Voxels

Anime without fanservice, Palworld discourse, cool murder mystery games, and books.

Show Notes:

Anime Follow Up:
Palworld:
Jubensha:
Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth:
Books:
Media Recommendations:
Chapters:


  • (00:33) - Frieren: Beyond Journey's End
  • (10:35) - Palworld
  • (20:47) - Jubensha
  • (30:06) - Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth
  • (37:22) - Sadiq's Book Corner
  • (43:33) - Media Recomendations

Creators & Guests

Host
Cristian Colocho
I like computers, reading science fiction, manga, bad anime, rap music, and making hot takes.
Host
Sadiq Saif

What is Voxels?

A podcast on Art and Culture by Sadiq Saif and Cristian Colocho

[music]

[music]

Hi, I'm Sadiq.

And I'm Christian.

And this is episode 2 of Voxels.

We are back.

This is, as we intended, I think, a two-week schedule.

Every two weeks, you want to do an episode.

So here we are.

Let's...

And can I just say, can I please just interject and say,

I'm kind of happy we're not doing a tech podcast right now.

I don't think I have it in me to go over any of the current discourses

that are going on on computers this week.

I wrote an entire blog post about shit that's been happening.

That's not going to it because I honestly,

I'm also tired of tech discourse.

Seriously, I had trouble writing that blog post

because I was like, I fucking hate technology.

So let's talk about anime instead, which I definitely do not hate.

You tolerate.

I tolerate anime.

Yes, I tolerate.

#tolerateanime.

So you have an anime that you really like.

So let's talk about something actually good.

Something that we like.

So what's it?

So we had the new season tier list last week

and I didn't add this show to it.

So this has been an ongoing airing show.

It's like 20 episodes right now.

So it's not a show new to the season.

So I didn't qualify it for inclusion

in the season, the anime pickup.

That was a mistake.

So this show started airing like last season, I think.

And the reason I got into this is like, you know,

Crunchyroll has their anime AI recommendations,

whatever bullshit it is, which is really just like

probably some sorting list and math, right?

It's probably like just some habit tracking algorithm thing

and not anything that's AI related.

But you know, companies be trying to do,

get that funding nowadays.

So I get it. I get it. Get the bag.

But this show is called "If You're In Beyond's Journey End."

And bro, okay.

So I'm going to just sell you on the premise of this.

I don't even want to like go too deep into spoilers,

but I think the premise of it itself alone

is intriguing enough to have a conversation on.

So Fyirun is an elf.

Her and four other, two humans and one dwarf,

go on a party for 10 years to kill the demon king.

In this world, elves live for hundreds of years.

Humans live the regular human lifespan

that we'd expect in our world.

And the thing that makes this interesting is

for her, 10 years went by in an instant

because of how long she's lived.

But for everyone else in the party,

that was like their decade.

And so the show picks up once they complete their journey

and have defeated the demon king and come back as heroes.

And she just disappears.

She's like, "Yeah, I'll see you guys in 50 years, I think."

And then she comes back and like all of her friends

are on their deathbed.

And so the premise of the show is

her trying to reconnect with the people she knew for a decade,

feeling guilty that she never connected with them

while they were adventuring once they've all passed.

So it's like dealing with the guilt of survivorship,

being the only one who survived or being--

Yeah, survivorship bias and all of that.

And the way it tells storytelling, it's so well done.

You maybe once or twice every episode or so get a flashback.

But the way the flashbacks are done,

it's not in a forward narrative perspective

where it is directly telling you something

that's important to the story.

It's always trying to show you.

So I think a good example that's not super-spoilery is

she eventually takes on an orphan,

which is the adopted daughter of one of the people

she went adventuring with.

And that orphan is a mage

who's really good at hiding her power level,

like how much mana she has.

And 15 episodes later, in a random flashback,

the person who ends up adopting her mentions to Fyren,

"Hey, how do you hide your power so much?

Because we know how strong you are,

but you don't off-put the energy."

And she just explains it.

But that's like a little one-second scene

in a completely different other flashback.

But if you've been paying attention to the show,

you can put one-on-one together and be like,

"Oh, that's why the adopted kid can hide their power."

Because she explained it to that person in that flashback

that it's about something different,

and that's how the story is told.

This is a forward narrative, right,

of her trying to re-go through the hero's journey

that they went through to revisit the places

that she went with her friends

and try and reconnect with them once they've passed.

But of course, there's things along the way,

and it is just told from that perspective

and that framing device.

And it is so, so good.

- I feel like this is one of those concepts.

It's pretty hard to pull off

because you could make it really kind of cliche

and kind of like the memory stuff, especially.

I don't know.

You could do all the nostalgia stuff,

which isn't as interesting.

But if it's trying to do a more thoughtful, reflective look

at people's, I guess, the relationship with death

and trauma and also memories and stuff like that.

Yeah, that seems interesting.

- I mean, there's another episode, too,

where it's a show where even on the episodes

where nothing happens, so much happens.

So there's one episode where the whole plan is

she just wants to clean up a statue of one of her friends

that someone built into town.

There's a whole half hour dedicated to that,

which could be done really boring,

but it's more told from the perspective

of the orphan girls' chance of adopting,

and they use her wondering,

"Why does this person want to clean the statue so much?

What does it mean to this person?"

as a way for them to develop their own relationship

with each other.

And it is just, listen,

I have teared up many times watching the show.

It is a fantastic show.

- I think this is the only show that we have talked about

that has like a 4.9 rating on Crunchyroll,

which suggests that this seems to be widely liked.

It seems to be actually good.

- This is one of those where I don't think,

sometimes some shows are like,

"This could only work with an anime.

This could only work with that."

This is a book as a manga with the way the story is told.

Regardless of what format it's in,

I feel like this is just great storytelling.

This is just a fantastic story.

And I know it's like 20 episodes in.

It's probably gonna go to 36 from when I read.

It's kind of a long show, but--

- That's actually fine.

That's actually preferable

because I can't really watch shows

that don't have that many episodes.

I mean, I can't really watch shows as they air.

I just forget.

I just forget to watch

and then I leave it to the end of the season

and I forget about the show entirely.

So if there's actually a bunch of episodes already,

that means that I can actually get invested in the show

and not forget,

which is actually good for me.

- Yeah.

Also the dub too.

The dub on this show is, listen, it is so...

So I watched the first 18 episodes as a dub.

Only the last two are sub only right now.

They haven't gotten dubs out for them yet.

And the dub, it is so well done.

The voice actress for "Fear In,"

I, oh my God, who is this?

I wanna give credit where the credits due.

Let me stall for a minute.

"Fear In Journeys."

- I am always like, I think,

I mean, I used to watch anime.

I used to be strongly, I mean, not strong,

but very much preferred watching subs,

which subs instead of dubs

because a lot of the time, dubbed voice acting,

is it up to par?

I feel like it was missing,

the voice actors are missing emotional stuff

in their voice acting.

But I mean, the last time I could remember

that watching a good dub of an anime

was the original Full Metal Alchemist anime.

I don't know if you've watched.

- Really original, not the remake?

I thought the remake was better.

- No, not "Brotherhood," no.

The original Full Metal Alchemist anime

had a really good dub.

If anybody else in the audience has watched that,

has the watched dub version of Full Metal Alchemist,

you probably know what I'm talking about.

It was a really, really good dub,

but that was the last time I remember a good dub.

I think Naruto also had some good dubbing

because it was a really big anime.

- Yeah, upside the name though.

So this person is Malorie Rodak,

and this is apparently her first leading role

from what I can see.

She's done some other anime,

like side characters, I've seen some of these shows,

and she did a few characters in "Borderlands 3,"

but I'm not seeing any protagonists on this.

Some important side characters.

But yeah, no, voice acting is fantastic.

You don't watch enough anime to know this is a problem,

but I am sick of the amount of fantasy shows

where everyone has a baby voice.

No disrespect to people who have baby voices,

but this is an elf that's been alive

for four, 500, 600 years.

They don't need to sound like a loli.

That's not how that works.

- Yeah, I think that's one of those anime tropes.

- But yeah, so watch this show.

This show's very good.

Once again, I know convincing you to watch any anime

is always a struggle.

- It is a difficult proposition,

but this one has a better chance

because it has some good episodes.

- The star rating ain't wrong,

and there's no fan service.

There's none of it.

Every episode I've seen.

- So some of the characters are kids, right?

So it's like childish jokes about the in-character.

It's never anything that's creepy or anything like that.

It is just, it is so good.

Good show, good show.

I'm very happy to see where it goes.

And this is probably one of the ones,

because I know it's probably gonna end

where the manga picks up from here.

I will buy the books for it, probably when it's done.

I would probably buy the books.

But all right, so that is my anime follow-up

for more shows that people should watch.

Now, I don't know if this is something people should watch,

but people have been forced to, I feel, partake in.

- I mean, watching is what I've done with this

because I don't want to play it.

So we are gonna talk about,

as everybody's talking about,

on every video game podcast,

every video game article this past week or so

has been about a game called Palworld.

You may have heard of it

if you follow video game news or discourse at all.

So what is Palworld?

That's the question first and foremost.

- Maybe the question first is why is Palworld,

but I think we can start with what.

So Palworld, Palworld, Palworld.

Everyone has been saying it's Pokemon with guns

because that's the marketing.

I'm sure there are guns in this game,

but I have not ran into any.

So basically, take Pokemon Legends Arceus,

a game you have not played,

Minecraft, a game you have played,

and Ark Survival Vault, a game I've played.

Have you played Ark?

- No, I'm not really a fan of survival games,

so I don't play them,

but I am aware of Ark Survival Vault, yeah,

but I've not played any games like Ark or Rust

or like Valheim or like those sort of

very survival-oriented where you have to craft stuff

and like build a base or whatever, right?

So I haven't played them, no.

- Well, so it mixes all three of those genres together

into one game,

and here's the thing with all the discourse.

All the discourse aside about is it AI generated,

is it a ripoff, should I simp for the company,

you know, all that shit,

put that shit in the trash where it belongs

because the game's actually kind of fun.

That's the biggest problem

if you like that genre of game

because you spawn out,

you have to do some base building,

and then you capture these Pokemon, sorry pals,

and then you can have them do automation stuff

for your bases, right?

You can have them build resources, all of that.

So is there a commentary?

And I think the game pokes fun at it.

Like there's totally a commentary

on how Pokemon probably has some form of slavery,

especially because every character in the game

has like a sanity level,

depending on how much you work them.

So there are,

I think the game designers are aware

of what they're poking at with this,

but it is still like a fun survival game,

and I don't go too hard on those.

Like I think Kato was saying in Remap Radio,

same thing, because I'm sort of similar with these.

The first five hours where you initially get shit started

is usually the most fun of any Minecraft-like game,

and then afterwards it just becomes a chore,

and that's where this falls into,

but that's the genre.

Some people live for the chore shit, right?

Some people live for like those routines and all that.

- I kind of like,

I don't play survival games,

but it sort of reminds me of playing like Animal Crossing

because Animal Crossing has this similar,

I mean, Animal Crossing is not a survival game,

but it has this similar loop, right?

Like where you're doing these tasks,

like you're not crafting,

I mean, you're kind of crafting,

but you're building these small goals

to build a bigger thing, right?

And survival games kind of have that, right?

You're doing small tasks towards a bigger goal, right?

And Animal Crossing works,

like the first, I don't know,

like 30 hours of Animal Crossing New Horizons,

like really, really worked.

Like it was great,

like just me in the loop doing the thing,

but then you get bored.

Like I got bored anyway.

So that's the problem I have with this sort of genre.

- Well, this is more of a social game too,

because this does have,

I think dedicated services is working on building,

but right now it's like eight people co-op on console.

I think it's more on PC,

and that works so much better

because I think this is a fun, like,

"Hey, I have nothing to do.

Let's hang out in a Discord room

and just fuck around in Power World,"

kind of thing, right?

- Yeah, I mean,

that's what survival games are fun for really,

like stuff like Valheim is really popular for that.

It's a good hangout game.

It's like a good, you know,

you can hang out with your friends

and build some shit and that's it.

Like Minecraft works for that as well.

And all the Discourse, it's just,

I'll say this.

I know we like,

I don't really want to get too deep into the Discourse

because honestly,

a lot of it is just so mind-boggling idiotic,

but like,

this game is like,

I think the Discourse is just silly.

I don't understand that people don't need to simp

for the Pokemon company.

Like you don't need to be like copyright police

for the Pokemon company.

They can do that themselves.

Like that stuff is just.

- It's very funny to me that people are like,

you know who we need to defend?

The innocent folks at Nintendo.

They never go after anyone.

(laughs)

- They can file a lawsuit or something.

They can do it.

They are aware this exists.

They're not saying.

- If you look at any video game company, right?

I think Nintendo's legal department

is probably the most well-financed.

- Yeah, and they are very, very aggressive.

So the fact that they haven't

done anything about this game,

I think suggests that they won't.

Like they don't care.

Like they just don't see it.

- And the thing too about these kind of lawsuits is right,

is you have to prove,

firstly it's like a copyright infringement,

a rip off or whatever,

and that it has harm.

And there's a downside of every copyright lawsuit is

what if the judge says no, it is not.

You open the door to other shit.

I feel like that is probably why

they haven't gone after them yet.

And Nintendo probably also sees like a PR nightmare.

Like, you know, if you do a lawsuit against this game,

this game is so massively popular

that attacking it will just cause it,

like people will not be happy with the demo.

It'll cause like a PR, it's a PR problem.

Like it's a PR disaster.

If you just let this lie,

like you just be like, this is fine.

I mean, I don't think it's copyright

or trademark infringement.

I think like what I've seen of like the

quote unquote pals in the game, right? The creatures,

like they are legally distinct

from actual Pokemon designs.

- I mean, it's a rip off obviously,

but it's like, who cares?

But like at the same time,

like Drake ripped off the whole continent of Africa

for his musical style and no one seemed to care.

(laughs)

- Yeah, that's, well, that's another can of worms.

- He ain't Jamaican, why he talking like that?

No one in Toronto talks like that.

I know people from Toronto.

- That's, some people in Toronto talk like that.

- Well, except for those who immigrated from,

obviously they immigrated from,

but not the white boys in that part of the city.

- Yeah, all right.

Let's stop there before we like have like

an entire discourse about--

- But yeah, PowerWorld's a good game.

PowerWorld's a good game.

I'm excited to see where it goes.

I'm curious, so everyone's talking about

is this like a short burst or is it a long tail?

Or is it a long tail?

I'm curious to see how it blows up on Twitch and that.

'Cause I know right now it's a game

that a lot of people are playing,

but I don't know like--

- I think what will happen with this

is what happened with Valheim is that

it's gonna have this short burst of like extreme popularity,

but it's gonna like, it's gonna go down a bit,

but there's still gonna be like a dedicated group of like

people who are like hardcore into this game

and like playing this game.

It's gonna have like a community, right?

So it's not gonna be as popular.

Like I don't think it's gonna become Minecraft,

but like it's gonna have like a following.

I think that's what's gonna happen.

So, which is fine.

Good for them, I guess.

And do we have, I think we can definitely prove

like any of the assets are, were generated using--

- Who cares?

Who cares? Okay, listen, I don't, God fucking dammit.

Okay, here's, I'm getting myself five minutes max

to talk about this.

This is this game of a small studio

who is on a shoestring budget

who probably is mostly financed by the game pass deal.

Okay, from what I can tell,

there's not VC money going into this

and I didn't, you know, to be clear,

there could be VC money going into it, but it's 2024.

There's no VC money around right now.

It's like no one, AZ whatever is not funding Pokemon ripoffs.

So, with that in mind,

even if they did or did not use mid journey

or any other AI generator, who cares?

They're not ripping off independent artists,

nor are they a company that can afford

to finance a full art team,

even if, you know, with how expensive games are

to make right now.

So what I'm saying with that is,

AI art is normally not great,

but it depends on who's using the tool and for what purpose.

Now, once they've had all this drama, like, hey,

I imagine too, a lot of the new pals

that will come in through updates

are probably going to be far less legally distinct

from Pokemon and be far more unique,

just because of the amount of backlash they've gotten.

But whether it is or is not ultimately does not matter

because this is not like Square Enix

using AI art for album covers and film star.

This is not like Ubisoft,

like getting rid of their whole art team.

I don't know if they did,

or like if they were to say, for example,

a company like Ubisoft got rid of the whole art team

and replaced it with just an AR art generator.

There's levels to this.

And that is my final take on most of the AI discourse is,

it is a thing.

It is a thing.

It depends on how the thing is used.

It is like, we have Mastodon servers

that have important content,

and we have Mastodon servers that have strict guidelines.

Mastodon itself is not the tool, it's the moderation.

It's everything around it, it's the human aspect of it.

- And I don't wanna like open this Pandora's box

even further because that becomes,

we become a tech podcast and that's not weird.

This is not gonna happen.

We're not gonna do that.

This is not the podcast for it.

If you want me to write a blog post about AI shit,

please add me.

And because I've been thinking about it,

but I just haven't paused it.

So, you know, tell me if you want that.

But anyways, next thing.

Next thing is I have not heard anything about this.

This is a completely, I've not watched this video.

I've not heard anything about this.

This is like a video by the YouTube channel,

the folks over at People Make Games,

about murder games, like what do we call it?

- Jubensha.

So it's like a tabletop game, you know, critical role,

a lot of stuff popular in the West, you know.

White people culture, as I like to call it.

I'm kidding.

There are a lot of,

I am pleased anyone who is black or brown

who loves tabletop games, I respect you.

But I open up critical role.

I open up all these Twitch streams.

- Do you know the podcast Friends at the Table, bro?

Like Austin Walker, shout out.

- I actually don't know what Friends at the Table is.

Actually, no.

- Okay, it's a play podcast.

It's like a real play.

I think D&D, I don't know if it's D&D or not,

but it's a real play podcast.

- Well, the real time podcast is a play podcast.

- Well, the real time followup, I was proven wrong

and I just need to stop watching

the big YouTube tabletop channels.

- Yeah, the critical role is definitely the biggest one.

That's for sure.

Yes, critical role is massive.

- Yeah, so this is same style of tabletop games

and it's a genre that's popular in China.

It's branched out to Singapore.

So the link we have in the show notes,

which you always find at voxels.fm,

is a people make games video, complete aside,

but everyone should,

if you have not seen the Palestinian game developers video

that they put out like a month ago,

fantastic video worth the entire half hour watch,

explains a lot of nuance on a unnuanced situation,

or rather a situation that people don't speak

with much nuance on.

And so what this game sort of is,

it's six people in a room.

There's a game master

and they're basically spinning a murder tale.

So you're handed information, right,

that you have to yourself

and the character is supposed to be playing

and it's basically like a whodunit murder mystery

where someone dies and then as the game progresses, right,

the game master only steps if need be,

just is there to move the story along.

People have to question each other,

talk to each other,

and figure out who actually committed the murder,

which is great.

I feel like there is not enough,

at least in the West, right,

experiences for tabletop content

where you can just go out to a place

and meet random people and have a game.

I don't, you're down here in Florida,

I don't know of any,

I don't know if you know any in Toronto,

places where you go and they do D&D,

they have game escape rooms, that I've seen,

but not anywhere it's like,

"Hey, yeah, I'm gonna go down here,

"get some food, and sure,

"let's do a quick campaign

"of this short D&D session or whatever."

- I think that does exist,

it depends on where you are.

I think Toronto has stuff like this,

but also I'm not a tabletop RPG person,

so if anybody is in our audience

and has experience with this kind of in-person,

like a board game shop,

usually board game shops

usually sometimes do these kind of things,

there are cafes and stuff like that

that do this kind of thing.

I know there's at least one in Toronto that does it,

so if you're aware, please let us know,

please send us links, because I'd love to know.

But yeah, this seems fun.

This seems interesting, because I'll be honest,

I don't really care about D&D.

I'm not saying that in a rude or anything,

I don't think D&D is bad,

anything strong opinion on D&D is that.

- I feel like it's one of those things where

it depends on the session you have.

It's just a thing, it's just like a survival game.

Survival games are way more fun when you're having fun

with friends, and I imagine D&D session,

when you're having a really engaging narrative

is the exact same thing.

- D&D is a social game, right?

It's essentially a very social game.

It really depends on who you're playing with

and how you're playing,

your group or your game master and all that.

So my only real experience with D&D

is through Baldur's Gate 3,

which admittedly, it was a really good time,

but I don't think it replicates the experience

of playing D&D, the tabletop version with the group,

as well as the video game can.

So I don't know, I've never done tabletop RPGs in person

or in online, even with other people,

so I don't know if I will ever do that,

but it's cool that these things exist.

- Yeah, and as well, the people who make games video

goes more in depth into this,

but there's also a really good conversation there

about how a lot of these don't have content warnings

'cause it just, what's the way they say this?

So it's not that having trigger warnings

and content warnings in games are something

that more or less is a Western thing,

but more or less Western developers and people,

I can speak for North America,

I really don't know how the culture is on that in Europe.

Mastodon, I see people all the time

talk about content warnings and that,

but the mastodon is not representative of all of Europe.

Sorry to the French.

But for us, at least, North America

and parts of South America,

it's been a lot more common nowadays

for games coming out of here to have content warnings,

trigger warnings, even modes like, what is that one,

by Obsidian, the Grounded.

They have that arachnophobia mode, right,

where you can turn off all the spiders

and turn them into purple blobs.

So there's a bigger push for that here.

But a lot of these games, a lot of the mysteries,

a lot of them tend to also have a murder,

but then there's always at least one assault in the game,

and there's no warnings for it.

So this sort of talks about how it's not great

if you're doing a session with someone

who that's a trigger for them, and then they just,

"Oh, yeah, by the way, you're about to get assaulted."

And it's like, "Ah, that's not good, not good at all."

- So Laura K. Dale, Laura K. Buzz,

some of you might know already,

she has this video series that she does on YouTube

called Accessibility, which is talking about video games

and accessibility, and she did a video

a couple weeks ago about PTSD and gaming accessibility

and the use of content warnings.

So I just wanted to mention that out here

because we talked about content warnings,

and it's a very good discussion.

It'll be in the show notes because I think it's a good video.

People should watch it.

Laura makes good videos.

People should subscribe to her stuff.

But yeah, it's a complex discussion

because even in "Western video game,"

content warnings are fairly new, and they're not.

Like, a lot of games will have content warnings,

but they're not specific or not in the right place.

It's starting to become more popular,

especially with smaller games, and even with triple-A games,

like I try to do content warnings and trigger warnings

and stuff like that, or better use of them.

So that's a good discussion.

So that's -- I mean, I'll watch the video.

I'll watch the video.

I put the "People Make Games" video on my YouTube watch list,

so I'll get around to it.

I'll watch it.

I should say, the last thing I want to touch on

before you go on to the next thing is,

out of all the uses for VR, before I sold my Quest,

there was one game --

you need someone else's VR to try it out --

but it's a virtual reality-style D&D game

where it's meant to be ran tabletop,

but it immerses you in the environment

because you have a VR headset on.

I feel like I --

it is so much privilege and money involved

in getting a session for that,

but I feel like having a five- or six-person session

would be rad.

Yeah, you have to have --

that's so many headsets that you have to buy.

That's like, what, $6,000 worth of headsets or whatever?

I don't know.

Well, this is what you played over the internet, though,

so you could play it remotely.

It didn't have to be done through the actual --

in a room.

But yeah, that's what I'm saying.

I'm just like, "Damn, if I could have a game like that

in a world where vision pros, vision headsets, and Quests

are far more affordable,

to have one where both of your friends have one

and you can have a full tabletop session going remotely

or everyone's immersed like that,

that's the kind of shit where I'm like, "Yeah, I can --"

It's like VR chat, but you have --

Less horny?

Maybe less horny.

You never know.

So let's talk about another video game,

Like a Dragon Infinite Weld,

which came out earlier this week.

Well, by the time you listen to this, it'll be the previous week,

but Like a Dragon Infinite Weld is a sequel to Yakuza,

Like a Dragon, which is --

I don't know how to say this dude's full name.

It's RGG.

I'm not going to say --

I feel like I'm going to butcher the Japanese pronunciation,

so I'm just going to say RGG.

RGG, they make --

People who are familiar with the Yakuza games,

Yakuza 0, probably the biggest one that I think people should play.

This one is in the style of a JRPG.

So you play as Ichiban, who's the main character,

Ichiban Kasuga, and you play with a party, right?

Like you have a JRPG-style party.

Like it's like a turn-based game --

The combat is turn-based, rather,

and you have a narrative.

It's a long ass game.

It has all the Yakuza stuff, like little mini-games,

karaoke, and leveling up.

You have RPG stuff like friendship, quests.

Every person in your party has a quest that you can do for them,

and you build a relationship and stuff like that.

So it has all the RPG stuff.

It's really, really fucking good.

I love the Yakuza Like a Dragon.

It was one of the best RPGs I've ever played, honestly.

It's really, really solid.

I'm not a huge JRPG person,

but I am a big fan of the style of JRPG.

Specifically the way RGG writes characters and narratives

I find really, really good.

And this is just Like a Dragon, Infinite Wealth.

I started it yesterday.

I played about eight hours of it so far.

I barely started, honestly.

Eight hours is not that long in this game.

Not much happens in eight hours.

It's incredible.

But yeah, it's like an iterative improvement on the previous game.

RGG just builds on top of what was good about the previous game.

It just makes everything a little bit better and more interesting.

We have a new locale.

For the first time in this series,

the Yakuza/Like a Dragon series' history,

we are in America.

We are in Hawaii, specifically,

which is an interesting place to be.

This is not a huge spoiler

because this happens in the first few hours of the game.

One of the big, first things that happens to you in America

is that you get framed by a dirty cop.

And I think RGG understands American culture just fine.

That's all I'm going to say.

The first thing that happens to you is an American cop fucks you over.

That sounds like America to me.

So, good shit.

Hell yeah, brother.

It's good. I'm only eight hours in.

But I'm sure by the time I'm done with this,

it's going to take me a full month to play

because it's going to be a long-ass game.

But I'm enjoying it.

It's been good so far.

Rock Paper Shotgun has a review of it.

I'm sure there's other reviews.

But so far, I'm really enjoying it.

Have you played any of the Yakuza or Dragon games?

Actually, I wanted to come to this conversation.

I've played parts of the Brawler ones.

I have not beaten them.

When they're on Game Pass, I've played a few of Yakuza 0, I think.

I didn't never beat it, though.

But my question for you here is,

was the switch to...

Because it seems like now all of the mainline games are going to be turn-based.

Do you think that was the right move to make?

Because it was just like free Brawl or runaround beforehand.

Yeah, so personally, my opinion on this is

I find the Brawl stuff is fun.

But personally, I prefer the RPG style turn-based combat.

I didn't used to be a big fan of RPG turn-based combat.

But the way this game does the combat is really, really interesting.

The way the systems are designed, the status effects,

and how they improve that system in Infinite Wealth.

And how you can chain attacks between people in your party.

Positioning is important and all that kind of stuff.

I find it personally far more interesting

than the Brawler-style combat in the previous mainline Yakuza games.

Not that I don't like those, but this is, I feel, a more enjoyable experience.

It stays interesting throughout the game, which is one of the things.

The Brawler combat is fun, but it's very...

Once you play Yakuza 0, or Yakuza Kiyomi 1, Kiyomi 2,

you get bored of the combat after a while because it's very repetitive.

Especially when the game throws repetitive waves of enemies at you.

You're just like, "Let's get this shit over with."

So this, I think, feels more like a tactics game in that way.

You have to think about combat more tactically.

When do you use guard? When do you use an item?

And the turn-based order.

Which enemy is going to attack you next?

So you can manage to have this tactics layer to it,

which I find super interesting.

And it makes fights more dynamic and just more fun.

Sort of a bit of XCOM-style gameplay going on,

which makes things more interesting and more dynamic throughout the game.

So that's my take on whether it's good enough.

The RPG stuff is better.

No, I get that. That makes sense.

I have another question, too, because I heard good things about this.

Have you gotten to the dating minigame yet?

I have not. Still pretty early on that stuff.

I don't think unlocks until a little bit later.

So I'm curious how that...

Yeah, there's a lot of minigames.

Yakuza's big thing is Yakuza/Like a Dragon.

The big thing is minigames. There's so many fucking minigames.

And honestly, I've never engaged with a lot of the minigames,

but I did engage with the real estate minigame in the previous game,

so I'll expect there to be at least one of the minigames in this one

that I'll engage with.

I tend to prefer straight-up narrative stuff personally,

but I'll see. I haven't really engaged.

The minigame stuff isn't really introduced to you yet.

The game is still doing the early...

We're in Chapter 3 and it's still doing some introductory stuff,

which is why I haven't engaged in the minigames yet.

So we'll see. We'll see what I think of this in a month.

Next month, ask me how I'm feeling about this game.

That's probably my...

Yeah, we'll totally follow up on it.

But yeah, so next up, we got the Books Corner.

We got Books Corner. I'm excited. I'm excited for this.

I will not talk about the light novels and manga I read in public,

so this is all you.

Okay, that's fair.

So I'm back into reading in a real way.

I'm trying to read more always,

so I'm doing at least one book a month,

but I can do more than that.

So I've read four books in January,

starting off with The Reading List by Sarah Nisha Adams.

I picked this up on this.

I saw this on, I think, on the Kobo e-book store on sale

in December, I think, and I picked it up.

I thought the premise was interesting,

so I was like, you know, it was like $3 or whatever.

I was like, sure, I'll buy it.

So I bought it.

It is really nice and heartwarming.

It's this sort of contemporary fiction

about the importance of libraries as centers of community

and how books and libraries can build community.

It's about these two characters who both have a lot of problems

in their lives, and I'm trying to deal with that.

So they use these different books to understand their own reality.

It's really, I think, really well done and heartwarming

and it's also, like, it doesn't use books as magic,

where it's like, oh, books are going to solve all your problems.

But it's more realistic.

It's a nice, cozy, maybe not cozy,

but it's a nicer sort of reflective read.

I think it's pretty good, worth your time for sure.

Next two books are both in the same series.

I read two books by Heather Fawcett.

I read the first book of the series, the Emily Wilde series,

which is the series here, Emily Wilde's Encyclopedia of Fairies.

And this is a fantasy novel, sort of historical fantasy,

I'd say, more than anything.

So it's about, it uses a lot of lore about fairies, Faye,

and it does it really, really well.

The author really did her research when it comes to, like,

you know, fairy mythology and, like, it makes good use of fairy mythology

in a way that I haven't seen in a while.

Honestly, it's some of the best use of mythology,

like that specific mythology, like, and it's really, really well done.

The characters are very, very fun, and the book is genuinely quite funny

in some places and heartwarming and charming.

The characters, there's a romance subplot, and I didn't hate it,

which is, in fact, I really like the romance subplot.

I think it's for a lot of, small aside, small mini rant is that

a lot of fantasy, especially YA young adult fantasy,

have these, like, romance sideplots, and they're bad,

like, a lot of them are bad, like, it's like, they're just, like,

kind of in there just for the sake, it's like a genre trope at this point,

and it's like, can we not do, like, a shitty romance subplot

that's kind of boring, like, but this one, like, really does,

sort of, build the romance well, and it treats it like an important part of the narrative.

And so, you know, I read Encyclopedia of Fairies, which is the first book,

and I also read the second book of the series,

which came out actually the week after I read the first book,

which was, you know, great timing.

Emily Wilde's Map of the Other Worlds, it just,

same, a lot of the same stuff happening in a different location,

and we added some new characters, and the interaction is still fucking,

really fucking good.

So, if you're looking for a new fantasy series to read,

it's not complete, I think there's going to be a third book,

yeah, there's going to be a third book in the series,

the author has indeed confirmed that,

but if you're looking for a new fantasy series to dig into,

Emily Wilde's Really Good Shit, Heather Fawcett,

doing good work here.

Last book, this is the second book in Becky Chambers' Wayfarers series.

I read the first book in 2022 when I was doing my reading challenge,

that year where I did like one book a week.

Closer to Common Orbit is the second book in the series,

and honestly, this shit, this shit is the straight up the best sci-fi

out here right now, like, I don't think anybody's writing sci-fi as well

as Becky Chambers is right now, it's straight up some of the most humane,

most of the most compassionate and well-written, like,

sci-fi stories that I've read in a long time.

Very much worth it, just start with the first book,

and go from there, it's really, really well-written,

I highly recommend it.

Honestly, I read this book, I could have read this book in one day

if I didn't have to like stop and like do other stuff,

because it's just very, very, I just devoured this shit,

like I read the first book in a single day,

in 2022, because I was just like, this shit is so good.

So yeah, those are the four books I've read,

really, really good shit.

I'll actually be continuing with the Wayfarers series next week,

when I start another one.

So I'm going to continue that and then move on to something else.

So that's my books corner.

And I would like manga and light novel recommendations

that would not make me shameful to post on the internet.

So if you have read any good light novels that are not animes,

actually, and you're not going to be reading them,

I would love to hear what you think about the light novels

that are not animes, actually.

So the listeners too, if you have read any light novels

that are like not animes, like, you know,

some interesting shit that's being translated,

like I'm more than happy to pick it up at me.

But I have one other thing I actually want to bring up,

it's on our notes.

I want to end this with an album recommendation.

We don't talk much about the album, but I think, you know,

giving weekly recommendations for media might be a cool thing.

So let me just, as I stall to pull up this bandcamp link,

I'm going to type in media recommendations.

So I've probably sent you all this dude's stuff.

He's on Stone's Throw, not Knowledge,

but another artist called Mind Design.

And there's a beat tape that came out last year

called Snacks with Three X's.

And it's a fire beat tape.

I think everyone should check this out.

It's good.

It's on all the streaming services, bandcamp link,

also because it gives the artists the most amount of money.

But yeah, no, I was fucking with this really hard last year,

and I don't feel like enough people have checked it out.

Yeah, Mind Design is kind of like one of those,

like I feel like Knowledge is, I mean,

more people know Knowledge, I think, than Mind Design,

but like Knowledge-

It's a piece of the Anderson Pack collab.

Yeah, because of the Anderson Pack collab,

more people know Knowledge, but you know,

there's a whole community of like, you know,

beat tape makers out there,

and a lot of them are on bandcamp.

So you know, you might want to-

Doesn't The Alchemist have like a subscription service for beats?

Am I making this up?

I think you're making that up.

I don't think that exists.

No, no, no, no, no, no. The Alchemist does.

The Alchemist has like some kind of direct-to-consumer shit.

I-

Yeah, he has a website where he can buy his music directly,

but I don't think he has like a store

where you can buy like beats from it.

But The Alchemist has like a direct-to-consumer-ish-

Oh yeah, Alk Records.

Yeah, you can buy all of the-

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay, so I was making some of it up,

but not all of it up, and that's what's important.

Yeah, music-wise-

Oh, he sells drum and sample kits. That's it.

You can buy like production tools.

That's what I was thinking of.

Yeah, so you could buy his actual music,

but you could also buy drum kits. Yeah.

That's cool.

I-

I have not-

I mean, I listen to-

I don't know if I would recommend it.

I listen to the new Benny the Butcher album,

which came out this Friday as we record this.

And I don't know if you felt this-

I'm a-

Like, I guess I call me a Benny the Butcher fan,

but this latest album called Everybody Can't Go.

Like, production-wise, honestly, incredible.

Like, this incredible production,

there's some Alchemist meets in here,

Hit Boy did a lot of it, and it sounds good.

But lyrically, I felt a little bit hollow.

I don't know.

I don't know what you thought of that.

But I felt it was a weaker album than Town of Town IV,

which was the album for this.

Okay, so my thing about Griselda Records is

you engage with them like you would engage with wine.

Not often, and in short bursts.

Okay.

I enjoy a lot of Griselda Records,

but I'm not like-

There's such a thing as too much West Side,

too much Benny the Butcher.

And I feel like this one here is one where

the Lil Wayne song was good, but a couple of them-

It's just like, they sometimes fall into tropes

in their music, like lyrically and musically,

and not all projects.

I think I engage them in a way where each album

has one or two songs to keep on rotation,

but I usually don't fuck with the rest of it.

Yeah, I think Benny the Butcher especially

has fallen in a bit of a light of his own,

where he's making the same music over and over again.

I mean, that's a thing artists do,

and there's a market for it, and there's an audience for it,

but I feel a little bored, I suppose,

in some of the music nowadays.

And I've never liked West Side Gun.

My hot take is West Side Gun is just straight up

really annoying.

I find his fucking ad-libs and whatever.

Bro, you are stepping in dangerous territory.

I would go to Toronto right now, sir.

Don't even. Don't even.

And I don't want to ever hear a conductor.

We've got a problem ever again.

A conductor is the hardest tag in all of hip-hop.

I am not taking this slander.

Listen, no, that should go hard.

We just hear him start screaming out,

"Conducto, we have a problem!"

I think my problem with the tag is that if it gets overused,

I think it gets annoying, and that's all I'll say.

I don't think it's inherently annoying.

I'm afraid to ask you this question, but I have to.

Gangsta girl DJ drama, yes or no for not being annoying?

Not annoying. I find it actually kind of hype, honestly.

I like that producer tag.

Same league as Metro Booming producer tags.

Producer tags are one of those things that could be really annoying or really bad.

I think at least his conductor, his producer tag is funny,

but I think there was this one album where every track had the producer tag on it multiple times,

and I swear to God, it drove me fucking bananas.

That's why I kind of hate it now.

No disrespect.

Shout out to conductor.

Is there anything else we want to say?

Musically, I've been listening to a lot of radio, actually.

KEXP, shout out. Seattle's radio station.

Because they have all the--

What?

Yeah.

Sorry, what? What the fuck?

No, I'm not even messing with you right now.

You think I'm joking? No.

I'm not making this up. KEXP, you can stream it online.

I'm not wearing you can't stream it online, actually.

This is like when I come to use with a Toronto Star article.

It's just like, what?

No.

I think KEXP is not like a lot of other FM radio stations.

It is a lot more--

First of all, there's a lot fewer ads that are on rate.

It's very much very listener funded.

A lot of their funding comes from direct donations and funding.

So they have a DJ rotating cast of people who actively maintain the music throughout the day.

And it's really, really good.

I highly recommend if you need something--

If you're stuck in some sort of musical rut,

like you're like, I don't know what music, I don't know, I'm kind of listening to the same shit over and over again,

just put on the KEXP stream.

I listen to it throughout the day, honestly.

It's kind of good. I've discovered a bunch of new shit through it.

So, you know, I'll link a playlist that I put together of stuff that I've discovered through KEXP.

In the show notes, so if people want to listen to it.

So that's my musical thing.

So that's a good place to wrap up, I think.

Is there anything else that we want to mention, we want to shout out before we go?

If you have any AI hot takes, please send them to feedback@voxels.fm.

Yeah, I mean, that will come to both of us, but specifically, I'm the one interested in your hot takes, actually.

Oh, I'm sure that there's not many people who agree with my whole, "It depends on how you use AI."

I'm positive on that. I mean, to be clear, I will admit, here's my disclosure.

I use a whisper model or open... I don't know what Hush uses.

Hush uses one of the open AI models to process the files because it makes it a lot easier.

And I don't want to do that manually.

I'm not paying someone to do the work. I would be doing it myself.

I mean, do you not use it for the transcripts? Is that for the transcripts?

Both. I use Hush to remove background noise.

Hush is not open AI. Hush is like a local model.

It's an open AI model, ran locally.

And whisper... So I use a transcription app as well. It uses the whisper model ran locally.

These are both using open AI models, yeah.

Okay. I did not know what model they were using. I thought it was like...

Yeah, I don't know if it was whisper. Hush is using another one, but I believe they're both either open AI ones.

All right. Let's wrap up this before we talk about AI models.

So, as always, you can find us on voxels.fm.

You can find all the show notes, all the links and everything.

You can find me on Mastodon, at Packet Can, at 10Forward.Social, and on my website,

SonicSave.com, and my blog, NonRouted.Space.

Please go read my blog. Put it in your RSS feed reader, as the kids say.

Christian, where do people find you on the World Wide Web?

Yeah, you can find me on Mastodon posting about the 25th... 20th, sorry, anniversary of Madvillainy.

Just coming up next month. It'll be a fun episode when that happens.

March 3rd, March 20-something, 2004 is when it came out.

So we're coming up with 20 years of Madvillainy. There will be a whole episode dedicated to that.

I'm sorry in advance.

But, @loficarrots@mastodon.plus, which is spelled M-S-T-D-N, because vowels are expensive and domain registrars.

And you can also find me on my website, chosenfind.website.

But yeah, until next time, I hope we can still stay friends, despite my opinions, and bye.

Yeah, good-goodbye.