Xbox Layoffs Fallout: What It Means for Gaming

7 Jul 2025 · 1 h 21 min · 23 chapters

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In short

Spawn on Me discusses Microsoft/Xbox’s “massive layoffs” and what they signal for the gaming industry, then reviews games they missed at Summer Game Fest.

Guests

Cam (brother Cam) joins host Kahlief Adams. Cam is an Xbox-focused gamer since high school and a developer/industry professional with experience across studios and corporate roles (Adams also references his own dev background).

Key claims

  • Microsoft laid off about 9,000 people globally (around 4% of Xbox/Microsoft staff), with cuts framed as necessary for Xbox’s “enduring success,” including removing management layers and prioritizing “strongest opportunities.”
  • Cam argues the messaging doesn’t match outcomes: canceled/closed Xbox initiatives (including an engine/initiative that was playable at SGF) and cancellations like Everwild, plus Everwild and other studio cutbacks create “ill will” under the Xbox banner.
  • Adams adds context: blame shouldn’t be simplified; Xbox’s strategy (including acquisitions like ABK) and Microsoft’s shift toward AI may be reshaping priorities and staffing.
  • Discussion includes Game Pass concerns: a developer perspective that Game Pass can stunt studio revenue/sales, while others note it can subsidize smaller studios—so it’s not automatically “every game must be on Game Pass.”

Notable examples

  • Studio impacts mentioned: layoffs/closures at Raven (CoD), Turn 10 becoming support, Everwild canceled (Rare), Everwild/initiative shutdown, High Moon cuts, Blizzard/Warcraft Rumble support ending, Halo studio layoffs, and a rumored cancellation of a Romero-published Microsoft-funded project.
  • Games covered: Yuka Replayly (Yuka remake), Marvel vs. Capcom-style beat-em-up Marvel Cosmic Invasion (by Tribute Games), and Final Fantasy: Magic Universes Beyond (economy/pricing concerns).

Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.

Chapters

Tap a time to open that second in VO

Podcast Updates and Community Engagement

0:45 to 2:18

Hosts discuss updates about the podcast and community interactions.

“It's always a fun time to be able to see the numbers go up and see people really enjoying the content.”

Previewing the Episode's Topics

2:18 to 3:22

Introduction of the show's main topics, including Xbox layoffs and missed games.

“It's a very busy, very busy month, which is, you know, good and a little bit harrowing, but it's always fun to be able to get some time to hang out with you and talk video games.”

Impact of Xbox Layoffs

3:22 to 4:25

Hosts discuss the significant layoffs at Xbox and the implications for the industry.

“that there were massive, massive layoffs at Microsoft with 9 ,000 people being affected globally and some of those folks being affected in the Xbox business unit.”

Personal Reflections on Job Loss

4:25 to 7:00

Hosts share personal experiences and reflections regarding job loss and industry dynamics.

“So it is a lot of a paradox in terms of the ways things are working and all those things.”

Assigning Blame in Corporate Layoffs

7:00 to 10:08

Discussion on the complexities of assigning blame for layoffs within large corporations.

“and it's like, it's really hard to find some grace to give them regarding everything.”

Business Decisions and Xbox's Direction

10:08 to 14:00

Exploration of Microsoft's business decisions and their impact on Xbox's future trajectory.

“I think that there are some people who are evil like that.”

The Changing Landscape of Xbox Management

14:00 to 16:55

Explore how the acquisition has altered Xbox's corporate structure and focus.

“acquisition happened and that merger happened that changed the relationship from microsoft as the parent company to Xbox as the BU in those ways.”

Phil Spencer's Memo and Its Implications

16:55 to 23:01

Dissect Phil Spencer's memo addressing layoffs and what it signifies for the future.

“So I think, again, I think there's a lot of discussion points to be pointed at.”

Critique of Xbox's Strategic Decisions

23:01 to 28:00

Analyze the closures of major projects and how they reflect on Xbox's strategy.

“I just don't know, because I'm not privy to those conversations.”

The Impact of Xbox Layoffs on the Gaming Community

28:00 to 34:00

Discussion on the implications of Xbox layoffs and their effects on developers and consumers.

Show all 23 chapters

Transition to Game Discussion

34:00 to 34:20

Transitioning to discussing games played at the Summer Games Fest.

Yooka-Laylee Remake Impressions

34:20 to 37:30

Impressions of the Yooka-Laylee remake and its gameplay features.

Marvel Cosmic Invasion Gameplay Experience

37:30 to 39:20

Discussion of gameplay experience with Marvel Cosmic Invasion and its mechanics.

Final Thoughts on Tribute Games

39:20 to 42:00

Thoughts on Tribute Games' design and the variety it brings to gameplay.

Excitement for New Games

42:00 to 42:38

Discussing the variety and excitement in upcoming games like Scott Pilgrim and Final Fantasy.

Final Fantasy in Magic the Gathering

42:38 to 45:04

Exploring how Final Fantasy sets are impacting the economy of Magic: The Gathering.

Impact of Collaborative Sets on Prices

45:04 to 49:56

Analyzing the price surge of Magic cards due to collaborative sets becoming part of standard rotation.

“So, like, initially, the collector booster, which is basically, like, where you get the potential to get, like, the best stuff.”

Concerns Over Magic's Future

49:56 to 52:29

Discussing concerns about the future of Magic: The Gathering amidst rising prices and market changes.

Collecting vs. Playing

52:29 to 56:00

Debating the shift from playing Magic to focusing on collecting valuable cards and the implications.

Magic Card Culture and Its Market Dynamics

56:00 to 1:01:04

Explore the culture surrounding Magic: The Gathering cards and their market value fluctuations.

Games Reviewed from Summer Games Fest

1:01:48 to 1:10:01

A recap of games showcased at Summer Games Fest including Thickest Thieves, Phasmophobia, and Exo Born.

“Thank you, everybody, for checking out the dope stuff that Naomi and my fan, Walt over Infinite are doing.”

Current Gaming Experiences

1:10:01 to 1:17:00

Hosts discuss various video games they've been playing recently.

“Went and finally got my hands on Dune Awakening, and that was super fun.”

Podcast Promotion and Insights

1:17:01 to 1:19:29

Cam promotes his JRPG podcast and discusses its content and community.

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Transcript

Automatic transcript. May contain errors.

0:01Spawn on Me is the premier podcast spotlighting people of color. Every week we talk news, what we've been playing, and tell you who's invited to the cookout. Our show is all about talking about gaming through a prism of blackness because we are the culture. Welcome to Burkago, y 'all. Yo, what up everybody in Burkago? This is Kahlief Adams and this is the Spawn on Me podcast with Kahlief Adams. I hope you're doing well, having a wonderful week. I hope you are having a fantastic beginning and kind of middle of our summer here in the States and getting it all in and rocking and doing all the goodness that you and your family should be doing during these wonderful, wonderful parts of the season.

0:44Massive shout out to everybody who has been checking out the work on all podcast platforms, on YouTube, on all the places where we reside and do content. It's always a fun time to be able to see the numbers go up and see people really enjoying the content. So please, if you have not checked out the show and subscribe, go check out the show on Spotify, on Apple Podcasts, all other podcast platforms. TikTok, tiktok.com slash spawn on me, youtube.com slash spawn on me and twitch.tv slash spawn on me, where we do our show usually live around 6 p.m. on Thursday evenings during the week. If you missed the last episode that we just put out, we had a fantastic interview with Rick Thire, who is the general manager of EVO, because I'm going to be going to EVO in the beginning of August for their amazing show.

1:32Check out the best in the fighting game world up in personal, up close in personal. And word, it was a really dope show, really dope conversation with him talking about the kind of evolution of EVO and how that show is growing. Also, really quickly, big shout out to our friends over at games for change for having me uh back home in new york to get a chance to host the games for change awards man i had so much fun uh doing that there was so many brilliant people so many fantastic folks in that conversation and in those in that big meeting again it's one of those things where social gaming for good and good and social impact is always a thing that we uh are aligned with so it's always great to be able to see dope people over there making it happen as well so it was always cool to be able to see that and be a part of it this week we have a pretty quick and dirty show i think there's really two big topics uh of the conversation of i'm sorry of the industry right now uh we are going to be talking a little bit about some of the games we missed from summer games fest because we did miss a couple that we didn't get a chance to cover uh i know we played and we did a chance to talk about so cam is going to be on here in a second talking about that with me and also the biggest conversation and discussion point around everything in the industry right now has been the massive layoffs at xbox and microsoft that happened this week so we're gonna pull in brother cam to come through talk about all of this madness on this episode of spawn on me cam how are you doing fam how's things i'm doing all right uh i'm hanging in there um how are things with you holding up uh you know i'm trying to make it happen trying to figure it out trying to trying to get things done and see how it's all working.

3:10It's a very busy, very busy month, which is, you know, good and a little bit harrowing, but it's always fun to be able to get some time to hang out with you and talk video games. So this week, we got the information and the news that there were massive, massive layoffs at Microsoft with 9 ,000 people being affected globally and some of those folks being affected in the Xbox business unit. you know 4 % of their I'm sorry of their worldwide staff which is I think over 200 ,000 people globally in terms of Microsoft with 9 ,000 people finding out that they lost their job this past week has been a topic of discussion for many reasons I think we as folks on Spawn on Me who are you know I think of our show as a very dev-centric show you know really want to give massive love to everyone who is affected It is a not easy thing to know that, you know, all the hard work that you've been putting in is kind of gone for naught.

4:12And that now you're going to be in the space where you have to go look for new work in a market that is not great, in a market that is not looking to get better, in an industry that is making a ton of money, but also laying off a ton of people. So it is a lot of a paradox in terms of the ways things are working and all those things. How are you feeling about the news cam that came down earlier this week? It's tough. It's complicated. I think that, you know, I've been primarily an Xbox gamer since high school, you know, and I'm now in my early 30s. And I think that there was a lot of promise, not promises and promising, but it's a lot of there's a lot of optimism in the direction that Xbox was heading over the past five to seven years.

5:20um and i just feel like that there's you know i i don't want to i don't want to put everything on on phil of course but phil is the head of xbox and when like there are certain things saying like hey we're going this direction and it you know phil talks about like how he's having these discussions with like the higher-ups at Microsoft and then things like this happen and it just those those ideas that they have don't really come to fruition it just kind of um I think it's a tough pill to swallow to um not be upset not just as a consumer but just as a human being seeing people lose so many jobs and um whether people like think it's 100 fair uh to direct that uh frustration and anger at phil it's it's one of those things where it it's hard right it's hard to to to find the right headspace to be like okay like where is where is the direct problem and How do we fix it moving forward?

6:51Like, how do we make it so it doesn't happen again? Because, I mean, this isn't just Microsoft, right? This is an industry issue. But when Microsoft is one of the biggest companies in the world, and Xbox is under that company, and it's like, it's really hard to find some grace to give them regarding everything. uh so yeah it's it's very complicated uh for me but um it's really uh upsetting seeing so many people lose their jobs um especially in just like the state of the world uh especially in the united states is um yeah that's kind of where i'm at with it yeah and i and i echo a lot of your sentiments i think the one of the things that i and we try to do on this show is is have a really honest and nuanced conversation about what we see and you know i think the the thing that i am struggling with and and and grappling with is i think the first thing that we like to do in the in the space is to assign blame to people and for, for things that we see happening.

8:11And I think, I think that's a very human thing that people do, right? Like I think I, as a person who is not in a position to oversee that big amount of people who are doing vast amount of jobs across multiple parts of the world and have, and being that person who is the head of that department underneath a much larger, you know, organization. I know a lot of people give Phil the like, well, you're the person in charge, so it is absolutely your fault. And I'm sure that at the end of the day, he has to sign off on on these things happening. Right. Like, I don't think that that is a thing that is not a part of those kinds of jobs.

9:02Like I've been a person who has worked everything from camp counselor to retail to working in a union for almost a decade to working in corporate spaces like Amazon and Intel and having worked at studios like Firewalk and Riot. Right. I've seen a large gamut of the ways people work in the ways that management deals with its workers and the pressures that come from up high that have to get delineated out to the workforce, both negative and positive. I've had a job where I've worked, where the CEO came in one day, sat us all down in the middle of our lunchroom and looked each one of us in the face and said, this whole office is gone tomorrow.

9:58I've been at that spot. I've been at a place where I've worked a job and have been feeling like I'm doing well in my position and then found out that I was being laid off a month later. like there are there are aspects of all of this stuff that me as a human being when i see all of these conversations come down from the internet i understand the frustration and i also understand all of the layers from a worker perspective and then some of the things that i've seen from folks who have to do that kind of work i don't personally believe that the folks who are in those layers at the C-suite position, the management position, the executive position are actively looking at people and being like, you have to go because I don't like you and I don't think your work is good and X, Y, and Z.

10:52I agree with that. I think that there are some people who are evil like that. I think Elon Musk is that person, right? I think Elon Musk is that evil. I think he is an evil human being who is doing work like that. I don't assign that to the people who I've met in those spaces. And that's not because of personal relationships and health and, and, and, and, um, getting a chance to meet and hang out with those folks and all that stuff. Cause I, again, like I know that if I was a brand risk in some form or fashion, those folks would distance themselves from me because that's a part of your job. Like you have to make sure the business is good first.

11:27Right. on the other hand we're having this discussion in not a bubble but we're having it in this really interesting space that a lot of times removes context from what we see i'm gonna read phil's statement in a minute because i think there's a part of that that leans into this discussion and from a xbox perspective i think the biggest problematic things or not even problematic things the biggest things that people are coming up with have been of course the acquisition of abk and how much money that cost because that was a very expensive deal to get done the the people who are doing the armchair quarterbacking who are saying well this is the reason why all of these things are happening like yes we all knew going into this merger folks like myself were really excited for it i think a lot of other folks were really excited because it meant that some consolidation was going to help me as a player be a person who's looking at this ecosystem as a kind of more whole ecosystem it's less fractured in those ways right but we also seem to have forgotten that from a business perspective even though microsoft was making a crap ton of money already the idea for the xbox division was that the xbox division was not making as much money as they had hoped it would and from the conversations that we saw during the FTC trial that happened last year, you know, the year before, a thing that Phil Spencer had actively said was like, look, we are, from a positioning perspective, we are in last place.

13:00We are out of the big three, Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft. We are the last of that group. From a business perspective, you are trying to do any and everything you can to get out of third place. Hence the acquisition of new studios, hence the acquisition of ABK, hence the acquisition acquisition of a lot of the different ip not ips and stuff that they've been kind of trying to trying to cultivate so from that perspective that still makes sense to me the thing where the rubber hits the road is that when that winds up coming down the road these things wind up happening and that sucks for everybody involved because if you think about what happened with with microsoft ever since that acquisition they've had some really dope announcements that they've had to walk back they've had moments where messaging hasn't resonated with fans they've also had things that have happened where other studios have been closed they've had a fair amount of layoffs all of those parts are happening the thing that is most interesting to me is it seems like there was a substantial change once that ftc acquisition happened and that merger happened that changed the relationship from microsoft as the parent company to Xbox as the BU in those ways.

14:16Like there were things that were being said from Xbox management that I feel like they were moving towards a direction that they were looking to go in. And something changed in that relationship between Microsoft and Xbox in that relationship of, we were thinking about money. We're thinking about acquiring more studios. We're thinking about growing the overall brand that is a multi-billion dollar company already. So you're going to have this mix and match between what happens and the expected result with also the collateral damage that winds up happening when you wind up losing human beings and their jobs and all of those things that occur when these things happen.

14:58I want people to, at least, if you're going to do the armchair quarterbacking thing, at least pull those parts into the equation in terms of context. because I think that they're important. I do want to read the Microsoft, the Phil Spencer blurb that he shared to folks on the team in a memo that he sent to staff addressing the cuts, claiming the job losses. Huh? Please do. Yes, so I'm reading this from the GameSpot article that is discussing the issues, and it says, uh Microsoft CEO Microsoft gaming CEO Phil Spencer sent a memo to staff today addressing the cuts claiming the job losses were necessary to allow for the enduring success of Xbox we will end or decrease work in certain areas of the business and follow Microsoft's lead in removing layers of management to increase agility and effectiveness he said Spencer also addressed the fact that the cutbacks are coming at a time when business is booming for Xbox I recognize that these changes come at a time when we have more players, games, and gaming hours than ever before.

16:06Our platform, hardware, and our game roadmap have never looked stronger, he said. The success of Xbox today is the result of tough decisions Microsoft made previously, Spencer said. We must make choices now for continued success in the future years and a key part of that strategy is the discipline to prioritize the strongest opportunities, he added, and we will protect what is thriving and concentrate effort on areas with the greatest potential while delivering on the expectations the company has for our business. I think that is a very important part that he just shared in that. This focused approach means we can deliver exceptional games and experiences for our players for generations to come.

16:44They add a blurb at the end that says, Microsoft's price slid slightly after the layoff news was announced, but the price has been trending upward in the past five years and currently stands at a near record high. Microsoft is currently the number two most valuable company on the planet, only behind NVIDIA. So I think, again, I think there's a lot of discussion points to be pointed at. We can't discount the transition that Microsoft has had in a really direct way towards AI. We've seen, I mean, me, even as a person, I'm sure you can attest to this too, Cam, as a person who's been on the job market recently, that a lot of positions in our field are now adding that layer of, hey, maybe you should learn AI.

17:37Hey, people who are learning AI are kind of more desirable in these positions. Like these are things that we're seeing across a layer as well, where we're seeing, you know, the Seattle Times having an article talking about Microsoft's move to a more AI, um, laden workforce in some spaces and how that is also removing layers of what they think is redundancy and, and folks, especially at the management and middle management layers have been losing their jobs as well. Um, any, any other parts of the discussion that you think are really important cam that you want to add any other layers of it that you think I'm missing, um, from a just like opinion perspective yeah from my from my opinion um a lot uh not a lot but i would say like enough of uh phil's statement i just don't really i don't really vibe with i think that there's this idea that like oh like these were necessary and like necessary in the sense of like oh we got the like we are prioritizing the things with like the best potential and things like that and i just feel like that they were put like specifically i want to talk about like the closure of the initiative like they were pushing that for so long and last year people got to play it for the first time in engine we learned um recently um and now and and now that's just gone and you know i i do i would be lying if i didn't think that there were i thought that there were issues like with the initiative uh you know for a while you know but the i just like the fact that that whole project is gone now that was like one of the really that was like one of the first really big things that phil was pushing and it's now shut down um that's really upsetting and we and then we also see like ever wild being canceled um which is a brand new ip from rare and like rare is an incredibly talented studio and just just for me i don't want them to just be the sea of thieves team anymore right um like for those that like sea of thieves i'm super happy for you i feel like um and i'm and i'm not saying it's like a waste of their talents either because sea of thieves is is an impressive game in its own right but that's just not what i want from rare yeah um and so i think that what i guess like my main thing is uh at this point is just it just kind of feels and then also like there's turn 10 right who has like consistently yeah been dishing out high quality games like yeah if you're not a forza motorsport guy then like that might not mean anything to you but the idea that they're basically a so a support studio or a studio that's like supposed to focus primarily on forza the forza horizon series now and then like assuming playground is going to start doing more things like fable and and the like moving forward it just doesn't sit right with me it just doesn't make it just doesn't make sense to me um even even if there like needs to you know if there is layoffs and stuff I just um I I you know I I agree that um I agree that like at the end of the day I don't you know these are people above Phil that are making these decisions and he's signing off but he's like he's kind of become Microsoft's punching bag in a sense where it's like and he might know that and he might know like hey this is the job and I get that but it's just also just like I know that he has a a drive to like get certain accomplishments done and the people above him are stopping that from happening and I feel like even though Phil has been like uh he's very you know very kind dude in person um you know uh i just and i think that he's he said especially earlier on he was saying a lot of things that people wanted to hear and like i do think he uh sees um a lot of those things you know he's he's he's just he's saying that because that's what he thinks um not just because like oh i'm the head of xbox and i'm trying to make these talking points um but now it just feels like that there's been so much ill will under the xbox banner from things like this that have nothing particularly to do with him right outside of just being the head of the x head of xbox and then by the time that he leaves that is what his like legacy is going to be and maybe he doesn't care about legacy and that's and that's fine if he doesn't but like when people talk about like phil spencer in the sense of like how it like the phil spencer era of xbox it's gonna be like yeah they introduced game pass and that was like really cool but then there's here's this whole other pile of really complicated things that are more negative leaning than positive that you know and that that is the thing that um comes to my mind and it again as a consumer and uh just as someone who has you know met phil and have you know they've been gracious enough to uh invite me to xbox themed events like i you know i think they want i think they want success but i think the people ahead of them are just kind of like pulling the rug under them and phil is in a position where he just kind of has to uh he has to be the mouthpiece of things that he probably does not agree with um right now and it's just like that sucks yeah like i i think as a person who is seen and worked on corporate comms at other jobs like someone has to take the bullet right like again like again i don't know what it's like to work under phil spencer in those ways again the times that i've had a chance to talk to him and and and really have like heart to hearts about like industry and you know and and and personal shit that has happened in my life and he's been a very kind person who's reached out directly to me and and gave me words of encouragement which i hold very deeply and and appreciate like like i know what it's like to be in a position where you have to be the bad guy and it's not fun it's not great it doesn't feel good i don't think that he's a person who is like money hatting twirling his mustache in a room and being like how many people's lives can i ruin today like i don't think that that's a thing that he or matt booty or even you know uh uh sarah sarah bond are thinking at the c-suite level right like those are all people who get affected who work underneath them were in those spaces.

25:05And I do wonder what that relationship has changed and looked like now, now that Satya and Amy Hood have gotten more of a direct kind of influence on the BU in this way, that it just makes me wonder what that looks like in some of those conversations. I just don't know, because I'm not privy to those conversations. And I think the people who I do know who work inside Xbox, who are working closest to that part of the business are also like, yo, what is happening? A little bit, you know? I do feel like there's a little bit of the rug getting pulled, and I think there is a part of the discussion where Xbox continues to have fairly good information again.

25:51You saw all the good info that came out around the games that were there at SGF, and although they've come out with a statement saying, like none of these games for the, we kind of saw at the showcase are going to get touched. We see layoffs at Raven, who was on the call of duty side, which is talked about turn 10, which is now a support studio, which again is wild. Cause they've had one of the most successful franchises on the planet for Xbox again, rare and ever while getting canceled. They had a new MMO that got canceled from elder scrolls and, and Zenimax perfect. Dark and initiative is no longer going to be a game.

26:26High moon had some layoffs as well, uh who also worked on stuff sledgehammer had some some cuts blizzard and warcraft rumble uh will not continue in some form of it like there's some support that will not continue uh that's going over there and supposedly almost maybe as from reporting uh aftermath reports that maybe a hundred people were affected there halo studios had some like people get left off One of the wildest stories about this was the Romero's, John and Brenda Romero's game that was being funded and published by, that is believed to be a Microsoft game, was and now canceled. Which is nuts because John and Brenda Romero are legends of the video game industry.

27:19And if they can't get a game to stick, what does that mean for anyone else in this space? And we've also now seen a discussion around, you know, from a developer, I think, who was it from someone from Arkane came out, one of the developers from Arkane came out and talked about now the idea that Game Pass is problematic for studios to get involved with because it kind of stunts potential revenue and potential sales because you're getting it basically for free in that space. again i have not ever written i've not written a deal i've never written a contract that had any of those things i've never been a video game contract ever i think the it's a good and interesting perspective to have now people discussing what that means i think consumers kind of care and kind of don't i do wonder i would love to hear more of a consensus from developers and people who have been in the space because i think like with everything there is a negative and a positive potential effect for any of that stuff.

28:22If you're an indie and you're just starting to get your feet wet in the gaming space and Microsoft is like, yo, we will subsidize your game, give you basically upfront money to put your game on game pass that will either build, sustain or grow what is potentially your next project, right? If you are a much larger company, maybe that's not a thing that makes a lot of sense for you because you already have either and install base that you know you can lean into you have other games in your repertoire and in your catalog that people know and you have name recognition and you can find other sources of potential revenue or potential sponsorship in those spaces to be able to kind of get your game off the ground in a good space i don't the thing that that is in a weird layer of the discussion from the community that I continue to see around this specific point is everyone makes it sound like you must be in game pass like that's not the that's not the way that works like it is a it is a business decision you are weighing the options when it comes to should we put our game in game pass or should we not there are boons and there are detriments to all of it but this idea that like like every game must be in game pass in that every developer is like i i must be in game pass that's not true and i think that's the thing that from the community gets misconstrued all the time and i feel like people need to readjust the discussions about that because they're getting that part wrong a lot like again we're doing this thing where we're blaming people about a bunch of stuff immediately without actually talking about the way the minutiae works.

30:05And I think that is going to be a problematic thing, not only for what we wind up seeing in the discussion around Xbox and moving forward, because like, look, I'm still excited for gigs for, for, for games that are in that space. I'm conflicted. I worry that some of the games that I'm excited for may not necessarily get to the finish line. I'm worried, not worried about like stuff like the the hardware like i think the xbox rally uh xbox i'm sorry the rock xbox alley x is going to be a fine piece of hardware i'm really excited for that like i'm still excited to to test that thing out and review it when that time comes like i'm not going to be like i'm now done with xbox i'm not going to pull a tim dog and do that kind of thing that's silly but i do think it does leave a lot of confusion it leaves a lot of worry for folks who are in that space the the the team xbox is dead is is revived again in this new form of fashion which again i think is silly and then it takes away from great um announcements like hell divers is coming to xbox right like hell divers 2 is coming to xbox that has sparked a new debate within the space about like uh exclusivity and who gets what and all that kind of stuff and the the the kind of merging and pulling down of the walls that we've seen but like that was that would that would have been a great uh announcement to just to just have out there in the world and now that gets clouded because of all the layoffs and all the other stuff and it feels a little bit like uh you know we got to throw this out there to kind of calm the waters a little bit because that'll be a thing that gives us some good space to be able to talk about i don't think that's the full way it was going i'm hoping that that was planned in in advance and that was the thing and it wasn't just like a pivot that we need to pivot to kind of take the heat down a little bit but if you're a consumer and player like that looks suspect we in a weird way right so um i don't i'm just having a hard time man like i'm again i want to focus on people people are the people who i care about the games will come out if they come out the company the corporations are going to do what corporations do we don't have to like it but we have to not we have to um we have to figure out ways to work within the system of what we have.

32:24I don't like that system. I don't want that system to continue to remove livelihoods from people and people being able to do that stuff. But I think the ways that the conversation continues to get talked about also isn't great because it's not pulling in facts yet because it's still a little bit too fresh. And two, everyone's want to run to point blame at stuff also doesn't usually pull the full context into scope. And I feel like that is a problematic thing that I feel like we have to figure out and fix if we're going to make that stuff happen in a real way. So this is, again, this is a story that is continuing to evolve.

33:06I think we're still trying to figure out what was going to happen here and figure out what that means for everybody else that's moving. But, you know, again, that massive love to everybody who lost their job, folks who are now looking at the calendar now and being like, is my job safe, which is never great. And to I hope the Xbox brass is finding better ways to message that stuff out, because I've also heard that like people found out day of like they lose that they were about to lose their jobs, like signing in the slack and then being locked out. like that's the worst way you can do stuff like that like we have to humanize this industry and continue to understand that humans are the people who drive this and if you're doing things like this that makes it much harder to support it it makes it much harder to to feel enthusiastic about the industry uh one that i know both of us want to continue to work in and do dope shit in so word um let's get to what we've been playing and talk about some of the games we missed at summer games fest

34:22so we missed a couple of games at summer games fest this this this uh past couple of weeks uh that's been what a month away uh that the games were out we got a chance to check out some stuff uh so i want to run down some of the things that we we missed uh you want to go first cam with some of the dopeness that you you got a chance to check out that we didn't get a chance to talk about yeah um so the one thing that i wanted to talk about is uh yuka replayly um this is a remake of the original uh yuka and lately uh game uh this was like for those that don't know the history of this game this is like one of the first big kickstarter games um this was a game that like wanted to be uh took direct inspiration from banjo kazooie and you know eventually as the game came out there it came to like relatively uh mixed reception i if i remember correctly there was some like bts stuff that was also like you know um a problem as well but uh they they're completely remaking it um and it's uh i've got to play like you know probably about 15 minutes of it at sgf um and I had a really good time with it um I think that I don't know exactly the amount of like new additions um or uh changes that they made but I really enjoyed my time with this game um it has it feels like it has a lot of variety of contents a lot of different unique puzzles um there at one point I got there's like this giant arcade cabinet that you find and you go in there and you play um a spit like a you know a game there but um it has a lot of it had a lot of variety that i noticed from the short amount of time that i played from it and i never played the original so this because of like kind of the the talk that it had um but i have wanted to play this game for a while and when i found out i was being remade i was like okay i'll just wait for for this to uh come out and give it a shot there but i really enjoyed my time with it and um i i can't wait to play the thing um i don't think there is a uh release date yet um but they did really uh and for those that you know uh want to try something similar in the meantime uh there is a they made a second game yuka uh yuka leila uh and the impossible layer it's more of a 2d side scrolling platformer but um when it came out people were really high on it people were saying like this was that it was really really good um but yeah no release date for yuko replayly uh outside of 2025 nice i i remember playing the first game and being like oh this is pretty cool i like this this is kind of dope like i'm not usually into those kinds of games anymore but getting a chance to play that i was like oh i see where i see how and why people are digging this and happy to see that they're kind of remaking and going back into that space and doing other stuff there um i know we got to both we both got a chance to play marvel uh cosmic invasion uh at summer games fest and i know we had i know i had a fun time with that thing that thing was super super good talk to me about your time with with marvel uh cosmic invasion yeah so this is being developed by tribute games uh this is a tribute is arguably the king of the beat-em-up genre um in in modern day um they did shredder's revenge they did uh scott pilgrim versus the world which they did announce that they're doing a follow-up to at sgf um which is super exciting um i think my one notable criticism that i have with tributes beat them ups up to um this point was that i felt like that there was just a certain level of rigidness when it came to just moving your characters controlling your characters just like the general like minute to minute movement feel and i think that this game is the first one that that like i don't know if it's completely um light like you know remove the load completely but it has lightened that load um it feels the movement feels a lot smoother to me uh feels like that there's more versatility um and it's been really it was really fun to play there's a bunch of different characters to play as there's team uh team up attacks um i really enjoyed my time with it uh yeah i only got i only got to play about 25 uh minutes of it but it's really really fun and i think it's if you love tribute it they're doing the tribute thing again um and and it's as polished as ever uh i can't wait to play more yeah i had a blast playing i got sat down with with um another gaming uh another gaming industry person um and i think one of the things that keeps coming back for me is like games like this just feel really good to get back to that very old school feel and i think tribute and die mu like they are again like you said like the the masters of these genres i've always been a big fan of their work they really do pay attention to the ips that they're working with in a really smart and and in kind of comprehensive way like they they get all the details right in a lot of that stuff and i think the team ups in this game and kind of the tag system that they have is really fun so you're basically picking two characters when you're playing and you're basically saying well i'm going to switch between these two during certain parts of the battle and you basically get like a tag team move and then you get your special moves and those things just feel really good like as a person who grew up on the the old school xbox not xbox old school x-men cabinet the four player uh one that everyone kind of knows and loves like this is the closest that it's felt to that in a very long time um and i'm just excited to see them continue to grow a thing like this the one thing i always worry about games like this is like will it garner enough of an audience to get the the space to do more and when you're playing it it feels like it's a as a game that you can play in kind of short bursts or long bursts like you're either doing it a quick couple of missions or you're like i'm gonna bum rush through the entire thing see what score i can get and kind of get you know if there's a leaderboard you know get your name on a leaderboard for stuff like that it's super fun like i think i think it's a super easy to pick up and play a lot of fun to be able to dig into and see your favorite characters represented um and you know i love what they did with venom venom in that game is is really really fun to play with so it's always cool to be able to see stuff like that as long as well as i didn't see uh venom them i played as cap i played as wolverine i don't remember after that but yeah i don't think there uh i don't want to correct myself i don't think there are team of attacks i think i got mixed up with like you get to choose two characters to swap in and out of but yeah i i agree with you um this game is fantastic and there's also just like more variety because these are superheroes right like i feel like with um tmt and like scott pilgrim there's only there's a limit there as to like how flashy um it can be uh scott pilgrim could be flashy if they wanted to just like get nuts with it admittedly but um yeah i i think that there's just so much variety in what you can do in that game versus uh tributes previous games that i um i think people are going to be really excited yeah excited to see more of it excited to get hands-on with it hopefully we get a chance to review it and team up and play uh so we can do a team up review for it which would be a lot of fun um you also got some time in with more final fantasy as well right yeah so i got to check out the marvel of the magic final fantasy uh set which has been out for about a little under a month now um and i just want to give that the team the design team their flowers uh because they really really nailed uh the the flavor that those cards bring um and like the stories that those cards tell based off of those characters or like the mechanics of certain games that final fantasy uh introduces um however i think it also has shown past these past few weeks that there is a there is a problem um with how not specifically final fantasy but universes beyond and these collaborative um sets may and currently are affecting the the kind of the economy of magic yeah um so like just to put into context because i know you you're just now getting into the game i'm a baby magic player yeah so previously all universe's beyond sets were just new sets that were not a part of like the standard rotation of sets like that are played in stand like the the the most like competitive basic uh version of magic and so uh you know there was assassin's creed which we talked about before in the uh pass on the pod because i did that at sgf a couple a year ago uh um there's there's doctor who there was fallout and most notably there was lord of the rings um you know and there were definitely some you know some decently expensive cards but nothing like out of nothing crazy um and the reason is because it wasn't a part of the standard set you know set rotation uh last year they announced that final fantasy was going to be the first set that was going to and moving forward that uh of universes beyond that's going to be a part of the set rotation um and so what that did is like and make from a from a business standpoint it makes so much sense like i'm not i'm not gonna pretend that it doesn't make sense from a business standpoint but what it has done is that it's made these cards so ridiculously expensive because it's more than just like collectors or people playing different formats collecting these cards it is people that are playing standard and in standard you get you can have like three or four copies of the same card that are just like buying up all of these cards and so these cards are just so expensive especially when it comes to like the higher rarity like surge foil like top of the you know top of the food chain foil cards where like um They're just hundreds of dollars.

46:01That's crazy. It's wild. So, like, initially, the collector booster, which is basically, like, where you get the potential to get, like, the best stuff. Like, the best in the sense of, like, you know, shiny stuff. That one pack of those was MSRP,$38. And that was a whole issue. And that's expensive. That's expensive for a collector booster. Okay. Okay. and now uh and but previously there was this whole mishap in magic where magic stopped giving out msrp for their products which allowed local game stores to just price it at whatever they wanted like you know and i mean they could do that anyway but like people because there's an msrp there are people that like aren't trying to be money hungry that can just be like hey here's the msrp price that's how i got my stuff you know what i mean i was like msrp cool good i'm not spending like an absurd amount of money for um for what i should be able to get for this price uh with magic you know almost everywhere that logic is just not it doesn't exist like these the people are selling these collector boosters right now like one collector booster pack for like over a hundred dollars damn so like three times the price and some of these cards that you can pull which are just like nicer treatment versions of other cards like the highest one i think right now it's like over eight hundred dollars for a single card it's it's absurd it's absurd and it's just one of those things where it just i know pretty it doesn't yeah it just it just looks really pretty it just looks really pretty man and it's just one of those things where i i can understand from again from a business side why magic would do this but i also think that this sets a dangerous precedent um where and i know that final fantasy is a big ip you know don't get me wrong like if any you know before lord outside of lord of the rings which also you know was at that time it was magic's best-selling set ever and final fantasy broke that record before the set even came out that's crazy yeah so there there's a lot to put into perspective there but like it's just one of those things where i'm worried about the future sets because like uh later this year we're getting a spider-man set and i'm wondering what that's going to look like because spider-man is arguably the most popular superhero um and then after that there's an avatar the last airbender set it's just like and i'm super excited i love avatar um what is that going to look like and so that that is i am i am worried that they they saw so much potential in the collaboration space you know a lot of people are starting to call magic the fortnight of trading card games um which is a fair comparison in my opinion um and i'm worried that things are just going to continue to get more and more expensive because of things like this and putting these universes beyond collaborative sets into standard the standard format um um because like yeah you might you know i think more people bought products more so this time around because it was final fantasy specifically sure but like i'm more worried about the the the the singles market where you're going to like card kingdom to specifically buy singles of a card um and it's like way more expensive than it probably should be because its universe is beyond in a state in the standard format and it's you know it's getting like that kind of uh tax price rise up just because it exists in that space of the game because i play commander and commander's like and that's what like you're you're gonna get into uh you know if you ever talk to me and you're like hey like this is the way to play magic in my opinion um and and in commander it's a hundred it's a hundred card deck so it's bigger than standard deck but you can only have one copy of any card unless it states otherwise which that is a very rare thing and so i just think that um i just don't want it to be i'm just worried about the health of like the economy i think like for people that are selling these cards they're having a great time yeah but for the people that are playing the game that love this game i it sucks i'm i'm i'm worried to see i like i'm worried about the future and i hope that this is an anomaly i think i hope that it's just because it's final fantasy uh that it's because it's final fantasy and then like spider-man might be big as well and then avatar like an avatar you know is a phenomenal show that people love i don't think the ip is as big in namesake compared to final fantasy and uh uh spider-man so i think that once we get a you know a year's in a year's time i think that will be a good kind of check-in to be like okay are my worries founded or they were they just worries um but there's other things that i'm super excited about like in you know the magic space like there's a sonic secret layer dropping a week from tomorrow uh so like the 15th the 14th of july um very excited about that as i am a sonic guy uh there's still cool things happening in the magic space but there is like this over overlying like rain cloud that that that is existing you're just kind of waiting to see if if the storm is going to actually come or not it's one of those things that because i have a couple friends of mine who have been like hey ka like i'm i'm working a side hustle basically selling magic cards and selling baseball cards and all this other stuff and i'm like like because i personally have just never had that like understanding of collectibles like that and collectible cards and and things like that like it's not a thing that does a lot for me personally and like unless i was doing it for money um it's it's just really interesting to see how that is not i'm not going to use the word corrupted but it's like it is a thing that is feeling like from people that i know become more important than actually playing the game which is kind of sucky like that's we talk about capitalism all the time ruining things and i'm like is that is that also a thing that is like being ruined because of you know capitalism and people wanting to make money off of stuff like that's wild to hear 800 cards that's nuts but i know people who spend crazy amount of money on pokemon cards i i don't get it but i i understand that there's a market for it that's where yeah like like just for an example uh just because i know what i'm talking about here uh i want to make a tifa commander deck there's technically two tifas but the one i want to make is uh i'm talking about the one i want to make specifically um that is a i think a rare oh so there's like common uncommon rare mythic uh so there's uh she's normally a rare that you can just pull from any pack okay if i want to get the nicest treatment of her card which you know when she when you have a commander normally you want the nicest treatment because you want it to be like oh this is my commander uh two hundred dollars minimum so so wait for a single card so so let me because i'm confused well i'm learning so are these treatments just different art for these cards or is it like the same art with like hologram foil stuff around it is it like is it actually different in a way like if i'm playing against you and you pull that car out that's the sexiest version of the card and you have the bottom and you have the bottom version it's going to look completely different it looks completely different but does it do anything in game specifically that's different so it's it's a clout it's a clout move it's like yo i got this sexy car as opposed to yeah it is it is for you and it is for you to show off to your to your friends and who you're playing against okay yeah um but but yeah so like for tifa for example there is the base art which is uh you know there's the base art and then after that if there is a non-foil borderless version so the art is completely different it's kind of the arts that you see where it's like the character in the front and then the number on the back sure in the background yeah so that's like oh it's tifa she has a green background and then there's the letter seven on the back then there's a borderless foil version which is just the same card but it's foil it's like traditional foil but then there's the surge foil and the surge foil is like way prettier it's like way prettier and then and that currently is sitting at like 200 while like the normal foil is sitting at like 50.

55:44so so like also would you like as a person who's playing i'm sorry and everybody at home we just got no no no no please but like is so is that a thing that you would actually take with you like i know everybody sleeves their cards and stuff for the most part right but like is that a thing that you would be like i'm not taking that because it's worth 200 or i'm gonna take it out to flex on somebody be like i just spent 200 on the thing and i'm i'm having in my car like is that a thing where people are like going to matches with sexy decks and being like not afraid for their life like because i'm like that seems like somebody would just roll up on you take all your shit i mean it's not gonna happen at a at a at a match yeah like i'm worried now that like you're holding contraband because you know like expensive ass cards and you just like i mean i would say in general if you're going to a place where you know that there's going to be a bunch of like magic cards and like people playing the game i would make sure to like have your bag on your person at all times for sure like there's definitely going to be people that aren't going to be afraid to try and like uh nab your shit if they can get away with it yeah uh but in that instance like yeah people would people would take it because there's also people that like would take that stuff specifically to trade right people are trying to like oh i'm looking for these cards and like i don't really need this like what what can we do with that so um yeah it really it's really dependent on like what you're really playing magic for like uh i i don't i don't play magic to collect um or like you know buy magic cards to collect i buy them specifically to play i do like in a perfect world i would love like all of those the surge art the surge foil art treatments like at some point down the line in the future but again like some of them are so expensive because like for example um the the final the final fantasy set also came with four commander decks like pre-built commander decks and there are those surge foil borderless art treatments of each of the commanders but you can only pull them in the collector booster oh and so there's soup so those are like the most like arguably the most expensive ones because you can only get them one way um and they're considered mythics so they're also a rare pull uh on top of that which is why like you know again uh the most expensive one which is like the ishtola one which is from final fantasy 14 it's like over 800 and then there's another tifa uh she's not uh the main commander but she's like the sub commander for clouds deck um and she's the deck i want to make eventually too i think hers last time i saw it is like 450 and it's just like it's like that's that's crazy like that like that shouldn't be a thing for a set that just came out like that should not like that should be a thing that should happen 10 years down the line you know what i mean that's yeah like it doesn't have time to grow in yeah rarity right yeah and the and these price jumps like happened like overnight like two weeks ago i remember like one night like i was i would have been able to get the uh the surge foil tifa if i wanted to for like sub a hundred dollars which is still a lot of money for one card to be clear but overnight it it doubled it's just like uh and it feels like that everyone kind of catches on at the same time and so you don't really see anyone like catching up it's just like you just wake up the next day and like everyone is just like oh it's just gone up exponentially man um and so i don't know it's it's a really uh weird thing um and magic is in a really weird place for reasons like that but um again i think like next year around this time it'd be a good thing to kind of like reflect back and be like okay like were my were my worries unfounded or not yeah that makes sense um thank you for for deep diving on that because that's stuff that is just fascinating to me i'm a person who's just learning about all this stuff i'm just like that's wild um we're gonna play two quick super fast ads uh in the show uh to give some shout outs to our friends over infinite and our friend naomi uh naomi kyle who's a homie of the show uh and then we're going to talk about the last couple of games we got a chance to check out at summer games fest so check out these quick ads we'll be right back after this what if you could transform your body level up your mind and unleash your warrior spirit all by playing a role-playing game well now you can with infinite the world's first science-backed fitness fantasy RPG where real-world progress becomes your power.

1:00:48Create your avatar based on your goals and level, then explore game modes like the Dungeon, Academy, and Sanctum using powerful tools and apps to forge real transformation. You ready to combine fitness and gaming to unlock your ultimate potential? Then visit fitnessfantasyrpg.com and use the code SPAWNOME for 10 % off your custom plan. Play Infinite and become the hero of your own fitness story. Hey there, my name is Naomi, and you might know me from internet things like hosting for IGN. I'd like to introduce you to my new show, This Week in Gaming. It's 20 minutes, short and sweet, and every week I go through all the important gaming news that you need to know, and then we have folks on like Khalif Adams, who shows up quite often, talk about all the important news.

1:01:34And you get to listen to it wherever you get your podcasts, so it's easy to find. Just look for This Week in Gaming and make sure to give it a follow. And every week, Monday at 9 p.m. Pacific time, you get a brand new episode. I hope you'll join me. We are back. Thank you, everybody, for checking out the dope stuff that Naomi and my fan, Walt over Infinite are doing. Remember to go check out that Spawn of Me code to get 10 % off. A couple of last quick games that we got a chance to check out, stuff that I got a chance to check out specifically as well. uh thickest thieves which was the game from war inspector the new stealth game that they are uh getting together for their game it is a multiplayer stealth game where you are in this large kind of large space uh large world where you are all competing for the ability to steal the most stuff uh within the world and kind of be the best thief you can be i really like this game i I think it has a lot of legs.

1:02:32We got a chance to check it out pretty early. It's still early in terms of development. It has kind of almost a class-based system where you're kind of moving through these spaces. Think like parkour, Dishonored a little bit, with more of a element around kind of thievery and things like that. What's cool is each one of these different characters and different kinds of play styles and archetypes has these different versions of tools and things that they can use to not only throw off the AI from tracking them down and basically capturing them and killing them, but you have all these other thieves that have these really cool powers.

1:03:17So like Chameleon can change into another NPC or look like an NPC. Spider, I believe, has the ability to kind of like use this grappling hook and move around the space a little bit faster. and I forget what the other one has, but it was a cool demo. You had a chance to check out the game getting played and getting demoed by one of the developers. What was really dope was being able to see the ways that you can traverse the space, the way you're kind of setting up and tracking other players so you can knock them out, take their gear, take their stuff and then X fell out. It was super early on, but I'm tracking it.

1:03:56I'm looking at it to continue to see where it's going to land and what it's going to wind up being. My one worry about that game is like, what happens if griefing becomes a thing? Because that also feels like you're not really working against each other. You're kind of working around each other. And what happens when and if the community decides that now we're going to change this into basically PvE as opposed to PvP. So that's an interesting thing there. uh phasmophobia got some new goodies in the chronicle update that is already out uh so that is very cool and excited to see more of that uh got a chance to sit down with the team and walk us through uh some some awesome stuff that's in the space there for you know a lot of quality of life changes a lot of additional ways to be able to play the game and get a chance to see you know some up res new versions of the maps that they have been working on and working to get you know moving in in a new space for them really excited for that team because again like a team that was a one person team is now almost i think 20 or 20 or plus 20 plus something like that might even be more um and you know a game like this is always one of those kind of titles where you hope that once the team finds success that they are able to continue to have success and continue to grow and continue to find an audience that is not only excited about what they are but they're making but continues to you know be uh stewards of the space and we're seeing a lot of that with phasmophobia and their new updates coming or that have already dropped um so i'm excited to jump back into that the thing about games like this is like you just need good fun folks to play with and sometimes if you don't have a lot of people to play with you can't enjoy games like this you need more people to be able to jump in and do stuff but i'm excited to see where they're going to land with all of the new stuff all the new the new um uh maps and and the new ways you're kind of able to interact with that world because phasmophobia is super fun i think it continues to get better uh they continue to find smart ways to grow that space um and it just looks really really good like I like what they've done with the aesthetic style of the phasmophobia game.

1:06:19Dark side. Warhammer 40k dark side also got a pretty big couple of updates. They have a new character in that space. The Arbitees. I think it's Arbitees, which basically makes you your kind of special kit now has a dog with it. So you can sick the dog on enemies. And one of the things that kind of came through with this was not only the ability to kind of have a dog companion, which you can pet, but they've revamped so much stuff. So, like, I played this early on when it first dropped and then kind of gave up on it because I just, you know, you wind up having, you know, more things to play and other things to play.

1:07:02Plus, again, like games like this, really, if you're going to have a ton of fun, you want a co-op team to roll with you. it didn't really have that but i love the aesthetic and love the way the game looks and now getting a chance to talk to a team they've done so much work in terms of revamping the onboarding revamping the skill trees revamping the graphical fidelity like they've done a really tremendous amount of work of upkeep on this game and making it feel fresh that i went back and played some the other night to get a feel of the the new character the new class and stuff like that man this game is fun like i forgot how much fun this game is again it goes back to like man when you get those experiences where you can get a whole bunch of people to run and just like have just everything coming to you and trying to kill you at the same time like it's the reason why i love horde modes in games because you get these moments where everything is chaos and you're just trying to figure out a way to get through the level um so really excited for what this is also going to bring to the table i'm hoping that they're doing well and i'm hoping that they're getting a lot of adoption uh for a game like this because these they continue to build on this world which is a one that i really love and and pay attention to and love that stuff uh last game uh in the grouping is exo born so exo born we got a chance to check out uh more level infinite goodness uh at sgf um and got a chance to check out more of the uh updates that they have in the game like again this is one of those games where the battle royale space is still pretty fervent like i think people are still having a ton of fun in it i think people are still trying to figure out their twists on on this space and what this game does really really well is not only some world building that i think is is smart but i really do like the way they think about the extraction shooter space movement is really really fun in here like again you can just fly around this thing and you're having a lot of the pve moments be uh extremely dangerous while also being you know challenging and and giving you lots of ways to kind of combat those spaces and those moments when you're about to get out and get about to extract we had a couple of moments during the demo that was just like harrowing stuff like we were like yo i don't know if we're gonna make it yo you gotta run over here now and cover me like yo i need you to come help me like there's a lot of it was a lot of screaming happening during during those moments in the game and it winds up being something that's just like really fun to be able to have those those kinds of in-between moments where you know you're going to be having a blast and knowing that you know games like this are going to exist it's really cool to be able to see you know that happen in a game like exo born i'm i'm again excited to play more of that i feel like i we're just ha we have so much stuff to play Like, I went back to go play some more rematch this week, which is a lot of fun.

1:10:05I've been playing a ton of predecessor. Went and finally got my hands on Dune Awakening, and that was super fun. Like, I'm dying to play more of that. There's just a lot of stuff out there right now that is, like, too much stuff to play and not enough time. But everything is super fun. Before we dip about it here, Cam, any last things that you're playing? any things that you're kind of messing around with that you haven't got a chance to talk about in a while like stuff you're actually playing um man uh yeah i mean i've been playing a lot when i have the time to uh it's kind of all over the place like i've played a little bit of ride hour remastered um which uh is as close to a remake as it can be without being a remake it's real they alice put a lot of work into that they re-upped the like art direction uh the backgrounds are now 3d instead of like you know flat backgrounds uh um they re they like redid the combat and um because there's two ride out games and they they basically remade the first one to to resemble uh the second game uh more than the first because there was a big jump there um it's really good if you're looking for like an action rpg to play um in the jrpg space ride i remastered also 50 you know not a not a 60 game not a 70 game not an 80 game so um if you're looking for something that isn't super demanding uh that's there's uh that option um i've been playing uh pokemon violet it on my uh switch two uh because there was a big switch two update on that uh i never played this the release at switch because of how bad people said it was um and boy am i glad i waited because that game is absolutely fantastic like i you know there's certain things that will not change like you know some of the environments look flat like there's some dullness there but like in the sense of just pokemon and like what i want from a pokemon game this is my favorite pokemon game in a in years like uh it's it's really really great um it makes me very optimistic for uh pokemon za that's dropping later this year because arceus legends had a similar issue to scarvi when it came out like just the technical aspects were not really there um i actually want to go back and see if the switch to just naturally makes that game look and run better um but uh that's been really great um i've been playing a little bit a lot the legend of dragoon uh for my uh for my patreon for my podcast um and i've been uh playing some uh lunar a silver store a silver story silver star i forgot what it's called but they did a remastered collection for both of those games uh earlier this year um and i've been playing that as well um i there's some other games i still really want to get back to i need to finish expedition 33 i know people are super high on that game i'm nearing the end of act two and i don't know what it is but that game's just not really clicking for me interesting and you know how annoying i was about that game when it got announced i was like all about it like oh this is gonna be one of the greatest games ever made and for a lot of people they feel that way and for me i'm just like i i think that it i think the presentation is phenomenal i think the mad the music phenomenal um i'm not super crazy about the combat i think a lot of the not a lot but i think like some of the kind of uh kits that the characters come with uh and how i don't think that they are super interesting or either they are interesting but they don't really it doesn't really come together completely for me um you know and i've just heard some other things just about the game that um are some trappings that i don't particularly like in the jrpg genre um because i hear like once you get done with act two you basically can just like finish the game you go act three is basically like up you go to the patron uh paintress and finish the game and uh but then i also heard that like oh yeah but there's like side quests for all the party members that are optional but they're super important and it's like then why are they optional like why like this because because you know arguably you know uh highly considered the best jrpg ever chrono trigger does this and i recently played chrono trigger for the first time and i thought that was really stupid it's like oh yeah there are these side quests for all these characters that are that you absolutely need to experience but they're optional and it's just like why would you do that yeah and so um and i know that there's a bunch of other additional like side content that like at the end of the day i think that um i think a lot of people are really impressed with the presentation and the cinematics and all the things i i speak highly on but when it comes to the actual like plane of the game i just don't i don't i just don't think it comes together in the way that i wanted it to or hoped it would um so that makes a ton of sense i mean i i'm i am lukewarm on the storytelling in death stranding 2 and everybody's making that to be the game of the year already uh so i feel you in in those respects i i also need to go back to go play the altars i've been playing i started that and then got really excited and then went to go do some other things there which i need to get back to that um there's a couple of other things that are in the mix that i that i can't remember off the top of my head right now but like it goes back to that understanding of like man there's oh college football is coming uh tomorrow like you know it's dropping on the 7th and there's a lot of stuff that's in the mix there for that too but like man there's so many good games out right now there's a ton of stuff to play uh there's so many things that are in in your ability to have a fun time uh so definitely go check out more of that stuff also played mecha break the other night uh and jumped on that and the fortnight the kind of super fast um mode the super fast br mode it's like you know 10 20 minute matches and stuff and then split gate 2 i've been also trying to find people to play split gate 2 with because i think is also very very good lots of stuff out there to play y 'all it is a very very very busy time of the year and if you say you don't have things to play you're a liar oh dude there's so much it's crazy there's so much stuff um before we get about it here cam plug uh the podcast yeah so i have a jrpg podcast called party chat colon a jrpg podcast with uh my homie kevin kenson youtube.com slash kevin kenson uh he does a bunch of uh like hardware accessories that type of thing in the gaming space um and uh yeah we have a jrpg podcast where we talk about uh the news in the jrpg space what we've been playing i will still cover other eastern titles as well so if you're like if you like soul's likes if you like um visual novels like anything like that's primarily made by a japanese developer or or an eastern developer uh we talk about that over there and then we always have like a topic of the show where we talk about a specific thing um this week we talked about like what was like the most notable um or definitive game jrpg for like each console generation so that was some that was a discussion that we did um and then sometimes we bring on guests and then they um you know they uh pitch us a topic to talk about and uh we uh we roll with that um and we also have a patreon so if you are a um if you're someone that we we like this podcast to be as uh inviting as possible like whether you are not super familiar with the jrpg genre and you've wanted to like dip your toes in more and you want to like be in a space where you can talk about these things ask these questions uh yeah we have a patreon where we have an exclusive discord um we have uh rewards for getting the episode a day early we have a q a we have a campfire catalog which is like our book club podcast our first one was on chrono trigger and our second one that's coming up is on legend of dragoon so um that's why i've been playing that recently um and so yeah it's um you know we try to make it as inviting as possible it's very casual podcasts like you know definitely more casual than what we got what we got here but uh yeah it's it's a good time um and you know we've uh it's it's new so it's uh something that's slowly but surely uh getting more in steam as we're going along and uh yeah that's that's that and then you can follow me on socials at cam final mix always go support the fam uh both cam and kevin it's super super cool stuff uh and again thank you everybody for watching this show you can check me out at caliph adams on twitter uh you can go hit me up on blue sky as well it's caliph over there uh and check out again most of the stuff that we have rolling out we just did that again that show with uh the hadoo uh talking about evo so that's on the feeds this will go up uh on monday uh it's gonna go up on monday you'll be listening to this on monday so check that stuff out uh and yeah we're still looking for some dope folks to talk to about the spawnies we're still looking to get that show rebooted for a february 2026 launch so please reach out and connect if you like what we do here on spawn if you think that this has value and you want to see it grow with our amazing award show that is the best on the planet because of the culture that we add to the conversation uh make sure you come and hit me up all the information is in my bios in those places and you can hit me up on linkedin as well for all of that goodness there so until we get up in your faces next week with some more dopeness and more conversations around video games and news of the week and stuff we've been playing hope you have a wonderful beautiful week hope you are taking care of yourselves hope you're having a good time and please remember you know don't be one of those hurt people that hurts people we see a lot of that happening out here right now it's a lot of weird grossness going on it's a lot of not good things happening but you have the ability to to share some goodness in the world in the ways that you do your thing so we're gonna see you much later have a good week and peace y 'all much love deuces

1:21:13We'll see you next week.

From the publisher

In Episode 550 of Spawn on Me, host Kahlief Adams and guest host Cam Hawkins dive into the massive Xbox layoffs and the fallout from Summer Game Fest coverage we missed.Xbox Layoffs Recap: Dissecting Microsoft’s July 2nd cuts of approximately 9,000 jobs across Xbox and gaming studios including Rare, Initiative, Turn 10, ZeniMax, and King Barcelona. We also discuss the cancellation of major projects like Everwild and Perfect Dark.Industry Reaction: We analyze Phil Spencer’s internal memo and the controversial suggestion for impacted staff to leverage AI tools like Copilot for job hunting.Studio-by-Studio Breakdown: Who’s affected? Rare, Turn 10, Initiative, ZeniMax, King Barcelona, and others. What does this mean for the future of Xbox exclusives?SGF Missed Gems: A quick roundup of standout announcements from Summer Game Fest that slipped under the radar in our previous coverage.Stay tuned and subscribe for more gaming breakdowns with a focus on people of color in the industry.

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