¶ Short Game Game of the Year 2025
Welcome back to the Short Game Show, but short video games, games that respect your time. I'm Reagan Kelly, and I'm joined this week by all three of the fantastic co-hosts.
Nate Heininger,
And Shane Kelly.
And this week, uh, we are doing our Game of the year thing. So,
woo.
been a weird year for the show. Uh, as you well know, if you have listened to the show for, uh, a while. Um, lots of our listeners have, we've been around for 10 plus years now. Thank
Wow.
Hey.
to have stuck around for all or some of that time. Uh, cheers. Everyone
Mm-hmm.
to the short game, uh, a a a venerable podcast that has had a bit of an off year as, uh, anyone listening might have been able to tell. Um, we really covered games for the first two thirds and then we kind of fell off the or I don't know if that's an appropriate
Yes, we fell off the
we fell off the wag.
Yeah.
We, converted it into a drinking podcast and, uh,
Well,
come up for
were a lot of reasons for that. We talked about them on some other episodes. We don't need to go into them now. Um, I will say that what has been very exciting recently is that we are rethinking the show and we're calling it Short Game Season
two. We learned.
baby.
We learned a lot. We learned a lot in the first season, and it's time to take those lessons and apply 'em. We're on to bigger and better things season two
will make it known I was against calling it season two.
we only need
silly.
and 450 episodes.
Uhhuh.
technically, but,
Some shows don't get their legs until their second season. Next generation famously.
Mm-hmm.
Uh, parks and Rec quite famously. You know, a lot of good shows don't really figure it out until season two, and I think 450 episodes is about the right amount for the first season. So I'm, I'm proud of the season two label, Reagan, and I think it's not silly at all.
Oh, it's not, in fact, you know, many of us know is often don't do much of anything useful until they're 10. And, and then, you know, look at us now.
Look at us now.
We're, uh, we're ready to go. So,
was, yeah, I was a real dirt bag when I was 10.
rethinking the format.
Mm-hmm.
this
We're gonna cover all the, from soft games.
From
Yeah. Yeah.
actually. Yeah, we're gonna
It's a long game now.
uh, each beat. We're gonna, we're gonna make sure we go into all, uh, strategic depths about every one of the bosses.
Mm-hmm.
yeah, so I'm excited to get into, uh, uh, the Armored core series before
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
any of the others. Um, so. The short game. Uh, we,
Podcast
a transition. Yep.
I
two.
it in your Apple Podcasts app.
at this now. No. So we, we've done a short game, game of the year, episode at the end of every year and, uh, it certainly felt weird not to do one this year, even though we have a, a slightly odd, uh, smattering of games to talk about. Um,
We did play some real fantastic bangers.
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
so we decided we would do our regular short game game of the year. uh, a little bit more table setting before we get into things. So the, the new format thing that I mentioned, we are doing a, uh, we're, we're gonna do an alternating weeks thing. So we're gonna be covering, uh, a game on every alternate week. And the other week is basically gonna be our, uh, what's making us happy. This week format.
Um, and, uh, you know, in the past we've done that as a single episode, uh, and this time we're gonna be breaking them up, and I believe the plan is to make those what's making us happy. Episodes Patron exclusive is, am I, am I still correct about that? Yeah.
Yeah, so every other week we'll be doing, uh, something exclusive on the Patreon. Something like making us happy or more topic based thing.
Mm-hmm.
Um, you know, just a, a looser framework for those episodes so that we can refocus the show on games and get you like a good full episode every other week where most of us have had more time to play the whole game. I think that's something that we've all been running into doing a episode every week on a full game, even though they're short games, has, uh, not, uh, melded well with our,
when
our lives.
game, great, you know, they're just not making a whole lot of two hour games. They, you know, when you're looking for the short games, a lot of 'em, or they're, they're a 10 hour
Yeah.
And if you do the math, you know, if you're a guy with like three kids like Reagan,
Uhhuh,
uh,
doesn't Reagan have like five or six kids? I thought
yeah.
it straight
secret kids.
Uhhuh,
huh.
but the
I'm talking about the family that y'all know.
mm-hmm. Ah, sure.
but the,
way.
yeah, so, so if you, if you do the meth on that, like you get some, you get some pretty slim time. So, and that's true even for me with just the one, uh, and life, life goes on. Uh, Laura, that's why you're, our MVP is because
our Rock.
you're
Uh,
least Proative member. Um.
it
what a
helps. for
A what a.
playing to be honest.
Bizarre metric. Uh, so I, I think it'll work better for us and hopefully for the listener as well, because we've been pretty inconsistent for a little while. And even when we were consistent, it's pretty inconsistent on who can be on every episode, how much we've actually played the game. And so by spreading it out a little bit more, we can have more time to play the game and come in a little bit more prepared.
And then we're still gonna have, uh, cool and interesting things to talk about outside of the games. It's just gonna be behind the Patreon paywall. So if you're a patron, thank you. If you're not,
Mm-hmm.
you go.
Also one
It's Christmas season.
uh, part of the other part of the plan is that we wanna be able to tell people about what is coming up on the show a little farther in advance. So where there's a little more notice so that people who are
Yep.
playing along with us and having that discussion, uh, can do so. And another part of that is that we are opening up the discord. So in the past, our main benefit for our Patreon. access to our Discord community, which we've been really happy with how that turned out. We love our Discord community. The folks that chat on there shouts out to all of our friends on Discord.
Yes,
we also wanted to open that up more, um, and.
nicest spot on my internet.
So if you
absolutely.
to talk about short games, interesting games, uh, whatever gaming stuff that you're interested in, if you sort of share an aesthetic and interest level with us, um, come join us on the Discord. Uh, it's now open, it is linked on our various pages. Um, so if you go to Short Game FM or any of those other places, you can get a link to join our Discord, and you can do that without. Joining our Patreon, if that is what you'd like.
We also, you know, we love our patons, we encourage you to do the Patreon, um, but we're now opening that up to anybody. If you're a dick, we're gonna kick you out, but otherwise, uh, it's open to everybody. Um, and we're excited about that. Um, but we are, we're gonna be adding additional content to, you know, non, uh, other, you know, the topic based episodes are gonna be our main discord, uh, main, excuse me, main, uh, benefit for patrons going forward. So if you want more content from us.
It will be part of the Patreon. Um, if you just want to chat about games, join us. We would love to hear from you and it's a good community, especially if you just want, you know, a ping once every couple of, uh, days telling you about like the great new game that's coming out. Um, and have a little chat about it with some like-minded people. So, um, join us on the Patreon Discord. I'm gonna, I'm gonna call it Patreon Discord, for a while. It's just
Formerly.
anybody.
I really think it's the future of social media is these sorts of com, you know, self-built communities. Um, I, I don't know. I think this whole group, we're all pretty far off of, uh, most social media at this point. Um,
Mm-hmm.
I've said it before on this show, and I'll say it again, like. Pretty much the ex, the full extent of my social media experience at this point is on like Discord servers and the short game is a huge part of that. And so, uh, I, it's a great place to be and, um, I think we would be
deeper discussion about social media with you guys at some point. Maybe we can make that one of our topic
Oh, sure.
please.
but yeah, my, I am, I'm off of nearly all social media. It's been an improvement with the exception of, of, uh, my Instagram where I've gone weirdly, hyper-local and I am basically only getting notifications from things that are happening, uh, within cycling range
Shane Duck.
Wonderful.
I, I have gone weird too. Um, I'm getting my social media from books I'm holding up to the camera now, for those of you who are not.
Oh my God. The drill book.
of, uh, drill Official Mr. 10 years anniversary collection,
I.
a print edition of, uh, all of the classic drill tweets.
Oh,
um, you may not
Only
my copy has many tabs,
you are my favorite person. Reagan. This is,
I, you know, I found I'm, I'm off of the social media sauce.
two. Reagan
no,
of the right out of the book.
let
we can't do this. We can't do this. This is the game of the year episode.
say we should, we should start game of the year, but I will say proudest moment on the internet was when Drill retweeted me about
Oh, that's good. That's good.
About what?
ca uh, the Keisha Warrior princess game that I think for Pettine,
Okay.
yeah.
Right.
yeah, I don't know how it got to the eyes of drill, but for a moment I was. Cent on Twitter, and then I
Mm-hmm.
Good word.
I cannot be retweeted by drill.
Listen, the only drill.
kill a lot of people, but it also
My God.
people to get to work on time. So it's impossible to say if it's bad or not.
Listen, the only drill we need to be talking about on this show is Mr. Driller's drill land. Okay. I don't this.
right.
¶ Dirtbag of the Year
should we give outward,
Yeah.
An
Well, speaking of drill,
with the
this is a good
award that we give out every year since we came up with it, which was pretty early, I think. I
prestigious.
prestigious, uh, the short game Dirt Bag of the Year. For those who may not know, game dirt bag of the year is an award given out to a character in games, that the dirt bag. and philosophy. Uh, it, the, the, the true dirt bag character that speaks to our souls
Yeah.
an American people
Sure.
Because
yeah,
this is not,
Mm-hmm.
thing. All, all nations have dirt bags. Um.
are, you know, for, for the video game character who is
sure. Unhinged maybe.
ideally
Yeah.
a liar,
Yeah.
um,
yeah.
I, I would hope. Someone that you feel a deep contempt for. Um, that's, that's what we're looking for and we, we really try to find
Dirt bags aren't
the,
although they can be
mm-hmm.
contempt. Yes, but love too.
when you see one. It's really
Ah,
define, and that's
yeah. Well,
award because I feel like
should we,
understand what the dirt
maybe we define by examples. Do we wanna
Mm-hmm.
throw some previous winners? I, I think
a previous winners.
so. Some previous winners. Then we'll run through a couple nominees. I.
with,
from
oh yes, that's an important one. I think
Uh huh.
with May Browski from
Uhhuh Night in the
Yeah.
still close to my heart as the
Uhhuh,
bag in games. Um,
uh, a raccoon and donut sit, uh, donut County I think
Um,
'em.
my
dirty dirt bag.
that we've awarded this was to the actor who played Am Bro Ambrosio,
Joe.
uh,
Mm-hmm.
the film Ambrosio From the Game Immortality by Sam Barlow. Um, and, uh, you know what? A dirt bag just dripping with smarm and
Mm-hmm.
To be clear, not the actual real
That's a real human.
in the game, the actor,
Yeah.
actor himself, who played the
the actor himself,
is
react to the award,
know. You gotta be a little bit of a dirt bag to embody that dirt bag that well, you know what I mean? Like you can't, you no one's.
award a little too readily to be
Yeah,
a, straight arrow, if you
he is at least somewhat a dirt bag.
loved that response because he was, he was, he seemed very excited to be the dirt
So happy.
Mm-hmm.
Uhhuh. It's an influential award.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah. and
Career
it's
changing.
one of the ones that we've been giving out for the longest, so.
Mm-hmm.
Uh, apart from the game of the Year award
Can we have a drum roll?
Yes. Uh, so our dirt bag of the year this year is Verity Amer Sham in the, the ankle game. Expelled an overboard game. Um, so we all loved this game. Uh, it was a great
Maybe. you know, uh. Uh, right to the, to the, to the heart of what this role, this game, uh, this award represents, uh, is to find a young girl in games
Yeah,
and give it to them.
like a young girl who the first, uh, when you first meet them, not
Yeah.
and then becomes increasingly dirt
The layers of dirt bag. Really the game it, the, the game in a way is just understanding how much of a dirt bag she really is.
a meter.
Yeah.
You're right.
Yeah.
She
You, you get to control to some degree your dirt bag level. Yeah. Yeah. But you're really unpacking, uh, if you will, how much of a dirt bag she truly is. So, uh, a, an esteemed award, and I can't think of anyone more deserving than, uh, than Verity.
We had some runners up. We should go ahead and save them. Um,
Mm-hmm.
I, I, I, briefly thought maybe the gnomes from Grun. They've got a certain dirt bagginess, but they're just
Mm-hmm.
enough. You
Yeah.
No,
Yeah.
but they're not, they're not character enough to be a dirt
they're dirty, but
and I thought of the weird hoarder that blocks the bridge in Eno Dream Barbecue. But like the whole game is so weird that like
The game is a dirt bag.
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
is a dirt
Ad game is four dirt bags.
Yeah, it's just a dirt bag game.
Yeah. All the way down. Dirt bags all the way down.
Mm-hmm.
I, um, and also of course we played, uh, the fourth, uh, chapter of Under Tail, and Susie is an all timer, uh, in the dirt
Always.
I don't think we've actually given her dirt bag of the year at any point, but it sort of feels like she's already in the hallowed halls, you know?
Mm-hmm.
uh, it almost would, it would almost be pointless to give her dirt bag of the year at this
He's there with me.
Yeah. Um, so, you know. Hands on hearts to Susie. Our,
Uhhuh.
you Your, your
Yeah.
bag
to the
the way. Yeah, paving the way so that other dirt bags may follow.
Yeah. Her,
Mm-hmm.
her jersey was already already hoisted to the rafters before we all got here.
¶ Most Little Guy Who Goes Around
So, who, who, who's gonna do
Yeah, I'll, I'll take this one. So this next one is, I think this is a newer one also, but this is one that's important. Something that has been in increasing in gaming over the years and, uh, I think finds its way onto our show quite regularly. Uh, this is the most little guy who goes around award,
Mm-hmm.
okay?
is full of little guys who go around.
Mm-hmm.
you know, it, it's. D it, it's, it's the heart of all storytelling is, you know, at the, at the center of your story, you need to have, a pilgrim,
Sure
a wanderer. Um, and, and this game, uh, represents that very well.
we, we've also been,
gaming began, uh, games have been about little guys because,
Well, and it's important to,
they can't be big
it is important to note that we are talking about,
I.
we're talking about little guys now. It could be gals as well, but little guy, they have to be. Little
Just a little
Uh huh
There's gotta be a little guy and they have to go around.
Mm-hmm. whenever we do this award, I feel, I have to give a little credit to where this phrase came
uhhuh.
a great podcast out there called the Anime Sickos, and they had a whole bit about the anime. Um, oh, geez,
Ranking of kink.
Uh, yes. Ranking of Kings and
Ranking of kings.
The character was a little guy who goes
He's a little guy.
an anime about a little guy who goes around and, um. It made me realize how many things are that, and, um,
Mm-hmm.
It. This is a phrase.
a little guy who goes around.
is a phrase that has been since I, I don't remember which of you brought it up first on the show. I do. I think it was Shane. Uh, but this is a phrase that have been stuck in my head since then. I'm just constantly thinking, is this a little guy who goes around? Like any game we play, I'm putting it through those that, that, those two checks, is it a little guy and is it going around?
I think
Okay.
things that define this. Like
Uhhuh.
isn't just a person who is small. There's an el, there's a,
It helps.
an it
It does help.
there's an
Thank goodness you're here, for example.
Mm-hmm.
Uh,
person, and then going around has to be their primary verb. And that's different from like. Moving. You gotta go around. You gotta
you gotta go around. You gotta go around. Uh,
around.
you know, if
you gotta go around.
and that's the primary verb, it doesn't matter if they go around, then they're not a little guy who goes around the, going
Mm-hmm.
has to be the thing that the little guy does. Right?
Yeah, it, it really was last
go together.
This is a tough one because our, our chosen little guy of the year who goes around has almost too many verbs because he can kick a ball.
Uhhuh.
that's one
Yeah, but also maybe the, the, the, the defining character of this was last year's. Thank goodness. Here, here he also is a little g guy who is single verb was kicking things
Mm-hmm.
I think
so.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
kicking must be allowed.
you're a
It's okay to kick, let, let us Terry know further we must get to the winner of this year's and that is young Julian Cordero from Dete an absolutely lovely game, um, that, uh, it was a real standout moment for me this year.
actual human who has won.
Mm-hmm.
goes around. Um, we have,
from, uh, thank goodness you're here, not a human.
was bright yellow, but I mean,
Are the Simpsons not human.
is an actual person.
Sure.
Okay.
a real hu.
developer.
real, there's a real human out there who the
being.
Yeah.
are awarding this bizarre award to,
And, and you, you spend the, the majority of this game just going around town. You're just going around and you are a 10-year-old boy. So what a.
am a, I'm
Just exploring keto in Ecuador. Yep.
around that is in first person,
Mm.
Hmm.
Wow.
because now I'm the little guy like,
Yeah.
a, what a moment. Like
that's why that game clicked for me so well, is it just simply that I finally got to be the little guy who goes around
Mm-hmm.
it's like touching, um, overview of an, a really interesting moment in history one that I never would've had perspective on, or is it simply that I got to be the little guy who goes around? I don't know, maybe, uh, maybe it is the perfect blend of the two.
Mm-hmm.
Um, yeah. A really, really lovely game. And what a, what a uh, deserving winner of the most little guy who goes around award
podcast that has covered a lot of walking simulators,
uhhuh.
surprised that we haven't had, something in that general vein that has been a little guy before. Uh, mostly it's full-size
It's mostly full-sized guys. Yeah.
sometimes they're in space.
is,
Yeah. Way too much.
that the talking kills the little guy, uh, or the going around.
Well, there's a lot of talking and just,
video,
but it's, yeah.
in your parents' video store is like epitome of a little guy who goes around.
I,
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
goes to the park, he goes home.
Wow.
I just wanna say, yeah, from all of us. Thank you Julian Cordero. We loved your game and we loved you.
Mm-hmm.
Absolutely.
loved to be you.
Yeah, we had a runner up for this, just to call out this game. Um, but I don't think it was particularly close when you compare the two.
have given any awards to this one. Yeah.
I know. So I think maybe this is just the time we call out this game. 'cause I know this was important to you and I, Shane, we had a good time with it. The fly night from, uh, fly night was, you're a, you're a little guy. You're a bug.
little guy. He has a lot of verbs
He does, yeah. The
why he did not win,
uh huh.
but I'm glad we get to acknowledge him. Um,
De fits the Yeah, fits the little guy part. Um, uh, going around you're doing that, but that's not all you're doing, right. So,
I
yeah,
a little ambiguous how little he is
that's true.
I think he is a a human shaped fly in a fly sized world. But if he is a human sized fly in a human world, uh, which, uh, you know, it could be the case. He's definitely not even little and
Yeah,
going around is just full of stuff to kill,
Uhhuh
not so sure. Yeah.
really cool game though, and I am, uh, really, really hopeful that there's enough support for them to continue making it and iterate on
Mm-hmm.
we got in fly night and, um, and make a
agree.
a, a fly night too that really builds on it.
Give, give us more like this. Uh, please.
yeah, the like four hour souls like combat first person sort of thing. Like there, I can't, I'm sure there's other examples out there, but I can't think of a single one. And certainly none of them made it to us like this. So, uh, you know,
Mm-hmm.
had a great time.
¶ Best Galerius
Well, I will introduce our next award. Um, we have for a long time had, as is our tradition, we really just sort of commit to the bit and stick with,
What do you mean?
obscure awards, uh,
What do you mean? These have been very serious awards so far.
they're very serious. Uh, the best Glarus is one that I've always really liked, uh, because each of these is a, is a sort of a weird lens or crystal through which to look at these different games. Um, and Glarus, uh, originates from the game. Uh, what was the name of that game?
Forbidden City
Yeah, the
or forgot, forbidden city.
city.
City. Thank you.
forbidden right? Or not
Forgotten.
I'm
Forbidden
it.
I think it's forbidden.
for, I've forgotten if it's forbidden. Um,
Forgotten City
Damn it.
um,
City. Stick
got it? Yeah, you're good. Laura. I'm sorry, I, I'm sorry I tried to correct you.
refresh my brain when I did the nine year trivia, so.
Right. And, uh, and
Very good.
uh, character, there is a, um, a farmer who just sort of shows up at the beginning of the game, um, and. an important role mechanically in a game that's basically a time loop game, uh, where you can basically send him off to do all the stuff that you would have to kind of drudge your way through. And, and by the end of the game you are showing up saying, Hey, trust me, I'm from the future. Can you please do this entire list of laundry for me? Um, so, um, the.
The, the, the heart of being a gallius across all of gaming is it's a character who serves a super important core mechanic in the game. Basically, it's a character who is a core mechanic and, um, we almost couldn't come up with one. I have two. That are nominees for this. Um, and I think we'll award it to one of them. Um, but they're both from things that I loved this year, but we could not cover. Um, and so probably our winner is, from Absalom, which our listeners will hear.
I swear we will do an episode on it. I've been pressuring all of my friends to play Absalom.
lot of Absalom.
is solved. It's happening. It's just we're doing this first.
it. It is,
Yeah.
perfectly honest, if we'd had our shit together, we would've had that episode out weeks or even months ago. And it would be on the game of the year list right now. And listeners,
Yeah.
played Absalom, go look it up. Um, Shannon.
be my game of the year
It,
if, if anyone but me had played it
would. I mean, I have now, and,
Well, we have also, we just haven't done it for the show. Yeah.
like, We'll, we're gonna talk about Game of the Year in a moment. Um. W the, the, the choice is clear, but also Absalom would've been in my top
Yeah,
like
for sure. Same.
Um, and, uh, if you haven't played it, which I'm just gonna give the ten second pitch, and then Shane gives the award. Um, Absalom, if you played Streets of Rage four, the incredible team that did absolute wizardry, magic, making the most incredible modern, beat him up I've ever played.
Reviving the whole genre for me and bringing back a game I loved from my childhood in a new form.
And now they made a brand new game with new characters in a fantasy setting where you're playing one of several wizards with weird powers and it has a roguelike structure, but it's not annoying. And it has, um, uh, like in incredible animations, good music, it has lore. That's actually kind of interesting.
There's a dwarf named Carl. I mean, what more do you want? What more do you want?
blue lady with a sword.
Uhhuh?
Uhhuh
Reagan. I thought Reagan, I thought
is ostensibly a wizard, but as far as I can tell, all of his spells are shoot
they just call everyone wizards. Uh, Reagan, I definitely, I, I definitely thought of you thinking, well, here's another girlfriend for Reagan on this game too, when there's a mean blue lady. Um, so yeah. I.
I'm looking forward to talking about that game. There are four Unlockable characters in that game. You guys haven't even gotten to the weird guys.
I've been playing a cider who's been fun.
yeah. Yeah.
like the
So I will, we'll save this for the actual podcast. Um, so I will tell you about a fantastic glar from that game. If you're playing a game with Roguelike Elements, what's the core? of a roguelike. It's the fact that you respawn with nothing when you die. Um, and so the, um, the character I would like to award is the 12 foot tall pregnant mom from, um, from Absalom.
Yep.
the first thing you do in that game is save her. Um, and every time you die, uh, you are reborn from 12 foot tall pregnant mom who cannot give birth until you defeat the big, bad guy.
right. Her.
Mother Uwe. Thank
Oh, I just only thought of her as
foot tall
I thought I was 12 foot pregnant mom. Uh, I, I love,
day.
I love the lengths at which Rogue likes Now, or rogue Lights are going to justify the fact that you start over at every time. Like, uh, I, I think it's funny and, and, um, having it be a 12 foot pregnant mom is a new one.
had a good
Mm-hmm.
it,
Yeah. Everyone was like, why don't we have a reason
Yeah. Absalom is,
lady give birth to you at the
yeah, Absalom in many ways is Hades, but side scrolling. Uh, and I think that's incredible. I'm a huge fan of the game as well, so, uh, yeah.
Yeah. It, it has so much in common with
Yeah,
It, it, really owes a lot to that. It's got that, uh,
there's,
and everything,
there's a lot.
Mother Uwe is like, represents a deep mechanic, like. You start again. This is the mechanic that exists in literally every game. Um, it's cool, but I, I do really like her as a character
Yeah.
as an element of the world
Mm-hmm.
story of the game is a struggle between the Roots sisters and the bad guy with the red Lighty helmet, whose name
That's also his name.
a,
got it. You got it. Yeah.
he, he's not Absalom. Nobody's Absalom.
I was thinking he was
I haven't figured that out yet.
Abso.
huh.
Um.
Um, so let's save all that for the next episode because I do also want to give an also ran, uh, award on, on Glarus, which is, um, for something that we couldn't and never will cover, and that is from Minecraft. I to the PO podcast, uh, might think that I love artistic, uh, cool games, you know, games that respect your time, but. I, I, my, my confession is that, um, my two week Minecraft phase never ended, and I play an absolutely embarrassing amount of Minecraft.
Um, I was playing Minecraft minutes ago. Um, I
Wait, we were recording 30 minutes ago. Is that why you were so distracted? Is that why you were so,
recording.
that,
like an iPad kid.
that why you were so distracted?
Yeah, no, I am, I, I now, I play a lot of Minecraft with my, with my iPad kid. Uh, we are both iPad kids together and,
is an iPad.
yeah, he is an iPad, a human
This is my biological son.
uh, so what I can say is that. For, for many years, Minecraft has kind of languished under the kind of control of Microsoft. It's still remains the best selling game of all time. Like one of the most popular games, it's weirdly popular with people who are much younger than the game itself. Um, the last year. Uh, they have changed how they release content for Minecraft and they, I don't know who they put in charge now, but they're making really, really good decisions.
And one of those is the introduction of the Copper Golum, who is another, who is a fantastic glarus, uh, the copper Golum. which, uh, for, for lovers of Minecraft you can create by putting a carved pumpkin on top of a block of copper, um, is a embodiment of. Um, making one of the most annoying things in Minecraft, easier for players of all ages and, and, and levels of capability. The copper golum is an adorable item, sorter, you bring it to life. It comes with a copper chest.
You put all your shit in that copper chest and he goes into the chest one at a time, gets things out, and then goes and looks at all of your other chests. And if he finds a chest that has a the same item in it, he puts them together. He just sorts stuff for you and he does it so adorable. And so of course. Of course I treasure him. I love him. I immediately enslaved him by creating, uh, a huge contraption full of copper golum, uh, so that I could dump on my entire inventory in one end.
And it sorts everything into an enormous line of chests. Uh, so. Um, yeah. Here's to you Copper Golum. Um, I would love to talk more, uh, about Minecraft. It's something that is a huge gamer subject for me, and I, I think maybe with the new format of the show, we could do an episode about Minecraft. Uh, that could be patron only. It's not short.
Hmm.
Uh, I, I think I have multiple Minecraft worlds that I've put hundreds of hours into, but we'll get there one day.
Yeah, you introduced my daughter to Minecraft and now she's playing it all the time.
wonderful.
uh, it's been neat to watch.
Yeah.
not that interested in playing it personally, uh, but I, I've done so to, you know, to hang out with my
Mm-hmm.
hang out with you, with your son. Um. Love Minecraft. It is, uh, it continues to be the less objectionable option in a world where kids seem to either play that or Roblox. So I'm all for it.
Yeah.
Yep. Roblox banned my house.
but we, uh, yeah, my daughter plays Minecraft as well and
I need to, all my nephew asked for it for Christmas was Roblox gift cards, and I refuse. He is not getting that.
mm-hmm.
Nope. thank you.
Now there's another topic, uh, for us.
¶ Best Mario
Yeah.
Um, so I would've presented the next award because, I, this is a plea, uh, listeners. You want me need to have nice things. My husband I don't need a switch to and I disagree. He's like, we don't have a big apartment. Our current switch is fine. That's what I said. Uh, he is like, switch is your, the current one works fine. I was like, it's making a very slight noise while I play. And he is like, not what you wear. Headphones. My husband is a smart man.
But I want to play the best Mario game this year, and I'm pretty sure it's Donkey Kong Bonanza. So listeners, if you would like me to talk about Donkey Kong Bonanza, you need to get on the Discord and tell my husband
He there?
to
Yeah. We created, uh,
a plea.
we created the award Best Mario, in order to reward a Mario game one time and now it's stuck with us. And yeah, I think this year the best Mario
probably.
uh, donkey Kong. Not a short game though,
No, uh, I, I have to speak to this one a little bit because it's one of the games I put the most time into this year, and I still haven't finished it. Um, but
Ooh, banana.
a, love banana. Um,
banana.
it's just called the monkey game because
Great.
kids know it as. And, um, the monkey game, uh, is so. fun to watch that my kids will watch me play it, which doesn't happen with a lot of games. I'll put on a
That's the stuff.
in. I'm
Uh.
I'm gonna play this game. It's gonna be neat. And 10 seconds in, they're either like, this is boring, I want Paw Patrol. Or they're like, can I play? And I'm like, kid, you
Correct.
But this one like worked out well and the, especially the thing that really worked out well about it was the ability for an additional player to play as Pauline, um, who's carried around on Donkey Kong's back. So Donkey Kong is aping around and that's me and Pauline is hanging on to their back. has basically one button that just like wrecks everything on screen. Uh, it's like a, a yell button.
And Pauline yells out, little, little yells, and they appear as little floating words that just crush anything in their path,
Hmm.
terrain, whatever. And, um. That make some of the parts of the game kind of trivially easy, which my gamer, inner gamer kind of rebels at a little bit. I'm like, I wanna deploy the boss. But you just yelled him off the screen. But also it kind of rules because it's a kind of co-op that you don't get very often. It requires absolutely nothing of the.
Of the co-op partner, you know, no skill is required for the player playing as Pauline, and yet they get to be the one that just destroys everything on screen, um, which
This kind of like skill, high involvement partner. Maybe we need a new, a new award for this because this is a category that I'm increasingly. I increasingly love, you know, if you think back to like when we were kids, the, you would give your controller for tails to the little brother Reagan. And, um, and tails can't die, so, you know, and tails can be so helpful. Tails can help you fly and things like that. Right. Um, we have a lost episode.
podcast, uh, from this year that was about, um, it's called a game called, uh, Planet and Primal Planet. I was thinking a lot about this kind of co-op as well, because that one has Dino character called Sino who also cannot die and, uh, has like an upgrade tree and very quickly becomes an absolute lethal menace and. Um, yeah. And so it's so much fun to play with that kind of interested player, but like who's maybe not ready for a metro vania or for a platformer.
Um, but you know, they can, they can come along with you. Usually these are the characters that automatically teleport when they get lost and wander off screen, uh, and just show back up. Uh, or I guess with Pauline, they're just stuck to your back. So, uh, yeah, this is, this is really cool. And, and I. We can think of a, um, if we can think of a name for this award, uh, then, then maybe we'll include it.
I
Uh,
be tails.
Best tails.
but we already award a Best Mario, do we wanna award a Best Mario? And a best Tails?
Yes.
Miles Prow.
The Miles award. It is that, yeah, that's a good one.
is our Miles Prow of the year.
¶ Late to the Party
Um, so let's see what's next on our list here. Um. This is, uh, the first game we covered this year. We, we've
Yep.
this award before. We, we are off sync with the rest of gaming pretty reliably. And,
Mm-hmm.
a, common problem is that around this time.
We do things a little differently
We're not like your other podcasts, you see, we're not like other girls.
of our own drum.
Yeah. We don't care much about optimization of release schedules. Yeah. I.
we have this problem all the time where sometimes some of the best games we play are things that like come out in like. November. Uh, and, and then we don't play it until January and it's like, sorry, you missed your shot at being in our Game of the Year award. And I'm sure they're really broken up about it. Um, but then we kind of feel like we want to, uh, to acknowledge those games. And so we have a category for late to the party. These are games that didn't come out this year.
That probably came out late last year that we got too early-ish, probably this year. And that ruled and probably would've been high on our game of the Year awards last year if they had been, if we'd gotten to them in time. Um, so, uh, bringing back of these, a blast from the past, a game that we played in January, uh, and that I still can't get some of the songs out of my head parking
This,
circuit.
this might be the best video game of all time. This might've been my, it might've been my video game, my game of the year 2025 or 24 had we played it on time. I, I love this game rips so hard.
we're kind of not
I, I love this game so much.
a, it's like really short, like I, I, I, the added mod support to it and I haven't gone back to it. sense. I wonder if there's more levels that'd be worth playing. But it was like a relatively small number of levels and I kind of wished it was actually a little meatier because I did, I played this game to pieces. Um,
Have you gotten gold on every track yet? Because that's been my mission. I'm not,
off
I'm not there yet either, but I'm, yeah, I'm working on it.
a little unreasonable on some of those, but it
It's perfect.
playing the same levels over and over and over again because I just, I kept feeling like, oh, next time I'm really gonna ace it. Um.
Then
If you didn't
I didn't.
episode, uh, this was a game from a developer who's like, been around. Like the, the guy who developed this was, uh, famously the developer of the Jelly car games. It's one of those on Apple Arcade right now. But it's one of those things that like began as like a flash game and it was like super well known in, in the, in that sort of sphere. Um, but he's also done a lot of other stuff. He's clearly like a talented guy.
Uh, especially considering he, uh, apparently like, like codes his own engines for some of this stuff. And like really, uh, really interesting. Does like dev logs on all of his stuff. You can go and watch him on YouTube and, and he's, he's interesting too. But anyway, that guy while a, while a ah, whatever, I don't know. His, the look up the developer. He's interesting, but he's, um, uh, this game. Uh, was clearly an homage to rally car racing games on the Sega Saturn specifically.
So it has a lot of really interesting like, um, early 3D art imitation of early 3D art with like weird angles and flickery, uh, geometry, uh, in the most interesting looking way. Um, ska soundtrack. incredible
Everything. It's perfect in every way.
it is perfect and
Yeah.
level is set in a unique parking garage across the world, so every,
Towers in Chicago, which is
Yep.
Mm-hmm.
it was. So I was like, oh man, that is one of the most iconic parking garages in the world. And, and I
Yeah, they're all real parking garages. Yeah. And it, it's, the game is funny. Yeah. I mean, ish, of course. But the game is funny without ever with no written text other than like rally time races and stuff. But like, you get the bit of it, right? Like, uh, uh, one of the levels starts out with. It zooms in on Mount Rushmore like, it's like it's a beau. Like you're like, you know, a typ typical racing game is you're be is. Yeah, exactly. Like you're gonna be racing around that.
It zooms in on that, and then the camera pans down to a parking
It's like
garage
garage,
and then you're in the parking garage. It's so good.
Mount Rushmore,
The parking garage around my, but
at the Alamo, you know, it's like,
yeah.
it's
But it's per, it's perfect racing. It, it's like, it's, so the, the, the genius of the game as far as a racing game standpoint goes is that you do, like, you realize like. Parking garages are incredibly tight structures with almost exclusively difficult sharp turns. And so the idea of doing like a speed run through a parking garage is actually really challenging and interesting.
And then the, the mechanics of driving the car just feel so fun is the type of thing, that type of game where you fuck up a hun like 99% of the time, but every single time you feel like. It was your fault. And so there is like a degree of mastery that you can get with it and they set the bar of a achievement really high. You can't just play this game and sort of breeze your way through it.
If you actually want to beat every level, you have to achieve some degree of mastery of each level to move forward. And I think that's the exact right way to go. You can go even further and go for like gold medals and things like that, but you don't just get to play it and beat it. You have to actually. Excel and it is so satisfying. It's, it's so much fun.
Hmm.
I am still thinking about this one every time I pull into my work parking garage, which has some, uh, pretty, uh, pretty tricky blind switchbacks. Um.
in there. Oh man.
It's so good. It's so good. Yeah. Uh, all right.
I think you need to
¶ Best game that nearly killed the podcast
introduce
Yeah, I'll take the next one. So this is a new award. It's an important one. May there never be another, but it's important that we acknowledge it this year. This award is the best game that significantly aided in the near death of the podcast. Um, and this one goes to Hollow Night Silk Song. Uh, when we were, when we, when we were in our darkest moment as a podcast, I had time, I had time to, uh. I had time to, to, to, to support the show.
and was playing hollow night.
Yeah. So, uh, I could have, I really, if I really was prioritizing things differently, I could have been pushing the show, playing the games, editing the podcast, all of these things that would've aided in the support of the show. But instead, I was playing Silk Song for two months straight.
you
And, and I beat it. And I, and I, well, I beat a, I I got to credits, but real people who would play the game though, there's a whole other element of the game to get to, which I'm still working my way through, but I've recommitted to the show and I've been playing show games for the podcast and I've been doing edits and stuff like that, but. This game absorbed my life from a gaming standpoint for two months straight. It came out on September 4th. On November 4th, I got credits.
Um, and maybe I have some regrets about, you know, not supporting the show as much, but I have no regrets about, uh, my time with Silk Song. Incredible game. I, I talk all about it in the already recorded Patreon episode about what we did over our, uh, like two month gap on the show. Uh, but the top 10, maybe top five, maybe top three game of, uh, all time for me. Uh, if we, this wasn't a short game show, uh, it would be my game of the year without even, uh, a question.
Um, and so I had to award it. 'cause as far as gaming in 2025 goes for me, uh, this was a, a big part of it. And, um, again, shout out to the discord. Who were a support structure for me as I made my way through, uh, uh, silk Song, because I don't think I'm particularly good at it, but I got through it. Uh, and that was with some, some, uh, Sherpas in the discord and just, uh, a lot of time. Um, so yes, so.
following that. And then some point I was like, wow, there's a lot of talk about Silk Song. And I muted that channel because I was like, man, but also. Incredible. Incredible. Uh, I'm, I, I started it and I am gonna play it. I adored Hollow Night years ago. Um, and I am gonna make time for Hollow Night Silk song. But let's see if we can get the podcast
Yeah. Well, yeah, so I, I have beaten so. We're in, no, we're in December and I have beaten one boss since November 4th. So I'm, I, my in, I've played very little, but I'm still chipping away at it. I want to finish act three. Um, but I, you know, gotta prioritize things a little bit differently in my life right now.
same holidays and stuff too. It's a,
Yeah. But, but Laura, you were playing hollow night through this whole time too.
Yes, and I've
Yeah.
it at a much more manageable rate than you. 'cause, uh, playing hollow night, I immediately took a contract to the end of the year, and then I went to Copenhagen for two weeks. So, you know, uh, kind of hurt the. The, but I, I, I play hollow night, uh, at least once a week till my hands hurt and
Yeah,
And, um,
it's great.
Uh, I, I think I found a life balance with it 'cause there's no pressure to play it fast, but
Great.
it's, it's exquisite and, um, I think it's probably my best gaming moment of the year was finally playing it. But I think y'all have more meaningful ones.
¶ Gaming Moment of the Year
Yeah. Um, we added the thing, we've done this before on previous, um, episodes like this, but, um, we were just gonna briefly say like what our favorite gaming moment of the year was. I had a, a few, um, but I think my absolute gaming moment of the year for me this year was, uh, finishing. Alba with my daughter. So my daughter is six and she had never completed a game before. I don't if even think she really realized that was a thing that happened in games that you could finish one.
Um, um, Alba, if you haven't seen it, it's like five years old. It's. Something at this point. Um, I think it, it's, it's from us two games, the same people that developed, um, the Monument Valley Games. Um, shout out the, uh, the third Monument Valley game just came out again. It was exclusive to Netflix for a while, and now it's out as like an its own thing. So if you wanna buy Monument Valley, you can do that now. Um.
I actually heard really good things about the new one.
I just downloaded it. I, uh, I haven't played it yet, but, um, I love the Monument Valley Games, but, um, uh, Alba is a game about a little girl on a trip to visit her grandparents on an island off the coast of Spain. And she's very interested in the wildlife. There's a wildlife preserve on the island that has kind of, uh, gone to seed. It's not well maintained. The the paths aren't, aren't, you know, the little boardwalks aren't being maintained.
And, uh, and, you know, it's just not, it's not in good shape. And the, uh, the mayor of the town who's very smarmy has decided to tear it down and have a large. hotel built, uh, of course, uh, bad guy, character. And, um, so it's up to you, the little girl, uh, and your, your friend Inez. Uh, you start a wildlife club together to do various tasks around the open world of this island to um, uh, to. stop the building of the hotel and, uh, it's quite a little adventure.
It takes place over like four days. It's really pretty short. It's like definitely in short game territory. And this is out on everything. It's been out for years. It's, um, it's on, uh, consoles, it's on phones. I think it's on Apple Arcade. Um, it is also, uh, it's
Yep, it's on Apple Arcade.
got it as a epic freebie at one point, although I've since bought it elsewhere too. Um. But it was so lovely playing through that with my daughter. And here's the hot tip. This is the thing that really made it work for us. Um, this is a 3D game and my daughter is six and hasn't played a lot of those and didn't really get them. And what we started doing was I was streaming it from my pc.
'cause again, I got the free epic version of streaming it from my PC to my Apple TV in my living room and the Apple TV as well as. iPhones and iPads also apparently have this feature called a Buddy controller, and this was what made the game work for us. The Buddy
This is nice.
think this exists on other platforms too, was you pair two controllers to the, in this case, the Apple tv and they both control player one. And so what we would do was she would sit down with her controller and I would have a controller in my lap. And I would not touch it. And then, um, she would be going around doing things and if she was having a hard time, usually it was things like she couldn't aim the camera the way she wanted to or something like that.
I would just nudge it and that was all. occasionally she'd be like, dad, I really want to take a picture of this bird, but it's really far away and I'm having a hard time. And I'd say, do you want me to do it? Sure. And I could just do it with my controller. And there was no handing the controller back and forth, which meant like, we've tried things where we handed a controller back and forth and she didn't like that. Uh, I think that's just like, doesn't work for a kid.
Like they don't want to hand over control to you. But having. Your own controller to help that worked. And it was, it was so smooth. And the game, I don't wanna spoil Alba, but it, it ends in this like what for the tone of the game was a little bit like, almost scary. She was terrified. The, the, the island is on fire. Um, there's a bit where you have to play as the grandpa searching for Alba and we don't know what happened to Alba during all of that part. And she was. Terrified.
Um, but you know, she's like, daddy, you have to be the grandpa. And so I played through the scary part for her. Um, but then of course we found Alba, she was fine. And, and uh, and she played as Alba again at the end. And it's, it was just so. Great. It was so nice playing through it with her, um, and seeing credits and, and you know, being like, oh, you finished the game and I can't believe it. And it was, it was so neat.
So that was my great gaming moment of the year, and it was a short game, so thank you to the short game. Uh, we're like five plus years late on that one, so, um, you know, not for the show exactly, but, um, it
I don't know. It could get an award. It could win Game of the year next year.
Uh, anybody else have a, I mean,
Sure. Uh, mine was also, uh, very kid related. Um, and it's a gaming moment, but it's, um. Not a video game moment. So maybe it, you know, fits or maybe it doesn't. But for me, a big thing this year was Dungeons and Dragons with my kiddo.
forever.
son is eight um, I think Wizards of the coast thinks you should be like 12 to play Dungeons and Dragons. But what do they know? We started off, he was aware of d and d because around my house I have a lot of little miniature figurines. Right. So his exposure, you know, early on was Dad has a lot of toys that I'm not allowed to touch. Um, although really eventually he did.
Uh, he, he, like, I'm not, I'm not playing with these, they're, they're better off in his hands and he broke quite a few of them. But, you know, we, we had a lot of fun with it. And, um. So he knew about Dungeons and Dragons. Um, over the summer he decided he really wanted to get into it, but he started coming up with his own character and made up a, a character called Willow who is a dry ad. Uh, and there's no like cool young kid, dry miniature out there, right?
So, and he really wanted to have a miniature, and that actually kicked off a whole long thing where, uh, we got a 3D printer. we learned 3D modeling software called Nomad Sculpt on our iPads. And we modeled Willow and printed him out. Um, and then I got to printing a whole bunch of other d and d stuff 'cause 3D printers have come a hugely long way since the last time I tried to 3D print a miniature. Um, and anyway, the kid got into. D and d he really liked, uh, you know, building this character.
We found another kid his age from our school, uh, a, a, a eight, I think eight maybe 9-year-old girl, uh, with co couple of cool parents, and we've, they've been coming over. We've been playing DD, And he just is absolutely mad for it. He wants to play every day if we can. We have had to institute these like, at least weekly side quests where, uh, it's really just me and him and mom. Um, but you know. F playing with, uh, we've played with lots of other kids at this point.
I have a, a friend who has two daughters and they came over and played with us. Um, so getting, getting that going has been really rewarding. It's nice to be able to share that with him. Um, I, it's flexing my dungeon master muscles in ways that I have not done in years. Um, and it's been a really. Just sweet, fun, cool time. Uh, and he's an absolute menace. He's insane. So, um, yeah, it's been, it's been great.
Uh, uh, Nate, uh, earlier you were telling me that your kids were also getting into DDI think this is the year that we get all our kid, turn our,
I know.
big nerds. Huh?
We'll do, uh, we'll, we, we, we as a podcast used to play d and d over, uh, Skype, I think at the time. Uh, art Rip Skype, um, and, uh, you know, a lot of fond gaming memories. Molly and I still talk about it from time to time. The, the Epic adventure we went on as a, as a podcast and, and various partners. Uh, maybe we'll recreate that with the kids and it'll be obnoxious and fun. Which is kind of the, I think, the balance of most stuff with kids obnoxious and fun. Um, yeah.
But we played for the first time, uh, this last weekend, and it was, it was a lot of fun.
That's awesome.
Um, but, uh, I'll say my gaming moment, look, I, I could say stuff with my kids, you know, we had some good gaming moments. I could say a lot of really heartfelt stuff, like what you guys just shared, these, you know, pivotal moments in parenthood. But the reality is it's silk song. What am I talking about? Of course.
mine was holiday, so it's
Yeah, of course.
not gonna, I have nothing deep to say.
Yeah, of course. I've already, I've already, I've talked enough, I mean, I haven't talked enough about Silk song, frankly. I could talk so much more, but I'm not going to. Um, but I think.
Coast time zone appreciates that
Yeah. Yeah. So I, I'll just leave it at everything. With Silk Song is my gaming moment of the year. We've got, uh, what two awards left to give.
¶ Best Rerelease
So we, I don't think we do this one every year. Um, and this was a particularly interesting game that I think we wanted to call out. So we're calling this award the best rerelease of 2025. Uh, and that goes to the root trees are dead, uh, which was a, uh, a controversial early release, um, that we covered on the show. Uh, I think we all.
No longer.
Yeah. No.
a little bit. There's a little bit, but uh.
I don't know. It's a, I don't think we need to unpack the whole thing here, but the, the, the short of it is that the original release of root trees are dead. U utilize some AI art and, uh, there's a lot of opinions. On that. Now, the, this was a, a very independent release that was very successful and the creator used the success of the initial release to re-release it, audience, no longer utilizing the AI art. Um, which is cool. Uh, and it's a, I I really interesting, really.
I think, um, and, and well-developed game that was like right into the heart of a lot of the things that we're interested on this show. Um, it's hard to make a game like this that is so successful and so I was glad to see the re-release. Glad to see the support around it and the overall success of this game, and I think we're all pretty supportive of the of the final release compared to the initial release.
But again, that is a whole thing that I don't think we have time in this game of the year episode to unpack again. Um, but happy for root trees are dead.
Yes.
I still love this game a lot. This is I, I, I didn't mind playing the version that we did. Um, I, you know, we talked through about, about the, the AI art aspect of it back then. Um, you know, and, and I think what we, where we came down on was like, hmm, it would be better without it, uh, with, with, you know, with, with more original art and hey, they did the thing, um.
And you can buy it on steam now instead of having to jump through hoops to get it from, uh, like a, a web-based thing on itch.io, which,
There will be that creepy kid. That we talked about for like five or six minutes. Um, 'cause the professional illustrator did them.
They also. utilize some of our, uh, our, our press of the game
They did
in, the launch trailer of the
oh that's right. Yeah.
know, we're a small show. We don't, we, we've had interactions over the years with, with developers and whatnot, but I think that was the first time we were actually included in a games launch trailer, like Right.
Mm-hmm.
other major
real outlets.
that that they used from us? I have something.
I don't, I don't know. I could probably
It, it was something very positive and glowing.
or something like that.
You know, boil
Hmm.
statement, but it was something positive, you know? 'cause we were very positive on that game
Oh, it was a great, it's a great game and people should check it out. If, if anything, um, of the earlier controversy kept in playing it, please go check it out. It's such a good deduction game.
yeah.
Um,
Really is.
yeah.
¶ Shout out to games ineligible for GOTY
Uh, and I'll also in like things that aren't. Eligible for Game of the Year because they, uh, are not, uh, respecting your time in the slightest and we're gonna play them forever ruining the premise of the show. Uh, special shout out to Ball X Pit, which I played before this episode started, which is well over the amount of time for a short game.
we have an
Uh,
game, which will be coming out. Uh, we
it rules,
This game
it's not
It does not
respectful.
a, play session. A play session is short. And I
minutes
initial
Grindy
we were throwing this under the rogue light exception that we do on the show. but sometimes that is a, is extended to a degree where we can no
absolutely worth covering, but like Hades not, we can't give it the award.
no,
It's not allowed,
that. Yeah.
no.
we're, we're celebrating the wrong things. You know, an
No,
does not, does not make the rule.
but it's super fun and uh,
I'm also
yeah.
yeah,
Yeah.
maybe I'll give that to my nephew instead of a Roblox gift card and wreck his life. Um,
Yeah.
just destroy him.
¶ Game of the Year 2025
So here we are at the end of the time together and it is time to talk about the actual short game game of the year. and we did a lot of thinking about this. Um, and you know, again, this is a weird year for us as a show. We played fewer games this year than we generally do. Um. we've missed out on some of the stuff that probably would've been more up of our, our alley, uh, especially towards the end of the year because we, the podcast was on a mini hiatus, not that mini anymore, really.
we, uh, but the game that was, it seemed pretty clear that the game of the year, this year for us, for our game, for, for the short game was expelled. An Overboard game, the second game in the in Overboard series and the second game of the year in that series. Now, I, I worried about this.
In is incredible. I still think, um, heaven's Vault is their best game. Heaven's Vault is incredible
ineligible for Game of the Year because it's.
of the Year because it was too long. But it an incredible game that I think gets slept on too much. Uh, it
honestly one of my favorite episodes 'cause my friend who was a classist was on it and talked about linguistics. So if you haven't ever listened to it, she was awesome as a guest. Continue, sorry.
the novels of that, by the way? I still haven't gotten around to them.
I, uh, asked her for Christmas, so.
only available as print. I think they were even just only available as hardbacks, and I just couldn't justify. And now they're actually out as a eBooks and um.
the only physical books I buy anymore are printouts of my favorite tweets. So I'm
that's literally
True.
the case. You've, you're making fun of me. But I have a printout of all, or not all,
You showed at the beginning of the episode,
No, that was,
that is how long we've been going.
That was the Patreon part, right?
that
Oh, was in this one. I thought it was in the Patreon's exclusive part at the beginning. Anyway, there we go.
the joke now is that you guys have explained the joke. Yeah.
the best part. Um, well
That is the best part.
expelled is incredible. I didn't think that game would be seizable in the way that it was. it, it, it, it, it was, it took everything I liked about, um, overboard and expanded on it and extended it. And it was, uh, it was surprising. It had many things about it that were like there for, if you played overboard, you would love them even more, but it stood totally on its own. Um, different setting, different stakes, different characters. Um. Uh, similar but even slightly different mechanics.
Uh, and just a absolute wild puzzle box. Not puzzle boxes, that's the wrong word. Although it is kind of that, I mean like clockwork of like mechanic narrative. Like the narrative in this game is the mechanic and it's so insane that it fits together as perfectly as it does with all of its different moving pieces. Um. So I, I mean, I don't want to talk people's ear off about this game because we did that already. We did two episodes. We did a, a great, I thought de hooting our own horn.
Uh, I thought our episode on the game, uh, first episode was mostly focused on mechanics and setup, and then there was a second episode with just spoilers about the story. Um, I super enjoy doing those episodes, but I also, uh, thought they came out really well. So if you haven't played that game. It's one of the best things this year by far. And it's, it was an incredible video game. Um, it's on everything. You can play it on your, your iPad, I think even phone now.
Um, I think you can, I mean, you obviously can get it on Steam, all the different places, and it's so worth your time. It's just an incredible game.
I'll say that for me, a game that I, if I haven't beat it before, recording a game that I keep playing is usually the sign that that's the game of the year. And for me, that, um, happened a couple times this year. It happened with Real World, which is one of our, uh, lost episodes that y'all might find. Um, played Real world.
They're coming to you, especially if
coming to you.
We're
Mm-hmm.
the short game minds and we're gonna uncover these lost episodes.
Yeah. Uh, ball x pit, as I've talked about. Can't stop playing it. But, uh, expelled, even after the spoilers conversation, that fuels me to go play more. 'cause people said, have you tried this route? And I hadn't. And then I went and pursued it even after recording, just for my own benefit. So, um. These games are kind of like the Ryan Johnson Knives Out movies. I hope there are a million Overboard likes. I hope they don't get, um, you know, make as many of them as make you happy Ankle.
Don't make them just for my sake, but if you feel like making more, I will play the shit out of them.
probably make them game of the year.
I I
Probably
another one that's just like this, then we probably, I
we won't.
I, this was a fundamentally different experience than Overboard
Mm-hmm.
of like, we're reading and looking at characters on a screen, like the gameplay differently, it was far more, uh, there were far more options, far more in like, uh, complicated. Um, it was just, it's a significantly bigger game than Overboard. And I, I think that even if we had played. Um, you know, far more games this year. This still probably ends up
Would've been in the top. Mm-hmm.
mean, I can't say that for sure 'cause I don't know what
Or towards the top.
but, it would've been up there if not a winner. 'cause this is straight to the heart of what we like on this show. Uh, so I, I think, uh, well deserved, like Reagan said, go listen to the other episodes, play the game. It's cheap, it's available everywhere, and it's wonderful. So.
Mm-hmm. And I think that's about
¶ Wrap-up
it. So, listeners, thank you for joining us on this episode of The Short Game and for this wild of the show. Um, we're gonna be bringing you a lot of short game in 2026. Uh, it we're, we're, again, we're. We're starting season two.
are back
I can't wait for season two
The reviews are in show's. Been picked up for a second season. I was
after, after only 10 plus years. We are picked up for a second season and, um. We're excited that, but we're, you know, we're also refocusing and finding new way. We're, we're 10 years older than we were when we started the show. We are, we are, um, you know, significantly more. Um, uh, we, we, we we're
Committed to other things.
that,
that's the nice phrase.
uh, we started this show because we were like, oh, we need games that don't, uh, take up too much of our time. And now I look back at the amount of time that I had we
Just oceans of
Several of us weren't married when we started. The
Mo. Yeah. Uh, most of us weren't,
most of us weren't
Yeah. yeah.
yeah. And yet, you know, here we are, the concept of let's play games that are short, continues to be a compelling one.
and valuable. Mm-hmm.
in some ways like. You know, 10 years ago when we started the show, I've said this before, the the idea of like a game that is short is a good thing and something you should seek out, um, was much more controversial, I guess. Or not controversial exactly, but certainly like a less widely held opinion than now and. And, you know, felt like more of a unique niche. Uh, now it sort of feel like, feels like we won already a few years ago.
And now it's just, you know, we're, we're mostly looking at this from a perspective of, um. You know, finding the games that appeal to us on many other axes. Um, but that's fine because there's still a lot to explore there. And we have a lot of, you know, it's, it's not just like, let's look only at games that are three hours than that, that are out on steam. We are, we also have others, other aesthetic and mechanic and narrative axes that are harder to specifically define. But if you share.
Tastes with us. We are really glad to have you along and we're eager to play more stuff in the 20, in the new year, in 2026. So, um, you know, join us for that. Um, we're refocusing on. Uh, making sure we ha take, can take the time to focus on the games that we're interested in, doing a game every two weeks like we mentioned, instead of what, every one alternating between that and more topic focused, uh, patron exclusive stuff.
Um, and, uh, I'm really eager to try this new format and I'm glad to be able to get back to talking with, uh, with you guys every week. So here we go. 2026,
Hey,
New Year
happy New Year.
and Merry Christmas and all.
We're just as
Just as good as.
at ending episodes.
Mm-hmm. Right. Um, and, uh, thanks listeners. You could, oh, other places you could find us on the internet. Uh, main places, short game fm. Um, we're also kind of going through and changing up some of the way we do our, the, it doesn't matter the behind the scenes tech stuff, we're, we're, uh, probably changing the way that the show's hosted. So the main place to look is short Game fm. That's the page with all the links and buttons. Don't worry if you can't find us someplace. It'll be there.
Go to short game fm. Um, uh, we're not on socials anymore, so I feel like we can kind of skip that. like, I'm not using anything. If you want to contact me, go on Discord. Like we said, our discord is open now it's open to anybody who wants to chat with us. And, uh, you can just go in there and ping me if that's a thing that you wanna do. I may regret that, but I think our traffic will be manageable, so,
If
um
me, ping Reagan first. He'll act as a filter and then
Mm-hmm.
send
He's our concierge.
Yeah.
Uhhuh
hey, ping us on Discord if you want. Or don't ping us. Like that's rude, right? But like go on our Discorded talk.
Say hi. Join our welcome channel.
yeah,
Introduce yourself,
the games that you like, recommend things. The recommendations channel continues to be the best part. Um, so do all of that. Uh, I've been Reagan Kelly.
Lauren Ash.
Nate Heininger.
Still that old Shane Kelly.
And, uh, thanks once again for joining us on this episode of the Short Game.