11: Sweet Pounding Hammer

What's good, Internet? It is August 19th, 2025. And this is not a buoyant world of bright colors and boss fights. It's Side Story, a podcast about games and the stories we tell about them, presented by Friends at the Table and supported by our patrons at friendsatthetable.cash. Joining me today...

Janine and Sylvie. Hello. Leaks are poison to all creation. Oh boy. Okay. What? What? Dear Stylists, we recently became aware that some unauthorized development materials from our game have been illegally shared on multiple platforms. These creative works were meant to be revealed at the right time, but instead have been exposed through improper channels.

The theft and illegal distribution of game content is harmful not only to our team, but also to the community that loves and supports this game. We want to state clearly any act of obtaining or distributing unreleased content through illegal means harms both the creative team and the player experience. Those responsible may gain short term benefit, but they will face the consequences.

We have already launched a full investigation into the matter and will pursue the appropriate legal action. At this time, we ask for your support. Please do not share or discuss leaked content. Leaks are poison to all creation. Oh my god. Wow.

By refraining, you show respect for the creative process and help build and maintain a healthy gaming community. Once again, thank you for your understanding, support and commitment to protecting the integrity of our game. We believe that our creativity and passion will not be diminished by these leaks. Let's work together. hammer out these leaks, protect Infinity Nikki, and preserve this beautiful world we've built together. Infinity Nikki, okay. Attached. Uh-huh. Pounding hammer.

There are moments when one's hands itch, eager to raise a mighty hammer towards a certain target. It's like a pink inflatable toy hammer. Oh, yeah, sure. Does it have stats or anything? Oh, yeah. It's a D elegant, D fresh. Sweet S. S to your sweet. D sexy. And a B cool. So it's primarily a sweet cool. It's playful romance. The tags are playful romance. I see. I see. No, that sounds right. Right down here, sweet pounding hammer as a potential title for the episode. Got it.

They said it. They did. They did say it. That's a message that is waiting in the inbox of every player of Infinity Nikki. What got leaked? I don't know. so you're telling me the community you're the community you weren't you harmed by the leaks no because in with i i have okay listen

Okay, I just want to say, one, I have worked on games that have been leaked, and it sucks. It sucks. It fucking sucks. It sucks to know, like, oh, we were really looking forward to people, like, seeing this in a good, cool state. And instead they just like heard it randomly from some guy. It sucks. But a thing that I have no numbers to back up, but believe wholeheartedly is that no game ever.

has had the majority of its player base following it in some sort of social media. Yeah. Be that Reddit or Discord or X or Blue Sky or whatever. I refuse to believe any game other than a game that maybe has some sort of immediate direct tie-in, like you have to be on Twitter or else you don't get your points. I don't believe that...

The majority players of any game ever have followed a game's social, especially, I should say, not just the official account, but like the community, have been actively engaged in the community outside of maybe their immediate circle of people. So when you send this email to everyone. Right. With this custom item, I'm fairly sure this is not a recolor. This is like a new item. They made this item to punish the leaks.

Which makes it feel perhaps a little anticipated. It kind of feels like you're just telling me to go look at the leaks. Which, for a game that has been having some problems... because of some lies they told their players and then they like change the image after the fact to make it seem like, oh, actually the wishlist, the Steam wishlist bonus was this other thing. It wasn't all this other stuff. Or, you know.

started changing the way that the premium currency would drop in the free-to-play game and all of that stuff, introduced a new kind of currency that only works. on a certain kind of premium gotcha like you know has been doing a lot of shit um and also recently released like a new store area that is maybe a little bit boring and is probably not doing as well as they think it should.

I just think it's interesting that they sent a notice out to everyone saying, don't look at these super naughty leaks about our cool stuff. Here's a pretty hammer. You're telling me this could be a false flag leak. This could be a... I don't know. I am just saying it is interesting to send that out with a big inflatable pink hammer that is sweet. Cool, playful, and romance. Well, I did find them posting the, there's an image that they posted coding their message leaks.

comma, are poison to all creation. Leaks and poison both in yellow. They put this on their X account. It's so funny. It feels like something that gets posted by, like, a local government thing about, like, hey, don't drink. Don't use your tap water.

right now there's a boil water order leaks are poison to all creation all to all creation yeah uh-huh in like theocratic flint michigan leaks her poison to all creation yeah uh-huh she's like a lithograph poster kind of kind of era of public bulletin it's like just a big a big sort of um stylized tap or something.

With like a little guy under it going, oh no. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. But look, I'm on Infinity Nikki Leaks, right? The Reddit, the subreddit right now. Look how cool this, well, not that image. That's not the preview I'm putting. That's not it. Oh my God. This one. This one. Sword Rain Knight. Look how cool this looks. Yeah, I guess. This just kind of looks like all the other stuff they've been doing at this region. Okay, well, I don't keep up. We're just like, wow, carry on slicers.

They keep doing outfits where it's just like, and there's, when you wear the whole outfit, there's a photo ability where it makes this one thing happen. It's like, cool. I don't give a shit. I don't care. All right. I have to close Reddit because otherwise I'm going to. get distracted by this Final Fantasy XIV patch or whatever, yeah, patch trailer that features the evil child from Final Fantasy XI who's back in Final Fantasy XIV.

So I gotta, I gotta close this tab. Otherwise we're not going to do a podcast. Shout outs to E. Old Narch. You fucking suck. Anyway.

Uh, hi. How are you doing outside of Infinity Nikki Hammer updates? Good. I'm on my third little man, I think. My third little, my third, you know, my little slime, the little, the pet with the hole and you put the finger in the hole. From our last episode when you were, these are called, I'm sure I can remember. Oh, I don't think I can remember. Poonie runes. Poonie runes.

You've gotten two more. And you've stayed with the little whole ones. Sylvia, did you hear about this? Are you up on this? I'm not up on this. Janine has gone virtual. Actually, wait, I might be on the fourth. oh my god did i forget it what was the yellow one there's like a yellow one that was like a shape or something sometimes they're furniture and sometimes i got one that was sushi and then

And you could tell me the mistake of touching it. Another music is happening. Sorry about that. I think I did a yellow one, but I don't remember what it was. It's like a guy. I don't know. I remember thinking it was really ugly. Wow. Get him. Much is happening right now. Sylvie, the short version of this is Janine had a virtual pet on our last episode.

has a virtual pet has four virtual pets at the time it was only one that was like oh i don't have the other ones i've shot them into space continue okay where you could reach your finger into a hole and touch the slimy body of the virtual pet oh right i saw the thumbnail for that episode and i was like oh that'll be interesting whenever i get to that and then i haven't gotten to that because i've been a little intimidated

That's fair. It's a good episode. You should go listen to it if you haven't listened to it. It's a good podcast. It is. Today we have a different slimy situation to talk about.

We are finally going to talk about the game, Janine, that you and I have been teasing now for episodes. At least two, maybe three. I think two or three, which would be a month plus. We are going to talk about Hyper Griff's game, Papukom.

Which you... told me about uh but but also i think maybe you saw it from patrick klepik's yes newsletter is that right i i got it in i i read about it in um patrick's newsletter cross it's called cross play right cross play yeah um which is for anyone who doesn't know a newsletter that is sort of about like the intersection of gaming and family um so there's kind of a focus on like kids games games that are

Good for like low stress co-op, I think is actually maybe the better way to frame it. And, you know, stuff of that nature, anecdotes about... experiences he has with his own kids etc um and gaming um so i heard about it there and the pitch was pretty appealing which was like the pictures was more or less like you know it's a co-op game where they don't

really want people to have to struggle you know we beat that game there's some struggle in that game challenging but not like a skill wall kind of situation I think that's fair hit a point where it's just like you can't progress because you don't have the skill or whatever. Yeah, I've written here that it is a co-op action puzzler that requires clever teamwork and mostly simple color matching combat. Not what I'll say.

i just want to say about the thing that you said a lot of the difficult stuff we did you don't need to do that to finish the game But don't you have to beat the final boss still? Wasn't the final boss kind of hard? Maybe not. Maybe there was an optional bosses that we did that were kind of hard. Yeah, we did all the optional bosses and those were hard, but you don't have to do those. There's more little guys to collect than there are.

Let me set it up a little bit. It is a third-person multiplayer action. puzzler like i said you are little guys uh little like chibi characters they're like chibi-ish they're like little kids um with bright bobblehead kind of proportions yeah Exactly. They break colors. Each of them can change color. So you might be red and you can become red and yellow, whereas blue could become like blue and greens. I imagine if you're playing single player, you would...

I don't think you can play single player, but for two player, you each have two colors. I think for four player, you would all have one color of your own. That's right, though. I think the three or four player mode didn't seem like it was the same mode. We didn't try that mode, but there was like different menu.

option the main menu had like right two player as the campaign then there was like a three or four player like party mode or something um this game takes place in something that reminded it reminds me a lot of like the splatoon world sort of like post apocalyptic, bright-color Earth. with like the remnants of a former human civilization, like an industrial civilization. And you are going through these kind of levels with a third person camera with a sort of like a slime blaster.

like a Mega Man-style blaster on your arm that can produce a blast of whatever color you currently are. So you kind of have, if you're red, you can go between red and yellow. So sometimes you're shooting red blast, and sometimes you're shooting yellow blast, and then the other player is shooting purple and green, right?

And the comp, let's just start at the very basic level, basic idea. You come to a new little area and some weird slimoids show up. Oh, I don't like that. That sounds like a slur. That does. I'm not saying that. What are they? They're called. Are they called pomos? They're pomos, right? They're pomos. They're pomos. Because I would say pomos a lot. And OK, there's a red one. Well, you can't beat a red one with a with a yellow shot. You have to become red. Right. And so you.

become red and then you shoot the red one and that's good. And then maybe you go to leave the arena and there is a kind of chest high yellow wall in front of both you and the player who's purple and... green. And hey, while you can turn yellow and walk through that wall, your partner can't. But what you can do is you can turn yellow and then use your little blaster to make an energy wall that your partner can stand on top of.

and then they can like stand on that and you can carry them above the top of the wall. Uh, and then the game is just like layering ideas like that over and over and over again for dozens of levels where you're doing. match three puzzles to make platforms you are using tools to like pick up and move things around you are fighting enemies that need to be like knocked over and then like hit with a color for on their underside you are doing

like slingshot maneuvers and like portal gun, you know, swapping. It's more like the swapper, swapping techniques. Every level is just like filled with some new idea. There's kind of four or five. main tools you get, but then those tools get reused in different ideas over and over again. Again, in these kind of bright and colorful, you know, sometimes it's like an abandoned amusement park or a logistics facility or a water park.

There's a bunch of weird levels. And then underlying it all is a very strange lore. situation I was gonna ask like if there was a story or if it was just like you get dropped into this thing I can I can answer that please Janine with a screenshot that I have energy station number 34

The explosion of an energy ball at this station caused widespread environmental pollution. The accident at energy station number 34 made the doctor aware of the unpredictable nature of prisma energy. He began to call for further research into prisma energy and its potential risks.

This was also when the doctor began to part ways with Andrew. I want to say like the second sticker we got in the whole game or something. We were like, who the fuck is Andrew? And let me tell you, I have a pretty good idea of who Andrew is now. Oh, I have Andrew. I have Andrew's thing.

Well, let's not spoil Andrew for the listener. Yes, that's fair. Hey, can I just say, it's not what you're expecting. I'm looking at this picture of Andrew, and I don't think anybody's going to be able to guess it. No, I don't think so either. No, not enough.

wild um there is there is something i i think this game is being like badly slept on but i also kind of think maybe It's just not its moment because co-op games are doing a different thing right now. But let's just start by saying, like, I think this game is fucking great.

I had so much fun playing it. I think the the puzzle design is really clever. It makes you feel really smart when you find stuff. The collectibles are so well hidden, but like I say so well hidden. I don't mean that they are like impossible to find. I mean, they are. the right amount of hard to find they're the exactly right amount of oh it feels like there should be something around yes yeah you get that like sort of

It's not as obvious as in an old cartoon when a part's going to move and it looks a little different because it's on a cell and on the background. It's not like that, but you can get a sense of like... wait a minute it's been a little while since we had a collectible and like what's this little overhang or like what's this little what's this box do like these little these little moments of like wait this looks like something that i can do something with

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And then you do, and then you get a little sticker that tells you about Andrew. That tells you about Andrew, or Yolki, the Yolk guy. Oh yeah, Yolki. Who's the scientist. Yeah, you have to, so there's like aliens, there's like slime aliens. Yolki's a goody bot? And the goodie bots are helping you build a missile.

They're helping you build the missile so that you can shoot the Pamu, like, mothership alien creature thing that's hovering above Earth and throwing monsters down at it. And also there's snow booze, but I don't... know what they have to do with anything. They just exist. I don't remember what Snoboos are either. This game is so weird because it is bright and colorful. I think I originally described it as like the best Dreamcast game you don't remember playing.

because it has that late 90s, early 2000s aesthetic so much. The kind of super saturated, bright color, this kind of like optimistic, bubbly vibe. But there is like a weird sickness at the heart. fucking game in a weird way everything feels dark in in It looks like if you, like, looked behind the corner, you would find out some shit about a secret laboratory. I mean, you do. You do find out stuff about secret laboratories. But, like, you know, again, you are rescuing these, like...

robots that are like egg yolks inside of little robot bodies. And then what are they doing for you? It's like, oh, we're doing the Manhattan Project for you. You know, it's like, what the fuck are you talking about, dude? And then even just like...

The boss, some of the boss fights, because of the way the game works, which is like, again, it's color matching. You are, you are doing match three style stuff in an action, like kind of an action puzzle, third person perspective. The boss fights are like fighting people. fighting these big guys made of balls, like made of different colored balls, you know? And so you have to match three on them live to beat them. So if they have like a leg that is like...

yellow orb, red orb, purple orb, you need to put two extra yellows next to the yellow so that it will pop the bubbles. And they will like... live fall over and start to crawl at you like the Terminator if you blow their legs off. Yeah. Or like you can pop their head off and they kind of struggle to figure out where they're going. Yes. You can... Yeah, you can mess up their torsos. Yes. It accounts for everything in the animations. I just want to say, like... Yes, please. It's... I...

It is match three, but I tend to think of it more as like a 3D puzzle platformer version of Zuma. Right, sure. Yeah, because it's a little bit more, and sometimes there's just like a Zuma game sometimes in like a Zuma minigame. You'll find a puzzle box or a puzzle little location or whatever where that's the case. Yeah, because it's a little bit more about like... How popping bubbles sort of interacts with stuff in the way that like when you're playing Zuma

popping the bubbles makes it roll back. And if you pop a good sequence of them, it'll roll back even farther. It's kind of like if you took that concept and then made it a guy who was walking around and coming at you and you exploded his legs. Yeah. And then he falls on the ground and starts crawling. at you faster and faster and faster.

Yeah. It's like there are moments where I was like, this is gross. It has that sort of like Mechagoro thing where like because it's robots, you can get away with, you know, because the Foot Clan in the cartoon were made of little robot guys, they could get slashed up by... by Leonardo's katana, like it wasn't a big deal. And it's like that, except for popping, like, bubbles, because the people are made of them. They come down by...

The big bosses come down by being vomited out of a thing. Oh, wonderful. It's gross. It's really good. In a rendered cutscene that feels like it's very... It feels like it's a game cutscene from the Xbox. It does feel like it's a game from the Xbox. It's like weirdly lo-fi compared to the rest of the game. That's the magic words you've just said. Yes, yes. I think you would love this game, Sylvie. I really think it's Sylvie core to me. Yeah, I've been watching you linked.

like full walkthrough in the in our discord and i just kind of like had that on in the background and tapping between it and when Janine links something and I have already sent this game to multiple people I want to play it with being like hey hey two fingers pointing at each other emojis what if we there's also a mini game arcade with

There's like a little arcade where you can play little mini games. And there is one in there called Volleyboink that I think should just be its own game. I would just play so much Volleyboink. It's very fun. It's like physics-y volleyball that like... You have very minimal control. Yeah, you get minimal control. You kind of just make your guys do the one motion they can do. It's very funny. And they'll like wobble around and respond to their own inertia. Yes.

You can end up on the completely wrong side of the net, and it's funny. I also just think that as far as co-op games go, you know, it is... I used to have a real hard time playing co-op puzzle games. A decade plus ago, I remember, Janine, you and I played some of the Trine games. And I used to just always feel very stupid. And I'm not... You know, I think that puzzles are hard and it's a very common thing inside of puzzle game design to struggle with...

the logic of a designer sometimes where it's like, oh, I don't really understand what the puzzle designer had in mind here. And so partly this is taste and it's just like, oh, this is a game that I kind of. grokked. Ooh, I hate that they took that from me. They stole it. I was writing a thing for my segment later and I had to be like, nope, it's a different word. Can't use it. I can't use it anymore. Yeah.

You know, it is partly that I just understand this intuitively, you know, like, but also I do think that there is just really clever, intentional co-op puzzle design throughout this, where sometimes it's...

more action based than it's puzzle based in the sense of like okay it's very obvious that what has to happen here is you put your shield to the left to protect me from the laser then it then we get past that laser because we're on a conveyor belt and then i'll put my shield to the right to protect you from the

laser and there's some sort of dance like quality to something like that but there are also moments where it's just like okay we have to okay you take the the little like a pyramid the little glowy pyramid thing that we can throw and and do a swap with and then I'll swap with it when you throw it in the air and that'll get me behind the grate and all of that stuff always makes you feel or makes me feel like

I think we figured it out. We did it. We figured out a thing. Sometimes you have to feel like you figured out a thing that the designers didn't intend, which is always one of the best feelings in video games. And then other times you will make a mistake. Like there's at least one time where I, we.

got a one of the collectible stickers that are hidden in the level and it tells you what number that sticker is in the level so there might be five and they'll be like oh yeah this is the fourth one and there was one time when it was like oh we had one two three and five and I was like shit But what if I use this cube thing that we can teleport with to trick the game into getting us back to where we were? Because normally it's quite hard to backtrack.

in a lot of levels they're designed in such a way where it's kind of a forward only exactly and that feeling is incredible it's just so good and I think it's a shame that people aren't I haven't seen anybody but Patrick talk about this game, and it's been out now for, I don't know, a few months? It's been out for...

Since June. June 1st it came out. And it's doing fine. It has a couple thousand reviews on Steam and stuff. But I just think that the world of co-op games is so different in this moment that it's hard for something like this, I think, to... stand out you know we're living in peaks world we're living in in the world of um uh sorry here's yeah here's here's how slept on this game is

Yeah. This is the first game that... any of us have been interested in where i've looked at the store page and it hasn't been on jack's wishlist whoa that's how slept on this game is wow we're telling jack about it we mentioned this game out loud and jack didn't know what it was on one of the earlier recordings which is very

Very rare. You need to understand that Jack's wish list is... Thousands. It's absurd. I don't know what to do about it. We've had multiple conversations in our chat about it. I thought I was bad at 400. Yeah. Oh, my God. Very different. I barely broke 100.

I think I'm somewhere in, I think I'm at 153. I'm at 153 and some of this stuff I should probably get rid of, you know? Yeah. If I look at the list of like when I added some of this stuff, let's see, what's the oldest thing I have on this list? I probably don't need Everyday Shooter, the PS3 music shooter game. I don't know, man. Maybe you do. That game's pretty good.

Yeah, shout outs. Anyway, yeah, I feel like there's something happening. You know, I love the what is often referred to as friend slop. I like those games a lot. It is humorously called that. It was humorously called that to begin with. I know. I don't know that most people mean it in a serious way. I know. It's not what slop is. That's the thing. You're taking bile out of slop. Oh, wow.

You're taking the bile out of slop. Yeah, it should be. So you're reverse grokking slop. Slop should feel derogatory. It should feel well, but anything that's derogatory will eventually be reclaimed, you know? Yeah. Unfortunately, and I don't, I don't mean that's always a good thing for it to happen, but like, you know, if they're out here reclaiming the S word, you know,

That's right. I'm half slop on my dad's side. Right. Yeah. You're allowed. I'm allowed to say slop. Oh my God. That is the, but you know what I mean? That style of game, you know, content warning and pee. and these games that are really built for emergent storytelling and kind of systems-driven co-op play.

Not that this game doesn't have systems, but it's a very structured, linear game about beating levels and getting all of the collectibles and, you know, completing boss fights. And it's just like, it's one of these moments where...

where you can kind of feel the sort of cultural paradigm not aligning with something. It has nothing to do with whether or not the game is good, you know? I think if this game would come out five years ago when there was a sort of... of co-op options, it probably would have done extremely well, you know, especially because it's so light and airy and like...

It's easy to jump in and play two levels or three levels or play for 45 minutes or something and actually make some progress, which is just, you know, that that particular need has been met now by this other type of game in such a way.

I don't know. It's just funny. It's a great illustration of the fact that success... does not simply you know relate to merit or like quality um you can make a really good thing and it might not hit is that true oh no yeah it's also like it's also interesting to think about like So, you know, we've talked about how there's sort of like a Dreamcast-y, Xbox-y, like, Y2K era of colorful...

you know fun game that feels a little bit strange um you know games don't often feel a little bit strange anymore so it's nice when they do um but there's so there's part of me that's like if this game had been published by Nintendo, and it was a Switch exclusive for two years, people would be losing their minds. 100%.

I mean, again, it does feel like Splatoon in that way in certain places. And it feels like Astro's Playhouse in certain areas. Yes, Playground. Playground? How many are there? Astro's Playground. Astro's... Playroom. Playroom was the first one. Oh my God. Playroom was the first one. And now there's, there's Asherbot rescue mission. Is that right? No, that was the first one. Astroth Rescue Mission was the VR one, PSVR one. Then there was Astroth's Playroom. And now there's another one.

What's the newest one called? I just called Astro Bot. I have an unfortunate amount of contempt for the robot. I do too. I think we actually talked about this on an episode we didn't.

Well, like a segment we ended up cutting from the very first episode of this show. Jack, Janine, and I talked a bunch of shit about... video games uh and like the keelys and some other stuff and part of what we talked about was frustration with astrobot so But this is like, playing this game was sort of a relief to me because it like reminded me that I didn't hate like cute things and joy and this style of...

um of game it really is the like branding stuff around astrobot that that makes me frustrated you know um so uh anyway i think people should be playing popacom i think that it's deeply slept on

At some point, if you do end up playing some of it, Sylvie, I would love to maybe do a stream of whatever the three or four player version is. Oh, my God, please. I have no idea what those are, but they're fun. There's like a 90% chance. before the end of this recording. It's in my Steam library. You're right. It's very targeted. It is, 100%. We should say, it's also cheap.

it's like yeah it's um i forget there's like there's like weird names there's like budget premium and whatever the fuck the nick bracket names for prices i don't fucking know um but you know it's yeah it's It's pretty fucking affordable, even if it's not on sale. Yeah. All right. That's Papukom. We finally have to talk about it. I think everyone should go check it out and should find out what the mystery of Andrew is. Oh, also the clothing is great.

yeah i just want to say really great outfits sick outfits you can look really cool um a very small thing that i love that i want to shout out is like i said it's it's red and yellow and then purple and green but every level that changes so it's like oh it's not red it's pink and it's not

yellow it's orange or it's peach and green it's teal exactly yeah which is really fun I think that there's like some fun now I actually suspected that might be an accessibility nightmare to some degree I don't think that this is a game that does a lot with you know I think about accessibility

Sorry, I had this playing on in the background. And remember the exact puzzle I talked about before of, like, you need to lift somebody with your shield? I just watched these players just absolutely fail it, and they both just jumped right into the acid pit together. It was very funny. Anyway, yeah, I think about best practices with color accessibility in games.

often being about producing, reproducing information, not just with color, but also with like shape, you know, like, oh, this is green, but it's also triangles or this is red, but it's also, you know, a, and none of that is in the.

game at all so i do think that that's a problem but there's a degree to like i you know i should say i don't remember if there is a colorblind mode but because it's a co-op game that's already gonna kind of be tricky because if your partner is saying like it's purple do purple it's like well um you know there's there's already gonna be like limited

You know, you can tell the difference between A and B and C and D, but like sometimes being like, well, this is red versus green or whatever is harder.

There is a colorblind mode. There are some sort of assists that you could turn on, though I'm not sure what those assists are off the top of my head. I should check into it, and I'll link to whatever... whatever uh is available in the in the description so that people can check it out for themselves to see if it's a good fit for them um all right let's take a quick break and we come back

Sylvia, I got to hear about what's going on in New Boston. Oh, don't you worry. I got you covered. All right. We'll be right back. What's that noise? I'm in. Hello to all the cyber listeners out there. I've hacked the airwaves to let you know the situation in Neo New Boston. It's just new Boston. It's just new Boston. I typed Neo first and then I went, wait, it's new, isn't it? It's new Boston. That's not as good. Listen, there...

They have a very ambitious post-release content roadmap. Maybe I can petition for them to change it to Neo Boston somewhere along the way. Just make it an option in the settings. Literally. You know, maybe just give me the Neo new toggle. yeah in the settings it's like how um kairosoft games let you toggle between yen and dollars just let me toggle between new and neo that's right we are of course talking about cyber knights flashpoint the latest game from

the Trisset Brothers. It is a, I've written here, maximalist cyberpunk turn-based tactics game where your crew of augmented mercenaries run missions and heists in dystopian Boston. I guess dystopian New Boston. There we go. If you've never heard of the Trusset Brothers... You are missing a very interesting branch of extension of a style of game that I think is not as popular as it once was. They've been making them now for over a decade.

They started out making games on Android and mobile phones. They found success on both Android and iOS eventually. And they started making games for the PC a few years ago. And the one that kind of hit for them big on PC was Star Traders Frontiers. which is like a space trading sim that had like elements of like Crusader Kings and also Darkest Dungeon. Really big systems driven kind of procedural storytelling, lots of layered systems, lots of complexity.

lots of like moving pieces that create the sort of emergent narratives that Lord knows I love. I think Jack and I streamed some Star Traders Frontiers once, and maybe Rob and I did for Waypoint at one point. That's the very short version. The type of games that they build really draw on a history of strategy games from PC. going back to a range of them from kind of space trading games like Elite or Star Control to kind of tile-by-tile dungeon crawls.

series of games that are very 40k inspired called like Templar Battle Force or whatever, kind of a space marine. And then even Star Traders itself, like I said, it's very Star Command, but it also has elements of kind of space exploration games. It has elements of...

classic kind of economics trading type stuff. But also that game ends up having lots of like... dune and 40k in it also where there's like noble houses and you know dueling dukes and space emperors and spice and you know chaos and shit like that you know all throughout it. And now they've made their first 3D game. Cyber Knights Flashpoint, which is a sequel to, for them, a long-running cyberpunk series called Cyber Knights. Yeah, the first one came out on Android phones. I had no idea.

I played the first one of these, Cyber Knights, on Android, on... God, what was it called? The Android emulator back in the day, Blue Stacks. Oh. Is that what it was called? Oh, sure. Yeah, there's Blue Stacks, yeah.

Yeah, like 15 years ago is when I first played this thing. And so for me, I was like, okay, they're making that, but like... they're making it look like an x-con they're making it in 3d they're making it with a home base they're doing all the stuff that i think is super exciting about that genre uh and i'll i guess i'll say right now partly the reason they were able to do that is they partnered with a they was co-developed with us

called NIX Games, which is a support studio that has worked with Paradox. It's worked with Supermassive and Wargaming and some other stuff. I think they were founded in Ukraine and now have studios all over the place, but classic like a situation where a small studio...

works with like a support studio and a publisher to try to like make a bigger more ambitious thing uh but i've only played very i've played like the first three hours of it i'm curious sylvie how much of this have you played how how's it going what's your trusset brothers experience before this is this your first journey yeah so i had seen some of star traders um okay and like i did a little i like i looked at that a little bit just to like um

Got a little more background for myself on them. And this game feels like kind of an evolution of that. But this is my first real, like, serious time playing one of their games. I'm about... I'm just under 40 hours in, I would say. It is definitely one of those games that I will just like lose a lot of time to. And it feels like I should be deeper in, but I'm like, I'm still in like my first era. Like there's this whole era.

era system, and I'm still in my first major event. Wait, what's the era system? Does the world change? Does the tech change? What's the vibe? The big one right now for me is that there is a new megacorp coming to the new Boston zone, the NBC. Okay. Listen, they will abbreviate it to that and your brain will be trained to go. Oh yeah, New Boston Zone. Of course, the Dome. That's like the big thing that's defining a lot of the missions you get basically is...

There's a mix of proc gen and scripted stuff, and a lot of this does seem to be affecting the script. That makes sense. Yeah, like the linear, like the main campaign. Yeah. Yeah, I think that the main campaign stuff can happen in different orders. I think that the starting one might always be this, like, there's a new German conglomerate coming to the NBC and, like, you... here's a mission where so you can get like a contact with them so you can start uh doing work and stuff like that

Because you were playing as a group of mercenaries and sort of Shadowrunner, Cyberpunk crew. I was going to say, some sort of people who run in the shadows. I see. I can give like a high level. Let me give a high level. This is the problem with this game. There are many weeds to get lost in. And they're all very enticing. So it is a heist team management game. Like I said, set in far future New Boston, 2231. That's main...

Its main flow is basically XCOM in a lot of ways. It is you're on the ground doing squad-based tactics, and then you go back to a base where you manage other things, sort of bigger picture stuff. um weirdly actually really makes me think of some of the uh forged in the dark games we've played on friends at the table because you're managing like your heat level based on how like loud you go during a mission interesting

What happens if you get too much heat? It gets way harder. Headhunters will be sent after you. um i i oh i forgot to write down the name i might boot up my game right now just to check um i have a headhunter on me because a um on a mission it got crashed by Bravestar, the like private police.

Right, not Lone Star from Shadowrun, but Brave Star. Very different. Very different. There's no elves in it, so it's very different. It's very distinct. There is a lot of, like... Oh, because I'm familiar with this... genre it's like that's that with the serial numbers filed off which in a way which i'm happy with yeah it is yeah 100 i should say like everything you're describing so far is like

a dream game for me. So I'm very excited to finally have the time to play this game. I think you'd love it. I really think you would love it. But like, so a mission went bad on like, it was a rescue mission. Actually, I should start this from the top to tell you how I got into this rescue mission because I wrote it down. Please. You have a whole squad of... Of your your heist team and I can grow and you can recruit new people. There's a bunch of different classes

The protagonist gets a unique one, the Cyber Knight, the titular Cyber Knight, that can do things that the other classes can't, and everyone can multi-class. But that's kind of... Beside the point. Every member of your team though will have different connections and stuff like that. With NPCs in the world? With NPCs, with corporations, with...

Because they have histories, right? They have like, oh, I used to work for this company, and then I quit, or then I got fired. There's like a, when you start the game, you are given, and I think... Because they're on, like, number 20-something or nearing 20-something with the... No, yeah, number 25 for their post-release updates, I think. Which is weird. This game, it's 1.0. It's not in early access. It's not early access. It is technically out of early access, but sometimes it feels like...

Some stuff is still early access. This is like one of their big... This is one of their big tenets. They have this kind of... They have... Here's how they describe it. So there's two people, Andrew and Corey, and they say, we make games that are regularly updated with long lifespans, no exploitative monetization or dark patterns. personal involvement in player communities like that's what they do that's their that's their kind of claim to fame

And so their previous games, you know, I just went to look what was the last time that Cyber Knights was updated, the Android game that I mentioned from 15 years ago or whatever. March. It was updated in March. Wow. They keep their stuff right. running and they do content updates all the time even the stuff that has been you know star traders was getting updated um uh last year or whatever on on steam so like star traders frontier is the one that made their made their

their name kind of on PC. So, you know, yeah, July 21st was their 371st update for Star Traders Frontiers. They added new contact types, new contact simulation for actions towards friends and fixed bugs around. cloaked components so they're like still making they really do the thing with these games so that makes sense sylvie it's really cool and then sometimes it also feels a little weird because like

There will be tech tree stuff where it's like for hackers, there's like one about when drones attack you, but drones aren't in the game yet. So like it doesn't really matter. Like I'm like, okay, so I don't need to take that. Right.

Because, like, they're still implementing companion classes, I think, is the way they've put it. Right, right. But yeah, so, like, I've linked, I've added, just sent an image of, this is my Cyber Knights.

Character sheet which you sort of answer these questions. I love it. I picked this the the sort of can you tell us about your cyber night? Yeah, so my my cyber night is Codename astral which is what once you get your codename. That's what everyone calls you so her name her first name is Maya and I heard last names cut off in this screenshot so I don't remember what it is sorry I'm not a very like good boss I'm very impersonal with these people

But aren't you my... Wait, who are you playing as? Are you not playing as Astral? You would think that I am playing as...

The two characters I tend to play the most as are the Cyber Knight, who is your de facto protagonist. And then you also have a handler for the team who's a non-combat character, does a lot of base stuff, affects contacts, which is like a very crucial... satyr king star traders thing is managing your web of contacts um and will also manage like your heat level basically everything that it that um

that leads into and comes out of missions sort of is affected by your faces stats um so the things like what jobs you can get how much you're getting paid yeah how much heat you get stuff like that yeah and you like you can use different tokens to like get better rewards or negotiate better. I think some stats affect how many favors you can get, because instead of getting paid, you can opt to take a favor from a person.

um and that is very forged in the dark that is very what thing are you do you want from this mission yeah um and so like So it kind of alternates between those two when you're picking dialogue options and stuff. And sometimes you'll get to pick a dialogue option for another character that is part of your team in the situation they're in.

but typically speaking i would say like 70 of the time you're playing as your cyber knight and then the other 20 in dialogue at the very least you are playing as your your face Gotcha. But the character creation, basically, you're given four options for, like, a couple different things. You're given a backstory. I picked Betrayed Detective, an ex-Bravestar detective who refused to back down on a corruption scheme investigation. Serpico basically um you know a raid went bad I got shot but uh

I'd left the force after that, you know, stuff like that. I really wanted to lean into noir with, with this character when I made it. Cause I was like, I have to be like, they all sort of do. They're all, there's like an X, like you leave it. It's all. It's basically all like, which faction did you leave before you started your own thing? You could be from one of the megacorps or a PMC or something. Yeah, there's some gangs. Right, okay.

And does that then give you... Oh, I see. It says faction insider. Due to your connections in history, you're capable of executing legwork, which is all bright green, inside Bravestar territory without undue attention. So it's like because you have those connections... You can still go there.

and hang out basically yeah you or um when you do you used to go to the cop bar yeah exactly i got contacts still um but then also there's a district captain who hates me because uh he's probably the one who got me shot um oh you have like a oh i see enemy pat brin district captain contact you believe that pat brin was the one who had you ambushed to hide corruption within the force games are good and all of your characters have stuff like this so like

Like if you click on my war machine vigil, she used to be part of Werner Brown, the one. i know what you're doing with that name yeah i know what you're doing with that name um she used to be used to like be a bodyguard for them but like i can't remember the specific something went bad and she like one refuses to work on missions that are coming from them now so that she won't be in your team if like you cannot select her um and then also she's like hunted by them or like like

that could come knocking basically down the road. If your heat gets too high, I assume, or like it'll affect what or wit or what headhunters or which headhunters get sent after you. Gotcha. I think. I've been managing my heat fairly well, so I haven't I just got a headhunter put on me um but the other because the mission went bad a mission went bad and the mission was if you if you look down a little further my my cool hacker overlord

Dade Overlord Sorenson. Sorry, Dade. I meant Overlord. So I go with just random names because I want to see what... than names are like in the game because I find that fun, you know? But when I got Dade as the name for my hacker, I was like, oh, it's going to take every bone in my body to not name this guy Zero Cool. And I managed to resist it.

um but there was an i got a conversation there's like a timeline always going in this very similar to xcom if you're familiar with that you're you know the sort of like passage of time thing when you're doing scans things like that

um this is where legwork comes into play it's basically you send someone off on a mission to uh i always i think of it as final fantasy tactics advanced style where you can get the like individual missions and send them off and certain people have a better chance of doing it um but i got a conversation with overlord and he was like hey um so i have a brother who was trying he's trying to take care of my mom and in doing so signed up to go on a chemco barge to pay for new lungs she needed.

Chemco, one of the megacorps, presumably? I believe that it is a chemical. They sound like they do good stuff. I think it is specific. I don't know if it's specific. Chem like chemotherapy, right? It's like they take care of people.

right yeah yeah totally i think what the chemco barges are because there's like a like my understanding of it is sort of a radioactive like underbelly sewer system thing going on and i think it's to do with that i actually there's like a big in-game Encyclopedia and I remember looking to be like what is chemco and we can't really find it So I'm kind of making my own inferences here

um i basically was like in my head it's like oil rig meets like sure whatever they had robert pattinson doing in mickey 17 but it's bad and you're like locked into a contract with these megacorps very you know, very standard sort of cyberpunk stuff. But his brother Kyle... He got locked into this contract and tried to escape after getting paid for it because you get paid up front because they say the survival rate is like 1% or something. It's really low.

And so he's locked up, waiting to be executed, and we had to go rescue him in this two-part mission. and it went well on the first part and then the second part um something came up and i don't know if this is because i didn't get the legwork to like prepare properly or what but because this this was coming from a

This was coming from a Bravestar contact. And right when we got down there, she's like, hey, in two terms, a Bravestar strike team is going to show up. I didn't know about this. And so at this point, the missions are like... Top-down XCOM style tactic stuff, but like that lean towards stealth. Is that right? Basically the way so when I First got it. I expected it to be a little invisible ink because you are right It does lean towards stealth but

Okay. Something that I saw pretty early on in like Steam comments and stuff was people being like, don't go into a mission expecting to do... 100 stealth you will get caught at some point things will get loud at some point and yeah i like that i think that's the fun of a heist game is um yeah seeing how far you can get now the factor yeah Yes, the D'Alessena rule of the stealth game is only as good as the moment that you kind of have to deal with losing stealth. You know, things go bad. Yeah.

um and all of a sudden i find myself in a firefight with uh two hackers who are not great at shooting because i've rescued kyle by this point who is now on my team and has the nickname Anemone, which I love. That's fun. But we're like...

There's five of us. Usually you only go on a mission with four. So at least I had an extra gun. But like two of us are melee focused because I'm doing a melee build for my Cyber Knight. And I brought my War Machine who's also got like she's got War Machine classes. less self-explanatory than hacker obviously it's you're very much the like um molly from from neuromancer oh from neuromancer yeah molly millions like so like with razor cyberware

Right, I see. Yeah, you're the augmented class. That's the word I was searching for. Very, very like, you get like lasers and claws and stuff. It's neat, but it also is like, oh, I should have given you a better machine gun. And like... Overwatch is a skill in this game. It is not a given that your characters are going to be able to do Overwatch. That's why I will multi-class some people into Soldier or Sniper because Sniper has a single shot Overwatch and Soldier just has basic Overwatch.

um and so like it basically just becomes this mad dash to an exit um Because the Brave Star are coming in. Because the Brave Star are coming in. And during this, I get on the radio, I get a dialogue with this guy who's like, surrender now. And, you know, we'll let your team out and all this stuff and identify yourself. And I think I just said my name is Chumbo, which is their version of, you know, you got to have the cyberpunk bro. the Cyberpunk 2077 one.

choom right yeah choom or chummer yeah uh-huh yeah so i do that and like he gets really mad he's like i'm gonna find your quantum fingerprint and there's a really good moment where i'm like to my face is that real and she's like no that's total but this like lieutenant within Bravestar now has like a grudge against my team and has the most recent development I've had is him hiring headhunters to come after me this headhunter named Matcha and I'm

really excited to see what their deal is great name but yeah that is kind of the flow of the game is you get these there's there's missions will either be pure combat, stealth mixed with combat, or hacking. Those are kind of the three main ways they're split. And like hacking optional is usually something you'll see on the mixed stealth combat ones.

Is that a different, like, layer of game? Yeah. It's like very... Sort of the classic tabletop... cyberpunk 2020 or shadow run thing of like and then your hacker is playing an entirely different game than everybody else yeah like literally it it is very um it's not it doesn't play the same way but it it has the same sort of economy of action points that i would

the um harebrained scheme shadow run games do yes totally um where like it's like you get you have more actions while hacking but it's like there's like a conversion between like your your um out of your in-person flesh body and your your right yeah yeah i see yeah yes um

How does this feel compared to those games? Because there's one of those games that I really love. One of them I like quite a bit. Yeah, Dragonfall. Dragonfall's fantastic. Hong Kong is pretty good. I didn't finish Hong Kong. I feel bad about that to this day. And then the first one returns is just kind of like, yeah, they're finding their legs a little bit. It felt like a puzzle.

concept yeah and then they knocked it out of the park shadow run dragonfall is incredible it's an all-timer but like the thing that that game is not doing is procedural systems driven simulation stuff you know so there are i don't think it's like because this is procedural it's obviously not Identical to that. I think that there are moments that emulate the sort of feeling of having a companion talking to a companion in Dragonfall and them being like, hey, there's one specifically with

your mage in that game where he's like, my nephew has fallen in with the pro-human supremacists and we need to get him out. The mission I got to rescue... the overlord's brother remind reminded me of that basically is like there is those moments where it feels like you're given a chance to go on a mission and build more loyalty with your um party members but it

I don't know how bespoke a lot of that is. Well, and then, like, the thing I think about it that's so fascinating is, like, the other... So if something like the extremely... linear and scripted Shadowrun games from Harebrained on one side.

of this kind of spectrum than like XCOM and XCOM 2 are on the other side, which have some scripted content around, you know, they have a campaign, they have stories, they even have a handful of NPCs back at base and enemy NPCs, especially in War of the Chosen. But none of your characters are... people you know what i mean like you don't you you bring it's only what you can bring to them none of them used to be part of the

cops and now they have beef with the cops you know none of them have that's just not a game that tries to do any of the social simulation stuff at all so this feels like it's trying to be You know, instead of it being a spectrum from one to two, that there's a sort of like triangle shape.

And here is this other thing that's sort of close to both of them, but also really doing something that neither of them does. It feels, it really does feel like they have added the, um... crusader kings or star traders like grand strategy um like interpersonal stuff into this like the the way that like you have to manage relationships in crusader kings and like you have to things like that um because like you're managing contacts those are the people who give you missions but also

Yeah, there is a lot more character given to the people in your squad. They will become friends with each other. Can they get beef with each other? I haven't had anyone start beefing yet, but I just hit double digits. with the amount of characters I have. So I'm expecting it at some point if I'm being real. That's a lot of characters though. It is, but when someone gets hurt, they're out of action for a while.

Interesting and you have to manage both their physical and mental health like you have to detox them in the synth like de-stressing thing There's like Yeah, that is XCOM to me, actually. That is, you need the deep roster, you need the deep, or Darkest Dungeon. Sorry, I have to send you to the monastery to, you know, or to the brothel, one or the other.

Yeah, you need to relax, man. Your discontent is about to hit 100% and then lower your loyalty. I counted outside of the standard time management and HP and health. management stuff there are like six distinct meters you've got to manage like at any given time um that well that reminds me of a different tactics game actually which was troubleshooter did you play are you troubleshooter is

Oh, yeah. Thank you. Yes, this is really troubleshootery to me. Troubleshooter, for people who don't know, is also one of these squad-based tactics games, but sort of more like... superhero-y, I guess, is how I'd describe the characters. They all have, like, different powers and stuff. Another game also that has a real shonen vibe to it, you know? Yeah. That game is also one that has had a ton of post-release.

Like updates and continued support from the developer. I think they are working on a sequel now, but sick like also extremely maximalist I think so extremely what if there were 30 different? meters for each character and everyone had different tags and different six different ways to do damage over time and you know all sorts of stuff like that Yeah, they're companion pieces, I would say, these two games. There's a lot of troubleshooter in here, now that you mention it. Cool.

I need to play this. This is, you know, in a real way, I think if you had gone back to 2010, 2011, I would have described wanting to play exactly this game. And I say that because I did and it was on the Android emulator playing. their version of this game on Android. So I really need to find the time to play it. I've been moving and maybe this will be my post-move treat for myself, you know?

I'm excited to swap run stories with you. I cannot wait. Any other final thoughts on Cyberknights? No, I'm curious to see where it goes from here. Like I said, I'm... 40 hours in but i also still feel like i've only really like dipped my toe in um i'm curious yeah that's the other thing about their games is like they're real like you see someone who has played them for 400 500 a thousand hours and they'll be like you know

Well, this sucks. And then at 800 hours, they go, I get it now. It's the best game ever. And I'm like, I think you maybe got it at 400, buddy. And then at 1,200 hours. Right. Yeah, exactly. Yes. Yeah, I'm excited to finally get to it. They've got like four more classes planned and they've already got 11. That's the thing that's tough is like, well, should I start now or should I wait until all the classes are in? Well, you can respec pretty easily.

for the most part, but yeah, I don't know. And I guess that's the thing, it's a sort of campaign that will just keep going, right? It's sort of, I guess the other games to compare to this that have come out in the last few years are things like... um what's it called warband is that the name of that game not nope not mountain blade war not mountain blade war i mean also maybe mountain blade warband with the like the uh

kind of mercenary unit management but do you know the one i'm talking about the one that is it the one that has like the cloak pin is its logo that sounds right no that's that's um Is that Banner Brothers? Though I guess that's also one of the Battle Brothers. Battle Brothers? Not that. Well, well, well. If it isn't the Banner Brothers. Oh, my God. What is the one I'm thinking of? War Tales?

War Tales. Thank you. War Tales. Yes. War Tales is absolutely the one. I have tried to play War Tales like four times. And each time I put two hours in and go, this is really cool. I can't wait until I can really give it. the time it needs and then i don't find it but yeah that game also continually getting updated with new contract the fief coming soon fief fife like a fiefdom a fiefdom fiefdom fiefdom that's what i'm saying Fife, fiftum, fiftum?

I hardly know him. Yeah. All right. On that note, I think we're going to end a little early today. I mean, I guess we beat our hour minimum that I try to aim for with the show. I have to get back to unpacking my apartment and get back to preparing to do another podcast today. On this day, I should probably just be unpacking my apartment. I just have to edit the KOTOR 2 Let's Play, which, by the way, I've been doing a...

KOTOR 2 Let's Play for a more civilized age. I guess it's possible that you don't know about that. So let me shout that out. You can find that on the AMCA YouTube. And speaking of YouTube, does anyone know what Keith's been putting up on? Actually, wait, first of all. Feel better, Keith. Keith is sick right now. Everyone send love up to Keith. Everyone just go and tell Keith feel better and that you love Keith. Go tell Keith your credit card number.

Go tell Keith your credit card number. That'll make him feel better. That's the one thing that I know makes sick Keith's feel better is the credit card numbers of strangers. I think most recently, though, actually was a stream that you were part of, Sylvie, that went up on YouTube. Yeah. YouTube.com slash.

friends at the table you want to talk about that yeah jack and i have been playing through and are almost done the anthology of the killer games uh which are extremely fun really funny and like the type of like clever writing that makes me like jealous when I'm reading it. It's really good. I'm crazy about those games now. And then, yeah, also some thief streams went up recently, too, that Jack has been doing, which are a fun time. Thief? Thiefdom? Thiefdom? Thiefdom. Thiefdom. Thiefdom.

Thanks for editing. Anyway, yeah, go watch those. YouTube.com slash friends at the table. We do streaming over at twitch.tv slash friends at the table. I don't know that we have any upcoming streams scheduled, but we do have to get Jack back to the Dreamcast streams. I think there's a couple more.

games to go there including mine so uh we need to do that very soon uh has been streaming though over on their partner's channel cat bam kapow they've been doing like a summer of of streams doing various things like blueprints yep and oh my god Wilmot works it out yeah yeah yeah or gold idol 2 maybe and some other grab bag of stuff i think they're gonna cook soon i think that the they've been cooking the whole time damn you fucking got it

I support my friends. Definitely go check those out. For people who don't know, KB, very good cook. KB is the only person who can get me to eat lentils. Wow. No one else in the world will ever do it. So I am pretty much with you, I think. You know, I would let someone else try, you know, but... I wouldn't. Wow. Strong feelings. It's our thing, you know? I just have to preserve it. Yeah, okay. You know what? Fair enough. We got Media Club Plus.

Oh, yeah. Oh, it's dropped. New Media Club Plus season has begun. Yeah. Next week after this drops, we should be having our Unbreakable episode. But yeah, we've begun our M. Night Shyamalan sort of... I think if we stay on schedule, like release schedule, fingers crossed, it should be about six months of M. Night movies. We're not watching everything. We are watching most of them.

No Avatar The Last Airbender, right? No, I think that was one where I really put my foot down, where I was like, I do not want to watch Avatar The Last Airbender. Because it's not his story, right? That's the whole point. Also, I don't want to waste my time. I think that's more of it. But we will be watching After Earth, and I want to be on that one. We'll get you there. Don't you worry. Okay. Take it.

Right now you've done Sixth Sense. You're doing The Unbreakable. You're doing most of those early big ones like Signs, Village, Lady in the Water, The Happening. Signs is the next one we're going to be recording. Yes. Stay tuned for Eye of Takes. Good. I'm glad. I am the signs hater. So I am shaking your hand. Thank you. Good. I can't wait. However, I am the sixth sense enjoyer and your episode on the sixth sense was incredible. Yeah. Really great conversation.

For people who are Friends of the Table fans but who are not, you know, anime fans who skipped Hunter x Hunter. Actually, for anybody who listens to this who isn't a big anime person who skipped Hunter x Hunter's season on Media Club Plus, go listen to this excellent season on M. Night Shyamalan.

Also, if you are a Friends at the Table person and you're like, what would it be like if Art and Keith argued about film? It's time, baby. It's happening. They're not arguing, but, you know, they have different experiences and different feelings, and it's fun.

to hear them chat about film. I've already gotten to hear, you know, Art had not been on any of the Media Club Plus yet. I know, Janine, you've also not been on Media Club Plus yet. I think you're going to guest on at least one of these coming up. So that's exciting for me. Check clears. Oh, I see. Yeah, we're in negotiations still. She's really hardballing us. I hope it works out. I hope that your agents get to, you know, chop it up and come to an equitable...

decision. Our lawyers are talking. Your lawyers are talking. Your people are, yeah. My people are talking to your people. I'll do it for exposure. I need to read people telling me I'm smart about, let's see here. Right, exposure to praise, right. To praise, that's right. Yeah, that's what it is. I need to be exposed to praise and that'll get me there.

All right. I think that that's going to do it for us. Anything else, Janine? Any other updates from the world of Infinity Nikki? Any other hammers you need to talk about? Are leaks still poison? Leaks are poison to all creation. Damn. Damn. Go look at our leaks. Subtext. With that said, to be continued.