transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:04] What's up, Tuesday? I almost choked.

Speaker 2:
[00:09] All right.

Speaker 1:
[00:11] How are you doing, podcast? Yay. Good news.

Speaker 2:
[00:15] Good news, everyone. I've taught the toaster how to feel love.

Speaker 1:
[00:24] Also, there's better prices now on at least one thing. Also, worse prices on two things. I just added it to the document.

Speaker 2:
[00:34] I saw that, but yes. It started off, hey, an incoming CEO did something good. Okay. And then it was turned around with like, oh, all these other things are more expensive because fuck you. We get to monetize now for saying that?

Speaker 1:
[00:49] Yes. We talked about, we always talk about prices going up.

Speaker 2:
[00:52] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[00:53] We got more prices going down.

Speaker 2:
[00:54] There is an asterisk with that price going down, but I think it's a worthy asterisk.

Speaker 1:
[00:58] I can't wait to learn about it. As always, we'll mention all the people who give us money at the end of the podcast.

Speaker 2:
[01:04] Yes. If you'd like to give us money, patreon.com/wulffdenpodcast or do the little things on Twitch or YouTube.

Speaker 1:
[01:12] Last week on the bonus episode, we talked about the VMU for the Dreamcast and upscaling for some reason. Yes.

Speaker 2:
[01:20] Well, it's all about updating your retro consoles for the modern era.

Speaker 1:
[01:26] Yes, because we had a new VMU that just came out, and I tried to use it and couldn't get it to work. I did bring all of the stuff, so if we want to try that later, we can. Unless you guys got any better ideas for a bonus episode.

Speaker 2:
[01:36] We're all ears.

Speaker 1:
[01:38] Anyway, next week, you're not going to be here.

Speaker 2:
[01:40] No, I'm not going to be here next week. No.

Speaker 1:
[01:42] AJ might be here though.

Speaker 2:
[01:43] Oh.

Speaker 1:
[01:45] You know him? You know that guy?

Speaker 2:
[01:47] Him I actually know.

Speaker 1:
[01:49] Let's talk about the price adjustments. Yes. What else are we talking about this week? Bafta Award Game Awards? Yes.

Speaker 2:
[01:58] There are other video game awards and just the Keelys. There's the Bafta Awards.

Speaker 1:
[02:02] Stop Killing Games major update?

Speaker 2:
[02:04] Yes. Big, big time update. Rock Band is back, kind of. A former PlayStation lead on why he was fired.

Speaker 1:
[02:12] I did see that and that was interesting.

Speaker 2:
[02:15] We got news on the 007 game. We got the Street Fighter trailer because I just want to talk about the Street Fighter movie. An update on my favorite reoccurring segment, what's going on with Mind's Eye?

Speaker 1:
[02:29] Okay. I'm also intrigued by that.

Speaker 2:
[02:33] But first, Xbox Game Pass Ultimate price update. Starting today, April 21st, 2026, Game Pass Ultimate drops from $29.99 US to $22.99 US a month.

Speaker 1:
[02:50] Hey, Asha.

Speaker 2:
[02:51] PC Game Pass will also drop from $16.49 to $13.99 US a month. Prices may vary in other regions. Beginning this year.

Speaker 1:
[03:02] That's very... PC Game Pass is very cheap.

Speaker 2:
[03:05] That's very cheap. Beginning this year, future Call of Duty titles won't join Game Pass Ultimate or PC Game Pass at launch. New Call of Duty games will be added to Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass during the following holiday season, about a year later, while existing Call of Duty titles already in the library will continue to be available. That's that asterisk I was hinting at before.

Speaker 1:
[03:30] I don't hate that because if Call of Duty is the sole reason for bringing up the prices on everything, then get it out of there.

Speaker 2:
[03:42] Yeah. Well, that's what everyone says is the main reason. That's why there's a $30 Game Pass here or there was a $30 Game Pass here.

Speaker 1:
[03:50] Of course, I would love it more if everything was free or if everything was just cheaper. You know, but if the one thing is holding it down, get it out.

Speaker 2:
[04:01] I feel like this is maybe the first admission that the day one games was not as beneficial as initially thought because Call of Duty is usually the best selling game of the year every year. It was not last year. I think in large part because it debuted in Game Pass day and date, so they didn't get the sales they normally get. Also too, yeah, it raised the price at Game Pass. And this is like the first walk back of first part, because it is technically a first party title, of first party titles being released day and date.

Speaker 1:
[04:37] They should stop that messaging.

Speaker 2:
[04:39] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[04:40] They have to because it's not first party anymore. This is their first party game and it's not launching on Game Pass.

Speaker 2:
[04:47] I feel like you can kind of like fudge that a little bit with Activision Games, because those are still being released on all platforms for the most part.

Speaker 1:
[04:54] You can't say first party titles.

Speaker 2:
[04:56] I think the problem is going to come when you start getting to like the Microsoft Studio titles, the explicitly labeled Xbox Game Studio titles, like Halo Campaign Evolved, like Forza 6, like all those, like the upcoming Fable game. Those are going to be the litmus tests. Because like when you say day one games, you can't really go back on that without major upheaval.

Speaker 1:
[05:20] Well, they already have. They already have. And we have had major upheaval here in this room. Because we've been yelling for years that they said day one, day one, first party games are coming to Game Pass, day one. And then they moved the goalposts. They moved when day one is.

Speaker 2:
[05:42] Yes, if you pay a little bit more, day one is before.

Speaker 1:
[05:44] Now all of a sudden, you can get, yeah, you can pay a little extra and get it negative days early. So that's bullshit and that sucks and that's false advertising. If it's not working out, give it up. Because Game Pass is a good deal, not if you, what was it before? $30 a month, that's insane. And if it's Call of Duty's fault, get it out. Nobody wanted it last year. I didn't want it last year. So maybe I would have kept my Game Pass subscription if they got rid of Call of Duty and made me have a cheaper Game Pass.

Speaker 2:
[06:18] Call of Duty is one of those games where most of the people who are buying it, that's the game they buy that year. So paying $30 a month just for Call of Duty isn't really worth it in the end for these people. Because they're not going to go and play all these other games that are in there.

Speaker 1:
[06:34] We talked about this last week. Was this speculated last week?

Speaker 2:
[06:40] It was brought up in an internal memo from Asha Sharma to Microsoft.

Speaker 1:
[06:45] Because I remember last week saying I don't hate the idea of Call of Duty being a subscription because it's the same thing every year. So if they're just going to update the game, then just making it always on subscription. I can stop my subscription when I'm done playing and start it again when I want to play it again. Back in the day when I used to work at GameStop, Call of Duty was a $60 a year purchase because it came out yearly. You pay $60 and then every few months, you pay $15 for a map pack and there were three map packs every game. So I can't do math. 60, 15, 15, and 15. That's almost a year of a subscription. So some people in the chat are saying, make it another tier on Game Pass. I'm not opposed to that either.

Speaker 2:
[07:32] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[07:33] But it should be its own thing too. Maybe people don't want Game Pass, maybe they only want Call of Duty, because when I worked at Game Stop again, remember I worked at Game Stop, everybody, there were the people who only bought Call of Duty or Madden or both. They only came in and that was the game that they got and that's it.

Speaker 2:
[07:50] But I think part of the problem is like, that sent another subscription service that you have to get in addition to whatever else you're subscribed to. And keep in mind, part of the thing with Game Pass is that's how you do online play now. Because no more Xbox Live Gold, it's all rolled into Game Pass.

Speaker 1:
[08:09] That is also bullshit. Well, if the next Xbox is going to be a PC, what are they going to do with that?

Speaker 2:
[08:18] That's a good question.

Speaker 1:
[08:20] I first see that going away.

Speaker 2:
[08:22] They would have to change something.

Speaker 1:
[08:25] Yes, because then you would have to pay for online only if you bought the game via the Microsoft Store on the PC, and that is dumb. No one would do that. People would just buy it on Steam. You would buy an Xbox, set it up in your living room, turn it on, go, wait, I can play for free on Steam? I'm just going to get it on Steam.

Speaker 2:
[08:50] Yeah. I think the idea, I mean, it was controversial back in the day when they started charging for online play, but it kind of sort of made sense then. I think charging for online play now, especially in the era of free-to-play games being the dominant type of game, is out of date and antiquated. Like that alone needs to be adjusted.

Speaker 1:
[09:09] I think there's value in other places here. We're getting a lot of games through a subscription, so let that speak for itself. But Asha Sharma said the barrier to entry is too high. Yeah. Like, it's a deterrent how expensive game pass is.

Speaker 2:
[09:30] Absolutely.

Speaker 1:
[09:31] I had it for a while. I didn't even use it. I had it and I had to give it up because I wasn't using it, and it was $30 goddamn motherfucking dollars. Yeah. And that's too many dollars.

Speaker 2:
[09:40] I gave up PS Plus and Xbox Live Gold during the PS4 era. I don't regret it at all. I never played multiplayer. I played some of the free games they give you, but not enough to justify, to continue to pay for it.

Speaker 1:
[10:01] It was great to have with day one games. Yeah. Because you don't have to pay for the whole game, but I could see that shooting them in the foot with a game like Call of Duty.

Speaker 2:
[10:09] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[10:10] Call of Duty is such a big game. It seems like they lost money by having it... Well, they didn't even have... Was it day one? Yeah. No? Okay.

Speaker 2:
[10:20] They created the $30 tier for Call of Duty, essentially.

Speaker 1:
[10:25] That was a horrible move because that just priced people out.

Speaker 2:
[10:28] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[10:28] Now, you're cheapening Call of Duty and pricing people out at the same time. That is dumb.

Speaker 2:
[10:36] I forgot. There was a list of all the Call of Duty games currently in Game Pass. There's only five or six. It's the two Black Ops games, the three most recent Modern Warfare games, and I think World War II is the other one.

Speaker 1:
[10:50] I like the idea that it'll come to Game Pass the following holiday. So, if this year is Black Ops 18, next year, Black Ops 18 will be free in Game Pass, part of Game Pass.

Speaker 2:
[11:04] This is another thing. I think it's supposed to be Modern Warfare 4.

Speaker 1:
[11:10] What is? This year?

Speaker 2:
[11:11] This year's Call of Duty.

Speaker 1:
[11:12] Okay.

Speaker 2:
[11:13] But I also thought we weren't getting a Call of Duty this year.

Speaker 1:
[11:17] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[11:17] Because there was this statement a while ago, like, oh, were they admitted that Black Ops 7 was not up to snuff, we're gonna take time to make the next Call of Duty good.

Speaker 1:
[11:25] Well, they haven't announced it yet.

Speaker 2:
[11:26] No. They haven't announced it.

Speaker 1:
[11:27] They're still...

Speaker 2:
[11:28] There's still time to go back on that?

Speaker 1:
[11:30] Well, yeah. There's... The speculation is that Black Modern Warfare 4 is coming out.

Speaker 2:
[11:37] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[11:38] But they could just be holding it.

Speaker 2:
[11:40] Well, yeah. I'm trying to see if I can find, like, the exact... quotes.

Speaker 1:
[11:47] I'm indifferent to COD, so this is okay for me. I think... I stopped playing Warzone. I played Warzone for, like, a while. I stopped, because it's the same. The only good part of Warzone is the old Warzone, and then it's just boring. So they added a blackout mode from Black Ops 4, I think. Okay. And no one liked that, so I don't know why they put it back in. That was a stupid thing. That would be amazing, and an announcement of a new Nintendo console. Excuse me, a new Nintendo console? What the hell? And why are you talking about that? We're talking about Xbox. Yeah. Call of Duty is rumored to be coming to Switch 2 at some point. So that's probably this next one.

Speaker 2:
[12:34] Probably.

Speaker 1:
[12:35] Or I thought we were supposed to have it by now. I thought it was supposed to be early this year.

Speaker 2:
[12:39] Who knows?

Speaker 1:
[12:40] Was this a Nate the Hate?

Speaker 2:
[12:43] I don't think it was Nate the Hate. Joint? I don't think so. I mean, what we were talking about last week, all these games are being delayed for Switch 2. There might be one of them. It seems like people are having a difficulty porting games to Switch 2, more so than initially thought.

Speaker 1:
[12:57] Yeah, I don't remember why. Well, they didn't have dev kits for a while. But I also know that Nintendo is really difficult to deal with. Like, having to get them to certify everything is annoying. Otherwise, I don't know. I don't know what would be taking so long to port things over to the Switch 2. I think they will switch between studios, like they used to. Yeah, I agree, but they, again, they release them yearly, and they need, even if they're switching studios, give it a rest.

Speaker 2:
[13:29] Well, even at a certain point, like back during the PS4 era, they were still switching studios, but it wound up becoming all hands on deck anyway. Like, whoever was working on next year's Call of Duty would have to stop to finish up this year's Call of Duty, and then whoever was working on this year's Call of Duty would have to help with next year's Call of Duty. It was all a vicious cycle.

Speaker 1:
[13:48] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[13:50] It was unsustainable making Call of Duty the way they made Call of Duty. It was bound to fall apart sooner or later.

Speaker 1:
[13:59] Unsustainable, and it burned us all out.

Speaker 2:
[14:00] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[14:02] The games are bad. So if the games are good, maybe it wouldn't be so bad. All right. So game pass is cheaper. That's good.

Speaker 2:
[14:09] That's good. Yes.

Speaker 1:
[14:10] That's good. Before we get into the bad price adjustments, I'd like to hear about the Project Helix.

Speaker 2:
[14:21] Okay. We all know Project Helix, that's the code name for the next generation Xbox after Xbox Series. Leaker by the name of Kelpearl2, who has been posting alleged tech updates on the upcoming PS6 and new Xbox, was speaking about Project Helix in a NeoGAF forum thread, and claimed that Microsoft will be selling the Project Helix chip to manufacturers like Asus and MSI, essentially letting you buy machines running the Project Helix innards. Whether that's true or not remains to be seen, but when this rumor started spreading on social media, some speculated that this might mean Project Helix will not be a first-party console, but may instead be a third-party device similar to the Asus ROG Allie X. Jason Ronald, the vice president of Xbox's gaming device and ecosystem, responded, saying that Project Helix will be available as a first-party Xbox console. Ronald does not dispute the speculation that Helix chips could be used in third-party devices, however, and considering Xbox's recent focus on the ubiquity of the brand and confirming that shakeups, sorry, and confirming that the device will play PC games, it doesn't seem out of the question. However, with all the big shakeups up top at Xbox following the departure of Phil Spencer and the company moving to completely erase the existence of the This Is An Xbox advertising campaign, just how much its future plans involve blurring the lines between traditional console and a living room PC are a bit unclear.

Speaker 1:
[15:54] I don't know how I feel about that. So obviously, I think it would be worse if there was no first-party Xbox console. If it was just Asus and MSI. I do like the ROG Allie X and the ROG Allie. They're great. It's confusing for consumers and they don't want that, and it's too expensive. So if you have a third-party making it, they got to make their cut. And there's more of a, like, I don't know, like a mystique of quality to a first-party device.

Speaker 2:
[16:31] 100%, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[16:33] Even if it's, like, white-labeled, even if it's just someone else makes it, but they say it's only Microsoft or Xbox. If it's just Asus or MSI or third-parties making Xboxes, that's the end of Xbox. That's not a home console anymore.

Speaker 2:
[16:52] That's a continuation of the this is an Xbox idea. Where, like, you just slap the label Xbox on everything and hope that that is enough to save the brand.

Speaker 1:
[17:02] That being said, they did say there will be a first-party Xbox console. So if there is a Microsoft-made Xbox console like we traditionally have, even if it is more like a PC, that is good. And if they have that along with Asus and MSI making stuff, I don't see the problem. Because then you can have, like, a more premium or maybe a more powerful one that's more expensive from Asus or MSI, or maybe a mid-console cycle generation that is a little beefier, you know? It'd be kind of cool to have something like that.

Speaker 2:
[17:36] I just don't know because the idea of a first-party Xbox and then third-party Xbox is made that could potentially be a little bit cheaper, a little bit underpowered for certain markets, whatever, like, that's all well and good. But there have existed in the past third-party-made consoles and those don't go well.

Speaker 1:
[18:01] Panasonic Q?

Speaker 2:
[18:03] The, well, the Panasonic, the GameCube, the Panasonic-made GameCube, yes. But speaking of Panasonic, were you aware that the Philips, sorry, the 3DO video game system?

Speaker 1:
[18:18] Do it again.

Speaker 2:
[18:23] Were you aware, first try, that the 3DO game system, you remember the 3DO?

Speaker 1:
[18:29] Yep.

Speaker 2:
[18:30] That was made by multiple different companies. That was licensed out to third parties. So there wasn't just one company making 3DO systems. Panasonic made one, Sanyo made one, Gold Star and Creative Technology.

Speaker 1:
[18:44] I did not know that.

Speaker 2:
[18:44] Yes. That was also the original idea of the Steam Machines back in the 2010s. Valve would make one, but Alienware would make a bunch, and other companies, Falcon would make a bunch.

Speaker 1:
[18:57] I think Alienware made one, and then that was the end of it.

Speaker 2:
[19:00] Yes, but the point remains. It sounds good on paper because DVD players, Sony makes some, Panasonic makes some, Samsung makes some, and they all play the same game.

Speaker 1:
[19:14] Well, literally, the only thing I can think of that this works for is Windows computers, and that's it.

Speaker 2:
[19:22] Yeah, but then you're, again, you're changing the game here. You're no longer making a video game console, you're making a gaming PC.

Speaker 1:
[19:32] Yeah, we know that the next Xbox is going to be a gaming PC.

Speaker 2:
[19:35] Some kind of gaming PC. It's still nebulous.

Speaker 1:
[19:38] So again, I like the idea of having a more premium, like third-party option out there, maybe not at launch, maybe a little later. I think Valve did a smart thing with the Steam Deck, saying that it will open Steam OS up to third parties, but then they locked it down for years and then gave Lenovo a little exclusive.

Speaker 2:
[20:01] Well, I think that was to try to establish a level of quality and then eventually let it out.

Speaker 1:
[20:07] And I think that Microsoft could do the same thing with the next Xbox. Have their first party want to establish a level of quality and then let Asus and MSI and whoever else wants to have the Project Helix chip. That's another thing that I'm confused about. What is the Project Helix chip?

Speaker 2:
[20:23] I'm assuming that's the main CPU or APU.

Speaker 1:
[20:27] Yeah, but I thought this was a computer.

Speaker 2:
[20:30] I don't think it's going to be like a... It's sounding more and more like it's going to be a more traditional console hardware that could possibly run Windows.

Speaker 1:
[20:40] Yeah, it sounds like it is just going to be Windows. Sounds like it's just going to be Xbox Game Mode or Xbox Fullscreen Experience on a Windows computer. News said it's not customized. You're saying the Helix chip? It sounds to me like the Project Helix chip is just like how AMD has custom chips for the Steam Deck and the Steam Machine has a custom chip, but they're extremely close to a different AMD chip that already exists. Right. So the Project Helix chip is probably going to be extremely close to one that exists already. The GPU and CPU is potentially much more powerful, but an APU is just cheaper. So smart choice. I don't know the difference. Is that like an arm thing?

Speaker 2:
[21:42] No. I typed APU.

Speaker 1:
[21:46] APU?

Speaker 2:
[21:46] Yes. That is literally the first hit.

Speaker 1:
[21:50] From Aladdin or from The Simpsons?

Speaker 2:
[21:53] The Simpsons because the monkey is ABU. ABU. Auxiliary Power Unit. No, that's in planes.

Speaker 1:
[22:02] APU is CPU and GPU in one chip. Oh, and SOC. Okay.

Speaker 2:
[22:10] In my day, we call them SOCs.

Speaker 1:
[22:11] Yes, in my day, in my old age, we call them SOCs. Anyway, let's move on to the bad news.

Speaker 2:
[22:25] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[22:28] I made a video almost two weeks ago now on the Einthor.

Speaker 2:
[22:32] Oh, I did hear about this.

Speaker 1:
[22:33] Popped off. Everybody loves the Einthor.

Speaker 2:
[22:35] It's really popular.

Speaker 1:
[22:36] Very popular. Well, I hope you got it because-

Speaker 2:
[22:39] I didn't.

Speaker 1:
[22:40] Up in price. Einthor Max is going to be 550 now, which is, that's a lot of money. That's the price of a Steam Deck.

Speaker 2:
[22:48] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[22:50] A new, they're adding a new model. Okay. It's the same max RAM, so 16 gigabytes of RAM, but half the storage, 512 gigabytes of storage, for $469, which is still a lot of money. Right. They're doing this because the one terabyte of RAM, the one terabyte of storage was too many terabytes, which is too much.

Speaker 2:
[23:16] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[23:17] Too many, cost too much, get it out of there. That's not a bad option because you, I don't know who needs to hear this, you don't need a terabyte in your fucking eye, Thor. Everybody really wanted the max for some reason.

Speaker 2:
[23:32] Because it's max, everyone thinks higher numbers mean better.

Speaker 1:
[23:34] I know, you don't need, it's not, you don't need it. It has an SD card slot. You're not playing, your Call of Duty is on this thing. You don't need all that storage space. But anyway, now it's a lot of money and the sixth, and now they're adding another one that's a little cheaper. It's kind of the same price as the Thor Max was, but with half the storage space. And then the Thor and Odin 3 will be transitioning to UFS 3.1 storage moving forward. That's instead of UFS 4.0 storage, which is much, 3.1 is slower.

Speaker 2:
[24:15] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[24:15] It really doesn't matter that much. It's still going to be faster than a microSD card. Okay. But it is slow enough to be annoying. This is annoying. This means that if you had an older Thor, it's better than the ones coming out, at least a little bit. So, this sucks. This is bad news to hear.

Speaker 2:
[24:42] Bad times.

Speaker 1:
[24:43] This is after they already raised the price. This is the second time they're raising the price.

Speaker 2:
[24:49] If they have to swap out for lesser powered hardware in order to just keep selling the thing, I understand. But it's still bad times to be living in here, you know?

Speaker 1:
[24:59] Yeah. I also don't think they expected this thing to be as popular as it is. This is, for sure, the most popular EIN product that I've seen. I know that their products were popular, but not this popular. This thing has popped off. It's half speed technically in benchmarks, but real world performance is not a big deal. Half speed sounds crazy, but I know that it's really not. It's really not that. Actually, maybe it's just that UFS 4.0 speeds are so fast that halving it really doesn't matter.

Speaker 2:
[25:36] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[25:38] I think I'm comparing it to micro SD speeds and micro SD speeds are vastly slower, but even still, you could still like boot games off of the micro SD just fine.

Speaker 2:
[25:46] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[25:47] Even some PC games do not feel any different. They're pre-ordering batch six. It's pretty crazy. Got mine pre-ordered from batch four. That's batch four? I remember when Gavin got his. Gavin, that was like three weeks ago and you were batch four and now they're on batch six? Jesus Christ. Oh, anyway. So that's the Eindhoven, but also Lenovo. Gotta love Lenovo. We already talked about the Lenovo Legion Go 2 going up to $2,000. It was $1,350 and I said, that's crazy. I made a whole video.

Speaker 2:
[26:33] And then the Lenovo said, hold my beer.

Speaker 1:
[26:36] I made a whole video where the thumbnail is just the Lenovo Legion Go 2 and it says $1,350. And I said, this has gotta stop. Well, now it's $2,000 and you can get one that's two terabytes of internal storage. That's $2,800.

Speaker 2:
[26:52] Don't do that.

Speaker 1:
[26:53] What is going on? You can buy a whole ass computer for that. You can put a down payment on a car for that.

Speaker 2:
[27:00] I saw somewhere, and we all know why this is happening, is the tariffs, it's the RAMpocalypse, it's storage shortages and things like that. And the RAM shortages, I read, are still going to be in effect for the next couple of years with the why. So we're not gonna be paying reasonable prices for video game consoles anymore.

Speaker 1:
[27:24] We're fucked. We're screwed.

Speaker 2:
[27:28] It's absolutely insane.

Speaker 1:
[27:30] We don't hold the computing power anymore.

Speaker 2:
[27:32] It's mind-boggling to me that like, I mean, video games was never like a cheap hobby, but like there was always light at the end of the tunnel. Because like things would get cheaper over time. And you could amass a video game collection that like costs, you know, was very cost-effective. That is out the window now.

Speaker 1:
[27:53] When the original Lenovo Legion Go came out, I was like, this is kind of expensive. I don't know why you would get this over a Steam Deck. It was 650.

Speaker 2:
[28:03] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[28:04] So anyway, the reason we're bringing all this up is because Lenovo is not done. The Legion Go S, the Z1 Extreme model, is now 1,579.99. That is, it was $800 when it came out.

Speaker 2:
[28:20] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[28:22] 1,579.99. Oh, I burped. Did you hear that?

Speaker 2:
[28:28] I heard it.

Speaker 1:
[28:29] Yeah. It sounds like a gear turning when I burp.

Speaker 2:
[28:31] It is, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[28:33] So this is what, $700 more?

Speaker 2:
[28:36] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[28:36] Yeah. Or $800. It's a lot more money. The Z2 Go model that nobody wanted, that was the cheap one. Yeah. That one was, I think, $600. It's now almost $1,000, $989.99. These are, these are the Steam OS ones. Yeah. These are the ones that come with Steam OS. These were supposed to be the cheap ones because you don't, they don't have to pay for Windows. They're, they're, they're getting Steam OS on there.

Speaker 2:
[29:05] Yeah. And like everything, everything is bad.

Speaker 1:
[29:11] I bought my Z1 Extreme for $650 on Black Friday, as Retro Game Corp. So the $650 one that he got is now $1,600. Yeah. It's, it's an extra zero added. No, it's not. I can't do math. $1,000 more. If it's $1,000 more, that's fine. $1,000 more than it was on Black Friday. So, Lenovo, are they going to make another one?

Speaker 2:
[29:44] Not anytime soon.

Speaker 1:
[29:45] They haven't made, well, they're supposed to actually, there's a Steam OS version of the Lenovo Legion Go 2 that's supposed to come out this summer.

Speaker 2:
[29:53] Like how would?

Speaker 1:
[29:54] And it's supposed to be, it was supposed to be cheaper. It was supposed to be-

Speaker 2:
[29:56] Who's gonna be buying this stuff?

Speaker 1:
[29:58] It was supposed to be like $200 off because it has Steam OS. So $1,350, it was supposed to be $1,150 or something. Along those lines. And now what? Now what's it gonna be?

Speaker 2:
[30:10] No, you can't justify this. There's no way you can justify spending this much money on video games. You can't do it, it's ridiculous.

Speaker 1:
[30:22] Why isn't the Xbox Ally getting a price increase? Actually, it got a price drop.

Speaker 2:
[30:27] The white one. The white one, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[30:28] It's got $100 off. I don't know if it's still that way.

Speaker 2:
[30:31] Last I saw it was $540.

Speaker 1:
[30:34] Okay.

Speaker 2:
[30:34] So it shot up a little bit, but I mean, $500 for that thing is a good deal. If you should get on it, if you see it for that price again, because that and the Steam Deck, those are your only options at this point.

Speaker 1:
[30:46] Why isn't the Xbox Ally getting a price increase? I just read that, didn't I? Yeah. I'm having a stroke.

Speaker 2:
[30:52] It's one of those days.

Speaker 1:
[30:53] I don't know. I think Asus is actually just selling well, or the partnership deal that they have with Microsoft is subsidizing it a little bit or something.

Speaker 2:
[31:03] Something. Something's going on.

Speaker 1:
[31:04] Maybe they're a little better at mitigating the stock that they have or whatever. Who knows? They're doing something right, and Lenovo is doing something wrong. Or maybe Lenovo is giving too many resources to other things. Did I hear that Lenovo Legion filed bankruptcy?

Speaker 2:
[31:23] No.

Speaker 1:
[31:23] Did they? Nobody said that, but maybe they were joking, because I couldn't find any information on that. I was just about to buy a Legion Go S. Is the cheaper one even worth that much? Not anymore. Do not buy a Lenovo Legion Go product at all. They're way too expensive right now.

Speaker 2:
[31:47] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[31:49] That is, this is an insane. They priced you out. They're not worth it. Buy in Asus. It's a shame because the Legion Go 2 is the nicest one. It is the nicest one. The OLED screen is very nice. It is great, but not for $2,000 to $3,000. Buy an Ally Z1 Xtreme, either the white or the black one, you will be happy. Honestly, the original Z1 Xtreme, great. Still great. Still a great console. Plays most things fine.

Speaker 2:
[32:27] Steam Deck is still great. I think people will say like, oh, it's done. It's toast or whatever kids say.

Speaker 1:
[32:35] A lot of AAA game companies are focusing on optimizing for low-end stuff, so a lot of the new shit is still running fine. Does ProgMod run good on Steam?

Speaker 2:
[32:45] It's verified.

Speaker 1:
[32:46] It's verified? It's verified, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[32:47] There you go.

Speaker 1:
[32:48] Good news, everyone. All right, let's do the backlog. All right.

Speaker 2:
[33:09] Welcome back to the WULFF DEN Podcast. That is a very podcast right here, where we go through our entire video game collection. A collection of over 1,100 games. I added one, and we picked one at random. We talk about it regardless of whether or not we've played it.

Speaker 1:
[33:22] Sonic Triple Trouble for the Game Gear.

Speaker 2:
[33:24] Ooh, this is not a game we had growing up, but this is a game that we got many years later. It's a game that always felt missing from our Game Gear collection, because most of the games that were worth playing were the Game Gear or the Sonic games.

Speaker 1:
[33:40] Yeah, we only had Chaos and Sonic 2 for the Game Gear, but we have a mission to get every Sonic Game Gear game for some reason.

Speaker 2:
[33:51] And Sonic Chaos, which we've done a backlog on previously, was an excellent game. Probably the best Game Gear game out there. Sonic Triple Trouble, have you ever played it?

Speaker 1:
[34:02] I don't know that I have.

Speaker 2:
[34:04] Uh, step down.

Speaker 1:
[34:06] Okay. Yeah, my understanding is Chaos is the best one.

Speaker 2:
[34:09] Chaos is the best.

Speaker 1:
[34:10] And it is very good.

Speaker 2:
[34:11] Yes. It's Triple Trouble.

Speaker 1:
[34:14] Sonic is so big on the screen.

Speaker 2:
[34:17] Well, yeah, because it's like Game Gear, so all the sprite scaling is all messed up because the screen is so small.

Speaker 1:
[34:23] So a lot of Game Gear games were also Master System games, and they were better on the Master System because it was a little zoomed out.

Speaker 2:
[34:29] There is no Master System version of Sonic Triple Trouble. Only on Game Gear.

Speaker 1:
[34:33] Okay. I hate how zoomed in it is. That's crazy.

Speaker 2:
[34:37] Yeah. If I remember correctly, the big selling point of Sonic Triple Trouble was that it started adding all the ancillary characters to the Game Gear series. You get Knuckles. His name is Fang the Sniper.

Speaker 1:
[34:58] That guy.

Speaker 2:
[34:58] But sometimes he's called Knack the Weasel.

Speaker 1:
[35:03] Okay.

Speaker 2:
[35:04] If you don't know who he is, he's got like, he's a little like weasel guy. He's got like a cowboy hat and a buck tooth. He's not around anymore. Like Sega just doesn't really acknowledge him.

Speaker 1:
[35:16] Was he not in Sonic Mania?

Speaker 2:
[35:18] No, I think he's in Superstars. There's a missing poster for him in Sonic Mania in Sonic Generations.

Speaker 1:
[35:27] Bang the Sniper?

Speaker 2:
[35:28] Bang the Sniper. Initially known as Nack the Weasel.

Speaker 1:
[35:36] Yeah, yeah, there is a missing poster of him in Sonic Mania. I thought he's in it for like a second.

Speaker 2:
[35:40] No.

Speaker 1:
[35:44] Because I think I saw him in Sonic Mania and I had a look up who he is.

Speaker 2:
[35:48] Yeah. I mean, so again, this is-

Speaker 1:
[35:51] Bang the Hunter. The Hunter?

Speaker 2:
[35:53] Oh, the Hunter now.

Speaker 1:
[35:55] That's what the Wikipedia page is.

Speaker 2:
[35:58] So yeah, it's very similar to Sonic Chaos. You can play Sonic or Tails. Tails is a little bit easier because he can fly and he's got more lives. It's your standard Sonic game. You run through the levels really fast. You try to collect the Chaos Emeralds. It's a weird game because it's not in canon with the Genesis games. So like Knuckles is still a bad guy. Thang was never in the Genesis game. So like who the fuck is this dude? Sonic can perform the super peelout. So that's when you like run really fast in place and zoom. So that's fun. But it's definitely in there. It's right there.

Speaker 1:
[36:45] I triple trouble.

Speaker 2:
[36:46] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[36:48] And we also have our Game Gear. This thing definitely doesn't work.

Speaker 2:
[36:51] No, that absolutely doesn't.

Speaker 1:
[36:52] So Game Gears, after however long it's been, the capacitors die out and you need to open it up and recap it. You need to solder new capacitors onto it.

Speaker 2:
[37:06] I also think, aside from the capacitors, our screen on that thing is like busted.

Speaker 1:
[37:11] I don't believe that anymore.

Speaker 2:
[37:14] You think it's just the capacitors?

Speaker 1:
[37:15] I think the capacitors make it so that it seems like the screen's busted. Okay. Then here's Sonic Triple Trouble. Yeah. We had the giant-ass battery pack. Also, that's another thing. I bet you there's AAAs that were in here or AAs that were in here that got all exploded.

Speaker 2:
[37:31] Probably, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[37:33] Then this was like something you charged, this battery pack.

Speaker 2:
[37:36] Yeah, because the only way to play Game Gear was with a battery pack because those things died.

Speaker 1:
[37:40] This thing died very quick. This was definitely much worse than the Game Boy.

Speaker 2:
[37:46] Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[37:47] It had a cool color screen, but the games were bad. Largely terrible games.

Speaker 2:
[37:53] Most, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[37:54] The only good one was Sonic Chaos. And I played a baseball game on here all the time for some reason.

Speaker 2:
[37:58] Yeah. No, because that's all we had.

Speaker 1:
[38:00] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[38:01] Yeah, no, I mean.

Speaker 1:
[38:02] Oh, no, we had a...

Speaker 2:
[38:03] We have all these games.

Speaker 1:
[38:05] Well, now we do.

Speaker 2:
[38:06] Some of these were original games.

Speaker 1:
[38:08] Yeah, well, growing up, we had Sonic Chaos, Sonic 2, the MLB game, and this one, Tom and Jerry. That's the one. Tom and Jerry, not good.

Speaker 2:
[38:18] Well, that X-Men game I've played, that game sucks.

Speaker 1:
[38:21] The Majors Pro Baseball. Also G-Lock.

Speaker 2:
[38:25] G-Lock, yes. G-Lock.

Speaker 1:
[38:26] G-Lock was like a first-person flight game.

Speaker 2:
[38:30] There's like a Genesis version of G-Lock that's apparently much better.

Speaker 1:
[38:34] I never knew that.

Speaker 2:
[38:35] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[38:36] But no, we did have... We used to pass off between the Game Boy and the Game Gear, and I liked it at the time.

Speaker 2:
[38:44] Look, I'm sure if we got that fixed, like Sonic Chaos at least would still be fun to play. And who knows? Maybe there are other Game Gear games out there that are enjoyable. I'm reading the Wikipedia page for Sonic Triple Trouble, the game we're supposed to be talking about, and they're saying it reviewed fairly well for a Game Gear game, but I just don't remember... I don't have as much fond memories for it as I do Sonic Chaos. Maybe that's because we got it later, but even when I got it and I played it, I've played it in emulators, it doesn't hit the same feeling, too.

Speaker 1:
[39:22] I mean, I was going to say, Sonic Chaos is a great Game Gear game, but again, you have the same issue where Sonic is huge. So it still doesn't play that good. But I like the world of Sonic Chaos. Sonic Triple Trouble, it looks kind of good. The levels look cool. This looks stylized. Was this after Chaos?

Speaker 2:
[39:39] It was after Chaos.

Speaker 1:
[39:40] Okay, it seems like a sequel type game.

Speaker 2:
[39:42] So in Japan, Sonic Chaos is known as Sonic and Tails. So in Japan, this is known as Sonic and Tails 2.

Speaker 1:
[39:48] Okay, so it is a sequel.

Speaker 2:
[39:50] Yeah, there does exist, and apparently this is very good, a fan remake of Sonic Triple Trouble in the Sonic 3 engine.

Speaker 1:
[40:04] Oh, I love that.

Speaker 2:
[40:06] Yes, and they re-write it to be in canon and take place after the events of Sonic 3. So I feel like if you're going to play this game, it is available for Windows, Mac OS, and Android. Maybe play that.

Speaker 1:
[40:25] The, this fan remake is available on, on all of this platform, you just said. Yes. The original Sonic Triple Trouble, the official one, is not anywhere anymore. Doesn't seem like you can get it at all. No.

Speaker 2:
[40:41] They have re-released it for like the 3DS and like a couple of other like handheld systems here and there, but like it's really hard to, actually is it in Sonic Origins?

Speaker 1:
[40:55] I don't think so. The mod, the Sonic Triple Trouble 16-bit, I think it's called. That looks sick as hell. 12 Game Gear games. Hold up. 12 Game Gear games? Yeah. Play 12 classic Sonic Game Gear titles.

Speaker 2:
[41:16] It is included in Sonic Origins Plus.

Speaker 1:
[41:19] Okay. Sonic Origins is great.

Speaker 2:
[41:23] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[41:23] I do like Sonic Origins a lot.

Speaker 2:
[41:25] It's a very good collection.

Speaker 1:
[41:27] It does have a mode where you could play as like Amy, and the little fucking guy with the blond, he glides.

Speaker 2:
[41:39] Oh, Ray the Squirrel.

Speaker 1:
[41:42] Ray the Squirrel.

Speaker 2:
[41:43] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[41:44] There's a mode where you could play Sonic 3, and every time you die, it gives you a new character.

Speaker 2:
[41:49] Yeah, but that's, so those are essentially remakes of the original Genesis games. If you're going to play Sonic Triple Trouble in Sonic Origins, that is just an emulated version of the game.

Speaker 1:
[41:58] Right, right. If you want an official one, way to play it, that's great. Yeah. The mod looks really cool, though.

Speaker 2:
[42:05] Yeah. I thought I had it, but I think I have another Sonic game that is a fan mod. But I might just get this.

Speaker 1:
[42:13] We have Sonic Origins?

Speaker 2:
[42:15] Yes. No, I'm talking about the 16-bit.

Speaker 1:
[42:18] Oh, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[42:19] It's not a trouble.

Speaker 1:
[42:20] I'm going to do that. Yeah. Thanks for watching the backlog. Goodbye.

Speaker 2:
[42:23] Bye.

Speaker 1:
[42:27] All right. Tell me about the Bafta Awards.

Speaker 2:
[42:30] The Bafta Awards. Bafta is the British Academy of Film, Television, and Arts. They have their version of the Oscars every year, but they also do their own game awards. They're considered the last of the big five video game ceremonies, and they had their Game of the Year awards the other day. And surprise, surprise, Clare Obscura Expedition 33, one Game of the Year.

Speaker 1:
[42:58] Wow.

Speaker 2:
[43:00] I believe this makes Clare Obscura like one of the most awarded, what was it? This is the second time a game has won all of the big five game awards other than Baldur's Gate III.

Speaker 1:
[43:20] Oh, well, that was pretty recent too, though.

Speaker 2:
[43:22] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[43:23] Death Stranding 2 on the Beach won artistic achievement. That's how I knew that there was even a Bafta award, because I saw that news.

Speaker 2:
[43:32] Dispatch won best animation and audio achievement. The best British game was Atomfall because remember, these are Brits.

Speaker 1:
[43:40] Never heard of Atomfall. I have.

Speaker 2:
[43:43] Have I played it? No.

Speaker 1:
[43:45] It's just a shooter.

Speaker 2:
[43:47] Best debut game, Claire Obscure, best evolving game, No Man's Sky, best family game, Lego Party. Game Beyond Entertainment, Despelote. Do I know what that means?

Speaker 1:
[44:02] I've seen this.

Speaker 2:
[44:03] Do I know what Game Beyond Entertainment means?

Speaker 1:
[44:05] Oh, no.

Speaker 2:
[44:06] Is that like Games for Impact? Like that nebulous category that kind of changes every year?

Speaker 1:
[44:11] It must be.

Speaker 2:
[44:12] Game design, blueprints, multiplayer, art creators, best music, Ghost of Yote, best narrative, Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, best new IP, South of Midnight, best performance in a leading role, Jennifer English from Claire Obscure, best performer in a supporting role, Jeffrey Wright from Dispatch, best technical achievement, Ghost of Yote, and that's it.

Speaker 1:
[44:36] I like how quick this Bafta Awards is.

Speaker 2:
[44:39] Well, okay. I feel like, because we talked about this before, the Game Awards should not be the end all be all of the video game award shows, because they often get it wrong and do weird choices and things like that. And by highlighting other game awards, like DICE and Bafta and whatnot, when we remember to do it, I think shows a more wide breadth of what's out there.

Speaker 1:
[45:03] It also seems like more of an achievement. Like the game awards feels like...

Speaker 2:
[45:12] The game awards feels like the MTV Movie Awards, where it's like a party and it's like kind of fun and it's very like, you know, high...

Speaker 1:
[45:21] The focus doesn't seem to be on the awards themselves. And the awards that are given out, it feels like Geoff Keighley and friends patting each other on the back.

Speaker 2:
[45:30] It definitely does.

Speaker 1:
[45:34] Anyway. Stop killing games. Tell me why... What updates do we have here?

Speaker 2:
[45:42] Stop killing games. The initiative dedicated to preventing game termination and subsequent inaccessibility has made its case for getting a new regulation in the European Parliament and the message seems to have been heard. Committee of Vice Chair Nils Yusakovas, sure, summarized the 45-minute stop killing games hearing available to watch in full on YouTube nicely when he said, today we've had the opportunity to understand directly from the organizers, experts and stakeholders about various challenges that arise when video games become unplayable after sale due to discontinued services or disabled access. This initiative highlights a real concern for millions. As far as we understand, for the presentations, and sorry, from the presentations, probably hundreds of millions of European citizens, ensuring that digital purchases remain functional and that consumer rights are respected in the evolving digital landscape. Basically, they went to the European Parliament, the government for the entire European Union said, we want these companies to stop killing games, made their case in the European Parliament. And they were like, oh, you're right, they need to stop killing games.

Speaker 1:
[46:51] So they acknowledged it.

Speaker 2:
[46:52] They acknowledged it and they put out a good argument and they heard it and they understand the situation. I think that's the big thing is like getting the government to understand your problem.

Speaker 1:
[47:03] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[47:03] Because we can't get our government to understand anything, regardless of who's in power. So I think this is a big step forward to them getting their mission to the finish line.

Speaker 1:
[47:14] Yeah, that's very good. I was not expecting it to be recognized, honestly. I was expecting it to be him telling the Parliament and then them being like, all right, good, yeah, right, let's move on to the next.

Speaker 2:
[47:26] I mean, well, they got enough signatures for the Parliament to hear it. So they had to hear it. And I think the way they presented the argument was, I guess, compelling enough and simple enough for them to understand that this is a widespread issue. This doesn't happen anywhere else. Ross Scott, the organizer of it, said, if you bought a book in a store, the publisher cannot come into your home and take your book back at will. Which is the central argument of it.

Speaker 1:
[47:53] Yep.

Speaker 2:
[47:54] So, and they understand.

Speaker 1:
[47:57] This is an American going to the European Union to get something done. Yes. Because he can't get it done in America.

Speaker 2:
[48:03] Right.

Speaker 1:
[48:05] That should upset everybody.

Speaker 2:
[48:06] It should. I think he's very clear that he understands that sometimes it's not possible. And we're not trying to get every game to run forever. It's just when the expectation is low, when you buy a game with your money, you should be able to play that game.

Speaker 1:
[48:29] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[48:30] Period. And like the developers can't, or publishers more specifically, can't just one day out of the blue say, you can't play this game anymore, buy the next one. Because imagine, imagine if when Man of Tomorrow comes out, Warner Brothers just goes, you know what? You can't watch Superman. You have to go see the new movie.

Speaker 1:
[48:52] My, I mean, obviously, this is a major issue. And it would be great if every game that is sunsetted, if they open it up so that people can have private servers on the games that are like, let's say it's a multiplayer only game.

Speaker 2:
[49:12] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[49:12] And if they shut down the game, let it open it up. Yeah. Like that should be, if I buy the game, I should be able to play the game. And I should be able to do whatever I want with it for as long as I want. Right. I am always thinking about the right to repair and our ownership of the software and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and how you can't just make a backup of the game. Yeah. Like, it says you can, but also you can't use circumvention software, which is what the copying is. So you're really, you are allowed, but it depends on the judge, whether or not you are allowed or not. There's no clear definition of that. So I'm always thinking about how we can get something to be done about that, how we can change the Digital Millennium Copyright Act to do something with that. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act, you can try to add amendments every three years. I think they did it maybe a year ago, two years ago. Maybe I should look into it. Maybe they're going to have amendments soon. But what do I got to go to fucking the European Union to get something to be done about it?

Speaker 2:
[50:25] Yeah. But I mean, I feel like this isn't like hardware where the EU says you have to put USB-C cables and everything. That kind of has to be done for all territories. It's just easier to manufacture. This is more of a software-based issue.

Speaker 1:
[50:42] So you're saying they could limit it to just Europe.

Speaker 2:
[50:44] I could see a future where they limit it to just Europe.

Speaker 1:
[50:49] Well, yeah, I mean, well, so like the easiest analogy is a game that is online and it shuts down and we want the servers to be local, like open. You can open your own servers. What's stopping you from just connecting to a European server?

Speaker 2:
[51:11] I mean, technically nothing, but like not everyone has that ability. You know, not everyone knows to get a VPN and like connect it to a server and, you know, do that stuff.

Speaker 1:
[51:24] Hopefully you don't need a VPN to connect to a, I mean, they could lock it down and nobody will stop them, I guess. I believe you are already allowed to make a copy of a game for own use in the EU. In the Netherlands, it is called the Theuscopy, Theuscopy. That's a good point. They're going to have a completely different digital blood and copyright act than what we have.

Speaker 2:
[51:47] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[51:48] So it literally is our own problem. The right to repair is a uniquely American problem.

Speaker 2:
[51:57] Yeah. Sonic Galactic, that's the other Sonic game I was thinking of. It's not Sonic Triple Trouble. It's like a fan game. It's more like a sequel to Sonic Mania, I would say.

Speaker 1:
[52:11] Whenever I go to... There was something I would always go to a URL during the podcast, and it would always bring up a Sonic fan game. They would auto-fill to always a calculator. No, that didn't work. There's a Sonic fan game that would always come up. It's not Sonic Galactic. Anyway, more news. Fortnite adds karaoke.

Speaker 2:
[52:48] Where are my notes?

Speaker 1:
[52:49] Bob, did you watch the Stop Killing Games court hearing? We just fucking read the article.

Speaker 2:
[52:58] Pirate Software. This is related to Stop Killing Games. I know he kind of disappeared and fell out of favor because he was critical of Stop Killing Games.

Speaker 1:
[53:07] That's not why. That's part of why.

Speaker 2:
[53:09] I was gonna say, that can't be the only reason. That was most definitely the start, but like...

Speaker 1:
[53:17] I don't think that was the start. I think this, literally, the biggest reason everybody hates Pirate Software is because he fucked up a WoW raid and took no credit for... He took no responsibility for fucking it up. That's the catalyst for everybody hating him. I'm not kidding.

Speaker 2:
[53:37] Okay, that's...

Speaker 1:
[53:39] I deep dove on this.

Speaker 2:
[53:41] That's objectively dumber than hating him for disagreeing with you on policy.

Speaker 1:
[53:47] Yeah. I mean, that was, I think, more egregious, yes.

Speaker 2:
[53:52] Yes, definitely. But like, I feel like if you have a controversial opinion on, like, a policy matter about video games, that's not enough to run you out of town, you know?

Speaker 1:
[54:05] He is also, I mean, fucking up a wow raid and not taking responsibility for it.

Speaker 2:
[54:10] No, that's just being a douchebag.

Speaker 1:
[54:12] It destroyed him. He was getting, like, 20,000 viewers concurrently on his live streams.

Speaker 2:
[54:18] I wouldn't stop seeing his face pop up in YouTube shorts ever.

Speaker 1:
[54:22] It is the power of just talking confidently, because the very first YouTube short I saw of Pirate Software was him talking about blowing up on YouTube shorts, saying, all you have to do on YouTube shorts is turn off the Give Notifications to Subscriber tab. Just turn that off.

Speaker 2:
[54:44] Don't give it to subscribers.

Speaker 1:
[54:45] That button doesn't exist. That's not a thing.

Speaker 2:
[54:49] I remember.

Speaker 1:
[54:50] I showed it to somebody at YouTube and they went, that's not a thing. It doesn't work. That was the very first thing I saw of him, and it was just wrong.

Speaker 2:
[55:00] Right. I saw one, you want to talk about speaking confidently. He basically taught you how to commit insurance fraud.

Speaker 1:
[55:07] There was a woman, it plays pirates all through, and then it's a woman going, actually, that's just insurance fraud and backs it all off.

Speaker 2:
[55:14] If you ever go to the hospital, just don't pay it. Because what happens is, they put it in a file, and it gets written as a write-off, so you don't have to pay anything. Not how write-offs work.

Speaker 1:
[55:23] No.

Speaker 2:
[55:24] They keep sending you the bill.

Speaker 1:
[55:26] Yeah. But he went through hell after the wow-rate thing, and I was like, can we give this guy a fucking rest, dude? It's like too much.

Speaker 2:
[55:37] But now-

Speaker 1:
[55:37] It's one thing to not like him, it's another thing to dog-pile on him, just because he wouldn't take responsibility for a wow-rate. Just leave him alone and just ignore him.

Speaker 2:
[55:47] Well, now they dog-pile on him for having an unpopular opinion on a very popular subject matter.

Speaker 1:
[55:53] Yes, yes. So- Just leave him alone. Just look the other way. You don't got to spew a hatred his way, just because he fucked up a wow-rate and wants you to commit insurance fraud.

Speaker 2:
[56:08] Anyway, Fortnite karaoke. Fortnite Festival mode just leveled up in the most unexpected way possible. Epic Games is adding full microphone vocal support to Fortnite Festival transforming the rock band-like mode into something that actually represents karaoke. And to launch the new season, it is bringing in jazz pop star Laufey as its featured artist.

Speaker 1:
[56:31] I thought this was a one-piece thing.

Speaker 2:
[56:35] Me too. I didn't know Laufey was a pop star, because I'm pushing 40.

Speaker 1:
[56:41] I also didn't know... I was watching Coachella last weekend and I didn't know a single person until David Byrne came on. And then I was like, look, Hannah, David Byrne. And she said, I'm going to bed. I also didn't know that there wasn't singing in Fortnite Festival.

Speaker 2:
[56:55] Me neither. But not only is there singing now, alongside karaoke, the update introduces a pro drum option, allowing players to plug in a Rockman 4 or other compatible MIDI drum kit and play along properly. And in a quality of life tweak that's long overdue, players will now be able to move while playing instruments in other Fortnite modes, rather than being rooted to the spot the moment they pick up the guitar.

Speaker 1:
[57:21] You can do this on a keyboard, apparently.

Speaker 2:
[57:23] So basically, Rockman's back.

Speaker 1:
[57:26] This literally looks like Rockman.

Speaker 2:
[57:28] It's literally just Rockman, because Epic owns Harmonix now. They bought Harmonix to put Fortnite Festival in the game, and they started with the guitar, now they're doing drums and vocals. So yeah, Rockman's back.

Speaker 1:
[57:39] That's pretty sick. This Reddit post says, can't wait for Cracked to make the drum set.

Speaker 2:
[57:46] It's true.

Speaker 1:
[57:48] That's sick.

Speaker 2:
[57:50] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[57:51] Will I play this? Who knows?

Speaker 2:
[57:53] No, definitely not. But it's nice to know it's there.

Speaker 1:
[57:56] I mean, I went through a Clone Hero phase like last year. Right. There needs to be like an official always evolving library of music that you can play with. Clone Hero is all download songs illegally. So, having something like...

Speaker 2:
[58:19] Well, I mean, that was Rock Band 4, but they shut that down. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. And I guess now it's Fortnite Festival.

Speaker 1:
[58:25] And that, you know what? That's fun.

Speaker 2:
[58:27] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[58:27] Give me something. More news, former PlayStation lead on why he was fired. This is Shuhei Yoshida.

Speaker 2:
[58:36] Yes. Speaking during an Alt Games panel, an Australian video game festival, Shuhei Yoshida recounted his career and shared that he was fired from his role by Jim Ryan because he didn't listen to him. Shuhei then continued, he asked me to do something ridiculous and I said, no. I helped Sony Santa Monica make God of War, Naughty Dog, make Uncharted and The Last of Us and Sucker Punch to make the beautiful Ghost of Tsushima. Ghost of Tsushima was one of the last games that I worked on as president of Worldwide Studios. But in 2019, after 11 years leading the first party development, I was fired from the role. Jim Ryan wanted to remove me from first party because I didn't listen to him. He asked to do something ridiculous and I said no.

Speaker 1:
[59:22] So that's all he said. I read more.

Speaker 2:
[59:24] He didn't go into details or specifics. He wasn't like...

Speaker 1:
[59:27] Because I wanted to know. Yeah. I tried to see more information because that's very juicy.

Speaker 2:
[59:33] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[59:33] But no, he didn't reveal anything.

Speaker 2:
[59:35] He wasn't... Also too, he wasn't outright fired and left the company. He wasn't president of Worldwide Studios anymore. He was replaced by Herman Holst.

Speaker 1:
[59:45] And then he moved to...

Speaker 2:
[59:45] He moved to like... I forgot what his official... Yeah. It was like the Indie Games fellow or whatever. And he was very successful in that role too.

Speaker 1:
[59:52] Yeah. Because he loved Indie games. Everybody at the company knew they liked Indie games. And he was successful in ushering in Indie games for PlayStation. And now he has his own company. Okay. And he basically helps. He's basically like a publisher for Indie games.

Speaker 2:
[60:12] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[60:13] So he's probably doing very well for himself.

Speaker 2:
[60:17] Jim Ryan, for those of you who don't remember, he was the president and CEO and chairman of Sony Interactive Entertainment from 2019 to 2024. He's the guy who said Sony is going to go all in on live service games.

Speaker 1:
[60:31] A lot of people are attributing him for the downfall of current AAA Sony games.

Speaker 2:
[60:37] I would say that's fair because you can't just... Just because you have a new guy in charge doesn't mean overnight things are going to change. There's probably a lot of stuff in motion right now that they have to course correct or see to the finish line.

Speaker 1:
[60:52] I think Yoshida understood creativity a little more.

Speaker 2:
[60:58] Creativity and also too what audiences actually wanted. They actually wanted these single-player narrative experiences, not endless multiplayer slot.

Speaker 1:
[61:11] There is a tweet that I saw from him. It's very strange. He was tweeted at by just a random Twitter user. Okay. That said, he wrote this in Japanese, Shusan. That sounds really strange. The part about you getting fired for refusing Jim Ryan's quote, weird stuff. It's out of place to air something like that in that way. It doesn't do your legacy or PlayStation any good. And then Shuhei Yoshida responded and said, you're right. Thanks for the advice. I thought that was really bizarre.

Speaker 2:
[61:44] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[61:45] Cause like, no, good for you. It's been years.

Speaker 2:
[61:49] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[61:50] Like air it out. You didn't even say anything that bad. You were literally, you were fine. It's the truth. You just told the truth, man.

Speaker 2:
[61:56] You can like bad mouth your boss if he was a bad boss.

Speaker 1:
[61:59] I wouldn't even consider that bad mouth thing if you're telling the truth. Yeah. You're not saying that he was a bad guy. You're just saying, he wanted you to do something and I refused to do it.

Speaker 2:
[62:12] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[62:13] Although you did say, he wanted me to do something stupid. him. Jim Ryan is not there anymore either, right? No. Go nuts with it then. Yeah. Shuhei Yoshida also says that they were very good friends. I think he said something along the lines of, we basically didn't respect each other because we were too close to each other, which I completely understand. Anyway, we love Shuhei Yoshida. YouTuber constructs Nintendo's first arcade cabinet, reconstructs Nintendo's first arcade cabinet.

Speaker 2:
[62:47] So this is a long one. I'm going to try and summarize it as best I can. The Nintendo's first arcade video game was Wild Gunman. The way Wild Gunman worked was it wasn't like a traditional video game the way we think of it. It was live action video footage that you interacted with via a light gun. The live action video game footage was recorded.

Speaker 1:
[63:12] Sorry.

Speaker 2:
[63:13] It was recorded with film stock. So like 16-millimeter film that degraded over time. So not many copies of the arcade version of Wild Gunman exist anymore. However, a Canadian arcade repairman and YouTuber, what's his name? Kaelin74xxBrown found copies of the film stock for Wild Gunman, intact, bought them at auction, and then using the patents from the original Wild Gunman arcade game, reverse engineered it to recreate the system.

Speaker 1:
[63:53] That is insane.

Speaker 2:
[63:54] It's nuts. He digitized the footage.

Speaker 1:
[63:57] I was going to say, you got to copy this shit.

Speaker 2:
[63:59] Yeah. So now it's running on, it's not a true one-to-one, so it's digitized footage now, but he has the original film stock.

Speaker 1:
[64:05] So that is crazy. So this is their first arcade cabinet.

Speaker 2:
[64:10] This is their first arcade cabinet, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[64:12] On its 50th anniversary, so it's been 50 years. That is insane. I played a game like this. I guess it wasn't this one. There was a Full Motion Video Wild West game that was popular.

Speaker 2:
[64:25] Yeah. It's not Lethal Enforcer, but I know what you're talking about.

Speaker 1:
[64:31] I can't imagine this being on film because you shoot, and then it plays another video.

Speaker 2:
[64:37] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[64:37] It has to move to it. I guess it moves to a different reel then. Yeah. And if you don't shoot, then it keeps playing the same reel.

Speaker 2:
[64:45] This article goes into detail, like how it worked. I very much summarized it.

Speaker 1:
[64:52] Right. I mean, just watch the video.

Speaker 2:
[64:54] Yeah. Two simultaneous film reel projectors, using two simultaneous film reel projectors, Light Gun Western, would alternate between the reels, depending on where you shot, triggering a winning or losing state.

Speaker 1:
[65:06] There you go.

Speaker 2:
[65:07] Yeah. Making the game, Gung Pae Yokoi, creator of the Game Boy, requested Fuji use Tetoran, a polyester mix that could be more durable. That said, Yokoi still believed it would begin to wear out after a thousand play sessions, never mind just the attract mode. So yeah, it would degrade over time.

Speaker 1:
[65:28] That's crazy. Yeah. So it's over on 74XX Arcade Repair, that YouTube channel.

Speaker 2:
[65:35] Yes. And he said he wants to start showcasing it and bringing it on tour and stuff.

Speaker 1:
[65:43] Ooh, bring that to Too Many Games.

Speaker 2:
[65:44] Yes. He is Canadian, so might be an issue.

Speaker 1:
[65:48] It's very big. The arcade cabinet is huge.

Speaker 2:
[65:50] Yeah. But this is games preservation.

Speaker 1:
[65:57] This is games.

Speaker 2:
[65:57] Nintendo would never.

Speaker 1:
[65:59] No, and it's their own thing. Yeah. Put this on Nintendo Switch Online. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[66:02] No, you probably get the NES version of Wild Gunman, which is a completely different thing.

Speaker 1:
[66:08] Polymega, remember her? We played with it.

Speaker 2:
[66:13] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[66:14] At E3.

Speaker 2:
[66:15] 2019, you had the last E3?

Speaker 1:
[66:17] That was 2019?

Speaker 2:
[66:18] Is it, I think it was 2019.

Speaker 1:
[66:21] We had a lot of, we were very skeptical of this thing, because at the time, they were lying about the Sega Saturn gameplay or something. It was like, found out that it was like an emulator.

Speaker 2:
[66:32] Yeah. It was very, it was very weird. Cause like, well, the big deal was the Sega Saturn emulation, cause it hadn't really been done before. And they were like, not really truthful. Like what it was, like the trailers used different footage, like wasn't true Saturn emulation. Also too, like the gimmick was the CD player was the base station and then you can slot in different modules for like NES, SNES. They said it was all going to be FPGA, but that would obviously be too fucking expensive. So they switched to software emulation. That was a whole hoopla or whatever. Now Polymega manufacturer Playmagi has announced the long promised Polymega remix to be released next month alongside the Polymega app.

Speaker 1:
[67:18] So did the Polymega release? The one that we play? Yes.

Speaker 2:
[67:23] That was, however, it was released in 2021.

Speaker 1:
[67:27] I never knew that.

Speaker 2:
[67:28] Me neither. However, the company has been continuing to suffer from stock issues and some players found the $450 price too high for what was essentially an emulation device.

Speaker 1:
[67:40] Maybe that's why I didn't get it.

Speaker 2:
[67:41] Polymega remix is...

Speaker 1:
[67:42] And then you have to buy the module.

Speaker 2:
[67:44] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[67:44] The 450 for the base and the modules are extra.

Speaker 2:
[67:46] Polymega remix is Play Magi's attempt to address both of these problems, offering a lower cost device which it says has already completed mass production and is on its way to our facilities from our own factories overseas. Remix is priced at $200 and features the same support for CD titles and the emulation modules, but instead connects to other devices, starting with Windows PCs and handheld devices and uses their processing power to run its emulators through the free Polymega app. Players connect the Polymega remix to their PCs, laptop or handheld such as the ROG Ally via USB, then rip their cartridges and disks to its storage. They can then disconnect the remix and use the Polymega app to play the games. Pre-orders for the Polymega remix are available now, and Play Magi expects to start shipping units out in May. The app will also be free to download from the Polymega website in May.

Speaker 1:
[68:48] They have a picture of it plugged into a Steam Deck.

Speaker 2:
[68:50] Yes. That functionality, they said, is coming much later.

Speaker 1:
[68:54] Oh.

Speaker 2:
[68:55] It's going to start on Windows PC.

Speaker 1:
[68:57] Okay. I am significantly more interested that you can rip games to a Windows computer. That is insane. So, that would get me to want to buy different modules.

Speaker 2:
[69:11] I mean, so the modules are for like cartridge games.

Speaker 1:
[69:14] Yeah. Yeah. So, it comes with a CD drive. Remember, we talked about this last, actually it was on the bonus episode last week. Yes. I talked about how there should be a CD drive that can rip all the different classic games. Yeah. So, what can this base unit play?

Speaker 2:
[69:30] PlayStation 1, Sega Saturn, Sega CD, Neo Geo CD, TurboGrafx CD. That's it.

Speaker 1:
[69:40] Fuck. I want Dreamcast, I want Gamecube.

Speaker 2:
[69:43] I know, you want everything after that. You want everything after that.

Speaker 1:
[69:45] PS2, that's so annoying. I know, I know.

Speaker 2:
[69:47] It's all the stuff we don't want to play.

Speaker 1:
[69:49] Yeah, that sucks. But, okay, I'm less interested now.

Speaker 2:
[69:55] It's a start.

Speaker 1:
[69:56] It's a start.

Speaker 2:
[69:57] You know, it's a start.

Speaker 1:
[69:59] I was emailed about this.

Speaker 2:
[70:00] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[70:01] I said I am interested specifically in the N64 and Super Nintendo modules.

Speaker 2:
[70:08] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[70:10] I haven't heard back. But they emailed me last week, so I'm assuming we will probably get our hands on this. Okay.

Speaker 2:
[70:15] I mean, look, the CD ripping alone, I think, is interesting because CD ripping games is not easy, especially Dreamcast, GameCube, PS2, whatnot, because those are like...

Speaker 1:
[70:29] We have, I think, one game. I think we have a Sylphied that we can rip.

Speaker 2:
[70:35] Well, no, we have PS1 games.

Speaker 1:
[70:36] Oh, PS1.

Speaker 2:
[70:37] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[70:39] Fine. We have Mega Man X4. We didn't have a PS1.

Speaker 2:
[70:44] We didn't have a PS1. We had to go back and like...

Speaker 1:
[70:47] Mega Man X4 was in a drawer at GameStop, like in the bottom of a drawer. And I just stole it. And Sylphied, I don't know why I got it. I thought it looked cool.

Speaker 2:
[70:58] I don't know why you have Sylphied either.

Speaker 1:
[71:01] And then that's it.

Speaker 2:
[71:03] What do we have on PS1? I can look it up.

Speaker 1:
[71:06] We also have, don't we have the Star Wars Arcade for the 32X?

Speaker 2:
[71:14] Yes, I don't know if it can rip. You need the Genesis module for that. We have, for the PlayStation, one, Tony Hawk, one and two, Spider-Man, Mission Impossible, Metal Gear Solid.

Speaker 1:
[71:32] What the fuck?

Speaker 2:
[71:34] Why wouldn't we have Metal Gear Solid?

Speaker 1:
[71:36] Because we didn't have a PlayStation. And that game is expensive.

Speaker 2:
[71:39] Not when I got it. Mega Man X4, Mega Man X6, Final Fantasy VII, and 007 Tomorrow Never Dies. Not a great collection.

Speaker 1:
[71:50] I'm shocked we even have that many games.

Speaker 2:
[71:53] Not a great collection. I wanted...

Speaker 1:
[71:55] We still do not have a PlayStation 1.

Speaker 2:
[71:57] No.

Speaker 1:
[71:57] But we have all of those games.

Speaker 2:
[71:58] We don't need one because we have a PS3, not pictured, and a PS2. I wanted Resident Evil 2 because I see it at every convention, but I'm not paying $70 for it.

Speaker 1:
[72:11] We have Mega Man X, by the way. I need to rip that because I have the PAL version as a ROM for some reason. Yeah, I need to fix that. It's 50 grams per second. MGS isn't that expensive.

Speaker 2:
[72:28] It's not.

Speaker 1:
[72:28] We're gonna look it up right now.

Speaker 2:
[72:29] When I got it, I think it was like $10. $10, which makes sense. It doesn't make any sense to me that Resident Evil 2 is $70. It's one of the most common games on the system.

Speaker 1:
[72:40] It's $40, Metal Gear Solid, on eBay. So at a convention, it's gonna be 60 or more. Actually, the greatest hits one is $30.

Speaker 2:
[72:51] Do I have the greatest hits one? Where are our PlayStation 1 games? Over there. Hold on a second, I might still have the price tag.

Speaker 1:
[72:58] Okay. So, I'm gonna hopefully be able to try out the Polymega, but I'm gonna need some games to rip, because that's the biggest, that's, I mean, I don't really want to have to play games on my computer, but I would love the option to rip them.

Speaker 2:
[73:17] It doesn't have the price tag on it. Well, I think, you know, you rip them, and then you have the file. And if you can, I mean, they're saying you gotta play it through the Polymega app, but, like, theoretically, you could get it off there and put it on MU-DAC or whatever the hell.

Speaker 1:
[73:34] That's my goal. Mr. Sandman says, lossless scaling can fix the PAL 50Hz. I have the game. I could just rip it. I have to install lossless scaling on every device that I have? When I could just rip the... I could just get a new ROM? I have the ROM. Anyway. Whole trailer for the Street Fighter 6 movie. Street Fighter... Street Fighter.

Speaker 2:
[74:00] Street Fighter! Yeah, so we had, like, the Game Awards preview, but now we have, like, the full trailer that actually tells us what's going on in the movie.

Speaker 1:
[74:09] Very silly and whimsical.

Speaker 2:
[74:11] Silly, very whimsical. Like, but this is Street Fighter. Man, like, this is what it is. Like, this is what it looks like. This is what the vibe is.

Speaker 1:
[74:21] I've heard people say this is much better than having a dark, gritty, like, option. Because it is silly. It should be silly.

Speaker 2:
[74:28] How are you- I tell you how you do, like, a serious Street Fighter. That's the legend of Chun-Li. And that movie is ass.

Speaker 1:
[74:35] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[74:35] So the fact that this, like, looks like Street Fighter or feels like Street Fighter, it's keeping it light and upbeat, but still kind of cool at the same time. Like, it gets the balancing act right. So I'm, like, super excited for this movie. Like, I'm, like, tempted to actually see it in a movie theater.

Speaker 1:
[74:54] I'm a little interested, but I still don't think it's going to be good.

Speaker 2:
[74:57] I genuinely said this to my friends. No matter how this turns out, if it's going to be a good movie or a bad movie, I do think this is going to be an all-timer.

Speaker 1:
[75:06] Because it's a video game movie?

Speaker 2:
[75:08] No, because this is either going to be really, really good or really, really bad.

Speaker 1:
[75:13] Oh, okay. Okay. I understand. Yeah. Like a Mario, 90s Mario movie type situation.

Speaker 2:
[75:20] Like a Street Fighter 94 movie type. I don't think it's going to be as bad as that movie. But I'm more excited for this than I am Mortal Kombat 2. And I was a bigger Mortal Kombat fan. Because I feel like the first Mortal Kombat movie, not the first one, but the one from a couple years ago, was fine, but it didn't really excite me in any real way. Like this looks genuinely exciting and fun. So I'm here for it.

Speaker 1:
[75:54] First Light theme and intro revealed. For James Bond. Which we can't play.

Speaker 2:
[75:59] Which we can't play.

Speaker 1:
[76:00] Lana Del Rey did it.

Speaker 2:
[76:01] Yes. So Lana Del Rey just dropped the theme for 007 First Light, which is a very big get for this game. Lana Del Rey is like who you would get to do the movie theme.

Speaker 1:
[76:15] No.

Speaker 2:
[76:16] You don't think so?

Speaker 1:
[76:16] I think she fell off. And that's why they got her for the video game. That's what I think.

Speaker 2:
[76:22] I mean, look, not in my wheelhouse of musical acts I keep up with, but from what I've heard of her, she could very much do a Bond theme.

Speaker 1:
[76:31] Yeah, 10 years ago. So mean.

Speaker 2:
[76:37] And like, this is a legit very good Bond theme. It is better than the last two movie Bond themes. There I said it. And then IO Interactive showed the intro cinematic, which is just like the fucking movie intro cinematics. It's like down to the frame, like pitch perfect. So, good shit.

Speaker 1:
[77:01] I'll, I haven't watched it. Not to watch it.

Speaker 2:
[77:04] It's very good. The song is genuinely good.

Speaker 1:
[77:06] When is the game coming out?

Speaker 2:
[77:09] May 27th. It was delayed on Switch, but it is coming out May 27th.

Speaker 1:
[77:13] I'm not getting it on Switch.

Speaker 2:
[77:14] I know you are.

Speaker 1:
[77:15] Getting it on Steam.

Speaker 2:
[77:15] I know. I was there when you pre-ordered the Collector's Edition that came with the Golden Gun. Did I pre-order it? Yes, you did.

Speaker 1:
[77:20] Where did I pre-order it?

Speaker 2:
[77:22] Well, you had to pre-order it somewhere because you got the Collector's Edition with the Golden Gun.

Speaker 1:
[77:25] No, I wanted it, but I don't remember if I actually pre-ordered it because I was afraid it wouldn't be a Steam code. And then like a week later, someone said it was the Steam code, and I don't know if I actually pulled the trigger on it.

Speaker 2:
[77:36] I mean, check your Amazon.

Speaker 1:
[77:42] 007 First Light Collector's PC.

Speaker 2:
[77:48] I assume you would have gotten it on Amazon.

Speaker 1:
[77:51] I probably would have, yes. It doesn't say anything. It would have said, like, you pre-ordered it.

Speaker 2:
[77:56] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[77:56] But I can pre-order it now. Okay. But maybe I will. What I'm going to do is I'm going to leave this in a tab, and I'm going to forget about it.

Speaker 2:
[78:04] Will it add it to your cart?

Speaker 1:
[78:05] It does have a golden gun. Yes. Wait, no. This one has a mask.

Speaker 2:
[78:15] What the frick is that mask?

Speaker 1:
[78:17] Collector's Edition. Oh, I think there's a Legacy Edition.

Speaker 2:
[78:21] Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[78:24] Legacy Edition. That's the golden go. And that's $300. The other one was $200. Legacy Edition's the good one.

Speaker 2:
[78:32] Yeah, that's the one you want.

Speaker 1:
[78:33] Yeah, baby. Yeah, platform PC. Okay. I'm going to add it to the court. Anyway, Troy Baker wants to start his own game studio.

Speaker 2:
[78:55] Where is it? Actor and musician Troy Baker, known for his work in every video game, has announced that he is exploring the possibility of opening his own game studio. Speaking to Kind of Funny Games, the veteran and prolific game actor, said he wants to tell his own stories and take a stab at making games with his own team. I want to build a team. I'm excited about building a studio with people that I've worked with, that I trust and going, here's my idea, how can we make it better? He said, as reported by GamesRadar, Baker isn't planning on starting a studio tomorrow or next week. He said he wants to avoid doing something rushed, in part because he's seen other people who have rushed into opportunities. Baker said if he starts a studio, he wants to do it right. And especially if I'm going to create a studio where other people are going to be responsible for my choices, I have to make them the right ones, he added. I think it's interesting that we don't, I mean, this article does mention another actor who got into game development. The main actor from Assassin's Creed Origins started his own game studio.

Speaker 1:
[79:56] Oh, okay.

Speaker 2:
[80:00] What's his name? Abubakar Salim, who was in Assassin's Creed Origins and created Surgeon Studios and released Tales of Kenzra Zhao in 2020.

Speaker 1:
[80:14] I don't know any of those words you just said. I was thinking, what the hell does Troy Baker know about making games as an actor? But then I remember he's in Abelian Games and has done a lot. So I'm sure he knows a lot about making games.

Speaker 2:
[80:26] I mean, in the article, he name drops all the developers he's worked with, Ken Levine, Kojima, Neil Druckmann, Todd Howard, Vince Sampella. I mean, yes, theoretically, just because you're an actor does not mean you know how to make games. But we see this all the time in movies.

Speaker 1:
[80:45] I think if you do it enough.

Speaker 2:
[80:47] Actors become producers and directors and start their own companies. It doesn't mean he's going to be at the computer.

Speaker 1:
[80:53] He's not going to be scripting in C++ or something.

Speaker 2:
[80:57] He could be the lead. He could be the face of it. He could be the producer of it. I'm surprised. I mean, I'm not surprised this doesn't happen more often because making games is fucking impossible.

Speaker 1:
[81:09] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[81:10] You can't just start a company overnight and expect to put out a game tomorrow. Vin Diesel tried doing that. And you see the games he's made. They're atrocious.

Speaker 1:
[81:20] Imagine Dragons just made a game. It's not doing too good.

Speaker 2:
[81:24] Isn't that like an older game that like they attached their names to is something?

Speaker 1:
[81:30] No, I think that they... Well, I don't know. I just saw the quote that they said they've always wanted to make a video game, so they're doing it. We're on a tile.

Speaker 2:
[81:37] What? Is that them? I think that's them.

Speaker 1:
[81:41] I just... If it's a... You can just tell. You can just tell what's an Imagine Dragons are.

Speaker 2:
[81:47] Yeah. Last Flag. That's the game.

Speaker 1:
[81:50] You have to catch the flag. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[81:52] Yeah. Okay.

Speaker 1:
[81:54] I hear... It launched and didn't do good, but I don't think they care because they just wanted to make a game. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[82:02] Which I mean, good for them.

Speaker 1:
[82:03] Good for them. Yeah. I've seen the documentary of how they made The Last of Us, and the way that they shot the movie, the way they shot the game, like it seems like Troy Baker was involved in a lot of the process, and if you multiply that by how many games he's been in, I think he probably knows a decent amount about making a game. Obviously, he doesn't know everything. He doesn't know about the coding or the injuries of the game engine and stuff.

Speaker 2:
[82:33] The art direction and things like that, and sound effects.

Speaker 1:
[82:36] You know, like you hire people to do that.

Speaker 2:
[82:38] You hire people who are good at that. You know enough people to get an idea of what to do and then take it from there. Fucking, Sydney Sweeney is a big time Hollywood producer now. She's making the fucking Gundam movie for Netflix.

Speaker 1:
[82:56] I didn't know she's...

Speaker 2:
[82:57] If you thought Scarlett Johansson as Ghost in the Shell wasn't whitewash-y enough...

Speaker 1:
[83:05] Well, are they American in Gundam Wing?

Speaker 2:
[83:11] No, I think they're supposed to be Japanese, aren't they?

Speaker 1:
[83:13] Well, in Ghost in the Shell, they are in Japan. They're in Tokyo, aren't they? But Gundam, I think, aren't they like... What are the Gundams? Oh, it's like a... Isn't it like the future where like the... It's just like the United Countries of the World or some shit? I don't know, I've never seen Gundam. I just bought a couple of Gundams, put the box on myself and never made them.

Speaker 2:
[83:42] And there's like 10 different Gundam universes.

Speaker 1:
[83:44] It's a whole new Federation. Yeah, it's like...

Speaker 2:
[83:46] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[83:48] Kingwizards says they're in space. Thank you.

Speaker 2:
[83:57] But Gundam Wing is not the same thing as Mobile Suit Gundam. Those are two different timelines.

Speaker 1:
[84:03] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2:
[84:04] But SD Gundam, I think, is part of Mobile Suit Gundam, even though that's the chibi version of Mobile Suit Gundam.

Speaker 1:
[84:13] I have never seen a single anything from Gundam Wing. I have played some games for like two seconds, arcade games. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[84:24] My knowledge of Gundam is like not great.

Speaker 1:
[84:30] Earth Federation versus Colonists. So I'm thinking they're cartoons is what they are. Last news, Build a Rocket Boy, our favorite thing to talk about. This is Mind's Eye, people.

Speaker 2:
[84:49] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[84:51] They're having a manic episode in front of everybody.

Speaker 2:
[84:55] Build a Rocket Boy can't stay out of the news. And once again, it's for reasons unrelated to Mind's Eye. The Independent Workers Union of Great Britain, representing employees at Build a Rocket Boy, has taken legal action against the company, alleging data privacy violations. The allegations stem from Build a Rocket Boy installing TerraMind surveillance software onto employee hardware without their knowledge.

Speaker 1:
[85:17] What a horrible name, TerraMind.

Speaker 2:
[85:20] TerraMind is used to track user activities such as keystrokes and screen behavior. At the time, CEO Mark Gerhardt said that it was done to see the IT team periodically try and improve security measures and that he hated, quote, the fact that they had to monitor. In an email sent to the media, the IWGB says that the recent actions by the studio regarding the software violates both data protection laws and a workforce's basic dignity, exceeding the legitimate remit to monitoring workers' productivity or safeguarding the company's security by recording individuals in their homes without their consent.

Speaker 1:
[85:58] Oh, boy.

Speaker 2:
[85:58] IWGB member and lead cinematic animator Chris Wilson called Build the Rockaboy's Culture of Security and Micromanaging one of the worst he's seen in his 20 years in the industry.

Speaker 1:
[86:11] So, I thought we were getting an update on the sabotage that was going on internally, but no, it turns out that they are.

Speaker 2:
[86:23] Well, technically, this is an update because the software they installed clandestinely on their employees' computer to catch the saboteur, they're being sued over.

Speaker 1:
[86:35] Yes. So, this was to catch the saboteur?

Speaker 2:
[86:40] I think this was... They're not saying this was to catch the saboteur, but like, come on.

Speaker 1:
[86:46] Yeah, but it was revealed that there was sabotage internally after the game released. So I would expect less work was being done after the game was released. So, it seems weird to put Tower of Mind on at that late in development, is what I'm saying.

Speaker 2:
[87:05] So, in February, Insider Gaming reported...

Speaker 1:
[87:10] Oh, wait. It can only be assumed that this software was added as a part of their effort to micromanage us, a product of their mistrust of their employees. It created an atmosphere of unease, something that doesn't lead to great game production. Okay, so that doesn't explain it.

Speaker 2:
[87:25] In February, Insider Gaming alleged that they were installing TerraMind on employees' computers in an effort to try to catch the saboteur. And so...

Speaker 1:
[87:38] They think they're still trying to sabotage them after the game came out.

Speaker 2:
[87:43] And the employees are finally like, man, fuck this. Which, good on them.

Speaker 1:
[87:49] So, this is Europe that is...

Speaker 2:
[87:51] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[87:52] Are they a great company?

Speaker 2:
[87:53] This is Great Britain.

Speaker 1:
[87:54] Are they a European company?

Speaker 2:
[87:55] I think so, yeah. But, like, England is not part of the European Union anymore. So, like, they still do things a little different.

Speaker 1:
[88:04] I was just thinking if they were an American company and they're being, like, reprimanded for, like, employees that work overseas. Because the whole thing is that the surveillance software is on computers that people are taking home.

Speaker 2:
[88:15] And, yeah. Which, like, understandably, like, companies put surveillance software on their employees' computers to, like, basically make sure they're not watching porn at work, so.

Speaker 1:
[88:25] Yeah, but, like, just look at them.

Speaker 2:
[88:27] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[88:28] Like, you don't need to have surveillance software on the computer to, like, know if they're watching porn at work. If they are watching porn at work and you can't tell, then they're doing a good job.

Speaker 2:
[88:36] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[88:37] Let them.

Speaker 2:
[88:38] So let them watch porn at work.

Speaker 1:
[88:39] Let them watch porn at work. So if you don't know about it, there's no problem. This is a picture of Lana Del Rey buying a PlayStation 5. Not Lana buying a PlayStation 5 to play First Light. And then the quote tweet is, Lana Del Rey Tracing.

Speaker 2:
[89:04] I feel like, and this is April 17th, like if she didn't have a PlayStation 5, like I'm sure IO would have sent her one, you know?

Speaker 1:
[89:13] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[89:15] So the fact that she's like buying one, that makes her a man of the people.

Speaker 1:
[89:24] They can't afford to give PlayStation out to everybody.

Speaker 2:
[89:27] That's true, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[89:28] They're raising the prices of everything.

Speaker 2:
[89:29] Yeah. I wonder if they're going to send her at least that ugly ass controller.

Speaker 1:
[89:36] Somebody in the chat earlier, when I brought up the 007 First Light Collector's Edition, somebody brought up, you can easily laser etch that gun.

Speaker 2:
[89:51] I'm sure you could.

Speaker 1:
[89:51] Maybe you can. I don't have a laser etch machine. What the fuck? I'm actually trying to laser cut a sheet metal for a keyboard.

Speaker 2:
[90:05] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[90:05] It is not an easy process. Like to send it to a company to get it done. I imagine. It's not an easy thing.

Speaker 2:
[90:12] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[90:15] Anyway, now we're going to talk to you.

Speaker 2:
[90:17] Yes. Let's start with the people who gave us money. Remember, you can give us money by going to patreon.com/wulffdenpodcast, but if you want us to talk to you, YouTube super chats and Twitch bits and all that crap. Then we're going to talk to people who have comments on last week's WULFF DEN Podcast over on the YouTube channel, youtube.com/wulffdenpodcast.

Speaker 1:
[90:37] Andre Mochito with the Nine Months, our little baby. Get it, Nine Months?

Speaker 2:
[90:41] Yeah, I get it.

Speaker 1:
[90:42] Jeffrey Sorensen, thanks for the 54 months. Hey. Hey. Snake Eater, thanks for the 12 months. An interesting thought, the regular PS5 is now the same price. I got my PS5 Pro on Black Friday, 650, crazy. Also, the only PS5 to not get a price hike is the Ghost of Yote bundle, still $600. I did hear that. That was like a hack. Yeah. You can get the Ghost of Yote bundle for cheaper.

Speaker 2:
[91:07] Well, it does, they're trying to like, you know, figure to just liquidate those, but like, you know, get that, it comes with the game.

Speaker 1:
[91:12] And it's, it's different looking, isn't it?

Speaker 2:
[91:16] Yeah, it's got like the designs on it. There's a black version and a gold version. Both of them look nice.

Speaker 1:
[91:21] Yes, those are cool. It's got the Kintsugi looking, yes, yes. That's the, that's the coolest one. So get that, it's cheaper and cooler looking. Mr. Yorch, thanks for the six months. Six months of taking my Bezos pesos. That means money. Oh. Chris BX, thanks for the 68 months. Still alive? Hello, Chris BX.

Speaker 2:
[91:44] Yep.

Speaker 1:
[91:45] How you doing? Chris BX, I started doing my own timestamps. It is miserable. I feel your pain. He used to write the timestamps. Just a pilot note, thanks for the 54 months. Yay, WULFF DEN Podcast Day. Hello. Jin Wong, thanks for the 55 months. Showing some love, LOL. Why is that funny? Snake Eater, thanks for the 100 bits. Oh, sure. But when Leroy Jenkins fucks up a wow raid, he becomes an internet legend.

Speaker 2:
[92:15] Well, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[92:17] So what Pirate Software did was he was a mage, like healing everybody. And a guy, they were in a raid and one guy said, run away. So he ran away. And then they said, no, come back. And he just kept running away and didn't say anything. And then everybody died.

Speaker 2:
[92:38] Okay.

Speaker 1:
[92:39] And that's what went wrong. So some people think he didn't do anything wrong. I think he should have communicated better.

Speaker 2:
[92:47] Yeah. Maybe had he screamed, Pirate Software.

Speaker 1:
[92:53] If he was a little sillier, a little goofier, maybe people would be less mad at him.

Speaker 2:
[93:01] Elements.

Speaker 1:
[93:04] Elements. Thank you for the eight months. Octopus. Charlie, thanks for the five months. Shazam! Thanks for the prime. Anonymous, thanks for getting us up. And is there anything on YouTube?

Speaker 2:
[93:16] There's a lot on YouTube. Demonic Brawler with the five bucks. Okay, I just got to know what y'all's opinion on the IGN review of Mouse PI for Hire Crazy, right? So I looked this up, apparently IGN gave it a six.

Speaker 1:
[93:28] I only saw a summary. Let them do whatever they want. It's their prerogative.

Speaker 2:
[93:35] I mean, the meta is like, the meta critic score is like 80. So like, I don't know if that's necessarily out of step with everybody else. I don't feel like that's as egregious as like, they gave Doom 2016 a seven when everyone else was giving it like nines and tens. So like.

Speaker 1:
[93:56] Why do you want there to be a hive mind of people saying the same thing?

Speaker 2:
[94:01] I think, I think because, specifically, this is IGN. Like, they are the biggest gaming website.

Speaker 1:
[94:07] And people hate them because they're the biggest gaming website.

Speaker 2:
[94:10] So like, they're looking for a reason like dogpile on them. Like when they're out of step with the common consensus, like it's cost for concern.

Speaker 1:
[94:17] I didn't play the game. I saw some gameplay. What they said seems legitimate. It's just an opinion, though. So like, it doesn't necessarily mean you're gonna have the same experience when you play. You might like it more. It does kinda seem like a generic shooter with just a nice gloss of legally distinct mouse.

Speaker 2:
[94:38] If other reviewers or content creators that you share opinions of played it and liked it, then maybe you would also like it too, you know?

Speaker 1:
[94:49] Yeah, so I'm not upset about their review. Mobilis says, with $5, fellas, what's the deal with Crown Heights, Brooklyn? I keep hearing about it in those NYC apartment tour videos. Keep it real. Vanks, Detroit. Vanks, I guess, from Detroit. Is that The Heights? Lin-Manuel Miranda's The Heights?

Speaker 2:
[95:15] No, that's Washington Heights.

Speaker 1:
[95:16] Oh, it's different, okay. Now I gotta look up where Crown Heights is. Brooklyn is very big and I am not well-versed in...

Speaker 2:
[95:26] Crown Heights is around Park Place between Hancock Street and Crown Street.

Speaker 1:
[95:31] That's very close to where our studio was. Let me see how close. Oh, wait. Wait. Where's my apartment? So the studio was north of that, far north of that. I don't know anything about Crown Heights. Sorry. I don't even have any... I have a bunch of pins on my Google Maps for places I want to go and little coffee shops and little restaurants and stuff I want to go to. Not a single one in Crown Heights, so I can't help you there. I can tell you it's probably a huge pain in the ass to get to. And that's all I could say. You want to go a little more north, there's a lot of great food options because that's where the studio used to be. Anyway, Rezorock gave us hexadecimal. I have to now convert it.

Speaker 2:
[96:23] All right. Well, you convert that. I'm going to... Christopher Doughty, welcome to the dude. Hello, dude. Did you convert it yet?

Speaker 1:
[96:35] Oh, wait. Convert to binary? No, convert it to text. Hi, Bob and Will. Hello, Professor Rock. Thank you for the $2. Okay. Now we are in the chat.

Speaker 2:
[96:54] Yeah. Last week's WULFF DEN Podcast.

Speaker 1:
[96:57] Cronhite sucks and it's out of the way. Okay.

Speaker 2:
[97:01] Big Ray from last week. My wife is gone for a week. Instead of cheating on her, I'm going to buy Call of Duty. I was literally listening to the podcast at work. The whole office heard me laugh so hard at that statement.

Speaker 1:
[97:16] Sorry for that.

Speaker 2:
[97:17] I mean, look, it's good advice. Disco Stomigubble.

Speaker 1:
[97:32] Disco Stomigubble.

Speaker 2:
[97:35] Nailed it.

Speaker 1:
[97:37] Death Stranding 1 is a perfect example of not taking critics' scores too seriously. Great game and massively misunderstood by a large selection of gamers.

Speaker 2:
[97:44] I think that's a good idea. Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[97:45] Last week, we talked about games that have bad scores that we liked. And Mouse PI is probably a similar situation. It's like the game seems like a generic shooter. But if you're interested in the world and what it looks like, that could skew your own score of it. And that's fine. Exactly.

Speaker 2:
[98:06] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[98:08] I didn't bring this up earlier. I played, we both beat Resident Evil 4, Resident Evil 9, Resident Evil, the new one.

Speaker 2:
[98:17] Requiem, yes.

Speaker 1:
[98:18] Also, I played Prog Moda.

Speaker 2:
[98:20] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[98:20] And I have thoughts on both of those things. Yes.

Speaker 2:
[98:22] I have thoughts on one of those things and I only play one of those things.

Speaker 1:
[98:25] I'll talk about Prog Moda first. Okay.

Speaker 2:
[98:26] Do you want to finish reading these or?

Speaker 1:
[98:29] Sure.

Speaker 2:
[98:30] Okay. Bob hates you guys. I'm sorry.

Speaker 1:
[98:34] Black Hand says, for me, when they delay third party games only on Switch 2, it just makes me forget that it's coming out. I might pick them up later on deep discounts, but when a game is late, I'm not paying full price. I know I'm not the target audience, though. Edit, or maybe I am, because I'm a Switch only gamer. Yeah. So when the Switch 1 came out, I was fine getting games later on the Switch because I just kind of ignored it everywhere else. It felt like a really big deal when it launched on the Switch. Now that Steam is more popular, and now that I have Steam, I don't care about the Switch release. The madcatter, this is a random question, and I think it's something for Will. Have you ever played the Telltale Guardians of the Galaxy game? No. I took a chance on the physical the other day, despite reviewers saying it is only episode 1 on the disc and you can't get the rest as they aren't on the store. Thankfully, this bypasses that and lets me download them all regardless. And hoping that will be the way with game key cards. Also, if you have thoughts on the game.

Speaker 2:
[99:44] I've not played it, but I do know that it was a thing with Telltale games. You only get episode 1 on the disc and you have to download the rest of them.

Speaker 1:
[99:51] That's really weird.

Speaker 2:
[99:52] Yeah. I don't know why they did that. It's not like you were giving away a free demo of it. You were only getting a fifth of the game.

Speaker 1:
[100:01] Did they release slowly over time? Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[100:03] It was episodic. Theoretically, it was supposed to be one episode a month, but they would always get delayed all the time. It was one episode every three months.

Speaker 1:
[100:12] So did the disc come out at the start?

Speaker 2:
[100:14] No, the disc came out after.

Speaker 1:
[100:16] Oh, okay. Well, that's stupid. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[100:20] But with Game Key Cards, my understanding is that there's no data on the disc aside from-

Speaker 1:
[100:25] A key.

Speaker 2:
[100:25] A key.

Speaker 1:
[100:26] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[100:26] So there's no gameplay data on the cart at all.

Speaker 1:
[100:30] Noelle does things unsubscribing from Game Pass was one of the best things I did in 2025. Yeah. Well, now you have an option to come back if you wanted. All right. We're going to talk about Resident Evil 4, Resident Evil 9. God damn it. I mean, Leon's in it. I can't help it. And Progmata. Let me talk about Progmata. Combat's really cool. Everybody says the combat's cool. I understand it now. It's basically you are shooting the enemy while also playing Snake with the face buttons. So a little window comes up and you have to, it's like a grid and you have to basically play Snake, like get from point A to point B. And then when you do that, it like breaks their armor basically and they're weaker.

Speaker 2:
[101:11] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[101:12] And the little girl is the one that like hacks them basically and you shoot them while that's all happening. So that's cool that like you're kind of multitasking, like it's like a metagame, they're like.

Speaker 2:
[101:21] That's interesting.

Speaker 1:
[101:21] That's cool. And the movement's cool. It's like, it's pretty cool. I don't care at all for the world that you're in.

Speaker 2:
[101:28] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[101:29] And I don't care at all for the characters. And I think the little girl's creepy and weird. And I don't like that. That's even a thing. Right. There was, I saw merch today of, it's just like the like key art with like the little girl on the guy's back. Yeah. But it's a big jacket that has that. And I'm like, that's weird to wear a shirt with a little girl on it. That's just weird.

Speaker 2:
[101:56] I mean, the gameplay looks interesting. I think the idea is interesting. It's definitely a game I want to try. I have seen people be very weird about this game online, particularly with regards to the girl.

Speaker 1:
[102:10] It makes no sense for them to have her in the game, first of all, just have the guy hack the bad guy. Like you don't need another person to be doing it. One, two, why is it a little girl? Three, she's a robot. Who made a robot little girl? Well, there's a lot of levels to this being weird. Why is she in the game at all? So somebody developed this way. And then also in the game, who made this robot? It's weird.

Speaker 2:
[102:47] Child robots are like a thing in Japan, like Astro Boy, Mega Man, things like that. So I understand the idea of a child robot.

Speaker 1:
[102:58] I understand if it's like cartoony. Right. And looks different than a human.

Speaker 2:
[103:04] But this is realistic.

Speaker 1:
[103:05] It's too humanoid.

Speaker 2:
[103:06] I understand, yeah, that's the other side of it. The art direction, the characterization seems to be pushing it in a weird way.

Speaker 1:
[103:13] Yeah. I also just... I don't like kids. So having to deal with this little girl the whole time is pissing me off in the game. I'm not interested in anything the game has to offer except for the one mechanic where you play snake when you shoot people.

Speaker 2:
[103:30] So this is definitely not a game I could play in front of my daughter because she will then try to climb on my back and try to do this in real life.

Speaker 1:
[103:35] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[103:37] And she is a large child.

Speaker 1:
[103:38] Yes. Other thing is Resident Evil 9. We both beat it finally.

Speaker 2:
[103:43] Yes, we both beat it.

Speaker 1:
[103:45] Did you get both endings? We're gonna spoil it.

Speaker 2:
[103:47] Yeah, full spoilers. I did the good ending and then I watched the bad ending on YouTube.

Speaker 1:
[103:55] That's what Wood did. Yes. I did the bad ending first and then just played the good ending.

Speaker 2:
[104:01] They let you go back, right?

Speaker 1:
[104:03] So I did the bad ending. So we've talked about this a little bit. It does end very quick.

Speaker 2:
[104:08] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[104:10] No matter what ending you pick, it seems like the ending is rushed.

Speaker 2:
[104:13] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[104:13] The bad ending just ends. The game just ends. So I was very unsatisfied. So it immediately gives you the option to go back and fix it. So I did that and I went back and got the good ending. The reason I chose the bad ending was because I was confused as to what Elpis is.

Speaker 2:
[104:37] Yeah, they never say what it is.

Speaker 1:
[104:38] I was like, it seems like it's the cure, but Leon really doesn't want it. So I'll just let him have what he wants. He wants me to destroy it, I'll destroy it. So I destroyed it. And then he fucking gets his face blown off and then the game ends. So I was like, well, that sucked. Let me go back. And then you go back and then she saves.

Speaker 2:
[104:57] It is the cure.

Speaker 1:
[104:58] And then you get a cool boss fight and then that's it. I think Grace should have had her own boss fight with her ending.

Speaker 2:
[105:10] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[105:11] If you pick the bad ending, she should have had her own boss fight.

Speaker 2:
[105:13] I think she should have had a boss fight regardless. Because the second half of the game, it literally just becomes the Leon show. The whole idea of the duel protagonist gets thrown out the window.

Speaker 1:
[105:25] I like Leon more, so I was cool with it.

Speaker 2:
[105:26] It was a lot more fun to play as Leon.

Speaker 1:
[105:28] But you're right. I think that the ending was way too quick, and it didn't feel like she had a gameplay resolution.

Speaker 2:
[105:39] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[105:39] It feels like you just kind of walk.

Speaker 2:
[105:40] Grace didn't really have a satisfying conclusion.

Speaker 1:
[105:42] Yeah. You kind of just walk into the room and then the game ends. And it would have been nice to have a grander, I mean, I guess the lickers are hard to deal with, but she should have had, they should have been a catalyst. Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[105:58] I mean, that should have been when she gets a shotgun or something more powerful than her handgun.

Speaker 1:
[106:03] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[106:04] I think that would have gone a long way to show that she's evolving beyond being a scaredy cat. I was going to say, that would have been something. I hated the final twists where at the end of the game, the good ending when Grace is like, it's a shame we couldn't see them, Emily and Leon just goes, you know, I didn't shoot any of her vital organs. She's probably still alive.

Speaker 1:
[106:39] Yeah. It's very weird.

Speaker 2:
[106:40] That was like, so like, what is this? Like...

Speaker 1:
[106:44] I think I would have liked an extra hour at the end to flesh out all of this stuff that they just kind of throw at you.

Speaker 2:
[106:53] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[106:54] That's one of those things. Like they could have, instead they're just like, she's all upset about Emily. And then they're like, oh no, she's fine.

Speaker 2:
[107:02] It would have made more sense if you found out that they were, that there was still experiments on these girls happening. And like, you were able to save one of them.

Speaker 1:
[107:13] Or she comes back as a boss.

Speaker 2:
[107:17] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[107:17] And you deal with it that way.

Speaker 2:
[107:19] That would have been something. Because we saw in the beginning of the game, the girl, like, the girl monster, like survives getting shot with a requiem like eight times.

Speaker 1:
[107:28] But also, Emily's story is, you don't get to experience her character at all in the game. So like, when you kill her in the game, when she turns into a big monster and you kill her, it seemed, I was like, she's got to come back, right? That was like too short. And Grace has too big of a reaction to this, like, tragedy for not knowing this person, like, long enough. Like that, Emily had no, like, connection, no character arc at all. She just shows up and then dies. So it would have been nice to have fleshed that out. Actually, when I killed her in the game, I Googled it. I was like, there's gotta be a way to, like, not kill her, right? And then I saw that.

Speaker 2:
[108:16] No matter what, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[108:17] But it looked like it's, it looked like it said, if you don't hit her vital organs, there's a thing at the end. But I think that's just how it is. I think that is just how it is, yeah. So that was weird. I feel like the game could have been another, like, four hours if you add more Emily stuff.

Speaker 2:
[108:34] Yeah. I also, this is more of a gameplay thing. In Leon's campaign towards the end, like, you have to actually fight soldiers with guns.

Speaker 1:
[108:46] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[108:46] And, like, I didn't like that in Resident Evil 5. I did not like that in this game because that's not what a Resident Evil game is. I kind of liked it. It's not built for, like, shooting combat. It's built for, like, fighting monsters.

Speaker 1:
[109:01] It made it very difficult. But I liked it. I did die and replay it a million times though because I was, like, kind of cheesing the game a little bit. I was like, I know there's going to be a guy here, so I'm going to peek and snipe him. Yeah, but I kind of liked it. It felt more, it felt like, the ending felt very Metal Gear.

Speaker 2:
[109:19] Yeah, yeah, I've seen it compared to Metal Gear 4 when you're, like, walking through the microwave room.

Speaker 1:
[109:24] There's that, yeah, because he's dying. But also, I think the hunk fight, or if that is hunk, we don't know.

Speaker 2:
[109:29] I think that is hunk.

Speaker 1:
[109:31] I hope it is, because I think that's cool. And that is a Metal Gear fight. That is a Metal Gear boss fight, and I thought that was cool. I liked a lot of the gameplay beats of Leon at the end.

Speaker 2:
[109:41] Yeah, I think, like, look, ultimately, like, I still think it's an amazing game, I still think it is a game of the year contender. I just feel like, towards the end, it started to, I don't want to say wear out, welcome, but I was disagreeing with it more.

Speaker 1:
[109:57] It felt rushed at the end.

Speaker 2:
[109:58] It definitely felt rushed, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[110:00] Which is weird, because I put it off for a while because it felt long, but then when I picked it up to finish it, it felt like it just kind of ended.

Speaker 2:
[110:07] And I'm a mad, I don't know if this is a me problem or a game problem, but, like, you remember, it was, like, towards the end of Leon's campaign. There's that room with all the liquors, there's, like, the six liquors. I've been seeing, like, YouTube shorts and, like, Instagram reels and whatnot of, like, you fire a shot in that room, you run away, they chase after you. If you wait a second, you can follow them back into the room stealthily and pick them off one by one because they don't hear you killing the other ones with your axe. I screwed up somehow and they found me. So I am fighting all of these guys off left and right.

Speaker 1:
[110:45] It happened to me a few times. When you're playing as Grace and you're navigating through the liquors, it was a little frustrating because they're blind, so they can't see you. But when a noise happens and they get activated, somehow they can see you.

Speaker 2:
[111:02] Yeah, like with Leon. I felt like they could just see him at the end.

Speaker 1:
[111:06] Yeah, it was frustrating because you have to use game logic now. Like how are they coded into the game and how can I navigate around this situation? Yeah, and the liquors weren't that big of a problem to me. I used them all to have cocktails most of the time. With Leon, I just used the shotgun and I just blew their faces off. Anyway, and I kind of liked stealthing around them. Because I like stealth games, but it is janky. I did like the game a lot. I just think it was a little rough.

Speaker 2:
[111:39] The game is still fantastic. I'm debating whether or not to do a second playthrough. Just now that I have all my gear, I can continue.

Speaker 1:
[111:46] Absolutely not doing that. There's no reason for me to go back.

Speaker 2:
[111:50] I mean, there's no time to go back.

Speaker 1:
[111:52] DLC might be cool. Maybe. People are saying that there's probably a Mercenaries mode.

Speaker 2:
[111:58] I've heard that.

Speaker 1:
[111:59] Because there is a little snippet at the end that seems like there's probably gonna be a Mercenaries mode.

Speaker 2:
[112:05] I've heard there's rumbling. I mean, this is probably just internet speculation, but there's gonna be Ada DLC, which I would play.

Speaker 1:
[112:12] That would be cool. Edward Bova says, Bob, did you watch the Stop Killing Games thing? No, but we talked about it. And I told you we talked about it. Also, Will, you forgot to talk about the big Splatoon Raiders news. Oh, this is a trailer for Splatoon Raiders.

Speaker 2:
[112:30] Oh yeah, it got a date.

Speaker 1:
[112:33] So, it's in July. Yeah. I don't know how I feel. The game actually looks pretty good. I don't know how I feel about single player Splatoon though, because I like the idea of it, but then I played single player Splatoon and it wasn't that good. I mean, if this one looks pretty good.

Speaker 2:
[112:45] If this is a more, cause like Splatoon, single player Splatoon is like a single player mode in a primarily multiplayer game. This is a primarily single player game that maybe they can like expand on it and actually make it worthwhile.

Speaker 1:
[112:54] It looks pretty good.

Speaker 2:
[112:57] And then it'll be $50 digitally and $60 physically.

Speaker 1:
[113:04] And they showed off the Amiibo. I did not see the Amiibo. Hi Bob, think you can do a video that goes over your whole 3D printing process. I filmed one in August and edited it and never put it out. And I don't know. I just forgot about it. Yeah. So, I might go back and look at it. We got to do a bonus episode. What do you want to do it on?

Speaker 2:
[113:29] What can we do it on?

Speaker 1:
[113:33] Have the Dreamcast and all the bonus.

Speaker 2:
[113:35] Try to.

Speaker 1:
[113:35] Try to get up. I also hated there were so many teasers at the end just to tease future games. Like, I don't care about future games. Let me live in the moment. Yeah, yeah, again, they dragged it.

Speaker 2:
[113:51] Yeah, it was like both rushed and dragged on.

Speaker 1:
[113:54] Yeah. You know? They added a lot that didn't need to be added. I wanted a resolution to what we just saw.

Speaker 2:
[114:00] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[114:01] What's on Tim Cook stepping down? Yes, that was rumored. Tim Cook was going to step down from Apple.

Speaker 2:
[114:07] Yeah, it had been talked about, like, a while, and then, like, officially he's like, goodbye.

Speaker 1:
[114:11] I don't know anything about this new guy. He's the hardware guy. He's probably the reason that the M chip exists.

Speaker 2:
[114:16] He had a big thing, he had a lot to do with the Macbook Neo. He's designed, he's worked on every iPad that's ever been released. So I've seen him in, like, the presentations and stuff.

Speaker 1:
[114:27] I think that Apple has been on a downtrend until the Neo. The Neo, the Macbook Neo, I think, is a huge success for them. But I think that their products have been on a downward trend for years.

Speaker 2:
[114:48] Like, when you say years, you mean, like, before the M1 or...?

Speaker 1:
[114:54] M1 happened and then they stagnated and I think they were getting shitty. I think their products are getting shitty.

Speaker 2:
[115:00] I mean, I would say stale, because, like, there's only so much you can do with, like, their product line.

Speaker 1:
[115:07] I think their software is getting shittier as well.

Speaker 2:
[115:11] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[115:11] It's not as, like, clean and, like, user-friendly as it once was.

Speaker 2:
[115:14] Yeah, it's definitely getting more complicated.

Speaker 1:
[115:16] Yeah. So I'd like to, I mean, we'll see. We'll see if he inherited shitty design, but things seem to be going good with the Neo. The issue is this year, supposedly, we're going to get an OLED MacBook touchscreen.

Speaker 2:
[115:33] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[115:34] And also a foldable iPhone.

Speaker 2:
[115:38] Yes.

Speaker 1:
[115:39] Those are two huge deal products that could be massive failures.

Speaker 2:
[115:44] Yeah.

Speaker 1:
[115:45] So this guy's brand new to this position and he might eat it. That's a lot for him to have to deal with right out the gate. So I hope that they do good for them. Anyway, let's do a bonus episode. Okay. Do you want to just play Dreamcast?

Speaker 2:
[116:04] Twist my arm.

Speaker 1:
[116:06] Thanks for hanging out.

Speaker 2:
[116:08] Thank you for tuning in. Thank you for watching us. Thank you for chatting with us. As always, the WULFF DEN Podcast is every season at 8 PM Eastern right here on twitch.tv/wulffden or youtube.com/wulffdenpodcast. If you can't make the show for any reason at all, we always put the archive version up over on youtube.com/wulffdenpodcast. You can go and check us out over there on demand whenever you want. If you prefer to listen to us rather than watch us, you can do that as well because we're also an audio podcast on any and every podcast service such as Apple Podcast, Spotify, YouTube Podcast, podcastaudible.com. The list goes on, but no matter where you get the show from folks, please be sure to subscribe, rate, and review us because that helps with placement on all of those respective platforms.

Speaker 1:
[116:45] Watch AJ. I'm rating him. He will be on the show next week. Yeah. That's that. I think we're going to play. I'm going to try to play Dreamcast. I'm going to try to hook it up. Thanks for being here. I will have a video out on Thursday on the Play Nix, the MU-DEC Play Nix. If you don't know what that is, you'll find out on Thursday. Thank you. Goodbye, everybody.

Speaker 2:
[117:09] Bye.