Subscribe (Stitcher) Subscribe (iTunes) Every year or so we release a horrifying blooper reel. Contained in this audio are our numerous follies and questions pertaining to the X-Men and Canadian media. At least there's nothing potentially libellous in here this year. I edited that out. THEse THEMEs are FROM THE FREE MUSIC ARCHIVE: "It Was" and "Positive Space" by Cosmic Analog Ensemble, and "Hungaria" by Latch Swing. BUILT TO PLAY IS A PRODUCT OF THE CJRU RADIO STATION IN THE HEART OF DOWNTOWN T...
Apr 21, 2015•13 min
We examine the modern role playing game as they come out in Bloodborne and Pillars of Eternity and how the games compare
Apr 13, 2015•34 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) Built to Play focuses on four space-themed stories all about exploration and self-discovery Space is a weird place to go. It's wondrous, potentially beautiful, but it's not quite worth the price of omission. Send astronauts up to the moon, fly a rover to Mars, speculate about a colony on Venus, and you'll still have the problem that it's mostly empty and extraordinarily expensive. Yet, we still want to go there, as science fiction authors will tell you alo...
Apr 06, 2015•52 min
At PAX East we found expert space explorers, monster hunters, attack musicians, and mood setters.
Mar 17, 2015•58 min
We wrap up our second day of PAX to chat about procedural generation and visual novels.
Mar 08, 2015•20 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) Built to Play visits PAX East and decides to talk about roguelikes and their friend in a bind, the MOBA. PAX East is our one big trip of the year. We can't afford planes, trains or automobiles, so we really try to go to a convention where we'll see a lot of new ideas and fascinating approaches to gameplay. One of the big trends we noticed on our first day, however, was gameplay based on two genres, the roguelike and the mobile online battle arena. They lik...
Mar 07, 2015•20 min
Subscribe (Stitcher) Subscribe (iTunes) We return to the Vector Festival to interface with the machine, dodge some lasers, and transform into our Sailor selves. Game controllers are often a player's lifeline. A player's familiarity with a control scheme or a controller can determine the difference between success and defeat. Over time we've seen controllers become more standardized, from a simple joystick and a button to the four face buttons, four triggers, and two analogue sticks. We've had go...
Mar 03, 2015•55 min
We discuss a litany of space themed games, including Mass Effect, Eve Online, Asteroids, and FTL
Feb 23, 2015•26 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) Built to Play explores the great beyond with games about the human heart, the future and cosmological afterlife. It's taken us a few weeks to get back into gear thanks to DICE, GDC and PAX East all being in short succession of each other, as people are either at a conference or will be soon. With that in mind, welcome to our first theme of 2015, Space. We're going to explore games and media's relationship to space and how it was almost inevitable that the ...
Feb 16, 2015•59 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) In an all-news episode, we discuss the end of the Nintendo Club, Persona 5, and Net Neutrality for all. We haven't had a chance to discuss the news for a while, so we thought it's time to catch up on everything we've missed since mid-January. Sony Online Entertainment was bought by Columbus Nova, and renamed Daybreak Game Company, alerting our suspicions. The Club Nintendo is becoming more exclusive to the point it no longer exists. Microsoft expects to be...
Feb 09, 2015•53 min
We wrap up the main four Metal Gear Solid game with an in-depth look at 3 and 4
Feb 02, 2015•53 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) We explore the history and development of one of the strangest entries in the Zelda series to discover how the game became the black sheep of the family. _The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask _is one of the few Nintendo games where the consequence of your failure is planetary genocide. Link, searching for his lost friend Na'vi, is robbed and is then forced to stop the moon from plunging into Termina. The happy mask salesman, who looks eerily like series crea...
Feb 01, 2015•29 min
Built to Play ventures into the harsh outside world to find games that take our mind off the cold. We manage with this with laser tag at Battlegrounds, an ancient English treasure hunt, and the Clash of Talons.
Jan 19, 2015•58 min
Subscribe (Stitcher)Subscribe (iTunes) For those just joining us, this is Part 2 of a series about the history of Metal Gear Solid, from the MSX to the PS4. If you haven't listened to Part 1, we recommend you do that now. This episode still works as a standalone, but we do call back to earlier points in the series. Continue at your own peril. With that out of the way... We laugh at the most problematic game in the Metal Gear Solid franchise, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty. No matter which w...
Jan 03, 2015•51 min
Subscribe (Stitcher) Subscribe (iTunes) The Built to Crew explore the world of Metal Gear Solid, tracing the series from its MSX origins to its increasingly nonsensical conclusion. Metal Gear Solid, first released in 1998, is one of the biggest game franchises out of Japan. Its combination of stealth gameplay, cinematic presentation, and charismatic voice acting has lent this series a charm it would have had otherwise. As for all of its moments of brilliance, Metal Gear Solid often feels like a ...
Dec 22, 2014•57 min
Our end of the year celebrations as we talk about games we didn't play and ones we played a little too much
Dec 15, 2014•58 min
We talk about Mr. T, World of Warcraft, the Ninendo DS and Bob Tarantino tells us whether it's a good thing there aren't many Canadian copyright suits.
Dec 14, 2014•24 min
Subscribe (Stitcher) Subscribe (iTunes) We confront enemies, war, and clones in our discussion of Battlefield 3 maps and screaming in Spaceteam Built to Play's had a chance to explore the ways games and interactive art can bring us closer together, but like any other medium they also have the power to tears us apart. Not just in the tribal sense either. Conflicts between whether a particular console is better than another are vacuous affairs, and rarely do friendships end over having bought an X...
Dec 08, 2014•55 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) We learn about learning, as we discuss game literacy, broken games and the world of theatre Built to Play learns about learning in our 50th episode. We don't know how we did it, except through willful ignorance of the heavenly signs and our friends and family. At this rate, Built to Play will never die, although we offer no guarantees. People often forget about game literacy, like this article did in the previous paragraph. Once you know how to read or wri...
Nov 23, 2014•53 min
On a spectacularly late episode of Built to Play, we talk about the things that keep us up at night, like taxes, lies, and harassment.* In out post-Halloween episode we decided to touch on real horror. While people are definitely scared of zombified spiders, it's not really the thing we're worried about. There are scarier things out there that we deal with on a day to day basis, some of us more than others. We all fear poverty and one day being stuck on the edge of financial precarity, especiall...
Nov 12, 2014•56 min
We travel to Gamercamp to walk on walls, battle in tent warfare, and defuse bombs. The annual indie game festival Gamercamp came to Toronto back in October, and then after three days promptly left this earth entirely. This was Gamercamp's sixth year, and its last one, for now anyway. Meaning if you couldn't visit this one, tough luck. We had an interview last week with Jaime Woo, its co-founder, if you're curious what happened. But we knew that you might have trouble making it out to Toronto's C...
Nov 03, 2014•1 hr
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) It's an episode in which we finally stop talking about virtual reality and move on to weeks of playing with pals. We start with the end of Gamercamp. Movie buffs visit film festivals. Bibliophiles browse books fairs. But game players charge into the convention. It's a practice hailing back from the olden times of the Star Trek conventions, to tech meetups in the early Silicon Valley and the mighty heights of the San Diego Comic Con. For the avid fan, there...
Oct 28, 2014•52 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) Built to Play dives back into virtual reality through Samsung's Gear VR and by visiting Toronto's VR hub. Almost a month ago, Samsung announced the Gear VR , a small virtual reality headset. The idea is Oculus already uses Samsung phone screens for its display. In fact their current display is the exact same as the Galaxy Note 4. So why not just use the phone as the virtual reality headset? Plug it into the Gear VR, and BOOM, virtual reality on the go. Tur...
Oct 13, 2014•54 min
It's all news and reviews as we talk FFXV road trips, laughing about Windows 10, Smash Bros, and Persona 4 Ultimax
Oct 06, 2014•54 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) On Built to Play, we put on a headset, strap on a pair of headphones, and talk about virtual reality in all its forms. UPDATE: Arman uploaded an unfinished version of the episode. A clean, fixed version has now been uploaded. We apologize for the mistake. Some people just can't stop thinking about virtual reality. Last week Oculus chief technology officer John Carmack (and the creator of DOOM ) got on stage at the VR conference, Oculus Connect, and improvi...
Sep 30, 2014•57 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stiticher) This time on Built to Play, Daniel visited Xbox Canada and Arman discusses Canadian games and the great outdoors. The Built to Play staff doesn't make it outside often. Sure we can see the outside from the windows in our studio, but we rarely experience it. Just kidding. Our studio doesn't have windows. Anyway, Daniel actually left the studio to talk to play some upcoming Xbox One games, while Arman talked to game designers about why they liked the outsid...
Sep 23, 2014•55 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) In what has to be the longest coherent rant they've ever put to audio, Dan and Arman discuss the ongoing harassment in the video game community. One of the first pieces I ever wrote for Built to Play was the style guide. On the podcast, and in the articles, we should limit our use of the word gamer. We agreed to that rule because it's not a word that makes a lot of sense. Not everyone who plays video games is a gamer, just like not everyone who watches mov...
Sep 15, 2014•27 min
Subscribe (iTunes) Subscribe (Stitcher) Built to Play explores new Nintendo games, the tricky world of Dota 2 and why we keep seeing the words "You Died" when we close our eyes. Daniel and Arman visited Nintendo of Canada to play upcoming titles like Mario Maker, Bayonetta 2 and Yoshi's Wooly World. But when it comes to Super Smash Bros. the two land on a bit of a competitive streak. Take a listen to hear more about the relative nudity of Pokemon, Toad's Batman voice, and genius robot design. If...
Sep 01, 2014•56 min
Built to Play is amping up the disappointment, as we take on failure. That's a failure to play and a failure to learn, starting with why play video games in the first place. From Takeshi's Challenge. We suck at video games, as a species. Yes, some of us are amazing at Street Fighter , and that Chinese team won five million dollars in Dota 2 , but on average most of us lose more than we succeed. In Call of Duty , you likely failed more levels than you won. In Super Meat Boy , people come close to...
Aug 03, 2014•57 min
Our last episode had no news because this episode has all of the news. Join us as we talk about the fates, fortunes and foibles of the everyone from the province of Quebec to Nintendo's shareholders. First up, Majesco did a reverse stock split , raising their stock price back to $2.56 from between 0.50-0.60 during the last few months. Masjeco is listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange which requires a minimum of a $1 value per share, and so the company needed a maneuver that would raise the price be...
Jul 16, 2014•55 min
