Fire Escape Cast #109

Hello, everybody, Welcome back to the fire Escape Cast. I'm Mike Maharty, your host as always here with Dan Riiker, Hello, and Mary kesh Yay. I make an effort to sound more excited. I announce you.

I can correct men, I can fix them.

Yeah, there was like sixty five episodes where I sounded pretty down really about it. Yeah, I don't know. Sixty five might be exaggerating. But we're back, uh, first time in a while. Well, I mean, I guess for listeners it's not. But we recorded the last episode a bit early before Mary went off on her another gallivant trip across Europe. God knows what she's doing over there.

It was twenty twenty one we recorded the last episode, so we're a little more caught up now.

Nothing's happened. Everything's fine in La.

I hear no one got shot in the face with a firework.

Bye, h residents. Still, do you have all your teeth?

Can I see them?

I thought they were gone?

I thought they I honestly, when I was on the ground, I thought I was going to take my hand off and see all my teeth on the ground. But they all stayed in place and outside of just some bruising throughout the inner lip and chin. I survived.

Yeah for the audience that doesn't vent diagram with giant bomb. Dan got quite literally hit in the face with a confetti canon explosion and made pressed nitrogen age have Reddit. I had friends like, didn't this guy was more than one friend media saying, isn't this the guy that married you?

Who is this idiot? You can't blame me for this. I was the victim here right a firework.

I didn't think my friend was about to turn a howitzer of a confetti cannon into my fucking face.

So there wasn't I guess there's like a walk me through the science here? Is there a hard part in the confetti?

Well, a lot of people had a lot to say about what happened. As a result, I learned how these work. So it is a bunch of compressed nitrogen at the bottom of a tube. And this is not one of the tiny little party popper things that you buy at targets. This was like a big ass tube and yeah, you twisted and it like somehow, lets the compressed nitrogen do something with the air. I don't know, chemistry happens and then there is no physical projectile.

But just a force like force.

It is very just It's like a sniper shot of crazy compressed air. And I was, I don't know, three and a half feet away from the top of the tube. And I have been elbowed in the teeth before so bad that my teeth dented in I had to go to the dentist to get my teeth fixed. This felt worse than that. I've never felt anything. It blew my lav mic off. It's just yeah, it bruised.

Like.

I was talking to Greg Miller the next night and he's like, the inside of your lip is like black, and I look at it and like, oh, yep, that's not good.

That's and that was the bruise.

The inside of the lip was the where it hurt kind of the most. And then like under my beard, I think they kind of obscured a lot of it, but like.

Beard protected you by like ooh, a bit of baffling, Like you know, just a bit of it.

Could have right stop the air. It could have been Yeah, No, I still felt every bit of it. I It's funny because and I understand why people thought it might have been a bit, because it seems like the type of thing I would do like a little little wrestling silliness or something.

Uh.

No, I would not have agreed to do that. That sounds way too dangerous and it is extremely dangerous. But I'm glad it happened because it's fucking funny.

You have like a corporate umbrella to take care of like any weeks.

Oh, we're going through the HR insurance. I'm on insurance, but not through Giant Palm, right.

Because it is like the worst time to get shot in the face.

Yes, yes, I am. I am legitimately going to reach out to the People's Court. Uh and maybe Judge Judy if anyone has a connection. I just think it would be the funniest fucking thing in the world.

Yeah.

If I try to sue Jeff Grubb for five thousand dollars and then we have to watch that clip a million times in court on TV.

And she's like, what are you an idiot? Yes, ma'am.

Yeah, if anyone has an exection, I'm not kidding. I am like tomorrow looking up contacts and stuff, and I'm trying to get a hold of TV court shows.

I wish you the.

Best of luck legally on suing Jeff Grub he's had.

Thank you very much.

Yes, it's very apologetic.

He was.

He was, and he said, if I would have gotten actually hurt, he would have felt really really bad.

But I guess he didn't, so he doesn't feel bad at all.

Well, I guess we're even now because he might have saved my life. Like two nights ago, so me and him were are our place was right next to a seven eleven, like three houses down.

Say what's that joking?

Oh, I want up some beers and butterfinger ice cream, and he wanted a slushy, and so, you know, like ten o'clock at night on this would have been Sunday night. I think we walked down to the seven eleven. I get some beers in a bag. We're walking back and again this is like three houses we have to walk down, and you know, there La there's a bunch of people

Resort to logic in the face of.

Someone like that lady who's obviously an eketamine fueled anger.

Did you hear the line item for my medelos or I did not steal these from you? Yeah, it did kind of stop her for a second, like she was just like completely screaming, and I said, like, I haven't received I held it up and she did look at it for a second like like I kind of like stunlocked her for a second. And then she's like she's like give me the bag, and Grubb just went like no and like lunge at her a little bit, and that kind of got her settled down, and oh my god, it was just.

She left after Grub like step to her.

I think she was like turning around still. Oh she started walking away and kept calling as the N word after that, So yeah, yeah, and then we hurried back to the house. Yeah, so Los Angeles was good, actually was good.

What uh what's what neighborhood was that.

I think we were like it was near Hollywood.

Oh oh, okay, that sticks out.

It has so many different neighborhoods. But that's the scary story. I Uh, I would be so nervous walking home, especially by myself. Like, I'm glad you guys had a buddy system so that Grub could save you in the event that you would be attacked by a lady.

Yes, an out of the uh.

Another confetti can and ready to go.

Yeah, probably proved that you purchased it legally.

That is true.

Yeah, out of the four other people sharing that B and B with me, I think Grub is probably the best one I could have had there, right out of all the giant bomb guys.

He's tall.

He's tall, and I think he could like handle himself, you know, Like I said, you know Manati, you know, flashback to this time at the dojo.

I don't know. Yeah, I think Jan. I don't know what Jan would do. Baclar would absolutely be useless.

Yeah, maybe with a hockey steak you could do something, but yeah, throw a hat at her.

It's a good question. I know that people have asked us like, who would be the most safe amongst us? I mean, I I do think that I could be taken down, but I take I'd take out at least a couple of eyeballs on my way. I snap like a twig, but I would kill a bit.

Yeah, and once you started scrapping with her Mary, I would have had time to run back to the house, so that would have been really helpful.

So I would have saved your life before you taking a couple syringes to the knee.

Yes, I would have done the eulogy at your funeral as a result.

So no, I you had been barred.

Funeral.

My death is just getting uh an edible arrangement and nothing else, and they're not allowed to come to my funeral.

Yes, So it was good.

Did the shows, Yeah, I had a bunch of guests. It was very, very busy. But one of those things we're at the end, you're at the airport and you're just like that.

That was good. We did a good thing there. That was great. So yeah, I hope to do it again next year.

Congrats. Acts I was not there this year.

It's kind of weird. Isn't it not going? I think the first time because last year I went, even though I don't think I had the best justification. But last year I went. I took some streamers out for there's some justification I can do if there's a lot of streamers in the area, like for a video game conference for example, Pack's East. I was able to justify by like taking streamers out we were doing an event for

I was on E Yeah, it was.

It was a kind of lower profile one, just kind of a more chilled out one.

There wasn't like a huge frenzy for anything.

You know.

I'd say, like Resident Evil, not like huge games announced anytime.

But I felt the same way. I mean generally speaking, I didn't hear anyone be like that was a waste of time. Like it's still neat, and I'm grateful that Summer Games Fest exists because it's I said this last year, but like it's so wonderful that it brings all these different people together to celebrate games. And I do love seeing my developer friends or other people in games media and just catching up with them. So happy that it exists.

Yeah, Like I honestly I'd barely played anything because we were just putting the shows together. So to me, it is just that social element of it of just like, hey, the industry is all here, let's hang out. So that's all it is to me. So and that end of it was a success in my book.

But you know, maybe that's what it is now. This is just the time where we all get together and eat terrible food and drink and avoid getting mugged.

Yeah together, I'm playing with that.

Yeah.

I had a great time.

So I fly to Ireland tomorrow. So there were Berts was just like, I'm not gonna make you go to la and then go to Ireland the next day. Basically so and also Berts was there, so they didn't need two of us.

We're just such travel travel junkies. I leave for France on Friday. I've been jet setting all over can uh uh, I'm gonna butcher this. I think it's candle on, but I'm gonna say Can's Lion, Can Leon.

I think that's right, Can's Lion.

Yeah, cans Lion is there.

Like the film festival.

I think it's connected, but it's you know, what what happens at festivals is advertisers with money go and that's a great place for companies and brands to go and be like give me your money. And so I will do that and hopefully I will be effective at it because it's so cool to get the opportunity.

I hope that it is a good gotch Can Okay, yeah this I thought you were the.

Same as the Can Film Festival, but it is like they do other festivals.

Yeah, I'm looking at now. I did not realize Can was a city. I just know.

It's on the riviera down your but it's like, uh, it almost sounds like a south By Southwest.

I think so, but I haven't been, so I'll have to report back to me. What it sounds like is some music, some entertainment and like panels and stuff like that, which, yes, seems like south By Southwest And it's just a good place to network and meet.

Did you say you're going to Paris as well?

I'm gonna fly into Paris because you flying into Can is apparently like impossible unless you have like a private play.

Do you look at Nice as well?

Yes?

And that was just expensive, yes, gotcha. Yeah, I guess it's the time of year when that's when people literally vacation down there.

I love that you know more about this than I did. I did what I was told I have. I'm so grateful that in my ignorant life, I've always been able to find a person who is also going, who is smarter than me. Who is more travel savvy than me and is also pickier with like hotels and Airbnbs and travel arrangements in me and then I say, awesome, tell me what to books and I'll do it. Her name is Scully, and well that's her last name, but that's

Yeah, that's I'm assuming you'll take the TGV. It's a very very fast train that goes down.

I don't even know what that is. I need it. I need a travel buddy. They're the person that like knows that stuff. There's a TikTok that makes the tv.

TGV is a big catapult in Paris that you jump that you climb into and then it just launches you all the way down to the south of France. Sometimes you miss and sometimes you miss and going and go into the sea. Weirdly, it's not a tribut shaw. It should be, though that would be more on theme.

It seems more franch I don't think that I'm like really meant to travel, but in this world, if someone's going to send me to a cool location, I require some kind of buddy that will at least guide me from from completely dying out there. But I can function. Every time I've ever gone to like a really cool place like Japan, I'm always like, when are you going?

Is there anything in France for me? I've never been to France. They got cheese, they.

Have a lot of cheese. Go to the Juro. That's like all there is in the East.

I'm not gonna go there just for cheese.

Fred Meyer like, you'll be fine going to your local supermarket.

Trying to aspects of like French culture. You would like lunches. Lunch is a big deal in general. It's a very lunch every day I know. But they that's what I'm saying. They go really hard on lunch, and the lunch you have is not going to be I didn't know if.

You knew this, But in the Netherlands there's the city of Guda, and it's Guda, and I thought, and I thought, maybe it would be neat if you ever traveled to the Netherlands. If I could convince you you could go.

To Gouda, I would like.

I like.

I think Europe in their cheese situation seems pretty good.

You just said you wouldn't travel to somewhere in Europe.

I've been. I didn't go just for cheese. I went for Hitman too.

I can't send him to Guda just for cheese. You need a secondary selling.

The cheese is a bone, that's all you need.

You don't know him at all.

Fact, I would say France is mostly people are going for food. If you're in the south of France, it's like it's very bougie vacation area, which I don't think would speak to you.

I bet it would. I would find it beautiful and be able to appreciate that right.

Pretty Yeah, it is old, which I think is like architecturally really nice. I don't know, I like I struggle in France. I haven't been there very often, but I have struggled because that people don't always like tourism, and they don't like people who don't speak French.

That's a very that's that's not at all but my experience whatsoever, my experience, I know, but it's a generalization that a lot of people espouse.

Honest generalization.

I don't. I think American people like foreigners less than any other country in the world demonstrably.

I think it's honest. That was my experience. They were pretty tough.

Also, didn't you also collapse a wall in Japan walking into a restaurant like I think the problem Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

I went into Kuda and was like, where's my cheese, bitch, and they were like, we hate you and I was like, oh, you hate English speaking Americans and they're like, yeah.

No, France can be I guess any country where they're speaking different language can be tough because some people appreciate you trying to speak a language. Others are like please this and now he's in a child, let's do English. Yeah, and it can be hard to navigate as cargo. I love as cargo.

Yes, I don't really know the deal with snails.

I would try it, you know whoa whoa iventuring a new era of being cool with food folks.

Ay, this was a big part of my triplet. I accidentally tried mustard.

You had never tried mustard before? No?

Well, I think like Bonk took me to like a nice sausage hostage mixed up hot dog and sausage plays in San Francisco because she's like, if you're ever gonna try it, try it on this like nice hot dog or whatever, And I think I try to bite. But I wasn't as open minded as I am now, So I accident I got a turkey and Swiss sandwich from the media lounge in.

At SGF Playdas.

Yeah, they had a bunch of wrap things, and it's like, here's a capacola, here's this thing, here's it's just a turkey and Swiss. And I looked at the ingredients and it said like lettuce and had tomatoes. So I already thought, like, you know what, I'm gonna be adventurous. I'm gonna eat a sandwich with a tomato on it, yeah, and which I never do. But it didn't say mustard, and so I foolishly just dove right in head first. I took a bite and I turned to Jan and Backler and

We don't. It's not the world's responsibility to explain everything to you.

Well, somebody to explain it to you at some point.

No, I just just try it, like not a bitch, Yeah, yeah, get them after forty years of being a bitch.

It was not like, I'll be damned, show.

Me that picture where you look like shit again.

Mary had. Mary had a georgeka Stanza moment that she shared with us where she thought of like an insult like days after it and uh, it's pretty rough. I don't even know it's it's it's lethal. But anyway, Dan, you're saying you like mustard now, well yeah, And.

I think I would have tried it a long time ago. People like I think I just because it was yellow. I was just like, I don't know what that flavor could be because it's like what, it's not gonna be like banana, and it's not gonna be like I'm fairing to think of other yellow flavors, and I.

I don't know.

I thought it was gonna be like yellow mayonnaise or something, and then it just had this cool tang to it. And I haven't tried it again yet, but I'm waiting for the right opportunity. I want to try it on a hot dog. I want to try it on another sandwich. I want to try different types. Yeah, I wanna try honey mustard on nuggets.

Can I suggest what could be the next evolution of this? Yes? There are many many different types of mustard too. My favorite setting for mustard is like at German beer gardens, dipping soft pretzels into the and mustard.

I want to try that because I love giant soft pretzels.

If it's ever on a MANI my order.

But a lot of times it'll be like you get to pick three dips, and it's always like cheese and a bunch of different mustard type spirits. And every single time, I say, just give me three cheeses. And now I want to mix and match because I already know I love sat bread.

Mustard and mustard and cheese go together really well, and I'll grow up my favorite. I actually don't. I also, I will admit I also don't put mustard on anything. I just don't really like mustard that much. I only when it comes to corn dogs, I only want mustard. Oh, and I don't know why. I'm going to make an argument to you, and then you can test it out one day when you're having Mani corn dogs, which is

I think it's I think I will try that.

I think it's god tear. But I actually don't like mustard on uh like burgers. I only put ketchup on burgers, but for whatever reason, like corn dog, it's got to be mustard.

Dude, I'm not a fan of yellow mustard. I do like spicy or brown ones with the seeds in it.

So describe like the just the normal ass yellow mustard see McDonald or something like what is that?

That was my least favorite.

Yeah, this was that kind of brown. This is kind of brown.

Yeah, that's that's like you actually get spicy seeds, and the seeds are what makes it like really like it's like horse radish kind of fills your mouth with a spice.

I never tried that.

Okay, I'm not saying that's similar. I'm just saying they have similar Yeah. Whoa, whoa, whoa.

I want to try everything now, this was a revelation.

No, yeah, like I prefer brown mustards. I like those.

Pickles, right, I've only like had like two or three bites and pickles in my life because.

I think pickles also give the tang.

Oh yeah, that's okay, a real shot.

I believe mustard. I was just gonna say, I know, well, the yellow yellow mustard does. I don't know if brown does. Maybe it is involved somehow, but it does. Maybe. I don't know. I like brown mustards.

Maybe you're learning that acid is like a really good food elevator, right, not a lot, right, If you have too much of it, it's probably like sour, like tough on your tongue, but a little bit enhances sweet, and it enhances like meat and other flavors. So like to me, it's always about the right ratio. Maybe like when you were a child, you were like wrecked by having too much mustard.

I definitely never had as a child.

I don't understand psychologically how you can be so opposed to something that you've literally I.

Don't either tried. It doesn't make sense and you know what.

I thought, maybe he met his dad.

Yeah, I mean they're they're all freaks. But I thought maybe like some mustard god in his eye, or no, some mustard like beat the ship out of his sister and.

Are just off put Like some things have just been off putting to me, but I still like tried them at a certain point to back on mustard, even just from spite, like to back on my dislike of it.

Yeah, I think that, like, yeah, yeah, there had to be some traumatic.

Thing your family member and now you hate yellow.

Nope, no, there's no log or two whatsoever. And I think maybe something, no, I think something that's maybe making me more open to doing more drying things is I see Mike Manatti and uh he is. He's worse than me when it comes to weird oat food stuff. And so he will say something like, oh, yeah, I've never had this thing, but I can't, like I can't eat a grape. And I will in my head be like, that's insane. You've never had it. How do you know

So yeah, the like you asked, whates cargo is, like, I don't know if do you like mushrooms?

That's when I've started having and I don't hate.

So us cargo. The few times I've had it, which I like it, it had an almost mushroomy texture, like kind of rubbery, which is never enticing when I say it, but there is like married like it's got that mushroom umami to it along with the texture.

And can I sell it?

But they can. They can cook it different different ways.

Like usually they give you like a dish maybe like a piece of wood or something like that, and imagine you stuck your thumb in it and made holes in it. Okay, you with me? It can wooden dish with thumb holes, and in each hole is one piece of s cargo And then they fill it to the brim with butter, delicious butter.

Yes.

And then they give you, well it's not alive, but yes, and then give you a fork that's like really thin and long so that you can stick it in the thumb hole and get your little piece of his cargo. And when you take it out, it's dripping in this butter. So even if you're like I'm on the fence about his cargo. It's it's a butter delivery service.

Has anyone ever done like a kitchy like bowling theme, Well, have they ever done like a bowling thing where it's like you're eating escargo out of because I'm just picturing finger holes in a bowling ball.

Like in the bowling Yeah.

That'd be like a kitchi like bowling high food place.

You know, there have been a bowling ball that's in like the holes are flesh light kind of things, so.

You can fuck the bowling ball and eat cargo, eat out of it first, and then fucking first of all.

This is the kind of thing. See, this is why we should be in business.

Together, shape Dick. It's should be so wait.

That cargoes, shape Dick. Let me see what s cargo looks like a pig's tail. No, don't want that. You got it, buddy, I'm keeping my dick. I'm not doing this.

Not too late. You got to pigsail Dick. Nope, nope, No.

You're one wish and it has been granted.

No. But yeah, to your marriage point, Like, salad dressing is acid adds, I mean salad dressing also is just a lot of the flavor and some salads unfortunately, but a lot of wine pairings are based around the acid of the wine help playing well with the food.

I bet my dad wishes he was on this episode.

Yeah, he probably does.

Actually, if you just said the word umami, he would have freaked out and left the call.

Describe a corn dog like some.

Gra I guess, so, I guess you're a real human to some degree.

I think I use it to say savory, like I think it's considered.

A fifth Yeah, it's like a flavor profile, right, yeah, yeah, so.

Did you know this? There are apparently, and I've learned this from reading wine books, So umami is the sixth there are apparently, so the country. Oh no, no, wait, no, that's not that far offense, sweat, sweetness, sour, salt, bitter, seeing dead people, seeing dead people. That was a good one.

Nice one, you guys we talked about when it's currently.

Uh umami and I'm probably missing one. But apparently Japan is like leads food research in a lot of these ways, or like how our tongues perceive flavor. Apparently there are like two more that they're working on defining that they are like apparently they're looking at how like taste buds interact with nerves, synapses and how the brain interprets them.

Do that really easily? Like like how they invent new colors by being like, you see, this is a little bit of a mix between green and blue, and we call it perry with sure yeah, like sure, yes, you can do that. And you could be like this is salt and savory, and so we're calling it.

Licky loo Oh No, you're right, Mary, it's the fifth. But they're they're finding a sixth and a seventh.

But do you know what I mean, Like there's a bit of like a pseudoscience to all of that unless they're literally inventing a new flavor. But like when I know, I'm a bit of a like realist of these types of things, are like a purist maybe, where I'm just like, we have a system, the system works sweet, salt, bitter, uh, savory, and then apparently umami well.

Is in every color just from the primaries, the three primaries. Yeah, so it's like when I hear new color, I think, like, this is zip zapp and it's not based on any of the primary colors.

You know, It's like eyes didn't like the giver.

You know, well, unless it's a color that's in an eyeshadow palette for women, and then it's called like or gas Matron four thousand. It's always named something so sexual.

Are all humans just a combination of like the same DNA genes? Possible combinations? How many of the same person you run into?

Who's a philosophizer?

Now it's not a philosophizer. I'm just applying the same logic. I don't know anything about genealogy. I'm just saying I'm pretty sure that like if you can mix and match things and get new.

Things, all start us.

So you actually oooh like a joke, I met a girl and I think we were next to each other before the Big Bang because we read I've seen the suck like such stupid fucking poems on Instagram. I used to it'd be like we we must we must have been near each other before the Big Bang.

It is funny when it's like people do hallucinogenics and stuff that so many people go to that and like I have only tripped like three times, and I remember fully having that feeling when I was like eighteen of like whoa, it's all energy and like nature and me it's all like why does everyone have that same weird sensation and when they're tripping.

Because I, yeah, like I don't know what, Yeah, what is it like about our brains opening up that starts being fascinated by the galaxy brain ship?

Well, maybe because we're so far removed from our ancestors where we actually had to give a shit about survival and understanding the world. Like we're just so far from the creatures that were us before, much like my dog is so far from being a wolf that he no longer is concerned.

With like, oh, he's dead in an hour if he's on his.

Own, absolutely could not survive out in the wild. But like there's there's elements of us that are still in there, right, Like the same thing where like if you get really upset or you get heated and you can feel your blood pressure racing and you get really upset emotionally, that's your fight or flight, right, Like that's the same thing that happens if you were like a caveman.

Mary always fights, Dan always flights.

Yeah, that's right, or shows shows receipts.

That's a very classic move that used to do.

Really, Grandpa used to do that in Korea. Who shows Dan's.

Great great great great great great great great great great. Grandpa was like a sabertooth that's coming up. But he's got this stone tablating.

Oh, I bought the spirit the cave down the street.

He pulls out a fucking dead fish with some writing on it. Uh, speaking of our ancestors and how we evolved from it, I found out something cool recently.

Uh.

So have you heard the terms aperatif and digestif?

Yes, yes, you know.

The teeth is something you have after you eat dinner.

Yes, I've only heard.

You say them, but yes, I've heard the apparatif is before. They're the same thing, it's just when you drink them. However, they always a common thing they have like a NEGRONI is a popular apparatif. Right now, they're all bitter. They have bitters in them, which can be the shaky bitters you have, or like in amara, which are actually like a liqueur that you mix with other things. The reason, yes, So the reason the reason we drink them is because

I like to think of my stomach as like a bunch.

Of people like shit, shit, coal. Yeah.

And there's like one manager out there and he's got like a notebook in a pen and he's like, it's shit, we gotta move it out. It tastes bitter, get rid of it. And everybody literally just starts pouring buckets of water down the tube. And that's how you get tirea.

And someone's like it's savory. It's like no, it's too. Mommy's like I don't give a fuck.

We gotta get rid of it's the ice yelling a bit of a weirdo. But to this day I think of like a bunch of men in the colon as like workers keep figuring it out there.

I want to talk about genes, genetics great, So I've been thinking about this lately. I don't remember what got me going on this, but you know, like a dog from like the Wolf Days and stuff will like because it's it's interesting, I'll see certain animals and stuff on TV. I've done this for where I show like Gizmo, like a dragon from Game of Thrones. He doesn't give a shit, but if he sees a wolf or other dogs on TV, he.

Freaks the fuck out.

So like or like people we know that like oh we're not going to eat these berries, like something just in our genes or our knowledge through their generations, like you know, stuck around. So is it literally like experiences can be like imprinted onto your genetics.

Like let's okay, weird hypothetical.

Let's say I had everyone in my family dating back ten generations lived in a nation of clowns and we were at war with clowns. Would it be imprinted on my genes to like, if I just saw a clown, even without the knowledge of my family's history or what a clown was, that I'd be like, oh no, like or the same way we see spiders and stuff like that. That is it just like knowledge can actually be imprinted onto genetics.

Is that the case?

I don't know. I know some things can be passed down, like like trauma can be passed down.

The generational trauma things like that, Like yeah, like anxiety and depression.

And examples of that. I think that even though your use case is incredibly just unbelievably stupid, I do think that is possible. And there's like lots of examples of that, like for example, uh, cats are instinctively known to be afraid of snakes, and so if you there's like that joke er, if you like put a cucumber, you know, snake like behind a cat when they see it, they usually jump and freak out because they're instincts. When they see like a cylinder traumatized snake and it breaks them out.

Yeah, I don't know, if I mean it must.

Be the case. With humans too, like deep down inside.

I know, like evolutionarily, I just in terms of like the yeah, because to your point, it's like, okay, physical traits you carry forward because at one point they were a mutation that helped that person survive longer, which helped them reproduce and more likely to pass on that gene. I don't know enough to not you and me buddy, right, I don't know them along. Yeah, yeah, I don't know. I'm sure knowledge gonna passed on. I don't know enough to refute it or support it. It sounds like a though.

Yeah, Like stuff like you know, what is the thing that triptophobia or whatever where you see like a design and it's supposed to be like a beehive or something like we have a natural.

Like oh ship?

Like is that just because over generations and generations we've seen people or known people like snakes or bees or whatever we know.

To avoid it? Like is that?

Like?

I guess I never thought of that actual just like knowledge and experience would be passed down through gene.

Not just things that you're afraid of, but things that you like too.

So that's where their instincts. I think you're describing instinct I don't know we're describing No, I don't know. I don't know. But like your point though, I don't know if it's like a gene thing or if it is actually like a brain pathway that we all have now because so many of our ancestors that survived had it, I have no clue.

Yeah, Like, let's say they were, uh on this one.

If you came from a family of pilots, you know, I guess that's a newer thing.

You know.

Let's say it's a family of warriors or something.

Yeah.

Yeah, Like if I didn't know anything about being a pilot not long ago, Dan, Yeah, that's true.

The pilot's a bad thing. I'm schilding my nation and the fielder.

Let's say that you're really good at splitting genomes.

Riding horses, Like if ten generations of me and my family just rode horses, but all of my relatives died before I was three years old, and I didn't even know anything about horse, would I be able to hop on and kind of know how to do this, you know, or come to it more naturally?

You know, I'm born to ride.

I don't think you would know how to do it right away, but you might be like predisposed to like develop the skills more early.

Yeah, Like would you just come to it quicker, you know, out of the.

Room, like with a half split and you're just like, yeah, I mean I suppose so that. I think we're also kind of talking a little bit about like nature versus nurture too, right, Sure, a lot of that too. If you're in a family of people who are like I was born a cowboy and I die a cowboy, and my grandpappy was a cowboy and my grandpap before him, then you probably like literally as a toddler, they were probably putting you on horses.

Yeah, I'm talking about like almost like that experiment, like the twins thing where they got separated and like you know like oh they both even though they've never met each other and they didn't know the family or whatever, they just still happened to be kind of the same person, you know.

I Mean that's like one case, right, That's like, well, I'm sure there's several cases like that where it's like very unique, but how many of them are are also like where they meet each other and they're like we're fucking totally different.

Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, we talk about that.

One because it's not as interesting.

True top level stuff I'm reading suggests that a lot of it's still being theorized, but it might not be genealogical. It's more culturally transmitted, like we.

Talk, not like in print.

But there's like theories that you can have ancestral memories. I think you just spent too much time at Kojima Productions this year.

Maybe that's it. Yeah, I'm thinking about Genome Soldiers.

Maybe that's like the actual moment where Mustard entered your mind and he accepted in you to like not be so weird about food.

Yeah, Kajima is the guy to make you not weird.

I'm seeing a super up like I'm seeing like a remedy game in which like you're all you think you're playing des Straining two for a demo, but then you zoom farther back out and there's like a one way mirror and it's actually just a bunch of people pointing laser Mustard beams at you through the wall.

It's at the end of Men in Black, yeah.

Yeah, or it's like a clockwork corne but they they don't need the eye peel things anymore.

Sure, I would do the clockworkcorne thing if they could do like a fun thing. You know, what is the benefit of it would be what would be like a smart one? Because they did it to make him hate violence and stuff. Yea, So how could you use the clockwork orange room to like make it like.

Oh, you can open up your mouth, not your eyes, and we would just keep squirting mustard in there.

I don't think that would make me like mustard immersion therapy.

It's oh, I don't think it's starving and it's the only sustenance we're giving you, and you're like, give me my mustard. I'm hungry, and we're like squirting in your mouth, blobbing.

It down your gob donuts and hell.

Experience and be like mom, like that saved my life.

I don't want to do that.

I have to starve you long enough. I could fix you. Dan give me three days in a fucking blank room.

I don't need to the fact that the reason someone else needed to clockwork orange him was against his will, Like the claws kept his eyes open, they had to keep Yeah, I think you can just clockwork orange yourself in a positive way anytime. He was you give yourself enough time?

Could they give me?

Like? Fun?

Drugs and clockwork orange me into seeing a bunch of mustard footage, and I associate mustard with fun and good.

Point is you don't need a they You can do this.

To yourself, CLOCKWORKRNS room.

You don't need a clocker gorns room. Just stare at mustard while you take drugs that you like. I don't, they don't need us.

Let's just make it simple. Why don't I just try this stuff?

Yeah, I mean.

Creating a cell.

Chinese water torture, where like we we you in a room and we like lock your arms and legs you can't move, and then we just constantly and slowly drip mustard on your forehead and it prevents you from being able to sleep.

I think I tried on a quarter founder.

If I told you my friends, I asked my friend to waterboard me because I didn't see how it would be stressful.

Yeah's horrible. Yeah, we waterboarded Temptorary and Aruba, and a lot of people have it.

They're like, I don't. I didn't. It didn't make sense to me how that was torturous. And then I did it. It's like drowning in the water. You feel like you're drowning, but you just don't die. Like a long time.

Remember that during the controversy and uh Iraqi freedom and Sean Hannity was boasting about like, it's not bad. I would do it. I would give you waterboarded and then I can't remember if something yeah, and then he.

Just absolutely didn't do it.

Okay, you didn't know it's you know, it's not good.

I remember one time when I was learning how to wakeboard, I kept calling it waterboarding because I think that logically makes more sense.

Oh yeah.

Everyone kept being like, you can't say that, and I was like, it's very similar. And what's a wake? You know what I mean? When you what.

Do you mean? What's a wake?

Well, when you s your snow, you're boarding on water, you're waterboarding.

Right, but you wouldn't wouldn't work.

You're boarding on snow.

It wouldn't work unless you were in the wake of a boat moving quickly enough to keep you upright.

But you really need the water, the wake made out of Michael, I know the water's important.

I'm gonna take you down like a nineteen year old did in my senior year of college. I swear to fucking God, it makes sense to be a water boarder.

Mary. I'm with you. I'm with you.

Waterboarding removed from the actual horrible thing that just sounds like a fun time.

Why why is it called surfing and not waterboarding?

I agree, I think it is.

It's just a bunch that's like, oh, that's a was that a Dmitri Martin bit when he's like, I wish I could have been there when someone was naming fruits and vegetables and they're like, they pick up an orange, They're like, let's call this an orange, perfect, and then they get to the carrot and they're like, fuck uh that's uh yeah.

Why do you run PR for waterboarding? Mary, Let's change it. Make waterboarding fun.

For PR for Montica, make waterboarding fun again. I can teach you how to waterboard in like two days. I just need a boat and some rope.

Wake wakeboarding is fun. I wakeboarded a lot when I was younger.

It is fun, yeah.

And get hurt. I tube sometimes, but even then I worry about it.

Tubing is fun. I really like water sports. I wish I wish I was rich or knew a boat guy, because I don't. It's it's so rare that I can get in a boat and do. I usually rent a boat once a year as like a treat, you know, a sweet treat to me. But man, it's so cool to have like a boat friend.

Yeah.

I'm spending some time at the lake at Ben Hanson's lake lot this summer, like we always do. And last time I was there, I think, is when they had a brand new jet ski and it was their first time out there and I had never driven one before and went out there with Temptorry and Tempterorry was on the tube and I was driving the thing and Tim fell off and then I'm like, don't go, gotta reverse or whatever. And I just reversed and caught all the rope up and the thing and just we.

Had to like shouldn't reverse in most.

Year, but Dave had to canoe out to the middle of the lake and like you know, tow us in and then uh yeah, we had to like get up in the guts and remove all the it was.

It was a whole thing. I was prepared to have to buy them a jet ski.

Yeah.

They're fun though.

It's fun trying to back up in a jet ski unless you really need to, and there's nothing.

These are the clowns of the sea. They like have no harm. You can be such an idiot on them and the worst thing that happens is you get flung off and land in more water.

Like would you drop your phone into the wilammet damn it. I'm sorry, I'm gunning for you a lot. I don't know why.

It was such a sad moment.

You guys. I tried calling it. Dan wasn't here when Jake was subbing in. I tried and it rang. Yeah, it was a bag. Later that day at the bottom of the limb, it.

Rang, and it's possible it's still ringing.

We did a whole bit about how I could have FaceTime with like a fish, but it was a you can find that, guys.

The boat home was so quiet.

Well, yeah you did. You weren't busting Rick James or blaring Rick James on your phone. That's why.

Yeah, I wasn't like doing a real cool tiktoks out there anymore.

You Lamprey eels had a party though, at the bottom of that river.

I did a flip off a boat once into the ozarks, and it was the first day of the trip in my glasses.

Wait, but into the Ozarks, like the hills, the leg of the Ozarks. Oh gotcha.

Yeah.

Yeah.

We were on a boat and I my glasses on as I always do, and I just did a flip and the thing and my glasses came up and I couldn't see the rest of the trip.

Great.

I've definitely lost my sunglasses in the ocean before thinking for whatever reason, thinking to myself, it'll be fine, just keep an eye, you know, don't don't let a wave splash right in the face. And of course a wave splashes you right in the face, you lose your sunnies and they're gone. They're gone sunglasses.

We went to Key West right after our wedding, and I got really paranoid that my ring would come off in the ocean, and especially because I had I was like putting sunscreen on, which made me even more, you know, I was, Oh, I was looped up ready to go. Uh a little pig yeah, like a like a little piggy boy running around the beach and uh. And I was really paranoid. And then I was vindicated when I later found out that a friend's friend lost his wedding ring on a similar honeymoon.

Paranoid. But that's why I have one of those, like just temperrings. Then you know they sell, and like I get the real one in a safe just because I feel really bad if I lost the real one.

Gotcha this one?

You could just get fatter fingers so that it can't come off.

My weight fluctuates, you know, up and down quite a bit, so it's like, I don't want to get skinny and then lose a wedding ring.

No enough to know about fingers to know whether you start losing much fat.

Is the opposite. Whereas you gain weight and your fingers get fatter and fatter, you like cut off the circulation of your finger. Because I've seen people not be able to take off their wedding ring and then they have to get them like not surgically, but like you have to go to a professional and have them like grilled off because.

Certain materials that you if you they're not careful with, then you have to like I forget the phrases, but you have to. Like jim Jimmy Fallon apparently had to do that finger he got gloved.

That was fucking gross.

Yeah, he gloves do.

You know what I'm talking about? He gloving is like one of the worst things that can happen to you, but his his I don't remember what happened. But the point is is that de gloving is like essentially where your ring is coming off, but it's getting stuck, and so it just takes off your skin, like your skin comes off with it. That's imagine a glove, but your glove is you that's crosisted off like a section of you, and it's really fucked because there's a lot of nerve

I've seen face off. You can just put the face back on and it'll heal back up.

No, they didn't.

They explain it.

They did, they explained it. I forgot they did. Never mind that all my concerns.

I had it once when I was on my honeymoon New Orleans, and I had the real ring still and uh, if we're walking a ton, if you're walking, I don't know if it's just for some of your your fingers kind of puff up and like, yeah, I had that kind of moment of panic and you just have to kind of wait.

But yeah, not a good feeling.

I think it's in the cold they shrink.

It's it's expanding and contracting, right, Like, that's how potholes happen.

You both know potholes are from rank, Hey, potholes are. Potholes are from ice getting into cracks and expanding and then shrinking.

If I'm not mistaken, I believe I read in a scientific journal that cold shrinks append.

I think I saw Seinfeld.

Not me though, not me my blog, but to thank you.

Yeah, no, absolutely, yeah.

Yeah, And that's why I keep the apartment really cold, because.

Then you want a man inside.

She just thinks it's the a C all the time. It's freezing in here, Babe. We're in fucking Arizona. It's cold out here, Babe, it's cold in the desert type babe.

Talking like rock climber. There's no rush from bowling George. He's a favorite character of mine in that show. All right, you want to talk about video games?

Yes? Sure, all right, start with the big item first, Dan, how you been liking the switch.

To I love it. It's really good.

I thought I brought it right here, but no, it's I got it while we're at SGF and obviously was a lot going on, but we had some time to do some multiplayer Mario Card, we tested out the camera. We played a lot of Soul Calber two against each other, which was great. But yeah, it's I'm not gonna act like the hardware is, you know. I definitely don't agree with all the people that are like though, this is like a boring console launch, like, oh, I don't have any hype for this or anything.

I think that's crazy.

But I can also see that like this isn't like a huge generational leap feeling thing.

You know.

It's like there are things that feel significantly improved, namely like the joy cons connecting disconnecting is so so much better, the screens better, but certainly in terms of like you know, graphics and stuff, which was always the big leap. You know, if you look like, oh, PlayStation one to two or certain two D to three D, you know, it's like

Sorry, what do you mean? So it sounds like a tournament almost.

Oh, so, it's like it's like you're played like a burnout or other race in games where there's like an eliminator mode where it's like, oh, after the last few people blow up or whatever, you know, it's that version here. But it's like there's Mario Kart World, which imagine like

It doesn't.

It feels less like a plastic toy, like especially the joy cons you know, on the on the old one kind of felt like flimsy. I always felt like I was going to break that plastic off when I was disconnecting them. This one, they feel like more of a premium modern product, you know, cool.

Steam deck, like in terms of comfort.

I actually like the feel of this more than the steam Deck. I love my steam Deck and I use it all the time, but like this is thinner. The steam deck is bulky, and it does like it doesn't feel like a toy by any means, but it does have a lot of so much more.

Power it can't be contained within the thinness of a little phone.

I mean, there's definitely more you can do with the steam Deck, for sure, like and I think going forward, I'll probably use them about equally depending on what games I'm playing. But I think I do like the feel of the this which two a bit better and I got like Ganky made a bunch of accessories for like the little attachments and stuff that you can put on there if you want more of a grip and things like that. So I've got that option if I fund like land in Bed and want to have a little

What about you? You were talking about the camera, but I interrupted you. What do you like? What functionality does the camera have?

Oh?

So it's really interesting because just like you set it at the front of the room and for instance, we were playing with Mike Manatti's brother and so we were several of us were in the same room and Mike Manatti's brother was in Ohio, and it has your face there and it imposes it over your cart so you can.

See like across the bottom.

It's like a discord call, so you can see you know, their their gameplay screen, you know, really shitty frame rate and stuff like that, but you can see it and you can see their face. But then also in Mario Kart, yeah, it's just like a little like thing over your cart, and if I was playing with YouTube, I would see both of your faces.

You know.

I hit Mike with a blue shell and I live am seeing Mike's face react to it, and it like spins around when it gets hit by a shell or wipes out or something.

Face genuinely is like your face in real time.

Yeah, it's like it's just a live camera feed and with one crazy yeah, well, with one camera you can have like four people's faces. It just detects them. Like at the beginning, you just like put a circle over your faces and you'll see everyone's heads over their carts, and it's like it's pretty awesome.

I think I'll wait and see.

You know, last time I was excited about this it was Xbox Live Vision camera for the three sixty and pretty much just worked for Uno on Xbox Live Arcade and I saw a guy in a Spiderman suit whacking off. So that was my last memory of a console camera really. But yeah, I'm curious how many people use it online.

Oh.

Also the microphone on the switch itself is kind of crazy because we were playing with CJ. Minati and it was right next to the TV or the switch was and we could hear each other clear as day. It does a really good job. It filters out the game sound, it filters out you know, things like air conditioners and vacuums and things like that. And you don't have to have a headset, you don't have to like, it's just it really works well. We were all very surprised by that.

I mean, I think it's great. Those are really small, minor, unique niche things.

It sounds like.

I haven't seen heard anything where I'm like I got to get what. I do have one, by the way, because I'm also that person. So I mine came in the mail this week and I'm looking forward to testing it out. But yeah, like I haven't heard anyone say anything where it's like thank God I got it because I have to have this item right now. It's like, of course I'm going to get it. I I don't

Yeah, it's and even as the Nintendo mark I am, I'm I'm going to be realistic and say that right now, it's kind of just gonna be the Mario Kart machine, except for some of the updates to do to switch one games are significant. I'm not a Pokemon guy, but Pokemon people have told me that those games have have done a lot better.

But mainly Zelda.

I loaded up Tiers the Kingdom on it, and that is way more of an improvement than I expected, mainly like frame rate, because that game was you know, thirty at best most of the time. Now running at sixty, it looks fucking sharp on there. The load times are a lot better. I'm going to go back and play through Breath the Whild for the first time since launch

Yeah, I'll pick one up eventually, I think, uh, Mary, have we talked about claiup Scary yet?

So I just played it is time I'm playing it.

Yeah, I like that game quite a bit. How far would you say you're into a few hours or so?

Mm eight hours?

Ten? Okay, so you're in like how many characters you have? Four? Okay? Gotcha?

Yeah, I mean I had to replay a bunch because I'm not very good at turn based RPGs and I usually don't play them. This is really out of my wheelhouse. And I would just like to say, much like Dan, I am growing this is my mustard. I just do not like turn based RPGs. I don't really understand them, and I didn't grow up with them, and I find them like a little off pudding. And and this was the first time I was at Kojimas and he was like, you gotta China. I'm joking about mustard. I had the

Oh.

But yeah, she's like this god like demon goddess living across this like ocean that they could see, and she paints a new number every year, and everybody who is that age just like starts to like vanish from like the like in the Avengers.

But but it goes down right like it started at count four and this year's thirty three, and everybody has thirty got bonked.

Yeah, but this yes, And then basically they organize an ex exposition every year once the number first changes, to go to kill her.

Yeah, so, and it's super unsuccessful.

The thing that confuses me is that a couple there's a couple of gripes. I have this game. I like it quite a bit, and I want to go back to the combat because there are pretty cool things in the combat that I think caters well to people who don't love turn based save points in this game are flags. That's how they're depicted, and when you save at them, it tells you which expedition to put the flag there.

Like you'll see a flag that says forty four, which means it was the expedition forty four.

I think it's cool, and my confusion is and I think a part of the game I'm missing is I think the expedition is always relatively young people. I don't think the expeditions are ever like you don't have to be a certain age. One of your main characters is like sixteen, so she doesn't have to go on this thirty three.

I think they made her eighteen for safety purposes, but for whatever reason, she looks like she's about fourteen, and it does. It does.

Trust me, she's because you have to find like parents die so they have to appoint guardians for the next So she's I thought they said she was younger than eighteen.

I think I don't think so. I actually I'm gonna look it up. I'm gonna look it up right now because we have the power of Internet.

I think she's younger.

You're ubscure character age.

She's males six? Is she sixteen?

Hold on mal right?

Yeah, I think it's weird.

How easy I found this. A lot of people are looking for her age mm hmm. I think it's sixteen.

Yeah so she yeah anyway, so yeah, they got these physicians.

You're not catching me.

She's not in the game. She's treated like an Ellie character, and about it. She's treated like a child. Like I don't think they sexualize her that much in this game at all, Like form.

Is so young and so petite, and I just think it's.

Kids in video games. It's like airports. What are they doing here?

How old do you think Princess Peaches like thirty four, let's google it.

Prince Mario's thirty babies and death stranding.

Early to mid twenties.

Well, that's a plot device.

What about all the games you like are animated?

Like a kid?

Ever made?

Was a kid?

Ever made a game? Better?

La was pretty integral to the last of us.

I guess, oh, baby Mario, Yeah, I think.

Says baby, and I think like.

Baby Mario, baby yourself. Yeah, all right, all right, but airports, get him out of there.

Wasn't link like fucking fourteen and win Waker.

He's twenty six.

He's living with his grandma. You're just shouting numbers twenty anyway. Okay, my l aside, I don't think in so far as I'm twelve hours in the game, she's not sexualized in my mind at all.

I don't think she's sexualized. I'm not saying that. I just think she's very petite, and they've made her look very young and petit in the game.

Okay, yeah, sure, I will say I like that the so the combat is cool for those who haven't seen it. It's turn based. However, there's a lot of timing based things you can do to fight way above your level. I missed. What you're laughing at.

Dan, is like trying to avoid any potential situation.

I'm just disapproving because I feel like I have some people playing this game, a lot of motherfuckers on Twitter that are doing the like, oh, I'm so in love with it, like posting pictures of like their clare obscure characters and now knowing that they might be like sixteen or something like, oh you fucking I'm blocking all you.

I don't, I Dan, your favorite form of entertainment has oiled up men wrestling.

Who never heard that one before. Are kids, We're not caring?

Are the adults? Yeah? Are they?

There's a grown man?

Okay, sure, My point being that, like, I don't think just the inclusion of someone who's under eighteen in a video game is inherently bad.

This is now just weird, knows I'm Blue Sky and shut the.

Fuck up while me and Mary talking about this game. Shut the fuck up. You're not adding anything. You're just shaking your head and being like, go eat mustard, be open minded in a different room right now. Mind it, because this game is really fucking cool.

And I believe it.

Try and get Dan gets the game.

The game sounds great.

A weird job of describing it too, because my alls, no, no, you know what, No, I don't want to talk this game anymore. I'm done. No you didn't.

It's not on there's a list, and I'm just saying she's young.

No. Continue.

It's like thirty two and they're on an expedition to kill the Paintress, and the second day land like the majority of their group gets annihilated, absolutely demolished by like some old guy, very strange behavior, and so now they're looking for the rest of their crew to go kill the paintress, and it's a uh, that's the story. That's that's it. That's as far as the story is really. I mean, like you're meeting other characters. I was worried my Ale died, but we did find her. She's fine.

But my point, Okay, going back to the combat there.

Doing a good job again.

No, no, no, no, there's just like I think, like, like I don't I also don't want to spoil much of the plot, like I have to be.

Careful with the story.

Yeah, yeah, I think. I think it's cool that if you're not super into Turn Base, they still give you enough. You can counter attacks, you can dodge attacks. At a certain point, they start adding layers to that where you're actually jumping over certain attacks and then responding mid air

You're still kind of quick timey. Though.

Yeah they're they're quick time events for sure, but they're like they're not They're they're not represented as just like a button popping up on the screen. It's an actual uh what's the word I'm looking for, diegetic animation in the fight right the boss. The boss like a square is not popping up from what I remember.

Like, I mean, I like this game just like.

I'm just saying, it's like a full way to integrate it.

I'm not like a usual turn based RPG player. When I did a battle and they were like, when you see a yellow diamond, if you don't jump, you're gonna take damage, and I was like, that's just a quick time event, baby, like, but what's cool about it is

Yes, I will also say I think some of the characters combat design is pretty nuanced. It reminds me of Final Fantasy seven remake, where once you get Tifa, she fights in a completely different style to Cloud. Similarly, here, when you have Mile, she's all about stances, kind of like like I don't know, like the Neo games or whatever. When you get your second character, he's very much you're trying to build up a certain number of colored gems based on the element that you're attacking with in order

With your weird yeah arm. Yeah, he does like lightning. They all do different types of moves, like his big one for me is lightning. The little girl does physical damage, and the floating girl I call her floating because I think she floats most of the time.

In the overworld. Yeah, you can travel around with her. I stick to her.

I gave her an AOI move, and so they all have different purposes. One is AOI, one is physical, one is electric. That way, I always have something based on what somebody's weakness is, which I have enjoyed. There's also just things you need to know about different enemies. There were these underwater enemies that have this mine above their head, and if you don't shoot the mine, you're in deep shit. But as long as you shoot the mine, then it's

There's three of them, you can chain it.

It's crazy. Yeah. And yeah, a lot of them have like a face hole, and if you shoot them right in their hole, it takes out like thirty percent of their health. So I'm learning pretty quickly, like secrets of how to get through it.

Yeah, I will say like I do have some gripes I get. On the one hand, I respect that they don't give you a mini map because you literally you're on an expedition to map this world out the continent they call it. It still gets pretty obnoxious to not have a minimap, and some of these areas are pretty labyrinthine and it's a bit annoying to not have a minimap. Tracking where I'm going.

I have side areas with like secrets, lots.

Of snaking like metrovens, but collectibles and shit.

Like.

Yeah, they're pretty intricate worlds, especially the farther you go into. And I will say some of these areas are really cool, like the uh one of the earlier like regions you're in is like underwater coral reef, but you're not really underwater. It's just like there's a coral reef around you. Later on you go and you start fighting or you start fighting and befriending. Like they're made of like burlap and wood.

I'm saying it's perfect, like it gets it's getting such high.

Yeah.

I was like, I guess I gotta try it because it's probably gonna come up for Gody, which is why I like gave it such a try. Even though this isn't usually my jam, I will say the audio is fucking fantastic. This is one of the best soundtracks I have ever heard from a game. I have let these songs play. I've been in Boss bites where I was like about to die and I was like, oh, yeah, I'm about to die.

I was the battle shaking my head.

I was loving it and even though they were gonna absolutely annihilate me.

The music is Yeah, there's certain like there's certain parts in like the uh in the woods where you're where you're fight those burlapped monsters, the Ska Patats they call them, sorry, they're they're like these mechs they put together through like potatoes, like canvas and tents and poles. They made like these mechs to defend the woods. And I believe it's just sack of potatoes and French. But like these Korok things

Eating Daniel play this game for before he quits?

I think no, I think I might like it is Bonks played a lot of it, and I've watched a lot of it, and and honestly, if I was going to get into a turn based RPG, it needs to be something that has some sort of gaming element during the fights and like you know, like a timing thing like That's why I like Paper Mario, That's why I like In Luigi because it's crona trigger because there's timing based things that like makes me feel like I'm playing a game during the fights, and that's what I've seen

You're right about the music.

It has been like so many times I've walked through the room and seeing her doing something, I'm like, what's going on here? And like it seems to have some like whimsy between it, like weird mini games and things like that, and like the personality of it seems pretty evident, and I am curious about it again after destranding in a bunch of these other bigger ones and stuff like, I would like to have played a significant amount by the end of the year.

Yeah.

Yeah, there's been bosses where I'm like, oh man, I'm under leveled. They really wanted me to explore more of this area, but because I figured out the attack patterns, I very much got through it. And it feels great because some of them have like five attack combos that you really need to like oh he he kind of stutters on this one before he smashes the ground, And they really do not have a big window for the dodge or the perry, especially the peril.

It's pretty cruel, but I think what's cool about it is is you can change the uh, you can change the rate of like how difficult the game is in the settings at any time, which I really appreciate. And because I was scared at the beginning of this game, the very first enemy I came across, for whatever reason, so difficult and so impossible for me. I had to change it to easy mode because I was like, obviously I'm bad at these games and I'm going to suffer

Oh yeah, Like there are little mini secret mini bosses, like did you fight that Pinocchio? Dude, Yes, he's the Minster or the the I don't know, he's a puppet. But you get really cool powerful you get items.

Really good loot behind them. But I didn't know that, and I just thought maybe the game was insanely hard and I didn't know what I was doing. It turns out you absolutely can play this on medium or even hard. I've tried all three modes just to test them out and see how hard it is. And like you said, Mike, as long as you're willing to really read the attack patterns, this isn't so much in my opinion, about min maxing my damage. It was about not taking damage as long

And yeah, regular margin changes. It's crazy. It's like it's the dodge.

Yeah, the dodge is like the window and hard is just like if.

You blink, it's gone. I didn't. I didn't know that. I thought the the damage you take increases on higher difficulties. I don't know the window.

Oh okay, I think because when I was on easy, it was giving me like ten damage for every time I took a hint, very forgiving. Yeah, but I felt like it was easier to dodge on easy mode.

So huh. That a balance though, because like you get used to easy and you go up to medium and then you're like muscle memory just completely.

Maybe I'm wrong. I definitely know damage you take goes up and down, but I thought it was easier to dodge on regular than it was on hard mode.

Gotcha. Yeah, No, overall I like it. I again just like Navigationally, I wish they just like threw you know, immersion to the wind and let me have a mini map because there are a lot of branching pathways in this world and almost like you forget you're playing an RPG when you don't get into combat for a while, it feels more like a three D platform or collectithon because you're exploring so many pathways. On the side, I left for four days to travel for work. I came back.

That's my other reason why I usually don't play turn based RPGs is because like the idea of like dumping sixty to eighty hours in a game is like very overwhelming for how much I'm working and traveling this summer, and so like That's why I really like these shorter experiences that make me feel like I've achieved something in a smaller amount of time. But thirty hours is so reasonable.

Yeah, no, it's it's uh, like I said, I would love to see more RPGs of this size keep coming out. It's almost like the turn based version of like Outer Worlds. When that came out, I was like, oh, this is nice. It's like twenty eight hours. You could beat it in. I think a vowed is around there as well. You guys I think have beaten it. I haven't.

I think that was like fifty to Oh, I can't remember. Maybe fifty. No, it was like fifty sixty.

I think I didn't finish avout. I would like to.

I would like to go back to it.

I have been overwhelmed by other things, speaking of which.

Yeah, you two. You two have both been playing pip Ostrello and the Cursed Yo Yo.

Possible contender for Worst Game name of the Year.

It's not good. It is not good.

Want to play it?

I almost overlooked this game because graphically it is uh No, it's actually really cool graphically, but like if you look at the cover art, it looks bad because it's like a mouse weird thing with huge eyes. The colors are super saturated. I think it's almost garish, Like at your first look at it, it looks.

Like like almost Pennies Big Breakaway if like, yeah, it's just it's an uglier look.

I think it's an ugly like the aesthetic is so saturated. The blues are like a vivid blue and a vivid red, which I think is hard on the eyes. I'll tell you what did get me though. It said it was a Yo Yo Vania. It said the first Yo Yo Vania, and I was like, I like Metroidvania. I feel like I can deal with this. To check it out, Dan, I'm really curious what you think. But like my instinct was, I, I've actually really freaking enjoyed this game. I've really liked it so far.

Yeah, I'm really impressed too, because, like I don't know, I love Zelda and specifically top down Zelda with like Links to the Past being my favorite ever. And so I've played so many like link to the Past likes, you know, and even like one that's like decent, I will enjoy just because it's like, oh, this reminds you

Like, I think that's pretty cool.

I love that system. I think it's so neat and I've never heard of anything like this before, a debt collection system. Every time I get coined, it does change the way I play the game, because now, yeah, when I'm fighting things, the coins disappear very quickly, and so I'm killing something and like and like sucking all the coins up because I owe a five hundred dollars debt and until I pay this debt, I have two hearts.

Yeah, it's it is smart and it is doing unique things that Like I think Link Between Worlds had that system where you would like rent items, like so like you rent the hook shot and I can't remember how like if you found it in the world then it would be permanent, or if you paid a much bigger fee or something, then you could own it. But I think this is kind of a smarter, cooler way of doing something like that instead of just like here's the

But yeah, I really enjoyed when I played so far.

It's it's got some really fun moves coming up as well. I almost got like almost animal weld when I was playing it, because I, you know, just like any metrodveining, you'll come across the space You'll be like, well, I don't know what to do here, you know, because you can only jump two squares and the game is very block shaped intentionally so that you know how far you can jump or how far you can throw your yo yo. I think you can throw your yo yo three, but

Yeah, the fast Travel is like you're just basically spending money to unlock it permanently, right, like the fast Travel.

I like that.

I think that's fun. Like they do make money matter in this game more than I think like rupees and a Zelda would. So you definitely are, you know, encouraged to get everything you can.

Well, not only do you have to spend them on paying off your contracts like Dan was saying, but you also need them to enhance your badge system. So just like Hollow Night, you'll come across these badges that will enhance your gameplay. So maybe you'll get a badge that gives you an extra heart, or they'll give you a badge that will drop more money. But you have so many badge slots, and uh, you can use money to

Yeah. I think I think I'm gona keep playing it to have on the go.

Yeah, I'm installing it on my Steam deck. I'm taking it on my trip. One percent probably gonna be the game that I play during my travels the most. I mean, I'm I'm super into it.

Yeah, it's great.

Speaking of, I picked up a game I've been meaning to play for a while. Dan, I texted you about it, but I didn't say anything else. Deep Rock Survivor. For those who don't know, it's just a I don't We must have talked about Deeprockalactic on fire Escape at some point. I love that game. It's one of my favorite, like live service games, if you can call it that, I think they that is a game more developers should be

Yeah, I've tried to add a couple of Vampire Survivors likes since I got obsessed with that, and yeah, I'm always going to look out for a good one of those. I think I did download it after you mentioned it to me a while ago, but I just haven't tried it yet.

But it sounds good.

Yeah, it's great. It's there's also like cool little mechanics, like similar to hell divers. If you call in Ammo drops at the right time, it'll crush a bunch of bugs at the same time. So it does enough to break away from Vampire Survivors. But like, I'm all for that genre getting as bigger, more people taking a swing at it. Like I'd love to see different properties, try to do the auto shooter, bullet heaven genre, whatever you want to call it. But yeah, it's great if people.

Played a game of that at Summer Games Fest. It's very good.

I've you know, obviously being a big old Mario Party guy, I've played other, you know, party game type things, and I feel like most of them try to do like a weird twist on it. Like I remember Sonic Shuffle back in the day. It was our like card based and sucked, and it's there's like an anime when we did recently that It's obviously the Mario ip goes far with me, but I also do really like just the

It's still the same like dichotomy between the board game layer and minigames.

Yeah, totally. So you do the four turns and then you do a minigame. But like all the mini games I did were a lot of fun and they do some unique things too, where it's like, okay, you're driving these little like remote control cars and each face button makes a wheel accelerate, so you have to like navigate through this, you know course with a bunch of holes and things like that by controlling individual wheels almost in like a Quop like way.

You know.

So yeah, really solid, many games great look to it. It's just silly stuff. Like the level we did had a volcano and if you get to the top of it, there's like a big turkey on a spit roast and it'll like heat up and explode up and land on one of your enemies and steal either studs or a brick. It works the lego stuff in in a smart way to where it's like you get on certain squares and

What were you playing it on?

It was an SGF demo, so I believe we had pissed I think we had pissed five controllers.

But uh yeah, I think it's probably gonna be on everything. Yeah, very good looking forward to stuff like that.

Yeah, I like I played, Uh, correct me if I'm wrong. There were three Switch Mario parties.

Uh yes, Super Mario Parties, Superstars, and Jamborey.

I played. I played the one that was like retro maps boards Superstars, that's the best way pay that. I liked it. And I played the first one on Switch and I thought it was fine. I don't know, I don't have the same lens to like critique it in the context of the franchise, but was the last one on Switch the one people didn't like or was the first one?

No?

I actually I was on the low end of the review scores on that one, but I still like it. I just, you know, I think I'm maybe like critic like Jamboree. Yeah, I think I just I kind of dissected a lot. Being a big Mario Party head, and there were elements I didn't love about it, but still it's a fun game. I'm just going to go to Superstars if I'm playing on the Switch, it's okay.

Yeah, I'd be down to try Lego Party. That sounds fun. Could be a bonus episode when it comes out. Yeah, yah yah, Maren, what's some midnight walk?

Okay? So this one thing I feel like, I feel like more people should be talking about this. I can't believe no one is playing this. This is a really cool game. This is a clay mation, handmade stop motion horror game. I'm gonna say horror, but I don't know if it's like that. I'm going to classify it as horror, but I think it's more of an adventure with scary elements. If you look at the trailer, it will give you an extraordinarily good example of like some of the creepy

Did Mike disapprove of the Nobody's pun because I saw him burious head.

In his hands.

I shouldn't have reacted that way. No, I liked it. It reminded me, for you, It reminded me of a very very deep cut video that my friends and I used to watch called, Uh, there's a this just man on the street that someone like struck a jackpot with. She's trying to ask him what he thought about like some Sydney ordnance, and he started going off. It's Canadian Steve Spiro's easy going.

Oh oh the vampires.

Yeah, yeah, Waterloo. And at one point he says, because you can't kill a nobody with nobody. That's what I'm just thinking about him. How he starts going off.

And Glenn, howardon did that speech in the BlackBerry movie? I don't really Yeah, yeah, Mary that this game is one of them that, like, you know, Bonk is always playing games, and you know, there are just certain ones where I walked through the room and you know, didn't really grab me or anything, and then this one I saw her playing it and I was like, wow, that is a striking art style, Like that is righting.

Eventually, the gameplay is also quite interesting. So a lot of the times you're hiding from a creature, they're always giving you a closet or a tunnel or something to hide. They have like interesting not too difficult, but there's always like some kind of thoughtfulness to a puzzle to help you get through a space. So like, let's say there's a monster and there's no places to hide, but there's a candle nearby. You can tell your little pot boy to light the flame of this candle. The monster will

Nice. What are you planning on?

I'm playing it on Steam and I am going to download it on steam Deck and hope that it also works on my steam Deck. I assume it will, and I stream deck.

It feels like a game i'd like to like, I would want to turn off the lights and turn up the surround sound and you know kind of sink in.

Is it on game Pass?

No, I'm just kidding.

Oh, it's funny.

It is a very good looking game.

Yeah, this is a game to like immerse yourself in. This is a game like turn off the lights, like Dan said, and like, just.

So, how do you like? That's fucking crazy though, that Like it's supposedly what do they mean? It's it's handcraft with real clay and animated as stop motion style, But like, I don't fully understand, Like that's crazy. I don't fully understand how you could hand make all of this clay to account for every animation that could happen in a video game.

Yeah, it's a really good question. My assumption is that a lot of the animations were done in clay, but they probably like some of the backgrounds and stuff like that were probably done in a three D renderer. But I think your main characters are all done in clay, and the hands you'll definitely see it, Like if you ever see a lot of this game has to do with fires. You're constantly like getting matches and lighting them.

It's cool. Dan, you've been playing Hell as Us as well.

I played it.

It's coming out in September and I was in Montreal. I played about three hours a bit and so obviously you know, limited time, but enough to see that it's really going for something and that something is not holding your hand. It is all about it just like you. There are very very limited HUT elements. There are no quest markers there. It's the opposite of like that Ubisoft Matt Barf thing where there's just a million checklist things.

Yeah, it is.

It feels like you could people could have vastly different experiences playing this game, you know, whereas at Alan Wake was a little bit like okay, now here's the part where you go to the amusement park, this is like, I don't know, go where you're going to go and see what order you learn things in and where it

It's really cool. It is interesting in that, like it does give you the option.

With like there's combat with these like weird other worldly like creatures that you can change perry timing and enemy aggressiveness and like that type of stuff, but you cannot choose to make the like, hey, give me an objective arrow, give me a mini map. It's you know, like a

Do you have a lightsaber esque esque thingber?

What weapon I have? You have like a drone that you can unlock a bunch of upgrades for and everything? I can't remember, like what weapons there is? Definitely Melee. Melee is like your main like.

A bunch of blowing swords and stuff.

It's kind of a hell of a look to it, and like the enemies look really wild, just these like husks with like these holes in them in their faces and very spooky and weird, and I'm into it. Great sound design. It reminds me a lot of Annihilation, And I asked the developers and they're like, yeah, that was like a that was a primary influence.

I what other game were we talking about about? Also has Annihilation vibes. I'm like, I feel like that format of movie. Even Stalker has it too. I mean Annihilation was kind of inspired by Stalker, the movie, which the games were playing from the same source material. I want more games to do exactly what it sounds like this is doing, where you're going into this weird altered landscape just to figure out what happened, and then you're finding weird fauna on flora and shit like that.

Yeah, I mean, it's like there's a huge, like I guess this game's version of like a high royal field in this area where it's a kind of a hub that connected a bunch of towns and stuff. And in the middle of it, from far away, you see this weird just pulsating orb of just this kind of evil looking orb of this like like in the middle of a field, and there's just a bunch of these like husks like walking around it, and so you just see it in the distance, You're like, what the fuck is that?

I think. I think, Mike, it's it seems like a mic game for sure.

Yeah, this looks rad I had seen this announced. I don't know if it was a Game Awards or an SGF. I'm like, all right, this looks looks kind of cool. But the more I you talk about this, the more i'm I would be into this coming out September.

Yes, yes, I think it's people from my dis X working on it.

Yeah, yeah, from IDOS back in the day.

Oh sure, Yeah, it's I think you're gonna like it.

Yeah, this looks cool. Last game I'll talk about quick. I also traveling. I went back to Rogue Legacy two on Steam deck anybody who didn't play that, because I believe it came out in early access for a bit and then went full That game is still really good. The first one was twenty fourteen. I want to say one of the earlier roguelikes to kind of blow up.

Get why people didn't get is into Rogue Legacy two is Rogue Legacy one. Because Rogue Legacy one like had a whole bunch of fair and I thought Rogue Legacy too was like we're gonna do the same thing but on crack and give you like way more ways to play the game and weird, weird stupid ways, like everything's upside down and gravity sucks.

Now.

I mean from my experience, like I loved Rogue Legacy one so much. I beat it on like three different consoles and I love it.

I beat it a couple of times. I really liked Rogue Legacy.

Yeah, it was one of the first Rogue lights I really really got into. So I was super excited for this, and like, I think my experience with it is why I don't really do a lot of early Access. It's why I haven't touched Hades too, despite loving Haites. One is because I played it right away when it went out in early access and like part of the pandemic. I didn't want to say. It was like June July twenty twenty or something like that, and I was like, Okay, cool, cool,

But then it's like, well, you don't really get the whole thing. This is just a me thing.

Maybe I'm sure there are others that feel this way, but like when it came out, I just didn't really I think I played a couple of runs and then I didn't continue because I would rather just wait until something is at a one point zero and then I feel like I have a beginning to end experience with the game, rather than staggering it like that.

You know, Yeah, No, I'm the exact same way. I have not touched Hades too. I think that could potentially ruin it for me. I also did the same thing with Darkest Dungeon two. I don't think I should have done that. I played that early access, but I think the way that we play even fully released games is so often bite size just to see what it's doing that when I play games in early access, I'm like, all right, I see what they're going for, and then

Okay, So I do want to get into this great.

Great Steam deck game. I'm there's six bosses to the base game. Oh it's been a at lunch, like I don't know, two thousand nineteen.

Oh so early access just like put a little bad taste in our mouths.

Or I played a lot of it before. I just went back recently on Steamck. I went back recently. I've never played it on steam Neck, which I have been playing, and it's a phenomenal Steam deck game, and now anybody who may have forgotten about it, which I get. It's a really good game. The first one is still more focused and tight. This one. It feels like they clearly were just trying a lot of different ideas that I don't always think mesh well. But there are really cool

I'm immune to that criticism. Yeah, No, it's that's just something terrible. People say.

There's a game like two years ago that I kind of liked. There's like a little indie Pokemon ripoff, but it just looks like they're they're literally cut out of paper. And I think it worked for the first game because it was kind of novel, but now it's like it's not the best looking game at all times.

I don't like any of the art styles where things look like they're cut out of paper.

I don't know, take a look at it. It's it's it's.

Also make your ship look a little bit more three D. I just don't like the thick outline to like, I don't know, hide stuff.

I feel like paper Mario.

I've never liked it. Yeah, art style, I think the game is cool. I don't like the art style.

Play Rogue is a really good game. War Chief war Group is the game I was thinking of it was. That's not the Pokemon thing. Is the term How good.

Paper Mario would be if it didn't look like that.

It's called didn't play Mario and Luigi.

How could you slip behind two new surfaces if it wasn't paper.

Yes, it's a gimmick. He slides underneath the blankets because he's a piece of paper. My goodness, fat shaming Mario, paper Mario.

But uh yeah, Rogue Legsy two. Check it out, Mary, wait, Mary, save this joke. I want to champion this game one more time. Go play Rogue Legsy two. Continue hit. It's not gonna be that funny. It's not gonna be worth it.

Where's Mario? Don't even have a waste? Mario? So thin? Mario light as a feather, Mario looking amazing? Mario?

Is this a reference to? It is like a miscongeniality thing? Mario?

Thigh gap?

What look for a guy at a castle? I did?

Everybody wants it. Imagine Mario in the thy gap.

Looking for a guy in high roll six.

Die gap. Nobody looks for a man with a thigh gap anymore. But I want to make it happen.

I don't think we can have it because we've got balls there.

You can tape them up. I'm looking for our guy in high roll five.

The balls dangle right where the thigh gap would be, right, so just.

You can you can?

Yeah, I guess so, I guess if you like folded him up, you can see if you have.

Daddy says, I got that good gap.

Stop that.

Let's talk about email, Okay, as always, you can right into I just almost gave my email. It's been a while. Fire Escape cast at gmail dot com for questions, comments, concerns. We got a bunch since last episode. Thank you for filling up that inbox again. Dan and Mike Manatti and Jeff Grubb love to do like eight emails when Mary and I are away, so we've refilled. It's been great. Mary, do you want to read this? This is definitely up your ally. This first one from Hillary from Virginia.

Sure, Hey, Escapees. This question has been floating around the cozy gamer sphere online and I would love to get your takes on it, especially Mary.

Thank you.

If you made your own cozy bundle of five games, what would they be? Feel free to leave this off the pod if you read this question. Mine would be Graveyard Keeper, Starduo, Valley, Animal Crossing, Powerwash, Stimulator, and Dragon Age origins not classified as cozy, but Thetis is my favorite place. Oh that's so cute. Much love Hillary. Thanks Hillary.

It's a good question for any genre, like what is the what is the ideal? Like the bundle pack bundle of five games. But yeah, cozy games, I guess to kick it off off, these are good I have. These are good ones. Animal Crossing I think is up there. Well, no, Mary, you can go first year the cozy Game Expert.

But like.

Stardoo Valley has to be there for sure.

I think, unfortunately, I mean, it's not unfortunate. Stardu Valley is kind of the mecca of cozy now, like, I don't think you could have a bundle without Stardoo. I'm gonna name a couple more that I think should be contend ees, and then what I think we should do is make fire Escapes cozy bundle, right, Like, with the five of us and our powers combined, I'm sure we can think of what we consider a cozy bundle.

My boss, Boss Boss, Yeah, joined the cat World.

Boss is like very.

He loves me. Yeah, we're buds like a Wolve's eyes.

I know, I can't, I can't look away. It's like a Medusa quality started interrupting. Okay, so other ones that I think we should be heavily considering for the fire Escape cozy Bundle. I think Slime Rancher is one of the cozyest games. I've played in the last decade. I have lost myself in this game.

Specifically one two did not do it for me really at all. They like, I mean, Mary, correct me if my memory is wrong, or rather share a different opinion if I'm you disagree, But they'd like overcomplicated everything in a way that, like the gameplay loop, was not nearly as satisfying and drawn out.

Yeah, I mean, I think slim Rancher, the original is the one that I poured hours into. I did not pour as many hours in a slime Ancher too. Maybe it was like two fine tuned, but the original Slime Rancher just the concept of like, yeah, you suck slims up into your little tube and then you get them to mate with each other. You gotta feed them, so you gotta have chickens, and you gotta have like fruits

Have two more. Yeah, it's more it's I think it leans more heavily puzzle than cozy game. But Strange Horticulture I think also kind of scratches similar itches, and.

Strange Horticulture might even be even better than Potion Craft. They're both That's what Strange Culture. I think it is the one I meant, Oh no, I think I really liked Strange.

Hort The Potion thing was similar, it's just with the animals, but.

Strange Horticulture is the one where they think somebody's dying and you got to like figure out who's the liar. That's Strange Horticulture. Okay, gosh, that game is so good and it has a cozy cat on a windowsill. I changed my mind. It's it's it's Strange Horticulture.

I will also say another game I would kind of classify as cozy. It's also sort of just like meditative as unpacking. Oh yeah, totally five years ago that was like that was the most yeah, meditative or like just flow state, like not doing much like almost Powerwatch stimulatory, but like a little bit more involved.

It was so smart with like, you know, a lot of it is just like okay, where am I going to put this stuff? And every once in a while it'll hit you with something like the diploma thing and there's no place to put it, and it's.

Like, oh, that's such a smart narrative. Like the thing.

As much as I I don't love story when it's just like now I'm watching this cut scene now, it's this dialogue. That thing was just like Wow, what an interesting way to tell a story with just like using the mechanics of the game, and it came out of nowhere.

It's like, that's so fucking smart.

Like a photo of the character and their ex from like years ago that they forgot about that they're not well obviously they're not dating their excenymorning. You're like, ah, shit, that's kind of sad, like that they just found this in a box and now it's like where do I put it? You slip it under the bed somewhere.

Still, it's a great game.

Environmental storytelling is very well done in the DAN. What would you add to our bundle?

I just want to call out a Powerwash simulator. Hillary.

That's a great call because like that is I guess I don't do a ton of cozy games. Well, I mean that's on Hillary's bundle here. I love Stardu, we love Animal Crossing, and then Powerwash. That that was my go to wheres like sometimes there's nights where it's like I just don't want to have to think about anything or you know, be challenged or anything.

I just want to zone out.

Maybe listen to a podcast or something, and I can't think of a game that made time just fly by like Powerwash Simulator, but like while remaining intensely satisfying every step of the way. So I just want to shout out Hillary's call there. Yeah, my own personal ones, Like I feel like between Stardoo, Animal Crossing, and Powerwash, those are like that might be my top three right there.

I mean those are all classics. A couple others that I don't think would make the list, but I still have to say their names because they're really good. Is Later Alligator, which is just like such a cute little game that you can play as an alligator frog detective, so cozy and funny and silly, and you're just a

Mary, did you see the trailer for There Are No Ghosts at the Grand at SGF?

No I missed it.

Okay, Mary, you need to watch this right after this podcast because like it was definitely one of the top, maybe like after a ship right now.

Yeah, inherit a crumbling English hotel and restore it by day while battling ghosts at night with a sardonic cat, a talking power tool, and a twisting natural plot. This is a musical mystery musical unlike any other. Will you be able to hold it together while everything around you falls apart?

Oh wait, this sounds off my ally too. Definitely.

You just see the trailer.

It looks like it's like a house flipper thing where you have a magic gun where you're cleaning up this spooky mansion. But then there's like musical numbers and stuff, and it's like blueprints house flipper like spooky.

Like it looks fucking awesome.

Whoa, this is coming soon too? Yeah, this looks red.

Oh yeah, shoot, paint off the wall.

Why is there a priest degree?

Yeah, and it's what's the cat's name is, like mister Bones the Bastard or something.

Yeah, this is Mary. I'll tell you now. This will be game pass, so God, thank you. Yes, yes, I really loved it when I saw this.

This looks awesome. Pickman's almost a co game kind of except like you can dying until they all get.

Scream.

You have a Pickman's up there. And then what was that game pass game that we all dan you played and then recommended and we all yes, tiny.

Is awesome, like low risk. Oh yeah, it's a great one. Yeah, that's maybe if I were to add.

One to all sorts of things can be cozy, even if they have like some stress to them, right, because it's it's like what you consider something.

That like city City, do you count that?

I would? I think it can be cozy. I don't think there's any rules, right, Like Dredge can be cozy and that kind of stressful. But like I like the idea of escaping into the world where like I'm a fisherman looking for stuff, and I gotta be careful at night, like I I don't know. I mean, I don't think there's like official hard set rules to it, but yeah, I find a lot of those types of games like very cozy.

Yeah, well, thank you, Hillary. We should do that another episode with different genres.

That's fun.

Yeah, okay, Dan, do you want to read this one from Matthew in Greenville?

Do you eat the drink garnish?

Obviously, I'm talking about the edible, practical stuff like an orange slice and a blue moon or a cherry and a cocktail. Do I look weird when I eat it? Is it meant to be eaten? That's Matthew and Greenville. I always eat it like I like it. It's like a tree at the end, or it's like, all right, I drank.

This my tie.

And I know not all my ties have like pineapple wedges in it, but like sometimes I do, and like at the end it's like this is pineapple wedge. It has been sitting in delicious my tie for a while. I'll bite it and it's like, okay, that tastes good and to yourself that it's it's healthy, you know, because it's fruit, and it's and it's soaked in rum.

Yeah it's great.

Yeah, it depends on my garnish, for sure.

It depends, right, Like, I think there's some that might be a little bit more strange than others. If you get a dirty martini with olives, eat them, olives, You've earned them. If you get a old fashioned or whatever that comes with the Maraschino cherry, I don't think that's old fashioned. Y Manhattan, Manhattan's about the Marichino cherry. I would eat that Maraschino cherry.

Yeah.

I personally think that if you get a lime with your beer and you and you eat your lime, I think squeeze that. I think you're a weird.

The rule of thumb is if it's a food you would eat.

The question is this, do you eat it? And I'm saying no, you don't eat that lime.

I think the rule of thumb is if it's a food you would eat outside of a cocktail context. Yes, but I'm not like chowing down on a handful of mint or cinnamon sticks when I'm done with something, you know, like, but I'll eat a cherry or a pineapple wedge.

You know, I have a weird one, okay, and Amanda thought it was weird. So have you guys had a Gibson before? Probably it's a martini, but it's basically martini, but instead of olives, it's a cocktail onion, a little like small pearl onion. Yeah, are you guys not onion fans or do you?

I've come around onions, but I'm not just gonna chow down on.

Like, onions are weird to me. They're so small. Why are they so small? I don't know about that?

Yeah, what are they to?

Yeah? Be bigger?

I'm so big. Gibson is one of my and my wife's like go to cocktails that that's definitely my martini of choice. I sometimes eat those at the end and you're, I don't you. I really don't think you're supposed to eat those because they're not as like trowelble as olives. The first time I did, She's like, I don't think you're supposed to eat it. We had to like look

It's like it adds the etiquette.

I don't, I think. I mean, it's your drink, do whatever you want, but like, I don't.

You said you looked it up.

Oh yeah, I know, I And then I said, etiquette, you're not supposed.

To You're okay, you're not supposed to eat my onion.

I don't think so, like because most it's not a that's a very that can be an offensive taste to get at.

It's a lot.

Yeah, it's like it's like holes when he climbs the mountain and finds those sweet onions on the tree.

Like holes.

Oh god. I think the question, though, has some that are questionable or like some that might be more on the fence. For example, an orange slice in a blue moon. I don't think you should eat the orange slice in the blue moon.

I'll do that.

Blue Moon is not a classy like beer to begin with. You might as well just make the most of it.

But I think it flavors the blue Moon. And then I'm done with the drink.

Yeah Moon, but the dance point. Then you drink the beer, and then the orange is soaked in beer. It's like rumham.

I can see it. But you don't agree on eating the lime?

No, I agree on the lime, I agree, what context are you're just eating a lime.

Unless you're doing the tequila shot in salt and lime.

Okay, but that's you suck in the juice.

That's for the acid to neutralize the Yeah, I know.

Like same. Similarly, if you were going to have a martini with a twist of lemon, you wouldn't eat the no.

No, And I love limes and lemons and I'm not just gonna go to town.

On that, of course I wouldn't. I'm kidding.

I want to hear your thoughts on like it's a big gimmick in some places now where it's like you get a Bloody Mary or Bloody Mary brunch and it's got like a bone steak yeah yeah, and the celery stock and like eight pieces of bacon some skills, you know.

Very gimmicky and I don't care for it.

I don't love it.

Yeah. I think it depends on the context. If you're just doing it just to do it, then no. If you're doing it at like a place like there's a place on the Upper West Side that is very much like it's about Southern comfort brunch with fucking biscuits overloaded with fried chicken and heavy sauces. It makes sense in that regard. And also there's a barbecue place in Brooklyn that does it and they put like some of their bacon in it. I was like, it makes sense in

That's I was just gonna say, like, ever since Instagram, I feel like you also see that with like milkshakes and Sundays and stuff where it's like, isn't it crazy that we covered the entire glass and sprinkles and it's got a full Snickers bar and a cake piece and stuff like times like this is just because it looks crazy. It's not that this is actually like flavors that like work well together necessarily. It's just like shoved in there, you know.

Yeah, And there's also kinds of garden you do have to eat them in that case it'd be weird. Yeah you did it, Oh yeah, the tea bone steak.

Yeah.

And there's different kinds of garnishes too. There's there's stuff that's meant to actually flavor the liquid itself. There's others that's meant for the old factory. When you drink it, it's like my tie has been in your nose to add to taste. Is just gonna old factory at a certain point anyway, But like those, I usually don't eat because I'm not I love mint like freshman, but I'm not chomping on them fresh minute.

Just eat a whole sprig of mint.

Yeah.

Yeah, it seems like you'd be going feral, like eating leaves like that. I I think.

So.

It sounds like we're in agreement that if you would eat it on its own without the drink, that it is reasonable and socially acceptable, and if you would not eat that item without the drink, then it might be considered a faux pas.

They were just weird, like anyone, just like eating a lime and'd be like, the hell are you doing?

You know?

That's why the onion is weird for me.

Yeah, I don't know, like that, like an apple, not in that form.

Yeah, not tiny, not twenty tiny? Onions get bigger, Like what's up with that? Do they make them that big or did they come into the ground that small.

Yeah, they're meant to they're meant for, Like I use pearl onions usually in like slow cooked stuff.

Like do they use a tiny wheelbarrel when they get them.

It's tiny people harvesting normal size onions. Then they give it to us.

That makes sense.

Hi guy, Hi, my family for a whole week. They climb up, take my drink and I throw it away because it's a faux pot.

They climb up to the top of their little ziggurattes among their bush jungles and like it's an offering to the dos. Here's your onion for your drink, and then we don't even eat it. Uh cool, Thank you, Matthew. Last one, Hello Escapees. I'm currently listening to your most recent episode with Mary dropping her Ponty Bowling team names and it's splitting me up. Pun intended. I happen to be currently driving from Regina back to thunder Bay. I

Thanks speed running for me. Speed speed running like game stuff like.

Speed no video of it.

You just sound like a psychopath.

Oh I'm not winning any medals for running.

For fastest for speed. I could beat that, Noah, dude.

Uh No, speed running is something that's like requires like actual crazy skill to do, and especially the idea of doing it for a dumb game like getting on the ET leaderboard and stuff like that. Like that's something I always am interested to hear more about and try.

I got.

I mean, I don't know how. It's not as niche as that, I don't think, but like I am working on like blind tasting wines. But there's no Olympic tournament you doing.

There was, I would win.

Be so boring.

Oh god, it be so boring to watch that tasting targlings.

Do we think he's gonna go cap froncissant? Sarah? This is the where the juncture? This could mean? Oh I just said something really dumb. The one was a red, one was a white. I'm embarrassed.

Yeah, we thought you were a idiot for a second. Yeah.

No, I'm trying to like, Uh, we've got a question similar where it's like, what is one very niche thing that you're better at you think you're you're better at than anyone in the world. This is kind of like I think the question is more what is something niche you want to be good at enough to win in gold medals? Like I would love to play a mandolin with my dick. Would be pretty interesting.

Be funny, that's super obscure.

That's what the question asked.

I could be like that le I could be the guy who like ate the most legos.

Yeah, now we're cooking. I'd love to like I'd love to have.

Guinness World Records that you might die from.

Yeah, I'd love to like burn the most nursing homes to the ground.

They got the gold. There they go in the back of the paddy.

Wagon silver, silver, and tied at one nursing home. I got gold because I did it to like fourteen of them. I go, I left. Uh. There's those people that can recite like how many numbers from pie? Oh, yeah, that's that's not that's that's that's more impressive.

That's really impressive. This one would be like a person who can uh construct a screen door the fastest.

Or like, I've seen more shooting stars than anybody, and the only metric you have is my own word. Yeah, I've seen three hundred and five thousand.

The most iPhones screens broken by dropping them.

That's my sister Kate. Yeah, I've never broken one. I'd never understand how people are constantly doing that.

I've broken a couple.

I've cracked a screen in my time. Yeah, I wish hard these days, say I to have it. Well, the screen protector has saved my buns. I have cracked so many screen protectors, but I just get a new screen protector. Have you guys ever seen A Long Way Down? It's a documentary. I think it's got Ewan McGregor, who's like an actor but he actually really likes motorcycles and he motorbikes down like a long stretch of road with his best friend and it's just a it's just documents how

There's that like there's that that brings two things to mine. There's a thing I think it's in Britain somewhere where they roll a wheel of cheese down a very steep.

Hill and then kester cheese thing or something.

Totally totally biffs it when they go down, Like I think people at.

Oh my god, like end over and like yeah, eating shit.

But then there's the Alaska truck thing on fourth of July. There's that one town in Alaska that like celebrates by driving trucks over this huge cliff. Like people aren't in the trucks, to be clear, they're just like people that wanted to get rid of cars. Will you know, put put a brick on the gas of these trucks. Just look it up like Alaska Fourth of July truck crash. Oh wow, that's super great. And then they just watch it crash down the hill and cheer and drink beers.

I like stuff like that. That's like not very serious. I like the Red Bull ones where they're like fly a plane the longest, but the planes like look like, uh, it doesn't really matter, but they don't look like planes and they're not going to make it. They look like cars with like these tiny little wings and they just immediately fall into the water and like that would be fun to win to like actually like do good at I.

Don't know if this is just a weird rural Midwestern thing, but I feel like growing up there was always these things at ponds and lakes where it's a competition to like people have to make a boat out of cardboard and see if they can like get across the lake. Is this sound familiar to anyone, Yeah, I feel like I've run into this like a dozen times in my life at different lakes and ponds and stuff, and it's just like, yeah, get across in this bullshit thing you made, and that's always fun.

That's like what they did for like a couple of seasons of a top Gear World Tour. They did challenges like that. They're like, you have to make a completely self sustaining biodegradable car. So like one made a car out of exclusively bricks and now they're made one out of mud and he got like ten feet before it started melting because it was a vehicle. It was really fun. Jake showed me that show, and it's really good.

I like stuff like that where like, yeah, you're maybe you're the best, but it's so obscure and weird. It's probably not worth anything, but it's fun. That's the good good.

I there's there's one other thing. This is kind of in line with the email question, but it's also top here they are. They find out that there's this convention in this small town and these guys are English, so I'm assuming it's somewhere in the UK. They find out there's a very very small convention of people that get together every year to celebrate this one car that's been discontinued.

I bet I've got to be close to the person who's seen the mcgroover the most. I gotta be close, right, Like I know people that come around to that movie finally it took them long enough, but like it's well over fifty times for me.

That's such a small number for a record, like someone someone could be so quickly if they wanted to. Oh yeah, people can't. It would be like tough. They'd have to work for.

It, right.

I'm sure something like you know The Godfather or Lord of the Rings, there are people who watch them like thousand times or whatever. But like mcgroober, you know, it's got to Bele's supported now album.

There's no one who's seen mcgoover more than fifty times.

I doubt there's ten people on the planet that I have seen mcgroover more than me, including like Will Forte and the Lowly Island.

Guys, you've been sitting in the editing booth for days on end. Yeah, all right, well, thank you David from Ontario. That's our show and if you want to send more questions at it's Firescape cast at gmail dot com. Uh. We've got some other stuff going on as usual. You can go if you're not a patron, you can go unlock ad free episodes or our video tier which gets you our bonus episodes when they go up. Right now, we have a series that's been going up on our

Giant Bomb? I got that stuff going on.

Just finished a bunch of great SGF couch segments and watch alongs and all that. And to check Giant bombs YouTube and giant bomb dot com. Slash join to support independent games media. That is what is keeping us going. So thank you to everyone.

Mary, what about you?

You?

Whate else is independent games media? Fire Escape I'm often streaming the games that I talk about here first on Twitch. You can check me there. I played a couple of the games, like The Midnight Walk and Bionic Bay before I talked about them on fire Escape, and it's kind of fun to get my first thoughts literally live. So that's where you can find me and usually on Instagram is where I post about my little puppy, my nine year old daughter.

You're a good post with yeah, great.

Parting it up. Yeah, my sweet, my sweet summer.

Child, trotting along on trails and by lakes and stuff. It's great.

Yeah, I mean my goal is to serve to take him to the finest places with the most exquisite views and the most delicious dog food. I got him. I fucking got him a pop cup. That is it's like whip cream for dogs, you know, like when you go to like Stopps and you get a pup cup. I bought a canister specifically for dogs, and it's peanut butter flavored. And every day, at like around three pm, I call it pup cup Hour, and he's like, and he gets

If people are ever in New York and wanna go to a visit a good wine bar, I'm summley there. I'm not gonna like point out the it's not that hard to find. I just don't I'm not going to call it out right now, but yeah, look it up, look me up on socials and there on the weekends. That stuff's in full swing. Yeah, we'll be back in a couple of weeks. I think we might have a sub. We're figuring out some scheduling, and we might have figured out a good No, then we figured it out, okay, cool.

Assuming all flights land on time, we're all good.

Baby.

Yeah, I think I've got a lot of travel coming up in the summer, but uh, I think I'm sure we all always do usually, so we'll obviously try to be here together as much as possible. I got a bunch of games I gotta catch up on in the interim.

Oh, I wonder if you'll talk about this stranding next time. Get ready for that?

Have you been playing it?

Yes? Oh my, I.

Don't even know how to react to that could be anything.

Oh you play it, No, I'm going to it's gonna be game of the year. Shut the fuck up, all right.

Well, zimbargoed, I don't know with that noise, that could mean any thing, could mean anything.

Well, thank you everybody for joining we'll be back in two weeks fire Escape see you then bye B.