Giant Bombcast 03-01-2011

All right, everybody, it's the Giant Bomb Cast. That's right, it's pulled into your stop here. Uh no, it's I don't know. The Giant Bomb Cast is uncorked and ready to it's uncut and ready to go. The gloves are off this podcast. That's right. This is so bear back and wait wait wait wait wait wait wait what are we talking about? Podcast? I'm your host, I'm your host. Jeff Gersman as always. Uh. Ryan Davis is out with a fever. He's got a fever. Oh no, what can cure it? The GDC fever? Yeah, I don't

know. It's if the only care is more GDC than man? Is he? And luck Yeah? Geez, though, I don't know he's he's lucky to I almost feel like he's lucky to get it now because the rest of us are just gonna get it in a couple of days. Yeah. I think it's creeping up on me already, feeling like craft great, Well, why don't we spend two hours and it's hot fucking clothes so that you can get get the rest of it. I don't just put my hands on all

of your mouths and get it over with. Well, I mean you were doing that or before, right, But I mean just to be sure. Okay, I am very ticless on my top. I used I'd poured hand sanitized it down my throat at that point, so probably didn't take. So what are your careers like, cop? It's weird. I'm worrying. Yeah, Hey, hey, it's going good. Vinny Caravella, Oh man, that's me out in me that's right. And Brad Shoemaker he have to catch up hands man. Yeah, these things from Poland Polish posh. It smells

like so much ketchup taste, like a screen door on a submarine. What No, these are German? Sorry? Okay, alright, German German ketchup flavored Teddy Bear snat. Well, maybe we get your sister in here to read them. She's flut in German, isn't she again? Your sister from the subjects? Great? Your sisters, she's really awesome. Hey, she's a hi, a lot of fun. Alex Navarro, Hi, there you're here sitting where I normally sit. Yes, and you're sitting where Ryan normally

sits. Yeah, I don't know, this is it's all a little off. Yeah, it is a little off. But man, big week this week with the Game Developers Conference in town. We've got a ton of stuff booked for that. Yeah, and then g DC and then g DC is also happening, So that's gonna be crazy. Yeah, that'll be pretty wild.

Actually, you know what, Like I'm looking over the schedule, I feel like we're seeing a ton of great games, and like we had to have the conversation this morning of like, oh, we need to actually go to the show floor. Yeah, and shoot video there too at some point too. So it was like spetree ain't gonna cover itself, I know. And I feel bad because there are actually talks I want to see this year, but I feel like some of those needs are going to be addressed elsewhere.

So what do you consider all of the peripheral stuff GDC at this point? If it comes to town for GDC, if it comes down for GDC, it's it's yeah, I know, it sucks, yeah, but that's how it is. But you know, the GDC serves a purpose for the industry. They go to learn and network and see these talks and go on the designer track and the artists track and all this stuff and see the see these things and yeah, catch colds and go to bad parties and all that

stuff. But there's a there's a talk about the MGP that I feel like we should probably try to see if it's not conflicting with one of our appointments that we already have. And of course swear he is talking about deadly premonition, but we are going to be graced with his presence on Tuesday morning, Boilers. By the time you listen to this, it's gonna happen, we will have met the man. Probably this might be the last thing you hear. I'm so excited for this. Yeah. I love how he sent a

bunch of ideas ahead, like, yeah, things we could do. Here's like three different things we could do while in neuro I don't know that I actually read any of that stuff. Plant the seed in your stomach, see what happens. I've not fallen for that again, I get I get the impression there he's never not thinking of stuff to do, Like he seems like someone who is maybe a tad unchecked when it comes to his ideas. Yeah, yeah, definitely, he's not not a shooter designer, no thanks,

so ideas for sure. But yeah, we have a lot of stuff lined up, a lot of games to see. But you know, let's let's get into it the regular way. Vinnie, hey man, did you play any video games over the past seven days? Oh boy, tell me about them. Take you back. So you know how Drew is playing Stronghold. Yeah, I was playing Stronghold. I saw that. I heard it went on sale for like three dollars or something. Yeah, from from Good Old Games. But because I'm an idiot, I bought it from Steam and so

I bought the entire like Stronghold collection for twenty bucks. That's good because I still haven't forgiven Good Old Games for their whole publicity stuff. You know. I was really behind them. And then yeah, they pulled that kind of nonsense and they did a little miacolpa. But yeah, that was that was kind of cool. So I played a bunch of Stronghold and that's fun.

What is that? So it's like it's like an RTS but you're basically you're building a stronghold, okay, but you're doing resource management and uh it comes down to like kind of like fortifying your little settlement against I almost want to say it's like, uh, like a wave based kind of which I'm call

yeah, like almost like that. But without but you're building a castle and the guys are just gonna come at you in waves, and if your defenses aren't good enough, they're going to penetrate the walls and they're gonna kill your your night or it's like Rampart. Do you play with a track ball? No? You could maybe I couldn't dig one out. I just turned my mouse upside down. The laser didn't work well though that That game is really cool. I I'm kind of curtous to see where that series is gonna There's

supposed to be like an MMO or something that's in beta. I haven't checked that out. How Old is a strong World one way back into the pretty Old and uh, I think there is another like Stronghold three slate. I could be completely wrong again. Stronghold not my playing a two thousand and one game, obviously not very familiar with the franchise. A Strong Suit not my Strong Suit. That's Stronghold three colon Strong Suit. That's DLCA get the Strong

Suit for like five hundred points. So it's on a PC. It's fun. You should watched a quick look if you're interested in it. If you're listening to this and don't know anything about it. A lot of people have played it, apparently pretty popular. It was a thing well received. Remember, so I like, I burned almost half a day playing that, and then you know, there's nothing left but another half a day, so one not put in some more Demon Souls And I also played something else, which

is a bullet storm. Okay yeah, so so okay, okay, so Demon Souls? Are you still approaching it from this whole like I'm need to do this and then die a bunch of times and then do this, so it's weird. I put it in another ten hours. My total play count to thirty twenty on one character, ten on another. Uh. I don't want to talk too much about it because I spent a lot of time last time talking about it, but I I did read a lot of things people sent me, which was like, dude, you're thinking way too hard.

Yeah that was that was, you know, the comments on last week's podcast, and it's late. I was seeing a lot of people just going like, dude, you don't need to do any of that stuff, just just play. So I tried that after I spent another like five hours grinding out some stuff, because then I reached the point where I was like, okay, yeah, now I got away, you know, you get some of the best. Yeah, now I got the bow I wanted. I can go play it. Uh, and I'm moving along. You know. It's

great. Still still got the same things that that our one had, you know, an hour thirty. But again, I don't like actively hate the game by any means. I think it's actually kind of cool. But it's still has a lot of those same issues of like, yeah, it's kind of messed up. Yep. It hasn't hit the point for me where it's a lot of people seem to hit, which is like it clicks and then you're suddenly like I understand whatever it's talking about, and like this is the

most amazing game ever. It's like still just like I mean, when I say the game's hard, you know, I'm not. I'm not saying I'm like, oh, like every encounter is super hard or anything like that.

It's just there are systems in place that aren't explained well. And then encounters where you're a lot of trial and error, right, so like you can die pretty quickly, and the death penalty is is fairly can be pretty severe, right, so you can encounter some something you've never seen before, and then suddenly just I don't know how to you know, fight this thing, and you're dead and two hits and then there's not a lot of checkpoint in going on. So I'm enjoying it, and I'm gonna keep going, you

know. It's it hasn't burned me enough to to to keep me off that souls. But all right, uh and it seems like you went to the other extreme maybe with Bulletstorm. I'd call that game easy. Yeah, it's default setting. So I kind of got a little bored kind of going through, and I was trying to use the game mechanics to spice it up a bit, you know, like I'm gonna just kick dudes or you know,

just use these weapons or certain weapons. But I only made it, uh pass, like slightly passed where our quick look ended, which is pretty early. So that's the part where the game gets good. Basically you have now trucked through all of the slow stuff at the beginning of that game you're talking about like what about it at the beginning of act three, Act two, like early act like basically anything after you get the control that remote control dude.

Yeah, I think pretty much the after the dinosaur. The game really starts to pick right or after you crush all those eggs. Maybe that's a little sto but you're right about that. So yeah, I'm like kind of right before the dinosaur bit and then yeah, you haven't even started the game yet. Yeah, it still seems a little kind of slow, very much. So much that's the game that it doesn't come into its own until you get more weapons, as much as it's about balls out action. Why do

they withhold the balls until? You know? I like you get to do a little bit at the beginning, but it's just like like here's how you slide cut scene, Yeah, here's how you vault over stuff. Cut scene? Right, Like give me a gun and let me impale a guy, yeah on a spike or something. Yeah, they do give you some of

that stuff. It's just that they only give you the assault rifle, which is not much fun so when you don't have anything else to mix it up, and you also you can't even unlock skill shots at first, like to that weird, Yeah, but that's you know, the skill that's Now that I've played through the beginning of that game a couple of times, that's like

five minutes or something. It seems it seems like, yeah, it did seem long to me as well, because it was like, I know this is in here, right, And like why I think the demo does like a disservice because you you kind of know what that game is. Is sort of like when you have everything unlocked and then yeah, you play and go like, wait, it's something broken. Yeah, we need to go into a menu and turn on the cool part. Like what happens the skill shots.

Definitely once those unlocked made it, uh, you kind of have more of incentive to go out and kill guys in interesting ways. It's just kind of like it's because you could get through the entire well part I played, I could have gotten through just by kicking dudes and shooting him in the head. But then at that early part in the game, that's kind of all

you can do. There isn't too much. Well, there's some other skill shots stuff, which is you know, like kick a dude and then shoot somebody else and then shoot the guy who just kicked you know, a lots in the air like that took a couple of tries, and you know that's exact when I tried it. Every time I tried to do that one specifically, I could never get it, uh, and it just happened. It was one of those ones that just you know, in the middle of chaos.

It's one of those things that after you get the thumper, becomes a lot easier to do because they stayed out. I found I found a lot of those tougher ones you had to just stop trying, because you drive yourself crazy trying to get trying to shoot a guy in the ass. Like yeah, it's like, just just play the game, like do as much crazy stuff as you can, and like they'll probably happen us again. So I've got that weird problem where I couldn't move on until I literally had like done

all that whole thing. But there's it's it's yeah you can't. It's it's because you know you're still going to use those weapons later on the Yeah, and I'm gonna burn them all out, right, But the part that kind of bummed me out, and just in the early part, and I hope this, hope this changes. I haven't bought anything from the drop pods yet because there and I knew this coming out of the quick look it's like Ammo

and like everything else, is locked at this point. So I'm just stacking points and like every time I see a drop pod, I go check it, and it's like, it's not like I'm getting an upgrade for the gun or even secondary abilities at this point. It withholds a lot of this stuff. Yeah, it's weird. Hell, like, I've god, where am I? I think I'm at the beginning of act four. I've got I've got the flail gun and it still hasn't let me buy charge for it.

I've had that gun for I mean, yeah, you get the shotgun and you hold on to that thing forever and you don't get the charge shot for it until way later in the game. So does that stuff just unlock on

its own? It's time. It's progression based. Like you get to a drop pod and it's like, okay, now you can get this because you're at this part part in the game, did they tell you, like before you get to the drop pod, like, oh man, we got a new I think it'll say it'll say new over the over the stuff, but you gotta be in it in the okay, Because I was almost ready to just start skipping them. Just be like I know that. So you haven't

run into problems where you're almost out of Ammo or anything like that. But I've definitely just been leashing and kicking guys into a well. So that's yeah.

That that was kind of the other problem, Like it forced me to kind of like, you're gonna need to break with this whole I need to finish all these skills skill shots before I move forward, Like I had to break with the I'm never gonna buy Ammo in a game because what if they're a finite number of points, I want to make sure I can afford every upgrade so you actually get so many points in that game, and the upgrades are not that expensive, So buy Ammo. Okay, Like, don't worry

about it. I haven't had a problem yet, but I was conserving it because I know he had mentioned that, like Ammo can become sparse, and that's why it becomes sparse is because you're not buying it. You're supposed to, but you are supposed to buy it, And you get to a point where you're basically pulling off skill shots on almost every single person you're killing.

He's just making money. Hey, Yeah, so you know you're you're just pulling in fifty or one hundred every time and a clip for the assault rifles like one sixty or something like that, so that just the math works out that you will have plenty of points. Don't worry about it. I'm having fun with it. Again. I did get a little bored, you know,

just at some point. Yeah, I don't honestly, I mean, like, yeah, by the end of act one, like, but basically everything I had played up until we started doing that quick look, up until the dinosaur thing, I was like, Man, this game doesn't seem very good at all. Yeah, it's plot. It was really sort of nothing against you, but I don't feel like you're far enough to really make that judgment because well, there is a specific point where it just jumps. Like

I said, I'm just qualifying it from whatever. Yeah, it's real. It's really it's ridiculous that the game is structured like that. They I don't know if they thought that they were easing people into it or what, but it's it's a really weird choicey progression. It seems like the kind of thing that would be informed by the notion of people who don't necessarily play a lot of fast paced shooters, like they wouldn't necessarily know what to do, so

they're just like overly holding your hand or something in the early goings. I don't know, but it's like it's weird because they get the tutorial stuff out of the way and then there's like a really slow, slow stuff after that, maybe like you've learned everything, and then it's you're going and you're like, well, wait, well, so okay once you get past act two,

like, does the pace just stay constant throughout? Is it just like balls out from there on or really like you know, you're definitely like clearing out batches of dudes. Then it's like, Okay, we're gonna hang out here for a little bit and then there's gonna be cuts scene and we're gonna move to the next area or something like that. Right, it's not just like dudes, dudes, dudes use dudes, right or anything like that.

It's just yeah, I mean, I don't know. If the pace does vary, then I can understand them wanting to like build it up a little bit, like to try and get some kind of like you know, eventual crescendo going, But it does sound like that goes on for way too long.

Yeah, for what it is, well, especially like the leash is really powerful right in that beginning part of the game because you you can pull guys from so far away and there are so few guys coming at you that again though I know, wait wait later on, like you're like thirty minutes from a point where like it's nothing but enemies that the leash doesn't work on. Sure, and again, like I said, it's just a part of map. But you know, if it makes you put the controller down to

break, it's probably not. It's issue side of that in the review that the starts really slowly. Yeah, I'm looking forward to going because I actually kind of am digging the universe they have set up the well, yeah, I know, if they'd get too deep into that stuff, though I haven't finished, I'm all you halfway through, they get deep enough, you know, And some of it's a little hokey, a little too convenient that you know, oh, what are the odds that these characters would meet or something

stuff like that. But they do a better job with the characters and with the story than I ever would have expected based on like especially the early parts of the game and the script and stuff like that. You're just like, this is the most just just the whole game just felt like it was trying too hard. But by the end of it, I was like, oh, you know, actually this is pretty well done. The characters have changed over the course of this game, and I would be interested in seeing where

they go from here. Not major changes, I mean, you know, in the context of a fucking completely crazy action game. But you know,

it's uh, well more than I expected. I enjoyed that there's a very early scene, so it's not I don't I don't think it's a spoiler that you're kind of walking down the side of the building doing this kind of like flashback mission, right, And I thought that was really cool that one, that one little scene, like feeled that that universe a bit more of like, oh, this isn't just like speech pirates kind of like and they got cool glasses. Yeah, Like, okay, do you sold having finished the

game? Do you truck with Ryan's theory that this takes place in the Gears universe? No? I mean I guess it could, but I'm not. There's no direct connection or anything. No there other than like the engine looks identical and everything is rendered and unreal. Right, Yeah, so in that sense, yes, it is the exact same universe. It's the exact same universe that every other video game takes place in. Also, so it's this actually takes place in the BioShock universe. Yeah, okay, no, it

takes place in the Moral Combat versus DC universe. Would make sense, all right. So yeah, I spent some time with that demon souls again, going to keep moving through that. And they God have mercy and yoursel yeah souls souls, right, the Gods have mercy. Well I should I should just mention the PC version of bullet Storm. Oh so we can just get get all our Bullstorm out. Now what version? It's a weird port Oh

yeah, you played some of it. That's that's what I'm playing. I'm playing the PC version, And this game I think marks the end over the beginning of the end of sixteen by ten resolutions, which is does it not do any technical thing to bring up but it really just totally is that what you call the yeah, like letter box or whatever, it's total sides or no, no, no, on the top and bottom. But even if even if you put it to a resolution which is specifically sixteen by ten,

like what is a nineteen twelve hundred is a sixteen by ten resolution. If you play it at that, it just slaps the black bars on there. It's still a sixteen letter box presentation. Yeah, which is just a huge bummer to me. I don't know if they were do they even you know, I haven't kept up on monitor stuff much lately, but do they sell sixteen by ten monitors? Still? That is the the larger soapbox issue here is that, like those things are getting real hard to find and way more

expensive. It's understandable. I mean, it's sixty by nine is the standard. Well, not only is it the standard, I'm sure those panels are a lot cheaper to get because that's they're producing Mosbauy or whatever. But you know, on a computer display you want more vertical just web pages and stuff like that. So the answers just get a bigger sixteen. I'm not going to complaint. Resolutions become standard on PCs and make capturing a lot easier.

Yeah, sure, right, that's fair. The funky aspectation, I guess that's fair. That's just kind of a bummer. And you know, like the I'm sure you saw all the stuff since you were reviewing the PC version, all the stuff about they encrypted all the config files in that game, so you can't just go in there and edit all the stuff the PC uh people are used to being able to edit. Yeah, so like somebody had to write a little app to be able to access all that stuff. Yeah,

it's not very well encrypted. Yeah. Yeah, it's like it's like the most basic cipher Like somebody somebody defeated it in about ten minutes. Cheap version of the club on the game. Why are you basically it's the exact same thing you used to protect the PlayStation three ouch Are you actually being serious? No? I would believe it took a solid like six months for them to start that. Okay, come on, I'm talking you know at the lower level. If that was like the algorithm they were using, I don't

know, right, why you even do it then? Anyway? Yeah, well that's the thing because somebody beat it in like ten minutes and that kind of the designer I guess of the game put fourth on Twitter that maybe they did that because the game has online leaderboards and the files you get access to actually let you completely change the difficulty of the game. Yeah, so about that. So about that. I messed around with that a little bit brought

it to my attention. So you're playing it on very hard with all the numbers tweaks to very easy or easier. Yeah, it's normal. I tried it. I don't know if I'll finish it that way, but I want to see if I worked. It totally works because there are different values. They're they're modifiers, you know, they're like multipliers for here's how much everything costs in the store, and so like, I'm very player health and a player health. It's even stuff like if I was reading the little like variable

names correctly. It's sort of like enemy like time to engagement and stuff like how fast they'll attack, or like their range for seeing you or hearing you. It's crazy to turn that way down. It's crazy they expose all this stuff. I mean, obviously they didn't want a lot of unreal games to expose that sort of stuff. People have definitely hacked a lot of Borderland stuff on the PC, you know, editing inventories and stuff like that. They're

using similar techniques, not identical, but similar. Yeah, and you know a lot of people complain about the PC version because it feels like console port. I mean it very much is. So it was a game that you know, having finished it on console before starting on the PC version, I understood the way the controls worked. But some people were like, why is the space bar do three different things? You know, and stuff like that. It's like, well, because when it's a button, it makes sense

for it to run and vault and you know, and so on. And I actually thought it controlled pretty much fine out of the box. Or you turn off the mouse smoothing, yeah, I had to. Once you do that, it's feels super scuorely. Yeah, it's weird. And once I've done that, but you know, other people want to go edit their FOV and do all other stuff you can get to that. It's just it's obfuscated.

It's like one extra step. It's not a huge deal. But but I guess I should say, just as you know, just to anger some people out there, I guess that I've always found fov editing to be insane. And unless you're in a case where you're running a game that wasn't meant to be seen in sixteen nine or sixteen ten on a wide screen monitors, in those cases, people have to fuck with it. But yeah, some people seem to have motion sickness. With weird. Yeah, but then some

people just like tunnel it all the way out for competitive reasons. Yeah. That that like when you're getting the weird fish eye effects. Yeah, is when you've gone too far. Yeah, but I don't know, I've always just thought of that stuff was weird. You shouldn't be able to edit that stuff. The developers had a vision about the way you should see that game. Right, I'm gonna back slowly away from the internet whatever. Yeah,

it's it's it's a good it's a good enough port ideal. Yeah, and there's some stuff like when you go into the skill shot database, the mouse, Yeah, there's control it like the mouse works on the main menu, knows the stuff just fine. But when you get into those menus it's like key in the store is w ASD and space bar. Yeah, it's a little weird, but you don't works really well in that game sixty game pad that would make some sense, works pretty well. So so it does.

Look it's great. So are we are we at the console point where in PC stuff is is taking the lead again? I've been there for like it's like visually absolutely, we've been there for a while. Well, I don't think it's been. I guess maybe you didn't see as much stuff coming on the PC because I didn't hadn't heard people talking about it as much of like, yeah, you need to check this out on the PC, like you

need to check Dead Rising. Yeah. I guess yeah. I think it's just that it's become like they're they're starting to get through the outer edges of it. It's more than just the resolution boost. It's getting to be you

know, like fast load times. But we're not talking like different lighting, right, We're not talking like there are like lighting effects that you're seeing that just aren't in the usually not Probably the most likely thing you'd see is like high resolution textures because those can be designed at high resolution and then bust it down. But I don't think you're going to see more like geometry on stuff. And I think that stuff, Oh, it's definitely the case where like

you know, it's a port. It's like, right, this was written, it's like Xbox and PS two games. The Xbox game it looked a little bit better because all they had to do was just you know, turn on Andy aliasing and run it for eighty or whatever. But well to that effect though, like one was the last PC Port you played. I mean it maybe looked a lot better than its console versions, but at the same time, like didn't have some sort of weird control quirk or you know issue

or that. Yeah, so angered the piece. I think it stuff like Bulletstorm. The problems are definitely surmountable, right, you can get around that stuff. It's just more of a question of should you have to but a lot of shouldn't you shouldn't you have a lot of those games, Like you said, you're just plugging a game pad and it's like now you're just playing it on a more powerful three sixty kind of without maybe your friends listen and

stuff. But like, uh, and that's the kind of interesting part is like you know, is at the end of this generation, like once people are like being able to look at that stuff easily and be like, yeah, three sixties old. You know, that's some old technology in there, because that is what you're what you're to come out. So it's you know, backdated. Looks like two years before the technolog Yeah, I think it's time. Let's move on and given another two years two years, are thinking

everyone should just throw out their xboxes right now. They're done. Geez, build a cool, PC man, I'm not ready for that. Play stronghold. As soon as you stop inverting your look? What because I start inverting my mouse? Look? Because you're just you're You're just part of an obsolete generation. I am. It's true. I want to get Paul Barnett back in here and have him talk about inverted look. Says that only old people

do it. We're old, and that there's a generation of kids that would never even think to do it, and that it's ridiculous and it's eventually going to go away. You're part of a dying breed, saying heartily agree with him, And I wonder, at what point is mouse and keyboard a dying breed? Oh god, it's getting there. With the way that developers are

treating the platforms. Yeah, yeah, with the way that the audience that prefers a mouse and keyboard gets treated, At what point do they just up and go like do they either say, well, I guess I'll start playing with it with a game pad or just say fuck this, I'm not playing games anymore. But there are still those genres that they absolutely absolutely and you know, for those genres, I think that mouse and keyboard will will continue to exist, but sure, But for the shooter, do you think there

will come a time? It seems like only when it becomes non trivial to include mouse keyboard support, like as it is right now, I have to imagine the API hooks and stuff or such that it just sort of is there, right. Yeah, it's gave me that hard to include. Yeah, on that platform. Plus it's expected to be included. Yea. You know, as time goes on, and as you know, the generation of people that expect that get older and the new generation comes in. Like I think

one point does it all shift? And well, at that point it all shifts, and no one's playing first person shooters because they're just playing Facebook games. I think I think you still need a big shift on the PC, Like maybe once it all becomes touch screen and on screen keyboards and stuff, then it's like you don't even have a mouse anymore. So once we're playing video games in Minority Report is what you're saying. Yeah, and that's when

the shift happened. Then we're all done and then I'm gonna I don't want to play games like that. I'm gonna invert my touch screen. I'm just gonna Yeah. So that was That was my That was my weekend. And then on Sunday I shared some time with Alex Navarro, played the Oscars game. We played the Oscars game on TV. It was the get drunk and watched the Oscars game. No, we won, We defeated the Oscars. I don't know, did you watch the Oscars? Yeah, no, we

beat it. We beat the show. I beat the Oscars by not watching The fair Way to Go. No, we had a good time. We hung out, we watch the Oscars. It was fun in spite of the show entirely in I've turned it on for a little bit near the beginning and it was like you and Rory on the couch with some dude and I was like, I don't even know what's going on. Oh the dude who looked like Eric Pope. It wasn't Eric Pope. Yeah, that was that's Roy's friend justin. Oh has he been in here before due. He's just sitting

on the couch on camera. He has a Pope had he has Pope sideburns. He was wearing a plaid shirt. It was it was really right. Oh okay, yeah, like Pope Pope, like the Pope. Yeah, oh, the Pope. The Eric pope, the Eric Pope. Yeah, so he was there and a pope. He became the villain of the night because he hated Inception and that did not draw the that that drew the irs. So I went out to a pizza place for someone's birthday for a little bit, and the oscars were kind of on in the background, and I

did actually manage to see the best picture. And there was a guy there who I guess hadn't been keeping up on it or something, And yeah, he was the exact same bot like when Inception, who would nominate that piece of shit movies a pile of trash bunch And he wasn't coming at it from the I don't get it. I don't don't make no sense to my stupid

brain. Right. It was more just this like active active hatred and indignation that someone would even think that that movie was in the same league as he wasn't going on his way to talk positively about any of the other movies. Yeah, I don't know, just struck me as a little weird. Maybe he only watches Adam Sandler movies. You know, I don't know who you're talking about, but I don't think you know this dude, but yeah, who knows, but yeah, so we did that and that was fun.

There was my favorite moment of the night, and I remember how it exactly happened, but there was this like James Franco, who's co hosting, right, yes, uh, doing their you know, you gotta feel sorry. Sometimes award shows are top. So they're doing their award show banter right bad and they come back from commercial break and I don't know how this happened.

Here's how I like to imagine it happened. In run throughs. There was a joke in there about movie names were pretty weird this year, and because you have Winter's Bone and how to train your dragon? Right, So they come back from break and he's just sitting there and doing its kind of like James Franco, kind of like weird posture he's got like he's very stiff,

like he's very uncomfortable. It's it's odd standing next to the coast who is Ann Hathaway Hathaway and she's got this weird look on her face and he's sitting there with this kind of weird smirk hunters on his face and he goes, you know, this year, a lot of movies have really weird names like Winter's Bone like inappropriate names was and how to Train Your Dragon like the most like yeah, like throwing the joke under the bus as flat yeah, and

she like halfway through it, she that kind of laughs, right, just like are you fucking doing this? I'm serious? And like that was it, man, that was the bit. There was no fallow up yeah, like no band like she just that was for him. That was just for him and maybe her. He had to get one in for him. But the whole the whole night was like that, though, like half the jokes didn't have follow ups or punchlines. It was just sort of like here's the

setup and here's the nominee. But that but that one in particular just seemed like he totally didn't want like this is stupid, take that out this yeah, and then it shows up in the teleprompter or something or like before like you're doing the Winter's Bone joke because I don't do it joke. My favorite night or sorry, my favorite moment of the whole night that I watched because in What's Whole Thing was Billy Crystal getting a standing ovation just for walking onto

the stage. Billy Crystal is the new Bob Hope. Guys, Billy Crystal is still alive. But but it was just like it was like, oh god, Billy take the bike phone, like save us, yeah, save the show, right, Okay? Yeah. I was like because I was sitting here thinking like why the fuck? But I want to stand up for fucking Billy Crystal. But like like maybe if it's the end of comic relief, yeah, fair now that'd be whoop be Goldberg, maybe all three of them. Yeah, uh yeah. He he is definitely he's the new Bob

Hope. He is the kind of old classy dude you bring up I've been doing this forever. Well he was even yeah he was talking about Bob Hope. Yeah, but everybody was just remembering when the OSCAR hosting was tolerable. Yeah, it wasn't last night so much. The last one I think I actually legitimately enjoyed was John Stewart. I haven't watched literally the Oscars and like yeah, yeah, but like, yeah, John Stewart I could see doing a good job. He was good, you know, he definitely felt restrained

compared to like what he can do on Comedy Central. But he was funny. And then I liked Hugh Jackman's musical numbers and not much else like the I don't know, David Litterman. Watching watching it, I get a sense that the there was a first time I watched Oscars in a long time, and it just seemed like it's not a fun industry right now, and like

everybody's kind of taking himself pretty seriously. You have this whole generation that's moved on that were all these like amazing actors that everybody respects, and there's like

this kind of weird gap. There are still actors that everybody respects, but not on like the de Niro kind of Jack Nicholson kind of like you know, right older group, and like you have a bunch of kind of younger kids that everybody's kind of like these guys kind of suck and like we have to make movies, but like these guys kind of sl well, they're like

struggling. I think they're struggling to figure out who matters, you know, like who who is actually important versus who is just kind of like the weird flavor of the week. And that's what it felt like. It felt like there were a bunch of dudes. Maybe again, I invert my controls to me, I'm just too old for this. H Like a lot of these people that are like are they going to be back here next year, like

you know, headlining these things, You're gonna be back up here? And then Billy Crystal walks out and it's like I've known Billy Crystal for a long time personally. Yeah. Yeah, But then Kirk Douglas came out and reminded you that we're all going to die someday, and that was really really rough. He is so old. Oh my god. Yeah. So the place I was at didn't have any of the volume up or anything like that, and I looked at you miss nothing. I had this moment of like,

is that Sandra Bullock? Yes, she's great. I like Sandra, Sure, she's America sweetheart. Yes, I guess, but it's yeah. There was definitely this moment of just like, that's where you're at, Like, Sandra Bullock's gonna present award. Well, she won Best Actress last year. That's why she came out, Yeah to the Best Actor, because the Best Actor Actress winners from last year. I always do those categories, okay, and she probably got Adam part of the half of the show. Oh she

was by far the funniest, by far. She is eminently likable. Yeah, she's just I don't know. I feel like she had her moment. Yeah, I could not care less about a Sandra Bullock movie. But yeah, the net guys, Speed come on, come on, come on. That's what she won Best Actress for right, Yeah, I know it was. It was Retroactive Award for Speed two Cruise Control. Of course they do those, Yes, when they realize they've made a mistake. Yeah, they

correct it totally. It is nice anyway, that's my oscar bit. Okay, I'm sorry. Yeah, uh, Brad, have you played any video games? Hello? Man, I don't even know where to start. I finished the SaaS screen two. Nice Finally, was it everything you know? Over the weekend? Man? What the hell was that? Yeah? Exactly? See you in a couple of months after Brotherhood, it was all well, right, it was all I could do. I finished conversation again. I finished it when I was very sleepy late at night on a Saturday.

The still all I could do not to throw in Brotherhood right away, just to see how that thing opens up, because it opens up, I think exactly. With the last couple of minutes of yea too, all right, so because yeah, I would have been going crazy. I'm sure you guys when you finish that game when it was new, like with nothing else to follow that up. Uh, I don't know. There was so much of other stuff coming out at the time. There wasn't really time to sit there

and go like, man, it really like more Assassin's Creed. It was more like I've got nine other games sitting yes, sure, sure, it's just it's a little cliffhangery. Yeah, they don't they I will say this though, they don't address some of the stuff from the end of two until pretty near the end of Brotherhood. You know, just stab dudes from you gotta keep you on the hook, you know. I gotta get back to that at some point. I feel like I've learned some Italian playing that game.

Nice? Just so much have you learned Italian? For stabbed that guy? Oh? I didn't get that one so much. It's rescue directly translation. It's a good game. It's a good game. Un I know there was something else Stronghold. Yeah that should we just talk about the showcase stuff. Well, Alex, you play anything else. I've been playing a few things here and there, I actually I almost bought Bullet Storm last week. I decided I'm going to hold off a little bit until it's a little cheaper.

It sounds great, but it also seems like the sort of thing I would totally play for like a week and then maybe not touch again, not even necessarily a week. Well, I mean, I might probably go back and play that that other mode for a little bit, and then I mean, you know, we went and bought that game Tuesday morning, and I had to review up Wednesday evening. So I play in smaller chunks than most people. I think. Yeah, but I think that once that game is

like forty or something, I will probably invest in it. But I actually, inexplicably last week popped in punch Out for the first time. I've had it forever, and I had never bothered for the wei. Yeah, I had never bothered to touch it before, and I'd played it at like at like demo stations and other people's houses. I never actually sat there and tried to play through it. That game's fucking hard, ye holy shit. Like it starts out okay, but then like within half an hour, I was

like, I don't want to do this anymore. I'm so angry at this were playing with You were playing with the controller, right, not the stuff. No, I wasn't doing the motion stuff. I mean, I like it. It's it's a really neat game, and it's a pretty neat tribute to the original. But holy shit, they were not screwing around with that game. Yeah. I wonder if there was talk for a while. I know, I'm pretty sure those guys were starting to work on a sequel.

I just don't know if I would think. I mean, that game sold, Okay, didn't, I'd imagine so I think so yeah, And I don't know. I know that's like a weird random game to like pull out of nowhere. But it's like I was just sitting on my shelf. I was looking for something to plan. I was like, well, I could play any of these games that are more than like ten hours long, or I could play this thing that I could very easily play in like fifteen minute

chunks. I'm going with this, And you know, I'd spent about an hour and a half on it, and I was like, I think I got through maybe like three dudes. It's like, yeah, it is that a game is rough. I'm sure someone is mocking me. Ruthlessly right now for for sucking at that game. But well it's all you know, it's all pattern It is all pattern and I started to get some of the patterns, but it is just try playing Docs punch Out or whatever the other the wee. I saw that, Yeah, I remember that. It was like

the fun Club thing. Yeah, yeah, one of the great Nintendo downloads of all times. Yes, I'm understand you're something of a connoisseur of them. I know a thing or two about downloadable products for Nintendo platforms. Well, we can talk about that later, but just to say so you say that ranks highly among them, I'd say, so, okay, you know, it's like it's relatively rare, like there's there's a lot of things going forward. It's it's going to open up your book. I love it.

You should. You should start like a Nintendo downloads like like antiques road show, like evaluating like the relative value of each Nintendo download. I found this in my grandmother's addict. It's a bit trip beat. Any idea what this is worth? No? No, I was hoping, you know, as I found it up there, I was hoping maybe it was worth a couple of bucks. Eight hundred wee points really, eight hundred wee points really?

Yeah, wow, very it's a very nice shape. Not not really sure what this game is called, but it's there's these flowers and you cut their petals like their hair. Uh it's like a tree and you you cut it and that's the game. And now what's the story with this? Uh? I don't know how did this come into your life? Uh? Well, you know, I was looking for games that let me cut hair on the Nintendo, of course, and that was the first one that that came along,

one of them. There were several others, but that was the first one I saw. I'm sorry, this one's counterfeits knockoff. So it's really worth you know, just enjoy it, you know, enjoy it for the story, for the you know, you're for the history and your family. But it's it's worth eighty week points. I spent six hundred on it. Well there you got all the winners. Anything else, No, not really, I mean usual stuff. Yeah, these two Portsland birds nesting. You

put a bird on this bird, you might have something. But Grandpa was stationed in the Far East during the war, sent me this letter and he downloaded this copy of disco light, this kind of Chinese man. Uh so I've obviously played a bunch of Bulletstorm reasonable for that review, but then plains Fight Night Champion, which I haven't played a ton of it. You know. It's like we've we've got a quick look going up on the site this

week. You can check out. It's you know, control wise, it seems very similar to the previous games, which I liked, So that's cool. I think it looks really nice. I think the story stuff seems smart so much. I haven't played enough of it to say one way or the

other. So what is the story stuff? It's basically like you're playing as a set character going through a story like that, you know, does like the whole first fight and the first fight slash tutorial is in prison, so it's like undisputed, and then it goes there it says like four years earlier and goes back to like you winning the gold medal at some amateur competition and then turning right and you know, introducing a bunch of evil, conniving fight

promoters that and your outsized baby brother who you can tell is just going to get you in some kind of nightclub fight later on. Yeah, he's number one. Yeah, yeah, troubling entourage. Why did they never do this for Matt because Blitz the league beat him to it, just saying it's like they've already had that superstar mode forever and they've never done anything CD with it. It's because the NFL would never do anything and boxing has no authority at

this point exactly. I mean, you know, I don't think they necessarily. I mean they're going out and getting licenses from specific fighters, right because there's no there's no definitive boxing league to or something, right. Yeah, they're all over the Yeah Women's Basketball Association, Yeah, totally, that's one of them. Uh yeah. Boxing is like a total mess, so there's no one that's gonna like regulate that stuff, like you. The closest you

could get is Don King, and his boxing game was not good. So also he don't give a fuck, right, he would have that a heartbeat like, oh hell yeah, I'll jump up on the table, make sure you get my hair right. Only in America. So here's what I hope for this story because actually, from what I've seen, actually, yeah,

I think it's kind of cool. I think the characters seem interesting and then kind of engaging and they don't seem too cheesy, you know, like a I hope it doesn't just become you know, cut sing regular exhibition, fight cutsing, regular exhibition. But it would be really interesting if they brought some of that story into the fight, like you know, like yeah, you know wrestling style, it's like something weird happened during some of the fights.

You know, some juj just has a heart attack during a fight and like whoa, whoa, whoa, or you have to decide if you're gonna throw a fight or not. Would be really interesting because I could see it kind of getting a little you know, awesome intense cutsing and then you know, back into this right it's like, all right now, I'm just beating the crap out of this dude. Yeah, I think you're probably closer with the

thing you don't want than the thing you do want. I feel like thing you're asking for is asking for an awful lot of creativity when it comes to a career mode. In a sports game, Sky takes Boston glove off and he's got a gun underneath it himself. Yeah, he gets on his knees in the end zone himself and shoots himself in the head like this demon comes out. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, and then then you have to

fight Piston Honda. Great, I'd buy that game. Uh, Beyond Good and Evil HD been playing kind of the early parts of that for various videos we've been doing fair over the past few days. I didn't play the first one or the original, but it seems lovingly restored. Yeah, yeah, it looks nice and that runs very smoothly. I think, you know, fans of that game will will probably appreciate it. But more importantly, I think that it's a game that's aged well enough and they've updated nicely enough that

you could get into this now. Will those fans rejoice? I don't know. Okay, I've never rejoiced once in my life, so I don't really know what that's about. Do you feel like this is sort of the last ditch test case to see if Ubisoft is finally going to put the money into Beyond Good and Evil too? Totally? Yeah, they did, but they also haven't said didn't anything about it. They didn't announce it, like that trailer or whatever leaked out and then they were like, oh, that's not

even necessarily a game. It's like it's a thing they kind of tried to back away from it, and then when we were at E three at the Ubisoft press conference, you asked, like, so, what's up with What did they say? They said, Oh, it's not really ready for It's not something we're focusing on at the moment, right, So it was not a denial that it existed as a game, but it was a you know,

this project is in I am alive territory somewhere. Michelle Ansel isn't a French bunker, and he's just you know, furiously, yeah, sketching away on this this idea in an Opium den. That's what I met by French bunker. Yeah, yeah, yeah, designing new species of Alisha's. Yes, exactly. It's weird ending. I didn't want to spoil it. But at the end, you know, she gets into the animus and okay, you know, Desmond wakes up and goes, man, that was really fucked

up. One let's go back to Italy. She gets out of the animals and it's Jade Raymond, what Yeah. And then Torchlight, which there's a quick looking up on the side of Friday. We talked Friday, which you can you know what it's torch should talk about it with a controllers, there's not that much that instead of a mystery keyboard at this point, and uh, direct control. Yeah, that's what I mean. It was at the event playable there, so you know there's no bargo on that event. That's

true. So I played it at the event about eight hours. Yeah, so I've already played that game on PC. Is there any reason for me to check out the XDLA version? It's still an awesome game, Yeah, there's that. So there's that. I have bought Plans Versus Zombies like four times at this point. So freaking freaking Torchlight man. Like I you know, they sent it to us early to cover it, and I was like, all right, I'll try this to see how the porch job is basically

right. Yeah, I was like, all right, I spent like twenty hours on the PC already. I just need to how they did this, and I'm good. Like five hours later for me, it was more like seven. You play like, it's so easy to get stuck right back, Like I downloaded on Sunday and we're just like, oh, let's see what's up. Oh God, it's five thirty and I need to be someplace at six and yeah, I am nude from below the ways this is not going to work out. I don't even like those kind of games, Like,

I'm not a Diablo style player. I'm not into those. And I dropped about ten hours on that game without even thinking about it, and it really I kind of missed the mod support. There was some fun stuff you could do on the PC version with that. Some some of the menus and controller like the menu control issues are a little annoying. I suspect it's one of those things that if you've spent a lot of time with the PC version you

will be more likely to notice. I think that's stuff. Yeah, but have they have they announced any kind of release window for Torchlight two of this year, but then they said they had pushed it. Oh they said that that's the new day. Okay, so yeah, that's that is pretty soon. Yeah, the game needs co op. I want to play that with other people. And totally a new Diablo is still in the See my awesome glowing sword. Check out what I got? Yeah, what good is lute?

If you can't show it? That is kind of the thing. Yeah, yeah, definitely, Yeah, Diablo three is still just whenever, right, Yeah, there was some earnings thing or something that implied they were shooting for this year. Yeah, I remember that wasn't guaranteed. Ye. Yeah, they've quickly followed up. They're like, like, I wandered to make this game till it's fun. I wonder if we'd see it like a torch

like three or four by the time even comes out. It happened. Well, I mean, Runick had that plan to go from Torchlight to that like free to play MMO based on torch Light, and they made so much money on that it was like crazy not to just make another one. But that's supposed to still be coming down the line, so all right. Yeah, but even but even this one, they're saying like multiple towns connected by an overworld and like quest spawning off of all the towns and like like like Diablo

two. Yeah, but it's basically Diablo. It is Debo. It's it's absolutely like I think they're basically straight up saying this is our Diablo two to Diablo. Great, you duds are about to make me play torchlinel over it. You know, it was not a game Diablo two. It was pretty good, so great some of those guys made it, So I think you can get away with this. Yeah, probably one of the few they can. All Right, So that's it for that. Let's talk about some news.

Wait, we're gonna talk about showcase stuff. Yeah, that can be part of that. I want to hear about showcase stuff breaking news. Microsoft had its February Games showcase in San Francisco, California, last week, and me and Brad and Drew went over there, like I said, and then the night before they had Gears of War three focused thing. I was like Ryan, Ryan went to that. I think that's where we must have picked up our flu whatever whatever viruses is propagating the beginnings of the nerd virus.

I mean, like half the people there were walking around talking like they were sick or had been sick, and yet you're still shaking their hands and there's all this finger food going around on trees. Let's cut half our GDC appointments and just go to like the two that we're really actually see for super super excited about. That sounds cool, and the ones that have the most hand sanitizer. So what what did you did you see? You guys can talk

all about this stuff. Yeah, uh s, Gears of War multiplayer. Huh, yeah, so I played some of that. I guess they were showing off different modes later at night, because Will went for the reception that we're having that evening and he played something that he described as like Oddball mixed with King of the Hill. I think, I don't know if that's a mode or if that's a specific map, because there's a what's the what's the coltranes? Like fake football sport? Oh, it's a thrash ball thrash ball,

Yeah. One of the maps is that, like a thrashball arena crazy. So I don't know if those I don't know if those mechanics that he's talking about are incorporated just into that map, or it's actually a mode that works against Like do you think there is a there is a thrash ball outline? No, No, not even a mini game. Just somebody knows how thrashball works over the football. It's it's the XFL. Yeah, have they

showed anything. Put they put the football at the fifty yard line to and then guys have to run and get it at the beginning, and they have a string that goes across the field and camera that shoots from the s and Jesse though even Tour is there. Yeah, you don't think anything explodes. It's not cyberball, no exploding balls, just the cheerleaders. Yeah, uh no, because I thought that they had, like because the the Terry Tate guy, the dude was at the event, saw him. Yeah, he's

a large man. And then didn't they have like pictures of Coal in his thrash Ball uniform and like Pete players in the game wearing football helmets and stuff like that. Maybe what Ryan was saying he saw, So I didn't see anything. Everybody wears shoulder pads in that universe. That's how you know the bold Storm is not there. Because yeah, so when I when I played it, it was it was team death match on a map called Old Town.

And this looks like them getting ready for the beta. They're still doing some kind of Facebook voting thing to determine what maps will be available in that, I guess. And it's team death match, but you have limited response. It's kind of a ticket style system where you get like fifteen spawns per team, uh, and then you know you run out and you'll lose.

Uh. And it's you're able to play as the locust on one side Yeah, one side is the just you know, kind of as before, So I'm just kind of jumping the gun here, sorry, but yeah, did you get to see any new character types or anything on the totally in it for the bad dudes anything? Uh? You know, I didn't get a good close look at them because I was kind of shooting them from a distance. Lamb or Chane song them, No, they were not Lamb It.

It's kind of curious with with Snuck Under the multiplayer single players, right right, They're definitely multiple types of locusts in there that you know that didn't all look one hundred percent familiar, but none that I would call out and describe

to you. Now, Okay that they because they were so crazy or anything like that, but uh, they're doing some interesting stuff kind of out of game or or out of out of map in that so between spawns, you can kind of pop up an overhead map, uh, like a drawn map that shows you kind of cons of where people are at any given time and

where the weapons are. And when you're between spawns, you can also set your secondary weapons or your primary and your secondary actually, so you have your smoke grenade, your pistol, but then you can decide if you want the Lancer or they had a retro lancer which instead of a chainsaw, look like it had a big old night blade thing on it. And then there was the hammer Burst rifle, which was your other option there. All the radicals

have been redone. They look pretty nice. Minor change, but and then secondary weapons. They had the regular shotgun and then a sawed off shotgun that, like the radical, was gigantic. It was just like, get up in a dude's face and pull the trigger and he will explode. But if you were not up into dude's face, you do, this is a huge waste of time. Yeah, and beyond that, I played like Gears had the same kind of pop out like achievement progress type stuff, but it looked

like you were actually working towards unlocking things for a multiplayer as well. So like, uh, you know, I ran up and did like a melee kill with the hammer Burst, and it like a little thing popped out and

said, do thirty of these to unlock the weapons specific execution. Oh oh, so you're unlocking everything or it seemed like you were just crossing over right, Okay, so well, I mean not necessarily crossing over, but it seemed like, you know, if you want to do the big executions and multiplayer, you're gonna have to do some a bunch of lamee looking ones first or something like that that. I wonder if that's all just cosmetic though.

I mean, we're not talking about a call of duty perks here, right, No, no, no, no, no, no load out changes or anything. Well, I imagine you'll unlock additional weapons because you know, you only had access to you know, three assault rifles and two shotguns. I mean there's plenty of other weapons and in the Gears of Verse. Yeah, but most of those stuff spawns on the map as opposed to you know, bring that stuff in with you, right, Yeah, that's true on

the map and stuff like that too. So it could have been stuff that they for the beta. They're right, not hard hard to say how that progression will will work if the Jenica there is a meaningful one, but we'll find out soon. I think they announced April beta for April. Yeah, so just to hit like what September release wise? Yeah, yeah, the old Halo dates, yeah right, yeah exactly. So uh, it's a pretty pretty gray pretty gears, no, a little more colorful really, like

the one map kind of like bullets. Yeah, they had they added some brown, some orange, like the color pell bull Storm is a predominantly orange game in my mind. I don't know if that anybody else, right, the Bulletstorm is it's like orange, and you can come to think of it like every movie poster on the planet. It's like orange basically orange and blue and orange. Ye. So really, so what you guys are playing wasn't just overcast like weird. Yeah, it was sunny and broad broaden the color

pellet a little bit insane. Yeah. Wow, I don't want to see, you know, Marcus under any kind of natural light. Just I just wanted to put his damn sleeves back on, put a fucking shirt on, like you don't. The sun is out, it's hot. On. Something looks wrong about what they've done to those those armor suits that I can't like it. Those armor suits never looked very right to be getting one of them. Is a lady, That one I'm okay with? All right? Yeah,

so Gears was there, Batman Arkham City was there. Yeah, that was the one that you guys could not stop like being excited about when you walked in. I mean, they weren't letting people play it there. They were playing it kind of in front of people on a twenty minute loop. And yeah, dude, yeah, that game looks to be the real deal. Sounds hot. That game is not the same game put out again. That game looks like the same mechanics applied to a much larger space, with

new mechanics in place to make that space meaningful. Did you notice a lot of different stuff about Detective Vision. It seems like that's one of the things they've been saying, is like that they know that people have been relying on it too much and they want to try to avoid that. But I was trying to remember was whether you could use the tectivision and the third person you when I asked you right after you said that it was only first person because

let's wear in that demo. Yeah, you could only use it in first person, because so you could do it in the third person the first time, right, because that's why they were complaining it. But just played the whole game, I'm like, yer, you could, yeah, pretty sure. It looked like it was just first person though, and like you couldn't

move, you just had look control. I think you could. You could move because there were times when he would pop it on before he would go through like a big set of double doors, and it's like, oh shit, there's five guys will end up. But I don't think they're intending for you to like leave it all like conduct full like stealth sequences or like like

whole combat cycles with the with the tect division on. Do you think that's sort of like an indicative of the more open nature of the game, like it's it's less specifically, I think that it's hopefully indicative that the game is not going to be designed to hide a lot of secrets around that you can only see with Detective turned on. Like that was the thing is you have people that wanted to they wanted to find every last thing, and to do

that, you pretty much had to leave that thing on at all time pretty much. Yeah, but you know, there's a cool sequence where they show like the exploding wall or the the breakaway wall icon on a wall, but instead of doing the explosive gel, you just run up and hit the Y

button, punches through and knocks the dude out like RoboCop style. That was a pretty good that's pretty pretty pretty amazing Stulls Crime scenes and stuff like that, where it'll be like detective vision, like I'm gonna scan this gun for fingerprints. The forensic stuff seems to have become a lot more situational as opposed to last time it was like pop detectivision. And then follow this bread comb breadcrumb trail of like scent clouds right out of the hole. And you know

the one. I mean it could still have that, I could still be in there. But the one we saw was like, you know, a sniper shot had been taken through a window, and it was like, find the two pieces of evidence that are actually relevant here, and it was the

bullet hole in the window and the impact point on the floor. And then as soon as you do that, it full It goes full on CSI, like draw a laser like like restruct the trajectory the bullet and like flies like through the window, across the alleyway and like into the tower that the shot came from. So that gives you the indication like, Okay, now I need to get to the tip of that, just like your objective rolls over and it's like to to the top of the tower. So it's awesome.

Why is CSI Batman not a show. I want that. Yeah, I want that really hard. Yeah. Yes, William Peterson and Batman solving crimes is Batman, dude? Yes, that's where he went. That's why he left CSI Las Vegas to go be Batman. That would be amazing. Yep, sorry Betty Glad, No, no, my train is too chooed out of here. Uh I was gonna all right, so the city? All right? So Arkham City is that? Yes? Uh so did it seem like it's an open world game or is it more like a hub with like

instances inside buildings? And it seems definitely like an open world game. Well it's open world and that you can go anywhere. Yeah, but no, no Batman, and you're not like carjacking. It didn't. I didn't see any vehicles when you just fly, so he's got like the And also everything looks like an alley that we saw, like you wouldn't want to drive cars in these streets. That sounds like Gotham. Yeah, it's and like is

it supposed to be? Uh I'm kind of I'm just look confused on the story beats, like, is it's right after Asylum or I don't think we Who's fucked up at the asylum after putting every single criminal back behind bars, like yep, sewed up the prison. It's like, no, actually everybody's back, Joker's out there. But other than that, like, I don't think we got a sense that a ton of the villains from the first one or loose well, which characters that they show to face cat Woman Face,

cat Woman Rider, Riddler is like to be out there. Riddler is like a player in the story this time. It's not just dropping stuff ever, trophies or whatever, though there is that as well. Definitely out there.

But yeah, so the frequencies you have to tune into and stuff. So one of the last things they showed was this billboard that had you know, like Riddler colored writing on it that says, you know, tuned to these frequencies you have like your your whatever, your door hacking device from the first game also scanner manually manly tun but like locations and and that sort of stuff, and put the frequency on the back of the game. Yeah, I

almost feel like they should just do that. They should put a frequency on the back of the box that the Riddler stuff be tied of that somehow. But it did not feel like open World Jank, Well, well, it's not open world in the sense that there are quest givers everywhere with like exclamation marks over their heads. You know. I don't think it's like GTA yeah

or Infamous or something. I think it's I think it seemed to me that's more like the first game, where you only have one objective than any given time, and like that's the story, and there's a bunch of side stuff that's gonna be kind of everywhere, but it'll be thematic side stuff, like

you know, here's a guy getting mugged. Well, it seems like the closest analog would be the Spider Man games, wouldn't it, because like that was sort of like open World. There was usually very specific story missions you had to do, but then there was that side stuff floating around and most of you were just like darting around the city website. Yeah. Maybe, yeah, but I'll say this looks a lot better. That's I totally don't

doubt that one bit. I'm just saying it's like it just in terms of structure, it seems like it's maybe going for more of that kind of thing. Just the flight mechanics so you can't climb to the top of the building and just jump off and glide. The gargoyles everywhere, even outside the city, like on every every other building has a gargoyle on it. That seems reasonable you can still do that stuff. But I mean it seems like anytime

you were in the air you could just pop the glider. Yeah, and and basically like you know, people were the guy was like back clawing to a building and then letting go out his assent and us to just yeah, basically just get a bunch of height and then glide. And then when you're when you're gliding, you can go to like a dive bomb and then pull out of it like pilot wing style to get right, right, right, and and continue gliding. Seems it seemed like really maneuverable, and you can

go straight into combat from that. You know, you can be can flying along and like targeting guy on a guy. Like first they're all guys just on the street. Yeah, they're still over the place. Are there civilians and there are people that you're trying to save. Okay, but it's not like a populated there's just people everywhere. It's night time. Yeah, I think it's always nice. I imagine there's always night time. Yeah, the hell's batman go and do during the day. If it's like the first game

and it's yeah, I take place over a single night. I like that about the first Yeah, definitely up. Yeah, so you guys are sad. Yeah. The fighting looks very similar conceptually, but the animation on it I thought looked a lot nicer. Yeah. I added a lot of stuff like there are times when two guys will try to attack you and you can like a block and counter both of them at the same time. Wow, and stuff like that. What was that extreme combat move that they showed at

the end beat down? Yeah, you just you start basically you go from like a kick into like you start with a front kick and then you can combo that into this beat down and it's just like, dude, that doesn't kill guys. It's real close. Yeah, that was real cool. I still think Arkham Stylum has the best melee combat in history. I think it's brilliant. It was fun, It was real fluid, yeah, because it

almost turns into a puzzle at some point. It's not even There was one spot where there's a guy who's a riddler informant in a cluster of dudes, and basically you get down there and they're all trying to attack you, but you need to make sure he's the last one standing so you can interrogate him because you don't want to knock him unconscious, right, which I thought was kind of a neat thing, because you know, he's he's trying to attack you, just the same as the other guys, you know, but you

have to very carefully like try to jump over him or you know, roll over him to hit the guys on the other side of him and stuff like that, which was kind of kind of clever, fascinating, some connect stuff. Guns Stringer, the guns stringer, Alex Navarro's the guns stringer. Let's no, not even close. No, I don't know your name was the only name I saw on it. So terrifying. Yeah, that so should we just say what my involvement with that game is. Yeah, So that

game uses a grading structure. I don't even know if they've talked about this yet, but there's like a grading structure in that game where at the end of each level they give you like a critic quote or something like like it's

term like a news because it's presented like a puppet show. The whole thing has like a big theatrical motif, right, And so the idea would be that there is like a quote at the and from like a newspaper critic or something that was judging the show, and that's that's it relates to how well you did, and also like if you beat other people on the leaderboards or something. And a good friend of mine, Dan Tisdale, who used to work at Harmonics U, is now the lead designer in that game, and

he was just like, hey, you write about stuff. Do you want to just like send some quotes in I was like, yeah, I'm sure, So I sent him some quotes and I think those might end up in the game. I don't know have in fact in a preliminary build of the case, Okay, did any of mine pop up? Yeah? Okay, that's all I saw. Really, I wonder if I'm actually the only one who submitted any He said he was going to go to multiple people, but maybe he just tricked me and I'm the only one who did it. How

was it playing? It's early, but it looks promising. Like basically you're kind of using your left hand to move the gun stringer around and that's almost like you're working the marionette side of things. Jerk your left hand up to make him jump, move it left and right to make him move left and right. And then your right hand is your gun hand, and that you're

moving the on screen radical around to kind of paint targets. You can paint up to six and then you you know, throw your arm back like you're like a recoil of a pistol, and it'll and it'll nail everybody you've painted. That's kind Yeah, it works pretty well. I mean it is a little early, so the control's not maybe as high as it hopefully will be, and that they've said as much. When we were talking to them about it. I thought it looks I thought it looked pretty cool art style school

and it. Yeah, and a lot of FMV in that game. In case you were worried, they just wet bearded men at the beginning of that game, like like shirtless. Yeah, wet bearded and a theater's full of people standing up and cheering and stuff like that. When you complete levels and you know, big FMV hands coming down and pushing boulders at you. Wow, like polygonal boulders, which was kind of a neat little effect, but uh cool. I told those guys they should make night Trap, and they

said that would be a good idea. Well, if anyone's gonna do it, I mean who else at this point, that's my only other tell tale. No, they have like seventeen other properties they're working on. They don't have time for for night Trap. Yeah, exactly, that looked pretty neat. Child of Eden was there, Yeah, we took a look at that. That looks like it's coming along. Did you get a chance to play

that? I did not. I didn't either, but just watching people play it, just you could tell them the correspondence of someone's hand to the screen, it seems to have been tightened up quite a bit. Yeah, I think it looks really great. Yeah. Cool. You know if those games come out soon ish, like I'm by that, I mean, like this year, everybody who has a Connect is just gonna buy those. They're just they're they're both coming out of the Gunstringer is a downloadable game. Yeah,

and is that slated soon? Is that it? I thought they said like summer or something might be It might be right, because I know the build actually just said coming twenty eleven. That's definitely this year, and Child of Eden seems like it's like close to done because it's like those are the only two Connect games really that I've I've heard of coming out this year, And yeah, what else are they even talking about? I don't want to tell you about Sesame Street once? Oh yeah, yeah, I forgot that was

for Connect, doesn't that? Yeah, which we played. Yeah, it's pretty fun. It looks fun. It just I mean it's extremely simplistic. You know, it's it's for kids. It's an interactive story book. At no point does it scream at you about the bookcase though, So it's not. It's not the best interactive story right, I've seen some interactive story books.

No, it's like, you know, every page of the book is a different kind of mini game thing, so you're kind of working your way through it, and they're gonna be played alone or with two players, so you know, parent a kid style thing. So like, what are you doing Connect wise with it? You're ducking, You're dancing, Okay, So it's a stand up game for sure. Jump Yeah, yeah, I thought it looked really nice. The thempetology of it all right is definitely hands right,

So you know, it's like shaders. Yeah. Actually the Yeah, the fur actually does look really nice, and and they do the right stuff with the arms on the guys where it's like the hand is really stiff and present and moving, but then the arm is just failing around completely crazy. They've they've been to the Henston Creature Shop like twice in New York. Huh, like studied all the rigging of the limbs and stuff, the exact physics

of the googly eyes. The eyes literally do like rattle around as if they're so awesome free floating. Do you play as a muppet? Are you? I'm not that direct, if that's what you mean. I mean it's literally like guys running automatically down a path and like your jump when a log is coming. You know, it's is it doesn't seem like it's educational. Yeah, okay, count a lot. Maybe not it's educational they talk about.

Yeah, it's one of the things they talked about is is it's not necessarily about the letters and numbers aspect of Sesame Street and more about the what does it they call it? I don't know that calls it the whole child curriculum branded yet or it's like teaching social skills or you know, how to read feelings of other people, and that's sort of like how to be a decent human sort of stuff. So it's not like brought to you by the letter

G for Gears of War three coming this September. Maybe actually that would be the funniest thing that they could do, if yeah, if the end it totally did brought to you by this and this, and it's also Microsoft sponsored products. Well, no, it's Warner Brothers. So it would be Mortal Kombat and Batman. There you go, Yeah, you know Mortal Kombat. Yeah, brought to you by the letters M and K. Anything else from

the shift two was there. Took a brief look at that. I played a little crisis too, but not enough to really say anything other than the three D caught me kind of queasy. God, I mean, that's seemed to be the stuff you were most excited about when you came back, Like you were talking a Batman big time. They had the news as Screed Brotherhood DLC they did. Then She's disappearance or whatever it's. They had a new

dishwasher. Yeah, that's gonna be in three D side scroll in three D. Great vampire smile like a two D game in three D, which I maybe sounds okay, why well, you know, it gives depths to the

backgrounds and stuff. I think it's really cool that there's like, you know, this indie developer like super small team game that that are actually doing it in three D. Actually kind of think that that might ac actually look a lot better than most of the three D three D stuff actually, I mean most every game that's been three D so far as a game that involves you moving like into the z plane, right, it's like driving games and shooters

and that's it. So there's probably running into the thing that you are seeing, yeah, whereas this is like you know, you're moving the left and right, but you're gonna see like so there's like ways you can make the detail pop that you wouldn't be able to do too that that's the access stuff. They would do some cool stuff there. I mean, how did it look. I didn't really it looked all right, Yeah, it kind of looked like the first game. It looked okay, need art style and stuff.

I like that very bloody super you know good hopefully maybe not quite as savagely difficult this time. I know a lot of people complain about the first game that way, I'd like to believe it won't be it's pretty tough. Yeah, I'd like to believe it won't be anything else from that event. Yeah, I mean there's stuff everywhere, but I think that was all the Yeah, definitely the Bigges stuff. They the Halo, Matt Path. Look at that. It's Fable three PC and all kinds of stuff, A little

bit of Windows Phone seven stuff. Yea. All right, Well, we're gonna take a quick break and come back with the rest of the news. Stay tuned. Heard stuff packing material in season. Yeah, it's like an onion flavored packing peedu. Yeah. All, let's get back to the news. Uh, Catherine, it's Sha or the Sea the Sea with katherin with the Sea contains Katherine with a K and Katherine the c in the game? Is Kathy in it? No, Kathy's not in act that. I don't

care about this. That game showed up on game stops database with the July release date and was pulled down. I guess so all I saw screenshots. Didn't see it in there myself, so could be all fabricated. I thought the publisher said, like even like less than a week ago, they had no immediate plans to translate and bring to the US or something they would, right, yeah, which, yeah, they did come out last week and say no, we're not No, we have no plans to bring it to

them. Just gott I didn't imagine that. Yeah. And then coupling with that, there've been rumors going around this week saying that they'd be an announcement on Tuesday. Uh, with regards to the North American release, that's tomorrow. Actually that's today, Yeah, it's today. When that? Oh my god. Yeah, so by the time you listen to this, we may be in a Catherine esque world. Was July is a lot sooner than I would anticipate. I would figure it would take them a little longer at to

localize it. Let's seem like out of character for Atlas. Maybe they've turned games around quickly in the past. Persona four was not exactly years in the making when it went from Japan to the US. I mean they might have just been working on while. A lot of buzz around this game. Yeah, I think it's a lot of buzz around this game until people see what it is and then you go, wait a minute, what I mean?

The block climbing stuff is okay, but you know, it's it's telling that they're releasing this difficulty patch to make it easier because I think, you know, the people that traditionally play some of those Atlas games, like some of them might not be into intense block climbing devil madness, so well, they definitely like the Devil. Oh yeah, definitely into the Devil. Definitely into madness. Charlie Sinoku worship at the altar of Satan himself. I mean,

I'm talking about the persona Satan. I'm talking about Satan. Yeah, talking about gene f and Simmons. Wow. Yeah, An we're not on gal Gun. When's that localization coming? Yeah? There there was. I actually got some something related to a localization for gal Gun, someone saying that that inquiries were made at one point. That wasn't That wasn't the gal Gun people. Yeah that was you please, I just want to understand. I just want to love We've made inquiries and uh, we've tracked it back down to

this address. Yeah, nine twenty one. So yeah, well to wait and see if if well whatever, I think I think Catherine's coming to the US. I think you might be right. I think I would whether they announce it tomorrow or not, regardless of what Atlas says. I think at some point they're gonna say, by the way, we're bringing Catherine out in the US, the reasonable it would be, it seems like it would be poor business not to I you know what, I don't know anything about making

video games, so I can't say that. Well, they've they've already spent the majority of the money it takes to make that game by shipping it in Japan, I guess three. So it's not going to cost them more to localize it into English than it would to develop it out right. So, I mean, no one says they have to make a million copies for the US or anything like. They can keep it a limit, a run to see what demand is and then you know, reprint if people. I think,

I think it's it's really got a fair amount. You know. Maybe it's just we just live in this weird Atlas bubble where people are always harassing us about playing Atlas games and talking over them, right, But it seems like there have been a lot of people talking about Catherine. They're a vocal audience, the Atlas fans, I mean, you know, the persona series is big and this is a game from that team, So I think it's

only natural for people to wat it out here. And it seems, if nothing else, a refreshing change from the typical games that are coming out these days. So it'd be nice to see something like that make it out over here and see how it does. PSP price cut huh. I know you guys are in the market for a PlayStation portable. Yeah, PSP three thousands

are now one twenty nine ninety nine. Those entertainment packs that come with bundled with games and whatever else, I think are one fifty nine or something like that. Huh. What about the Go? Hey? What about the Go? Go? Is sold out online on game Stock, and Amazon does not seem to have a ton of them in stock either. Some people guessing that maybe Sony is not necessarily hitting those factories curtain pushing a bunch of those out into the channel. This is shocking news. So in other news, my

PSP go has just skyrocketing out. Don't want to buy my PSP GOO nine thousand dollars? What? Oh no, don't don't you like need that for you know, research and posterity. Go buy a PSP three thousand for it's going in that box with your Gizmondo and you're all your engages, isn't it. Yeah, eventually it's gonna end up in there with my two Gizmondos and my five engages. You have two Gizmondos. Really wow? That tapwave of

zodiac I got two tapwave of Zodiacs. Jesus I. I mean the got seems like a perfectly reasonable, uh addition of the PSP, like you know, iteration of it, Like what was so bad? I never thought that reasonable? It came out at the wrong time in the life cycle, but

that's everyone who wanted a PSP already had one at that point. So the idea of you know, selling them to new customers who were then going to live in this digital future like aside, well that's what I mean, so like aside from being in the PSP life stream there, Yeah, Like why support the three thousand more than the go unless it's way more expensive to make

because there are tons of the UMDs on storage. Yeah, I think there are tons of UMDs exactly, Well, tons of people already have PSPs at that point, Like, why why would you buy a thing that just lets you redownload mostly games that you already. Probably people have these libraries built up if they can't even play on this new PATI and then they But you know how many people I mean, you know, I ended up with a few

of them, but I'm not the common man. And when it comes to video game hardware, but how many people need multiple PSPs except for the obvious reason that they are shady and they have one PSP that can no longer play regular games. But for new customers, I mean, they poorly supported it. You know, there are relatively big games out there for the PSP that you can't get on that thing at all. On Yeah, they just didn't put them out on the on the store. I guess they just want to

support this digital future. Sure, I love the digital future. I mostly buy downloadable games at this point, but that that that system never offered anything even remotely worthwhile like it for me. For me, it was all foreign factor, Like the more time I spent with it after buying it, Yeah, it's it's it's too thin. I don't like the throw on the buttons, and the dpad is too shout like, it doesn't move enough. It's it's not comfortable to hold. Yeah, not for people with big hands.

Let's just let's just leave it a not for people. It's just not for people. Just be ghost for dogs. Yeah, it's PSP for dogs. PSP for dogs, but dogs don't see in color. Just it's just like the game Boy game gear argument all over again. Sucks for them. Yeah, I don't know what the MGP do out in Japan at the end of this year. Issue. Yeah, it's kind of like, you know, yeah, of course they're going to cut the price on this stuff, and I can't imagine this is gonna be the last price cut we'll see. And

I don't know. I'd be interested to see if this spike's PSP hardware sales, if anyone is out there waiting to get one. It's like, oh well, now that it's only one hundred and thirty bucks, I'm totally gonna go get to I don't think it's gonna be like the PS two thing, where that this thing just keeps selling over time, Like, I don't I don't see much of a spike with that thing. Yeah, that's that's my guess as well. In other handheld news, the three DS was launched in

Japan over the weekend. That's a console now that is out there for people that are in Japan. Well, it's not out there anymore because sell out day one, sell out, hold on. I thought it was like, yeah, we sold most all of them. There might be a few left, you know. I guess there's always might be a few left. But but it sounds like that, doesn't It sounds like it is not easy to

find in Japan right now. Ye a headline once it's not. But I saw, you know, people on Twitter the day it came out over there saying like, yeah, you can still walk down so and so a store and they have some on the shelves. It was sold out day one. Okay, Reggie, whatever you say, whatever, please stop hitting me. Sold out Okay, Yeah, I guess I don't know what they issued. Actually, let me look, I haven't to have a Nintendo's press site open

here in a browser. Wow. Uh. They have nothing about the Japanese launch for the three DS issued in the US saleswise, so I'd have to go dig somewhere else for that. So I don't have that information. But I bet they're very happy. Yeah, I'm sure that you know the number of units that they decided to put out there. Most of the vast majority of them sold. I think it was like four hundred. Yeah, yeah, so it's two forty nine and US dollars there, right, and that's

what it's also coming out as here I thought it was. I thought, yeah, yeah, so did you hit the hit up any contacts for what's going on to the store there. It's not live yet, but the three DS shop is not gonna be live until like May or something like that. Yeah, they were already. You come out and said that that's no downloads at launched, so no interest at launch. Yeah, I'm concerned. Fair.

Yeah, the cartrids just have a tab on them to ostensibly prevent you from cramming them into a DS. Oh so they're the same form factor, just with a tab on it, with a tab to prevent them from going into those So it happens when you file it off, because that's that is exactly when when presented with this fact, that is what I wrote back to Mark, but Donald said, get a get a file. The world needs

to know and did not hear back. So we don't know. That will be a tested segment, right right, then if you put a piece of tape over it, then make the record over it. Yeah, yeah, which is nice with some of these games, Steel Diver, so that's out there. I don't know. I kind of went through when like the full range of emotion in the in the run up, thinking like should we get one so we can cover it? But you know, we don't take any video of it. We can't. Yeah, we can't take any video of

it really. Uh, and you know anyone that was importing them into the US wanted like four hundred and fifty bucks for one outrageous. It's just like I don't really want to, you know, for a system that will probably have in three weeks or something like that, or you know, before you know it's out in them like a month, right, Yeah, I think March March, it's the end of March. Yeah, I think it's like

the twenty something in twenty fourth or something like that. Yeah, so March forty three we will have our chance, and we will have our chance to review the launch lineup of those games. But you know you're right and that it still does present this big question mark for us as like a fairly video focused site, even if we acquired the necessary arcane device yeah to take video, which I suspect it will be available probably at some point and that'll,

you know, solve a lot of the problems. But even if it's not gonna be three D, yeah, you still can't represent the games in like the fullest, truest kill whatever. Yeah, we were actually having conversations about it. You can we do three can we do three D flash player? But the question is can people display it? And in most cases probably not. I have no idea that so you can just put on some cool glasses or something. If it's anything like all the other three D technology out there,

you need a special screen for it that most people don't have. Right, unless we could do like the red blue or whatever whatever, you can play movies on your three davies to your three DS and watch them on that. That's yeah, okay, problem solved. Yeah, so yeah, I don't know, it's still a big question mark for how we'll we'll cover that stuff other than like text reviews and and that sort of stuff, because over the shoulder shots look yeah, well I mean can you can you present those

games like in two D? I mean yeah, yeah, sure. I understand they make the devices that put those games onto a television, right at least so so they're putting out footage of it in some house. Right, so in a pinch, you can only show what the games look like at their core, or even without the three DST Someday we will be able to do that, right, we are not equipped with something that is the size of a Beta Max player. He will be able to do that. Yeah,

it'll probably about that big. Yeah, I've seen it. Yeah, what it exists in a wild bee? Don't know what I do? Man, we need a beige box. Is that what you're saying? Uh? What else? A lot of people talking about this Modern Warfare related website find macarov dot com. People started getting dog tags and mail I actually got mine this week. Some people got there's last week. I think it's just because mailing from Canada or wherever it came from took a little while. So yeah,

people were looking at this site. It's a countdown that's gonna expire sometime on Wednesday, and people were looking at it saying, well, this is obviously the countdown of Modern Warfare. Three. An activision kind of uncharacteristically came out and said this is not us. It wasn't we don't come in a rut speculation. It said, this is a hoax or something we are not announcing a Call of Duty game next week. D. This is not so they say we're not announcing it. They say, we're not announcing a call

to any okay week. So it still could be from Action, Yes, it could be, but probably not. Okay. My favorite running theory for this thing is that it's actually a Battlefield three promotion. So Jeff Kealey uh put forth that it is a Call of Duty uh based fan film huh, and that he was hinted he was sent some sort of still image from it showing a guy dressed up as ghost in a helicopters. Yeah, and and he wrote up a thing about that, so he seems to be pretty firm

about that in terms of it leading to that. So so how long until Activision sues the makers of that film? Any day now? Yeah? Any day now. I don't know it worked for people making a Mortal Kombat fan film, that's true, of a sudden, they're making a whole lot more of those. So well, the difference is that helped renew interest in a

brand that maybe has not. I mean, you know, MK versus DC sold well, but I mean it hasn't exactly like you know, been at peak popularity for a while, and then that simultaneously Modern Warfare is really big and really kind of Activision's big thing. So also Activision is in the business of fiercely protecting their ip. Yeah, but I mean that Mortal Kombat thing came out and was really good. That was like the Lynchpin there was like, holy shit, this is actually a quality thing. Yeah, So I

don't know if they do a good job with it. Maybe, yeah, I don't. I don't know. I'm sure if that dude we're selling his Moral Kombat film to people, it would be a different story. Yeah, yeah, sure. Yeah. Well now it's a web series, so there you go that they are probably gonna sell. So yeah, well as long as he gets his big thumbs up right right right right at that point. Yeah, so a fan movie like a wait in see kind of whatever.

But let's take guesses here real quick. You think this year's game is Modern Warfare? Three? Yes, all right, shouldn't it be? Yes, it'll be a call of Duty game. Okay, way to cop out. All you're asking is will it be called Modern war right? Three? That's yeah, we'll be said in that fiction, I continue that story. There'll be a captain Price. I feel like probably etcetera, etcetera. I think the answer like, we'll pick up where Modern Warfare two left off, ish

like dudes on the run. Since they're since it's invariably going to new people, maybe they'll kind of skirt around those stuff a little bit. I don't know. They don't have to pick up a minute one after that. Yeah, they don't have to be all like, who wasn't it was getting dragged away? Was it? I was you? I think by Price? Wasn't it? If I remember correct? Who wasn't I was getting like there was fireman carried by other because you were pulling a knife out of your stomach.

I remember throwing it into Shepherd's something head Wait was that his name? Yeah? The bad guy. So which major real world political situation do you think they'll play off of for for a level in this game? Seriously, not late Libbya happened too late for them to realistically incorporate it. So maybe Egypt. I think Egypt's probably even too late. I think if it's a Modern Warfare game, I feel like they've gone off the rail so much. It

could be on Mars. Yeah, it's fair. They're finding dwarves Underground, Like, yeah, I would totally play that game. Yes, soap to get underground. Get you all ask the Mars, Yeah, I mean they're behind it all. I bet there is a modern warfare. Three of the question is like who worked on it and what exactly? Valid question? Exactly is the content of it? I think that multi studio story will prove to be true. The Infinity Ward is leading the charge, but backed up by

Raven and Sledgehammer at All, whoever else. I totally believe that this Beachhead Studio or whatever we'll do continued map support or whatever it ends up band. But if that ends up being true, I'd be really curious to see exactly how disparate that game ends up feeling if that many different studios, because sometimes when when there's a lot of studios working on one game like sir An,

elements start feeling really Yeah, that can happen. But you know, at the same time, there are enough different parts to that game that they easily have. You know, these guys are doing multiplayer, these guys are working on the campaigns, are working on d so also they have a very clear blueprint true describes exactly what that game should be. Yeah, you guys are working on the eye rolling into the back of your head physics. It's very

key scene. It's a very huge, two hundred person studio just works on that. Yeah, that's it for news. Okay, sweet, let's talk about new releases. Okay, Fight Nights out this week. Yeah, Beyond Good and Evil HDS out this week. I think Pixel Junk Shooter two is out this week. Yeah, I think you're right and out this week on we Wear bit Trip Flux from Access Games. One of two players rate for everyone eight hundred wee points. This is this is the finale, right,

Yeah, this is it. This is it. Now I can finally go back and make my way through the series. Right, follow this story with Commander Video. So the Bittrip series comes full circle with Bittrip Flux, Commander Video's final adventure. Grab your we remote TM controller and grab get ready for

classic paddle based gameplay. As Commander Video returns to the source. Whether playing in single player or cooperative player mode, you'll be faced with new challenges that will make even the most experienced bit trippers wheats bit trippers in all cats as always enjoy new power ups, including the full screen paddle, new beat types, including avoid beats and the new meta mode, right along with Commander video

as he completes his mission and returns home. A. Yeah, that's even kind of like a flagship we Wear a series that's before the definitely the standout. That's it. We were done. It's kind of wild. It hasn't been coming to a lot of other platforms, but it's like the first one came out on PC and iPad, slash iPhone. They did bittrip beat there, and I would assume that they would think about out doing the rest of them there too, But I don't know. I wonder how well that's done

for them. I don't know. I mean, you know, they've kind of stuck to their guns and kept the Upthhole series as a as a We Wear series. I mean, I have to imagine it was going poorly they would stop making them at a certain point. Right. Developer put out a press release last week about acquiring another studio, these guys, the Gudgeon Games. Yeah, I mean studio they're requiring may have been one guy, sure

for all we acquired this basement we did, I don't know. I guess they do it all right, yea, and the snacks contained within and a couple of demos out on wewear this week. I Know you guys love demos. YEA Gods versus Humans demo version from zalag One player made an e for Everyone comic Mischeff cartoon violence zero we points. The full version is twelve hundred week points. That's twelve bucks twelve dollars. Embody major gods from Scandinavian,

Egyptian, Roman, and Japanese mythologies. As a god, you have enough hour to rule the humans all but the cheeky ones. What Some of them want to enter your domain and have decided to build a tower to confront you. Use your divine powers to bring them down and show them whose boss. Be careful not to hurt them, though you need people to believe in you,

also make sure to befuddle their language. Yeah. The game includes sixty levels for the solo campaign, sixteen playable gods with specific powers, four hysterical bosses to defeat, and sixteen additional challenges for experienced players. I still have no idea what you do in that game, and it sounds like a god game to me. It sounds like that the humans are trying to build a tower to get to you and you have to stop them but without killing them.

But like, what what would you do? It sounds like Godfather too Black Hand addition, where you gotta, you know, beat the guys enough up, enough to shake them down, but not enough to kill them all right. Palm Toss Pro Frat Party Games demo version Spear Palm there's some JV games incorporated. It rated really yeah, like really yeah really, oh man? One to four players. Rated EH alcohol reference, comic mischief, mild language. Really you can get an E rating with an alcohol reference. It

could be a mild reference. This is a demo. The full version is six hundred week points. Born on College Campus is pownk Toss is the ultimate party game favorite. Now pown Toss Pro takes it to the next level with improved graphics and a redesigned throwing system for complete accuracy. Also new to pown Toss Pro is a tournament mode that supports four, eight or sixteen team bracket play. Pown Toss Pro features six regulation tables and the ability to modify simple

house rules. Rocket with a high energy soundtrack and listen to the announcer commenting on your play. Oh man, I know, it just sounds more and more intense rule the table with fireball bonuses for consecutive shots. In speed Pong, up to three challengers can compete at the same time. Speed and strategy are in this fast based game. Jack up your opponents. I don't want to do that. Jack up your opponents by using a slew of power ups

that will slow them down. The first player to sink the last cup wins it all. I wonder if there is any actual alcohol in that game at all, or if it's just like it's if they just got slapped with the alcohol reference because it's it is just a beer palm. Yeah, there could be like a picture of a beer can or something just in the background for ambiance or something, but I don't know. Three DSi ware releases this week

A right Yeah, hit us My Little Restaurant from Cubic Games. It's qu ic capital g all one word, one player, raded e for everyone five hundred and Nintendo DSi points. Welcome to My Little Restaurant. Two. Get in here and turn this place from a small diner into a crowd at eating palace. Help Mikey and Annie seat the guests. What h help Mikey and Annie seat the guests? Have to dash around to do it, collect orders,

deliver meals, and earn money. Every once in a while. Every once in a while, jump into the kitchen and prepare some tasty burgers or perfect sushi. How every once in a while, how cooking mama? Do you think that section? Every once in a while, you won't find a better deal at any other place. The game features five restaurant themes American Diner, Japanese Bar, ancient palace, picnic fun and Space lunch Room. Oh I just want a sandwich. I don't want to have to work here.

Well, then you leave, get get in the Space lunch room out just for a bit. Plus two extra cooking games Burgers for the Chef and Sushi Master Challenge. Enjoy thirty three unique levels and discover extra features and power ups. You gotta get in on that that diner serving people train Yeah, that's that's you know. This might close it out with Space lunch Room. I can't imagine, Like where do you wave from there? I don't know, underwater Martian dwarves. They need to eat too. About a lunch room in

the core of the sun. I'd be a pretty good place. What do they serve? There? Can I get, like, can I get a rare steak in the core of the rare steak and ice cream? Yeah? Okay, Magnetic Joe Summer, I think that's hilarious. Magnetic Joe from Subdued Software one of two players ready for everyone comic missed you five hundred and ten video high points. Take control of Magnetic Joe. All right, everyone's favorite little magnetic sphere. I actually have another preferred magnetic sphere. Let's hear it

all Yeah, that's that's what I thought. Guide him through one hundred exciting mazes filled with spikes, enemies, and other obstacles helped Joe as he pursues his nemesis, doctor Magnieval, who's on his way to conquer the world. All right, he's on his way, Like, oh, I gotta stop picking my dry cleaning work in this diner for a little bit. Yeah, he's enough and cost Mikey and Annie down the space lunch room. And I guess I'm gonna go conquer the world. But first first, for the chef.

The mazes are full of magnets that push and pull Joe in different directions. Your task is too skillfully use their magnetic force to get Joe to the exit unharmed. Use the magnetic force carefully. The levels are filled with surprises and the boss could be lurking. You know, it sounds like they picked the wrong hero. Yeah, go after mister doctor magneevil Magnetic Joe. He's gonna stick to them. Yeah. I guess what. I'm not magnetic.

I'll walk right by everything and kill the Giant Man. There were so many opportunities for ICP references in that press release they never went for and I was really disappointed. That's why it's from subdued software. No better to shay and closing it out for this week's hot new releases, Monster Buster Club. Wow, they're just putting words together out Monster Buster Club Forward current as master Buster Club is one player, It's raided if for every one comic mischief, mild

cartoon violence, eight hundred Nintendo DSi points. Earth is about to be invaded by evil aliens and the first top is single Town. What is that? Where all the bust the monsters that live as long as they're around To save the day. The members of the master Buster Club refuse to let this happen.

Joint Kathy, Danny, Sam and Chris on An exciting adventure based on the hit animated TV series Monster Buster Club and stop these troublemakers from taking over right old Yeah, as you search for the villainis nosada n Osi dd ada. Sure, you and the NBC team will battle aliens outside the school, race your car through the streets of Single Town, solve puzzles, engage in

air battles, and even visit out of space. Yeah. The game features a highly interactive world with exciting gameplay that challenges your speed, timing, and puzzle solving abilities. Discover a wide variety of puzzles and challenges to overcome. Using the Nintendo ds I t M stylists, play as any of the four NBC characters Kathy, Danny, Chris or Sam. It's good that they felt the needs to like bring bring the names back like that one again. That's

that's eight hundred and Nintendo DSi points for Monster Buster Club. If you're a monster Buster, I highly recommend checking Single Town. I got a monster Buster buster? Is that town just like full of spinsters and like weird, like twenty something pickup artists? So all the Busters? Yes makes them feel good? All right? That's it for new releases and now it's time for perhaps some emails, Yes, emails BombCast at GiantBomb dot com or x what is

the email address? What nothing to send your emails to. This first one comes in from Brian in the UK, who wants to know about clacks. In the nineties, it was it was time for clacks. Okay, it is now twenty eleven. What time is it for krick crack? It's time for krick crack. Crack clacks is what you're saying. You can't even crunch. It's mushy. You have to like go out of your way to what

if I pray im all of it in my mouth at one time. It's like the third time I've heard someone say that today, and every time I just all I can do a smile and nod. Yes. I mean how many of those times? Was it Brad's fingers? Yeah, ketchup, polish kitch pain. Sorry, Alex, I don't know what time it is. There is no there's been no follow up for clacks. There is still time

for clocks in twenty eleven. That's the answer, especially in the next version with that blob ball thing which was a story mode and silly Mike from New Hampshire says, Hey you guys. First off, thanks for coming to Pack's East. We haven't gone yet, No guarantees, man, I would like to wear my Whiskey Media member shirt on Friday of Pack's East to start conversation with other Whiskey Media members. But Friday is also the day of your panel.

PCU clearly states that you don't wear the T shirt of the band you were going to see. You don't want to. You don't want to be that guy. I was wondering if the same rule applied to panels. Yes, well I wear two shirts. Yeah, where two shirts you can change? Also, I just don't. I don't think. I almost want to say it's totally fine to do it, because you can't take life lessons from anything that. Jeremy Piven was involved hardily Sheen, on the other hand,

Yeah, yeah, exactly. He would wear nothing but lifeless. He's got life lessons spilling out of him about about the dangers of consuming mercury. Yeah that might be. I guess that is something we could learn from Jeremy Piven. To make an exception, there be the worst person alive. I say, wear the T shirt? Why not, you'll be among friends. Yeah, totally yeah, i'd say where where? Do what you feel? Yeah? Yeah, you feel that morning, you know. Don't make these these

are game time decisions you're talking. Don't plan too far ahead, you overthink, It'll make you crazy. Frank from Texas. I was just playing through Halo Reach recently, and I realized I hate using the assault rifle because I don't care much for the crosshairs. I perform more and prefer more accurate weapons. So the smaller the radical, the better. Do you, guys, any favorite cross hairs or preferences on scopes versus iron sights? So this is

happening, all right, heady question? Like a nice red dot? All it needs a dot or a dot with a circle around the dot. I'm more of a cross guy. I like a three style red cross some of those crossairs. I never needed the circle. Yeah, just the dots. Yeah, the dots fine. Yeah. Also, that was sent from his iPhone case the case you were wondering. He really needed to send that question, like as soon as he thought of it. Wait wait, wait, I gonna get this bomb cast it. What damn it? I'm driving in

my head. This person is also driving. Chris from Tampa, Florida says Hello, Jents. I was thinking about the long history of Duke Nukem Forever and the many people who have worked on the game and it's past. My question to you guys is how long do you think the credits for Duke Will Last? Will be the longest credit sequence in history? Or will Gearbox decide to only put people who recently worked on the game in the credits so they've

actually have a site up. I don't know if you saw this. Gearbox put up a website saying, hey, were you affiliated with the development of Duke Nukem Forever and to make credited in the game. I was hoping that's what you're gonna say. That's amazing, Like they've just like lost the master list at some point. Yeah, it's like, you know, to fill out this form and we'll look into it. George Bissar's basement flooded one time.

We don't, We've got nothing. And it's like, you know, obvious entries for people to actually work on games, and it's like, if you're like Press who has a significant tie to the history of the development of this game, you may qualify. Let us know, or like if you argue with George Brassard, on usenet once. You know, by all means, let's get in the credits. Let's get in the credits for that game. You can put it on our pages. Oh no, is that?

But still even with all those people, would that those credits be any longer than something like rock band beatles like that? That was by far the longest credits he which I ever sat through. That's like half an hour of credits. Are you counting all the photo portion as part of the overall credit time or just the role, the whole role, the whole thing like that from from the moment the credit start. Yeah, it's not how long your credits are though, it's how fast you scroll it. Yeah, that's true.

It's a pause it Boltstorm, you totally pause Warfare? Was it two? They can have a really long, real fast Yeah, it's like here's the activision dudes, peace Uh Calforn, Australia. Do you live in fear that the term dick tits will get used so much that it slingshots around the moon of irony, it becomes hurling back to Earth as a bona fide swear, It's only the game once and not in a particularly good spot. It's not like well used for all, for you know, for it coming out in

those trailers and being the thing that people latched onto. Like, it's not represented in the game as a major thing that to use the word dick way too often though they absolutely do. I don't live in fear. Yeah, I'm not worried about it. It's it's just too stupid. It will not hit the window. Bollstorm is a fine game, but I don't know that six months from now, anybody's gonna be saying much of anything about it. You think it's one of those sort of like good in the instant you play

it, and then kind of forgettable type experiences. I mean, but there are some things in there some people will pick up and run with. You don't think it'll be a franchise. I don't know. I think it'll be a I mean that comes down to how well it's cells. Yeah. I think they could do a Bulletstorm too. Yeah, I think there's definitely room for it. Like design wise, there's definitely stuff they could do. Maybe maybe worst cover I've seen the Xbox version. It's just like, what is

that cover art? Terrible? It's like the bottom of a shoe. Yeah. Yeah, the Box PC version. Is it different? Forget you got a hold of the is it different fronts? The cover art different from the console? No? No, no, it's the same because on on the Xbox, like when you see people play right PC version, it's got the odds. It's the old box And then maybe that's the one that'll switch too when it's not limited edition anymore or something weird like that. But yeah,

I don't know. I feel like they should have stuck with that other box Heart because the big bootprint thing just looks it's awful. It's hard to tell you. Yeah, it's no Borderlands Dean in Woollong Gone Australia. Woong uh with Gearbox stepping in and cleaning up the massive Duke nugam. Which developer can we now charge with completing valves work on Half Live Episode three? How about Valve? Valve needs to be taught a lesson here. If you don't use

it, you lose it a franchise. Sorry, I'm developing. Well I heard Twisted Pixels doing it and it's all FMV. It's amazing. Uh. Yeah, they make a game, it's just they passed it to MGS and now it is a connect game. It's just gonna be Half Live three at this point, right, Like, it's not even there's not even gonna be an episode. It's just Half Life three. Ye has to make it, has to think it has to be. Yeah, maybe I don't think they

should do another episode for Half Life two at this point. I think they should just make Half lif three. Would even be the point? No, they should put out Half three and then put out Half Live three as like a prequel, Like here's what you miss, it's the it's the pre order bonus. You only get that if you buy it from game Stop. Doesn't doesn't making a new Half Life like with a new number on it kind of bring like a new engine requirement and stuff. Yeah, I think at this

point absolutely hope. So, yeah needs an overall so you can't use the same stock weapons and the same art assets and stuff. Yes, as as someone who is weeks away from building a brand new PC, yes it's time. Yes, you would you would play Half lif three on a PC? Imagine it probably half two at some point. Yeah, everything. I mean. Valve is a multiplatform developer. I was thinking in the context of a reviewer and someone who has to play a lot of games, he would probably

have to play that PC version at some point? What if they call it half I have three episode one. I think everybody just what they call it half life episode three? Like, what, it's Barney, it's the original, it's the original engine. Yeah. Uh, let's scrolling through some of these emails here. Oh god, this is even scarier proposition. Jean francois right in to say the current generation of consoles helped the adoption of wide screen

HDTVs. Now that twenty one by nine wide screen televisions are barely starting to hit the market, do you think the next gen consoles will have the option of displaying games and movies in such a ratio? I think it is the next logical step and it would be great if they did. What do you think it's you know, ready for PC PC games to stop supporting sixteen by nine? Also twenty one by nine? Geez, what is that is that?

Like? I don't think I don't think that's film right, cinematic like three millimeter or whatever, like two point three five to one or something. Maybe somebody do the ratio for me. That sounds about right, because eighteen by nine would be ten and a half to four to four and a half I don't know, but I don't want that either. No, that sounds crazy. Is that like a curved wrap around kind of thing or something? Movie screens as I was saying with aspect, But I mean, where would

you put that in the house? What are you gonna watch on it? Nothing? Right, nobody's ever gonna make see games now. I guess maybe that's what people said with four by three, but I don't know. It was a long time before you got a sixteen by nine television at home. Yeah, uh yeah, I don't know. Uh, it's gonna come more of these in here. Nick from North Carolina, I was wondering, who do you think bullet storms kind of terrible attitude and sense of humor comes from

People Can Fly or Epic? All the large scale space marine but cheese. Most stuff seems distinctly epic, and the over the top weapons and enemy design is distinctly PCF. But the source of all the edgy humor in betweens is still a mystery to me. What do you guys think? I work with the theory that it started with people can Fly and Epic. Just egg them the hell on, like, no, make it crazier, make it crazy. My understanding is that the original scripts was out of PCF and had way

more cursing in it. Yeah, almost like that. That canan Lynch style thing of dudes who don't necessarily speak a ton of English, right getting their English on and you fuck stick you in the mouth to you. I have to say, I think she is actually a decent character. Yeah, I like. I like all the weird like like warring for control between his human brain and the computer stuff, and some of the like have they fade the they fade, like the weird robot distortion on his voice in and out.

Yeah, that's kind of neat. It is pretty cool, And that's gonna do for emails and subsequently that's gonna do it for this installment episode addition of the Giant Podcast. How do you guys feel about that? I'm pretty excited. I give it. That just means that that we're in gd SE. Yeah, so g dc uh, it's it's upon us. We got some appointments lined up. We're going to see more Batman, hopefully get an interview

of that. You think it is playable in some form at there. I don't know that they're gonna necessarily let us play it, but we will be closer to We'll be closer to the screen and they I guess we will see a little bit more of it than we did at the Microsoft thing, and they're gonna issue some video we're not gonna be We're not gonna be taking our own video of that game. We're also going to see Moral Combat again. It sounds like we're gonna sit down with Ed Boone and we talk to him

a little bit as well. So look for that. What else Twisted Metal Metals, Infamous two still in the books. Infamous two is tomorrow, Okay today? Sometimes Jesus, what do you figure out who's going to stuff? Because like there's the All Day EA thing where they're gonna be showing Kingdoms of Bamalore, reckoning Rich Gallups, Kingdom of the Sole Developer on that uh, and then there's that so many stuff, so I don't know. We need

to figure out Charted three. Hopefully Ryan will get unsick at some point because I think we're going to need everybody in here for this, especially if you're getting sick. Yeah, and I'm in this room breathing your air, and I don't I can't tell if if me being so hot right now is me getting sick or just this room being hot. It's pretty hot in here. It's not just you. This week sucks. Yeah, god damn well, I'm gonna do the poker tournament to Marrows sality fun. Yeah, the charity

poker tournament. Yeah, I bought in for it. Yeah. Battlefield three, Yeah, there's a Battlefield three event. They're not letting people play that there. We know that much Infamous two and Charted three. Yeah, your own that seems like kind of a big thing. The resistance stuff going there is resistance to your own. Yeah, Okay, we might see Dead Island at some point. Maybe I would like to see Dead Island possibly coming full circle for me three two thousand and six. I would like to see it.

Yeah, tbd. Yeah, So they're definitely gonna be games here. It's it's the appointments are such that I don't know that we'll make it to the any of the talks. Kind of a bummer. There's some stuff worth seeing. There was exactly there was a post mortem on super meat Boy today. Oh really love Yeah, uh so, yeah, you're expect more from us. We're gonna be trying to rope people back here for some podcasts, but I'm not sure, you know, it's like the kind of usual suspects

seems like they didn't A lot of them didn't come into town. So we'll be out there talking to talk, seeing who we can drag back to our bar and uh, you know, beat information out of them and see we make something happen. But I don't know, keep checking out the site. Also coming up this week details on our upcoming world tour. So what details on our upcoming world tours? What we're coming to your continent? Oh?

No, coming to where you live? If if certain things have you know, it's like you're gonna have an opportunity to rally your homeland troops and find a way to get us onto your continent, assuming you live on one of the three commons. Sweet that we are set up to go to good odds. Yeah, it's pretty good. Yeah, it's pretty good. Looking at the membership numbers and seeing or the traffic numbers and seeing where people come from.

What we're looking at hitting all the major spots Antarctica hope that big. Yeah, So we'll be looking to come to you and bring some magic. I don't know what we bring American beer t shirts and funnions bringing bud light to your town. Not exactly, Charlie Sheen. Now, I don't know if magic is what we're peddling, but I am on a drug called Charlie Sheen. And your face hasn't melted off, not yet, not yet. But the lab's get exploding day now and you need to take it down and

move it to a different motel. I should probably get on that. So let's uh call it a show no t and this week no TNT, this week Happy Hour, this week on Friday for some form immediate members, you'll be sure to roll through on Friday and see how the see how that goes, see what the week has done to us. Yeah, he's left standing, Yeah, exactly exactly. It's just gonna be Drew by himself. Yep. Now he'll be down, he'll be he'll be whatever. He is,

a bulletproof. It's true. Drew went going to Packs East. Yeah left, he'll be running and shooting the cost the weekend and that's the week after. So yeah, that's of course if you're going to Pack East. We've got a panel Friday night at Packs East. Get ready Boston, Yeah, and uhez think about attending the rock band Night on Thursday in Boston as well. Maybe some stuff will happen, Maybe we'll be there, magic again, more magic, magic, spreading this magic around. That's it. We're gonna

be f eighteens dropping ordinance on the ground in Boston. Poetry and our fingers, tigers and our blood goddesses, goddesses exactly see you next week or tomorrow or something whenever this next podcast happened. I don't even know anymore, h