. The notice reads, Nintendo Co. Limited deeply regrets to announce that President Satoru Iwata passed away on July 11, 2015 due to a bile duct growth. this is a heartbreaking surprise as iwata was more than just a high-ranking nintendo executive he was a personality and representative for the company and has a long history of programming and hands-on game development for many of nintendo's biggest games our condolences go out to all of his friends and family as well as as many fans nintendo won't be the same without him and i think 100 it never was yeah i mean and that's not to say nintendo's good bad otherwise but iwata was so synonymous with Nintendo Directs and what that was and his friendship with Reggie and what that whole system was.

3:32:11To lose him even is I've never been the Nintendo guy. Can you imagine when Miyamoto goes? Oh no, I don't like to think about that either. Any of them. Why don't you start thinking about how many Kojima games are left, but you digress. Yeah, I was going to say one thing that was really important about that moment. First of all, yeah, he was this amazing guy that came out of development that broke through, like you were saying, that he kind of bridged that between, if you remember, it was Yamauchi, like really old school Nintendo leadership, but Miyamoto was more like the face, but Iwata was, to your point, able to make through.

3:32:44But secondly, the thing that we kind of lost there was there normally was that leadership handoff, right? Well, Iwata would still be there, but there would have been the next moment when Iwata chose the successor. And so we've, since then, that's not how it's really quite happened. I feel like it's kind of gotten tossed around a bit since then. And we can see, quite frankly, with Switch 2, things have changed quite a bit. Yeah. Andrea adds, deservedly so, 2015 also sees the release of Witcher 3, Grand Theft Auto 5, and Fallout 4. Jesus. What a year. That's the big deal. Three big games, but only one of those is, like, all-time legendary, I would say.

3:33:20Going to get your wig out? No, this is a fight. We're charging you for this one. One of those three? I've got the money. Definitely two. I think Fallout is debatable, but I have a vivid memory. of Todd Howard being on stage, I think at the time was the Kodak Theater, where they have the Oscars every year. But as they did their press conference in Hollywood, it was this big thing, them renting out this giant theater for us all to go to. And it had been, I mean, the next thing in Fallout had been rumored for years at that point. And then they kind of like shadow dropped it. They announced it and then said, it's coming this November.

3:33:59and that had never really been done up until that point that they released announced a major triple a franchise installment from one of the biggest publishers and said just like four months later you're going to be able to buy it like that was it was wild it's it's not your contention that witcher 3 could be placed in the same category of awesome like legendariness as gta 5 yeah almost Nothing can be. Well, again, GTA 5 2013. GTA 5 is on an island, right? Yes. They stand alone in a number of ways. But as one of the biggest games, Witcher 3? Oh, that's right. You just said it. It stands alone. You can't put anything else with it.

3:34:38Maybe one or two other games like Super Mario. But there's Minecraft. There's a handle. But pull the numbers for Witcher 3 and GTA 5 right now. I'm talking purely from a sales perspective. Yes. From a content perspective, we can do a whole other four-hour podcast. I would also say Mindshare. I mean, look at the number of people that are freaking out around. Like, when GTA 6 hits, that is going to be the biggest day in the history of gaming. When Witcher 4 hits, it will not be anything close to that. Well, I don't disagree with that. But therefore what, you know? I'm just saying, I'm just saying with the three games that you mentioned.

3:35:06Speaking of something humongous, 2016, Pokemon Go launched and took over the world. The closest we've ever been to world peace. Wait, what did Pokemon Go? Pokemon Go. I remember walking out of the old spare bedroom, because this is kind of funny being super independent, right? and you'd get out there on the street and people in my weird sleepy neighborhood in the sunset out there chasing Charmander's. Like, what the fuck is happening? Remember you could see people like all congregating. Oh, that must be a gym. Yeah, exactly, exactly. I was in Dolores Park for a Pokemon Go event that I was covering for Gamer Next Door Weekly and there was 4 ,000 people in Dolores Park.

3:35:38And it was a crawl through San Francisco of people going and playing Pokemon Go together. Yeah. It was actually creating like street safety issues at one point In New York everyone was like rushing across Central Park Or like people were like being encouraged to go hang out in Central Park In the middle of the night to find a fucking Charmander Instead you get fucking knifed It's super effective I have to wonder was that actually like The biggest phone gaming moment that happened by far Like what was a big phone game at that time I mean nothing like this Angry Birds Candy Crush Angry Birds Yeah but those are all games That you just play on your own These games actually Like it was weird Because it was the first game That was like noticeable Out in the real world Yeah That normal people Were playing when I'd walk past I don't think I don't think any of the Examples we come up Are going to touch What this was And then of course 2017 Kind of funny launches Kind of funny games A short 2000 episodes ago Everybody If you can Do you have an Do you still have You must have it right Like your very first show Somewhere What does that look like Oh yeah I don't get any I don't get rid of any of them I got them all I mean like What is it?

3:36:45I mean, have you ever gone back and looked at that? No, but I can pull it in this next break if you want me. Yeah, let's have a look. You're on the hot seat for the next seat. That's right. Whatever. Because guess what, everybody? We have another clip to show you, but before we do, we have a super chat question. We want you to write in with topics for Gary Witta for a special segment called What Grinds Gary's Gears? I found out that I was doing this five minutes ago. That's the best work for you. Ask him about loot boxes, gaming CEOs, or anything that might piss him off with your super chats over on YouTube.com.

3:37:13slash kinda funny games. Do it while you watch this news writers clip segment. 2000 episodes of kind of funny games daily. Jeff Grubb from giant bomb. You guys are incredible. Congratulations. I am steeped in video game news, and yet I still try to listen every day. And there's a reason for that. You guys get it. You get that. We come to y 'all for to commiserate, to, to connect, to goof around. And then when something is making all of us, gamers angry you know how to put a voice to that and make us feel like we have someone on our side so I just want to say I will be here for the next 2 ,000 y 'all look forward to it, you guys are doing a great job, keep it up 2 ,000 episodes, 5 stories a day at about £150 per story so what does that that is 1.5 million it's pounds but let's call it dollars because they're our friends so 1.5 million dollars you owe as Kind of Funny Games.

3:38:13Pay up, Miller. My favourite moment of Kind of Funny Games daily was the episode that I got to host with the wonderful Mr Midas while I was in the midst of a massive bout of food poisoning. Chris, your favourite moment? Not so much a single moment as multiple moments. I like every time Blessing tries to pronounce my name and gets it wrong every time. I think Scullion is the one he settles on. It is Scullion. Tim gets it right 100 % of the time. Well, we were going to end this with thank you for all the support, but it's really been us propping you up for all this time like we do with every other gaming podcast.

3:38:42We'll continue to provide you award-winning games journalism and wish you well on 2 ,000 more episodes. Love you all. See you next time. Hi, Kinda Funny. It's me, Rebecca Valentine. Hey, congrats on 2 ,000 episodes of Games Daily. That's freaking incredible. You guys are really awesome. One of the things that I've come to appreciate about Kinda Funny Games Daily is the way that it's taken a lot of my more businessy, industry, insider kind of pieces and helped make them a little more digestible for just, you know, regular everyday gamers. And you guys do that with my pieces. You do that with a whole lot of other really great writers who write about industry topics.

3:39:22And it's just really awesome that you do that. You asked me to share one of my favorite pieces, and I actually wanted to share this one. I wrote this one a couple of years ago, and I actually feel like not very many people picked it up, but it's genuinely one of my favorite things that I've ever written. It's about this game called Spin Tires and the weird back and forth argument over who actually owned this little driving simulation game. It's really detailed. It took some very bizarre twists and turns. And I really, really enjoyed reporting on it just because of the multitude of skills that I had to use to sort of get to the bottom of what was really happening here.

3:39:58So that's an article from me, but you guys are freaking incredible and I appreciate everything about you. I love listening to Games Daily and I hope you guys have an amazing 2000 episode and 2000 and many more episodes to come. Bye! What's up? Kind of Funny Wesley here from Game Informer. Congrats on 2000 episodes of Kind of Funny Games Daily. That is incredible and I'm so thankful to have been a small part of that show each time my stories are read on the air and it means the world that Kind of funny supports journalists like us all around the world by reading our stories and making sure our news and our reports and our features are out there for people to hear about on the show.

3:40:36I remember the first time Greg read one of my stories on the air, he didn't actually mention my name because he wasn't reading the author bylines at that point. And so I messaged him and said, yo, you should absolutely be reading the bylines selfishly because I just wanted to hear my name on the show, but also because it's a good thing to do. And he started doing that, but not without calling me Wesley LeBlanc, that motherfucker. Every single time he'd read one of my stories and I loved it and it made me laugh every time. Fast forward a few years later and now I'm a Game Informer and my stories still get read on the air sometimes and it makes my day every single time and I love it.

3:41:072 ,000 episodes, that's truly nuts. I've been on the show twice, once when I got laid off a couple years ago from Game Informer, not so fun. The second time was with Blessing earlier this year to help bring back Game Informer's new era of our magazine. It's been with Blessing both times and I've loved that, but it is kind of concerning with me that Greg continues to avoid hosting the show with me. I know he's scared. I know he's terrified of my knowledge, and I would absolutely school him on Kind of Funny Games Showdown and end Blue Team Streak. It is what it is. It's not up for debate. It's not a question.

3:41:37Everybody knows that. I get why he doesn't host with me. But one day, we'll make it happen. Congrats on 2000 Kind of Funny Games Daily. Hey, what's up, Kind of Funny Crew? Newble here. I want to congratulate you guys on 2000 episodes of Kind of Funny Games Daily. you guys are doing an amazing job covering the industry and personally i have to thank you because without you i wouldn't probably do that stuff anymore i do on my account so thank you so much my favorite kind of funny moment is the whole ongoing bit with the mike and sarah bond father's story and Mike you're probably the funniest the funniest person on the internet I know so please never change dude I wish you guys all the best and I hope we will see at least another thousand episodes of Kinda Funny Games daily.

3:42:31Mike that's my guy right there. Mike's the funniest. That's my guy right there shout out big bug what about me? What's his name? What's his name? No he's telling What's his name? What's his name? Noble. Okay. Wow. Come on now. We're tight. We're tight. Come on. Y 'all. Keep them coming right now. We are gathering your super chats. Questions for Gary Whitta to make him grind his gears. What's going to piss Gary off? Get it straight from the source. I'll give you one to start with. You know what pisses me off? Assuming that I can just be poked with a fucking stick and rant on demand. I rant when I feel the need.

3:43:06It's an organic thing. You can't just go and rant. Do something. Say something. Be angry. I feel like you say that, but you pull rants out of thin air, Gary. Well, again, out of thin air, not because I was poked with a stick. Arturotron Robo Bartender Super Chats says, Gary, people mad at Bad Bunny headlining the Super Bowl. Thoughts? Ridiculous. I mean, last I heard he was one of the most popular musical artists in the world. Let him know, Gary. What exactly is the problem again? He speaks Spanish. Bad Bunny. Oh, no. Can't have that. Puerto Rican. no one in the United States speaks Spanish right always reminds me of that lining contact when they're like well why didn't aliens just speak English and she's like well maybe because like 90 % of the world speaks other languages yeah contact what a good movie we don't talk about great movie this doesn't have anything to do with a Gary Rand thing but I want to thank Ken G with a$50 super chat and Karen Lidner with another$50 super chat in addition to flip the USB twice she says long time fan since IGN days just want to say thanks for all the vids and good vibes got my first KFGD shirt and it's arriving today.

3:44:08Here's to another 2K. Hell yeah. Thank you, everybody. Gary, isn't it crazy that we went through 10 years plus of news and they didn't bring up World of Warcraft once? Unbelievable. I mean, 2004, the launch of what could be the biggest game in video game history. And that game fucking dominated my life. There was a lot of news that was missed. Typically, I tried not to add video game releases because that would have made the segment last too long. Because every year has video game releases. Will Fredo Super Chat. That was a trend, you know? Will Fredo Super Chat says Gary. World of Warcraft was and remains a big fucking deal.

3:44:40Big fucking deal. Huge deal. How long have you booted up World of Warcraft, Gary? Well, I mean, look. No, this isn't. I'm not trying to. I'm not arguing. This isn't. I had my time with World of Warcraft. During the first few years, I played from the beta. I maxed out level 39 Paladin in the beta all the way up to Cataclysm. I think it was where I stopped. Did you ever say beta? Oh, yeah. I used to say beta. I used to say root. I never said root. I never used to say beta. I never used to say router because routers only became a thing after I came to America. I've been to America in the American almost 30 years.

3:45:16So certain things I've only ever learned the American way to say. I used to say, yeah, I still say tomato. Sometimes I say tomato. I'm sorry, back to your World of Warcraft. You had your thing, you did your run. You're great. Yeah, so I was in a hardcore raiding guild. We did everything there was to do in that game. I still have some of my fondest memories ever. and every now and again, I've, I've toyed with the idea of going back, but you know, again, I've said before, nostalgia ain't what it used to be. You try to recreate something. I felt that this game made me feel a certain way. Like to me, it never works.

3:45:48It always just kind of like, ah, it's not how I remember it. Leave it alone. If you have great memories of a game from like 20 years ago, leave them crystallized in amber. You don't have to go back and poke at them. Wilfredo super chats and says, Gary, talk about modern video game story writing. Sorry, say again, Talk about modern video game story writing. Come on, you can do a better question than that. I mean, you're not going to get a rant out of me that way. No, no, no. When I say better, I mean, like, that's the biggest umbrella question. Like, what's, like, the more granular way to ask something?

3:46:20Gary, as an accomplished writer and a winner of two BAFTAs, how do you currently feel about video game story writing? I think it's in the best shape it's ever been. Thank you very much. I remember when, you know, sorry, Mario, but the princess is in another castle. That was the extent of video game storytelling. And now, you know, some of the storytelling in video games can stand alongside any other medium. It's incredible. Amazing time to be a gamer. Can I bring in one from KH Cloud who writes in and says, Gary, what are your favorite things about microtransactions and live service games? I'm sorry, say again?

3:46:53What are your favorite things about microtransactions and live service games? My favorite thing, you know what I'm going to do? I'm going to fuck you all up. I'm just going to say nice, positive, happy things about everything. The card collection of people alternate team is so lit, Gary. Skate Battle Pass tomorrow. My two most played games of the last 12 months, and arguably ever. Are they Dune Awakening and Rematch? No. Helldivers. Rematch is a distant. Helldivers 2, which I currently have more than 2 ,500 hours in. Jeez. And Dune Awakening, which I didn't think I was going to get into, but these jabronis convinced me to play it and then immediately fucked off.

3:47:31left me on but now me and Adam fucking run that server we're the Spice Barons we're like the fucking Harkonnens swimming around in all that shit and go give me more spice my Arrakis I'm that guy yeah yeah so no it's great I still I haven't played for about a week but like man I was like hard I have been and continue to be hardcore into Dune Awakening I've said this to a few people a few times now even Adam who didn't want to play it fucking loves it now I think people are sleeping on that game it's a really probably that since I've been looking to scratch the MMO itch since World of Warcraft. I can't go back to World of Warcraft because, again, that's its own thing.

3:48:04And I've tried other games. This is the first one that came along. I was like, man, I, you know, I've said it all the time. Like, for me, the really best live service games are not, or just games in general, are not a game that you play, but a place that you go. Like, when I play Mass Effect, I'm fucking in that world. If they released a Mass Effect MMO, you would never see me again. Same Zs. I love that shit. And Dune Awakening, it does such a good job of, it actually got me more into, I read the book years ago and I enjoyed the movies, but that game got me into the Dune lore and the world of Dune more than anything else that's come along.

3:48:35It's so fascinating. I could tell you all about the water conservation on Arrakis and you get into it. It's a really, really fun game. The combat loop is really fun. It's fun to build and customize your base. It's a beautiful world. The graphics are phenomenal. I kind of feel like people are sleeping on it. This game will not even be mentioned when it comes to the game of the year, but it's a really fucking good game. I think what really is going to happen is when it comes to console. Yeah, that's next year. And I think it'll get its roses then. I have 140 hours in Dune Awakening, my most played game this year.

3:49:08Yeah. But on the flip side of that, I'm like, okay, let's be honest. So 90 hours is probably just me building seven different bases where I would like always read. The building in that game is just so freaking fun. But, Gary, we need aliens to shoot at. Like, I couldn't do it. I couldn't just shoot dudes anymore. No? I need like big raid bosses. And that's not part of the Dune world. No, it's not. I mean, there's the worms, but the whole point is you can't kill them. I need something more than just a guy with two daggers. Do they ever do a raid boss where you can fight a worm or something? It would be awesome.

3:49:38I'll tell you this. It's not just me. A lot of people have said this. The only time that I've, because the cost, if it gets you, is so severe. The only time that I've played a video game in the last 10 years where I've genuinely felt fear is in that game. when you're in the middle of a desert and the fucking worm starts trembling. It's like, there's a worm in your area. You better get out of there. There have been times when you're trying to get back in the ornithopter and take off before the worm comes. And it's like, because the thing is, if the worm eats you, it's over. It's fucking, you don't get any of your shit back.

3:50:08Like there's no bag for you to go recover. It's fucking worms got it now. I've been eaten by a worm twice and it set me all the way back to the beginning. Since then, you know, once you get in the air with an ornithopter, you're fine. But like, again, sometimes you've got to land in a spice field and you're walking around trying to be really careful and you'll hear that, oh, there's a worm. And literally, the effects on it are really good when the big sandworm comes out. It's like, oh shit, that's epic and terrifying. And those are the little worms. Then you go to the deep desert and they're fucking 50 times bigger.

3:50:36I didn't know that was a bigger worm. I had no idea. You haven't seen the fucking Shai Halud yet, my friend. This thing is huge. The desert takes, the desert takes. So basically, you go out to the deep desert, right, where they have these massive spice fields. and the spice field is probably like 10 times the size of this studio in terms of like real space. When the big worm comes up, it eats the entire field in one bite. Oh my God. It's mental. Big worm. It's real. But honestly, that sense of like danger. And again, just that sense of like being in a time and place. Like I feel like I'm on Arrakis.

3:51:07I am this character. I'm doing this shit. It's really, really good. It's my, take my recommendation. You've like sold me so hard because I'm a diehard Dune fan and I had the pleasure of seeing multiple fun comps. He walked by a TV and heard Dune Awakening. Here comes Nick. Before Nick says, I think maybe some people don't realize that Funcom worked really closely with the movie's art team. To make it really cohesive. All of the aesthetic is from the legendary logo. The first time you go to Arakeen, it's like, shit, that's the Arakeen from the movie. They did a really good job with all of that stuff.

3:51:48Andrew if you want to play come to our server I'm so worried that I don't have what am I going to do me and Andrea will sorry me and Adam will boost up because we're fucking we're kings on that server so that's my question we come home at the end of the day and we swim around in spice like fucking Scrooge McDuck that's how rich we are before it launched I was super into everything I was hearing then I missed launch weekend and then all I heard was Nick be like oh man we can't help Gary it'll hold us back but if I came to your server would you be able to help me? Hold on. So first of all, Nick is the only one that actually stuck around and he's still playing with us.

3:52:22We see him in the game all the time. Everyone else fucked off immediately. Nick went and paid our taxes. He went to the city and paid the... Let me tell you what grinds my gears. He paid our taxes to the Padishah Emperor. Let me tell you what grinds my gears. You get your best friend, Gary, into a game. And then Gary gets his best friend Adam into a game. And then one week goes by, you go on vacation with your lovely wife. Spain. To Spain. enjoying life you leave they're both grinding the sand bike you come back and they are totalitarian spice barons who don't want anything to do with you anymore it's been a great now they've got we supersede you it's been a great be seen with your pedestrian it's been a great it's been a great character arc so i i didn't want to i didn't want to play by myself but i remember when i when i came in at that point nick was the only one playing and like at the beginning of the game it is a lot like rust right like it's it's a challenge just to stay alive because it's like sweltering you know you're arrakis right it's super hot there's no fucking water anywhere like you're constantly like like literally like licking like dew off of a leaf to try and like get some hydration anywhere you go you've got no transport you go into a desert if you can even buy a worm everything kills you everywhere all the time on arrakis until you start to like get a little bit of a foothold and when i was still in that like wearing the rags that you start with and everything nick's like i'll come over and help you out and he kind of didn't even know this was in the game he comes in on this fucking ornithopter and like jumps out with all this badass gear and starts like fucking grappling around like oh shit like is that what i'm gonna be able to do eventually nick was a badass but then you get to pass it on because when adam came i came in i did something well now i'm nick and i'm giving you all the free shit but adam like was resistant for the longest time he's like don't get me into his life you don't understand like what i'm like with these games they're in obsession with me that's what that's where i'm at and that's why i've been abstaining because i'm like i don't know if i can fall down the hole now he's annoying because like he's a min maxer he's like well why have you refined that it would have been more efficient to refine it this way or whatever.

3:54:12Like, you haven't done your daily chores. Like, fuck off. Walter White to Heisenberg over here. Because of that, to be fair, because of, like, Adam started after me and leapfrogged me almost immediately because he was, like, again, I play the game, but I'm playing in a very inefficient way. Whereas Adam is like, every second is like, this is the most efficient thing I can be doing in this moment. Like, he doesn't care about the nice things like the traffic. I have all the decorations and all the little ornaments and things and my house looks nice. His is just like a fucking shed, like a box with all the machines.

3:54:41It's like an Amazon box. Yeah, it's sad, right? It is sad. It's miserable. Every time I have to go there and fabricate something, it's miserable. I can't wait to get back. But, like, we now want to pay it forward to other big Khalif. We got Khalif into it. You show up. It will take you probably, I would say, maybe 100 hours in the game to get, like, fully loaded up with all the Thopter and all the Tier 5 gear. You can have that in an hour if you team up with it. Oh, my God. I'm doing it. I'm in, Gary. I'm in. All right. Good. You do it. Here's what I'll say. Yeah. Because I have, flash forward to me, right?

3:55:08I still love this game, but there's nothing much to do, and that's a big problem with the game. Once you hit the end game, it's tricky. The end game is kind of just not there, right? And it's unfortunate. Some of it has to do with the fact that they can't iterate a ton because of the IP, some of this other stuff. I have faith. I'm still hanging in there. I'm still paying everyone's taxes. But I fly in the other day, and I look. Ka's base is gone. Ka just played for like five seconds, and it is gone. Adam's base is in disrepair. It's falling apart. I was refueling it the other day because he's let it go.

3:55:36He's done. He's done. I look. No, he's coming back. Is he? Yeah, I spoke to him today. All right, so here's what I'll say for both of you. We have real estate in the Beverly Hills. It's not really the Beverly Hills. It's more like Brentwood. If you guys want to play, we can carve out a spot for you, and I can start putting those down for you guys. The end game is fun. Remember that first firefight that we were in in the deep desert? Oh, my God. So the end game. Real quick, I like this super chat from Downey Downerson. Hey, what the fuck are you guys talking about? Dune Awakening, everybody. We're talking about Dune Awakening.

3:56:06It's one of those games where you... This is always the hallmark of a great game. Afterwards, you've got fishing stories to tell about what happened. So we finally got to the point where we can go to the deep desert, which is a separate area from the rest of the game. And it's PVP, and it's very dangerous, and the worms are 10 times larger and everything. But that's where all the spice is. Nothing works without spice at the end of the game. You've got to have it. But it's really fucking dangerous to get. So you have to build a sandcrawler, basically a harvester. You build that, and you have one person driving that.

3:56:34And so I basically drive the sandcrawler because you can't fuck that up, really. And let me tell you. And then you've got Adam. If you want to hear an old bickering couple fighting over comms, watch Adam launch Gary's Spicecrawler and how Gary starts freaking out because he falls down. So there's a lot. You have to play that. You can't do the endgame yourself. You have to play with other people. So like one person's in the sandcrawler. You've got Adam in the carrier, like the carryall, above me hovering. like anytime there's like any worm sign it's his job to like grab me and pick me up or the crawler's gonna get eaten and I'm gonna lose all my shit in the crawler.

3:57:08It's PVP so at any point it's PVP so it's like we can only go now with an arm so it's like Adam you wanna go get some spice we need an escort we need a couple of like tough guys so we get like Nick and some of Adam's friends like get loaded up with the weapons. They contracted me for a very unfair rate that was a generous rate it was muscle. Yeah hide muscle they just put me out there So we fitted up his Ornithopter with some rocket pods. It's like, because you go out there and these spice fields are highly contested. So another Ornithopter show up with their carrier. It's like, oh, sorry, this space is already taken.

3:57:42But you don't know. Are these guys going to be cool or are they going to start some shit? And you've got like Nicks up there. Like you were like super fucking like, I said, no itchy trigger fingers. Like you fire the first shot and there's no going back. Stay frosty, stay frosty. Yeah, yeah. But we did not stay frosty. Yeah, this guy looked at Gary the wrong way. And Gary lit this dude up. and then the dude strategically just proved to us very quickly that he had been there before. Yeah, he was better than us. It was our first aerial battle. Destroyed all three of us. Yeah, yeah. I see Busty trying to get us back on track.

3:58:10I have two questions for my own thing. Do you guys play with controller? Yes. You can? Has anybody tried it on Steam Deck? I see it's verified. How's that going to look? It's all right on Steam Deck. It's not very performant. If I was going to play it on Steam Deck, I could probably stream it from Steam Link on whatever your main PC is. we can stop talking about it I just fucking love Nick why are more people talking about this game? it's such a good game I gotta go see a thing tonight but after that let's start I'm ready to jump back here alright perfect two blessings because you were playing for like five seconds I was playing for five seconds I could be down to come back oh hot damn it's on Nvidia GeForce now too that would be I think the nice thing playing it on controller which is it works totally well I mean it's totally primed for that console release I think they knew they had to make the console this had to work with the controller because they wanted to do these console versions.

3:58:58Yeah, it's going to be good. So fun. Yeah. You guys are welcome in our neighborhood. Dune Awakening has eaten up the entirety of what grinds Gears. That was great. Sorry. Well, again, I didn't really want to. Again, I didn't really want to go on it. I didn't want to do it. Gary? Keep it positive. We need positivity. Well, what grinds your Gears is not enough people are playing Dune Awakening. There you go. Well, yeah. I mean, there are plenty of people playing it, but the way that the servers are structured, you can only have so many people on each one. Well, look. Take a back lesson. If you've got like a little crew of like three or four people playing together, seriously, I'll give you the name of our seat and you can come join us.

3:59:34I'm in. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now it's time for kindoffunny.com slash you're wrong. Rewrite it and let us know what we got wrong as you got it wrong so we can correct it for those watching later on YouTube and listening later on podcast services around the globe. Surprisingly, we only got three things wrong in this almost four hour episode of KFGD. Husky Denim writes in and says it was the FCC, the Federal Commerce Commission, that wouldn't let Eminem be. You're wrong to claim that it was the FTC, the Federal Trade Commission. Isn't the FCC the Communications Commission? That's correct. So everybody's fucking wrong except me.

4:00:06Okay, as usual. Kebabs writes in and says the cable comes out of the bottom of the Dreamcast controller because the top is where you put the VMU. Which I don't think is technically wrong. It's just the reason why. That just kind of seems like, why have you done it this way? Why didn't you do it this way? And someone just says, well, because we did it that way. Like, it's not, it doesn't explain to me why you made a bad decision. And then Kebabs also writes and says, the PS2 could output 1080i with a few games, including Gran Turismo 2. Also worth noting that the PS3 was the first console to launch with HDMI out as standard.

4:00:35I think Xbox 360 could do 1080i? Since the 360 launched with Analog out for the first few years. And that is it. You're wrong. Greg, do you want to close out with a reader mail? Oh, man, I would like to. what I am booting Dune Awakening on NVIDIA. Oh, he's coming in! Thank you. We, of course, ask everybody to super chat in to be part of it. We used to do reader mail. Now we have a letter from a listener. Do you want me to go to the bottom to see who it is or is that a reveal? It can be a reveal. What's up, Kind of Funny Games Daily crew? Wow. Can you believe it? 2 ,000 episodes of Games Daily.

4:01:10Feels like just yesterday I was watching the first episode debuting after whatever Nick was doing on the morning show. parentheses and Andrea berating him to wrap up fun clips already it's no exaggeration to say that KFGD established my name in the community while I had met Greg and Tim at PSX 2015 meet and greet I wasn't engaged in the chat so nobody knew who I was KFGD changed all that particularly you're wrong in the year-long battle I waged with Greg to pronounce my username correctly I see I've met so many cool and amazing KFBFs over the years thanks to the show but I specifically wanted to shout out the ladies in the chat.

4:01:46Send Nuggies, Pages Inked, Violet, Mad Exposure, Daniel Z, Miss Envy, Lollifox, and more. It's always a delight seeing them in the chat, the coolest of any community. A mix of a gaming podcast and the midday news is a genius idea, and the show means so much to me as a bastion of insightful takes sprinkled with goofs and just telling it how it is. It really is an industry leader, and I'm so thankful to be part of it. I hope that episode 2000 is just the beginning. Thank you so much for what you do and keep being awesome, everyone. You know the best part about that? Very nice. Kebabs. Kebabs. You know the best part of that?

4:02:24What's that? YouTube went to an ad in the middle of it. Pay the fucking money. Is it that hard? That's right. YouTube Premium is the best subscription you'll ever buy. That's correct. 100%. I never think twice about that. If I had to give up every subscription except one, it would be YouTube Premium. I'm never giving every premium. 100%. I don't know why people complain about it. It's brilliant. Ladies and gentlemen in NMBs, that's another episode of Kind of Funny Games Daily in the books. 2 ,000 episodes. Mike, are there any super chats to get out of? What was the update? Did we ever get a final update from Raj?

4:02:54No, Roger never wrote me. Roger, I still love you. Just write me one day. But we have a lot of super chats. Roger, let us know. Is that two grand there? I think it's a different currency. Oh, no. I mean, it's a dollar sign, so I don't know what that would be. It's like MX, then a dollar sign. I think it's Mexican money. Oh, MX. Okay, all right, fair enough. So, yeah. I thought MX was like the name of the person or something. Okay. Back to you, Mike. A lot of great Super Chats congratulating all of the team on 2 ,000 episodes of Kind of Funny Games daily. So many to read. A couple of them encouraging you, like Brett, who right in says, I would love to watch you all continue to play Dune Awakening.

4:03:30So, guess what? I'll stream it. I've been thinking about streaming it because it's a fun game to stream and watch. Let's do it. Let's go hit some testing stations. Teach them. I'll text you the name of our server so you know where to roll. Please do. And I did want to say 2 ,000 pesos is$108.32. That's not nothing. Oh, wow. No, I never said it was not nothing. No, I'm saying it's good. It's an amazing donation. No, I'm just saying, even with the conversion, that's a decent amount. Yeah, it is. Thank you. Is that it for Super Chats, Mike? Are you going to unleash the beach because I could read all these?

4:04:04You said you had a whole bunch. There's over a thousand of them for sure. Maybe don't read that many. I messaged Roger to ask what the final number is. Roger! Roger, do something. I don't know why, but a few people in chat have asked me if I've seen One Battle After Another. Yes, I have. It's my favorite movie of the year. And you will very much like my Halloween costume this year. Oh! I saw it during the weekend. It's an excellent movie. Such a good movie. Here comes Roger, everybody. A round of applause for Roger Picorny over here. Roger! Where do we end up with Super Chats? We were getting close to 1 ,000.

4:04:40We were like 980-something. Well, I'm proud to announce that we are at 1 ,100. And with Gary's contributions, we are well past 1 ,100. We're at the 3 ,000 mark. You like charging me by the wood? We'll send you an invoice. Alex Hubcap with a$2. One more for the road. Nick Schloss says, love y 'all. Congratulations. Matthew Hidalgo. Duro. A dot boom. We're getting, we're in the spot where we're getting just a lot of$1 contributions. Yeah. Because people wanted that number to go up. $20 from Brent McCaleb. Talking about Dune Awakening. Sleeper hit of the year. We don't need to bring it up again. Christy Cream writes, happy 2000.

4:05:22Jesus writes in and says, Gary, remember what you roasted? Remember when you roasted me because I said Pikmin? is a top three franchise. Do you still stand by that, Gary? You know what? That's not what I even got the most shit for. Remember when I said nobody gives a shit about Killer Instinct? Me and Paris got a lot of shit for that. Ass got roasted for that one for a while. I mean, rightly so. I stand by it. Gary, which Goaty winner do you disagree with? Ask Anthony, Adam. Which what? Goaty winner. Goaty as in game of the year? Yeah. I don't know. Tell me some games of the year and I'll see if I disagree.

4:06:00Untitled Goose Game. Was that a game of the year? A dice. I mean, again, it's hard to know. I don't know what else was there, but it's absolutely a worthy winner. What a great game. I don't know if there is. I can't think of the last time I thought of a game. And I'm like, oh, that shouldn't have won game of the year. It takes two. 2023. 100%. Yeah. Of course. Brilliant. Absolutely fantastic game. I've actually been really pleased. like Bellatro, 100%, Baldur's Gate 3, like all the Astro Bot, these are all, like no one's going to have that win. I mean, these are all brilliant games. Yeah. It's very rare, you know, every now and again, like the Oscars or whatever, something will win, and people go, really?

4:06:39Seriously, that movie? Usually in games, the right game wins it, don't you think? I think there's also just an embarrassment of riches. Yeah. It's tough. These last few years have been packed. I mean, like I'd say the last 15 years even, Like it's the field of games in any given year. I mean, obviously some years have, you know, more like AAA, like obvious like nominees than others. But we've just gotten so many surprise gems, particularly in the last five years. I think I remember 2023 because that was the year I presented the golden joysticks. I remember everyone saying like, man, what a year.

4:07:14Like this is brutal for game of the year because it's just like you want to every year. Every year. There's a demo available right now called Ball X Pit. It's called Ball Pit. Great roguelite brick breaker game. It's awesome. Super, super fun so far. The demo's available now. Also, Mega Bonk. Can't not do that. I've heard about that as well. Is that the one that's like vampire survivors? Yeah, I saw Shroud playing that. Yeah. It's just straight up 3D vampire survivors. What's it called again? Mega? Mega Bonk. Mega Bonk. I'm going to check it out. One word. Great game. So, Exposition 33, right?

4:07:43That's nailed on, surely. I mean, on the list for sure. I mean, it's one of them for sure. There's Hades 2. Hades 2, I feel like, is the one people are forgetting about. Split Fiction was earlier in the year. Ghost of Yotai, right? That's going to probably be in there. Silk Song. Death Stranding. I mean, there's a bunch of games. Bonanza. Bonanza, yeah. But it'll be Expedition 30. For a lot of people, yeah. I think when you like, because there's so many Games of the Year awards, right? But once you tally up, I think Expedition 30 will have won the most of them. Other things will win other things at other awards, but I don't know.

4:08:15It just feels like, it's funny because I remember the first time they showed a trailer for it, I was on KF, going back and finding the clip, and I was kind of like, what is this? This looks fucking great. This looks like a banger. Why haven't I heard of this game? This weird French thing. And it ended up being one of the best games of the past few years. Incredible game. I played quite a bit of that Kingdom Come Deliverance 2. Oh, that's another one? I think that's in the frame as well. That's a video game. What inspired you to do that? You know, I listened to the streets. Or you walked by my desk and saw me playing, and I was like, I got to get ready.

4:08:41And then there's a Reddit thread. Bless his playing game. Oh, common bless W. He's the king. I'm like, what the fuck, guys? I was cruising the shops. I was cruising the stores. Big W to bless. I saw a little indie title called Kingdom Come Deliverance, too, and I was like, you know what? I'll give it a shot. Blueprints? That's another one. I was pandering to the audience. Blueprints? I haven't got to it because it's a puzzle game, so it's the sort of thing that I'll watch Leah play. I can't do puzzles. Blueprints are so good. But, yeah, that's going to be on the list. Here's a super chat with a massive throwback right here from Jeff the Maverick says, this one's worth a dollar.

4:09:13Oh, man. That's good. This will be worth a dollar. Bradley Schofield writes in and says, hey, I'm usually working, but I like to watch and listen. Shout out from Halifax, Canada. Hello up there. Mad Rock says, Breaking news. Mean of the Hollower delayed. Saw that. Yeah, we'll have that tomorrow on your next episode of Kind of Funny Games. What was that? Breaking news? Mean of the Hollower has been delayed. That's Yacht Club's game. The Shovel Knight directors. Supposed to come out on Halloween. They've now said it will come out when it's ready. We are not prepared to give you another date. That's a bummer.

4:09:44That's quite a bummer. Who had that on Fantasy? I mean I was already out of the running But I needed it for a good placement You know what I mean? I don't want to be the fucking seller with Roger What's left this year that we can't have a game of the year Conversation without seeing? Maybe Outer Worlds 2? Call of Duty is going to be good? Potentially When is Call of Duty ever in the frame for anything? Oh you mean, I'm sorry I forgot game of the year There's one I'm going to go to the critics To check it counterfly.com Jurassic World evolution 3 Gary. Come on. Yeah there you go. Yuka Rappley.

4:10:24Oh man. Yeah I'm scrolling through. Oh there's Metroid Prime. Metroid Prime 4. What was the big I guess Donkey Kong Bonanza. It won't be bigger than Bonanza I don't think. I think Metroid is just an inherently smaller overall audience than Donkey Kong. Wasn't Bonanza like universally loved? It should be up there right? It'll be up there. There's Dispatch. I don't think it'll be that high but like I'm looking forward to that game. Especially like because the platform category is usually kind of wide open these days right because that's not like a very busy genre. So if you release a platform game that's a total banger you might have it sealed up.

4:10:58If Bonanza doesn't make the list but Super Mario Wonder did make the list I would like fights will start. I don't see a world where Bonanza doesn't make that list. Agreed. Michael Major with a$50 super chat. Says congrats on 2 ,000 I watch every single one of them. Here's to 2 ,000 more. Thank you Michael Major. OMG writes in and says thanks for making one hour of my work day the best without kind of funny I wouldn't have so many amazing friends love you guys Leah texted me to remind me that when we used to do the Jesus puppet on Xbox 360 you know apparently I don't remember this I must have been too stoned but somebody apparently got quite offended by it and pulled a gun and pointed it at the camera like they were going to shoot Jesus oh wow understandable irrational reaction we have Regen Moss saying here's my first super chat love seeing you guys every day we love seeing you thanks for hanging out with us thank you andy give me two more and then let's get out of here we have cesar palafox says congrats folks glad andrea is here yeah thank you for your super chat and then we have one from matt bowers who says found kfgd in the summer of 2018 because of brian intahar interview i've been watching ever since memeing and laughing ever since happy 2k dudes and that is not the last one because i do have one extra one five dollars from chris roper who says hey two thousand wow happy two thousand to all of you remember ladies gentlemen and nbs we couldn't do this without your support it means the world to us that you have been here for 10 years of kind of funny let alone 2 000 episodes of kind of funny games daily of course blessing roger thank you so much for all the work you put into this amazing episode i hope did it come together the way you wanted bless oh yeah it came together honestly better than i could have even imagined yeah yeah the only thing is That 2000 segment probably should have condensed it a little bit.

4:12:44You got through it. That's on me. You know how I go on. Oh, when he originally sent the notes and I saw that, I was like, oh, man, do they think this is going to be like an eight hour show? In my mind, I was thinking like, oh, Greg will read it like quick hits. But then I forgot who I put on the panel. We're known for how quickly we move through material. Gary, Andrea, thank you for returning to the desk today. A pleasure. Thank you for having us. Always a pleasure. Don't worry about that. I miss you, Andrea. I like being next to you here. We should do this more often. You're the best. You're the best.

4:13:14Come on now. Ladies, gentlemen, and NBs, this has been Kind of Funny Games Daily, each and every weekday on a variety of platforms. We run you through the nerdy video game news you know about live on twitch.tv slash kindoffunnygames, youtube.com slash kindoffunnygames, and podcast services around the globe. If you love that and you've loved it for 2 ,000 episodes or maybe just two, we'd love you to go pick up a Kind of Funny membership. You can grab it on patreon.com slash kindoffunny, YouTube.com slash kindoffunnygames Apple, Spotify. Of course, you could get all the shows ad-free. You could get your daily dose of me, Greg Miller, in a series we call Gregway.

4:13:49And of course, you'd get good karma for supporting an 11-person business all about live talk shows in an increasingly crazy media landscape. Again, we couldn't do it without you. Thank you for everything you've given us. Thank you for all the support today, all the super chats, all the views. Maybe it's a good time to tell your friends about it. Like, subscribe, share if you don't want to give us money. Leave a review. Remember, if you have Amazon Prime, you have Twitch Prime, we'd love you to give away that free subscription. They give you each and every month, but don't remind you about and don't let auto renew.

4:14:20However, that's the end of our programming day. That's the end of episode 2000 of Kind of Funny Games Daily. But don't worry. Just like every weekday, we'll be here tomorrow with all the nerdy news you need to know about. Until next time, it's been our pleasure to serve you. Come on.