Level 32 - Bond, James Bond

Welcome to Remember 64. We're this week. We're playing. Do I even have to tell you? Welcome to the show everyone. This is a very special episode. Yes, that's right, we have booted up Goldeneye 007 for the Nintendo 64, likely one of the most influential games of the generation of the 90s, and, some could argue of gaming in general. Jiggy look back is in the

cohosting chair once again. But to be honest, it's not myself or Jiggy that make this episode as special as we think it is. It's because we have Elise Nor, associate professor at Regis University and the person that has written the book on Goldeneye 007. She is the author of Goldeneye 007 from Boss Fight Books.

According to the website, it says quote through extensive interviews with Goldeneye creators, writer and scholar Elise Nora traces the story of how this unlikely licensed game reinvigorated A franchise and genre. Learn all the stories behind how this iconic title was developed and why Goldeneye Double O Seven has continued to kick The Living Daylights out of every other Bond game since. And because of all this, we're going to be doing something a

little bit different. Yes, I usually intro the show just like I'm doing now, but I'm not going to go through the history of Goldeneye and its development. We have a lease with us if anyone knows anything about Goldeneye and the development of it, she is the perfect, perfect person throughout this book, which myself and Jiggy read.

Highly recommend it by the way. Never mind, just this podcast, but it's something that is definitely worth reading, you know, She spoke to a lot of the people that created this game at Rare, and it's just such an extensive look at what this game means and how it was created. So instead of taking the time and listening to me talk for a few minutes, we're going to bring a lease in in just a moment.

And we're going to have a full on discussion about the game, its development, how it relates to the movie, how it relates to the franchise, what it means for society, what it meant then, what it means now. Oh, we just have a whole lot to go through. So it's time to cover one of the biggest games of the Nintendo 64 and the 90s. Goldeneye 007, Thank you very much for listening to Remember 64, a proud member of the Tokyo Beats Podcast network.

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Goldeneye. Load a rumble pack and see how it feels when 007 meets N64? Well, we usually have a pretty long spiel at the beginning of our episodes. I usually talk everyone's ear off with the, you know, development of these games and how were they, how they were created and everything. But instead, this time we were lucky enough to have, I would say, an expert on the show.

I would say if there's anybody to talk about Goldeneye 007 on this console, it's going to be Elise Snore, the author of the Boss books. Book about Goldeneye, about its development, about everything around Goldeneye. Elise, welcome to the show. Thanks so much for having me. It's great to be with y'all I am.

I'm so excited because not only is Goldeneye obviously a very big game when it comes to the N64 and really just the 90s and this generation of games, but to be able to talk about someone who did so much work in order to make this book and talk to so many people that helped develop it and everything, it's it's really exciting. Jiggy man. Like I don't know I I can go for the next like 10 minutes be like I'm excited, but I'm assuming we're we're in the same button.

Yes, absolutely. And I'm here, by the way. Yes. And you're here. So at least let's, let's talk a little bit about, I'm going to ask you about you about how you came to writing a book like this because we were sort of, you know, joking before we hit record that, you know, me and Jiggy are experts at the N64 games, which I think we're just going to own it. We're going to run with it. But we're giving you. Yeah, exactly. We're giving you the expert title on on Goldeneye, double the seven.

And you know, a lot of people can sit here and be like I played this game or any other game over and over and over as a kid. But it's different when you've dug into the history and all that. But but how do you get to even get to this point of writing a book like this? Well, so I've always been a big fan of games. I I played my first game before I could read or write. My dad sat me down in front of Super Mario Brothers Three and Doom and Mist and Day of the

Tentacle when I was tiny. So I grew up with games. I've always loved games. Can I stop you right there to ask, Yeah, please, what was your first video game? It was Super Mario 3. It was Super Mario. What a glorious way to start. Sonic the Hedgehog. Sonic the Hedgehog. Excellent. Also excellent. Also excellent. If we're all sharing your mind. Yeah, mine is not a standout title because I didn't get a console.

I mean the first one that I think I owned and I played rather than like watching someone play, let's say Super Mario Three or something like that, was this like old F1 racing game that was on our PC that you would just control with the arrow keys or in maybe was indie probably. Arrow keys, Yeah, that's. Amazing the magic controlling a game with arrow keys like forward was gas and the back button was break. Like it was that kind of thing.

Literally, you just used for keys and it almost looked like this, you know, wire frame representation of the cars. And he's only sat in the seat. I think, honestly, I think it's just called like Indy 500, like that's all it's called. I don't know how we had it because my parents do not play games, never have. So I don't know where it came from. Maybe it was just preinstalled on whatever, you know, little PC we had.

I don't know, whatever. That's the first one I remember that I actually sat there and played is probably that. Yeah. Yeah. Incredible. Yeah, incredible. Interrupting. I just was really curious. Yeah, I love it. Please, please interrupt. So I just, I always loved games. I went to college and studied creative writing in journalism. I became a English professor. I was living up in Alaska, starting to get into my, like, you know, late 20s, feeling a little nostalgic about the games

I grew up playing. And I saw a call from boss fight books for proposals about video game, for books about video games. They release, you know, one like standalone titles about individual games. And I was thinking, like, you know, mostly I write poetry, but it would be really fun to apply those journalism skills, to write a book that says documentary work and memoir work combined on a video game. So I wrote a book about Super Mario Three, since that was my original favorite game of all

time. And then a few years later I was got the itch again to do some more video game writing and I pitched the editor gave a book about Goldeneye. So sort of drawing together my video game fandom, my love of writing, memoir and creative work and also wanting to put those those journalism skills to get use and and keep those fresh with interviews and research and documentary style writing. That's that's awesome. I will say too.

I I don't know if you have any involvement of any of the authors have any involvement in like what even like the books look like. But the Super Mario Brothers 31 literally has a real raccoon just on the front of it, which is just fantastic. And then the artistry that kind of goes into the I guess there's there's two editions of the Goldeneye one there's a regular then there's a deluxe and the the look of them are both very cool.

Like it's it's very simple art. But I just want to point out that if anyone looks it up, I find them very charming. All three of those, so. Oh, thanks. Yeah, they did. A pretty cool job with that too. Sort of. I think the first few seasons that he doesn't in seasons gave during the endor of Boss. First few seasons of Boss by books. The covers all have a real life representation of something that's you know, graphically rendered in the game. So in my case for Mario it's the raccoon.

But there are plenty of other really great and hilarious examples of sort of like real life animals or objects on those covers. And lately he's been going for a more stylized, which I think looks equally great, sort of more more graphical looking art. And in the case of the hardcover of my book, something that was hand drawn by our wonderful cover designer. Yeah, it's it's it's really

cool. Yes. Like even like the the real life ones, like the Resident Evil ones as a typewriter, like that's great. I love. Yeah, yeah, like that. That's really fine. Like a really old school typewriter, too. Like, it looks like it's from like the 30s or something. So that's awesome. The paperback. I should just, I should just say in case people can't see it, the paperback of Goldeneye. I just think it's the funniest thing. It's it's a guy in a boulder hat with his back to you and a

little. Like a little crosshairs right above his head. So it's supposed to be odd job, you know? He's like just just too short for yours. So that just cracked me up that we were able to do that. I was like, this. This is everything. I always agree. They definitely know what. They're doing when you know you know, right? Like, you know, you know, OK, so let's, let's talk a little bit. Let's talk about the game that you mentioned. Obviously you've been playing

games your whole life. Let's talk about like the 64. You know, for certain consoles kind of hit people at a certain age and they just sort of stick with them, right. And the 64 has this great like, you know, nostalgic feel of getting people together from. I would say that the the standout games unless it's, you know, Zelda or even Mario 64, like yeah, you could swap controllers and all that kind of

stuff. But you know, sitting down, playing Mario Party, sitting down, playing this game, what was your experience with the with the 64 as you as you grew up? It came out when I was 9, and this was a perfect age because I had grown up on the NES and Super NES and fallen in love with games like Mario and Donkey Kong, and I loved adventure games and platforming games.

And so when the N64 came out, I was sort of maturing into the those more complicated games like Mario 64, you know, Star Fox 64, Shadows of the Empire and of course Goldeneye. And then going into, you know, middle school and high school and then even on to college, it was just the perfect golden eye. In particular, the perfect game to to play with your friends, to play at sleepovers. Of course, we've all had these wonderful experiences of playing with our best friends and our

siblings. In my case, my my college boyfriend and his roommate and my roommate. It was just such a great party game and I think the N64 in general, you know, really facilitated that. We also played a lot of Mario Kart, a lot of Super Smash Brothers, and it's just. You know, actually I have some friends from out of town from from North Carolina right now in my house. And last night the four of us were all in our like 30s and 40s, gathered around my old N64.

Sitting on the floor. And played Goldeneye slappers only and we were just laughing so hard. My wife like one, she's never beat a video game in her life and she beat all of us and slappers only. So I do think the N64 is you know that as as you talk about on your show a lot is just it's the ultimate like party friendship. OK. Just just going off that, so multiplayer, were you good? No, OK, OK. No, absolutely. Not like to ask because I suck. No, it's very hard.

I think that I was always the one, sort of like launching grenades and then blowing myself up by them or walking into my own minds. I was like, decent. Like I would never be last, but I would definitely never be first. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's true for. That's true for all the games. I'd always try to gear multiplayer things back to Smash Bros because it could dominate in Smash Bros, but. Yeah, you know, we gotta, you gotta, you gotta have variety. But I'd like to win.

Totally. I mean I've never been a super I I talk about this in the Super Mario book, but like I've never been a super competitive person around. Like beating other people. Like that's never been a thing that gives me a lot of a lot of joy. I am very self competitive. So anything that's going to be like those timed missions in Goldeneye or the the single player campaign, like wanting to level up past agent to double O agent or you know double 007 and all those extra objectives.

Like I like long distance running and not sports with balls and points. Like it's always just kind of like about endurance and completion for me. So I did. I did really love the single player campaign too. Yeah, I mean, and that's the thing. And he's just, it's some of the notes that I that I wrote down as I was reading the book to where it really is the single player is what we'll get more into. We'll probably be jumping all over this game and stuff because there's just so much to talk

about. And like I said, we you're here, so we're going to talk about everything we can. The single player is is something that for whatever reason, when I was saying like even telling myself when I started the show, that you know, when we get to gold and I have this distinct feeling that I'm going to have this nostalgia more for the single player than I do even for the multiplayer.

Not that obviously everybody seemed around this time to to be playing multiplayer on this, whether it's 2-3 or four people. But the sort of create your own fun type of thing that is like a really big thing you can do in open world games now or even other FPS games that have come out since then. Like Halo is a prime example of games like that, I think because of the mechanics. And this is one of those games.

But it's clear that in the book, as I'm as you're you know, writing about all the experiences and how these guys made this game and how this, how Rare made the game, that's exactly what they wanted. In some ways I think I grew up thinking like, oh, we're breaking the game quote UN quote breaking the game. Or oh, we're we're just messing around with the mechanics. And they didn't really want us to do that with the Minds or they don't really want us to do that with the Rockets or whatever.

But that is what they wanted. And they it seems like they just left things in there to have fun with. And they left things in there that were goofy, like things that we thought were funny, they thought were funny, and that's why they were in there. And I love that. Absolutely, absolutely. They were so motivated by fun, I mean, it was 8 guys, only two of whom had ever worked on a game before. So they were all these rookies.

Crazy. They were just going based on what they loved and they were playing games with each other the whole time. They were playing Super Bomberman and Doom and so they they lived and really worked in an environment of play all the time and they play tested everything with each other just to see if it was fun so.

That really comes through and they talk about how there are these sandbox elements of Goldeneye, that some of them are intentional, some of them are unintentional messiness they left in. Whether it's sort of like you know little things that you just noticed that are little Easter eggs that are super fun or the ability to like shoot a soldiers hat off of his head and they the hats can start stacking and you can do weird things and juggle hats and that.

Like the the kind of multiple routes through a level, multiple ways to beat a level. All that kind of like low fi, open world concept was super influential on the game, being as fun to choose your own path as it was. Yeah. One of the things that I remembered as I was reading was, and as I picked up the game again was everything explodes. Like everything. Yeah, everything. Everything. Everything. That's the. Chair. You should have chairs.

Yeah, yeah. It's just, oh, OK, you know, Yeah. And some stuff that makes sense, makes sense. So sure, the computer's. Going to be right. You want to know what I picked up right away? I was like, oh, I remember this drawing pictures on the wall with the bullet holes. Yeah, and I was like, you can write your name. Yeah, I wasn't writing my name. I definitely drew a penis. And it definitely was like a thing that like immediately. I'm like just. You have to do it.

It was like all this takes me back. You absolutely have to, Yeah. Yeah, it should have been like a cheat code or so. It could have got you, could have got you one of the cheats. It gives you a special gun. That would be funny. Remember the prison level that you start in, There's definitely like urine stains on the wall. You can see it like they've drawn that into the art and they're very. They were very prurient

themselves. There's quite a few things in there that are like naughty schoolboy humor as they call it. Like the DD the DD Destovi pistol was named after double D bra size slappers. Only is actually slapper is a reference to prostitutes. It's a British slang for prostitutes. And then that line where Moneypenny in the pre mission briefing says she says like. Be careful with that chopper, James. And she's she's referring to the helicopter.

I never got that joke as a kid, but it's because I guess an England chopper is slang for penis. Yeah, I I think so. They had. I rewatched the movie. I think there's a line very similar to that because they sort of do a back and forth in the one scene that they're together. There's something similar to that. Yeah, but but that's the other thing too, right?

It's very easy as a kid to just skip over those, like mission briefings, but they're written really clever, you know, like there's there's some stuff like that I easily would have missed. I don't know, chopper. I knew a chopper was a helicopter. That's what I Even now. Honestly, until until I read that in your book, I never would have. Made It's very British. I mean, I didn't, I didn't get it. But yeah, they put all kinds of really, really silly little

things like that in there. And they a lot of the time they were literally they told me in interviews just trying to see what they could get away with. And sometimes, and sometimes, like in the case of David Doke, including himself as a character in the game, they were told no, The developers told them, or even just the inclusion of a multiplayer option, that their bosses at Rare said absolutely not, you may not do this, and then they just did it anyway. I love that.

So just like looking at the beginning of your book, talking about the history of Rare, the history of the game, I love that they didn't want to talk to James Bond. They were like, no, no, we don't want to do a license game. And I'm like, in my mind, I'm like, that's instant money grab cuz you get auto recognition. But they were like, no, it's not original, like it's not something we wanna mess with. And I'm like, that's so interesting to me. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I think they were.

It was rare, kind of at the height of their powers. And they were getting cocky and they were for good reason. They were making beautiful games and they were really, really interested in aiming high and only taking on really high prestige projects. And so they, you know, that's how that's how I end up giving the project to these rookies, because they were like, what? I guess this will just be something for the new guys to cut their teeth on.

It's not gonna matter. It's a it's a movie license game. That's like a kiss of death as far as quality. Those games are always so bad. And still, and honestly, that's still a stain that that sticks around, right? In a way, yeah. It really doesn't. For it's not, I don't think it's as evident as maybe it used to be, but fair enough. I mean, I feel like I would question it too.

We say this and then I just like I remember that stigma of movie tie in games, and I remember there were a lot of them. But I also remember a lot of good ones that were so much fun. Spiderman Two comes to my head. I was like that game was so much fun. I was going to bring that one up, yeah. I like there were a couple Matrix games that were really fun.

Yeah, there was just like, it wasn't it, You know, it's a stigma because the bad ones that were bad were really bad, But there were gems out there, like, you ever played The Incredibles. I know that that's a little more Disney Pixar. Slaps. I did play a Peppa Pig on the Xbox with my 4 year old the other day and it did not slap. It did not slap for me, but it slapped for her and that's what matters. Yeah, that matters. When that Next up is apparently a Bluey game too.

And Bluey's, you know, that's great. So that that could be kind of cool. Bluey's fun. I don't even have kids, and I've watched a few episodes of my officials, which is fabulous. Blue is a show for any age. I'm coming. Really. Yeah. I love that game. The bite the. Bite size episodes, everything. It's great. It's actually so sweet. So sweet. Also to the in the development of everything to which I didn't know this at all. So I was just like checking off

boxes. I've learned something today. You know one of those things every time I got to a new couple pages of your book, I was like, I didn't know that. I didn't know that I have all these like how? Great, this is amazing that this was this was originally. Similar to what Virtuo Cop was, which was, which is constantly brought up in the development that this was an on rails shooter at first, which I had no idea.

I guess it makes sense based on technology and time and everything, but like I just can't even imagine that being this game or even a game like that on the 64 at that time. It feels like it was like that for so long in development too, which is so crazy to me. Totally. Yeah, it was real. This was the one thing about the development process that I got really mixed answers from the guys about. They really had trouble remembering when it came off the rails.

Some of them said we always wanted to put it off the rails and others said, you know, we didn't decide for sure that we're gonna take it off the rails until after Super Mario 64 came out and we saw how fun and open world was on the N64. I mean, part of the problem is they didn't have an N64. For the vast majority of the development process. They didn't have the controller. They didn't know it was

possible. They didn't know what the consoles really be able to do. But yeah, they were so committed to the virtual cop model that they would go to the arcade and bring big bags of coins and sort of sit there and feed the machine coins and really learn. Virtua Cop one of the the first artists hired on the game, Carl Hilton, was giving some advice to his friend Brett Jones when Brett was applying to be the next the second artist on the game.

And Brett Jones had never played a video game before. He was a real talented artist and he knew a lot about James Bond. He was a huge James Bonder, but he didn't play video games. So Carl Hilton told him, listen, in your interview, just make sure you talk a lot about Virtua Cop. It's really important to Martin

and Brett did and the child. So, yeah, yeah, there's, there's, I mean, I mentioned this book, but there's, there's footage of it on the rails still all the way up through, I mean like within maybe 6 to 9 months of it coming out. Yeah, I think I wrote down that it was yeah, last minute it was E 396. It's you can wrote in the book that that it was still technically on rails and that's when Mario 64 and Gold and I were shown and it's like that's just crazy. I don't that's crazy.

And there's still, there's still, there's still levels that show that influence, right. So like the train level really feels like a Rails level. It's very linear. You know, you're very tight shooting guys, they pop out. But the fact that then you can also have levels you get lost in, you know maze like levels or levels where you can really have a different strategy approach depending on, I mean it just it it made the game, the fact that it's open world and so yeah,

huge, huge decision. Yeah. I can't believe that. I can't believe it. I just can't. It blows my mind, yeah. What blows my mind is the fact that they didn't have a dev kit. They didn't have any. I remember reading that I'm like nothing, like no, nothing. How do you design something for something you have no idea how it's like? Now that's wild. Yeah, it's it's wild.

And it definitely led to a lot of challenges in their process, whether it was the the musicians trying at the last minute to, you know, basically they were, they were told the N64 could do a lot more than it ended up being able to do. So that meant the artists were screwed on. You know that the size of some of their images and files they do a lot of work compressing and cutting and shrinking things.

Same thing with the musicians. And I do think that you know the the thing about the N64 controllers that you know it's I guess like according to legend the controller was really designed for Mario 64. It's it's a that plays really well for that game. But then the Golden Eye guys you know it's it's a horrendously sort of horrible controller for

a first person shooter. However, if you play with one controller in each hand and and you know you have one control stick for Amy and one for moving, it technically is the first dual analog control stick. Sugar. Right. Which is also, I honestly, I don't know. How long have we have, you know, nerds like me or us. Been on the Internet? I did not know. Nope. That was a thing. Until, I think, less than a year ago. I had no idea.

So crazy, so awkward. And I I I feel like now that the game has been re released for Xbox and Switch, which it wasn't at the time that my book came out, there were rumors about it, right? But it hadn't happened. Now you know, I don't know about you guys if you've played it on on those consoles, but I cannot get used to it. I cannot get used to doing so cold night with dual analog. I kind. Of hate I have. Yeah. I have my Xbox controller still sitting beside me because I just.

I opened it back up and played like the first two stages again. Cool, cool, cool. How did it go? Today so I. So I have I have the cartridge, I have a Switch and I have it on on Xbox cuz I have Game Pass. So I I dabbled in all of them, but I think I'm just too tailored to playing with dual, dual sticks now, So really, yeah. Yeah, So I think, you know, I'm kind of the, the, I'm talking about this game that's 25 plus years old and yet here I am playing it with an Xbox and an

Xbox controller, I I think. For me I just my mind now works where I have a separate joystick to constantly look around as opposed to you know, not relying on auto aim. But auto aim is obviously something that is that is big and in the in the original and and on the switch as well.

It works almost exactly the same and having to press R and look around and stuff is is fine because you don't always have to do it. But I found I was like looking like I was doing this and I was walking weird directions and stuff, which is cooler. Yeah, it just feels a little bit awkward, and I don't know if that's because it's what it always was, but I don't remember it feeling that way.

But it's interesting because me and Jiggy just played Jeff Force Gemini and it works almost exactly the same, except that's technically third person. Yeah, and that's where I was going to go with this. So I started playing the Switch version and set it up for dual dual stick in it. Okay. And so I'm playing dual stick and I'm like, okay, this is cool. But because we played Jet Force Gemini and I went back to this.

So I initially like my replay since the last time I played it, which who knows how many years it's been, I was like first replay, dual stick, modern, more modern controls. And then I went back to the 64 and I'm like, this feels really good, like I was. I was almost surprised at how much I enjoyed playing it on the 64. I'm like, this works really well. And yeah, it's so true. Yeah yeah, I think I'm the same. I mean, I I I love having a dual control stick for everything

modern. But for whatever reason my like Goldeneye muscle memories are tied to the N64 controller and I don't know how to function if I'm firing with my right finger instead of my left finger and but yeah that that that R button aim was such a pain in the ass because you did have to do it on the higher difficulty levels the auto aim was less intense and so or in multiplayer you know it's really helpful to use that R but it is terrible and especially if your control stick if you're if

your N64 controller is like a little old and the control stick is a little sticky you're in big trouble. Yeah, because it's true when you're aiming at the cameras or the turrets on the on the ceiling and stuff you yeah, there's no auto aim with those none. So those those and it's not super subtle. No. And it's it's not. Yeah. And and those turrets are are relentless. They they can find you from a couple of pixels. You know, like they just beat

the crap out of you. I just, yeah, I was like, are you kidding? I thought I was good at this game. Totally destroying those cameras is one of the tensest moments for me. Because like, as soon as it you know you you. As soon as it's easy, you're screwed. But it takes forever to aim with the stupid thing. And so it's it's. Very yeah, I I found in. And not to jump ahead into levels, but the jungle level with the the drones that come out of the ground, they're like

hiding in the bushes. I'm like Mother Grabber. I was getting mad. Yeah, it's just brutal. It really is. And yeah, I still struggle on that level every time. Yeah, when I when I played that, I was like, I honestly, I only sort of forgot about some of the levels because like I mentioned earlier with the like. Sort of make your own fun type of thing. It seems like a lot of people repeated same levels, whether it was dam or whether it was whatever. Usually jungle wasn't one of those.

I think maybe because it was just like turrets and then what would you could call a boss fight, right? Essentially. And there's just less experimentation with that. There's less. How about this? There's less tables and chairs to blow up. So there's, you know, like. Yeah. Yeah, less reason to fill a room with minds, I guess. True, those levels are especially interesting for me to watch. One of my favorite run throughs to watch is the beating Goldeneye with like only one bullet.

You can do it. So people have done it and they the only bullet you need actually is to shoot the lock off the gate in dam oh everything else that you can do. And it's incredible, especially on levels like that because you're thinking how, how, how are you gonna get through how can you do a defense only approach and cross the bridge past Zenia? How can you get past those turrets that are so, so less, so much less forgiving than the guards that you can kind of sneak fast because they're

stupid and slow? Yeah. Purpose is stupid, which which I don't mind. That's totally fine. That's why you can shoot their hat off. That's why you can just, you know just shoot them in the butt and like you know the little animations that they have and everything. Yeah, that level actually with the Jungle was actually kind of cool when I when I went back to like oh this, you know, it's you mentioned the music earlier and like the the music in this.

You know when it's a licensed game or when it's such a recognizable property, especially a Bond theme and based on a movie that came out years before they did a great job of the music. And and somehow this is one of those games where like the fog of war works in in this level because you're in the jungle or whatever. And I was like. I feel this level. I like it. I like it. It was. I actually enjoyed it more than I thought I would or more than I remember enjoying anyway.

Right. You got that kind of turrock effect in the in the jungle. But it's it definitely makes sense. It's it's earned. They were, you know the one of the things that developers were always so self-conscious about when I talked to them was, was the frame rate and and the fog and the things they were doing to kind of cover some of those issues. They're still very embarrassed about it. And I was just like guys, like it was 1996. Like what? What are you gonna do?

I mean, you you did beautiful work. And they're they're so British. They just refuse any compliments. They absolutely hated being complimented by me. And I was like, I have to compliment you. I'm writing a book about how beautiful your game is. And they, they would just, like, wince every time I said something nice and oh, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. The most humble humbles. And it sounds it comes through in the book for sure.

Humblest, sweetest guys. Good. But do you were mentioning to me, I think when we were talking about playing it like last week or something like that, you said that you ran into some of the frame rate stuff, but none of it, none of it bothered me. I don't know did it cause any problems for you or? OK, so yes, and I have a very.

I have a very. High tolerance for frame rate dipping like like my favorite, my favorite game of all time is Banjo Tooie and the frame rate is locked at a solid 24 and it often dips below that, you know, So I'm like really accustomed but I'm trying to think it's one of the it's one of the beginning levels where you have to go like it's right when you meet Trevlin for the first time. It's that level and like the gas canisters and everything. So in there, I triggered an

alarm. And then you get like, I don't know how many guys coming at you, like, they just load like to the point where your game is like, like stuttering, right? And I'm trying to power through it. I'm just firing, firing. My game froze. And this happened not once but twice for me. And I was mad because it's like, it's not at the beginning, it's not at the end. It's like midway through the mission and I just have to start over. Yeah, and and all that stuff's blowing up and everything.

I think when all the explosions went off is sort of when I noticed it. I think that might have been one of the stages. But like, I I don't know. I mean, I was just like, all right, I'm just gonna kill everybody, get out of here. Like I just sort of did it quit and it was it was fine. It didn't stop me. I still exactly. I was just like, it's not like collecting a bunch of tribals to complete the game. Jetforce Gemini. My. God, no, it's definitely not that.

Thank God it's way worse. I mean, it is way worse on the multiplayer. I think when you have four, cuz we had this afternoon, the other night when I was playing with my buddies, When you have four separate screens and they all have explosions going in grenade mode, it's just terrible. It slows down to like 10, you know, you're like, OK, I can't. But I did think it was way worse as a whole.

I think the framer issue was way worse in Perfect Dark than in Golden Eye, which is a real one of the biggest reasons I never could get into Perfect Dark. I just. Yeah, I remember that being the case. But I never. I don't have a ton of experience. The perfect dark, but I do remember that being the thing. But it's like also. This and a lot of games that came around this time. I was like, well, if you had that expansion pack it would have, you know, really boosted things or whatever.

It wasn't out yet. They didn't know it was coming. Probably at that point like all of that stuff in a in a similar way, I find it. OK, so I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do a little maybe, maybe you look this up maybe you have a note on it at least. But so the entire game was 12 megabytes the entire game. That's first of all, insane that

it's just that size, right? You wrote the way you describe it in the book is. And I'm gonna preface it by saying kids these days might not know what 12 megabytes is, right? Yeah. How many copies of this game could fit in a 64 gigabyte cell phone? Do you remember what that number is? I'm I'm. I'm looking at my own book because I forgot it's it's OK.

Crazy, I know that is. 5333, that is that is only 64 gigs which which at this point this point sitting in the middle of 2023 is is yeah is very easy to get. You know 64 is almost nothing at this point right. I just and then and then it goes. It just it goes back to your point of being like. Yeah. So what if there's a little bit of slowdown? Look what you had to work with, right? These guys were masters. One of the masters like they did.

One of the themes that came up in talking to the Goldeneye guys and the Super Mario Brothers, three people, was that these designers really like they missed this period when you could design A AAA title on a team of under a dozen people working really, really closely. And where the constraints led to creativity and the constraints was a was a fun obstacle for them that that made them come with their best ideas.

And now they they they sort of sound a little cynical about the fact that you know most, most textures in modern games are far larger than 12 megabytes. And you know, every but everything got bigger. And so teams got bigger. For these AAA, AAA games, the teams got bigger. You may never know all the people working on the game with you. And so they definitely kind of refer to this as like a golden era of game design for them.

Yeah, well, I can imagine even some of the pictures that you that are in your book about just, you know, a small little office of them, just, you know, working around these tiny little computers and having TV's and just books and resources and things just everywhere. It's like it feels like they

were. On their own little college campus you know like that's really what it would it look like and each like team which like you said under a dozen people you know probably on average around around that you know rare campus was could fit within a couple rooms and they just that's like that's where this game was made that's it's just. So, so that yeah. That aspect of it, like what you said, is almost verbatim

something I heard our NUMA. Who is the director of Zelda and Tears of the Kingdom that just came out and switched. He was talking about how he appreciates that when people, whenever people bring up like, oh, Nintendo hardware, so like last Gen. it's out of date. It doesn't have enough. He said that exact thing. He's like, I love when we're limited by that because that's when we get creative.

That's when we come up with new concepts to utilize those limitations in a way that makes a fun game play style, and there is definitely truth to that. Yeah, as a writer, I use this concept in teaching writing all the time. You need the constraint of a sonnet to write a beautiful poem because it forces you to be concise, to be careful, to be intentional. It forces you to think of not the very first word that comes into mind, but the one that will rhyme with the word that you need.

All of those constraints, yeah, are super important for creativity and they're what creates fun in the process. So games are fun because they have rules. Games are fun because they constrain you when you're outside with your friends and you're like, what should we do? And it's like, I don't know, like it's not fun. But when you're like, let's play this game and there are rules involved, that's what creates fun. So it's super interesting. It's a very Japanese.

Idea too, and I guess a British one too. That smallness and and and tightness and miniatures, you know, are especially exciting. But I definitely, you know both in terms of how close they felt as a small team and in terms of how they felt creatively inspired by their constraints. It was amazing to me to hear how nostalgic these guys were about their experiences making the game. Because, of course, I'm writing this book because I feel so nostalgic about playing the game.

Right, right. Which is which is wild. Yeah, Well, yeah, I know, right. Is that is that why I'm doing this? Probably that's why we have it. Right. So I yes, I I love that and I love the fact that I that that it's 1212 megabytes, right. That's the size because I I had to look it up because I'm like OK, rare. Like I know conquer was more conquer Rep and conquer. I know conquer was more. I I just wanted to talk about my shirt. That's why I'm bringing this up. Conquer.

It was like the end of the 64 life, you know, the end of that era. And I was like, I wonder what that cartridge size kind of got to. And it said conquer maxed out at 64 megabytes. So you think even that I remember having a, you know, a flash drive that was, I don't know, 256 megabytes back in the day. And I'm like those like all of that, all that content squeezed into that small little package. But 12 megabytes is even more impressive. Like that's it's golden eyes, not short.

It's a decent size game, that's the thing. Yeah, yeah, I was going through it. And yeah. And kind of like what you mentioned earlier at least, where you said like you want to sort of have those goals for yourself or you're conquering the different. Difficulties, for example, like playing it in single player and stuff. Yeah, where you're conquering the yeah, that'd be a cool mashup. And so I started on the middle. The regular difficulty, I don't remember offhand exactly what it

was. I think it's just Secret Agent, I think, and I ran into a little bit of a wall in the difficulty and I want to find exactly what stage it was. I think it was. One of the last ones maybe caverns or control Control I think maybe. Control is very, oh, control. OK. So it's not just me. No, no, no. OK, that. That's where she has to, like, you know, she has to go. She's on the computer and you have to kind of save her or keep her alive or whatever. Yeah, I don't know how many times.

I was frustrating. She got, she was killed. And I'm like, I can't. I can't do this. I can't. What am I supposed to do, like, jump in front of a bullet? I don't even know that's there. Like, how am I supposed to do this? So I. Find that you do? Yeah. Well, that's what I ended up doing. I just instead of you know, standing by the stairs where the guys were coming around coming down and stuff, I just ended up standing. I I took the hits. I I stood in like on either side

of her. I just went left to right and just did a half circle around her while she was, you know, doing her her fist. Smacking of the keyboard and yeah, actually the funny. The funniest thing of the animation is yes, there's lots of animations that they had fun with, with the with the guards and everything. When you shoot them, you shoot them in the groin, you shoot them in the butt, you hit their hat, their arm, their leg. All that stuff is amazing. The funniest thing to me is when

she's typing. Sometimes when the and any characters typing, sometimes when they type because they don't have fingers, they can't really, they couldn't really pull that off which is fair enough. It's just what it is. She kind of like flip flips her wrist up. She kind of, she's typing. She just goes up like this, as if she's like giving the computer the finger. But they can't animate the, you know, the little finger. That's what it looks like.

It's almost like she's going. Such a great catch. I hadn't thought about that, but you're totally right. Bond, you saved me. You. Oh, you did such a great job. And then it looks like she's going. You know what? Fuck you. Like that's what it looks like she was. Doing, yeah, it really does. So yeah, so that stage got me and then I bumped the the difficulty down 1 notch. And then I forgot that if you don't beat it in one difficulty, you can't continue on the next

level on that other difficulty. So I was like, do I have to go back and do this? That's why I did it and the easiest mode possible. Yes, it gets incredibly difficult in those later levels, especially once you. Yeah. Well, no, I mean even the difference between dam on agent and dam on 007 is pretty extraordinary like. Yeah, yeah. And that's just the start. That's the first stage. I couldn't do it. I mean, I can still beat Super Mario Brothers three, you know? No problem.

Like with work whistles. Give me 10 minutes, I'll beat the game. But, but, but Goldeneye when I was, when I was replaying it to write this book, I couldn't beat it on 007. I couldn't finish it. I got to controls and I couldn't pass that. It was just OK. All right, so it's not OK. You get. You guys are making me feel better. It's not just me. It was that stage and it was that. All right, All right, cool. OK, Yeah. Well, that's all we need to talk about.

As long as I feel better about myself, that's it. Full ego best. All right, great. Amazing. Do you have at least you have a standout level that you remember either replaying or one that when you replayed you're like, oh, that's the one that I really appreciate. Like I know those might be two different things, but if there isn't we can go 1st and whatever. Yeah, I just thought I would. Jump into that. I actually like control. I actually like control a lot because I write about this in my

Mario book. But I have, I have complicated feelings about like damsels in distress because I know that they can be, you know, a little bit regressive and all of that. And I want women to be saving men and saving other women and I want all of that. But I also, you know, I am a lesbian. And so I I like a good like tamsel to take care of and to to to, you know, to protect and to do this chivalrous, you know, like.

Taking bullets for her, just like you explained, so that that levels a bit of a thrill, you know, narratively for me maybe, but I think gameplay was my favorite, is the sneaky bunker level, where you need to break out of your cell and sneak around when you're playing that on. A higher difficulty level. It's just wild. I mean, you can't make any noise. You have to slap people. You have to use the throwing knives. It's very unforgiving to any

kind of noise. And I love that the game offers us these like run and gun macho levels, but also these very sneaky, quieter strategic levels where I, you know, I probably played it like three dozen times just trying to figure out, OK, if I get my gun first with the silencer, can I, you know, I hope that I have to be too loud to get that. So where should I? It's just a very fun, like cognitive. Causal Add it on to your kind of

twitch reflex skills. Yeah. And that's one that you can get overwhelmed in pretty quickly because. And they just kind of keep spawning out of, I guess, keep coming. Yeah, they just keep coming, right. So regardless of what difficulty you're on, you could be mowing down enemies if you make too much noise like you said. For days, if you survive, yes. Like right, right you you can't think for one minute that you can just kill all the bad guys and keep going. They they will keep coming and

so I love that. What are you and? That's another and that's another one with the with the camera and stuff as well, right. We have to take the cameras out and everything, so right. I really like that, I mean. Yeah, that's a good one. Yeah, I think that's one that I definitely remember replaying a bunch. I don't know. Why? That was the one that I went back to.

But I wouldn't be surprised if as a kid, as someone who's, you know, 10 years old or 12 years old, that's the one I go back to because the enemies kept spawning, because I could put in the cheats and I could have a bunch of mines everywhere, have 12 of them all in like a staircase and just see the explosions go nuts like it. I think that's probably why that was one of them. And then I do remember playing the train quite a bit. I remember playing that a decent

amount. I really appreciated this time. Surface surface is the one where. Oh yeah. That's you're in this, you're it's pretty open. It's not that long of a level, but it's open. You're in the snow. As far as I remember re watching the movie, that is not something that happens. It's one of the additional sort of stages, or at least an expansion of the movie. And I just, it felt, it felt ahead of its time.

When I'm sitting there playing this again for the first time in like, you know, probably 17 years or something, I was like, oh, they, you know, talking about the fog of war and all those types of things in jungle. This was that, but in one sort of like large circular area. And you could kind of do things in any order you wanted. And, you know, enemies kept spawning, but it never felt like you were in a tunnel. You were literally out in the open and like.

All that stuff was a lot of fun, so I think that's the one that stood out to me and also had gave me a good chance to use a sniper. And I always love sniping in games, so yes. Oh yeah. For sure. Yeah. I I personally, First off I love Dam. Like the Dam is just it's so much fun it's it's iconic it's got it's got so much going for it. And I I hate to be a one note song because often when I think of games like the first levels tend to be my favorite.

And I don't know if that's like, I don't know if that's a me thing or if that's like me just thinking like, wow, this is when they were fresh. This is when they were like, this is the idea, let's hit it hard. And you know, because there's so much, there's so many elements in DAM that you can go through like they have the alarm system, It's like disable the alarms. There's the whole, like, shoot the lock to get through the thing like you were mentioning earlier. Yeah, that's a lot of fun.

And feels very spy. Like, yeah. And it feels giant. And there's even the the extra mission that you put the modem in the, you know, in the in the in the thing, in the PC or whatever. But it's like there's so much going on and there's like, it's the level that really made me feel like a spy rather than run and gun kind of a thing, which I appreciate. And plus, it's also got that dope cutscene at the end when you bungee off the dam, which is awesome.

So great it's it's. Fun if you mentioned that. Yeah, go ahead, go ahead. I was just gonna finish. I also like streets because you can hop in a tank. And I I I wanted to bring that one up because I I watched the movie. Like I rewatched the movie just for this. Yeah, me too. Yeah, I gotta watch the movie because I haven't seen it since I was a kid or since I was really young. And then he gets in the tank and goes, and I'm like, yeah, I forgot about that. And then I'm playing the game.

I got to that level and I was like, I got to get in the tank. I was like, I don't even like, you don't even need to give in the tank. I just, I was like, whoa. Right. Yes. It's such a great level. The guy, the guys were joking with me that they they they feel kind of embarrassed of that level because it was a little thrown together at the last

minute. And they and they they're very conscious of the fact that like the way the graphics work in the first person's perspective like Bond becomes a tank. Like it's. You could, you know, be Bond, but you just your weapon is a tank. And I love that. I love that. It's funny that you mentioned. That the tank be the tank you. Know Yeah, you are the tank. That's why you mentioned you like those early games because it's while they still had the

idea. But what's really funny is like in both Mario Three and in Goldeneye, the first levels were the ones they designed last because they wanted to leave them. Last. So they could make sure that they were introducing all the mechanics at the beginning of the game the way they wanted to. And I just love that because it's something I it's advice that you've had students all the time.

Like, write your introduction to your paper last when you once you know what you want to introduce, you know. It completely makes sense because at that point, I mean, especially with the way, like we talked about, the way things change so much in that last year leading up to release, especially with a game like this or with games at that time.

Absolutely because now you know the basis of of the rest of the game or at least you know the vast majority potentially and all that and and it's it's that you know that that level is is great because just like a lot of stages in this because I I after I I read the book and after I played the game I watched the movie and I just wanted to compare notes on that and same thing. I haven't watched it in years. It's been I don't even know how long, probably even longer than

than since I've played the game. And I just love the expansion of what they did because it's sort of like I wrote this down because it reminds me of I have some friends and Mike, I'm sure you're listening, I disagree with you, but I'm gonna, I'm gonna call you out just a little bit, You know, there there's talk that, you know, the, like Rogue One in Star Wars is sort of an expansion on. One sentence that said saying like, oh, these are the secret plans and that's it, right?

You don't need to know that story. I I disagree with that completely. I think it's a great movie. I think the story of itself, of of the plans and how it all works is interesting, even if it wasn't in that movie, even if it was in a novel or whatever. That's just my opinion on it doesn't have to be everybody's obviously. Is your friend saying that he doesn't like Rogue One? Because that's a great movie. He he's, I think he's your. Friend, I for exactly the reason

you I totally respect. I totally respect that it is a really good movie. It's just not a movie I enjoy, but it's. But it's because I think if you love Star Wars, some people are really more drawn to like the light sabery stuff and some people are more drowned like the Han Soloy stuff. And I'm just more of a lightsaber. Like I want to see people using the forest. I want to see lightsaber duels, like I want it. I'm not as into, like the espionage, like I'm not a huge fan of Pandora.

So that's the only reason. It's like, it's funny you say that because I feel like it gave us one of the most badass Darth Vader scenes in a movie. It did. I personally, it's true. Yeah, it was pretty. Awesome. Very bad ass sort of fader scenes, yeah. Yeah, exactly. That's no. And the reason why I bring that up is because, yes, that's a much larger expansion of a

singular idea for sure, but. When you start a movie with a guy jumping off a dam, yes, you suspect that it's James Bond, but the fact that they show you how he gets there and you you are him getting to that point. Like you spend let's say 20 minutes, half an hour if you're messing around whatever it might be like or speed running it and just using one bullet. You're James Bond in that moment and then you begin the movie and I love that that's how they started.

They could easily, yeah, you are, you are holding the gun. They could have easily started this with the ending of that of that stage of dam Jumping off of the dam could have just been the start of the game and it would have been totally fine. It would have been great. But they created a game that, like you said, introduces a bunch of mechanics. Alarms, sneaking, you know, going behind the truck I think is such a fun. Way to start things, yeah. And it. Totally right.

I mean, it feels like, almost like a prequel, like you're they're immersing you into his. Because those opening James Bond action sequences before the plot of the movie actually starts are such a wonderful tradition of the genre and of the series. And my my grandfather's favorite thing to say is after that opening huge action sequence that they have in every movie, you always will turn to you and go. It could happen. That's like, that's our tradition. And then the movie starts,

right? Like after the big music, music, credit scenes. But yeah, it's fun that you get to participate in that in the game, for sure. Yeah, those are those are little additions. So we talked about favorite stages or favorite ones that we remember and stuff. Any guns in particular that that are your favorite? You know, I mean I love the laser. I cuz I'm kind of a scifi fan and so I thought that was a really fun thing to do in that little bit on this level, to have the laser.

Yeah, that that's up there for sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. RCP 90 The RCP 90 is really fun. So that's the one that always stood out to me as a as a kid for sure. So when I finally picked it up in the game, I was like, yeah, I got it and it's funny, it just shoots super fast. It was it's it's really cool. But I like. But I actually found this time that maybe because it's very all around, it's strong, whatever, maybe it's just overpowered, I don't know. But the assault rifle is kind of that.

I found that to be very effective because you do have a yeah, you have a zoom on it and everything. So in single player at least it was. It was really good multiplayer. I feel like. I feel like even the club was good, even though it's like, you know, a spray machine. Legendarily bad. Yeah, exactly. Jiggy What about you? Am I the only one that loves the original? Like just the PPK? Because no, not at. All yeah, honestly. Honestly.

Like, it's. I found myself playing through levels and when you start with that, I would often just keep using it because it's you get up. It's especially with the silence around it. You go up and you're like pee. Pee. You know, it's not only the sound effect, but it's also like it's pretty powerful. Like, it only takes a few hits to down pretty much any enemy. I mean, it's not ideal for every situation, but I found myself using it more than I thought.

I would like a base weapon, like you never stick with the standard, but I was like this is a pretty good standard. It's it's a good go to. It's a good thing to always have and I Love Actually that reminds me two things. Just reminded me of what we're talking about the guns is the with the pistol. I love the sound effect of the silencer of that and the sniper and stuff. They did such a good job with that.

And then I think it was, I think, yeah, in the movie, I realized some of the sound effects in the game they took from the movie. So like when some of the bullets are hitting off the wall and stuff, like the ricochet of the bullets, yeah, those sound effects are in the movie. And I'm like, Oh my God, I thought that was just a game. This is amazing. So that little things like that were really like fun touches because they, I guess they kind of had some time. In order to to to implement

those things. But those little touches I thought were great. And then because I mentioned the club, I know at least we should talk about that a little bit because the club was something that has a like a little bit of a story to it because like you said it's like infamously weak. But that was the thing that the team knew about like they that that's. They did, yeah. They did that to us on purpose, for sure. They they just thought it was really fun to have.

A big range of weapons, right? They they've kind of muddled this after Doom, but we're able to talk about all these guns we love now because they all have their own sort of feel and personality, and that's that. Those differences are created by, of course, how the gun looks and sounds, but also the sort of rate of fire, the the speed of reload, the accuracy, the amount of damage inflicted by each bullet. And so that those created a really unique feel for each gun.

And so they did want to have a gun that kind of was a little bit wild and sprayed everywhere and and was a little bit. Duncan Batwood describes the club as chattery and just having like a. Yeah, I read that and it was like or I've seen that in other places too it before this. And yeah, they were my that's that's what it sounds like. Like the plastic chattering teeth wind up teeth thing when you shoot. Yeah, and it kind of feels like cheap or something like lightweight.

And it might just be because it's so inaccurate and it inflicts so little damage. But they always do point out that on licensed kill mode, one hit kill mode, it's the best weapon because it's got such a widespread and so it's the amount of damage inflicted doesn't matter at all. But yeah, I think the thing to keep in mind about the the guys making this game is they were. They were British guys who had never been around weapons before and never had ever fired a gun.

So they had a big picture book called Firearms of the World and they were just looking for the the guns that looked cool. They were really inspired by the movie Heat and John Blue action movies and they wanted the the guns that were in those movies, of course the the weapons that were in Golden Eye, the movie they included. And so yeah, they were. They were just kind of going off what they what they thought looks cool and and sounded cool and when they when they ended up

making the club, they. They need to give all these games, all these guns alternate names because the Nintendo legal people were concerned about copyright infringement on real gun names, so they named the Club. The club was modeled after a gun called the Scorpion and changed the name to the Spider. And then, after 800,000 instruction manuals were printed with the name Spider as the club in them, they found out that Spider is the name of a paintball gun, and so they had to change it again.

And this time they decided to name it Club after Ken Lobb, the Nintendo of America employee who had really gone to bat for the game and really kind of pushed for them to be allowed to include the multiplayer at the last minute. And now, now all the guys feel sort of guilty that they named this terrible weapon after after Ken Lobb. And he's super happy. He's he's like, no, I love this.

It's great. I, you know they kind of joke like or Ken Lobb will say yeah, it's it's really loud and wildly inaccurate. That's me. These guys are good sport about it. That's great. It's I mean it's just sounds like all these guys are just having so much fun. You know like you mentioned before it's amazing how like the fun that they had and the camaraderie that they had and all that stuff, it shows in the final product. I mean, like there's this is just like such a monumental

game. Because yes, there were, there were first person shooters available before this, But unless you had a PC, which, you know, some people did, and unless you had one that could run Doom or unless you were allowed to own Doom as a kid, like, yeah, right. I never, I never owned it. It was always at a friend's place. And I don't know, I feel like, you know, it was, it was shareware and stuff, right? So it's easy to get a hold of. But I also never had Internets

until I was in high school. Like all that kind of stuff was just not available to me. And yet this, this is what stands out as that. Like Doom is obviously iconic cast. Castlevania Wolfenstein is is obviously, you know those games are there, but there's something about this game that is just ingrained in gaming and just culture in general and I just, I it's insane. It's just insane that these guys did this in such a small, with such a small team in like a tight space.

I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna throw this out there because we were talking about how how much fun they must have been having and stuff. So the book has pictures. And you get those, those pictures of, like, I'm looking at Martin Hollis right now, convinced David is a doke. David Doke. Sorry, I'm. Yeah, my fonts small. Any glasses? But, you know, you just look at the pictures and they're sitting there, they're smoking a cigarette. You know, long ponytail, like, yeah, you know, drinks.

If you look at the table, there's just drinks everywhere. And it's like, yeah, you know, they were having a good time. Yeah. Oh yeah. Absolutely. They have all kinds of stories about sneaking off campus cuz you weren't allowed to smoke it rare. So they would sneak across the street to a little church, church, backyard or something. And they. Yeah, they were just so young. And, you know, honestly, they were.

They were quite close to people. My students age now and I teach people who are trying to create their own art. And so I've found it to be really. Inspiring reminder that if you're making something and and you are genuinely enjoying it, you are having fun. You are being true to yourself. You are being honest and and it's and it's moving to you, then it will be meaningful to someone else. We we get so focused on. Like imagining what our readers or our viewers or our listeners,

I guess in y'all's case, want. But then at the end of the day, like you have to you were your own first audience and I think those those guys like you described it with how much fun they were having really stayed true to that. Yeah absolutely. It's it's it's just a fun time. I just, I I was, I was worried it was going to be I mean maybe it's like maybe it's you know using the Xbox controller and sort of like ended up working out for me a little bit more.

I still felt totally fine playing it with the with the 64 controller. It didn't bother me at all. But like I, you know, there's enough chatter online. It's very easy to be cynical, very easy to be like, you know, mean on the Internet behind a username and stuff. So there's like chatter there that that spreads, that's like, oh, this game doesn't hold up and oh, it's it's trash now or

whatever. And I just do not agree, especially after revisiting it. Like, yeah, it's, it feels like it was made when it was, but that's not a bad thing, you know? That is a positive in my mind.

Totally. I mean it's like when you when you see a picture of like your grandfather when he was like old and and kind of hot and kind of like good looking and like you're like oh, you must have gotten all the girls and like if you could go back in time and like throw down with him, he could throw down, you know, and now he's. Old he's older and he but he throws down in a different way and he you know he's got kind of bad knees and and maybe he can't

always remember things. It's like, yeah, this game shows its age for sure. That's that's not there's no debate. Right there. It's not as perennially great as Super Mario 3, I don't think, but it still throws down now and for its time, it really, really threw down and was incredibly new and innovative. Yeah, absolutely. Well, it's like so so this is so that's my cat. She just Full disclosure, my cat just scared the crap out of me because she just like jumped.

She jumped. I had the door closed. She jumped on the door and like, threw it open and like, reacted. So if anybody sees the video of this, they're going to see me like React at some point. Amazing. But anyways, so my my YouTube channel, I actually started because I saw a video about someone bashing Donkey Kong 64 and I was like, I love Donkey Kong 64. And so I started my YouTube channel. I was like, I love it, here's why.

And I made a video about it. And so I'm so like, people online say they don't like a game. I'm like, that makes me like it more. At this point, yeah, I'll show you. Seriously. No, there's something to it. Like a game and one of those, the game's really good. But it's not necessarily always the case. But that's why we like something. I mean there it could be nostalgia.

It could be that it hit you in the in the fields just because of who you are or because of where you're at with your life or whatever. But yeah, we shouldn't, we shouldn't be trying to. Yuck anyone's Yum. I'm big on that. Yeah, absolutely. And and just just to just to just to wrap up with just how many copies were out there of this game. I believe this is worldwide, but it is the third best selling

game on the console. Yes, it was bundled with some consoles, but as we know, you didn't have to get it then in order to get this game, right. 8,090,000 copies according to the Yeah. So yeah, a little Austin Powers. Which, by the way, we haven't brought up Austin Powers, but I could. Not help. Think of that. Yeah. So it was gonna bring it up. That was me. So not. For you have to I set it up, yeah. Austin Powers was one of those movies that I watched a little bit too early.

Or at least the first one anyway. Just constantly, constantly on. I mean really as a yeah, I was like 1213 year old. I probably shouldn't have watched the first one, but it was like always so especially the second ones. But you know, it's it's funny because you know, it's they're not they're not fantastic movies, they're just goofy or whatever. But watching Goldeneye again, playing through it and all like just small things, small hints here and there.

I was like, oh, that's awesome, Powers or oh, you know, like I knew it was riffing on on James Bond at the time, but I didn't really understand what they were riffing on. And it's just this is one of those movies because the movie was so big, it's easy for them to, for him, for Mike Myers to have to go and and grab from a movie like this, not just, you know, the Sean Connery days for example and stuff, so.

Yeah, I don't know about y'all, but I'm definitely one of those millennials that, like, saw, like played the game before I saw the movie. In fact, I don't think I'd ever seen a James Bond movie before playing this game. It introduced me to the entire franchise. And so one of the arguments I make in the book is that. Goldeneye, the game I think played a major role in in saving

the Bond franchise. And then you know, in terms of like your your show at large, I think Goldeneye played a really significant role in saving the N64 and therefore saving Nintendo. And I know that's a huge claim and I know that it's not 100% accurate, but we have to make fun, big claims. But yeah, I I think the Nintendo 64 would have totally flopped if it weren't for Goldeneye. We know that from sales numbers and just from, you know, the way people were writing about it online.

Like I guess I have to get an N 60. Now so that I can play this game and without the N 60, I mean you know the insects were just kind of scraped by and and that's that's how no live to fight another day with the GameCube. Yeah yeah no kidding. But but it's true like that it's yes there's other there were other games in development at this time and yes there were things that came out 9899, two

thousand or whatever. But I don't know that like late 99, mid 2000, like those last couple of, you know, years of the console really would have happened unless you have this. Because even just looking at the top, like sales charts quickly, if Goldeneye was out in 97, the closest one that has high sales is Diddy Kong Racing in 97 and Star Fox 64, which came out just before everything else is Mario Kart, Super Mario and then everything else is 9899. Two thousand, right.

So yeah, so a lot of those games, you know, I'm sure Donkey Kong 64 was being, you know, at least early stages that when this game was being made, but also also rare. But maybe they wouldn't have been given the same leash. Or maybe they wouldn't have as much money or as big of a team. Whatever, right? And Goldman was meant to reach a different audience than than folks who would have been playing Donkey Kong 64 and Banjo, too. We, of course, Conquer and and Goldeneye were kind of in this

adult gaming category. And we're yeah, we're really still trying to fight that console war that they had kind

of been. Losing to to Sonic and this edgier, more more grown up vibe and so they were really experimenting with it. I think they obviously came back full circle and now they're still your your cartoon family friendly company, but the the the 90s and and odds are really interesting time for Nintendo experimenting with more adult themes and more, you know grittier, less family friendly games and so I I find it a super interesting time in their history. Yeah, and your your claim about.

Goldeneye saving 64. I mean, like you, you can make an argument for the game, but you can't. You can't make an, I must say, can't argue. Can't. Yes, you can make an argument for the game, but you can't argue with the fact that Rare definitely saved the N64 with their library so and that just that Goldeneye and that really kind of catalyst everything because. Like, even Donkey Kong 64 had influences from Goldeneye. That's why Donkey Kong had the gun. Yeah, you know, like really

great. I'd talk about that, yeah. Great point. I mean there's just, there's so many good ideas rolling around in that you know in that campus or in that workplace or whatever, right. And they just sort of. Totally, yeah. I think Donke Kong sees you first for the example of how they meshed a lot of their ideas together, you know?

And a lot of it work together, but some, you know, as we've discussed, as we've discussed in the previous episode, some of it works really well and some of it just feels like too much. But there's something about about Goldeneye where it has like this perfect balance and you know, and and that's honestly the perfect balance could even just be like you said, I think towards the beginning of of a recording of how like multiplayer was sort of they were told like don't do it

and they still did. But all of this stuff we're saying I think could be true if multiplayer wasn't in this game. So add that on top of it, which is what a lot of people remember because it gets you either at that age, perfect age to get together, perfect console, the first one with four controllers, like all these things that came together, it has this perfect middle ground and and if someone hasn't played it, they're scared about the way it controls on like the Switch for example.

Or if you have Game Pass, I still think you absolutely should play it, even if you're not playing multiplayer. Agreed. Yeah, I do think that it's a fun one to play now, and it also is so important for a very specific generation of humans because of exactly what you said. Those of us who have grown up with Mario on the NES or Super NES, or played, played on the Genesis. Then we're starting to want a little something, a little bit

more mature. Then we got this game and it kind of feels like the console grew up with us. Yeah, in a really fun way. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. At least I just wanna say thank you. I wanna say thank you for taking. The time thank you, no thank you it was. So much fun.

I've really enjoyed chatting with you and I've learned so much and I've just really enjoyed getting to think through all this with y'all oh of course and and you know what, Not not only thanks for taking the time, but thanks for writing like a book and books like this because I honestly I think that they are are valuable resources for people that are either are either don't know the history of games like this or Super Mario Brothers Three or any of the other boss fight books games

like there's a lot to dig into you know and. There's a lot on 64 titles, so yeah, there's, there's put. If you're an N64 fan, there's plenty plenty to read from boss fight. Yeah exactly. And they have physical and digital copies of stuff which is great. And yeah, I I just you know thanks for taking the time to to talk with us and and our goofy little nerdy 64 show here and. And I will say all. Day. I will say that your book is very well written. I don't know that we said that,

so it's very well written. I was trapped in an airport the other day like last weekend, and I passed the time by reading your book. So. No, I'm honored. Thank you for spending your time that way. That's that's. I I was. Like thank you. I was like, I gotta read this. I was like, I this is perfect timing. And then I pulled it up and then I was just like. So I helped you feel like you were escaping a little like. Yeah.

Oh, I love it. I love diving into the history of rare Like that to me was like, that was so cool. I love the history of it. That was just awesome because obviously Rare's a big part of my life. Yeah. Oh yeah, yeah. And the street, yeah, yeah. Yeah, and the shirt and the Cocker shirt. And so yeah, it was awesome. It was great. I wanted to bring up two things before we end this and the first is have you guys seen the ROM of Golden Eye with Mario characters?

Yes, I. Don't know that I Mario. Yeah. It's pretty funny. It's amazing. Like Koopas or enemies you've got like Natalia is Peach, Daisy is Zenya and Luigi is Trevlin. And like they they like change the dialogue and things. So like Luigi, I wrote this down because I was like it was pretty funny. He's like running away from Mario and he's like finish the job. Mario, if you were Cam. I just love that the game has this continued life with with people modding it and there's

some mods that are really fun. So I just, I just opened it up. You're gonna? Recreate like World War 2 areas or OOP. Give me one second. Yeah. Yes. Oh my God. Who this is? This is one of the scientists, and it's Yoshi. Yeah, it's Yoshi Body and the scientist. Yes, it's awesome. Disable the a security. I know it's something so. Sweet. Something for viewers to look up that's that's excellent, That's so funny. I never saw that before. And you can play them. I mean, you can download all

this. You can play them if you if you want more Goldeneye. You know, like there's lots out there by really creative people and their hearts middle levels are very hard and super engaging. Yeah, yeah, it's super cool. That's that's the cool thing about 64 right now. Just the mod scene. Creating. I just love that people, people can put these and actually have them run on physical hardware.

It's not just, it's not emulation, it's it's you put it on a cartridge, you can put it in your 64 and you can play the game. And I just absolutely adore that there's tons of banjo modding. That modding scene is huge. Goldeneye. It's like a lot of rare stuff, which is just so cool to me. And then the other thing I just wanted to bring up because I I told Dave I would. Fam Kay Jensen She's hot, so yes. Yes. And she. Yeah. And she actually, she's Xenia, right? Yeah, yeah.

Yeah. So she lived up to her name because I don't know if I was able to put this in the book or not, but during filming. So okay for anyone who's not familiar with the movie she does. She's named Xenia on the top and then she does kill a man by straddling him during sex and and like strangling him. Yes, with her thighs. So incredible. Classic one boned girl. But. She actually, the actress sent a stunts guy to the hospital during filming. She really.

Yes. Yeah. She she actually really did hurt him. So she's she's fierce and she's amazing. And yeah, the 90s were. I touched on this a little bit in the book, but the 90s were a super interesting time for gender in the Bond movies because. They were like really concerned like is people are people too PC now will they not like that we have these Bond girls. So they they tried to emphasize that they have a computer programming Bond girl doing this kind of traditionally male role

and she's super smart. And you have Xenia who's super badass. Yeah. So you're trying to pitch this, you know, purpose? Right, they did. And what's funny though, it's like they had even have M in the movie, said Judi Dench. Say to Bond, you know, you're a misogynist dinosaur. Then you've got Pierce Brosnan on the publicity tour for the movie was saying the most horrible thing. He was like, he's a show, he's a chauvinist and he's proud of it.

And if a girl gives him any lip, he's gonna slap her around and you're like, Oh my God, you have to imagine the movie executives were like, Pierce, shut up. Like going for. It OK. Yeah, they couldn't control it. Say whatever you want. You know what, Maybe he just didn't actually. He didn't know what was else was said in the movie. So he's like, Oh yeah, no, I'm just basically Sean Connery. This is basically 78 like for sure I could say. Yeah, yeah.

That sound very Sean Connery. Yeah, that's nobody like. It seems like that's what he was playing when he was doing publicity. It's like, dude, that's not, yeah, what was happening here, right. That's not the vibe at all in the movies that he just, yeah, I don't know what got into him, but it's very. Funny. And and and it's and that's like one of the first things that. That is said to him by M2,

right? She's just like, I don't want to hear your misogynistic, yeah excuses or something like that's like, yeah. Right there. And and of course it's her too. Like Judi Dench. Just saying anything like that to someone is like that first. Hell yeah. I mean love it. It's it's a very cool. Yeah, it's hard to remember that. You know when that when that movie came out, it had been a long gap between the last Spawn movie and the next. They were worried about the

franchise. They were worried that like, hey, the, the Soviet Union's kind of over, or is our franchise even relevant? Who's he gonna fight? Who's, you know, now they're computers, they're cyber attacks. What are we gonna do? So going I represents a big a big transition, not just for gaming, but also for the film industry and film narratives as

well. Yeah, that franchise took and like you said, I think, but I think the combo like, yeah, the game came out just just you know what year and a half roughly after the after the movie, which usually doesn't happen. We know that that's part of development and the console and like all these types of things, but like. You know, they they perfected a lot of things. And between the movie doing really well and then just enough to, I feel like it's just enough time.

Because movies had so much life on VHS and stuff at the time that like just when you stopped maybe pressing play on the VHS 17 * a week, the game came out and then you were ready to to play the game. And it just sort of like somehow that year and a half, whatever, 18 months, whatever it was, just extended the life of everybody loving. James Bond and the game, like you said, I think played that part for not only the console Nintendo, but I think, yeah, for

the franchise too, for sure. Yeah. It's just, it's just one of those titles. So once again, Elise, thank you very much. I really, really appreciate it. Thank you all. I really appreciate it. So much fun. Thank you. We will hopefully be able to touch base soon and anytime you want to talk another crazy N64 game, let us know. We are. We know where to find us. Anytime. Count me in. I love. Gigi and I are so very grateful that you joined us on this episode of Remember 64. And of course.

Very, very happy and grateful to welcome on Elise Nora to Remember 64. Be sure to check out the Goldeneye 007 Boss Fight books and her book as well on Super Mario Brothers 3. All of those are available at bossfightbooks.com. There are paper, ebook and hardcover editions of many of the books, including these ones. All are pretty affordable prices. You can check the link in the show notes. I will link to the books there as well and make sure you check out Giggy's page as well as got some.

Really cool stuff, including some Toy Story videos, digging into some Morden, Donkey Kong 64 and we are going to continue to be doing more things together. We're expanding sort of different ideas like streaming and playing games together, doing special edition episodes that aren't just like this with special guests, but doing different kinds of things and different videos and all that. So stay tuned at our YouTube page at Remember 64 or at Jiggy. Look back as well on YouTube.

But other than that, I just. I really want to say thank you everyone for again for joining us on this journey of the show. Your support, whether it's on Patreon or not, allows us to dig in and do more fun, exciting things like this. I really enjoy doing this. Whether the game is a home run or not, whether it's Goldeneye or whether it's something else,

it really doesn't matter. Taking this journey with you, with Giggy, with Luigi, with people like Elise and all the other amazing guests that we've had have been just honestly a joy. So thank you everyone for listening. Thank you everyone for being a part of the show. And of course, thanks again to Elise for being on this episode of Goldeneye 007. If you do want to support us to help us continue to grow the show, do fun, cool things like this and expand on those ideas

that I was just talking about. patreon.com/remember 64 show as little as a dollar a month. Everything helps just like every other Patreon out there. But I will say we do are doing a little bit of a giveaway. If you are a new sign up, we have Holographic Remember 64 stickers available for free to you. You can sign up if you feel comfortable giving me your address. I will mail those out and get them to you as soon as possible. All right, everybody, talk to you next time.

I remember 64. Yes.