DGC Ep 464: LoZ: Majora's Mask (part two)

Hello and welcome back to Dev Game Club, a weekly podcast in which two veteran game developers look at games from the past. to discuss their relevance and impact today. I'm Brett Duville and I'm joined as always by my co host, a man who went to great lengths to get to that legendary mask, and when he finally had it, could sense the doom of a dark omen brewing. Tim Longo. That's my happy mask salesman, you know, reading of the uh of the scene when you finally get back to him after you have uh

go you know, rewound time once. Yeah. So it's uh one of those things that he talks about. It's uh Yeah, that is a creepy scene with that guy. His his eyes go wide, uh somebody I think uh calamity. um in the Discord. We're talking about Jorge Mask, by the way. Um, put in the clippings of him like his animation clipping back and forth like or cutting.

back and forth like you talked about last time. Um which which is definitely a choice. Uh no no doubt about that. No no argument. I had not seen that yet last last time. So um Ah right, right, right. Yeah. Yeah. And it maybe it only happens with him when you talk to him. I I don't think it's just that scene that I saw it, but that's probab maybe it was just his maybe his and Skull Kids are, you know, always weird. Yeah, it wouldn't surprise me if you see Skull Kid. It's nice to strange.

It's nice that they that they are making choices like that though, you know, that they're that they're really intentionally making it feel different, um, or trying to at least. That that is an interesting moment. I actually had had to go through that sequence. a whole second time not to jump into one of our topics, but I lost um

I lost uh I lost progress. I know you did too, but uh for a different reason. But um I just yeah, the the saving and yeah, the structure of the game is weird enough to where it tripped me up and

I also realized another reason why I lost time or I lost uh playtime because of a some a bad assumption I made. Um but through the through the Orders of the universe, time and space of the universe is why in this unique situation I made an assumption that I shouldn't have and I just wasn't paying attention. I can explain more later or now if you want. Yeah, go ahead. You can why not dive into now.

Well yeah, one of the topics we wanted to hit was You know, we we obviously I would say introduced the structure of the game last episode when we started.

And and of course most people listening know that it's a differently structured game. And and in its time would have been fairly rare and interesting. I think indie games have been doing a lot more interesting stuff since then. But at this time I would call this a pretty weird game, um, because there were just so many traditional structures at the time.

And the f so this so what do you do so what do you do with saving your game at that point when you've chosen the structure? And one thing that I've been reflecting on as I've been playing is I don't know if they did a great job teaching you. Like there's definitely times when people tell you what to do with like the time song and the owls.

over talk what to do like they over explained. Yeah. You know, it's like there's like five paragraph five, you know, skip throughs to to um when they explain how you save like Bef I guess it what it is. They call it not even it's it's even crazier than that because they call it if you want to interrupt your game again. You know, use this process. I was like, interrupt? What what do you mean? Yeah, I think they basically mean if you want to save in the middle of a cycle.

Yeah, exactly. But they don't they don't talk about it as a cycle. So like the terminology is super strange. Yeah. So, you know, and of course it's clear it's clear that the owls are not what they seem. But uh, you know, you whack'em with a sword and they're like, Hey, um Yeah, this is, you know, uh this is a this is your problem. You know, here you can you can go and there'll be a special icon, I think it even talks about on the save file.

Yeah. And you're just like, what are you talking about? Yeah. Yeah. It's like it's a lot of information. And what's worse is They and I sor sorry to start start critically because I I still really am Fascinated and loving the structure so far. But just some of these, my my macro point is just when you've chosen to take a different route.

it comes with a lot of baggage you're gonna have to figure out and I don't think they'd quite figured everything out. But so not only are the are the terms weird, maybe it's localization challenges, but calling the saves with owls an interruption of your play is is not it might be accurate, but it's not really like user use uh user friendly. But then when you when you strike the owl, it plays the um very positive, very Zelda, you know, little um jingle.

for like finding a secret door or treasure or something. You know, is that so it's like it really incentivizes you to activate those things. Um, now I'm not positive, maybe you know. I don't maybe it explains it in its five paragraph explanation and I just missed it, but when you strike one, it it it spreads its wings out. But I don't know if that counts as this as a save or if you actually have to answer the question and say, I'm gonna save and quit and then come back. And that's the real save.

Or both. I don't know. But I don't know, although I guess I'll find out because I did do that. Um oh, was it before or after I looped the day? I don't remember now. Um because I also crashed. So if I come back and I have that as a save, uh then we'll know that's a good thing. Oh, that'll be a good test. Yeah, because I don't I really don't remember when I did that, although hm. So you're saying you you activated it but you didn't save and quit.

Because you're going to be able to do that. But I don't know if I I I played basically two two loops, two iterations of the loop. So I don't know if I did it in the first iteration of the loop, in which case the save would have been overwritten. when I looped, because whenever you loop the day, it saves.

Yeah. Mm-hmm. Um whenever you play those. With one exception that I will explain to you. Yeah, we'll get to that too. Um it's supposed to anyway. It says that it does. Well, maybe maybe you maybe it asks you. I guess it asks you. No, no, no. It's a specific situation that I'll that that I'll explain. But yeah. But it's no, you're right. It it does but you have to do something for it to save that loop state before something else happens. Oh that happened to me. Um

Well, I don't know. I'm inter I'm I I'd actually be in interested to know how you end your loops now that you're mentioning it. But anyway, long story short. Well I don't know because all I did was last week where I you know I just did it the one time. Um so are you playing the song of time to end your loop?

Yes. Okay, so here I'll just jump into it now. Yeah, let's here's the funny here's the funny, like weird game um gaming history uh uh space-time continuum weirdness that happened to me. So I just finished Outer Wild. That game is heavily influenced by this game. Like, no doubt. No doubt. And maybe I know there's a documentary that we've mentioned multiple times about Outer Wild. So maybe they talk about it in that. I don't know. I haven't watched it.

So my assumption with this game was it's okay to let the world end because that will automatically save my state and I'll just pop back to the to a new a new loop. That is not what happens. Yeah. Because that's what happens and obviously that's like the core thing about Outer Wilds is like you're gonna have that supernova happen. And that's you know, and it's a wonderful moment.

Um and the one in Majora's is also like amazing because the moon crashes into the planet and they if for an N64 title they presented pretty well and it is terrifying that moon I will have nightmares. I will have nightmares. And it's always also ever present, right? It's always like staring down at you. Oh yeah. And and when you're in the last Whatever, twelve hours. When it's it's super close and the ground is rumbling.

Yeah, that's so great. Like this face of this moon It's like the gravity of the moon being that close is like tearing apart sort of like in that movie Melancholia, if you saw that. Um where the this planet comes close enough that it like It's it draws off some air from Earth. And Like it draws off some of our atmosphere and like people, you know, feel it. You can tell. That the atmosphere is thinner everywhere uh on Earth. Yeah. There's a similar concept with the stranger with

Stranger things. So interesting. Um yeah, you know, nothing's new. Bleak bleak movie, but uh but I like it. So Yeah, I thought yeah. Melancholia, I think is the name of the is the other planet. This planet they uh they call it melancholia that that comes closer. So Yeah. So anyway I but because I did that I I because I made that assumption I hadn't saved, like in any way, and I didn't use the song of time. So when So when the moon cra when you let the catastrophe happen.

Um the last time I guess it autosaved was when you go back to the mask guy. Right. The first time. Right. And so basically I lost, you know, all my Your whole day. Your whole day. Yeah. Yeah. Exploration and, you know, I had a couple masks. I had talked to different people, you know, so like none of that state none of th those states were were there anymore.

Um so it's not you know not a big deal, but it was just funny to me that I made an assumption based on Outer Wiles, yeah, you know, about how this game works and It didn't even dawn on me. And maybe they even said at some point, like, don't let this happen'cause, you know, you won't come back from it. I don't remember if somebody said that. Um

But it was just a funny, weird, out of order thing. Like who you know, how many people in the world have played Outer Wilds before Majora's Man? Yeah, right, sure. I mean but also I mean I could I could f sort of get feeling like, oh well the The game's just gonna continue. Like even right even back then it would seem like I'm not gonna lose anything. You know? Yeah. You know? Um so I guess a little strange.

Yeah, so I guess what that means is you have to use this song of time. You have to, yeah, to get um before the before that timer, that final timer ticks down. So Yeah. And it gives you you should have plenty of time um to do that. Yeah.

Yeah, no, it's it's there. It's just I was just milking the time as much as I could, you know, and assuming that it would save the state of everything. But anyway, that was just a funny, funny funny part of the structure of the game and and I think real that combined with the saving process, I'll call it.

You know I completely applaud them for taking Ocarina and making this game out of that. Yeah because it's such a big shift. But when you do that, you're bucking so many trends that the players are gonna make assumptions about that you really have to be careful. One takeaway that I'm early having you know, early in this playing this game is

how careful you have to be if you're gonna choose to do weird stuff like this, you know. And now we have many, many examples of games that fool with this now in the modern era. So maybe players are more used to it, but Um I don't know if that was some of the controversy for people or not, but um back then, but I can imagine it might be. I I mean, my my recollection was the whole you're reusing all the assets was the

You know, things that people new um you know, new everything. Um, etcetera. And and then it was followed up, I guess the next game would have been Wind Waker. Mm-hmm. And people were ticked about that then because they didn't they wanted a more realistic looking game and They got this this gorgeous cell shaded game, you know, that holds up really well because it's cell shaded, you know, and it it hasn't really aged. You know, it looks it looks

quite good today. I actually um threw on the demo. That d there's a demo on the same disc that I have. Um And uh I just put it on'cause I was I was like, Oh yeah, I wanna Wanna look at that again and it's like, oh man, this game This game looks so good. Yeah. You know. I was looking at a semi recently for for some research purposes, in fact, because of the cell shading held up so well. Yeah. Um Yeah, it's r it's remarkable. Um you know. And you know, of course Majora's mask

It doesn't. I mean it looks like an N sixty four game and that's fine. You know, it doesn't that's not the sort of thing that that bothers me, but but Wind Waker is like that, you know, it's kind of timeless. It's like you could make that today, you know. Um you know, with with some

you know, probably edge case stuff like it's not uh I don't I think it's six forty, four eighty, right? So it's there's there's issues, but um but for the most part, you know, it's like, oh, you know, this this holds up really well. But anyway, yeah, I mean I think that um Yeah, I th I I definitely expect people did not give this a fair shake. And of course it was, as we pointed out last week.

it was an expensive game in the sense of needing the the expansion pack. Right. There's some yeah, there's some lines that they cross, I think, for for consumers. So you can see adding that all up to to having it be a very having it be whatever and I won't say very, but having it be a controversial title because of when you would when you put together the reuse, when you put together the you know, the hardware and

Um, maybe it sounds like maybe its length is gonna ultimately be shorter than ocarina, you know. So there's a lot of things and they called it a sequel, and it was probably the same price. Um so I can see how people but you know, I don't know. Yeah. More biased toward the negative internet or against the negative internet mentality, but um and, you know, out of con I'm trying to think of it in context, but out of context, um

R the reuse for me is almost like why I wanted to play it for the podcast. Because it's such a fascinating and and that's another, you know, another topic I wanna hit, but it's just such a fascinating development challenge that they gave themselves. I'm still I'm I'm kind of I'm I'm really kind of impressed to be honest, even though I know the players weren't were mad because it was reused, but I'm

I love the idea of that challenge. Oh, the point I was going to make there is that in this day and age, if you're trying to amortize your assets and your your engine over a SQL product. It would generally this the tactic there was do more of the same. Just like make more take ocarina. In this case it would be take ocarina, make more chapters, make more dungeons. you know, and just extend the same structure.

Or, you know, first person shooters of the time were the perfect example with expansion packs or RTSs with expansion packs. It's like everything's the same. It's just more of the same. Right. Um that's how you that's how you amortize that over over time to make the the cost lower. But they didn't do that here. They just decided to do a whole different thing. They're like, what if we added a whole bunch of mechanics and had didn't have to rebuild the assets?

Yeah. Yeah, yeah. What a weird choice. And restructuring. Yeah. The structure mechanics. Um yeah. It's Wild. Yeah. Yeah. It is. It is it is pretty wild. Well, let's let's get into that topic more, you know, um, and then we can talk about uh some structure some more and then of course how both of us got stuck in different ways. Uh'cause last time we were talking about how Oh what a warm bath. Like you come in, you got a clear quest.

But what you're supposed to be doing, it's like this leads to that and bada bing and uh and it didn't go that way for either of this this time. So we'll we'll get to that towards the end. Uh come back to the negative stuff. Um uh but uh but yeah, let's talk about that that reuse stuff and and your fascination with it. Yeah, so um you know, your memory's better than mine and so I I have I have my vague memory of Ocarina, but it's been

A few years since we played it. So I'm trying I was trying, as I'm playing this, I'm trying to kind of connect the dots some. But one thing that um that I'm impressed by and kind of flabbergasted by And kind of remembering too, again, I don't remember, it was a year, two years, how long did it did this come out? How far after it came out about two years later. Um the development time was um uh only about fourteen months.

Right. So it Yeah, so putting in that context, I you know, players probably would have remembered a lot of this stuff too, but but I'm kind of like I put some of them in my notes, but I'm also just kind of making a mental checklist of you know, essentially I'll just say things, abstractly, things that they had from Ocarina. that they, you know, remixed basically for this game.

And it and it's f it's pretty far like I'm really impressed with how far and wide it goes because I had I had a vague memory that there were masks in Ocarina. But I don't think I I um found all of them or didn't use them as deeply as you did. But I think you you did find all of them and Yeah, there there aren't them there aren't tons of them. Um and they are They're more like It to help you find secrets or to have kind of unusual interactions in the world.

that are way off the main and like they're not necessary by any means. Um right, right. Secondary stuff. Yeah, yeah. Which is sort of like stones and things like that. Yeah. Right. The gossip stones, right, yeah. And that's kind of like how

That's that's sort of like their their role in Breath of the Wild as well, ultimately, kind of this augmentation to the game. But the reason I bring the mass up first is that obviously this is the core element of this game and I love the idea that they were sitting in a room someplace and/or however they made the decision and they came up with the idea of taking this minor thing from Ocarina like math.

and making it the thing, you know, um, as far as like giving you new mechanics at least, or new variables. I'll talk about one specific mask that's a really simple idea, but a really cool one later. And then there's things like time of day. They knew they had time of day. They knew time was a thing. from Ocarina of time. So they're like, let's reuse that, but let's make the day cycle mean something different, you know, and have it repeat.

And then there's simple things like um finding um locations or places that are like reminiscent of locations, like going to the ranch. And you know, th there's some people there and milk is a thing and there there's a race, but it's Yorkes? You know I hadn't I hadn't gotten that far. Oh, okay. So there is a racetrack there. There's a couple of things.

Uh same as you, I was I was looking for an item and so I ended up going there to look for that item. But when they didn't have it, I was like, Oh well never mind and I I left. Got it. So I didn't see the r I didn't see the racetrack.

Right, yeah. So it i it they're just, you know, they're um and there's, you know, there's chickens around or whatever, but you don't use them in the same way. I think there's gonna be something with cows that we we might have to go find cows. Yeah, there've been a lot of cow There's not a lot of cow like origami or little statues or something like that in every in every like

In people's houses? I don't know if you've noticed. Interesting. No, I haven't seen that. Yeah. I think there's a thing, yeah. I think I don't know if they're lost cows, but there's something gonna be happening with cows instead of chickens, you know. Um and then of course they have the four they have four different locations that are, you know, that we talked about last time of of the sort of biomes, if you will. Um and then the use of kind of the townsfolk, you know, that are are um

are character models that we know, but they've recontextualized. Um and then My favorite my other favorite one is the concept that and I guess the Deku Kid's the only real example we have of this so far, but I can only imagine where where it will go. I bet you get like a a signature mask. Um after every dungeon that gives you a a Deku Kid kind of ability. But the idea of turning you into enemies.

from Ocarina is like also I think a brilliant move. Um and it just makes it so much more meaningful. Now they have what I would call maybe secondary masks, like the fairy mask, which has a very specific purpose and Like doesn't give you like a new ability per se, but um And I think you said or I think we know that there's quite a m quite a few masks in the game.

if you get them all. So I'm yeah. There's a lot of space for them on the mask menu. Oh right. That's a good point. Yes, right. There's a lot of space. There's yeah. There's Probably twenty slots. Yeah. Something like that. Twenty or sixteen or something. Maybe more. I it's I think it's more than sixteen. I think there's sixteen and then like some main ones that are on the side. Right. Um so like the Deku dungeon. The Deku Kid one is on the side or the Deku scrub and then The um

the other the fairy one is like not in kind of this notched progression. Yeah. I think those are dungeons over there probably and then um other ones. uh in the middle. And it's like, oh wow. Like, is that all gonna be necessary? Like, or is it all to support the sort of side quest stuff that uh we'll talk about next week'cause Tim hasn't hasn't found that. Um

There's a there's a sort of journal that uh you keep that keeps track of stuff in notebook. Well they You ran into the kids and they told you about it but you don't you haven't I haven't found it yet. You haven't discovered how to get it. Um Yeah.

Well and I guess I'll I'll use the mask example I was gonna use that that is uh a bit of a spoiler for folks and and for Brett'cause he hasn't quite gotten it. But you it's I'm surprised you haven't'cause I I'm I bet you talked to this person, so I'm wondering how you didn't get it, but um you get so the son of the mayors of the mayor and his wife. um is missing or has been kidnapped or not, I don't not sure, or he's

He's he's he's about to be married, and it seems like there's even some rumors about the fact that maybe he's getting cold feet or something, or he wants to cancel the wedding. Anyway, he's missing. And then she gives you a mask of him. And interesting. If you wear that mask, you can talk to literally everybody so far, and they may say something about where they saw him last.

Oh it's amazing. And so I talked to this one kid and I didn't find her. That's why. Ah yeah. So you would have found it if yeah. So she's just she's in another room. Yeah, there. So um But it's just like you talk to one of the I was gonna call'em Bookhouse Boys, but they're bombers. The bomb yeah, something the bomber boys. Yeah, Bombers Club, yeah. The Bombers Club. Great, yeah, wonderful name. Um

Anyway, um and he's like, Yeah, I saw I saw him not long ago near the laundry, whatchamacallit, blah blah blah. But You know, it's just this really simple concept of using th this mask idea that they have, but turning it into this. NPC interaction, you know? Um, and so you now you want to go around and re-talk to everybody because they might have something different to say.

Um, and you know, having just played Ultima four, it's really just the boiled down same concept of like you didn't know a certain word before talking to this person, and now you know that word. Right. So you can go talk to that person now and they might say something new. So it's obviously a simple quest concept, but I just love the idea of them.

taking these things that they had in their toolbox and finding clever ways to reuse them. Um but but in my opinion with some some good meaning. Because now I'm really interested to know where this guy is. Like why is he missing? Right. Does he just have cold feet?

Yeah, and then and then we both did find his journal and he's talking about the wedding, right? He's he's he he has a fiance, he's gonna get married. It even alludes to a wedding mask, I think. Both he and the briar he and she have made their wedding mask. And that might be what you got from her. Oh, you're right. I didn't put two and two together there. I don't think she described it that way, but maybe she did. Yeah. Yeah. So maybe we

Wow, are we gonna be able to be in the wedding? Yeah. That's a that would be amazing. That's a hitman moment right there. I was just gonna say that. That's a hitman moment. Oh my god. That's like the opera house in Blood Money. Oh my god. So good. Uh all right. We hitman's in Majora's Mask. You heard it here first. Yeah. Um l so I guess well, was there more you wanted to talk about with regards to the structure?

Oh no, yeah. So I had migrated to the other topic of just sort of like that. Um structure wise, let's see, is there anything anything? Oh, the one ex one example that I was hoping that they would do that I was impressed with that that they did do is Is it getting to the I think it's Getting to the ranch is only possible on the third day. Oh, right, yeah. You know, and so I was hoping that they would use the days as

you know, as a gate like that. Because there's this guy that's like, you know, um pickaxing. Yeah, as a boulder that's blocking the way. And he's like, Come back, come back tomorrow. Come back in two days.

Yeah, exactly. And so, you know, those are there's pros and cons to that because people hate to wait, right? But I guess you can there's a way to speed up time, I think the scarecrow tells you you can There is, yeah. But if you play the Um if you double the notes, the first three notes of the song of time, it will advance to the next

Twelve hour chunk, I believe. Double the note. What do you mean double the no you play two of the notes? Play two of each of each of the first three notes. See okay, well there's another example of them taking the ocarina concept and You know morphing it or or iterating on its purpose. Um because that one song of time can do now three things. Yeah. And it'll prompt you at at if you want to experiment with it just to hear it, because it's fun to hear.

how they play with the music. Um because they will they will do a thing where they They change the um the key.

of what they're playing in order to indicate the effect that it's having. Um so some of the musical choices are really are really kinda nice that way. I will say that um speaking of audio Uh some of the auto is pretty muddy. Um I've been so I I did get to the dungeon and and that is that is where I crashed. Uh so I'm I'll be replaying these days again. Um just as I I would. Um but so

There was definitely areas where it's like there is too much going on audio-wise. This mix is a mess. Um where it's like, I'm a decu scrub, there's some Dekus walking around patrolling. There's one that is shooting uh whatever the nuts are called, decku nuts, I guess, um, you know, at me. There's Other sounds, you know, that are just part of the environment. Like if it's night, there's like little fires, torches, and things like it, braziers, I guess. So it's just like

It just it adds up to like I cannot pick out the salient information from the audio, which is unusual for them. Um, and maybe uh another, you know, sort of uh key to like, oh wow, they really did this in a hurry. Uh kind of feel of a accelerated development cycle because it definitely felt like They just threw in all these elements and all these elements just made sounds. Um and they didn't they weren't

built to sound like that together, if you know what I mean. You know? So Yeah. It does seem I agree. A lot of s a lot of mix like that everything's kind of in in the middle. Instead of having some high frequency and low frequency, everything's kind of in the middle and it just is like you know, this is all just one one batch of noise. You know, it's like they're interfer the sounds are interfering with each each other so much that it's like I'm not

I'm not getting a lot of information from from the audio at times. Um, you know. There's also an there's also I think at the start of the game on the GameCube version uh that I'm playing. Um they they do say like This um this audio is not as good. you know, there's some problems with the audio basically. Um to they mean like a there's a title card or something? There's a title card before the before the game plays that that sort of says

Yeah, there's some issues here. It's not your Wii, you know, or or it's not your GameCube. It's Um, it's this it's this port, you know, or this emulation or whatever they whatever they say.

Yeah, like it you know, normally you'd have better audio. We're sorry, you know, sort of thing. Um Holy cow. It's a very unusual thing to h to see from Nintendo. Uh so um but it is, you know, they are porting it forward just one gen, you know, and Um, you know, I don't know hardware wise, I'm surprised that they were the audio was hugely different, but um

I guess they had more capability'cause they were also, you know, um disk based, you know, so optical media. So they could have been using something like Redbook, even though the the discs were many mini discs they still had. more space and things like that that they normally would be playing from. Um, but with this, no, you know. So yeah, it's hard to hard to know what the without, you know, having a n a Nintendo sixty four version to refer back to, it's hard to know. Um

You know, where the issues might have been. Yeah. Well, I mean there's there could be yeah, there could be hardware related stuff, but I guess to your point and and we're gonna talk about I think another example of of this with the shorter development cycle in a second about a quest, but

Audio I've noticed the same thing, but I think you you put you um explained it better and put you know, um, hit the nail on the head as far as what's going on there. But now that you're mentioning it, I do feel like Mix wise.

They're reusing a lot and they're gonna not create a lot of new audio cues. In fact, there's an argument to say for anyone who played Ocarina that you don't wanna change audio cues for things, but because they're remixing they're gonna have the same audio for certain things and that were not intended to be. you know, say in the same space or whatever. Yeah because they were designed for ocarina. So inevitably there's gonna be clashing I think that that's gonna happen there. Um

Uh so yeah, that's interest that's an that's an unintended and I do they do generally do an excellent job at using audio for cueing and telegraphing things in general. So they wouldn't want to like turn those off or anything or change them, but it you can see the clashing happening. On the flip side of that, I will say I think the music is amazing. Oh yeah, the music has been quite good. Yeah. Especially the new music that's like

The foreboding end of the cycle music. Yeah. Yeah. So good. Oh my gosh. So foreboding and so, yeah. Yeah, but I was I was in the I was in that dungeon and it came to be the end of the day where they've got the the chunking in, chunk, chunk, you know, as the last

you know, five seconds or whatever go. And it was definitely like, Okay, that's important. I mean the screen's also changing. So it you know, it's coming through multiple channels. So that's good. But um But like that audio on top of all the other audio I was hearing was like, oof, this is like Yeah. Just like nah I'm getting nothing. I have to just stop here while this happens because uh you know, I can't I can't kind of I can't separate out the different things that I'm supposed to be hearing.

So anyway. That's a good point too, because that can happen anywhere. Yeah. Unl unlike Ocarina when it's generally

they know what's gonna happen. You know, exactly. Yeah. They have elements. Yeah. Yeah. They don't have a lot of control over like the only thing that the sorts of things that you have happen in Arc arena where you wouldn't necessarily know where somebody's gonna be are are the day-night cycle changes where you have like the you have a little musical cue is like dunno you know of like it's becoming nighttime now and you hear a howl of a wolf

Um but that only happens in the open area. So basically Hyrule Field, right? So in you're if you're in a location, I don't think time is advancing. I don't remember if is that true in Ocarina? That's sort of my feelings. Like if you're in a place like time isn't moving. But I I could be wrong about that. I d I don't remember for sure. Um so I I think they had an ability to control for it is is kind of my point. Right.

Yeah, exactly. I think yeah. And again about time. Time is always moving, you know. Right. Exactly. That's the important thing, is like you only have so much time, um, you know, and and to do things, you know, and you have to you know, they have to design around what can you do in a day, you know, as well. You know, and Do you learn stuff so that the that you get a second crack at it the next day and you're like, Okay, now I know what to do. Um you know, sort of thing. So

Yeah. Yeah. I mean it's it's still I I still think it's it's an astounding choice to make, the what they're doing with this game. And obviously I don't think Outer Wilds would exist without this game trailblazing for it. The one thing I will say about Outer Wilds that I'm appreciating even more because of some of the structure stuff we were just talking about and kind of like just how the game works.

is and maybe Outer Wilds learned a lot from this game and other games like it that have come before it, but Outer Wilds does a really good job at Teaching you what's going on as you're playing. You know, um, and it's and you can do it things in kind of any order as well, based on what you find when. So it's that they really nailed that problem, which

you know, um, is why I made the assumption I made. But also oh I think they were you know, they were still figuring things out for this game about what to do in this situation. Yeah. Um, so it's interesting to have a modern example.

Let's uh talk getting stuck, because we both got stuck um in in similar places. Well actually the same place. I got stuck twice. Um, I was going. So in this first part, this first dungeon is in the swamp. Um and there is uh Yeah, there's a I guess there's a hut, uh it's like the tourist information hut. And there's a ladder up into it, there's a bridge out to it. You you climb up a ladder. So

You know, it's described as a swamp. There's water everywhere, and I'm like, oh, it's a swamp. I know from swamps you don't go on the water in a swamp. You wouldn't want to do that. You'll die there. Um, so I was like avoiding the water, uh, which is bad because they the the guy inside is like, well, you need to get a ticket for the boat.

And you can take a picture to get the he's got some contest or something, but he can't give it to you until you have a ticket for the boat cruise. Um, the tour, which is also kind of reinforces the like, oh, you want a boat to go on this water. um kind of idea. So there's like a couple of things kinda, you know, like video game knowledge of like swamps are bad.

And um, you know, and also a uh hey, I will, you know, you you need a boat basically to go in the swamp. So I'm like, oh, okay. You know, well, where do I find this person? Well, they have a They have a hut on the edge of the swamp. So I'm like, Okay, well there's not a lot of swamp area I've been to but I combed over all of it again and could not find the witch's house. Turns out you have to go in the water and swim around the corner.

to where her house is. So there's there's a little lack of clarity there. Um and I spent a fair uh uh I would say an embarrassing amount of time uh trying to trying to figure out what am I supposed to be doing here. Uh and then I could see the lily pads and I was like, well maybe I can Deco scrub and like skip over to that. Um

And it turns out you can. Turns out you don't even need to. And I finally made my way over to uh the how the the witch's hut, the potion house or something like that. Um another another house way up on stilts. But that's The other place, uh, and this is the place we both got stuck, why don't you take take that away? Um,'cause there's definitely definitely a clarity issue here.

Yeah, yeah. Um yeah, we wanted to talk about it because it it seems uncharacteristic for them. But um Uh before I hit that, t as you're mentioning the swamp water stuff, I'm wondering it I'm just don it's just dawning on me now that I'm wondering if the lily pads What if the water was originally death or damaging and the lily pads was the It is it is in a in the next area of the swamp. So you have to you have to be a Deku.

To to use the code. So there is a there is a part where that is intentionally that way. But they're teaching you a little light version of that with the lily pads in the safe areas. I noticed the water around The octo pods, octorocks, uh all rocks, um had like a purpley yes hue to it or something. Exactly. As you go deeper in the swamp when you actually are on the boat ride. Um

the there's a point at which they're like, Well don't get out of the water here'cause or don't you know, don't go into the water here'cause it's poisonous. Got it. Okay. Which is the whole problem, right, that you're trying to solve in the swamp. But like I my understanding was oh, all of the swamp is poisonous. Yeah, no, it makes sense. Yeah.

Um, so yeah, so you find you find the Baba Yaga potion uh potion cut. And then as soon as you there's a little cutscene that plays um and it shows um uh one of the witches, you know, flying away on her broom. back behind the hut and so you go back there and there is a traditional kind of, you know, Zelda mystery maze kind of thing that Lost Woods, yeah. Lost Woods, you gotta find the right path or you exit out.

the you know you exit out the way you came in. Uh there is a little um primate of some kind who is uh who is leading you so you find the path That way. Um, there's some enemies and stuff, but um w at one of the rooms in the mystery maze. There is a witch on a broom. Um I g I don't remember, I can't tell which one it is. I think that's not the one that you see leaving.

No, she's off to go find her sister. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and so uh she's flying around, you can talk to her, and I don't remember what she says, and then if you keep going to essentially the quote unquote end. of the of the Lost Woods kind of maze, you find a witch who has is unconscious and also you have to talk to her, I think, as a human. She won't talk to you as a Deku. Um so there's sort of like

Maybe step one of the the teach us these things, please. Yeah. Uh because I was like, huh, why isn't you waking up? And I switched um I switched out of my Deku form and that worked. But then um she's like, Ah, I need energy. I need you to find me energy. Can you can you give me something? And I don't have that thing, of course. And she says, Ah, you're useless. So I leave.

I was like, okay, I need something with energy that's probably like a potion or something in a bottle, knowing Zelda. So um I'm off. Marsh but and of course this is the potion seller's house, but y we know she's not there. You can actually go up and there, she's not there. There's a note like I've you know, I'm doing a quick errand in the forest. You know, I'll be back, you know, but she won't be, you know, unless you deal with this.

Yeah, exactly. So this is a this seems critical path'cause you can't get on you can't get the boat tour to start without her. So that's where I am stuck currently. I didn't even make it to the dungeon, even though I I explored lot to try to figure out what to give her. Um obviously made some Zelda assumptions that it's a potion bottle of some kind, but the energy word is highlighted, so you you know it's energy based. Um so you know, then it's like probably hour and a half, if not more, of just

I basically retraced my steps at that point. Yeah. Um As did I and went through the town, all to the other l zones, which would be silly. Like why would I try to go to the other dungeon areas? Because you A you can't I didn't I didn't try yeah. I wasn't interested in doing that. But I went to every building I could in town. I waited. That was when I got into the curiosity shop. Um, I actually incidentally got my adult wallet, though I'll have to do that again because I crashed. Um

So uh adult wallet. That's such a funny term. Yeah, you can carry twice as many rupees. Um Yeah, so I spent I spent all that time doing that. I already I already told you pr in pre-show what you have to do. But this is a very this is a definite misstep. Um because there are places to get. potions or milk, you know, but they won't give you

you they won't sell it to you because you don't have a bottle to put it in, an empty bottle. And you're like, I know, that's what I want. You know, like so everything is reinforcing that our idea of what to do is correct. Um but They really, they really had a misstep that you actually need to re-enter the forest and find the first witch who's not. suck suck in quicksand or whatever, um, the one you saw flying away, and talk to her a second time to basically tell her, Oh, I found your sister

And then she'll say, Oh, well, here, take this. And she'll give you a bottle, um, with the the red liquid in it, the health potion basically. So it's just you know, it it is a big misstep. That is not a Nintendo thing. I do not expect that of Nintendo for to have both of s both of us to get stuck there is there's clearly something going on. Um where that making the connection there of like, oh, I'm supposed to find her sister Just did not

The uh she could have said that. You know, I mean it's it's so easy to fix, you know, it's just such a strange, you know, choice there. Well and and I think that they're always very, very, I would say very, very good at the order of operation problem for design, and that is In this case, what I mean is they they almost never have you have to talk to somebody or do a thing like a quest like this.

uh a second time without context. And all that really happened here We're pretty sure is you talk to the one in the quicksand And that state then changes the dialogue for the other sister. Yeah. But there's no indication of that, you know. So rather than say the sister, the one in the quicksand gives you something and then you know, okay, I gotta give that thing to the other sister or, like you said, a simpler answer.

Which is not as I think cool, but like she could have said, Go find my sister, you know. Right. Um, but what she says really is very focused on you. Like you don't have what you need. You need to go get what what I need. Yeah. And The fact that the state change for the other sister changed at that moment? No clue. Yeah. Um Yeah, it was a bad it was a bad bit of player direction to to like, you don't have what I need.

was like, oh well okay, well let me go get it.'Cause the implication is that the first time I got there I could have had it. Mm-hmm. Right? But the way that conversation goes is like you could have had the thing already had you planned ahead. But it that's not true. It is not possible to have the thing that you need at that point. So you you're always gonna have to go to her.

and make your way through that excellent the second time. And that's and and that is that just feels wrong. And it because of the way she says it. Yeah. It implies. It I would completely agree. It felt like when she said that to me that I that you admit that I missed something. Or yeah, or or just that like You now you're gonna have to do this again because you weren't prepared, you know. Um

So it's definitely yeah, weird a weird misstep. Um and I don't know if there's gonna be more of those. I do know that there's some you know, there I I recall from the swamp You know, dungeon that there is a difficult thing at the end of that dungeon that I remember looking up a video for. So I'm not not looking forward to that again because I'm gonna try to do it without hints or anything.

this time. Um, but I remember the last time I was like, Oh man, this is rough. Um You're basically following following a character through a maze that's kind of left, right, left, right, left, right, very quick, you know, like you have to know. you know, go through this door and then go through this door and then go through that door kinda very quickly and not make a lot of mistakes. And if you fail, I think it just goes back to the beginning. I mean, so it's a thing you can learn, but it's like

You know, I was not I did not have the patience to learn it the first time. We'll see how we do this time. Um, so we will see. I'm I'm hoping that this is kind of the the worst hump in the game in that way. You know, I'm hopeful that There'll be a lot of delights to be had with all the mini masks. So Yeah. We shall see how it goes. Well, and I and the the it's the other thing I'm looking forward to that I feel like is Is an element of Zelda and

that I appreciate, but might be multiplied in this case. And I know probably a lot of the masks are going to be pretty specifically contextual, like the fairy mask you only can really use for one thing, it seems like, or one context. So it's not gonna be systemic or anything, but I'm imagining a time when I have all or most of the mass. And your options at that point seems like could be very cool.

You know, of like, oh, I have a lot of things I can do. And now I'm gonna be able to start to be creative. Now, maybe I'm overly optimistic about that. because um but you know, the one with the sun with the missing sun is interesting to me because it did Immediately recontextualize all of the NPCs, right? Now I have another reason to talk to them.

And they might say something different. And and sometimes they just say, Oh yeah, I don't know what I don't know where he is, or they say something simple. But I've been surprised at how many new, you know, pieces of dialogue happen from from that context. So Yeah, that'll be cool. I'm looking forward to that myself. I've also seen there's a place where you go through um

There's a hollow log, you know, before you go into the swamp and there's a little rumble in the in the middle of that thing. I'm sure that's gonna turn out to be a thing. Um I do like those kind of like layers on the world where it's like, oh Now that I I mean the gossip stones from from Ocarina are a good example of like, oh, now I know what to do with those things.

Um, I have uh now that I have this mask, right? So now I can go and talk to the gossip stones and understand what they're talking about. Um Yeah, or something. So Mhm. Or magic beans and the and the planting or the Yeah, well you've got you've got that coming up in this one as well. So does uh There's more beans in this one. Yeah, yeah. But I've seen the spots where it's coming up s it's in the dungeon. You'll need that. Okay.

Yeah. That you'll learn about that and you'll find the magic bean vendor. So uh you'll have a chance to come back here, I assume. Um All right, let us move then to reviews. Next time we will definitely get into that dungeon. Uh, hopefully through that dungeon, maybe even to a second dungeon. We'll we'll see how it goes.

Um and uh and kinda make our decision then about how many episodes we wanna do. I mean, I ideally we would finish this game, but it it might be longer than we, you know then we'd want to go in four episodes. So we'll s we'll see how it goes. Um but anyway, on to reviews. We got one here. This again it goes to the sort of Apple infrastructure. I find those. Otherwise You know, let us know where we can find your reviews. This one is from Oddberry Games. It just says thank you as the subject.

Thank you so much. I love listening to your show and appreciate the tone, depth, and breadth. You're both so good at balancing the various aspects of what games are. Congrats on ten years. Now I need to go finish listening to your latest. So that is a reflection on ten years. Uh thank you for the ten year gift, uh Oddberry Games. It's uh it's nice to nice to have a new review. Yeah. Thank you.

Uh let's dig into email. Uh these of course were sent to devgameclub at gmail.com. We have a bunch, so we're gonna I think we're gonna try to catch up. We'll see how it goes. Uh let's at least get through four. Okay. So yeah, some of some of them are short. Um are long. Subject uh ultima from scratch, uh from Vitor. Hello uh greetings, Avatars in the Making. I wish to ask thee a question.

Uh I have always been fascinated by Lord British's ambition to write every Ultima main title from scratch, never reusing code except for spin-offs and Ultima uh seven part two. Uh Okay. Uh this decision feels uh fairly unique. Either Beholder 2 used the engine from part one, so did Doom 2 or Fallout 2 or Monkey Island 2. What dost thou think of th this decision? I would be glad to hear thee discuss it from any angle in thine choosing of thine choosing.

Be it artistic, financial, or technical, thou hast my thanks. Good luck on thy quest. Name, job, and buy. Vitor. Oh my god, what a great sign-off. Name, job, and bye. Bye. Bye. Um Yeah, I I think I alluded to this at one point uh one of the episodes. I didn't know this. This is insane to me. That his that his thinking was, you know, new new numbered game in the series, new engine. Period. Um

Which is that's why they don't make them anymore. Well, and it's uh I mean uh I would not say that that's why they don't make them anymore. Uh in fact there was a Ultima Ascension uh not that long ago, in the last five years, I think. Uh um six years ago. Not technically an ultima yeah. You're talking about the one that um No. Not the under not the underworld one. Um Oh, oh. Okay. Oh, okay. You're talking about a real a regular like architecture. Ultima. Yeah, it was Ultima

Ultima ten. I it wasn't called Ultima Ten though. Odyssey. Yeah, oh no no, that's... Something else. No, I I will I will I will find it. But there was a prof yeah, one fairly recent you're saying. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Anyway, continue. I'm interrupted. Yeah, no. So he um yeah, that was just like his thing. Like I, you know, when I make a a new entry in the series, I'm I make a new game. And I as I think I had mentioned, War inspector uh came into origin systems around the time of Ultima Seven, I guess, and um you know, was like, you know, we could make some other games with this and they made four in that Ultima Seven engine, the two

Ultima Adventures games and the two parts of Ultima Seven. Part two was not really meant to be a part two, it was just let's make another game um with the engine. And I will say that, you know, at the time People were getting more out of the hardware each time and because the hardware was so limited, the fact that you were doing something different from game to game actually m m it made more sense, I think, to have a new engine. So if you're on the Apple Two, Um

you know, where you've you know, y your your main uh you know, it's an eight it's an eight bit system. Like your your data is extremely limited. You wanna sort of like really maximize what you're getting. It's you're not ti typically making a general purpose thing on that. I mean there are some exceptions and you know, text adventure games are a good example, but they are structured

in a sort of like, okay, there's rooms, they're connected in this way, you know, there's some directions that take you, you know, from one to the other. And then some common commonalities between them like inventory and things like that. So there's like there is kind of a structure But that structure is just like there to support a bunch of words, a bunch of text. Which, you know

kind of the best case scenario, I guess, for for reuse. Uh and scum is kind of the same way with, you know, he mentions Monkey Island, Monkey Island two, um, you know, being scum games. Whereas if you're doing something where it's like, oh, I have you know, I might be changing up combat or how like how you navigate dungeons or what have you. You know, A, the developer's probably learning a lot from game to game to game and has things that they want to rewrite, um, just because they're like, uh.

you know, I could have gotten a little more like the dungeons could have been bigger or more interesting or whatever. Um, if I thought about organizing my data in this way that they kind of learned, you know, too too close to ship. Um yeah, I mean and also the games aren't that big, so rewriting the code base is not a huge lift. So I don't know. Kinda I I c I kinda get it, you know, but um but yeah, definitely as you're getting to like seven and then eight and nine, it's like

What are we doing here? Uh well, and to your point, I hadn't thought about it, but to your point, like costs. for game development if you're making you know, if you're trying to like stay, I guess, current, you know. Of course, you know, um now these days you can make fidelity of all sorts of kinds, right? With small teams, large teams, whatever. But But I think the escalation was happening during

Ultima's history. And to your point, like there was also all over time there's sort of been a convergence there. And this is me talking in an in an uninformed way that you'd be able to handle better. But There's been sort of a convergence of platform architecture over time. You know, we remember.

Um I just noticed on the Discord today somebody posted about how GameStop is declaring the PS3 uh a retro console, um, as well as the 360 and and and I think uh the GameCube. But But I bring that up because there was an architectural difference between the PS3 and the 360 that was pretty big. You're right. It was it was pretty sizable difference. Yeah. Well and then my point is like when they went to PS4

They s right. I mean, uh ever since then I feel like things have been they're basically similar. Yeah, they're basically PCs with like different with different motherboards and yeah, it's like different different stuff in them. And and their operating systems are different, like PlayStations is a Linux system and um and of course the the Xbox series are all Windows based.

you know, effectively. Um, you know, there are in fact they use some Windows libraries and things like that. So yeah, I mean the but but in terms of the actual hardware It's it's v extremely similar. It's like, oh well I got some different RAM than you got and I got a different video card than you got, but it's like it's very much like

you know, plug and play style architecture. It's just that you know every PS5 is the same and you know every Xbox Series X is the same. Right. Right. Yeah. Uh well I just remember like quite a lot of they're very similar. Yeah. Right. And in that era I remember some of the some of the um production and and financial debates that were being had of like, well, this game is on Unreal, but it needs to be on PS3 and the 360. And so Unreal may or may not work better on

Well, I guess in that case it probably wasn't as optimized for PS three. And then PS two, we even ran into that with with Republic Commando. It's porting Republic Commando over to PS two Would have been a big issue. Yeah. Would have been a big issue. Big Yeah. So so Well, after our executable was nearly like I don't know, twenty eight megabytes, something like that. Um the Unreal executable is not a small thing, uh and wasn't then either. Um

I mean that's small by today's standards but but uh which makes me sad. But um but yeah, I mean at the At the time I remember being like, Well, how do we actually put the game on the BS T well we can barely put the the engine on it? Um and it would have been yeah, it would have been a huge lift. And and we had um secret level had actually pitched away to

to sort of take the spirit of the game, but take out all the squad elements and like kind of do an a different title, you know, but that that was kind of at a shared time frame. I think they wanted to do some kind of sniper missions type thing. Um Was their I do not remember that with it was their idea, yeah. Yeah, yeah. It was it was you know, it was like well if we wanted to have something on the the PS two, you know, that was also called

Republic Commando, you know. Right. Or or something similar, you know, um, that's that's how they would have done it. I can't think of another example, but I do feel like I have a vague memory of that being a thing where there was oh actually no there is a good example. The the um Call of Duty games, there were often ones that were focused SKUs that were focused around PS two. Mm. Um, or maybe it was Medal of Honor at the time, um, technically.

where they would do a different basically kind of a different game. Oh yeah, it was Metal Bunner. Branded around the same you know, kind of like timeline. But it was because it was on the PlayStation Two, it couldn't be the same. Right. Yeah, they had a different, you know, two word subtitle. Yeah. Yeah. You know, armored assaults versus, you know, whatever. Yeah. Yeah. Totally a thing.

But yeah, anyway, that was kind of his thing. I mean, there's a certain even Garrett is a programmer, so there's also a certain like pride And like this, you know, it's a whole new program, you know, the goal is different, so the program is different, you know. Which is a very pure way of of thinking of programming. That's pretty cool. Yeah. But um but definitely a a thing of its time. Um, not something that would fly today.

Most of the time. I mean, if you're writing something from scratch that's small, then yeah, of course you're you're thinking, well, you know. Uh, I'm doing this for this. And then, you know, if I do something different, I do something different. It would be a different different engine. You probably share some low level code. And there probably are snippets.

you know, from game to game. I mean, I mentioned the first person dungeon delving. That actually probably is the thing that changed the least. Um, although I do think like in the first few games there it's pure wireframe and they are filled polys, um flat shaded polys in in Ultima Four.

That's my my recollection of the first ones is that they're wireframe. Um you know, so there there even are iterations there. But I'm sure between some of those games that code was was pretty much the same. Um'cause the goals were the goals were not changing, you know, for that part of the game, all that much. So All right, here I've got one from one Mystery Dip uh subject hairbrained idea.

As I was listening to the 10-year retrospective, a thought occurred to me that I'd really love to have all the takeaways and interviews in a form that I could reference. There's so many good bits pulled out over the years, and while I enjoy all four hundred and sixty plus episodes, I don't want to go skipping around through a podcast player whenever I want to remember one.

Uh, which made me think of how nice it would be to have it in book form. Imagine, for example, a couple of pages for each game played, one with the name, some context of the time, a couple of picks, and then one or two with your takeaways, uh, then any interviews that may follow. Not uh the whole series verbatim, just the highlights. I doubt such a thing would be a commercial success at volume, but maybe feasible through one of those print on demand shops.

Uh I say all this not because I expect you or Tim to do this, but I know you're both avid readers, and I suspect if such a thing were genie poofed into existence today on your desk, you'd enjoy owning it.

So a question, if suffer such a project were proposed by someone, not saying myself necessarily, would you be on board? Uh I'm not sure how copyright slash licensing would work with such a thing, but assuming you wouldn't have to put in More effort than reading a proof copy if desired, just curious regards mystery dip. Uh I have thought about that a little bit and I what I would say is

uh w when we do end the podcast, I will have time in my life again. And it might be the sort of pro project that I'd be interested in in in looking at at that time and don't really want to have it before then. You know, it wouldn't make sense to do it before the podcast ends, I guess, is my point. Um so so I guess I hold that thought is was where I am. I don't know what your thoughts are.

Uh, it's the first time hearing of it and I I no, I'm I'm full support. Uh we I'm because we don't do this for any sort of financial reasons. Um, I think the copyright stuff would be pretty simple and whatever, but and never would have even thought of that, but I mean I feel like in a way, even though it's just the two of us and their interviews.

Um, I guess it's a little bit tricky if we somehow try to involve the interviews. Maybe we can't. Yeah, I don't want to game plan it out now, but um but uh yeah. Um I'm totally up for it. That sounds like a great idea. Uh and and totally interesting to me that it even would be an idea.'Cause I'm like Uh I don't know. When something's in print like it makes it really real to me. Yeah. Um the internet's a good idea. I would think I would think probably ebook.

You know, don't Yeah, sure, sure. Yeah. That's fair. But I mean, you know, to to Mystery's point, like people do enjoy print on demand, you know, if they want. Some people like a physical thing. But um Yeah, with with whatever. EPUB EPUB three or whatever it is these days. Yeah, I've mentioned I've mentioned it I think before, but one other project that I would like to tackle

Probably after we finish or you know or close things down. But um but I might, you know, maybe there's a miracle happens where I start before that, but I do still have all of my notes and I think I might take more more physical notes than bread just because my memory's so bad. Um and I do look back at some of them sometimes um and

There obviously I I talked about most of it on air, but I don't talk about everything'cause we just don't have time. So I think it'd be fun to for myself even just to go back to those and like you know, do a a few sentences about each note explaining what I was talking about, you know. Um and just putting that on our website or something, just for like an an additional

uh resource. Uh the annotated longo files. Yeah, essentially yeah, exactly. An annotated kind of thing. Um I do take notes they tend to they tend to be digital. Like I just keep a text file open, especially when we're playing a console. Yeah, all mine are digital. Yeah, for sure. Oh okay. Yeah. I I uh Yeah, no, I I do keep them and I refer back to them. Um but they also are not

uh there I'm not really drawing on them. There are more notes I take while we play, but then I'm that's just to kind of cement them in my mind so that when we talk there it's uh it's you know, I've already written it down so it's kind of more Fresh in my mind in a way. Right. You know, where they Yeah, totally. Yeah. Yeah, unfortunately that doesn't cement anything in my brain. Yeah, I know. If I have to reference them.

All right, your next email, sir. Yes, games from the past from Carlos. Hey Carlos. Hello, as always, thanks for these discussions and congrats on hitting ten years. Here's a question related to this milestone. Colon, are there any titles you wouldn't have considered to be games from the past in the earliest episodes? But you would consider playing for the podcast today. Or has your bar for what an older game, uh, in quotes, is uh changed over the years?

Uh yeah. Carlos. Thank you, Carlos. Good question. I I have a feeling I know why he's asking this question. Uh yeah, people sometimes want uh I I mean for us it's more been a window of like, are these people who are um pretty active in the industry still. Like we don't want to kinda

talk about anything's that's really current. We work in the industry today, so we don't that's kind of been always our thing. It's like, well, with us being people who are in the industry, we really don't wanna pick apart something that we don't, you know

that that hasn't been in the public eye for a long time, you know. Um You know, and that the that you know, people who are still maybe mid career, you know, and maybe this is their first game and now they're you know, they're on their third or fourth, second, third, fourth game.

Uh these days it would be second probably second game if they're first game if it was in the last ten years because games take m so much longer to make. Um You know, so we just kind of are trying to avoid that, that just kind of um Get out.

criti criticism of, you know, that it would be like, well, yeah, well then show me yours, you know, kind of answer that it would bring, I guess. Um so that's kind of a a big part of why our window is older. Um and so you know, other than a few indies that were the sort of twenty thirteen, twenty fourteen, uh the latest I guess was were Dark Souls and like maybe Deadly Premonition.

Um Dark Souls of twenty eleven, right? Yeah, and I think Deadly Premation is right around there too. Um I d I don't remember exactly, but um so it's kinda like That's kind of the the you know, as late as we've gone and that was kind of a you know, and Dark Souls definitely uh An exceptional case.

So Yeah. It was kind of if I think to us it felt like an unavoidable one, you know, but um at least for me it did. The irony a little bit about this to let people know, we might have mentioned this before or or on the Discord. Uh right as we were hitting our tenth anniversary, we finally made a document.

Um so it took us ten years, but we actually now have Um a cloud-based document that we have a list of all the games both you have suggested that we play, the Discord has suggested that we play, and that ones that we've kind of batted back and forth around um time from time to time. And it is a very long list already. And there are a lot of them in the old days that would be worthy to play without having

And I think to Brett's point, like this, we've never wanted this to feel like a journalistic podcast or a critical podcast, you know, a criticism podcast, um, f especially for modern games. And the primary reason was because we're currently active and it is a you know For me at least, it feels weird to kind of be a critic of a modern game as we are also shipping games. But I think that the other thing that I've reflected on a lot is the recency bias problem.

And Outer Wilds is one that I've mentioned on this episode a lot that I'll bring up in that case. Hollow Knight's another one. Um uh because the games we've been playing are quote unquote classic older games, they have been put to the test. you know, over the years and they are on the list, on our list for re for some reason.

And I'm not saying that Outer Wilds doesn't deserve to be on that list. I'm guessing that might be one that Carlos or others would like us to play because we talked about it while I streamed it. People are like, You guys should do this game. Yeah, I know, I know what you're saying. But um

But there is, I think, a recency bias that you need I personally think you need time to pass. You need things to be tested and because we try to talk about thing the legacy of things and how it has influenced other you know, inf influenced the the past or sorry, the future, um Or the present that, you know, if we play a modern game, you don't really know yet. You could look backwards, I guess, and s and kind of

retrace history to see how this game came to be like Idle Wilds. But yeah, I think the recency bias thing is a little bit too much for me because on the Discord and I think at least on one of my streams, we uh we had a d discussion about like, okay, what what are your current top five favorite games of all time? You know, not the best. And not forever, but like currently, you know, and Outer Wilds was on a lot of people's lists.

And this was before I had played it and I was surprised. I was like, Really? Of all time? This is one of your favorite games? And then so my going into playing that game, my expectations were pretty high. And I can see what people meant, but I think that as I get some distance from playing it, it is a brilliant game, but I don't know if it would be on my list.

Um, you know, and I know you're going back to Hollow Knight and that's one that comes on people's list too, but I just wonder how much of it is recently.

So anyway. The other thing too is that there's there's been a lot of convergence of game design, you know, especially in the Um the triple A space where we we talk about the everything game. You know, it's like So there's certain It's not so much that there's an everything game, but there's like certain elements that are turning up again and again and again, game after game after game.

Um that there there's kind of these large scale templates like a uh the Ubisoft model of how they make their games is a a good example of like Sure, the mix of the elements is kinda different from series to series, you know, but you kinda have the uh the the the Ubisoft kind of type of title that you like to play. Somebody else might like this other one, um, series of games. And they kind of repeat that. And then others are kind of following that model as well, uh, in some other cases.

And at that point it's like, well, why'd you pick this one over that one? And, you know, and is there a lot new? to a to offer when that idea is kind of not not fresh, right? There's you know, it's like you know, kind of noodling on the margins as to how those systems work.

There's also kind of that, you know, where it's like, Well, I'm not sure we'd have a lot more to say, but like when somebody was first putting something like that into a game And they were figuring it out, that's the interesting time to be like, well, look at the template they laid down. Um You know, and how people have div diverged diverged or converged on that template, you know, in the

You know, like they really nailed it. They got everything right, you know, here. Um, or or or not, you know, in in you know, in some cases. And w that's just kind of the more interesting space as well. So Yeah.

All right, I have one here that is that says longtime no see, long time listener, now veteran developer from Anthony. Hello, Brett and Tim. This is Anthony Vicaro, Creative Director of Cinner Steel Studio, and co-founder alongside my brother Nicholas. I've listened to your podcast for the last ten years and your work is one of the inspirations for me pushing forward in game development.

I now work in it full time and co-own my studio with my brother. We release our own games as well as contract out with other companies for work. We are currently working alongside Eric Heinberg and the late Sandra Powers for Project Gorgon. It's been an absolute dream.

I want to touch base with you and thank you personally for your inspiration, the both of you. In twenty sixteen, my brother, sister, and myself lost our father suddenly to a stroke and complications of cancer that he had neglected for decades. That was a deep source of grief for all of us, and speaking for myself, an almost terminal one.

When I first emailed you in december twenty seventeen, I was going through a deep depression that I didn't realize at the time and was reaching out to you in order to convey my appreciation. I thank you for that and for reading that email aloud on your cast. I can only hope that it helped others to begin their journey into game development to find their artist's voice.

We released our seminal game Valley of Shadow in November of twenty twenty four. We began pre-production in November of twenty seventeen, ushered along by inspirational works like your podcast, and it took us seven years to complete. It's an autobiographical puzzle game about my journey through the darkest parts of myself after my father p passed, as told through my eyes and ears through a pseudo fictional therapy set.

It's as close to real as we could have made it and is based fully and completely around my own year long cognitive behavioral therapy after an attempt. Uh Nicholas programmed the game and have and developed the puzzles inspired by games like What Remains of Edith Finch, The Witness, and The Talus Prince.

I created the art, music, and direction, uh credit where credit's due, and our sister Maria provided the voice of the therapist Emma, written and performed as a strong representation of my actual session. A lot of love went into this and we wanted desperately to show what video games can do and how deep they can take us. Thank you both again. It's truly been a pleasure to listen to your work and to have you by our side in such trying times, even digital.

Good luck to the both of you in all that you do, and I hope you are enjoying your lives and your work. Uh Anthony Vicaro. Wow.

Yeah, thanks Anthony. Um Bret and I've been talking about this a little bit, you know, off offline. So um I was aware of the mail and And the game and such and um and uh can't yeah, I can't wait to check it out, uh which I will, and it's uh astounding to me that Um that people in the audience are taking this plunge and relating it to their life in ways that I I've never bit you know, had the

had the um opportunity or drive, I guess, um, and r uh to to make a game that's, you know, so personal. So it really makes me think about some things I you know, that I might do someday that uh that you're ahead of me on, Anthony. Uh so I'm I'm glad the game development has been that uh You know, something that you can share with everybody and have some, you know, some processing happening for your own journey through through grief.

And thank you for sharing. Yeah, thank you for sharing and and for uh you know Um Anthony had also sent along uh Steam Codes test for the game and I've I've actually installed it and uh and and I'm hoping to get to it shortly. So it's it's one of the few PC games I have installed currently. So it's I will get to it soon. But uh you know, this is one of those things that I uh you know, when I say things like it's humbling to do this, uh this is the sort of thing I'm talking about. Um so

Thanks very much, Anthony. It's really it means a lot to you know that we had this kind of impact uh on you and I'm I'm glad we were there for you in any small way, uh, when you when you needed it. So Moving on. Now now one shorter and lighter. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Again. Thanks. Thanks, Anthony. It's also brave just to even send the email, by the way. So

Appreciate you reaching out to us, you know, um your original one and and that one. Um making games is hard too, especially any game, and so having it be personal as well as uh yeah.

I'm sure d a double uh double challenge. Uh okay, so moving on. Happy anniversary from Raymond. Hi, just saying happy ten years. And uh and however many more you're comfortable doing after. Regards Raymond. Yes. Thank you for putting it that way, Raymond. Um, as we've talked about on the anniversary episode, we're not sure what how we're feeling about the future. So Ten years is a great milestone. Um, and thank you for that. Um, congratulations.

Raymond had uh actually sent some other follow up emails. There was kinda a little Chain, I think he was writing emails as he was listening to last week's episode. He did uh confirm that um at the end of Ocarina When Link goes to the temple to put back the master sword and become a child again, Navi says, Hey, listen and and f kind of flies up and out through the window. Um so that's That's the friend to which uh Link is referring.

in the beginning of uh Majora's Mask. And then uh another thing was the the phrase I was looking for last week was asset flip. Uh the games where uh they take a a a a simple idea for a game and then just you know, iterate on it with different asset store assets, you know, so like putting out uh um I I I saw a talk at GDC once about, you know, these guys who did

you know, uh basically a scripted like um I it was like a match three type game or something like that, or even a slots game or something, but they themed it on different just ideas and they like basically auto generated the game. So they were like Very low quality.

And they basically just used it to figure out what the what people where people's interests were. Oh, some people like lions, you know, whatever. And it was just at the time my soul was dying a little bit to to listen to what they were doing. Um You know, and there's plenty of that out there. It's kinda like A B testing on a grand scale what they were doing. But um I was gonna say, yeah, it's not like A B testing. Um and now these days it's even easier. Yeah. Uh huh.

Moving on, uh subject. Final mail, and uh we'll be all caught up. Um, which is why what I'm trying to get through here. Uh so the subject is Majora's Mask and David Lynch from Drew. Hey. Hey, listen. Um no he didn't say hey listen. Uh Wanted to write in after hearing you guys discuss potential influences on Majora's Mask in your latest episode. I don't think that this uh has ever been stated outright by any of the game's creative team, but it's hard not to see David Lynch all over this title.

An important note, Takashi Tazuka, who directed Link's Awakening for the original Game Boy, name checked Twin Peaks as a major influence on that game. Tuzuka was involved with Majora's development in some capacity. Uh he's listed as a quote supervisor, um and these two oddball entries in the Zelda series have a lot in common. Link's Awakening isn't as dark as Majora's Mask. But it's similarly surreal and dreamlike.

When I play Majora's Mask, I see the same heightened, absurdist humor and startling. often grotesque weirdness that I associate with Lynch. And as you guys dig deeper into Clocktown, you'll start uncovering a ton of bizarre Twin Peaks inflected side quests Buried under the townspeople's time looped schedules, deadly premonition might be another point of comparison. Lots to look forward to. Very excited to hear your takes as the series continues and congrats on ten years of podcasting, Drew.

Yeah, that's a it's a great poll because I never I never would have come up with Lynch for this. Although it it totally I can totally see it. Like the um You know, the masked guy in a way being the giant, you know, or something. It's like he's this dream light figure who's outside of

You know, time and space and you know I don't know. Um while also being uh a lot spookier a lot spookier so he's maybe, you know, not a direct analogy, but he's just kind of got that feel of like he's not he's not part of things, you know? Um so yeah, it's an that's an interesting and the kind of time like time and space, right? And like that not being consistent and especially Twin Peaks and the twenty five years later thing.

I just hope it ends with um Navi turning to the turning to the camera and screaming. Um It's really funny though, like, are we gonna find Navi? Is like Navi part of this game? Now I'm like now I'm really intrigued about that. But Um, but also Drew mentioned Deadly Premonition, which is just dawning on me. I wouldn't have also wouldn't have thought of that, like obviously more directly Twin Peaks, but the sort of clockwork nature of the scenario back and the scheduling and everything.

There's a there's a sort of a yeah, simulated sort of aspect. And now that he's mentioned like the digging into the I didn't know it was called Clocktown, but I guess I missed that. Um Uh That there are layers within. It makes I think you've already found one, you know, with the mask of the Yeah, that's a that feels that was a weird moment, yeah, because

You're talking to the mother, and then she hands you a mask of this guy, and you're like, What? What? What's going on right now? Um Yeah, and and now of course Drew has now planted this seed, so now it's probably just gonna grow in my mind, but I'm now I'm like What's going on with this town? This town is creepy. Yeah. I and now I'm thinking about it even more. How funny. Yeah.

Yeah, so uh we'll we'll probably discuss it more in the future.'Cause now it's gonna be it's gonna be in both of our brains. So you planted it there. Thank you, Drew. Um those of course are sent to devgameclub at gmail c dot com and uh

We thank, um, now I've already forgotten. Oh, Oddberry Games for the review. Uh much appreciated. We'd love to get those, you know, because we don't promote this in any way. So, you know, word of mouth and reviews are the only way we spread. We're on the web at devgameclub.com and my co host Twitches at twitch dot TV slash Tim Longo Jr. with the J R at the end. Uh are we what are you gonna try to do another perfect hitman this this week or

Are we back to dwarf fortress? What's going on? I th I think I I think I need a Hitman palette cleanser, so yeah, I I think we need to get back to um oh Moore's actually ended up naming we're we're renaming our fortress, but I'm now blanking on Something enclave. Dwarven Dwarven. for D G C Orvin Gem Cutters Enclave Con uh yeah, something like that. Okay. Conclave. But anyway, yeah, so uh we're gonna get back to to the to our our collective dwarf fortress and see uh who's dead.

Um Okay No, no, it's hasn't it hasn't been simulating, so everyone's in the same state. But we do we did have somebody go um go insane that I I posted on Discord, so Yeah, let's get back to Dwarf Fortress and see what's going on. Cool. Well, you will see an announcement for that uh on the Discord. There is a link uh in the show notes.

Our intro and outro music was written, performed by Kirk Hamilton, commissioned by friendly cast Aaron Evers, and our logo, that Discord, our merch store, all by Mark Garcia. Have fun healing evil magic and troubled spirits this week, and good night. Good night.