@GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six Button Samurai are once again reunited in the desert after five years! And it’s a perfect moment to recap 2023, and what represents a whole catalog of wins, losses, and unfinished games JJJ and Eddy will still be working on long in 2024. Don’t miss this very special OGIH, recorded live from a hidden fortress on the outskirts of Tucson. ★ Support this podcast on Patreon ★
@GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six Button Samurai talk The Fame, er, Game Awards, and how a lack of understanding around who the audience for this show, and what it’s function is, ties directly into the not-surprising death of E3. We also go deep into the fantasy zone of Sega’s recent quintuple franchise revival trailer, trying to make sense of the glimmers of joy we caught from footage of brand-new Crazy Taxi, Golden Axe, Jet Set Radio, Shinobi, and Streets of Rage games. Last but not least, we pi...
The Six Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) are back, and so is The Big Question, albeit it in evolved form, as they compare and contrast their individually-compiled lists of Five Shockingly Superior Video Game Sequels. Plus, our cross-Pacific heroes discuss what they’re playing now and next, some notable moments of fan-translation (including the awesome news about an English translation for Samurai Shodown RPG for Neo-Geo CD) and Capcom continuing to be somewhat shady with their approach to ...
With the news of Nintendo’s new movie project, that being a live-action Zelda feature, @GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six Button Samurai ponder just how high the bar would be for a franchise and a main character that fans hold ridiculously close to their hearts. Would Link speak? It might make for the biggest Internet kerfuffle among Nintendo fans since… well, the last one. Plus, we go in on why consoles have given the heave-ho to The Platform Formerly known as Twitter, and other dirty deeds like M...
It’s our second anniversary at Oh God It Hz! And our death-defying hosts, @GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six Button Samurai are once again fearlessly diving headlong into the corporate shark-infested waters that is the video game industry in 2023. We discuss the departure of Unity’s CEO, the looming (THANK GOD) finality of the ActBlizz merger, and some seemingly cocky prices hikes from Sony. But it ends on a high note, as we discuss the first game we’ve ever been gifted access to, that being Retro ...
As Halloween draws near, we’re thinking about our favorite games that feature ghouls and ghosts and bats and whip-toting vampire killers, zombies, and anything else SPOOKY! From Castlevania to Sweet Home, from Eternal Darkness to the Resident Evil 4 remake, and everything in-between across decades of horror-inspired video games. (Big bonus points if you can remember CHILLER!) We’ve got an all-star Ruminations Radio Network panel to dip into their personal favorites, what we’d love to see come ba...
The Six Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) pick apart a somewhat heavy week of developments in the game industry, particularly the mess surrounding Unity’s announcement of a confusing and some would say outright greedy initiative called the Unity Runtime Fee, which had many indie developers and industry watchers hot under the collar. We also discussed the massively Mario-centric Nintendo Direct that dropped, and stopped to ponder the retro joys of GameCenter CX, which is approaching its 20th...
Summer is turning into fall, and @GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six Button Samurai pick apart Sony’s proposed price hikes for their online service tiers, inviting outline outbursts from many disgruntled gamers given the steep climb of +35%. But it isn’t all teeth-gnashing, as we dissect the Nintendo Direct on Super Mario Bros. Wonder that has us thinking about ‘shrooms, and Sea of Stars, which has us jonesing for another stellar Yasunori Mitsuda soundtrack. We also chat about new developments in re...
As it had been some time since The Six Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) had locked in for a ‘proper’ OGIH episode, we batted around a variety of topics in retrogaming. We focus on the new Gold Master Series from Digital Eclipse and The Making of Karateka, and how it addresses preservation of both the game in its various iterations as well as collecting the history of the people around a given project, and how this differs from the approach in M2’s recent shmup releases, which seem more int...
With successful revival efforts behind Streets of Rage and TMNT having done well commercially and critically, and more making their way out like Double Dragon Gaiden: Rise of the Dragons, it was time for The Six Button Samurai, @GameAgentET (OGiH) and special guest @Hoptimus (RFC) to discuss their love of the genre and how it influences their view of the new breed of beat-em-ups on the market. We each take a crack at calling out the first games that made us fall in love with the form, what our a...
The Six Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) walk the dark streets of shattered glass and unhappy gamers who have invested themselves too deeply into rigid definitions of game franchises, or worse yet, taken sides in the Console Wars, which are grinding Skynet-like into their forties. But it isn’t all dystopia, as they find some fun stuff they remain invested in and have some hot news from the latest Nintendo Direct to pop off about. Play it, don’t say it, and take a trip with Eddy and JJJ on ...
GameAgentET and The Six Button Samurai have their hands FULL with games like Zelda: TotK and SF6 in the mix, so we brought aboard Hoptimus from Retro Futurist Culture to help us sort through the madness of the rash of not-E3 news and new game announcements. We also went in deep on TotK and Street Fighter 6 specifically, with Eddy having spent the most time with Zelda and JJJ + Hop definitely focused on picking up those wild Drive system mechanics in Capcom’s powerfully revitalized fighting franc...
Join The Six-Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) as we get on our bikes and ride into a freewheeling convo that centers on our experiences thus far with The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and the Street Fighter VI open beta. Turns out neither of your hosts have spent as much time as we’d like with these monstrous, soon-to-be time devouring titles, and we’re striving to figure this out in real-time. We also talk about the Legend of Zelda series writ-large, and address some corners of lo...
@GameAgentET (OGiH) is joined by The Six-Button Samurai and special guest @Hoptimus (RFC) as they look to an otherwise hopeful summer with big games like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and Street Fighter VI. We also discuss news about a brand-new Double Dragon game and the joys of the Super Mario Bros. Movie. The big rants at the end have everything to do with Microsoft’s current woes regarding Xbox, from the Act/Blizz merger in limbo to the pained state of original Xbox exclusives mo...
The Six-Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) are back after a month-long hiatus, but there’s A LOT to talk about, between some serious questions being asked at Microsoft about the future of Xbox, The Super Mario Bros. Movie pulling in a BILLION dollars (and what this might mean for seeing other Nintendo franchises materialize at the box office), plus observations on what is looking to be an incredible summer of gaming between brand-new entries in the Street Fighter, Final Fantasy, and The Lege...
@GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six Button Samurai are joined by the RetroFuturist himself, @Hoptimus (RFC) as the mighty remaster of Metroid Prime for Switch takes center stage, mutating into a heavy discussion centering on the games of 2001-2005, an era in which there was also a very heated console race between Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo. But unlike now, there was a lot of fear that 2D pixel art would disappear altogether, a fact that left many Metroid fans a bit suspicious (if not outright hos...
On this latest episode, JJJ and @GameAgentET (OGiH) discuss the ongoing mess that is the Microsoft + Activision merger, and how the recent announcement regarding Call of Duty games for Nintendo consoles is one of the strangest in recent memory given the sheer size of the corporate gods involved with so few actual players potentially interested in the news. We also broach the subject of remakes, one apparently done incredibly well, with the other another bit of a retro mess from Bamco. Plus we fi...
The latest Nintendo Direct dropped some delightful bombshells, which Game Agent ET and The Six-Button Samurai are happy to dive into, from Game Boy and GBA support on Nintendo Switch Online to a variety of new announcements, not the least of which was the final trailer for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and the long-awaited and rumored Metroid Prime: Remastered! Come and get a handle on this GameCube-heavy episode as we party like it’s 2003 on an unexpected episode of OH GOD IT HZ! h...
The Six-Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) are back after Eddy got the 'rona, but you wouldn't know he couldn't talk two weeks ago as they tear into subjects like the Xbox exclusive HI-FI RUSH, the secret origin of the Pac-Man CE demake they've been simping over for months, and what can happen when video games inspire real-life choices. It's all that and an impossible Double Dragon elbow shot to the FACE in this latest episode of OH GOD IT HZ! https://linktr.ee/ohgodithz www.RuminationsRadio...
@GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six-Button Samurai wrestle with the arrival of 2023, and what it means to be a gamer these days. They discuss some of their recent holiday acquisitions, such as Atari 50, Kirby & The Forgotten Land, and some of the more promising games already shining brightly with potential on this fresh calendar. Can a gamer learn some new tricks to address a swelling backlog and actually finish something? We ponder this and so much more on the latest episode of OH GOD IT Hz! ht...
The Six-Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) are joined by their blood brother in gaming @Hoptimus (RFC) to gnaw what's left on the ragged soup bone that was the year of gaming in 2022. Hop finally got to experience the majesty of the Bioshock Trilogy, Eddy is still freaking out over the excellence that is the 8-bit Pac-Man CE demake, and JJJ blows his ocarina for the critically-beloved Tunic. So much love, a rapid-fire airing of grievances, and some shiny nuggets of hope (cough, STREET FIGHTE...
A Salty Sack of Random Cheers. Fears, and Tears. @GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six Button Samurai stage a miniature Festivus over issues like controller drift and Nintendo's seeming absence in really addressing those matters, but it isn't entirely grumpy, as they also discuss joyful matters like the Atari's 50th anniversary and newly-released retro collection, Street Fighter's 35th anniversary and poppin' art show in Osaka, and the unrelenting thrills offered by M2's expert 8-bit demake of Pac-Man...
The Six Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) are finally back, embracing a one-hour format and keeping it loose as they go on an unplanned but deeply felt ramble about the Disney+ series Andor before discussing Bayonetta 3 and what might be next for fan-favorite Platinum Games. We also pay tribute to a new inductee into our Oh God Tier, that being the legendary Sega artist/producer/designer Rieko Kodama. And don’t miss our first ‘Oh God Itz Good’ game recommendation on this BRAND NEW episode o...
GameAgentET and The Six Button Samurai chew on the state of the gaming industry with PS5 price hikes afoot on the eve of a weirdly quiet fall for releases, the expected other shoe dropping from 2-1/2 years of pandemic uncertainty making an impact on developers worldwide. But even with Eddy’s thumb on the mend, there’s still some gaming fun to be had for our intrepid trans-Pacific duo. Last but not least, they discuss the games that generated the biggest emotional wallop for them. Join the Oh God...
With our beloved cohost @GameAgentET (OGiH) still recovering from his thumb surgery and unable to play much, we shift gears and ditch the usual segments, opting for an easy-breezy catchup that ultimately winds towards our observations around EVO and related announcements involving Street Fighter VI, not to mention an inkling or two about Splatoon 3. The Six-Button Samurai hasn’t been playing a lot, but has been obsessive over a lesser-known MegaDrive shooter called Slap Fight MD. (Which sounds l...
The shmup, which used to be simply known as a shooter, is one of the oldest genres in gaming. The genre was permanently established when Taito's Space Invaders rocked arcades in Japan, establishing a legacy that would carry on throughout the entirety of video game history. @Hoptimus (RFC) of the Retro Futurist Podcast joins @GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six Button Samurai for a wild and woolly trip through the shmup's evolution during the 8/16/32-bit age, stopping to pay respects to a vast galaxy ...
We’re past the fusillade of non-E3 announcements, but E3 itself is now making news with a new organizer, ReedPop, and what looks to be a move towards much more of a fan-driven event. ET and JJJ also discuss the Bayo 3 release date and Naive Angel mode details, make time to shit on NFTs *again^, and take a really hard detour with an unexpected random sidebar about Strider. All this, plus more shmup talk and the origin of ‘Tugboat’ on a ‘mild-stone’ episode of OH GOD IT Hz! https://linktr.ee/ohgod...
JJJ and @GameAgentET (OGiH) navigate an urgent medical happening in ET's life, but then resume their usual commentary on the very strange collision between gaming, developers, and a social media audience that sometimes seems hellbent for solutions in the least effective way. All this, and a whole lotta love for Capcom Fighting Collection. Remember the opening scene from Rashomon where the monk is openly asking how/why humanity got this broken? This episode feels a little like that, so if you're ...
@GameAgentET (OGiH) and The Six-Button Samurai observe another summer without a massive, central traditional media gathering ala E3, but no less festooned with a variety of gaming news pertaining to the console realm. Is this end-of-days anarchy, or something better? Regardless of that argument, our cross-Pacific heroes chatter excitedly about the ever-more promising Street Fighter VI, whether or not we're getting a proper Nintendo Direct in June, and about the less-than-ideal arrival of a retro...
Six-Button Samurai and @GameAgentET (OGiH) surf through a riptide of gaming currents, such as the sudden seeming dearth of Xbox titles for fall 2022 in the wake of Bethesda's Starfield and Redfall being delayed, a class-action lawsuit being filed against retrogaming inflationists Wata Games, and some fantastic new wrinkles for the MiSTer. And while Eddy has been spending more time watching streaming TV given his savage workload, JJJ has been playing all kinds of games, including (gasp) a modern ...
