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Welcome to Ready Player 2!
No, not that one.
Four friends, too many opinions, and absolutely no idea what a panini is. Ready Player 2 is the gaming podcast where the important stuff gets discussed: Titles they've played, rants, and the chaos that usually ensues. Ready Player 2 is a gaming podcast held together by banter, bad takes, and a deep love of the medium. Swears included at no extra charge.
(Music)
Hello and welcome to Ready Player 2 Episode 6.
We've just been rambling away for ages and ages
about unrelated non-game things, but we thought
that at some point we were probably going to
have to start recording so that we could put
some content out that other
people can actually listen to.
You may have noticed, if you are watching the
video version of this podcast, if you are just
listening to the audio version of this podcast,
you've noticed absolutely nothing.
I apologise.
But we have got a lower docket of
hosts this week and so I am rich.
You have got me.
I apologise.
You didn't have me last time, which I'm sure
everybody was really happy about.
We also have
Mr Fun Retro himself, Lee.
Hello.
I'm here.
I'm not hosting this time.
You're not.
No, I could do a bit if you want.
Yeah, go on.
Hello, welcome.
No, I don't really want to actually.
I wondered if that was why you wore the same
t-shirt as me, just so you could take over.
Yeah, I didn't get it.
I'm just going to merge into the back of your
head and it will be my face.
No, I don't like that.
No, no, no, no.
You're in rich when you go to sleep tonight.
John Travolta coming out of my...
No.
And we also have Miss L.
Hi, L.
Hello.
I was about to take a drink then.
I decided not to.
I know.
I waited specifically until you were taking a
drink so that I could try
and catch you in the act.
Hi, how are you doing?
Yeah, yeah, pretty good.
I did get the memo to dress in orange.
A little bit gutted.
Sorry.
I didn't read it.
Yeah.
That's the internal slack channels.
Wait, there's an internal slack channel?
Yeah.
Oh, no, no, no, no.
Not one you've been invited to, don't worry.
Yes, I know.
That's most of my life.
Well, we're here.
We don't have a Ross
because he's at the most magical.
He's at the second most magical place on earth.
And I'm not going to tell you what.
That's the first most magical place on earth.
He's at the second most
magical place on earth at the moment.
And so he couldn't be with us.
We were going to have an
emergency stunt double Ross.
But unfortunately, that person also had to
cancel on us because of immediate illness,
which is something that happens to me
frequently when people find out they're going
to have to talk to me for an hour and a half.
As soon as he found out,
I shouldn't have told him.
Yeah, by the way, you've got to wear an orange
t-shirt and you've got to talk to this guy
called Rich for an hour and a half.
Oh, so I'm sorry.
I've got to cancel.
Oh, if he didn't have one before,
he would have had one afterwards.
So it's just us a limited,
a limited amount of hosts.
That's fine.
It's okay.
It's fine.
It's more than enough.
Fucking Ross.
And have I got past?
Have I gone past the watershed yet?
Probably not.
Right.
You're fine.
If we front load it,
I spent most of my life front loaded.
So we need to get we need to get on to it.
Because we spent ages talking about films and
non game related stuff before I, before I
decided to do the intro and we actually started
the podcast in earnest.
So we need to start
talking about gaming things.
And I know that you guys have got exciting game
things that you want to talk about.
And last time I was on the podcast, I was
forced to go first and
that's not going to happen again.
So I am going to go straight to L this time.
If that is okay, L, yeah, they have a game
related thing that you
would like to talk about.
I do.
So because me and Lee share very similar names,
I wanted to understand Lee a bit more.
And thankfully, there is a game that helps me
understand Lee's experience the world.
It's called Re-Story.
And I have been really enjoying this.
It's a quite a recent game, it
came out on the 6th of August.
And it is a electronics repair simulator.
Lee What?
Lee And I really love it, it's very enjoyable.
So you start off as like this small repairs
person who's like opening a shop in Japan.
And you work through like a story.
I haven't finished the story yet.
I'm just having fun fixing egg gotchis, which
are obviously like Tamagotchis.
And I find this so cathartic and
like just a nice chill experience.
You pick things apart, you have like cleaning
supplies, you get to like buy
different levels of your equipment.
So you've got like a sonic cleaner, and you
have like a parts destroyer.
You have like a little soldering iron as well.
I think this is a great neat little game.
Turn it on.
Lee I could have sworn that there were two
games that existed that already had this
premise, which is totally fine.
I have no problem with that.
But was there a Star Wars game that did this?
Or am I totally imagining that?
Lee Is there one with droids?
Lee Yeah, I thought so.
Lee Maybe.
Lee That might be in the
fever dream that has been my life.
But this is more fun retro.
And I'm shocked that nobody came to
you for the licensing rights, Lee.
But this is like more fun retro, the game.
If Lee had...
Lee Absolutely, not me, but this was did make
waves in my community and in the retro vintage
tech repair community a while back.
And I played the demo of
this quite a while ago.
And just today, somebody mentioned it on Retro
Hardware Discord, because I think it's becoming
a bit more popular again.
But it's not for me.
Because I've got all of that right here.
Yeah, this is what I do.
But it's like a papers
please type thing, isn't it?
And people coming past your window, you have to
interact with people, you have to break things
down so you've got currency and supplies and
then you've built up...
Do you get blueprints and things like that?
Lee So you can do software.
So you already have the devices themselves.
So you've got like a computer.
Lee Well, don't people
bring you devices as well?
Lee Yes.
So essentially, you've got your workstation.
And as you earn more money, you can spend
things to decorate your place.
So you can choose the color of the walls, you
can get little church keys to
increase the zen of your workspace.
And on your computer,
you've got a bunch of stuff.
So you've got like an eBay, you have your email
inbox where you can receive online orders.
And then you have a web store.
So you can go and you can buy licenses to fix
or build certain devices.
Later in the game, there's a competition that
you want to be like the repair master.
So you basically build the devices on a timer.
What else was there?
There's something else that was exciting.
Oh, yeah.
So you can buy a software upgrade kit, where
it's like, oh, you get to upload
the firmware on devices and stuff.
And the mini game to like, let's say mini game,
the stuff that you do to do the software update
is you mash buttons on your keyboard.
It's so funny.
Tap your keyboard to write the code.
Can you like modify things to make them do
things that they're not supposed to do?
I think so.
I haven't got to the point where
you can like jailbreak devices.
Yes.
But you can also paint them.
Right.
Okay.
The joy with which you said that sentence.
There are some great cameos as well.
So the people come into your window, there's
like the story ones, but you have like cameos.
So you have characters like
from like different walks of life.
You have a star cameo from
someone from Resident Evil.
Yes.
And you have like Guitar Hero people coming by.
It's amazing.
I just think it's such a cute game.
Here you go, Lee.
This is one for you and your community.
Then can you can you get a cameo in this game?
You and Rosie, is it possible for one of you to
get yourself in this game?
Rosie doesn't actually repair anything.
He just talks about what he's just mean to
children on the internet.
But that's a different story.
Yeah, I would love to.
I'd love to be in this.
That would be a dream come true.
But yeah, what a great game.
You really you stunned me there.
Oh, I didn't I didn't expect
that one to come out there.
Yeah.
I've been excited to tell you of that one.
I've been keeping secret for like two.
This is one of the downsides of doing this
podcast because we all
keep secrets from each other.
We don't tell each other what we've been doing.
So we used to do show notes
and tell each other everything.
And now we have no idea.
Look, we even clash with our clothing because
we don't know what we're up to.
It's this is this is
overwhelmingly positive on Steam at the moment.
And it's only 1499.
So big thumbs up.
I really enjoyed it.
If you like games where you can just sit and
just tinker like this is such a nice little
game to do if you enjoy
background storytelling.
This is also an excellent one, just because
there are a lot of like mini stories from the
people's lives that come and
visit you and give you devices.
And you also get to make like a narrative
choices that impact the develops over time.
And I think this is well worth it for like, I
know that generally I do say like £15 is the
indie game amount that I will spend on a game.
And let me have a look.
I've played for 10 hours
and I haven't finished it yet.
So £1.50 per hour of entertainment.
I think that's a bargain.
Yeah, I think that's fantastic.
That's definitely the right threshold.
If you can get it.
My goal is always a pound an hour.
If you get a pound an hour for a game, then
just it's absolutely worth it. 100% worth it.
Yeah, this is but I actually would like to play
I, I cannot I've said this before.
I cannot and would not do what Lee does.
Right.
I could not do it.
However, I would play this.
I would play a stimulated
version of what Lee does.
Because I know that I
would do what Lee does badly.
And I don't like attempting to do things badly.
One thing I would like to see is a VR version
because this would be such a
good training like experience.
Well, not training.
Well, you know, you just want to not train.
Careful, careful.
No, but like teaching people repair skills is
good. democratizing repair skills.
Yeah, knowing where things go, Lee, and how to
plug it in as it won't
teach them how to solder.
Nobody's trying to take it away from you.
Right.
All the all the expensive toys like the
de-soldering station and stuff like that that
you bought still valid.
When you pick up the solder and iron at the
wrong end and you can smell
bacon, do not come running to me.
No, I promise you never pick up
a soldering iron from any end.
All right, I actually kind of like like this
and I would I would actually play it and I'm
I'm I've actually been in the market for a cozy
game, something that I can just sort of play
the end of the night when I'm just chilling out
and I'm not quite ready to go to bed and I
can't be bothered to read
my book for whatever reason.
I would actually play this and it's it's both
from a recommendation from Elle and would teach
me to do exactly what Lee does and then I
wouldn't need to watch any of his videos.
So, very simplified, but it is fun.
I've seen Lee's videos, I could do that.
I'm just completely completely lying.
I definitely, definitely couldn't.
All right, brilliant.
Anything else you want to
talk you want to say about this?
Or is was it the shock value for Lee and saying
it's good and you've enjoyed it?
Yeah, I like the shock value for Lee.
I also got it because it's kind of cute and
how's those like Studio Ghibli vibes?
Studio Ghibli vibes.
I like this.
I like the look of it.
I would absolutely play this and I'm actually
very tempted to just get it now at the plate
when we're done this evening.
Okay, brilliant.
Thank you, Elle, for sharing.
Lee, top that, bitch.
I think I can.
Oh, you can.
Okay, so I, as you know, I
bought a couple of handhelds.
Yes, very nice.
And the reason that I bought these was to get
back into gaming because I haven't been playing
games, a good four years, five years without
playing a game for any length of time.
And I really, really, really, really missed it.
And I felt like there was something missing.
And I also wanted something
to talk about with you guys.
So it was important to me to
find a way that I could play games.
And on my PC, not going to happen.
So I thought handheld.
And I was intending on my handheld because
that's what handhelds are for, is to play retro
games, these, this sort of
handheld, Android handhelds.
Well, the whole world has opened up to me.
Because I've recently found out and I'm sure
that this is very common knowledge, but I
didn't know this, that you
can play PC games on handhelds.
Yeah.
I didn't know this through Android, through
Android, you can visit.
Yeah, there's this amazing app that is so
simple to install and use called Game Native.
And it's basically a Windows layer.
It uses like wine and
what's the other one, Proton.
A bit like the Steam machines do and, and yeah,
Steam Deck uses Proton for Windows.
But these are now powerful enough that they can
run loads of Windows games.
So yeah, I went off and look for lists of indie
games that I can play off on Steam on my
Android handheld through Game Native.
And I was shocked at the price of some of the
absolute top tier games.
I was like, oh, I'm not playing that.
I don't know.
I'm not going to jump in with a 25 pound game.
This is not, you know, where I need to be.
I'm going to look for a free one first.
And I found one.
Now, it's got a little bit of an edge to what I
do, because it's about the tubers.
They are in the game, not YouTubers, and it's
called Holo Cure save the fans.
Oh, no.
Nobody's heard of disli.
It's looking at this is is was
it a vampire survivor type game.
Okay, okay.
So you is waves of baddies, you start off with
no abilities and you get cards to upgrade your
attacks and your weapons and your stats.
You've got to pick up the currency that the
baddies drop to get the cards to upgrade and
then bosses come along and then you beat them
and the next wave of things come along and you
basically got to kite around.
It's a twin stick so you can move with your
left stick, aim with your right stick and at
the start your character just
does something in front of them.
So one of them just shoots a weak pistol and
one of them has a scythe that they sweep in
front of them and another one has this weird
tentacle that just comes out in a disturbing
fashion and it just will basically hit the
thing in front of you just quite close and
there's only a few baddies to start with but
after not very long and you've upgraded a
little bit you've got literally hundreds of
enemies on screen at once just barreling
towards you the whole time and you've built up
all of these different abilities and weapons
and area of effect and defense capabilities and
stuff and it just turns into this bloodbath.
Wait there's no blood but
it's just a regular bath.
Just an absolute bath.
It's really addictive and
the only box that it doesn't check for me is
it's not very pick up and play because you get
so wrapped up in the game you don't want to put
it down so then pick it up again later you just
keep playing until you either
get to the end boss or expire.
I'm absolutely loving it.
It's got really beautiful pixel graphics,
bright and vibrant fantastic sound, really
catchy tune especially on the I've only I've
played the second level but I've not beaten the
second level it's really hard
as well the difficulty ramps up.
There's a store you can upgrade your abilities
so you pick up coins to buy stuff and there's a
home this house that you can go to to do
farming to farm more coins and I think it's
literal farming not actually you
know beating things up farming.
Yeah absolutely loving it.
It really captured my imagination again.
I'm really enjoying it.
Oh and the other thing is because I've been
playing it on my retroid bucket six I can just
the handheld and play it like you would and
then I can go and sit in the lounge drop it
into the dock pick up an Xbox controller and
play it on BigTelly as well.
So good.
It's what an experience.
What a time to be alive it's great.
Indie games are brilliant.
Indie games are great.
I'd never heard of this game.
I've just had a look at it what you're talking
about it's overwhelmingly positive on Steam.
It is absolutely free on Steam.
I would imagine they've had to make it free
because it's an unofficial fan game.
Yeah it's always free.
It uses the likenesses and probably the license
of people from Hololive.
So I would imagine that they would be in hot
water if they tried to charge money for it but
it looks very very positive all of the
responses and everything on Steam.
Not the kind of game that I would have expected
you to play as well I've got to say.
No yeah.
It wasn't one I was but it was just the top of
the list of free games so I was just gonna and
I've just literally just found out that
Hololive is a thing and that there are real
Vtubers from Hololive is a thing.
I thought it was something made up in the game.
And they're in this game.
No no no Hololive is a thing and yeah I mean
not we've spoken about this before there are
entire avenues of the internet to which I am
not privy which for the most part is probably a
good thing but I am not I
didn't know about Hololive.
I didn't know about I know Vtubers exist but
normally it's an agency.
El's gone down the rabbit hole now.
I'm already there.
Okay wow and this performance wise it works
great on the on the Android handheld.
Fantastic and I I've tried I have tried a few
games on because the first thing that happens
is you log in well with GameNet if you can log
into Epic Games, Good Old Games, another one
and Steam and your libraries are
there ready to download and play.
So now my Steam library is mostly VR stuff
because that's what I was basically playing or
first person shooters which I don't want to
play on Twin Stix I just don't like them.
But they're trying to think what game I played.
I picked up something that I had you know a
regular Steam game from six years ago ran fine
no problem at all and then
yeah this one no problem.
Apparently the hit rate is about 70% of games
will just work and Game Native is so well set
up that games that people have already set up
will just automatically configure themselves
with the best layer and the best settings so
you will have the best performance you can get
and the controls just worked I didn't have to
do anything all the controls were just set up.
It's honestly what a time to be alive so I only
know about this because so my
phone is a is a red magic phone.
I don't play games on it I could play games
we've spoken about this before I've got a
little control pad attachment thing for it and
everything it was it was what my grand idea
that I would actually play games on handheld I
don't play games on handheld but I want to
upgrade my phone I haven't been given a good
enough reason to upgrade it yet but the newer
the newer red magic phones people are playing
Red Dead Redemption 2 on them and Cyberpunk
2077 and I'm like this is nuts like with actual
good FPS as well like above 50 FPS which is
crazy for an emulated full-fledged PC game on
any handheld let alone a phone it's absolutely
nuts so it's like it's the future ecosystem now
it's crazy okay well I've just got normal
things to talk about this I which are going to
be boring by comparison to these things that
you've just raised to me one game that I
actually now want to play and information about
handheld that again makes me want to get one of
those handhelds even though I'm definitely
definitely not going to get one rich you can't
spend money on things you're not going to use
um can I go so don't don't do wave your
handhelds at me after we've spoken about this
all right okay I've got two I've got two that I
want to talk about I'm gonna depending on time
I might not be able to get to one of them but
I'm going to talk about the other one and it
and this is this was pretty big for me um
mostly because it it wasn't it wasn't as
surprising as I expected it to be but and it's
difficult to explain has anybody played Alum
Wake did you play Alum Wake it came out really
long time ago yeah I did yeah right so on the
what on the xbox 360 I think it was or was it
the original xbox I can't remember anyway I
played Alum Wake for about two hours and then I
think I just put it down and never played it
again I think I rented it from from somewhere
or borrowed it from a friend or something like
that but I never finished it um and now years
and years and years later one of my friends one
of my good friends said to me oh I was looking
for games to play and he said if you play down
on wake two I said to be honest I never
finished Alum Wake one he said you've got to
play Alum Wake two I was like do I have to play
the first one he said that's a really stupid
thing for you to ask okay okay fine so I got I
went and got Alum Wake one remastered which we
which I played through and I'm not going to go
into that too much but it's great and it's it's
a game if you've never played or seen Alum Wake
effectively the the whole shtick is that you're
an author and you've got writer's blocks so you
go to this place on holiday to try and get
around this writer's block and then you argue
with your wife and then she ends up falling
into a great big lake it's that age old story
and then um you there's a real story there's a
story going on a horror story but it turns out
that you or a version of you is writing the
story and things are becoming real in the real
world and the place that you're in is like a
weird confluence location with horror things
going on and it sucks the energetic juices of
creative people and turns their art into
reality and this guy is a particularly brooding
piece of shit to be perfectly honest and so his
brooding shittiness turns into reality and and
then he has to live through it it's fine right
it's a good game the remastered version of Alum
Wake one it's great game nothing particularly
wrong with it but Alum Wake two my word so I
played through Alum Wake one because I needed
to I wanted to get through Alum Wake one so
that I could refresh the story I could have
just watched a youtube video I guess but let's
play all the way through it um and then I went
to play Alum Wake two now I'm going to jump in
here and interrupt have either of you um played
control or are you aware of control recently
I'm aware of control can I just say that when
you asked me if I played Alum Wake one and I
said yes I um what I thought you said was have
you played just cause and the answer to that
was yes but to Alum Wake no it was no they are
not very similar they are not very similar no
no control I'm aware of control okay fine right
so Remedy Interactive Remedy is the company who
made Alum Wake they are also the company who
made a game called Control they are also the
company who originally made Max Payne
this is important right so Remedy made Max
Payne one and two and then for whatever reason
I'm assuming because the company the studio was
was in trouble they sold the rights to Max
Payne to uh Rare I believe um so now they no
longer own the rights to Max Payne even though
the studio head of Remedy Interactive was the
face likeness of Max Payne oh awkward now they
then brought out control now control and Alum
Wake exist in the same universe and control is
this fantastic sort of again pseudo horror but
action this time um game where you get more and
more powerful and you gain all these abilities
and stuff like that but there's this there's
this persistent sort of horror undertone and
weird alternate world event undertone to this
into the entire game and it starts to become
apparent and it specifically becomes apparent
in one of the DLCs for control that control and
um Alum Wake exist in the same universe Q Alum
Wake 2 and it now becomes apparent that the
intent was always for Max Payne to exist in
this same universe as well and I wish it had
been so Alum Wake 2 has got a stand-in
character for Max Payne called Alex Casey Alex
Casey is again it has got the same face
likeness the same guy who provided the face
likeness for Max Payne is the guy who provides
the face likeness and the motion capture for
Alex Casey and the same guy who voiced Max
Payne voices Alex Casey as well so for all
intents and purposes we now have a game that
overlaps Max Payne control and Alum Wake I
don't know where they got this from but the
production values for Alum Wake 2 the the ramp
that this game goes up is absolutely insane the
writing is exceptional if very convoluted and a
little bit full of itself in places but it
hangs a lantern on that and it knows it's full
of itself in places um but the production value
with mixing real life actors and real life um
set pieces with actual actors that have been
filmed on a set and then immediately
transitioning straight into the game world and
the game world version of those is superb the
music in it is fantastic the way it blends
again between real world actors doing a playing
out real world scene and then all of a sudden
it shifts and you're now in that scene and
you're playing in that scene is fantastic it is
so difficult to explain what this game actually
is but it is a pseudo horror game it is a
horror game but a pseudo horror game in which
you need to use light in order to repel these
baddies and then you can shoot them when you've
shone enough light on them but the atmosphere
the world building the storytelling the the
little head nods to popular culture the little
head nods to the other games that live in this
interconnected universe that they've created
the production value the acting is just
brilliant and the fact that they've managed to
do all of this while effectively removing Alum
Wake as the main character in his own game for
the majority or for a big big part of the game
is just excellent it's masterfully done it is
incredibly well delivered and if like me you
were put off because when it first came out it
was only available on the epic store and it was
like 60 pounds and the only way that you could
buy it was on the epic store and you couldn't
buy it anywhere cheaper like on one of the key
selling sites or anything like that so i
skipped past this originally because it was too
expensive i'm not spending 60 pounds on a
gamble for a game and i waited until the entire
they did like a bundle with Alum Wake 1
remastered and Alum Wake 2 in it for like 15
quid or something so i got i got them both and
played them both through 100 worth it if you
are interested in the Remedy interconnected
universe if you enjoyed control and really
liked the way that they tell stories and the
weirdness that they have in their universe and
you liked Alum Wake 1 but you wanted more this
is that it is absolutely worth your time it's
about i think i've got about 27 hours of of
time out of this for the second game and it
absolutely it's so difficult to there are there
are musical numbers in it there are it's just
it's so bizarre to try and explain the the the
joy that you get and the massive smile that i
had on my face while certain sections of this
game were playing out while some of it is
relatively formulaic the the rest of it is just
quite joyful and put together so well and it's
got this great sort of who done it undertone to
to like a noir crime thriller as well so you
get drip fed pieces of this story and you're
trying to put it together and what well is that
what's gone on in fact to the point where even
you have a crime board and you have you you get
red stuff clues and stuff yeah yeah absolutely
so you can you get clues and stuff to what's
happening and you you put them on the crime
board and to try and figure out what's going on
then draw conclusions based on the things you
put on the crime board and it's just it's
absolutely i cannot recommend it enough it is
far more than alan wake one it feels like a
studio that has now got money and has got
backing because they've proven themselves
they've proven themselves with control and alan
wake one and they're now actually able to
fulfill that vision with the technology of the
modern times rather than being limited with
what they had previously and having to release
on like the xbox of the xbox 360 or whatever it
was and it's delivered so well so so well so
yeah if you're interested in that universe and
there's another control game coming out now as
well which will tie into alan wake two so it's
definitely a good time to be getting on board i
have questions can you have questions question
me first question is there bullet time so no no
there is not bullet time there is there is no
max pain esque gameplay in this game um and
there isn't it is not a fast-paced action game
in the same way that control is it is that was
that's my next question
what is the control scheme
uh how how do you mean the control scheme mouse
keyboard uh twin stick well i played it i
played it mouse keyboard it's third person i
played it mouse and keyboard it does support
pad as well i don't know what the control
scheme is like on the pad but it's third person
over the shoulder pretty standard fare nothing
particularly complicated i'm going to get to
this in the second i'm talking about today as
well but um it's fine it played great it played
without a problem i don't think i needed to
remap any of the keys or anything like that it
just played well out of the box right and final
question your honor um it's not available alan
wake two is not on steam what platform did you
or what it was epic that was what that was what
put me off originally weirdly not that i'm not
that i'm against buying things from the epic
store i own things on the epic store the
problem i have is with games on steam there are
other key selling sites that you can buy the
games from at a much reduced cost yeah but you
what there might be options for that on the
epic store but if there are they are
significantly reduced and so when i originally
wanted to get it it would there was nowhere i
could get it other than directly on the epic
store and it was like i said about 60 pounds
and i didn't want to do it so um yeah as far as
i'm aware the only place you get this on pc is
on the epic store what did you pay for it this
time i think it was about 15 pounds and i got
and that was a bundle and i got i got alan wake
one remastered and alan wake two in it in the
bundle yeah that's what i'm seeing as well so
it's only been out for since 2020 october 2023
so yeah it's a recent game i think that this
has been on pc certainly i think that the
exposure for this game has been massively hurt
by their decision to be on the epic store only
yeah i think the exposure for this game would
have been significantly greater if they were on
steam i i can understand like wanting to give
loyalty to like the people that basically
funded the game but at the same time it does
feel like they're shooting themselves in the
foot yeah it does it is such a it is i can't
recommend it enough it is a joy gave is cool
give him money well no i don't know don't give
people money if you don't need to give them
money but at the same time at the same time
look this this i think this has flown under the
radar for an awful lot of people possibly
because they didn't play the first game
possibly because you know they don't know how
invested they need to be did they need to play
the first game first i don't know yes you cut
you do really need to play the first game first
but you absolutely could watch a youtube video
you know a 20 minute youtube video will wrap up
all of the events of the first game quite
nicely and the fence i would probably recommend
that you do that the first game is absolutely
worth playing especially the remastered version
but it still plays like a remastered game from
15 years ago so you will get that out of it
until it feels like a big barrier it is one
pounds 19 pence just to have the standard good
old-fashioned allen wake one on steam okay it
won't look like garbage one pound 19 yeah it
will look like they will that's my thing even
the remastered version doesn't look great in
quite a lot of places and there's only so much
you can do you can do and they were definitely
working with the technology of their time when
they made the first game i i genuinely you can
you could watch a youtube video to recap the
events of the first game i don't think there's
going to be an absolute travesty to do that at
all is the first game worth playing yes i think
it is and i enjoyed it and i'm glad that i
played it and there's probably a lot of little
easter eggy things that i found in the first
game like notes and pictures and things that
you don't necessarily need to stop and look at
or read that there were then callbacks to in
the second game and enhanced my knowledge of
the world but if you want to just to know about
the second game in order to experience what in
my opinion is the main course of the series
which is the second game then just watch
youtube video i think it'd be absolutely fine
the uh the platforms that this uh is available
and that's i mean we've only spoken about
windows there's also a playstation 5 series x
xbox series x and um also g force now and
amazon luna so if you really want to amazon is
that still going i did not know that was still
going i thought that's what ross was playing
football on maybe it was i don't know wow i
don't remember i don't remember
game is streaming wow no i know i care what
ross says no that's don't listen to him ross if
you live if you ever watch this lee naughty boy
um yeah so anyway that's the first game i
wanted to again i do i genuinely i don't i
don't spend a huge amount of time trying to
push things on this podcast i want people to be
informed however i must say if you're a fan of
film noir if you're a fan of remedies games if
you are interested in this interconnected
universe that they're trying to build um i i
really really do recommend it it is i don't
want to i hate this but you know when people
say watch that film it's amazing 10 out of 10
best thing you've ever seen and they oversell
it and then even when you watch it it like it
might still be actually very good but because
it was oversold it ends up feeling like it's
fallen short whereas if they just said it's
pretty good yeah you definitely should go and
watch it and you don't go in with such high
expectations it feels a lot is that just me no
no i i had that we yeah what's the empire film
that everyone was banging on about and i
watched it i was like oh is it okay oh uh
sinners yeah i was like yeah this had
everything that i i should have loved and i was
like it's all right i'm glad i went into
sinners completely cold i enjoyed it i did
video games right the hype did it go oh sorry
okay right uh cool back on track we were
talking about right okay fine right then so
yeah that's my that's my first one i want to
talk about and if it look if anybody else
decides to pick this game up if anybody who
listens to us or watches us decides to pick up
holland wait two based on my recommendation i
would actually genuinely really love to hear
what you thought about it now you can't
actually reach me anywhere online i thought you
were going to offer a marie fund if they didn't
like it no no no no no why would i do it no no
that's a terrible idea i'm
sure he will yeah but no i
talk and talking to how did what do you call it
uh comments comment under one of the videos and
let me know if it's something that you have
ended up deciding to play because i spoke about
it i genuinely am actually really interested to
know if it if i've recommended it and anybody
wanted to give it a go that whether they
enjoyed it or not because that if you say i
tried it on rich's recommendation has spent my
genuine hard-earned money and it was an
absolute bag of sick never listened to this guy
and i will stop making such hard
recommendations in future okay right i've
spoken far too much we need to talk to somebody
else and the things that you guys wanted to
speak about on this podcast uh i went to lee
last so i've got to go to elle now did you okay
um yeah i did i remember when i spoke to you
and i spoke to lee and then i spoke do you
remember that's how it works it's your it's
your turn now hell yeah yeah that's fine i
sleep like a dolphin okay eyes open um uh so
wait you were sleeping while i was talking
about that game just his own no i'm only joking
jesus um so one of the uh other cozy games that
i've played recently and finished is called is
this seat taken i do like a little puzzle um
this is a little puzzle game um so there is a
story in the background of this which you may
like it you may not it doesn't really impact
the enjoyment of the puzzles uh there is a
budding uh actor called nat who is a rhombus
and rhombuses don't normally get seen in films
she is very excited seeing rhombus uh pretty
sure the plumber of rhombuses is rhombi rhombi
well whichever language evolves and so does nat
through the course of this game uh she goes
from being someone who is um quite anxious
about uh her dreams to someone who goes on and
achieves them and all of the puzzles like take
you through nat's journey so you go to
different cities and in each city you follow
her through what she does in a day so there are
certain like backdrops so you uh organize
people on a train so people are like happy uh
they there are people who are noisy there are
people who are smelly uh there are people who
like hot parts of the train or cold parts of
the train um and i really enjoy uh like easily
accessible puzzle games um they're a lot easier
to manage than uh physical board games because
you don't have any pieces to put back in a box
afterwards um i found this to be entirely uh
endearing i find this to be quite cute i love
the style um i loved how simple it was and i
loved how easy it was to get into it um i can't
remember how much i paid for this because it's
been a hot minute since i did play it costs
eight pound ninety nine on steam right now
sweet uh but it i really enjoyed it um where's
my steam library i will go and i'll tell you
how many hours it took me because that is that
is a thing that we like uh i played eight point
eight hours the whole game perfect one pound an
hour one pound an hour yeah okay yeah this
reminds me of unpacking yeah i did really like
that as well i thought you meant literally
unpacking no no there's a game there's there's
loads of games about doing stuff that's boring
as f*** in real life but are actually weirdly
endearing when put into game form and unpacking
is one of those things isn't that cozy games
yes basically cozy games um i think i enjoyed
unpacking a bit more because i've played it
more like i went back and i replayed it because
you've got like the books for your save files
and i filled all those then and i feel like
there's a lot more content in um unpacking but
this is just really nice and simple i still
find it enjoyable it's kind of like the the
sort of puzzle games that you might have found
like back when the internet was young and you
had things like newgrounds and people would
make like games for fun um and i think that's
what makes this like such a charming game
because it's it's not um it's not pretending to
be bigger than it is it's a very very small
story it's very self-contained the puzzles are
really easy to enjoy they're not too
frustrating as you go through they do become
like a little bit more challenging as obviously
you see more people and they have more needs um
but yeah i thought this was a very worthwhile
purchase and i had a very good time brilliant
it's gorgeous to look at isn't it i it is it's
really nice looking isn't it cozy games are
always i don't play that i i can't even
remember the last cards but i i watch videos or
people explain cozy games to me and i go and
look at them and i think oh yeah i like the
idea of that there was one what was it called
tiny village or oh yeah there was one where you
where you made like a fantasy village tiny
glade that's it and and i what and again i
never played it i never got it but i can watch
youtube videos of other people playing it for
ages yeah making them these little these little
villages and i like you can't even walk around
them or do anything in them or
but you can build on top of sheep
you can build on top of sheep there's sometimes
there's like a sheep that will go through and
you're like i'll get you and it like uh i've
never thought that i've never thought that and
clearly not welsh me yeah oh well what's gonna
that was gonna drop that in but i thought no no
i don't want to insult every one but it it
flings up in the air and it like floats down
with like a brawly i think it was very it's
what the sheep yeah yeah it displaces the sheep
in it i thought you i thought okay it just i
thought it flung the the wall up in the air
yeah okay i mean tiny glades good but i've only
played 110 minutes so it can't have been that
super good okay all right is this seat taken i
like the look of this as well not quite as much
as your last one actually no i saved a good one
for right out the gate right out the gate you
saved a good one for first that's the best
thing to do i find just in case they don't give
you a second chance this is true
brilliant all right thank you hell right lee
hello you got more stuff cl this is how it
works the order this is called taking turns we
learned this i know i was
too busy enjoying myself
so i bought a couple of retro handhelds okay
what i decided to do on this one now is to play
my indie games on this one and my more advanced
games and later games that's what this is going
to be and this one is going to sit in my pocket
and it's going to play whatever game i uh
decide i don't know if you'll be able to see
what that is it sounds zelder-ish can you see
what it is that's all the clues you're going to
get it sounds it looks a bit zeldar-ish but i
couldn't tell you it's not a zelda game so the
last game i played on this was a zelda game and
i really enjoyed it was the i know what it is i
just i think i can i see it again no um it's uh
bastard the last zelda game i played was the
mini shat uh the minish hat and um i really
enjoyed that but got kind of bored and i
thought well i need to just keep playing like
these absolute bangers otherwise i'm just going
to find something mediocre and i'll just stop
playing i'll put this down and it'll sit in a
drawer for a year so i went and found another
listicle and found the probably one of the
highest rated rpgs ever uh yeah you got got it
yeah it's chrono trigger yeah we i can't
remember when we were talking about this now i
haven't played a huge amount i'm well into like
the first well the second area because you you
start off in present time i'm in the next
period of time you know where you get sent back
in time blah blah blah but so i'm i'm a i'm a
good chunk into the game but i'm taking my time
i'm not rushing through this like i did with
zelda i'm not picking up at every opportunity
because i've got other distractions now and i'm
actually trying to do some work as well um but
i am enjoying it i came this close to putting
it down and never playing uh probably twice
right right at the beginning of the game it
doesn't tell you anything you just are in this
weird um overview of the world and you go you
can choose to go into different parts of the
village or there's a fair thing going on and it
doesn't give you any clue there's no guidance
at all you can go and talk to people and they
say oh go to the fair so you know i mean that
is basically a little bit of guidance so but
you go to the fair and just wander around just
doing random things and you're like well
where's the story what's going on and then
things eventually it took way too long to get
to that point eventually things got to the
point where um it sent me on to the next stage
but the means of it doing that if i have you
both played it yeah a while ago now but yeah
that's the last game of the day though sorry
like no i so there's there's quite a lot of um
games that didn't really have a lot of like
hand holding so i think we're spoiled these
days yeah yeah so i loved um golden sun and
that's like a similar came out at a similar
time but yeah the like that's that's how it was
back in the day kids we didn't get to two of
those you got absolutely zero guidance but but
chrono trigger not just from my memory not just
has zero guidance or very very little guidance
but also at the beginning of the game there's
not a lot happening like you're kind of like
what's my motivation here and yeah you could
kind of think oh it's trying to introduce me to
the characters and there's a bit of dialogue
but it's not even really doing that there's
just not a fat lot going on unlike the
beginning of like final fantasy seven for
example which just kind of throws you straight
into it and it gives you your motivations and
off you go and you're on your way chrono
trigger sort of it's a bit of a nothing burger
until all of a sudden it's a fucking everything
burger all at once right um yeah the the part
that where it kicks off is the bit in the uh in
the fair there's where uh greenish i think is
the character is like this science person
there's got this experiment where they're
transporting someone from one pad to the next
it's the fly basically and um that that's going
on and you get in it and you transport over and
you're i'm just thinking what sort of fair is
this i mean what the fairs i go to you used to
throw things at plates and brat smash up a
piano that was unusual but not yeah yeah yeah
no that used to be a thing um smashing up a
piano with a sledgehammer there used to be a
race they would because after um like after the
war pianos fell out of fashion stopped people
it used to have them in their parlors to stand
around and sing around they used to be a piano
in every home and they just fell out of fashion
so they used they had to get rid of them and it
was a bit like used cars they just didn't know
what to do with them so they would it was a
great great piano culling that i wasn't aware
of just a like half a mile down the road i can
remember standing um at the queen's jubilee and
there was uh two pianos in the car park of the
king's head and two burly men with proper
sledgehammers had to smash them up they had to
get it down to the ground the first person to
smash the piano into the ground was the winner
like that bonus stage in street fighter with
the car exactly like that but with a big
sledgehammer i couldn't tell l i don't know
whether this was a true real story or not when
he started i was just like i'm going to not a
love but this doesn't sound like a real thing i
can believe the thing about pianos being in
every like person's home because it's like well
that was entertainment back in the day you know
people and then they got they all got chrono
trigger and there was no need for them anymore
and they all got that thing they all got yeah
game boy advance so in this particular fair
there's a teleportation device not a piano okay
piano teleportation device and you get on it
and you get transported over the love interest
or whatever the lady interest in the the game
that you've picked up randomly at the fair who
happens to be royalty um gets onto the thing
and then she gets swept off into the mists of
time and that's the point where the game takes
off but that took a good i don't know it must
have been about three quarters of an hour of
gameplay of me just wandering around trying to
find the game and and it taking that long to
get to it and i honestly i almost put it down
at that point i then almost put it down again
when i got into the battles and i because it is
old school and it is a proper retro game the
control well the controls are fine but actually
the interface for using things and moving
things around between your characters and
interacting with your character sheet that sort
of thing in your abilities i didn't really like
that it took me a while to get used to it and
and i've i almost bounced off of that as well
but soon as i got past the there's a cathedral
section um right in the first um past area soon
as i got past or into that bit i started to
enjoy it a bit more now i'm going to talk about
this game in stages i'm probably going to bring
it up every episode for a while i'm going to
keep playing this one because it's just not a
fast game no not something i can play in a week
and and do it justice so no yeah it was a
proper long form experience this one can i ask
are you probably not but i'll ask anyway do you
have headphones on when you play this no do you
have the audio on yes is it loud enough for you
to properly hear on the edge of it so the one
takeaway that i remember from these old jrpgs
um one of the things that's had a tendency to
really set jrpgs apart from each other when
when they were sort of mostly in vogue was the
music and i have to say chrono triggers score
is in places not always but in places
exceptionally good especially given the the the
technology they had at the time to be able to
produce the kind of sound that they did
okay right it's brilliant so i would recommend
playing it with the sound up enough for you to
hear the music because it's a it's a mass of my
opinion from my remembrance of that game it's a
mass a massive part of the experience is the
music is having that music accompanying each
area that you're in i've as i've been playing i
have noticed that i've been like earwarming the
music and yeah you know i put it down and i'm
like what is that tune oh that's what i was
playing a little while ago yeah it is yeah the
music is good um i am i am enjoying it and i
can see the appeal of the game i think the test
is going to be because it hasn't i mean
obviously nothing uh is aged perfectly over all
of this time uh when it's stacked up against
modern games we've learned so much about making
games in the meantime the games just are better
i mean even as a retro enthusiast i have to i
have to say games just are better now so i the
test is going to be whether i i'm not i'm not
sure i'll ever finish it i don't know how how
many hours it would take i believe in you you
did but i think it's roughly
reading the back of the bottles
right we used to have to read the back of
bottles when we went to the bathroom right we
we have good attention spans you can do this we
believe i do want to um give another shout out
to the trim you wide brick again because this
thing is a marvel i can leave it for a week and
then just press that button on the side and
bang i'm straight into the game that's one
thing that i miss on this when i'm playing um
game native games because it's a windows game i
can actually i think if i press it now yeah it
is actually in a game oh it's not no that's the
um that's the desktop but often i'll quit out
the game so that my game saves um to the steam
cloud and because i'm quit out of the game i've
then got to load it again and and that isn't
every time there's a barrier in the way that's
that's a problem for me and i'm always trying
to get rid of barriers don't like barriers
how's the um battery life on the little one oh
it's amazing i like i said i haven't i'll
probably not charge this in a week and um it
just you know the if i played it constantly for
um if i played it constantly it'd probably last
about 10 hours and on standby it doesn't use
any battery literally it you just hit that
button and and put it down don't worry about it
put it in your pocket come back to it in a week
don't wash your trousers so i've just i've just
looked it up and an average is 16 to 20 hours
for chrono trigger where if you play with a lot
of the side quests um to to experience major
character side stories and stuff maybe about 25
hours full completionist can go up to 45 but i
would imagine that you're probably going to be
more around the 25 hour mark you you you did
start to put me off at 70 hours but um 15 to 20
hours i think i was remembering final fantasy
seven because i was just so engaged with that
game and probably it took me way longer than it
took most other people but i i just spent so
long in that world so long at the trucboreces
chrono yeah absolutely that i live they're
talking about musical earworms yeah absolutely
um okay i'm interested to see now i bounced off
chrono trigger so i did i did almost exactly
the same thing that you're doing right now um
years ago with my gptx which i'm not going to
go into but i play chrono trigger again because
i hadn't played it before um and there's a
particular near the end of the game which i
clearly just wasn't prepared for and had not
created a safe state in a good enough place for
me to do something about this and the fight was
so punishingly hard and i was so ill prepared
that i never actually managed to successfully
finish it on that attempt um i have finished it
in like before that but not on that attempt so
remember that well i've been safe scumming my
way through the whole thing anyway so that's
the right way of doing it that's the right way
of playing i haven't got i've got time just
about to play games but not to keep playing
them over and over yeah well you will you will
potentially need to do that though you will
potentially need to go out and just find areas
where to get to kill monsters to level up yeah
on repeat which i always loved in the old like
again the other kind of farming yeah yeah the
other kind of farming where i just go out and
go i can definitely kill that snake eventually
i'm gonna keep bashing my head against enemies
until i can kill that giant snake that is
currently one shotting me yeah i know you yeah
oh god right okay brilliant good job anything
else you want to say about that no i'm i'm
interested to find out what my next game is
though i'm interested to see i'm not sure
whether to play something like more frivolous
and have three games on the go is that too much
you know how many games do you don't burn
yourself out yeah also don't stick with a game
if you're genuinely not feeling it yeah that's
it i don't think i'll stay with um the hollow
thingy game because holocure um because it's
i'm i'm finding it quite difficult to progress
that one going back to that the progression in
it is is not as i want to be able to take my
abilities from one fight to the next but as
soon as you finish that fight in that stage you
go right back to the beginning and um you've
got some extra stats and things but your all of
your abilities and everything all gone yeah
you've got to build them up again at the
beginning of the next stage yeah so i'm looking
for another game to play on game native but it
might be i've got my eye on a few things so it
might be something quite different that i talk
about next time okay that's good we like
variants we like different okay i've got a game
that is definitely varied and different from
that i feel like i'm bringing the triple a
goods to this podcast a triple a game and i'm
actually feeling the man with the money i've
actually no no no no got this one for free and
i i actually would prefer to uh to be playing
indie games myself a lot of the time but this
one fell on my lap and i've actually been sat
on it for a little while wait it can't be on my
lap and i'm sat on it but anyway and i've been
i've not been playing it for a while i've had
it in my library for a while i've not been
playing it partially because it doesn't really
inspire confidence and then i thought you know
what screw it it's a story-based game and uh
and i like story-based games and my friends
like watching play me playing story-based games
through discord as i've said before i play
these things and we have friends in the room
and they and they watch the stream and comment
on how terribly i'm doing so i played 007 first
light oh okay now this is a proper triple a
licensed game from amazon studios i think it's
one of the first things that they've done with
the 007 license since they obtained it
everybody's worried about what they're going to
be doing with the film franchise and nobody was
worried enough about what they were going to be
doing with the game franchise now um i'd like
to point out to begin with because we were
speaking about the control scheme of alan wake
before i get into the game i get that certain
games are largely for console they are designed
probably with console players first in mind and
therefore an awful lot of the control scheme is
designed for for a pad and in this game there
are creepy sneaky elements there are shooty
bang bang elements and there are driving
elements and also like melee close combat all
of these things probably work very well on a
pad and i could tell when i was playing it the
way that they've got the game laid out is
designed for that with that in mind to be
played on a pad but if you're playing it on
mouse and keyboard for some reason they expect
to be a fucking concert pianist because the
some of these keys were like beyond the pale
you're doing the intro and the tutorial and
it's just like right so you've got to this
thing now you now you've got to you've got to
you've got to throw your gun you've run out of
bullets so you're going to throw your gun so
far i'm like wasd and then e puts you into like
a bullet time thing and then c is crouched on
my eye whatever i can deal with that and then
and then i've got to i've like creep up behind
somebody and knock him out that's x i'm like
that's not ideal but whatever x i can live with
g g no that's too far over now you're moving
you're moving too far along the keyboard and
then worse than that it just starts fucking
mixing them up it just starts going oh we've
forgotten what key we set that to before so now
that's v why not that's v so then you start
doing like um what do they call them quick time
events and a quick time event comes up and it's
type the name of your first pair i'm like jesus
christ i'm not fucking ready for this it is all
over the place whoever whoever translated it
and it genuinely feels like this game was 100
created with a pad in mind first and then they
just put the fucking janitor on translating the
controls to mouse and keyboard it is terrible
it is awful i can't for a game that is and i i
think that they may have actually dropped the
ball in other areas of this game's development
and translation and they say translated
literally because i might be wrong but i'm
fairly sure this game has not been localized at
all there is no localized version of this game
so there is only an english language voiced
version of this game um i might be wrong and
i'm happy to be to to be wrong i'm pretty sure
i've read that and so the just the translation
of some of this guy's just not worked well at
all and the worst the most egregious part of
this is when you're playing mouse and keyboard
for the driving sections of the game which is
absolutely borderline unplayable it is awful
because you need the camera to turn because you
need to be able to see around the corner you
don't have a thumbstick to do that you have
only got the mouse the mouse the the camera
wants to sort of stick behind the vehicle and
there's like a bit of stickiness to it so with
the thumbstick you have to nudge it and then
nudge it a bit further and then it gives you
free control but when you're using a mouse and
your mouse your right hand is now in fucking
narnia because you need this camera to turn
because you're about to crash into a wall and
all of a sudden the stickiness breaks and it
goes okay fine have control of the camera fuck
me then and the camera just does a fucking 360
and you're like Jesus Christ this is even worse
it's bad it is bad so the driving sections of
the game luckily few and far between are
terrible on mouse and keyboard and genuinely
driving sections of a lot most games are bad on
mouse and keyboard anyway because you have
absolutely no granular control with a keyboard
there's no there's no fine grain turn left a
little bit you're either turning left all the
fucking way or you're not sending left at all
on a keyboard so that those parts are bad
however right so that that's bad stuff right
bad stuff out of the way the rest of it the
good stuff good grief this game is lovingly
crafted like ridiculously lovingly crafted that
there are going to be comparisons drawn if you
ever watch videos to hitman to the hitman
series of games because there are large
sections of this game which are you as a spy
creeping around a big populated area like a
hotel or something like that and the thing is
densely packed with NPCs we are talking
insanely dense like so densely packed i'm not
even sure how to manage to make this freaking
thing run but not only are these these NPCs all
over the place they're all having conversations
with each other and they're all moving and
doing things and they have purposes and it
doesn't feel just like they're wooden there and
there's little noises and people are hoovering
things and there's a there's a grandfather
clock going off it is incredibly detailed to an
absurd level probably more than any other game
i think i've pro i've ever played and it it
goes to because it plays out very much like a
film and there are lots of scenes some of the
scenes are of vital importance and you spend an
awful lot of time in them like a big hotel that
you're walking around doing an investigation
trying to sneak about getting to certain places
but there are other scenes where it's just a
scene of you driving in a car through the
streets of london for example and you don't
really have a huge amount of control the scene
only exists for a minute and a half and its
only purpose is so some dialogue can pass
between two characters between two of these
major scenes but the level of detail you never
see this london street again you never see it
they haven't built it and used it for this one
scene so they can put it back into the game
later on it only exists for this minute and a
half but the level of detail is absolutely
mind-blowing it genuinely feels like the people
who made the game had a huge amount of care and
really really wanted to get it right and they
wanted it to feel like a film feel like a
proper big budget film and they've hugely
achieved it it is the level of detail and
everything else that's in the game including
the dialogue and all the other bits and bobs is
perfect absolutely brilliant it really feels
like a bond for your inner bond film the
dialogue is terrific the guy that plays james
bond didn't think i was going to like him to
begin with because he's
about 12 but actually did he?
and i honestly he's not i don't.
Welcome to my world.
The guy's called the guy's called patrick
gibson i don't think i've seen him in anything
else he's been in a couple of other things i'm
sure that other people probably know who he is
i've never seen him in anything else but uh and
when when when it first when the when the game
first started it took me you know the suave
because yeah he's a very distinct character
isn't he yeah exactly so the game is a bit of a
james bond's an asshole let's face it james
bond is an asshole and he this game starts at
the very beginning of his career so he is not
in mi6 at the beginning of this game he is an
an airman and he is uh on this mission that is
got stuff going on and he's in a helicopter and
the helicopter gets shot down and then all of a
sudden he's thrust into this situation that he
is incredibly ill prepared for and he ends up
getting this comm unit and he talks to somebody
and this person says right i'm working for mi6
do what i say or you're going to be dead and
he's like what the heck what's going on and
then and and so it is the entire start of his
career and it goes through his training his
basic training literally everything and there's
these amazing sort of montage scenes that you
play through with this insane i said earlier i
don't know how they technically manage to make
these scenes work with so many npc's in them
there are other scenes where they're like
montages where you're playing in one scene and
it seamlessly transitions to a completely
different scene at a completely different time
of day in a completely different location with
completely different npc's but it happens like
that with no load times no nothing it's just it
plays out like a film and they've done it so
well that it were it plays so perfectly all the
way through so you play through all of bonds
early career training for mi6 and it's sort of
very similar to the film kingsmen where you've
got all of these people that are all being
trained up to potentially end up working for
kingsmen it's it's kind of similar to that
you've got all of these potential people who
are being trained up and um and i didn't think
that the guy patrick gibson was going to turn
into a bond that i would recognize as james
bond um but he does he actually really does he
puts his stamp on it in this in the same way
that any great james bond actor manages to do
by taking the character tearing down your
expectations of that character and then
building them back up in the way that they want
to play that character which is recognizable
enough as the character that you expected to
see but with that actor's specific take on it
and for this this guy i think it works
beautifully you've got to give him time you've
got to let him cook but if you if you give him
enough time to let him cook it honestly
genuinely comes off incredibly well the whole
game is is not very long i think got about 17
and a half hours out of it there is more there
is more to be done there's there's this whole
kind of like uh simulation section that you can
go to with with challenge missions and i think
there's a whole pile of challenge missions i
tried them i i wasn't bothered by them i was
interested in the story in the main campaign
and so there's probably many more hours worth
of content there if you're interested in that
kind of thing but the main story about 17 and a
half hours it took me to get into the game and
it was absolutely polished and perfect all the
way through with only one exception right
obviously the keyboard i have so many no well
no there's a keyboard thing but there's also a
mission near the end of the game that is just
ill fucking conceived but other than that it
was it was very enjoyable all the way through
you had a question yeah um right so why didn't
you play on pad on pc because i should have
done in retrospect i should have done i didn't
play on pad because i expected that there were
going to be quite a few sections of shooty bang
and uh yeah you don't don't please right so
there were sections of shooty bang now i will
point out that the you cannot shooty bang so
the the rules of mi6 the the like rule code
yeah is is sneaky punch right you are only
you're only going to license to kill if they
shoot at you first then you're allowed to
shooty bang well but the way
i play these kinds of games
that happens quite quickly in the mission i end
up getting shot at very early so then there is
continuous shooting bang going from then on um
and because i know what i'm like and i know
that i have only got a limited tolerance for
sneaky punch i i thought i'm going to play some
mouse and keyboard because my i need to be able
to shoot people in the head and be done with it
so that was what i did okay next question is um
in the split screen multiplayer is odd job
overpowered like in the what because he's too
short and there is no multiplayer there is no
multiplayer of any kind that was genuinely a
thing yeah yeah yeah hundred percent yeah
people people used to fight friends fell out
with each other because they didn't allow
people to play as odd job because he was he had
a smaller hitbox than the other characters um
and my last thing is uh you you said that the
driving sections were more the controls for the
driving was really bad but the thing that
struck me was when you mentioned um different
types of combat um you stealth and you shoot
your bang and also melee and i always found
what is what is this a first person or third
person i'm on the third person right yeah so
that's not so bad but melee in in most games it
always strikes me as the weaker part of the
combat there are some games that did it right
but yes i agree with you um so the the melee it
does a heavy focus on the melee in this because
as i said before the whole with this this kind
of code of honor and license to kill is that
you don't end up in a situation where you
murder every motherfucker in the entire area
now i lost my ring yeah i left the trailer
corpses that puts pale to that entire idea but
um i uh because of that not only have they made
the sneaky sections really engaging like you
get all your cue gadgets and everything and you
get so many options to distract people or drop
things on them or whatever it is that you can
genuinely sneak around but then if you end up
in an altercation providing you don't allow one
of the combatants to run off and alert other
people or set off an alarm or go on their radio
or whatever it's entirely possible to contain
that situation without other people hearing it
by punching them all and and and it's sort of
similar without the bombasticness of as uh the
batman arkham games where it it's very well put
together it's really well done it's it's hard
but it is an entire play style all of its own
that works really nicely that part on mouse and
keyboard was not a problem at all um and so you
genuinely can play with a lot of sneaking with
a load of punching and the combat is really
really nicely done it's very um contextual so
you'll end up in a fight with somebody you'll
he'll punch you you'll punch him he'll kind of
clatter against a wall you'll hit the punch
button but instead of punching him bond will
grab the side of his head and slam it into the
wall that he's now right next to or chair or
desk so it it feels really dynamic it feels
like you're actually using your environment you
can slide over desks and kick people and like
at one point i slid over a desk and kicked a
coffee cup which then hit the other guy that i
wasn't fighting so he then staggered and then i
punched the first guy then picked up something
else at the desk and threw it at the other guy
and then it's brilliant really cinematic as
well and according to the guys who are watching
me play it really enjoyable to watch too so
yeah that that is all fantastic and if even the
gunplay sections of the game you have only a
very limited amount of ammo because they don't
expect you to just go around shooty banging
everybody in the face your your wealth of pvk
or whatever it is you've got from mi6 has only
got like one clip of ammo in it so if you want
to shooty bang the entire place you've got to
get more guns and the only way you can do that
there's not convenient ammo caches around the
place you've got to kill people and you've got
to take their guns off them but the way that
happens you can punch somebody in the face or
you can even shoot the gun out of his hand the
gun will ping off you can put okay the guns
over here f you can literally grab the gun out
of the air swing it around and then shoot the
guy with his own gun and it looks great it's
really cinematic so yeah lots of care and
attention have gone into this game and i am
disappointed with myself not playing it sooner
but the whole connotations of playing a kind of
bond game after gold and i i don't remember any
good bond games to be perfectly honest so i let
this one sit for a little while and it is
definitely definitely worth it worth your time
i love how different our questions are you've
gone for like more mechanical ones i'm gonna
nip in because i've only got two just go um so
bond for me it was very much um i know that you
said that this is a very cinematic game one of
the things that were very prominent to me from
the james bond franchise is the music because
it's very dramatic very brass ebbie so how is
the music in the game in offensive so much like
yourself why will said that's not true lee now
um what i will say is good in keeping with the
tone of the game and the areas that you are in
um it's very and is given over to if you're in
a big sort of amphitheater kind of area it will
be in keeping with the area that you're in but
oftentimes it's ambient music which is being
played out of speakers because you're at a gala
or something like that which again is in
keeping with where you are it isn't there are
big brass band overtones that happen within the
action scenes and when something particularly
but yeah and set pieces and stuff when
something very bondy is happening in the action
scenes and stuff like that but the rest of the
time it sort of gets out of your way and allows
you to experience the the the sights and sounds
of the area that you're in rather than
bombarding you with this constant sort of big
overtone of background music it kicks in when
you're in combat as well which is also really
good and then the second one really quick one
so again we're going back to the cinematic
pieces is this as playable film as the metal
gear solid series um no it is it is far more
there is a lot of dialogue and a lot of
interaction with the characters but the
majority of it all happens in playable set
pieces rather than take the controls away from
you set pieces i like that so lots and lots of
you walking through crowds and pushing through
crowds which is again also really well done if
you start walking through a crowd will be like
oh sorry and things like that and people npc's
will go what are you doing and think you'll
hear people talking to you about the fact that
you push past them and stuff like that but he
will be in his earpiece having a conversation
with money penny or one of the other recruits
and stuff and so you get all of that background
and story while you're able to explore your
areas that are in or you're driving the car or
whatever it happens to be so there are some
parts where it takes you takes the control away
from you but those are very few and far between
cool yeah because that was one of the
complaints i had for some of
the metal gear games sorry lee
that's okay i just wanted to talk about the
price because you mentioned right at the start
that you got it for free yes steam at the
moment is 60 quid i want to know would you have
knowing what you know now would you have bought
it i would not have bought it for 60 pounds i
would there are very very few games that i
would spend that much money on um it is about
44 pounds if you were to buy it a key sharing
or a key purchasing website whatever for about
40 pounds for a triple-a game absolutely i
would pay that for this game it is worth it it
is definitely worth it i know 17 and a half 18
hours is not a huge amount of time to get out
of a game and i know it's breaking the one
pound per hour rule but honestly the quality of
this game and the amount of care that has gone
into it is is absolutely worth the price of
entry it you feel like you are bombed you feel
like you are in the universe playing a bond
game um without the constraints of having one
of the major actors that has actually played
him on the big screen and all of the
accompanying actors as well that have been on
the big screen these people get to put their
own stamps on q um on m on money penny and in
it it's its own thing without being held back
um to the point where like right at the
beginning bond in his helicopter crash gets a
great big scar like a big cut down his face and
and i thought oh you know as as you're doing
the training montages and stuff that's
gradually healing gradually healing gradually
healing to the point where it's a scar and then
months later i'm like i don't remember james
bond having a great big scar down his face
what's all that about and so i looked it up
yeah james bond in the books apparently had a
great big scar down his face they've just never
done it in any of the films apparently so it's
really like very faithful um and incredibly
incredibly well done 60 pounds i'm not the kind
of person that wants to spend 60 pounds on a
game i must say um when it comes when it's on
offer if you can get it for 40 pounds or less
and you're interested in this and you're a bond
fan or an action game or film fan yeah i would
absolutely say it is definitely worth the price
of admission cool lovely all right that's
that's my other game i want to talk about i've
played and i got it so by the way i got this
for free not because i'm since big shot
celebrity or something stupid like that um i i
um uh bought a laptop and there was an offer i
know it's still on but if you get if you buy
certain nvidia graphics cards you get this game
for free and this this laptop happened to have
an nvidia graphics card in it and it came with
a code to to activate the game and that's so
that's how i got it and that's how i ended up
playing it um but yeah loved it ab genuinely
absolutely loved it i've been very very treated
between this and alan wake 2 it like no notes
yeah there's um probably a bit of a feeling of
where where where do i go next what's the next
game going to be can i top this a little bit
yeah so i'm i my palate cleanser is um a souls
like and that's what i'm gonna do next so
there's a new souls like that uh that's not
long come out and the great thing about most
souls like games is there's no fucking story
that you need to worry about yeah there
probably is but you're never going to
understand it so it doesn't matter so the great
thing about coming off these really heavy story
games you go into something like a souls like
which is pure hack slash toil trouble trying to
beat these bosses palette yeah exactly repeat
palette cleanses the hell out of all of that so
that's probably going to be my next go-to um
i've just remembered something that uh i should
probably should have said in the intro when we
were saying oh what's been going on with you
and that sort of thing um but we've only got
like eight minutes to go but i just wanted to
say i had the horrible experience of sitting at
my editing pc this week and the whole thing
just going poof no what gpu gpu died no okay so
not super terminal hard drive and everything
else is still on it oh no the computer's fine
but yeah the gpu died and um i was really
guided because i'd recently this gpu second
hand uh it's a an rtx 2080 ti um it's decent
card and i only got it for 60 quid i was really
happy with that so i haven't lost too much but
um it has ended up costing me quite a lot more
than that to replace it so yeah same thing
happened to my daughter recently this is a gtx
1070 that was mine um it is 10 years old we
looked it up uh so that this actual graphics
card stenny's opens what she was using and it
uh and that went kaput in hers you've never
seen a child as crest fallen as this girl she
she didn't know what to do now luckily or
unluckily for her she just i've just been
through this i i know exactly how she well yeah
yeah so she just had her birthday so she bought
a second hand card uh to replace it but uh yeah
absolutely was absolutely gutted beside herself
with sadness bless her oh dear okay well so
have you fixed it have you got a new card yeah
okay yeah i put a 3080 in there oh you put a
3080 for all those games you're gonna play with
the video in an rtx 30x oh well okay yeah yeah
when i used to do video editing they never even
bothered leveraging the graphics cards for the
most part i would imagine that's very different
now always yeah okay all right fine i'll give
you that uh are you gonna play a game on it at
some point no no no that's not nonsense rich i
was actually tempted to load up the um the
hollow thingy game and uh and try that on there
but i thought what's the point it runs
absolutely speed on this on a 4k tv so yeah i
take my 3080 and put a game that will work on
an android handheld handheld on it where's the
point maximum settings i feel like we've got
through loads of stuff this week i feel like
we've spoken about many games and consoles and
cozy things speaking of which i think i want to
go get that cozy game we spoke about um however
um we gotta call it a night we gotta we gotta
draw the line somewhere we're not allowed to
talk about anything else now that's it i'm
cutting you all off so rude that means we've
got to do an outro and that means we've got to
tell people where they can find us and and
where they can interact with us and talk to us
now that's easy for me because the answer is
nowhere which is absolutely fine because i love
speaking to you guys and i love speaking to
anybody who wants to listen to the podcast
through this medium but unfortunately i do not
like social media and so i
am not on it anywhere however
rich's social media is the youtube comment
comment so leave a comment in this video if you
want to talk to rich him he won't even look at
them but we will pass them on they will tell me
and then i will look at them and then i will
respond and i have responded to people in the
youtube comments i've been really good with
that um but you can however find l on social
places where can people sort of i've got my
placeholders at escaping irl sometimes i do
chat to people sometimes i don't yeah it's a
mixed bag yeah don't be offended if you're not
interesting enough for her to talk to you yeah
don't just send me hi because i'll read it and
ignore it yeah well that's what i do with
family and then and then you can also
definitely find lee on social places and he
makes up for he makes up for my total lack in
l's partial lack of socialization so where can
people find you lee uh you can find me on
youtube on morphum retro i'm still morph i'm
making it on blue sky and that's really the
there is a facebook page but don't go on there
and try and contact me because i only look at
that when i upload videos so um yeah that's not
the best one for me but yeah blue sky is a good
place that's uh that's a happy place for me
well i say happy it's still social media lee
you're supposed to just be telling people where
they can find you not your inner most feelings
about it i like to share this is a sharing man
so people can find you on blue sky and morphum
making it yeah and morphum retro on youtube i
will be switching that over to morphum retro at
some point when i find a spare second in a day
which doesn't come around very often which you
can't because you're in great demand you can't
play chrono not so much yeah it's my own demand
because i i fill up my days with um fixing
weird old computers as you can see with fun
things good brilliant thank you very much then
guys in that case it is time to call it the
dayist of days and go forth play more
interesting and fun things to come back and
tell me about in a couple of weeks time and
hopefully we'll also have ross who will
definitely have played absolutely nothing um
but he can talk to us about stuff as well thank
you very much to everybody who is listening who
has joined us on this journey of the resurgence
of ready player too thank you for listening
thank you for watching thank you for commenting
and engaging it is brilliant to talk to people
it is brilliant to know that people want to
hear what we have to even if not necessarily me
um and please keep doing it because as lee said
i do like to see that people are actually
paying attention and we're not just screaming
into the void for absolutely no reason
whatsoever but i'm also happy doing that too so
do you know what whatever thank you to
everybody thank you to you guys for talking to
me and goodbye it's way more like screaming in
the void okay don't you just scream at clouds
shouting at clouds oh it's just absolutely a
cloud goodbye everybody bye you