TGI 666 - Scary Season, Scary Number

Welcome to the Gamers Inn. Come on in, pull up a chair next to the fire. It looks like you've had a long journey. I'm your host, Jocelyn, and joining me as always is my co-host, Ryan. Hello, Ryan. Hello, Jocelyn. Happy spooky episode. It's so spooky in the week of Halloween, totally, completely randomly, because guys, this is episode 666. Yep. What? What are the chances? It's like we counted backwards from today.

All the way back to 2010 when we started the show. And we're like, hey, you know, it'd be super cool. We're still doing this in 15 years. You know what's going to fall on Halloween? Yeah. So that was a pretty fun coincidence. It's pretty wild. And we had these grand plans. We were going to play some scary games. We were going to talk about vampires that masquerade through the bloodlines too.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I'm going to say basically it's so in Canada, it's an $80 game. And that is just such a steep price that I'm like. I think I'm going to wait for a sale because the reviews have been so bad. And I'm like, it looks cool to me. But like they've done away with a lot of stuff and like simplified a lot of stuff. I think basically just to get the game out. And while I'm excited for more opportunity to see a narrative and like be back in that lore.

um i'm not so stoked from what i've read about the game mechanics so like oh man i felt it feels so crazy although i probably should have seen this coming but It feels so crazy for this to have been like my most anticipated title since 2019. Like that's when I put it on my Steam wishlist. To not have bought it day one and to like not be rushing to play it. Like I'm basically clearing out my backlog, taking part in Halloween events and all the other games that I play like now is just not.

the time necessarily which is also kind of hilarious because I've pretty much finished Hades 2. I think I have four more achievements to get them all. And I'm just like, I'm still like, I'm kind of almost entering a lull here of gaming and still like wanting to wait for a sale. So I don't know. I mean.

yay being responsible with my money but also it's wild that i have wanted this game for so long and haven't picked it up i think it's fair to wait for a sale you know yeah i like i on the one hand i know but like I feel like this is it's the same. Maybe I'm just too responsible in 2025 or there's too much coming out in the gaming world in 2025. I don't know. But like, it's the same as a switch to that's the first like.

since i've had my own money like the first time nintendo's released something and i haven't been like right on top of it day one and you know it just it's it feels so weird and we're going to talk about stuff in the news where i'm just like And also, I'm not going to buy that thing either. And like, ah, I don't know. Part of it feels like I'm making good, responsible choices with my money.

And the other part is like, man, am I actually missing out or have I just wasted a lot of money and time over the years? I don't know. But anyways, so yeah, Vampire Masquerade. I haven't picked it up. do intend to play it but i don't think there's any rush because i have a feeling it's not going to be in any game of the year conversations this year so like i i feel More kind of drive and pressure to play Expedition 33.

because i'm sure that that's going to be in all the game of the year conversations right so i do really want to make sure i play it and it kind of falls under the same umbrella as silksong hades 2 like it's not necessarily a genre i would have spent a lot of time in before but you know like 2025 has been full of amazing experiences it's been like the most stacked year i remember in a long time so yeah i think that maybe I'll pick Masquerade up in like...

I don't know, January, February, March, you know, somewhere where there isn't anything else really going on. And when I expect it to be deeply discounted, I would be shocked if this was still full price by Christmas. I think that's fair. And I mean, there's a distinction to make between, you know, like not buying the latest and greatest or the thing you've been waiting for the day it comes out.

Not playing any video games, because I think anybody listening to this knows that Jocelyn and I are still playing plenty of video games. But I think there's just so much choice now where, like, for example. The Outer Worlds 2 comes out tomorrow. uh all year i was saying oh man is that tomorrow yeah it's tomorrow and i was like i'll resubscribe to game pass i'll play it i've even got a code for game pass sitting there that i've that i've purchased and i'm gonna you know redeem when i'm ready

And, uh, now I'm sitting here like, yeah, you know what? I don't think I feel like doing that anymore because there's just so much choice out there. Like I want to finish Hades too. uh i've got you know a bunch of other games i'm still playing dispatch as episodes uh you know roll out um And there's just, you know, I promised I'd play Rebirth that comes up. I can't list out things I could be doing and not say Rebirth because we'll get comments. But and then and then we're heading like.

Legend of Zelda Hyrule Warriors thing comes out in two weeks. I wasn't going to get that either, but that's out in two weeks. Metroid Prime 4 is out start of December and that feels... you know close enough considering there's just so much choice and so much coming out that like you could easily be like you know what i'll wait for that and i'll play these five other things

that come out and we're not even like including the things that just drop of like oh we didn't even consider that uh like peak or repo like these games that come out that are like perfect for game night and and for extra life and suddenly, you know, take up space in our gaming brain. So I don't think you should ever feel bad for like waiting on a sale or passing on something or waiting on something until it's right.

I know there is this pressure, you know, doing a gaming podcast where it's like, well, we got to cover, you know, the latest and greatest. I do feel like I need to have something different to talk about every week. So I feel pretty bad about it this week, guys, but I'm still.

recovering from whatever it is that i have had and which i'm pretty sure was coven and it just like i it's been like six weeks now and i just can't shake it so um yeah like i i three nights out of the past six since we last recorded i've gone to bed as soon as i've put olivia down like i'm just i've been exhausted so uh yeah i really haven't had too much time to play much of anything um although i do like the the bloodlines 2 was a conscious decision i know i've even called it

18 different things in the last 10 minutes we've been chatting vampire masquerade bloodlines 2 is definitely um you know that was a conscious decision that wasn't like an i ran out of time thing But yeah, I haven't really picked up too much. The only thing that I've really kind of been poking away at is really like my the stuff I play all the time. So like Fortnite and Smite both have.

like halloween events running right now so i want to participate in those because the fortnite one is super fun the smite one has some cool cosmetics and so like i really want to be involved in those because they're kind of like time limited um and yeah like and then hades i've been having such a great time in hades so

Yeah, there's just nothing else. Sorry, guys. There's just nothing else that's caught my attention this week. So if you have any suggestions, let me know. But yeah, Hades 2, I'm still poking away at it. I'm still having fun. I think I'm at like 100-ish hours now, maybe more. Um, yeah, but, uh, I have, like I say, four more achievements to do and then I think I have them all. So cool.

And that's four more and then plus the achievement you get for getting all the achievements. So technically I have five achievements left. Yeah. That last one will auto pop. It should. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So. But yeah, I'm still really enjoying it. But I know you've also been playing Hades 2 as well. Are you close? And I actually, I have like a related news item after your, yeah. Okay.

Well, I, I feel like I'm close. So I, you know, we're not going to go into spoilers in this like brief Hades to where we're at. We all know Jocelyn has hit credits. There is talk that we are there is credits like three weeks ago. I know. Jocelyn's finished it for a while. She's and now I believe Ridiculous Hat has hit credits. So it's it's on me. He has. Yep.

This is hitting... To nobody's surprise. This is hitting Final Fantasy VII Rebirth Watch levels of, have you finished the game yet, Ryan? Maybe not quite. I mean, that that's been nine months strong. This is this has only been three weeks, but I I've not finished yet. I have any credits, but I feel like I'm almost there. And what happened for me is something similar to happen.

with the first Hades is where, when I beat the boss and then proceeded to get the story after the boss in the first one, I was like, I think I'm good with this and kind of walked away. This has not happened with Hades 2 just before Jocelyn jumps in and starts. Like I could have been talking to had about the story tonight. Instead, we're talking about Hades to spoiler free. No, I am. I am going to finish it. But basically what happened was I've every time I go the down route, I'm able to.

you know defeat chronos pretty much every time uh with the up route i was struggling and then eventually i did complete the up route i finished that boss And I won't say who it is because we haven't talked about that yet. And it's heavily shrouded in mystery right up until you face that boss. Even though I feel like...

They could have warned us a lot. You're talking to the gods all the time. I know. And then after you fight it for the first time, everyone's like, yeah, it's kind of weird that it's this thing. And I'm like... You could have warned me. Just saying. But anyways, I finished that once and then I got to the end and I'm like, oh, this is kind of that. And I had to shake it off, but this is kind of the same feeling I had with Hades 1.

Where I was like, oh, I've done it. Although, you know, I still feel the purpose of the story in Hades 2 is much more clearer off the start. So, you know. We steal Death to Kronos, all that fun stuff. So I think I've maxed out the down route in terms of the mats I need from completing that route. And I have a few more wins to go for the up route. The, the up route feels more chaotic in that.

there needs to be more things in line for me not to die a horrible death yeah you need to have a more like conscious build yeah whereas the down route i feel like i can just like have fun and yeah So there's a, you know, the uproot is definitely like the second half of the game if you think of both routes as like, you know, beginning to end. So I'm still working my way through the uproot.

I feel like I'll be able to, when I do find time, it's also been a crazy week for me. When I find time to sit down and have the energy to play Hades 2, I will have finished it very soon, and we will be able to schedule... our spoiler chat, um, uh, in November. That's my goal. Uh, whether we get a rebirth spoiler chat in there as well that people have been asking for, I don't, I don't know, but, uh, we'll see. We'll see.

So speaking of the ending chat. So I didn't want to say anything in our in our Hades 2 spoiler thing because I didn't want to like. cloud anyone's judgment around the ending or anything like that but the devs have now put out a patch into like basically like ptb like player test build um so it's like downloadable as like a beta basically but the ending was so um controversial maybe

Not well received, potentially. Like I'm trying to figure out a way to kind of like say this without saying too, too much. But basically the devs are patching it out. They're changing it. They're changing it so much. So there is a way that you can go and see the new ending if you have already passed credits like Hat and I have.

you can there's like an incantation so you get some mats and you throw it together and it'll let you basically open up the down route again and then you get a few more chronos kills and then you'll see the new ending um Yeah, so it was that level of OMG that the devs have actually changed it. So that's why I wanted to talk. So now, Hat and I have experienced the OG ending.

depending on when you finish you may get the new ending because i'm not sure exactly when the patch is is set to release like i say it's kind of in beta right now um so yeah you may get a totally different ending than what actually like that hat and i saw the one that i wanted to talk about because yeah there was so much chatter on the internet about this this ending so yeah

Hopefully I haven't said too, too much, because again, I don't want to like cloud your judgment or your experience or anything like that. But you might end up with a different ending than us, depending on how long it takes you to play through. Well, so shouldn't I?

wait like for this new ending i mean well it's kind of up to you like if you want to see the original ending then do it now and then you can compare but yeah worst case scenario if i do end up taking a little longer and get the new ending i can just youtube the old ending just yeah yeah there's obviously playthroughs all over the place and yeah

that content is out there i didn't realize it was like that's why like i wanted to talk about it so badly and get all of your takes on it um because i was like i had just had so many thoughts okay well and apparently everyone had so many thoughts and most of them weren't good so the devs were like okay we'll fix it really so they're like mass effect 3 yes exactly oh man what was it called the um

What was the extended cut? Is that what they called it? I think so. Something like that. Man, Mass Effect 3. the one game i didn't play in the in the legendary edition i got through the i got through the first two i never did finish the third one um so my my question is this it's been on the the public test builds, has the reception to the patched ending been more positive, I guess? As far as I know, yes. It is currently, like I said, it's currently in beta.

I think the patch, like the PTB just became available like over the weekend. Might have even been Friday. So yeah, like I haven't had a chance to play it. I haven't played through the new ending. But yeah, let me see here. Post-launch patch one preview was posted on Thursday at four o'clock. So, or sorry, three o'clock. So yeah, late in the day on Thursday, they made the patch available as a preview. So you can go in and play it now. Okay.

Yeah, it hasn't been patched into the main game. So that's what I'm waiting for is like I want to finish everything up as is with like the 1.0 version. And then, yeah, I'll play through a couple more times. to see the new ending because yeah i have thoughts ryan i have thoughts i'm almost there do you have like a i do still think that regardless we should still do a chat about the ending um once once you're all done yeah

I will get there. I feel like I don't know what happened. I played a good chunk of it leading up to the weekend, and then just it's been nothing. So I will get back to it. I know I say that a lot, but I actually will. And we will have that spoiler chat. Otherwise it'll just be Jocelyn and hat. I feel like this is one of those scenarios where you'll say like, Hey, you're not done in three weeks.

Then we're doing it without you. We're going live, that sort of thing. So we'll figure it out. It'll happen. I'm very close. I feel like I just have to complete the last, the final boss on the up route a couple more times. do some magic stuff and then, uh, uh, wrap it up now. And the ending is the first credits. Cause I've heard there's like a, there is like a secondary epilogue. You don't have to do that. That's just like, uh,

Wink and a nod to the real world, basically. OK, it's like, well, that was a rough week. Yeah. Glad that's over. Okay. Yeah, it's basically just, yeah, you don't have to do it. That won't be part of the discussion. The big thing is the main credits ending. Okay. And you'll know, because it's a big, long credit scene. Yeah, I am...

I'm glad that I'm going to hit that. I really do feel confident I will. There was a moment there where I was like, oh man, I got to keep doing this. But eventually I did get to the point where I was like, okay, I found the fun again. uh just using the weapons that that really seem to gel with my playthrough has sort of been my process for doing the up route so that's really helped as well

Is to not like feel forced to like, OK, I'm going to use the weapon I hate, even though I know it's going to likely hold me back from finishing a route. So that's been helpful. Awesome. Well, I look forward to all of your thoughts once we've actually, because I think when we recorded our spoiler cast, you hadn't even beat the uproot yet. Yeah. Oh yeah. You didn't, you didn't even know that there was four areas. So.

Yeah, it's going to be a good chat when we get there. I'm excited. Yep. Yep. It's coming soon. Very soon. So tell me how event ads went over the weekend. Unfortunately, I wasn't available to actually watch, but you guys played Peak again, which.

I think it's your first time back to it since we played for game night and did have a really great time. So was it as fun when you played with the Vendats? Yes. Yeah, it was a lot of fun. So we had the peak event ads, which is our a yearly event ads event. And so myself, Crofton, Travis and whirlwind, you're probably familiar with all those names if you're a part of the TGI discord.

And I know Jocelyn's familiar with those names as well. And yeah, we played Peak. It was a game that sort of would normally not have been on our radar. Crofton had played previously. And I know, Jocelyn, you had picked it up quite inexpensively over the summer and we played it for game night. And then after I played it for game night, I'm like, OK, this this has potential.

The struggle being, though, is that this shouldn't surprise anyone in the community, is that Whirl is more of a PlayStation gamer. And this is a Steam exclusive title. So, but he had actually purchased a Steam Deck and he played on his Steam Deck. We had to like do some technical stuff to start things off because I guess he didn't have a headset. So he played portable the whole time.

To the point where I think his Steam Deck had crashed near the end. Like we ended up going for about four hours. So his Steam Deck crashed and he like disconnected. And we found out that his Steam Deck had died, like it lost all battery power because it wasn't plugged in, I guess, while he was playing. Oh my God. So he had to like, he plugged it in and then it still wasn't working. And we ended up.

having to do like live tech support. Turns out a Steam Deck is very particular about what power cord you use and you really, really should use the one that comes with it. Oh, oh, I see what you mean. I thought you were going to say it got testy after you restarted and without shutting it down properly. And I'm like.

As a PlayStation gamer, we're all should know. Yes. Yeah. That thing yells at you like, you know, they look so much. It gets so mad. I'm like, dude, you were on and the power went out. That is not my fault. Yeah, it's like worse than Resetti and Animal Crossing, you know, just yelling at you for turning off your PlayStation. And yeah, like, no, but we we did have a lot of fun.

um we struggled with the first biome to to be fair you know croft and i had played before whirlwind and travis were starting out but i really do feel like this game uh works really well if you know, to onboard folks because the concept, especially in that early biome, is fairly simple. There's nothing...

you know, working against you other than your fellow players and the fact that, you know, which sometimes is enough is enough. Yeah. But it's also like the line, you know, like if you're, if you're trying to climb. You know, it's all procedurally generated each day. So you're getting a new mountain each day. But we had to do the first biome, I think.

two two times before we were able to pass it so we would all die and then we had to start over but when you start over like it's the same climb so you can kind of have that knowledge built in uh in comparison to game night where i think we just had sort of a steady go like we just we were we were able to yeah we didn't fail until we really failed yeah yeah and i think we eventually did get stuck in the third biome similar to game night um but we didn't get the the the ice one we got a

I think it was called the Mesa. It was like a desert area. Oh, OK. So there were like tornadoes and these like huge ravines you had to like climb. Like if you didn't have tools that you could use like slingshots and. sort of rope cannons you had to like climb down then back up we didn't even make it to the mountain in the third

We were just really struggling and it was super late by the time we were doing this. I think this was like hour three and we were, we were, we were kind of losing it at that point. But I don't know. Uh, like, I don't know if you, cause I know, uh, Bing Bong is a character that comes up a lot in peak and this is the plushie. that you find at the beginning of your run. And I know, Jocelyn, you had a certain affinity to the character when we were playing. I did. You were trying to bring it up.

Whirl also got pretty attached to Bing Bong, mainly because Crofton had joked that there's an achievement. How could you not? Yeah, how could you not? And there's an achievement if you bring them to the top of the, if you complete. peak that run so of course he put that in his inventory he's known to be a bit of a trophy hunter um but did you know that bing bong talks

No, I stuffed him in my backpack for the whole time. So I don't know how Whirlwind discovered this. And I don't normally do this, but I did bring a clip to kind of illustrate this point. Once Whirlwind discovered that if you held Bing Bong and interacted with it, you basically squeeze it like a stuffed animal, and it'll make a random line.

Like voice line? Yeah. Random voice line. So this, the whole last two hours of the stream, he's, he's doing this, uh, it's a great comedic effect. I gotta give, uh, you know, I gotta give him, you know, a shout out because he did, he did.

It was greatly timed. He used it sparingly? Okay. He did. He did. And I'll play the clip. And then, unfortunately, my favorite, I didn't have time to get all... clips but this one clip kind of illustrates it but there's one line that's not in the clip that we'll talk about after that is my favorite but anyways this is this is the tail end of the stream

our four where Crofton's computer has crashed twice and he's gone. And this is after whirlwind has, we, we've fixed his steam deck, but this is us.

funny enough fittingly this is the same way we died when we played game night we were stuck at the bottom of a ravine slowly dying uh and it was just whirlwind left being haunted by the two of us and him just sitting there in a corner talking to Bing Bong and I'm trying to like sign the stream off but anyways listen to this we'll have game day on Saturday November 8th yeah see Bing Bong knows what's up

And we'll have lots of other fun games planned for then, including Peak, probably. Definitely not. We are going to play Peak, I think, again. If I say yes, will you take me with you? We will. We will take you. Okay. So that little robotic voice is Bing Bong. You don't say. Yeah, that's not Whirlwind doing his best Bing Bong impression. Bing Bong impression. Yeah, exactly. But my favorite line that Bing Bong will do, and it's all random, is he'll just like very...

It's equal parts sad and equal parts hilarious where he just says, I miss my wife. And again, you know, like mid climb, you just hear this like. sad robotic voice, I miss my wife. And it's this plushie. Maybe his wife is at the peak. That's what I'm going to tell myself. Oh, maybe. Maybe it's part of the story. Maybe. Maybe Bing Bong is the story. Maybe we just have to get to the peak. So, yeah, as you as you heard in that clip, I think the plan is to play peak on game day. You know.

bing bong wasn't a fan until until he asked if he could come with us so naturally jocelyn i i think now you know what you need to do is you need to we need to get bing bong to the top of the peak oh yeah we need to for the kids yes for charity 100 so yeah we had a we had a lot of fun um again it's like a 12 15 game canadian it's on sale all the time and and uh you know it is a lot of fun so we had a we had a blast we raised some money for uh extra life and uh yeah the event ads

retire once again for another year but obviously game day will be a big hit we'll be playing video games all day including peak so look forward to that We will. And that is on Saturday, November 8th from 10 a.m. Eastern until approximately 11 p.m. Eastern or whenever we pass out. Because, yeah, we're super tired now. Yes. Yeah. We'll see how long it goes.

yeah we'll see but uh yeah so that is saturday november 8th at 10 a.m eastern until 11 p.m eastern uh we will be streaming at twitch.tv slash joss plays if you'd like to donate to extra life head to tiny me.cc slash TGI Extra Life.

If you would like to support the show, you can go to patreon.com slash thegamersin. Like our October patron, Brian, thank you so much for supporting the show. We have monthly host specials.

You promise it's coming soon, right? Because we've got three days left in October. Not to put too much pressure on you. No, no. If you're listening to this, you likely also have another... gamers in in your feed if you have the patreon rss feed in the same pod catcher uh you will see both those episodes likely back to back unless you listen like

As soon as it's posted, which, you know, thank you so much. That's awesome that we we jumped the queue. I know we all have way too many podcasts we listen to. But yeah, this week, October. And it's in, you know, it's happening. And I'll say this was totally planned because it is a spooky Halloween themed special. So I wanted it to be closer to the end of the month.

And that's what I'm sticking to. We also wanted to remind everybody that our next game night is going to be Friday, November 21st. That'll be at 8.30 p.m. Eastern. We do that in the Discord. We have a gameplay stream and patrons can jump in to spots and play with us. So it's always a ton of fun. Friday, November 21st at 830 p.m. Eastern. And remember, you can find all of that at patreon.com slash the gamers in.

That brings us to the news this week. Halo is finally it's finally coming to PlayStation as well, which is the big one, right? Like. the campaign evolved which i guess is like the og halo yes yeah so it was a remake remaster whatever um is coming to to xbox pc but playstation 5 Yeah, it's super weird. I made a point. I think I even linked the video, but I made a point of watching all the videos they launched a couple days ago on the PlayStation channel. There's like three of them.

The one I linked is the trailer that'll be in the show notes, but there's also like a 13 minute gameplay demo and then like a roundtable discussion. And yeah, they're all posted.

playstation youtube channel and i mean part of me is like so so this yes so this is a remake of halo combat evolved so it's the campaign only the trailer when i first watched it and i don't know if you got this vibe as well when when you checked it out and you can probably all if you hadn't you can check check it out now and oh no i i watched it don't worry i watched it i did my homework you're welcome

I don't, I mean, look, I wouldn't blame you. I mean, I wouldn't say Halo is on par with like, this is a Star Wars story, but like after the road to Halo four, I don't blame you for disengaging on Halo content. It's fine. But.

When I first saw the trailer, I was like, I don't know if this looks good. It kind of looks a little like, let's run a filter on Halo Combat Evolved in Unreal 5. spit it out you know when i watched the original trailer i was just like it just kind of looks a little stilted and a little like too shiny i don't know i i get i definitely get that it does it does look

shiny and like polished but like polished literally yes um it does look shiny uh and the thing i think i mean it's a 25 year old game yep ish Right? So it's going to look funny. It's going to look different. the way you remember it looking probably like if you saw it again like a youtube video or something of the original version like you're like oh that actually looks terrible i like the new one better yeah

Like your brain like fills in those gaps, right? Like when the first time I looked back on Ocarina of Time and actually like went to go play it again when it was like years and years later, I was like, oh, this isn't how I remember it.

where is all of link's detail it's definitely there yeah like it was good for the time but yeah like times and 25 years has gone by it's gonna change so i mean this might be what halo would have looked like if it released today right is i guess kind of what i'm getting at like it's gonna be hard to to completely replicate the way it looked before

With all the tech and all this, I bet they have ray tracing because everything traces rays. So putting that stuff in is, yeah, just going to make things look different for sure. But yeah, it's not... it's not grimy it's not gritty it's not hard it's it is very um bright and shiny because i remember even the the gun i think it's like it's the one with the crystals poking out of the top oh the needler yeah

yeah that i was like wow this is like neon so that was the that was the one that stood out to me probably because it was also the gun i used quite often when playing halo so yeah Yeah, I, so yeah, after the trailer, I went and watched, I was actually. tying Halloween bags, 150 of them, just with these little strings because we live in town and we're going to get a bunch of people. So I just kind of had it up on the background. I was watching. They had a 13-minute gameplay trailer.

sort of running through the level which is the trailers the silent cartographer the level demo is like a longer version of that the whole sort of segment of gameplay and that sold me a lot more on it I think that they sort of showcased more of the gameplay and more of the environments without having to feel the need to constrain it to a trailer. Then listening to the roundtable they did talking about how...

They've actually redid all the main voice lines. So they got all the voice actors back in for the main voice lines, like for Master Chief and Cortana. And they actually showed them in the booth, like recording the lines. They've like remixed the music and they talk about like this is a remake. They're taking the original, but they are not. They're being true to the original, but like making it modern, like when they.

When they name this campaign Evolved, it seems like it's more than just a clever play on Combat Evolved, which was the original subtitle. I mean, we'll see what happens when it launches. And then my brain immediately when I watched this going back is like, also my brain also went, I feel like I got to play this on PS5 just to be that guy. Like I'm playing Halo on PlayStation. This is so weird.

It is odd. It's like I literally wrote it's like hell has frozen over because like this is I think the equivalent of us playing a Mario game on a PlayStation. You know, it is the. So I, I, I mean, and they've even stated like, this isn't, no, this isn't just about the remaster. This is like Halo is now multi-platform. Like it's going forward. It's on everything.

I mean, and if they've done that for Halo, I think that's a pretty good indication that they're going to do it for everything. Like, I would kind of expect basically everything Xbox to be available on all platforms now. the fable game if that ever comes out like yeah it just everything will be everywhere i think yeah i should say everything microsoft like everything xbox will be everywhere i don't expect sony to put their

first-party stuff over on other platforms. I know they've done a little bit on PC, but which, you know, in a roundabout way, I'm just going to skip to the third news story here. that Xbox will run Steam, which means that anything that PlayStation has put onto Steam... will be available to play on the next Xbox. So like Horizon, you'll be able to play on an Xbox. So like we're, they're definitely getting into a place of cross platform.

like a console piece instead of the console wars now it's console piece and everybody's kind of carving out their little niche and you know like competition is maybe not there as much um because yeah so the the rumor is that the next gen xbox will be like a console pc hybrid and will run steam and they've already made

changes to the app i noticed this week when i went in because basically i needed to free up space on my hard drive and i was like well i'm going to uninstall anything that i've ever installed on game pass because i'm not paying for game pass anymore so um i was like i don't want this stuff like taking up room if i haven't gone and bought it on another platform

And even if I have bought it on another platform, clearly I'm playing it over there instead of on Xbox. So I'm just going to delete all the stuff. And then I'm like, wait, there's so much stuff in here because now it's showing me in my Xbox library. When I look at installed games, it's pulling. all my steam games and all my epic games into my xbox launcher library

And I was like, I never told you to do that. But it's basically like now the Xbox app has scanned my PC and found every installed game and put it in the Xbox library, regardless of the platform I originally bought it on. I'm just like... I just, there's so much about this that I'm like, stop, but definitely hinting at the way that the company is starting to think, which is just that like all of these barriers between, you know, platforms and companies and whatever.

are kind of dumb when everybody lives on the Microsoft platform. Right. So, yeah, like it's weird. Like this is kind of how we thought maybe Xbox could go and then run closer.

to a Windows type PC, but it is interesting because like the closest we have to this concept is the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X. handheld which i mean gosh stupid fucking name terrible name just saying it out loud uh but it is funny because like i i love my steam deck and i know that when you look at the other handheld pcs they get lumped in with the steam deck but the steam deck i don't have issues with when playing a game especially on the steam game mode side uh so that's

That's kind of how they're billing this Xbox thing is like it'll be like it'll have an Xbox mode and then it'll have a Windows mode similar to the Steam Deck and that you have your game mode and then you can go to desktop mode and that's where you can install other launchers.

you can surface that stuff to the game mode through like shortcuts and stuff but for the most part it is this like sort of separate thing and that's what they're describing here is like it'll kind of work close to that where you may maybe will be able to surface stuff

to the game mode but you're doing a lot of that tinkering on the windows side but it was really interesting because before we recorded the show there was a blue sky post that kind of popped up it's been getting reposted with people's reactions but The original is from Gene Park and he's talking about playing the Xbox version of Halo Infinite on his Asus ROG Xbox Ally X. Where...

In order to play it, he said he had to verify the files, repair the files, end the tasks for Xbox, uninstall gaming services, re-update the Xbox app in the Microsoft Store, update Visual C++. redistribute roles, reinstall gaming services, and then restart the device in order to get Halo working. Halo, the Xbox game, you know, and that sounds terrible.

it's like well yeah like i mean we've talked about this before where you know when you sit down and use a console part of the perk of the console experience is shit just works you don't have to worry about drivers and tinkering and everything else like that is very much a pc gaming experience and now they're like when you're talking about a hybrid pc console like you would hope that you would get the the kind of ease of use of a console but it sounds like

instead you're getting the tinkering of the pc and it's like no we don't want to deal with that shit we want all that stuff in the background like you're a console or at least trying to be Don't make me do all these extra stupid PC steps. I want to plug it in and make it work. Like you say, it's a Microsoft title. You shouldn't have to jump through that many hoops or a title that is native to that company.

come on yeah so i mean if obviously this is 2027 that they're aiming for it's a couple years out and if they're able to i mean microsoft is a software company if they're able to figure out the software side With no devs left. Well, yeah, definitely. They're struggling there too, but I, if they can figure out that software side, cause I like have had.

A great experience with the Xbox console experience. I think their UI, it works. It launches games. I'm able to play them. I haven't had those issues on the console side. The PC side is a whole other thing. They're constantly tinkering. It's been a bit of a mess there. And then looking at what's being said about the ROG Xbox Ally X, it's not there yet. I thought maybe taking off the Asus part would... It would make it matter when it doesn't. What if we call it the Ally X? Is that...

I think that, yeah, sure, whatever. Yeah, I was going to say maybe there's another Ally X, but I honestly don't care at this point. I don't know. I also don't know. I don't care. Fuck Microsoft. I really don't. Um, but yeah, so like what I'm seeing with the Xbox Alley X is that it is not like the Steam Deck where it is. There's a... xbox mode and then there's a windows mode i think it is just this is handheld windows and it's not there yet which is frustrating for a thousand dollar uh handheld

I think it's more than that, isn't it? I looked tonight to go, like, I'm looking at this article because I wanted to go and look and see what the price on the Ally was because I was, yeah, just curious. And it was $1,300. Oh, my God. Yeah. That's insane. Oh, my God. This is too many dollars. Yeah. I wonder if that's Canadian pricing. Maybe it's $1,000 in the States, but yeah. Oh my God. I wanted to basically see if it actually did run Steam or if the...

next gen actual console that these rumors are about was going to run Steam. But yeah, it seems like it's across the board. So they're really going for that.

hybrid experience they're trying to i think like like i mentioned at the start of this news story about you know carving out a niche is like nintendo's got its like switch stuff it's a little bit more gimmicky i i think they might you know stick with the switch idea they seem to really have finally knocked it out of the park on the gimmick side of things so you know that might be their direction now uh and then sony's got the kind of like traditional console like

We play games really well. That's all that we do. You know, that kind of an experience. And then Xbox is like, hey, we know you're PC gamers. If you want a console, you could go to PlayStation or you could pay not quite as much as a gaming PC, but definitely way more than a console and have this like...

I was going to say gaming PC, but it's kind of what it is, but without all the PC bells and whistles, it's basically just like a console with PC specs, maybe? I don't know. They seem to be trying to go like... high-end with like have nintendo be low-end then sony then them and that's going to be their niche is like high-end high performance play anything You don't have to buy a PC. You can buy an Xbox instead. That seems to be how their vision of the console market for the next generation. Yeah.

Not saying it's a good one, but I think that's where they're aiming. I wonder, like I almost approach it from a different angle here in that like when you kind of like, as you said, you line them all up and you look at what... what makes each of them special this feels like a really good angle for xbox to take considering they are going multi-platform they are putting their software on every system and then like

it makes sense to be like, all right, let's put our, let's, let's put what we're doing with games towards hardware and be like, let's build something that is a little more. I hesitate to say open because it's not. It's still Windows. Yeah, it's still Windows. Yeah, still Microsoft. Unlike the Steam Deck, which is Linux, you know, maybe. Yeah. I don't. So like with.

With what Xbox is trying to do, I also feel like there's this hazard that comes in where you're getting the best and worst of both of those platforms. Like, you know, from a console perspective, you're locked into hardware. That's the that's not going to work for most PC gamers. And then on the PC side, you're you have to you're going to have to tinker. You're going to have to, you know, fiddle and uninstall and install. And in order.

I hope or I don't hope in order to get like the Xbox side of it working and console gamers, myself included, hate that. Like the Steam Deck. Yeah. I was able to do some extra stuff in desktop mode and like do the emulation stuff. But like that was I did it. I did the easy route and I did it for a little bit. And then I was like.

And this is not what I bought this for. This is cool. I got it working. I played some games from my childhood, but like now I'm ready to go back and play Hades 2 or play like I find a majority of the games I'm buying on Steam.

are capable of running on the Steam Deck in docked mode, and I don't have to fiddle. I just hit the button, it launches, it goes. I don't have faith that Xbox isn't going to have that clear... between xbox mode and desktop mode like steam deck has you know it's it's it is optional you do not have to go into desktop mode on the steam deck um at all Unless you want to go in and like, hey, I want to install some other launchers or install, you know, emulation station or emu deck or whatever.

It's optional. If you just want to play your Steam games and they're verified or playable even, you just hit the install button and you're golden. I worry, especially with what I'm hearing about the Xbox Ally X, I do worry that Xbox isn't going to nail that like software separation. Desktop mode can clearly be something that is optional.

as opposed that's what i needed to be like i don't want it to be this like blurred lines it's a pc it's a console it's both i want it to be just be a console damn it yeah in your lane well yeah i'm getting pretty close to that angle because I really do feel like what the Steam Deck offers is this clear separation between the two. And that makes it a much more user-friendly device.

Like the Xbox Ally X is not targeted at the people who are buying Xboxes. It's targeted at people who think they want to run Windows on these handheld devices. Which, to be fair, was me before I decided that they were trash and I didn't want anything to do with them, is that the idea of being able to play my whole Xbox library and my whole Steam library and, you know, everything else.

on one device was very appealing. But then I had to buy a Microsoft device and I decided that was not for me. So I think that like... In theory, the concept of having access to all of your libraries is a good concept, except that...

The more PC-ish it gets, then the more issues you're going to have trying to make all of that stuff work. And if you need your user to interact with it on the level that it sounds like the Ally X. is, you know, how you have to interact with that, then that's not going to sell 15, 16, $1,700. pc console hybrids that whatever the next xbox gen will be called right like because that's really what i'm thinking is like their their aim

I think is probably going to be in like the $1,500 price range. I would guess is like they're going to build this like way OP thing and. want to distinguish themselves from sony and be like hey this is where the xbox lives now like don't have two grand for a gaming pc don't worry you can buy the xbox console for 1500 like Yeah, that's that's where I think this is going. Yeah. Price wise, I feel like if it takes you.

six months to a year to to prepare for sticker shock like i think the switch 2 is a really good barometer for like what these things what the next generation is going to cost and prepare for these things to be over $1,000, and that's not Canadian. that's america no like this is us dollars we're probably talking about like these are going to be expensive devices the ps5 pro is priced at around i think 980 canadian

And I would imagine I would imagine that I think the Xbox is going to be more expensive than the PlayStation. I really do think that Xbox is. Did you say the next box? Because I kind of actually love that. It's better than them. sticking random X's and S's everywhere. So, um, it's now the next box and I, I will die on that hill. Okay. We can call it that the next box. I'm sure. I love it. I love it. I'm sure it has, has.

has been said uh elsewhere but i don't know i did slip of the tongue you can i mean we could edit this out and send it directly to phil spencer and be like we want we want to be paid fuck that guy yeah okay yeah you can have it for free it's fine um I mean, they probably have already named that thing, right? TM! TM, yeah. There, I fixed our problem. Oh, we fixed it. Wouldn't we also have an issue with Apple? Because didn't they have a next...

They had something they called the next or something. I don't know. They were next computing. I don't know. Either way, neither of those companies should come after us. They can have it. Yeah, I think it's going to be expensive. I think that... I'm also reading these this news. I mean, obviously, this is all rumors and reports. We'll see what happens when they actually unveil it. Likely late next year, I would imagine. Maybe.

Xbox went early. I feel like they were game awards the year before launch. So like December, a full almost calendar year before it was unveiled. They showed the, that was the whole fridge meme. that we got with the Series X and NS at the Game Awards. Maybe that'll happen again this year, but I would imagine we'll start to see details next year.

Yeah, I think it'll be next year because I think everybody's probably targeting 2027. Yeah. So but yeah, I'm kind of on the other hand, when I read this report, I'm like, you know what? I think this saves me some money. Because I really feel going forward, like I'm comfortable with what Steam is doing with the Steam Deck. I feel like I'll buy a Steam Deck 2 at some point if that console iteration happens.

And then the PS6 is likely a... a done deal like i think i am yeah i feel like that's the no-brainer next one for me is uh the playstation 6 especially with the conclusion to horizon coming right like i kind of have to playing that day one yeah like i'm locked in for ps6 because we know it's not gonna to come on ps5 right so yeah yeah it uh it might horizon it'll probably be it'll probably be on both but like come on yeah come on yes i understand but yeah

Yeah, I mean, this is interesting to discuss. We'll definitely keep an eye on it as we move forward. The next year will be all reports and rumors and everything else before as we lead into the announcement that we're pretty sure are going to come probably this time next year. We will keep covering the stuff that seems legit. And this seems pretty legit. Keep your eyes out for more next-gen news. I can't believe we're talking about next-gen.

Here we are. Finally tonight, Amazon is making significant cuts to its gaming business and moving away from MMOs, which to be honest, I forgot New World was a thing. This news doesn't shock me at all. They are sticking with some of their other projects that we've announced, which is good. They're sticking with the next Tomb Raider game. And I guess there's also an open world driving game that they're working on.

They've got this whole new gaming service that has like party games and stuff. So they're not getting out of gaming completely. They're just moving away from MMOs, which. I think MMOs in general seem to kind of just be struggling as a genre. Like it's been declining for years and nothing new really seems to have broken into the market.

final fantasy 14 kind of had a resurgence uh and but you know like even world of warcraft has been you know everything's been declined like wow declined to the point that they stopped reporting player numbers So yeah, it's it's not the. kind of the genre to be in anymore i don't think there's still some that are active and and have player bases like eso and and like i said final fantasy and and warcraft like all have their player bases but for a new one to break into that genre

They are just such a time sink that you really have to have a dedicated fan base ahead of time. And New World was like... fine but it was nothing really like special i played it i think for a week and then i was like i don't want to sink too much of my life into this so yeah i think it's a big ask of players especially when

like we talked about it off the top of the show, there is so much going on in gaming right now, especially like on the indie side of things. There are so many amazing experiences from, you know, smaller teams. That, yeah, an MMO in this day and age is just a really, really hard ask. The landscape has just changed too much, I think, to, you know, demand to have a game where you're demanding your players are playing every single day to keep up. Right. Yeah.

I've, uh, I haven't, I've been off of MMOs for a very long time just specifically because I just, I don't have the time and I know it is like a time commitment, like both in the short term, but also the longterm. And. I mean, when you look at that, it's like, do I want to try this for 30 days or do I want this to be my second game that I'm always playing? And we talk about choice. And I think that let's really replace those titles.

has been a lot of the free to play offerings like fortnight and well any of the games that they're all games as a service right so yes it's just that some of the games as a service now have moved to the point of you know not asking too much of you and i think mmos just ask too much of you they ask to be either your main or only game um and yeah there's just too much out there right now i think like i can literally walk into fortnight

you know, play it for a couple days and walk away for a month and I'm not punished at all. Like, I might miss some stuff in the shop, but... oh no boohoo probably shouldn't be spending money on vbucks anyways like but the the base game is still like always the same like the weapons might rotate through the you know map right might rotate through but

you never come back feeling like you're super far behind because every single game you're starting from scratch. Whereas like an MMO, you have like... gear levels and and professions and there's just so much so much of the game that you can fall behind if you aren't playing every single week and making sure you keep up um and a lot of the other kind of constant service games

they just aren't like that anymore and they're a lot easier to come in and out of because again like ryan said free to play there are so many things that are free to play and aren't requiring a subscription so it's like if you're requiring more of my money and more of my time it's just such a hard sell right yeah so do we think like the traditional mmo is

it's dead like it's it's done i mean i don't really know who could like short of maybe like a warcraft 2 which i think obviously since world of warcraft has been running this long i don't think that and they have like a three expansion like trilogy thing going on or whatever like

Yeah, I don't think that they're going to move to WoW 2. So if they're not doing it, like I don't really know. There have been so many other people who've tried to launch them and they just haven't worked. So I'm not really sure. what ip because obviously new ips don't work we had like new world wild star um oh what was there was another one that like it was kind of like a medieval-y one oh uh

I thought that was New World. No, New World is like colonization, basically, if I remember correctly. No, this one was like Black something, maybe. Oh, Black Desert. Black Desert. Fine, yes. Yeah, like, I just, I feel like the...

Even if you had a tried and tested IP, because I'm thinking, wasn't there a Lord of the Rings MMO too? Like, that's a pretty tried and tested. Like, nerds love Lord of the Rings. Like, I just can't see a path to... basically stealing all the mmo players away from all the other mmos because that's kind of what you have to do like there's there's a subset of gamers who are mmo gamers and who love it and that's awesome but they've already picked their mmo and most

other gamers now aren't going to get into that genre. And people who've left MMOs aren't going to go back to that genre. So you kind of have to like steal from your competitors. And I don't know if there's like because of the like just the kind of game that an MMO is because of the amount of investment you have into like your character, your mats. your housing, you know, all that kind of stuff, all of your time, your game knowledge, your gear, your guilds and your friendships.

that is a lot to try to pull somebody away from so i don't really think that anyone else can kind of get in that space we thought new world was going to be the one right because it's got amazon money behind it it looked pretty polished like I didn't make it far enough in to see what the story was about. But like, you know, it seemed like if anyone was going to do it, it was going to be Amazon. It was going to be New World. And obviously they've had to like reboot New World. How many times?

It was not successful, even though it had Amazon money. It was tied into Twitch. They had Twitch streamers streaming that shit all over the platform. Not to mention, like every month with Prime Gaming, there was like new cosmetics for New World. Like Amazon was so plugged into the gamer sphere and they couldn't make it.

work i i struggle to see what another mmo could do that others haven't already tried in order to try to capture that audience like i just don't think it can happen at this point yeah That makes sense. And I mean, you mentioned Lord of the Rings. One of the projects that they've canceled at Amazon is was a new Lord of the Rings MMO. So I mean, yeah, I thought there already was one. There was. Yeah.

yeah okay like it was like lord of the rings online wasn't it because i feel like they just tagged for a while they just tacked like online to the end of the title yeah yeah and then yeah That was that was how you named an MMO. But yeah, so I don't think anyone else could should pour money into this genre. I think the ones that exist will continue to be updated and played. And that's like.

Yeah, the best you can ask of the genre. I think if like all of them shut down and the MMO players had nowhere to go. that would be the time to launch a new one but i mean i don't really see like eso and final fantasy and warcraft ever like shutting down their servers for good i'm sure eventually there will come a time but yeah it is not this day no no Yeah, so really, really unfortunate because this was a really big layoff.

Amazon said they're eliminating 14,000 of their corporate jobs, most of which affect gaming and publishing. So yeah, this is a huge layoff. from amazon it's really unfortunate like you know mmo genre talk aside um that is so many jobs lost so many uh and it looks like mostly in san diego and irvine yeah Which we had talked about previously, very expensive place to run a development studio, especially if it's not doing well. But yeah, I guess we're...

this is news that was sort of like rumored over the last couple of days. And then when it finally hit, it was exactly as rumored, you know, this huge layoff around at Amazon. And, and I think, I think there's, you know, We always feel like, okay, this has got to be the last one, but it just keeps happening. I'm sure Microsoft is working towards another big cut, even though they just had one.

Like, didn't they? They had a big one not too long ago. They made a bunch of cuts. I think it was over the summer, wasn't it? So I feel like I feel like this is this is another one of those in those long stretch. And then I'd also seen like you have a lot of these, you know. companies making big bets in gaming and as we talked about specific specifically in mmos and then having like all these jobs and uh you know suddenly being like well this isn't working and

you know, it's never the guys that, uh, you know, at the top that are, that are suffering. It's always the folks that they've, they've hired to build these games that they no longer have faith in. And they just like, they canceled them.

Which is which is a super unfortunate way for them to look at it. But like all these big tech companies like that seems to be their only solution for something that isn't immediately bringing in profit. So. I mean, yeah, like just like Microsoft, if you're working on an Amazon games game, I would, you know, like it's not a good not a good time to be working for Amazon.

I think they've been very public, like Microsoft, in saying that they want to replace a lot of jobs through AI and do that sort of thing. So it's just like... There are studios out there that are, you know, working on games in a way that doesn't seem really like short sighted and weird to be like, we're going to fix this with AI. We're going to.

We're going to make everything work. And there's another story we didn't include this week. There's been reporting out of EA and that they are trying to push a lot of their developers to use AI. And they're having to spend more time fixing the AI mistakes. Well, that's the thing I don't understand is like, and the further we go down this AI pipeline.

the more AI garbage is going to be on the internet that's going to be training AI. And to me, it's just going to get worse and worse and worse and worse, right? I don't understand how, because it's like, there are so many things about AI that's so bad. You can pick it out, whether it's visuals, whether it's audio, whether it's writing. It always just isn't quite right, which means you're going to have to have people.

to go through it and pick out all the parts that aren't right and fix them. And like you say, that's going to take so much time instead of just having a person do it right the first time. Like, oh, I don't, I don't know. But yeah. yeah definitely ridiculous um i i thought you were gonna say uh that we did another story we didn't have in here was the the uh netflix closed that studio that was working on their squid game game um

Yeah. So, yeah, that's the one I thought you were going to say is these big companies making their way into gaming that maybe don't belong there. Like, oh, you talking about the Netflix story? No. yeah just more yeah more closures more layoffs like yeah it's so rough to be in the games business right now like I feel so bad for all of for anyone involved. Like, it's got to be so difficult to especially and we talked about this a few weeks ago, like.

You ship a game that is amazing, does well by all metrics, and then they fire you. Like, the fuck is that? Like, who wants to work in that industry? Oh, man, I feel for them. I really do. The devs, not the companies with the fucking shareholders and all that bullshit. No, I feel for the devs. Yeah. And like I said, there are devs out there, small, medium, large, that treat their products.

and their consumers and their developers, their employees. Well, like, you know, it's a, it's a varying degree, but like, I know like Nintendo is not perfect, but they seem to treat.

their employees well and they treat their IP well and they make mistakes sometimes ones that cost consumers a little bit more than we'd like to pay but like then there are smaller titles that we like to focus on on this show like hades 2 is one of them dispatch is coming from a small team peak small team um and occasionally we'll play a game that we absolutely loved and did well critically but as jocelyn stated like gets

gets sort of a company gutted. And I think Dragon Age comes to mind immediately. I loved the Veilguard and a lot of people loved it, but just didn't hit the targets. And suddenly it's like, well, Bioware is cut in half. And, you know, Mass Effect suddenly looks like, oh, is this even going to happen? So it's a tough industry to be a part of. It's a tough industry to be a consumer.

of especially if you're paying attention like sometimes sometimes i do wish like man sometimes sometimes i wish we were a little more checked out on a lot of this stuff you know and sometimes we are because there's just so much news like there's so much yeah

we often will cover something and like, I'll, I'll read the news as I'm like editing and I'm checking blue sky. I'm like, shit, I completely missed that story. That was, you know, it was a bad news story, but I missed it. And you know, there's, there's just so much.

going on that can be hard to sort of keep it all in front of you and at the end of the day also trying to find time to like put that aside and just enjoy it as a as a hobby which is which is what i like to do i like to focus on like the fun and if something's no longer fun from a gaming perspective whether it is like just bad news like this whole xbox stuff like i really do feel like the other worlds too

Me not playing it day one after saying I would because the reviews are fine. They're good reviews. But like I just all this Xbox shit that has been happening is just like. I'm like, yeah, you know what? I'm good. I've got plenty of other stuff to play and I'm not feeling it right now. And, you know, I still love playing games. I still love talking about video games, even when the news is like a little hit and miss. But.

You go where the fun is. And for me, you know, I try to go where the fun is and stay where the fun is. And if something is no longer fun, like I just like, okay, like, you know. you sit over here now. And I, and I think we, we do that. We do that on the show. I think that happened with Blizzard when, when they were having their issues and I've.

haven't really gone back outside of a little bit of diablo 4 for a bit there but uh uh you know and then with xbox and activision blizzard and all that stuff like i think it's fine to sort of Go, like I said, go where the fun is. And if you're not having fun, like there's just so much other stuff out there that you can play and engage with. Yeah. So it's an embarrassment of riches.

these days and lots of really cool little games too on steam and other platforms to check out so definitely check that stuff out too absolutely uh All right. I think that's going to do it for us tonight. If you want to continue the conversation, head on over to tiny.cc slash TGI Discord. You can also visit us on the web at gamersinpodcast.com.

Or follow us over on Blue Sky. You can find me, Jocelyn, at jocplays.com. Ryan at ryanmurphy.ca. And also be sure to check out our TGI Community Starter Pack at tiny.cc slash TGI Starter Pack. Thanks for staying at the Gamers Inn, and remember, tune in next week. Bye, everybody. Bye, everyone.