transcript

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Speaker 2:
[01:49] I'm not gonna go into how much I get food from 7-Eleven. This isn't about me being a being an absolute slob when it comes to 7-Eleven pizza. My friends have been on the case about how often I order pizza from 7-Eleven. Do not kill me, please. I know there's good pizza out there.

Speaker 1:
[02:06] Michael, you need to come over here. I'm going to make you pizza in my in my Ooni oven. I've been. Oh, come on over. Let's have an Unlocked get together over here. I'll make you guys pizzas. Enough of the 7-Eleven nonsense.

Speaker 2:
[02:19] Listen, it's cheap and it's right on my street. I love going by, you know, and all that. The convenience store, you know, 7-Eleven is not like the greatest.

Speaker 1:
[02:26] All right.

Speaker 2:
[02:27] This isn't about me. This isn't about me. This is about the game.

Speaker 3:
[02:32] This is Steve Downs, the voice of Master Chief, Sierra 117. And you're listening to Podcast Unlocked, the world's number one Xbox podcast. Now, finish this fight. Master Chief, out.

Speaker 1:
[02:52] What's happening, friends? Welcome to Podcast Unlocked, IGN's weekly Xbox show, episode 738, talking you through everything happening in the world of Xbox. Each and every week, my name is Ryan McCaffrey, and I'm joined as always by my friends, Michael Hyam and Miranda Sanchez. What up, friends? How are you? Well, we've got plenty to talk about. We had an ID at Xbox showcase today produced by IGN. Yes, us. I had nothing to do with it. I can't take any credit, but it's really good. There are a lot of great games in there that we're going to talk about, but we can't ignore the elephant in the room, which is again, I wrote an opinion piece on this to where I said, I genuinely couldn't think of this ever happening with any other streaming service ever. So Game Pass Ultimate has seen a price decrease, not price increase like we're used to. It's rare these days. A price decrease, the 30 bucks a month that rightfully enraged us all is now down to $23 a month, and Call of Duty will not be in there on day one with the new release each year anymore. Instead, it'll go in a year later. So that's the trade off. It's not all the way back down to where it was before all this at 20 bucks a month. It's basically, as far as I would see it, probably if they were going to raise it last year, 23 is what they should have raised it to last year if they were going to increase the price. So let's just, let's dig into this before we start talking about those cool idea Xbox games we had in our showcase. Miranda, I'll start with you. Give me your reactions. Like, are you shocked that this actually happened?

Speaker 4:
[04:36] Um, yes and no, because I think adjusting the cost of one of your products is something we've seen for a long time. Obviously, it usually goes up. But for games and other like consoles, devices tend to see them, you know, go down over time. Obviously, that's not going to be the case with Game Pass. But I think this is obviously reaction to the fact that they, it was exorbitant, you know, it's just a really bad move for them to raise it so much. And I think the fact that they have figured out the math behind the scenes or whatever it is to make sure that this works for them within the current economic climates is a good thing. But at the same time, I'm not like, this feels also a little bit like a please clap moment, but because it's like, look, we made a smart decision, which is make something that people actually want to pay for. Because I think that's the risk with these streaming services. In the grand scheme of history of streaming media, it's still relatively young. So they have a lot of room to experiment with how much are people willing to pay. And we see all these other subscription services out there slowly edging forward and forward and forward and seeing how much they can push. And Game Pass is like, we're just going to push really hard, like really hard. And I think they saw the limits of that. So I would be curious to see at like, you know, find the wall sort of deal of hearing the talks that happened after they announced it and how seeing like what the reaction was to, I'm sure a lot of people are prescribing from Ultimate at the very least because that is so expensive. That is so expensive if you're not playing a ton of games all the time. Like just the value of what that was before is like, if you only play say one game a month, some of those games aren't necessarily $30 either. So if you're playing games, you know, not even that, you're kind of losing out. So I think it's weird to say like even the gamification of that, like having to consider is my money, is the money that I'm paying for this worth what I'm playing, you know, and having to like, you know, plan it out in that way is like kind of a bummer to have to do. So I think them, again, like as you mentioned, Ryan, this isn't back to where it was. It is still at least $3 more. So I did the thing. It is, yeah, so before the hike, it was $20 for Ultimate and $12 for PC. And now it is, as you said, $23 for Ultimate and $14 for PC. So it is like, as you said, something that we would expect a bit more. Like it's easy, not a fun till the swallow, but a little bit easier in just a few dollars rather than 10. So at least in Ultimate's case. But that's sort of my thoughts on it. It's more of a, you know, I think I'm also, I don't know, I'm of two months on the Call of Duty thing with Ultimate of it being like a year later, simply because it feels like a big reason Xbox and Microsoft shelled out all that money for Activision Blizzard, of course, profit, but also like a big boom to that for like Xbox players and Game Pass subscribers was that you're gonna get access to this like, oh shit, you don't have to pay for Call of Duty anymore. Just kidding, it's too expensive for us to include this, which seems like kind of a bummer, you know? Like it's, regardless of how you play Call of Duty, like it was nice to be able to say, hey, I like really just want to hop in for this for like a weekend. And now you could do that at launch. But if you have to do that a year later, like that's not, that's not great, honestly. And at the same time, too, it's hard to say if this is something that Asha brought about to Microsoft and be like, hey guys, after all my research, I mean, obviously, there's a lot of people who are doing sentiment reports at Xbox and being able to say, hey guys, people like this. If this was something that Microsoft and Xbox leads considered to like attach Asha to, just to give her like rep a bit of a boost, right? Like she's coming in kind of from the back footing of not being a gamer, which again, we've talked about is not necessarily a problem at all. She's here to run a business, not solely to play games, but having come off of Phil, who I think was generally quite liked, they just kind of wanted to try to attach some of like, oh, look, Phil's successor is someone that you can like because she's doing these things or she's making these things happen, which aren't necessarily true. Like this stuff doesn't, I mean, it could be that she's like, you guys, we got to focus on this first. Like, I don't really know. We don't know. But I do think this does feel a bit like a PR play to like really have her attached to it.

Speaker 1:
[09:19] Well, even if it is, which I certainly understand that approach, even if you might call it cynical, but it's in this day and age, it's fair. It is still a win, right? Like it is still like whether whether it was sort of premeditated for months or whether she did come in and just say, hey, like, where can I have some immediate impact? It's still nice that they mostly undid this because, I mean, for as many copies as Call of Duty sells a year, it's still like I think for most Game Pass subscribers, granted, I don't have any data to back that up. This is they would rather have 23 bucks a month and then maybe pay 70 bucks for the new Call of Duty each year. Michael, let me go to you to get your thoughts here before we get deeper into this. Sure.

Speaker 2:
[10:17] So, this is my bad, I thought you were going to team me up there. No, it's all good though, because I think this is a great move. But the thing is, I mean, again, from the cynical perspective, Game Pass Ultimate was 20 bucks. Brought up to 30, everyone loses their minds for good reason. You bring it back down to 23, that's still kind of a price hike and you get away with it with a little bit of goodwill. So I guess everybody kind of wins in this regard. But at the same time, any kind of price hike doesn't surprise me because these things are getting more and more expensive. Like game development isn't getting any cheaper and like consoles are getting more expensive. I'm not saying this is the price hike at all is the right move. I'm just like, this is kind of in line with where things have been headed. So I mean, you know, the increase to $30 was kind of this swing where, you know, we're looking for to recoup costs on things. We need new revenue. Like, I think like an easy answer to that is like, oh, what if we bump up the price and try to play damage control? Learn that that did not work out. And then what they can do is, like you said, research shows that people don't like price increases and that like a $10 price increase subscription is pretty damn dramatic, man. So bring it down to 23. I think it's a bit of a happy medium. And you again, you get attached to this goodwill with a new new regime or new sort of cabinet at Xbox. And these things are probably planned well in advance. You know, Ajay Sharma just got there. So I doubt that you would come in and rock the boat like that. But I'm sure that this was on the table. And it was one of the options that they could do early on to kind of bring back that goodwill along with the new with new faces at Xbox. So I think this is this is good overall. The thing about Call of Duty is that I don't think it's going to. It's not going to affect the OK. I'm just at the top of the brain. I don't think it's going to affect the kind of people who subscribe to Game Pass already. And the people who want to play Call of Duty are going to pay the full price for it to play it day one.

Speaker 4:
[12:36] So me specifically, I guess. But yeah, people like me who are like, I listen, I just want my one week and when everyone's in and then I'm bouncing before we'll get really hardcore.

Speaker 2:
[12:45] Yeah. And I'm the same way to where like I will play the new Call of Duty for a week or two and then never think about it again. And but that one week or two, it's pretty sick. And I remember when Black Ops 6 came around, now I had a ton of fun with Black Ops 6. And the reason why I was able to jump in early on was because it was on Game Pass. So like I'm one of the few that would be affected by not having Call of Duty attached to Game Pass Ultimate. But I think if you look at scope, the people who play Call of Duty, the ones you want buying your game, buying that game are the ones who are going to be shelling out full price for it and aren't necessarily the ones who are going to probably be the ones attached to Game Pass. Because like for Game Pass to be successful, the way you want Game Pass to be successful, if you're Xbox, you want long term subscribers. You want people who are kind of in it for life and who are going to pay that 15, 20 dollars, 20 something dollars every month for years on end. And I just don't think that the core Call of Duty crowd looks at that as something that is attractive to them. So I feel like, you know, you can't have everything. So they probably looked at this like, this is probably makes the most business sense for us because we still want to push Call of Duty and it exists on other platforms of PC and PS5. So it's not like call like Xbox is the only place you can play Call of Duty. And a large majority of that crowd is on PC and PlayStation. So detaching that from Xbox is like, well, we lose something, but we don't lose too much to where like, now we're taking a bunch of L's elsewhere. So I think this makes sense. And I'm maybe a little bummed that I won't be hopping on. I won't have an avenue to hop on Call of Duty day one. But in the grand scheme of things, I think that's not a very big deal to me.

Speaker 4:
[14:37] Yeah. Michael, to your point, I do think we've talked about in the past where a lot of like, when we think about the Call of Duty player, the person is really into it. It's like, this is one of the few games they play a year. If maybe not the only game they get every year. So as you're saying, yeah, they're probably already not subscribed to Game Pass anyway. So people who lose out are people like us who play a lot of stuff and like to experiment. And so that's, I'm sure when they looked at the wider scope, it made sense.

Speaker 2:
[15:03] Yeah. And one more thing is like, maybe this is just me, but I like how Game Pass is a tool for discoverability. Finding things you wouldn't have played otherwise that you wouldn't shell out 20, 30, even $50 for, and then realize like, oh, this is one, this is a valuable service to subscribe to. I just found a really cool game that I would not have. Call of Duty is a known quantity. No one's coming across Call of Duty on Game Pass, like, yo, I just discovered this new game. It's called Call of Duty, right? Maybe that's just how I think of Game Pass, or how some of us think of Game Pass as that way. But like, yeah, you could plaster Call of Duty onto the Xbox app and then say it's day one on Game Pass. But I'm like, I just don't know if that's necessarily the greatest use of Game Pass, but at least I'm trying to like think about their mentality, Xbox mentality and how they curate games for Game Pass. And they look at this and be like, well, we take Call of Duty off, we'd sell it full price on our platform, and the people who are gonna buy it at full price are gonna do that anyway. And then we don't lose as much in Game Pass, and we could bring the price down and then regain elsewhere. So I think that this is a move that makes sense for both the price decrease and removing Call of Duty from it at least in the first year. So, I don't know.

Speaker 4:
[16:22] Yeah, and Ryan, you're saying this is kind of a cynical approach potentially of looking at it, of this, you know, like the police class. But at the same time, I feel, though, I don't necessarily like to be like overly critical of things or just like mean. I know some shows can get kind of mean about how they talk about certain, like state of the industry and such. But I think the critical approach in this instance is because I think, in a big way of course, Game Pass is unparalleled, right? Like who else is doing it like this? So I feel like if we kind of have to have that honest feedback with this, and I think very critical of just, this is the way to keep it the best or like as good as possible. The other attempts to do things similar to Game Pass, just like pale, right? It pales so much in comparison. So I think if anything, it's just like, how do we keep saying like, no dude, go this way, go this way.

Speaker 1:
[17:13] Yeah, it's funny that, you know, Miranda, you were talking about how other streaming services have just been inching their prices up and up and up over the years to, you know, the boiling the frog slowly, right? Is what everybody else is. And Microsoft just tried throwing us into, they just basically like threw a pot of boiling water in our faces and asked us to like it last year. And they learned, nope, that doesn't work. You've got to take this stuff slower. So, yeah, I mean, it's true that this is still a net price increase over where it was in October. But kind of, I guess in the, in the wider context, it's still, I guess it's just nice. I think for me, what I like about this, what I take away from it that's particularly positive is whether this was positioned as a way to get Rasha a win as a, this non-gamer coming in this outsider, like, hey, let's get her some points with the fan base. It still shows that, again, like I genuinely, no hyperbole, I cannot think of a single other instance where a major gaming or entertainment streaming service has ever lowered its price without like introducing a crappy ad-filled tier. So like for that alone, it feels like, okay, Asha is not afraid to and is empowered to make big changes. And so for that, that kind of, to me, it's sort of the potential of what that represents for, then maybe she'll take another look at hardware prices. Maybe she'll take another look at exclusivity and what the hell that even means. And maybe she'll seek to define it. So I think that's part of where I'm coming from with this. I mean, again, I recognize that it's still three bucks more, but it's also the context of just 30 is a lot of money per month. Like you said, Miranda, unless you're playing a ton of games, whereas 23 is, I mean, it's like 40 percent less or something like that. I forget what the what the actual number is, but it's it's it's like down enough where it just doesn't. It doesn't hurt it. Like you don't you don't feel like you're having to. Give it a like a job interview every month, like so. Are we right? Is this a good fit for this month because you're this much money? So it just it does seem like a net win overall, even if there are there are justifiable finer points about this to still be wary of and critical of. Picture this. You get done with work. You're super hungry. You're also super exhausted. There is something healthy in the fridge. You probably should make it, but man, you're just super tired. You don't have it in you. Well, for me, it's like that. Eating healthy is not a willpower problem. It's a setup problem that is until I found Factor. With Factor, I'm hitting my nutrition goals this spring season without the planning, without the grocery runs, and most important as far as time goes, without the cooking. Factor's got meals built around your goals, whether that's weight loss, overall nutrition, more protein, or GLP-1 support. For strength and workout recovery, you can check out Factor's Muscle Pro Collection as one awesome example. Now, let's talk about the taste factor. That's what's going to keep you coming back, right? It's fresh, it's never frozen. They've got over a hundred rotating weekly meals, including globally inspired flavors like Mediterranean and Asian, so there's always something new to look forward to. You can also give their just launched, ready-to-eat salads a try with vibrant ingredients like elote corn and miso edamame. Plus 70 plus add-ons to round out your nutrition, from green juices to peanut butter energy bites. Their food is ready in just two minutes. Factor shops, preps, cooks and delivers straight to your door, so you have more time for everything you love this spring. From our most recent Factor box, I had the grilled chicken breast and wild rice, then the next day the grilled pork chop. Super good. My wife, in the middle of her busy day, heated up the lunch from Factor, the five-spice tofu noodle salad and the shredded chicken with loaded mashed potatoes the next day. So we are big fans of Factor in my household. Head to factormeals.com/unlocked50off and use code unlocked50off to get 50% off and free daily greens per box with new subscription only while supplies last until September 27. See the website for more details.

Speaker 5:
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Speaker 1:
[23:56] Which brings me to the other piece of good news with this, which is PC Game Pass. That's going down as well. Now, that might not so secretly be the real best value. If you're just a PC, you're just a PC player. It had gone up to $16.50, alright, $16.49, technically, and now that's been cut to $14. And the thing is, every first-party Microsoft game, without exception, is day one on PC. So, if you've got a capable PC gaming rig, take the $14 per month PC Game Pass service, and that one you're probably gonna be getting pretty good value out of every month, right, Michael?

Speaker 2:
[24:40] Yeah, yeah, I mean, I play a lot on PC, and having Ultimate, I'm an Ultimate subscriber, so it's like, I can pluck out anything I want. But when you look at the value of PC Game Pass and all the stuff that is available, especially like, I don't know, I tend to you get you get a different experience on PC. You get like the the mentality of trying smaller games that are like really quick to download and having that on PC. Like that is sometimes I download a bunch of like five different things, play maybe for 10 minutes each and then one of them will hit. Like having that for $14 a month, I think, is a very good value. On top of all the other games you actually, you know, want to play without needing that first impression. And I think this also goes to the point of, you know, PC being like, yes, it is very expensive to have and maintain a good gaming PC, but all the software is a lot cheaper. You know, you have Steam sales and the PC Game Pass is much, much cheaper and you just have access to so much in terms of like breadth and library and history on PC. So like this is actually the best value for that. The question I have going into this though, is that what does PC Game Pass look like when the next Xbox is also kind of a PC?

Speaker 1:
[25:53] Good point.

Speaker 2:
[25:54] You know, and maybe the PC Game Pass is just looked at as a cheaper tier in the breadth of Game Pass. So maybe that's how they think of it or reframe it. But then how does that change the value of Ultimate and who actually wants to subscribe to Ultimate as opposed to PC Game Pass? And does that change which versions of games you're downloading onto your system? So there's a lot of questions there, but as it stands right now, I think there's just so much good stuff on PC. If you have even a mid-range gaming PC, I mean, you're not going to be able to maybe run Forza Horizon 6 on Mac settings, but you'll have access to games like that. And yeah, this is a really good like I. Yes, the price increase was bad. I looked at 1650. I think we said this too at the time when we're talking about the initial price increases like, yeah, Ultimate, that looks that that's crazy. Thirty dollars a month for Ultimate. That's crazy. But I think that makes that made PC game has looked a lot more attractive because it was only 1650. Like that's something you can stomach and still get a lot of value out of if you play your games that way. So bringing it down along with everything else like you look at Ultimate, that's kind of the quote big win there because it's such a steep decrease after a steep increase. But yeah, PC game is still looking really good. And yeah, if you are going to subscribe to something, that is the one I would probably recommend first.

Speaker 1:
[27:22] I think the the for me to get cynical now, my turn.

Speaker 4:
[27:29] Oh, no, it made Ryan cynical.

Speaker 1:
[27:31] Hey, let's go. Well, OK. I mean, maybe not cynical, but just concerned. Like, I think justifiably concerned would be OK. Like, for me personally, taking Call of Duty out doesn't really affect me. Like, I'm a campaign player. I didn't even play Black Ops Seven's campaign. I enjoyed Black Ops Six's campaign. I've reviewed a few of the recent ones, recent campaigns. But the concern, I guess, I would have would be, OK, well, they clearly did that because money, right? Because they weren't. Call of Duty is so valuable to them. That's like you said, Miranda, that's a big reason why they paid $69 billion for Activision, Blizzard and King. And I look ahead to something like, I mean, the one that comes to mind, even though it's still probably at least two, if not three years away, is the Elder Scrolls Six. So is like, are they going to pull that out and be like, nope, actually, that's not going to be an ultimate for a year. You've just got to buy it. So I guess the, it's like, okay, is Call of Duty just the exception of the rule here? Or does this open the door for future games to either be in or out? And then does that sort of, if that's the case, does that start to kind of compromise the entire ethos of the service? Like, which was pitch day one is all of our day one first party games. But then at the same point, when Microsoft started Game Pass, I don't even think anybody there at the time would have envisioned them buying up entire huge publishers. So it's still messy, I guess. And so I guess what I'm trying to say is I'm still a little like, I still think there's going to need to be some clear definitions laid down by Asha Sharma and the team. And in her somewhat defense here, she did say in that leaked memo from like a week ago that that they are still kind of figuring out like long term what what Game Pass needs to turn into.

Speaker 2:
[29:53] Yeah, I think what we've seen is that a lot of this is written in pencil. They can erase it. They can redraft it. These things, it doesn't feel like anything is off the table when it comes to decisions that they make. And I think, Ryan, that's that is a very interesting thing to look at more moving forward is like, what do they do with Elder Scrolls 6? That is going to be the biggest thing aside from GTA 6. Yeah. Because this is probably obviously they have, they would have closer to an answer for this is that will putting Elder Scrolls 6 on Game Pass Day 1 bring in subscribers in a way that will not necessarily offset or like will be beneficial to them internally? Like, can we make more off of Game Pass subscribers banking on a bunch of people who will subscribe for Elder Scrolls 6 and forget to cancel when they're done with the game?

Speaker 1:
[30:46] And it's such a big game that they'll probably be playing it for months. For a long time. Subscribed.

Speaker 2:
[30:51] Yeah. Like Elder Scrolls, a new Elder Scrolls is not a game you're going to blast through in two weeks and then, OK, cool. I'm done with it. Like, no, we're going to you're going to live in that game for months, at least a couple months. So if they can get people to subscribe for three months, that's the price of a of a full game. And then, you know, as subscription services are successful off of people who forget to cancel the subscription, like that is a big portion of this.

Speaker 4:
[31:18] It has to be low enough for you to forget.

Speaker 2:
[31:20] Yeah, exactly. I can't look at my bank statement like, yeah, 30 bucks a month. I got to do something about it. It goes into the question of like eight bucks is ten bucks. Seven bucks is five. But like the whole like value proposition of like, what is the actual value that I am paying for? But that is that is an interesting thing because that other schools is a game that they can if they keep it off, if they take it off of Game Pass or keep it off Game Pass, that thing is going to sell like hotcakes no matter what. So they're going to make money no matter what. But it's like how much money can they make if they put it on Game Pass Ultimate and get subscribers that way, that they would have otherwise if people are going to buy it straight off of the store. And this is probably something that's going to be multi-platform. I highly doubt it's going to be. I don't know if, damn, I should have asked Todd Howard when I saw him. It's like, yo, is this going to be an exclusive or is this going to be multi-platform? That answer is probably maybe out there. But that's another thing too, is like, how do they posit Game Pass as a system seller? Because yeah, there aren't really system sellers anymore because things aren't necessarily exclusive. And it's no longer a system seller, is this a subscription seller is the thing. And so how do they think of that when it comes to multi-platform games with something as big under their umbrella like in Elder Scrolls? I don't know, that's probably an evolving question that they are thinking a lot about. And they have a lot of time too, because this game ain't going to come out for a very, very long time, as Todd had said himself. But it is an interesting thing to ponder when they, it feels like they could do anything or they can make rash decisions in both directions whenever they want. And maybe the challenges will be very different when it comes, like when Elder Scrolls is imminent. So, but yeah.

Speaker 1:
[33:11] Yeah, and you were pointing out, Michael, that Elder Scrolls 6 would be like three months of it would basically be the equivalent of buying it, except the contingent of PC players for Elder Scrolls games is so huge. It's like, whereas I would imagine Call of Duty, again, maybe the numbers do exist, I don't have them. I would expect that Call of Duty leans more console player, whereas I would very much expect that Elder Scrolls games lean more PC as big as they are on on console. And so that that $14 a month, that's a lot of months to get to add up. Yeah, PC Game Pass to get to a, you know, 70 bucks or whatever that game is going to cost.

Speaker 2:
[33:58] I'm sure, I'm sure they would, I'm sure they'd be like, well, it's an ultimate exclusive if it even is on Game Pass. But yeah, I also like, I mean, you know, the fact that they're still using creation that is an engine that is ripe for modding. And you know, Bethesda has their own like, creation club modding scene. And you know, you're going to get a lot of PC players that way that's also of course on console as well. But like the people who make mods, the people who really dig their teeth into mods exist on PC. And how do you pitch that? If you're going to attach this to a subscription service, how do you pitch that to PC players? And I feel like, I feel like what they're thinking is that PC Game Pass's pricing tier is a little too low to include Elder Scrolls 6 on it. I would love it if it is. Trust me, I would love to see that. But, you know, I wouldn't put it past them to like, gate off the biggest thing that they have under their belts behind higher price tiers or just not including it at all.

Speaker 1:
[35:02] Well, and oh, sorry, Miranda, go ahead.

Speaker 4:
[35:04] I was going to say, this is like a chaotic thought. But do you think they would ever do Game Pass Exclusive games?

Speaker 1:
[35:12] Well, it's so that's not a crazy thought. And the reason is you saying that just triggered the memory that in the very beginning, Phil said that they had talked about that. You know, it obviously has never has yet to come to fruition, but they talked about that, like potentially episodic stuff like that. That was a talking point back in the very beginning that that maybe that is a road they could go down. Yeah, I don't know if maybe five, maybe in in practice, the finances, financial side of that just doesn't make sense.

Speaker 4:
[35:47] But yeah, it doesn't seem like it would be like, especially for certain games. It's like if it's a PC game, especially like we've seen the uproar whenever something's like Epic Exclusive or something, right?

Speaker 1:
[35:58] Yeah, true.

Speaker 4:
[35:58] It's got to be on Steam.

Speaker 1:
[35:59] Like Alan Wake 2, right? Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[36:01] Right. And they've worked really hard to like, I think, or at least it seems like Microsoft has worked to like make sure that their games are on Steam. And because they understand that that is part of the ecosystem. You can't, Steam is its own behemoth, right? It's like going up against that's hard, although Microsoft does still have a place in there. It's just, you're just going to have both options. But I don't know, like, I'm just thinking about what the future of Game Pass is.

Speaker 2:
[36:26] That's an interesting thing, because I'm thinking about like games I pay subscriptions for. Like I still pay $14 a month for Final Fantasy 14, and I gladly pay it because I play that game all the time. I love that game. Yeah. And I mean, not that, I don't think, if you were to put something as a Game Pass exclusive, not trying to see this idea more than it already is, but like you would need something like that, where it's a game that people kind of want to live in. And I don't know if Xbox necessarily has something like that cooking up hosting. Like what if they do World of Warcraft? Yeah. Wow. Console Edition. Finally, after all these years.

Speaker 4:
[36:59] Chaotic thoughts for that. But I do not want to put into the world. I'm just not going to say it.

Speaker 2:
[37:04] Yeah, because like people still pay for wow. Then like they gladly pay pay that. So maybe that's something. But developer side, there's a lot of conversation about whether or not Game Pass, as it exists, makes sense for a developer on a financial perspective. So doing something that would be a Game Pass exclusive would further push that question. Like, yeah, is this valuable on developer side? And how do they wield their own financials if they do that? Because it's kind of this nebulous thing. Like you talk about playtime, you could talk about downloads, but it is kind of at the end of the day, you want to have sales numbers and you want to have hard figures of money that you are generating. You are selling your product rather than attaching yourself to a subscription where you're not in control of those numbers. So interesting dynamic.

Speaker 1:
[37:53] You know, I wonder if just just to close the loop on the on the Elder Scrolls 6 thought one other. There was one other report this week. You know, the Game Pass Ultimate thing that is official, that has obviously happened. But Tom Warren from The Verge announced or put out a piece that said that he's got sources that say that Microsoft's considering again, considering a lot of options, but he specifically noted a first party only tier. So presumably that would be only Xbox Studios and not Bethesda stuff, Activision stuff, Blizzard stuff, etc. And so, like you said, Michael, that with Elder Scrolls specifically, they've got at least a couple of years to figure it out. But I wonder if that could be a model that evolves over time of of, you know, you have add ons to your Game Pass subscription to get the Bethesda stuff and the Activision stuff. Yeah. But obviously, they would need to make the core Xbox Studios sub reasonable enough that you'd you'd want to have that and still consider adding a Bethesda add on or Activision.

Speaker 4:
[39:13] That feels like too much, honestly.

Speaker 1:
[39:14] It might be. It might be. I'm just, you know, I'm not, by the way, I'm not advocating any of this. I'm not saying they should do it. I'm just trying to sort of think like they would and see like, OK, what, you know, if I'm if I'm on Asha's team, like, what, what am I pitching? Like, what, what are we considering? And so it there's such a big, weird organization now compared to what they were five years ago, that it's just it is a game pass is like it's it's gotten extra complicated just with all the moves they make. Which again, that's that's not our problem. That's their problem. Although when they jacked it to 30 bucks, they made it our problem. And then we made it their problem by not subscribing to it, which is clearly why they lowered the price down to twenty three dollars a month because the numbers didn't add up anymore. So, yeah, it's like the one thing they can't ever do. Like, I think they're always there has to be a day one game tier. Otherwise, like I said, that that's otherwise you're just PlayStation Plus at that point, which not that that's a bad thing. I don't want the Sony fans coming after me. I'm not. But it's just like. There's nothing. That sets would set game pass apart at that point if you're not doing first party stuff, so I don't know where it all shakes out and where it all lands, but I I'm just I'm happy that they they not only lowered like, because when the rumors were going around to like a week or two ago that they were thinking about lowering it, in my head, I was like, OK, what's it going to go down to? And and even and I promise I'm not just, you know, Monday morning quarterbacking it. I did think like there's probably it's probably unrealistic for it to go all the way back to where it was at 20 bucks, like just modern capitalist society. It's that's probably not happening. And so in my head, I was thinking, well, if they do 25, I don't think people are. I think people are not going to be there. There will be no, no clapping, Miranda. There would be no 25 would just be like, OK, I'm still not subscribing to it. It's still a lot. And so, yeah, I was like, is it maybe 20, 22, 20? And it ended up 23. And it's like, OK. I mean, technically, by the math again, I'm not defending anything, but by the math, if you sub to Game Pass Ultimate at 23 bucks over a 12 month period and you buy Call of Duty on day one for 70 bucks, you come out $14 ahead of where you would have if you'd just paid the $30 a month price. Yes, I did the math. I'm a journalism major, so math isn't my strong suit. But I think I got the numbers right on that one. And it's $14 saved versus having the $30 ultimate subscription that just includes Call of Duty.

Speaker 4:
[42:26] So I think when you look at the $23 number, as you're saying, Ryan, it's not too far off from 25, but at the same time, it comes down to that weird math of like $7 is basically $5, $8 is $10, like that little weird threshold. The team behind Peak did a really funny video about that as well. So I think that's kind of the weird. This seems associated close enough with 20. It's not there obviously, still closer to 25, but at least it's not actually 25. So yeah.

Speaker 2:
[43:01] Listen, if I think of this as $20 a month minus one coffee that I would buy on like a random Wednesday morning, maybe that's how you could justify it. Like people tend to do that math. Maybe people as in like me. Yeah. I look at like, I look at my bank statement. I look at all the subscriptions. I forgot to cancel. I'm like, okay, well, I could take this. I can tank this hit. If this $15, like I have, for one month, I was like, ah, I forgot to cancel my ESPN Plus that's attached to Hulu, damn it. Cause I wanted to watch baseball, like the last month of baseball, whatever. So the next month I'm like, ah, damn, well, I'll just not buy three coffees this month from my coffee shop next door. And then listen, it's like, it's like I didn't lose any money at all. Like we all go through that sort of math.

Speaker 4:
[43:52] That is actually, I value it's like, am I going to get the good coffee beans this month or this, this grocery or am I going to get the shitty ones and just deal with it?

Speaker 2:
[44:01] Yeah, so there's ways to think about it. But ultimately, going down to 23 from 30 is a significant deal to where people can do those mental gymnastics in a way that fits their lifestyle or fits the way they engage with Game Pass. So, you know, it's it's not nothing.

Speaker 1:
[44:22] I mean, I guess to to close this out. And I know this is a tough, this is a little a little bit of a lame exercise because we all do subscribe to Ultimate as part of our jobs, which not a complaint. But if you didn't work at IGN, you didn't work in games, would were you would you have subscribed when it went up to 30? And would you subscribe at 23? So for me, I will just be honest, 30. And I think I said this on the podcast, but I absolutely would have canceled at 30. Like I just don't like I'm fortunate. I've got a family. I do a lot of family stuff on the weekends. Like I just would not for even for the amount of games I play, I would not be able to get for me 30 bucks a month value out of it. But I will say for 23 would get me back in. I would resub if I had if I had bailed out. How about you, Michael?

Speaker 2:
[45:21] I would consider it. And as we mentioned earlier, PC Game Pass being the more interesting value and having having a gaming PC, I would probably after the price increase, I would I would cancel, maybe consider PC Game Pass. And if they're trying to reel me back in, I would look at this and be like, OK, well, I'll jump in back in with PC Game Pass. And I think over time, I would figure out what I can and can't play and think about, like, Oh, the things that I am locked out of. Is that worth jumping up a tier for what would be nine extra dollars a month to get to ultimate from from from PC Game Pass? But I think the as I've learned about the way I engage with games, I would probably sit pretty well with PC Game Pass. I think over the years as well, I've been a little bit more deliberate with how I spend money on games. And I I kind of like paying for the individual game. I think the alluring aspect of subscriptions have kind of worn off for a while now. I think the one subscriptions became like a thing, like, oh, I can play whatever I want. And that still lingers in my head, which is why I say PC Game Pass is an interesting prospect for discoverability and playing things you wouldn't otherwise. But when I know I want to play a game, I actually don't mind paying not for not full price or full price for certain things. And then if I pay $40 for something on sale, like, hey, that's a pretty good value. Like buying individual products, I think I am more motivated. This goes into like psychology with how you engage with games or things that you buy. If I pay a price for a thing, I'm more likely to engage with that thing on its own terms rather than it being part of a library that I have full access to. So like, you know, if I buy something on Steam, it's like, oh, 40 bucks, I'm going to lock in and play that to make sure that that 40 bucks was not going to waste. At least that's me and how I think of subscriptions versus full price games. But I would consider it with this new pricing initiative, but I would at least hop in with PC Game Pass and go from there.

Speaker 1:
[47:29] How about you, Miranda? Where would you have landed?

Speaker 4:
[47:32] Yeah, I would have definitely canceled and gone to PC Game Pass and probably just stuck with PC Game Pass until I had a reason to upgrade to Ultimate again, if there were a reason. Because generally, I have a lot of games, I have a lot of game systems as well, so I'm bouncing between them a lot, but I do spend a lot of time on PC. So a lot of the things that I use Game Pass for is for trying different games. And I think my PC is, it's not like super powerful, but it's good enough to try most games at like good settings. So I think that would be totally serviceable. So I'd probably just do that and just use my Xbox for games I already have, which I have plenty of games that I've purchased over the years. And then also I have Genshin now, so I can just play that literally forever.

Speaker 1:
[48:14] Yeah. All right. Those are our thoughts on the Game Pass Ultimate price decrease. Yes, you heard me correctly, price decrease. So the other fun thing from this week was the ID at Xbox Showcase. It aired today as we are putting this episode out. Hopefully you got a chance to watch it. If not, go find it on IGN's channel, youtube.com/ign. It is, I believe, 40 minutes long, if memory serves correctly. And there are a whole bunch of games in it. We're not going to go through every single one of them. You can check it out for yourself. But I thought we'd go through each the ones that kind of are highlights, the ones we like the most. Miranda, I'm going to start with you, give you the first choice here. Which which of these games jumped out at you as something you're super excited about?

Speaker 4:
[49:04] I feel bad because the one that I am most excited for is actually one I've been following for quite a long time at this point. It's Tears of Metal. And it was so exciting to see this in this presentation because it hadn't been announced for Xbox or anything. And it's going to be on Game Pass, which is even better. So this is sort of a hack and slash roguelite. And it's multiplayer, very Viking, Scottish, Northern, what is it, like the United Kingdom area, but not quite UK. But I don't exactly know exactly all the details of the mythos they're going for. But lots of kilts is what I have seen. And I am very excited for it because it just looks like a very fun time. And I apologize to the UK plus people in that part of the world because they're probably like, Miranda, how do you not know? I'm like, listen, guys, I'm from the US.

Speaker 5:
[49:59] You guys know what our school systems are like, okay?

Speaker 4:
[50:01] Anyway, that's all to say that I am quite excited for this and have been wanting to play with my friends for a long time. So I'm excited. It's almost out soon.

Speaker 1:
[50:12] By the way, we'll go around a couple of times because there are definitely more than one game each that we were all into here.

Speaker 4:
[50:18] Oh, yeah.

Speaker 1:
[50:19] Michael, how about you? What was the first thing that jumped out at you after watching the showcase?

Speaker 2:
[50:23] Speaking of the aggro crab developers that we mentioned earlier, Crashout Crew, which is their new game. If you've played Peak, it's another it's a variation on that. I think, you know, peak took the world by storm because of the whole like it's a five dollar game and like or and you pay or eight dollars. And then like that's kind of like five dollars. Like people were like people jumped into that game because it was very approachable or accessible from a price standpoint. And what they realized is like it was a great co-op experience. If you look at the R style, it's basically taking the peak aesthetic and the peak sort of sensibilities and then putting into an objective based game with like forklifts and doing objectives with your friends. Again, like I think the term quote friend slop is evolving but as the day as the days go on where it's it was used as a derogatory term for these games that are like trying to get streamers and multiplayer settings and getting your friends to play it. And then it became like a term of endearment because these games are charming when they're done right. And I think AgroCrab looked at peak and realized that they can still make other games and things like Another Crab's Treasure, which is a full single player Souls like game that is also cute. But at the same time, you can do something that's more bite size, that's attractive to a much larger audience. And this is them playing off of their success from peak. So I really want to play like I like good party games. I think Super Battle Golf is something that I love playing with my friends. And that's a thing I could play for an hour, maybe two hours, have a great time with people. And Crashout Crew looks like an extension of that idea. These like this team kind of knows what they're doing when it comes to fun multiplayer, things that are not super intense to like learn. You can jump in, take a few minutes to get your bearings, and then you kind of know how to play and know what to do. So Crashout Crew looks like a really fun party game that almost reminiscent of the Xbox Live Arcade era. I'm actually excited for this one.

Speaker 1:
[52:30] I'm going through the list and I'm like, which one do I want to talk about? There are actually several of these that had jumped out at me. I'm going to go. So the one I'm going to pick here has been announced before. And this trailer actually doesn't doesn't really show anything, but it just it reminded me like, oh, yeah, like this looks really interesting to me. And then it inspired me to go look up more about the game. And that's RV There Yet. It's just like so it's the game is you and your buddies are trying to get home from a vacation. And it's basically just a bunch of nonsense happens on the way back. And you're just trying to get the RV home. And I don't know, it just I their comedy is is an underrepresented genre in gaming overall. And I love the art style with this. And I love the sort of very playful, light hearted tone. So I want to I want to give this a try when it comes along. I this one, this one was that it's out in May. So it's coming out next month. Yeah, which I probably if I'm being honest with myself right now, probably not going to get to it in May because of Forza Horizon 6, Lego Batman, Legacy of the Dark Knight, 007 First Light, Mixtape is out in May too. So May is like a very personally busy month is for new releases for me. But I'll be eager to see what the reviews are like for this and how people are finding it. But this one jumped out at me. Miranda, I'll just go back to you. Give me another one here. We'll go around one or two more times before we wrap up.

Speaker 4:
[54:09] Really quickly, correction on Tears of Metal. It is Scottish. I was like, not Vikings. It's just Scottish. So, yeah, yeah, it's a cool UK medieval fighting. Anyway, for the next thing that I am excited for, though, it is Escape Academy 2. So another playing with somebody else, which a lot of these games have that theme, which is like, do you want to multiplayer it? I'm like, actually, yes, yes, I do. So I played all of the original Escape Academy with my twin sister, child to Sarah. Love you. She is a puzzle-solving master, but we have different kinds of puzzle-solving that we're good at. So this is such a fun game to play with somebody else, since there is also an underlying mystery element to it, and you're trying to discover there's something weird going on with this Academy. It was just such a great time, and I'm so curious to see how the addition of open world is going to change up the whole structure of this game, and also excited that we can just basically divide and conquer in this world of puzzles. So I am stoked for that.

Speaker 1:
[55:11] Yeah, I played a chunk of I played the demo of that at Summer Game Fest, like two years ago, maybe, and had a good time with it. Yeah, it's it is definitely it is definitely good stuff. Michael, how about you give me another one?

Speaker 2:
[55:25] I'm going to go to a two for one here because of their similarities. I'm going to go with Vampire Crawlers, which is out now and Echo Generation 2. Now, I know what you're thinking when you look at these games. Card based deck builders get out of here. I'm tired. Well, guess what? Slay the Spire 2 came out earlier this year and it's a banger. And from what I know, from what I played of Vampire Crawlers, our game is a banger. You know, if you don't know Vampire Crawlers, we've talked about it before. And it's it's been talked about because of the success of Vampire Survivors, you know, taking that idea of, you know, the Roguelike and building your character through items that get exponentially more powerful. But putting that into a like a dungeon crawler as is in the name and marrying that with the with a card based system. Like, yes, it's you think of it as overdone. But like when it comes to mechanics and the Roguelike structure, I think this is a team that knows what you're doing. And from what I've played so far, it is scratching that itch where you see a bunch of numbers go up. So it hasn't lost that satisfying part of it, where you see a bunch of things blow up. You see a bunch of gems and crystals in your inventory going up, blowing up on screen. You see big damage numbers and it moves fast. Like it's not a game that you need to like think too hard of. And once you come to like grips with, you look at the cards, you already know what they're doing, once you use them a few times. So this is a really cool idea. And I do kind of miss the dungeon crawling aspect of something like an Etrian Odyssey. So it does kind of fulfill that desire in some respect. So Vampire Crawlers, like that's out now, but the fact that you can play on Game Pass is cool. And that's out now. But on the same token, Echo Generation 2, which we've seen before, again, card-based deck builder. I know that that's kind of, that might be overdone, but I do really like the PS1-ish aesthetic of this game. And I think Echo Generations 1.

Speaker 1:
[57:16] It's voxels. Yeah.

Speaker 4:
[57:17] It's so stylish.

Speaker 1:
[57:18] I love the first one.

Speaker 2:
[57:19] Yeah, the first one was fantastic. And I think like this being, it feels like it's a pretty, it looks like a significant step from the first one. I think this is one I want to pay attention to. And that's also out in May. A lot of these games on the slate are out in May. So this one's coming a lot sooner than I thought. I just hope that the, for a card-based deck builder to work, I need to understand what the cards do immediately. And I need to be able to build and play off of them as I build, as the game goes on. And I hope that this game can nail that because I love the look of it.

Speaker 1:
[57:52] A game that was new to me that jumped out that I really liked was Deep Dish Dungeon, which it's a, again, as you saw in the showcase, it's an intentionally low-poly, like that's kind of a early PS1 era 3D game where they basically brag about, there's no handholding, there's secrets all over the place to find. You can play with friends or play by yourself. Survival elements, crafting elements, one big interconnected dungeon. And I just love that whatever you cook defines your stats and abilities. What a neat hook that is. And Deep Dish Pizza is the most powerful. So controversial take, I like Deep Dish Pizza. I don't think it's better or worse than other styles. It's just a different thing. I'm not on the Jon Stewart thing of that it's casserole. A good Deep Dish Pizza is its own unique thing.

Speaker 4:
[58:56] There's got to be balance to it. Yeah, everyone does it differently. Depends on what you want.

Speaker 1:
[59:00] Yeah, and I love Chicago Tavern style too, by the way. The cracker thins, like the polar opposite of Deep Dish. But anyway, yeah, I thought this one seemed really, it had a unique hook to it. I like the the intentionally low poly old school 3D look to it. So yeah, I'm going to be keeping an eye on this one. Let's go around, let's go around one more time and then we'll wrap it up here. And just to mix it up, Michael, I will go back to you, sir.

Speaker 2:
[59:27] Oh, man, I really wanted to talk about a deep dish dungeon because that looks really, really cool. I guess I want to maybe I'll talk about inKONBINI because that's a game that I have played before. And it's like we've talked about what cozy games mean to us, but inKONBINI is a little bit different in the sense that you like you are a manager at a at a KonBINI, which is Japanese convenience store. And there's something soothing about it, about organizing and identifying like, oh, these items that are placed, put them together. You go back to your stock room and keep, keep tabs on how successful you're doing. You talk to customers. It is the slice of life thing that you get from, that I, that you get from like usually from anime, where you just learn about people's lives. There's no real like huge stakes there. And there's something about the, like the convenience store, the idea of it that is kind of comforting to me. I know I'm not going to go into how much I get food from 7-Eleven. This isn't about me being a, being an absolute slob when it comes to 7-Eleven pizza. My friends have been on the case about how often I order pizza from 7-Eleven. Do not kill me, please. I know there's good pizza out there.

Speaker 1:
[60:42] Michael, you need to come over here. I'm going to make you pizza in my, in my Ooni oven. I've been, come on over and let's have an Unlocked get together over here. I'll make you guys pizzas. Enough of the 7-Eleven nonsense.

Speaker 2:
[60:55] Listen, it's cheap and it's right on my street. I love going by, you know, all that. The convenience store, you know, 7-Eleven is not like the greatest.

Speaker 1:
[61:03] All right.

Speaker 2:
[61:03] This isn't about me.

Speaker 1:
[61:04] This isn't about me.

Speaker 2:
[61:06] This is about the game.

Speaker 1:
[61:07] It is now. What have you done?

Speaker 4:
[61:11] I was like, wait, but like, I thought you're kind of like, oh, when I'm like, when I thought he was joking or like, no, yeah, like, I mean, that's the problem is I don't think convenience store culture outside of certain areas is very good. Like we have Quick Trip and other stuff in Texas.

Speaker 2:
[61:26] Quick Trip.

Speaker 4:
[61:27] That place. Bomb. I love Quick Trip. Buckies, all that good stuff like that. That is something special. That is an event. But most 7-Elevens in the United States are just like really like, oh, Japan. Fantastic.

Speaker 1:
[61:39] My bar is low. My bar is low.

Speaker 2:
[61:42] On the app, it tells you like how many times you order. So a quick story is like, I always say, yes, it says ordered nine times. And I'm like, oh, wow, you're going to put me on blast like that. I was like, does this go to double digits? It doesn't, because now says ordered often. I'm like, all right, cool, we're good now. Anyway, inKONBINI looks sick. It's it's low lift mechanically, but it has all the trappings that you would have a management sim with the sort of life sim element that slice of life I was talking about. And it has like a really inviting art style. And you like there's a lot of detail, too, when you look at the items and the item descriptions that you sell in your store. And so there's I think this is like an underrated or underrated it might I don't want it to be overlooked because it is a very comforting game. And from what I played at ID at Xbox, like two years ago and in the 30 minutes that I played, I was like, oh, this is like really cute and really soothing. So that is a standout to me. And it's out next week, I think.

Speaker 1:
[62:46] Can't beat that. Yeah, that is other than other than out now, that's about as good as it gets. Miranda, give me one more before we wrap up.

Speaker 4:
[62:54] I'm constantly chasing the high that I got from Battle Chef Brigade, which released back in 2017. Yes, you get it, Michael, it's so good. And one that seems like it might scratch that itch is Beastro, so another food based game. So you are cooking different meals for these heroes who go off to battle. Unfortunately, it is, definitely, or like look, or like card based combat at least. But it looks like it's something that is very approachable, quite quick to read, that I might be interested in playing. And I think I'm going to do it. But basically, you're cooking all these different meals. You have different recipes to put together for these heroes. I'm sure they have preferences. And like what you feed them equips them for their next adventure. Depending on if they're successful or not, they'll come back with like rare ingredients for you. You can also collect ingredients in the world around you. So there's a little bit of exploration. So you're not just like in these menus all the time. The art style is also so charming. I love how in the actual combat scenes, it does seem like someone's coming back to tell you a story of their adventure. And so it's done with these paper puppets. It's great. So I think this is a game. I just got to give it a try. And because it looks so cool. Like I just, I got to play it, you know? So that's where I'm at. Nice.

Speaker 1:
[64:18] There was a, definitely a Ryan game in this. And I would be remiss if I didn't call it out. And that's, I don't actually know how to pronounce it because it's got, there's an umlaut involved, but it's either LOFSONG or LofSONG. This was a world premiere. So this was a game none of us had seen before. And it's like, all right, you've got a super stylized art direction. You've got third person cinematic puzzle adventure. And what might be no dialogue, it's tough to really tell from the trailer. But this is super up my alley. I just love the look of it, love the vibe of it. And I really want to play this. This looked this looks super good. If you're watching us on video right now on youtube.com/igngames, you're seeing our producer Tayo's got the trailer up. And yeah, there's little surfing across some sand dunes here. It just yeah, this stuck out to me as a as a gem, potential gem. And so, yeah, it's there's no release date for this one. Again, just first first announcement. But I will be curious what that get to learn more about that game. So that was that's my final pick. But again, go watch the whole showcase. There were a ton of good games in there. We only covered we just covered like 10 of them basically. And there are plenty more than that. So check that out again on ign.com or youtube.com/ign.

Speaker 4:
[65:47] Can I give a quick shout out to the Albion online trailer? Because it was so charming.

Speaker 1:
[65:51] Yeah, it was good.

Speaker 4:
[65:52] Like please watch the showcase. Like it's a lot of fun. Also, our colleagues do a fantastic job. If you're watching, you can't hear the audio for the trailer, but it is really funny. So please, please check it out.

Speaker 1:
[66:04] Yeah, a rare live action trailer that doesn't suck.

Speaker 4:
[66:07] Yeah, oh yeah. They did a great work with that.

Speaker 1:
[66:10] Good stuff. All right, before we go, I want to mention our friends over at Humble Bundle because you can help them and they can help you. Jump into the Humble April Choice Bundle and score an amazing lineup of games this month. It's Assassin's Creed Valhalla, Daemon X Machina, Titanic Scion, Lord of the Rings Return to Moria. Until then, Planet of Lana, Artisan TD, The Procession of Calvary, and Buddy Simulator 1984. All of these games, you buy the bundle. It supports Reverb, which is a non-profit harnessing the cultural power of music to drive real world change by greening concerts, eliminating single use plastics, and bringing large scale clean energy solutions to live music. Head to humblebundle.com now through May 5th to start playing today. Anything to plug, Miranda, before we go?

Speaker 4:
[67:07] If you are playing Vampire Crawlers, we have an awesome guide in progress right now, so check that out for any help you may need. I also worked on the Tomodachi Life Guide, so if you are looking into that, I have some tips on that. The game basically plays itself, but there are some things you can miss if you don't know how to unlock them.

Speaker 5:
[67:24] And that's all for now.

Speaker 1:
[67:27] Good stuff. How about you, Michael?

Speaker 2:
[67:29] Got some things later this week. If you are listening to this after Thursday, you will see that I have a big review on the site called ign.com. So I worked really hard on that throughout the week. And also I will be at Final Fantasy XIV FanFest. I will be reporting live from the event itself. Lots of new stuff coming to Final Fantasy XIV. If you play that game, it's on Xbox. You should give it a try. It's my favorite game of all time. But yeah, I will be covering that at ign.com because it's where I work. And keep it locked in to Unlocked. It's the best podcast in the game, man. You don't even know it. Well, you probably do know it because you're listening to this. But also, oh my God, I just spilled a bunch of coffee on my phone. Oh no! I got too excited, it's fine. It was almost empty. Okay. But yes, all that and more on ign.com.

Speaker 1:
[68:18] Well, let's let Michael get cleaned up here. Although I'm still rocked by this 7-Eleven pizza revelation.

Speaker 5:
[68:25] I know, I can't stop thinking about it.

Speaker 1:
[68:27] This is, listen.

Speaker 4:
[68:27] I can't stop.

Speaker 2:
[68:28] If I could plug one more thing, is that I am actually working on becoming a private chef. So I am a very good cook, I will say.

Speaker 4:
[68:35] I've seen your Instagram.

Speaker 1:
[68:36] Yes.

Speaker 4:
[68:37] I get very hungry when I'm just like, oh.

Speaker 2:
[68:39] So I do eat good food.

Speaker 4:
[68:41] You just put this over here.

Speaker 2:
[68:42] Sometimes I wanna be a little goblin, all right? But I'm not gonna turn down a pizza made by Ryan, so hit me up, let me know when to come back.

Speaker 1:
[68:51] I'm serious. Well, it's gonna happen. We are gonna have a little unlocked party over here.

Speaker 2:
[68:55] Let's do an episode live then.

Speaker 1:
[68:58] We could. I mean, it's gross to listen to people eat on a podcast, so I don't know if we wanna do that, but maybe we'll figure something out. All right, that'll wrap it up for the 738th edition, my goodness, of Podcast Unlocked, IGN's weekly Xbox show, which was hosted by the three people you've been listening to for the last hour plus, produced by Tayo Oyakin, technical productions by Mariah Franzen and Amir Akib, technical direction and editing. Tayo's got you covered there as well. Graphic designs by our friend Justin Vachon. Unlocked is an IGN production. We're part of the Geek Media Network. Stick with us. We shall return next week with more Xbox news, opinion and analysis. We'll see you then.